I. Tapp stamped away along the graveled walk, leaving the young man alone. Lawford's calmness was as irritating to him as sea water to a raw wound.

CHAPTER XXIV

GRAY DAYS

Those days were dark for Louise Grayling; on her shoulders she bore double trouble. Anxiety for her father's safety made her sufficiently unhappy; but in addition her mind must cope with the mystery of Cap'n Amazon's ident.i.ty and Cap'n Abe's whereabouts.

For she was not at all satisfied in her heart that the storekeeper had sailed from the port of Boston on the _Curlew_; and the status of the piratical looking Amazon Silt was by no means decided to her satisfaction. Her discoveries in his bedroom had quite convinced the young woman that Cap'n Amazon was in masquerade.

His comforting words and his thoughtfulness touched her so deeply, however, that she could not quarrel with the old man; and his insistence that Cap'n Abe had sailed on the Curlew and would be at hand to a.s.sist Professor Grayling if the schooner had been wrecked was kindly meant, she knew. He scoffed at the return of Cap'n Abe's chest as being of moment; he refused to discuss his brother's reason for stuffing the old chest with such useless lumber as it contained.

"Leave Abe for knowing his own business, Niece Louise. 'Tain't any of our consarn," was the most he would say about that puzzling circ.u.mstance.

Louise watched the piratical figure of Cap'n Amazon shuffling around the store or puttering about certain duties of housekeeping that he insisted upon doing himself, with a wonder that never waned.

His household habits were those which she supposed Cap'n Abe to have had. She wondered if all sailors were as neat and as fussy as he. He still insisted upon doing much of the cooking; it was true that he had good reason to doubt Betty Gallup's ability to cook.

When there were no customers in the store Louise often sat there with Cap'n Amazon, with either a book or her sewing in her hand. Sometimes they would not speak for an hour, while the subst.i.tute storekeeper "made up the books," which was a serious task for him.

He seemed normally dexterous in everything else, but he wrote with his left hand--an angular, upright chirography which, Louise thought, showed unmistakably that he was unfamiliar with the use of the pen.

"Writing up the log" he called this clerkly task, and his awkward looking characters in the ledger were in great contrast to Cap'n Abe's round, flowing hand.

For several days following the discovery in the "_Globe_ paper" of the notice about the _Curlew_, Louise Grayling and Cap'n Amazon lived a most intimate existence. She would not allow Betty Gallup to criticise the captain even slightly within her hearing.

They received news from New York which was no news at all. The Boston Chamber of Commerce had heard no further word of the schooner. Louise and the captain could only hope.

The world of seafaring is so filled with mysteries like this of the _Curlew_, that Louise knew well that no further word might ever be received of the vessel.

Cap'n Amazon rang the changes daily--almost hourly--upon sea escapes and rescues. He related dozens of tales (of course with the personal note in most), showing how ships' companies had escaped the threat of disaster in marvelous and almost unbelievable ways.

Louise had not the heart now to stop this flow of narrative by telling him bluntly that she doubted the authenticity of his tales. Nor would she look into the old books again to search out the originals of the stories which flowed so glibly from his lips.

Who and what he could really be puzzled Louise quite as much as before; yet she had not the heart to probe the mystery with either question or personal scrutiny. The uncertainty regarding the _Curlew_ and those on board filled so much of the girl's thought that little else disturbed her.

Save one thing. She desired to see Lawford Tapp and talk with him.

But Lawford did not appear at the store on the Sh.e.l.l Road.

Mr. Bane came frequently to call. He was an eager listener to Cap'n Amazon's stories and evidently enjoyed the master mariner hugely.

Several of the young people from the cottages along The Beaches called on Louise; but if the girl desired to see Aunt Euphemia she had to go to the Perritons, or meet the Lady from Poughkeepsie in her walks along the sands. Aunt Euphemia could not countenance Cap'n Amazon in the smallest particular.

"It is a mystery to me, Louise--a perfect mystery--how you are able to endure that awful creature and his coa.r.s.e stories. That dreadful tale of the albatross sticks in my mind--I cannot forget it," she complained. "And his appearance! No more savage looking man did I ever behold. I wonder you are not afraid to live in the same house with him."

Louise would not acknowledge that she had ever been fearful of Cap'n Amazon. Her own qualms of terror had almost immediately subsided. The news from the _Curlew_, indeed, seemed to have smothered the neighborhood criticism of the captain, if all suspicions had not actually been lulled to rest.

Cap'n Amazon spoke no more of his brother, save in connection with Professor Grayling's peril, than he had before. He seemed to have no fears for Cap'n Abe. "Abe can look out for himself," was a frequent expression with him. But Cap'n Amazon never spoke as though he held the danger of Louise's father in light regard.

"I'll give 'em a fortnight to be heard from," Cap'n Joab Beecher said confidently. "Then if ye don't hear from Cap'n Abe, or the noospapers don't print nothin' more about the schooner, I shall write her down in the log as lost with all hands."

"Don't you be too sartain sure 'bout it," growled Cap'n Amazon.

"There's many a wonder of the sea, as you an' I know, Joab Beecher.

Look at what happened the crew of the _Mailfast_, clipper built, out o'

Baltimore--an' that was when you an' I, Cap'n Joab, was sharpenin' our milk teeth on salt hoss."

"What happened her, Cap'n Am'zon?" queried Milt Baker, reaching for a fresh piece of Brown Mule, and with a wink at the other idlers. "Did she go down, or did she go up?"

"Both," replied Cap'n Amazon unruffled. "She went up in smoke _an'_ flame, an' finally sunk when she'd burned to the Plimsol mark.

"Every man of the crew and afterguard got safely into two boats. This wasn't far to the westward of Fayal--in mebbe somewhere near the same spot where that Portugee fisherman reports pickin' up the _Curlew's_ boat.

"When the _Mailfast_ burned the sea was calm; but in six hours a sudden gale came up and drove the two boats into the southwest. They wasn't provisioned or watered for a long v'y'ge, and they had to run for it a full week, ev'ry mile reeled off takin' them further an' further from the islands, and further and further off the reg'lar course of shipping."

"Where'd they wind up at, Cap'n Am'zon?" asked Milt.

"Couldn't hit nothin' nearer'n the Guineas on that course," growled Cap'n Joab.

"There you're wrong," the subst.i.tute storekeeper said. "They struck seaweed--acres an' acres of it--square miles of it--everlastin'

seaweed!"

"Sarga.s.so Sea!" exploded Washy Gallup, wagging his toothless jaw. "I swanny!"

"I've heard about that place, but never seen it," said Cap'n Joab.

"And you don't want to," declared the narrator of the incident. "It ain't a place into which no sailorman wants to venture. The _Mailfast's_ comp'ny--so 'tis said--was driven far into the pulpy, gra.s.sy sea. The miles of weed wrapped 'em around like a blanket. They couldn't row because the weed fouled the oars; and they couldn't sail 'cause the weed was so heavy. But there's a drift they say, or a suction, or something that gradually draws a boat toward the middle of the field."

"Then, by golly!" exclaimed Milt Baker, "how in tarnation did they git aout? I sh'd think anybody that every drifted into the Sarga.s.so Sea would be there yit."

"P'r'aps many a ship an' many a ship's company _have_ found their grave there," said Cap'n Amazon solemnly. "'Tis called the graveyard of derelicts. But there's the chance of counter-storms. Before the two boats from the _Mailfast_ were sucked down, and 'fore the crew was fair starved, a sudden shift of wind broke up the seaweed field and they escaped and were picked up.

"The danger of the Sarga.s.so threatens all sailin' ships in them seas.

Steam vessels have a better chance; but many a craft that's turned up missin' has undoubtedly been swallowed by the Sarga.s.so."

Louise, who heard this discussion from the doorway of the store, could not fail to be impressed by it. Could the _Curlew_, with her father and Cap'n Abe aboard, have suffered such a fate? There was an element of probability in this tale of Cap'n Amazon's that entangled the girl's fancy. However, the idea colored the old man's further imagination in another way.

"Sarga.s.so Sea," he said reflectively, between puffs of his pipe, after the idlers had left the store. "Yes, 'tis a fact, Niece Louise.

That's what Abe drifted in for years--a mort of seaweed and pulp."

"What _do_ you mean, Uncle Amazon?" gasped the girl, shocked by his words.

"This," the master mariner said, with a wide sweep of his arm taking in the cluttered store. "This was Abe's Sarga.s.so Sea--and it come nigh to smotherin' him and bearin' him down by the head."

"Oh! you mean his life was so confined here?"

Cap'n Amazon nodded, "I wonder he bore it so long."

"I am afraid Uncle Abram is getting all he wants of adventure now,"

Louise said doubtfully.