Captains All and Others

She re-entered the house and ran lightly upstairs. The candle was still alight and the gun was leaning against the bed-post; but the visitor had disappeared. Conscious of an odd feeling of disappointment, she looked round the empty room.

“Come and look at him,” entreated a voice, and she turned and beheld the amused countenance of her late prisoner at the door.

“I’ve been watching from the back window,” he said, nodding. “You’re a wonder; that’s what you are. Come and look at him.”

Mrs. Waters followed, and leaning out of the window watched with simple pleasure the efforts of the amateur sexton. Mr. Benn was digging like one possessed, only pausing at intervals to straighten his back and to cast a fearsome glance around him. The only thing that marred her pleasure was the behaviour of Mr. Travers, who was struggling for a place with all the fervour of a citizen at the Lord Mayor’s show.

“Get back,” she said, in a fierce whisper. “He’ll see you.”

Mr. Travers with obvious reluctance obeyed, just as the victim looked up.

“Is that you, Mrs. Waters?” inquired the boatswain, fearfully.

“Yes, of course it is,” snapped the widow. “Who else should it be, do you think? Go on! What are you stopping for?”

Mr. Benn’s breathing as he bent to his task again was distinctly audible. The head of Mr. Travers ranged itself once more alongside the widow’s. For a long time they watched in silence.

“Won’t you come down here, Mrs. Waters?” called the boatswain, looking up so suddenly that Mr. Travers’s head bumped painfully against the side of the window. “It’s a bit creepy, all alone.”

“I’m all right,” said Mrs. Waters.

“I keep fancying there’s something dodging behind them currant bushes,” pursued the unfortunate Mr. Benn, hoarsely. “How you can stay there alone I can’t think. I thought I saw something looking over your shoulder just now. Fancy if it came creeping up behind and caught hold of you! The widow gave a sudden faint scream.

“If you do that again!” she said, turning fiercely on Mr. Travers.

“He put it into my head,” said the culprit, humbly; “I should never have thought of such a thing by myself. I’m one of the quietest and best-behaved–”

“Make haste, Mr. Benn,” said the widow, turning to the window again; “I’ve got a lot to do when you’ve finished.”

The boatswain groaned and fell to digging again, and Mrs. Waters, after watching a little while longer, gave Mr. Travers some pointed instructions about the window and went down to the garden again.

“That will do, I think,” she said, stepping into the hole and regarding it critically. “Now you’d better go straight off home, and, mind, not a word to a soul about this.”

She put her hand on his shoulder, and noticing with pleasure that he shuddered at her touch led the way to the gate. The boat-swain paused for a moment, as though about to speak, and then, apparently thinking better of it, bade her good-bye in a hoarse voice and walked feebly up the road. Mrs. Waters stood watching until his steps died away in the distance, and then, returning to the garden, took up the spade and stood regarding with some dismay the mountainous result of his industry. Mr. Travers, who was standing just inside the back door, joined her.

“Let me,” he said, gallantly.

The day was breaking as he finished his task. The clean, sweet air and the exercise had given him an appetite to which the smell of cooking bacon and hot coffee that proceeded from the house had set a sharper edge. He took his coat from a bush and put it on. Mrs. Waters appeared at the door.

“You had better come in and have some breakfast before you go,” she said, brusquely; “there’s no more sleep for me now.”

Mr. Travers obeyed with alacrity, and after a satisfying wash in the scullery came into the big kitchen with his face shining and took a seat at the table. The cloth was neatly laid, and Mrs. Waters, fresh and cool, with a smile upon her pleasant face, sat behind the tray. She looked at her guest curiously, Mr. Travers’s spirits being somewhat higher than the state of his wardrobe appeared to justify.

“Why don’t you get some settled work?” she inquired, with gentle severity, as he imparted snatches of his history between bites.

“Easier said than done,” said Mr. Travers, serenely. “But don’t you run away with the idea that I’m a beggar, because I’m not. I pay my way, such as it is. And, by-the-bye, I s’pose I haven’t earned that two pounds Benn gave me?”

His face lengthened, and he felt uneasily in his pocket.

“I’ll give them to him when I’m tired of the joke,” said the widow, holding out her hand and watching him closely.

Mr. Travers passed the coins over to her. “Soft hand you’ve got,” he said, musingly. “I don’t wonder Benn was desperate. I dare say I should have done the same in his place.”

Mrs. Waters bit her lip and looked out at the window; Mr. Travers resumed his breakfast.

“There’s only one job that I’m really fit for, now that I’m too old for the Army,” he said, confidentially, as, breakfast finished, he stood at the door ready to depart.

“Playing at burglars?” hazarded Mrs. Waters.

“Landlord of a little country public-house,” said Mr. Travers, simply.

Mrs. Waters fell back and regarded him with open-eyed amazement.

“Good morning,” she said, as soon as she could trust her voice.

“Good-bye,” said Mr. Travers, reluctantly. “I should like to hear how old Benn takes this joke, though.”

Mrs. Waters retreated into the house and stood regarding him. “If you’re passing this way again and like to look in—I’ll tell you,” she said, after a long pause. “Good-bye.”

“I’ll look in in a week’s time,” said Mr. Travers.

He took the proffered hand and shook it warmly. “It would be the best joke of all,” he said, turning away.

“What would?”

The soldier confronted her again.

“For old Benn to come round here one evening and find me landlord. Think it over.”

Mrs. Waters met his gaze soberly. “I’ll think it over when you have gone,” she said, softly. “Now go.”

THE NEST EGG

Artfulness,” said the night-watch-man, smoking placidly, “is a gift; but it don’t pay always. I’ve met some artful ones in my time—plenty of ‘em; but I can’t truthfully say as ‘ow any of them was the better for meeting me.”

He rose slowly from the packing-case on which he had been sitting and, stamping down the point of a rusty nail with his heel, resumed his seat, remarking that he had endured it for some time under the impression that it was only a splinter.

“I’ve surprised more than one in my time,” he continued, slowly. “When I met one of these ‘ere artful ones I used fust of all to pretend to be more stupid than wot I really am.”

He stopped and stared fixedly.

“More stupid than I looked,” he said. He stopped again.

“More stupid than wot they thought I looked,” he said, speaking with marked deliberation. And I’d let ‘em go on and on until I thought I had ‘ad about enough, and then turn round on ‘em. Nobody ever got the better o’ me except my wife, and that was only before we was married. Two nights arterwards she found a fish-hook in my trouser-pocket, and arter that I could ha’ left untold gold there—if I’d ha’ had it. It spoilt wot some people call the honey-moon, but it paid in the long run.

One o’ the worst things a man can do is to take up artfulness all of a sudden. I never knew it to answer yet, and I can tell you of a case that’ll prove my words true.

It’s some years ago now, and the chap it ‘appened to was a young man, a shipmate o’ mine, named Charlie Tagg. Very steady young chap he was, too steady for most of ‘em. That’s ‘ow it was me and ‘im got to be such pals.