The Captain's Toll-Gate Part 36

The lieutenant laughed. "Then that is settled. I know Olive."

Mrs. Easterfield flushed, and then laughed. "I doubt that knowledge. It is certain you do not know me! The young man loves her with all his heart; there is no objection to him; and I am most earnestly in favor of the match."

"Ah" said the lieutenant, with a bow; "if that is the case, I must get a pencil and paper and calculate what I can give her for her trousseau. I hope the wedding will not come off very soon, for I am decidedly short at present, on account of recent matrimonial expenses. Would you mind telling me his name? Is he naval?"

"Oh, no," said she; "he is pedagogy."

"What!" he cried, his eyes wide open.

Then she laughed and told him all about d.i.c.k Lancaster.

"Of course," concluded Mrs. Easterfield, "I can not ask you not to speak to _anybody_ about what I have told you, but I do hope you will prevent its getting to Olive's ears. I am afraid it would make a breach between us if she knew that I was trying to make a match for her. And, you see, that is exactly what I am doing."

"And you are right," said the lieutenant; "and what is more, I am with you! You don't know," he added in a softer tone, "how grateful I am to you for your care of Olive now that my dear wife is gone!"

For the moment he totally forgot that his dear wife had merely gone to the edge of the bluff with the captain and Olive to look at the river.

That evening, as they sat together, Lieutenant Asher told his brother all that Mrs. Easterfield had confided to him about d.i.c.k Lancaster. The captain was delighted.

"That is what I have wanted," he said, "almost from the beginning, and I want it more than ever now. I am getting to be an old fellow, and I want to see her settled before I sail."

"You know, John," said the lieutenant, "that I find Olive is a little more of a girl of her own mind than she used to be. I don't believe she would rest quietly under the housekeeping of a girl so nearly her own age."

The captain gave some vigorous puffs. "I should think not!" he said to himself. "Olive would have that young woman swabbing the decks before they had been out three days! You are right," said he aloud, "but we must all look out that Olive does not hear anything about this."

It was not until they were continuing their bridal trip that Lieutenant Asher considered the subject of mentioning d.i.c.k Lancaster to his wife.

Then, after considering it, he concluded not to do it. In the first place, he knew that he was getting to be a little bit elderly, and he did not care about discussing the perfections of the young man who had been selected as a suitable partner for his wife's school friend. This was all very foolish, of course, but people often are very foolish.

Thus it was that Olive Asher never heard of the tripart.i.te alliance between her father, her uncle, and her good friend at Broadstone.

When Captain Asher learned, a few days after his brother had left, that the Broadstone family had gone to the seash.o.r.e, he sat reflectively and asked himself if he were doing the right thing by Olive. The season was well advanced; it was getting very hot at the toll-gate, and at many other gates in that region; and this navy girl ought to have a breath of fresh air. It is wonderful that he had not thought of it before!

At breakfast the next morning Olive stopped pouring coffee when he told her his plans to go to the sea.

"With you, Uncle John!" she cried. "That would be better than anything in the world! You sail a boat?" she asked inquiringly.

"Sail a boat!" roared the captain. "I have a great mind to kick over this table! My dear, I can sail a boat, keel uppermost, if the water's deep enough! Sail a boat!" he repeated. "I sailed a catboat from Boston to Egg Harbor before your mother was born. By the way, you seem very anxious about boat sailing. Are you afraid of the water?"

She laughed gaily. "I deserve that," she said, "and I accept it. But perhaps I have done something that you never did. I have sailed a felucca."

"Very good," said the captain; "if there's a felucca where we're going you can sail me in one."

They went to a Virginia seaside resort, these two, and left old Jane in charge of the toll-gate.

Early in the day after they arrived they went out to engage a boat. When they found one which suited the captain's critical eye, he said to the owner thereof: "I will take her for the morning, but I don't want anybody to sail me. I will do that myself."

"I don't know about that," said the man; "when my boat goes out--"

He stopped speaking suddenly and looked the captain over and over, up and down. "All right, sir," said he. "And you don't want n.o.body to manage the sheet?"

"No," interpolated Olive, "I'll manage the sheet."

So they went out on the bounding sea. And as the wind whistled the hat off her head so that she had to fling it into the bottom of the boat, Olive wished that her uncle kept a toll-gate on the sea. Then she could go out with him and stop the little boats and the great steamers, and make them drop seven cents or thirteen cents into her hands as she stood braced in the stern; and she was just beginning to wonder how she could toss up the change to them if they dropped her a quarter, when the captain began to sing Tom Bowline. He was just as gay-hearted as she was.

It was about noon when they returned, for the captain was a very particular man and he had hired the boat only for the morning. Olive had scarcely taken ten steps up the beach before she found herself shaking hands with a young man.

"How on earth!" she exclaimed.

"It was not on earth at all," he said; "I came by water. I wanted to find out if what I had heard of the horrors of a coastwise voyage were true; and I found that it was absolutely correct."

"But here!" she exclaimed. "Why here? You could not have known!"

"Of course not," he answered; "if I had known I am sure I would have felt that I ought not to come. But I didn't know, and so you see I am as innocent as a b.u.t.terfly. More innocent, in fact, for that little wagwings knows where he ought not to go, and he goes there all the same."

Captain Asher was still at the boat, making some practical suggestions to her owner; who, being not yet forty, had many things to learn about the sails and rigging of a catboat.

"Mr. Locker," said Olive, looking at him very intently, "did you come here to renew any of your previous performances?"

"As a serenader?" said he. "Oh, no! But perhaps you mean as a love-maker?"

"That is it," said Olive.

Mr. Locker took off his hat, and rubbed his head. "No," said he, "I didn't; but I wish I could say I did. But that's impossible. I presume I am right in a.s.suming this impossibility?"

"Entirely," said Olive.

"And, furthermore, I truly didn't know you were here. I think you may rest satisfied that that flame is out, although--By the way, I believe I could make some verses on that subject containing these lines:

"'I do not want the flame, I better like the coal--'

meaning, of course, that I hope our friends.h.i.+p may continue."

She smiled. "There are no objections to that," she said.

"Perhaps not, perhaps not," he said, clutching his chin with his hand; "but some other lines come into my head. Of course, he didn't want the coal to go out.

"'He blew too hard, The flame revived.'"

"That will do! That will do!" cried Olive. "I don't want any more of that poem."

"And the result of it all," said he, "is only a burnt match."

"Nothing but a bit of charcoal," added Olive.

At this moment up came the captain. Olive had told him all about Mr.

Locker, and he was not glad to see him. Olive noticed this, and she spoke quickly. "Here's Mr. Locker, uncle; he has dropped down quite accidentally at this place."

"Oh" said the captain incredulously.