Man hath a weary pilgrimage,
As through the world he wends;
On every stage, from youth to age,
Still discontent attends;
With heaviness he casts his eye,
Upon the road before,
And still remembers with a sigh
The days that are no more.
Southey.
It has now become necessary to advance the time three entire days,
and to change the scene to Key West. As this latter place may not be
known to the world at large, it may be well to explain that it is a
small seaport, situate on one of the largest of the many low islands
that dot the Florida Reef, that has risen into notice, or indeed
into existence as a town, since the acquisition of the Floridas by
the American Republic. For many years it was the resort of few
besides wreckers, and those who live by the business dependent on
the rescuing and repairing of stranded vessels, not forgetting the
salvages. When it is remembered that the greater portion of the
vessels that enter the Gulf of Mexico stand close along this reef,
before the trades, for a distance varying from one to two hundred
miles, and that nearly everything which quits it, is obliged to beat
down its rocky coast in the Gulf Stream for the same distance, one
is not to be surprised that the wrecks, which so constantly occur,
can supply the wants of a considerable population. To live at Key
West is the next thing to being at sea. The place has sea air, no
other water than such as is preserved in cisterns, and no soil, or
so little as to render even a head of lettuce a rarity. Turtle is
abundant, and the business of "turtling" forms an occupation
additional to that of wrecking. As might be expected, in such
circumstances, a potato is a far more precious thing than a turtle's
egg, and a sack of the tubers would probably be deemed a sufficient
remuneration for enough of the materials of callipash and callipee
to feed all the aldermen extant.
Of late years, the government of the United States has turned its
attention to the capabilities of the Florida Reef, as an advanced
naval station; a sort of Downs, or St. Helen's Roads, for the West
Indian seas. As yet little has been done beyond making the
preliminary surveys, but the day is not probably very distant when
fleets will lie at anchor among the islets described in our earlier
chapters, or garnish the fine waters of Key West. For a long time it
was thought that even frigates would have a difficulty in entering
and quitting the port of the latter, but it is said that recent
explorations have discovered channels capable of admitting anything
that floats. Still Key West is a town yet in its chrysalis state,
possessing the promise rather than the fruition of the prosperous
days which are in reserve. It may be well to add, that it lies a
very little north of the 24th degree of latitude, and in a longitude
quite five degrees west from Washington. Until the recent conquests
in Mexico it was the most southern possession of the American
government, on the eastern side of the continent; Cape St. Lucas, at
the extremity of Lower California, however, being two degrees
farther south.
It will give the foreign reader a more accurate notion of the
character of Key West, if we mention a fact of quite recent
occurrence. A very few weeks after the closing scenes of this tale,
the town in question was, in a great measure, washed away! A
hurricane brought in the sea upon all these islands and reefs, water
running in swift currents over places that within the memory of man
were never before submerged. The lower part of Key West was
converted into a raging sea, and everything in that quarter of the
place disappeared. The foundation being of rock, however, when the
ocean retired the island came into view again, and industry and
enterprise set to work to repair the injuries.
The government has established a small hospital for seamen at Key
West. Into one of the rooms of the building thus appropriated our
narrative must now conduct the reader. It contained but a single
patient, and that was Spike. He was on his narrow bed, which was to
be but the pucursor of a still narrower tenement, the grave. In the
room with the dying man were two females, in one of whom our readers
will at once recognize the person of Rose Budd, dressed in deep
mourning for her aunt. At first sight, it is probable that a casual
spectator would mistake the second female for one of the ordinary
nurses of the place. Her attire was well enough, though worn
awkwardly, and as if its owner were not exactly at ease in it. She
had the air of one in her best attire, who was unaccustomed to be
dressed above the most common mode. What added to the singularity of
her appearance, was the fact, that while she wore no cap, her hair
had been cut into short, gray bristles, instead of being long, and
turned up, as is usual with females. To give a sort of climax to
this uncouth appearance, this strange-looking creature chewed
tobacco.
The woman in question, equivocal as might be her exterior, was
employed in one of the commonest avocations of her sex--that of
sewing. She held in her hand a coarse garment, one of Spike's, in
fact, which she seemed to be intently busy in mending; although the
work was of a quality that invited the use of the palm and
sail-needle, rather than that of the thimble and the smaller
implement known to seamstresses, the woman appeared awkward in her
business, as if her coarse-looking and dark hands refused to lend
themselves to an occupation so feminine. Nevertheless, there were
touches of a purely womanly character about this extraordinary
person, and touches that particularly attracted the attention, and
awakened the sympathy of the gentle Rose, her companion. Tears
occasionally struggled out from beneath her eyelids, crossed her
dark, sun-burnt cheek, and fell on the coarse canvas garment that
lay in her lap. It was after one of these sudden and strong
exhibitions of feeling that Rose approached her, laid her own
little, fair hand, in a friendly way, though unheeded, on the
other's shoulder, and spoke to her in her kindest and softest tones.
"I do really think he is reviving, Jack," said Rose, "and that you
may yet hope to have an intelligent conversation with him."
"They all agree he _must_ die," answered Jack Tier--for it was _he,_
appearing in the garb of his proper sex, after a disguise that had
now lasted fully twenty years--"and he will never know who I am, and
that I forgive him. He must think of me in another world, though he
is n't able to do it in this; but it would be a great relief to his
soul to know that I forgive him."
"To be sure, a man must like to take a kind leave of his own wife
before he closes his eyes for ever; and I dare say it would be a
great relief to you to tell him that you have forgotten his
desertion of you, and all the hardships it has brought upon you in
searching for him, and in earning your own livelihood as a common
sailor."
"I shall not tell him I've _forgotten_ it, Miss Rose; that would be
untrue--and there shall be no more deception between us; but I shall
tell him that I _forgive_ him, as I hope God will one day forgive me
all _my_ sins."
"It is, certainly, not a light offence to desert a wife in a foreign
land, and then to seek to deceive another woman," quietly observed
Rose.
"He's a willian!" muttered the wife--"but--but--"
"You forgive him, Jack--yes, I'm sure you do. You are too good a
Christian to refuse to forgive him."
"I'm a woman a'ter all, Miss Rose; and that, I believe, is the truth
of it. I suppose I ought to do as you say, for the reason you
mention; but I'm his wife--and once he loved me, though that has
long been over. When I first knew Stephen, I'd the sort of feelin's
you speak of, and was a very different creatur' from what you see me
to-day. Change comes over us all with years and sufferin'."
Rose did not answer, but she stood looking intently at the speaker
more than a minute. Change had, indeed, come over her, if she had
ever possessed the power to please the fancy of any living man. Her
features had always seemed diminutive and mean for her assumed sex,
as her voice was small and cracked; but, making every allowance for
the probabilities, Rose found it difficult to imagine that Jack Tier
had ever possessed, even under the high advantages of youth and
innocence, the attractions so common to her sex. Her skin had
acquired the tanning of the sea; the expression of her face had
become hard and worldly; and her habits contributed to render those
natural consequences of exposure and toil even more than usually
marked and decided. By saying "habits," however, we do not mean that
Jack had ever drunk to excess, as happens with so many seamen, for
this would have been doing her injustice, but she smoked and
chewed--practices that intoxicate in another form, and lead nearly
as many to the grave as excess in drinking. Thus all the accessories
about this singular being, partook of the character of her recent
life and duties. Her walk was between a waddle and a seaman's roll,
her hands were discoloured with tar, and had got to be full of
knuckles, and even her feet had degenerated into that flat,
broad-toed form that, perhaps, sooner distinguishes caste, in
connection with outward appearances, than any one other physical
peculiarity. Yet this being _had_ once been young--had once been
even _fair;_ and had once possessed that feminine air and lightness
of form, that as often belongs to the youthful American of her sex,
perhaps, as to the girl of any other nation on earth. Rose continued
to gaze at her companion for some time, when she walked musingly to
a window that looked out upon the port.
"I am not certain whether it would do him good or not to see this
sight," she said, addressing the wife kindly, doubtful of the effect
of her words even on the latter. "But here are the sloop-of-war, and
several other vessels."
"Ay, she is _there;_ but never will his foot be put on board the
Swash ag'in. When he bought that brig I was still young, and
agreeable to him; and he gave her my maiden name, which was Mary, or
Molly Swash. But that is all changed; I wonder he did not change the
name with his change of feelin's."
"Then you did really sail in the brig in former times, and knew the
seaman whose name you assumed?"
"Many years. Tier, with whose name I made free, on account of his
size, and some resemblance to me in form, died under my care; and
his protection fell into my hands, which first put the notion into
my head of hailing as his representative. Yes, I knew Tier in the
brig, and we were left ashore at the same time; I, intentionally, I
make no question; he, because Stephen Spike was in a hurry, and did
not choose to wait for a man. The poor fellow caught the yellow
fever the very next day, and did not live eight-and-forty hours. So
the world goes; them that wish to live, die; and them that wants to
die, live!"
"You have had a hard time for one of your sex, poor Jack--quite
twenty years a sailor, did you not tell me?"
"Every day of it, Miss Rose--and bitter years have they been; for
the whole of that time have I been in chase of my husband, keeping
my own secret, and slaving like a horse for a livelihood."
"You could not have been old when he left--that is--when you
parted."
"Call it by its true name, and say at once, when he desarted me. I
was under thirty by two or three years, and was still like my own
sex to look at. All _that_ is changed since; but I _was_ comely
_then_."
"_Why_ did Captain Spike abandon you, Jack; you have never told me
_that_."
"Because he fancied another. And ever since that time he has been
fancying others, instead of remembering me. Had he got _you,_ Miss
Rose, I think he would have been content for the rest of his days."
"Be certain, Jack, I should never have consented to marry Captain
Spike."
"You're well out of his hands," answered Jack, sighing heavily,
which was the most feminine thing she had done during the whole
conversation, "well out of his hands--and God be praised it is so.
He should have died, before I would let him carry you off the
island--husband or no husband."
"It might have exceeded your power to prevent it under other
circumstances, Jack."
Rose now continued looking out of the window in silence. Her
thoughts reverted to her aunt and Biddy, and tears rolled down her
cheeks as she remembered the love of one, and the fidelity of the
other. Their horrible fate had given her a shock that, at first,
menaced her with a severe fit of illness; but her strong, good
sense, and excellent constitution, both sustained by her piety and
Harry's manly tenderness, had brought her through the danger, and
left her, as the reader now sees her, struggling with her own
griefs, in order to be of use to the still more unhappy woman who
had so singularly become her friend and companion.
The reader will readily have anticipated that Jack Tier had early
made the females on board the Swash her confidants. Rose had known
the outlines of her history from the first few days they were at sea
together, which is the explanation of the visible intimacy that had
caused Mulford so much surprise. Jack's motive in making his
revelations might possibly have been tinctured with jealousy, but a
desire to save one as young and innocent as Rose was at its bottom.
Few persons but a wife would have supposed our heroine could have
been in any danger from a lover like Spike; but Jack saw him with
the eyes of her own youth, and of past recollections, rather than
with those of truth. A movement of the wounded man first drew Rose
from the window. Drying her eyes hastily, she turned toward him,
fancying she might prove the better nurse of the two,
notwithstanding Jack's greater interest in the patient.
"What place is this--and why am I here?" demanded Spike, with more
strength of voice than could have been expected, after all that had
passed. "This is not a cabin--not the Swash--it looks like a
hospital."
"It is a hospital, Captain Spike," said Rose, gently drawing near
the bed; "you have been hurt, and have been brought to Key West, and
placed in the hospital. I hope you feel better, and that you suffer
no pain."
"My head is n't right--I do n't know--everything seems turned round
with me--perhaps it will all come out as it should. I begin to
remember--where is my brig?"
"She is lost on the rocks. The seas have broken her into fragments."
"That's melancholy news, at any rate. Ah! Miss Rose! God bless
you--I've had terrible dreams. Well, it's pleasant to be among
friends--what creature is that--where does _she_ come from?"
"That is Jack Tier," answered Rose, steadily. "She turns out to be a
woman, and has put on her proper dress, in order to attend on you
during your illness. Jack has never left your bedside since we have
been here."
A long silence succeeded this revelation. Jack's eyes twinkled, and
she hitched her body half aside, as if to conceal her features,
where emotions that were unusual were at work with the muscles. Rose
thought it might be well to leave the man and wife alone--and she
managed to get out of the room unobserved.
Spike continued to gaze at the strange-looking female, who was now
his sole companion. Gradually his recollection returned, and with it
the full consciousness of his situation. He might not have been
fully aware of the absolute certainty of his approaching death, but
he must have known that his wound was of a very grave character, and
that the result might early prove fatal. Still that strange and
unknown figure haunted him; a figure that was so different from any
he had ever seen before, and which, in spite of its present dress,
seemed to belong quite as much to one sex as to the other. As for
Jack, we call Molly, or Mary Swash by her masculine appellation, not
only because it is more familiar, but because the other name seems
really out of place, as applied to such a person--as for Jack, then,
she sat with her face half averted, thumbing the canvas, and
endeavouring to ply the needle, but perfectly mute. She was
conscious that Spike's eyes were on her; and a lingering feeling of
her sex told her how much time, exposure, and circumstances, had
changed her person--and she would gladly have hidden the defects in
her appearance.
Mary Swash was the daughter as well as the wife of a ship-master. In
her youth, as has been said before, she had even been pretty, and
down to the day when her husband deserted her, she would have been
thought a female of a comely appearance rather than the reverse. Her
hair in particular, though slightly coarse, perhaps, had been rich
and abundant; and the change from the long, dark, shining, flowing
locks which she still possessed in her thirtieth year, to the short,
grey bristles that now stood exposed without a cap, or covering of
any sort, was one very likely to destroy all identity of appearance.
Then Jack had passed from what might be called youth to the verge of
old age, in the interval that she had been separated from her
husband. Her shape had changed entirely; her complexion was utterly
gone; and her features, always unmeaning, though feminine, and
suitable to her sex, had become hard and slightly coarse. Still
there was something of her former self about Jack that bewildered
Spike; and his eyes continued fastened on her for quite a quarter of
an hour in profound silence.
"Give me some water," said the wounded man, "I wish some water to
drink."
Jack arose, filled a tumbler and brought it to the side of the bed.
Spike took the glass and drank, but the whole time his eyes were
riveted on the strange nurse. When his thirst was appeased, he
asked--
"Who are you? How came you here?"
"I am your nurse. It is common to place nurses at the bedsides of
the sick."
"Are you man or woman?"
"That is a question I hardly know how to answer. Sometimes I think
myself each; sometimes neither."
"Did I ever see you before?"
"Often, and quite lately. I sailed with you in your last voyage."
"You! That cannot be. If so, what is your name?"
"Jack Tier."
A long pause succeeded this announcement, which induced Spike to
muse as intently as his condition would allow, though the truth did
not yet flash on his understanding. At length the bewildered man
again spoke.
"Are _you_ Jack Tier?" he said slowly, like one who doubted. "Yes--I
now see the resemblance, and it was _that_ which puzzled me. Are
they so rigid in this hospital that you have been obliged to put on
woman's clothes in order to lend me a helping hand?"
"I am dressed as you see, and for good reasons."
"But Jack Tier run, like that rascal Mulford--ay, I remember now;
you were in the boat when I overhauled you all on the reef."
"Very true; I was in the boat. But I never run, Stephen Spike. It
was _you_ who abandoned _me,_ on the islet in the Gulf, and that
makes the second time in your life that you left me ashore, when it
was your duty to carry me to sea."
"The first time I was in a hurry, and could not wait for you; this
last time you took sides with the women. But for your interference,
I should have got Rose, and married her, and all would now have been
well with me."
This was an awkward announcement for a man to make to his legal
wife. But after all Jack had endured, and all Jack had seen during
the late voyage, she was not to be overcome by this avowal. Her
self-command extended so far as to prevent any open manifestation of
emotion, however much her feelings were excited.
"I took sides with the women, because I am a woman myself," she
answered, speaking at length with decision, as if determined to
bring matters to a head at once. "It is natural for us all to take
sides with our kind."
"You a woman, Jack! That is very remarkable. Since when have you
hailed for a woman? You have shipped with me twice, and each time as
a man--though I've never thought you able to do seaman's duty."
"Nevertheless, I am what you see; a woman born and edicated; one
that never had on man's dress until I knew you. _You_ supposed me to
be a man, when I came off to you in the skiff to the eastward of
Riker's Island, but I was then what you now see."
"I begin to understand matters," rejoined the invalid, musingly.
"Ay, ay, it opens on me; and I now see how it was you made such fair
weather with Madam Budd and pretty, pretty Rose. Rose _is_ pretty,
Jack; you _must_ admit _that,_ though you be a woman."
"Rose _is_ pretty--I do admit it; and what is better, Rose is
_good."_ It required a heavy draft on Jack's justice and
magnanimity, however, to make this concession.
"And you told Rose and Madam Budd about your sex; and that was the
reason they took to you so on the v'y'ge?"
"I told them who I was, and why I went abroad as a man. They know my
whole story."
"Did Rose approve of your sailing under false colours, Jack?"
"You must ask that of Rose herself. My story made her my friend; but
she never said anything for or against my disguise."
"It was no great disguise a'ter all, Jack. Now you're fitted out in
your own clothes, you've a sort of half-rigged look; one would be as
likely to set you down for a man under jury-canvas, as for a woman."
Jack made no answer to this, but she sighed very heavily. As for
Spike himself, he was silent for some little time, not only from
exhaustion, but because he suffered pain from his wound. The needle
was diligently but awkwardly plied in this pause.
Spike's ideas were still a little confused; but a silence and rest
of a quarter of an hour cleared them materially. At the end of that
time he again asked for water. When he had drunk, and Jack was once
more seated, with his side-face toward him, at work with the needle,
the captain gazed long and intently at this strange woman. It
happened that the profile of Jack preserved more of the resemblance
to her former self, than the full face; and it was this resemblance
that now attracted Spike's attention, though not the smallest
suspicion of the truth yet gleamed upon him. He saw something that
was familiar, though he could not even tell what that something was,
much less to what or whom it bore any resemblance. At length he
spoke.
"I was told that Jack Tier was dead," he said; "that he took the
fever, and was in his grave within eight-and-forty hours after we
sailed. That was what they told me of _him_."
"And what did they tell you of your own wife, Stephen Spike. She
that you left ashore at the time Jack was left?"
"They said she did not die for three years later. I heard of her
death at New Or_leens,_ three years later."
"And how could you leave her ashore--she, your true and lawful
wife?"
"It was a bad thing," answered Spike, who, like all other mortals,
regarded his own past career, now that he stood on the edge of the
grave, very differently from what he had regarded it in the hour of
his health and strength. "Yes, it _was_ a very bad thing; and I wish
it was ondone. But it is too late now. She died of the fever,
too--that's some comfort; had she died of a broken heart, I could
not have forgiven myself. Molly was not without her faults--great
faults, I considered them; but, on the whole, Molly was a good
creatur'."
"You liked her, then, Stephen Spike?"
"I can truly say that when I married Molly, and old Captain Swash
put his da'ghter's hand into mine, that the woman was n't living who
was better in my judgment, or handsomer in my eyes."
"Ay, ay--when you _married_ her; but how was it a'terwards?--when
you was tired of her, and saw another that was fairer in your eyes?"
"I desarted her; and God has punished me for the sin! Do you know,
Jack, that luck has never been with me since that day. Often and
often have I bethought me of it; and sartain as you sit there, no
great luck has ever been with me, or my craft, since I went off,
leaving my wife ashore. What was made in one v'y'ge, was lost in the
next. Up and down, up and down the whole time, for so many, many
long years, that grey hairs set in, and old age was beginning to get
close aboard--and I as poor as ever. It has been rub and go with me
ever since; and I have had as much as I could do to keep the brig in
motion, as the only means that was left to make the two ends meet."
"And did not all this make you think of your poor wife--she whom you
had so wronged?"
"I thought of little else, until I heard of her death at New
Or_leens_--and then I gave it up as useless. Could I have fallen in
with Molly at any time a'ter the first six months of my desartion,
she and I would have come together again, and everything would have
been forgotten. I knowed her very nature, which was all forgiveness
to me at the bottom, though seemingly so spiteful and hard."
"Yet you wanted to have this Rose Budd, who is only too young, and
handsome, and good for you."
"I was tired of being a widower, Jack; and Rose _is_ wonderful
pretty. She has money, too, and might make the evening of my days
comfortable. The brig was old, as you must know, and has long been
off of all the Insurance Offices' books; and she could n't hold
together much longer. But for this sloop-of-war, I should have put
her off on the Mexicans; and they would have lost her to our people
in a month."
"And was it an honest thing to sell an old and worn-out craft to any
one, Stephen Spike?"
Spike had a conscience that had become hard as iron by means of
trade. He who traffics much, most especially if his dealings be on
so small a scale as to render constant investigations of the minor
qualities of things necessary, must be a very fortunate man, if he
preserve his conscience in any better condition. When Jack made this
allusion, therefore, the dying man--for death was much nearer to
Spike that even be supposed, though he no longer hoped for his own
recovery--when Jack made this allusion, then, the dying man was a
good deal at a loss to comprehend it. He saw no particular harm in
making the best bargain he could; nor was it easy for him to
understand why he might not dispose of anything he possessed for the
highest price that was to be had. Still he answered in an apologetic
sort of way.
"The brig was old, I acknowledge," he said, "but she was strong, and
_might_ have run a long time. I only spoke of her capture as a thing
likely to take place soon, if the Mexicans got her; so that her
qualities were of no great account, unless it might be her
speed--and that you know was excellent, Jack."
"And you regret that brig, Stephen Spike, lying as you do on your
death-bed, more than anything else."
"Not as much as I do pretty Rose Budd, Jack; Rosy is so delightful
to look at!"
The muscles of Jack's face twitched a little, and she looked deeply
mortified; for, to own the truth, she hoped that the conversation
had so far turned her delinquent husband's thoughts to the past, as
to have revived in him some of his former interest in herself. It is
true, he still believed her dead; but this was a circumstance Jack
overlooked--so hard is it to hear the praises of a rival, and be
just. She felt the necessity of being more explicit, and determined
at once to come to the point.
"Stephen Spike," she said, steadily, drawing near to the bed-side,
"you should be told the truth, when you are heard thus extolling the
good looks of Rose Budd, with less than eight-and-forty hours of
life remaining. Mary Swash did not die, as you have supposed, three
years a'ter you desarted her, but is living at this moment. Had you
read the letter I gave you in the boat, just before you made me jump
into the sea, _that_ would have told you where she is to be found."
Spike stared at the speaker intently; and when her cracked voice
ceased, his look was that of a man who was terrified as well as
bewildered. This did not arise still from any gleamings of the real
state of the case, but from the soreness with which his conscience
pricked him, when he heard that his much-wronged wife was alive. He
fancied, with a vivid and rapid glance at the probabilities, all
that a woman abandoned would be likely to endure in the course of so
many long and suffering years.
"Are you sure of what you say, Jack? You would n't take advantage of
my situation to tell me an untruth?"
"As certain of it as of my own existence. I have seen her quite
lately--talked with her of _you_--in short, she is now at Key West,
knows your state, and has a wife's feelin's to come to your
bed-side."
Notwithstanding all this, and the many gleamings he had had of the
facts during their late intercourse on board the brig, Spike did not
guess at the truth. He appeared astounded, and his terror seemed to
increase.
"I have another thing to tell you," continued Jack, pausing but a
moment to collect her own thoughts. "Jack Tier--the real Jack
Tier--he who sailed with you of old, and whom you left ashore at the
same time you desarted your wife, _did_ die of the fever, as you was
told, in eight-and-forty hours a'ter the brig went to sea."
"Then who, in the name of Heaven, are you? How came you to hail by
another's name as well as by another sex?"
"What could a woman do, whose husband had desarted her in a strange
land?"
"That is remarkable! So _you_'ve been married? I should not have
thought _that_ possible; and your husband desarted you, too. Well,
such things _do_ happen."
Jack now felt a severe pang. She could not but see that her
ungainly--we had almost said her unearthly appearance--prevented the
captain from even yet suspecting the truth; and the meaning of his
language was not easily to be mistaken. That any one should have
married _her,_ seemed to her husband as improbable as it was
probable he would run away from her as soon as it was in his power
after the ceremony.
"Stephen Spike," resumed Jack, solemnly, "_I_ am Mary Swash--_I_ am
your wife!"
Spike started in his bed; then he buried his face in the
coverlet--and he actually groaned. In bitterness of spirit the woman
turned away and wept. Her feelings had been blunted by misfortune
and the collisions of a selfish world; but enough of former self
remained to make this the hardest of all the blows she had ever
received. Her husband, dying as he was, as he must and did know
himself to be, shrunk from one of her appearance, unsexed as she had
become by habits, and changed by years and suffering.