Rivers of Ice by Robert Michael Ballantyne (books to read to improve english TXT) 📖

his rugged brow, "but I may be said to know you pretty well, seeing that I have for many years been the friend and messmate of your late husband's brother in Californy."

"Indeed!" exclaimed Mrs Stoutley, with increasing animation, as she rose and held out her hand; "any friend of my brother-in-law is heartily welcome. Be seated, Mr Wopper, and let me hear about him. He was very kind to my dear husband during his last illness--very kind. I shall never forget him."

"No doubt he was," said the Captain, accepting the chair which Emma Gray handed to him, with looks of great interest. "Thank 'ee, Miss. Willum Stout--excuse my familiarity, ma'am, I always called him Willum, because we was like brothers--more than brothers, I may say, an' very friendly. Yes, Willum Stout _was_ kind to his brother in his last days. It would have bin shame to him if he hadn't for your husband, ma'am, was kind to Willum, an' he often said to me, over the camp-fires in the bush, that he'd never forget _his_ kindness. But it's over now," continued the seaman in a sad tone, "an' poor Willum is left alone."

"Is my uncle _very_ poor?" asked Lewis, who had been paying more attention to the appearance of their rugged visitor than to what he had said.

"Ay, _very_ poor," replied the seaman, "as regards near relations, leastwise such as he has seen and known in former days, but he an't poor as regards gold. He's got lots of that. He and I worked not far from each other for years, an' he used to hit upon good claims somehow, and shovelled up the nuggets like stones."

"Indeed! I wish he'd send a few of them this way," exclaimed Lewis, with a careless laugh.

"No doubt he might do so, young man, if he knew you were in need of 'em, but your father gave him to understand that his family was rich."

"Rich!" exclaimed Lewis, with a smile, in which there was a touch of contempt. "Well, yes, we were rich enough once, but when my father was away these wretched mines became--"

"Lewie!" exclaimed his mother, hastily, "what nonsense you do talk! Really, one would think from your account that we were paupers."

"Well, mother, so we are--paupers to this extent at least, that we can't afford to take a run to Switzerland, though ordered to do so for your health, because we lack funds."

Lewis said this half petulantly, for he had been a "spoilt child," and might probably have been by that time a ruined young man, but for the mercy of his Creator, who had blessed him with an amiable disposition. He was one of those youths, in short, of whom people say that they can't be spoiled, though fond and foolish parents do their best to spoil them.

"You mis-state the case, naughty boy," said Mrs Stoutley, annoyed at being thus forced to touch on her private affairs before a stranger. "No doubt our ready cash is what our man-of-business calls `locked up,' but that, you know, is only a matter of temporary inconvenience, and cannot last long."

As Mrs Stoutley paused and hesitated, their visitor placed on the table a canvas bag, which, up to this point he had rested on one knee.

"This bag," he said, "of nuggets, is a gift from Willum. He desired me to deliver it to you, Miss Gray, as a _small_ acknowledgment of your kindness in writin' so often to him. He'd have bought you a silk gown, or a noo bonnet, so he said, but wasn't sure as to your taste in such matters, and thought you'd accept the nuggets and buy it for yourself. Leastwise, that's somethin' like the speech Willum tried to tell me to deliver, but he warn't good at speech-makin' no more than I at remembrin', and hoped you'd take the will for the deed."

With a flush of surprise and pleasure, Emma Gray accepted both the will and the deed, with many expressions of gratitude, and said, that as she did not require either a silk dress or a bonnet just then, she would invest her little fortune; she would lend it at high interest, to a lady under temporary inconvenience, who was ordered by her doctor to Switzerland for the benefit of her health. To this Mrs Stoutley protested very earnestly that the lady in question would not accept the loan on any consideration; that it must not be diverted from its destined use, but be honestly expended on silk-dresses and new bonnets. To which Emma replied, that the destiny of the gift, with interest (she was very particular on that head), should be fulfilled in good time, but that meanwhile it must be lent out.

In the midst of a cross-fire of this kind the bag was opened, and its contents poured on the table, to the immense admiration of all the company, none of whom had, until that day, beheld gold in its native condition.

"How much may it be worth, Mr Wopper?" asked Lewis, weighing one of the largest lumps.

"About two hundred pound, I should say, more or less," replied the seaman.

"Indeed!" exclaimed the youth in surprise--an exclamation which was echoed by his mother and cousin in modified tones.

While they sat thus toying with the lumps of gold, the conversation reverted to the sender of it, and the Captain told such entertaining anecdotes of bush life, in all of which "Uncle Willum" had been an actor, that the afternoon arrived before Mrs Stoutley had time to wish for it. They also talked of the last illness of the deceased father of the family; and when it came out that Captain (they had found out by that time that their visitor had been a skipper, and, by courtesy, a captain), had assisted "Willum" in nursing Mr Stoutley, and had followed him to the grave, Mrs Stoutley's gratitude was such that she insisted on her visitor staying to dinner.

"Thank 'ee, ma'am," he said, "I've dined. I always dines at one o'clock if I can manage it."

"But we don't dine till eight," said the lady, "so it will just suit for your supper."

"Do come," said Emma Gray, "we shall be quite alone, and shall have a great spinning of yarns over Uncle William and the gold-fields."

"Well, I don't mind if I do," said the Captain, "but before supper I must go to the docks for my kit and settle my lodgings."

"I am going to the Strand, and shall be happy to give you a lift," said Lewis.

The Captain accepted the offer, and as they drove along, he and his young friend became very intimate, insomuch that Lewis, who was lighthearted, open, and reckless, let him into his confidence, and spoke quite freely about his mother's difficulties. It is only justice to add that the Captain did not encourage him in this. When, however, the youth spoke of himself, he not only encouraged him, but drew him out. Among other things, he drew out of him the fact that he was in the habit of gambling, and that he fully expected--if his usual luck attended him--to assist in adding to the fund which was to take the family abroad.

The Captain looked at the handsome stripling for a few seconds in silent surprise.

"You don't mean to tell me," he said slowly, "that you gamble?"

"Indeed I do," replied Lewis, with a bland smile, and something of a twinkle in his eye.

"For money?" asked the Captain.

"For money," assented the youth; "what have you to say against it?"

"Why, I've to say that it's mean."

"That's strong language," said Lewis, flushing.

"It an't strong enough by a long way," returned the Captain, with indignation, "it's more than mean, it's contemptible; it's despicable."

The flush on Lewis's face deepened, and he looked at his companion with the air of one who meditates knocking another down. Perhaps the massive size and strength of the Captain induced him to change his mind. It may be that there occurred to him the difficulty--if not impossibility--of knocking down a man who was down already, and the want of space in a cab for such violent play of muscle. At all events he did nothing, but looked "daggers."

"Look 'ee here, my lad," continued the Captain, laying his huge hand on his companion's knee, and gazing earnestly into his face, "I don't mean for to hurt your feelin's by sayin' that _you_ are mean, or contemptible, or despicable, for I don't suppose you've thought much about the matter at all, and are just following in the wake of older men who ought to know better; but I say that the _thing_--gambling for money--is the meanest thing a man can do, short of stealing. What does it amount to? Simply this--I want another man's money, and the other man wants mine. We daren't try open robbery, we would be ashamed of that; we're both too lazy to labour for money, and labour doesn't bring it in fast enough, therefore we'll go _play_ for it. I'll ask him to submit to be robbed by me on condition that I submit to be robbed by him; and which is to be the robbed, and which the robber, shall depend on the accidental turn of a dice, or something equally trifling--"

"But I don't gamble by means of dice," interrupted Lewis, "I play, and bet, on billiards, which is a game of skill, requiring much practice, judgment, and thought."

"That makes no odds, my lad," continued the Captain. "There is no connection whatever between the rolling of a ball and the taking away of a man's money, any more than there is between the turning of a dice and the taking of a man's money. Both are dishonourable subterfuges. They are mere blinds put up to cover the great and mean fact, which is, that I want to get possession of my neighbour's cash."

"But, Captain," retorted Lewis, with a smile--for he had now entered into the spirit of the argument--"you ignore the fact that while I try to win from my friend, I am quite willing that my friend should try to win from me."

"Ignore it? no!" cried Captain Wopper. "Putt it in this way. Isn't it wrong for me to have a longing desire and itching fingers to lay hold of _your_ cash?"

"Well, put in that simple form," said Lewis, with a laugh, "it certainly is."

"And isn't it equally wrong for you to have a hungering and thirsting after _my_ cash?"

"Of course that follows," assented Lewis.

"Well, then," pursued the Captain, "can any agreement between you and me, as to the guessing of black or white or the turning of dice or anything else, make a right out of two wrongs?"

"Still," said Lewis, a little puzzled, "there is fallacy somewhere in your argument. I cannot see that gambling is wrong."

"Mark me, my lad," returned the Captain, impressively, "it is no sufficient reason for the doing of a thing that you _cannot see_ it to be wrong. You are not entitled to do anything unless you _see_ it to be right. But there are other questions connected with gambling which renders it doubly mean--the question, for instance, whether a man is entitled to risk the loss of money which he calls his own, but which belongs to his wife and children as