Joshua Marvel

So they sat together talking and musing, and it was past midnight before they retired to rest.

Early in the morning, the whimsical mail-contractor was jogging along towards Bull's Run; he had to stop so many times for the little birds in the road, that his progress was slow; but he had reckoned upon these impediments, and he arrived at the station not more than a couple of hours after the usual time. That was the end of his journey; the following day he had to make his way back to Dan's village. The residence of the owner of Bull's-Run station was built of slabs split from the bloodwood-tree; the roof was of shingle; and the interior of the house was lined with rich dark-red cedar, which gave it quite a cosey, comfortable appearance. The workmen's huts were built of palm-tree slabs, and the roofs were thatched with strong sword-grass, which grew in great profusion on the banks of a river within a few miles of the homestead. Ramsay was always welcomed at Bull's Run; the men and women on the station-for, primitive as it was, there were women and children living on it-used to cluster round him and ask him for news from the villages through which he passed, and the smallest items were received with thankfulness, and eagerly listened to. On this occasion, Ramsay had but little news to tell, and his budget was soon exhausted. In return, they told him theirs: one of the bulls had torn a man's arm open; a child had been lost for a whole night, and all the men were out searching for it miles away, and it was found the next morning within half a mile of the hut; three bushrangers, splendidly mounted, passed the station last week at full gallop; one of the shepherds had come in with a cock-and-a-bull story of gold being found somewhere or other; another shepherd had gone mad; Yellow-hammer Jack and his wife had had a row; and-but Oh! this was the best bit of the lot! – a man had been brought in by two stockmen who were looking for lost cattle, and had found him instead; he was almost dead, and had been living a long time with the Blacks. He seemed a decent kind of fellow, had been a sailor, he said, but was strangely silent about himself-for good reasons, some of the ill-natured ones said. Any ways, the man was better, although still very weak, and intended to start the next morning for Sydney; nothing would stop him.

"A long tramp for a weak man," said kind-hearted Ramsay; "if he's a decent fellow, I'll give him a lift."

As he said this, there came towards the group, walking very slowly, a strange-looking man, with a beard down to his breast, dressed in skins and furs; he had a stick in his hand, and seemed to require its support. They pointed to him, and said that was the man. Ramsay looked at him keenly, and the air of melancholy that rested in the man's eyes impressed the mail-contractor with a feeling of pity.

"A sailor, eh?" he thought; "and living with the savages. Wonder what he lived with them for?" Then he thought of Dan's and Ellen's anxiety concerning strange sailors and castaways, and that perhaps they would be glad to see this man. He said nothing, however, but was up the next morning early, and saw the man start on his road with slow and painful steps. A few minutes afterwards the old mare was harnessed, and its tail was turned to Bull's Run. Soon he came up to the man, and as he did so, two purple-breasted robins pecking at a bit of honeysuckle barred his progress. "Get out of my way, little birds," said the mail-driver, pulling up his mare; and he gave a soft flick with his whip in a direction where the robins were not. The words reached the man's ears, and he turned his head in surprise, and saw the little comedy. A gentle, sweet smile rested on his lips, and he looked at the mail-driver almost gratefully. Ramsay smiled in return, and again bade the little robins get out of his way; and presently they took flight, each with a tiny piece of the sweet flower in its beak. Then the old mare jogged lazily along, and the strange-looking man gazed wistfully after the cart. Ramsay, looking back, saw the wistful expression, and stopped at once. "Hi, mate!"

Joshua came slowly forward.

"Where you bound for?"

"Sydney."

"Going to walk all the way?"

"If I can," sighed Joshua; and could not help adding, "and if I don't die on the road!"

"Jump up, mate; I can give you a lift for forty miles."

"I have no money," and Joshua turned away, with a sob.

"I don't want your money; I want your company. But how were you going to live, if you've no money?"

"I should trust to the Providence that has so wonderfully delivered me," thought Joshua, but made no reply aloud; though it could be seen in his eyes, which were filled with tears.

"Jump in," said Ramsay, imperatively and kindly, "without another word."

And without another word Joshua climbed into the cart.

"I dare say now," said Ramsay in the course of conversation, as the old mare trotted steadily on the road, "that you wonder what made me so anxious for your company. Well, I'll tell you. In the village where I shall put up to-morrow afternoon, and which is forty odd miles on the road to Sydney, live some people I'm very fond of, who had a sailor friend that they've not heard of for a long while."

"Ah!" sighed Joshua; "I know, what their feeling must be. Did they love him?"

"Love him! Well, you shall see for yourself; if, in return for the lift I am giving you, you won't mind talking to them a bit."

"I shall be glad to; it may remind me of my own friends."

"Where are your friends? – Now, Dozy!" this to the old mare, who had stopped suddenly short; "what d'ye stop for? The sense of the creature!" he added proudly, pointing, to a bird some yards in front of them. "Get out of my way, little bird!"

"When I first heard you say that," said Joshua, "I was sure you had a kind heart."

"Fond of birds yourself, mate?"

"Very, very fond. The tenderest remembrances of my life are connected with them."

Ramsay cast a sharp glance at the half-savage.

"Been long among the Blacks, mate? or isn't the story true?"

"It's true enough. Long among them? Ay-years, but I don't know how long."

Joshua, indeed, had lost count of time.

"From choice?"

"No; but I've told my story to no one yet. It would scarcely be believed. But tell me about your friends and the sailor."

"There's a mother there, that lost a son when she lost her sailor" – Joshua pressed his fingers to his face, and sobbed convulsively at the thought of his own dear mother, who had lost a son when she lost her sailor; and the mail-driver felt a choking in his throat, and had to wait a few moments before he could proceed. "And a father that lost a son at the same time. And a wife that lost a husband. And a friend that lost a friend. And a little child that can hardly be said to have lost a father, for she never saw her father's face."

"Merciful God!"

"What's the matter, mate?"

For Joshua was trembling-like a child; and great sobs came from his chest-like a man.

"You remind me-you remind me," sobbed Joshua. "Don't think me unmanly, don't think me mad. I have been sorely, sorely tried!"

Whereat Ramsay stopped the mare, and got out of the cart, and went into the bush to look for birds. He must have had a great difficulty in finding them, he was away so long; and the old mare stood perfectly still and contented the while, twitching her tail to knock off the flies, which was the only spirited action she was ever known to be guilty of. When they were jogging along again, they did not speak a word for a full hour, and then it was Joshua who spoke first, taking up the thread where it had been dropped.

"The child who has never seen her father-a girl then?"

"Yes, mate."

"How was it that she had never seen him?"

"Married her mother; went away to sea, and never heard of since."

"How old is the child?"

"Five years, I should say."

"If you knew," said Joshua in a slow trembling voice, "what a chord you have touched in my heart, you would pity me. Forgive me for my strange manner, and answer me. The mother who has lost a son; describe her."

"An angel. I'm not good at picking faces to pieces; but when I look at her, she reminds me of my own mother, dead and gone this many a year. Never thinks of herself; always putting herself out for other people-bless her old face! And yet she's not so old, although her hair is nearly white-that's from grief."

"The father who lost a son?"

"A fine fellow; a little self-willed and obstinate; a wood-turner."

A long, long silence. The mail-driver did not break it, nor did he intrude upon his companion's thoughts. "Twit-twit-twit!" came from the throats of some diamond sparrows, which were flitting among the gum-tree branches and a flock of scarlet lowry parrots floated through the bush that lined the road on either side, their wonderfully-gorgeous plumage lighting up the dark trees with brilliant light.

"The wife that lost a husband, and the friend that lost a friend?"

"Treasures both; brother and sister."

"One other question-where do they come from?"

"London. I don't know what part."

A mist floated before Joshua's eyes, and he remained like one in a dream during the afternoon-wondering, hoping, fearing. When they were near to the village the following afternoon, Joshua said, -

"It may be that you have rendered me one of the greatest services that a man can possibly render another. If it be as I scarcely dare to hope, we shall know each other for long after this. Complete the service by doing one little thing more. Drive past the house where your friends live and point it out to me, so that I may descend and walk to it alone when we are at the end of your journey."

Ramsay nodded. It was about five o'clock when the mail-cart rattled into the village. The contractor for the mails always made a great clatter when he came in, as if he had been driving for his life-a fiction which, although no one believed in, he thought it desirable to keep up. "It looks government-like," he said.

Solomon Fewster is in the garden at the rear of the house, pleading his suit to Ellen for the twentieth time. She stands silent until he has finished a rhapsody, in which love and money are strangely commingled.

"Think of the time I have waited, Ellen," he says; "think of the constancy of my affection, and of the position I can offer you. I am making money fast, and only wait for you to say yes, to buy a house for us, which in three years will be worth three times what they ask for it. What is the use of your wasting your life in this out-of-the-way village when all the attractions of a city-life are open to you? Come now, give me your hand, and reward the man who has been your constant friend and lover, and who can make you rich."

But Ellen is insensible to the splendor of the offer; indeed, she is weary of it and him, and she tells him so spiritedly, and yet cannot repulse him. At length she says, -

"Mr. Fewster, there must be an end to this. I shall never, never marry again; and even if I did," she adds, to put a stop to what has become persecution, "I should not choose you;" and leaves him with this arrow in his heart.

He stands amazed. Not choose him! Why, a thousand girls would jump at him. Not here perhaps, for womankind was a scarce commodity; but at home, or anywhere where girls were more plentiful. Not choose him! He follows her into the house, wounded and mortified, and into Dan's room, where Mr. Marvel and Dan are at work. Mr. Marvel has all his tools, and does a great deal of wood-turning-having, indeed, more than he can do-and is putting by money. He scarcely looks up as Solomon Fewster walks in, somewhat defiantly; and as no one speaks to him, an awkward silence ensues upon his entrance; broken by Mr. Marvel, who, noticing Ellen's flushed face, observes, -

"Been teasing Ellen again, Mr. Fewster?"

"Teasing her, indeed!" exclaims Solomon Fewster loftily; "honoring her, I should say."

The flush upon Ellen's face deepens at this, and she casts such a look of aversion at Mr. Fewster that all the blood rushes into his face, and he says some injudicious words about ingratitude, and about what one might expect if one condescended to lower himself as he had done.

Upon this George Marvel starts to his feet in a great heat, and exclaims, -

"What do you mean by ingratitude, and by lowering yourself, Mr. Fewster? What gratitude do we owe you?"

"Ask Dan," says Mr. Fewster, – "ask Dan who it was bought his birds to keep you when you were starving, and when no one else would look upon you. But it serves me right for noticing you and helping you, instead of treating you as all your neighbors did. I ought to have known what return I might expect."

"And I dare say you got your return," says George Marvel, "when you sold Dan's birds at a good profit. As for Dan selling his birds to keep us from starving, that was no business of yours, so long as you got value for your money. That is a matter between Dan and me; and Dan's satisfied with the way that account stands, or I'm mistaken in him." Dan presses George Marvel's hand. "Thank you, Dan. Now, as to lowering yourself, Mr. Fewster. Do you mean to tell me that you would be lowering yourself if Ellen here was free to marry you, and would accept you? You mean-spirited dog! I'm a good deal older than you are; but if you were not in my house, I would thrash you for speaking as you have done, as I've thrashed others in Stepney when they let loose their lying tongues at us. Get out of the place, and never set foot in it again!" Attracted by the loud voices, Susan and Mrs. Marvel, with Ellen's child, have come into the room; and Mrs. Marvel now goes to her husband's side and lays her hand upon his arm. "Nay, Maggie-let be; I'm not going to hurt him; I wouldn't lay a finger upon him here; and I don't want to anywhere else; only, don't let him cross me if he says a word against us out of this house. – Dan!" he cries, "do you want to see Mr. Fewster here again?"

"No, sir; I think it will be best if Mr. Fewster will keep away from us."

"And you, Ellen? what do you say?

"I never wish to see him again. For the sake of what is past, I would have been content to see him, if he would have ceased from persecuting me; but after what he has said to you, I hope he will leave us in peace."

"You hear," exclaims George Marvel; "we are happy enough without you. Go, and never darken this door again!"

Solomon Fewster looks round, almost savagely; his face is white with passion, and all the vindictiveness of his bad nature comes into play.

"You are happy enough without me!" he sneers, with his knuckles to his mouth.

"Don't make too sure of that. I have been your friend hitherto. What if I now make myself your enemy? What if, when I go from this house, I spread about my version of your reason for leaving London? What if I tell your neighbors here of the real character of your sailor-hero, and how, because of his villainy, all your friends turned their backs upon you" -

But he has no time to say more; for the door, which has been partly open, swings on its hinges, and Joshua enters.

Not one of them recognizes him. In his strange garb, with his fur-cap pulled over his eyes, and with his face covered with hair, no trace of Joshua is discernible; and yet they look at him spell-bound, waiting for him to speak. He gazes at the forms of all the dear ones and grasps the back of a chair to steady himself. He takes them all in at a glance, and sees in one brief moment the changes in them that time has made. His mother's white hair; the deepened wrinkles in his father's face; Ellen more matronly than she was, but fair and pleasant to look at as when she was a girl; Susan, like an old woman; Dan grown a little stouter, and with the same dear boyish light in his eyes and on his face-but the child, clinging to Ellen's apron and looking at him wonderingly with Ellen's eyes and his! -

He had thought, before he entered, that he would be strong, but he has no more control over himself for a few moments than a straw in a fierce wind. Then muttering, "Justice first!" he turns upon Solomon Fewster a glance of hate and scorn, and grasps him by the shoulder with so powerful a grasp, that Fewster writhes with pain.

"I heard your last words," he says.

But directly he speaks, a thrill runs through them, and they are running towards him with outstretched arms, when he cries, -

"Stand off! By what strange chance I find you, I can scarcely imagine. But do not come nearer to me for a little while, or I shall fall dead at your feet!"

Awe-struck and trembling they obey him.

"I would not touch one of your dear hands till you have heard me and judged me, though death were the penalty for depriving myself of the joy! I would not receive one kiss from your honored lips upon my cheek till you have heard me and judged me, though I were sure that my tongue would be paralyzed in the utterance of what I have to say! Some part of your sufferings, some part of your pain, I know from my own suffering and pain, and I will clear myself before your eyes, so help me Thou! or go forever from my sight!"

Susan is running to him with cries of "Justice! justice!" and is about to throw herself upon him, when George Marvel's arm restrains and keeps her back. "Be still, madwoman!" he mutters sternly, and stands by her side, watchful of her, and no less watchful and attentive of every word that falls from his son's lips.

Joshua takes the cap from his head, and lets it fall to the ground, still keeping his strong grasp upon Solomon Fewster, whose cowardly blood grows thin as he writhes and listens.

"Justice!" echoes Joshua. "You shall have it, and so shall this base dog, whose presence pollutes the air I breathe. Listen well. Of another matter that we must speak of presently, and which is near and dear to all our hearts, I will say nothing before him. But in the 'Merry Andrew' in which I sailed from Gravesend, and which is now at the bottom of the sea, with many dear brave souls that were aboard her, was a villanous sailor-a Lascar, from whose hands I once rescued the woman who calls for justice, and who struck me down on that dreadful Christmas-eve when I first came home from sea. He shrinks and trembles beneath my grasp, this false friend, of whose bad heart I warned my brother Dan before the 'Merry Andrew' sailed. At one time during the voyage, when we were in danger, there was an attempt at mutiny, and this Lascar was one of the cowardly wretches who endeavored to spread dissatisfaction. When we were in dread peril, this Lascar sailor and a mutinous mate, whom we had to put in irons, strove hard to injure me and the captain-Heaven rest his soul-and, happily, failed. The ship was wrecked, and we had to abandon her, and take to a raft which we had made; and on that raft we suffered more than six weeks hunger and thirst, and every species of misery. Out of the entire crew and passengers only seven were saved, among them being myself and this Lascar sailor and his confederate, the mutinous mate. Before the captain died, he appointed me to succeed in the command, and I have the record from the log-book about me now. We got ashore. How we lived, you shall hear from me by and by; but once the Lascar (whom we suspected of having killed his confederate) stole upon me, and but that I turned my head in time, I should not be here now to expose the villainy of this cowardly wretch. Foiled in his devilish design, he told me then that he had been set to trap me, and was paid for it. Some time after that, I found the Lascar dead in the forest; and before I buried him-not wishing to leave a human creature however vile, to be eaten by birds and beasts-I obtained evidence which proved to me that the wretch who writhes now within my grasp was the master who paid him to ruin, and perhaps to murder me."

"A clever lie," Solomon Fewster manages to say, though he is shaking from terror.

"A lie! have the proofs. Be thankful that I have met you here among those who are all that the world holds dear for ma. If I had met you in the forest, in the midst of such scenes as I have witnessed lately, I would not have answered for your life."

Joshua hurls Solomon Fewster from him with such force that he falls, almost stunned, in the corner of the room. Then Joshua takes from his neck the bag containing; his relics, and selects from them the silver watch and the document which Fewster had given the Lascar, and after reading aloud the document and the inscription on the watch, lays them upon the table.

"Here are the proofs of your crime and your villainy," he says to Fewster. "Be thankful if you are allowed to escape punishment. Go and go quickly, and without a word!" He stands aside to let the man pass; and Solomon Fewster, without a word or a look to any one there, passes out of the room, and out of the village. And is never seen in it again.

When they are alone, Joshua turns to Susan, and, in a softer voice, says, -

"Susan, you cried for justice. Upon me!"

"Yes, upon you. Where is Minnie? What have you done with Minnie?"

The big tears roll down Joshua's beard at the mention of her name.

"You think I took her away?"

"You know you did."

"Then truly, if all of you believe as Susan believes, my life is darker than the darkest night." With upraised hand he checks them, from speaking; but he sees in their faces what gives him precious comfort. "When I went away from Gravesend," he says in a soft and gentle voice, "I had no knowledge that Minnie was aboard. When we got to Sydney I did not know it. My duties occupied all my time. We sailed from Sydney, and I was still in ignorance. But on the night the 'Merry Andrew' struck on the rocks I heard her voice for the first time. I suppose she thought that we were lost, and in her agony she made herself known to me; but I did not see her-the night was too dark. When I saw her the next day, I saw to my amazement that she had stained her face, and that her hair was not so long as she used to wear it. We were together on the raft. We were together on the shore. She was one of the seven who were saved. We lived together like brother and sister. When the savages discovered us, they had a strange fancy respecting her, and she obtained great influence over them. She used all her influence to protect me, and but for her I should have lived and died where the tribe we fell amongst chiefly wandered-in the north, many hundreds of miles from here." He takes from his bag Ellen's portrait, the lock of her hair he had cut before he left Gravesend, and Dan's Bible. He places these on one side. "What is left, Dan, is yours. This tress, cut not many weeks ago; this paper, which she desired me to give you, and which I have never read; this earth, which I gathered from her grave Before she died, she sent you all her dearest love, and a kiss for mother, Dan, and Ellen. She died pure as she had lived, dear, faithful, mistaken heart! As I hope for redemption, I speak the truth. If you believe me, take me to your hearts again, and let me live in them as I know I once lived!"

As he once lived! as he had always lived! They cluster round him, and kiss him, and sob over him. Had he not been saved from the deep-ay, and from greater perils-to comfort them? And they put his little daughter in his arms, who asks, hearing that he was her father, "Has God sent my father back? God is very good."

O good faithful mother! can this great bearded man be your son? Not often can such a cluster of loving hearts be seen-faithful to each other, believing in each other's goodness and purity, in face of terrible adverse circumstance. Their faithfulness is a proof of their own worth. To the pure all things are pure. But hush! for Minnie's last words; Dan is reading them aloud.

"I have learned, too late, the consequences of my fault. But I, and I alone, am to blame. No one knew it; no one suspected it; no one aided me in it. I am writing this upon a page of Dan's Bible, and it seems to me like an oath. I cannot live long. I am dying. But a long-life's devotion could not repay Joshua's brotherly care. All good angels guard him and you! If Joshua is preserved to give you this-and I believe he will be-think, while you read it, that my spirit is near; and forgive me, dear Dan and Ellen. My love to you both, and to good Mrs. Marvel and Joshua's father; and to Susan, who must have no bad thoughts of Joshua. God bless you, and send you happiness!

"Minnie."

Dan and Joshua sit talking together until late in the night. Ellen and Mr. and Mrs. Marvel are sitting up also, but in another part of the house. They know that Dan wants to speak to Joshua of Minnie, and they leave the friends undisturbed.