"Ezekiel Green sailed the _Betsy King_--" enlightened Sidney.
"Old Zeke? Why, sure as spatter! Well, well! I might say I was brought
up on stories about Zeke Green. My father overhauled the _Betsy King_
for Zeke. Zeke's folks any folks of yours?" turning suddenly to Sidney.
Sidney explained that they were--that she was Sidney Romley of
Middletown, going now to visit her Cousin Achsa, whom she had never
seen and of whom she knew little.
"You don't say. My, my, comin' all this way. So Achsa's livin', is she?
Zeke's boy died, near as I can remember. I rec'lect a benefit they had
for his widow. She was a Wellfleet girl. Seems to me she died, too.
Yes, she did--suddenly, when her baby was born. Can't rec'lect whether
the baby lived or not. Don't pay much time to those things, don't have
to for Elizy does it well enough for the two of us. Ain't anything on
the Cape Elizy misses. Comes to me though that I heard her say
something about that kid--sure does. I remember that benefit like it
was last night. I'd just come ashore from a long v'yage and was rigged
from t'mast to mizzen for a night at Potter's with the boys and Elizy
puts me into a b'iled shirt and makes me hitch up the hoss and drive to
that benefit. I guess I ought 'er remember it."
He was too deep in his own reminiscences to observe the effect of his
words upon Sidney. So Cousin Asabel was dead! And they had had a
benefit for his widow. Sidney did not know just what a benefit was but
the sound of the word connected it in her brain with the League and the
mortgage. She wished Cap'n Phin Davies could remember whether the baby
had lived or not.
"If it had lived--I mean that baby--how old would it be, now?"
"Oh--yes--the baby. Let's see. That benefit must a' been all a' sixteen
or seventeen year ago. It was the last trip I made on the _Valiant_.
Yep, the last. Elizy'd know for sartin sure, though. Ain't many dates
she can't remember down to the minit. There's somethin' about that kid
of Green's I've heard Elizy tell--" He turned suddenly to Sidney:
"You're comin' down to this part of the country to visit what's left of
your folks hereabouts and you don't know nothin' 'bout them? Seems to
me some one ought 'a shipped with you. Now I wish 'twas Elizy and me
you was comin' to visit. I sartin' do. Elizy likes little girls--we've
often wished we had a boat's crew of 'em. What's the use I tell her of
havin' a house as big as a four-masted schooner and nary a chick or a
child in it. I tell you, you ask your auntie or whatever she is to let
you come over and stay a spell with us. Wellfleet ain't so far. I'll
tell Elizy. You'll come, now, won't you? Anyone can tell you which is
Phin Davies' house--ain't any much finer on the Cape."
"Is it square--and white--and on an eminence?"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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