CHAPTER XV. JACK STAPLES.
|Professor Puffer had a grievance. He had sent on board a good supply ofwhisky--sufficient to last him through the voyage--but the greater partof this had mysteriously disappeared. Whether it had been carried to thewrong vessel or not could not be ascertained. At any rate, he had to dowithout it, and this to a man of the professor's tastes was a greatdeprivation.
He was quite ready to buy some, and applied to the captain, but CaptainSmith had no more than he desired for his own use. He occasionallyinvited the professor to take a glass, in his own cabin, but this by nomeans satisfied Mr. Puffer. The enforced abstinence made him irritable,and he vented this irritation on Bernard, with the result of making theboy shun his company.
"Where do you keep yourself all the time?" asked Professor Puffer, oneafternoon. "I haven't seen you for hours."
"Have you any work for me to do?" asked Bernard hopefully.
"No. I shall do no work on board ship."
"Would you like to have me read to you?"
"You may read the morning paper if you can find one," sneered theprofessor.
But it appeared that Professor Puffer had nothing for him to do, and hadonly complained of his absence because he was irritable, and wantedsomething to find fault with.
Bernard made the acquaintance of one of the sailors, Jack Staples, whowas a stout, good-humored man of thirty. He possessed a shrewdintelligence that interested Bernard, and he often chatted with himabout his Vermont home.
"How came you to go to sea?" asked Bernard one day.
"Well, you see, my father died and my mother married again. You neverhad a stepfather, I take it."
"No; my mother died when I was a baby, and my father when I was fiveyears old."
"That was bad luck."
"Yes," answered Bernard gravely.
"I think," said Jack, shifting his quid of tobacco from one cheek to theother, "that I was about fifteen when my mother told me that she haddecided to marry Mr. Stubbs. Stubbs kept a grocery store in the village,and passed for a man well to do. My mother had about two thousanddollars, left by my father, and she did some dressmaking, while I didchores for the neighbors, and sometimes worked on a farm, so thatbetween us we made a comfortable living, and always had enough to eat.When mother told me that, I felt very much upset, for I didn't like Mr.Stubbs, who was a mean, grasping man, and I tried to get her off thenotion of marrying him. But it was of no use. She said she had given herword.
"'Besides,' she added, 'we haven't got much money, Jack, and Mr. Stubbssays he will support, us both in comfort.'
"'Are you going to give him your money, mother?' I asked.
"'Well, yes, Jack. Mr. Stubbs says he can use it in his business, and hewill allow me interest on it at the rate of six per cent. You know Ionly get five per cent in the savings bank.'
"'It is safe in the savings bank,' I said.
"'And so it will be with Mr. Stubbs. He is a good, honorable man.'
"'I don't know about that. All the boys in town dislike him.'
"'He says they tease him, and steal apples and other things from thestore,' she replied.
"'I don't like the idea of having such a man as that for my father.'
"'He is going to put you into his store, and teach you business, andmake a man of you,' she said.
"I made a wry face, for I knew of one or two boys who had worked forStubbs, and complained that he had treated them like niggers. However, Isoon found that it was no use talking to mother, for she had made up hermind and I couldn't alter it. In a month she changed her name to Stubbs,and we went to live at the house of my stepfather.
"I soon found that he lived very meanly. We didn't live half so well asmother and I had before she married, although our means were small. Iwent into the store, and I never worked so hard in my life. I went tobed tired, and I got up at five o'clock in the morning, feeling moretired than when I went to bed. Presently I needed some new clothes, so Iwent to mother, and asked for some. She applied to Stubbs, but herefused to get them for me..
"'The boy is proud,' he said. 'He wants to look like a dude. I won'tencourage him in such foolishness.'
"'He really needs some new clothes,' pleaded mother.
"'Then he can buy them himself,' he returned.
"'I will buy some out of my interest money,' said mother.
"'Your interest isn't due,' he said shortly.
"'You might advance me a little,' she returned 'Say, ten dollars.'
"But he wouldn't do it, and while I am on the subject I may as well saythat he never did pay her the interest he promised. Of course he had togive her a few dollars now and then, but I don't think it amounted tomore than thirty or forty dollars a year, while she was entitled to ahundred and twenty."
"He must have been a mean man," said Bernard, in a tone of sympathy.
"Mean was no name for it. I tried to get him to pay me wages, no matterhow small, so that I could have something to spend for myself, but itwas of no use. He wouldn't agree to it. Finally I told mother I couldn'tstand it any longer; I must run away and earn my own living. She feltbad about having me go, but she saw how I was treated, and she cried alittle, but didn't say much. So I ran away, and when I reached Boston Itried to get a place. This I couldn't do, as I had no friends and no oneto recommend me; and finally, not knowing what else to do, I shipped asa sailor."
"Have you ever been home since?"
"Yes, I went two or three times, and I always carried some money tomother, who needed it enough, poor woman! Finally I went home two yearssince and I found that my mother was dead;" and Jack wiped away a tearfrom his eye. "I don't think I shall ever go there again."
"And did Mr. Stubbs keep your mother's money?" asked Bernard.
"You may be sure he did. But it didn't do him much good."
"How is that?"
"His store burned down. Some say it was set on fire by an enemy, and hehad plenty. It wasn't insured, for the insurance company had increasedits rates, and Mr. Stubbs was too mean to pay them. Then in trying toput out the fire--it was a cold winter night--he caught a bad cold whichbrought on consumption, and finally made him helpless. Would you like toknow where he is now?"
"Yes."
"He is in the poorhouse, for all his means had melted away. The man incharge is about as amiable as Stubbs himself, and I have no doubt he hasa pretty hard time of it. I don't pity him, for my part, for he made mymother unhappy, and drove me to sea."
"I am sorry for you, Jack. Your luck has been worse than mine. My fatherand mother are both dead, but as long as they lived they fared well."
"No one ever tried to rob them of money, as my mother was robbed of hersmall fortune?"
"I don't feel sure of that," said Bernard thoughtfully.
"What do you mean?"
Then Bernard told Jack what he had heard from Alvin Franklin about hisfather's having had money, and of his suspicion that Mr. McCracken hadappropriated it.
The story made an impression on Jack Staples.
"I shouldn't wonder if you were right, Bernard," he said. "He seems tohave treated you in a queer way. What sort of a man is this ProfessorPuffer?"
"I don't know much about him."
"Do you like him?"
"No."
"I'll tell you what--he looks to me like my stepfather."
"I am puzzled about him," said Bernard. "He doesn't look in the leastlike a literary man, or a professor."
"That's so."
"Then I find he is intemperate. I haven't been able to learn anythingabout his business, or studies, but he is fond of whisky. Do you know,Jack, I don't believe I shall be content to stay with him very long."
"Is he a friend of your guardian?"
"I suppose so."
"Are you to get any pay?"
"Twenty-five dollars a month and my expenses."
"That is good--if you get it."
"Don't you think I will?"
"I don't think you'll get it any more than my mother got her int
erest."
"Then I certainly shall not stay with him."
"But what can you do? You will be in Europe."
"I don't know, Jack, but I think I shall get along somehow."
"To my mind your guardian had some object in putting you with such aman."
"Perhaps so, but I may be doing Mr. McCracken an injustice."
"If ever you get into trouble, Bernard, don't forget that Jack Staplesis your friend. I have got a few dollars stowed away in a bank at home,and they are yours if you need them."
"I will remember it, Jack, and thank you, whether I need them or not."
A day or two later something happened that made Bernard still moresuspicious of his guardian and Professor Puffer.