Chapter VI

Althea’s parting admonition as she drove down the sandy road bound for Abington was:

“Now, Asaph, you’ll do the best you can with the Dolphin till I get back, won’t you?”

And then she disappeared behind the curving shore and was lost in the depths of the plumy-tipped pines crowding one another for a peep at the highway.

Asaph was still half resentfully pondering her injunction when Lemmy Gill’s droning whistle reached his ear and his crony was seen turning in at the gate.

Now for the last two days Lemuel had been occupied carting kelp from the beach to spread as fertilizer on his lawn, and therefore tidings of Althea’s proposed visit had escaped him. Hence in high good humor he hailed Asaph with the jovial salutation:

“Well, at last the great day’s come, Asaph. It’s certainly a prime one for business, I’ll say that. The Dolphin couldn’t set sail under a fairer sky. I s’pose Althea’s in the seventh heaven.”

Lemuel knew all about the Green Dolphin, oh, yes, indeed! Had he not followed its progress step by step? He always knew everything with which Asaph Holmes was concerned, and Asaph expected he would. But today, for some reason the Captain’s leisurely attitude toward life and the inquisitive gleam in his sharp blue eyes irritated his comrade, who turned away and began bustling about the piazza in the hope of conveying the impression that he was too busy for gossip.

“Althea’s gone away,” he called over his shoulder with crisp brevity.

“Gone--gone away!”

“Yes. She had to go up to Abington.” He imparted the news in offhand fashion struggling to make it appear that such visits were every-day events and that he regarded them as matters of no importance.

But Lemuel Gill was neither to be rebuffed nor deceived.

“Land alive!” ejaculated he, drawing nearer and dropping expectantly down on the steps. “Must have been somethin’ magnitudinous that would coax her to Abington today. I s’pose the Tylers are in the fryin’ pan again. Wouldn’t you know that Sarah’d contrive to get herself into hot water just when ’twas least convenient? What’s the matter now?”

When Lemuel Gill wished to know a thing he adopted the direct method of asking; and if this means failed to bring forth the information he sought, he asked again. He saw no reason why he should not, since for almost thirty years Asaph’s affairs had been quite as much his property as his own. Did he not reciprocate the courtesy by recounting to his colleague all his doings? He had, to be sure, little to tell, for Lemmy’s horizon was not an extended one. How many eggs his Plymouth Rocks laid each day; what he had had for supper; the number of buds on his Regal lilies; the size of the lobsters caught in his traps; these together with the gossip picked up at the store formed the boundaries of his world. Nevertheless, had he been blessed with weightier concerns he would as unreservedly have prattled them into Asaph’s listening ear.

Such being the case, it was beyond his understanding that the advent of a woman should in any way interfere with the former arrangement. To condone with his comrade as he habitually had done seemed only to be expected; and when the misfortune included wife as well as husband, why, his interest was simply doubled.

Meanwhile, Asaph, the apex of the triangle, found his position a far less complicated one to maintain. On the one hand was Lemmy, who, sensitive as a girl, was deeply wounded by even a hint of reticence on his part; on the other was Althea, reserved to the verge of secretiveness, in whom the discovery that every thought emanating from her mind, every observation that crossed her lips, was passed on to Lemuel Gill, awakened a disconcerting degree of indignation.

“I do wish, Asaph, you hadn’t told Lemuel about my makin’ over my weddin’ dress, an’ how I painted the furniture in our bedroom. It’ll be all over town. You tell him everythin’ that goes on in this house, I do believe.”

Her husband did not refute the charge.

“Lemmy’s interested,” replied he mildly.

“’Tain’t likely he cares hearin’ how I managed to eke out my sleeves,” retorted Althea sharply.

“Yes, he does.”

“Well, I ain’t goin’ to tell him,” protested his wife with spirit; “Lemuel Gill’s a perfect sieve; whatever goes in his ears comes straight out his mouth. He’ll retail every word told him down at the store before nightfall.”

“I don’t believe so,” came from Asaph.

“Well, whether he does or not I don’t want you should babble to him all our doin’s. What goes on in this house is no concern of Lemuel Gill’s.”

For an instant the man was silent.

“I’ve always been in the habit of tellin’ Lemmy everythin’,” he said presently. “Were I to stop doin’ it now ’twould hurt his feelin’s. Besides, he never does any harm with what he hears.”

“Didn’t he go blabbin’ all over Belleport about the Dolphin before the paint was dry on the tables?”

“He did kinder spread the news around. But that was only ’cause he was tryin’ to help. Remember you did worse yourself, Althea--you put all about the tea-shop in the newspapers.”

“That was different. I was advertisin’.”

“So was Lemmy. There ain’t a better advertiser to be found in town. Tell him what you want told an’ he’ll strew the tidin’s about like wildfire.”

“Tell him what you don’t want told an’ he’ll strew ’em just as far.”

“Not always,” corrected Asaph stoutly. “There’s things wild horses couldn’t drag out of Lemuel. He ain’t, for instance, ever uttered a word about the dance your Uncle Ben led the family, or how he skipped to Mexico with the money from the Allentown bank.”

The blood shot scarlet to Althea’s cheeks.

“He knew?” she whispered.

Asaph nodded.

“Some feller who came down here from Boston told him. But Lemmy’s never mentioned it to me an’ ’twas only by accident I found he’d heard the story. A corkscrew couldn’t twist it out of him.”

Althea’s expression softened.

“Lemuel Gill may go round boastin’ how smart you were to cut over your dress so’st ’twould look like new; but you’ll never find him breathin’ to a soul any scandal of Uncle Ben an’ how he ended up.”

The wife turned away. She had fineness enough to appreciate the distinction contained in Asaph’s defense of his friend. Moreover, she was born with sufficient worldly wisdom to realize that her family escutcheon was in Lemmy’s hands to sully or leave spotless as he saw fit. The result was that henceforth she seldom cautioned her husband as to what information he should or should not impart to Captain Gill.

Nevertheless, the episode served as a warning, and when Asaph found himself confronted by opposing loyalties, the devil on the one hand and the deep sea on the other, he exercised as great a degree of prudence and restraint as Lemuel Gill would permit him to.

Such a dilemma now faced him.

At the thought of Althea’s desertion Lemmy could scarcely contain his ire. He stood primed to take up the cudgels in his friend’s defense, and assert in no uncertain terms that she who had instigated the Green Dolphin should have remained at home and attended to it. Asaph saw war in his eye, and admitted that even a less interested person would doubtless have held the same view. It did seem reasonable.

Evidently Lemuel sensed that right was on his side and had no intention of surrendering his ground.

“What’s got the Tylers that they must see Althea today?” persisted he, after he had waited a proper length of time and received no answer to his first question.

Inwardly Asaph sighed. There was no help for it. Unless Althea was to be misjudged and berated he must divulge the facts.

“Teddie’s had a fall an’ has to go to the city for an X-ray.”

“Humph! I don’t see what Althea can do about that.”

“Sarah wanted she should come up an’ keep house for the family while she took the little chap to a Boston hospital.”

“Keep house!” blazed the Captain. “Keep house! An’ in the meantime what’s to become of her own place an’ this infernal Dolphin? Who’s to look out for them, I’d like to know? What’s Althea thinkin’ of? She can’t clear out an’ leave you high an’ dry now.”

“But she has cleared out.”

“She’s gone already?”

Timidly Asaph nodded.

“An’ ain’t comin’ back today?”

“She feared she mightn’t be back for a week. There’s reasons why--”

“My soul! What in mercy does she think is goin’ to become of her tea-shop in the meantime? Ain’t she advertised it in ’most every newspaper on Cape Cod? I’ve read the notices--trudged way up to the village readin’ room a-purpose to see ’em in print:”

“‘_The Green Dolphin will open June first for tea an’ light
refreshments. Hours three to six. Come for a quiet hour to the Sign
of the Dolphin, Shore Road, Belleport._’”

“Quiet hour!” broke in Asaph. “Did she say that? She ain’t givin’ ’em leave to stay an hour, is she?”

“Oh likely that was just her way of wordin’ it,” consoled Lemuel on witnessing his companion’s horror. “Most of ’em wouldn’t want to stay an hour anyway. City folks can’t sit still that long; they have to keep movin’.”

“But if she’s promised ’em they can stay an hour they’ll have the right to,” insisted Asaph, his sense of equity to the fore. “’Twouldn’t be square to shoo ’em out short of their full time. It’ll mean dishin’ ’em gallons of tea, though.”

“Oh, they won’t be drinkin’ tea all that time,” was Lemmy’s answer.

“But what’ll be the use of their hangin’ round here if they ain’t?”

“They’ll be lookin’ at the view, smellin’ your flowers--”

“She didn’t tell ’em they could do that, did she?” cried the man indignantly.

“No, not in so many words.”

“Then I sha’n’t let ’em,” snapped out Asaph. “Smellin’ my flowers! I guess not. I ain’t goin’ to have every Tom, Dick, an’ Harry treadin’ my garden down an’ mebbe spoilin’ it.”

“I don’t blame you for feelin’ so,” agreed Captain Gill. “If folks was to go pickin’ them irises of yours now--”

“They ain’t goin’ to pick ’em,” shouted his crony. “Ain’t I sent far an’ wide to get them plants? There ain’t a garden anywhere round here that has so many kinds of iris as mine. My iris an’ my hollyhocks can’t be beat. Roses I ain’t so much on. That feller up to Bridgewater has me skun to a finish. Still I ain’t so bad on Ramblers; an’ my Silver Moon will reach the ridgepole this season, see if it don’t. How’s yours doin’, Lemmy?”

“Growin’ like a queen. Some of the blossoms are a good seven inches across.”

“Huh!”

“What?”

“I just said nonsense. You can’t stuff me with a yarn like that. No Silver Moon livin’ ever had a seven-inch blossom.”

“Mine has.”

There was no reply.

“I tell you it has!” blustered Captain Gill in a louder tone.

“There, there, Lemmy--don’t go gettin’ het up. Have it your own way,” soothed his peaceable host.

“You don’t believe it, though.”

“I didn’t ’xactly say that.”

“But you don’t, do you?”

A menacing silence followed.

“In other words you put me down for a liar. All right, Asaph Holmes. If that’s your ratin’ of me I may’s well go back where I come from.”

Magnificently the Captain rose and drawing his spare little figure up to the last quarter inch he strode with dignity toward the gate.

“You might at least have told me your Madonnas had come out,” called he in an aggrieved tone as he passed into the road.

“I didn’t know they had,” declared Asaph hurrying after him. “I’ve been so upset about Althea goin’ I forgot to look at ’em.”

“They’re out--every durn one of ’em,” exclaimed Lemmy, forgetting his anger in the excitement of the moment. “Even the little sickly one that we thought was goin’ to dry up an’ not blossom at all is bloomin’ like a star. Did you ever see a prettier sight? How white they look against the sky! That big one on the second stalk must be full as large as my Silver Moon rose,” concluded he magnanimously.

“It can’t be,” protested the delighted gardener, who, proud as a father glimpsing his first son, triumphantly surveyed the flower.

“Yes, it is--every mite. How much should you say it measured across?” pressed Lemmy.

“I don’t know. Five inches, mebbe.”

“I reckon that after all my rose ain’t bigger’n that,” admitted the horticulturist. “Sizes are misleadin’.”

“So they are.”

For an interval the two men stood bending over the lilies, drinking in their perfume. Then as if nothing had occurred Captain Gill wheeled about and sauntered with his friend back to his place on the steps.

“Say, Asaph, how you goin’ to manage without Althea?” questioned he, abruptly.

“I don’t know,” confided the proprietor of the Dolphin, ignoring in his turn the recent unpleasantness. “She was of the opinion that folks wouldn’t be comin’ for tea much at first. You know it always takes the public a while to get started on a new idea. In case, though, anyone should straggle in she baked a lot of cake an’ stuff an’ I’m to give ’em that.”

“Most likely nobody’ll come,” was the comforting retort. “Should they heave in sight remember you can signal me. I can brew tea an’ coffee that’s good as anybody’s; an’ I can turn out a rip-snorter of a clam chowder--if I do say it myself.”

“I’ll back your chowder makin’, Lemmy,” attested his friend. “You have the world beat on that dish. I’d like some this minute.”

“What do you say we go dig a bucket of clams an’ make one?” suggested Lemuel, catching up the idea. “’Twould seem like old times. We ain’t had a chowder together--I don’t know the day. The tide’s goin’ out an’ ’twill be low water soon. Let’s make a spree of it. Come on over to my shack with your pail an’ fork an’ we’ll stew up such a chowder as never was!”

“Oh, I couldn’t do that, Lemmy,” objected Asaph. “What would become of the Dolphin?”

“Lock it up.”

“Althea wouldn’t like it.”

“Why not?”

“Somebody might come.”

“Let ’em pound. If you warn’t here you’d be saved that much trouble.”

“They might break in an’ take somethin’.”

“You ain’t carin’ if my things are stole,” responded Lemuel, reproach in his tone.

“They wouldn’t be. Who’s goin’ to wade waist high through a jungle of tick grass an’ sand to overhaul a shanty that ain’t ever locked day or night, an’ that’s been invitin’ thieves to come an’ carry it off for the last quarter century? But it’s different with the Dolphin. Everybody knows Althea must have laid in knives, forks, an’ spoons, an’ while I ain’t boastin’ they’re solid silver, still they’re skun over with it thick enough to attract some mean cuss.”

“So you ain’t goin’ to have the chowder after all.”

“Sure I’m goin’ to have it,” contradicted Asaph, unable to endure the disappointment in Lemmy’s face. “You didn’t think I intended to give it up, did you? No, siree! Only we’ll make it here, Lemmy, instead of over to your place. We’ll dig the clams an’ shuck ’em in our shed. I’ve pork, crackers, potatoes, and onions in the house, an’ luckily plenty of milk, too. I’ve got all the fixin’s right in the pantry.”

Lemuel beamed until his beady blue eyes threatened to be swallowed up.

“You know, now I come to think of it, that Silver Moon rose of mine ain’t a mite more’n four inches across,” announced he irrelevantly.