Captain's Folly

LONG ago the Bay folks named it Captain’s Folly, that great white house whose tightly shuttered windows, like so many sightless eyes, stare vainly out across the Inlet to the big green water. It was built for Captain Dory Ibbens, and his was the folly. Of course, there was more than the mere building of the house to earn it such a name. It was a good house, nobly placed. In all the length of Barnegat, from Absecon to the Matedecong, one can find no more pleasing site than the bold, bare top of Whaleback Hill.

No, it was not with the building of the big house that his folly began. It was when he married for the second time that he took the first step. As for the good folks of Cedarton, they fairly gasped when Monyah became Mrs. Dory Ibbens. He in the sixties and she but twoand-twenty! Oh, it was a tender morsel for a community that could criticise the color a man painted his front steps.

No one blamed Monyah. What else, pray, was a practically homeless girl to do when a rich old fool asked her to marry him ? But of Captain Dory Ibbens they had expected more wisdom. In fact, when he had finally come ashore for good, they had no hesitation at all in deciding exactly what he ought to do. He had made his fortune, had he not ? His ships sailed to all quarters of the globe. Reluctant as he might be to quit it, he was getting too old for the quarter-deck. He should settle down somewhere on dry land, smoke his pipe, take his ease, draw his dividends, and let the world wag. That was the way others had done under like circumstances. His few old friends welcomed him as one whose race had been run. They made room for him in a corner of the sleepy Maritime Club, indicating that he was free to play at whist and checkers, to bear his part in endless nautical debates, as long as he lasted.

Captain Ibbens did not accept this programme. He was past sixty, to be sure. He had seen forty years of sailoring, weathering typhoons in the Indian Ocean, thrashing heavily cargoed ships through wintry seas around the Horn, or lying becalmed off the fever coasts. Now he was done with the sea. But he was no dismantled old hulk, fit for nothing better than to ground keel amid the harbor sedges. If he must cast anchor he wanted mid-channel, at least, for a berth; a place where he could feel the tides come and go and hear the wind sing through the taut rigging. In this mind he opened what he was pleased to call a shipping-office, and took rooms at the Cedarton House.

One winter of living at a village hotel quite prepared Captain Ibbens for something desperate. It was almost as bad as visiting around among relatives with whom he felt barely acquainted. Many a time did he long to be back in the snug quarters of his after cabin with his own steward to wait on him, and his first and second mates for company.

Only Monyah saved the situation from absolute dreariness. She soon learned how he liked his breakfast eggs and coffee, preparing them herself when the cook declined to take suggestions. Three times a day she greeted him with that cheery smile of hers; for Monyah, you see, was the dining-room waitress at the Cedarton House. This was because her uncle’s hotel was the only place which she could call home. If she chose to wait on table instead of idly accepting her bread, who was there to think the less of her? Not the folks of Cedarton. They were unused to drawing lines of caste. Not Captain Ibbens. He recognized the aristocracy of a ship’s deck and of nothing else.

Monyah’s smile at the grim old captain was entirely impersonal. On all the world Monyah smiled just because, even though there was no great wisdom in her head, there was much sunshine in her heart.

Having seeing eyes, Captain Ibbens noted the healthy bloom on Monyah’s cheeks, the graceful curves of Monyah’s figure, the sweetness of Monyah’s voice, and, above all, the hearty cheerfulness of Monyah’s smile. So Captain Ibbens visited a fashionable city tailor, and arrayed himself in shore togs such as Cedarton seldom saw save on summer visitors. He had his gray hair and mustache trimmed in the mode. He discarded his heavy sea-boots for light patent leather shoes. He took to wearing posies on his coat lapel.

At this stage Cedarton, not being in the secret, was proud of him. To strangers he was pointed out, as he walked jauntily down the street, tall, erect, well-groomed, pink - cheeked, with such enlightening phrases as,—

“That’s Cap’n Ibbens, sir. Retired,— big shipowner, — guess he’s wuth nigh onto half a million.”

There is no doubt, too, that Monyah admired, that she was flattered by his friendship. Not that Monyah was unused to attention. The young men of Cedarton knew a pretty face and a trim figure. More than one had told her as much. In the gold locket which she sometimes wore was a tiny photograph. But then, where was Sidney Carter now ? It had been three, almost four, years since she had heard from him. That was the way with the boys of Cedarton. The best of them went away to the big cities, and those who stayed had no better prospects than that of remaining clerks in the Cedarton stores. Sidney Carter had gone away and prospered, no doubt. Probably he had forgotten her. Monyah wept a little sometimes, as she opened the locket and looked at the frank, boyish face which smiled up at her. This was foolish, and she knew it.

So when Captain Ibbens asked her, one June morning over his coffee cup, if she would be an old man’s darling, Monyah blushed very prettily, delayed giving her answer quite long enough for modesty’s sake, and ended by telling him that she would. This she did without looking very deep into the present or very far into the future. Many another village belle has chosen less wisely.

There was a simple ceremony in the minister’s parlor, and then they slipped out of town on the noon train. Such a honeymoon trip as that no Cedarton girl ever had before or has since enjoyed. For to Captain Dory Ibbens, accustomed to three-year cruises, a journey meant a voyage around the world, at least. It was done in style, too. To please Monyah had become his business in life, and when he could do that he was happy.

Nor was Monyah difficult to please. Once she had become used to being among strangers, to new sights and scenes, she developed an adaptability which was wonderful when you consider that never before had she been more than a score of miles away from Cedarton. Paris awed her at first, but before she left it she had filled a trunk with its hats and gowns and gloves. In Japan she acquired a waitingmaid who begged that she might serve Monyah forever.

Thus, while it was the same Captain Ibbens who returned, looking a dozen years younger, the Monyah who came back with him was a personage whom Cedarton recognized with difficulty. What, this grand lady who wore such superbly fitting gowns, whose skirts rustled so, who drove about town with a Japanese maid beside her, — this the Monyah who had waited on table at the Cedarton House!

Yet Monyah smiled on them all, just as she used. There was no hint of condescension in her manner, no loftiness in her tone. She was glad to see them, glad to be back. How were all the boys and girls ? Did n’t they think her Koto was cute ? Oh, she had such lots of things to tell them.

Cedarton, however, refused to believe. She must be “stuck up,” proud, conceited. And if you look for anything hard enough, you know, you are bound to find it. Vainly did Monyah try to break through the coldness and restraint with which her old friends greeted her. What did it all mean ? What had she done ? For the heart of Monyah was as simple as ever. She had come to know the look of strange cities, the customs of strange peoples, but she was no more learned in human nature than before she went away.

But Captain Ibbens knew Cedarton and its ways. He divined the cause of Monyah’s unhappiness, and he shook his fist at those who were at the bottom of it.

“We’ll cure ’em of that,” he said to himself. “If there’s any society in Cedarton too good for Mrs. Captain Ibbens I guess we’ll find out what it is.”

Then he planned his folly. He bought Whaleback Hill with its Bay frontage, and communicated with a firm of city architects. They were delighted, they wrote. They would send a representative. They did.

“Why, it’s Sidney Carter!” exclaimed Monyah, blushing just a little as she held out her hand to him. “But I suppose you’ve forgotten me.”

Forgotten her! Oh, Monyah how could you? Some there are, to be sure, whose first love is but the beginning of a series, who progress through a kind of graded system of courtships until they acquire a matrimonial degree. Others, and they are rare souls, enshrine their first love in their heart of hearts and pay it devotion for all time. Of these last was Sidney Carter.

As a youth he had been shy and reserved. He had followed Monyah with those big, sober brown eyes of his for months before she had noticed him among her train. And even after that it had been a long period before he had revealed any hint of that love which he had declared in one sudden, passionate outburst. He was to go away the next morning, but he begged her to wait for him,

Monyah had laughed, but she had listened. She had let him kiss her, too, when they parted, and had kissed him in return. Then he had sent her the little gold locket with his picture in it, and there it had ended. Poor little gold locket! Where was it now? Monyah tried to make herself believe that she did not know. But she did. She knew the very trunk corner where it was hidden.

And she could ask him if he had forgotten! It had been almost five years now, — years of unceasing work, of discouraging failure, of ambitious endeavor, — but in all that time had he ever closed his eyes at night without thought of the smiling, fresh-cheeked girl, the Monyah whose one kiss, perhaps lightly given, still thrilled him ?

The news of her marriage to old Captain Ibbens had been a shock, of course; but, after all, he had expected that she might marry some one. She had not promised to wait, and the time had been so long. There had been so much for him to learn, so many difficulties to overcome. No, he had not expected her to wait. He had only hoped that she would. Through it all he had kept bright that youthful ideal of her. He had even smiled at the irony of fate, personified by the senior partner of the big firm in which he had won an interest, which sent him back to Cedarton to build a fine home for Monyah and her rich old husband.

Truly a fine home he made of it. All his skill of conception, all his artistic taste he employed to create on the crest of Whaleback a mansion noble enough to shelter one who had been so dear to him. Nothing of this would you have guessed, though, had you seen him discussing plans and designs with Monyah and the captain. Even Monyah did not suspect, for the thoughts and sentiments of Sidney Carter lay deep.

Almost every day during the months when the house was rising from its substantial stone foundations the old captain and his bride drove out to inspect progress, so that Sidney saw much of this full-figured, charmingly gowned woman that had developed from the simple village girl whose early graces had now ripened into what seemed to him perfection.

Most absurdly happy did they seem with the building of their new home, Captain Ibbens and Monyah. Sidney watched them as they walked hand in hand through the big, unfinished rooms. He noted the fond way in which the old captain would slyly pat Monyah’s shoulder, how his stern face would relax and soften as he looked at her. He saw the frank, grateful glances which she gave him. And Sidney Carter, seeing these things, applied himself strictly to the business of compelling the contractors to do their whole duty.

Finally it was finished. Everything was complete and in order, from the private gas plant in the great basement to the telescope mounted in the big white cupola. Sidney Carter, a deeper soberness in his brown eyes, had gone back to the city. The mansion opened its doors to receive master and mistress.

“Do you like it, Monyah ?” asked the old captain with a smile of satisfaction, for he had already read the answer in her eyes.

“Like it?” Monyah was letting her gaze roam over the polished floors, through vistas of arched doorways, along picture-hung walls. “Why, it’s grand! And you are an old dear, so there!”

For a time, too, she was very happy. But when the novelty had worn thin, when she had become familiar with all the comforts and luxuries of her new home, she realized that something was lacking. It was companionship. Of course, Captain Ibbens was there every forenoon, reading his paper, walking about the grounds, pipe in hand. But in the afternoon he drove down to his office, talked with his old friends, received reports from his shipping agents, and did not return until it was time for an early evening dinner, after which he and Monyah always sat looking out across the Bay, waiting for the first flash from the great white eye of the lighthouse, whose high tower, like a lonely sentinel, stood guard over the Inlet.

Rarely did any of the Cedarton folks take the trouble to drive over the two miles of road which led from the village to the big white house. Day after day Monyah and Koto looked in vain down the yellow sweep of the carriage drive, but the wives of the judges and doctors and other town dignitaries did not come.

It was always still and solemn up on Whaleback, save when a storm raged. Then Monyah shut herself in the cosy sewing-room, or went to bed. Only in a storm, however, did the old captain seem to feel really at home. Putting on oilskins and sou’wester, he would tramp up and down the broad veranda, watching sea and sky, just as if he were on a ship’s deck. While the storm lasted he could not be induced to leave his post. Often he spent the whole night in this manner.

Storms Monyah had always feared and dreaded. It was a storm which had taken from her both her father and her mother. Now she had an added dread of storms. They meant for her long, sleepless hours when, trembling under the covers, she could hear, during lulls in the wind, the steady tramp, tramp of the old captain. Once she tried to persuade him not to stay out, urging that it made her nervous to know that he was so exposed.

“Nonsense, little girl,” he replied. “ Don’t be silly, now. Besides, I could n’t stay inside a night like this to save me.”

It was almost the only request of hers which he had denied, and she pouted over it for a day or two. Had it been a mutiny on the high seas Captain Ibbens could not have taken the matter more seriously. In a dozen ways he tried to make reparation before he hit upon the right method.

“ I ’ll tell you what we ’ll do, Monyah,” he said one morning at the breakfasttable. “Let’s have a party, a real, big, bang-up affair.”

“Oh, shall we?” and she clapped her hands.

“Of course we shall, if you say so. We’ll fill the house full. You go ahead, little girl. Ask every one you want to and have them stay as long as you please.”

“Oh, a house party! Won’t that be splendid!”

“And, by the way, I’d like to have that young Carter down to see how the place looks when it’s full of folks. Fine young fellow that Sidney Carter has grown up to be, has n’t he ? You write and tell him to come down for a week.”

So the party was arranged. Half of Cedarton was bidden to the big house, some only for the dinner and dance, some for a few days. They all came, and Monyah won their hearts by the genuine, unaffected warmth with which she welcomed them. Never had she looked prettier than in the simple evening gowns which she wore then, her cheeks flushed with excitement, her eyes brilliant, and that cheery smile for every one. And Captain Dory Ibbens, looking taller and more erect than ever in his first broadcloth clawhammer, his cheeks as pink as Monyah’s,his gray-blue eyes as clear,seemed, for all his white hair, no unfitting figure beside her.

A certain pride in them both did Sidney Carter take. Truly, this stanch, dignified, hale old sea captain, who bore his years so jauntily, was well worthy of her youth and beauty. This great house, too, with its lights and flowers and many guests, was an appropriate setting for such a jewel, a setting which he could not have given.

Yet, for all this most honorable attitude, he dared not trust himself to look too long at the charming picture made by Monyah as she moved from group to group. He knew that during the past few weeks when he had been in his city office he had thought of her too much and too often. He had tried to believe that his love was all for the simple, girlish Monyah of the past, that it was no more than a boyish romance to which he clung. Now he knew better. He schooled his eyes to elude hers. He avoided being left alone with her. He did not even ask her to dance with him.

Perhaps you think that Monyah saw not. She was puzzled, piqued. It was not, however, until the third day of his visit, when but few guests remained, that chance threw them together and alone.

“Look here, sir,” she said in mock reproof, “I want to talk to you. Sit down here. Now tell me, are you afraid I ’ll bite you ?”

Sidney protested that he had no such fear.

“Then why do you run when I come near? Why do you look another way when I turn toward you ? In short, Sidney Carter, why do you treat me like a disagreeable stranger ? You used to like me when we went to school together — and afterward; at least you said that you did.”

One answer, complete, comprehensive, could he have made had she been simply Monyah. But she was Mrs. Dory Ibbens. So he held back the words that rushed to his tongue-tip and offered an unconvincing substitute.

“You did not dance once with me the other night,” she continued.

“But I dance as badly as ever.”

“You used to ask me once in a while, though. But that was before you went away and forgot all about me. Come, can you look me in the eye and say that you did not? Try it, sir.”

Sidney did look into her eyes, long and earnestly. Under the circumstances it was not the course of caution. One is apt to forget. Sidney forgot. He threw aside his reserve. Well, if she wished, he would play the game, hazardous though he felt it to be. He would answer smile with smile, folly with folly.

“Once,” he said, “I gave some one a locket, but I suppose she has lost it.”

“Has she? Wait and see.”

That evening Monyah wore, dangling from a single rope of pearls about her neck, a little gold locket. Also she and Sidney danced on the veranda while some one played waltzes on the piano inside. They walked together, they took long drives, they sailed on the Bay. For four days they laughed and chatted and made merry. Four delicious, golden days they were to them both. And then, suddenly, abruptly, Monyah found herself joining the captain in bidding Sidney a formal farewell. Once more she was alone in the big house on Whaleback Hill.

It was a little later than usual that afternoon when Captain Ibbens came home from the village. Monyah did not meet him at the door as usual and he went upstairs to find her. She was lying on a long, cushion-piled couch. She was asleep, but there were traces of tears on her cheeks. Held loosely in one hand was something which glittered. It was a small gold locket, open. In one side was a photograph. Captain Ibbens recognized the frank-eyed, boyish face of Sidney Carter.

Of itself this was no startling discovery, just a locket and a picture. But through a narrow window, you know, one may view a wide landscape. For a moment he stood beside her, stern, erect, motionless. Then he went softly down the stairs and sent for Koto to call her mistress to dinner. When she came down the tear stains had been washed away, the locket had disappeared.

Monyah did not watch with him that evening for the flashing of the light across the Bay. Her head ached, she said, and she was tired. So the old captain sat alone, hour after hour, seeing the stars wheel overhead and thinking, thinking.

It was along in the gray of the morning that Monyah, roused by a vague, formless dread, crept down to seek for him on the veranda. She found him in his big porch rocker, rigid and helpless, unable either to move or to call for help. Abruptly the machinery of life, which had run so smoothly for so many years, had gotten itself sadly out of gear.

They had nursed and dosed him for a fortnight before he could talk without difficulty. Then he demanded,—

“What was it, Doc?”

“Well, Captain,” said the village physician with some erudite pompousness, “it was what we call a temporary cessation of the normal functions, — a temporary cessation, mind you.”

“Huh!” growled the captain. “Common folks call it a stroke of paralysis, don’t they ?”

“ Ye-e-es, Captain, I believe they do.”

“A man who has one stroke usually has another, don’t he?”

“Well, in most cases, in most cases.”

“And about the second or third finishes him, eh?”

“Sometimes. Yet there have been instances where ” —

“Oh, damn your instances! When can you put me on my feet ?”

The physician hastened to assure him that he would be walking around within a week, but it was two before Captain Ibbens was hobbling about the veranda, using a cane for the first time in his life, and leaning on Monyah’s arm. She was at his side constantly, reading his paper to him, filling his pipe, telling him the news of the town, offering every moment some new proof of her tenderness and solicitude.

Persistently she attempted to renew his faith in that rugged constitution which had carried him into the sixties with a springy step. In this she was making some progress when one day she persuaded him to drive into the village with her. As they were returning he caught sight of one of his old friends.

“There’s Pop Sawyer on his front porch, Monyah. Let’s stop a minute till I say howdy.”

But the limp figure propped up with pillows in a big armchair answered his greeting only by a feeble waving of a gaunt hand. Mrs. Sawyer came bustling out to tell the dreary story.

“He’s had his second stroke, you know, Cap’n Ibbens, and it’s about done for him. Poor old Jim! He ain’t much like the man that used to sail mate to you, is he ?”

That encounter seemed to take from Captain Ibbens the last faint savor of life that remained. He drove home in silence. For days after he would sit before one of the big front windows of his new home, staring moodily out toward the ocean. He seemed more content when Monyah was with him, now and then turning to stroke her hair gently, or to smile sadly at her.

Quite unexpectedly he roused himself. He walked about the grounds, renewed an interest in affairs. For several days he went alone to his office in the village. There were business matters, he said, which needed his attention. Monyah was delighted with this change.

Soon after this a weather-beaten old schooner was brought around and anchored off the new wharf at the foot of the hill.

“Why, whose old schooner is that?” asked Monyah.

“That, my dear, is the old Betsy Belle. She and I began doing business up and down the coast forty years ago. She’s been beached up in Plunkett’s Cove for I don’t know how long. Thought I’d have her patched up and anchored out where I could see her, just for old times’ sake. I might want to take another cruise some time, you know,” and he chuckled a little at his joke.

Later she noticed that some one had been out to the Betsy Belle and hoisted the foresail. It was a new piece of canvas, contrasting strongly with the battered hull and time-blackened spars.

“She looks more shipshape and natural with a riding-sail on her,” explained the captain, and Monyah gave the incident no more thought.

Along toward the end of October the mild Indian summer weather came to a sudden end. The wind swung from the south into the northeast, driving in from the sea dull, slate - colored, low-hanging banks. Monyah and the captain were sitting at one of the big windows watching the gathering storm.

“Monyah, child,” he said, taking one of her hands in his, “do you remember how Pop Sawyer looked when we saw him not long ago ?”

“Yes, dear; poor old fellow!”

“Do you know, Monyah, he is hardly more than a year older than I, but we — Well, we’re started on the same road.”

“Oh, don’t! Don’t say that!”

“There’s no use denying it, little girl. I’ve tried to, but I can’t. No, I can’t, Monyah, and I — I don’t want to go like that. I hope I sha’n’t. If I go quicker, in some other way, you must n’t mind, child. Just remember that I was glad to — to go differently.”

“Let’s not talk any more about such things, dear. You are going to get well this winter, you know, and next spring we’re going to travel again.”

Captain Ibbens patted her hand fondly, but he shook his gray head.

“We will see, Monyah, we will see. You have been a good little wife to me, dear. You have made me very happy. But after I am gone I want you to feel free to find some one else, some one you can love and who will love you, who will make you happier than I have. If you do find some one like that you will take him; promise me that you will, Monyah.”

“No, no, no!” She was sobbing protestingly, her arms about his neck.

“Yes, Monyah, but you must. The best of your years are yet before you, mine are almost done. You have been to me all that I could ask, but — I see it now — I could not be to you all that you deserve. So you will make the promise, dear.”

And in the end he did gain from her a faint assent.

Before Monyah went to her chamber, sad and frightened, the fury of the storm was well developed. Perhaps it was an hour later when she looked up to find the old captain, fully clad in yellow oilskins, bending over her.

“Good-night, Monyah, child,” he said huskily as he stooped to kiss her.

“Oh, you are not going to stay outside this dreadful night, are you, dear ? Please don’t!”

“I must, Monyah. It’s going to be a big storm, a grand one. And who knows, I may never see another one like this. Good-night, dear.”

She coaxed and begged that he would not go, but she could not change his purpose. Twice he kissed her, twice he said good-night. Then she heard the thump of his sea-boots as he went down the stairs and out on the veranda.

For a time she could hear him pacing back and forth, but soon even this slight comfort was lost to her. The northeaster let itself loose. On the closed shutters the gale-driven rain was beating out the long roll of the storm’s muster call. Against the stone embankment on the Bay front she could hear the waves dashing, and from the outer beach, four miles away, came the deep-toned thunder of great breakers.

Just how he went about it the Bay folks have never fully agreed. The only witnesses were the lightkeeper and his assistant, who, under the shadow of the hood, happened to be watching the yeasty cauldron of the Inlet just as a schooner, the loosened peak of her foresail, like a madman’s arm, waving a crazy salute, and her leeward deck buried to the cabin windows, drove seaward through the great rollers. Lashed to the wheel was a tall, erect figure in oilskins.

“The glasses, Jim!” shouted the lightkeeper. And when he had stared through the binoculars for a moment, “Great God, man! It’s old Cap’n Dory Ibbens in the Betsy Belle! Look!”

Somewhere near midnight,— this is the accepted theory, — when the northeaster was at its worst, he had rowed out to the old schooner, dropped the peak of her riding-sail, let the anchor cable go by the run, trimmed in the sheet, and put out close hauled almost into the very teeth of the gale. How far he reached out to sea no one can say, but it is evident that he kept the light in view. Probably off Sunken Rocks, where they catch the big blues, he came about and squared away for the beach.

That the old hulk should have held together as she boiled home before that sixty-mile-an-hour snorter was a miracle. Skid Everett, the Coast Guard who first sighted her, said that at times, when the wind ballooned her sail up and out, it almost seemed to lift her clear of the water, and the next minute it would jam her down until he thought she had gone to the bottom all standing.

They fired rockets, burned all their Coston lights, to no effect. Still the schooner raced shorewards, straight for the North Point, where old Neptune’s white horses charged up on the beach until they almost leaped into the Bay beyond. When she finally did strike the shoal it was with a bang that snapped her rotten stays as if they had been so much thread, sent both her sticks crashing over her bows, and split her hull into a dozen pieces.

Thus did Captain Dory Ibbens enter that vast, uncharted sea of the world beyond, a roaring northeaster piping his triumphant requiem, the whole Atlantic for a winding sheet.

The great white mansion on Whaleback Hill — Captain’s Folly, as the Bay folks call it — still stands empty, its shuttered windows staring blindly out toward the open sea whence the sternfaced old sailor, laying a straight course for Kingdom Come, drove the Betsy Belle ashore on that wild October night.