"Tim, why be'n't I like other boys?"
Tim looked up bewildered, but the grave, anxious countenance was bent intently watching his own, and Dallas gave him no help with his answer.
"Like Manasquan boys?" sharpening his wits. "Why so you be, Dallas. Only for your house here, and your crockery and bottles; and," reflectively, "then you've got no mother or sisters belonging to you. All of us has them. That's a difference."
Dallas made no reply, but he suddenly turned his face away. He did not hide it, however, from the sharp eyes that were on him. Tim's face flushed as he saw it. "You're kinder than the other big boys, Galbraith," quickly. "There be'n't one in the village that has as many friends as you. You be the only one that won't lie or drink, the women says. I don't heed the stories they tell. Nobody heeds them. You kin look anybody in the face, Dallas."
"So they tell stories, do they?" with a sad, slow smile. After a long pause, he said, as if thinking aloud, "There never was such good men as here, Tim. I never was in a church till I came here. No. Laddoun took me in that first evening. I didn't understand old Father Kimball, but it was so quiet there, under the hill, with the trees out side. The hymn too—it was a tune that; well, I'd heard that tune long ago. And coming out, the men was so friendly. When Laddoun told them my name, they nodded in their sober way and spoke very friendly to me, first one and then another, goin' through the woods. I'd often thought, when I was a little chap, if I could come across God, He'd be something like that. Quiet and friendly. Not asking where I'd been, or what I'd done, or about things I'd no share in bringing on myself." The words came out slow, unconscious, the reasonable, grave eyes still fixed on the fire. "It's been the same with Manasquan people ever since," after a short silence. "They've treated me as if I was one of themselves. There's not one of them has told me of the difference between us."
Tim's black eyes grew keener. "What be the difference, Dallas?"
The simple, credulous face turned, and the answer came quickly. He was talking to the child just as he would havereasoned with himself if he had been alone.
"Sometimes I think there be'n't any. You boys will grow up men just like them, and you say, Tim, I be like the other boys. But sometimes it seems as if I weren't allowed a chance like every man has. It weren't by my will that I was born—down there. It weren't my fault that. No matter," hastily rising. "I'm doing the best I can here. God knows I want to be a decent, God-fearing man like your father, or Father Kimball. I never knowed men like them. And if I'm dragged back now—It seems as if there was something agin me in the world. I doubt it's too strong for me," lifting his arms, and letting them fall.
"You look strong enough to fight anything, Galbraith," said Tim, encouragingly. "Who be you afraid of? The Quaker?"
Dallas walked to the window and glanced out. "It be time you were off, little 'un. It's after eight. Your folks 'll be in bed, and all Manasquan besides. I'll leave the light in the window. Now! Make a run for it." He stood in the door to watch the little chap cross the woods, giving him a cheer to keep his spirits up.
The cheer and the cold sea air brought himself up out of the slough, as a stroke on the face will make a man feel his strength all over his body. Whatever this something was which had been against him, ordering his birth and childhood in vice and poverty, it faded now out of sight.
"Strong enough to fight anything," Tim had said. Was that true? After all, what had he to complain of? He was a strong, athletic boy, standing in the door of the home he had made for himself. He looked over his shoulder at his bottles, picks, retorts, and laughed. Nothing makes a man feel his footing so sure in the world as to know his right work, and have it well gripped in his hands for life. And everybody was so
