Part 2 (1/2)

'I could tell better if I was up there.'

'Come, then.'

'How?'

'Do you not see the ladder?'

'Ah, yes,--Jacob had a ladder, I remember; he comes up this way, I suppose?'

'He does not; but I wish he would.'

'Undoubtedly. But you are not Leah all this time?'

'I am Silver, as I told you before; I know not--what you mean with your Leah.'

'But, mademoiselle, your Bible--'

'What is Bible?'

'You have never read the Bible?'

'It is a book, then. I like books,' replied Silver, waving her hand comprehensively; 'I have read five, and now I have a new one.'

'Do you like it, your new one?' asked Waring, glancing towards his property.

'I do not understand it all; perhaps you can explain to me?'

'I think I can,' answered the young man, smiling in spite of himself; 'that is, if you wish to learn.'

'Is it hard?'

'That depends upon the scholar; now, some minds--' Here a hideous face looked out through one of the little windows, and then vanished. 'Ah,'

said Waring, pausing, 'one of the family?'

'That is Lorez, my dear old nurse.'

The face now came out on to the balcony and showed itself as part of an old negress, bent and wrinkled with age.

'He came in a boat, Lorez,' said Silver, 'and yet you see he is not Jacob. But he says he is tired and hungry, so we will have supper, now, without waiting for father.'

The old woman smiled and nodded, stroking the girl's glittering hair meanwhile with her black hand.

'As soon as the sun has gone it will be very damp,' said Silver, turning to her guest; 'you will come within. But you have not told me-your name.'

'Jarvis,' replied Waring promptly.

'Come, then, Jarvis.' And she led the way through a low door into a long narrow room with a row of little square windows on each side all covered with little square white curtains. The walls and ceiling were planked and the workmans.h.i.+p of the whole rude and clumsy; but a gay carpet covered the floor, a chandelier adorned with l.u.s.tres, hung from a hook in the ceiling, large gilded vases and a mirror in a tarnished gilt frame adorned a shelf over the hearth, mahogany chairs stood in ranks against the wall under the little windows and a long narrow table ran down the centre of the apartment from end to end. It all seemed strangely familiar; of what did it remind him? His eyes fell upon the table-legs; they were riveted to the floor. Then it came to him at once,--the long narrow cabin of a lake steamer.

'I wonder if it is not anch.o.r.ed after all,' he thought.

'Just a few shavings and one little stick, Lorez,' said Silver; 'enough to give us light and drive away the damp.'