Uncle William/Chapter 6

T was Indian summer. Uncle William was mending his chimney. He had built a platform to work on. Another man would have clung to the sloping roof while he laid the bricks and spread the mortar. But Uncle William had constructed an elaborate platform with plenty of room for bricks and the pail of mortar, and space in which to stretch his great legs. It was a comfortable place to sit and look out over Arichat harbor. Andy, who had watched the preparations with scornful eye, had suggested an arm-chair and cushion.

“I like to be comf’tabul,” assented Uncle William. “I know I do. I don’t like to work none too well, anyhow. Might as well be comf’tabul if you can.”

The platform was comfortable. Even Andy admitted that, when Uncle William persuaded him to climb up one day, on the pretext of advising whether the row of bricks below the roof line would hold. It was a clear, warm day, with little clouds floating lightly, as in summer. Andy had climbed the ladder grumbling.

“Nice place to see,” suggested Uncle William.

Andy peered down the chimney hole. “You will have to take off the top row all around,” he said resentfully.

“Ye think so, do ye? I kind o’ thought so myself. They seemed sort o’ tottery. But I thought mebbe they ’d hold. Sit down, Andy, sit down.” He pushed the pail of mortar a little to one side to make room.

Andy edged away. “Can’t stop,” he said. He was searching with his foot for the ladder.

“What you going to do?” demanded Uncle William.

Andy glanced at the sky. “I ’m going to take in the Andrew Halloran.” He was already on his way down the ladder.

Uncle William pursued him, peering over. “You ’ll have to have me to help ye, Andy. Can’t you jest wait till to-morrow—till I get my chimbley done?”

“You ’ve been a month now,” said Andy. He was glowering at the bay and the little boat bobbing below.

“I know it, Andy, I know it.” Uncle William was descending the ladder with slow care. “But I don’t want my mortar to freeze, and I ’m kind o’ ’fraid of its comin’ off cold again to-night. I was jest goin’ to begin to hurry up. I was goin’ to begin to-day.”

“I can get along without you,” said Andrew, doggedly.

“Why, no, you can’t, Andy. How you goin’ to haul her up?” Uncle William spoke reproachfully.

Andy moved away. “I can do it, I guess.” He was mumbling it to his teeth. “I don’t need anybody’s help.”

With a sigh and a look of affection at the platform and the pail and the blue sky above, Uncle William followed him down the rocky path.

They worked busily all the morning, towing in the Andrew Halloran, cleaning her up and stowing away tackle, making her ready for the winter.

In the afternoon Uncle William mounted the roof again. His face, under its vast calm, wore a look of resolve. He looked thoughtfully down the chimney hole. Then he sat down on the platform and took up his trowel. He balanced it on his palm and looked at the pile of bricks. His gaze wandered to the sky. It swept the bay and came back across the moors. A look of soft happiness filled it; the thin edges of resolve melted before it. “Best kind of weather,” murmured Uncle William, “best kind—” His eye fell on the pile of bricks and he took up one, looking at it affectionately. He laid it in place and patted down the mortar, rumbling to himself.

When Andy came by, half an hour later, three bricks were in place. Uncle William nodded to him affably. “Where goin’, Andy?”

“How much you got done?” demanded Andy.

Uncle William looked at it thoughtfully. “Well, there ’s quite a piece. Comin’ up?” he said hopefully.

“It don’t show any.”

“No, it don’t show much—yet. It ’s kind of down below.—Think we ’re goin’ to have a change?” The tone was full of hopeful interest.

Andy nodded. “Freeze inside of twenty-four hours.”

Uncle William scanned the horizon.

“When you calculatin’ to finish?” asked Andy.

“Well, I was thinkin’ of finishin’ to-night.”

Andy’s gaze sought the sun.

Uncle William took up another brick.

Andy seated himself on a rock. He had done a good day’s work. His conscience was clear; and then William worked better when Andy was around, and Andy took pride in it. “Where ’d you get your bricks?” he asked.

Uncle William looked at the one in his hand. “I wheeled them over from the Bodet cellar-place. The’ ’s quite a pile left there yet.”

“They all good?”

“Putty good.” Uncle William was working thoughtfully. “We ’ve set by them bricks a good many times, Andy.”

“Yep.”

“You remember the things she used to give us to eat?”

Andy swung about. “Who give us?”

“Old Mis’ Bodet.”

Andy’s eye lighted. “So she did. I ’d forgot all about ’em.”

Uncle William nodded. “There was a kind of tart she used to make—”

Andy broke in. A look of genuine enthusiasm filled his eye. “I know—that gingery, pumpkin kind—”

“That ’s it. And you and me and Benjy used to sit and toast our toes by the fire and eat it—”

“He was a mean cuss,” said Andy.

“Who Benjy? Why, we was al’ays fond of Benjy!” Uncle William’s face beamed over the edge of the roof. “We was fond of him, wa’n’t we?”

“I wa’n’t,” said Andy, shortly. “He ’d lick a feller every chance he got.”

“Yes, that ’s so—I guess that ’s so.” Uncle William was slapping on the mortar with heavy skill. “But he did it kind o’ neat, didn’t he?” His eye twinkled to his work. “’Member that time you ‘borrowed’ his lobster-pot—took it up when it happened to have lobsters in it, and kep’ the lobsters—not to hev ’em waste?”

Andy’s face was impassive.

“Oh, you was fond of Benjy!” Uncle William spoke cheeringly. “You ’ve kind o’ forgot, I guess. And I set a heap o’ store by him. He was jest about our age—twelve year the summer they moved away. I cried much as a week, off and on I should think. Could n’t seem to get ust to not havin’ him around.”

“Reckon he ’s dead by this time?” Andy spoke hopefully. A little green gleam had crept into his eye.

Uncle William leaned over, looking down at him reproachfully. “Now, what makes you say that, Andy? He don’t hev no more call to be dead ’n we do. We was both fond of him.”

Andy stirred uneasily. “I liked him well enough, but it ain’t any use talkin’ about folks that ’s moved away, or dead.”

“Do you feel that way, Andy? Now I don’t feel so.” Uncle William’s gaze was following a floating cloud. “I feel as if they was kind o’ near us; not touching close, but round somewheres. Now, I would n’t really say Benjy Bodet was in that cloud—”

Andy stared at it suspiciously.

“He ain’t really there, but it makes me feel the way he did. I used to get up kind o’ light in the mornin’, ’cause I was goin’ to see Benjy. The’ wa’n’t ever anybody I was so fond of, except Jennie—and you, mebbe.”

Andy’s gaze was looking out to sea. “You was mighty thick with that painter chap,” he said gruffly.

“That wa’n’t the same,”—Uncle William spoke thoughtfully,—“not quite the same.”

The gloom in Andy’s face lifted.

“I ’ve thought about that a good many times,” went on Uncle William. “It ’s cur’us. You get to know folks that ’s a good deal nicer than your own folks that you was born and brought up and have lived and quarreled with,—and you get to know ’em a good deal better some ways—but they ain’t the same as your own.”

Andy’s face had grown almost mild. “I guess that ’s right,” he said. “Now there’s Harr’et—I ’ve lived with Harr’et a good many year.”

Uncle William nodded. “She come from Digby way, didn’t she?”

“Northeast o’ Digby. And some days I feel as if I wa’n’t even acquainted with her.”

Uncle William chuckled.

Andy glanced at the sun. “I must be gettin’ home. It ’s supper-time.” His gaze sought the ridge-pole. The few rows of bricks set above its line gleamed red and white in the sun. “You won’t get that done to-night.” The tone was not acrid. It was almost sympathetic—for Andy.

Uncle William glanced at it placidly. “I reckon I shall. There ’s a moon, you know. And this is a pleasant place to set. It ought to be quite nice up here by moonlight.”

He set and watched Andy’s figure down the road. Then he took up the trowel once more, whistling. The floating cloud had sailed to the horizon. It grew rosy red and opened softly, spreading in little flames. The glow of color spread from north to south. A breeze had sprung up and ruffled the bay. Uncle William glanced at it and fell to work. “Andy ’s right—it ’s goin’ to change.”

He worked till the cold, clear moon came over the hill behind him. It shone on the chimney rising, straight and firm, above the little house. By its light William put on the finishing touches.