CHAPTER XXVI
_In Which it Seems that an Axe and Terry Lute's Finger Are Surely to Come into Injurious Contact, and Terry Lute is Caught and Carried Bawling to the Block, While His Mother Holds the Pot of Tar_
In Tom Lute's cottage beyond Come-Along Point of Amen Island they wereready for the operation. There was a thick, round billet of birch,upended in the middle of the kitchen floor, to serve as a block for theamputation; and the axe was sharp, at last--at hand, too, but concealed,for the moment, behind the pantry door--and a pot of tar was warming onthe kitchen stove.
Sandy Lands had reported for duty, whom nothing but a sense of duty haddrawn to a hand in the surgical assistance--a bit perturbed, as hecontemplated the task of restraining the struggles of a violent littlesubject, whose temper he knew, but sturdy and resolved, his resolutionsubstantiated by a sort of religious austerity.
Black Walt Anderson, a gigantic, phlegmatic fellow, who would havesubdivided into half a dozen little Terry Lutes, also awaited thesignal to pounce upon the Little Fiddler of Amen Island, imprison hisarms, confine his legs, subdue all his little struggles, in short, bearhim to the block and flatten his hand and spread his fingers for thesevering blow.
It was to be a simple operation--a swift descent of the axe and a quickapplication of hot tar and bandages to stifle the wound. And that was tobe the end of the finger and the trouble.
There had been a good deal of trouble. Terry Lute's sore finger was asource of brutal agony. There had been many days of this pain--athrobbing torture in the finger and hand and arm. And Terry hadpracticed deception in an heroic degree.
No pain (said he); but, ah, well, a twinge, now an' again--but nothin'at all t' make a man complain. An' sure (said he), 'twas better all thewhile--improvin' every blessed minute, sir. A day more (said he) wouldsee the boil yield t' mother's poultice; an' a fortnight would see unall healed up an' the finger able for labour again.
It was in the night that Terry could conceal the agony no longer--deepin the night, when his mother sat beside the cot; and then he wouldcrawl out of bed, stow his slender little body away in his mother'sarms, put his head down and cry and moan without shame until he hadexhausted himself and fallen into a fitful sleep.
No; it was no trifling agony for Terry Lute to withstand. And he knewall the while, moreover, that the cut of an axe--no more, it might be,than a flash--would eventually relieve him. Terry Lute was not afraid ofthe pain of the thing they wanted to do. That was not the inspiration ofhis infuriated rebellion.
There was nothing mistaken in the intention of the axe. It was neithercruel nor blundering.
Amen Island lies remote: the folk do for themselves--they are nearlysufficient to themselves, indeed, in all the affairs of life; and whenthey fail (they say) and sorrow comes of it--well, there is failureeverywhere, too, and life leaves every man when the spirit is finishedwith its habitation. "I done the best I could!" It is epitaph honourableenough. There was no horror on Amen Island--no furious complaint of thewrongs of a social arrangement--when catastrophe came through lack ofuncommon means to stave it off.
And so when Tom Lute told old Bob Likely that when he had a job to do hewas accustomed to employ the best means at hand--he expressed in simpleterms the lesson of his habitat. This affair of Terry Lute's finger wasof gravest moment; had the finger gangrened--it must come off in haste,and the sooner the better; and an axe and a pot of tar were theserviceable instruments according to the teaching of all experience.
Doubtless doctors were better provided and more able; but as there wasno doctor to be had, and as Terry Lute was loved and greatly desired inthe flesh, and as he was apparently in peril of a sudden departure--andas he was in desperate pain--and as----
But Terry Lute would not have his finger off. From the corner, where hestood at bay, roaring in a way to silence the very gale that had nowbegun to shake the cottage, he ran to his mother's knee, as though forbetter harbour.
And there he sobbed his complaint.
"Ah, Terry, lad," his father pleaded; "'tis only a finger!"
"'Tis on my left hand!"
"You're not left-handed, son," Tom Lute argued, patiently. "You've noreal need o' four fingers there. Why, sonny, boy, once I knowed aman----"
"'Tis one o' my fiddle fingers."
Tom Lute sighed. "Fiddle fingers, son!" said he. "Ah, now, boy! You'vesaid that so often, an' so foolishly, that I----"
"I'll not have it off!"
"But----"
"Isn't no _use_ in havin' it off," Terry complained, "an' I can't spareit. This here boil----"
"'Tisn't a boil, son. 'Tis mortification. An'----"
"'Tis not mortification."
Again Tom sighed.
"Is you afeared, Terry?" said he. "Surely you isn't a pullin' littlecoward, is you? A finger! 'Tis such a simple little thing t' suffer----"
"I'm not afeared neither!"
"Well, then----"
"You may cut any finger you likes off my right hand," Terry boasted,"an' I'll not whimper a peep."
"I don't want a finger off your right hand, Terry."
"I won't have it!"
"'Tis no pleasure t' me t'----"
"I won't have a finger off my left hand!"
"I tells you, Terry, you isn't left-handed. I've told you that athousand times. What in the name o'----"
"I tells you I won't have it!"
Black Walt Anderson looked to Tom Lute for a signal. Sandy Lands rose.
"Now?" he seemed to inquire.
Tom Lute shook his head.
"That's the way we done aboard the _Royal Bloodhound_," the LittleFiddler's grandfather put in. He began to pace the floor. The tap-tap ofhis wooden leg was furious and his voice was as gusty as the galeoutside. "Now, you mark me!" he ran on. "We chopped Cap'n Sam Small'sfoot off with a axe an' plugged it with b'ilin' tar. 'Twasmortification. I knows mortification when I sees it. An' Sam Small gotwell."
He was bawling, by this time, like a skipper in a gale--being deaf, theold man was accustomed to raise his voice, a gradual _crescendo_, untilhe had come as near hearing himself as possible.
"Yes, sir--you mark me! That's what we done aboard the _RoyalBloodhound_ the year I shipped for the seals along o' Small Sam Small.We chopped it clean off with a meat axe an' plugged it with b'ilin' tar.If Small Sam Small had clung t' that member for another day he wouldhave died. Mark me! Small Sam Small would have been dropped over theside o' the _Royal Bloodhound_ an' left t' shift for hisself in a sackan' a Union Jack!"
He paused before Terry Lute and shook a lean finger under the littleboy's nose.
"Now," he roared, "you mark me!"
"I isn't aboard the _Royal Bloodhound_!" Terry sobbed.
"Ah, Terry!" This was Terry's mother. She was crying bitterly. "You'lldie an you don't have that finger off!"
"I'll die an I got to!"
"Oh, Terry, Terry!"
"I isn't afeared t' die."
"Ah, Terry, dear, whatever would I do----"
"I'll die afore I gives up one o' my fiddle fingers."
"But you isn't got----"
"Never you mind about that!"
"If you had----"
"You jus' wait till I grows up!"
Again Sandy Lands inquired for the signal. Tom Lute lifted a hand toforbid.
"Terry, son," said he, gravely, "once an' for all, now, will you----"
"No!" Terry roared.
"Oh, oh, Terry, dear!" the mother wailed, observing the preparationsthat were making behind Terry's back. "If you'd only----"
Terry screamed in a furious passion:
"Have done, woman! I tells you I won't have none o' my fiddle fingerscut off!"
It was the end. Tom Lute gave the signal. Sandy Lands and Black WaltAnderson pounced upon little Terry Lute and carried him bawling andstruggling from his mother's knee towards the block of birch in themiddle of the kitchen floor. Tom Lute stood waiting there with the axe.
As for Terry Lute's mother, she flew to th
e stove, tears streaming fromher eyes, her mouth grim, and fetched the pot of tar. And then all atonce the Little Fiddler of Amen Island wriggled out of the clutches ofhis captors--they were too tender with him--and dived under the kitchentable.
Billy Topsail, M.D.: A Tale of Adventure With Doctor Luke of the Labrador Page 28