by Van Reid
The handsome young man released Cordelia once she had regained her balance. He nodded with mock formality. “Thank you!” said she, stepping aside for foot traffic as onlookers recommenced their activities.
“My pleasure,” said the young man, who did not suffer from close scrutiny—indeed, he was a list of good looks: dark brown eyes, a straight nose, strong jaw, and curly black hair. (Horace, still leaning against the nearby piling, thought it was the young fellow’s pleasure indeed, and let out a short sneezelike laugh.)
“Thank you!” said the portly gentleman to Cordelia.
Cordelia laughed, one hand over her heart. “It’s a wonder I didn’t pull us both off.” (“I was so surprised!” said Maven Flyce, though no one seemed to hear him.)
The portly man laughed with her. “If I hadn’t attempted to walk on air . . . ! Sir,” he said to the young man, who was backing away, “I am much indebted to you for rescuing this young lady to whom I am indebted.”
The young man bowed again, and Cordelia was aware, suddenly, of the woman waiting for him a few feet away. The older man raised a hand to tip his hat before realizing it wasn’t there. The woman smiled as her companion took her arm, expressing both humor and admonishment with the lift of an eyebrow. They disappeared amongst the pedestrians on the wharf.
He only glanced back once.
“I am indebted, miss,” said the portly fellow, reaching in vain for his hat again. A remarkable jollity flashed behind his spectacles. One could believe that smiles came easily to his round face. He was in the flush of his middle age; his eyes were dark, and what small fringe of hair left to him was chestnut brown. He stood on short legs and his round shoulders shook when he laughed.
“Oh, dear,” he chuckled, but his humor stopped short with an involuntary sound of pain when he turned to find his dropped valise. He stood precariously on one foot for a moment and waggled his right ankle.
“You’ve been hurt,” said Cordelia, touching him gently on the shoulder. The man’s pained expression disappeared as he regarded the beauty before him. The green eyes and slightly upturned nose, which was dusted with freckles, struck him first; then the moderate mouth lit with fine teeth, the delicate chin and dark eyebrows. From beneath a simple straw hat, her red hair had come loose on one side. She was small boned and the hand that she held up to him was slim and graceful.
“Oh, no, my dear,” he assured her, “it’s fine.” But his smile had a wry quality to it as he tested the suspect ankle. Hoping to appear at ease, he bowed. “Tobias Walton, at your service.”
“Cordelia Underwood, at yours,” said she, not fooled by his gallant denial. She held her hand out and grasped his firmly. She had taken notice of the two men watching this scene just a foot or so away—one grinning candidly, the other staring open-mouthed.
“Your hat’s on its way,” said Horace McQuinn.
“Excuse me?” said Mister Walton.
Horace pointed down at the water, and when they looked over the side of the wharf a swimmer was just reaching the ladder, the wayward hat between his teeth. In another minute a sailor—stripped to the waist, barefoot, and dripping—gained the top of the ladder.
“You have rescued my hat!” announced Mister Walton. “Why, I shall be indebted to the entire city before lunch.” He took the proffered article and barely stopped himself from putting it soaking upon his head.
“Pardon me, ma’am,” said the sailor, who seemed awkward, suddenly, with his lack of clothing. He glanced toward Horace, recognized him, and gave him a nod. Then he turned about and took a splendid dive from the wharf.
“Oh, my!” said Cordelia.
“Dear me,” said Mister Walton. “I would have liked to have given him something for rescuing my hat.”
“He should be careful,” said Horace, peering after the diver. “There are old pilings down there.”
There was nothing about either Horace or Maven that encouraged a reply from Cordelia, but Mister Walton waggled his wet hat, by way of salute, and said a cheery “Good day.” In another moment he and the young woman were moving toward the street, chatting happily as if they had known each other for years. Mister Walton limped slightly, as they disappeared in the crowd.
“Well, I never!” exclaimed Maven, and he was quite sure that he hadn’t.
Horace regarded his friend for some moments, gazing at Maven’s extraordinary cowlick as if noticing it for the first time. Suddenly, he said:
“My land!” said Maven. “I don’t know how you do it!”
“That fellow came as near as he could to swimming without getting wet,” said Horace, his extemporized verse already forgotten.
“He was kind of baffled,” suggested Maven.
“Now he’s losing his baggage.”
“What?”
“Forgot that bag of his,” informed Horace.
Maven looked, but the valise was not where Mister Walton had left it.
“That young fellow seems to have taken a liking to it,” said Horace, indicating with a slight incline of his head a ragamuffin figure disappearing with Mister Walton’s valise into the passing crowd.
“Hey!” shouted Maven. The boy turned his head and saw Maven with his neck craning and his cowlick waving in the air. The boy’s jaw dropped and his eyes widened—then he was gone, the bag with him. “Goodness sakes, Horace!” said Maven. “It’s been clapped and run off with right under our eyes!”
“Why don’t you go get it, Maven?” suggested Horace.
Maven’s already wide eyes widened considerably. He stretched his head forward like an angry rooster and finished off this expression with his own rendition of a determined frown. Though he lived his life in a state of perpetual astonishment, Maven seldom astonished himself. He did just that, however, by wading into the crowd in pursuit of the thief.
“Pardon me,” he said as he stepped on a sailor’s foot, and “I’m very sorry,” upon kicking the cane out from under an elderly gentleman, and “I can’t tell you how doleful this makes me,” when given a harsh glare from a matron whose feathered hat he had dislodged. His path through the traffic was punctuated with a sort of bobbing gait, so that Horace was able to monitor his friend’s progress by continued sightings of Maven’s cowlick.
Maven, by means of these vertical oscillations, was attempting to catch sight of his quarry; what he caught instead were inquisitive, even suspicious, glares from other pedestrians. A dog, fascinated with Maven’s eccentric progress, separated itself from its owner and barked at the pursuer’s heels. The crowd thinned unexpectedly, and Maven had a brief glimpse of Mister Walton’s valise dwindling before him just as he fell over a wheelbarrow.
He traveled in this conveyance for several feet, in the company of a large sow, before the stevedore trundling them dropped wheelbarrow and all in a shuddering halt and filled the air with waving arms and a cloud of foreign verbiage. Effusive with apologies, Maven attempted to shake the dog’s teeth from his pant cuff, and shouted abruptly as the sow nudged him lovingly in a ticklish place.
“Haste causes difficulties,” said Maven to himself, deciding that furtive creeping might win what speed and agility could not. So adopting a posture of stealth—head down, knees bent—he dragged the growling dog after him through the crowd.
Leaning against his piling, Horace continued to track Maven’s activities by noting the migration of confusion and indignation down the length of the Custom House Wharf. He could not see exactly what transpired, but he could imagine well enough. A lad appeared, sent by Mister Walton to find his valise, and Horace told the fellow what he knew. He had little hope of the bag’s recovery.
He was surprised, therefore, a good half an hour later, to see Maven emerge from the traffic on the quay with the valise in hand. His hair was wilder than before, and he was missing a good portion of one pant leg, but the look of wonderment on his face was as plain as ever.
“Gory, Hod!” said Maven. “I have never, I promise! I caught the bag and lost the thief! Goodness sakes! I
had to explain the whole thing to a passing law officer. He made me pick up everything I knocked over!”
“Funny how people meet,” said Horace McQuinn to a respectable-looking fellow who happened to stand, for a moment, beside him.
The man looked down his nose at Horace. “I haven’t the slightest idea what you’re talking about, sir.”
“That’s just what I mean,” said Horace.
2 Pigs, Not Contraband
AS JAMES AND MERCIA STEPPED FROM THE STREET INTO THE CUSTOM House, their senses were assailed by the thunder of business within. The smokes of many cigars and pipes were accumulated in a blue haze; and the shouts and orders that echoed in the cavernous interior had more the quality of the barking of dogs than the speech of men. To the unschooled eye, all was chaos—captains of ships and captains of industry coming and going between knots of gesticulating activity, inspectors mulling over cargo manifests or stamping documents with their official approval, messengers scurrying between correspondents.
There were lines before each of the clerk-windows, and James led the way across the marble tiles to the shortest of these.
“What is wrong, Mr. Underwood?” rose a voice above the general din. A figure separated itself from the crowd and approached James and his wife.
“Wrong, Mr. Pue?” asked James Underwood.
“Wrong,” said that man. “Untoward. What is wrong with this establishment?”
James saw, now, that the question was academic. He smiled. “I have always found the Portland Custom House a model of efficiency, Mr. Pue—especially under the influence of your administration.”
“You are very kind, sir,” said Mr. Pue. “But you have not observed.”
Nathaniel Pue, official customs inspector, was as neat a man as you could want for such a job—from his dress, to his posture, to the cut of his hair and the trim of his beard. He was not tall, but this attribute lent him an air of brevity that must be admired in any public official. He did not seem short, but compact. Somewhere between forty and fifty, he was a handsome man—carrying himself with the authority of the latter age, and looking the former, despite a hairline that had answered its own call to brevity.
James exchanged an amused glance with his wife and looked about the main room of the Custom House—at the marble countertops and tall, light-filled windows. For a moment, he was baffled; then he caught sight of the flags at either end of the room.
“You are not decked out, Mr. Pue,” said Mercia, before James could speak.
“No Fourth of July bunting, Mr. Pue?” asked James.
“It’s well you should ask,” said the man. “Mr. Prie!”
“Yes, sir,” said a young man, who stepped up to Mr. Pue’s side.
“Mr. and Mrs. Underwood, here, have noticed a certain deficiency in our institution,” informed Mr. Pue.
The young Prie did his best to hide his exasperation. “Yes, sir. The decorations have been ordered and should arrive within the hour.”
“A model of efficiency, Mr. Underwood,” said Mr. Pue, with some irony. He left his subordinate and led the way back to the hall. “Sir, ma’am—if you would come with me, I have kept your claim under my personal supervision. Mr. Prie, please send two of the boys to my office!”
James turned for a moment, before following the customs inspector, and winked at Mr. Prie. The young man smiled, a short laugh escaping him.
“A governmental establishment should be festive on such an occasion, don’t you think, Mr. Underwood?” wondered Mr. Pue as he led the way up the stairs.
“It does seem reasonable.”
“He’s a good lad.” The inspector paused at the first landing and turned to regard them. “A cast-iron pot on one side of his head and a sieve on the other. He can remember the document number of a six-month-old manifest, and couldn’t tell you what day of the week it is. Yes, Mr. Murning?”
A clerk standing at the bottom of the stairs said: “There is a discrepancy in one line item of the Humboldt’s cargo list.”
“After working here awhile, Mr. Murning,” said the inspector, “you will find that most manifests need some adjustment. If only a single item is off, then Captain Pelf has made a good account indeed. Does it amount to more than five percent of said item?” inquired the inspector.
Mr. Murning stared into his eyebrows in search of a calculation. Then his face cleared, and he said: “Yes, sir.”
“Does it look like contraband?”
“Contraband?”
“Might he be harboring distillates—drink, man, alcohol!”
“It’s pigs, sir.”
“Pigs?”
“Small ones. Pound-wise it might not be more than five percent.”
“What are you talking about, Mr. Murning?”
“There were three litters born since they left Charleston.”
“Charleston pigs,” said Mr. Pue, as if committing the phrase to memory.
“Pigs do have litters, don’t they?” asked the clerk.
“You can’t stop them, Mr. Murning. Record the discrepancy as acquired in transit.”
“In transit?”
“It’s either that or an act of God.”
The clerk frowned and shook his head before hurrying back to his desk in the bustling main room. “Charleston pigs,” said Mr. Pue again, before continuing up the stairs to the second floor. “One never knows, ma’am,” he added, with a glance in Mercia’s direction.
“I’m sure one doesn’t, Mr. Pue.”
Another clerk met the inspector at the door to his office. “The constable at Yarmouth has reported several crates, with the name Castalanara on them, washed up on the beach there.”
“That will be the wreck off Cape Cod, last March. Take the first train down and make an accurate accounting. Find what sort of claim has been made for the registry.” Having answered “Yes, sir,” while his superior listed the details of his mission, the clerk hurried down the stairs.
“Will there be anything to claim?” asked the inspector as he ushered the Underwoods into his office ahead of him.
“I have no idea what’s in the chest, Mr. Pue,” said James. “It contains my brother’s personal effects.”
Mr. Pue nodded. “I met your brother, once. Under memorable circumstances. Yes, Mr. Prie?” he asked of the young man, who stood, out of breath, at the door.
“The decorations have arrived, Mr. Pue.”
“Well, raise the flag! No, the flag is raised. Raise the bunting, then—or hoist it, or whatever you do.”
“Yes, sir,” replied the clerk, and he was gone.
“It’s quiet here in the winter,” averred the inspector. “There it is,” he said, pointing.
The trunk stood under a tall window in the office; such a wandering object that it looked at home even in this temporary place. James had the fleeting fancy that Basil’s sea chest would fit in any nook or corner that it briefly occupied, but that it would grow out of place the longer it remained in one spot. It was typical of its sort, but he imagined that he would recognize it amongst a hundred like it. Mr. Pue had placed it in plain view, not in a dimly lit corner, or behind a desk, but where it might hold court in his bright office. Looking past it, out the window, they could see Portland’s Observation Tower on Munjoy Hill.
“Thought it must be your brother’s. His initials are spelled out in brass studs on the top.”
“Thank you,” said James. “We appreciate your looking after it for us.”
“Not at all. When I was a clerk, years ago, I was coming off a ship one night, after a day of reconciling a list of goods, and I heard a commotion in one of the holding sheds on the wharf. It wasn’t very wise of me, but I was young, and I surprised three men rifling the unclaimed stowage. About as hard a looking crew as you would want to startle, and I was sort of sorry for it.
“Captain Underwood happened by just then. Poked his head in, saw what was about, and asked the three burglars for help with his trunks—calm as church on Sunday. They helped him, too. H
e gave them a lecture for a tip and sent them on their way. Wyatt Earp never handled himself with such ease. Got into his carriage and drove off without a backward glance.
“I was kind of worn out after that one. Never did get to thank him properly. Just sign right there, Mr. Underwood.” Mr. Pue had found the proper document on his desk. He dipped his pen and handed it to James.
“Thank you, Mr. Pue,” said James as he signed the paper. “I hadn’t heard from my brother in a long time.”
There was a sound of fluttering behind the inspector and he turned to see a stream of red, white, and blue rippling outside the window. “Ah, the bunting,” said Mr. Pue. “Won’t do without it. The holiday must be served. The lad can get some work done when he puts his mind to it, but I think he’s in love.”
“One never knows, Mr. Pue,” said Mercia.
“I’m sure one doesn’t, ma’am.”
Cordelia watched with amused sympathy as Mister Walton took stock of his waterlogged hat. “Do you know of a good haberdasher, Mister Walton?”
“If Alfred Hill is still in business, yes.”
“His son, I think.”
“Ah, yes. Well, it has been some years.” He elected to carry his hat in his hand, and continued to falter down the wharf on his sore ankle. Cordelia took his arm and managed to lend him support without appearing to do so. He was grateful for her assistance and not unconscious of the quiet manner in which she rendered it. It occurred to him then that, except for himself, she was without escort.
“My parents have business at the Custom House, Mister Walton,” she said, seeming to read his mind.
“The wharfs can be a dangerous place, Miss Underwood. Why, when I was a lad, I once—”
“Oh, there’s a scad of people about, and I’m not shy with this,” she said, raising the point of her furled parasol. To several people, frowning suspiciously as they moved in the opposite direction, it looked quite like a weapon as she brandished it before her.
“I am sure,” said Mister Walton with a smile.