The Bow of Orange Ribbon - Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr (best book club books of all time txt) 📗

"How merry you sing, _mijn Katrijntje_! Like a little bird you sing. What, then, is it?"

"A pretty song made by the schoolmaster, _mijn moeder. 'Oranje Boven'_ the name is."

"That is a good name. Your father I will remind to have it painted over the door of the summer-house."

"There already are two mottoes painted,--Peaceful is my garden,' and 'Contentment is my lot.'"

"Well, then, there is always room for two more good words, is there not?" And Katherine gayly sung her answer,--


"Tie the splendid orange,
Orange still above!
_O oranje boven!_
Orange still above."



IV.

"The trifles of our daily lives,
The common things scarce worth recall,
Whereof no visible trace survives,--
These are the mainsprings, after all."

"Honoured gentleman, when will you pay me my money?"

The speaker was an old man, dressed in a black coat buttoned to the ankles, and a cap of silk and fur, from beneath which fell a fringe of gray hair. His long beard was also gray, and he leaned upon an ivory staff carved with many strange signs. The inquiry was addressed to Captain Hyde. He paid no attention whatever to it, but, gayly humming a stave of "Marlbrook," watched the crush of wagons and pedestrians, in order to find a suitable moment to cross the narrow street.

"Honoured gentleman, when will you pay me my moneys?"

The second inquiry elicited still less attention for, just as it was made, Neil Semple came out of the City Hall, and his appearance gave the captain a good excuse for ignoring the unpleasant speaker.

"Faith, Mr. Semple," he cried, "you came in an excellent time. I am for Fraunce's Tavern, and a chop and a bottle of Madeira. I shall be vastly glad of your company."

The grave young lawyer, with his hands full of troublesome-looking papers, had little of the air of a boon companion; and, indeed, the invitation was at once courteously declined.

"I have a case on in the Admiralty Court, Captain," he answered, "and so my time is not my own. It belongs, I may say, to the man who has paid me good money for it."

"Lawyer Semple?"

"Mr. Cohen, at your service, sir."

"Captain Hyde owes me one hundred guineas, with the interests, since the fifteenth day of last December. He will not hear me when I say to him, 'Pay me my moneys;' perhaps he will listen, if you speak for me."

"If you are asking my advice in the way of business, you know my office-door, Cohen; if in the way of friendship, I may as well say at once, that I never name friendship and money in the same breath. Good-day, gentlemen. I am in something of a hurry, as you may understand." Cohen bowed low in response to the civil greeting; Captain Hyde stared indignantly at the man who had presumed to couple one of his Majesty's officers with a money-lender and a Jew.

"I do not wish to make you more expenses, Captain;" and Cohen, following the impulse of his anxiety, laid his hand upon his debtor's arm. Hyde turned in a rage, and flung off the touch with a passionate oath. Then the Jew left him. There was neither anger nor impatience visible in his face or movements. He cast a glance up at the City Hall,--an involuntary appeal, perhaps, to the justice supposed to inhabit its chambers,--and then he walked slowly toward his store and home.

Both were under one roof,--a two-storied building in the lower part of Pearl Street, dingy and unattractive in outward appearance, but crowded in its interior with articles of beauty and worth,--Flemish paintings and rich metal work, Venetian glasses and velvets, Spanish and Moorish leather goods, silverware, watches, jewellery, etc. The window of the large room in which all was stored was dim with cobwebs, and there was no arrangement of the treasures. They were laid in the drawers of the great Dutch presses and in cabinets, or packed in boxes, or hung against the walls.

At the back of the store, there was a small sitting-room, and behind it a kitchen, built in a yard which was carefully boarded up. A narrow stairway near the front of the store led to the apartments above. They were three in number. One was a kind of lumber-room; a second, Cohen's sleeping-room; and the largest, at the back of the house, belonged to the Jew's grandchild Miriam. There was one servant in the family, an old woman who had come to America with Jacob. She spoke little English, and she lived in complete seclusion in her kitchen and yard. As far as Jacob Cohen was concerned, he preserved an Oriental reticence about the women of his household; he never spoke of them, and he was never seen in their company. It was seldom they went abroad; when they did so, it was early in the morning, and usually to the small synagogue in Mill Street.

He soon recovered the calmness which had been lost during his unsatisfactory interview with Captain Hyde. "A wise man frets not himself for the folly of a fool;" and, having come to this decision, he entered his house with the invocation for its peace and prosperity on his lips. A party of three gentlemen were examining his stock: they were Governor Clinton and his friends Colden and Belcher.

"Cohen," said Clinton, "you have many fine things here; in particular, this Dutch cabinet, with heavy brass mountings. Send it to my residence. And that Venetian mirror with the silver frame will match the silver sconces you sold me at the New Year. I do not pretend to be a judge, but these things are surely extremely handsome. Pray, sir, let us see the Moorish leather that William Walton has reserved for his new house. I hear you are to have the ordering of the carpets and tapestries. You will make money, Jacob Cohen."

"Your Excellency knows best. I shall make my just profits,--no more, no more."

"Yes, yes; you have many ways to make profits, I hear. All do well, too."

"When God pleases, it rains with every wind, your Excellency."

Then there was a little stir in the street,--that peculiar sense of something more than usual, which can make itself felt in the busiest thoroughfare,--and Golden went to the door and looked out. Joris Van Heemskirk was just passing, and his walk was something quicker than usual.

"Good-day to you, Councillor. Pray, sir, what is to do at the wharf? I perceive a great bustle comes thence."

"At your service, Councillor Golden. At the wharf there is good news. The 'Great Christopher' has come to anchor,--Captain Batavius de Vries. So a good-morrow, sir;" and Joris lifted his beaver, and proceeded on his way to Murray's Wharf.

Bram was already on board. His hands were clasped across the big right shoulder of Batavius, who stood at the mainmast, giving orders about his cargo. He was a large man, with the indisputable air of a sailor from strange seas, familiar with the idea of solitude, and used to absolute authority. He loved Bram after his own fashion, but his vocabulary of affectionate words was not a large one. Bram, however, understood him; he had been quite satisfied with his short and undemonstrative greeting,--

"Thee, Bram? Good! How goes it?"

The advent of Joris added a little to the enthusiasm of the meeting. Joris thoroughly liked Batavius, and their hands slipped into each other's with a mighty grasp almost spontaneously. After some necessary delay, the three men left the ship together. There was quite a crowd on the wharf. Some were attracted by curiosity; others, by the hope of a good job on the cargo; others, again, not averse to a little private bargaining for any curious or valuable goods the captain of the "Great Christopher" had for sale. Cohen was among the latter; but he had too much intelligence to interfere with a family party, especially as he heard Joris say to the crowd with a polite authority, "Make way, friends, make way. When a man is off a three-years' cruise, for a trifle he should not be stopped."

Joanna had had a message from her lover, and she was watching for his arrival. There was no secrecy in her love-affairs, and it was amid the joy and smiles of the whole household that she met her affianced husband. They were one of those loving, sensible couples, for whom it is natural to predict a placid and happy life; and the first words of Batavius seemed to assure it.

"My affairs have gone well, Joanna, as they generally do; and now I shall build the house, and we shall be married."

Joanna laughed. "I shall just say a word or two, also, about that, Batavius."

"Come, come, the word or two was said so long ago. Have you got the pretty Chinese _kas_ I sent from the ship? and the Javanese _cabaya_, and the sweetmeats, and the golden pins?"

"All of them I have got. Much money, Batavius, they must have cost."

"Well, well, then! There is enough left. A man does not go to the African coast for nothing. _Katrijntje, mijn meisje_, what's the matter now, that you never come once?"

Katherine was standing at the open window, apparently watching the honey-bees among the locust blooms, but really perceiving something far beyond them,--a boat on the river at the end of the garden. She could not have told how she knew that it was there; but she saw it, saw it through the intervening space, barred and shaded by many trees. She felt the slow drift of the resting oars, and the fascination of an eager, handsome face lifted to the lilac-bushes which hedged the bank. So the question of Batavius touched very lightly her physical consciousness. A far sweeter, a far more peremptory voice called her; but she answered,--

"There is nothing the matter, Batavius. I am well, I am happy. And now I will go into the garden to make me a fine nosegay."

"Three times this week, into the garden you have gone to get a nosegay; and then all about it you forget. It will be better to listen to Batavius, I think. He will tell us of the strange countries where he has been, and of the strange men and women."

"For you, Joanna, that will be pleasant; but"--

"For you also. To listen to Batavius is to learn something."

"Well, that is the truth. But to me all this talk is not very interesting. I will go into the garden;" and she walked slowly out of the door, and stopped or stooped at every flower-bed, while Joanna watched her.

"The child is now a woman. It will be a lover next, Joanna."

"There is a lover already; but to anything he says, Katrijntje listens not. It is at her father's knee she sits, not at the lover's."

"It will be Rem Verplanck? And what will come of it?"

"No, it is Neil Semple. To-night you will see. He comes in and talks of the Assembly and the governor, and of many things of great moment. But it is Katherine for all that. A girl has not been in love four years for nothing. I can see, too, that my father looks sad, and my mother says neither yes nor no in the matter."

"The Semples are good business managers. They are also rich, and they approve of good morals and the true religion. Be content,