Part 50

A little later a man strolled past, hands behind his back. He was placidly smoking a cigar, and, though the dusk had deepened, Mayo could perceive that he was attired with some pretensions to city smartness.

“I beg your pardon, sir,” called the young man. “But do you know anything about the inwardness of this business on Hue and Cry Island?”

“I can tell you all about it,” stated the person who had been hailed. He sauntered up and sat down on the edge of the porch. He showed the air of a man who was killing time. “I'm in charge of it.”

“Not of putting those people off the island?”

“Sure! That's what I'm here for. I'm state agent on pauper affairs, acting for the Governor and Council.”

“You say the state is back of this?” demanded Mayo, incredulously.

“Certainly! It's a matter that the state was obliged to take up. State has bought that island from the real heirs, has ordered off those squatters, and we shall burn down their shacks and clear the land up. Of course, we allow heads of families some cash for their houses, if you can call 'em houses. That's under the law regulating squatter improvements. But improvements is a polite word for the buildings on that island. It is going to cost us good money to clear up for that New York party who has made an offer to the state--he's going to use the island for a summer estate.”

He flicked the ashes from his cigar and broke in on Mayo's indignant retort.

“It had to be done, sir. They have intermarried till a good many of the children are fools. The men are breaking into summer cottages, after the owners leave in the fall. They steal everything on the main that isn't nailed down. They have set false beacons in the winter, and have wrecked coasters. Every little while some city newspaper has written them up as wild men, and it has given the state a bad name. We're going to break up the nest.”

“But where will they go?”

“Fools to the state school for the feeble-minded, cripples to the poorhouse. The able-bodied will have to get out and go to work at something honest.”

“But, look here, my dear sir! Those poor devils are starting out with too much of a handicap. After three generations on that island they don't know how to get a living on the main.”

“That's their own lookout, not the state's! State doesn't guarantee to give shiftless folks a living.”

“How about using a little common sense in the case of such people?”

“You are not making this affair your business, are you?” asked the commissioner, with acerbity.

“No.”

“Better not; and you'd better not say too much to me!” He rose and dusted off his trousers. “I have investigated for the Governor and Council and they are acting on my recommendations. You might just as well advise nursing and coddling a nest of brown-tail moths--and we are spending good money to kill off moths. We don't propose to encourage the breeding of thieves. We are not keeping show places of this sort along the coast for city folks to talk about and run down the state after they go back home. It hurts state business!” He marched away.

Captain Mayo strode up and down the porch and muttered some emphatic opinions in regard to the intellects and doings of rulers.

“You see, I know the sort of people who live on that island, Miss Candage. I have seen other cases alongshore. They are blamed for what they don't know--and what they are led into. Amateur missionaries will load them down in a spasm of summer generosity with a lot of truck and make them think that the world owes them a living. The poor devils haven't wit enough to look ahead. When it comes winter they are starving--and when children are hungry and cold a man will tackle a proposition that is more dangerous than a summer cottage locked up for the winter. Next comes along some chap like that state agent, who prides himself on being straight business and no favors! He puts the screws to 'em! There's nobody to help those folks in the real and the right way. I pity them!”

“I live in the country and I know how unfeeling the boards of selectmen are in many of the pauper cases. When it's a matter of saving money for the voters and making a good town record, they don't care much how poor folks get along.”

Mayo continued to patrol the porch. “I'm in a rather rebellious state of mind just now, I reckon,” he admitted. “Seems to me that a lot of folks, including myself, are getting kicked. I'm smarting! I have a fellow-feeling for the oppressed.” He laughed, but there was no merriment in his tones. “It's the little children who will suffer most in this, Miss Candage,” he went on. “They are not to blame--they don't understand.”

“And of course nothing can be done.”

“Nothing sensible, I'm afraid.” He walked to and fro for many minutes. “You see, it's none of my business,” he commented, when he came and sat down beside her.

“I suppose there's not one man in the world to step forward and say a good word for them,” said the girl, softly, uttering her thoughts.

“Words wouldn't amount to anything--with the machinery of the state grinding away so merrily as it is. But this matter is stirring my curiosity a little, Miss Candage. That's because I am one of the oppressed myself, I reckon.” Again his mirthless chuckle. “I intended to take the stage out of here in the morning, but I have an idea that I'll stay over and see what happens when that gentleman who represents our grand old state proceeds to scatter those folks to the four winds.”

“I was hoping you would stay over, Captain Mayo.” She declared that with frank delight.

“But you don't expect me to do anything, of course!”

“It's not that. You see, I'd like to go down to the island and--and father is so odd he might not be willing to escort me,” she explained, trying to be matter-of-fact, her air showing that she regretted her outburst.