She showed herself, however, a pattern of
filial piety and obedience. She never pouted and sulked; she never flew
in the face of parental authority; she never fell into a passion, or
fell into hysterics, as many romantic novel-read young ladies would do.
Not she, indeed! She was none such heroical rebellious trumpery, I
warrant ye. On the contrary, she acquiesced like an obedient daughter;
shut the street-door in her lover's face, and if ever she did grant him
an interview, it was either out of the kitchen window, or over the
garden fence.
Wolfert was deeply cogitating these things in his mind, and his brow
wrinkled with unusual care, as he wended his way one Saturday afternoon
to a rural inn, about two miles from the city. It was a favorite resort
of the Dutch part of the community from being always held by a Dutch
line of landlords, and retaining an air and relish of the good old
times. It was a Dutch-built house, that had probably been a country
seat of some opulent burgher in the early time of the settlement. It
stood near a point of land, called Corlears Hook, which stretches out
into the Sound, and against which the tide, at its flux and reflux,
sets with extraordinary rapidity. The venerable and somewhat crazy
mansion was distinguished from afar, by a grove of elms and sycamores
that seemed to wave a hospitable invitation, while a few weeping
willows with their dank, drooping foliage, resembling falling waters,
gave an idea of coolness, that rendered it an attractive spot during
the heats of summer.
Here, therefore, as I said, resorted many of the old inhabitants of the
Manhattoes, where, while some played at the shuffle-board and quoits
and ninepins, others smoked a deliberate pipe, and talked over public
affairs.
It was on a blustering autumnal afternoon that Wolfert made his visit
to the inn. The grove of elms and willows was stripped of its leaves,
which whirled in rustling eddies about the fields.
The ninepin alley was deserted, for the premature chilliness of the day
had driven the company within doors. As it was Saturday afternoon, the
habitual club was in session, composed principally of regular Dutch
burghers, though mingled occasionally with persons of various,
character and country, as is natural in a place of such motley
population.
Beside the fire-place, and in a huge leather-bottomed armchair, sat the
dictator of this little world, the venerable Rem, or, as it was
pronounced, Ramm Rapelye.
He was a man of Walloon race, and illustrious for the antiquity of his
line, his great grandmother having been the first white child born in
the province. But he was still more illustrious for his wealth and
dignity: he had long filled the noble office of alderman, and was a man
to whom the governor himself took off his hat. He had maintained
possession of the leathern-bottomed chair from time immemorial; and had
gradually waxed in bulk as he sat in his seat of government, until in
the course of years he filled its whole magnitude. His word was
decisive with his subjects; for he was so rich a man, that he was never
expected to support any opinion by argument. The landlord waited on him
with peculiar officiousness; not that he paid better than his
neighbors, but then the coin of a rich man seems always to be so much
more acceptable. The landlord had always a pleasant word and a joke, to
insinuate in the ear of the august Ramm. It is true, Ramm never
laughed, and, indeed, maintained a mastiff-like gravity, and even
surliness of aspect, yet he now and then rewarded mine host with a
token of approbation; which, though nothing more nor less than a kind
of grunt, yet delighted the landlord more than a broad laugh from a
poorer man.
"This will be a rough night for the money-diggers," said mine host, as
a gust of wind howled round the house, and rattled at the windows.
"What, are they at their works again?" said an English half-pay
captain, with one eye, who was a frequent attendant at the inn.
"Aye, are they," said the landlord, "and well may they be. They've had
luck of late. They say a great pot of money has been dug up in the
field, just behind Stuyvesant's orchard. Folks think it must have been
buried there in old times by Peter Stuyvesant, the Dutch Governor."
"Fudge!" said the one-eyed man of war, as he added a small portion of
water to a bottom of brandy.
"Well, you may believe, or not, as you please," said mine host,
somewhat nettled; "but every body knows that the old governor buried a
great deal of his money at the time of the Dutch troubles, when the
English red-coats seized on the province. They say, too, the old
gentleman walks; aye, and in the very Same dress that he wears in the
picture which hangs up in the family house."
"Fudge!" said the half-pay officer.
"Fudge, if you please! - But didn't Corney Van Zandt see him at
midnight, stalking about in the meadow with his wooden leg, and a drawn
sword in his hand, that flashed like fire? And what can he be walking
for, but because people have been troubling the place where he buried
his money in old times?"
Here the landlord was interrupted by several guttural sounds from Ramm
Rapelye, betokening that he was laboring with the unusual production of
an idea.
