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diff --git a/26112.txt b/26112.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..e595d07 --- /dev/null +++ b/26112.txt @@ -0,0 +1,8792 @@ +Project Gutenberg's A Tar-Heel Baron, by Mabell Shippie Clarke Pelton + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: A Tar-Heel Baron + +Author: Mabell Shippie Clarke Pelton + +Illustrator: Edward Stratton Holloway + +Release Date: July 23, 2008 [EBook #26112] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A TAR-HEEL BARON *** + + + + +Produced by Barbara Tozier, Bill Tozier and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + +A Tar-Heel Baron + +_SECOND EDITION_ + + +[Illustration: "OAKWOOD"] + + + + +A Tar-Heel Baron + + + +_by_ + +Mabell Shippie Clarke Pelton + + + +With Illustrations by + +Edward Stratton Holloway + + + +Philadelphia & London +J. B. Lippincott Company +1903 + + +COPYRIGHT, 1903 +BY J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY + +Published February, 1903 + +_Electrotyped and Printed by_ +_J. B. Lippincott Company, Philadelphia, U.S.A._ + + + + +TO + +F. A. P. + + "_One who never turned his back but marched breast forward, + Never doubted clouds would break, + Never dreamed, though right were worsted, wrong would triumph, + Held we fall to rise, are baffled to fight better, + Sleep to wake._" + + + + +Contents + + +Chapter Page + + I FRIEDRICH VON RITTENHEIM 7 + II THE SNARE OF THE FOWLER 22 + III A WEAK MAN'S STRENGTH 38 + IV "THOU SHALT NOT COVET THY NEIGHBOR'S WIFE" 47 + V A STRONG MAN'S WEAKNESS 61 + VI "I WARRANT THERE'S VINEGAR AND PEPPER IN'T!" 74 + VII IN THE SOUTHERN APPALACHIANS 85 + VIII SYDNEY RIDES AGAINST TIME 105 + IX "IT NEEDED ONLY THIS!" 118 + X THROUGH THE MIST 132 + XI IN THE CORN 146 + XII ILLUMINATION 156 + XIII RECONCILIATION 171 + XIV THE FOURTH OF JULY 179 + XV THE GANDER-PULLING 193 + XVI ON THE BRIDGE 202 + XVII OUT OF A CLEAR SKY 216 + XVIII BUSINESS PLANS 230 + XIX HILDA 242 + XX SACRIFICE 255 + XXI A POKE PARTY 267 + XXII VON RITTENHEIM COLLECTS HIS RENT 285 + XXIII THE 'POSSUM-HUNT 299 + XXIV "FOUGHT THE FIGHT" 312 + XXV CARL VON STERNBURG 322 + XXVI SURRENDER 335 + XXVII DIXIE 348 + + + + +List of Illustrations + + + Page + +OAKWOOD _Frontispiece_ + +A FENCE AT THE TOP OF A SHARP ASCENT 109 + +TO THE FRENCH BROAD, WHERE FLETCHER'S BRIDGE CROSSES THE +RIVER 204 + +PINK ROSES AND RED SWUNG TO AND FRO IN THE SUNSHINE AS +THEY CLIMBED THE DOCTOR'S WHITEWASHED PORCH 242 + +"IT IS NOT FITTING THAT A VON RITTENHEIM SHOULD LIVE +IN A CABIN LIKE THAT" 269 + + + + +A Tar-Heel Baron + + + + +I + +Friedrich von Rittenheim + + +The incongruity of his manner of life was patent to all who saw. The +mountaineers around him recognized it, but they attributed it to the +fact of his being a foreigner. The more cultivated folk realized that a +man of the world who bore every mark of good birth and breeding was +indeed out of place in the gray jeans of the North Carolina farmer, +guiding the plough with his own hand. + +At first no one knew just how to take him, even to the calling of his +name. Baron Friedrich Johann Ludwig--and a half-dozen more--von +Rittenheim was a good deal to compass. The farmers and the negroes +finally settled upon "Mr. Baron." + +As to "taking him," it was he who took them, and by storm. He was as +poor as his poorest neighbors, that was evident, so they felt no +jealousy, and laid aside the mistrust which is the countryman's shield +and buckler. He asked agricultural instruction from the men, was +courteously respectful to the women, and played with the children. +Among those of more gentle birth there was little question of their +reception of him after once he had ridden to their doors, making the +first visit, as in the old country. To be sure, he had appeared astride +a mule, but neither his mount nor his dress could conceal a soldierly +bearing that made him the envy of every man who saw him. And he had but +to click his heels together and make his queer foreign bow that +displayed the top of his fair head, and to kiss the fingers of the +"gnaedige Frau," to win the hearts of all the women. His English, in +itself, was no small charm, for, though he had conquered his w's and +th's, his use of idiom was ever new. + +It was of the Baron that Dr. Morgan and his wife were talking as they +drove towards home at sunset of a late March day. + +"Hanged if Ah know how the fellow gets on," said the Doctor. "It was +fall when he came here, and that farm he bought from Ben Frady hadn't +any crop on it but a mahty little corn. He did his winter ploughing and +killed the pig he took with the place, but how he's pulling through Ah +don't know." + +The Doctor spat in a practised and far-reaching manner into the red +clay mud, and shook the reins over the backs of the horse and mule, +which plodded on unheeding. + +"This is 'starvation time,' too. Ah noticed yesterday our bacon was +getting low," returned Mrs. Morgan, with the application to self that a +country life induces. "The Baron never did tell any one about his money +affairs, did he, Henry?" + +It would be hard to say why she asked, unless for the sake of +continuing the conversation, for, had there been any such bit of +gossip, it would have been the Doctor's exclusive property only so long +as it took him to drive from the place where he had heard it to his own +house. + +"Not a word," he replied. "Hi, Pete, what are you doing?" + +Always a careless driver, the Doctor was more than ever so when the +state of the roads precluded travelling faster than a walk. He had not +noticed the mud-hole which the mule had tried to jump. In his +harnesses, twine, rope, and wire played as prominent a part as leather. +In fact, most of the points of responsibility were guarded by those +materials rather than by the original. Pete's jump and his mate's +consequent shy proved too much for long-worn traces, and two of them +snapped. + +"Hang those things! That outside one popped just yesterday, Sophy," +said the Doctor, in a tone of grievance, as if the fact of its having +broken yesterday ought to have rendered him free from the liability of +a similar annoyance to-day. + +"Ah reckon you-all 'll have to get a new harness some time," returned +Sophy, placidly, holding the reins which her husband transferred to her +as, with no great relish, he lowered his long, lean person into the red +sea of mud below. + +"Rather juicy down here. Got any string, wife?" + +"Not a bit. You'll have to take a piece out of the lines," suggested +Mrs. Morgan, with resource born of long experience. + +"Ah 'low Ah will, though they're pretty short now from doing the same +thing befo'." + +He examined them gravely. + +"They ain't very strong, either," he added. "Let's see, where are we +at?" He looked about him for landmarks. "Oh, there's the road that +leads to the Baron's over yonder. Give me yo' handkerchief fo' this +other trace now, and we'll try and get there befo' it pops again." + +Friedrich von Rittenheim was standing on the porch in front of his +cabin, gazing at the western sky. A royal mantle of purple enwrapped +the shoulders of mighty Pisgah against a background of lucent gold. The +expression of anxiety and of spiritless longing left the man's face as +he watched the melting glory. + +"_Wunderschoen!_" he murmured. "I wonder if she, too, is seeing it, +also." + +The Doctor's buggy came laboring into sight around the corner of the +house. + +"_Ach_, here are my so good friends, who are ever welcome. I kiss your +hand, gr-racious Madam," he cried, as he went to the side of the +carriage, and unshrinkingly saluted an old fur glove, from which the +gracious madam's every finger was protruding. + +"Ah've broken mah traces, Baron. Can you-all let me have some wire or +string?" + +"With delight, my dear Doctor. And will you not do me the honor to +enter herein, dear lady, while the Herr Doctor and I r-repair the +har-rness?" + +He helped her from the buggy with a courtesy that induced a responsive +manner in her, and she sailed ponderously into the cabin, displaying an +elegance that caused her husband to chuckle and say to himself,-- + +"He certainly does fetch the women!" + +The Baron stirred the fire, whose light fell on a scar, the mark of a +student duel, that crept out from under his hair. He left Mrs. Morgan +stretching her plump feet and puffy hands to enjoy the flames' warmth, +while her keen eyes examined every corner of the bare room, its tidily +swept hearth, and the bunch of galax leaves on the table. + +"You-all keep pretty neat fo' a bachelor," she said, when the two men +came in after their task was done. "Ah always tell the Doctor it's +lucky he's married and has some one to look after him. You see he's no +great shakes at keeping clean now;" she looked him over with an eye +made critical by his proximity to the German, who was a model of +soldierly neatness; "and if he wasn't married, Ah don't know what he'd +be!" + +Von Rittenheim didn't know, either, so he said, "That is one advantage +of an ar-rmy tr-raining, Mrs. Mor-rgan." + +"Well, Ah don't know as Ah agree with you there, Baron," she replied. +"Henry was in the army all through the Civil War, and Ah don't think +his habits were a bit improved at the end of it." + +Henry grinned appreciatively, but the Baron's features betrayed only +such interest as incited Mrs. Morgan to further conversation. + +"Where's the rocking-chair you had when Ah was here befo'? That was Ben +Frady's mother's chair. Ah've seen the old woman sitting out on the +po'ch in it many a time." + +She waited for an answer, and Friedrich colored to the roots of his +hair. It was on his tongue's tip to say that it was in the next room, +but Mrs. Morgan was quite capable of penetrating there; and, besides, +telling the truth was another result of army training. He stammered +something about having disposed of it, and hastened to ask if Madam +would not like a cup of coffee. + +It was a natural pride that deterred von Rittenheim from confessing to +these friends of not many months' standing that he had sold the chair, +the only thing in the house worth selling, and had sold it from +necessity. The Doctor was right in his suspicions that the Baron was +not getting on comfortably. Ten days ago he had spent his very last +cent, and he was learning the true meaning of the word "poverty." The +crop of corn that he had bought with the farm had served him until now +as feed for the mule, as meal and hominy, and, by the alchemy of the +alembic, as whisky. The end of the bacon from Ben Frady's pig was on +the shelf in the cupboard before which he was standing, and he had just +offered to his guest the last of the coffee with which the sale of old +Mrs. Frady's chair had provided him. It was this anxiety that had +clouded his brow as he looked at the sunset. He had nothing to send to +market, not even wood, for his bit of forest yielded only enough for +his own use. He had sold his cow, and had let a man have his mule for +its keep. + +It had not hurt his pride to live on this little mountain farm. He was +as independent there as at home; more so, because the social demands +upon him were as nothing. But no money and no food meant that he must +work for a wage, and that galled him. Then, at this season of the year, +what work was there to be done? No one needed extra laborers. + +It looked very much as if he were brought face to face with starvation, +and a man of thirty-five does not encounter such a prospect as gayly as +a youth. + +Fortunately for his further catechism, the idea of coffee appealed to +Mrs. Morgan, and von Rittenheim set about making it, secretly wondering +what his breakfast would be like without it, but preparing it none the +less cheerfully. + +"I gr-rieve, dear Frau Mor-rgan," he said, as he offered her the cup, +"that I have not cr-ream for you,--or sugar, either," he added, peering +into a bowl that he knew to be empty. He brightened as he picked up a +little pitcher. "But molasses; may I give to you molasses?" + +"Yes, indeed," returned Mrs. Morgan, cordially. "Ah like them just as +well as sugar. Just a few, now," as she held out her cup. + +"Shall it be coffee for you, Herr Doctor, or whisky? See, I have a jug +of corn whisky which I myself made." + +"No need to ask me, sir. Whisky, of course," and the Doctor's eyes +twinkled under their shaggy brows. "Not bad fo' new whisky," he +commented, as he swallowed the fiery stuff. "How do you make it, Baron? +Ah didn't know you had a still." + +"Nor have I, except a little affair in a bucket, with a bit of r-rubber +hose for a worm. It makes enough for me. It is not a pleasant drink," +he added, quaintly. + +"But better than nothing, eh?" returned the Doctor, jovially, and then +was sorry that he had said it, for his glance had fallen within the +cupboard, and had spied out the emptiness of the larder. To cover his +mistake, he added,-- + +"Mind you-all don't sell any. It's against the law, you know." + +"A very str-range law. If I from my corn make meal or hominy, or what +you call 'r-roughness,' for the cattle to eat, I may sell them. But if +I make whisky, I must dr-rink it all myself, eh?" + +"Yes, or give it to me! You see they must tax us on something, and +while they class whisky as a luxury--" + +"Cor-rn whisky?" interrupted Friedrich, incredulous. + +"--they know it's enough of a necessity with us North Carolina +mountaineers, at any rate, to return some revenue." + +"My sympathy is with the moonshiners, I confess, Herr Doctor; though it +is also with men who think such a bever-rage good to dr-rink! You go? +Ah, dear lady, I hope it will be soon again that you honor my house." + +The Baron looked after the buggy as it disappeared in the dusk, and +then turned back into the cabin, once more to face the harsh reality of +his thoughts. + +It grew clear to him that he must seek work in Asheville, the nearest +large town, a dozen miles away. He must walk there and beg for +employment like any tramp. Such straits as this he had not anticipated +when he had made the sacrifice that had forced him to leave the +Fatherland, though he did not for a moment regret that sacrifice. + +What he could not formulate was just how he had been brought to his +present pass. It was with stinging honesty that he owned it to be +through some lack of foresight or of energy. But how should he have +energy when he had no purpose in life? + +To be sure, there was Sydney Carroll, who might supply purpose to any +man who loved her, if that man were not a broken-spirited craven. The +hopeless longing that had been in his eyes while he gazed at the sunset +filled them once more. What had he to offer her but devotion,--the one +capacity that was mighty within him? No, not even Love could endow him +with Purpose. + +Always he completed the circle of his thoughts. He must work for +somebody else. That would be, indeed, a new experience and a bitter. + +He was fighting with his pride when a call outside summoned him. It was +the cry that has brought many a man to his door to be shot to death; +but von Rittenheim had no feuds, and went forward without hesitation. + +"Can you-all give me some supper?" asked a man who loomed big in the +darkness as he sat on his horse. "Ah must have taken the wrong turn +back yonder and wandered off the county road." + +"This r-road goes only by my house like a bow of which the county +r-road is the str-ring," explained the Baron. "Dismount, I beg, and +with much pleasure will I give you what I can." + +It was little enough, though to the bit of bacon was added a couple of +apples roasted in the ashes. It was to the credit of the visitor's +powers of perception that he did not ask for other than was set before +him, and compel his host to disclose his poverty. He was a man of +middle age, with a shrewd face whose expression was spoiled by an +occasional look of slyness or glance of suspicion. + +"Very fair whisky," approved the stranger. "Do you get it round here?" + +"I make it." + +"You do?" with a sudden contraction of the eyelids. + +Von Rittenheim saw nothing but his own regret at his necessarily meagre +hospitality, for which he tried to make amends by being increasingly +agreeable. + +"You will like to see my little affair?" he asked, after describing the +primitive manufacture of his still. + +"Ah'm afraid Ah must be going on; Ah'm obliged to get to Asheville +to-night. But if you'd sell me a quart of yo' whisky to keep me warm on +the way, Ah'd like it." + +He opened the door and looked out. + +"It's right smart cold," he added. + +Friedrich made no reply. He had checked his first impulse, which was to +offer to give the fellow all the whisky he wanted, and he looked with a +sort of fascination at the coin which the other drew from his pocket +and tossed on to the table. Undoubtedly he was hungrier than ever he +had been in his life, and not only had he seen his supper devoured +before his eyes, but there would be nothing to eat in the morning +before his long walk to town. With this money he could buy something at +the store which he must pass on his way. + +His recent conversation with Dr. Morgan went through his mind. He +glanced at his guest, who was buttoning his coat and tightening a spur +preparatory to starting. + +"I think he will not tell," thought von Rittenheim, and he found an +empty bottle and filled it from the jug. Then he helped the stranger +with his horse, and after his departure returned to look ruefully into +the fire. + +"Never before," he mused, "did one of my race commit so petty a wrong." + + + + +II + +The Snare of the Fowler + + +It was at the early hour when the morning brings to the earth no warmth +and but a dim and grudging light, that a sharp rap summoned von +Rittenheim to his cabin door. Three men stood outside in the grayness, +their horses tied to trees behind them. To his surprise, Friedrich +recognized his guest of the previous evening. + +"_Ach_, my good friend, you did not reach Asheville last night?" + +Unconsciously he frowned as he realized that if these men wanted +breakfast he would have to confess that there was nothing to eat in the +house. At the thought his instinct of hospitality and his pride both +suffered. + +"Yes, Ah got to Asheville, and Ah've come back--fo' you." + +The man entered the cabin and motioned to his companions, who stepped +one to each side of the Baron. + +"What do you mean?" Von Rittenheim spoke with amazement born of entire +lack of understanding. His mind could not compass the treachery of the +man to whom he had given his last mouthful. + +"Ah mean that Ah'm a United States deputy-marshal, and that Ah 'rest +you fo' retailing." + +Von Rittenheim started, a motion that caused three hands to seek as +many pistol-pockets. + +"You mean for selling to you last night that whisky to keep the cold +from you?" + +"Correct. Of co'se you-all took yo' chances, 'n you struck the wrong +man." + +Deputy-marshal Wilder chuckled complacently. He had made few captures +lately, and he counted on this to look well at headquarters. Besides, +he was having less trouble with the "big Dutchy" than he had expected. +Indeed, he had prepared his assistants for a hard fight. + +"You mistake--I did not str-rike you--yet," said Friedrich, +misunderstanding. "But I compr-rehend that you arrest me, and for +what." + +Von Rittenheim looked at Wilder with so much contempt that the man +turned away shamefaced. Still, the justice of his capture appealed to +the German, trained in the soldier's school, for it was true that he +had transgressed the law, and knowingly. That he should have yielded to +the weakness aroused his irritability. + +"I am a fool," he ejaculated. + +"You-all needn't say anything to incriminate yo'self," said the deputy, +more from habit than because the remark was appropriate. + +"I go with you." + +Von Rittenheim put on his hat. One of the men tinkled a pair of +handcuffs in his jacket-pocket, and raised his brows inquiringly at +Wilder. The latter nodded, though doubtfully. As he picked himself up +from the floor a little later he realized that his doubt was justified. +At the mere sight of the irons the Baron had flashed into fury. He +flung one man across the table with a violence that brought him several +minutes' quiet. The other rolled into a corner, and Wilder fell +altogether too near for comfort to the bricks of the fireplace. + +As the deputy-marshal rose he felt von Rittenheim's grasp on his +throat. + +"You understand not," he cried, his usually good English almost +unintelligible in his excitement, "You understand not--how, indeed, +should you?--that I am a gentleman. When I say I go with you, I go." + +Giving him a shake as a final relief to his feelings, he added, +imperatively,-- + +"Come, pick up your fr-riends and let us start. You have a horse for +me?" + +No one was disposed to make another attempt to handcuff the captive, +and the little detachment set out, headed by the prisoner, who had much +more the appearance of a leader than did any one of the crestfallen +group behind him. + +The miles passed but slowly, so heavy was the road's deep mud, and it +seemed to von Rittenheim that he had been travelling for hours when +they crossed the Six Mile Branch that measured but half their journey +done. The keen air of the early morning, whose cold was accentuated by +a drizzling rain, chilled him to the bone, unfortified by food as he +was. He experienced the physical misery that forces to submission men +of large build more quickly than those of lighter make. + +His mind suffered in sympathy, and his thoughts were of the bitterest. +Never had his experience known an act of perfidy like that of Wilder. +To have betrayed his hospitality was bad enough,--to have lured him on +to selling the whisky was the act of a villain. He cursed the chance +that had brought the fellow to his door. How had it happened? + +The scoundrel had said that he had missed the way, but that was not +probable. The county road was plain enough. He must have passed Dr. +Morgan, too, who would have set him right. + +A pang of suspicion came into his mind. One had betrayed him, why not +the other? The Doctor was aware that he had the whisky. He must have +stopped Wilder, knowing him to be an officer, and told him about it. + +As a matter of fact, the deputy's story was true. In the dusk he had +turned into the Baron's road without noticing that he had left the +highway. He had passed the Doctor, and had spoken to him, but it was on +the State Road, before he had found himself to be out of his way. + +Von Rittenheim, faint from lack of food, sick at heart over his +position, and filled with disgust at his betrayal, was in a mood to +accept any suspicion, and the evil thought grew fat within him. He +pondered every word of his conversation with the Morgans, and fancied +that he saw indisputable evidence of the Doctor's falseness in his talk +about whisky. + +The course of affairs in Asheville was brief. Wilder rode beside his +prisoner when they came to the town, not because he feared Friedrich's +escape, but that he might have the appearance of being in command of +the troop. Von Rittenheim was too closely absorbed in his own painful +thoughts to pay any attention to this enforced companionship. He +dismounted wearily as the squad drew rein before the Federal Building, +and followed the deputy-marshal into the commissioner's office. + +It was early, but Mr. Weaver was at his desk, for he happened to be +pressed with work. + +He was a nervous, bustling man, with an expression of acuteness, and a +trick of rubbing his head with a circular motion, as if he were trying +to effect a tonsure by force of friction. He nodded a recognition of +Wilder and his men, and sent a look of surprise at Von Rittenheim, +whose appearance was not what was usual in the prisoners brought before +him, although his dress seemed to indicate the mountaineer. + +"What for?" he asked Wilder, gruffly, when he was at liberty to attend +to them. + +"Retailing," returned the deputy-marshal, and proceeded to tell a story +in which the details of his method of purchasing the liquor were +meagre, but the account of the German's resistance to the officers was +full. + +Baron von Rittenheim pleaded guilty to the charge against him, and +listened to the exaggerated tale of the arrest without comment, though +with a look of disgust that did not escape Mr. Weaver. Perhaps he knew +his man in Wilder. At any rate, a few trenchant questions brought out +the fact that Friedrich had resisted only when an attempt was made to +handcuff him. + +"Really, Wilder," said the commissioner, sharply, "you make me tired. +Haven't you got good sense? Do you suppose a fellow like that is going +to run away?" + +"No knowing what these cussed foreigners won't do," growled Wilder, and +added something about being blown up before his prisoner, that brought +a frown to Mr. Weaver's brow. + +He was puzzled about von Rittenheim, and he felt sure that there was +something in the case that was not in evidence; but the man had pleaded +guilty, and there was nothing to do but to hold him for the Grand Jury. + +"Who'll go on your bond?" he asked, taking up his pen. + +"Bond?" + +"You must give a justified bond for your appearance before the United +States Court in May." + +"Oh, I see. I do not know. I have no fr-riends." + +"It's only two hundred dollars." + +"It might be only two hundred cents, still would it be the same. +Yesterday I thought I had fr-riends, but to-day----" + +He broke off abruptly, and again Weaver gave a perplexed rub to the top +of his head. He opened a door and spoke to a negro boy who passed a +waiting life in the anteroom. + +"Sam, ask Mr. Gudger to step here, if he's in the building." + +Mr. Gudger was a professional bondsman who added this calling to that +of real-estate dealer and insurance agent, and interwove the three +occupations with some talent and much success. + +Von Rittenheim's farm served to secure Gudger against loss, while the +mention of its existence caused the commissioner again to rub his head. +Why in the world should a man----? He gave up the conundrum in despair, +and applied himself to the necessary business. + +Friedrich took but a passive part in the transaction, whose detail, +with its rapid interchange of technicalities, he did not attempt to +understand. His courteous dignity and submission to the justice of the +legal procedure told nothing of the caldron of feeling boiling within +him at the _in_-justice that had brought him to a pass where this thing +was right. + +As he walked away from the Federal Building, his mind began to leave +these thoughts and to dwell on the almost equally disagreeable subject +of what he should do next. His immediate need was of something to eat. +He was sick with hunger, and he found himself even casting a regretful +thought after Wilder's quarter of a dollar. His hand had happened to +touch it in his pocket during his morning ride, and he had flung it +from him as far as he could into the woods beside the road. + +"But, no," he thought, "rather would I starve than buy food with that." + +He went up Patton Avenue, and eyed the signs on the buildings in the +hope of seeing one that would suggest to him some way of making money. + +The early morning's rain had turned into snow, that beat into the open +place from the north, and drove the loafers from their accustomed +haunts. The pavement was whitening rapidly. + +"The first of April to-morrow," thought von Rittenheim, disgustedly. +"What will happen to those pease that I put into the gr-round last +week?" + +As he stood, sheltered from the storm by a projecting building, he +reflected that it was useless for him to go back into the country. +There was no planting to be done as early as this, except that of a few +garden vegetables, and he had no seeds to plant even if he went. + +He remembered as if it were long ago that he had meant to come to +Asheville to-day, and thought with grim humor that after all he had not +been obliged to walk. + +Yes, he must find some occupation in town that would support him during +the month that intervened before the sitting of the court. He knew that +the usual sentence for moonshining was "A hundred dollars or three +months," and, since he had no money, he must submit to the degradation +of imprisonment. May, June, July. That would bring him to August, and +it would be time enough then to consider the future. + +A von Rittenheim in prison! A shudder went through him with the +thought, and a wild desire to avert the evil. If only he had not +pledged his farm to that bondsman! + +Friedrich's life had not been one to promote business knowledge. At +home he had known but little of affairs--in America, nothing. He did +not realize that he might have raised on his place ten times the amount +of his fine without affecting Mr. Gudger's interests. He thought that +his negotiation with that excellent person had put his estate out of +his hands for all similar uses. Vaguely he thought that the bondsman +would be released when his trial came on, and that at that time the +land would be free again, and that perhaps it might be arranged then. +But he did not see how, for they would not allow him to go out to do +it, and he did not know any one who would take a mortgage on it. And, +oh, how sleepy he was--and how hungry--and how the cold bit through +him! + +He bestirred himself and walked around the square. He was studying the +window of a harness-shop which appealed to him as having to do with the +subject he knew most about--horses; and he was pondering in what +capacity he would offer his services to the proprietor, when he was +accosted by a negro boy. + +"The boss wants you-all over yonder," he said, grinning affably. + +"The--who?" asked the Baron, to whom the appellation was new. + +"The boss in the revenue office, Mr. Weaver. He wants you. Ah'm his boy +Sam." + +Friedrich supposed that some form had been omitted, and returned with +docility to the Federal Building. Mr. Weaver nodded pleasantly as he +entered. + +"This German was brought in here just after you went out, von +Rittenheim. I want you to interpret, if you will." + +Friedrich's breakfast seemed now more nebulous than ever, but even this +hour's tedium came to an end, and Weaver, with a "Thank you," pushed a +half-dollar along the table towards him. + +"No, no. It is a pleasure, my dear sir," began the Baron, when suddenly +he brought his heels together, made his low bow, and took the money. "I +thank you, _mein Herr_. I need it. I will take it." + +Mr. Weaver looked at him with the provincial American's amusement at +foreigners' ways, mingled with shrewdness. + +"By the way, do you mind telling me how you-all got into this scrape?" + +The German flushed and tossed back his head. Then he controlled +himself, and said, gently,-- + +"But perhaps you have a r-right to know. If you will excuse me for a +time, however, I will r-return after a breakfast. I left my house very +early this morning." + +Weaver noticed the sudden pinched look of faintness that turned von +Rittenheim's ruddy face ashy. + +"He's missed more than one meal," he thought, but said aloud only, "Any +time before two o'clock." + +It was not much that the commissioner learned from von Rittenheim after +all, for food brought back self-reliance and courage, and he felt that +the whole story of his trouble would be an appeal for sympathy that he +could not make. However, he told enough to cause Weaver to say under +his breath a few condemnatory things about the deputy-marshal, and then +he asked,-- + +"What are you going to do?" + +"I hope to find some occupation in Asheville until the time of my +tr-rial." + +"What do you want to do?" + +"I care not. I am well, str-rong. I fear not labor." + +Mr. Weaver compared with a glance von Rittenheim's figure with his own +puny proportions, and said,-- + +"No, I should think not!" + +Then he rubbed his head and asked,-- + +"Can you teach?" + +"I know not. Never have I done such a thing. I am a soldier." + +"That's easily seen. Still, you're a university man." + +He touched his forehead just where on Friedrich's the tip of his scar +was visible. + +"Oh, yes. I was at Heidelberg." + +"I suspect you'll do if you-all are willing to try. My boy's fitting +for college, and he's getting badly behind in his German. If you'd +tackle his instruction for a few weeks, I'm sure it would be of great +value to him. Will you do it?" + +"If you will accept a novice, I shall be gr-rateful." And again +Friedrich made his low bow. + +"Then be at my house at five this afternoon, and here's a week's salary +in advance. You'll be wanting it, perhaps." + +So was Baron von Rittenheim established as Tommy Weaver's tutor, and +fortunate he thought himself. + +Fortunate he was, in that this engagement secured to him his simple +living; but most unlucky in that it left him with too much spare time. +Had he worked at a task that occupied seven or eight hours a day, his +thoughts would have filtered through the weariness of his body, and +been purified thereby. But his leisure was abundant, and he spent it in +brooding over his troubles. + +To those that had wrung him before was added his present shame. And his +shame was embittered by his suspicion of Dr. Morgan. He held Wilder of +no account. He was beneath a gentleman's notice. But Dr. Morgan had +pretended to be his friend. He dwelt on all his intercourse with him, +and weighed every conversation that he remembered. There came to him +half a hundred trifling circumstances that seemed to substantiate his +distrust. + +The lack of his accustomed exercise told on his health. He grew moody +and irritable, and daily the wish for revenge grew stronger. +Satisfaction was due him, and satisfaction he would have. + + + + +III + +A Weak Man's Strength + + +It was three weeks later. Bud Yarebrough, going rabbit-hunting, +pondered, as he trudged along the road, upon the freaks of an April +that had come in with snow, and alternately had warmed and chilled the +swelling hopes of bud and blossom, until the end of the month showed +trees and shrubs but a trifle farther advanced than at its beginning. + +"Jus' like M'lissy used to treat me!" + +He made the comparison with a breath of relief that that time of +wretchedness and rapture was past. + +He heard the sound of hoofs approaching from behind, and whistled to +heel his three scrawny hounds. When he made sure of the rider's +identity, he shifted his gun to his other shoulder, and pulled off his +remnant of felt in salutation of Miss Carroll. As she stopped to speak +to him, he stared earnestly at her horse's neck; but kind Nature +permits even a shy man's vision to take a wide range, and Bud by no +means was unobservant of the brilliant skin framed by a glory of red +hair; of the velvet dark eyes with their darker lashes; and of the +corduroy habit, brownly harmonious with the sorrel horse and the clay +road, as with its wearer's coloring. + +"How is Melissa, Bud?" + +Some of Sydney Carroll's friends thought her voice her greatest charm. + +"And the baby? She's a dear baby! I think she looks like Melissa, don't +you?" + +"She's tol'able--they's tol'able. Yes, Miss Sydney, they says so," +replied the lad, whose condition as the father of a family seemed to +cast him into depths of bashfulness. + +"It's a great responsibility for you, Bud. I hope you feel it. And I +hope that you won't let _this_ happen often." + +Sydney gravely tapped her eye with her finger, while Bud stole a shamed +hand over his own visual organ, which was surrounded by the paling +glories of a recent contusion. The color mounted to his hair as he +stammered,-- + +"Hit wasn't that--that what you think, Miss Sydney. Hit was a stick o' +wood----" But his voice trailed off into nothingness before the girl's +gaze. + +"Bud, I know--I heard how it happened. Don't tell me what isn't true." + +Bud kicked a stone that lay at his feet. + +"You-all always does find out," he murmured, with unwilling admiration. +"You see Ah was right smart glad about the baby, 'n 'bout M'lissy bein' +so well, 'n Ah jus' took a little; 'n Pink Pressley was awful +aggravatin', 'n Ah jus' 'lowed Ah didn' want nothin' t' interrup' mah +joy," he ended, looking up with a humorous twinkle that brought a +responsive smile to the severe young face before him. + +"But Ah know hit ain' right to M'lissy," he went on hurriedly, for he +realized that the smile was only transitory, "'n Ah'm goin' to try, Ah +sho' am," he added, stepping out of the way of the horse, grown uneasy +at this long colloquy. "Ah certainly am goin' to get out the tools 'n +look 'em over to-morrow," he finished, as Sydney gathered up her reins. + +"I hope so, Bud; but why don't you do it _to-day_?" she called back, +saying to herself, as Johnny broke into a canter, "As if poor Bud ever +could do anything to-day! He should have been born in the land of +_manana_." + +The horse lengthened his stride into a sweeping gallop where the +condition of the road permitted, slackening his pace and betaking +himself to the side, and even to the footpath on the bank, when the mud +grew too deep for speed. The girl paid little attention to him, for, +like all mountain horses, he was accustomed to pick his way with a +sagacity that man cannot assist. + +On Sydney's face rested a shade too heavy to have been brought there by +the failings, customary to the country, of Melissa's husband. But +twenty years are not proof against the joint attack of sunshine and +fresh, sweet air and the glorious motion of a horse, and she seemed a +happy, care-free girl to Bob Morgan, sitting in the sun on his father's +porch. + +Unlike the Carroll house, which was of stone and surrounded by roofed +verandas, Dr. Morgan's dwelling presented an unabashed glare of +whitewashed weather-boarding. It needed only green shutters to be a +hostage from New England. In summer a rose climbed over the portico and +broke the snowy monotony, but at this season the leafless stems served +only to enhance the bareness. + +As he heard Sydney's approach Bob raised his aching head from his hand +and sprang unsteadily to his feet. She was quick to notice his +condition, for she knew only too well the weakness that was wringing +the heart of the good old Doctor and lining "Miss Sophy's" face. Bob +was their only son and only child, "'n hit do seem strange," the +country women said, "that a man who's done's much good's the ol' Doctor +shouldn' have better luck with his boy." + +Sydney flushed as Bob ran unevenly along the path to take her from the +saddle. Her experiences seemed to be like history this morning. A +little sigh escaped her as she looked about for the Doctor, and then +resigned herself to be lifted down by Bob's strong and eager, though +shaking, hands. + +To him her manner was quite the reverse of her attitude towards the +other victim of a weak will from whom she just had parted. If to +Yarebrough she was straightforward, to this man she was diplomatic. If +to Bud she was Mentor, to Bob she was Telemachus. If Bud stared at her +in puzzled surprise at her "always finding out," Bob exerted himself to +appear before her a man on whom she could rely, because he was sure +that she never had thought of him otherwise. + +"Yes, it is a lovely day," she replied, in answer to his salutation. +"Is your mother at home? And what in the world is the matter with your +face?" + +He was holding open the gate for her to pass, and she saw that it would +be absurd any longer to ignore his appearance. + +"The calf got mixed up in the rose-bush, and while I was getting him +out he kicked me," explained Bob, glibly, shamelessly loading upon the +back of a tiny and unoffending little bull-calf nibbling in front of +the door the burden of his scratched and bruise-stained countenance. + +Sydney averted her eyes as he told this unblushing lie, and sighed +again as she thought of the poor mother, for she knew how long a +Carolinian can stay on a horse, and that Bob must have been bad, +indeed, to have rolled off, as it was evident that he had done. + +"You must let me do it up for you," she said. "Go and get me the +witch-hazel and something for a bandage." + +She sat and waited for him in the living-room, where modern taste had +made use of the blue-and-white homespun coverlets of the Doctor's +grandmother as door curtains and couch covers. She noticed the kettle +swung over the fire from the same crane that had balanced its burden +thus for a hundred years, and she listened to Bob knocking about +up-stairs in the room over her head. + +"Now, sit down," she cried, when he returned. "You're so dreadfully +tall. Towels! That won't do at all! Here, I'll wet my handkerchief and +put that on first." + +"May I keep it?" + +Bob's good eye twinkled merrily, and what was visible of the other +showed some amusement. + +"Of course not. You'll return it to me as soon as you can." + +Sydney's mouth twitched in appreciation of his audacity. + +"I'm afraid I can't very soon," he replied, gravely. "I expect to need +it for a long, long time." + +He turned to the mirror and gazed therein at his shock of black hair +rising above the linen, and at the one rueful eye visible below. + +"It makes me look rather a fool, doesn't it? But it's awfully sweet of +you to do it, Sydney. I say, Sydney." Suddenly he wheeled about and +seized both her hands. "Is it always going to be this way? Are you +never going to care for me? You know I'd give my life for you. You +never asked me to do anything yet that I didn't do," he hurried on, +yearning for an answer from her, yet knowing well that when she raised +those white lids the eyes would not give him the reply that he wanted. +"Truly, I'll do anything you say, if only you'll care a little, just a +little, dear!" + +He drew her to him, and she raised to his her eyes, warm, brown, +swimming in tears. He let fall her hands, realizing that she _knew_--that +she always had known--and feeling how empty were his words when he had +never tried to do for her sake the one thing that might touch her. + +Letting fall her hands, he sank speechless upon his knees, and buried +his head in the blue-and-white coverlet of the couch. + +With tear-laden eyes Sydney walked to the gate, her hands outstretched +before her, like a blind man feeling his way. Johnny rubbed his nose in +sympathy against her shoulder as she unfastened his chain. It was the +first time in Bob's fond, foolish, generous life that ever he had +allowed Sydney to do for herself anything that he could do for her. + +As Johnny carried his mistress down the State Road, and the "bare, +ruined choirs" of the trees became clear to her eyes once again, she +realized that a new pain and a new pity had come into her life--and a +new responsibility. + + + + +IV + +"Thou Shalt Not Covet thy Neighbor's Wife" + + +It was fortunate that Johnny needed no guiding hand, for his mistress +was far too absorbed in her thoughts to give him any attention. She did +not see the ranks of gray tree-trunks through which peered glimpses of +blue as the land fell away against the background of the sky; the heavy +bunches of mistletoe in some leafless top failed to attract her +attention; and she was blind to the beauty of the coarse green +pine-needles against the brown masses of the oak-leaves that cling to +the branches all winter to cheat the Devil of his bargain, the Earth, +which is to be his when all the boughs are bare. + +Her whole soul was filled with a longing to help Bob Morgan,--Bob, her +dear old playfellow, so lovable and, alas! so weak. Already she had +tried to foster his self-respect and to encourage his firmness by +indirect means. It seemed now as if the chance were given her to act +more openly. If only she could do so without rousing in the boy's +breast a hope that she could not fulfil, for she knew that never could +she love him as he wanted to be loved! + +It was not that a difference of birth, of rearing, of tradition placed +her apart from him. She even had a fondness for him, but love--no! + +She had been thinking a great deal about love of late. She knew what it +was to have men in love with her. Her grandmother, with whom she lived +at fine old Oakwood, had introduced her in Baltimore, where she revived +many old-time connections; and she had had another season in New +Orleans. Her striking beauty had brought her a success that pleased +Mrs. Carroll more than Sydney herself. The haughty old lady approved +the girl's coldness, and nodded in agreement with Aunt Frony, who +watched her young mistress's path with proprietary satisfaction. + +"She cert'nly do favor her paw; 'n she walks along tru all dem +gen'lemen like Joseph tru dat co'nfiel' wif de sheaves a-bowin' befo' +him, 'n he never pay no mo' 'tention to 'em 'n if dey jus' common +roughness--'n no mo' do she!" + +"My son's daughter demeans herself as one of her family should," had +been Mrs. Carroll's reply; but she was really gratified at this +aloofness that seemed to excite the attention which she felt to be her +granddaughter's due, without inducing a surrender of her heart. +Sydney's marriage would take from her her only companion, and was an +evil that the old lady recognized as necessary, but to be put off as +long as possible. + +Sydney regarded the various love-affairs in which she had had a part as +the usual incidents in every woman's career. They had touched her +little. She was extraordinarily lacking in conceit, and she could not +realize, since her sympathy was unquickened by a responsive affection, +that a love of short growth could mean much to its possessor. This lack +of appreciation of love's intensity was increased by the fact that her +own simplicity of thought and straightforwardness of character always +had prevented her from taking seriously any man's attentions until they +resolved themselves definitely into intentions. + +None of her experiences had moved her like this with Bob Morgan. When, +in the autumn, she had given up her season in town on account of her +grandmother's feebleness, it had been one of her consolations that at +least she would be free from that sort of complication. And here was +something worse than anything that had gone before, because her real +fondness for Bob gave her an insight into his pain, and a pity for the +sorrow that she knew she must inflict upon him. + +She felt vaguely into the darkness for a realization of what love was. +She had lain awake many a night that winter, waiting for her +grandmother's call, listening to the rain as it dripped upon the roof +from the twig-tips of the oaks, and dreaming a waking dream of what a +love would mean that would make any sacrifice a joy, any pain a +rapture. And, like all women from Time's beginning, she had cried into +the shadow, "Oh, that I, too, may have this joy, this sacrifice, this +pain!" + +At the cross-roads Johnny fell into a walk until he should learn his +rider's wish. _He_ preferred to go home; but if she chose the +right-hand road he was willing to carry her over it, mistaken as he +felt her decision to be. + +Sydney roused at the change of gait and turned the horse into the +homeward way; but, just as he was settling down gleefully to his work, +she remembered that she had failed entirely to accomplish the errand +upon which her grandmother had sent her; the errand that had clouded +her brow with anxiety. + +Mrs. Carroll was very fond of Baron von Rittenheim. He interested her, +he amused her, he aroused her curiosity, and his formal manners +recalled to her memory the gallants of her youth. He called upon her +frequently, and the old lady looked forward to his visits with +agreeable anticipation. For three weeks he had not been to Oakwood, and +she was determined no longer to endure such neglect,--at any rate, to +investigate it. To this end she had sent Sydney to Dr. Morgan's to +inquire of him news of the recreant German. And Sydney had not stayed +to see the Doctor or Mrs. Morgan! + +Obedient to the rein, Johnny stopped and looked about with an air of +inquiring patronage. His mistress was not given to abrupt changes of +intention, but he was willing to humor her when they appeared. + +"I can't go back to the Doctor's, of course," thought Sydney. "I'll go +to Melissa Yarebrough's,--she'll know." + +Off from the State Road, just beyond the cross-roads, a rough trail led +into the woods. Sydney turned into it, and rode between bushes of +laurel and rhododendron, whose glossy leaves shone dark above her head +even as she sat upon her horse. Patches of vivid green moss crept +confidingly to the foot of the oaks, and a bit of arbutus, as pink as +the palm of a baby's hand, peered from under its leathery cover. A few +daring buds tentatively were opening their tiny leaves to the world, +and some stray blades of grass pricked, verdant, through the general +brownness. + +This was but a deserted lane, which Sydney had chosen as affording a +short cut to Melissa's, and, of a sudden, the passage was closed by a +snake fence eight rails high. It was beyond Johnny's jumping powers, +but his rider was undaunted. Leaning over the right side of the horse +she dexterously pulled apart the top rails where they crossed, and +Johnny cleverly stepped back in time to avoid their hitting his legs in +their fall. Pressing forward again, she dislodged the next pair, and +then Johnny took the breach neatly, and picked his discriminating way +through the brush on the other side. + +Though their cabins were a mile apart, the Yarebroughs were Baron von +Rittenheim's nearest neighbors, and Sydney thought that Melissa would +know if he were ill, as she feared. + +But as she rode on in sinuous avoidance of protruding boughs and +upstart bushes, she was seized by a shyness quite new to her. It seemed +as if she could not bear to question Melissa about the Baron. She +fancied she saw the girl's possible look of amusement. It became +suddenly a position which she stigmatized as "horrid!" + +Beside her a big white pine spread an inviting seat of heaped-up tags, +and she slipped off the horse and leaned against the broad trunk. +Johnny, at the bridle's length, nibbled at the enamelled green of the +lion's tongue with equine vanity,--for he knew that it would beautify +his coat,--and pushed his muzzle down among the dry leaves beyond the +radius of the pine-needles, lipping them daintily in search of +something more appetizing beneath. + +The sunshine forced its way through the thick branches of the pine and +frolicked gayly with Sydney's ruddy hair, as she tossed aside her hat +and sat down to recover her composure, so suddenly and extraordinarily +lost. Perhaps five minutes, perhaps ten, had passed thus in reflection +which she called to herself "disgustingly self-conscious," when Johnny +lifted his head and pointed his ears towards that side where the +undergrowth was thickest. Sydney sprang to her feet and put on her hat, +for she had no desire to be caught day-dreaming. + +Having taken this precaution, however, she stood quite still, and +Johnny, with satisfied curiosity, renewed his search among the fallen +leaves. + +The approaching sounds betrayed that there was a path on the other side +of the thicket. Indeed, Sydney remembered that one ran from Melissa's +cabin to a spring not far off, and she realized that she must be nearer +to the house than she had appreciated. The voices were those of a man +and a woman in no good humor with each other. In fact, a lively quarrel +seemed to be in progress. + +"Ah certainly wish you-all wouldn' come here no mo'." It was Melissa. +"_Ah_ don' wan' to see ye; 'n you are so aggravatin' to Bud." + +"Ye used to like to have me come, ye know ye did, M'lissy. Don' you-all +remember the time Ah kissed ye behin' the big oak in yo' daddy's +pasture? Ye liked me well enough then." + +"You shut up, Pink Pressley. Ah was a silly girl then, 'n Ah'm a +married woman now, 'n hit's time you-all stopped foolin' roun' here." + +The voices lessened in the distance, and a jay-bird which had screamed +lustily at their approach turned his attention once more to Sydney, and +found her still standing, bridle in hand. + +She was shocked at the trouble that seemed to threaten the happiness of +Bud Yarebrough's household, and she stood uncertain whether to turn +back from the encounter upon which unwittingly she had intruded, or +whether to go on in case Melissa needed her help or her comfort. Johnny +pushed against her invitingly, and she mounted him from a near-by +stump, and, breaking through the scrub, turned his head along the path +in the direction of the cabin. + +The house proved, indeed, to be close at hand; it had been hardly worth +while to mount the horse, so near it stood to the pine-tree of Sydney's +ambush. The mud daubing between the logs shone bright through the hazy +spring atmosphere, and a thick white smoke, betokening a handful of +chips newly tossed upon the fire, ascended slowly into the air as if +eager to explore the dulled blue sky above. + +As Sydney came around the corner of the cabin, for the path debouched +at the rear, a terrified white rooster came running from the front, his +outstretched wings lengthening the stride of his sturdy yellow legs, +and his wattles swinging violently from side to side. At the same +moment angry voices again struck Sydney's ears. + +"Never, never, never!" + +Melissa was tremulously insistent. + +"Ah'll make you-all sorry you ever married Bud Yarebrough," the man +responded, and Sydney turned the corner just in time to see him seize +Melissa by the waist and lean over to kiss her. The girl took advantage +of the loosening of his hold as he caught sight of Miss Carroll, and +delivered him a resounding slap upon his cheek, when she turned panting +to her opportune visitor. + +"You-all saw, Miss Sydney, he didn' do hit! He's that hateful, he won' +let me alone,--always pesterin' roun' here when Bud ain' to home. Ah +'low Ah jus' hate him!" + +Stricken still with surprise, Sydney sat upon her horse, her face +scarlet with distress and stern with disapproval. Pink glanced up at +her, and began to sidle off, abashed. He could not forbear, however, +throwing back a parting threat. + +"You-all remember what Ah said. Ah'll make you sorry you ever married +Bud Yarebrough." + +"What does it mean, Melissa?" asked Sydney, dropping from the saddle +and turning her face, now colorless, upon the weeping little wife +crouching in a corner of the doorway. + +"Jus' what you-all heard, Miss Sydney. He's always comin' here when +Bud's away; 'n when he meets Bud anywheres they's always quar'lin', 'n +Ah'm jus' wore out with him." + +Sydney hung the horse's bridle over the end of an upturned horseshoe +nailed to a tree before the cabin, and sat down on the door-step beside +her humble friend. + +"Melissa, tell me,"--she was very grave,--"did he ever before--does +he----?" + +She sought vainly for some phrase less bald than that which seemed so +uncompromisingly full of embarrassment. + +"Did he ever try to kiss me, ye mean? No, indeed, Miss Sydney; he sho' +didn'. Only one time when Ah was a girl we kep' company fo' a right +smart bit, 'n one night, when a lot of us was playin' tag in the +pasture, he caught me 'n kissed me. That's the only time, hones', Miss +Sydney. He never done a thing like this befo' to-day since Ah been +married; jus' hung roun' 'n been aggravatin'." + +Sydney took the hard hand between her own soft palms and stroked it +gently. + +"Hush, dear, don't sob like that. Can't Bud keep him away? Can't he +forbid him to come here?" + +"Ah'd be afraid to tell him about this, he's that fiery-tempered, Bud +is. He goes along jus' as easy, 'n then some day he jus' natchelly goes +rarin'. When Ah've tol' him how Pink comes botherin' me, he jus' says, +'Pore feller, he didn' get ye. Ah'm sorry fo' him.' But 'f Ah tell him +this he might shoot him, 'n Ah couldn' bear that!" + +Melissa ended with a shuddering cry, and Sydney remembered pityingly +how the girl's brother had been brought home dead two years ago, shot +in a quarrel whose primary cause was corn whisky. + +"Tell me, Melissa, what did he mean by that threat,--that he'd make you +sorry you'd married Bud? How can he harm him?" + +"Ah don' know, oh, Ah don' know," sobbed the poor girl; "only hit's +somethin' mahty mean fo' sho'. He's that low-down 'n sneaky hit's sho' +to be somethin' mean," she reiterated. + +"It seems to me, Melissa, that if I were married, I shouldn't want to +have a secret that my husband didn't know. Of course, you understand +Bud best; but be sure, quite sure, that it is right before you keep +anything from him, won't you?" + +A wail from within the cabin brought both the girls to their feet. The +fortunate rule that most women who have to worry over their husbands +have children to divert their minds was unbroken in Melissa's case. She +wiped her eyes, took the morsel from the bed, and kissed it +passionately, while Sydney looked on with avid gaze. + +"May I take her for a little while, Melissa?" she asked, humbly. "She's +so sweet!" + + + + +V + +A Strong Man's Weakness + + +Through all the year's round of weather, good and bad; through the snow +of January and the wind of March; through the glare of the warm April +days before the foliage casts its protective shade over the earth; +through the heat of midsummer and the glorious wine-clear air of +October, round again to the rigors of Christmas,--through all the +circle of the twelvemonth Melissa's door stood open. + +To all appearance, ventilation is a hobby ridden and overridden in the +Carolina mountains, but the doors are not left open for hygiene's sake, +or even in hospitality's good name. It is to promote the performance of +the ordinary duties of life, more comfortably carried on in the light +than in the dark; for since the shuttered openings that serve as +windows are unglazed, the door must be left open to admit the sun's +bright rays. + +The one room of Melissa's cabin was scrupulously clean. Pictures of the +President and of one of the happy victims of Somebody's Pleasant +Pain-Killer were tacked upon the walls beside long strings of dried red +peppers and of okra. A gourd, cut into the shape of a cup, hung upon a +nail by its crooked neck. The bed was covered neatly with a +blue-and-white homespun coverlet, and a kettle steamed upon the fire at +the opposite end of the room. + +The sunlight swept across the floor as far as Sydney's feet, and +glinted upon the silver spur at her left heel. It crept up to her +radiant face and glowing hair. As she held the little baby in her +strong young arms, she stood transfigured like an angel of old in the +eyes of Friedrich von Rittenheim as he walked up the trail that served +as an approach to the cabin. + +"_Himmlisches Maedchen_," he whispered, and pulled off his cap with a +feeling of guilt that he was bringing into this pure presence his +thoughts of hatred and revenge. + +Little Miss Yarebrough had a narrow escape from a fall as her temporary +nurse's eyes fell upon the figure outside the door. + +"Ah, Baron, it is you!" cried Sydney, tucking the baby into the hollow +of one arm and extending her hand. "Grandmother has been disturbed +about you. Have you been away? It is a long time since you were at +Oakwood." + +"Has it seemed so to you?" he said, tenderly. "I have been to the town, +and I am but now r-returned within a pair of minutes. I have come to +ask Mrs. Yare-brough to put into order my house for me." + +The unexpected sight of Sydney was like the sudden breaking out of +sunshine through a bank of stormy cloud to the man whose whole mind had +been filled for days with poisonous thoughts. He beamed upon Melissa +and shook hands with her cordially. + +"Yes, sir, Ah'll go this mo'nin'. You-all wants yo' flo's mopped up, Ah +suppose." + +She took the baby from Sydney and laid her on the bed, and began to get +together what paraphernalia she needed. + +"Bud ain' comin' home to dinner, so Ah c'n stay 'n cook yo's 'f ye +want," she called, cheerily, breaking in upon the silence that had +fallen between her two guests; a silence fraught with happiness for the +man, and with a return of that terrible shyness for the girl. Why she, +the belle of two seasons, whose composure always had been the envy of +the girls of her age, should stand overcome with embarrassment before +this jeans-clad German she truly did not know. All power of initiative +seemed to have passed from her, and von Rittenheim stood before her and +feasted his eyes upon her in a way that she had been wont to condemn as +"horridly foreign," and she did nothing to relieve the situation. + +At last the happy idea of flight suggested itself. She pinned her hat +more securely and unlooped her skirt. + +The glow died from von Rittenheim's face. + +"You go? So goes ever-ything from me--love and fr-riendship--and even +hope," he added, in a whisper. Then, as Sydney looked at him curiously, +"Let me bring Yonny for you." + +Sydney kissed a "good-by" upon the fat hand of the baby, now hooded for +her journey to the Baron's, and murmured to Melissa,-- + +"You will think of what I said? You will be quite sure?" + +She turned and surrendered her slender, booted foot to the Baron's +palm, and was tossed deftly into the saddle. She had no realization of +the thrill that went through him at the touch; he had no notion of the +admiration that his dexterity roused in her. + +"I came by a path through the woods and tore down some of Bud's fence. +Will you go with me and put it up? It is only a little way." + +Von Rittenheim was delighted at the prolongation of his happiness. To +walk with his hand on her horse's neck; to do her a trifling service! +It was heaven! + +"You will come soon to Oakwood, won't you? Grandmother is eager to see +you, and we are expecting some guests from New York on this afternoon's +train--the Wendells; I want them to know you." + +The words were as sweet as the voice, and he repeated them in a whisper +as he put together the rails of Bud's fence after Johnny's surmounting +heels had cleared them. + +Then the chill swept around his heart again. It did seem to him as if +he were losing everything that made life good. In the old country he +had yielded up the little that was left after happiness had been stolen +from him. Here he had yearned for friendship, and it had played him a +scurvy trick; he had begun to see a faint glimmer of hope at the end of +the black cavern--just a point of light that gave promise of a land of +sun and cheer beyond. And now he felt that he had no right to travel +towards that point of light, to strive to reach it and make that land +his own, while shame hung over him, and black and bitter thoughts +filled his heart. + +His was a simple nature, von Rittenheim's,--one that yielded easily to +the common thralls of love and life. He should have been the happy head +of a family with the daily round of duties on a large estate to occupy +his thoughts. It was one of the freaks of fate that the kindly +outpourings of his heart always had been flung back at him. Unkind +chance had done her best to ruin a gentle and trusting disposition. + +He was musing on his wrongs as he tramped along the path between Bud's +cabin and his own. His high-flung head was bent and his gaze downcast. +He struck ruthlessly at the dry stalks of goldenrod on the bank, +nodding southward before the prevailing wind. He still was brooding as +he approached his cabin; brooding so darkly as to bring over his +judgment the dim mists of error and of injustice with their attendant +cloud of revenge. + +A mud-spattered buggy before the door drew his attention. It must +be--yet how would he dare? Still it _was_ Dr. Morgan's buggy. That +long-haired black mule was unmistakable. The sight of it shook von +Rittenheim as a breeze drives through pine-boughs. He felt choked, and +put his hand to his throat. + +The old man had come to exult over him, and what could he do in his own +house? Ah, there was only one thing to be done. Everything pushed him +towards it. + +But _now_--he would not be so cowardly as not to face the man he hated, +though a step into the brush beside the road would have concealed him. +As he approached he saw the Doctor's tall figure filling the height of +the doorway, though there was plenty of room to spare on each side. He +was talking to Melissa Yarebrough, who was within making a fire as a +preliminary to her cleaning and cooking operations. + +"He sent you-all over, did he? Well, Ah 'low that means he's coming +along in a little bit. He's been away? Is that so? Ah wonder where. Oh, +here he is. How are you, Baron? Pretty day, isn't it? Melissa tells me +you-all've been away." + +"Yes," curtly. "I have been away, as no one should know better than +you." + +"Better'n me? Ah never knew it till this minute when Melissa told me. +Ah was at Mrs. Carroll's this morning, and she commissioned me to find +out where you-all were at, and why you hadn't been to see her. She had +sent Sydney to my house for news, but Ah missed her on the road +somehow. The old lady put me through mah catechism, and Ah couldn't +tell her anything about you since the day Sophy and Ah were here, so Ah +came by to find out." + +"Do you dare say to me, sir, that you do not know where I have been?" + +"Ah certainly do say it! How in the world should Ah know all the +movements of people in God-forsaken coves like this?" + +The German's persistence was beginning to irritate the Carolinian, +grown autocratic and unaccustomed to question by long years of practice +among a country-folk submissive to the dictation of a leader. + +"You are under my r-roof there where you stand. Come you down here +where only heaven's blue covers you, and I will tell you some things +which it is well that you should know." + +To keep them out of mischief Friedrich thrust his clinched hands into +his pockets. Morgan did not see the application of von Rittenheim's +words about the sky, but he felt a threat in his tone, and, being no +coward, he came down the steps promptly. He even went so far as to +dispense with his quid. + +A sharp contrast they presented,--the German, erect, well-poised, +plainly a soldier in spite of his ill-fitting clothes; the American, +lank and stomachless, yet taller than the other in spite of his bent +shoulders. His tawny beard was guiltless of care. Of all his slack body +only his eyes showed alertness as they looked sidewise from under his +old felt hat. + +"Ah don't know what you-all are driving at, but Ah'm thirsting fo' that +information you're advertising to present me with free!" he drawled. + +Von Rittenheim now had himself under control, though his feet and hands +were cold because of the retreat to his head of the fighting fluid. + +"Let me ask you--after you were here with Mrs. Morgan--it is now three +weeks ago--did you not meet a man who asked you the way?" + +"Asked the way? Let me see. Yes, Ah 'low we did. White horse?" + +"A white horse. Exactly," returned von Rittenheim, dryly. "You directed +him on his road only too well." + +"What do you mean? He asked if there was any cut that would shorten the +way to Asheville, and Ah told him the shortest he could do was to stick +to the State Road." + +"Allow me to tell you, sir, that you lie." + +Dr. Morgan flung up his head angrily. But he was loath to think that +von Rittenheim, whom he liked, was trying to pick a quarrel with him. +Besides, English spoken with a foreign accent fails to carry conviction +to ears unaccustomed to hearing it, and Morgan thought the German +unfortunate in his choice of a word. + +"You mean Ah'm mistaken, and there is a short cut? If there is, Ah +don't know it. Where do you leave the State Road?" + +"I mean, sir, that you tell not the truth, that you lie, when you say +that that was your conversation with that man. You lie, I say!" + +Now there could be no mistake. The Doctor's sixty years fell from him +like a mantle. He looked a young man, and his face unfurled the banner +of wrath that knows no nation, but calls all the earth its own. The two +men glared at each other like dogs leaping against their collars, eager +to bury their teeth in each other's throats. + +"By God," growled the elder man, "if you-all weren't a damned foreigner +Ah'd kill you! But Ah suppose you don't know any better, and Ah've got +to let you alone." + +He turned and walked to his buggy. He did not forget to pat the noses +of the horse and mule that drew his equipage. He clambered into the +carriage, which protested, creaking, against his weight, and he jogged +slowly out of sight. + +"Oh, my Lawd," he whispered to himself, gently rocking from side to +side,--"oh, my Lawd, why ain't he an American? Oh, why ain't he? But a +foreigner! He ain't responsible!" + +Friedrich watched the retreating buggy with mingled disgust and +surprise. + +"Why did he not r-resent that? If not that, what? He is br-rave, that +is clear; then why does he not fight? Ah, these Americans, I +compr-rehend them not!" + +A furnace of indignation, he walked into the house. He passed through +his living-room, where Melissa was scrubbing the floor and singing a +doleful hymn as an encouragement to exertion, and went into his +bedroom. There, in the glass, he suddenly came upon his own face, +filled with bitterness, scowling. + +He paused, shocked that this mask of hatred should be his. Abashed, he +turned away from the too truthful mirror of his tell-tale features. A +gurgling sound fell upon his ear, and he saw, lying contentedly upon +his bed, babbling inexplicable nothings, waving meaningless gestures, +rosy, happy, a baby--Melissa's baby. + +The soldier looked down upon her solemnly. His face grew less stern and +his whole form seemed to relax. + +Glancing guiltily towards the open door of the other room, he leaned +over the bed, and, turning the little head to one side with the tip of +his forefinger, he kissed the baby's cheek just on the rosiest spot. + + + + +VI + +"I Warrant There's Vinegar and Pepper In't!" + + +A heavy rain was beating against the windows with intermittent bursts +of fury. Dr. Morgan, sitting in front of the fire in the room in which +Sydney and Bob had had their painful interview on the previous morning, +heard a mandatory whoop from without. Thrusting his stockinged feet +into his slippers, and laying down the _Pickwick Papers_ with a sigh +for the probability of his having to make a visit in such a storm, he +opened the door. A blast of wind brought in a sheet of rain that +dampened the ashes swept from the fireplace by the sudden draught. + +"O-oh, Doctor!" came a voice from the rider on the other side of the +fence. + +"Hullo! Who are you?" + +"Bud Yarebrough. Ah got a letter fo' you." + +"Well, light, ye fool, and put yo' beast under the shack." + +The Doctor slammed the door and shivered back into the range of the +fire's glow. + +"Come in," he shouted, when he heard Bud's stamping feet on the porch. +"Come in and warm. Who's sick, Melissa or the baby?" + +Bud unwound the scarf that protected his ears, shook the water from his +jacket, and began to untie the strings that secured pieces of sacking +to his feet. + +"Ne'er one. M'lissy's tol'able, 'n the baby's right smart. Doctor, Ah +don' know's Ah ever knew a baby 's was 's lively 's Sydney M'lissy." + +"Common failing o' first babies," grunted the Doctor. + +"Now mos' babies," pursued Bud, spreading out his scarf and the pieces +of burlap to dry before the blaze,--"mos' babies ain' overly +interestin', but Ah 'low Ah never saw a baby suck her thumb no +prettier'n Sydney M'lissy!" + +"Did you-all say something about a letter?" + +The Doctor was torn between a desire to be hospitable and a yearning to +return to Sam Weller. + +"Yes, Ah got a letter fo' ye." + +Bud began to hunt in the inner recesses of his apparel. + +"'N Ah 'low he cain't be well." + +"He? Who?" + +The Doctor's hopes of picking up his book again, which had risen when +he heard of the admirable physical state of Melissa and the baby, sank +once more. + +"Mr. Baron. He sho' mus' be crazy to go out in such weather's this, 'n +what's mo', to expect me to." + +"He seemed to know the right person to apply to." + +"That's the trouble with me. Ah'm that lackin' in good sense Ah do +anythin' anybody asts me to 'cos Ah'm flattered to be ast!" + +"Does he say he's sick?" + +"He don' say so, but he looks powerful res'-less 'n wild-like. He came +over 'bout noon 'n ast me would Ah carry you this letter." + +Here Bud's prolonged search resulted in the discovery of the letter's +outline under his sweater, and he extracted it by way of the neck of +that elastic garment. + +"Ah said, no, Ah wa'n' no fool to go out in such weather, 'n then he +cut loose 'n talked the most awful language. Ah couldn' understan' a +word of hit; Ah reckon hit's his foreign words or somethin', but Ah +never heard anythin' like hit befo'. 'N then he ast me again, mahty +quiet like, wouldn' Ah take this letter to you-all fo' him, 'n Ah jus' +natchelly thought Ah would!" + +The boy grinned sheepishly. The Doctor nodded and ran his finger under +the flap of the envelope. + +"So you think he's sick." + +"M'lissy does. When Ah was puttin' the saddle on the mule she come out +to the stable with them bits o' crocus sack fo' mah feet, 'n she said +Mr. Baron'd jus' gone, 'n she 'lowed he had a fever comin' on, he +looked so bad." + +Dr. Morgan was reading the letter for the second time, frowning heavily +over it. + +"What do you-all think yo'self?" + +"Well, Ah don' see how he can be right to walk a mile to our house in +this weather, not needin' to, 'n to _in_-sist on mah comin' here. Is +they e'er an answer?" + +The older man rose and put a log on the fire, while Bud gathered +together his primitive panoply and began to arm himself against the +elements. + +"You tell him, Bud, that Ah'll attend to it when the mud dries after +this rain. Ah get enough hauling round to do in the mud, without +anything extra," he added. + +Bud's curiosity was suffering. + +"Ain' you-all goin' to see him?" + +"You tell him what Ah say." The Doctor picked up his book with an air +of dismissal. "Shut the do' tight," he called, and then read the same +page three times over with unthinking mind, until he heard Bob's step +coming down the stairs. + +"Bob." + +"Sir?" + +The young man looked out of the window, wondering how soon the rain +would stop enough for him to go to see Sydney. + +"Read this." + +Bob took the letter. + +"The Baron," he said, studying the small, foreign hand. + +"Read it aloud." + +Bob began obediently: + + "MY DEAR SIR,--It is now more than three weeks that you played upon + me a trick most treacherous. What it was I will not relate, for it + would be needless. This I do assert, and more, that when you tell + me you do not know what I mean, as you told me yesterday, you say + not the truth. When I demand that you give to me the satisfaction + that a gentleman should offer to another under such circumstances, + I feel that I am treating you with a courtesy which you do not + deserve. I think a whipping would suit better your contemptibility. + Still, nevertheless, I conceal my pride, and I beg that you will + meet me at whatever place you may appoint, and that you will fight + with me with any weapon that you may choose. + + "My unfriended condition in this country makes it not possible that + I should be accompanied by a person who shall be suitable to be my + second. But I entreat that my poverty in this respect will not + deter you from bringing a friend with you. + + "I am, sir, + + "Yours with faithfulness, + + "FRIEDRICH JOHANN LUDWIG V. RITTENHEIM." + +Bob whistled,--a long sibilation of amazement,--and then laughed and +laughed again. + +"What have you-all been doing to the old fellow?" + +"Ah haven't any idea." + +"He says you talked it over yesterday." + +"You hardly could say we discussed it," said the Doctor, dryly. "He +insisted that Ah knew the drift o' his remarks, which Ah didn't, and +rung in something about a man on a white horse." + +"Who was he?" + +"Blamed if Ah know. Ah begin to think, like Bud, the man's sick. He +certainly was angry over something, and he used pretty strong +language." + +"Swearing?" + +"No. Told me Ah lied." + +Bob whistled again. + +"That warmed you under the collar, I suspect?" + +"It did wilt mah linen a trifle. However, Ah took it that, being a +foreigner, he didn't know just how strong a word he was employing, so +Ah drove off and left him." + +"I reckon from this," holding up the letter, "he did know, and meant +just what he said. It looks as if you'd been too lenient. You ought to +have given him a biff or two on the spot." + +"Maybe Ah had oughter." + +Morgan pulled his beard thoughtfully. + +Bob read the letter through once more. + +"Quaint English, isn't it? The idea of a regular challenge gets me. I +don't know when I've come across anything funnier." + +"The notion ain't so novel to me, but duels are scarce nowadays. The +State ain't so overly encouraging to them. Hand me down those Statutes +and let me see exactly how they fix us." + +Bob took the book from the shelf against the wall, and the Doctor +turned over the pages. + +"Here it is, in the Constitution. 'Article XIV., Section 2. Penalty for +fighting a duel. No person who shall hereafter fight a duel, or assist +in the same as a second, or send, accept, or knowingly carry a +challenge therefor, or agree to go out of the State to fight a duel, +shall hold any office in this State.' H'm," sniffed the Doctor. +"Strikes me that won't prevent a lot of people from fighting. It +discriminates against the would-be office-holder, but not against _me_, +who wouldn't swallow an office if you put it in mah mouth." + +"Or von Rittenheim, who wouldn't know one if he saw it! Perhaps it's a +delicate tribute to the desire of all North Carolinians to serve their +State." + +"What disturbs me," said Dr. Morgan, shutting the book, "is that Ah +like the fellow, and Ah don't want to shoot him all up fo' nothing. +And, as Ah said befo', Ah sho' do think the fever's coming on him." + +"What are you going to do?" + +"Blest if Ah know!" + +"What answer did you send?" + +"Ah told Bud to tell him Ah'd attend to it when the mud dried." + +"Good. That'll give you two or three days to find out what's the matter +with him. Oh, what a joke, what a joke!" + +Bob subsided into a chair, overcome with joy at the idea of his father +as a participant in a formal duel. + +"Let me know how it comes on, won't you, sir? May I be your second?" + +"No," returned the Doctor, hunting his place in the discarded novel. +"Ah'm laying off to have you governor some day, and Ah don't want to +have you disqualified this early!" + +Bob grinned appreciatively, and again explored the clouds. + +"I'm going to see Sydney. May I show her this?" + +Bob took his father's "H'm" for an assent, and went out to saddle his +horse. + +Von Rittenheim, sitting before the fire with _Wallenstein's Lager_ on +his knee, but with eyes bent upon the flames that burst with tiny +explosions from the logs, and with mind wandering far from thoughts of +Schiller,--von Rittenheim was waiting with what patience he could +command for Bud's return. + +With the falling of the wind at dusk the rain ceased. Friedrich lighted +his lamp and opened his door to look up the road, a view not commanded +by his single window. + +He prepared his evening meal of coffee and bread and the batter-cakes +that he had learned to like and then to make in this land of the +frying-pan. Still Bud did not come. At eleven o'clock he went to bed, +for he knew that no countryman, unless he were going for the doctor, +would be abroad at that hour, with such mud under foot. + +The next day's noon brought no news of the recreant messenger, and von +Rittenheim went to the Yarebroughs' cabin in search of him. + +"He ain' home," Melissa said, in the raised voice that she felt to be +necessary to the German's understanding of her English. "He's gone to +shoot cotton-tails. Ah 'low Ah'll make you-all a pie, 'f ye like," she +added, offering this practical sympathy to the suffering that she saw +written on his face. + +"A pie of cotton-tails! Delightful! It will give me pleasure," said von +Rittenheim, politely, with vague notions of birds floating through his +brain. "Did he--Bud--br-ring no message for me yesterday in the +afternoon?" + +"No. He said the Doctor 'lowed he'd 'tend to hit--what yo' letter was +about--when the mud dried, 'n Bud reckoned that wasn' no message, 'n +hit wasn' no use goin' over to tell you jus' that." + +"When the mud dried," repeated Friedrich. "Remarkable! Good-morning, +Mrs. Yarebrough. Most remarkable!" he kept repeating to himself as he +walked home. "He is not afraid, of that I am certain. Why, then, does +he delay? Remarkable!" + + + + +VII + +In the Southern Appalachians + + +It was five o'clock, and a pretty girl, Katrina Wendell, was standing +at one of the long windows of the drawing-room at Oakwood, looking out +upon the storm. + +She had not Sydney's unusual beauty, nor had she her imperious manner, +the heritage to Southern women from generations of slave-holding +ancestors; but she had charm and a certain distinction, and she had the +stamp with which New York seals her daughters imprinted upon every tuck +and frill of her clever gown. + +"Katrina, it isn't polite to look so bored," said her brother John, who +was amusing himself with Sydney's help by drawing caricatures of the +men of the day. + +Katrina flushed. She _was_ bored, but John was a beast to mention it. +She had just brought her first season to an ignominious close by +falling in love with the worst match of the year,--Tom Schuyler, +handsome, irrepressible, and penniless. Mrs. Wendell promptly had +refused her consent to the engagement, and, with equal decision and +what Tom called "disgusting alacrity," had sent her daughter South +under her brother's care to accept the hospitality of Mrs. Carroll, a +life-long friend. + +Under the circumstances it was not strange that the prospect from the +window did not appeal to Katrina. + +John, on the other hand, was reaping his reward for the self-sacrifice +that had made him accept the duty of escorting his sister to North +Carolina. Unlike the martyrs of old who went unprotesting to their +doom, he had obeyed his mother's commands in no submissive spirit. It +was a relief to the keenness of his martyrdom to kick against the +pricks, and kick he did from New York to Flora, during all such parts +of the twenty-four hours as were not occupied in attending to the wants +of his admirable appetite, or in yielding to the refreshment of such +repose as a sleeping-car can offer. Even he felt that his recompense +was undeservedly great when he found himself welcomed at the little +Flora flag-station by Sydney. He was twenty-eight, and at that age a +pretty girl still stands far up on the list of diversions. No, +decidedly, John was not bored. + +Katrina made no answer to her brother's accusation. + +"Poor Katrina," said Sydney, going to the window and standing beside +her guest. "It is an abominable day for your first one. Just look at +that!"--she summoned John by a glance over her shoulder; "pouring! And +usually we pride ourselves on our view." + +Sheets of rain were driving across the field at the foot of the knoll +upon which the house stood. At times the mountains beyond were shut off +entirely. Again the clouds overhead blew past, and through a leaden +light the storms in the distance could be seen, thickening under some +canopy of blackness, or ceasing as the upper mist grew thin. + +"What an advantage it gives you to have such a stretch of open +country," said John. "Here you can see a storm coming when it is yet +twenty miles away, and make your plans accordingly; but in New York, +with the horizon line on the roofs of the houses across the street, you +may be caught by a shower that was lurking over the Battery when you +left your own door." + +"I can't understand the foliage being so little advanced," said +Katrina. "It's the last of April, and yet the leaves hardly are +starting. They aren't much ahead of the Park." + +"You expected a Florida climate, perhaps. We never cease to have winter +letters from people in the North who lament their cold, and wish they +were with us on our 'rose-covered veranda in the Sunny South,' and it +may be zero when we are reading their flights of imagination." + +"Is it really ever as cold as that?" + +"Not often, but quite often enough. I've known snow as late as the +twentieth of April, and I've been to a picnic on Buzzard Mountain in +January." + +"We're always hearing about this wonderful climate. It sounds as if it +were remarkable chiefly for eccentricity." + +"Oh, the average temperature is very even. The summers are delightful, +too,--a long warm season instead of a short hot one. Though you may +have fires now and then, it's not cool enough to close the windows, +night or day, from the first of May to the first of October, and yet it +seldom goes over eighty-five." + +"It's the equilibrium between altitude and latitude, showing what it +can do, isn't it?" asked John. "The fact that we are half a mile above +the booming waters of the deep, my dear Katrina, counterbalances the +nine hundred miles that lie between us and that large and noisy city to +which I have no doubt your heart is turning fondly." + +"Here are some men on horseback, Sydney," said Katrina, again ignoring +her brother. + +The wind was dying and the rain was lessening with each fitful gust. + +"Are they cavaliers approaching the presence, or hinds of the estate +coming to crave an audience?" demanded John, who professed much +amusement at what he had seen of the semi-feudal manner of life at +Oakwood, and at Sydney's responsibilities with regard to the work of +the farm and to the tenants. + +The girl peered into the gathering gloom. + +"It must be Bob Morgan. Yes, it is; and that looks like Patton McRae's +black mare." + +"By their nags ye shall know them," said John. "Who are these estimable +youths? I look upon them with the eye of jealousy." + +"Bob Morgan? Oh, he's Dr. Morgan's son. You passed his house near the +post-office. And the McRaes live at Cotswold; there's a big family of +them. Will you ring for tea, Mr. Wendell?" + +"I fly to do your bidding, even though it be to succor my rivals, for +such I feel they are," and he slapped his chest melodramatically. + +Much stamping of feet and shaking of garments heralded the announcement +of the two young men by Uncle Jimmy, the old colored butler. + +"How good of you both to come in this weather," said Sydney, flashing a +greeting at each one in turn. "You are just in time to prevent Miss +Wendell from being bored to death." + +"Delighted to prevent your demise," said Patton, promptly, and attached +himself at once to Katrina's following. + +"Uncle Jimmy," said Sydney to the old man who was poking the fire with +an assiduity born of a desire to stay in the room as long as possible, +"tell Mrs. Carroll that tea is just coming in, and that Mr. Bob and Mr. +Patton are here." + +"See what you've brought us, Mr. McRae," Katrina was saying, as a ray +of sunshine broke the twilight darkness. + +The mountains stood a deep and penetrable blue against a golden break +behind the Balsams. Fierce black clouds hurried across the upper sky, +dragging after them ragged ends of mist, and beneath this roofing the +setting sun aimed its luminous shafts across the _rest_ made by +Pisgah's rugged peak. + +No one broke the spell of beauty by a word, but Wendell saw a glance +pass between Sydney and Bob,--the look of sympathy sure of its fellow. + +The sound of Mrs. Carroll's cane brought them all to their feet. She +entered, tiny, autocratic, keen, leaning upon Uncle Jimmy's faithful +arm. + +"Good afternoon, Bob. Good afternoon, Patton. You are doubly welcome on +this stormy day. Put my chair a little more to the side of the +fireplace, Bob. Yes, Patton, the footstool, if you please. You may go, +James. John, the hook for my cane is on the left of the mantel-piece. +Katrina, tell Sydney to put a shade less cream in my tea than she did +yesterday. No cake, thank you, John, but a rusk,--yes, a rusk appeals +to me. Bob, what wild thing did you do on that horse of yours on your +way here?" + +"Not a thing, Mrs. Carroll. He came along like a Shetland pony. Gray +Eagle doesn't like rain. It depresses him." + +"Patton is riding the black mare to-day, grandmother," called Sydney +from behind her tea equipage. + +The old lady raised her eyes in comical despair and shook her head +mournfully. + +"You certainly have courage, my dear child." + +"Only the courage of a Cotswold lion, I'm afraid. But you mustn't be +distressed about her, she's really beginning to do Sydney credit." + +"You see, Mr. Wendell, Black Monday was raised on the place here, and +she's been the hardest colt to break of any we ever had. Patton owns +her now, but I feel a personal responsibility for her because he took +her out of my hands before she was thoroughly quiet." + +"I see," nodded John, gravely, in accord with Sydney's seriousness. +"You fear some burst of girlish exuberance." + +"Did you see her roll in her saddle just as we were coming out of +church Sunday?" asked Patton, turning eagerly to Sydney. + +"How do you dare to use such half-broken creatures?" cried Katrina. + +"My dear," said Mrs. Carroll, "when you've been with us a little while +you'll realize how close we are to primitive conditions. To-day you +break the horse you mean to ride next week. To-morrow you kill the +steer or the pig or the chickens that were your pets to-day." + +"I suppose it must be so always in the country, but you can't be very +primitive here with a large town near by and a railroad." + +"In reality we are only as far from the Asheville Court House as the +people on the upper boundary of the Bronx are from Castle Garden; but +in point of convenience, owing to the scarcity of trains and their poor +arrangement, we are almost as near to Washington." + +"Still, the railroad has opened the country and given the farmers new +markets," asserted John. + +"Undoubtedly; but that is not an unmixed good, in my opinion," said +Mrs. Carroll, stoutly. "They sell more cabbages and apples, but they +buy cheap fabrics and ready-made clothing in place of the stout +homespun that the women used to weave." + +"You'd be surprised," said Patton, "to know how little the country +people use the railroad. There was an example of it day before +yesterday. A man from McDowell's Creek, about six miles from Flora, +took his first train-ride since the road was put through, fifteen years +ago." + +"How extraordinary that seems! It was the day of his life, I suppose." +Katrina's eyes were large with amazement. + +"In a way it was," said Bob, dryly, "for in Asheville he celebrated his +adventures not wisely, but too well, and on the way out he fell from +the platform and was killed." + +"Bob, how can you be so flippant?" objected Sydney to the crestfallen +young man. "It seems a terrible end." + +"All sudden deaths seem terrible to us who are left behind," said Mrs. +Carroll; "but even such an ending does not give us the shock that it +would if we did not live in a community accustomed to the accidents +consequent upon every man's carrying a revolver. It's a bad habit. I +hope you boys don't do it." + +"No, indeed, Mrs. Carroll," they both replied, with suspicious +promptness, and they sat up very straight, so that the backs of their +coats presented an unbroken line. + +John smiled at them. + +"Are they often used?" he asked. + +"Quite too often," answered Sydney, gravely. "As grandmother says, we +do, indeed, live close to nature. If a man is angry with his neighbor, +he calls him to his door on some moonless night and shoots him." + +"In primitive society the primitive wants of man are satisfied in +primitive ways," remarked Bob. + +"Moses ought to have put the Ten Commandments on something stronger +than stone if he meant them to be unbroken," added Patton. + +Mrs. Carroll shook her head at him. + +"I don't see how you can be so very primitive," insisted Katrina. "Now +this----" She glanced expressively about the room, where old portraits +surmounted the dark panelling and heavy rugs glowed warmly in the +firelight. + +"Oh, we are as composite in our mountains as are the people of any +other part of these composite United States," said Sydney. "The +mountaineers themselves are a mixture. There are men in coves distant +from the railroad who are living on land to which their ancestors drove +up their cattle from the low country three or four generations ago. +These men are a law unto themselves. They have no opportunities for +educating their children, and once in a while you hear of a family that +never has heard the name of God." + +"My great-grandfather came here in the early eighteen hundreds," said +Bob, "and a queer lot he must have found. They say that there was a +crop of younger sons of good English families which had been planted +here as a good country for the culture of wild oats." + +"I suppose that in the eighteenth century this was as remote a place as +any to lose black sheep in, if losing was their desire," suggested +John. + +"It's quite true, quite true, what Bob says," Mrs. Carroll took up the +explanation. "Mr. Carroll used to tell me that he knew it to be a fact +that Bud Yarebrough's father--Bud is a ne'er-do-weel who lives in a +cove not many miles from here, Katrina, my dear--was a great-grandson +of one of the Dukes of Calverley." + +"Then Melissa's baby is the Lady Sydney Melissa Something-or-other!" +laughed Sydney. + +"There's a legend of a penal colony, too," said Patton. + +"That is disputed," replied Mrs. Carroll. + +"If there was one, Pink Pressley is of its lineage, I am sure," said +Sydney. + +"If heredity counts for anything, I should think that a colony of black +sheep whose diet had been wild oats would account for all the +lawlessness of the community," offered John. + +"For a great deal of it, undoubtedly, and their life of freedom from +restraint for so many years would be responsible for more." + +"But these people are not close about you here," exclaimed Katrina. + +"Indeed, they are. They are our neighbors and our friends. Why, there's +a tenant on our place who has been tried twice for murder." + +"Bob and I found a deserted still in the woods over the creek the other +day," said Sydney. "That suggests another of our friends' occupations." + +"But your influence must be at work among them constantly." + +"We hope it is, and that is why we lay stress upon the compositeness of +our settlement," said Mrs. Carroll. "There are the country people we've +been telling you about, and there's a group of what we call +Neighborhood people, for distinction's sake. The Delaunays at the Cliff +were originally from New Orleans, and the Hugers were from Charleston, +and we came from Virginia. Before the war we used to come over the +mountains every summer in carriages to take refuge from the heat of the +lowlands, and after the war we were glad to live here permanently." + +"It was post-bellum poverty that drove us here from the +Scotch-Presbyterian settlements in the middle of the State," said +Patton. "We're another element." + +"And is there really fusion going on as there is in other parts of the +country?" asked Katrina. + +"My people have assimilated with the peasantry, as I suppose Mrs. +Carroll calls them, ever since they came," said Bob. + +"This settlement must be unique," said John. + +"No. I know of two not very far from here, and I've heard of others. +The more fortunate people consider themselves as closely allied to the +country as do the mountaineers. We are integral parts, and we insist on +being so considered." + +"We aren't a wholly bad lot, we mountaineers," said Bob. "I speak as of +the soil, you see. Too much whisky and tobacco and hog-meat have +deprived us of physical beauty, and we are sadly lacking in moral +strength, but the life of freedom and lawlessness developed good +traits, too. We don't lie,--that is, about important things," he added, +hastily, putting his hand under his coat; "and we don't steal, and we +are loyal to our friends." + +"Especially when the minions of the law are after them," grinned +Patton. + +"Ah, you've betrayed yourselves," cried Sydney. "I know it was you two +boys who hid Pink Pressley when the revenue men were chasing him the +last time." + +"The last time?" John asked the question. + +"Oh, Pink used to be a chronic moonshiner. He seems to be a reformed +pirate now," said Patton. "He must be in love." + +"Whisky is the curse of this country," said Mrs. Carroll, vehemently, +while Bob gazed into the fire and Sydney played with the sugar-tongs. +"You can't deny lying, Bob, when the moonshiners are lying to the +revenue men every day, and their friends are lying in their behalf; and +you can't say they don't steal, when they are defrauding the government +with every quart of blockade they sell. The mountaineers may be loyal +to their friends, but it is to conceal crime." + +"Illicit stilling seems to be regarded like smuggling," said John. "The +government is fair game." + +"Whisky stunts the growth of children, and blunts the morals of youth, +and makes murderers of men," went on the old lady, disregarding John's +interruption, and sitting with expressive straightness. A silence fell +upon the group that John and Katrina felt to be painful without +understanding why. Patton and Sydney were burning with sympathy for +Bob. It was Patton who broke the quiet. + +"And they drink it from a dipper!" + +The ensuing laughter snapped the strain of embarrassment. + +"We have another class of people that we haven't described to Katrina," +said Sidney. "The resident foreigners." + +"Like Baron von Rittenheim," said Bob, absently, staring at the fire. + +"Another title! How in the world did he come here?" asked Katrina. + +"Oh, he's one of the footballs of Fate," said Patton. + +"Usually they're English,--the footballs," said Bob. "They come here to +mend either health or fortune, stay a few years, and go away." + +"Mended?" + +"Yes, in health, if they--stop drinking." Bob brought it out with a +jerk. "This climate's great, you know." + +"But not with improved finances?" + +"Yes, that too. It's a fine place for economy." + +"For what purpose did this German come?" asked Katrina. + +"He's one of the mysteries," said Patton, rising to take his leave. + +Bob called Sydney from the drawing-room into the hall, and handed her a +letter. + +"Father got it this afternoon," he said. "It's awfully funny." + +Sydney took it from its envelope. Bob, bending to buckle on his spurs, +did not see her flush at the signature and then grow pale as she read. + +"Bob," she whispered, hoarsely, "promise me,--promise that you'll let +me know--if they do it--when it's going to be." + +And Bob, who had no thought but to amuse her, said, heartily, "Why, of +course." + +Had von Rittenheim, sitting before his fire awaiting Bud's return, been +able to see into the minds of his neighbors, he would have found matter +more productive of mental confusion than were English irregular verbs +to him. + +That Dr. Morgan, after receiving a challenge, could settle back to the +perusal of the _Pickwick Papers_ as placidly as if he had attended to +the last minute detail of the conventions attendant upon that process +called "giving satisfaction," was a thing that his traditions, his +education, and his environment had put it out of his power to +understand. + +That Bob could regard the incident as a joke was even farther from his +grasp. An indifference caused by a lack of fear,--that was within his +range. But that this method of wiping out an insult should be regarded +as funny,--of such an emotion under such circumstances he could not +conceive. + +Sydney's feeling, could he have known it, was closer to his +comprehension, because it is not beyond man's imagination to guess, +approximately, the frame of mind into which a woman would be thrown +upon hearing of such a prospective meeting. What he could not see was +the importance that his own part played in the girl's fear. + +The thing seemed to her barbaric, mediaeval, horrible. She shook to +think of harm that might come to her good old friend, the Doctor. She +became an abject coward when she remembered that the old man was noted +throughout the mountains as a perfect shot. + +She could not understand herself. She had not had this feeling at all +when Ben Frady had cleared the open space before the post-office of all +loafers, and she unwittingly had ridden on to the scene, and, grasping +the situation, had demanded his revolver from him and had received it. + +Not until afterwards had she had any such sensations as this, when a +message had come to the house that the negroes on the farm were cutting +each other, and she had walked in upon them and had ordered them to +separate. + +Bob had told her that he didn't know what it was all about, and the +uncertainty made the situation only more disquieting. Like most +Southern women, it did not occur to her to interfere before the event +in any affair that was men's own; but she began to formulate a plan +that depended for its success upon Bob's keeping her informed as to the +course pursued by his father. Could she depend on him? Her anxiety was +cruel. + + + + +VIII + +Sydney Rides against Time + + +Three days later Bud brought to von Rittenheim the following note: + + "DEAR BARON,--I say again that I haven't any idea what you are + driving at, but I never yet went back on a fight, so if you still + want one I'll meet you at twelve o'clock to-morrow on top of Buck + Mountain. I think you went to a picnic there when the chestnuts + were ripe last fall, so you know the place. I'll take the weapons + along with me, and you can examine them when you get there. I don't + want any second. + + "Yours truly, + + "HENRY MORGAN." + +Von Rittenheim puzzled over the English of this document, and nodded +his head in satisfaction. + +"At last he performs his duty. Buck Mountain I know. It is a distant +spot, ten miles from here. He is strange not to say what are the +weapons; but what can you expect?" + +With a shrug derogating the social experience of his adopted land, he +proceeded to negotiate with Bud for the use of his mule on the next +day. + +It was nearly eleven o'clock on the following morning when Bob Morgan +drew rein before the Carrolls' door, and asked to see Sydney. + +"Beg her to come to the door just a moment, Uncle Jimmy. No, I'll not +send the horse around. And she'll want Johnny saddled at once. Send +word to the stable, please." + +When she appeared he ran up the steps as far as his bridle would allow, +and spoke in a low voice, with a glance at the windows. + +"It's this morning, Sydney, at twelve. Will you come? Father didn't +tell me about it until just as he was leaving the house, and he said he +didn't want me, but I'd promised you, and we'll be in time if we hurry, +I've ordered Johnny." + +The girl clutched her throat with a feeling that every bit of strength +was leaving her body. Bob, buckling his curb rein, saw nothing. His +only thought was to give her some sport. A fight, more or less, counted +but little with him personally; and he did not think that this one +actually would take place, else he would not have considered taking a +girl to it. + +Sydney spared a thought of wonder at Bob's nonchalance, but as swiftly +reflected that perhaps men always were cool in such emergencies. To her +it meant murder,--the crime of life destroyed. And whose life? Perhaps +that of her dear old friend. Perhaps----! + +The blood surged back to her brain and she mastered herself. + +"We have so little time," she panted. "I'll be ready in a minute." + +Before the horse was at the mounting-block she was awaiting him, +buttoning her gloves, while she extended her foot for Bob to buckle her +spur. She had put on her riding-skirt, but otherwise was as she had +come to the door. + +"Don't you-all want a coat, Sydney?" asked Bob, solicitously. "Or a +hat?" + +"No, I'm quite warm. Where is that boy? Hurry, Clint," she called to +the little negro, who was bringing the horse around with a slowness +born of his enjoyment of the brief ride. + +"Off with you, quick, now, boy!" It was Bob, who was catching the +girl's impatience. "Here, take Gray Eagle." + +He flung his bridle to the lad, and threw Sydney into the saddle as +quickly as she could wish. She adjusted herself carefully, for she knew +how the discomfort of a twisted skirt may make a difference of a minute +in the mile, or may mean real danger at a jump. + +"There's no time to lose, it's five minutes past eleven now," she said, +glancing at a strap watch on her wrist, and touching Johnny with her +spur. + +Bob's horse was off in pursuit before his master was well on his back. + +"I declare, she might have given me a fairer start!" he growled, as the +sorrel settled down ahead of him into a run that bade fair to keep even +the advantage. They had had many a race, Bob and Sydney, and usually it +was the girl who was the more cautious rider of the two. To-day, +however, she took risks that amazed even her old-time playmate, who +thought he knew her every mood. + +By the long driveway and the road it was two miles to the Doctor's +house, and five from there to the foot of Buck Mountain. By a cut +across the sheep-pasture the first part of the way could be reduced +nearly a mile. + +"She certainly is keen for the fun," thought Bob, as he saw Sydney turn +from the avenue and drive Johnny at a gate which he knew that she did +not care often to take. + +"Too high for Johnny. I must tell her not to do that again," he +commented, as he noticed during his own flight that the top rail was +split from contact with the first horse's heels. + +[Illustration: A fence at the top of a sharp ascent] + +Down the hill and across the field tore the sorrel, leaping the branch, +and slackening to allow the gray's approach only when he came to a +fence whose position at the top of a sharp ascent forbade his taking +it. + +Sydney looked back impatiently as Bob covered the dozen lengths between +them and swung off to open the gate. + +"You might wait for a fellow," he grumbled, but already the girl was +through, and her white blouse and ruddy hair shone half-way across the +unenclosed meadow upon which she had entered. For the first time her +pale face impressed Bob. + +"Looks like she saw something," he thought, with a remnant of old +superstition. "I do believe she thinks there's going to be bloodshed." +And with a view to reassuring her, he caught up with her in the path +through the belt of woods that led from the field to the road. Their +horses were nose on tail, and of necessity going slowly. + +"Sydney!" he cried, "O-oh, Sydney! You don't think it's serious, do +you? Because----" + +Here the path debouched into the open road, and Johnny was off again +before Bob could finish, and his question, meant to inspirit Sydney, +had sounded to her only like a desire for his own reassurance, and had +alarmed her more than ever. + +A mad feeling within pricked her to tear on without slackening. She +felt that she could have galloped to the very top of the mountain +without fatigue. Her horsewoman's intelligence, however, warned her to +think of her animal, and she took him along quietly through the open +place before the post-office, giving Bob a chance to catch up. + +He was thoroughly out of temper now. Never before had Sydney been so +careless of him. He couldn't understand it; but he was beginning to +realize that she was taking the adventure seriously, and, with boyish +malice, he resolved to make no further effort to undeceive her. + +Indeed, as they rode on slowly and silently, side by side, for a few +hundred yards, he became not so sure himself that the duel was the joke +that he had considered it. + +He knew his father to be a man ready in his own defence, and of a high, +though controlled temper; and he had not overlooked the fact that the +stocks of two guns were protruding from the holster that projected from +under the skirt of the Doctor's McClellan. Furthermore, he knew that +the German was in deadly earnest. + +As these suspicions assailed him, he turned to Sydney and touched the +spur to his gray. The girl responded to his look, and they set into the +steady gallop that covers much country with but little effort either to +horse or rider. + +Sydney held out her watch for Bob to see. It was quarter past eleven. +Nearly five miles lay before them to the foot of the mountain, and to +the summit there was a long, steep mile and a half which was the +time-consumer to be reckoned with. + +A mile beyond the post-office they turned from the State Road into a +less-travelled, and hence rougher, side road. Through a stretch of +sandy mud they breathed the horses again, and then on, on, on to the +big hill whose vast bulk was beginning to tower mightily before them. +Past the old school-house they dashed, without a glance for its forlorn +state of decay; past one of the farm gates of the Cotswold estate; past +the Baptist Bethel, indistinguishable from a school-house except for +the white stones in the graveyard, upon which the sun glinted +cheerfully. + +Quarter after quarter they left behind them, slowing up only for steep +descents or for patches of lengthwise road-mending whose upthrust +branch ends are liable to snag a horse's legs. Johnny and Gray Eagle +took in their stride the brooks that babbled gayly across the way; they +shied at a glare of mica on the red clay of the bank; they dodged ruts, +and leaped mud-holes, and pushed for the middle of the road. + +At the end of the third mile Sydney asked, not lifting her eyes from +the ground before her, "Is the bridle-path open?" It was the first time +she had spoken since they left Oakwood. + +"I don't know. It may be washed. We'd better keep to the sled-track." + +"It's half a mile longer." + +"But the other might delay us more." + +Sydney did not urge the point, but looked at her watch as they reached +the opening where the ascent began. + +It was twenty minutes of twelve. + +Without a word she held out her hand to Bob. She felt sick and faint, +and her companion's whistle was not reassuring. + +"They'll probably be late," he suggested, but he remembered as he said +it that his father had left home for the meeting-place before he had +started to take the news to Sydney. + +The trail began in a steep acclivity that soon brought the horses to a +walk. When it was surmounted the beasts needs must blow, though they +pressed on willingly enough at a half-minute's end. A fairly level bit +followed along the ridge of the foot-hill they just had climbed. It was +not wide enough for them to travel abreast, and Johnny led with a sharp +trot that made clever avoidance of the stones and roots and stumps that +sprang into sight before him as at the summons of a malignant spirit. + +The next upward stretch was over a ledge of rock from which the +winter's rains had washed the soil. A trickling spring kept its surface +constantly wet, and its slippery face brought Johnny to his knees. + +Sydney uttered a cry which ordinarily would have been one of pity for +her favorite's pain. Now it was a note of fear lest the fall might mean +delay. But the brave sorrel heaved himself up, and turned across the +path to pant after the exertion. + +"Are you all right, Sydney?" came Bob's anxious cry from below, whence +he had seen the accident. + +"It was nothing," she called. "Come, Johnny, poor old man!" + +She patted his lowered neck, and he bent his hoofs to catch his +toe-calks in the cracks of the rock. + +Another fleeting pause at the top rewarded his endeavor, and then a +couple of hundred yards of hardly perceptible upward incline produced +again the swift and ready trot. + +Five minutes more of easy climbing brought into view the tobacco barn +which was one of the mountain's landmarks. Beyond it the grade became +much more abrupt, and although it was worn fairly smooth by the sleds +of the men who planted aerial cornfields far up on the highest +clearings, yet its steepness rendered this last half-mile the truly +formidable part of the ascent. + +Johnny glanced up it with regretful eye, stopped an instant, took a +long breath, shook himself, and went bravely to his task. + +Sydney's every thought was a passionate longing to press on,--to hurry, +to rush, to fly. Her lips grew white when she saw that the hands of her +watch pointed to four minutes of twelve. + +"It is not possible to be in time," she agonized. "O God, delay them! O +God, stop them!" + +She bent forward over the horse's withers, and stretched upward, as if +to pull him higher by her buoyancy. She was heedless of the stream that +gurgled beside the trail among the evergreen sword-fern--a noisy +betrayer of the mountain's angle. She did not observe that she was +alone, that Bob was not following her. She was deaf to his cries as he +struggled below with the gray, which was plunging against an attack of +yellow jackets, and refused to take the trail. + +Johnny stopped, his sides heaving pitiably. + +"Oh, can I bear it? Oh, go on; do go on! O God, give me strength to +wait." + +Though she tore off her gloves in nervous impatience, still she left +the rein upon the horse's neck, for she knew that the willing beast was +doing his best. + +He stopped again, and still once more, before they came to the foot of +the bald, whose slippery, dead grass added another peril to the climb. +The trail ended here, for it was not needed where a sled could go +anywhere over the clearing. + +"Come, dear boy. Come, dear old horse," she urged. "Five minutes more +will take us there." + +The watch's cruel face told the hour to be twelve minutes past twelve, +but Sydney did not feel so keen a pang as when she looked last, +although it was later than the fatal hour. The continued silence gave +her confidence. Only the bay of a hound in some cove below, and the +yelp of a puppy, reached her. + +She was dully dogged. The horse stumbled and scrambled on. + +"We can't do better than our best, Johnny. May God keep them! Oh, +Johnny! My dear, faithful Johnny, don't fall! Get up--_get up_!" she +cried. + +As he settled on to his side to roll up on to his feet again,--a +process that his labored breathing and the weight of his rider made +difficult on the sharp incline,--she slipped from his back and +struggled on on foot. + +She was near the crest of the mountain,--the bunch of chestnut-trees on +the summit showed their swelling buds against the sky just over her +head,--yet how slow was her advance! The sedge-grass caught her feet; +the blackberry-vines tore at her skirt; a rolling pebble threw her down +upon her hands. + +In an instant she was up and on again,--she was at the summit at last! +And there, just below the crest on the other side, facing each other on +their animals, like knights of old, were the two men she sought. + + + + +IX + +"It Needed Only This!" + + +Trembling she stood, looking down upon the foes below her. Her hands +were knotted against her breast, that heaved with nature's cry at her +cruelty. The thumping of her heart shook her body mercilessly. The +anguish of her soul dried her throat, and filled her eyes with dread, +and made her an embodiment of horror. Yet a stir of gratitude fought +with fear for a place in her. + +"Thank God, I am not too late!" was her voiceless cry. + +Through the clear air came the sound of a voice, sharply articulate. + +"It is not enough that you eat my bread and go forth from my door to do +your treacherous act. You come again to my house to scorn at me after +my humiliation, and you have not the courage to own your falseness. And +now, when I demand from you the satisfaction that most surely do you +owe me, how do you make a mock at me? Is that a weapon with which +gentlemen do fight? Is it a shot-gun that men do carry to a duel?" + +The hitherto still figure on the Doctor's horse stirred uneasily. + +"And see, I break it." The mule turned back his ears, as upon them fell +the click of the opening gun, followed by the drop of a shell into an +open palm. "_Ach_, yes, I thought so! It needed only this! This so +small shot is for the birds!" + +A thud vibrated on the air--the sound of the flung-down weapon. + +"Now, if you-all were only an American, Ah could make you understand +right quick that----" + +The Doctor's slow drawl was broken by an exclamation from von +Rittenheim. Morgan followed the German's eyes, and saw above them +against the fleckless blue of the heavens the brilliant figure of the +girl, her hands straining against her breast, her face a field where +anxiety and grief flitted like clouds across the background of the sky. + +She came down towards them when she saw herself observed, and the two +men silently dismounted as she approached, and pulled off their caps, +less in salutation than from instinctive respect for deep emotion. + +It was a poor little appeal she made, as words went. Her voice was +hardly whisper-high, so labored was her breathing. She held out her +hands to them one after the other, in supplication. + +"You won't do it! Oh, please don't! I came---- You mustn't----" Her +breath came in gasps. + +Von Rittenheim mutely took the pleading hands in his, and reverently +kissed them. He faced the Doctor brokenly. + +"I thought you had heaped upon me every humiliation. Until now this was +lacking. You might have spared me this!" + +Mounting his mule he broke into the thicket and disappeared. + +The two left behind--the tawny, stooping Carolinian and the girl, gone +white-lipped in spite of the beating of her heart--stared in silence at +the copse as long as they could hear the crash of the breaking twigs +and resisting branches. + +Sydney still was intent on the lessening sounds when the old man's keen +blue eyes withdrew themselves from the wood and scrutinized her face, +pitiably drawn and colorless. + +"H'm," he grunted, and added, mentally, "Hard lines for Bob." + +The sound of his ejaculation reached the girl's dulled ears. She turned +to him with a touch of distrust, and yet a look of question that seemed +to implore her old friend for an explanation that might save him to her +as an honest man. The Doctor was touched by it. He nodded in the +direction in which the Baron had disappeared. + +"Crazy, plumb crazy," he averred. + +Sydney's dry lips formed a soundless "Why?" + +"He's got some notion in his head that Ah've done him an injury--you +heard him?" + +She nodded. + +"Ah swear to you, Sydney, Ah haven't any idea what he means, but he +harps on it, and he sent me a challenge, as Ah suppose you know, or you +wouldn't be here." + +"Yes. Bob brought me." + +"Ah bluffed him off fo' three days. Ah hoped Ah might think of +something that would get him out of that vein without hurting his +foreign feelings, but Ah couldn't think of anything, so Ah 'lowed to +pretend to play up to his game, and in some way turn it into a joke." + +"The bird-shot was the joke?" + +The Doctor colored dimly under his tan. + +"Well, Ah must confess that it seemed to me mo' humorous when Ah was +loading up the guns at home than when the Baron was discoursing about +it." + +"I should think so. I should think----" + +Sydney bit her sentence in two. She felt too uncontrolled to allow +herself to comment upon the Doctor's conduct. + +"Ah certainly believe he's crazy or going to have a fever, and Ah'll +find some way of watching him. Ah suppose he won't let me on his place +now; Ah'll have to see Bud. Where's yo' horse?" he asked, suddenly. + +Sydney pressed her hand to her head confusedly. + +"I don't know. Back there somewhere." + +"Come, we must hunt him. You seem tired to death, child. Did you ride +hard?" + +"It was about an hour and ten minutes to the foot of the bald." + +She was dragging herself wearily up to the chestnut-trees. + +"An hour and ten minutes to the foot of the bald? From where?" + +"From home." + +"From Oakwood? Holy Smoke! What did Bob let you do such a fool thing +fo'?" he ejaculated, angrily. "Where is Bob, anyway?" + +"I don't know. I haven't seen him since--I think it was--I don't know +where it was," she ended, weakly, and with distress. + +The Doctor looked at her keenly. + +"Here, never mind him; he can take care of himself well enough; better +than he can of you, by the looks of it. Sit down, now; yes, right here +on the grass, and drink this." + +He gave her a draught from his flask, standing over her threateningly +when she hesitated at the entire contents of the cup cover. + +"Take it all," he insisted, "every drop. It's the only thing on earth +that's health to its enemies and death to its friends." + +Sydney leaned back wearily against a jutting rock and closed her eyes. +Her head swam, and she resigned herself to the Doctor's commands with +the blessed feeling of relief that a woman has when responsibility +falls from her own upon some man's shoulders. + +A whoop from the chestnuts made her open her eyes. + +"Is it Bob?" + +"Yes, leading Johnny." Doctor Morgan raised his voice. "Come down here. +You're a pretty feller to carry a girl to ride," he continued, as Bob +tied the horse to one of the chestnuts and sprang down the slope. "No +girl in my time ever shook me like that. Where did she lose you?" + +Bob answered nothing to his father's gibes, but bent anxiously over +Sydney. + +"You are not hurt, de--Sydney? Just awfully done up? I ought not to +have let you come. It's been too hard a ride. It's all my fault," he +went on, accusingly, while the Doctor nodded his head in agreement, and +Sydney tried in vain to interrupt. + +"No, indeed, Bob, you were not to blame at all. I made you promise, and +I couldn't have forgiven you or myself if I hadn't been here when----" + +She fell back against the rock, and the Doctor broke in, by way of +diversion,-- + +"Where's Gray Eagle?" + +"Down at the tobacco barn. He got wild and balked the steep part of the +trail, so I tied him to a tree and left him to kick it out." + +"You walked up, then?" + +"Yes, and found Johnny gluttonously eating blackberry-vines on the +other side of the bald. That scared me to death, for I thought he'd +made way with Sydney in some mysterious fashion,--perhaps eaten +her,--and was indulging in dessert! Where's your enemy?" + +The Doctor glanced quickly at Sydney, and frowned at Bob. + +"Gone home," was all he would say. + +They lifted the girl on to her horse, and Bob guided him down to the +very foot of the mountain. At the tobacco barn the Doctor untied Gray +Eagle, subdued by his enforced loneliness, and led him behind them. + +"Bob will stay to luncheon at Oakwood, it's so late," said Sydney to +him as they parted at his gate. "You'll not forget to find out in some +way if the Baron is ill, will you?" + +"No, my dear, I'll watch him like the Pinkertons' eye that never +sleeps," returned the old man, genially. + +"Mrs. Carroll has gone into the dining-room," the servant told them at +the door, and Sydney assumed much cheerfulness as she made her +apologies. + +"I've brought Bob, grandmother. He's been all over everywhere with me +this morning. You'll forgive me, Katrina, for leaving you, won't you? +Where's Mr. Wendell?" + +"Not back from Asheville yet." + +"He went in yesterday," explained Mrs. Carroll to Bob. "I suppose the +train is late. It does seem as if they grow more and more uncertain, +and when there are only two a day each way, it certainly is annoying, +very. You wouldn't know what to make of so meagre an arrangement, would +you, Katrina dear?" + +"There's the carriage now," said Bob. "The train couldn't have been +much over an hour behind time; surely you wouldn't complain of that." + +"I feel as if I had been journeying for days," said John, sitting down, +"and had seen the sights of far-distant worlds." + +"It's the obelisk in Court Square that makes you think that," suggested +Sydney. + +"Or the battlements on the library building," added Bob. + +"Are there street-cars?" asked Katrina. + +"Street-cars? Why, child, there are street-cars to burn--electric ones, +too. I felt grievously defrauded. I wanted a mule tram." + +"The mule is an unfashionable animal," said Mrs. Carroll. "Time was +when a handsome pair of mules was considered not unsuitable to draw a +gentleman's carriage." + +"The farmers aren't using them so much, either," said Bob. "They're too +unreliable. Horses are cheaper, too." + +"I saw some very decent saddle-horses in town--of their kind." + +"What's their kind?" + +"Long-tailed single-footers, Katrina." + +"The easiest gait in the world," put in Bob, combatively, disregarding +the tails. + +"It looks so. And not a Derby hat in the whole place except mine." + +"And not a silk one, except on colored coachmen," added Sydney, +maliciously. + +"Did you drive about?" + +"I saw all the sights, dear Mrs. Carroll. I have done to a brown the +Vanderbilt place, the Sunset Drive, and the junction of the Swannanoa +and the French Broad. I flogged a rebellious horse to Gold View, and I +scaled Beaumont and looked down into Chunn's Cove. I gazed at the--you +will excuse me, I hope--faded exterior of a tobacco warehouse----" + +"The farmers don't grow much now," interpolated Bob. + +"So I was told. And I beheld with rapture the architecture of the +Federal Building. That's the fullest beehive for its size, isn't it? +Post-office, revenue office,--goodness knows what's in it!" + +"Is the United States Court on yet?" asked Bob. + +"Not being a victim, I don't know." + +"You don't have to be a victim to find that out. The whole town is +filled with the rural population who are interested in the liquor +cases,--and our rural population is unmistakable." + +"If that's the sign, then it isn't on, for only about half the town +looked egregiously rural. Now I think of it, though, the court is going +to sit day after to-morrow." + +"Of course. It's the first Monday in May, isn't it?" + +"Please ask me how I knew it. Thank you, Mrs. Carroll. I see that you +are about to oblige me. Know then, good people, that this humble worm +that you see before you has had the honor of occupying the same seat in +the train with a minion of the law,--in fact, a revenue officer." + +"Coming out to-day?" + +"Yes. And, furthermore, he paid the flag-station of Flora the +distinguished attention of getting out there." + +"Was he after somebody?" + +"He was about to jog the memories of several people, and I think you'll +be surprised to know who one of them is. Mrs. Carroll, how can you +expect the less fortunate part of your community to keep in the +straight and narrow way, when the aristocracy--yea, verily, the +nobility--sets it so bad an example?" + +"What do you mean, John?" + +"I'm going to write a tale to be called 'The Titled Moonshiner; or, The +Baron's Quart of Corn.'" + +Sydney and Bob looked at each other with dawning comprehension, yet +without the ability entirely to clear away the fog. + +"John, are you hinting any slur against Baron von Rittenheim, our +neighbor and good friend?" The old lady was radiating dignity and +indignation. + +"I'm not hinting a thing, my dear Mrs. Carroll. I'm telling you what +the affable revenue man told me. About a month ago, it seems, your +friend and neighbor entertained a guest who proved to be, not an angel +in disguise, but a deputy-marshal on his way to Asheville. Not knowing +the official position of his visitor, von Rittenheim sold him a quart +of whisky of his own vintage. Whereupon, like all other chilled vipers +that have been warmed by this or other means, even from the far days of +fable, the beast retaliated. He returned the next day and arrested +him." + +Mrs. Carroll and Katrina cried out in surprise and indignation. Bob's +eyes were fixed upon Sydney, and she, ghastly white, was crumbling her +bread into bits. + +"The next day? Why, that is why he didn't come here for so long, +Sydney!" + +"He's under bond to appear at the next sitting of the United States +Court, and, as that comes in on Monday, you understand the appearance +of my friend the enemy on the train." + +"Poor fellow!" murmured Katrina. + +"Why in the world should the Baron sell any whisky, I should like to +have some one tell me," demanded Mrs. Carroll. "And why didn't we see +it in the paper?" + +"Probably the name was put in incorrectly," Bob suggested. "The +Asheville reporters aren't accustomed to German." + +Sydney was silent. But upon Bob, for his father's sake, she laid +accusing eyes, for she thought she had a clue to the words that had +come to her ears through the clear air as she stood upon the top of +Buck Mountain. + + + + +X + +Through the Mist + + +One day in the autumn, a few weeks after he had bought Ben Frady's +farm, von Rittenheim had taken his gun, and had whistled to heel one of +the hounds that had preferred to stay in his old home with an unknown +master rather than endure the precarious temper of the known quantity, +and had climbed Buzzard, the mountain behind his cabin, in search of +squirrel or quail. + +As the day advanced, fleecy clouds gathered over the sky and obscured +the sun, and then thickened and turned leaden. Suddenly, as the +huntsman tramped across a clearing, a one-time cornfield high on the +side of the mountain, he saw a mass of fog rolling towards him, and +before he could descend below its level he found himself enveloped in +the mist of a passing cloud. Heavy as a palpable thing it closed around +him, impenetrable to the eye, chilling to the whole physical being, +fraught with discouragement and depression to the mind. + +Friedrich tried to regain a path that he remembered to have crossed a +few minutes before, but under the trees the gloom was too dense for +profitable search. Moisture began to collect upon the leaf tips and to +drip upon him. The dog did not answer to his whistle. There were no +points of the compass; there was no view of the valley below. He was +like a ship rudderless. He only knew of a surety that the earth was +beneath his feet, and as night drew on, and he could no longer see the +soil his boot-soles pressed, he only knew that he was descending. + +And then of a sudden came the barking of a dog in greeting, and the +bray of a hungry mule, and he found himself close upon a cabin, and by +a freak of fortune it proved to be his own, and he was at home. + +Vaguely enough, yet insistently, the experience kept recurring to him +during the days in Asheville, when he was awaiting his trial. + +He went into the court-room in the Federal Building and watched, with a +languid curiosity born of its foreignness, the easy-going ceremony of +the opening of court. A group of lawyers laughed and gossiped at the +front. A larger number of men, who proved to be potential jurors, +gathered on one side and talked together more quietly, impressed by the +novelty of their experience; while the men who had served on the jury +before explained the furnishing of the room to them. + +Some ladies were ushered into seats near the bench by a dapper young +lawyer. Behind a railing, all about von Rittenheim, in front of him, +beside him, and back of him, were the lean forms and bent shoulders of +the mountaineers who were witnesses or principals in the whisky cases +that fill so fully the docket of this court. From their appearance it +was impossible to tell which were the law-breakers and which the +bearers of testimony against them. There were old men and boys. +Children were clinging to the skirts of their mothers, who had come to +town either as witnesses or for the holiday. One woman was quieting a +crying baby with the gag that a baby never refuses. She herself was +soothed by the snuff-stick that protruded from the space left vacant by +the early decay of her two front teeth. + +The air rapidly grew heavy with the smell of unwashed bodies and of +moist tobacco, and with the peculiar oily odor of corn whisky. + +A short man of important bearing stepped in front of the rail and +scanned the mass behind it. He easily singled out von Rittenheim, whose +cropped head shone fair from among the towsled pows around him. + +"Oh, von Rittenheim," he called, "step out here a minute." + +"My so good friend, Mr. Weaver?" acknowledged Friedrich, looking at him +through the squinting eyes that a sharp headache gave him. + +"You'll be held by the grand jury, of course, von Rittenheim, but you +needn't stay here all the time. Just drop in once or twice a day and +see how the list stands. Some of these are old cases crowded out of the +last term, and we may not get to you until Wednesday or Thursday. It +ain't a right enjoyable place to stay in, and you'd better go out in +the fresh air--you look sick." + +"My head does give me pain," Friedrich admitted. + +"Your case can't possibly be called to-day, anyway. You'd better go off +until to-morrow." + +"I thank you. I will when I have seen the honorable judge come in. It +is most new to me, these customs of yours." + +"I reckon they must be," returned Weaver, with something like pity in +his upward glance at the drawn face above him. He scuttled off as a +voice cried,-- + +"The court! the court!" + +The lawyers scampered to their places behind the bar, and stood to +acknowledge the entrance of the judge. + +Beyond thinking him strangely unjudicial in appearance, Friedrich took +no interest in him, for he did not regard him as the arbiter of his +fate, since he had learned the customary sentence for cases like his, +which was pronounced with the regularity of machinery and knew no +variety. + +He waited until another half-hour's observation had made clear to him +the method of drawing the jurors. He left this task still in process of +being fulfilled, and urged his way out of the press that held him fast. + +The fresh, cool air was as wine to him, for wine invigorates the body +while it clouds the mind. His lungs greedily took in great draughts of +its light purity, and his blood raced so merrily that he grew confused. +Always the pain bit into his eyes, and through his half-closed lids he +saw but dimly the people around him and the pavement beneath his feet. + +He went back to the little room that he had hired, and slept heavily +into the afternoon. When he went out to get his supper at a restaurant, +the gaunt figures of his fellow-criminals were at every step. They +gazed curiously into the lighted shop-windows; they talked in groups +that overflowed the curbstone into the gutter. In a vacant lot back of +the Methodist church the glare of a camp-fire showed the covered wagon +that was to give a night's shelter to the family whose shadows were +cast large against its canvas side. + +As he passed each group of them the odor that he had breathed for an +hour in the morning assailed his nostrils and seemed to force itself +into his lungs. He could not eat his supper, and he spent a restless +night, filled with horrid dreams. Sydney was selling whisky to Mr. +Weaver. The Judge turned into Dr. Morgan, who grinned triumphantly at +his victim as he stood in the crowd behind the rail. He bent to kiss +the hand of Mrs. Carroll, and she held in it a shell filled with +bird-shot. + +Always the sickening odor of the overheated court-room choked him, and +his head throbbed unceasingly, and the balls of his eyes beat in +anguished unison. + +The first electric-car passing the house in the early dawn crashed into +his dream as the bullet that was speeding from his revolver to Dr. +Morgan's heart, and found its resting-place in Sydney's breast instead. +He woke to find himself soaked with the sweat of exhaustion. + +The cloud of that day on the mountain still clung around his fancy as +he went out upon the street again. A horrible something, as penetrable +as mist, as keen as the sting of conscience, as inevitable as the +burden of life, seemed to inwrap him. He felt it dully, and wondered +how much of it was physical and how much mental, and he didn't care +which it was. + +He ate a little breakfast, though it was odious to him, and went out +to meet again the lantern-jawed mountaineers, who, like him,--_like +him_,--were drifting towards the Federal Building. + +Yes, he was going to the court-room to be tried for a criminal offence; +he was a criminal, a criminal, a criminal. It buzzed angrily through +his head. + +He stumbled over a child sitting beside his mother on the edge of the +sidewalk in front of the post-office. The woman had her elbows on her +knees and her face in her hands, and in her eyes was the look of +waiting that comes to women with uncertain husbands. She cuffed the +child, and then shook him to still the uproar she had created. Two more +children sat on the curb beyond her, and beyond them, up Haywood +Street, men leaned against the iron fence or squatted in pairs upon the +sidewalk. Friedrich wondered how they kept their balance, and went on +up the stairs, through pools of tobacco-juice, to the court-room, where +the day's work already had begun. + +He secured a seat, and leaned his head against the wall. A negro man, +accused of fraudulently obtaining a pension, was explaining volubly how +he had received the injury upon which he based his claim. + +His case was given to the jury, which filed out, and the second set of +men made themselves comfortable in the abandoned seats, with much +scraping of chairs and of throats, and adjustment of cuspidors to the +range of each juror. + +The case of the next prisoner, tried on a charge of a fraudulent use of +the mails, lashed to frenzy the prosecuting attorney. He compared this +foul violator of the laws of his country with Sextus and Benedict +Arnold and Judas Iscariot. The national eagle had been insulted in his +nest, and his screams were ringing from mountain-peak to mountain-peak. +The echoes of Mitchell were sending back the cry, and Saint Elias's +snowy top gave forth an answering sound. + +Von Rittenheim understood enough of the rapid English to realize its +irrelevancy, and wondered idly why the man was such a fool, not knowing +that it was the presence of a visiting national senator from the hotel +that had inspired this eloquence. + +The air grew worse as more and more people pushed into the already +crowded room. Some one opened a window, and some one else immediately +begged to have it shut. There was a constant shuffling of feet and a +restless moving of hands. Friedrich found himself smothered by the +evil-smelling clothes of his companions as he sat against the wall, and +he stood, to bring his head up into a clearer air. The steam in one of +the radiators began to thump and clang, and each crash smote a raw +nerve in his beating temple. + +The feeling of striving against the mist, yielding but inexorable, had +him fully in its possession, and through the fog he saw the face of +Wilder, the deputy-marshal. Their eyes met, and the malice in the +officer's drove the German mad. How long must he stand here and wait +among these swine? Yet he remembered many hours of waiting motionless +upon his horse, and he rebuked himself for a poor soldier. + +Ah, if only he could tell the whole truth; if only he could stand +before the bar of the world--of God himself--and say, "I am guilty. Of +violating the law I am guilty. I am willing to bear my punishment for +what I have done. But if I am guilty, how is he innocent who brake my +bread and then tempted me? He who ate my last mouthful, and then +offered me an unlawful chance to get more? Is the law of hospitality to +be held of no account? And how is he innocent who poses as my friend, +who drinks from my cup, who holds my hand in his, and who goes forth to +betray me? Is there no law that binds a friend in honor? I have broken +a law--the law of man. Those two men of whom I speak have broken the +laws of the heart, the ties of honor and of love. I am a criminal in +the eyes of men. They are sinners before the face of God." + +Friedrich was trembling as he felt these words flow through his mind. +The men on each side of him noticed his agitation, and drew away from +the emotion of his tense face. So insistently did the words ring in his +ears that it seemed to him that he must have spoken them aloud. Yet he +was conscious that he had not, and that when the time came for him to +face this throng he would never go beyond the first three words, "I am +guilty." + +He found himself speaking quietly to Mr. Weaver, and looked on at the +conversation as if he were a thing apart from himself. + +"The next case but one after this will begin the moonshine cases, and +you-all surely won't come on until to-morrow morning. You might as well +go now." + +"I thank you," said Friedrich, and stumbled from the room. + +In the corridor he leaned for a moment against the wall, that he might +be sure to keep his balance as he went down the steep stairs dizzying +before him. + +How he reached the court on the next day he never could remember. He +was conscious of feeling very ill, worse than ever he had felt in his +life. His spine pulsed painfully up into his brain; his eyes burned +back in their sockets until the two shafts of anguish met in one +well-nigh unbearable torture. The cloud-mist wrapped about him and +hindered him, and yielded only to blind him more. The same evil smells +reeked around him, and a wave of nausea surged within him. + +He heard his name called, and some one guided him to that part of the +Judge's platform that served as a dock. He raised his hand, and heard +afar off some words about the truth and God. He was bidden to kiss the +filthy cover of a book. Dimly he heard a question and answered it. + +"I am guilty." + +A chair was pushed towards him and he sat down, conscious of a strange +silence in the usually noisy room. + +He heard Wilder telling his story of his purchase of a quart of whisky, +"an' he owned it was blockade," and a long and detailed account of "the +Dutchy's" resistance to arrest, in which the ferocity of his behavior +would have been creditable to a bloodthirsty villain driven to +desperate straits. + +A voice asked him if he had anything to say, and he heard himself +repeating once again, "I am guilty." + +Then the voice of the laureate of the eagle's nest soared, and fell to +a whisper, and swelled again, and Friedrich wondered if "example" would +be "_Muster_" or "_Beispiel_." And "different class,"--what did that +mean? How stupid he was about English! + +By-and-by there was silence, and the Judge's voice said,-- + +"Three months or a hundred dollars." + +And then there was a long, long silence. + + + + +XI + +In the Corn + + +Summer had come. + +The soft days of spring had gone by, the days when the feeling of +growth impresses every sense. The haze-filled April mornings, warming +into the forcing ardor of noon, had stirred into life the activity +latent in root and twig. May's glowing sun, shining through the +scantily covered branches, made dancing motes of heat wave above the +surface of red clay. The aspens fluttered into exquisite greenness. The +sourwood put forth the satin of its tender leaves. All over the +mountain-sides and through the forest thickets the oak-tips blushed +faint pink, a delicate velvet against the stout bristles of the yellow +pines. + +Birds flew over, bound for the North, each with his instinctive goal; +some almost at their journey's end, others with many a long ethereal +mile before them. Some of them sojourned for a few days, following the +ploughman as he overturned the mellow earth. Others let this high land +be the end of their wanderings, and settled here to the duty of +love-making and the pleasures of domestic life. + +The azalea flamed in yellow and orange and scarlet glory, a note of +savage color on spring's soft palette. The delicate clusters of the +laurel, and, later, of the rhododendron, crowned the stems of the +parent bush, as sometimes a fair girl springs from a rough and ugly +father. + +The germ grew strong within its warm seed-prison, and sent inquiring +leaflets into the upper world; and the adventurers never returned, but +sent back demands for food and drink, as colonists to a new land rely +upon the mother-country for sustenance and support. + +On the steep mountain-sides, and in the coves that dimple the lower +slopes; on the flat lands of the plateau, and in the meadows along the +French Broad, the slender shafts of the corn-leaves were pushing upward +with what success their position fostered. By mid-June the crop in the +bottom-land was knee-high, while that nourished by the field over which +Sydney had stumbled on the top of Buck Mountain was only half as tall. + +Bud Yarebrough and Pink Pressley were hoeing among stalks half-way +between these heights on the upland slopes of the Baron's farm, whose +cultivable land they had hired for the season. Stripped to their +shirts, whose open throats showed each a triangle of sunburned skin, +they worked rapidly down the adjoining furrows, one keeping a hoe's +length behind the other, that their tools might not interfere. +Conversation was more pithy than voluble. + +"Damn hot," ejaculated Pink, stopping to hitch up his trousers, and +then to spit on his hands before resuming his hoe. + +"Mos' dinner time," returned Bud, looking up at the sun, and then over +his shoulder towards the spring-betraying group of trees to which +Melissa was accustomed to bring his dinner when he was working here. +"They's some feller tyin' his horse in front of the cabin. Who is hit?" + +Pink leaned on his hoe and squinted across the blazing field to the +grove that sheltered von Rittenheim's house. + +"Bob Morgan, Ah reckon. Looks like his horse." + +"Come to get somethin' fo' Mr. Baron. O-oh, Bob!" + +Bob looked around his horse's nose, and held up his hand in token of +understanding. He unlocked the cabin and disappeared within, coming out +again with a bundle, which he tied on to the saddle, and then led his +animal towards the trees at the spring. The two laborers tossed down +their hoes and moved to the same haven. + +"What time is hit, Bob?" + +Morgan looked at his watch. + +"Five past twelve, Pink. Working hard?" + +"Yep. Tol'able big crop." He sat down at the foot of a tree and opened +his dinner-pail. + +"Have some?" he asked, pointing the opening at Bob, who was settling +into repose with his hat over his face. + +"No, I thank you. I must be going home in a few minutes. How are you +getting on? Bought any more stock lately?" + +Bob lay on his back with one long leg balanced on the other knee like a +see-saw on a saw-horse. The rowel of his spur rattled as he jerked his +foot up and down at the ankle. + +"No." Pink had his mouth full. + +"How many head have you got now?" + +"Oh, jus' a mule 'n a couple o' cows." + +"Sold your horse?" + +"'M. Here Bud, take some o' this. Ah jus' natchelly hate to have +you-all die o' starvation." + +"No, she's comin'. Ah see her now." And Bud ran to meet his wife and to +relieve her of the baby. + +"Hungry, ain' he?" sneered Pink, as he watched his partner's alacrity, +while Bob struggled to his feet to greet Melissa. + +"Say, you-all wasn' wantin' to buy a cow, was ye, Bob?" asked Pink. + +"Got one to sell?" + +"Yes, the muley cow." + +"No, I don't guess I want her." + +"You seemed so damn curious about my stock, Ah 'lowed ye were +purchasin'." + +"Oh, no. I just thought you must have an extra lot of cattle to be +providing for, or you wouldn't have needed to hire this land and to +make an extra big crop of corn." + +A dull red showed on Pink's forehead above the tan-mark, and crowded +into his pale-blue eyes, destitute of lashes. The two men looked +steadily at each other. Then, as Melissa drew near, Pink broke into an +ugly laugh. + +"Give a dog a bad name, eh? You-all needn' be quite so bigoty now yo' +fine friends have been at the same business." + +He waved his hand towards the cabin, and Bob, in his turn, flushed as +he shook hands with Melissa. + +The girl gave scant greeting to Pressley. Her husband's new friendship +with him was distasteful to her; it filled her with foreboding when she +remembered his threats. + +Yet there had been nothing definite of which she could complain to Bud +since the day when Miss Carroll had caught Pink trying to kiss her. He +had never been to the cabin since his rebuff, but she knew that he and +Bud were constantly together, and this partnership in the hiring of the +Baron's land was a culmination of their friendly relations. + +"Ah don' see how ye c'n stan' him, nohow, Bud," she often said, and Bud +as often replied,-- + +"Ah never did see anythin' like the prejudice o' women! They certainly +ain' no doubt about yo' sex, M'lissy." + +Pink bore his part in the present conversation with no trace of +embarrassment. Indeed, there was an assertiveness in his bearing that +reacted upon Melissa to produce extreme shyness. Neither cause nor +effect escaped Morgan's shrewd black eyes. + +"How's Mr. Baron?" asked Bud, between bites. + +"Doing very well. He gets out on the porch every day now." + +"Great luck he has," growled Pressley. "Yo' father never paid my fine +when Ah was given mah choice between 'a hundred dollars or three +months.'" + +"My father likes to choose his friends," replied Bob, sternly. Melissa +looked distressed. + +"What's sauce fo' the goose ought to be sauce fo' the gander," argued +the ex-moonshiner. + +"It ain' fittin' fo' you-all to say anythin' ag'in' Dr. Morgan, +whatever he may _se_-lect to do," asserted Bud, combatively, and Pink +hastened to hedge. + +"Ah 'low not. He certainly was white to me when Ah broke mah laig. 'N +as fo' Mr. Baron, Ah always did like him, 'n this is a new tie between +us. Now we're brothers." + +He chuckled with a full appreciation of his insolence, for the story of +von Rittenheim's downfall and its cause was well known throughout the +country. + +Melissa went white at the malignity of his tone. She turned to Bob with +a question: + +"Mrs. Carroll 'n Miss Sydney--are they wore to a frazzle takin' care o' +him?" + +"Mrs. Carroll's all right. They've had two nurses from Asheville all +the time, you know. Miss Sydney's wonderful. There's such a lot to do +about a house when there's a serious illness, even for people who +aren't doing the actual nursing." + +"Ah s'pose so. Wouldn' hit be nice, jus' like a story, 'f they'd fall +in love with each other--Mr. Baron 'n Miss Sydney?" + +"Now, ain' that jus' like a girl!" ejaculated Bud, gulping the last of +his coffee. + +Bob sat down and fanned himself with his hat. + +"Hot, ain' hit?" observed Pink, dryly. Then he turned to Melissa. + +"You-all's fo'gittin' that he might be in prison at this minute. No +woman o' his class would marry him now. No woman likes to think her +man's guilty o' breakin' the law, eh? You-all wouldn' like yo' husband +to be a moonshiner, would ye?" + +The man's body leaned towards the girl, and he fixed her with a cruel +stare from which she seemed unable to move her eyes. Seated as he was, +he looked like a huge snake upreared to strike. + +He went on mercilessly. "O' co'se ye wouldn'. Ah expect you'd never +hol' up yo' haid ag'in. What woman can when her man's that-a-way?" + +"Oh, dry up, Pink," cried Bud. "You-all make me feel like Ah had the +constable after me now, 'n Lawd knows hit ain' _me_ that's raced 'em +through these woods." + +Pink acknowledged the shot with a grunt. + +Melissa rose to go, and Bud picked up the baby and handed it to her. + +"Hit's her busy day fo' sleepin', ain' hit?" he said, poking a blunt +finger into the soft cheek. + +"I must go, too," said Bob, "or my mother'll jar me up for being late." + +"Good-by," said Bud, genially. "Stop by ag'in some time." + +"Miss Sydney's been so busy she ain' rode over here fo' a long time. +Will you-all give mah love to her, please?" said Melissa, timidly. + +"'N mine," Pink started to add, but a dangerous look in Bob's eye +induced him to change it to "'N mah _re_-gards to Mr. Baron," though +his grin remained unaltered. + + + + +XII + +Illumination + + +For the first time since the beginning of his illness, von Rittenheim +was walking unassisted towards the cluster of trees on the Oakwood +lawn, beneath whose shelter rugs and low chairs and a tea-table made a +summer sitting-room. Mrs. Carroll, who already was established in the +shade, watched anxiously her guest's feeble approach. + +"You should have let the nurse or James come with you," she called to +him. "It's too far for you to walk alone." + +"Ah, dear Mrs. Carroll, it is so good not to have that admirable nurse +or the good Uncle Yimmy with me." + +He let himself down carefully into a big chair. + +"And you see that not yet do I disdain cushions. The down of that +pr-rovident bird, the eider duck, makes a substitute for the flesh that +ought to pad my poor bones. Thank you, Uncle Yimmy," to the old negro, +who had just set down the tea-tray, "thank you, yes, one more pillow +behind my shoulders." + +"You'll have tea?" + +"May I have tea? Is it possible that I r-return in one same day to two +examples of independence? I walk abr-road alone, and I say again to my +dear Mrs. Carroll, 'I thank you. It does me pleasure to accept a cup of +tea from your hands.'" He held up his own hand against the sun. "A +little worse for the wear, my hand, eh? But still of use." + +A slight change of position brought into view the field at the foot of +the knoll upon whose top they were. Friedrich sat upright in his chair, +while a flush tinged his worn cheeks. + +"What makes Miss Sydney down there?" he cried. + +"Sydney? Oh, she is breaking some of the colts; teaching them to jump, +I think she said, to-day." + +Mrs. Carroll adjusted her eye-glasses. Two negro grooms were setting up +a low hurdle with wings, while two small black boys dangled joyously +from the halters of a couple of young horses, and a third bore Sydney's +saddle upon his head. + +"Is it Bob Mor-rgan with Miss Sydney?" asked Friedrich, wistfully, as +the girl walked across the field beside a man who was leading a tall +gray, already saddled. + +"Yes, that's Bob. A huge fellow, isn't he?" + +"And fear you not that Miss Sydney should ride those so wild colts?" + +"Not now. I used to be frightened to death, but I've seen her and Bob +down there doing that for so many years that I've learned not to be +afraid. She rides really very well, you know, and Bob is careful of +her." + +"He would be." + +Von Rittenheim sighed, and leaned back with closed eyes. He wished with +all his soul that it were he down in the field fitting the saddle--that +_dear_ side-saddle--to that dancing creature; that it were he who was +responsible for the safety of Sydney. + +"Bob gives her a lead over, you see, on his horse, which is a +well-trained animal." + +Friedrich opened his eyes in time to see the gray take off neatly. +Sydney followed, and lifted her mount so cleverly that he had leaped +his first hurdle before he knew what he was doing. The watchers on the +knoll could see Bob, sitting on his horse at one side, clap his hands +in approval, while the pickaninnies turned cartwheels in the grass. + +"She does r-ride most beautifully, Miss Sydney. It is truly pleasurable +to see her," murmured von Rittenheim, though his expression was one of +approval rather than delight. + +"Do you know, Mrs. Carroll, have I told you how much this _Aussicht--view_, +is it not?--and the position of your house make me to think of my home? +It is on the edge of the Schwarzwald, and we look down from the Schloss +into a valley, oh, so lovely! with trees and a little r-river." + +"A much wilder prospect than we have here at Oakwood." + +"But not more beautiful, and the feeling is the same." + +A vulgar emotion assailed the well-kept precincts of Mrs. Carroll's +mind. Curiosity, commonplace curiosity surged within her. She yielded +to its force. + +"How could you bear to leave it?" + +"It was the old pr-reference of the man in the window of the burning +castle,--behind, the flames r-roaring mightily, and below, the spears +of his enemies." + +"A choice between evils." + +"Yes, if you will for-rgive my calling your country an evil. I was +unhappy--too unhappy to stay where every day I saw something to make me +worse; and that evil was gr-reater than to banish myself, even though I +do love my country dearly." + +"Was it necessary for you to come so far? Could you not find peace in +your own land?" + +"I thought not. You see--if I do not weary you I will tell you. Shall I +tell you?" + +"You never weary me," returned Mrs. Carroll, heartily. "I shall +consider that you do me an honor if you care to speak to me about +yourself." + +"It shall be only a little," began Friedrich, repenting of his +expansiveness. "Perhaps I have told you that I am the older of my +family. I have one br-rother four years younger. Our parents are dead +several years, and Maximilian is married two years ago with Hilda von +Arnim." + +"You spoke of them both when you were ill; in your delirium, you know." + +"Of Max and Hilda? What did I say?" + +A sharp note was in Friedrich's voice. + +"My dear Baron, I must make the humiliating confession that long disuse +has impaired sadly my understanding of German. If you should speak to +me very slowly, probably I could comprehend you, but at that time you +were not speaking slowly." + +"My nurses?" + +"Neither of them speaks a word of anything but English." + +"It is an escape," he murmured. "Forgive me, _gnaedige Frau_. It is a +startle to think that perhaps you have given to the world your heart's +thoughts." + +"Be reassured. It was only the names, Max and Hilda, that we +understood." + +"When my tr-rouble came to me, it was unbearable to stay at the +Schloss, so I must go away. Yet Maximilian was not able to pr-reserve +the estate as it should be kept. He is not r-rich, Max, and he is a +little what you call swift, eh? He spends much." + +"I see." + +"So if I leave him to care for the Schloss I must leave him also my +incomings, and, if I act so, I cannot live myself in my own country +where I have friends of the army and of society; where I have a--what +is it?--a stand?" + +"Position?" + +"Yes, yes, a position to hold up. I must go where it concerns nobody if +I am changed in purse. So to America I came, it is about two years +since, and for one year I tr-ravelled everywhere to see where I liked +best, and for the diversion also, for I was most sad. Then my money +grew down so small that I saw I must stop, so to this lovely land I +happened, and I bought my little farm. But, alas! I fear I am not a +farmer. Still, I shall learn. I am determined of that." + +"I'm sure you will. You haven't had a chance yet." + +"And this year, what can I do? I am so misfortunate as to be away and +sick at the time of planting." + +"You won't be without some little return, for when we found that you +would be ill so long we let your fields to two men who have planted +them, and will pay you one-third of their crop of corn. That's the +customary rent here, and it will keep your mule through next winter, at +any rate." + +"Now, that is truly kind and thoughtful. It is, indeed, fr-riendly!" + +"You must thank Dr. Morgan for that arrangement." + +Von Rittenheim sat erect and stared at the little old lady before him. +A look of confused and struggling recollection was called into life by +her words. + +"I must thank--whom?" + +The spirit of the gallant adventurer who had been Mrs. Carroll's +immigrant ancestor to the Virginia wilds pushed her on to dare the +situation. She also sat upright, and the two faced each other +undauntedly. + +"You must thank Dr. Morgan for that kindness, and for others even +greater." + +"Dr. Mor-rgan?" + +Clearer remembrance brought with it the old feeling of suspicion and +its accompanying look of hatred, which distorted Friedrich's handsome +face. + +"Yes, Dr. Morgan. I want you to listen to what I am going to tell you. +You are well enough now to hear the truth." + +"It is your right, madam, to say to me what you may like." + +Von Rittenheim turned his stern face towards the training-field, and +kept his eyes upon the moving forms that shifted below him. + +Mrs. Carroll was unabashed. + +"Dr. Morgan is an old and tried friend of mine and of all my family. He +has seen life come and go at Oakwood. He rejoiced with us at Sydney's +birth, and he was my chief help and support when her father and mother +left us two here together, alone." + +With a certain tenderness--the yearning that a man feels to protect the +feeble and the helpless--Friedrich turned his softened eyes towards +her. + +"I tell you this because I can say truthfully that I know him to be +faithful in friendship and incapable of treachery." + +Friedrich turned again with tightened lips to his contemplation of the +meadow. + +"We heard of your being summoned to court and for what purpose." + +Mrs. Carroll stopped, for a grayness settled over the young man's face, +and the eyes that he turned upon hers were filled with horror. + +"You had forgotten?" + +"Yes, I had forgotten." + +All the pride went out of him, as the fading of the sun's flush leaves +the evening clouds without illumination and dull. + +"I had for-rgotten, but now I r-remember. It comes back to me. Yes, now +I r-remember all--all." + +He turned away his face both from her and from the field below, and +rested his cheek on his hand. Mrs. Carroll noticed the thinness of his +wrist, and her heart misgave her. + +"Shall I go on?" + +"If it please you." + +"Bob Morgan went into Asheville to follow your career in behalf of all +your friends here." + +Von Rittenheim's head fell lower. + +"He was in the court-room when you were----" + +The old lady hesitated and watched von Rittenheim sharply. She was +doubtful of his strength after all. + +"When I was--yes, continue, please," he said, with muffled voice. + +"When you were sentenced." + +She hastened on, pretending not to hear the groan that followed her +revelation. + +"He galloped out here at once as fast as he could, and told us about +it--his father and me. He feared an illness for you then--you looked +not yourself, he said. We decided that it was best for you to come here +to Oakwood. We could not bear to think of your going to the hospital." + +Friedrich felt vaguely across the table for the plump little hand of +his hostess, and pressed it blindly. + +"They drove into town that same afternoon, Dr. Morgan in our carriage, +and Bob in his buggy, and found you in the--found you very ill." + +"Found me where?" + +"You were delirious even then." + +"Found me where?" + +Friedrich pushed aside the cups and placed both elbows on the table. He +seemed to Mrs. Carroll to have grown haggard since she had begun her +recital. + +"Found me where?" he repeated for the third time. + +"You insist?" + +"It is my r-right." + +"They found you in--in the jail." + +Mrs. Carroll turned away from the wretched man before her and sobbed +undisguisedly. On them fell a quiet pregnant with emotion. The hush was +broken by the crash of a tea-cup upon which Friedrich's fingers had +happened to fall. + +"Bob secured the nurses and drove one of them out in the buggy, and the +Doctor and the other one brought you in the carriage." + +"Why did they let me go from the--jail?" + +"The Doctor paid your fine." + +Often during the preceding weeks Mrs. Carroll had thought of this +conversation with von Rittenheim, and the statement that she had just +made always had figured as the climax of her argument in the Doctor's +behalf. Now she felt no pleasure in it. The man before her was too +crushed for her to exult over. He made no comment, merely said, +reflectively,-- + +"Yes, there was a fine. It comes to me,--'one hundred dollars or three +months.' It is the last thing I r-remember." + +"You were dangerously ill by the time you reached Oakwood, and for +three days Dr. Morgan left you only to visit his other patients. +Between the attacks of stupor you talked a great deal, usually in +German, but occasionally in English. From what you said then, and what +Dr. Morgan remembered of conversations you had had with him, and from +what Bob learned in Asheville, we gathered that you thought that when +Dr. and Mrs. Morgan met the marshal on the road after they had been to +your house, they betrayed you to him, and your arrest was the +consequence. Is that so?" + +Von Rittenheim nodded. "Yes, it is so." + +"I hope it will come to you as clearly as we see it who are the +Doctor's friends, that he is incapable of such a thing." + +"Dear lady, even already I think I see it. I r-remember darkly my +trial; how the officer told of his trick to entr-rap me into selling. +Ah, dear Mrs. Carroll, I was anxious to despair from my so unusual +poverty, and I was hungry, and bitten with shame for my weakness--and +hopeless." + +Unconsciously his eyes turned to the field below, where Sydney's hair +gleamed red bronze in the sunset light. She was dismissing the men and +horses. A great wall seemed to von Rittenheim to spring up between +them, a wall made thick by his folly, and high by his disgrace, and +strong by his weakness. + +"Though I am shameful to say such things as if they were excuses, +nothing excuses me. I am without justification. I say so most humbly to +you." + +Weakly he leaned back among his cushions. Mrs. Carroll glanced at him +and hurried on. + +"When the first fury of the disease was spent, you seemed distressed at +the sight of the Doctor, though you did not recognize him fully; so, +though he has not failed to come here twice each day, it is through the +nurses' reports and Bob's that he has been treating you. He can do so +much better for you now if you will see him." + +"If I will see him?" he repeated. "Yes, I can at least make some little +amends for my folly--my distr-rust. But can I win back ever my +self-r-respect, so that you and other people can r-respect me? So +that----" + +He stopped as Sydney's voice reached him. She was coming up the hill, +laughing with Bob. + +Von Rittenheim looked appealingly at Mrs. Carroll. + +"Sydney," she called, "go on to the house, dear, with Bob, and send +James here." + +She rose and laid her hand tenderly on the bent head. + +"Stay here a while. It is still quite warm enough for you." + +She went slowly across the lawn and disappeared beneath the veranda's +roses. A level ray from the setting sun touched Friedrich's fair hair +with gold, and went on to be splintered into a thousand tiny shafts +against the swelling side of the silver cream-jug. + + + + +XIII + +Reconciliation + + +The sunshine of a clear June day was beating upon the gravel of the +driveway, and a few woolly clouds, the forerunners of the early +afternoon's daily shower, clung over the tops of the southern +mountains. + +Behind the screen of vines and climbing roses that sheltered the porch +von Rittenheim sat reading a New York paper of two days before. It was +the morning after his explanation with Mrs. Carroll, and the emotional +outcome of the talk had been a state of abasement of soul that had +sapped his little store of strength. His thin hands shook weakly, and +he continually changed his position, and glanced expectantly at the +long window which opened upon the gallery. + +Sydney's voice inside the house made him clutch his paper nervously. +She spoke loudly, as in warning. + +"The Baron? You'll find him on the porch, Dr. Morgan. The nurse says +he didn't sleep very well last night." + +"He didn't? We must mend that." And the Doctor stepped from the window +and approached his long-unseen patient. + +Von Rittenheim looked up into the wrinkled brown face with its shrewd, +kind eyes, and covered his own eyes with his hand. + +"You know?" he asked, brokenly. "Mrs. Carroll has told you?" He felt +his other hand taken into a cordial grasp. + +"Mrs. Carroll has told me that she has described to you all the +happenings of yo' illness that had escaped yo' attention, so to speak. +Curious troubles, these brain affairs, aren't they? Make you feel as if +you'd been on an excursion outside of yo'self for a while, and had to +hear all the home news when you got back." + +Von Rittenheim grew composed as the Doctor rambled on. + +"She has not told you," he said, insistently, "of my so deep r-regret +for the injustice that I made towards you. I can never do atonement for +my br-rutal behavior, for my unjust suspiciousness. That you can take +my hand shows much par-rdon in you." + +"Now, don't talk about that any more, Baron. It ain't worth it," Dr. +Morgan replied, awkwardly. "Ah don't guess that circumstances looked +very favorable to me. Anyway, you-all can please me best now by doing +credit to my doctoring skill. Quit having the appearance of a skeleton +just as quick as you can." + +"I'll try," answered Friedrich, meekly. + +"And don't worry too much over what's gone by," went on the Doctor, +clumsily. "Breaking the law's breaking the law, Ah'm not denying that; +but it makes a lot of difference what the motive is, and you've +suffered your share of punishment, too. It's the right of every man to +begin afresh. Avoid mud and give yo' horse a firm take-off, and he'll +leap as clean as a whistle for you. Lawd, Ah'm getting plumb +religious," he ejaculated, wiping his face. + +Friedrich's knowledge of English was put to a test, but he listened +with his eyes as well as his ears, and nodded slowly. + +"I think I understand," he said. "But do you think that people--my +fr-riends"--his eyes turned towards the house--"that my friends can +overlook it--can ever think of me as they used to think of me?" + +"Oh, I reckon she will," replied Dr. Morgan, with a smile that +disconcerted von Rittenheim and drove him to a new topic. + +"You will for-rgive me if I do talk some business with you," he said, +hastily. + +"Do you feel well enough?" + +"Oh, yes. I shall feel much better when I have cleared my mind of all +these things. I want to say to you that I do much appr-reciate, also, +besides your kindness, all the money that you have paid, and--no, let +me talk, please, Herr Doctor--and I must tell you that I shall write +to-day to Germany for a r-remittance. There is a sum which I can have. +Yes, I see you look, wondering that I have lived so poor. Well, I +explain to you that I have sworn that I would not use it for myself--I +have another use for it--so long as I am well and can earn enough for +living; but now I am not well, and I have expenses in the past weeks, +and I must live until I grow str-rong to work in some way; so am I +justified to myself to send for the money, you see." + +"Fix it any way you like," said the Doctor, cheerily, "only remember +that if it ain't convenient to pay up _ever_,--why, just banish it from +your mind, and Ah'll never think of it again, Ah promise you. Now, is +that all?" he asked, as he leaned towards his patient and put a +practised finger on his pulse. "Yes? Then Ah'd like to know where that +Sydney is with that egg-nog. Here, you Sydney," he cried, putting his +head into the house and letting his cracked voice echo into the +darkness. "What kind of a nurse are you? How do you expect to rise in +the profession, miss, if you don't have an egg-nog ready the instant +yo' patient happens to think of it? Oh, here you are! Well, sit down +here, then, and see that the Baron takes every drop of that, and don't +tire him out with yo' chatter. Do you understand?" + +After which burst he kissed her, and disappeared into the house. Sydney +turned blushing to the Baron, and laughed at his wistful look. + +"Age has its compensations," he said, as he took the tumbler from her. +"But I do not begrudge the good Doctor all the happiness that comes to +him. He is a most generous man." + +"He's a darling!" + +"A darling? Ah, yes. I should not have used that word for _him_, but I +agree with the sentiment." + +"You are critical this morning. Don't you ever allow yourself any +liberty of speech in German? Do you always say exactly what you mean, +and use exactly the right word?" + +"Oh, Miss Sydney, you describe to me a pig--no, a pr-rig person. Surely +I use many picture words in my thinking of--well, just to illustrate +what I mean, I will say, in my thinking of _you_!" + +Sydney moved her position so that her face was partly hidden behind the +back of the Baron's wheeled chair. + +"Now, there is _Schatz_," went on Friedrich, sipping his egg-nog +placidly, but keeping a wary eye upon the bit of pink cheek that was +still within his range of vision. "I like to think of you as +_Schatz_,"--there was a danger-betokening movement of the glowing +head,--"because you are such a treasure to your grandmother." + +He paused a moment, but there was no reply. + +"And _Perle_--it is a pretty word, _Perle_--it makes you to think of +the r-radiance of the moon, so pure, so soft. Yes," he went on, +hastily, "_Perle_ r-rhymes with _Erle_--that means an alder-tree--and +that r-reminds me of you." + +"I must say I fail to see the resemblance," came an injured voice from +behind the chair. + +"Not see? Oh, Miss Sydney, surely--with your cleverness! Listen to +this, then; perhaps you like it better that I call you my--I mean +_a_--_Rose_." + +"That's because my hair is red." + +"It is a white r-rose that always figures in my mind. A beautiful white +r-rose with a heart of gold." + +By a dexterous touch upon one wheel he whirled his chair about so that +he saw her downcast face. + +"A heart full of goodness to others is it, and of courage, and of +love." + +He was leaning eagerly towards her. She lifted her eyes with an effort, +and met his. Then he remembered. + +"Yes," he continued, hurriedly, "full of love for the poor and the +desolate." + +Sydney rose. + +"Your pretty figures do me too much honor," she said, unsteadily, and +went into the house with lingering tread and look. + +Friedrich gazed after her. + +"God knows I would be counted among the poor and the desolate," he +cried, softly, to himself. "But I must not speak again of this until I +am more worthy to stand before her--if ever that can be!" + + + + +XIV + +The Fourth of July + + +That the settle-_ment_ celebrated the Fourth of July was not due to an +exuberance of patriotism, but to the mercantile spirit of Uncle Jimmy's +son, Pete. + +Pete was married, and lived in one of the cottages on the Oakwood +estate, where he worked intermittently, sandwiching between thin slices +of manual labor thick layers of less legitimate emprise. + +Independence Day, as the anniversary of the birth of our country's +liberty, is not celebrated with enthusiasm in the South. It meets with +more cordial acceptance when regarded as another opportunity for +knocking off work. + +Pete's plan catered to all conditions of conscience, from the seared +commodity that asked no excuse for playing to the scrupulous article +that considered justification necessary, and found it in the +infrequency of such amusement. + +He advertised far and wide, by placards in the scattered stores and +post-offices that cling near the railway stations and dot the Haywood +Road on the other side of the river, a-- + + GANDER PULIN + FORTH OF JULY + AT 5 OCLOCK. + FRADYS FEILD. + +"I always make a point of going to these outdoor gatherings of the +country people," explained Mrs. Carroll to the Baron, as they drove +towards the field. "I think they like to have me." + +Von Rittenheim had insisted upon going home to his cabin a few days +before, since which time the old lady had missed him grievously. He was +not yet strong enough to take the five-mile ride to Oakwood on his +mule, and she had made the gander-pulling an excuse to go to his cabin +to see how his housekeeping was progressing, and to take him for a +drive. + +"We don't have gander-pullings often now, since the law requires that +the fowl shall be dead," she explained. "It demands less skill to break +the poor thing's neck when it isn't writhing wildly." + +"And it does not r-rouse the br-rutal desire to kill that seems to live +in every one of us men. Will Miss Sydney be there?" + +"Yes, she is going on horseback--" + +"Ah!" + +"--with John Wendell." + +"Eh?" + +"You didn't meet them--John and Katrina Wendell--when they were here in +the spring. They went North again not long after you came to Oakwood." + +"Oh, dear madam, I do so earnestly hope that my going to Oakwood did +not depr-rive you of more welcome guests." + +"Not the least in the world. They went back to New York to put the +crown to a pretty romance." + +"A love-story!" + +"Katrina was sent down here, under her brother's care, to forget a +certain Tom Schuyler, whom her mother considered impossible because he +was penniless." + +"The poor but honest suitor." + +"A poor but lavish suitor would describe him better. It seems that an +aunt of his was moved to give him a present of five hundred dollars. He +says that he had just paid his tailor's bill as a concession to his +desire to _range_ himself, and he really didn't know what to do with +the money. It wasn't enough to get anything really nice with,--he'd +been trying to make his father give him an automobile,--unless it were +a ring for Katrina. He concluded, however, that Mrs. Wendell would +object to her daughter's accepting it, and that he might as well take a +little flyer with it." + +"Take--what is that?" + +"Speculate--in stocks." + +"And he made his for-rtune?" + +"No, on the contrary. He took his father's advice about his purchase, +and lost his five hundred dollars within twenty-four hours." + +"Then wherefr-rom came his good luck? For surely I perceive the +pr-resence of good luck." + +"His father was so remorseful over his poor counsel, and so delighted +with Tom's apparent desire to 'settle down,' that he made amends for +his unfortunate 'tip' by giving his son a very decent sum of money." + +"It is like a story, is it not? So the brother and sister went up from +here to the wedding." + +"It was only a few days ago, and now Tom and Katrina have come to us on +their _Hochzeitreise_." + +"And the brother?" + +Mrs. Carroll glanced amusedly at her companion. + +"He came to-day on the afternoon train, to continue the visit which +Katrina insisted on shortening for him in May, he says." + +"You will enjoy them." + +Friedrich's tone was not enthusiastic, and he pulled his moustache +gloomily. + +"Very much. They are charming young people. See, there are Tom and +Katrina now, just turning into the field." + +Von Rittenheim raised his hat as Mrs. Schuyler waved her hand to Mrs. +Carroll, and studied critically the bride's radiant face and pretty +gown as the victoria followed the phaeton through the opened +fence-rails. He found her charming and acknowledged it reluctantly, not +because he begrudged her her beauty, nor because he thought her +handsomer than Sydney, for he did not, but because he had a secret fear +of the attractiveness of the brother of so fascinating a girl. + +"Tom," said Mrs. Carroll, as Mrs. Schuyler came to the side of the +carriage, "I want you to know my very dear friend, Baron von +Rittenheim--Mr. Schuyler. Now take the Baron over to Katrina, Tom, and +then find Mrs. Morgan,--that's she in the red-wheeled buggy,--and beg +her to come and sit with me here. Vandeborough," to the coachman, +"drive me under that apple-tree, where there is more shade. How do you +do, Eliza?" she said to a woman by whom the carriage slowly passed; +"I'm glad to see you out to-day. And you, Mary. Jack Garren, is that +you? You grow too fast for my memory. Ah, Jane, I hope your rheumatism +is better,--and is that Mattie's Bertha? Stop here, Vandeborough. This +will be comfortable. Ah, Mrs. Morgan, it is kind of you to make me a +little visit, but I couldn't possibly climb into that buggy of yours. I +don't know how you achieve it." + +"Nor do Ah, Mrs. Carroll. Ah thought it was high five years ago, when +Ah didn't consider mahself overly fat, so you can imagine what the +effort is now." And she shook jovially. + +"Is the Doctor here?" + +"Yes, indeed. He drove me. He always comes to these things. They +generally need him before they get through, and it often saves him a +long trip into the mountains if he's on the spot when things happen." + +"I dare say his presence prevents a good many quarrels." + +"Maybe so; but Ah should hate to have any mo' fights than there are. +There's always whisky about, you know." + +"If the chief crop of this country could be changed, what a blessing it +would be!" + +"Ah don't know as it would make much difference as long as potatoes +were left." + +"And thirst." + +"There's Bob now. O-oh, Bob!" she called, waving a fat hand to her son +as he cantered across the open on his gray. + +Bob looked about for the source of the call, and turned his horse +towards the tree. + +"He's growing handsome, Mrs. Morgan," said Mrs. Carroll, in an +undertone, as the tall fellow leaped to the ground, slipped the bridle +over his arm, and pulled off his cap. + +"He looks as his father did at his age," returned Mrs. Morgan, fondly, +glancing across to where her husband was talking to a group of lank +mountaineers from whom he was hardly to be distinguished. + +"It's right nice of you to come this afternoon, Mrs. Carroll," Bob was +saying. "The people always appreciate it. What is it, mother? Those +boys? Oh, they're having a game of ball; and the men you see over +yonder are throwing horseshoes over a peg--with mighty poor skill, too. +Here come Patton McRae and Susy. Excuse me. I'll help him with his +horses," for Patton's black mare hated the harness even more than she +did the saddle, and was doing her best to demoralize her mate and +overturn the buggy. + +Sydney, entering the field from the State Road, glanced past the +tethered mules and the chair-laden wagons, from which the horses had +been taken, to where Bob sat in the carriage beside Susy, saying +something very pretty to her, if downcast lids and a blush are any +evidence; in reality, teasing her about an absent sweetheart. + +Wandering farther, her eyes saw the quoit-throwers, and the groups of +women and children sitting in the shade, enjoying an interchange of +gossip with the zest of infrequent meetings. She saw the clusters of +laughing negroes, and the tent where Pete and his wife were doing a +vigorous business in cakes and ice-cream and lemonade. She waved her +hand to her grandmother and Mrs. Morgan. She noticed the men and boys +who strolled with apparent aimlessness towards the thicket on the edge +of the field, and returned wiping their lips on their sleeves. And she +saw Katrina talking animatedly to Baron von Rittenheim, who sat beside +her, while Patton McRae watched her with adoring eyes, and Tom wore the +conscious smile that indicates the young husband's pride of possession. + +Sydney had been feeling very much without occupation since the Baron +had gone home, and the anticipation of seeing him again this afternoon +had been pleasant to her. He never had made love to her more definitely +than on the morning after his interview with Dr. Morgan, but to herself +she acknowledged that he admired her, and while she was not sure of his +entertaining a more pronounced feeling, up to this time she had known, at +least, that his eyes were only for her. And here he was _revelling_--she +underlined the word in her thought--in Katrina's vivacity and charm. The +sensation of rivalry was new to her and not pleasant. + +As for Bob, she had a feeling of warm affection for dear old Bob, and a +desire to be useful to him, and she meant to make her influence over +him one for good, if that were possible. She was thoroughly glad in the +news that had come to her that Bob had not been drinking for several +months now. But how he could help referring to the passage that had +occurred between them she could not understand. She didn't really +want him to make love to her,--that was a notion altogether too +unmaidenly,--but she did feel as if an expression of affection from +_somebody_ would be very comforting. + +She turned to John Wendell, who rode beside her, and gave him a more +generous smile than it had been his lot to receive while Sydney was the +possessor of those agreeable anticipations of the early afternoon. + +"You like it? All this?" She waved her hand comprehensively. + +"I love it," he answered, promptly, looking at her clear-cut face with +its frame of red hair under her sailor hat, and at the well-made linen +habit. + +"It must be novel to you." + +"Not very." He pulled his moustache to conceal an amused smile. "It +depends upon where new ends and old begins, you see. Now, I came down +here in April, so my feeling is not 'the last cry.'" + +"But at that time of year you didn't see--oh, how foolish you are!" she +cried, and touched Johnny with her spur. His response brought him near +the phaeton, which seemed a focal point for a general movement. + +"They're going to have the gander-pulling now," exclaimed Bob, who had +come with Susy to join the group. "The best view will be from this +side." + +"Are you going to ride, Mr. Morgan?" asked Katrina. + +"Yes, I think so." + +"Bob never can resist any game that's played with a horse," said +Sydney, laughing. + +"You know you'd like right well to try it yourself," he retorted. + +Baron von Rittenheim gave his seat beside Mrs. Schuyler to Miss McRae, +and went to Sydney's side. + +"At last the sun begins to shine," he said, in a low voice, smiling up +at her and patting Johnny's neck. + +"Your universe has many suns, I'm afraid," responded Sydney, a trifle +pettishly, yet swiftly, scanning his face for signs of returning +health. She was not unobservant, either, of his new white summer +clothes. + +Friedrich glanced across the horse to Mrs. Schuyler. + +"I find agr-reeable the light of the lesser planets," he said, +"but--there is only one Sun." + +Looking up at her, he laughed again, so heartily and with such genuine +pleasure at seeing her that Sydney melted. + +"You look so _well_," she cried. "It is a delight to see you. But it's +not a compliment to our care that you grow better so fast when you +leave us." + +"R-rather is it a tr-ribute to your so admirable nursing that has +pr-repared me to r-recover with speed, even though I have it no +longer." + +"Will you ride, Baron?" asked Bob. "You're welcome to Gray Eagle if you +will." + +"I thank you, gr-reatly, but I dare not. The eye of my care-taker is +upon me, and your Herr Father is here somewhere. No, decidedly, I am +afraid," and he leaned with every appearance of contentment against +Johnny's shoulder. + +"How about you, Mr. Wendell?" + +"I think I will, if Miss Sydney will trust me with the horse." + +"Of course; and I'll give you a lovely prize if you bring me the head." + +"It's yours," cried John, while Friedrich bit his lip, in annoyance, +and thought on the _Ewigweibliche_. + +"Can you find me something, Mr. Morgan?" cried Schuyler. "I really +can't stand here and see you fellows having this fun without me." + +"What's Mr. Schuyler driving, Sydney? 'Possum? She'll do, if you don't +mind. I'll swipe a saddle off of one of those mules over there." And he +and Tom fell to unharnessing the useful 'Possum, while the Baron held +Gray Eagle and commented on Bob's resource. + +"He is full of device," he said, heartily, "and r-ready, always, to +think and to do." And Sydney remembered some of the things he had done, +and nodded with misty eyes. + + + + +XV + +The Gander-Pulling + + +Under all the trees where horses had been hitched, the mountaineers +were tightening girths, mending unsound bridles, and pulling down +stirrups from the saddles across which they had been flung to be safe +from fly-kicking hoofs. + +Some men had switches tucked under their saddle-flaps. Others, less +provident, swung on to their beasts, and, heavily elastic, trotted +across to the brush to cut a "hickory" from a sourwood-tree. + +Pete was testing the strength of a stout oak pole driven into the +ground, across whose fork was lashed, like the cross-bar of a "T," a +leaf-stripped sapling. To the tip of this rod the negro was tying the +legs of a big, white goose, whose extended wings and pendant head +betrayed compliance with inexorable law. + +"Hit's a damn shame," Pete murmured, as he anointed the creature's neck +and head with liberal smearings of lard. "Whar de fun o' pullin' on a +ole daid t'ing lak dis? But Ah hope dey'll tink hit's great!" And he +beat vigorously on a pan to attract the attention of all hearers. + +"Gen'lemen. O-oh, gen'lemen!" he cried, at the top of his lungs. "Now +fo' a great ole gander-pullin'! De only one we've had in dis settle-_ment_ +fo' t'ree year. Every gen'leman as craves to enter dis gander-pullin' +will kin'ly ride up here and _de_-posit a quarter 'f a dollar. Only +twenty-five cen's fo' de priv'lege o' takin' a pull at dis yer +goose,--warranted a tasty goose! One-half dis sum o' money goes to de +gen'leman who succeeds in _re_-movin' de haid from dis fowl, an' also +de goose hitself, which sho' do look lak good eatin'!" + +Pete's old hat soon sagged with the coins that were tossed into it, +while his keen eye noted each entry as surely as if he wrote the name +in black and white. It would have been useless for anyone to try to +enter the lists without paying the proper fee. + +Two lines of excited onlookers served at once to define a lane, whose +ultimate point was the gallows whereon hung the goose, and to rouse to +excitement the horses, whose overworked spirits did not respond +promptly to the sudden stimulus. + +They cheered the aspirants with jovial condemnation. + +"Show us what yo' ole plug c'n do, 'Gene." + +"Sho', Alf, you-all ain' goin' to ride that po' critter!" + +"He's powerful gaunted up, yo' war-horse, Bud." + +"Mighty strength'nin' ploughin' is, but not stimmerlatin'!" + +"High-strung animal, that clay-bank o' Pink's." + +Pink's temper was in that state where he enjoyed hugely gibes at his +friends' expense, but was in no mood to receive amiably jests directed +against himself. + +"Whar's you-all's horse?" he shouted, in exasperation, to one of his +tormentors. "Ah reckon no one would len' you anythin' mo' vallyble 'n a +billy-goat. Now dry up. Pete, start this thing." + +He rode to the end of the passage where the horsemen were gathering. +Alf Lance, Melissa's father, whose horses Bud and Pink were riding, +scanned them both to make sure that they were not too drunk to be +trusted with his animals. + +Pete fussed about nervously. + +"Which o' you gents will begin dis pullin'?" he called. "Now, sahs, +come on." + +Pink pushed his horse towards the edge of the crowd, but he was hailed +with dissuasive cries. + +"Aw, hold on, Pink." + +"Don' be so bigoty." + +"Who you-all think ye are?" + +"Where's Bob Morgan?" + +"Yes, Bob's the feller!" + +"O-oh, Bob!" + +It was their tribute to the Doctor, this giving precedence to his son, +and Bob so understood it. It was, therefore, irritating to have Pink +thrust forward his red face and look him over sneeringly. + +"Aw, gwan," he cried, "lessee what you-all c'n do." + +The bunch of horsemen fell to one side, and Bob started Gray Eagle from +well back in the field near the deserted wagons. He passed the mounted +men and thundered through the lines of standing howlers. The gray had +been his master's coadjutor in so many situations of excitement and +even peril, that the cheering mob did not provoke him unduly. He +galloped, unswervingly, up to the hanging goose, though his ears were +pricked forward, and he shuddered as the instinctive repulsion from +death pulsed through him. Bob's outstretched hand grasped the long and +slippery neck, while the inarticulate yell with which the Southern +farmer calls his dogs and chases his cows and terrifies his enemies +went up from the onlookers. Tightly he clutched the greasy thing, and +tried to give a sharp twist that should break the vertebrae. But his +hand slipped swiftly down to the flat head, which offered no hold for +his grasp, the beak ripped through his fingers, and the sapling, which +had bent and followed him as Gray Eagle dashed on, snapped back, waving +triumphantly its unharmed burden. + +"Hard lines, old man, but the fun lasts longer so," cried Wendell, as +Bob pulled up beside him after circling the spectators. + +"Who's that?" the New Yorker asked, as a lank country horse plunged +down the lane, shied violently at the feathered horror, threw his rider +into the crowd, and galloped with flapping stirrups over the field. + +"'Gene Frady. He never can stay on anything. He's all right, dad," to +the Doctor, who was moving towards the upper end. "See, he's chasing +his horse now." + +With a drunken whoop, Pink Pressley rushed his animal towards the +prize; but his condition, combined with twitches and jerks of the +bridle, and rakings of the spur, had acted upon his mount's usually +stolid nerves, and half-way up the alley he whirled about and tore +back, carrying his cursing rider far up the road before he calculated +the probable results to himself of this outburst, and consented to +return. + +Bud Yarebrough was more fortunate. He leaned far forward and succeeded +in getting a firm grasp of the neck, but he had guided his horse too +close to the bird, and his jerk drew it directly over his face, +blinding him with grease and feathers. + +His plight was greeted with howls of derision, which fell into silence +as John Wendell made the trial. His unpractised hand in some way pulled +down the goose, and the rebound of the sapling plucked the booty out of +his grasp, and flung it high above his head. + +Tom Schuyler was equally unlucky. + +Alf Lance forgot that he was left-handed until he was close upon his +quarry, when he dropped his reins and pawed vaguely at the air as his +horse carried him on. + +Another yell announced Pink Pressley's return. Now his chastened steed +bore him straight enough to the goal, but by that time Pink was too +drunk to distinguish the goose he was after from the flock that swirled +and dipped before his eyes, and he never touched a feather. + +"Doctor, you-all'll have to show us how," said Alf Lance. + +"Come on, Doctor." + +"Yes, yo' the feller." + +"Bob, give yo' father yo' horse and let him larn ye what's what." + +"Oh, I hope he'll do it," cried Sydney. "He's capital at it!" + +"Fo' the Lawd's sake!" ejaculated Mrs. Morgan, rising to her feet in +the carriage and steadying herself by an informal hand on Mrs. +Carroll's shoulder. "Fo' the Lawd's sake, if that ain't Henry Morgan! +Well, did you ever!" And her fat body trembled with pride and +excitement. + +Gray Eagle took his second turn with the same equanimity as if his own +master were on his back. He galloped handsomely towards the goose; +there was a quick snatch and a snap, and the old man turned short and +came back, holding aloft his trophy. + +"Wah, wah, wah!" + +Yells, whistles, and cat-calls greeted his success. Sydney and Katrina +and Mrs. Carroll clapped their hands, and the Doctor, folding in his +handkerchief the somewhat dubious treasure, rode over to the apple-tree +and presented it to his wife. + +During the confusion attendant upon the harnessing of horses and mules, +Bob, restoring 'Possum's saddle to the mule from which he had borrowed +it, heard Pink Pressley's voice on the other side of the big oak by +which he was working. + +"Howdy, Mr. Baron," he was saying. + +"How_dee_," responded von Rittenheim, with an accent that made Bob +throw back his head and laugh silently. "You had bad fortune with your +horse this afternoon." + +"Correct. Damn pore horse. Some day Ah'll have a good horse o' mah own, +not a ole borrowed plug. Ah'm goin' to be rich some day. You-all know +how, eh? Say,"--he was wagging his head solemnly to and fro, +disgustingly near von Rittenheim's face,--"Ah reckon you'd like to go +into business with me now ye made a start at hit." + +Bob remained behind his shield, hoping that Pressley would go away +before von Rittenheim had the mortification of seeing him. + +"Ah reckon you-all need money mahty bad," drawled the drunken voice. "A +feller always does when he wants to get married, 'n hit's clear what +yo' after with Miss Sydney." + +Like bolts from heaven, two blows fell upon him simultaneously, and von +Rittenheim and Bob faced each other over his fallen body. + +"Leave him alone," said Bob, hoarsely. "He'll sleep it off." + +Then he strolled over to his father. + +"Dad, I suspect you'd better take a look at Pink Pressley under the big +oak-tree. I've just given him a biff in the solar plexus, or mighty +near it." + + + + +XVI + +On the Bridge + + +All through July the growing heat of summer forced the people of the +low country up into the mountains in search of an altitude where +humidity is not a factor in the sum total of suffering. Every evening's +six o'clock train brought families of travellers, glad to escape from +the steaming heat of Charleston or Savannah, or ready to run the risk +of the fever-killing frost coming too late for the beginning of the New +Orleans schools. They emerged dishevelled and weary from the hot cars. +The elders counted children, nurses, and luggage; the children sat down +at once upon the ground and took off their shoes and stockings. + +By the first of August the whole Asheville plateau was transformed from +its winter state. + +The large towns were filled with pretty, pale girls, gay in muslins and +ribbons and big hats, who danced and drank soda-water in the mornings +and danced again in the evenings, or went on drag-rides, and flirted at +all hours. + +The small hotels in the country were full of the same girls, chaperoned +by gay mammas, who played whist six hours a day, while their charges +found temperate amusement in walking to the post-office in the cool, +purple dusk, and in dancing--chiefly with each other--after supper. + +The proportion of men to girls was the usual summer ratio. Nice +discriminations of extreme age or extreme youth counted for little +against ability to dance. The girl with brothers of almost any size was +popular among her kind, and the girl who "grabbed" was held in cordial +contempt. + +Woe be unto the youth who really fell in love. His courtship was the +cynosure of all eyes. Its progress was reported hourly. His presence +was noted and his absence commented upon. His ardor was gauged by the +thermometer of many eyes, and the barometer of hotel partisanship +betrayed the storms of love. + +The Neighborhood awoke from its winter sleep. Every house had its +guests, and there were constant gayeties both by day and evening. + +The first moon of August, by lighting the dark forest roads, became +responsible for nightly festivities. On one of the earliest evenings of +the month she looked down upon carriages and horsemen making their way +to the French Broad, where Fletcher's Bridge crosses the river. The +Schuylers, with Sydney and John, were in the Oakwood surrey, while +Vandeborough cantered behind to take care of the horses "while de white +folkses eats." + +[Illustration: To the French Broad, where Fletcher's Bridge crosses the +river] + +The Cotswold party filled a three-seated buckboard and a surrey, and +rejoiced further in outriders. Baron von Rittenheim bestrode his mule. +The Delaunays brought a carriage-load of girls, who laughed a great +deal in the soft, full voices the far South gives her daughters. From +the Hugers' party came scraps of talk about "the City," and the "Isle +of Palms." + +There was a wagon-load of people from the Buck Mountain House, too, +friends of the Hugers. + +By Sydney's command the picnic fire was built by the river's bank in a +large field, whose openness showed the quick march across the heavens +of the rising moon. + +Every one brought a stick to lay on the blazing pile. Bob and one of +the Delaunay girls fetched water from a spring that hid its coolness +under a shelving rock in the forest across the road. Susy McRae made +the coffee, hindered by John's advice, more voluble than useful. Tom +Schuyler was instructed in the proper method of propping up a broiler +before the blaze, so that the chicken might cook without exacting a +human burnt offering. Patton volunteered for the task of getting the +potatoes into the ashes. The rest of the girls laid the table-cloths on +the ground, and opened the baskets, and the rest of the men hunted up +logs for seats, and brought the cushions and rugs from the carriages. + +Sydney dominated the scene, giving a clever suggestion to Tom, +encouraging Susy to disregard John's teasing, which threatened some +harm to the coffee, sympathizing with Patton over a burn, and showing +Katrina how to cook bacon on a long forked stick. + +After the meal was eaten and complacency filled them, she it was who +sent their suppers to the coachmen, and who packed up baskets and +folded cloths, aided by von Rittenheim and Bob. + +"Oh, do stop doing that, Sydney," cried Mildred Huger. "You make us all +feel so mean not to be helping you, and you know it isn't necessary +right now." + +"Yes, come and sit by me, Sydney," said John. "I've been saving a +place, and it'll be a treat for you." + +"Wait a few minutes, Sydney," said Tom, "and you shall have my valuable +help." + +"There, it's all done, dear people," cried Sydney, "and we can watch +the moon with a clear conscience." + +"Will you not come with me to the bridge to see it?" begged Friedrich, +in a low voice. "Ah, do come!" + +Bob, who had been about to ask the same thing, turned away and +stretched himself at Mildred Huger's feet. Susy softly touched her +guitar, suggesting popular airs, and voices took up the tunes, now +stopping to say something funny and to laugh while others carried on +the song, now joining in an energetic chorus. On the outskirts of the +circle farthest from the dying fire sat the couples in whom the soft +night and the moonlight and the music were arousing sentiment. More +than one young fellow watched Friedrich and Sydney as they disappeared +behind the willows on the bank, and wished that he had been the first +to suggest the bridge, and envied the two their vantage point. + +They stood side by side upon its hoof-worn planks. Under their feet +swept the musical flow of the stream, molten silver in the moonlight as +it slid towards them, a sparkling, dancing mist of tossing diamonds as +it fled away over the stones of the rough bottom. + +They faced the wonderful glory of the moon. Her hand was on the bar at +first, and his beside it. After a moment he glanced at the tempting +nearness, and put his in the pocket of his jacket. Then he turned his +back upon the moon, and leaned on the railing by her, facing the lesser +splendor that was to him as dazzling. + +"Will you for-rgive me if I spoil the beauty of this per-rfect night by +speaking to you a little about--myself?" + +His voice was serious. Sydney looked at him and turned away her head. +Her lips trembled. + +"I have not the r-right to force upon you a subject so unwor-rthy. But +I think it is just that you should know--that all my friends should +know--what work I am going to tr-ry now to do to retr-rieve myself. Ah, +you make the little gesture that means 'Say not that word.' But you +will let me say just this one time ever-ything I want to, if you +please. When I say 'retr-rieve myself,' I understand well that nothing +can destr-roy the fact that my name is wr-ritten on those books over +there,"--he waved his hand in the direction of Asheville,--"and I know +well that for my fault all my life I shall suffer in one way or +another. But I can tr-ruly say, in God's sight,"--he stood bareheaded, +and faced again the heaven's pomp,--"that I have r-repented my weakness +most bitterly, both for what it did lead me to, and because such +weakness in itself is shameful." + +Sydney lifted to his her eyes blurred with tears. + +"Don't," she whispered, hoarsely. + +"_Ach_, Heaven help me, look not at me like that," he cried; "I cannot +bear ever-ything!" + +Silence lay between them after this cry of pain. Friedrich began again, +very low. + +"I see now clearly what I saw not at the time,--that my weakness came +upon me fr-rom my own lack of str-rength to make an effort. I was +cr-rushed by a gr-rief when I left my land to come to America. I +allowed it to paralyze my will. I let myself dr-rift, not caring enough +about what became of me to exert myself to ward off poverty. Poverty +never had been mine,--I did not r-realize it, but I did know well the +meaning of self-r-respect and honor, and it was base of me to permit my +will so to sink." + +Again he paused. + +"I tire you? You let me go on?" + +Sydney's face looked white in the moonlight. She assented by a motion +of the head. + +"Even when I knew--you--" + +Sydney gazed down at the scintillant water. Von Rittenheim did not turn +to her, and went on, steadily,-- + +"--and admired your beauty and your sweetness--for-rgive me that I +say these things so baldly--and wondered at the r-responsibilities you +assumed, and at the care you took of every needing person who came near +you--even fr-rom you whom I admired and--whom I admired with all my +str-rength, I did not learn the lesson that was before my eyes." + +"How can you say all this to me, Baron? You must not." + +"You will do me the justice to listen just a pair of minutes longer. +Now I see it all clearly; now I have a purpose in my life. It is to +make you look upon me with r-respect,--with so much r-respect that you +will for-rget that on one of those turned-over pages of my life there +is a blot." + +"And you have chosen to seek your salvation through work! It is a fine +spirit, Baron, and the American gospel--though perhaps you may not like +it the more on that account." + +"You are an American." + +Sydney blushed and laughed,--her sweet, rich laugh. She was glad to be +a little farther away from tragedy. + +"Shall I tell you my plan? You will see how I am practical! My +salvation lies in the unpoetic shape of--cattle." + +"Cattle?" + +"I have some money for which I sent to Germany; some that I felt it +r-right to use if I should be in gr-reat need of it, but which I should +not have sent for except that I was ill. With this money and my little +farm I go into partnership with young Mr. McRae. His father gives to +him one-half of his so large estate. On his place and mine we r-raise a +cr-rop which we feed to our cr-reatures." + +"Where are they to come from?" + +"Some we do r-raise ourselves, and some we buy here and there, +every-where in these mountains where we can find two or three +colts--no, calves." + +"Will there be a sufficient market to justify you?" + +"How wonderful for business are you! Yes, we think so. Alr-ready have +we an or-rder to send a whole carload of steers to R-richmond." + +"Really? You've really begun?" + +"Yes, I take much pr-ride to say that we have begun two days ago. +Patton is to buy the calves at first, he does so well understand the +folk of the mountains; and later, when I talk more accurately English, +then I shall help him. Until then my part is on the farms." + +"I think it is admirable! It will give you so much to do and to +interest you. You are sure to succeed." + +She smiled at him generously and with perfect sympathy. Her white dress +shone cool against the purple sky, and her face rose radiant above. + +Von Rittenheim leaned over her as she sat on the bridge's railing. On +the road, not far away Susy McRae's guitar betrayed her approach, and +John Wendell's barytone hummed the air that she was picking. Von +Rittenheim put his foot on the topmost bar and leaned his elbow on his +uplifted knee. By his position Sydney was screened entirely from the +oncomers. + +"I seem to have a gr-reat deal to say to-night. Now I shall tell you a +little stor-ry." + +His tone was gay, but Sydney saw that his eyes were grave. + +"Does it begin 'Once upon a time'?" she fenced. + +"_Ja. Es war einmal_ a knight, who led a happy life in his own country +until a gr-rief came to him which he thought the most ter-rible sorrow +that could come to anybody. He learned better afterwards, but at the +time it seemed to him not to be endured. So he left his home and became +a wanderer over the earth. And for many months he r-roamed, and nothing +ever made him for-rget his tr-rouble until one day he saw a beautiful +pr-rincess. Ah, she was a most lovely pr-rincess, with a face like a +r-rose, and teeth like pearls, and a heart that was a tr-reasure of +goodness." + +Friedrich warmed with his subject. He was looking his fill on the +downcast face before him, while Sydney pulled at the little +handkerchief in her lap, and carefully smoothed out a corner of it on +her knee. + +"As soon as he saw her the knight knew that his old tr-rouble was not +what he had thought it. And he knew also at once what would be the +gr-reatest happiness that life could give him. He determined to win +this happiness if he could, but first he had to pr-rove himself to the +pr-rincess that he was a knight of cour-rage and not a weakling. So he +told her of his purpose and begged of her a favor that he might wear it +on his heart." + +There was a pause, so long that Sydney asked, still with downcast +head,-- + +"How does the story end?" + +"I know not." + +"You don't know?" + +"I never learned it any farther. What do you think comes next?" + +"I don't--I think----" + +Bravely she raised her eyes to his, and stood before him, blushing +divinely. + +"I think she gave him a token and bade him Godspeed." And Friedrich +found himself with a morsel of cambric in his hand, which he kissed +passionately, while Sydney was walking towards the bridge's end, +answering Susy's cry. + +"Here I am. Is it time to go?" + +And John was answering,-- + +"Mrs. Carroll warned us to go home early on account of the dance +to-morrow night." + +Laughing and singing they went through the moonlight, some with the +happy hearts they had brought, others saddened by some of the whimsies +of Fortune that seem lurking to spoil our joy when most we exult. +Gladdest of all the blissful ones rode Friedrich von Rittenheim. At the +cross-roads he waved a gay "good-by" to the Oakwood surrey as it bore +away from him the lady of his love. He stopped his mule and looked long +after it, and threw a kiss at its bulky form as it plunged into the +wood. + +He did not put on his cap again, but stuffed it into his pocket, and +trotted on towards home with the moonlight shining on his fair hair. +The good creature between his knees felt his exhilaration and broke +into a short canter as an expression of sympathy with his master's +humor. The negroes whose cabins he passed pulled the clothes over their +heads, whispering "Hants!" as he galloped by, singing "Dixie" at the +top of his lungs. + +Sydney had taught it to him, the stirring song, and he brought it out +roundly,-- + + "Oh, I wees' I was in the land of cotton, + The good old times are not for-rgotten, + Look away, look away, look away, + Deexie Land." + + + + +XVII + +Out of a Clear Sky + + +There came to von Rittenheim as he stabled his mule, with many a tender +pat upon his coarse coat, one of those times of spiritual insight when +we see ourselves as after a long absence we look with scrutiny upon +once familiar objects. A perception of new growth filled him with +surprise, as we look at the seedling under the window, and notice of a +sudden that it has grown to be a sapling. With the scrutiny and the +perception came a comprehension of new power, such as we feel +objectively when our child asserts himself, and we understand in a +flash that the man is born within him, and that the days of childhood +are past. + +The remembrance of the months of regret and sorrow that had followed +upon his coming to America struck him with nausea. The thought of his +long ineptitude for the life which he had adopted voluntarily gave him +a feeling of self-contempt. The inertness of his will disgusted him. + +And then all this disgust and contempt was swept away by a great wave +of courage and determination and strength. He tingled with the +consciousness that once more there had come to him the intrepidity with +which his youth had faced the future, the will-power to take up life +again, and the force to work and to win. + +Reverently he thanked God for each increment of might that pulsed +through him, as he struck a match and lighted his lamp,--so +automatically the commonplace actions of life are performed while the +spirit surges within. + +Reverently he thanked God for the love that filled him, and for the +hope of return that had come to him. Then he stretched his arms upward +to their fullest height, merely for the sake of feeling his physical +strength, and broke into a torrent of tender German epithets,--_Englein +Geliebte_, _Herzenfreude_, _Liebling_. He took out the little handkerchief +and kissed it again and again, and walked restlessly about his room, too +glad and too happy to be quiet. + +The nickel clock upon the mantel-shelf struck eleven, and at the same +time something like the sound of wheels penetrated his exaltation. He +stopped in his march and listened. No one could have turned by mistake +into his road in such brilliant moonlight, yet he knew no one who would +visit him at that hour. He thought it possible that some one was taking +the back road to Bud's cabin, so he made no move until the vehicle +stopped before his house. Then he stepped hastily into his bedroom and +slipped his revolver into his pocket before he responded to a gentle +rap. + +Flinging back the door he saw standing on the porch a woman, a girl, +about whom the breeze blew a scarf of thin black stuff. Two trembling +hands were held out to him as if to implore a greeting, and a white +face looked up from its dark inwrapment like the face of a wistful +child. The moon, sailing high in the zenith, cast no light beneath the +porch's roof, and von Rittenheim stood unrecognizing. + +She spoke in German. + +"Friedrich, you do not know me?" + +"Hilda!" + +There was dismay in his tone and surprise unspeakable. He made no offer +to take her hands, and they sank at her side. The driver seeing that +his fare had found whom she sought, deposited her trunk and a valise +upon the floor of the porch, with a succession of heavy thumps, and +drove off with a relieved "Good-night," to which he received no +response. + +"Friedrich, your welcome is not cordial. Surely you know me? You called +me 'Hilda.'" + +"Yes, I know you. You are Hilda," he repeated, dully. "Why are you +here?" + +"Won't you ask me in and let me tell you?" + +"I beg your pardon." He stepped back that she might pass him. "You have +surprised me almost out of my senses--entirely out of my manners, as +you see." + +He gave her a splint chair--one of the two which were the room's +complement--and stood before her. His arm lay on the mantel-shelf, his +fingers clutching its edge until the nails grew white. The girl took +off her heavy black bonnet and laid it on the table. The lamp behind +her shone through the golden hair that made a halo around her face, the +face of a child, unworldly, confiding. The only mark of maturity about +her was the straight line of a determined mouth. + +Friedrich spoke first. + +"You are wearing black. Is it Max?" + +The great, innocent blue eyes filled with tears. + +"Yes, it is Max." + +"Poor child!" + +A shiver passed over the girl. + +"And poor Max! When was it?" + +"Five months ago." + +"Five months ago? You can't mean that! Five months ago! Why wasn't I +told?" + +"I hadn't your address." + +"Max had it." + +"I looked through all his papers and found nothing." + +"Herr Stapfer, my lawyer, had it." + +"I applied to him, and he gave me an address in Texas that you had sent +him a year ago." + +"It is true. I believe I never wrote to him after I settled here until +last June." + +"Yes, it was in June that I heard from him again that you were here, +and ill. I begged him not to tell you of Max's death. I did not know +how ill you were, and I feared for you. Then I decided to come myself +to find you--and care for you if you needed care." + +"Your aunt?" + +"She is dead. I have no one now--but you." + +Silence fell on them. The little figure with the dark robes of her +mourning clinging about her, rose and stood before him, her linked +fingers twisting nervously together. + +"You will let me stay? You told me once--you swore it, do you +remember?--that your life was mine; that I had but to tell you of my +need. You remember?" + +"Yes, I remember." + +His eyes were on the ground and never met her steady gaze, but she +seemed satisfied with what she saw. Her hands stopped their nervous +play. + +She looked curiously about the room. + +"This is a hunting-lodge, I suppose. But you must not think I care. I +shall get on very well. And may I go to my room now?" + +Von Rittenheim was startled into activity by the simple request. + +"I think you must wait until some preparation is made. I will go and +fetch a woman who will look after you. You will not be afraid if I +leave you alone for a few minutes?" + +"Entirely alone?" + +"Yes. There is no one here. But see, I leave you my pistol, and you can +lock the door on the inside, and when I come back I will call in +German. No one else near here knows a word of German." + +"Shall I be safe?" + +"Perfectly--even without those precautions. I will hurry." + +He stood an instant outside the door listening to the noise of the key +in the lock. Then he turned in the direction of the Yarebroughs', and +ran feverishly along the path. + +His knock upon the door was answered by a sleepy "Who's that?" and the +click of a gun's hammer. Von Rittenheim explained his identity, and Bud +responded by opening the door an ungenerous crack. The Baron told his +necessity,--how his sister-in-law had arrived unexpectedly, and would +Mrs. Yarebrough be so good, so _very_ good, as to go back with him and +see if she could make her comfortable, and spend the rest of the night +there? + +Bud shut the door, and Friedrich heard the sound of discussion. +Kindness of heart and curiosity to see the strange lady triumphed over +the claims of sleep, and Bud opened the door again to call through the +crevice,-- + +"She'll go, Mr. Baron." + +It was almost midnight when they reached the cabin, Friedrich and the +whole Yarebrough family; for Sydney Melissa could not be left behind, +and Bud had a curiosity of his own. Von Rittenheim spoke in German and +the door was unlocked. He made a hasty explanation to Hilda concerning +the number of his escort. + +Melissa stared with all her eyes at the childish beauty before her. + +"Oh, Mr. Baron," she cried, with sudden courage, "Ah'd like to take +care of her, she's so little an' pretty. Ah don' min' hit a bit, Bud; +truly Ah'm honin' to," in unconscious confession of her previous +timidity. "You-all go long back with Bud, Mr. Baron, 'n Ah'll make her +comfortable. Will ye have yo' trunk in here, ma'am?" + +To Hilda's answer, "Yes, if you please," in faltering English, Melissa +cried, in ecstasy,-- + +"Don' she speak pretty! Now, Bud, you tote in the lady's trunk, 'n then +go. She's tired." And the usually timid country girl entered into her +new _role_ of care-taker with extraordinary zest. + +Friedrich approached his sister-in-law. + +"Good-night," he said. "You will be quite safe. Have no fear." + +She held out her hand to him. He hesitated a moment, and then took it +in a brief clasp. + +"Good-night," was all she said. + +Declining Bud's offer of shelter, von Rittenheim bade him farewell, and +strode into the darkness of the forest. Yarebrough looked after him, +puzzled and disapproving. + +"He ain' none so glad to see his sister-in-law," he pondered. "Ah +wonner what hit all means." + +Friedrich took no heed of his way beyond a numb feeling of pleasure +when it grew steeper and rougher. He had left the trail long since, but +he was stayed by no obstacle, was arrested by no barrier of Nature's +make. A lizard asleep on a tiny ledge of rock, jutting from a cliff, +scuttled away in fright as a man in sudden onslaught scaled its face. A +pair of cotton-tails bobbed from one thicket to another in wildest +terror as he came breaking through. A trout, floating in a rocky basin +of the brook, fled with a dexterous flip of fin and tail to the +protecting shelter of an overhanging root, as the placid pool was +agitated by the passage of an enemy, following the course of the stream +as the path of least resistance. + +To all these sights and sounds Friedrich was blind and deaf. He spoke +no word. It was as if he were deprived of every power but that of +motion. He plunged on like a man of old pursued by the Erinyes. + +Though he was unconscious of fatigue, the mad pace began to tell on +him, and his muscles cried for quarter. At such times he rushed either +to the right or left, going along the side of the mountain until he +found an easier upward passage, but always ascending, never turning +down the slope; always fleeing from the pursuing wretchedness; always +subtly conscious of the futility of flight. + +So mounts a small bird into the air, pursued by a hawk. Higher and +higher he flies, straight up into the blue, hoping that the wind may +blow him far beyond his pursuer's reach, believing that the light +atmosphere that suffices to support his frail body may be too tenuous +to uphold his heavier enemy. Hoping thus and believing; but realizing +at last the unequal contests between their strengths, the failing of +his own force, the fateful, certain, deadly approach of the antagonist +whose power it is useless to oppose. + +One above the other two shelves of rock arose, like two steps of a +giant's staircase. Friedrich's exhausted body sank upon the moss of the +upper, and the bracken and small shrubs closed over him, as if to +shield him in their gentle embrace from the trouble that had driven him +to their care. He lay on his back, staring with unseeing eyes at the +tree-leaves far above his head, black against the sky's purple. + +His mind seemed to be exhausted with his body. It moved with painful +slowness, and groped vaguely after the things of memory. + +Was it yesterday--when was it that he had seen Sydney moving about in +the yellow firelight? Had he not--yes, he was sure he had--led her +under the willow-trees and on to the old bridge, with the glistering +glory under their feet, and the moon in splendor above them? And had +she given him--no, of course not--but yes, what was this? He pressed to +his lips the scrap of lace from his pocket. And there had been one +splendid hour of hope and strength and courage--one hour when the past +had fallen away from him and the future opened to his sight a not +impassable avenue. + +The moon cast level shadows as the great planet rolled towards the +western hills. Friedrich fancied himself in Germany, far back in the +long ago, when he was madly in love with Hilda. The story unfolded +before him like a panorama of some one else's life. It was, indeed, he +who had loved Hilda, but he felt not a flutter of the emotion now. +_Now_ he knew what real love was. Yet this ardent, jealous lover was +he, and she had jilted him for Maximilian. He went over again the old +arguments in her behalf. Why shouldn't she prefer Max--gay, handsome +old Max? He was nearer her age, and he had just had a legacy from his +Aunt Brigitta, whose favorite he had been. Of course, that reason did +not count. But he was gay and handsome and younger. Surely those three +excuses were enough. + +That wedding day! Should he ever forget it? He had thought to go away, +but that would have been unkind to Max, and perhaps have put Hilda in a +wrong light in the eyes of those who knew them. No, he was the head of +the family. His duty was to sit through the wedding-breakfast which her +aunt gave to the bride, and to preside at the feast that welcomed the +pair to Schloss Rittenheim. Though the old love could not enter him +again, the old torture came back poignantly. + +After the feast was over and the guests had gone, he had found himself +with her in a recessed window, looking down upon a carriage rolling +away in the moonlight. He had taken her hands, and had compelled her +gaze. She looked so fragile, so helpless, as he thought of his +brother's carelessness and love of self, and he swore a solemn oath to +stand ready to help her and to care for her, if ever need should be. +Max, a little uncertain in speech and gait, had called her then, and +Friedrich had ordered a horse, and had ridden recklessly into the +forest--on and on and on. + +For a whole month he had endured the torture of greeting her calmly +every morning, and of lifting her tiny white hand to his lips every +night, and then he had decided that there was no reason for such +crucifixion, and he had come to America. + +And in America he had met the princess--the splendid princess! + +The moon sank behind the mountains, and with its disappearance +Friedrich slept. + + + + +XVIII + +Business Plans + + +Through the early morning's shifting mist--the haze that foretells a +fine day--two men felt their way up the side of Buzzard Mountain. They +followed no path,--indeed, there are few trails to follow,--but they +climbed steadily on, as if they knew well their way, and as if speed +were of importance. + +With all their perseverance they could not cover much ground, for the +ascent is sharp enough to clutch the lungs, and the mist covered for +them a world of stumbling-blocks. + +"H'm," grunted the leader, Pink Pressley. "They oughter be a black oak +about here with a varmint hole in hit." + +He stopped and peered about him through the gloom, while Bud, his +companion, took the opportunity to lay his burden upon the ground while +he wiped his forehead with a blue handkerchief. He made no response to +his friend's remarks, but wore the air of one who does what he is bid, +and follows where he is led. Pink swung himself into motion again. + +"Ah reckon we ain' high enough, yet," he growled, and swore softly as +he struck his foot against an unseen stone. + +"Hang ye, don' do that," he cried, angrily, as he heard the breaking of +a branch behind him. "Why don' ye blaze yo' way right along, or mark +yo' path with a rope? Do you wan' the whole settle-_ment_ follerin' us +up here?" + +With praiseworthy discretion Bud still refrained from speech. A +particularly steep bit of climbing silenced his companion as well. +Yarebrough was the first to discover the landmark. + +"Is that the black oak?" he asked. + +"Where?" + +He pointed above them and a little to the right, to a veteran whose +side had been cut by hunters for the discomfiture of a 'coon or 'possum +that had taken refuge within. + +"Yep." + +They climbed to it, and both men set their heavy loads upon the ground. + +"Much further?" asked Bud. + +"No, come on. Sun'll be up soon 'n we'll be late gettin' down." + +Pressley pointed to the east, where a sort of inner glow seemed to +illuminate the haze and make it thinner and more penetrable. They +shouldered their packs and again Pink led the way. He advanced, now, +with a certain care. From the tree he counted a hundred paces to the +right, and called Bud's attention to the number. + +"That brings ye to this hickory--see?--with a rock under hit. Now, +then, straight up from this is the place we's after, twenty-five steps, +about; but hit's hard to tell, hit's so steep." + +He deposited his load upon a flat platform of rock, above which, at a +height of a dozen feet, the bank overhung. Under the bank was a hole, +not clear enough to be called a cave, nor of any great size. Bud sank +down, gratefully, beside his leader, and scrutinized the place. + +"Not overly large," he commented, "but Ah 'low hit 'll be right smart +bigger when hit's cleaned out." + +"Hit is," returned Pressley, laconically. He spoke with so much +decision that Bud looked at him sharply. + +"You-all ain' ever----?" He hesitated. + +"Used hit before? Not much! Ah ain' a plumb fool! But they's nothing +like comin' from a fam'ly that's observin' an' contrivin'." + +A smile of self-appreciation swept over his face. + +"Ah've knowed about this place ever since Ah was fryin' size. In fact, +mah father--well, never min' him. Only you'll fin' they's plenty o' +room inside to stow away that rubbish an' all our little do-es beside." + +"Whereaway's the water?" + +"They's a spring over yonder a little bit." + +Bud stared at the hole sullenly, and slowly scratched his head. +Pressley, unlashing a mattock and shovel from his pack, did not notice +him. + +"Ah swear, Pink," broke out Yarebrough, in puzzled indecision, "Ah +swear Ah donno's Ah like this business." + +Pressley sneered. + +"Don' talk so loud. Yo' rather late findin' hit out." + +"No, Ah ain'. Ah ain' never been sho'." + +"Sho' 'bout what?" + +"Oh, Ah donno. Kin' o' hard to say. You-all don' think we'll get +caught?" + +"Not 'f you keep that big mouth o' yo's shut." + +"Mr. Baron did." + +"Mr. Baron's a fool. He trusted a stranger." + +"Hit'll kin'er make ye uneasy 'bout talkin' to fellers on the road, +won' hit?" said Bud, who was the most sociable man in the settlement. + +"Hit'll sharpen yo' judg-_ment_. The way you-all go on now you ain' fur +off Mr. Baron fo' never suspectin' nobody." + +It was this very quality in Bud that was playing into Pink's hands. +Yarebrough, however, felt properly rebuked. + +"Ah ain' had yo' experience, ye know. Ah never see but one marshal to +know him." + +"When ye do see one, an' yo' sho', never forget him. Hit's the only +way. Here, take this mattock 'n pull those small rocks out, 'n pile 'em +on this crocus-sack so's they won' make any trash on this-yer +platform." + +Bud did as he was bid, and the men worked quietly and steadily for ten +minutes. + +"Here she is," Pink whispered, at last, and peered excitedly into the +cavern. + +It was, as he had said, not very large, but large enough. + +"Now pick up that sack with me an' tote hit in here. We mus'n' leave +anythin' roun'. Here, this corner 'll do. Now bring me in that pipe 'n +the little keg. We c'n leave all the tools here _ex_-ceptin' our axes. +Axes looks well 'f we meet anybody goin' down." + +"H'm," grunted Yarebrough once more, and scratched his head again. He +stepped out of the cave on to the platform that Nature's hand had laid. +The brightening light indicated the approach of dawn, though the sun +had not yet risen. The mist was not dispelled, but it had grown +thinner, and trees at some distance down the mountain began to have +individual shape through the veil of dry haze that inwrapped them. The +air was cool and sweet. The birds were singing, though still sleepily, +but one in a tree over his head burst into a glorious heralding of the +morning. Bud thrust his hands into his pockets and whistled softly. +Pink roused him roughly from his reverie. + +"Come, boy, we gotter fix up this yer openin' somehow." + +Bud answered irrelevantly: + +"Ah wisht Ah was certain about M'lissy." + +Pressley let fly the bush that he was bending across the mouth of the +cave. + +"What about her?" he asked, sharply. + +"Oh, everythin'!" + +Explanation was difficult to his slowness of thought. + +"She'll be wonderin' what takes me away from home so much at night; an' +Ah don' much like to leave her alone, neither." + +"Cain' ye trust her?" jeered Pink, with an evil scowl, but Bud turned +on him so fiercely that he added, hastily,--"to keep still if ye tell +her?" + +"Tell her? Tell M'lissy! Ah wouldn' tell her fo' a good deal! You-all +don' know M'lissy." + +"She'd jump ye, Ah reckon." + +"No, Ah don' allow she'd say much. The way hit is, ye see, +M'lissy,--hit's foolish 'f her,--but M'lissy kinder thinks Ah ain' a +right bad feller, an' Ah sorter hate to disabuse her min' o' that +opinion." + +"She mus' know you-all drinks." + +"Yes, Ah 'low she do." + +"An' ye play craps." + +"Oh, well, that ain' anythin'." + +"An' ye fight chickens." + +"Of co'se; everybody does that." + +"'N you've killed paddidges befo' the law was off." + +"Who hasn'?" + +"If she knows all those things she sho' cain' think yo' a plumb angel." + +"Ah don' s'pose she's lookin' fo' wings. All the same, Ah do hate to +have her know Ah'm about to do this." + +"Oh, this is all right. She don' know yo' in debt an' need the money." + +"No, she don'." + +"Would that worry her?" + +"Ah reckon hit would, specially if----" + +"If what?" + +"You seem powerful eager to know what'll worry M'lissy." + +"If ye don' know what worries people ye cain' know how to help 'em." +Pink was suavity itself. "If what?" + +"Ah was goin' to say, specially 'f she knowed it was you-all Ah owed +hit to." + +"Lemme tell ye somethin' right now, Bud: M'lissy wouldn' fin' everybody +clever 'nough to len' money to a no-'count feller like you. She better +like me 'f she don'." + +"She don' know hit, ye see. 'N she never shall 'f Ah c'n help hit." + +Pressley grunted and seemed to reflect. Then he shook his head and +muttered to himself. + +"Hit might spoil the other." + +"What ye say?" asked Bud. + +"Nothin'. Ah'm studyin' 'bout fixin' a sort o' do' fo' here, so's the +light won' shine out none when we-uns is workin'." + +"Where's the smoke goin' to?" + +"They's a split in that upper rock, fur back, we c'n run a bit o' pipe +through. Leastways, they was when Ah was a kid." + +"'N 's they ain' been no _con_-vulsion o' nature since that happy time, +you 'low hit's still there." + +"May be filled up; 'twan' overly big. But that's easy fixed." + +"Say, Pink, don' you think we'd make any money--jus' as much money--'f +we paid the tax, 'n could retail openly?" + +"Paid the tax? Paid---- Fo' the Lawd's sakes! Pink Pressley payin' the +gover'men' tax!" + +He gave a great burst of laughter, which he quickly strangled, looking +about suspiciously, and shook and shook with suppressed mirth. Bud +stared at him seriously, and with some offence. + +"Ah don' see nothin' e'er so ludicrous about that suggestion." + +"Oh, Lawd!" Pink was rocking gently from side to side. "You don'? Jus' +look yere, then. Have you-all got twenty-five dollars to pay the +Federal gover'men' fo' this privilege? 'N fifty to pay the State? 'N +fifty to pay the county? 'F you got a hundred 'n twenty-five dollars to +spen' so free, Ah'd like to see hit!" + +Bud rubbed his head and said nothing. + +"'N who'd ye get to go on yo' bond? Mrs. Carroll 'n Miss Sydney, Ah +s'pose! Oh, dear!" + +Again he laughed, soundlessly. + +"If ye go into hit so expensive, ye gotter have the plant to do a big +business, 'n where'd ye get that? 'N ye'd have to get mo' co'n 'n you +'n me c'n make ourselves, 'n that'd mean ye gotter buy hit, or rent mo' +lan' 'n hire niggers to work hit, 'n how'd ye pay fo' that?" + +Bud listened gloomily, chewing the side of his finger. + +"Them gover'men' fellers cain' make nothin'," went on Pink. "Firs' +place they's co'n at fifty cen's a bushel. One bushel o' co'n makes +about two gallons o' whisky; they's an _ex_-pense o' nigh twenty-five +cen's a gallon to begin with. Then the gauger comes 'roun', 'n ye have +to pay a tax on all he's smart enough to fin',--a dollar 'n ten cen's a +gallon. They's a dollar 'n thirty-five cen's a gallon befo' the stuff's +lef' yo' sto'house. 'N what payin' market c'n ye fin' fo' hit when any +feller who wan's c'n get all the moonshine he needs fo' a dollar or a +dollar 'n a quarter a gallon? Oh, Ah tell you, 'f ye wan' to make any +money with a gover'men' still ye gotter have a switch-off that the +gauger cain' fin. 'N 'f ye do that, ye might's well's, far's yo' morals +is concerned, do hit all moonshine 'n save those ex-penses Ah listed +fo' ye right now." + +"Ah s'pose yo' right," assented Bud. "Blockadin's blockadin', whether +ye do hit by moon or day. Do you-all 'low Calkins might inform on us?" + +"Him's runs the still back o' Buck? Ah don' guess so. He knows Ah could +tell the sto'keeper the whereabouts o' a pipe in his still-house that +don' run into no sto'house. Oh, no, he won' inform on us." + +"Ah hope not," said Bud, dismally. "Anyway, you-all better come on down +now. Gimme that axe, will ye?" + +"We gotter be right careful not to make no path comin' here. We better +never come twict the same way." + +Bud nodded his understanding. + +"Come on," he urged. "Ah'm's empty 's a gun." + + + + +XIX + +Hilda + + +Pink roses and red swung to and fro in the sunshine as they climbed the +Doctor's whitewashed porch. Big bees hummed their sleepy drone from the +fragrant hearts of the flowers, and a humming-bird whirred busily in +and out in search of the honeysuckle that he loved. Up-stairs Mrs. +Morgan was darning stockings in the coolest room in the house,--a +bedroom with a northern exposure. A white shirt-waist gave a puffy look +to a body that could ill endure such appearance of enlargement, and a +black belt accentuated the amplitude of girth that it encircled. The +good lady sat in an armless rocking-chair, or rather _on_ it, for she +was by no means contained therein, but bulged over and beyond at all +points. Her feet, shod in heelless black slippers, above which puffed +white stockings, rested upon a low footstool, and her widespread knees +provided a generous lap for the support of her supply of socks and her +implements,--her needle-book' and darning-gourd and balls of cotton. +She had that look of comfort that fat people seem to radiate even when +it is evident that physical annoyance is their own share. + +[Illustration: "Pink roses and red swung to and fro in the sunshine as +they climbed the doctor's whitewashed porch"] + +Discomfort had no part in the picture that Mrs. Morgan presented, +however, for a cool breeze gently ruffled her hair, and her eyes, when +she lifted them from her work, rested contentedly on the fertile fields +of the Doctor's farm, which were thriving, under Bob's management. She +nodded with, pursed-up lips, as she wove her little lattices in heel +and toe. + +"He's doing better than ever Ah thought he would," she murmured. +"Better, even, than Ah dared to hope,--thank God!" + +Up and down, over and under, in and out went her needle. + +"It's such a joy to Henry to have him so." + +The scissors snipped a thread at the end of a darn, and a new hole +displayed its ravage over the yellow surface of the gourd. + +"It's been going on some months now, bless him! Ah'd like to know how +he started in. Ah believe mahself it's Sydney." + +The work sank into her lap for a space, while her shrewd eyes roamed +over the fields, and sought Buck Mountain beyond, thrusting its topmost +clump of chestnut-trees against the sky. She nodded to her thoughts as +she picked up the unfinished sock. + +"She's a wise mother who knows where her son ties his horse, and Ah +confess Ah haven't always known, but it strikes me it's mostly the +Oakwood hitching-post." + +She smiled at her own sagacity. + +"Not that Sydney'd have him. Though she might do a great deal worse, a +great deal worse," she added, loyally. "But he cares for her enough to +want to please her, and it takes the best to satisfy Sydney." + +A step on the stairs outside made itself heard. + +"Come in, dear. Ah was just thinking about you." + +Bob flung his cap on the bed, sat down on a cricket beside his mother, +and leaned his head against her shoulder. + +"Tired, dear?" + +"No, just hot. I've been over every field on the farm since breakfast." + +"In all this sun!" + +"Do you think it ought to cease to shine to shade your boy? There'll be +a right smart crop this year." + +"So your father was telling me yesterday." + +"I've got better hands than usual." + +"And they have a better overseer." + +She let fall the stocking from her left hand and patted the shock of +black hair resting on her shoulder. Silence fell between them--the +embarrassment that comes from the broaching of a delicate subject. + +"It's hard work," he sighed, and her mother-love knew that he did not +refer to the management of the farm. + +"We all have our dragons to fight, and yours is one of the hardest +kind. Ah'm sure he's growing weaker, though." + +"But he's still in the ring," groaned Bob, with a comical look, and +they laughed in sympathy. + +"I ought to have begun on him long years ago for your sake, ma dear, +but--it wasn't you!" he blurted out, and hastened to kiss her, lest she +be offended. + +She could not help just a little sigh. + +"It's what happens to most mothers, and we are thankful for the result, +and put our vanity into our pocket." + +"I don't want you to suppose that I'm such a puppy as to believe that +she--you know who--cares for me--that way, you know. But I happened to +think one day when--well, never mind what happened--I just thought that +while she might never care anyway, she was dead sure not to if I went +on being the kind of thing I was." + +"True, dear, and even if she never did,"--how she longed to give him +hope, as she had given him every toy he asked for in his baby days! But +wisdom came to her now, and love gave her strength,--"even if she never +did, the victory would still be a victory." + +"And you'd care, anyway. Oh, mothers are good things! Do you mind my +telling you-all this?" + +He was sitting before her now, with his elbows on his knees and his +chin in his hands. She leaned forward and kissed him. + +"You've given me the greatest happiness Ah've known for years, dear." + +He pulled at the stockings in her lap. + +"I don't think I've had much show lately, do you?" + +"You mean----?" + +"Oh, well, I reckon I don't mean anything. It's all in the game. +There's father," as a cry of "O-oh, Sophy!" was heard below. "Sophy's +up here in the north room, dad," he called, eliciting from his mother +the expected-- + +"You impertinent boy!" + +The Doctor came in, bringing with him an air of excitement that made +Bob cry,-- + +"What's up?" + +Mrs. Morgan laid down her half-darned sock in anticipation. + +"You never can guess the latest development." + +"Ah've no desire to, Henry. Ah'd rather hear it at once." + +"Who do you think's come?" + +"Where?" + +"To the Neighborhood." + +"Henry, don't be so aggravating! Why don't you-all tell what you've got +to tell, if you _have_ got anything to tell." + +This sarcasm drove on the Doctor to disclosure. + +"Baron von Rittenheim's sister-in-law." + +"His sister-in-law!" cried Bob. + +"What in the world will he do with her in that cabin of his?" +ejaculated Mrs. Morgan. + +"Is she pretty?" This from Bob. + +The Doctor was quite satisfied with the sensation he had aroused, and +sat down to tell his story comfortably. + +"Ah've just come from Oakwood, and Sydney told me. It seems she turned +up last night after the Baron got home from the picnic; drove out from +Asheville. He had to go and get Melissa Yarebrough to come and look +after her." + +"He wasn't expecting her, then?" + +"Sydney says no. Of course he couldn't ask visitors to that shack of +his." + +"Ah suppose she hadn't any idea he was living that-a-way." + +"Ah reckon not. She's his brother Maximilian's wife, or widow, rather, +for she brought him the news of his brother's death. Sydney says he was +quite broken up about it when he came over soon this morning to ask +Mrs. Carroll if she would take her in. The old lady'd gone to fetch her +when Ah got there." + +"Did you wait?" + +"You bet!" + +"Is she pretty?" Bob asked again, with some insistence. Perhaps the +Baron--how could he, though? But there was at least a chance of his +falling in love with his own countrywoman. + +"Pretty? I should say so! She looks like a lovely child, or an angel on +a Christmas card, or something. Oh, you needn't grin. She won't look at +you!" + +"Saving all her looks for you, I suppose! Can she speak English?" + +"Yes; but not enough to hurt anything. You'd ought to have seen her run +up to Sydney, just like a little girl, and cry out, 'Oh, I thank you +for that you have been so kind, every one, to my dear Friedrich!'" + +"How did Sydney take that?" Mrs. Morgan could not resist a glance at +her son. + +"Oh, Sydney always does everything all right." + +"What did she say to you, dad?" + +"Oh, something about Friedrich telling her that Mrs. Carroll and Ah +were his best friends." + +"How long's she going to stay?" + +"Ah don't know. Ah came away right off." + +At Oakwood Baroness Hilda von Rittenheim's coming partook of the nature +of an event. Sydney, who never had happened to hear even her name +mentioned, went about during the time of her grandmother's absence in a +state of agreeable anticipation. She was curious to see this unexpected +arrival, and she took pleasure in arranging flowers in her room, and in +shading the windows to produce the most desirable light. + +"It will please him," she thought, "for us to be nice to her. Poor +thing, she's lost all she cared for in the world; everybody ought to be +nice to her." And she thought how happy she was herself, and resolved +to be as kind as she knew how to be to the new-comer. + +Sydney had a strong reluctance to face emotional or spiritual crises, +and not even after her conversation on the bridge did she acknowledge +to herself that von Rittenheim loved her, or that she cared for him. +She was content to feel the glow that warmed her when she knew that she +was the princess of his fable, and not to analyze her own feeling +further, or to posit in him more than admiration. + +Americans usually think of German women as fat and affectionate, or, if +they are extremists, as "fit only to propagate their own undesirable +race." Sydney formulated no idea of Hilda's appearance, but she found +herself none the less surprised when she and Dr. Morgan watched from +the window the tiny figure in its black robes, descending from the +carriage. + +"Why, the Baron said she was twenty-five, but she doesn't look any +older than I do," she cried, and she flew down the steps to welcome +her. + +Hilda's little speech of thanks was natural and pretty, and Sydney +liked her at once because she liked Friedrich. Katrina was delighted +with her. Tom declared that he could listen to that accent forever, and +John went into absurd raptures that were more serious than they +sounded. Even Mrs. Carroll, usually not enthusiastic, granted her to be +"Pretty? Yes, even lovely. And charming? Very." + +Hilda must have felt herself to be under scrutiny during the day, yet +she betrayed no knowledge of it. Her behavior was perfect. Several +times she alluded to Max. + +"Poor Max! The shock of his death was to me severe. Have I known +Friedrich long? Oh, yes, indeed. Before ever I met Maximilian. I was +living with my aunt in Heidelberg when he was at the University. I was +a little girl then. Ah, yes, Friedrich always was _nett_ to me, even so +before Max. Yes, always shall I love Friedrich." + +It occurred to Sydney that there was a shade too much insistence on +this mutual affection, but she berated herself for a "jealous piece," +and ordered Uncle Jimmy to bring out on the lawn coffee as well as tea, +in deference to her guest's probable predilection. + +"Yes, dear Frau Carroll," said Hilda, in answer to a question. "Indeed, +have I much to talk with him. He comes this evening to see me. I have +much to tell him and to hear from him." + +Over her cup she glanced shrewdly at Sydney, who was enraged to feel +herself blushing. + +When Baron von Rittenheim appeared in the evening, Sydney and the +Schuylers and John were just starting for the Hugers' dance. + +"Surely you will go," the little Baroness had said, "and you will not +think of me one time." + +"You ask too much," murmured John. + +She glanced at her mourning with a look that might have meant yearning +for Max, or a desire to go to the ball. + +Then she raised her eyes to Friedrich's, and Sydney was surprised to +see a look of anger sweep over her childish face. Seeking its cause she +found von Rittenheim's eyes fixed on herself, so full of love and +longing and sadness that her one wish was to comfort him. Involuntarily +she took a step towards him, and held out her hands. Then she +remembered herself, and swept him a low courtesy, as if in thanks for +the admiration of his gaze. + +"You like my frock, M. le Baron?" she asked. + +Von Rittenheim's eyes went to the fluffy white mass lying on the floor, +and rose again to her face. + +"He's speechless with rapture, Sydney," said John. + +"I am, indeed," said Friedrich, bowing with his hand on his heart. + +"Then come on, Sydney, and let language flow once more." And Tom +dexterously threw her cape over her shoulders. + +"See that? I've learned to do that really well since I was married. +I've been practising in private. Mrs. Schuyler, allow me." And he +repeated his performance and swept his flock before him to the door. + + + + +XX + +Sacrifice + + +"I know that you two have much to say to each other," said Mrs. +Carroll, when the noise of departing wheels had died away. "Ring the +bell, Baron, please, and tell James to light the lamp in the little +sitting-room. And in considering your plans, let me beg both of you to +remember that it will be a pleasure to us all if the Baroness will stay +at Oakwood as long as she wishes." + +Hilda ran to the elder woman in her childish, impulsive way, and +thanked her with many little German phrases of gratitude. Von +Rittenheim raised her hand to his lips and murmured,-- + +"You make my decision easier, dear lady." + +In the little sitting-room Hilda established herself in a huge +arm-chair, whose high back cast a shadow on her face, and Friedrich, at +the window, drew in great breaths of sweet summer air. He turned to her +when Uncle Jimmy had gone. + +"First tell me about Max." + +"Yes, I must tell you about Max. I am afraid it will be an added grief +to you to know that Max----" + +"What is it?" he asked, sharply and apprehensively, as she hesitated. +How familiar to him was that feeling of apprehension about his brother. +Hilda was sitting erect in the big chair, looking at him fixedly. + +"Max--shot himself." + +"My God! Shot himself! Poor girl!" + +The expression on Hilda's face changed to one of relief--almost of joy. +After all, his first thought had been for her. + +"Why did he--how did it happen?" + +"He had had troubles----" + +"Money?" + +She nodded. + +"I think they distressed him more than usual. And he was--he wasn't +quite himself." + +Von Rittenheim stared persistently out of the window, his face almost +entirely turned away from her. He lost not a word of what she said, and +at the same time there ran through his mind memories of their boyhood +days together, and of their adventures at the gymnasium and the +university. Then their rivalry over Hilda. With what careless ease +Maximilian had won her away from his brother, just for the pleasure of +victory. He felt again a dash of the old bitterness. + +"You mean he was drunk?" he asked, bluntly. + +She raised her tiny hands before her face as if she were warding off a +blow. Friedrich hardly could hear her "Yes." + +Her action suggested an idea to von Rittenheim. + +"Tell me, Hilda." He stammered over the question. "Did he--did Max ever +strike you?" + +Without a word Hilda pushed back the hair that fell over her forehead +at one side, and showed, close to the roots, a scar. + +Friedrich gazed at her in horror. + +"You poor, poor girl!" + +Again the glow of satisfaction warmed her face. + +"Where was he when he--when he died?" + +"At the Schloss--in my dressing-room." + +"You were there?" + +"My dress was wet with his blood." + +Over Friedrich there rushed man's protective feeling, the desire to +shield a woman from pain; his own yearning of not so many months ago, +to fend this one fragile creature from the world. He drew nearer to +her, and she leaned back in her chair and looked up at him out of the +shadow. + +"I could not bear to live at the Schloss any longer--there were +horrible memories, and I was alone; I told you my aunt had died. You +know she was my only relative." + +Von Rittenheim knew. It was at her aunt's house in Heidelberg that he +had met Hilda. + +"Then Maximilian had told me that we could not live in the Schloss if +you did not supply the money to carry it on. After he died I could not +feel myself indebted for that to you when I had treated you so badly." + +She hung her head. Von Rittenheim made a gesture of polite dissent, and +walked again to the window. + +"You always had enough money, I hope?" + +"No sum ever was large enough for Max." They both smiled. "But a piece +of great good fortune came to me just after you went away." + +Von Rittenheim turned again to the window and betrayed some +embarrassment, but Hilda was intent upon her story, and noticed +nothing. + +"Some of the investments into which my dowry had been put appreciated +enormously in value." + +So that was the way Herr Stapfer had explained it. Friedrich nodded +approvingly. + +"So I always had enough for my needs, even when----" + +"When what?" + +"Forgive me. I did not mean to say it." + +"You were going to say, 'Even when Maximilian took it?'" + +She hung her head again, like a sorry child. He noticed how her neck +and arms shone white through the thin black of her gown. + +"After all, you are his brother. Perhaps I should tell you. At the +end--it was because of that that he shot himself, poor Max! He came to +me in my room and asked me for money, and I told him I had none. +Indeed, he had taken the last I had a few days before. He did not +believe me, and he threatened to shoot himself if I did not give it to +him." + +"Coward!" + +"Of course, I did not think that it was more than--excitement. How +could I believe that he was in earnest? But he kept crying, 'Give it +up, give it up!' The servants heard him. And then----" + +Friedrich crossed quickly to her and leaned over the chair as she sat +with her face buried in her handkerchief. + +"Hilda, it seems to me no woman ever needed pity and comfort more than +you. You have come many thousands of miles to claim it from me, and I +will not fail you. You reminded me last night of my oath to you. I +repeat it now. My life is at your service if it can bring you +happiness." + +The words sounded forced and stilted to his ears, even while he pressed +the little white hand that she put out blindly towards him. He was not +sorry for his pledge; he felt that he could have done no less; but +Sydney's proud, earnest face flashed before him, and his memory saw it +soften and flush with the happy shyness that covered it when she gave +him her handkerchief,--and he wondered to what extent Hilda would +consider that his promise bound him. + +A few days made it clear that he had committed himself to no mere form +of words. She received the admiration of every man in the Neighborhood. +Patton McRae's elastic heart added another to its list of occupants, +and John Wendell fell seriously in love with her. But always in the +foreground she placed von Rittenheim. It was not alone that she looked +for his coming, and monopolized him when he arrived; that she deferred +to him, and did half a hundred tell-tale things; but in some way, by a +hint here and a phrase there, she made every one understand how it had +been with them in the past,--how madly he had loved her; how foolish +she had been to break the engagement; how worse than foolish, for she +had broken his great, noble heart, too. But, now--with a pretty sigh +and an appealing look--now was her opportunity to remedy the harm she +had done. When one or two of the bolder ones hinted at an engagement, +she denied it, with a rebuking glance at her black gown, her +fascinating, floating diaphanous black gown. Still, it became evident +to every one that when a proper time had elapsed after Maximilian's +death, her consolation would be even more remedial. + +John haunted her steps, and left her only when the Baron came. Then he +disappeared until his rival's departure. Sydney grew distant in manner +to von Rittenheim, and often he did not see her at all when he went to +Oakwood. Hilda's visit to Mrs. Carroll was prolonged on the ground that +seemed to have place in every one's mind, though no one could trace its +origin, that she would stay on near Friedrich until it was time to go +home to Germany to begin her wedding preparations,--say, until after +Christmas,--and that they would be married as soon as the year of +mourning was over. + +"It would be disgracefully soon if her husband had been a good man, of +course, but he was such a beast!" And a shrug made all the necessary +condonement for the hastening of the marriage. + +By September the whole neighborhood was converted to this belief, all +except John, who _would_ not believe, and Sydney, who had not trusted +herself to think. + +The compulsion of thought seized her in her own room one night, after a +day when it had been forced upon her that there could be but one truth, +and that the conclusion to which her friends had come. From window to +window she walked, dragging her trailing draperies, softly blue in the +moonlight. She was fretted into constant motion by the impelling might +of a desire to do something that would put off the moment when she must +stop and think out the situation. She tried to divert her fancy to the +channels of her daily life. She decided what colts should be broken +next summer. She devised a new plan for keeping Bob employed and happy +when the dull days of winter should come. She endeavored to be grateful +that her grandmother was less harassed by pain than usual. Yet through +all wreathed the insistent cry, "Face it. You must face it." + +That compelling threat she knows who recognizes that the one dearest to +her on earth must die. It commands the scrutiny of facts, and an end to +the glossing of truth. It rings the knell of hope. Later comes the +sustaining reflection of the future life,--its opportunities for work +and its attendant happiness for him who enters upon it. But now is +self's confrontment with loneliness, with sorrow, with despair. + +The cry became insistent in Sydney's ears. Face it she must. + +She stepped through the long window upon the balcony which commanded +west and south. The moon swam cold in the steel-blue sky. The ribbon of +low-lying mist betrayed the devious winding of the creek. On the +horizon swung the gray masses of the mountains, their hardness veiled +in the tender light of distance. Sydney fell on her knees and twisted +her hands one within the other. She spoke in a whisper. + +"I cannot bear it! I cannot bear it! Oh, I cannot bear it!" she +repeated over and over. + +Then stung to openness by the lash of the constant inward cry-- + +"I love him! Oh, I love him! Oh, I cannot bear it!" she moaned yet +again. + +She rocked to and fro upon her knees, and hid her face in her hands to +shut out the glory of beauty and calm that lay before and around her. + +"I never thought that love would be like this. To feel it--to be sure +of it--and to have to give him to another woman!" She began to cry +weakly. + +The moon flooded the gallery with its light. A diamond on one of +Sydney's clasped hands winked as gayly as if a tragedy were not filling +the girl's heart. Then oft-read words came to her lips: + +"Nothing is sweeter than love, nothing more courageous, nothing higher; +nothing wider, nothing more pleasant; nothing fuller nor better in +heaven and earth." + +"For it carries a burden which is no burden, and makes everything that +is bitter sweet and savory." + +"He that loveth flieth, runneth and rejoiceth; he is free and is not +bound." + +"He giveth all for all." + +"He giveth all for all." She repeated it again and again. + +She had, indeed, dreamed of a love for which sacrifice should be a joy. +But that this should be the kind of sacrifice! Even through her +wretchedness the humor of it penetrated, and a woe-begone smile +fluttered over her lips. + +The singing words came to her again. + +"Let me be possessed by love, mounting above myself." + +"Let me love thee more than myself, and love myself only for thee." + +She kneeled upright and rested her folded arms upon the railing. Peace +seemed to be flowing in upon her, and a purpose grew into form within +her mind. With increasing control she rose to her feet. + +"If my love is worth anything it can do even that." + +Her uplifted face shone strong and beautiful as she left the splendor +without, and knelt beside her bed. + +"O God, I thank thee that thou hast granted me the power to love. Help +me now, I implore thee, to make use of this, my dearest treasure, for +the joy of others." + + + + +XXI + +A Poke Party + + +Friedrich was sitting at his solitary breakfast. He had grown expert in +the daily preparation of bacon, eggs, cornbread, and coffee; but that +is a poor feast which is denied the sauce of companionship, and he +dallied with his spoon, while he stared gloomily through the open door. +The jaded green of the late September foliage harmonized with his mood +of depression. + +He went to Oakwood now only so often as courteous attention to his +sister-in-law--poor little girl!--seemed to demand. Sydney avoided him; +and John, who still lingered, although the Schuylers had gone north +long before, gave him the black looks of a jealous rival. Hilda, though +never assuming before him the part of betrothed which every one +assigned to her, nevertheless made him feel the bond by which he had +engaged himself,--a net as fine as silk and as strong as steel; an +enmeshment of chivalry and sympathy and love for his good word. + +He made his new business the excuse for his infrequent visits. It was +no subterfuge, for even in the short period of two months the "McRae +Cattle" were earning encomiums, from those who knew stock, for their +good condition and the flavor of their beef. Both on the Baron's place +and at Cotswold long shelter-sheds were being erected for winter +protection; and at Cotswold, whose larger size warranted the +establishment of a more extensive plant, the firm had put in a small +stationary engine to cut the feed, and was building a silo for the +preservation of the winter supplies. A dehorning machine, which caused +a moment of present torture for the sake of months of future peace, +served an additional purpose as an advertisement. Farmers came from far +back in the mountains to see the inhuman weapon, and incidentally +brought along a calf or two to sell as an excuse for their waste of +time. Their denunciations sent more of the curious, who were not +deterred by motives of tenderness from submitting their creatures to +the operation, provided they received a good price. + +When Hilda had discovered her brother-in-law's straitened circumstances +she had offered to him a part of her income, deploring his evident +poverty with real distress of voice and manner. + +"I don't understand why it is so,--you are not extravagant, like +Max,--but I can see the fact plainly enough, and I beg you to take it, +dear Friedrich." + +Friedrich kissed her hand in gratitude, but refused, explaining that he +had enough capital for the undertaking of his business venture, and +that his personal wants were of the simplest. + +"But your house, Friedrich. It is not fitting that a von Rittenheim +should live in a cabin like that." + +[Illustration: "It is not fitting that a von rittenheim should live in +a cabin like that"] + +"Man makes the house, Hilda, and I don't feel that my dignity is hurt. +I am comfortable, and that is all that is necessary." + +He happened to think of this conversation as he drank the last of his +coffee, and he realized that Hilda's offer was another of the tiny +threads that linked him to her. He thought how true it was now that, so +long as he could make his living out of his new business, he cared +nothing for the roof that sheltered him; while on that golden night of +happiness when Sydney and he had watched the river flow under the +bridge, he had been glad of his new prosperity because he could build +for _her_ a house such as she should fancy. + +He did not allow himself to think often of Sydney. He was glad that he +had had the strength to refrain from asking her to be his wife until he +had something more substantial than his name to offer her. It relieved +somewhat the present situation. Yet her avoidance of him he could +construe only as contempt for a man who had played with her while bound +by other ties. Sometimes he felt that he must explain to her how +intangible were those bonds. Yet he was sufficiently conscious of their +actual existence to feel that the difficulties of explanation were +almost insurmountable. And Hilda, poor child, took his devotion +entirely for granted. + +His thoughts were leading him in a circle, and it was a relief when +Melissa appeared in the doorway. He sprang up to welcome her. + +"Come in, Mrs. Yare-brough. How do you do?" + +"Ah'm well, thank ye. How are you?" returned Melissa, in the polite +formula of her kind. + +"Won't you have a cup of coffee?" + +"No, Ah thank you. How's Mrs. Baron?" + +"Mrs. Baron? Oh! She was very well the last time I was at Oakwood. She +asks fr-requently for you and the baby." + +"Mrs. Baron's so sweet! Ah never 'lowed to like anybody's much's Miss +Sydney, but Mrs. Baron's jus' splendid." + +With a woman's care-taking instinct, she began to gather together the +dishes on the table and prepare them for washing. + +"No, let me," she said, in response to von Rittenheim's objection. +"Jus' while Ah'm talkin'. Ah stopped by to tell ye that Ah'm goin' to +have a party to-night, an' Ah'd be proud to have you-all come to hit." + +Her interest in him was so evident, and her desire to give him pleasure +so real, that Friedrich responded, heartily,-- + +"Certainly, I shall go. It will give me delight. It is kind of you to +ask me." + +Melissa turned away, and rattled the knives and forks in gratified +embarrassment. + +"Hit's goin' to be to mother's 'cos her house is larger. You know where +hit is?" + +"Yes, indeed. Is it a dance?" + +"Hit's a poke party, but there'll be dancin', too." + +"A poke party! What is that?" + +"Don't you-all know what a poke party is?" + +"Poke? That is what I do with my finger at the baby." + +Melissa laughed aloud. + +"You wait 'n see, then. Ah reckon hit'll be a surprise party fo' you as +well as a poke party." + +It was clear that Melissa had imparted to her friends the Baron's guess +as to the probable nature of a poke party, for he was greeted with +broad smiles as he made his way through the crowd of men and boys about +Mrs. Lance's door into the room where dancing was going on. Melissa +came to him and proposed a seat beside Mrs. 'Gene Frady until the +cotillon should be ended, but von Rittenheim preferred to go about the +room as dexterously as he might in avoidance of the dancers, speaking +to his acquaintances among the women and girls who lined its walls. +There was space upon the floor for only two sets, and the lookers-on +gossiped patiently, until such time as Alf Lance, the fiddler, should +grow weary and let fall his bow. + +"They's fo' blue waistes here to-night. Ollie Warson looks mahty sweet +in her's." + +"Do you think so? Hit seems like she favored her paw too much." + +"Well, Bill Warson 'lows that if they's any good looks in the family, +they come from him." + +"Maw, you-all got a hairpin? Give hit to me next time I turn co'ners." + +"Look at Evvie Williams! She always gets a seat nex' the window, so's +she c'n talk to some feller out o' hit." + +"Ah did, too, when Ah was that age." + +"Yes, Ah remember you did. Ah don' guess Hamp Pinner's goin' to dance +with Ollie tonight." + +"Yes, he is. He jus' ast her in through the window." + +"Sh, sh, sh. Will you hush yo' fuss!" + +"Ah'm well, thank ye, Mr. Baron. How are you?" + +"Look at Drusilla Pinner cross her feet, an' her a church-member, too!" + +"Ah been lookin'. She's awful careless about her dancin'." + +"This child'll have to go to bed in the other room. He's yellin' jus' +tur'ble." + +"Ah 'low M'lissy 'll make some money out o' this. They's right smart +here." + +Von Rittenheim made his rounds and joined the group of men at the door. +They received him pleasantly, for he was a favorite among them. Indeed, +since his misfortune in the spring he had noticed an added warmth in +their attitude, and a certain intimacy of approach. As he talked to +them the music stopped abruptly, and with its last note he found +himself alone, for the youths about him had precipitated themselves +into the room to secure their partners for the next cotillon. The +enterprising Hamp came in through the window, by which port of entry +the orchestra departed in search of the reviving pail on the back +porch. + +Melissa came timidly to von Rittenheim. + +"Won't you-all dance this nex' one, Mr. Baron? Ah'll get ye a partner." + +"I fear I should make too many mistakes. I do not understand well +enough English to know quickly what says the director." + +"Oh, yo' partner 'll tell ye all that." + +"Then, if you will be that partner, will I try." + +"Oh, no. Hit looks like Ah'd been askin' you." + +"But no, Mrs. Yare-brough, for I would not tr-rust myself to the care +of anybody whom I knew less well." + +"Truly? Then we'll stand here?" And Friedrich, looking at her beaming +face, did not regret the effort. + +The other participants in the cotillon gained no praise from the +spectators, for every eye was upon their unexpected guest. They +applauded his successes and smiled encouragingly upon his mistakes. +They admired his good looks in pleased undertones, and secretly urged +Alf to prolong the dance and their pleasure until it seemed to +Friedrich that he had been on the floor for hours. + +When at last the music stopped, Bud's voice was heard calling, +loudly,-- + +"Come in yere, boys, 'n get yo' pokes." + +The girls found seats for themselves, while the men crowded into the +other room. + +"Hit's supper," said Melissa, giving Friedrich a little shove towards +the door. "You'll see now." + +"May I have the honor of bringing yours to you?" + +"No, Ah thank ye, Mr. Baron. Ah always eats mine with Bud. But you-all +go in an' get some, an' you'll fin' somebody to eat hit with when ye +come back." + +In the other room the men crowded before a table upon which were piled +paper bags of different sizes. Each man was taking two, one for himself +and one for his partner. + +"This size poke is ten cents," insisted Bud, in the uproar, "'n this +size is fifteen. They's good things in 'em all. The quality's the same, +hit's the quantity makes the difference. Yes, they's devil ham +san'wich. Ah know they is, 'cos Ah cut mah finger openin' a can fo' +M'lissy this mo'nin'. Yes, they's cake, too. You, Hamp, that size is +fifteen!" + +As Friedrich approached, a laugh went up at the expense of 'Gene Frady, +who had taken a bag of each size. + +"Watch out which one 'Gene gives his wife," cried Bud, sarcastically. + +The babies on the bed, four of them, were aroused by the noise, and +joined their voices thereto. Three older children, who were sleeping +rosily under the covers, slumbered on peacefully. + +"One poke, or two, Mr. Baron? Ah'm proud to see you-all here," said +Bud. + +"A poke is a bag, eh? Give me two pokes, if you please, Bud. Yes, the +large ones." + +Returning to the dancing-room, he made his way to Mrs. Lance, Melissa's +mother, who was sitting near the window. She was flattered into silence +by the attention of the offered poke, and they ate the contents of +their bags with solemnity. + +A figure moving in the dim light outside attracted Friedrich's +attention. He put his head out of the window. The man came directly +beneath, and looked up. + +"Ah, Pink, I thought that was you. I want to see you at some time." + +"Ah'll watch out fo' ye when you-all's unhitchin' yo' mule." + +"Very well. I'm going in a few minutes. You do not come in?" + +"No. Hit's M'lissy's party, 'n she 'n me ain' friends." + +"Here, take this, then." + +Friedrich dropped his partly filled poke into the ready, uplifted hand. + +"I had my supper very late to-night," he explained to Mrs. Lance, "and +a man outside a party looks so forlorn, don't you think so?" + +"Some of 'em deserves hit," returned Mrs. Lance, laconically. "He's +one." + +Von Rittenheim was fumbling with the halter-strap of his mule, when +Pressley appeared beside him out of the shadow of a pine-tree. + +"Is that you, Pr-ressley? Do you r-ride or walk?" + +"Ah'm walkin'." + +"Then will I not mount." + +Friedrich slipped the reins over the mule's head, and led him out on to +the highway. Pressley walked beside him. The stars shone brightly +enough to make visible the open road. + +"Are you-all goin' to ask me about the rent, Mr. Baron? Bud 'n me's +been pullin' fodder fo' a week. Hit's all ready in the upper field, 'n +you c'n take yo' choice any time. They's good bundles, fo' han's to the +bundle." + +"Thank you. No, it was not of that I was going to speak. I want to tell +you that about six weeks ago--it was in August--I was up on Buzzard +Mountain one night, and I fell asleep there." + +Pink looked at him suspiciously in the darkness, and put a piece of the +road between them. + +"I fell asleep on a ledge of r-rock, and when I woke up I heard voices +just under me." + +"The hell ye did!" + +"It was you and Bud." + +"Well, what ye goin' to do about hit? Hit ain' befittin' you to squeal +on us." + +Von Rittenheim turned hot in the darkness, and made an impulsive motion +that induced a corresponding disturbance in his companion. + +"If I had thought of doing that I should not have spoken to you +to-night." + +Pressley nodded, and came across the intervening space. + +"You-all wan' to come into the game, eh?" + +"No, I do not want to join you, if that is what you mean." + +"Well, what do ye want, anyway?" + +"I wees' to say a few things to you. I do not ask you to stop +moonshining. You are old enough to decide for yourself what kind of +life you pr-refer to lead, though you know well that the life of a +law-br-reaker is not the r-right sort." + +"Oh, quit preachin', Mr. Baron. You-all's a law-breaker, yo'self." + +Friedrich clutched the reins with a jerk that made the mule give a +disgusted snort. The justice of the retort compelled him to +self-control, as well as the knowledge that a giving way to rage would +accomplish nothing, whereas coolness might do something. + +"You know as well as I do the penalty of br-reaking the law. You've +suffered it more than once, they tell me." + +"Ah reckon Ah've cost 'em right smart mo'n they ever got out o' me," +chuckled Pink. + +"So I do not ask you to face the r-results of what you do, because you +know well what they are, and you have made your choice. But I do ask +you to think carefully before you undertake the r-responsibility of +making Bud a criminal." + +Pink's eyes shone cruelly in the darkness, but he only said, "Seems +like you-all been a long time startin' on this yere work o' reform. You +said hit was six weeks ago you heard us a-talkin'." + +"Perhaps I have been wrong to delay. But that morning Bud seemed not +sure and determined about joining you, and I hoped that he might make +up his mind to refr-rain." + +"How do you know he ain'?" + +"Oh, by the grape-vine telegraph. Those things always are known. Also +have I heard the men at the party to-night talking about it." + +"Bud ain' no boy. Don' you think he's old enough to decide fo' himself +fo' or ag'in' the life of a law-breaker, as you call hit." + +"No, I do not. Bud is several years younger than you in r-real age, and +he is a child beside you in deter-rmination. Also, he admires you." + +"Ah'm grateful for the compliment!" + +"You could do anything with him." + +"Ah'm doin' what Ah wan' to with him." + +Von Rittenheim looked at his opponent in disgust, and fell back upon +his last argument. + +"You know well what are the chances of your getting caught. You've been +caught before." + +"Yes, but Ah won' be this time. Hit was fellers that was mad with me +who told on me befo', 'n Ah've fixed hit this time so Ah ain' got no +enemies. They's only one feller that might inform." + +"Who's that?" + +"You." + +The Baron flung up his head in quick scorn, and Pressley noted the +gesture shrewdly, and nodded in satisfaction. Still he drove in another +nail. + +"A feller who'll listen will tell." + +Friedrich colored angrily. + +"You mean me? It does not sound well to hear--that! At first when I +awoke on the mountain I was sleepy. I r-realized not what it meant. +When I did know, I had no wees' to die at once. I was unarmed myself, +and a man in your position would shoot deter-rmined to kill." + +Pressley smiled at this tribute to his quickness and resolve. + +"But it is not a question of me. What I was going to say was that you +know there's a chance of your being arrested, and surely you would not +care to feel that it was through you that Bud had br-rought that shame +and disgr-race upon his wife." + +"His wife?" + +The ejaculation sounded to von Rittenheim like the hiss of a snake, and +he drew away from Pressley as from a reptile. + +"You have no r-relatives to suffer; alone you bear the bur-rden of your +misdeeds. But if Bud goes wr-rong consider of the gr-rief of that poor +Melissa, and think of the baby gr-rowing up to know that her father is +a cr-riminal!" + +"You-all think you got a mahty strong argyment there, Mr. Baron, don' +you? But let me tell you, that's the weakest one you could bring. +M'lissy Lance told me 'No' when she was a girl, an' M'lissy +Yarebrough's never spoke a decent word to me since she's been married, +'n 'f unhappiness comes on her, Ah'll be glad of hit; 'n 'f hit comes +through mah doin', hit's only what Ah'm aimin' at." + +"'Aimin' at?' What mean you by that?" + +"Ah mean Ah'll be gladder still 'f she's hurt through me." + +"Know you not that it is a coward who takes pleasure in the pain of +women and children?" + +"So be," returned Pink, cheerfully. "A coward Ah am, then, fo' that's +the way Ah feel." + +"I warn you I shall speak to Bud." + +"Talk yo' hatful, Ah don' care. Ah got a pull on him. Talk all you +please so long's ye don' talk to the marshal." + +"An' Ah ain' afraid o' yo' doin' that," he continued to himself, as he +turned into the side road that led to his cabin. "You-all's had enough +o' them folkses; an' you ain' that kind, either." + + + + +XXII + +Von Rittenheim Collects his Rent + + +It was in the cool of the next day's afternoon that von Rittenheim, +with 'Gene Frady, who was working for him, drove up to the field where +was piled his rent corn. Bud was awaiting him there, and after he had +chosen his heap from the three which were as nearly alike as it was +possible to make them, he sat on a fallen tree and idly watched the two +men loading the wagon. The western sky gave prophecy of a cloudless +sunset, and Friedrich wished that his own path towards oblivion were as +free and clear, and smiled faintly at the triteness of his comparison. + +He owned to himself as he sat there that he was contented. He had +entered upon his business with the desire to retrieve his past, and to +make for himself a future that might be worthy for Sydney to share. Now +the latter spur to ambition was gone, but it was replaced by an urgent +desire to forget in work the bitter disappointment that had befallen +him. Pushed by that incentive his venture could not long remain a +venture. Such energy was bound to bring success. And the victory, which +was daily more evident and more substantial, combined with the feeling +that he was doing his duty as he saw it, to produce content. + +But happiness? No. Never while---- Oh, what was the use of thinking +about it? He rose impatiently, and walked through the brush at the top +of the field, slapping at the leaves with a switch that he had been +stripping. + +Of a sudden he stopped and sat down on a stump. + +"Goin' down with me, Mr. Baron?" called 'Gene from the top of the +loaded wagon. + +"No, I think not. I'll stay and talk with Bud a while. Come up here, +Yare-brough," he added, as Frady drove off, whistling. + +Bud approached, wiping the perspiration from his forehead with his +shirt sleeve. + +"Bud, did you know this was here?" + +Von Rittenheim reached behind him and tapped something that gave forth +a sound of earthenware. + +"Know what was there?" + +"Come and see." + +Yarebrough stepped behind the stump, upon whose top the Baron swung +around so as to keep his face in view. + +"Whose jug?" asked Bud. + +"I know not. I thought you might know." + +Bud picked it up, disclosing a silver half-dollar upon which it had +been resting. He looked at it as if afraid, and then glanced sheepishly +at Friedrich. + +"A half a gallon," remarked the German, dryly. + +The mountaineer reddened and stooped for the coin. + +"Wait!" commanded von Rittenheim. "Before you touch that, I want to ask +you if you would be willing that your wife should know how you ear-rned +that money?" + +Yarebrough changed his weight uneasily from one foot to the other, and +then sat down suddenly, as if his legs were not equal to his support. + +"Well, Ah wasn' fixin' to tell M'lissy," he acknowledged. + +"Know you not that that so good little woman would r-rather be hungr-ry +than have you give her money that you gained by br-reaking the law?" + +"Well, Ah wasn' fixin' to give hit to her." + +"You weren't? What are you going to do with it?" + +Unfortunately for the success of Friedrich's plan for Bud's moral +regeneration, Yarebrough's affection for the Baron made him reticent on +the fact of his debt to Pressley. + +"For," he thought, sagely, "if Ah tell him Ah owe Pink, he'll go to +lend me the money, 'n Ah know he cain' afford hit. Would he ever 'a' +gone into sellin' blockade himself if he hadn' been as pore as a crow?" + +His wit not being very ready, however, he offered no excuse, but +said,-- + +"Ah reckon Ah don' care to tell ye." + +Friedrich laid his hand on the young man's shoulder as he sat beside +him on the ground. + +"Think what it means, Bud, to do what now you do. You put yourself in +the class of wr-rongdoers instead of in the r-ranks of those who do +r-right. You will br-reak Melissa's heart if she finds it out, as +certainly she will. And think of the baby. You want her to have an +honest father, don't you?" + +Bud was ground between the upper and the nether millstone. On one side +of his weak will was his affection for his wife and child, and his +desire to please the Baron. On the other was his fear of Pressley's +sneers and his habit of submission to the older man's domination. And +since his inclination towards good was not assisted by the mighty lever +of a love of good for virtue's sake, the millstones clung close +together, and the grinding still went on. + +To compromise with a disagreeable present is a desire which it takes a +stronger man than Bud to shake off. His inner light showed him no +reason for making such an effort. + +"Ah s'pose Ah hadn' oughter do hit," he admitted, "but hit's mahty +temptin'. Now that there's the first money Ah seen from hit yet. Hit's +all been hard work up to now, an' nothin' comin' in." + +He lifted the jug and looked longingly at the coin on the ground. + +"You don' know what hit is to wan' hit so bad, Mr. Baron." + +"Do I not know? Good God! Bud, it was because I wanted half that sum so +much that I couldn't r-resist the temptation of it shining in a man's +hand, that I did the thing for which never shall I for-rgive myself. +You know, Bud; you r-recollect----" + +He hid his face in his hands and gave a sob of tortured remembrance. +Bud's easy sympathies were strained almost to the point of tears. + +"Ah know," he responded, hastily; "you hadn' oughter 'a' done hit. +Don', Mr. Baron, don'! Ah'll think about stoppin', Ah certainly will. +Sit up, Mr. Baron," he cried, agitatedly, "here's folkses comin',--Mrs. +Baron an' Miss Sydney." + +Von Rittenheim raised his head, hardly believing Bud's cry to be other +than an excuse to rouse him from his emotion. But he saw in the road +below him a party of four people on horseback approaching his cabin. +Even from his elevation he could recognize Sydney's erect carriage, and +the white habit that it pleased Hilda to wear. He rose to his feet. + +"Think of what I say, boy," he said to Yarebrough. "I am older than +you, and God knows I've earned my experience." + +Bud watched him down the hill. When he was greeting his guests at the +door of his cabin, Yarebrough picked up the jug and the coin, and +disappeared into the woods. + +Wendell was taking the baroness off her horse, and Bob was performing +the same office for Sydney, when Von Rittenheim reached them. + +"We are come to beg a welcome fr-rom you for a few minutes, dear +Friedrich," said Hilda, in English. + +"Which surely is yours," returned Von Rittenheim, kissing her hand. He +turned to Sydney, but she was busy doing something to her saddle, and +greeted him over her shoulder. His hand dropped to his side. + +"Let me help you tie the horses, Bob," he insisted, and took Sydney's +animal from him. + +"Dear Yonny," he murmured, in the unresponsive ear, as he fastened him +in the shade, and gave him a pat and a lump of sugar from his pocket. + +"May we go in?" asked Hilda. "I want to see the state of your +storeroom," she added, with an air of protecting care that sat prettily +on her youthful face. + +"_Natuerlich_," called Friedrich from Johnny's side. "The key of the +cupboard is in the table-drawer." + +Sydney was alone on the porch when Friedrich came up the steps. + +"Your view is lovely," she said. "I think I like Pisgah better from +this angle than from any other." + +"Then do I, too," he replied, looking at her with his heart in his +eyes, for it was long since he had seen her, and to a lover yesterday, +when it is passed, is as a thousand years. + +Sydney threw up her chin haughtily, and von Rittenheim thought ruefully +of the category in which undoubtedly she classed all his remarks of +that kind. + +"Will you not enter?" he said. "Never have you honored my roof, I +think." And Sydney was glad to do so to avoid being alone with him. + +They found Hilda leaning against the table opposite the cupboard, while +Bob recited the contents of the shelves, and Wendell wrote them down. + +"Two packages of oatmeal." + +"Oatmeal," echoed John. + +"One tin of mustard." + +"Mustard." + +"A sack half-full of cornmeal." + +"Cornmeal." + +"What in the world are you doing?" cried Sydney, in amazement. + +Friedrich looked annoyed. No one likes to have his house-keeping +arrangements too closely scrutinized. + +"Friedrich, this list is going to help you ver-ry much to know what you +must or-rder from the--how you call him?" She appealed to John and Bob +in turn. "The grocy?" + +Friedrich smiled to conceal his irritation. + +"My way, Hilda, is to get more of something when I find empty the box +that holds it. I'm afr-raid I am not pr-rovident." + +She returned his smile adorably. + +"That I must teach you," she said, and Sydney and John turned away. + +Sydney walked to the mantel-shelf, which was so high that it was on a +level with her eyes. There was an array of pipes and a tin box of +tobacco; a volume of Schiller, with some matches lying loose upon it; +and, flat on the board, a photograph. She picked it up idly, not +noticing what she was doing, conscious only of doing something, so that +her separation from the others might not be noticeable. Her discovery +proved to be half of a picture of a Neighborhood picnic, taken by an +itinerant photographer who had established his tent near the Flora +post-office. It was that side of the group in which she was standing, +and her figure was brought into relief by a frame of card-board slipped +over it like a mat. It had become a picture of herself, and of herself +alone. + +Her first feeling--the instinct that comes before thought--was one of +pleasure; he had cared enough to do that. But quick upon it came the +cry of wounded pride. She found von Rittenheim at her side, and turned +upon him fiercely. + +"How dare you?" she cried, in an undertone. "How dare you do such a +thing? You know I never have given any man my picture,--once I told you +so,--and you have made this a picture of me alone. You, who----" + +She broke off, choking, but she had enough voice to add,-- + +"But it is like you, it is like you!" as she tore the card into bits +and flung it into the fireplace. + +Friedrich stooped involuntarily to catch the falling fragments, but he +saw at once the foolishness of his movement, and desisted. He said +nothing, and Sydney, made ashamed of her tirade by his silence, as she +would not have been by any words, at last looked up at him. The +expression on his face was so hopeless, so unutterably sad, that she, +in her turn, stood silent. + +"Could you not have left me that?" he whispered, hoarsely. + +Sydney was held by the inexplicable bond of his mute pain. A sense of +comprehension went through her, and with it a thrill of happiness. It +might be that after all--yes, it _must_ be that he had not been +trifling with her, that he had cared, that he was suffering as she +herself was suffering. And if so, how rewarded was her sacrifice! Her +love had been strong enough to make her willing that he should love +another woman, if his happiness lay in so doing. Her reward came in the +knowledge that after all his love was hers--that he was sharing her +sacrifice. _Why_ this was she did not understand; she only felt sure +that she was right, and she gloried in it. Then, woman-like, she +reproached herself for the moments when she had cheapened her +renunciation by the suspicion that he had been flirting with her. + +Friedrich stood beside her, his left hand clutching his heart. He felt +as if, in destroying that picture, so often gazed at through clouds of +meditative smoke, so often kissed, she had done him a physical injury. +Through his coat he pinched hard her little handkerchief, which always +rested over his heart, lest she should divine its presence, and in some +way tear that from him, too. His suffering was so great that he did not +follow her change of expression, but his fingers felt hers touch them +ever so fleetingly, and her whisper came to his ears,-- + +"Forgive me. I think I understand now." + +Across the room came Hilda, who never could stay away from Friedrich +many minutes, in spite of Wendell's efforts to interest her; and +Wendell himself, following her reluctantly only when her progress +brought him near von Rittenheim; and Bob, never truly happy except near +Sydney. There was laughing and talking, in which Friedrich and Sydney +heard themselves taking part, and wondered how it could be. + +"Also we br-rought you an invitation," said Hilda, "as well as our so +interesting selves." + +"Yes," said Bob, "we're going on a 'possum-hunt to-morrow night, and we +want you and your best dog." + +"You shall have me! I r-remember last year when first I came I heard +the dogs on the mountain, but then I had no kind fr-riends to make me +the invitation." + +"It's a little early, but we want to be sure to have one before Mr. +Wendell goes." + +"You go soon?" + +Von Rittenheim's interest was only a courteous expression of concern, +but John, fretted by Hilda's alternate encouragement and coldness, was +tormented by his nerves, and not in command of his judgment. He saw in +the Baron's question a malicious pleasure in his prospective departure. + +"Yes," he said, "I must go soon, I'm afraid. You're playing in luck +these days, old man. You gain what I lose--and the close season for +moonshiners is coming on, now that the corn is ripe." + +Hilda, who did not understand a word he said, laughed softly, as if in +amusement at his wit. Von Rittenheim, who had not been able to follow +the colloquialisms, frowned at "moonshining," which rang out for his +ears above all else. Sydney and Bob looked with horror at the sneering +face before them. + +"John," said Sydney, sternly, "you forget yourself strangely." + +As they were about to start she leaned from her horse and gave her hand +to Friedrich. + +"You have much to forgive me," she said. + +"For much have I to thank you," he returned. + + + + +XXIII + +The 'Possum-Hunt + + +Buzzard Mountain, wooded to the top, extends for two miles north and +south. Its long, gradual slope is like the body of a dormant animal, +rising from the sunken haunches over a long and flattened back, and +falling again to the nose dropped sleepily between the outstretched +paws. + +The meet for the 'possum-hunt was at its northern end, on the outskirts +of the settlement. The run was to be along the crest towards the south, +bringing the hunters out at the end of the ridge nearest their homes. + +The night was lighted by a youthful moon, not brilliant enough to dim +the lustre of the stars, shining clear through the air. It was cool +with the first touch of autumn; so cool as to invite to exercise, yet +so warm as to make it a pleasure to be in the open. + +The hunters were in high spirits. The men from the hamlet about the +post-office,--'Gene Frady and Alf Lance, Mitchell Robertson, the +blacksmith, Doc Pinner, the carpenter, and a half-dozen more, with a +boy to drive back the horses, were piled into a wagon. There were much +pushing and scrambling for places, and many ejaculations of discomfort. + +"Git off mah feet, 'Gene." + +"Hang 'em outside, man. Ah gotter sit somewheres." + +"Ouch! What fool put rye-straw in here?" + +"Powerful penetratin', ain' hit?" + +"Now, look here, that dog's gotter run with the rest. They ain' no room +for him in this wagon." + +"Cain' you-all make them horses o' yo's git along a little mo' lively, +Alf? Mr. Baron'll 'a' cleaned the mountain o' 'possums befo' we git +there." + +"How you-all think they's goin' ter hurry with so many fellers ter +haul? Some o' you boys gotter light 'n walk up this hill in a minute, +so ye better enjoy drivin' while ye can." + +At a deserted cabin on the road that ran through the northern gap they +found Bob Morgan and John Wendell, who had come in a buggy, and the +Baron on his mule. A small negro was to take the vehicle, with von +Rittenheim's animal tied behind, around the base of the mountain to the +German's house, there to await the end of the hunt. The boy's brown +face was twitching with excitement, as the men began to throw their +coats into the wagon, and to light their torches, split from the heart +of the yellow pine. + +"Oh, Lor', Missa Bob," he cried, rubbing one bare foot up and down the +other leg in ecstasy, "lemme go, too. Ah'll never ast ye nothin' again, +Ah swear Ah won't. _Please_, Missa Bob." + +"Can't do it, Scipio," said Bob, kindly. "You're the only man we've got +to look after these creatures. Here, don't let your eyes pop out of +your head. I tell you, you drive to Mr. Baron's and tie the horse and +the mule,--tie 'em strong, mind,--and then you can come up the other +side and meet us." + +Scipio's mournful eyes followed the disappearing forms with an +appreciation of their purpose rather than of the picturesqueness of +their appearance. The flaming lights grew silent as the distance became +too great for his ear to catch their sizzling. They danced hither and +yon,--now scattered, now flashing in a bunch. He followed the course of +a very bright one as it appeared and vanished, but went always on and +up. + +"Ah 'low dat's Missa Bob's," said the loyal little soul. "He sho' would +have de bigges'." + +On the hill-side the men opened their line to cover a wide stretch of +the mountain, and plunged upward through the scrub of pines and oaks. +There was much running about of the dogs, and desultory barking, +corrected by spicy admonitions from their masters, until the ascent's +steepness forced silence upon them by the weapon of difficult +breathing. + +Once 'Gene Frady tripped on a root and fell headlong, pitching his +torch into the dry duff a man's length before him. There was a rush to +stamp out the incipient fire, the autumn terror of the forests, before +any one lent a hand to help the fallen. Robertson went half-way up his +leggings in a spring, and stood swearing fiercely, while the rest +jeered at him and ordered him to move on before he muddied up a good +drinking-place. Bob and Friedrich pushed on on adjoining courses, an +occasional cry of "_malerisch_," or "_zauberisch_," showing that von +Rittenheim was regarding the scene as well as the sport. On the other +side of Bob climbed Wendell, sullenly self-reproachful in the Baron's +presence, yet of too exuberant a nature not to be alive to the +excitement of the chase. + +Of a sudden a hound gave voice,--the bay that makes hunters of us all. +The other dogs rushed to his standard, yelping, barking, galloping from +all directions across their masters' paths, until the forest seemed +suddenly alive with them. One after another found, and added his note +to the general cry that trailed off into the distance. The men who had +started to follow paused, and the rest drew together. + +"Rabbit," suggested Bob, disgustedly, and the others nodded, and began +to whistle for their retainers. + +Singly they returned, with swinging tongue and pendant ears, and a +disposition to sit down and contemplate the scenery. Then once more +came a cry, the steady bay of a dog at stand. His companions instantly +forgot their fatigue, pricked up their ears, pulled in their tongues, +and started towards the herald, with all the huntsmen in pursuit. + +Gathered about a veteran oak, whose blasted top betrayed it the +lightning's victim, were grouped the dogs, each one shoving to better +his place in the bunch, each with tuneful throat and uplifted tail. +Occasionally one from the outskirts would rush around the crowd of his +fellows and try to push in from the other side of the ring. The ones +nearest the tree snuffed at a hole in the trunk between the roots, and +dug fiercely with their forepaws. + +"Holler, ain' hit?" + +"Yes. He's went in that-a-way." + +"Don' look like hit's holler up fur." + +"No. Reckon we c'n chop him out." + +Lance pushed among the dogs, kicking and cuffing them out of his way, +and sounded the tree with the back of a hatchet. + +"Ah 'low hit's gone all the way up," he cried. + +"Well, chop hit 'n fin' out!" returned his friends, impatiently. + +He began cutting a square and soon broke through the outer shell. + +"Gimme a glove, one o' you fellers," he cried. "Ah ain' aimin' to have +a finger chewed off this time." + +Some one tossed him the desired protection. He put it on and thrust his +arm into the hole, while the crowd pushed up on to the dogs, and they +yelped excitedly. + +"Ah tol' ye so. Hit's holler clear up's fur's Ah c'n reach." + +"All right. We'll smoke him out, then. Git out o' here, you dogs, an' +give us a chance at this fireplace." + +The hole at the base of the tree was quickly enlarged enough to push in +a smudge, and the opening which Lance had made above was closed with +moss and green leaves. + +"Hi, there she comes," cried some one, enthusiastically, as the thick +white smoke made its way out of the broken top. "The varmint won' stan' +that long." + +Soon, indeed, amid a shower of bark and burning punk, a black and white +ball scrambled into the air and dropped from the ragged splinters that +offered no sufficient hold for its claws. + +As swift as sight, 'Gene Frady dashed close to the bole and caught the +falling creature in his hands. High above the leaping dogs he held it, +while they snarled, defrauded of their prey. + +"Quick, that crocus sack," he called. "Ah promised the kids to bring +one home. Give him a switch, Mitchell." + +The 'possum, rousing from the semi-stupor into which the smoke and the +shock of his fall had thrown him, was beginning to struggle violently. +Robertson broke a finger-thick stick and thrust it between the snapping +jaws, that clamped upon it fiercely. The rat-like tail wound about the +other end of the rod, and the bag was drawn over him while he clung to +his fancied means of safety. Frady flung his burden high on his back to +secure it from the dogs, and the others put out the fire in the tree, +and again fell into open order to beat the woods. + +The next 'possum which they discovered, more fortunate than his +brother, who had been sighted on the ground where locomotion is slow +and awkward for his kind, was aloft in the branches when the dogs spied +him. He clambered dexterously about with his hand-like extremities, +aiding his progress with his prehensile tail; but he had not calculated +upon the added heaviness which his autumn diet had given him. He +ventured upon a sapling that bent beneath him. Wendell added his weight +to bear it to the ground, and the dogs leaped at their victim and tore +him into bits. + +Both men and dogs were tired now, and pushed on with less enthusiasm. +The dogs, indeed, who had covered many more miles in their wild +dashings than had their masters, were not above sitting down +occasionally and lapping a memento of the last 'possum's sharp teeth, +or passing a rueful paw over a slit and bleeding ear. + +As they were approaching the southern end of the mountain, and realized +that the edge of the excitement was blunted, the men walked nearer to +each other, and talked on indifferent themes as they pushed through the +brush just below the top of the ridge. One after another fell silent, +perhaps through fatigue; possibly impressed with the beauty of the +night. + +Through the openings in the tree-tops the stars shone with steady +clearness, doing their best to replace the light of the little moon +which had gone to rest early, like most young things. Under the forest +cover the starlight did not penetrate, and the darkness was illumined +by the yellow flare of the torches. The fall of feet on crackling +twigs, and the slapping of smitten shrub-leaves broke the thick silence +that falls on the earth with night. + +To Pink Pressley, crouching at the entrance of his cave, the sound of +approaching steps was a threat. He had put out his fire as soon as he +heard the dogs on the other end of the ridge, and for two hours he had +followed the course of the hunt by their barking and the cries of the +men. He guessed it to be what it was,--a 'possum-hunt,--yet suspicion +born of guilt hinted always at such a hunt as an excuse for a raid upon +his still. + +On the other hand, the party was coming from the north, and might be +made up of men from Asheville. In that case, since, perhaps, they did +not know the mountain, it was quite possible that they would turn back +before they reached his hiding-place. At any rate, he determined to +stay where he was, and run the risk of detection. If it should prove to +be a raid, he was not averse to exchanging shots with the revenue men. +The thought of it filled him with a fierce joy. Three times they had +destroyed his whole plant, and this time he meant to fight for it. + +He took down the boards that filled the cave's mouth, and pulled the +bushes more carefully before it. The dogs would find and reveal him as +quickly with one arrangement as the other, and he had no desire to +undergo a siege shut up in that hole, when he might burst out and +defend himself with some enjoyment. + +Screened by his net-work of bushes, he listened keenly to every sound. +A misgiving seized him that Bud had betrayed him, and he cursed him in +a whisper. Yarebrough had told him in the afternoon that his baby was +ill, and that he could not leave Melissa alone with her that night; but +he had confessed at the same time, with his usual lack of reticence, +that the Baron had "been a-talkin'" to him, and Pink suspected that the +baby's illness was a fabrication to excuse his non-appearance at the +still, and possibly his treachery. Pressley's judgment of his partner's +honor was based on his own, and he felt in his pocket to make sure of +the safety there of a letter whose crackle sounded pleasantly in his +ears. + +"'Twon' do to give him too much rope," he muttered. + +Nearer came the soft scampering of dogs and the trampling of men, and +the torches' glow warming the unlighted forest. Pressley hoped that +they might pass along the mountain's side below him, or on top of the +ledge that roofed his cavern, but there always was danger from the +dogs. Even as he thought it, one padded along the shelf of rock that +lay like a step before his door, and stopped short with a growl. He was +so near that Pink struck him with the butt of his revolver, and sent +him off with a paw uplifted in pain. + +The man leaned out from his shelter and stared towards the right, +whence the lights were coming. Then he looked straight ahead for a +moment, down the mountain, under the leafy tops, and wished it were all +over and he knew how it had come out. + +When he looked back the foremost men were in view, a group of three or +four, with their dogs following at heel soberly enough. Their torches +flung grotesque shadows on the trees, and distorted their figures into +uncouth semblances. He could not recognize them, yet they seemed +familiar. Those two in front--was it----? Yes, by God! Like a fiend he +sprang from his lair and rushed at von Rittenheim, as if from the very +bowels of the rock. His face glared, malignant, in the unsteady light. + +"So you did squeal on me, you damned German!" he yelled. "Take that and +that and that." He fired three times full at von Rittenheim's face. +With the third shot another rang in unison, and Pressley fell, twisted +and snarling, on the stone before his still. + +Bob Morgan's hand, holding the smoking pistol, fell to his side. + +"Are you all right, von Rittenheim?" he asked; then added, weakly, "I +reckon you'll have to carry me down, boys. He's touched me." And he +staggered into Friedrich's arms. + +He had been walking a stride higher up the hill-side than von +Rittenheim, and, flinging himself from his greater elevation between +the German and his assailant, he had received the bullets meant for +Friedrich's head lower in his own body. + + + + +XXIV + +"Fought the Fight" + + +Bob lay white and still upon his bed, breathing painfully. Two of +Pink's bullets had torn their way through his lungs, and the third had +splintered his collar-bone. A surgeon had come out from Asheville, and, +after examining the wounds, had sent for help. When the second +physician arrived, they had probed and prodded the inert body, while +Dr. Morgan, with an ever-growing fear clutching at his heart, +administered the chloroform with a steady hand. Outside the door Mrs. +Morgan had knelt against the wall, tearless, and without a word of +prayer. + +Now it was over, and there was no hope, only waiting for the end,--the +waiting that saps courage from the heart of the onlooker, and makes +endurance seem a thing impossible; the torture of seeing suffering that +is not to be relieved; suffering that seems all unnecessary, since +death is to be the issue after all. + +Bob had asked for Sydney as soon as he came out of the chloroform, and +she had responded at once. + +"You won't leave me, dear?" he had questioned, when he opened his eyes +from the drowsiness that the opiate forced upon him, and saw her +sitting beside him. + +"No, Bob; I'll stay as long as you want me." + +He had smiled feebly at her. + +"It won't be very long." + +A glimmer in his eyes showed that he understood the possible +impertinent interpretation of his speech. + +"You won't mind letting me hold your hand, Sydney, will you?" he had +said, in his hoarse, weak voice. "It's one of the perquisites of dying. +Tuck your fingers in there, dear. Those doctors have strapped me up so +I can't move my arm." + +So she sat with her hand in his, and her eyes looking out across the +meadows to Buck Mountain, while Bob dozed and woke and dozed again, +always smiling happily at her when he found her still beside him, and +pressing her fingers in his weak grasp. + +As the sun sank towards the west he roused from his stupefied slumber, +and spoke with growing clearness. + +"It's mighty good of you to stay here, Sydney. I'm selfish to ask you, +but I haven't seen you much lately, I've been so busy with the crops." + +"You've never failed me, Bob dear. It's my turn now." + +"It's just because I'm weak, I suppose, but I want a little flattery. +Don't you think I've done pretty well about--drinking?" + +"You've been wonderful, Bob. I honor and respect you more than I can +say. You feel that, don't you?" + +"Thank you, dear. You know I did it for you? Oh, I told her all about +it," as Sydney glanced towards the corner where Mrs. Morgan, worn out +with grief, was sleeping behind a screen. "I've been a little more +hopeful about you lately, since--well----" + +He paused, not liking to finish his sentence "since the Baroness came," +for it suggested implications too delicate for utterance. + +"But I always knew, really, that you couldn't care for me in that way. +It was a temporary deceit, the way you can make yourself believe for a +few minutes that you haven't a toothache, and then it jumps on you +again." + +"Dear old Bob." + +Sydney bent forward and kissed him. Over his face spread a radiance of +unexpected happiness. + +"Oh, Sydney, you darling! I say, Sydney, if you wouldn't think that I'm +taking advantage of my condition--would you mind--_would_ you do that +again?" + +She kissed him again, gladly, willingly, and he sank happily to sleep. +When he woke once more he asked for von Rittenheim. + +"He's down-stairs. He's been waiting all day hoping you'd want to see +him." + +Sydney summoned Friedrich. He uttered an exclamation of sorrow as he +saw the big black eyes looking from their hollows, and the white face +of the man so suddenly brought to this pass from the full tide of +strength. + +"For-r my sake!" he groaned. "How with all my soul I wish it were I!" + +He took Bob's other hand--Sydney had resumed her old position--and +tried to command his voice. It was Bob who spoke first: + +"What about Pressley?" + +Von Rittenheim looked questioningly at Sydney, who nodded. + +"He's dead, Bob." + +A ray from the setting sun found its way to the bed and lighted up the +dying man's face. + +"Kind of sudden for him, too," he mused. "Did he live any time at all?" + +"No. Your bullet went through his heart. He must have died instantly." + +"It's a mighty serious thing to do, to kill a man. I never realized +before how serious it was. But I'm not sorry." + +"You saved my life, Bob. I can't talk about it. Only, I'd give it +gladly, gladly, to keep you, old man." + +He bent his head with a sob. + +"Never mind that, Baron. I suspect Yarebrough'll be all the better for +not having Pink to lead him into mischief." + +"It has saved him from a heavy punishment. They found in Pr-ressley's +pocket a letter offering to turn State's evidence." + +"That would have sent Bud to jail and freed himself, wouldn't it?" +asked Sydney. + +"Yes. He must have been afraid of betrayal." + +"No," cried the girl; "I'm sure he planned the whole thing to spite +Melissa. I heard him threatening her one day. He said he'd make her +sorry she ever married Bud." + +"I think you're right, Sydney," said Bob. "He was working Bud all +summer, I'm confident, with the purpose of betraying him at the end." + +He sank a little into the pillow, and Sydney gave von Rittenheim a +glance of dismissal. + +"You're tired, dear," she said to Bob. + +"A little. I think I'll take a nap. Oh, Baron, I almost forgot. I was +in Asheville a few days ago,--Monday, Tuesday,--I don't know when," he +went on, weakly, "and I met a man who said he thought he knew you. He's +at the hotel,--a German." + +"Did he tell you his name?" + +"I can't remember. Something long. He said if you were Friedrich von +Rittenheim from the Black Forest that he knew you well, and would you +look him up? You will, won't you?" + +"Yes, I will." + +"If you don't, he'll think I've broken my promise." + +"I will. He shall know that you told me. Good-by, Bob, good-by." + +But Bob was asleep and did not answer. + +It was with the ebbing of the night and the coming of the dawn that +Bob's soul went out,--went out in stress and travail. + +When the struggle was over, Sydney left the old doctor and his wife +kneeling side by side at the edge of the bed, and crept down-stairs. +Von Rittenheim was sitting before the fire, his head buried in his +hands. He sprang to meet her as she entered. + +"Is he----? Has he----?" + +The girl nodded. + +"Just now." + +Suddenly she threw her arms over her head and broke into stifled sobs. + +Friedrich was torn with distress. He drew her to the fire, and +established her in a big chair, wrapping her warmly in a rug from the +couch. Somewhere he found a glass of wine, and made her take it. Then +he knelt beside her, rubbing the fingers that were cold and cramped +from Bob's long clasp, and talking softly to her as to a child. + +God alone knows the force he put upon himself not to take her in his +arms and comfort her on his breast; not to pour into her ears the words +that were burning his heart out. Drops of moisture stood on his +forehead as he resisted the temptation that was the stronger because he +felt that she returned his love, and that these forbidden words would +be her greatest comfort. But Sydney was not insensible of their subtle, +unspoken sympathy, and at last yielded to the solace of warmth and the +consciousness of being cared for, and, exhausted, closed her eyes in +sleep. + +Friedrich stirred the fire and watched its light play on the face of +the woman he loved, and gave himself up to wonder and longing and +regret. + + * * * * * + +Unless it had been that of Dr. Morgan himself, no other death in all +the country round could have touched so nearly so many hearts. Around +the grave, lined with the glistening laurel-leaves of victory, stood +old and young, rich and poor, men and women, and even little children. +There were those who had come because he was the Doctor's son; there +were those who had been with him on many a gay excursion; there were +those who had experienced his tenderness and loving-kindness. Old man +Johnson, from over the river, who had walked eight painful miles, laid +the first shovelful of earth into the grave. Patton McRae helped to +cover his life-long friend. The negroes from the farm sobbed audibly as +they worked. A tramp came into the graveyard from the road and asked +whose buryin' it was. They told him, and he swore softly, and begged to +be allowed to help. John Wendell yielded his shovel to Hamp Pinner, and +he to Colonel Huger. + +Then the women came forward and covered the mound with boughs of green, +and clusters of flowers, and sprays of bright leaves, and Sydney laid +about the whole grave a garland of feathery aster and delicate fern. +Through the quiet came a sweet, sonorous voice reading the words of the +hymn,-- + + "Love's redeeming work is done, + Fought the fight, the victory won." + +Out of the church-yard, side by side, with bowed heads, walked Bud +Yarebrough and Friedrich von Rittenheim,--the man whose fragile honor +had been preserved by Bob's act, and the man whose life he had given +his own to save. + + + + +XXV + +Carl von Sternburg + + +Mrs. Morgan and the Doctor had insisted upon giving to von Rittenheim +Gray Eagle and Bob's buggy. They could have done nothing kinder or more +tactful, for Friedrich was apprehensive even of their seeing him for +whom their son had given his life, and their insistence upon his +accepting this remembrance of their dead boy proved their feeling +towards him more cogently than any words. + +It was the good gray horse that he was driving towards Asheville a few +days after the funeral, on his way to fulfil his promise to Bob to hunt +up the German who had claimed acquaintance with him. + +As he travelled on, he thought of the two notable journeys which he had +made on this same highway,--the heart-chilling ride through the +penetrating morning mist at the head of the men who had arrested him, +and the wild flight through the darkness to secure the surgeon for poor +Bob. Between the two had intervened a lifetime of experience. He had +been branded a criminal, and had rehabilitated himself; he had knocked +at the door of death, and been refused; he had lost his confidence in +man's honesty, and had regained a fuller faith in his goodness; he had +watched the slow blossoming of the tender flower of love's hope within +his heart, and he had seen it overshadowed by the stouter growth of +loyalty to his word. + +Of his future, in so far as it might have to do with Sydney, he did not +allow himself to think. There was no shaft of light lying upon that +road. But a clear and steady, though not far-reaching flame illumined +the present, for he felt sure now that she loved him, and that gave him +a certain happiness. It was like having a beautiful secret,--a secret +whose delight would be doubled if it might be shared with the world, +but nevertheless a secret which gave joy in mere solitary +contemplation. + +_Hilda_ was a subject which forced itself with increasing potency +upon his mind. After the first shock of her sudden coming had passed, +he had been touched by her turning to him in her loneliness. That +Sydney's withdrawal from him lay at Hilda's charge he could not fail to +see, and he blamed himself for the occasional repulsion against his +sister-in-law with which the situation filled him. She was so sweet, so +childlike, so full of trust in him, so regretful for her mistakes of +the past, so reticent as to Maximilian's ill-behavior. Her whole +conduct won his respect and confidence, even while he felt himself +subtly encompassed by the seine of her entire reliance upon the keeping +of his oath. That she expected him to marry her he did not formally +concede to himself, but he was quite sure that she did not expect him +to marry any one else. + +His errands done,--a commission for Mrs. Morgan and some business for +the firm,--he betook himself to the hotel and asked for the register. +He was running over the names when he heard some one behind him saying, +in German,-- + +"It _is_ my von Rittenheim! It is my dear Friedrich!" and "dear +Friedrich" and a somewhat stout young man a few years younger than he +flung themselves into each other's arms, and kissed both cheeks after +the manner of their race, while the clerk turned to his safe to conceal +the grin that inwreathed his countenance. + +"Von Sternburg! What in the world brought you here?" + +"Baedeker. This scenery is among the things a globe-trotter has to +see." + +"Shall you stay long?" + +"I go to Florida day after to-morrow. Come on to the veranda and tell +me about yourself." + +"If I can stop asking questions long enough!" + +It was while they were talking and smoking in the sunshine with the +glorious western range spread before them, that von Sternburg said,-- + +"And poor old Max is dead." + +He knocked the ash from his cigar with his little finger, and glanced +at Friedrich, who was non-committal. + +"Yes," was all he said. + +"I suppose they've never found any trace of the she-devil, have they?" + +Friedrich sat up with a jerk and stared at von Sternburg. + +"She-devil? What she-devil?" + +"What she-devil? Why, the Baroness, of course. Max's wife." + +"No trace of Hilda? She-devil? What are you talking about?" + +"Do you mean to say that you don't know about Maximilian's death?" + +"I know he shot himself." + +"And you don't know why?" + +"I had not heard from Max for six months before he died. I did not know +of his death until several months after it occurred!" + +"That was strange! Your man of business did not write you?" + +"It was my fault. I hadn't sent him my address for a long time. When I +did there was a reason for his not writing at once." + +"Who is he?" + +"Stapfer." + +"I knew it!" + +Von Sternburg slapped his knee. + +"Stapfer was crazy over her, and she had some reason for your not +knowing." + +"_She!_ Are you talking about my sister-in-law?" + +"Oh, you needn't put on any dignity over her. She isn't worth it, +though I suppose you don't know that as well as you will in a few +minutes." + +Friedrich passed his hand over his face. + +"I can't understand it. You say Stapfer was in love with Hilda?" + +"And she made use of him, just as she did of Moller and von Hatfeldt +and everybody else who came near her. She overreached herself about von +Hillern, though." + +"It seems treachery to listen to you, von Sternburg." + +"Treachery! Why, my dear boy----" + +Von Sternburg ended his sentence with an expressive gesture. + +"And Max--did he know?" + +"Why, that's what killed him, man! Haven't you kept in touch with +anybody in the Fatherland who would write you any news?" + +"I haven't received a letter from a soul except Max and Stapfer since I +came to America." + +Von Sternburg gave a whistle of surprise. + +"Then you don't even know how Max improved? Everybody thought when he +married Hilda von Arnim that he did it merely for the pleasure of +cutting you out. Forgive my speaking so plainly." + +He laid a deprecating hand on von Rittenheim's knee. Friedrich nodded +silently. + +"I haven't a doubt in the world that that was his chief motive then. +But after you left he fell a victim to the charm that she seems to +exert over everybody who doesn't know her tricks--you must let me go on +now," he said, quickly, in response to a motion of von Rittenheim's, +"or I can't establish my case. He fell madly in love with her, and it +made another man of him." + +"There was much good in Max." + +"Well hidden all through his youth, you must allow. He gave up +drinking----" + +"Not entirely?" + +"He drank only what a gentleman takes for dinner." + +"He was not intoxicated when he sh--when he died?" + +"I know for a fact that he was not drunk once during the whole last +year of his life." + +"You know? How do you know? Forgive me, Carl," as a look of annoyance +clouded von Sternburg's face, "but every proof is important to me." + +"I was living at our Schloss--at my father's. I saw Maximilian nearly +every day. We were together constantly." + +"Extraordinary!" murmured Friedrich. "Did this wonderful change extend +to his money affairs?" + +"Well, you know Max could use any amount of money, and you couldn't +expect him to become an economist at one shot. Then he always spent a +great deal on his wife; he was continually sending to Paris for +something for her." + +Friedrich scowled thoughtfully. + +"Still he paid all his old debts out of his Aunt Brigitta's legacy, and +didn't make any new ones." + +"That means more for Max than it would for most people." + +"He told me that he could not have afforded to keep up the Schloss +without your help, but aside from the expenses of the house he had +plenty, plenty." + +"And Hilda?" + +"Oh, the Baroness is a millionaire. Her aunt in Heidelberg died more +than a year ago and left her all her fortune. Max never got a pfennig +of it though, even in a Christmas-gift." + +There flashed across Friedrich's mental view his cabin, differing in no +respect from those of the "mountain whites," his neighbors. Then a +picture of a little figure with white neck and arms shining through the +filmy blackness of her gown, shrinking into an arm-chair, and saying, +"I always had enough for my needs, even when----" + +"Was he kind to her?" + +"Kind? I tell you he loved her with the most unselfish devotion. It was +his dearest wish to live a life so correct that she might be proud of +him. You couldn't expect more than that, could you?" + +"Not from Maximilian," admitted von Rittenheim. "Perhaps the very +intensity of his love may have made him exacting towards her?" + +"My dear fellow, she paid no more attention to him and his wishes than +if he were the lowest servant on the estate. She had a constant flock +of men hanging about, with whom she flirted desperately, entirely +regardless of Max's feelings. I must say he bore it like an angel! Why, +if my wife--well, never mind, I haven't one yet. She made herself +conspicuous with Moller--Colonel Moller, you know, before von Hatfeldt +killed himself on her account." + +"The Graf's son?" Friedrich was startled. + +"The second son. He took poison and told his father why. The old man +went to Max about it." + +"Poor old Max!" + +"What could he do? When he charged her with it there's nothing so sweet +and gentle on earth as that girl! What had she done? Nothing at all, +but torment a poor fellow until his nerves and will were wrecked. How +could she be responsible for that?" + +Friedrich saw before him John Wendell, haggard and sneering, saying to +him something so insulting that Sydney had grown white, and Bob had +raised a threatening arm. + +"But, as I said, she overreached herself with von Hillern. Fortunately +for him he was in love with some one else, which was his safeguard, but +he was willing enough to singe his wings, and the Baroness was +determined to make him give up his marriage, as a sign that he loved +her." + +Von Rittenheim stared at the mountains and thought of Sydney. Von +Sternburg continued,-- + +"Maximilian was fully alive to everything that went on, and he was +beside himself with distress. Apart from the pain of his own unrequited +love, he was acutely anxious over the gossip about her." + +"Von Hillern is an old friend of our family." + +"Exactly. I think Max blamed him very little, but it preyed on his +mind." + +"You think it became unhinged?" + +"I think so. Indeed, I'm almost sure of it. He hadn't the constitution +to endure any mental anxiety." + +"I suppose he shot himself in a fit of alienation." + +"He shot himself because his wife refused to give up her affair with +von Hillern. Whether it was mania, or a passing craze of jealousy, I +don't pretend to say." + +"How do you know it wasn't on account of financial troubles?" + +"I was there in the next room at the time." + +Von Rittenheim leaned forward and fixed his eyes on von Sternburg's +face with keen anxiety. + +"You heard him?" + +"I had gone to ask Max to ride with me. The servant who opened the door +said he dared not announce me to the Baron; that he was storming about +in his dressing-room. I ran up-stairs and into Max's room, which was +empty, but I heard his voice in the Baroness's room, which adjoined +it." + +"You understood what he said?" + +"Perfectly. It seemed to be the end of a long argument. He cried, +'Hilda, will you or will you not give up von Hillern?'" + +"And she said?" + +"'I have told you repeatedly, Max, that I will not.' Then he seemed to +go wild, and cried, 'Give him up! Give him up!'" + +Von Rittenheim paled. He never moved his eyes from his friend's face. + +"Without a word of warning, he fired two shots. I broke open the door +instantly, expecting that he had killed Hilda, but he had ended his +suffering in another way." + +Friedrich's head sank, and Carl again laid a hand upon his knee in +awkward sympathy. + +"Of course, the whole thing came out," he continued. "The servants knew +everything, as they always do, and I had to tell my story at the +inquest. The Baroness braved public opinion for a time, first playing +the innocent and then the martyr; but one day Graf von Hatfeldt called +upon her, and told her a few home truths, and that very night she left +the Schloss. Nobody knows where she went to, unless it's Stapfer. If he +does, he has kept her secret." + +Friedrich preserved a silence that disturbed von Sternburg. Carl +crossed his knees uneasily and lighted a cigarette, glancing +occasionally at his friend. Just how deeply this would cut him he had +no means of knowing. + +At last von Rittenheim, looking worn but not unhappy, lifted his head. +He rose and walked to the edge of the veranda, and stretched himself as +if to shake off some trammel of thought. + +"After we have had luncheon, will you do me a great kindness, Carl?" he +asked. "Will you drive home with me into the country, and spend the +night?" + +"My dear fellow, I shall be delighted to do so," cried von Sternburg, +surprised and relieved at this unexpected turn of the conversation. + + + + +XXVI + +Surrender + + +Uncle Jimmy lighted the room and took away the tea-equipage, while Mrs. +Carroll established herself with a book before the fire. Hilda and John +arranged the chess-board on a little table near the lamp. The red shade +cast a warm glow over the girl's fairness and gave a look of physical +vigor to her delicate charm. John made his moves with unthinking +swiftness, happy in the sight of her beauty and in the chance touch of +her hand. + +In a large chair Sydney lay back languidly, her hands idle upon her +lap. The shock of Bob's death had exhausted her, and she found herself +spent, physically and emotionally. A book lay open upon her knees, but +her eyes closed wearily, or stared unseeing into space. She was +thinking of all that Bob's life had meant to her of companionship and +affection; of the pain that his weakness had brought her, and the pride +that had watched his redemption. She had yearned over him in maternal +tenderness. Yet she knew that she could but have brushed the edges of +his future; that his death at this time saved him from inevitable +sorrow. She sighed as she thought that perhaps he knew now, dear old +Bob, how completely she was able to sympathize with him in the +bitterness of his longing. Involuntarily she glanced at Hilda, and +admired her beauty. Hilda caught her look and smiled in return. + +"_Armes Kind_," she cried, tossing her a kiss from her finger-tips, +"you are so tired." + +It was astonishing to Sydney that she felt no jealousy or envy of +Hilda. It seemed to her that it was not natural that she should feel so +kindly disposed towards the woman who had taken her lover from her. Yet +it was true. Although she could not help an occasional wince at some +look or word, yet she had no hard feeling. She did not attribute this +lack to any excellence of her own character. It seemed to her but +simple justice that a woman who had made so sad a mistake, and who had +expiated it so rudely, should have her reward; whereas, what had +_she_ done to deserve recompense? Did happiness come at any one's +whistle? + +But how she wished it would. + +Mrs. Carroll laid down her book and sighed in disgust. + +"I do wish," she said, "that there was some one here old enough for me +to talk to." + +"Try me," said John, as the oldest of the company addressed, while the +girls laughed. + +"I grow so impatient with it," went on the old lady, pursuing aloud her +train of thought. "It seems as if the whole body of French fiction +writers was in a conspiracy against one's illusions. They are clever +enough to see the value of them, you would suppose, yet almost every +book you take up teaches that honor is a thing of the external life, +and not a part of the very essence of one's being." + +"Do you call that an illusion?" asked Sydney. + +"_I_ call it a truth, and belief in it an article of faith," said Mrs. +Carroll, stoutly, "but these people"--she tapped the book she had laid +down--"posit it as an illusion, and then demolish it by all sorts of +examples that could occur nowhere outside of Gaul!" + +"Do you forget the books that are 'crowned'?" asked John. + +"When a Frenchman attempts to be spiritual, it is an unfortunate fact +that he becomes insipid," asserted Mrs. Carroll, with a finality that +made them laugh again. + +"You keep to this day your illusions!" said Hilda, softly admiring. + +"I am most glad to say that I do. They are worn, but serviceable +still," replied Mrs. Carroll, smiling. "Even at my age, I still believe +that most husbands cherish their wives, and that most wives love their +husbands, and wear their names worthily." + +"Checkmate." + +"Oh, Mr. Vendell!" + +Hilda was so adorably regretful, and her lack of mastery of her was +so captivating, that John was desperately sorry that he had taken +advantage of her preoccupation. + +"It was Mrs. Car-roll who beat me, not you," she said. "I was listening +to her and not thinking." + +"Of me? You never do," he whispered. + +She was resetting the board, and giving John delicious little thrills +from her finger-tips, when Uncle Jimmy threw open the door. + +"Baron von Rittenheim," he announced. + +Sydney rose in greeting, and Mrs. Carroll gave an exclamation of +pleasure at the coming of her favorite, but both were startled into +silence by Hilda's cry. The chess-board emptied its burden upon the +floor with many tinkling crashes, and she was on her feet, one hand +pressed against her head, and the other turned palm outward as if to +avert a blow. A grayness like the livery of death came over her face, +but now so vitally warm. The red lamp-light behind increased her +ghastliness. Her eyes were fixed on the man who had followed von +Rittenheim into the room. + +"You, you!" she whispered, hoarsely. + +Von Sternburg gave a cry of amazement. + +"The Baroness--_here_! Why didn't you tell me, Friedrich?" he demanded, +while his mind quickly reviewed the possible relations between von +Rittenheim and his sister-in-law, and considered the effect upon them +of his frank disclosures of the morning. + +Friedrich, whose gaze had been searching keenly first one face and then +the other, gave a nod, and without replying to his friend, introduced +him to Mrs. Carroll and Sydney. Von Sternburg bent over each hand and +then approached Hilda. She was regaining her control, though she +trembled so violently as to justify in his precaution Wendell, who had +sprung to her, fearing that she would fall. + +"This is an unexpected meeting, Baroness," von Sternburg said, in +English. + +"Why have you come?" she asked, in the same hoarse but articulate +whisper. + +"As I told Fr-riedrich, Baedeker brought me. I had no idea that I was +to have the pleasure of seeing him again among these mountains, much +less, you." + +"You two men must have had an enormous amount to say to each other," +said Mrs. Carroll. "John, give Hilda that large chair. The surprise of +seeing Baron von Sternburg has been too much for her." + +Hilda sank into the offered seat, and von Sternburg placed himself +beside her. He fitted his clothes to the cracking-point, and he had the +lack of impressiveness that goes with rotundity. Yet it was clear that +he felt himself to have the whip-hand of the situation, and Hilda's +manner acknowledged it. + +Across the room the others were talking together, though von Rittenheim +was not without preoccupation. + +"You don't seem glad to see me," von Sternburg said, in German. + +Hilda ignored his opening. + +"I suppose you have told Friedrich everything," she said at once, in a +tone dull with the chagrin of defeated hope. + +"Yes," replied von Sternburg, "I think I have." + +"Then I hate you!" + +She sat erect, and an angry flush colored her cheeks. + +"No doubt." + +"You have destroyed the only chance of happiness I ever expect to +have." + +"Do you deserve happiness?" + +"Won't you grant me that mercy?" + +"Have you ever shown mercy?" + +As her regret over the failure of her plans had been swallowed up in +resentment at the doer of the mischief, so her passion was swept away +by a wave of self-pity. She turned to him with fierce reproach. + +"You think I am so heartless as to be outside of the needs of other +women, don't you?" + +"I must confess that you are the only one of your kind in my +experience." + +Hilda was maddened at his irony. + +"Can you not believe that I am eager to be happy in the way that other +women are? That I _long_ to feel the love that comes to every one but +me?" + +"No,--pardon me,--I cannot believe that." + +"Insolent! I don't know why I try to justify myself to you. But listen. +Can you imagine what it is to be without a heart? To make men love you +for the sport of it, and not to care when they kill themselves for your +sake,--truly _not to care_? And at the same time to have another part +of yourself wanting to care,--yearning to feel pity?" + +"Is that dual nature yours?" + +"You are sneering. You always have thought of me as rejoicing in +cruelty, I suppose." + +"Certainly as indifferent to suffering." + +"You have believed that I thought myself normal; that I was unconscious +of my want of feeling." + +"I never observed any recognition of your temperament evidenced in your +conduct." + +"But it is true, Baron. I swear to you that I know my need so well, so +painfully well, that on the chance of Friedrich's saving me from all +that it means, I was willing to force him to poverty, and to separate +him from all that he held dear." + +"I don't doubt it, though I don't see how you expected that to help +you." + +"I thought that, if I could have him near me always, perhaps my heart +might wake within me. I do not love him, but he is the only man I ever +met whose every thought I honor." + +"Yet you were willing to sacrifice him!" + +"I needed him." + +Von Sternburg looked at her in abhorrence. + +"I suppose you don't know what an abomination of selfishness you are." + +She did not seem to hear him, but added, bitterly,-- + +"Now you have come, my hope is gone." + +Von Sternburg looked across the room. Friedrich was leaning over +Sydney's chair. + +"It is still in the family, I should say. It merely has changed its +abiding-place." + +A spasm which was the recognition of defeat, not the anguish of loss, +went over Hilda's face. She crossed the room to Mrs. Carroll, von +Sternburg following slowly after. + +"Dear Mrs. Car-roll," she said, in English, "Baron von Sternburg has +brought news that compels me to leave Oakwood soon--yes, to-morrow. I +hope you know how gr-rateful I am to you for your hospitality. Your +kindness alvays vill be a br-right spot in my life!" + +She looked charmingly young and very lovely as she stooped and kissed +the old lady's cheek. + +"To-morrow? Oh, surely not to-morrow!" cried Sydney, in hospitable +reproach. + +"Sydney dear, you are vonderful! I r-really believe you mean it after +everything." And she tapped the taller girl's cheek with her tiny hand. + +She was entirely self-possessed now, much less agitated than the two +men who knew her secret, or than Wendell, who had been stricken at the +news of her departure; or than Sydney, who was overcome by +embarrassment as she came to appreciate the meaning of her guest's +speech. + +"I expect never to see you again, Friedrich; I should pr-refer not; so +I vant to make my confession to you now. Oh, any one may hear," she +said, in answer to a gesture of Friedrich's. "I am quite +indifferent--now. Did the Baron tell you that Max shot himself because +I r-refused to give up a flirtation? It is quite tr-rue. I lied to you, +Friedrich, and I did an injustice to a man who had conquered the +follies of his life. Ah, Mrs. Car-roll, I did not love my husband or +vear his name vorthily. I am one of the lost illusions." + +She looked from one to another in quick observance of their emotion. + +"Then, my scar," she went on, lightly, "that vas another lie. I've had +it ever since I vas a child. And here is something that Baron von +Sternburg could not have disclosed. You see I am r-revealing +everything. I am sure he told you that I am rich? Yes? But he vas not +avare that _I knew_ from Herr Stapfer that you vere depr-riving +yourself for me." + +"Oh, Hilda," cried Mrs. Carroll, in quick censure of the non-restitution +that might have averted a life-time's self-reproach from Friedrich, "How +could you keep it!" + +"The money itself vas nothing to me, but I hoped that through +Friedrich's poverty I might gain some power over him, and make him do +vhat I vanted. I shall see that it is r-restored to you at once, +Friedrich." + +She turned to Wendell, and her face changed subtly. She became the +tempting woman, alluring in the innocence of her child-like beauty. + +"Do you still mean vhat you said to me yesterday, Mr. Vendell?" + +She leaned towards him a trifle--the merest trifle. Wendell stood +silent. + +"Do you still vant to marry me--John?" The name was but a breath. + +He stared at her as if fascinated by the spell of her glowing eyes. +With an effort he looked away from her to von Rittenheim. + +"Tell me," he said, huskily, "I don't understand. Her husband? Is----?" + +"She will not dishonor you," answered Friedrich to the unspoken +question. + +"She'll merely br-reak your heart," completed von Sternburg, brutally. + +Wendell turned to Hilda in relief, to find her drawn haughtily erect +before him. She did not notice his extended hands. + +"You doubted me," she flung at him, arrogantly. "I demand from those +who love me, all--or nothing." + +She swept from the room, small, proud, forceful; while John threw +himself upon a chair and buried his head in his hands. + + + + +XXVII + +Dixie + + +Gray Eagle was trotting briskly along the road over which another hand +had guided him so often,--the Oakwood carriage-way. On his back sat +Friedrich, erectly vigorous, singing for the trees' benefit,-- + + "Oh, I wees' I was in Deexie, + Look away, look away! + In Deexie Land I take my stand, + To live and die in Deexie." + +The aspen fluttered its yellow leaves in applause, and the sourwood +threw at him by the breeze's hand a cluster of its scarlet foliage. The +mouse-gray goldenrod nodded approval of his mood, and the oak-trees +swung their yet green boughs in sympathy with his light-hearted onward +rush. + +The air was cool and warm, and bright and mellow, and all the +contradictions that make October the month of the year's mature +perfection; that middle age of the seasons, when the blossoms of folly +are past, and the fruits of the will are ripened, and the chill of bare +winter is still in the future. + +Occasionally, in sheer exuberance, von Rittenheim rose high in his +stirrups and gave a whoop of gladness that made Gray Eagle skip in +sympathetic deviation from his usual long stride. + +It was during one of these upstandings, when his head was brought above +its customary level, that Friedrich saw a girl running away from the +carriage-road down the lane that led to the sheep-farm. The sunshine +burned on her brilliant head, and Gray Eagle found his glad career +brought to a sudden close, and his amusement abruptly reduced to the +occupation of nibbling the stem of the young tree to which he was tied. +He watched his rider's long legs vault over the gate, and pondered +wisely on the similarity of interests of his two masters, for he, too, +now descried a flash of color in the distance. + +Sydney's race ended beneath a huge oak, against which she leaned, +breathless and laughing, and faced her pursuer, who was close upon her. +The musical ring of his rowelled spurs ceased as he grasped her hands. + +"_Unartiges Maedchen!_ Do you intend never to let me see you again? Tell +me what you mean by it." + +Not a word said Sydney--only laughed at him provokingly. + +"I am of a mind to punish you," he cried, drawing her towards him, and +leaning over her. He looked determined, and Sydney surrendered her +silence with dignified haste. + +"No, no, don't," she said, in reply to his gesture rather than his +words. "I'll tell you anything. What do you want to know?" + +"First, wherefore you were r-running down here." + +"To escape from you." + +"Tr-ruly?" + +He dropped her hands and looked cut to the heart; so hurt that Sydney +hastened to apply ointment to the wound. + +"But I was walking on the carriage-road to meet you." + +"You were?" Friedrich's gloomy face was alive again. "Then why did you +r-run?" + +"I don't know. For the same reason a kitten won't come when she's +called, I suppose." + +"Even though she wants to?" + +"Who knows what a kitten wants?" + +"It would give me the gr-reatest of pleasure, Miss Car-roll, to shake +you!" + +"I don't doubt it." + +"It is such a hard blow to my vanity that you r-ran. See, I tr-ry to +comfort myself in this question: Perhaps you did not know it was I +whose horse you heard?" + +"Of course I knew it was you." + +"Oh, Sydney, dear Sydney, did your heart tell you that your lover was +on the r-road?" + +The girl blushed hotly at this bold speech, but she declined to be +sentimental. + +"Not at all," she said. "There was other evidence. Who else could sing +like you, 'Oh, I wees' I was in Deexie'?" + +Her mimicry of his pronunciation was so good, and at the same time so +absurd, that they both laughed joyously. + +They walked slowly towards the gate, behind which Gray Eagle was +waiting with what patience he might. + +"Tell me, my pr-rincess, why have you not allowed me to see you since +that evening, though I have come every day?" + +"That terrible evening! Oh, Friedrich----" + +"Say that again!" + +"What? Friedrich?" + +"Yes. Now just one time more." + +"How absurd you are, Friedrich!" + +"I thank you. Now tell me." + +"Why, for the first day or two there was so much to do in getting them +away in their different directions--Hilda and John. Grandmother has had +a letter from John, from Palm Beach. He has joined Baron von Sternburg +there. And then--oh, Friedrich, perhaps it was foolish, but I could not +feel as if we ought to be happy, you and I, so soon after _that_." + +"What a dear, sensitive child you are! And you thought the time of +mourning was up to-day, did you?" + +"No, but--you won't make fun of me if I tell you?" + +"I have al-ways supposed that it was you who teased me." + +"But you might think it was funny ever so many years from now!" + +"Ah, now there are going to be _years_ in the future. Only a little +while ago the future was made up of thousands and thousands and +thousands of inter-rminable days." + +"I know." + +"You felt it so, too?" + +"Yes. That's the reason why--you won't ever laugh at me, will you?--I +wanted the years to begin to-day. I couldn't wait another twenty-four +hours." + +"My dar-rling!" + +They stopped, and Friedrich drew her gently into his arms. + +"Will you let me kiss you?" + +She lifted her face trustfully to his, and Gray Eagle watched them +gravely over the gate. + +"I wees' I could make you know what you are to me, my pr-rincess, what +it means that you give yourself to me. It is not merely that I love +you, my dar-rling, with all the strength that has been gathering in me +while the years were adding themselves to my age. And it is not only +that I think you are per-rfect, so lovely in the char-racter, and so +clever, and so beautiful, my dear white r-rose. It means, besides those +things, that you have saved me from the sin of letting my poor powers +grow weaker; that you have changed me from a plaything of chance into a +man of will and action. I am bor-rn again, my heart's joy, into a world +of force and possibility, and you are the queen of the world, most +pr-recious." + +She laid her bright head against his breast. + +"Will you not say something to me, heart's dear-rest?" + +"I am too happy, dear, to speak." + +"And I am too happy to keep still!" + +They released Gray Eagle from his bondage, and walked along the +carriage-road towards the house. + +"After all, Friedrich, it was Bob who gave us to each other." + +"Twice over, dear. He sent me to von Sternburg, and he saved my life +for--us." + +"Poor Hilda!" + +"Poor Bob!" + + +THE END + + + + +A DAUGHTER OF THE SNOWS. + +By JACK LONDON. + +A strong and extremely dramatic story. Its love interest intense. The +book is beautifully illustrated in colors from drawings by F. C. Yohn, +and is handsomely bound. + +Illustrated in colors. 12mo. Decorated cloth, $1.50. + + +THE INEVITABLE. + +By PHILIP VERRILL MIGHELS. + +The hero of Mr. Mighels's book is an exceedingly interesting and +good-looking young fellow of twenty-four years, whose parentage is +shrouded in mystery. + +With frontispiece in colors by John Wolcott Adams. 12mo. Decorated +cloth, $1.50. + + +WOVEN WITH THE SHIP. + +By CYRUS TOWNSEND BRADY. + +Mr. Brady's thousands of readers will derive fresh pleasure from his +new book. It has an intensely interesting plot and something happens on +every page. Illustrated with stunning drawings by Christy, Leyendecker, +Glackens, Parkhurst, and Crawford, and has a striking cover design in +colors. + +Illustrated. 12mo. Decorated cloth, $1.50. + + * * * * * + +J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY, PHILADELPHIA. + + + + +ADAM RUSH. + +By LYNN ROBY MEEKINS. + +A new and interesting figure in a love story with the charm of country +and village life in every chapter. + +Frontispiece by Francis Day. 12mo. Decorated cloth, $1.50. + + +BREACHLEY--BLACK SHEEP. + +By LOUIS BECKE. + +Mr. Becke's work is stamped by vigor of expression and an intensely +dramatic imagination. Breachley is the most capable and in many +respects the most interesting of his books. + +12mo. Decorated cloth, gilt top, $1.50. + + +A BLAZE OF GLORY. + +By JOHN STRANGE WINTER. + +A new novel by an author whose thousands of readers attest to her +continued popularity. This is one of her strongest and brightest +stories. + +12mo. Cloth, $1.25. + + +GENTLEMAN GARNET. + +By HARRY B. VOGEL. + +A tale of old Tasmania by a popular novelist. _Lippincott's Series of +Select Novels._ + +Crown 8vo. Decorated cloth, $1.00; paper, 50 cents. + + * * * * * + +J. B. 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