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diff --git a/old/sally10.txt b/old/sally10.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..eadb986 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/sally10.txt @@ -0,0 +1,6750 @@ +****The Project Gutenberg Etext of Sally Dows, by Bret Harte**** +#38 in our series by Bret Harte + + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world, be sure to check +the copyright laws for your country before posting these files!! + +Please take a look at the important information in this header. +We encourage you to keep this file on your own disk, keeping an +electronic path open for the next readers. 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FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.04.29.93*END* + + + + +SALLY DOWS + +by Bret Harte + + + + +CONTENTS + + +SALLY DOWS + +THE CONSPIRACY OF MRS. BUNKER + +THE TRANSFORMATION OF BUCKEYE CAMP + +THEIR UNCLE FROM CALIFORNIA + + + + +SALLY DOWS. + + +PROLOGUE. + +THE LAST GUN AT SNAKE RIVER. + + +What had been in the cool gray of that summer morning a dewy +country lane, marked only by a few wagon tracks that never +encroached upon its grassy border, and indented only by the faint +footprints of a crossing fox or coon, was now, before high noon, +already crushed, beaten down, and trampled out of all semblance of +its former graciousness. The heavy springless jolt of gun-carriage +and caisson had cut deeply through the middle track; the hoofs of +crowding cavalry had struck down and shredded the wayside vines and +bushes to bury them under a cloud of following dust, and the short, +plunging double-quick of infantry had trodden out this hideous ruin +into one dusty level chaos. Along that rudely widened highway +useless muskets, torn accoutrements, knapsacks, caps, and articles +of clothing were scattered, with here and there the larger wrecks +of broken-down wagons, roughly thrown aside into the ditch to make +way for the living current. For two hours the greater part of an +army corps had passed and repassed that way, but, coming or going, +always with faces turned eagerly towards an open slope on the right +which ran parallel to the lane. And yet nothing was to be seen +there. For two hours a gray and bluish cloud, rent and shaken with +explosion after explosion, but always closing and thickening after +each discharge, was all that had met their eyes. Nevertheless, +into this ominous cloud solid moving masses of men in gray or blue +had that morning melted away, or emerged from it only as scattered +fragments that crept, crawled, ran, or clung together in groups, to +be followed, and overtaken in the rolling vapor. + +But for the last half hour the desolated track had stretched empty +and deserted. While there was no cessation of the rattling, +crackling, and detonations on the fateful slope beyond, it had +still been silent. Once or twice it had been crossed by timid, +hurrying wings, and frightened and hesitating little feet, or later +by skulkers and stragglers from the main column who were tempted to +enter it from the hedges and bushes where they had been creeping +and hiding. Suddenly a prolonged yell from the hidden slope +beyond--the nearest sound that had yet been heard from that ominous +distance--sent them to cover again. It was followed by the furious +galloping of horses in the lane, and a handsome, red-capped +officer, accompanied by an orderly, dashed down the track, wheeled, +leaped the hedge, rode out on the slope and halted. In another +instant a cloud of dust came whirling down the lane after him. Out +of it strained the heavy shoulders and tightened chain-traces of +six frantic horses dragging the swaying gun that in this tempest of +motion alone seemed passive and helpless with an awful foreknowledge +of its power. As in obedience to a signal from the officer they +crashed through the hedge after him, a sudden jolt threw an +artilleryman from the limber before the wheel. A driver glanced +back on the tense chain and hesitated. "Go on!" yelled the +prostrate man, and the wheel went over him. Another and another gun +followed out of the dust cloud, until the whole battery had deployed +on the slope. Before the drifting dust had fairly settled, the +falling back of the panting horses with their drivers gave a +momentary glimpse of the nearest gun already in position and of the +four erect figures beside it. The yell that seemed to have evoked +this sudden apparition again sounded nearer; a blinding flash broke +from the gun, which was instantly hidden by the closing group around +it, and a deafening crash with the high ringing of metal ran down +the lane. A column of white, woolly smoke arose as another flash +broke beside it. This was quickly followed by another and another, +with a response from the gun first fired, until the whole slope +shook and thundered. And the smoke, no longer white and woolly, +but darkening and thickening as with unburnt grains of gunpowder, +mingled into the one ominous vapor, and driving along the lane hid +even the slope from view. + +The yelling had ceased, but the grinding and rattling heard through +the detonation of cannon came nearer still, and suddenly there was +a shower of leaves and twigs from the lower branches of a chestnut- +tree near the broken hedge. As the smoke thinned again a rising +and falling medley of flapping hats, tossing horses' heads and +shining steel appeared for an instant, advancing tumultuously up +the slope. But the apparition was as instantly cloven by flame +from the two nearest guns, and went down in a gush of smoke and +roar of sound. So level was the delivery and so close the impact +that a space seemed suddenly cleared between, in which the whirling +of the shattered remnants of the charging cavalry was distinctly +seen, and the shouts and oaths of the inextricably struggling mass +became plain and articulate. Then a gunner serving the nearest +piece suddenly dropped his swab and seized a carbine, for out of +the whirling confusion before them a single rider was seen +galloping furiously towards the gun. + +The red-capped young officer rode forward and knocked up the +gunner's weapon with his sword. For in that rapid glance he had +seen that the rider's reins were hanging loosely on the neck of his +horse, who was still dashing forwards with the frantic impetus of +the charge, and that the youthful figure of the rider, wearing the +stripes of a lieutenant,--although still erect, exercised no +control over the animal. The face was boyish, blond, and ghastly; +the eyes were set and glassy. It seemed as if Death itself were +charging the gun. + +Within a few feet of it the horse swerved before a brandished +rammer, and striking the cheeks of the gun-carriage pitched his +inanimate rider across the gun. The hot blood of the dead man +smoked on the hotter brass with the reek of the shambles, and be- +spattered the hand of the gunner who still mechanically served the +vent. As they lifted the dead body down the order came to "cease +firing." For the yells from below had ceased too; the rattling and +grinding were receding with the smoke farther to the left. The +ominous central cloud parted for a brief moment and showed the +unexpected sun glittering down the slope upon a near and peaceful +river. + +The young artillery officer had dismounted and was now gently +examining the dead man. His breast had been crushed by a fragment +of shell; he must have died instantly. The same missile had cut +the chain of a locket which slipped from his opened coat. The +officer picked it up with a strange feeling--perhaps because he was +conscious himself of wearing a similar one, perhaps because it +might give him some clue to the man's identity. It contained only +the photograph of a pretty girl, a tendril of fair hair, and the +word "Sally." In the breast-pocket was a sealed letter with the +inscription, "For Miss Sally Dows. To be delivered if I fall by +the mudsill's hand." A faint smile came over the officer's face; +he was about to hand the articles to a sergeant, but changed his +mind and put them in his pocket. + +Meantime the lane and woods beyond, and even the slope itself, were +crowding with supports and waiting troops. His own battery was +still unlimbered, waiting orders. There was a slight commotion in +the lane. + +"Very well done, captain. Smartly taken and gallantly held." + +It was the voice of a general officer passing with his staff. +There was a note of pleasant relief in its tone, and the middle- +aged, care-drawn face of its owner was relaxed in a paternal smile. +The young captain flushed with pleasure. + +"And you seem to have had close work too," added the general, +pointing to the dead man. + +The young officer hurriedly explained. The general nodded, +saluted, and passed on. But a youthful aide airily lingered. + +"The old man's feeling good, Courtland," he said. "We've rolled +'em up all along the line. It's all over now. In point of fact, I +reckon you've fired the last round in this particular fratricidal +engagement." + +The last round! Courtland remained silent, looking abstractedly at +the man it had crushed and broken at his feet. + +"And I shouldn't wonder if you got your gold-leaf for to-day's +work. But who's your sunny Southern friend here?" he added, +following his companion's eyes. + +Courtland repeated his story a little more seriously, which, +however, failed to subdue the young aide's levity. "So he +concluded to stop over," he interrupted cheerfully. "But," looking +at the letter and photograph, "I say--look here! 'Sally Dows?' +Why, there was another man picked up yesterday with a letter to the +same girl! Doc Murphy has it. And, by Jove! the same picture +too!--eh? I say, Sally must have gathered in the boys, and raked +down the whole pile! Look here, Courty! you might get Doc Murphy's +letter and hunt her up when this cruel war is over. Say you're +'fulfilling a sacred trust!' See? Good idea, old man! Ta-ta!" +and he trotted quickly after his superior. + +Courtland remained with the letter and photograph in his hand, +gazing abstractedly after him. The smoke had rolled quite away +from the fields on the left, but still hung heavily down the south +on the heels of the flying cavalry. A long bugle call swelled up +musically from below. The freed sun caught the white flags of two +field hospitals in the woods and glanced tranquilly on the broad, +cypress-fringed, lazy-flowing, and cruel but beautiful Southern +river, which had all unseen crept so smilingly that morning through +the very heart of the battle. + + +CHAPTER I. + + +The two o'clock express from Redlands to Forestville, Georgia, had +been proceeding with the languid placidity of the river whose banks +it skirted for more than two hours. But, unlike the river, it had +stopped frequently; sometimes at recognized stations and villages, +sometimes at the apparition of straw-hatted and linen-coated +natives in the solitude of pine woods, where, after a decent +interval of cheery conversation with the conductor and engineer, it +either took the stranger on board, or relieved him of his parcel, +letter, basket, or even the verbal message with which he was +charged. Much of the way lay through pine-barren and swampy woods +which had never been cleared or cultivated; much through decayed +settlements and ruined villages that had remained unchanged since +the War of the Rebellion, now three years past. There were +vestiges of the severity of a former military occupation; the +blackened timbers of railway bridges still unrepaired; and along +the line of a certain memorable march, sections of iron rails taken +from the torn-up track, roasted in bonfires and bent while red-hot +around the trunks of trees, were still to be seen. These mementos +of defeat seemed to excite neither revenge nor the energy to remove +them; the dull apathy which had succeeded the days of hysterical +passion and convulsion still lingered; even the slow improvement +that could be detected was marked by the languor of convalescence. +The helplessness of a race, hitherto dependent upon certain +barbaric conditions or political place and power, unskilled in +invention, and suddenly confronted with the necessity of personal +labor, was visible everywhere. Eyes that but three short years +before had turned vindictively to the North, now gazed wistfully to +that quarter for help and direction. They scanned eagerly the +faces of their energetic and prosperous neighbors--and quondam +foes--upon the verandas of Southern hotels and the decks of +Southern steamboats, and were even now watching from a group in the +woods the windows of the halted train, where the faces appeared of +two men of manifestly different types, but still alien to the +country in dress, features, and accent. + +Two negroes were slowly loading the engine tender from a woodpile. +The rich brown smoke of the turpentine knots was filling the train +with its stinging fragrance. The elder of the two Northern +passengers, with sharp New England angles in his face, impatiently +glanced at his watch. + +"Of all created shiftlessness, this beats everything! Why couldn't +we have taken in enough wood to last the ten miles farther to the +terminus when we last stopped? And why in thunder, with all this +firing up, can't we go faster?" + +The younger passenger, whose quiet, well-bred face seemed to +indicate more discipline of character, smiled. + +"If you really wish to know and as we've only ten miles farther to +go--I'll show you WHY. Come with me." + +He led the way through the car to the platform and leaped down. +Then he pointed significantly to the rails below them. His +companion started. The metal was scaling off in thin strips from +the rails, and in some places its thickness had been reduced a +quarter of an inch, while in others the projecting edges were torn +off, or hanging in iron shreds, so that the wheels actually ran on +the narrow central strip. It seemed marvelous that the train could +keep the track. + +"NOW you know why we don't go more than five miles an hour, and-- +are thankful that we don't," said the young traveler quietly. + +"But this is disgraceful!--criminal!" ejaculated the other +nervously. + +"Not at their rate of speed," returned the younger man. "The crime +would be in going faster. And now you can understand why a good +deal of the other progress in this State is obliged to go as slowly +over their equally decaying and rotten foundations. You can't rush +things here as we do in the North." + +The other passenger shrugged his shoulders as they remounted the +platform, and the train moved on. It was not the first time that +the two fellow-travelers had differed, although their mission was a +common one. The elder, Mr. Cyrus Drummond, was the vice-president +of a large Northern land and mill company, which had bought +extensive tracts of land in Georgia, and the younger, Colonel +Courtland, was the consulting surveyor and engineer for the +company. Drummond's opinions were a good deal affected by +sectional prejudice, and a self-satisfied and righteous ignorance +of the actual conditions and limitations of the people with whom he +was to deal; while the younger man, who had served through the war +with distinction, retained a soldier's respect and esteem for his +late antagonists, with a conscientious and thoughtful observation +of their character. Although he had resigned from the army, the +fact that he had previously graduated at West Point with high +honors had given him preferment in this technical appointment, and +his knowledge of the country and its people made him a valuable +counselor. And it was a fact that the country people had preferred +this soldier with whom they had once personally grappled to the +capitalist they had never known during the struggle. + +The train rolled slowly through the woods, so slowly that the +fragrant pine smoke from the engine still hung round the windows of +the cars. Gradually the "clearings" became larger; they saw the +distant white wooden colonnades of some planter's house, looking +still opulent and pretentious, although the fence of its inclosure +had broken gaps, and the gate sagged on its single hinge. + +Mr. Drummond sniffed at this damning record of neglect and +indifference. "Even if they were ruined, they might still have +spent a few cents for nails and slats to enable them to look decent +before folks, and not parade their poverty before their neighbors," +he said. + +"But that's just where you misunderstand them, Drummond," said +Courtland, smiling. "They have no reason to keep up an attitude +towards their neighbors, who still know them as 'Squire' so-and-so, +'Colonel' this and that, and the 'Judge,'--owners of their vast but +crippled estates. They are not ashamed of being poor, which is an +accident." + +"But they are of working, which is DELIBERATION," interrupted +Drummond. "They are ashamed to mend their fences themselves, now +that they have no slaves to do it for them." + +"I doubt very much if some of them know how to drive a nail, for +the matter of that," said Courtland, still good-humoredly, "but +that's the fault of a system older than themselves, which the +founders of the Republic retained. We cannot give them experience +in their new condition in one day, and in fact, Drummond, I am very +much afraid that for our purposes--and I honestly believe for THEIR +good--we must help to keep them for the present as they are." + +"Perhaps," said Drummond sarcastically, "you would like to +reinstate slavery?" + +"No. But I should like to reinstate the MASTER. And not for HIS +sake alone, but for freedom's sake and OURS. To be plain: since I +have taken up this matter for the company, I have satisfied myself +from personal observation that the negro--even more than his +master--cannot handle his new condition. He is accustomed to his +old traditional task-master, and I doubt if he will work fairly for +any other--particularly for those who don't understand him. Don't +mistake me: I don't propose to go back to the whip; to that brutal +institution, the irresponsible overseer; to the buying and selling, +and separation of the family, nor any of the old wrongs; but I +propose to make the old master OUR OVERSEER, and responsible to US. +He is not a fool, and has already learned that it is more profitable +to pay wages to his old slaves and have the power of dismissal, like +any other employer, than be obliged, under the old system of +enforced labor and life servitude, to undergo the cost of maintaining +incompetence and idleness. The old sentiment of slave-owning has +disappeared before natural common-sense and selfishness. I am +satisfied that by some such process as this utilizing of the old +master and the new freedom we will be better able to cultivate our +lands than by buying up their estates, and setting the old owners +adrift, with a little money in their pockets, as an idle, +discontented class to revive old political dogmas, and foment new +issues, or perhaps set up a dangerous opposition to us. + +"You don't mean to say that those infernal niggers would give the +preference to their old oppressors?" + +"Dollar for dollar in wages--yes! And why shouldn't they? Their +old masters understand them better--and treat them generally +better. They know our interest in them is only an abstract +sentiment, not a real liking. We show it at every turn. But we +are nearing Redlands, and Major Reed will, I have no doubt, +corroborate my impressions. He insists upon our staying at his +house, although the poor old fellow, I imagine, can ill afford to +entertain company. But he will be offended if we refuse." + +"He is a friend of yours, then?" asked Drummond. + +"I fought against his division at Stony Creek," said Courtland +grimly. "He never tires of talking of it to me--so I suppose I +am." + +A few moments later the train glided beside the Redlands platform. +As the two travelers descended a hand was laid on Courtland's +shoulder, and a stout figure in the blackest and shiniest of alpaca +jackets, and the whitest and broadest of Panama hats, welcomed him. +"Glad to see yo', cun'nel. I reckoned I'd waltz over and bring +along the boy," pointing to a grizzled negro servant of sixty who +was bowing before them, "to tote yo'r things over instead of using +a hack. I haven't run much on horseflesh since the wah--ha! ha! +What I didn't use up for remounts I reckon yo'r commissary gobbled +up with the other live stock, eh?" He laughed heartily, as if the +recollections were purely humorous, and again clapped Courtland on +the back. + +"Let me introduce my friend, Mr. Drummond, Major Reed," said +Courtland, smiling. + +"Yo' were in the wah, sir?" + +"No--I"--returned Drummond, hesitating, he knew not why, and angry +at his own embarrassment. + +"Mr. Drummond, the vice-president of the company," interposed +Courtland cheerfully, "was engaged in furnishing to us the sinews +of war." + +Major Reed bowed a little more formally. "Most of us heah, sir, +were in the wah some time or other, and if you gentlemen will honah +me by joining in a social glass at the hotel across the way, I'll +introduce you to Captain Prendergast, who left a leg at Fair Oaks." +Drummond would have declined, but a significant pressure on his arm +from Courtland changed his determination. He followed them to the +hotel and into the presence of the one-legged warrior (who turned +out to be the landlord and barkeeper), to whom Courtland was +hilariously introduced by Major Reed as "the man, sir, who had +pounded my division for three hours at Stony Creek!" + +Major Reed's house was but a few minutes' walk down the dusty lane, +and was presently heralded by the baying of three or four foxhounds +and foreshadowed by a dilapidated condition of picket-fence and +stuccoed gate front. Beyond it stretched the wooden Doric columns +of the usual Southern mansion, dimly seen through the broad leaves +of the horse-chestnut-trees that shaded it. There were the usual +listless black shadows haunting the veranda and outer offices-- +former slaves and still attached house-servants, arrested like +lizards in breathless attitudes at the approach of strange +footsteps, and still holding the brush, broom, duster, or home +implement they had been lazily using, in their fixed hands. From +the doorway of the detached kitchen, connected by a gallery to the +wing of the mansion, "Aunt Martha," the cook, gazed also, with a +saucepan clasped to her bosom, and her revolving hand with the +scrubbing cloth in it apparently stopped on a dead centre. + +Drummond, whose gorge had risen at these evidences of hopeless +incapacity and utter shiftlessness, was not relieved by the +presence of Mrs. Reed--a soured, disappointed woman of forty, who +still carried in her small dark eyes and thin handsome lips +something of the bitterness and antagonism of the typical "Southern +rights" woman; nor of her two daughters, Octavia and Augusta, whose +languid atrabiliousness seemed a part of the mourning they still +wore. The optimistic gallantry and good fellowship of the major +appeared the more remarkable by contrast with his cypress-shadowed +family and their venomous possibilities. Perhaps there might have +been a light vein of Southern insincerity in his good humor. +"Paw," said Miss Octavia, with gloomy confidence to Courtland, but +with a pretty curl of the hereditary lip, "is about the only +'reconstructed' one of the entire family. We don't make 'em much +about yer. But I'd advise yo' friend, Mr. Drummond, if he's coming +here carpet-bagging, not to trust too much to paw's 'reconstruction.' +It won't wash." But when Courtland hastened to assure her that +Drummond was not a "carpet-bagger," was not only free from any of +the political intrigue implied under that baleful title, but was a +wealthy Northern capitalist simply seeking investment, the young +lady was scarcely more hopeful. "I suppose he reckons to pay paw +for those niggers yo' stole?" she suggested with gloomy sarcasm. + +"No," said Courtland, smiling; "but what if he reckoned to pay +those niggers for working for your father and him?" + +"If paw is going into trading business with him; if Major Reed--a +So'th'n gentleman--is going to keep shop, he ain't such a fool as +to believe niggers will work when they ain't obliged to. THAT'S +been tried over at Mirandy Dows's, not five miles from here, and +the niggers are half the time hangin' round here takin' holiday. +She put up new quarters for 'em, and tried to make 'em eat together +at a long table like those low-down folks up North, and did away +with their cabins and their melon patches, and allowed it would get +'em out of lying round too much, and wanted 'em to work over-time +and get mo' pay. And the result was that she and her niece, and a +lot of poor whites, Irish and Scotch, that she had to pick up +''long the river,' do all the work. And her niece Sally was mo' +than half Union woman during the wah, and up to all No'th'n tricks +and dodges, and swearin' by them; and yet, for all that--the thing +won't work." + +"But isn't that partly the reason? Isn't her failure a great deal +due to this lack of sympathy from her neighbors? Discontent is +easily sown, and the negro is still weighted down by superstition; +the Fifteenth Amendment did not quite knock off ALL his chains." + +"Yes, but that is nothing to HER. For if there ever was a person +in this world who reckoned she was just born to manage everything +and everybody, it is Sally Dows!" + +"Sally Dows!" repeated Courtland, with a slight start. + +"Yes, Sally Dows, of Pineville." + +"You say she was half Union, but did she have any relations or-- +or--friends--in the war--on your side? Any--who--were killed in +battle?" + +"They were all killed, I reckon," returned Miss Reed darkly. +"There was her cousin, Jule Jeffcourt, shot in the cemetery with +her beau, who, they say, was Sally's too; there were Chet Brooks +and Joyce Masterton, who were both gone on her and both killed too; +and there was old Captain Dows himself, who never lifted his head +again after Richmond was taken, and drank himself to death. It +wasn't considered healthy to be Miss Sally's relations in those +times, or to be even wantin' to be one." + +Colonel Courtland did not reply. The face of the dead young +officer coming towards him out of the blue smoke rose as vividly as +on that memorable day. The picture and letter he had taken from +the dead man's breast, which he had retained ever since; the +romantic and fruitless quest he had made for the fair original in +after days; and the strange and fateful interest in her which had +grown up in his heart since then, he now knew had only been lulled +to sleep in the busy preoccupation of the last six months, for it +all came back to him with redoubled force. His present mission and +its practical object, his honest zeal in its pursuit, and the +cautious skill and experience he had brought to it, all seemed to +be suddenly displaced by this romantic and unreal fantasy. Oddly +enough it appeared now to be the only reality in his life, the rest +was an incoherent, purposeless dream. + +"Is--is--Miss Sally married?" he asked, collecting himself with an +effort. + +"Married? Yes, to that farm of her aunt's! I reckon that's the +only thing she cares for." + +Courtland looked up, recovering his usual cheerful calm. "Well, I +think that after luncheon I'll pay my respects to her family. From +what you have just told me the farm is certainly an experiment +worth seeing. I suppose your father will have no objection to give +me a letter to Miss Dows?" + + +CHAPTER II. + + +Nevertheless, as Colonel Courtland rode deliberately towards Dows' +Folly, as the new experiment was locally called, although he had +not abated his romantic enthusiasm in the least, he was not sorry +that he was able to visit it under a practical pretext. It was +rather late now to seek out Miss Sally Dows with the avowed intent +of bringing her a letter from an admirer who had been dead three +years, and whose memory she had probably buried. Neither was it +tactful to recall a sentiment which might have been a weakness of +which she was ashamed. Yet, clear-headed and logical as Courtland +was in his ordinary affairs, he was nevertheless not entirely free +from that peculiar superstition which surrounds every man's +romance. He believed there was something more than a mere +coincidence in his unexpectedly finding himself in such favorable +conditions for making her acquaintance. For the rest--if there was +any rest--he would simply trust to fate. And so, believing himself +a cool, sagacious reasoner, but being actually, as far as Miss Dows +was concerned, as blind, fatuous, and unreasoning as any of her +previous admirers, he rode complacently forward until he reached +the lane that led to the Dows plantation. + +Here a better kept roadway and fence, whose careful repair would +have delighted Drummond, seemed to augur well for the new +enterprise. Presently, even the old-fashioned local form of the +fence, a slanting zigzag, gave way to the more direct line of post +and rail in the Northern fashion. Beyond it presently appeared a +long low frontage of modern buildings which, to Courtland's +surprise, were entirely new in structure and design. There was no +reminiscence of the usual Southern porticoed gable or columned +veranda. Yet it was not Northern either. The factory-like outline +of facade was partly hidden in Cherokee rose and jessamine. + +A long roofed gallery connected the buildings and became a veranda +to one. A broad, well-rolled gravel drive led from the open gate +to the newest building, which seemed to be the office; a smaller +path diverged from it to the corner house, which, despite its +severe simplicity, had a more residential appearance. Unlike +Reed's house, there were no lounging servants or field hands to be +seen; they were evidently attending to their respective duties. +Dismounting, Courtland tied his horse to a post at the office door +and took the smaller path to the corner house. + +The door was open to the fragrant afternoon breeze wafted through +the rose and jessamine. So also was a side door opening from the +hall into a long parlor or sitting-room that ran the whole width of +the house. Courtland entered it. It was prettily furnished, but +everything had the air of freshness and of being uncharacteristically +new. It was empty, but a faint hammering was audible on the rear +wall of the house, through the two open French windows at the back, +curtained with trailing vines, which gave upon a sunlit courtyard. +Courtland walked to the window. Just before it, on the ground, +stood a small light ladder, which he gently put aside to gain a +better view of the courtyard as he put on his hat, and stepped out +of the open window. + +In this attitude he suddenly felt his hat tipped from his head, +followed almost instantaneously by a falling slipper, and the +distinct impression of a very small foot on the crown of his head. +An indescribable sensation passed over him. He hurriedly stepped +back into the room, just as a small striped-stockinged foot was as +hastily drawn up above the top of the window with the feminine +exclamation, "Good gracious me!" + +Lingering for an instant, only to assure himself that the fair +speaker had secured her foothold and was in no danger of falling, +Courtland snatched up his hat, which had providentially fallen +inside the room, and retreated ingloriously to the other end of the +parlor. The voice came again from the window, and struck him as +being very sweet and clear:-- + +"Sophy, is that YOU?" + +Courtland discreetly retired to the hall. To his great relief a +voice from the outside answered, "Whar, Miss Sally?" + +"What did yo' move the ladder for? Yo' might have killed me." + +"Fo' God, Miss Sally, I didn't move no ladder!" + +"Don't tell me, but go down and get my slipper. And bring up some +more nails." + +Courtland waited silently in the hall. In a few moments he heard a +heavy footstep outside the rear window. This was his opportunity. +Re-entering the parlor somewhat ostentatiously, he confronted a +tall negro girl who was passing through the room carrying a tiny +slipper in her hand. "Excuse me," he said politely, "but I could +not find any one to announce me. Is Miss Dows at home?" + +The girl instantly whipped the slipper behind her. "Is yo' wanting +Miss Mirandy Dows," she asked with great dignity, "oah Miss Sally +Dows--her niece? Miss Mirandy's bin gone to Atlanta for a week." + +"I have a letter for Miss Miranda, but I shall be very glad if Miss +Sally Dows will receive me, returned Courtland, handing the letter +and his card to the girl. + +She received it with a still greater access of dignity and marked +deliberation. "It's clean gone outer my mind, sah, ef Miss Sally +is in de resumption of visitahs at dis houah. In fac', sah," she +continued, with intensified gravity and an exaggeration of +thoughtfulness as the sounds of Miss Sally's hammering came +shamelessly from the wall, "I doahn know exac'ly ef she's engaged +playin' de harp, practicin' de languages, or paintin' in oil and +watah colors, o' givin' audiences to offishals from de Court House. +It might be de houah for de one or de odder. But I'll communicate +wid her, sah, in de budwoh on de uppah flo'." She backed +dexterously, so as to keep the slipper behind her, but with no +diminution of dignity, out of a side door. In another moment the +hammering ceased, followed by the sound of rapid whispering +without; a few tiny twigs and leaves slowly rustled to the ground, +and then there was complete silence. He ventured to walk to the +fateful window again. + +Presently he heard a faint rustle at the other end of the room, and +he turned. A sudden tremulousness swept along his pulses, and then +they seemed to pause; he drew a deep breath that was almost a sigh, +and remained motionless. + +He had no preconceived idea of falling in love with Miss Sally at +first sight, nor had he dreamed such a thing possible. Even the +girlish face that he had seen in the locket, although it had +stirred him with a singular emotion, had not suggested that. And +the ideal he had evolved from it was never a potent presence. But +the exquisitely pretty face and figure before him, although it +might have been painted from his own fancy of her, was still +something more and something unexpected. All that had gone before +had never prepared him for the beautiful girl who now stood there. +It was a poor explanation to say that Miss Sally was four or five +years older than her picture, and that later experiences, enlarged +capacity, a different life, and new ambition had impressed her +youthful face with a refined mobility; it was a weird fancy to +imagine that the blood of those who had died for her had in some +vague, mysterious way imparted an actual fascination to her, and he +dismissed it. But even the most familiar spectator, like Sophy, +could see that Miss Sally had the softest pink complexion, the +silkiest hair, that looked as the floss of the Indian corn might +look if curled, or golden spider threads if materialized, and eyes +that were in bright gray harmony with both; that the frock of India +muslin, albeit home-made, fitted her figure perfectly, from the +azure bows on her shoulders to the ribbon around her waist; and +that the hem of its billowy skirt showed a foot which had the +reputation of being the smallest foot south of Mason and Dixon's +Line! But it was something more intangible than this which kept +Courtland breathless and silent. + +"I'm not Miss Miranda Dows," said the vision with a frankness that +was half childlike and half practical, as she extended a little +hand, "but I can talk 'fahm' with yo' about as well as aunty, and I +reckon from what Major Reed says heah," holding up the letter +between her fingers, "as long as yo' get the persimmons yo' don't +mind what kind o' pole yo' knock 'em down with." + +The voice that carried this speech was so fresh, clear, and sweet +that I am afraid Courtland thought little of its bluntness or its +conventional transgressions. But it brought him his own tongue +quite unemotionally and quietly. "I don't know what was in that +note, Miss Dows, but I can hardly believe that Major Reed ever put +my present felicity quite in that way." + +Miss Sally laughed. Then with a charming exaggeration she waved +her little hand towards the sofa. + +"There! Yo' naturally wanted a little room for that, co'nnle, but +now that yo' 've got it off,--and mighty pooty it was, too,--yo' +can sit down." And with that she sank down at one end of the sofa, +prettily drew aside a white billow of skirt so as to leave ample +room for Courtland at the other, and clasping her fingers over her +knees, looked demurely expectant. + +"But let me hope that I am not disturbing you unseasonably," said +Courtland, catching sight of the fateful little slipper beneath her +skirt, and remembering the window. "I was so preoccupied in +thinking of your aunt as the business manager of these estates that +I quite forget that she might have a lady's hours for receiving." + +"We haven't got any company hours," said Miss Sally, "and we +haven't just now any servants for company manners, for we're short- +handed in the fields and barns. When yo' came I was nailing up the +laths for the vines outside, because we couldn't spare carpenters +from the factory. But," she added, with a faint accession of +mischief in her voice, "yo' came to talk about the fahm?" + +"Yes," said Courtland, rising, "but not to interrupt the work on +it. Will you let me help you nail up the laths on the wall? I +have some experience that way, and we can talk as we work. Do +oblige me!" + +The young girl looked at him brightly. + +"Well, now, there's nothing mean about THAT. Yo' mean it for +sure?" + +"Perfectly. I shall feel so much less as if I was enjoying your +company under false pretenses." + +"Yo' just wait here, then." + +She jumped from the sofa, ran out of the room, and returned +presently, tying the string of a long striped cotton blouse-- +evidently an extra one of Sophy's--behind her back as she returned. +It was gathered under her oval chin by a tape also tied behind her, +while her fair hair was tucked under the usual red bandana +handkerchief of the negro housemaid. It is scarcely necessary to +add that the effect was bewitching. + +"But," said Miss Sally, eying her guest's smartly fitting frock- +coat, "yo' 'll spoil yo'r pooty clothes, sure! Take off yo'r coat-- +don't mind me--and work in yo'r shirtsleeves." + +Courtland obediently flung aside his coat and followed his active +hostess through the French window to the platform outside. Above +them a wooden ledge or cornice, projecting several inches, ran the +whole length of the building. It was on this that Miss Sally had +evidently found a foothold while she was nailing up a trellis-work +of laths between it and the windows of the second floor. Courtland +found the ladder, mounted to the ledge, followed by the young girl, +who smilingly waived his proffered hand to help her up, and the two +gravely set to work. But in the intervals of hammering and tying +up the vines Miss Sally's tongue was not idle. Her talk was as +fresh, as quaint, as original as herself, and yet so practical and +to the purpose of Courtland's visit as to excuse his delight in it +and her own fascinating propinquity. Whether she stopped to take a +nail from between her pretty lips when she spoke to him, or whether +holding on perilously with one hand to the trellis while she +gesticulated with the hammer, pointing out the divisions of the +plantation from her coign of vantage, he thought she was as clear +and convincing to his intellect as she was distracting to his +senses. + +She told him how the war had broken up their old home in Pineville, +sending her father to serve in the Confederate councils of +Richmond, and leaving her aunt and herself to manage the property +alone; how the estate had been devastated, the house destroyed, and +how they had barely time to remove a few valuables; how, although +SHE had always been opposed to secession and the war, she had not +gone North, preferring to stay with her people, and take with them +the punishment of the folly she had foreseen. How after the war +and her father's death she and her aunt had determined to +"reconstruct THEMSELVES" after their own fashion on this bit of +property, which had survived their fortunes because it had always +been considered valueless and unprofitable for negro labor. How +at first they had undergone serious difficulty, through the +incompetence and ignorance of the freed laborer, and the equal +apathy and prejudice of their neighbors. How they had gradually +succeeded with the adoption of new methods and ideas that she +herself had conceived, which she now briefly and clearly stated. +Courtland listened with a new, breathless, and almost superstitious +interest: they were HIS OWN THEORIES--perfected and demonstrated! + +"But you must have had capital for this?" + +Ah, yes! that was where they were fortunate. There were some +French cousins with whom she had once stayed in Paris, who advanced +enough to stock the estate. There were some English friends of her +father's, old blockade runners, who had taken shares, provided them +with more capital, and imported some skilled laborers and a kind of +steward or agent to represent them. But they were getting on, and +perhaps it was better for their reputation with their neighbors +that they had not been BEHOLDEN to the "No'th." Seeing a cloud +pass over Courtland's face, the young lady added with an affected +sigh, and the first touch of feminine coquetry which had invaded +their wholesome camaraderie:-- + +"Yo' ought to have found us out BEFORE, co'nnle." + +For an impulsive moment Courtland felt like telling her then and +there the story of his romantic quest; but the reflection that they +were standing on a narrow ledge with no room for the emotions, and +that Miss Sally had just put a nail in her mouth and a start might +be dangerous, checked him. To this may be added a new jealousy of +her previous experiences, which he had not felt before. +Nevertheless, he managed to say with some effusion:-- + +"But I hope we are not too late NOW. I think my principals are +quite ready and able to buy up any English or French investor now +or to come." + +"Yo' might try yo' hand on that one," said Miss Sally, pointing to +a young fellow who had just emerged from the office and was +crossing the courtyard. "He's the English agent." + +He was square-shouldered and round-headed, fresh and clean looking +in his white flannels, but with an air of being utterly distinct +and alien to everything around him, and mentally and morally +irreconcilable to it. As he passed the house he glanced shyly at +it; his eye brightened and his manner became self-conscious as he +caught sight of the young girl, but changed again when he saw her +companion. Courtland likewise was conscious of a certain +uneasiness; it was one thing to be helping Miss Sally ALONE, but +certainly another thing to be doing so under the eye of a stranger; +and I am afraid that he met the stony observation of the Englishman +with an equally cold stare. Miss Sally alone retained her languid +ease and self-possession. She called out, "Wait a moment, Mr. +Champney," slipped lightly down the ladder, and leaning against it +with one foot on its lowest rung awaited his approach. + +"I reckoned yo' might be passing by," she said, as he came forward. +"Co'nnle Courtland," with an explanatory wave of the hammer towards +her companion, who remained erect and slightly stiffened on the +cornice, "is no relation to those figures along the frieze of the +Redlands Court House, but a No'th'n officer, a friend of Major +Reed's, who's come down here to look after So'th'n property for +some No'th'n capitalists. Mr. Champney," she continued, turning +and lifting her eyes to Courtland as she indicated Champney with +her hammer, "when he isn't talking English, seeing English, +thinking English, dressing English, and wondering why God didn't +make everything English, is trying to do the same for HIS folks. +Mr. Champney, Co'nnle Courtland. Co'nnle Courtland, Mr. Champney!" +The two men bowed formally. "And now, Co'nnle, if yo'll come down, +Mr. Champney will show yo' round the fahm. When yo' 've got +through yo'll find me here at work." + +Courtland would have preferred, and half looked for her company +and commentary on this round of inspection, but he concealed his +disappointment and descended. It did not exactly please him that +Champney seemed relieved, and appeared to accept him as a bona fide +stranger who could not possibly interfere with any confidential +relations that he might have with Miss Sally. Nevertheless, he met +the Englishman's offer to accompany him with polite gratitude, and +they left the house together. + +In less than an hour they returned. It had not even taken that +time for Courtland to discover that the real improvements and the +new methods had originated with Miss Sally; that she was virtually +the controlling influence there, and that she was probably retarded +rather than assisted by the old-fashioned and traditional +conservatism of the company of which Champney was steward. It was +equally plain, however, that the young fellow was dimly conscious +of this, and was frankly communicative about it. + +"You see, over there they work things in a different way, and, by +Jove! they can't understand that there is any other, don't you +know? They're always wigging me as if I could help it, although +I've tried to explain the nigger business, and all that, don't you +know? They want Miss Dows to refer her plans to me, and expect me +to report on them, and then they'll submit them to the Board and +wait for its decision. Fancy Miss Dows doing that! But, by Jove! +they can't conceive of her AT ALL over there, don't you know?" + +"Which Miss Dows do you mean?" asked Courtland dryly. + +"Miss Sally, of course," said the young fellow briskly. "SHE +manages everything--her aunt included. She can make those niggers +work when no one else can, a word or smile from her is enough. She +can make terms with dealers and contractors--her own terms, too-- +when they won't look at MY figures. By Jove! she even gets points +out of those traveling agents and inventors, don't you know, who +come along the road with patents and samples. She got one of those +lightning-rod and wire-fence men to show her how to put up an arbor +for her trailing roses. Why, when I first saw YOU up on the +cornice, I thought you were some other chap that she'd asked--don't +you know--that is, at first, of course!--you know what I mean--ha, +by Jove!--before we were introduced, don't you know." + +"I think I OFFERED to help Miss Dows," said Courtland with a +quickness that he at once regretted. + +"So did HE, don't you know? Miss Sally does not ASK anybody. +Don't you see? a fellow don't like to stand by and see a young lady +like her doing such work." Vaguely aware of some infelicity in his +speech, he awkwardly turned the subject: "I don't think I shall +stay here long, myself." + +"You expect to return to England?" asked Courtland. + +"Oh, no! But I shall go out of the company's service and try my +own hand. There's a good bit of land about three miles from here +that's in the market, and I think I could make something out of it. +A fellow ought to settle down and be his own master," he answered +tentatively, "eh?" + +"But how will Miss Dows be able to spare you?" asked Courtland, +uneasily conscious that he was assuming an indifference. + +"Oh, I'm not much use to her, don't you know--at least not HERE. +But I might, if I had my own land and if we were neighbors. I told +you SHE runs the place, no matter who's here, or whose money is +invested." + +"I presume you are speaking now of young Miss Dows?" said Courtland +dryly. + +"Miss Sally--of course--always," said Champney simply. "She runs +the shop." + +"Were there not some French investors--relations of Miss Dows? +Does anybody represent THEM?" asked Courtland pointedly. + +Yet he was not quite prepared for the naive change in his +companion's face. "No. There was a sort of French cousin who used +to be a good deal to the fore, don't you know? But I rather fancy +he didn't come here to look after the PROPERTY," returned Champney +with a quick laugh. "I think the aunt must have written to his +friends, for they 'called him off,' and I don't think Miss Sally +broke her heart about him. She's not that sort of girl--eh? She +could have her pick of the State if she went in for that sort of +thing--eh?" + +Although this was exactly what Courtland was thinking, it pleased +him to answer in a distrait sort of fashion, "Certainly, I should +think so," and to relapse into an apparently business abstraction. + +"I think I won't go in," continued Champney as they neared the +house again. "I suppose you'll have something more to say to Miss +Dows. If there's anything else you want of ME, come to the office. +But SHE'LL know. And--er--er--if you're--er--staying long in this +part of the country, ride over and look me up, don't you know? and +have a smoke and a julep; I have a boy who knows how to mix them, +and I've some old brandy sent me from the other side. Good-by." + +More awkward in his kindliness than in his simple business +confidences, but apparently equally honest in both, he shook +Courtland's hand and walked away. Courtland turned towards the +house. He had seen the farm and its improvements; he had found +some of his own ideas practically discounted; clearly there was +nothing left for him to do but to thank his hostess and take his +leave. But he felt far more uneasy than when he had arrived; and +there was a singular sense of incompleteness in his visit that he +could not entirely account for. His conversation with Champney had +complicated--he knew not why--his previous theories of Miss Dows, +and although he was half conscious that this had nothing to do with +the business that brought him there, he tried to think that it had. +If Miss Sally was really--a--a--distracting element to contiguous +man, it was certainly something to be considered in a matter of +business of which she would take a managerial part. It was true +that Champney had said she was "not that sort of girl," but this +was the testimony of one who was clearly under her influence. He +entered the house through the open French window. The parlor was +deserted. He walked through the front hall and porch; no one was +there. He lingered a few moments, a slight chagrin beginning to +mingle with his uneasiness. She might have been on the lookout for +him. She or Sophy must have seen him returning. He would ring for +Sophy, and leave his thanks and regrets for her mistress. He +looked for a bell, touched it, but on being confronted with Sophy, +changed his mind and asked to SEE Miss Dows. In the interval +between her departure and the appearance of Miss Sally he resolved +to do the very thing which he had dismissed from his thoughts but +an hour before as ill-timed and doubtful. He had the photograph +and letter in his pocket; he would make them his excuse for +personally taking leave of her. + +She entered with her fair eyebrows lifted in a pretty surprise. + +"I declare to goodness, I thought yo' 'd ridden over to the red +barn and gone home from there. I got through my work on the vines +earlier than I thought. One of Judge Garret's nephews dropped in +in time to help me with the last row. Yo' needn't have troubled +yo'self to send up for me for mere company manners, but Sophy says +yo' looked sort of 'anxious and particular' when yo' asked for me-- +so I suppose yo' want to see me for something." + +Mentally objurgating Sophy, and with an unpleasant impression in +his mind of the unknown neighbor who had been helping Miss Sally in +his place, he nevertheless tried to collect himself gallantly. + +"I don't know what my expression conveyed to Sophy," he said with a +smile, "but I trust that what I have to tell you may be interesting +enough to make you forget my second intrusion." He paused, and +still smiling continued: "For more than three years, Miss Dows, you +have more or less occupied my thoughts; and although we have +actually met to-day only for the first time, I have during that +time carried your image with me constantly. Even this meeting, +which was only the result of an accident, I had been seeking for +three years. I find you here under your own peaceful vine and fig- +tree, and yet three years ago you came to me out of the thunder- +cloud of battle." + +"My good gracious!" said Miss Sally. + +She had been clasping her knee with her linked fingers, but +separated them and leaned backward on the sofa with affected +consternation, but an expression of growing amusement in her bright +eyes. Courtland saw the mistake of his tone, but it was too late +to change it now. He handed her the locket and the letter, and +briefly, and perhaps a little more seriously, recounted the +incident that had put him in possession of them. But he entirely +suppressed the more dramatic and ghastly details, and his own +superstition and strange prepossession towards her. + +Miss Sally took the articles without a tremor, or the least +deepening or paling of the delicate, faint suffusion of her cheek. +When she had glanced over the letter, which appeared to be brief, +she said, with smiling, half-pitying tranquillity:-- + +"Yes!--it WAS that poor Chet Brooks, sure! I heard that he was +killed at Snake River. It was just like him to rush in and get +killed the first pop! And all for nothing, too,--pure foolishness!" + +Shocked, yet relieved, but uneasy under both sensations, Courtland +went on blindly: + +"But he was not the only one, Miss Dows. There was another man +picked up who also had your picture." + +"Yes--Joyce Masterton. They sent it to me. But you didn't kill +HIM, too?" + +"I don't know that I personally killed either," he said a little +coldly. He paused, and continued with a gravity which he could not +help feeling very inconsistent and even ludicrous: "They were brave +men, Miss Dows." + +"To have worn my picture?" said Miss Sally brightly. + +"To have THOUGHT they had so much to live for, and yet to have +willingly laid down their lives for what they believed was right." + +"Yo' didn't go huntin' me for three years to tell ME, a So'th'n +girl, that So'th'n men know how to fight, did yo', co'nnle?" +returned the young lady, with the slightest lifting of her head and +drooping of her blue-veined lids in a divine hauteur. "They were +always ready enough for that, even among themselves. It was much +easier for these pooah boys to fight a thing out than think it out, +or work it out. Yo' folks in the No'th learned to do all three; +that's where you got the grip on us. Yo' look surprised, co'nnle." + +"I didn't expect you would look at it--quite in--in--that way," +said Courtland awkwardly. + +"I am sorry I disappointed yo' after yo' 'd taken such a heap o' +trouble," returned the young lady with a puzzling assumption of +humility as she rose and smoothed out her skirts, "but I couldn't +know exactly what yo' might be expecting after three years; if I +HAD, I might have put on mo'ning." She stopped and adjusted a +straying tendril of her hair with the sharp corner of the dead +man's letter. "But I thank yo', all the same, co'nnle. It was +real good in yo' to think of toting these things over here." And +she held out her hand frankly. + +Courtland took it with the sickening consciousness that for the +last five minutes he had been an unconscionable ass. He could not +prolong the interview after she had so significantly risen. If he +had only taken his leave and kept the letter and locket for a later +visit, perhaps when they were older friends! It was too late now. +He bent over her hand for a moment, again thanked her for her +courtesy, and withdrew. A moment later she heard the receding beat +of his horse's hoofs on the road. + +She opened the drawer of a brass-handled cabinet, and after a +moment's critical survey of her picture in the dead man's locket, +tossed it and the letter into the recesses of the drawer. Then she +stopped, removed her little slipper from her foot, looked at THAT, +too, thoughtfully, and called "Sophy!" + +"Miss Sally?" said the girl, reappearing at the door. + +"Are you sure you did not move that ladder?" + +"I 'clare to goodness, Miss Sally, I never teched it!" + +Miss Sally directed a critical glance at her handmaiden's red- +coifed head. "No," she said to herself softly, "it felt nicer than +wool, anyway!" + + +CHAPTER III. + + +In spite of the awkward termination of his visit,--or perhaps +BECAUSE of it,--Courtland called again at the plantation within the +week. But this time he was accompanied by Drummond, and was +received by Miss Miranda Dows, a tall, aquiline-nosed spinster of +fifty, whose old-time politeness had become slightly affected, and +whose old beliefs had given way to a half-cynical acceptance of new +facts. Mr. Drummond, delighted with the farm and its management, +was no less fascinated by Miss Sally, while Courtland was now +discreet enough to divide his attentions between her and her aunt, +with the result that he was far from participating in Champney's +conviction of Miss Miranda's unimportance. To the freedmen she +still represented the old implacable task-mistress, and it was +evident that they superstitiously believed that she still retained +a vague power of overriding the Fourteenth Amendment at her +pleasure, and was only to be restrained by the mediation of the +good-humored and sensible Miss Sally. Courtland was quick to +see the value of this influence in the transition state of the +freedmen, and pointed it out to his principal. Drummond's previous +doubts and skepticism, already weakened by Miss Sally's fascinations, +vanished entirely at this prospect of beneficially utilizing these +lingering evils of slavery. He was convinced, he was even +enthusiastic. The foreign investors were men to be bought out; the +estate improved and enlarged by the company, and the fair owners +retained in the management and control. Like most prejudiced men, +Drummond's conversion was sudden and extreme, and, being a practical +man, was at once acted upon. At a second and third interview the +preliminaries were arranged, and in three weeks from Courtland's +first visit, the Dows' plantation and part of Major Reed's were +merged in the "Drummond Syndicate," and placed beyond financial +uncertainty. Courtland remained to represent the company as +superintendent at Redlands, and with the transfer of the English +investments Champney retired, as he had suggested, to a smaller +venture of his own, on a plantation a few miles distant which the +company had been unable to secure. + +During this interval Courtland had frequent interviews with Miss +Sally, and easy and unrestrained access to her presence. He had +never again erred on the side of romance or emotion; he had never +again referred to the infelix letter and photograph; and, without +being obliged to confine himself strictly to business affairs, he +had maintained an even, quiet, neighborly intercourse with her. +Much of this was the result of his own self-control and soldierly +training, and gave little indication of the deeper feeling that he +was conscious lay beneath it. At times he caught the young girl's +eyes fixed upon him with a mischievous curiosity. A strange thrill +went through him; there are few situations so subtle and dangerous +as the accidental confidences and understandings of two young +people of opposite sex, even though the question of any sentimental +inclination be still in abeyance. Courtland knew that Miss Sally +remembered the too serious attitude he had taken towards her past. +She might laugh at it, and even resent it, but she KNEW it, +remembered it, knew that HE did, and this precious knowledge was +confined to themselves. It was in their minds when there was a +pause in their more practical and conventional conversation, and +was even revealed in the excessive care which Miss Sally later took +to avert at the right moment her mischievously smiling eyes. Once +she went farther. Courtland had just finished explaining to her a +plan for substituting small farm buildings for the usual half- +cultivated garden-patches dear to the negro field-hand, and had +laid down the drawings on the table in the office, when the young +lady, leaning against it with her hands behind her, fixed her +bright gray eyes on his serious face. + +"I vow and protest, co'nnle," she said, dropping into one of the +quaint survivals of an old-time phraseology peculiar to her people, +"I never allowed yo' could just give yo'self up to business, soul +and body, as yo' do, when I first met yo' that day." + +"Why, what did you think me?" he asked quickly. + +Miss Sally, who had a Southern aptitude for gesture, took one +little hand from behind her, twirled it above her head with a +pretty air of disposing of some airy nothing in a presumably +masculine fashion, and said, "Oh, THAT." + +"I am afraid I did not impress you then as a very practical man," +he said, with a faint color. + +"I thought you roosted rather high, co'nnle, to pick up many worms +in the mo'ning. But," she added with a dazzling smile, "I reckon +from what yo' said about the photograph, yo' thought I wasn't +exactly what yo' believed I ought to be, either." + +He would have liked to tell her then and there that he would have +been content if those bright, beautiful eyes had never kindled with +anything but love or womanly aspiration; that that soft, lazy, +caressing voice had never been lifted beyond the fireside or +domestic circle; that the sunny, tendriled hair and pink ears had +never inclined to anything but whispered admiration; and that the +graceful, lithe, erect figure, so independent and self-contained, +had been satisfied to lean only upon his arm for support. He was +conscious that this had been in his mind when he first saw her; he +was equally conscious that she was more bewilderingly fascinating +to him in her present inaccessible intelligence and practicality. + +"I confess," he said, looking into her eyes with a vague smile, "I +did not expect you would be so forgetful of some one who had +evidently cared for you." + +"Meaning Mr. Chet Brooks, or Mr. Joyce Masterton, or both. That's +like most yo' men, co'nnle. Yo' reckon because a girl pleases yo' +she ought to be grateful all her life--and yo'rs, too! Yo' think +different now! But yo' needn't act up to it quite so much." She +made a little deprecating gesture with her disengaged hand as if to +ward off any retaliating gallantry. "I ain't speaking for myself, +co'nnle. Yo' and me are good enough friends. But the girls round +here think yo' 're a trifle too much taken up with rice and +niggers. And looking at it even in yo'r light, co'nnle, it ain't +BUSINESS. Yo' want to keep straight with Major Reed, so it would +be just as well to square the major's woman folks. Tavy and Gussie +Reed ain't exactly poisonous, co'nnle, and yo' might see one or the +other home from church next Sunday. The Sunday after that, just to +show yo' ain't particular, and that yo' go in for being a regular +beau, yo' might walk home with ME. Don't be frightened--I've got a +better gown than this. It's a new one, just come home from +Louisville, and I'll wear it for the occasion." + +He did not dare to say that the quaint frock she was then wearing-- +a plain "checked" household gingham used for children's pinafores, +with its ribbons of the same pattern, gathered in bows at the smart +apron pockets--had become a part of her beauty, for he was already +hopelessly conscious that she was lovely in anything, and he might +be impelled to say so. He thanked her gravely and earnestly, but +without gallantry or effusion, and had the satisfaction of seeing +the mischief in her eyes increase in proportion to his seriousness, +and heard her say with affected concern: "Bear up, co'nnle! Don't +let it worry yo' till the time comes," and took his leave. + +On the following Sunday he was present at the Redlands Episcopal +Church, and after the service stood with outward composure but some +inward chafing among the gallant youth who, after the local +fashion, had ranged themselves outside the doors of the building. +He was somewhat surprised to find Mr. Champney, evidently as much +out of place as himself, but less self-contained, waiting in the +crowd of expectant cavaliers. Although convinced that the young +Englishman had come only to see Miss Sally, he was glad to share +his awkward isolation with another stranger, and greeted him +pleasantly. The Dows' pew, being nearer to the entrance than the +Reeds', gave up its occupants first. Colonel Courtland lifted his +hat to Miss Miranda and her niece at the same moment that Champney +moved forward and ranged himself beside them. Miss Sally, catching +Courtland's eye, showed the whites of her own in a backward glance +of mischievous significance to indicate the following Reeds. When +they approached, Courtland joined them, and finding himself beside +Miss Octavia entered into conversation. Apparently the suppressed +passion and sardonic melancholy of that dark-eyed young lady +spurred him to a lighter, gayer humor even in proportion as Miss +Sally's good-natured levity and sunny practicality always made him +serious. They presently fell to the rear with other couples, and +were soon quite alone. + +A little haughty, but tall and erect in her well-preserved black +grenadine dress, which gave her the appearance of a youthful but +implacable widow, Miss Reed declared she had not seen the co'nnle +for "a coon's age," and certainly had not expected to have the +honor of his company as long as there were niggers to be elevated +or painted to look like white men. She hoped that he and paw and +Sally Dows were happy! They hadn't yet got so far as to put up a +nigger preacher in the place of Mr. Symes, their rector, but she +understood that there was some talk of running Hannibal Johnson-- +Miss Dows' coachman--for county judge next year! No! she had not +heard that the co'nnle HIMSELF had thought of running for the +office! He might laugh at her as much as he liked--he seemed to be +in better spirits than when she first saw him--only she would like +to know if it was "No'th'n style" to laugh coming home from church? +Of course if it WAS she would have to adopt it with the Fourteenth +Amendment. But, just now, she noticed the folks were staring at +them, and Miss Sally Dows had turned round to look. Nevertheless, +Miss Octavia's sallow cheek nearest the colonel--the sunny side-- +had taken a faint brunette's flush, and the corners of her proud +mouth were slightly lifted. + +"But, candidly, Miss Reed, don't you think that you would prefer to +have old Hannibal, whom you know, as county judge, than a stranger +and a Northern man like ME?" + +Miss Reed's dark eyes glanced sideways at the handsome face and +elegant figure beside her. Something like a saucy smile struggled +to her thin lips. + +"There mightn't be much to choose, Co'nnle." + +"I admit it. We should both acknowledge our mistress, and be like +wax in her hands." + +"Yo' ought to make that pooty speech to Sally Dows, she's generally +mistress around here. But," she added, suddenly fixing her eyes on +him, "how does it happen that yo' ain't walking with her instead of +that Englishman? Yo' know that it's as plain as day that he took +that land over there just to be near her, when he was no longer +agent." + +But Courtland was always master of himself and quite at ease +regarding Miss Sally when not in that lady's presence. "You +forget," he said smilingly, "that I'm still a stranger and knew +little of the local gossip; and if I did know it, I am afraid we +didn't bargain to buy up with the LAND Mr. Champney's personal +interest in the LANDLADY." + +"Yo' 'd have had your hands full, for I reckon she's pooty heavily +mortgaged in that fashion, already," returned Miss Reed with mere +badinage than spitefulness in the suggestion. "And Mr. Champney +was run pooty close by a French cousin of hers when he was here. +Yo' haven't got any French books to lend me, co'nnle--have yo'? +Paw says you read a heap of French, and I find it mighty hard to +keep up MY practice since I left the Convent at St. Louis, for paw +don't knew what sort of books to order, and I reckon he makes awful +mistakes sometimes." + +The conversation here turning upon polite literature, it appeared +that Miss Octavia's French reading, through a shy, proud innocence +and an imperfect knowledge of the wicked subtleties of the +language, was somewhat broad and unconventional for a young lady. +Courtland promised to send her some books, and even ventured to +suggest some American and English novels not intensely "No'th'n" +nor "metaphysical"--according to the accepted Southern beliefs. A +new respect and pitying interest in this sullen, solitary girl, +cramped by tradition, and bruised rather than enlightened by sad +experiences, came over him. He found himself talking quite +confidentially to the lifted head, arched eyebrows, and aquiline +nose beside him, and even thinking what a handsome high-bred +BROTHER she might have been to some one. When they had reached the +house, in compliance with the familiar custom, he sat down on one +of the lower steps of the veranda, while she, shaking out her +skirt, took a seat a step or two above him. This enabled him, +after the languid local fashion, to lean on his elbow and gaze up +into the eyes of the young lady, while she with equal languor +looked down upon him. But in the present instance Miss Reed leaned +forward suddenly, and darting a sharp quick glance into his very +consciousness said:-- + +"And yo' mean to say, co'nnle, there's nothing between yo' and +Sally Dows?" + +Courtland neither flushed, trembled, grew confused, nor prevaricated. + +"We are good friends, I think," he replied quietly, without evasion +or hesitation. + +Miss Reed looked at him thoughtfully, "I reckon that is so--and no +more. And that's why yo' 've been so lucky in everything," she +said slowly. + +"I don't think I quite understand," returned Courtland, smiling. +"Is this a paradox--or a consolation?" + +"It's the TRUTH," said Miss Reed gravely. "Those who try to be +anything more to Sally Dows lose their luck." + +"That is--are rejected by her. Is she really so relentless?" +continued Courtland gayly. + +"I mean that they lose their luck in everything. Something is sure +to happen. And SHE can't help it either." + +"Is this a Sibylline warning, Miss Reed?" + +"No. It's nigger superstition. It came from Mammy Judy, Sally's +old nurse. It's part of their regular Hoo-doo. She bewitched Miss +Sally when she was a baby, so that everybody is bound to HER as +long as they care for her, and she isn't bound to THEM in any way. +All their luck goes to her as soon as the spell is on them," she +added darkly. + +"I think I know the rest," returned Courtland with still greater +solemnity. "You gather the buds of the witch-hazel in April when +the moon is full. You then pluck three hairs from the young lady's +right eyebrow when she isn't looking"-- + +"Yo' can laugh, co'nnle, for yo' 're lucky--because yo' 're free." + +"I'm not so sure of that," he said gallantly, "for I ought to be +riding at this moment over to the Infirmary to visit my Sunday +sick. If being made to pleasantly forget one's time and duty is a +sign of witchcraft I am afraid Mammy Judy's enchantments were not +confined to only one Southern young lady." + +The sound of quick footsteps on the gravel path caused them both to +look up. A surly looking young fellow, ostentatiously booted and +spurred, and carrying a heavy rawhide riding-whip in his swinging +hand, was approaching them. Deliberately, yet with uneasy self- +consciousness, ignoring the presence of Courtland, he nodded +abruptly to Miss Reed, ascended the steps, brushed past them both +without pausing, and entered the house. + +"Is that yo'r manners, Mr. Tom?" called the young lady after him, a +slight flush rising to her sallow cheek. The young man muttered +something from the hall which Courtland did not catch. "It's +Cousin Tom Higbee," she explained half disdainfully. "He's had +some ugliness with his horse, I reckon; but paw ought to teach him +how to behave. And--I don't think he likes No'th'n men," she added +gravely. + +Courtland, who had kept his temper with his full understanding of +the intruder's meaning, smiled as he took Miss Reed's hand in +parting. "That's quite enough explanation, and I don't know why it +shouldn't be even an apology." + +Yet the incident left little impression on him as he strolled back +to Redlands. It was not the first time he had tasted the dregs of +former sectional hatred in incivility and discourtesy, but as it +seldom came from his old personal antagonists--the soldiers--and +was confined to the callow youth, previous non-combatants and +politicians, he could afford to overlook it. He did not see Miss +Sally during the following week. + + +CHAPTER IV. + + +On the next Sunday he was early at church. But he had perhaps +accented the occasion by driving there in a light buggy behind a +fast thoroughbred, possibly selected more to the taste of a smart +cavalry officer than an agricultural superintendent. He was +already in a side pew, his eyes dreamily fixed on the prayer-book +ledge before him, when there was a rustle at the church door, and a +thrill of curiosity and admiration passed over the expectant +congregation. It was the entrance of the Dows party, Miss Sally +well to the fore. She was in her new clothes, the latest fashion +in Louisville, the latest but two in Paris and New York. + +It was over twenty years ago. I shall not imperil the effect of +that lovely vision by recalling to the eye of to-day a fashion of +yesterday. Enough, that it enabled her to set her sweet face and +vapory golden hair in a horseshoe frame of delicate flowers, and to +lift her oval chin out of a bewildering mist of tulle. Nor did a +certain light polonaise conceal the outlines of her charming +figure. Even those who were constrained to whisper to each other +that "Miss Sally" must "be now going on twenty-five," did so +because she still carried the slender graces of seventeen. The +organ swelled as if to welcome her; as she took her seat a ray of +sunlight, that would have been cruel and searching to any other +complexion, drifted across the faint pink of her cheeks, and +nestling in her nebulous hair became itself transfigured. A few +stained-glass Virtues on the windows did not come out of this +effulgence as triumphantly, and it was small wonder that the +devotional eyes of the worshipers wandered from them to the face +of Sally Dows. + +When the service was over, as the congregation filed slowly into +the aisle, Courtland slipped mutely behind her. As she reached the +porch he said in an undertone: + +"I brought my horse and buggy. I thought you might possibly allow +me to drive"-- But he was stopped by a distressful knitting of her +golden brows. "No," she said quickly, but firmly, "you must not-- +it won't do." As Courtland hesitated in momentary perplexity, she +smiled sweetly: "We'll walk round by the cemetery, if you like; it +will take about as long as a drive." Courtland vanished, gave +hurried instructions and a dollar to a lounging negro, and rejoined +Miss Sally as the delighted and proud freedman drove out of the +gate. Miss Sally heaved a slight sigh as the gallant equipage +passed. "It was a mighty pooty turnout, co'nnle, and I'd have just +admired to go, but it would have been rather hard on the other +folks. There's the Reeds and Maxwells and Robertsons that are too +pooah to keep blood horses, and too proud to ride behind anything +else. It wouldn't be the right thing for us to go whirling by, +scattering our dust over them." There was something so subtly +pleasant in this implied partnership of responsibility, that +Courtland forgot the abrupt refusal and thought only of the tact +that prompted it. Nevertheless, here a spell seemed to fall upon +his usually ready speech. Now that they were together for the +first time in a distinctly social fashion, he found himself +vacantly, meaninglessly silent, content to walk beside this +charming, summery presence, brushed by its delicate draperies, +and inhaling its freshness. Presently it spoke. + +"It would take more than a thousand feet of lumber to patch up the +cowsheds beyond the Moseley pasture, and an entirely new building +with an improved dairy would require only about two thousand more. +All the old material would come in good for fencing, and could be +used with the new post and rails. Don't yo' think it would be +better to have an out-and-out new building?" + +"Yes, certainly," returned Courtland a little confusedly. He had +not calculated upon this practical conversation, and was the more +disconcerted as they were passing some of the other couples, who +had purposely lingered to overhear them. + +"And," continued the young girl brightly, "the freight question is +getting to be a pretty serious one. Aunt Miranda holds some shares +in the Briggsville branch line, and thinks something could be done +with the directors for a new tariff of charges if she put a +pressure on them; Tyler says that there was some talk of their +reducing it one sixteenth per cent. before we move this year's +crop." + +Courtland glanced quickly at his companion's face. It was grave, +but there was the faintest wrinkling of the corner of the eyelid +nearest him. "Had we not better leave these serious questions +until to-morrow?" he said, smiling. + +Miss Sally opened her eyes demurely. "Why, yo' seemed SO quiet, I +reckoned yo' must be full of business this morning; but if yo' +prefer company talk, we'll change the subject. They say that yo' +and Miss Reed didn't have much trouble to find one last Sunday. +She don't usually talk much, but she keeps up a power of thinking. +I should reckon," she added, suddenly eying him critically, "that +yo' and she might have a heap o' things to say to each other. +She's a good deal in yo' fashion, co'nnle, she don't forget, but"-- +more slowly--"I don't know that THAT'S altogether the best thing +for YO'!" + +Courtland lifted his eyes with affected consternation. "If this is +in the light of another mysterious warning, Miss Dows, I warn you +that my intellect is already tottering with them. Last Sunday Miss +Reed thrilled me for an hour with superstition and Cassandra-like +prophecy. Don't things ever happen accidentally here, and without +warning?" + +"I mean," returned the young lady with her usual practical +directness, "that Tave Reed remembers a good many horrid things +about the wah that she ought to forget, but don't. But," she +continued, looking at him curiously, "she allows she was mighty cut +up by her cousin's manner to yo'." + +"I am afraid that Miss Reed was more annoyed than I was," said +Courtland. "I should be very sorry if she attached any importance +to it," he added earnestly. + +"And YO' don't?" continued Miss Sally. + +"No. Why should I?" She noticed, however, that he had slightly +drawn himself up a little more erect, and she smiled as he +continued, "I dare say I should feel as he does if I were in his +place." + +"But YO' wouldn't do anything underhanded," she said quietly. As +he glanced at her quickly she added dryly: "Don't trust too much to +people always acting in yo' fashion, co'nnle. And don't think too +much nor too little of what yo' hear here. Yo' 're just the kind +of man to make a good many silly enemies, and as many foolish +friends. And I don't know which will give yo' the most trouble. +Only don't yo' underrate EITHER, or hold yo' head so high, yo' +don't see what's crawlin' around yo'. That's why, in a copperhead +swamp, a horse is bitten oftener than a hog." + +She smiled, yet with knitted brows and such a pretty affectation of +concern for her companion that he suddenly took heart. + +"I wish I had ONE friend I could call my own," he said boldly, +looking straight into her eyes. "I'd care little for other +friends, and fear no enemies." + +"Yo' 're right, co'nnle," she said, ostentatiously slanting her +parasol in a marvelous simulation of hiding a purely imaginative +blush on a cheek that was perfectly infantine in its unchanged +pink; "company talk is much pootier than what we've been saying. +And--meaning me--for I reckon yo' wouldn't say that of any other +girl but the one yo' 're walking with--what's the matter with me?" + +He could not help smiling, though he hesitated. "Nothing! but +others have been disappointed." + +"And that bothers YO'?" + +"I mean I have as yet had no right to put your feelings to any +test, while"-- + +"Poor Chet had, yo' were going to say! Well, here we are at the +cemetery! I reckoned yo' were bound to get back to the dead again +before we'd gone far, and that's why I thought we might take the +cemetery on our way. It may put me in a more proper frame of mind +to please yo'." + +As he raised his eyes he could not repress a slight start. He had +not noticed before that they had passed through a small gateway on +diverging from the road, and was quite unprepared to find himself +on the edge of a gentle slope leading to a beautiful valley, and +before him a long vista of tombs, white head-stones and low +crosses, edged by drooping cypress and trailing feathery vines. +Some vines had fallen and been caught in long loops from bough to +bough, like funeral garlands, and here and there the tops of +isolated palmettos lifted a cluster of hearse-like plumes. Yet in +spite of this dominance of sombre but graceful shadow, the drooping +delicacy of dark-tasseled foliage and leafy fringes, and the waving +mourning veils of gray, translucent moss, a glorious vivifying +Southern sun smiled and glittered everywhere as through tears. The +balm of bay, southernwood, pine, and syringa breathed through the +long alleys; the stimulating scent of roses moved with every +zephyr, and the closer odors of jessamine, honeysuckle, and orange +flowers hung heavily in the hollows. It seemed to Courtland like +the mourning of beautiful and youthful widowhood, seductive even in +its dissembling trappings, provocative in the contrast of its own +still strong virility. Everywhere the grass grew thick and +luxuriant; the quick earth was teeming with the germination of the +dead below. + +They moved slowly along side by side, speaking only of the beauty +of the spot and the glory of that summer day, which seemed to have +completed its perfection here. Perhaps from the heat, the +overpowering perfume, or some unsuspected sentiment, the young lady +became presently as silent and preoccupied as her companion. She +began to linger and loiter behind, hovering like a butterfly over +some flowering shrub or clustered sheaf of lilies, until, +encountered suddenly in her floating draperies, she might have been +taken for a somewhat early and far too becoming ghost. It seemed +to him, also, that her bright eyes were slightly shadowed by a +gentle thoughtfulness. He moved close to her side with an +irresistible impulse of tenderness, but she turned suddenly, and +saying, "Come!" moved at a quicker pace down a narrow side path. +Courtland followed. He had not gone far before he noticed that +the graves seemed to fall into regular lines, the emblems became +cheaper and more common; wooden head and foot stones of one +monotonous pattern took the place of carved freestone or marble, +and he knew that they had reached that part of the cemetery +reserved for those who had fallen in the war. The long lines drawn +with military precision stretched through the little valley, and +again up the opposite hill in an odd semblance of hollow squares, +ranks, and columns. A vague recollection of the fateful slope of +Snake River came over him. It was intensified as Miss Sally, who +was still preceding him, suddenly stopped before an isolated mound +bearing a broken marble shaft and a pedestal with the inscription, +"Chester Brooks." A few withered garlands and immortelles were +lying at its base, but encircling the broken shaft was a perfectly +fresh, unfaded wreath. + +"You never told me he was buried here!" said Courtland quickly, +half shocked at the unexpected revelation. "Was he from this +State?" + +"No, but his regiment was," said Miss Sally, eying the wreath +critically. + +"And this wreath, is it from you?" continued Courtland gently. + +"Yes, I thought yo' 'd like to see something fresh and pooty, +instead of those stale ones." + +"And were they also from you?" he asked even more gently. + +"Dear no! They were left over from last anniversary day by some of +the veterans. That's the only one I put there--that is--I got Mr. +Champney to leave it here on his way to his house. He lives just +yonder, yo' know." + +It was impossible to resist this invincible naivete. Courtland bit +his lip as the vision arose before him of this still more naif +English admirer bringing hither, at Miss Sally's bidding, the +tribute which she wished to place on the grave of an old lover to +please a THIRD man. Meantime, she had put her two little hands +behind her back in the simulated attitude of "a good girl," and was +saying half smilingly, and he even thought half wistfully:-- + +"Are yo' satisfied?" + +"Perfectly." + +"Then let's go away. It's mighty hot here." + +They turned away, and descending the slope again re-entered the +thicker shade of the main avenue. Here they seemed to have left +the sterner aspect of Death. They walked slowly; the air was heavy +with the hot incense of flowers; the road sinking a little left a +grassy bank on one side. Here Miss Sally halted and listlessly +seated herself, motioning Courtland to do the same. He obeyed +eagerly. The incident of the wreath had troubled him, albeit with +contending sensations. She had given it to please HIM; why should +HE question the manner, or torment himself with any retrospective +thought? He would have given worlds to have been able to accept it +lightly or gallantly,--with any other girl he could; but he knew he +was trembling on the verge of a passionate declaration; the +magnitude of the stake was too great to be imperiled by a levity of +which she was more a mistress than himself, and he knew that his +sentiment had failed to impress her. His pride kept him from +appealing to her strangely practical nature, although he had +recognized and accepted it, and had even begun to believe it an +essential part of the strong fascination she had over him. But +being neither a coward nor a weak, hesitating idealist, when he +deliberately took his seat beside her he as deliberately made up +his mind to accept his fate, whatever it might be, then and there. + +Perhaps there was something of this in his face. "I thought yo' +were looking a little white, co'nnle," she said quietly, "and I +reckoned we might sit down a spell, and then take it slowly home. +Yo' ain't accustomed to the So'th'n sun, and the air in the hollow +WAS swampy." As he made a slight gesture of denial, she went on +with a pretty sisterly superiority: "That's the way of yo' No'th'n +men. Yo' think yo' can do everything just as if yo' were reared to +it, and yo' never make allowance for different climates, different +blood, and different customs. That's where yo' slip up." + +But he was already leaning towards her with his dark earnest eyes +fixed upon her in a way she could no longer mistake. "At the risk +of slipping up again, Miss Dows," he said gently, dropping into her +dialect with utterly unconscious flattery, "I am going to ask you +to teach me everything YOU wish, to be all that YOU demand--which +would be far better. You have said we were good friends; I want +you to let me hope to be more. I want you to overlook my +deficiencies and the differences of my race and let me meet you on +the only level where I can claim to be the equal of your own +people--that of loving you. Give me only the same chance you gave +the other poor fellow who sleeps yonder--the same chance you gave +the luckier man who carried the wreath for you to put upon his +grave." + +She had listened with delicately knitted brows, the faintest touch +of color, and a half-laughing, half-superior disapprobation. When +he had finished, she uttered a plaintive little sigh. "Yo' +oughtn't to have said that, co'nnle, but yo' and me are too good +friends to let even THAT stand between us. And to prove it to yo' +I'm going to forget it right away--and so are yo'." + +"But I cannot," he said quickly; "if I could I should be unworthy +of even your friendship. If you must reject it, do not make me +feel the shame of thinking you believe me capable of wanton +trifling. I know that this avowal is abrupt to you, but it is not +to me. You have known me only for three months, but these three +months have been to me the realization of three years' dreaming!" +As she remained looking at him with bright, curious eyes, but still +shaking her fair head distressedly, he moved nearer and caught her +hand in the little pale lilac thread glove that was, nevertheless, +too wide for her small fingers, and said appealingly: "But why +should YOU forget it? Why must it be a forbidden topic? What is +the barrier? Are you no longer free? Speak, Miss Dows--give me +some hope. Miss Dows!--Sally!" + +She had drawn herself away, distressed, protesting, her fair head +turned aside, until with a slight twist and narrowing of her hand +she succeeded in slipping it from the glove which she left a +prisoner in his eager clasp. "There! Yo' can keep the glove, +co'nnle," she said, breathing quickly. "Sit down! This is not the +place nor the weather for husking frolics! Well!--yo' want to know +WHY yo' mustn't speak to me in that way. Be still, and I'll tell +yo'." + +She smoothed down the folds of her frock, sitting sideways on the +bank, one little foot touching the road. "Yo' mustn't speak that +way to me," she went on slowly, "because it's as much as yo' +company's wo'th, as much as OUR property's wo'th, as much maybe as +yo' life's wo'th! Don't lift yo' comb, co'nnle; if you don't care +for THAT, others may. Sit still, I tell yo'! Well, yo' come here +from the No'th to run this property for money--that's square and +fair business; THAT any fool here can understand--it's No'th'n +style; it don't interfere with these fools' family affairs; it +don't bring into their blood any No'th'n taint; it don't divide +their clannishness; it don't separate father and son, sister and +brother; and even if yo' got a foothold here and settled down, they +know they can always outvote yo' five to one! But let these same +fools know that yo' 're courtin' a So'th'n girl known to be 'Union' +during the wah, that girl who has laughed at their foolishness; let +them even THINK that he wants that girl to mix up the family and +the race and the property for him, and there ain't a young or old +fool that believes in So'th'n isolation as the price of So'th'n +salvation that wouldn't rise against yo'! There isn't one that +wouldn't make shipwreck of yo'r syndicate and yo'r capital and the +prosperity of Redlands for the next four years to come, and think +they were doing right! They began to suspect yo' from the first! +They suspected yo' when yo' never went anywhere, but stuck close to +the fahm and me. That's why I wanted yo' to show yourself among +the girls; they wouldn't have minded yo' flirting with them with +the chance of yo' breaking yo' heart over Tave Reed or Lympy +Morris! They're fools enough to believe that a snub or a jilt from +a So'th'n girl would pay them back for a lost battle or a ruined +plantation!" + +For the first time Miss Sally saw Courtland's calm blood fly to his +cheek and kindle in his eye. "You surely do not expect ME to +tolerate this blind and insolent interference!" he said, rising to +his feet. + +She lifted her ungloved hand in deprecation. "Sit still, co'nnle. +Yo' 've been a soldier, and yo' know what duty is. Well! what's +yo' duty to yo' company?" + +"It neither includes my private affairs nor regulates the beating +of my heart. I will resign." + +"And leave me and Aunt Miranda and the plantation?" + +"No! The company will find another superintendent to look after +your aunt's affairs and carry out our plans. And you, Sally--you +will let me find you a home and fortune North? There is work for +me there; there is room for you among my people." + +She shook her head slowly with a sweet but superior smile. "No, +co'nnle! I didn't believe in the wah, but the least I could do was +to stand by my folks and share the punishment that I knew was +coming from it. I despise this foolishness as much as yo', but I +can't run away from it. Come, co'nnle, I won't ask yo' to forget +this; mo', I'll even believe yo' MEANT it, but yo' 'll promise me +yo' won't speak of it again as long as yo' are with the company and +Aunt Miranda and me! There mustn't be more--there mustn't even +SEEM to be more--between us." + +"But then I may hope?" he said, eagerly grasping her hand. + +"I promise nothing, for yo' must not even have THAT excuse for +speaking of this again, either from anything I do or may seem to +do." She stopped, released her hand, as her eyes were suddenly +fixed on the distance. Then she said with a slight smile, but +without the least embarrassment or impatience: "There's Mr. +Champney coming here now. I reckon he's looking to see if that +wreath is safe." + +Courtland looked up quickly. He could see the straw hat of the +young Englishman just above the myrtle bushes in a path intersecting +the avenue. A faint shadow crossed his face. "Let me know one +thing more," he said hurriedly. "I know I have no right to ask the +question, but has--has--has Mr. Champney anything to do with your +decision?" + +She smiled brightly. "Yo' asked just now if yo' could have the +same chance he and Chet Brooks had. Well, poor Chet is dead, and +Mr. Champney--well!--wait and see." She lifted her voice and +called, "Mr. Champney!" The young fellow came briskly towards +them; his face betrayed a slight surprise, but no discomfiture, as +he recognized her companion. + +"Oh, Mr. Champney," said Miss Sally plaintively, "I've lost my +glove somewhere near pooah Brooks's tomb in the hollow. Won't you +go and fetch it, and come back here to take me home? The co'nnle +has got to go and see his sick niggers in the hospital." Champney +lifted his hat, nodded genially to Courtland, and disappeared below +the cypresses on the slope. "Yo' mustn't be mad," she said, +turning in explanation to her companion, "but we have been here too +long already, and it's better that I should be seen coming home +with him than yo'." + +"Then this sectional interference does not touch him?" said +Courtland bitterly. + +"No. He's an Englishman; his father was a known friend of the +Confederacy, and bought their cotton bonds." + +She stopped, gazing into Courtland's face with a pretty vague +impatience and a slight pouting of her lip. + +"Co'nnle!" + +"Miss Sally." + +"Yo' say yo' had known me for three years before yo' saw me. Well, +we met once before we ever spoke to each other!" + +Courtland looked in her laughing eyes with admiring wonder. +"When?" he asked. + +"The first day yo' came! Yo' moved the ladder when I was on the +cornice, and I walked all ever yo' head. And, like a gentleman, +yo' never said a word about it. I reckon I stood on yo' head for +five minutes." + +"Not as long as that," said Courtland laughing, "if I remember +rightly." + +"Yes," said Miss Sally with dancing eyes. "I, a So'th'n girl, +actually set my foot on the head of a No'th'n scum of a co'nnle! +My!" + +"Let that satisfy your friends then." + +"No! I want to apologize. Sit down, co'nnle." + +"But, Miss Sally"-- + +"Sit down, quick!" + +He did so, seating himself sideways on the bank. Miss Sally stood +beside him. + +"Take off yo' hat, sir." + +He obeyed smilingly. Miss Sally suddenly slipped behind him. He +felt the soft touch of her small hands on his shoulders; warm +breath stirred the roots of his hair, and then--the light pressure +on his scalp of what seemed the lips of a child. + +He leaped to his feet, yet before he could turn completely round--a +difficulty the young lady had evidently calculated upon--he was too +late! The floating draperies of the artful and shameless Miss +Sally were already disappearing among the tombs in the direction of +the hollow. + + +CHAPTER V. + + +The house occupied by the manager of the Drummond Syndicate in +Redlands--the former residence of a local lawyer and justice of the +peace--was not large, but had an imposing portico of wooden Doric +columns, which extended to the roof and fronted the main street. +The all-pervading creeper closely covered it; the sidewalk before +it was shaded by a row of broad-leaved ailantus. The front room, +with French windows opening on the portico, was used by Colonel +Courtland as a general office; beyond this a sitting-room and +dining-room overlooked the old-fashioned garden with its detached +kitchen and inevitable negro cabin. It was a close evening; there +were dark clouds coming up in the direction of the turnpike road, +but the leaves of the ailantus hung heavy and motionless in the +hush of an impending storm. The sparks of lazily floating +fireflies softly expanded and went out in the gloom of the black +foliage, or in the dark recesses of the office, whose windows were +widely open, and whose lights Courtland had extinguished when he +brought his armchair to the portico for coolness. One of these +sparks beyond the fence, although alternately glowing and paling, +was still so persistent and stationary that Courtland leaned +forward to watch it more closely, at which it disappeared, and a +voice from the street said:-- + +"Is that you, Courtland?" + +"Yes. Come in, won't you?" + +The voice was Champney's, and the light was from his cigar. As he +opened the gate and came slowly up the steps of the portico the +usual hesitation of his manner seemed to have increased. A long +sigh trilled the limp leaves of the ailantus and as quickly +subsided. A few heavy perpendicular raindrops crashed and +spattered through the foliage like molten lead. + +"You've just escaped the shower," said Courtland pleasantly. He +had not seen Champney since they parted in the cemetery six weeks +before. + +"Yes!--I--I thought I'd like to have a little talk with you, +Courtland," said Champney. He hesitated a moment before the +proffered chair, and then added, with a cautious glance towards the +street, "Hadn't we better go inside?" + +"As you like. But you'll find it wofully hot. We're quite alone +here; there's nobody in the house, and this shower will drive any +loungers from the street." He was quite frank, although their +relations to each other in regard to Miss Sally were still so +undefined as to scarcely invite his confidence. + +Howbeit Champney took the proffered chair and the glass of julep +which Courtland brought him. + +"You remember my speaking to you of Dumont?" he said hesitatingly, +"Miss Dows' French cousin, you know? Well--he's coming here: he's +got property here--those three houses opposite the Court House. +From what I hear, he's come over with a lot of new-fangled French +ideas on the nigger question--rot about equality and fraternity, +don't you know--and the highest education and highest offices for +them. You know what the feeling is here already? You know what +happened at the last election at Coolidgeville--how the whites +wouldn't let the niggers go to the polls and the jolly row that was +kicked up over it? Well, it looks as if that sort of thing might +happen HERE, don't you know, if Miss Dows takes up these ideas." + +"But I've reason to suppose--I mean," said Courtland correcting +himself with some deliberation, "that any one who knows Miss Dows' +opinions knows that these are not her views. Why should she take +them up?" + +"Because she takes HIM up," returned Champney hurriedly; "and even +if she didn't believe in them herself, she'd have to share the +responsibility with him in the eyes of every unreconstructed rowdy +like Tom Higbee and the rest of them. They'd make short work of +her niggers all the same." + +"But I don't see why she should be made responsible for the +opinions of her cousin, nor do I exactly knew what 'taking him up' +means," returned Courtland quietly. + +Champney moistened his dry lips with the julep and uttered a +nervous laugh. "Suppose we say her husband--for that's what his +coming back here means. Everybody knows that; you would, too, if +you ever talked with her about anything but business." + +A bright flash of lightning that lit up the faces of the two men +would have revealed Champney's flushed features and Courtland's +lack of color had they been looking at each other. But they were +not, and the long reverberating crash of thunder which followed +prevented any audible reply from Courtland, and covered his +agitation. + +For without fully accepting Champney's conclusions he was cruelly +shocked at the young man's utterance of them. He had scrupulously +respected the wishes of Miss Sally and had faithfully--although +never hopelessly--held back any expression of his own love since +their conversation in the cemetery. But while his native +truthfulness and sense of honor had overlooked the seeming +insincerity of her attitude towards Champney, he had never +justified his own tacit participation in it, and the concealment of +his own pretensions before his possible rival. It was true that +she had forbidden him to openly enter the lists with her admirers, +but Champney's innocent assumption of his indifference to her and +his consequent half confidences added poignancy to his story. +There seemed to be only one way to extricate himself, and that was +by a quarrel. Whether he did or did not believe Champney's story, +whether it was only the jealous exaggeration of a rival, or Miss +Sally was actually deceiving them both, his position had become +intolerable. + +"I must remind you, Champney," he said, with freezing deliberation, +"that Miss Miranda Dows and her niece now represent the Drummond +Company equally with myself, and that you cannot expect me to +listen to any reflections upon the way they choose to administer +their part in its affairs, either now, or to come. Still less do I +care to discuss the idle gossip which can affect only the PRIVATE +interests of these ladies, with which neither you nor I have any +right to interfere." + +But the naivete of the young Englishman was as invincible as Miss +Sally's own, and as fatal to Courtland's attitude. "Of course I +haven't any RIGHT, you know," he said, calmly ignoring the severe +preamble of his companion's speech, "but I say! hang it all! even +if a fellow has no chance HIMSELF, he don't like to see a girl +throw herself and her property away on a man like that." + +"One moment, Champney," said Courtland, under the infection of his +guest's simplicity, abandoning his former superior attitude. "You +say you have no chance. Do you want me to understand that you are +regularly a suitor of Miss Dows?" + +"Y-e-e-s," said the young fellow, but with the hesitation of +conscientiousness rather than evasion. "That is--you know I WAS. +But don't you see, it couldn't be. It wouldn't do, you know. If +those clannish neighbors of hers--that Southern set--suspected that +Miss Sally was courted by an Englishman, don't you know--a poacher +on their preserves--it would be all up with her position on the +property and her influence over them. I don't mind telling you +that's one reason why I left the company and took that other +plantation. But even that didn't work; they had their suspicions +excited already." + +"Did Miss Dows give that as a reason for declining your suit?" +asked Courtland slowly. + +"Yes. You know what a straightforward girl she is. She didn't +come no rot about 'not expecting anything of the kind,' or about +'being a sister to me,' and all that, for, by Jove! she's always +more like a fellow's sister, don't you know, than his girl. Of +course, it was hard lines for me, but I suppose she was about +right." He stopped, and then added with a kind of gentle +persistency: "YOU think she was about right, don't you?" + +With what was passing in Courtland's mind the question seemed so +bitterly ironical that at first he leaned half angrily forward, in +an unconscious attempt to catch the speaker's expression in the +darkness. "I should hardly venture to give an opinion," he said, +after a pause. "Miss Dows' relations with her neighbors are so +very peculiar. And from what you tell me of her cousin it would +seem that her desire to placate them is not always to be depended +upon." + +"I'm not finding fault with HER, you know," said Champney hastily. +"I'm not such a beastly cad as that; I wouldn't have spoken of my +affairs at all, but you asked, you know. I only thought, if she +was going to get herself into trouble on account of that Frenchman, +you might talk to her--she'd listen to you, because she'd know you +only did it out of business reasons. And they're really business +reasons, you know. I suppose you don't think much of my business +capacity, colonel, and you wouldn't go much on my judgment-- +especially now; but I've been here longer than you and"--he lowered +his voice slightly and dragged his chair nearer Courtland--"I don't +like the looks of things here. There's some devilment plotting +among those rascals. They're only awaiting an opportunity; a +single flash would be enough to set them in a blaze, even if the +fire wasn't lit and smouldering already like a spark in a bale of +cotton. I'd cut the whole thing and clear out if I didn't think it +would make it harder for Miss Dows, who would be left alone." + +"You're a good fellow, Champney," said Courtland, laying his hand +on the young man's shoulder with a sudden impulse, "and I forgive +you for overlooking any concern that I might have. Indeed," he +added, with an odd seriousness and a half sigh, "it's not strange +that you should. But I must remind you that the Dowses are +strictly the agents and tenants of the company I represent, and +that their rights and property under that tenancy shall not be +interfered with by others as long as I am here. I have no right, +however," he added gravely, "to keep Miss Dows from imperiling them +by her social relations." + +Champney rose and shook hands with him awkwardly. "The shower +seems to be holding up," he said, "and I'll toddle along before it +starts afresh. Good-night! I say--you didn't mind my coming to +you this way, did you? By Jove! I thought you were a little stand- +offish at first. But you know what I meant?" + +"Perfectly, and I thank you." They shook hands again. Champney +stepped from the portico, and, reaching the gate, seemed to vanish +as he had come, out of the darkness. + +The storm was not yet over; the air had again become close and +suffocating. Courtland remained brooding in his chair. Whether he +could accept Champney's news as true or not, he felt that he must +end this suspense at once. A half-guilty consciousness that he was +thinking more of it in reference to his own passion than his duty +to the company did not render his meditations less unpleasant. Yet +while he could not reconcile Miss Sally's confidences in the +cemetery concerning the indifference of her people to Champney's +attentions with what Champney had just told him of the reasons she +had given HIM for declining them, I am afraid he was not shocked by +her peculiar ethics. A lover seldom finds fault with his mistress +for deceiving his rival, and is as little apt to consider the +logical deduction that she could deceive him also, as Othello was +to accept Brabantio's warning, The masculine sense of honor which +might have resented the friendship of a man capable of such +treachery did not hesitate to accept the love of a woman under the +same conditions. Perhaps there was an implied compliment in thus +allowing her to take the sole ethical responsibility, which few +women would resist. + +In the midst of this gloomy abstraction Courtland suddenly raised +his head and listened. + +"Cato." + +"Yes, sah." + +There was a sound of heavy footsteps in the hall coming from the +rear of the house, and presently a darker bulk appeared in the +shadowed doorway. It was his principal overseer--a strong and +superior negro, selected by his fellow-freedmen from among their +number in accordance with Courtland's new regime. + +"Did you come here from the plantation or the town?" + +"The town, sah." + +"I think you had better keep out of the town in the evenings for +the present," said Courtland in a tone of quiet but positive +authority. + +"Are dey goin' to bring back de ole 'patter rollers,'* sah?" asked +the man with a slight sneer. + + +* The "patrol" or local police who formerly had the surveillance of +slaves. + + +"I don't know," returned Courtland calmly, ignoring his overseer's +manner. "But if they did you must comply with the local regulations +unless they conflict with the Federal laws, when you must appeal to +the Federal authorities. I prefer you should avoid any trouble +until you are sure." + +"I reckon they won't try any games on me," said the negro with a +short laugh. + +Courtland looked at him intently. + +"I thought as much! You're carrying arms, Cato! Hand them over." + +The overseer hesitated for a moment, and then unstrapped a revolver +from his belt, and handed it to Courtland. + +"Now how many of you are in the habit of going round the town armed +like this?" + +"Only de men who've been insulted, sah." + +"And how have YOU been insulted?" + +"Marse Tom Highee down in de market reckoned it was high time fancy +niggers was drov into de swamp, and I allowed that loafers and +beggars had better roost high when workin' folks was around, and +Marse Tom said he'd cut my haht out." + +"And do you think your carrying a revolver will prevent him and his +friends performing that operation if you provoked them?" + +"You said we was to pertect ourse'fs, sah," returned the negro +gloomily. "What foh den did you drill us to use dem rifles in de +armory?" + +"To defend yourselves TOGETHER under orders if attacked, not to +singly threaten with them in a street row. Together, you would +stand some chance against those men; separately they could eat you +up, Cato." + +"I wouldn't trust too much to some of dem niggers standing +together, sah," said Gate darkly. "Dey'd run before de old +masters--if they didn't run to 'em. Shuah!" + +A fear of this kind had crossed Courtland's mind before, but he +made no present comment. "I found two of the armory rifles in the +men's cabins yesterday," he resumed quietly. "See that it does not +occur again! They must not be taken from the armory except to +defend it." + +"Yes, sah." + +There was a moment of silence. Then it was broken by a sudden gust +that swept through the columns of the portico, stirring the vines. +The broad leaves of the ailantus began to rustle; an ominous +pattering followed; the rain had recommenced. And as Courtland +rose and walked towards the open window its blank panes and the +interior of the office were suddenly illuminated by a gleam of +returning lightning. + +He entered the office, bidding Cato follow, and lit the lamp above +his desk. The negro remained standing gloomily but respectfully by +the window. + +"Cato, do you know anything of Mr. Dumont--Miss Dows' cousin?" + +The negro's white teeth suddenly flashed in the lamplight. "Ya! +ha! I reckon, sah." + +"Then he's a great friend of your people?" + +"I don't know about dat, sah. But he's a pow'ful enemy of de Reeds +and de Higbees!" + +"On account of his views, of course?" + +"'Deed no!" said Cato with an astounded air. "Jess on account of +de vendetta!" + +"The vendetta?" + +"Yes, sah. De old blood quo'll of de families. It's been goin' on +over fifty years, sah. De granfader, fader, and brudder of de +Higbees was killed by de granfader, fader, and brudder of de +Doomonts. De Reeds chipped in when all de Higbees was played out, +fo' dey was relations, but dey was chawed up by some of de Dowses, +first cousins to de Doomonts." + +"What? Are the Dows in this vendetta?" + +"No, sah. No mo'. Dey's bin no man in de family since Miss +Sally's fader died--dat's let de Dows out fo' ever. De las' +shootin' was done by Marse Jack Doomont, who crippled Marse Tom +Higbee's brudder Jo, and den skipped to Europe. Dey say he's come +back, and is lying low over at Atlanty. Dar'll be lively times of +he comes here to see Miss Sally." + +"But he may have changed his ideas while living abroad, where this +sort of thing is simple murder." + +The negro shook his head grimly. "Den he wouldn't come, sah. No, +sah. He knows dat Tom Higbee's bound to go fo' him or leave de +place, and Marse Jack wouldn't mind settlin' HIM too as well as his +brudder, for de scores is agin' de Doomonts yet. And Marse Jack +ain't no slouch wid a scatter gun." + +At any other time the imminence of this survival of a lawless +barbarism of which he had heard so much would have impressed +Courtland; now he was only interested in it on account of the +inconceivable position in which it left Miss Sally. Had she +anything to do with this baleful cousin's return, or was she only +to be a helpless victim of it? + +A white, dazzling, and bewildering flash of lightning suddenly lit +up the room, the porch, the dripping ailantus, and the flooded +street beyond. It was followed presently by a crash of thunder, +with what seemed to be a second fainter flash of lightning, or +rather as if the first flash had suddenly ignited some inflammable +substance. With the long reverberation of the thunder still +shaking the house, Courtland slipped quickly out of the window and +passed down to the gate. + +"Did it strike anything, sah?" said the startled negro, as +Courtland returned. + +"Not that I can see," said his employer shortly. "Go inside, and +call Zoe and her daughter from the cabin and bring them in the +hall. Stay till I come. Go!--I'll shut the windows myself." + +"It must have struck somewhere, sah, shuah! Deh's a pow'ful smell +of sulphur right here," said the negro as he left the room. + +Courtland thought so too, but it was a kind of sulphur that he had +smelled before--on the battlefield! For when the door was closed +behind his overseer he took the lamp to the opposite wall and +examined it carefully. There was the distinct hole made by a +bullet which had missed Cato's head at the open window by an inch. + + +CHAPTER VI. + + +In an instant Courtland had regained complete possession of +himself. His distracting passion--how distracting he had never +before realized--was gone! His clear sight--no longer distorted by +sentiment--had come back; he saw everything in its just proportion-- +his duty, the plantation, the helpless freedman threatened by +lawless fury; the two women--no longer his one tantalizing vision, +but now only a passing detail of the work before him. He saw them +through no aberrating mist of tenderness or expediency--but with +the single directness of the man of action. + +The shot had clearly been intended for Cato. Even if it were an +act of mere personal revenge, it showed a confidence and security +in the would-be assassin that betokened cooperation and an +organized plan. He had availed himself of the thunderstorm, the +flash and long reverberating roll of sound--an artifice not unknown +to border ambush--to confuse discovery at the instant. Yet the +attack might be only an isolated one; or it might be the beginning +of a general raid upon the Syndicate's freedmen. If the former he +could protect Cato from its repetition by guarding him in the +office until he could be conveyed to a place of safety; if the +latter, he must at once collect the negroes at their quarters, and +take Cato with him. He resolved upon the latter course. The +quarters were half a mile from the Dows' dwelling--which was two +miles away. + +He sat down and wrote a few lines to Miss Dows stating that, in +view of some threatened disturbances in the town, he thought it +advisable to keep the negroes in their quarters, whither he was +himself going. He sent her his housekeeper and the child, as they +had both better remain in a place of security until he returned to +town. He gave the note to Zoe, bidding her hasten by the back +garden across the fields. Then he turned to Cato. + +"I am going with you to the quarters tonight," he said quietly, +"and you can carry your pistol back to the armory yourself." He +handed him the weapon. The negro received it gratefully, but +suddenly cast a searching glance at his employer. Courtland's +face, however, betrayed no change. When Zoe had gone, he continued +tranquilly, "We will go by the back way through the woods." As the +negro started slightly, Courtland continued in the same even tone: +"The sulphur you smelled just now, Cato, was the smoke of a gun +fired at YOU from the street. I don't propose that the shot shall +be repeated under the same advantages." + +The negro became violently agitated. "It was dat sneakin' hound, +Tom Higbee," he said huskily. + +Courtland looked at him sharply. "Then there was something more +than WORDS passed between him and you, Cato. What happened? Come, +speak out!" + +"He lashed me with his whip, and I gib him one right under the +yeah, and drupped him," said Cato, recovering his courage with his +anger at the recollection. "I had a right to defend myse'f, sah." + +"Yes, and I hope you'll be able to do it, now," said Courtland +calmly, his face giving no sign of his conviction that Cato's fate +was doomed by that single retaliating blow, "but you'll be safer at +the quarters." He passed into his bedroom, took a revolver from +his bedhead and a derringer from the drawer, both of which he +quickly slipped beneath his buttoned coat, and returned. + +"When we are in the fields, clear of the house, keep close by my +side, and even try to keep step with me. What you have to say, say +NOW; there must be no talking to betray our position--we must go +silently, and you'll have enough to do to exercise your eyes and +ears. I shall stand between you and any attack, but I expect you +to obey orders without hesitation." He opened the back door, +motioned to Cato to pass out, followed him, locked the door behind +them, and taking the negro's arm walked beside the low palings to +the end of the garden, where they climbed the fence and stood upon +the open field beyond. + +Unfortunately, it had grown lighter with the breaking of the heavy +clouds, and gusty gleams of moonlight chased each other over the +field, or struck a glitter from standing rain-pools between the +little hillocks. To cross the open field and gain the fringe of +woods on the other side was the nearest way to the quarters, but +for the moment was the most exposed course; to follow the hedge to +the bottom of the field and the boundary fence and then cross at +right angles, in its shadow, would be safer, but they would lose +valuable time. Believing that Cato's vengeful assailant was still +hovering near with his comrades, Courtland cast a quick glance down +the shadowy line of Osage hedge beside them. Suddenly Cato grasped +his arm and pointed in the same direction, where the boundary fence +he had noticed--a barrier of rough palings--crossed the field. +With the moon low on the other side of it, it was a mere black +silhouette, broken only by bright silver openings and gaps along +its surface that indicated the moonlit field beyond. At first +Courtland saw nothing else. Then he was struck by the fact that +these openings became successively and regularly eclipsed, as with +the passing of some opaque object behind them. It was a file of +men on the other side of the fence, keeping in its shelter as they +crossed the field towards his house. Roughly calculating from the +passing obscurations, there must have been twelve or fifteen in +all. + +He could no longer doubt their combined intentions, nor hesitate +how to meet them. He must at once make for the quarters with Cato, +even if he had to cross that open field before them. He knew that +they would avoid injuring him personally, in the fear of possible +Federal and political complications, and he resolved to use that +fear to insure Cato's safety. Placing his hands on the negro's +shoulders, he shoved him forwards, falling into a "lock step" so +close behind him that it became impossible for the most expert +marksman to fire at one without imperiling the other's life. When +half way across the field he noticed that the shadows seen through +the openings of the fence had paused. The ambushed men had +evidently seen the double apparition, understood it, and, as he +expected, dared not fire. He reached the other side with Cato in +safety, but not before he saw the fateful shadows again moving, and +this time in their own direction. They were evidently intending to +pursue them. But once within the woods Courtland knew that his +chances were equal. He breathed more freely. Cato, now less +agitated, had even regained something of his former emotional +combativeness which Courtland had checked. Although far from +confident of his henchman's prowess in an emergency, the prospect +of getting him safe into the quarters seemed brighter. + +It was necessary, also, to trust to his superior wood-craft and +knowledge of the locality, and Courtland still walking between him +and his pursuers and covering his retreat allowed him to lead the +way. It lay over ground that was beginning to slope gently; the +underbrush was presently exchanged for springy moss, the character +of the trees changed, the black trunks of cypresses made the gloom +thicker. Trailing vines and parasites brushed their faces, a +current of damp air seemed to flow just above the soil in which +their lower limbs moved sluggishly as through stagnant water. As +yet there was no indication of pursuit. But Courtland felt that it +was not abandoned. Indeed, he had barely time to check an +exclamation from the negro, before the dull gallop of horse-hoofs +in the open ahead of them was plain to them both. It was a second +party of their pursuers, mounted, who had evidently been sent to +prevent their final egress from the woods, while those they had +just evaded were no doubt slowly and silently following them on +foot. They were to be caught between two fires! + +"What is there to the left of us?" whispered Courtland quickly. + +"De swamp." + +Courtland set his teeth together. His dull-witted companion had +evidently walked them both into the trap! Nevertheless, his +resolve was quickly made. He could already see through the +thinning fringe of timber the figures of the mounted men in the +moonlight. + +"This should be the boundary line of the plantation? This field +beside us is ours?" he said interrogatively. + +"Yes," returned the negro, "but de quarters is a mile furder." + +"Good! Stay here until I come back or call you; I'm going to talk +to these fellows. But if you value your life, don't YOU speak nor +stir." + +He strode quickly through the intervening trees and stepped out +into the moonlight. A suppressed shout greeted him, and half a +dozen mounted men, masked and carrying rifles, rode down towards +him, but he remained quietly waiting there, and as the nearest +approached him, he made a step forward and cried, "Halt!" + +The men pulled up sharply and mechanically at that ring of military +imperiousness. + +"What are you doing here?" said Courtland. + +"We reckon that's OUR business, co'nnle." + +"It's mine, when you're on property that I control." + +The man hesitated and looked interrogatively towards his fellows. +"I allow you've got us there, co'nnle," he said at last with the +lazy insolence of conscious power, but I don't mind telling you +we're wanting a nigger about the size of your Cato. We hain't got +anything agin YOU, co'nnle; we don't want to interfere with YOUR +property, and YOUR ways, but we don't calculate to have strangers +interfere with OUR ways and OUR customs. Trot out your nigger--you +No'th'n folks don't call HIM 'property,' you know--and we'll clear +off your land." + +"And may I ask what you want of Cato?" said Courtland quietly. + +"To show him that all the Federal law in h-ll won't protect him +when he strikes a white man!" burst out one of the masked figures, +riding forward. + +"Then you compel me to show YOU," said Courtland immovably, "what +any Federal citizen may do in the defense of Federal law. For I'll +kill the first man that attempts to lay hands upon him on my +property. Some of you, who have already tried to assassinate him +in cold blood, I have met before in less dishonorable warfare than +this, and THEY know I am able to keep my word." + +There was a moment's silence; the barrel of the revolver he was +holding at his side glistened for an instant in the moonlight, but +he did not move. The two men rode up to the first speaker and +exchanged words. A light laugh followed, and the first speaker +turned again to Courtland with a mocking politeness. + +"Very well, co'nnle, if that's your opinion, and you allow we can't +follow our game over your property, why, we reckon we'll have to +give way TO THOSE WHO CAN. Sorry to have troubled YOU. Good- +night." + +He lifted his hat ironically, waved it to his followers, and the +next moment the whole party were galloping furiously towards the +high road. + +For the first time that evening a nervous sense of apprehension +passed over Courtland. The impending of some unknown danger is +always more terrible to a brave man than the most overwhelming odds +that he can see and realize. He felt instinctively that they had +uttered no vague bravado to cover up their defeat; there was still +some advantage on which they confidently reckoned--but what? Was +it only a reference to the other party tracking them through the +woods on which their enemies now solely relied? He regained Cato +quickly; the white teeth of the foolishly confident negro were +already flashing his imagined triumph to his employer. Courtland's +heart grew sick as he saw it. + +"We're not out of the woods yet, Cato," he said dryly; "nor are +they. Keep your eyes and ears open, and attend to me. How long +can we keep in the cover of these woods, and still push on in the +direction of the quarters?" + +"There's a way roun' de edge o' de swamp, sah, but we'd have to go +back a spell to find it." + +"Go on!" + +"And dar's moccasins and copperheads lying round here in de trail! +Dey don't go for us ginerally--but," be hesitated, "white men don't +stand much show." + +"Good! Then it is as bad for those who are chasing us as for me. +That will do. Lead on." + +They retraced their steps cautiously, until the negro turned into a +lighter by-way. A strange mephitic odor seemed to come from sodden +leaves and mosses that began to ooze under their feet. They had +picked their way in silence for some minutes; the stunted willows +and cypress standing farther and farther apart, and the openings +with clumps of sedge were frequent. Courtland was beginning to +fear this exposure of his follower, and had moved up beside him, +when suddenly the negro caught his arm, and trembled violently. +His lips were parted over his teeth, the whites of his eyes +glistened, he seemed gasping and speechless with fear. + +"What's the matter, Cato?" said Courtland glancing instinctively at +the ground beneath. "Speak, man!--have you been bitten?" + +The word seemed to wring an agonized cry from the miserable man. + +"Bitten! No; but don't you hear 'em coming, sah! God Almighty! +don't you hear dat?" + +"What?" + +"De dogs! de houns!--DE BLOODHOUNS! Dey've set 'em loose on me!" + +It was true! A faint baying in the distance was now distinctly +audible to Courtland. He knew now plainly the full, cruel purport +of the leader's speech,--those who could go anywhere were tracking +their game! + +Every trace of manhood had vanished from the negro's cowering +frame. Courtland laid his hand assuringly, appealingly, and then +savagely on his shoulder. + +"Come! Enough of this! I am here, and will stand by you, whatever +comes. These dogs are no more to be feared than the others. Rouse +yourself, man, and at least help ME make a fight of it." + +"No! no!" screamed the terrified man. "Lemme go! Lemme go back to +de Massas! Tell 'em I'll come! Tell 'em to call de houns off me, +and I'll go quiet! Lemme go!" He struggled violently in his +companion's grasp. + +In all Courtland's self-control, habits of coolness, and +discipline, it is to be feared there was still something of the old +Berserker temper. His face was white, his eyes blazed in the +darkness; only his voice kept that level distinctness which made it +for a moment more terrible than even the baying of the tracking +hounds to the negro's ear. "Cato," he said, "attempt to run now, +and, by God! I'll save the dogs the trouble of grappling your +living carcass! Come here! Up that tree with you!" pointing to a +swamp magnolia. "Don't move as long as I can stand here, and when +I'm down--but not till then--save yourself--the best you can." + +He half helped, half dragged, the now passive African to the +solitary tree; as the bay of a single hound came nearer, the negro +convulsively scrambled from Courtland's knee and shoulder to the +fork of branches a dozen feet from the ground. Courtland drew his +revolver, and, stepping back a few yards into the open, awaited the +attack. + +It came unexpectedly from behind. A sudden yelp of panting cruelty +and frenzied anticipation at Courtland's back caused him to change +front quickly, and the dripping fangs and snaky boa-like neck of a +gray weird shadow passed him. With an awful supernaturalness of +instinct, it kept on in an unerring line to the fateful tree. But +that dread directness of scent was Courtland's opportunity. His +revolver flashed out in an aim as unerring. The brute, pierced +through neck and brain, dashed on against the tree in his impetus, +and then rolled over against it in a quivering bulk. Again another +bay coming from the same direction told Courtland that his pursuers +had outflanked him, and the whole pack were crossing the swamp. +But he was prepared; again the same weird shadow, as spectral and +monstrous as a dream, dashed out into the brief light of the open, +but this time it was stopped, and rolled over convulsively before +it had crossed. Flushed, with the fire of fight in his veins, +Courtland turned almost furiously from the fallen brutes at his +feet to meet the onset of the more cowardly hunters whom he knew +were at his heels. At that moment it would have fared ill with the +foremost. No longer the calculating steward and diplomatic +manager, no longer the cool-headed arbiter of conflicting +interests, he was ready to meet them, not only with the intrepid +instincts of a soldier, but with an aroused partisan fury equal to +their own. To his surprise no one followed; the baying of a third +hound seemed to be silenced and checked; the silence was broken +only by the sound of distant disputing voices and the uneasy +trampling of hoofs. This was followed by two or three rifle shots +in the distance, but not either in the direction of the quarters +nor the Dows' dwelling-house. There evidently was some interruption +in the pursuit,--a diversion of some kind had taken place,--but what +he knew not. He could think of no one who might have interfered on +his behalf, and the shouting and wrangling seemed to be carried on +in the accents of the one sectional party. He called cautiously to +Cato. The negro did not reply. He crossed to the tree and shook it +impatiently. Its boughs were empty; Cato was gone! The miserable +negro must have taken advantage of the first diversion in his favor +to escape. But where, and how, there was nothing left to indicate. + +As Courtland had taken little note of the trail, he had no idea of +his own whereabouts. He knew he must return to the fringe of +cypress to be able to cross the open field and gain the negro +quarters, where it was still possible that Cato had fled. Taking a +general direction from the few stars visible above the opening, he +began to retrace his steps. But he had no longer the negro's +woodcraft to guide him. At times his feet were caught in trailing +vines which seemed to coil around his ankles with ominous +suggestiveness; at times the yielding soil beneath his tread showed +his perilous proximity to the swamp, as well as the fact that he +was beginning to incline towards that dread circle which is the +hopeless instinct of all lost and straying humanity. Luckily the +edge of the swamp was more open, and he would be enabled to correct +his changed course again by the position of the stars. But he was +becoming chilled and exhausted by these fruitless efforts, and at +length, after a more devious and prolonged detour, which brought +him back to the swamp again, he resolved to skirt its edge in +search of some other mode of issuance. Beyond him, the light +seemed stronger, as of a more extended opening or clearing, and +there was even a superficial gleam from the end of the swamp +itself, as if from some ignis fatuus or the glancing of a pool of +unbroken water. A few rods farther brought him to it and a full +view of the unencumbered expanse. Beyond him, far across the +swamp, he could see a hillside bathed in the moonlight with +symmetrical lines of small white squares dotting its slopes and +stretching down into a valley of gleaming shafts, pyramids, and +tombs. It was the cemetery; the white squares on the hillside were +the soldiers' graves. And among them even at that distance, +uplifting solemnly, like a reproachful phantom, was the broken +shaft above the dust of Chester Brooks. + +With the view of that fateful spot, which he had not seen since his +last meeting there with Sally Dows, a flood of recollection rushed +upon him. In the white mist that hung low along the farther edge +of the swamp he fancied he could see again the battery smoke +through which the ghostly figure of the dead rider had charged his +gun three years before; in the vapory white plumes of a funereal +plant in the long avenue he was reminded of the light figure of +Miss Sally as she appeared at their last meeting. In another +moment, in his already dazed condition, he might have succumbed to +some sensuous memory of her former fascinations, but he threw it +off savagely now, with a quick and bitter recalling of her deceit +and his own weakness. Turning his back upon the scene with a half- +superstitious tremor, he plunged once more into the trackless +covert. But he was conscious that his eyesight was gradually +growing dim and his strength falling. He was obliged from time to +time to stop and rally his sluggish senses, that seemed to grow +heavier under some deadly exhalation that flowed around him. He +even seemed to hear familiar voices,--but that must be delusion. +At last he stumbled. Throwing out an arm to protect himself, he +came heavily down upon the ooze, striking a dull, half-elastic root +that seemed--it must have been another delusion--to move beneath +him, and even--so confused were his senses now--to strike back +angrily upon his prostrate arm. A sharp pain ran from his elbow to +shoulder and for a moment stung him to full consciousness again. +There were voices surely,--the voices of their former pursuers! If +they were seeking to revenge themselves upon him for Cato's escape, +he was ready for them. He cocked his revolver and stood erect. A +torch flashed through the wood. But even at that moment a film +came over his eyes; he staggered and fell. + +An interval of helpless semi-consciousness ensued. He felt himself +lifted by strong arms and carried forward, his arm hanging +uselessly at his side. The dank odor of the wood was presently +exchanged for the free air of the open field; the flaming pine-knot +torches were extinguished in the bright moonlight. People pressed +around him, but so indistinctly he could not recognize them. All +his consciousness seemed centred in the burning, throbbing pain of +his arm. He felt himself laid upon the gravel; the sleeve cut from +his shoulder, the cool sensation of the hot and bursting skin bared +to the night air, and then a soft, cool, and indescribable pressure +upon a wound he had not felt before. A voice followed,--high, +lazily petulant, and familiar to him, and yet one he strove in vain +to recall. + +"De Lawdy-Gawd save us, Miss Sally! Wot yo' doin' dah? Chile! +Chile! Yo' 'll kill yo'se'f, shuah!" + +The pressure continued, strange and potent even through his pain, +and was then withdrawn. And a voice that thrilled him said:-- + +"It's the only thing to save him! Hush, ye chattering black crow! +Say anything about this to a living soul, and I'll have yo' +flogged! Now trot out the whiskey bottle and pour it down him." + + +CHAPTER VII. + + +When Courtland's eyes opened again, he was in bed in his own room +at Redlands, with the vivid morning sun occasionally lighting up +the wall whenever the closely drawn curtains were lightly blown +aside by the freshening breeze. The whole events of the night +might have been a dream but for the insupportable languor which +numbed his senses, and the torpor of his arm, that, swollen and +discolored, lay outside the coverlet on a pillow before him. +Cloths that had been wrung out in iced water were replaced upon it +from time to time by Sophy, Miss Dows' housekeeper, who, seated +near his bedhead, was lazily fanning him. Their eyes met. + +"Broken?" he said interrogatively, with a faint return of his old +deliberate manner, glancing at his helpless arm. + +"Deedy no, cunnle! Snake bite," responded the negress. + +"Snake bite!" repeated Courtland with languid interest, "what +snake?" + +"Moccasin o' copperhead--if you doun know yo'se'f which," she +replied. "But it's all right now, honey! De pizen's draw'd out +and clean gone. Wot yer feels now is de whiskey. De whiskey +STAYS, sah. It gets into de lubrications of de skin, sah, and has +to be abso'bed." + +Some faint chord of memory was touched by the girl's peculiar +vocabulary. + +"Ah," said Courtland quickly, "you're Miss Dows' Sophy. Then you +can tell me"-- + +"Nuffin, sah absomlutely nuffin!" interrupted the girl, shaking her +head with impressive official dignity. "It's done gone fo'bid by +de doctor! Yo' 're to lie dar and shut yo'r eye, honey," she +added, for the moment reverting unconsciously to the native +maternal tenderness of her race, "and yo' 're not to bodder yo'se'f +ef school keeps o' not. De medical man say distinctly, sah," she +concluded, sternly recalling her duty again, "no conversation wid +de patient." + +But Courtland had winning ways with all dependents. "But you will +answer me ONE question, Sophy, and I'll not ask another. Has"--he +hesitated in his still uncertainty as to the actuality of his +experience and its probable extent--"has--Cato--escaped?" + +"If yo' mean dat sassy, bull-nigger oberseer of yo'se, cunnle, HE'S +safe, yo' bet!" returned Sophy sharply. "Safe in his own quo'tahs +night afo' las', after braggin' about the bloodhaowns he killed; +and safe ober the county line yes'day moan'in, after kicking up all +dis rumpus. If dar is a sassy, highfalutin' nigger I jiss 'spises-- +its dat black nigger Cato o' yo'se! Now,"--relenting--"yo' jiss +wink yo' eye, honey, and don't excite yo'se'f about sach black +trash; drap off to sleep comfor'ble. Fo' you do'an get annuder +word out o' Sophy, shuah!" + +As if in obedience, Courtland closed his eyes. But even in his +weak state he was conscious of the blood coming into his cheek at +Sophy's relentless criticism of the man for whom he had just +periled his life and position. Much of it he felt was true; but +how far had he been a dupe in his quixotic defense of a quarrelsome +blusterer and cowardly bully? Yet there was the unmistakable shot +and cold-blooded attempt at Cato's assassination! And there were +the bloodhounds sent to track the unfortunate man! That was no +dream--but a brutal inexcusable fact! + +The medical practitioner of Redlands he remembered was conservative, +old-fashioned, and diplomatic. But his sympathies had been +broadened by some army experiences, and Courtland trusted to some +soldierly and frank exposition of the matter from him. Nevertheless, +Dr. Maynard was first healer, and, like Sophy, professionally +cautious. The colonel had better not talk about it now. It was +already two days old; the colonel had been nearly forty-eight hours +in bed. It was a regrettable affair, but the natural climax of +long-continued political and racial irritation--and not without +GREAT provocation! Assassination was a strong word; could Colonel +Courtland swear that Cato was actually AIMED AT, or was it not +merely a demonstration to frighten a bullying negro? It might have +been necessary to teach him a lesson--which the colonel by this time +ought to know could only be taught to these inferior races by FEAR. +The bloodhounds! Ah, yes!--well, the bloodhounds were, in fact, +only a part of that wholesome discipline. Surely Colonel Courtland +was not so foolish as to believe that, even in the old slave-holding +days, planters sent dogs after runaways to mangle and destroy THEIR +OWN PROPERTY? They might as well, at once, let them escape! No, +sir! They were used only to frighten and drive the niggers out of +swamps, brakes, and hiding-places--as no nigger had ever dared to +face 'em. Cato might lie as much as he liked, but everybody knew +WHO it was that killed Major Reed's hounds. Nobody blamed the +colonel for it,--not even Major Reed,--but if the colonel had lived +a little longer in the South, he'd have known it wasn't necessary to +do that in self-preservation, as the hounds would never have gone +for a white man. But that was not a matter for the colonel to bother +about NOW. He was doing well; he had slept nearly thirty hours; +there was no fever, he must continue to doze off the exhaustion of +his powerful stimulant, and he, the doctor, would return later in +the afternoon. + +Perhaps it was his very inability to grasp in that exhausted state +the full comprehension of the doctor's meaning, perhaps because the +physical benumbing of his brain was stronger than any mental +excitement, but he slept again until the doctor reappeared. +"You're doing well enough now, colonel," said the physician, after +a brief examination of his patient, "and I think we can afford to +wake you up a bit, and even let you move your arm. You're luckier +than poor Tom Higbee, who won't be able to set his leg to the floor +for three weeks to come. I haven't got all the buckshot out of it +yet that Jack Dumont put there the other night." + +Courtland started slightly. Jack Dumont! That was the name of +Sally Dows cousin of whom Champney had spoken! He had resolutely +put aside from his returning memory the hazy recollection of the +young girl's voice--the last thing he had heard that night--and the +mystery that seemed to surround it. But there was no delusion in +this cousin--his rival, and that of the equally deceived Champney. +He controlled himself and repeated coldly:-- + +"Jack Dumont!" + +"Yes. But of course you knew nothing of all that, while you were +off in the swamp there. Yet, by Jingo! it was Dumont's shooting +Higbee that helped YOU to get off your nigger a darned sight more +than YOUR killing the dogs." + +"I don't understand," returned Courtland coldly. + +"Well, you see, Dumont, who had taken up No'th'n principles, I +reckon, more to goad the Higbees and please Sally Dows than from +any conviction, came over here that night. Whether he suspected +anything was up, or wanted to dare Higbee for bedevilment, or was +only dancing attendance on Miss Sally, no one knows. But he rode +slap into Highee's party, called out, 'If you're out hunting, Tom, +here's a chance for your score!' meaning their old vendetta feud, +and brings his shot-gun up to his shoulder. Higbee wasn't quick +enough, Dumont lets fly, drops Higbee, and then gallops off chased +by the Reeds to avenge Higbee, and followed by the whole crowd to +see the fun, which was a little better than nigger-driving. And +that let you and Cato out, colonel." + +"And Dumont?" + +"Got clean away to Foxboro' Station, leaving another score on his +side for the Reeds and Higbees to wipe out as best they can. You +No'th'n men don't believe in these sort of things, colonel, but +taken as a straight dash and hit o' raiding, that stroke of Sally +Dows' cousin was mighty fine!" + +Courtland controlled himself with difficulty. The doctor had +spoken truly. The hero of this miserable affair was HER cousin-- +HIS RIVAL! And to him--perhaps influenced by some pitying appeal +of Miss Sally for the man she had deceived--Courtland owed his +life! He instinctively drew a quick, sharp breath. + +"Are you in pain?" + +"Not at all. When can I get up?" + +"Perhaps to-morrow." + +"And this arm?" + +"Better not use it for a week or two." He stopped, and, glancing +paternally at the younger man, added gravely but kindly: "If you'll +take my unprofessional advice, Colonel Courtland, you'll let this +matter simmer down. It won't hurt you and your affairs here that +folks have had a taste of your quality, and the nigger a lesson +that his fellows won't forget." + +"I thank you," returned Courtland coldly; "but I think I already +understand my duty to the company I represent and the Government I +have served." + +"Possibly, colonel," said the doctor quietly; "but you'll let an +older man remind you and the Government that you can't change the +habits or relations of two distinct races in a few years. Your +friend, Miss Sally Dows--although not quite in my way of thinking-- +has never attempted THAT." + +"I am fully aware that Miss Dows possesses diplomatic accomplishments +and graces that I cannot lay claim to," returned Courtland bitterly. + +The doctor lifted his eyebrows slightly and changed the subject. + +When he had gone, Courtland called for writing materials. He had +already made up his mind, and one course alone seemed proper to +him. He wrote to the president of the company, detailing the +circumstances that had just occurred, admitting the alleged +provocation given by his overseer, but pointing out the terrorism +of a mob-law which rendered his own discipline impossible. He +asked that the matter be reported to Washington, and some measures +taken for the protection of the freedmen, in the mean time he +begged to tender his own resignation, but he would stay until his +successor was appointed, or the safety of his employees secured. +Until then, he should act upon his own responsibility and according +to his judgment. He made no personal charges, mentioned no names, +asked for no exemplary prosecution or trial of the offenders, but +only demanded a safeguard against a repetition of the offense. His +next letter, although less formal and official, was more difficult. +It was addressed to the commandant of the nearest Federal barracks, +who was an old friend and former companion-in-arms. He alluded to +some conversation they had previously exchanged in regard to the +presence of a small detachment of troops at Redlands during the +elections, which Courtland at the time, however, had diplomatically +opposed. He suggested it now as a matter of public expediency and +prevention. When he had sealed the letters, not caring to expose +them to the espionage of the local postmaster or his ordinary +servants, he intrusted them to one of Miss Sally's own henchmen, to +be posted at the next office, at Bitter Creek Station, ten miles +distant. + +Unfortunately, this duty accomplished, the reaction consequent on +his still weak physical condition threw him back upon himself and +his memory. He had resolutely refused to think of Miss Sally; he +had been able to withstand the suggestions of her in the presence +of her handmaid--supposed to be potent in nursing and herb-lore-- +whom she had detached to wait upon him, and he had returned +politely formal acknowledgments to her inquiries. He had +determined to continue this personal avoidance as far as possible +until he was relieved, on the ground of that BUSINESS expediency +which these events had made necessary. She would see that he was +only accepting the arguments with which she had met his previous +advances. Briefly, he had recourse to that hopeless logic by which +a man proves to himself that he has no reason for loving a certain +woman, and is as incontestably convinced by the same process that +he has. And in the midst of it he weakly fell asleep, and dreamed +that he and Miss Sally were walking in the cemetery; that a hideous +snake concealed among some lilies, over which the young girl was +bending, had uplifted its triangular head to strike. That he +seized it by the neck, struggled with it until he was nearly +exhausted, when it suddenly collapsed and shrunk, leaving in his +palm the limp, crushed, and delicately perfumed little thread glove +which he remembered to have once slipped from her hand. + +When he awoke, that perfume seemed to be still in the air, distinct +from the fresh but homelier scents of the garden which stole +through the window. A sense of delicious coolness came with the +afternoon breeze, that faintly trilled the slanting slats of the +blind with a slumberous humming as of bees. The golden glory of a +sinking southern sun was penciling the cheap paper on the wall with +leafy tracery and glowing arabesques. But more than that, the calm +of some potent influence--or some unseen presence--was upon him, +which he feared a movement might dispel. The chair at the foot of +his bed was empty. Sophy had gone out. He did not turn his head +to look further; his languid eyes falling aimlessly upon the carpet +at his bedside suddenly dilated. For they fell also on the +"smallest foot in the State." + +He started to his elbow, but a soft hand was laid gently yet firmly +upon his shoulder, and with a faint rustle of muslin skirts Miss +Sally rose from an unseen chair at the head of his bed, and stood +beside him. + +"Don't stir, co'nnle, I didn't sit where I could look in yo'r face +for fear of waking yo'. But I'll change seats now." She moved to +the chair which Sophy had vacated, drew it slightly nearer the bed, +and sat down. + +"It was very kind of you--to come," said Courtland hesitatingly, as +with a strong effort he drew his eyes away from the fascinating +vision, and regained a certain cold composure, "but I am afraid my +illness has been greatly magnified. I really am quite well enough +to be up and about my business, if the doctor would permit it. But +I shall certainly manage to attend to my duty to-morrow, and I hope +to be at your service. + +"Meaning that yo' don't care to see me NOW, co'nnle," she said +lightly, with a faint twinkle in her wise, sweet eyes. "I thought +of that, but as my business wouldn't wait, I brought it to yo'." +She took from the folds of her gown a letter. To his utter +amazement it was the one he had given his overseer to post to the +commandant that morning. To his greater indignation the seal was +broken. + +"Who has dared?" he demanded, half rising. + +Her little hand was thrust out half deprecatingly. "No one yo' can +fight, co'nnle; only ME. I don't generally open other folks' +letters, and I wouldn't have done it for MYSELF; I did for yo'." + +"For me?" + +"For yo'. I reckoned what yo' MIGHT do, and I told Sam to bring ME +the letters first. I didn't mind what yo' wrote to the company-- +for they'll take care of yo', and their own eggs are all in the +same basket. I didn't open THAT one, but I did THIS when I saw the +address. It was as I expected, and yo' 'd given yo'self away! For +if yo' had those soldiers down here, yo' 'd have a row, sure! +Don't move, co'nnle, YO' may not care for that, it's in YO'R line. +But folks will say that the soldiers weren't sent to prevent +RIOTING, but that Co'nnle Courtland was using his old comrades to +keep order on his property at Gov'ment expense. Hol' on! Hol' on! +co'nnle," said the little figure, rising and waving its pretty arms +with a mischievous simulation of terrified deprecation. "Don't +shoot! Of course yo' didn't mean THAT, but that's about the way +that So'th'n men will put it to yo'r Gov'ment. For," she +continued, more gently, yet with the shrewdest twinkle in her gray +eyes, "if yo' really thought the niggers might need Federal +protection, yo' 'd have let ME write to the commandant to send an +escort--not to YO, but to CATO--that HE might be able to come back +in safety. Yo' 'd have had yo'r soldiers; I'd have had back my +nigger, which"--demurely--"yo' don't seem to worry yo'self much +about, co'nnle; and there isn't a So'th'n man would have objected. +But," still more demurely, and affectedly smoothing out her crisp +skirt with her little hands, "yo' haven't been troubling me much +with yo'r counsel lately." + +A swift and utterly new comprehension swept over Courtland. For +the first time in his knowledge of her he suddenly grasped what +was, perhaps, the true conception of her character. Looking at her +clearly now, he understood the meaning of those pliant graces, so +unaffected and yet always controlled by the reasoning of an +unbiased intellect; her frank speech and plausible intonations! +Before him stood the true-born daughter of a long race of +politicians! All that he had heard of their dexterity, tact, and +expediency rose here incarnate, with the added grace of womanhood. +A strange sense of relief--perhaps a dawning of hope--stole over +him. + +"But how will this insure Cato's safety hereafter, or give +protection to the others?" he said, fixing his eyes upon her. + +"The future won't concern YO' much, co'nnle, if as yo' say here +yo'r resignation is sent in, and yo'r successor appointed," she +replied, with more gravity than she had previously shown. + +"But you do not think I will leave YOU in this uncertainty," he +said passionately. He stopped suddenly, his brow darkened. "I +forgot," he added coldly, "you will be well protected. Your-- +COUSIN--will give you the counsel of race--and--closer ties." + +To his infinite astonishment, Miss Sally leaned forward in her +chair and buried her laughing face in both of her hands. When her +dimples had become again visible, she said with an effort, "Don't +yo' think, co'nnle, that as a peacemaker my cousin was even a +bigger failure than yo'self?" + +"I don't understand," stammered Courtland. + +"Don't yo' think," she continued, wiping her eyes demurely, "that +if a young woman about my size, who had got perfectly tired and +sick of all this fuss made about yo', because yo' were a No'th'n +man, managing niggers--if that young woman wanted to show her +people what sort of a radical and abolitionist a SO'TH'N man of +their own sort might become, she'd have sent for Jack Dumont as a +sample? Eh? Only, I declare to goodness, I never reckoned that he +and Higbee would revive the tomfooling of the vendetta, and take to +shootin' each other at once." + +"And your sending for your cousin was only a feint to protect me?" +said Courtland faintly. + +"Perhaps he didn't have to be SENT for, co'nnle," she said, with a +slight touch of coquetry. "Suppose we say, I LET HIM COME. He'd +be hanging round, for he has property here, and wanted to get me to +take it up with mine in the company. I knew what his new views and +ideas were, and I thought I'd better consult Champney--who, being a +foreigner, and an older resident than yo', was quite neutral. He +didn't happen to tell YO' anything about it--did he, co'nnle?" she +added with a grave mouth, but an indescribable twinkle in her eyes. + +Courtland's face darkened. "He did--and he further told me, Miss +Dows, that he himself was your suitor, and that you had refused him +because of the objections of your people." + +She raised her eyes to his swiftly and dropped them. + +"And yo' think I ought to have accepted him?" she said slowly. + +"No! but--you know--you told me"--he began hurriedly. But she had +already risen, and was shaking out the folds of her dress. + +"We're not talking BUSINESS co'nnle--and business was my only +excuse for coming here, and taking Sophy's place. I'll send her in +to yo', now." + +"But, Miss Dows!--Miss Sally!" + +She stopped--hesitated--a singular weakness for so self-contained a +nature--and then slowly produced from her pocket a second letter-- +the one that Courtland had directed to the company. "I didn't read +THIS letter, as I just told yo' co'nnle, for I reckon I know what's +in it, but I thought I'd bring it with me too, in case YO' CHANGED +YO'R MIND." + +He raised himself on his pillow as she turned quickly away; but in +that single vanishing glimpse of her bright face he saw what +neither he nor any one else had ever seen upon the face of Sally +Dows--a burning blush! + +"Miss Sally!" He almost leaped from the bed, but she was gone. +There was another rustle at the door--the entrance of Sophy. + +"Call her back, Sophy, quick!" he said. + +The negress shook her turbaned head. "Not much, honey! When Miss +Sally say she goes--she done gone, shuah!" + +"But, Sophy!" Perhaps something in the significant face of the +girl tempted him; perhaps it was only an impulse of his forgotten +youth. "Sophy!" appealingly--"tell me!--is Miss Sally engaged to +her cousin?" + +"Wat dat?" said Sophy in indignant scorn. "Miss Sally engaged to +dat Dumont! What fo'? Yo' 're crazy! No!" + +"Nor Champney? Tell me, Sophy, has she a LOVER?" + +For a moment the whites of Sophy's eyes were uplifted in speechless +scorn. "Yo' ask dat! Yo' lyin' dar wid dat snake-bit arm! Yo' +lyin' dar, and Miss Sally--who has only to whistle to call de fust +quality in de State raoun her--coming and going here wid you, and +trotting on yo'r arrants--and yo' ask dat! Yes! she has a lover, +and what's me', she CAN'T HELP IT; and yo' 're her lover; and +what's me', YO' can't help it either! And yo' can't back out of it +now--bo'fe of yo'--nebber! Fo' yo' 're hers, and she's yo'rs--fo' +ebber. For she sucked yo' blood." + +"What!" gasped Courtland, aghast at what he believed to be the +sudden insanity of the negress. + +"Yes! Whar's yo'r eyes? whar's yo'r years? who's yo' dat yo' +didn't see nor heah nuffin? When dey dragged yo' outer de swamp +dat night--wid de snake-bite freshen yo'r arm--didn't SHE, dat poh +chile!--dat same Miss Sally--frow herself down on yo', and put dat +baby mouf of hers to de wound and suck out de pizen and sabe de +life ob yo' at de risk ob her own? Say? And if dey's any troof in +Hoodoo, don't dat make yo' one blood and one soul! Go way, white +man! I'm sick of yo'. Stop dar! Lie down dar! Hol' on, co'nnle, +for massy's sake. Well, dar--I'll call her back!" + +And she did! + + +"Look here--don't you know--it rather took me by surprise," said +Champney, a few days later, with a hearty grip of the colonel's +uninjured hand; "but I don't bear malice, old fellow, and, by Jove! +it was SUCH a sensible, all-round, business-like choice for the +girl to make that no wonder we never thought of it before. Hang it +all, you see a fellow was always so certain it would be something +out of the way and detrimental, don't you know, that would take the +fancy of a girl like that--somebody like that cousin of hers or +Higbee, or even ME, by Jove that we never thought of looking beyond +our noses--never thought of the BUSINESS! And YOU all the time so +cold and silent and matter-of-fact about it! But I congratulate +you! You've got the business down on a safe basis now, and what's +more, you've got the one woman who can run it." + +They say he was a true prophet. At least the Syndicate affairs +prospered, and in course of time even the Reeds and the Higbees +participated in the benefits. There were no more racial +disturbances; only the districts polled a peaceful and SMALLER +Democratic majority at the next election. There were not wanting +those who alleged that Colonel Courtland had simply become MRS. +COURTLAND'S SUPERINTENDENT; that she had absorbed him as she had +every one who had come under her influence, and that she would not +rest until she had made him a Senator (to represent Mrs. Courtland) +in the councils of the nation. But when I last dined with them in +Washington, ten years ago, I found them both very happy and +comfortable, and I remember that Mrs. Courtland's remarks upon +Federal and State interests, the proper education of young girls, +and the management of the family, were eminently wise and practical. + + + + +THE CONSPIRACY OF MRS. BUNKER. + + +PART I. + + +On the northerly shore of San Francisco Bay a line of bluffs +terminates in a promontory, at whose base, formed by the crumbling +debris of the cliff above, there is a narrow stretch of beach, salt +meadow, and scrub oak. The abrupt wall of rock behind it seems to +isolate it as completely from the mainland as the sea before it +separates it from the opposite shore. In spite of its contiguity +to San Francisco,--opposite also, but hidden by the sharp re- +entering curve of coast,--the locality was wild, uncultivated, and +unfrequented. A solitary fisherman's cabin half hidden in the +rocks was the only trace of habitation. White drifts of sea-gulls +and pelican across the face of the cliff, gray clouds of sandpipers +rising from the beach, the dripping flight of ducks over the salt +meadows, and the occasional splash of a seal from the rocks, were +the only signs of life that could be seen from the decks of passing +ships. And yet the fisherman's cabin was occupied by Zephas Bunker +and his young wife, and he had succeeded in wresting from the hard +soil pasturage for a cow and goats, while his lateen-sailed +fishing-boat occasionally rode quietly in the sheltered cove below. + +Three years ago Zephas Bunker, an ex-whaler, had found himself +stranded on a San Francisco wharf and had "hired out" to a small +Petaluma farmer. At the end of a year he had acquired little taste +for the farmer's business, but considerable for the farmer's +youthful daughter, who, equally weary of small agriculture, had +consented to elope with him in order to escape it. They were +married at Oakland; he put his scant earnings into a fishing-boat, +discovered the site for his cabin, and brought his bride thither. +The novelty of the change pleased her, although perhaps it was but +little advance on her previous humble position. Yet she preferred +her present freedom to the bare restricted home life of her past; +the perpetual presence of the restless sea was a relief to the old +monotony of the wheat field and its isolated drudgery. For Mary's +youthful fancy, thinly sustained in childhood by the lightest +literary food, had neither been stimulated nor disillusioned by her +marriage. That practical experience which is usually the end of +girlish romance had left her still a child in sentiment. The long +absences of her husband in his fishing-boat kept her from wearying +of or even knowing his older and unequal companionship; it gave her +a freedom her girlhood had never known, yet added a protection that +suited her still childish dependency, while it tickled her pride +with its equality. When not engaged in her easy household duties +in her three-roomed cottage, or the care of her rocky garden patch, +she found time enough to indulge her fancy over the mysterious haze +that wrapped the invisible city so near and yet unknown to her; in +the sails that slipped in and out of the Golden Gate, but of whose +destination she knew nothing; and in the long smoke trail of the +mail steamer which had yet brought her no message. Like all +dwellers by the sea, her face and her thoughts were more frequently +turned towards it; and as with them, it also seemed to her that +whatever change was coming into her life would come across that +vast unknown expanse. But it was here that Mrs. Bunker was +mistaken. + +It had been a sparkling summer morning. The waves were running +before the dry northwest trade winds with crystalline but colorless +brilliancy. Sheltered by the high, northerly bluff, the house and +its garden were exposed to the untempered heat of the cloudless sun +refracted from the rocky wall behind it. Some tarpaulin and ropes +lying among the rocks were sticky and odorous; the scrub oaks and +manzanita bushes gave out the aroma of baking wood; occasionally a +faint pot-pourri fragrance from the hot wild roses and beach grass +was blown along the shore; even the lingering odors of Bunker's +vocation, and of Mrs. Bunker's cooking, were idealized and refined +by the saline breath of the sea at the doors and windows. Mrs. +Bunker, in the dazzling sun, bending over her peas and lettuces +with a small hoe, felt the comfort of her brown holland sunbonnet. +Secure in her isolation, she unbuttoned the neck of her gown for +air, and did not put up the strand of black hair that had escaped +over her shoulder. It was very hot in the lee of the bluff, and +very quiet in that still air. So quiet that she heard two distinct +reports, following each other quickly, but very faint and far. +She glanced mechanically towards the sea. Two merchant-men in +midstream were shaking out their wings for a long flight, a pilot +boat and coasting schooner were rounding the point, but there was +no smoke from their decks. She bent over her work again, and in +another moment had forgotten it. But the heat, with the dazzling +reflection from the cliff, forced her to suspend her gardening, and +stroll along the beach to the extreme limit of her domain. Here +she looked after the cow that had also strayed away through the +tangled bush for coolness. The goats, impervious to temperature, +were basking in inaccessible fastnesses on the cliff itself that +made her eyes ache to climb. Over an hour passed, she was +returning, and had neared her house, when she was suddenly startled +to see the figure of a man between her and the cliff. He was +engaged in brushing his dusty clothes with a handkerchief, and +although he saw her coming, and even moved slowly towards her, +continued his occupation with a half-impatient, half-abstracted +air. Her feminine perception was struck with the circumstance that +he was in deep black, with scarcely a gleam of white showing even +at his throat, and that he wore a tall black hat. Without knowing +anything of social customs, it seemed to her that his dress was +inconsistent with his appearance there. + +"Good-morning," he said, lifting his hat with a preoccupied air. +"Do you live here?" + +"Yes," she said wonderingly. + +"Anybody else?" + +"My husband." + +"I mean any other people? Are there any other houses?" he said +with a slight impatience. + +"No." + +He looked at her and then towards the sea. "I expect some friends +who are coming for me in a boat. I suppose they can land easily +here?" + +"Didn't you yourself land here just now?" she said quickly. + +He half hesitated, and then, as if scorning an equivocation, made a +hasty gesture over her shoulder and said bluntly, "No, I came over +the cliff." + +"Down the cliff?" she repeated incredulously. + +"Yes," he said, glancing at his clothes; "it was a rough scramble, +but the goats showed me the way." + +"And you were up on the bluff all the time?" she went on curiously. + +"Yes. You see--I"--he stopped suddenly at what seemed to be the +beginning of a prearranged and plausible explanation, as if +impatient of its weakness or hypocrisy, and said briefly, "Yes, I +was there." + +Like most women, more observant of his face and figure, she did not +miss this lack of explanation. He was a very good-looking man of +middle age, with a thin, proud, high-bred face, which in a country +of bearded men had the further distinction of being smoothly +shaven. She had never seen any one like him before. She thought +he looked like an illustration of some novel she had read, but also +somewhat melancholy, worn, and tired. + +"Won't you come in and rest yourself?" she said, motioning to the +cabin. + +"Thank you," he said, still half absently. "Perhaps I'd better. +It may be some time yet before they come." + +She led the way to the cabin, entered the living room--a plainly +furnished little apartment between the bedroom and the kitchen-- +pointed to a large bamboo armchair, and placed a bottle of whiskey +and some water on the table before him. He thanked her again very +gently, poured out some spirits in his glass, and mixed it with +water. But when she glanced towards him again he had apparently +risen without tasting it, and going to the door was standing there +with his hand in the breast of his buttoned frock coat, gazing +silently towards the sea. There was something vaguely historical +in his attitude--or what she thought might be historical--as of +somebody of great importance who had halted on the eve of some +great event at the door of her humble cabin. + +His apparent unconsciousness of her and of his surroundings, his +preoccupation with something far beyond her ken, far from piquing +her, only excited her interest the more. And then there was such +an odd sadness in his eyes. + +"Are you anxious for your folks' coming?" she said at last, +following his outlook. + +"I--oh no!" he returned, quickly recalling himself, "they'll be +sure to come--sooner or later. No fear of that," he added, half +smilingly, half wearily. + +Mrs. Bunker passed into the kitchen, where, while apparently +attending to her household duties, she could still observe her +singular guest. Left alone, he seated himself mechanically in the +chair, and gazed fixedly at the fireplace. He remained a long time +so quiet and unmoved, in spite of the marked ostentatious clatter +Mrs. Bunker found it necessary to make with her dishes, that an +odd fancy that he was scarcely a human visitant began to take +possession of her. Yet she was not frightened. She remembered +distinctly afterwards that, far from having any concern for +herself, she was only moved by a strange and vague admiration of +him. + +But her prolonged scrutiny was not without effect. Suddenly he +raised his dark eyes, and she felt them pierce the obscurity of her +kitchen with a quick, suspicious, impatient penetration, which as +they met hers gave way, however, to a look that she thought was +gently reproachful. Then he rose, stretched himself to his full +height, and approaching the kitchen door leaned listlessly against +the door-post. + +"I don't suppose you are ever lonely here?" + +"No, sir." + +"Of course not. You have yourself and husband. Nobody interferes +with you. You are contented and happy together." + +Mrs. Bunker did not say, what was the fact, that she had never +before connected the sole companionship of her husband with her +happiness. Perhaps it had never occurred to her until that moment +how little it had to do with it. She only smiled gratefully at the +change in her guest's abstraction. + +"Do you often go to San Francisco?" he continued. + +"I have never been there at all. Some day I expect we will go +there to live." + +"I wouldn't advise you to," he said, looking at her gravely. "I +don't think it will pay you. You'll never be happy there as here. +You'll never have the independence and freedom you have here. +You'll never be your own mistress again. But how does it happen +you never were in San Francisco?" he said suddenly. + +If he would not talk of himself, here at least was a chance for +Mrs. Bunker to say something. She related how her family had +emigrated from Kansas across the plains and had taken up a +"location" at Contra Costa. How she didn't care for it, and how +she came to marry the seafaring man who brought her here--all with +great simplicity and frankness and as unreservedly as to a superior +being--albeit his attention wandered at times, and a rare but +melancholy smile that he had apparently evoked to meet her +conversational advances became fixed occasionally. Even his dark +eyes, which had obliged Mrs. Bunker to put up her hair and button +her collar, rested upon her without seeing her. + +"Then your husband's name is Bunker?" he said when she paused at +last. "That's one of those Nantucket Quaker names--sailors and +whalers for generations--and yours, you say, was MacEwan. Well, +Mrs. Bunker, YOUR family came from Kentucky to Kansas only lately, +though I suppose your father calls himself a Free-States man. You +ought to know something of farming and cattle, for your ancestors +were old Scotch Covenanters who emigrated a hundred years ago, and +were great stock raisers." + +All this seemed only the natural omniscience of a superior being. +And Mrs. Bunker perhaps was not pained to learn that her husband's +family was of a lower degree than her own. But the stranger's +knowledge did not end there. He talked of her husband's business-- +he explained the vast fishing resources of the bay and coast. He +showed her how the large colony of Italian fishermen were inimical +to the interests of California and to her husband--particularly as +a native American trader. He told her of the volcanic changes of +the bay and coast line, of the formation of the rocky ledge on +which she lived. He pointed out to her its value to the Government +for defensive purposes, and how it naturally commanded the entrance +of the Golden Gate far better than Fort Point, and that it ought to +be in its hands. If the Federal Government did not buy it of her +husband, certainly the State of California should. And here he +fell into an abstraction as deep and as gloomy as before. He +walked to the window, paced the floor with his hand in his breast, +went to the door, and finally stepped out of the cabin, moving +along the ledge of rocks to the shore, where he stood motionless. + +Mrs. Bunker had listened to him with parted lips and eyes of +eloquent admiration. She had never before heard anyone talk like +THAT--she had not believed it possible that any one could have such +knowledge. Perhaps she could not understand all he said, but she +would try to remember it after he had gone. She could only think +now how kind it was of him that in all this mystery of his coming, +and in the singular sadness that was oppressing him, he should try +to interest her. And thus looking at him, and wondering, an idea +came to her. + +She went into her bedroom and took down her husband's heavy pilot +overcoat and sou'wester, and handed them to her guest. + +"You'd better put them on if you're going to stand there," she +said. + +"But I am not cold," he said wonderingly. + +"But you might be SEEN," she said simply. It was the first +suggestion that had passed between them that his presence there was +a secret. He looked at her intently, then he smiled and said, "I +think you're right, for many reasons," put the pilot coat over his +frock coat, removed his hat with the gesture of a bow, handed it to +her, and placed the sou'wester in its stead. Then for an instant +he hesitated as if about to speak, but Mrs. Bunker, with a delicacy +that she could not herself comprehend at the moment, hurried back +to the cabin without giving him an opportunity. + +Nor did she again intrude upon his meditations. Hidden in his +disguise, which to her eyes did not, however, seem to conceal his +characteristic figure, he wandered for nearly an hour under the +bluff and along the shore, returning at last almost mechanically to +the cabin, where, oblivious of his surroundings, he reseated +himself in silence by the table with his cheek resting on his hand. +Presently, her quick, experienced ear detected the sound of oars in +their row-locks; she could plainly see from her kitchen window a +small boat with two strangers seated at the stern being pulled to +the shore. With the same strange instinct of delicacy, she +determined not to go out lest her presence might embarrass her +guest's reception of his friends. But as she turned towards the +living room she found he had already risen and was removing his hat +and pilot coat. She was struck, however, by the circumstance that +not only did he exhibit no feeling of relief at his deliverance, +but that a half-cynical, half-savage expression had taken the place +of his former melancholy. As he went to the door, the two gentlemen +hastily clambered up the rocks to greet him. + +"Jim reckoned it was you hangin' round the rocks, but I couldn't +tell at that distance. Seemed you borrowed a hat and coat. Well-- +it's all fixed, and we've no time to lose. There's a coasting +steamer just dropping down below the Heads, and it will take you +aboard. But I can tell you you've kicked up a h-ll of a row over +there." He stopped, evidently at some sign from her guest. The +rest of the man's speech followed in a hurried whisper, which was +stopped again by the voice she knew. "No. Certainly not." The +next moment his tall figure was darkening the door of the kitchen; +his hand was outstretched. "Good-by, Mrs. Bunker, and many thanks +for your hospitality. My friends here," he turned grimly to the +men behind him, "think I ought to ask you to keep this a secret +even from your husband. I DON'T! They also think that I ought to +offer you money for your kindness. I DON'T! But if you will honor +me by keeping this ring in remembrance of it"--he took a heavy seal +ring from his finger--"it's the only bit of jewelry I have about +me--I'll be very glad. Good-by!" She felt for a moment the firm, +soft pressure of his long, thin fingers around her own, and then-- +he was gone. The sound of retreating oars grew fainter and fainter +and was lost. The same reserve of delicacy which now appeared to +her as a duty kept her from going to the window to watch the +destination of the boat. No, he should go as he came, without her +supervision or knowledge. + +Nor did she feel lonely afterwards. On the contrary, the silence +and solitude of the isolated domain had a new charm. They kept the +memory of her experience intact, and enabled her to refill it with +his presence. She could see his tall figure again pausing before +her cabin, without the incongruous association of another +personality; she could hear his voice again, unmingled with one +more familiar. For the first time, the regular absence of her +husband seemed an essential good fortune instead of an accident of +their life. For the experience belonged to HER, and not to him and +her together. He could not understand it; he would have acted +differently and spoiled it. She should not tell him anything of +it, in spite of the stranger's suggestion, which, of course, he had +only made because he didn't know Zephas as well as she did. For +Mrs. Bunker was getting on rapidly; it was her first admission of +the conjugal knowledge that one's husband is inferior to the +outside estimate of him. The next step--the belief that he was +deceiving HER as he was THEM--would be comparatively easy. + +Nor should she show him the ring. The stranger had certainly never +said anything about that! It was a heavy ring, with a helmeted +head carved on its red carnelian stone, and what looked like +strange letters around it. It fitted her third finger perfectly; +but HIS fingers were small, and he had taken it from his little +finger. She should keep it herself. Of course, if it had been +money, she would have given it to Zephas; but the stranger knew +that she wouldn't take money. How firmly he had said that "I +don't!" She felt the warm blood fly to her fresh young face at the +thought of it. He had understood her. She might be living in a +poor cabin, doing all the housework herself, and her husband only a +fisherman, but he had treated her like a lady. + +And so the afternoon passed. The outlying fog began to roll in at +the Golden Gate, obliterating the headland and stretching a fleecy +bar across the channel as if shutting out from vulgar eyes the way +that he had gone. Night fell, but Zephas had not yet come. This +was unusual, for he was generally as regular as the afternoon +"trades" which blew him there. There was nothing to detain him in +this weather and at this season. She began to be vaguely uneasy; +then a little angry at this new development of his incompatibility. +Then it occurred to her, for the first time in her wifehood, to +think what she would do if he were lost. Yet, in spite of some +pain, terror, and perplexity at the possibility, her dominant +thought was that she would be a free woman to order her life as she +liked. + +It was after ten before his lateen sail flapped in the little cove. +She was waiting to receive him on the shore. His good-humored +hirsute face was slightly apologetic in expression, but flushed and +disturbed with some new excitement to which an extra glass or two +of spirits had apparently added intensity. The contrast between +his evident indulgence and the previous abstemiousness of her late +guest struck her unpleasantly. "Well--I declare," she said +indignantly, "so THAT'S what kept you!" + +"No," he said quickly; "there's been awful times over in 'Frisco! +Everybody just wild, and the Vigilance Committee in session. Jo +Henderson's killed! Shot by Wynyard Marion in a duel! He'll be +lynched, sure as a gun, if they ketch him." + +"But I thought men who fought duels always went free." + +"Yes, but this ain't no common duel; they say the whole thing was +planned beforehand by them Southern fire-eaters to get rid o' +Henderson because he's a Northern man and anti-slavery, and that +they picked out Colonel Marion to do it because he was a dead shot. +They got him to insult Henderson, so he was bound to challenge +Marion, and that giv' Marion the chyce of weppings. It was a +reg'lar put up job to kill him." + +"And what's all this to do with you?" she asked, with irritation. + +"Hold on, won't you! and I'll tell you. I was pickin' up nets off +Saucelito about noon, when I was hailed by one of them Vigilance +tugs, and they set me to stand off and on the shore and watch that +Marion didn't get away, while they were scoutin' inland. Ye see +THE DUEL TOOK PLACE JUST OVER THE BLUFF THERE--BEHIND YE--and they +allowed that Marion had struck away north for Mendocino to take +ship there. For after overhaulin' his second's boat, they found +out that they had come away from Saucelito ALONE. But they sent a +tug around by sea to Mendocino to head him off there, while they're +closin' in around him inland. They're bound to catch him sooner or +later. But you ain't listenin', Mollie?" + +She was--in every fibre--but with her head turned towards the +window, and the invisible Golden Gate through which the fugitive +had escaped. For she saw it all now--that glorious vision--her +high-bred, handsome guest and Wynyard Marion were one and the same +person. And this rough, commonplace man before her--her own +husband--had been basely set to capture him! + + +PART II. + + +During that evening and the next Mrs. Bunker, without betraying her +secret, or exciting the least suspicion on the part of her husband, +managed to extract from him not only a rough description of Marion +which tallied with her own impressions, but a short history of his +career. He was a famous politician who had held high office in the +South; he was an accomplished lawyer; he had served in the army; he +was a fiery speaker; he had a singular command of men. He was +unmarried, but there were queer stories of his relations with some +of the wives of prominent officials, and there was no doubt that he +used them in some of his political intrigues. He, Zephas, would +bet something that it was a woman who had helped him off! Did she +speak? + +Yes, she had spoken. It made her sick to sit there and hear such +stories! Because a man did not agree with some people in politics +it was perfectly awful to think how they would abuse him and take +away his character! Men were so awfully jealous, too; if another +man happened to be superior and fine-looking there wasn't anything +bad enough for them to say about him! No! she wasn't a slavery +sympathizer either, and hadn't anything to do with man politics, +although she was a Southern woman, and the MacEwans had come from +Kentucky and owned slaves. Of course, he, Zephas, whose ancestors +were Cape Cod Quakers and had always been sailors, couldn't +understand. She did not know what he meant by saying "what a long +tail our cat's got," but if he meant to call her a cat, and was +going to use such language to her, he had better have stayed in San +Francisco with his Vigilance friends. And perhaps it would have +been better if he had stayed there before he took her away from her +parents at Martinez. Then she wouldn't have been left on a desert +rock without any chance of seeing the world, or ever making any +friends or acquaintances! + +It was their first quarrel. Discreetly made up by Mrs. Bunker in +some alarm at betraying herself; honestly forgiven by Zephas in a +rude, remorseful consciousness of her limited life. One or two +nights later, when he returned, it was with a mingled air of +mystery and satisfaction. "Well, Mollie," he said cheerfully, "it +looks as if your pets were not as bad as I thought them." + +"My pets!" repeated Mrs. Bunker, with a faint rising of color. + +"Well, I call these Southern Chivs your pets, Mollie, because you +stuck up for them so the other night. But never mind that now. +What do you suppose has happened? Jim Rider, you know, the +Southern banker and speculator, who's a regular big Injin among the +'Chivs,' he sent Cap Simmons down to the wharf while I was +unloadin' to come up and see him. Well, I went, and what do y'u +think? He told me he was gettin' up an American Fishin' Company, +and wanted me to take charge of a first-class schooner on shares. +Said he heard of me afore, and knew I was an American and a white +man, and just the chap ez could knock them Eytalians outer the +market." + +"Yes," interrupted Mrs. Bunker quickly, but emphatically, "the +fishing interest ought to be American and protected by the State, +with regular charters and treaties." + +"I say, Mollie," said her astonished but admiring husband, "you've +been readin' the papers or listenin' to stump speakin' sure." + +"Go on," returned Mrs. Bunker impatiently, "and say what happened +next." + +"Well," returned Zephas, "I first thought, you see, that it had +suthin' to do with that Marion business, particklerly ez folks +allowed he was hidin' somewhere yet, and they wanted me to run him +off. So I thought Rider might as well know that I wasn't to be +bribed, so I ups and tells him how I'd been lyin' off Saucelito the +other day workin' for the other side agin him. With that he +laughs, says he didn't want any better friends than me, but that I +must be livin' in the backwoods not to know that Wynyard Marion had +escaped, and was then at sea on his way to Mexico or Central +America. Then we agreed to terms, and the long and short of it is, +Mollie, that I'm to have the schooner with a hundred and fifty +dollars a month, and ten per cent. shares after a year! Looks like +biz, eh, Mollie, old girl? but you don't seem pleased." + +She had put aside the arm with which he was drawing her to him, and +had turned her white face away to the window. So HE had gone--this +stranger--this one friend of her life--she would never see him +again, and all that would ever come of it was this pecuniary +benefit to her husband, who had done nothing. He would not even +offer her money, but he had managed to pay his debt to her in this +way that their vulgar poverty would appreciate. And this was the +end of her dream! + +"You don't seem to take it in, Mollie," continued the surprised +Zephas. "It means a house in 'Frisco and a little cabin for you on +the schooner when you like." + +"I don't want it! I won't have it! I shall stay here," she burst +out with a half-passionate, half-childish cry, and ran into her +bedroom, leaving the astonished Zephas helpless in his awkward +consternation. + +"By Gum! I must take her to 'Frisco right off, or she'll be havin' +the high strikes here alone. I oughter knowed it would come to +this!" But although he consulted "Cap" Simmons the next day, who +informed him it was all woman's ways when "struck," and advised him +to pay out all the line he could at such delicate moments, she had +no recurrence of the outbreak. On the contrary, for days and weeks +following she seemed calmer, older, and more "growed up;" although +she resisted changing her seashore dwelling for San Francisco, she +accompanied him on one or two of his "deep sea" trips down the +coast, and seemed happier on their southern limits. She had taken +to reading the political papers and speeches, and some cheap +American histories. Captain Bunker's crew, profoundly convinced +that their skipper's wife was a "woman's rights" fanatic, with the +baleful qualities of "sea lawyer" superadded, marveled at his +bringing her. + +It was on returning home from one of these trips that they touched +briefly at San Francisco, where the Secretary of the Fishing +Company came on board. Mrs. Bunker was startled to recognize in +him one of the two gentlemen who had taken Mr. Marion off in the +boat, but as he did not appear to recognize her even after an +awkward introduction by her husband, she would have recovered her +equanimity but for a singular incident. As her husband turned +momentarily away, the Secretary, with a significant gesture, +slipped a letter into her hand. She felt the blood rush to her +face as, with a smile, he moved away to follow her husband. She +came down to the little cabin and impatiently tore open the +envelope, which bore no address. A small folded note contained the +following lines:-- + + +"I never intended to burden you with my confidence, but the +discretion, tact, and courage you displayed on our first meeting, +and what I know of your loyalty since, have prompted me to trust +myself again to your kindness, even though you are now aware whom +you have helped, and the risks you ran. My friends wish to +communicate with me and to forward to me, from time to time, +certain papers of importance, which, owing to the tyrannical +espionage of the Government, would be discovered and stopped in +passing through the express or post-office. These papers will be +left at your house, but here I must trust entirely to your wit and +judgment as to the way in which they should be delivered to my +agent at the nearest Mexican port. To facilitate your action, your +husband will receive directions to pursue his course as far south +as Todos Santos, where a boat will be ready to take charge of them +when he is sighted. I know I am asking a great favor, but I have +such confidence in you that I do not even ask you to commit +yourself to a reply to this. If it can be done I know that you +will do it; if it cannot, I will understand and appreciate the +reason why. I will only ask you that when you are ready to receive +the papers you will fly a small red pennant from the little +flagstaff among the rocks. Believe me, your friend and grateful +debtor, + +"W. M." + + +Mrs. Bunker cast a hasty glance around her, and pressed the letter +to her lips. It was a sudden consummation of her vaguest, half- +formed wishes, the realization of her wildest dreams! To be the +confidante of the gallant but melancholy hero in his lonely exile +and persecution was to satisfy all the unformulated romantic +fancies of her girlish reading; to be later, perhaps, the Flora +Macdonald of a middle-aged Prince Charlie did not, however, evoke +any ludicrous associations in her mind. Her feminine fancy exalted +the escaped duelist and alleged assassin into a social martyr. His +actual small political intrigues and ignoble aims of office seemed +to her little different from those aspirations of royalty which she +had read about--as perhaps they were. Indeed, it is to be feared +that in foolish little Mrs. Bunker, Wynyard Marion had found the +old feminine adoration of pretension and privilege which every +rascal has taken advantage of since the flood. + +Howbeit, the next morning after she had returned and Zephas had +sailed away, she flew a red bandana handkerchief on the little +flagstaff before the house. A few hours later, a boat appeared +mysteriously from around the Point. Its only occupant--a common +sailor--asked her name, and handed her a sealed package. Mrs. +Bunker's invention had already been at work. She had created an +aunt in Mexico, for whom she had, with some ostentation, made some +small purchases while in San Francisco. When her husband spoke of +going as far south as Todos Santos, she begged him to deliver the +parcel to her aunt's messenger, and even addressed it boldly to +her. Inside the outer wrapper she wrote a note to Marion, which, +with a new and amazing diffidence, she composed and altered a dozen +times, at last addressing the following in a large, school-girl +hand: "Sir, I obey your commands to the last. Whatever your +oppressors or enemies may do, you can always rely and trust upon +She who in deepest sympathy signs herself ever, Mollie Rosalie +MacEwan." The substitution of her maiden name in full seemed in +her simplicity to be a delicate exclusion of her husband from the +affair, and a certain disguise of herself to alien eyes. The +superscription, "To Mrs. Marion MacEwan from Mollie Bunker, to be +called for by hand at Todos Santos," also struck her as a marvel of +ingenuity. The package was safely and punctually delivered by +Zephas, who brought back a small packet directed to her, which on +private examination proved to contain a letter addressed to "J. E. +Kirby, to be called for," with the hurried line: "A thousand +thanks, W. M." Mrs. Bunker drew a long, quick breath. He might +have written more; he might have--but the wish remained still +unformulated. The next day she ran up a signal; the same boat and +solitary rower appeared around the Point, and took the package. A +week later, when her husband was ready for sea, she again hoisted +her signal. It brought a return package for Mexico, which she +inclosed and readdressed, and gave to her husband. The recurrence +of this incident apparently struck a bright idea from the simple +Zephas. + +"Look here, Mollie, why don't you come YOURSELF and see your aunt. +I can't go into port without a license, and them port charges cost +a heap o' red tape, for they've got a Filibuster scare on down +there just now, but you can go ashore in the boat and I'll get +permission from the Secretary to stand off and wait for you there +for twenty-four hours." Mrs. Bunker flushed and paled at the +thought. She could see him! The letter would be sufficient +excuse, the distrust suggested by her husband would give color to +her delivering it in person. There was perhaps a brief twinge of +conscience in taking this advantage of Zephas' kindness, but the +next moment, with that peculiar logic known only to the sex, she +made the unfortunate man's suggestion a condonation of her deceit. +SHE hadn't asked to go; HE had offered to take her. He had only +himself to thank. + +Meantime the political excitement in which she had become a +partisan without understanding or even conviction, presently +culminated with the Presidential campaign and the election of +Abraham Lincoln. The intrigues of Southern statesmen were revealed +in open expression, and echoed in California by those citizens of +Southern birth and extraction who had long, held place, power, and +opinion there. There were rumors of secession, of California +joining the South, or of her founding an independent Pacific +Empire. A note from "J. E. Kirby" informed Mrs. Bunker that she +was to carefully retain any correspondence that might be in her +hands until further orders, almost at the same time that Zephas as +regretfully told her that his projected Southern trip had been +suspended. Mrs. Bunker was disappointed, and yet, in some singular +conditions of her feelings, felt relieved that her meeting with +Marion was postponed. It is to be feared that some dim conviction, +unworthy a partisan, that in the magnitude of political events her +own petty personality might be overlooked by her hero tended +somewhat to her resignation. + +Meanwhile the seasons had changed. The winter rains had set in; +the trade winds had shifted to the southeast, and the cottage, +although strengthened, enlarged, and made more comfortable through +the good fortunes of the Bunkers, was no longer sheltered by the +cliff, but was exposed to the full strength of the Pacific gales. +There were long nights when she could hear the rain fall monotonously +on the shingles, or startle her with a short, sharp reveille en the +windows; there were brief days of flying clouds and drifting +sunshine, and intervals of dull gray shadow, when the heaving white +breakers beyond the Gate slowly lifted themselves and sank before +her like wraiths of warning. At such times, in her accepted +solitude, Mrs. Bunker gave herself up to strange moods and singular +visions; the more audacious and more striking it seemed to her from +their very remoteness, and the difficulty she was beginning to have +in materializing them. The actual personality of Wynyard Marion, as +she knew it in her one interview, had become very shadowy and faint +in the months that passed, yet when the days were heavy she +sometimes saw herself standing by his side in some vague tropical +surroundings, and hailed by the multitude as the faithful wife and +consort of the great Leader, President, Emperor--she knew not what! +Exactly how this was to be managed, and the manner of Zephas' +effacement from the scene, never troubled her childish fancy, and, +it is but fair to say, her woman's conscience. In the logic before +alluded to, it seemed to her that all ethical responsibility for her +actions rested with the husband who had unduly married her. Nor +were those visions always roseate. In the wild declamation of that +exciting epoch which filled the newspapers there was talk of short +shrift with traitors. So there were days when the sudden onset of a +squall of hail against her window caused her to start as if she had +heard the sharp fusillade of that file of muskets of which she had +sometimes read in history. + +One day she had a singular fright. She had heard the sound of oars +falling with a precision and regularity unknown to her. She was +startled to see the approach of a large eight-oared barge rowed by +men in uniform, with two officers wrapped in cloaks in the stern +sheets, and before them the glitter of musket barrels. The two +officers appeared to be conversing earnestly, and occasionally +pointing to the shore and the bluff above. For an instant she +trembled, and then an instinct of revolt and resistance followed. +She hurriedly removed the ring, which she usually wore when alone, +from her finger, slipped it with the packet under the mattress of +her bed, and prepared with blazing eyes to face the intruders. But +when the boat was beached, the two officers, with scarcely a glance +towards the cottage, proceeded leisurely along the shore. Relieved, +yet it must be confessed a little piqued at their indifference, she +snatched up her hat and sallied forth to confront them. + +"I suppose you don't know that this is private property?" she said +sharply. + +The group halted and turned towards her. The orderly, who was +following, turned his face aside and smiled. The younger officer +demurely lifted his cap. The elder, gray, handsome, in a general's +uniform, after a moment's half-astounded, half-amused scrutiny of +the little figure, gravely raised his gauntleted fingers in a +military salute. + +"I beg your pardon, madam, but I am afraid we never even thought of +that. We are making a preliminary survey for the Government with a +possible view of fortifying the bluff. It is very doubtful if you +will be disturbed in any rights you may have, but if you are, the +Government will not fail to make it good to you." He turned +carelessly to the aide beside him. "I suppose the bluff is quite +inaccessible from here?" + +"I don't know about that, general. They say that Marion, after he +killed Henderson, escaped down this way," said the young man. + +"Indeed, what good was that? How did he get away from here?" + +"They say that Mrs. Fairfax was hanging round in a boat, waiting +for him. The story of the escape is all out now." + +They moved away with a slight perfunctory bow to Mrs. Bunker, only +the younger officer noting that the pert, pretty little Western +woman wasn't as sharp and snappy to his superior as she had at +first promised to be. + +She turned back to the cottage astounded, angry, and vaguely +alarmed. Who was this Mrs. Fairfax who had usurped her fame and +solitary devotion? There was no woman in the boat that took him +off; it was equally well known that he went in the ship alone. If +they had heard that some woman was with him here--why should they +have supposed it was Mrs. Fairfax? Zephas might know something-- +but he was away. The thought haunted her that day and the next. +On the third came a more startling incident. + +She had been wandering along the edge of her domain in a state of +restlessness which had driven her from the monotony of the house +when she heard the barking of the big Newfoundland dog which Zephas +had lately bought for protection and company. She looked up and +saw the boat and its solitary rower at the landing. She ran +quickly to the house to bring the packet. As she entered she +started back in amazement. For the sitting-room was already in +possession of a woman who was seated calmly by the table. + +The stranger turned on Mrs. Bunker that frankly insolent glance and +deliberate examination which only one woman can give another. In +that glance Mrs. Bunker felt herself in the presence of a superior, +even if her own eyes had not told her that in beauty, attire, and +bearing the intruder was of a type and condition far beyond her +own, or even that of any she had known. It was the more crushing +that there also seemed to be in this haughty woman the same +incongruousness and sharp contrast to the plain and homely +surroundings of the cottage that she remembered in HIM. + +"Yo' aw Mrs. Bunker, I believe," she said in languid Southern +accents. "How de doh?" + +"I am Mrs. Bunker," said Mrs. Bunker shortly. + +"And so this is where Cunnle Marion stopped when he waited fo' the +boat to take him off," said the stranger, glancing lazily around, +and delaying with smiling insolence the explanation she knew Mrs. +Bunker was expecting. "The cunnle said it was a pooh enough place, +but I don't see it. I reckon, however, he was too worried to judge +and glad enough to get off. Yo' ought to have made him talk--he +generally don't want much prompting to talk to women, if they're +pooty." + +"He didn't seem in a hurry to go," said Mrs. Bunker indignantly. +The next moment she saw her error, even before the cruel, handsome +smile of her unbidden guest revealed it. + +"I thought so," she said lazily; "this IS the place and here's +where the cunnle stayed. Only yo' oughtn't have given him and +yo'self away to the first stranger quite so easy. The cunnle might +have taught yo' THAT the two or three hours he was with yo'." + +"What do you want with me?" demanded Mrs. Bunker angrily. + +"I want a letter yo' have for me from Cunnle Marion." + +"I have nothing for you," said Mrs. Bunker. "I don't know who you +are." + +"You ought to, considering you've been acting as messenger between +the cunnle and me," said the lady coolly. + +"That's not true," said Mrs. Bunker hotly, to combat an inward +sinking. + +The lady rose with a lazy, languid grace, walked to the door and +called still lazily, "O Pedro!" + +The solitary rower clambered up the rocks and appeared on the +cottage threshold. + +"Is this the lady who gave you the letters for me and to whom you +took mine?" + +"Si, senora." + +"They were addressed to a Mr. Kirby," said Mrs. Bunker sullenly. +"How was I to know they were for Mrs. Kirby?" + +"Mr. Kirby, Mrs. Kirby, and myself are all the same. You don't +suppose the cunnle would give my real name and address? Did you +address yo'r packet to HIS real name or to some one else. Did you +let your husband know who they were for?" + +Oddly, a sickening sense of the meanness of all these deceits and +subterfuges suddenly came over Mrs. Bunker. Without replying she +went to her bedroom and returned with Colonel Marion's last letter, +which she tossed into her visitor's lap. + +"Thank yo', Mrs. Bunker. I'll be sure to tell the cunnle how +careful yo' were not to give up his correspondence to everybody. +It'll please him mo' than to hear yo' are wearing his ring--which +everybody knows--before people." + +"He gave it to me--he--he knew I wouldn't take money," said Mrs. +Bunker indignantly. + +"He didn't have any to give," said the lady slowly, as she removed +the envelope from her letter and looked up with a dazzling but +cruel smile. "A So'th'n gentleman don't fill up his pockets when +he goes out to fight. He don't tuck his maw's Bible in his breast- +pocket, clap his dear auntie's locket big as a cheese plate over +his heart, nor let his sole leather cigyar case that his gyrl gave +him lie round him in spots when he goes out to take another +gentleman's fire. He leaves that to Yanks!" + +"Did you come here to insult my husband?" said Mrs. Bunker in the +rage of desperation. + +"To insult yo' husband! Well--I came here to get a letter that his +wife received from his political and natural enemy and--perhaps I +DID!" With a side glance at Mrs. Bunker's crimson cheek she added +carelessly, "I have nothing against Captain Bunker; he's a +straightforward man and must go with his kind. He helped those +hounds of Vigilantes because he believes in them. We couldn't +bribe him if we wanted to. And we don't." + +If she only knew something of this woman's relations to Marion-- +which she only instinctively suspected--and could retaliate upon +her, Mrs. Bunker felt she would have given up her life at that +moment. + +"Colonel Marion seems to find plenty that he can bribe," she said +roughly, "and I've yet to know who YOU are to sit in judgment on +them. You've got your letter, take it and go! When he wants to +send you another through me, somebody else must come for it, not +you. That's all!" + +She drew back as if to let the intruder pass, but the lady, without +moving a muscle, finished the reading of her letter, then stood up +quietly and began carefully to draw her handsome cloak over her +shoulders. "Yo' want to know who I am, Mrs. Bunker," she said, +arranging the velvet collar under her white oval chin. "Well, I'm +a So'th'n woman from Figinya, and I'm Figinyan first, last, and all +the time." She shook out her sleeves and the folds of her cloak. +"I believe in State rights and slavery--if you know what that +means. I hate the North, I hate the East, I hate the West. I hate +this nigger Government, I'd kill that man Lincoln quicker than +lightning!" She began to draw down the fingers of her gloves, +holding her shapely hands upright before her. "I'm hard and fast +to the Cause. I gave up house and niggers for it." She began to +button her gloves at the wrist with some difficulty, tightly +setting together her beautiful lips as she did so. "I gave up my +husband for it, and I went to the man who loved it better and had +risked more for it than ever he had. Cunnle Marion's my friend. +I'm Mrs. Fairfax, Josephine Hardee that was; HIS disciple and +follower. Well, maybe those puritanical No'th'n folks might give +it another name!" + +She moved slowly towards the door, but on the threshold paused, +as Colonel Marion had, and came back to Mrs. Bunker with an +outstretched hand. "I don't see that yo' and me need quo'll. I +didn't come here for that. I came here to see yo'r husband, and +seeing YO' I thought it was only right to talk squarely to yo', as +yo' understand I WOULDN'T talk to yo'r husband. Mrs. Bunker, I +want yo'r husband to take me away--I want him to take me to the +cunnle. If I tried to go in any other way I'd be watched, spied +upon and followed, and only lead those hounds on his track. I +don't expect yo' to ASK yo' husband for me, but only not to +interfere when I do." + +There was a touch of unexpected weakness in her voice and a look of +pain in her eyes which was not unlike what Mrs. Bunker had seen and +pitied in Marion. But they were the eyes of a woman who had +humbled her, and Mrs. Bunker would have been unworthy her sex if +she had not felt a cruel enjoyment in it. Yet the dominance of the +stranger was still so strong that she did not dare to refuse the +proffered hand. She, however, slipped the ring from her finger and +laid it in Mrs. Fairfax's palm. + +"You can take that with you," she said, with a desperate attempt to +imitate the other's previous indifference. "I shouldn't like to +deprive you and YOUR FRIEND of the opportunity of making use of it +again. As for MY husband, I shall say nothing of you to him as +long as you say nothing to him of me--which I suppose is what you +mean." + +The insolent look came back to Mrs. Fairfax's face. "I reckon yo' +'re right," she said quietly, putting the ring in her pocket as she +fixed her dark eyes on Mrs. Bunker, "and the ring may be of use +again. Good-by, Mrs. Bunker." + +She waved her hand carelessly, and turning away passed out of the +house. A moment later the boat and its two occupants pushed from +the shore, and disappeared round the Point. + +Then Mrs. Bunker looked round the room, and down upon her empty +finger, and knew that it was the end of her dream. It was all over +now--indeed, with the picture of that proud, insolent woman before +her she wondered if it had ever begun. This was the woman she had +allowed herself to think SHE might be. This was the woman HE was +thinking of when he sat there; this was the Mrs. Fairfax the +officers had spoken of, and who had made her--Mrs. Bunker--the go- +between for their love-making! All the work that she had done for +him, the deceit she had practiced on her husband, was to bring him +and this woman together! And they both knew it, and had no doubt +laughed at her and her pretensions! + +It was with a burning cheek that she thought how she had intended +to go to Marion, and imagined herself arriving perhaps to find that +shameless woman already there. In her vague unformulated longings +she had never before realized the degradation into which her +foolish romance might lead her. She saw it now; that humiliating +moral lesson we are all apt to experience in the accidental display +of our own particular vices in the person we hate, she had just +felt in Mrs. Fairfax's presence. With it came the paralyzing fear +of her husband's discovery of her secret. Secure as she had been +in her dull belief that he had in some way wronged her by marrying +her, she for the first time began to doubt if this condoned the +deceit she had practiced on him. The tribute Mrs. Fairfax had paid +him--this appreciation of his integrity and honesty by an enemy and +a woman like herself--troubled her, frightened her, and filled her +with her first jealousy! What if this woman should tell him all; +what if she should make use of him as Marion had of her! Zephas +was a strong Northern partisan, but was he proof against the +guileful charms of such a devil? She had never thought before of +questioning his fidelity to her; she suddenly remembered now some +rough pleasantries of Captain Simmons in regard to the inconstancy +of his calling. No! there was but one thing for her to do: she +would make a clean breast to him; she would tell him everything she +had done except the fatal fancy that compelled her to it! She +began to look for his coming now with alternate hope and fear--with +unabated impatience! The night that he should have arrived passed +slowly; morning came, but not Zephas. When the mist had lifted she +ran impatiently to the rocks and gazed anxiously towards the lower +bay. There were a few gray sails scarce distinguishable above the +grayer water--but they were not his. She glanced half mechanically +seaward, and her eyes became suddenly fixed. There was no mistake! +She knew the rig!--she could see the familiar white lap-streak as +the vessel careened on the starboard tack--it was her husband's +schooner slowly creeping out of the Golden Gate! + + +PART III. + + +Her first wild impulse was to run to the cove, for the little +dingey always moored there, and to desperately attempt to overtake +him. But the swift consciousness of its impossibility was followed +by a dull, bewildering torpor, that kept her motionless, helplessly +following the vessel with straining eyes, as if they could evoke +some response from its decks. She was so lost in this occupation +that she did not see that a pilot-boat nearly abreast of the cove +had put out a two-oared gig, which was pulling quickly for the +rocks. When she saw it, she trembled with the instinct that it +brought her intelligence. She was right; it was a brief note from +her husband, informing her that he had been hurriedly dispatched on +a short sea cruise; that in order to catch the tide he had not time +to go ashore at the bluff, but he would explain everything on his +return. Her relief was only partial; she was already experienced +enough in his vocation to know that the excuse was a feeble one. +He could easily have "fetched" the bluff in tacking out of the Gate +and have signaled to her to board him in her own boat. The next +day she locked up her house, rowed round the Point to the +Embarcadero, where the Bay steamboats occasionally touched and took +up passengers to San Francisco. Captain Simmons had not seen her +husband this last trip; indeed, did not know that he had gone out +of the Bay. Mrs. Bunker was seized with a desperate idea. She +called upon the Secretary of the Fishing Trust. That gentle man +was business-like, but neither expansive nor communicative. Her +husband had NOT been ordered out to sea by them; she ought to know +that Captain Bunker was now his own master, choosing his own +fishing grounds, and his own times and seasons. He was not aware +of any secret service for the Company in which Captain Bunker was +engaged. He hoped Mrs. Bunker would distinctly remember that the +little matter of the duel to which she referred was an old bygone +affair, and never anything but a personal matter, in which the +Fishery had no concern whatever, and in which HE certainly should +not again engage. He would advise Mrs. Bunker, if she valued her +own good, and especially her husband's, to speedily forget all +about it. These were ugly times, as it was. If Mrs. Bunker's +services had not been properly rewarded or considered it was +certainly a great shame, but really HE could not be expected to +make it good. Certain parties had cost him trouble enough already. +Besides, really, she must see that his position between her +husband, whom he respected, and a certain other party was a +delicate one. But Mrs. Bunker heard no more. She turned and ran +down the staircase, carrying with her a burning cheek and blazing +eye that somewhat startled the complacent official. + +She did not remember how she got home again. She had a vague +recollection of passing through the crowded streets, wondering if +the people knew that she was an outcast, deserted by her husband, +deceived by her ideal hero, repudiated by her friends! Men had +gathered in knots before the newspaper offices, excited and +gesticulating over the bulletin boards that had such strange +legends as "The Crisis," "Details of an Alleged Conspiracy to +Overthrow the Government," "The Assassin of Henderson to the Fore +Again," "Rumored Arrests on the Mexican Frontier." Sometimes she +thought she understood the drift of them; even fancied they were +the outcome of her visit--as if her very presence carried treachery +and suspicion with it--but generally they only struck her benumbed +sense as a dull, meaningless echo of something that had happened +long ago. When she reached her house, late that night, the +familiar solitude of shore and sea gave her a momentary relief, but +with it came the terrible conviction that she had forfeited her +right to it, that when her husband came back it would be hers no +longer, and that with their meeting she would know it no more. For +through all her childish vacillation and imaginings she managed to +cling to one steadfast resolution. She would tell him EVERYTHING, +and know the worst. Perhaps he would never come; perhaps she +should not be alive to meet him. + +And so the days and nights slowly passed. The solitude which her +previous empty deceit had enabled her to fill with such charming +visions now in her awakened remorse seemed only to protract her +misery. Had she been a more experienced, though even a more +guilty, woman she would have suffered less. Without sympathy or +counsel, without even the faintest knowledge of the world or its +standards of morality to guide her, she accepted her isolation and +friendlessness as a necessary part of her wrongdoing. Her only +criterion was her enemy--Mrs. Fairfax--and SHE could seek her +relief by joining her lover; but Mrs. Bunker knew now that she +herself had never had one--and was alone! Mrs. Fairfax had broken +openly with her husband; but SHE had DECEIVED hers, and the +experience and reckoning were still to come. In her miserable +confession it was not strange that this half child, half woman, +sometimes looked towards that gray sea, eternally waiting for her,-- +that sea which had taken everything from her and given her nothing +in return,--for an obliterating and perhaps exonerating death! + +The third day of her waiting isolation was broken upon by another +intrusion. The morning had been threatening, with an opaque, +motionless, livid arch above, which had taken the place of the +usual flying scud and shaded cloud masses of the rainy season. The +whole outlying ocean, too, beyond the bar, appeared nearer, and +even seemed to be lifted higher than the Bay itself, and was lit +every now and then with wonderful clearness by long flashes of +breaking foam like summer lightning. She knew that this meant a +southwester, and began, with a certain mechanical deliberation, to +set her little domain in order against the coming gale. She drove +the cows to the rude shed among the scrub oaks, she collected the +goats and young kids in the corral, and replenished the stock of +fuel from the woodpile. She was quite hidden in the shrubbery when +she saw a boat making slow headway against the wind towards the +little cove where but a moment before she had drawn up the dingey +beyond the reach of breaking seas. It was a whaleboat from +Saucelito containing a few men. As they neared the landing she +recognized in the man who seemed to be directing the boat the +second friend of Colonel Marion--the man who had come with the +Secretary to take him off, but whom she had never seen again. In +her present horror of that memory she remained hidden, determined +at all hazards to avoid a meeting. When they had landed, one of +the men halted accidentally before the shrubbery where she was +concealed as he caught his first view of the cottage, which had +been invisible from the point they had rounded. + +"Look here, Bragg," he said, turning to Marion's friend, in a voice +which was distinctly audible to Mrs. Bunker. "What are we to say +to these people?" + +"There's only one," returned the other. "The man's at sea. His +wife's here. She's all right." + +"You said she was one of us?" + +"After a fashion. She's the woman who helped Marion when he was +here. I reckon he made it square with her from the beginning, for +she forwarded letters from him since. But you can tell her as much +or as little as you find necessary when you see her." + +"Yes, but we must settle that NOW," said Bragg sharply, "and I +propose to tell her NOTHING. I'm against having any more +petticoats mixed up with our affairs. I propose to make an +examination of the place without bothering our heads about her." + +"But we must give some reason for coming here, and we must ask her +to keep dark, or we'll have her blabbing to the first person she +meets," urged the other. + +"She's not likely to see anybody before night, when the brig will +be in and the men and guns landed. Move on, and let Jim take +soundings off the cove, while I look along the shore. It's just as +well that there's a house here, and a little cover like this"-- +pointing to the shrubbery--"to keep the men from making too much of +a show until after the earthworks are up. There are sharp eyes +over at the Fort." + +"There don't seem to be any one in the house now," returned the +other after a moment's scrutiny of the cottage, "or the woman would +surely come out at the barking of the dog, even if she hadn't seen +us. Likely she's gone to Saucelito." + +"So much the better. Just as well that she should know nothing +until it happens. Afterwards we'll settle with the husband for the +price of possession; he has only a squatter's rights. Come along; +we'll have bad weather before we get back round the Point again, +but so much the better, for it will keep off any inquisitive +longshore cruisers." + +They moved away. But Mrs. Bunker, stung through her benumbed and +brooding consciousness, and made desperate by this repeated +revelation of her former weakness, had heard enough to make her +feverish to hear more. She knew the intricacies of the shrubbery +thoroughly. She knew every foot of shade and cover of the +clearing, and creeping like a cat from bush to bush she managed, +without being discovered, to keep the party in sight and hearing +all the time. It required no great discernment, even for an +inexperienced woman like herself, at the end of an hour, to gather +their real purpose. It was to prepare for the secret landing of an +armed force, disguised as laborers, who, under the outward show of +quarrying in the bluff, were to throw up breastworks, and fortify +the craggy shelf. The landing was fixed for that night, and was to +be effected by a vessel now cruising outside the Heads. + +She understood it all now. She remembered Marion's speech about +the importance of the bluff for military purposes; she remembered +the visit of the officers from the Fort opposite. The strangers +were stealing a march upon the Government, and by night would be in +possession. It was perhaps an evidence of her newly awakened and +larger comprehension that she took no thought of her loss of home +and property,--perhaps there was little to draw her to it now,--but +was conscious only of a more terrible catastrophe--a catastrophe to +which she was partly accessory, of which any other woman would have +warned her husband--or at least those officers of the Fort whose +business it was to-- Ah, yes! the officers of the Fort--only just +opposite to her! She trembled, and yet flushed with an +inspiration. It was not too late yet--why not warn them NOW? + +But how? A message sent by Saucelito and the steamboat to San +Francisco--the usual way--would not reach them tonight. To go +herself, rowing directly across in the dingey, would be the only +security of success. If she could do it? It was a long pull--the +sea was getting up--but she would try. + +She waited until the last man had stepped into the boat, in nervous +dread of some one remaining. Then, when the boat had vanished +round the Point again, she ran back to the cottage, arrayed herself +in her husband's pilot coat, hat, and boots, and launched the +dingey. It was a heavy, slow, but luckily a stanch and seaworthy +boat. It was not until she was well off shore that she began to +feel the full fury of the wind and waves, and knew the difficulty +and danger of her undertaking. She had decided that her shortest +and most direct course was within a few points of the wind, but the +quartering of the waves on the broad bluff bows of the boat tended +to throw it to leeward, a movement that, while it retarded her +forward progress, no doubt saved the little craft from swamping. +Again, the feebleness and shortness of her stroke, which never +impelled her through a rising wave, but rather lifted her half way +up its face, prevented the boat from taking much water, while her +steadfast gaze, fixed only on the slowly retreating shore, kept her +steering free from any fatal nervous vacillation, which the sight +of the threatening seas on her bow might have produced. Preserved +through her very weakness, ignorance, and simplicity of purpose, +the dingey had all the security of a drifting boat, yet retained a +certain gentle but persistent guidance. In this feminine fashion +she made enough headway to carry her abreast of the Point, where +she met the reflux current sweeping round it that carried her well +along into the channel, now sluggish with the turn of the tide. +After half an hour's pulling, she was delighted to find herself +again in a reverse current, abreast of her cottage, but steadily +increasing her distance from it. She was, in fact, on the extreme +outer edge of a vast whirlpool formed by the force of the gale on a +curving lee shore, and was being carried to her destination in a +semicircle around that bay which she never could have crossed. She +was moving now in a line with the shore and the Fort, whose +flagstaff, above its green, square, and white quarters, she could +see distinctly, and whose lower water battery and landing seemed to +stretch out from the rocks scarcely a mile ahead. Protected by the +shore from the fury of the wind, and even of the sea, her progress +was also steadily accelerated by the velocity of the current, +mingling with the ebbing tide. A sudden fear seized her. She +turned the boat's head towards the shore, but it was swept quickly +round again; she redoubled her exertions, tugging frantically at +her helpless oars. She only succeeded in getting the boat into the +trough of the sea, where, after a lurch that threatened to capsize +it, it providentially swung around on its short keel and began to +drift stern on. She was almost abreast of the battery now; she +could hear the fitful notes of a bugle that seemed blown and +scattered above her head; she even thought she could see some men +in blue uniforms moving along the little pier. She was passing it; +another fruitless effort to regain her ground, but she was swept +along steadily towards the Gate, the whitening bar, and the open +sea. + +She knew now what it all meant. This was what she had come for; +this was the end! Beyond, only a little beyond, just a few moments +longer to wait, and then, out there among the breakers was the rest +that she had longed for but had not dared to seek. It was not her +fault; they could not blame HER. He would come back and never know +what had happened--nor even know how she had tried to atone for her +deceit. And he would find his house in possession of--of--those +devils! No! No! she must not die yet, at least not until she had +warned the Fort. She seized the oars again with frenzied strength; +the boat had stopped under the unwonted strain, staggered, tried to +rise in an uplifted sea, took part of it over her bow, struck down +Mrs. Bunker under half a ton of blue water that wrested the oars +from her paralyzed hands like playthings, swept them over the +gunwale, and left her lying senseless in the bottom of the boat. + + . . . . . . + +"Hold har-rd--or you'll run her down." + +"Now then, Riley,--look alive,--is it slapin' ye are!" + +"Hold yer jaw, Flanigan, and stand ready with the boat-hook. Now +then, hold har-rd!" + +The sudden jarring and tilting of the water-logged boat, a sound of +rasping timbers, the swarming of men in shirtsleeves and blue +trousers around her, seemed to rouse her momentarily, but she again +fainted away. + +When she struggled back to consciousness once more she was wrapped +in a soldier's jacket, her head pillowed on the shirt-sleeve of an +artillery corporal in the stern sheets of that eight-oared +government barge she had remembered. But the only officer was a +bareheaded, boyish lieutenant, and the rowers were an athletic but +unseamanlike crew of mingled artillerymen and infantry. + +"And where did ye drift from, darlint?" + +Mrs. Bunker bridled feebly at the epithet. + +"I didn't drift. I was going to the Fort." + +"The Fort, is it?" + +"Yes. I want to see the general." + +"Wadn't the liftenant do ye? Or shure there's the adjutant; he's a +foine man." + +"Silence, Flanigan," said the young officer sharply. Then turning +to Mrs. Bunker he said, "Don't mind HIM, but let his wife take you +to the canteen, when we get in, and get you some dry clothes." + +But Mrs. Bunker, spurred to convalescence at the indignity, +protested stiffly, and demanded on her arrival to be led at once to +the general's quarters. A few officers, who had been attracted to +the pier by the rescue, acceded to her demand. + +She recognized the gray-haired, handsome man who had come ashore +at her house. With a touch of indignation at her treatment, she +briefly told her story. But the general listened coldly and +gravely with his eyes fixed upon her face. + +"You say you recognized in the leader of the party a man you had +seen before. Under what circumstances?" + +Mrs. Bunker hesitated with burning cheeks. "He came to take +Colonel Marion from our place." + +"When you were hiding him,--yes, we've heard the story. Now, Mrs. +Bunker, may I ask you what you, as a Southern sympathizer, expect +to gain by telling me this story?" + +But here Mrs. Bunker burst out. "I am not a Southern sympathizer! +Never! Never! Never! I'm a Union woman,--wife of a Northern man. +I helped that man before I knew who he was. Any Christian, +Northerner or Southerner, would have done the same!" + +Her sincerity and passion were equally unmistakable. The general +rose, opened the door of the adjoining room, said a few words to an +orderly on duty, and returned. "What you are asking of me, Mrs. +Bunker, is almost as extravagant and unprecedented as your story. +You must understand, as well as your husband, that if I land a +force on your property it will be to TAKE POSSESSION of it in the +name of the Government, for Government purposes." + +"Yes, yes," said Mrs. Bunker eagerly; "I know that. I am willing; +Zephas will be willing." + +"And," continued the general, fixing his eyes on her face, "you +will also understand that I may be compelled to detain you here as +a hostage for the safety of my men." + +"Oh no! no! please!" said Mrs. Bunker, springing up with an +imploring feminine gesture; "I am expecting my husband. He may +be coming back at any moment; I must be there to see him FIRST! +Please let me go back, sir, with your men; put me anywhere ashore +between them and those men that are coming. Lock me up; keep me a +prisoner in my own home; do anything else if you think I am +deceiving you; but don't keep me here to miss him when he comes!" + +"But you can see him later," said the general. + +"But I must see him FIRST," said Mrs. Bunker desperately. "I must +see him first, for--for--HE KNOWS NOTHING OF THIS. He knows +nothing of my helping Colonel Marion; he knows nothing of--how +foolish I have been, and--he must not know it from others! There!" +It was out at last. She was sobbing now, but her pride was gone. +She felt relieved, and did not even notice the presence of two or +three other officers, who had entered the room, exchanged a few +hurried words with their superior, and were gazing at her in +astonishment. + +The general's brow relaxed, and he smiled. "Very well, Mrs. +Bunker; it shall be as you like, then. You shall go and meet your +husband with Captain Jennings here,"--indicating one of the +officers,--"who will take charge of you and the party." + +"And," said Mrs. Bunker, looking imploringly through her wet but +pretty lashes at the officer, "he won't say anything to Zephas, +either?" + +"Not a syllable," said Captain Jennings gravely. "But while the +tug is getting ready, general, hadn't Mrs. Bunker better go to Mrs. +Flanigan?" + +"I think not," said the general, with a significant look at the +officer as he gallantly offered his arm to the astonished Mrs. +Bunker, "if she will allow me the pleasure of taking her to my +wife." + +There was an equally marked respect in the manner of the men and +officers as Mrs. Bunker finally stepped on board the steam tug that +was to convey the party across the turbulent bay. But she heeded +it not, neither did she take any concern of the still furious gale, +the difficult landing, the preternatural activity of the band of +sappers, who seemed to work magic with their picks and shovels, the +shelter tents that arose swiftly around her, the sheds and bush +inclosures that were evoked from the very ground beneath her feet; +the wonderful skill, order, and discipline that in a few hours +converted her straggling dominion into a formal camp, even to the +sentinel, who was already calmly pacing the rocks by the landing as +if he had being doing it for years! Only one thing thrilled her-- +the sudden outburst, fluttering and snapping of the national flag +from her little flagstaff. He would see it--and perhaps be +pleased! + +And indeed it seemed as if the men had caught the infection of her +anxiety, for when her strained eyes could no longer pierce the +murky twilight settling over the Gate, one came running to her to +say that the lookout had just discovered through his glass a close- +reefed schooner running in before the wind. It was her husband, +and scarcely an hour after night had shut in the schooner had +rounded to off the Point, dropped her boat, and sped away to +anchorage. And then Mrs. Bunker, running bareheaded down the +rocks, breaking in upon the hurried explanation of the officer of +the guard, threw herself upon her husband's breast, and sobbed and +laughed as if her heart would break! + +Nor did she scarcely hear his hurried comment to the officer and +unconscious corroboration of her story: how a brig had raced them +from the Gate, was heading for the bar, but suddenly sheered off +and put away to sea again, as if from some signal from the +headland. "Yes--the bluff," interrupted Captain Jennings bitterly, +"I thought of that, but the old man said it was more diplomatic +just now to PREVENT an attempt than even to successfully resist +it." + +But when they were alone again in their little cottage, and Zephas' +honest eyes--with no trace of evil knowledge or suspicion in their +homely, neutral lightness--were looking into hers with his usual +simple trustfulness, Mrs. Bunker trembled, whimpered, and--I grieve +to say--basely funked her boasted confession. But here the Deity +which protects feminine weakness intervened with the usual miracle. +As he gazed at his wife's troubled face, an apologetic cloud came +over his rugged but open brow, and a smile of awkward deprecating +embarrassment suffused his eyes. "I declare to goodness, Mollie, +but I must tell you suthin, although I guess I didn't kalkilate to +say a word about it. But, darn it all, I can't keep it in. No! +Lookin' inter that innercent face o' yourn"--pressing her flushing +cheeks between his cool brown hands--"and gazing inter them two +truthful eyes"--they blinked at this moment with a divine modesty-- +"and thinkin' of what you've just did for your kentry--like them +revolutionary women o' '76--I feel like a darned swab of a traitor +myself. Well! what I want ter tell you is this: Ye know, or ye've +heard me tell o' that Mrs. Fairfax, as left her husband for that +fire-eatin' Marion, and stuck to him through thick and thin, and +stood watch and watch with him in this howlin' Southern rumpus +they're kickin' up all along the coast, as if she was a man +herself. Well, jes as I hauled up at the wharf at 'Frisco, she +comes aboard. + +"'You're Cap Bunker?' she says. + +"'That's me, ma'am,' I says. + +"'You're a Northern man and you go with your kind,' sez she; 'but +you're a white man, and thar's no cur blood in you.' But you ain't +listenin', Mollie; you're dead tired, lass,"--with a commiserating +look at her now whitening face,--"and I'll haul in line and wait. +Well, to cut it short, she wanted me to take her down the coast a +bit to where she could join Marion. She said she'd been shook by +his friends, followed by spies--and, blame my skin, Mollie, ef that +proud woman didn't break down and CRY like a baby. Now, Mollie, +what got ME in all this, was that them Chivalry folks--ez was +always jawin' about their 'Southern dames' and their 'Ladye fairs,' +and always runnin' that kind of bilge water outer their scuppers +whenever they careened over on a fair wind--was jes the kind to +throw off on a woman when they didn't want her, and I kinder +thought I'd like HER to see the difference betwixt the latitude o' +Charleston and Cape Cod. So I told her I didn't want the jewelry +and dimons she offered me, but if she would come down to the wharf, +after dark, I'd smuggle her aboard, and I'd allow to the men that +she was YOUR AUNTIE ez I was givin' a free passage to! Lord! dear! +think o' me takin' the name o' Mollie Bunker's aunt in vain for +that sort o' woman! Think o' me," continued Captain Bunker with a +tentative chuckle, "sort o' pretendin' to hand yo'r auntie to +Kernel Marion for--for his lady love! I don't wonder ye's half +frighted and half laffin'," he added, as his wife uttered a +hysterical cry; "it WAS awful! But it worked, and I got her off, +and wot's more I got her shipped to Mazatlan, where she'll join +Marion, and the two are goin' back to Virginy, where I guess they +won't trouble Californy again. Ye know now, deary," he went on, +speaking with difficulty through Mrs. Bunker's clinging arms and +fast dripping tears, "why I didn't heave to to say 'good-by.' But +it's all over now--I've made a clean breast of it, Mollie--and +don't you cry!" + +But it was NOT all over. For a moment later Captain Bunker began +to fumble in his waistcoat pocket with the one hand that was not +clasping his wife's waist. "One thing more, Mollie; when I left +her and refused to take any of her dimons, she put a queer sort o' +ring into my hand, and told me with a kind o' mischievious, +bedevilin' smile, that I must keep it to remember her by. Here it +is--why, Mollie lass! are you crazy?" + +She had snatched it from his fingers and was running swiftly from +the cottage out into the tempestuous night. He followed closely, +until she reached the edge of the rocks. And only then, in the +struggling, fast-flying moonlight, she raised a passionate hand, +and threw it far into the sea! + +As he led her back to the cottage she said she was jealous, and +honest Captain Bunker, with his arm around her, felt himself the +happiest man in the world! + + . . . . . . + +From that day the flag flew regularly over the rocky shelf, and, in +time, bugles and morning drumbeats were wafted from it to the decks +of passing ships. For the Federal Government had adjudged the land +for its own use, paid Captain Bunker a handsome sum for its +possession, and had discreetly hidden the little cottage of Mrs. +Bunker and its history forever behind bastion and casemate. + + + + +THE TRANSFORMATION OF BUCKEYE CAMP + + +PART I. + + +The tiny lights that had been far scattered and intermittent as +fireflies all along the dark stream at last dropped out one by one, +leaving only the three windows of "Parks' Emporium" to pierce the +profoundly wooded banks of the South Fork. So all-pervading was +the darkness that the mere opening of the "Emporium" front door +shot out an illuminating shaft which revealed the whole length of +the little main street of "Buckeye," while the simple passing of a +single figure before one of the windows momentarily eclipsed a +third of the settlement. This undue pre-eminence given to the only +three citizens of Buckeye who were still up at ten o 'clock seemed +to be hardly justified by their outward appearance, which was that +of ordinary long-bearded and long-booted river bar miners. Two sat +upon the counter with their hands upon their knees, the third +leaned beside the open window. + +It was very quiet. The faint, far barking of a dog, or an +occasional subdued murmur from the river shallows, audible only +when the wind rose slightly, helped to intensify their solitude. +So supreme had it become that when the man at the window at last +continued his conversation meditatively, with his face towards it, +he seemed to be taking all Nature into his confidence. + +"The worst thing about it is, that the only way we can keep her out +of the settlement is by the same illegal methods which we deplore +in other camps. We have always boasted that Buckeye could get +along without Vigilance Committees or Regulators." + +"Yes, and that was because we started it on the principle of +original selection, which we are only proposing to continue," +replied one of the men on the counter. "So there's nothing wrong +about our sending a deputation to wait upon her, to protest against +her settling here, and give her our reasons." + +"Yes, only it has all the impudence without the pluck of the +Regulators. You demand what you are afraid to enforce. Come, +Parks, you know she has all the rights on her side. Look at it +squarely. She proposes to open a store and sell liquor and cigars, +which she serves herself, in the broken-down tienda which was +regularly given to her people by the Spanish grantee of the land +we're squatting on. It's not her fault but ours if we've adopted a +line of rules, which don't agree with hers, to govern the settlers +on HER land, nor should she be compelled to follow them. Nor +because we justify OUR squatting here, on the ground that the +Spanish grant isn't confirmed yet, can we forbid her squatting +under the same right." + +"But look at the moral question, Brace. Consider the example; the +influence of such a shop, kept by such a woman, on the community! +We have the right to protect ourselves--the majority." + +"That's the way the lynchers talk," returned Brace. "And I'm not +so sure about there being any moral question yet. You are assuming +too much. There is no reason why she shouldn't run the tienda as +decently--barring the liquor sale, which, however, is legal, and +for which she can get a license--as a man could, and without +interfering with our morals." + +"Then what is the use of our rules?" + +"They were made for those who consented to adopt them, as we all +did. They still bind US, and if we don't choose to buy her liquor +or cigars that will dispose of her and her tienda much more +effectually than your protest. It's a pity she's a lone +unprotected woman. Now if she only had a husband"-- + +"She carries a dagger in her garter." + +This apparently irrelevant remark came from the man who had not yet +spoken, but who had been listening with the languid unconcern of +one who, relinquishing the labor of argument to others, had +consented to abide by their decision. It was met with a scornful +smile from each of the disputants, perhaps even by an added shrug +of the shoulders from the woman's previous defender! HE was +evidently not to be taken in by extraneous sentiment. Nevertheless, +both listened as the speaker, slowly feeling his knees as if they +were his way to a difficult subject, continued with the same +suggestion of stating general fact, but waiving any argument +himself. "Clarkson of Angels allows she's got a free, gaudy, +picter-covered style with the boys, but that she can be gilt-edged +when she wants to. Rowley Meade--him ez hed his skelp pulled over +his eyes at one stroke, foolin' with a she bear over on Black +Mountain--allows it would be rather monotonous in him attemptin' any +familiarities with her. Bulstrode's brother, ez was in Marysville, +said there was a woman--like to her, but not her--ez made it lively +for the boys with a game called 'Little Monte,' and he dropped a +hundred dollars there afore he came away. They do say that about +seven men got shot in Marysville on account o' this one, or from +some oneasiness that happened at her shop. But then," he went on +slowly and deferentially as the faces of the two others were lowered +and became fixed, "SHE says she tired o' drunken rowdies,--there's a +sameness about 'em, and it don't sell her pipes and cigars, and +that's WHY she's coming here. Thompson over at Dry Creek sez that +THAT'S where our reputation is playin' us! 'We've got her as a +reward o' virtoo, and be d----d to us.' But," cautiously, "Thompson +ain't drawed a sober breath since Christmas." + +The three men looked in each other's faces in silence. The same +thought occurred to each; the profane Thompson was right, and the +woman's advent was the logical sequence of their own ethics. Two +years previously, the Buckeye Company had found gold on the South +Fork, and had taken up claims. Composed mainly of careful, +provident, and thoughtful men,--some of cultivation and +refinement,--they had adopted a certain orderly discipline for +their own guidance solely, which, however, commended itself to +later settlers, already weary of the lawlessness and reckless +freedom which usually attended the inception of mining settlements. +Consequently the birth of Buckeye was accompanied with no dangerous +travail; its infancy was free from the diseases of adolescent +communities. The settlers, without any express prohibition, had +tacitly dispensed with gambling and drinking saloons; following the +unwritten law of example, had laid aside their revolvers, and +mingled together peacefully when their labors were ended, without +a single peremptory regulation against drinking and playing, or +carrying lethal weapons. Nor had there been any test of fitness or +qualification for citizenship through previous virtue. There were +one or two gamblers, a skillful duelist, and men who still drank +whiskey who had voluntarily sought the camp. Of some such +antecedents was the last speaker. Probably with two wives +elsewhere, and a possible homicidal record, he had modestly held +aloof from obtrusive argument. + +"Well, we must have a meeting and put the question squarely to the +boys to-morrow," said Parks, gazing thoughtfully from the window. +The remark was followed by another long silence. Beyond, in the +darkness, Buckeye, unconscious of the momentous question awaiting +its decision, slept on peacefully. + +"I brought the keg of whiskey and brandy from Red Gulch to-day that +Doctor Duchesne spoke of," he resumed presently. "You know he said +we ought to have some in common stock that he could always rely +upon in emergencies, and for use after the tule fever. I didn't +agree with him, and told him how I had brought Sam Denver through +an attack with quinine and arrowroot, but he laughed and wanted to +know if we'd 'resolved' that everybody should hereafter have the +Denver constitution. That's the trouble with those old army +surgeons,--they never can get over the 'heroics' of their past. +Why he told Parson Jennings that he'd rather treat a man for jim- +jams than one that was dying for want of stimulants. However, the +liquor is here, and one of the things we must settle tomorrow is +the question if it ought not to be issued only on Duchesne's +prescription. When I made that point to him squarely, he grinned +again, and wanted to know if I calculated to put the same +restriction on the sale of patent medicines and drugs generally." + +"'N powder 'n shot," contributed the indifferent man. + +"Perhaps you'd better take a look at the liquor, Saunders," said +Parks, dismissing the ethical question. "YOU know more about it +than we do. It ought to be the best." + +Saunders went behind the counter, drew out two demijohns, and, +possibly from the force of habit, selected THREE mugs from the +crockery and poured some whiskey into each, before he could check +himself. + +"Perhaps we had better compare tastes," said Brace blandly. They +all sipped their liquor slowly and in silence. The decision was +favorable. "Better try some with water to see how it mixes," said +Saunders, lazily filling the glasses with a practiced hand. This +required more deliberation, and they drew their chairs to the table +and sat down. A slight relaxation stole over the thoughtful faces +of Brace and Parks, a gentle perspiration came over the latter's +brow, but the features and expression of Saunders never changed. +The conversation took a broader range; politics and philosophy +entered into it; literature and poetry were discussed by Parks and +Brace, Saunders still retaining the air of a dispassionate +observer, ready to be convinced, but abstaining from argument--and +occasionally replenishing the glasses. There was felt to be no +inconsistency between their present attitude and their previous +conversation; rather it proved to them that gentlemen could +occasionally indulge in a social glass together without frequenting +a liquor saloon. This was stated with some degree of effusion by +Parks and assented to with singular enthusiasm by Brace; Saunders +nodding. It was also observed with great penetration by Brace that +in having really GOOD, specially selected liquor like that, the +great danger of the intoshikat'n 'fx--he corrected himself with +great deliberation, "the intoxicating effects"--of adulterated +liquors sold in drinking saloons was obviated. Mr. Brace thought +also that the vitiated quality of the close air of a crowded saloon +had a great deal to do with it--the excess of carbon--hic--he +begged their pardon--carbonic acid gas undoubtedly rendered people +"slupid and steepy." "But here, from the open window," he walked +dreamily to it and leaned out admiringly towards the dark landscape +that softly slumbered without, "one could drink in only health and +poetry." + +"Wot's that?" said Saunders, looking up. + +"I said health and poetry," returned Brace with some dignity. "I +repeat"-- + +"No. I mean wot's that noise? Listen." + +They listened so breathlessly that the soft murmur of the river +seemed to flow in upon them. But above it quite distinctly came +the regular muffled beat of horse-hoofs in the thick dust and the +occasional rattle of wheels over rocky irregularities. But still +very far and faint, and fading like the noises in a dream. Brace +drew a long breath; Parks smiled and softly closed his eyes. But +Saunders remained listening. + +"That was over OUR road, near the turnpike!" he said musingly. +"That's queer; thar ain't any of the boys away to-night, and that's +a wagon. It's some one comin' here. Hark to that! There it is +again." + +It was the same sound but more distinct and nearer, and then was +lost again. + +"They're dragging through the river sand that's just abreast o' +Mallory's. Stopped there, I reckon. No! pushin' on again. Hear +'em grinding along the gravel over Hamilton's trailin's? Stopped +agin--that's before Somerville's shanty. What's gone o' them now? +Maybe they've lost the trail and got onto Gray's slide through the +woods. It's no use lookin'; ye couldn't see anything in this +nigger dark. Hol' on! If they're comin' through the woods, ye'll +hear 'em again jest off here. Yes! by thunder! here they are." + +This time the clatter and horse-hoofs were before them, at the very +door. A man's voice cried, "Whoa!" and there was a sudden bound on +the veranda. The door opened; for an instant the entrance appeared +to be filled with a mass of dazzling white flounces, and a figure +which from waist to crown was impenetrably wrapped and swathed in +black lace. Somewhere beneath its folds a soft Spanish, yet +somewhat childish voice cried, "Tente. Hol' on," turned and +vanished. This was succeeded by the apparition of a silent, +swarthy Mexican, who dropped a small trunk at their feet and +vanished also. Then the white-flounced and black-laced figure +reappeared as the departing wagon rattled away, glided to the +centre of the room, placed on the trunk a small foot, whose low- +quartered black satin slipper seemed to be held only by the toe, +threw back with both hands the black lace mantilla, which was +pinned by a rose over her little right ear, and with her hands +slightly extended and waving softly said, "Mira caballeros! 'Ere +we are again, boys! Viva! Aow ees your mother? Aow ees that for +high? Behold me! just from Pike!" + +Parks and Brace, who had partly risen, fell back hopelessly in +their chairs again and gazed at the figure with a feeble smile of +vacuous pain and politeness. At which it advanced, lowered its +black eyes mischievously over the table and the men who sat there, +poured out a glass of the liquor, and said: "I look towards you, +boys! Don't errise. You are just a leetle weary, eh? A leetle. +Oh yes! a leetle tired of crookin' your elbow--eh? Don't care if +the school keep!--eh? Don't want any pie! Want to go 'ome, eh?" + +But here Mr. Parks rose with slight difficulty, but unflinching +dignity, and leaned impressively over the table, "May I ashk--may I +be permitted to arsk, madam, to what we may owe the pleasure of +thish--of this--visit?" + +Her face and attitude instantly changed. Her arms dropped and +caught up the mantilla with a quick but not ungraceful sweep, and +in apparently a single movement she was draped, wrapped, and +muffled from waist to crown as before. With a slight inclination +of her head, she said in quite another voice: "Si, senor. I have +arrive here because in your whole great town of Booki there is not +so much as one"--she held up a small brown finger--"as much as ONE +leetle light or fire like thees; be-cause in this grand pueblo +there is not one peoples who have not already sleep in his bed but +thees! Bueno! I have arrive all the same like a leetle bird, like +the small fly arrive to the light! not to YOU--only to THE LIGHT! +I go not to my casa for she is dark, and tonight she have nothing +to make the fire or bed. I go not to the 'otel--there is not ONE"-- +the brown finger again uplifted--"'otel in Booki! I make the +'otel--the Fonda--in my hoose manana--to-morrow! Tonight I and +Sanchicha make the bed for us 'ere. Sanchicha, she stands herself +now over in the street. We have mooch sorrow we have to make the +caballeros mooch tr-rouble to make disposition of his house. But +what will you?" + +There was another awkward silence, and then Saunders, who had been +examining the intruder with languid criticism, removed his pipe +from his mouth and said quietly:-- + +"That's the woman you're looking for--Jovita Mendez!" + + +PART II. + + +The rest of that interview has not been recorded. Suffice it that +a few minutes later Parks, Brace, and Saunders left the Emporium, +and passed the night in the latter's cabin, leaving the Emporium +in possession of Miss Mendez and her peon servant; that at the +earliest dawn the two women and their baggage were transferred to +the old adobe house, where, however, a Mexican workman had already +arrived, and with a basketful of red tiles was making it habitable. +Buckeye, which was popularly supposed to sleep with one eye on the +river, and always first repaired there in the morning to wash and +work, was only awake to the knowledge of the invasion at noon. The +meeting so confidently spoken of the night before had NOT been +called. Messrs. Parks and Brace were suffering from headaches-- +undoubtedly a touch of tule chill. Saunders, at work with his +partner in Eagle Bar, was as usual generous with apparently +irrelevant facts on all subjects--but that of the strangers. It +would seem as if the self-constituted Committee of Safety had done +nothing. + +And nothing whatever seemed to happen! Thompson of Angels, smoking +a meditative pipe at noon on the trail noticed the repairing of the +old adobe house, casually spoke of it on his return to his work, +without apparent concern or exciting any comment. The two +Billinger brothers saw Jovita Mendez at the door of her house an +hour later, were themselves seen conversing with her by Jim Barker, +but on returning to their claim, neither they nor Barker exhibited +any insurrectionary excitement. Later on, Shuttleworth was found +in possession of two bundles of freshly rolled corn-husk cigarettes, +and promised to get his partner some the next day, but that +gentleman anticipated him. By nightfall nearly all Buckeye had +passed in procession before the little house without exhibiting any +indignation or protest. That night, however, it seemed as if the +events for which the Committee was waiting were really impending. +The adult female population of Buckeye consisted of seven +women--wives of miners. That they would submit tamely to the +introduction of a young, pretty, and presumably dangerous member of +their own sex was not to be supposed. But whatever protest they +made did not pass beyond their conjugal seclusion, and was +apparently not supported by their husbands. Two or three of them, +under the pretext of sympathy of sex, secured interviews with the +fair intruder, the result of which was not, however, generally +known. But a few days later Mrs. "Bob" Carpenter--a somewhat +brick-dusty blonde--was observed wearing some black netting and a +heavily flounced skirt, and Mrs. Shuttleworth in her next visit to +Fiddletown wore her Paisley shawl affixed to her chestnut hair by a +bunch of dog-roses, and wrapped like a plaid around her waist. The +seven ladies of Buckeye, who had never before met, except on +domestic errands to each other's houses or on Sunday attendance at +the "First Methodist Church" at Fiddletown, now took to walking +together, or in their husbands' company, along the upper bank of the +river--the one boulevard of Buckeye. The third day after Miss +Mendez' arrival they felt the necessity of immediate shopping +expeditions to Fiddletown. This operation had hitherto been +confined to certain periods, and restricted to the laying in of +stores of rough household stuffs; but it now apparently included a +wider range and more ostentatious quality. Parks' Emporium no +longer satisfied them, and this unexpected phase of the situation +was practically brought home to the proprietor in the necessity of +extending the more inoffensive and peaceful part of his stock. And +when, towards the end of the week, a cartload of pretty fixtures, +mirrors, and furniture arrived at the tienda, there was a renewed +demand at the Emporium for articles not in stock, and the consequent +diverting of custom to Fiddletown. Buckeye found itself face to +face with a hitherto undreamt of and preposterous proposition. It +seemed that the advent of the strange woman, without having yet +produced any appreciable effect upon the men, had already +insidiously inveigled the adult female population into ostentatious +extravagance. + +At the end of a week the little adobe house was not only rendered +habitable, but was even made picturesque by clean white curtains at +its barred windows, and some bright, half-Moorish coloring of beams +and rafters. Nearly the whole ground floor was given up to the +saloon of the tienda, which consisted of a small counter at one +side, containing bottles and glasses, and another, flanking it, +with glass cases, containing cigars, pipes, and tobacco, while the +centre of the room was given up to four or five small restaurant +tables. The staff of Jovita was no longer limited to Sanchicha, +but had been augmented by a little old man of indefinite antiquity +who resembled an Aztec idol, and an equally old Mexican, who looked +not unlike a brown-tinted and veined tobacco leaf himself, and +might have stood for a sign. But the genius of the place, its +omnipresent and all-pervading goddess, was Jovita! Smiling, +joyous, indefatigable in suavity and attention; all-embracing in +her courtesies; frank of speech and eye; quick at repartee and +deftly handling the slang of the day and the locality with a +childlike appreciation and an infantine accent that seemed to +redeem it from vulgarity or unfeminine boldness! Few could resist +the volatile infection of her presence. A smile was the only +tribute she exacted, and good-humor the rule laid down for her +guests. If it occasionally required some mental agility to respond +to her banter, a Californian gathering was, however, seldom lacking +in humor. Yet she was always the principal performer to an +admiring audience. Perhaps there was security in this multitude +of admirers; perhaps there was a saving grace in this humorous +trifling. The passions are apt to be serious and solitary, and +Jovita evaded them with a jest,--which, if not always delicate or +witty, was effective in securing the laughter of the majority and +the jealousy of none. + +At the end of the week another peculiarity was noticed. There was +a perceptible increase of the Mexican population, who had always +hitherto avoided Buckeye. On Sunday an Irish priest from El Pasto +said mass in a patched-up corner of the old Mission ruin opposite +Rollinson's Ford. A few lounging "Excelsior" boys were equally +astonished to see Jovita's red rose crest and black mantilla glide +by, and followed her unvarying smile and jesting salutation up to +the shadow of the crumbling portal. At vespers nearly all Buckeye, +hitherto virtuously skeptical and good-humoredly secure in Works +without Faith, made a point of attending; it was alleged by some to +see if Jovita's glossy Indian-inky eyes would suffer aberration in +her devotions. But the rose-crested head was never lifted from the +well-worn prayer-book or the brown hands which held a certain poor +little cheap rosary like a child's string of battered copper coins. +Buckeye lounged by the wall through the service with respectful +tolerance and uneasy shifting legs, and came away. But the +apparently simple event did not end there. It was unconsciously +charged with a tremendous import to the settlement. For it was +discovered the next day by Mrs. "Bob" Carpenter and Nan +Shuttleworth that the Methodist Church at Fiddletown was too far +away, and Buckeye ought to have a preacher of its own. Seats were +fitted up in the loft of Carpenter's store-house, where the +Reverend Henry McCorkle held divine service, and instituted a Bible +class. At the end of two weeks it appeared that Jovita's invasion-- +which was to bring dissipation and ruin to Buckeye--had indirectly +brought two churches! A chilling doubt like a cold mist settled +along the river. As the two rival processions passed on the third +Sunday, Jo Bateman, who had been in the habit of reclining on that +day in his shirtsleeves under a tree, with a novel in his hand, +looked gloomily after them. Then knocking the ashes from his pipe, +he rose, shook hands with his partners, said apologetically that he +had lately got into the habit of RESPECTING THE SABBATH, and was +too old to change again, and so shook the red dust of Buckeye from +his feet and departed. + +As yet there had not been the slightest evidence of disorderly +conduct on the part of the fair proprietress of the tienda, nor her +customers, nor any drunkenness or riotous disturbance that could +be at all attributed to her presence. There was, it is true, +considerable hilarity, smoking, and some gambling there until a +late hour, but this could not be said to interfere with the rest +and comfort of other people. A clue to the mystery of so +extraordinary a propriety was given by Jovita herself. One day she +walked into Parks' Emporium and demanded an interview with the +proprietor. + +"You have made the rules for thees Booki?" + +"Yes--that is--I and my friends have." + +"And when one shall not have mind the rule--when one have say, 'No! +damn the rule,' what shall you make to him? Shall you aprison +him?" + +Mr. Parks hastened to say with a superior, yet engaging smile that +it never had been necessary, as the rules were obligatory upon the +honor and consent of all--and were never broken. "Except," he +added, still more engagingly, "she would remember, in her case-- +with their consent." + +"And your caballeros break not the rules?" + +"No." + +"Then they shall not break the rules of me--at MY TIENDA! Look! I +have made the rule that I shall not have a caballero drunk at my +house; I have made the rule that I shall not sell him the +aguardiente when he have too mooch. I have made the rule that when +he gamble too mooch, when he put up too mooch money, I say 'No!' I +will not that he shall! I make one more rule: that he shall not +quarrel nor fight in my house. When he quarrel and fight, I say +'Go! Vamos! Get out!'" + +"And very good rules they are too, Miss Mendez." + +Jovita fixed her shining black eyes on the smiling Parks. "And +when he say, 'No, nevarre, damn the rules!' When he come drunk, +remain drunk, play high and fight, YOU will not poonish him? YOU +will not take him out?" + +"Well, you see, the fact is, I have not the power." + +"Are you not the Alcalde?" + +"No. There is a Justice of the Peace at Fiddletown, but even he +could do nothing to enforce your rules. But if anything should +happen, you can make a complaint to him." + +"Bueno. You have not the power; I have. I make not the complaint +to Fiddletown. I make the complaint to Jose Perez, to Manuel, to +Antonio, to Sanchicha--she is a strong one! I say 'Chook him out.' +They chook him out! they remove him! He does not r-r-remain. +Enough. Bueno. Gracias, senor, good-a-by!" + +She was gone. For the next four days Parks was in a state of some +anxiety--but it appeared unnecessarily so. Whether the interview +had become known along the river did not transpire, but there +seemed to be no reason for Miss Mendez to enforce her rules. It +was said that once, when Thompson of Angels was a little too noisy, +he had been quietly conducted by his friends from the tienda +without the intervention of Jose. The frequenters of the saloon +became its police. + +Yet the event--long protracted--came at last! It was a dry, +feverish, breezeless afternoon, when the short, echoless explosion +of a revolver puffed out on the river, followed by another, +delivered so rapidly that they seemed rolled into one. There was +no mistaking that significant repetition. ONE shot might have been +an accident; TWO meant intention. The men dropped their picks and +shovels and ran--ran as they never before ran in Buckeye--ran +mechanically, blindly groping at their belts and pockets for the +weapons that hung there no longer; ran aimlessly, as to purpose, +but following instinctively with hurried breath and quivering +nostrils the cruel scent of powder and blood. Ran until, reaching +the tienda, the foremost stumbled over the body of Shuttleworth; +came upon the half-sitting, half-leaning figure of Saunders against +its adobe wall! The doors were barred and closed, and even as the +crowd charged furiously forward, a window was sharply shut above, +in their very face. + +"Stand back, gentlemen! Lift him up. What's the row? What is it, +Saunders? Who did it? Speak, man!" + +But Saunders, who was still supporting himself against the wall, +only looked at them with a singular and half-apologetic smile, and +then leaned forward as if to catch the eye of Shuttleworth, who was +recovering consciousness in the uplifted arms of his companions. +But neither spoke. + +"It's some d----d Greaser inside!" said Thompson, with sudden +ferocity. "Some of her cursed crew! Break down the doors, boys!" + +"Stop!" + +It was the voice of Shuttleworth, speaking with an effort. He was +hard hit, somewhere in the groin; pain and blood were coming with +consciousness and movement, and his face was ghastly. Yet there +was the same singular smile of embarrassment which Saunders had +worn, and a touch of invincible disgust in his voice as he +stammered quickly, "Don't be d----d fools! It's no one in THERE. +It's only me and HIM! He'll tell you that. Won't you, Saunders?" + +"Yes," said Saunders, leaning anxiously forward, with a brightening +face. "D--n it all--can't you see? It's only--only us." + +"You and me, that's all," repeated Shuttleworth, with a feverish +laugh. "Only our d----d foolishness! Think of it, boys! He gave +me the lie, and I drew!" + +"Both of us full, you know--reg'lar beasts," said Saunders, sinking +back against the wall. "Kick me, somebody, and finish me off." + +"I don't see any weapons here," said Brace gravely, examining the +ground. + +"They're inside," said Shuttleworth with tremulous haste. "We +began it in there--just like hogs, you know! Didn't we, Saunders?" +bitterly. + +"You bet," said Saunders faintly. "Reg'lar swine." + +Parks looked graver still, and as he passed a handkerchief around +the wounded man's thigh, said: "But I don't see where you got your +pistols, and how you got out here." + +"Clinched, you know; sorter rolled over out here--and--and--oh, +d--n it--don't talk!" + +"He means," said Shuttleworth still feebly, "that we--we--grabbed +ANOTHER MAN'S six-shooter and--and--he that is--and they--he--he +and me grabbed each other, and--don't you see--?" but here, +becoming more involved and much weaker, he discreetly fainted away. + +And that was all Buckeye ever knew of the affair! For they refused +to speak of it again, and Dr. Duchesne gravely forbade any further +interrogation. Both men's revolvers were found undischarged in +their holsters, hanging in their respective cabins. The balls +which were afterwards extracted from the two men singularly +disappeared; Dr. Duchesne asserting with a grim smile that they had +swallowed them.* + + +* It was a frontier superstition that the ball extracted from a +gunshot wound, if swallowed by the wounded man, prevented +inflammation or any supervening complications. + + +Nothing could be ascertained of the facts at the tienda, which at +that hour of the day appeared to have been empty of customers, and +was occupied only by Miss Mendez and her retainers. All surmises +as to the real cause of the quarrel and the reason for the +reticence of the two belligerents were suddenly and unexpectedly +stopped by their departure from Buckeye as soon as their condition +permitted, on the alleged opinion of Dr. Duchesne that the air of +the river was dangerous to their convalescence. The momentary +indignation against the tienda which the two combatants had +checked, eventually subsided altogether. After all, the fight had +taken place OUTSIDE; it was not even proven that the provocation +had been given AT the tienda! Its popularity was undiminished. + + +PART III. + + +It was the end of the rainy season, and a wet night. Brace and +Parks were looking from the window over the swollen river, with +faces quite as troubled as the stream below. Nor was the prospect +any longer the same. In the past two years Buckeye had grown into +a city. They could now count a half dozen church spires from the +window of the three-storied brick building which had taken the +place of the old wooden Emporium, but they could also count the +brilliantly lit windows of an equal number of saloons and gambling- +houses which glittered through the rain, or, to use the words of a +local critic, "Shone seven nights in the week to the Gospel shops' +ONE!" A difficulty had arisen which the two men had never dreamed +of, and a struggle had taken place between the two rival powers, +which was developing a degree of virulence and intolerance on both +sides that boded no good to Buckeye. The disease which its infancy +had escaped had attacked its adult growth with greater violence. +The new American saloons which competed with Jovita Mendez' Spanish +venture had substituted a brutal masculine sincerity for her veiled +feminine methods. There was higher play, deeper drinking, darker +passion. Yet the opposition, after the fashion of most reformers, +were casting back to the origin of the trouble in Jovita, and were +confounding principles and growth. "If it had not been for her the +rule would never have been broken." "If there was to be a cleaning +out of the gambling houses, she must go first!" + +The sounds of a harp and a violin played in the nearest saloon +struggled up to them with the opening and shutting of its swinging +baize inner doors. There was boisterous chanting from certain +belated revelers in the next street which had no such remission. +The brawling of the stream below seemed to be echoed in the uneasy +streets; the quiet of the old days had departed with the sedate, +encompassing woods that no longer fringed the river bank; the +restful calm of Nature had receded before the dusty outskirts of +the town. + +"It's mighty unfortunate, too," said Brace moodily, "that +Shuttleworth and Saunders, who haven't been in the place since +their row, have come over from Fiddletown to-day, and are banging +around town. They haven't said anything that I know of, but their +PRESENCE is quite enough to revive the old feeling against her +shop. The Committee," he added bitterly, "will be sure to say that +not only the first gambling, but the first shooting in Buckeye took +place there. If they get up that story again--no matter how quiet +SHE has become since--no matter what YOU may say as mayor--it will +go hard with her. What's that now?" + +They listened breathlessly. Above the brawling of the river, the +twanging of the harp-player, and the receding shouts of the +revelers, they could hear the hollow wooden sidewalks resounding +with the dull, monotonous trampling of closely following feet. +Parks rose with a white face. + +"Brace!" + +"Yes!" + +"Will you stand by me--and HER?" + +"Stand by YOU AND HER? Eh? What? Good God! Parks!--you don't +mean to say you--it's gone as far as THAT?" + +"Will you or won't you?" + +The sound of the trampling had changed to a shuffling on the +pavement below, and then footsteps began to ascend the stairs. + +Brace held out his hand quickly and grasped that of Parks as +the door opened to half a dozen men. They were evidently the +ringleaders of the crowd below. There was no hesitation or +doubt in their manner; the unswerving directness which always +characterized those illegal demonstrations lent it something of +dignity. Nevertheless, Carpenter, the spokesman, flushed slightly +before Parks' white, determined face. + +"Come, Parks, you know what we're after," he said bluntly. "We +didn't come here to parley. We knew YOUR sentiments and what YOU +think is your duty. We know what we consider OURS--and so do you. +But we're here to give you a chance, either as mayor, or, if you +prefer it, as the oldest citizen here, to take a hand in our +business to-night. We're not ashamed of what we're going to do, +and we're willing to abide by it; so there's no reason why we +shouldn't speak aboveboard of it to you. We even invite you to +take part in our last 'call' tonight at the Hall." + +"Go!" whispered Brace quickly, "YOU'LL GAIN TIME!" + +Parks' face changed, and he turned to Carpenter. "Enough," he said +gravely. "I reserve what I have to say of these proceedings till I +join you there." He stopped, whispered a few words to Brace, and +then disappeared as the men descended the stairs, and, joining the +crowd on the pavement, proceeded silently towards the Town Hall. +There was nothing in the appearance of that decorous procession to +indicate its unlawful character or the recklessness with which it +was charged. + +There were thirty or forty men already seated in the Hall. The +meeting was brief and to the point. The gambling saloons were to +be "cleaned out" that night, the tables and appliances thrown into +the street and burnt, the doors closed, and the gamblers were to be +conducted to the outskirts of the town and forbidden to enter it +again on pain of death. + +"Does this yer refer to Jovita Mendez' saloon?" asked a voice. + +To their surprise the voice was not Parks' but Shuttleworth's. It +was also a matter to be noted that he stood a little forward of the +crowd, and that there was a corresponding movement of a dozen or +more men from Fiddletown who apparently were part of the meeting. + +The chairman (No. 10) said there was to be no exception, and +certainly not for the originator of disorder in Buckeye! He was +surprised that the question should be asked by No. 72, who was an +old resident of Buckeye, and who, with No. 73, had suffered from +the character of that woman's saloon. + +"That's jest it," said Shuttleworth, "and ez I reckon that SAUNDERS +AND ME did all the disorder there was, and had to turn ourselves +out o' town on account of it, I don't see jest where SHE could come +into this affair. Only," he turned and looked around him, "in one +way! And that way, gentlemen, would be for her to come here and +boot one half o' this kempany out o' town, and shoot the other +half! You hear me!--that's so!" He stopped, tugged a moment at +his cravat and loosened his shirt-collar as if it impeded his +utterance, and went on. "I've got to say suthin' to you gentlemen +about me and Saunders and this woman; I've got to say suthin' +that's hard for a white man to say, and him a married man, too-- +I've got to say that me and Saunders never had no QU'OLL, never had +NO FIGHT at her shop: I've got to say that me and Saunders got shot +by Jovita Mendez for INSULTIN' HER--for tryin' to treat her as if +she was the common dirt of the turnpike--and served us right! I've +got to say that Saunders and me made a bet that for all her airs +she wasn't no better than she might be, and we went there drunk to +try her--and that we got left, with two shots into us like hounds +as we were! That's so!--wasn't it, Saunders?" + +"With two shots inter us like hounds ez we were," repeated Saunders +with deliberate precision. + +"And I've got to say suthin' more, gen'lemen," continued +Shuttleworth, now entirely removing his coat and vest, and +apparently shaking himself free from any extraneous trammels. "I've +got to say this--I've got to say that thar ain't a man in Buckeye, +from Dirty Dick over yon to the mayor of this town, ez hasn't tried +the same thing on and got left--got left, without shootin' maybe, +more's the pity, but got left all the same! And I've got to say," +lifting his voice, "THAT EF THAT'S WHAT YOU CALL DISORDERLINESS IN +HER--if that's what yo'r turnin' this woman out o' town for--why"-- + +He stopped, absolutely breathless and gasping. For there was a +momentary shock of surprise and shame, and then he was overborne +by peal after peal of inextinguishable laughter. But it was the +laughter that precipitated doubt, enlightened justice, cleared +confusion, and--saved them! + +In vain a few struggled to remind them that the question of the +OTHER saloons was still unaffected. It was lost in the motion +enthusiastically put and carried that the Committee should +instantly accompany Saunders and Shuttleworth to Jovita's saloon to +make an apology in their presence. Five minutes later they halted +hilariously before its door. But it was closed, dark, and silent! + +Their sudden onset and alarm brought Sanchicha to the half-opened +door. "Ah, yes! the Senorita? Bueno! She had just left for +Fiddletown with the Senor Parks, the honorable mayor. They had +been married only a few moments before by the Reverend Mr. McCorkle!" + + + +THEIR UNCLE FROM CALIFORNIA. + + +PART I. + + +It was bitterly cold. When night fell over Lakeville, Wisconsin, +the sunset, which had flickered rather than glowed in the western +sky, took upon itself a still more boreal tremulousness, until at +last it seemed to fade away in cold blue shivers to the zenith. +Nothing else stirred; in the crisp still air the evening smoke of +chimneys rose threadlike and vanished. The stars were early, pale, +and pitiless; when the later moonlight fell, it appeared only to +whiten the stiffened earth like snow, except where it made a dull, +pewter-like film over the three frozen lakes which encompassed the +town. + +The site of the town itself was rarely beautiful, and its pioneers +and founders had carried out the suggestions they had found there +with loving taste and intelligence. + +Themselves old voyageurs, trappers, and traders, they still loved +Nature too well to exclude her from the restful homes they had +achieved after years of toiling face to face with her. So a strip +of primeval forest on the one side, and rolling level prairie on +the other, still came up to the base of the hill, whereon they +had built certain solid houses, which a second generation had +beautified and improved with modern taste, but which still retained +their old honesty of foundation and wholesome rustic space. These +yet stood among the old trees, military squares, and broad sloping +avenues of the town. Seen from the railway by day, the regularity +of streets and blocks was hidden by environing trees; there +remained only a picturesque lifting of rustic gardens, brown roofs, +gables, spires, and cupolas above the mirroring lake: seen from the +railway this bitter night, the invisible terraces and streets were +now pricked out by symmetrical lines and curves of sparkling +lights, which glittered through the leafless boughs and seemed to +encircle the hill like a diadem. + +Central in the chiefest square, and yet preserving its old lordly +isolation in a wooded garden, the homestead of Enoch Lane stood +with all its modern additions and improvements. Already these +included not only the latest phases of decoration, but various +treasures brought by the second generation from Europe, which they +were wont to visit, but from which they always contentedly returned +to their little provincial town. Whether there was some instinctive +yearning, like the stirred sap of great forests, in their wholesome +pioneer blood, or whether there was some occult fascination in the +pretty town-crested hill itself, it was still certain that the +richest inhabitants always preferred to live in Lakeville. Even the +young, who left it to seek their fortune elsewhere, came back to +enjoy their success under the sylvan vaults of this vast ancestral +roof. And that was why, this 22d of December, 1870, the whole +household of Gabriel Lane was awaiting the arrival from California +of his brother, Sylvester Lane, at the old homestead which he had +left twenty years ago. + +"And you don't know how he looks?" said Kitty Lane to her father. + +"I do, perfectly; rather chubby, with blue eyes, curly hair, fair +skin, and blushes when you speak to him." + +"Papa!" + +"Eh?--Oh, well, he USED to. You see that was twenty-five years +ago, when he left here for boarding-school. He ran away from +there, as I told you; went to sea, and finally brought up at San +Francisco." + +"And you haven't had any picture, or photograph of him, since?" + +"No--that is--I say!--you haven't, any of you, got a picture of +Sylvester, have you?" he turned in a vague parenthetical appeal to +the company of relatives and friends collected in the drawing-room +after dinner. + +"Cousin Jane has; she knows all about him!" + +But it appeared that Cousin Jane had only heard Susan Marckland say +that Edward Bingham had told her that he was in California when +"Uncle Sylvester" had been nearly hanged by a Vigilance Committee +for protecting a horse thief or a gambler, or some such person. +This was felt to be ineffective as a personal description. + +"He's sure to wear a big beard; they all do when they first come +back," said Amos Gunn, with metropolitan oraculousness. + +"He has a big curling mustache, long silken hair, and broad +shoulders," said Marie du Page. + +There was such piquant conviction in the manner of the speaker, who +was also a very pretty girl, that they all turned towards her, and +Kitty quickly said,-- + +"But YOU'VE never seen him?" + +"No--but--" She stopped, and, lifting one shoulder, threw her +spirited head sideways, in a pretty deprecatory way, with elevated +eyebrows and an expression intended to show the otherwise +untranslatable character of her impression. But it showed quite +as pleasantly the other fact, that she was the daughter of a +foreigner, an old French military explorer, and that she had +retained even in Anglo-Saxon Lakeville some of the Gallic +animation. + +"Well, how many of you girls are going with me to meet him at the +station?" said Gabriel, dismissing with masculine promptness the +lesser question. "It's time to be off." + +"I'd like to go," said Kitty, "and so would Cousin Jane; but +really, papa, you see if YOU don't know him, and WE don't either, +and you've got to satisfy yourself that it's the right man, and +then introduce YOURSELF and then us--and all this on the platform +before everybody--it makes it rather embarrassing for us. And +then, as he's your younger brother and we're supposed to be his +affectionate nieces, you know, it would make HIM feel SO +ridiculous!" + +"And if he were to KISS you," said Marie tragically, "and then turn +out not to be him!" + +"So," continued Kitty, "you'd better take Cousin John, who was more +in Uncle Sylvester's time, to represent the Past of the family, and +perhaps Mr. Gunn"-- + +"To represent the future, I suppose?" interrupted Gabriel in a +wicked whisper. + +"To represent a name that most men of the world in New York and San +Francisco know," went on Kitty, without a blush. "It would make +recognition and introduction easier. And take an extra fur with +you, dear--not for HIM but for yourself. I suppose he's lived so +much in the open air as to laugh at our coddling." + +"I don't know about that," said her father thoughtfully; "the last +telegram I have from him, en route, says he's half frozen, and +wants a close carriage sent to the station." + +"Of course," said Marie impatiently, "you forget the poor creature +comes from burning canyons and hot golden sands and perpetual +sunshine." + +"Very well; but come along, Marie, and see how I've prepared his +room," and as her father left the drawing-room Kitty carried off +her old schoolfellow upstairs. + +The room selected for the coming Sylvester had been one of the +elaborate guest-chambers, but was now stripped of its more +luxurious furniture and arranged with picturesque yet rural +extravagance. A few rare buffalo, bear, and panther skins were +disposed over the bare floor, and even displayed gracefully over +some elaborately rustic chairs. The handsome French bedstead had +been displaced for a small wrought-iron ascetic-looking couch +covered with a gorgeously striped Mexican blanket. The fireplace +had been dismantled of its steel grate, and the hearth extended so +as to allow a pile of symmetrically heaped moss-covered hickory +logs to take its place. The walls were covered with trophies of +the chase, buck-horns and deer-heads, and a number of Indian arrows +stood in a sheaf in the corners beside a few modern guns and +rifles. + +"Perfectly lovely," said Marie, "but"--with a slight shiver of her +expressive shoulders--"a little cold and outdoorish, eh?" + +"Nonsense," returned Kitty dictatorially, "and if he IS cold, he +can easily light those logs. They always build their open fires +under a tree. Why, even Mr. Gunn used to do that when he was +camping out in the Adirondacks last summer. I call it perfectly +comfortable and SO natural." Nevertheless, they had both tucked +their chilly hands under the fleecy shawls they had snatched from +the hall for this hyperborean expedition. + +"You have taken much pains for him, Kaitee," said Marie, with her +faintest foreign intonation. "You will like this strange uncle-- +you?" + +"He is a wonderful man, Marie; he's been everywhere, seen everything, +and done everything out there. He's fought duels, been captured by +Indians and tied to a stake to be tortured. He's been leader of a +Vigilance Committee, and they say that he has often shot and killed +men himself. I'm afraid he's been rather wicked, you know. He's +lived alone in the woods like a hermit without seeing a soul, and +then, again, he's been a chief among the Indians, with Heaven knows +how many Indian wives! They called him 'The Pale-faced Thunderbolt,' +my dear, and 'The Young Man who Swallows the Lightning,' or +something like that." + +"And what can he want here?" asked Marie. + +"To see us, my dear," said Kitty loftily; "and then, too, he has to +settle something about HIS share of the property; for you know +grandpa left a share of it to him. Not that he's ever bothered +himself about it, for he's rich,--a kind of Monte Cristo, you +know,--with a gold mine and an island off the coast, to say nothing +of a whole county that he owns, that is called after him, and +millions of wild cattle that he rides among and lassos! It's +dreadfully hard to do. You know you take a long rope with a +slipknot, and you throw it around your head so, and"-- + +"Hark!" said Marie, with a dramatic start, and her finger on her +small mouth, "he comes!" + +There was the clear roll of wheels along the smooth, frozen +carriage sweep towards the house, the sharp crisp click of hoofs on +stone, the opening of heavy doors, the sudden sparkling invasion of +frigid air, the uplifting of voices in greeting,--but all familiar! +There were Gabriel Lane's cheery, hopeful tones, the soprano of +Cousin Jane and Cousin Emma, the baritone of Mr. Gunn, and the +grave measured oratorical utterance of Parson Dexter, who had +joined the party at the station; but certainly the accents of no +STRANGER. Had he come? Yes, for his name was just then called, +and the quick ear of Marie had detected a light, lounging, alien +footstep cross the cold strip of marble vestibule. The two girls +exchanged a rapid glance; each looked into the mirror, and then +interrogatively at the other, nodded their heads affirmatively, and +descended to the drawing-room. A group had already drawn round the +fire, and a small central figure, who, with its back turned towards +them, was still enwrapped in an enormous overcoat of rich fur, was +engaged in presenting an alternate small varnished leather boot to +the warmth of the grate. As they entered the room the heavy fur +was yielded up with apparent reluctance, and revealed to the +astonished girls a man of ordinary stature with a slight and +elegant figure set off by a traveling suit of irreproachable cut. +His light reddish-yellow hair, mustache, and sunburned cheek, which +seemed all of one color and outline, made it impossible to detect +the gray of the one or the hollowness of the other, and gave no +indication of his age. Yet there was clearly no mistake. Here was +Gabriel Lane seizing their nervously cold fingers and presenting +them to their "Uncle Sylvester." + +Far from attempting to kiss Kitty, the stranger for an instant +seemed oblivious of the little hand she offered him in the half- +preoccupied bow he gave her. But Marie was not so easily passed +over, and, with her audacious face challenging his, he abstractedly +imparted to the shake of her hand something of the fervor that he +should have shown his relative. And, then, still warming his feet +on the fender, he seemed to have forgotten them both. + +"Accustomed as you have been, sir," said the Reverend Mr. Dexter, +seizing upon an awkward silence, and accenting it laboriously, +"perhaps I should say INURED as you have been to the exciting and +stirring incidents of a lawless and adventurous community, you +doubtless find in a pastoral, yet cultivated and refined, seclusion +like Lakeville a degree of"-- + +"Oh, several degrees," said Uncle Sylvester, blandly flicking bits +of buffalo hair from his well-fitting trousers; "it's colder, you +know--much colder." + +"I was referring to a less material contrast," continued Mr. +Dexter, with a resigned smile; "yet, as to the mere question of +cold, I am told, sir, that in California there are certain severe +regions of altitude--although the mean temperature"-- + +"I suppose out in California you fellows would say our temperature +was a darned sight MEANER, eh?" broke in Amos Gunn, with a +confidential glance at the others, as if offering a humorous +diversion suited to the Californian taste. Uncle Sylvester did +not, however, smile. Gazing critically at Gunn, he said +thoughtfully: "I think not; I've even known men killed for saying +less than that," and turned to the clergyman. "You are quite +right; some of the higher passes are very cold. I was lost in one +of them in '56 with a small party. We were seventy miles from any +settlement, we had had nothing to eat for thirty-six hours; our +campfire, melting the snow, sank twelve feet below the surface." +The circle closed eagerly around him, Marie, Kitty, and Cousin Jane +pressing forward with excited faces; even the clergyman assumed an +expression of profound interest. "A man by the name of Thompson, I +think," continued Uncle Sylvester, thoughtfully gazing at the fire, +"was frozen a few yards away. Towards morning, having been fifty- +eight hours without food, our last drop of whiskey exhausted, and +the fire extinguished, we found"-- + +"Yes, yes!" said half a dozen voices. + +"We found," continued Uncle Sylvester, rubbing his hands cheerfully, +"we found it--exceedingly cold. Yes--EXCEEDINGLY cold!" + +There was a dead silence. + +"But you escaped!" said Kitty breathlessly. + +"I think so. I think we all escaped--that is, except Thompson, if +his name WAS Thompson; it might have been Parker," continued Uncle +Sylvester, gazing with a certain languid astonishment on the eager +faces around him. + +"But HOW did you escape?" + +"Oh, somehow! I don't remember exactly. I don't think," he went +on reflectively, "that we had to eat Thompson--if it was HIM--at +least not then. No"--with a faint effort of recollection--"that +would have been another affair. Yes," assuringly to the eager, +frightened eyes of Cousin Jane, "you are quite right, that was +something altogether different. Dear me; one quite mixes up these +things. Eh?" + +A servant had entered, and after a hurried colloquy with Gabriel, +the latter turned to Uncle Sylvester-- + +"Excuse me, but I think there must be some mistake! We brought up +your luggage with you--two trunks--in the station wagon. A man has +just arrived with three more, which he says are yours." + +"There should be five in all, I think," said Uncle Sylvester +thoughtfully. + +"Maybe there are, sir, I didn't count exactly," said the servant. + +"All right," said Uncle Sylvester cheerfully, turning to his +brother. "You can put them in my room or on the landing, except +two marked 'L' in a triangle. They contain some things I picked up +for you and the girls. We'll look them over in the morning. And, +if you don't mind, I'll excuse myself now and go to bed." + +"But it's only half past ten," said Gabriel remonstratingly. "You +don't, surely, go to bed at half past ten?" + +"I do when I travel. Travel is SO exhausting. Good-night! Don't +let anybody disturb themselves to come with me." + +He bowed languidly to the company, and disappeared with a yawn +gracefully disguised into a parting smile. + +"Well!" said Cousin Jane, drawing a long breath. + +"I don't believe it's your Uncle Sylvester at all!" said Marie +vivaciously. "It's some trick that Gabriel is playing upon us. +And he's not even a good actor--he forgets his part." + +"And, then, five trunks for one single man! Heavens! what can he +have in them" said Cousin Emma. + +"Perhaps his confederates, to spring out upon us at night, after +everybody's asleep." + +"Are you sure you remembered him, papa?" said Kitty sotto voce. + +"Certainly. And, my dear child, he knows all the family history as +well as you do; and"--continued her father with a slight laugh that +did not, however, conceal a certain seriousness that was new to +him--"I only wish I understood as much about the property as he +does. By the way, Amos," he broke off suddenly, turning to the +young man, "he seemed to know your people." + +"Most men in the financial world do," said Gunn a little +superciliously. + +"Yes; but he asked me if you hadn't a relative of some kind in +Southern California or Mexico." + +A slight flush--so slight that only the keen, vivaciously observant +eyes of Marie noticed it--passed over the young man's face. + +"I believe it is a known fact that our branch of the family never +emigrated from their native town," he said emphatically. "The +Gunns were rather peculiar and particular in that respect." + +"Then there were no offshoots from the old STOCK," said Gabriel. + +Nevertheless, this pet joke of Gabriel's did not dissipate the +constraint and disappointment left upon the company by Uncle +Sylvester's unsatisfying performance and early withdrawal, and they +separated soon after, Kitty and Marie being glad to escape upstairs +together. On the landing they met two of the Irish housemaids in a +state of agitated exhaustion. It appeared that the "sthrange +gintleman" had requested that his bed be remade from bedclothes +and bedding ALWAYS CARRIED WITH HIM IN HIS TRUNKS! From their +apologetic tone it was evident that he had liberally rewarded them. +"Shure, Miss," protested Norah, in deprecation of Kitty's flashing +eye, "there's thim that's lived among shnakes and poysin riptiles +and faverous disayses that's particklar av the beds and sheets they +lie on. Hisht! Howly Mother! it's something else he's wanting +now!" + +The door of Uncle Sylvester's room had slowly opened, and a blue +pyjama'd sleeve appeared, carefully depositing the sheaf of bows +and arrows outside the door. "I say, Norah, or Bridget there, some +of you take those infernal things away. And look out, will you, +for the arrowheads are deadly poison. The fool who got 'em didn't +know they were African, and not Indian at all! And hold on!" The +hand vanished, and presently reappeared holding two rifles. "And +take these away, too! They're loaded, capped, and NOT on the half- +cock! A jar, a fall, the slightest shock is enough to send them +off!" + +"I'm dreadfully sorry that you should find it so uncomfortable in +our house, Uncle Sylvester," said Kitty, with a flushed cheek and +vibrating voice. + +"Oh, it's you--is it?" said Uncle Sylvester's voice cheerfully. "I +thought it was Bridget out there. No, I don't intend to find it +uncomfortable. That's why I'm putting these things outside. But, +for Heaven's sake, don't YOU touch them. Leave that to the +ineffable ass who put them there. Good-night!" + +The door closed; the whispering voices of the girls faded from the +corridor; the lights were lowered in the central hall, only the red +Cyclopean eye of an enormous columnar stove, like a lighthouse, +gleamed through the darkness. Outside, the silent night sparkled, +glistened, and finally paled. Towards morning, having invested the +sturdy wooden outer walls of the house and filmed with delicate +tracery every available inch of window pane, it seemed stealthily +to invade the house itself, stilling and chilling it as it drew +closer around its central heart of warmth and life. Only once the +frigid stillness was broken by the opening of a door and steps +along the corridor. This was preceded by an acrid smell of burning +bark. + +It was subtle enough to permeate the upper floor and the bedroom +of Marie du Page, who was that night a light and nervous sleeper. +Peering from her door, she could see, on the lower corridor, the +extraordinary spectacle of Uncle Sylvester, robed in a gorgeous +Japanese dressing-gown of quilted satin trimmed with the fur of +the blue fox, candle in hand, leisurely examining the wall of the +passage. Presently, drawing out a footrule from his pocket, he +actually began to measure it! Miss Du Page saw no more. Hurriedly +closing her door, she locked and bolted it, firmly convinced that +Gabriel Lane was harboring in the guise of Uncle Sylvester a +somnambulist, a maniac, or an impostor. + + +PART II. + + +"It doesn't seem as if Uncle Sylvester was any the more comfortable +for having his own private bedding with him," said Kitty Lane, +entering Marie's room early the next morning. "Bridget found him +curled up in his furs like a cat asleep on the drawing-room sofa +this morning." + +Marie started; she remembered her last night's vision. But some +instinct--she knew not what--kept her from revealing it at this +moment. She only said a little ironically:-- + +"Perhaps he missed the wild freedom of his barbaric life in a small +bedroom." + +"No. Bridget says he said something about being smoked out of his +room by a ridiculous wood fire. The idea! As if a man brought up +in the woods couldn't stand a little smoke. No--that's his excuse! +Marie!--do you know what I firmly believe?" + +"No," said Marie quickly. + +"I firmly believe that poor man is ashamed of his past rough life, +and does everything he can to forget it. That's why he affects +those ultra-civilized and effeminate ways, and goes to the other +extreme, as people always do." + +"Then you think he's really reformed, and isn't likely to take an +impulse to rob and murder anybody again?" + +"Why, Marie, what nonsense!" + +Nevertheless, Uncle Sylvester appeared quite fresh and cheerful at +breakfast. It seemed that he had lit the fire before undressing, +but the green logs were piled so far into the room that the smoke +nearly suffocated him. Fearful of alarming the house by letting +the smoke escape through the door, he opened the window, and when +it had partly dispersed, sought refuge himself from the arctic air +of his bedroom in the drawing-room. So far the act did not seem +inconsistent with his sanity, or even intelligence and consideration +for others. But Marie fixed upon him a pair of black, audacious +eyes. + +"Did you ever walk in your sleep, Mr. Lane?" + +"No; but"--thoughtfully breaking an egg--"I have ridden, I think." + +"In your sleep? Oh, do tell us all about it!" said Cousins Jane +and Emma in chorus. + +Uncle Sylvester cast a resigned glance out of the window. "Oh, +yes--certainly; it isn't much. You see at one time I was in the +habit of making long monotonous journeys, and they were often +exhausting, and," he added, becoming wearied as if at the +recollection, "always dreadfully tiresome. As the trail was +sometimes very uncertain and dangerous, I rode a very surefooted +mule that could go anywhere where there was space big enough to set +her small hoofs upon. One night I was coming down the slope of a +mountain towards a narrow valley and river that were crossed by an +old, abandoned flume, of which nothing was now left but the upright +trestle-work and long horizontal string-piece. As the trail was +very difficult and the mule's pace was slow, I found myself dozing +at times, and at last I must have fallen asleep. I think I must +have been awakened by a singular regularity in the movement of the +mule--or else it was the monotony of step that had put me to sleep +and the cessation of it awakened me. You see, at first I was not +certain that I wasn't really dreaming. For the trail seemed to +have disappeared; the wall of rock on one side had vanished also, +and there appeared to be nothing ahead of me but the opposite +hillside." + +Uncle Sylvester stopped to look out of the window at a passing +carriage. Then he went on. "The moon came out, and I saw what had +happened. The mule, either of her own free will, or obeying some +movement I had given the reins in my sleep, had swerved from the +trail, got on top of the flume, and was actually walking across the +valley on the narrow string-piece, a foot wide, half a mile long, +and sixty feet from the ground. I knew," he continued, examining +his napkin thoughtfully, "that she was perfectly surefooted, and +that if I kept quiet she could make the passage, but I suddenly +remembered that midway there was a break and gap of twenty feet in +the continuous line, and that the string-piece was too narrow to +allow her to turn round and retrace her steps." + +"Good heavens!" said Cousin Jane. + +"I beg your pardon?" said Uncle Sylvester politely. + +"I only said, 'Good heavens!' Well?" she added impatiently. + +"Well?" repeated Uncle Sylvester vaguely. "Oh, that's all. I only +wanted to explain what I meant by saying I had ridden in my sleep." + +"But," said Cousin Jane, leaning across the table with grim +deliberation and emphasizing each word with the handle of her +knife, "how--did--you--and--that--mule get down?" + +"Oh, with slings and ropes, you know--so," demonstrating by placing +his napkin-ring in a sling made of his napkin. + +"And I suppose you carried the slings and ropes with you in your +five trunks!" gasped Cousin Jane. + +"No. Fellows on the river brought 'em in the morning. Mighty spry +chaps, those river miners." + +"Very!" said Cousin Jane. + +Breakfast over, they were not surprised that their sybaritic guest +excused himself from an inspection of the town in the frigid +morning air, and declined joining a skating party to the lake +on the ground that he could keep warmer indoors with half the +exertion. An hour later found him standing before the fire in +Gabriel Lane's study, looking languidly down on his elder brother. + +"Then, as far as I can see," he said quietly, "you have made ducks +and drakes of your share of the property, and that virtually you +are in the hands of this man Gunn and his father." + +"You're putting it too strongly," said Gabriel deprecatingly. "In +the first place, my investments with Gunn's firm are by no means +failures, and they only hold as security a mortgage on the forest +land below the hill. It's scarcely worth the money. I would have +sold it long ago, but it had been a fancy of father's to keep it +wild land for the sake of old times and the healthiness of the +town." + +"There used to be a log cabin there, where the old man had a habit +of camping out whenever he felt cramped by civilization up here, +wasn't there?" said Uncle Sylvester meditatively. + +"Yes," said Gabriel impatiently; "it's still there--but to return +to Mr. Gunn. He has taken a fancy to Kitty, and even if I could +not lift the mortgage, there's some possibility that the land would +still remain in the family." + +"I think I'll drive over this afternoon and take a look at the old +shanty if this infernal weather lets up." + +"Yes; but just now, my dear Sylvester, let us attend to business. +I want to show you those investments." + +"Oh, certainly; trot 'em out," said his brother, plucking up a +simulation of interest as he took a seat at the table. + +From a drawer of his desk Gabriel brought out a bundle of +prospectuses and laid them before Uncle Sylvester. + +A languid smile of recognition lit up the latter's face. "Ah! +yes," he said, glancing at them. "The old lot: 'Carmelita,' 'Santa +Maria,' and 'Preciosa!' Just as I imagined--and yet who'd have +thought of seeing them HERE! A good deal rouged and powdered, Miss +Carmelita, since I first knew you! Considerably bolstered up by +miraculous testimony to your powers, my dear Santa Maria, since +the day I found you out, to my cost! And you too, Preciosa!--a +precious lot of money I dropped on you in the old days!" + +"You are joking," said Gabriel, with an uneasy smile. "You don't +mean to imply that this stock is old and worthless?" + +"There isn't a capital in America or Europe where for the last five +years it hasn't been floated with a new character each time. My +dear Gabriel, that stock isn't worth the paper it is printed on." + +"But it is impossible that an experienced financier like Gunn could +be deceived!" + +"I'm sorry to hear THAT." + +"Come, Sylvester! confess you've taken a prejudice against Gunn +from your sudden dislike of his son! And what have you against +him?" + +"I couldn't say exactly," said Uncle Sylvester reflectively. "It +may be his eyes, or only his cravat! But," rising cheerfully and +placing his hand lightly on his brother's shoulder, "don't YOU +worry yourself about that stock, old man; I'LL see that somebody +else has the worry and you the cash. And as to the land and-- +Kitty--well, you hold on to them both until you find out which the +young man is really after." + +"And then?" said Gabriel, with a smile. + +"Don't give him either! But, I say, haven't we had enough business +this morning? Let's talk of something else. Who's the French +girl?" + +"Marie? She's the daughter of Jules du Page--don't you remember?-- +father's friend. When Jules died, it was always thought that +father, who had half adopted her as a child, would leave her some +legacy. But you know that father died without making a will, and +that--rich as he was--his actual assets were far less than we had +reason to expect. Kitty, who felt the disappointment as keenly as +her friend, I believe would have divided her own share with her. +It's odd, by the way, that father could have been so deceived in +the amount of his capital, or how he got rid of his money in a way +that we knew nothing of. Do you know, Sylvester, I've sometimes +suspected"-- + +"What?" said Uncle Sylvester suddenly. + +The bored languor of his face had abruptly vanished. Every muscle +was alert; his gray eyes glittered. + +"That he advanced money to Du Page, who lost it, or that they +speculated together," returned Gabriel, who, following Uncle +Sylvester's voice only, had not noticed the change of expression. + +"That would seem to be a weakness of the Lane family," said Uncle +Sylvester grimly, with a return of his former carelessness. "But +that is not YOUR own opinion--that's a suggestion of some one +else?" + +"Well," said Gabriel, with a laugh and a slight addition of color, +"it WAS Gunn's theory. As a man of the world and a practical +financier, you know." + +"And you've talked with HIM about it?" + +"Yes. It was a matter of general wonder years ago." + +"Very likely--but, just now, don't you think we've had enough +financial talk?" said Uncle Sylvester, with a bored contraction of +his eyebrows. "Come," looking around the room, "you've changed the +interior of the old house." + +"Yes. Unfortunately, just after father's death it was put in the +hands of a local architect or builder, one of father's old friends, +but not a very skillful workman, who made changes while the family +were away. That's why your present bedroom, which was father's old +study, had a slice taken off it to make the corridor larger, and +why the big chimney and hearthstone are still there, although the +fireplace is modernized. That was Flint's stupidity." + +"Whose stupidity?" asked Uncle Sylvester, trimming his nails. + +"Flint's--the old architect." + +"Why didn't you make him change it back again?" + +"He left Lakeville shortly after, and I brought an architect from +St. Louis after I returned from Europe. But nothing could be done +to your room without taking down the chimney, so it remained as +Flint left it." + +"That reminds me, Gabriel, I'm afraid I spoke rather cavalierly to +Kitty, last night, about the arrangements of the room. The fact +is, I've taken a fancy to it, and should like to fit it up myself. +Have I your permission?" + +"Certainly, my dear Sylvester." + +"I've some knickknacks in my trunks, and I'll do it at once." + +"As you like." + +"And you'll see that I am not disturbed; and you'll explain it to +Kitty, with my apologies?" + +"Yes." + +"Then I'm off." + +Gabriel glanced at his brother with a perplexed smile. Here was +the bored traveler, explorer, gold-seeker, soldier of fortune, +actually as pleased as a girl over the prospect of arranging his +room! He called after him, "Sylvester!" + +"Yes." + +"I say, if you could, you know, just try to interest these people +to-night with some of your adventures--something told SERIOUSLY, +you know, as if you really were in earnest--I'd be awfully obliged +to you. The fact is,--you'll excuse me,--but they think you don't +come up to your reputation." + +"They want a story?" + +"Yes,--one of your experiences." + +"I'll give them one. Ta-ta!" + +For the rest of the day Uncle Sylvester was invisible, although his +active presence in his room was betrayed by the sound of hammering +and moving of furniture. As the remainder of the party were +skating on the lake, this eccentricity was not remarked except by +one,--Marie du Page,--who on pretense of a slight cold had stayed +at home. But with her suspicions of the former night, she had +determined to watch the singular relative of her friend. Added +to a natural loyalty to the Lanes, she was moved by a certain +curiosity and fascination towards this incomprehensible man. + +The house was very quiet when she stole out of her room and passed +softly along the corridor; she examined the wall carefully to +discover anything that might have excited the visitor's attention. +There were a few large engravings hanging there; could he have +designed to replace them by some others? Suddenly she was struck +with the distinct conviction that the wall of the corridor did not +coincide with the wall of his room as represented by the line of +the door. There was certainly a space between the two walls +unaccounted for. This was undoubtedly what had attracted HIS +attention; but what BUSINESS was it of his? + +She reflected that she had seen in the wall of the conservatory an +old closed staircase, now used as shelves for dried herbs and +seeds, which she had been told was the old-time communication +between the garden and Grandfather Lane's study,--the room now +occupied by the stranger. Perhaps it led still farther, and thus +accounted for the space. Determined to satisfy herself, she +noiselessly descended to the conservatory. There, surely, was the +staircase,--a narrow flight of wooden steps encumbered with +packages of herbs,--losing itself in upper darkness. By the aid of +a candle she managed to grope and pick her way up step by step. +Then she paused. The staircase had abruptly ended on the level of +the study, now cut off from it by the new partition. She was in a +stifling inclosure, formed by the walls, scarcely eighteen inches +wide. It was made narrower by a singular excrescence on the old +wall, which seemed to have been a bricked closet, now half +destroyed and in ruins. She turned to descend, when a strange +sound from Uncle Sylvester's room struck her ear. It was the sound +of tapping on the floor close to the partition, within a foot of +where she was standing. At the same moment there was a decided +movement of the plank of the flooring beneath the partition: it +began to slide slowly, and then was gradually withdrawn into the +room. With prompt presence of mind, she instantly extinguished her +candle and drew herself breathlessly against the partition. + +When the plank was entirely withdrawn, a ray of light slipped +through the opening, revealing the bare rafters of the floor, and a +hand and arm inserted under the partition, groping as if towards +the bricked closet. As the fingers of the exploring hand were +widely extended, Marie had no difficulty in recognizing on one of +them a peculiar signet ring which Uncle Sylvester wore. A swift +impulse seized her. To the audacious Marie impulse and action were +the same thing. Bending stealthily over the aperture, she suddenly +snatched the ring from the extended finger. The hand was quickly +withdrawn with a start and uncontrolled exclamation, and she +availed herself of that instant to glide rapidly down the stairs. + +She regained her room stealthily, having the satisfaction a moment +later of hearing Uncle Sylvester's door open and the sound of his +footsteps in the corridor. But he was evidently unable to discover +any outer ingress to the inclosure, or believed the loss of his +ring an accident, for he presently returned. Meantime, what was +she to do? + +Tell Kitty of her discovery, and show the ring? No--not yet! +Oddly enough, now that she had the ring, taken from his wicked +finger in the very act, she found it as difficult as ever to +believe in his burglarious design. She must wait. The mischief-- +if there had been mischief--was done; the breaking in of the +bricked closet was, from the appearance of the ruins, a bygone act. +Could it have been some youthful escapade of Uncle Sylvester's, the +scene of which he was revisiting as criminals are compelled to do? +And had there been anything taken from the closet--or was its +destruction a part of the changes in the old house? How could she +find out without asking Kitty? There was one way. She remembered +that Mr. Gunn had once shown a great deal of interest to Kitty +about the old homestead, and even of old Mr. Lane's woodland cabin. +She would ask HIM. It was a friendly act, for Kitty had not of +late been very kind to him. + +The opportunity presented itself at dusk, as Mr. Gunn, somewhat +abstracted, stood apart at the drawing-room window. Marie hoped +he had enjoyed himself while skating; her stupid cold had kept her +indoors. She had amused herself rambling about the old homestead; +it was such a queer place, so full of old nooks and corners and +unaccountable spaces. Just the place, she would think, where old +treasures might have been stored. Eh? + +Mr. Gunn had not spoken--he had only coughed. But in the darkness +his eyes were fixed angrily on her face. Without observing it, she +went on. She knew he was interested in the old house; she had +heard him talk to Kitty about it: had Kitty ever said anything +about some old secret hoarding place? + +No, certainly not! And she was mistaken, he never was interested +in the house! He could not understand what had put that idea in +her head! Unless it was this ridiculous, shady stranger in the +guise of an uncle whom they had got there. It was like his +affectation! + +"Oh, dear, no," said Marie, with unmistakable truthfulness, "HE did +not say anything. But," with sudden inconsistent aggression, "is +THAT the way you speak to Kitty of her uncle?" + +Really he didn't know--he was joking only, and he was afraid he +must just now ask her to excuse him. He had received letters that +made it possible that he might be called suddenly to New York at +any moment. Marie stared. It was evident that he had proposed to +Kitty and been rejected! But she was no nearer her discovery. + +Nor was there the least revelation in the calm, half-bored, +yet good-humored presence of the wicked uncle at dinner. So +indifferent did he seem, not only to his own villainy but even to +the loss it had entailed, that she had a wild impulse to take the +ring from her pocket and display it on her own finger before him +then and there. But the conviction that he would in some way be +equal to the occasion prevented her. The dinner passed off with +some constraint, no doubt emanating from the conscious Kitty and +Gunn. Nevertheless, when they had returned to the drawing-room, +Gabriel rubbed his hands expectantly. + +"I prevailed on Sylvester this morning to promise to tell us some +of his experiences--something COMPLETE and satisfactory this time. +Eh?" + +Uncle Sylvester, warming his cold blood before the fire, looked +momentarily forgetful and--disappointing. Cousins Jane and Emma +shrugged their shoulders. + +"Eh," said Uncle Sylvester absently, "er--er--oh yes! Well" (more +cheerfully), "about what, eh?" + +"Let it be," said Marie pointedly, fixing her black magnetic eyes +on the wicked stranger, "let it be something about the DISCOVERY of +gold, or a buried TREASURE HOARD, or a robbery." + +To her intense disgust Uncle Sylvester, far from being discomfited +or confused, actually looked pleased, and his gray eyes thawed +slightly. + +"Certainly," he said. "Well, then! Down on the San Joaquin River +there was an old chap--one of the earliest settlers--in fact, he'd +come on from Oregon before the gold discovery. His name, dear +me!"--continued Uncle Sylvester, with an effort of memory and +apparently beginning already to lose his interest in the story-- +"was--er--Flint." + +As Uncle Sylvester paused here, Cousin Jane broke in impatiently. +"Well, that's not an uncommon name. There was an old carpenter +here in your father's time who was called Flint." + +"Yes," said Uncle Sylvester languidly. "But there is, or was, +something uncommon about it--and that's the point of the story, for +in the old time Flint and Gunn were of the same stock." + +"Is this a Californian joke?" said Gunn, with a forced smile on his +flushed face. "If so, spare me, for it's an old one." + +"It's much older HISTORY, Mr. Gunn," said Uncle Sylvester blandly, +"which I remember from a boy. When the first Flint traded near +Sault Sainte Marie, the Canadian voyageurs literally translated his +name into Pierre a Fusil, and he went by that name always. But +when the English superseded the French in numbers and language the +name was literally translated back again into 'Peter Gunn,' which +his descendants bear." + +"A labored form of the old joke," said Gunn, turning contemptuously +away. + +"But the story," said Cousins Jane and Emma. "The story of the +gold discovery--never mind the names." + +"Excuse me," said Uncle Sylvester, placing his hand in the breast +of his coat with a delightful exaggeration of offended dignity. +"But, doubts having been cast upon my preliminary statement, I fear +I must decline proceeding further." Nevertheless, he smiled +unblushingly at Miss Du Page as he followed Gunn from the room. + +The next morning those who had noticed the strained relations of +Miss Kitty and Mr. Gunn were not surprised that the latter was +recalled on pressing business to New York by the first train; but +it was a matter of some astonishment to Gabriel Lane and Marie du +Page that Uncle Sylvester should have been up early, and actually +accompanied that gentleman as far as the station! Indeed, the +languid explorer and gold-seeker exhibited remarkable activity, +and, clad in a rough tourist suit, announced, over the breakfast- +table, his intention of taking a long tramp through the woods, +which he had not revisited since a boy. To this end he had even +provided himself with a small knapsack, and for once realized +Kitty's ideal of his character. + +"Don't go too far," said Gabriel, "for, although the cold has +moderated, the barometer is falling fast, and there is every +appearance of snow. Take care you are not caught in one of our +blizzards." + +"But YOU are all going on the lake to skate!" protested Uncle +Sylvester. + +"Yes; for the very reason that it may be our last chance; but +should it snow we shall be nearer home than you may be." + +Nevertheless, when it came on to snow, as Gabriel had predicted, +the skating party was by no means so near home as he had imagined. +A shrewd keenness and some stimulating electric condition of the +atmosphere had tempted the young people far out on the lake, and +they had ignored the first fall of fine grayish granulations that +swept along the icy surface like little puffs of dust or smoke. +Then the fall grew thicker, the gray sky contracted, the hurrying +flakes, dashed against them by a fierce northwester, were larger, +heavier, and seemed an almost palpable force that held them back. +Their skates, already clogged with drift, were beginning to be +useless. The bare wind-swept spaces were becoming rarer; they +could only stumble on blindly towards the nearest shore. Nor when +they reached it were they yet safe; they could scarcely stand +against the still increasing storm that was fast obliterating the +banks and stretch of meadow beyond. Their only hope of shelter was +the range of woods that joined the hill. Holding hands in single +file, the little party, consisting of Kitty, Marie, and Cousins +Jane and Emma--stout-hearted Gabriel leading and Cousin John +bringing up the rear--at last succeeded in reaching it, and were +rejoiced to find themselves near old Lane's half-ruined cabin. To +their added joy and astonishment, whiffs of whirling smoke were +issuing from the crumbling chimney. They ran to the crazy door, +pushed aside its weak fastening, and found--Uncle Sylvester calmly +enjoying a pipe before a blazing fire. A small pickaxe and crowbar +were lying upon a mound of freshly turned earth beside the chimney, +where the rotten flooring had been torn up. + +The tumultuous entrance of the skating party required no explanation; +but when congratulations had been exchanged, the wet snow shaken +off, and they had drawn round the fire, curious eyes were cast upon +the solitary occupant and the pile of earth and debris before him. + +"I believe," said Gabriel laughingly, "that you have been so bored +here that you have actually played at gold-hunting for amusement." + +Uncle Sylvester took the pipe from his mouth and nodded. + +"It's a common diversion of yours," said Marie audaciously. + +Uncle Sylvester smiled sweetly. + +"And have you been successful THIS TIME?" asked Marie. + +"I got the color." + +"Eh?" + +Uncle Sylvester rose and placed himself with his back to the fire, +gently surveying the assembled group. + +"I was interrupted in a story of gold-digging last evening," he +said blandly. "How far had I got?" + +"You were down on the San Joaquin River in the spring of '50, with +a chap named Flint," chorused Cousins Jane and Emma promptly. + +"Ah! yes," said Uncle Sylvester. "Well, in those days there was a +scarcity of money in the diggings. Gold dust there was in plenty, +but no COIN. You can fancy it was a bother to weigh out a pinch of +dust every time you wanted a drink of whiskey or a pound of flour; +but there was no other legal tender. Pretty soon, however, a lot +of gold and silver pieces found their way into circulation in our +camp and the camps around us. They were foreign--old French and +English coins. Here's one of them that I kept." He took from his +pocket a gold coin and handed it to Gabriel. + +Lane rose to his feet with an exclamation: + +"Why, this is like the louis-d'or that grandfather saved through +the war and gave to father." + +Uncle Sylvester took the coin back, placed it in his left eye, like +a monocle, and winked gravely at the company. + +"It is the SAME!" he went on quietly. "I was interested, for I had +a good memory, and I remembered that, as a boy, grandfather had +shown me one of those coins and told me he was keeping them for old +Jules du Page, who didn't believe in banks and bank-notes. Well, I +traced them to a trader called Flint, who was shipping gold dust +from Stockton to Peter Gunn & Sons, in New York." + +"To whom?" asked Gabriel quickly. + +"Old Gunn--the father of your friend!" said Uncle Sylvester +blandly. "We talked the matter over on our way to the station this +morning. Well, to return. Flint only said that he had got them +from a man called Thompson, who had got them from somebody else in +exchange for goods. A year or two afterwards this same Thompson +happened to be frozen up with me in Starvation Camp. When he +thought he was dying he confessed that he had been bribed by Flint +to say what he had said, but that he believed the coins were +stolen. Meantime, Flint had disappeared. Other things claimed my +attention. I had quite forgotten him, until one night, five years +afterwards, I blundered into a deserted mining-camp, by falling +asleep on my mule, who carried me across a broken flume, but--I +think I told you that story already." + +"You never finished it," said Cousin Jane sharply. + +"Let me do so now, then. I was really saved by some Indians, who +took me for a spirit up aloft there in the moonlight and spread the +alarm. The first white man they brought me was a wretched drunkard +known to the boys as 'Old Fusil,' or 'Fusel Oil,' who went into +delirium tremens at the sight of me. Well, who do you suppose he +turned out to be? Flint! Flint played out and ruined! Cast off +and discarded by his relations in New York--the foundation of whose +fortunes he had laid by the villainy they had accepted and condoned. +For Flint, as the carpenter of the old homestead, had discovered the +existence of a bricked closet in the wall of father's study, +partitioned it off so that he could break into it without detection +and rifle it at his leisure, and who had thus carried off that part +of grandfather's hoard which father had concealed there. He knew it +could never be missed by the descendants. But, through haste or +ignorance, he DID NOT TOUCH THE PAPERS and documents also hidden +there. And THEY told of the existence of grandfather's second +cache, or hiding-place, beneath this hearth, and were left for me to +discover." + +He coolly relit his pipe, fixed his eyes on Marie without +apparently paying attention to the breathless scrutiny of the +others, and went on: "Flint, alias Pierre a Fusil, alias Gunn, died +a maniac. I resolved to test the truth of his story. I came here. +I knew the old homestead, as a boy who had wandered over every part +of it, far better than you, Gabriel, or any one. The elder Gunn +had only heard of it through the criminal disclosure of his +relative, and only wished to absorb it through his son in time, and +thus obliterate all trace of Flint's outrage. I recognized the +room perfectly--thanks to our dear Kitty, who had taken up the +carpet, which thus disclosed the loose plank before the closet that +was hidden by the partition. Under pretext of rearranging the +room--for which Kitty will forgive me--I spent the day behind a +locked door, making my way through the partition. There I found +the rifled closet, but the papers intact. They contained a full +description of the sum taken by Flint, and also of a larger sum +buried in a cask beside this chimney. I had just finished +unearthing it a few moments before you came. I had at first hoped +to offer it to the family as a Christmas gift to-morrow, but"-- He +stopped and sucked slowly at his pipe. + +"We anticipated you," said Gabriel laughing. + +"No," said Uncle Sylvester coolly. "But because it don't happen to +belong to YOU at all! According to the paper I have in my pocket, +which is about as legal a document as I ever saw, it is father's +free gift to Miss Marie du Page." + +Kitty threw her arms around her white and breathless friend with +a joyful cry, and honest Gabriel's face shone with unselfish +gratification. + +"For yourself, my dear Gabriel, you must be satisfied with the fact +that Messrs. Peter Gunn & Sons will take back your wildcat stock at +the price you paid for it. It is the price they pay for their +share in this little transaction, as I had the honor of pointing +out to Mr. Gunn on our way to the station this morning." + +"Then you think that young Mr. Gunn knew that Flint was his +relation, and that he had stolen father's money," said Kitty, "and +that Mr. Gunn only wanted to"-- She stopped, with flashing eyes. + +"I think he would have liked to have made an arrangement, my dear, +that would keep the secret and the property in the family," said +Uncle Sylvester. "But I don't think he suspected the existence of +the second treasure here." + +"And then, sir," said Cousin Jane, "it appears that all these +wretched, unsatisfactory scraps of stories you were telling us were +nothing after all but"-- + +"My way of telling THIS one," said Uncle Sylvester. + +As the others were eagerly gathering around the unearthed treasure, +Marie approached him timidly, all her audacity gone, tears in her +eyes, and his ring held hesitatingly between her fingers. "How can +I thank you--and how CAN you ever forgive me?" + +"Well," said Uncle Sylvester, gazing at her critically, "you might +keep the ring to think over it." + + + + +End of this Project Gutenberg etext of Sally Dows. diff --git a/old/sally10.zip b/old/sally10.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..410bedb --- /dev/null +++ b/old/sally10.zip |