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Chesnutt +</TITLE> + +<STYLE TYPE="text/css"> +BODY { color: Black; + background: White; + margin-right: 10%; + margin-left: 10%; + font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; + text-align: justify } + +P {text-indent: 4% } + +P.noindent {text-indent: 0% } + +P.poem {text-indent: 0%; + margin-left: 10%; + font-size: small } + +P.letter {text-indent: 0%; + font-size: small ; + margin-left: 10% ; + margin-right: 10% } + +P.finis { text-align: center ; + text-indent: 0% ; + margin-left: 0% ; + margin-right: 0% } + +</STYLE> + +</HEAD> + +<BODY> + + +<pre> + +Project Gutenberg's The House Behind the Cedars, by Charles W. Chesnutt + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The House Behind the Cedars + +Author: Charles W. Chesnutt + +Posting Date: October 9, 2008 [EBook #472] +Release Date: March, 1996 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE HOUSE BEHIND THE CEDARS *** + + + + +Produced by Charles Keller. HTML version by Al Haines. + + + + + +</pre> + + +<BR><BR> + +<H1 ALIGN="center"> +THE HOUSE BEHIND THE CEDARS +</H1> + +<BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +BY +</H3> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +CHARLES W. CHESNUTT +</H2> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +CONTENTS +</H2> + +<TABLE ALIGN="center" WIDTH="80%"> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">I </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap01">A STRANGER FROM SOUTH CAROLINA</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">II </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap02">AN EVENING VISIT</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">III </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap03">THE OLD JUDGE</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">IV </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap04">DOWN THE RIVER</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">V </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap05">THE TOURNAMENT</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VI </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap06">THE QUEEN OF LOVE AND BEAUTY</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap07">'MID NEW SURROUNDINGS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VIII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap08">THE COURTSHIP</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">IX </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap09">DOUBTS AND FEARS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">X </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap10">THE DREAM</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XI </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap11">A LETTER AND A JOURNEY</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap12">TRYON GOES TO PATESVILLE</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XIII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap13">AN INJUDICIOUS PAYMENT</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XIV </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap14">A LOYAL FRIEND</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XV </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap15">MINE OWN PEOPLE</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XVI </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap16">THE BOTTOM FALLS OUT</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XVII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap17">TWO LETTERS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XVIII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap18">UNDER THE OLD REGIME</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XIX </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap19">GOD MADE US ALL</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XX </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap20">DIGGING UP ROOTS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXI </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap21">A GILDED OPPORTUNITY</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap22">IMPERATIVE BUSINESS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXIII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap23">THE GUEST OF HONOR</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXIV </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap24">SWING YOUR PARTNERS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXV </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap25">BALANCE ALL</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXVI </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap26">THE SCHOOLHOUSE IN THE WOODS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXVII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap27">AN INTERESTING ACQUAINTANCE</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXVIII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap28">THE LOST KNIFE</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXIX </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap29">PLATO EARNS HALF A DOLLAR</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXX </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap30">AN UNUSUAL HONOR</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXXI </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap31">IN DEEP WATERS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXXII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap32">THE POWER OF LOVE</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXXIII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap33">A MULE AND A CART</A></TD> +</TR> + +</TABLE> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap01"></A> +<H1 ALIGN="center"> +THE HOUSE BEHIND THE CEDARS +</H1> + +<BR><BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +I +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +A STRANGER FROM SOUTH CAROLINA +</H3> + +<P> +Time touches all things with destroying hand; and if he seem now and +then to bestow the bloom of youth, the sap of spring, it is but a brief +mockery, to be surely and swiftly followed by the wrinkles of old age, +the dry leaves and bare branches of winter. And yet there are places +where Time seems to linger lovingly long after youth has departed, and +to which he seems loath to bring the evil day. Who has not known some +even-tempered old man or woman who seemed to have drunk of the fountain +of youth? Who has not seen somewhere an old town that, having long +since ceased to grow, yet held its own without perceptible decline? +</P> + +<P> +Some such trite reflection—as apposite to the subject as most random +reflections are—passed through the mind of a young man who came out of +the front door of the Patesville Hotel about nine o'clock one fine +morning in spring, a few years after the Civil War, and started down +Front Street toward the market-house. Arriving at the town late the +previous evening, he had been driven up from the steamboat in a +carriage, from which he had been able to distinguish only the shadowy +outlines of the houses along the street; so that this morning walk was +his first opportunity to see the town by daylight. He was dressed in a +suit of linen duck—the day was warm—a panama straw hat, and patent +leather shoes. In appearance he was tall, dark, with straight, black, +lustrous hair, and very clean-cut, high-bred features. When he paused +by the clerk's desk on his way out, to light his cigar, the day clerk, +who had just come on duty, glanced at the register and read the last +entry:— +</P> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> + "'JOHN WARWICK, CLARENCE, SOUTH CAROLINA.'<BR> +</H4> + +<BR> + +<P> +"One of the South Ca'lina bigbugs, I reckon—probably in cotton, or +turpentine." The gentleman from South Carolina, walking down the +street, glanced about him with an eager look, in which curiosity and +affection were mingled with a touch of bitterness. He saw little that +was not familiar, or that he had not seen in his dreams a hundred times +during the past ten years. There had been some changes, it is true, +some melancholy changes, but scarcely anything by way of addition or +improvement to counterbalance them. Here and there blackened and +dismantled walls marked the place where handsome buildings once had +stood, for Sherman's march to the sea had left its mark upon the town. +The stores were mostly of brick, two stories high, joining one another +after the manner of cities. Some of the names on the signs were +familiar; others, including a number of Jewish names, were quite +unknown to him. +</P> + +<P> +A two minutes' walk brought Warwick—the name he had registered under, +and as we shall call him—to the market-house, the central feature of +Patesville, from both the commercial and the picturesque points of +view. Standing foursquare in the heart of the town, at the +intersection of the two main streets, a "jog" at each street corner +left around the market-house a little public square, which at this hour +was well occupied by carts and wagons from the country and empty drays +awaiting hire. Warwick was unable to perceive much change in the +market-house. Perhaps the surface of the red brick, long unpainted, +had scaled off a little more here and there. There might have been a +slight accretion of the moss and lichen on the shingled roof. But the +tall tower, with its four-faced clock, rose as majestically and +uncompromisingly as though the land had never been subjugated. Was it +so irreconcilable, Warwick wondered, as still to peal out the curfew +bell, which at nine o'clock at night had clamorously warned all +negroes, slave or free, that it was unlawful for them to be abroad +after that hour, under penalty of imprisonment or whipping? Was the +old constable, whose chief business it had been to ring the bell, still +alive and exercising the functions of his office, and had age lessened +or increased the number of times that obliging citizens performed this +duty for him during his temporary absences in the company of convivial +spirits? A few moments later, Warwick saw a colored policeman in the +old constable's place—a stronger reminder than even the burned +buildings that war had left its mark upon the old town, with which Time +had dealt so tenderly. +</P> + +<P> +The lower story of the market-house was open on all four of its sides +to the public square. Warwick passed through one of the wide brick +arches and traversed the building with a leisurely step. He looked in +vain into the stalls for the butcher who had sold fresh meat twice a +week, on market days, and he felt a genuine thrill of pleasure when he +recognized the red bandana turban of old Aunt Lyddy, the ancient negro +woman who had sold him gingerbread and fried fish, and told him weird +tales of witchcraft and conjuration, in the old days when, as an idle +boy, he had loafed about the market-house. He did not speak to her, +however, or give her any sign of recognition. He threw a glance toward +a certain corner where steps led to the town hall above. On this +stairway he had once seen a manacled free negro shot while being taken +upstairs for examination under a criminal charge. Warwick recalled +vividly how the shot had rung out. He could see again the livid look +of terror on the victim's face, the gathering crowd, the resulting +confusion. The murderer, he recalled, had been tried and sentenced to +imprisonment for life, but was pardoned by a merciful governor after +serving a year of his sentence. As Warwick was neither a prophet nor +the son of a prophet, he could not foresee that, thirty years later, +even this would seem an excessive punishment for so slight a +misdemeanor. +</P> + +<P> +Leaving the market-house, Warwick turned to the left, and kept on his +course until he reached the next corner. After another turn to the +right, a dozen paces brought him in front of a small weather-beaten +frame building, from which projected a wooden sign-board bearing the +inscription:— +</P> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> + ARCHIBALD STRAIGHT,<BR> + LAWYER.<BR> +</H4> + +<P> +He turned the knob, but the door was locked. Retracing his steps past a +vacant lot, the young man entered a shop where a colored man was +employed in varnishing a coffin, which stood on two trestles in the +middle of the floor. Not at all impressed by the melancholy +suggestiveness of his task, he was whistling a lively air with great +gusto. Upon Warwick's entrance this effusion came to a sudden end, and +the coffin-maker assumed an air of professional gravity. +</P> + +<P> +"Good-mawnin', suh," he said, lifting his cap politely. +</P> + +<P> +"Good-morning," answered Warwick. "Can you tell me anything about +Judge Straight's office hours?" +</P> + +<P> +"De ole jedge has be'n a little onreg'lar sence de wah, suh; but he +gin'ally gits roun' 'bout ten o'clock er so. He's be'n kin' er feeble +fer de las' few yeahs. An' I reckon," continued the undertaker +solemnly, his glance unconsciously seeking a row of fine caskets +standing against the wall,—"I reckon he'll soon be goin' de way er all +de earth. 'Man dat is bawn er 'oman hath but a sho't time ter lib, an' +is full er mis'ry. He cometh up an' is cut down lack as a flower.' +'De days er his life is three-sco' an' ten'—an' de ole jedge is libbed +mo' d'n dat, suh, by five yeahs, ter say de leas'." +</P> + +<P> +"'Death,'" quoted Warwick, with whose mood the undertaker's remarks +were in tune, "'is the penalty that all must pay for the crime of +living.'" +</P> + +<P> +"Dat 's a fac', suh, dat 's a fac'; so dey mus'—so dey mus'. An' den +all de dead has ter be buried. An' we does ou' sheer of it, suh, we +does ou' sheer. We conduc's de obs'quies er all de bes' w'ite folks er +de town, suh." +</P> + +<P> +Warwick left the undertaker's shop and retraced his steps until he had +passed the lawyer's office, toward which he threw an affectionate +glance. A few rods farther led him past the old black Presbyterian +church, with its square tower, embowered in a stately grove; past the +Catholic church, with its many crosses, and a painted wooden figure of +St. James in a recess beneath the gable; and past the old Jefferson +House, once the leading hotel of the town, in front of which political +meetings had been held, and political speeches made, and political hard +cider drunk, in the days of "Tippecanoe and Tyler too." +</P> + +<P> +The street down which Warwick had come intersected Front Street at a +sharp angle in front of the old hotel, forming a sort of flatiron block +at the junction, known as Liberty Point,—perhaps because slave +auctions were sometimes held there in the good old days. Just before +Warwick reached Liberty Point, a young woman came down Front Street +from the direction of the market-house. When their paths converged, +Warwick kept on down Front Street behind her, it having been already +his intention to walk in this direction. +</P> + +<P> +Warwick's first glance had revealed the fact that the young woman was +strikingly handsome, with a stately beauty seldom encountered. As he +walked along behind her at a measured distance, he could not help +noting the details that made up this pleasing impression, for his mind +was singularly alive to beauty, in whatever embodiment. The girl's +figure, he perceived, was admirably proportioned; she was evidently at +the period when the angles of childhood were rounding into the +promising curves of adolescence. Her abundant hair, of a dark and +glossy brown, was neatly plaited and coiled above an ivory column that +rose straight from a pair of gently sloping shoulders, clearly outlined +beneath the light muslin frock that covered them. He could see that +she was tastefully, though not richly, dressed, and that she walked +with an elastic step that revealed a light heart and the vigor of +perfect health. Her face, of course, he could not analyze, since he +had caught only the one brief but convincing glimpse of it. +</P> + +<P> +The young woman kept on down Front Street, Warwick maintaining his +distance a few rods behind her. They passed a factory, a warehouse or +two, and then, leaving the brick pavement, walked along on mother +earth, under a leafy arcade of spreading oaks and elms. Their way led +now through a residential portion of the town, which, as they advanced, +gradually declined from staid respectability to poverty, open and +unabashed. Warwick observed, as they passed through the respectable +quarter, that few people who met the girl greeted her, and that some +others whom she passed at gates or doorways gave her no sign of +recognition; from which he inferred that she was possibly a visitor in +the town and not well acquainted. +</P> + +<P> +Their walk had continued not more than ten minutes when they crossed a +creek by a wooden bridge and came to a row of mean houses standing +flush with the street. At the door of one, an old black woman had +stooped to lift a large basket, piled high with laundered clothes. The +girl, as she passed, seized one end of the basket and helped the old +woman to raise it to her head, where it rested solidly on the cushion +of her head-kerchief. During this interlude, Warwick, though he had +slackened his pace measurably, had so nearly closed the gap between +himself and them as to hear the old woman say, with the dulcet negro +intonation:— +</P> + +<P> +"T'anky', honey; de Lawd gwine bless you sho'. You wuz alluz a good +gal, and de Lawd love eve'ybody w'at he'p de po' ole nigger. You gwine +ter hab good luck all yo' bawn days." +</P> + +<P> +"I hope you're a true prophet, Aunt Zilphy," laughed the girl in +response. +</P> + +<P> +The sound of her voice gave Warwick a thrill. It was soft and sweet and +clear—quite in harmony with her appearance. That it had a faint +suggestiveness of the old woman's accent he hardly noticed, for the +current Southern speech, including his own, was rarely without a touch +of it. The corruption of the white people's speech was one +element—only one—of the negro's unconscious revenge for his own +debasement. +</P> + +<P> +The houses they passed now grew scattering, and the quarter of the town +more neglected. Warwick felt himself wondering where the girl might be +going in a neighborhood so uninviting. When she stopped to pull a +half-naked negro child out of a mudhole and set him upon his feet, he +thought she might be some young lady from the upper part of the town, +bound on some errand of mercy, or going, perhaps, to visit an old +servant or look for a new one. Once she threw a backward glance at +Warwick, thus enabling him to catch a second glimpse of a singularly +pretty face. Perhaps the young woman found his presence in the +neighborhood as unaccountable as he had deemed hers; for, finding his +glance fixed upon her, she quickened her pace with an air of startled +timidity. +</P> + +<P> +"A woman with such a figure," thought Warwick, "ought to be able to +face the world with the confidence of Phryne confronting her judges." +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +By this time Warwick was conscious that something more than mere grace +or beauty had attracted him with increasing force toward this young +woman. A suggestion, at first faint and elusive, of something +familiar, had grown stronger when he heard her voice, and became more +and more pronounced with each rod of their advance; and when she +stopped finally before a gate, and, opening it, went into a yard shut +off from the street by a row of dwarf cedars, Warwick had already +discounted in some measure the surprise he would have felt at seeing +her enter there had he not walked down Front Street behind her. There +was still sufficient unexpectedness about the act, however, to give him +a decided thrill of pleasure. +</P> + +<P> +"It must be Rena," he murmured. "Who could have dreamed that she would +blossom out like that? It must surely be Rena!" +</P> + +<P> +He walked slowly past the gate and peered through a narrow gap in the +cedar hedge. The girl was moving along a sanded walk, toward a gray, +unpainted house, with a steep roof, broken by dormer windows. The +trace of timidity he had observed in her had given place to the more +assured bearing of one who is upon his own ground. The garden walks +were bordered by long rows of jonquils, pinks, and carnations, +inclosing clumps of fragrant shrubs, lilies, and roses already in +bloom. Toward the middle of the garden stood two fine magnolia-trees, +with heavy, dark green, glistening leaves, while nearer the house two +mighty elms shaded a wide piazza, at one end of which a honeysuckle +vine, and at the other a Virginia creeper, running over a wooden +lattice, furnished additional shade and seclusion. On dark or wintry +days, the aspect of this garden must have been extremely sombre and +depressing, and it might well have seemed a fit place to hide some +guilty or disgraceful secret. But on the bright morning when Warwick +stood looking through the cedars, it seemed, with its green frame and +canopy and its bright carpet of flowers, an ideal retreat from the +fierce sunshine and the sultry heat of the approaching summer. +</P> + +<P> +The girl stooped to pluck a rose, and as she bent over it, her profile +was clearly outlined. She held the flower to her face with a +long-drawn inhalation, then went up the steps, crossed the piazza, +opened the door without knocking, and entered the house with the air of +one thoroughly at home. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," said the young man to himself, "it's Rena, sure enough." +</P> + +<P> +The house stood on a corner, around which the cedar hedge turned, +continuing along the side of the garden until it reached the line of +the front of the house. The piazza to a rear wing, at right angles to +the front of the house, was open to inspection from the side street, +which, to judge from its deserted look, seemed to be but little used. +Turning into this street and walking leisurely past the back yard, +which was only slightly screened from the street by a china-tree, +Warwick perceived the young woman standing on the piazza, facing an +elderly woman, who sat in a large rocking-chair, plying a pair of +knitting-needles on a half-finished stocking. Warwick's walk led him +within three feet of the side gate, which he felt an almost +irresistible impulse to enter. Every detail of the house and garden +was familiar; a thousand cords of memory and affection drew him +thither; but a stronger counter-motive prevailed. With a great effort +he restrained himself, and after a momentary pause, walked slowly on +past the house, with a backward glance, which he turned away when he +saw that it was observed. +</P> + +<P> +Warwick's attention had been so fully absorbed by the house behind the +cedars and the women there, that he had scarcely noticed, on the other +side of the neglected by-street, two men working by a large open +window, in a low, rude building with a clapboarded roof, directly +opposite the back piazza occupied by the two women. Both the men were +busily engaged in shaping barrel-staves, each wielding a sharp-edged +drawing-knife on a piece of seasoned oak clasped tightly in a wooden +vise. +</P> + +<P> +"I jes' wonder who dat man is, an' w'at he 's doin' on dis street," +observed the younger of the two, with a suspicious air. He had noticed +the gentleman's involuntary pause and his interest in the opposite +house, and had stopped work for a moment to watch the stranger as he +went on down the street. +</P> + +<P> +"Nev' min' 'bout dat man," said the elder one. "You 'ten' ter yo' wuk +an' finish dat bairl-stave. You spen's enti'ely too much er yo' time +stretchin' yo' neck atter other people. An' you need n' 'sturb yo'se'f +'bout dem folks 'cross de street, fer dey ain't yo' kin', an' you're +wastin' yo' time both'in' yo' min' wid 'em, er wid folks w'at comes on +de street on account of 'em. Look sha'p now, boy, er you'll git dat +stave trim' too much." +</P> + +<P> +The younger man resumed his work, but still found time to throw a +slanting glance out of the window. The gentleman, he perceived, stood +for a moment on the rotting bridge across the old canal, and then +walked slowly ahead until he turned to the right into Back Street, a +few rods farther on. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap02"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +II +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +AN EVENING VISIT +</H3> + +<P> +Toward evening of the same day, Warwick took his way down Front Street +in the gathering dusk. By the time night had spread its mantle over the +earth, he had reached the gate by which he had seen the girl of his +morning walk enter the cedar-bordered garden. He stopped at the gate +and glanced toward the house, which seemed dark and silent and deserted. +</P> + +<P> +"It's more than likely," he thought, "that they are in the kitchen. I +reckon I'd better try the back door." +</P> + +<P> +But as he drew cautiously near the corner, he saw a man's figure +outlined in the yellow light streaming from the open door of a small +house between Front Street and the cooper shop. Wishing, for reasons +of his own, to avoid observation, Warwick did not turn the corner, but +walked on down Front Street until he reached a point from which he +could see, at a long angle, a ray of light proceeding from the kitchen +window of the house behind the cedars. +</P> + +<P> +"They are there," he muttered with a sigh of relief, for he had feared +they might be away. "I suspect I'll have to go to the front door, +after all. No one can see me through the trees." +</P> + +<P> +He retraced his steps to the front gate, which he essayed to open. +There was apparently some defect in the latch, for it refused to work. +Warwick remembered the trick, and with a slight sense of amusement, +pushed his foot under the gate and gave it a hitch to the left, after +which it opened readily enough. He walked softly up the sanded path, +tiptoed up the steps and across the piazza, and rapped at the front +door, not too loudly, lest this too might attract the attention of the +man across the street. There was no response to his rap. He put his +ear to the door and heard voices within, and the muffled sound of +footsteps. After a moment he rapped again, a little louder than before. +</P> + +<P> +There was an instant cessation of the sounds within. He rapped a third +time, to satisfy any lingering doubt in the minds of those who he felt +sure were listening in some trepidation. A moment later a ray of light +streamed through the keyhole. +</P> + +<P> +"Who's there?" a woman's voice inquired somewhat sharply. +</P> + +<P> +"A gentleman," answered Warwick, not holding it yet time to reveal +himself. "Does Mis' Molly Walden live here?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," was the guarded answer. "I'm Mis' Walden. What's yo'r +business?" +</P> + +<P> +"I have a message to you from your son John." +</P> + +<P> +A key clicked in the lock. The door opened, and the elder of the two +women Warwick had seen upon the piazza stood in the doorway, peering +curiously and with signs of great excitement into the face of the +stranger. +</P> + +<P> +"You 've got a message from my son, you say?" she asked with tremulous +agitation. "Is he sick, or in trouble?" +</P> + +<P> +"No. He's well and doing well, and sends his love to you, and hopes +you've not forgotten him." +</P> + +<P> +"Fergot him? No, God knows I ain't fergot him! But come in, sir, an' +tell me somethin' mo' about him." +</P> + +<P> +Warwick went in, and as the woman closed the door after him, he threw a +glance round the room. On the wall, over the mantelpiece, hung a steel +engraving of General Jackson at the battle of New Orleans, and, on the +opposite wall, a framed fashion-plate from "Godey's Lady's Book." In +the middle of the room an octagonal centre-table with a single leg, +terminating in three sprawling feet, held a collection of curiously +shaped sea-shells. There was a great haircloth sofa, somewhat the worse +for wear, and a well-filled bookcase. The screen standing before the +fireplace was covered with Confederate bank-notes of various +denominations and designs, in which the heads of Jefferson Davis and +other Confederate leaders were conspicuous. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> + "Imperious Caesar, dead, and turned to clay,<BR> + Might stop a hole to keep the wind away,"<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +murmured the young man, as his eye fell upon this specimen of +decorative art. +</P> + +<P> +The woman showed her visitor to a seat. She then sat down facing him +and looked at him closely. "When did you last see my son?" she asked. +</P> + +<P> +"I've never met your son," he replied. +</P> + +<P> +Her face fell. "Then the message comes through you from somebody else?" +</P> + +<P> +"No, directly from your son." +</P> + +<P> +She scanned his face with a puzzled look. This bearded young +gentleman, who spoke so politely and was dressed so well, surely—no, +it could not be! and yet— +</P> + +<P> +Warwick was smiling at her through a mist of tears. An electric spark +of sympathy flashed between them. They rose as if moved by one +impulse, and were clasped in each other's arms. +</P> + +<P> +"John, my John! It IS John!" +</P> + +<P> +"Mother—my dear old mother!" +</P> + +<P> +"I didn't think," she sobbed, "that I'd ever see you again." +</P> + +<P> +He smoothed her hair and kissed her. "And are you glad to see me, +mother?" +</P> + +<P> +"Am I glad to see you? It's like the dead comin' to life. I thought +I'd lost you forever, John, my son, my darlin' boy!" she answered, +hugging him strenuously. +</P> + +<P> +"I couldn't live without seeing you, mother," he said. He meant it, +too, or thought he did, although he had not seen her for ten years. +</P> + +<P> +"You've grown so tall, John, and are such a fine gentleman! And you +ARE a gentleman now, John, ain't you—sure enough? Nobody knows the +old story?" +</P> + +<P> +"Well, mother, I've taken a man's chance in life, and have tried to +make the most of it; and I haven't felt under any obligation to spoil +it by raking up old stories that are best forgotten. There are the dear +old books: have they been read since I went away?" +</P> + +<P> +"No, honey, there's be'n nobody to read 'em, excep' Rena, an' she don't +take to books quite like you did. But I've kep' 'em dusted clean, an' +kep' the moths an' the bugs out; for I hoped you'd come back some day, +an' knowed you'd like to find 'em all in their places, jus' like you +left 'em." +</P> + +<P> +"That's mighty nice of you, mother. You could have done no more if you +had loved them for themselves. But where is Rena? I saw her on the +street to-day, but she didn't know me from Adam; nor did I guess it was +she until she opened the gate and came into the yard." +</P> + +<P> +"I've be'n so glad to see you that I'd fergot about her," answered the +mother. "Rena, oh, Rena!" +</P> + +<P> +The girl was not far away; she had been standing in the next room, +listening intently to every word of the conversation, and only kept +from coming in by a certain constraint that made a brother whom she had +not met for so many years seem almost as much a stranger as if he had +not been connected with her by any tie. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, mamma," she answered, coming forward. +</P> + +<P> +"Rena, child, here's yo'r brother John, who's come back to see us. +Tell 'im howdy." +</P> + +<P> +As she came forward, Warwick rose, put his arm around her waist, drew +her toward him, and kissed her affectionately, to her evident +embarrassment. She was a tall girl, but he towered above her in quite a +protecting fashion; and she thought with a thrill how fine it would be +to have such a brother as this in the town all the time. How proud she +would be, if she could but walk up the street with such a brother by +her side! She could then hold up her head before all the world, +oblivious to the glance of pity or contempt. She felt a very +pronounced respect for this tall gentleman who held her blushing face +between his hands and looked steadily into her eyes. +</P> + +<P> +"You're the little sister I used to read stories to, and whom I +promised to come and see some day. Do you remember how you cried when +I went away?" +</P> + +<P> +"It seems but yesterday," she answered. "I've still got the dime you +gave me." +</P> + +<P> +He kissed her again, and then drew her down beside him on the sofa, +where he sat enthroned between the two loving and excited women. No +king could have received more sincere or delighted homage. He was a +man, come into a household of women,—a man of whom they were proud, +and to whom they looked up with fond reverence. For he was not only a +son,—a brother—but he represented to them the world from which +circumstances had shut them out, and to which distance lent even more +than its usual enchantment; and they felt nearer to this far-off world +because of the glory which Warwick reflected from it. +</P> + +<P> +"You're a very pretty girl," said Warwick, regarding his sister +thoughtfully. "I followed you down Front Street this morning, and +scarcely took my eyes off you all the way; and yet I didn't know you, +and scarcely saw your face. You improve on acquaintance; to-night, I +find you handsomer still." +</P> + +<P> +"Now, John," said his mother, expostulating mildly, "you'll spile her, +if you don't min'." +</P> + +<P> +The girl was beaming with gratified vanity. What woman would not find +such praise sweet from almost any source, and how much more so from +this great man, who, from his exalted station in the world, must surely +know the things whereof he spoke! She believed every word of it; she +knew it very well indeed, but wished to hear it repeated and itemized +and emphasized. +</P> + +<P> +"No, he won't, mamma," she asserted, "for he's flattering me. He talks +as if I was some rich young lady, who lives on the Hill,"—the Hill was +the aristocratic portion of the town,—"instead of a poor." +</P> + +<P> +"Instead of a poor young girl, who has the hill to climb," replied her +brother, smoothing her hair with his hand. Her hair was long and +smooth and glossy, with a wave like the ripple of a summer breeze upon +the surface of still water. It was the girl's great pride, and had +been sedulously cared for. "What lovely hair! It has just the wave +that yours lacks, mother." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," was the regretful reply, "I've never be'n able to git that wave +out. But her hair's be'n took good care of, an' there ain't nary gal +in town that's got any finer." +</P> + +<P> +"Don't worry about the wave, mother. It's just the fashionable ripple, +and becomes her immensely. I think my little Albert favors his Aunt +Rena somewhat." +</P> + +<P> +"Your little Albert!" they cried. "You've got a child?" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, yes," he replied calmly, "a very fine baby boy." +</P> + +<P> +They began to purr in proud contentment at this information, and made +minute inquiries about the age and weight and eyes and nose and other +important details of this precious infant. They inquired more coldly +about the child's mother, of whom they spoke with greater warmth when +they learned that she was dead. They hung breathless on Warwick's +words as he related briefly the story of his life since he had left, +years before, the house behind the cedars—how with a stout heart and +an abounding hope he had gone out into a seemingly hostile world, and +made fortune stand and deliver. His story had for the women the charm +of an escape from captivity, with all the thrill of a pirate's tale. +With the whole world before him, he had remained in the South, the land +of his fathers, where, he conceived, he had an inalienable birthright. +By some good chance he had escaped military service in the Confederate +army, and, in default of older and more experienced men, had +undertaken, during the rebellion, the management of a large estate, +which had been left in the hands of women and slaves. He had filled +the place so acceptably, and employed his leisure to such advantage, +that at the close of the war he found himself—he was modest enough to +think, too, in default of a better man—the husband of the orphan +daughter of the gentleman who had owned the plantation, and who had +lost his life upon the battlefield. Warwick's wife was of good family, +and in a more settled condition of society it would not have been easy +for a young man of no visible antecedents to win her hand. A year or +two later, he had taken the oath of allegiance, and had been admitted +to the South Carolina bar. Rich in his wife's right, he had been able +to practice his profession upon a high plane, without the worry of +sordid cares, and with marked success for one of his age. +</P> + +<P> +"I suppose," he concluded, "that I have got along at the bar, as +elsewhere, owing to the lack of better men. Many of the good lawyers +were killed in the war, and most of the remainder were disqualified; +while I had the advantage of being alive, and of never having been in +arms against the government. People had to have lawyers, and they gave +me their business in preference to the carpet-baggers. Fortune, you +know, favors the available man." +</P> + +<P> +His mother drank in with parted lips and glistening eyes the story of +his adventures and the record of his successes. As Rena listened, the +narrow walls that hemmed her in seemed to draw closer and closer, as +though they must crush her. Her brother watched her keenly. He had +been talking not only to inform the women, but with a deeper purpose, +conceived since his morning walk, and deepened as he had followed, +during his narrative, the changing expression of Rena's face and noted +her intense interest in his story, her pride in his successes, and the +occasional wistful look that indexed her self-pity so completely. +</P> + +<P> +"An' I s'pose you're happy, John?" asked his mother. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, mother, happiness is a relative term, and depends, I imagine, +upon how nearly we think we get what we think we want. I have had my +chance and haven't thrown it away, and I suppose I ought to be happy. +But then, I have lost my wife, whom I loved very dearly, and who loved +me just as much, and I'm troubled about my child." +</P> + +<P> +"Why?" they demanded. "Is there anything the matter with him?" +</P> + +<P> +"No, not exactly. He's well enough, as babies go, and has a good +enough nurse, as nurses go. But the nurse is ignorant, and not always +careful. A child needs some woman of its own blood to love it and look +after it intelligently." +</P> + +<P> +Mis' Molly's eyes were filled with tearful yearning. She would have +given all the world to warm her son's child upon her bosom; but she +knew this could not be. +</P> + +<P> +"Did your wife leave any kin?" she asked with an effort. +</P> + +<P> +"No near kin; she was an only child." +</P> + +<P> +"You'll be gettin' married again," suggested his mother. +</P> + +<P> +"No," he replied; "I think not." +</P> + +<P> +Warwick was still reading his sister's face, and saw the spark of hope +that gleamed in her expressive eye. +</P> + +<P> +"If I had some relation of my own that I could take into the house with +me," he said reflectively, "the child might be healthier and happier, +and I should be much more at ease about him." +</P> + +<P> +The mother looked from son to daughter with a dawning apprehension and +a sudden pallor. When she saw the yearning in Rena's eyes, she threw +herself at her son's feet. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, John," she cried despairingly, "don't take her away from me! +Don't take her, John, darlin', for it'd break my heart to lose her!" +</P> + +<P> +Rena's arms were round her mother's neck, and Rena's voice was sounding +in her ears. "There, there, mamma! Never mind! I won't leave you, +mamma—dear old mamma! Your Rena'll stay with you always, and never, +never leave you." +</P> + +<P> +John smoothed his mother's hair with a comforting touch, patted her +withered cheek soothingly, lifted her tenderly to her place by his +side, and put his arm about her. +</P> + +<P> +"You love your children, mother?" +</P> + +<P> +"They're all I've got," she sobbed, "an' they cos' me all I had. When +the las' one's gone, I'll want to go too, for I'll be all alone in the +world. Don't take Rena, John; for if you do, I'll never see her again, +an' I can't bear to think of it. How would you like to lose yo'r one +child?" +</P> + +<P> +"Well, well, mother, we'll say no more about it. And now tell me all +about yourself, and about the neighbors, and how you got through the +war, and who's dead and who's married—and everything." +</P> + +<P> +The change of subject restored in some degree Mis' Molly's equanimity, +and with returning calmness came a sense of other responsibilities. +</P> + +<P> +"Good gracious, Rena!" she exclaimed. "John 's be'n in the house an +hour, and ain't had nothin' to eat yet! Go in the kitchen an' spread a +clean tablecloth, an' git out that 'tater pone, an' a pitcher o' that +las' kag o' persimmon beer, an' let John take a bite an' a sip." +</P> + +<P> +Warwick smiled at the mention of these homely dainties. "I thought of +your sweet-potato pone at the hotel to-day, when I was at dinner, and +wondered if you'd have some in the house. There was never any like +yours; and I've forgotten the taste of persimmon beer entirely." +</P> + +<P> +Rena left the room to carry out her hospitable commission. Warwick, +taking advantage of her absence, returned after a while to the former +subject. +</P> + +<P> +"Of course, mother," he said calmly, "I wouldn't think of taking Rena +away against your wishes. A mother's claim upon her child is a high +and holy one. Of course she will have no chance here, where our story +is known. The war has wrought great changes, has put the bottom rail +on top, and all that—but it hasn't wiped THAT out. Nothing but death +can remove that stain, if it does not follow us even beyond the grave. +Here she must forever be—nobody! With me she might have got out into +the world; with her beauty she might have made a good marriage; and, if +I mistake not, she has sense as well as beauty." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," sighed the mother, "she's got good sense. She ain't as quick as +you was, an' don't read as many books, but she's keerful an' +painstakin', an' always tries to do what's right. She's be'n thinkin' +about goin' away somewhere an' tryin' to git a school to teach, er +somethin', sence the Yankees have started 'em everywhere for po' white +folks an' niggers too. But I don't like fer her to go too fur." +</P> + +<P> +"With such beauty and brains," continued Warwick, "she could leave this +town and make a place for herself. The place is already made. She has +only to step into my carriage—after perhaps a little preparation—and +ride up the hill which I have had to climb so painfully. It would be a +great pleasure to me to see her at the top. But of course it is +impossible—a mere idle dream. YOUR claim comes first; her duty chains +her here." +</P> + +<P> +"It would be so lonely without her," murmured the mother weakly, "an' I +love her so—my las' one!" +</P> + +<P> +"No doubt—no doubt," returned Warwick, with a sympathetic sigh; "of +course you love her. It's not to be thought of for a moment. It's a +pity that she couldn't have a chance here—but how could she! I had +thought she might marry a gentleman, but I dare say she'll do as well +as the rest of her friends—as well as Mary B., for instance, who +married—Homer Pettifoot, did you say? Or maybe Billy Oxendine might +do for her. As long as she has never known any better, she'll probably +be as well satisfied as though she married a rich man, and lived in a +fine house, and kept a carriage and servants, and moved with the best +in the land." +</P> + +<P> +The tortured mother could endure no more. The one thing she desired +above all others was her daughter's happiness. Her own life had not +been governed by the highest standards, but about her love for her +beautiful daughter there was no taint of selfishness. The life her son +had described had been to her always the ideal but unattainable life. +Circumstances, some beyond her control, and others for which she was +herself in a measure responsible, had put it forever and inconceivably +beyond her reach. It had been conquered by her son. It beckoned to +her daughter. The comparison of this free and noble life with the +sordid existence of those around her broke down the last barrier of +opposition. +</P> + +<P> +"O Lord!" she moaned, "what shall I do with out her? It'll be lonely, +John—so lonely!" +</P> + +<P> +"You'll have your home, mother," said Warwick tenderly, accepting the +implied surrender. "You'll have your friends and relatives, and the +knowledge that your children are happy. I'll let you hear from us +often, and no doubt you can see Rena now and then. But you must let +her go, mother,—it would be a sin against her to refuse." +</P> + +<P> +"She may go," replied the mother brokenly. "I'll not stand in her +way—I've got sins enough to answer for already." +</P> + +<P> +Warwick watched her pityingly. He had stirred her feelings to unwonted +depths, and his sympathy went out to her. If she had sinned, she had +been more sinned against than sinning, and it was not his part to judge +her. He had yielded to a sentimental weakness in deciding upon this +trip to Patesville. A matter of business had brought him within a +day's journey of the town, and an over-mastering impulse had compelled +him to seek the mother who had given him birth and the old town where +he had spent the earlier years of his life. No one would have +acknowledged sooner than he the folly of this visit. Men who have +elected to govern their lives by principles of abstract right and +reason, which happen, perhaps, to be at variance with what society +considers equally right and reasonable, should, for fear of +complications, be careful about descending from the lofty heights of +logic to the common level of impulse and affection. Many years before, +Warwick, when a lad of eighteen, had shaken the dust of the town from +his feet, and with it, he fondly thought, the blight of his +inheritance, and had achieved elsewhere a worthy career. But during +all these years of absence he had cherished a tender feeling for his +mother, and now again found himself in her house, amid the familiar +surroundings of his childhood. His visit had brought joy to his +mother's heart, and was now to bring its shrouded companion, sorrow. +His mother had lived her life, for good or ill. A wider door was open +to his sister—her mother must not bar the entrance. +</P> + +<P> +"She may go," the mother repeated sadly, drying her tears. "I'll give +her up for her good." +</P> + +<P> +"The table 's ready, mamma," said Rena, coming to the door. +</P> + +<P> +The lunch was spread in the kitchen, a large unplastered room at the +rear, with a wide fireplace at one end. Only yesterday, it seemed to +Warwick, he had sprawled upon the hearth, turning sweet potatoes before +the fire, or roasting groundpeas in the ashes; or, more often, reading, +by the light of a blazing pine-knot or lump of resin, some volume from +the bookcase in the hall. From Bulwer's novel, he had read the story +of Warwick the Kingmaker, and upon leaving home had chosen it for his +own. He was a new man, but he had the blood of an old race, and he +would select for his own one of its worthy names. Overhead loomed the +same smoky beams, decorated with what might have been, from all +appearances, the same bunches of dried herbs, the same strings of +onions and red peppers. Over in the same corner stood the same +spinning-wheel, and through the open door of an adjoining room he saw +the old loom, where in childhood he had more than once thrown the +shuttle. The kitchen was different from the stately dining-room of the +old colonial mansion where he now lived; but it was homelike, and it +was familiar. The sight of it moved his heart, and he felt for the +moment a sort of a blind anger against the fate which made it necessary +that he should visit the home of his childhood, if at all, like a thief +in the night. But he realized, after a moment, that the thought was +pure sentiment, and that one who had gained so much ought not to +complain if he must give up a little. He who would climb the heights +of life must leave even the pleasantest valleys behind. +</P> + +<P> +"Rena," asked her mother, "how'd you like to go an' pay yo'r brother +John a visit? I guess I might spare you for a little while." +</P> + +<P> +The girl's eyes lighted up. She would not have gone if her mother had +wished her to stay, but she would always have regarded this as the lost +opportunity of her life. +</P> + +<P> +"Are you sure you don't care, mamma?" she asked, hoping and yet +doubting. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, I'll manage to git along somehow or other. You can go an' stay +till you git homesick, an' then John'll let you come back home." +</P> + +<P> +But Mis' Molly believed that she would never come back, except, like +her brother, under cover of the night. She must lose her daughter as +well as her son, and this should be the penance for her sin. That her +children must expiate as well the sins of their fathers, who had sinned +so lightly, after the manner of men, neither she nor they could +foresee, since they could not read the future. +</P> + +<P> +The next boat by which Warwick could take his sister away left early in +the morning of the next day but one. He went back to his hotel with +the understanding that the morrow should be devoted to getting Rena +ready for her departure, and that Warwick would visit the household +again the following evening; for, as has been intimated, there were +several reasons why there should be no open relations between the fine +gentleman at the hotel and the women in the house behind the cedars, +who, while superior in blood and breeding to the people of the +neighborhood in which they lived, were yet under the shadow of some +cloud which clearly shut them out from the better society of the town. +Almost any resident could have given one or more of these reasons, of +which any one would have been sufficient to most of them; and to some +of them Warwick's mere presence in the town would have seemed a bold +and daring thing. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap03"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +III +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE OLD JUDGE +</H3> + +<P> +On the morning following the visit to his mother, Warwick visited the +old judge's office. The judge was not in, but the door stood open, and +Warwick entered to await his return. There had been fewer changes in +the office, where he had spent many, many hours, than in the town +itself. The dust was a little thicker, the papers in the pigeon-holes +of the walnut desk were a little yellower, the cobwebs in the corners a +little more aggressive. The flies droned as drowsily and the murmur of +the brook below was just as audible. Warwick stood at the rear window +and looked out over a familiar view. Directly across the creek, on the +low ground beyond, might be seen the dilapidated stone foundation of +the house where once had lived Flora Macdonald, the Jacobite refugee, +the most romantic character of North Carolina history. Old Judge +Straight had had a tree cut away from the creek-side opposite his +window, so that this historic ruin might be visible from his office; +for the judge could trace the ties of blood that connected him +collaterally with this famous personage. His pamphlet on Flora +Macdonald, printed for private circulation, was highly prized by those +of his friends who were fortunate enough to obtain a copy. To the left +of the window a placid mill-pond spread its wide expanse, and to the +right the creek disappeared under a canopy of overhanging trees. +</P> + +<P> +A footstep sounded in the doorway, and Warwick, turning, faced the old +judge. Time had left greater marks upon the lawyer than upon his +office. His hair was whiter, his stoop more pronounced; when he spoke +to Warwick, his voice had some of the shrillness of old age; and in his +hand, upon which the veins stood out prominently, a decided tremor was +perceptible. +</P> + +<P> +"Good-morning, Judge Straight," said the young man, removing his hat +with the graceful Southern deference of the young for the old. +</P> + +<P> +"Good-morning, sir," replied the judge with equal courtesy. +</P> + +<P> +"You don't remember me, I imagine," suggested Warwick. +</P> + +<P> +"Your face seems familiar," returned the judge cautiously, "but I +cannot for the moment recall your name. I shall be glad to have you +refresh my memory." +</P> + +<P> +"I was John Walden, sir, when you knew me." +</P> + +<P> +The judge's face still gave no answering light of recognition. +</P> + +<P> +"Your old office-boy," continued the younger man. +</P> + +<P> +"Ah, indeed, so you were!" rejoined the judge warmly, extending his +hand with great cordiality, and inspecting Warwick more closely through +his spectacles. "Let me see—you went away a few years before the war, +wasn't it?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, sir, to South Carolina." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, yes, I remember now! I had been thinking it was to the North. +So many things have happened since then, that it taxes an old man's +memory to keep track of them all. Well, well! and how have you been +getting along?" +</P> + +<P> +Warwick told his story in outline, much as he had given it to his +mother and sister, and the judge seemed very much interested. +</P> + +<P> +"And you married into a good family?" he asked. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, sir." +</P> + +<P> +"And have children?" +</P> + +<P> +"One." +</P> + +<P> +"And you are visiting your mother?" +</P> + +<P> +"Not exactly. I have seen her, but I am stopping at a hotel." +</P> + +<P> +"H'm! Are you staying long?" +</P> + +<P> +"I leave to-morrow." +</P> + +<P> +"It's well enough. I wouldn't stay too long. The people of a small +town are inquisitive about strangers, and some of them have long +memories. I remember we went over the law, which was in your favor; but +custom is stronger than law—in these matters custom IS law. It was a +great pity that your father did not make a will. Well, my boy, I wish +you continued good luck; I imagined you would make your way." +</P> + +<P> +Warwick went away, and the old judge sat for a moment absorbed in +reflection. "Right and wrong," he mused, "must be eternal verities, +but our standards for measuring them vary with our latitude and our +epoch. We make our customs lightly; once made, like our sins, they +grip us in bands of steel; we become the creatures of our creations. +By one standard my old office-boy should never have been born. Yet he +is a son of Adam, and came into existence in the way ordained by God +from the beginning of the world. In equity he would seem to be entitled +to his chance in life; it might have been wiser, though, for him to +seek it farther afield than South Carolina. It was too near home, even +though the laws were with him." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap04"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +IV +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +DOWN THE RIVER +</H3> + +<P> +Neither mother nor daughter slept a great deal during the night of +Warwick's first visit. Mis' Molly anointed her sacrifice with tears and +cried herself to sleep. Rena's emotions were more conflicting; she was +sorry to leave her mother, but glad to go with her brother. The mere +journey she was about to make was a great event for the two women to +contemplate, to say nothing of the golden vision that lay beyond, for +neither of them had ever been out of the town or its vicinity. +</P> + +<P> +The next day was devoted to preparations for the journey. Rena's +slender wardrobe was made ready and packed in a large valise. Towards +sunset, Mis' Molly took off her apron, put on her slat-bonnet,—she was +ever the pink of neatness,—picked her way across the street, which was +muddy from a rain during the day, traversed the foot-bridge that +spanned the ditch in front of the cooper shop, and spoke first to the +elder of the two men working there. +</P> + +<P> +"Good-evenin', Peter." +</P> + +<P> +"Good-evenin', ma'm," responded the man briefly, and not relaxing at +all the energy with which he was trimming a barrel-stave. +</P> + +<P> +Mis' Molly then accosted the younger workman, a dark-brown young man, +small in stature, but with a well-shaped head, an expressive forehead, +and features indicative of kindness, intelligence, humor, and +imagination. "Frank," she asked, "can I git you to do somethin' fer me +soon in the mo'nin'?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yas 'm, I reckon so," replied the young man, resting his hatchet on +the chopping-block. "W'at is it, Mis' Molly?" +</P> + +<P> +"My daughter 's goin' away on the boat, an' I 'lowed you would n' min' +totin' her kyarpet-bag down to the w'arf, onless you'd ruther haul it +down on yo'r kyart. It ain't very heavy. Of co'se I'll pay you fer +yo'r trouble." +</P> + +<P> +"Thank y', ma'm," he replied. He knew that she would not pay him, for +the simple reason that he would not accept pay for such a service. "Is +she gwine fur?" he asked, with a sorrowful look, which he could not +entirely disguise. +</P> + +<P> +"As fur as Wilmin'ton an' beyon'. She'll be visitin' her brother John, +who lives in—another State, an' wants her to come an' see him." +</P> + +<P> +"Yas 'm, I'll come. I won' need de kyart—I'll tote de bag. 'Bout +w'at time shill I come over?" +</P> + +<P> +"Well, 'long 'bout seven o'clock or half pas'. She's goin' on the Old +North State, an' it leaves at eight." +</P> + +<P> +Frank stood looking after Mis' Molly as she picked her way across the +street, until he was recalled to his duty by a sharp word from his +father. +</P> + +<P> +"'Ten' ter yo' wuk, boy, 'ten' ter yo' wuk. You 're wastin' yo' +time—wastin' yo' time!" +</P> + +<P> +Yes, he was wasting his time. The beautiful young girl across the +street could never be anything to him. But he had saved her life once, +and had dreamed that he might render her again some signal service that +might win her friendship, and convince her of his humble devotion. For +Frank was not proud. A smile, which Peter would have regarded as +condescending to a free man, who, since the war, was as good as anybody +else; a kind word, which Peter would have considered offensively +patronizing; a piece of Mis' Molly's famous potato pone from Rena's +hands,—a bone to a dog, Peter called it once;—were ample rewards for +the thousand and one small services Frank had rendered the two women +who lived in the house behind the cedars. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Frank went over in the morning a little ahead of the appointed time, +and waited on the back piazza until his services were required. +</P> + +<P> +"You ain't gwine ter be gone long, is you, Miss Rena?" he inquired, +when Rena came out dressed for the journey in her best frock, with +broad white collar and cuffs. +</P> + +<P> +Rena did not know. She had been asking herself the same question. All +sorts of vague dreams had floated through her mind during the last few +hours, as to what the future might bring forth. But she detected the +anxious note in Frank's voice, and had no wish to give this faithful +friend of the family unnecessary pain. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, no, Frank, I reckon not. I'm supposed to be just going on a short +visit. My brother has lost his wife, and wishes me to come and stay +with him awhile, and look after his little boy." +</P> + +<P> +"I'm feared you'll lack it better dere, Miss Rena," replied Frank +sorrowfully, dropping his mask of unconcern, "an' den you won't come +back, an' none er yo' frien's won't never see you no mo'." +</P> + +<P> +"You don't think, Frank," asked Rena severely, "that I would leave my +mother and my home and all my friends, and NEVER come back again?" +</P> + +<P> +"Why, no 'ndeed," interposed Mis' Molly wistfully, as she hovered +around her daughter, giving her hair or her gown a touch here and +there; "she'll be so homesick in a month that she'll be willin' to walk +home." +</P> + +<P> +"You would n' never hafter do dat, Miss Rena," returned Frank, with a +disconsolate smile. "Ef you ever wanter come home, an' can't git back +no other way, jes' let ME know, an' I'll take my mule an' my kyart an' +fetch you back, ef it's from de een' er de worl'." +</P> + +<P> +"Thank you, Frank, I believe you would," said the girl kindly. "You're +a true friend, Frank, and I'll not forget you while I'm gone." +</P> + +<P> +The idea of her beautiful daughter riding home from the end of the +world with Frank, in a cart, behind a one-eyed mule, struck Mis' Molly +as the height of the ridiculous—she was in a state of excitement where +tears or laughter would have come with equal ease—and she turned away +to hide her merriment. Her daughter was going to live in a fine house, +and marry a rich man, and ride in her carriage. Of course a negro +would drive the carriage, but that was different from riding with one +in a cart. +</P> + +<P> +When it was time to go, Mis' Molly and Rena set out on foot for the +river, which was only a short distance away. Frank followed with the +valise. There was no gathering of friends to see Rena off, as might +have been the case under different circumstances. Her departure had +some of the characteristics of a secret flight; it was as important +that her destination should not be known, as it had been that her +brother should conceal his presence in the town. +</P> + +<P> +Mis' Molly and Rena remained on the bank until the steamer announced, +with a raucous whistle, its readiness to depart. Warwick was seen for +a moment on the upper deck, from which he greeted them with a smile and +a slight nod. He had bidden his mother an affectionate farewell the +evening before. Rena gave her hand to Frank. +</P> + +<P> +"Good-by, Frank," she said, with a kind smile; "I hope you and mamma +will be good friends while I'm gone." +</P> + +<P> +The whistle blew a second warning blast, and the deck hands prepared to +draw in the gang-plank. Rena flew into her mother's arms, and then, +breaking away, hurried on board and retired to her state-room, from +which she did not emerge during the journey. The window-blinds were +closed, darkening the room, and the stewardess who came to ask if she +should bring her some dinner could not see her face distinctly, but +perceived enough to make her surmise that the young lady had been +weeping. +</P> + +<P> +"Po' chile," murmured the sympathetic colored woman, "I reckon some er +her folks is dead, er her sweetheart 's gone back on her, er e'se she's +had some kin' er bad luck er 'nuther. W'ite folks has deir troubles +jes' ez well ez black folks, an' sometimes feels 'em mo', 'cause dey +ain't ez use' ter 'em." +</P> + +<P> +Mis' Molly went back in sadness to the lonely house behind the cedars, +henceforth to be peopled for her with only the memory of those she had +loved. She had paid with her heart's blood another installment on the +Shylock's bond exacted by society for her own happiness of the past and +her children's prospects for the future. +</P> + +<P> +The journey down the sluggish river to the seaboard in the +flat-bottomed, stern-wheel steamer lasted all day and most of the +night. During the first half-day, the boat grounded now and then upon +a sand-bank, and the half-naked negro deck-hands toiled with ropes and +poles to release it. Several times before Rena fell asleep that night, +the steamer would tie up at a landing, and by the light of huge pine +torches she watched the boat hands send the yellow turpentine barrels +down the steep bank in a long string, or pass cord-wood on board from +hand to hand. The excited negroes, their white teeth and eyeballs +glistening in the surrounding darkness to which their faces formed no +relief; the white officers in brown linen, shouting, swearing, and +gesticulating; the yellow, flickering torchlight over all,—made up a +scene of which the weird interest would have appealed to a more blase +traveler than this girl upon her first journey. +</P> + +<P> +During the day, Warwick had taken his meals in the dining-room, with +the captain and the other cabin passengers. It was learned that he was +a South Carolina lawyer, and not a carpet-bagger. Such credentials were +unimpeachable, and the passengers found him a very agreeable traveling +companion. Apparently sound on the subject of negroes, Yankees, and +the righteousness of the lost cause, he yet discussed these themes in a +lofty and impersonal manner that gave his words greater weight than if +he had seemed warped by a personal grievance. His attitude, in fact, +piqued the curiosity of one or two of the passengers. +</P> + +<P> +"Did your people lose any niggers?" asked one of them. +</P> + +<P> +"My father owned a hundred," he replied grandly. +</P> + +<P> +Their respect for his views was doubled. It is easy to moralize about +the misfortunes of others, and to find good in the evil that they +suffer;—only a true philosopher could speak thus lightly of his own +losses. +</P> + +<P> +When the steamer tied up at the wharf at Wilmington, in the early +morning, the young lawyer and a veiled lady passenger drove in the same +carriage to a hotel. After they had breakfasted in a private room, +Warwick explained to his sister the plan he had formed for her future. +Henceforth she must be known as Miss Warwick, dropping the old name +with the old life. He would place her for a year in a boarding-school +at Charleston, after which she would take her place as the mistress of +his house. Having imparted this information, he took his sister for a +drive through the town. There for the first time Rena saw great ships, +which, her brother told her, sailed across the mighty ocean to distant +lands, whose flags he pointed out drooping lazily at the mast-heads. +The business portion of the town had "an ancient and fishlike smell," +and most of the trade seemed to be in cotton and naval stores and +products of the sea. The wharves were piled high with cotton bales, +and there were acres of barrels of resin and pitch and tar and spirits +of turpentine. The market, a long, low, wooden structure, in the middle +of the principal street, was filled with a mass of people of all +shades, from blue-black to Saxon blonde, gabbling and gesticulating +over piles of oysters and clams and freshly caught fish of varied hue. +By ten o'clock the sun was beating down so fiercely that the glitter of +the white, sandy streets dazzled and pained the eyes unaccustomed to +it, and Rena was glad to be driven back to the hotel. The travelers +left together on an early afternoon train. +</P> + +<P> +Thus for the time being was severed the last tie that bound Rena to her +narrow past, and for some time to come the places and the people who +had known her once were to know her no more. +</P> + +<P> +Some few weeks later, Mis' Molly called upon old Judge Straight with +reference to the taxes on her property. +</P> + +<P> +"Your son came in to see me the other day," he remarked. "He seems to +have got along." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, yes, judge, he's done fine, John has; an' he's took his sister +away with him." +</P> + +<P> +"Ah!" exclaimed the judge. Then after a pause he added, "I hope she +may do as well." +</P> + +<P> +"Thank you, sir," she said, with a curtsy, as she rose to go. "We've +always knowed that you were our friend and wished us well." +</P> + +<P> +The judge looked after her as she walked away. Her bearing had a touch +of timidity, a shade of affectation, and yet a certain pathetic dignity. +</P> + +<P> +"It is a pity," he murmured, with a sigh, "that men cannot select their +mothers. My young friend John has builded, whether wisely or not, very +well; but he has come back into the old life and carried away a part of +it, and I fear that this addition will weaken the structure." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap05"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +V +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE TOURNAMENT +</H3> + +<P> +The annual tournament of the Clarence Social Club was about to begin. +The county fairground, where all was in readiness, sparkled with the +youth and beauty of the town, standing here and there under the trees +in animated groups, or moving toward the seats from which the pageant +might be witnessed. A quarter of a mile of the race track, to right +and left of the judges' stand, had been laid off for the lists. +Opposite the grand stand, which occupied a considerable part of this +distance, a dozen uprights had been erected at measured intervals. +Projecting several feet over the track from each of these uprights was +an iron crossbar, from which an iron hook depended. Between the +uprights stout posts were planted, of such a height that their tops +could be easily reached by a swinging sword-cut from a mounted rider +passing upon the track. The influence of Walter Scott was strong upon +the old South. The South before the war was essentially feudal, and +Scott's novels of chivalry appealed forcefully to the feudal heart. +During the month preceding the Clarence tournament, the local +bookseller had closed out his entire stock of "Ivanhoe," consisting of +five copies, and had taken orders for seven copies more. The +tournament scene in this popular novel furnished the model after which +these bloodless imitations of the ancient passages-at-arms were +conducted, with such variations as were required to adapt them to a +different age and civilization. +</P> + +<P> +The best people gradually filled the grand stand, while the poorer +white and colored folks found seats outside, upon what would now be +known as the "bleachers," or stood alongside the lists. The knights, +masquerading in fanciful costumes, in which bright-colored garments, +gilt paper, and cardboard took the place of knightly harness, were +mounted on spirited horses. Most of them were gathered at one end of +the lists, while others practiced their steeds upon the unoccupied +portion of the race track. +</P> + +<P> +The judges entered the grand stand, and one of them, after looking at +his watch, gave a signal. Immediately a herald, wearing a bright yellow +sash, blew a loud blast upon a bugle, and, big with the importance of +his office, galloped wildly down the lists. An attendant on horseback +busied himself hanging upon each of the pendent hooks an iron ring, of +some two inches in diameter, while another, on foot, placed on top of +each of the shorter posts a wooden ball some four inches through. +</P> + +<P> +"It's my first tournament," observed a lady near the front of the grand +stand, leaning over and addressing John Warwick, who was seated in the +second row, in company with a very handsome girl. "It is somewhat +different from Ashby-de-la-Zouch." +</P> + +<P> +"It is the renaissance of chivalry, Mrs. Newberry," replied the young +lawyer, "and, like any other renaissance, it must adapt itself to new +times and circumstances. For instance, when we build a Greek portico, +having no Pentelic marble near at hand, we use a pine-tree, one of +nature's columns, which Grecian art at its best could only copy and +idealize. Our knights are not weighted down with heavy armor, but much +more appropriately attired, for a day like this, in costumes that +recall the picturesqueness, without the discomfort, of the old knightly +harness. For an iron-headed lance we use a wooden substitute, with +which we transfix rings instead of hearts; while our trusty blades hew +their way through wooden blocks instead of through flesh and blood. It +is a South Carolina renaissance which has points of advantage over the +tournaments of the olden time." +</P> + +<P> +"I'm afraid, Mr. Warwick," said the lady, "that you're the least bit +heretical about our chivalry—or else you're a little too deep for me." +</P> + +<P> +"The last would be impossible, Mrs. Newberry; and I'm sure our chivalry +has proved its valor on many a hard-fought field. The spirit of a +thing, after all, is what counts; and what is lacking here? We have +the lists, the knights, the prancing steeds, the trial of strength and +skill. If our knights do not run the physical risks of +Ashby-de-la-Zouch, they have all the mental stimulus. Wounded vanity +will take the place of wounded limbs, and there will be broken hopes in +lieu of broken heads. How many hearts in yonder group of gallant +horsemen beat high with hope! How many possible Queens of Love and +Beauty are in this group of fair faces that surround us!" +</P> + +<P> +The lady was about to reply, when the bugle sounded again, and the +herald dashed swiftly back upon his prancing steed to the waiting group +of riders. The horsemen formed three abreast, and rode down the lists +in orderly array. As they passed the grand stand, each was conscious +of the battery of bright eyes turned upon him, and each gave by his +bearing some idea of his ability to stand fire from such weapons. One +horse pranced proudly, another caracoled with grace. One rider +fidgeted nervously, another trembled and looked the other way. Each +horseman carried in his hand a long wooden lance and wore at his side a +cavalry sabre, of which there were plenty to be had since the war, at +small expense. Several left the ranks and drew up momentarily beside +the grand stand, where they took from fair hands a glove or a flower, +which was pinned upon the rider's breast or fastened upon his hat—a +ribbon or a veil, which was tied about the lance like a pennon, but far +enough from the point not to interfere with the usefulness of the +weapon. +</P> + +<P> +As the troop passed the lower end of the grand stand, a horse, excited +by the crowd, became somewhat unmanageable, and in the effort to curb +him, the rider dropped his lance. The prancing animal reared, brought +one of his hoofs down upon the fallen lance with considerable force, +and sent a broken piece of it flying over the railing opposite the +grand stand, into the middle of a group of spectators standing there. +The flying fragment was dodged by those who saw it coming, but brought +up with a resounding thwack against the head of a colored man in the +second row, who stood watching the grand stand with an eager and +curious gaze. He rubbed his head ruefully, and made a good-natured +response to the chaffing of his neighbors, who, seeing no great harm +done, made witty and original remarks about the advantage of being +black upon occasions where one's skull was exposed to danger. Finding +that the blow had drawn blood, the young man took out a red bandana +handkerchief and tied it around his head, meantime letting his eye roam +over the faces in the grand stand, as though in search of some one that +he expected or hoped to find there. +</P> + +<P> +The knights, having reached the end of the lists, now turned and rode +back in open order, with such skillful horsemanship as to evoke a storm +of applause from the spectators. The ladies in the grand stand waved +their handkerchiefs vigorously, and the men clapped their hands. The +beautiful girl seated by Warwick's side accidentally let a little +square of white lace-trimmed linen slip from her hand. It fluttered +lightly over the railing, and, buoyed up by the air, settled slowly +toward the lists. A young rider in the approaching rear rank saw the +handkerchief fall, and darting swiftly forward, caught it on the point +of his lance ere it touched the ground. He drew up his horse and made +a movement as though to extend the handkerchief toward the lady, who +was blushing profusely at the attention she had attracted by her +carelessness. The rider hesitated a moment, glanced interrogatively at +Warwick, and receiving a smile in return, tied the handkerchief around +the middle of his lance and quickly rejoined his comrades at the head +of the lists. +</P> + +<P> +The young man with the bandage round his head, on the benches across +the lists, had forced his way to the front row and was leaning against +the railing. His restless eye was attracted by the falling +handkerchief, and his face, hitherto anxious, suddenly lit up with +animation. +</P> + +<P> +"Yas, suh, yas, suh, it's her!" he muttered softly. "It's Miss Rena, +sho's you bawn. She looked lack a' angel befo', but now, up dere +'mongs' all dem rich, fine folks, she looks lack a whole flock er +angels. Dey ain' one er dem ladies w'at could hol' a candle ter her. +I wonder w'at dat man's gwine ter do wid her handkercher? I s'pose +he's her gent'eman now. I wonder ef she'd know me er speak ter me ef +she seed me? I reckon she would, spite er her gittin' up so in de +worl'; fer she wuz alluz good ter ev'ybody, an' dat let even ME in," he +concluded with a sigh. +</P> + +<P> +"Who is the lady, Tryon?" asked one of the young men, addressing the +knight who had taken the handkerchief. +</P> + +<P> +"A Miss Warwick," replied the knight pleasantly, "Miss Rowena Warwick, +the lawyer's sister." +</P> + +<P> +"I didn't know he had a sister," rejoined the first speaker. "I envy +you your lady. There are six Rebeccas and eight Rowenas of my own +acquaintance in the grand stand, but she throws them all into the +shade. She hasn't been here long, surely; I haven't seen her before." +</P> + +<P> +"She has been away at school; she came only last night," returned the +knight of the crimson sash, briefly. He was already beginning to feel +a proprietary interest in the lady whose token he wore, and did not +care to discuss her with a casual acquaintance. +</P> + +<P> +The herald sounded the charge. A rider darted out from the group and +galloped over the course. As he passed under each ring, he tried to +catch it on the point of his lance,—a feat which made the management +of the horse with the left hand necessary, and required a true eye and +a steady arm. The rider captured three of the twelve rings, knocked +three others off the hooks, and left six undisturbed. Turning at the +end of the lists, he took the lance with the reins in the left hand and +drew his sword with the right. He then rode back over the course, +cutting at the wooden balls upon the posts. Of these he clove one in +twain, to use the parlance of chivalry, and knocked two others off +their supports. His performance was greeted with a liberal measure of +applause, for which he bowed in smiling acknowledgment as he took his +place among the riders. +</P> + +<P> +Again the herald's call sounded, and the tourney went forward. Rider +after rider, with varying skill, essayed his fortune with lance and +sword. Some took a liberal proportion of the rings; others merely +knocked them over the boundaries, where they were collected by agile +little negro boys and handed back to the attendants. A balking horse +caused the spectators much amusement and his rider no little chagrin. +</P> + +<P> +The lady who had dropped the handkerchief kept her eye upon the knight +who had bound it round his lance. "Who is he, John?" she asked the +gentleman beside her. +</P> + +<P> +"That, my dear Rowena, is my good friend and client, George Tryon, of +North Carolina. If he had been a stranger, I should have said that he +took a liberty; but as things stand, we ought to regard it as a +compliment. The incident is quite in accord with the customs of +chivalry. If George were but masked and you were veiled, we should +have a romantic situation,—you the mysterious damsel in distress, he +the unknown champion. The parallel, my dear, might not be so hard to +draw, even as things are. But look, it is his turn now; I'll wager +that he makes a good run." +</P> + +<P> +"I'll take you up on that, Mr. Warwick," said Mrs. Newberry from +behind, who seemed to have a very keen ear for whatever Warwick said. +</P> + +<P> +Rena's eyes were fastened on her knight, so that she might lose no +single one of his movements. As he rode down the lists, more than one +woman found him pleasant to look upon. He was a tall, fair young man, +with gray eyes, and a frank, open face. He wore a slight mustache, and +when he smiled, showed a set of white and even teeth. He was mounted +on a very handsome and spirited bay mare, was clad in a picturesque +costume, of which velvet knee-breeches and a crimson scarf were the +most conspicuous features, and displayed a marked skill in +horsemanship. At the blast of the bugle his horse started forward, +and, after the first few rods, settled into an even gallop. Tryon's +lance, held truly and at the right angle, captured the first ring, then +the second and third. His coolness and steadiness seemed not at all +disturbed by the applause which followed, and one by one the remaining +rings slipped over the point of his lance, until at the end he had +taken every one of the twelve. Holding the lance with its booty of +captured rings in his left hand, together with the bridle rein, he drew +his sabre with the right and rode back over the course. His horse moved +like clockwork, his eye was true and his hand steady. Three of the +wooden balls fell from the posts, split fairly in the middle, while +from the fourth he sliced off a goodly piece and left the remainder +standing in its place. +</P> + +<P> +This performance, by far the best up to this point, and barely escaping +perfection, elicited a storm of applause. The rider was not so well +known to the townspeople as some of the other participants, and his +name passed from mouth to mouth in answer to numerous inquiries. The +girl whose token he had worn also became an object of renewed interest, +because of the result to her in case the knight should prove victor in +the contest, of which there could now scarcely be a doubt; for but +three riders remained, and it was very improbable that any one of them +would excel the last. Wagers for the remainder of the tourney stood +anywhere from five, and even from ten to one, in favor of the knight of +the crimson sash, and when the last course had been run, his backers +were jubilant. No one of those following him had displayed anything +like equal skill. +</P> + +<P> +The herald now blew his bugle and declared the tournament closed. The +judges put their heads together for a moment. The bugle sounded again, +and the herald announced in a loud voice that Sir George Tryon, having +taken the greatest number of rings and split the largest number of +balls, was proclaimed victor in the tournament and entitled to the +flowery chaplet of victory. +</P> + +<P> +Tryon, having bowed repeatedly in response to the liberal applause, +advanced to the judges' stand and received the trophy from the hands of +the chief judge, who exhorted him to wear the garland worthily, and to +yield it only to a better man. +</P> + +<P> +"It will be your privilege, Sir George," announced the judge, "as the +chief reward of your valor, to select from the assembled beauty of +Clarence the lady whom you wish to honor, to whom we will all do homage +as the Queen of Love and Beauty." +</P> + +<P> +Tryon took the wreath and bowed his thanks. Then placing the trophy on +the point of his lance, he spoke earnestly for a moment to the herald, +and rode past the grand stand, from which there was another outburst of +applause. Returning upon his tracks, the knight of the crimson sash +paused before the group where Warwick and his sister sat, and lowered +the wreath thrice before the lady whose token he had won. +</P> + +<P> +"Oyez! Oyez!" cried the herald; "Sir George Tryon, the victor in the +tournament, has chosen Miss Rowena Warwick as the Queen of Love and +Beauty, and she will be crowned at the feast to-night and receive the +devoirs of all true knights." +</P> + +<P> +The fair-ground was soon covered with scattered groups of the +spectators of the tournament. In one group a vanquished knight +explained in elaborate detail why it was that he had failed to win the +wreath. More than one young woman wondered why some one of the home +young men could not have taken the honors, or, if the stranger must win +them, why he could not have selected some belle of the town as Queen of +Love and Beauty instead of this upstart girl who had blown into the +town over night, as one might say. +</P> + +<P> +Warwick and his sister, standing under a spreading elm, held a little +court of their own. A dozen gentlemen and several ladies had sought an +introduction before Tryon came up. +</P> + +<P> +"I suppose John would have a right to call me out, Miss Warwick," said +Tryon, when he had been formally introduced and had shaken hands with +Warwick's sister, "for taking liberties with the property and name of a +lady to whom I had not had an introduction; but I know John so well +that you seemed like an old acquaintance; and when I saw you, and +recalled your name, which your brother had mentioned more than once, I +felt instinctively that you ought to be the queen. I entered my name +only yesterday, merely to swell the number and make the occasion more +interesting. These fellows have been practicing for a month, and I had +no hope of winning. I should have been satisfied, indeed, if I hadn't +made myself ridiculous; but when you dropped your handkerchief, I felt +a sudden inspiration; and as soon as I had tied it upon my lance, +victory perched upon my saddle-bow, guided my lance and sword, and +rings and balls went down before me like chaff before the wind. Oh, it +was a great inspiration, Miss Warwick!" +</P> + +<P> +Rena, for it was our Patesville acquaintance fresh from +boarding-school, colored deeply at this frank and fervid flattery, and +could only murmur an inarticulate reply. Her year of instruction, +while distinctly improving her mind and manners, had scarcely prepared +her for so sudden an elevation into a grade of society to which she had +hitherto been a stranger. She was not without a certain courage, +however, and her brother, who remained at her side, helped her over the +most difficult situations. +</P> + +<P> +"We'll forgive you, George," replied Warwick, "if you'll come home to +luncheon with us." +</P> + +<P> +"I'm mighty sorry—awfully sorry," returned Tryon, with evident regret, +"but I have another engagement, which I can scarcely break, even by the +command of royalty. At what time shall I call for Miss Warwick this +evening? I believe that privilege is mine, along with the other honors +and rewards of victory,—unless she is bound to some one else." +</P> + +<P> +"She is entirely free," replied Warwick. "Come as early as you like, +and I'll talk to you until she's ready." +</P> + +<P> +Tryon bowed himself away, and after a number of gentlemen and a few +ladies had paid their respects to the Queen of Love and Beauty, and +received an introduction to her, Warwick signaled to the servant who +had his carriage in charge, and was soon driving homeward with his +sister. No one of the party noticed a young negro, with a handkerchief +bound around his head, who followed them until the carriage turned into +the gate and swept up the wide drive that led to Warwick's doorstep. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, Rena," said Warwick, when they found themselves alone, "you have +arrived. Your debut into society is a little more spectacular than I +should have wished, but we must rise to the occasion and make the most +of it. You are winning the first fruits of your opportunity. You are +the most envied woman in Clarence at this particular moment, and, +unless I am mistaken, will be the most admired at the ball to-night." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap06"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +VI +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE QUEEN OF LOVE AND BEAUTY +</H3> + +<P> +Shortly after luncheon, Rena had a visitor in the person of Mrs. +Newberry, a vivacious young widow of the town, who proffered her +services to instruct Rena in the etiquette of the annual ball. +</P> + +<P> +"Now, my dear," said Mrs. Newberry, "the first thing to do is to get +your coronation robe ready. It simply means a gown with a long train. +You have a lovely white waist. Get right into my buggy, and we'll go +down town to get the cloth, take it over to Mrs. Marshall's, and have +her run you up a skirt this afternoon." +</P> + +<P> +Rena placed herself unreservedly in the hands of Mrs. Newberry, who +introduced her to the best dressmaker of the town, a woman of much +experience in such affairs, who improvised during the afternoon a gown +suited to the occasion. Mrs. Marshall had made more than a dozen ball +dresses during the preceding month; being a wise woman and +understanding her business thoroughly, she had made each one of them so +that with a few additional touches it might serve for the Queen of Love +and Beauty. This was her first direct order for the specific garment. +</P> + +<P> +Tryon escorted Rena to the ball, which was held in the principal public +hall of the town, and attended by all the best people. The champion +still wore the costume of the morning, in place of evening dress, save +that long stockings and dancing-pumps had taken the place of +riding-boots. Rena went through the ordeal very creditably. Her shyness +was palpable, but it was saved from awkwardness by her native grace and +good sense. She made up in modesty what she lacked in aplomb. Her +months in school had not eradicated a certain self-consciousness born +of her secret. The brain-cells never lose the impressions of youth, and +Rena's Patesville life was not far enough removed to have lost its +distinctness of outline. Of the two, the present was more of a dream, +the past was the more vivid reality. At school she had learned +something from books and not a little from observation. She had been +able to compare herself with other girls, and to see wherein she +excelled or fell short of them. With a sincere desire for improvement, +and a wish to please her brother and do him credit, she had sought to +make the most of her opportunities. Building upon a foundation of +innate taste and intelligence, she had acquired much of the +self-possession which comes from a knowledge of correct standards of +deportment. She had moreover learned without difficulty, for it suited +her disposition, to keep silence when she could not speak to advantage. +A certain necessary reticence about the past added strength to a +natural reserve. Thus equipped, she held her own very well in the +somewhat trying ordeal of the ball, at which the fiction of queenship +and the attendant ceremonies, which were pretty and graceful, made her +the most conspicuous figure. Few of those who watched her move with +easy grace through the measures of the dance could have guessed how +nearly her heart was in her mouth during much of the time. +</P> + +<P> +"You're doing splendidly, my dear," said Mrs. Newberry, who had +constituted herself Rena's chaperone. +</P> + +<P> +"I trust your Gracious Majesty is pleased with the homage of your +devoted subjects," said Tryon, who spent much of his time by her side +and kept up the character of knight in his speech and manner. +</P> + +<P> +"Very much," replied the Queen of Love and Beauty, with a somewhat +tired smile. It was pleasant, but she would be glad, she thought, when +it was all over. +</P> + +<P> +"Keep up your courage," whispered her brother. "You are not only queen, +but the belle of the ball. I am proud of you. A dozen women here +would give a year off the latter end of life to be in your shoes +to-night." +</P> + +<P> +Rena felt immensely relieved when the hour arrived at which she could +take her departure, which was to be the signal for the breaking-up of +the ball. She was driven home in Tryon's carriage, her brother +accompanying them. The night was warm, and the drive homeward under +the starlight, in the open carriage, had a soothing effect upon Rena's +excited nerves. The calm restfulness of the night, the cool blue +depths of the unclouded sky, the solemn croaking of the frogs in a +distant swamp, were much more in harmony with her nature than the +crowded brilliancy of the ball-room. She closed her eyes, and, leaning +back in the carriage, thought of her mother, who she wished might have +seen her daughter this night. A momentary pang of homesickness pierced +her tender heart, and she furtively wiped away the tears that came into +her eyes. +</P> + +<P> +"Good-night, fair Queen!" exclaimed Tryon, breaking into her reverie as +the carriage rolled up to the doorstep, "and let your loyal subject +kiss your hand in token of his fealty. May your Majesty never abdicate +her throne, and may she ever count me her humble servant and devoted +knight." +</P> + +<P> +"And now, sister," said Warwick, when Tryon had been driven away, "now +that the masquerade is over, let us to sleep, and to-morrow take up the +serious business of life. Your day has been a glorious success!" +</P> + +<P> +He put his arm around her and gave her a kiss and a brotherly hug. +</P> + +<P> +"It is a dream," she murmured sleepily, "only a dream. I am Cinderella +before the clock has struck. Good-night, dear John." +</P> + +<P> +"Good-night, Rowena." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap07"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +VII +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +'MID NEW SURROUNDINGS +</H3> + +<P> +Warwick's residence was situated in the outskirts of the town. It was +a fine old plantation house, built in colonial times, with a stately +colonnade, wide verandas, and long windows with Venetian blinds. It +was painted white, and stood back several rods from the street, in a +charming setting of palmettoes, magnolias, and flowering shrubs. Rena +had always thought her mother's house large, but now it seemed cramped +and narrow, in comparison with this roomy mansion. The furniture was +old-fashioned and massive. The great brass andirons on the wide hearth +stood like sentinels proclaiming and guarding the dignity of the +family. The spreading antlers on the wall testified to a mighty hunter +in some past generation. The portraits of Warwick's wife's +ancestors—high featured, proud men and women, dressed in the fashions +of a bygone age—looked down from tarnished gilt frames. It was all +very novel to her, and very impressive. When she ate off china, with +silver knives and forks that had come down as heirlooms, escaping +somehow the ravages and exigencies of the war time,—Warwick told her +afterwards how he had buried them out of reach of friend or foe,—she +thought that her brother must be wealthy, and she felt very proud of +him and of her opportunity. The servants, of whom there were several +in the house, treated her with a deference to which her eight months in +school had only partly accustomed her. At school she had been one of +many to be served, and had herself been held to obedience. Here, for +the first time in her life, she was mistress, and tasted the sweets of +power. +</P> + +<P> +The household consisted of her brother and herself, a cook, a coachman, +a nurse, and her brother's little son Albert. The child, with a fine +instinct, had put out his puny arms to Rena at first sight, and she had +clasped the little man to her bosom with a motherly caress. She had +always loved weak creatures. Kittens and puppies had ever found a +welcome and a meal at Rena's hands, only to be chased away by Mis' +Molly, who had had a wider experience. No shiftless poor white, no +half-witted or hungry negro, had ever gone unfed from Mis' Molly's +kitchen door if Rena were there to hear his plaint. Little Albert was +pale and sickly when she came, but soon bloomed again in the sunshine +of her care, and was happy only in her presence. Warwick found +pleasure in their growing love for each other, and was glad to perceive +that the child formed a living link to connect her with his home. +</P> + +<P> +"Dat chile sutt'nly do lub Miss Rena, an' dat's a fac', sho 's you +bawn," remarked 'Lissa the cook to Mimy the nurse one day. "You'll get +yo' nose put out er j'int, ef you don't min'." +</P> + +<P> +"I ain't frettin', honey," laughed the nurse good-naturedly. She was +not at all jealous. She had the same wages as before, and her labors +were materially lightened by the aunt's attention to the child. This +gave Mimy much more time to flirt with Tom the coachman. +</P> + +<P> +It was a source of much gratification to Warwick that his sister seemed +to adapt herself so easily to the new conditions. Her graceful +movements, the quiet elegance with which she wore even the simplest +gown, the easy authoritativeness with which she directed the servants, +were to him proofs of superior quality, and he felt correspondingly +proud of her. His feeling for her was something more than brotherly +love,—he was quite conscious that there were degrees in brotherly +love, and that if she had been homely or stupid, he would never have +disturbed her in the stagnant life of the house behind the cedars. +There had come to him from some source, down the stream of time, a rill +of the Greek sense of proportion, of fitness, of beauty, which is +indeed but proportion embodied, the perfect adaptation of means to +ends. He had perceived, more clearly than she could have appreciated +it at that time, the undeveloped elements of discord between Rena and +her former life. He had imagined her lending grace and charm to his +own household. Still another motive, a purely psychological one, had +more or less consciously influenced him. He had no fear that the +family secret would ever be discovered,—he had taken his precautions +too thoroughly, he thought, for that; and yet he could not but feel, at +times, that if peradventure—it was a conceivable hypothesis—it should +become known, his fine social position would collapse like a house of +cards. Because of this knowledge, which the world around him did not +possess, he had felt now and then a certain sense of loneliness; and +there was a measure of relief in having about him one who knew his +past, and yet whose knowledge, because of their common interest, would +not interfere with his present or jeopardize his future. For he had +always been, in a figurative sense, a naturalized foreigner in the +world of wide opportunity, and Rena was one of his old compatriots, +whom he was glad to welcome into the populous loneliness of his adopted +country. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap08"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +VIII +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE COURTSHIP +</H3> + +<P> +In a few weeks the echoes of the tournament died away, and Rena's life +settled down into a pleasant routine, which she found much more +comfortable than her recent spectacular prominence. Her queenship, +while not entirely forgiven by the ladies of the town, had gained for +her a temporary social prominence. Among her own sex, Mrs. Newberry +proved a warm and enthusiastic friend. Rumor whispered that the lively +young widow would not be unwilling to console Warwick in the loneliness +of the old colonial mansion, to which his sister was a most excellent +medium of approach. Whether this was true or not it is unnecessary to +inquire, for it is no part of this story, except as perhaps indicating +why Mrs. Newberry played the part of the female friend, without whom no +woman is ever launched successfully in a small and conservative +society. Her brother's standing gave her the right of social entry; +the tournament opened wide the door, and Mrs. Newberry performed the +ceremony of introduction. Rena had many visitors during the month +following the tournament, and might have made her choice from among a +dozen suitors; but among them all, her knight of the handkerchief found +most favor. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +George Tryon had come to Clarence a few months before upon business +connected with the settlement of his grandfather's estate. A rather +complicated litigation had grown up around the affair, various phases +of which had kept Tryon almost constantly in the town. He had placed +matters in Warwick's hands, and had formed a decided friendship for his +attorney, for whom he felt a frank admiration. Tryon was only +twenty-three, and his friend's additional five years, supplemented by a +certain professional gravity, commanded a great deal of respect from +the younger man. When Tryon had known Warwick for a week, he had been +ready to swear by him. Indeed, Warwick was a man for whom most people +formed a liking at first sight. To this power of attraction he owed +most of his success—first with Judge Straight, of Patesville, then +with the lawyer whose office he had entered at Clarence, with the woman +who became his wife, and with the clients for whom he transacted +business. Tryon would have maintained against all comers that Warwick +was the finest fellow in the world. When he met Warwick's sister, the +foundation for admiration had already been laid. If Rena had proved to +be a maiden lady of uncertain age and doubtful personal attractiveness, +Tryon would probably have found in her a most excellent lady, worthy of +all respect and esteem, and would have treated her with profound +deference and sedulous courtesy. When she proved to be a young and +handsome woman, of the type that he admired most, he was capable of any +degree of infatuation. His mother had for a long time wanted him to +marry the orphan daughter of an old friend, a vivacious blonde, who +worshiped him. He had felt friendly towards her, but had shrunk from +matrimony. He did not want her badly enough to give up his freedom. +The war had interfered with his education, and though fairly well +instructed, he had never attended college. In his own opinion, he +ought to see something of the world, and have his youthful fling. +Later on, when he got ready to settle down, if Blanche were still in +the humor, they might marry, and sink to the humdrum level of other old +married people. The fact that Blanche Leary was visiting his mother +during his unexpectedly long absence had not operated at all to hasten +his return to North Carolina. He had been having a very good time at +Clarence, and, at the distance of several hundred miles, was safe for +the time being from any immediate danger of marriage. +</P> + +<P> +With Rena's advent, however, he had seen life through different +glasses. His heart had thrilled at first sight of this tall girl, with +the ivory complexion, the rippling brown hair, and the inscrutable +eyes. When he became better acquainted with her, he liked to think +that her thoughts centred mainly in himself; and in this he was not far +wrong. He discovered that she had a short upper lip, and what seemed +to him an eminently kissable mouth. After he had dined twice at +Warwick's, subsequently to the tournament,—his lucky choice of Rena +had put him at once upon a household footing with the family,—his +views of marriage changed entirely. It now seemed to him the duty, as +well as the high and holy privilege of a young man, to marry and +manfully to pay his debt to society. When in Rena's presence, he could +not imagine how he had ever contemplated the possibility of marriage +with Blanche Leary,—she was utterly, entirely, and hopelessly unsuited +to him. For a fair man of vivacious temperament, this stately dark +girl was the ideal mate. Even his mother would admit this, if she +could only see Rena. To win this beautiful girl for his wife would be +a worthy task. He had crowned her Queen of Love and Beauty; since then +she had ascended the throne of his heart. He would make her queen of +his home and mistress of his life. +</P> + +<P> +To Rena this brief month's courtship came as a new education. Not only +had this fair young man crowned her queen, and honored her above all +the ladies in town; but since then he had waited assiduously upon her, +had spoken softly to her, had looked at her with shining eyes, and had +sought to be alone with her. The time soon came when to touch his hand +in greeting sent a thrill through her frame,—a time when she listened +for his footstep and was happy in his presence. He had been bold +enough at the tournament; he had since become somewhat bashful and +constrained. He must be in love, she thought, and wondered how soon he +would speak. If it were so sweet to walk with him in the garden, or +along the shaded streets, to sit with him, to feel the touch of his +hand, what happiness would it not be to hear him say that he loved +her—to bear his name, to live with him always. To be thus loved and +honored by this handsome young man,—she could hardly believe it +possible. He would never speak—he would discover her secret and +withdraw. She turned pale at the thought,—ah, God! something would +happen,—it was too good to be true. The Prince would never try on the +glass slipper. +</P> + +<P> +Tryon first told his love for Rena one summer evening on their way home +from church. They were walking in the moonlight along the quiet +street, which, but for their presence, seemed quite deserted. +</P> + +<P> +"Miss Warwick—Rowena," he said, clasping with his right hand the hand +that rested on his left arm, "I love you! Do you—love me?" +</P> + +<P> +To Rena this simple avowal came with much greater force than a more +formal declaration could have had. It appealed to her own simple +nature. Indeed, few women at such a moment criticise the form in which +the most fateful words of life—but one—are spoken. Words, while +pleasant, are really superfluous. Her whispered "Yes" spoke volumes. +</P> + +<P> +They walked on past the house, along the country road into which the +street soon merged. When they returned, an hour later, they found +Warwick seated on the piazza, in a rocking-chair, smoking a fragrant +cigar. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, children," he observed with mock severity, "you are late in +getting home from church. The sermon must have been extremely long." +</P> + +<P> +"We have been attending an after-meeting," replied Tryon joyfully, "and +have been discussing an old text, 'Little children, love one another,' +and its corollary, 'It is not good for man to live alone.' John, I am +the happiest man alive. Your sister has promised to marry me. I +should like to shake my brother's hand." +</P> + +<P> +Never does one feel so strongly the universal brotherhood of man as +when one loves some other fellow's sister. Warwick sprang from his +chair and clasped Tryon's extended hand with real emotion. He knew of +no man whom he would have preferred to Tryon as a husband for his +sister. +</P> + +<P> +"My dear George—my dear sister," he exclaimed, "I am very, very glad. +I wish you every happiness. My sister is the most fortunate of women." +</P> + +<P> +"And I am the luckiest of men," cried Tryon. +</P> + +<P> +"I wish you every happiness," repeated Warwick; adding, with a touch of +solemnity, as a certain thought, never far distant, occurred to him, "I +hope that neither of you may ever regret your choice." +</P> + +<P> +Thus placed upon the footing of an accepted lover, Tryon's visits to +the house became more frequent. He wished to fix a time for the +marriage, but at this point Rena developed a strange reluctance. +</P> + +<P> +"Can we not love each other for a while?" she asked. "To be engaged is +a pleasure that comes but once; it would be a pity to cut it too short." +</P> + +<P> +"It is a pleasure that I would cheerfully dispense with," he replied, +"for the certainty of possession. I want you all to myself, and all the +time. Things might happen. If I should die, for instance, before I +married you"— +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, don't suppose such awful things," she cried, putting her hand over +his mouth. +</P> + +<P> +He held it there and kissed it until she pulled it away. +</P> + +<P> +"I should consider," he resumed, completing the sentence, "that my life +had been a failure." +</P> + +<P> +"If I should die," she murmured, "I should die happy in the knowledge +that you had loved me." +</P> + +<P> +"In three weeks," he went on, "I shall have finished my business in +Clarence, and there will be but one thing to keep me here. When shall +it be? I must take you home with me." +</P> + +<P> +"I will let you know," she replied, with a troubled sigh, "in a week +from to-day." +</P> + +<P> +"I'll call your attention to the subject every day in the mean time," +he asserted. "I shouldn't like you to forget it." +</P> + +<P> +Rena's shrinking from the irrevocable step of marriage was due to a +simple and yet complex cause. Stated baldly, it was the consciousness +of her secret; the complexity arose out of the various ways in which it +seemed to bear upon her future. Our lives are so bound up with those +of our fellow men that the slightest departure from the beaten path +involves a multiplicity of small adjustments. It had not been +difficult for Rena to conform her speech, her manners, and in a measure +her modes of thought, to those of the people around her; but when this +readjustment went beyond mere externals and concerned the vital issues +of life, the secret that oppressed her took on a more serious aspect, +with tragic possibilities. A discursive imagination was not one of her +characteristics, or the danger of a marriage of which perfect frankness +was not a condition might well have presented itself before her heart +had become involved. Under the influence of doubt and fear acting upon +love, the invisible bar to happiness glowed with a lambent flame that +threatened dire disaster. +</P> + +<P> +"Would he have loved me at all," she asked herself, "if he had known +the story of my past? Or, having loved me, could he blame me now for +what I cannot help?" +</P> + +<P> +There were two shoals in the channel of her life, upon either of which +her happiness might go to shipwreck. Since leaving the house behind +the cedars, where she had been brought into the world without her own +knowledge or consent, and had first drawn the breath of life by the +involuntary contraction of certain muscles, Rena had learned, in a +short time, many things; but she was yet to learn that the innocent +suffer with the guilty, and feel the punishment the more keenly because +unmerited. She had yet to learn that the old Mosaic formula, "The sins +of the fathers shall be visited upon the children," was graven more +indelibly upon the heart of the race than upon the tables of Sinai. +</P> + +<P> +But would her lover still love her, if he knew all? She had read some +of the novels in the bookcase in her mother's hall, and others at +boarding-school. She had read that love was a conqueror, that neither +life nor death, nor creed nor caste, could stay his triumphant course. +Her secret was no legal bar to their union. If Rena could forget the +secret, and Tryon should never know it, it would be no obstacle to +their happiness. But Rena felt, with a sinking of the heart, that +happiness was not a matter of law or of fact, but lay entirely within +the domain of sentiment. We are happy when we think ourselves happy, +and with a strange perversity we often differ from others with regard +to what should constitute our happiness. Rena's secret was the worm in +the bud, the skeleton in the closet. +</P> + +<P> +"He says that he loves me. He DOES love me. Would he love me, if he +knew?" She stood before an oval mirror brought from France by one of +Warwick's wife's ancestors, and regarded her image with a coldly +critical eye. She was as little vain as any of her sex who are endowed +with beauty. She tried to place herself, in thus passing upon her own +claims to consideration, in the hostile attitude of society toward her +hidden disability. There was no mark upon her brow to brand her as +less pure, less innocent, less desirable, less worthy to be loved, than +these proud women of the past who had admired themselves in this old +mirror. +</P> + +<P> +"I think a man might love me for myself," she murmured pathetically, +"and if he loved me truly, that he would marry me. If he would not +marry me, then it would be because he didn't love me. I'll tell George +my secret. If he leaves me, then he does not love me." +</P> + +<P> +But this resolution vanished into thin air before it was fully +formulated. The secret was not hers alone; it involved her brother's +position, to whom she owed everything, and in less degree the future of +her little nephew, whom she had learned to love so well. She had the +choice of but two courses of action, to marry Tryon or to dismiss him. +The thought that she might lose him made him seem only more dear; to +think that he might leave her made her sick at heart. In one week she +was bound to give him an answer; he was more likely to ask for it at +their next meeting. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap09"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +IX +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +DOUBTS AND FEARS +</H3> + +<P> +Rena's heart was too heavy with these misgivings for her to keep them +to herself. On the morning after the conversation with Tryon in which +she had promised him an answer within a week, she went into her +brother's study, where he usually spent an hour after breakfast before +going to his office. He looked up amiably from the book before him and +read trouble in her face. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, Rena, dear," he asked with a smile, "what's the matter? Is +there anything you want—money, or what? I should like to have +Aladdin's lamp—though I'd hardly need it—that you might have no wish +unsatisfied." +</P> + +<P> +He had found her very backward in asking for things that she needed. +Generous with his means, he thought nothing too good for her. Her +success had gratified his pride, and justified his course in taking her +under his protection. +</P> + +<P> +"Thank you, John. You give me already more than I need. It is +something else, John. George wants me to say when I will marry him. I +am afraid to marry him, without telling him. If he should find out +afterwards, he might cast me off, or cease to love me. If he did not +know it, I should be forever thinking of what he would do if he SHOULD +find it out; or, if I should die without his having learned it, I +should not rest easy in my grave for thinking of what he would have +done if he HAD found it out." +</P> + +<P> +Warwick's smile gave place to a grave expression at this somewhat +comprehensive statement. He rose and closed the door carefully, lest +some one of the servants might overhear the conversation. More +liberally endowed than Rena with imagination, and not without a vein of +sentiment, he had nevertheless a practical side that outweighed them +both. With him, the problem that oppressed his sister had been in the +main a matter of argument, of self-conviction. Once persuaded that he +had certain rights, or ought to have them, by virtue of the laws of +nature, in defiance of the customs of mankind, he had promptly sought +to enjoy them. This he had been able to do by simply concealing his +antecedents and making the most of his opportunities, with no +troublesome qualms of conscience whatever. But he had already +perceived, in their brief intercourse, that Rena's emotions, while less +easily stirred, touched a deeper note than his, and dwelt upon it with +greater intensity than if they had been spread over the larger field to +which a more ready sympathy would have supplied so many points of +access;—hers was a deep and silent current flowing between the narrow +walls of a self-contained life, his the spreading river that ran +through a pleasant landscape. Warwick's imagination, however, enabled +him to put himself in touch with her mood and recognize its bearings +upon her conduct. He would have preferred her taking the practical +point of view, to bring her round to which he perceived would be a +matter of diplomacy. +</P> + +<P> +"How long have these weighty thoughts been troubling your small head?" +he asked with assumed lightness. +</P> + +<P> +"Since he asked me last night to name our wedding day." +</P> + +<P> +"My dear child," continued Warwick, "you take too tragic a view of +life. Marriage is a reciprocal arrangement, by which the contracting +parties give love for love, care for keeping, faith for faith. It is a +matter of the future, not of the past. What a poor soul it is that has +not some secret chamber, sacred to itself; where one can file away the +things others have no right to know, as well as things that one himself +would fain forget! We are under no moral obligation to inflict upon +others the history of our past mistakes, our wayward thoughts, our +secret sins, our desperate hopes, or our heartbreaking disappointments. +Still less are we bound to bring out from this secret chamber the dusty +record of our ancestry. +</P> + +<P> + 'Let the dead past bury its dead.'<BR> +</P> + +<P> +George Tryon loves you for yourself alone; it is not your ancestors +that he seeks to marry." +</P> + +<P> +"But would he marry me if he knew?" she persisted. +</P> + +<P> +Warwick paused for reflection. He would have preferred to argue the +question in a general way, but felt the necessity of satisfying her +scruples, as far as might be. He had liked Tryon from the very +beginning of their acquaintance. In all their intercourse, which had +been very close for several months, he had been impressed by the young +man's sunny temper, his straightforwardness, his intellectual honesty. +Tryon's deference to Warwick as the elder man had very naturally proved +an attraction. Whether this friendship would have stood the test of +utter frankness about his own past was a merely academic speculation +with which Warwick did not trouble himself. With his sister the +question had evidently become a matter of conscience,—a difficult +subject with which to deal in a person of Rena's temperament. +</P> + +<P> +"My dear sister," he replied, "why should he know? We haven't asked +him for his pedigree; we don't care to know it. If he cares for ours, +he should ask for it, and it would then be time enough to raise the +question. You love him, I imagine, and wish to make him happy?" +</P> + +<P> +It is the highest wish of the woman who loves. The enamored man seeks +his own happiness; the loving woman finds no sacrifice too great for +the loved one. The fiction of chivalry made man serve woman; the fact +of human nature makes woman happiest when serving where she loves. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, oh, yes," Rena exclaimed with fervor, clasping her hands +unconsciously. "I'm afraid he'd be unhappy if he knew, and it would +make me miserable to think him unhappy." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, then," said Warwick, "suppose we should tell him our secret and +put ourselves in his power, and that he should then conclude that he +couldn't marry you? Do you imagine he would be any happier than he is +now, or than if he should never know?" +</P> + +<P> +Ah, no! she could not think so. One could not tear love out of one's +heart without pain and suffering. +</P> + +<P> +There was a knock at the door. Warwick opened it to the nurse, who +stood with little Albert in her arms. +</P> + +<P> +"Please, suh," said the girl, with a curtsy, "de baby 's be'n oryin' +an' frettin' fer Miss Rena, an' I 'lowed she mought want me ter fetch +'im, ef it wouldn't 'sturb her." +</P> + +<P> +"Give me the darling," exclaimed Rena, coming forward and taking the +child from the nurse. "It wants its auntie. Come to its auntie, bless +its little heart!" +</P> + +<P> +Little Albert crowed with pleasure and put up his pretty mouth for a +kiss. Warwick found the sight a pleasant one. If he could but quiet +his sister's troublesome scruples, he might erelong see her fondling +beautiful children of her own. Even if Rena were willing to risk her +happiness, and he to endanger his position, by a quixotic frankness, +the future of his child must not be compromised. +</P> + +<P> +"You wouldn't want to make George unhappy," Warwick resumed when the +nurse retired. "Very well; would you not be willing, for his sake, to +keep a secret—your secret and mine, and that of the innocent child in +your arms? Would you involve all of us in difficulties merely to +secure your own peace of mind? Doesn't such a course seem just the +least bit selfish? Think the matter over from that point of view, and +we'll speak of it later in the day. I shall be with George all the +morning, and I may be able, by a little management, to find out his +views on the subject of birth and family, and all that. Some men are +very liberal, and love is a great leveler. I'll sound him, at any +rate." +</P> + +<P> +He kissed the baby and left Rena to her own reflections, to which his +presentation of the case had given a new turn. It had never before +occurred to her to regard silence in the light of self-sacrifice. It +had seemed a sort of sin; her brother's argument made of it a virtue. +It was not the first time, nor the last, that right and wrong had been +a matter of view-point. +</P> + +<P> +Tryon himself furnished the opening for Warwick's proposed examination. +The younger man could not long remain silent upon the subject uppermost +in his mind. "I am anxious, John," he said, "to have Rowena name the +happiest day of my life—our wedding day. When the trial in Edgecombe +County is finished, I shall have no further business here, and shall be +ready to leave for home. I should like to take my bride with me, and +surprise my mother." +</P> + +<P> +Mothers, thought Warwick, are likely to prove inquisitive about their +sons' wives, especially when taken unawares in matters of such +importance. This seemed a good time to test the liberality of Tryon's +views, and to put forward a shield for his sister's protection. +</P> + +<P> +"Are you sure, George, that your mother will find the surprise +agreeable when you bring home a bride of whom you know so little and +your mother nothing at all?" +</P> + +<P> +Tryon had felt that it would be best to surprise his mother. She would +need only to see Rena to approve of her, but she was so far prejudiced +in favor of Blanche Leary that it would be wisest to present the +argument after having announced the irrevocable conclusion. Rena +herself would be a complete justification for the accomplished deed. +</P> + +<P> +"I think you ought to know, George," continued Warwick, without waiting +for a reply to his question, "that my sister and I are not of an old +family, or a rich family, or a distinguished family; that she can bring +you nothing but herself; that we have no connections of which you could +boast, and no relatives to whom we should be glad to introduce you. +You must take us for ourselves alone—we are new people." +</P> + +<P> +"My dear John," replied the young man warmly, "there is a great deal of +nonsense about families. If a man is noble and brave and strong, if a +woman is beautiful and good and true, what matters it about his or her +ancestry? If an old family can give them these things, then it is +valuable; if they possess them without it, then of what use is it, +except as a source of empty pride, which they would be better without? +If all new families were like yours, there would be no advantage in +belonging to an old one. All I care to know of Rowena's family is that +she is your sister; and you'll pardon me, old fellow, if I add that she +hardly needs even you,—she carries the stamp of her descent upon her +face and in her heart." +</P> + +<P> +"It makes me glad to hear you speak in that way," returned Warwick, +delighted by the young man's breadth and earnestness. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, I mean every word of it," replied Tryon. "Ancestors, indeed, for +Rowena! I will tell you a family secret, John, to prove how little I +care for ancestors. My maternal great-great-grandfather, a hundred and +fifty years ago, was hanged, drawn, and quartered for stealing cattle +across the Scottish border. How is that for a pedigree? Behold in me +the lineal descendant of a felon!" +</P> + +<P> +Warwick felt much relieved at this avowal. His own statement had not +touched the vital point involved; it had been at the best but a +half-truth; but Tryon's magnanimity would doubtless protect Rena from +any close inquiry concerning her past. It even occurred to Warwick for +a moment that he might safely disclose the secret to Tryon; but an +appreciation of certain facts of history and certain traits of human +nature constrained him to put the momentary thought aside. It was a +great relief, however, to imagine that Tryon might think lightly of +this thing that he need never know. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, Rena," he said to his sister when he went home at noon: "I've +sounded George." +</P> + +<P> +"What did he say?" she asked eagerly. +</P> + +<P> +"I told him we were people of no family, and that we had no relatives +that we were proud of. He said he loved you for yourself, and would +never ask you about your ancestry." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, I am so glad!" exclaimed Rena joyfully. This report left her very +happy for about three hours, or until she began to analyze carefully +her brother's account of what had been said. Warwick's statement had +not been specific,—he had not told Tryon THE thing. George's reply, +in turn, had been a mere generality. The concrete fact that oppressed +her remained unrevealed, and her doubt was still unsatisfied. +</P> + +<P> +Rena was occupied with this thought when her lover next came to see +her. Tryon came up the sanded walk from the gate and spoke pleasantly +to the nurse, a good-looking yellow girl who was seated on the front +steps, playing with little Albert. He took the boy from her arms, and +she went to call Miss Warwick. +</P> + +<P> +Rena came out, followed by the nurse, who offered to take the child. +</P> + +<P> +"Never mind, Mimy, leave him with me," said Tryon. +</P> + +<P> +The nurse walked discreetly over into the garden, remaining within +call, but beyond the hearing of conversation in an ordinary tone. +</P> + +<P> +"Rena, darling," said her lover, "when shall it be? Surely you won't +ask me to wait a week. Why, that's a lifetime!" +</P> + +<P> +Rena was struck by a brilliant idea. She would test her lover. Love +was a very powerful force; she had found it the greatest, grandest, +sweetest thing in the world. Tryon had said that he loved her; he had +said scarcely anything else for several weeks, surely nothing else +worth remembering. She would test his love by a hypothetical question. +</P> + +<P> +"You say you love me," she said, glancing at him with a sad +thoughtfulness in her large dark eyes. "How much do you love me?" +</P> + +<P> +"I love you all one can love. True love has no degrees; it is all or +nothing!" +</P> + +<P> +"Would you love me," she asked, with an air of coquetry that masked her +concern, pointing toward the girl in the shrubbery, "if I were Albert's +nurse yonder?" +</P> + +<P> +"If you were Albert's nurse," he replied, with a joyous laugh, "he +would have to find another within a week, for within a week we should +be married." +</P> + +<P> +The answer seemed to fit the question, but in fact, Tryon's mind and +Rena's did not meet. That two intelligent persons should each attach a +different meaning to so simple a form of words as Rena's question was +the best ground for her misgiving with regard to the marriage. But +love blinded her. She was anxious to be convinced. She interpreted the +meaning of his speech by her own thought and by the ardor of his +glance, and was satisfied with the answer. +</P> + +<P> +"And now, darling," pleaded Tryon, "will you not fix the day that shall +make me happy? I shall be ready to go away in three weeks. Will you +go with me?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," she answered, in a tumult of joy. She would never need to tell +him her secret now. It would make no difference with him, so far as +she was concerned; and she had no right to reveal her brother's secret. +She was willing to bury the past in forgetfulness, now that she knew it +would have no interest for her lover. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap10"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +X +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE DREAM +</H3> + +<P> +The marriage was fixed for the thirtieth of the month, immediately +after which Tryon and his bride were to set out for North Carolina. +Warwick would have liked it much if Tryon had lived in South Carolina; +but the location of his North Carolina home was at some distance from +Patesville, with which it had no connection by steam or rail, and +indeed lay altogether out of the line of travel to Patesville. Rena +had no acquaintance with people of social standing in North Carolina; +and with the added maturity and charm due to her improved +opportunities, it was unlikely that any former resident of Patesville +who might casually meet her would see in the elegant young matron from +South Carolina more than a passing resemblance to a poor girl who had +once lived in an obscure part of the old town. It would of course be +necessary for Rena to keep away from Patesville; save for her mother's +sake, she would hardly be tempted to go back. +</P> + +<P> +On the twentieth of the month, Warwick set out with Tryon for the +county seat of the adjoining county, to try one of the lawsuits which +had required Tryon's presence in South Carolina for so long a time. +Their destination was a day's drive from Clarence, behind a good horse, +and the trial was expected to last a week. +</P> + +<P> +"This week will seem like a year," said Tryon ruefully, the evening +before their departure, "but I'll write every day, and shall expect a +letter as often." +</P> + +<P> +"The mail goes only twice a week, George," replied Rena. +</P> + +<P> +"Then I shall have three letters in each mail." +</P> + +<P> +Warwick and Tryon were to set out in the cool of the morning, after an +early breakfast. Rena was up at daybreak that she might preside at the +breakfast-table and bid the travelers good-by. +</P> + +<P> +"John," said Rena to her brother in the morning, "I dreamed last night +that mother was ill." +</P> + +<P> +"Dreams, you know, Rena," answered Warwick lightly, "go by contraries. +Yours undoubtedly signifies that our mother, God bless her simple soul! +is at the present moment enjoying her usual perfect health. She was +never sick in her life." +</P> + +<P> +For a few months after leaving Patesville with her brother, Rena had +suffered tortures of homesickness; those who have felt it know the +pang. The severance of old ties had been abrupt and complete. At the +school where her brother had taken her, there had been nothing to +relieve the strangeness of her surroundings—no schoolmate from her own +town, no relative or friend of the family near by. Even the +compensation of human sympathy was in a measure denied her, for Rena +was too fresh from her prison-house to doubt that sympathy would fail +before the revelation of the secret the consciousness of which +oppressed her at that time like a nightmare. It was not strange that +Rena, thus isolated, should have been prostrated by homesickness for +several weeks after leaving Patesville. When the paroxysm had passed, +there followed a dull pain, which gradually subsided into a resignation +as profound, in its way, as had been her longing for home. She loved, +she suffered, with a quiet intensity of which her outward demeanor gave +no adequate expression. From some ancestral source she had derived a +strain of the passive fatalism by which alone one can submit +uncomplainingly to the inevitable. By the same token, when once a thing +had been decided, it became with her a finality, which only some +extraordinary stress of emotion could disturb. She had acquiesced in +her brother's plan; for her there was no withdrawing; her homesickness +was an incidental thing which must be endured, as patiently as might +be, until time should have brought a measure of relief. +</P> + +<P> +Warwick had made provision for an occasional letter from Patesville, by +leaving with his mother a number of envelopes directed to his address. +She could have her letters written, inclose them in these envelopes, +and deposit them in the post-office with her own hand. Thus the place +of Warwick's residence would remain within her own knowledge, and his +secret would not be placed at the mercy of any wandering Patesvillian +who might perchance go to that part of South Carolina. By this simple +means Rena had kept as closely in touch with her mother as Warwick had +considered prudent; any closer intercourse was not consistent with +their present station in life. +</P> + +<P> +The night after Warwick and Tryon had ridden away, Rena dreamed again +that her mother was ill. Better taught people than she, in regions +more enlightened than the South Carolina of that epoch, are disturbed +at times by dreams. Mis' Molly had a profound faith in them. If God, +in ancient times, had spoken to men in visions of the night, what +easier way could there be for Him to convey his meaning to people of +all ages? Science, which has shattered many an idol and destroyed many +a delusion, has made but slight inroads upon the shadowy realm of +dreams. For Mis' Molly, to whom science would have meant nothing and +psychology would have been a meaningless term, the land of dreams was +carefully mapped and bounded. Each dream had some special +significance, or was at least susceptible of classification under some +significant head. Dreams, as a general rule, went by contraries; but a +dream three times repeated was a certain portent of the thing defined. +Rena's few years of schooling at Patesville and her months at +Charleston had scarcely disturbed these hoary superstitions which lurk +in the dim corners of the brain. No lady in Clarence, perhaps, would +have remained undisturbed by a vivid dream, three times repeated, of +some event bearing materially upon her own life. +</P> + +<P> +The first repetition of a dream was decisive of nothing, for two dreams +meant no more than one. The power of the second lay in the suspense, +the uncertainty, to which it gave rise. Two doubled the chance of a +third. The day following this second dream was an anxious one for +Rena. She could not for an instant dismiss her mother from her +thoughts, which were filled too with a certain self-reproach. She had +left her mother alone; if her mother were really ill, there was no one +at home to tend her with loving care. This feeling grew in force, +until by nightfall Rena had become very unhappy, and went to bed with +the most dismal forebodings. In this state of mind, it is not +surprising that she now dreamed that her mother was lying at the point +of death, and that she cried out with heart-rending pathos:— +</P> + +<P> +"Rena, my darlin', why did you forsake yo'r pore old mother? Come back +to me, honey; I'll die ef I don't see you soon." +</P> + +<P> +The stress of subconscious emotion engendered by the dream was powerful +enough to wake Rena, and her mother's utterance seemed to come to her +with the force of a fateful warning and a great reproach. Her mother +was sick and needed her, and would die if she did not come. She felt +that she must see her mother,—it would be almost like murder to remain +away from her under such circumstances. +</P> + +<P> +After breakfast she went into the business part of the town and +inquired at what time a train would leave that would take her toward +Patesville. Since she had come away from the town, a railroad had been +opened by which the long river voyage might be avoided, and, making +allowance for slow trains and irregular connections, the town of +Patesville could be reached by an all-rail route in about twelve hours. +Calling at the post-office for the family mail, she found there a +letter from her mother, which she tore open in great excitement. It was +written in an unpracticed hand and badly spelled, and was in effect as +follows:— +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +MY DEAR DAUGHTER,—I take my pen in hand to let you know that I am not +very well. I have had a kind of misery in my side for two weeks, with +palpitations of the heart, and I have been in bed for three days. I'm +feeling mighty poorly, but Dr. Green says that I'll get over it in a +few days. Old Aunt Zilphy is staying with me, and looking after things +tolerably well. I hope this will find you and John enjoying good +health. Give my love to John, and I hope the Lord will bless him and +you too. Cousin Billy Oxendine has had a rising on his neck, and has +had to have it lanced. Mary B. has another young one, a boy this time. +Old man Tom Johnson was killed last week while trying to whip black Jim +Brown, who lived down on the Wilmington Road. Jim has run away. There +has been a big freshet in the river, and it looked at one time as if +the new bridge would be washed away. +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +Frank comes over every day or two and asks about you. He says to tell +you that he don't believe you are coming back any more, but you are to +remember him, and that foolishness he said about bringing you back from +the end of the world with his mule and cart. He's very good to me, and +brings over shavings and kindling-wood, and made me a new well-bucket +for nothing. It's a comfort to talk to him about you, though I haven't +told him where you are living. +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +I hope this will find you and John both well, and doing well. I should +like to see you, but if it's the Lord's will that I shouldn't, I shall +be thankful anyway that you have done what was the best for yourselves +and your children, and that I have given you up for your own good. +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> + Your affectionate mother,<BR> + MARY WALDEN.<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Rena shed tears over this simple letter, which, to her excited +imagination, merely confirmed the warning of her dream. At the date of +its writing her mother had been sick in bed, with the symptoms of a +serious illness. She had no nurse but a purblind old woman. Three +days of progressive illness had evidently been quite sufficient to +reduce her parent to the condition indicated by the third dream. The +thought that her mother might die without the presence of any one who +loved her pierced Rena's heart like a knife and lent wings to her feet. +She wished for the enchanted horse of which her brother had read to her +so many years before on the front piazza of the house behind the +cedars, that she might fly through the air to her dying mother's side. +She determined to go at once to Patesville. +</P> + +<P> +Returning home, she wrote a letter to Warwick inclosing their mother's +letter, and stating that she had dreamed an alarming dream for three +nights in succession; that she had left the house in charge of the +servants and gone to Patesville; and that she would return as soon as +her mother was out of danger. +</P> + +<P> +To her lover she wrote that she had been called away to visit a +sick-bed, and would return very soon, perhaps by the time he got back +to Clarence. These letters Rena posted on her way to the train, which +she took at five o'clock in the afternoon. This would bring her to +Patesville early in the morning of the following day. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap11"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XI +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +A LETTER AND A JOURNEY +</H3> + +<P> +War has been called the court of last resort. A lawsuit may with equal +aptness be compared to a battle—the parallel might be drawn very +closely all along the line. First we have the casus belli, the cause +of action; then the various protocols and proclamations and general +orders, by way of pleas, demurrers, and motions; then the preliminary +skirmishes at the trial table; and then the final struggle, in which +might is quite as likely to prevail as right, victory most often +resting with the strongest battalions, and truth and justice not seldom +overborne by the weight of odds upon the other side. +</P> + +<P> +The lawsuit which Warwick and Tryon had gone to try did not, however, +reach this ultimate stage, but, after a three days' engagement, +resulted in a treaty of peace. The case was compromised and settled, +and Tryon and Warwick set out on their homeward drive. They stopped at +a farm-house at noon, and while at table saw the stage-coach from the +town they had just left, bound for their own destination. In the +mail-bag under the driver's seat were Rena's two letters; they had been +delivered at the town in the morning, and immediately remailed to +Clarence, in accordance with orders left at the post-office the evening +before. Tryon and Warwick drove leisurely homeward through the pines, +all unconscious of the fateful squares of white paper moving along the +road a few miles before them, which a mother's yearning and a +daughter's love had thrown, like the apple of discord, into the narrow +circle of their happiness. +</P> + +<P> +They reached Clarence at four o'clock. Warwick got down from the buggy +at his office. Tryon drove on to his hotel, to make a hasty toilet +before visiting his sweetheart. +</P> + +<P> +Warwick glanced at his mail, tore open the envelope addressed in his +sister's handwriting, and read the contents with something like dismay. +She had gone away on the eve of her wedding, her lover knew not where, +to be gone no one knew how long, on a mission which could not be +frankly disclosed. A dim foreboding of disaster flashed across his +mind. He thrust the letter into his pocket, with others yet unopened, +and started toward his home. Reaching the gate, he paused a moment and +then walked on past the house. Tryon would probably be there in a few +minutes, and he did not care to meet him without first having had the +opportunity for some moments of reflection. He must fix upon some line +of action in this emergency. +</P> + +<P> +Meanwhile Tryon had reached his hotel and opened his mail. The letter +from Rena was read first, with profound disappointment. He had really +made concessions in the settlement of that lawsuit—had yielded several +hundred dollars of his just dues, in order that he might get back to +Rena three days earlier. Now he must cool his heels in idleness for at +least three days before she would return. It was annoying, to say the +least. He wished to know where she had gone, that he might follow her +and stay near her until she should be ready to come back. He might ask +Warwick—no, she might have had some good reason for not having +mentioned her destination. She had probably gone to visit some of the +poor relations of whom her brother had spoken so frankly, and she would +doubtless prefer that he should not see her amid any surroundings but +the best. Indeed, he did not know that he would himself care to +endanger, by suggestive comparisons, the fine aureole of superiority +that surrounded her. She represented in her adorable person and her +pure heart the finest flower of the finest race that God had ever +made—the supreme effort of creative power, than which there could be +no finer. The flower would soon be his; why should he care to dig up +the soil in which it grew? +</P> + +<P> +Tryon went on opening his letters. There were several bills and +circulars, and then a letter from his mother, of which he broke the +seal:— +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +MY DEAREST GEORGE,—This leaves us well. Blanche is still with me, and +we are impatiently awaiting your return. In your absence she seems +almost like a daughter to me. She joins me in the hope that your +lawsuits are progressing favorably, and that you will be with us soon.... +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +On your way home, if it does not keep you away from us too long, would +it not be well for you to come by way of Patesville, and find out +whether there is any prospect of our being able to collect our claim +against old Mr. Duncan McSwayne's estate? You must have taken the +papers with you, along with the rest, for I do not find them here. +Things ought to be settled enough now for people to realize on some of +their securities. Your grandfather always believed the note was good, +and meant to try to collect it, but the war interfered. He said to me, +before he died, that if the note was ever collected, he would use the +money to buy a wedding present for your wife. Poor father! he is dead +and gone to heaven; but I am sure that even there he would be happier +if he knew the note was paid and the money used as he intended. +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +If you go to Patesville, call on my cousin, Dr. Ed. Green, and tell him +who you are. Give him my love. I haven't seen him for twenty years. +He used to be very fond of the ladies, a very gallant man. He can +direct you to a good lawyer, no doubt. Hoping to see you soon, +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> + Your loving mother,<BR> + ELIZABETH TRYON.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +P. S. Blanche joins me in love to you. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +This affectionate and motherly letter did not give Tryon unalloyed +satisfaction. He was glad to hear that his mother was well, but he had +hoped that Blanche Leary might have finished her visit by this time. +The reasonable inference from the letter was that Blanche meant to +await his return. Her presence would spoil the fine romantic flavor of +the surprise he had planned for his mother; it would never do to expose +his bride to an unannounced meeting with the woman whom he had tacitly +rejected. There would be one advantage in such a meeting: the +comparison of the two women would be so much in Rena's favor that his +mother could not hesitate for a moment between them. The situation, +however, would have elements of constraint, and he did not care to +expose either Rena or Blanche to any disagreeable contingency. It +would be better to take his wife on a wedding trip, and notify his +mother, before he returned home, of his marriage. In the extremely +improbable case that she should disapprove his choice after having seen +his wife, the ice would at least have been broken before his arrival at +home. +</P> + +<P> +"By Jove!" he exclaimed suddenly, striking his knee with his hand, "why +shouldn't I run up to Patesville while Rena's gone? I can leave here +at five o'clock, and get there some time to-morrow morning. I can +transact my business during the day, and get back the day after +to-morrow; for Rena might return ahead of time, just as we did, and I +shall want to be here when she comes; I'd rather wait a year for a +legal opinion on a doubtful old note than to lose one day with my love. +The train goes in twenty minutes. My bag is already packed. I'll just +drop a line to George and tell him where I've gone." +</P> + +<P> +He put Rena's letter into his breast pocket, and turning to his trunk, +took from it a handful of papers relating to the claim in reference to +which he was going to Patesville. These he thrust into the same pocket +with Rena's letter; he wished to read both letter and papers while on +the train. It would be a pleasure merely to hold the letter before his +eyes and look at the lines traced by her hand. The papers he wished to +study, for the more practical purpose of examining into the merits of +his claim against the estate of Duncan McSwayne. +</P> + +<P> +When Warwick reached home, he inquired if Mr. Tryon had called. +</P> + +<P> +"No, suh," answered the nurse, to whom he had put the question; "he +ain't be'n here yet, suh." +</P> + +<P> +Warwick was surprised and much disturbed. +</P> + +<P> +"De baby 's be'n cryin' for Miss Rena," suggested the nurse, "an' I +s'pec' he'd like to see you, suh. Shall I fetch 'im?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, bring him to me." +</P> + +<P> +He took the child in his arms and went out upon the piazza. Several +porch pillows lay invitingly near. He pushed them toward the steps +with his foot, sat down upon one, and placed little Albert upon +another. He was scarcely seated when a messenger from the hotel came +up the walk from the gate and handed him a note. At the same moment he +heard the long shriek of the afternoon train leaving the station on the +opposite side of the town. +</P> + +<P> +He tore the envelope open anxiously, read the note, smiled a sickly +smile, and clenched the paper in his hand unconsciously. There was +nothing he could do. The train had gone; there was no telegraph to +Patesville, and no letter could leave Clarence for twenty-four hours. +The best laid schemes go wrong at times—the stanchest ships are +sometimes wrecked, or skirt the breakers perilously. Life is a sea, +full of strange currents and uncharted reefs—whoever leaves the +traveled path must run the danger of destruction. Warwick was a +lawyer, however, and accustomed to balance probabilities. +</P> + +<P> +"He may easily be in Patesville a day or two without meeting her. She +will spend most of her time at mother's bedside, and he will be +occupied with his own affairs." +</P> + +<P> +If Tryon should meet her—well, he was very much in love, and he had +spoken very nobly of birth and blood. Warwick would have preferred, +nevertheless, that Tryon's theories should not be put to this +particular test. Rena's scruples had so far been successfully +combated; the question would be opened again, and the situation +unnecessarily complicated, if Tryon should meet Rena in Patesville. +</P> + +<P> +"Will he or will he not?" he asked himself. He took a coin from his +pocket and spun it upon the floor. "Heads, he sees her; tails, he does +not." +</P> + +<P> +The coin spun swiftly and steadily, leaving upon the eye the impression +of a revolving sphere. Little Albert, left for a moment to his own +devices, had crept behind his father and was watching the whirling disk +with great pleasure. He felt that he would like to possess this +interesting object. The coin began to move more slowly, and was +wabbling to its fall, when the child stretched forth his chubby fist +and caught it ere it touched the floor. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap12"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XII +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +TRYON GOES TO PATESVILLE +</H3> + +<P> +Tryon arrived in the early morning and put up at the Patesville Hotel, +a very comfortable inn. After a bath, breakfast, and a visit to the +barbershop, he inquired of the hotel clerk the way to the office of Dr. +Green, his mother's cousin. +</P> + +<P> +"On the corner, sir," answered the clerk, "by the market-house, just +over the drugstore. The doctor drove past here only half an hour ago. +You'll probably catch him in his office." +</P> + +<P> +Tryon found the office without difficulty. He climbed the stair, but +found no one in except a young colored man seated in the outer office, +who rose promptly as Tryon entered. +</P> + +<P> +"No, suh," replied the man to Tryon's question, "he ain't hyuh now. +He's gone out to see a patient, suh, but he'll be back soon. Won't you +set down in de private office an' wait fer 'im, suh?" +</P> + +<P> +Tryon had not slept well during his journey, and felt somewhat +fatigued. Through the open door of the next room he saw an inviting +armchair, with a window at one side, and upon the other a table strewn +with papers and magazines. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," he answered, "I'll wait." +</P> + +<P> +He entered the private office, sank into the armchair, and looked out +of the window upon the square below. The view was mildly interesting. +The old brick market-house with the tower was quite picturesque. On a +wagon-scale at one end the public weighmaster was weighing a load of +hay. In the booths under the wide arches several old negro women were +frying fish on little charcoal stoves—the odor would have been +appetizing to one who had not breakfasted. On the shady side stood +half a dozen two-wheeled carts, loaded with lightwood and drawn by +diminutive steers, or superannuated army mules branded on the flank +with the cabalistic letters "C. S. A.," which represented a vanished +dream, or "U. S. A.," which, as any negro about the market-house would +have borne witness, signified a very concrete fact. Now and then a +lady or gentleman passed with leisurely step—no one ever hurried in +Patesville—or some poor white sandhiller slouched listlessly along +toward store or bar-room. +</P> + +<P> +Tryon mechanically counted the slabs of gingerbread on the nearest +market-stall, and calculated the cubical contents of several of the +meagre loads of wood. Having exhausted the view, he turned to the +table at his elbow and picked up a medical journal, in which he read +first an account of a marvelous surgical operation. Turning the leaves +idly, he came upon an article by a Southern writer, upon the perennial +race problem that has vexed the country for a century. The writer +maintained that owing to a special tendency of the negro blood, however +diluted, to revert to the African type, any future amalgamation of the +white and black races, which foolish and wicked Northern negrophiles +predicted as the ultimate result of the new conditions confronting the +South, would therefore be an ethnological impossibility; for the +smallest trace of negro blood would inevitably drag down the superior +race to the level of the inferior, and reduce the fair Southland, +already devastated by the hand of the invader, to the frightful level +of Hayti, the awful example of negro incapacity. To forefend their +beloved land, now doubly sanctified by the blood of her devoted sons +who had fallen in the struggle to maintain her liberties and preserve +her property, it behooved every true Southron to stand firm against the +abhorrent tide of radicalism, to maintain the supremacy and purity of +his all-pervading, all-conquering race, and to resist by every +available means the threatened domination of an inferior and degraded +people, who were set to rule hereditary freemen ere they had themselves +scarce ceased to be slaves. +</P> + +<P> +When Tryon had finished the article, which seemed to him a +well-considered argument, albeit a trifle bombastic, he threw the book +upon the table. Finding the armchair wonderfully comfortable, and +feeling the fatigue of his journey, he yielded to a drowsy impulse, +leaned his head on the cushioned back of the chair, and fell asleep. +According to the habit of youth, he dreamed, and pursuant to his own +individual habit, he dreamed of Rena. They were walking in the +moonlight, along the quiet road in front of her brother's house. The +air was redolent with the perfume of flowers. His arm was around her +waist. He had asked her if she loved him, and was awaiting her answer +in tremulous but confident expectation. She opened her lips to speak. +The sound that came from them seemed to be:— +</P> + +<P> +"Is Dr. Green in? No? Ask him, when he comes back, please, to call at +our house as soon as he can." +</P> + +<P> +Tryon was in that state of somnolence in which one may dream and yet be +aware that one is dreaming,—the state where one, during a dream, +dreams that one pinches one's self to be sure that one is not dreaming. +He was therefore aware of a ringing quality about the words he had just +heard that did not comport with the shadowy converse of a dream—an +incongruity in the remark, too, which marred the harmony of the vision. +The shock was sufficient to disturb Tryon's slumber, and he struggled +slowly back to consciousness. When fully awake, he thought he heard a +light footfall descending the stairs. +</P> + +<P> +"Was there some one here?" he inquired of the attendant in the outer +office, who was visible through the open door. +</P> + +<P> +"Yas, suh," replied the boy, "a young cullud 'oman wuz in jes' now, +axin' fer de doctuh." +</P> + +<P> +Tryon felt a momentary touch of annoyance that a negro woman should +have intruded herself into his dream at its most interesting point. +Nevertheless, the voice had been so real, his imagination had +reproduced with such exactness the dulcet tones so dear to him, that he +turned his head involuntarily and looked out of the window. He could +just see the flutter of a woman's skirt disappearing around the corner. +</P> + +<P> +A moment later the doctor came bustling in,—a plump, rosy man of fifty +or more, with a frank, open countenance and an air of genial good +nature. Such a doctor, Tryon fancied, ought to enjoy a wide popularity. +His mere presence would suggest life and hope and healthfulness. +</P> + +<P> +"My dear boy," exclaimed the doctor cordially, after Tryon had +introduced himself, "I'm delighted to meet you—or any one of the old +blood. Your mother and I were sweethearts, long ago, when we both wore +pinafores, and went to see our grandfather at Christmas; and I met her +more than once, and paid her more than one compliment, after she had +grown to be a fine young woman. You're like her! too, but not quite so +handsome—you've more of what I suppose to be the Tryon favor, though I +never met your father. So one of old Duncan McSwayne's notes went so +far as that? Well, well, I don't know where you won't find them. One +of them turned up here the other day from New York. +</P> + +<P> +"The man you want to see," he added later in the conversation, "is old +Judge Straight. He's getting somewhat stiff in the joints, but he +knows more law, and more about the McSwayne estate, than any other two +lawyers in town. If anybody can collect your claim, Judge Straight +can. I'll send my boy Dave over to his office. Dave," he called to +his attendant, "run over to Judge Straight's office and see if he's +there. +</P> + +<P> +"There was a freshet here a few weeks ago," he want on, when the +colored man had departed, "and they had to open the flood-gates and let +the water out of the mill pond, for if the dam had broken, as it did +twenty years ago, it would have washed the pillars from under the +judge's office and let it down in the creek, and"— +</P> + +<P> +"Jedge Straight ain't in de office jes' now, suh," reported the +doctor's man Dave, from the head of the stairs. +</P> + +<P> +"Did you ask when he'd be back?" +</P> + +<P> +"No, suh, you didn't tell me ter, suh." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, now, go back and inquire. +</P> + +<P> +"The niggers," he explained to Tryon, "are getting mighty trifling +since they've been freed. Before the war, that boy would have been +around there and back before you could say Jack Robinson; now, the lazy +rascal takes his time just like a white man." +</P> + +<P> +Dave returned more promptly than from his first trip. "Jedge +Straight's dere now, suh," he said. "He's done come in." +</P> + +<P> +"I'll take you right around and introduce you," said the doctor, +running on pleasantly, like a babbling brook. "I don't know whether +the judge ever met your mother or not, but he knows a gentleman when he +sees one, and will be glad to meet you and look after your affair. See +to the patients, Dave, and say I'll be back shortly, and don't forget +any messages left for me. Look sharp, now! You know your failing!" +</P> + +<P> +They found Judge Straight in his office. He was seated by the rear +window, and had fallen into a gentle doze—the air of Patesville was +conducive to slumber. A visitor from some bustling city might have +rubbed his eyes, on any but a market-day, and imagined the whole town +asleep—that the people were somnambulists and did not know it. The +judge, an old hand, roused himself so skillfully, at the sound of +approaching footsteps, that his visitors could not guess but that he +had been wide awake. He shook hands with the doctor, and acknowledged +the introduction to Tryon with a rare old-fashioned courtesy, which the +young man thought a very charming survival of the manners of a past and +happier age. +</P> + +<P> +"No," replied the judge, in answer to a question by Dr. Green, "I never +met his mother; I was a generation ahead of her. I was at school with +her father, however, fifty years ago—fifty years ago! No doubt that +seems to you a long time, young gentleman?" +</P> + +<P> +"It is a long time, sir," replied Tryon. "I must live more than twice +as long as I have in order to cover it." +</P> + +<P> +"A long time, and a troubled time," sighed the judge. "I could wish +that I might see this unhappy land at peace with itself before I die. +Things are in a sad tangle; I can't see the way out. But the worst +enemy has been slain, in spite of us. We are well rid of slavery." +</P> + +<P> +"But the negro we still have with us," remarked the doctor, "for here +comes my man Dave. What is it, Dave?" he asked sharply, as the negro +stuck his head in at the door. +</P> + +<P> +"Doctuh Green," he said, "I fuhgot ter tell you, suh, dat dat young +'oman wuz at de office agin jes' befo' you come in, an' said fer you to +go right down an' see her mammy ez soon ez you could." +</P> + +<P> +"Ah, yes, and you've just remembered it! I'm afraid you're entirely +too forgetful for a doctor's office. You forgot about old Mrs. +Latimer, the other day, and when I got there she had almost choked to +death. Now get back to the office, and remember, the next time you +forget anything, I'll hire another boy; remember that! That boy's +head," he remarked to his companions, after Dave had gone, "reminds me +of nothing so much as a dried gourd, with a handful of cowpeas rattling +around it, in lieu of gray matter. An old woman out in Redbank got a +fishbone in her throat, the other day, and nearly choked to death +before I got there. A white woman, sir, came very near losing her life +because of a lazy, trifling negro!" +</P> + +<P> +"I should think you would discharge him, sir," suggested Tryon. +</P> + +<P> +"What would be the use?" rejoined the doctor. "All negroes are alike, +except that now and then there's a pretty woman along the border-line. +Take this patient of mine, for instance,—I'll call on her after +dinner, her case is not serious,—thirty years ago she would have made +any man turn his head to look at her. You know who I mean, don't you, +judge?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes. I think so," said the judge promptly. "I've transacted a little +business for her now and then." +</P> + +<P> +"I don't know whether you've seen the daughter or not—I'm sure you +haven't for the past year or so, for she's been away. But she's in +town now, and, by Jove, the girl is really beautiful. And I'm a judge +of beauty. Do you remember my wife thirty years ago, judge?" +</P> + +<P> +"She was a very handsome woman, Ed," replied the other judicially. "If +I had been twenty years younger, I should have cut you out." +</P> + +<P> +"You mean you would have tried. But as I was saying, this girl is a +beauty; I reckon we might guess where she got some of it, eh, Judge? +Human nature is human nature, but it's a d—d shame that a man should +beget a child like that and leave it to live the life open for a negro. +If she had been born white, the young fellows would be tumbling over +one another to get her. Her mother would have to look after her pretty +closely as things are, if she stayed here; but she disappeared +mysteriously a year or two ago, and has been at the North, I'm told, +passing for white. She'll probably marry a Yankee; he won't know any +better, and it will serve him right—she's only too white for them. +She has a very striking figure, something on the Greek order, stately +and slow-moving. She has the manners of a lady, too—a beautiful +woman, if she is a nigger!" +</P> + +<P> +"I quite agree with you, Ed," remarked the judge dryly, "that the +mother had better look closely after the daughter." +</P> + +<P> +"Ah, no, judge," replied the other, with a flattered smile, "my +admiration for beauty is purely abstract. Twenty-five years ago, when +I was younger"— +</P> + +<P> +"When you were young," corrected the judge. +</P> + +<P> +"When you and I were younger," continued the doctor +ingeniously,—"twenty-five years ago, I could not have answered for +myself. But I would advise the girl to stay at the North, if she can. +She's certainly out of place around here." +</P> + +<P> +Tryon found the subject a little tiresome, and the doctor's enthusiasm +not at all contagious. He could not possibly have been interested in a +colored girl, under any circumstances, and he was engaged to be married +to the most beautiful white woman on earth. To mention a negro woman +in the same room where he was thinking of Rena seemed little short of +profanation. His friend the doctor was a jovial fellow, but it was +surely doubtful taste to refer to his wife in such a conversation. He +was very glad when the doctor dropped the subject and permitted him to +go more into detail about the matter which formed his business in +Patesville. He took out of his pocket the papers concerning the +McSwayne claim and laid them on the judge's desk. +</P> + +<P> +"You'll find everything there, sir,—the note, the contract, and some +correspondence that will give you the hang of the thing. Will you be +able to look over them to-day? I should like," he added a little +nervously, "to go back to-morrow." +</P> + +<P> +"What!" exclaimed Dr. Green vivaciously, "insult our town by staying +only one day? It won't be long enough to get acquainted with our young +ladies. Patesville girls are famous for their beauty. But perhaps +there's a loadstone in South Carolina to draw you back? Ah, you change +color! To my mind there's nothing finer than the ingenuous blush of +youth. But we'll spare you if you'll answer one question—is it +serious?" +</P> + +<P> +"I'm to be married in two weeks, sir," answered Tryon. The statement +sounded very pleasant, in spite of the slight embarrassment caused by +the inquiry. +</P> + +<P> +"Good boy!" rejoined the doctor, taking his arm familiarly—they were +both standing now. "You ought to have married a Patesville girl, but +you people down towards the eastern counties seldom come this way, and +we are evidently too late to catch you." +</P> + +<P> +"I'll look your papers over this morning," said the judge, "and when I +come from dinner will stop at the court house and examine the records +and see whether there's anything we can get hold of. If you'll drop in +around three or four o'clock, I may be able to give you an opinion." +</P> + +<P> +"Now, George," exclaimed the doctor, "we'll go back to the office for a +spell, and then I'll take you home with me to luncheon." +</P> + +<P> +Tryon hesitated. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, you must come! Mrs. Green would never forgive me if I didn't +bring you. Strangers are rare birds in our society, and when they come +we make them welcome. Our enemies may overturn our institutions, and +try to put the bottom rail on top, but they cannot destroy our Southern +hospitality. There are so many carpet-baggers and other social vermin +creeping into the South, with the Yankees trying to force the niggers +on us, that it's a genuine pleasure to get acquainted with another real +Southern gentleman, whom one can invite into one's house without fear +of contamination, and before whom one can express his feelings freely +and be sure of perfect sympathy." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap13"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XIII +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +AN INJUDICIOUS PAYMENT +</H3> + +<P> +When Judge Straight's visitors had departed, he took up the papers +which had been laid loosely on the table as they were taken out of +Tryon's breast-pocket, and commenced their perusal. There was a note +for five hundred dollars, many years overdue, but not yet outlawed by +lapse of time; a contract covering the transaction out of which the +note had grown; and several letters and copies of letters modifying the +terms of the contract. The judge had glanced over most of the papers, +and was getting well into the merits of the case, when he unfolded a +letter which read as follows:— +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +MY DEAREST GEORGE,—I am going away for about a week, to visit the +bedside of an old friend, who is very ill, and may not live. Do not be +alarmed about me, for I shall very likely be back by the time you are. +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> + Yours lovingly,<BR> + ROWENA WARWICK.<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +The judge was unable to connect this letter with the transaction which +formed the subject of his examination. Age had dimmed his perceptions +somewhat, and it was not until he had finished the letter, and read it +over again, and noted the signature at the bottom a second time, that +he perceived that the writing was in a woman's hand, that the ink was +comparatively fresh, and that the letter was dated only a couple of +days before. While he still held the sheet in his hand, it dawned upon +him slowly that he held also one of the links in a chain of possible +tragedy which he himself, he became uncomfortably aware, had had a hand +in forging. +</P> + +<P> +"It is the Walden woman's daughter, as sure as fate! Her name is Rena. +Her brother goes by the name of Warwick. She has come to visit her +sick mother. My young client, Green's relation, is her lover—is +engaged to marry her—is in town, and is likely to meet her!" +</P> + +<P> +The judge was so absorbed in the situation thus suggested that he laid +the papers down and pondered for a moment the curious problem involved. +He was quite aware that two races had not dwelt together, side by side, +for nearly three hundred years, without mingling their blood in greater +or less degree; he was old enough, and had seen curious things enough, +to know that in this mingling the current had not always flowed in one +direction. Certain old decisions with which he was familiar; old +scandals that had crept along obscure channels; old facts that had come +to the knowledge of an old practitioner, who held in the hollow of his +hand the honor of more than one family, made him know that there was +dark blood among the white people—not a great deal, and that very much +diluted, and, so long as it was sedulously concealed or vigorously +denied, or lost in the mists of tradition, or ascribed to a foreign or +an aboriginal strain, having no perceptible effect upon the racial type. +</P> + +<P> +Such people were, for the most part, merely on the ragged edge of the +white world, seldom rising above the level of overseers, or +slave-catchers, or sheriff's officers, who could usually be relied upon +to resent the drop of black blood that tainted them, and with the zeal +of the proselyte to visit their hatred of it upon the unfortunate +blacks that fell into their hands. One curse of negro slavery was, and +one part of its baleful heritage is, that it poisoned the fountains of +human sympathy. Under a system where men might sell their own children +without social reprobation or loss of prestige, it was not surprising +that some of them should hate their distant cousins. There were not in +Patesville half a dozen persons capable of thinking Judge Straight's +thoughts upon the question before him, and perhaps not another who +would have adopted the course he now pursued toward this anomalous +family in the house behind the cedars. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, here we are again, as the clown in the circus remarks," murmured +the judge. "Ten years ago, in a moment of sentimental weakness and of +quixotic loyalty to the memory of an old friend,—who, by the way, had +not cared enough for his own children to take them away from the South, +as he might have done, or to provide for them handsomely, as he perhaps +meant to do,—I violated the traditions of my class and stepped from +the beaten path to help the misbegotten son of my old friend out of the +slough of despond, in which he had learned, in some strange way, that +he was floundering. Ten years later, the ghost of my good deed returns +to haunt me, and makes me doubt whether I have wrought more evil than +good. I wonder," he mused, "if he will find her out?" +</P> + +<P> +The judge was a man of imagination; he had read many books and had +personally outlived some prejudices. He let his mind run on the +various phases of the situation. +</P> + +<P> +"If he found her out, would he by any possibility marry her?" +</P> + +<P> +"It is not likely," he answered himself. "If he made the discovery +here, the facts would probably leak out in the town. It is something +that a man might do in secret, but only a hero or a fool would do +openly." +</P> + +<P> +The judge sighed as he contemplated another possibility. He had lived +for seventy years under the old regime. The young man was a +gentleman—so had been the girl's father. Conditions were changed, but +human nature was the same. Would the young man's love turn to disgust +and repulsion, or would it merely sink from the level of worship to +that of desire? Would the girl, denied marriage, accept anything less? +Her mother had,—but conditions were changed. Yes, conditions were +changed, so far as the girl was concerned; there was a possible future +for her under the new order of things; but white people had not changed +their opinion of the negroes, except for the worse. The general belief +was that they were just as inferior as before, and had, moreover, been +spoiled by a disgusting assumption of equality, driven into their thick +skulls by Yankee malignity bent upon humiliating a proud though +vanquished foe. +</P> + +<P> +If the judge had had sons and daughters of his own, he might not have +done what he now proceeded to do. But the old man's attitude toward +society was chiefly that of an observer, and the narrow stream of +sentiment left in his heart chose to flow toward the weaker party in +this unequal conflict,—a young woman fighting for love and opportunity +against the ranked forces of society, against immemorial tradition, +against pride of family and of race. +</P> + +<P> +"It may be the unwisest thing I ever did," he said to himself, turning +to his desk and taking up a quill pen, "and may result in more harm +than good; but I was always from childhood in sympathy with the under +dog. There is certainly as much reason in my helping the girl as the +boy, for being a woman, she is less able to help herself." +</P> + +<P> +He dipped his pen into the ink and wrote the following lines:— +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +MADAM,—If you value your daughter's happiness, keep her at home for +the next day or two. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +This note he dried by sprinkling it with sand from a box near at hand, +signed with his own name, and, with a fine courtesy, addressed to "Mrs. +Molly Walden." Having first carefully sealed it in an envelope, he +stepped to the open door, and spied, playing marbles on the street near +by, a group of negro boys, one of whom the judge called by name. +</P> + +<P> +"Here, Billy," he said, handing the boy the note, "take this to Mis' +Molly Walden. Do you know where she lives—down on Front Street, in +the house behind the cedars?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yas, suh, I knows de place." +</P> + +<P> +"Make haste, now. When you come back and tell me what she says, I'll +give you ten cents. On second thoughts, I shall be gone to lunch, so +here's your money," he added, handing the lad the bit of soiled paper +by which the United States government acknowledged its indebtedness to +the bearer in the sum of ten cents. +</P> + +<P> +Just here, however, the judge made his mistake. Very few mortals can +spare the spring of hope, the motive force of expectation. The boy +kept the note in his hand, winked at his companions, who had gathered +as near as their awe of the judge would permit, and started down the +street. As soon as the judge had disappeared, Billy beckoned to his +friends, who speedily overtook him. When the party turned the corner +of Front Street and were safely out of sight of Judge Straight's +office, the capitalist entered the grocery store and invested his +unearned increment in gingerbread. When the ensuing saturnalia was +over, Billy finished the game of marbles which the judge had +interrupted, and then set out to execute his commission. He had nearly +reached his objective point when he met upon the street a young white +lady, whom he did not know, and for whom, the path being narrow at that +point, he stepped out into the gutter. He reached the house behind the +cedars, went round to the back door, and handed the envelope to Mis' +Molly, who was seated on the rear piazza, propped up by pillows in a +comfortable rocking-chair. +</P> + +<P> +"Laws-a-massy!" she exclaimed weakly, "what is it?" +</P> + +<P> +"It's a lettuh, ma'm," answered the boy, whose expanding nostrils had +caught a pleasant odor from the kitchen, and who was therefore in no +hurry to go away. +</P> + +<P> +"Who's it fur?" she asked. +</P> + +<P> +"It's fuh you, ma'm," replied the lad. +</P> + +<P> +"An' who's it from?" she inquired, turning the envelope over and over, +and examining it with the impotent curiosity of one who cannot read. +</P> + +<P> +"F'm ole Jedge Straight, ma'm. He tole me ter fetch it ter you. Is +you got a roasted 'tater you could gimme, ma'm?" +</P> + +<P> +"Shorely, chile. I'll have Aunt Zilphy fetch you a piece of 'tater +pone, if you'll hol' on a minute." +</P> + +<P> +She called to Aunt Zilphy, who soon came hobbling out of the kitchen +with a large square of the delicacy,—a flat cake made of mashed sweet +potatoes, mixed with beaten eggs, sweetened and flavored to suit the +taste, and baked in a Dutch oven upon the open hearth. +</P> + +<P> +The boy took the gratuity, thanked her, and turned to go. Mis' Molly +was still scanning the superscription of the letter. "I wonder," she +murmured, "what old Judge Straight can be writin' to me about. Oh, +boy!" +</P> + +<P> +"Yas 'm," answered the messenger, looking back. +</P> + +<P> +"Can you read writin'?" +</P> + +<P> +"No 'm." +</P> + +<P> +"All right. Never mind." +</P> + +<P> +She laid the letter carefully on the chimney-piece of the kitchen. "I +reckon it's somethin' mo' 'bout the taxes," she thought, "or maybe +somebody wants to buy one er my lots. Rena'll be back terreckly, an' +she kin read it an' find out. I'm glad my child'en have be'n to school. +They never could have got where they are now if they hadn't." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap14"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XIV +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +A LOYAL FRIEND +</H3> + +<P> +Mention has been made of certain addressed envelopes which John +Warwick, on the occasion of his visit to Patesville, had left with his +illiterate mother, by the use of which she might communicate with her +children from time to time. On one occasion, Mis' Molly, having had a +letter written, took one of these envelopes from the chest where she +kept her most valued possessions, and was about to inclose the letter +when some one knocked at the back door. She laid the envelope and +letter on a table in her bedroom, and went to answer the knock. The +wind, blowing across the room through the open windows, picked up the +envelope and bore it into the street. Mis' Molly, on her return, +missed it, looked for it, and being unable to find it, took another +envelope. An hour or two later another gust of wind lifted the bit of +paper from the ground and carried it into the open door of the cooper +shop. Frank picked it up, and observing that it was clean and unused, +read the superscription. In his conversations with Mis' Molly, which +were often about Rena,—the subject uppermost in both their minds,—he +had noted the mystery maintained by Mis' Molly about her daughter's +whereabouts, and had often wondered where she might be. Frank was an +intelligent fellow, and could put this and that together. The envelope +was addressed to a place in South Carolina. He was aware, from some +casual remark of Mis' Molly's, that Rena had gone to live in South +Carolina. Her son's name was John—that he had changed his last name +was more than likely. Frank was not long in reaching the conclusion +that Rena was to be found near the town named on the envelope, which he +carefully preserved for future reference. +</P> + +<P> +For a whole year Frank had yearned for a smile or a kind word from the +only woman in the world. Peter, his father, had rallied him somewhat +upon his moodiness after Rena's departure. +</P> + +<P> +"Now 's de time, boy, fer you ter be lookin' roun' fer some nice gal er +yo' own color, w'at'll 'preciate you, an' won't be 'shamed er you. +You're wastin' time, boy, wastin' time, shootin' at a mark outer yo' +range." +</P> + +<P> +But Frank said nothing in reply, and afterwards the old man, who was +not without discernment, respected his son's mood and was silent in +turn; while Frank fed his memory with his imagination, and by their +joint aid kept hope alive. +</P> + +<P> +Later an opportunity to see her presented itself. Business in the +cooper shop was dull. A barrel factory had been opened in the town, +and had well-nigh paralyzed the cooper's trade. The best mechanic +could hardly compete with a machine. One man could now easily do the +work of Peter's shop. An agent appeared in town seeking laborers for +one of the railroads which the newly organized carpet-bag governments +were promoting. Upon inquiry Frank learned that their destination was +near the town of Clarence, South Carolina. He promptly engaged himself +for the service, and was soon at work in the neighborhood of Warwick's +home. There he was employed steadily until a certain holiday, upon +which a grand tournament was advertised to take place in a neighboring +town. Work was suspended, and foremen and laborers attended the +festivities. +</P> + +<P> +Frank had surmised that Rena would be present on such an occasion. He +had more than guessed, too, that she must be looked for among the white +people rather than among the black. Hence the interest with which he +had scanned the grand stand. The result has already been recounted. He +had recognized her sweet face; he had seen her enthroned among the +proudest and best. He had witnessed and gloried in her triumph. He +had seen her cheek flushed with pleasure, her eyes lit up with smiles. +He had followed her carriage, had made the acquaintance of Mimy the +nurse, and had learned all about the family. When finally he left the +neighborhood to return to Patesville, he had learned of Tryon's +attentions, and had heard the servants' gossip with reference to the +marriage, of which they knew the details long before the principals had +approached the main fact. Frank went away without having received one +smile or heard one word from Rena; but he had seen her: she was happy; +he was content in the knowledge of her happiness. She was doubtless +secure in the belief that her secret was unknown. Why should he, by +revealing his presence, sow the seeds of doubt or distrust in the +garden of her happiness? He sacrificed the deepest longing of a +faithful heart, and went back to the cooper shop lest perchance she +might accidentally come upon him some day and suffer the shock which he +had sedulously spared her. +</P> + +<P> +"I would n' want ter skeer her," he mused, "er make her feel bad, an' +dat's w'at I'd mos' lackly do ef she seed me. She'll be better off wid +me out'n de road. She'll marry dat rich w'ite gent'eman,—he won't +never know de diffe'nce,—an' be a w'ite lady, ez she would 'a' be'n, +ef some ole witch had n' changed her in her cradle. But maybe some +time she'll 'member de little nigger w'at use' ter nuss her w'en she +woz a chile, an' fished her out'n de ole canal, an' would 'a' died fer +her ef it would 'a' done any good." +</P> + +<P> +Very generously too, and with a fine delicacy, he said nothing to Mis' +Molly of his having seen her daughter, lest she might be disquieted by +the knowledge that he shared the family secret,—no great mystery now, +this pitiful secret, but more far-reaching in its consequences than any +blood-curdling crime. The taint of black blood was the unpardonable +sin, from the unmerited penalty of which there was no escape except by +concealment. If there be a dainty reader of this tale who scorns a +lie, and who writes the story of his life upon his sleeve for all the +world to read, let him uncurl his scornful lip and come down from the +pedestal of superior morality, to which assured position and wide +opportunity have lifted him, and put himself in the place of Rena and +her brother, upon whom God had lavished his best gifts, and from whom +society would have withheld all that made these gifts valuable. To +undertake what they tried to do required great courage. Had they +possessed the sneaking, cringing, treacherous character traditionally +ascribed to people of mixed blood—the character which the blessed +institutions of a free slave-holding republic had been well adapted to +foster among them; had they been selfish enough to sacrifice to their +ambition the mother who gave them birth, society would have been +placated or humbugged, and the voyage of their life might have been one +of unbroken smoothness. +</P> + +<P> +When Rena came back unexpectedly at the behest of her dream, Frank +heard again the music of her voice, felt the joy of her presence and +the benison of her smile. There was, however, a subtle difference in +her bearing. Her words were not less kind, but they seemed to come +from a remoter source. She was kind, as the sun is warm or the rain +refreshing; she was especially kind to Frank, because he had been good +to her mother. If Frank felt the difference in her attitude, he +ascribed it to the fact that she had been white, and had taken on +something of the white attitude toward the negro; and Frank, with an +equal unconsciousness, clothed her with the attributes of the superior +race. Only her drop of black blood, he conceived, gave him the right +to feel toward her as he would never have felt without it; and if Rena +guessed her faithful devotee's secret, the same reason saved his +worship from presumption. A smile and a kind word were little enough +to pay for a life's devotion. +</P> + +<P> +On the third day of Rena's presence in Patesville, Frank was driving up +Front Street in the early afternoon, when he nearly fell off his cart +in astonishment as he saw seated in Dr. Green's buggy, which was +standing in front of the Patesville Hotel, the young gentleman who had +won the prize at the tournament, and who, as he had learned, was to +marry Rena. Frank was quite certain that she did not know of Tryon's +presence in the town. Frank had been over to Mis' Molly's in the +morning, and had offered his services to the sick woman, who had +rapidly become convalescent upon her daughter's return. Mis' Molly had +spoken of some camphor that she needed. Frank had volunteered to get +it. Rena had thanked him, and had spoken of going to the drugstore +during the afternoon. It was her intention to leave Patesville on the +following day. +</P> + +<P> +"Ef dat man sees her in dis town," said Frank to himself, "dere'll be +trouble. She don't know HE'S here, an' I'll bet he don't know SHE'S +here." +</P> + +<P> +Then Frank was assailed by a very strong temptation. If, as he +surmised, the joint presence of the two lovers in Patesville was a mere +coincidence, a meeting between them would probably result in the +discovery of Rena's secret. +</P> + +<P> +"If she's found out," argued the tempter, "she'll come back to her +mother, and you can see her every day." +</P> + +<P> +But Frank's love was not of the selfish kind. He put temptation aside, +and applied the whip to the back of his mule with a vigor that +astonished the animal and moved him to unwonted activity. In an +unusually short space of time he drew up before Mis' Molly's back gate, +sprang from the cart, and ran up to Mis' Molly on the porch. +</P> + +<P> +"Is Miss Rena here?" he demanded breathlessly. +</P> + +<P> +"No, Frank; she went up town 'bout an hour ago to see the doctor an' +git me some camphor gum." +</P> + +<P> +Frank uttered a groan, rushed from the house, sprang into the cart, and +goaded the terrified mule into a gallop that carried him back to the +market house in half the time it had taken him to reach Mis' Molly's. +</P> + +<P> +"I wonder what in the worl 's the matter with Frank," mused Mis' Molly, +in vague alarm. "Ef he hadn't be'n in such a hurry, I'd 'a' axed him +to read Judge Straight's letter. But Rena'll be home soon." +</P> + +<P> +When Frank reached the doctor's office, he saw Tryon seated in the +doctor's buggy, which was standing by the window of the drugstore. +Frank ran upstairs and asked the doctor's man if Miss Walden had been +there. +</P> + +<P> +"Yas," replied Dave, "she wuz here a little w'ile ago, an' said she wuz +gwine downstairs ter de drugsto'. I would n' be s'prise' ef you'd fin' +her dere now." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap15"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XV +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +MINE OWN PEOPLE +</H3> + +<P> +The drive by which Dr. Green took Tryon to his own house led up Front +Street about a mile, to the most aristocratic portion of the town, +situated on the hill known as Haymount, or, more briefly, "The Hill." +The Hill had lost some of its former glory, however, for the blight of +a four years' war was everywhere. After reaching the top of this +wooded eminence, the road skirted for some little distance the brow of +the hill. Below them lay the picturesque old town, a mass of vivid +green, dotted here and there with gray roofs that rose above the +tree-tops. Two long ribbons of streets stretched away from the Hill to +the faint red line that marked the high bluff beyond the river at the +farther side of the town. The market-house tower and the slender +spires of half a dozen churches were sharply outlined against the green +background. The face of the clock was visible, but the hours could +have been read only by eyes of phenomenal sharpness. Around them +stretched ruined walls, dismantled towers, and crumbling +earthworks—footprints of the god of war, one of whose temples had +crowned this height. For many years before the rebellion a Federal +arsenal had been located at Patesville. Seized by the state troops upon +the secession of North Carolina, it had been held by the Confederates +until the approach of Sherman's victorious army, whereupon it was +evacuated and partially destroyed. The work of destruction begun by +the retreating garrison was completed by the conquerors, and now only +ruined walls and broken cannon remained of what had once been the chief +ornament and pride of Patesville. +</P> + +<P> +The front of Dr. Green's spacious brick house, which occupied an +ideally picturesque site, was overgrown by a network of clinging vines, +contrasting most agreeably with the mellow red background. A low brick +wall, also overrun with creepers, separated the premises from the +street and shut in a well-kept flower garden, in which Tryon, who knew +something of plants, noticed many rare and beautiful specimens. +</P> + +<P> +Mrs. Green greeted Tryon cordially. He did not have the doctor's +memory with which to fill out the lady's cheeks or restore the lustre +of her hair or the sparkle of her eyes, and thereby justify her +husband's claim to be a judge of beauty; but her kind-hearted +hospitality was obvious, and might have made even a plain woman seem +handsome. She and her two fair daughters, to whom Tryon was duly +presented, looked with much favor upon their handsome young kinsman; +for among the people of Patesville, perhaps by virtue of the prevalence +of Scottish blood, the ties of blood were cherished as things of value, +and never forgotten except in case of the unworthy—an exception, by +the way, which one need hardly go so far to seek. +</P> + +<P> +The Patesville people were not exceptional in the weaknesses and +meannesses which are common to all mankind, but for some of the finer +social qualities they were conspicuously above the average. Kindness, +hospitality, loyalty, a chivalrous deference to women,—all these +things might be found in large measure by those who saw Patesville with +the eyes of its best citizens, and accepted their standards of +politics, religion, manners, and morals. +</P> + +<P> +The doctor, after the introductions, excused himself for a moment. +Mrs. Green soon left Tryon with the young ladies and went to look after +luncheon. Her first errand, however, was to find the doctor. +</P> + +<P> +"Is he well off, Ed?" she asked her husband. +</P> + +<P> +"Lots of land, and plenty of money, if he is ever able to collect it. +He has inherited two estates." +</P> + +<P> +"He's a good-looking fellow," she mused. "Is he married?" +</P> + +<P> +"There you go again," replied her husband, shaking his forefinger at +her in mock reproach. "To a woman with marriageable daughters all roads +lead to matrimony, the centre of a woman's universe. All men must be +sized up by their matrimonial availability. No, he isn't married." +</P> + +<P> +"That's nice," she rejoined reflectively. "I think we ought to ask him +to stay with us while he is in town, don't you?" +</P> + +<P> +"He's not married," rejoined the doctor slyly, "but the next best +thing—he's engaged." +</P> + +<P> +"Come to think of it," said the lady, "I'm afraid we wouldn't have the +room to spare, and the girls would hardly have time to entertain him. +But we'll have him up several times. I like his looks. I wish you had +sent me word he was coming; I'd have had a better luncheon." +</P> + +<P> +"Make him a salad," rejoined the doctor, "and get out a bottle of the +best claret. Thank God, the Yankees didn't get into my wine cellar! +The young man must be treated with genuine Southern hospitality,—even +if he were a Mormon and married ten times over." +</P> + +<P> +"Indeed, he would not, Ed,—the idea! I'm ashamed of you. Hurry back +to the parlor and talk to him. The girls may want to primp a little +before luncheon; we don't have a young man every day." +</P> + +<P> +"Beauty unadorned," replied the doctor, "is adorned the most. My +profession qualifies me to speak upon the subject. They are the two +handsomest young women in Patesville, and the daughters of the most +beautiful"— +</P> + +<P> +"Don't you dare to say the word," interrupted Mrs. Green, with placid +good nature. "I shall never grow old while I am living with a big boy +like you. But I must go and make the salad." +</P> + +<P> +At dinner the conversation ran on the family connections and their +varying fortunes in the late war. Some had died upon the battlefield, +and slept in unknown graves; some had been financially ruined by their +faith in the "lost cause," having invested their all in the securities +of the Confederate Government. Few had anything left but land, and +land without slaves to work it was a drug in the market. +</P> + +<P> +"I was offered a thousand acres, the other day, at twenty-five cents an +acre," remarked the doctor. "The owner is so land-poor that he can't +pay the taxes. They have taken our negroes and our liberties. It may +be better for our grandchildren that the negroes are free, but it's +confoundedly hard on us to take them without paying for them. They may +exalt our slaves over us temporarily, but they have not broken our +spirit, and cannot take away our superiority of blood and breeding. In +time we shall regain control. The negro is an inferior creature; God +has marked him with the badge of servitude, and has adjusted his +intellect to a servile condition. We will not long submit to his +domination. I give you a toast, sir: The Anglo-Saxon race: may it +remain forever, as now, the head and front of creation, never yielding +its rights, and ready always to die, if need be, in defense of its +liberties!" +</P> + +<P> +"With all my heart, sir," replied Tryon, who felt in this company a +thrill of that pleasure which accompanies conscious superiority,—"with +all my heart, sir, if the ladies will permit me." +</P> + +<P> +"We will join you," they replied. The toast was drunk with great +enthusiasm. +</P> + +<P> +"And now, my dear George," exclaimed the doctor, "to change one good +subject for another, tell us who is the favored lady?" +</P> + +<P> +"A Miss Rowena Warwick, sir," replied Tryon, vividly conscious of four +pairs of eyes fixed upon him, but, apart from the momentary +embarrassment, welcoming the subject as the one he would most like to +speak upon. +</P> + +<P> +"A good, strong old English name," observed the doctor. +</P> + +<P> +"The heroine of 'Ivanhoe'!" exclaimed Miss Harriet. +</P> + +<P> +"Warwick the Kingmaker!" said Miss Mary. "Is she tall and fair, and +dignified and stately?" +</P> + +<P> +"She is tall, dark rather than fair, and full of tender grace and sweet +humility." +</P> + +<P> +"She should have been named Rebecca instead of Rowena," rejoined Miss +Mary, who was well up in her Scott. +</P> + +<P> +"Tell us something about her people," asked Mrs. Green,—to which +inquiry the young ladies looked assent. +</P> + +<P> +In this meeting of the elect of his own class and kin Warwick felt a +certain strong illumination upon the value of birth and blood. Finding +Rena among people of the best social standing, the subsequent +intimation that she was a girl of no family had seemed a small matter +to one so much in love. Nevertheless, in his present company he felt a +decided satisfaction in being able to present for his future wife a +clean bill of social health. +</P> + +<P> +"Her brother is the most prominent lawyer of Clarence. They live in a +fine old family mansion, and are among the best people of the town." +</P> + +<P> +"Quite right, my boy," assented the doctor. "None but the best are good +enough for the best. You must bring her to Patesville some day. But +bless my life!" he exclaimed, looking at his watch, "I must be going. +Will you stay with the ladies awhile, or go back down town with me?" +</P> + +<P> +"I think I had better go with you, sir. I shall have to see Judge +Straight." +</P> + +<P> +"Very well. But you must come back to supper, and we'll have a few +friends in to meet you. You must see some of the best people." +</P> + +<P> +The doctor's buggy was waiting at the gate. As they were passing the +hotel on their drive down town, the clerk came out to the curbstone and +called to the doctor. +</P> + +<P> +"There's a man here, doctor, who's been taken suddenly ill. Can you +come in a minute?" +</P> + +<P> +"I suppose I'll have to. Will you wait for me here, George, or will +you drive down to the office? I can walk the rest of the way." +</P> + +<P> +"I think I'll wait here, doctor," answered Tryon. "I'll step up to my +room a moment. I'll be back by the time you're ready." +</P> + +<P> +It was while they were standing before the hotel, before alighting from +the buggy, that Frank Fowler, passing on his cart, saw Tryon and set +out as fast as he could to warn Mis' Molly and her daughter of his +presence in the town. +</P> + +<P> +Tryon went up to his room, returned after a while, and resumed his seat +in the buggy, where he waited fifteen minutes longer before the doctor +was ready. When they drew up in front of the office, the doctor's man +Dave was standing in the doorway, looking up the street with an anxious +expression, as though struggling hard to keep something upon his mind. +</P> + +<P> +"Anything wanted, Dave?" asked the doctor. +</P> + +<P> +"Dat young 'oman's be'n heah ag'in, suh, an' wants ter see you bad. +She's in de drugstore dere now, suh. Bless Gawd!" he added to himself +fervently, "I 'membered dat. Dis yer recommemb'ance er mine is gwine +ter git me inter trouble ef I don' look out, an' dat's a fac', sho'." +</P> + +<P> +The doctor sprang from the buggy with an agility remarkable in a man of +sixty. "Just keep your seat, George," he said to Tryon, "until I have +spoken to the young woman, and then we'll go across to Straight's. Or, +if you'll drive along a little farther, you can see the girl through +the window. She's worth the trouble, if you like a pretty face." +</P> + +<P> +Tryon liked one pretty face; moreover, tinted beauty had never appealed +to him. More to show a proper regard for what interested the doctor +than from any curiosity of his own, he drove forward a few feet, until +the side of the buggy was opposite the drugstore window, and then +looked in. +</P> + +<P> +Between the colored glass bottles in the window he could see a young +woman, a tall and slender girl, like a lily on its stem. She stood +talking with the doctor, who held his hat in his hand with as much +deference as though she were the proudest dame in town. Her face was +partly turned away from the window, but as Tryon's eye fell upon her, +he gave a great start. Surely, no two women could be so much alike. +The height, the graceful droop of the shoulders, the swan-like poise of +the head, the well-turned little ear,—surely, no two women could have +them all identical! But, pshaw! the notion was absurd, it was merely +the reflex influence of his morning's dream. +</P> + +<P> +She moved slightly; it was Rena's movement. Surely he knew the gown, +and the style of hair-dressing! She rested her hand lightly on the +back of a chair. The ring that glittered on her finger could be none +other than his own. +</P> + +<P> +The doctor bowed. The girl nodded in response, and, turning, left the +store. Tryon leaned forward from the buggy-seat and kept his eye fixed +on the figure that moved across the floor of the drugstore. As she came +out, she turned her face casually toward the buggy, and there could no +longer be any doubt as to her identity. +</P> + +<P> +When Rena's eyes fell upon the young man in the buggy, she saw a face +as pale as death, with starting eyes, in which love, which once had +reigned there, had now given place to astonishment and horror. She +stood a moment as if turned to stone. One appealing glance she +gave,—a look that might have softened adamant. When she saw that it +brought no answering sign of love or sorrow or regret, the color faded +from her cheek, the light from her eye, and she fell fainting to the +ground. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap16"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XVI +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE BOTTOM FALLS OUT +</H3> + +<P> +The first effect of Tryon's discovery was, figuratively speaking, to +knock the bottom out of things for him. It was much as if a boat on +which he had been floating smoothly down the stream of pleasure had +sunk suddenly and left him struggling in deep waters. The full +realization of the truth, which followed speedily, had for the moment +reversed his mental attitude toward her, and love and yearning had +given place to anger and disgust. His agitation could hardly have +escaped notice had not the doctor's attention, and that of the crowd +that quickly gathered, been absorbed by the young woman who had fallen. +During the time occupied in carrying her into the drugstore, restoring +her to consciousness, and sending her home in a carriage, Tryon had +time to recover in some degree his self-possession. When Rena had been +taken home, he slipped away for a long walk, after which he called at +Judge Straight's office and received the judge's report upon the matter +presented. Judge Straight had found the claim, in his opinion, a good +one; he had discovered property from which, in case the claim were +allowed, the amount might be realized. The judge, who had already been +informed of the incident at the drugstore, observed Tryon's +preoccupation and guessed shrewdly at its cause, but gave no sign. +Tryon left the matter of the note unreservedly in the lawyer's hands, +with instructions to communicate to him any further developments. +</P> + +<P> +Returning to the doctor's office, Tryon listened to that genial +gentleman's comments on the accident, his own concern in which he, by a +great effort, was able to conceal. The doctor insisted upon his +returning to the Hill for supper. Tryon pleaded illness. The doctor +was solicitous, felt his pulse, examined his tongue, pronounced him +feverish, and prescribed a sedative. Tryon sought refuge in his room +at the hotel, from which he did not emerge again until morning. +</P> + +<P> +His emotions were varied and stormy. At first he could see nothing but +the fraud of which he had been made the victim. A negro girl had been +foisted upon him for a white woman, and he had almost committed the +unpardonable sin against his race of marrying her. Such a step, he +felt, would have been criminal at any time; it would have been the most +odious treachery at this epoch, when his people had been subjugated and +humiliated by the Northern invaders, who had preached negro equality +and abolished the wholesome laws decreeing the separation of the races. +But no Southerner who loved his poor, downtrodden country, or his race, +the proud Anglo-Saxon race which traced the clear stream of its blood +to the cavaliers of England, could tolerate the idea that even in +distant generations that unsullied current could be polluted by the +blood of slaves. The very thought was an insult to the white people of +the South. For Tryon's liberality, of which he had spoken so nobly and +so sincerely, had been confined unconsciously, and as a matter of +course, within the boundaries of his own race. The Southern mind, in +discussing abstract questions relative to humanity, makes always, +consciously or unconsciously, the mental reservation that the +conclusions reached do not apply to the negro, unless they can be made +to harmonize with the customs of the country. +</P> + +<P> +But reasoning thus was not without effect upon a mind by nature +reasonable above the average. Tryon's race impulse and social prejudice +had carried him too far, and the swing of the mental pendulum brought +his thoughts rapidly back in the opposite direction. Tossing uneasily +on the bed, where he had thrown himself down without undressing, the +air of the room oppressed him, and he threw open the window. The cool +night air calmed his throbbing pulses. The moonlight, streaming +through the window, flooded the room with a soft light, in which he +seemed to see Rena standing before him, as she had appeared that +afternoon, gazing at him with eyes that implored charity and +forgiveness. He burst into tears,—bitter tears, that strained his +heartstrings. He was only a youth. She was his first love, and he had +lost her forever. She was worse than dead to him; for if he had seen +her lying in her shroud before him, he could at least have cherished +her memory; now, even this consolation was denied him. +</P> + +<P> +The town clock—which so long as it was wound up regularly recked +nothing of love or hate, joy or sorrow—solemnly tolled out the hour of +midnight and sounded the knell of his lost love. Lost she was, as +though she had never been, as she had indeed had no right to be. He +resolutely determined to banish her image from his mind. See her again +he could not; it would be painful to them both; it could be productive +of no good to either. He had felt the power and charm of love, and no +ordinary shook could have loosened its hold; but this catastrophe, +which had so rudely swept away the groundwork of his passion, had +stirred into new life all the slumbering pride of race and ancestry +which characterized his caste. How much of this sensitive superiority +was essential and how much accidental; how much of it was due to the +ever-suggested comparison with a servile race; how much of it was +ignorance and self-conceit; to what extent the boasted purity of his +race would have been contaminated by the fair woman whose image filled +his memory,—of these things he never thought. He was not influenced +by sordid considerations; he would have denied that his course was +controlled by any narrow prudence. If Rena had been white, pure white +(for in his creed there was no compromise), he would have braved any +danger for her sake. Had she been merely of illegitimate birth, he +would have overlooked the bar sinister. Had her people been simply +poor and of low estate, he would have brushed aside mere worldly +considerations, and would have bravely sacrificed convention for love; +for his liberality was not a mere form of words. But the one objection +which he could not overlook was, unhappily, the one that applied to the +only woman who had as yet moved his heart. He tried to be angry with +her, but after the first hour he found it impossible. He was a man of +too much imagination not to be able to put himself, in some measure at +least, in her place,—to perceive that for her the step which had +placed her in Tryon's world was the working out of nature's great law +of self-preservation, for which he could not blame her. But for the +sheerest accident,—no, rather, but for a providential +interference,—he would have married her, and might have gone to the +grave unconscious that she was other than she seemed. +</P> + +<P> +The clock struck the hour of two. With a shiver he closed the window, +undressed by the moonlight, drew down the shade, and went to bed. He +fell into an unquiet slumber, and dreamed again of Rena. He must learn +to control his waking thoughts; his dreams could not be curbed. In that +realm Rena's image was for many a day to remain supreme. He dreamed of +her sweet smile, her soft touch, her gentle voice. In all her fair +young beauty she stood before him, and then by some hellish magic she +was slowly transformed into a hideous black hag. With agonized eyes he +watched her beautiful tresses become mere wisps of coarse wool, wrapped +round with dingy cotton strings; he saw her clear eyes grow bloodshot, +her ivory teeth turn to unwholesome fangs. With a shudder he awoke, to +find the cold gray dawn of a rainy day stealing through the window. +</P> + +<P> +He rose, dressed himself, went down to breakfast, then entered the +writing-room and penned a letter which, after reading it over, he tore +into small pieces and threw into the waste basket. A second shared the +same fate. Giving up the task, he left the hotel and walked down to +Dr. Green's office. +</P> + +<P> +"Is the doctor in?" he asked of the colored attendant. +</P> + +<P> +"No, suh," replied the man; "he's gone ter see de young cullud gal w'at +fainted w'en de doctah was wid you yistiddy." +</P> + +<P> +Tryon sat down at the doctor's desk and hastily scrawled a note, +stating that business compelled his immediate departure. He thanked +the doctor for courtesies extended, and left his regards for the +ladies. Returning to the hotel, he paid his bill and took a hack for +the wharf, from which a boat was due to leave at nine o'clock. +</P> + +<P> +As the hack drove down Front Street, Tryon noted idly the houses that +lined the street. When he reached the sordid district in the lower +part of the town, there was nothing to attract his attention until the +carriage came abreast of a row of cedar-trees, beyond which could be +seen the upper part of a large house with dormer windows. Before the +gate stood a horse and buggy, which Tryon thought he recognized as Dr. +Green's. He leaned forward and addressed the driver. +</P> + +<P> +"Can you tell me who lives there?" Tryon asked, pointing to the house. +</P> + +<P> +"A callud 'oman, suh," the man replied, touching his hat. "Mis' Molly +Walden an' her daughter Rena." +</P> + +<P> +The vivid impression he received of this house, and the spectre that +rose before him of a pale, broken-hearted girl within its gray walls, +weeping for a lost lover and a vanished dream of happiness, did not +argue well for Tryon's future peace of mind. Rena's image was not to +be easily expelled from his heart; for the laws of nature are higher +and more potent than merely human institutions, and upon anything like +a fair field are likely to win in the long ran. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap17"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XVII +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +TWO LETTERS +</H3> + +<P> +Warwick awaited events with some calmness and some philosophy,—he +could hardly have had the one without the other; and it required much +philosophy to make him wait a week in patience for information upon a +subject in which he was so vitally interested. The delay pointed to +disaster. Bad news being expected, delay at least put off the evil day. +At the end of the week he received two letters,—one addressed in his +own hand writing and postmarked Patesville, N. C.; the other in the +handwriting of George Tryon. He opened the Patesville letter, which +ran as follows:— +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +MY DEAR SON,—Frank is writing this letter for me. I am not well, but, +thank the Lord, I am better than I was. +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +Rena has had a heap of trouble on account of me and my sickness. If I +could of dreamt that I was going to do so much harm, I would of died +and gone to meet my God without writing one word to spoil my girl's +chances in life; but I didn't know what was going to happen, and I hope +the Lord will forgive me. +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +Frank knows all about it, and so I am having him write this letter for +me, as Rena is not well enough yet. Frank has been very good to me and +to Rena. He was down to your place and saw Rena there, and never said +a word about it to nobody, not even to me, because he didn't want to do +Rena no harm. Frank is the best friend I have got in town, because he +does so much for me and don't want nothing in return. (He tells me not +to put this in about him, but I want you to know it.) +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +And now about Rena. She come to see me, and I got better right away, +for it was longing for her as much as anything else that made me sick, +and I was mighty mizzable. When she had been here three days and was +going back next day, she went up town to see the doctor for me, and +while she was up there she fainted and fell down in the street, and Dr. +Green sent her home in his buggy and come down to see her. He couldn't +tell what was the matter with her, but she has been sick ever since and +out of her head some of the time, and keeps on calling on somebody by +the name of George, which was the young white man she told me she was +going to marry. It seems he was in town the day Rena was took sick, +for Frank saw him up street and run all the way down here to tell me, +so that she could keep out of his way, while she was still up town +waiting for the doctor and getting me some camphor gum for my camphor +bottle. Old Judge Straight must have knowed something about it, for he +sent me a note to keep Rena in the house, but the little boy he sent it +by didn't bring it till Rena was already gone up town, and, as I +couldn't read, of course I didn't know what it said. Dr. Green heard +Rena running on while she was out of her head, and I reckon he must +have suspicioned something, for he looked kind of queer and went away +without saying nothing. Frank says she met this man on the street, and +when he found out she wasn't white, he said or done something that +broke her heart and she fainted and fell down. +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +I am writing you this letter because I know you will be worrying about +Rena not coming back. If it wasn't for Frank, I hardly know how I +could write to you. Frank is not going to say nothing about Rena's +passing for white and meeting this man, and neither am I; and I don't +suppose Judge Straight will say nothing, because he is our good friend; +and Dr. Green won't say nothing about it, because Frank says Dr. +Green's cook Nancy says this young man named George stopped with him +and was some cousin or relation to the family, and they wouldn't want +people to know that any of their kin was thinking about marrying a +colored girl, and the white folks have all been mad since J. B. +Thompson married his black housekeeper when she got religion and +wouldn't live with him no more. +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +All the rest of the connection are well. I have just been in to see +how Rena is. She is feeling some better, I think, and says give you +her love and she will write you a letter in a few days, as soon as she +is well enough. She bust out crying while she was talking, but I +reckon that is better than being out of her head. I hope this may find +you well, and that this man of Rena's won't say nor do nothing down +there to hurt you. He has not wrote to Rena nor sent her no word. I +reckon he is very mad. +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> + Your affectionate mother,<BR> + MARY WALDEN.<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +This letter, while confirming Warwick's fears, relieved his suspense. +He at least knew the worst, unless there should be something still more +disturbing in Tryon's letter, which he now proceeded to open, and which +ran as follows:— +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +JOHN WARWICK, ESQ. +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +Dear Sir,—When I inform you, as you are doubtless informed ere the +receipt of this, that I saw your sister in Patesville last week and +learned the nature of those antecedents of yours and hers at which you +hinted so obscurely in a recent conversation, you will not be surprised +to learn that I take this opportunity of renouncing any pretensions to +Miss Warwick's hand, and request you to convey this message to her, +since it was through you that I formed her acquaintance. I think +perhaps that few white men would deem it necessary to make an +explanation under the circumstances, and I do not know that I need say +more than that no one, considering where and how I met your sister, +would have dreamed of even the possibility of what I have learned. I +might with justice reproach you for trifling with the most sacred +feelings of a man's heart; but I realize the hardship of your position +and hers, and can make allowances. I would never have sought to know +this thing; I would doubtless have been happier had I gone through life +without finding it out; but having the knowledge, I cannot ignore it, +as you must understand perfectly well. I regret that she should be +distressed or disappointed,—she has not suffered alone. +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +I need scarcely assure you that I shall say nothing about this affair, +and that I shall keep your secret as though it were my own. +Personally, I shall never be able to think of you as other than a white +man, as you may gather from the tone of this letter; and while I cannot +marry your sister, I wish her every happiness, and remain, +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> + Yours very truly,<BR> + GEORGE TRYON.<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Warwick could not know that this formal epistle was the last of a dozen +that Tryon had written and destroyed during the week since the meeting +in Patesville,—hot, blistering letters, cold, cutting letters, +scornful, crushing letters. Though none of them was sent, except this +last, they had furnished a safety-valve for his emotions, and had left +him in a state of mind that permitted him to write the foregoing. +</P> + +<P> +And now, while Rena is recovering from her illness, and Tryon from his +love, and while Fate is shuffling the cards for another deal, a few +words may be said about the past life of the people who lived in the +rear of the flower garden, in the quaint old house beyond the cedars, +and how their lives were mingled with those of the men and women around +them and others that were gone. For connected with our kind we must +be; if not by our virtues, then by our vices,—if not by our services, +at least by our needs. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap18"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XVIII +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +UNDER THE OLD REGIME +</H3> + +<P> +For many years before the civil war there had lived, in the old house +behind the cedars, a free colored woman who went by the name of Molly +Walden—her rightful name, for her parents were free-born and legally +married. She was a tall woman, straight as an arrow. Her complexion +in youth was of an old ivory tint, which at the period of this story, +time had darkened measurably. Her black eyes, now faded, had once +sparkled with the fire of youth. High cheek-bones, straight black +hair, and a certain dignified reposefulness of manner pointed to an +aboriginal descent. Tradition gave her to the negro race. Doubtless +she had a strain of each, with white blood very visibly predominating +over both. In Louisiana or the West Indies she would have been called +a quadroon, or more loosely, a creole; in North Carolina, where fine +distinctions were not the rule in matters of color, she was +sufficiently differentiated when described as a bright mulatto. +</P> + +<P> +Molly's free birth carried with it certain advantages, even in the +South before the war. Though degraded from its high estate, and shorn +of its choicest attributes, the word "freedom" had nevertheless a +cheerful sound, and described a condition that left even to colored +people who could claim it some liberty of movement and some control of +their own persons. They were not citizens, yet they were not slaves. +No negro, save in books, ever refused freedom; many of them ran +frightful risks to achieve it. Molly's parents were of the class, more +numerous in North Carolina than elsewhere, known as "old issue free +negroes," which took its rise in the misty colonial period, when race +lines were not so closely drawn, and the population of North Carolina +comprised many Indians, runaway negroes, and indentured white servants +from the seaboard plantations, who mingled their blood with great +freedom and small formality. Free colored people in North Carolina +exercised the right of suffrage as late as 1835, and some of them, in +spite of galling restrictions, attained to a considerable degree of +prosperity, and dreamed of a still brighter future, when the growing +tyranny of the slave power crushed their hopes and crowded the free +people back upon the black mass just beneath them. Mis' Molly's father +had been at one time a man of some means. In an evil hour, with an +overweening confidence in his fellow men, he indorsed a note for a +white man who, in a moment of financial hardship, clapped his colored +neighbor on the back and called him brother. Not poverty, but wealth, +is the most potent leveler. In due time the indorser was called upon to +meet the maturing obligation. This was the beginning of a series of +financial difficulties which speedily involved him in ruin. He died +prematurely, a disappointed and disheartened man, leaving his family in +dire poverty. +</P> + +<P> +His widow and surviving children lived on for a little while at the +house he had owned, just outside of the town, on one of the main +traveled roads. By the wayside, near the house, there was a famous deep +well. The slim, barefoot girl, with sparkling eyes and voluminous +hair, who played about the yard and sometimes handed water in a gourd +to travelers, did not long escape critical observation. A gentleman +drove by one day, stopped at the well, smiled upon the girl, and said +kind words. He came again, more than once, and soon, while scarcely +more than a child in years, Molly was living in her own house, hers by +deed of gift, for her protector was rich and liberal. Her mother +nevermore knew want. Her poor relations could always find a meal in +Molly's kitchen. She did not flaunt her prosperity in the world's +face; she hid it discreetly behind the cedar screen. Those who wished +could know of it, for there were few secrets in Patesville; those who +chose could as easily ignore it. There were few to trouble themselves +about the secluded life of an obscure woman of a class which had no +recognized place in the social economy. She worshiped the ground upon +which her lord walked, was humbly grateful for his protection, and +quite as faithful as the forbidden marriage vow could possibly have +made her. She led her life in material peace and comfort, and with a +certain amount of dignity. Of her false relation to society she was +not without some vague conception; but the moral point involved was so +confused with other questions growing out—of slavery and caste as to +cause her, as a rule, but little uneasiness; and only now and then, in +the moments of deeper feeling that come sometimes to all who live and +love, did there break through the mists of ignorance and prejudice +surrounding her a flash of light by which she saw, so far as she was +capable of seeing, her true position, which in the clear light of truth +no special pleading could entirely justify. For she was free, she had +not the slave's excuse. With every inducement to do evil and few +incentives to do well, and hence entitled to charitable judgment, she +yet had freedom of choice, and therefore could not wholly escape blame. +Let it be said, in further extenuation, that no other woman lived in +neglect or sorrow because of her. She robbed no one else. For what +life gave her she returned an equivalent; and what she did not pay, her +children settled to the last farthing. +</P> + +<P> +Several years before the war, when Mis' Molly's daughter Rena was a few +years old, death had suddenly removed the source of their prosperity. +</P> + +<P> +The household was not left entirely destitute. Mis' Molly owned her +home, and had a store of gold pieces in the chest beneath her bed. A +small piece of real estate stood in the name of each of the children, +the income from which contributed to their maintenance. Larger +expectations were dependent upon the discovery of a promised will, +which never came to light. Mis' Molly wore black for several years +after this bereavement, until the teacher and the preacher, following +close upon the heels of military occupation, suggested to the colored +people new standards of life and character, in the light of which Mis' +Molly laid her mourning sadly and shamefacedly aside. She had eaten of +the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge. After the war she formed the habit +of church-going, and might have been seen now and then, with her +daughter, in a retired corner of the gallery of the white Episcopal +church. Upon the ground floor was a certain pew which could be seen +from her seat, where once had sat a gentleman whose pleasures had not +interfered with the practice of his religion. She might have had a +better seat in a church where a Northern missionary would have preached +a sermon better suited to her comprehension and her moral needs, but +she preferred the other. She was not white, alas! she was shut out +from this seeming paradise; but she liked to see the distant glow of +the celestial city, and to recall the days when she had basked in its +radiance. She did not sympathize greatly with the new era opened up +for the emancipated slaves; she had no ideal love of liberty; she was +no broader and no more altruistic than the white people around her, to +whom she had always looked up; and she sighed for the old days, because +to her they had been the good days. Now, not only was her king dead, +but the shield of his memory protected her no longer. +</P> + +<P> +Molly had lost one child, and his grave was visible from the kitchen +window, under a small clump of cedars in the rear of the two-acre lot. +For even in the towns many a household had its private cemetery in +those old days when the living were close to the dead, and ghosts were +not the mere chimeras of a sick imagination, but real though +unsubstantial entities, of which it was almost disgraceful not to have +seen one or two. Had not the Witch of Endor called up the shade of +Samuel the prophet? Had not the spirit of Mis' Molly's dead son +appeared to her, as well as the ghostly presence of another she had +loved? +</P> + +<P> +In 1855, Mis' Molly's remaining son had grown into a tall, slender lad +of fifteen, with his father's patrician features and his mother's +Indian hair, and no external sign to mark him off from the white boys +on the street. He soon came to know, however, that there was a +difference. He was informed one day that he was black. He denied the +proposition and thrashed the child who made it. The scene was repeated +the next day, with a variation,—he was himself thrashed by a larger +boy. When he had been beaten five or six times, he ceased to argue the +point, though to himself he never admitted the charge. His playmates +might call him black; the mirror proved that God, the Father of all, +had made him white; and God, he had been taught, made no +mistakes,—having made him white, He must have meant him to be white. +</P> + +<P> +In the "hall" or parlor of his mother's house stood a quaintly carved +black walnut bookcase, containing a small but remarkable collection of +books, which had at one time been used, in his hours of retreat and +relaxation from business and politics, by the distinguished gentleman +who did not give his name to Mis' Molly's children,—to whom it would +have been a valuable heritage, could they have had the right to bear +it. Among the books were a volume of Fielding's complete works, in +fine print, set in double columns; a set of Bulwer's novels; a +collection of everything that Walter Scott—the literary idol of the +South—had ever written; Beaumont and Fletcher's plays, cheek by jowl +with the history of the virtuous Clarissa Harlowe; the Spectator and +Tristram Shandy, Robinson Crusoe and the Arabian Nights. On these +secluded shelves Roderick Random, Don Quixote, and Gil Blas for a long +time ceased their wanderings, the Pilgrim's Progress was suspended, +Milton's mighty harmonies were dumb, and Shakespeare reigned over a +silent kingdom. An illustrated Bible, with a wonderful Apocrypha, was +flanked on one side by Volney's Ruins of Empire and on the other by +Paine's Age of Reason, for the collector of the books had been a man of +catholic taste as well as of inquiring mind, and no one who could have +criticised his reading ever penetrated behind the cedar hedge. A +history of the French Revolution consorted amiably with a homespun +chronicle of North Carolina, rich in biographical notices of +distinguished citizens and inscriptions from their tombstones, upon +reading which one might well wonder why North Carolina had not long ago +eclipsed the rest of the world in wealth, wisdom, glory, and renown. +On almost every page of this monumental work could be found the most +ardent panegyrics of liberty, side by side with the slavery statistics +of the State,—an incongruity of which the learned author was +deliciously unconscious. +</P> + +<P> +When John Walden was yet a small boy, he had learned all that could be +taught by the faded mulatto teacher in the long, shiny black frock +coat, whom local public opinion permitted to teach a handful of free +colored children for a pittance barely enough to keep soul and body +together. When the boy had learned to read, he discovered the library, +which for several years had been without a reader, and found in it the +portal of a new world, peopled with strange and marvelous beings. Lying +prone upon the floor of the shaded front piazza, behind the fragrant +garden, he followed the fortunes of Tom Jones and Sophia; he wept over +the fate of Eugene Aram; he penetrated with Richard the Lion-heart into +Saladin's tent, with Gil Blas into the robbers' cave; he flew through +the air on the magic carpet or the enchanted horse, or tied with +Sindbad to the roc's leg. Sometimes he read or repeated the simpler +stories to his little sister, sitting wide-eyed by his side. When he +had read all the books,—indeed, long before he had read them all,—he +too had tasted of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge: contentment took +its flight, and happiness lay far beyond the sphere where he was born. +The blood of his white fathers, the heirs of the ages, cried out for +its own, and after the manner of that blood set about getting the +object of its desire. +</P> + +<P> +Near the corner of Mackenzie Street, just one block north of the +Patesville market-house, there had stood for many years before the war, +on the verge of the steep bank of Beaver Creek, a small frame office +building, the front of which was level with the street, while the rear +rested on long brick pillars founded on the solid rock at the edge of +the brawling stream below. Here, for nearly half a century, Archibald +Straight had transacted legal business for the best people of +Northumberland County. Full many a lawsuit had he won, lost, or +settled; many a spendthrift had he saved from ruin, and not a few +families from disgrace. Several times honored by election to the +bench, he had so dispensed justice tempered with mercy as to win the +hearts of all good citizens, and especially those of the poor, the +oppressed, and the socially disinherited. The rights of the humblest +negro, few as they might be, were as sacred to him as those of the +proudest aristocrat, and he had sentenced a man to be hanged for the +murder of his own slave. An old-fashioned man, tall and spare of +figure and bowed somewhat with age, he was always correctly clad in a +long frock coat of broadcloth, with a high collar and a black stock. +Courtly in address to his social equals (superiors he had none), he was +kind and considerate to those beneath him. He owned a few domestic +servants, no one of whom had ever felt the weight of his hand, and for +whose ultimate freedom he had provided in his will. In the +long-drawn-out slavery agitation he had taken a keen interest, rather +as observer than as participant. As the heat of controversy increased, +his lack of zeal for the peculiar institution led to his defeat for the +bench by a more active partisan. His was too just a mind not to +perceive the arguments on both sides; but, on the whole, he had stood +by the ancient landmarks, content to let events drift to a conclusion +he did not expect to see; the institutions of his fathers would +probably last his lifetime. +</P> + +<P> +One day Judge Straight was sitting in his office reading a recently +published pamphlet,—presenting an elaborate pro-slavery argument, +based upon the hopeless intellectual inferiority of the negro, and the +physical and moral degeneration of mulattoes, who combined the worst +qualities of their two ancestral races,—when a barefooted boy walked +into the office, straw hat in hand, came boldly up to the desk at which +the old judge was sitting, and said as the judge looked up through his +gold-rimmed glasses,— +</P> + +<P> +"Sir, I want to be a lawyer!" +</P> + +<P> +"God bless me!" exclaimed the judge. "It is a singular desire, from a +singular source, and expressed in a singular way. Who the devil are +you, sir, that wish so strange a thing as to become a +lawyer—everybody's servant?" +</P> + +<P> +"And everybody's master, sir," replied the lad stoutly. +</P> + +<P> +"That is a matter of opinion, and open to argument," rejoined the +judge, amused and secretly flattered by this tribute to his profession, +"though there may be a grain of truth in what you say. But what is your +name, Mr. Would-be-lawyer?" +</P> + +<P> +"John Walden, sir," answered the lad. +</P> + +<P> +"John Walden?—Walden?" mused the judge. "What Walden can that be? Do +you belong in town?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, sir." +</P> + +<P> +"Humph! I can't imagine who you are. It's plain that you are a lad of +good blood, and yet I don't know whose son you can be. What is your +father's name?" +</P> + +<P> +The lad hesitated, and flushed crimson. +</P> + +<P> +The old gentleman noted his hesitation. "It is a wise son," he +thought, "that knows his own father. He is a bright lad, and will have +this question put to him more than once. I'll see how he will answer +it." +</P> + +<P> +The boy maintained an awkward silence, while the old judge eyed him +keenly. +</P> + +<P> +"My father's dead," he said at length, in a low voice. "I'm Mis' Molly +Walden's son." He had expected, of course, to tell who he was, if +asked, but had not foreseen just the form of the inquiry; and while he +had thought more of his race than of his illegitimate birth, he +realized at this moment as never before that this question too would be +always with him. As put now by Judge Straight, it made him wince. He +had not read his father's books for nothing. +</P> + +<P> +"God bless my soul!" exclaimed the judge in genuine surprise at this +answer; "and you want to be a lawyer!" The situation was so much worse +than he had suspected that even an old practitioner, case-hardened by +years of life at the trial table and on the bench, was startled for a +moment into a comical sort of consternation, so apparent that a lad +less stout-hearted would have weakened and fled at the sight of it. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, sir. Why not?" responded the boy, trembling a little at the +knees, but stoutly holding his ground. +</P> + +<P> +"He wants to be a lawyer, and he asks me why not!" muttered the judge, +speaking apparently to himself. He rose from his chair, walked across +the room, and threw open a window. The cool morning air brought with +it the babbling of the stream below and the murmur of the mill near by. +He glanced across the creek to the ruined foundation of an old house on +the low ground beyond the creek. Turning from the window, he looked +back at the boy, who had remained standing between him and the door. +At that moment another lad came along the street and stopped opposite +the open doorway. The presence of the two boys in connection with the +book he had been reading suggested a comparison. The judge knew the +lad outside as the son of a leading merchant of the town. The merchant +and his wife were both of old families which had lived in the community +for several generations, and whose blood was presumably of the purest +strain; yet the boy was sallow, with amorphous features, thin shanks, +and stooping shoulders. The youth standing in the judge's office, on +the contrary, was straight, shapely, and well-grown. His eye was +clear, and he kept it fixed on the old gentleman with a look in which +there was nothing of cringing. He was no darker than many a white boy +bronzed by the Southern sun; his hair and eyes were black, and his +features of the high-bred, clean-cut order that marks the patrician +type the world over. What struck the judge most forcibly, however, was +the lad's resemblance to an old friend and companion and client. He +recalled a certain conversation with this old friend, who had said to +him one day: +</P> + +<P> +"Archie, I'm coming in to have you draw my will. There are some +children for whom I would like to make ample provision. I can't give +them anything else, but money will make them free of the world." +</P> + +<P> +The judge's friend had died suddenly before carrying out this good +intention. The judge had taken occasion to suggest the existence of +these children, and their father's intentions concerning them, to the +distant relatives who had inherited his friend's large estate. They +had chosen to take offense at the suggestion. One had thought it in +shocking bad taste; another considered any mention of such a subject an +insult to his cousin's memory. A third had said, with flashing eyes, +that the woman and her children had already robbed the estate of +enough; that it was a pity the little niggers were not slaves—that +they would have added measurably to the value of the property. Judge +Straight's manner indicated some disapproval of their attitude, and the +settlement of the estate was placed in other hands than his. Now, this +son, with his father's face and his father's voice, stood before his +father's friend, demanding entrance to the golden gate of opportunity, +which society barred to all who bore the blood of the despised race. +</P> + +<P> +As he kept on looking at the boy, who began at length to grow somewhat +embarrassed under this keen scrutiny, the judge's mind reverted to +certain laws and judicial decisions that he had looked up once or twice +in his lifetime. Even the law, the instrument by which tyranny riveted +the chains upon its victims, had revolted now and then against the +senseless and unnatural prejudice by which a race ascribing its +superiority to right of blood permitted a mere suspicion of servile +blood to outweigh a vast preponderance of its own. +</P> + +<P> +"Why, indeed, should he not be a lawyer, or anything else that a man +might be, if it be in him?" asked the judge, speaking rather to himself +than to the boy. "Sit down," he ordered, pointing to a chair on the +other side of the room. That he should ask a colored lad to be seated +in his presence was of itself enough to stamp the judge as eccentric. +"You want to be a lawyer," he went on, adjusting his spectacles. "You +are aware, of course, that you are a negro?" +</P> + +<P> +"I am white," replied the lad, turning back his sleeve and holding out +his arm, "and I am free, as all my people were before me." +</P> + +<P> +The old lawyer shook his head, and fixed his eyes upon the lad with a +slightly quizzical smile. "You are black." he said, "and you are not +free. You cannot travel without your papers; you cannot secure +accommodations at an inn; you could not vote, if you were of age; you +cannot be out after nine o'clock without a permit. If a white man +struck you, you could not return the blow, and you could not testify +against him in a court of justice. You are black, my lad, and you are +not free. Did you ever hear of the Dred Scott decision, delivered by +the great, wise, and learned Judge Taney?" +</P> + +<P> +"No, sir," answered the boy. +</P> + +<P> +"It is too long to read," rejoined the judge, taking up the pamphlet he +had laid down upon the lad's entrance, "but it says in substance, as +quoted by this author, that negroes are beings 'of an inferior order, +and altogether unfit to associate with the white race, either in social +or political relations; in fact, so inferior that they have no rights +which the white man is bound to respect, and that the negro may justly +and lawfully be reduced to slavery for his benefit.' That is the law +of this nation, and that is the reason why you cannot be a lawyer." +</P> + +<P> +"It may all be true," replied the boy, "but it don't apply to me. It +says 'the negro.' A negro is black; I am white, and not black." +</P> + +<P> +"Black as ink, my lad," returned the lawyer, shaking his head. "'One +touch of nature makes the whole world kin,' says the poet. Somewhere, +sometime, you had a black ancestor. One drop of black blood makes the +whole man black." +</P> + +<P> +"Why shouldn't it be the other way, if the white blood is so much +superior?" inquired the lad. +</P> + +<P> +"Because it is more convenient as it is—and more profitable." +</P> + +<P> +"It is not right," maintained the lad. +</P> + +<P> +"God bless me!" exclaimed the old gentleman, "he is invading the field +of ethics! He will be questioning the righteousness of slavery next! +I'm afraid you wouldn't make a good lawyer, in any event. Lawyers go +by the laws—they abide by the accomplished fact; to them, whatever is, +is right. The laws do not permit men of color to practice law, and +public sentiment would not allow one of them to study it." +</P> + +<P> +"I had thought," said the lad, "that I might pass for white. There are +white people darker than I am." +</P> + +<P> +"Ah, well, that is another matter; but"— +</P> + +<P> +The judge stopped for a moment, struck by the absurdity of his arguing +such a question with a mulatto boy. He really must be falling into +premature dotage. The proper thing would be to rebuke the lad for his +presumption and advise him to learn to take care of horses, or make +boots, or lay bricks. But again he saw his old friend in the lad's +face, and again he looked in vain for any sign of negro blood. The +least earmark would have turned the scale, but he could not find it. +</P> + +<P> +"That is another matter," he repeated. "Here you have started as +black, and must remain so. But if you wish to move away, and sink your +past into oblivion, the case might be different. Let us see what the +law is; you might not need it if you went far enough, but it is well +enough to be within it—liberty is sweeter when founded securely on the +law." +</P> + +<P> +He took down a volume bound in legal calf and glanced through it. "The +color line is drawn in North Carolina at four generations removed from +the negro; there have been judicial decisions to that effect. I +imagine that would cover your case. But let us see what South Carolina +may say about it," he continued, taking another book. "I think the law +is even more liberal there. Ah, this is the place:— +</P> + +<P> +"'The term mulatto,'" he read, "'is not invariably applicable to every +admixture of African blood with the European, nor is one having all the +features of a white to be ranked with the degraded class designated by +the laws of this State as persons of color, because of some remote +taint of the negro race. Juries would probably be justified in holding +a person to be white in whom the admixture of African blood did not +exceed one eighth. And even where color or feature are doubtful, it is +a question for the jury to decide by reputation, by reception into +society, and by their exercise of the privileges of the white man, as +well as by admixture of blood.'" +</P> + +<P> +"Then I need not be black?" the boy cried, with sparkling eyes. +</P> + +<P> +"No," replied the lawyer, "you need not be black, away from Patesville. +You have the somewhat unusual privilege, it seems, of choosing between +two races, and if you are a lad of spirit, as I think you are, it will +not take you long to make your choice. As you have all the features of +a white man, you would, at least in South Carolina, have simply to +assume the place and exercise the privileges of a white man. You +might, of course, do the same thing anywhere, as long as no one knew +your origin. But the matter has been adjudicated there in several +cases, and on the whole I think South Carolina is the place for you. +They're more liberal there, perhaps because they have many more blacks +than whites, and would like to lessen the disproportion." +</P> + +<P> +"From this time on," said the boy, "I am white." +</P> + +<P> +"Softly, softly, my Caucasian fellow citizen," returned the judge, +chuckling with quiet amusement. "You are white in the abstract, before +the law. You may cherish the fact in secret, but I would not advise +you to proclaim it openly just yet. You must wait until you go +away—to South Carolina." +</P> + +<P> +"And can I learn to be a lawyer, sir?" asked the lad. +</P> + +<P> +"It seems to me that you ought to be reasonably content for one day +with what you have learned already. You cannot be a lawyer until you +are white, in position as well as in theory, nor until you are +twenty-one years old. I need an office boy. If you are willing to +come into my office, sweep it, keep my books dusted, and stay here when +I am out, I do not care. To the rest of the town you will be my +servant, and still a negro. If you choose to read my books when no one +is about and be white in your own private opinion, I have no objection. +When you have made up your mind to go away, perhaps what you have read +may help you. But mum 's the word! If I hear a whisper of this from +any other source, out you go, neck and crop! I am willing to help you +make a man of yourself, but it can only be done under the rose." +</P> + +<P> +For two years John Walden openly swept the office and surreptitiously +read the law books of old Judge Straight. When he was eighteen, he +asked his mother for a sum of money, kissed her good-by, and went out +into the world. When his sister, then a pretty child of seven, cried +because her big brother was going away, he took her up in his arms, +gave her a silver dime with a hole in it for a keepsake, hugged her +close, and kissed her. +</P> + +<P> +"Nev' min', sis," he said soothingly. "Be a good little gal, an' some +o' these days I'll come back to see you and bring you somethin' fine." +</P> + +<P> +In after years, when Mis' Molly was asked what had become of her son, +she would reply with sad complacency,— +</P> + +<P> +"He's gone over on the other side." +</P> + +<P> +As we have seen, he came back ten years later. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Many years before, when Mis' Molly, then a very young woman, had taken +up her residence in the house behind the cedars, the gentleman +heretofore referred to had built a cabin on the opposite corner, in +which he had installed a trusted slave by the name of Peter Fowler and +his wife Nancy. Peter was a good mechanic, and hired his time from his +master with the provision that Peter and his wife should do certain +work for Mis' Molly and serve as a sort of protection for her. In +course of time Peter, who was industrious and thrifty, saved enough +money to purchase his freedom and that of his wife and their one child, +and to buy the little house across the street, with the cooper shop +behind it. After they had acquired their freedom, Peter and Nancy did +no work for Mis' Molly save as they were paid for it, and as a rule +preferred not to work at all for the woman who had been practically +their mistress; it made them seem less free. Nevertheless, the two +households had remained upon good terms, even after the death of the +man whose will had brought them together, and who had remained Peter's +patron after he had ceased to be his master. There was no intimate +association between the two families. Mis' Molly felt herself +infinitely superior to Peter and his wife,—scarcely less superior than +her poor white neighbors felt themselves to Mis' Molly. Mis' Molly +always meant to be kind, and treated Peter and Nancy with a certain +good-natured condescension. They resented this, never openly or +offensively, but always in a subconscious sort of way, even when they +did not speak of it among themselves—much as they had resented her +mistress-ship in the old days. For after all, they argued, in spite of +her airs and graces, her white face and her fine clothes, was she not a +negro, even as themselves? and since the slaves had been freed, was not +one negro as good as another? +</P> + +<P> +Peter's son Frank had grown up with little Rena. He was several years +older than she, and when Rena was a small child Mis' Molly had often +confided her to his care, and he had watched over her and kept her from +harm. When Frank became old enough to go to work in the cooper shop, +Rena, then six or seven, had often gone across to play among the clean +white shavings. Once Frank, while learning the trade, had let slip a +sharp steel tool, which flying toward Rena had grazed her arm and sent +the red blood coursing along the white flesh and soaking the muslin +sleeve. He had rolled up the sleeve and stanched the blood and dried +her tears. For a long time thereafter her mother kept her away from +the shop and was very cold to Frank. One day the little girl wandered +down to the bank of the old canal. It had been raining for several +days, and the water was quite deep in the channel. The child slipped +and fell into the stream. From the open window of the cooper shop +Frank heard a scream. He ran down to the canal and pulled her out, and +carried her all wet and dripping to the house. From that time he had +been restored to favor. He had watched the girl grow up to womanhood +in the years following the war, and had been sorry when she became too +old to play about the shop. +</P> + +<P> +He never spoke to her of love,—indeed, he never thought of his passion +in such a light. There would have been no legal barrier to their union; +there would have been no frightful menace to white supremacy in the +marriage of the negro and the octoroon: the drop of dark blood bridged +the chasm. But Frank knew that she did not love him, and had not hoped +that she might. His was one of those rare souls that can give with +small hope of return. When he had made the scar upon her arm, by the +same token she had branded him her slave forever; when he had saved her +from a watery grave, he had given his life to her. There are depths of +fidelity and devotion in the negro heart that have never been fathomed +or fully appreciated. Now and then in the kindlier phases of slavery +these qualities were brightly conspicuous, and in them, if wisely +appealed to, lies the strongest hope of amity between the two races +whose destiny seems bound up together in the Western world. Even a +dumb brute can be won by kindness. Surely it were worth while to try +some other weapon than scorn and contumely and hard words upon people +of our common race,—the human race, which is bigger and broader than +Celt or Saxon, barbarian or Greek, Jew or Gentile, black or white; for +we are all children of a common Father, forget it as we may, and each +one of us is in some measure his brother's keeper. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap19"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XIX +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +GOD MADE US ALL +</H3> + +<P> +Rena was convalescent from a two-weeks' illness when her brother came +to see her. He arrived at Patesville by an early morning train before +the town was awake, and walked unnoticed from the station to his +mother's house. His meeting with his sister was not without emotion: +he embraced her tenderly, and Rena became for a few minutes a very +Niobe of grief. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, it was cruel, cruel!" she sobbed. "I shall never get over it." +</P> + +<P> +"I know it, my dear," replied Warwick soothingly,—"I know it, and I'm +to blame for it. If I had never taken you away from here, you would +have escaped this painful experience. But do not despair; all is not +lost. Tryon will not marry you, as I hoped he might, while I feared +the contrary; but he is a gentleman, and will be silent. Come back and +try again." +</P> + +<P> +"No, John. I couldn't go through it a second time. I managed very +well before, when I thought our secret was unknown; but now I could +never be sure. It would be borne on every wind, for aught I knew, and +every rustling leaf might whisper it. The law, you said, made us +white; but not the law, nor even love, can conquer prejudice. HE spoke +of my beauty, my grace, my sweetness! I looked into his eyes and +believed him. And yet he left me without a word! What would I do in +Clarence now? I came away engaged to be married, with even the day +set; I should go back forsaken and discredited; even the servants would +pity me." +</P> + +<P> +"Little Albert is pining for you," suggested Warwick. "We could make +some explanation that would spare your feelings." +</P> + +<P> +"Ah, do not tempt me, John! I love the child, and am grieved to leave +him. I'm grateful, too, John, for what you have done for me. I am not +sorry that I tried it. It opened my eyes, and I would rather die of +knowledge than live in ignorance. But I could not go through it again, +John; I am not strong enough. I could do you no good; I have made you +trouble enough already. Get a mother for Albert—Mrs. Newberry would +marry you, secret and all, and would be good to the child. Forget me, +John, and take care of yourself. Your friend has found you out through +me—he may have told a dozen people. You think he will be silent;—I +thought he loved me, and he left me without a word, and with a look +that told me how he hated and despised me. I would not have believed +it—even of a white man." +</P> + +<P> +"You do him an injustice," said her brother, producing Tryon's letter. +"He did not get off unscathed. He sent you a message." +</P> + +<P> +She turned her face away, but listened while he read the letter. "He +did not love me," she cried angrily, when he had finished, "or he would +not have cast me off—he would not have looked at me so. The law would +have let him marry me. I seemed as white as he did. He might have +gone anywhere with me, and no one would have stared at us curiously; no +one need have known. The world is wide—there must be some place where +a man could live happily with the woman he loved." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, Rena, there is; and the world is wide enough for you to get along +without Tryon." +</P> + +<P> +"For a day or two," she went on, "I hoped he might come back. But his +expression in that awful moment grew upon me, haunted me day and night, +until I shuddered at the thought that I might ever see him again. He +looked at me as though I were not even a human being. I do not love +him any longer, John; I would not marry him if I were white, or he were +as I am. He did not love me—or he would have acted differently. He +might have loved me and have left me—he could not have loved me and +have looked at me so!" +</P> + +<P> +She was weeping hysterically. There was little he could say to comfort +her. Presently she dried her tears. Warwick was reluctant to leave +her in Patesville. Her childish happiness had been that of ignorance; +she could never be happy there again. She had flowered in the sunlight; +she must not pine away in the shade. +</P> + +<P> +"If you won't come back with me, Rena, I'll send you to some school at +the North, where you can acquire a liberal education, and prepare +yourself for some career of usefulness. You may marry a better man +than even Tryon." +</P> + +<P> +"No," she replied firmly, "I shall never marry any man, and I'll not +leave mother again. God is against it; I'll stay with my own people." +</P> + +<P> +"God has nothing to do with it," retorted Warwick. "God is too often a +convenient stalking-horse for human selfishness. If there is anything +to be done, so unjust, so despicable, so wicked that human reason +revolts at it, there is always some smug hypocrite to exclaim, 'It is +the will of God.'" +</P> + +<P> +"God made us all," continued Rena dreamily, "and for some good purpose, +though we may not always see it. He made some people white, and +strong, and masterful, and—heartless. He made others black and +homely, and poor and weak"— +</P> + +<P> +"And a lot of others 'poor white' and shiftless," smiled Warwick. +</P> + +<P> +"He made us, too," continued Rena, intent upon her own thought, "and He +must have had a reason for it. Perhaps He meant us to bring the others +together in his own good time. A man may make a new place for +himself—a woman is born and bound to hers. God must have meant me to +stay here, or He would not have sent me back. I shall accept things as +they are. Why should I seek the society of people whose +friendship—and love—one little word can turn to scorn? I was right, +John; I ought to have told him. Suppose he had married me and then had +found it out?" +</P> + +<P> +To Rena's argument of divine foreordination Warwick attached no weight +whatever. He had seen God's heel planted for four long years upon the +land which had nourished slavery. Had God ordained the crime that the +punishment might follow? It would have been easier for Omnipotence to +prevent the crime. The experience of his sister had stirred up a +certain bitterness against white people—a feeling which he had put +aside years ago, with his dark blood, but which sprang anew into life +when the fact of his own origin was brought home to him so forcibly +through his sister's misfortune. His sworn friend and promised +brother-in-law had thrown him over promptly, upon the discovery of the +hidden drop of dark blood. How many others of his friends would do the +same, if they but knew of it? He had begun to feel a little of the +spiritual estrangement from his associates that he had noticed in Rena +during her life at Clarence. The fact that several persons knew his +secret had spoiled the fine flavor of perfect security hitherto marking +his position. George Tryon was a man of honor among white men, and had +deigned to extend the protection of his honor to Warwick as a man, +though no longer as a friend; to Rena as a woman, but not as a wife. +Tryon, however, was only human, and who could tell when their paths in +life might cross again, or what future temptation Tryon might feel to +use a damaging secret to their disadvantage? Warwick had cherished +certain ambitions, but these he must now put behind him. In the +obscurity of private life, his past would be of little moment; in the +glare of a political career, one's antecedents are public property, and +too great a reserve in regard to one's past is regarded as a confession +of something discreditable. Frank, too, knew the secret—a good, +faithful fellow, even where there was no obligation of fidelity; he +ought to do something for Frank to show their appreciation of his +conduct. But what assurance was there that Frank would always be +discreet about the affairs of others? Judge Straight knew the whole +story, and old men are sometimes garrulous. Dr. Green suspected the +secret; he had a wife and daughters. If old Judge Straight could have +known Warwick's thoughts, he would have realized the fulfillment of his +prophecy. Warwick, who had builded so well for himself, had weakened +the structure of his own life by trying to share his good fortune with +his sister. +</P> + +<P> +"Listen, Rena," he said, with a sudden impulse, "we'll go to the North +or West—I'll go with you—far away from the South and the Southern +people, and start life over again. It will be easier for you, it will +not be hard for me—I am young, and have means. There are no strong +ties to bind me to the South. I would have a larger outlook elsewhere." +</P> + +<P> +"And what about our mother?" asked Rena. +</P> + +<P> +It would be necessary to leave her behind, they both perceived clearly +enough, unless they were prepared to surrender the advantage of their +whiteness and drop back to the lower rank. The mother bore the mark of +the Ethiopian—not pronouncedly, but distinctly; neither would Mis' +Molly, in all probability, care to leave home and friends and the +graves of her loved ones. She had no mental resources to supply the +place of these; she was, moreover, too old to be transplanted; she +would not fit into Warwick's scheme for a new life. +</P> + +<P> +"I left her once," said Rena, "and it brought pain and sorrow to all +three of us. She is not strong, and I will not leave her here to die +alone. This shall be my home while she lives, and if I leave it again, +it shall be for only a short time, to go where I can write to her +freely, and hear from her often. Don't worry about me, John,—I shall +do very well." +</P> + +<P> +Warwick sighed. He was sincerely sorry to leave his sister, and yet he +saw that for the time being her resolution was not to be shaken. He +must bide his time. Perhaps, in a few months, she would tire of the +old life. His door would be always open to her, and he would charge +himself with her future. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, then," he said, concluding the argument, "we'll say no more +about it for the present. I'll write to you later. I was afraid that +you might not care to go back just now, and so I brought your trunk +along with me." +</P> + +<P> +He gave his mother the baggage-check. She took it across to Frank, +who, during the day, brought the trunk from the depot. Mis' Molly +offered to pay him for the service, but he would accept nothing. +</P> + +<P> +"Lawd, no, Mis' Molly; I did n' hafter go out'n my way ter git dat +trunk. I had a load er sperrit-bairls ter haul ter de still, an' de +depot wuz right on my way back. It'd be robbin' you ter take pay fer a +little thing lack dat." +</P> + +<P> +"My son John's here," said Mis' Molly "an' he wants to see you. Come +into the settin'-room. We don't want folks to know he's in town; but +you know all our secrets, an' we can trust you like one er the family." +</P> + +<P> +"I'm glad to see you again, Frank," said Warwick, extending his hand +and clasping Frank's warmly. "You've grown up since I saw you last, +but it seems you are still our good friend." +</P> + +<P> +"Our very good friend," interjected Rena. +</P> + +<P> +Frank threw her a grateful glance. "Yas, suh," he said, looking +Warwick over with a friendly eye, "an' you is growed some, too. I seed +you, you know, down dere where you live; but I did n' let on, fer you +an' Mis' Rena wuz w'ite as anybody; an' eve'ybody said you wuz good ter +cullud folks, an' he'ped 'em in deir lawsuits an' one way er 'nuther, +an' I wuz jes' plum' glad ter see you gettin' 'long so fine, dat I wuz, +certain sho', an' no mistake about it." +</P> + +<P> +"Thank you, Frank, and I want you to understand how much I appreciate"— +</P> + +<P> +"How much we all appreciate," corrected Rena. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, how much we all appreciate, and how grateful we all are for your +kindness to mother for so many years. I know from her and from my +sister how good you've been to them." +</P> + +<P> +"Lawd, suh!" returned Frank deprecatingly, "you're makin' a mountain +out'n a molehill. I ain't done nuthin' ter speak of—not half ez much +ez I would 'a' done. I wuz glad ter do w'at little I could, fer +frien'ship's sake." +</P> + +<P> +"We value your friendship, Frank, and we'll not forget it." +</P> + +<P> +"No, Frank," added Rena, "we will never forget it, and you shall always +be our good friend." +</P> + +<P> +Frank left the room and crossed the street with swelling heart. He +would have given his life for Rena. A kind word was doubly sweet from +her lips; no service would be too great to pay for her friendship. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +When Frank went out to the stable next morning to feed his mule, his +eyes opened wide with astonishment. In place of the decrepit, one-eyed +army mule he had put up the night before, a fat, sleek specimen of +vigorous mulehood greeted his arrival with the sonorous hehaw of lusty +youth. Hanging on a peg near by was a set of fine new harness, and +standing under the adjoining shed, as he perceived, a handsome new cart. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, well!" exclaimed Frank; "ef I did n' mos' know whar dis mule, +an' dis kyart, an' dis harness come from, I'd 'low dere 'd be'n +witcheraf' er cunjin' wukkin' here. But, oh my, dat is a fine mule!—I +mos' wush I could keep 'im." +</P> + +<P> +He crossed the road to the house behind the cedars, and found Mis' +Molly in the kitchen. "Mis' Molly," he protested, "I ain't done nuthin' +ter deserve dat mule. W'at little I done fer you wa'n't done fer pay. +I'd ruther not keep dem things." +</P> + +<P> +"Fer goodness' sake, Frank!" exclaimed his neighbor, with a +well-simulated air of mystification, "what are you talkin' about?" +</P> + +<P> +"You knows w'at I'm talkin' about, Mis' Molly; you knows well ernuff +I'm talkin' about dat fine mule an' kyart an' harness over dere in my +stable." +</P> + +<P> +"How should I know anything about 'em?" she asked. +</P> + +<P> +"Now, Mis' Molly! You folks is jes' tryin' ter fool me, an' make me +take somethin' fer nuthin'. I lef' my ole mule an' kyart an' harness in +de stable las' night, an' dis mawnin' dey 're gone, an' new ones in +deir place. Co'se you knows whar dey come from!" +</P> + +<P> +"Well, now, Frank, sence you mention it, I did see a witch flyin' roun' +here las' night on a broom-stick, an' it 'peared ter me she lit on yo'r +barn, an' I s'pose she turned yo'r old things into new ones. I wouldn't +bother my mind about it if I was you, for she may turn 'em back any +night, you know; an' you might as well have the use of 'em in the mean +while." +</P> + +<P> +"Dat's all foolishness, Mis' Molly, an' I'm gwine ter fetch dat mule +right over here an' tell yo' son ter gimme my ole one back." +</P> + +<P> +"My son's gone," she replied, "an' I don't know nothin' about yo'r old +mule. And what would I do with a mule, anyhow? I ain't got no barn to +put him in." +</P> + +<P> +"I suspect you don't care much for us after all, Frank," said Rena +reproachfully—she had come in while they were talking. "You meet with +a piece of good luck, and you're afraid of it, lest it might have come +from us." +</P> + +<P> +"Now, Miss Rena, you oughtn't ter say dat," expostulated Frank, his +reluctance yielding immediately. "I'll keep de mule an' de kyart an' de +harness—fac', I'll have ter keep 'em, 'cause I ain't got no others. +But dey 're gwine ter be yo'n ez much ez mine. W'enever you wants +anything hauled, er wants yo' lot ploughed, er anything—dat's yo' +mule, an' I'm yo' man an' yo' mammy's." +</P> + +<P> +So Frank went back to the stable, where he feasted his eyes on his new +possessions, fed and watered the mule, and curried and brushed his coat +until it shone like a looking-glass. +</P> + +<P> +"Now dat," remarked Peter, at the breakfast-table, when informed of the +transaction, "is somethin' lack rale w'ite folks." +</P> + +<P> +No real white person had ever given Peter a mule or a cart. He had +rendered one of them unpaid service for half a lifetime, and had paid +for the other half; and some of them owed him substantial sums for work +performed. But "to him that hath shall be given"—Warwick paid for the +mule, and the real white folks got most of the credit. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap20"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XX +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +DIGGING UP ROOTS +</H3> + +<P> +When the first great shock of his discovery wore off, the fact of +Rena's origin lost to Tryon some of its initial repugnance—indeed, the +repugnance was not to the woman at all, as their past relations were +evidence, but merely to the thought of her as a wife. It could hardly +have failed to occur to so reasonable a man as Tryon that Rena's case +could scarcely be unique. Surely in the past centuries of free manners +and easy morals that had prevailed in remote parts of the South, there +must have been many white persons whose origin would not have borne too +microscopic an investigation. Family trees not seldom have a crooked +branch; or, to use a more apposite figure, many a flock has its black +sheep. Being a man of lively imagination, Tryon soon found himself +putting all sorts of hypothetical questions about a matter which he had +already definitely determined. If he had married Rena in ignorance of +her secret, and had learned it afterwards, would he have put her aside? +If, knowing her history, he had nevertheless married her, and she had +subsequently displayed some trait of character that would suggest the +negro, could he have forgotten or forgiven the taint? Could he still +have held her in love and honor? If not, could he have given her the +outward seeming of affection, or could he have been more than coldly +tolerant? He was glad that he had been spared this ordeal. With an +effort he put the whole matter definitely and conclusively aside, as he +had done a hundred times already. +</P> + +<P> +Returning to his home, after an absence of several months in South +Carolina, it was quite apparent to his mother's watchful eye that he +was in serious trouble. He was absent-minded, monosyllabic, sighed +deeply and often, and could not always conceal the traces of secret +tears. For Tryon was young, and possessed of a sensitive soul—a +source of happiness or misery, as the Fates decree. To those thus +dowered, the heights of rapture are accessible, the abysses of despair +yawn threateningly; only the dull monotony of contentment is denied. +</P> + +<P> +Mrs. Tryon vainly sought by every gentle art a woman knows to win her +son's confidence. "What is the matter, George, dear?" she would ask, +stroking his hot brow with her small, cool hand as he sat moodily +nursing his grief. "Tell your mother, George. Who else could comfort +you so well as she?" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, it's nothing, mother,—nothing at all," he would reply, with a +forced attempt at lightness. "It's only your fond imagination, you best +of mothers." +</P> + +<P> +It was Mrs. Tryon's turn to sigh and shed a clandestine tear. Until +her son had gone away on this trip to South Carolina, he had kept no +secrets from her: his heart had been an open book, of which she knew +every page; now, some painful story was inscribed therein which he +meant she should not read. If she could have abdicated her empire to +Blanche Leary or have shared it with her, she would have yielded +gracefully; but very palpably some other influence than Blanche's had +driven joy from her son's countenance and lightness from his heart. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Miss Blanche Leary, whom Tryon found in the house upon his return, was +a demure, pretty little blonde, with an amiable disposition, a talent +for society, and a pronounced fondness for George Tryon. A poor girl, +of an excellent family impoverished by the war, she was distantly +related to Mrs. Tryon, had for a long time enjoyed that lady's favor, +and was her choice for George's wife when he should be old enough to +marry. A woman less interested than Miss Leary would have perceived +that there was something wrong with Tryon. Miss Leary had no doubt that +there was a woman at the bottom of it,—for about what else should +youth worry but love? or if one's love affairs run smoothly, why should +one worry about anything at all? Miss Leary, in the nineteen years of +her mundane existence, had not been without mild experiences of the +heart, and had hovered for some time on the verge of disappointment +with respect to Tryon himself. A sensitive pride would have driven +more than one woman away at the sight of the man of her preference +sighing like a furnace for some absent fair one. But Mrs. Tryon was so +cordial, and insisted so strenuously upon her remaining, that Blanche's +love, which was strong, conquered her pride, which was no more than a +reasonable young woman ought to have who sets success above mere +sentiment. She remained in the house and bided her opportunity. If +George practically ignored her for a time, she did not throw herself at +all in his way. She went on a visit to some girls in the neighborhood +and remained away a week, hoping that she might be missed. Tryon +expressed no regret at her departure and no particular satisfaction +upon her return. If the house was duller in her absence, he was but +dimly conscious of the difference. He was still fighting a battle in +which a susceptible heart and a reasonable mind had locked horns in a +well-nigh hopeless conflict. Reason, common-sense, the instinctive +ready-made judgments of his training and environment,—the deep-seated +prejudices of race and caste,—commanded him to dismiss Rena from his +thoughts. His stubborn heart simply would not let go. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap21"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XXI +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +A GILDED OPPORTUNITY +</H3> + +<P> +Although the whole fabric of Rena's new life toppled and fell with her +lover's defection, her sympathies, broadened by culture and still more +by her recent emotional experience, did not shrink, as would have been +the case with a more selfish soul, to the mere limits of her personal +sorrow, great as this seemed at the moment. She had learned to love, +and when the love of one man failed her, she turned to humanity, as a +stream obstructed in its course overflows the adjacent country. Her +early training had not directed her thoughts to the darker people with +whose fate her own was bound up so closely, but rather away from them. +She had been taught to despise them because they were not so white as +she was, and had been slaves while she was free. Her life in her +brother's home, by removing her from immediate contact with them, had +given her a different point of view,—one which emphasized their +shortcomings, and thereby made vastly clearer to her the gulf that +separated them from the new world in which she lived; so that when +misfortune threw her back upon them, the reaction brought her nearer +than before. Where once she had seemed able to escape from them, they +were now, it appeared, her inalienable race. Thus doubly equipped, she +was able to view them at once with the mental eye of an outsider and +the sympathy of a sister: she could see their faults, and judge them +charitably; she knew and appreciated their good qualities. With her +quickened intelligence she could perceive how great was their need and +how small their opportunity; and with this illumination came the desire +to contribute to their help. She had not the breadth or culture to see +in all its ramifications the great problem which still puzzles +statesmen and philosophers; but she was conscious of the wish, and of +the power, in a small way, to do something for the advancement of those +who had just set their feet upon the ladder of progress. +</P> + +<P> +This new-born desire to be of service to her rediscovered people was +not long without an opportunity for expression. Yet the Fates willed +that her future should be but another link in a connected chain: she +was to be as powerless to put aside her recent past as she had been to +escape from the influence of her earlier life. There are sordid souls +that eat and drink and breed and die, and imagine they have lived. But +Rena's life since her great awakening had been that of the emotions, +and her temperament made of it a continuous life. Her successive +states of consciousness were not detachable, but united to form a +single if not an entirely harmonious whole. To her sensitive spirit +to-day was born of yesterday, to-morrow would be but the offspring of +to day. +</P> + +<P> +One day, along toward noon, her mother received a visit from Mary B. +Pettifoot, a second cousin, who lived on Back Street, only a short +distance from the house behind the cedars. Rena had gone out, so that +the visitor found Mis' Molly alone. +</P> + +<P> +"I heared you say, Cousin Molly," said Mary B. (no one ever knew what +the B. in Mary's name stood for,—it was a mere ornamental flourish), +"that Rena was talkin' 'bout teachin' school. I've got a good chance +fer her, ef she keers ter take it. My cousin Jeff Wain 'rived in town +this mo'nin', f'm 'way down in Sampson County, ter git a teacher fer +the nigger school in his deestric'. I s'pose he mought 'a' got one f'm +'roun' Newbern, er Goldsboro, er some er them places eas', but he +'lowed he'd like to visit some er his kin an' ole frien's, an' so kill +two birds with one stone." +</P> + +<P> +"I seed a strange mulatter man, with a bay hoss an' a new buggy, +drivin' by here this mo'nin' early, from down to'ds the river," +rejoined Mis' Molly. "I wonder if that wuz him?" +</P> + +<P> +"Did he have on a linen duster?" asked Mary B. +</P> + +<P> +"Yas, an' 'peared to be a very well sot up man," replied Mis' Molly, +"'bout thirty-five years old, I should reckon." +</P> + +<P> +"That wuz him," assented Mary B. "He's got a fine hoss an' buggy, an' +a gol' watch an' chain, an' a big plantation, an' lots er hosses an' +mules an' cows an' hawgs. He raise' fifty bales er cotton las' year, +an' he's be'n ter the legislatur'." +</P> + +<P> +"My gracious!" exclaimed Mis' Molly, struck with awe at this catalogue +of the stranger's possessions—he was evidently worth more than a great +many "rich" white people,—all white people in North Carolina in those +days were either "rich" or "poor," the distinction being one of caste +rather than of wealth. "Is he married?" she inquired with interest? +</P> + +<P> +"No,—single. You mought 'low it was quare that he should n' be +married at his age; but he was crossed in love oncet,"—Mary B. heaved +a self-conscious sigh,—"an' has stayed single ever sence. That wuz +ten years ago, but as some husban's is long-lived, an' there ain' no +mo' chance fer 'im now than there wuz then, I reckon some nice gal +mought stan' a good show er ketchin' 'im, ef she'd play her kyards +right." +</P> + +<P> +To Mis' Molly this was news of considerable importance. She had not +thought a great deal of Rena's plan to teach; she considered it +lowering for Rena, after having been white, to go among the negroes any +more than was unavoidable. This opportunity, however, meant more than +mere employment for her daughter. She had felt Rena's disappointment +keenly, from the practical point of view, and, blaming herself for it, +held herself all the more bound to retrieve the misfortune in any +possible way. If she had not been sick, Rena would not have dreamed +the fateful dream that had brought her to Patesville; for the +connection between the vision and the reality was even closer in Mis' +Molly's eyes than in Rena's. If the mother had not sent the letter +announcing her illness and confirming the dream, Rena would not have +ruined her promising future by coming to Patesville. But the harm had +been done, and she was responsible, ignorantly of course, but none the +less truly, and it only remained for her to make amends, as far as +possible. Her highest ambition, since Rena had grown up, had been to +see her married and comfortably settled in life. She had no hope that +Tryon would come back. Rena had declared that she would make no +further effort to get away from her people; and, furthermore, that she +would never marry. To this latter statement Mis' Molly secretly +attached but little importance. That a woman should go single from the +cradle to the grave did not accord with her experience in life of the +customs of North Carolina. She respected a grief she could not +entirely fathom, yet did not for a moment believe that Rena would +remain unmarried. +</P> + +<P> +"You'd better fetch him roun' to see me, Ma'y B.," she said, "an' let's +see what he looks like. I'm pertic'lar 'bout my gal. She says she +ain't goin' to marry nobody; but of co'se we know that's all +foolishness." +</P> + +<P> +"I'll fetch him roun' this evenin' 'bout three o'clock," said the +visitor, rising. "I mus' hurry back now an' keep him comp'ny. Tell +Rena ter put on her bes' bib an' tucker; for Mr. Wain is pertic'lar +too, an' I've already be'n braggin' 'bout her looks." +</P> + +<P> +When Mary B., at the appointed hour, knocked at Mis' Molly's front +door,—the visit being one of ceremony, she had taken her cousin round +to the Front Street entrance and through the flower garden,—Mis' Molly +was prepared to receive them. After a decent interval, long enough to +suggest that she had not been watching their approach and was not +over-eager about the visit, she answered the knock and admitted them +into the parlor. Mr. Wain was formally introduced, and seated himself +on the ancient haircloth sofa, under the framed fashion-plate, while +Mary B. sat by the open door and fanned herself with a palm-leaf fan. +</P> + +<P> +Mis' Molly's impression of Wain was favorable. His complexion was of a +light brown—not quite so fair as Mis' Molly would have preferred; but +any deficiency in this regard, or in the matter of the stranger's +features, which, while not unpleasing, leaned toward the broad mulatto +type, was more than compensated in her eyes by very straight black +hair, and, as soon appeared, a great facility of complimentary speech. +On his introduction Mr. Wain bowed low, assumed an air of great +admiration, and expressed his extreme delight in making the +acquaintance of so distinguished-looking a lady. +</P> + +<P> +"You're flatt'rin' me, Mr. Wain," returned Mis' Molly, with a gratified +smile. "But you want to meet my daughter befo' you commence th'owin' +bokays. Excuse my leavin' you—I'll go an' fetch her." +</P> + +<P> +She returned in a moment, followed by Rena. "Mr. Wain, 'low me to +int'oduce you to my daughter Rena. Rena, this is Ma'y B.'s cousin on +her pappy's side, who's come up from Sampson to git a school-teacher." +</P> + +<P> +Rena bowed gracefully. Wain stared a moment in genuine astonishment, +and then bent himself nearly double, keeping his eyes fixed meanwhile +upon Rena's face. He had expected to see a pretty yellow girl, but had +been prepared for no such radiant vision of beauty as this which now +confronted him. +</P> + +<P> +"Does—does you mean ter say, Mis' Walden, dat—dat dis young lady is +yo' own daughter?" he stammered, rallying his forces for action. +</P> + +<P> +"Why not, Mr. Wain?" asked Mis' Molly, bridling with mock resentment. +"Do you mean ter 'low that she wuz changed in her cradle, er is she too +good-lookin' to be my daughter?" +</P> + +<P> +"My deah Mis' Walden! it 'ud be wastin' wo'ds fer me ter say dat dey +ain' no young lady too good-lookin' ter be yo' daughter; but you're +lookin' so young yo'sef dat I'd ruther take her fer yo' sister." +</P> + +<P> +"Yas," rejoined Mis' Molly, with animation, "they ain't many years +between us. I wuz ruther young myself when she wuz bo'n." +</P> + +<P> +"An', mo'over," Wain went on, "it takes me a minute er so ter git my +min' use' ter thinkin' er Mis' Rena as a cullud young lady. I mought +'a' seed her a hund'ed times, an' I'd 'a' never dreamt but w'at she wuz +a w'ite young lady, f'm one er de bes' families." +</P> + +<P> +"Yas, Mr. Wain," replied Mis' Molly complacently, "all three er my +child'en wuz white, an' one of 'em has be'n on the other side fer many +long years. Rena has be'n to school, an' has traveled, an' has had +chances—better chances than anybody roun' here knows." +</P> + +<P> +"She's jes' de lady I'm lookin' fer, ter teach ou' school," rejoined +Wain, with emphasis. "Wid her schoolin' an' my riccommen', she kin git +a fus'-class ce'tifikit an' draw fo'ty dollars a month; an' a lady er +her color kin keep a lot er little niggers straighter 'n a darker lady +could. We jus' got ter have her ter teach ou' school—ef we kin git +her." +</P> + +<P> +Rena's interest in the prospect of employment at her chosen work was so +great that she paid little attention to Wain's compliments. Mis' Molly +led Mary B. away to the kitchen on some pretext, and left Rena to +entertain the gentleman. She questioned him eagerly about the school, +and he gave the most glowing accounts of the elegant school-house, the +bright pupils, and the congenial society of the neighborhood. He spoke +almost entirely in superlatives, and, after making due allowance for +what Rena perceived to be a temperamental tendency to exaggeration, she +concluded that she would find in the school a worthy field of +usefulness, and in this polite and good-natured though somewhat wordy +man a coadjutor upon whom she could rely in her first efforts; for she +was not over-confident of her powers, which seemed to grow less as the +way opened for their exercise. +</P> + +<P> +"Do you think I'm competent to teach the school?" she asked of the +visitor, after stating some of her qualifications. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, dere 's no doubt about it, Miss Rena," replied Wain, who had +listened with an air of great wisdom, though secretly aware that he was +too ignorant of letters to form a judgment; "you kin teach de school +all right, an' could ef you didn't know half ez much. You won't have +no trouble managin' de child'en, nuther. Ef any of 'em gits onruly, +jes' call on me fer he'p, an' I'll make 'em walk Spanish. I'm chuhman +er de school committee, an' I'll lam de hide off'n any scholar dat don' +behave. You kin trus' me fer dat, sho' ez I'm a-settin' here." +</P> + +<P> +"Then," said Rena, "I'll undertake it, and do my best. I'm sure you'll +not be too exacting." +</P> + +<P> +"Yo' bes', Miss Rena,'ll be de bes' dey is. Don' you worry ner fret. +Dem niggers won't have no other teacher after dey've once laid eyes on +you: I'll guarantee dat. Dere won't be no trouble, not a bit." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, Cousin Molly," said Mary B. to Mis' Molly in the kitchen, "how +does the plan strike you?" +</P> + +<P> +"Ef Rena's satisfied, I am," replied Mis' Molly. "But you'd better say +nothin' about ketchin' a beau, or any such foolishness, er else she'd +be just as likely not to go nigh Sampson County." +</P> + +<P> +"Befo' Cousin Jeff goes back," confided Mary B., "I'd like ter give 'im +a party, but my house is too small. I wuz wonderin'," she added +tentatively, "ef I could n' borry yo' house." +</P> + +<P> +"Shorely, Ma'y B. I'm int'rested in Mr. Wain on Rena's account, an' +it's as little as I kin do to let you use my house an' help you git +things ready." +</P> + +<P> +The date of the party was set for Thursday night, as Wain was to leave +Patesville on Friday morning, taking with him the new teacher. The +party would serve the double purpose of a compliment to the guest and a +farewell to Rena, and it might prove the precursor, the mother secretly +hoped, of other festivities to follow at some later date. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap22"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XXII +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +IMPERATIVE BUSINESS +</H3> + +<P> +One Wednesday morning, about six weeks after his return home, Tryon +received a letter from Judge Straight with reference to the note left +with him at Patesville for collection. This communication properly +required an answer, which might have been made in writing within the +compass of ten lines. No sooner, however, had Tryon read the letter +than he began to perceive reasons why it should be answered in person. +He had left Patesville under extremely painful circumstances, vowing +that he would never return; and yet now the barest pretext, by which no +one could have been deceived except willingly, was sufficient to turn +his footsteps thither again. He explained to his mother—with a +vagueness which she found somewhat puzzling, but ascribed to her own +feminine obtuseness in matters of business—the reasons that +imperatively demanded his presence in Patesville. With an early start +he could drive there in one day,—he had an excellent roadster, a light +buggy, and a recent rain had left the road in good condition,—a day +would suffice for the transaction of his business, and the third day +would bring him home again. He set out on his journey on Thursday +morning, with this programme very clearly outlined. +</P> + +<P> +Tryon would not at first have admitted even to himself that Rena's +presence in Patesville had any bearing whatever upon his projected +visit. The matter about which Judge Straight had written might, it was +clear, be viewed in several aspects. The judge had written him +concerning the one of immediate importance. It would be much easier to +discuss the subject in all its bearings, and clean up the whole matter, +in one comprehensive personal interview. +</P> + +<P> +The importance of this business, then, seemed very urgent for the first +few hours of Tryon's journey. Ordinarily a careful driver and merciful +to his beast, his eagerness to reach Patesville increased gradually +until it became necessary to exercise some self-restraint in order not +to urge his faithful mare beyond her powers; and soon he could no +longer pretend obliviousness of the fact that some attraction stronger +than the whole amount of Duncan McSwayne's note was urging him +irresistibly toward his destination. The old town beyond the distant +river, his heart told him clamorously, held the object in all the world +to him most dear. Memory brought up in vivid detail every moment of +his brief and joyous courtship, each tender word, each enchanting +smile, every fond caress. He lived his past happiness over again down +to the moment of that fatal discovery. What horrible fate was it that +had involved him—nay, that had caught this sweet delicate girl in such +a blind alley? A wild hope flashed across his mind: perhaps the +ghastly story might not be true; perhaps, after all, the girl was no +more a negro than she seemed. He had heard sad stories of white +children, born out of wedlock, abandoned by sinful parents to the care +or adoption of colored women, who had reared them as their own, the +children's future basely sacrificed to hide the parents' shame. He +would confront this reputed mother of his darling and wring the truth +from her. He was in a state of mind where any sort of a fairy tale +would have seemed reasonable. He would almost have bribed some one to +tell him that the woman he had loved, the woman he still loved (he felt +a thrill of lawless pleasure in the confession), was not the descendant +of slaves,—that he might marry her, and not have before his eyes the +gruesome fear that some one of their children might show even the +faintest mark of the despised race. +</P> + +<P> +At noon he halted at a convenient hamlet, fed and watered his mare, and +resumed his journey after an hour's rest. By this time he had +well-nigh forgotten about the legal business that formed the ostensible +occasion for his journey, and was conscious only of a wild desire to +see the woman whose image was beckoning him on to Patesville as fast as +his horse could take him. +</P> + +<P> +At sundown he stopped again, about ten miles from the town, and cared +for his now tired beast. He knew her capacity, however, and calculated +that she could stand the additional ten miles without injury. The mare +set out with reluctance, but soon settled resignedly down into a steady +jog. +</P> + +<P> +Memory had hitherto assailed Tryon with the vision of past joys. As he +neared the town, imagination attacked him with still more moving +images. He had left her, this sweet flower of womankind—white or not, +God had never made a fairer!—he had seen her fall to the hard +pavement, with he knew not what resulting injury. He had left her +tender frame—the touch of her finger-tips had made him thrill with +happiness—to be lifted by strange hands, while he with heartless pride +had driven deliberately away, without a word of sorrow or regret. He +had ignored her as completely as though she had never existed. That he +had been deceived was true. But had he not aided in his own deception? +Had not Warwick told him distinctly that they were of no family, and +was it not his own fault that he had not followed up the clue thus +given him? Had not Rena compared herself to the child's nurse, and had +he not assured her that if she were the nurse, he would marry her next +day? The deception had been due more to his own blindness than to any +lack of honesty on the part of Rena and her brother. In the light of +his present feelings they seemed to have been absurdly outspoken. He +was glad that he had kept his discovery to himself. He had considered +himself very magnanimous not to have exposed the fraud that was being +perpetrated upon society: it was with a very comfortable feeling that +he now realized that the matter was as profound a secret as before. +</P> + +<P> +"She ought to have been born white," he muttered, adding weakly, "I +would to God that I had never found her out!" +</P> + +<P> +Drawing near the bridge that crossed the river to the town, he pictured +to himself a pale girl, with sorrowful, tear-stained eyes, pining away +in the old gray house behind the cedars for love of him, dying, +perhaps, of a broken heart. He would hasten to her; he would dry her +tears with kisses; he would express sorrow for his cruelty. +</P> + +<P> +The tired mare had crossed the bridge and was slowly toiling up Front +Street; she was near the limit of her endurance, and Tryon did not urge +her. +</P> + +<P> +They might talk the matter over, and if they must part, part at least +they would in peace and friendship. If he could not marry her, he +would never marry any one else; it would be cruel for him to seek +happiness while she was denied it, for, having once given her heart to +him, she could never, he was sure,—so instinctively fine was her +nature,—she could never love any one less worthy than himself, and +would therefore probably never marry. He knew from a Clarence +acquaintance, who had written him a letter, that Rena had not +reappeared in that town. +</P> + +<P> +If he should discover—the chance was one in a thousand—that she was +white; or if he should find it too hard to leave her—ah, well! he was +a white man, one of a race born to command. He would make her white; +no one beyond the old town would ever know the difference. If, +perchance, their secret should be disclosed, the world was wide; a man +of courage and ambition, inspired by love, might make a career +anywhere. Circumstances made weak men; strong men mould circumstances +to do their bidding. He would not let his darling die of grief, +whatever the price must be paid for her salvation. She was only a few +rods away from him now. In a moment he would see her; he would take +her tenderly in his arms, and heart to heart they would mutually +forgive and forget, and, strengthened by their love, would face the +future boldly and bid the world do its worst. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap23"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XXIII +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE GUEST OF HONOR +</H3> + +<P> +The evening of the party arrived. The house had been thoroughly +cleaned in preparation for the event, and decorated with the choicest +treasures of the garden. By eight o'clock the guests had gathered. +They were all mulattoes,—all people of mixed blood were called +"mulattoes" in North Carolina. There were dark mulattoes and bright +mulattoes. Mis' Molly's guests were mostly of the bright class, most +of them more than half white, and few of them less. In Mis' Molly's +small circle, straight hair was the only palliative of a dark +complexion. Many of the guests would not have been casually +distinguishable from white people of the poorer class. Others bore +unmistakable traces of Indian ancestry,—for Cherokee and Tuscarora +blood was quite widely diffused among the free negroes of North +Carolina, though well-nigh lost sight of by the curious custom of the +white people to ignore anything but the negro blood in those who were +touched by its potent current. Very few of those present had been +slaves. The free colored people of Patesville were numerous enough +before the war to have their own "society," and human enough to despise +those who did not possess advantages equal to their own; and at this +time they still looked down upon those who had once been held in +bondage. The only black man present occupied a chair which stood on a +broad chest in one corner, and extracted melody from a fiddle to which +a whole generation of the best people of Patesville had danced and made +merry. Uncle Needham seldom played for colored gatherings, but made an +exception in Mis' Molly's case; she was not white, but he knew her +past; if she was not the rose, she had at least been near the rose. +When the company had gathered, Mary B., as mistress of ceremonies, +whispered to Uncle Needham, who tapped his violin sharply with the bow. +</P> + +<P> +"Ladies an' gent'emens, take yo' pa'dners fer a Fuhginny reel!" +</P> + +<P> +Mr. Wain, as the guest of honor, opened the ball with his hostess. He +wore a broadcloth coat and trousers, a heavy glittering chain across +the spacious front of his white waistcoat, and a large red rose in his +buttonhole. If his boots were slightly run down at the heel, so +trivial a detail passed unnoticed in the general splendor of his +attire. Upon a close or hostile inspection there would have been some +features of his ostensibly good-natured face—the shifty eye, the full +and slightly drooping lower lip—which might have given a student of +physiognomy food for reflection. But whatever the latent defects of +Wain's character, he proved himself this evening a model of geniality, +presuming not at all upon his reputed wealth, but winning golden +opinions from those who came to criticise, of whom, of course, there +were a few, the company being composed of human beings. +</P> + +<P> +When the dance began, Wain extended his large, soft hand to Mary B., +yellow, buxom, thirty, with white and even teeth glistening behind her +full red lips. A younger sister of Mary B.'s was paired with Billy +Oxendine, a funny little tailor, a great gossip, and therefore a +favorite among the women. Mis' Molly graciously consented, after many +protestations of lack of skill and want of practice, to stand up +opposite Homer Pettifoot, Mary B.'s husband, a tall man, with a slight +stoop, a bald crown, and full, dreamy eyes,—a man of much imagination +and a large fund of anecdote. Two other couples completed the set; +others were restrained by bashfulness or religious scruples, which did +not yield until later in the evening. +</P> + +<P> +The perfumed air from the garden without and the cut roses within +mingled incongruously with the alien odors of musk and hair oil, of +which several young barbers in the company were especially redolent. +There was a play of sparkling eyes and glancing feet. Mary B. danced +with the languorous grace of an Eastern odalisque, Mis' Molly with the +mincing, hesitating step of one long out of practice. Wain performed +saltatory prodigies. This was a golden opportunity for the display in +which his soul found delight. He introduced variations hitherto +unknown to the dance. His skill and suppleness brought a glow of +admiration into the eyes of the women, and spread a cloud of jealousy +over the faces of several of the younger men, who saw themselves +eclipsed. +</P> + +<P> +Rena had announced in advance her intention to take no active part in +the festivities. "I don't feel like dancing, mamma—I shall never +dance again." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, now, Rena," answered her mother, "of co'se you're too dignified, +sence you've be'n 'sociatin' with white folks, to be hoppin' roun' an' +kickin' up like Ma'y B. an' these other yaller gals; but of co'se, too, +you can't slight the comp'ny entirely, even ef it ain't jest exac'ly +our party,—you'll have to pay 'em some little attention, 'specially +Mr. Wain, sence you're goin' down yonder with 'im." +</P> + +<P> +Rena conscientiously did what she thought politeness required. She +went the round of the guests in the early part of the evening and +exchanged greetings with them. To several requests for dances she +replied that she was not dancing. She did not hold herself aloof +because of pride; any instinctive shrinking she might have felt by +reason of her recent association with persons of greater refinement was +offset by her still more newly awakened zeal for humanity; they were +her people, she must not despise them. But the occasion suggested +painful memories of other and different scenes in which she had lately +participated. Once or twice these memories were so vivid as almost to +overpower her. She slipped away from the company, and kept in the +background as much as possible without seeming to slight any one. +</P> + +<P> +The guests as well were dimly conscious of a slight barrier between +Mis' Molly's daughter and themselves. The time she had spent apart +from these friends of her youth had rendered it impossible for her ever +to meet them again upon the plane of common interests and common +thoughts. It was much as though one, having acquired the vernacular of +his native country, had lived in a foreign land long enough to lose the +language of his childhood without acquiring fully that of his adopted +country. Miss Rowena Warwick could never again become quite the Rena +Walden who had left the house behind the cedars no more than a year and +a half before. Upon this very difference were based her noble +aspirations for usefulness,—one must stoop in order that one may lift +others. Any other young woman present would have been importuned +beyond her powers of resistance. Rena's reserve was respected. +</P> + +<P> +When supper was announced, somewhat early in the evening, the dancers +found seats in the hall or on the front piazza. Aunt Zilphy, assisted +by Mis' Molly and Mary B., passed around the refreshments, which +consisted of fried chicken, buttered biscuits, pound-cake, and eggnog. +When the first edge of appetite was taken off, the conversation waxed +animated. Homer Pettifoot related, with minute detail, an old, +threadbare hunting lie, dating, in slightly differing forms, from the +age of Nimrod, about finding twenty-five partridges sitting in a row on +a rail, and killing them all with a single buckshot, which passed +through twenty-four and lodged in the body of the twenty-fifth, from +which it was extracted and returned to the shot pouch for future +service. +</P> + +<P> +This story was followed by a murmur of incredulity—of course, the +thing was possible, but Homer's faculty for exaggeration was so well +known that any statement of his was viewed with suspicion. Homer +seemed hurt at this lack of faith, and was disposed to argue the point, +but the sonorous voice of Mr. Wain on the other side of the room cut +short his protestations, in much the same way that the rising sun +extinguishes the light of lesser luminaries. +</P> + +<P> +"I wuz a member er de fus' legislatur' after de wah," Wain was saying. +"When I went up f'm Sampson in de fall, I had to pass th'ough +Smithfiel', I got in town in de afternoon, an' put up at de bes' hotel. +De lan'lo'd did n' have no s'picion but what I wuz a white man, an' he +gimme a room, an' I had supper an' breakfas', an' went on ter Rolly +nex' mornin'. W'en de session wuz over, I come along back, an' w'en I +got ter Smithfiel', I driv' up ter de same hotel. I noticed, as soon +as I got dere, dat de place had run down consid'able—dere wuz weeds +growin' in de yard, de winders wuz dirty, an' ev'ything roun' dere +looked kinder lonesome an' shif'less. De lan'lo'd met me at de do'; he +looked mighty down in de mouth, an' sezee:— +</P> + +<P> +"'Look a-here, w'at made you come an' stop at my place widout tellin' +me you wuz a black man? Befo' you come th'ough dis town I had a +fus'-class business. But w'en folks found out dat a nigger had put up +here, business drapped right off, an' I've had ter shet up my hotel. +You oughter be 'shamed er yo'se'f fer ruinin' a po' man w'at had n' +never done no harm ter you. You've done a mean, low-lived thing, an' a +jes' God'll punish you fer it.' +</P> + +<P> +"De po' man acshully bust inter tears," continued Mr. Wain +magnanimously, "an' I felt so sorry fer 'im—he wuz a po' white man +tryin' ter git up in de worl'—dat I hauled out my purse an' gin 'im +ten dollars, an' he 'peared monst'ous glad ter git it." +</P> + +<P> +"How good-hearted! How kin'!" murmured the ladies. "It done credit to +yo' feelin's." +</P> + +<P> +"Don't b'lieve a word er dem lies," muttered one young man to another +sarcastically. "He could n' pass fer white, 'less'n it wuz a mighty +dark night." +</P> + +<P> +Upon this glorious evening of his life, Mr. Jefferson Wain had one +distinctly hostile critic, of whose presence he was blissfully +unconscious. Frank Fowler had not been invited to the party,—his +family did not go with Mary B.'s set. Rena had suggested to her mother +that he be invited, but Mis' Molly had demurred on the ground that it +was not her party, and that she had no right to issue invitations. It +is quite likely that she would have sought an invitation for Frank from +Mary B.; but Frank was black, and would not harmonize with the rest of +the company, who would not have Mis' Molly's reasons for treating him +well. She had compromised the matter by stepping across the way in the +afternoon and suggesting that Frank might come over and sit on the back +porch and look at the dancing and share in the supper. +</P> + +<P> +Frank was not without a certain honest pride. He was sensitive enough, +too, not to care to go where he was not wanted. He would have curtly +refused any such maimed invitation to any other place. But would he +not see Rena in her best attire, and might she not perhaps, in passing, +speak a word to him? +</P> + +<P> +"Thank y', Mis' Molly," he replied, "I'll prob'ly come over." +</P> + +<P> +"You're a big fool, boy," observed his father after Mis' Molly had gone +back across the street, "ter be stickin' roun' dem yaller niggers +'cross de street, an' slobb'rin' an' slav'rin' over 'em, an' hangin' +roun' deir back do' wuss 'n ef dey wuz w'ite folks. I'd see 'em dead +fus'!" +</P> + +<P> +Frank himself resisted the temptation for half an hour after the music +began, but at length he made his way across the street and stationed +himself at the window opening upon the back piazza. When Rena was in +the room, he had eyes for her only, but when she was absent, he fixed +his attention mainly upon Wain. With jealous clairvoyance he observed +that Wain's eyes followed Rena when she left the room, and lit up when +she returned. Frank had heard that Rena was going away with this man, +and he watched Wain closely, liking him less the longer he looked at +him. To his fancy, Wain's style and skill were affectation, his +good-nature mere hypocrisy, and his glance at Rena the eye of the hawk +upon his quarry. He had heard that Wain was unmarried, and he could +not see how, this being so, he could help wishing Rena for a wife. +Frank would have been content to see her marry a white man, who would +have raised her to a plane worthy of her merits. In this man's shifty +eye he read the liar—his wealth and standing were probably as false as +his seeming good-humor. +</P> + +<P> +"Is that you, Frank?" said a soft voice near at hand. +</P> + +<P> +He looked up with a joyful thrill. Rena was peering intently at him, +as if trying to distinguish his features in the darkness. It was a +bright moonlight night, but Frank stood in the shadow of the piazza. +</P> + +<P> +"Yas 'm, it's me, Miss Rena. Yo' mammy said I could come over an' see +you-all dance. You ain' be'n out on de flo' at all, ter-night." +</P> + +<P> +"No, Frank, I don't care for dancing. I shall not dance to-night." +</P> + +<P> +This answer was pleasing to Frank. If he could not hope to dance with +her, at least the men inside—at least this snake in the grass from +down the country—should not have that privilege. +</P> + +<P> +"But you must have some supper, Frank," said Rena. "I'll bring it +myself." +</P> + +<P> +"No, Miss Rena, I don' keer fer nothin'—I did n' come over ter +eat—r'al'y I didn't." +</P> + +<P> +"Nonsense, Frank, there's plenty of it. I have no appetite, and you +shall have my portion." +</P> + +<P> +She brought him a slice of cake and a glass of eggnog. When Mis' +Molly, a minute later, came out upon the piazza, Frank left the yard +and walked down the street toward the old canal. Rena had spoken +softly to him; she had fed him with her own dainty hands. He might +never hope that she would see in him anything but a friend; but he +loved her, and he would watch over her and protect her, wherever she +might be. He did not believe that she would ever marry the grinning +hypocrite masquerading back there in Mis' Molly's parlor; but the man +would bear watching. +</P> + +<P> +Mis' Molly had come to call her daughter into the house. "Rena," she +said, "Mr. Wain wants ter know if you won't dance just one dance with +him." +</P> + +<P> +"Yas, Rena," pleaded Mary B., who followed Miss Molly out to the +piazza, "jes' one dance. I don't think you're treatin' my comp'ny jes' +right, Cousin Rena." +</P> + +<P> +"You're goin' down there with 'im," added her mother, "an' it 'd be +just as well to be on friendly terms with 'im." +</P> + +<P> +Wain himself had followed the women. "Sho'ly, Miss Rena, you're gwine +ter honah me wid one dance? I'd go 'way f'm dis pa'ty sad at hea't ef +I had n' stood up oncet wid de young lady er de house." +</P> + +<P> +As Rena, weakly persuaded, placed her hand on Wain's arm and entered +the house, a buggy, coming up Front Street, paused a moment at the +corner, and then turning slowly, drove quietly up the nameless +by-street, concealed by the intervening cedars, until it reached a +point from which the occupant could view, through the open front +window, the interior of the parlor. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap24"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XXIV +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +SWING YOUR PARTNERS +</H3> + +<P> +Moved by tenderness and thoughts of self-sacrifice, which had occupied +his mind to the momentary exclusion of all else, Tryon had scarcely +noticed, as he approached the house behind the cedars, a strain of +lively music, to which was added, as he drew still nearer, the +accompaniment of other festive sounds. He suddenly awoke, however, to +the fact that these signs of merriment came from the house at which he +had intended to stop;—he had not meant that Rena should pass another +sleepless night of sorrow, or that he should himself endure another +needless hour of suspense. +</P> + +<P> +He drew rein at the corner. Shocked surprise, a nascent anger, a vague +alarm, an insistent curiosity, urged him nearer. Turning the mare into +the side street and keeping close to the fence, he drove ahead in the +shadow of the cedars until he reached a gap through which he could see +into the open door and windows of the brightly lighted hall. +</P> + +<P> +There was evidently a ball in progress. The fiddle was squeaking +merrily so a tune that he remembered well,—it was associated with one +of the most delightful evenings of his life, that of the tournament +ball. A mellow negro voice was calling with a rhyming accompaniment +the figures of a quadrille. Tryon, with parted lips and slowly +hardening heart, leaned forward from the buggy-seat, gripping the rein +so tightly that his nails cut into the opposing palm. Above the +clatter of noisy conversation rose the fiddler's voice:— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> + "Swing yo' pa'dners; doan be shy,<BR> + Look yo' lady in de eye!<BR> + Th'ow yo' ahm aroun' huh wais';<BR> + Take yo' time—dey ain' no has'e!"<BR> +</P> + +<P> +To the middle of the floor, in full view through an open window, +advanced the woman who all day long had been the burden of his +thoughts—not pale with grief and hollow-eyed with weeping, but flushed +with pleasure, around her waist the arm of a burly, grinning mulatto, +whose face was offensively familiar to Tryon. +</P> + +<P> +With a muttered curse of concentrated bitterness, Tryon struck the mare +a sharp blow with the whip. The sensitive creature, spirited even in +her great weariness, resented the lash and started off with the bit in +her teeth. Perceiving that it would be difficult to turn in the narrow +roadway without running into the ditch at the left, Tryon gave the mare +rein and dashed down the street, scarcely missing, as the buggy crossed +the bridge, a man standing abstractedly by the old canal, who sprang +aside barely in time to avoid being run over. +</P> + +<P> +Meantime Rena was passing through a trying ordeal. After the first few +bars, the fiddler plunged into a well-known air, in which Rena, keenly +susceptible to musical impressions, recognized the tune to which, as +Queen of Love and Beauty, she had opened the dance at her entrance into +the world of life and love, for it was there she had met George Tryon. +The combination of music and movement brought up the scene with great +distinctness. Tryon, peering angrily through the cedars, had not been +more conscious than she of the external contrast between her partners +on this and the former occasion. She perceived, too, as Tryon from the +outside had not, the difference between Wain's wordy flattery (only +saved by his cousin's warning from pointed and fulsome adulation), and +the tenderly graceful compliment, couched in the romantic terms of +chivalry, with which the knight of the handkerchief had charmed her +ear. It was only by an immense effort that she was able to keep her +emotions under control until the end of the dance, when she fled to her +chamber and burst into tears. It was not the cruel Tryon who had +blasted her love with his deadly look that she mourned, but the gallant +young knight who had worn her favor on his lance and crowned her Queen +of Love and Beauty. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Tryon's stay in Patesville was very brief. He drove to the hotel and +put up for the night. During many sleepless hours his mind was in a +turmoil with a very different set of thoughts from those which had +occupied it on the way to town. Not the least of them was a profound +self-contempt for his own lack of discernment. How had he been so +blind as not to have read long ago the character of this wretched girl +who had bewitched him? To-night his eyes had been opened—he had seen +her with the mask thrown off, a true daughter of a race in which the +sensuous enjoyment of the moment took precedence of taste or sentiment +or any of the higher emotions. Her few months of boarding-school, her +brief association with white people, had evidently been a mere veneer +over the underlying negro, and their effects had slipped away as soon +as the intercourse had ceased. With the monkey-like imitativeness of +the negro she had copied the manners of white people while she lived +among them, and had dropped them with equal facility when they ceased +to serve a purpose. Who but a negro could have recovered so soon from +what had seemed a terrible bereavement?—she herself must have felt it +at the time, for otherwise she would not have swooned. A woman of +sensibility, as this one had seemed to be, should naturally feel more +keenly, and for a longer time than a man, an injury to the affections; +but he, a son of the ruling race, had been miserable for six weeks +about a girl who had so far forgotten him as already to plunge headlong +into the childish amusements of her own ignorant and degraded people. +What more, indeed, he asked himself savagely,—what more could be +expected of the base-born child of the plaything of a gentleman's idle +hour, who to this ignoble origin added the blood of a servile race? +And he, George Tryon, had honored her with his love; he had very nearly +linked his fate and joined his blood to hers by the solemn sanctions of +church and state. Tryon was not a devout man, but he thanked God with +religious fervor that he had been saved a second time from a mistake +which would have wrecked his whole future. If he had yielded to the +momentary weakness of the past night,—the outcome of a sickly +sentimentality to which he recognized now, in the light of reflection, +that he was entirely too prone,—he would have regretted it soon +enough. The black streak would have been sure to come out in some +form, sooner or later, if not in the wife, then in her children. He +saw clearly enough, in this hour of revulsion, that with his +temperament and training such a union could never have been happy. If +all the world had been ignorant of the dark secret, it would always +have been in his own thoughts, or at least never far away. Each fault +of hers that the close daily association of husband and wife might +reveal,—the most flawless of sweethearts do not pass scathless through +the long test of matrimony,—every wayward impulse of his children, +every defect of mind, morals, temper, or health, would have been +ascribed to the dark ancestral strain. Happiness under such conditions +would have been impossible. +</P> + +<P> +When Tryon lay awake in the early morning, after a few brief hours of +sleep, the business which had brought him to Patesville seemed, in the +cold light of reason, so ridiculously inadequate that he felt almost +ashamed to have set up such a pretext for his journey. The prospect, +too, of meeting Dr. Green and his family, of having to explain his +former sudden departure, and of running a gauntlet of inquiry +concerning his marriage to the aristocratic Miss Warwick of South +Carolina; the fear that some one at Patesville might have suspected a +connection between Rena's swoon and his own flight,—these +considerations so moved this impressionable and impulsive young man +that he called a bell-boy, demanded an early breakfast, ordered his +horse, paid his reckoning, and started upon his homeward journey +forthwith. A certain distrust of his own sensibility, which he felt to +be curiously inconsistent with his most positive convictions, led him +to seek the river bridge by a roundabout route which did not take him +past the house where, a few hours before, he had seen the last fragment +of his idol shattered beyond the hope of repair. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +The party broke up at an early hour, since most of the guests were +working-people, and the travelers were to make an early start next day. +About nine in the morning, Wain drove round to Mis' Molly's. Rena's +trunk was strapped behind the buggy, and she set out, in the company of +Wain, for her new field of labor. The school term was only two months +in length, and she did not expect to return until its expiration. Just +before taking her seat in the buggy, Rena felt a sudden sinking of the +heart. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, mother," she whispered, as they stood wrapped in a close embrace, +"I'm afraid to leave you. I left you once, and it turned out so +miserably." +</P> + +<P> +"It'll turn out better this time, honey," replied her mother +soothingly. "Good-by, child. Take care of yo'self an' yo'r money, and +write to yo'r mammy." +</P> + +<P> +One kiss all round, and Rena was lifted into the buggy. Wain seized +the reins, and under his skillful touch the pretty mare began to prance +and curvet with restrained impatience. Wain could not resist the +opportunity to show off before the party, which included Mary B.'s +entire family and several other neighbors, who had gathered to see the +travelers off. +</P> + +<P> +"Good-by ter Patesville! Good-by, folkses all!" he cried, with a wave +of his disengaged hand. +</P> + +<P> +"Good-by, mother! Good-by, all!" cried Rena, as with tears in her +heart and a brave smile on her face she left her home behind her for +the second time. +</P> + +<P> +When they had crossed the river bridge, the travelers came to a long +stretch of rising ground, from the summit of which they could look back +over the white sandy road for nearly a mile. Neither Rena nor her +companion saw Frank Fowler behind the chinquapin bush at the foot of +the hill, nor the gaze of mute love and longing with which he watched +the buggy mount the long incline. He had not been able to trust +himself to bid her farewell. He had seen her go away once before with +every prospect of happiness, and come back, a dove with a wounded wing, +to the old nest behind the cedars. She was going away again, with a +man whom he disliked and distrusted. If she had met misfortune before, +what were her prospects for happiness now? +</P> + +<P> +The buggy paused at the top of the hill, and Frank, shading his eyes +with his hand, thought he could see her turn and look behind. Look +back, dear child, towards your home and those who love you! For who +knows more than this faithful worshiper what threads of the past Fate +is weaving into your future, or whether happiness or misery lies before +you? +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap25"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XXV +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +BALANCE ALL +</H3> + +<P> +The road to Sampson County lay for the most part over the pine-clad +sandhills,—an alternation of gentle rises and gradual descents, with +now and then a swamp of greater or less extent. Long stretches of the +highway led through the virgin forest, for miles unbroken by a clearing +or sign of human habitation. +</P> + +<P> +They traveled slowly, with frequent pauses in shady places, for the +weather was hot. The journey, made leisurely, required more than a +day, and might with slight effort be prolonged into two. They stopped +for the night at a small village, where Wain found lodging for Rena +with an acquaintance of his, and for himself with another, while a +third took charge of the horse, the accommodation for travelers being +limited. Rena's appearance and manners were the subject of much +comment. It was necessary to explain to several curious white people +that Rena was a woman of color. A white woman might have driven with +Wain without attracting remark,—most white ladies had negro coachmen. +That a woman of Rena's complexion should eat at a negro's table, or +sleep beneath a negro's roof, was a seeming breach of caste which only +black blood could excuse. The explanation was never questioned. No +white person of sound mind would ever claim to be a negro. +</P> + +<P> +They resumed their journey somewhat late in the morning. Rena would +willingly have hastened, for she was anxious to plunge into her new +work; but Wain seemed disposed to prolong the pleasant drive, and +beguiled the way for a time with stories of wonderful things he had +done and strange experiences of a somewhat checkered career. He was +shrewd enough to avoid any subject which would offend a modest young +woman, but too obtuse to perceive that much of what he said would not +commend him to a person of refinement. He made little reference to his +possessions, concerning which so much had been said at Patesville; and +this reticence was a point in his favor. If he had not been so much +upon his guard and Rena so much absorbed by thoughts of her future +work, such a drive would have furnished a person of her discernment a +very fair measure of the man's character. To these distractions must be +added the entire absence of any idea that Wain might have amorous +designs upon her; and any shortcomings of manners or speech were +excused by the broad mantle of charity which Rena in her new-found zeal +for the welfare of her people was willing to throw over all their +faults. They were the victims of oppression; they were not responsible +for its results. +</P> + +<P> +Toward the end of the second day, while nearing their destination, the +travelers passed a large white house standing back from the road at the +foot of a lane. Around it grew widespreading trees and well-kept +shrubbery. The fences were in good repair. Behind the house and +across the road stretched extensive fields of cotton and waving corn. +They had passed no other place that showed such signs of thrift and +prosperity. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, what a lovely place!" exclaimed Rena. "That is yours, isn't it?" +</P> + +<P> +"No; we ain't got to my house yet," he answered. "Dat house b'longs +ter de riches' people roun' here. Dat house is over in de nex' county. +We're right close to de line now." +</P> + +<P> +Shortly afterwards they turned off from the main highway they had been +pursuing, and struck into a narrower road to the left. +</P> + +<P> +"De main road," explained Wain, "goes on to Clinton, 'bout five miles +er mo' away. Dis one we're turnin' inter now will take us to my place, +which is 'bout three miles fu'ther on. We'll git dere now in an hour +er so." +</P> + +<P> +Wain lived in an old plantation house, somewhat dilapidated, and +surrounded by an air of neglect and shiftlessness, but still preserving +a remnant of dignity in its outlines and comfort in its interior +arrangements. Rena was assigned a large room on the second floor. She +was somewhat surprised at the make-up of the household. Wain's +mother—an old woman, much darker than her son—kept house for him. A +sister with two children lived in the house. The element of surprise +lay in the presence of two small children left by Wain's wife, of whom +Rena now heard for the first time. He had lost his wife, he informed +Rena sadly, a couple of years before. +</P> + +<P> +"Yas, Miss Rena," she sighed, "de Lawd give her, an' de Lawd tuck her +away. Blessed be de name er de Lawd." He accompanied this sententious +quotation with a wicked look from under his half-closed eyelids that +Rena did not see. +</P> + +<P> +The following morning Wain drove her in his buggy over to the county +town, where she took the teacher's examination. She was given a seat +in a room with a number of other candidates for certificates, but the +fact leaking out from some remark of Wain's that she was a colored +girl, objection was quietly made by several of the would-be teachers to +her presence in the room, and she was requested to retire until the +white teachers should have been examined. An hour or two later she was +given a separate examination, which she passed without difficulty. The +examiner, a gentleman of local standing, was dimly conscious that she +might not have found her exclusion pleasant, and was especially polite. +It would have been strange, indeed, if he had not been impressed by her +sweet face and air of modest dignity, which were all the more striking +because of her social disability. He fell into conversation with her, +became interested in her hopes and aims, and very cordially offered to +be of service, if at any time he might, in connection with her school. +</P> + +<P> +"You have the satisfaction," he said, "of receiving the only +first-grade certificate issued to-day. You might teach a higher grade +of pupils than you will find at Sandy Run, but let us hope that you may +in time raise them to your own level." +</P> + +<P> +"Which I doubt very much," he muttered to himself, as she went away +with Wain. "What a pity that such a woman should be a nigger! If she +were anything to me, though, I should hate to trust her anywhere near +that saddle-colored scoundrel. He's a thoroughly bad lot, and will +bear watching." +</P> + +<P> +Rena, however, was serenely ignorant of any danger from the +accommodating Wain. Absorbed in her own thoughts and plans, she had +not sought to look beneath the surface of his somewhat overdone +politeness. In a few days she began her work as teacher, and sought to +forget in the service of others the dull sorrow that still gnawed at +her heart. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap26"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XXVI +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE SCHOOLHOUSE IN THE WOODS +</H3> + +<P> +Blanche Leary, closely observant of Tryon's moods, marked a decided +change in his manner after his return from his trip to Patesville. His +former moroseness had given way to a certain defiant lightness, broken +now and then by an involuntary sigh, but maintained so well, on the +whole, that his mother detected no lapses whatever. The change was +characterized by another feature agreeable to both the women: Tryon +showed decidedly more interest than ever before in Miss Leary's +society. Within a week he asked her several times to play a selection +on the piano, displaying, as she noticed, a decided preference for gay +and cheerful music, and several times suggesting a change when she +chose pieces of a sentimental cast. More than once, during the second +week after his return, he went out riding with her; she was a graceful +horsewoman, perfectly at home in the saddle, and appearing to advantage +in a riding-habit. She was aware that Tryon watched her now and then, +with an eye rather critical than indulgent. +</P> + +<P> +"He is comparing me with some other girl," she surmised. "I seem to +stand the test very well. I wonder who the other is, and what was the +trouble?" +</P> + +<P> +Miss Leary exerted all her powers to interest and amuse the man she had +set out to win, and who seemed nearer than ever before. Tryon, to his +pleased surprise, discovered in her mind depths that he had never +suspected. She displayed a singular affinity for the tastes that were +his—he could not, of course, know how carefully she had studied them. +The old wound, recently reopened, seemed to be healing rapidly, under +conditions more conducive than before to perfect recovery. No longer, +indeed, was he pursued by the picture of Rena discovered and +unmasked—this he had definitely banished from the realm of sentiment +to that of reason. The haunting image of Rena loving and beloved, amid +the harmonious surroundings of her brother's home, was not so readily +displaced. Nevertheless, he reached in several weeks a point from which +he could consider her as one thinks of a dear one removed by the hand +of death, or smitten by some incurable ailment of mind or body. +Erelong, he fondly believed, the recovery would be so far complete that +he could consign to the tomb of pleasant memories even the most +thrilling episodes of his ill-starred courtship. +</P> + +<P> +"George," said Mrs. Tryon one morning while her son was in this +cheerful mood, "I'm sending Blanche over to Major McLeod's to do an +errand for me. Would you mind driving her over? The road may be rough +after the storm last night, and Blanche has an idea that no one drives +so well as you." +</P> + +<P> +"Why, yes, mother, I'll be glad to drive Blanche over. I want to see +the major myself." +</P> + +<P> +They were soon bowling along between the pines, behind the handsome +mare that had carried Tryon so well at the Clarence tournament. +Presently he drew up sharply. +</P> + +<P> +"A tree has fallen squarely across the road," he exclaimed. "We shall +have to turn back a little way and go around." +</P> + +<P> +They drove back a quarter of a mile and turned into a by-road leading +to the right through the woods. The solemn silence of the pine forest +is soothing or oppressive, according to one's mood. Beneath the cool +arcade of the tall, overarching trees a deep peace stole over Tryon's +heart. He had put aside indefinitely and forever an unhappy and +impossible love. The pretty and affectionate girl beside him would +make an ideal wife. Of her family and blood he was sure. She was his +mother's choice, and his mother had set her heart upon their marriage. +Why not speak to her now, and thus give himself the best possible +protection against stray flames of love? +</P> + +<P> +"Blanche," he said, looking at her kindly. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, George?" Her voice was very gentle, and slightly tremulous. +Could she have divined his thought? Love is a great clairvoyant. +</P> + +<P> +"Blanche, dear, I"— +</P> + +<P> +A clatter of voices broke upon the stillness of the forest and +interrupted Tryon's speech. A sudden turn to the left brought the +buggy to a little clearing, in the midst of which stood a small log +schoolhouse. Out of the schoolhouse a swarm of colored children were +emerging, the suppressed energy of the school hour finding vent in +vocal exercise of various sorts. A group had already formed a ring, +and were singing with great volume and vigor:— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> + "Miss Jane, she loves sugar an' tea,<BR> + Miss Jane, she loves candy.<BR> + Miss Jane, she can whirl all around<BR> + An' kiss her love quite handy.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> + "De oak grows tall,<BR> + De pine grows slim,<BR> + So rise you up, my true love,<BR> + An' let me come in."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +"What a funny little darkey!" exclaimed Miss Leary, pointing to a +diminutive lad who was walking on his hands, with his feet balanced in +the air. At sight of the buggy and its occupants this sable acrobat, +still retaining his inverted position, moved toward the newcomers, and, +reversing himself with a sudden spring, brought up standing beside the +buggy. +</P> + +<P> +"Hoddy, Mars Geo'ge!" he exclaimed, bobbing his head and kicking his +heel out behind in approved plantation style. +</P> + +<P> +"Hello, Plato," replied the young man, "what are you doing here?" +</P> + +<P> +"Gwine ter school, Mars Geo'ge," replied the lad; "larnin' ter read an' +write, suh, lack de w'ite folks." +</P> + +<P> +"Wat you callin' dat w'ite man marster fur?" whispered a tall yellow +boy to the acrobat addressed as Plato. "You don' b'long ter him no +mo'; you're free, an' ain' got sense ernuff ter know it." +</P> + +<P> +Tryon threw a small coin to Plato, and holding another in his hand +suggestively, smiled toward the tall yellow boy, who looked regretfully +at the coin, but stood his ground; he would call no man master, not +even for a piece of money. +</P> + +<P> +During this little colloquy, Miss Leary had kept her face turned toward +the schoolhouse. +</P> + +<P> +"What a pretty girl!" she exclaimed. "There," she added, as Tryon +turned his head toward her, "you are too late. She has retired into +her castle. Oh, Plato!" +</P> + +<P> +"Yas, missis," replied Plato, who was prancing round the buggy in great +glee, on the strength of his acquaintance with the white folks. +</P> + +<P> +"Is your teacher white?" +</P> + +<P> +"No, ma'm, she ain't w'ite; she's black. She looks lack she's w'ite, +but she's black." +</P> + +<P> +Tryon had not seen the teacher's face, but the incident had jarred the +old wound; Miss Leary's description of the teacher, together with +Plato's characterization, had stirred lightly sleeping memories. He +was more or less abstracted during the remainder of the drive, and did +not recur to the conversation that had been interrupted by coming upon +the schoolhouse. +</P> + +<P> +The teacher, glancing for a moment through the open door of the +schoolhouse, had seen a handsome young lady staring at her,—Miss Leary +had a curiously intent look when she was interested in anything, with +no intention whatever to be rude,—and beyond the lady the back and +shoulder of a man, whose face was turned the other way. There was a +vague suggestion of something familiar about the equipage, but Rena +shrank from this close scrutiny and withdrew out of sight before she +had had an opportunity to identify the vague resemblance to something +she had known. +</P> + +<P> +Miss Leary had missed by a hair's-breadth the psychological moment, and +felt some resentment toward the little negroes who had interrupted her +lover's train of thought. Negroes have caused a great deal of trouble +among white people. How deeply the shadow of the Ethiopian had fallen +upon her own happiness, Miss Leary of course could not guess. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap27"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XXVII +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +AN INTERESTING ACQUAINTANCE +</H3> + +<P> +A few days later, Rena looked out of the window near her desk and saw a +low basket phaeton, drawn by a sorrel pony, driven sharply into the +clearing and drawn up beside an oak sapling. The occupant of the +phaeton, a tall, handsome, well-preserved lady in middle life, with +slightly gray hair, alighted briskly from the phaeton, tied the pony to +the sapling with a hitching-strap, and advanced to the schoolhouse door. +</P> + +<P> +Rena wondered who the lady might be. She had a benevolent aspect, +however, and came forward to the desk with a smile, not at all +embarrassed by the wide-eyed inspection of the entire school. +</P> + +<P> +"How do you do?" she said, extending her hand to the teacher. "I live +in the neighborhood and am interested in the colored people—a good +many of them once belonged to me. I heard something of your school, +and thought I should like to make your acquaintance." +</P> + +<P> +"It is very kind of you, indeed," murmured Rena respectfully. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," continued the lady, "I am not one of those who sit back and +blame their former slaves because they were freed. They are free +now,—it is all decided and settled,—and they ought to be taught +enough to enable them to make good use of their freedom. But really, +my dear,—you mustn't feel offended if I make a mistake,—I am going to +ask you something very personal." She looked suggestively at the +gaping pupils. +</P> + +<P> +"The school may take the morning recess now," announced the teacher. +The pupils filed out in an orderly manner, most of them stationing +themselves about the grounds in such places as would keep the teacher +and the white lady in view. Very few white persons approved of the +colored schools; no other white person had ever visited this one. +</P> + +<P> +"Are you really colored?" asked the lady, when the children had +withdrawn. +</P> + +<P> +A year and a half earlier, Rena would have met the question by some +display of self-consciousness. Now, she replied simply and directly. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, ma'am, I am colored." +</P> + +<P> +The lady, who had been studying her as closely as good manners would +permit, sighed regretfully. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, it's a shame. No one would ever think it. If you chose to +conceal it, no one would ever be the wiser. What is your name, child, +and where were you brought up? You must have a romantic history." +</P> + +<P> +Rena gave her name and a few facts in regard to her past. The lady was +so much interested, and put so many and such searching questions, that +Rena really found it more difficult to suppress the fact that she had +been white, than she had formerly had in hiding her African origin. +There was about the girl an air of real refinement that pleased the +lady,—the refinement not merely of a fine nature, but of contact with +cultured people; a certain reserve of speech and manner quite +inconsistent with Mrs. Tryon's experience of colored women. The lady +was interested and slightly mystified. A generous, impulsive +spirit,—her son's own mother,—she made minute inquiries about the +school and the pupils, several of whom she knew by name. Rena stated +that the two months' term was nearing its end, and that she was +training the children in various declamations and dialogues for the +exhibition at the close. +</P> + +<P> +"I shall attend it," declared the lady positively. "I'm sure you are +doing a good work, and it's very noble of you to undertake it when you +might have a very different future. If I can serve you at any time, +don't hesitate to call upon me. I live in the big white house just +before you turn out of the Clinton road to come this way. I'm only a +widow, but my son George lives with me and has some influence in the +neighborhood. He drove by here yesterday with the lady he is going to +marry. It was she who told me about you." +</P> + +<P> +Was it the name, or some subtle resemblance in speech or feature, that +recalled Tryon's image to Rena's mind? It was not so far away—the +image of the loving Tryon—that any powerful witchcraft was required to +call it up. His mother was a widow; Rena had thought, in happier days, +that she might be such a kind lady as this. But the cruel Tryon who +had left her—his mother would be some hard, cold, proud woman, who +would regard a negro as but little better than a dog, and who would not +soil her lips by addressing a colored person upon any other terms than +as a servant. She knew, too, that Tryon did not live in Sampson +County, though the exact location of his home was not clear to her. +</P> + +<P> +"And where are you staying, my dear?" asked the good lady. +</P> + +<P> +"I'm boarding at Mrs. Wain's," answered Rena. +</P> + +<P> +"Mrs. Wain's?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, they live in the old Campbell place." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, yes—Aunt Nancy. She's a good enough woman, but we don't think +much of her son Jeff. He married my Amanda after the war—she used to +belong to me, and ought to have known better. He abused her most +shamefully, and had to be threatened with the law. She left him a year +or so ago and went away; I haven't seen her lately. Well, good-by, +child; I'm coming to your exhibition. If you ever pass my house, come +in and see me." +</P> + +<P> +The good lady had talked for half an hour, and had brought a ray of +sunshine into the teacher's monotonous life, heretofore lighted only by +the uncertain lamp of high resolve. She had satisfied a pardonable +curiosity, and had gone away without mentioning her name. +</P> + +<P> +Rena saw Plato untying the pony as the lady climbed into the phaeton. +</P> + +<P> +"Who was the lady, Plato?" asked the teacher when the visitor had +driven away. +</P> + +<P> +"Dat 'uz my ole mist'iss, ma'm," returned Plato proudly,—"ole Mis' +'Liza." +</P> + +<P> +"Mis' 'Liza who?" asked Rena. +</P> + +<P> +"Mis' 'Liza Tryon. I use' ter b'long ter her. Dat 'uz her son, my +young Mars Geo'ge, w'at driv pas' hyuh yistiddy wid 'is sweetheart." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap28"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XXVIII +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE LOST KNIFE +</H3> + +<P> +Rena had found her task not a difficult one so far as discipline was +concerned. Her pupils were of a docile race, and school to them had +all the charm of novelty. The teacher commanded some awe because she +was a stranger, and some, perhaps, because she was white; for the +theory of blackness as propounded by Plato could not quite +counter-balance in the young African mind the evidence of their own +senses. She combined gentleness with firmness; and if these had not +been sufficient, she had reserves of character which would have given +her the mastery over much less plastic material than these ignorant but +eager young people. The work of instruction was simple enough, for most +of the pupils began with the alphabet, which they acquired from +Webster's blue-backed spelling-book, the palladium of Southern +education at that epoch. The much abused carpet-baggers had put the +spelling-book within reach of every child of school age in North +Carolina,—a fact which is often overlooked when the carpet-baggers are +held up to public odium. Even the devil should have his due, and is +not so black as he is painted. +</P> + +<P> +At the time when she learned that Tryon lived in the neighborhood, Rena +had already been subjected for several weeks to a trying ordeal. Wain +had begun to persecute her with marked attentions. She had at first +gone to board at his house,—or, by courtesy, with his mother. For a +week or two she had considered his attentions in no other light than +those of a member of the school committee sharing her own zeal and +interested in seeing the school successfully carried on. In this +character Wain had driven her to the town for her examination; he had +busied himself about putting the schoolhouse in order, and in various +matters affecting the conduct of the school. He had jocularly offered +to come and whip the children for her, and had found it convenient to +drop in occasionally, ostensibly to see what progress the work was +making. +</P> + +<P> +"Dese child'en," he would observe sonorously, in the presence of the +school, "oughter be monst'ous glad ter have de chance er settin' under +yo' instruction, Miss Rena. I'm sho' eve'body in dis neighbo'hood +'preciates de priv'lege er havin' you in ou' mids'." +</P> + +<P> +Though slightly embarrassing to the teacher, these public +demonstrations were endurable so long as they could be regarded as mere +official appreciation of her work. Sincerely in earnest about her +undertaking, she had plunged into it with all the intensity of a +serious nature which love had stirred to activity. A pessimist might +have sighed sadly or smiled cynically at the notion that a poor, weak +girl, with a dangerous beauty and a sensitive soul, and troubles enough +of her own, should hope to accomplish anything appreciable toward +lifting the black mass still floundering in the mud where slavery had +left it, and where emancipation had found it,—the mud in which, for +aught that could be seen to the contrary, her little feet, too, were +hopelessly entangled. It might have seemed like expecting a man to +lift himself by his boot-straps. +</P> + +<P> +But Rena was no philosopher, either sad or cheerful. She could not +even have replied to this argument, that races must lift themselves, +and the most that can be done by others is to give them opportunity and +fair play. Hers was a simpler reasoning,—the logic by which the world +is kept going onward and upward when philosophers are at odds and +reformers are not forthcoming. She knew that for every child she +taught to read and write she opened, if ever so little, the door of +opportunity, and she was happy in the consciousness of performing a +duty which seemed all the more imperative because newly discovered. +Her zeal, indeed, for the time being was like that of an early +Christian, who was more willing than not to die for his faith. Rena +had fully and firmly made up her mind to sacrifice her life upon this +altar. Her absorption in the work had not been without its reward, for +thereby she had been able to keep at a distance the spectre of her lost +love. Her dreams she could not control, but she banished Tryon as far +as possible from her waking thoughts. +</P> + +<P> +When Wain's attentions became obviously personal, Rena's new vestal +instinct took alarm, and she began to apprehend his character more +clearly. She had long ago learned that his pretensions to wealth were a +sham. He was nominal owner of a large plantation, it is true; but the +land was worn out, and mortgaged to the limit of its security value. +His reputed droves of cattle and hogs had dwindled to a mere handful of +lean and listless brutes. +</P> + +<P> +Her clear eye, when once set to take Wain's measure, soon fathomed his +shallow, selfish soul, and detected, or at least divined, behind his +mask of good-nature a lurking brutality which filled her with vague +distrust, needing only occasion to develop it into active +apprehension,—occasion which was not long wanting. She avoided being +alone with him at home by keeping carefully with the women of the +house. If she were left alone,—and they soon showed a tendency to +leave her on any pretext whenever Wain came near,—she would seek her +own room and lock the door. She preferred not to offend Wain; she was +far away from home and in a measure in his power, but she dreaded his +compliments and sickened at his smile. She was also compelled to hear +his relations sing his praises. +</P> + +<P> +"My son Jeff," old Mrs. Wain would say, "is de bes' man you ever seed. +His fus' wife had de easies' time an' de happies' time er ary woman in +dis settlement. He's grieve' fer her a long time, but I reckon he's +gittin' over it, an' de nex' 'oman w'at marries him'll git a box er +pyo' gol', ef I does say it as is his own mammy." +</P> + +<P> +Rena had thought Wain rather harsh with his household, except in her +immediate presence. His mother and sister seemed more or less afraid +of him, and the children often anxious to avoid him. +</P> + +<P> +One day, he timed his visit to the schoolhouse so as to walk home with +Rena through the woods. When she became aware of his purpose, she +called to one of the children who was loitering behind the others, +"Wait a minute, Jenny. I'm going your way, and you can walk along with +me." +</P> + +<P> +Wain with difficulty hid a scowl behind a smiling front. When they had +gone a little distance along the road through the woods, he clapped his +hand upon his pocket. +</P> + +<P> +"I declare ter goodness," he exclaimed, "ef I ain't dropped my +pocket-knife! I thought I felt somethin' slip th'ough dat hole in my +pocket jes' by the big pine stump in the schoolhouse ya'd. Jinny, +chile, run back an' hunt fer my knife, an' I'll give yer five cents ef +yer find it. Me an' Miss Rena'll walk on slow 'tel you ketches us." +</P> + +<P> +Rena did not dare to object, though she was afraid to be alone with +this man. If she could have had a moment to think, she would have +volunteered to go back with Jenny and look for the knife, which, +although a palpable subterfuge on her part, would have been one to +which Wain could not object; but the child, dazzled by the prospect of +reward, had darted back so quickly that this way of escape was cut off. +She was evidently in for a declaration of love, which she had taken +infinite pains to avoid. Just the form it would assume, she could not +foresee. She was not long left in suspense. No sooner was the child +well out of sight than Wain threw his arms suddenly about her waist and +smilingly attempted to kiss her. +</P> + +<P> +Speechless with fear and indignation, she tore herself from his grasp +with totally unexpected force, and fled incontinently along the forest +path. Wain—who, to do him justice, had merely meant to declare his +passion in what he had hoped might prove a not unacceptable +fashion—followed in some alarm, expostulating and apologizing as he +went. But he was heavy and Rena was light, and fear lent wings to her +feet. He followed her until he saw her enter the house of Elder +Johnson, the father of several of her pupils, after which he sneaked +uneasily homeward, somewhat apprehensive of the consequences of his +abrupt wooing, which was evidently open to an unfavorable construction. +When, an hour later, Rena sent one of the Johnson children for some of +her things, with a message explaining that the teacher had been invited +to spend a few days at Elder Johnson's, Wain felt a pronounced measure +of relief. For an hour he had even thought it might be better to +relinquish his pursuit. With a fatuousness born of vanity, however, no +sooner had she sent her excuse than he began to look upon her visit to +Johnson's as a mere exhibition of coyness, which, together with her +conduct in the woods, was merely intended to lure him on. +</P> + +<P> +Right upon the heels of the perturbation caused by Wain's conduct, Rena +discovered that Tryon lived in the neighborhood; that not only might +she meet him any day upon the highway, but that he had actually driven +by the schoolhouse. That he knew or would know of her proximity there +could be no possible doubt, since she had freely told his mother her +name and her home. A hot wave of shame swept over her at the thought +that George Tryon might imagine she were following him, throwing +herself in his way, and at the thought of the construction which he +might place upon her actions. Caught thus between two emotional fires, +at the very time when her school duties, owing to the approaching +exhibition, demanded all her energies, Rena was subjected to a physical +and mental strain that only youth and health could have resisted, and +then only for a short time. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap29"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XXIX +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +PLATO EARNS HALF A DOLLAR +</H3> + +<P> +Tryon's first feeling, when his mother at the dinner-table gave an +account of her visit to the schoolhouse in the woods, was one of +extreme annoyance. Why, of all created beings, should this particular +woman be chosen to teach the colored school at Sandy Run? Had she +learned that he lived in the neighborhood, and had she sought the place +hoping that he might consent to renew, on different terms, relations +which could never be resumed upon their former footing? Six weeks +before, he would not have believed her capable of following him; but +his last visit to Patesville had revealed her character in such a light +that it was difficult to predict what she might do. It was, however, +no affair of his. He was done with her; he had dismissed her from his +own life, where she had never properly belonged, and he had filled her +place, or would soon fill it, with another and worthier woman. Even +his mother, a woman of keen discernment and delicate intuitions, had +been deceived by this girl's specious exterior. She had brought away +from her interview of the morning the impression that Rena was a fine, +pure spirit, born out of place, through some freak of Fate, devoting +herself with heroic self-sacrifice to a noble cause. Well, he had +imagined her just as pure and fine, and she had deliberately, with a +negro's low cunning, deceived him into believing that she was a white +girl. The pretended confession of the brother, in which he had spoken +of the humble origin of the family, had been, consciously or +unconsciously, the most disingenuous feature of the whole miserable +performance. They had tried by a show of frankness to satisfy their +own consciences,—they doubtless had enough of white blood to give them +a rudimentary trace of such a moral organ,—and by the same act to +disarm him against future recriminations, in the event of possible +discovery. How was he to imagine that persons of their appearance and +pretensions were tainted with negro blood? The more he dwelt upon the +subject, the more angry he became with those who had surprised his +virgin heart and deflowered it by such low trickery. The man who +brought the first negro into the British colonies had committed a crime +against humanity and a worse crime against his own race. The father of +this girl had been guilty of a sin against society for which +others—for which he, George Tryon—must pay the penalty. As slaves, +negroes were tolerable. As freemen, they were an excrescence, an alien +element incapable of absorption into the body politic of white men. He +would like to send them all back to the Africa from which their +forefathers had come,—unwillingly enough, he would admit,—and he +would like especially to banish this girl from his own neighborhood; +not indeed that her presence would make any difference to him, except +as a humiliating reminder of his own folly and weakness with which he +could very well dispense. +</P> + +<P> +Of this state of mind Tryon gave no visible manifestation beyond a +certain taciturnity, so much at variance with his recent liveliness +that the ladies could not fail to notice it. No effort upon the part +of either was able to affect his mood, and they both resigned +themselves to await his lordship's pleasure to be companionable. +</P> + +<P> +For a day or two, Tryon sedulously kept away from the neighborhood of +the schoolhouse at Sandy Rim. He really had business which would have +taken him in that direction, but made a detour of five miles rather +than go near his abandoned and discredited sweetheart. +</P> + +<P> +But George Tryon was wisely distrustful of his own impulses. Driving +one day along the road to Clinton, he overhauled a diminutive black +figure trudging along the road, occasionally turning a handspring by +way of diversion. +</P> + +<P> +"Hello, Plato," called Tryon, "do you want a lift?" +</P> + +<P> +"Hoddy, Mars Geo'ge. Kin I ride wid you?" +</P> + +<P> +"Jump up." +</P> + +<P> +Plato mounted into the buggy with the agility to be expected from a lad +of his acrobatic accomplishments. The two almost immediately fell into +conversation upon perhaps the only subject of common interest between +them. Before the town was reached, Tryon knew, so far as Plato could +make it plain, the estimation in which the teacher was held by pupils +and parents. He had learned the hours of opening and dismissal of the +school, where the teacher lived, her habits of coming to and going from +the schoolhouse, and the road she always followed. +</P> + +<P> +"Does she go to church or anywhere else with Jeff Wain, Plato?" asked +Tryon. +</P> + +<P> +"No, suh, she don' go nowhar wid nobody excep'n' ole Elder Johnson er +Mis' Johnson, an' de child'en. She use' ter stop at Mis' Wain's, but +she's stayin' wid Elder Johnson now. She alluz makes some er de +child'en go home wid er f'm school," said Plato, proud to find in Mars +Geo'ge an appreciative listener,—"sometimes one an' sometimes anudder. +I's be'n home wid 'er twice, ann it'll be my tu'n ag'in befo' long." +</P> + +<P> +"Plato," remarked Tryon impressively, as they drove into the town, "do +you think you could keep a secret?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yas, Mars Geo'ge, ef you says I shill." +</P> + +<P> +"Do you see this fifty-cent piece?" Tryon displayed a small piece of +paper money, crisp and green in its newness. +</P> + +<P> +"Yas, Mars Geo'ge," replied Plato, fixing his eyes respectfully on the +government's promise to pay. Fifty cents was a large sum of money. +His acquaintance with Mars Geo'ge gave him the privilege of looking at +money. When he grew up, he would be able, in good times, to earn fifty +cents a day. +</P> + +<P> +"I am going to give this to you, Plato." +</P> + +<P> +Plato's eyes opened wide as saucers. "Me, Mars Geo'ge?" he asked in +amazement. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, Plato. I'm going to write a letter while I'm in town, and want +you to take it. Meet me here in half an hour, and I'll give you the +letter. Meantime, keep your mouth shut." +</P> + +<P> +"Yas, Mars Geo'ge," replied Plato with a grin that distended that organ +unduly. That he did not keep it shut may be inferred from the fact +that within the next half hour he had eaten and drunk fifty cents' +worth of candy, ginger-pop, and other available delicacies that +appealed to the youthful palate. Having nothing more to spend, and the +high prices prevailing for some time after the war having left him +capable of locomotion, Plato was promptly on hand at the appointed time +and place. +</P> + +<P> +Tryon placed a letter in Plato's hand, still sticky with molasses +candy,—he had inclosed it in a second cover by way of protection. +"Give that letter," he said, "to your teacher; don't say a word about +it to a living soul; bring me an answer, and give it into my own hand, +and you shall have another half dollar." +</P> + +<P> +Tryon was quite aware that by a surreptitious correspondence he ran +some risk of compromising Rena. But he had felt, as soon as he had +indulged his first opportunity to talk of her, an irresistible impulse +to see her and speak to her again. He could scarcely call at her +boarding-place,—what possible proper excuse could a young white man +have for visiting a colored woman? At the schoolhouse she would be +surrounded by her pupils, and a private interview would be as +difficult, with more eyes to remark and more tongues to comment upon +it. He might address her by mail, but did not know how often she sent +to the nearest post-office. A letter mailed in the town must pass +through the hands of a postmaster notoriously inquisitive and +evil-minded, who was familiar with Tryon's handwriting and had ample +time to attend to other people's business. To meet the teacher alone +on the road seemed scarcely feasible, according to Plato's statement. +A messenger, then, was not only the least of several evils, but really +the only practicable way to communicate with Rena. He thought he could +trust Plato, though miserably aware that he could not trust himself +where this girl was concerned. +</P> + +<P> +The letter handed by Tryon to Plato, and by the latter delivered with +due secrecy and precaution, ran as follows:— +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +DEAR MISS WARWICK,—You may think it strange that I should address you +after what has passed between us; but learning from my mother of your +presence in the neighborhood, I am constrained to believe that you do +not find my proximity embarrassing, and I cannot resist the wish to +meet you at least once more, and talk over the circumstances of our +former friendship. From a practical point of view this may seem +superfluous, as the matter has been definitely settled. I have no +desire to find fault with you; on the contrary, I wish to set myself +right with regard to my own actions, and to assure you of my good +wishes. In other words, since we must part, I would rather we parted +friends than enemies. If nature and society—or Fate, to put it +another way—have decreed that we cannot live together, it is +nevertheless possible that we may carry into the future a pleasant +though somewhat sad memory of a past friendship. Will you not grant me +one interview? I appreciate the difficulty of arranging it; I have +found it almost as hard to communicate with you by letter. I will suit +myself to your convenience and meet you at any time and place you may +designate. Please answer by bearer, who I think is trustworthy, and +believe me, whatever your answer may be, +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> + Respectfully yours,<BR> + G. T.<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +The next day but one Tryon received through the mail the following +reply to his letter:— +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +GEORGE TRYON, ESQ. +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +Dear Sir,—I have requested your messenger to say that I will answer +your letter by mail, which I shall now proceed to do. I assure you +that I was entirely ignorant of your residence in this neighborhood, or +it would have been the last place on earth in which I should have set +foot. +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +As to our past relations, they were ended by your own act. I frankly +confess that I deceived you; I have paid the penalty, and have no +complaint to make. I appreciate the delicacy which has made you +respect my brother's secret, and thank you for it. I remember the +whole affair with shame and humiliation, and would willingly forget it. +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +As to a future interview, I do not see what good it would do either of +us. You are white, and you have given me to understand that I am +black. I accept the classification, however unfair, and the +consequences, however unjust, one of which is that we cannot meet in +the same parlor, in the same church, at the same table, or anywhere, in +social intercourse; upon a steamboat we would not sit at the same +table; we could not walk together on the street, or meet publicly +anywhere and converse, without unkind remark. As a white man, this +might not mean a great deal to you; as a woman, shut out already by my +color from much that is desirable, my good name remains my most +valuable possession. I beg of you to let me alone. The best possible +proof you can give me of your good wishes is to relinquish any desire +or attempt to see me. I shall have finished my work here in a few +days. I have other troubles, of which you know nothing, and any +meeting with you would only add to a burden which is already as much as +I can bear. To speak of parting is superfluous—we have already +parted. It were idle to dream of a future friendship between people so +widely different in station. Such a friendship, if possible in itself, +would never be tolerated by the lady whom you are to marry, with whom +you drove by my schoolhouse the other day. A gentleman so loyal to his +race and its traditions as you have shown yourself could not be less +faithful to the lady to whom he has lost his heart and his memory in +three short months. +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +No, Mr. Tryon, our romance is ended, and better so. We could never +have been happy. I have found a work in which I may be of service to +others who have fewer opportunities than mine have been. Leave me in +peace, I beseech you, and I shall soon pass out of your neighborhood as +I have passed out of your life, and hope to pass out of your memory. +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> + Yours very truly,<BR> + ROWENA WALDEN.<BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap30"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XXX +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +AN UNUSUAL HONOR +</H3> + +<P> +To Rena's high-strung and sensitive nature, already under very great +tension from her past experience, the ordeal of the next few days was a +severe one. On the one hand, Jeff Wain's infatuation had rapidly +increased, in view of her speedy departure. From Mrs. Tryon's remark +about Wain's wife Amanda, and from things Rena had since learned, she +had every reason to believe that this wife was living, and that Wain +must be aware of the fact. In the light of this knowledge, Wain's +former conduct took on a blacker significance than, upon reflection, +she had charitably clothed it with after the first flush of +indignation. That he had not given up his design to make love to her +was quite apparent, and, with Amanda alive, his attentions, always +offensive since she had gathered their import, became in her eyes the +expression of a villainous purpose, of which she could not speak to +others, and from which she felt safe only so long as she took proper +precautions against it. In a week her school would be over, and then +she would get Elder Johnson, or some one else than Wain, to take her +back to Patesville. True, she might abandon her school and go at once; +but her work would be incomplete, she would have violated her contract, +she would lose her salary for the month, explanations would be +necessary, and would not be forthcoming. She might feign +sickness,—indeed, it would scarcely be feigning, for she felt far from +well; she had never, since her illness, quite recovered her former +vigor—but the inconvenience to others would be the same, and her +self-sacrifice would have had, at its very first trial, a lame and +impotent conclusion. She had as yet no fear of personal violence from +Wain; but, under the circumstances, his attentions were an insult. He +was evidently bent upon conquest, and vain enough to think he might +achieve it by virtue of his personal attractions. If he could have +understood how she loathed the sight of his narrow eyes, with their +puffy lids, his thick, tobacco-stained lips, his doubtful teeth, and +his unwieldy person, Wain, a monument of conceit that he was, might +have shrunk, even in his own estimation, to something like his real +proportions. Rena believed that, to defend herself from persecution at +his hands, it was only necessary that she never let him find her alone. +This, however, required constant watchfulness. Relying upon his own +powers, and upon a woman's weakness and aversion to scandal, from which +not even the purest may always escape unscathed, and convinced by her +former silence that he had nothing serious to fear, Wain made it a +point to be present at every public place where she might be. He +assumed, in conversation with her which she could not avoid, and stated +to others, that she had left his house because of a previous promise to +divide the time of her stay between Elder Johnson's house and his own. +He volunteered to teach a class in the Sunday-school which Rena +conducted at the colored Methodist church, and when she remained to +service, occupied a seat conspicuously near her own. In addition to +these public demonstrations, which it was impossible to escape, or, it +seemed, with so thick-skinned an individual as Wain, even to +discourage, she was secretly and uncomfortably conscious that she could +scarcely stir abroad without the risk of encountering one of two men, +each of whom was on the lookout for an opportunity to find her alone. +</P> + +<P> +The knowledge of Tryon's presence in the vicinity had been almost as +much as Rena could bear. To it must be added the consciousness that +he, too, was pursuing her, to what end she could not tell. After his +letter to her brother, and the feeling therein displayed, she found it +necessary to crush once or twice a wild hope that, her secret being +still unknown save to a friendly few, he might return and claim her. +Now, such an outcome would be impossible. He had become engaged to +another woman,—this in itself would be enough to keep him from her, if +it were not an index of a vastly more serious barrier, a proof that he +had never loved her. If he had loved her truly, he would never have +forgotten her in three short months,—three long months they had +heretofore seemed to her, for in them she had lived a lifetime of +experience. Another impassable barrier lay in the fact that his mother +had met her, and that she was known in the neighborhood. Thus cut off +from any hope that she might be anything to him, she had no wish to +meet her former lover; no possible good could come of such a meeting; +and yet her fluttering heart told her that if he should come, as his +letter foreshadowed that he might,—if he should come, the loving +George of old, with soft words and tender smiles and specious talk of +friendship—ah! then, her heart would break! She must not meet him—at +any cost she must avoid him. +</P> + +<P> +But this heaping up of cares strained her endurance to the +breaking-point. Toward the middle of the last week, she knew that she +had almost reached the limit, and was haunted by a fear that she might +break down before the week was over. Now her really fine nature rose +to the emergency, though she mustered her forces with a great effort. +If she could keep Wain at his distance and avoid Tryon for three days +longer, her school labors would be ended and she might retire in peace +and honor. +</P> + +<P> +"Miss Rena," said Plato to her on Tuesday, "ain't it 'bout time I wuz +gwine home wid you ag'in?" +</P> + +<P> +"You may go with me to-morrow, Plato," answered the teacher. +</P> + +<P> +After school Plato met an anxious eyed young man in the woods a short +distance from the schoolhouse. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, Plato, what news?" +</P> + +<P> +"I's gwine ter see her home ter-morrer, Mars Geo'ge." +</P> + +<P> +"To-morrow!" replied Tryon; "how very fortunate! I wanted you to go to +town to-morrow to take an important message for me. I'm sorry, +Plato—you might have earned another dollar." +</P> + +<P> +To lie is a disgraceful thing, and yet there are times when, to a +lover's mind, love dwarfs all ordinary laws. Plato scratched his head +disconsolately, but suddenly a bright thought struck him. +</P> + +<P> +"Can't I go ter town fer you atter I've seed her home, Mars Geo'ge?" +</P> + +<P> +"N-o, I'm afraid it would be too late," returned Tryon doubtfully. +</P> + +<P> +"Den I'll haf ter ax 'er ter lemme go nex' day," said Plato, with +resignation. The honor might be postponed or, if necessary, foregone; +the opportunity to earn a dollar was the chance of a lifetime and must +not be allowed to slip. +</P> + +<P> +"No, Plato," rejoined Tryon, shaking his head, "I shouldn't want to +deprive you of so great a pleasure." Tryon was entirely sincere in +this characterization of Plato's chance; he would have given many a +dollar to be sure of Plato's place and Plato's welcome. Rena's letter +had re-inflamed his smouldering passion; only opposition was needed to +fan it to a white heat. Wherein lay the great superiority of his +position, if he was denied the right to speak to the one person in the +world whom he most cared to address? He felt some dim realization of +the tyranny of caste, when he found it not merely pressing upon an +inferior people who had no right to expect anything better, but barring +his own way to something that he desired. He meant her no harm—but he +must see her. He could never marry her now—but he must see her. He +was conscious of a certain relief at the thought that he had not asked +Blanche Leary to be his wife. His hand was unpledged. He could not +marry the other girl, of course, but they must meet again. The rest he +would leave to Fate, which seemed reluctant to disentangle threads +which it had woven so closely. +</P> + +<P> +"I think, Plato, that I see an easier way out of the difficulty. Your +teacher, I imagine, merely wants some one to see her safely home. +Don't you think, if you should go part of the way, that I might take +your place for the rest, while you did my errand?" +</P> + +<P> +"Why, sho'ly, Mars Geo'ge, you could take keer er her better 'n I +could—better 'n anybody could—co'se you could!" +</P> + +<P> +Mars Geo'ge was white and rich, and could do anything. Plato was proud +of the fact that he had once belonged to Mars Geo'ge. He could not +conceive of any one so powerful as Mars Geo'ge, unless it might be God, +of whom Plato had heard more or less, and even here the comparison +might not be quite fair to Mars Geo'ge, for Mars Geo'ge was the younger +of the two. It would undoubtedly be a great honor for the teacher to +be escorted home by Mars Geo'ge. The teacher was a great woman, no +doubt, and looked white; but Mars Geo'ge was the real article. Mars +Geo'ge had never been known to go with a black woman before, and the +teacher would doubtless thank Plato for arranging that so great an +honor should fall upon her. Mars Geo'ge had given him fifty cents +twice, and would now give him a dollar. Noble Mars Geo'ge! Fortunate +teacher! Happy Plato! +</P> + +<P> +"Very well, Plato. I think we can arrange it so that you can kill the +two rabbits at one shot. Suppose that we go over the road that she will +take to go home." +</P> + +<P> +They soon arrived at the schoolhouse. School had been out an hour, and +the clearing was deserted. Plato led the way by the road through the +woods to a point where, amid somewhat thick underbrush, another path +intersected the road they were following. +</P> + +<P> +"Now, Plato," said Tryon, pausing here, "this would be a good spot for +you to leave the teacher and for me to take your place. This path +leads to the main road, and will take you to town very quickly. I +shouldn't say anything to the teacher about it at all; but when you and +she get here, drop behind and run along this path until you meet +me,—I'll be waiting a few yards down the road,—and then run to town +as fast as your legs will carry you. As soon as you are gone, I'll +come out and tell the teacher that I've sent you away on an errand, and +will myself take your place. You shall have a dollar, and I'll ask her +to let you go home with her the next day. But you mustn't say a word +about it, Plato, or you won't get the dollar, and I'll not ask the +teacher to let you go home with her again." +</P> + +<P> +"All right, Mars Geo'ge, I ain't gwine ter say no mo' d'n ef de cat had +my tongue." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap31"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XXXI +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +IN DEEP WATERS +</H3> + +<P> +Rena was unusually fatigued at the close of her school on Wednesday +afternoon. She had been troubled all day with a headache, which, +beginning with a dull pain, had gradually increased in intensity until +every nerve was throbbing like a trip-hammer. The pupils seemed +unusually stupid. A discouraging sense of the insignificance of any +part she could perform towards the education of three million people +with a school term of two months a year hung over her spirit like a +pall. As the object of Wain's attentions, she had begun to feel +somewhat like a wild creature who hears the pursuers on its track, and +has the fear of capture added to the fatigue of flight. But when this +excitement had gone too far and had neared the limit of exhaustion came +Tryon's letter, with the resulting surprise and consternation. Rena +had keyed herself up to a heroic pitch to answer it; but when the +inevitable reaction came, she was overwhelmed with a sickening sense of +her own weakness. The things which in another sphere had constituted +her strength and shield were now her undoing, and exposed her to +dangers from which they lent her no protection. Not only was this her +position in theory, but the pursuers were already at her heels. As the +day wore on, these dark thoughts took on an added gloom, until, when +the hour to dismiss school arrived, she felt as though she had not a +friend in the world. This feeling was accentuated by a letter which +she had that morning received from her mother, in which Mis' Molly +spoke very highly of Wain, and plainly expressed the hope that her +daughter might like him so well that she would prefer to remain in +Sampson County. +</P> + +<P> +Plato, bright-eyed and alert, was waiting in the school-yard until the +teacher should be ready to start. Having warned away several smaller +children who had hung around after school as though to share his +prerogative of accompanying the teacher, Plato had swung himself into +the low branches of an oak at the edge of the clearing, from which he +was hanging by his legs, head downward. He dropped from this reposeful +attitude when the teacher appeared at the door, and took his place at +her side. +</P> + +<P> +A premonition of impending trouble caused the teacher to hesitate. She +wished that she had kept more of the pupils behind. Something +whispered that danger lurked in the road she customarily followed. +Plato seemed insignificantly small and weak, and she felt miserably +unable to cope with any difficult or untoward situation. +</P> + +<P> +"Plato," she suggested, "I think we'll go round the other way to-night, +if you don't mind." +</P> + +<P> +Visions of Mars Geo'ge disappointed, of a dollar unearned and unspent, +flitted through the narrow brain which some one, with the irony of +ignorance or of knowledge, had mocked with the name of a great +philosopher. Plato was not an untruthful lad, but he seldom had the +opportunity to earn a dollar. His imagination, spurred on by the +instinct of self-interest, rose to the emergency. +</P> + +<P> +"I's feared you mought git snake-bit gwine roun' dat way, Miss Rena. +My brer Jim kill't a water-moccasin down dere yistiddy 'bout ten feet +long." +</P> + +<P> +Rena had a horror of snakes, with which the swamp by which the other +road ran was infested. Snakes were a vivid reality; her presentiment +was probably a mere depression of spirits due to her condition of +nervous exhaustion. A cloud had come up and threatened rain, and the +wind was rising ominously. The old way was the shorter; she wanted +above all things to get to Elder Johnson's and go to bed. Perhaps +sleep would rest her tired brain—she could not imagine herself feeling +worse, unless she should break down altogether. +</P> + +<P> +She plunged into the path and hastened forward so as to reach home +before the approaching storm. So completely was she absorbed in her +own thoughts that she scarcely noticed that Plato himself seemed +preoccupied. Instead of capering along like a playful kitten or puppy, +he walked by her side unusually silent. When they had gone a short +distance and were approaching a path which intersected their road at +something near a right angle, the teacher missed Plato. He had dropped +behind a moment before; now he had disappeared entirely. Her vague +alarm of a few moments before returned with redoubled force. +</P> + +<P> +"Plato!" she called; "Plato!" +</P> + +<P> +There was no response, save the soughing of the wind through the +swaying treetops. She stepped hastily forward, wondering if this were +some childish prank. If so, it was badly timed, and she would let +Plato feel the weight of her displeasure. +</P> + +<P> +Her forward step had brought her to the junction of the two paths, +where she paused doubtfully. The route she had been following was the +most direct way home, but led for quite a distance through the forest, +which she did not care to traverse alone. The intersecting path would +soon take her to the main road, where she might find shelter or +company, or both. Glancing around again in search of her missing +escort, she became aware that a man was approaching her from each of +the two paths. In one she recognized the eager and excited face of +George Tryon, flushed with anticipation of their meeting, and yet grave +with uncertainty of his reception. Advancing confidently along the +other path she saw the face of Jeff Wain, drawn, as she imagined in her +anguish, with evil passions which would stop at nothing. +</P> + +<P> +What should she do? There was no sign of Plato—for aught she could +see or hear of him, the earth might have swallowed him up. Some deadly +serpent might have stung him. Some wandering rabbit might have tempted +him aside. Another thought struck her. Plato had been very +quiet—there had been something on his conscience—perhaps he had +betrayed her! But to which of the two men, and to what end? +</P> + +<P> +The problem was too much for her overwrought brain. She turned and +fled. A wiser instinct might have led her forward. In the two +conflicting dangers she might have found safety. The road after all +was a public way. Any number of persons might meet there accidentally. +But she saw only the darker side of the situation. To turn to Tryon +for protection before Wain had by some overt act manifested the evil +purpose which she as yet only suspected would be, she imagined, to +acknowledge a previous secret acquaintance with Tryon, thus placing her +reputation at Wain's mercy, and to charge herself with a burden of +obligation toward a man whom she wished to avoid and had refused to +meet. If, on the other hand, she should go forward to meet Wain, he +would undoubtedly offer to accompany her homeward. Tryon would +inevitably observe the meeting, and suppose it prearranged. Not for +the world would she have him think so—why she should care for his +opinion, she did not stop to argue. She turned and fled, and to avoid +possible pursuit, struck into the underbrush at an angle which she +calculated would bring her in a few rods to another path which would +lead quickly into the main road. She had run only a few yards when she +found herself in the midst of a clump of prickly shrubs and briars. +Meantime the storm had burst; the rain fell in torrents. Extricating +herself from the thorns, she pressed forward, but instead of coming out +upon the road, found herself penetrating deeper and deeper into the +forest. +</P> + +<P> +The storm increased in violence. The air grew darker and darker. It +was near evening, the clouds were dense, the thick woods increased the +gloom. Suddenly a blinding flash of lightning pierced the darkness, +followed by a sharp clap of thunder. There was a crash of falling +timber. Terror-stricken, Rena flew forward through the forest, the +underbrush growing closer and closer as she advanced. Suddenly the +earth gave way beneath her feet and she sank into a concealed morass. +By clasping the trunk of a neighboring sapling she extricated herself +with an effort, and realized with a horrible certainty that she was +lost in the swamp. +</P> + +<P> +Turning, she tried to retrace her steps. A flash of lightning +penetrated the gloom around her, and barring her path she saw a huge +black snake,—harmless enough, in fact, but to her excited imagination +frightful in appearance. With a wild shriek she turned again, +staggered forward a few yards, stumbled over a projecting root, and +fell heavily to the earth. +</P> + +<P> +When Rena had disappeared in the underbrush, Tryon and Wain had each +instinctively set out in pursuit of her, but owing to the gathering +darkness, the noise of the storm, and the thickness of the underbrush, +they missed not only Rena but each other, and neither was aware of the +other's presence in the forest. Wain kept up the chase until the rain +drove him to shelter. Tryon, after a few minutes, realized that she +had fled to escape him, and that to pursue her would be to defeat +rather than promote his purpose. He desisted, therefore, and returning +to the main road, stationed himself at a point where he could watch +Elder Johnson's house, and having waited for a while without any signs +of Rena, concluded that she had taken refuge in some friendly cabin. +Turning homeward disconsolately as night came on, he intercepted Plato +on his way back from town, and pledged him to inviolable secrecy so +effectually that Plato, when subsequently questioned, merely answered +that he had stopped a moment to gather some chinquapins, and when he +had looked around the teacher was gone. +</P> + +<P> +Rena not appearing at supper-time nor for an hour later, the elder, +somewhat anxious, made inquiries about the neighborhood, and finding +his guest at no place where she might be expected to stop, became +somewhat alarmed. Wain's house was the last to which he went. He had +surmised that there was some mystery connected with her leaving Wain's, +but had never been given any definite information about the matter. In +response to his inquiries, Wain expressed surprise, but betrayed a +certain self-consciousness which did not escape the elder's eye. +Returning home, he organized a search party from his own family and +several near neighbors, and set out with dogs and torches to scour the +woods for the missing teacher. A couple of hours later, they found her +lying unconscious in the edge of the swamp, only a few rods from a +well-defined path which would soon have led her to the open highway. +Strong arms lifted her gently and bore her home. Mrs. Johnson +undressed her and put her to bed, administering a homely remedy, of +which whiskey was the principal ingredient, to counteract the effects +of the exposure. There was a doctor within five miles, but no one +thought of sending for him, nor was it at all likely that it would have +been possible to get him for such a case at such an hour. +</P> + +<P> +Rena's illness, however, was more deeply seated than her friends could +imagine. A tired body, in sympathy with an overwrought brain, had left +her peculiarly susceptible to the nervous shock of her forest +experience. The exposure for several hours in her wet clothing to the +damps and miasma of the swamp had brought on an attack of brain fever. +The next morning, she was delirious. One of the children took word to +the schoolhouse that the teacher was sick and there would be no school +that day. A number of curious and sympathetic people came in from time +to time and suggested various remedies, several of which old Mrs. +Johnson, with catholic impartiality, administered to the helpless +teacher, who from delirium gradually sunk into a heavy stupor scarcely +distinguishable from sleep. It was predicted that she would probably +be well in the morning; if not, it would then be time to consider +seriously the question of sending for a doctor. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap32"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XXXII +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE POWER OF LOVE +</H3> + +<P> +After Tryon's failure to obtain an interview with Rena through Plato's +connivance, he decided upon a different course of procedure. In a few +days her school term would be finished. He was not less desirous to +see her, was indeed as much more eager as opposition would be likely to +make a very young man who was accustomed to having his own way, and +whose heart, as he had discovered, was more deeply and permanently +involved than he had imagined. His present plan was to wait until the +end of the school; then, when Rena went to Clinton on the Saturday or +Monday to draw her salary for the month, he would see her in the town, +or, if necessary, would follow her to Patesville. No power on earth +should keep him from her long, but he had no desire to interfere in any +way with the duty which she owed to others. When the school was over +and her work completed, then he would have his innings. Writing +letters was too unsatisfactory a method of communication—he must see +her face to face. +</P> + +<P> +The first of his three days of waiting had passed, when, about ten +o'clock on the morning of the second day, which seemed very long in +prospect, while driving along the road toward Clinton, he met Plato, +with a rabbit trap in his hand. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, Plato," he asked, "why are you absent from the classic shades of +the academy to-day?" +</P> + +<P> +"Hoddy, Mars Geo'ge. W'at wuz dat you say?" +</P> + +<P> +"Why are you not at school to-day?" +</P> + +<P> +"Ain' got no teacher, Mars Geo'ge. Teacher's gone!" +</P> + +<P> +"Gone!" exclaimed Tryon, with a sudden leap of the heart. "Gone where? +What do you mean?" +</P> + +<P> +"Teacher got los' in de swamp, night befo' las', 'cause Plato wa'n't +dere ter show her de way out'n de woods. Elder Johnson foun' 'er wid +dawgs and tawches, an' fotch her home an' put her ter bed. No school +yistiddy. She wuz out'n her haid las' night, an' dis mawnin' she wuz +gone." +</P> + +<P> +"Gone where?" +</P> + +<P> +"Dey don' nobody know whar, suh." +</P> + +<P> +Leaving Plato abruptly, Tryon hastened down the road toward Elder +Johnson's cabin. This was no time to stand on punctilio. The girl had +been lost in the woods in the storm, amid the thunder and lightning and +the pouring rain. She was sick with fright and exposure, and he was +the cause of it all. Bribery, corruption, and falsehood had brought +punishment in their train, and the innocent had suffered while the +guilty escaped. He must learn at once what had become of her. Reaching +Elder Johnson's house, he drew up by the front fence and gave the +customary halloa, which summoned a woman to the door. +</P> + +<P> +"Good-morning," he said, nodding unconsciously, with the careless +politeness of a gentleman to his inferiors. "I'm Mr. Tryon. I have +come to inquire about the sick teacher." +</P> + +<P> +"Why, suh," the woman replied respectfully, "she got los' in de woods +night befo' las', an' she wuz out'n her min' most er de time yistiddy. +Las' night she must 'a' got out er bed an' run away w'en eve'ybody wuz +soun' asleep, fer dis mawnin' she wuz gone, an' none er us knows whar +she is." +</P> + +<P> +"Has any search been made for her?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yas, suh, my husban' an' de child'en has been huntin' roun' all de +mawnin', an' he's gone ter borry a hoss now ter go fu'ther. But Lawd +knows dey ain' no tellin' whar she'd go, 'less'n she got her min' back +sence she lef'." +</P> + +<P> +Tryon's mare was in good condition. He had money in his pocket and +nothing to interfere with his movements. He set out immediately on the +road to Patesville, keeping a lookout by the roadside, and stopping +each person he met to inquire if a young woman, apparently ill, had +been seen traveling along the road on foot. No one had met such a +traveler. When he had gone two or three miles, he drove through a +shallow branch that crossed the road. The splashing of his horse's +hoofs in the water prevented him from hearing a low groan that came +from the woods by the roadside. +</P> + +<P> +He drove on, making inquiries at each farmhouse and of every person +whom he encountered. Shortly after crossing the branch, he met a young +negro with a cartload of tubs and buckets and piggins, and asked him if +he had seen on the road a young white woman with dark eyes and hair, +apparently sick or demented. The young man answered in the negative, +and Tryon pushed forward anxiously. +</P> + +<P> +At noon he stopped at a farmhouse and swallowed a hasty meal. His +inquiries here elicited no information, and he was just leaving when a +young man came in late to dinner and stated, in response to the usual +question, that he had met, some two hours before, a young woman who +answered Tryon's description, on the Lillington road, which crossed the +main road to Patesville a short distance beyond the farmhouse. He had +spoken to the woman. At first she had paid no heed to his question. +When addressed a second time, she had answered in a rambling and +disconnected way, which indicated to his mind that there was something +wrong with her. +</P> + +<P> +Tryon thanked his informant and hastened to the Lillington road. +Stopping as before to inquire, he followed the woman for several hours, +each mile of the distance taking him farther away from Patesville. +From time to time he heard of the woman. Toward nightfall he found +her. She was white enough, with the sallowness of the sandhill poor +white. She was still young, perhaps, but poverty and a hard life made +her look older than she ought. She was not fair, and she was not Rena. +When Tryon came up to her, she was sitting on the doorsill of a +miserable cabin, and held in her hand a bottle, the contents of which +had never paid any revenue tax. She had walked twenty miles that day, +and had beguiled the tedium of the journey by occasional potations, +which probably accounted for the incoherency of speech which several of +those who met her had observed. When Tryon drew near, she tendered him +the bottle with tipsy cordiality. He turned in disgust and retraced +his steps to the Patesville road, which he did not reach until +nightfall. As it was too dark to prosecute the search with any chance +of success, he secured lodging for the night, intending to resume his +quest early in the morning. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap33"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XXXIII +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +A MULE AND A CART +</H3> + +<P> +Frank Fowler's heart was filled with longing for a sight of Rena's +face. When she had gone away first, on the ill-fated trip to South +Carolina, her absence had left an aching void in his life; he had +missed her cheerful smile, her pleasant words, her graceful figure +moving about across the narrow street. His work had grown monotonous +during her absence; the clatter of hammer and mallet, that had seemed +so merry when punctuated now and then by the strains of her voice, +became a mere humdrum rapping of wood upon wood and iron upon iron. He +had sought work in South Carolina with the hope that he might see her. +He had satisfied this hope, and had tried in vain to do her a service; +but Fate had been against her; her castle of cards had come tumbling +down. He felt that her sorrow had brought her nearer to him. The +distance between them depended very much upon their way of looking at +things. He knew that her experience had dragged her through the valley +of humiliation. His unselfish devotion had reacted to refine and +elevate his own spirit. When he heard the suggestion, after her second +departure, that she might marry Wain, he could not but compare himself +with this new aspirant. He, Frank, was a man, an honest man—a better +man than the shifty scoundrel with whom she had ridden away. She was +but a woman, the best and sweetest and loveliest of all women, but yet +a woman. After a few short years of happiness or sorrow,—little of +joy, perhaps, and much of sadness, which had begun already,—they would +both be food for worms. White people, with a deeper wisdom perhaps +than they used in their own case, regarded Rena and himself as very +much alike. They were certainly both made by the same God, in much the +same physical and mental mould; they breathed the same air, ate the +same food, spoke the same speech, loved and hated, laughed and cried, +lived and would die, the same. If God had meant to rear any impassable +barrier between people of contrasting complexions, why did He not +express the prohibition as He had done between other orders of creation? +</P> + +<P> +When Rena had departed for Sampson County, Frank had reconciled himself +to her absence by the hope of her speedy return. He often stepped +across the street to talk to Mis' Molly about her. Several letters had +passed between mother and daughter, and in response to Frank's +inquiries his neighbor uniformly stated that Rena was well and doing +well, and sent her love to all inquiring friends. But Frank observed +that Mis' Molly, when pressed as to the date of Rena's return, grew +more and more indefinite; and finally the mother, in a burst of +confidential friendship, told Frank of all her hopes with reference to +the stranger from down the country. +</P> + +<P> +"Yas, Frank," she concluded, "it'll be her own fault ef she don't +become a lady of proputty, fer Mr. Wain is rich, an' owns a big +plantation, an' hires a lot of hands, and is a big man in the county. +He's crazy to git her, an' it all lays in her own han's." +</P> + +<P> +Frank did not find this news reassuring. He believed that Wain was a +liar and a scoundrel. He had nothing more than his intuitions upon +which to found this belief, but it was none the less firm. If his +estimate of the man's character were correct, then his wealth might be +a fiction, pure and simple. If so, the truth should be known to Mis' +Molly, so that instead of encouraging a marriage with Wain, she would +see him in his true light, and interpose to rescue her daughter from +his importunities. A day or two after this conversation, Frank met in +the town a negro from Sampson County, made his acquaintance, and +inquired if he knew a man by the name of Jeff Wain. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, Jeff Wain!" returned the countryman slightingly; "yas, I knows +'im, an' don' know no good of 'im. One er dese yer biggity, braggin' +niggers—talks lack he own de whole county, an' ain't wuth no mo' d'n I +is—jes' a big bladder wid a handful er shot rattlin' roun' in it. Had +a wife, when I wuz dere, an' beat her an' 'bused her so she had ter run +away." +</P> + +<P> +This was alarming information. Wain had passed in the town as a single +man, and Frank had had no hint that he had ever been married. There +was something wrong somewhere. Frank determined that he would find out +the truth and, if possible, do something to protect Rena against the +obviously evil designs of the man who had taken her away. The barrel +factory had so affected the cooper's trade that Peter and Frank had +turned their attention more or less to the manufacture of small +woodenware for domestic use. Frank's mule was eating off its own head, +as the saying goes. It required but little effort to persuade Peter +that his son might take a load of buckets and tubs and piggins into the +country and sell them or trade them for country produce at a profit. +</P> + +<P> +In a few days Frank had his stock prepared, and set out on the road to +Sampson County. He went about thirty miles the first day, and camped +by the roadside for the night, resuming the journey at dawn. After +driving for an hour through the tall pines that overhung the road like +the stately arch of a cathedral aisle, weaving a carpet for the earth +with their brown spines and cones, and soothing the ear with their +ceaseless murmur, Frank stopped to water his mule at a point where the +white, sandy road, widening as it went, sloped downward to a +clear-running branch. On the right a bay-tree bending over the stream +mingled the heavy odor of its flowers with the delicate perfume of a +yellow jessamine vine that had overrun a clump of saplings on the left. +From a neighboring tree a silver-throated mocking-bird poured out a +flood of riotous melody. A group of minnows; startled by the splashing +of the mule's feet, darted away into the shadow of the thicket, their +quick passage leaving the amber water filled with laughing light. +</P> + +<P> +The mule drank long and lazily, while over Frank stole thoughts in +harmony with the peaceful scene,—thoughts of Rena, young and +beautiful, her friendly smile, her pensive dark eyes. He would soon +see her now, and if she had any cause for fear or unhappiness, he would +place himself at her service—for a day, a week, a month, a year, a +lifetime, if need be. +</P> + +<P> +His reverie was broken by a slight noise from the thicket at his left. +"I wonder who dat is?" he muttered. "It soun's mighty quare, ter say +de leas'." +</P> + +<P> +He listened intently for a moment, but heard nothing further. "It must +'a' be'n a rabbit er somethin' scamp'in' th'ough de woods. G'long +dere, Caesar!" +</P> + +<P> +As the mule stepped forward, the sound was repeated. This time it was +distinctly audible, the long, low moan of some one in sickness or +distress. +</P> + +<P> +"Dat ain't no rabbit," said Frank to himself. "Dere's somethin' wrong +dere. Stan' here, Caesar, till I look inter dis matter." +</P> + +<P> +Pulling out from the branch, Frank sprang from the saddle and pushed +his way cautiously through the outer edge of the thicket. +</P> + +<P> +"Good Lawd!" he exclaimed with a start, "it's a woman—a w'ite woman!" +</P> + +<P> +The slender form of a young woman lay stretched upon the ground in a +small open space a few yards in extent. Her face was turned away, and +Frank could see at first only a tangled mass of dark brown hair, matted +with twigs and leaves and cockleburs, and hanging in wild profusion +around her neck. +</P> + +<P> +Frank stood for a moment irresolute, debating the serious question +whether he should investigate further with a view to rendering +assistance, or whether he should put as great a distance as possible +between himself and this victim, as she might easily be, of some +violent crime, lest he should himself be suspected of it—a not +unlikely contingency, if he were found in the neighborhood and the +woman should prove unable to describe her assailant. While he +hesitated, the figure moved restlessly, and a voice murmured:— +</P> + +<P> +"Mamma, oh, mamma!" +</P> + +<P> +The voice thrilled Frank like an electric shock. Trembling in every +limb, he sprang forward toward the prostrate figure. The woman turned +her head, and he saw that it was Rena. Her gown was torn and dusty, +and fringed with burs and briars. When she had wandered forth, half +delirious, pursued by imaginary foes, she had not stopped to put on her +shoes, and her little feet were blistered and swollen and bleeding. +Frank knelt by her side and lifted her head on his arm. He put his +hand upon her brow; it was burning with fever. +</P> + +<P> +"Miss Rena! Rena! don't you know me?" +</P> + +<P> +She turned her wild eyes on him suddenly. "Yes, I know you, Jeff Wain. +Go away from me! Go away!" +</P> + +<P> +Her voice rose to a scream; she struggled in his grasp and struck at +him fiercely with her clenched fists. Her sleeve fell back and +disclosed the white scar made by his own hand so many years before. +</P> + +<P> +"You're a wicked man," she panted. "Don't touch me! I hate you and +despise you!" +</P> + +<P> +Frank could only surmise how she had come here, in such a condition. +When she spoke of Wain in this manner, he drew his own conclusions. +Some deadly villainy of Wain's had brought her to this pass. Anger +stirred his nature to the depths, and found vent in curses on the +author of Rena's misfortunes. +</P> + +<P> +"Damn him!" he groaned. "I'll have his heart's blood fer dis, ter de +las' drop!" +</P> + +<P> +Rena now laughed and put up her arms appealingly. "George," she cried, +in melting tones, "dear George, do you love me? How much do you love +me? Ah, you don't love me!" she moaned; "I'm black; you don't love me; +you despise me!" +</P> + +<P> +Her voice died away into a hopeless wail. Frank knelt by her side, his +faithful heart breaking with pity, great tears rolling untouched down +his dusky cheeks. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, my honey, my darlin'," he sobbed, "Frank loves you better 'n all +de worl'." +</P> + +<P> +Meantime the sun shone on as brightly as before, the mocking-bird sang +yet more joyously. A gentle breeze sprang up and wafted the odor of bay +and jessamine past them on its wings. The grand triumphal sweep of +nature's onward march recked nothing of life's little tragedies. +</P> + +<P> +When the first burst of his grief was over, Frank brought water from +the branch, bathed Rena's face and hands and feet, and forced a few +drops between her reluctant lips. He then pitched the cartload of +tubs, buckets, and piggins out into the road, and gathering dried +leaves and pine-straw, spread them in the bottom of the cart. He +stooped, lifted her frail form in his arms, and laid it on the leafy +bed. Cutting a couple of hickory withes, he arched them over the cart, +and gathering an armful of jessamine quickly wove it into an awning to +protect her from the sun. She was quieter now, and seemed to fall +asleep. +</P> + +<P> +"Go ter sleep, honey," he murmured caressingly, "go ter sleep, an' +Frank'll take you home ter yo' mammy!" +</P> + +<P> +Toward noon he was met by a young white man, who peered inquisitively +into the canopied cart. +</P> + +<P> +"Hello!" exclaimed the stranger, "who've you got there?" +</P> + +<P> +"A sick woman, suh." +</P> + +<P> +"Why, she's white, as I'm a sinner!" he cried, after a closer +inspection. "Look a-here, nigger, what are you doin' with this white +woman?" +</P> + +<P> +"She's not w'ite, boss,—she's a bright mulatter." +</P> + +<P> +"Yas, mighty bright," continued the stranger suspiciously. "Where are +you goin' with her?" +</P> + +<P> +"I'm takin' her ter Patesville, ter her mammy." +</P> + +<P> +The stranger passed on. Toward evening Frank heard hounds baying in +the distance. A fox, weary with running, brush drooping, crossed the +road ahead of the cart. Presently, the hounds straggled across the +road, followed by two or three hunters on horseback, who stopped at +sight of the strangely canopied cart. They stared at the sick girl and +demanded who she was. +</P> + +<P> +"I don't b'lieve she's black at all," declared one, after Frank's brief +explanation. "This nigger has a bad eye,—he's up ter some sort of +devilment. What ails the girl?" +</P> + +<P> +"'Pears ter be some kind of a fever," replied Frank; adding +diplomatically, "I don't know whether it's ketchin' er no—she's be'n +out er her head most er de time." +</P> + +<P> +They drew off a little at this. "I reckon it's all right," said the +chief spokesman. The hounds were baying clamorously in the distance. +The hunters followed the sound and disappeared m the woods. +</P> + +<P> +Frank drove all day and all night, stopping only for brief periods of +rest and refreshment. At dawn, from the top of the long white hill, he +sighted the river bridge below. At sunrise he rapped at Mis' Molly's +door. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Upon rising at dawn, Tryon's first step, after a hasty breakfast, was +to turn back toward Clinton. He had wasted half a day in following the +false scent on the Lillington road. It seemed, after reflection, +unlikely that a woman seriously ill should have been able to walk any +considerable distance before her strength gave out. In her delirium, +too, she might have wandered in a wrong direction, imagining any road +to lead to Patesville. It would be a good plan to drive back home, +continuing his inquiries meantime, and ascertain whether or not she had +been found by those who were seeking her, including many whom Tryon's +inquiries had placed upon the alert. If she should prove still +missing, he would resume the journey to Patesville and continue the +search in that direction. She had probably not wandered far from the +highroad; even in delirium she would be likely to avoid the deep woods, +with which her illness was associated. +</P> + +<P> +He had retraced more than half the distance to Clinton when he overtook +a covered wagon. The driver, when questioned, said that he had met a +young negro with a mule, and a cart in which lay a young woman, white +to all appearance, but claimed by the negro to be a colored girl who +had been taken sick on the road, and whom he was conveying home to her +mother at Patesville. From a further description of the cart Tryon +recognized it as the one he had met the day before. The woman could be +no other than Rena. He turned his mare and set out swiftly on the road +to Patesville. +</P> + +<P> +If anything could have taken more complete possession of George Tryon +at twenty-three than love successful and triumphant, it was love +thwarted and denied. Never in the few brief delirious weeks of his +courtship had he felt so strongly drawn to the beautiful sister of the +popular lawyer, as he was now driven by an aching heart toward the same +woman stripped of every adventitions advantage and placed, by custom, +beyond the pale of marriage with men of his own race. Custom was +tyranny. Love was the only law. Would God have made hearts to so +yearn for one another if He had meant them to stay forever apart? If +this girl should die, it would be he who had killed her, by his +cruelty, no less surely than if with his own hand he had struck her +down. He had been so dazzled by his own superiority, so blinded by his +own glory, that he had ruthlessly spurned and spoiled the image of God +in this fair creature, whom he might have had for his own +treasure,—whom, please God, he would yet have, at any cost, to love +and cherish while they both should live. There were difficulties—they +had seemed insuperable, but love would surmount them. Sacrifices must +be made, but if the world without love would be nothing, then why not +give up the world for love? He would hasten to Patesville. He would +find her; he would tell her that he loved her, that she was all the +world to him, that he had come to marry her, and take her away where +they might be happy together. He pictured to himself the joy that +would light up her face; he felt her soft arms around his neck, her +tremulous kisses upon his lips. If she were ill, his love would woo +her back to health,—if disappointment and sorrow had contributed to +her illness, joy and gladness should lead to her recovery. +</P> + +<P> +He urged the mare forward; if she would but keep up her present pace, +he would reach Patesville by nightfall. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Dr. Green had just gone down the garden path to his buggy at the gate. +Mis' Molly came out to the back piazza, where Frank, weary and haggard, +sat on the steps with Homer Pettifoot and Billy Oxendine, who, hearing +of Rena's return, had come around after their day's work. +</P> + +<P> +"Rena wants to see you, Frank," said Mis' Molly, with a sob. +</P> + +<P> +He walked in softly, reverently, and stood by her bedside. She turned +her gentle eyes upon him and put out her slender hand, which he took in +his own broad palm. +</P> + +<P> +"Frank," she murmured, "my good friend—my best friend—you loved me +best of them all." +</P> + +<P> +The tears rolled untouched down his cheeks. "I'd 'a' died, fer you, +Miss Rena," he said brokenly. +</P> + +<P> +Mary B. threw open a window to make way for the passing spirit, and the +red and golden glory of the setting sun, triumphantly ending his daily +course, flooded the narrow room with light. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Between sunset and dark a traveler, seated in a dusty buggy drawn by a +tired horse, crossed the long river bridge and drove up Front Street. +Just as the buggy reached the gate in front of the house behind the +cedars, a woman was tying a piece of crape upon the door-knob. Pale +with apprehension, Tryon sat as if petrified, until a tall, +side-whiskered mulatto came down the garden walk to the front gate. +</P> + +<P> +"Who's dead?" demanded Tryon hoarsely, scarcely recognizing his own +voice. +</P> + +<P> +"A young cullud 'oman, sah," answered Homer Pettifoot, touching his +hat, "Mis' Molly Walden's daughter Rena." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR><BR> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The House Behind the Cedars, by Charles W. Chesnutt + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE HOUSE BEHIND THE CEDARS *** + +***** This file should be named 472-h.htm or 472-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/4/7/472/ + +Produced by Charles Keller. 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