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diff --git a/old/53992-0.txt b/old/53992-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index a76e157..0000000 --- a/old/53992-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,11383 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of Peggy O'Neal, by Alfred Henry Lewis - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most -other parts of the world 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. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - - - -Title: Peggy O'Neal - -Author: Alfred Henry Lewis - -Illustrator: Henry Hutt - -Release Date: January 18, 2017 [EBook #53992] -Last Updated: March 12, 2018 - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PEGGY O'NEAL *** - - - - -Produced by David Widger from page images generously -provided by the Internet Archive - - - - - - - -PEGGY O'NEAL - -By Alfred Henry Lewis - -Illustrated By Henry Hutt - -A. J. Drexel Biddle - -1902 - - -[Illustration: 0001] - -[Illustration: 0007] - -[Illustration: 0010] - -[Illustration: 0011] - - -TO - -MRS. A. J. DREXEL BIDDLE - -THIS VOLUME - -IS RESPECTFULLY INSCRIBED - - - - -PREFACE - -Doubtless I shall tell this tale but poorly, since I have no skill -of writing or rhetoric and must, for the most part, proceed by blunt -sentences and short one-syllable words to the end that I be understood. -This record is worth while, I think, for it exhibits the growth of -favor for the Union within the General's breast; and to be corollary -thereunto, his wrath against States Rights as a doctrine, together with -a hatred of Calhoun, its champion, and what other folk were found to -uphold the Vice-President's hands in those ill courses of nullification -and separation and secession he laid down for national misguidance. I -myself had been with the General, war and peace, for thirty years -on end. He was like an elder brother to me, and I apprehended no man -better. And knowing him thus well--having his thought and feeling and -emotion of politics at my mental finger-ends--it is in my strong belief -that not until he came and made oath as chief magistrate, did he -conclude his position touching this claim of right on a state's part -to nullify general law and strike her name from the roll of our common -sisterhood. I was with him, I say, when the seed of the General's -determination to stand for a union, one and indivisible, was planted; -and I witnessed its quick upgrowing and broadening until it sheltered -and shadowed with wide safety the very integrity of the country. We -had arrived at a fork in the road; the ways were about to part. Calhoun -would have led us to the left where no man could be sure of national -continuance over night. But the General ruled; he was for the right -hand. By his iron courage, and the brisk, white clearness of his mental -lights, the General was to triumph. As descendant of such victory the -States were to be unified and secession beaten down. Nor shall that -hour find its morning in all time when the mighty excellences of the -General's labors are not to have their evidence, and the tree he -planted bear into the hands of men its fruits upon the earth. He was a -tremendous mechanic of state, was General Jackson; and the world in -its construction will wear his hammer-marks with those of Cromwell and -Napoleon while the ages keep to their procession. - -And yet, as may the Amazon have ultimate well-head in some rivulet as -thin as a thread, or a spring so little that a gourd might serve for its -exhaustion, so did the General come to select his place in this business -of upholding the Union against those who would pull it down, as -incident to bucklering a woman--poor and slight and feeble, she was; -the beautiful Peg O'Neal!--who for her loveliness was envied and for her -goodness was hated and for her origin as a tavern-keeper's daughter was -contemned by those proud folk who named themselves the nation's court of -fashion. - -The General was a sentimentalist; justice and to do right were with -him instincts, and came not as grist ground coldly in the mills of -calculated selfishness and reason. Scotch-Irish he was in his strain; -but more Irish than the Irish and more Scotch than the Scotch, he in a -manner wonderful could in the same moment be cool and warm, and cautious -and headlong, and prudent and reckless, and close and frank--at once -a Fabius and a Scipio. In a glow of sentiment made molten hot by the -recent death of his wife--to him the Goddess of his worship--the General -would extend the power of his place and name to be a refuge for the -tearful, beautiful Peg, whom, as a child, his wife had known and loved, -and whom he now found evilly crushed beneath the social wheel. And in -a rush of feeling he rescues her and sets her high among the highest. -Still, while it owns its hot inception to impulse wholly Irish, this -rescue; the carrying out thereof, when now the General goes about it, -turns to be all Scotch in the cautious yet indomitable character of its -execution. - -Also, for that the General is ardent and prone to mix private passion -with his public thought, he arrives at a hatred of nullification, -finding it a prime principle among those enemies whom he faces for the -sake of poor Peg O'Neal. It is the great fire kindled of a small thing, -this, the General's war to sustain the Union against ones who already -searched for its life. He rides into the lists for a woman's name, and -all unknowingly he bears the country's future on the point of his spear. -And so comes this story; to the purpose and the hope that what in this -good way the General did, and why and how he did it, may not die and -disappear upon the memories of men. - - - - -PEGGY O'NEAL - - - - -CHAPTER I--THE LUSTROUS PEG O'NEAL - -It was my fate, I will not say my misfortune--being too proud--to dwell -overmuch with camps and caucuses and transact more than stood best for -me of politics and war. These were my schools, and they sadly served to -make me coarse and turn me hard. Sometimes I think this pity, for I was -conceived, you are to notice, with no scanty promise of fineness to my -fiber. - -Now I am moved to remember, and I might add almost to regret these -things, because I would like much at this pinch to color for you a right -picture of the fair, innocent, unfortunate Peg O'Neal. Yet how am I to -do this?--I, loaded of a sluggish fancy and a genius without touch! I am -no Apelles to paint an Aphrodite, no Phidias to carve a Venus; and for -that matter, Peg no Phryne to be model for such art. The best I might -draw would stand crude and cornerwise, since I own only to talents -whereof the graphic character is exhausted when they have laid out a -worm fence? - -It is within the rim of the possible that you may feel for me, born as I -show you with the hands of all good power of description bound close and -fast by my sides. Perhaps, too, you yourself on occasion have been stung -of high impulse and fain would soar with a poem; and then, when you -stretched for flight, found no furnishment of wings. Most folk have -been thus crowded upon by exaltations, and were prey to thoughts for the -expression of which their lisping natures lacked facility. They had -the sinew but not the soul. There was verse in them, but with it no -presentation dress of word or ornament of rhyme. They caged a tune of -music in their hearts and failed of those notes asked for to announce -its melody. - -Still, our Peg, for whom we toiled--the General and I--and intrigued and -made new friendships and broke old ones, and who was in her fortunes the -beginning of policies on the General's part so lasting in importance to -the State, shall not go untold. I must make what effort lies in me -to give some notion of a beauty that claimed so much of potency in -equations of government solved of our times. - -For myself, and I take no shame for it, I say freely that of the charges -laid against her by common tongue, I was convinced of her innocence by -the mere beauty of her face, just as the loveliness of that Greek girl -aforetime convinced the judges and wrought a verdict in her favor. There -be flowers so purely beautiful as to refuse and refute a stain; and such -a blossom was the lustrous Peg O'Neal. - -I was first to meet with her at this time; and while I had not condemned -her in my thoughts--to condemn a woman is, for a man, the coward -part!--if I found myself possessed of views at all, they leaned to her -disfavor. I knew the General regarded Peg as a white soul suffering -wrong; but I also knew the General to be mercurial, and a blindly -passionate recruit when once enlisted. Besides, his own wife had been -throughout her life--and she most virtuous!--so lashed of slander, that -his blood was ever up and about the defence of any whose wailing wrongs -resembled her's. The General's attitudes were never the offshoots of -cold wisdom; he was one who believed the worst of a foe so soon as -it was told, and the best of a friend before ever it was told at all. -Wherefore I would not accept the General's decision touching Peg, more -than I would take other conclusions from his hands. - -My conservatism and just slowness cut, however, no figure, since, as I -tell you, with the moment I clapped eyes upon her, I changed to be her -knight--her champion; and thereafter I matched even the torrid General -in fire for her cause. - -I was in talk with the General when news reached me of Peg waiting in -the parlor for a meeting. It was Jim who bore me word; he peered around -the corner of the door and with rolling' eye as one who brings bad -tidings, beckoned me into the hallway. - -“What is it?” I demanded impatiently. - -I should tell you, perhaps, that Jim was more than twenty years my -senior, and nearing on to three score years and ten. This may explain -that attitude of mentor, not to say protector, of my morals which it was -his pleasure to hold towards me. - -“What is it? Speak up!” - -Jim shook his grizzled head, and his look was loaded of reproof. - -“See yere, Marse Major,” said Jim; “dish yere aint Tennessee where -you-all kin do as you please. What you reckon now Marse Gen'ral would -gwine say to sech cat-an'-fiddle doin's?” - -“And now what's wrong?” I inquired; humbly enough, for I was much -beneath Jim's sway. - -“Marse Major, lemme ask you,” said Jim, and with that he fixed me with -his old eye like an inquisitor; “lemme ask you: Does you-all send for to -meet a young lady?” - -“Certainly not,” I replied. “Do you think I've come to Washington to -meet young ladies?” This last indignantly. - -“How I know what you do?” retorted Jim, sullenly. “Ever see a hoss in a -new parstur? Ever see how he r'ar an' pitch an' buck-jump an' kick up? -How I know what you do?” - -“Get to the point,” I said, and I drew on a fierce expression, for I was -running low of patience. - -“No use, Marse Major, for you to go dom'neerin' with Jim,” and the -scoundrel shook his head admonishingly. “I'll fotch up at d' p'int fas' -enough. I tells dese yere niggahs about dis hotel that if any one -comes squanderin' 'round to see you-all, an' speshul, if any of them -evil-minded women-folks comes 'round, to let me know.” - -“What do you mean with your evil-minded women-folks?” - -“That's all right, Marse Major; Jim aint heer'n d' Bible read for mighty -likely sixty years an' not know of them evil-minded womenfolks. King -Solomon, an' him d' wisest man, was mingled up in d' midst of a whole -passel of'em. An' so, when a minute back one of d' house niggahs comes -up to me an' lets on thar's a young lady in d' parlor who's waitin' for -you, I allows I'll take a look, an' try an' rummage out what she wants. -With that, I kinder loiters into d' parlor like I'm sent a urrent; an' -sho! Marse Major, if thar don't sot a girl who's that beautiful she's -plumb reedic'lous. - -“'Be you-all wantin' to meet d' Marse Major?' I says. - -“She say, 'Yes; I'm d' wife of his friend, Mr. Eaton.' - -“'Mr. Eaton,' I says, 'who lives down south of Nashville at Franklin -Co't House?' - -“She say, 'Yes; I'm Mrs. Eaton.' - -“Course I knows dish yere aint so. An' I'm partic'lar skeered about you, -besides, since she's so handsome. It's d' beautiful ones makes all d' -trouble; a homely woman aint no more harm than squinch owls, that's -Jim's sperience. But nacherally, Marse Major, I don't tell dish yere -girl she's lyin'; I'm too well brought up. So I says: - -“'I've knowed Mr. Eaton since befo' d' las' wah with d' British what -Marse Gen'ral done whups at Noo Aw-leans; Mr. Eaton's a kin to my Marse -Major. I've been down by his place a hun'red times at Franklin; an' you -hyar me, honey! they aint been no mention about you bein' his wife in -Tennessee.' - -“She smile a bit at this--she's seemin' trifle sad like--an' says: 'Mr. -Eaton an' me, we get married only 'bout a month ago in Wash'ton.' An' so -she tell me ag'in to go fotch you; an' arter sort o' hesitatin' 'round -between a balk an' a break-down for a while, settlin' on d' properest -move, I reckons mebbe I'd better come an' tell you arter all.” - -“It's as well you did,” I said, turning back to the General's door. - -“That's all right, Marse Major.” Jim called this after me in severe -tones. “I'm boun' I'm gwine look arter you-all jes' d' same.” Then in a -wheedling voice: “Say, Marse Major, would you-all mind if I he'ps myse'f -to a dram outen d' demijohn in your closet? What with all dish yere -talkin' an' frettin' about you, Jim's mouth is as dry as a kivered -bridge.” - -“One, mind you; no more.” The General, in converse with a caller, was -considering Van Buren, and party lines and issues in New York. I would -have told him of Peg, and that I was about to see her, but the presence -of his visitor put it out of reach. On the whole, I decided, it would be -as well to meet Peg first and tell the General later. I interrupted, and -explained that I was going to the parlors for a moment; we would get to -his letters on my return. - -“No hurry, Major, no hurry,” he replied; “I'm quite content to put them -off. I am already seized on by the spirit of laziness that pervades this -place, and which caused Randolph to say: 'I never wind my watch whilst -in Washington, as I feel that all time spent here is wasted and thrown -away.' It's not quite that bad, perhaps; still, we'll willingly put off -the letters until to-morrow.” - -And now, since I am to tell you of Peg, I would that I possessed -somewhat the art of petticoats--a little polite skill for flounce and -farthingale--some shadow of a parlor or a boudoir grace. - -Peg, then, was the truth itself for height and mould, and her pretty -hands and feet told of no tavern in their genesis, even though the lip -of envy did. I give you my first impression of her, earned eye to eye -and ear to voice. I say the latter because her voice was as honey and -wove conviction like a spell. She had your pansy face; a face regular -and ineffably good. And how any, even a woman and a rival, might -look her deep eyes through and doubt her, masters conjecture! Peg's -hair--hanging in long curls about her neck and shoulders--was black; -fine as silk or cobwebs; black, yet with the gold-black of the black -Saxon. And her skin was snow and peach-blow. There was meditation, too, -in her wide brow; and her mouth, with teeth like milk, was both firm -and loving. Also, there was that in her atmosphere to bring brave men to -her. It was upon one in a moment that Peg, while tender to be hurt, was -hard to conquer; sensitive, she would feel her fate; yet she would face -it--face it with the faithful courage of an angel. But I'll have done; -why furnish the fragments and queer splinters of a portrait I'm too -inaptly dull to offer as a whole! - -Peg O'Neal came this day, and making herself known, gave me my first -sight of her in the drawing room of the Indian Queen. There was a look -about her, lonely, bitter and pathetic; a look that should belong with -one hunted, and who waits to be made sure of her friends. She gave me -her hand; white and soft and small and yielding--it was as though I -took hold on a lily. My heart went out to her before she spoke; as I've -confessed, I was warm for her cause on the instant. - -Peg had read the cabinet list in the paper; I think, too, she foresaw -the woe and worry to become the tail of it more clearly than did either -the General or myself, or even the port-wine Duff Green. It was of that -she desired to talk; she would see the General; but first she would see -me. - -This preference for myself before the General was a common custom into -which Peg readily stepped. All who knew the General, knew me for his -other self; and I will say, despite the inference of a boast, knew me -for his calmer and more prudent self. - -Peg did not come to me until the afternoon, and before I go to the story -of our converse it would be as well to sketch a handful of incidents -which preceded her advent and which should be understood to teach one -the whole truth of this tale. - -This Washington day I have on my mind's edge, being the one next before -the day Peg came to me, was the fourteenth of February, St. Valentine's -Day, albeit the latter has nothing of part herein. We had arrived, the -General and myself, on the tenth, and housed at the Indian Queen. This -tavern was not the tavern of old, when that O'Neal who was Peg's -father prevailed as master, yet even under new control--and with a born -conservative like myself, the new is ever the defective--it was a first -hostel of the capital. - -Our advent discovered a crust of ice and snow to our feet, and a mortal -sharpness in the air that was like a tonic. During those three or four -days since our coming, a thaw had befallen which left thoroughfares -a discouraging swale of mire, and made going about a foulest possible -employ. Withal, as though sponsor for the softening temperature, there -descended a fog--fairly a hash of misty rain that one might wash one's -face in--and the air was as full of water as a sponge. - -These were no true conditions for the General, with lungs never the -hardiest, and whose health was more than commonly broken by the blow -of his wife's death. She was soundly, deeply sleeping in her grave in -Tennessee, and the new sods above her counted but twelve weeks for their -age, when we rode into Washington. She had heard the guns and the music -which told of her hero's triumph; and then, heart-stricken of shafts -of slander aimed against her sinlessness by an opposition willing to -conquer with black means, she bowed her gentle head and passed. She -was not to multiply a White House honor by sharing it, and left her -lover-husband to go his presidential way alone unlighted of her eyes. - -Those dark scenes at the Hermitage when the General's angel went from -us, and storms of grief--so utter, so beyond repair!--fair beat upon him -to a point which all but laid him beneath the grass-roots to keep her -company, have neither part nor lot in this relation. They may be guessed -at, however; and the General came forth of them woe-worn and shaken, -and with the thought in his soul that she perished by the venom of his -enemies, who had struck at his fortunes by striking at her pure repute. - -After his wife died I had been in the grip of sore concern for the -General. He was but a frail man at his best; he carried lead in his -shoulder and lead in his side--private bullets stopped in private wars, -truly, yet no less, perilous for that--and when on these, plus the angry -work and wrath of a campaign, was laid this funeral farther load, I say, -I trembled for the upcome. - -Our way to Washington was to be by the Cumberland and the Ohio to -Pittsburg, and then overland through the mountains, and so along the -Potomac. All Tennessee seemed come to Nashville when we went aboard; -I helping the General--whose weakness was so great he must, despite -vanity, lean visibly on my support. - -As he sank exhausted into a chair, and the boat backed off the levee, I -was in blackness for the gloom I felt. I believed he would not live -to see Washington, but fall by the way; I in no sort presupposed those -eight tremendous years when the White House would be to the common folk -as a temple, with him the idle of their adoration. I could not foresee -his marvelous two presidencies, and how, his name brightening with each -added sun and followed by every eye, he would retire again to privacy -and his Hermitage, the best beloved since the even day of Jefferson. - -And now as I talk to you the tears start. He is dead as I write, and -gone long ago to join his heart in the grave and lie by the side of his -wife; and it comes strangely, even to myself that I, an old man, -and held as one hard and practical and cold, should be so moved of -retrospection. If it were to remember loss and sadness and decay, such -indeed might stand as reason for emotion. But my rearward glances find -only the glory of an ever-climbing, sky-kissed high success. Mayhap it -is the splendor and white gleam of it to bring the tears, as does the -glint of sunshine on the snow. - -Yet it half shames my years, these drops of feeling. And for all that, -I well recall how Dale and Overton and Houston and Blair--no meek -souls, these!--were as much commoved when claimed of thoughts of General -Jackson;--such, for his friends, were the soft and softening spells and -powers of the man! The wet eyes of these, stern and rock-hewn, may save -me from the stain of doting weakness. But I loiter--I lose time when -there is none to lose--a wandering delay is the crime common of old age. - -Our journey to Washington was disputed by applause at every foot; the -double banks of the Cumberland and the Ohio appeared to have become -alike the rendezvous of South and West and North. Bands brayed and -“committees” came aboard; a dozen times was the boat tied up and the -General borne ashore as on a wave to greet and be greeted of roaring -thousands who hailed him their Messiah of politics and one come for -their redemption. From the first our progress was hedged and canopied of -the never-ceasing shout, “Hurrah! for Jackson!” Night and day it was in -our ears, and our very sleep gave way and fled before it. - -To say that through this I held no alarms for the General would be but -an idle picture of my feelings. Verily! I more than once found my heart -in my mouth lest the gusty multitude that struggled and fought to touch -his hand should kill him for mere kindness. - -And yet he would thrive and be fat upon it, if such word by any padding -of hyperbole may be made to fit his slim meagerness. His gray eye would -light, his lean cheek show a color, his milky bristle of hair turn more -stiffly, jauntily spinous with each of these encounters. When I would -remonstrate and cite his sick weakness to forbid, he would shake his -head and smile--his closest journey to a laugh. Then he would say: - -“Major, you don't know me! These shoutings are as medicine in wine. -These people love me; I take strength from their hands; their applause -is my food and I live and grow heavy by it.” - -And so this boisterousness of endorsement went on; and the General -reveled while I sat sour with terror lest from it he sicken and die, -stricken by the very evidences of his popularity. He was right and I was -wrong; he came from this general joy, which with every hour arose and -laid actual hands upon him, as one remade. - -Some pages back I pitched upon the fourteenth as a day much in my mind, -and the fourth since we came upon the capital. I begin narration -properly with that day, regarding what has gone before as preliminary -and given for a clearer knowledge of that which is to follow as it -unfolds. - -There were matters to take place upon the fourteenth which served to fix -it in my memory. The first was a mishap to the General himself. - -For the rain and the mist and the mire, we that day found ourselves -much confined to the Indian Queen. This might be called no hardship of -loneliness since, despite the mud, all the world would pull on its boots -to visit us. The General, whose dyspepsia was dominant, had eaten only -a little rice. This he took at short intervals; yet such dwarf spoonfuls -were they, that in the end the aggregate was smallish, and he found -himself weakly languid as a reward. - -The General had been to a casual reception below to meet official -folk--they were building hopes for themselves of what should follow -inauguration, still eighteen days away--and being done with them, and -uneasy with the weariness of their call, was returning to his room. At -the stair's head he stumbled; as he fell he griped his side and gave a -smothered sob of pain. - -I, who walked close behind, was well aware of what had chanced. The old -Dickenson wound was imperfectly healed, and a sharp wrench would tear it -and set it to inward hemorrhage. Swiftly I raised him, and since it was -no vast distance down the hall, nor he a mighty burden, carried him to -his chamber. - -“Call Augustus,” he said, his voice pain-lowered to a whisper. - -Placing a chair I gave him a mouthful of whisky by way of a stimulant. -Augustus was the black body-servant who had come with us from the -Hermitage. I knew what the summoning of Augustus argued, yet was -handless to interfere. The General when stricken--as he had been many -times--in the fashion I have named, was used to open a vein, and so -bleed himself comfortably till he felt relief. More than once I had -denounced such backwoods surgery as not only dangerous but revolting, -and wanting foundations of common sense. There was no logic for it, -I said; and it stood for the spirit of the preposterous when one bled -internally to bleed one's self externally as remedy. As well might I -have spoken with the trees. The General made his stubborn laws and lived -them. - -“There was a Frenchman,” observed the General on some occasion of my -remonstrance, “who said that at forty every man was either a fool or a -doctor. Now I am more than forty; and I'm no fool.” - -Augustus, a tawny, handsome black, arrived in a hurry splendidly -promissory of zeal. Being deft of practice, he whipped a bandage -sharply tight about the General's arm above the elbow--as starved as -a rake-handle, that arm, yet strong as hickory bough! Then the General -with his jackknife nicked a vein well down the lower arm, and proceeded -to bleed himself most contentedly and liberally, while Augustus held a -basin. - -Following these horse-leech experiments, for so I scrupled not to brand -them, the General, wrapped in a dressing gown, was put to rest upon -a sofa. It would have been the bed; but it stood not yet three of the -afternoon, and it was a saying of the General's that no man should take -to his bed by daylight until he came to die. On the lounge, and, as he -declared, much uplifted of health, Augustus and I left him, with the -whisky easily at hand in event of over-creeping faintness. - -After the lapse of an hour I returned. There lay that upon me which, as -I saw the future, it was proper enough should be said to the General. -And since he was like to oppose my counsel, as folk commonly do what is -patent for their peace, sticking as stoutly for the seeds of trouble -as though they were indeed the seeds of righteousness, I reckoned aid -perhaps from his present weak, low state. He would lack somewhat his -vivacity, and might be drawn with less of struggle to my manner of -thought. - -Thus abode the coil: It was the evening before when the General told -me how he would propose Eaton to be his Secretary of War, and asked -my view. I had withheld opinion at the time, my caution evoking a -dull flare of that heat-lightning of the General's temper, which last -commodity was never deeply in abeyance. I would tell him later, I said; -and following a rumble of contempt on his part for the sluggishness -of my friendship for Eaton--for that gentleman and I for long had been -friends--the subject was for the moment at rest. Now was the time ripe -to dispute this question with him; so I bethought, as I wended towards -his door. - -Coming to his chamber I tapped, and then pushed in without wait, as was -my wont. The windows were to the west where at this hour the sun should -have been; but such was the veil of fog without that the day seemed -already spent and sinking into twilight. - -The great fire on the hearth--honest, crackling logs to feed it, since -the General would tolerate no less--set the room in a bloom of light -that came close to marking the candle that burned at his elbow a -profligacy. He had lifted himself from the sofa where Augustus and I -placed him, and was seated before a little table. On it, propped -against the _Vicar of Wakefield_, a book whereof he never tired, stood -a miniature of his wife. Throughout the day he wore this little painting -beneath his garments and hung about his neck by a black cord. His wife -had given it him in the old days and when their love was new. Each -night, when folk pray and con the Bible, he would have this picture -before him; and with it her hymn-book to read her favorite songs. This -was his devotion--his worship; it was as though he communed with her, -his Saint Rachel, on the work of the day and its duties. To the time of -his death he did this; and for whatever was good of his performing he -would lay it to these conferences, sweet at once and sad, when in the -dusk borderlands of day and night he met and talked with the soft shadow -of his heart's own. - -As I came into the room the General raised his eyes. They were -tear-brimmed and he made no shift to hide them. - -“Major,” he said with trembling lip, gazing the while on the miniature, -“she strove to make me a Christian. I gave her my promise to become a -Christian. And so I shall when once I'm done with office and back again -at home. I would become one now, were it within the domain of what might -be. But who is he who could unite politics and Christ? I'm no hypocrite, -Major; you know that! You know what a politician is; you know what a -Christian should be. No man may be both, Major; no man may be both.” - -“You are not a politician,” I retorted. “You are a president.” - -This I got off with a gruff air of harshness, not, however, because it -drew a true distinction. I sought to call him from his present mood. The -General was unusual in so far that a best step towards comforting him -was to irritate him. In his breast he loved collision, and might even -leave mourning for a war. - -“I am a president and not a politician!” This with a gather of scorn. -“And pray, when is a president not a politician?” - -With a deprecatory gesture I dismissed the point. - -“Let that remain,” I replied, “as a question wherewith to rack some -further moment. I came for another matter.” The General turned a -keen eye upon me. “You spoke of Eaton for your portfolio of war,” I -continued. - -“Have you considered what objection might lodge against such course?” - -“Go on,” he said. - -“General, I misdoubt the wisdom of the step. I will make my word plain. -There is none to be more the friend of Eaton than myself, none to -respect him more. But, sir, you are aware of what folk say.” - -“And what do folk say?” Anger stood red on the brow of the General as a -banner is flung from a battlement. “What do folk say?” - -“You should consider coolly, General,” I went on. Ever cool myself, it -was for that the General valued my counsel. “You know this tale as well -as I. It has been told me more than once within four days. Light and -laughter-loving, the beautiful Peg O'Neal grows up, the daughter of this -very tavern that shelters us. She weds Timberlake, the purser. He is -here; then he is at sea. The girlish Peg is still a girl. She goes to -rout and ball; she is gay and high and does not mope and wear demure -half-weeds as good opinion holds one should whose love is on the sea -among the storms. There come whisper and nod and innuendo--the pot of -Washington scandal, they tell me, is made easily to boil. Then in the -Mediterranean Timberlake cuts his throat; and next, as one who makes -sure work, leaps overboard into fifty fathoms. The beautiful Peg does -not become distinguished for her grief. This, and the throat-cutting, -augment talk, and tongues wag doubly. Within the year thereafter, and -not two months ago, she and our friend Eaton are wed. Gossip gains a new -impulse; heads nod and there are wise leers. I put this to you, General, -with a rude coarseness almost ferocious; I do so for a purpose. I put it -as your enemies will put it when, should you call Eaton to your cabinet, -they seize on the story to your injury. It is not what you and I say or -believe; that is not the question. It is what will your enemies tell and -the world accept.” - -While I was talking, the General filled a clay pipe; in tobacco he found -calm. Holding the pipe by its long reed stem he strode up and down, -puffing cloudily. The red faded on his forehead, but his eyes were -agate-hard. I saw it would be Eaton against argument. The General's will -was set as hard and fast and cold as arctic ice. - -Nor, to be fully honest, was I over-surprised or sensibly cast down; -I had fairly foreseen it all. You may question why, then, I made this -vigorous head; and Eaton my friend. - -It is a proper curiosity. Freely, I am constrained, as I review the -past, to regard myself as sometimes the victim of self-foolery. On this -February evening with the General, I make no doubt but I thought I acted -wholly for his weal and peace. And yet I was clear before I spoke, how -my words would win to no effect, and Eaton for the cabinet it would be. -Thus, I now see that my impulse, indubitably, was one wholly of vanity; -as the friend privileged to frankness and who--as he said many times and -until I consented to the fact myself--more than any other had builded -him up to be a president, I would tell my mind, air my gifts of -prophecy, and arrange myself for a future wherein the General might say, -when the winds blew high, “You saw the tempest coming and you told me.” - That, as I now see, was the very conceited, small, cheap reason of my -interference; although at the time I in no sort beheld it by that light, -but felt somewhat noble and high and as might a loyal friend. - -The General for ten full minutes smoked up and down, I silent, and the -room otherwise still save for the tick-ticking of the clock. At last he -spoke smilingly and off to one side. - -“You remember that sagacious doctor who was yesterday called from -Baltimore to amend me after my journey? 'I'll do anything you say,' -I told him, 'save give up coffee and tobacco.' 'Then you'll die,' he -retorted, 'since it is coffee and tobacco which are killing you.' 'Then -I'll die,' I replied, 'since coffee and tobacco are all that are -left worth living for.' He quit the place in a fury of heat, did that -doctor.” - -The General grinned. There was another pause; then he swung back to my -Eaton warning, while his face again showed grave and firm. - -“Sir, Mrs. Eaton--Peg, as we call her--is as spotless as a star. My wife -knew her, loved her.” His tone was tender, while his glance sought the -miniature where from the table it followed him up and down with its -eyes. “Timberlake's habits were unfortunate; his suicide was due to -that. There was never a doubt of Peg in his soul; never a question of -her conduct. I know this; I do not guess. What!”--here his voice began -to rise with choler--“what! are we to guide by nameless slanders? Eaton -is my friend, honorable, high of mind, honorably married to the woman -he loves! I will not, by anything I do or fail to do, arm villification. -Into my cabinet he goes though every bow in hell be bent against it.” - -Smash! went the General's pipe upon the hearth. It was the manner of the -man when driven of anger. First and last he smashed pipes by the gross. - -“That is not the song of it!” I stubbornly protested. - -Then I put out what was true; that he should look at this thing from the -point of his presidency. There was the public interest; his faith to the -public must be dwelt on. - -“If there be a faith to the public,” he retorted, “there is also a faith -to a friend. It is a widest rumor that Eaton is to be of my cabinet. -Folk are morally sure of it as much as folk may be of what sits in the -antechamber of time. Should he not be named, that fact will be held as -an endorsement of these slanders. It will destroy Eaton; worse, it -will destroy Peg. Do you counsel that? Must that be done in the name of -Public Good?” The General now was speaking in a cold, contained way for -all his late pipe-smashing, and you are not to infer, from any verbal -force displayed, a shouting anger. Wroth he was; but, nathe-less, -low-voiced and steady as with a kind of tranquility of fury. “Must my -friend be abased, insulted--must a sweet, true woman suffer harm for -that you say a public interest asks it? Sir, you speak folly and propose -disgrace. There can be no public good to come from private wrong. And if -it were so, still I should stand the same. I've suffered many tests for -the public you prate of; I've abode the death-chances of a hundred -battles; I've marched to the public's wars when, spent and weak, I must -be lifted to the saddle; in no way have I spared or saved myself. But I -will spare my friend; I'll save a woman's honor; aye! spare and save -them though your public interest perish in their steads. You could name -no altar whereon I would make such sacrifices. The honor of a woman--to -safeguard her good fame--is the first duty of a man. It is before -friendship, before patriotism; it has precedence over things public or -private. What you offer spells ruin for a woman--ruin for Peg whom my -wife has loved and kissed! I will not do it. I say it again: Eaton for -the cabinet it should be though it were the last act of my life. More; -if I were capable of beginning my administration with treason to a -friend, I might surely look to conclude it with treason to the people.” - -You are to know that the General made these long orations walking the -floor, and in a manner jerky and declamatory, though not loud. There -might be spaces of silence between sentences measured by two and three -steps; and much of the time his eye left me and he was like one who -debates with himself. - -I ramble off his utterances somewhat in full; for I not only regard -the sentiments expressed as creditable to the General himself, but am -disposed to give you the truth of him as one who, while right oftener -than most men, and as set for justice as a pair of scales, on this as on -every other strong occasion did his thinking with his heart. Also, while -he never said the word, it ran in him like a torrent that his wife, -were she with him, would shield poor Peg at whatever vital cost; and of -itself that was equal to the sweeping down of reasons strong as oak or -adamant. - -Who was the un-observer to say that familiarity breeds contempt? He -went wide of the truth; he should have said that familiarity breeds -self-confidence. Now I knew the General--I knew the windings of his -thought as one knows his way about a house. Folk called him a hero; he -was never so to me. And yet, more than any, I knew him to be even better -and braver and broader than was his fame in the worshiping mouths of -ones who uplifted him to be a god. No, the General and I neither looked -up nor looked down when we dealt with one another; we met ever on level -terms. He was president, or shortly would be; but what then? As he -himself said, “The presidency is a condition, not an attribute, as it -might be a malady or a fortune, an evil or a good. And if I am King are -you not Warwick?” This last was his way of phrasing it when, a year or -so later, I told him of some overheard amazement concerning the easy, -old-shoe terms on which I lived with him. - -Such being our attitudes one to the other, the General's oral -exaltations--while I identified them for honest and as from his soul's -soul--struck on me as more florid than was called for by an interview, -private and commonplace, between us two. But it was the nature of him; -his surface could be made to toss like some tempest-bitten ocean, while -his steady depths were calm. This may explain, if it does not excuse, -that while he thus walked about, raging and eloquent, I listened with a -bit of impatience, helping myself meanwhile to a mouthful of whisky and -filling a pipe of my own. - -“Say no more,” I observed, having advantage of a pause; “say no more. -Eaton you will have it, and Eaton it shall be. But, on the whole, do -you call it good to your Peg? Do you call it wise or friendly to put her -forth to be the target for every bolt of detraction?” - -The General drew over to the fire and sat down. Slowly he poured himself -a glass of spirits, and then as slowly drank it off. For some moments he -smoked in silence. - -“What with this wrong to my side, Major,” he said at last, “and the -blood I've let, and all on a pale diet of rice, I fear I'm not strong -enough to argue with you. Let us agree, then, that Eaton shall go in as -Secretary of War. As for Peg--poor little Peg!--why should she be safer -out than in? Moreover, a woman must have her courage as a man has his. -She must risk slander as he risks sword, and both must front their -enemies.” He had gone on with a mighty mildness; now he began to wave -his second pipe, and I looked to have it go into the fireplace with -every word. “You say that the Eatons will be assailed. Already they are -attacked; not for themselves, but for me. They were married in January; -none found fault until, with our coming, Eaton's nearness to me was -remembered and the whisper of what I would do with him began to run -abroad. The Eatons are the victims of my feuds; it is I, through them, -who am stabbed at. Sir,”--smash! went the pipe and the General started -up--“sir, it is the work of Henry Clay--that creature of bargain and -corruption! You know his methods of the past campaign. What lie was too -vile to tell? What calumny too gross? Who so innocent as to escape his -malice? Why, sir! such as Clay and his crew would befoul Gehenna, and -Satan himself might shrink aside in shame from their companionship! Who -was sure from them and the poison of their mendacity? She died by -it”--here he pointed to the miniature. “Even the poor lost grave of my -mother was not sacred to such jackals. And now it is the Eatons--now it -is the pretty, harmless Peg! So let it be; they will find me ready. If I -feel joy for a presidency it is because it clothes my hands for their -annihilation.” - -There was a rap at the door. Augustus opened it and announced: “General -Green.” - -“Duff Green,” said the General, as though a new thought occurred. “I -think now for once, in a way I shall turn our rotund friend to partial -use.” - -“And how will you compass that miracle?” I spoke rather in scorn than -curiosity since I owned to briefest admiration for the General's caller. -“It will be a novelty to see your Duff Green of use.” - -“Why then,” returned the General, “the benefit I propose from him is one -simple enough. I shall have him, in his paper, give this cabinet list to -the public. Once in print the thing is ended--the nails for that cabinet -building will be clinched.” - -“And that is it,” cried I, in opposition. “Now to my notion it is -ever best to hold a question of this sort in abeyance until the latest -moment. Thereby you preserve for yourself room wherein to change your -plan.” - -“One's first aim is the surest,” responded the General. “Now I've never -known much good to come from this plan-changing of which you talk. Nor -do I believe in secrets. One should tell the people their business so -soon as ever that business is transacted. More folk are trapped and -slain with their own secrets than are saved by them. Besides one has no -right to lock a door between the people and their affairs. There go but -two keys with government, one for the treasury and the other for the -gaol, and every officer from path-master to President should be made to -study this lesson of the keys until he can repeat it.” - -To this lecture I made no retort whether of comment, denial or -agreement. These abstractions delighted him; and in this instance I -too listened with pleasure, not so much because of the deep-sea wisdom -disclosed as for that tranquility of spirit after his tossing anger -against Clay, which their utterance would seem to bring him. As it stood -the General's high temper had faded and his heat was much cooled away -when Duff Green appeared. - - - - -CHAPTER II--PORT WINE DUFF AND PIGEON-BREAST - -Duff Green was a round, insincere, self-seeking, suave, smooth, -porpoise-body of a personage, small of eye, hair age-streaked, a port -wine voice, wide mouth, and nose of friendly hue. He had come to town -the year before, poor and modest, and bartered himself into possession -of the _Telegraph_, a leading journal of the capital. He prospered, -and prosperity had swollen him. Nor was he without some tincture of -shrewdness; for he owned the wit in the late elections to support the -General, and now would wax pompous and come forward because of it. I did -not like him, holding him selfish and withal weak; besides, his affable -complacency offended me. - -The General would defend Duff Green, although I am sure he had -his measure from the start. The General, retorting to my charge of -selfishness and vanity, would say: “Of course, Duff's selfish; that's -why I enjoy him. I like selfish folk; they are easy to understand, easy -to start or stop. One has but to bait his trap with their interest and, -presto! there they are in the morning caught sharp and fast for his use. -And again, your selfish folk are content with much less than will -suffice your disinterested folk who truly love you.” This was one of the -General's efforts at sarcasm, and delivered with the sly flicker of a -smile. - -“But the smug vanity of Duff Green!” I would urge. “I could wish you -half so tremendous as he deems himself.” - -“Fie! Major, fie!” would be the reply; “vanity is the powder in the gun, -the impulse that sends the bullet home. It is the sails of the ship and -the reason of motion to that hull of merit which might make no voyage -without. Vanity has won more battles than patriotism; wanting vanity, -Caesar would have crossed no Rubicon, and Napoleon would have begun, not -ended, with Waterloo.” - -This fashion of bicker fell often forth between the General and myself; -indeed, we were in frequent disagreement, he being one who, while -holding notions of his own wisdom, was withal much imposed against by -pretences on the false parts of men whom I saw through as through a -ladder; and so I told him. - -“Ah! excellent evening, Mr. President! excellent evening, Major--ah!” - exclaimed Duff Green, his friendly nose aflame, and port wine tones, -satisfied and unctuous. Coming forward, he took first the General's hand -and then mine. For all the warmth of his countenance, his hand had the -cold feel of a fish, and I did not, myself, insist on its retention -beyond the plain limits of politeness. “Excellent evening, Mr. -President,” he repeated, glowing the while, in anticipation doubtless of -public printing to come. - -“You are not hard to suit for your evening, Duff,” returned the General, -whose fault it was to be on terms too common with many unworthy of the -honor. “Now, I call this the scandalous evening of a scandalous day. I -say 'scandalous' because muddy,” explained the General. - -In the talk to follow it developed that the purpose of Duff Green's -visit was no more noble than to just wring future patronage from -the General. Especially did our caller have his watery eye on the -governorship of Florida, a post, for its palms and orange groves -and flowers and summer seas, and mayhap the social life of St. -Augustine--aristocratic, and still on Spanish stilts--much quested; and -the reason of a deal of court paid the General by rich ones who, -having money, hungered for an opening to its display. Duff Green even -suggested, tentatively, the name of a certain wealthy thick-skull. -He said the notable in hand was a prime friend of Calhoun; that his -selection would be held vastly a compliment--a flower to his nose, -indeed!--by the Vice-President. - -“Why, sir!” observed the General, whose familiarity diminished as -the place-hunting eagerness of the worthy Duff Green began to gain -expression; “why, sir, the man you tell of lacks brains. It cannot be; -say no more. We'll find some safer way to flatter the Vice-President than -by periling public service in the hands of a weakling.” - -“Weakling!” repeated Duff Green, while the friendly nose began to -bleach; “weakling! Mr. President, this gentleman--this friend of -Calhoun--is one of our richest people.” - -“Why, I believe he did inherit a fortune,” responded the General -carelessly; “or perhaps a more proper phrasing would make the fortune -inherit him. But that is scant reason why he should mismanage a gravely -important trust. The governorship of Florida is not all citron groves -and mocking birds; there is responsible work to do; and the territory, -I tell you, shall not be wasted by a fool. But cheer up, Duff,”--the -visitor was looking blue and the hue of friendship had quite departed -his nose--“cheer thou up! Perchance we may yet discover some office -wherein your ambitious wittol of wealth--whom the Vice-President -loves!--may be great without being dangerous.” - -Duff Green was no more urgent on the point of a Florida governorship. He -was not so dim but he saw his failure and accepted it with what grace he -might. - -“I don't know how the Vice-President may take it!” he murmured at the -close. - -“As to that,” said the General, and his words fell with a suspicious -sharpness, as from one smelling to a threat; “as to that, the -Vice-President must sustain himself very patiently. I know those who -would hold other conduct on the Vice-President's part as excessively -misplaced. They might even teach the Vice-President a similar -conclusion. You should tell him that; since I see you act by his request -and as his agent.” - -Here the General looked hard at Duff Green. Already I caught a shadow -of those jealous differences to come between the General and -Calhoun--differences that would seem, for the separation of the White -House and the Vice-Presidency, constructed of the Constitution. -These offices never have agreed--never have been true friends in any -administration. It was the less important in this instance, since, -secretly and unknown to him, Calhoun for over a decade had been -the General's enemy. On that February evening which Duff Green so -distinguished as “excellent” the General was by no means distant from -the fact's discovery. - -“You do wrong, Mr. President,” faltered Duff Green, his affable nose -as pale as paper now, “when you say I am Calhoun's agent. The -Vice-President knows nothing of this. It was by accident I became aware -of his anxiety touching the Florida governorship. I give you my honor, -Mr. President; I give you my honor!” - -“Let it pass; it's of no mighty consequence.” Then impatiently, “Don't -call me 'Mr. President' until I'm President. It will be bad enough after -inauguration, I take it.” - -Here poor Duff Green was visibly disturbed. I said nothing to relieve -him. Indeed, I didn't utter a dozen words while he remained; as I've -told you, I misliked Duff Green, with his face the color of a violin and -his airs of fussy consequence. - -“But here, Duff,” resumed the General, coming himself to the rescue of -our visitor, who might be described as sinking for the third and last -time in the deep waters of his own confusion, “here, Duff, is something -I much desire you to do. It is a list of the cabinet as I intend its -construction on the hocks of my inaugural. There are reasons why it -should be printed; the Major”--here he indicated me, and with a dry note -in his voice which I understood--“approves the names and thinks they -should be given to the public. Get them in the next _Telegraph_. Here, -I'll read them.” And the General reached for his horn-framed glasses and -began from a paper he'd taken from his pocket. “Van Buren, Secretary -of State; Ingham, the Treasury; Eaton, for the War Office.” I saw Duff -Green look sharply up. Somehow, while I found protest in his glance, I -could not believe the promised cabinet selection of Eaton unpleasant to -him. From that moment I knew him for no well-wisher of the General--to -be thus pleased with a prospect of hot water! The General drove ahead: -“Branch for the Navy; Berrien for the Department of Justice; and lastly, -Barry, Postmaster General. There you have it. New York, Pennsylvania, -Tennessee, North Carolina, Georgia, and Kentucky; the North, the West, -and the South--two each; and none for the Yankee East, since to that -hard region where men, to make them smart, are raised on foxes' ears -and thistle tops, I owe no debts. There is the list. Let me see it in -print.” And the General placed the paper in Duff Green's hands. - -The General turned to fill his infallible pipe; he would have it ready -to shatter into smithereens should provocation come. Duff Green fingered -the folded paper with timid air while the General fished for a coal with -the little table tongs. For myself, I said nothing; since it was to -be done, it might as well see ink--that cabinet list. As the General -straightened his tall, slight form, his tobacco-lighting accomplished, -Duff Green, breathing pursily from a dash of trepidation, could not -forbear comment. - -“I suppose you would like my thoughts on this list?” Duff Green took -care to give his supposition the rising turn of query. - -“And why do you suppose so?” said the General, his tone something grim. - -“Only because I supposed you'd like the thoughts of everybody.” Duff -Green fawned with his voice in a half-fright. It is ill to pester -a lion, being no lion-tamer. “I supposed you'd like the thoughts of -everybody,” he repeated. - -“Quite right!” said the General, pretending return of sunshine. “And -what are your thoughts?” - -“The list will be welcome,” he answered, gaining confidence from the -General's mollified features; “the list will be welcome save in one -particular. The selection for your Secretary of War, Mr. President--” - -Here Duff Green came to a stop, utterance wholly at a halt. Nor did I -blame him, for now the General gloomed in truly savage sort. The General -waved his pipe; but he did not break it. Probably he did not think Duff -Green worth a pipe. - -“And what of Mr. Eaton?” demanded the General at last. - -“It's Mrs. Eaton,” gasped the other, while his fear shook him until he -quaked like a custard; “it's Mrs. Eaton. Our society will not receive -her; that is, our ladies won't. Mr. President, she's a tavern-keeper's -daughter--he kept this identical Indian Queen, as you must know. -Mrs. Eaton's origin is too low for such station; and besides they -say--and--and--Mr. President, really, our ladies won't receive her into -society.” Duff Green ran visibly aground and could go no further. - -“Mark you this, Duff Green,” and the General's eyes sparkled, while he -kept his voice in hand; “mark you this! If a 'low origin' be the -social argument, then I am minded of no palace as the habitat of my own -bringing up. But here I tell you: I've not come to the White House to be -ruled. Once I was set to the defence of New Orleans. The society of -that great city was against me, and I put society under martial law; a -society legislature was thereby shocked, and I dissolved it; a society -Frenchman murmured against this, and I marched him out of town with two -bayonets at his back; a society American denounced the expulsion, and -I clapped him in irons; a society judge issued a writ of release, and -I arrested him. Incidentally, I beat Pakenham and his English, and did -what I was sent to do. Now I've been ordered to Washington by the public -and given duties to perform. I look to find here conditions of sympathy -and friendship and support. If they be not here, I'll construct them; -if, being here, they fail me, I'll supply their places. Notably, should -I get up some morning to discover myself without a newspaper”--Duff -Green sweats now and pricks up his ears--“there shall one grow instantly -from the ground like any Jonah's gourd. Your ladies will not receive -Mrs. Eaton whose 'origin is low!' And for that cogent reason Mr. Eaton -must not be Secretary of War! Man, have I been lifted to a presidency -to consult wives and gossips in picking my constitutional advisers? Go; -print that list--print it as I give it you;--go!” - -The breath of the General's indignation carried Duff Green into the -hall; and even when the door was closed behind him, I could follow by -ear as he fled towards the stair with a fat shuffle that told of terror. - -“The man exhausts me,” said the General, as he refilled his pipe. - -“I think I'll write to Frank Blair.” - -“Why?” and the General looked up. - -“We should have him ready to start a Jackson paper in Washington when -Duff Green deserts.” - -When I turned out on the next morning I found the fogs and mists of the -day before departed and blown aside, and a bright sky overhead. There -was no frost; but on the contrary a fine spring promise in the air that -smelled in one's nostril like the breath of budding trees. The roads, -too, were more in the way of reform, and here and there a dry spot -showed in profert of what would be. Altogether it was quite an April -rather than a February morning. I finished shaving and dressing and -called Jim to brush my coat. A hostler before he became a valet, Jim was -used to accompany these brush-labors with an aspiration like unto the -escape of steam; a sound held sovereign by him for giving a horse's coat -a gloss, and therefore good for mine. I had gone forth in an earlier day -to break Jim of these stable tricks, but, making no headway, wisely gave -it up, and Jim hissed on unchecked. There be things your African won't -learn; there be things he will learn; and effort to suppress in the one -direction or excite enterprise in the other, is thrown away. Aware on -these points, I had taken years before the bridle of restraint off Jim, -and to give him his due he went the better with his head free. - -When brushed to fit Jim's notion of the spic and span, I settled my chin -in my black stock and went to call upon the General. I would know how -he held himself on the back of his bleedings and his wraths against Duff -Green. - -I found him over a bowl of coffee and with a pipe going; he had been up -and breakfasted an hour before. Also, he had gotten letters to please -him and was in top spirits. - -I recall looking at him as I entered his chamber, and thinking, as I -noted his quick, game-cock air, full of life and resolution, how little -he seemed that invalid who but the evening before was opening veins and -lying ill with old wounds. The difference would have amazed any save -myself, who had seen too much of him to be now astonished. The -General could pull himself together like a watch-spring. Moreover, he -fed on sensation, and a glow at his heart's roots was better for -him than a meal of victuals. I've borne witness as he rode into the -wilderness to conquer Weatherford and his Creeks, with a month-old -bullet in his shoulder and its fellow in his arm. He was so feeble and -nigh death that he must be handed to his saddle like a sack of bran, and -each hour the surgeons must bathe him over with sugar-of-lead water to -keep life in his body. And yet, from the outset, and on bad food -and with the ground for his bed, he began to mend. The man lived on -sensation, I say, like a babe on milk. He would walk up and down a line -of battle and be as drunk on rifle smoke as any other on brandy. - -When I came into his room I found the General--pipe and coffee for the -moment in retirement--to his own evident satisfaction, but in a rusty -raven voice I fear, humming _The Star Spangled Banner_. His eyes were -closed. He was sitting by the fire, beating out the time of the music -with pipe held like a baton in his claw-like hand, wearing meanwhile -much the air of your critic at an opera. His notes slipped frequently -into quavers, and there was constant struggle to keep from lapsing into -the savage minor key. - -“You make grewsome music for a bright morning, General,” said I; “it -sounds dolefully like a wail.” - -“That's a majestic tune, Major,” he replied, opening his eyes. “It never -fails to stir me, and would bear comparison with _Old Hundred_, albeit -one tells of religion and the other of patriotism. After all, what -should be the separation between true patriotism and true religion?” - -“Last evening,” I retorted, “you fell upon me hip and thigh because I -said you were not a politician but a president; you would have it that -the two were synonyms for each other. Also, you declared that no -one might be both a politician and a Christian. Now you talk of no -separation between patriotism and religion. General, you go to bed in -one frame and get, up in another; you are not consistent.” - -“I'll not quarrel with you,” said he, “though to say, as you would seem -to, that a president and a patriot are ever the same, is begging the -question and a far shot from the truth. I still stick for it, however, -that _The Star Spangled Banner_ comes close to religion in its -influence; I've heard it given while the big guns were speaking at the -front, and I may tell you, sir, it brought water to my eyes.” - -I could well believe this, for the General was as soon to shed tears as -a woman; and withal so readily excited that on least occasion his hand -would shake like a leaf in a ripple of wind. He said the latter was from -coffee and tobacco and not from natural nervousness. He was half right -and half wrong. This tremble of the hands was the vibration of that -mighty machinery of the man when the belts were thrown on for utter -action. However, this is all aside the story. - -The promulgation in Duff Green's valued imprint of the General's designs -had made a stir, I warrant you. The capital community seized on the list -of coming cabineteers with wondrous relish. Delighted day by day -over the tattle of office, the local public sat up, one and all, -and chattered of the printed names like unto a coop of catbirds. -Particularly, I might add, were the Eatons tossed from tongue to tongue; -folk took sides, and some assailed while others defended, and -no little heat found generation. The General admired the buzz and -clash--for his ears were open and he heard of it--being as fond of -storms as a petrel; and for myself, I was well enough pleased. It was -prior to my interview with Peg, you are to remember, and I not yet her -partisan; I half hoped those resentful clamors against the Eatons would -stay the General at the eleventh hour. - -“It's not yet too late,” said I, “to have White for the war portfolio -and leave Eaton in his Senate seat. I repeat, there's the country to -think of.” - -The General was blandly immovable. Said he, “I have told you how it's -a war on me as much as a war on Peg. They fight really against me; they -attack her good name in their criminal strategy. Besides, Major, you -do the country insult.” Here he gave me a smile. “The country is larger -than you would admit and not to be easily shaken or over-set. Nor are -you and I of such import as we think. The worst that both of us might -do of public evil would hardly serve to rock the boat. And though the -common interest should dip gunwale a trifle, to this side or to that, -are we to throw overboard a girl on an argument of trimming ship? I say -to you for the last time, I'm no such mariner.” - -The latter sentences were vivid of spirit, and it was clear the General -had given the Eatons a deal of consideration since the night before, -with the result of stiffening his first determination. - -“You'll find more folk than myself,” I observed at last, “to differ with -concerning this business. I do not believe the town is like to sit down -quietly with the arrangement.” - -“We will cross that river,” said he, “when we come to it. But why, -Major, should you and I continue whirling flails over this old straw? -It was between us most thoroughly threshed last evening. I think you -are right about the town, however, and that's why I'm waiting now in my -apartment. Mud or no mud, I would else be in the saddle for a morning -ride. I'm in momentary hope of visitation by a delegation of society -Redsticks, who, I understand, connive a descent upon me. They propose -at the coming pow-wow to demand my Eaton intentions, and to make protest -against them should their most worshipful fancy disapprove.” The term -“Redsticks,” which the General employed, was a kind of border slang -and the name given to the Creek hostiles in Weatherford's war. “You must -stand to my back, Major, when the enemy arrives.” This, with a glance -of humor which showed the General as not attaching vast emphasis to the -invasion or what might grow from it. - -“I will abide the shock of your Redsticks' charge,” I said, smiling with -him, “unless they bring a reserve of women to the field. With the first -dire swish of warlike crinoline I shall abandon you to the fate you've -invited. I have stood to odds; but my courage is not proof against an -angry woman.” - -The General beamed in his droll fashion and, shifting our ground of -talk, said he had letters to write and needed my help. It may as well be -known, for soon or late it is bound to escape into notice, that I wrote -most of the General's letters. He was a perilous hand with a pen, and no -more a speller than a poet. - -But there would be no letters written that day; for when we were in the -very act and article of beginning, Augustus came in with a card. - -“Ah! Colonel Towson, U. S. A.,” read the General. “Show him up.” This -last to Augustus. “The Redsticks would seem to have dwindled to one,” - observed the General, turning to me. “This Colonel Towson was to be -their spokesman. Now he comes alone. He is a very brave or a very -ignorant man.” And the General sniffed dangerously, and yet in manner -comic, as recognizing the elements of a farce. - -Colonel Towson, I must needs say, was a poor feature of a man, with -a trivial face in which the great expression was a noble opinion of -himself. He was of the cavalry, as I judged by the facings on his -regimentals, for our visitor appeared in full uniform, and for part -of his regalia dragged a clattering saber and wore fierce spurs to his -heels. Plainly he was one of your egregious fops; and his breast was -trussed outward and upward with the fullness of a pigeon's by dint -of some vain contrivance inside his garments. As he brought his heels -together, and stood with a deal of splendor just inside the door, the -General ran him over with questioning eye that took in everything from -the wax on his moustache to the gilt on his spurs. - -“What do you want, sir?” demanded the General, as blunt as a hammer. - -“I am Colonel Towson, Mr. President; the paymaster of the forces.” - -Pigeon-breast spoke in high, affected tones, and would clip his words -and slur his “r's” in a mincing fashion beyond imitation. - -“Of what forces?” - -The voice was calculated to plant dismay in the other's youthful ears. -I was aware how the General's ferocity was assumed, and that deep in -his throat he was laughing. I should have laughed myself, but managed -instead to establish a firm gravity. - -“Of the army, Mr. President.” - -The high tone began to squeak from agitation. And no marvel! The -General's frown was enough to abash a lion. - -“Are you come to me on duty?” - -“No, sir, Mr. President, I--” - -“Then why do you wear your side arms?” The General could throw an -expression into his face before which a hostile council of red Indians -had been known to shrink and turn gray beneath the paints wherewith they -were tallowed. The hapless Pigeon-breast was shaking in the shadow -of one of the General's most hateful looks. When the other made no -response, the General resumed: - -“Note this, sir; I am not in the habit of being terrorized by the -military forces of the nation. Never again presume to come into my -presence armed and spurred, unless required by the regulations.” - -“I'll retire, Mr. President, and change my apparel.” - -This was feebly piped, and poor Pigeon-breast came nigh to wrinkling his -coat in attempts to bow conciliation and apology. - -“State your errand, sir, now you are here,” commanded the General. “I've -no time for two visits from you.” - -Pigeon-breast took what confidence he might from the General's brusque -permission, and drew from his cuff a memorandum; as it were, the heads of -a speech. Clearing his throat and collecting himself, he began what may -have been a most lucid and eloquent discourse. Its effect was lost in -the delivery, however; for what with the high thin tones, and what with -the orator's lady-like affectations, neither the General nor myself -could make more of it than of the laughter of a loon. For his own -careless part, I don't think the General paid even slight attention. If -Pigeon-breast were uttering thunder, then it was summer thunder and high -and harmless, far above his head; he minded it no more than the scraping -of a fiddle at a tavern dance. In the midst, Pigeon-breast was made to -halt. The General waved his hand as demanding silence.. - -“We will shorten this. For whom do you come to me?” - -“I was asked to see you on behalf of Mrs. Calhoun and the ladies of -Washington.” - -The General glanced in my direction. Of course we well understood that -the mighty purpose of Pigeon-breast was to protest against Eaton's -selection. Indeed, we had caught enough of his oratory to teach us that -much. Moreover, Pigeon-breast had at one stage read aloud the article -from Duff Green's paper as the reason of his coming, and received the -General's word that the list therein set forth was authorized. - -But we had caught no word of Mrs. Calhoun, and her name, when it did -fall, came as a surprise. The Vice-President's wife was the head of -capital fashion--the stately queen of the little court. Both she and her -husband, however, had called on the Eatons just following their wedding; -and now to discover the lady in the enemy's van owned a sinister as -well as unexpected side. It looked like a change of front, and much -sustained the General's surmise that this was to be a war on him rather -than the Eatons; that its purpose was politics while its source was a -plot. - -“Did I not tell you that here was an intrigue?” asked the General. I -continued blowing my tobacco smoke in silence by the fire. Then, with -utter suavity, the General returned to Pigeon-breast. “I must treat -the messenger with politeness because of his fair principals. Let me -understand: You come from 'Mrs. Calhoun and the ladies of Washington'?” - -Pigeon-breast bowed as profoundly as he might with his armor on and -gasped assent. - -“And their objections are to Mr. Eaton in the cabinet--really to Mrs. -Eaton?” - -Another bow and gasp from the bold Pigeon-breast. - -“Sir, give my compliments to 'Mrs. Calhoun and the ladies of -Washington.' Say I much regret that I must disregard their wishes. Say, -also, they do grave wrong, a wrong greater than mere injustice, to one -who in all that stands best is their equal. Being ladies, they should -receive her as one of themselves; being women, they should feel for -her as an innocent maligned; being Christians, they should come to her -succor as one borne upon by troubles. These would be graceful courses, -and make for the glory of 'Mrs. Calhoun and the ladies of Washington.' -On the point of their protest, however, describe me as saying that Mr. -Eaton will be of my cabinet; I shall tender him the portfolio of war and -he has signified his readiness to accept. I do not know what this may -imply socially; I do not decide that, but leave it to the better and -more experienced tastes of 'Mrs. Calhoun and the ladies of Washington.' -Also, you are to do me this favor, sir.” - -Pigeon-breast, who was flattered by the General's long harangue, and -inclined to congratulate himself over a polite finale to what as an -interview at one moment was stricken of a storm, here aroused himself -smartly. - -“Believe me, Mr. President, any favor in my power.” - -Pigeon-breast touched his brow with prodigious military _eclat_, and -then slapped his leg with his hand like cracking off a pistol. - -“Why, then, the favor is simple. Tell every enemy of mine, and -especially every friend of Henry Clay, my decision touching Mr. Eaton. -I want the news to travel fast and far. My friends will sustain Mr. -Eaton; and as for my foes, it shall go hard but I discover ways to deal -with them. You may depart, sir.” - -Pigeon-breast saluted with flattered chin in air, and went his way, and -presently we heard his saber on its jingling journey down the stair. - -“I do not understand that word about the Calhouns,” observed the -General, when we were alone. “The Calhouns have already visited the -Eatons and professed friendship. As for myself, I've supposed Calhoun my -supporter. And why should he be otherwise?” The General shook his head -as one puzzled. “We must, I fear, count as against us more than Henry -Clay and his rogues of Bargain and Corruption. Well, so be it; a fight -is like a frolic in so far that 'the more, the merrier,' as a proverb, -applies with equal force to both.”. - -Now that Pigeon-breast was gone, and we being alone, I remonstrated with -the General for that he had entertained our caller and submitted to his -anti-Eaton speech. I said it disparaged his dignity; that he had already -listened to Duff Green, which was bad enough, but now he must stand with -half-patient ear while yon clanking popinjay reeled off his high-pitched -opposition and that of those befeathered dames whom he professed to -represent. It was a poor beginning for a president. - -“Why, sir,” retorted the General, “you, yourself, are wont to hector me -at will; I may not buy a coat without you finding fault. Major, I fear -me you are the proud one. To be sure, I stoop when I listen to such as -Duff and our martial visitor just here. But you must know what Franklin -said of stooping: 'The world is like a tunnel, dark and low of roof. -He who stoops a little as he passes through will save himself many a -thump.'” - -“Oh, if it were to be,” said I, “an argument of saw and proverb and -slips of dried wisdom, I might quote you not a few and redden your ears. -What I say is, you sacrifice dignity; you know it full well at that.” - -The General laughed. “But I had my reasons, Major. I sent him whom you -term 'Pigeon-breast' forth to be a poultice to this Eaton inflammation. -I want to draw it to a head. Duff Green wouldn't do; he'd keep our talk -to himself, since my harshness hurt his self-love, and he's too vain -to tell a tale against himself. And again, he would be made silent with -thoughts of my possible resentment. With Pigeon-breast the cards fall -differently. Did you not remark how well I flattered? At the outset he -was afraid of me. In the end I packed his timidity in cotton-batting -and sang it to sleep; I rocked his cradle and warmed his milk for him. -I called up his pride and made him my messenger. He will tell the Eaton -story to all, and give me as his authority; that is what I seek. It is -a business that will be the sooner over by setting folk's mouths to the -quarrel at once. And we should make it short for Peg's sake. Poor Peg; -it's her tavern origin that kindles patrician wrath, and it is their -aristocratic method to blow calumny upon her. Slander, Major,”--here the -General donned his manner of philosopher--“slander, Major, is as much -the resource of your true aristocrat as poison of your Turk.” - - - - -CHAPTER III--PEG'S MEETING WITH THE MAJOR - -Before, in this relation, I go to that meeting with Peg whereof I made -account in the commencement of my story, it would be proper, I think, -to notice a singular personality; one who, in intermittent fashion, will -run in and out of my history like a needle through cloth. His sewing, -however, will be of the friendliest, for he was as loyal to the General -as any soul who breathed. - -Mordecai Noah, was the man's name. The General possessed a good previous -acquaintance with him, although, as in the gentle instance of Peg, I was -now to meet him for the earliest time. - -Noah was a writer of plays, and an editor; moreover, he was a gentleman -of substance and celebration in New York City, where his paper did -stout service for the General the hot autumn before. Noah also had been -America's envoy to the Barbary States during the years of Madison. A -Hebrew of purest strain, Noah was of the Tribe of Judah and the House of -David, and the wiseacres of his race told his lineage, and that he was -descended of David in a right line, and would be a present King of -the Jews were it not that the latter owned neither country nor throne. -However this may have been--and indeed a true accuracy for such -ancestral cliff-climbing seems incredible, when any little slip would -spoil the whole--Noah was of culture and quiet penetration; withal -cunning and fertile to a degree. Also, I found his courage to be the -steadiest; he would fight with slight reason, and had in a duel -some twenty years before, with the first fire, killed one Cantor, a -flamboyant person--the world might well spare him--on the Charleston -racetrack, respectably at ten paces. I incline to grant space favorable -to Noah; for he played his part with an integrity as fine as his -intelligence, while his own modesty, coupled with that vulgar dislike -of Jews by ones who otherwise might have named him in the annals of that -day, has operated to obscure his name. - -The General told me of Noah somewhat at length on this morning, and just -following the marching away of Pigeon-breast. He said he had sent for -him, and that any moment might bring his footfall to the door. - -As he dwelt on Noah and his characteristics, I was struck by a word. It -is worth record as a sidelight on his own nature. - -The General showed gusto and a lipsmacking interest in Noah's duel with -the man Cantor, and ran out every detail as one runs out a trail. I -could not forbear comment. - -“How is it,” said I, “you so dote on strife?” - -“I don't dote on strife. But when it comes to that, Major, war is as -natural as peace.” - -“If it were so,” I returned, “still your admiration is entirely for war. -You do not love peace.” - -“I don't love war so much as warriors,” he contended. “I understand your -war man; and I do not fear him. Besides, your honest soul of battles -may be made a best friend. I feel the rankle of a Benton bullet in -my shoulder as we talk together; and yet to-day a Benton faces my -detractors on the floor of the Senate. I say again, I love the natural -warrior; I comprehend him and he gives me no feeling of fear.” - -“Do you tell me you can be a prey to fear?” I put the query as an -element of dispute. His reply was the word that surprised me. - -“Fear?” and the General repeated the word with a sight of earnestness. -“Sir, I fear folk who won't fight; I fear preachers, Quakers. They are a -most dangerous gentry to run crosswise with.” - -When Noah arrived, I was still sitting with the General. Noah was a -sharp, nimble man of middle size and years, and physically as deft and -sure of movement as a mountain goat. He took hold of my hand on being -presented by the General, and I observed how he had an iron steadiness -of grip. I liked that; I am, myself, of prodigious thews and as strong -of arm as any canebrake bear, and when folk shake hands with me, a blush -of emphasis is to my humor. I like to know that I've hold on somebody -and that somebody has hold on me. As I looked in Noah's face, I was -struck with the contradiction of his black eyes, and hair red as the -fur of a fox. On the whole, I felt pleased to know that Noah was the -General's true friend; no one would have cared for his enmity. - -“I feel as though you were an old acquaintance,” said Noah, and his face -lighted as I've observed a sudden splash of sunshine to light a deep -wood. “The General has named you so often in his letters, and spoken of -you so much in what interviews I've enjoyed with him, that you are to me -no stranger.” - -“And I've heard frequently and much of you,” I replied. - -We from that moment were as thoroughly near to one another as though -neighbors for a decade. It was a strange concession of my nature, for -men come slowly upon terms of confidence with me, and my suspicions are -known for their restlessness. - -“This is my thought, Noah,” said the General; “this is why I summoned -you. Blessed is he to whom one is not driven with explanations, and who -intuitively comprehends. You are that man, Noah.” The General's vivid -manner was a delight to me. “There's the Eaton affair--you read -my scheme of a cabinet in the paper. There's to be a war upon the -Eatons--upon me. Already I hear a dull rumble as the opposition takes -its artillery into position. I would know what this means. Is it a -frill-and-ruffle wrath alone and confined to our ladies? Or does it go -deeper and plant its tap-root in a plot? You know what I should say. -Four years pass as swiftly as four clouds; and Henry Clay would still -hanker for a presidency. These Bargain and Corruption wolves will hunt -my administration for every foot of the way, and strive to drag it down. -You gather my notion, Noah. Discover all you can; back-track this Eaton -trouble--it's but just started and the trail is short--and bring me sure -word, not only of those who foment it, but of the position held towards -it by both Clay and Calhoun. Of the hatred of the former I'm certain, -and that he'll strike at me with foulest blow. Calhoun, elected to the -vice-presidency by my side, I would have leaned on confidently; but a -word has been said--the Major heard it--that nurtures doubt. Let me -learn all there is of this tangle with what dispatch you may. My own -belief goes to it that, when all is said, search will discover Clay to -be the sole, lone bug under the chip, and Calhoun--and put it the worst -way--but an indifferent looker-on.” - -Noah paid wordless attention until the General was through. Then he -spoke. “General,” said Noah, “I had already heard much when you sent for -me. Your portfolio purposes have not been a secret well kept. Also, it -has been abroad as gossip for almost a week, this ill talk of the Eatons; -this morning's publication simply served to give it volume. Thus far, -and personally, Henry Clay has had naught to do with it; his friends, -however, have been prompt to lift up the cry. You are right, too, when -you regard the rage of these wolves as threatening you. They would, -as you declare, tear down your administration. They will leave nothing -untried. They will hang on your flanks through the defiles and in the -thickets of society; and it is thus they will seek to harass you by -means of the Eatons. They reckon no slight help to their plans, General, -through your high temper; I say this for no end of irritation, but to -put you on guard with yourself.” - -Noah would have gone forth at once, but the General held him in speech -about Van Buren, who as present Governor of New York must resign his -Albany position to assume place as the General's premier. - -Noah, who lived Van Buren's right hand of power in his own region, was -full to the brim with him, and I, who had yet to be introduced to the -little Knickerbocker, sat absorbed of his description. The General had -met Van Buren a dozen times or more; but in any sense of intimacy he was -as ignorant of his future secretary as was I myself. We therefore gave -fullest heed to Noah, who talked well, being one able to take you a man -to pieces as though he were a clock, and show in detail his wheels and -particular springs, and point you to the pendulum of motive for every -hour he struck. - -We were in mid-swing of talk when I was called. It was none other than -Jim, to bring me that information--threatening, he deemed it--of the -beautiful Peg who waited my coming below. - -As I was going, the door standing open, one in coat of clerical finish -presented himself without announcement, and rapped modestly on the door -frame. I had had experience of his flock and knew him by his feathers. -Plainly, he was a solicitor of subscriptions for some amiable charity. -The book in his hand spoke loudly for my surmise. - -My doubt, had one been entertained, would have found dissipation by the -words of the General, as, harsh and strident, they overtook me on my -way. - -“No, sir,” I heard him say; “no, sir! Not one splinter!--not one two-bit -piece! I shall begin as I mean to end. You people are not to send me out -of the White House, a pauper and a beggar, as you sent poor Jim Monroe.” - -Doughtily resolved, oh General! hard without and soft within! Doughtily -resolved and weakly executed, when eight years later you are made to -borrow ten thousand dollars wherewith to pay your White House debts -before ever you wend homeward to your Hermitage! - -After forty and when youth's suppleness has fled, one's fancy is as -prone to lapse into a stiff inertness as one's joints. It came then to -pass, as I journeyed parlorward along the old-fashioned corridors and -stairways of the Indian Queen, that I in nowise was visited by any -glint of the possible beauty of Peg, nor yet of her honest injuries; but -rather, in half peevish fashion, I considered her a proposed incumbrance -to the General's administration, in which I may be pardoned for -saying--I, who had been busy with trowel and plumb-line about the corner -stone and subsills of his whole career--I was smitten of an interest. -Truly, I had been Eaton's friend; and had used him well, too. Also, I -was glad to have him take Peg to wife, since such was his fancy. But why -should she and he rise subsequently up to vex folk who were like to own -troubles more properly their own? That was the question I held acridly -under my tongue as I went onward to my meeting with Peg, and I fear some -blush of it showed in my face. - -Over six feet and broad as a door, I doubtless towered forbiddingly -upon her imaginings when I came up to Peg; these and the cloud on my -forehead--for I am sure one darkened it--showed her to be both brave -and innocent when, without hesitation or holding back, she put forth -her hands to me. I've told somewhere how she gave me her hand; that was -wrong; she gave me both, and gave them with a full sweep of frankness, -that showed confident at once and sad, as though with the motion of it -she offered herself for my protection. She spoke no word; her little -hands lay in my great ones, and I felt within them the beat of a sharp, -small pulse as of one under strain and stress. Once, long before, I had -toiled upward with caitiff secrecy and captured a sleeping mother-pigeon -on her nest. The quick flutter of the bird's heart beneath my fingers -was as this poor throbbing in Peg's hands. I remember, also, I was -melted into the same sudden compassion for the pigeon that seized on me -for Peg. - -“I came to you because you are the General's old friend,” she said. Her -sweet, large eyes were swimming, and her voice began to break. Then she -put out an effort and brought herself to bay. “I've nothing to ask; not -much to say, neither. I know what the General would do; my husband -has told me. I know, too, what it will mean of slander and insult and -suffering. And yet--I've prayed upon it; prayed and again prayed!--I -must go forward. I can not, nay, I dare not become a bar across the path -of my husband; I dare not poison his success.” - -All this time I had been holding to her hands, for I felt her great -beauty and it made me forget the name of time. Besides, this was no -common meeting, but rather the making of a league and covenant between -folk who were to be allies throughout a bitter strife. I think she -noticed my awkward and scarce polite retention of her fingers, for she -withdrew them, while a little flush of color painted itself in her face. -Still, she did not do this unkindly; and, I may say, there was nothing -of sentiment in my breast which cried for rebuke or tendered her aught -but honor. - -“Pardon a freedom in one twice your years, but you are wondrous -beautiful.” These were my first words to Peg. “Mr. Eaton has come by -mighty fortune.” - -“My beauty, as you call it,” said she, with just the shadow of a smile -that told more of pain than gladness, “has been no good ground to me -and borne me nettles for a crop. I had been happier for a wholesome -plainness.” - -Then we settled to a better conversation; and the while her sweetness -was growing on me like a vine and I becoming more and more soundly her -partisan with every moment. - -“My husband is much honored,” said she at one point, “and deems himself -advanced by what the General would offer. Also, he sees nothing of the -darkness into which I stare; he sees only the high station and the power -of it, and the way shines to his feet. But I know what society will -do; I have not been child and girl and woman in Washington without -experience of it. Folk will turn from me and ignore me and seek to blot -me out. If it were none save myself to be considered, I would abandon -the field; I would hunt seclusion, cultivate obscurity as if it were a -rose. But am I to become a drag on the man who loves me and gives me his -name? Am I to be fetters for his feet--a stumbling-block before him?” - -“There is no need of this apprehension,” said I; “you should have a -higher spirit, since you are innocent.” - -“Innocent, yes!” she cried, and her deep eyes glowed; “innocent, yes! As -heaven hears me, innocent!” Her manner dismayed me with what it unveiled -of suffering. Then in a lower tone, and with a kindle of that cynicism -to come upon folk who, working no evil and doing no wrong, are yet made -to find themselves fronted of adverse tides and blown against by winds -of cruelty, “Innocent, yes; but what relief comes then? I am young; many -are still children with my years. And, thanks to a tavern bringing -up,”--here was hardness now--“I have so seen into the world's heart as to -know that it is better to be a rogue called honest, than honest and -called a rogue. That is true among men; I tell you it is doubly true -among women.” - -To be open about it, I was shocked; not that what Peg said was either -foolish or untrue. But to be capable of such talk, and she with that -loving, patient mouth, showed how woeful must have been the lesson. But -it gave me none the less a deal of sureness for the level character of -her intellect, and I saw she carried within her head the rudiments of -sense. - -“What is it you would ask of me?” said I, at last. “I can only promise -beforehand anything in my power.” - -“I would ask nothing,” she replied, “save the assurance that you will be -my husband's friend and mine. I see grief on its way as one sees a storm -creep up the sky. Oh!” she suddenly cried with a sparkle of tears, “my -husband! He must not be made ashamed for me! Rather than that, I would -die!” - -Peg bowed her flower-like head and wept, I, sitting just across, doing -nothing, saying nothing; which conduct was wise on my part, albeit I -hadn't the wit to see it at the time, and was simply daunted to silence -by a sorrow I knew not how to check. It was a tempest, truly, and swayed -and bent her like a willow in a wind. At last she overtook herself; she -smiled with all the brightness of nature, or the sun after a flurry of -rain. - -“It will do me good,” she said; “and when the time comes I will be -braver than you now think.” - -When Peg smiled she gave me a flash of white behind the full red of her -lips. Then I noticed a peculiar matter. She wanted the two teeth that, -one on each side of the middle teeth, should grow between the latter and -the eye teeth. When I say she wanted these, you are not to understand -she once owned them and that they were lost. These teeth had never been; -where six should have grown there were but four; and these, set evenly -and with dainty spaces between, took up the room, each claiming its just -share. The teeth were as white as rice, short and broad and strong, and -the eye teeth sharply pointed like those of a leopard. There gleamed, -too, a shimmer of ferocity about these teeth which called for all Peg's -tenderness of mouth, aye! even that sadness which lurked in plaintive -shadows about the corners, to correct. And yet what struck one as a -blemish went on to be a source of fascination and grew into the little -lady's chiefest charm--these separated sharp white leopard teeth of -Peg's. - -When I came into the room I was thinking on the hardships to the -General's administration; now I regarded nothing save the perils of -Peg herself. With that on my soul I started, man-fashion, to talk -courageously. - -“After all, what is there to cower from?” said I. “You know society, you -say; doubtless that is true. I confess I do not, since this is almost -my first visit to the town. But I know men, and of what else is society -compounded? Their heaviest frown, if one but think coolly and be sure of -one's self, should not weigh down a feather.” - -“Why, yes,” she cried, “you know men. But do you know women? Men are as -so many camp followers of society; it is the women who make the fighting -line. And oh! their shafts are tipped with venom!” - -“It cannot be so bad,” I insisted. “So-called society, which must -take on somewhat the character of come-and-go with the ebb and flow of -administrations, begins with the White House, does it not?” - -“We will do our best,” smiled Peg, without replying to my question. - -Probably she comprehended the hopeless sort of my ignorance and the -uselessness of efforts to set forth to me the “Cabinet Circle,” the -“Senate Circle,” the “Supreme Court Circle,” and those dozen other -mysterious rings within rings, wheels within wheels, which the -complicated perfection of capital social life offers for the confusion -of folk. - -“Unquestionably, the White House,” Peg went on, “is the citadel, the -great tower, and we can always retreat to that. We will do well enough; -but oh!”--here Peg laid her hand like a rose leaf on my arm--“you do not -understand, a man can not understand, what we shall go through.” - -“Let us have stout hearts for all that,” said I. “It behooveth us to -be bold, since no victory, even over weakness, was ever constructed of -timidity. Besides, the foe may offer us its defeat by its own errors. -I recall, how once upon a time, certain Creeks whom the General was to -attack entrenched themselves, and all about felled trees and sharpened -the branches into points, the whole as defensive as any bristle of -bayonets. You, as thought these red engineers, would have deemed the -place impregnable, for no one might force his way through this _chevaux -de-frise_. But the General's military eye unlocked the situation. The -sun-dried leaves and twigs were lying where they fell. An arrow, with -blazing tow tied to its shaft and shot from a safe two hundred yards -away, solved the problem. In a moment that precious defence was on fire; -and the enemy, driven forth by the heat and flame and smoke of it, -were met in the open and destroyed to a man. We may yet smoke these -society savages into a surrender by setting an honest torch to their -surroundings. One thing we can promise ourselves.” I remarked this in -conclusion. “Whatever else may fail, at the worst, you shall not go -wanting a revenge.” - -“And that thought is sweet, too,” said she in return. - -Peg's leopard teeth were not without significance; that much I saw. -After all, her speech was to have been expected; for who will go further -afield for revenge than your flesh and blood true woman, still of -earth's fires and not ready for the skies? - -Peg told me a portion of her story; partly because it was natural she -should think that I, who had been a stranger to her, might justly want -such knowledge; but mostly, I believe, for that she had an instinct to -defend herself against what I might have preconceived to her disaster. -Dear child, she had small cause to fret herself on that score! I -remember she gave herself no little blame as the self-willed gardener -of those thorny sorrows among which she had walked and was still -sorrowfully to find her path. She would run on like this, as I recall: - -“The first fault belonged with this tavern of an Indian Queen. I could -have been no older than eight when I knew how folk who came here, -Congressmen and officers of state and their ladies, looked upon us who -kept the place as but servants over servants, and took care not to -meet us on an equal footing with themselves. My father and mother were -disrated as mere tavern-keepers who sold their entertainment to any -and to all; and I, so soon as I came to discretion and an ability to -apprehend, found myself included in the ban thus set upon my people. -I've seen nurses skurry to carry their charges off from childish games -with me and the contamination of my baby contact. Later, in girlhood, -I've overheard mothers while they warned their daughters to avoid me, -and experienced the tilt-nosed airs of those same daughters who with -superior arts of insolence stung me like wasps. More often than once, -I've crept away to tears of shame because I was the daughter of a -tavern. - -“But in the end it hardened me. I had a perverse, retaliatory temper. I -grew up beautiful, so folk told me; moreover, I knew it but too well by -the merest glance in a glass. With my beauty,”--Peg spoke of it in mixed -simplicity and sadness as though she recounted deformity--“I was wont to -fashion my revenge. My father--not a poor man, for while taverns may be -vulgar they maybe profitable--was ever ready to spend money on me; and I -had only to hint at a comb or a ribbon or a ring, to find the gewgaw -an hour after on my table. Good, poor man! my father, calm and careless -enough under his condition so far as it rested on himself, felt for my -humiliations, which now and again he could not fail to see, and sought -with trinketry and luxury of dress to repair the injury. Neither he nor -my mother spoke of what they both must have felt, that is our nosocial -condition, if one may so describe it; and for myself, I was too proud, -and too tenderly in love with them for their thousand kindnesses, to -bring it upon their notice. - -“As I've said, I made my beauty the method of my revenge. I owned taste -as well as looks, and my wits were as deep and as quick and as bright as -my eyes. I've set many a wrinkle on many a fair brow by defeating it to -second place in that woman's rivalry of looks. - -“For these wars, where loveliness tilts against loveliness, my allies -were the men. Compliment for me was never silent on their lips. I was -the town's toast as I grew up. This put the women to an opposite course. -As the men spoke of my beauty, the women shrugged their pure shoulders -and told of my boldness; and I must confess that in a native vivacity, -together with that rebellion of the spirit born of their attitude -towards me, I gave them endless evidence to go upon. I have lived my -life without an immorality or the shadow of one; I have done no wrong -wherewith to shame myself; but, reckless, careless, and with the frank -ignorance of innocence--and then, to be sure, because it made those -others angry--I was greedy of men's praise, withal too free of speech -and eye, and thereby offered tongues eager to assail me the argument -required as material for their ill work. They, the women, wove for me -as bad a story as they might, and then wrapped it about me for a -reputation. How I loathed and hated them! those who, worsted of my -beauty, would tear me with calumny by way of reprisal! - -“Now I must tell you, it was I who wearied first of that game where it -was beauty on the one side against icy stare, arched brow, and covert -innuendo on the other. No; my tongue would not have spared them--it was -never a patient member, that tongue!--but for such artillery, as you -would call it, my persecutors were out of reach. There is a gravity -of words; they descend and never climb; they must, like a stone, come -tumbling from above to do an injury. Wherefore these folk high up -were safe from me--safe from everything except my beauty; and since I -maintained myself without a stain upon my virtue, even my beauty wore -for them and theirs no real peril. Above, on the cliffs of society, they -rolled down tale and whisper against me like so many black stones; -in retort, though I might be beautiful and so madden them with the -possession of what they lacked, I from below could harm them nothing. -I think, too, some in pain of their own ugliness, envied and would have -changed places with me. They would not, had they known what I knew and -felt what I felt. My soul was in torment, and I grew never so callous -but the darts of their forked malignancy would pierce and pain. - -“It was to avoid conditions which grew at last intolerable--for I -brooded when alone and magnified the evils of my position, turning -morbid the while--that I wedded Mr. Timberlake. I never loved him; I -took him to be a refuge rather than a husband, and my little life with -him was not a happy one. By no fault of his, however; I think he loved -me, and I know he did his best. I had nothing from him save kindness, -and when he died in the Mediterranean I doubt not he carried into the -other world a sincere regard for me. - -“And I would have loved him if I could.” Peg waved her hand with an -accent of despair, and as one who had striven and failed beyond recall. -“But I could not--could not; strive as I might, love would not come. I -felt guilt to live with him; I was glad when he sailed away; and, God -help me! my sighs over his death were the sighs of one released from -bonds.” - -Peg broke and cried like any child. You should understand, however, that -she was unjust to herself. What she said of her brooding aforetime to -the frontier of the morbid was over-true. And, supersensitive, proud, -her hope had wasted as her gloom grew; her griefs of girlhood, enlarged -many fold doubtless, as she herself suspected, by stress of her own -fancy sorrowing with a wound, had left solemn stamp upon her; and this -took far too often and unjustly the shape of self-blame. Beneath all, -and hidden deep within her breast, Peg carried small opinion of herself; -thought herself selfish, hard, shallow, and of no rich depth of heart. -She was wrong to the core; for her inner self was as beautiful as her -face. And yet, despite knowledge on her own part, and her friends' -assurances, in the ultimate recesses of her thoughts there existed -a torture-chamber; and therein she ever racked herself as the one -wrongdoer in what she had passed through. There was no driving her from -this; she was merciless against herself; and while none not the closest -might know, for in the presence of non-friends and strangers she showed -the iron fortitude of an Indian or a soldier, to myself and those with -whom she practiced no reserve these self-flagellations were much too -painfully plain. - -I say, folk near to Peg were aware of this morbid lack of soul-vanity -and good regard for herself. There should be one exception counted, and -that, curious to tell, her own husband. Peg, for all he might be double -her age, and I think no very handsome man at that, I could see, when I -talked with her, loved Eaton as she loved her eyes or mothers love their -children. And yet, never to him did she show her true feeling; in his -presence she was the brave, gay, bright, strong, brilliant Peg, asking -in the fight which followed no quarter and granting none, she seemed to -the common world. It is curious, and presents a problem too involved for -my solution, that Peg should have guarded against the one she most loved -and shut the door upon discovery by him of her own wondrous self. Yet so -it was; it stood patent to me from the beginning that Eaton knew no more -of Peg than of her whom he never met. - -In her morbid estimates of her worth it is possible she feared to grant -him too clear a view. She may have thought she would lose by it. The -reason, however, for this great secrecy coupled with great love--this -hiding from him for whom she would have died--I shall leave to be -searched for by those scientists of souls who are pleased to explain the -inexplicable. For myself, I confess I was baffled by it. - -This, however, I will say; the fact that Peg could so practice upon -Eaton to his blindness gave me no high opinion of that gentleman. He -should have groped for her and grasped her, and found her out for the -loving, loyal, sorrowing heart she was; and that he did not, but went in -placid darkness of the treasure he held in his hands, content to have -it so, marked him for a lack of insight and want of sympathy which I'm -bound to say do not distinguish me. Such stolidity on the part of folk -has caused me more often than once to consider whether the angels, by -mere possession, may not at last find even heaven commonplace. - -Still, it is none the less infuriating to witness so much beauty so -much thrown away! Indubitably, the economy of existence asks for pigs -as loudly as it asks for pearls, and to blame Eaton for failing in -appreciation of Peg is as apart from equity as would be the flogging -of a horse who sees no beauty in a moss-rose--and less, perhaps--not -present in a musty lock of hay. However, it is none the less infuriating -for that. - -Mark you though, I would be guilty of no wrong to Eaton, nor establish -him on too low a level in your esteem. He was in the Senate from -Tennessee at the time, and of solid repute among his fellows. He was a -brave, dull, good-humored sort, who thought better, perhaps, of a bottle -than of a book--not to excess, you are to notice--and as a statesman, if -he put out no fires, he kindled none; though he did no good, at worst he -did no harm; and that, let me tell you, is a record somewhat better than -the average. I have been attacked and charged with a distaste of Eaton. -There are two words to go with that, and no one--and I challenge those -who knew us both--can put his finger on any ill of word or deed or -thought I ever aimed against him. Truly, I hunted not his company with -horn and horse and hound; but what then? I take it, I'm as free to pick -and choose for my intimates as any other. And I still declare what -was in my thoughts in those hours I tell of, that Eaton, sluggish and -something of a clod-head, and with a blurred, gray tone of fancy, was -unworthy such a woman, whose love for him, be it said, was when I -met her as boundless as the difficulty of accounting for its first -existence. I say again, and the last time, I hold no dislike for Eaton, -and more than once have done him good favors in days gone. That I shall -grant him no extensive mention in these pages means no more than that -he was but a supernumerary in the drama where of the General and Peg -carried the great parts. Eaton came on and off; but his lines were -few and brief and burned with no interest. There is little reason for -prodigious clamor over Eaton, and little there will be. But I am not to -be accused of unfairness to the man for that he dwelt with an angel and -was too thick to find it out. - -Peg at last recalled herself from the dead Timberlake. She brushed away -her tears. - -“These are all of them you are to see,” laughed Peg, stoutly, referring -to her tears. “I promise to shed no more. However, you may quiet alarm; -a woman's tears are no such mighty matter.” I showed perturbation, I -suppose, and she would dissipate it. - -Peg told me of her wedding with Eaton. She dwelt a deal on her love for -him; but since one consents to it as a sentiment, even though its cause -defy one's search, there comes no call to extend the details in this -place. - -It stood open to my eyes, however, as Peg talked, how no man was more -loved than Eaton. And when I looked upon the ardent girl and considered, -withal, the dull stolidity of the other, there would rise up pictures -from my roving past to be as allegories of Peg's love. I would recall -how once I saw a vine, blossom-flecked and beautiful, flinging its green -tenderness across a hard insensate wall; and that was like Peg's love. -Or it would come before me how I had known a mountain, sterile, seamed, -unlovely, where it heaved itself against the heavens, a repellant harsh -shoulder of stone. The June day, fresh and new and beautiful, would -blush in the east, and her first kiss was for that cold gray, rude, -old rock. That day at noon in her warm ripeness would rest upon it. Her -latest glance, as our day died in the west, was for it; and when the -valley and all about were dark, her last rays crowned it. And the vivid -day, with her love for that unregardful mountain, the rich day wasting -herself on the desert peak that would neither respond nor understand, -was as the marvel of Peg's love. - -It is all the mystery that never ends; woman in her love-reasons is not -to be fathomed nor made plain. The cry of her soul is to love rather -than to be loved; her happiness lives in what she gives, not what she -gets. This turns for the good fortunes of men; also, it offers the -frequent spectacle of a woman squandering herself--for squandering it -is--on one so unworthy that only the sorrow of it may serve to smother -the laughter that else might be evoked. However, I am not one to discuss -these things, being no analyst, but only a creature of bluff wits, too -clumsy for theories as subtle, not to say as brittle, as spun glass. -Wherefore, let us put aside Peg's love and break off prosing. The more, -since I may otherwise give some value to a jest of the General's--made -on that same day--who would have it I was at first sight half in love -with Peg myself. This was the General's conception of humor ard owned no -other currency--I, being twice Peg's age, and in the middle forties, -and not a trifle battered of feature by my years in the field. I was old -enough to be Peg's father;--but when it comes to that, Eaton was quite -as old. - -It was time to seek the General, I said. Peg and I had arrived at a -frank acquaintance, and we went together to the General's room in good -opinion of ourselves, she the better by a new staunch friend, and I -prosperous with thoughts for her of a coming elevation consistent with -her graces of mind and person, and which should atone as much as might -be for what she had suffered heretofore. We decided that Peg should wear -a gay look, and harrow the General with no tears. - -As we went along I was given to quite a novel enthusiasm, I recollect; -and it was the more strange since, while no pessimist, I never had found -celebration as one whose hope was wont to wander with the stars. I could -see the white days ahead for Peg; and albeit I fear their glory shone -not to her apprehension as it did to mine, and while they came slowly -as days shod with lead, dawn they did, as he shall witness who goes with -this history to the end. - -My servant Jim was sent with a message to the General to give him the -word of Peg's coming. During our talk in the parlor, Jim, be it said, -was never far to call. Obviously, Jim proposed for me no dangers of -bright eyes so far as remained with him to be my shield. He dodged in -and out of the room, now with this pretext and now with that, and when -I bade him repair to the General to say that Peg and I would visit him, -the gray old rogue was fair irresolute, and hung in the wind as though -he had but to turn his back on us and bring down every evil. I drove him -forth at last, and when Peg and I would tap on the General's door our -black courier was just coming away. - -While the General was greeting Peg--rather effusively for him, so I -thought--Jim, detaining me at the door, took the liberty of a private -word. - -“Now you-all is yere, Marse Major,” observed Jim, and his manner was of -complaint and weariness, “an' where Marse Gen'ral kin keep a eye on you, -I feels free an' safe to go projectin' 'round about my own consarns. -I was boun' I wouldn't leave you alone, Marse Major, in d' parlors; I -shore tells you it makes Jim draw long brefs an' puts him to fear an' -tremblin' lest every minute's gwine to be his nex', while any woman as -han'some as dish yere Missis Eaton is pesterin' nigh. You-all can't tell -what dey'll do, or what you'll do! Which Jim has knowed Love to up -an' prounce on a man like a mink on a settin' hen; an' him jes' merely -lookin' at one of them sirens, as d' good book calls'em. That's d' shore -enough fac', Marse Major; an' you-all oughter be mighty keerful an' keep -Jim hoverin' about d' lan'scape at all sech meetin's. It's a heap safer, -that a-way; you hyar Jim!” At this point of warning Jim stopped like a -clock that has run down. - -“You asked me if you might have one drink from the demijohn in my -closet,” I said. “Yassir, Marse Major, I does.” - -“You took four, you scoundrel; you took at least four, as I can tell by -the mill-wheel clatter of your tongue.” - -“On'y three, Marse Major; on'y three. An' you don't want to disrecollect -Marse Major, pore old Jim's got a heap on his mind to make him thirsty.” - -“I shall not disrecollect, as you call it, to lock my closet door. I -don't propose, sir, to furnish you forty-year-old whisky to become the -inspiration of such crazy harangues as I've just listened to.” - -My voice was stern, and the awful threat of locking the closet door took -vastly the heart out of Jim. - -“Why, Marse Major,” he began apologetically, “Jim warn't aimin' to say -nothin' to cumfusticate you; Jim was talkin' for your good. I wouldn't -go for to lock up that closet, Marse Major; how's Jim gwine to get your -clothes to bresh? Besides, Jim's done said his say, an' arter this he'll -nacherally go about as cat-foot an' as wary an' as quiet as a coon at -noon, that's what Jim will. You has heard d' las' word from Jim, Marse -Major; d' very las' word. On'y don't go for to lock that closet door; -if you does, most likely we'll lose d' key an' it's gwine to get in our -way.” - -“Well, sir, we shall see,” I replied, severely. “One thing is certain; -I'm not to have my servant, at the age of seventy, make a drunken show -of himself. I'll send you back to Tennessee, first.” - -Jim departed, sensibly subdued. - -With Peg and the General I found Eaton, who arrived while I was -receiving my lecture from the sapient Jim. We greeted each other with -warmth, and I could see that Peg felt this warmth and took a glow from -it. Dear girl! he was her all; she had friendship for those who were his -friends, love for those who loved him; and, twisting a commandment, Peg -would do unto others as they did unto him. - -Eaton was a blond, ruddy man. As we released each other's hands, he said: - -“I'm here to offer my thanks to the General. I was speaking of this -cabinet matter to my colleague, White. He is greatly pleased. By the -way, General,”--here Eaton wheeled on the General--“my senate seat will -want an occupant. Why not prevail on our friend, the Major, to take it?” - -“No, no!” responded the General, quickly and with a gay energy; “that -would never match my plans. The Major, or I much mistake, must go with -me to the White House. I could not carry on my administration unless I -found him quarreling at my elbow whenever I turned my head.” - -“And if 'carry on' be the name of it, who is to carry on my farms?” I -asked. - -This I put seriously; it stood much to the left hand of any programme of -mine, this making one of the General's White House family. - -“Who will carry on your farms?” repeated the General. “Why, then, who is -to carry on mine? Do you mean that you, who have put me here, are about -to desert me? Nonsense, man; there is no room in your body, big as -it is, for so gross a treason. If I stay, you stay; and that's nailed -down.” - -“And surely you wouldn't abandon me?” said Peg, bringing her pretty face -something near to my shoulder. Then, low and pleading: “Me; with trouble -frowning?” - -Who was there to stand up against both Peg and the General? I made no -breathless battle of it, you may guess. - -“Major, I've been telling this child,” said the General, laying his thin -hand on Peg's curly mop of hair, “how at our receptions she'll light up -that great East Room with the bright face of her. We shall require all -the beauty we can muster, since the administration is like to go limping -in the business of looks. Van Buren and Barry are wifeless; and I'm told -Mrs. Ingham is forbiddingly hideous, with the voice of a henhawk. You -see, my child,” turning to Peg, “we build on you to save our day from -the sin of ugliness.” - -Peg's eyes danced, and she seemed to bask in prospects naught save -sunshine. She was far from that broken one of sobs and sorrows whose -hand I held a short half hour before. A great woman is ever a great -actress; Peg was proving it now; for with a face all light, her heart -was a heart of shadows, and heavy with the forebode of dark days -coming down. What a paradox is woman! Here was Peg, brave at once, -and fearful--afraid for her husband, while quick with courage for him, -finding her peril where she found her strength. - -“We are living,” remarked Eaton, as he tucked Peg under his arm -preparatory to their departure, “we are living on the Georgetown side -of the President's Square. General, we won't, while you are in the White -House, have a far journey when we visit you. Major, you must call on -us.” - -“Indeed, you must!” echoed Peg. - -As the two took their leave, and the General, having bowed the little -lady to the door, sought his never-failing pipe, Jim reappeared, and -with a caution that bordered upon mystery put a penciled note in my -hand. It read: - -“Mr. Noah presents his compliments to the Major; and will the Major -do Mr. Noah the honor to meet him immediately in the card room? It -is considered advisable by Mr. Noah to say nothing to the General -concerning this message.” - -The note went into my pocket, the General, luckily involved with his -pipe, which for some stubbornness concealed within the stem refused to -draw, failing to notice. This was as should be, for the General was as -inquisitive and prompt with query as a girl. Even now he asked where I -was bound. - -“I've had nothing to eat as yet,” I returned. - -“That's true; I had forgotten. Come back when you are finished; there's -a deal to talk about. I shall need you to help me make up my mind.” - -“Help you unmake it, you mean,” I replied. - -There was an exchange of grins. I had exactly stated the case; and, as a -grave truth will on occasion, it struck our sense of the ridiculous. It -had been my work for years; it would be my work for the eight years yet -to come; this unmaking of the General's mind. - -On my way to the card room I asked Jim, - -Peggy - -O'Neal who was close behind, where he got the message. - -“Marse Major, Jim done obtains it from that red-head Jew gentleman I -sees romancin' 'round yere this mornin'. An' say, Marse Major; don't -you-all reckon Jim better skuffle for your room an' fotch your box of -pistols?” - -“Pistols!” I exclaimed, stopping short; “what in the name of General -Jackson do I. want of pistols?” - -“Oh, nothin', Marse Major, jest nothin',” said Jim, shifting uneasily on -his feet. “It's simply one of them old-time Cumberland idees of Jim's. -D' fac' is, Marse Major, Jim sort o' allows from d' signs how dish yere -red-head Jew gentleman's gwine to have a fight.” - - - - -CHAPTER IV--THE JEW AND HIS SPANISH SWORD - -Jim's surmise of trouble on the brew set fire to my feet. At the door -of the card room I met Duff Green coming out--Duff of the Oporto nose. I -barely nodded; I could taste of insincerity and a suave false slyness on -the man as one smells secret fire in a house. - -As I pushed into the card room, while it was well filled of folk, my -first glance revealed nothing to justify Jim's fears. There was Noah, -truly; and sitting with him that Kentucky Yankee, the anxious Amos -Kendall. Isaac Hill, gray and thin, and limping with his club-foot, -was also about. These were the General's friends; there was naught to -anticipate of a misunderstanding with Noah from them. - -And for all that, Jim was right; calm as showed the surface, there ran -an undertow of conversation which flowed for storm. Jim, who lived long -among fighting men on fighting ground, had attained perhaps some -sharpened sense for the sign or sound of approaching strife, and could -foretell it while yet a mile away, Kendall was by Noah's side, and Hill -had paused at his elbow; yet it was with neither of these he was -engaged. Against the corner of a mantelpiece, and two paces from Noah, -leaned a young man of dissolute look. His name, I learned, was Catron, -and he came from Port Tobacco, a small hamlet in the southern toe of -Maryland. Evidently, Catron was of an upper class in his country, as his -dress, and fine hands, smallish and unmarred of toil, would give a -signal. He had been drinking, but seemed more vicious than drunk. - -Catron was doing the talking, and with a manner of itself an insult -seemed bent for altercation. - -“Don't cross the run of things,” warned Noah, in a whisper, as I marked -my advent by dropping a hand upon his shoulder; “I am glad you are come; -but don't interfere. Affairs go famously.” - -Willing to gain some insight of the trend of traffic, I paused behind -Noah's chair. - -“That I should cross words,” Catron was saying, “with a Jackson Jew does -not tell in favor of my respectability. It is what one must look for, -however, when the beggars of politics are promoted to the saddle.” - -“Your epithet of 'Jackson Jew,'” responded Noah, quietly, “I take for -myself, and am much flattered thereby. And you are also to remember -there are weapons other than words which one may cross with me whenever -one's valor arouses to that pitch. Jew, yes! my ancestors were poets, -lawgivers--they read the stars, and collected the wisdom and the -learning of the world, when the slant-skulled fore-fathers of upstairs -I might indicate went clothed of sheepskin and club, ate their meat raw, -and saved their fire to pray to.” - -All this flowed from Noah in tones modulate and sweet. I began to wonder -at my fair-haired friend; not unskilled in colloquy of this sort, it beat -upon me that Noah, himself, was wanting an encounter. - -“If I were to own my way,” said Catron, paying no heed to Noah's -intimation of a stone-age savagery as the state of his forebears. “If I -might have my way, I'd exclude every shoe-lace Jew from the country.” - -“Doubtless; if you were to have but your own way,” purred Noah. “And -yet, observe the injustice you propose. The Jew is as much the American -as you. My father fought for this country; I have fought for it; the -Jews found and gave one-third of that money which won the Revolution. -The Jews wasted their treasure and their blood like water for -independence, while folk one wots of were filling the roles of Royalists -and upholding the hands of the King.” - -There now fell out a deal of talk to little purpose, I thought, and I -was on the tip of telling Noah so, when someone from over my shoulder -flung a remark. - -“You are he,” said this man--his name was Witherspoon, and he a Clay -Kentuckian--“you are he,” addressing Noah, “who had this country -stricken from the muster of Christian nations. You caused the Bey of -Tunis to make the decision.” - -“I but caused the Bey to expound our constitution,” said Noah, looking -carelessly back at Witherspoon. - -While I was turning these last remarks in my mind, and gnawing the -enigma they offered, Catron broke forth with a cataract of malediction -upon the General, and Noah and any and all who stood the former's -supporters. It was a flood of abuse that told strongly for the ruffian's -muddy powers. - -“And now this precious Jackson of yours,”--these were Catron's closing -words--“this murderer! this thief of other men's wives! would insult the -decency of our capitol with a courtesan in his cabinet.” - -“Meaning whom?” asked Noah, half rising. - -Noah's words had the fiber of triumph; he put his question as might he -who had trapped that result which he went seeking from the start. - -“Who?” retorted the other; “who, save that Peg O'Neal who was as common -as the streets she walked.” - -“You lie; you rogue and dog of Henry Clay, you lie!” - -Noah fair spat out the words; it was as though they came freighted with -the venom of the viper. - -Catron growled an oath and leaped towards Noah. He was met flush in the -face with a glass of whiskey which Noah in most casual fashion had just -poured. I had foreseen Noah's purpose; I'd heard him say he drank no -spirits. - -For the moment Catron was stopped, the bite and anguish of the alcohol -in his eyes making him as a blind man. As Noah threw the liquor, I -seized him by the wrist; so far it had been gentleman's work; I did not -want him to spoil his position by throwing the glass. - -“Don't grip so hard,” warned Noah, making not the least of struggle; -“don't grip so hard. I shall anon need this hand for what is in store; -that grasp like a hand-vise will weaken it for a sword, or shake it for -a pistol.” - -Never was I more played upon and pleased than by the coolness of Noah, -who showed as steady, not to say indifferent, as he who acts a part in a -theater. - -“I shall have your life for this!” screamed Catron, who, in the hands of -friends and still blind of the whiskey, was carried to another room. - -When something like peace fell, I asked Noah to explain. I would -understand this violence; the more since it looked to be half-plan -on Noah's part. Kendall and Hill were with us and made four for our -conversation. - -“What is the riddle, then?” I said. “I got your note; what was it you -desired?” - -“Nothing, save your presence,” he replied. “As you observe, I was -provoking a fight--not a most amiable attitude, I confess. But you will -hear my reasons. Since I saw you, I have found how there exists a clique -of bloods--they are of both the Clay and Calhoun parties--who go about -grossly assailing Mrs. Eaton. There is concert in their villainy; and -they relax themselves at intervals with threats of violence against any -who shall take Mrs. Eaton's part. A duel--a prompt, sharp duel, with a -wound or two--is the best, in truth! the only way to stifle them. -There is nothing like steel or lead to teach such gentry mildness and a -Christian spirit.” - -Noah laughed over the adjective. - -“And have you put yourself forward,” I demanded, “as that master who is -to give these lessons of lead and steel?” - -“What could be better?” returned Noah. “I am cold and steady, and not -apt for error. Again, I am of no such overt and particular emphasis in -the General's designs as to link his name too much with this ruffle. -Since it is to be, I think I am excellently the hand for the work; and I -hold it fortunate I am here when I so dovetail with events.” - -“And what is to come?” said I. - -“Indubitably, a challenge,” broke in Kendall. “The Maryland Catrons -are of touchwood stock. They duel for their pleasure.” Then with an -inflection of warning. “This Catron will ask for swords!” - -“Swords should do exceeding well,” remarked Noah. “It should go through -sharply, this affair, for the best moral effect on others of his -ill-tongued clan. With swords we might fight in a room, since they make -no noise. Let us meet at once. In an hour this Catron's eyes will cease -to burn, and he'll see the better for it.” - -“But, mind you, Catron is a master of the sword,” said Kendall. “He had -the best teachers in Florence.” - -“Should he show you my blood,” returned Noah, coldly, “I will avouch him -the best fencer of America.” - -There would be a duel, so much I could tell. And yet the situation put -me to deepest thought. I was sorry for Peg's name in it, too; that would -mean no end of talk. - -“There is no end of talk as it stands,” argued Noah. “It were best to -make Mrs. Eaton's fame the issue. I could have forced a quarrel on his -insults for that I was a Jew. But I hold it better as it is. Mrs. Eaton -was the one question worth duelling with such a bully about; but for -the duel to be of suppressive virtue, it is required to have the _casus -belli_ surely shown.” - -Noah was profoundly right in these arguments; the next day's sequel of -silence on the cautious parts of our anti-Eaton swashbucklers remarked -as much. - -“You speak of this Catron as a bully,” commented Hill. “I know nothing -of your code, for it does not obtain in New Hampshire. But is a -gentleman bound to take notice of the vaporings of a bully--a mere -blackguard?” - -“One may be a bully,” returned the steady Noah, “and none the less -patrician for that. Indeed, your prince oft takes his purple blood for -license. Who was Alcibiades but a bully-boy of Athens? Who have been the -bullies of London town, with their Mohocks and Hell Fire Clubs, but -the nobility and royal princes? No, believe me, sir;” and Noah's lip -twitched sarcastically, “the bully's blood is sometimes blue.” - -It was settled that I should second the interests of Noah. At a first -blink, this arrangement might have the look of the General's fat in the -fire, since we professed anxiety to keep his name clear of the muddle. -But there are two ends to a lane; our purpose was attained when the -General's want of personal knowledge found demonstration. That plain, it -was next good to have it understood how the Jackson interest was at the -Noah shoulder. These reasons, and because I owned experience of such -arbitraments--for I had lived where pistols, barking at ten paces, were -rife enough--taught Noah his preference for me over Kendall and Hill, -who had seen fewer of these bickers, the latter none at all. - -“They will be the challenging party,” I observed to Noah; “that gives us -the choice of arms.” - -“Should Kendall be right,” said Noah, “as to the Florentine studies -of our friend, he will prefer swords. Suppose you concede swords on -condition he fight at once.” - -Even while we conferred, there came Pigeon-breast, my friend of the -clanking saber and gold heels, to wait upon us. The sight of me as -sponsor for Noah caused Pigeon-breast a dubious start; possibly he -feared lest the General resent his presence as the avowed ally of the -enemy. Indeed poor Pigeon-breast expressed his thought. - -“It is to be hoped,” faltered Pigeon-breast, in his high-pitched tenor, -“you will represent me, sir, in certain quarters you know of, as acting -solely for the honor of my friend. My personal position as to the -subject matter of the quarrel must not be deduced from that.” - -I maintained myself with gravity, as folk about a litigation of honor -should; also, I set Pigeon-breast easy on risks and perils for himself. -In the matter of weapons Pigeon-breast fair fell upon my neck. - -“It is for you to name weapons,” quoth Pigeon-breast. Then, with -hesitation: “If it meet your view, however, we for our side would -welcome swords.” - -“And that is a highly improper remark, permit me to say.” My attitude -was purposely severe. It would throw Pigeon-breast into confusion. -“Since the choice is with us, it is neither graceful nor safe for you to -try to lead it.” - -“Surely,” protested Pigeon-breast, “I meant no unfairness, no offence. -But with swords, sir, this might come quietly off in town. Should you -say pistols, it will mean Bladensburg; and the mud is girth deep.” - -At the word “mud,” poor Pigeon-breast gazed upon his varnished boots and -bandbox regimentals with round eyes of apprehension. I took advantage -of Pigeon-breast's solicitude and feminine terror of Bladensburg mire to -say that if we might have our men up at once, it would tell strongly -in favor of swords. Of course, my haste was to have the thing finished -before some waifword of it reached the General's ear. - -“Why, I believe an hour from now,” said Pigeon-breast, hopefully, “might -suit us extremely well. That would make it sharp noon. Shall we say noon?” - -“And the ball room at Gadsby's?” I returned. Having considered, I deemed -it best to be out of the Indian Queen with this clash. - -Gadsby's was to the taste of Pigeon-breast; it would serve admirably. -Also, Pigeon-breast would bring a brace of rapiers. - -Thus was it adjusted between the militant Pigeon-breast and myself. -Pigeon-breast withdrew, giving me a most sweeping bow; but carefully -keeping his hand to himself, by which I saw that he was not unversed in -the etiquette of the field. - -Returning to Noah, I laid before him our arrangements; incidentally, I -would get a morsel of food, since I had had none that morning, and my -stomach was much inclined to take this neglect in dudgeon. - -Having a private parlor to ourselves, for Kendall and Hill would lunch -with me, I sent for what we craved and urged dispatch. The repast was -brought, and while we did it honor with knife and fork, Noah sipped a -thimbleful of sherry, saying he accepted it to quicken the eye and give -vigor and pliancy to the wrist. - -As we lunched, Noah called for a messenger. - -“Find Mr. Rivera,” said Noah; “bring him to me here.” - -There was a question on my tongue; it covered the charge tossed over -my shoulder by the man, Witherspoon, that Noah had fixed the country's -status as a nation of heathen among the powers of the earth. - -“The statement is true,” said Noah; “the story is brief. It was during -the last war, and while I represented the country in Tunis. A Yankee -privateer, little but valiant, came into port towing a hulking English -merchantman, whereof, cutlass in hand, he had made prize. The Yankee -would have the merchantman condemned in the courts of Tunis, and sold. -The British minister objected; he recalled the Bey, before whom we both -appeared, to his treaty made with England. One clause precluded the use -of Tunis as a port of condemnation for English ships made prize in -wars between England and any other 'Christian nation.' The phrase was -'Christian nation.' There was no going about the treaty; it stood in -ink and sheepskin. Whereupon I read the learned Bey--himself a darkened -pagan--our constitution. I showed him we were not a 'Christian nation,' -but admitted every creed or sect or sept or faith of men, Gentile or Jew -or Musselman, and all on common terms. It was impossible we should be a -'Christian nation;' the treaty with England did not in this instance tie -his hands. The Bey held with me; America was not a 'Christian nation;' -the prize was condemned and sold. The Bey would receive one-fifth of the -proceeds of that sale; which may or may not have aided his wisdom to the -decision I've described. Still, it was a decision; and since it never -has been quarreled with or overturned, a heathen country we remain to -this day in the eye of international law.” - -As Noah ended his scrap of history, a tall young man, square and heavy -of shoulders, and with every movement of his body as smoothly sure and -sinuous as the movements of a cat, appeared. He was that Rivera for whom -Noah had sent. - -“Go to my rooms and bring me a pair of swords,” said Noah. - -“The smallswords?” asked Rivera, with just a thought of interest. - -“No; the Spanish swords.” - -“Who is your armorer?” I asked of Noah when Rivera was gone. - -This boy I had come across before. He had drawn himself upon my -attention by the panther grace and strength told of in his motions. -Large, long of limb, and heavy, there was yet a brisk lightness with him -to hold one like a spell. - -“His name,” responded Noah, “is Rivera--Michael Rivera--and his blood -flows a fantastic, almost a formidable mixture. His mother was a maid of -my mother; an Irish lass she was, and came out of Tipperary. The father, -on the far other hand, was a Spanish Jew; by trade a bull-fighter, the -foremost toreador of Seville, where, when my family was visiting in -Spain, the impressionable Tipperary maiden lost her heart to him as he -flourished bloodily about the arena. They were married by the padre, for -Rivera senior, while pure Jew, was none the less pure Catholic; under -Spanish law he could have had no place among the bull-fighters else, -since in Spain it is not permitted to be cruel unless one first be -Christian. My protege, who goes for the swords, is the fruit of that -union; now, his parents being dead, and because he was born among my -people, he abides with me. He has a drowsy, honest soul--though hot -enough when moved--and he loves me. He would accept death for me like a -dog.” - -“And what is his part with you?” asked Kendall. The tale of Rivera -interested us. - -“No part,” responded Noah, “more than to go where I go, and come where -I come; to fetch and to carry and to do my word. He is well taught of -books; but owns ideas not at all, for he has no width nor current of -conjecture. Yet you are not to believe him a fool. He is silent, but -blithe to obey, and true as blade to hilt. I keep him for he would have -otherwise no support. If I turned him on the world, he could not make a -dollar--nor guard it if he should. In that fiscal particular, the Jew -in him has balked and broken down.” Noah laughed lightly. “The faithful -Rivera,” he went on, “has, however, certain advantages. There is -a compensation, an equilibrium, in nature. Rivera, slow of brain, -possesses the muscle-power of a Hercules; moreover, in those twin arts -of boxing and wrestling, it's to be doubted if his over-lord exists. -Some day, in some moment of brutality--being now and again overtaken -of such--I shall have Rivera to England to beat Bendigo and Ward. The -prize-ring is his one opening for eminence. And I--as does the immortal -Byron, who has more pride of fisticuffs than verse--applaud the ring.” - -While Noah talked, I was yielding him my meed of tacit admiration. Here -was a man, a creature of quills and ink, too, within minutes of meeting, -edge to edge, with one keen of his weapon, and a declared adept among -sword fighters. And clearly, the business was no more upon his spirit -than if the day bore no grim promise, but only smiles. It was more than -courage, it was the absolute absence of fear; he leaned back with his -sherry, and the little story of his young Spanish Irish-Jew, as though -hate were not at that same moment of time whetting a rapier with hope -against his life. His foreclaim of being cold and steady was not a boast -which wanted feet to stand upon. - -Rivera came back, bearing the swords wrapped from casual eye in the -folds of a cloak. I drew one--a plain rapier or Spanish sword--and of as -superb temper as any to come from its birth-forge of Toledo. - -“They are brothers, those swords,” said Noah; “there is none better. I -had them from the hands of that Bey who branded us as heathen, and so -fretted the friend of Henry Clay. And since, in a pastime such as we -go about, a fullest confidence in one's weapon is important, you will -prefer these for me if the choice be given you.” This was spoken to me. - -Rivera knelt down, and taking off his patron's shoes, replaced them with -light fencing slippers, whereof the soles crackled with a fresh coat -of resin. Then came loose overshoes, meant to protect the others on the -road to Gads-by's from intervening mud. Having done this, and saying not -a word whether of question or remark, the boy stood back as waiting the -next command. I was ever reckoned a judge of anything on two legs or -four, as became the best quartermaster the General ever had, and I've -yet to glimpse so perfect--so splendidly, so accurately perfect--an -example of the physical man as showed in this youth, with his brown -hair, brown eyes, dark skin, and round thick neck like the carved column -of some sculptor. - -It was time to be off for Gadsby's, no mighty journey, being just across -the street. As we were about departing, Noah called to Rivera, who -exhibited no more distrust of a finale than was present with the other, -and observed: “I shall be hungry on my return. Have a fowl and a flask -of wine set out for me in my own rooms.” - -Rivera bowed as one who understands; and giving me the cloak to be still -a refuge for the Toledoes, watched us, as by a side door we got onto the -walk and headed for Gadsby's over the way. - -There were the four of us, Noah, Kendall, Hill, and myself, when we -came into that great room of Gadsby's which was reserved for routs and -dancing. It was a large and lofty room with a gallery all about. We had -the place to ourselves for the moment; Pigeon-breast and his principal -were yet to arrive upon the scene. - -Noah kicked off the overshoes, and stepped and scrubbed his feet against -the flooring boards. The experiment ended to his taste. - -“The resin holds,” he remarked. Then glancing about the vast apartment, -he came back to me with a smile: “It's like fighting in a 10-acre -field,” said he. - -Pigeon-breast appeared by a far door. Besides his bully principal, -there were two others, for I had named the propriety of witnesses and -suggested the number. I crossed over and greeted Pigeon-breast, and then -led him aside. - -“Is either of the gentlemen with you,” said I, “a surgeon?” - -“Why, no,” returned Pigeon-breast, “the thing clean slipped my mind.” - -“It might be well to send, then,” I said, “for I think he will be -wanted.” - -Pigeon-breast spoke to the others, who, with Catron between them, had -continued near the door. Pigeon-breast, after a word, returned to me. - -“There is a surgeon below,” he reported; “he will be with us like -winking, for he loves this kind of thing.” - -“And now the swords,” I said. “We may as well transact preliminaries as -far as we can go while waiting.” - -Pigeon-breast suggested we spin a coin, their weapons or ours. It fell -for ours; a good omen, I thought, albeit a look at Noah, where he gazed -carelessly from a window, face immovable as granite, gave encouragement -enough to declare war for a crown. I went over to tell him we had won -the use of our Toledoes. - -“That sounds well,” he said. “I like good tools, especially when the -work demanded leans upon the fine.” - -“You will not slay the man?” I asked. - -“For the one matter of his life,” returned Noah, “he's as safe as though -this dancing room were a church. Beyond that, however, I shall take such -measures with him that, for months, who sees him shall know what reward -is waiting on cowards who vilify a pure girl.” - -Pigeon-breast signaled for a word. Taking me to a remote corner, he -argued that our duties required we discuss the possibility of apology. - -“They must fight a little first,” I retorted. “There is no room between -epithets such as 'rogue' and 'liar' to squeeze in an explanation. These -folk must fight while both can hold out swords.” - -This was not butcher's taste; but I began to see with Noah, that the -mouths against us must be silenced,--at least the men. We would begin -with Catron; we would duel our way through the social register, if need -beckoned, to purchase that justice of silence for our Peg. - -Poor Peg! she was not to lie helpless in every cur's mouth, to be torn -at as most pleased his cruelty or best fattened his interest. The more -the situation ran before me, the more my breast took fire; I sustained -a strict face, however, engaged as I was upon the parade ground of honor -and in the service of a gentleman. Still, I said enough, and said it in -such fashion that Pigeon-breast, now a little nervous when the actual -steel was about to be drawn, saw nothing for it but to bring forward -his fellow. This, I admit, he managed in a genteel way; nor did Catron -either whiten or lag backward, but stepped to his place as might he who -is warm for vengeance. I did not like this Catron's looks; surely -the creature was a blackguard with no right to name himself among -gentlefolk, only so far as one might lie within the accident of decent -birth. But he seemed stout enough of kidney, though that may have grown -with a belief in his infallible craft of the sword. - -We gave our men their arms; and as, stripped to their shirts, they stood -apart, awaiting signal to engage, Noah put point to floor, and bearing -hard upon the hilt, bent his blade double. Abruptly lifting his hand, -the honest steel sprang straight, and the sword was tossed high in the -air. As it fell, with the clear, sureness of legerdemain, Noah caught -it by the hilt. It was no more than a flourish of the fencing school, -perhaps; but it served to hearten me mightily and to put me confident -of victory. Neither was it wanting in effect, I may suppose, on the -volatile Pigeon-breast and his man, Catron; I thought on their side it -made somewhat for a certain seriousness of face. - -Speaking now of the battle, I must warn you of my inability to tell the -tale in nice and hair-line strokes. It was a notable fight, valorously -sustained and fairly made; but indubitably it did not remain in one -like myself--wholly ignorant of that fencing which pushes or stabs, and -admirable with a saber no farther than striking a downright blow with -the edge--to catch close work, and taste the merit of it. I have no more -of fencing than of Sanscrit, and remember no work, of my own of that -character beyond splitting an Indian's head like a pumpkin in a skirmish -on the Tombigbee. I am strong of arm, and having the day before come -across the long hair of seven white women, murdered at Fort Mimms, -smoke-drying in the wigwams of a Creek village we sacked, I doubtless -smote upon that savage with uncommon violence. - -When the pair engaged, there were preliminary moments employed in -feeling one another's strength. The swords kept up an incessant thin -rasping, with an occasional singing note as they parted company -for thrust or parry. Even my uneducated vision observed from the -commencement how Noah held the better of it. His address was superior; -and I should say that, with a stiffer wrist, he was withal the more -falcon-like in assault, and readier of recovery. - -Catron, by his brow of fury, meant death if he might only clothe his -point for it. That was not to be. On the heels of a desperate stroke--it -was fellow to a dozen that preceded it--which Noah foiled with blade -describing a circle no bigger than a curtain-ring, Catron's flushed -cheek faded to ghastly gray. For the moment I thought him touched; -but no, it was but the sudden daunting conviction that he had met his -master. This, breaking on him like the boom of a death-bell, and how his -life stood now naked before one whom he had so provoked, ate the yolk -from his courage like a weasel. - -Catron foresaw his downfall before we who looked on might tell. And if -I am to understand a gray, drawn face, then the news taught him the -bitterness of death itself. - -In the opening exchanges, Catron attacked. He was in and out with a -hateful ferocity, thrusting and pressing, as one whose merest wish is -murder. Noah gave backward not at all, but stood like a wall, risking -all on eye and wrist. I could not catch the sleight of it, but again and -again, as Catron thrust, I could see the lead-colored blade glimmer by -Noah's side with not an open inch to give away. As Noah told me later, -however, an inch in fencing is a wide margin. - -Catron felt his strength slip from him; it was like the sands running -from an hour-glass. But the rogue's heart summoned stoutness. Finding -himself going, Catron must crowd the strife to an end before it ended -him. He leaped back to get his distance; then without pause, and giving -a sort of bellowing, roaring cry that may have been a scheme for terror, -he sprang forward, sending on his point as straight as the stroke of a -serpent. - -What befell was like the lightning's flash; and no man's gaze, however -trained to the trick of it, might follow. Noah did not parry, but stood -aside from the other's point, which, passing, grazed his garments. -Noah's point, in retort, entered Catron's sword arm just above the -guard. I saw Noah hold his own hand high, and with point a bit lowered. -Noah ripped up his foe's arm--split it like a mackerel!--from wrist to -shoulder. - -[Illustration: 0142] - -It was a gaping furrow of a wound; and the horrid shock of it, when -Noah's steel caught in the shoulder bones, brought the wretched Catron -to the floor. The blood ran away in a crimson rivulet from the prostrate -one; and to tell the best and the worst of me, I've yet to look on -blood, or anything besides, which brought me so much of comfort and of -the sweetness of peace. - -While the surgeon, needle and lint going, dealt with Catron, I conveyed -Noah to the end of the room. We must await the report of yon -fellow's condition; we could not leave the field without consent of -Pigeon-breast--quite pale and stricken now, was Pigeon-breast, as he -stood watching while the bandages were wound. - -Following a nod of the surgeon's, Pigeon-breast came towards me. I met -him on his way. - -“The thing is ended,” said Pigeon-breast; his voice came huskily, and in -a fashion faint. “The thing is at an end. My friend can not hold sword.” - -“That is enough,” said I. - -“One word, sir,” said Noah, coming forward, handkerchief all red where -he had been cleaning his blade; “you are to take notice: I from this day -shall seek out with challenge each man who speaks evil of Mrs. Eaton. -That creature who lies there, and whom, maugre his wound, I still -contemn for the rogue and fetch-dog of Henry Clay I painted him, may be -for warning.” - -“But has Mrs. Eaton no husband to fight for her?” sputtered -Pigeon-breast, not relishing Noah's attitude. - -“Let that go by,” retorted Noah, sternly. “Your diplomacy shall not -reach. Again I tell you, he who shall assail Mrs. Eaton with word or -look, or who fails to please that lady with his conduct, replies to me. -I wounded this one; I shall slay the next.” - -“What is this to be?” cried Pigeon-breast, appealing to me in a flutter -of spiteful fright. “Is it that we have a bravo?” - -“A bravo whom you are like to encounter, sir,” I said, “unless you teach -your tongue some prudence--you and your tribe.” - -“Sir, I would refuse to meet a bravo.” - -“Sir, you would meet the bravo or meet me.” Then came a rush of temper -about my heart. I thought on poor Peg; and a great anger began to flame -in me. I glowered on the tinsel Pigeon-breast; then I thrust towards -him my huge bear-paw hands. Pigeon-breast considered them, and the hairy -wrists like pistons, with a kind of interest of dismay. “Sir,” said I, -“the first foul dog among you who shall so much as take the name of that -innocent one upon his lips, I'll find him out, and with the ruth one -grants to rattlesnakes, I'll kill him with these fingers.” - -And so ended that blood letting which was meant to tie the tongue of -slander and in a measure did. - -“I shall leave it to you,” observed Noah as we came away, “to place this -affair before the President in a right light. His is the only judgment -whose favor I would seek, and that, particularly, for that his name is -certain to figure in the story of this bicker whenever it is told. I -would not have him think I had rashly put him in peril of criticism.” - -“There should be no alarm on that score,” I replied. “My word for it, -the General will endorse with his full name every step we have taken.” - -On our return to the Indian Queen we found Rivera waiting, and a table -spread in Noah's apartment as he had commanded. Rivera received the -Spanish swords, still wrapped in the concealing cloak. He drew forth of -its scabbard the blade which had armed Noah's hand; it still carried -a stain or two of that Catron's blood, and Rivera's eye seemed to fire -with a sleepy satisfaction while he looked on it. Then he turned his -gaze on his patron in a manner of inquiry. - -“No, he will live,” said Noah, as though in reply to a query put by his -protege; “it was not to kill him that we went across the way.” - -At this news, Rivera took the Spanish swords and withdrew; and all with -the evident purpose of putting them in order against a next campaign. - -“I think,” said I, as Noah drew up to the table--for it would seem that -his work had given his appetite an edge, not dulled it--“I think I shall -hunt up our friend the General. There is slight chance of any being -before me; and yet I would make sure to bring him the earliest word of -what has chanced.” - -Both Hill and Kendall would be for leaving, also, and as we three arose -to go Noah filled a quartet of glasses with Burgundy. Offering one to -each, he said: “Let us drink to the defeat, ay! even to the death of -ones who would bear false witness against the innocent. May their best -fate be no better than the fate of him whom we met to-day.” - - - - -CHAPTER V--REVEREND CAMPBELL AND THE MAGPIE - -It was as good as a study of character, the varying fashions wherein -those interested received the story of Noah's clash with Catron. There -was nothing told of it in the paper, for the port wine Duff was wise -withal, and suppressed whatever of hunger may have possessed him to -print a palatable piece of news. The General might not approve such -type-freedoms; Eaton would doubtless distaste a notoriety of this hue -for Peg; indeed, there might be others of consequence whom it would -disturb. The port wine Duff carried a gulping appetite for public -printing; it might befall that to offend would get between the legs of -his anticipations and trip them up. Wherefore, neither Noah, Catron, -Pigeon-breast, nor myself, was granted the contemplation of his valor -by the pleasing light of ink; I, myself, did not consider this a -deprivation; nor did Noah; nor Catron, so far as one might hear. But the -chagrined Pigeon-breast bewailed it. He was quite crestfallen, and among -intimates talked of the call for a court journal which should, like a -similar imprint of St. James, delicately set forth the surprising deeds -of our nobility. - -It was I who gave the tale of that ballroom fight at Gadsby's to the -General. He took it coolly; granted it, in sooth, a more quiet reception -than I had hoped. The fair truth is, I was prepared for an explosion. I -was pleasantly fooled; the General could not have displayed less -temper had I related the breaking of a horse. And yet he made claim for -slimmest detail; question after question on his part prolonged narration -for an hour. - -“It was the best that could be,” said the General, revolving the tangle -in his mind. “The great thing is to stop folk's mouths; and a duel well -fought, and with the right individual, is, as Noah says, the way to -construct such condition. I've known the killing in proper form of one -man to remove a slander from the conversation of a whole county. Folk -let it fall of themselves and never took it up again.” - -“This Catron,” said I, “was a noted fighter and had been out before.” - -“Which is precisely,” responded the General, “what makes the work worth -while. Here was a berserk, celebrated as one most frothingly prompt for -blood. Now he is disposed of, it will tame your minor war-hawks. They'll -not be half so ready; they may even surprise themselves with what they -will hereafter forbear in favor of keeping the peace.” - -Eaton, strange to tell, was moved of anger against Peg's champion. - -“Sir,” said Eaton, bearing himself stiffly to Noah, “it is far to the -wrong side of the regular that you should defend my wife. That is my -privilege, sir; it does not rest with others.” - -“And that is true,” returned Noah, politely; “but the situation was -unusual. It was of crying importance to get the thing off before the -President knew. Folk would criticise him sharply if he did not interfere -for peace. Besides, had you been brought into the business, your foes -would have torn your prospects to pieces with it. You must see, sir, -that however just your quarrel, you could not ride into the cabinet on -the back of a duel.” - -“Sir, I can better be out of a cabinet,” said Eaton grimly, “than leave -my honor to the swords of other men.” - -“You and I,” returned Noah, turning distant, “disagree extremely. I can -not charge myself with wrong. I should act my part again were occasion -to rise. You, however, are the judge of your own injuries. And I shall -be in town some time.” - -“Sir, I am glad to be told so,” responded Eaton. “When I have more -considered, I may send a word to you.” - -This wrong discourse I was ear-witness of, but in it bore no part. I was -so stung with anger against Eaton, for that he would act the boor, and -talk of calling folk out when he should be thanking them, I dared not -trust myself with a syllable. I would have spoken nothing pleasant for -Eaton, and that would be a wide flight from wise, and draw his horns -my way. We were both too near the General to talk of a difference that -would have broken everybody's dish. Moreover, Noah owned the wit and the -wrist to very well care for his own fortunes. - -“Why, the man is clean beside himself!” exclaimed the General, when he -learned of Eaton's high heels. “What franchise could he pretend to for a -quarrel with Noah? Noah's right to fight with whom he will, and for any -reason good to his own eyes and those of his adversary, is not to be -impeached. Eaton has surprised me out of bounds! For myself, I'd as soon -think of stepping between a man and his wife, as a man and his enemy. -Sir, there are relations which are sacred! Eaton's great love for Peg -has blurred him; a husband is ever a bad judge of either his rights or -his wrongs. I'll set Eaton to the properest view in this when we meet.” - -The General was scandalized in the face of Eaton's pose. But I did not -go with his theory of its being love for Peg. It was offspring rather of -a March-hare vanity that resented a good office for which it lacked the -generosity to be grateful. - -It would seem, however, that the General read Eaton a right lesson, for -he made amends. He came blandly to Noah. - -“I am told,” he said, “by one whose friendship and whose judgment I -never doubt, that I have behaved badly towards you. Permit me to offer -my apologies. Also, I am to thank you for your service against that -scoundrel.” - -Noah took Eaton's explanation in courtly spirit, and so the wrinkles -were made smooth. I was relieved, though not pleased; I would have found -no fault with Noah had he gone a ruder course. - -“Where is this Catron?” asked Noah. - -“As to that,” replied Eaton, “I think myself qualified to answer. I sent -to learn his condition, and with some purpose, so soon as he was able, -of taking him up where you let go of him. The word came back that he had -quit the town.” - -It was Peg, however, who minded her debt to Noah. She went to him with -wet eyes, and, without word, took his sword hand in both of hers and -kissed it. Noah started back. - -“That is too much,” he cried. “It is I who will be now in arrears to you -for the balance of my days.” - -It stood the day but one following the affair of Gadsby's, and I was -comfortably in my own room engaged about my letters. If I were to bide -with the General, and not immediately to see Nashville, then I must name -a manager and put my plantations in some kind of command. There were -to be missives from the General, also, and we had arranged to send them -west on the next day by hand of a special express. It would take him six -weeks, that horseman and his saddle-bags, with roads as they were, to -win to Tennessee; we were then at some fever, you will understand, to -have our mails concluded and riding on their way. - -As I drove my quill rapidly across the pages, Jim was busy in the -adjoining bedroom, giving a polish to my boots. Jim cheered himself over -his labors with snatches of song. - -As I wrote hard at my desk, I could hear him, in a most lugubrious -refrain: - - Thar's a word to be uttered to d'rich man an' his pride; - - (Which a man is frequent richest when it's jest befo' he died.) - - Thar's a word to be uttered to d'hawg a-eatin' truck; - - (Which a hawg is frequent fattest when it's jest befo' he's stuck.) - -“Cease that outlandish howling,” I commanded furiously. - -“Shore, Marse Major!” said Jim, coming into the room where I sat, and -bringing one of my high horseman boots on his arm, polishing it the -while with unabated ardor; “shore, Marse Major! An' yet, that's a mighty -well liked song up an' down d'Cumberland. Hit's been made, that song is, -by Miss Polly Hines; little Miss Polly who lives over on d'Possom Trot. -She makes it all about a villyun who comes fo'closin' 'round her paw's -betterments for what he owes that Dudleyville bank, an' sellin' 'em off -at public vandoo. Marse Major, you-all oughter listen to d'res' of that -roundelay; if you'd only hear it plumb through, Jim sort o' reckons -you'd like it.” - -I made no response, but kept on with my work. I was not to be moved of -ballads as Jim rendered them, even though vouched to be the offput of -that Sappho of the 'Possom Trot. - -Ten minutes went racing by and Jim reappeared in the door. - -“Say, Marse Major, do you-all recollects that gentleman who comes -pesterin' about for them subscriptions, an' who d'Marse Gen'ral done -skeers off d' time you an' me is goin' down to d'parlor to meet dish -yere Missis Eaton?” - -“Well, what about him?” - -“He's been 'round ag'in to-day. It's this mornin' whiles you is sleepin', -an' I runs up on him outside in d'hall, kind o' ha'ntin' about our door. -I say: 'What you-all want?' He say: 'I want to see d'Marse Major.' With -that I ups an' admonishes him that you-all is soun' asleep. 'An',' I -says, 'it don't do to go keerlessly wakin' d'Marse Major up. He's got a -monstrous high temper, that a-way, d' Marse Major has, an' all you has -to do is rap on that door jes' once, an' he'll nacherally come boilin' -outen bed, an' be down on you like a failin' star; that's what he will.' -Then I tells him he can't get no subscriptions from you no how; that you -is a heap sight worse than d' Marse Gen'ral 'bout 'em. 'You hyar me!' I -expostulates; 'you-all is simply barkin' at a knot; thar aint no sign -of a raccoon up that tree at all. You-all might jes' as well try to get -sugar-sap outen a swamp-beech as subscriptions outen d'Marse Major!' -Shore, that's what Jim tell 'um.” - -“And for that, you miscreant, I'll give him a hundred dollars when he -does come, to show him how little truth you tell.” - -“Don't go blazin' off into a fandad, Marse Major,” said Jim, -reprovingly, “throwin' your money away. Dish yere gentleman 'sponds to -Jim, an' allows he aint aimin' at no subscriptions. But he do say he -want to see you; an' so I tell him to be back ag'in in five hours. He's -liable to come buttin' in yere any minute now, as d' time Jim sots is -done arriv'.” - -As if for endorsement, a knock was heard at the door. - -There were two to enter, a man and a woman. The man was huge of frame, -shambling, uncouth, with knobby joints and large uncertain feet; his -face flabby, sickly, with little greedy, shifty eyes, like the eyes of -swine; gross mouth, full lipped and coarse, and working and munching in -a full-fed way, engaging itself upon imaginary mouthfuls. The hands of -this individual were puffy, warty members, with palms as hot and wet and -soft as an August swamp, and, save for their temperature, much like the -belly of a toad to the feel. These hands were commonly in motion, making -plausible and deprecatory gestures. It was as though the world were a -cat and they would stroke its back by way of conciliation. Over all was -obsequiousness like a veil--my visitor seemed to sweat subserviency, -exhale abasement as an atmosphere. The woman, thin, and bird-faced, and -with beaky nose that looked as though the frost had pinched the neb, was -of the chattering, empty, magpie flock; she appeared as vulgar as -the man; albeit, not with his obsequiousness, since she affected the -girlish, and stood ready with giggle and gurgle and arch look, all of -which but poorly fitted with her sober fifty years. From an odor of -pulpits observable, I thought him a preacher; also, I took the woman to -be his wife. - -The man--I will thus far defend him--was not, however, that subscription -person whom Jim remembered with the General. - -“Dish yere's d'gentleman who is done been teeterin' 'round our door this -mornin',” said Jim, as he ushered the visitors. - -“It is not the gentleman who called on the General,” I remarked. - -“Well, what's d'diffrunce, anyhow?” asked Jim with mighty unconcern. -“He's a preacher, so it's all d'same.” - -“No difference, perhaps,” I returned, “except to make plain how little -you are to be relied on.” - -“I s'ppose Jim's as cap'ble of mistakes as anybody.” Here Jim lapsed -into the abused tone of one virtuous, and driven to the desperate by -ill-usage. “But I tells you-all, Marse Major; since you done locks up -that demijohn, Jim aint been d'same niggah. His mem'ry has sort o' -begun to bog down. No wonder Jim gets folks swapped 'round foolish in his -mind.” - -While these reproofs were going, my callers stood by the door, inviting -consideration with much bending of the body and bowing of the head. - -“I am the Reverend Campbell,” began the man; “I am pastor of a precious -flock in this town. And this is Deborah, my beloved consort. I trust I -find all well and holy here, and the blessing of the Spirit upon this -place?” - -Then the Reverend Campbell re-began his abject bowing, while his magpie -wife smirked and giggled sociably. - -It had been long since I met folk who more repelled me. For the sake of -his cloth, however, and the real respect I bore it, I required myself to -assume a manner of cordiality. I asked the purpose of the visit. - -“It was my privilege,” responded the Reverend Campbell, with a -meeting-house snuffle that certain divines adopt as a professional -manner of articulation, “I may say it was my inestimable privilege -some years back, to behold in the body of the church, during many of my -preachments, that mighty man of war, our coming president, and his sweet -lady; although she--for flesh is as grass--has since perished and passed -over to dwell among the blest.” - -“Mrs. Jackson was my nearest, dearest friend,” simpered the awful magpie -wife, interrupting. “It was when General Jackson had a seat in the -senate. We were like loving sisters, Mrs. Jackson and I.” - -This last I distrusted, but I did not say so. - -“You are the General's old preacher?” I said; the Reverend Campbell -meanwhile seesawing and bowing, and locking and unlocking his warty -fingers. “Have you been in to meet the General?” - -“Not yet, good sir, not yet,” replied the Reverend Campbell. “That shall -be in good time. Since you abide on terms of intimacy with our coming -president, I deemed it prudent to first make myself known to you. -Knowing David, I would know Jonathan. There is a business--a piece of -sinful, worldly business--I would inquire of, a boon I would ask, and -ere I went to the transaction thereof, I held it sapient to call upon -you who will be so strong to bind or loose--so potent, as one might say, -in the coming dispensation of preferments.” - -The Reverend Campbell--who should have been a mandarin for his -repulsiveness and talents to bow--kept up his bending, while the magpie -wife in vacuous vanity, beamed on like a tarnished sun. To put a stop -to the bowing, which began to grow on me nervously, I bade the pair be -seated. They would remain the longer, but I would save myself with less -of irritation. - -“I do not come for myself,” observed the Reverend Campbell, snuffling, -and balancing uneasily on his chair's edge. His wife had taken her seat -with more of confidence; spreading her skirts to advantage, and leaning -back as one certain of results. “No, it is by request of a beloved -brother in Christ, the Reverend Doctor Ely of Philadelphia. Our great -Chief Magistrate knows him and loves him well.” - -Then the Reverend Campbell went on in pulpit tones to elaborate his -mission. It soon declared itself to be the old Duff Green errand of -office angling. Also, it was a coincidence something strange, I thought, -when the Reverend Campbell, following in the very footprints of the -wine colored Duff, spoke of the Florida Governorship, and named the same -wealthy zany for its occupation. - -“He is a Pennsylvania Westfall,” concluded the Reverend Campbell, his -breath bated and his air impressed, “he is a Pennsylvania Westfall, and -extremely rich of this world's goods. Doctor Ely desires this post for -him with all his heart; he believes, moreover, that his old friend, our -excellent president, who--and heaven be thanked!--is less than a scant -two weeks away from his inauguration, will be glad to pleasure him in -this regard. You might, sir, hint to that eminent statesman and soldier -how his friend, Doctor Ely, would profit by this selection, going, as -in that event he will, to St. Augustine, to be chaplain for the then -Governor Westfall.” - -“And my husband, too, would be called to Dr. Ely's place in -Philadelphia,” gurgled the magpie wife; “it's a much richer church than -the one here.” - -There, then, was the cat out of the bag; I had been guessing for some -moments in the dark, as to why the Reverend Campbell should so zealously -be fishing for office when he ought to be fishing for souls. The magpie -wife granted me a glint of his secret. It did not swell my fund of -respect for the Reverend Campbell, a fund nothing rotund as things -stood. - -“You should see the General,” I said at last. “These are not my -affairs; I would not presume, wanting his invitation, to advise with -him concerning them. You should see him; or, if you will, you might wait -until Van Buren arrives.” - -“Ah, yes; the coming Secretary of State,” remarked the Reverend -Campbell, while his thick lips munched unpleasantly. “Will Mr. Van Buren -make the Florida selection?” - -I was driven to say I thought not; the General himself had been once -Governor of Florida; therefore, he might believe he was the one better -qualified to make such appointment. - -Beholding the Reverend Campbell in the throes of doubt, tipping on -his chair, and looking with his black clothes not a little like a crow -hesitating on a fence-rail as to whether or no he will plump down among -the sprouting corn, I suggested,--to relieve myself, I fear--that now he -was come, he might better go in to the General and offer his request. I -entertained no thought of success for him; I had not forgotten the fate -in that connection of the pursy Duff--Duff of the ripe, ripe nose. But -I aimed at a riddance of the Reverend Campbell and his leering, bubbling -helpmeet; and I was not so loyal to the General as to prevent me from -earning my own release by betraying him into their talons. - -“Do you deem it the part of sagacity,” said the Reverend Campbell, -following a thoughtful pause, “to crave this boon at once?” - -“Sagacious? surely!” I would have given my word for anything to -work free of the Reverend Campbell and that magpie wife, the latter -gentlewoman being rusty of plume, strident, and of but a sorry favor -of face; to say nothing about her gigglings and chuck-lings; for that -vacant dame was like a parrot, with a running rattle of vocalisms, going -from gurgle to chirp, as an accompaniment to whatever was said by her -lord and master. - -“Then let us repair to him,” said the Reverend Campbell, raising his -hands as if asking a benediction on me and my belongings; “let us hie -to him and unbosom ourselves, and may we find him in grace of spirit and -well of this mortal body.” - -We discovered the General in his rooms. We found him in a rather merry -spirit for him. He was sitting by his fire, with Peg on a footstool at a -corner of the fireplace. - -Hearing of the General's diet of rice, Peg's mother--she lived over to -the south, across that wooded strip, the Mall--holding herself to excel -in certain elixirs and cordials and draughts marvelous for maladies -stomachic, had sent to the General's relief a bottle of medicine -warranted of transcendent merit, and in which dandelion flourished a -dominant element. The good lady would trust her drugs to none save -Peg; there she was, then, the fairest foot and hand ever to be sent on -porter's work or to run an errand with a message. - -The unexpected sight of Peg sent over me a wave of pleasure. I love -the beautiful, have an inborn joy of it, and who or what could be more -lovely than our Peg--Peg with her wildrose face? - -The General glanced up through the tobacco smoke wherewith the rooms -were cloudy. Peg had said she loved smoke, and could stand to it like -a side of bacon. His look was of half-recognition as it settled upon my -company. - -“The Reverend Campbell, is it not?” said he. - -“The same, Mr. President,” returned the other, commencing again those -bowing motions which had so tortured my soul, his flabby cheeks -the while exuding a beady dew; “the same. And here is Deborah, my -well-beloved wife, Mr. President.” - -The magpie one of rumpled feather gained indication by the Reverend -Campbell pointing to her with a bulbous forefinger that was somewhat -suffering about the nail for lack of care. The magpie one gave the usual -proof of her satisfaction with chirp and giggle. - -“The last time I beheld you, Mr. President,” said the Reverend Campbell, -“you and your dear wife sat beneath my words.” The General flinched as -though a rude hand touched a wound. He gathered himself, however. “That -dear one, Mr. President, has gone from our midst. It is a chastening, -Mr. President. Whom the Lord loveth, He chasteneth. It is a loss, Mr. -President, but we must summon meekness of spirit. Blessed are the meek -in spirit, saith the singer, and they shall inherit the earth. Mr. -President, let us pray.” - -The Reverend Campbell rolled forth the foregoing, and never halt or -pause; with the last word he was down upon his knees, expanding into a -gale of prayer. - -It is not for me to pass upon such sacred petitions, but the Reverend -Campbell's effort grated on my conscience as crude, and, if the term -be not improper, vulgar. The General, who was still in his chair, bowed -head in hand and sat silent throughout. He made neither sign nor sound; -and yet it must have galled him like musketry, that prayer. - -It was when the Reverend Campbell stood again on his feet, and the -magpie one had rearranged her feathers, that their glances took in Peg -where she now stood near the fire. She was silent, collected, and her -calm look rested upon the Reverend Campbell and the magpie one. It was a -steady glance of unseeing indifference and unacquaintance, and as though -the pair were strangers to her. - -Their actions, however, would smack of something nearer. No sooner did -they behold Peg, than with one impulse they started towards her, faces a -garden of smiles. - -“Why, my dear Mrs. Eaton!” cried the magpie one. - -“My dear, recovered lamb!” exclaimed the Reverend Campbell. - -The two made for Peg with exuberant hands extended. Peg waved them off. - -“You make a mistake,” said Peg. Her words took flight evenly and with -nothing of disturbance. “I do not know you.” Then, as the Reverend -Campbell and his magpie love seemed but half checked: “And I will not -know you.” - -These closing words were vibrant of a nipping vigor, and Peg's leopard -teeth came together with a click, and, as it were, for emphasis. Peg -turned to me: - -“Will you take me to my carriage?” - -With that, the General arose and cavaliered Peg to the door. - -“Give my thanks to your good mother, child,” said the General, his fond -eye pleasant with the reflection of Peg's pretty face; “tell her I shall -profit by her kindness. I feel half restored with merely having the -Dandelion Water on my shelf.” - -Closing the door after us, the General returned to the Reverend Campbell -and his magpie love. - -“There is no story with it.” Peg replied, when I put those queries the -situation suggested. “They are folk of treachery; that is it. They have -been my persecutors as much as any. And with more shame for them, since -they have pretended friendship for my family, and had support from my -father for year piled upon year.” - -“And is that the whole of it?” I asked. - -“Truly, it is, my best dear friend.” Peg held up her pansy face, and -offered me a cheerful look by way of proof. “Nor am I even a trifle -provoked. For all that, I would not permit them because they found -me with the good General, and with you”--she gave my arm a little -pressure--“and doubtless would offer some request, to put on a false -face, and so use me for their interest. I owe them no such tenderness. -Besides, since I've found real friends,”--Peg crowded to my side more -closely, and bent upon me her kind, unfathomed eyes, as though admitting -my protection,--“since I've found real friends, I've no room in my heart -for mocking imitations.” Peg laughed her witch-laugh now, and stepped on -more quickly. “Don't let us talk of them,” she said, “don't let us talk -of such hollow folk!” - -Peg's carriage stood at the curb. Indeed, she had but just arrived when, -as I piloted the Reverend Campbell and the magpie, I found her by the -General's fire. - -“Some day you must go with me to meet my mother,” said Peg; “I've -promised her.” Then, as I lifted her into the carriage, “Mercy! you -should practice for a lighter hand. I feel as one in the paws of a -bear.” - -With a wave of her hand, she was off for the President's Square where -her home stood; I, on my part, turned back to the General, walking -slowly, and seeing Peg's gentle eyes before me all the way to his door. -Sweet Peg! had it been I, no tawdry ambition of politics would have -divided my heart with you; you would have reigned over it alone; we -would have left Washington to the vermin who devoured it, and made our -kingdom in lands of peace and truth! - -It was not without relief I discovered that the Reverend Campbell, with -his magpie mate, was gone. - -“Assuredly, no!” exclaimed the General, when I inquired whether the name -of Doctor Ely, and the petition preferred of the Reverend Campbell, -had re-colored his thoughts touching St. Augustine and the Florida -Governorship; “assuredly, no! He who has that place from me must be -emphatically two things--a man and a friend. The creature, Westfall, -is emphatically neither. I can not guess, however, in what this sudden -office-hunting excitement of our ghostly fathers finds its source. I -asked the Reverend Campbell, was this Westfall known to him. He said, -only by repute; that he urged the case at the request of Doctor Ely.” - -Clearing him on that question of purpose, I told the General of Doctor -Ely's arrangement to be a Governor's chaplain in St. Augustine; and -how, in a moment of gurgling exaltation concerning what might be, that -unguarded magpie exposed the scheme of “calling” our Reverend Campbell -to Doctor Ely's fat present pulpit, should it become vacant in favor of -palms and orange groves. - -“And in that way runs the road!” exclaimed the General, full of leniency -and amusement. “The preachers are becoming better politicians every day. -Major, you and I must look to our lines, or some dominie may yet turn -our flanks.” - -Then I gave the General what Peg had told of her attitude, like a -diminutive iceberg, towards the Reverend Campbell and his magpie -partner. - -“They have done Peg no actual harm,” I said. “They passed her by one -day, like the Levites they were and are; and now she revenges herself.” - -“One can always hear the savage stirring about in Peg,” commented the -General; “and I like her the better for it. I love your re-vegeful -soul--he who has a long knife, a long memory, and will go a long trail -to his feud.” - -“And that is an excellent observe,” I said, teasing him a bit, “and you -a Christian and a president!” - -“The observe, as you phrase it,” retorted the General, “is not only -excellent but earnest. Revenge is the fair counterpart of gratitude. -They are off the same bolt of cloth. Find me a soul for revenge, and -I'll find you a soul to be grateful. What are revenge and gratitude, -when one goes to the final word, but just a man paying his debts?” - -“Who is this Doctor Ely?” I asked. “The Reverend Campbell described him -as your friend.” - -“Doctor Ely is no more than an acquaintance, and hardly that. I met him -years ago in Philadelphia; and I've heard him preach. He is a showy, -fashionable figure of man; not deep, yet musical and fluent. The women, -I remember, liked his discourses right well. There were a beat and a -march to his periods; and albeit, while he talked, the wise ones went to -sleep, others with music-boxes for minds, and who mistook sensation for -sense, sat bolt upright, feeling the liveliest delight.” - -“I've met the latter sort,” I assented; “the gentry who prefer rhyme to -reason.” - -“Somehow,” observed the General, following an interval of silence, “I -ever fear I'll be unfair to your preachers. My inclination is to judge -them too harshly--estimate them below their worth. It has been ever the -fault of military men to do this, and, for myself, I would guard against -it.” - -“And now will you explain what you are talking about?” I was in cold -earnest, for the General's remorse over an injustice to preachers was -clean beyond me and _apropos_ of nothing. - -My own thought galloped to it--for his wife taught him that softness, -being as devout as an abbess, herself--that for the dominies, as an -order or trade among men, he carried more of charity than any whom I -knew. More by far than I could boast, or cared to. “Why do you reproach -yourself about the preachers?” - -“It was this Doctor Ely,” returned the General, “of whom I was thinking. -I was remembering certain severities of judgment towards him long ago. -I heard him preach, yet could give him no credit for sincerity. He -impressed me as one who looked often in the glass and seldom from the -window. He was friendly, affable, and, I think, honest; and yet I liked -him no more than I like that reverend cringer who was just now here. I -well recall saying to this Doctor Ely--probably I had him in my mind's -eye at the time, and it hurt him, too--that he who was professionally -good would never be very good, nor he who was excellent for a salary -offer an example of the best excellence. It may be that my natural -distrust of preachers is, after all, nothing save my natural fear of -them. You have not forgotten how I told you I feared men of peace. That -is true; I fear folk who profess peace as a principle--your Quaker -and your preacher--as I fear and fall back before the inhuman, or as -children fear a ghost. It is all to be accounted for perhaps, in the -differing natures of folk. One man has a genius for peaceful while -another's bent is for war, and each will misunderstand the other's -motives. There can be little in common and less of trust between them, -since they will live as far apart as black and white. It is, I say, -quite natural--war and peace--wolf and sheep. I've no doubt, now,” - concluded the General, a smile beginning to show, “that to your wolf on -the hill, your grazing sheep down in the valley is a mighty suspicious -character.” - - - - -CHAPTER VI--THE STORM GATHERS AGAINST PEG - -Those next few weeks went by in a tumbling procession that was more -like mob violence than aught orderly or sequential. The town was overrun -of folk. It was a climbing case of everybody under foot--everybody -stepped on one, and, in compensation, one stepped on everybody. - -Jim was driven to remark concerning the collecting tangle of humanity, -and the crush and crowd and jostle of it. The sage Jim was speaking to -his own defence, being indicted for some neglect of me. - -“'Pears like, Marse Major,” said Jim, soothingly, “you-all must jes' -wrastle along somehow until dish yere pop'lace begins to abrogate. I'm -doin' d' bes' I knows how; but she shorely is a time for every 'possum -to learn to hang by his own tail.” - -“What do you mean by 'abrogate?'” I was willing to be amused at the -expense of the erroneous Jim. - -“You don't tell me, Marse Major, that you-all don't know what 'abrogate' -means?” - -Jim imitated astonishment. “Why, a thing abrogates when it beds itse'f -down--kind o' quiles itse'f up like a moccasin snake.” - -It was impressive, the throng in the streets--a multitude hungry for -office--a multitude it would ask a miracle to feed and fill. The whole -country was come to town, the place blazed with Jackson badges, every -face shone with victory. It was a pretorian band, and had borne its -beloved captain into power on its shields. It was present now for -jubilation and for spoil. - -For myself, I surveyed the surging, shouting, unkempt thousands with -disfavor; the General liked and applauded them. - -“They are as rightfully here,” said he, “as the smuggest, slyest rascal -of riches of them all. We are done with Adams and his Federal dogma, -'The best dressed citizen is the best citizen.' The day is the day of -democracy.” - -“And very well,” said I; “democracy is my creed, too. But may it not -scrape its face with a razor? Would soap destroy it? I grow sick of a -democracy which finds no outlet for expression save cowhide boots all -mud, and standing on a damask chair in them.” The General snorted; next -to his dead Saint Rachel, he loved the herd. - -Noah, who was much in my company these days, gave one of his cynic -shrugs. - -“Major, doubtless you are a democrat,” observed Noah with a comic face. -“But you have been too much solitary, and you've forgotten the tenets -of our faith. You should recall yourself to that inscription on the -cornerstone of our temple: 'The Mob giveth, the Mob taketh away, blessed -be the name of the Mob.'” - -The weather was fine, and clear as a bell in the sky; but the frost -coming up from the ground made underfoot another sonnet altogether. With -bright air, and sun shining, still the roads weltered mere swamps, and -all so set and puddled of soft ooze they would have bogged a saddle -blanket. Carriages were out of the possible; but, save for crowds on the -sidewalks, folk a-foot did well enough. - -The pretty Peg was each day to the Indian Queen to chat with us. I saw -so much of her, she grew on me like a habit. - -Eaton for the war desk was known now to all, and, verbally at least, -acquiesced in. Noah's slicing work with his Spanish sword had been -whispered industriously; scores went up to gaze on the broad blotches of -dull red where the rogue Catron's blood had spread like paint; the arm -wide open from wrist to should der-joint--a very gutter of a wound!--was -dilated upon; and the result appeared in a wholesome caution on the -conversational parts of our enemies. Noah was still in town; and no male -at least came reckless enough to court the fate of Catron. Besides, the -buzz and talk of a new administration scraping its feet at the door and -lifting the latch of events would occupy the public mouth, and mention -of Peg, whether for good or bad, was crowded out of it. The future would -have been the better for peace had these conditions secured a longer -maintenance. - -Among others, that Reverend Doctor Ely, for whom the equally Reverend -Campbell and the magpie one aforetime came upon the carpet, broke -rapturously into town. I say “broke,” since as a term it may best depict -the effusiveness of that descent upon the General. Twenty years before, -this Ely had met the General; their acquaintance had been as attenuated -as it might be and still bear up the name; and with that slender capital -the hopeful Doctor was present to make the most it. - -Surely, I met the reverend man. He was a bald, brisk, worldly personage, -with a most noble appetite for the flesh-pots. He carefully sustained -himself the hypocrite in that last behalf, however, and to folk casual -he offered nothing beyond an appearance fervently religious. While with -us, he held forth in sundry local pulpits, and although I heard him not -myself, he was warmly eulogized by pious critics who knew what sermons -should be. - -The worthy Doctor with a view to Florida dangled about the General. The -Reverend Campbell, and the magpie one, dangled about the worthy Doctor. -They were made to see, with the very finish of it, however, that by no -accident of concession would the General place their man, Westfall, in -the van of Florida affairs to set up mimic thrones in the Governor's -Palace of St. Augustine. - -The news was a blow to them; and the urgent trio were no Stoics to be -capable of excluding from their brows the chagrin they felt. They no -longer harrassed the General, however, which, when now a score of duties -pulled at him like horses, was no small desideratum. - -Presumably as a last ditch wherein to perish, the Reverend Doctor Ely -came to me. I was no favorite of his, nor he of mine. To me he was not -a precious metal. Polished? yes--and yet only to remind one of brass. He -was, as I have said, of fashionable model; fond of his burgundy, and -his canvas-back; garbed fastidiously and in the mode; precisely that -character the General so accurately read those years before when he -suspected him as one less concerned for the fit of his conscience than -the fit of his coat. - -When the Reverend Doctor encountered me, I cut him short. To do this, -let me tell you, I took my courage in my hands, for it is no child's -play to thwart a dominie. - -“You are one who holds fast for the doctrine of foreordination?” I asked -this like a catechist at his questions. - -“I am,” returned the Reverend Doctor. - -“And you believe that many are called while few are chosen?” - -“I do.” - -“And in original sin; and infant damnation; and how hell is paved with -children's skulls?” - -“I do. To what, however, does this move?” - -“And the love of gold to be the root of evil?” I went on, disregarding -the question thrust at me; “and that it would be easier to pass a camel -through the needle's eye than a rich man into heaven?” - -“Sir, I insist on hearing the purpose of your surprising curiosity.” - -“Why, then, it should all be huddled into this. Your Westfall, rich and -sinful, by what you say may be presumed to dwell in multiplied peril of -immortal shipwreck. And since such be your craft, and the trade you pick -up bread by, would it not come more seemly for yourself, and be for -this Westfall an effort more of grace, were you, instead of storming the -General with pleas for a Governorship which might prove but a worm -to gnaw him, to employ your self in bringing about the eternal safe -advantage of his soul?” - -The Reverend Doctor withdrew, his dander much on furious end, and -shortly thereafter the tail of my eye caught a picture of him, as--heads -close together--he conferred whisperingly with the Reverend Campbell in -a corner of the longroom of the Indian Queen. - -Since I could not think well, I was careful to think nothing at all of -these reverend office seekers. In that latter I dropped into error; they -were worthy serious respect. I should have borne it more upon my memory -how easy comes destruction, and that he who is incapable of building one -brick upon another may yet tear down the most stubborn best masonry of -man. I should have kept before me those powers for ill which arm the -meanest, and not have forgotten how the veriest vermin of a rat might -gnaw the canvas of a Rubens. - -Remembering those ignoble ones that evening, I foolishly burst into -disparagement of the clergy as a class. The General was smart for -defence. - -“Humbug!” quoth the General. “Because you have seen the inside of two, -you would have it you know them all. It were as wise if you declared -Washington to be a traitor for that Arnold would have sold West Point. -Every tub, even a pulpit tub, must stand upon its own bottom.” - -I have told how dumb and dead lay vilification on the masculine lip, -and that no man so much as breathed against the fame of Peg. There was -notice on its way to show the women were unquelled. - -It was the day before the General's inauguration, and he over ears with -his address, reading and re-reading it, so as to give the periods a -best volume and voice, and endow them with that strutting majesty of -utterance his vanity conceived belonged in justice to their merit. He -would be by himself while thus rehearsing, for he took shame to vapor -up and down, and toss about before me, and swore that my presence, -glowering from a chair, would have daunted Cicero. I was glad enough to -leave him to himself, it being but poor sport to play at audience for a -bad orator; moreover, since the speech was written in my Nashville home -and wrangled over, as it proceeded, by the General and myself like dogs -over a bone, it would come to me as nothing new. And so the General -was left to plod about in his paragraphs much like a cow in a morass, -difficult and slow, and sinking to the hocks with every step. I could -catch the humming roar of him in my parlor, while he swaggered about his -rooms, singing out shrill and high in declamation, and reveling in the -figure he would cut. - -While I was idly turning this weakness of the General to think himself -a Patrick Henry, when he had no more of eloquence or music than any -midnight owl, a nervous tap came on my panels. I was instantly on my -feet; the tap quite drove the General and his rhetoric out of my head. -By some instinct, or, mayhap, the tap itself was marked of agitation, I -not only recognized it for Peg, but knew she was in grief. I threw open -the door. - -Peg stepped in; she was white to the lips; and this paleness of ivory -showed the more on her because of the great dark eyes and those midnight -shadows to dwell within her hair. Save for this pallor, however, she -seemed steady as a rock. - -It was on the outside, though, for no sooner was I seated again than she -drifted down before my feet on the floor, and, with her head on my knee, -broke into a passion of sobbing. I let my hand, for sympathy, rest a -moment on her poor head, and when I thought she would have cried enough, -lifted her up and placed her in a chair. - -“What is it?” I said. “I thought I was to see no more tears from you.” - This I threw off in half sprightly tones to rally Peg. - -“Nor shall you,” cried she, “but I was fair spent and beaten for want -of a good cry. And you should know”--she was giving me a trace of -brightness now--“that crying is so much like conversation, to cry alone -is like talking to one's self. I can not go to my husband; and the -General, good and kind, is with it all too old and too great, and, -therefore, too much out of my reach. I've just you; and that's how rich -I am for confidants. I've not a woman to be friend to me in all the -world; nor would I trust her if I had. I've just you; and so you are -like to see a deal of worry.” - -“All that is mighty sweet,” I returned, “and every word a flower. And -yet, what is the wrong?” - -“And simply nothing, after all,” she replied. “Only it's so much more -horrible to see it with your eyes than hear it with your ears.” Peg put -a note into my hands. “It came through the post; and doubtless means no -more than the malevolence which was author to it.” - -The note had no name; nothing to indicate its parentage. It read: - -“Revenge is sweet! I have you in my power; and I shall burn you as -savages burn their victim at the stake. I pray that you live long to -extend my pleasure. Think not that you can escape me. I would not that -death nor any evil thing should take you out of my hand for half the -world.” - -“The nameless devil!” I cried. “It is a woman's hand of writ, though the -letters are made purposely big and sprawling. Have you any thought at -who she should be?” - -“No,” returned Peg; “I can not so much as guess.” - -Peg and I talked the question up and down, I asking and she answering, -and with the end we were where we started, that was nowhere at all. The -Reverend Campbell came into my conjecturings, he and his magpie mate; -but I did not mention them, for what would have been the use of -feathering Peg's imagination with a surmise? - -“But, in good truth, I came to you,” said Peg at the end, “not for any -hope of solving this. That would be frankly impossible. Rather I am here -to get a drink of your courage; for, faith! though I wear as brave a -face as I may, my own betimes runs something low. And now,”--Peg stood -up and gave me her dainty hand, mimicking the manner of a man--“and -now, my big comrade, having had my cry, and got my draught of courage, -I shall go back to the President's Square; and there I shall forget the -whole story of this miserable letter. That is”--she had gone into the -hall and was closing the door now, with only a strip of her sweet face -looking in to me--“forget all except how I cried at your knee and was -very, very happy because you were good and kind and--let me cry.” - -When the door was shut, I picked up the note which Peg had left and -placed it in the private locker of my desk. Then I sate me down and -thought revengefully on Peg's wrongs, and the hatefulness of him who -should think her harm. But her dark, deep eyes were forever coming in to -look on me, and at the last I had a memory for nothing but her beauty; -and, elaborating thereon, I considered how beauty was in itself a -benediction implied of Providence, and a sermon; and then I got to -reading Burns; and I confess--however often I had spoken of them as so -much sweetened oatmeal--there arose in me a delight from those verses -as though they were the songs of birds. And throughout the whole, from -Peg's crying at my feet until I'd put Burns away in his place, the drone -of the General, thundering on tariff, and finance, and standing armies, -and sinking funds, was in the air; and all futile, so I thought, and -dreary and workaday and commonplace. - -Somehow, for all of Burns and my meditations, after Peg had left me, my -heart felt poor and robbed. Also, I turned less and less patient with -the General, humming at his coming speech like a great bee in a bottle. -At last I went in to him and gave him my tart opinion of his doings, for -all the world like an actor with a part to study, or some girl primping -and preparing for conquest before a glass. - -“Have you so forgotten English,” I cried, “that you can not tell your -views to the people without first telling and re-telling them a score of -times to yourself?” - -But the General was in a high mood and no more to be dealt with than a -tempest. - -“Take your irritation out for a walk, sir,” said he. “Take a walk for -your nerves. Something has combed your fur wrong-wise; and I don't think -it could have been politics. You prodigiously remind me of one in love, -and who has ear-patience for naught save the voice of his mistress.” - -Out to walk I went; I did not think the General worth a retort. You -are not, however, to follow his hint, and lose and leave the plain -footprints of the fact. I was no more in love with Peg than was he; I -examined myself on that head and made myself particularly clear. Like -all men who are physically big and strong, and, moreover, like all men -border-born and taught that duty from the ground up of protecting ones -weaker than themselves, particularly women-folk and babes, I went as -naturally to Peg's side in her troubles as ever went deer to drink. It -was in my nature and my lesson to do this. Sympathy is a plant to grow -most quickly on roughest soil; and folk of my shag-bark sort are ever -soonest on the ground, and stay the longest, when the cause is the -weeping cause of woman. - -And there you have the explanation of my interest for Peg. The General, -himself, was just as headlong; his sympathies fair went about on tiptoe -in a constant search for weak ones in distress. Not humanity alone, but -animals; and I've seen him go forth into midnight sleet and ice--and -Death tearing at his lungs with a cough--to bring in a bleating lamb. It -was, then, but partisan sympathy, and not love in the bud, which I felt -for Peg; and I turned much fortified and quieter in my own thoughts, -when, following a rigid search of my breast, I made it out. - -Noah, whom I ran across in the corridor, went with me for the walk. We -broke away northward across the city to be free of the crowds which came -and went about Gadsby's and the Indian Queen. When we were more alone -and with the roads to ourselves, I told Noah of the nameless letter to -Peg. - -“And that is a fine feather in the cap of Henry Clay,” I cried; “this -employment of nameless villains to write threats to a girl!” - -“Now let me set you straight,” said Noah. “I've gone to the ends of -this foul work. It is not the Clay so much as the Calhoun interest which -furnishes the venom. The General is turned round; he believes it to be -Clay. I assure you, the enemy is a Calhoun coterie from South Carolina.” - -“But what is their purpose?” I asked. “Calhoun is Vice-President; he -will preside over the Senate and be part of the administration. Why -should he seek to mar it?” - -“Mark you, I do not say,” replied Noah, “that Calhoun, personally, -so much as hears of these wrongs done in his name. Your friends will -sometimes go farther in your cause than you will go for yourself. Let me -briefly tell you what I know. Calhoun would succeed the General for the -Presidency. He spins a web as fine as any spun of spiders. So curiously -has he brought his forces to bear, that of the six he will own three of -the General's cabinet--Berrien, Branch, and Ingham. He wanted the war -office, and was craftily urging Hayne, of his own state, when the -General unconsciously brushed his plan aside with Eaton. Now the Calhoun -thought is to drive Eaton from the place; and to mock at Mrs. Eaton and -stain her with slanders is the Palmetto idea of a method. The more cruel -it is, the more likely to succeed; and the latter condones the -ignobility. These folk play for a White House; and the greater the stake -the less of scruple on the part of the players. Remember, too, these -children of evil have just begun; the attacks, as they proceed, will -mobilize a force. The women will be brought to their aid. We gagged the -men's mouths with a duel; but who is to gag the women's, and how will he -go upon the work?” - -This news about Calhoun was nothing by way of surprise. I knew him to be -as ambitious as Lucifer; more, I was aware of him for no friend of the -General; I had learned that much two years before. - -While it was within my knowledge, this enmity, I had not set it forth to -the General; the truth of it would have done him no good, and gotten -in the way. It would have served only to fire his wrath, and he was one -most unmanageable when angry. - -Wherefore throughout the campaign, while the General and Calhoun were -running mates, I said no word of the latter's secret feeling of envious -jealousy and hate, and the General went to the election in the dark, -believing the Vice-President to be among his staunchest friends. -Thinking now of Peg, I began to glimpse a day when the Calhoun rancors -would be worth the General's knowledge. - -“Assuming that Calhoun languishes to be President,” said I, “and -intrigues for that object, what do you say to the radical sort of his -States Rights position--going in for the right to nullify a general law, -and secede at will from the national circle, and all that? Would you -call Calhoun either politic or right to occupy those positions? - -“And now for the 'politic and right,'” responded Noah, “Calhoun must go -with the current. A statesman is a scientist of circumstances; he must -not fight wind and tide, but use them. In South Carolina, Nullification -and Secession are doctrines of a first respectability. One meets folk -daily who would sooner be respectable than right; and Calhoun may -well be one of these. No,” observed Noah in conclusion, speaking with -emphasis, “Calhoun must adopt his state, or his state will not adopt -him. He can not build himself for anything without his state; that is -the keystone, wanting which his arch of the future comes tumbling to the -ground.” - -“Then you regard Calhoun as helpless, and that he could not, if he -would, rescue himself on a question of Nullification or Secession?” - -“No; he's as helpless as a fly in amber; he must go with his state or be -lost.” - -“Do these proposals of a right to nullify and a right to secede, then, -strike so deep with their roots? I had not thought men cared so much for -tariff.” - -“Sir,” replied Noah, “while present States Rights discussion circles -about tariff as argument most convenient, behind it, and as the grand -motive, lurks black slavery. A protest against tariff links many rich -merchants, not alone in Charleston, but in every great seaboard city -from Baltimore to Boston, to this doctrine. They would bring in goods -free. There be many among these, tugged upon by their pockets, who can -be brought to States Rights for a tariff argument, and who would turn -off in horror were the true black slavery reason advanced. There you -have the cunning of Calhoun.” - -“Then you hold slavery to be the mainspring of States Rights as a -movement?” - -“Absolutely,” and Noah's tones left no doubt of his conviction. “Slavery -overshadows all. It is a question to yet shake the country in its soul.” - -There was silence between us; we walked on, I, for my side, ruminating -the words of Noah. The more I considered them, the more they looked the -truth. Calhoun's enmity I made no mouth about believing; indeed, as I've -set forth, it already had dwelt in my knowledge for long. - -Getting back to what was presently being acted, I spoke of that cabinet -trio whom my companion had marked as of the clan and same family of -politics with Calhoun. - -“Branch, Berrien, and Ingham,” repeated Noah, “are blood and bone with -Calhoun. If they drive out Eaton, there may come a fourth to strengthen -them. Four of a cabinet six! That would make a mighty beginning in any -hunting of the White House.” - -“And what,” said I, remembering Peg, and my rage swelling, “what are we -to think of ones who would hunt a White House across the naked honor of -a woman?” - -“What we are to think,” said Noah, with a toss of the hand, “will be the -least of their worry when once they succeed.” - -“And that will never happen,” I returned. “I hold it between my palms -to defeat their best laid plan--their most darling chicane, as you shall -witness.” - -“And so I hope,” said he. “Also, now you know as much as I, it is left -with you to warn the General and make bare to him Calhoun. You are the -right one to speak with him on that skittish topic.” - -Inauguration as a ceremony came and departed, and I looked on the going -thereof as its most superlative feature. There were twenty thousand -people to hear the General's address; and when he advanced to the -platform reared for him on the eastern front of the Capitol, the -multitude doffed hats and stood a most remarkable spectacle, the like of -which I'd never gazed on. - -But the later horde in the White House defies expression! It was simple -loot and pillage, wanting bloodshed, and nothing carried away. The -cowhide throng, mud and mire to the boot-ears, climbed on sofas and -stood on chairs; they would catch a glimpse of their god at whatever -damask cost. When punch would have been brought for their entertainment, -they rushed upon the servants like red barbarians, struggling, -wrestling, the pails spilled out upon the floors. It was I who settled -the disorder, and I claim credit as for a stratagem which on other -fields might have saved a battle. I caused the drinkables to be quietly -withdrawn to the lawn, beyond the first hill and far to the south. Then -from a corner of the East Room I announced the fact with a loud voice. - -It was as though my words bore a charm; in a twinkling the White House -proper approached desertion. Folk decent and civilized might again move -about, and quiet ones have peace. The mob never came back, for I made -it my duty that no lack of punch should occur on the lawn; there the -uproarious remained and drank, and at last--those who could walk--they -drifted away, each deviously to his habitat, and something akin to quiet -settled again about the eaves and rafters of the mansion. - -The General put in most of the next day on a lounge, in nurse to -Augustus, recovering from the ordeal. It all but swept his life away as -in a freshet. However, he pulled through; and when in the evening I went -to ask about his condition, I found him with that little miniature of -his wife I've spoken of, and her hymn-book, wherewith he made his -daily church and said his prayers. What a soul would have been his for -cross-handles and chain-mail!--what a knight! so dauntless among men, -and withal so loyal with all his love to the dear lady of his heart. She -might die to others, but she would never die to him. His love would each -night search her out among the stars. - -And now we settled down to our strange life. But since I use the word, -let me tell you in how short a period the strange becomes the common; -for I had not been a week in the White House, and in and out of its -great rooms, when all was as familiar and friendly to me as though I had -passed my days from boyhood within the four walls of it. - -The General's family, beyond himself and me, was made up of his nephew -Donalson, the latter's wife, and the portrait-maker, Earl; not an -extensive circle, truly, and one to be soon contracted by the desertion -of two, as you shall presently hear. - -We were still in process of that mild wrangle with our new abode which -must ever precede a last adjustment, when, like a clap of thunder from -a sky without a cloud, the General's niece--she who was our Lady of -the White House--came upon him. There lowered something formidable -and gloomy in the mien of the young woman as she entered the room, -and because no towering force of character had distinguished her -theretofore, this cloudy something was the more to be observed. I should -have said, too, the social lines were already being set for and against -our pretty Peg, and this visit of the General's niece was somewhat in -the nature of a blow from the enemy's side. - -“What is it, my dear?” asked the General, glancing up from his -conversation with me. - -“Uncle,” she said, much in the manner of a starling which whistles a -tune that has been taught it, “Uncle, I am here to tell you that I can -not call upon Mrs. Eaton. I will receive her, since this is your house, -and you its master. But call on her in return, I can not.” - -“Hoity toity!” quoth the General, “and now where did you learn these bad -manners?' - -“It is my duty to myself, Uncle; there is not a lady in Washington, -beginning with Mrs. Calhoun and going down to the least among us, who -will call on Mrs. Eaton; therefore, I can not call on her.” - -“Then you might better go back to Tennessee, my dear,” said the General. - -And the niece and her husband went. - -The word “Calhoun,” had not, however, escaped the General. It was -forever cropping up in manner and form most sinister, that word Calhoun; -and in the entire crusade of venom waged upon our Peg, it seemed on -the lips of everyone with whom the exigencies of the hour threw us into -speech, from the immortal Pigeon-breast to the General's very niece. - -“The Calhoun interest,” remarked the General, when his young -relative had retired in wrath to pack her trunks, “would appear to be -headquarters for the foe.” - -The General said “foe” and meant it; for he was one whose eyes were in -his heart and saw ever his enemy in the enemy of his friend. - -It was then I took occasion to lay out to the General in particular, -not alone the plan of Calhoun to seize a presidency; not alone -his leadership in that war of politics then mustering forces over -Nullification and a state's right to secede, and which in the next -Congress gave birth to the debates between Webster and Hayne; but I -went a step beyond, and exhibited the hidden enmity of Calhoun which was -leveled at himself, and had hunted his destruction as far away as the -Seminole campaign, when Calhoun was in Monroe's cabinet as Secretary of -War. - -“It is true,” I declared; “at that time your only friend was Monroe. -Calhoun in the secret councils of the cabinet was warm to break your -sword.” - -“How do you know that?” demanded the General, his eye making for heat. - -“I read it in a letter from Governor Forsythe to Colonel Hamilton. If -that be not enough, I heard it from ex-President Monroe himself, when -last evening he was with us here to dinner. Moreover, I was made aware -of it two years ago on my trip to the Mississippi.” - -“And why did I not hear of it before?” - -“You have learned it in ample time for every interest you carry, whether -of your own or Peg's.” - -“That is true,” said the General, “that is quite true.” Then he mused -with bended brow. At last he burst forth: “I begin to see into the -Calhoun thoughts. He knows my rule, which we agreed on before we left -Nashville, that no member of my cabinet shall succeed me. That leaves -him but two rivals, Clay and Adams, for Crawford can never run again. He -has three adherents in my cabinet through whose aid he hopes to feather -the nest of his ambitions with patronage. He would destroy Eaton with -the thought of gaining a fourth. Meanwhile he will preside over the -Senate, and control legislation in favor of low tariff, if not a flat -level of free trade. Thus he trusts to break down Clay and Adams, who -are wedded to protection. Verily, a most noble, a most delicate bit of -chicane!” Here the General brooded for a long space. “I might admire -it,” he went on, “nay, I might even aid it on its high-stepping way, -were it not that he includes in his intrigue the destruction of a girl. -It is like a play, Major, and we must foil the villain and save -our beautiful Peg. Her name shall not be blown upon, though all the -presidencies for ten centuries to come depend upon it! Peg came spotless -among us; and from among us, spotless she shall depart; and that in the -teeth of all the Calhouns that ever came out of Carolina.” - -The General smashed his clay pipe at this crisis, and by that token -I knew the thing to be already done. It was a way he had, this -pipe-breaking, of signing his bonds. - -Peg lived catty-cornered across the President's Square, and ran in and -out of the White House like one of the inmates. She liked the flowers, -and she liked the pictures, and was never tired of gazing at the latter -and smelling to the former. She was so much sunshine about the mansion, -not the lightest nor yet the least gloomy house in nature, but quite the -contrary. - -One day a little scene occurred about which nothing of import clambered, -and yet I would give it here; for it pleases me when now I'm fallen in -the vale of years, and the General and Peg and those others who were my -friends are dead and gone from out my hands, to remember such frail -matters for their sweetness rather than their consequence; and truth to -say, they stay by me, too, with gentle clearness when events that were -of moment are clean faded from my mind. - -Peg, then, was dragging me about by the hand--for she was as much the -romp as any child--and we journeyed from room to room, and from picture -to picture. We were standing in front of that portrait of Washington -which Dolly Madison once slashed from its frame to save from vandal -British. - -“Come,” said Peg, tugging at my wrist with the two hands of her, “I'm -weary of these. Doubtless he was a wondrous fine gentleman”--pointing to -the painted figure of our first president--“and lived well aware of it, -himself, as one may know by the satisfied smirk of him. But show me some -other picture, one more beautiful and less grand--and not so satisfied -with itself, and respectable. All the folk I hate are respectable, and I -begin to loathe the word!” - -“I can show you the most beautiful picture in the world,” I retorted; -and, whirling her by the shoulders, I stood her before a mirror. - -Peg looked upon her kindly reflection for long in silence; then her eyes -filled up. - -“It isn't your compliments I cry for,” said Peg, breaking into a catchy -laugh; “but your tone is so queer with the sheer kindness of it, that I -am taken by the heart. You dear, true friend; you at least think good of -little Peg!” And with that, she came quite close, and turned her face in -wistful yet trusting fashion up to mine. - -An hour later--and it was growth of this--I did a foolish action; and -yet no harm turned of it, but only a better friendship between myself -and the coxcomb Pigeon-breast. It fell forth when Peg was gone home, and -I alone near the north door of the big East Room, and none save myself -in the broad expanse of that mighty apartment. My soul was somewhat in -arms over Peg, for the wintry moan in her tones when she spoke of my -faith in her goodness was still working on me, and I would have bartered -ten years of my life to have had set before me some specific male of -my species who should avow himself Peg's evil-thinker. My vengeance was -starving and wolfish, and I would have fed it with him. - -While in this vein of fret and tumult, I caught the voice of Jim in the -hallway outside the door. - -“Do I know d'Marse Major?” I heard Jim say, apparently in answer to the -question; “does Jim know d'Marse Major? Well, Jim should say likely; -for, you hyar me! Jim's been all through him with a lantern. You-all may -tell them gambler-gentlemen somethin' new about a ace of clubs; an 'mebby -you could post Jim of somethin' he aint heerd about corn whiskey; but -I don't allow thar's anythin' mo' for Jim to learn about d'Marse Major. -'Cause why; 'cause he's Jim's Marse Major, an' I jes' nacherally raise -him, I does, from a colt.” - -When I stepped into the vestibule to answer to my own name, and put a -stop to the extravagances of Jim, I saw, to my astonishment, that the -caller was no less a personage than Pigeon-breast. Without pausing to -hear his mission, I took him by the arm and led him out upon the lawn. - -Once there, however, I was sore put to it to show reason for my conduct, -of the rather extraordinary character of which one caught some glint in -the expression of amazement that made wide the eyes of Pigeon-breast and -all but set his mouth ajar. - -Now the truth was, that anonymous letter to Peg, and which lay safe -locked in my desk, had ever stuck in my craw. I said it was a woman's -hand of writing, but I was by no means sure. Knowing hardly a baker's -dozen of folk in town, there were not many for my thoughts to run upon -in this scurvy business; and I had had it now and then on my mind--the -more since Pigeon-breast had broken into the trouble at an early hour as -the open ill-wisher of Peg--to call this fine gentleman's attention -to the missive with a view to asking him was he its architect. In my -present frame of hunger to lay hands on a flesh and blood enemy of -Peg's--one of my own rude sex--and I suppose because Pigeon-breast was -a foppish creature of scents and ribbons who might lean to feminine -methods of attack, I put the question to him. Fairly, I blurted it out, -and I fear with nothing of fineness or diplomacy. - -“Me?” cried the outraged Pigeon-breast in a shrill treble through a -sense of injustice; “me?” he cried again, starting back a pace, perhaps -from savageries which looked out upon him from my eye, “never! On my -soul! to think of such a thing! Me write an anonymous letter! Why, sir,” - and poor Pigeon-breast chirped forth the words like a mouse that has -been wronged, “why, sir, should a man say so, I'd have him to the field, -sir, and cut his throat.” - -There was no doubt of it; the insulted Pigeon-breast was not the author -of that letter. No man might simulate his indignant excitement. I made -amends handsomely, and for the first time Pigeon-breast and I shook -hands. There was no harm in the creature save that he was a bandbox -fool. - -It ran well towards evening when I went about in the conservatory -culling a basket of flowers for Peg. This I was wont to do each day, -since the blossoms went otherwise to waste; for the place was a mere -lair and nest of masculinity, with the General's niece gone home, and -none about save the General and myself--and I might add Earl, but he had -no wit save for canvas and colors, and no thought except from morning -till night to paint the General's portrait. The General and I were no -mighty consumers of nosegays; wherefore, as I've said, and to save the -flowers from loss, I was used each day to cut an armful of the best and -bravest and send them across to Peg's, where they would give her smile -for smile and dare their beauties against her own from every corner. - -While I was roving right and left among the blossoms, the General came -in with long strides. There was a kind of angry hurry to him, and he -carried a letter in his hand. - -“Here is something to make you curse your kind,” cried he. Then, seeing -my flowers: “How now! how now! and when was Mars a gardener and has the -world turned girl! These should be thin days and bloodless, when the -starkest saber that ever rode on my bridle hand--he whom the Creeks -called the 'Big Death'--loiters with woman's wares and learns to twine a -posy.” - -“They are for Peg,” said I, more nettled than I showed, for it struck me -he talked a deal about nothing at all. - -“Oh, they are for Peg,” he repeated, his glance whimsical, yet narrow -and intent; “they are for Peg!” Then just as I was warming to the brink -of knowing what he would mean by that, he harked back suddenly to the -letter in his clutch. “Come with me. Here is a word from that very -Reverend Doctor Ely about your Peg, and we must concert steps to prove -him the false defamer that he is.” - - - - -CHAPTER VII--THE SECRETARY, SUAVE AS CREAM. - -And now there comes beneath my hand the hard portion of this history, -the part which I most mislike and bear with least of patience. It is -the record written by the smug, false Doctor Ely to the General, wherein -with a particular past bearing, he piled up his scarlet charges. There -came a dozen counts, and as if it were an indictment; and in them no -slackness, but, instead, an evil confidence of statement plain and -clear, as one after another he cast those stones at Peg. Nor shall his -communication be set forth; I would not so offend against the whiteness -of Peg's name, nor yet harass my own soul's roots by giving a line of it -to types and presses. The more, since it was all a web of lies which sly -rogues wove for the shallow hand of this Ely; and not enough of truth in -it from top to bottom as should serve to make it respectable falsehood. -Sufficient that there were stories with Washington and again New York -as the theatres, and on these was based a brazen demand that Eaton be -dismissed the cabinet and Peg whipped from among women wherever virtue -had a name. - -As the General read these things aloud I sat biting my nail in the -flaming impatience of my rage. - -“And now what think you?” said he, when he was done. - -“I think,” cried I, “that I shall ride at once for the caitiff ears of -him.” - -The General, seeing my anger, turned to be mighty calm. It was a manner -of ours that when I was for a rage he would go the other way; I, on -my side and by way of requital, showed never so busy about methods -for peace as when the General was for sounding Boots and Saddles. So, -beholding me eating my fingers in a sort of blood-eagerness to come at -the throat of that Ely, the General would be for craft; and to demand -proof; and to go upon a litigation of the business among ourselves. - -“And now you know,” said the General, with a bitterness in his mouth -like aloes, “why I fear preachers and your peace folk. Here is a false -tissue against a girl as white as an angel.” - -“My soul for that!” I interjected. - -“No one not of the cloth, and saved from men's vengeance by his coat and -ruffle, would so dare. But now this Ely throws these lies in our laps, -and we must sit tied.” - -“Yes,” I cried, “I see your meaning right well, and I would give my left -hand at the wrist joint could any gate be opened through which in honor -I might win to the miscreant's heart.” Now the General read the letter -to himself; now he knitted his forehead into a snarl and brooded while -over against him I sat fury-stung. - -“Two matters we are to agree on,” said the General at last. “We are not -to tell Peg.” - -“No,” said I. - -“Nor Eaton.” - -Now, somehow, I in no fashion, not even the most shadowy, had had Eaton -on my slope of thought. It had seemed, in the confusion of wrath into -which this charge laid on poor Peg had stirred me, as though there were -just three folk in interest for our own side, being the General and Peg -and myself. The mention of Eaton struck on me in a strange, blistering -way, and was as much an iron in my soul as the slanders of that infamous -Ely himself. This came to be no more than a blur of my wits, however -it departed in a blink, and then a feeling somewhat of pleasure -succeeded to think Eaton would not be engaged in Peg's defence. - -“Peg shall not know,” repeated the General, as he who goes over a -manouvre in his mind, “Eaton shall not know. You and I will be enough; -and Noah; and mayhap Henry Lee, since I think, Major, you are not the -man to be trusted with a reply. You--like myself.--would overflow too -much, since you own a feeling too deep.” - -There was sense in what the General advanced; I was in an ill frame -for cunning, and to be cool of quill with any specious or refutatory -letter-writing. I could have indited nothing that would not run into a -challenge with the first line; and, with the pulpit character of the foe -to be our answer, that would have been as so much raving madness. - -“Let us” said the General, again taking up the scrawl, “examine this -precious scorpion's nest in detail, and then we may know best how it -should be torn to pieces. This Ely does not make these charges by his -own knowledge, but declares how he believes in their truth on the word -of some 'extremely honest individual' of this town. This person would be -so much the viper he must needs hide and crawl under cover; for this Ely -also says 'who asks his name withheld.'” - -By this time I had myself in recovery and began to take a part in the -thinking. - -“First, then,” said I, “is there any accusation carried which you, -yourself, should contradict?” - -“There are two,” returned the General. “This Ely has it that my dear -wife knew Peg's bad conduct and condemned her for it. That is false; my -wife spoke of Peg within a six-month; she loved her like her own child; -and, I well recall, she kissed Peg when last we left this place. Then, -too, Ely asserts how Timberlake was jealous of Eaton before he sailed -for the Mediterranean, hated him as Peg's tempter, and would have slain -him. That, also, I should know to be a lie; for here,” and the General -crossed to a shelf and took down a rich Turkish tobacco pouch, “is a -tobacco pocket which Timberlake sent to Eaton with a letter asking him -to give it me when I arrived; and the letter bore date not ten days -before Timberlake died. There remain but two great delinquencies -alleged; the one here and the other in New York; and both are capable -of proof for either their truth or falsity.” - -“And how shall we go about that proof?” I asked. - -“As a primary step, then, let us have Noah with us.” - -Noah came, and the General put the Ely letter into his dark, nervous -hands. - -“The gentleman seems marvelously prompt,” said Noah, “to decide a -woman's fame away on barest hearsay. Doubtless he is a good Christian, -but he would make a bad judge.” - -“This is what you will do, Noah, if you love me,” said the General: “Go -to Philadelphia. Squeeze from this Ely the name of that reptile on whose -word he starts about this crime against innocence. Then press to -New York for the evidence needed to display the falsehood he tells -concerning Peg in that place.” - -When Noah had gone forth, the General called in Henry Lee, who was a -secret, truthworthy man, and, dictating while Lee did the pen work, -proceeded to beat the Reverend Ely and his lies as folk beat carpets. -The General, when it was done, dismissing Lee, read to me his answer; -and I could not so much as add one word. It was as complete a retort, -and withal as slashing an arraignment of this Ely for his own cruel -part, as might be compassed with paper and ink. I listened; and I never -loved the General half so well before. - -“And yet,” observed the General, when he had closed the reading and the -letter lay ready for the post, “this Ely is but the mask for some rogue -who hides behind him.” - -There was no more to do now, save wait for Noah's return. I had one -ordeal of the spirit, however; that was when Peg came next day. I so -yearned over her in pity, it marked itself in my face and she took -some dim account of it. She went away wrong in her hunting for a cause, -however. - -“What has been the mischance?” said Peg, getting up and standing behind -my chair with a soft hand on each of my shoulders. “You've had poor news -from your farms?” - -“A horse dead,” I replied. This was so far true as a word that the -letter telling me thereof had but just arrived, and lay open on my -table. “Only that a favorite horse has died,” I replied. “But he was one -of the General's Truxton colts, and I but loth to lose him.” - -It was a soon day thereafter, and we yet waiting for word of Noah, when -the General re-opened the affair of the Ely letter. - -“The man Ely,” said he, thoughtfully, “has been practiced upon. The -Calhoun interest it was which stirred him to this. He would be clay -easily moulded for such a purpose, and peculiarly when the potters -employed upon him might promise somewhat for his ambition. As against -Eaton and Peg, the fellow would needs lack personal motive, since -he knows them not at all. He might find in his bosom, truly, a part -willingness to disturb me, because I broke the heart of his hope for a -Florida exaltation. Yet even with that to train his malignancy upon the -Eatons, it is clear he must be loaded, primed, and aimed by other hands. -Thus do I make the story of it: if Clay be out, as you declare, who -is there save Calhoun to put this Ely forward? Then, too, there is the -coincidence of method. Ely does there what the Calhoun folk do here.” - -“Still,” I returned, for I believed in justice though to an enemy, -and would not condemn the Vice-President without some open sureness of -proof; “still, as Noah explained, these villainies might find act and -parcel in Calhoun's interests, and that gentleman be as innocent of -personal part as next year's babes.” - -“Be that as it may,” retorted the General, “a man is responsible for his -dogs. Besides, it is too much to believe that Calhoun has no notice of -this war on the Eatons.” - -“Oh, as to that,” I replied, “I think there is scant doubt. An important -movement in his destinies is not to continue for long in the dark, to a -keen sight like Calhoun's. However, he might miss details.” - -“He knows of these tales against Peg,” declared the General firmly, and -as though the question were solved and settled. “Also, by lifting his -finger he could end them in the mouths that give them words. When one -can do a thing and doesn't do it, that is because one doesn't want to do -it, but prefers things as they are. And there you have it. In the mean -courses against Peg your Vice-President is accessory. By the Eternal!” - swore the General abruptly, beginning to walk about the floor, “but such -perfidy makes me to loathe the man! I should hate all that comes from -him, whether of policy or plan. For where a source is foul, the stream -will be unclean.” - -There was now to enter upon the stage one who wrought strongly for Peg's -defence. But he toiled better for himself, for at last he took the White -House by it; the General in a gust of kindness for what he did in Peg's -pure favor making him his heir of politics and laying the presidency in -his hands with the death of his own second term. This personage, to be -so much the ally of Peg, and so fortunate for his own future, was none -other than that Van Buren who resigned his Governorship and traveled the -long way from Albany to become the General's Secretary of State. - -Heretofore I've made suggestion that the General's knowledge of Van -Buren was nothing deep, but only narrow and of a surface sort. More; -the truth was that now when the General stood in the midst of this Eaton -trouble and saw a long strife ahead, he was by no sense secure for the -coming attitude of his premier, and went doubt-pricked as to whether or -no it would turn to be a friendly one. I could discern some feather of -these misgivings when one evening over our pipes we dwelt on Marcy and -Van Buren, these two being topmost spirits of our party in their state. - -Marcy was a bold man, and strong with a burly force; as frank and -without fear too, as a soldier, and less the hypocrite than any of his -day. He had yet to say, from his seat in the Senate, “The politicians of -my state wear no masks of superior goodness and make no pretences. They -are content to preach what they practice. If they be defeated, they -expect to step down and out; if they triumph, they look to enjoy the -fruits of their victory. They see no harm in the aphorism, 'To the -victor belongs the spoil of the enemy.'” Marcy, I say, had not yet -uttered these words in the Senate; but they dwelt with him as a -sentiment; he had given them expression in Duff Green's paper; and, -since the General said nothing in negation, they were held to declare -the feelings of the administration. - -Before this, I have written somewhere, have I not?--for old age can not -hold a memory, nor tell a lucid story step by step, but forever must -wander to the garrulous this-side-or-that, with topics alien to the task -in hand--how I caught some flash of the General's uncertainty of Van -Buren and the pose that gentleman would take on? It fell in this kind. I -had asked then a question about Van Buren, and how he compared with his -fellow captain, Marcy. The General shook uncertain head. - -“Van Buren may surprise us,” said he, “and show me wrong besides; but -this is what I think. You are to bear in mind, also, that his selection -to be at my cabinet right hand was not personal but political. Here is -how I hold him.” Now the General spoke with a thoughtful, measured flow -of speech, as though his eye were turned to introspection, and he read, -as one reads a page of print, his estimate of him whom he sought to -weigh. “Van Buren is essentially furtive, lurking, cat-like. He delights -in moonlight politics and follows the byways. He avoids the eye, is -seldom in the show ring, and, in making his excursions, sticks to the -lanes and keeps off the highways. Few men see, and fewer know, Van -Buren. He is sly rather than bold; chicanes rather than assails; and -when attacked he does not fight in that strifish sense of hard knocks. -He poisons the springs and streams and standing water; and then he falls -back into the hills. Van Buren does with snares what others do by blows; -traps while others hunt. And yet, in a feline way, he likes trouble. Set -out a bowl of milk and a bowl of blood, and turn your back. If sure -of unobservation, he will lap the blood. But if you stare at him, he -dissembles with the milk, purring with fervor sedulous. Ever secret, Van -Buren knows of no harder fate than mere discovery. His points of power -are his egotism, his skill for sly effort, his talent as a trader of -politics. Marcy is of another sort. Marcy is vigorous where Van Buren is -fine. If a band of music were to go by, Marcy would regard the bass drum -as the great instrument. Van Buren would prefer the piccolo. Marcy does -his war work with an axe. When any homicide of politics enforces -itself upon Van Buren he moves with sack and bowstring. He waits until -midnight, and then, with victim gagged and bagged and bound, drowns him -in the Bosphorus of party.” - -Even as the General spoke, Van Buren was trudging up the street; for it -would appear that he had come into town the hour before, and now made -speed to pay his respects to the General. - -While Van Buren was in talk with the General, our first greetings being -done, I strove to come by some true account of one who was like to make -for much weight in the scales. He was round, short, and by no means -superb or imposing. Standing between the General and myself, and both -of us above six feet, he seemed something stunted. There was a -quiet twinkle in his gray, intelligent eye that he drew from his -tavern-keeping sire of Kinderhook; the latter being of shrewd Dutch -stock, born to count pennies and to save them, and whose profits with -his inn found partial coinage in an education above bottles and taprooms -for his son. There hovered an oily peace about Van Buren; it showed on -him like painted color. I was not tremendously impressed of him, I grant -you; albeit, before all was done, I came to better learn him. The -man, for a best simile, was like so much quicksilver. Bright and of -surprising weight, he rolled away from a touch and never failed to -fit himself scrupulously and plausibly into every inequality which -the surface he rested on presented. He came to be, as you may think, -precisely the man for the General; since, while the one was as apt for -heat as Sahara, and as much the home of hurricanes, the other under -no stress was ever known to give or take offence. He would be without -quills, this Van Buren, and yet no porcupine in his rattling armor went -about more perfect to his own defence or so equal for the problem of his -own security. - -Van Buren made no lengthy stay with us; there was a hand-shake, a talk -of a moment, a bow, and he was back to his quarters in the Indian Queen. - -“And what do you say of him?” asked the General, when now his new -secretary was gone. - -“Why, sir,” I replied, “I should call your story of the man a good one. -But he does not look so strong as you would make him.” - -“Why, then,” returned the General, “neither does any other thing of -silk.” Then, after a pause: “Just as an insinuation is stronger than a -direct charge, so is Van Buren stronger than other men. I warrant you, -as we stand here with all our wisdom, he holds our measures more nearly -than we hold his.” - -The General, you are to observe, and whether early or late, never said -a word to Van Buren of Peg and the villain forays against her fame; -the General was too proud for that. The defence of Peg seemed a thing -personal to his heart; with him it owned no place in politics or the -business of the state. Therefore, he would ask no man's aid, and folk on -that quarrel might be neutral or pick their sides and go what ways they -would. - -The General, I say, beheld nothing of politics in the question of his -defence of Peg; it was wholly the thing personal. He never realized, -what is clear to you and me, that everything was the thing personal with -him, and politics a thing most personal of all. Even now, since he had -found the Palmetto coterie to be among his enemies, and within short -weeks of the birth of his first rancor against Calhoun as one who had -sought to do him hidden harm while apeing friendship and aiming at his -betrayal with a kiss, he had commenced to nourish a steady wrath against -that statesman's policies of Secession and States Rights. This latter he -was cultivating and feeding in all possible fashion. - -One day I came upon him deep within Marshall's definitions of treason as -declared in the trial of Aaron Burr. - -“There's the law for you,” he cried, with a note of exultation in his -tone, and thrusting the book at me with one hand while with the other -he marked the place; “there's the law of treason so laid down that a -wayfaring man though a fool should not err therein. I shall get it pat -to my tongue; I may yet teach it to our Secessionists with a gibbet.” - -I put this down to show the climbing of the General's anger against -Calhoun; and how it began to spread and feel about to assail the -Vice-President in his acts and plans and sentiments and hopes. It was, -as he said aforetime, “We would foil the villain and save our pretty -Peg.” - -You may rest sure I made no argument against his law studies; indeed, I -think treason a crime which the White House can not understand too well -nor hate too thoroughly, and I never thought so more than in those far -days when the General read Marshall and we carried forward our fight for -lovely Peg. - -While the General spoke no word of the Eatons and their injuries to Van -Buren, the latter for a certainty was not long in town before he thereon -held converse with himself. I would be made wise of this by his coming -to me--it was our second encounter--and, with a manner suave as cream, -asking what to my thought would be a time fitting, and to the lady -convenient, for him to call upon our Peg. - -“For you must know,” said he, spreading out his smooth hands and -regarding the backs of them, being, I think, a trick of his to cover an -inability to look one between the eyes, “for you must know, sir, since -my wife died, and with no daughter in my house to teach me, my society -learning has gone excessively to seed.” - -It became my turn to say that society, I was told--for I carried no -personal knowledge thereof, having little genius for it--ran now to -broken ends and fragments, and would continue so throughout the -year. The social season, by word of such experienced parlor scouts as -Pigeon-breast, would not begin until New Year's Day. - -“However,” said I, in finale, “you may take it from me that the Eatons -will be blithe to receive you on any evening you should care to call. -There need be no formality; you may pull their latch-string at any hour -with every assurance of a welcome.” - -“Can not you take me there this evening?” he asked, with a kind of -enthusiasm. - -“I am only too pleased to be of service.” - -The fair truth is I could have hugged the little secretary from gladness -for Peg. - -That same night, when later I paid my usual visit to the General for a -friendly pipe and to finish the day in smoke before we went to bed, I -told him of Van Buren's waiting on Peg. The pleasure the news gave him -fell across his face like sunlight. But he carried himself in ordinary -fashion. - -“Why, sir,” said he, “I'm glad that he has been to see the Eatons. -Still, no less could have been looked for from a gentleman.” - -“But he did better,” I said. “Never have I heard more delicate -compliment than he offered to Peg. He says she shall preside at his -house for those functions which belong with his position.” - -“And that, since he has no wife, will be a vast convenience for him,” - responded the General; “this pouring of his guests' tea by our beautiful -Peg.” - -The General would accept it as a matter of course, but I tell you the -tidings of that tea-pouring warmed the cockles of his heart. For myself, -I made no effort to hide my satisfaction. - -“Is it not a strange thing,” said the General, after a bit, “how one's -first impression will go astray? Who could be more true, or more wise, -or better bred or founded in whatever makes for the best in a man, than -our Van Buren? And yet I thought him sly, and with a hand for selfish -design. The man's as simple as a child!” - -“He tells me,” I remarked, “that your friend Hoyt of this region warned -him you did not like him, and how your great favorite was Calhoun.” - -“Hoyt is a presumptuous fool,” returned the General, hotly. “I would not -give Van Buren's finger for Calhoun. Why should he be favorite of mine -who foments treason, and schemes to split the nation like a billet of -wood!” - -Peg was with me betimes next morning to jubilate with dancing pulses -over Van Buren to her house the night before. - -“For can't you see,” she cried, her cheeks red with the excitement that -crowed in her breast, “what a strategic point, as you sons of war -would term it,”--Peg was laughing here--“is your little, round, smooth -Secretary of State? He carries the grand legation folk in his wake. With -them, all ribbons and orders, and the army--for the latter will be bound -to us since we are the war department--our receptions should be a blaze -of glory and gold braid.” - -Here Peg clapped her hands with the glee of it. It was an inspiration to -see her so gay. - -“I am overcome of delight,” I said, mocking gravity, “to know that we -are like to gain so much of ornamentation.” Then, changing my tone: “But -of a truth, my little one, I shall forever love our State Secretary for -your sweet sake.” - -“You brought him,” cried Peg. “What a watch-dog you are to me!” This -with sudden warmth. “That is the word, a watch-dog--a faithful watch-dog -with a great sleepless heart guarding its Peg! And you shall have a -collar.” - -[Illustration: 0226] - -With that, since I was sitting in my chair and so within her reach, the -minx crept up and threw her arms about my neck. It was simply play--the -exuberance of a born tomboy. And yet I was glad we were alone and no -General about, else I would have lived long ere I had heard the last of -it. The situation would have fitted like a glove with the General's bent -of humor, and I should not have cared for his raillery. - -Peg clung to my neck like a rose to an oak while I tried softly to -loosen her arms. I could not make head against her for fear of hurting -her. - -“How do you like your collar, watchdog?” she cried, with a chuckle. “And -now the buckle--how do you like that?” Here she laid her velvet cheek -against my face. “So, watch-dog, you would slip your collar?” This, -banteringly. “There; you are free.” And Peg unlocked her arms and stood -back smiling, her small, white leopard teeth just showing, and her eyes -like diamonds. Then donning a satiric air: “Sir, you call yourself a -gentleman and a politician. You should know, then, there be two honors -no man may decline; the one is a presidency and the other is a--lady.” - -With this smartness on her lips Peg broke into downright merriment. The -little witch was never so charming! - -That evening I was sitting alone with the General; each of us silent and -within himself, wrapping his own fancies about him like a cloak. I know -not on what uplands of conjecture the General's thoughts were grazing; -for myself, I was dwelling on Peg, for I could still feel that soft, -warm collar of her two arms clasping my neck. - -It is trenching on the wondrous, too, how the sweet image of a woman -will train one's soul for war. No sooner would I take Peg upon the -back of my meditations, than they straightway went plunging off to -her enemies, and to tire themselves with vain circlings of how best to -refute the malice of her foes and return upon their wicked heads the -most of cruelty. Commonly I might be held as one not beyond touch of -mercy, and indeed I have spared a painted Creek when he stood helpless. -But I doubt me if Peg's foes, when by some sleight of fate they had -fallen within my power, would have found a least loophole of relief. -Of a verity! I think I might have looked long on their writhings ere my -heart was touched or my hands raised to stay their tortures. - -While I sat in this blood-mood, and shedding in imagination the lives -of ones who would persecute our innocent, my glance was caught by the -General's pistols lying near by on a table. They were of that long, -duelling breed belonging with the times, and the General kept them as -bright and new as he kept his honor. - -“And why are those on parade?” I asked, pointing to the weapons. - -“It is the day of the year,” said the General, and his steady voice -was low, “whereon I killed Dickenson. This is the one I used,” and he -stretched his long arm and offered it for my inspection. It had a ribbon -of black about the butt. “That is not for Dickenson,” he explained; “it -is for her.” Here he indicated that miniature of his wife from which -he would never be parted, where it rested on the mantel and looked down -upon us with the painted eyes. - -“You speak in a queer way,” I said; “do you regret killing the man?” - -“No,” he returned, half sadly; “I do not regret killing him.” - -“Tell me of it,” I urged. “I was not about, and Overton went with you to -the field.” - -The General never named his fight with Dickenson to others, but I was -sure he would tell the tale to me. In good truth, I had not asked for -it, save that, knowing him far better than I knew myself, I saw what -was in his manner to make me believe he would be the lighter after the -relation. - -“Dickenson,” said the General, making no flourish of talk in explanation -of a readiness to describe adventures which some folk for the red ending -might have shrunk from; “Dickenson was the tool of a conspiracy made -against my life, and politics was at the bottom of it. I was too -popular; I was in the way; the grave was a place for me; thus argued -my enemies. And then they went about to draw in Dickenson to be their -cat's-paw. - -“Dickenson was young and vain, and withal willingly cruel enough to act -as my murderer for the illustration it would bring. He counted himself -safe, since he was reckoned the surest, quickest hand in all the world. -The man could shoot from the hip like a flash, and as accurately as one -might put one's finger. - -“Once the plan was laid, Dickenson took a sure course; he spoke evil of -my wife.” Here the General picked up the two pistols, a butt in either -hand, and looked first upon the one and then upon its fellow. “Following -my marriage, with every dollar I owned, I bought these pistols. They are -hair-triggers and a breath unhooks them. Also, they are sighted to shoot -as fine and as true as the moral law. I gave to their purchase my last -dollar, and devoted them to the destruction of what scoundrels should -vilify my wife. They have done their work and never failed me. - -“Overton was to act my second, and we would fight in Kentucky, sixty -miles away. All day we traveled; the Dickenson party preceded us over -the same trail. At every squatter's cabin the inmates would call us to -the wizard work of Dickenson. Here he shot the head from a fowl; there -he cut the string by which a gourd was hanging; now he drove a nail at -twenty paces. It was a trick to shake my nerve. - -“We would fight in the early morning, each standing to a peg twelve -paces apart. Overton won the word and the pistols. I was dressed in a -black coat, loose and long, and with no white to show at the throat and -coax a bullet. We were given our places, I to my joy with my favorite -pistol. - -“It was conceded by Overton and myself, as we went up and down the -business in advance, that Dickenson would kill me. Our hope was that I'd -last long enough to kill him--he, the defamer of my wife! - -“The thought on our side was for me to brace myself and take Dickenson's -fire. I could not rival him for quickness or for sureness. And the haste -of an attempt would waste and throw away my aim. - -“We were put up, I say; the words were to be -'Fire--one--two--three--stop!' We might fire at any moment between -'Fire!' and 'Stop!' And Overton had the word. As I took my place I -slipped a bullet into my mouth. I would set my teeth on it to steady my -hand. - -“Overton cried the word and began the count. With the word 'Fire!' -Dickenson's weapon flashed. I heard the roar of it, and felt the numb, -dull shock as the lead crashed into my side. But I sustained myself. I -was held on my feet by hate. I thought he had slain me, but with him out -of hell I would not rest in my grave. - -“When I did not fall, but stood firm, Dickenson started back. - -“'My God, I have missed him!' he cried. - -“'Step to your peg, sir,' roared Overton, pausing in his count and -cocking a pistol; 'step to your peg, or I'll blow your head from your -body!' - -“Dickenson stood again to his peg and turned his eyes from me; his face -was the color of tobacco ashes. - -“Overton resumed his count. 'One!' 'Click!'” My pistol caught at -half-cock. Overton paused and I re-cocked my pistol; Dickenson white -and firm to his peg--a man who had played his life away. - -“'Two!' cried Overton. - -“My pistol responded; the lead tore its way through the midst of -Dickenson's body. He crippled slowly down on one knee; and then he -fell along on his face, and next turned over on his back with a sort of -twitching jerk. I never took my eyes from him.” - -“And your wound,” said I, “was a serious one, I well know that.” - -“My ribs were broken, while my boot was clogged with the blood which -ran down beneath my garments. The bullet I placed between my teeth was -crushed as flat as a two-bit piece.” - -“It was hardy work,” said I, “bearing up and firing on the heels of such -a wound.” - -“Sir, I was thinking on her”--glancing at the miniature. “I should have -killed that man though he had put his bullet through my heart.” - -Here the General turned his face towards me; his eyes were shining with -the lambent orange glow one sees in the panther's eyes at night. - -There was silence, I still looking on the General. His nervous face was -twitching. Then the frown on his forehead gave way to quiet sadness. -Rising, he stood by the mantel and gazed for long, and tenderly, on the -miniature of his dead dear one. - -“I have had many titles,” said he, and he spoke whisperingly and as -though talking with the picture; “I have had many titles, and the -greatest was the one 'her husband.' I have had honors;--I stand the -chief of the greatest nation in the greatest age the world has witnessed; -and I would give all to hold her hand one moment. They say there is a -heaven above us. It will be no heaven unless I meet her there.” - -Now while I was in warmest sympathy with the General, his talk would -seem to fill me up with darkness. Also, I could feel the two hot arms -of Peg burning my neck. That story, too, of the Dickenson fight may be -supposed to have set in my nature that animal which lairs within each of -us, somewhat on truculent edge. Abruptly I burst forth: - -“And it is a surprising thing,” cried I--ripping out an oath, the last -not common with me--“how Eaton abides Peg's wrongs. He should have -killed a man or two by now.” - -“Sir,” returned the General, coming from his reverie with a kind of -snap, “sir, no man since Catron has been known to speak a word. Besides, -my cabinet men can not go trooping off for Blandensburg at any price. It -is one of the drawbacks to a high position of state that it chops one's -hands off at the elbow; duels are no longer a question.” - -“I do not see it thus,” I retorted viciously. “You do not? Look on Aaron -Burr--deserted and old and poor, and dying in New York. He came down -from his vice-presidency to slay one who had maligned him for years. And -there is his reward.” - -“What do I care for that?” cried I. “If it were for Peg, I should leave -a throne and perish poor, despised and all alone, but I would strangle -the throat that spoke her wrong.” - -“Ah! if it were Peg!” And the General, now alert and wholly of this -world, gave me that narrow intent glance I resented among the flowers. - -What might have been uttered next was cut short by a messenger on the -door. He brought word from Noah; he had just come to town, and since it -was turned late he would defer his call until the morning. - -“Let's have him with us now,” cried the General, briskly. “I shall not -sleep for hours; and you, I take it, will stay awake in such a cause?” - -“I would stand sleepless guard for weeks if it were to defend Peg,” said -I. - -“Think now and then, my friend, for your own defence.” The General said -this with a look both quizzical and grave. Then, without pausing: “Write -Noah a note in my name.” While I scribbled he walked to and fro. “I must -ever ask you to write for me, since I am so unfortunate as to deny a -proverb and be one whose sword was ever mightier than his pen.” - -In the hall I discovered Jim, and told him to depart with our message to -the Indian Queen. - -“'Course I'll nacherally go, Marse Major,” said Jim, “but I was jes' -waitin' to see you-all, an' ask how soon you reckons we'll go caperin' -back to Tennessee.” - -“Why,” I demanded, “what has made you so soon homesick?” - -“It aint that, Marse Major,” and Jim gave to his words a melancholy -whine, “but we-all can't stand d'pace yere. For a week Jim was as happy -an' chirpy as a drunkard at a barbecue. But since you locks that closet -do', Jim's sort o' been obleeged to buy whiskey for himse'f; an' what -you think? They charge Jim five cents a drink for whiskey that don't -cost two bits a gallon all along d'Cumberland! They's shorely robbers; -an' they jes' nacherally takes Jim's money off him so fas' he cotch -cold.” - -“Go on, you rogue!” said I. “Here is a Mexican dollar to bolster your -finances. We're not yet bankrupt, Jim.” - -Noah came to us spattered of travel, and with the high riding-boots he -wore on the road. I took a deal of pleasure for a buoyancy I observed in -him, since I read it as a sign of whitest promise. Nor was I to be cast -down from that hope. - -“You are to know,” said Noah, turning to the General, “that I was two -days before your letter with the Reverend Ely. In the first of our -conversations he held his head loftily; in the end, he came something -under control. Your letter much dismayed him, and after that his courage -ran very thin indeed. Now he quite agrees he knew nothing, and was wrong -and false in all he wrote. I dragged him to New York with me. I have -Mrs. Eaton's innocence here, in these papers.” Noah laid a sealed -package by the General's elbow. They were from the Reverend Ely, as well -as from the folk of the hotel wherein that Ely said Peg lodged. “They -are oath-made; they prove Mrs. Eaton chaste as snow.” - -“And how did you make conquest of this Ely?” questioned the General, his -eye gratified and spirit a mate for Noah's. - -“The power of the press, I should call it,” laughed Noah. “The ignoble -Ely hath a mighty distaste of unfriendly ink. And I'm an editor. That -was it,” went on Noah; “I showed him what might be done. He should stand -in the pillory of my types for the reasonless defamer he was. Then the -dog trembled and came my way with meekness, asking what he should do. I -answered much like the monks with the wild Clovis, 'Bend thy neck, proud -Sicambrian; adore what thou hast burned, burn what thou hast adored!' -In short, I demanded a letter of retractory amends to the President; and -also that he name his fellow reptile, whose infamous word he claimed for -the truth of his scurrility.” - -“And who is he?” demanded the General, as warm as ever I saw him. - -By some virtue of telepathic sort, I read the answer before Noah uttered -it. And why had I not guessed before! The secret one so falsely in -the ear of the shallow Ely was none other than the unctious Reverend -Campbell. - - - - -CHAPTER VIII--THE MAD CAPRICIOUS PEG - -Next morning the sun had not climbed over-high when the Reverend -Campbell, head down and secret eye aslant, came shuffling to call upon -the General. I caught the black shadow of him--for all the world like -the shadow of some vulture to sail between one and the sun--as the -drooping, furtive creature sidled through the hall. The General had sent -for him, for the General was not one to let the grass grow deep between -resolve and action. - -“I will see the man alone, Major,” observed the General; “he might -complain, were you present, of a situation offering two against one and -planned to over-ride him.” - -Such management was much to my appetite, since it would but serve to -boil my anger--this listening while the Reverend Rogue laid out his pack -of calumnies upon Peg. In good truth! I much misdoubt if I had withstood -my hands from him when under such honest provocation; and that, maugre -his black surtout and pulpit snuffle. - -And yet it did not miss me as a feature hard to be read for its -significance, that now was the earliest time when the General had shown -himself so equitable as to think on “two against one” and fail to ask -my presence for his conferences. He had met folk for war and peace, and -they had come alone; I had been there, and no one spoke of over-riding. -However, the subject was not worth quizzing one's self concerning; -the Reverend Campbell was come, the best thing about it being that the -General lived ample and to spare to arrest whatever of slander he should -bring us in his mouth, and put it to the death. The General could -track a lie as surely as ever he tracked Creek, and lived even more -inveterately its enemy. - -Peg met the Reverend Campbell almost in the great front door, for she -was on her usual journey to consult with me about some trifling nothing. -When his sidelong glance encountered Peg's, the rascal cowered and -seemed to turn more mean, if that were possible, than by nature belonged -with him. But he said no word; he did not so much as muster against her -one square look, but sinuously, and as a snake might, writhed himself -out of her path Peg, for herself, swept him with a chill, errant eye as -if he were some gutter-being, offensive though unknown. - -“And what brings that bird of mal-omen to flutter about one's door?--so -bright a morning, too!” This was Peg's question on the Reverend Campbell -as she walked in to me and climbed to her customary chair at the left -hand of my desk. “What should you say, watch-dog, was his bad mission? -Is he a threat? Does he drag a danger after him? You must be alert if -you would make safe your little Peg.” - -The tone of raillery which Peg adopted secured me; she had no surmise, -then, to the purpose of the Reverend Campbell. - -“It's quite sure,” I returned, evasively, “that our swart visitor would -be much uplifted were the General to relent and dispose of Florida -according to his wish.” - -And now while Peg sits before the mirror of my memory with her sweet -face, as she on that far morning sat in the great leathern chair, let me -please my fond pencil with a word of her. There were so many expressions -of the unexpected to our Peg--for so I had grown to call her--one must -needs be describing and redescribing her with each new page one turns. -A born enchantress and a witch full-blown besides! it is the mere truth -that Peg bore upon me like a spell. - -There was never woman to be Peg's marrow for flash and spirit, and -beyond all to creep so tenderly near to one. And for a crown to that, -she was as wise as the serpent. There were moments when Socrates himself -might have listened to her and not lost his time. - -And she could shift color like a chameleon. Behold her on some day of -social parade, or where she meets strangers or half acquaintances, and -she will be older by fifteen years than now when she plants her small -self in that armchair, and makes me turn my writing downward to talk -with her. Tender, wilful, pliant, wise, patient, petulant, true, -uncertain, sure, confiding and confusing, she offered contradictions -equal with the General. I would exhaust the roll-call of the adjectives -were I wholly to set forth this child-woman in the last of her frank -arts and sage simplicities. - -Peg wore as many moods as a lake on a flawy day and where skies are -scud-swept. Now, with a cloud across the sun, she would be dull and -sad as lead. Then, with a gust of wind, she would wrinkle into waves of -temper. And next there would dawn a tranquil moment when, calm and clear -and deep and sweet, she shone on one like burnished silver. - -Once, I recall, she sat in her big chair, steeped in a way of pensive -wordlessness. I had not heard her voice for an hour; nor she mine, for -I was fallen behind in my letters, and politics and president-making are -mighty gluttons of ink. Suddenly she broke in: - -“Why are you so good to me--so much more than any other?” - -“How should one fail of sympathy,” said I, giving my manner a light -turn, “for another so innocent and so ill-used?” - -“And it's just sympathy--all sympathy?” demanded Peg, resting her round -chin in her little shell of a palm. “Nothing but sympathy?” - -“What else should it be?” - -“I don't know,” said Peg, shortly. Then she walked slowly across the -room and studied a picture. In a moment she gave a word to me over -her shoulder: “I may tell you this, Mr. Questioner. There is but one -question a man should put to a woman.” - -Smiling on her jaunty petulances, I went forward with my writing; she to -pulling out the slides of a cabinet. This apartment, I should tell you, -was my private workshop of politics wherein I repaired and extended the -destinies of the General, and transacted his fame for him. There were a -world of history and one president--and say the least of it--constructed -in that room. - -Peg came presently to my elbow, bringing a trinket of coral. It had been -my sister's, and was my mother's before that. - -“Is it worth much money?” asked Peg. - -“Nothing at all,” I returned. - -“And yet you value it highly?” - -“Very highly.” - -“May I have it?” - -It seemed shame to hesitate, and yet I did, while Peg stood with wistful -face. - -“Why,” said I at last, “I meant it for the one I should love.” - -“Oh, you meant it for her whom you would love! And do you look to see it -again after that? The coral is mine from this moment.” - -With a swish of her skirts Peg was gone; and with her went the coral. - -Peg betimes would lay out her campaign for the coming winter. It was -then she talked of Van Buren, “the good little secretary,” as Peg named -him. Van Buren went often to the Eatons; and on each of those kind -excursions he climbed ever higher with the General and with me. - -“Not only,” said Peg, assuming a wise pucker of the brow as she -recounted how she should wage and win her social war, “not only shall I -preside for our good little secretary at dinners and receptions, but he -has brought to me the Viscount Vaughn, who is minister for the English, -and Baron Krudener, who is here, as you know, for the Russians; and -they, since they own no wives to help them, also have besought me to be -at the head of their legation functions. And with the White House back -of all, what then will Mrs. Calhoun and her followers do! Watch-dog we -have them routed!” Here Peg's rich laugh would ring out for victory on -its way. - -Peg, on another day, would shake her head with soft solemnity. - -“I do so wish some one watched over me.” Peg spoke in contemplative -earnestness. “If I could find a fault in a best of husbands, it must be -that he doesn't watch over me.” - -“What idleness now claims your tongue?” said I, impatiently. “Was ever -such nonsense uttered! And the wives should all turn ospreys, too, I -take it, and haunt the upper air to watch their husbands?” - -“No,” returned Peg, demurely reading the carpet, “no; a wife should -never watch her husband. What should you think of her who, dwelling in -a garden--a measureless garden of roses--went ever about with petticoats -tucked up, stick in hand, questing for some serpent? Who is she, to be -so daft as to refuse the fragrance of a thousand blossoms to find one -serpent and be stung by it?” Peg crowed high and long, deeming -herself a princess of chop-logic. “But a man should watch a woman,” she -concluded; “the woman wants him to.” - -“And why?” said I, becoming curious. - -“Because she likes to feel herself tethered by his vigilance.” - -“But why?” I insisted. “Is not freedom dear to a woman?” - -“Yes, but love is more dear. See what she gains when she barters only a -little freedom for a world of love.” - -“I had not thought a woman set such store by jealousy--the green eye -turned against herself.” - -“Jealousy--a man's jealousy is but the counterpart of his love.” - Peg lifted her clever head oracularly. “And, watch-dog, that reminds -me”--here she admonished me with upraised finger--“you are jealous of me! -Yes you are; you are jealous of my husband.” - -“You are a confusing form of little girl!” I said, laughing in my turn; -“and most confusing when you jest.” - -“Yes; when I jest.” This in a way of funny dryness. “Especially, when -I jest. Still, you are jealous; you watch me all the time. Do not look -frightened; I do not object to jealousy.” Peg finished in a mirthful -ripple. - -“I would not see you walk into harm,” said I, meekly. - -Perhaps I was thus meek because the small hectorer would stir up -confusion in my bosom; and she, cool, assured, mistress of situations it -was her merry humor to create. - -“You would not see me walk into harm,” she repeated. “But you are -jealous of my husband. Is my husband 'harm?'” - -“Do you not complain for that he does not watch you?” - -This I said desperately. It is not a hand's-breadth behind a miracle how -a girl--and you a steady man of years, and twice her age--will wrap you -in perplexities like a parcel. It was so with me; the witch would wind -and unwind me as though I were a ball of knitting-yarn! She would darn -and patch her laughter with me! - -“Watch-dog,” said Peg, severely, “watchdog, you know you are jealous! -And how long do you count it since I told you that jealously was but -love turned upside down?” This came off trippingly, and with superior -wave of wrist, as settling a thing beyond debate. Then with a tinge of -tenderness: “Watch-dog, being so trusted, what would you do for me?” - -“I would be a slave for you,” said I, simply enough, “if it were to do -you good.” - -“Qualification,” cried she, with a vicious stamp of her foot, “always -qualification!” Then mimicking me: “'If it were to do me good.' -Good!--good!--what a desert of weariness in four letters! If I were to -discover some unnamed desolation, some barren waste, one arid, gray, -dry, dead--especially dead--I'd turn geographer and call it 'Good.'” - -Peg was quiet after this upheaval, which was with it all but a surface -impatience and nothing deep, and uttering never a word, gazed over -against the wall. On my side, I made no return; for I was grown used to -her whims, and knew they were not to be argued with. And most fatal of -all was agreement. A best course would be to reply nothing, whether -of denial or comment or endorsement, but let Peg talk her talk out -unrestrained. - -However, catching the fashion of her with the fringe of my eye as I -went for more ink on my pen, and observing her face to seem over sad and -considerate, I spoke up to cheer her. - -“And now what are your thoughts?” said I. - -“I was just wanting to be a man, that's all.” And Peg stared straight -ahead as though in a muse. Then starting up, and with a rush of -vivacity: “Heigh ho! and now if I were, I'll wager I'd be as dull as the -others--as dull as you, watch-dog.” Then, changing the tune of it, but -keeping to her dash and fling: “So you would be my slave! Come, let me -mark you for my slave!” - -Without warning, she seized my hand, and with her sharp leopard teeth -bit until the blood flowed. Then surveying her work, she kissed the -pin-prick of a wound with unction. When she raised her face, there was a -trickle of blood on her lip and chin. - -Walking to a mirror with a careless, flinging step, Peg glanced her face -over, and I thought with relish. - -“See if there do not come a pretty white mark when it heals.” This she -told me in an arch manner, and with chin on shoulder, and the fleck of -blood on her chin. “Now if I but dared,” she went on, returning to the -glass, “I would wear that blood always and never wash it away. But the -world! the world!--ah, the world! One must wash one's face for the world -although one owes the world nothing.” - -Peg, now in a climax of bubbling spirits, and pouring a spoonful of -water on her handkerchief, washed off the spots of red, transferring -them to her tiny square of cambric. This she contemplated with a sort of -surprised delight, as tendering a new idea. - -“I need never wash that, at any rate,” said she. Then with her glancing -eyes on me: “You will wear my mark now;--Peg's mark for her slave!--who -would do her good.” - -The next moment she went singing across the lawn for her home, leaving -me to think on the caprices of our radiant, reckless, blooming, madcap -Peg. All this by the way, however; now to return to our day of the -Reverend Campbell's call upon the General. - -Peg was still curled in her big armchair when, following his interview -with the General, the Reverend Campbell left the mansion. It was she -who told his departure to me where I wrought at my desk. Peg caught a -flutter of him through the large window. - -“Oh!” cried Peg, “there goes our Reverend Raven.” - -Looking up from where I worked, I beheld the Reverend Campbell making -speed out of the grounds. In such hurry was he that he left the walk of -gravel, and to save a corner would cut across the grass. The black-foot -creature slouched away for all mankind like unto some henroost fox of -the night whom daylight had surprised and who now went skulking for the -comforting safe darkness of his burrow. - -“It is wonder,” said Peg, “what could induce the good General to -tolerate the presence of our Reverend Raven for so long. What should be -the interest in his croakings?” - -As Peg spoke, the General's gaunt form appeared in the door. He was more -than half warm with an angry excitement. Without pause or first words of -greeting, he addressed himself to Peg. - -“Child, where was Timberlake two years ago this summer?--where was he in -June?” - -“Here in Washington,” returned Peg, her eyes full of wonder, as she -scanned the face of the General in quest of a clue to his sharp, unusual -curiosity. “He stayed here idle for four years before he last sailed. -He was seeking to adjust his accounts as purser for the frigate -_President_. His books were lost when the English captured the ship. -It was that to make all the trouble; the red-tape of the navy office -detained him here four years before it would accept his accounts. It was -during that period we were wed.” Peg's voice, brisk at the start, fell -sorrowfully away towards the end. - -“Then he was here in June two summers ago,” said the General, “and for -three years prior and almost one year after that time?” - -“Yes,” said Peg. - -“Now there!” cried the General, with a mixture of wrath and disgust; -“see what bald and easily confuted falsehood a fool moved of low malice -will tell! I could believe at times, when I'm brought face to face with -such mendacious simplicity, that liars are denied powers of reflection.” - -“What is it all about?” asked Peg. - -“Nothing, child, nothing,” returned the General. “Now run away home; I -want a word with your big playmate here.” Then in a softer manner: “No, -child, the Major and I are trying to do you a service, and please God! I -think we shall accomplish it.” - -The whole kind attitude of the General towards Peg seemed ever that of a -father, and he was used to call her to him or dismiss her with no -shade of rudeness, truly, and yet with no more of ceremonies than -an affectionate parent might adopt. Peg never grudged obedience, and -received the General's word as readily, and was withal as free of -affront at any suddenness, as should be a daughter who feels her place -assured. - -When Peg was off for home, the General came and sat in the chair she had -vacated. - -With the white thick brush of his end-wise hair, and the fierce eyes of -him, he made a portrait wide apart from that tender one the great chair -so lately framed. - -“You are not to know,” quoth the General, without halting for my -question, “the whole foul story this creature has told me. It is bad -enough that I was made to give ear to it. The point lies here: If -Timberlake were with Peg in June two years ago, and for a year before, -this miserable tale falls to the ground as false. He makes its main -element to depend upon Timberlake's absence--his charge of iniquity -against Peg holds only by that. The Reverend Serpent's hinge to swing -his vilification on is the absence of Timberlake. And you heard her -declare how Timberlake was here.” - -“Does this snake, as you rightly term him, give you his story as of a -knowledge of his own?” - -“No; he hides behind the words of two women; a mother and daughter, -named Craven. They pretend to base their slanders on what they allege -was told them by the husband and father, a Doctor Craven--dead, he is, -these ten months.” - -“And that is mighty convenient,” said I, “for the Reverend Campbell and -his fellow ophidians--this retreat to the word of one who dwells dead -and dumb beneath six feet of earth.” - -“That is their coward strategy,” commented the General, furiously. -“However, my thought is to ask Noah to visit these women and question -them before the Reverend Campbell collects the wit to tell of his -talk with me. I may have alarmed the man, for I was now and then not -altogether calm.” - -I was driven to smile at this; so much concession of a want of calmness -on the General's part would mean that he had fumed up and down like a -tiger. The scuttling eagerness of the Reverend Campbell to be clear of -the place was not without a cause. There beat some reason in his heels. - -“I asked him,” said the General, “why he did not tell this story in the -beginning. He explained that he hesitated to approach me with it; he -related it to Doctor Ely, who pretended to close terms with me. Then I -demanded why this Ely had not told me by word of mouth? Why should he -leave with that lie in his stomach, and then write it and send it by -post? He said that when it came to the test, Doctor Ely was afraid of -me. Fear, fear, that was the assassin excuse of him, and the reason for -striking at a woman in the dark! Why, I would not believe the sun was -shining on the words of such coward rogues!” - -It was settled that I should make company for Noah when he saw the -Cravens. - -“But don't interfere for a word, Major,” exhorted the General, with a -world of earnestness. “You do right well when the quarry is a bear or -the enemy no more subtile than an Indian. But now the foe is a woman, -you might better fall to the rear and leave leadership to Noah. You are -monstrous ignorant of woman.” - -The Cravens lived no breathless distance up Georgetown way. Not far from -their doorstep, Noah and I encountered the Reverend Campbell, who seemed -shaken by the meeting. - -“Nothing could be better,” cried Noah, cheerfully, claiming the Reverend -Campbell's arm. “You shall present the Major and myself to the ladies. -And please permit me to do the talking; you may have your turn at the -conversation when we leave.” - -The two women were bilious, lime-faced folk, and the daughter notably -ugly. I was something stiff, I fear; but Noah, when introduced by the -Reverend Campbell, showed as balmy as a day in May. He swept the pair -with rapid glance and then turned to the daughter. - -“I shall pitch upon the one I deem the more manageable,” said Noah, on -our journey to the house, “and when I commence to talk with her, you -engage with the other.” - -Having this hint in my mind, when Noah began to address the daughter I -favored the mother with a word or two on safe topics, principally the -weather and the condition of the roads. For all that, I could tell how -the mother, like myself, had her ears laid back to catch the words of -the others. Her suspicions were upon us from the start, even with the -guaranty of the Reverend Campbell's company. As for that perturbed -animal, he looked only upon the floor, saying never a syllable, and -rubbing one warty hand with the other in a composite of doubt and -trepidation. The tragic wrath of the General still sang in the -hare-hearted creature's head. - -“We are being shown about by our reverend friend,” I heard Noah say; -“we were asked to make a few calls with him and meet the better folk. -We were too glad, I assure you; I grow vastly weary of nobody save the -politicians and nothing better to talk of than politics.” - -To say that I was startled at these gay, glib fictions on the lips of my -companion would fall behind the fact; I was amazed. But I also had the -General's command to leave leadership to Noah, and so stood mute. I let -my gaze go for a moment to the Reverend Campbell to come by some thought -of how he took the trend of Noah's surprising discourse. I saw naught -beyond the top of his head, as, bowed forward in his chair, he appeared -to study his toes, meanwhile twiddling and rubbing his nobby fingers. - -As for the women, they knew no argument of fact or otherwise for -distrusting Noah's statements. I should have before explained that -neither possessed the least of glimmer as to our identity or nearness to -the General. Indeed, they lived ignorant, we found later, of the letters -of that Ely ill-using Peg's name, and of the Reverend Campbell's visit -to the General paid that morning. Thus, it fell about that the daughter -sailed off with Noah on a current of conversation in the dark, and the -mother just as blind. - -“And so,” Noah went on, “you are a copyist in the Department of -Justice.” This from her explanation and his notice of a stain of -ink near her finger-nail, for this daughter was an untidy slut. -“The Department of Justice!” repeated Noah. “And there is something -consistent in your employment in such a field, since Justice is a -woman--and blind.” This last quip under his breath. “I am a close friend -with Judge Berrien, the Attorney General, who heads your department. The -great tie to unite us is our love for Calhoun.” - -“Are you a friend of the Vice-President?” asked the daughter, her -interest a little kindled. - -“Perhaps partisan would be the truer word,” replied Noah. “I trust a -good day will come when we are to drop the 'Vice' to his title and -find him at home in the White House. And you, I suppose, meet many of -Calhoun's adherents in your Department of Justice?” - -“Numbers, indeed,” assented the daughter, while the mother bent an -intent ear, trying to discover the drift. - -By this time I could well make out how neither of these women was of -vigorous intelligence. A malignant spirit, and a ripe aptness for evil -to others. I could read in their vinegar faces and the fault-finding -gather to their brows; but no power of thought, nor yet much cunning. -I leaned back now, inquisitive as to Noah's methods and to note their -results. - -Noah led the talk up and down the town. He made it cover several years, -for the Cravens were not newcomers in the place. At last he considered -the navy and mentioned Timberlake. Had the young lady known the -handsome purser Timberlake? The young lady had known the handsome purser -Timberlake. A forbidding scowl contorted her features as she said this. - -“Oh, I beg a thousand pardons!” cried Noah. He had caught the scowl. “I -fear the mention of the handsome Timberlake is not agreeable. But he cut -his throat, and there's the proper villain end of him.” - -The butt-end cruelty of Noah's manner I was sure possessed a purpose, -for commonly he was one of your most guarded of folk. While I had -this in thought, it did not lessen my dismay when the daughter fell to -weeping with her face in her hands, and all in frantic kind. Sobbing, -she left the room. - -“An affair of the heart?” cooed Noah, sympathetically, to the mother, -while the Reverend Campbell fidgeted visibly. - -“Sir,” said the mother, loftily, “you touched her rudely. Mr. -Timberlake was paying my daughter marked attentions, and ones not to be -misunderstood, when he was stolen from her side and trapped to the altar -by that wanton, Peg O'Neal.” - -“Sorry, I assure you,” murmured Noah, apologetically. “Sorry I so -blundered against your daughter's sensibilities. Please recall her, -madam, if only to hear me ask forgiveness.” - -The daughter, whose emotion was of the briefest, returned, with nose -reddened and look more bilious than before. Noah became profuse in his -regrets, and severely characterized his own awkwardness. - -“Nor are you to have blame for your feeling,” said he, addressing the -daughter and as a finish to his self-reproaches. “Your mother has -done us the honor to confide the once nearness of the handsome purser -Timberlake to you. And that hideous woman who stole him away! I do not -marvel you hate her. I could teach you to write her such a letter as -should be a revenge; for I know one of her secrets, the very name of -which would crush her like a falling tree.” - -It was to me a thing astounding how neither of these women resented the -raw freedom of Noah's words. On the contrary, they went with him, making -no question of the propriety of such talk on the tongue of a stranger. -They would appear not to have been crossed by such a thought, for, so to -phrase it, they fell in with Noah, and, as if it were, hand in hand. - -At the word “secrets,” both women sat bolt upright and questioned Noah -with tongue and eye. What was this hidden sin of that siren, Peg O'Neal? -They panted for a fullest tale of it. - -“Nay, then,” remonstrated Noah, “it was but a slip. I said I could teach -you how to write a letter that should strike her to the soul. But of -what avail? Timberlake is dead; his grave is the Mediterranean.” - -“But she lives,” hissed the daughter. “Tell me that secret concerning -her, and I shall call you my best friend.” Truly, the bilious maiden had -a taste for vengeance as pointed as a thorn. - -“Why, then,” returned Noah, hesitating with invented reluctance, “there -is no reason why I should not humor your wishes. Take your pen, and I'll -dictate that letter I have in my mind.” - -The bilious one wheeled about to a writing table which stood by her -side, and while the rest of us sat silent--for the mother and myself had -long before surrendered our semblance of conversation, and the unhappy -dominie still pored upon the floor--Noah began with finger on forehead -as one who cudgels memory. - -“Write her this,” said Noah. “Revenge is sweet! I have you in my power; -and I shall burn you as savages burn their victim at the stake. Think -not that you can escape me. I would not that death nor any evil thing -should take you out of my hand for half the world.” When Noah began this -evil dictation, the lime-faced one took down his opening words with -greedy pen. As he proceeded, she first hesitated, and then with -blanched, scared face, whirled herself upon him. Her pen fell to the -floor, while her hands shook in a gust of fear. At the close she gasped: - -“You have read my letter!” - -“I have, indeed,” returned Noah. “I have repeated word for word your -atrocious threats to a lady whom we will not name.” It was verity; with -a memory like unto wax, Noah had recalled with every faithfulness of -word and mark that menacing epistle Peg brought to me, and which was -then under my private lock and key. “Yes, you wrote that letter,” - repeated Noah. “And you,” coming round on the Reverend Campbell, who -writhed as one in the jaws of wretchedness, unable to make a plan or -frame a sentence; “and you, sir, were privy to it.” - -“Our dear sister”--he could not lay aside his snuffle even now--“our -dear sister did indeed tell me she had sent such a note.” - -“You mix your tenses, sir,” retorted Noah, savagely. “She told you -before it was dispatched, and you read it.” - -* “My dear gentlemen,” broke in the mother, in mighty agitation, “he put -that letter in the post himself. Oh, gentlemen, spare my poor daughter!” - With that the mother put her arm about the-younger harpy, where, like -some frightened thing of sin that can escape no farther, she waited as -one frozen. - -“Your daughter, madam,” replied Noah, quietly enough, “lies in no peril, -although by the law there be punishments for ones who thus misuse the -post. But there remains another question. You have put a lie against -that lady of the letter into the mouth of our reverend friend. He has -retold it to many; this morning he told it to the President. The tale -proves itself untrue upon its face, and that is the one merit of it. It -was a dangerous falsehood to tell, and”--here Noah looked towards the -unhappy Reverend Campbell, who, as though fascinated by the other's -baleful eye, lifted up his visage,' with its ugly array of munching -mouth and flabby unhealthfulness--“and a still more dangerous falsehood -to repeat.” - -“What do you require of us, gentlemen?” asked the frightened -mother-harpy. - -“Nothing, save tongues of peace,” cried Noah. “It is too much to suppose -that her friends will rest quiet while you foully tear a good woman to -shreds. Tie up your tongues, you three, and the thing rests. Let another -word escape, and a torch shall be found to burn you out like any other -nest of adders.” The Reverend Campbell made no return to this warning -thrown to him with the others. The scoundrel had the wisdom of silence -when words would work no benefit. Still, I could trace a hunger for -retaliation writhing beneath the coarse snake's skin of him. - -“I think we have locked three evil mouths to-day,” observed Noah, as we -were about our return. “It is the less important, perhaps, since already -a whole flock of these lies has been uncaged in the town.” - -“It is never unimportant,” I returned, “to identify an enemy. I am the -more relieved, too, since you cleared up the mystery of that written -menace. And yet I do not make out how you supposed it gained emanation -among these people.” - -“I had no such thought in the beginning,” replied Noah. “I knew, as did -you, and with a glance, how our entertainers were nothing fine nor deep, -but of a harshest clay and of least intelligence. No more delicacy was -required than might do for driving pigs. At first I sought to develop -their whereabouts, and stormed the woods with my remarks. In that, -and on the sheer chance of it, I employed the name of Timberlake. The -daughter's disturbed features were a cue. And you know the rest. The -digging up of the authorship of the letter was but the birth of a bold -guess. However, we've paralyzed that trio of tongues, which is excellent -as far as it goes. And we must beat out these fires wherever we find -them. Else they will spread, and may come to mean a conflagration that -shall burn some one to a cinder.” - -“And going back for cause,” I said, my thought recurring to Peg, “I -still can not tell the hound purpose of this incessant, malignant -pursuit of our little girl.” - -“Sir, they reason in this guise,” returned Noah. “As I've told you, the -great impulse springs from the adherents of Calhoun. They desire the -destruction of the President as a method of their man's advancement. -They fear that the President will seek to succeed himself--there has -been illustrious example--or, in default of that, insist on selecting -his successor. They attack Mrs. Eaton in hope of its reaction against -the administration. Suppose, sir, they make her out to be vile, suppose -they show the administration as condoning and defending her vileness, -will they not have organized the women against us? Give Calhoun -the women of the country to be his allies, and he will go over the -administration like an avalanche.” - -“But you”--now I spoke gingerly, for I would not hurt so true a friend -nor ruffle him with himself--“in your pretense of friendship for -Calhoun, and as well in other particulars, misled our harpy folk.” - -“I but fought the devil with fire and snared liars with lies,” said he. -“These she-villains were not entitled to the truth. Only truthful folk -have a right to truth.” - -When the General and I were together, I laid before him those ethics or -word-morals of Noah; he stoutly agreed with that diplomat. - -“One is not always bound to tell the truth,” asserted the General. -“Would you tell a footpad whose gun was at your breast where you lodged -your money? In war, would you disclose your strengths or your plans to -the foe because he asked? Sir, truth is a property--a goods; to have -right to it one must possess title to it. The casual man, and the more -if he would work me harm, has as scant a right to search my head with -his questions as to search my pockets with his fingers. Take my word -for it, Major,”--this in high Delphic vein, for the General was growing -pleased with his argument--“take my word, sir; the right in the one is -the right in the other, and he who may lock a door may lie.” - -“These harpies,” said I, commenting on what had befallen, “and the -Reverend Campbell have fair admitted their guilt.” - -“Why, as to that, sir,” returned the General, “the falsity of the -story was never in doubt. But the prime thing is to smother out these -calumnies. It is not hard to see how this day has been well spent.” - -In concord with what we had long before agreed, neither the General nor -I, by lisp or the lifting of an eyebrow, gave Peg a least intimation of -what had gone forward about her name and fame. And yet, she must have -divined her close interest, for in the early hours of the twilight she -came again to the General, saying she remembered books of account kept -by Timberlake's own hand, which would demonstrate his whereabouts for -those four years. Her mother, Peg said, had these books in her house. - -“Why, then,” said the General, “that should give us the best evidence. -Major, go you with the child to her mother's and bring me those books.” - -It was not the first call I had made on Peg's mother, but this night the -garrulous old soul would so launch herself upon wide waters of gossip, -and never quit until she crossed them from shore to shore, that it -leaned towards ten of the clock when Peg and I, taking the road in our -hands, as say the Spaniards, went forth for our return. - -The night was dark and still, and a moist promise of rain hung in the -air. Our way lay from the south, diagonally across the wooded patch -called the Mall. We were finding our path without trouble, Peg keeping -close and warm to my side, with a hand gripping my arm, and had gone -some distance when, in a way of dull faintness, a sound like the fall of -a stealthy foot on the grass overtook my ear. Peg heard it as soon as I. - -“Are we dogged?” she asked. Peg showed no fear, but bit off her words in -a manner vicious and resentful. - -“That we may soon know,” said I. Then I drew her in by a clump of bushes -where her white frock would be screened. “It should be a strange thing -if any save ourselves were going this road at such an hour.” - -We had been but a moment hidden by the trees when a dark figure crouched -past us with furtive, hurrying step that made it plain he followed as a -spy. As he would have brushed by, I stretched out and seized him by the -shoulder. The creature screamed like a hare when the dogs snap her up. - -Now I lugged him to the open, and, for all the night was moonless and no -stars because of clouds, it puzzled neither Peg nor myself to make out -the Reverend Campbell. The fellow hung in my hand like a rag, and beyond -that first shrill screech uttered not a word. - -“What shall I do with him?” I asked, still holding him in my grasp like -something dead. - -“Kill him!” cried Peg; “kill him with your great hands!” And then, while -I was dumb before the sudden murderous fury of her tones, Peg began to -plead the other way about. “Let him go free,” she said. “He's not worth -punishment. And yet it is sure he was after us as a spy.” - -“I think,” said I, “it would do no harm to throw him in yonder water.” - -Now in that day a chain of baby lakes lay along this portion of the -Potomac fens, and one of these was glimmering on our near left hand. It -was not deep; but muddy and grown up to lilies, and the home, besides, -of certain sedate bullpouts and turtles and other stagnant fish that do -not care for currents but love dead waters. These, since bullpouts and -turtles be in no manner hysterical animals nor nervous, would not suffer -for any plumping of the spy into their midst; and, thus forming my -resolve, I was for posting to its execution. My captive still swung -limp and loose, for all the world as though he had fainted. I could not -believe this last, however, and in any event I would throw him in among -the lilies. If he were too far gone with fright to save his own life -from drowning, it would mean no more than that I must wade to him and -fish him ashore again. - -Thus adjusted in my mind, I was on the brink of heaving him overboard, -when with a touch of protest Peg stayed my arm. - -“No,” she cried, “let him go free.” - -“But a moment gone,” I remonstrated, “and you were calling for murder -with all its inconveniences. Now you interpose to stop a mighty proper -punishment, for, I bethink me, it has been custom to duck spies in every -age.” - -“Still, you must let him go,” cried Peg. “I will not have you touch -him.” And she seized my hand with her little fingers. - -With that I threw the caitiff creature on the grass; whereupon he rolled -to his knees and extended his palms towards Peg. There was something to -roil me in the attitude, and to end that I pushed him over with my foot. - -“Be off,” I cried. “And you are to thank this lady for your dry clothes. -You had been splashing among the lily-pads except for her.” - -Without retort, he scrambled to his soles and was gone like some foul -shadow. His absence, of itself, relieved me, for the sight of him was -like a blot. - -“He would not resist, and so I made you let him go,” said Peg. - -“You would have it safe for cowards,” I returned. - -“It wasn't for that creature!” exclaimed Peg. She seemed to scorn me -for a dullard. “No; it was for you. I would not have such a memory--you, -punishing an unresisting beast!” - -We were for a second time on our way, Peg now holding my arm with her -two hands and laying her cheek against it like a child. I could tell by -that how this bushwhacking rogue had fluttered her not a little. At last -she lifted her face, and I could, even in the pitch darkness, catch the -deep glow of her eyes. - -“And after all, for what should you think he spied upon us? What should -he hope to find?” - -“Indeed, that is beyond me,” I replied. - -“But the very wicked are often very foolish too.” - -“To follow so right a character as yourself, watch-dog, is for a spy to -waste his strength.” Peg spoke in a droll way of laughter. - -“Why, then, I may say I emulate the virtuous Drusus, who commanded the -architect to so build his house that all who would might behold every -act of his life.” I must tell you I had studied the classics in my -youth, and would like at times to flourish with a scrap or two. I was no -pedant to show off my learning, only a tag or two from Ovid or Horace on -occasion, and just enough to suggest what a deal I had forgot. - -“And your Drusus would so live as to hide nothing.” Peg was still -stifling a laugh. “How very admirable! And what was the end of your -memorable Drusus?” - -“As to that,” I retorted, puzzled and put about by the satirical toss -she gave to her queries, “as to that, I believe the people stoned him to -death.” - -“Ah, the poor people! His awful goodness, I suppose, drove them to -frenzy.” Peg's voice was mocking sympathy. Then, with a great abruptness -of anger, and throwing away my arm: “Do you know what I think of your -precious Drusus? I think he was a hypocrite, and a canting prig who -earned his fate; and if he have followers they should taste the same -destiny for a sniveling conceit that teaches them a holiness above -their neighbors.” This Peg flung at me like a spoiled child; and then, -stepping smartly, she went on alone, I following in silence a yard or -more to the rear. - - - - -CHAPTER IX--THE GENERAL SELECTS HIS SUCCESSOR. - -Now fell across us the sultry summer; sometimes with rain, and steamy -mud to follow; and then with stretches of a burning dryness when the -dust curled aloft on the impertinent lip of the wind to fill folk's eyes -and faces. There came, too, the shadow of impending calamity to rest -upon us, for the General's health began to flag, and it would look for a -while as though he had been marked by death itself. The malady was never -understood by me, and I think the doctor lived no better off; but, as -near as one might guess, it arose from the bogs and reeking marshes -fringing the river on our south, and on which, morning and evening, I've -seen the damps and miasmas lying white and thick as a flock of wool--a -sight to shake the strongest. - -The General was indeed ill, and with face turning to be wan while his -haggard eye grew ever more bright and hollow. He lost greatly the use -of his legs; those members being swollen to a preposterous size, and his -feet dropsical, so that he could not be said to walk but only hobble. -He must be supported, leaning commonly on my arm, though sometimes Peg's -pretty shoulder was his crutch; for she was with him very constant, -reading to him, or passing him a glass, or cheering him with her talk of -flippant nothings. - -With his usual bitterness of resolution the General would each day be up -and dressed, and pass the hours on a lounge which Augustus prepared, and -where he might lie and through the open casement command a prospect of -the distant Arlington hills. - -To such a lowness did the General sink that his death was waited for, -and the doctor who attended him--and did no good--felt driven to give -him the name of it. - -“For one who is in so high a place,” said the doctor, “must needs have -weighty concerns to be put in order; and therefore of all folk he should -be shown his end in time.” - -This was gospel true enough as an abstraction, but in the case of the -General that doctor should have known how his business was to cure, and -not stand prating of death. Of this I informed him in such wise that he -was at once for leaving the house and never coming back. The loss might -have been easily measured had he done so. - -It was the General himself who told me he was to die; and it stood -a marvel, the good patience and sympathy wherewith he went upon the -information. One would have supposed it was of my death he talked. - -“And in the bottom of it,” said he, in conclusion, “I have the chance -of meeting her”--pointing to his wife's picture--“and that chance alone -would make twenty deaths worth trying. For when we come to the end of -it, Major, the heaven they talk of may be true.” This last with a manner -of reverie as when hope upholds conviction leaning to a fall. - -As best it could, my nature fought against a belief that the General -would die; but his own word overpowered me. The fear of it, when he told -the news, went through me like a spear. Or it was as if a stone were -rolled upon my heart. - -Sick folk, for a rule, are impatient and sharply cross with those about, -even with their best beloved. But the General would be the opposite, and -was never more tolerant than now when he lay ill; and this kindness made -it a privilege and a pleasure to be near him, and not a burden to be -borne. - -Peg, as I have written, was much with him--fresh and sweet as a cluster -of violets, about a sick room she was worth her weight in drugs. And the -General and she had never so full a space for acquaintance before, and -so each day he came to know Peg better and to love her more. - -There existed throughout this summer a kind of truce in the crusade -against Peg; the Reverend Ely had turned to be as mute as an oyster, -while the Reverend Campbell and those harpies whom Noah so confounded -were not only silent but deeply out of sight. There was neither sign nor -rumor to come from them. - -The books of account which Peg and I brought away from her mother's on -the night when we were dogged, showed all Peg claimed. For the June her -detractors spoke of in their lyings, and for three years before and well -nigh a twelvemonth to follow, Timberlake was in town, and, after his -wedding, constantly with Peg until he sailed. There was left no ground -for argument, and that tale, as fatuous as it was wicked, fell, knocked -on its sinful head. - -As for the lurking Reverend Campbell himself, I caught sight of him but -once. This was accident, and the pleasure of the shortest, for he dodged -around a corner like the wind; and although--through an idleness of mind -to see him going--I made speed to be at his point of disappearance, he, -so to say, had exhaled. Into what dark crevice he crawled to hide from -me I have no hint; but as if that street corner were a corner of the -universe and he spilled therefrom into the very abyss of eternity -itself, I never afterward caught the picture of his tallow cheeks and -festering, munching lips. - -This peace for Peg was something due to, a desertion of the town; for -everybody--and women-folk especially--not tied by the leg to duties, -went seeking cool comfort by the ocean or on the mountains. - -Eaton himself made one of those who went away; he would have had Peg -for company, but she urged--what was true, since the old lady had grown -frail and weakly--that she ought not to leave her mother for so long -a space. Eaton agreed with entire good humor to this, and so left Peg -behind, and never a qualm or mark of hesitation, while he sought his -ease by the sea. - -Eaton from his own view-point might well spare Peg from his plans; he -was extremely a man's man, and owning, withal, a hand for the bottle and -a mighty promptitude for cards, would the better amuse himself with no -wife to be a mortgage on his liberty. - -Summer is for society what winter is to war; the forces lie all in -quarters, and beyond caring for their arms or practicing a drill against -the campaign day to dawn, there arises nothing to be called a movement. -Indeed, as I've explained, the women--who, as Peg would have it, are the -fighting line--for the most part were fled to beach and hill. The town -was in its sleep, and society would awaken it only with the advent of -the snows. - -In the last there were still our three cabinet wives, that is, the -ladies Berrien, Branch, and Ingham, to be left about us. These would -soon depart; but by this claim or that, they had been brought to lag -behind when the great covey of their flounced fellows went whirring away -to be cool. Peg never had visited these folk, nor they her, and on those -few occasions when official exigency threw them together, the cabinet -three, who, like the General's fleeting niece, were utterly beneath the -sway of the Vice-President's wife--herself a woman of unquestioned place -and breeding, and a natural queen, besides,--took heed to hold aloof -from Peg. On her side, Peg passed them by or looked them through as -though they had not been, and, if I am to judge, came off from these -tiltings with prestige all undimmed. - -It would have been as good as the play, were I not prey and spoil to so -much soreness in the business, to have watched those tacit joustings of -Peg with our old mailed warriors of the drawing rooms. The dauntless Peg -crossed glances with the most seasoned of her bad-wishers, and left them -ever the worse for those thrustings. If she were wounded, no one learned -the bleeding fact; and not even I should know. From the laugh to ring -true, and the fine spirit of her, I was fain to conclude that Peg, so -far from shrinking, joyed in such silken combats to take place among the -flowers and with the music of orchestras stirring the blood; and in the -last I am sure she did. - -Berrien and Branch, and for that matter the clumsy Ingham, would with -an invariable politeness, nicely measured to a hair, greet Peg whenever -they met with her; and she would accept their courtesy in a cold way of -elevation and as though our cabinet gentlemen came of the general press -about whose very names she did not know and never would. On such lofty -terms a fair peace was maintained, and nothing to rancorously rise above -the majesty of a ripple to beat upon any one's shore. - -The General might have preferred a better cordiality, but he could make -no interference. - -“If to step between a man and his enemy,” he would say, “is to invoke -a risk, how much more is he in danger who tampers with the feuds of -women?” - -For one, I much agreed with him, and we both looked on, idle of hand and -tongue, while Peg met and foiled the “Redsticks,” as the General named -them. - -Nor would Peg need our aid. I've seen no prouder, braver woman walk -across a room, or one of a more nimble faculty or fortitude more broadly -planted, than our Peg. My admiration spent its days to weave new wreaths -for her. - -It was the doting Ingham--he of our Treasury--to be witless enough to -broach this business of feminine ice with Eaton. Ingham was a girthy -person, and one's briefest consideration disclosed him for the vulgar -Pennsylvania paper-maker he was. Short and thick of body, with thick -legs, thick neck; even his tongue was thick, and his slow wits thickest -of all. Of Ingham I shall not forget Jim's estimate. - -“It aint for Jim,” said that worthy, “to go talkin' sassy about no white -gentleman; but as for dish yere Mr. Ingham, thar's a notion ag'in him -which goes gropin' about through Jim like d'grace of heaven through a -camp meetin'. That Mr. Ingham is mean; he's that mean if he owned a lake -he wouldn't give a duck a drink. He's jes' about as pop'lar with Jim as -a wet dawg; an' that's d'mortual fac'.” - -“You don't appear to carry a high estimate of our Secretary of the -Treasury,” said I. - -“'Deed Jim don't, Marse Major,” he replied. “An' jes' let Jim warn -you-all. You don't want to disrecollect, Marse Major, that Jim's a heap -sight older man than you be, an' while Jim don't deny he's been gettin' -duller an' duller ever since you locks up that demijohn, still it's -mighty likely Jim's wise an' wary to a p'int where you-all oughter -listen.” - -“Go on,” said I, “I'm listening.” - -“Course you-all is listenin',” agreed Jim; “of course you listens, -'cause you has got listenin' sense. That's what Jim likes about you. Now -let Jim tell you, Marse Major; that Mr. Ingham's plumb selfish. Jim can -see it in his eye. He's all right whilst he's haulin' fodder for his own -stack, but you let your intrusrun ag'in his, an' you hyar Jim! that Mr. -Ingham 'ud burn your barn to boil his egg quicker than a mule can kick.” - -Ingham took up the subject of their wives' coldness with Eaton in an -unexpected fashion. I have heard that he was thus set in foolish motion -by a fear of trouble at ten paces with the war secretary, and would have -placated him and missed a bullet. He stood under no cloud of peril, but -that dove-like truth was yet to claim him. The General would have been -his shield; but Ingham, who regarded the General as chief among the -fire-eaters, would be the last to suspect the news. - -It was on the kibes of a cabinet meeting when Ingham approached Eaton. - -“Sir,” said Ingham, tugging nervously at his lapels, “sir, there is -something of strain between our ladies, about which, if you'll permit, I -should like word with you.” - -“Why, sir,” returned Eaton, seizing the initiative, “I perhaps should -tell you that I can not, in her social obligations, control my wife. -That, sir, let me say, is work beyond a gentleman. My wife must be her -own mistress; and while I know of no just cause why she should refuse to -receive or recognize Mrs. Ingham, I must still insist how the right to -do both lies wholly in her hands. Personally, I may deplore my wife's -refusal of the acquaintance of Mrs. Ingham; however, I stand none the -less ready to give you any satisfaction you require.” - -With this speech, Eaton bent his brows upon the other in such way of -iron menace that without a word our timid treasury gentleman clapped on -his hat and went pantingly in quest of safer company. - -“Was it not a master-stroke?” exulted the General, when he related the -flurry. “Eaton had the hill of him in an instant; Napoleon himself could -not have exhibited a more military genius.” - -The General, in his glee, would talk of nothing else throughout the -evening; but since I left him at an early hour I was not bored too much. -Eaton replied in a manner to his credit when one considers the fact of a -surprise; but there dwelt therein no reason for that long-drawn delight -in which the General indulged. I was so far fortunate, however, as to -soon quit him on that particular night, having work to look after, and -so escaped his enthusiasm. Any childishness of satisfaction for little -reason, by the General, obtruded offensively on my ideal of him, and I -would experience no more of it than I might; wherefore I went about my -affairs, leaving him in full song, celebrating the gallant cleverness -of Eaton, who, to my notion, instead of his smart speeches should have -pulled the Ingham nose. - -While the General was sick on his lounge, and when Peg tired of reading, -she would fall to a review of the unremitting politeness bestowed upon -her by the suave Van Buren. One might read the pleasure of the General -over these tidings in his relaxed face and the heed he offered to each -detail. The word of how Van Buren had brought Vaughn of the English and -Krudener of the Russians--for these ministers were joint despots among -the legation folk and led them to what social fields they would--gave -the General peculiar satisfaction; and if there remained a door in his -affections which had not yet opened to the little Knickerbocker, Peg's -recitals of the secretary's steady yet delicately balanced goodness -threw it wide. - -When the General and I were alone with our nightly pipes--albeit he at -the time would be in his bed for sickness--he made his little premier -the great burden of his conversation and was wont to find in him new -excellencies. Time and again he would quote Peg to me for virtues owned -of Van Buren and which he feared might otherwise elude my notice. It -was clear “the good little secretary”--Peg's name--was become a first -favorite of the General; and to be frank, and for identical reasons, as -much should be said of me. I loved any who was good to Peg, and made -no bones of showing it. Wherefore, you are to conceive, there arose no -dispute between us; instead, we took turn and turn about in exalting our -secretary and teaching each other a higher account of the man. - -Peg would set forth to the General--it amused him and he would question -her concerning such matters--how in this sort or in that, and always -in some way of trifles too small for the mind of a man to seize on, the -women who followed the social banner of the Vice-President's wife would -strive to drive her into obscurity. And this was not wanting of stern -effect on the General. The name Calhoun found constant repetition in -these tales, and never to give the General delight. And there is this -to observe: while Peg spoke of Mrs. Calhoun, the General, for his side, -would be thinking only on the Vice-President, and at the end he held -even more hateful views of the Carolinian than of Henry Clay himself. -Surely, he came finally to be strung like a bow against him. - -This vivacity of disfavor for Calhoun, however, may have had its story. -Clay was a foe beaten beyond question, powerless for further war. -Calhoun, on the other hand, was increasing in power; and, active in -design and searching for the future, stood forth as an enemy yet to be -conquered. - -“The man is a would-be traitor,” said the General one day when speaking -with me of Calhoun and his lines of political resolve. “He should -consider, however; I may yet teach him a better patriotism.” - -“He is for your destruction,” said I, “and has been since the Seminole -days.” - -“Nothing is more plain than that,” said the General. “And yet, were he -or his people fibered of any decency, they would not, as an element of -assault on me, seek to make tatters of poor Peg. I can not see how they -bring themselves to that; for myself, I would not give hand to so vile a -ploy for all the world.” - -“They would plunge you in for Peg's defence,” I said, recalling Noah's -explanation. “They hope to set the women of the land upon you as he who -gives countenance to one flagrant of her sins. That is their precious -intrigue; they, with their lies of Peg, would shake your power with -private home-loving folk whose firesides are clean and who base -themselves on chastity. There you have the whole crow-colored scheme of -them, with the black impulse which turns them against Peg.” - -“If they shake me with the people,” said the General, “they should call -it the thirteenth labor of Hercules.” - -“They should have punishment for all that,” cried I. - -“Sir, they shall be punished,” retorted the General. “And as for -Calhoun, he most of all shall suffer. Mark you this: That man shall -never be president. More, he may yet win Gilderoy's elevation at a -rope's end.” This last in wrathful whisper like a warning of death. - -There was spreading reason to talk on Calhoun and his policies. South -Carolina, ever arrogant, was moving to snap rebellious thumb and finger -in the National face. The legislature of that insolent commonwealth had -done its treason part; Nullification and its counterpart, Secession, -were already agreed on; men were being enrolled and arms collected, -while medals found Charleston coinage bearing the words, “John C. -Calhoun, First President of the Southern Confederacy.” - -And the restless spirit to animate it all was no other than Calhoun -himself. He was then among his henchmen of the Palmettoes, directing -even the very phrases wherewith to deck their traitorous fulminations. -So much the General knew, not alone from what Peg read daily in the -papers, but by the weeded word of ones whom, safe and prudent, we -dispatched to find the truth. - -And yet, in the last, I was sure Calhoun would never mean rebellion and -a severance of his state from the common bonds. On such terms he could -not succeed the General for the presidency, which was his invincible -ambition. What Calhoun hoped was, by a deafening din of threat on his -people's part of secession and rebellion, and every whatnot of stark -treason besides, to browbeat the General to his will of Nullification; -and thus by the one stroke to so fix himself in the van of victorious -sentiment that no one might stay his march of White House conquest. And -in good truth, thus argued the General. - -“But he should beware,” said the General. “Calhoun and his cohorts -shall not steal a march on the old soldier. They must not go too far. -A conspiracy to do treason exists, and Calhoun is at its head. But the -mere conspiracy is not enough. Marshall lays it down how folk can not -think treason, can not talk treason, and that treason to be treason must -be acted. There must be the overt act; and though it be but the act -of one, it attaches to every member of the conspiracy and becomes the -treason of all. If one man so much as snap a South Carolina flint, that -is an act to fall within the law, and the treason is the treason of -Calhoun. I say, he should take heed for himself; whether he know it or -no, the man walks among pitfalls.” - -“But you should be prepared,” I said. - -“We will go upon the work at once,” returned the General. “Winfield -Scott shall proceed to Charleston; the fleet shall convene in the bay; -Castle Pinckney shall have a hundred thousand stand of arms; and we will -write to our old Indian fighters, Crockett and Coffee and Houston and -Dale and Overton and the rest, to lie ready with one hundred -thousand riflemen in Tennessee and North Carolina to overwhelm these -rebellionists at the dropping of a handkerchief.” - -This converse, I recall, came off one afternoon when the General was in -more healthful fettle than stood common during those days of fear -for his life. Peg sat with us; indeed, it was news she gave us from a -Charleston paper to bring down all this talk. - -Peg, silent yet interested, listened while the General laid out his -purposes. - -“And if the Vice-President were taken for treason, what then?” asked Peg -in a kind of innocence. “What would you do with him?” - -“He shall hang, child,” and the General spoke slowly and with a granite -emphasis; “he shall hang as high as Haman! He shall be a lesson to -traitors for all time.” - -It was then, and for the first time, as the General sank back spent, and -in his weakness almost consumed of his own fires, there broke on me -the whole peril of Calhoun. I knew the General too well to distrust the -execution of his rope-and-gibbet threat. I was the more confirmed when -that evening he would have me go about a score of letters ordering the -readiness of those ships and arms and men he had outlined. A cordon of -power was to be thrown about Calhoun and the ground beneath him mined -for his destruction. - -Now if the General through this long summer grew to a better -acquaintance with Peg, the same also might be told of me. And hardly -a day was to dawn and die when in the unique turns and twists of her -manifold nature she would not come upon me in a novel light. She was -never to be twice the same, and my sluggish apprehension could scarce -keep pace with the changes of her. - -For a specimen, then, of how she would stand against me over a wrong -claim, and her skill in its defence. One morning she had drawn me off to -the northward for a walk. The day was by no means sultry, and a breeze -was blowing and so induced a temperature which made the exercise a joy. -We were rambling through a deep valley--Peg and I--which was the home -of a brawling rivulet, and making a slow journey of it, since the way, -broken by boulders and sown with thickets in between, was something of -the roughest. While about this pleasant toil Peg broke forth: - -“Do you see that vine?” Here she pointed to a creeper, luxuriant and -rich, which, failing of support to climb by, ran all about on the -ground. “That vine is like me. It needs a trellis--asks some tall and -strong tree to clasp and love and grow upon. Given a tree to touch the -heavens, that loving vine would climb upward to kiss the heavens with -her tree. Wanting her tree--poor vine!--she grovels about the ground. -That vine and I are the same.” - -To this I offered no response, for I could not see how the matter called -for debate; and then her fancy was like unto a shooting star, and no one -might foresee its flight or prophesy its course. However, Peg did not -ask reply. Away she plunged in a new direction. - -“Should one control his love, to send it here or there like a dog?” - -“Why,” said I, “the thing is out of the question. One's love is not a -creature of bit and bridle, to be guided as one guides a horse. I should -say that no one controls his love, but is controlled by it.” - -“See there, now! A second Daniel!” cried Peg, with a little flicker of -derision. For all that, I could tell how she agreed with me. She went -on, “Then one is not to blame how one's love wanders, since one has it -in no leading-string. Should one marry without love?” - -“Of a verity! no,” I retorted. “It would be to cheat the other of every -chance of happiness.” - -“If one be not to blame,” said Peg, in a wandering way of talk, “if -one be not to blame for the birth of one's love, neither should one -be blamed for its death. And if one is not to marry without love, one -should not continue, the wife with the husband nor he with her, when -love has met its end. You yourself have shown me the wrong of that. Ah, -watch-dog! am I not right?” - -“Now, in all my days,” said I, “I have not been made to talk so much on -love. The question is above me.” - -“You said folk should not wed wanting love.” Peg paused to stamp her -foot at me in saucy vehemence. “If that be true, then folk should not -remain wedded wanting love. Do you not think, if a wife were to cease to -love her husband, she should leave him? Does she not owe him that duty? -And you have said, watch-dog, as you shall not forget, that her love, -too, is not her fault.” - -“Still, I should deem it great pity,” said I, “were a wife to leave her -husband.” - -“And that is mighty loyal to your friend,” cried Peg, in a hot spurt of -indignation. “Did not the General's wife leave a husband for him? -It was well for both her and him they did not consult with you. She -might have been unhappy yet, and he never happy at all.” Then, gravely, -following a pause: “watch-dog, you are dull beyond description.” - -When I reflected on my blind inference of criticism against the General, -and his wife in her grave, I was willing to concede as much. However, I -took refuge in saying nothing, waiting for my blunder to blow by. - -After a moment, and as we walked in a wide grassy place side by side, -Peg took up my hand. Finding the round, white mark where the wound of -her leopard tooth had healed, she gazed on it a moment and sighed. Then, -before I could stay her, she kissed it. - -“Peg's mark!” she exclaimed, as though she conversed with her thoughts; -“Peg's mark for her slave!” Then lifting up her eyes to mine: “I love -that mark; so much of you I love.” Then hiding a rogue of a smile which -began to creep about the corners of her mouth, for she would be amused, -it would seem, over the confusion into which her caress had thrown -me--“Tell me, slave, do you not wish now it were a great hideous scar to -overwhelm you?” - -“And wherefore?” I asked. I could see how she meant to tease me with her -mockeries, and would give her no answer to go upon. “I regard that as a -very excellent scar as it is,” said I. “I would not have it larger for a -good deal.” - -“Oh, believe me,” cried Peg, her nose to the sky in a moment: “I would -not make it larger for the world.” - -With that, and wearing a mighty air of insult, she went about swiftly, -and never a syllable for good or ill could I bring from her until -we reached her house. At the gate she paused and offered me her old, -teasing look. - -“Do you pray, watch-dog?” said she. - -“I cannot make that boast,” I replied. - -“You should begin at once,” she retorted. “You should pray for quickness -and a little wit.” Then, seeing me to rummage about in my thoughts for -a clue to this: “But have no fear, watch-dog; I shall never let the -General know how you condemned his wife.” - -This gave me ease again, for then I caught her meaning. However, I -needed no such assurance, since I knew of none to own Peg's tact, or one -less likely to go upon that error with the General she would pledge me -her word to avoid. - -The summer was running into autumn and the General no better. There had -been good days and bad days, and for weeks on end we were made to swing -between hope and fear like a pendulum. And I believe he would have died, -too, if it had not been for Peg to tend upon his pillow like a daughter. -What a joy I had of the girl! My soul would fair reach out to take her -in its arms for that tireless affection wherewith she surrounded him. -While she could help, she was about him like an angel; when he turned -his head for a little rest, she would be with me in her big chair by my -desk. - -And yet, when the days drew on themselves the coolness of October, and -one should have looked for him to mend, the General fell suddenly away -to the last flicker of his strength like a candle burning out. It was -then the doctor gave him that warning how his time was near, and put us -upon our guard to meet the worst. I may tell you my heart was as so much -wood under my ribs, and gloom dwelt in the house like a ghost. - -It will have somewhat a foolish sound, but, as I live by bread I think -it was our Peg to save the General out from between the paws of death. -Not by her care, though that was above description, but rather with a -thought she one day laid upon him. - -“Child, I shall surely die,” the General was saying. “I have thought so -more than once during my rough life; but this time is my first to really -know. Now I see that I shall die.” - -Then he asked her to read a song from the hymn-book of his wife. “They -are always an ease to me,” he said. - -Peg's eyes were running tears, and she had her work cut out to smother -her sobs. For all that, she bore bravely up. - -“You will not die,” cried Peg. “And I shall read you, instead of hymns, -how the Vice-President means to pull the country to pieces with -his Charleston plots. Will you die and make him president in your -stead--endow him with the power for his treasons?” - -Peg told me how she had no design in saying this, and that Calhoun -was in her mouth no more than an exclamation. And yet had it been the -prescription of a whole college of doctors, it could not have exerted a -wholesomer effect. - -The General had told me he would die; and I had stood in daily terror of -it; and yet neither had once fallen to consider--and this smacks of the -foolish for both of us--how his death would raise up Calhoun to take his -place. The truth is, I could never bring myself to plan or look beyond -the General's death; my thought, however fear-spurred, would run no -farther than just his death; there it would stop nor budge a pace -beyond. The General's death would seem the end of things, as it might be -a second deluge. And perhaps he, himself, fell into similar frame; only -with him it was but his building on that all-swallowing hope of meeting -with his Saint Rachel, never again to be parted. That crowded out all -else. - -Letting conjecturings go adrift, however, the bald fact remains that it -was Peg, after all, who came first to make us take a thought in advance -and consider where the General's going would place the country with -Calhoun. I remember how the General lay back on his pillow after Peg's -outburst of warning; and next how his glance began to collect its -old-time fire. - -“By the Eternal!”--this in a whisper--“I will not die and leave the -people helpless with those traitors. I must either live my term out, or -live till I hang Calhoun. The country must be safe before I go.” - -From that moment he would not speak of dying, but only of getting -well and living; and each day he made visible stages towards a better -strength, and would sit up longer, and would demand that we do some -work. I can not say I witnessed these efforts without trembling; he -might break himself down to death's door with this sudden load of labor. -But no, he would go on; and no harm to come of it, but only good, for -within the four weeks to follow Peg's inspired exhortation--for I shall -ever think of her as one inspired of heaven to call the General back -from death--he could be looked on as a hale man, one sound and in a -plight of safety. - -Also, his old fierceness began again to burn; he would bicker with me -viciously--a thing laid aside for months. It comes back to me how, -at the tail end of that sickness, his first words of opposition to -something I proposed fell on my ears like a concord of sweet sounds. -I could thank God in my heart to hear his anger, for now I knew he was -surely upon health's own highroad. And so he was. - -There came another thing of moment to find its cause in the General's -illness, and that death it would threaten. The word had gone about the -town that the General was in his last throes, or nearly; and at that, -the thought giving a mean courage to the man, in the midst of this -bad news our port wine Duff Green came upon us with a long editorial -comparison of Calhoun with Van Buren, wherein the latter was lashed and -the other uplifted to the blue dome. The article was nothing strong or -well considered--a mere black thing of froth and poison!--and served no -purpose beyond marking Duff Green's friendship in one quarter and his -enmity in another. - -It was Peg, who had taken charge of our newspapers, to call our eyes to -the business. - -Peg's indignation ran high, for she was a tireless adherent of her “good -little secretary,” who would be her ally against Mrs. Calhoun. - -“Listen to this wretch!” cried Peg, as with the paper in her little claw -she burst upon the General and me. - -Thereupon she gave us the English of it, and being strung with anger, -flourished it off with much spirit and effect. - -While the General bent quiet ear, his brow lowered and his own anger -began to run with Peg's. - -“The scoundrel speaks of Van Buren,” said the General, when Peg was -done; “but he means me. And so he applauds Calhoun! Then let him follow -his applause for his support.” Then, to me directly: “Did you not in the -beginning speak of calling Blair to found a paper? Write to him; bid him -come at once. This Duff Green has done enough for punishment, and we -will go about his destinies in ways not soon to be forgot.” - -Within the hour, a word was on the road to Blair in Frankfort; a word -to become at once the death-warrant of Duff Green's _Telegraph_ and the -reason of Blair's _Globe_, which last, as the General once said, grew up -in a night like any Jonah's gourd, to cast a long, important shadow in -affairs. - -Duff Green, as if to observe the effect of his Calhoun-Van Buren shot, -would call upon the General. It was my guardian Jim who told me of that -visit. - -“I was sort o' knockin' 'round,” said Jim, “like a blind dog in a meat -shop, when dish yere Duff Green gentleman tells me to give you 'Howdy!' -an' say he's waitin' to see you-all.” - -“Where is he?” I asked. - -“He's pervadin' about d'big Eas' Room,” returned Jim, “when I 'bandons -him.” - -Duff Green extended his fishy hand; but I did not see it, my eyes being -employed upon his face; and that with so cold an industry it served to -turn the violin red of it to apoplectic purple for uneasiness and rage. - -“I offer you my hand, sir,” cried Duff. - -“Sir,” said I, “in requital, I offer you a sentence of counsel. Be out -of that door, and do not enter it again until your friend Calhoun is -master in this house. But stay; I have another order for your ear. Do -not, by word or look or act, whether to me or to any man, make claim on -my acquaintance. I will not agree as to the measure of my resentment in -case you do.” - -“Sir, is this an insult?” - -“Sir, you will please yourself for a term.” - -“And, sir,”--Duff Green's voice quavered a trifle--“am I to consider -this the action of the president?” - -“I think it would be wise to do so,” I retorted, “since you would seem -to stand even lower in his graces than you do in mine. I argue this -from a comparison of our remarks upon you.” I was enough the savage -to delight in harassing the pursy Duff and in diminishing his brow -of consequence. “I did but casually describe you--being idle at the -time--as a bloated spider, sucking patronage, and with a newspaper to be -your web, when he would correct me. 'You do the dog a compliment,' said -he. 'Now, one might conceive of a spider that should be of some moment. -He whom we call Duff Green is no such thing. He is nothing; or at most -a vacuum, which is nothingness given a name--as it were, an im-ponderous -absence of overpowering unimportance.'” - -“Them's mighty fine words, Marse Major, you-all flings loose,” said Jim, -when Duff Green quit the field. Jim, whose care concerning me was only -equaled by his curiosity, stood, of course, in close attendance upon the -colloquy. “Yas-sir,” he continued, “them's what Jim calls langwidge of -d'good ol' Cumberland kind. That Duff Green gentleman shore misses it -a mile when he comes pawin' 'round for to 'spute with you. Yes, indeed, -Marse Major, that's whar he drap his water-million!” - -When I repeated my interview with Duff to the General, together with -Jim's comments of admiration, and we had had our laugh, the General -turned serious: - -“Major,” said he, “I've been thinking. I may yet die, and the rule we -made that no one of my cabinet shall succeed me when my term is done -turns now to be no good rule. It strengthens Calhoun. Also, it is he to -set his dog of a Duff against Van Buren because the latter would buckler -Peg. I'm too much broken and too weak for talk, and I need not repeat -the reasons for such step. It's on my heart, however, to set the ball in -motion for Van Buren to have this place when my term is done.” - -“And how would you proceed?” said I. “For myself, nothing could be -better to my taste.” - -“This is my notion,” said the General. “Let us write to Overton, setting -forth--with a cloud of other matter to be a cover--the presidential -fitness of Van Buren in his every line. This shall be a secret between -Overton and us. The letter will be wanted only in event of my death, -for while I live Calhoun shall never have the White House. If I die, why -there's my name to it for Van Buren against the world. And let me tell -you, sir, I much mistake my place with the people if my dead word be not -of greater weight with them, aye! if it do not move them far beyond any -potency to be latent in the living name Calhoun.” - -We made no pause about it, the General and I, and as soon as saddle-bags -might carry, Overton received the missive which the General had -described. It was never wanted, for the General did not die; but there -it lay in the hands of Overton, and the word-for-word blood brother -to it in my own, ready like a grim reserve to take his place in battle -against Calhoun should the General be stricken down. - -And thus, during our first summer and autumn, did the General and I, -with caution and wise concern, coil down and clear our political decks -for the great wars we knew were at hand. Defeat for our enemies; triumph -for our friends; those were our watchwords. - -You may believe I went into November and looked winterward with a load -off my soul, when now the General's health was come back; and with -it his temper to wrangle and clash with me; also his mighty heart was -restored, hot as Hecla and as volcanic, against those who, mongering -Nullification, would forge a Calhoun treason down among the rice fields. - -As for Peg, there stood no limit to her satisfaction when the fight for -the General's life was won, and he in fairer health than at any hour -since we came. - -“And, child, it was you who saved me,” said the General, lifting up -Peg's chin with his thin hand. “Do you think I shall forget that?” - -Now the town began to regain its own, and folk came straggling in from -beach and hill and dale. Noah, too, was down from New York, he and his -graceful Hercules, Rivera; and, as the town filled, Peg's spirits would -put on spurs, and she never was more blithe and high than now when we -drew close to that struggle of the drawing rooms wherein she so planned -to have a leading portion. - -One day, however, she would seem not quite so gay as common, but with a -haze of thought about those eyes, which of late--with the General strong -and above the need of drugs--had danced and sparkled. Peg had brought me -a posy of flowers for my desk. - -“Are they not beautiful?” she asked. “I love the flowers; so sweet, so -contented on their stems among the leaves! Are they not beautiful?” - -“And how will I see flowers while you are in the place?” said I. - -This was to cure her out of her sadness, which, for all her words about -the flowers, hung over her face like a mist. - -“Now, see how well you said that!” cried Peg, brightening a little and -turning me her droll look. “Was it prepared? Was it spontaneous? Really, -slave, were you to go on like that for a year, or say for two, my hope -might revive over you.” This lightly, and to step off her tongue with -foot of air. Then, for my bewilderment beyond hope, she without warning -breaks into tears. And next, to be a cap-sheaf on my shocked amazement, -she gives me this at the door, to which she cries her way blindly: “My -husband will be home to-night!” And with that she leaves me helplessly -to wonder was there ever born upon this earth, to be a beautiful woman -and turn folk mad, such another confusing tangle as this Peg of ours! - - - - -CHAPTER X--THE MAJOR AND PEG AT CROSSES - -Next morning I went straight into the midst of my correspondence and -began tossing it on my pen as husbandmen toss hay. There rang no unusual -call for this energy of ink, but the whole truth was that, flying like a -fugitive before pursuing thoughts of Peg--I may tell you they had a fine -dance about my pillow the night before!--I would make a refuge of my -work. - -Long ago I had given up the hope of solving Peg in her vagaries. One -would never know where or when or how to lay hold on her, for she -came to one new and new each day. Wayward, erratic, now fierce and now -tender, now in laughter and now in tears, one might not count on her -moods in their direction more than on the flight of birds. The one -only thing one might be sure of concerning Peg was that one was sure of -nothing. - -It was the thought of those tears for the home-coming of Eaton which -would storm me down and have me captive for all I might barricade with -pen and ink. What should they proclaim? That Peg was unhappy, truly, -since folk do not weep for mirth. In a way I was daunted of my honor as -I went about these thoughts; it seemed a trustless thing to dwell on Peg -and her wedded life. And I would fight against it; and still it pinned -and held me. In the last of it I was claimed by the conclusion that Peg -found existence grievously dark, for what else should be headwaters for -those tears? Also, I resolved that I would coldly look the question of -her grief in the face; it might turn the better for both of us to lay -hands upon its cause. I was given the more courage for this scrutiny -since I had not forgotten how Peg named me to be her only confidant; -that word put a trust upon me and made my question-asking a kind of -duty. - -As thread by thread I lifted up the inquiry of Peg's sorrow, the truth -would begin to make itself plain to me. Eaton was something gross, and -mayhap in his finer senses not unnumbed of the bowl. He could not value -Peg--she, a perfumed spirit thing of music and color and fire and light! -And Peg would feel his lack of appreciation; it would wring her heart, -stab her like a dagger. Verily, I came by a great freshness when now I -was on the right scent of it. This, it was, to lie at the root of her -meaning when she showed me that vine trailing its rich beauties along -the ground, instead of climbing, and said, “I am like that vine.” The -prone and earth-held soul of Eaton offered her no trellis. - -And so Peg mourned her lost estate of love! And why should she not -mourn? she, thus swindled of a rightful destiny! Peg shone a thing of -beauty to deck a heaven with; and here was she fated to be the jewel in -the dulled head of a toad! Why should her sorrow find rebuke? Born to be -the reason of admiration and to feed on it as a flower feeds on the sun, -the irony of accident had flung her into this chill corner of neglect. -And her love was dying--starving away its life. Peg did not love Eaton; -the yoke galled her--yoking her as it did to one who, while perhaps -owning the affections, the integrity, the loyalty, owned also the low -unelevation of the brute. And for that, Peg would stay behind when Eaton -went away and weep to see him coming. - -While, with some fondness for the argument--since it would make for -Peg's exoneration--I was moving to these conclusions, it ran abruptly -over me how, during our first talk in the parlors of the Indian Queen, -Peg's eyes would seem to swim in love for Eaton. I recalled her cry of -pain when she feared he might be shamed for her, and how she said she -would sooner die than that. Then, surely, Peg must have loved him; nor -had he changed since then. - -These memories were sent to baffle me; but with a second thought the -fallacy of such deductions was laid bare. When, in the Indian Queen, -Peg would weep for love of Eaton, she was but the bride of a month. -She stood yet in the haze of the honeymoon, and had been given no frank -outline of her mate. Then he seemed what he should be, not what he was, -and Hope, not Truth, was painter to the picture. - -Yes, it would walk before me right enough; Eaton had been a lover of -gold to become a husband of brass. Peg was as much wasted on him as -though one put a love verse from Herrick into the hands of a Seminole of -the Everglades. In his arms she was an error--a solecism--a crime--as it -might be, a lily on a muck-heap! - -These thoughts so played the tyrant with me as to take the pen from -between my fingers; I could do no work, but only sit and stare from the -window while my mind ran away to Peg. - -Then I resolved to call Peg over; she should adorn her throne at my -desk's end; I would show her how, for all that cloudiness of sensibility -on the part of another, there still lived one on whom her sweet fineness -was not thrown away. I would dispatch her a note by Jim; I would crave -her help for my mails. This should bring her, and be a fair excuse -besides, since it was not the beginning of such requests. Peg had often -aided me to get my letters off. - -Note in hand and ready, I stepped to the rear of the mansion to summon -Jim. I could hear his high, patronizing tones, evidently employed about -the instruction of the cook. The two were close by a rear door that -opened into the kitchen. - -“Yassir,” I heard Jim say, “they has black bass in d'Cumberland, shoals -an' shoals of'em. How much you reckon that one weigh?” Apparently they -had a Potomac fish between them to be the basis of discussion. “How much -that weigh? Five pounds? You hyar me, son, we uses that size fish for -bait back in Tennessee. Do Jim ever catch a bigger one? Say; if Jim -don't catch a bass in d'ol' Cumberland that's bigger than a cow, then -Jim'll jine d'church! It was a heap excitin', cotchin' that fish. He -grab d'hook; an' then he jes' nacherally split up an' down d'river like -ol' Satan was arter him for dinner; an' then he done dives. That's whar -he leads d'wrong kyard; for he bump his nose, blim! on d'rock bottom; -an' it hurt him so he jes' turn, an' next he comes lippin' up through -d'top of d'water an' goes soarin' off up into d'air for fifty foot. -That's when Jim sees how big he is. When he gets up into d'atmosphere, -he sort o' shuck himse'f, same as you-all sees a hen waller in d'dust; -an', son, you could hear his scales rattle like shakin' buckshot in a -bottle! An' at d'same time, that bass lams loose a yell folk might -nacherally hear a mile, an' which shorely sounds like d'squall of a soul -in torment. You hyar Jim! that bass--” At this, I broke in on the -revelations of our black Munchausen with my demands. As he turned, I -heard him call back: - -“No, I don't get him; he done bruk d'hook.” - -Peg and I had been worthily busy with my letters for full ten minutes. -She was, for her, very quiet, almost indeed to the line of a grave -sadness, which after all should be the aftermath of those tears of the -day before. - -If Peg were wordless, I, on my side, sat equally without conversation. -We made tongueless company; but for that very reason went with all the -more earnestness to the letters as though they were the seeds of this -silence. - -“Well?” said Peg, with a suddenness, her hands in her lap. I stared. -“Well?” she repeated. Then, when I said nothing, she would elaborate a -bit. “Well, watch-dog, what would you have? You know these letters were -the merest pretext for me to come.” - -“Why, then,” said I, made desperate because she snatched away my -disguise, “why, then, I was in a fret to look on you.” - -“Was it that?” - -“Sometimes I fear your husband does not wholly understand you.” It -took courage to go thus far; it marked a point mightily forward of any -attained to in former talks. - -Peg gave me one of those fathomless looks, narrowing her brow -whimsically. My bluntness had not dashed her spirit, at any rate; -indeed, it would seem to have raised it. - -“You fear my husband does not understand me?” repeated Peg. Now she -paused an endless while, her eyes reading mine like print. I could feel -her searching me for my last promise of expression. “You fear my husband -does not understand me. And is he to be the only one? Is it there the -roll-call ends? If that were true, I might sustain myself.” For all a -shadowy, vague piquancy of brow, Peg got this off wearily enough, and -I still prisoner to her eyes. Now, after a moment, her vivacity -would mount a little. “You are right,” she went on, “I am not much -understood.” A smile peeped from the dimple in her cheek. “What -would you think, watch-dog, were I to give thick folk lessons in -myself--expound myself to dunces as your pedagogue gives lessons in a -book?” - -“The lessons you propose should be marvellously sweet,” said I. Then, -with some tincture of my better courage: “By my soul's hope! I should be -sure to go to school for those lessons.” - -“Ah! do you challenge me?” cried Peg. Now it would be the old Peg. “From -this hour you begin your studies. Life shall be a never-ending lesson, -and Peg the lesson.” - -“And I a student most diligent.” - -Peg came and stood close against my shoulder where I sat at the desk. -Her color and her brightness had returned to chase away the shadows. -With her fingers she parted my hair where the frosts of two score years -and four were beginning their blight. She made as though she considered -these ravages of silver. - -Finally, she spoke to me in a way tenderly good. - -“Watch-dog, watch-dog, you have eyes in your head and none in your wits. -You are a blind-wit, watch-dog, a blind-wit of no hope. And you would -study Peg? Teach I never so lucidly, study thou never so long, yet -shouldst thou never know Peg, but die in darkness of her.” Peg said this -with a kind of murmur of regret. Then, collecting direction: “How many -times has Peg been with you? And yet you have never seen her--never once -seen Peg. You do not see Peg now while she stands at your shoulder. You -are a blind-wit.” - -“If I have not seen Peg,” said I, “and if I do not now see Peg, then at -the least my eyes have tasted visions above report.” - -“Now you speak well,” quoth Peg, with an archness of pretended approval. - -Here, surely, should be the old, true Peg. It was a delight to listen to -the bantering yet soft tones of her, like walking in the May woods with -their new green and the new blossoms painting the ground about one's -feet. - -“What have I seen, then?” I asked, going back a pace. - -“What have you seen? A mirage, the mere mirage of Peg--her picture, -sketched on the skies of your ideal.” Then in a playful manner of -correction, as when a girl refuses a compliment: “You have looked -upward, watchdog, when you should have looked down. And now for your -first lesson. This is the text of it: Would you find a woman, keep your -eyes on the ground.” - -For all Peg's humor of gaiety, I could tell how she was under greatest -strain. Also, there ran an odd current of reproach throughout her words. -It was as though she saw faults in me. - -“And now,” said I, seeking to focus complaint, “and now, what have I -done or said to hurt?” - -Peg drew away from my shoulder. I could not see her face, but I felt her -spirit changing from cool to hot in the furnace of some thought. There -was silence for a moment. - -“What have you done to hurt?” cried Peg, suddenly, breaking into a -wondrous wrath. “Oh, I could die with such a dullard! What have you -done? What is this just-now complaint you conceive against my husband? -He does not understand me, forsooth! You should consider yourself! What -have you done to hurt? You place me too high! You put me out of reach! -Oh, I know of no more dreadful fate than to be forever mistaken for -an angel!” That last came like the cry of a heart in torture. The next -moment Peg was gone and I left gasping. - -Of what avail to think? As she had said, I was a blundering blind-wit, -and, by me at least, Peg would not be made out. I had declared how -Eaton owned a footless fancy which could not raise itself to realize a -goddess. And now, in my own high superiority, I had come bravely off! -I had been properly paid as one who is churl enough to give a woman a -compliment at the expense of her husband. Was I to suppose my goddess -would accept flattery at the cost of her self-respect? The goddess -from her furious pedestal had denounced me as one who planned for her -dishonor. - -Congress was now come down upon us like a high wind. The town began to -rub its eyes free of those cobwebs of vacation slumbers; the taverns -took on a buzzing life, while the streets, lately so still and lonesome, -showed thickly sown of folk going here and there, for this reason of -legislation or that hunger of office, and with faces gay or sombre as -success was given or denied. - -Noah was one to be denied. He had come to town somewhat in advance of -Congress. The General brought him quickly to the White House and made -him unpack his budget of gossip. How was Burr? How was Swartout? How -fared Hoyt? Thus ran off the General's curiosity. - -“All well, all prosperous,” responded Noah, “and the town itself growing -up to weeds of riches. The New York cry is, Money! They revise your -friend Crockett, and, for an aphorism, say, 'Be sure you're rich, then -go ahead.'” - -The General would have it that Noah must take an office--a collectorship -or some such gear. - -“The Senate would defeat my confirmation,” said Noah; “first for that -I'm a Jew; and next because of Catron.” - -“And even so,” returned the General; “it is still worth while to -discover who would do that.” - -Noah was right, and his name came up to be refused by one vote. Calhoun -from his place as president of the Senate proved as flint against Noah, -while his mouthpiece, Hayne, led the war on the floor. I have yet to -look on more anger than was the General's when the news arrived. - -“Heed it not,” said Noah, snapping his fingers. “I have still my -laughter, my newspaper, and my Spanish swords.” - -“But the insult of it!” cried the General. - -“To the cynic,” said Noah, lightly, “there can come no insult. Your -philosopher who laughs is safe against such whimsies. I shall long -remain both fat of pride and fat of purse for all a Senate may do. You -do not know me; I should have been a Diogenes and insulted Alexanders -from my tub.” - -Calhoun and his coterie brought with them to town their great question -of Nullification. They worked on it incessantly and made a deal of -hubbub. Calhoun set forward his man, Hayne, to the exposition of this -policy of national disintegration. Hayne was met in that debate and -overthrown by the mighty Webster. The country echoed with the strife of -these Titans. - -For himself, the General followed the argument, North against South, -word by word and step by step. He had the debate of each day written -off, and Peg would come over and read it to him while he smoked and -pondered and resolved. - -About this time I must write down how I was made to feel rebuked and -neglected. Following that unguided reference to her husband, Peg would -seem to have deserted me. My eyes had little of her, and I heard her -voice still less; for while she was often in to gossip with the General, -or read those Senate speeches to him, she gave me only stray, cold -glances and monosyllables. She came no more to my workshop; and day -after day I sat alone while melancholy crept upon me like mosses over -stone. I was not so dense but I could tell how I had offended. Peg was -proud; she resented my suggestion that Eaton lacked appreciation; that -was why she flew upon me, beak and talon, and said it was I who lived in -darkness of her. I had been the wiser had I forgotten those tears of -hers so soon as they were dry, and withstood myself from meddling -opinions concerning her lot in life. Peg's coldness was the proper -retort for my impertinence, and I must bear it even while it broke my -heart. - -It would be the expected thing that I should turn cheerless and be cast -down when now Peg left me with my thoughts alone. I had grown so used -to her about me, and to hear the sweet laugh of her, that it was to miss -something out of my life when she took herself away. And yet it would -be egotism. Folk miss and for a while deplore what has become a piece of -their days--even chains and dungeons, so I've heard. Nor is this due to -any love save self-love. I have often considered, as folk shed tears on -a grave, how they wept for themselves and not for him who slept at their -feet. It was the merest selfishness of habit, this dejection because Peg -would desert me. Her absence would become custom in time, and then, -should' she return, that coming doubtless would irk me just as much. - -For all my wisdom, however, when now my starved eyes came only by stray, -sparse glimpses of Peg, as I beheld her now and again across in the -President's Square, or when she went by my door on her visits to the -General, my spirit fell to be jaded and vastly lowered. - -Had I known my way to go about it, I would have sought Peg out and -talked with her freely and in full of what had fallen to be our -differences. I would have acknowledged my error. But I saw no open gate -through which to come by such converse, and I feared with an attempt -to plunge bad into worse. - -Once, indeed, my resolve was half hatched to gain some plain speech of -her. I lay in wait until, the day being fine, I had sight of her on a -rustic seat over across in the square. She was wrapped in a fur of some -sort--martin, I think--and, with this drawn high about the throat, it so -framed her face as to make her beautiful to the verge of witchcraft. - -Seeing how she was near a path, I lounged out of door, and crossing the -road, would make as though to walk by her, casually, and for exercise -and air. It was my plan to greet Peg, and next drift into word with her -as in the old time. The old time! It was not days away, and yet it -seemed as distant as my cradle! I would drift into speech of her, I say, -and trust to fortune and my wit to bring down the explanation I believed -might solve a reconciliation for us. It was a stratagem sagacious -enough, but Peg granted me no chance of its test. - -Before I could get to Peg, indeed, before I journeyed half the distance, -she arose, careless and contained, as though she had not observed -me--albeit I am sure she had--and would be moving for her own gate. At -this I half halted; and Peg, striking out into a rapid walk, was in a -moment the other side of her door. A little later I saw her standing by -a window. - -[Illustration: 0323] - -With Peg's flight I was abashed; it was so sure she wished to dodge me. -Then a kind of anger took me in hand and I started towards her house. I -do not know what was my precise thought in this, or whether I would have -gone forward to lift the great knocker on the panel. As it fell forth, -however, Peg, on seeing me coming, whipped away from the window; with -that my heart would turn all to water and I faced sadly about. - -Being abroad in the streets, I now went on to walk, and to clear my -bosom of that unhappiness which lay so heavy on it. I walked on and on, -with no clear purpose until the thing to strike my notice was how here -before me sprawled that vine which, on a summer day, Peg characterized -for its wanderings and said it was like her. - -Why I should go seeking this vine is by no means plain; and yet I must -have owned to some hope of its succor, since I stood long to consider -it, and cast about with my eyes if, by any luck of nature, a stout true -tree stood at hand which might be given it for support. There was none; -the poor vine must live and die unwedded on the loveless ground. - -Somehow it magnified my sorrow when I could learn no way to help Peg's -vine. But so it abode; there it should lie until the end. And the vine -would seem to realize this, too; for it looked desolate, with leaves -frost-seared and discolored like perished hopes. - -It can not be said that I was uplifted of my walk, and I returned home, -if the fact must out, more unhappy than on any day since I last looked -on the Cumberland. It is curious, also, that this woe of Peg's coldness -towards me should precipitate itself in wrath upon the General. But thus -it did; for that innocent soldier had but to breathe Peg's name as we -sat with our pipes that night, and all in a setting of conversation most -commonplace, when I was upon him like a panther, snarling demands and -clawing for replies, as to how much more time he expected me to steal -from my plantations to waste upon him and his affairs. - -To give credit where credit is due, the General kept himself quite -steady under this unexpected fire, and refilled his pipe in confident, -unshaken peace. - -“My explosive friend,” said the General, “I need make no better answer -than just to turn your question on yourself. You know full well you -would no more leave me than I would leave you. Those growls you give us -arise from a dyspepsia of the imagination. You'll be as right as gold -after a night's sleep.” - -It was upon me a bit later, as I sat trying to do some letters, that -one secret of my gloom reposed in Peg's great chair, spreading its -empty arms to my eyes each time I raised them from the page. It was that -mocking empty chair to stare my heart out of countenance and give accent -to its dreary emptiness. - -On the impulse, I swooped as on an enemy and bore it to another room. -Then I felt better; and indeed it was a relief not to be longer taunted -of that chair, which would exult in being vacant and find a triumph by -flinging at me the absence of my Peg. - -Now the General, while commonly as frank for talk as a cataract, could -be, when he preferred, as inscrutable as the tomb. It pleased him to -lock up his tongue over Nullification; and while I understood his pose, -and both Peg and Noah had heard him tell his thought on that pregnant -topic of state, together with his feeling for Calhoun, folk for a widest -part remained much in the dark. And it was often put and never answered, -this query of what the General's course would be when the last grapple -came to hand. The agitators for Secession were no folk to put to sea -wanting chart, however crude, to display the shores and waters about -them. They resolved to arrive by some knowledge of the General's temper -on this dogma of danger so near the Calhoun heart. - -In quest of such news, a spy, or perhaps he should be called a -scout--the title is the more honorable--was dispatched to find and mark -the General's position. The General and I were given a foreword by Noah -of our gentleman who would be thus upon a recon-noiter. He came in sight -one day, and fell upon our flank in this fashion. - -It was an afternoon, crisp and clear; altogether a day proper for middle -autumn rather than the winter of any honest year. I had been out with -Noah and was about my return. As I came up the walk, the -General's ramrod form--tall hat, dark garb, swinging his tasseled -walking-stick--emerged from the mansion's front door. - -“Turn with me for a short jaunt,” said he. “But first step down to the -stables. I must have a look to my horses. That clumsy rascal, Charlie, -let them run away, and aside from a strain to the horses and a hand's -breadth of hide knocked off the nigh one's shoulder, he broke the wheel -of the coach--my wife's coach, Major; I wouldn't have had it injured for -a world of coaches.” - -This coach was one of the General's treasures. Well I recall how it -was first brought up the Cumberland years before and rolled ashore at -Nashville. - -“But it's for her,” observed the General, as I suggested the slimness of -his purse in contrast with the cost of the vehicle; “it's for her. She -shall have a proper carriage to ride in.” - -“I am more concerned for the coach,” remarked the General, as we went -about the western corner of the mansion on our way towards the stables, -“then for the horses. If she were here now, her whole tender thought -would be of the latter.” - -The injuries to the carriage were not grievous, and a look of pleased -relief filled the General's eyes. The horses, too, had come well through -their unauthorized dash along the road, and a hostler, skillful of -horse-drugs, gave his word to cure them of every ill received with a -quart of wormwood and vinegar, and a spoonful of tar for the cuts. - -“Beauties, eh?” said the General, as he admired the sleek gray-dappled -coats with hand and eye. “Beauties, they are indeed! And descended in -direct line from my great horse Truxton. You remember Truxton; that -never-beaten King of the Clover Bottom Course?” - -Truxton would be recalled easily enough. The more, since it was that -fleet champion's match with the renowned Ploughboy which in part opened -way to the savage duel with Dickenson. - -Made sure of the safety of his carriage, the General and I turned -westward for a stroll. When we were gone no desperate distance, I was -all of a sudden shouted after in high-pitched tones, though amiable. -We faced about to settle the riddle of the interruption. The calls -were from one Rhetz, a member of the Calhoun inner circle. Being of a -friendly diplomacy, this Rhetz had maintained good relations with the -General and myself. - -“Ah! here we have our friend Rhetz,” exclaimed the General. Rhetz was -yet some distance. While we waited the General made his comment. “He is -the one who should come from Calhoun; my silence on Nullification, as -Noah warned us, has made the Vice-President nervous, and he would feel -me out. I think, Major, and by your leave, I shall clear the business -up for them. Come, now, what say you? Let us run up our Union flag like -gallant, hearty fellows, you and me, and call on the fray. I think, too, -I'll give them my views on Calhoun.” - -“Would it be wise to declare open war on Calhoun?” - -“He has for long waged secret war on me,” retorted the General. “No; -let us unmask ourselves and thereby unmask him. It will cripple him and -strengthen us, since the sole chance he has to harm me is to pretend to -be my friend. Moreover, a fierce openness now should serve somewhat to -hamstring the enemy's campaign against Peg.” - -“I was about to call on you,” said Rhetz, greetings over “and was told -at the door how you were somewhere for a stroll about the grounds.” - -“What was your concern with me?” asked the General, his manner most -urbane. - -“No concern at all,” responded the affable Rhetz, “no concern beyond -a friendly regard, Mr. President. I would call only to exhibit my -friendship.” - -“And that should give me great pleasure,” said the General, casting a -comic side-look towards me. Then, with a plain purpose of helping the -scout to his discoveries: “And what of Congress? I suppose both House -and Senate still heave with the ground-swells of the Webster-Hayne -debate.” - -“There is no end of cloakroom talk,” said Rhetz. “And, by the way, Mr. -President,”--here was a feeler--“there be folk, and your friends at -that, who wonder you are not openly with Calhoun and against Webster and -his Yankees for this principle of States Rights.” Rhetz followed -this last observe with a setting forth of argument bearing for the -Calhoun-Hayne contention. - -“Beware of metaphysics,” observed the General dryly, turning his gray -look against Rhetz, as that rice-land sophist laid down one by one those -various refinements and abstractions wherewith the Palmetto gentry--the -Cal houns and the Butlers and the Pinckneys and the Haynes--were -blazing the path for Secession; “beware of metaphysics! No good comes of -splitting hairs. A rough-hewn honesty--a turgid frankness--should be the -better road.” The General walked on in silence fora brief space, Rhetz -also silent, feeling himself on the brink of some precipice of the -General's temper, and in no sort eager for a fall. “Sir,” resumed the -General, “let me now set you an example; let me be most open with you, -not only for Nullification, but for your friend, Calhoun. First, then, -Calhoun is not trustworthy. Did he not for years teach me to believe he -was my friend with Monroe, when it was he of all that cabinet who -urged my court-martial for taking Florida and hanging Ambristie and -Arbuth-not? Calhoun was my enemy, sir; he is my enemy now. He would hide -the fact, but it is too late. When I tell you how Calhoun is my enemy, -would you still urge on me this prince of duplicity for a statesman -whose word is worth a following? Calhoun, for a plan or a principle, can -not be relied on. He is congenitally bad, and will propose nothing that -is true or high.” Here, as the General's anger began to tower, he would -strike viciously at old weeds, dead and winter-bitten, which ranked the -path we traversed, cutting them down with his hickory stick as with -a saber; Rhetz still silent, without voice. “There lives but one more -trustless than Calhoun--that arch-rogue Clay. And my friends would show -amazement at my failure to be openly with Calhoun! Also, you say they -fear I may follow Webster and his Yankees. Sir, I know the Yankees; they -are a dour, hard brood, who to aid their interests might not scruple to -over-reach. I have yet to hear, however, they betray their friends, as -did Calhoun; I have still to know they would bargain the downfall of -their party, as did Clay. Judas would have done a no more ebon deed than -did that Kentucky renegade when he sold his soul to Adams for a place. -And now am I to take a great doctrine from such children of deceit? -Webster and his Yankees may be centered on themselves and selfish; -doubtless they are. But you may tell Calhoun that I prefer them as -companions of policy before such cozeners as himself and Clay.” The -General's voice here rose like the far high scream of an osprey. - -“Calm yourself, General,” I said, in tones which never failed to bring -him to himself. “There is scant need of informing all Washington City of -our opinions.” - -The General had paused in his walk and taken off that high white -hat, deep girdled of a mourning-band. As he talked he beat this stiff -headgear with his cane until I quite trembled for its integrity. - -“Calhoun,” went on the General, but with temper more in hand, “claims -for his state the right to annul the law--the right to secede from the -Union. Sir, if we were to walk by this doctrine of Nullification, the -Union would be like a bag open at both ends. No matter where or how you -picked it up the meal would all run out. Tell Calhoun that I shall tie -the bag and save the country.” - -The General's lean jaws at this last mention of Calhoun closed hard and -iron-fast like a trap, while his nose seemed more beaky and predatory. -Evidently he half scented Calhoun as a prey to come, and would be ready -to swoop on him. - -“You would seem deeply to hate both Clay and Calhoun, Mr. President,” - Rhetz suggested. Rhetz was somewhat feeble of voice; the General's -outburst had taken his breath. - -“And it is they rather than their doctrines I loathe,” said the General. -“They creep and crawl and sprawl in ambush, and strike at midnight. They -pretend friendship while plotting one's destruction. I was born to make -war upon their tribe--war to the death.” - -Rhetz made no protracted stay in such warm company. We did not hinder -his escape, and presently had the advantage of his back. - -“I should like to see the Calhoun face,” said I, “when Rhetz lays out -his discoveries.” - -“You observe how they try me,” cried the General, passionately, gazing -after the disappearing Rhetz. “You will witness it! But by the heavens -above us! I'll uphold the law!” - -“And now,” continued the General, when Rhetz was quite gone away, -“having been so vigorously free with the envoy, I must at once write -Calhoun a letter and say it all over again. I would have talked this to -Calhoun first of all, were I accurately the gentleman of honor; but then -he should not have stirred me with his spy.” - -The General's letter declaratory of the duplicity of Calhoun was written -and went to the Vice-President the next day. It repeated his words -to Rhetz so far as they were personal to Calhoun, and made a deal of -commotion, I warrant you. The missive exploded in the very heart of -Secession like a hand-grenade. - -The General and I had turned now; we aimed to be home before dark, and -your midwinter day is not the longest of the year. The sun was still -an hour over the western trees, however, when we found ourselves in the -President's Square. Supper would only come with sundown, since we still -adhered to our Tennessee customs. - -Having moments to spare, we rested ourselves upon a bench which owned -a thick pine tree at its back. I was the more willing, for we were in -close view from Peg's windows, and I half hoped the sight of the General -would lure her out to us. I was pining for a look into her face, and to -hear the voice of her, sweet as the full note of a harp. - -“Do you know,” remarked my companion, “I never walk in this square but I -think on the day when the British burned the White House. They halted -in this very park and told off the squad of incendiaries and sent them -across. Mrs. Madison was about to give a dinner, and was fair driven -from the table by the bayonets of the English. I would I'd been here,” - he concluded; “I'd have made it for those visitors another New Orleans. -The lady should have had her dinner if I'd been here.” - -“The English are good soldiers,” I urged, paying little heed to him, for -my eyes were roving after some flutter of Peg's skirts. - -“They are marvellously puissant,” he retorted, “when they number two for -one of the enemy.” The General's antipathy for the English was so great -he could never do them justice. “I carry some record of their gallantry -myself,” he continued, as he took off his hat and parted the bristling -hair where the rough welt of a saber-slash proved a refusal to blacken -English boots in the storm-torn years of the Revolution, when the -General was a boy of twelve. “That fixed my opinion of the English,” he -said, as he replaced his hat. “And can you believe it, that scar burned -like fire the day at New Orleans. Also, it has felt better ever since.” - -“Say what you will of the British,” I insisted--I was turned obstinate -now, seeing no sign of Peg--“they make stubborn soldiers. Note what they -did with Napoleon.” - -“It was not the English,” responded the General, with heat, “who -defeated Napoleon; it was Paris. He should have done with Paris what the -Russian did with Moscow--burned it, sir; burned it to the ground, and -thrown himself for his support upon the country. So I should have done, -and my country would have sustained me.” - -The General had been a partisan of the Corsican a score of years before; -in the energy of his present defence, he arose from the seat and started -again for home. I more slowly followed, still hoping the possible -appearance of Peg. - -As the General rounded a clump of bushes set near the path, he paused -abruptly. - -“What's this!” he exclaimed. The look of defiance for everything -English, which still made hard his face, changed to one of tenderness -and regard. “What's this!” he repeated. - -There lay a little negro child, well coated and warm, sound and fast -asleep for all the frost. The General thought no more on Napoleon, the -English, the treachery of Paris, or the disaster of Waterloo. He stooped -and gathered up the sleeping pickaninny in his arms. - -“He is Augustus' little boy,” he said. “He has tired himself with play. -Augustus should have better watch of the child such weather as this. -I'll put a flea in his careless ear to that effect.” - -Loaded with the small burden of the sleeping boy, the General led the -way across the grounds. - -Now when I had ceased to hope for her, a light foot on the sod told me -how Peg was at hand. I verily believe the perverse witch to have been -behind a tree, or hidden of a shrub, and not a score of yards from us -during our whole halt in the square. I would have accosted her, but she -brushed by with a curt bending of the head and not a word, and joined -the General where that chieftain marched ahead with the pickaninny. -My heart sank, and I fell still farther to the rear, more lonely than -before Peg came. - -It was ten minutes later, and when Peg, leaving the General, was on the -turn of setting forth for her own house. I was in my workshop, idle at -my desk, thoughtful with no thoughts, and my heart inexpressibly sad. - -As Peg would have crossed my door, her glance swept the interior of the -room. With that, she came to a full stop. I looked up with an eagerness -to hear her speak; and thinking, too, that now she would come in, and we -two be the old kind friends again. - -But instead of kindness, my glance gave me her face, cloudy and -threatening. Also, there were lamps of danger lighted in her eyes. What -new crime had I done? It was clear I stood guilty of some baseness; -I read that much in Peg's frown, and the last poor spark of my hope -pinched out. Never again, whatever the temptation, would I condemn a -husband to his wife. - -Peg swept into the room while I gazed on her without speaking. If for no -reason save one of politeness, I should have greeted her; but my manners -were quite driven out of my head with wondering what new eggs would here -be toasting on the spit for me. - -“Where is my chair?” cried Peg, and with a voice as full of wrath as a -coal of fire. Then pointing to where her leathern chair was not: “Where -is my chair, I say?” - -Stupidly, I looked over beyond my desk where her throne had been in -happy times; but I kept my teeth on my tongue, not willing to have the -risk of a word. - -“I will have it back!” Peg went on, eye as vicious as a kestrel's, “I -will have it instantly back!” - -With every headlong dispatch I went after the chair, while Peg walked up -and down as might that leopard who should own those two sharp teeth, -the gleam of which just showed beneath the upper redness of her lip like -points of pearl. When the chair was restored, I turned to her and called -my courage to my shoulder. - -“And now will you sit down?” said I. - -“I will not sit there until I choose,” stormed Peg, still up and down. -Her cheek was flame, but with no laughing roguishness of fun; her eyes -shone like mirrors, but not from any interest of amusement. As she -went to and fro, leopard-like, she would have those eyes on me with a -questioning indignation. - -“So you would thrust my chair out of your room?” said she. - -Then, as I made no words on it, Peg after a space would for the second -time be about her departure, and I confess, for all my late thirst for -her presence, not a trifle to my relief. A leopard--even a leopard named -Peg--is no good company. - -When Peg was by the door, she swung round on me. “I will not sit there -until I choose,” she cried again. “But you shall not touch my chair! -I will not have it banished!” With this, she went quite away, while I -stayed to look on the chair which had made the trouble, and now from -its old place would leer victoriously upon me, and mock with a more -insulting emptiness than ever, that doubly vacant heart of mine. - - - - -CHAPTER XI--THE GENERAL MAKES PROVERBS - -In those few days next to follow Peg's tantrum of the chair, like those -several to precede it, I was given no more than meager pictures of her. -I should perhaps beg forgiveness for the name “tantrum,” which is a -byword or term of slang, but search as I may, I find nothing so good -wherewith to tell the story of that rootless wrath of Peg's. However, I -may say I was at care not to shift the chair again, but left it to stand -waiting for her in accord with her command. - -Peg, on the next day after that tantrum, and on every day, would come -for her visit with the General; but each time she so crept by me, -whether by stealth or luck, that I lost notice of her advent, and knew -nothing of her presence until she went past my door when on her way for -home. She would create noise enough with her flight; setting her small -feet down in emphasis and sending a rustle along the hallway with the -swirl of her petticoats, so that I had ample time to raise my head and -be on guard for her. She would nod slightly as she caught my glance, -but ever sustained herself with that distance which she had seen fit to -construct between us. - -When Peg flashed by my door--for, radiant as ever, and with the motion -of a meteor, “flashed” should be the description of it--I was bound -to observe how her look shot straight for her chair like an arrow. She -would be sure it was there, that chair; and I could tell how its absence -would have become the signal for crowning me with so warm a version of -her feelings that I shriveled like October leaves to simply think on -it. But I would meet no risk of the sort, since I did not entertain the -hardihood to invoke it. - -I say the latter, because sooth it is, that half in anger, half in -thought to bring her in for a talk, I once had it on my mind to send -Peg's chair again into exile. Indeed, I did put it out of the room. But -only for a moment; the wick of my courage burned dim, and I fell to -be in utmost haste to restore that leathern furnishment, breathing the -while in a quick, craven fashion of respiration, lest she surprise me -before the situation was repaired. Thus it stood; the chair and I in the -room, and both desolate, with Peg going each day by like a watchman on -his rounds, to glance in and be assured. - -These conditions of separation between Peg and myself, as days went on, -would give me less and less of ease. I was forever carrying them on the -ridge of my thought, and they made an unhappy element in life's skyline. -I stood the more in grief, since to be out with little Peg was like a -quarrel with a child; and then, moreover, the fault of it was mine, for -I overstepped an obvious line of right conduct when I went forth upon -Eaton's disparagement. It was a fool's work, besides; for I might have -known she would be sharp to notice and as sharply bound to resent; had -she not already warned me how I disfavored Eaton, and told me I was -jealous? She would say, truly, she did not care for that jealousy; but -that was mere laughter when her fancy was at merriest. Also, she had -told how I did not know her, and never would see her true self; I began -now to understand that she was right. And yet I would have her back, and -our old frank confidence returned; for Peg, as I tell you, was only -a child--a prankish girl when all was in, and it made no more for my -credit than for my peace that we should be at crosses. - -It stands a thing strangest of all, how differently one will regard -another when the time is this or that. Peg, as I have written, would -seem ever to me the rompish child; for my thoughts of her were forged -and beaten out upon the stithy of those moments when, free and playful -and without restraint, she sat alone with me. By the same token! I -recall another score of moments where the stage was a drawing room and -strange folk framed the scene, and Peg, a beautiful woman of dignity and -grave reserve, would remind one of no child at all. But then she would -not be Peg to me; on such times when this proud, sufficient being made -me some sweeping, stately recognition, and as though I had known her -but a day, I have stood aside to wonder was she that playful leopard Peg -whose white mark I wore on my hand? Was it she to call me “slave” and -kiss the mark, or “watch-dog” and make me a collar with her arms? And -still I liked her thus. I was proud to see her proud; and my bosom would -swell to note how when Peg, fastidious, and with her highbred look, -stepped across a room, she seemed among the women gathered there--and -they the Vere de Veres--a greyhound among poodles, or rather the leopard -she was among a troop of tabbies. These be crude comparisons, surely; -yet there comes no other to so fit with my thoughts of rearward days -when Peg moved an empress in the midst of peasants, at once the envy and -despair of rivalry. - -As I tell you, for all these exhibitions of commanding womanhood, Peg -would continue with me but a child; the image of such ballroom triumphs -were not to remain with me, while the real Peg, the true Peg, the -dear Peg of memory when alone, would ever be the laughing, mocking, -hectoring, teasing Peg on her leathern throne at my desk's end. It is -the same with men; there come such words as play and work, and danger -and safety; and the man you saw on the battle-line, as stern and as -brave as Caesar, is that boy by yonder campfire who now laughs over -some tale of personal chicken-pillage when he fled before a mad old dame -armed of a pudding stick. - -While Peg and I were on these long-range terms, I went more in hunt of -the General for his company's sake and for conversation. I do not think -the General stood aware of Peg's cold pose towards me, for, as I have -urged, he was no one to see such things; besides, Peg, who showed -herself no bad strategist, would be about me with the friendliness of -those days that were, whenever the General sat by to make a third. Peg -held the General in a best esteem; and then, too, she would be mindful -how lately he was ill and save for her tending might have died, and be -the last to vex him with thoughts of how two so near him and dear upon -his sentiment nourished a feud among themselves. - -While the General missed the reason of my frequent visits, he no less -relished our talks; for a president, let me inform you, is a mighty idle -man, for all your sycophants and toadies of print would depict him as -a galley slave who breaks his heart against an oar of duty. A president -has little to do beyond fret and fume while affairs go crosswise to his -wishes; also, the General would have him to be a most tied and helpless -creature, besides. - -“The presidency,” he would say, “when one goes to a last experiment, is -but another word for paralysis.” - -“And is a president such a thing without hands?” I would ask, for it was -sure he thirsted to lecture. - -“The office is so much bigger than the man,” he would reply, “that it -controls him, as a mountain might bear down the strongest were you to -load his back with one.” - -“Now, I had thought a president to be of some consequence,” I would -retort, in a manner of vexing him. “At least I have known presidents to -think so.” - -“And so thought I,” he would respond, “ten months ago and before -inauguration. Sir, a president is but the fly on the chariot wheel. -Being vain, the insect might flatter himself with a theory that he is -the reason of that dust and motion he observes. But the insect's vanity -would be none the less in error. I say to you, a presidency is a thing -of bolts and bars and locks and fetters. What may a president do? He may -say this man shall keep office and that man shall not, and that would be -as important as if he said this rat shall go overboard and that rat stay -to roam the ship. The vermin fate of these, for black or white, would -neither affect a course nor pick those ports at which the vessel -touched.” - -“But a president may veto a bill,” I would reply, “or make it a law with -his fist. He may bring down a war.” - -“And yet he is no free agent when he does any of these,” he would -return. “He is pressed upon by one force or another, or mayhap a dozen -at once, and must go with conditions like a man in a landslide. As I -say, the office is so much bigger than the man that it transacts the -man, and not the man the office. It is as though one were made president -of the Potomac, or of a glacier. Could he take the one beyond its banks -with a war or stay the other in its progress with a veto? He might run -up a flag, order a bugle blown, fire a gun; but the river or the glacier -would be the last impressed. No, sir; were one made chief magistrate of -that snowstorm which now whitens the world outside, and set to rule its -flakes, he would be in as much control as when given a White House and -told that he is President.” - -Mayhap it will interest should I offer a report of one of our -afternoons. It might go as specimen of all, for each was but a strolling -here and there of talk. Our discourse would be hit or miss, like a rag -carpet, and would fall foul of whatever caught the eye or stubbed the -toe of fancy at the moment. - -On this day, and being weary with the sight of Peg's empty chair, I went -down the hall to the General's workroom and found him with his nose in -_Tristram Shandy_.' - -“Do you like your author?” said I. - -“Why, sir,” said the General, laying aside the book, “he is so grown up -to sedge of phrase and choked of word-weeds as to deny one either the -sight or the taste of the true stream of his story.” - -“Walpole,” I returned, “said that reading _Tristram_ was to laugh a -moment and yawn an hour.” - -“Then he had the better of me, since I have done nothing but yawn.” - After a pause: “Peg gave me the book; it was my loyalty to the child -that sent me between its pages. And speaking of Peg: Do you still send -her the roses? I know you do, for I met your Jim on his way to her, -buried in blossoms and looking for all the world like the flower booth -in a village fair.” Here the General lazily reached for his pipe. - -“And why should she not have the flowers?” I demanded, warmly. - -“No reason under the sky, sir,” said he, giving me that old glance out -of the falcon eyes of him--to anger me, I suppose--“none under the sky! -Send our pretty Peg the roof off the house should she have a mind for -it.” Then, when now his pipe was going: “Was it not you to recommend a -round, squat, corpulent being named Curtis to be marshal for Tennessee?” - -“I said he was a good man.” - -“One might say as much of a pan of dough. The creature is absolutely -without motion; I tried him mentally and physically, so to speak; the -man is stagnant.” - -“None the less a good man,” I contended. “To do nothing is at least to -do no harm.” - -“Now, that is as may be,” retorted the General. “I will have nothing to -do with your motionless folk. They are always the worst folk of all. I -never have been in any crush of peril or concern where action was not -less hazardous than inaction, and to do the wrong thing far and away -better than to do nothing at all. Now, this fellow Curtis of yours would -not even talk. He had no more conversation than a catfish.” - -“Silence is caution,” said I, dogmatically, also reaching down a pipe -from the mantel to keep the General in smoky countenance; “silence is -caution, and caution is ever a good thing.” - -“Caution is a braggart,” returned the General, argumentatively, “to call -itself a virtue when it is more often a cover for cowardice. Caution has -lost more fights than rashness, you may take a soldier's word for that.” - -“That is in keeping with your other proverb, 'Never overrate a foe.' -Those be the maxims to get folk killed!” - -“And why not, so the folk be the enemy? I have beaten twice my strength -because they overrated me.” - -“Still,” said I, stubbornly, “the crime of silence which you charge upon -this Curtis is no mighty delinquency. Words, as a rule, are a weakness; -and I think Curtis should be marshal.” - -“Let him be marshal, then, and end it,” returned the General; “but I may -tell you, sir, that words are not a weakness, but a source of strength.” - The General was an indomitable conversationist, and would not be -criticised. “The man who says the most, commonly knows the most, and -comes most often to succeed. Silent folk win only by accident, as he -shall see who retraces any of their victories to its birth.” - -“And now what nonsense!” cried I. “What wise one said 'Silence is -golden!'?” - -“Some wise one who wanted the floor for himself, doubtless,” puffed the -General. “Talk is a cloak, and great talk a great cloak to hide -one's movements. It is a common fallacy to suppose that one who talks -much--chatters, we will even call it--tells ever the truth. Now my -experience goes for it that a great talker is misleading you nine-tenths -of the time; heads one way while he talks another. I cannot be sure of -the plans or aims of a great talker. He would seem to point so many ways -at once. Your tongue-tied fellow I read easily. When I once know where -he is, and then remember where he would be, I will readily foresee for -you the trail he means to travel.” - -“Calhoun is a silent man.” - -“And Calhoun is a defeated man; his one chance is my death, which I -have no mind shall happen. Calhoun is a silent, but not a secret man. He -hides nothing, and can hide nothing by a still tongue. Who does not know -how he is for Nullification and must live or die by it?” - -“And you,” said I, “have decided it shall be the latter.” - -“If Calhoun had not assailed me, and, more, if he had not included Peg's -destruction in his plans--as a soldier might burn a beautiful suburb for -an element of his assault on a city--Calhoun and I would have come -by some agreement. I like the man; but you see he has no gift to be -popular. He makes war on me, which is the least popular thing he could -do and then, to prick me on for bitterest resolution and a strife to the -death, he sets his dogs to baying Peg. Also, let us not forget how he -would drag down Van Buren because he is Peg's friend and mine. Sir, you -and I will one day make Van Buren president for that.” - -“And you have written Calhoun that letter to be notice of your hate.” - -“It ties him hand and foot,” said the General. “Were Calhoun Samson, -that letter shears his locks. He will publish it, and make every friend -I have his enemy.” - -“And you are enough loved by the people to make that a most formidable -condition for Calhoun.” - -You are to observe that now when I would find the General idle and -with an itch for talk, I trolled him along as folk troll pickerel. It -relieved him to thus unbuckle; more, it helped him form his plans, for -so he said himself. - -“I am ten fold more loved than Calhoun,” responded the General. -“Calhoun, as I've said, has no gift to be popular. He talks _to_ folk; -I talk _with_ them. Sir, between those words, _with_ and _to_, dwells the -whole art of popularity.” - -“Your popularity is growth of your work in the field.” - -“My being a soldier, had much to do with its beginning. Man is a -fighting animal and loves a fighter. Particularly if he win. Now, were -I to advise one to a short cut for public favor, I would say, 'Be a -soldier and win.'” - -“Especially 'win,'” I returned. - -“By all means add the 'win' and emphasize it. That is my rede: Be sure -to win. No one is made to explain a victory, no one tries a conqueror; -the error of all errors is the black error of defeat.” - -“And yet a good man may lose.” - -“Sir, the best man may lose. But you are to consider: When he loses, the -public owes him nothing. A farmer toils like a slave; a drought kills -his crops; is he paid for the corn he does not raise? The public owes -the successful soldier for that profit it takes from his sword; and -the public pays its debts. I won at the Horseshoe, at Pensacola, at -New Orleans; and the public pays me with a White House. Had I lost my -battles, I would have been cashiered a score of times. Calhoun would -have succeeded with his scheme to court-martial me in the Seminole days, -save that I was armored of my victories. I would never agree to less -than victory, and that stubbornness for triumph has even defeated -enemies I did not know I had.” - -“You have had vast success,” said I, judgmatically, “when one remembers -the blindness of your prejudices, and how you will help this one or hurt -that one for a no better reason than love or hate. There is your defect; -I have often wished that to your honesty and ardor you added the just -fairness of Jefferson.” - -“Jefferson!” This with a snort: “I am a fairer--a more just man than was -Jefferson! He was just to his enemies and unjust to his friends. Now, I -am strong enough to do justice by a friend. It hurts no man with me that -he has been the friend of Andrew Jackson.” - -“But you can not do justice by a foe. You are all for a foe's -destruction.” - -“I am all for a foe's defeat. And defeat of a foe is justice to a foe. -'Woe to the vanquished!' said Brennus, and the barbarian was right. -Being in the field, your business is to conquer.” - -“You talk like a philosopher,” said I, “but you never feel like one. -Here: I will show you your prejudice in the face! Give me now your -estimate of Clay--of Webster--of Hayne--of Calhoun--of Randolph!” - -“You think my portraits will be red and black and flame-color.” The -General spoke cunningly. I saw how he had gone sentry over his feeling, -and now I looked for a mild story of those whom I had named. “Webster, -mentally, is strong,” said he, “and willing, like a horse. But, like a -horse, he can not harness himself to a load. There should be those about -to hook the traces and in a measure guide him for his haulings. Compared -with Hayne, whose mentality is slim and graceful as is an elm, Webster -is the oak. He is bigger and stronger without being so beautiful. -Besides, Hayne is indolent, and would sooner drift all day than pull an -oar an hour. That is the reason why Calhoun, who has currents, sweeps -Hayne along for Nullification. Calhoun is simply a good man gone wrong; -and, for that he was bred narrowly and as an aristocrat, he loses time -over his dignity. Also, he does not keep in touch with the detail of his -destinies, but leaves too much to underlings. Thus he is put into the -position of him who attacks a woman--an act without defence, and one -most perilous; and, being in, Calhoun lacks that force needed for his -extrication. Randolph is built like a spear, with his anger the head and -his intelligence to be the shaft of it. He has no morality of thought, -and his one virtue is his contempt for Clay. Randolph was born to be -beaten, since he was born to make a science of hatred and become a -specialist of reprisal. Clay is altogether another story. The man is -mean beyond expression. He would be perilous, but he wants in courage. -He has appetites but no principles; he can attain to a conclusion but -not to a conviction. He owns no depth of mind; he is brilliant in a -sheeny, shimmery way, and, being of no integrity, is no more to be laid -hold on, mind you! and held to anything, than so much water.” - -“And would you say,” cried I, “that Clay has no convictions?” - -“No more than has a mirror! Sir, the man will acquiesce, and show you -whatever is set before him like a looking-glass. There is his conviction -for you! It is each time some other man's conviction and wholly outside -of Clay. Remove it from before him; look then into your burnished -statesman, and where is his conviction? Why, sir, when Clay sold himself -to Adams, did it not prove what I say?” - -The General reeled off these views with, for him, a mighty conservatism -that was a surprise to me; for knowing his headlong, not to say -trenchant, sort, I looked to have him go about his carvings of the -portraits of ones inimical to him with a knife. He would have obliged me, -too; but he observed my thought, and turned cautious to disappoint me. -I must concede, he weighed up these gentry fairly well--he squarely -hit them off or I'm the more mistaken. He was too lenient with Calhoun; -Calhoun might have called off those slanders against Peg which found -voice for his advancement; when he failed of that he became their -sponsor. - -When I went again to my own lair of labor, I found Noah waiting. I had -grown to delight in our cool gentleman of the red hair, the jet eyes, -and the sharp Spanish swords. - -“And now,” said I, and greeting my visitor, “how runs the world away?” - -“There are things talked about our taverns,” said Noah, “and the -corridors of Congress, whereof it might be proper the President should -hear. The more, since the conversations have him for their motive.” - -“Let us journey down the hall and tell him,” said I. - -“No,” returned Noah; “you may enlighten him later, since there comes no -call for hurry. I dislike to dodge in and out or play hide and seek -with a president; it is not seemly. And the fact that our friend would -tolerate, and might even encourage the familiarity on my personal part, -offer best reasons why I should avoid it.” - -“You make yourself too modest,” said I. - -None the less I was touched to admiration with this decent sense of the -proprieties on Noah's part. It stood a pity it found imitation by so -few. - -“What is it to be, then?” I asked. - -“You need not be told,” said Noah, “how the President's note to the -Vice-President, added to Rhetz's report of the White House views -on Nullification, Secession, and kindred hangman topics, has made -a flutter. Your Palmetto folk who plot for Nullification fear the -President. Being so far right, they then step aside for error; they fall -to fond imaginings that, for all his violence of phrase to Rhetz, the -President, in return, fears them. They believe, were he to count their -power, he would not dare them to any last-ditch opposition. Then, too, -the leaders are not wholly satisfied with the Rhetz returns. Thus -a situation is framed where some stronger light on the President's -intentions, together with the true news of those lengths to which he -stands ready to go, and whether an ultimate resort would call for -rifles and then the gallows, is deeply to be desired. And these tavern -conversations and talks of the corridors have for their object the -President's development along the lines exhibited.” - -“And this is highly the natural thing,” said I. “Have our anxious ones -invented any trap wherewith to catch that word they seek?” - -“They will search for it in this wise,” said Noah; “thus canters the -plan: They look to a day far ahead, but it will be with them in -time. They have settled on Jefferson's birthday to make a test of the -President and discover what he would do should South Carolina, -with Calhoun, abrogate a tariff and defy government in the port of -Charleston. The occasion will be in honor of the Man of Monticello. -Jefferson's memory and its graceful illustration will serve as the -cause, ostensible, of that banquet; really, the affair is to be twisted -for Nullification. There will come a score of toasts; and each to exalt -the state at the cost of the nation, and argue treason holy. The -speeches will follow of a piece with the toasts. Calhoun and his cohorts -will crowd the tables; applause will be extant for every sentiment of -disunion; in short, they devise a States Rights gathering where -Nullification and the rebellious spawn of it shall gain a broad -endorsement.” - -“And where does the General come into their machinations?” - -“The President will be invited to attend. Should he come, he will be -given the Chair's right hand. The Calhoun folk will read his face while -their toasts of treason are flaunted. They will ask him for a sentiment. -They believe that his courses to come, as he designs them, can not fail -to find disclosure. They hope to gain the measure of his apprehensions. -When they once have the pattern of the President's hopes and fears, and -learn his timid limits, they think those boundaries of safety beyond -which Nullification must not push will be determined.” - -“Now, if these schemers,” I cried, “own no capital save the General's -timidity, they are indeed in bankrupt case.” - -“They build on sand,” said Noah. “But that fact of sand is precisely -what they do not know. However, the President may teach then? with what -light he sees fit. Should he decide to prolong their night of doubt, he -has but to stay away.” - -“And how would our black gentry construe his absence?” - -“Assuredly they would incline to believe he was afraid.” - -“Why, then,” cried I, “it might be difficult to say that the General -will or will not attend a gathering of treason scheduled more than three -months away. There is this to be recalled, however; the General has done -few things because he was afraid.” - -“But it is well,” returned Noah, “to have the President aware of what -is in store. He will own the larger space for preparation. The gathering -will continue a sort of secret for six weeks to come; nor is the traitor -color thereof to be shown until a glass-and-bottle stage. When courage -is high and caution fled, rebellion will be unpacked. You observe how -surprise is arranged for. There will be hawks' eyes to catch the trend -of presidential thought concerning it. There lies open the whole plot -for you.” - -“And many thanks,” said I. “Your warning, as you remark, has the mighty -merit of being early. Rest secure the General will profit by it; he may -even contrive some counter reason for amazement that shall become to our -folk of Secession the very mother of dismay.” - -When, now, Noah was about to go, he came back from the door with a new -thought. - -“This on Rivera's word,” said he. “The boy, however, is to be trusted -when he tells merely what he sees and hears, and is not asked to -think. There would seem to be a rough Maryland brood to hang about the -tap-rooms--as many as ten, all told. They belong, so to say it, with -that Catron whom we think of now and then for the pleasure he gave us at -Gadsby's. Catron, somewhat the worse of his sword-arm, is also in town. -These ruffians use your name and mine, and never in a way of praise. -Should you go about the roads of nights, carry an ear for ones to come -up behind. Also, walk warily where corners are dark.” - -“And you?” said I, laughing at the comic twist with which Noah -ornamented his counsel; “and you? Have you gone upon precautions?” - -“No more than you see,” said Noah, bringing to light a knife of peculiar -make. “I have no great burden of respect for just one man, however -urgent his irritation or its reason. But a horde, and the members to be -of midnight, hangdog sort, arouses the latent prudence of my race, and I -comfort my nervousness with toys like this.” Here the queer knife made a -flourish. - -I took the weapon from his hand. It was one of those new knives called -a bowie, and the first in my fingers. There was a buckhorn haft, and the -9-inch blade showed thick at the back with plenty of steel. This gave it -weight, and it balanced in one's hand like a hatchet, and all sanguine -and hopeful to the feel. - -“It is a Maryland conception,” said Noah, “and therefore a most fitting -rebuke to what thugs shall come out of that commonwealth on a mission -for one's disaster.” Then, reclaiming the bowie: “The courage of a race -appears in the length of its weapons. The shorter the weapon the hardier -the strain Now, whoever devised that knife had a Norse heart in him; -his instinct was to go close in to his enemy, and comeback covered with -blood.” - -“And do you believe,” said I, “those fellows of whom Rivera tells were -brought here by that Catron to work a revenge for him?” - -“They are here by favor of his money, truly,” responded Noah, “as Rivera -overheard them say. And for that revenge you speak of, it will be long -ere Catron works one for himself in person, since his arm has turned -dead in deference to my rapier. He could not so much as point a pistol -with it.” - -These words of Catron and his ruffians did not dwell with me seriously; -they were the sooner thrust out of mind because the General, not -a moment behind Noah's going, came into my room. On hearing of the -latter's visit, he was active at first to call him back. But on another -thought, he gave that up; full of a new notion of concern to Peg, he -would have my view of it. - -“Now I have a decided humor,” observed the General, throwing himself -into Peg's chair--which was consistent enough since he came upon Peg's -good--“I have grown to a decided humor that Peg shall rout these carpet -Red-sticks who would conspire for her defeat. The more, perhaps, -since the chief--if that be fit title for a lady--is wife of our -Vice-President, and moving, as she sees it, for his interest of politics -against me. Peg must and shall triumph; to lose--aside from what we -might personally feel--would spell nothing short of her destruction. And -a war, mark you, which combed a country of its last of life, would mean -no more for any individual.” - -“Why then,” I said, “you can not be more deeply set on Peg's success -than I.” - -“Of a truth, no!” retorted the General, with his shrewd grin; “do not -imagine I had a doubt of it. But here is what I have been turning in -my head for a question. The White House, socially, they tell me, is of -immense consequence. Now, I have decided to endow Peg with this coign -of vantage to be an aid for her plans. For myself, I shall follow Peg's -flag; I shall implicitly take her commands. She shall hold the White -House for her reserve; or have it on either wing; or she may head a -charge with it.” - -“And do you think to surprise me with this?” I returned. “I knew how you -would thus conduct yourself from the beginning.” - -“I am glad to have been so flattered in your thoughts,” said the -General, dryly. “I may take it you forestalled my action by considering -what should be your own. However, now that we are come by these sage -decisions to put Peg in control of us, I hold it excellent to have -her over and learn her views. Perchance, after all, she may mislike -us--these, her volunteers--and give us our dismissals.” - -“Shall I send word for her?” I asked. Mighty ready was I for any reason -that should bring Peg walking our way. - -“It is what I would propose,” said he. “The sooner Peg knows of these, -her troops, the sooner she can sketch her line of battle. Send your Jim; -he has doubtless learned the way to Peg's on those rose errands.” - -The General's humor would court a risk of being overtaxed with a too -much concern for those roses to Peg. Some day I might ask him to observe -as much, and to seek newer reason for his jesting. There is such a -word as threadbare, but in conjunction with my floral sendings to -Peg, which--and properly--still went on, and his endless references -thereunto, the General would appear to live in ignorance of it. However, -I did not proceed for his enlightenment at this time, but put it off to -a more sour leisure and a cloudier day. - -Jim was sitting near a hall window, ruefully considering the snow -through the pane. Jim's tropic blood would shrink from winter, and, as -though in sympathy with what were probably his feelings, he crooned in a -most dismal vein: - - “Rain come wet me, sun come dry me, - - Take keer, white man, don't come nigh - - me.” - -“Is that another of those inspirations of Polly Hines of the 'Possum -Trot?” I asked. - -“Why, no, Marse Major,” said Jim, “It's a good ol' Cumberland ditty jes' -d'same. Jim sings 'em when he's thinkin' of d'folks in Tennessee. It -sort o' he'ps Jim to see 'em. Thar's times when, if Jim sings long -enough, d'folks back thar nacherally seems to rise right up befo' Jim.” - -“Those are surely advantages,” said I, “and if I thought it might bring -me such fortune, I would strike up a tune for myself. Since you appear -to be in touch with them, tell me what is going on among our people at -home.” - -Jim, with his own color and on a capital made up of a dried snake's -head, the smoke-cured cud of a cow, and the several feet of a -rabbit--“a graveyard rabbit, cotched in d'dark of d'moon,” was Jim's -description--set up, you should understand, for a seer. In a compliant -spirit of fun, I was wont to countenance Jim in these weird assumptions. - -“Tell me what they do in Tennessee,” I repeated. - -“Jim's afeerd to try, Marse Major,” said Jim, shaking his head as one -who distrusts his powers. “You-all can see yourse'f, that camped yere as -we-all be, millions an' millions of miles away, tellin' what goes on -in Tennessee aint easy. Under d'most fav'ble conditions, it's what Jim -would call a long shot an' a limb in d'way. An' you hyar Jim! thar aint -been no fav'ble conditions cirklin' round him since ever you turns d'key -on that demijohn. Jim aint got over thinkin' you-all acts plumb hasty -about that demijohn, Marse Major.” - -“Well, perhaps I did,” said I, “and so far as a dollar will go”--here I -tossed Jim a Mexican--“towards repairing the injury, I am ready to make -amends. Meanwhile you are to take this note where you take the flowers.” - -Jim's confidence in Peg had long ago been established, and he was -no more ploughed of those fears which arose to furrow him during our -earlier days at the Indian Queen. He promptly took my note--one which -employed the General's name--and with it the Mexican coin, and went -about his errand. - -“It's monstrous remark'ble, Marse Major,” said Jim, as he pocketed the -silver, “how money does 'liven an' limber a man up. Now that dollar -shore makes Jim feel as spry as a gray squirrel; it mos' certainly do!” - -I was not without my alarms for Peg's coming; but when she tripped in -upon the General and myself, it was as balm to my bruised nature to -feel on her part some quick leniency towards me, and a certain tacit -sweetness--somewhat sorrowful, but none the less good--to which I had -been alien since the day I laid those witless strictures upon Eaton for -that he was conceived without a soul. This gentle attitude of Peg's came -upon me like summer weather, touching everything with sunshine, and the -hour took on a sudden pleasant value. Peg could not fail to see the -change; and even the General would be aware of that improvement. - -“Now you must have brought June in your apron,” said the General, -playing with Peg. “In any event, you have thawed our frigid friend -here. He has been frozen for days, and now you see his face glows like -harvest-home.” - -“If that be true,” laughed Peg--quite her old beautiful laugh, too, -and not a laugh contrived solely for the General, but with a share for -me--“if that be true, I must show more pains to come often, and not make -my stay so short as has been my wont. I did not know that I was such a -blessing.” - -The General would make Peg have her old chair by my desk, which showed -me--and I wondered over it not a little--how he was observant beyond -what I had supposed, to be thus sharp on that small point of where -Peg would sit when in confab with me. When Peg was throned in her old -place--and, to my eyes, she filled the room with a kind of glory--the -General drew up his own chair so as to put us three to be the corners of -a triangle. - -“We have brought you here,” quoth the General, giving his face a droll -expression by which one might tell him to be in a frame of amiable -lightness, “we have brought you here, the good, thawed Major and I, to -make a despot of you. We draw towards New Year's Day, when our society -Redsticks will start upon the warpath. We desire to put ourselves and -our White House, and all we have besides, in your hands. You have but -to publish your orders, and lo! we carry them out. Being now set to -rule over us, the Major--and I perceive with joy he is quite warmed -through--would crave your commands for him. As for myself, you have had -only to lift your finger to dispose of half my kingdom since ever that -day when I lay dying and you revived me with the name of Calhoun.” - -When he said this, the General beamed on Peg in his tolerant, paternal -fashion, while for my side I sat silent, yet the happiest one of all, -since I was growing sure and more sure with every moment how my Peg of -the old days had of a truth come back. I would not stop to query how or -why; it was enough to have it so, and the music that went singing in -my heart with this white surprise of joy was near to betraying me into -humming a tune--a burst of harmony, had I been weakly guilty of it, -which the General would have made the material of his mirth for so long -a term it would weary him who sought to measure it. - -“And I am to order you and your White House up and down in my campaign?” - cried Peg, sparkling forth. - -“Have I not told you how you are to be a despot?” - -“And I may have a dinner, a reception, or a dance, or what I will--the -carpets up in the East Room, if I choose?” - -“Your word shall be as Aladdin magic among us, your very hint a law.” - -“Well, then,” cried Peg, whose smile was a bright comrade for the -General's, “well, then, now that I am clothed of this high estate, I -must not begin by being rash. Let me consider!” And with that Peg put -her little hand to her brow with such another air of jaunty profundity I -would have clinked down a fortune to have had her on canvas just as she -sat--Peg, in the great chair that but an hour gone was mocking me as -my most hateful enemy, and which now would be the friendliest thing in -life. - - - - -CHAPTER XII--HOW PEG WOULD WEAR THE CORAL. - -This is how I shall do,” said Peg at last, and after the General and I -had waited upon her small profundity for some space; “this shall be my -plan. We will have the White House for a reserve, then. The day for our -cabinet folk to receive their friends will be Tuesday--the procession -begins with the first Tuesday to follow New Year's Day. Our good little -Secretary of State has suggested, inasmuch as I am to preside for him, -that his house and mine be open only on alternate cabinet days. In -short, we will receive together. On one Tuesday he will be at my house; -on the next, when my house is closed, I will take stand in his drawing -room and receive our guests for him. You know, too, how I am to be the -head for what functions occur at the British and Russian legations and -act as Lady of the Mansion for our friends, the Viscount Vaughn and -Baron Krudener. Thus I begin with a double reception in my house for the -good little secretary and myself; then at Krudener's; then at the good -little secretary's; and then with the English. After that, we commence -again at my own home.” - -“And when do you march my White House upon this desperate field?” - demanded the General, with much gaiety of mien. Peg's vivacious recount -of how she should move her social troops delighted him no little. “In -what manner will I be made of use?” - -“Why, then,” said Peg, “after the reception at the English house if you -will, you may give me a dinner, with a dance in the big East Room?” - This was spoken in manner dubious and with the lifting inflection of a -request. “Also, though it be much to ask, I could wish mightily for -you to come in person to my reception. It would be a most convincing -initial.” - -“And you doubt my coming?” asked the General, beamingly. - -“It would be most unusual for a president,” said Peg, shaking warning -head. “The gossips would scarce survive the shock of it.” - -“My life,” observed the General, in a most satisfied way, “has been made -up of shocks to other folk.” - -“But you must consider,” urged Peg, “how your appearance in any one's -house would be held a letting down of your dignity. Indeed, in austere -quarters, where the regular is as a god, it would be regarded for a no -slight rent in your robes.” - -“And yet, child, I shall come.” This the General offered in a manner -indescribably good. “I have been no man of precedent in my time; I care -little for what was, but much for what is presently right. I shall come -to your reception; more, I'll stay until you give me leave to go. If to -be in the house of my friend, or to show him courtesy who has shown -me only favor and good service--if that be to establish a rent in my -presidency, I'll even promise to have it a thing of rags and patches -before ever I am done.” - -“Then you will come!” exclaimed Peg. “Now shall we go bravely through! -For, you are to know, so much of social concession or countenance is -born of nothing save fear of loss or hope of place, that the herd will -collect, bowing and smiling and shining like the sun, wherever you are -known to be.” - -“These be, truly, most satisfying maps you draw,” remarked the General, -quizzically, “and yet I do not see how we are to tell when victory is -ours. Now, in war the enemy surrenders or runs away.” - -“In the _salons_,” said Peg, laughing at the General's quaint twists, -“triumph turns to the mere question of numbers added to quality. -It is a matter of 'Who?' and 'How many?--a count of carriages to your -gate. But the query of quality is uppermost. Now, your presence at my -house will outweigh the world, should it be so foolish as to gather -itself together against us in the camps of the foe.” - -“Then you are indeed very safe,” said the General, “since I shall be -with you as I've said. Also, you are to have your dinner and that East -Room ball to follow, on what day you lay the finger of your pretty -preference. Even though I lacked the reason of my affection, I still -could do no less for so beautiful an enemy of Calhoun. But you spoke -of Van Buren. How did our round little friend go about his proposals -of those joint receptions? I have a curiosity as to that argument which -should lead him to this kindly wisdom; for, let me remind you, it is a -stratagem worthy of a Caesar, and one, besides, to smell most humanly -of what is honest and staunch, this phrasing of a situation where your -ill-wishers must become his ill-wishers and his friends take on terms of -friendship for you. How did Van Buren go upon that proposition, child?” - -“In the oddest way, then,” smiled Peg. “He said that because we were -both of tavern origin, with sires to keep houses of call, and since -there might come proud folk to frown upon us for that, it were a wisest -thing, and one to make for the ease of them and us, to hold ever our -receptions in common. Folk then might come, or stay away, and all with -a prodigious saving of effort, whether of compliment or insult, to every -one concerned. But, of course,” said Peg, at the close, her eye a bit -wet, “it was only his goodness to do this.” - -“Now, I believe nothing of that sort,” declared the General, stoutly. -“Child, I do not know by what paths you descend to this modest esteem -of yourself, but it in nowise shakes the fact that, with the last of it, -you grace and illustrate and honor the best room you enter or the best -arm to lean on in the land.” - -Thus spoke the gallant General from his heart; and to me it was like -milk and honey to only hear him. In the finish he turned his eyes my -way. - -“And where be your words in this council?” demanded the General. “Have -you lost the will to speak?” - -Now, I had kept myself mighty quiet since Peg was come back to her -throne. For one thing, the simple sight of her, and she friendly, -was enough to overflow my cup of happiness; moreover, I owned to some -lurking fear of Peg, and imagined how I had but to open my mouth to set -her anger again on edge. At any rate, no stone could have said less than -did I while Peg and the General held this long parley of the drawing -rooms. When now, however, the General aimed at me direct, I was bound to -make return. - -“Have you no advice for us, then?” repeated the General. “It is not -usual for you to so neglect my welfare. Here you permit me to talk ten -minutes without once telling me fully and wholly just what I should do.” - All this in tones of jesting: “Now you would seem willing that I, and -our little girl, too, should go unguided to destruction rather than -unstrap your wisdom in our cause. Sir, do you call that the truth of a -friend?” - -“Perhaps I have no good eyes for these trails,” said I. “Your reception -perils and how to foil them are things I have not studied. I would but -lose you your course were I to lead you.” - -“Mighty diffident,” quoth the General, “and most suddenly abject! And -no good eyes, say you? Why, then, you could see a church by daylight, I -take it! At the least, you might cheer folk on who propose such deeds of -carpet daring as do our little Peg and I.” - -With what further raillery the General might have entertained himself I -came not to know, for word was brought to him, at this nick, of ones who -awaited his coming in the cabinet room. As he went away he called back -to Peg, where she still abode in her leathern chair: - -“Then it is settled and made. I shall be at your reception, to the -grinding shock of gossips and the disorder of my presidential robes; -also, you are to dine and dance in the White House whenever you sweetly -will.” - -“Where should have lodged more kindness for me than I now find here?” - cried Peg, when the General was quite gone forth of the room. Then -raising her warm eyes to mine where I sat wondering, now cold, now hot, -would she go, or would she stay to talk with me, she gazed upon me with -a steady, friendly look, which, for all it lacked of distance or any -spirit of resentment, yet bred within me a feeling of confusion. I knew -not how to meet it, and I could find no word to say. “And now,” said -Peg, after a pause, but very kindly, “let us have a fair moment of -friendship. No,” she went on, stopping me with her hand as I was -beginning to stumble forward upon an apology for my ill words against -Eaton, “no; let me talk. You have no genius of explanation; you would -speak only to worsen things. Besides, you dwell in the same darkness now -you ever did.” - -“And it was to say that,” I interjected, for I was bound to some remark, -“I started to speak. It was to tell you how I had no close knowledge of -your husband and owned no right of information to criticise him.” - -“Watch-dog!” cried Peg, motioning with little hands for silence, -“watch-dog, will you have done?” - -There was something of pain and reproach in this to stop me as though I -had been planet-struck. Nor could I determine Peg's feeling, nor catch -the color of it in a least of shade. For the most, I felt amazement, and -was set back by the plain agitation of her, an agitation greater than -was to have been looked for in one who came solely to pardon me those -trespasses against good decent taste. - -Peg called herself together with a shake of the head that had for one -piquant effect the whipping of her shock of curls about her face, and -leaving them a tangle to fall forward on her shoulders. - -“Hear me,” went on Peg, brightening, and peering out on me in an arch -way through her curls; “you are guilty of no wrong save the wrong of -incredible dullness. Therefore you are to offer no defence. Even your -dullness should have been a virtue in my eyes, since it spoke only of -your honor, and told of the lofty place I hold in your regard.” Now I -could see how Peg was at least accepting all I had said, and not one -part only, and would give me credit for a compliment to herself, while -she refused my strictures upon Eaton. “Observe, then; I have resolved we -two shall be good friends. Better friends than before, because better -to understand one another. And our trouble was my fault, too, not yours. -Nor had I one right foot to go upon.” - -“Now, that is the maddest charity of error!” cried I. - -“It is not, I say,” returned Peg, her eyes beginning to shine with the -first flavor of my opposition. “I say it is not. You had done nothing, -said nothing; while I--why, then I hated you for having eyes of lead. -But we will amend that.” Here Peg turned pleasantly brisk. “We have been -too much abroad with mistakes. We have made you too old and me too young -in our dealings. There shall be a change, and you and I hereafter are to -consider ourselves as folk of even years, each with the other. It is but -right, watchdog, for though you have no learning on that point, it is -none the less true that a woman of twenty-two is very old and very -wise, while a man of forty-four is for his youth and guilelessness, or I -should have said dullness, a creature insupportable. Yes, watch-dog, -for your ignorance you are insupportable; but I forgive you, since it -is your only defect.” And here Peg recovered her old gay smile, and with -that my heart came home again to peace. - -“Well,” I said, when Peg would let me be heard, “I make no secret that -I am over happy with this new prospect of your friendship. It was night -while I thought you would not forgive me my offence.” - -“Say no more of it,” cried Peg, sharply, putting her fingers in her -ears. At the same time I caught the milky shine of her leopard teeth. -“Say no more, or I shall go back to my anger as a refuge. Speak of -something else! Why did you turn my chair out of door?--my poor chair -that had done no harm!” Peg caressed the arms of it with her palms as -though it were alive and could know and feel her petting. “You did it -because you hated me.” - -“No, forsooth!” I protested. “Now if I had only hated you it might have -stayed till the fall of doom. But I could not bear the leering, mocking -look of it, and me deserted; it would seem ever to brew for me a cup of -loneliness. And so for that I thrust it from the room.” - -“Why, then! and that was it!” cried Peg. “There you see, now, I can be a -fool as well as you.” - -“But why did you avoid me?” I asked, in my turn. “Surely, even for my -dull clumsiness, there was need of no such hard reproof. Come, now, why -did you stay away? And why did you run from me when I went across to the -square that day to beg a word from you?” - -“Because I hated you,” returned Peg, with a self-satisfied air. “I hate -you now, watchdog, when I pause and think. You had made me suffer, and -I thought to see you suffer in return. And really, watch-dog, you did -suffer; and it pleased me much.” - -“I had not thought you were made with such a palate for revenge,” - said I, a bit stricken with these words of cruelty. “And yet, if it so -pleasure you to give me pain, why then, go on.” - -“Don't, watch-dog, don't,” returned Peg, in a voice whimsically between -crying and laughing. “Only a little more of that and you shall have -my tears. But can't you see how your suffering was a most tender -compliment? I declare to you that when I would go by your door, the look -of grief to weigh upon your brow was better to me than a smile. The mere -memory of it would keep my heart warm throughout a winter's day.” - -“It must indeed be a topsy-turvy nature,” said I, “that finds its -pleasure in the woe of friends.” - -“No recriminations, watch-dog,” retorted Petif, in a high vein. “If your -dullness have no limits, at the least my patience has. Now where did you -go when I avoided you in the square, and you were too much the coward to -lift the knocker of my door? Fie! such another fawn-heart does not roam -existence! Where did you go, I say?” - -“Well, I would give that vine of yours a tree to clamber on and lift it -off the ground.” - -“And did you,” demanded Peg, eagerly. “The gods ruled otherwise,” I -returned. “There was no tree to be near or possible for your vine; -it must live and die on the ground.” Peg sat quite still and never a -response. As I looked on her, somewhat with wonder, I concede, two great -drops welled from her eyes and fell down upon her hands. - -“Now I would like to hear,” said Peg at last, her voice in a twitter of -pain, “does ever one get what one prays for in this world of ours? Would -there be such a word as contentment, now? However, I am glad, watchdog, -your good heart took you to my vine. But let it go; let it all go! Let -us be friends; and if the day can't be for us all sunshine, let us own -as few clouds as we may. Now, we will forget the past, and start our -friendship out anew. We will bring nothing to remind us of days when I -was young and cunning and you were old and dull.” - -At this, I involuntarily looked for the mark of Peg's leopard tooth, -where, round and white, it stared up at me from my hand. - -“Ah, yes!” said Peg, softly, “I had forgotten. There is that sign -between us that shall last through time. No, we can never forget.” Then, -after musing a moment: “But we may change the subject and say the worst -of it. You heard me lay out my reception purposes. What do you think of -my plans?” - -“Tell me first one thing,” said I. “When it was so much pleasure to -behold me in grief for your absence, why, then, did you come back?” That -speech of Peg's was like a dagger in my heart, and I would have her draw -it out with some kindness of explanation. “Why did you come back, then?” - -“The mere sorrow of it brought me back, watch-dog,” said Peg, and her -words were music in my ear. “It came finally to where I would sooner -suffer than have you suffer. That is the woman nature of me. The sheer -truth is, I've been on my way back to you for days. When I followed you -in the square, it was with a full purpose of taking your arm and walking -with you as in the old time.” - -“And why didn't you?” - -“Just as I would have done so, I was caught up in a little swirl of -hatred which carried me away from your side. It didn't last the moment, -but by the time it was gone the chance had taken flight. There is one -thing I should tell you, however; at such a time you must not palter -with a woman.” Peg's tones were uplifted to the pitch severe. “Do you -know what you should have done that day? You should have seized me by -the shoulder as you did that spy who dogged us; you should have stopped -me flush and full. Without excuse or explanation or pretense of remorse -for what had been, you should have made me take your arm. You might have -found, had you so willed it, that for all my high head I would follow -you like a dog.” - -“Take you by the shoulder!” cried I, somewhat aroused to a spirit of -terror. “And that would have been polite, indeed, and the act of a true -gentleman! I can see myself seizing you by the shoulder!” - -“For all that,” contended Peg, with much candor, “that is what you -should have done. Remember: in treating with a woman, while one _should_ -be a gentleman--your word--one _must_ be a man. There is this, too, -about a woman with the man she would love. She likes warfare but she -does not want to win; victory would only embarass your woman. Her -instinct is rather for protection than to protect, and to find him on -whom she leans weaker than herself might alarm her love into flight. And -as for that politeness you tell of, it is an artifice, like a dress or a -house, and good only within a limit. There be occasions when politeness -to a man is a fair thing thrown away; also, there be occasions when -politeness to a woman is nothing better than a waste of justice. -Watch-dog, you should have pocketed the 'gentleman' for use on a languid -day; you should have been all 'man.' You should have seized me by the -shoulder; you should have made me go or stay, or talk or stand mute, as -you willed. It was for that”--and Peg gave me this gravely, like some -confidant Pythoness sure of her Apollo-inspired word--“it was for that, -watch-dog, you were made the stronger of us two.” - -Now here was a pretty word of caution! It was as the General once said: -one had only to listen, and lo! one would hear ever the savage stirring -about in Peg. - -“There is one thing whereof I was cheated,” said I, after a brief -silence, and seeking to give our talk a slighter, if not a direction of -more reason. “You were to give me lessons in yourself. I looked forward -to no little improvement from such good teaching, and when I was made to -go missing it I could feel a plain loss to myself.” - -“And perhaps now,” observed Peg, with her half-merry glance, “I was -giving you a lesson in Peg for every moment of that frowning time.” - Then, as if in reply to my look of bewilderment: “No, watch-dog I went -too fast in those threats to expound myself. You are in no sort prepared -for so tremendous a course of study.” - -“Wherein do I lack now?” - -“Why, you flounder in abyssmal ignorance of yourself. To study another -with a hope of light, one should first own some liberal knowledge of -one's self. To have gone about to teach you that difficult lesson of -Peg, you, who are as unaware of yourself as any bush or tree or tuft of -grass, would have been as truly wise, and a task well worth one's while, -as would be a discussion of Moore with that savage of the woods who has -yet to hear of the alphabet. However, we will rest content with you as -you are, oh, watch-dog! oh, slave of Peg, wearing her mark! The more, -for that your splendid ignorance of both yourself and me has to be its -characteristic, a white, high beauty like unto some snow-capped -peak--safe, too, since inaccessible. And now, because I have stayed -long; and because we are good friends again; and because we will -infallibly quarrel should I remain, I think, watch-dog, I shall go -home.” - -And so Peg went away, singing a little song which was no song but like -the whistle of some thrush, leaving me in a calm of peace; nor did I -fail to remember how Peg's tune, when she departed, was the earliest -music upon her lips since ever she would be in anger with me for those -ill opinions against Eaton. - -There was no long time given me to think on Peg and her whims of temper, -black and white, for Noah was with me briskly on the tail of her going -away. Noah brought with him that Blair who had come in deference to -my note, to be the rival of Duff Green and organize the _Globe_ as a -death-stab to Duff's _Telegraph_. I had met Blair before, and liked him; -most of all was he a favorite of the General, for his pen was fed of -fire and the heart of his friendship was like the loyal heart of a dog. -In person, Blair was a slender, sickly man, but with a great head on his -shoulders, and strange feverish eyes that shone like jewels. He was -not unlike the General; only the latter stood vastly taller, and, while -Blair was as some fire to blaze and sparkle and burn, the General would -be more that hurricane of wind, bridled of no man, sweeping flat as a -field of turnips everything to stand in the way. - -“Here is a delicate question,” said Noah, with his grin of the cynic. -“The department folk will give our friend, Blair, no public printing; -it goes all to Duff. That should be stopped, since your public -advertising--I speak from my place as an editor--is for your newspaper -as the breath in its body.” - -“And what would you propose by way of cure for that felon perversity of -our folk of the departments who will still send printing to the recreant -Duff?” This I put laughingly, to be abreast of the lightness of Noah. - -“Surely,” said Blair, speaking with a kind of eagerness natural to him, -and which ran red-hot throughout all he did; “surely, the president -must make no personal interference. Were he to order printing out of -one paper and into another, the opposite side would use it for a club -against him to the last day of his career.” - -“But there is a way,” said Noah. “We may have advantage of the mean -fears of our folk of place who are ever prompt to read a threat against -themselves. Such egotists do they grow to be that, following a decade of -office holding, it may not so much as thunder but your agitated desk-man -knows it at once for some plot of heaven's hand to snatch him from his -pap.” - -“How would you approach these fears with an appeal?” I asked. - -“And there could be nothing easier,” quoth Noah, “while missing every -word that might look like an order from the White House. You have but -to issue a request, addressed to each who is in control of any least -of printing, to send to the president with every month a full report -of what advertisements he has dispensed and to what imprints. There you -have it in your claw; after such notice not one line will go to Duff, -but all to Blair. With the one stone you kill two birds; the _Telegraph_ -is destroyed while the _Globe_ in its fortunes is made beyond a -chance.” - -“Your mighty proper suggestion will be adopted,” said I. “The request -you speak of goes forth this very day.” - -When Blair had departed the scene to look after the daily fortunes of -his paper, Noah and I, as was much and frequently our case, settled to -a mouthful of party gossip. We had not run far, however, when my Jim -appeared with a word from the General to meet him in his personal -workshop on some trivial concern. - -“D'Marse Gen'ral trees Jim by d'winder,” said that worthy black man, -“an' tells him to ask you-all, Marse Major, to come squanderin' along -down to his room. He allows, d'Marse Gen'ral does, how he's got letters -from home you might like to see.” - -“And how is your 'Marse Gen'ral'?” said Noah, for “the red-head Jew -gentleman,” as Jim ever referred to him, was fond of making Jim talk. -“How does your 'Marse Gen'ral' carry himself these winter days?” - -“Mighty toler'ble an' tranquil, thankee, sah!” replied Jim; “mighty -toler'ble an' tranquil. Jim on'y wishes he himse'f was feelin' half so -good. But Jim's got a mis'ry in his back, an' d'rheumatics in his -laigs an' shoulders ontwell he can't but jes' make out to hobble 'round. -Yassir; them rheumatics leaves Jim like a fly in a saucer of m'lasses; -he gets about plumb slow.” - -Jim furnished a most doleful air to be the frame for this piece of news; -one might have thought him some flame-enveloped martyr. - -“At any rate,” said Noah, in tones of greatest sympathy, “you are -fortunate, Jim, since now you are an invalid, in having such a kind, -forbearing master as your 'Marse Major' here.” - -“D'Marse Major aint so mighty bad,” observed Jim, with the face of one -who considers deeply. “Course he has his spells. Thar's times when he's -sort o' amiable, d'Marse Major is; an' then Jim nacherally takes to him -like a honeysuckle to a front porch. Then thar's other days when Jim -quits him an' goes streakin' it for d'tall grass. Them's d'times when -d'Marse Major takes to t'arin' about loose, an' carryin' all befo' him -like a b'ar in a hawg-pen.” - -Having disposed of the letter which had given the loquacious Jim that -delay required for these important disclosures, I put an end to them by -carrying Noah away to the General's room. He would expostulate and hold -back; but I made him come with me on the plea of how the General had -asked to talk with him of that coming Nullification banquet to be held -at the Indian Queen. - -“True, he has heard it from me,” said I, “but what then? You know how -folk are. He would hear it from you first-hand.” - -While I was running over the General's mails from Tennessee, that -eminent person and Noah waded forth into deep and animated converse. - -“I am rather glad than otherwise,” said the General, lighting the while -the usual friendly pipe, “for that treason dinner our Calhoun clique -would plan. I shall go; should they ask it, I'll even give them a toast. -I will light a torch for them; I would be the last to have it said I let -folk go blundering to a gibbet in the dark.” - -“You recall,” remarked Noah, “how zealous were certain influences for -that Florida post, and how they would have it go to one Westfall?” - -“The man Westfall,” retorted the General, “was an utter weakling. He -never would have done for such a place. The Florida governorship is of -consequence; its duties call for one of force. I have thought on a man -for it, but the time has not come. The present incumbent does fairly -well for an Adams selection.” - -“That weakness of Westfall to which you refer,” said Noah, “was, I take -it, no slight merit in the minds of those who stood by the elbow of his -hope. It was a part of the Nullification scheme, the putting forward of -Westfall.” - -“In what sort?” asked the General. “I know how Calhoun desired him, for -Duff Green told us so much when we were not a week in town.” - -“Westfall's success for the place would have linked to the -Vice-President the richest, strongest elements in Pennsylvania. Then -there is Florida itself--two-thirds Spanish and by no means in love with -the balance of this country. With a weak governor in St. Augustine, and -one who owed his crown to our Vice-President, what should be simpler, in -the event of secession in South Carolina, than to count on Floridian men -and money for the venture?” - -“They will do as well without their Westfall,” commented the General. -“Mayhap they will do better, since had they succeeded for him, it -might hereafter have given their rashness inspiration, and turned them -gallows-ripe. One thing sure: let them once rebel against the law--let -them but rise in Calhoun's state to the law's defiance--and I will burn -them from the earth. They shall be destroyed root and stalk and standing -grass, with the reptiles that crawl between. Their leaders shall -swing for it so surely as my name is Jackson or there's such a word as -'President' in the land.” - -Here I come near to the first true social test to be put upon our Peg, -and that, you will know, was the reception which she would give as a -cabinet lady at her own home on the Georgetown side of the President's -Square. And now, when I am driven by stress of this tale to furnish you -with a handful of hints or little twigs of description concerning the -business, I write as though with fetters on my wrists. It is because -I have no _salon_ learning, and was never taught your lessons of -chandeliers and wax-lights and orchestras and tables spread with -elegance and palms and flowers and folk brilliant on evening parade, -formidably engaged, each with a part like people in a play, in bringing -off one of those encounters where well dressed men and women meet to -crowd each other and call the trial a function. If it were to be a -battle or even some quiet-lying landscape with its stretch of river, -and a forest to fringe the banks, and mayhap a mountain chain with -its plushy dress of pines to the background, I might not come on so -haltingly. But this, as it were, is to lay a fence of stone--and that, -you are to witness, means a journey full of backaches--to be here piling -one word upon another for the story of a drawing-room three hours. - -Van Buren was himself Peg's partner for this reception--his own doors -closed, as Peg explains in rearward pages when she talks with the -General. It would be then, a double reception, and both the State and -the War Departments to stand thereof the social sponsors. - -Word had crept abroad how the General himself planned a place among the -callers, and at the grave tidings Duff Green, in his paper, was driven -to extremes of frantic ink over the proposed lowering of the presidency -to cabinet levels, which latter the disturbed Duff would seem to think -were common, even if they were not bad. - -“The White House,” cried Duff, in his shocked columns, “should not be -taken down from that high place of elevation in which our late president -was pleased to leave it.” - -“Truly, an excellent thought!” observed the General, “to set Adams -before me for a model! Why, man! from his purchase of the rogue Clay -down to the last measure to meet the flourish of his pen and be made -a law thereby, I call it patriotism to turn my back on every position -Adams occupied, and the very essence of right to undo all he did. Me to -follow Adams! I should as soon think of emulating Billy Weatherford and -his Creeks.” - -“But why stand over me,” said I, “with all this arm tossing and -threatening declamation? It is your Duff Green and not I who would thus -drive you to an Adams example.” - -“Well,” said the General, somewhat subdued by this thought, “you at -least are here and I must vent myself on some one.” - -While both the General and I lived in a deal of fog concerning such -coils, neither of us was torn of doubt as to the certainty of Peg's -triumph. Vaughn and Krudener, for the favor of Van Buren, would lead up -the legation folk as bell-sheep lead a flock; the military element was -bound to Peg's chariot-wheel by merest war department bonds; withal, the -General's presence alone would mean a multitude, and that of gaudiest -feather, for it asked no skill of society to know how that same impulse -of self-interest was ever at work to move it, as much as might be said -of any conspiracy of roughest politics. The General as the present -source of things temporal would be courted; and to that sycophantish -end your swarming brood of courtiers would be found tagging at his back -though he were to make a sulphurous pilgrimage and seek the pit itself. - -There came one thing, however, to rub my fur against the grain; but this -was of the week prior to our Tuesday of Peg's reception. It is the great -marvel how it will ever be the slight affair to ruffle one. I have -known a rascal to crack off his pistol at me for a no better reason than -strong drink; and yet beyond a busy interest to stun him and prevent -a return of his experiment, and so settle safety in my favor, my bosom -went as rippleless of wrath as any millpond. On the other side, the idle -whistle of some fellow, and him outside the house and of no knowledge -even of my being, has sent me off on storms of rage. - -This it was to nag me into irritation. There arrived one day a mighty -casket of jewels for Peg--diamonds and rubies they were, and ones a -princess might have worn with honor. They were a gift from Eaton; for -that secretary was notably rich and owned the treasure-chests of an -emperor. - -Peg said naught of these trinkets, whether to the General or to me, nor -did she show them. But since they came in from New York, employing for -their safety certain armed guardians of express, the thing could be -called no secret. Moreover, Eaton himself would probably be the last -to smother the story of these chains and bracelets and brooches and -coronets and flashing whatnot, since for what else did he buy them save -self-love and to deck Peg out as one decks out a horse on gala days. -That man never loved Peg; it was a mark of sentiment beyond him. He -had a pride of her as of a gem or a picture, and wore her beauty as one -wears a decoration. - -But he no more knew Peg, no more loved Peg, than cud-cattle know and -love the stars above their stolid heads. Her praise would ring sweet -to his ear, yes; her loveliness and the bright glory of her eyes would -lighten his face. Also, the moon will light you and shine again on the -face of that chance-hollowed mud-hole which the rains have filled and -the swine enjoyed. - -It is but truth to say that my resentment of these jewels to Peg gave -me a pause of uneasiness. It was not the little fact of their existence -which bayed me; it was not that I went pricked as though by nettles -because of these gewgaws; that was not it. But why should I be pricked -at all? Other folk would bring diamonds to their wives or sweethearts, -and you meet none who owned to less excitement or a colder interest -thereover than myself. Why, then, should these stir my pulse and set my -anger to a trot? It were indeed a thing most passing strange, and one -whereof I was bound to find the bottom if I called myself an honest man. - -The question of my anger for Peg's jewels hung about me like lead, I -tell you; for to myself I made free confession of that wrath and would -hide nothing of it from my conscience. I was stout to drag myself to the -bar, and to sit in trial over my own heart. Was it love of Peg to move -me? The General had told me how I had been swept away in love for her -from the first; but that was his jest and the bantering humor of him at -the time. Was I in love with Peg? And if not, then wherefore fly to -arms for that Eaton would hang the common gifts of man to wife about her -charms and strive for her delight? That was the question I held before -my soul's eyes and shook it for an answer. - -In a trice the riddle was replied to; the reasons of my anger unrolled -before me like a scroll. It was not that I loved Peg; it was my certain -sureness how Eaton himself was master of no such true sentiment, nor -one worthy of the word. As I have said, he but held her--being below a -better thought--to adorn his vanity; he would wrap her in his riches in -the vulgarity of a boast. Peg was as the feather to his hat, the -jewel to his hilt; he trapped her in brilliants just as he drunk from -cut-glass. And knowing Peg as I knew her, and with a deep appreciation -of her worth, was it miracle, or must my heart be charged of crime, -because my brow would flush to see her thus abased and set to nurse so -gross a self-esteem? Besides, it fell as a blow upon one's better taste, -since to embellish Peg with such earthenware was indeed to paint a lily -and gild gold. - -It was true, I so much resented these jewels, and they so bit my feeling -in advance, that I went at wits' end to fish forth some excuse for being -absent from that reception and thus avoid their tawdry splendors. But -when I moved the matter, the General was set like iron that I should go. - -Were it the General alone to cross my temper for this, I should have -run over him, no doubt, and had my way for it. But next stood Peg in the -path. I no more than breathed a half-suggestion of possible conditions -to arise and keep me from the house, when she glowed on me with a look -so gently pleading that, without waiting for her to speak, I straightway -told her I would come. - -“And I am glad, watch-dog,” said Peg, simply. “I could give myself no -reason, save a reason that would burn like fire, why you should stay -away.” - -It should be noted, perhaps, that the magical tale of those gems ran in -and out of the mouth of gossip for prior days, and I doubt not a purpose -to look on them--for the feminine eye is caught with glitter like a -blackbird, which hollow fowl will think of nothing for a week on end -save how to steal a bit of broken glass--brought as many to Peg's -reception as did the presence of the General. - -And here, being now upon the brink, I fairly ask you what should be the -use of setting forth how the carriages rolled to the gate; and how Peg -stood like some flower beneath the light of a chandelier--for these -receptions were in the evening--with her “good little secretary” by her -side, welcoming the throngs to press forward in her honor? The Calhouns -were not there; and, indeed, the folk from the Vice-President's own state -would be obviously absent. The other cabinet folk--that Calhoun trio, -the ladies Branch and Berrien and Ingham--did not appear; but then they -were upon certain similar receptions of their own.. However, there came -scores to have their places. There were the lion Webster, the courtly -Vaughn, Krudenerwith red heels to his shoes, red waistcoat, and earrings -to his ears, Noah with his black, dangerous eyes, and a high-caste -multitude, besides, from Senate and House and Supreme Court and -Legations, and those two score other lofty lairs of your utter capital -fashion. There arose the never-ceasing gride of carriages as they came -and went incessantly upon the frozen gravel; there crawled the endless -file of hand-shaking folk, the grave and the gay, the young and the old, -the beautiful and the ugly, the good and the bad--this last since there -stood no process of elimination to separate the sheep from the goats -where all who would might come. And Peg went through it with a sweet, -grave grace; and even surly Envy submitted to the verdict of a vast -success and one to fix Peg's standing beyond distrust, and mark itself, -besides, as the hopeless Waterloo of her every last ill-wisher. - -The General, bright of eye and unbending as a bayonet, was there early -to remain late. - -“I have enlisted for the campaign,” said he, “and I shall stay while I -hear of one foe to be in the field.” - -Never had I known him to look better, and the old-time deference -wherewith he would be about Peg so that all might see his regard for her -was like a page from chivalry. - -And now I must tell a tale on myself, and show how this was to twist -into a happy hour for me and I be harrassed by no sordid hatefulness of -those jewels. I had, for my shame be it told, gone to my place in the -line of calling folk with a reluctance that bound my breast like a rope. -I could scarce breathe for it. The file moved slowly, but I held my head -high, and, being a tall man, looked easily over Peg and did not once -rest my eyes upon her. - -I would escape the canker of those barbarous rubies and diamonds. - -It was the tones of a woman, who had Peg by her hand, to rivet my -interest. - -“Why! where now be those diamonds I heard so much about?” The voice was -of the empty tin-pan kind that tells of society and mighty little else. -“Where be those diamonds? Or was the story false?” - -Then I heard Peg in cold retort to our she-savage and her coarse greed -to look on diamonds. - -“Why, I believe I have a few handsful somewhere about the house,” said -Peg. “If it be those you are come to see, I shall have pleasure in -directing you to my maid.” - -Now when quite close I bent my slow eyes upon our little Peg. There she -stood, a lamp of beauty! and never the sign of your diamonds or rubies -about her--nothing of ornament save a rose my Jim had brought, and the -little coral of my mother's which Peg took from the cabinet on that -summer day. As she offered me her hand, she lifted up her face to mine. -She gave me no word but the red blood showed in her cheek a match for my -coral. Then her eyes fell; and next, with a heart full to foolishness of -a joy that was like a mystery, I passed on to walk the air and join the -General. - -“Our victory was measureless,” declared the General, in the stiff manner -of him who makes report, when late that night he and I were about our -inevitable pipes in his room. The General would discuss Peg's reception. -“Sir, it was absolute triumph. Do you know how Peg's function compared -with those of the enemy? 'Quantity and quality' were her words; you -remember that. Do you know on those two points, how our affair compared -with those of Ingham and Berrien and Branch? You do not? Sir, you -surprise me, and you to be a soldier whom I myself taught! Why! how are -you to know when we win or lose if you keep no account of the fight? -'Quantity and quality,' mark you! that is the test.” The General was in -towering spirit and as exalted of brow as one might wish to see. It was -like the real war to him. “Now,” he went on, “I was of a mind to know -results; I took measures for a count of noses, and a list of your folk -who called at those four cabinet houses to-day. Sir, it may please you -to hear that on both proposals of 'quality and quantity' Peg and you and -I overpowered those Redsticks as ten would overpower one.” - -The General smoked on in silent satisfaction; I said nothing, my mind -being wholly taken with my coral on Peg's bosom, and never mark of -diamond or ruby for a blemish to the rich beauty of her neck and face -and the cataract of gold-black hair to fall about her shoulders. - -“Peg is a grand girl!” mused the General. “It is pity, too; she should -have been a man and a soldier. And then the pure taste of her! You have -heard of a peck, more or less, of diamonds which Eaton brought on from -the North? I looked to see them wreathed about Peg's neck or arms or -fingers or wherever heaven meant they should go. And, mind you! not a -trace of them. 'Why,' says our Peg, when I would question her, 'they -were of such wondrous richness I thought it shame to wear them in my own -drawing room--and me no more than a girl--and set them against older, -better folk who would be my guests. It would have been to over-crow -them, and as though I sought to pamper vanity at their cost. Wherefore, -in compliment, I would not wear them, but put them all aside. Now, this -bit of coral is better, since more modest. It was from a sweetheart, and -is the one thing I love best of all the world.' Was there not fineness -for you?” demanded the General. “Was there not magnanimity? What other -woman between the poles could have withstood her hands from those gems? -Or who, from mere kindness and to spare the women about her their own -envy, would have thrust them away to don that coral trifle in their -stead? A tavern's daughter, forsooth! Why, such a spirit would give -a grace beyond her title to a duchess! I know of nothing more good or -noble to tell the silken nature of our little Peg.” - - - - -CHAPTER XIII--THE SON OF THE SPANISH BULL-FIGHTER - -Peg's war for social eminence would now move bravely. The tale of that -double reception with its polite throngs pushing forward in honor of -her and her “good little secretary,” and the General's presence thereat, -stately yet deferential, fluttered from lip to lip like some bright -bird. And, as such birds will, the farther it fluttered the brighter -it grew. I've told you how I own no warrant, whether of education or -natural trend, to descant on wax-lights and polished floors and satins; -but so far as I might trap the murmur of folk who should have such -matters of gossamer and music on their tongues' ends, the most guarded -decision went to it that Peg's position had become thereby as surely -fixed as the pole-star, and might with as much safety be observed and -steered by whenever any of your blind mariners of the drawing rooms -should lose a course or find himself in deep, strange waters. - -Like a great captain who in the wake of victory makes speed to again -strike the enemy while yet the latter is disorganized and before he can -re-collect formation or even hope, Peg was next and swiftly in the field -with that dinner for her glory at the Russian legation, tendered by -the wily Baron Krudener--he of the earrings and the scarlet heels. The -Tartar, as the General called him, zealous for the favor of the General -and Van Buren, was keen to note how a civility done Peg would become a -key to the best good will of both. After Krudener's, came the cabinet -reception at our “good little secretary's,” where Peg would reign; and -since Van Buren lived but a half-dozen houses north from Peg's, it was -hardly to step beyond her own door. Then followed the ball given by the -British with Peg in the place of esteem, and the Viscount Vaughn to lead -Peg forth in the first figure with his own diplomatic hand. - -Who could have been more delighted than the General with this splendor -of _salon_ success now spread to our pretty Peg's uninterrupted feet, -and that under the jaundiced eyes of her enemies? The General could not -be present at either the “good little secretary's,” the Russian or the -English house; but he was indomitable to hear; and never exquisite, nor -macaroni, nor buck about London town, gave ear of warmer ardor to the -nightly annals of Mayfair than did the General to those stories of Peg's -victories. Who were there and what they did and said, would be his -constant curiosity; and indeed he carried question-putting to the verge -of what stood foppish. - -“But can't you see, sir,” demanded the General, when I told him how his -heat to trace Peg's skirts through every dance, or learn the calling -list of each reception, would jostle one's better conception of him, -“can't you see that with the world and the law as made, this is the -trial of Peg's standing, and freighted of life or death?” - -“No,” said I, full bluntly; “and if you will have my notion then, I call -these things mere antic matters of apeish trick and chatter, not worth a -man's attention.” - -“You are a barbarian,” retorted the General, oracularly. “These -functions--these dinners and dances and receptions--are trials by jury -where the repute of folk, peculiarly the repute of women folk, is passed -upon. The verdict in her favor means the world and all for Peg. It is -the law.” - -“And if it be,” said I, “it is but a bad law and a cheap law, and one -whereat I should snap my fingers.” - -“And yet, sir,” replied the General, “wondrous highly as you hold -yourself, you are not yet grown to be the world. It's Peg's happiness--a -matter of being within the pale, without which she would feel decided -against and spurned. And remember this, sir, while you flourish with -your defiances, that a bad law is none the less a law, with penalty -in nowise to be mollified because of that badness at which you rail. -Wherefore I deem, these drawing-room trinkets of a first weight in Peg's -concerns; I shall know as much of them as I well may, and take my chance -of falling in your graces.” - -After that, and somewhat in the broader manner of a jest, I would each -day lay out to the General whatever of polite gaities took place the -night before; and while I recited those present, and what they did or -said, or failed to do or say, and particularly when such relation told -for Peg, he would smoke, and listen, and exult, and on occasion comment -like unto any grandmother gossip who still enjoys by second hands those -scenes which long ago her years taught her to desert. - -These exploits of waxed floors and dinner tables, while the General -might have neither art nor lot therein, drew me along with them--for all -I loved them not--like a magnet. For one thing, I would behold how Peg -fared; and then, the General would have me attend, to the purpose that -he be given their story. - -It was at the Russian's I was called on to witness the iron steadiness -of Peg--albeit I could have wished the Dutch jade, who offended, a man, -that I might pinch his neck. You must know, then, how the Minister -from the Netherlands was a bloated creature of beer and butter-tub -proportions--a Herr Huygens, he was; and Frau Huygens, his lady--save -the mark!--was as dropsical as he. The latter ungentlewoman would be -a waddling, duck-built cabbage thing of fifty years; and of no little -standing for a money-prudence and strict economy, since while as rich as -that commerce of gin by which her spouse had builded up their fortunes, -she owned celebration for but one frock--a most fantastic garment for -color and flounce like the garb of a clown in a kirmess. - -At the Krudener dinner, your Frau Huygens, whose place was next to -Peg's, would up and leave her chair immediately she was seated; and all -with a lofty face as of one insulted, and following a great looking of -Peg over through a spying glass. - -Spurred by this rudeness, Krudener directed a servant to remove the -chair and plate and table furniture of that place. This was swiftly done; -and next, to show his own feeling of the insolence offered under his -roof, our Russian would have the plate and the rest, including the gilt -chair, broken to pieces in one corner of the apartment and thrown upon -the blaze in the vast fireplace. - -“They have been used by that woman of canals and gin-casks,” explained -Krudener--under his exterior of quiet diplomacy and with his eye on Van -Buren, I could tell how the Muscovite was in a towering rage--“and I -have no servant so low he would now eat off that plate or sit in that -chair. Let them be destroyed, and with them the recollection of the -offence to our fair guest, which throughout my life I shall deplore.” - With this Krudener bowed deeply to Peg. - -“Since you say so much, Baron,” responded Peg, “I am driven to tell you -that you need have been to no disturbance. I should have remarked that -person's going only for the relief it gave to be free of the nearness of -one so gross.” - -This our pretty Peg got off in a way of relieved superiority that was -invincible; she lost nothing through the episode, but would gain ground -thereby for her bearing. - -In my first ill-humor to see this reasonless slight put upon our Peg, -I looked about for the rotund Herr Huygens, with a view, I -suppose--although I remember no clear plan in my angry head at the -time--to have his opinion on the conduct of that wife, since he as her -lord would be responsible. He was not present, nor had he been; it was -as well, for I might have forgotten his sacred character as a Minister -and said or done that which should be a further and more depressing jolt -to the proprieties. - -The General, when he learned of the business, was even warmer than -myself. He was all for having Van Buren give Herr Huygens his walking -papers, and would scarce listen to less. The “good little secretary,” - with Peg, herself, to aid, won him from his mood to banish the Dutchman -and that offensive Frau. It bred a sharp alarm in the bosom of Herr -Huygens, for he would as soon lay down his life as his post of Minister, -over the proud eminence whereof he gloated much. - -An incident more to be merry with, and one carrying within itself the -elements of fair reproof, came off in the house of the English. - -By this time your drawing-room forces had greatly abandoned the -Vice-President's wife and the ladies Berrien, Branch and Ingham, -to follow Peg. Among these, and glittering in the van, shone the -vainglorious Pigeon-breast. It was at the dance of the Viscount Vaughn -that Pigeon-breast, after deeply considering the butter on his bread, -made obviously and obsequiously up to Peg. - -In his earlier advances I did not see the tinsel fellow or I might have -interposed to dash his good resolves; I was to first know of him in -these bright relations of friendship for our side when I gained a -glimpse of him across the wide ball room where, with Peg's hand held -high, and maintaining a mighty respectful distance between them as -though Peg were majesty itself, he led her through one of those slow -dances--more, indeed, like a promenade than any dance--which had vogue -of that hour. - -I waited with much irritation until the dance was to its end and Peg at -liberty. I remembered, however, in her defence, that Peg was not aware -of Pigeon-breast for one who had sought her harm. No one had told her -of that splendid long speech to the General when Pigeon-breast chose -to represent “Mrs. Calhoun and the ladies of Washington,” which latter -term, under the scorching fire of Peg's successes, had dwindled to -a sour handful scarce equal to the task of filling a dinner table or -constructing a quadrille. - -“Why should you dance,” said I, when now I had gotten Peg by herself -near a window, “why should you dance with such a coxcomb?” - -“You mean,” returned Peg, “to tell me that he is no friend. As for that, -I've known him for an ill-wisher and, as far as his frail strength went, -an ill-doer, from the beginning.” - -“And how would that news come to you?” said I. “Has the rogue said -anything?” - -“Not so fierce, watch-dog, not so fierce!” whispered Peg. “Folk present -are not cognizant of your mastiff sort and might wonder to learn of it. -Wherefore, go quietly about me with your guardianship.” Peg would be -amused by the energy of my distaste of Pigeon-breast. “The 'rogue' has -said nothing. I knew he was my wrong-wisher from yourself.” - -“Me?” cried I. “And how should you have had it from me when I have not -breathed of the popinjay's existence?” - -“How? Why, from your face, where I've been long wont to read much more -than your tongue has ever told.” - -“What of my face, then?” - -“And I have wished you might see it! Whoever it was to approach me, I -had but to watch your brow. Was your brow frank, open, friendly: he who -came was a friend. Did you lower and gloom hatefully: he was an enemy -who rapped at the gate. Now you gave this fop the look of a fiend when -one day he would pass us in the square. And so by the light, or rather -the twilight of your frown, I read him.” - -“All exceeding clever,” said I, half made to laugh by the airy fashion -wherein Peg would toss this off, “all exceeding clever. But it brings -me with interest to my question, why, then, did you honor him with a -dance?” - -“For the same reason,” said Peg, with a look of funny malice, “that an -Indian scalps his foe.” - -“Now what should that mean?” - -“Wait and see, oh watch-dog!” - -It was a bit later when Peg was again by my side. - -“Do you know why I am back with you?” she asked. “Well, aside from the -profound pleasure of your company, the more profound by contrast with -that of those vapid ones”--here she would include the ball room males -with a sweep of her round arm--“I thought I would scalp my enemy before -your eyes. You have a violent nature, watch-dog, and I reflected how the -exhibition might bring you joy. Since you do not dance, your time must -lie on your hands like iron; I would do somewhat to lighten it.” - -Before I could ask Peg to unravel the intent of her long speech, -Pigeon-breast was pushing valourously our way. - -“He comes for a second dance,” said Peg. “See, his name is next on my -card.” - -“And call you that scalping?” cried I. “At that rate, every man in the -room will compete for your cruelty! Scalping, say you! I wish for the -simple humor of it, a Seminole might hear you.” - -The truth was I had fallen into a dudgeon with Peg for her notion of -taking a trophy; she would confer heaven on this Pigeon-breast and call -it “scalping!” - -“I believe,” observed Pigeon-breast, with his nose fairly to the floor, -so deeply would he bow, “I believe I will have the honor of another -dance”--here another bow as lowly louted as the first. - -As Pigeon-breast resumed the perpendicular, he crooked his gallant arm -invitingly and would lead Peg to her place. - -But Peg drew back, as much to my bewilderment as that of the -wonder-smitten Pigeon-breast himself, and with a manner coldly polite -said: - -“There is a mistake, sir; I could have promised you no dance, since I do -not know you.” - -“Mistake!” gasped Pigeon-breast. - -“Mistake,” repeated Peg, with, if anything, an access of ice. “I never -before saw you; I could have put you down for no dance. One does not -dance with strangers.” Then to me: “Your arm, if you please.” - -As I carried Peg away, Pigeon-breast was heard to inarticulately moan -and whine like a high wind in a keyhole. Later I beheld him desperately, -in the refreshment room, drinking strong waters with both hands and as -though he had a fish in his stomach. - -“And now,” said I to Peg, as we moved away from the crushed -Pigeon-breast, “why were you so bitter? That empty fellow was not worth -so much. Besides, you have shamed him before the town; you hurt him to -the heart.” - -“Hurt him to the vanity,” corrected Peg. “If it be true that -nothing dries more quickly than a woman's tear--and it is true, -watch-dog--nothing cures more quickly than the hurt vanity of a man. -That dandy will anon be as gay as a peacock. However, I would punish -him. I have made him an Ishmael of the drawing-rooms; I have driven him -forth from us, and he cannot return to the others for his apostasy of -their cause is known. Did I not tell you, watch-dog, I was a revengeful -woman?” - -Altogether, I might have wished our Peg had taken another course with -Pigeon-breast. - -Thus to publicly drum him out of camp was a thought too hardy. However, -Pigeon-breast had wrought for what he received, and I think, too, Peg -was more moved by the audacious fun of the business than any darkling -taste to have a vengeance, for all her word. - -The General, I am minded, was of my view; it was the frolic of the thing -to carry Peg away. - -“Peg is young,” quoth the General, amiably; “our Peg is young. What -would you have? She shall be older one day and more upon dignity. What -shall more bound and frisk and play than your scapegrace kitten? And -yet what more gravely decorous than your cat? By Joshua's horn! on the -whole, I'm glad your Pigeon-breast was brought up with a round turn.” - -It was one afternoon when the General came to me with a request that I -seek out Noah at the Indian Queen and confer with him over the merits of -a gentleman who lusted to hold a certain office. - -“This individual comes to me well spoken of,” said the General, “and -yet I would know more of him, and that from one who has no axe to be -grinded.” - -While I made ready for my walk to the Indian Queen, the General -unpouched another piece of interesting news. - -“By the way,” said he, “our Peg has settled on April as a time for that -dinner and ball. She would have had it sooner; but she does not now need -the White House for any direct aid to her arms. She will save it for the -close, and make the affair a sort of celebration.” - -“It is a good thought,” said I. “It is wiser, since she has won her way -with what should be her own resources, not to subtract from that success -by any full blown movement of the White House upon the scene. Mean folk -would say she could not have come through without you to be her ally.” - -“And that is my notion, too!” coincided the General. “Peg's position is -complete; the White House now would but divide her glory. We will offer -her our East Room courtesies in April, and let it be for an old-time -Roman triumph as when a victor returns from war. Peg well deserves a -triumph; the Vice-Presidential coterie and all whom it might control -have moved heaven and earth for Peg's disaster and pulled and hauled -like common sailor-folk on any rope to do her harm.” - -“Does not April,” said I, “mark an unheard-of span for your social -season? I had thought it might end with Lent.” - -“And so it would,” smiled the General, “if now we were only Federalists -like Adams, and remembered the Church of England as a guide. This, -however, is a Presbyterian administration; wherefore, we shall abide -none of your Lents, but drink and dance and dine as far into spring -flowers as we will.” - -“Being the earliest instance,” added I, “when to drink and to dance and -to dine were called an evidence of Calvinism.” - -Noah was pen-employed over certain wisdom which should find subsequent -exposition in his paper. - -“There are large money influences,” remarked Noah, thoughtfully, when -we had talked a moment, “which have grown alluringly friendly about my -associate, Watson Webb. They are offering a loan to our paper of fifty -thousand dollars. You know”--this with his satirical air--“how papers -are ever in want of a loan. These money folk bank on that to win us; -perhaps, too, they find hope in my being a Jew.” - -“And what would your associate do?” I asked. - -“To be frank,” returned Noah, “he grants admiring ear to this song of -siren money. I think we shall part company--Webb and I.” - -“And yet,” said I, with a bent for banter, “you are ever in one kind or -another laying emphasis on your Jewish readiness for gold. Now you see -it is the Jew who can not be moved, while our Gentile, with an eye to -the yellow chance, would not be found so sentimental.” - -“For all that,” remarked Noah, “the Jew is a profound money hunter. -It is but natural he should be. That cupidity, or, if you prefer, that -gold-greed, has been through centuries developed as his one hope for -safety. In the oppressions which have borne upon him, and which in all -countries save this still bear him down, your Jew has found in money his -last cave of retreat. He might bulwark himself with riches. With others, -gold would mean luxury; with the Jew, it stood for life itself, and -to go wanting it was to be tooth and nail about the digging of his own -grave.” - -“And it is your theory, then,” said I, “that the great need for gold -which for ages was to stare the Jew in the face, became the seed of that -genius, to gather which now the race is heir to?” - -“Without question,” said Noah. “More; since the Jew has been safe of his -goods and his blood in this land of ours, and the rowels of that great -need no longer lance the flanks of effort and set it to the leap, we -rear a kind of Jew who owns no mighty care for money. I will find you -Jews in our midst who can still be hawks to swoop, but who have no hold -to keep. They will spend you their riches or give them away like water. -We shall yet rear an American Jew who has no skill to get money. Still, -going back to that first thought--for it is worrying my soul like a -dog--of those money influences busy with the enlistment of Webb, I am -free to say that even in his worst hour your Jew would never take a -bribe. He would sell neither his friend nor his principle; those were -never Jewish ways of money-finding.” - -“Your Jew makes a stout patriot,” said I. “I could want no better -American than a Jew.” - -“Why, then,” responded Noah, “there be none to whom America means so -much. You, being of the strain of Saxon-Dane, would have justice in -England, welcome in Russia, friendship in France. What would your Jew -meet? Your Jew loves America because he loves himself; he is a patriot -since he is a Jew.” - -“And yet,” I protested, “it is no question of cool selfishness with your -Jew. He is as spontaneously the patriot as any other. Take Judah Touro: -whose money or whose blood was more at the beck of his country that -January day at New Orleans?” - -“Why, yes, that is true,” said Noah. “But you should reflect: -patriotism, like every other emotion--if it be a mother's love for her -child--has ever its first feet in selfishness. That would be the tale -of Jew or Gentile the wide world round. Selfishness seems but a rough, -unworthy root, but from it have flowered art, poetry, science, or what -you will. The lineage of each sentiment of beauty, whether it be the -tenderest charity or that self-sacrifice that lays down its life, begins -with selfishness--that mighty cornerstone of the world.” - -“Beware of metaphysics,” said I. “That, at least, would be our -matter-of-fact General's caution.” - -“Who? the President?” Noah laughed. “I will let you in with a -secret. There is only one to be more the sentimentalist than your -'matter-of-fact General,' and that, my friend, is yourself. However, -keeping from the personal, I would still stand firm to it that -selfishness is the beginning of the virtues. Those better expressions, -charity and love, come by its cultivation just as the generous apple has -for its forebear that bitter, thorny, sour creature, the wild crab. -Now, your Jew has been vastly cultivated”--here came Noah's look of -satire--“he has been ploughed by adversity and harrowed of oppression. -Thus farmed, your Jew will produce those Judah Touros you tell of. There -were mates for Touro throughout our years of revolution. There dwelt but -seven hundred families of Jews in this land when Concord and Lexington -and Bunker Hill fell forth. From Lexington until Cornwallis, those -Jews were busy with their ducats and their blood for freedom. They gave -millions. Old Haym Salomon alone gave six hundred thousand dollars He -was the richest of his day; he died copper poor to the obolary point -of groats and farthings. At his end he said: 'I die broken and in the -talons of want; but I die happy since I have lived to see civil and -religious liberty established on this soil.'” - -Rivera, broad of shoulder, mild of eye, here drew near and made a slight -motion, as one who points with his thumb, towards the tap-room of the -tavern. Noah would seem instantly to understand his wordless satellite. - -“Come,” said Noah, eagerly, “I can show you those Catron thugs I warned -you against. It may serve you to know their faces.” - -“I had forgotten to ask,” I returned. “Has any of them gone about to -molest you? I see you still safe.” - -“It is because I am looked on,” returned Noah, lightly, “as a Jew most -perilous. Those Catron five minutes at Gadsby's did me good service. -Also, since I love quiet, I would have gossip give wings to it how I -carry a knife. The truth is, these caitiff folk mistrust me as a trap of -death.” - -There was a rude group gathered about a table in the bar. The members -were drinking rum from tin measures, and their vivid noses and features -much aflame would not have said the habit was one lately taken up. - -“Those be our friends,” whispered Noah. “That animal with the -shoulders of a buffalo, the iron jaw, and no forehead to speak of, is a -prize-fighter of renown. He was brought over to be a counter-weight for -Rivera. I would wager, should they come together, that my man beats him -to a pumice.” - -The light in Noah's eyes showed no sloth of appetite for such a battle. - -The rogues about the table were made uneasy by our presence. We looked -them up and down at no little length, Noah with an eye of rawest -insolence, enough of itself to draw resentment from an image. Noah -called Rivera from where he lounged against the doorpost and held -whispered converse with him touching the fellows, and all in a most -apparent way of insult. But beyond a wrathful growl one might not lure -them; they turned their shifty, evil eyes away, and hastily gulping the -rum, shuffled from the place. - -“If those ruffians are come to town for a motive of trouble,” said I, -“why do not they go upon their mission? They have been weeks here. Has -this Catron so much money to waste?” - -“Doubtless Catron has money enough,” replied Noah. “Like yourself, -however, I can not find reason for this stage-wait in the tragedy. I -have tempted them to a rupture with my eye a score of times, but their -conduct was always what you saw.” - -Noah went with me to the General, to reply to the latter's interest -concerning the ambitious one. - -“He is wise and brave and true,” said Noah; “that is the worst I know of -him.” - -“And that should be enough,” said the General, decisively. “What more -may one want than 'wise and brave and true?'” - -“Then you care only for the man,” said I, “and ask nothing of his -principles of politics?” - -“Added to those cardinals,” laughed the General, “of 'wise and brave and -true,' one would need but the other virtue of being my friend. When you -say 'principles of politics,' Major, I should know what you mean. Still, -with a now and then Calhoun exception, I am free to say I care only -for your man and nothing for a measure. If it were an election, now, I -should vote for a good man on a bad platform rather than a bad man on a -good platform.” - -“And why?” asked Noah. “For myself, I am not so sure.” - -“You will turn sure,” replied the General, “if you but pause and recall -your own experience. Measures are like batteries aboard ship. It is ever -the man behind the measure, as it is the man behind the gun. If he be -'wise and brave and true,' good. If he be otherwise;--why, hang him and -have you another man.” - -As I was returning alone to my workshop, I overheard the voices of Peg -and Jim within the room. - -“An' so, Miss Peg,” Jim was saying, “as soon as ever your mammy gives -Jim d'message an' that mouthful of whiskey, Jim shore lights out for -you. Honey, Jim comes that fas', Jim does, he jes' natcherally leaves -things on both sides of d'road. Your mammy's plumb sick, an' thar aint -no sort o' doubt of it. Plumbago is what Jim allows it is.” - -“My mother is ill,” said Peg, when I came in. “I sent your Jim down to -get word from her. She wants me, and I would ask you to go with me to -her if I dared.” - -“That should call for no desperate courage,” said I. - -The deep snows had been melting for many days, and, while the ground was -now quite bare, it lay wet as a sponge, and the roads not to be thought -of for horses. Peg's mother, however, lived but a little mile distant, -and our way would lie through woodland for the most, with paths to wind -in and out among the trees. These walks, being grassy, would do well -enough for folk afoot. - -“We must walk,” said Peg, “and since that be the order, I must go back -for stronger boots to fend against this wet.” - -When Peg returned from her own home and we would be setting forth, it -was six years off her age to merely see her. For what mud and water -we might meet, Peg had donned thick-soled, high-laced boots, and with -these, and skirts cut short to match her boots, Peg appeared not an hour -older than sixteen. - -“You look like a schoolgirl,” said I, in comment. “You will be now more -than ever the child with me.” - -“'Tis a good uniform to walk in,” said Peg, “and to balk mire and -water.” - -Peg's mother was in no strait of weakened health more than stood proper -with her days. But she was grown peevish and with nerves on edge to see -her daughter; for since rout and dinner and reception made such claim on -Peg, she had not visited the good old lady as often as was her wont. - -And now when we were there, the old mother would hear no soon word for -our departure; we must stay to supper; Peg should cook for us, she said. - -It was not without surprise that I observed how this command to turn -herself a cook would fit with Peg's temper like a glove. In the first, -Peg hung upon uncertainties; the paths were bad, there were mire and -pool. But when told that she should cook for me, her face brightened and -she was instantly moved to recall that a great moon would shine and so -put those night-dangers of pool and mire to rest. - -So patent stood Peg's satisfaction in her new duties that, as she would -heap and heap again my plate--scarce eating a morsel herself--I was -driven to ask reason. - -“And you don't know?” said Peg, pausing with a new-baked tin of -light-bread in her little hands--these latter white with flour. “It is -because this is the first natural woman thing I've done for months. You -may be very sure, watch-dog, whenever you see me bowing and scraping at -a reception, or dismissing some Pigeon-breast from my royal presence at -a ball, that I would give the stockings off my feet to be busy about a -fireplace instead, and cooking bread and meat for you. You see, I am so -much more the woman than the lady. There is my defect.” - -“And was it that,” said I, attacking a second steak with the fury of a -farm-hand, while Peg glowed to see me dispatch it, “was it that to teach -you to warn me I must be a man rather than a gentleman when I dealt with -you?” - -“Now I shouldn't wonder,” replied Peg, going for more coffee. - -This kitchen mood of Peg's--and somehow I liked it as much as ever she -did--and her word for it how she preferred cookery to balls, set me to -put questions as we twined along our path among the trees on homeward -journey. The night, as Peg foretold when she so favored supper-getting, -was full of a white radiance that one might read print by, for the air -was as clear as glass and the moon both big and round. - -“You were speaking as one weary,” said I, “of dance and reception, and -declared how you would sooner cook. Now that puts me in a fog; I should -have supposed you the happiest, as you should be the proudest, woman in -the world.” - -“I said I would sooner cook for you,” said Peg. “You are uncouth enough -to forget that part. Or perhaps, now it was your timidity. I am proud -enough, doubtless; but why, watch-dog, should you think me happy?” - -“Is it not reason enough,” returned I, “that you have stifled your -enemies, and stand on the last summit of our society?” - -“I am happy only as it makes my friends happy,” returned Peg; “the good -General and yourself. I would not, for my own part, waste one moment on -it.” - -“I can not understand,” said I. “That I should love nothing of -drawing-rooms does not amaze me; the day is on in middle life with -me and I've seen too much of grass and sky to now care for floors and -frescoes. But for a woman:--I should have said her joy would be there.” - -“Watch-dog, I am too much the woman,” said Peg; “or, since you may -better understand, I'm too much the savage. I've climbed the social -mountain. I stand on its summit; there is nowhere higher. And yet what -will it all mean?” - -“What will it not mean?” I asked. - -“Watch-dog, I'll tell you what it will not mean.” Peg spoke in a tone of -tired earnestness. “It will not mean sympathy or love or trust. Society, -as we've agreed, is like a mountain. And like a mountain, you find less -and less of vegetation as you climb--fewer of the green, good virtues -that stand so thickly rank in the poor valleys below. As you climb, it -would turn ever barer and colder; and at the last no virtues--nothing -but lichens and livid mosses. We are at the summit, watch-dog. And now -what find we other than the dead cold snow? You have told me I stand on -the social summit; you see I keep repeating. Do you know now what it is -in my heart to do? There lies no peril of a slip; I have too much the -sure foot of the ibex. Do you know what I am moved to do?--me on my high -snow social peak? Why, then, dash myself into that common valley far -below.” - -“Now, that is not our Peg who speaks,” cried I, not a trifle put about -by Peg's Alpine parables. “It is the talk of a tongue and means mere -wildness.” - -“And that is it, watch-dog,” returned Peg, in a way of mourning. “I am -not tame; I am like the wild things that will not bear a cage. Now here; -see how strange I am. I do not like women; I will not trust one with a -word; I must watch myself to treat them with a fair face. Then I am all -to talk and go about with men. I should have been born one of those -Indian girls of whom you told me. A campfire and a petticoat of -buckskin, a wigwam and a husband--big and broad like you, watch-dog--to -fight and to hunt for me; that would be my dream.” - -There arose a rough laugh, and if my ears were true, a rum-sodden laugh. -I turned my head, and there, a hundred yards to our rear, came rolling -and stumbling the drunken crew whom Noah had been at pains to show me -in the Indian Queen. Over my shoulder I watched them for a moment. They -were in sottish glee, and would shout, and now and then troll a bar or -two of some pot-house ballad. - -My nature was on watch in a moment; I suspected how these ruffians would -be after us. We were in a lonely strip of trees, and no folk near the -spot but just ourselves--a safe theatre for villainy. I counted our -roaring drunkards; there were eleven, and among them I could pick out -the yard-wide shoulders of that gladiator to whom Noah had pointed. - -Peg, as well as I, could see these creatures coming; but then she had -not my news, and would only know them for roysterers returning from some -drinking bout. I glanced at Peg; her face was bright and free, and -for all her late lamentations over society and its dead cold wastes of -proper snow, mighty wide awake and vivacious. I never beheld her more -brisk; in the white moonlight her picture shone out as clear as day. - -Peg was on my right arm. I began to go more slowly so that those who -followed should overtake us, and to push a little off the path to the -right, for I would have Peg out of the midst of them when trouble fell. - -As I would loiter and go with a slower foot, the eleven behind quickened -their step. They came on, roaring and jesting among themselves; not -together, but by twos and threes, and straggling along the path like -geese. I think it was their plan to push ahead of Peg and me and bar our -way; for they went lumbering and lurching by, making a rude joke to toss -from tongue to tongue, but no one to so much as look on us direct until -the last one came up. He would be lagging behind for a purpose, too, -since he was gone on no more than a yard ahead of Peg and myself when he -sings out to his fellows with an oath: - -“D'ye see whom we have here? Why, here is our big lover and his light o' -love--no less!” - -With that, stepping before Peg, I seized the scoundrel with my left -hand. It was his arm above the elbow I took hold on, and a soft snick -like a snapping of the clay stem of a pipe, and the grotesque way in -which the hand dangled, palm outward, showed me how I had broken the -bone. - -The creature's scream brought the others to his rescue. That was no -loss, for it would have been their plan from the first to return and -fall upon me. As they came on in a blundering file, whirling forth -oaths, I took the one in my hand with a grip about his middle. Heaving -him over my head, I dashed him at the others as they drew near. The -villain would do beautifully as a projectile, too, for he mowed down -three like a chain-shot, his boot making a fine gash in the face of one -of them. - -On the point of going forward to meet the others, I was stayed by -a shout, loud and musical, yet much like the muffled roar of some -deep-lunged animal. Then came one from the the rear with the speed of an -arrow at top flight. In the moonlight I could tell him for Rivera the -son of that Spanish bull-fighter, running like a stag. He flashed by me; -and the next moment he struck one of the roughs with his fist. It was a -hammer-like blow, and that one who would stop it fell with the crash of -a tree. - - - - -CHAPTER XIV.--THE FEDERAL UNION: IT MUST BE PRESERVED. - -Doubtless, since my very palms itched to be about that employment, I -would have had my hands on others of the rogue crew, but I was granted -no chance. Rivera poured himself against the scoundrels like a torrent. -Quick, catlike, springing in and out, he smote upon two of them as with -a poleaxe, and they went to the grass like folk of wood. The sound of -the blows came to my ears as clearly as the click of balls in a billiard -game. Beholding the thunderbolt work of Rivera, the others, losing -courage, and with a concert of curses and growling cries, turned tail -and ran. - -There was one, however, of those who were yet upon their ignoble feet, -to save himself this disgrace. When the rest ran off crying among the -trees, this man would tarry; he was that wide-shouldered fighting man -who was thought to match Rivera. For reasons of his own, and perhaps -they were in a rude sort chivalric and to his credit, this fellow had -not rushed upon us with the others, but stood at some distance looking -on, arms folded across his chest. Now, when all were down or vanished in -the dark, he, with arms still folded, came slowly towards Rivera. - -“Volks tells me, lad,” said the fighting man as, arms still at peace, -he paused within a few yards of Rivera, who would be coolly waiting -for him, “volks tells me as 'ow you be summat of a boxer; and vor a -certainty, you does make beef of them coves in a vorkmanlike vay--you -does, upon my davy! But now, d'ye see, you settles vith me--me, Jim -Burns of W'itechapel.” - -“Assuredly!” returned Rivera, and his deep tones, like the roll of an -organ, would carry the impression of one in wondrous good humor, “I -shall be most pleased to settle with you. See, you may take your time; -there is no hurry.” - -The other, who seemed to have faith in the leisurely mood of Rivera, -softly doffed coat and waistcoat, and stood in his shirt of gray cloth, -trousers and shoes. Rivera similarly prepared himself; he would meet his -enemy in the same light costume. - -“Best to turn up your trowsers, lad,” advised the fighting man, “as I -does. They may 'inder your veet, else, in steppin'.” - -When these improvements had been wrought, the fighting man's thought -would double a new corner. - -“And yet,” he remarked, complainingly, “w'at's the bloomin' use? 'Ere's -them coves all run away”--pointing to the last of the trio whom Rivera -had beaten down, as that unworthy staggered to his feet and lurched off -into the darkness--“an' no purse nor nothink to vight for. I sees no -use, lad, in our puttin' hup our 'ands.” This last in a grieved tone. - -“But you must fight,” remonstrated Rivera, in a sharp, eager fashion. -“You came to this town to beat me. Will you now let yourself be stopped -and never a blow? Are you afraid?” - -“Me, afeerd?” retorted the fighting man, fiercely, his little eyes like -sparks. “W'y, lad! th' cove doant stan' in leather as I'm afeerd on. -Me, a fourteen stoner, leery? An' of only one? Well, I likes that!” The -disgust of the fighting man was unmistakable. - -It was a queer position, this waiting to be spectator of a fist duel -between these game-some ones, but I did not feel free to leave until the -thing should end. When the fighting man, arms crossed, came pacifically -up, I would have been for going forward to lay hold on him, but Rivera, -with a manner like a prayer and as he who seeks a favor for his soul, -besought me to withstay my hand. - -“Don't,” pleaded Rivera, but never taking his gaze from the man, “don't; -he is mine.” - -With that, giving over whatever of right I may have owned to the fellow, -I went to Peg where she stood on a little knoll among the deeper shadows -of the woods. - -“I should take you to safety at once,” said I, in explanation of my -loitering lack of expedition, “but I would see Rivera through this.” - -“I do not want to go,” replied Peg, gazing the while as with a kind of -fascination. - -Peg's face wore a flush of excitement; this I could tell even in the -shadows, and her words had a great ring of interest. I did not remark -on the strangeness of it, nor frame a rebuke for that she should love to -look on while gladiators fought. I, myself,--for I confess to a mighty -lust of strife,--was hot to see what might follow, and it came to me as -quite the thing that Peg should share my feeling. It was the savage in -her blood, as the General would have said; but, a trifle strung of the -fracas and with the wolf in me at full stretch, I felt no amazement, but -only sympathy for Peg's sentiment. - -As Peg and I stood considering the others in their words and motions, -Rivera pointed to a level, glady spot where no trees grew and the -moonlight came down in a white flood. - -“That should be a fine place,” said Rivera to the fighting man, “for us -to try each other?” - -“It does look a tidy bit of grass,” assented the fighting man. - -As the two walked forward to this turfy spot of fairness it brought them -nearer to Peg and myself, and squarely under our eyes. It was as though -they set a stage, and would produce their drama of blows for us and in -such wise that we should not lose the least of it. - -As the pair moved to the selected place, that moaning one whose arm -I had broken, and who, when the rest had fled, still lay in a fit of -fainting, so far recovered as to sit weakly up. But he could not yet -walk, being shaken and dizzy mayhap, and so he, too, would be a looker -on, albeit I do not think he was to see much, being taken with his own -woes and groaning over them. - -“W'at a come-down is this!” exclaimed the fighting man, as he moved -into the center of the ground, “me, who should be champion, vighting -by moonlight in a vorest vith a mad Yankee! W'at a tale to tell in -W'itechapel!” - -“I'm not a Yankee,” said Rivera, as if for the other's consolation, I -thought, “I'm an Irish-Jew.” - -“An Irish-Jew!” returned the other, with a note of admiration. “Now -that's better, lad; Irish on Jew makes a bitter cross for the ring. But -all the same, it's a shame vor me to be 'ere millin' by moonlight in -voreign parts, an' never no purse nor ropes nor nothink, an' no 'igh -toby blokes to referee or even 'old a vatch. An' me, mind you, as should -be champion.” - -“Why do you say that?” asked Rivera, in a hunger of boyish curiosity to -know how honorable the conquest was he went about. “Of what should you -be champion?” - -“Hengland, lad, w'at else!” said the other. “It's all on account of an -accident that I beant. I vights vith Big Tom Brown of Bridgenorth, I -does; an' Tom, 'e naps it on the bugle so 'ard 'e's all vor bleedin' to -death. An' vith that, the beaks is vor puttin' me on a transport to go -to New South Wales, when I moseys down to Bristol an' goes aboard ship -an' comes over 'ere. If I could 'ave stayed at 'ome, I'd a-beat Bendigo -by now, an' been the champion 'stead of 'e. 'Owever, volks must do the -best vith w'at they has, so hup vith your mauleys, lad. Time!” - -More than once I had seen our rough keel-boatmen of the Cumberland -indulge, when soaked of rum, in what they termed a “rough and tumble,” - but this, when Rivera and the fighting man of Whitechapel stood up to -one another, was the first time I was to observe how ones trained -to fisticuffs expound the game. My keel-boatmen fought in a biting, -clawing, gouging, wildcat way that was a climax of brutality and blood. -This would not be the story of Rivera and his foe, for their labors were -as cleanly accurate as a cameo, while yet the blows they dealt would -have shaken an oak to its core. - -As the fighting man of Whitechapel exclaimed “Time!” Rivera and he drew -cautiously over to one another. I could see how each kept his left hand -well forward and his left foot advanced to bear it company, while the -right foot was planted with firm squareness, and no spring nor give to -the knee, but the leg stiff to prop against a blow. The right arm would -be used, too, more as a guard to save the body, but with hand in reserve -clenched like iron to deal a finishing blow whenever the vanguard or -left hand had opened the way with the enemy. - -Rivera and the fighting man sparred carefully and as folk who would test -each other. And yet, while there abode with each a wealth of care and -a saving determination to be sure of guards and parries, there was no -slowness. They paced about and before one another like two fighting -panthers, each as ready as leven-flash to have advantage of a weakness -in the other's defence. - -To me it was like a picture of motion, and a sense of delight coursed -in my veins. I was so held, too, I did not once cast my eyes on Peg, who -with her hand on my arm was crowded snug to my side and--as I remembered -later, when I would learn the reason of pain for it--leaning upon me -with all her slight weight. No, so rapt was my gaze for the moment that -I never once looked nor thought on Peg; and that, let me tell you, is a -deal to say, since such was our witch-child's sweet hold on me I could -number you few moments which did not find her in the fond foreground of -my fancy. - -Of the suddenest, the fighting man fell upon Rivera like a storm. But it -would be of no avail. The blows he dealt, Rivera caught upon his -forearm; and that with so careless a confidence it would appear to sting -the other. In the last of the melee the fighting man, stepping swiftly -near, struck a slashing, swinging blow that should have cracked a skull -had one gotten in the way. Rivera leaped back, light as a goat and as -sure. As the big fist swept harmlessly on its journey, Rivera laughed as -at a jest. - -Our fighting man, however, would own to no turn for humor. The laugh -hurt him like the lash of a rawhide. Without pause or space, and with a -sharpness that stood a marvel in one so bulky, he repeated the smashing -swing, but with the other hand. Rivera did not spring backward; indeed, -he had no time, even had he carried the inclination. But it would be -all one with Noah's protege, for he ducked his head like a wild fowl -who dives from the flash of a gun. Again the blow passed without scathe; -only, this time, over Rivera's cunning head. The force of the swing half -turned the fighting man; with that, and not striking him, but, as though -in a spirit of derision, pushing with open hand, and at the same moment -locking, as wrestlers would say, the enemy's ankle at the back with -his foot, Rivera tumbled our huge gentleman over on the grass. He fell -a-sprawl, but with no hurt to himself, and all as easy as delivering a -bale of goods at one's door. - -The fighting man got slowly to his feet. Then he looked on Rivera with -an eye of puzzled discontent. - -“Be you playin' vith me, lad?” said he at last. This in a manner of -injury. - -Rivera made no retort other than his quiet laugh that told rather of -pleasure than amusement. Clearly, Rivera was in enjoyment's very heart -and his cup would come to him crowned of high delight. - -The fighting man went now and leaned against a tree to breathe himself. -Presently he spoke again; I could tell by the way of it how his regard -for Rivera had been augmented. - -“'Ow 'eavy be you, lad?” he asked, his breath still coming in short, -deep puffs. - -“One hundred and eighty-two,” said Rivera. - -“An' w'at would that be in stone?” - -“Thirteen.” - -“D'ye see now!” exclaimed the fighting man, dejectedly, “an' that should -be my veight. Only I'm a stone above; but it's fat an' does me 'arm. You -bees a 'ard un, young master, an' I doant know as 'ow I can do vor you, -an' me not trained. 'Owever, I shall try all I knows. Time!” - -For the second occasion the two stood forth against one another in the -middle of the moonlighted glade; and again the fighting man was the -aggressor. It would be still the same old tale; Rivera foiled him and -beat him back upon himself at every angle of his effort. It was like, -a tune to simply see Rivera for his eye and hand and foot worked all -together in a fashion of harmony like the notes in music. - -But the dour end was on its way, and it fell upon the victim like -the bursting of a bomb. The fighting man had stepped a pace backward -following a rally in which he won nothing save chagrin. As he retreated, -Rivera would seem to swoop on him. It was a feint--an artifice; it had -for result, however, the drawing of the fighting man again upon Rivera. -Straight from his shoulder, and by way of retort or counter to the -feint, the fighting man sent his left hand for Rivera's face. It would -be the situation wrought for. Rivera, with feet firm set, moved his -head aside so that the blow met nothing, but whistled across his left -shoulder. Then his left hand, arm as stiff as a bar of iron, met the -oncoming foe, carried forward with the momentum of his own wasted blow, -flush in the mouth. I heard the sound of it, and saw it jolt the other's -head back as though he had run against the pole of a baggage wagon. The -vicious emphasis of it shook his senses in their source; before he could -rally, Rivera dealt him a smashing blow above the heart with his right -hand; it was a buffet like the kick of a pony and one that would have -splintered a rock! - -The fighting man fell forward senseless on the grass; the moonlight -played across his face and tiny streams of blood were running thinly -from his nose and ears. He lay without motion or quiver, and, after -considering him a bit with all the warmth an artist might bestow upon -a masterpiece, Rivera turned loungingly to Peg and myself where we -were viewing proceedings from our knoll. There was a dancing light in -Rivera's eyes such as comes to a child pleased of a new toy. As he stood -before us, a smile about his mouth, he stretched upward on his toes, and -raised his hands above his head, his vast chest arching and swelling -the while like a drum, and the muscles of his neck writhing until they -fairly burst the collar of his gray shirt and sent a button buzzing into -the darkness. - -“He wasn't fit,” said Rivera, recovering himself from the -muscle-stretching, and beaming amiably; “the fellow was not in -condition.” Here he indicated with a nod the prostrate fighting man, -still stunned and bleeding where he fell. - -“Have you killed him?” said Peg, with a deep breath. The girl was drawn -as tense as harpstrings. “I hope he will not die.” - -“Oh, no,” declared Rivera; “he will not die. In two minutes, or at the -most in ten, he will be well again. If he do not come to his wits in ten -minutes, I shall help him with water on his face.” - -“We have to thank you,” said I; “you are a brave fellow to match -yourself against a horde.” - -“I was told always to follow them,” said Rivera. “I have been at their -heels for weeks. But they would do nothing until to-night.” Rivera's -manner when he related the long-drawn indolence of his quarry and -those weeks wherein they would “do nothing,” tasted of disappointment. -“However,”--this as though a wrong had been repaired,--“they got to work -at last, so after all it ends right.” - -Now I walked across to my moaning one of the broken arm, who still sat -nursing his injuries. - -“Why would you rob us?” I asked. - -“Rob you?” he repeated between moans, and with a startled air. “No one -wanted to rob you.” - -“You and your gang,” said I--for this was the story I meant to tell, -if made to tell one of the night's turmoil--“you and your gang are -footpads. You would have robbed us. Should you be in the town to-morrow, -I will find you a place of bars and bolts.” - -Certainly, these brawling creatures were not highwaymen, but only -ruffians whom that Catron had hired for I know not what particular -purpose of revenge. But the wretch's exclamation, “Here is our big lover -and his light o' love!” alarmed me for Peg. I would not have that tale -told to thus bring forth her name. It were better to drive these fellows -off and have an end of it. That was my thought in calling them footpads -and talking of attempts to take a purse. - -The argument of robbery put a measure of life into the moaning one; he -got upon his feet and made ready to betake himself to scenes of better -safety. - -“My arm is broken,” said he, whiningly, and as hoping I might feel a -sympathy. - -“It should have been your neck, instead,” said I, in no wise -sympathetic. “And so it would, had I owned the forethought to have had -you by the throat rather than your arm. You might better depart, sirrah; -else I may yet wring round your head, for my spirit is hard laid siege -to by some such twisting impulse.” - -That was enough; our moaning one made shift to get himself away through -the trees and with not a trifle of expedition. - -“And now, what will you do?” I asked Rivera. - -“Oh, I shall remain here,” replied Rivera, simply, “and wait for him to -return to his wits,” Here he pointed to his enemy. “He is a very bold, -strong man, and perhaps when he has recovered and rested he may want to -fight again.” This last sentence was vibrant of a dim hope. - -Turning from me, Rivera brought a little snow-water in his hat from a -hollow where it had collected during the thaws and began to sprinkle -the face of his fighting friend from Whitechapel. Leaving him upon these -labors of grace and philanthropy--albeit I believe the thought uppermost -in his innocent heart was that the smitten one, when duly revived, might -declare for another battle--I again sought Peg. I went to her something -stricken of my conscience and uneasy with the fear of having neglected -my duties as her cavalier. I found her sitting upon the little knoll, -her foot drawn under her, and she nursing her right ankle in a marked -peculiar way. - -“Was not Rivera grand!” exclaimed Peg, as I came up. “And you, too, -watch-dog: I shall never forget the picture of you”--Peg spoke in a -bubbling way and as though she overflowed of ecstasy--“as you flung that -crying creature in the faces of the others. It was a moment of nobility; -I shall never miss it from my memory.” - -“And what has gone wrong with your foot?” said I, for from her crouching -position and the manner in which she would caress her ankle I was struck -with the fear of some disaster; nor was I wrong. - -“It is my ankle,” said Peg, and I could notice how her brow was wrung -with the pain of it. “As I climbed upon this knoll in the first of it, -my foot turned under me. I did not observe until just now how sharp was -the injury.” - -That was the story; Peg's ankle, for all her strong high boots, had won -to a grievous wrench. - -“Now that I've nothing else to think on,” said Peg, biting her lips to -smother a cry, “it gives me torture like a knife.” - -“Your ankle,” said I, “is becoming swollen; and that in those -tight-laced boots, let me say, should mean a torment of the -inquisition.” - -My years in the field had made me deft of strains and bruises and, -when need pressed, even broken bones and wounds more threatening. I -straightway knelt down before Peg and began with care to make loose her -footgear. What a little boot it was! “One and one-half” was the size, so -Peg told me. I slipped the boot off with mighty tenderness and put it in -the pocket of my coat. - -“And I'm very proud of my small foot, watch-dog,” said Peg, a smile -struggling with the lines of pain which pinched the corners of her -mouth. “Yes, I am proud of my small foot. Why not? It came to me from -that same wareroom of nature where you got your great heart and that arm -of might, and where the good General found his honesty and his -courage. I've as much right to be proud of my foot as you folk of those -attributes of excellence I've named.” - -Peg was striving to laugh down her pain with these compliments for her -foot; I could tell, moreover, that she was a far cry from success, for -her pretty argument ended in a halfsob as a pang more than commonly -severe crushed her poor ankle in its vise. - -Gently I chafed Peg's foot; and while that would do little good, it -served to soothe and modify the instant agony. Meanwhile I told her -how I would carry her home in my arms so soon as the first grief of the -sprain was chafed away. - -“Carry me in your arms!” cried Peg. - -“What else?” said I. “You can't walk.” - -So, then, Peg made no more demur; and presently, when her foot was well -enough, I lifted her and started through the woods. It would be no more -than just carrying a child; and since Peg put her arm about my neck, and -helped to keep her place, my own arms even failed of the full burden -of her. It was an easy task at any rate, and if you will be told it, a -sweet task, too; this walk with Peg held close, and her hair, which had -been caught up with a comb, to fall down and sweep across my throat -and face. I could taste a fragrance in that hair like a breath from the -Isles of Spice--a perfume that fair set my bosom in a flame. - -It might have been the half of a mile that I carried Peg; however, I had -no knowledge of it, whether for the distance or the time, but only of a -bliss that was like a radiance, and a heart-willingness to go on and on -and on to the world's end. - -It was Peg herself who at last would bring me to my senses; for I -was pressing forward as void of speculation as a drunken man to march -through the crowded avenues of the town, Peg on my breast and my two -arms holding her tight like a treasure. - -“Put me down, watch-dog,” whispered Peg, for her mouth was at the very -door of my ear, “put me down. I can stand well enough. Have me down, and -let us wait here until we can call a carriage. It would be a perplexing -sight to quiet folk were you to go striding through the streets with -such a burden.” - -With a sigh to end so dear a toil, I had Peg down carefully; and there -she stood, and as she would say it, “like a chicken on one foot.” It -fell our luck that one of those carriages of public livery, whereof -there was plentiful store in the town, drove by about this time. I -called to it, and placing Peg therein, soon had her at her own door. - -“I am mighty sorry for the sprain,” said I, as I lifted Peg from the -carriage. - -“Are you?” quoth Peg, with an archness that would almost cloak the pain. -“Now is that gallant of you, watch-dog?” Then, making a mock of my words -and manner: “I am mighty glad for the sprain. Only, I could wish my -mother lived farther away. I never knew how close she was till now.” - -As the winter wore into spring, the talk to swell and grow was of -Nullification. Calhoun's state of South Carolina had laid aside -disguise, and while nothing worse than speeches, with now and then -a doughty resolution, were indulged in, these showed ever of that -rebellious sort that waited only to be turned into action to become -sufficient treason. The General sat brooding and watching the drift; his -plans of men and rifles and ships laid like a trap, and set to snap up -in the jaws of them the first traitor to be afoot for that secession the -Calhoun clique would claim was each state's holy right. Altogether, the -days were on a strain, and hair turned white and folk went pale of the -cheek with the worry of the question “How will this ferment end?” - -The one query of most concern related to the General. What would he do? -To what line would his resentment travel? Folk knew how he was against -Secession and States Rights and Nullification, or whatever the name -might be wherewith iniquitous rebellion pleased itself for the moment, -but would he treat these sins of politics as stark treason? Would he -fall back on courts and hangman's ropes in dealing with them? - -No one might tell. The General, after he made himself plain with that -Rhetz who came to spy out his resolves, would say no farther word. Ones -in interest might go wrong or go right; as for the General himself, he -would light no more lamps. - -“Have I not told them what I will do?” cried the General. “Must I be -out of my bed o' nights to tell them again? No; let these would-be -treason-mongers proceed as they see their way. Besides, to hang the -right man now may save the lives of later thousands.” - -This was said for my ear alone; to no other would the General so much as -give one look of yea or nay. - -While the General would be the sphinx over Nullification, prudent -rebellionists argued for a waiting strategy. There would dawn the -anniversary of Jefferson's birthday; there would come that dinner at the -Indian Queen; the General's conduct if not his words on that occasion -must surely tell his story of decision. Should he remain away, they -would know he feared to face them. Should he be present, they would try -him with toasts of treason and mark his manner under fire. They would -ask him for a sentiment; what he said or did in retort might give them -every needed glimpse. Decidedly, it was wise to wait; Secession would -keep; in the name of one's neck and a rope, proceedings might better be -stayed until those toast experiments on the General were given a chance. - -The General was well enough pleased with this uncertainty whereof he now -found himself the hub. He guarded his words, left every man to grope out -his own path for himself, and the days coursed on with the unanswered -question of the General's determination in their mouths. Thus dwelt the -business on that day of April from the developments whereof so much was -to be hoped. - -For the prior space of eight weeks or more the General had said little -to me of that banquet planned of nullifiers to uncover him on those -topics of perilous statecraft. Seeing his taste to be mysterious, I -would say nothing to the General, whether to ask a question or give a -hint of conduct, but left him to himself. I knew what he would do; and -for the detail of how he would go upon its execution, I was the more -willing to miss a forecast of it since I have a weakness for the unknown -and am as prone as any other to save up surprise for myself. Wherefore, -I would have the General make his own maps and design his own -ambuscades, and leave me in blindness of them. On that April morning I -owned no sure knowledge that the General would even attend the banquet, -to say naught of what he might do or say if ever he once were there. - -It was the middle of the afternoon when the General looked into my -workshop, pipe in mouth, and said with a twinkle in his eye, a twinkle -that was both mirthful and hard: “Major, I take it you and I will go to -that dinner to-night?” - -The General would put this as though it were a question; not because it -stood unsettled and unsaid as a thing resolved, but it was the way of -him when he would pay you a compliment to pretend a consultation, and -coax you into a council, hoping you would advise those things he was -already resolved upon like iron and which were often half performed. - -For all I was aware of this talent on the General's part to be polite, -and was certain, when he glanced in through my door, that both of us -would be of the band about those Indian Queen tables, I was quick to -humor his whim for the mysterious and undecided. I looked up as one who -turns a new proposal on the wheel of his thoughts. - -“It is my idea,” said I at last, with the air of a man who likes the -notion's flavor, “that your presence would work for good. I should say -we might better go. We may count the enemy, and that at least should be -something.” - -“You are right,” returned the General. “We will go; and I think, too, it -might be good policy to let the foe count us.” - -The Indian Queen was a crowded hostelry that night. The halls and -waiting rooms of the tavern were thronged of eminent ones. Some were -present to attend the Jefferson dinner; others casually for gossip and -to hear the news. - -As the General and I would be going up the stair, my eye was caught by -the heavy shoulders and lion face of Webster coming down. - -“There's too much Secession in the wind for me,” remarked Webster, as -the General asked if he were going away. - -“You did not leave the Senate for that,” responded the General. “If -Secession be here, it's a reason for remaining.” - -Webster shrugged his big shoulders and went on. - -As I gazed at the group--waiting, they were, for the opening of the -banquet hall--I met many a great face. Among those about the stair-head -and in the rooms beyond were Colonel Johnson of Kentucky, tall of form, -grave of eye, he who slew Tecumseh; Benton, big, pompous, wise but -with a bottomless conceit; the lean Rufus Choate, eloquent and sound; -Corwin, round, humorous, with a face of ruddy fun; White, the dignified, -in the Senate from my own state of Tennessee; Hill, gray and lame, the -General's friend in New Hampshire; Noah, my Hebrew with red hair; Van -Buren, Peg's “good little secretary” of state; Vaughn, the British -minister; the quickeyed Amos Kendall, with Blair by his side; the -recreant Duff Green, now wholly for Calhoun; Calhoun himself, pale, -scholarly and fine; Huygens, that ministerial tubby personage, -gin-bleary and dull; Krudener, the Russian; Eaton, easy, florid, -urbane; Branch and Berrien and Barry and Ingham and the reckless Marcy. - -The dinner was spread. The decorations were studied in their democracy. -Hundreds of candles from many-armed iron branches blazed about the plain -walls of the room and made the light of day. For the rest, the hall was -hung with flags. The stars and stripes, to be a centerpiece, was draped -about a portrait of Jefferson just to the rear of the place where Lee of -Virginia, who was to preside, would sit. Extending around the four sides -of the room were festooned the flags of the several states. - -With peculiar ostentation, and next to the national colors, flowed the -banner of South Carolina, with its palmetto and rattlesnake--Calhoun's -emblem. - -“Do you see it?” said the General in a low tone, as we approached our -places, “do you see Calhoun's flag? That serpent may rattle but it must -not strike.” - -“And if it strike?” - -“If it strike, it dies.” - -Profusion and elegance were displayed in the arrangements, with none of -that long-drawn foolishness of courses so dear to Whigs and Federals and -other imitators of an English nobility. Black servants came and went -to shift one's plate and knife, or to aid in carving at the call of a -guest. At hopeful intervals along the tables reposed huge sirloins and -smoking rounds of beef; there were quail pies and chickens fried and -turkeys roasted; there stood pies of venison and rabbit and pot-pies of -squirrels; soups and fishes and vegetables; boiled hams and giant dishes -of earthenware holding baked pork and beans; roast suckling pigs and -each with a crab-apple in its mouth. There were corn breads and -flour breads and pancakes rolled with jellies; sideboards upheld -puddings--Indian, rice and plum--quaking custards, and scores of kindred -dainties. Everywhere bristled ranks and double ranks of bottles and -decanters, and a widest range of drinks, from whisky to wine of the -cape, were at one's call. There, too, stood wooden bowls of salads on -side tables, supported of weighty cheeses; and to close in the flanks -were pies, mince and pumpkin and apple, with final coffee, and slim long -pipes with tobacco of Trinidad for folk who would smoke. - -Before we were seated, and while we stood to our places, the sentiment -was proposed: - -“The memory of Thomas Jefferson.” The toast was drunk in silence; all -could agree on Jefferson; and then with clatter of knife and fork, the -thirsty clink of glasses, and the murmurous hum of conversation over -all, the work of the night commenced. - -As the moments roved on, Nullification and Secession became so much the -open objects of many present, and were withal so loosely in the common -air, that sundry gentlemen--more timorous than loyal, perhaps--made -excuses and withdrew. - -The General's presence was a plain surprise to more than one; they could -not construe it. For himself, he carried it off as though his being -there were the most expected of possible things. The General sat on the -right hand of the presiding Lee. I was, myself, to the General's right -hand. Opposite was Calhoun with that Calhoun triangle of the cabinet, -Berrien, Branch and Ingham. The quartet got on most beamingly. The -General, as we came up, rendered them a sweeping bow which they might -share among them. - -“Calhoun,” whispered the General, indicating the Vice-President with a -nod, “is, you see, openly claiming his half of my cabinet. I'll startle -him some day by making him a present of the three.” - -An hour passed on; the banquet reached that glass-and-bottle stage which -Noah anticipated. There were a round score of regular toasts; each would -smell of secession, while the speeches were even more malodorous of that -villainy. - -I, with a hundred others, was narrowly watching the General, and, -well as I knew him, I wondered at the calmness wherewith he maintained -himself. This man who had a genius for anger, who went head-free into -each debate, who offered you his last thoughts in an unrestricted stream -of talk, would now be as impassive as marble. The General, throughout -these wordy treasons of speech and toast, showed cold and stern and -master of a dignity that became both himself and the exalted character -of his station. - -The hour was hurrying towards the late. Calhoun glanced across at the -General; there was a questioning uneasiness in his look. Evidently the -urgent moment was at hand. - -Calhoun offered a slip of paper to Lee, presiding, and whispered a word. - -“The Vice-President proposes a toast,” cried Lee. - -There fell a stillness, laughter died and talk was hushed. The Chairman -read: - -“'_The Federal Union. Next to our liberty, the most dear. May we all -remember that it can only be preserved by respecting the rights of the -States, and distributing equally the benefits and the burden of the -Union_.'” - -That stillness of death continued, marked and profound. Folk strained -and craned at both the General and Calhoun as do ones who would observe -the effect of a shot. There were eyes replete of interrogation, and if -one must have it truly told, defiance, to be peculiarly turned upon the -General. - -For his part, the General never wore a loftier look. He scribbled a -quick line and gave it to the Chairman. - -“The President offers a toast.” Then solemnly, as one who feels its -import: - -'”_The Federal Union: It must be Preserved_.'” - -The General's glance was on Calhoun, as pointed as a sword. His eye was -fierce with a sort of gray fury like the eye of some fighting eagle. -Calhoun for a moment gave him look for look; then his glance fell, his -face whitened, he would seem to shrink and sear and wither before the -man of fire. It was as though he saw the future's danger, or felt some -gallows prophecy thereof. In the end he sat like one under a blackness -of shadow. - -The General it was who broke the spell. Pushing back, he arose, and -bowing to the Chairman who still sat with that toast of menace in his -hand he began moving towards the door. His head was lifted, and he -bore himself as should one who flings a gauntlet to the world. Openly, -obviously, defiantly, he set his heel on Secession's head in the midst -of Secession's champions. - -Pausing, the General swept those present, letting his look of challenge -rest on each one in his turn. It was as though he questioned them: -“Where, now, is your courage?” - -There was none to retort to him. Folk scented peril on him as cattle -smell in the wind the unborn storm. - -“The Federal Union. It must be preserved.” The General, as though to -call a last attention, repeated his toast. Then, with burning eye laid -full upon Calhoun, and thinking, doubtless, on Overton and Crockett and -Houston and Dale and Coffee and those riflemen in hunting shirts and -leggings, and on the ships and Scott and Castle Pinckney, he added: “And -it shall be preserved.” - -It was the moment pregnant and mighty; the moment when one man foiled -a plot to stampede history itself, and calmed and turned and drove the -herd of events in a right national direction for the Union and to fields -of quiet peace. Treason's heart and Treason's hand were palsied with -a toast of seven words, when now the words came wedded with the grim, -relentless courage that would die or make them true. - -The galleries about the big room were filled with women looking on, Peg -among the others. When the General and I were again at the White House, -late as stood the hour, we found Peg waiting. I never saw a being more -given over to fire than was our Peg. - -“Was he not noble?” cried Peg, when she would have me alone for a -moment. “Was he not grand? I would give my life if for one hour I might -be a man, and be a man like that.” - -And yet for all the plain sureness of that toast, and the General's -looks of decision which were sent to be its escort, the rebellionists -would ask a further sign. They sent the insinuating Rhetz to call upon -the General. That was the next morning. - -The politic Rhetz presented himself, and the General met him with a -manner of studied distance. He would have the visitor to know how he -held him for no friend. This was meant to give the General's words more -weight-, since the other would understand that he stood upon guard and -spoke nothing he did not intend to carry out. - -“Mr. President,” said Rhetz, suavely deferential, “I go back to my home -to-morrow. Have you any message for your South Carolina friends?” - -“Yes,” returned the General, with his cold eye on the questioner, “yes, -I have a message for my friends of South Carolina.” The words were -coming with a slow emphasis like a sentence of death. “Their state is a -part of the Union, and a part of the Union it shall remain. You may -tell them, if one South Carolina finger be raised in defiance of this -government, that I shall come down there; and once I'm there, I'll hang -the first man I lay hands on to the first tree I can reach.” - - - - -CHAPTER XV--HOW PEG WAS SAVED FROM PEG. - -Now when the General's toast at that banquet in the Indian Queen had -gone abroad, it would have the effect of a warning, each man taking -it home. A mighty silence fell upon States Rights; the foxes of -Nullification found their dens, and were to be noticed for a sudden -absence from one's eye and ear where but the day before with their -presence and their yelpings they would fill both. - -It will have a strange look, but it was the General, himself, who of all -folk fostered a distrust of his course. - -It was to Noah and me he one day told this. Noah mentioned the vast -silence of a voiceless conservatism which had fallen upon that movement -of Secession, late so reboant and rampant. - -“And yet,” said the General, “the story of the country will at last show -me wrong.” - -“Will you say how?” asked Noah. “Surely, you do not doubt the common -need of a union between the States, and one strong enough to defy the -caprice or the ambition of a clique?” - -“My sentiment for the Union,” said the General, “has suffered no -modification, and it is because I stand for union and would die for -union, that I am not sure of the wisdom of that toast of mine. It would -have been better to stand aloof, and let Secession go the length of -treason. Had I held to such a course, perhaps as many as one hundred -might have answered for the crime with their lives. But the question -would have been settled; the dispute would have been made _res -adjudicata_ and the future forever freed of that struggle. Now the -serpent is only bruised, not killed; in years to follow yours and mine -it will revive in rebellion and may yet crush the country in its folds.” - -“I can not think you are right,” said I, for I was having part in the -conversation with the others; “I am no judge, or you have closed the -door against this Nullification.” - -“Ay!” responded the General, “closed but not locked the door. It should -have been barred with a gibbet. Folk are not taught by threats but by -example. Had I stayed myself until the leaders for Secession went so far -they were hanged for it, that would have meant the end. Now the business -is deferred; the country will yet be forced to fight a civil war and -wade knee-deep in blood to save itself.” - -“Is it,” asked Noah, curiously, “is it now you first hold these views?” - -“They are not new,” returned the General; “I owned them from the -beginning. But I lacked the hardihood to act on them. I grow old; I have -been in my hour the instrument by which so much blood has been shed that -in my grey age I shrink from more. That toast was devised to save myself -from spilling further blood; I was thinking on myself when I framed it -and not of those black ones who would do treason. Its great purpose was -to save me from becoming their executioner.” - -“Now your feeling is mine too,” observed Noah, shaking a thoughtful -head. “The seed of the whole trouble is slavery; while that exists, the -certain chance of civil war stands open.” - -“And how would one be rid of it?” demanded the General, passionately. -“Washington was against slavery, Jefferson was against it, Franklin was -against it, every great one whose trowel employed itself in laying the -foundations of our government was against it, and yet there to-day it -lives. They could not cope with slavery; how, then, shall we?” - -“It existed in the North,” said Noah, “and it was wiped out.” - -“The slaves were few in the North,” responded the General; “as chattels -they made but a slim fraction of that region's riches. Moreover, slavery -did not pay a Northern profit. It is easy, when there is money loss, -to abandon the cause of that loss. But conditions within the present -boundaries of slavery show otherwise. The slave's cost of keep is less, -his months of labor more in number, and he is not winter-killed with -maladies of the lungs. Moreover, your slave makes a fairer unit of -labor in rice savannahs and cotton fields, where a plantation carries -thousands of acres, than he did where land was more divided and a farm -of a hundred and sixty acres the common holding of a man. In short, the -slave spins that money profit for the South which was lacking in the -North. That fact of profit--the greed of men--will meet folk who would -free the slave and make you a mighty difference.” - -“And still,” said Noah, “slavery should be stricken down.” - -“To that I agree,” remarked the General, “but again I ask you, How? -Certain of our New England radicals, when they shout for Abolition, cry -'Down with slavery!' as lightly as one should say: 'Marry! swallow a -strawberry.' When a man is in the upper story of a burning house he does -not hurl himself from a window, he descends by the stair. Let us, when -now we be ablaze over slavery--for it is that, as you say, to lie at the -bottom of this whole movement of States Rights--let us grope cautiously -until we find the safe stairway of escape.” - -“It is not so clear to my mind,” said I, for the spirit to lecture, -excited by example, began to move within me, “that slavery is so bad for -the blacks. One must have account for a difference of race. You would -not insist that a deer tear a prey with his teeth and howl on some -hill of midnight like a wolf. It has been the never-flagging mistake of -government to deal with the Indian as though he were white, and enforce -pale-face conditions upon him. It would be as rife of error to proceed -with the negro as though he were white or could work out a white man's -destiny. Make the black man free, and I tell you he will be as helpless -as a ship ashore on the instant.” - -“To better the black,” said the General, “is not my argument; I am -against slavery to better the white man. When I seek to destroy slavery, -it is the master I would free, and not the slave.” - -Just what the General would intend by this last I had no opportunity -to discover, for the zealous Jim was heard at the door, ushering in our -Peg. - -“Never mind, Miss Peg,” I could hear Jim say, in a way of patronizing -reassurance, and evidently in combat of some suggestion of Peg's that -she would defer her appearance among us, “never mind about d'Marse Major -an' d'Marse Gen'ral an' that red-head Jew gentleman argufyin'. That -don't count for nothin'; they're allers at it, night an' day, argufyin' -away like they aint got a minute to live, and nothin' to never come of -it. Never mind 'em, Miss Peg; you-all jes' trapse right along in an' -declar' your urrent.” - -With Peg's coming, Noah made polite expedition to retire; nothing one -might do or say would serve to keep him. He who could look a man in the -eye and stand knee to knee with him for life or death, feared a woman as -though she were a ghost and fled from the mere sight of her. - -“I am somewhat abashed,” said Peg, “to think of the disturbance I have -caused, and that I drive away your visitor.” This to the General. “Why -did you not make him stay? I shall never forget my debt to him; and I'm -glad, too, he is so much your favorite.” - -“Noah puts us all in his debt,” said the General. “To me he is the man -remarkable; fine, high, yet bold and quick, there will be no one to take -his place when he is gone.” - -Peg's purpose was to tell the General--for he had asked the question in -a little note that morning--how she should like the dinner and that East -Room dance he offered, on the next evening but one. - -“Is not the time too short?” asked the General. “Forty-eight hours would -seem no mighty space for folk to make themselves prepared. They may own -other engagements.” - -“There will be no engagements,” said Peg. “The season is quite at an -end; the Redsticks, as you christened them, closed their defeated doors -six weeks ago, and for our own side, we only continued our receptions -two weeks longer to show how we remained masters of the field. There -will stand nothing in the way; and as for space to be ready in, why, -then, folk don't need hours, but only minutes, when the invitation is -from the White House.” - -“Let us say the day following to-morrow, then,” said the General. “It -shall be for your victory, child, and to celebrate it. Also, since -the losers as well as the victors have proper place in a triumph, and, -again, because it will look like the olive branch and an expression of -peace, we will bid both friend and foe to this merrymaking, and mark it -with as wide a good feeling as our opponents will accept.” - -Peg's dinner, as dinners go, was a creature of magnificence, with Peg, -beautiful as a moss-rose, at the General's right, and Dolly Madison's -own silver--massy, and, as the women said, “gorgeous,”--to glisten on -the white napery. The General's wide-flung invitations were as widely -accepted; and not alone the Van Burens and the Krudeners and the -Vaughns, but the Calhouns and the Berriens and the Branches, and all of -the sept of Nullification, were there, as though to put down any surmise -of sulky fear for themselves to be the offshoot of that conflict of the -toasts. Even the frivolous Pigeon-breast was with us undismayed; albeit -he practiced a forbearance touching Peg, and never once after the first -formalities so far forgot his caution as to be near enough to that -sparkling lady to court the awful hazard of her glance. - -There came but one clash beneath my notice, and that would feed my -humor. Houston was just come into town, as rude and tangled a gentleman -in every politer technicality as the bears of his native woods. With -him for his table-mate he bore away the wife of Ingham of the Treasury. -Houston guarded his prize to her place with a ferocious backwoods -vigilance as though it were indeed the enemy's country and they in peril -of some Indian ambuscade with each new room they entered. The lady, with -a tact as crude as Houston's knowledge of the drawing-room, perceiving -the savageries of her protector, would be prompt to establish herself -as directress' of his manners. Poor Houston suffered more than once the -humiliation of the lady's counsel, given in a high, obvious voice, and -with the manner of one who corrects a novice dull to the confines of -despair. - -The rupture befell over fish and when a portion of delicate pompano was -placed before the headlong Houston. - -“That is not the fish fork,” cautioned the lady in a whisper so loud it -bred a smile on thirty faces either side of her; “that is not the fish -fork; here, take this.” - -“By Satan's hoofs, madam!” exclaimed the wrathful Houston, whose -long-stifled resentment would now be in the saddle, at the same time -brandishing the huge trident he had somehow gotten hold on; “by Satan's -hoofs! keep your fish forks for whom you will. For myself, I'll eat this -catfish with my saber if I have the mind.” - -Later I heard the distempered lady confide to a neighbor how Houston was -“an untaught brute,” while that hurt hero told me on his word as a man -that for those several hours he was in her company, he had less of ease -than at the Horseshoe where he was given four wounds. - -The East Room, when agile ones would dance was brilliant in white and -gold and crystal chandeliers, with floor of water-soaked oak so polished -it reflected the gay dresses like a looking-glass, and so slippery that -clumsy ones, like myself, went gingerly about it in terror for their -bones. - -Peg was as glorious as a star, and to me never more lovely, albeit my -coral on her bosom may have had somewhat to do with that. And to see her -so bowed to and flattered was like a perfume; for it looked as though -the foe would forego those old-time tactics of distance and averted -gaze, and that a new word was abroad in Peg's behalf. There came no one -to more emphasize his courtesy or show more attentive in what might do -Peg honor than the Vice-President himself, and with him were the members -of that cabinet triumvirate who had cast in their narrow lots with him. -Even the stately Mrs. Calhoun would be gracious in a far-off sort, while -the ladies Berrien and Branch relaxed from a former frigidity, and if -not torrid, were at all events of the temperate zone when the etiquette -of the floor would bring Peg and them in contact. As for the vigorous -Madam Ingham, she was so overcome of her labors in elevation of Houston -that following dinner she could do nothing but repose herself. However, -for so much as she remained in the picture, she beamed affably in a fat, -vermilion way, and her red face was like the setting sun. - -The male Ingham, being in prodigious fettle, would fain waddle onto -the treacherous floor with Peg in his hand for a dance; for Ingham was -sensibly exalted of his valor since Eaton, whom he held in fear, was -not present, but off in Baltimore on some long-drawn duty about new -rifles--meant, I fear me, for Nullifiers, should their pot of treason -over-boil. I will say this of Ingham, however: for all his rotund -uncouthness, he went through that dance without falling down; a no small -feat I should call it, and one to give me relief, since for the while -it lasted I was held on tenter-hooks over Peg's safety, and would hover -about ready to rush in and save her should affairs go badly between -Ingham and the glass-like floor. - -There occurred one incident of harshness I could have wished left out. -It was when that Frau Huygens drew up to Peg and would greet her as -though there were no such name as Krudener and no such story as the -slight she cast on Peg in the Russian's dining room. The gross Frau -Huygens was arrayed in her one garish frock of many colors, and which -her prudence to save money and buy no more frocks had made so well -known. - -Frau Huygens, trained to the venture, doubtless, by her husband, who -still dwelt in fear of Van Buren and those passports which should -return him to the Hague, swept before Peg with the grace of a cabbage on -parade. When Peg, in response to her greeting, was silent and would only -look on her in a baffled manner, as though her memory were at bay, Frau -Huygens exclaimed, with a Dutch thickness of reproach which no one might -imitate with a pen: - -“Madam, don't you remember me?” - -“Well, then,” said Peg, as one who makes every polite effort and yet -fails, “I remember your dress very well, but your face is strange to -me.” - -With that I swooped on Peg and whisked her away, for I had a horror of -what might follow. - -“And there,” cried Peg, with an unctuous gurgle, “was it not a best of -fortunes, watchdog, that she should give me that opportunity? Now we are -quits; and I think, too, I have her in my debt.” - -There was nothing to be said to this, and - -I made myself content with thoughts of how we were no worse off. - -Late one afternoon when the hour was drawing towards the close of the -day, I had planted myself at a window and was looking across to the -President's Square, and, since her gables were of necessity in the -corner of my eye, carrying Peg vaguely on my meditations. It had been a -still, windless day of the early spring, but, for all it stood so late -of the season, with a heaviness in the air that smelled of snow. - -Now I am not one readily to be borne upon by imps in blue, and would -commonly give you the reason of my gloomy mood, if gloom I were a spoil -to. But this was the day odd for me, since I was pressed hard with a -sense of disaster and the feeling as of some threat in the air like a -knife, that I liked not at all and understood still less. What was it to -so hang upon me like a millstone or a sibyl-spoken prophecy of death? I -would try to laugh it down; but the smile I wrung from my unwilling lips -owned so much of bitterness that in mere defence I surrendered myself to -a pensive resignation instead, as being of two evils the lesser one, and -so paused for what blow might descend upon me. Some disaster pended, of -that my spirit went convinced; and I folded my hands and waited for the -future to announce its name. - -While I was thus by the window it began to snow. It was of your -left-over storms which have been held captive in caverns of the clouds, -to at last escape and overtake the world a month or more behind the -proper time. There was no stir to the air, and the day went still and -moderate; and yet I never looked on such a fall of snow, with flakes big -and soft as a baby's hands. Even as I gazed, the ground under my eyes -turned from a new spring green to white, while the trees across were -snow from roots to very finger-tips, and showed in milky fretwork -against the low dullness of the sky. - -As I stood watching these white changes in the face of things--for -the spectacle would charm me like mesmerism and made me forget my -forebodes--the General laid a gentle hand upon my shoulder. This, too, -had its side to startle, for the General, while as tender as a woman, -was in nowise demonstrative, and not one to be patting your shoulder or -slapping your back. - -In dim fashion those thin fingers would add themselves to that threat of -sadness, and stir a new alarm inside my bosom. - -“What is it?” I asked, as though he solicited my notice to something -urgent or unusual; “what should it be now?”--my voice not firm but -tremulous. - -The General looked on me with an affectionate, consolatory eye, and yet, -somehow, his glance would fit in ominously with my feeling. I could tell -how I stood at the point of bad tidings. - -And at that he began far enough away, for his first words were of the -long ago. - -“I was thinking,” said he, “of that time my horse was shot and pinned me -by the leg in the fight on the Tombigbee. Do you recall how you sprang -from your saddle and flung the dying horse aside as though you but -hefted a rabbit?” - -“When it comes to that,” I returned, “I supposed that you as well as -your horse were shot down, and the fear gave me a flash of strength.” - -The General was silent, his hand still on my shoulder. Then he began -again, musingly. - -“We must ever be together, Major,” said he; “we must stay together to -the last. I shall die first; I am eighteen years nearer the grave than -you and shall go on ahead. It is you--I look to you for this--it is -you who must be by my side to close my eyes. We must never part; we are -lonely men and lonesome men, and shall make no new friends. We must be -for that the closer to each other.” - -Now, even through my clouds, these words would strike me as lacking -object or coherency. What should be the matter? Was there some wrong -with him or with me? He had not spoken in this vein even when he lay in -the vale of death. - -“Why,” said I, “there is no present need to talk on death, thank God! -Why should you talk on death?” - -“It was not death but you, I had on my mind,” he replied. “I would never -be parted from you.” - -“Nor shall you,” I declared; “although I should count the absence of -myself no loss to you or any one.” - -This was not it; what would he be about? - -“Well, let us put aside dole,” cried he, cheering himself with an -effort; “now folk would call us two fortunate, I warrant you, to be -looking from a White House window upon a world all ours. Come, we will -have a brisker view; I have great news for you, and news to make you -stare. Nor will I beat about the bush, but go to the heart at once. I am -about to dissolve my cabinet.” - -“What!” I exclaimed, for here was a thing without a precedent. - -“My cabinet is to dissolve. I have arranged for it. Van Buren will -tender his resignation as of his own desire; Eaton and Barry will follow -suit. If Calhoun's three do not take the hint and act on so good an -example, then I will bring them to book with a demand. I will say that, -half of my cabinet being gone, I desire to sweep clean the site and rear -up in its place a new edifice of counsel.” - -My thoughts were in a tumult, and the blood in me seemed seized of riot. -It was a strange thing, that from the moment the General's hand fell -upon my shoulder it seemed to hold Peg before my eyes. And when he -talked it was as though he spoke her name with every word. - -“Yes,” he went on, “Van Buren's resignation will be in my hands -to-morrow; Eaton's so soon as he returns from Baltimore, say in a week; -then Barry's will come along in the wake of Eaton's. I shall send -Van Buren Minister to England. He shall be Vice-President for my second -term, as you and I have planned, and President after that.” - -“But Peg,” cried I, at last; “what will you do with Peg?” - -The General would try to smile at this, but the effort was as futile as -had been my own. But he did not fence at me with any jesting reminder of -how Peg was no part of his cabinet; he met my thought squarely and would -make allowance for my feeling. - -“It is most natural,” he returned, “that you should ask of Peg. We have -guarded our little girl too long--you and I--not to own her first in -our concern. Peg, then, shall go to Florida and be a queen. I shall give -Eaton that Governorship; we may yet need a firm hand in St. Augustine. -Is it not a good thought? Our Peg shall rule among those Spaniards; it -will almost be to have a throne and wear a crown. Does not that please -you, when now her station under kinder skies is to be so splendid and so -notably enhanced?” - -From him I turned and paced the room; then from sadness my anger began -to swell, for I am one whose grief runs with the end of it into wrath. - -“Tell me one thing,” cried I at last, pausing before the General. “Why -do you dissolve your cabinet?” - -“Will it not lop off three arms of Calhoun's power?” he asked. “Does it -not palsy Branch and Ingham and Berrien?” - -“But is that the true reason?” I demanded. - -“It is the one I shall let the world believe, it any rate.” - -“That should be no answer,” I retorted, my heart like a furnace with the -rage that was coming over me. “Why do you palter? I have the right to -know. You have made your dozen poor jests upon me, and said I was in -love with Peg. Perhaps you would mean those jests. I tell you I do not -believe your word when you say it is a move against Calhoun. That is -mere glamour and fallacy and meant for blindness. It is no tale to tell -me as though I were some common gull. Give me your reason, then--the -true one. Does Eaton know he is to go?” - -All this I reeled off, and gave the General no opening for an answer, -asking a dozen questions at once. But he sat quiet and with a friendly -patience, and his face spoke to me only of nearness and sympathy, and -never a shade of hurt for the rudeness I visited upon him. What a heart -of gold was his! He, who bore nothing from an enemy, would bear all at -the hands of a friend. - -When I was run out of queries he began to take me up, beginning at the -end. - -“Eaton knows,” said he; “he knew before he left for Baltimore. For him -the change will be a relief; his has been no bed of flowers, and in St. -Augustine his place and power, and last, not least, his peace, will gain -promotion.” - -“Doubtless,” said I, in a high pitch of scorn, “he can there flaunt his -riches in the faces of the Dons, and show Peg's beauty, and make a vast -display.” - -“You interrupt me,” remarked the General. “However let me ask a -question: Why do you remind me how I've jested and mayhap made some idle -laugh between us, and as innocent as idle, over your feeling for the -little girl? Why do you put that to me?” - -“Because,” said I, in a fury, “I think you break up your cabinet for -that. You will have it how Peg is in some peril of me; you would send -Peg to Florida on a pretense to make her safe from me. There you have -it. You see I can be the honester and the franker man. I pass you my -heart on a spear.” - -The General arose from the chair into which he had flung himself, and -taking me by the two shoulders, would look on me squarely, while I in my -turn must gaze into his gray depths. I could see the tears stand in his -fine eyes. - -“Let me tell you one thing,” said he. “I but repeat what you know as -well as I, when I say that should you harbor thought of Peg, or look -on her in lights other than as the wife of a friend, it would be black -disgrace to yourself and to me, and most of all to Peg. And do you think -I would not trust you? Man, I need no sentry over you save the sentry of -your own conscience, no guard other than the guard your honor sets. You -would do no wrong to Peg. It is not you I fear; on your faith I would -stake my soul's hope of a meeting I look and long for after death. Will -you have my reason now for what I do? It is not to save Peg from you; -it is to save Peg from Peg, she goes to Florida. And to save our Peg I'd -break a dozen cabinets.” - -It was now grown dark, and the silent storm swept down more whitely -dense than before. I threw a heavy military cloak about me and stepped -out into the night. I had no set purpose, no destination; but some sure -influence tugged at me, and then the house would seem to choke and its -heat to smother me; I wanted the darkness and the coolness and to be -alone. Was it some sweet power beckoning my heart, or merely a plain -instinct to save and recover myself, one that any hard-struck animal -might have had, to thus take me forth into the midst of the blinding -storm? - -My journey through the gathering drifts was not pushed far when, under -one of the oil lamps that flanked the road and shed a sickly flare -through the thick-falling snow, I beheld a closed carriage drawn up. It -was one of those vehicles of hire common of the place, and beyond being -better than most, and with two powerful horses that would have looked -well hauling a gun in a battery, nothing to mark it. At first glance I -thought it had come by some mishap to running gear or axle-tree. - -As I was for pushing by, quite heedless of the stalled carriage and -thinking only on my own broken heart, some one plucked me by the cloak. -Wheeling sharply, I saw it was the coachman who had leaped from his box -to interrupt me. - -There would be no mistaking the massive shoulders and easy pose; it was -Rivera. - -“What's this?” said I. “When did you turn whip?” - -Rivera gave me no words, but motioning towards the carriage, swung -again to his place with the reins. As he did so, there came a tap on the -glass. - -Somewhat in a maze, I approached and flung open the door. In the dark -depths I made out the vague outlines of a woman. - -“Get in.” It was Peg's voice. - -Without demur or question I took my place beside her and shut the door; -with that, Rivera cracking a thong over the sleepy horses to rouse them, -the carriage at a slow pace began moving Georgetown way. - -“Hold me close to you,” whispered Peg, her low tones falling on my ears -like a cry of pain, “hold me close to you; I am cold.” - - - - -CHAPTER XVI.--LOVE'S FUNERAL IN THE SNOW. - -As though in a dream I took Peg in under my great cloak, and having my -arm about her would now hold her close and warm to my side. Her ear was -over my heart as her face lay pressed against me, and I only hope she -could understand the story of that throbbing. - -For myself I was in a mid-swirl of mere confusion, with my wits all -upside down, and no clear notion of what I did or why. The General's -word of that Florida business, the cabinet to break and Peg to go away -from me, made it for the moment as though the floor of the world had -given way beneath my feet. It would provoke chaos and seem the end of -things. - -It was never said of me, even by the least informed, that I would be -swayed in any kind or made to pause in what I went about by the counsel -of conventionality. I had lived a life half-bitted, and for the main -with bridle on my neck; the last I cared for were the frowns or the -smiles of folk. If it were a woman to talk against the teeth of my -fancy, I would turn my back on her; if a man, I had a way to gag his -tongue if it should be no better than the butt of my pistol. And yet, -however loose my habit or dull my knowledge of those matters, I did not -go without a fashion of cold shock on Peg's behalf when I was so far my -own man again as to dwell on our position--we, plodding through the snow -and the darkness, locked in that carriage. - -This mood of apprehension was so much in the upper-hand with me that -it came to be the impulse, and would suggest the topic I laid tongue to -when first I found my words. It was not without a mighty effort of the -will that I obliged myself to some steadiness of utterance. Then, and -not very craftily, I might observe, I, in the manner of one who -thinks aloud, and surely as much to myself as to Peg, gave vent to an -exclamation under my breath. Indeed, I would not have looked for Peg -to hear me, since her head--pretty ears and all--was buried beneath the -thick folds of my cloak. - -“What if folk were to know!” I said. - -Then came Peg's voice like a half stifled murmur of despair. - -“What should I care who knows?” cried she. “It is my heart's funeral! My -heart is dead and we go upon its funeral in this snow!” - -At that, without well heeding what I was about, and doubtless drawn to -it by the note of woe in Peg's tones, I held her to my side even more -closely than before. Thus we remained for a long space in utter silence, -neither speaking a word, while the quiet storm stole down upon us and -the slow wheels forced their passage through the white cold levels of -the snow. - -After a bit, Peg's head, curls in a tangle and hood removed, was thrust -outside my cloak, which garment, however, she would continue to wrap -about her and hold with her hand. - -“I would still be near to you,” she said, as though in explanation of -the cloak, “though I am no longer cold.” - -The mere truth was, the night, while a choke and smother of snow, was -nothing chill, being bare freezing for a temperature and never a breath -of air to stir, and the inside of the big carriage as warm as many a -library. And yet, when I would first get in, I found Peg shivering as -with an ague. That was gone now and she more in control. - -Peg would now be more mistress of herself and speak with a measure of -firmness. - -“You have heard?” she asked. - -“The General,” I returned, “has told me you are to go to Florida. But -how should you have been told? Or was it known to you for long?” - -This latter I put a little viciously, for it struck me on the moment how -Peg might have been aware of this new destiny for days, and hidden it -from me. But no; she had come to her information but an hour before. -Even while the General with his hand on my rebellious shoulder gave me -the story of it, the letter which told the news to Peg was put within -her hands. - -“It was to have been a secret,” said she, “and my husband would have -kept it until his return. But he will be detained beyond his plans; he -wrote me because of preparations I must make.” - -While Peg said this, her face was held up towards mine, and even in the -vague lights, which were rather the ghosts of lights than any radiance -however dim, I could catch some whiteness of it. - -Suddenly her head was in its old resting place over my heart, with the -cloak to again become its cover. - -“Watch-dog,” whispered Peg, and I might tell how deeply she was stricken -by the quaver of her voice, as much as by a trembling that swept her as -a gust rumples the surface of a tarn; “watch-dog, I felt that I would -not live unless I saw you. Do you contemn me? Do you own shame for your -little friend? I could not help it; I sent for Rivera, and made him -fetch this carriage. We are alone--hidden from the world's eyes. I have -torn a night from the hands of Time to be no one's night save ours. I -waited by the lamp; my soul called to you and I knew you would come. I -would not send; I was sure you would be with me without that. I should -have died if I had not found you. Say that I did right, watch-dog. Say -that it was right! I only cry for your one word; what others will think -or say I care not, but I could not bear up against your anger! Say that -I did right; say it!--say that you are glad.” - -“I will say it all and intend it all, my little one!” Here I stroked -Peg's tangle of curls as one would pet a child. - -My whole being was wrapped in a storm and my bosom caged a whirlwind. -I could be calm enough, apparently, and yet I was growing aware of that -tempest of spirit which shook me like an aspen. I had been dull--dull -to the point of crime; but now my wisdom would begin to sharpen and -brighten itself. - -Still, I had so much coolness to call my own that I was glad of the fact -of Rivera. I remember thinking on that; for, with no more words than the -dumb, he was as secret as a mole and as honest, withal, and -single-hearted as a hound. There would be none to know; as Peg said, she -had torn a night from eternity to be ours and ours alone. - -While these thoughts went tumbling down the steeps of my conjecturings, -I continued mechanically to caress Peg's hair, and it felt like a web of -gossamer in my coarse fingers. - -“Contemn you, child!” said I, and my voice was not much louder than had -been hers, and I bent down my head so that she might hear; “contemn -you! I would as soon impeach the snow outside, new given from the sky, -denouncing it for soot.” - -Peg began to weep, and I could hear the sharp catching of her sobs. -Suddenly the moan came sighing up to me: - -“Oh, if there were no such word as right or justice or duty, but only -love--just love!” Then with a quick backward twist of her form that was -like an impulse, and as replete of a swift grace as any suppleness of -that long ago leopard whereof she would so often make me think, Peg -turned herself in my arms, and with her own encircling my neck lay -crying on my bosom. I held her close--closer. I could tell the beating -of her heart, count the footfalls of her nature as though she were -parcel of myself. How I loved her! adored her!--my prone spirit would -fall on its knees to her for its Deity. - -The while, too, and with my soul at these prayers, my candor would -arrest me for the traitor I was. Where should be that conscience the -General spoke on? Or where that honor which was to have been as a sentry -to check my strayings? That honor was recreant where love would take the -field against it; that conscience was so much apostate of the right -it would frame an argument of equity and claim superior liberty for -superior love, and be all for carrying Peg away. My boasted manhood was -a rope of sand! - -Even now, as weary-white with years I tell this tale of dead and other -days, I yet wonder upon that discovery of myself. This was what I beheld: -I had loved Peg from the start; the General's jest was sober truth. I -would worship her, and then cheat myself with lie and sophistry to hide -my villainy against my own detection. And now when the mask was fallen -and I stood face to face with the true image of my infamy, would I still -press forward to my sins? Or would I think on the good General, and the -pain and the foul stain for each of us which I was about to compass? - -It was this to run in my mind, but all in a dimmest way to be imagined, -and as though it were a dream and nothing true. As bonds to stay me, -these thoughts came to be no more than packthreads; as props to uphold -me, trembling to a fall, they proved the merest, reeds to lean on. With -Peg cradled in my arms, her heart beating on my own, she filled out the -world for me and thrust all else beyond the frontier of my outmost hope -or fear. I wanted only Peg, would heed no other call, and whether it -were right or wrong or black or white I cared not. Caught fast in the -mills, I was wholly ground between Peg and my mighty love for her. In -a supreme egotism and the selfishness that goes wanting heart or -conscience, I would set torch to the skies before I gave her up. - -It is the fair wellhead of amazement how a man is thus strange to -himself; how he will defeat his own best prophecy and be as opposite as -night and day to all he promised. Folk have never accounted me weak, and -I myself would have said I was a man of stone. I have been described for -one of resolution. I have spurred my horse across the front of beaten -troops, terror-whipped and in retreat. I've ridden against them, and -with word and point of sword forced them to a halt. I've wheeled them, -and, since they would not go without, driven them back like sheep; and -then, when they would be of a braver hope, taken their lead and whirled -them like lions upon the foe they lately fled from, and won a battle -with them. And now I, who was granite in the face of men, had only a -will of water for this girl who wept across my heart. - -“Take me away!” she cried; “oh, take me away!” - -Then it was my love swept down upon her like a strong wind. I take shame -to repeat what I said. Bluntly I would disregard all claims, forfeit -honor, forget the General and defy the rest; we would wander to new -regions, she and I, and set up our idol of blind love. Carried by my -soul's wish, I would leave her nothing untold; I would bow down at her -feet and beg of her to come with me. - -As I spoke, Peg would seem to turn more calm and comforted. She did not -withdraw from my arms, but rested in them like a child. And yet there -arose a sad steadfastness to wrap her about that was a check and a bar -to me. - -“Watch-dog,” said Peg at last, and her manner was the manner of one who -grieves, “watch-dog, I am a wicked woman. I live my life backward, and -it would be as though I could not help or save myself. My feet take hold -on baseness, and my hands spin evil for those who do me good. My touch -is a darkness--a palsy--a death. Oh, why was I born!” Peg wailed; “why -was I sent to destroy the ones I love!” - -Not a word would now come to me. I was silenced and sat like one -convicted, waiting sentence. But that cold thought still crept about my -heart like a snake. I would--I must have Peg; I would give my share in -God to make her mine! - -“What should be the wrong in me?” Peg went on. “Knowing the right from -the left, I take ever the left hand turning; seeing good and evil, I -choose the bad, and there rises a black glory in my heart like a cloud -of pleasant sin to swallow up repentance. Oh, if I might only tame -myself to an appearance of right and be a hypocrite when I may not be a -saint!” - -Peg was presently better restored to herself. In the very moment when -the gates of my soul would open to let it forth to her and I gave myself -into her hands to be fashioned by her as she would, Peg began to gather -steadiness. It was she to now think and speak and decide for both of -us; for myself, I was clean swept away. I was not to know this new -strength of Peg's from her tones alone, or the trend of what she uttered; -I could feel her heart-throbs become firmer and more slow as she lay -in my arms, and it was in them I read the truth of her resolve. - -“Watch-dog,” said Peg in a way most sweetly solemn, “I think nothing -of myself. If it were I alone to be unmade, I'd never leave your arms -again. Come weal, come woe, here would I bide, and while your arms were -round me the worst would change to be the best. But I will not see you -under the mire of men's tongues. Dear one, you would die! You are one -whose life grows on his honor like a flower on its stem; disgrace would -cut you down and you would die. And yet, I am glad I love you; I am -glad I care nothing for myself. Let my fate be woven to me coarse as -sackcloth, harsh as nettles, yet will I exult while I draw its folds -about me. I will go on as a world would say I should; and if the way of -life lie steep, I'll still climb on and think I toil for you; and if it -be stony and if it bruise my feet, I'll say I suffer that to keep you -safe; I'll make my grief my Eden and find in the endless woe of your -surrender a nobler, higher, more immortal transport than would have -owned me in your arms. And there will be another world!” Peg's tones -swung low to my ear, and mystical. “Watch-dog, there he lives after -this.” - -Peg was silent for a space, and would turn even and cool and in a way of -content. I, on my part, might neither say her yea nor nay, for I was in -the hollow of her hand like a pebble to be retained or cast by her into -the sea as she should conclude. - -And somehow I was no longer in the dark. I loved her; and yet I knew Peg -was not to be for me; she had said the word; she would go and I would -stay; for all her soft beauty and that love for me which spoke in every -fiber of her being, the truth flowed in on me like a tide that in no way -might I change her or shape her or move her from her will. Against my -prayer and in the front of protest, I would be saved to myself and I -would lose her; she would do it all. What was it the General said? He -would save Peg from Peg? It was she who now would save me from both -herself and me when my love-sown madness was hot to make a wreck of all. - -“Yes, watch-dog,” Peg continued dreamily, “there will come another -life.” Then of the suddenest twining her arms about my neck more tightly -still and until she clung there like a part of me, she cried out as -though her soul spoke: “Kiss me, sweetheart; kiss me, if it be but once. -This night at least is ours.” - -It was she who would command. I grew drunken on her lips while my -thoughts would stray and stagger. I could know nothing, act nothing, -be nothing save as she would have me. Her hot arms were as the arms -of summer torrents to hurry me along; her lips were like the lips of -a whirlpool! It was a kiss--a kiss of the infinite--and would lay its -velvet touch upon the ultimate reason of existence. - -And so Peg went away; and for my portion I took up my old life, which -now was as dark and chill and hollow as a cave. - -Now what should there be more to tell? What matters it how secession -hid its head? or how Calhoun resigned his Vice-Presidency to later creep -back to a seat in that Senate where he had sat on high and ruled? or how -the General fought and slew the Bank? Who is there to care for the -story of the General's re-election, when Van Buren came with him for the -second place? Who, I say, would bend the ear of interest to such tales -as those when now our Peg was gone? - -The General never again took up with me that matter of his Cabinet and -its dissolution, and how he scattered it to save Peg from herself. One -evening, however, as he smoked and I sat bitter and listless, I plumped -a question at him. - -“If it were to save Peg from Peg,” said I, “why did you defer so long? -Why did not you disperse your Cabinet months before? Or was it that you -failed to note Peg's peril of herself till just before you acted?” This -last with a great sneer. - -“It was plain to me from the beginning how Peg was won to you,” said he. - -“Then, in the beginning why did not you act?” - -“How could I? Peg was under fire for her fair repute. Had I broken up my -Cabinet, it would have been Peg's death blow. Folk would have told how -it was for the war upon her and because she could not be defended. No, I -must give her time for triumph; that achieved, the rest might happen and -she be made secure in Florida. It was the one trail, and I followed it.” - The General came over to my chair. “Old comrade,” said he with a world -of goodness in his manner, “if I have thrust a thorn in your heart, -forgive me. If friendship can cure, that thorn will be plucked away.” - -On another day the General was in a temper for abstract philosophies. It -lay in a hot time of summer and his moods flowed lazily. His fancy would -run away to the topic of woman and her helplessness. - -“Beautiful and sweet, she is,” he was saying, “and a blessing, too; but -the man must ever bear upon his mind her weakness, and be her buckler -even from herself. He must be on guard for both. For she is as a child, -and nowise deep nor fortified of any rooted strength. Your man, on the -other hand, while wanting those traits of beauty which shine forth in -woman like the stars at night, is withal safe enough. He is cold like -an iceberg, and like an iceberg he rides steadily throughout every gale -with nine-tenths of him beneath the sea. Your tempest can go no deeper -than the surface; it cannot search the ocean's depths, and so the man -swims safely.” - -Where the General would have brought up in these tongue-wanderings one -may only guess. He was never to finish, for in a flurry of irritation I -interrupted him. - -“Now let me tell you one thing,” said I, wheeling on him with a sort -of venom; “to my mind, your man is a dullish fool of neither bones nor -brains, and your woman has nothing to fear from him.” - -“What's that?” cried the General, startled into letting fall his pipe; -“what do I hear you say?” - -“And more,” I went on; “your man will do whatever your woman commands. -He will go or stay, or fetch or carry, or weep or laugh, or live or die -by the least breath of her lips. Your man is mere clay; your woman is -the potter to mould him and bake him and break him in form and fashion -and fragment as shall best flatter her caprice or most nicely match the -color of her fancy. For virtue, your man is a toad and your woman that -blossom by which he crouches. For power, your woman is the wind, while -your man is that poor scrap of nothing to be tossed thereon.” - -“You are a cynic,” retorted the General with a snort, and after -surveying me for a moment with a warlike eye he sauntered away for -another pipe. - -“Your woman must save herself,” cried I, as he went through the door. -“At all events, if she have nothing stronger than your man to lean on, -her case is lost and desolate indeed.” - -“You-all is plumb kerrect, Marse Major,” said Jim, who as usual had been -listening with flattering interest while the General and I discussed; -“you-all is plumb right. Man an' woman is jes' like a candle; he's -d'taller, she's d'wick. D'Marse General is a pow'ful fine soger an' all -that, but he shore don't know enough 'bout women folks to wad a gun.” - -One day I got a little note from Peg. It was as though I held a sunbeam -in my fingers; I kissed it while my heart put up a prayer. Thus it ran: - -“So, Watch-dog:--They have taken me and left you, and there be miles -between. Wherefore I feel very safe and very sad. It is all birds and -blossoms and trees and sunshine and bright days and sorrow here. I came -away in such a tumult of hurry I left many things behind. Most of them -I can do without, but I mislaid my love, and that grows to be a sore -distress. Here where I should need it I'm without it; there, where -mayhap it lies unregarded and uncared for, it can give me no good but -only pain. You may find it--my poor love!--since it should be something -close to you. It may be lying at your feet while you read this. Should -you come across it, even though you be in the art and press of president -making, don't forget to lift it up and save it and keep it warm upon -your heart for sake of little Peg. But I must cure me of this abject -strain; I too much beg where I should give commands. For are you not my -slave? Look if the small white mark of vassalage be not upon your hand! -Do you find it? Yes? Read it, then, and re-read it with your heart! Do -you know the promise it would tell you? By the sign of that white mark -my tooth made, it is given that now or then, or here or there, or in -this life or in that, your Peg will yet lay hands of love upon her -slave.” - -That was the last letter as it was the first--the last word from my lost -and vanished Peg. I have that letter by me as I write; it is yellow and -worn and stained and blistered as though with tears. That was my last -word from her, I say. And now when the winter of my days lies thick and -white and cold upon me, and those whom I loved are gone, while those to -come and go before me are strangers whose very names are strange, I wend -often to Peg's grave. There where the great stone fits down above her, -and resting myself upon that stone--there, by the door of death, I -muse upon the past. I kiss the stone above Peg--cold it is, cold as my -age-chilled lips! And I think on the time that was, with its hot lights -to dazzle and blind and make drunk the heart with the red splendors of -them; and on the time that will be--a shadow-land of unformed wonders! -Then will my old eyes come to search among the wrinkles for that small -white mark on my hand which Peg's loving leopard teeth ordained, and -I feel again that snowstorm kiss, while my hope, for a prayer, recites -Peg's bond to yet lay hands of love upon her slave. - -THE END. - - - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Peggy O'Neal, by Alfred Henry Lewis - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PEGGY O'NEAL *** - -***** This file should be named 53992-0.txt or 53992-0.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/3/9/9/53992/ - -Produced by David Widger from page images generously -provided by the Internet Archive - - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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