fireplace. The processes of hospitality would be swifter if quietly
acquiesced in, and now that the slim decanter of Santa Cruz was opened
the odor was not unwelcome. He bad been busy enough since daybreak, but
wore an amused look, though somewhat tired and worried, as the major
flew about like a captive bumblebee. Miss Nancy's prim turban got
shifted over one ear, and one white and two black handmaidens joined her
in the course of such important affairs. At last the major reappeared,
victorious and irate, with a steaming porringer which had just begun to
heat in the kitchen fireplace, and splashed it all the way along the
floor. He went down stiffly on his knees in the breakfast-room to blow
the coals, with such mighty puffs that a film of ashes at once covered
the water and retarded its rise of temperature. Miss Nancy and Colonel
Hamilton looked at each other across his broad back and laughed.
"There, there, major! The steam 's rising, and 't will do already,"
urged the colonel. "I'd rather not take my drink too hot, and go out
again to face the wind."
"I felt the wind myself," acknowledged the major, looking up pleasantly.
"My fore door, where I like to sit, is well sheltered, but I felt the
wind." Miss Nancy so far descended from her usual lofty dignity as to
make a little face, which Hamilton, being a man, did not exactly
understand.
"I like to have the water boiling hot; then you can let it cool away,
and the flavor 's well brought out," explained the major. Phoebe, the
old slave woman who looked over his shoulder, now pronounced with
satisfaction that the water was minnying, with the steam all in it, to
which her master agreed. Miss Nancy put out a strong hand and helped
him to his feet.
"You 've set your turban all awry, sister," the major remarked politely
by way of revenge, and the little company burst into a hearty laugh.
Miss Nancy produced a gay china plate of pound cakes from the cupboard,
and sat by in silence, discreetly knitting, until the toddy was not only
made, but half gone down the gentlemen's throats.
"And so Roger Wallingford 's gone to sea, and those who would burn him
in his house for a Tory are robbed of a great pleasure," she said at
last. "I wonder what their feelings are to-day! My heart aches for his
mother; 't will be a deathblow to all her pride."
"It will indeed," said Hamilton seriously.
"I was sore afraid of his joining the other side only yesterday," said
the major, "but this news has lain heavy as lead on me all the morning.
There are those aboard the Ranger who will only have him for a spy. I
heard a whisper of this last night, before we parted. I was even glad to
think that the poor boy has plenty of old family friends in England, who
can serve him if worst comes to worst."
"'T was in my mind, too," agreed the colonel. "John Lord was hinting at
trouble, in my counting-room, this morning early. I fancied him more
than half glad on his own account that Wallingford is gone; the lads
have looked upon each other as rivals, and I have suspected that 't was
Roger who was leading in the race." The colonel's wind-freshened cheeks
brightened still more as he spoke, and looked up with an expectant smile
at Miss Nancy, who did not reply except by giving two or three solemn
nods of her turbaned head.
"Everybody loves the boy," she said presently, "but 't is of his dear
mother I am thinking most. 'T is a sad heart alone in her great house to
front the winter weather. She told me last week that she had a mind not
to make the usual change to her house in town. There were like to be
disturbances, and she had no mind for anything but quiet. I shall
write, myself, to her young cousins in Boston, or to the Sherburnes, who
are near friends, and beg them to visit her; 'tis none so cheerful in
Boston either, now. We were always together in our youth, but age makes
us poor winter comrades. Sit ye down," said Miss Nancy Haggens
affectionately, as Hamilton rose and put by his empty glass. "And how
is our dear Mary?" she asked, as she rose also, finding him determined.
There was an eager look in the old lady's eyes.
"I have not seen my sister," answered Hamilton, looking grave. "I was
very early by the riverside with my old brig Pactolus going downstream,
and everything and everybody tardy. I shall lay her up for the winter
by Christian Shore; but, as things look now, I fear 't is the last
voyage of the good old vessel. I stood and watched her away, and when
she made the turn past Pine Point it seemed as if her old topmasts were
looking back at me wishfully above the woods."
The major made a sound which was meant for sympathy; he was very warm
and peaceful now before the fire.
"My sister will not be long seeking such a friend as you," said
Hamilton, with sudden change of tone, and looking at Miss Nancy with an
unwonted show of sentiment and concern in his usually impassive face. "I
slept but little last night, and my fears, small and great, did not
sleep at all. 'T is heavy news from the army, and I am perplexed as to
Mary's real feelings. The captain counts upon success; as for the step
that Roger Wallingford has taken, it has no doubt averted a very real
danger of the moment."
"She must go at once to see his mother. I wish that she might go
to-day. You may tell Mary this, with the love of an old friend," said
Miss Nancy warningly. "She has great reserve of feeling with all her
pretty frankness. But young hearts are not easy reading."
"I must be gone all day," said Hamilton gravely.
For once the major listened and had no opinion ready. All the troubles
of life had been lifted in the exercise of such instant hospitality.
"We must leave all to Time," he announced cheerfully. "No man regrets
more than I our country's sad situation. And mark ye both: the captain
of the Ranger's got all the makings of a hero. Lord bless me," he
exclaimed, as he followed Hamilton along the hall, "I could have shed
tears as I caught his fire, at thinking I was too old and heavy to ship
with him myself! I might be useful yet with his raw marines and in the
land attacks. I felt last night, as our talk went on, that I should be
as good for soldiering as ever."
"Brother Tilly!" Miss Nancy was crying from the breakfast-room in
despair. "Oh, don't go out into the wind, and you so warm with your
toddy! Wait, I command you, Tilly! Phoebe 's coming with your hat and
cloak!" But the old campaigner was already out beyond the lilacs in the
front yard, with the rising northwester lifting his gray locks.
*IX*
*BROTHER AND SISTER*
"All thoughts, all passions, all delights,
Whatever stirs this mortal frame,
All are but ministers of Love,
And feed his sacred flame."
That same afternoon of the first of November, one might have thought
that the adventurers on board the Ranger had taken all the pleasant
weather away with them, and all the pleasure and interest of life; only
endurance and the bleak chilliness of autumn seemed to be left ashore.
The wind changed into the east as night drew on, and a cold fog,
gathered along the coast, came drifting up the river with the tide,
until rain began to fall with the early dark. The poplars and elms
looked shrunken about the gardens at Hamilton's, and the house but ill
lighted. The great rooms themselves were cold and empty.
Colonel Hamilton, gloomy with further bad news from the army on Long
Island, sat alone reviewing some accounts, shaking his head over a great
ledger which had been brought up from the counting-house, and lay before
him on a table in the west room. The large Russian stove was lighted
for the first time that year, and the tiny grate glowed bright in its
tall prison-like front, which was as slow to give out any heat as a New
England winter to give place to spring. The pair of candles gave a dull
yellow light, and the very air of the west room looked misty about them
in a sort of halo, as Mary Hamilton opened the door. She was rosy with
color from an afternoon ride, while her brother looked tired and dull.
All the long day she had been so much in his anxious thoughts that he
glanced over his shoulder with apprehension. In spite of his grave face
and unyielding temper, he had a quick imagination, and, for the few
persons whom he loved, a most tender heart.
To his blank surprise, his young sister had never worn a more spirited
or cheerful look. She was no lovelorn maiden, and had come to him for
neither pity nor anxious confidence. She came instead to stand close
beside him, with a firm warm hand on his shoulder, and smiling looked
into his upturned face.
"Well, sir, have you made the most of a bad day?" she asked, in the tone
of comradeship which always went straight to Hamilton's heart, and made
him feel like a lover. "They must have had a good offshore wind for
many hours," she added before he could answer. "The Ranger must be safe
off the coast by this time, and out of this hindering fog."
"She must indeed," answered Hamilton, lending himself comfortably to her
mood. "The wind was free all day out of the northwest until this
easterly chill at sundown. They will not like to drift in a long calm
and easterly fog."
"Come, you look miserable here; you are pale with cold yourself, Jack,"
she urged kindly. "Let us poke this slow contrivance for a fire! I
like to see a broad blaze. Caesar kept me a fine hoard of pitch-pine
roots when they cleared that thicket of the upper pasture, and I made a
noble heat with them just now in my own room. I told him to look after
your stove here, but he was sulky; he seems to think 't is a volcano in
a box, and may wreck the house and all his happiness. See, it was full
of ashes at the draught. Sir, may I ask what you are laughing at?"
"I thought you would be like Niobe, all tears," he answered boldly,
giving her a half amused, half curious glance. "And here you praise the
wind that blows your lover seaward, and make yourself snug ashore."
The firelight flashed in Mary's face at that moment, and something else
flashed back to meet it. She was kneeling close to the small iron door,
as if she were before a confessional; but she looked over her shoulder
for a moment with a quick smile that had great sweetness and power to
charm.
"Let us be happy together, my dear," she said. "They go to serve our
country; it should be a day for high hopes, and not for mourning. I
look for great gallantry on board the Ranger!"
She stood facing her brother a moment later, and looked straight in his
face, as if she had no fears of any curious gaze, simply unconscious of
self, as if no great shock had touched her heart in either new-found
happiness or sense of loss. It seemed as if her cheerful
self-possession were putting a bar to all confidence.
"I cannot understand you!" he exclaimed sharply.
"You are cold and tired, my poor old man! Come, I shall have no more
figuring," and she slid away the ledger beyond his reach on the smooth
polished oak of the table top. "Let us make a bit of hot drink for so
cold a man!" and was swiftly gone across the hall to the great kitchen,
leaving the doors wide open behind her. It seemed warmer at once, and
presently the sound of laughter and a coaxing voice made Hamilton's
heart a little gayer. Old Peggy and her young mistress were in the
midst of a lively encounter, and presently a noise of open war made him
cross the hall with boyish eagerness to see the fray.
Peggy was having a glorious moment of proud resistance, and did not
deign to notice the spectator. The combatants stood facing each other in
front of the huge fireplace, where there was a high heap of ashes and
but faint glow of fire. The old woman's voice was harsh, and she looked
pale and desperate; there was always a black day for the household after
such a masterpiece of a feast as Peggy had set before her master's
guests the night before. The fire of energy was low in her gaunt frame,
except for a saving spark that still moved the engines of her tongue.
She stood like a thin old Boadicea with arms akimbo, and Mary Hamilton
faced her all abloom, with a face full of laughter, and in exactly the
same attitude; it was a pleasing sight to Hamilton at the door of the
side hall. The usually populous kitchen was deserted of all Peggy's
minions except Caesar, and there were no signs of any preliminaries of
even the latest supper.
"Oh, Peggy, what a cross old thing you are!" sighed Mary, at the end of
Peggy's remarks upon the text of there being nobody in the house to do
anything save herself. "I should really love to stay and have a good
battle to warm us up, except that we should both be near to weeping when
it was done, and you would be sorrier than you need, and cook something
much too nice for supper, tired as you are." Then she dropped her hands
and relaxed her mocking pose. "Come, Peggy dear, the colonel's here, and
he's ridden the whole length of Beech Ridge and the Tow-wow woods since
morning with his surveyors; he 's very cold and down-hearted, and I only
want a spatter of mulled wine for him. Come, find me a little skillet
and we 'll heat it here on the coals. See, they 're winking bright
under that hill of ashes. Where are all the maids?"
"In their beds, I suppose, black and white alike, and getting their
first sleep like ladies," grumbled Peggy. "I told them the master would
be late, and would sup at Pine Hill, as he said this morning. 'T is no
matter about me; Caesar and me, we 're old and tough," and the stern
features relaxed a little. "Why did n't you tell me 't was for the
master, an' he'd no supper after such a day, with the clock far past
seven, and you yourself with nothing but bread and milk to stay you?
Truth to tell, I was asleep in the corner of the settle here, and a
spark 's burnt me a hole in this good apron and spoilt my temper. You
have too much patience with poor old Peggy," she muttered, bending over
the ashes and raking them open to their bright life with her hard brown
hand.
Mary stood watching her for a moment; a quick change came over her face,
and she turned away silently, and went toward the window as if to look
up the river.
"What was you designin' to get for supper?" old Caesar humbly inquired
at this auspicious moment. "I mought be a-layin' of the table." But
Peggy did not notice him. He was still in a place of safety behind the
settle, his gray head just appearing over the high back.
"We might finish the pigeon pie," the young mistress suggested; "the
colonel will like a bit of cheese afterward and plenty of bread. Mind,
Peggy, 'tis only a cold supper!"
"Was you es-pectin' any of the quality aside yo'selves, missy?" politely
demanded Caesar, in the simple exercise of his duty.
"Don't you keep a-askin' questions; 't ain't no way to converse with
human creatur's!" said Peggy severely.
"Laws, Peggy, I feels an int'rist!" said poor Caesar humbly.
"No, you don't neither; you 're full to bu'stin' of cur'osity, an' it's
a fault that grows by feedin' of it. Let your mind dwell on that, now,
next Sabbath mornin' up in your gallery, 'stid o' rollin' your eyes at
the meetin' folks an' whisp'rin' with Cato Lord!" and Peggy laughed in
spite of herself. "Come out from there, an' fetch me some dry pine
chips, if 't won't demean your dignity. I 'll ax you some questions you
don't know no answers to, if you be an Afriky potentate!"
The master of the house had tiptoed back across the hall like a pleased
schoolboy, and was busy with the ledger when his sister came back, a few
minutes later, with a steaming porringer. She proceeded to mix a most
fragrant potion in a large gayly flowered glass, while Hamilton
described his morning entertainment by the major; then an old dog came
loitering in, and watched his master enviously, as he drank, and stirred
again, and praised the warm drink, and grew every moment more cheerful.
Mary Hamilton stood leaning against the Russian stove. "It is just
getting warm now, this dull old idol of yours," she said, "and we cannot
cool it before spring. We 'll sit in the dining parlor to-night after
supper; you shall smoke your pipe there, and I can see the good
firelight. We are lonesome after a gay day and night like yesterday; we
have had no word of gossip yet about our ball. I have many things to
tell you."
Hamilton nodded amiably; the color had come back into his face, and
driven away the worn and worried look that had fallen on him before his
time. He had made so light of care that care made light of him, and was
beginning to weigh his spirit down early in middle life.
"I came across the river at the Great Falls," he said, not without
effort, and looking at his young sister, "the roads were so heavy
through the woods by Cranberry Meadow."
"So you did n't stop to give Granny Sullivan the money?" asked Mary, as
if she were disappointed.
"Yes, on my way this morning. She knew more about last night than I
could sweep together to tell her if I had stayed an hour."
"The birds tell granny everything," said Mary, laughing. "She gave me a
handsome scolding the other day because Peggy's rack of spiced hams had
fallen in the ashes that very morning. How was the master?"
"Very absentminded, and reading his Horace as if the old poet were new.
He did not even look up while she thanked me for the money the judge had
sent. 'I'm knitting every minute I'm not working or eating, for my poor
lame lad Jamie,' she said. 'Now, he has nothing to do but read his law
books, an' tell others what's in them, and grow rich! 'T is all because
his father 's such a gentleman!'"
"How proud she is, the dear old woman!" said Mary warmly.
"Yes, and they have the sense to be proud of her," said Hamilton,
settling into his chair more comfortably and putting his empty glass
aside.
"I rode to the Rocky Hills myself late this afternoon. I heard that
Elder Shackley had been ill. I liked the fresh wind and wet after last
night's warmth and a busy morning here in the house. I meant at first
to ride north to meet you; but it was better not, since you crossed at
the Falls."
"I thought you would go another way," said Hamilton seriously. There
were moments when he seemed old enough to be her father; there were,
indeed, many years between them. "There is a sad heart and a lonely one
across the river to-night, while we seem gay enough together."
Mary's face changed quickly; she stepped toward him, and seated herself
on the broad arm of the chair, and drew her brother's head close against
her side.
"What is it that you wish to say to me?" she asked. "I have been
thinking of dear Madam Wallingford all day long," and Hamilton could
feel her young heart beating quick like a bird's, close to his ear.
"She was in my mind, too. I came down that side of the river to see
her, but it grew so rainy and late that I gave up my thought of stopping
except to leave a message. My mare was very hot and spent," he
explained, in a matter-of-fact way. "As I came toward the house I saw
my lady standing at a window, and she beckoned me. She came herself to
the door, and the wind blew her to and fro like a flag. She had been
weeping terribly. 'I longed to see a friend,' she told me, and could
say no more.... I feared that she might bear us much ill will."
Hamilton was so full of feeling that his own voice failed him, and Mary
did not speak at first.
"Well, dear brother?" she asked a moment later, knowing that he had more
to say.
"She wished to send you a message; 't was her reason for calling me in.
She asked if you would not come to see her to-morrow, late in the
afternoon. Earlier she has business of the estate to manage, in place of
her son. There are men coming down from the Lake."
"Oh yes, yes, I shall go!" said Mary, with a sob. "Oh, I am so glad; I
feared that her heart was broken, and that she would only hate us!"
"I was afraid, too," returned Hamilton, and he took his sister's hand
gently in his own, and would have spoken something that she could not
bear to hear.
She moved away quickly. "Come, dear man," she said, "you must throw off
these muddy clothes; you are warm again now, and they will soon be
calling us to supper."
He sighed, and looked at her in bewilderment as he obeyed. She had gone
to the window and pushed the shutter back, and was gazing out into the
dark night. He looked at her again as he was going out of the room, but
still she did not speak. Was it the captain, after all, who had gone
away with her heart? She had not even mentioned his name!
She was not always so silent about her lovers; they had been many, and
she sometimes spoke frankly enough when he and she were alone together
like this, and the troubles and veils of every-day intercourse were all
put aside. But who could read a woman's heart? Certainly not a poor
bachelor, who had never yet learned to read his own!
*X*
*AGAINST WIND AND TIDE*
"Whose daughters ye are as long as ye do well and are not afraid with
any amazement."
Late the next afternoon Mary Hamilton appeared at the north door of the
house, and went quickly down the steep garden side toward the water. In
the shallow slip between two large wharves lay some idle rowboats, which
belonged to workmen who came every morning from up and down the river.
The day's short hurry was nearly over; there was still a noise of heavy
adzes hewing at a solid piece of oak timber, but a group of men had
begun to cluster about a storehouse door to talk over the day's news.
The tide was going out, and a birch canoe which the young mistress had
bespoken was already left high on the shore. She gave no anxious glance
for her boatman, but got into a stranded skiff, and, reaching with a
strong hand, caught the canoe and dragged it down along the slippery mud
until she had it well afloat; then, stepping lightly aboard, took up her
carved paddle, and looked before her to mark her course across the swift
current. Wind and current and tide were all going seaward together with
a determined rush.
There was a heavy gundalow floating down the stream toward the lower
warehouse, to be loaded with potatoes for the Portsmouth market, and
this was coming across the slip. The men on board gave a warning cry as
they caught sight of a slender figure in the fragile craft; but Mary
only laughed, and, with sufficient strength to court the emergency,
struck her paddle deep into the water and shot out into the channel
right across their bow. The current served well to keep her out of
reach; the men had been holding back their clumsy great boat lest it
should pass the wharf. One of them ran forward anxiously with his long
sweep, as if he expected to see the canoe in distress like a drowning
fly; but Miss Hamilton, without looking back, was pushing on across the
river to gain the eddy on the farther side.
"She might ha' held back a minute; she was liable to be catched an'
ploughed right under! A gal's just young enough to do that; men that's
met danger don't see no sport in them tricks," grumbled the boatman.
"Some fools would ha' tried to run astarn," said old Mr. Philpot, his
companion, "an' the suck o' the water would ha' catched 'em side up
ag'in' us; no, she knowed what she was about. Kind of scairt me,
though. Look at her set her paddle, strong as a man! Lord, she 's a
beauty, an' 's good 's they make 'em!"
"Folks all thinks, down our way, she 'll take it master hard the way
young Wallin'ford went off, 'thout note or warnin'. They 've b'en
a-hoverin' round all ready to fall to love-makin', till this objection
got roused 'bout his favorin' the Tories. There'd b'en trouble a'ready
if he'd stayed to home. I misdoubt they'd smoked him out within half a
week's time. Some o' them fellows that hangs about Dover Landin' and
Christian Shore was bent on it, an' they'd had some better men 'long of
'em."
"Then 't would have been as black a wrong as ever was done on this
river!" exclaimed the elder man indignantly, looking back over his
shoulder toward the long house of the Wallingfords, that stood peaceful
in the autumn sunshine high above the river. "They 've been good folks
in all their generations. The lad was young, an' had n't formed his
mind. As for Madam,--why, women folks is natural Tories; they hold by
the past, same as men are fain to reach out and want change. She 's
feeble and fearful since the judge was taken away, an' can't grope out
to nothin' new. I heared tell that one o' her own brothers is different
from the rest as all holds by the King, an' has given as much as any man
in Boston to carry on this war. There ain't no Loyalist inside my skin,
but I despise to see a low lot o' fools think smart o' theirselves for
bein' sassy to their betters."
The other man looked a little crestfallen. "There's those as has it
that the cap'n o' the Ranger would n't let nobody look at young miss
whilst he was by," he hastened to say. "Folks say they 're good as
promised an' have changed rings. I al'ays heared he was a gre't man for
the ladies; loves 'em an' leaves 'em. I knowed men that had sailed with
him in times past, an' they said he kept the highest company in every
port. But if all tales is true"--
"Mostly they ain't," retorted old Mr. Philpot scornfully.