UNCLE PHIN’S PLAN.
After finishing his supper on the memorable evening of Arthur’s unjust
punishment, Mr. John Dustin stepped softly into the woodshed, which, in
that overcrowded household, had seemed to be the only place that could
be given up for an extra sleeping-room. He closed the door behind him,
and, by the light of a candle that he carried, gazed long and earnestly
at the tear-stained face of the child who lay on a rude cot. It was hot
and flushed, and the sleeping boy tossed and moaned as though visited by
unhappy dreams. Once he called out: “Don’t let them whip me, mamma! I
haven’t been naughty. Indeed I have not!”
At this the man, as though fearful of awakening the sleeper, hastily
retired from the place, and there was a suspicious moisture in his eyes
as he re-entered the other room.
Here he said: “Wife, I believe we have treated that little chap very
unjustly. My brother Richard was the most truthful and honorable boy and
man I ever knew, and I am inclined to think the son takes after his
father. Hereafter I shall try to make his life pleasanter and happier,
and in this I want you to help me.”
Mrs. Dustin made no answer to this, for her heart was hardened against
the orphan lad, and she really believed him to be the sly bad boy that
Dick strove to make him appear. “I will watch him more closely than
ever, and show him up in his true light yet,” she thought, as she bent
her head over her sewing so that her husband could not see her face. “He
sha’n’t stand in the way of my children, and I’ll believe my own Dick’s
word before his every time,” was her mental resolve.
Knowing nothing of his wife’s thoughts, Mr. Dustin was already taking
steps to insure Arthur’s greater comfort. He went to the pantry and
brought from it a bowl of milk, a loaf of new bread, and a plate of
ginger cookies made that day. With these he again entered Arthur’s
sleeping-room, and softly placed them on a chair where, by the light of
the moon that was just rising, the boy would see them whenever he should
awake. Once, while he was thus engaged, Mrs. Dustin opened her mouth to
remonstrate against such a lavish provision of food for a mere child;
but a glance at her husband’s determined face caused her to change her
mind, and she wisely remained silent.
There had been another and more appreciative witness of Mr. Dustin’s
thoughtful act. It was Uncle Phin, who, kneeling outside the shed and
gazing through an open chink in its rough wall, was waiting patiently
for the family to retire that he might have a private and undetected
conversation with his “lil Marse.”
As Mr. Dustin again left the shed, the old man said softly to himself:
“De good Lawd bress you fer what you is jes done, Marse Dustin. You is
got some ob pore Marse Richard’s goodness into you after all. If it
warn’t fer de ole Miss an dem wicked chillun, me an lil Marse would try
an stick it out awhile longer. But it can’t be did. No, sah, it can’t be
did.” Here the old man shook his white head sorrowfully. “Dem young
limbs is too powerful wicked, an ole Miss, she back ’em up. Fer a fac,
ole Phin got ter tote his lamb away fum heah, an maybe de good Lawd lead
us to de green fiels ob de still waters, where we kin lie down in
peacefulness.”
An hour later, when the lights of the house were extinguished and all
was still with the silence of sleep, Uncle Phin cautiously opened the
shed door, and tip-toeing heavily to where Arthur lay, rested his horny
hand gently on the boy’s white forehead.
The child opened his eyes and smiled, as, by the moonlight, now flooding
the place, he saw who was bending over him.
“Sh-h-h, Honey,” whispered Uncle Phin, with warning finger uplifted;
“git up quiet like a fiel mouse an come erlong wif me. Sh-h-h!”
Then the old man and the child stole softly away, the former not
forgetting to carry with him the supply of food provided by Mr. Dustin.
As quietly as two shadows they moved across the open space between the
house and the barn.
Not until they were safe in his particular corner of the hay-mow did
Uncle Phin venture to speak aloud. Here he drew a long breath of
satisfaction, for in this place they could talk freely and without
danger of being overheard.
First he made Arthur drink all that he could from the bowl of milk and
eat heartily of the bread and cakes that Mr. Dustin had left for him.
After eating the food, of which he stood so greatly in need, and which
the old man assured him had been left by one “ob de good Lawd’s own
rabens,” Arthur said:
“Oh, Uncle Phin, I’ve tried as hard as I can to be good, and make them
all love me here, but they won’t do it. No matter what I do, it seems to
be the wrong thing, and I only get punished for it. I am getting almost
afraid to try and do right any more, and if we stay here much longer I’m
pretty sure I shall grow to be a bad boy, such as my own dear mamma and
papa wouldn’t love. Now don’t you think we might run away and live
somewhere else, where it would be more easy to be good than it is here?
Do you think it would be very wrong if we did? I’m sure Aunt Nancy would
be glad to have us go, and perhaps Uncle John would too.”
“Why, Honeybug!” cried the old man delightedly, “dat ar is prezactly
what yo ole Unc Phin’s been projeckin to hissef—only you mus’n’t call it
runnin away, like you was a pore niggah. A Dale don’t nebber run away.
He only change de spere ob his libbin, when he gits tired ob one place,
an’ takes up wif anudder, same like we’s a gwine ter. I’s been
considerin fer a long while back dat dese yere Dustins, who isn’t much
better ’n pore white trash no how, wasn’t de bestest company fer a
thorobred Dale like you is.”
“Hush, Uncle Phin! You must not speak so of my uncle’s family. He was my
dear papa’s own brother, and they are the only relatives I have in the
world,” said Arthur.
“No, dey isn’t, Honey. Dey isn’t de onliest ones what you got in de
worl. You is got a granpaw libin yet. A monsrus fine gen’lm’n he is, and
he’s place one ob de fines’ in all Ferginny, if I does say it. He’s
quality, he is, an Dalecourt is yo own properest home.”
“But I have never seen my Grandpapa Dale, and he doesn’t know me, and I
don’t believe he wants to,” replied Arthur; adding sadly: “There doesn’t
seem to be anybody in the whole world that wants to know me, except you,
and Brace Barlow, and Cynthia. Besides Dalecourt is a long way off, and
it would take a great deal of money to get there, and we haven’t any at
all, and I don’t believe even you could find the way to it if we should
try and go there.”
“Dint I uster lib dere, Honey, and dint I come frum dere? What fo you
spec I can’t go whar I come frum?”
“But coming from a place and going back to it are very different
things,” replied Arthur, wisely.
“So dey is, Honey, ob cose dey is,” agreed Uncle Phin, who was not yet
ready to disclose his plans.
“But we will go away somewhere and live together, won’t we?” pleaded
Arthur. “I don’t suppose we could take my ‘dear Giant’ and Cynthia with
us; but if we only could, wouldn’t we be happy?”
“Ob cose we’se a gwine leab dish yere place,” replied the old man. “You
jes trus yo Unc Phin, an he fin a way to trabble, an a place fer to go.”
Then he told the boy that he should go away before daylight, and might
remain several days making preparations for their journey. He would not
say where he was going, because he wanted Arthur to be able to say
honestly he did not know, if he were asked. He instructed the boy to
collect all his little belongings, including his scanty wardrobe, and
have them ready for a start at a moment’s notice. “Itll be in de night
time, Honey, in de middle ob de night, an ole Phin ’ll creep in an wake
you, same like he did erwhile ago. So don’t you be afeared when you
wakes up sudden an fin’s him stan’in alongside ob you.”
“No, I won’t be afraid, and Ill be ready whenever you come for me,”
replied the little fellow; “but don’t stay long away, because I shall be
so lonely without you.”
Uncle Phin promised that he would not be a single minute longer than was
necessary to make preparations, and Arthur was about to go back to the
house, when a sudden thought flashed into his mind, and he exclaimed:
“Oh, my book, my precious book that the beautiful lady gave me! I can’t
leave it behind, and Im afraid Aunt Nancy won’t let me have it.”
Then, in answer to Uncle Phin’s inquiries, he had to tell him the whole
story of his adventures as a Prince, which he had not heretofore found
an opportunity of relating, and in which the old man was greatly
interested. He was particularly pleased with the title bestowed upon his
“lil Marse” by the beautiful lady, and said: “You is a shuah ’nough
Prince, Honey, if dere ebber was one in dis worl, only you won’t always
be Prince Dusty. Some day youll be a Prince somefin else. But you mus
hab yo book, in cose you mus, an we’ll make out to git hol ob it somehow
or nudder.”
Comforted by this assurance, and filled with the new hopes raised by
their prolonged conversation, Arthur flung his arms about the old man’s
neck and kissed him good-night and good-bye. Then slipping from the
hay-mow he sped back to the house, carrying the empty dishes, from which
Uncle Phin had taken the remnants of food for his own use.