AFTER.
Toward noon of the next day, the Judge drove up to his own gate,
alone, and not a little troubled. His wife and daughter were evidently
expecting him. They seemed disappointed.
"Wouldn't he come?" asked his wife.
"He was not there to come."
"Not there!" from both.
"No; he went off in the stage last night to Jefferson."
"Went off! Why, father!"
"Well, it seems that he had arranged to leave on Tuesday, and sent
his trunk out to Hiccox's, but didn't go; and all day Wednesday
he wandered about, his mother said, seeming reluctant to start. At
evening she said he appeared much depressed, and said he would not go
until the next evening."
"Thank God!" said the ladies.
"George," continued the Judge, "who had been down to the Post-office,
heard that you were lost, and hurried home, and told him all he
had heard. His mother said when he heard it he asked a good many
questions, and said, 'I know now why I stayed,' and that in five
minutes he was off to the woods."
"Father, there was a special Providence in it all."
"And did Providence send him off last night?"
"Perhaps so."
"Did his mother tell how he came to think Julia had crossed the old
road?"
"He didn't tell his mother much about it. She said he was more
cheerful and lighter hearted than he had been for a year, but did not
seem inclined to talk much; ate a very little breakfast, and went to
bed, saying that he hoped she would not let anybody disturb him. He
did not come down again until five, and then told her he should leave
that evening. She tried to dissuade him, but he said he must go--that
he was not wanted here any more--that he felt it was better for him
to go at once. She said that she spoke to him of us, of Julia, saying
that she thought he ought to remain and let us see him, if we wished.
He answered that he had better go then, and that they would understand
it. He said they might perhaps call and say some things to her; if
they did, she should say to them that he could understand what their
feelings might be, and appreciated them; that it was not necessary to
say anything to him; that he wished all the past to be forgotten, and
that nothing might be said or done to recall it; he had left Newbury
forever as a home.
"I told her that I wanted to provide for his studies, and to start him
in business--of course in as delicate a way as possible. She rather
started up at that, and said she hoped I would never in any way make
any offer of help to him. I asked who went with him to meet the stage,
and his mother replied that he went alone--walked down just at dark,
and wouldn't permit either of the boys to go with him."
"Why Edward! how strange this is!"
"It isn't strange to me at all," remarked Julia, in a low, depressed
voice.
"Father, I've a little story to tell you. I should have told it last
night, and then you would have better understood some things that have
occurred. It was nothing that happened between us yesterday morning. I
have told you every word and thing of that."
Then she recited to the astonished Judge the incidents of her
adventure in the woods with Bart and the wolverine.
"And I," said the Judge, "have also a little incident to relate," and
he told of the occurrence on the river with which this tale began.
"Oh, father!" exclaimed Julia, "could you leave him, away there, weary
and alone?"
"I did not mean to do that; I stopped, and lingered and looked
back, and waited and thought he would ask or call to me," said the
humiliated Judge: "and now he has repaid me by saving your life."
"Father! father, dear!" going and laying her arm around his neck,
and her cheek against his, "You are my own dear papa, and could never
purposely harm a living thing. It was all to be, I suppose. Mamma, do
you remember the night of Snow's ball, when you playfully complained
of his inattention to you? and he said he would atone for all
offences,--
'In that blissful never,
When the Sundays come together,
And the sun and glorious weather,
Wrapped the earth in spring forever?'
and he has."
"I remember, but I could not recall the words."
"I can repeat the very words of the beautiful prayer that he made in
the woods," said the young girl.
"And which I seemed to hear," said her mother.
"And that 'blissful never' came, mother, and all its good was for
me--for us."
"Not wholly, I trust. This young man's mind and nature are their own
law. His mother said he was lighter-hearted and more like himself than
for a long time. He has suffered much. He mourned more for his brother
than most could. He had lost his own self-respect somehow, and now he
has regained it, and will come to take right views of things, and a
blissful ever may come for him."
"And he wanted all the past forgotten," said the girl.
"Of all that happened between you before he has only remembered what
you said to him," said her mother. "And you possibly remember what he
said to you."
"I remember his generosity and bravery, mother," replied Julia.
The Judge remained thoughtful. Turning to his wife, "Would you have me
follow him to Jefferson?"
"No. He went away in part to avoid us; he will be sensitive, and I
would not go to him at present. Write to him; write what you really
feel, a warm and manly letter like your own true self. I am not
certain, though, how he will receive it."
A silence followed which was broken by Julia.
"Father, do you know this Mr. Wade with whom Barton has gone to
study?"
"Yes; I have met him several times and like him very much. He was our
senator, and made that awful speech against slavery last winter. He is
a frank, manly, straightforward man."
"How old is he?"
"Thirty-five, perhaps; why?"
"Nothing. Is he married?"
"He is an old bachelor; but I heard some one joking him about a young
lady, to whom it is said he is engaged. Why do you inquire about him?"
"Oh! I wanted to know something of the man with whom he is. I met Mr.
Ranney a year ago, you know."
That night the fair girl remained long in a serious and thoughtful
attitude.
* * * * *
In the afternoon of the next day, the ladies drove to Mrs. Ridgeley's.
The elders embraced cordially. One was thinking of the boy who had
died, and of him who had gone so sadly away; the other of her agony at
a supposed loss, and her great joy at the recovery. Julia took one
of Mrs. Ridgeley's thin, toil-hardened hands in her two, rosy and
dimpled, and kissed it, and shed tears over it. Then they sat down,
and Mrs. Markham, in her woman's direct natural way, poured out the
gratitude they both felt; Julia, with simple frankness, told the
happenings of the night, and both were surprised to learn that Bart
had told her so little.
Mrs. Ridgeley described his going out, and coming back next morning,
and going again at evening. It was his way, his mother said. She was
proud of Barton, and wondered that this sweet girl should not love
him, and actually pitied her that she did not. She would not betray
his weakness; but when she came to speak of his final going, the
forlorn figure of the depressed boy walking out into the darkness,
alone, came before her, and she wept. Then Julia knelt by her, and
again taking her hand, said "Let me love you, while he is gone; I want
to care for all that are dear to him;" and the poor mother thought
that it was in part as a recompense for not loving Barton. There was
another thing that Julia came to say, and opening her satchel, she
pointed to something red and coarse, and putting her hand on it, she
said, "This was Bart's. He took it off himself, and put it on me; and
went cold and exposed. I did not think to restore it, and I want very
much to keep it--may I?" The poor mother raised her eyes to the
warm face of the girl, yet saw nothing. "Yes." And the pleased child
replaced it and closed her satchel.
Then Mrs. Markham said their friends and neighbors were coming in on
the Tuesday evening following, to congratulate them, and would Mrs.
Ridgeley let them send for her? The gathering would be informal and
neighborly. But Mrs. Ridgeley begged to be excused. Julia wanted to
see the boys, and they came in from the garden--Ed shy, quiet and
reserved; George, dashing, sparkling and bashful. Julia went up and
shook them by their brown hands, and acted as if she would kiss George
if he did look very much like Bart. She talked with them in her frank
girl's way, and took them captive, and then mother and daughter drove
away.
* * * * *
The gathering at the Judge's was spontaneous almost, and cordial. The
whole family were popular individually, and the young girls especially
gathered about Julia, who was a real heroine and had been rescued by a
brave, handsome young man;--the affair was so romantic!
They wondered why Bart should go away; and wouldn't he be there that
night? They seemed to assume that everything would be a matter of
course, only he behaved very badly in going off when he must know he
was most wanted. Of course he would come back, and Julia would forgive
him; and something they hinted of this. Kate and Ann, and sweet Pearly
Burnett, who had just come home from school, and was entitled to
rank next after Julia, with Nell and Kate, were very gushing on the
subject.
Others took Bart to account. His sudden and mysterious flight was very
much against him, and his reputation was at a sudden ebb. Why did he
go? Then Greer's name was mentioned, and Brown, and New Orleans; and
it was talked over that night at Markham's with ominous mystery, and
one wouldn't wonder if Bart had not gone to Jefferson, at all--that
was a dodge; and another said that at Painesville he stopped and went
west to Cleveland; or to Fairport, and took a steamer; and Greer went
off about the same time.
Julia caught these whispers and pondered them, and the Judge looked
grave over them.
In the morning Julia asked him what it all meant. She remembered that
he had spoken of Bart in connection with Greer, when he came home from
the Cole trial, which made her uneasy; she now wanted to know what it
meant.
The Judge replied that there was a rumor that Bart was an associate
of Greer, and engaged with him. "In what?" He didn't know; he was
a supposed agent of Brown's, and a company. "What were they doing?"
Nobody knew; but it was grossly unlawful and immoral. "Did anybody
believe this of Bart?" He didn't know; things looked suspicious. "Do
you suspect Bart of anything wrong?" He did not; but people talked and
men must be prudent. "Be prudent, when his name is assailed, and he
absent, and no brother to defend him?" "Why did he go?" asked the
Judge, "and where did he go?"
"Father!"
"I don't suspect anything wrong of him, and yet the temptation to this
thing might be great."
Julia asked no more.
The next morning she said that she had long promised Sarah King to pay
her a visit, and she thought she would go for two or three days. Sarah
had just been to Pittsburg, and had seen Miss Walters, and she wanted
so much to hear from her. This announcement quite settled it. She
had recently taken the possession of herself, in a certain sweet
determined way, and was inclined to act on her own judgment, or
caprice. She would go down in the stage; she could go alone--and she
went.
The morning after, the elegant and leisurely Mr. Greer, at the
Prentiss House, Ravenna, received a dainty little note, saying that
Miss Markham was at Mr. King's, and would be glad to see him at his
early leisure. He pulled his whiskers down, and his collar up,
and called. He found Miss Markham in the parlor, who received him
graciously.
What commands had she for him?
"Mr. Greer, I want to ask you a question, if you will permit me."
Anything he would answer cheerfully.
"You know Barton Ridgeley?"
"Yes, without being much acquainted with him. I like him."
"Have you now, or have you ever had any business connection with him?"
"I have not, and I never had."
"Will you say this in writing?"
"Cheerfully, if you wish it."
"I do."
Greer sat down to the desk in the library adjoining.
"Address my father, please."
He wrote and handed her the following:
"Hon. E. MARKHAM:
"_Dear Sir_,--I am asked if I have now, or have ever had any business
relations of any kind with Barton Ridgeley. I have not, and never had,
directly or indirectly, on my own, or on account of others.
"Very respectfully,
"THOS. J. GREER.
"RAVENNA, April 1838."
"May I know why you wish this?" a little gravely; "you've heard
something said about something and somebody, by other somebodys or
nobodys, perhaps."
"I have. Mr. Ridgeley is away. You have heard of our obligations to
him, and I have taken it upon myself to ask you."
"You are a noble girl, Miss Markham. A man might go through fire for
you;" enthusiastically.
"Thank you."
"And now I hope your little heart is at rest."
"It was quite at rest before. I am much obliged, Mr. Greer; and it may
not be in my power to make other returns."
"Good morning, Miss Markham."
"Good morning, Mr. Greer."
In the afternoon, as the Judge was in his office, a little springy
step came clipping in. "Good afternoon! Papa Judge," and two
wonderful arms went about his neck, and two lips to his own.
"Why Julia! you back! How is Sarah?"
"Splendid!"
"Your friend Miss Walters?"
"Oh, she is well. See here, Papa Judge," holding out the Greer note.
The Judge looked at and read it over in amazement.
"Where under the heavens did you get this?"
"Mr. Greer wrote it for me."
"Mr. Greer wrote it for you? I am amazed! no man could have dared to
ask him for it! What put this into your head?"
"You almost suspected Bart"--with decidedly damp eyes--"and others did
quite, and while in Ravenna I wrote a note to Mr. Greer, who called,
and I asked the direct question, and he answered. I asked him to write
it and he did, and paid me a handsome compliment besides. Papa Judge,
when you want a thing done send me."
"Well, my noble girl, you deserve a compliment. A girl that can do
that can, of course, have a man go through night and storm and flood
for her," said the Judge with enthusiasm.
"Mr. Greer said a man should go through fire," said Julia, as if a
little hurt.
"And so he may," said the Judge, improving.
"That is for you," said Julia, more gravely, and gave him the note.