The words of Penelope Blight fell on my ears as chillingly as the
rattler's whir. That the prophecies of Mr. Pound and Squire Crumple
had come to nothing was little consolation for me. So near had they
been to fulfilment that it seemed that I must have been spared only for
a harder fate, and the figure of Stacy Shunk peering at me through the
top of his hat, uttering his ominous warning, rose before my startled
eyes. I should have run, but my retreat was barred, the girl blocking
the way over the shelving beach. I took a backward step and for an
instant the Prophet Pound's star was in the ascendant, for the foot
touched the water. So great was my dread of the Professor that had I
been in a position to choose my course I should have taken my chances
in the stream, but I lost my self-control with my balance and made a
desperate clutch at the air.
Again the brown hand caught mine, and this time it did not release me.
"Come with me," my small captor said in a tone of command.
I did not resist, but I went with fear. To resist would have been a
confession of cowardice, and there is no pride of courage like that of
a boy of ten in a girl's presence. I might have made excuses, but with
that little spire of smoke so close at hand, promising a fire, I,
dripping and shivering as I was, could think of nothing to say in
protest. I did declare feebly that I was not cold. My teeth
chattered, and my body shook, and the girl looked up at me and laughed,
and led me on.
James, a man of a superstitious and imaginative mind, in the quiet
evenings on the barn-bridge had often told me strange stories in which
giants and dwarfs, witches and fairies, entangled men in their spells.
One of these tales, a favorite of his, came to me now and caused my
feet to lag and my eyes to study my guide with growing distrust. It
was of a lady called "Laura Lee," who, James said, sat on the bank of
the big river combing her hair and singing, the beauty of her face and
voice luring too curious sailormen to their destruction. It was a far
cry from the big river to the mountain brook, from the lovely "Laura
Lee" to this tiny girl, about whom all my careful scrutiny could
discover no sign of a comb. Yet it did seem to me that there was a
resemblance between the creature of the story, "the beautiful lady with
blue eyes and golden hair who hung around the water," and this child of
the woods who had no fear of snakes and boasted a professor for a
father. She felt the tug of my resisting hand.
"You're not afraid of me, are you, boy?" she asked, turning to me
sharply.
I, a boy of ten, afraid of this mite! Had she really been what I was
beginning to suspect, a decoy sent out by the Professor to lure me to
his den, she could not have used more cunning than to put to me such a
question. I afraid? Though the blood still waved through me, I
squared my shoulders, dissembled a laugh, and stepped before her, and
it was I who led the way along the path into the open day of the
clearing. There I came face to face with the Professor.
First I saw that he was human in shape and attire. Indeed, both his
appearance and his occupation were exceedingly commonplace. When we
came upon him he was leaning on a hoe and watching a passing cloud.
Had he smiled at me, I think I must have fallen to my knees and lifted
my hands in pleading, but he gave no sign of pleasure that another
victim had fallen into his toils. In fact, there was something
reassuring in the perfect indifference with which he regarded me. When
the crackling of the bushes called his eyes to us, he threw one glance
our way as though a trifle annoyed at being disturbed in his study.
Then he returned to the contemplation of the sky. So I stood on the
edge of the woods my hand holding the girl's, and watched him, and as
the seconds passed and he did not change his form, but remained a lazy
man leaning on a hoe in a patch of riotous weeds, fear left me and
wonder took its place.
There was nothing about this man to merit the opprobrium of his name,
and from appearances Stacy Shunk had as well warned me against being
caught by Mr. Pound. In the village Mr. Pound was the mould of
respectability. He always wore a short frock-coat of glossy black
material, which strained itself to reach across his chest. So did the
Professor. But his black had turned to green in spots, and he was so
thin and the tails were so short and the coat so broad that it seemed
as though its length and breadth had become transposed. It was a
marvellously shabby coat, but even in its poverty there was no
mistaking its blue blood. It was a decayed sartorial aristocrat, ill
nourished and sad, but flaunting still the chiselled nose and high,
white brow of noble lineage. Here it was all out of place. Mr. Pound
wore a great derby which swelled up from his head like a black ominous
cloud, and so dominated him that it seemed to be in him the centre of
thought and action, and likely at any moment to catch a slant on the
wind and carry him from earth. The Professor wore a great derby, too,
but one without the buoyant, cloud-like character of Mr. Pound's. It
was a burden to him. Only his ears kept it from dragging him to earth
and smothering him, and now as he looked up at the sky I saw clear cut
against its blackness a thin quixotic visage, shaded by a growth of
stubble beard. I marvelled at a man working in such attire, for the
sun baked the clearing, but watching, I saw how little he swung his hoe
and how much he studied the sky. The whole place spoke of one who kept
his coat on while he worked, and gazed at the clouds more than he hoed.
It was wretched and dismal. It hid itself away in the woods from very
shame of its thriftlessness. Age had twisted the house askew, so that
the mud daubing crumbled from between the logs, and the chimney was
ready to tumble through the roof with the next puff of wind. The
shanty barn was aslant and leaned heavily for support on long props.
The hay burst through every side of it, and the sole occupant, an
ancient white mule, had burst through too, and with his head projecting
from an opening and his ears tilted forward, he was regarding me
critically. Everywhere the weeds were rampant. Everywhere there were
signs of a feeble battle against them, bare spots where the Professor
had charged, cut his way into their massed ranks, only to retreat
wearied and beaten by their numbers.
Over this wretchedness the girl waved her hand and said: "Here is our
farm." The blue ribbon in her hair bobbed majestically as she pointed
across the stretch of weeds to the cabin. "And yonder is our house."
She pinched my arm as a sign of caution. "And there is father," she
added in a voice of muffled pride. "He's studying. Father's always
studying."
She would have led me on in silence, not to disturb his labors with
either mind or hoe, but he looked down and asked in a tone of yawning
interest: "Who's the lad, Penelope?"
"I don't know," she answered. "He fell into the creek, and I pulled
him out. I've brought him in to warm him up."
Wet, shivering boys emerging suddenly from the woods might have been a
common sight about the Professor's home, did one judge from the way he
received his daughter's explanation. He merely nodded and fell upon
the weeds with newly acquired vigor. As we walked on we heard the
spasmodic crunching of his hoe. But the noise stopped before we
reached the house door, and the silence caused us to turn. He was
standing erect looking at us.
"I think you'd better have something, lad," he cried, and, dropping the
hoe, he hurried after us.
So it came that the Professor did me the honors of his home, and with
such kindness that all my fear of him was soon gone. He stirred the
fire to a roaring blaze and placed me in front of it. He spread my
coat before the stove and drew my boots, and quickly my clothes began
to steam, and I was as uncomfortably warm as before I had been
uncomfortably cold. The shy politeness of my age forbade my protesting
against this over-indulgence in heat, and not until the Professor
declared that he must give me a dose to ward off sickness did I raise a
feeble voice in remonstrance.
My protest was in vain. From the cupboard he brought a large black
bottle. Had I seen my mother approaching me with a bottle as ominous
as that, even her favorite remedy that I knew so well, the Seven Seals
of Health and Happiness, I should have fled far away, but now the girl
had my coat, and was turning it before the fire, while her father stood
between me and my boots. He smiled so benignly that had he offered me
our family nostrum I should have taken it without a grimace. I
accepted the proffered glass and drank. Never had anything more
horrible than that liquid fire passed my lips. In a moment I seemed to
be turned inside out and toasting at a roaring blaze, and to increase
my discomfort the Professor poured another dose, many times larger than
the first. Had he held it toward me I should have abandoned my coat
and boots, but to my relief he raised it to his lips and drained it off
with a smile of keen appreciation of its merits.
"Now I feel better," he said, putting the bottle and glass on the
table, and dropping into a chair.
It was strange to me that he, who was perfectly dry, should prescribe
for himself exactly the same remedy that he had given to me for my
wringing wetness. Yet there was no denying the beneficence of the
dose, for I was most uncomfortably warm, and had he been feeling badly
he was certainly now in fine spirits.
Drawing his daughter between his knees, he enfolded her in his arms
protectingly. "Well, boy, I warrant you feel better," he said.
I replied that I did, and if he did not mind I should like to sit a
little farther from the stove.
He consented, laughing. "And now we should introduce
ourselves--formally," he went on. "You have met my daughter, Miss
Blight--Miss Penelope Blight. I am Mr. Blight--Mr. Henderson
Blight--in full, Andrew Henderson Blight. And you?"
"I am David Malcolm, sir," I answered.
"Ah!" He lifted his eyebrows. "You are one of those bumptious
Malcolms."
"Yes, sir," I returned proudly, for the word "bumptious" had a ring of
importance in it, and I had every reason to believe that the Malcolms
were persons of quite large importance.
Why Mr. Blight laughed so loud at my reply I could not understand, but
I supposed that in spite of his saturnine appearance he was a man of
jovial temperament and I liked him all the more.
The wave of merriment past, he regarded me gravely. "Then you must be
the son of the distinguished Judge Malcolm."
"Yes, sir," I said, pride rising triumphant over my polite humility.
"Penelope," he said, as though addressing only his daughter, "we are
greatly honored. Our guest is a Malcolm--a sop of the celebrated Judge
Malcolm."
By this adroit flattery my host won my heart, and in the comfort he had
given me I lost all care for passing time. When I recalled James, it
was with the thought that I was safe and he would find me, and I was
troubled by no obligation to save him worry. This strange man
interested me, he held my family in high regard, and I was well
satisfied to see more of him. So I fixed my heels on the rung of my
chair, folded my hands in my lap, sat up very straight, and watched him
gravely. In this was the one grudge that I long bore against the
Professor--that he baited me as he did, played with my child's pride,
and with my innocent connivance vented his contempt on all that I held
most dear. I did not understand the covert sneer against my father.
Years have given me a broader view of life than was my father's, and at
times I can smile with Henderson Blight at the solemnity with which he
invested his judgeship, but mine is the smile of affection. With no
knowledge of the law, with a power restricted to county contracts, when
he sat on the bench in court week with his learned confrère, drew his
chin into his pointed collar, and furrowed his brow, Blackstone beside
him would have appeared a tyro in legal lore. The distinguished Judge
Malcolm! So Henderson Blight spoke of him in raillery and so he was in
truth, distinguished in his village and his valley, and as I have come
to know men of fame in larger villages and broader valleys I can still
look back to him with loving pride. Yet that day I sat complacently
with my feet on the chair-rung, regarding the Professor with growing
friendliness.
"You know my father?" I asked, seeking to draw forth more of this
agreeable flattery.
"I have not the honor," he replied. "You see I am comparatively new in
these parts--driven here, as you may suspect, by temporary adversity.
But a man with ideas, David, must some day rise above adversity. All
he needs is a field of action." He looked across the bare room and out
of the door, where the weeds were charging in masses against the very
threshold; he looked beyond them, above the wall of woods, to a small
white cloud drifting in the blue. Young as I was, I saw that in his
eyes which told me that could he reach the cloud he might set the
heavens afire, but under his hand there lay no task quite worthy of
him. "A field of action--an opportunity," he repeated meditatively.
"It's hard, David, to have all kinds of ideas and no place to use them.
When a man knows that he has it in him and----"
"Is that why Mr. Shunk calls you the Professor?" I interrupted.
Henderson Blight turned toward me a melancholy smile. "Yes," he said.
"They all call me that, David, down in the village. Ask them who the
Professor is. They will tell you, a vagrant, a lazy fellow with a gift
of talking, a ne'er-do-well with a little learning. Ask Stacy Shunk.
Ask Mr. Pound--wise and good Mr. Pound. He will tell you that ideas
such as mine are a danger to the community, that I speak out of
ignorance and sin. As if in every mountain wind I could not hear a
better sermon than he can give me and find in every passing cloud a
text to ponder over. They don't understand me at all."
The Professor drew his little daughter close to him and regarded me
fixedly, as though to see if I understood.
"Yes, sir," I said. "I will ask them."
At this matter-of-fact reply his mouth twitched humorously. "And
perhaps you will find that they are right," he said. "That's the worst
of it. Even dull minds can generate a certain amount of unpleasant
truth; that's what sets me on edge against them--when they ask me why I
don't carry out some of my fine ideas instead of criticising others."
"Why don't you?" The question was from no desire to drive my host into
a corner, but came from an innocent interest in him and a wish to get
at something concrete.
He took no offence at my presumption, but rose slowly, lifted his arms
above his head, and stretched himself. Unconsciously he answered my
question.
"Had I the last ten years to live over again I would," he said as he
paced slowly up and down the room. "Perhaps I shall yet. Long ago,
when I was home on a little farm with the mountains tumbling down over
it, I used to plan getting out in the world and doing something more
than to earn three meals a day. It is stupid--the way men make meals
the aim of their lives. I wanted something better, but to find it I
had to have the means, and means could only be had by the most
uncongenial work. So here I find myself on a still smaller farm with
the mountains coming down on my very head. It was different with
Rufus."
"Rufus who?" I demanded with the abruptness of an inquisitive youth who
was getting at the facts at last.
The Professor halted by my chair. "My brother Rufus. You see, David,
I taught school because it was easy work and gave me time to think.
Rufus was a blockhead. He never had a real idea of any kind, but he
could work. When he owned a cross-road store he was as proud as though
he had written 'Paradise Lost.' He went to conquer the county town and
did it by giving a prize with every pound of tea. He wrote me about it
and you might have supposed that he had won a Waterloo. Yet he had his
good points. Now if Rufus and I could have been combined, his physical
energy with my mental, we should have done something really worth
while."
"Yes, sir--yes, indeed, sir," I said politely. My conception of the
Professor's meaning was very faulty, but I found him engrossing because
he talked so fluently and made so many expressive gestures. He, I
suspect, was pleased with a sympathetic listener, though one so small.
Laying a hand on my shoulder, he asked: "David, what are you going to
do when you grow up?"
"I am going to be like my father," I replied.
"Like the distinguished Judge Malcolm?" he exclaimed. "That's a high
ambition--for the valley." He was standing over me pulling his chin,
and from the manner in which he eyed me I believe that he quite
approved my choice of a model. Suddenly his arms shot out. "Try to be
more, David. Try to be what Rufus and I combined would have been. Try
to work for something better than three meals a day. Wake up, David,
before you fall asleep in a land where everybody dozes like the very
dogs."
To enforce his admonition his hands closed on my shoulders; he lifted
me from my chair and began to shake me. Being so much in earnest he
was rather violent, so that James, now in the doorway, saw me wincing
and looking up with a grimace of fright and eyes of pleading.
"Steady there, man," he cried. He thought that he was just in time to
rescue me from torture, and came forward with his whip raised.
"I beg your pardon," said the Professor, dropping me gently into my
chair. "I didn't mean to hurt you, David. Did I hurt you?"
"Not at all, sir," I answered, and feeling more at ease with James near
I made a dive for my coat and hat.
"Well," said James, glaring at my host. "I advise you to keep your
hands off anyway, for if I catch you a-hurting of him again--" There
was a terrible threat in the eyes and in the upraised butt of the whip,
but suddenly the manner changed, for James was looking at the bottle on
the table and it had a strangely quieting influence on his temper. The
blaze died away from his eyes; his voice became soft to meekness; the
whip fell limply. "I might think you'd done it a-purpose, Professor,
and you know I allus tries to be friendly."
"I hardly believe David will complain of my treatment," returned the
Professor. "You see he came to us all wet and cold from a tumble into
the creek."
James turned to me with wide-opened eyes. "And I suppose you met a
rattler," he cried.
"Oh, yes," I answered, as though this was but a petty incident of my
day.
"Well, you are a boy!" From me his eyes moved to the bottle again, and
as he looked at it he began to tremble and his legs lost their strength
and he sank to a chair by the table. "You'll be the death of me yet,
Davy. Why, my nerves has all gone from just thinking of what might
have happened."
His hand was groping toward the bottle, and he gave the Professor a
glance that asked for his permission.
"Penelope," the Professor said quietly, "the gentleman would like a
glass of water."
Evidently the gentleman did not think that water would quiet his
nerves, for he did not hear the command and was contented with the
healing power nearer at hand. He poured the tumbler almost full of the
fiery liquid and raised it to his lips. He winked gravely at Mr.
Blight, threw back his head, and drained the glass without taking
breath. The Professor failed to see the humor of the act, and, seizing
the bottle, drove the cork in hard, while the unabashed James beamed on
him, on Penelope, and on me.
"Thank you," he said, rising, and slowly drawing his sleeve across his
mouth; "I feel better--much better. Another drop would set me up all
right, but, as you say--" He looked hopefully from the bottle in the
Professor's hands to the Professor's face, but finding there no promise
of more of the sovereign remedy, he took my arm and led me to the door.
"Davy, you must thank Mr. Blight and the young lady."
"You'll come again, Davy," Penelope cried.
"And all by yourself, Davy," the Professor added.
To me this remark was of the kindest, but it irritated James. He
picked up his whip and fumbled with it while he stared at our host, who
stood by the table, with one hand on the bottle and the other pointing
the way over the clearing. "You're a good talker, Professor," James
drawled. "You can argue down Stacy Shunk and make Mr. Pound tremble,
but when it comes to manners--the manners of a gentleman--I never see
such a lack of them."
With this parting shot he strode away so fast that I could hardly keep
pace with him. At the edge of the woods, I looked back and saw the
father and child in the slanting doorway waving their hands to me.
From his window in the barn the white mule was watching with ears
pricked, and now he brayed a hostile note, as though he divined the
trouble which could come at the heels of a wandering boy. I waved my
hat and plunged into the bush.
"Now, Davy, tell me how it all happened," said James, drawing himself
up very straight in the saddle as he started the horses toward home.
I began to tell him. He broke into a song. When I tried to make
myself heard, his voice swelled up louder. Never before had James sung
as he was singing now, and I watched him first with wonder and then
with increasing terror. As we dragged our way up the ridge, out of the
narrow gut, he droned his music in maudlin fashion in time to the slow
motion of the beasts. When the valley stretched before us he fairly
thundered, striving to make himself heard across the broad land. I
hoped that before we entered the village exhaustion would silence him,
but in answer to my appeals he raised his voice to a pitch and volume
that brought the people running out of their houses, and he seemed to
find great pleasure in the attention that he was attracting. The high
throne from which I had looked down so proudly that morning as I rode
to my fishing became a pillory of shame. I could not escape from it,
for the whip was swinging in time to the music, and the horses,
confused by the riot, were rearing and plunging. I had to cling to the
harness with all my strength. We halted at the store. It was quite
unintentional and made the climax of a boisterous progress. James,
lurching back in his saddle, would have fallen but for the support of
the rein. The horses stopped suddenly. He shot forward, clutching at
the air, and hurtled into the road. From my height and from my shame,
I saw the whole world running to witness our plight--men, women, and
children, it seemed to me hundreds of them, who must have been lying in
wait for this very thing to happen. Through them Mr. Pound forced his
way, waving back the press until he reached the side of the fallen man.
"James," he said, looking down and speaking not unkindly, "how often
have I warned you!"
The answer was a look of childish wonder.
"Come, come," said Mr. Pound, taking a limp, sprawling arm and lifting
the culprit to his feet. "Tell me, who was the tempter who brought you
to this?"
James gazed stupidly at the minister. Then a devil must have seized
him, for in his nature he was a gentle soul, as I knew, who had heard
him so often crooning over his horses or sitting on the barn-bridge of
an evening sorrowing for Annie Laurie and Nellie Grey, women whom he
had never seen. Before all the town he raised his hand and brought it
crashing down on Mr. Pound's cloud-like hat.