IN WHICH JERRY CAREW GIVES DAVID HIS VIEWS ON FUTURE PUNISHMENT, AND
LITTLE HOYLE PAYS HIM A VISIT AND IS MADE HAPPY
Uncle Jerry Carew had led David's horse down to the station ready
saddled to meet him, according to agreement, and side by side they rode
back, the old man beguiling the way with talk of mountain affairs most
interesting to the young doctor, who led him on from tales of his own
youthful prowess, "when catamounts and painters war nigh as frequent as
woodchucks is now," until he felt he knew pretty well the history of all
the mountain side.
"Yas, when I war a littlin', no highah'n my horse's knees, I kin
remember thar war a gatherin' fer a catamount hunt on Reed's Hill ovah
to'ds Pisgah. Catamounts war mighty pesterin' creeters them days. Ev'y
man able to tote a gun war thar. Ol' man Caswell--that war Miz
Merlin--she war only a mite of a baby then--her gran'paw, he war the
oldest man in th' country; he went an' carried his rifle his paw fit in
th' Revolution with. He fit at King's Mountain, an' all about here he
fit."
"Did he fight in the Civil War, too?"
"Her gran'paw's paw? No. He war too ol' fer that, but his gran'son
Caswell, he fit in hit, an' he nevah come back, neither. Ol' Miz
Caswell--Cassandry Merlin's gran'maw, she lived a widow nigh on to
thirty year. She an' her daughter--that's ol' Miz Farwell that is
now--they lived thar an' managed the place ontwell she married Merlin."
"You knew her first husband, then?"
"Yas, know him? Ev'ybody knew Thad Merlin. He come f'om ovah Pisgah way,
an' he took Marthy thar. Hit's quare how things goes. I always liked
Thad Merlin. The' wa'n't no harm in him."
David saw a quaint, whimsical smile play about the old man's mouth. "He
war a preacher--kind of a mixtur of a preacher an' teacher an hunter.
Couldn't anybody beat him huntin'--and farmin'--well he could farm,
too,--better'n most. He done well whatever he done, but he had a right
quare way. He built that thar rock wall an' he 'lowed he'd have hit run
plumb 'round the place.
"He war a fiddler, and he'd build awhile, and fetch his fiddle--he
warn't right strong--an' then he'd set thar on the wall an' fiddle to
the birds; an' the wild creeturs, they'd come an' hear to him. I seen
squerrels settin' on end hearkin' to him, myself. Arter a while, folks
begun to think 'at he didn't preach the right kind of religion, an' they
wouldn't go to hear him no more without hit war to listen did he say
anythin' they could fin' fault with. 'Pears like they got in that-a-way
they didn' go fer nothin' else. Hit cl'ar plumb broke him all up. He
quit preachin' an' took more to fiddlin', an' he sorter grew puny, an'
one day jes' natch'ly lay down an' died, all fer nothin', 'at anybody
could see."
"What was the matter with his preaching?" asked David, and again the
whimsical smile played around the old man's mouth, and his thin lips
twitched.
"I reckon thar wa'n't 'nuff hell 'n' damnation in hit. Our people here
on the mountain, they're right kind an' soft therselves. They don't whop
ther chillen, nor do nothin' much 'cept a shootin' now an' then, but
that's only amongst the men. The women tends mostly to the religion, an'
they likes a heap o' hell 'n' damnation. Hit sorter stirs 'em up an'
gives 'em somethin' to chaw on, an' keeps 'em contented like. They has
somethin' to threat'n ther men folks with an' keep ther chillen straight
on, an' a place to sen' ther neighbors to when they don't suit. Yas,
hit's right handy fer th' women. I reckon they couldn't git on without
hit."
"Do they think they will have bodies that can be hurt by any such thing
in the next world?"
"I reckon so. But preacher Merlin, he said that thar war paths o' light
an' paths o' darkness, an' that eve'y man he 'bided right whar he war at
when he died. Ef he hed tuk the path o' darkness, thar he war in hit;
but ef he hed tuk the path o' light whar war heaven, then he war thar.
An' he said the Lord nevah made no hell, hit war jes' our own selves
made sech es that, an' he took an' cut that thar place cl'ar plumb out'n
the Scripturs an' the worl' to come. But he sure hed a heap o larnin',
only some said a sight on hit war heathen, an' that war why he lef' all
the hell an' damnation outen his religion."
Thus enlightened concerning many things, both of this particular bit of
mountain world, which was all the world to his companion, and of the
world to come, Thryng rode on, quietly amused.
Sometimes he dismounted to investigate plants new to him, or to gather a
bit of moss or fungi or parasite--anything that promised an elucidating
hour with his splendid microscope. For these he always carried at the
pommel of his saddle an air-tight box. The mountain people supposed he
collected such things for the compounding of his drugs.
When they reached the Fall Place, David continued along the main road
below and took a trail farther on, merely a foot trail little used, to
his eyrie. He had not seen Cassandra since they had walked together down
from Hoke Belew's place. He had gone to Farington partly to avoid seeing
her, nor did he wish to see her again until he should have so mastered
himself as to betray nothing by his manner that might embarrass her or
remind her painfully of their last interview, knowing he must eliminate
self to reestablish their previous relations.
David rode directly to his log stable, put up his horse, then unslung
his box and walked with it toward his cabin. Suddenly he stopped. From
the thick shrubbery where he stood he could see in at the large window
where his microscope was placed quite through his cabin into the light,
white canvas room beyond. Before the fireplace, clearly relieved against
the whiteness of the farther room, stood Cassandra, gazing intently at
something she held in her hand. David recognized it as a small, framed
picture of his mother--a delicately painted miniature. He kept it always
on the shelf near which she was standing. He saw her reach up and
replace it, then brush her hand quickly across her eyes, and knew she
had been weeping. He was ashamed to stand there watching her, but he
could not move. Always, it seemed to him, she was being presented to him
thus strongly against a surrounding halo of light, revealing every
gracious line of her figure and her sweet, clean profile.
He turned his eyes away, but as quickly gazed again; she had
disappeared. He waited, and again she passed between his eyes and the
light, here and there, moving quietly about, seeing that all was in
order, as her custom was when she knew him to be absent.
He saw her brushing about the hearth, carefully wiping the dust from his
disordered table, lifting the books, touching everything tenderly and
lightly. His flute lay there. She took it in her hands and looked down
at it solemnly, then slowly raised it to her lips. What? Was she going
to try to play upon it? No, but she kissed it. Again and again she
kissed the slender, magic wand, hurriedly, then laid it very gently down
and with one backward glance walked swiftly out of the cabin and away
from him, down the trail, with long, easy steps. Only once more she drew
her hand across her eyes, and with head held high moved rapidly on.
Never did she look to the right or the left or she must have seen him as
he stood, scarcely breathing and hard beset to hold himself back and
allow her to pass him thus.
Now he knew that she had been deeply stirred by him, and the revelation
fell upon his spirit, filling him with a joy more intense than anything
he had ever felt or experienced before, so poignantly sweet that it hurt
him. Had he indeed entered into her dreams and become an undercurrent in
her life even as she had in his, and did her soul and body ache for him
as his for her?
Then he suffered remorse for what he had done. How long she had defended
herself by that wall of impersonality with which she had surrounded
herself! He had beaten down the ramparts and trampled in the garden of
her soul. As he stood in the door of his cabin, the place seemed to
breathe of her presence. She had made a veritable bower of it for his
return. Every sweet thing she had gathered for him, as if, out of her
love and her sorrow, she had meant to bring to him an especial blessing.
A shallow basin filled with wild forget-me-nots stood on the shelf
before his mother's picture. Ferns and vines fell over the stone mantle,
and in earthen jars of mountain ware the early rhododendron, with its
delicate, pearly pink blossoms, filled the dark corners. Masses of the
plumed white ash shook feathery tassels along the walls, making the air
sweet with their fragrance. Ah, how clean and fresh everything was! All
his disorder was set to rights, and fresh linen was on his bed in his
canvas room.
Even his table was laid with his small store of dishes, and food placed
upon it, still covered in the basket he was now so accustomed to see.
Sweet and dainty it all was. He had only to light the fat pine sticks
laid beneath the kettle swung above and make his tea, and his meal was
ready. Had she divined he would not stop at the Fall Place this time,
when in the past it had been his custom to do so? Ah, she knew; for is
not the little winged god a wonderful teacher?
Thryng was humbled in the very dust and ashes of repentance as he sat
down to his late dinner. The fragrance in the room, all he ate,
everything he touched, filled his senses with her; and he--he had only
brought her sorrow. He had come into her life but to bruise her spirit
and leave her sad at heart with a deep sadness he dared not and could
not alleviate. He lifted a pale purple orchid she had placed in a
tumbler at his hand and examined it. Evidently she had thought this the
choicest of all the woodland treasures she had brought him, and had
placed it there, a sweet message. What should he do? Ah, what could he
do? He must not see her yet--at least not until to-morrow.
Later, David brought in his specimens and occupied himself with his
microscope. He had begun a careful study of certain destructive things.
Even here in the wild he found them, evil and unwholesome, clinging to
the well and strong, slowly but surely sapping the vitality of those who
gave them life. Every evil, he thought, must, in the economy of nature,
have its antidote. So, with the ardor of the scientist, he divided with
care the nasty, pasty growth he had found and prepared his plates.
Systematically he made drawings and notes as he studied the magnified
atoms beneath his powerful lens, and while he sat absorbed in his work,
Hoyle's childish voice piped at him from the doorway.
"Howdy, Doctah Thryng."
"Why, hello! Howdy!" said David, without looking up from his work.
"What you got in that thar gol' machine? Kin I look, too?"
"What have I got? Why--I've got a bit of the devil in here."
"Whar'd you git him? Huh?"
"Oh, I found him along the road between here and the station."
"Did--did he come on the cyars with you? Whar war he at? Hu come he in
thar?" David did not reply for an instant, and the awed child drew a
step nearer. "Whar war he at?" he insisted. "Hu come he in thar?"
"He was hanging to a bush as I came along, and I put him in my box and
brought him home and cut him up and put a little bit of him in here."
Then there was silence, and David forgot the small boy until he heard a
deep-drawn sigh behind him. Looking up for the first time, he saw him
standing aloof, a look of terror in his wide eyes as if he fain would
run away, but could not from sheer fright. Poor little mite! David in
his playful speech had not dreamed of being taken in earnest. He drew
the child to his side, where he cuddled gladly, nestling his twisted
little body close, partly for protection, and partly in love.
"You reckon he's plumb dade?" David could feel the child's heart beating
in a heavy labored way against his arm as he held him, and, pushing his
papers one side, he lifted him to his knee.
"Do I reckon who's dead?" he asked absently, with his ear pressed to the
child's back.
"The devil what you done brought home in yuer box."
"Dead? Oh, yes. He's dead--good and dead. Sit still a moment--so--now
take a long breath. A long one--deep--that's right. Now another--so."
"What fer?"
"I want to hear your heart beat."
"Kin you hear hit?"
"Yes--don't talk, a minute,--that'll do."
"What you want to hear my heart beat fer? I kin feel hit. Kin you feel
yourn? Be they more'n one devil?"
"Heaps of them."
"When I go back, you reckon I'll find 'em hanging on the bushes? Do
they hang by ther tails, like 'possums does?"
Comfortable and happy where he was, the little fellow dreaded the
distance he must traverse to reach his home under the peculiar phenomena
of devils hanging to the bushes along his route.
"Oh, no, no. Here, I'll show you what I mean." Then he explained
carefully to the child what he really meant, showing him some of the
strange and beautiful ways of nature, and at last allowing him to look
into the microscope to see the little cells and rays. As he patiently
and kindly taught, he was pleased with the child's eager, receptive mind
and naive admiration. Towards evening Hoyle was sent home, quite at rest
concerning devils and all their kin, and radiantly happy with a box of
many colored pencils and a blank drawing-book, which David had brought
him from Farington.
"I kin larn to make things like you b'en makin' with these, an' Cass,
she'll he'p me," he cried.
"What is Cass doing to-day?" David ventured.
"She be'n up here most all mornin', an' I he'ped get the light ud fer
fire, an' then she sont me home to he'p maw whilst she stayed to fix
up."
"But now, I mean, when you came up here?"
"Weavin' in the loom shed. Maw, she has a lot o' little biddies. The ol'
hen hatched 'em, she did."
"What have you done to your thumb?" asked David, seeing it tied about
with a rag.
"I plunked hit with the hammer when I war a-makin' houses fer the
biddies. I nailed 'em, I did."
"You made the chicken coops? Well, you are a clever little chap. Let me
see your hand."
"Yas, maw said I war that, too."
"But you weren't very clever to do this. Whew! What did you hit your
thumb like that for?"
"Dunno." He looked ruefully at the crushed member which the doctor laved
gently and soothingly.
"Why didn't you come to me with it?"
"Maw 'lowed the' wa'n't no use pesterin' you with eve'ything. She tol'
me eve'y man had to larn to hit a nail on the haid."
David laughed, and the child trotted away happy, his hand in a sling
made of one of the doctor's linen handkerchiefs, and his box of pencils
and his book hugged to his irregularly beating heart; but it was with a
grave face that Thryng saw him disappear among the great masses of pink
laurel bloom.
That evening, as the glow in the west deepened and died away and the
stars came out one by one and sent their slender rays down upon the
hills, David sat on his rock with his flute in his hand, waiting for a
moment to arrive when he could put it to his lips and send out the
message of glad hopes he had sent before. She had asked that one little
thing, that his music might still be glad, and so for Cassandra's sake
it must be.
He tried once and again, but he could not play. At last, putting away
from him his repentant thoughts, he gave his heart full sway, saying to
himself: "For this moment I will imagine harmlessly that my vision is
all mine and my dream come true. It is the only way." Then he played as
if it were he whom she had kissed so passionately, instead of his flute;
and thus it was the glad notes were falling on her spirit when Frale
found her.