[Illustration: 9247]
T was just at the break of day the following morning. Major Warren, who
had not retired until late the night before in his perturbed state of
mind over the calamity which hovered in the air, was sleeping lightly,
when he was awakened by the almost noiseless presence of some one in his
room. Sitting up in bed he stared through the half darkness at a form
which towered straight and still between him and the open window through
which the first touches of the new day were stealing. “Who's there?” he
demanded, sharply.
“It's me, Marse William--Lewis.”
“Oh, you!” The Major put his feet down to the rug at the side of
his bed, still not fully awake. “Well, is it time to get up?
Anything--wrong? Oh, I remember now--Pete!”
A groan from the great chest of the negro set the air to vibrating, but
he said nothing, and the old gentleman saw the bald pate suddenly sink.
“Oh, Lewis, I hope--” Major Warren paused, unable to continue, so vast
and grewsome were the fears his servant's attitude had inspired. The old
negro took a step or two forward and then said: “Oh, marster, dey done
tuck 'im out las' night--dey tuck my po' boy--” A great sob rose in old
Lewis's breast and burst on his lips.
“Really, you don't mean it--you can't, after--”
“Yasser, yasser; he daid, marster. Pete done gone! Dey killed 'im las'
night, Marse William.”
“But--but how do you know?”
“I des dis minute seed Jake Tobines; he slipped up ter my house en
called me out. Jake lives back 'hind de jail, Marse William, en when de
mob come him en his wife heard de racket en slipped out in de co'n-patch
ter hide. He seed de gang, marster, wid his own eyes, en heard um ax fer
de boy. At fus Marse Barrett refused ter give 'im up, but dey ordered
fire on 'im en he let um have de keys. Jake seed um fetch Pete out, en
heard 'im beggin' um ter spar' his life, but dey drug 'im off.”
There was silence broken only by the old negro's sobs and the smothered
effort he was making to restrain his emotion.
“And mammy,” the Major began, presently; “has she heard?”
“Not yit, marster, but she is awake--she been awake all night long--on
her knees prayin' most er de time fer mercy--she was awake when Jake
come en she knowed I went out ter speak ter 'im, en when I come back
in de house, marster, she went in de kitchen. I know what she done dat
fur--she didn't want ter know, suh, fer certain, ef I'd heard bad news
or not. I wanted ter let 'er know, but I was afeared ter tell 'er, en come
away. I loves my wife, marster--I--I loves her mo' now dat Pete's gone
dan ever befo'. I loves 'er mo' since she been had ter suffer dis way,
en, marster, dis gwine ter kill 'er. It gwine ter kill Lindy, Marse
William.”
“What's the matter, father?” It was Helen Warren's voice, and with a
look of growing terror on her face she stood peering through the open
doorway. The Major ejaculated a hurried and broken explanation, and with
little, intermittent gasps of horror the young lady advanced to the old
negro.
“Does Mam' Linda know?” she asked, her face ghastly and set in
sculptural rigidity.
“Not yet, missy, not yet--it gwine ter kill yo' ol' mammy, child.”
“Yes, it may,” Helen said, an odd, alien quality of resignation in her
voice. “I suppose I'd better go and break it to her. Father, Pete was
innocent, absolutely innocent. Carson Dwight assured me of it. He was
innocent, and yet--oh!”
With a shudder she turned back to her room across the hall. In the
stillness the sound of the match she struck to light her lamp was
raspingly audible. Without another word, and wringing the extended hand
of his wordless master, Lewis crept down the stairs and out into the
pale light of early morning. Like an old tree fiercely beaten by a
storm, he leaned towards the earth. He looked about him absently for a
moment, and then sat down on the edge of the veranda floor and lowered
his head to his brown, sinewy hands.
A negro woman with a milk-pail on her arm came up the walk from the
gate and started round the house to the kitchen door, but seeing him
she stopped and leaned over him. “Is what Jake done say de trufe?” she
asked.
“Yassum, yassum, it done over, Mary Lou--done over,” Lewis said, looking
up at her from his blearing eyes; “but ef you see Lindy don't let on ter
her yit. Young miss gwine ter tell 'er fust.”
“Oh, my Lawd, it done over, den!” the woman said, shudderingly; “it
gwine ter go hard with Mam' Lindy, Unc' Lewis.”
“It gwine ter _kill_ 'er, Mary Lou; she won't live dis week out. I know
'er. She had ernough dis life wid all she been thoo fur 'erself en her
white folks, in bondage en out, en' dis gwine ter settle 'er. I don't
blame 'er. I'm done thoo myse'f. Ef de Lawd had spar' my child, I
wouldn't er ax mo', but, Mary Lou, I hope I ain't gwine ter stay long.
I'll hear dat po' boy beggin' fer mercy every minute while I live, en
what I want mo' of it fur? Shucks! no, I'm raidy--en, 'fo' God, I wish
dey had er tuck us all three at once. Dat ud 'a' been some comfort, but
fer Pete ter be by hisse'f beggin' um ter spar' 'im--all by hisse'f, en
me 'n his mammy--”
The old man's head went down and his body shook with sobs. The woman
looked at him a moment, and then, wiping her eyes on her apron, she went
on her way.
A few minutes later, just as the red sun was rising in a clear sky and
turning the night's moisture into dazzling gems on the grass and leaves
of trees and shrubbery, like the beneficent smile of God upon a pleasing
world, Helen descended the stairs. She had the sweet, pale face of a
suffering nun as she paused, looked down on the old servant, and caught
his piteous and yet grateful, upturned glance.
“I'm going to her now, Uncle Lewis,” she said. “I want to be the first
to tell her.”
“Yes, you mus' be de one,” Lewis sighed, as he rose stiffly; “you de
onliest one.”
He shambled along in her wake, his old hat, out of respect for her
presence, grasped in his tense hand. As they drew near the little
sagging gate at the cottage there was a sound of moving feet within,
and Linda stood in the doorway shading her eyes from the rays of the sun
with her fat hand. To the end of her life Helen had the memory of the
old woman's face stamped on her brain. It was a yellow mask, which might
have belonged to a dead as well as a living creature, behind which the
lights of hope and shadows of despair were vying with each other for
supremacy. In no thing pertaining to the situation did the pathos so
piteously lie as in the fact that Linda was deliberately playing a
part--fiercely acting a rôle that would fit itself to that for which the
agony of her soul was pleading. She was trying to smile away the shadows
her inward fears, her racial intuition were casting on her face.
“Mighty early fer you ter come, honey,” she said; “but I reckon you is
worried 'bout yo' ol' mammy.”
“Yes, it's early for me to be up,” Helen said, avoiding the wavering
glance that seemed in reality to be avoiding the revelation of hers.
“But I saw Uncle Lewis and thought I'd come back with him.”
“You hain't had yo' breakfast yit, honey, I know,” said Linda, reaching
for a chair half-heartedly and placing it for her young mistress, and
then her eyes fell on her husband's bareheaded, bowed attitude as he
stood at the gate, and something in it, through her sense of sight, gave
her a deadening blow. For an instant she almost reeled; she drew a deep
breath, a breath that swelled out her great, motherly bosom, then with
her hands hanging limply at her side, she stood in front of Helen. For
a moment she did not speak, and then, with her face on fire, her great,
somnolent eyes ablaze, she suddenly bent down and put her hands on
Helen's knees and said: “Looky here, honey, I've been afraid of it all
night long, an' I've fit it off an' fit it off, an' I got up dis mawnin'
fightin' it off, but ef you come here so early 'ca'se--ef you come here
ter tell me dat my child--ef you come here--ef you come here--gre't God
on high, it ain't so! it cayn't be dat way! Look me in de eyes, honey,
I'm raidy en waitin' fer you ter give it de lie.”
For one moment she glared at Helen as the girl sat white and quivering,
her glance on the floor, and then she uttered a piercing scream like
that of a frightened beast, and grasping the hand of her husband, who
was now by her side, she pointed a finger of stone at Helen. “Look!
Look, Lewis; my Gawd, she _ain't lookin' at me!_ Look at me, honey
chile; look at me! D' you hear me say--” She stood firmly for an instant
and then she reeled into her husband's arms.
“She daid; whut I tol you? Missy, yo' ol' mammy daid,” and lifting his
wife in his arms he bore her to the bed in the corner of the room. “Yes,
she done daid,” he groaned, as he straightened up.
“No, she's only fainted,” said Helen; “bring me the camphor, quick!”