MARY POTTER AND HER SON.
While Gilbert was dismounting at the gate leading into his barn-yard, he
was suddenly accosted by a boyish voice:--
“Got back, have you?”
This was Sam, the “bound-boy,”--the son of a tenant on the old Carson
place, who, in consideration of three months' schooling every winter,
and a “freedom suit” at the age of seventeen, if he desired then to
learn a trade, was duly made over by his father to Gilbert Potter. His
position was something between that of a poor relation and a servant. He
was one of the family, eating at the same table, sleeping, indeed, (for
economy of house-work,) in the same bed with his master, and privileged
to feel his full share of interest in domestic matters; but on the other
hand bound to obedience and rigid service.
“Feed's in the trough,” said he, taking hold of the bridle. “I'll fix
him. Better go into th' house. Tea's wanted.”
Feeling as sure that all the necessary evening's work was done as if he
had performed it with his own hands, Gilbert silently followed the boy's
familiar advice.
The house, built like most other old farm-houses in that part of the
county, of hornblende stone, stood near the bottom of a rounded knoll,
overhanging the deep, winding valley. It was two stories in height, the
gable looking towards the road, and showing, just under the broad double
chimney, a limestone slab, upon which were rudely carved the initials of
the builder and his wife, and the date “1727.” A low portico, overgrown
with woodbine and trumpet-flower, ran along the front. In the narrow
flower-bed, under it, the crocuses and daffodils were beginning to
thrust up their blunt, green points. A walk of flag-stones separated
them from the vegetable garden, which was bounded at the bottom by a
mill-race, carrying half the water of the creek to the saw and grist
mill on the other side of the road.
Although this road was the principal thoroughfare between Kennett
Square and Wilmington, the house was so screened from the observation
of travellers, both by the barn, and by some huge, spreading apple-trees
which occupied the space between the garden and road, that its inmates
seemed to live in absolute seclusion. Looking from the front door across
a narrow green meadow, a wooded hill completely shut out all glimpse of
the adjoining farms; while an angle of the valley, to the eastward, hid
from sight the warm, fertile fields higher up the stream.
The place seemed lonelier than ever in the gloomy March twilight; or
was it some other influence which caused Gilbert to pause on the flagged
walk, and stand there, motionless, looking down into the meadow until a
woman's shadow crossing the panes, was thrown upon the square of lighted
earth at his feet? Then he turned and entered the kitchen.
The cloth was spread and the table set. A kettle, humming on a heap
of fresh coals, and a squat little teapot of blue china, were waiting
anxiously for the brown paper parcel which he placed upon the cloth. His
mother was waiting also, in a high straight-backed rocking-chair, with
her hands in her lap.
“You're tired waiting, mother, I suppose?” he said, as he hung his hat
upon a nail over the heavy oak mantel-piece.
“No, not tired, Gilbert, but it's hungry _you'll_ be. It won't take long
for the tea to draw. Everything else has been ready this half-hour.”
Gilbert threw himself upon the settle under the front window, and
mechanically followed her with his eyes, as she carefully measured the
precious herb, even stooping to pick up a leaf or two that had fallen
from the spoon to the floor.
The resemblance between mother and son was very striking. Mary Potter
had the same square forehead and level eyebrows, but her hair was darker
than Gilbert's, and her eyes more deeply set. The fire of a lifelong
pain smouldered in them, and the throes of some never-ending struggle
had sharpened every line of cheek and brow, and taught her lips the
close, hard compression, which those of her son were also beginning to
learn. She was about forty-five years of age, but there was even now a
weariness in her motions, as if her prime of strength were already past.
She wore a short gown of brown flannel, with a plain linen stomacher,
and a coarse apron, which she removed when the supper had been placed
upon the table. A simple cap, with a narrow frill, covered her head.
The entire work of the household devolved upon her hands alone. Gilbert
would have cheerfully taken a servant to assist her, but this she
positively refused, seeming to court constant labor, especially during
his absence from the house. Only when he was there would she take
occasion to knit or sew. The kitchen was a marvel of neatness and
order. The bread-trough and dresser-shelves were scoured almost to the
whiteness of a napkin, and the rows of pewter-plates upon the latter
flashed like silver sconces. To Gilbert's eyes, indeed, the effect was
sometimes painful. He would have been satisfied with less laborious
order, a less eager and unwearied thrift. To be sure, all this was in
furtherance of a mutual purpose; but he mentally determined that when
the purpose had been fulfilled, he would insist upon an easier and more
cheerful arrangement. The stern aspect of life from which his nature
craved escape met him oftenest at home.
Sam entered the kitchen barefooted, having left his shoes at the back
door. The tea was drawn, and the three sat down to their supper of
bacon, bread and butter, and apple-sauce. Gilbert and his mother ate and
drank in silence, but Sam's curiosity was too lively to be restrained.
“I say, how did Roger go?” he asked.
Mary Potter looked up, as if expecting the question to be answered, and
Gilbert said:--
“He took the lead, and kept it.”
“O cracky!” exclaimed the delighted Sam.
“Then you think it's a good bargain, Gilbert. Was it a long chase? Was
he well tried?”
“All right, mother. I could sell him for twenty dollars advance--even to
Joel Ferris,” he answered.
He then gave a sketch of the afternoon's adventures, to which his mother
listened with a keen, steady interest. She compelled him to describe the
stranger, Fortune, as minutely as possible, as if desirous of finding
some form or event in her own memory to which he could be attached; but
without result.
After supper Sam squatted upon a stool in the corner of the fireplace,
and resumed his reading of “The Old English Baron,” by the light of the
burning back-log, pronouncing every word to himself in something
between a whisper and a whistle. Gilbert took an account-book, a
leaden inkstand, and a stumpy pen from a drawer under the window, and
calculated silently and somewhat laboriously. His mother produced a
clocked stocking of blue wool, and proceeded to turn the heel.
In half an hour's time, however, Sam's whispering ceased; his head
nodded violently, and the book fell upon the hearth.
“I guess I'll go to bed,” he said; and having thus conscientiously
announced his intention, he trotted up the steep back-stairs on his
hands and feet. In two minutes more, a creaking overhead announced that
the act was accomplished.
Gilbert filliped the ink out of his pen into the fire, laid it in his
book, and turned away from the table.
“Roger has bottom,” he said at last, “and he's as strong as a lion.
He and Fox will make a good team, and the roads will be solid in three
days, if it don't rain.”
“Why, you don't mean,”--she commenced.
“Yes, mother. You were not for buying him, I know, and you were right,
inasmuch as there is always _some_ risk. But it will make a difference
of two barrels a load, besides having a horse at home. If I plough both
for corn and oats next week,--and it will be all the better for corn,
as the field next to Carson's is heavy,--I can begin hauling the week
after, and we'll have the interest by the first of April, without
borrowing a penny.”
“That would be good,--very good, indeed,” said she, dropping her
knitting, and hesitating a moment before she continued; “only--only,
Gilbert, I didn't expect you would be going so soon.”
“The sooner I begin, mother, the sooner I shall finish.”
“I know that, Gilbert,--I know that; but I'm always looking forward to
the time when you won't be bound to go at all. Not that Sam and I can't
manage awhile--but if the money was paid once”--
“There's less than six hundred now, altogether. It's a good deal to
scrape together in a year's time, but if it can be done I will do
it. Perhaps, then, you will let some help come into the house. I'm as
anxious as you can be, mother. I'm not of a roving disposition, that you
know; yet it isn't pleasant to me to see you slave as you do, and for
that very reason, it's a comfort when I'm away, that you've one less to
work for.”
He spoke earnestly, turning his face full upon her.
“We've talked this over, often and often, but you never can make me see
it in your way,” he then added, in a gentler tone.
“Ay, Gilbert,” she replied, somewhat bitterly, “I've had my thoughts.
Maybe they were too fast; it seems so. I meant, and mean, to make a good
home for you, and I'm happiest when I can do the most towards it. I want
you to hold up your head and be beholden to no man. There are them in
the neighborhood that were bound out as boys, and are now as good as the
best.”
“But they are not,”--burst from his lips, as the thought on which he
so gloomily brooded sprang to the surface and took him by surprise. He
checked his words by a powerful effort, and the blood forsook his face.
Mary Potter placed her hand on her heart, and seemed to gasp for breath.
Gilbert could not bear to look upon her face. He turned away, placed his
elbow on the table, and leaned his head upon his hand. It never occurred
to him that the unfinished sentence might be otherwise completed. He
knew that his _thought_ was betrayed, and his heart was suddenly filled
with a tumult of shame, pity, and fear.
For a minute there was silence. Only the long pendulum, swinging openly
along the farther wall, ticked at each end of its vibration. Then Mary
Potter drew a deep, weary breath, and spoke. Her voice was hollow and
strange, and each word came as by a separate muscular effort.
“_What_ are they not? What word was on your tongue, Gilbert?”
He could not answer. He could only shake his head, and bring forth a
cowardly, evasive word,--“Nothing.”
“But there _is_ something! Oh, I knew it must come some time!” she
cried, rather to herself than to him. “Listen to me, Gilbert! Has any
one dared to say to your face that you are basely born?”
He felt, now, that no further evasion was possible; she had put into
words the terrible question which he could not steel his own heart to
ask. Perhaps it was better so,--better a sharp, intense pain than a dull
perpetual ache. So he answered honestly now, but still kept his head
turned away, as if there might be a kindness in avoiding her gaze.
“Not in so many words, mother,” he said; “but there are ways, and
ways of saying a thing; and the cruellest way is that which everybody
understands, and I dare not. But I have long known what it meant. It is
ten years, mother, since I have mentioned the word '_father_' in your
hearing.”
Mary Potter leaned forward, hid her face in her hands, and rocked to and
fro, as if tortured with insupportable pain. She stifled her sobs, but
the tears gushed forth between her fingers.
“O my boy,--my boy!” she moaned. “Ten years?--and you believed it, all
that time!”
He was silent. She leaned forward and grasped his arm.
“Did you,--_do_ you believe it? Speak, Gilbert!”
When he did speak, his voice was singularly low and gentle. “Never mind,
mother!” was all he could say. His head was still turned away from her,
but she knew there were tears on his cheeks.
“Gilbert, it is a lie!” she exclaimed, with startling vehemence. “A
lie,--A LIE! You are my lawful son, born in wedlock! There is no stain
upon your name, of my giving, and I know there will be none of your
own.”
He turned towards her, his eyes shining and his lips parted in
breathless joy and astonishment.
“Is it--is it true?” he whispered.
“True as there is a God in Heaven.”
“Then, mother, give me my name! Now I ask you, for the first time, who
was my father?”
She wrung her hands and moaned. The sight of her son's eager, expectant
face, touched with a light which she had never before seen upon it,
seemed to give her another and a different pang.
“That, too!” She murmured to herself.
“Gilbert,” she then said, “have I always been a faithful mother to you?
Have I been true and honest in word and deed? Have I done my best to
help you in all right ways,--to make you comfortable, to spare you
trouble? Have I ever,--I'll not say acted, for nobody's judgment is
perfect,--but tried to act otherwise than as I thought it might be for
your good?”
“You have done all that you could say, and more, mother.”
“Then, my boy, is it too much for me to ask that you should believe my
word,--that you should let it stand for the truth, without my giving
proofs and testimonies? For, Gilbert, that I _must_ ask of you, hard as
it may seem. If you will only be content with the knowledge--: but then,
you have felt the shame all this while; it was my fault, mine, and I
ought to ask your forgiveness”--
“Mother--mother!” he interrupted, “don't talk that way! Yes--I believe
you, without testimony. You never said, or thought, an untruth; and
your explanation will be enough not only for me, but for the whole
neighborhood, if all witnesses are dead or gone away. If you knew of the
shameful report, why didn't you deny it at once? Why let it spread and
be believed in?”
“Oh,” she moaned again, “if my tongue was not tied--if my tongue was not
tied! There was my fault, and what a punishment! Never--never was woman
punished as I have been. Gilbert, whatever you do, bind yourself by no
vow, except in the sight of men!”
“I do not understand you, mother,” said he.
“No, and I dare not make myself understood. Don't ask me anything more!
It's hard to shut my mouth, and bear everything in silence, but it cuts
my very heart in twain to speak and not tell!”
Her distress was so evident, that Gilbert, perplexed and bewildered as
her words left him, felt that he dared not press her further. He could
not doubt the truth of her first assertion; but, alas! it availed only
for his own private consciousness,--it took no stain from him, in the
eyes of the world. Yet, now that the painful theme had been opened,--not
less painful, it seemed, since the suspected dishonor did not exist,--he
craved and decided to ask, enlightenment on one point.
“Mother,” he said, after a pause, “I do not want to speak about this
thing again. I believe you, and my greatest comfort in believing is
for your sake, not for mine. I see, too, that you are bound in some way
which I do not understand, so that we cannot be cleared from the blame
that is put upon us. I don't mind that so much, either--for my own sake,
and I will not ask for an explanation, since you say you dare not give
it. But tell me one thing,--will it always be so? Are you bound forever,
and will I never learn anything more? I can wait; but, mother, you know
that these things work in a man's mind, and there will come a time when
the knowledge of the worst thing that could be will seem better than no
knowledge at all.”
Her face brightened a little. “Thank you, Gilbert!” she said. “Yes;
there will come a day when you shall know all,--when you and me shall
have justice. I do not know how soon; I cannot guess. In the Lord's good
time. I have nigh out-suffered my fault, I think, and the reward cannot
be far off. A few weeks, perhaps,--yet, maybe, for oh, I am not allowed
even to hope for it!--maybe a few years. It will all come to the light,
after so long--so long--an eternity. If I had but known!”
“Come, we will say no more now. Surely I may wait a little while, when
you have waited so long. I believe you, mother. Yes, I believe you; I am
your lawful son.”
She rose, placed her hands on his shoulders, and kissed him. Nothing
more was said.
Gilbert raked the ashes over the smouldering embers on the hearth,
lighted his mother's night-lamp, and after closing the chamber-door
softly behind her, stole up-stairs to his own bed.
It was long past midnight before he slept.