Nevertheless, as Colonel Courtland rode deliberately towards Dows'
Folly, as the new experiment was locally called, although he had not
abated his romantic enthusiasm in the least, he was not sorry that he
was able to visit it under a practical pretext. It was rather late now
to seek out Miss Sally Dows with the avowed intent of bringing her a
letter from an admirer who had been dead three years, and whose memory
she had probably buried. Neither was it tactful to recall a sentiment
which might have been a weakness of which she was ashamed. Yet,
clear-headed and logical as Courtland was in his ordinary affairs, he
was nevertheless not entirely free from that peculiar superstition which
surrounds every man's romance. He believed there was something more than
a mere coincidence in his unexpectedly finding himself in such favorable
conditions for making her acquaintance. For the rest--if there was any
rest--he would simply trust to fate. And so, believing himself a
cool, sagacious reasoner, but being actually, as far as Miss Dows was
concerned, as blind, fatuous, and unreasoning as any of her previous
admirers, he rode complacently forward until he reached the lane that
led to the Dows plantation.
Here a better kept roadway and fence, whose careful repair would
have delighted Drummond, seemed to augur well for the new enterprise.
Presently, even the old-fashioned local form of the fence, a slanting
zigzag, gave way to the more direct line of post and rail in the
Northern fashion. Beyond it presently appeared a long low frontage of
modern buildings which, to Courtland's surprise, were entirely new in
structure and design. There was no reminiscence of the usual Southern
porticoed gable or columned veranda. Yet it was not Northern either. The
factory-like outline of facade was partly hidden in Cherokee rose and
jessamine.
A long roofed gallery connected the buildings and became a veranda to
one. A broad, well-rolled gravel drive led from the open gate to the
newest building, which seemed to be the office; a smaller path diverged
from it to the corner house, which, despite its severe simplicity, had a
more residential appearance. Unlike Reed's house, there were no lounging
servants or field hands to be seen; they were evidently attending to
their respective duties. Dismounting, Courtland tied his horse to a post
at the office door and took the smaller path to the corner house.
The door was open to the fragrant afternoon breeze wafted through the
rose and jessamine. So also was a side door opening from the hall into
a long parlor or sitting-room that ran the whole width of the house.
Courtland entered it. It was prettily furnished, but everything had the
air of freshness and of being uncharacteristically new. It was empty,
but a faint hammering was audible on the rear wall of the house, through
the two open French windows at the back, curtained with trailing vines,
which gave upon a sunlit courtyard. Courtland walked to the window. Just
before it, on the ground, stood a small light ladder, which he gently
put aside to gain a better view of the courtyard as he put on his hat,
and stepped out of the open window.
In this attitude he suddenly felt his hat tipped from his head, followed
almost instantaneously by a falling slipper, and the distinct impression
of a very small foot on the crown of his head. An indescribable
sensation passed over him. He hurriedly stepped back into the room, just
as a small striped-stockinged foot was as hastily drawn up above the top
of the window with the feminine exclamation, “Good gracious me!”
Lingering for an instant, only to assure himself that the fair speaker
had secured her foothold and was in no danger of falling, Courtland
snatched up his hat, which had providentially fallen inside the room,
and retreated ingloriously to the other end of the parlor. The voice
came again from the window, and struck him as being very sweet and
clear:--
“Sophy, is that YOU?”
Courtland discreetly retired to the hall. To his great relief a voice
from the outside answered, “Whar, Miss Sally?”
“What did yo' move the ladder for? Yo' might have killed me.”
“Fo' God, Miss Sally, I didn't move no ladder!”
“Don't tell me, but go down and get my slipper. And bring up some more
nails.”
Courtland waited silently in the hall. In a few moments he heard a heavy
footstep outside the rear window. This was his opportunity. Re-entering
the parlor somewhat ostentatiously, he confronted a tall negro girl
who was passing through the room carrying a tiny slipper in her hand.
“Excuse me,” he said politely, “but I could not find any one to announce
me. Is Miss Dows at home?”
The girl instantly whipped the slipper behind her. “Is yo' wanting Miss
Mirandy Dows,” she asked with great dignity, “oah Miss Sally Dows--her
niece? Miss Mirandy's bin gone to Atlanta for a week.”
“I have a letter for Miss Miranda, but I shall be very glad if Miss
Sally Dows will receive me,” returned Courtland, handing the letter and
his card to the girl.
She received it with a still greater access of dignity and marked
deliberation. “It's clean gone outer my mind, sah, ef Miss Sally is in
de resumption of visitahs at dis houah. In fac', sah,” she continued,
with intensified gravity and an exaggeration of thoughtfulness as the
sounds of Miss Sally's hammering came shamelessly from the wall, “I
doahn know exac'ly ef she's engaged playin' de harp, practicin' de
languages, or paintin' in oil and watah colors, o' givin' audiences to
offishals from de Court House. It might be de houah for de one or de
odder. But I'll communicate wid her, sah, in de budwoh on de uppah
flo'.” She backed dexterously, so as to keep the slipper behind her, but
with no diminution of dignity, out of a side door. In another moment the
hammering ceased, followed by the sound of rapid whispering without; a
few tiny twigs and leaves slowly rustled to the ground, and then there
was complete silence. He ventured to walk to the fateful window again.
Presently he heard a faint rustle at the other end of the room, and he
turned. A sudden tremulousness swept along his pulses, and then they
seemed to pause; he drew a deep breath that was almost a sigh, and
remained motionless.
He had no preconceived idea of falling in love with Miss Sally at first
sight, nor had he dreamed such a thing possible. Even the girlish face
that he had seen in the locket, although it had stirred him with a
singular emotion, had not suggested that. And the ideal he had evolved
from it was never a potent presence. But the exquisitely pretty face
and figure before him, although it might have been painted from his own
fancy of her, was still something more and something unexpected. All
that had gone before had never prepared him for the beautiful girl who
now stood there. It was a poor explanation to say that Miss Sally was
four or five years older than her picture, and that later experiences,
enlarged capacity, a different life, and new ambition had impressed her
youthful face with a refined mobility; it was a weird fancy to imagine
that the blood of those who had died for her had in some vague,
mysterious way imparted an actual fascination to her, and he dismissed
it. But even the most familiar spectator, like Sophy, could see that
Miss Sally had the softest pink complexion, the silkiest hair, that
looked as the floss of the Indian corn might look if curled, or golden
spider threads if materialized, and eyes that were in bright gray
harmony with both; that the frock of India muslin, albeit home-made,
fitted her figure perfectly, from the azure bows on her shoulders to the
ribbon around her waist; and that the hem of its billowy skirt showed a
foot which had the reputation of being the smallest foot south of Mason
and Dixon's Line! But it was something more intangible than this which
kept Courtland breathless and silent.
“I'm not Miss Miranda Dows,” said the vision with a frankness that was
half childlike and half practical, as she extended a little hand, “but I
can talk 'fahm' with yo' about as well as aunty, and I reckon from what
Major Reed says heah,” holding up the letter between her fingers, “as
long as yo' get the persimmons yo' don't mind what kind o' pole yo'
knock 'em down with.”
The voice that carried this speech was so fresh, clear, and sweet that I
am afraid Courtland thought little of its bluntness or its conventional
transgressions. But it brought him his own tongue quite unemotionally
and quietly. “I don't know what was in that note, Miss Dows, but I can
hardly believe that Major Reed ever put my present felicity quite in
that way.”
Miss Sally laughed. Then with a charming exaggeration she waved her
little hand towards the sofa.
“There! Yo' naturally wanted a little room for that, co'nnle, but now
that yo' 've got it off,--and mighty pooty it was, too,--yo' can sit
down.” And with that she sank down at one end of the sofa, prettily drew
aside a white billow of skirt so as to leave ample room for Courtland
at the other, and clasping her fingers over her knees, looked demurely
expectant.
“But let me hope that I am not disturbing you unseasonably,” said
Courtland, catching sight of the fateful little slipper beneath her
skirt, and remembering the window. “I was so preoccupied in thinking of
your aunt as the business manager of these estates that I quite forget
that she might have a lady's hours for receiving.”
“We haven't got any company hours,” said Miss Sally, “and we haven't
just now any servants for company manners, for we're short-handed in the
fields and barns. When yo' came I was nailing up the laths for the vines
outside, because we couldn't spare carpenters from the factory. But,”
she added, with a faint accession of mischief in her voice, “yo' came to
talk about the fahm?”
“Yes,” said Courtland, rising, “but not to interrupt the work on it.
Will you let me help you nail up the laths on the wall? I have some
experience that way, and we can talk as we work. Do oblige me!”
The young girl looked at him brightly.
“Well, now, there's nothing mean about THAT. Yo' mean it for sure?”
“Perfectly. I shall feel so much less as if I was enjoying your company
under false pretenses.”
“Yo' just wait here, then.”
She jumped from the sofa, ran out of the room, and returned presently,
tying the string of a long striped cotton blouse--evidently an extra one
of Sophy's--behind her back as she returned. It was gathered under her
oval chin by a tape also tied behind her, while her fair hair was tucked
under the usual red bandana handkerchief of the negro housemaid. It is
scarcely necessary to add that the effect was bewitching.
“But,” said Miss Sally, eying her guest's smartly fitting frock-coat,
“yo' 'll spoil yo'r pooty clothes, sure! Take off yo'r coat--don't mind
me--and work in yo'r shirtsleeves.”
Courtland obediently flung aside his coat and followed his active
hostess through the French window to the platform outside. Above them a
wooden ledge or cornice, projecting several inches, ran the whole length
of the building. It was on this that Miss Sally had evidently found a
foothold while she was nailing up a trellis-work of laths between it and
the windows of the second floor. Courtland found the ladder, mounted
to the ledge, followed by the young girl, who smilingly waived his
proffered hand to help her up, and the two gravely set to work. But in
the intervals of hammering and tying up the vines Miss Sally's tongue
was not idle. Her talk was as fresh, as quaint, as original as herself,
and yet so practical and to the purpose of Courtland's visit as to
excuse his delight in it and her own fascinating propinquity. Whether
she stopped to take a nail from between her pretty lips when she spoke
to him, or whether holding on perilously with one hand to the trellis
while she gesticulated with the hammer, pointing out the divisions of
the plantation from her coign of vantage, he thought she was as clear
and convincing to his intellect as she was distracting to his senses.
She told him how the war had broken up their old home in Pineville,
sending her father to serve in the Confederate councils of Richmond,
and leaving her aunt and herself to manage the property alone; how the
estate had been devastated, the house destroyed, and how they had
barely time to remove a few valuables; how, although SHE had always been
opposed to secession and the war, she had not gone North, preferring to
stay with her people, and take with them the punishment of the folly she
had foreseen. How after the war and her father's death she and her aunt
had determined to “reconstruct THEMSELVES” after their own fashion on
this bit of property, which had survived their fortunes because it had
always been considered valueless and unprofitable for negro labor. How
at first they had undergone serious difficulty, through the incompetence
and ignorance of the freed laborer, and the equal apathy and prejudice
of their neighbors. How they had gradually succeeded with the adoption
of new methods and ideas that she herself had conceived, which she now
briefly and clearly stated. Courtland listened with a new, breathless,
and almost superstitious interest: they were HIS OWN THEORIES--perfected
and demonstrated!
“But you must have had capital for this?”
Ah, yes! that was where they were fortunate. There were some French
cousins with whom she had once stayed in Paris, who advanced enough to
stock the estate. There were some English friends of her father's, old
blockade runners, who had taken shares, provided them with more capital,
and imported some skilled laborers and a kind of steward or agent to
represent them. But they were getting on, and perhaps it was better for
their reputation with their neighbors that they had not been BEHOLDEN to
the “No'th.” Seeing a cloud pass over Courtland's face, the young lady
added with an affected sigh, and the first touch of feminine coquetry
which had invaded their wholesome camaraderie:--
“Yo' ought to have found us out BEFORE, co'nnle.”
For an impulsive moment Courtland felt like telling her then and there
the story of his romantic quest; but the reflection that they were
standing on a narrow ledge with no room for the emotions, and that Miss
Sally had just put a nail in her mouth and a start might be dangerous,
checked him. To this may be added a new jealousy of her previous
experiences, which he had not felt before. Nevertheless, he managed to
say with some effusion:--
“But I hope we are not too late NOW. I think my principals are quite
ready and able to buy up any English or French investor now or to come.”
“Yo' might try yo' hand on that one,” said Miss Sally, pointing to a
young fellow who had just emerged from the office and was crossing the
courtyard. “He's the English agent.”
He was square-shouldered and round-headed, fresh and clean looking in
his white flannels, but with an air of being utterly distinct and alien
to everything around him, and mentally and morally irreconcilable to it.
As he passed the house he glanced shyly at it; his eye brightened and
his manner became self-conscious as he caught sight of the young girl,
but changed again when he saw her companion. Courtland likewise was
conscious of a certain uneasiness; it was one thing to be helping Miss
Sally ALONE, but certainly another thing to be doing so under the eye
of a stranger; and I am afraid that he met the stony observation of the
Englishman with an equally cold stare. Miss Sally alone retained her
languid ease and self-possession. She called out, “Wait a moment, Mr.
Champney,” slipped lightly down the ladder, and leaning against it with
one foot on its lowest rung awaited his approach.
“I reckoned yo' might be passing by,” she said, as he came forward.
“Co'nnle Courtland,” with an explanatory wave of the hammer towards her
companion, who remained erect and slightly stiffened on the cornice,
“is no relation to those figures along the frieze of the Redlands Court
House, but a No'th'n officer, a friend of Major Reed's, who's come down
here to look after So'th'n property for some No'th'n capitalists. Mr.
Champney,” she continued, turning and lifting her eyes to Courtland as
she indicated Champney with her hammer, “when he isn't talking English,
seeing English, thinking English, dressing English, and wondering why
God didn't make everything English, is trying to do the same for
HIS folks. Mr. Champney, Co'nnle Courtland. Co'nnle Courtland, Mr.
Champney!” The two men bowed formally. “And now, Co'nnle, if yo'll
come down, Mr. Champney will show yo' round the fahm. When yo' 've got
through yo'll find me here at work.”
Courtland would have preferred, and half looked for her company
and commentary on this round of inspection, but he concealed his
disappointment and descended. It did not exactly please him that
Champney seemed relieved, and appeared to accept him as a bona fide
stranger who could not possibly interfere with any confidential
relations that he might have with Miss Sally. Nevertheless, he met the
Englishman's offer to accompany him with polite gratitude, and they left
the house together.
In less than an hour they returned. It had not even taken that time for
Courtland to discover that the real improvements and the new methods
had originated with Miss Sally; that she was virtually the controlling
influence there, and that she was probably retarded rather than assisted
by the old-fashioned and traditional conservatism of the company of
which Champney was steward. It was equally plain, however, that the
young fellow was dimly conscious of this, and was frankly communicative
about it.
“You see, over there they work things in a different way, and, by Jove!
they can't understand that there is any other, don't you know? They're
always wigging me as if I could help it, although I've tried to explain
the nigger business, and all that, don't you know? They want Miss Dows
to refer her plans to me, and expect me to report on them, and then
they'll submit them to the Board and wait for its decision. Fancy Miss
Dows doing that! But, by Jove! they can't conceive of her AT ALL over
there, don't you know?”
“Which Miss Dows do you mean?” asked Courtland dryly.
“Miss Sally, of course,” said the young fellow briskly. “SHE manages
everything--her aunt included. She can make those niggers work when no
one else can, a word or smile from her is enough. She can make terms
with dealers and contractors--her own terms, too--when they won't look
at MY figures. By Jove! she even gets points out of those traveling
agents and inventors, don't you know, who come along the road with
patents and samples. She got one of those lightning-rod and wire-fence
men to show her how to put up an arbor for her trailing roses. Why, when
I first saw YOU up on the cornice, I thought you were some other chap
that she'd asked--don't you know--that is, at first, of course!--you
know what I mean--ha, by Jove!--before we were introduced, don't you
know.”
“I think I OFFERED to help Miss Dows,” said Courtland with a quickness
that he at once regretted.
“So did HE, don't you know? Miss Sally does not ASK anybody. Don't you
see? a fellow don't like to stand by and see a young lady like her doing
such work.” Vaguely aware of some infelicity in his speech, he awkwardly
turned the subject: “I don't think I shall stay here long, myself.”
“You expect to return to England?” asked Courtland.
“Oh, no! But I shall go out of the company's service and try my own
hand. There's a good bit of land about three miles from here that's in
the market, and I think I could make something out of it. A fellow ought
to settle down and be his own master,” he answered tentatively, “eh?”
“But how will Miss Dows be able to spare you?” asked Courtland, uneasily
conscious that he was assuming an indifference.
“Oh, I'm not much use to her, don't you know--at least not HERE. But
I might, if I had my own land and if we were neighbors. I told you SHE
runs the place, no matter who's here, or whose money is invested.”
“I presume you are speaking now of young Miss Dows?” said Courtland
dryly.
“Miss Sally--of course--always,” said Champney simply. “She runs the
shop.”
“Were there not some French investors--relations of Miss Dows? Does
anybody represent THEM?” asked Courtland pointedly.
Yet he was not quite prepared for the naive change in his companion's
face. “No. There was a sort of French cousin who used to be a good deal
to the fore, don't you know? But I rather fancy he didn't come here to
look after the PROPERTY,” returned Champney with a quick laugh. “I think
the aunt must have written to his friends, for they 'called him off,'
and I don't think Miss Sally broke her heart about him. She's not that
sort of girl--eh? She could have her pick of the State if she went in
for that sort of thing--eh?”
Although this was exactly what Courtland was thinking, it pleased him
to answer in a distrait sort of fashion, “Certainly, I should think so,”
and to relapse into an apparently business abstraction.
“I think I won't go in,” continued Champney as they neared the house
again. “I suppose you'll have something more to say to Miss Dows. If
there's anything else you want of ME, come to the office. But SHE'LL
know. And--er--er--if you're--er--staying long in this part of the
country, ride over and look me up, don't you know? and have a smoke
and a julep; I have a boy who knows how to mix them, and I've some old
brandy sent me from the other side. Good-by.”
More awkward in his kindliness than in his simple business confidences,
but apparently equally honest in both, he shook Courtland's hand and
walked away. Courtland turned towards the house. He had seen the farm
and its improvements; he had found some of his own ideas practically
discounted; clearly there was nothing left for him to do but to thank
his hostess and take his leave. But he felt far more uneasy than when
he had arrived; and there was a singular sense of incompleteness in
his visit that he could not entirely account for. His conversation with
Champney had complicated--he knew not why--his previous theories of Miss
Dows, and although he was half conscious that this had nothing to do
with the business that brought him there, he tried to think that it had.
If Miss Sally was really--a--a--distracting element to contiguous man,
it was certainly something to be considered in a matter of business of
which she would take a managerial part. It was true that Champney had
said she was “not that sort of girl,” but this was the testimony of one
who was clearly under her influence. He entered the house through the
open French window. The parlor was deserted. He walked through the front
hall and porch; no one was there. He lingered a few moments, a slight
chagrin beginning to mingle with his uneasiness. She might have been on
the lookout for him. She or Sophy must have seen him returning. He would
ring for Sophy, and leave his thanks and regrets for her mistress.
He looked for a bell, touched it, but on being confronted with Sophy,
changed his mind and asked to SEE Miss Dows. In the interval between her
departure and the appearance of Miss Sally he resolved to do the very
thing which he had dismissed from his thoughts but an hour before as
ill-timed and doubtful. He had the photograph and letter in his pocket;
he would make them his excuse for personally taking leave of her.
She entered with her fair eyebrows lifted in a pretty surprise.
“I declare to goodness, I thought yo' 'd ridden over to the red barn and
gone home from there. I got through my work on the vines earlier than
I thought. One of Judge Garret's nephews dropped in in time to help me
with the last row. Yo' needn't have troubled yo'self to send up for me
for mere company manners, but Sophy says yo' looked sort of 'anxious and
particular' when yo' asked for me--so I suppose yo' want to see me for
something.”
Mentally objurgating Sophy, and with an unpleasant impression in his
mind of the unknown neighbor who had been helping Miss Sally in his
place, he nevertheless tried to collect himself gallantly.
“I don't know what my expression conveyed to Sophy,” he said with a
smile, “but I trust that what I have to tell you may be interesting
enough to make you forget my second intrusion.” He paused, and still
smiling continued: “For more than three years, Miss Dows, you have more
or less occupied my thoughts; and although we have actually met to-day
only for the first time, I have during that time carried your image
with me constantly. Even this meeting, which was only the result of an
accident, I had been seeking for three years. I find you here under your
own peaceful vine and fig-tree, and yet three years ago you came to me
out of the thunder-cloud of battle.”
“My good gracious!” said Miss Sally.
She had been clasping her knee with her linked fingers, but separated
them and leaned backward on the sofa with affected consternation, but
an expression of growing amusement in her bright eyes. Courtland saw the
mistake of his tone, but it was too late to change it now. He handed
her the locket and the letter, and briefly, and perhaps a little more
seriously, recounted the incident that had put him in possession of
them. But he entirely suppressed the more dramatic and ghastly details,
and his own superstition and strange prepossession towards her.
Miss Sally took the articles without a tremor, or the least deepening
or paling of the delicate, faint suffusion of her cheek. When she had
glanced over the letter, which appeared to be brief, she said, with
smiling, half-pitying tranquillity:--
“Yes!--it WAS that poor Chet Brooks, sure! I heard that he was killed
at Snake River. It was just like him to rush in and get killed the first
pop! And all for nothing, too,--pure foolishness!”
Shocked, yet relieved, but uneasy under both sensations, Courtland went
on blindly:
“But he was not the only one, Miss Dows. There was another man picked up
who also had your picture.”
“Yes--Joyce Masterton. They sent it to me. But you didn't kill HIM,
too?”
“I don't know that I personally killed either,” he said a little coldly.
He paused, and continued with a gravity which he could not help feeling
very inconsistent and even ludicrous: “They were brave men, Miss Dows.”
“To have worn my picture?” said Miss Sally brightly.
“To have THOUGHT they had so much to live for, and yet to have willingly
laid down their lives for what they believed was right.”
“Yo' didn't go huntin' me for three years to tell ME, a So'th'n girl,
that So'th'n men know how to fight, did yo', co'nnle?” returned the
young lady, with the slightest lifting of her head and drooping of her
blue-veined lids in a divine hauteur. “They were always ready enough for
that, even among themselves. It was much easier for these pooah boys to
fight a thing out than think it out, or work it out. Yo' folks in the
No'th learned to do all three; that's where you got the grip on us. Yo'
look surprised, co'nnle.”
“I didn't expect you would look at it--quite in--in--that way,” said
Courtland awkwardly.
“I am sorry I disappointed yo' after yo' 'd taken such a heap o'
trouble,” returned the young lady with a puzzling assumption of humility
as she rose and smoothed out her skirts, “but I couldn't know exactly
what yo' might be expecting after three years; if I HAD, I might have
put on mo'ning.” She stopped and adjusted a straying tendril of her hair
with the sharp corner of the dead man's letter. “But I thank yo', all
the same, co'nnle. It was real good in yo' to think of toting these
things over here.” And she held out her hand frankly.
Courtland took it with the sickening consciousness that for the last
five minutes he had been an unconscionable ass. He could not prolong the
interview after she had so significantly risen. If he had only taken
his leave and kept the letter and locket for a later visit, perhaps when
they were older friends! It was too late now. He bent over her hand for
a moment, again thanked her for her courtesy, and withdrew. A moment
later she heard the receding beat of his horse's hoofs on the road.
She opened the drawer of a brass-handled cabinet, and after a moment's
critical survey of her picture in the dead man's locket, tossed it and
the letter into the recesses of the drawer. Then she stopped, removed
her little slipper from her foot, looked at THAT, too, thoughtfully, and
called “Sophy!”
“Miss Sally?” said the girl, reappearing at the door.
“Are you sure you did not move that ladder?”
“I 'clare to goodness, Miss Sally, I never teched it!”
Miss Sally directed a critical glance at her handmaiden's red-coifed
head. “No,” she said to herself softly, “it felt nicer than wool,
anyway!”