A RECONNOITRE
Norton slept at last from sheer physical exhaustion and waked at eleven
o'clock refreshed and alert, his faculties again strung for action.
He wondered in the clear light of noon at the folly of his panic the night
before. The fighting instinct in him had always been the dominant one. He
smiled now at his silly collapse and his quick brain began to plan his line
of defense.
The girl was in his house, yes. But she had been here in spirit, a living,
breathing threat over his life, every moment the past twenty years. No
scene of pain or struggle could come but that he had already lived it a
thousand times. There was a kind of relief in facing these phantoms for the
first time in flesh and blood. They couldn't be more formidable than the
ghosts he had fought.
He shaved and dressed with deliberation--dressed with unusual care--his
brain on fire now with the determination to fight and win. The instincts of
the soldier were again in command. And the first thing a true soldier did
when driven to desperation and surrounded by an overwhelming foe was to
reconnoitre, find the strength of his enemy, and strike at their weakest
spot.
He must avoid Cleo and find the exact situation of Tom and Helen. His
safest way was again to cultivate Andy's knowledge of the house in his
absence.
He rang for him and waited in vain for his appearance. He rang again and,
getting no response, walked down stairs to the door and searched the lawn.
He saw Cleo beside a flower bed talking to Helen. He caught a glimpse of
the lovely young face as she lifted her eyes and saw him. He turned back
quickly into the house to avoid her, and hurried to the library.
Andy had been watching carefully until Norton went through the front door.
Sure that he had strolled out on the lawn to see Helen, with a sigh of
relief the negro hurried back to the mirror to take another admiring glance
at his fine appearance in the new suit.
Norton's sudden entrance completely upset him. He tried to laugh and the
effort froze on his lips. He saw that Norton had recognized the stolen
suit, but was too excited to see the amusement lurking behind his frown:
"Where were you a while ago, when I was calling?"
"I been right here all mornin', sah," Andy answered with forced surprise.
"You didn't hear that bell?"
"Nasah, nebber hear a thing, sah."
Norton looked at him severely:
"There's a bigger bell going to ring for you one of these days. You like to
go to funerals, don't you?"
Andy laughed:
"Yassah--odder folk's funerals--but dey's one I ain't in no hurry to git
to----"
"That's the one--where were you when I rang just now?"
The negro looked at his master, hesitated, and a broad grin overspread his
black face. He bowed and chuckled and walked straight up to Norton:
"Yassah, major, I gwine tell yer de honest truf now, cose honesty is de
bes' policy. I wuz des embellishin' mysef wid dis here ole suit er close
dat ye gimme, sah, an' I wants ter specify my 'preciation, sah, at de
generosity wid which yer always treats me, sah. I had a mos' particular
reason fer puttin' dis suit on dis mornin'----"
Norton examined the lapel of the coat, his lips twitching to suppress a
smile:
"My suit of broadcloth----"
Andy rubbed his hands over the coat in profound amazement:
"Is dis de broadcloth? De Lawd er mussy!"
Norton shook his head:
"You old black hound----"
Andy broke into a loud laugh:
"Yassah, yassah! Dat's me. But, major, I couldn't find the vest!"
"Too bad--shall I get it for you?"
"Nasah--des tell me whar yer put it!"
Norton smiled:
"Did you look in my big cedar box?"
"Thankee, sah--thankee, sah. Yer sho is good ter me, major, an' yer can
always 'pend on me, sah."
"Yes, I'm going to send you to the penitentiary for this----"
Andy roared with laughter:
"Yassah--yassah--cose, sah! I kin see myse'f in dat suit er stripes now,
but I sho is gwine ter blossom out in dat double-breasted vest fust!"
When the laughter had died away Norton asked in good-natured tones:
"You say I can depend on you, Andy?"
"Dat yer kin, sah--every day in the year--you'se de bes frien' I ebber had
in de world, sah."
"Then I want to ask you a question."
"Yassah, I tells yer anything I know, sah."
"I'm just a little worried about Tom. He's too young to get married. Do you
think he's been really making love to Miss Helen?"
Norton watched the negro keenly. He knew that a boy would easily trust his
secrets to such a servant, and that his sense of loyalty to the young would
be strong. He was relieved at the quick reply which came without guile:
"Lawdy, major, he ain't got dat far, sah. I bin er watchin' 'em putty
close. He des kinder skimmin' 'round de edges."
"You think so?"
"Yassah!" was the confident reply. "He 'minds me er one er dese here
minnows when ye go fishin'. He ain't swallowed de hook yit--he des
nibblin'."
Norton smiled, lighted a cigar, and quietly said:
"Go down to the office and tell Mr. Tom that I'm up and wish to see him."
"Yassah--yassah--right away, sah."
Andy bowed and grinned and hurried from the house.
Norton seated himself in an armchair facing the portrait of the little
mother. His memory lingered tenderly over the last beautiful days they had
spent together. He recalled every smile with which she had looked her
forgiveness and her love. He felt the presence of her spirit and took
courage.
He lifted his eyes to the sweet, tender face bending over her baby and
breathed a prayer for guidance. He wondered if she could see and know in
the dim world beyond. Without trying to reason about it, he had grown to
believe that she did, and that her soul was near in this hour of his trial.
How like this mother the boy had grown the past year--just her age when he
was born. The color of his blonde hair was almost an exact reproduction of
hers. And this beautiful hair lent a peculiar distinction to the boy's fine
face. He had developed, too, a lot of little ways strikingly like the
mother's when a laughing school girl. He smiled in the same flashing way,
like a sudden burst of sunlight from behind a cloud. His temper was quick
like hers, and his voice more and more seemed to develop the peculiar tones
he had loved.
That this boy, around whose form every desire of life had centered, should
be in peril was a thought that set his heart to beating with new energy.
He heard his quick step in the hall, rose and laid down his cigar. With a
rush Tom was in the room grasping the outstretched hand:
"Glad to see you back, Dad!" he cried, "but we had no idea you were coming
so soon."
"I got a little homesick," the father replied, "and decided to come in for
a day or two."
"I was awfully surprised at Miss Helen's popping in on us so
unexpectedly--I suppose you forgot to tell me about it in the rush of
getting away."
"I really didn't expect her to come before my return," was the vague
answer.
"But you wrote her to come at once."
"Did I?" he replied carelessly.
"Why, yes, she showed me your letter. I didn't write you about her arrival
because you told me under no circumstances, except of life or death, to
tell you of anything here and I obeyed orders."
"I'm glad you've made that a principle of your life--stick to it."
"I'm sorry you're away in this dangerous campaign so much, Dad," the boy
said with feeling. "It may end your career."
The father smiled and a far-away look stole into his eyes:
"I have no career, my boy! I gave that up years ago and I had to lead this
campaign."
"Why?"
The look in the brown eyes deepened:
"Because I am the man to whom our danger has been revealed. I am the man to
whom God has given a message--I who have been tried in the fires of hell
and fought my way up and out of the pit--only the man who has no ambitions
can tell the truth!"
The boy nodded and smiled:
"Yes, I know your hobby----"
"The big tragic truth, that the physical contact of the black race with the
white is a menace to our life"--his voice had dropped to a passionate
whisper as if he were talking to himself.
A laugh from Tom roused him to the consciousness of time and place:
"But that isn't a speech you meant for me, Dad!"
The father caught his bantering tone with a light reply:
"No."
And then his tall form confronted the boy with a look of deep seriousness:
"To-morrow I enter on the last phase of this campaign. At any moment a fool
or a madman may blow my brains out."
Tom gave a start:
"Dad----"
"Over every mile of that long drive home last night, I was brooding and
thinking of you----"
"Of me?"
"Wondering if I had done my level best to carry out the dying commands of
your mother----"
He paused, drew a deep breath, looked up tenderly and continued:
"I wish you were settled in life."
The boy turned slightly away and the father watched him keenly and
furtively for a moment, and took a step toward him:
"You have never been in love?"
With a shrug and a laugh, Tom dropped carelessly on the settee and crossed
his legs:
"Love--hardly!"
The father held his breath until the light answer brought relief and then
smiled:
"It will come some day, my boy, and when it hits you, I think it's going to
hit hard."
The handsome young head was poised on one side with a serious judicial
expression:
"Yes, I think it will--but I guess my ideal's too high, though."
The father spoke with deep emotion:
"A man's ideal can't be too high, my boy!"
Tom didn't hear. His mind was busy with his ideal.
"But if I ever find her," he went on dreamily, "do you know what I'll
want?"
"No."
"The strength of Samson!"
"What for?"
He shook his head with a smile:
"To reach over in California, tear one of those big trees up by the roots,
dip it in the crater of Vesuvius and write her name in letters of fire
across the sky!"
He ended with a wide, sweeping gesture, showing just how he would inscribe
it.
"Really!" the father laughed.
"That's how I feel!" he cried, springing to his feet with an emphatic
gesture, a smile playing about his firm mouth.
The father slipped his arm around him:
"Well, if you should happen to do it, be sure to stand in the ocean,
because otherwise, you know, if the grass should be dry you might set the
world on fire."
The boy broke into a hearty laugh, crossed to the table, and threw his leg
carelessly over the corner, a habit he had gotten from his father. When the
laugh had died away, he picked up a magazine and said carelessly:
"I guess there's no danger, after all. I'm afraid that the big thing poets
sing about is only a myth after all"--he paused, raised his eyes and they
rested on his mother's portrait, and his voice became a reverent
whisper--"except your love for my mother, Dad--that was the real thing!"
He was looking the other way and couldn't see the cloud of anguish that
suddenly darkened his father's face.
"You'll know its meaning some day, my son," was the even reply that came
after a pause, "and I only demand of you one thing----"
He laid his hand on the boy's shoulder:
"That the woman you ask to be your wife bear a name without shadow. Good
blood is the noblest inheritance that any father or mother ever gave to a
child."
"I'm proud of mine, sir!" the boy said, drawing his form erect.
The father's arm stole around the young shoulders and his voice was very
low:
"Fools sometimes say, my son, that a man can sow his wild oats and be all
the better for it. It's a lie. The smallest deed takes hold on eternity for
it may start a train of events that even God can't stop----"
He paused and fought back a cry from the depths of his soul.
"I did something that hurt your mother once"--his voice dropped--"and for
twenty years my soul in anguish has begged for forgiveness----"
The boy looked at him in startled sympathy and his own arm instinctively
slipped around his father's form as he lifted his face to the shining
figure over the mantel:
"But you believe that she sees and understands now?"
Norton turned his head away to hide the mists that clouded his eyes. His
answer was uttered with the reverence of a prayer:
"Yes! I've seen her in dreams sometimes so vividly and heard her voice so
plainly, I couldn't believe that I was asleep"--his voice stopped before
it broke, his arm tightening its hold--"and I know that her spirit broods
and watches over you----"
And then he suddenly decided to do the most cruel thing to which his mind
had ever given assent. But he believed it necessary and did not hesitate.
Only the vague intensity of his eyes showed his deep feeling as he said
evenly:
"Ask Miss Helen to come here. You'll find her on the lawn with Cleo."
The boy left the room to summon Helen, and Norton seated himself with grim
determination.