THE SESSION
Judge White had been consulted with regard to the meeting and asked to
attend it, but had declined, inasmuch as Mr. Grey only owed him for a
quarter’s rent. But he made no effort to restrain the people.
“The dog deserves it, for, of course, he’s been dishonest,” he said. “I
have been in the business long enough to know how it can be done, and I
always mistrusted he was up to it.”
This did not help matters, and, stormy as was the night, a dozen men or
more were in the hall by half-past eight, some of them hardly knowing
why they were there, or what they were going to do.
Godfrey Sheldon knew. He had come early, and meant to have Tom Grey
punished; and when the meeting was called to order he made an opening
speech, in which he went over the ground, dwelling upon Mr. Grey’s
extravagance and the money he had spent, and which he could not have
come honestly by.
“No, sir,” he said: “He has used our money unlawfully for his own
purposes, and it’s all gone—every sumarkee of it gambled away and used
for his fine house, and horses, and diamonds, and the Lord knows what.
At the very best we shan’t get more than ten cents on a dollar, and what
is that? Where have my two thousand dollars gone to? I ask you, and echo
answers, Where?”
He was getting quite eloquent, and gesticulating wildly, calling Mr.
Grey an embezzler, a gambler, a cheat and a villain, who should be made
to feel the weight of the law.
As he said this he brought his fist down upon a shaky little table with
such force that it fell with a crash to the floor. Two or three sprang
forward to pick it up, and in their excitement they did not hear the
door open or see the drooping figure which came in time to hear “feel
the weight of the law,” and see the blow which emphasized it.
When they did see her, every man rose to his feet and stared at her as
she advanced into their midst and stood with the water falling from her
cloak and hood, her face very pale and her eyes unnaturally bright. Had
a ghost appeared to them they could scarcely have been more startled,
and they began to be sorry for what Sheldon had said, and to hope she
had not heard it.
“Miss Grey,” one of them began, going toward her and offering her a
chair, “we did not expect you here. What can we do for you?”
Louie had been buffeted by the wind and drenched with the rain. The
stairs were long, and she was breathless with climbing them and with
excitement. Her heart was beating rapidly, her tongue felt thick, and
for a moment she could not speak.
Turning back her hood and undoing her cloak, which seemed to be choking
her, she threw it off with such force that the drops of water upon it
were shaken over the man who had brought her a chair and stood close to
her. He was their nearest neighbor, who had sat often at their table and
shared their hospitality, and “et tu Brute” came to Louie’s mind, as she
looked up at him.
Drawing two or three long breaths, she said:
“I heard you were to meet to-night, to see what you would do with my
father. Is that so?”
She turned to Mr. Sheldon, who answered:
“That’s about the size of it, but we didn’t expect you.”
“No,” and her lips quivered. “But, you see, I had to come; there was no
one else,” and her voice shook a little as she thought of Herbert, who
was still sitting on the dry-goods box and cursing himself for a coward.
“Did your father send you?” Mr. Sheldon asked, and Louie’s voice was
very steady as she replied:
“My father? No. He knows nothing of the meeting. He does not know me all
the time. Haven’t you heard how bad he is?”
There was no reply, and she went on:
“He is completely crushed, and so sorry. Why, he is an old man in looks.
I know he has done wrong, and I am so sorry, and mother is, too. Neither
of us had any suspicion of the truth. If we had had, do you think we
would have allowed so much expenditure? Never. I don’t know why he did
it, but it is done, and I have come to ask you not to proceed against
him; not to have him arrested, as I have heard you mean to do. It will
do no good. It will not restore your money, and it cannot add to your
happiness to know that my father, whom you have professed to like so
much, is in prison. He may die,” here her voice broke, but she steadied
herself and went on, “but, whether he lives or dies, his debts shall be
paid. It will take time—years, maybe—but I am young, only eighteen, and
I know how I can pay them. I have thought it all out, and feel sure I
can do it.”
“Have you an idee how much they be?” Godfrey Sheldon asked.
“Yes,” she replied; “but, much or little, if God spares my life, I’ll
pay them. Believe me, I will. Our house is for sale, with the horses and
carriage and diamonds. The piano is sold, and my wheel, and with part of
the money they brought I have paid some of the smaller debts. We shall
give up everything, and we shall take a small, cheap house by and by;
but I want father to stay where he is till he is better, or worse, and
perhaps you won’t mind if we keep enough to live on a while. We must
have something.”
Her voice broke again, but she had said all she came to say, and,
covering her face with her hands, the tears trickled through her fingers
and dropped into her lap. For a moment there was perfect silence, and
more than one wiped his eyes at sight of this young girl, pleading for
her father, and promising to pay a debt which would stagger many a
strong man, and which they felt sure she could never do. But that did
not matter. They were, most of them, men with kind hearts, and Louie had
done more for her father than Herbert could ever have done. It was a
little awkward, not knowing who should speak first, or what he should
say, or how his companions were feeling. The neighbor of the Greys
finally took the initiative.
He had hesitated about coming, for he knew Mr. Grey was ill, he said.
The doctor had told him so. All broke up, he understood, which proved he
was not a hardened wretch. Nothing could bring back the money, and why
not let him alone? His own thoughts would be punishment enough, and he
did not believe in kicking a fellow when he was down. Better give him a
chance to get up again.
Louie’s eyes were very bright as she smiled upon him and turned to the
others for their decision.
“Yes, let him go,” every one said, except Godfrey Sheldon, who was
silent.
His two thousand dollars weighed heavily upon him, and Louie’s refusal
to turn the horses and carriage toward his debt weighed heavier.
He wanted those bays—the finest in town—and he wanted the carriage and
his daughters wanted it, and at last he said:
“Girl, what’ll you take for them horses and kerridge, anyway? I don’t
mean a turnin’ but a square sale. You’d as lief sell ’em to me as
anybody, I s’pose. I’m good to my dum critters, I be.”
Louie looked bewildered a moment, and then replied: “I don’t know. Mr.
Blake will see to that. We shall sell them to someone”; then to the men:
“It is settled, then, that you will not trouble father. I thank you so
much, and I promise again that you shall be paid if I live.”
It was a great deal to promise, and not one of her hearers believed she
could do it, but she did, and looked very brave and hopeful as she put
on her cloak and started to leave. The neighbor, Mr. Clark, asked her to
wait and he would go with her. But she said: “No, thanks; I came alone,
and can go alone. I would rather. Father is wanting me by this time.”
She pulled her hood over her head and left the room, hearing, as she
closed the door, Mr. Sheldon’s saying:
“Don’t promise them horses to anybody till you hear from me.”
Herbert was still sitting on the dry-goods box in the dark recess when
she came out, and he knew by her face that she had been successful.
“Louie,” he said, coming forward with a suddenness which made her start.
“Louie, I am here.”
She did not cry out, but she stopped quickly and looked at him in
amazement. He had declined going there to speak for her father, and yet
here he was waiting for her, and for an instant she felt something like
gratitude that he should thus think of her. But his answer to her
question, “How did you know I was coming here?” dispelled that illusion.
“I didn’t know,” he said. “I came, hoping to find out what they meant to
do. I never dreamed of your venturing out in this storm, and was
astonished when I saw you come up the stairs.”
“Where were you?” Louie asked next, and he answered her truthfully:
“In that recess. Confound it, I am a coward and a sneak, that’s a fact,
and I didn’t care to have you or anyone see me.”
“So you kept in the dark, and let me go in alone,” Louie replied, in a
tone Herbert did not like.
He could not see her face, as they were going down the stairs, but he
could feel that something had come between them, and was very
uncomfortable.
The wind had gone down, but the rain still fell heavily, and he drew her
cloak around her and her arm closely in his, and held her umbrella over
her, and tried to talk naturally, asking what the men had said, and if
they were civil to her.
“If they hadn’t been, I’d—” he began, then stopped suddenly as he
thought of himself on the dry-goods box in the recess, wondering how he
was to know whether they were civil or not.
He made light of the idea that they ever thought seriously of molesting
her father. Godfrey Sheldon might, for he was a revengeful dog; but no
one would follow him, and if they had, his father would have spoken to
them. In fact, he had been asked to attend the meeting, and had
declined. He was drawing a good deal upon his imagination as to what his
father would do, for he knew very well what he would not do. But he
wanted to reassure Louie and talked on in the same strain, but Louie did
not answer, and with every word he said it seemed to her he was cutting
the tie which bound them. She had pledged herself to her father’s
creditors, and meant to keep the pledge, although she knew it would in
all human probability separate Herbert from her.
“And why not do it at once?” she kept asking herself, and by the time
she reached home her resolution was taken.
There was a moment of blindness, when she did not even see the light
from the hall, as she went up the steps—a long breath, which was
something like a sob, and then she said: “Come in a moment; I want to
speak to you.”