Baird heard a stir at the stables and went to the window. He could not
see the stables, the kitchen wing of the house shut them off, but he
could hear cautious voices and the movement of horses. Would they come
in by the front or by the veranda?
They rounded the kitchen, a compact group which was in full view for a
moment or two, then drew in so close to the house that the veranda roof
hid them. They passed along, moving slowly, to the other wing of the
house, evidently to what had been the old plantation office. Then sounds
ceased.
Baird drew a short breath. He had not been able to see very clearly, but
the group kept together in a fashion he knew well; they were carrying
some inert burden.
And he had to stay where he was till morning!
XI
KEPT IN THE DARK
The dawn ushered a brilliant spring day, a sky without a cloud, a light
warm breeze from the south, the song of birds awakened early by the
promise of nature.
Baird lay unconscious of it all, for a little before the pinky gray of
morning lighted his room he had fallen asleep. Dawn had crept over him
before he knew, and he lay stirless until the knock on his door aroused
him into habit.
"Come in!" he called, still held by sleep.
It was the negress he had seen the night before, bearing a tray.
Baird sat up and stared at her. He was fully dressed and lying without
covering, and after a rolling comprehensive glance, she stood with eyes
lowered.
"What is it?" Baird asked, only half awake as yet.
"Miss Judith done send you a cup of coffee, suh, an' she says fo' you to
res' till dinner if you feels like it. I tol' her I thought you was
movin'--I didn't go fo' to wake you."
Baird was still dazed, for at the mention of Judith's name the events
of the dark hours had rushed over him. It was difficult to connect them
with this brilliant sunshine, or this collected ebony statue with the
weeping, cringing creature of the night before.
Baird sprang up; he was fully awake now. "What time is it?" he asked.
"Hit's mos' ten, suh."
"Lord! Why didn't some one wake me before! I don't deserve any
breakfast. The family--I hope nobody waited for me?"
"Miss Judith an' Mis' Morrison, they ain't had breakfus yet."
Baird pulled off his coat. "Tell them I'll be down right away--it won't
take me ten minutes to shave.... Just bring me some hot water, will
you?"
The woman served him in silence. Baird would have liked to get some hint
of the state of things before he went down, but the family reserve
seemed to reside in the black woman also. He saw now that, though
powerfully and superbly built, she was not young; she was probably an
old family servant. In the hasty minutes he required for dressing, Baird
tried to adjust himself to the perfectly normal atmosphere. What had
happened while he slept he could not guess. He could tell better when he
went down.
Judith and Mrs. Morrison were in the drawing-room, and welcomed him
exactly as he had been welcomed when he first entered Westmore. Both
bore the marks of anxiety and lack of sleep. In the bright light Mrs.
Morrison looked blanched and old, and Judith was also colorless and with
heavy shadows under her eyes, but both were gracefully vivacious; their
manner was as usual.
"It was a perfect shame to wake you!" Judith declared, when Baird
apologized. "We were so certain we heard you moving."
"Don't you worry, Mr. Baird," Mrs. Morrison said. "I only just came down
myself, and it was I told Hetty you were up--my old ears deceived me....
Let us go in, Judith--I'm ready fo' your beaten-biscuits."
It seemed that they were to breakfast alone, and with no account given
of the absent ones, though Judith did say, "Sunday breakfast is an
elastic meal at Westmore. We come down early or late, alone or in
relays, as we feel inclined, and, somehow, we manage to be fed."
"I never have been certain which a man likes best--to eat or to sleep,"
Mrs. Morrison remarked briskly. "The fascinatin'ly natural creatures
seem to like both so well--and to drink best of all."
Baird laughed. "That depends on who is ministering to us at the moment.
Just now, I should much prefer to eat."
It was all so perfectly normal and natural, with the sunshine slanting
across the floor and the windows open to the breeze, that Baird might
almost have persuaded himself that he had dreamed--except for the
consciousness that he had slept in his clothes and for the telltale
pallor and lines of anxiety in Judith's face. And he was certain that he
had been waked purposely; he was not wanted at the noonday meal. They
intended that he should depart from Westmore in ignorance.
He was soon given a chance to declare his intentions. "I am going to
ride to church this morning," Judith said. "Do you care to go, Mr.
Baird?"
"Drive to church, you mean, Judith--I'm going with you," Mrs. Morrison
intervened.
"Not this morning," Baird said. "I want to get back to the club before
noon."
Judith did not urge him, and Baird decided that their determination to
drive four miles to church when they were both still ridden by anxiety
and drooping with fatigue must also be with purpose, a still further
maintaining of appearances; doubtless others beside himself were to be
kept in the dark. They were heroic in their methods, these people. They
were quite capable of sitting in church with heads high, knowing
meantime that something ghastly lay in the disused office. His eyes had
not deceived him the night before.
Baird was thinking of it, when, suddenly, heavy steps sounded on the
veranda, followed by the tumbling and whining of several hounds, and a
voice he knew well said sharply: "Be off, now! Get out!" Then the rear
door opened and shut and a man strode through the hall, his spurs
jingling as he came.
It was Garvin Westmore.
At the first sound, Judith had half risen; then she dropped back, and
the next moment Garvin came in, in riding clothes, booted and spurred,
clean-shaven but haggard. Baird was astounded to say the least. Had he
been a nervous person, he would have been shocked. His surmises had
fallen flat.
Garvin tossed aside his cap. "Still at breakfast?" he said casually.
"Hello, Baird." He drew up a chair and sat down.
Baird did not know how the other two looked; he was conscious that he
was staring. "Hello--" he returned blankly.
"You'll have coffee, Garvin--" Judith was saying, "and what else?"
"Anything. I'm not hungry."
He looked infinitely tired. His eyes harbored melancholy easily, as did
Edward's; he looked somberly at Judith as he tossed a folded slip of
paper across to her. "From Ed," he said briefly. Judith glanced at it,
then set it aside.
Baird's brain was working again. So Edward had gone--where? And why?
"Is it going to be hot, Garvin?" Mrs. Morrison asked.
"It is already hot, Aunt Carlotta." His voice was too even for sarcasm.
"Aunt Carlotta and I are going to church, and Mr. Baird thinks he must
go back to the club. What are you going to do?" Judith said, in the same
clear way in which she had spoken to her own people the night before.
Garvin straightened a little under its warning note. "I? I am going to
ride--if I can have Black Betty--the bay is about done. You and Aunt
Carlotta can represent the family at church, and I'll show myself at the
village. I'll ride as far as the Post-Road with you, Baird." He spoke
more heartily, though his always disdainful lip curled.
Judith's anxious eyes said that he looked a fitter subject for bed than
for the saddle, but she made no comment. For her sake, Baird excused
himself and rose. "I'll get things into my bag, then."
XII
A VENDETTA
They went together, as far as the County Road, Judith and Mrs. Morrison
driving and Baird and Garvin riding beside them. There the two men
turned into the extension of the Westmore Road that skirted the Mine
Banks, the shortest way to the Post-Road, leaving Judith and Mrs.
Morrison to go by the more roundabout way; the disused Mine Banks Road
was possible only to riders.
Judith reached from the buggy to shake hands with Baird, and there was
the same sweetness in her voice as there had been when she parted from
him the night before. "You must come to see us very soon, Mr. Baird. I
shall expect you," and her eyes said, "Welcome you."
And Garvin's voice also had a kinder note when he parted with her, as if
he had his worn nerves under better control. "I'll be back for dinner,
Judy."
"Be sure you are," she returned brightly.
"Poor Judith!" Garvin said, as he and Baird rode on. "She has the world
on her shoulders--or, rather, the Westmore family--and it's something of
a weight, I assure you." He sighed impatiently and looked up at the
looming conglomeration of sear undergrowth and trees and bald red
patches which they were approaching. "Ever been up there?" he asked.
"No, but I'm going."
"Well, don't go without a guide--there are some ugly pitfalls about....
That was a steep broad hill once, dug down and muddled into what it is
by the picks and shovels of English convicts. If all that's said is
true, they fared worse under my great-great-grandfather's rule than the
niggers did. It's not easy to make slaves of Englishmen.... For the last
hundred years it's been simply a game warren. There are caves and
underground passages and ore-pits full of water up there, and some soft
little hollows, too, where the pines and cedars have grown up. I know
every inch of it. It always fascinated me, but there are some of our
family who couldn't be driven to set foot in the place, and there's not
a nigger in the county will go near it. And that's a good thing--keeps
it free of pests." He laughed shortly. "Lord! I've slept off more than
one drunk up there--and played with a girl there, too, on occasion, and
only the moon the wiser for it." He spoke steadily, carelessly, but with
an undercurrent of feeling.
Edward's exclamation still rang in Baird's ears. Garvin had not been
drunk the night before; that he knew. When he and Judith went down to
the terraces Garvin was dancing with Priscilla Copeley, and with an air
of enjoyment.
Baird studied him closely. Garvin was riding with face lifted, and it
brought his profile into relief, bold brow, haughty nose and lip,
beautifully modeled chin. The lines about his eyes suggested both
weariness and sadness, the curled lip measureless disgust and
discontent; a thoroughly unhappy man--if he was any judge of
physiognomy. And again Baird felt sorry for him; there was something
radically wrong with him.
Garvin's face changed suddenly. "Look there!" he exclaimed. "By jove!
Any one would say it was a bear."
He was pointing with his whip to a clambering object which was clearly
outlined against one of the red patches above, a bald spot just below
the cluster of evergreens that darkened the highest ledge on the Banks.
There was a red crag behind them, tipping the summit, and the trees
stood as if guarding it; the creature that went on all fours was
apparently bent on gaining the ledge.
"It does look like a bear--it's a man, though," Baird said.
"It's Bear Brokaw.... What's he climbing up to Crest Cave for? Not for
an afternoon nap, I hope. The old cuss knows there's a better way up
than that--he's shinning up that slope just because he enjoys it."
Garvin looked interested, amused.
"So he's the honey-tree thief."
"Poof!" Garvin said. "He served Aunt Carlotta right. There's not a
stancher, closer-mouthed creature in existence than Bear. He swears by
Judith and would do almost anything for me. He taught me to handle a
gun--many's the night I've gone coon-catching with him."
They rode on, and Garvin's face settled into gravity. "I wonder what
he's doing up there?" he said musingly. "I should have thought he'd had
enough of the Banks last night," he added, and fell into silence.
It was the first reference to the night Baird had heard, but he dared
not question. They were well under the Banks now and the going very
rough, a road once, but no more than a trail now, leading over mounds
and down into hollows, the trees hedging them closely. Baird felt tired,
and they rode in silence for the next half-mile. Then they dipped into a
deep cut between high banks, and Garvin aroused to speak again.
"See that?" he said, pointing to a large white stone that stood planted
like a monument in the red soil of the roadside. "That's where my
grandfather dropped when he was shot by some one hidden up above there.
A good place for a murder and a getaway, isn't it?"
"Who did it?" Baird asked with interest.
"That's what we don't know--we never will know, I suppose. The family
tried to fasten it on a Penniman, old William Penniman's father, but
they had no proof at all--except that there was bad blood between
them--there always had been, ever since a Penniman got part of the
Westmore tract by buying the old house over there. The accusations of
our family didn't help matters. I've always had my theory about it,
though: old Penniman's father had nothing to do with it; those men my
great-grandparents worked up there in the Banks didn't all die or leave
the country--somebody's son or son's son did it." He shrugged with a
look of bitter disgust. "Lord! the thing's nearly a hundred years old,
and still we go on with it! There's not a Penniman will bend his head to
a Westmore, or a Westmore to a Penniman. We go on with things
endlessly--just our sickening, effete pride! It gets on my nerves." He
looked as if it did; he looked harried.
"There's one Penniman who doesn't seem to bear a grudge," Baird
remarked, "the little girl who came to your rescue yesterday morning."
"Ann?... Ann's young and light-hearted. There's plenty of time for the
Penniman to develop in her," he answered carelessly, but Baird noticed
that his color rose.
Garvin dropped the subject, talked of trivial things, until they reached
the Post-Road. They came upon a man here, a sturdily-built,
dark-featured man, clad in neat business gray and carrying a bag. He
stood at the juncture of the three roads, the Westmore Road, the Back
Road to the Hunt Club and the Penniman farm, and the Post-Road. His hat
was tipped back like one who had walked far and was warm, and had
stopped to rest and look about him. He was looking at the Mine Banks;
when the two riders came up out of the cut, he looked at them, or,
rather, at Garvin; he had merely glanced at Baird.
It was his steady grim stare at Garvin that arrested Baird's attention.
There was no curiosity in it, it was too cold; fraught with recognition
and a settled frozen antagonism. He stood his ground though Garvin's
horse almost brushed him, planted firmly, like one who would instantly
contest the few inches he covered. There was a quiet determined force
about the man; Baird was affected by it, even before they reached him.
Baird glanced questioningly at Garvin and saw that he was giving the man
stare for stare, erect in his saddle, chin slightly lifted. But Garvin's
look lacked the animosity that froze the other man's features, and just
before they passed Baird saw Garvin's hand lift half-way to his cap then
drop. They passed with Garvin's eyes shifted to look straight ahead, but
the man's stare never wavered.
"Speak of the devil and you see him," Garvin muttered, after they had
passed.
"Who is he?" Baird asked.
"Coats Penniman.... No forgiveness for the past there--why should I have
any compunctions over the future." He spoke icily. The cut he had
received had evidently stung.
Baird had already guessed. There was an unnamable likeness to Ann in the
man's features.
They had come to the center of the Post-Road. "Well, here we part,"
Garvin said more lightly. "I'll see you soon, I hope."
"Come over to dinner with me to-morrow," Baird returned. "We've got to
arrange about that machine."
"I meant to thank you about that," Garvin said quickly. "I haven't my
usual wits about me to-day. It's good of you, Baird." There was all the
Westmore charm about the man when he smiled.
"Not a bit of it--I'll see you to-morrow," and they parted, Garvin going
off at a gallop down the Post-Road.
Baird took the Back Road, glancing at Coats Penniman as he did so. He
had not moved; he was looking after Garvin. "I'd hate to have a man look
at me like that--especially if I was in love with his daughter," Baird
said to himself.
He rode slowly, for he was thinking--of the past night, of many things
that were not clear to him. He came up through the pastures, then
skirted the woods, as Ann had the day before. He was thinking of her,
among other things, so it did not startle him greatly when he saw her a
short distance ahead, standing and looking in his direction. But before
he reached her she slipped back into the woods. He hurried his horse and
stopped to look about him when he had gained the woods, but she had
hidden herself.
Though tired, Baird was tempted to dismount and search for her; he was
constitutionally opposed to anything escaping him. He did prepare to
dismount, then went on, when it occurred to him why she was there: "To
meet her father, of course," was Baird's conclusion. "She took me for
him, at first."
XIII
INERADICABLY BRANDED
Baird was right; Ann had come to meet her father.
Saturday afternoon and evening had been filled with preparations for
Coats Penniman's coming. Ann's pause for play in the barn and her
adventure with Baird had merely been an interlude in the rush of work.
Sue had worked late into the night, and Ann had helped her. When they
went to bed, the house shone in readiness for the home-comer.
Ann had worked steadily and silently; she had had her afternoon's
adventure to think over, with a commingling of anger and astonishment
and a stir of feeling that made her cheeks burn. The big mannerless
creature! He had taken advantage. He had held her and looked at her in
imperious fashion; in a way that had made her heart bound. And she had
not resented it until it was over. Ann was always truthful to herself;
she had liked the hot pressure on her cheek; she could feel it yet,
though now it made her angry. She was enraged with herself for having
liked it, and with Baird for having touched her. He could not have a
particle of respect for her or he would not have dared. Ann tossed about
uncomfortably on her bed. If he came again--and she hoped earnestly that
he would--he should see! All Ann's considerable will was aroused.
Then the ever-present hurt took possession of her. If she had not grown
up with the longing to be petted unsatisfied, the caress of a mere
stranger would not have seemed so sweet. At least, so Ann explained
herself to herself, having had no experience in passion to tutor her. If
only her father would love her, she would be happy. If only she knew?
It was then the plan to meet him sprang into Ann's mind and filled it.
He had written that he was not to be met at the station; that he wanted
to walk home. Ann decided that he was certain to come the back way. She
would meet him and come proudly back with him--if he was loving to her.
And if he was not?... Ann did not know what she would do. At least, her
aunt and her grandfather would not be there to see.
Ann kept her purpose closely to herself during the morning, working
feverishly over the tasks Sue set her, her cheeks vivid, as were Sue's.
Her grandfather was very silent. He sat with his Bible on his knee, as
was his custom on Sunday morning, his thin body bent over it, his white
hair hiding his face; but Ann saw him look up once as Sue passed him,
moving quickly and energetically. It was a long intent look he gave
her, his eyes, always vividly blue, brighter and keener than Ann ever
remembered seeing them. His lips, the sunken mouth of an old and broken
man, shook. He loved Sue, Ann knew that well; he often watched her at
work, but with lips tight set, as if in pain; now they trembled. Coats
would be bringing Sue deliverance from toil.
Ann stole off in plenty of time to the Back Road. She had waited almost
an hour before Baird came upon her. She saw him when he was some
distance away, but it occurred to her that he was probably Garvin
Westmore, and from him she had no desire to run; she wanted to tell him
that her father was coming.
When she saw who it was she hid herself. Crouched in the creek, she
watched Baird's pause and close scrutiny of his surroundings. When he
was about to dismount, she was frightened; when he rode on, she was a
little disappointed, and yet she wanted him away. Ann did not leave her
hiding place until she was certain that Baird was well on his way to the
club; then she went back to her post. And when she saw a man coming
across the pastures, she forgot Baird, everything; it was her father,
come at last.
She watched him with the blood throbbing in her ears, a heavily-built
man, not thin and sharp-featured like most of the Pennimans, yet with
the Penniman look about him. She had waited eagerly enough, but with
each step that brought him nearer, her terror of what might be held her
back; she did not stand out where she could be seen until her father had
nearly reached her.
When she came out suddenly from behind the undergrowth that screened
her, they were only a few yards apart, and Coats Penniman stopped on a
forward step, stood quite still. Ann saw the spasm that crossed his
face, lifting his brows and widening his eyes. She thought that she had
startled him; he did not know who she was.
"It's Ann, father--" she said, with a quivering smile. "I--I came to
meet you--"
His face changed, settled into deep lines about his mouth, into wrinkles
about his eyes, the look of her grandfather upon him--until he smiled,
though it was more a twitching of the muscles in his cheeks than an
actual smile.
"Ann--" He drew an audible breath. "I--wasn't expecting it--"
He came to her, for Ann stood rooted; no volition of hers could have
brought her an inch nearer to that look of her grandfather, covered by
that painful smile. "So you came to meet me?" He put his hands on her
shoulders. "It's fourteen years since I saw you--you have grown
up--child."
There was all the sorrow of the forsaken in the dazed shrinking look Ann
gave him. "Yes, I've grown up," she said in tones as colorless as her
face. "But I know you--you look like grandpa."
He bent and kissed her cheek, then took his hands from her shoulders,
and he said what Sue had said: "And you are a Penniman, too, Ann--we're
all Pennimans--we'll never outgrow that.... How are you, child?"
"I am well, suh."
"And Cousin Sue and Uncle Will?"
"They are well--they are expectin' you."
Coats Penniman took up his bag and they turned into the woods. Ann's
eyes were fixed straight before her. Things looked curiously white and
unreal, as they do after a shock. Her father looked at her as they went
on, at her proud brow and eyes, then at her softly-rounded chin and warm
mouth, reminders of her mother, and, again, the deepening lines in his
face made him look old. "I'm glad you came to meet me," he said kindly.
And Ann answered to the note of kindness, just as she had always
answered to the same note in Sue's voice, by an offer of service. "Can't
I carry your satchel for you, father? You've walked so far."
"No, Ann, I've not come home to be waited on.... There're going to be
better times at the farm, now I have come home. Until the last year I
haven't had the means to make it easier for you all. For fourteen years
I've prayed to make money, and then, all at once, when I'd given up
hope, it came. For your sake, and for Sue's sake, I wish it had come
sooner." He spoke with a deep note of feeling.
"It has been hard for Aunt Sue," Ann said tonelessly.
She felt numb and sick; she was more conscious of a feeling of illness
than of anything else. The necessity of walking steadily on when she
wanted simply to hide herself somewhere, was infinitely painful. Sue had
said, "If Coats seems like a stranger to you, don't you feel hard to
him." He did not seem like a stranger to her, any more than her
grandfather did, or even her aunt did, at times. But he did not seem
like her father, any more than they did. From the height of her
isolation, Ann could even look at him calmly.
His dark face had lighted, now that he was looking about him. "Uncle
Will has not cut down the trees--every tree is here--just as it used to
be," he said with deep satisfaction. "I was afraid he'd had to make
cord-wood of them.... How well I remember it all!" he added, half
eagerly, half sadly. He walked faster, until they reached the open, and
then he stopped. "The house and the barn ... and the spring-house!" he
said. "Not a stick or a stone changed! My, my!... And fourteen long
years!... When I went, I never wanted to see it again, but it has pulled
at me, just the same. It's brought me back."