Agatha Roland was a particularly well ordered young gentlewo

THE MASTER OF WARLOCK

A VIRGINIA WAR STORY

BY GEORGE CARY EGGLESTON

AUTHOR OF "DOROTHY SOUTH," "A CAROLINA CAVALIER," ETC.

ILLUSTRATED BY

C. D. WILLIAMS

LOTHROP PUBLISHING

COMPANY BOSTON

COPYRIGHT,

1903,

BY

LOTHROP

PUBLISHING

COMPANY.

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

ENTERED AT

STATIONERS'

HALL

Published, January, 1903

TO "DOROTHY SOUTH," THE DEAR LITTLE WOMAN WHO HAS BEEN WIFE TO ME

FOR THIRTY-FOUR YEARS, WHO HAS UNCONSCIOUSLY INSPIRED ALL MY WORK,

AND WHOSE PERSONALITY, IN ITS SEVERAL PHASES, IT HAS BEEN MY LOVING

ENDEAVOUR TO PORTRAY IN ALL THE STORIES I HAVE WRITTEN, I DEDICATE

THIS BOOK WITH REVERENCE AND SOUL-FELT THANKS.

GEORGE CARY EGGLESTON.

_Culross, October 18, 1902._

[Illustration: "_In the firelight_"]

Table of Contents

CHAPTER PAGE

I. A BREAK IN THE BRIDGE 11

II. THE BRINGING UP OF AGATHA 32

III. JESSAMINE AND HONEYSUCKLE 47

IV. IN REVOLT 71

V. AT THE OAKS 78

VI. NEXT MORNING 94

VII. A FAREWELL AT THE GATE 111

VIII. A RED FEATHER 118

IX. THE BIRTH OF WOMANHOOD 135

X. IN ACTION 144

XI. AT WARLOCK 163

XII. UNDER ESCORT 172

XIII. A SOUVENIR SERVICE 187

XIV. QUICK WORK 199

XV. AGATHA'S VENTURE 214

XVI. CANISTER 223

XVII. AT HEADQUARTERS 238

XVIII. A BRUSH AT THE FRONT 248

XIX. AGATHA'S RESOLUTION 256

XX. TWO HOME-COMINGS 265

XXI. AT PARTING 279

XXII. SAM AS A STRATEGIST 290

XXIII. A NEGOTIATION 301

XXIV. FLIGHT 317

XXV. A NARROW ESCAPE 327

XXVI. MADEMOISELLE ROLAND 336

XXVII. AGATHA'S WONDER-STORY 345

XXVIII. WHEN A MAN TALKS TOO MUCH 364

XXIX. A STRUGGLE OF GIANTS 374

XXX. THE LAST STRAW 380

XXXI. AT WARLOCK AND AT THE OAKS 396

XXXII. IN RIGHTEOUS WRATH 407

XXXIII. UNDER RED LEAVES 416

XXXIV. THE END AND AFTER 425

_List of Illustrations_

"_In the firelight_" Frontispiece

_Agatha Ronald_ 44

"'_If any man flunks--I'll brain him_'" 126

"'_Riding under gallant escort_'" 186

"'_I love you, Agatha Ronald_'" 235

"'_At Christ-church-in-the-woods_'" 423

The Master of Warlock

I

_A BREAK IN THE BRIDGE_

The road was a winding, twisting track as it threaded its way through a

stretch of old field pines. The land was nearly level at that point, and

quite unobstructed, so that there was not the slightest reason that

ordinary intelligence could discover for the roadway's devious

wanderings. It might just as well have run straight through the pine

lands.

But in Virginia people were never in a hurry. They had all of leisure

that well-settled and perfectly self-satisfied ways of life could bring

to a people whose chief concern it was to live uprightly and happily in

that state of existence into which it had pleased God to call them. What

difference could it make to a people so minded, whether the journey to

the Court-house--the centre and seat of county activities of all

kinds--were a mile or two longer or shorter by reason of meaningless

curves in the road, or by reason of a lack of them? Why should they

bother to straighten out road windings that had the authority of long

use for their being? And why should the well-fed negro drivers of family

carriages shake themselves out of their customary and comfortable naps

in order to drive more directly across the pine land, when the horses,

if left to themselves, would placidly follow the traditional track?

The crookedness of the road was a fact, and Virginians of that time

always accepted and respected facts to which they had been long

accustomed. For that sufficient reason Baillie Pegram, the young master

of Warlock, was not thinking of the road at all, but accepting it as he

did the greenery of the trees and the bursting of the buds, as he jogged

along at a dog-trot on that fine April morning in the year of our Lord

1861.

He was well mounted upon a mettlesome sorrel mare,--a mare with

pronounced ideas of her own. The young man had taught her to bend these

somewhat to his will, but her individuality was not yet so far subdued

or suppressed as to lose itself in that of her master. So she suddenly

halted and vigorously snorted as she came within sight of the little

bridge over Dogwood Branch, where a horse and a young gentlewoman were

obviously in trouble.

I name the horse and the girl in that ungallant reverse order, because

that was the order in which they revealed themselves to the mare and her

master. For the girl was on the farther side of the horse, and stooping,

so that she could not be seen at a first glance. As she heard

approaching hoof-beats she straightened herself into that dignity of

demeanour which every young Virginia gentlewoman felt it to be her

supreme duty in life to maintain under any and all circumstances.

She was gowned in the riding-habit of that time, with glove-fitting body

and a skirt so long that, even when its wearer sat upon a high horse, it

extended to within eighteen inches of the ground. When Baillie Pegram

reached the little bridge and hastily dismounted, she was standing as

erect as a young hickory-tree, making the most of her five feet four of

height, and holding the skirt up sufficiently to free her feet. She

wore a look half of welcome, half of defiance on her face. The defiance

was prompted by a high-bred maidenly sense of propriety and by something

else. The welcome was due to an instinctive rejoicing in the coming of

masculine help. For the girl was indeed in sore need of assistance. Her

horse had slipped his foot through a break in the bridge flooring, and

after a painful struggle, had given up the attempt to extricate it. He

was panting with pain, and his young mistress was sympathetically

sharing every pain that he suffered.

Baillie Pegram gave the girl a rather formal greeting as he dismounted.

Stooping he examined the imprisoned leg of the animal. Then seizing a

stone from the margin of the stream, he quickly beat the planking loose

from its fastenings, releasing the poor brute from its pillory. But the

freed foot did not plant itself upon the ground again. The horse held it

up, limp and dangling. Seeing what had happened, the young man promptly

ungirthed the saddles, and transferred that of the young woman to the

back of his own animal.

"You must take my mare, Miss Ronald," he said. "Your horse is in no

condition to carry you, and, poor fellow, he never will be again."

"Just what has happened, Mr. Pegram?" the girl asked, with a good deal

of hauteur in her tone.

"Your horse's leg is broken beyond all possibility of repair," he

answered. "I will take care of him for you, and you must ride my mare.

She is a trifle unruly at times, and not very bridle-wise, so that she

is scarcely fit for a lady's use. But I take it you know how to ride."

The girl did not answer at once. After a space she said:

"You forget that I am Agatha Ronald."

"No, I do not forget," he answered. "I remember that fact with regret

whenever I think of you. However, under the circumstances, you must so

far overcome your prejudice as to accept the use of my mare."

There was a mingling of hauteur and amusement in the girl's voice and

countenance as she answered:

"Permit me, Mr. Pegram, to thank you for your courteous proffer of help,

_and to decline it_."

"I need no thanks," he said, "for a trifling courtesy which is so

obviously imperative. As for declining it, why of course you cannot do

that."

"Why not?" she asked, resentfully. "Am I not my own mistress? Surely you

would not take advantage of my mishap to force unwelcome attentions upon

me?"

The utterance was an affront, and Baillie Pegram saw clearly that it was

intended to be such. He bit his lip, but controlled himself.

"I will not think," he answered, "that you quite meant to say that. You

are too just to do even me a wrong, and surely I have not deserved such

an affront at your hands. Nor can the circumstances that prompt you to

decline any unnecessary courtesy at my hands justify you in--well, in

saying what you have just said. I have not sought to force attentions

upon you, and you know it. I have only asked you to let me behave like a

gentleman under circumstances which are not of my making or my seeking.

Your horse is hopelessly lamed--so hopelessly that as soon as you are

gone, I am going to kill him by the roadside as an act of ordinary

humanity. You are fully five miles from The Oaks, where you are staying

with your aunts. Except in this bit of pine barren, the roads are

exceedingly muddy. You are habited for riding, and you could not walk

far in that costume, even upon the best of roads. You simply must make

use of my mare. I cannot permit you to refuse. If I did so, I should

incur the lasting and just disapproval of your aunts, The Oaks ladies.

You certainly do not wish me to do that. I have placed your saddle upon

my mare, and I am waiting to help you mount."

The girl hesitated, bewildered, unwilling, and distinctly in that

feminine state of mind which women call "vexed." At last she asked:

"What will you do if I refuse?"

"O, in that case I shall turn the mare loose, and walk at a respectful

distance behind you as you trudge over the miry road, until you become

hopelessly involved in the red clay at Vinegar Post. Then I shall rush

to your rescue like a gallant knight, and carry you pick-a-back all the

way to The Oaks. It will be a singularly undignified approach to a

mansion in which the proprieties of life are sternly insisted upon.

Don't you think you'd better take the mare, Miss Ronald?"

The girl stood silent for nearly a minute in a half-angry mood of

resistance, which was in battle with the laughing demon that just now

possessed her. She did not want to laugh. She was determined not to

laugh. Therefore she laughed uncontrollably, as one is apt to do when

something ludicrous occurs at a funeral. Presently she said:

"I wonder what it was all about anyhow--the quarrel, I mean, between

your grandfather and my poor father?"

There was a touch of melancholy in her tone as she spoke of her "poor

father"--for that phrase, in Virginian usage, always meant that the dear

one mentioned was dead. "I wonder what it was that makes it so

imperative for me to be formally courteous beyond the common to you, and

at the same time highly improper for me to accept such ordinary

courtesies at your hands as I freely accept from others, thinking

nothing about the matter."

"Would you really like to know?" the young man asked.

"Yes--no. I'm not quite certain. Sometimes I want to know--just now, for

example--so that I may know just what my duty is. But at other times I

think it should be enough for me, as a well-ordered young person, to

know that I must be loyal to my poor father's memory, and never forgive

a Pegram while I live. My good aunts have taught me that much, but they

have never told me anything about the origin of the feud. All I know is

that, in order to be true to the memory of my poor father, who died

before I was born, I must always remember that the Ronalds and the

Pegrams are hereditary enemies. That is why I refuse to use the mare

which you have so courteously offered me, Mr. Pegram."

"Still," answered the young man, as if arguing the matter out with

himself, "it might not compromise your dignity so much to ride a mare

that belongs to me, as to let me 'tote' you home--for that is precisely

what I must do if you persist in your refusal."

The girl again laughed, merrily this time, but still she hesitated:

"Listen!" said Baillie; "that's my boy Sam coming. It would be unseemly

for us to continue our quarrel in the presence of a servant."

As he spoke the voice of Sam rose from beyond the pines, in a ditty

which he was singing with all the power of a robust set of vocal organs:

"My own Eliza gal--she's de colour ob de night,

When de moon it doesn't shine a little bit;

But her teeth shows white in de shaddah ob de night,

And her eyes is like a lantern when it's lit.

"Oh, Eliza!

How I prize yeh!

You'se de nicest gal dere is;

It's fer you dat I'se a-pinin',

For you're like a star dat's shinin'

When de moon it's done forgitten how to riz."

With that Sam came beaming upon the scene. His round, black, shining

visage, and eyes that glittered with a humour which might have won an

anchorite to merriment, resembled nothing so much as the sun at its

rising, if one may think of the sun as black and glistening from a

diligent rubbing with a bacon rind, which was Sam's favourite cosmetic,

as it is of all the very black negroes.

Sam was sitting sidewise upon a saddleless mule, but when he saw the

situation he quickly slipped to the ground, pulled his woolly forelock

in lieu of doffing the hat which he had not, and asked:

"What's de mattah, Mas' Baillie?"

The girl saw the impropriety of continuing the discussion--it had ceased

to be a quarrel now--in Sam's presence. So she held out her hand, and

said:

"Thank you very much, Mr. Pegram. I will ride your beautiful mare, and

to-morrow, if you are so minded, you may call at The Oaks to inquire how

the animal has behaved toward me. Good morning, sir!"

She sprang into the saddle without waiting for young Pegram to assist

her, for she was even yet determined to accept no more of attention at

his hands than she must. He, in his turn, was too greatly relieved by

this ending of the embarrassing scene to care for the implied snub to

his gallantry. As soon as the girl rode away, which she did without

pausing for a moment, Baillie Pegram turned to Sam, and without

inquiring upon what errand that worthy had been going, gave the order:

"Mount your mule and ride at a respectful distance behind Miss Agatha

Ronald. She may have trouble with that half-broken mare of mine. And

mind you, boy, don't entertain the young lady with any of your songs as

you go. When you get back to Warlock, bring me a horse to the

Court-house, do you hear?"

Then leading the wounded animal upon three legs into the woods near by,

Pegram fired a charge of shot from the fowling-piece which he carried,

into its brain, killing the poor beast instantly and painlessly.

Having discharged this duty of mercy, the young man, with high boots

drawn over his trousers' legs, set out with a brisk stride for the

county-seat village, known only as "the Court-house." Entering the

clerk's office, he said to the county clerk:

"As a magistrate of this county I direct you to enter a fine of five

dollars against Baillie Pegram, Esq., supervisor of the Vinegar Post

road, for his neglect to keep the bridge over Dogwood Branch in repair.

Here's the money. Give me a receipt, please, and make the proper entries

upon the court records."

"Pardon me, Mr. Pegram," answered the clerk, "but you remember that at

the last term of the county court, with a full bench of magistrates

sitting, it was decided to adjourn the court indefinitely in view of the

disturbed condition of the time?"

"I remember that," answered the young man, "but that action was taken

only upon the ground that under present circumstances it would work

hardship to many for the courts to meet for the enforcement of debts.

This is a very different case. As road supervisor I am charged with a

public duty which I have neglected. As a magistrate it is my duty to

fine every road supervisor who is derelict. No session of the court is

necessary for that. I shall certainly not tolerate such neglect of duty

on the part of any county officer, particularly when I happen to be

myself the derelict official. So enter the fine and give me a receipt

for the money."

Does all this impress the reader as quixotic? Was it a foolish

sentimentalism that prompted these men to serve their neighbours and the

public without pay, and, upon occasion, to hold themselves rigidly

responsible to a high standard of duty? Was it quixotism which prompted

George Washington to serve his country without one dollar of pay,

through seven years of war, as the general of its armies, and through

nearly twice that time as President, first of the Constitutional

Convention, and afterwards, for eight years, as President of the nation?

Was it an absurd sentimentalism that prompted him, after he had declined

pay, to decline also the gifts voluntarily and urgently pressed upon him

by his own and other States, and by the nation? The humourists ridicule

all such sentiment. But the humourists are not a court of final appeal.

At any rate, this sentimentality had its good side.

But at this time of extreme excitement, there were, no doubt, ludicrous

exaggerations of sentiment and conduct now and then, and on this

sixteenth day of April, 1861, the master of Warlock encountered some

things that greatly amused him. Having finished his business in the

clerk's office, he found himself in the midst of excited throngs.

Startling news had come from Richmond that morning. In view of the

bombardment of Fort Sumter, President Lincoln had called for

seventy-five thousand men as an army with which to reduce the seceding

States to subjection.

Virginia was not one of the seceding States. Up to that time, she had

utterly repudiated the thought that secession was justified by Mr.

Lincoln's election, or by any threat to the South which his accession to

office implied.

The statesmen of Virginia had busied themselves for months with efforts

to find a way out of the difficulties that beset the country. They were

intent upon saving that Union which had been born of Virginia's

suggestion, if such saving could be accomplished by any means that did

not involve dishonour. The people of Virginia, when called upon to

decide the question of their own course in such a crisis by the election

of a constitutional convention, had overwhelmingly decided it against

secession, and in favour of adherence to the Union. Under Virginia's

influence, Maryland, North Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky, Arkansas, and

Missouri had refused to secede.

But while the Virginians were thus opposed to secession, and while they

were fully convinced that secession was neither necessary nor advisable

under the circumstances then existing, they were of one mind in

believing that the constitutional right of any State to withdraw from

the Union at will was absolute and indefeasible. So when Mr. Lincoln

called upon Virginia for her quota of troops with which to coerce back

into the Union those States which had exercised what the Virginians held

to be their rightful privilege of withdrawal, it seemed to the

Virginians that there was forced upon them a choice between secession

and unspeakable dishonour. They wanted to remain in the Union, of which

their State had been from the beginning so influential a part. They were

intensely loyal to the history and traditions of that Union over which

their Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, and Tyler had presided,

and at the head of whose supreme court their John Marshall had so wisely

interpreted the constitution. But when Mr. Lincoln notified them that

they must furnish their quota of troops with which to make war upon

sister States for exercising a right which the Virginians deemed

unquestionable, they felt that they had no choice but to join the

seceding States and take the consequences.

What a pity it seems, as we look back upon that crisis of forty odd

years ago, that Mr. Lincoln could not have found some other way out of

his difficulties! What a pity that he could not have seen his way clear

to omit Virginia and the other border States from his call for troops,

with which to make war upon secession! Doubtless it was impracticable

for him to make such a distinction. But the pity of it is none the less

on that account. For if this might have been done, there would have been

no civil war worthy the attention of the historian or the novelist. In

that case the battles of Bull Run, the Seven Days, Fredericksburg,

Antietam, Chancellorsville, Gettysburg, the Wilderness, Spottsylvania,

Cold Harbour, and the rest of the bloody encounters would never have

been fought. In that case the country would not have exhausted itself

with four years of strenuous war, enlisting 2,700,000 men on one side,

and 600,000 on the other. In that case many thousands of brave young

lives would have been spared, and the desolation of homes by tens of

thousands would not have come upon the land.

It is idle, however, to speculate in "if's," even when their

significance is so sadly obvious as it is in this case. Facts are facts,

and the all-dominating fact on that 16th of April, 1861, was that

President Lincoln had called upon Virginia for her quota of troops with

which to make war upon the seceding States, and that Virginia had no

mind to respond to the call.

It was certain now, that Virginia--however reluctantly and however

firmly convinced she might be that secession was uncalled for on the

part of the Southern States, would adopt an ordinance of secession, and

thus make inevitable the coming of the greatest war in all history,

where otherwise no war at all, or at most an insignificant one, would

have occurred.

There was no question in the minds of any body at the Court-house on

this sixteenth day of April, 1861, that Virginia would secede as soon as

a vote could be taken in the convention.

The county was a small one, insignificant in the number of its white

inhabitants,--there being six negroes to one white in its

population,--but it was firmly convinced that upon its attitude depended

the fate of Virginia, and perhaps of the nation. This conviction was

strong, at any rate, in the minds of the three local orators who had

ordered a muster for this day in order that they might have an audience

to harangue. These were Colonel Gregor, of the militia and the bar,

Lieutenant-Colonel Simpson, also of the bar and the militia, and Captain

Sam Guthrie, who commanded a troop of uniformed horsemen, long ago

organised for purposes of periodical picnicking. This troop afterward

rendered conspicuously good service in Stuart's First Regiment of

Virginia cavalry, but not under Captain Guthrie's command. That officer,

early in the campaign, developed a severe case of nervous prostration,

and retired. The militiamen also volunteered, and rendered their full

four years of service. But Lieutenant-Colonel Simpson retired during his

first and only skirmish, while Colonel Gregor discovered in himself a

divine call to the ministry of the gospel, and stayed at home to answer

it. But all this came later. In April, 1861, these three were the eager

advocates of war, instant and terrible. Under inspiration of the news

from Richmond, they spouted like geysers throughout that day. They could

not have been more impassioned in their pleas if theirs had been a

reluctant community, in danger of disgracing itself by refusing to

furnish its fair share of volunteers for Virginia's defence, though in

fact every able-bodied man in the county had already signified his

intention of volunteering at the first opportunity.

But the orators were not minded to miss so good an opportunity to

display their eloquence, and impress themselves upon the community.

Colonel Gregor, in a fine burst of eloquence, warned his fellow

citizens, whom he always addressed as "me countrymen," to examine

themselves carefully touching their personal courage, "for," he

thundered, "where Gregor leads, brave men must follow."

Later in the day, Lieutenant-Colonel Simpson hit upon the happy idea,

which his superior officer at once adopted, of ordering the entire

militia of the county into camp at the Court-house, where the three men

eloquent might harangue them at will between drills. The two

field-officers told the men that they must now regard themselves as

minute men, and hold themselves in readiness to respond at a moment's

notice to the country's call, for the repelling of invasion, whensoever

it might come.

All this impressed Baillie Pegram as ridiculous. That young gentleman

had a saving sense of humour, but he was content to smile at a

foolishness in which he had no mind to join. The young men of the

county responded enthusiastically to the encampment call. It meant for

them some days of delightful picnicking, with dancing in the evening.

Baillie Pegram, having business to transact in Richmond, absented

himself from a frolic not to his taste, and took the noonday train for

the State capital.

II

_THE BRINGING UP OF AGATHA_

Agatha Roland was a particularly well ordered young gentlewoman, at

least during her long, half-yearly visits to her aunts at The Oaks. At

home with her maternal grandfather, Colonel Archer, she was neither well

nor ill ordered--she was not ordered at all. She gave orders instead, in

a gentle way; and her word was law, by virtue of her grandfather's

insistence that it should be so regarded, and still more by reason of

something in herself that gently gave authority to her will.

Agatha had been born at The Oaks, and that plantation was to be her

property at the death of her two elderly maiden aunts, her dead father's

sisters. But she had been taken as a little child to the distant home of

her grandfather, Colonel Archer, and after her mother's death she had

lived there alone with that sturdy old Virginia gentleman.

She was less than seven years old when he installed her behind the

tea-tray in her dead mother's stead, and made her absolute mistress of

the mansion, issuing the order that "whatever Miss Agatha wants done

must be done, or I will find out why." Her good aunts sought to

interfere at first, but they soon learned better. They wanted the girl

to come to them at The Oaks "for her bringing up," they said. Upon that

plan Colonel Archer instantly put a veto that was not the less

peremptory for the reason that he could not "put his foot down" just

then, because of an attack of the gout. Then the good ladies urged him

to take "some gentlewoman of mature years and high character" into his

house, "to look after the child's bringing up, so that her manners may

be such as befit a person of her lineage."

To this appeal the old gentleman replied:

"I'll look after all that myself. I don't want the child taught a lot of

nonsense, and I won't have her placed under anybody's authority. She

doesn't need control, any more than the birds do; she shall grow up

here at Willoughby in perfect freedom and naturalness. I'll be

responsible for the result. She shall wear bonnets whenever she wants

to, and go without them whenever that pleases her best; when she wants

to go barefoot and wade in the branches, as all healthy children like to

do, she shall not be told that her conduct is 'highly improper,' and all

that nonsense. O, I know," he said, in anticipation of a protest that he

saw coming, "I know she'll get 'dreadfully tanned,' and become a

tomboy--and all the rest of it. But I'll answer for it that when she

grows up her perfectly healthy skin will bear comparison with the

complexion of the worst house-burnt young woman in all the land, and as

for her figure, nature will take care of that under the life of liberty

that she's going to live, in the air and sunshine."

"But you'll surely send her to school?"

"Not if I retain my senses. I remember my humanities well enough to

teach her all the Latin, Greek, and mathematics she needs. We'll read

history and literature together, and as for French, I speak that

language a good deal better than most of the dapper little

dancing-masters do who keep 'young ladies' seminaries.' We'll ride

horseback together every day, and I'll teach her French while I'm

teaching her how to take an eight-rail fence at a gallop."

The remonstrances were continued for a time, until one day the old

gentleman made an end of them by saying:

"I have heard all I want to hear on that subject. It is not to be

mentioned to me again."

Everybody who knew Colonel Archer knew that when he spoke in that tone

of mingled determination and self-restraint, it was a dictate of

prudence to respect his wish. So after that Agatha and he lived alone at

Willoughby, a plantation in Northern Virginia three or four days distant

by carriage from The Oaks.

Morning, noon, and night, these two were inseparable companions.

"Chummie" was the pet name she gave him in her childish days, and he

would never permit her to address him by any other as she grew up.

Old soldier that he was,--for he had commanded a company under Jackson

at New Orleans, and had been a colonel during the war with Mexico,--it

was his habit to exact implicit obedience within his own domain. He was

the kindliest of masters, but his will was law on the plantation, and as

everybody there recognised the fact, he never had occasion to give an

order twice, or to mete out censure for disobedience. But for Agatha

there was no law. Colonel Archer would permit none, while she in her

turn made it her one study in life to be and do whatever her "Chummie"

liked best.

Colonel Archer had a couple of gardeners, of course, but their work was

mainly to do the rougher things of horticulture. He and Agatha liked to

do the rest for themselves. They prepared the garden-beds, seeded them,

and carefully nursed their growths into fruitage, he teaching her, as

they did so, that love of all growing things which is botany's best

lesson.

"And the plants love us back again, Chummie," she one day said to him,

while she was still a little child. "They smile when we go near them,

and sometimes the pansies whisper to me. I'm sure of that."

She was at that time a slender child, with big, velvety brown eyes and a

tangled mass of brown hair which her maid Martha struggled in vain to

reduce to subjection. She usually put on a sunbonnet when she went to

the garden in the early morning; but when it obstructed her vision, or

otherwise annoyed her, she would push it off, letting it fall to her

back and hang by its strings about her neck. Even then it usually became

an annoyance, particularly when she wanted to climb a fruit-tree, and

Martha would find it later, resting upon a cluster of rose-bushes, or

hung upon a fence-paling.

The pair of chums--the sturdy old gentleman and the little girl--had no

regular hours for any of their employments, but at some hour of every

day, they got out their books and read or studied together.

They were much on horseback, too, and when autumn came they would tramp

together through stubble fields and broom-straw growths, shooting quails

on the wing--partridges, they correctly called them, as it is the habit

of everybody in Virginia to do, for the reason that the bird which the

New York marketman calls "quail," is properly named "Partridge

Virginiensis," while the bird that the marketman sells as a partridge is

not a partridge at all, but a grouse. The girl became a good shot

during her first season, and a year later she challenged her grandfather

to a match, to see who could bag the greater number of birds. At the end

of the morning's sport, her bag outnumbered her companion's by two

birds; but when the count was made, she looked with solemn eyes into her

grandfather's face and, shaking her head in displeasure, said:

"Chummie, you've been cheating! I don't like to think it of you, but

it's true. You've missed several birds on purpose to let me get ahead of

you. I'll never count birds with you again."

The old gentleman tried to laugh the matter off, but the girl would not

consent to that. After awhile she said: "I'll forgive you this time,

Chummie; but I'll never count birds with you again."

"But why not, Ladybird?"

"Why, because you don't like to beat me, and I don't like to beat you.

So if we go on counting birds and each trying to lose the match, we'll

get to be very bad shots. Besides that, Chummie, cheating will impair

your character."

But the girl was not left without the companionship of girls of her own

age. Colonel Archer was too wise a student of human nature for that. So

from the beginning he planned to give her the companionship she needed.

"You are the mistress of Willoughby, you know, Agatha," he said to her

one day, "and you must keep up the reputation of the place for

hospitality. You must have your dining-days like the rest, and invite

your friends."

And she did so. She would send out her little notes, written in a hand

that closely resembled that of her grandfather, begging half a dozen

girls, daughters of the planters round about, to dine with her, and they

would come in their carriages, attended by their negro maids. It was

Colonel Archer's delight to watch Agatha on these occasions, and observe

the very serious way in which she sought to discharge her duties as a

hospitable hostess in becoming fashion.

A little later he encouraged her to invite two or three of her young

friends, now and then, to stay for a few days or a week with her, after

the Virginian custom. But not until she was twelve years old did he

consent to spare her for longer than a single night. Then he agreed with

The Oaks ladies that she should spend a few weeks in the spring and a

few in the late summer or autumn of every year with them. They welcomed

the arrangement as one which would at least give them an opportunity to

"form the girl." During her semi-annual visits to The Oaks they very

diligently set themselves to work drilling her in the matter of respect

for the formalities of life.

The process rather interested Agatha, and sometimes it even amused her.

She was solemnly enjoined not to do things that she had never thought of

doing, and as earnestly instructed to do things which she had never in

her life neglected to do.

At first she was too young to formulate the causes of her interest and

amusement in this process. But her mind matured rapidly in association

with her grandfather, and she began at last to analyse the matter.

"When I go to The Oaks," she wrote to her "Chummie" one day, "I feel

like a sinner going to do penance; but the penance is rather amusing

than annoying. I am made to feel how shockingly improper I have been at

Willoughby with you, Chummie, during the preceding six months, and how

necessary it is for me to submit myself for a season to a control that

shall undo the effects of the liberty in which I live at Willoughby. I

am made to understand that liberty is the very worst thing a girl or a

woman can indulge herself in. Am I very bad, Chummie?"

For answer the old gentleman laughed aloud. Then he wrote:

"You see how shrewdly I have managed this thing, Ladybird. I wouldn't

let you go to The Oaks till you had become too fully confirmed in your

habit of being free, ever to be reformed."

Later, and more seriously, he said to the girl:

"Every human being is the better for being free--women as well as men.

Liberty to a human being is like sunshine and fresh air. Restraint is

like medicine--excellent for those who are ill, but very bad indeed for

healthy people. Did it ever occur to you, Agatha, that you never took a

pill or a powder in your life? You haven't needed medicine because

you've had air and sunshine; no more do you need restraint, and for the

same reason. You are perfectly healthy in your mind as well as in your

body."

"But, Chummie, you don't know how very ill regulated I am. Aunt Sarah

and Aunt Jane disapprove very seriously of many things that I do."

"What things?"

"Well, they say, for example, that it is very unladylike for me to call

you 'Chummie,'--that it indicates a want of that respect for age and

superiority which every young person--you know I am only a 'young

person' to them--should scrupulously cultivate."

"Well, now, let me give you warning, Miss Agatha Ronald; if you ever

call me anything but 'Chummie,' I'll alter my will, and leave this

plantation to the Abolitionist Society as an experiment station."

Nevertheless, Agatha Ronald was, as has been said at the beginning of

this chapter, a particularly well ordered young gentlewoman so long as

she remained as a guest with her aunts at The Oaks. She loved the gentle

old ladies dearly, and strove with all her might, while with them, to

comport herself in accordance with their standards of conduct on the

part of a young gentlewoman.

Sometimes, however, her innocence misled her, as it had done on that

morning when Baillie Pegram had met her at the bridge over Dogwood

Branch. The spirit of the morning had taken possession of her on that

occasion, and she had so far reverted from her condition of

dame-nurtured grace into her habitual state of nature as to mount her

horse and ride away without the escort even of a negro groom. It was not

at all unusual at that time for young gentlewomen in Virginia to ride

thus alone, but The Oaks ladies strongly disapproved the custom, as they

disapproved all other customs that had come into being since their own

youth had passed away, especially all customs that in any way tended to

enlarge the innocent liberty of young women. On this point the good

ladies were as rigidly insistent as if they had been the ladies superior

of a convent of young nuns. They could not have held liberty for young

gentlewomen in greater dread and detestation, had they believed, as they

certainly did not, in the total depravity of womankind.

"It is not that we fear you would do anything wrong, dear," they would

gently explain. "It is only that--well, you see a young gentlewoman

cannot be too careful."

Agatha did not see, but she yielded to the prejudices of her aunts with

a loyalty all the more creditable to her for the reason that she did not

and could not share their views. On this occasion she had not thought of

offending. It had not occurred to her that there could be the slightest

impropriety in her desire to greet the morning on horseback, and

certainly it had not entered her mind that she might meet Baillie Pegram

and be compelled to accept a courtesy at his hands. She knew, as she

rode silently homeward after that meeting at the bridge, that in this

respect she had sinned beyond overlooking.

For Agatha Ronald knew that she must be on none but the most distant and

formal terms with the master of Warlock. She had learned that lesson at

Christmas-time, three months before. She had spent the Christmas season

in Richmond, with some friends. There Baillie Pegram had met her for the

first time since she had attained her womanhood--for he had been away at

college, at law school, or on his travels at the time of all her more

recent sojourns at The Oaks. He had known her very slightly as a shy and

wild little girl, but the woman Agatha was a revelation to him, and

her beauty not less than her charm of manner and her unusual

intelligence, had fascinated him. He frequented the house of her

Richmond friends, and had opportunities to learn more every day of

herself. He did not pause to analyse his feeling for her; he only knew

that it was quite different from any that he had ever experienced

before. And Agatha, in her turn and in her candor, had admitted to

herself that she "liked" young Pegram better than any other young man

she had ever met.

[Illustration: _Agatha Ronald_]

No word of love had passed between these two, and both were unconscious

of their state of mind, when their intercourse was suddenly interrupted.

A note came to Baillie one day from Agatha, in which the frank and

fearlessly honest young woman wrote:

"I am not to see you any more, Mr. Pegram. I am informed by my relatives

that there are circumstances for which neither of us is responsible,

which render it quite improper that you and I should be friends. I am

very sorry, but I think it my duty to tell you this myself. I thank you

for all your kindnesses to me before we knew about this thing."

That was absolutely all there was of the note, but it was quite enough.

It had set Baillie to inquiring concerning a feud of which he vaguely

knew the existence, but to which he had never before given the least

attention.

That is how it came about that Agatha rode sadly homeward after the

meeting at the bridge, wondering how she could have done otherwise than

accept the use of Baillie Pegram's mare, and wondering still more what

her aunts would say to her concerning the matter.

"Anyhow," she thought at last, "I've done no intentional wrong. Chummie

would not blame me if he were here, and I am not sure that I shall

accept much blame at anybody's else hands. I'll be good and submissive

if I can, but--well, I don't know. Maybe I'll hurry back home to

Chummie."

III

_JESSAMINE AND HONEYSUCKLE_

It was a peculiarity of inherited quarrels between old Virginia families

that they must never be recognised outwardly by any act of discourtesy,

and still less by any neglect of formal attention where courtesy was

called for. Such quarrels were never mentioned between the families that

were involved in them, and equally they were never forgotten. Each

member of either family owed it to himself to treat all members of the

other family with the utmost deference, while never for a moment

permitting that deference to lapse into anything that could be construed

to mean forgiveness or forgetfulness.

Agatha, as we have seen, had twice violated the code under which such

affairs were conducted; once in the note she had sent to Baillie Pegram

in Richmond, and for the second time in giving him permission to call at

The Oaks to inquire concerning her journey homeward on his mare. But on

both occasions she had been out of the presence and admonitory influence

of her aunts, and when absent from them, Agatha Ronald was not at all

well regulated, as we know. She was given to acting upon her own natural

and healthy-minded impulses, and such impulses were apt to be at war

with propriety as propriety was understood and insisted upon at The

Oaks.

But Baillie Pegram was not minded to make any mistake in a matter of so

much delicacy and importance. He had received Agatha's permission to

make that formal call of inquiry, which was customary on all such

occasions, and she in her heedlessness had probably meant what she said,

as it was her habit to do. But Baillie knew very well that her good

aunts would neither expect nor wish him to call upon their niece. At the

same time he must not leave his omission to do so unexplained. He must

send a note of apology, not to Agatha,--as he would have done to any

other young woman under like circumstances,--but to her aunts instead.

In a note to them he reported his sudden summons to Richmond, adding

that as he was uncertain as to the length of his stay there, he begged

the good ladies to accept his absence from home as his sufficient excuse

for not calling to inquire concerning the behaviour of his mare during

their niece's journey upon that rather uncertain-minded animal's back.

This note he gave to Sam for delivery, when Sam brought him the horse he

had ordered but no longer wanted.

Baillie Pegram had all the pride of his lineage and his class. He had

sought to forget all about Agatha Ronald after her astonishing little

note had come to him some months before in Richmond, and until this

morning he had believed that he had accomplished that forgetfulness. But

now the thought of her haunted him ceaselessly. All the way to Richmond

her beauty and her charm, as she had stood there by the roadside, filled

his mind with visions that tortured him. He tried with all his might to

dismiss the visions and to think of something else. He bought the daily

papers and tried to interest himself in their excited utterances, but

failed. Red-hot leaders, that were meant to stir all Virginian souls to

wrathful resolution, made no impression on his mind. He read them, and

knew not what he had read. He was thinking of the girl by the roadside,

and his soul was fascinated with the memory of her looks, her words, her

finely modulated voice, her ways, as she had tried to refuse his offer

of assistance. Had he been of vain and conceited temper, he might have

flattered himself with the thought that her very hauteur in converse

with him implied something more and better than indifference on her part

toward him. But that thought did not enter his mind. He thought instead:

"What a sublimated idiot I am! That girl is nothing to me--worse than

nothing. Circumstances place her wholly outside my acquaintance, except

in the most formal fashion. She is a young gentlewoman of my own

class--distinctly superior to all the other young gentlewomen of that

class whom I have ever met,--and ordinarily it would be the most natural

thing in the world for me to pay my addresses to her. But in this case

that is completely out of the question. To me at least she is the

unattainable. I must school myself to think of her no more, and that

ought to be easy enough, as I am not in love with her and am not

permitted even to think of being so. It's simply a craze that has taken

possession of me for a time,--the instinct of the huntsman, to whom

quarry is desirable in the precise ratio of its elusiveness. There, I've

thought the whole thing out to an end, and now I must give my mind to

something more important."

Yet even in the midst of the excitement that prevailed in Richmond that

day, Baillie Pegram did not quite succeed in driving out of his mind the

memory of the little tableau by the bridge, or forgetting how supremely

fascinating Agatha Ronald had seemed, as she had haughtily declined his

offer of service, and still more as she had reluctantly accepted it, and

ridden away after so cleverly evading his offer to help her mount.

It had been his purpose to remain in Richmond for a week or more, but on

the third morning he found himself homeward bound, and filled with vain

imaginings. Just why he had started homeward before the intended time,

it would have puzzled him to say; but several times he caught himself

wondering if there would be awaiting him at Warlock an answer to his

formal note of apology for not having made a call which nobody had

expected him to make. He perfectly knew that no such answer was to be

expected, and especially that if there should be any answer at all, it

must be one of formal and repellent courtesy, containing no message from

Agatha of the kind that his troubled imagination persisted in conceiving

in spite of the scorn with which he rejected the absurd conjecture.

Nevertheless as he neared home he found himself half-expecting to find

there an answer to his note, and he found it. It gave him no pleasure in

the reading, and in his present state of mind he could not find even a

source of amusement in the stilted formality of its rhetoric. It had

been written by one of Agatha's aunts, and signed by both of them. Thus

it ran:

"The Misses Ronald of The Oaks feel themselves deeply indebted to

Mr. Baillie Pegram for his courtesy to their niece and guest, Miss

Agatha Ronald, on the occasion of her recent misadventure. They

have also to thank Mr. Pegram most sincerely for having taken upon

himself the disagreeable duty of giving painless death to the

unfortunate animal that their niece was riding upon that occasion.

They have to inform Mr. Pegram that as Miss Agatha Ronald is making

her preparations for an almost immediate return to her maternal

grandfather's plantation of Willoughby, in Fauquier, and as she

will probably begin her journey before Mr. Pegram's return from

Richmond, there will scarcely be opportunity for his intended call

to inquire concerning her welfare after her homeward ride upon the

mare which he so graciously placed at her disposal at a time of

sore need. They beg to report that the beautiful animal behaved

with the utmost gentleness during the journey.

"The Oaks ladies beg to assure Mr. Pegram of their high esteem, and

to express their hope that he will permit none of the events of

this troubled time to prevent him from dining with them at The Oaks

on the third Friday of each month, as it has been his courteous

custom to do in the past. The Misses Ronald remain,

"Most respectfully,

"SARAH RONALD,

"JANE RONALD."

This missive was more than a little bewildering. Its courtesy was

extreme. Even in practically telling Baillie Pegram not to call upon

their niece, the good ladies had adroitly managed to make their message

seem rather one of regret than of prohibition. Certainly there was not a

word in the missive at which offence could be taken, and not an

expression lacking, the lack of which could imply negligence. The young

man read it over several times before he could make out its exact

significance, and even then he was not quite sure that he fully

understood.

"It reads like a 'joint note' from the Powers to the Grand Turk," he

said to the young man--his bosom friend--whom he had found awaiting him

at Warlock on his return. This young man, Marshall Pollard, had been

Baillie Pegram's intimate at the university, and now that university

days were done, it was his habit to come and go at will at Warlock, the

plantation of which Baillie was owner and sole white occupant with the

exception of a maiden aunt who presided over his household.