"Not even Catrine Montour?" I asked, to plague her.
"No; it turns me cold to think of her running in the forest, but I am
not afraid."
She stood pensive in the doorway, rolling and unrolling her embroidery.
Harry and Cecile came out, flourishing alder poles from which lines and
hooks dangled. Samuel and Benny carried birchen baskets and
shallow nets.
"If we're to have Mohawk chubbs," said Cecile, "you had best come with
us, Dorothy. Ruyven has a book and has locked himself in the play-room."
But Dorothy shook her head, saying that she meant to ride the boundary
with us; and the children, after vainly soliciting my company, trooped
off towards that same grist-mill in the ravine below the bridge which I
had observed on my first arrival at Varick Manor.
"I am wondering," said Dorothy, "how you mean to pass the morning. You
had best steer wide of Sir Lupus until he has breakfasted."
"I've a mind to sleep," I said, guiltily.
"I think it would be pleasant to ride together. Will you?" she asked;
then, laughing, she said, frankly, "Since you have come I do nothing but
follow you.... It is long since I have had a young companion, ... and,
when I think that you are to leave us, it spurs me to lose no moment
that I shall regret when you are gone."
No shyness marred the pretty declaration of her friendship, and it
touched me the more keenly perhaps. The confidence in her eyes, lifted
so sweetly, waked the best in me; and if my response was stumbling, it
was eager and warm, and seemed to please her.
"Tulip! Tulip!" she cried, "I want my dinner! Now!" And to me, "We will
eat what they give us; I shall dress in my buckskins and we will ride
the boundary and register the signs, and Sir Lupus and the others can
meet us at Sir George Covert's pleasure-house on the Vlaie. Does it
please you, Cousin George?"
I looked into her bright eyes and said that it pleased me more than I
dared say, and she laughed and ran up-stairs, calling back to me that I
should order our horses and tell Cato to tell Tulip to fetch meat and
claret to the gun-room.
I whistled a small, black stable lad and bade him bring our mounts to
the porch, then wandered at random down the hallway, following my nose,
which scented the kitchen, until I came to a closed door.
Behind that door meats were cooking--I could take my oath o' that--so I
opened the door and poked my nose in.
"Tulip," I said, "come here!"
An ample black woman, aproned and turbaned, looked at me through the
steam of many kettles, turned and cuffed the lad at the spit, dealt a
few buffets among the scullions, and waddled up to me, bobbing and
curtsying.
"Aunt Tulip," I said, gravely, "are you voodoo?"
"Folks says ah is, Mars' Ormon'," she said, in her soft Georgia accent.
"Oh, they do, do they? Look at me, Aunt Tulip. What do my eyes tell you
of me?"
Her dark eyes, fixed on mine, seemed to change, and I thought little
glimmers of pure gold tinted the iris, like those marvellous restless
tints in a gorgeous bubble. Certainly her eyes were strange, almost
compelling, for I felt a faint rigidity in my cheeks and my eyes
returned directly to hers as at an unspoken command.
"Can you read me, aunty?" I asked, trying to speak easily, yet feeling
the stiffness growing in my cheeks.
"Ah sho' can," she said, stepping nearer.
"What is my fate, then?"
"Ah 'spec' yo' gwine fine yo'se'f in love," she said, softly; and I
strove to smile with ever-stiffening lips.
A little numbness that tingled spread over me; it was pleasant; I did
not care to withdraw my eyes. Presently the tightness in my face
relaxed, I moved my lips, smiling vaguely.
"In love," I repeated.
"Yaas, Mars' Ormon'."
"When?"
"'Fore yo' know h'it, honey."
"Tell me more."
"'Spec' ah done tole yo' too much, honey." She looked at me steadily.
"Pore Mars' Gawge," she murmured, "'spec' ah done tole yo' too much. But
it sho' am a-comin', honey, an' h'it gwine come pow'ful sudden, an' h'it
gwine mek yo' pow'ful sick."
"Am I to win her?"
"No, honey."
"Is there no hope, Aunt Tulip?"
She hesitated as though at fault; I felt the tenseness in my face once
more; then, for one instant, I lost track of time; for presently I found
myself standing in the hallway watching Sir Lupus through the open door
of the gun-room, and Sir Lupus was very angry.
"Dammy!" he roared, "am I to eat my plate? Cato! I want my porridge!"
Confused, I stood blinking at him, and he at table, bibbed like a babe,
mad as a hornet, hammering on the cloth with a great silver spoon and
bellowing that they meant to starve him.
"I don't remember how I came here," I began, then flushed furiously at
my foolishness.
"Remember!" he shouted. "I don't remember anything! I don't want to
remember anything! I want my porridge! I want it now! Damnation!"
Cato, hastening past me with the steaming dish, was received with a
yelp. But at last Sir Lupus got his spoon into the mess and a portion of
the mess into his mouth, and fell to gobbling and growling, paying me no
further attention. So I closed the door of the gun-room on the great
patroon and walked to the foot of the stairway.
A figure in soft buckskins was descending--a blue-eyed, graceful youth
who hailed me with a gesture.
"Dorothy!" I said, fascinated.
Her fringed hunting-shirt fell to her knees, the short shoulder-cape
from throat to breast; gay fringe fluttered from shoulder to wrist, and
from thigh to ankle; and her little scarlet-quilled moccasins went
pat-patter-pat as she danced down the stairway and stood before me,
sweeping her cap from her golden head in exaggerated salute.
She seemed smaller in her boy's dress, fuller, too, and rounder of neck
and limb; and the witchery of her beauty left me silent--a tribute she
found delightful, for she blushed very prettily and bowed again in dumb
acknowledgment of the homage all too evident in my eyes.
Cato came with a dish of meat and a bottle of claret; and we sat down
on the stairs, punishing bottle and platter till neither drop nor
scrap remained.
"Don't leave these dishes for Sir Lupus to fall over!" she cried to
Cato, then sprang to her feet and was out of the door before I could
move, whistling for our horses.
As I came out the horses arrived, and I hastened forward to put her into
her saddle, but she was up and astride ere I reached the ground, coolly
gathering bridle and feeling with her soft leather toes for
the stirrups.
Astonished, for I had never seen a girl so mounted, I climbed to my
saddle and wheeled my mare, following her out across the lawn, through
the stockade and into the road, where I pushed my horse forward and
ranged up beside her at a gallop, just as she reached the bridge.
"See!" she cried, with a sweep of her arm, "there are the children down
there fishing under the mill." And she waved her small cap of silver
fox, calling in a clear, sweet voice the Indian cry of triumph, "Kôue!"