At about the hour at which I was taking leave of the Don my grandfather
was sitting alone in his dining-room, reading; his snow-white hair and
beard, as they glistened in the lamp-light, affording a strong contrast
to the vivacity of his dark eyes and the ruddy glow of his complexion.
But the book before him was hardly able to fix his attention. Every now
and then he would raise his eyes from its pages, with the look of one
who fancied that he heard an expected sound. Several times he had risen
from his seat, gone to the door, opened it, and listened. Something like
this he had been doing now for nearly a week. “Dick!” called he at last,
opening the door: “Dick!”
Uncle Dick emerged from the kitchen, where, for several days past, he
had had orders to sit up till ten o’clock in the hope that Charley might
arrive.
“Yes, mahster!”
“Dick, I thought I heard some one coming.”
Uncle Dick, who very naturally (and correctly) supposed that this was
another false alarm, threw his head into an attitude of pretended
listening.
“Do you hear anything?” asked the old gentleman.
“Ain’t dem de horses a-stompin’ down at de stable?”
“I believe you are right,” sighed the old gentleman, as he turned to
re-enter the dining-room.
“Marse Charley ain’t sont you no letter, is he?” asked Uncle Dick,
advancing deferentially towards my grandfather, across the space that
separated the kitchen from the “Great-House.”
“Why, no; but I thought he might come. He wrote me a week ago that the
gentleman was getting well.”
“Adzackly!” replied Dick, scratching in the fringe of white wool that
bordered his bald head. “Jess so! Does you think it rimprobable,
mahster,” he began again after a moment of seeming reflection, “dat
Marse Charley would come without he writ fust and ’pinted de day, and de
ferry ’most twenty miles from here, and nothin’ to hire dere ’cep’n ’tis
dat old flea-bitten gray, and he a-string-halted?”
“True enough.”
“Dat ain’t no fitten animil for de likes o’ Marse Charley, and he a-used
to straddlin’ o’ de very best dat steps.”
“But listen, Dick! what’s that?”
“Lor’, mahster, dat ain’t nothin’ but de old m’yar and colt out d’yar in
de pasture.”
“Well, what in the blue-blazes makes them all stamp so to-night?”
replied the old gentleman, not without a little petulance.
“Dat’s jess what I say! leastwise d’yar ain’t no flies to bite ’em dis
weather; but dey will do it, mahster, dey will do it. Every dog have he
day, dey tell me.”
Uncle Dick was strong on proverbs, though hardly happy in their
application. Sometimes, in fact, just as doctors will, when they don’t
know what is the matter with a patient, prescribe pills of several
remedial agents, in the hope that if one shall miss another may hit, so
our old hostler, carriage-driver, and dining-room servant would not
scruple, when aiming at a truth, to let fly at it an aphorism compound
of the head of one proverb and the tail of another.
“Yes,” said my grandfather, applying Dick’s saying for him, “every dog
will have his day, and I suppose that is why your Marse Charles is
staying so long in Richmond.”
Uncle Dick was a year or two his master’s senior, and many a “wrassle”
had they had together as boys. He was, of course, a privileged
character, and he now gave one of those low chuckles beyond the reach of
the typographer’s art to represent to the eye. “Yes, mahster, I hears
’em say dat d’yar is some monstrous pretty gals, nebberdeless I should
say young ladies, up d’yar in Richmond. Howsomever, pretty is as pretty
does. Dat’s what old Dick tells ’em.”
“You think Charley is in love, I presume?”
Old Dick drew himself up as became one consulted on family affairs, and,
dropping his head on one side, he assumed, with his knitted brows and
pursed lips, an eminently judicial air.
“Well, mahster, ef you axes me ’bout dat, I couldn’t ’espond pint’ly, in
course; for I ain’t seen Marse Charles a-noratin’ of it and
a-splanifyin’ amongst de Richmond f’yar sect; but old Dick ain’t been
a-wrasslin’ and a-spyin’ ’round in dis here vain world for nigh on to a
hundred year for nothin’ ef you listen to Dick; and ef you believes me,
mahster, dey all of ’em most inginerally gits tetched with love
onetimeornuther.”
“I believe you are quite right, Dick.”
“Why, Lor’ me, mahster,” began Dick, encouraged, and assuming an
attitude worthy of the vast generalization he was about to utter, “I
really do believe into my soul dat people is born so; dey is
pint’ly,—specially young folks.” And he stopped in mid-career. “What
dat? ’Pear like I hear the far gate slam. But Marse Charley, he are a
keener, he are, and the gal what catches him will have to be a keener
too, she will pint’ly. Marse Charley worse’n a oyster at low tide; soon
as a young ’oman begins a-speculatin’ and a-gallivantin’ _round him_, he
shets up, he do.” And the old man chuckled. “Howsomever, he am pint’ly a
keener, ef you hear Dick—”
“Listen, Dick!”
“I do believe I hear a horse snort! D’yar ’tis again! Somebody comin’
through de gate. ’Fore de Lord, I believe ’tis Marse Charley! Lemme look
good! Sure enough, d’yar he is! Sarvant, Marse Charles! I knowed you was
a-comin’ dis very night, and I hope I may die ef he ain’t on old
Hop-and-go-fetch-it! Lord a’ massy! Lord a’ massy! Well, it’s an ill
wind what don’t blow de crows out o’ some gent’mun’s cornfield. Lord a’
massy, Marse Charley, what _is_ you a-doin’ up d’yar on dat poor old
critter, and de horses in de stable jess a-spilin’ to have somebody
fling he leg over ’em?”
“Well, my boy, is that you?”
“Yes, here I am again, and glad to be back at home. How are you, Uncle
Tom?”
“The same old seven-and-sixpence,—always well; and how are you?”
“Sound in wind and limb, and savagely hungry.”
“Well, get down, and we’ll soon cure that ailment.”
“I am very sorry,” said Charley, as they entered the dining-room, “that
I had to stay away so long, but it seemed right that I should help nurse
him. Ah, what a noble fire!”
“Well, you are at home again, at any rate. Polly will soon have some
supper for you, and you know what is in the sideboard.”
Old Dick, meanwhile, was carrying out his share in the programme.
“Well, I s’pose I’ll have to feed you,” said he to the flea-bitten,
surveying him from head to hock.
No true negro feels any doubt whatever as to his words being perfectly
intelligible to horse, mule, cow, or dog.
“Ef ever I see a poor-folks’ horse, you is one. Git up! git up! don’t
you hear me? You needn’t be a-standin’ here a-thinkin’ Dick gwine to
ride you to de stable. Aha! you hear dat word stable, did you? Bound for
you! You been d’yar befo’, and you know d’yar’s corn in dat ’ar stable;
and a heap mo’, besides you, know dat d’yar is pervisions a-layin’
around here, and dey ain’t horses neither, nor yet mules. Git up, I tell
you! Ain’t you got no more sense, old as you is, than to be a-snatchin’
at dry grass like dat? But Lor’, Dick don’t blame you! No, honey, Dick
ain’t got a word agin you. Who is you, any way, I ax you dat? Is you
blood? Is you quality? Dat’s what’s de matter, ef you believe me. You
needn’t be a-shakin’ your head; you can’t tell Dick nothin’. Anybody can
see _you_ ain’t kin to nobody. ’M’h’m! yes, chile! you needn’t say a
word, Dick knows dat kind far as he can see ’em, be dey man _or_ beast.
Howsomever, Dick don’t mount no sich. Nigger property is too unsartin
for dat. Nebberdeless, Marse Charles, bein’ as how he belongs to his
self, he mought. Nebberdeless, you fotch him home, and pretty is as
pretty does, dat’s de way old Dick talks it. Polly! Polly!” shouted he
to his wife, the cook, as he passed the kitchen door; “Polly! git up,
gal! Marse Charles done come and want he supper. _I would say_,”
continued he, not content with the colloquial phrases in which he had
announced his young master’s arrival and the state of his appetite,—“I
would say, Polly,”—and enveloped in darkness as he was, and invisible
even to his spouse, the old man threw himself into an impressive pose,
as he always did when about to adorn his language with phrases caught up
from the conversation of his master and his guests,—“I would say de
Prodigy Son have arrove, and he as ravenous as de fatted calf.” Hearing
Polly bustling about within the kitchen: “Polly,” inquired he, in a
stately voice, “did you hearken to what I rubserved?”
“I hear you, Dick.”
“But did you make me out, chile, dat’s de pint, did you make me out?”
“G’long, man, and put dat horse in de stable. Marse Charley want he
supper, course he do. What’s de use o’ talkin’ about fat calves, when
you know as well as I does d’yar ain’t no sich a thing in de kitchen.
Marse Charley want he supper, I know dat, and I’se gittin’ ready to cook
it fast as I can.”
“I b’lieve you. Well, put my name in de pot, chile.” And the old man
went his way. “Well,” said he, soliloquizing upon the much-longed-for
return of his young master, “dey tell me chickens, like horses
[curses?], always does come home to roost—git up, I tell you!—’cep’n
onless dey meets a free nigger in de road, den good-by chickens—for
you’re gwine to leave us.”