COLONEL DENBIGH was pleasantly detained at the club luncheon. He went
home in a taxi late in the afternoon, only about half an hour before
his own dinner-time. Plato met him in the hall.
“Miss Jinny ain’t eaten no lunch, no suh, an’ now she’s up in her room.
She say she’s got headache, an’ not to wait dinner.”
The colonel deposited his broad-brimmed hat on the table.
“Anybody been here to see me to-day, Plato?”
The old negro shook his head.
“No, suh. Mist’ Wilyum Carter, he came in to see Miss Jinny, but he’s
gone ’bout two hours ago.”
A strange expression flitted across the colonel’s face, but he did not
show it to his faithful factotum.
“Serve dinner on time, Plato,” he said gravely. “I don’t expect
company--lunched in town with Judge Jessup and Mr. Payson.”
“Yessuh, so Miss Jinny tole me. Great trial, suh! Mirandy, Miz Carter’s
collud girl, she ’phoned me ’bout it. She say she got so excited she
went out in de yard an’ killed the wrong hen fo’ dinner. She killed de
bes’ layer dey got, an’ Mist’ Carter he mos’ throw a fit. She say he’s
gwine to make Mist’ Wilyum git a divorcement----”
“Plato,” bellowed the colonel, “how often have I got to tell you to
stop gossiping? You quit it and get my dinner ready, or I’ll kill you
instead of Mrs. Carter’s hen! Hear me?”
Plato giggled disgracefully, but he retired toward the dining-room door.
“Colonel Colfax he used to say----”
“Shut up!” shouted Colonel Denbigh, making for the stairs.
Plato withdrew slowly, still mumbling, and the colonel went up to
Virginia’s room. He hesitated an instant, and then he knocked at the
door.
“Got a bad headache, Jinny?”
She answered without opening the door.
“Very bad, grandpa. Don’t wait dinner--I don’t want any.”
“I’ll ’phone for Dr. Barbour,” he suggested anxiously. “How about it,
Jinny?”
“No, no! It’s just a little headache from the sun. Any news, grandpa?”
The colonel, outside the closed door, stood with his hand at his chin,
thinking.
“Not much, Jinny. I ’phoned everything I could, didn’t I? Dan made a
great figure at the trial, and Leigh’s home now--I reckon Mrs. Carter’s
got him packed in cotton-batting by this time. There’s one thing--I saw
myself----” He hesitated, listening, but there was no interrogation
from the other side of the door. “I saw William Carter ignore his wife
in open court--after the verdict. It--well, Jinny, it stuck in my
throat.”
There was a significant silence. He heard the slight stir of some one
in the room; he thought that Virginia had been lying down and had
suddenly sat up.
“I don’t think it was just right,” she said at last, in a faint voice.
“He was here this afternoon, and he told me--he says she’s left him for
good.”
The colonel, outside the door, gritted his teeth a moment in silence,
very red in the face.
“The lummox!” he muttered under his breath at last.
“What did you say, grandpa?”
“I didn’t say anything, Jinny. I only thought something. I thought
something not quite polite.”
“Oh!”
Again he heard the faint stir of her movements on the other side of the
door.
“The girl looked like death,” he said bluntly. “She’d been through a
terrible ordeal. It--I tell you what, Jinny, it looked darned cowardly!”
There was no reply to this, not even the rustle of Virginia’s garments.
The colonel waited, rubbing his chin. At last he thought it better to
leave something to her imagination.
“Have a bottle of ginger ale, Jinny? It’ll do your head good.”
She laughed hysterically. He could hear it. It was a musical laugh, but
it was full of tears. His hand clenched.
“You get better!” he called to her. “I want you to drive up the
mountain to-morrow and look at Colonel Russell’s mare. He wants to
sell her for a lady’s saddle-horse. I reckon you’d like her, Jinny.
It’ll take you about half the day. You can lunch with Mrs. Barbour. The
doctor met me in town to-day, and he said his wife wanted you out to
luncheon at the farm to-morrow.”
There was a rustle this time.
“I think I’ll go. Thank you, grandpa. You’re an angel--I mean about the
horse.”
The old man cackled.
“Not in any other way, eh, Jinny?”
“You go to your dinner! You’ll get no compliments here,” she called
back gaily.
But it was a tremulous gaiety. The old man knew it, and he suspected
the headache. He went slowly and thoughtfully down-stairs. Dinner
was already served in the quaint dining-room, Plato standing erect
and black as ebony behind the colonel’s chair. The old man glanced
contentedly at the white damask and the old-fashioned service.
“What have you got for dinner, Plato?” he asked as he sat down.
Plato went over a modest menu.
“Got some deviled crabs, col’nel. Yessuh, got ’em dis mornin’ when yo’
was in court--bigges’ crabs I’s seen dis season.”
The colonel considered.
“Plato, you take a deviled crab up to Miss Jinny’s room. If she doesn’t
eat it, I’ll ’phone for Dr. Barbour.”
Unconsciously, the colonel was applying Miranda’s panacea for all
human ills. Inwardly he was exceeding wroth with William Carter. His
wrath and his fears continued well into the next morning, until he saw
Virginia, pale but smiling, seated in the old wagonette, and Lucas
driving sedately down the roadway to the gate. The colonel observed
their departure with an anxious eye.
He was not sure now that Virginia cared. She was pale, but she was
holding her own. The idea that William Carter had dared to come
straight back--after that trial and all!
“The lummox!” the colonel growled under his breath. “The cowardly
lummox--he knew I was out.”
Meanwhile, Lucas was driving slowly along the turnpike down which
Fanchon had galloped, followed by Corwin--on his way, as it turned
out, to his death; for that ride had led straight to the climax in the
upper room of the inn. As it transpired later on, both Virginia and
Lucas were thinking of it as the colonel’s slow old horses trotted
along under the spreading branches of the great trees which stood like
sentinels on either side of the wide road.
At this late season the foliage was dense and a little dusty, while
here and there a sumac waved the first red flag of autumn, or a
gum-tree stood like a flame in the midst of a grove of cedars. Virginia
was watching a cardinal-bird winging its crimson flight from branch
to branch when she heard Lucas accost a passing friend and then fall
to chuckling--the succulent, suggestively happy chuckle of the negro.
Lucas had never acquired the silent elegance of Mrs. Payson’s coachman.
He was an old family servant, and he had known Virginia from her
childhood. He chuckled now, touching the off horse with the mildly
provoking tip of his whip.
“See dat nigger, Miss Jinny? He works at Miz Quantah’s place. He’s
gwine courtin’, sho’s yo’re born!”
Virginia, who had lost sight of the red bird, glanced down the road
after the retreating form of a middle-aged negro attired in clean blue
overalls and a big straw hat.
“How do you know he’s going courting, Lucas? He’s not very young, is
he?”
“No, ma’am, Miss Jinny, he ain’t, but his wife died a while ago. He’s
gwine courtin’--yes, miss, he sho’ is. How’d I know? He done wash
his face, Miss Jinny. When a man wash his face an’ shave, he’s gwine
courtin’--yes, miss.”
Virginia laughed, and Lucas, thus encouraged, proceeded. He touched the
nigh horse this time.
“Yo’ g’long, Tommy Becket. Yes, Miss Jinny, he’s gwine courtin’--he
works ober at Miz Quantah’s, ayonnah”--Lucas pointed his whip--“righ’
over dere in dem trees. Dat’s where Miz Wilyum Carter am now, Miss
Jinny.”
Virginia blushed. Involuntarily her eyes followed the flourish of his
whip. They had come to the foot-hills, and, in a clearing, she saw a
bleak farmhouse, a mere shack it seemed to her. She remembered that the
Quantah place was miserable and the woman herself gaunt and poor--a
forlorn, forbidding creature.
Then Lucas broke into his monologue again.
“Miz Carter, she’s sick, Miss Jinny--took sick jest after de trial. I
did heah she ain’t got any money, an’ Miz Quantah, she’s gwine to turn
her out, sick or no sick, she say.”
Virginia sat up suddenly.
“What did you say, Lucas?”
Lucas turned half-way round, driving with one hand, and flourishing the
other as he answered.
“I say Miz Wilyum Carter took sick, an’ she ain’t got any money.” Lucas
stopped the horses and pointed.
“I reckon she’s sick in dat room ayonnah--see de blinds open? Ain’t
nebber open ’less Miz Quantah got a lodger. Ain’t got noffin to eat
at Miz Quantah’s ’cept corn-dodgers an’ rabbits--no, Miss Jinny, dey
ain’t.”
“Lucas,” said Virginia earnestly, “do you really mean that Mrs. William
Carter is over there now, ill, and without money?”
“Sho, Miss Jinny, she is. I got dat from Miz Quantah’s collud man--yes,
miss, I sho did. She’s sick an’ she ain’t got no money.”
Virginia was silent. Her eyes fixed themselves on that distant house,
that repulsive, sordid-looking house, and she thought of Fanchon--a
small, dainty, bewitching creature--dancing that amazing dance at the
church musicale.
Lucas started the horses. The road turned, and before them a low
bridge spanned an exquisite stream. The water purled and dashed over
stones and slipped, still clamoring, into a lovely pool where lily-pads
floated and low willows dipped their swinging boughs.
“Lucas, stop!” cried Virginia.
Lucas pulled the horses up so suddenly that one old fellow looked back
over his shoulder.
“Yes, Miss Jinny?”
“Drive back to Quantah’s place, Lucas.”
The fat old horses turned obediently. Lucas said nothing. For once he
restrained that racial quality which makes the faithful colored servant
the intimate adviser and guardian of “his family.” He had a very clear
understanding of Miss Jinny’s motives, he knew Miss Jinny. For all
that, he felt that this time she could be trusted to go her own way--as
long as he was in attendance, to exercise, at the crucial moment, his
worldly wisdom.
The old wagonette, turning clumsily because of its length, was moving
along the broken bit of road which led around the elbow of the wood
into the Quantah clearing. The wood was an exquisite place, delicately
fringed along its edges with yellow patches of goldenrod and the
purplish white mist of asters. Through slender tree-stems Virginia
began to see the house more plainly.
The side door stood open, and a tall, slatternly woman was feeding
chickens, holding an old tin saucepan in the hollow of her arm. As the
wagonette appeared she raised her eyes from the fowls long enough to
stare, but went on throwing scraps out by the fistful, her hard mouth
drawn into forbidding lines.
Lucas drew rein and Virginia descended.
“Is Mrs. William Carter here?” she asked quietly.
Mrs. Quantah emptied the pan and looked around her.
“Yes, she is--she’s sick, too.”
Virginia’s quick blush mounted. She felt peculiarly helpless. She was
not even sure that Fanchon would see her, but she held out her card.
“Please ask her to see me--if she can,” she said, in a propitiating
tone.
Mrs. Quantah wiped her fingers on her apron and took the card.
“Come in,” she said harshly, holding open the door.
Virginia followed her in. Involuntarily she gathered her white dress
about her, the place seemed so dingy and repulsive. They passed through
a forlorn hall and entered the kitchen. Sitting in a chair in the
middle of the old room, with his back to the stove, was Mr. Samuel
Bernstein. Virginia stopped involuntarily, and the woman, pulling out
a chair for her, left them abruptly, carrying Virginia’s card in the
empty saucepan.
Mr. Bernstein rose and bowed.
“Miss Denbigh, I think?” he said with elaborate politeness.
Virginia smiled.
“Mr. Bernstein, I know,” she replied quietly.
He offered his chair.
“It’s better than the one she’s given you,” he said graciously, “which
ain’t sayin’ much. Sit down, Miss Denbigh. I guess you’ve come out
here same as I have. I’m trying to see Mrs. Carter--Miss Fanchon la
Fare, I guess it is now. This party”--he waved his thumb over his
shoulder--“Mrs. Quantah, she says Mrs. Carter’s sick.”
“So I hear.” Virginia turned her eyes discreetly away. She could not
look at Mr. Bernstein without thinking of his effort to engage her
grandfather, and she wanted to laugh in spite of her errand. “I’m very
sorry; I hope she’ll see me.”
“I hope so.” Mr. Bernstein leaned forward confidentially. “Say, I’ll
tell you what I’ve done. You see, I felt kinder guilty. You know
about that Carter boy? Well, I came out here on purpose to make good.
I’m offering Miss Fanchon one thousand dollars a week for one big
seven-reel feature for the Unlimited Film Company, and, after that,
say, five hundred a week steady as ingenoo in the company.”
Virginia lifted her eyes with difficulty to the kindly red face
opposite.
“That seems magnificent, Mr. Bernstein,” she said softly, and then in
spite of herself she giggled.
Mr. Bernstein beamed.
“It’s a good offer, if I do say it! But, see here, Miss Denbigh,
it ain’t often we get a subject like that. She’s just ideal for
dances--see? Now, there’s another thing--coming out here, I made a
find!” Mr. Bernstein raised one fat hand and spoke behind it, watching
the door. “Notice that party--Mrs. Quantah?”
Virginia nodded, her eyes dancing. Mr. Bernstein edged his chair closer.
“Say! We’re going to do some Dickens pictures. No copyright on Dickens,
you know, an’ it’s easy to get ’em. We’re going to do ‘Nicholas
Nickleby.’ Now I ask you, did you ever see a better _Miss Squeers_?
Look at her--take her all around--them angles an’ that mouth! Say, I’d
give her something neat, believe me I would. I said so to her, an’ what
d’you suppose she said to me? That woman, poor as Job’s turkey--what
d’you suppose she said?”
Virginia was unable to imagine it and said so--with some difficulty,
her lips tremulous.
“I asked her.” Mr. Bernstein leaned back in his chair and shook his
head sadly. “I told her what I wanted an’ what I’d pay, an’ she said,
‘Nothing doin’!’ Now, what d’you know about that?”
He was about to say more, to enlarge on his grievance and on Mrs.
Quantah’s resemblance to _Miss Squeers_, but there was a sharp sound. A
door opened and shut, and the ideal _Miss Squeers_ entered. She did not
look at Mr. Bernstein, but turned a stony gaze upon Virginia’s flushed
and smiling face.
“She’ll see you,” she said laconically.
Mr. Bernstein leaned farther back in his chair with the air of a martyr
determined to await his turn, if it took all night. Virginia rose
hastily and followed Mrs. Quantah.
A moment before she had had to laugh at Bernstein; now her heart sank.
She felt that Fanchon had never liked her, and now--wasn’t this an
intrusion? Her courage suddenly wavered, and her knees felt weak under
her when the gaunt woman opened a door at the end of the hall and
almost thrust her into the room beyond.