A few days later Mary left on horseback immediately after breakfast.
From Rowland, Charles learned that she was going to see certain persons
who owned near-by farms, with the hope of borrowing money for the
removal of the wounded man to Atlanta and for his treatment there by the
famous surgeon, Doctor Elliot.
Charles was at work, hoeing corn, when from the thicket bordering the
field Kenneth and Martin stealthily emerged and joined him, having crept
around from the barn.
"It is all right," Kenneth said, with an assuring smile. "Nobody is in
sight on the road for a mile either way. We can dodge back any minute at
the slightest sound. It's hell, Brown, to stay there like a pig being
fattened for the killing. This is monotonous, I tell you. I can't stand
it very long. That man must get to Atlanta. Mary is off this morning to
borrow cash for it. Our credit is gone. Nobody will indorse for the old
man but Albert Frazier, and I think his name is none too good here
lately."
"He will get the money for sister, see if he doesn't," Martin spoke up,
plaintively. "She is trying to keep him from it, though; that's why she
went off this morning. She doesn't care for him--she doesn't--she
doesn't! She knows what he is. She couldn't love a man like that. I hate
him. He claims to be helping us, and he is, I reckon, but he has an
object in view, and I'd die rather than have him gain it."
"No, I don't want her to marry him, either." Kenneth's voice had a touch
of genuine manliness in it which Charles noticed for the first time.
Moreover, his face was very grave. He shrugged his shoulders and flushed
slightly as he went on. "I've been watching you, Brown. Having nothing
else to do all day long, I've watched you at your work and seen you come
and go from the field to the house and back. I envy you. To tell you the
God's truth, I'm sick and tired of the way I've been living. They say I
am responsible for Martin being in this mess, too. I reckon I am, and I
know I am the cause of sister's worry and the disgrace of all this on
the family. They say an honest confession is good for the soul, and I
say to you that if this damned thing passes over I'm going to take a
different course. I see the pleasure you get out of working, and I am
going to work. The other thing is not what it is cracked up to be."
Kenneth's voice had grown husky, and he cleared his throat and coughed;
the light of shame still shone in his eyes.
"He means it," Martin said, throwing his arm about his brother and
leaning on him affectionately. "Last night when he found me awake he
came over to my corner and sat down and talked. He said he'd got so he
couldn't sleep sound, either. It was wonderful the way he talked, Mr.
Brown. I didn't know Ken was like that. He talked about mother and about
sister's brave fight against so many odds--and, may I tell him, Ken? You
know what I mean."
"I don't care what you say," Kenneth answered. He was seated on the
ground, his eyes resting on the gray roof of the house which could be
seen above the trees, outlined against the blue sky and drifting white
clouds. "I'm not ashamed of anything I said."
"Why, he said," Martin went on, "that he admired you more than any man
he had ever run across. He said what you told him about how you used to
drink and gamble--when you could have kept it to yourself--and how you
had quit it all and put it behind you because it was the sensible thing
to do--Ken said that was the strongest argument he had ever heard, and
that he liked you because you seemed to want him to do the same thing."
"I did appreciate that talk, Brown," Kenneth admitted. "You put it to me
in a different light from any one else. You spoke like a man that had
burnt himself at a fire, and was warning others to stay away from it. I
don't care where you come from or what you were when you landed here,
you are a gentleman. You have made me feel ashamed of myself, and I am
man enough to say so. I've been bluffing in this thing. I have felt it
as much as Martin, but wouldn't let on. I've not been asleep all the
time when he thought I was. God only knows how I've lain awake and what
I've been through in my mind."
Suddenly Kenneth rose; his face was full and dark with suppressed
emotion, and he stalked away toward the barn.
"He is not like he used to be," Martin remarked, softly, his eyes on his
brother. "All this has had a big effect on him. It is strange, but I
often try to comfort him now. He is worried about Albert Frazier."
"About him?" Charles exclaimed, under his breath.
"Yes. He doesn't like to feel that we are in his power so completely. He
is afraid sister will marry him, and she will, Mr. Brown, if she fails
to get that money elsewhere. I don't think she really wants to marry
him. She pretends to like him, but that is all put on to fool me and
Ken. He is working for us. Every day he tells the sheriff something to
throw him off our track. He actually forged a letter that he showed to
his brother which he claimed was from a friend in Texas saying that me
and Ken had been seen at Forth Worth, on our way West. When sister told
Ken that it made him mad. A week ago he would have chuckled over it, but
now he hates it because it sort o' binds sister to Frazier. A man that
will fool his own brother like that is not the right sort for a sweet
girl like my sister to live with all her life. Father wouldn't care
much, but Ken and I would. We have been running with a tough crowd, but
we know that we've got good blood in our veins."
Presently Martin left, went to keep his brother company, and Charles
resumed his plodding work in the young corn. He gave himself up to
gloomy meditation. What a strange thing his life had been! How queer it
was that nothing prior to his arrival there in the mountains now claimed
his interest. William, Celeste, Ruth, old Boston friends, college chums,
business associates--all had retired from his consciousness, almost as
if they had never existed. The fortunes of this particular family wholly
absorbed him. He could have embraced Martin while the boy was talking,
because of his resemblance in voice and features to Mary. He respected
Kenneth for his fresh resolutions, and pitied him as he had once pitied
himself. His hoe tinkled like a bell, at times, on the small round
stones buried in the mellow soil. The mountain breeze fanned his hot
brow. Accidentally he cut down a young plant of corn, and all but
shuddered as he wondered if it, too, could feel, think, and suffer. He
saw a busy cluster of red ants, and left them undisturbed. They were
sinking a shaft, he knew not how deep, in the earth. One by one they
brought to the surface tiny bits of clay or sand, rolled them down a
little embankment, and hurried away for other burdens. That they
thought, planned, and calculated he could not doubt. He himself was a
monster too great in size for their comprehension. Had he stepped upon
them their universe would have gone out of existence. He wondered if
they loved one another, if their social system would have permitted one
of their number to go into voluntary exile and in that exile to find a
joy never before comprehended.