delight; “I’s mighty fond o’ fishin’, myse’f.”
“All right; I’m in your hands from now on.”
’Lias drew his shoulders up, with an unconscious motion. The preacher
saw it, and mentally rejoiced. He felt that the first thing the boy
beside him needed was a consciousness of responsibility, and the
lifted shoulders meant progress in that direction, a sort of physical
straightening up to correspond with the moral one.
On seeing her son walk in with the minister, Aunt ‘Ca’line’s’ delight was
boundless. “La! Brothah Dokesbury,” she exclaimed, “wha’d you fin’ dat
scamp?”
“Oh, down the street here,” the young man replied lightly. “I got hold of
his name and made myself acquainted, so he came home to go fishing with
me.”
“’Lias is pow’ful fon’ o’ fishin’, hisse’f. I ’low he kin show you some
mighty good places. Cain’t you, ’Lias?”
“I reckon.”
’Lias was thinking. He was distinctly grateful that the circumstances of
his meeting with the minister had been so deftly passed over. But with
a half idea of the superior moral responsibility under which a man in
Dokesbury’s position laboured, he wondered vaguely—to put it in his own
thought-words—“ef de preachah hadn’t put’ nigh lied.” However, he was
willing to forgive this little lapse of veracity, if such it was, out of
consideration for the anxiety it spared his mother.
When Stephen Gray came in to dinner, he was no less pleased than his wife
to note the terms of friendship on which the minister received his son.
On his face was the first smile that Dokesbury had seen there, and he
awakened from his taciturnity and proffered much information as to the
fishing-places thereabout. The young minister accounted this a distinct
gain. Anything more than a frowning silence from the “little yaller man”
was gain.
The fishing that afternoon was particularly good. Catfish, chubs, and
suckers were landed in numbers sufficient to please the heart of any
amateur angler.
’Lias was happy, and the minister was in the best of spirits, for his
charge seemed promising. He looked on at the boy’s jovial face, and
laughed within himself; for, mused he, “it is so much harder for the
devil to get into a cheerful heart than into a sullen, gloomy one.” By
the time they were ready to go home Harold Dokesbury had received a
promise from ’Lias to attend service the next morning and hear the sermon.
There was a great jollification over the fish supper that night, and
’Lias and the minister were the heroes of the occasion. The old man again
broke his silence, and recounted, with infinite dryness, ancient tales of
his prowess with rod and line; while Aunt ‘Ca’line’ told of famous fish
suppers that in the bygone days she had cooked for “de white folks.” In
the midst of it all, however, ’Lias disappeared. No one had noticed when
he slipped out, but all seemed to become conscious of his absence about
the same time. The talk shifted, and finally simmered into silence.
When the Rev. Mr. Dokesbury went to bed that night, his charge had not
yet returned.
The young minister woke early on the Sabbath morning, and he may be
forgiven that the prospect of the ordeal through which he had to pass
drove his care for ’Lias out of mind for the first few hours. But as he
walked to church, flanked on one side by Aunt Caroline in the stiffest of
ginghams and on the other by her husband stately in the magnificence of
an antiquated “Jim-swinger,” his mind went back to the boy with sorrow.
Where was he? What was he doing? Had the fear of a dull church service
frightened him back to his old habits and haunts? There was a new sadness
at the preacher’s heart as he threaded his way down the crowded church
and ascended the rude pulpit.
The church was stiflingly hot, and the morning sun still beat
relentlessly in through the plain windows. The seats were rude wooden
benches, in some instances without backs. To the right, filling the
inner corner, sat the pillars of the church, stern, grim, and critical.
Opposite them, and, like them, in seats at right angles to the main body,
sat the older sisters, some of them dressed with good old-fashioned
simplicity, while others yielding to newer tendencies were gotten up in
gaudy attempts at finery. In the rear seats a dozen or so much beribboned
mulatto girls tittered and giggled, and cast bold glances at the minister.
The young man sighed as he placed the manuscript of his sermon between
the leaves of the tattered Bible. “And this is Mt. Hope,” he was again
saying to himself.
It was after the prayer and in the midst of the second hymn that a more
pronounced titter from the back seats drew his attention. He raised his
head to cast a reproving glance at the irreverent, but the sight that met
his eyes turned that look into one of horror. ’Lias had just entered the
church, and with every mark of beastly intoxication was staggering up the
aisle to a seat, into which he tumbled in a drunken heap. The preacher’s
soul turned sick within him, and his eyes sought the face of the mother
and father. The old woman was wiping her eyes, and the old man sat with
his gaze bent upon the floor, lines of sorrow drawn about his wrinkled
mouth.
All of a sudden a great revulsion of feeling came over Dokesbury.
Trembling he rose and opened the Bible. There lay his sermon, polished
and perfected. The opening lines seemed to him like glints from a
bright cold crystal. What had he to say to these people, when the full
realisation of human sorrow and care and of human degradation had just
come to him? What had they to do with firstlies and secondlies, with
premises and conclusions? What they wanted was a strong hand to help them
over the hard places of life and a loud voice to cheer them through the
dark. He closed the book again upon his precious sermon. A something new
had been born in his heart. He let his glance rest for another instant on
the mother’s pained face and the father’s bowed form, and then turning to
the congregation began, “Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy
laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of
me: for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your
souls.” Out of the fulness of his heart he spoke unto them. Their great
need informed his utterance. He forgot his carefully turned sentences
and perfectly rounded periods. He forgot all save that here was the
well-being of a community put into his hands whose real condition he had
not even suspected until now. The situation wrought him up. His words
went forth like winged fire, and the emotional people were moved beyond
control. They shouted, and clapped their hands, and praised the Lord
loudly.
When the service was over, there was much gathering about the young
preacher, and hand-shaking. Through all ’Lias had slept. His mother
started toward him; but the minister managed to whisper to her, “Leave
him to me.” When the congregation had passed out, Dokesbury shook ’Lias.
The boy woke, partially sobered, and his face fell before the preacher’s
eyes.
“Come, my boy, let’s go home.” Arm in arm they went out into the street,
where a number of scoffers had gathered to have a laugh at the abashed
boy; but Harold Dokesbury’s strong arm steadied his steps, and something
in his face checked the crowd’s hilarity. Silently they cleared the way,
and the two passed among them and went home.
The minister saw clearly the things which he had to combat in his
community, and through this one victim he determined to fight the general
evil. The people with whom he had to deal were children who must be led
by the hand. The boy lying in drunken sleep upon his bed was no worse
than the rest of them. He was an epitome of the evil, as his parents were
of the sorrows, of the place.
He could not talk to Elias. He could not lecture him. He would only
be dashing his words against the accumulated evil of years of bondage
as the ripples of a summer sea beat against a stone wall. It was not
the wickedness of this boy he was fighting or even the wrong-doing
of Mt. Hope. It was the aggregation of the evils of the fathers, the
grandfathers, the masters and mistresses of these people. Against this
what could talk avail?
The boy slept on, and the afternoon passed heavily away. Aunt Caroline
was finding solace in her pipe, and Stephen Gray sulked in moody silence
beside the hearth. Neither of them joined their guest at evening service.
[Illustration: “AUNT CAROLINE WAS FINDING SOLACE IN THE PIPE.”]
He went, however. It was hard to face those people again after the
events of the morning. He could feel them covertly nudging each other
and grinning as he went up to the pulpit. He chided himself for the
momentary annoyance it caused him. Were they not like so many naughty,
irresponsible children?
The service passed without unpleasantness, save that he went home with an
annoyingly vivid impression of a yellow girl with red ribbons on her hat,
who pretended to be impressed by his sermon and made eyes at him from
behind her handkerchief.
On the way to his room that night, as he passed Stephen Gray, the old man
whispered huskily, “It’s de fus’ time ’Lias evah done dat.”
It was the only word he had spoken since morning.
A sound sleep refreshed Dokesbury, and restored the tone to his
overtaxed nerves. When he came out in the morning, Elias was already in
the kitchen. He too had slept off his indisposition, but it had been
succeeded by a painful embarrassment that proved an effectual barrier to
all intercourse with him. The minister talked lightly and amusingly, but
the boy never raised his eyes from his plate, and only spoke when he was
compelled to answer some direct questions.
Harold Dokesbury knew that unless he could overcome this reserve, his
power over the youth was gone. He bent every effort to do it.
“What do you say to a turn down the street with me?” he asked as he rose
from breakfast.
’Lias shook his head.
“What! You haven’t deserted me already?”
The older people had gone out, but young Gray looked furtively
about before he replied: “You know I ain’t fittin’ to go out with
you—aftah—aftah—yestiddy.”
A dozen appropriate texts rose in the preacher’s mind, but he knew that
it was not a preaching time, so he contented himself with saying,—
“Oh, get out! Come along!”
“No, I cain’t. I cain’t. I wisht I could! You needn’t think I’s ashamed,
’cause I ain’t. Plenty of ’em git drunk, an’ I don’t keer nothin’ ’bout
dat”—this in a defiant tone.
“Well, why not come along, then?”
“I tell you I cain’t. Don’t ax me no mo’. It ain’t on my account I won’t
go. It’s you.”
“Me! Why, I want you to go.”
“I know you does, but I mustn’t. Cain’t you see that dey’d be glad to say
dat—dat you was in cahoots wif me an’ you tuk yo’ dram on de sly?”
“I don’t care what they say so long as it isn’t true. Are you coming?”
“No, I ain’t.”
He was perfectly determined, and Dokesbury saw that there was no use
arguing with him. So with a resigned “All right!” he strode out the gate
and up the street, thinking of the problem he had to solve.
There was good in Elias Gray, he knew. It was a shame that it should be
lost. It would be lost unless he were drawn strongly away from the paths
he was treading. But how could it be done? Was there no point in his mind
that could be reached by what was other than evil? That was the thing
to be found out. Then he paused to ask himself if, after all, he were
not trying to do too much,—trying, in fact, to play Providence to Elias.
He found himself involuntarily wanting to shift the responsibility of
planning for the youth. He wished that something entirely independent of
his intentions would happen.
Just then something did happen. A piece of soft mud hurled from some
unknown source caught the minister square in the chest, and spattered
over his clothes. He raised his eyes and glanced about quickly, but no
one was in sight. Whoever the foe was, he was securely ambushed.
“Thrown by the hand of a man,” mused Dokesbury, “prompted by the malice
of a child.”
He went on his way, finished his business, and returned to the house.
“La, Brothah Dokesbury!” exclaimed Aunt Caroline, “what’s de mattah ’f
yo’ shu’t bosom?”
“Oh, that’s where one of our good citizens left his card.”
“You don’ mean to say none o’ dem low-life scoun’els—”
“I don’t know who did it. He took particular pains to keep out of sight.”
“’Lias!” the old woman cried, turning on her son, “wha’ ’d you let
Brothah Dokesbury go off by hisse’f fu’? Whyn’t you go ’long an’ tek keer
o’ him?”
The old lady stopped even in the midst of her tirade, as her eyes took
in the expression on her son’s face.
“I’ll kill some o’ dem damn—”
“’Lias!”
“’Scuse me, Mistah Dokesbury, but I feel lak I’ll bus’ ef I don’t ’spress
myse’f. It makes me so mad. Don’t you go out o’ hyeah no mo’ ’dout me.
I’ll go ’long an’ I’ll brek somebody’s haid wif a stone.”
“’Lias! how you talkin’ fo’ de ministah?”
“Well, dat’s whut I’ll do, ’cause I kin out-th’ow any of ’em an’ I know
dey hidin’-places.”
“I’ll be glad to accept your protection,” said Dokesbury.
He saw his advantage, and was thankful for the mud,—the one thing that
without an effort restored the easy relations between himself and his
protégé.
Ostensibly these relations were reversed, and Elias went out with the
preacher as a guardian and protector. But the minister was laying his
nets. It was on one of these rambles that he broached to ’Lias a subject
which he had been considering for some time.
“Look here, ’Lias,” he said, “what are you going to do with that big
back yard of yours?”
“Oh, nothin’. ’Tain’t no ’count to raise nothin’ in.”
“It may not be fit for vegetables, but it will raise something.”
“What?”
“Chickens. That’s what.”
Elias laughed sympathetically.
“I’d lak to eat de chickens I raise. I wouldn’t want to be feedin’ de
neighbourhood.”
“Plenty of boards, slats, wire, and a good lock and key would fix that
all right.”
“Yes, but whah’m I gwine to git all dem things?”
“Why, I’ll go in with you and furnish the money, and help you build the
coops. Then you can sell chickens and eggs, and we’ll go halves on the
profits.”
“Hush, man!” cried ’Lias, in delight.
So the matter was settled, and, as Aunt Caroline expressed it, “Fu’ a
week er sich a mattah, you nevah did see sich ta’in’ down an’ buildin’ up
in all yo’ bo’n days.”
’Lias went at the work with zest, and Dokesbury noticed his skill with
tools. He let fall the remark: “Say, ’Lias, there’s a school near here
where they teach carpentering; why don’t you go and learn?”
“What I gwine to do with bein’ a cyahpenter?”
“Repair some of these houses around Mt. Hope, if nothing more,” Dokesbury
responded, laughing; and there the matter rested.
The work prospered, and as the weeks went on, ’Lias’ enterprise became
the town’s talk. One of Aunt Caroline’s patrons who had come with some
orders about work regarded the changed condition of affairs, and said,
“Why, Aunt Caroline, this doesn’t look like the same place. I’ll have to
buy some eggs from you; you keep your yard and hen-house so nice, it’s an
advertisement for the eggs.”
“Don’t talk to me nothin’ ’bout dat ya’d, Miss Lucy,” Aunt Caroline had
retorted. “Dat ’long to ’Lias an’ de preachah. Hit dey doin’s. Dey done
mos’ nigh drove me out wif dey cleanness. I ain’t nevah seed no sich
ca’in’ on in my life befo’. Why, my ’Lias done got right brigity an’ talk
about bein’ somep’n’.”
Dokesbury had retired from his partnership with the boy save in so far
as he acted as a general supervisor. His share had been sold to a friend
of ’Lias, Jim Hughes. The two seemed to have no other thought save of
raising, tending, and selling chickens.
Mt. Hope looked on and ceased to scoff. Money is a great dignifier, and
Jim and ’Lias were making money. There had been some sniffs when the
latter had hinged the front gate and whitewashed his mother’s cabin, but
even that had been accepted now as a matter of course.
Dokesbury had done his work. He, too, looked on, and in some satisfaction.
“Let the leaven work,” he said, “and all Mt. Hope must rise.”
It was one day, nearly a year later, that “old lady Hughes” dropped in on
Aunt Caroline for a chat.
“Well, I do say, Sis’ Ca’line, dem two boys o’ ourn done sot dis town on
fiah.”
“What now, Sis’ Lizy?”
“Why, evah sence ’Lias tuk it into his haid to be a cyahpenter an’ Jim
’cided to go ’long an’ lu’n to be a blacksmif, some o’ dese hyeah othah
young people’s been tryin’ to do somep’n’.”
“All dey wanted was a staht.”
“Well, now will you b’lieve me, dat no-’count Tom Johnson done opened a
fish sto’, an’ he has de boys an’ men bring him dey fish all de time. He
give ’em a little somep’n’ fu’ dey ketch, den he go sell ’em to de white
folks.”
“Lawd, how long!”
“An’ what you think he say?”
“I do’ know, sis’.”
“He say ez soon ’z he git money enough, he gwine to dat school whah ’Lias
an’ Jim gone an’ lu’n to fahm scientific.”
“Bless de Lawd! Well, ’um, I don’ put nothin’ pas’ de young folks now.”
Mt. Hope had at last awakened. Something had come to her to which she
might aspire,—something that she could understand and reach. She was
not soaring, but she was rising above the degradation in which Harold
Dokesbury had found her. And for her and him the ordeal had passed.
THE COLONEL’S AWAKENING
THE COLONEL’S AWAKENING
It was the morning before Christmas. The cold winter sunlight fell
brightly through the window into a small room where an old man was
sitting. The room, now bare and cheerless, still retained evidences of
having once been the abode of refinement and luxury. It was the one
open chamber of many in a great rambling old Virginia house, which in
its time had been one of the proudest in the county. But it had been in
the path of the hurricane of war, and had been shorn of its glory as a
tree is stripped of its foliage. Now, like the bare tree, dismantled, it
remained, and this one old man, with the aristocratic face, clung to it
like the last leaf.
He did not turn his head when an ancient serving-man came in and began
laying the things for breakfast. After a while the servant spoke: “I got
a monst’ous fine breakfus’ fu’ you dis mo’nin’, Mas’ Estridge. I got
fresh aigs, an’ beat biscuits, an Lize done fried you a young chicken
dat’ll sholy mek yo’ mouf worter.”
“Thank you, Ike, thank you,” was the dignified response. “Lize is a
likely girl, and she’s improving in her cooking greatly.”
“Yes, Mas’ Estridge, she sho is a mighty fine ooman.”
“And you’re not a bad servant yourself, Ike,” the old man went on, with
an air of youthful playfulness that ill accorded with his aged face. “I
expect some day you’ll be coming around asking me to let you marry Lize,
eh! What have you got to say to that?”
“I reckon dat’s right, mastah, I reckon dat’s mighty nigh right.”
“Well, we shall see about it when the time comes; we shall see about it.”
“Lawd, how long!” mumbled the old servant to himself as he went on about
his work. “Ain’t Mas’ Bob nevah gwine to git his almanec straight? He
been gwine on dis way fu’ ovah twenty yeahs now. He cain’t git it thoo’
his haid dat time been a-passin’. Hyeah I done been ma’ied to Lize fu’
lo dese many yeahs, an’ we’ve got ma’ied chillum, but he still think I’s
a-cou’tin’ huh.”
To Colonel Robert Estridge time had not passed and conditions had not
changed for a generation. He was still the gallant aristocrat he had
been when the war broke out,—a little past the age to enlist himself,
but able and glad to give two sons to the cause of the South. They had
gone out, light-hearted and gay, and brave in their military trappings
and suits of gray. The father had watched them away with moist eyes and a
swelling bosom. After that the tide of war had surged on and on, had even
rolled to his very gates, and the widowed man watched and waited for it
to bring his boys back to him. One of them came. They brought him back
from the valley of the Shenandoah, and laid him in the old orchard out
there behind the house. Then all the love of the father was concentrated
upon the one remaining son, and his calendar could know but one day and
that the one on which his Bob, his namesake and his youngest, should
return to him. But one day there came to him the news that his boy had
fallen in the front of a terrific fight, and in the haste of retreat
he had been buried with the unknown dead. Into that trench, among the
unknown, Colonel Robert Estridge had laid his heart, and there it had
stayed. Time stopped, and his faculties wandered. He lived always in the
dear past. The present and future were not. He did not even know when
the fortunes of war brought an opposing host to his very doors. He was
unconscious of it all when they devoured his substance like a plague of
locusts. It was all a blank to him when the old manor house was fired and
he was like to lose his possessions and his life. When his servants left
him he did not know, but sat and gave orders to the one faithful retainer
as though he were ordering the old host of blacks. And so for more than a
generation he had lived.
“Hope you gwine to enjoy yo’ Christmas Eve breakfus’, Mas’ Estridge,”
said the old servant.
“Christmas Eve, Christmas Eve? Yes, yes, so it is. To-morrow is Christmas
Day, and I’m afraid I have been rather sluggish in getting things ready
for the celebration. I reckon the darkies have already begun to jubilate
and to shirk in consequence, and I won’t be able to get a thing done
decently for a week.”
“Don’t you bother ’bout none o’ de res’, Mas’ Estridge; you kin ’pend on
me—I ain’t gwine to shu’k even ef ’t is Christmus.”
“That’s right, Ike. I can depend upon you. You’re always faithful. Just
you get things done up right for me, and I’ll give you that broadcloth
suit of mine. It’s most as good as new.”
“Thanky, Mas’ Bob, thanky.” The old Negro said it as fervently as if he
had not worn out that old broadcloth a dozen years ago.
“It’s late and we’ve got to hurry if we want things prepared in time.
Tell Lize that I want her to let herself out on that dinner. Your Mas’
Bob and your Mas’ Stanton are going to be home to-morrow, and I want to
show them that their father’s house hasn’t lost any of the qualities that
have made it famous in Virginia for a hundred years. Ike, there ain’t
anything in this world for making men out of boys like making them feel
the debt they owe to their name and family.”
“Yes, suh, Mas’ Bob an’ Mas’ Stant sholy is mighty fine men.”
“There ain’t two finer in the whole country, sir,—no, sir, not in all
Virginia, and that of necessity means the whole country. Now, Ike, I want
you to get out some of that wine up in the second cellar, and when I
say some I mean plenty. It ain’t seen the light for years, but it shall
gurgle into the glasses to-morrow in honour of my sons’ home-coming. Good
wine makes good blood, and who should drink good wine if not an Estridge
of Virginia, sir, eh, Ike?”
The wine had gone to make good cheer when a Federal regiment had lighted
its campfires on the Estridge lawn, but old Ike had heard it too often
before and knew his business too well to give any sign.
“I want you to take some things up to Miss Clarinda Randolph to-morrow,
too, and I’ve got a silver snuffbox for Thomas Daniels. I can’t make many
presents this year. I’ve got to devote my money to the interest of your
young masters.”
There was a catch in the Negro’s voice as he replied, “Yes, Mas’
Estridge, dey needs it mos’, dey needs it mos’.”
The old colonel’s spell of talking seldom lasted long, and now he fell
to eating in silence; but his face was the face of one in a dream. Ike
waited on him until he had done, and then, clearing the things away,
slipped out, leaving him to sit and muse in his chair by the window.
“Look hyeah, Lize,” said the old servant, as he entered his wife’s cabin
a little later. “Pleggoned ef I didn’t come purt’ nigh brekin’ down dis
mo’nin’.”
“Wha’ ’s de mattah wif you, Ike?”
“Jes’ a-listenin’ to ol’ Mas’ a-sittin’ dah a-talkin’ lak it was de ol’
times,—a-sendin’ messages to ol’ Miss Randolph, dat’s been daid too long
to talk about, an’ to Mas’ Tom Daniels, dat went acrost de wateh ruther
’n tek de oaf o’ ’legiance.”
“Oomph,” said the old lady, wiping her eyes on her cotton apron.
“Den he expectin’ Mas’ Bob an’ Mas’ Stant home to-morrer. ’Clah to
goodness, when he say dat I lak to hollahed right out.”
“Den you would ’a’ fixed it, wouldn’t you? Set down an’ eat yo’
breakfus’, Ike, an’ don’t you nevah let on when Mas’ Estridge talkin’,
you jes’ go ’long ’bout yo’ wuk an’ keep yo’ mouf shet, ’ca’se ef evah he
wake up now he gwine to die right straight off.”