in what he called "the gospel of keeping the mouth shut." Accordingly
he made his preliminary canvas silently, secretly and with so little
ostentation that neither Webb nor any of his friends dreamed of what
was going on. Their first intimation of it was the discovery one
morning that the nominating placards were posted on the court house
doors, all over the fronts of all the blacksmiths' and wheelrights'
shops, on all the school houses, on the posts of every gate that was
licensed to obstruct a public road, and upon every conspicuous tree in
the piedmont part of the Senate district.
For Carley Farnsworth had adopted Judy Peters's view of "drymatic
effect," and had had all his placards posted between midnight and
morning of a single day.
The dramatic effect was instantly apparent. All tongues were set
wagging and before another night came everybody in the region round
about knew that Boyd Westover was a candidate for the Senate, nominated
in his absence and supported by many of the most influential men in the
community.
What it meant, nobody knew, and everybody asked everybody else. Those
who asked Carley Farnsworth got for reply:
"Oh, it is only that some of us think we ought to have a fitter man
than Webb to represent us in the Senate, and we've nominated Westover
without his knowledge or consent."
"But where is he?" was sure to be the next question. "Is he afraid to
face the public?"
"No," Carley answered in every case. "If you get it into your head that
Boyd Westover is afraid of anything or anybody, you'll be as badly
mistaken as if you'd burnt your boots. He's away on a hunting and
fishing expedition, just now, and he knows nothing of his nomination.
When we notify him of it he'll be here to face anything or anybody, and
in the meanwhile there are some others of us who are prepared to do any
'facing' that may be necessary."
This last utterance was intended to check unfavorable references to
Boyd Westover's unfortunate experience, and it was in the main
effective. For Carley Farnsworth, small as he was, had a reputation as
a fighting force of no mean pretensions. Three times he had met
antagonists on the duelling field. On one of those occasions he had
seriously wounded his foe, and then had tenderly cared for him, nursing
him back to health in his own house. On the two other occasions his
antagonists had apologized. In still another case Carley had shown a
loftier courage. After accepting a challenge he had said to his seconds:
"I am satisfied that I'm in the wrong in this matter. I was entirely
sincere in making the charge for which I am challenged, but I made it
upon misinformation, and I am prepared to withdraw and apologize for
it. Communicate that decision to my antagonist. If he still wants a
shot at me, he can have it of course."
Such was Carley Farnsworth, and in view of the veiled warning his words
gave, it was felt that an extreme discretion in discussing matters
pertaining to Westover's candidacy was, to say the least, desirable.
Yet Webb and his friends felt that something must be done to stem the
tide created by the Westover nomination. The names appended to it were
those of such men that their support of any candidacy in opposition,
seriously imperilled Webb's chance of election, which until then had
been regarded as a foregone conclusion that needed no looking after.
"Something must be done," and the fact that Colonel Conway's signature
was conspicuously absent from the nomination paper, suggested the
nature of that "something." It was known that The Oaks and Wanalah were
adjoining plantations; that the Conways and the Westovers had been the
closest intimates for generations; that Colonel Conway had wearied all
ears with his eulogiums of Westover's gallantry in rescuing his
daughter in time of peril. Why then was Colonel Conway's name absent
from a list that it should naturally have headed? Was it that he
believed in Westover's guilt in spite of the revealed facts, as some
others professed to do? Or was there truth in the rumor, which was
vaguely floating about, that Westover had jilted Colonel Conway's
daughter?
That last suggestion was quickly negatived in all well ordered minds by
the certain knowledge that if Westover or any other man on earth had
been guilty of such offence toward a daughter of the house of Conway,
the head of that house would have horse-whipped the offender in public
and at the point of a pistol.
Nevertheless there remained the fact that Colonel Conway's name did not
appear among those nominating Boyd Westover, and that fact greatly
encouraged Webb and his adherents when they found that they must fight
tooth and nail for an election which they had deemed secure beyond the
necessity of endeavor of any sort. They set to work, not so much to
find out the reason for Colonel Conway's refusal of his name, as to
insinuate conjectural solutions of that riddle that might be hurtfully
whispered into doubting ears.
"There must be something wrong in that quarter."
"It isn't easy to explain."
"Of course Colonel Conway has his reasons, even if he doesn't give
them."
"If there wasn't something wrong, why didn't Colonel Conway put his
name first on the list?"
These, and like things could be said without incurring a challenge from
Carley Farnsworth's wrath, and they were diligently and hurtfully said;
hurtfully because in that community the least suspicion that a man had
been other than chivalrous in his treatment of a woman was damning
beyond the possibility of forgiving.
This thing troubled Carley Farnsworth more than he liked to admit even
to himself. A good many signatures had been denied to his nominating
paper on the sole ground that Colonel Conway had refused to sign it,
and the absence of his signature was the one effective plea of Webb and
his followers.
When Carley Farnsworth had gone to Colonel Conway to ask his aid, the
sturdy old planter had replied:
"I have reasons of my own for not signing your paper, Dr. Farnsworth.
Please do not ask me what they are."
To that there was no possible response. The request with which the
Colonel concluded his reply made a peremptory end of the conversation
so far as that subject was concerned, and so Carley Farnsworth talked
of crops and the curing of hams instead.
But Carley Farnsworth felt that this doubt, this question, this
suspicion, was a seriously undermining influence in his campaign for
his friend, which there was no means of meeting in Boyd Westover's
absence. For, in whispers and by questions that could not be challenged
as assertions, Webb and his followers were suggesting that Colonel
Conway was only waiting for Westover's return before making public the
reasons that impelled him to withhold his approval of his neighbor's
candidacy, and that the fear of Colonel Conway's wrath was the real
reason for Boyd Westover's continued absence.
Carley's first impulse was to write to Judy Peters, telling her that
Boyd's presence was necessary and giving her the reasons. But upon
reflection he decided that this was a case in which Judy's objection to
"puttin' things down in writin'" was peculiarly applicable and valid.
So he sought converse with Edgar Coffey, who, under Judy's
instructions, was "a hangin' round" the lower parts of the district,
and confided to him the urgent and explanatory message he wished Judy
to receive.
On receipt of the message, Judy acted promptly, but in her own way. To
Edgar Coffey she said:
"You go home now, an' look after things there. You's got nine good hogs
to kill this fall an' your wife's a feedin' 'em on apples. Your wife's
purty, Edgar, an' her ways is pleasin', but she ain't got the sense she
was borned with. She mixes the strippin's with the milk jes' as ef
strippin's wa'n't purty nigh the same as cream, an' she hitches a horse
to the body of a tree, 'stead of a swingin' limb, so's the beast can
break the halter an' go home, leavin' her to walk. She done that at
church only two weeks ago come nex' Sunday. An' now she's a feedin'
hogs on apples when she orter be a givin' 'em corn to harden the meat
fer killin' time. So you better go home an' fix things. I'll ten' to
the rest."
Edgar was grievously disappointed. He had confidently hoped to be
himself Judy's messenger to Boyd Westover, but Judy was much too
sagacious to permit that.
"Boyd'll ax questions," she reflected, "'cause he'll be full o'
wonderment 'bout this here thing, an' Edgar mout let the right answers
slip out. Theonidas can't do that, 'cause he don't know nothin' 'bout
the answers."
She expected Theonidas to visit her that evening to secure a bag of
corn meal that she knew he and Boyd sorely needed. She would send her
message by Theonidas, therefore, and would leave the message to take
the place of the meal.
It was supper time when Theonidas arrived, bringing a wild turkey
gobbler and a dozen squirrels on his back.
"Them's all right," said Judy, feeling of the game. "Tell Boyd he'd
orter 'a' saved 'em to take to Wanalah to-morrow. He'll be a
entertainin' folks there an' it 'ud 'a' been handy to have some game in
the house."
"He ain't a thinkin' o' comin' down the mounting yit," replied the boy
in open eyed wonder.
"I know he ain't," Judy replied. "But when you git back up there
to-night--an' you's a goin' to start back soon's you git yer
supper--he'll _be_ a thinkin' about it, an' 'twon't take much thinkin'
to set them legs o' his'n a movin'. You come an' git your supper, an'
then mosey up the mounting as fast as yer feet kin foller one another.
An' you're to tell Boyd that they's the devil to pay an' no funds, down
Wanalah way. Tell him I says he's got to git down thar' quick an' face
the music."
"What's it all about, Mammy?" asked Theonidas with not unnatural
curiosity.
"That ain't none o' your business," Judy replied, "an' ef you don't
know nothin' you can't git it wrong in tellin' it. You jes' say what
I's tole you to say, an' by midnight he'll be a stumblin' down the
mounting to find out what's the matter. But tell him--now _mind_,
Theonidas, an' listen to what I's a sayin'--" for the boy was reaching
across the table for a second helping of some dish he specially
relished, and Judy feared that he was not attending to her
instructions--"listen to what I's a sayin'--"
"I's _is_ a listenin', Mammy," the boy replied. "I's heard every word."
"Is you? Then what was it I said last?" she demanded.
"You said as how that by midnight he'd be a stumblin' down the mounting
to find out what's the matter."
"Right you is!" said Judy approvingly. "Now that's business, an' so is
what I'm a goin' to say. You is to tell him _not to come near Judy
Peters's place_. Tell him they's reasons. Tell him to go down t'other
road Arricktown way. It's shorter an' quicker, but tell him they's
reasons besides the shortness an' quickness. An' when you's tole him
all that tell him your Mammy says he kin count on her tell death!
That'll cheer him up, like."
XX
THE SATISFACTION OF W. W. WEBB
When William Wilberforce Webb found that he had to fight for an
election which he had supposed to be securely his by virtue of his
regular nomination as the candidate of the dominant party, he hastily
called his friends and advisers together for consultation.
In the course of the discussion it was decided that the weak spot in
Webb's campaign lay in his neglect to do anything to secure the
mountain vote.
"We'll divide about even down here," said the shrewdest politician
among Webb's following. "You see the whole Democratic vote is just so
much withdrawn from Westover's strength among the planters, and the
Democrats seem to be in earnest this year. That leaves us with a small
but secure majority in this part of the district. The decision will
rest with the mountain vote, and so far as I can see we've done nothing
to secure that."
"I haven't thought it necessary," answered Webb, "until now. You see
the mountain people have seemed entirely indifferent, and they seem so
now. As they gave me a big majority at the last election, I have
reckoned upon party lines to give me a like majority this time."
"Have you seen Judy Peters?" asked one of the advisers.
"No. I have taken the mountain vote for granted, as about three-fourths
Whig and one-fourth Democratic. You see none of us expected this
intrusion of Boyd Westover into the campaign."
"No, none of us expected it," answered another, "but we've run up
against the unexpected, and we've got to meet it. Webb, you've got to
go up and see Judy Peters. If you please her she'll settle the election
out of hand, but if you offend her, then God save us, for no lesser
power can!"
"I'll go," answered Webb, "but I really don't think it necessary. I had
a talk with Edgar Coffey the other day--in fact I had him dine with me
at the hotel--and he assured me that Judy Peters was taking no interest
in the campaign. He said Judy cares so little about it that even he
hadn't heard an expression of opinion from her lips. So I have taken
the normal Whig majority in the mountains for granted."
Thereupon "Foggy"--he had some other name but nobody ever remembered
it--arose and walked twice across the floor before speaking. He was
barkeeper, constable, jailor, livery man, faro dealer, hound-master,
money lender, note shaver, and pretty nearly everything else that was
disreputable, whether official or unofficial, at the county seat, and
in his various capacities he was rightly supposed to know politics and
men as nobody else in the county did. At last he turned to Webb and
asked:
"Was it yesterday or the day before, that you were born? Because if it
was longer ago than yesterday there really can be no excuse for your
faith in Edgar Coffey. Don't you know he was never caught telling the
truth but once in his life, and that time he was talking in his sleep
after too heavy a load of apple jack, and took it all back as soon as
he waked up? Now my advice to you is to get your walking boots on as
quick as ever you can, and go up to Judy Peters's for a consultation as
to the mountain vote. And you want to mind your eye with Judy, for if
you offend her your goose is cooked and your cake's dough."
In accordance with this suggestion, Webb prepared himself for a journey
up the mountain road, but as he had a speaking engagement to keep, he
could not make the proposed visit until a day later. In the meanwhile,
and by way of placation, he sent a messenger with a note to Judy, in
which he wrote:
"I feel that I have neglected my duty in not visiting you before, but I
have had my days and nights so full of work that it has really seemed
impossible until now. I am going up to-morrow to enjoy one of your
matchless suppers and have a talk with you about whatever interests
you. As for my campaign for the Senate, I know your loyalty too well to
doubt that it has your approval; and now that the intrusion of a third
candidate has rendered the result somewhat insecure in the piedmont
part of the district, I hope to interest you so far that you will help
me stir up a rousing vote in the mountains."
Judy's sole comment on the letter was:
"They'll be a rousin' vote in the mountings sure enough."
Then she turned to Sapphira and with a relish in her tone, said:
"Say, Sapphiry, you an' me's got to lay ourselves out on tomorry
night's supper. They's a candidate a comin'."
"Is he one you's a goin' to 'lect?"
"Yes--to stay at home. But may be you's noticed, Sapphiry, that
whenever I picks out a shoat to be turned into victuals next day, I
always gives that shoat fust chanst at the buttermilk, an' see to it as
how he kin jes' lay down all night, 'longside o' more corn 'n he could
eat in a week. They ain't much difference 'twix' candidates an' shoats
I reckon,--leastways some candidates. So you an' me's jes' got to git
up a supper fer to-morry night sich as the candidate never seen in his
life before. You go to the smoke house an' git the ham that hangs wrong
end up on the third row o' hooks, three hams from the left end. Wash it
an' put it on to bile right away so's that it'll have time to git firm
cold. They's half a shoat in the spring house, an' we'll wring the
necks o' some fryin'-size chickens to-night so's to have 'em ready.
To-morry's the reg'lar twice a week churnin' day, so's that they'll be
fresh butter an' plenty o' buttermilk ef the candidate happens to like
buttermilk. I'll set a bakin' o' bread to-morry mornin' so's we kin
have a hot loaf fer supper. As fer beat biscuit an' batter bread, we
kin make 'em when the time comes. Say, Sapphiry, le's surprise the
candidate!"
Judy uttered that sentence with enthusiasm and with a smile on her
face. A happy thought had come to her.
"Tain't hog-killin' time yit, nor yit 'twon't be fer more'n a month to
come, an' so nobody ain't seen no sassage sence last winter. Le's make
some, out'n the trimmin's o' that half a shoat! You an' me kin chop it
an' season it to-night an' it'll be extry superfine by supper time
to-morrow."
"Well, you certainly is a layin' yourself out fer that there candidate,
Mammy," said Sapphira in admiration of her mother's enthusiasm. "Is you
a goin' to give him a chanst at your old peach and honey?"
"What! peach an' honey fer that miserable wild mustard patch of a
candidate? Well, not ef I see it fust. Apple jack he'll drink, an'
it'll come out o' that there bar'l as was made out o' last year's
windfalls an' cullin's, at that. They ain't no fine flavor to that
slop, but it'll make drunk come just the same, an' I reckon that's all
a half breed like Webb's got any call to expect o' liquor. The best o'
victuals ain't none too good fer anybody as sets down to Judy Peters's
table, but politeness an' liquor goes by favor, an' I ain't got no
favor to spare fer that doggoned counterfeit-copper cuss, Webb."
When Webb appeared, he found Judy arrayed in colors that the lilies of
the field never dared assume and that Solomon in all his glory did not
dream of. She had even put on her bracelets and her breast pin of green
glass, simulating a setting of emeralds. She had borrowed Sapphira's
earrings--great golden hoops that had cost a dollar and a quarter--and
was wearing them in honor of the occasion.
Her gorgeousness of adornment and the barbaric lavishness of the supper
she served him, convinced Webb at the outset that her favor was
altogether his, that the mountain vote was secure, and that in spite of
all alarms his triumphant election was as certain as any human event
could be. Perhaps Judy had intended to create that impression on his
mind. Certainly she did nothing to correct or remove it, and by the
time supper was over Webb was so well satisfied with things as they
were that he did not hesitate to indulge freely in the apple jack that
Judy set out for his consumption.
When she had got his tongue "loosened up" to her liking, and not till
then, she brought the conversation around to subjects connected with
the political campaign. Webb had not ventured to introduce those
subjects earlier. His instinct was keen enough to realize that in Judy
Peters's house Judy Peters was herself the director of the
conversation, and he had heard, till the fact was deeply impressed on
his mind, that the person who forced the talk into channels of his own
choosing was pretty sure to find himself snubbed and snuffed out by
some caustic and high-flavored utterance of her majesty the Queen of
the Mountains.
"Tell me 'bout your campaign, William Wilberforce Webb," she said after
he had had a third or fourth helping of apple jack. Then she changed
her mind--or perhaps the change had been in her mind all the while--and
said: "No, don't bother 'bout that yit. Tell me, instid o' that, what
you's a luggin' all that name around for. I s'pose when you was a boy
they called you jes' Billy Webb. Why ain't that a good 'nough name for
you now? You see us folks up here in the mountings ain't got much
respec' nor patience like with names bigger'n the men what wears 'em.
They was wunst a feller come up here what called hisself James Augustus
de Forrest Hyde, an' we run him out'n the mountings. He come back arter
a while a callin' hisself plain Jim Hyde, an' he's been a breedin'
mules successful, like, ever since. You see when he fust come he
brought more name along than he could tote, an' that's jest what you's
a doin' with your William Wilberforce Webb. It sounds well down 'mong
the stuck ups, but 'tain't no go up here in the mountings. Us folks
likes somethin' plainer--somethin' like Boyd Westover."
"Of course you're right, Judy," answered Webb flinching a little at the
name of his antagonist, "but when a man's parents have given him a long
name what's he to do but wear it? A man's name's a part of him."
"Yes, an' it's that part us folks up here in the mountings don't like.
It's the fool part. Why ain't 'W. W. Webb' a good enough name fer a
one-horse vehicle like you?"
It was the epithet rather than the question that staggered Webb, but
that it did stagger him was indicated to Judy's shrewd observation by
the fact that he took three deep draughts of the apple brandy before
answering. At last he said:
"Well, you see, Judy--"
"No, I don't see," she interrupted, "an' you ain't a goin' to make me
see sense in a thing what ain't got no sense in it."
"I was going to say--" he began again.
"Yes, I know you was. Never mind a sayin' it. Listen to me. Ef I'm to
help you in your canvass up here in the mountings, you's got to shorten
your name somehow. Mind I don't say I's a goin' to help you,"--Judy's
sturdy love of truth in the abstract prompted this qualification of
what was essentially a lie in the concrete--"but _ef_ I'm to help you,
you's got to give me a shorter name 'n William Wilberforce Webb to call
you by. You see every time I try to say anything 'bout you my mouth
gits so choked up, like, with that durned worm fence of a name that the
rest o' the words won't come out nohow."
"I'm sorry, Judy, awfully sorry that my name offends you. Just call me
Billy hereafter."
"That's all right for me," answered Judy, "but you was enominated by
the name of William Wilberforce Webb, an that's the way it'll be wrote
on the pollin' books. How's the folks up here in the mountings to know
as how Billy Webb an' William Wilberforce Webb is the same feller? The
two don't sound much alike. Howsomever we'll try an' manage that. Now
tell me 'bout how things is a goin' down plantation ways."
In the embarrassment created by Judy's critical reflections upon his
name, Webb had filled his large tumbler again with the insidious
intoxicant, forgetting to add water, and had taken several swigs of the
"reverend spirits," which is what Virginians always called undiluted
brandy or whiskey. Judy had observed the fact but had not discouraged
it. Her son, Daniel Webster, was at home that night to put Webb to bed
if need be, and meanwhile she wanted to find out from Webb's
indiscretion what she had no hope of learning in any other way, namely,
"all about the gal that's mixed up in the matter."
To that end she interrupted Webb many times, checking his tendency to
indulge in generalities and holding him down to facts. He told her how
greatly Boyd Westover's intrusive nomination had disturbed what had
promised to be a "walk-over campaign"; how the refusal of Colonel
Conway to sign Boyd's nomination paper was exciting suspicion, and much
else of interest to which Judy paid no heed. She harked back instead to
the Conway matter.
"What was the matter with Conway?" she asked. "Has him an' young
Westover had any fallin' out?"
Webb had attained that condition of alcoholic indiscretion in which the
impulse is to be confidential and to say things far better left unsaid.
He unbosomed himself.