was Jake Greenfield, a Vermonter, without education beyond what he
called the 'rujimenteries,' whom I met in the Rocky Mountains."
"Tell me about him," implored Jack, saying nothing of his own
acquaintance with Jake, who had been his companion and shrewd adviser
during his stay in the Rocky Mountains in Boyd Westover's interest.
"Tell me about him."
"I will," she answered. "I am always pleased to celebrate his virtues.
Jake is ignorant, unfamiliar with the ways of society, and wholly
unformed as to his manners, but he is instinctively a gentleman. He
habitually eats with his knife--a dirk-like thing that he carries in
his belt. He has no hesitation about sitting at table and picking his
teeth with a fork. It never occurs to him to apologize for lighting his
pipe at table or quitting the company before the others have done. None
of the conventions of civilized life have dawned upon his intelligence
as matters worthy of attention. When I knew him, if a single pie sat
before him he would carefully count noses and divide it equally; but if
the table were well dotted with pies he would seize upon the one
nearest him and devour it from his hand without enlisting the services
of knife or fork in aid of the process.
"I met him in the Rocky Mountains where my father had some mining
interests, and I was a good deal distressed and disgusted by his lack
of manners until I came to know the real man who lived under so rough
an exterior."
"How did that come about? Tell me, please," said Jack Towns as he
handed his companion up the two or three steps that led to the porch.
"It was a rather thrilling experience," she answered, "at least in its
beginning. I was only a girl then of eighteen or nineteen. I had gone
to the Rockies with my father for the sake of 'roughing it,' as they
say out there, and enjoying the out-of-door life. I was in the habit of
riding alone, anywhere I pleased, for the region was a wilderness and
nobody lived in it except a few surface miners. One day I rode away
till I came to a little stream, a few inches deep, which was crossed by
a ford. The road to and from the stream had been cut by nature or by
man, through bluff banks, twenty feet high. I crossed the stream,
scarcely wetting the fetlocks of my horse. I rode up through the cut on
the other side to the high ground above, and thence on through a
delightfully wild region, until presently it began to rain in that
sudden and torrential way that belongs to the Rocky Mountains. I turned
my horse about and trotted him somewhat hurriedly toward the ford I had
crossed. When I got there I found the trickling little brook swollen to
a mountain torrent, but I did not recognize the change as a matter of
consequence. I saw that the water had risen, but to me that meant only
that where I had had to make my horse wade fetlock deep before, I must
make him wade knee deep now. I pushed him into the stream and almost
instantly he was swept from his footing. The depth required swimming,
and the onrush of the waters was so great that swimming across the
stream was impossible. The horse made a gallant struggle to reach the
other side within the roadway space, but he was swept away down stream.
I was afloat on his back, imprisoned as it were between two
perpendicular bluffs that offered no point of possible landing or
rescue.
"Just as I fully realized my situation Jake Greenfield, mounted upon a
strong horse, appeared on the bank above.
"'Hold on for your life!' he cried to me, 'an' I'll be with you in half
a minute.' With that he turned his horse's head and rode away for
thirty or forty paces. Then, suddenly turning about, he rode straight
toward the bluff, digging spurs into his horse's flanks at every step,
and lashing his rumps with a black snake whip by way of making sure
that he should not refuse the leap. A moment later there was a splash
and a struggle in the water. Jake Greenfield's horse had leaped into
the stream from the bluff twenty feet or more above, with Jake
Greenfield on his back, and the two had sunk beneath the flood within a
few feet of me as I clung to my horse.
"After a few moments both came to the surface, and the snortings of the
horse indicated that his breathing capacity was impaired. By way of
sparing him Jake slipped off the saddle and took hold of a stirrup
strap as a towing line. But his poor horse's powers were exhausted and
he could sustain himself no longer. He gave up the struggle and sank
beneath the flood, a martyr to the duty he owed to his master--man.
Pardon me, I'm making a long story of this, but the details interest me
so."
"They interest me, too," quickly responded her companion. "You cannot
narrate them in too minute detail to please me. I could listen all
night to the story. Go on, please."
"Well, Jake continued to swim until presently he caught my horse's tail
and used it as a means of keeping up with me. Then he said:
"'Turn him to the right! Keep close in shore. There's a little break in
the bluffs just ahead, and may be we can make it! More to the right!
Closer in shore! There! There's the break. Make him catch bottom there
if you can,' You see, Mr. Towns, every word spoken at that time was
burned into my memory, and I recall every detail as vividly as if the
thing had happened yesterday, or even to-day.
"I succeeded in 'beaching' my horse at that little break in the bank.
It was literally like beaching him, for no sooner had he taken three or
four steps through shoaling water toward the land, than he lay down,
utterly exhausted."
Here the girl stopped in her narrative, as if it had been done. Jack
Towns had no mind thus to lose the climax.
"You haven't told me yet in what way Jake proved himself a gentleman."
"That is true," she answered, "and it was that that I set out to tell
you. Somehow heroism always appeals to me, and in telling you of Jake's
heroism I forgot the other end of the story. I was soaked through, of
course, and chilled to the bone. So Jake took me by the arm--he wanted
to take me on his back but I wouldn't let him--and hurried me to one of
his cabins. You see, as caretaker of the mining lands, he had several
cabins, scattered about over them. He told me there was a motherly old
squaw there who would look after me, but when we got there the squaw,
after the manner of her race, had wandered away somewhere and was not
likely to return. Jake built a big fire in the cabin chimney, and then
went outside, telling me to 'shuck off them soakin' clothes' and wrap
myself up in the quilts that covered the sole orderly bed in the place.
As I did so I bethought me of the conventionalities, and when Jake came
back to cook my supper and dry my clothes, I protested that I could not
consent to stay there alone, and without even a squaw to sustain my
dignity. I simply must go to my father, I said, and when he objected
that the mountain torrent lay between and was by this time twenty-fold
fiercer in its fury than when I had dared it before, I declared that it
made no difference; that at all hazards I must make my way to my
father's quarters that night. By way of making the matter impersonal
and in that way sparing his feelings, I dwelt upon the anxiety my
father must feel for me. I think Jake understood my real objection to
the situation. Indeed I know he did, for by way of reply he said:
"'Ef you only could rest quiet here an' not worrit overmuch, I've been
a-plannin' to go up the mountain to where the stream don't 'mount to
nothin', an' cross it an' go down an' tell Mr. Danvers as how you is
safe an' sound nevertheless of your bein' tired out an' chilly an' all
that. Ef you kin spare me, I'd like to do that.'
"Not at all realizing the fact that that torrent had its beginning
twenty miles away and in mountains so precipitous that no man could
scale them, I gave eager consent to his proposal, and after preparing
such supper as he could for me, the devoted fellow--no, the chivalric
gentleman, I mean--set forth in the torrential rain. I learned
afterwards that he toiled up the stream for six miles, plunged into it
and the darkness, breasted his way across it as it swept him down its
resistless current, and with difficulty effected a landing on the
opposite side four miles below his starting point. Thence he trudged
through the darkness and the rain to my father's quarters, where rescue
parties were forming to hunt for me. That's the story. Don't you agree
with me that Jake's a gentleman in the true sense of the word?"
"All that is what I should have expected of Jake," answered the young
man. "You see I've just returned from that region, and during my stay
there I was closely associated with him."
The girl uttered a little exclamation of astonishment; then, with that
perfect self-possession which Jack Towns had found to be the most
fascinating thing about her, she added:
"Confidence deserves confidence in return, and before you go," for Jack
had risen and the two were advancing toward his restless, pawing horse,
"it seems only fair to tell you that what you have said of the Boston
banker who entertained you over Sunday has been very gratifying to me,
for the reason that the gentleman concerned is my father, and the house
you found so hospitable is my home. I sincerely hope you'll have other
occasions to visit us there."
Jack's instant thought was:
"I'll make the occasions, and I'll do it pretty soon too," but he
confined his speech to the courtesies of the moment, and a minute later
he was riding at half speed toward Wanalah, wondering if his absence
had kept supper waiting, and not caring in the least whether it had
done so or not.
XXXII
WHAT HAPPENED AT FIGHTING CREEK
In Virginia in the late fifties there was no question of principle or
policy or anything else at issue between the Whig and Democratic
parties. Even in national politics there was none. The Whigs were
supposed to represent tariff protection and internal improvements. The
Democrats stood for free trade and sailors' rights, but neither the one
nor the other of these cries represented anything vital, any policy
that was pending.
In Virginia the instinct of self-preservation, awakened by hostility at
the North to the institution of slavery, had stimulated both parties to
an intemperate, uncompromising, relentless advocacy of slavery as a
system right in itself,--a thing that nobody really believed,--and
whenever Whig and Democrat met in debate, the only question between
them was which could go to the greatest extreme in that direction.
There were the old antagonisms between the two parties. They were still
remembered with bitterness, and men grew excited and even violent in
their discussion; but nobody on either side could have said what they
meant, for the sufficient reason that they meant just nothing at all.
There was a new, Free Soil party rapidly gaining strength at the North,
and by both Whigs and Democrats in Virginia that party was regarded as
the common enemy, to be fought to the death. But while waiting for
that, the Whigs and Democrats fought each other for precedence and
place.
Political speaking under such conditions was apt to be uninteresting to
others than the speakers, unless it involved something of accidental
and unusual moment. If any speaker under the excitement of perfervid
oratory happened to use terms which his adversary could construe to be
offensive to himself, there was instantly awakened the interest that
pertains to a quarrel which may presently ripen into a duel or a street
fight.
Nothing of that kind occurred at Fighting Creek on the day after Jack
Towns's visit to Millicent, but some other things occurred that gave
peculiar interest to the occasion. Carley Farnsworth read from the
platform the note in which Colonel Conway pledged himself to the
support of Westover's nomination. That in itself was a staggering blow
to Webb's candidacy. As Foggy, whose phrases were apt to be
picturesque, put the matter:
"It knocks the underpinnin' out of our campaign, and it looks to me,
Webb, as if it might knock the stuffin' out'n you."
But staggering as the announcement was, there was far worse to come.
When Sam Butler, the Democratic candidate for Senator, had emptied his
mind and mouth of all the florid rhetorical phrases he had sat up of
nights to construct, he brought a matter of practical political
importance to the front.
"I have endeavored to show you, my fellow citizens, that Democratic
principles ought to triumph in this election; but neither you nor I can
fail to see that there is no chance of that in this senatorial
district. After consultation with my friends and political advisers, I
have decided that the issue lies solely between the regular and the
independent Whig candidates; and as between these two I think no
Democrat can hesitate to choose Mr. Boyd Westover as the fittest man to
represent us. I therefore resign my own candidacy in Mr. Westover's
behalf, and I urge all my friends, all loyal Democrats in the district,
to vote for him. I have been moved to this decision by impulses of
patriotism and by a sense of duty to the district and to my fellow
citizens."
This was a thunderbolt out of a clear sky, and for a full minute the
crowd stood paralyzed with astonishment. Then Butler's most active
supporter--by prearrangement of course--leaped to the platform and
cried out:
"Friends, Democrats, patriots! It occurs to me that our party in this
county has named no candidate for the lower house of the Legislature.
In order that the Democratic vote shall not be completely unrecorded, I
move that we now name Samuel Butler, Esq., for that honorable place.
His candidacy for that will in no way interfere with his
self-sacrificing decision to take himself out of the senatorial
campaign. I ask all Democrats here present to gather in the prize barn
across the road, to consider this suggestion."
A "prize barn" was one in which there were appliances for pressing leaf
tobacco into hogsheads.
Ten minutes later it was announced that the late Democratic candidate
for Senator had been unanimously nominated for the House of Delegates.
"Now I know," said Carley Farnsworth to himself, "what Edgar Coffey's
message from Judy to Butler meant. It's the shrewdest bit of play I
ever heard of. By securing his withdrawal from the senatorial contest,
the Queen of the Mountains has enormously swelled Boyd's planter vote.
And by way of accomplishing that she has promised the mountain vote to
Butler for the lower office, and it will elect him beyond a doubt. On
the whole, I reckon I won't explain the matter to Westover. He's
quixotic, and he knows nothing of politics. But, by Jove, it was a
master stroke on Judy's part."
That night when Edgar Coffey made his report to Judy, telling her of
the adroit and graceful way in which the program had been carried out
by Butler, her comment was:
"Some folks has more sense'n you'd think."
When he had told her of the confidence with which Webb was reckoning
upon the mountain vote to offset the loss, she added:
"An' some folks ain't got the sense the law allows 'em."
But if Webb had less political sense "than the law allowed him," there
were certain of his followers who were better endowed. Foggy, in
particular, realized the situation, and, by way of meeting it, summoned
Webb and a dozen or so of his immediate supporters to a conference in
the hostelry of a neighboring county seat.
There Foggy laid down the law to the optimistic candidate.
"These here two happenings," he said, "mean trouble. All the swell Whig
planters who were holding back because of Colonel Conway's stand will
now vote for Westover, and use their influence to make their overseers
and others do the same. Every Democrat in the district will vote for
him as a matter of course. They want to beat the regular Whig nominee,
and now that they haven't a candidate of their own, they'll vote for
Westover. Now what have we got to meet all this with?"
Webb suggested the mountain vote, and Foggy instantly replied:
"So far as I can see, we ain't got no mortgage on that, and if we are
to carry it we've got to go after it."
So they went on discussing the situation, ending by ordering a vigorous
campaign in the mountains with Webb for leader and Judy Peters as the
Dominant Power to be approached with negotiations.
When Jack Towns heard of this program, he went to Carley Farnsworth in
some alarm, to suggest some counter move.
"I am conducting this campaign," answered the little doctor, "and I am
in confidential relations with Judy. I'll tell you, Jack, but you must
keep the secret, that it was Judy herself who conceived and planned and
organized Boyd's candidacy. She made one of the best diagnoses I ever
heard of in his case, and her therapeutics is matchless. Let her alone.
She has made up her mind to elect Westover with such a majority as
shall be convincing even to him, and she will do it you may be sure. If
she wants to see any of us she'll have Edgar Coffey whisper a hint of
her desire into our ears. Until she does that we mustn't interfere. She
might resent it as a reflection on her skill in political management.
Now let me drop a hint into your ear. I said just now that I was
managing this campaign. That was a vainglorious boast. I didn't
persuade Butler to retire in Westover's favor, but somebody arranged
that. Have you any idea who it was? And if at the end of the campaign
Butler should find himself elected to the lower house of the
Legislature by virtue of the entire mountain vote added to the regular
Democratic poll down here, do you imagine for an instant that the
result would take him by surprise? Now keep mum about all these things.
I am only making suggestions by way of preventing you from making
mistakes. Don't say a word to Boyd about it."
XXXIII
CONSPIRACIES
Jack Towns was particularly pleased with the reassurance that
Farnsworth gave him respecting the campaign. It set him free. In his
loyalty to Boyd Westover he would have ridden all night and all day in
aid of his friend's election; but he greatly preferred to go to Dr.
Carver's and dance all night with Millicent.
In fact he did very nearly that. He put his name down on her card for
every set that wasn't taken in advance, and he danced all of them but
three or four which she elected to "sit out." If she had been
accompanied by a chaperon, she would have had to restrict Mr. Towns's
allowance of sets, but chaperons were not deemed necessary for
well-bred young women in Virginia. Such young women were supposed to
know how to behave properly, and as for protection, was not the entire
adult male population ready and eager to render it upon occasion?
Moreover, Jack Towns did not in fact secure an undue proportion of
Millicent's sets, for the reason that all the young men in the company,
who managed to get possession of her card in time, put their names on
it, for one dance each. She rigidly restricted them to one. Perhaps she
considered Jack. But she put no restriction on Jack Towns in the
matter, and Jack was so ill-mannered in his infatuation that he asked
no other young woman for her card, except in the case of Charlotte
Deane. Charlotte was no longer as young as she could have wished, and
she was distinctly not beautiful or brilliant. So Jack, observing that
there were no throngs of young men about her, asked for her card and
put his name down for two dances.
For the rest, he devoted his attention to Millicent Danvers until
everybody was set wondering if at last Jack Towns had really and truly
fallen in love. The same question arose in Jack's own mind, but he, at
least, was able to answer it. "Yes," he admitted to himself, "I have
had many fleeting fancies before, but none that resembled this. I am
determined to win Millicent Danvers if devotion can accomplish it. I
never felt in that way before. Always I have felt, that while one young
woman pleased me, there were others who might be equally pleasing. I
don't feel so now. It is Millicent Danvers now, or nobody with me. I
wonder what she will think of my big, disorderly bachelor establishment
if she ever consents to be its mistress? I'll wager something handsome
that she'll--well, it will be time enough to speculate on that when I
have won her. By the way, she would say that differently--'when I shall
have won her.' Anyhow my present task is to win her. If I do that she
will take care of the rest. And after all a bachelor establishment
isn't a home. Just think of the difference between my big house, where
everything is in chaos, and that home of hers among the blue hills of
Milton."
So he went on, thinking, wondering, speculating, so long as she was
fulfilling an engagement to dance with somebody else whom he hated and
held in unmerited contempt without any assignable reason. And when his
own turn came and he danced with her, his fancies floated before his
eyes as a dream pervades the mind, a dream that so rejoices as to make
of waking a calamity.
Millicent did well whatever she did at all. In dancing with her, Jack
felt that she simply lifted herself half an inch or so from the floor
and floated about without again touching it. It was a delight to dance
with her, as every young man who had enjoyed the experience stood ready
to testify, but Jack Towns rejoiced even more in "sitting out" a set.
For then, with her arm in his he could promenade the porches, or the
pair could stroll out into the grounds where common prudence and
courtesy required him frequently to readjust the wrappings that
protected her otherwise bare arms and shoulders, or, better still, he
could seek out a secluded nook in the porch or elsewhere, where they
two might talk of things that held interest for both of them in common.
It was during one of these confabs, when they sat out two dances in
succession, that Jack Towns invited himself to Boston and to
Millicent's home in the blue hills of Milton. It came about in this
way. Jack was really and earnestly in love, for the first time in his
life, and the impulse to tell Millicent so was well nigh irresistible.
But Jack was a Virginian, and he recognized the right of a young woman
to be courted in her own home. He restrained his impulse of speech,
therefore, so far as open avowals were concerned, but his utterances,
short of a declaration, were such as to leave the young woman in no
doubt as to his attitude and purpose.
When she spoke of her prospective home-going, he asked, a little
eagerly perhaps, when that was to occur. She answered:
"It must be very soon--as soon as I shall have done a duty that rests
upon me. I'm sorry Mr. Boyd Westover isn't here to-night. He told me,
when I met him casually this afternoon, that he was obliged to return
to Wanalah."
"I suppose he was," answered Jack Towns in a peculiarly inscrutable
tone that he adopted upon occasion. "But why? Do you particularly want
to see him?"
"Yes, not only particularly but peremptorily. It is a part of the duty
I have set myself. I cannot go back to Boston till I do."
"I see," he answered. "If you like I'll call at The Oaks and ask you to
ride with me. We can ride over to Wanalah, and I'll see to it that he
shall be there at the time."
"Oh, no, no, no! That would never do. There are reasons which I cannot
explain, if you'll excuse me. I must meet Mr. Westover casually, quite
by accident as it were."
"Very well, then," answered Jack, with all the confidence he was
accustomed to assume at a court trial when his case was an uncertain
one. "I'll arrange the accident and create the 'casualty.' You have
only to respond favorably to the invitations you receive during the
next few days. I'll take care of the rest."