walking--or perhaps I should say climbing--up there?"
She responded gladly and the two set off. The climb was not an easy
one, and it was quite half an hour before they reached the summit. When
they arrived there Westover led his companion to the best points of
observation, but he was disappointed to find that her enthusiasm was
less than he had hoped.
"You don't care much for the views after all," he ventured to say, half
reproachfully.
"Yes, I do. Or rather, I should enjoy them intensely, if it were not
that I have something on my mind, something that it is my duty to do
and that I fear I shall go wrong in doing. It was for that that I came
up here with you, Mr. Westover, in order that I might talk with you
apart from the crowd down there."
She paused timorously, and nervously stripped the glove she had
unconsciously removed from her hand. By way of encouragement, Boyd
Westover said:
"Go on. I shall be glad to hear anything you have to tell me."
She remained meditatively silent for half a minute more. Then she
asked, with great, open, honest eyes looking into his:
"Mr. Westover, can you, do you believe a woman--in the same way that
you take a man's word, I mean? If Mr. Towns, or Dr. Farnsworth, should
solemnly assure you of the perfect truth of anything they might have to
say to you, you would believe him as implicitly as if his statement
were a fact within your personal knowledge. Can you believe a woman's
solemn assurance in the same way and to the same extent?"
"When you are the woman making the statement, yes!" he answered
gallantly, but with an assurance of sincerity in his voice, and with a
still more emphatic assurance of sincerity in the eyes that looked
straight into hers. "I shall believe anything you tell me as firmly as
I believe in my own existence, or in the stability of the rocks under
our feet."
"I thank you sincerely," she said, with that Bostonian fulness of
expression that had peculiarly charmed all the Virginians who had
enjoyed a meeting with her. "Now I'll make the statement that you are
to believe as absolutely true."
She paused, as if framing her utterance carefully. After a moment she
said:
"In what I am going to say to you, and in seeking this opportunity to
say it, I do not represent anybody but myself. Especially I do not
represent Margaret Conway."
He started a little at the name, and she observed the fact, but she
went on, not heeding it.
"Indeed in telling you what I am going to tell you, I am violating
Margaret's earnest and express commands. Perhaps I am even violating a
confidence of friendship. I don't know, and it makes no difference. It
is my duty to tell you, and I'll do that duty at all hazards. It
involves the life-long happiness or unhappiness of two persons whom I
hold in affectionate regard."
By this time Westover, nervous, restless, troubled and enthusiastic as
he was, was wrought up to the verge of delirium.
"Tell me!" he cried earnestly. "Tell me quickly! I can endure the
suspense no longer."
In reply the girl, who had completely recovered her self-control, said
very deliberately:
"What I have to tell you may perhaps explain many things that you have
not hitherto understood. It is this: the letters you wrote to Margaret
Conway at the time of your trouble were never delivered to her; the
letters she wrote to you at that time were never posted. That is all."
"How do you know this?" he asked, seizing her by the shoulders as if
intent upon shaking the answer out of her. "Do you _know_ it or is it
only conjecture? Tell me, quick, how do you know it?"
"I have seen the letters," she answered, calmly enjoying his half-mad
excitement.
"But how do you know mine were not received and hers not mailed?"
"I have seen them," she answered. "Yours were not opened and Margaret
had never seen them. Hers were addressed and stamped, but bore no
postmarks. Be perfectly sure, Mr. Westover, that I know all I say."
"But who interfered? Why were the letters stopped in transit?" he asked
almost angrily.
"That I am not free to tell you. I am concerned only for you and
Margaret. The rest concerns another person, and I have no right--"
"Was it Colonel Conway? Did he--"
"Mr. Westover, you know Colonel Conway. Therefore you know it was not
he, just as you know that he isn't a coward or anything else
dishonorable. Now please don't ask me any further questions. I have
already violated obligations, I suppose. At any rate I have put you in
possession of the essential facts. The rest lies with you. We must go
down the hill now."
The two started off together, but before they had journeyed far,
Westover stopped suddenly and, taking both the girl's hands in his,
said fervently:
"I thank God, and I thank you, Millicent Danvers. To the end of my life
I shall thank you. Now let us be off, for I must get away from here."
She did not ask him why, but she understood and approved.
XXXVI
THE MEETING AT THE OAKS
As the two neared the scene of Judy's festivities, Millicent suddenly
stopped and, looking straight into Westover's eyes, asked:
"You are very sure you believe me, and that I have acted upon the
prompting of conscience alone?"
"Millicent Danvers, I never believed anything in my life more
confidently than I do that."
"And do you think I have done right?"
"Right? Yes. You have saved two lives from wreck and wretchedness.
Could anything be righter than that? You have a sensitive conscience;
bid it rest easy in the consciousness of a brave deed well done.
Charles Kingsley says: 'God gives it to few men to carry a line to a
stranded ship.' That is what God has given it to you to do. Be sure I
shall not compromise you in any way, and may God always bless you!"
Both were too much overwrought to indulge in further speech. They
hurried on to the house, and Boyd went instantly to Judy, saying:
"I'm sorry to miss the rest of the frolic and especially the evening
dance; but I find I must leave immediately."
"That's all right, Boyd, ef it's becase o' the gal," answered Judy with
womanly sympathy. "Jest set still here fer five minutes an' I'll have
Theonidas bring your horse round to the road back o' the house, so's
nobody'll see you a settin' off. Say, Boyd, that Boston gal's awful
nice. I wish 'twas her."
"Let Jack Towns dance with her to-night, Judy, and you'll be satisfied."
Five minutes later Westover was in the saddle and hurrying down the
mountain as rapidly as his concern for the welfare and the bones of Rob
Roy would permit. That enthusiastic quadruped had an unconquerable
preference for the faster gaits familiar to horse flesh, and, if left
to himself, he would have gone at a gallop all the way down the
mountain. But his master, with a discretion superior to his, restrained
him, permitting only a trot on the levels and compelling what the horse
evidently regarded as an absurd walk down the steeper inclines.
In spite of all restraints the good horse carried him over the
twenty-mile distance in little more than two hours' time, and it was at
the gloaming time that he approached The Oaks.
He had formed no plans when he rode away from Judy Peters's place. His
first thought as he went down the mountain was that he would go to
Wanalah, write a letter to Margaret, enclose it in a note to Colonel
Conway and send it by a special messenger. He abandoned that program
promptly, and after framing and rejecting several others of less
elaborate formality, he resolved to go straight to Margaret.
"I have a right to do that," he said to himself. "Now that I know what
her attitude has been it is not only my privilege but my duty to deal
directly with her, to tell her what I have learned, to tell her of the
misapprehension I have labored under, to renew my suit and to learn
from her lips what her present feeling is. I know that, already, but it
will be reassuring to have her tell me of it. God bless that Boston
girl and her New England conscience and her courage! For it required
courage of a high order to do what she did. Not many people would have
dared do it."
So thinking he rode into the house grounds at The Oaks while the last
glow of daylight was fading out of the sunset side of the sky.
Seeing a young negro, he dismounted and tossed the rein to the boy,
saying:
"Don't stable him; just walk him back and forth till he cools down and
then hitch him somewhere handy; I shall ride again presently."
Walking rapidly up the path he stepped upon the porch, and there met
Margaret face to face for the first time since he had gaily bidden her
adieu at midsummer.
"Margaret!" he exclaimed.
"Boyd!" she answered, and a moment later he had taken her in his arms
and caressed her fervently.
[Illustration: "Margaret!" . . . "Boyd!"--_Page 436._]
"You have come at last!" she said as she withdrew herself from his
embrace.
"At last?" he asked in answer. "It was only two hours ago that I
learned that I might come at all. I was twenty miles away then, and I
am here now, here to claim fulfilment of the most glorious promise a
woman ever made to a man--here to claim you, Margaret."
"I know," she answered, as they sank into porch chairs. "Don't let us
waste time in explanations, now that they are so utterly unnecessary.
Just let us be happy."
The conversation thus begun lasted until near supper time. It is not
necessary to report it for the information of any who have been lovers,
and as for the rest, they would never understand.
Just before the late supper time Westover suddenly awakened to his duty.
"I must see your father," he said. "Without his permission I have no
right to consider myself a guest in his house."
Margaret, knowing her father's perplexed eagerness to see Westover and
be reconciled with him, smiled as she answered:
"I'll send for Father."
She did so, and presently the old Colonel came limping into the porch.
As he approached, Margaret slipped into the house, leaving the two men
alone.
They greeted each other with a cordiality that rendered all
explanations and apologies needless, but Colonel Conway insisted upon
explaining and apologizing.
"I've been a coward, Boyd! I've been an abject coward."
"I don't know any other man living who would dare say that, Colonel."
"Perhaps not. No, I suppose not. Still it is true, and I'm profoundly
ashamed of it."
"Now my dear Colonel Conway," interjected Westover, "let us not talk of
that. This is the happiest hour of my life and, I hope, of Margaret's.
Let us not spoil it by discussing disagreeable things which are
completely past and gone."
"But there are some things that I must explain, Boyd, and you must
listen to me. I ought to have gone to you in Richmond at the time of
your trouble. I didn't, because I was forbidden to do so by an
authority which I was cowardly enough to yield to. Margaret--great
woman that she is--told me then I was a coward, and she was right. When
you came back to Wanalah my purpose was to go to you at once, but the
same authority forbade, giving me a sufficient reason in the fact that
you had written no line to Margaret. I know better now, but only within
the past few days. Under that mistaken belief I refused to join in your
nomination. A few days ago a catastrophe here revealed the truth to
both Margaret and me. She appealed to me to do what my sense of honor
might suggest. That meant that I should go to you at once, grasp your
hand, tell you of the misapprehension and of the facts that removed it,
and ask your pardon. No, don't interrupt. You are generously disposed
to spare me, but I shall not consent to be spared. My first impulse was
to do what Margaret expected of me. But an appeal was made to me to
spare another--the culprit in the case--and I weakly yielded to it. I
compromised with my conscience and my honor. I wrote to Dr. Farnsworth
the letter you have doubtless seen, and I did no more. It was all
cowardice, and I am heartily ashamed of it. Will you forgive me, Boyd?"
"Colonel Conway," answered Boyd with intense earnestness, "no man with
a cowardly nerve in his body could ever have made the manly
self-accusing apology you have offered to me. You grievously wrong
yourself. It was not cowardice that restrained you, but a tender and
generous consideration for a helpless person who was entitled to every
protection you could give her. Now let us talk no more of this! Let us
never refer to it! Let it be a dead thing of a dead past--a thing done
with, forgotten, banished forever from our minds!"
"You are very generous," answered the now feeble old man. "But that is
not a thing to be wondered at. You are Westover of Wanalah, and for
nearly two hundred years that name has stood for all there is of
gentle, generous and courageous manhood. You'll stay to supper of
course?"
"No, Colonel. I have much to do to-night. I must ride at once--as soon
as I shall have said 'good night' to Margaret."
It took a considerable time for the saying of that good night.
"I'll be over here at ten o'clock to-morrow morning, Margaret," he
said, "and we'll go for a ride. I'll have a servant bring over a young
filly I have in my stables, that you'll be delighted to ride. She's
spirited, but as gentle as a zephyr--that's what I've named
her--'Zephyr'--and her paces are perfect. She's to be yours from this
time forth. I personally educated her for you last summer,
before--before the trouble came."
"But to-morrow is Sunday; aren't we to go to church?"
"No. We are going to Wanalah, so that you may look over the place and
see what alterations are needed. I must tell you, Margaret, that an
investment,--very wise or very lucky, I don't know which,--made by my
father in my name, has suddenly borne fruit, making me, Jack Towns
says--and he has charge of the business--three times over the richest
man in Virginia. The wealth is of no consequence in itself, but I
mention it so that in deciding what shall be done at Wanalah you need
have no fear of expense before your eyes."
"But church is at Round Hill, to-morrow, almost under our noses. If we
don't attend, what will people say?"
"Hang 'people.' We are 'people' now. We're happy and we're going to
stay happy. And after all what can they say? They'll say that Boyd
Westover and Margaret Conway are very much in love with each other, and
we don't care to contradict that, do we?"
"I do not," she answered.
"Neither do I. So let them say on. They'll wonder when it is to be, and
I'm wondering about that myself now. When is it to be, Margaret?"
"I don't know. Of course I must have time to make a trousseau."
"What for?" he asked. "Hang the trousseau, or make it after we're
married. What's the difference? You've plenty of clothes, and you're
charming in any of them."
"But Boyd, dear,--"
"But Margaret dear," he interrupted, "you see our marriage was to have
occurred in the late summer or early fall. It has already been
unreasonably delayed. It is nonsense to delay it further. Think a
little, and think quick, and name a day."
"If you must have it so, I suppose it must be so. You are the Master
now. And besides--"
She did not finish her sentence till he challenged it, saying:
"Besides what, Margaret?"
"I was only thinking," she answered, "that I can't persuade Millicent
to stay much longer, and I do want her to be my first bridesmaid. You
see, Boyd, it isn't only that I'm very fond of her--I am _very grateful
to her_."
"So am I," he answered with emphasis, but neither the one nor the other
said aught of the occasion for gratitude. They both understood. But he
eagerly grasped at the helping hand:
"Then you _must_ name a very early day, or she will have flitted."
"Let me see," she said; "the election will occur one week from next
Tuesday; that is ten days hence. Our wedding shall occur on the day
after you are elected Senator."
"But suppose I should not be elected?"
"In that case the day will come round just the same," she said; "but
you will be elected. I have Dr. Farnsworth's positive assurance that
you will be elected by the largest majority any candidate ever received
in this district, and Dr. Farnsworth is a man who deals exclusively in
facts, never in conjectures."
"Then you have concerned yourself about my election?"
"How could it be otherwise? As I told you in the long ago, Boyd, I am
not a woman who loves lightly or lightly forgets."
"I know," he answered. "Your father is taking his supper alone. Go to
him at once. I'll mount and away."
XXXVII
THE OLD CLOCK TICKS AGAIN
"It's a rambling old place," Westover said, as he and Margaret strolled
through the vast spaces of the Wanalah rooms with their highly polished
white ash floors, their wealth of stoutly built, time darkened
furniture, their ancient, oaken wainscots and their hospitably spacious
fireplaces. "I suppose a modern judgment would say tear it down and
build anew--"
"Then the modern judgment shall have no welcome when I am mistress
here. Tear down Wanalah, with its walls of thick masonry, its
generously large rooms, and its memories? Only a vandal would do that.
I'll tell you, Boyd, there is only one change I'd like you to make
here."
"I'll make it. What is it?"
"There's a beautiful old standing clock in the dining room that has
never ticked since I have known Wanalah. Won't you have somebody put
new works into it and set it going again?"
"Yes," he answered, "but it shall not run until you and I return from
our wedding trip and you enter the house as its mistress. We'll go to
it together then and set it going, to mark time in a new era at
Wanalah."
"You are very good and thoughtful and tender, Boyd. I suppose you are a
trifle romantic also, but I shall certainly not quarrel with that, now
or ever."
"Speaking of our wedding trip, Margaret," he said eagerly, "what is it
to be? We can go anywhere you like and everywhere you like and for as
long as you like."
"Am I really free to choose?" she asked, looking into his eyes.
"Yes, really and absolutely."
"What I would like best, then, would be to go up to that place of yours
in the high mountains. It was there that you suffered most on my
account; I want you to rejoice and be happy there, Boyd, by way of
recompense."
"But it's rough living up there, Margaret; perhaps you'd find it----"
"I'd find it delightful. How could it be otherwise, with just you and
me there?"
"It shall be so then. Nothing could delight me more. I'll get Theonidas
to carry my things back up there at once. They are still at Judy's. And
we'll take along with us whatever baggage you want."
"That will be very little. It is the air, the sunshine, the rain, the
freedom and _you_, Boyd, that I want. And besides, you know you have
forbidden me to have a trousseau. I'll be a wood nymph or a water witch
or something of that sort, and such beings do not bother with baggage,
I suppose."
During the next week, Westover was speaking day and night, all over the
district. He really cared nothing for the office he was running for,
but it was his temperament to do his mightiest to win in any contest in
which he had a part, and in this case he had the additional impulse to
gratify Margaret by securing the biggest majority possible for his
election.
Meanwhile, in his enthusiasm, Colonel Conway forgot all about his gout,
and busied himself in the fulfilment of the promise he had long ago
given, to fill The Oaks at the wedding time with the most brilliant
company the country could furnish, and to have feasting there of a kind
that might make the occasion memorable. He even made a journey to
Washington and fairly forced his old commander in the Mexican War,
General Scott, to be a guest, honored and honoring the occasion.
Judy Peters was also an honored guest. When Westover learned at last
what part she had borne in his nomination and in his campaign, he rode
all the way up to her place to persuade her to come. And when the time
arrived, he sent the Wanalah carriage to fetch her. She appeared at the
ceremony, in a gown more gaudily gorgeous than any that had been seen
in that region since "the time whereof the memory of man runneth not to
the contrary."
Colonel Conway devoted his particular attention to her. Among other
special courtesies he shared with her a bottle of precious old
Madeira--too precious, as he told her, to be "wasted on a lot of young
fellows whose palates are not educated up to it."
She drank the wine with relish, and after the third thimbleful glass
she gave judgment.
"It's better 'n apple jack, but in the matter o' taste, 'tain't quite
up to peach an' honey, is it now, Bob?"
Since his boyhood nobody had ever ventured to address Colonel Conway as
"Bob," but as it came from Judy's barbaric and privileged lips, he
rather liked it.
The wedding was held in the early morning because Boyd Westover had
explained, without a hint of whither they were bound, that he and
Margaret had a long journey to make before nightfall.
The wedding morn was on the day following the election, and the returns
were all in. Carley Farnsworth summarized them to the company by
announcing that Westover was elected by the vote of more than
three-fourths and nearly four-fifths of the citizens of the district.
Then he added:
"And Sam Butler, Democrat, is elected to the House of Delegates,
chiefly by the mountain vote, which seems to have been pretty nearly
solid for him."
Judy Peters beamed upon Colonel Conway, and ventured the remark:
"'Tain't no use a-votin', Colonel, ef you don't stick together an' vote
to 'lect. That's our way up in the mountings."
"Ah, Judy," the Colonel replied, "I'm afraid you're a sad sinner. I'm
afraid you manipulated that vote."
"I ain't close acquainted with that big word o' your'n, Bob, but I was
purty nigh right in my jedgment as to how this here 'lection was a
goin' to come out. Say, Bob, what d'you think that there comb-cut
rooster William Wilberforce Webb thinks of hisself by now? I wonder ef
he'll unload some o' that name?"
Westover and his bride left as soon as the ceremony was over, but
Colonel Conway kept the festivities going all day, and there was a
dance at night.
The occasion was rich in opportunities for Jack Towns, and, with the
alert energy which was characteristic of him, he made the most of them.
When, two days later, he left for Boston as Millicent's escort, there
was no room for doubt in anybody's mind as to the outcome of his visit
to the blue hills of Milton.
It was a month later, and winter had begun, when Westover and
Margaret--just entering the house--went to the clock and set it going.
She said something--no matter what. He said nothing, but gathering her
head to his breast, he caressed her. Words seemed superfluous.
THE END.
The Potter and the Clay
A Romance of To-day
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