THE DESPATCH BEARER
Leaves of yellow and red and brown were falling, and the wind that came
up the valley played on the boughs like a bow on the strings of a
violin. The mountain ridges piled against each other cut the blue sky
like a saber's edge, and the forests on the slopes rising terrace above
terrace burned in vivid colours painted by the brush of autumn. The
despatch bearer's eye, sweeping peaks and slopes and valleys, saw
nothing living save himself and his good horse. The silver streams in
the valleys, the vivid forests on the slopes and the blue peaks above
told of peace, which was also in the musical note of the wind, in the
shy eyes of a deer that looked at him a moment then fled away to the
forest, and in the bubbles of pink and blue that floated on the silver
surface of the stream at his feet.
Prescott had been into the far South on a special mission from the
Confederate Government in Richmond after his return from the Wilderness
and complete recovery from his wound, and now he was going back through
a sea of mountains, the great range that fills up so much of North
Carolina and its fifty thousand square miles, and he was not sorry to
find the way long. He enjoyed the crisp air, the winds, the burning
colours of the forest, the deep blue of the sky and the infinite peace.
But the nights lay cold on the ridges, and Prescott, when he could find
no cabin for shelter, built a fire of pine branches and, wrapping
himself in his blanket, slept with his feet to the coals. The cold
increased by and by, and icy wind roared among the peaks and brought a
skim of snow. Then Prescott shivered and pined for the lowlands and the
haunts of men.
He descended at last from the peaks and entered a tiny hamlet of the
backwoods, where he found among other things a two-weeks-old Richmond
newspaper. Looking eagerly through its meager columns to see what had
happened while he was buried in the hills, he learned that there was no
new stage in the war--no other great battle. The armies were facing each
other across their entrenchments at Petersburg, and the moment a head
appeared above either parapet the crack of a rifle from the other told
of one more death added to the hundreds of thousands. That was all of
the war save that food was growing scarcer and the blockade of the
Southern ports more vigilant. It was a skilful and daring blockade
runner now that could creep past the watching ships.
On an inside page he found social news. Richmond was crowded with
refugees, and wherever men and women gather they must have diversion
though at the very mouths of the guns. The gaiety of the capital, real
or feigned, continued, and his eye was caught by the name of Lucia
Catherwood. There was a new beauty in Richmond, the newspaper said, one
whose graces of face and figure were equaled only by the qualities of
her mind. She had relatives of strong Northern tendencies, and she had
been known to express such sympathies herself; but they only lent
piquancy to her conversation. She had appeared at one of the President's
receptions; and further on Prescott saw the name of Mr. Sefton. There
was nothing by which he could tell with certainty, but he inferred that
she had gone there with the Secretary. A sudden thought assailed and
tormented him. What could the Secretary be to her? Well, why not? Mr.
Sefton was an able and insinuating man. Moreover, he was no bitter
partisan: the fact that she believed in the cause of the North would not
trouble him. She had refused himself and not many minutes later had been
seen talking with the Secretary in what seemed to be the most
confidential manner. Why had she come back to Richmond, from which she
had escaped amid such dangers? Did it not mean that she and the
Secretary had become allies more than friends? The thought would not
let Prescott rest.
Prescott put the newspaper in his pocket and left the little tavern with
an abruptness that astonished his host, setting out upon his ride with
increased haste and turning eastward, intending to reach the railroad at
the nearest point where he could take a train to Richmond.
His was not a morbid mind, but the fever in it grew. He had thought that
the Secretary loved Helen Harley: but once he had fancied himself in
love with Helen, too, and why might not the Secretary suffering from the
same delusion be changed in the same way? He took out the newspaper and
read the story again. There was much about her beauty, a description of
her dress, and the distinction of her manner and appearance. The
President himself, it said, was charmed with her, and departing from his
usual cold reserve gave her graceful compliments.
This new reading of the newspaper only added more impetus to his speed
and on the afternoon of the same day he reached the railroad station.
Early the next morning he entered Richmond.
His heart, despite its recurrent troubles, was light, for he was coming
home once more.
The streets were but slightly changed--perhaps a little more bareness
and leanness of aspect, an older and more faded look to the clothing of
the people whom he passed, but the same fine courage shone in their
eyes. If Richmond, after nearly four years of fighting, heard the guns
of the foe once more, she merely drew tighter the belt around her lean
waist and turning her face toward the enemy smiled bravely.
The President received the despatch bearer in his private room, looking
taller, thinner and sterner than ever. Although a Kentuckian by birth,
he had been bred in the far South, but had little of that far South
about him save the dress he wore. He was too cold, too precise, too free
from sudden emotion to be of the Gulf Coast State that sent him to the
capital. Prescott often reflected upon the odd coincidence that the
opposing Presidents, Lincoln and Davis, should have been produced by
the same State, Kentucky, and that the President of the South should be
Northern in manner and the President of the North Southern in manner.
Mr. Davis read the despatches while their bearer, at his request, waited
by. Prescott knew the hopeless tenor of those letters, but he could see
no change in the stern, gray face as its owner read them, letter after
letter. More than a half-hour passed and there was no sound in the room
save the rustling of the paper as the President turned it sheet by
sheet. Then in even, dry tones he said:
"You need not wait any longer, Captain Prescott; you have done your part
well and I thank you. You will remain in Richmond until further orders."
Prescott saluted and went out, glad to get into the free air again. He
did not envy the responsibility of a president in war time, whether the
president of a country already established or of one yet tentative. He
hurried home, and it was his mother herself who responded to the sound
of the knocker--his mother, quiet, smiling and undemonstrative as of
old, but with an endless tenderness for him in the depths of her blue
eyes.
"Here I am again, mother, and unwounded this time," he cried after the
first greeting; "and I suppose that as soon as they hear of my arrival
all the Yankees will be running back to the North."
She smiled her quiet, placid smile.
"Ah, my son," she said, and from her voice he could not doubt her
seriousness, "I'm afraid they will not go even when they hear of your
arrival."
"In your heart of hearts, mother, you have always believed that they
would come into Richmond. But remember they are not here yet. They were
even closer than this before the Seven Days, but they got their faces
burned then for their pains."
They talked after their old custom, while Prescott ate his luncheon and
his mother gave him the news of Richmond and the people whom he knew. He
noticed often how closely she followed the fortunes of their friends,
despite her seeming indifference, and, informed by experience, he never
doubted the accuracy of her reports.
"Helen Harley is yet in the employ of Mr. Sefton," she said, "and the
money that she earns is, I hear, still welcome in the house of the
Harleys. Mr. Harley is a fine Southern gentleman, but he has found means
of overcoming his pride; it requires something to support his state."
"But what of Helen?" asked Prescott. He always had a feeling of
repulsion toward Mr. Harley, his sounding talk, his colossal vanity and
his selfishness.
"Helen, I think," said his mother, "is more of a woman than she used to
be. Her mind has been strengthened by occupation. You won't object,
Robert, will you, if I tell you that in my opinion both the men and
women of the South have suffered from lack of diversity and variety in
interests and ambitions. When men have only two ambitions, war and
politics, and when women care only for the social side of life,
important enough, but not everything, there can be no symmetrical
development. A Southern republic, even if they should win this war, is
impossible, because to support a State it takes a great deal more than
the ability to speak and fight well."
Prescott laughed.
"What a political economist we have grown to be, mother!" he said, and
then he added thoughtfully: "I won't deny, however, that you are
right--at least, in part. But what more of Helen, mother? Is Mr. Sefton
as attentive as ever to his clerk?"
She looked at him covertly, as if she would measure alike his expression
and the tone of his voice.
"He is still attentive to Helen--in a way," she replied, "but the
Secretary is like many other men: he sees more than one beautiful flower
in the garden."
"What do you mean, mother?" asked Prescott quickly.
His face flushed suddenly and then turned pale. She gave him another
keen but covert look from under lowered eyelids.
"There's a new star in Richmond," she replied quietly, "and singular as
it may seem, it is a star of the North. You know Miss Charlotte Grayson
and her Northern sympathies: it is a relative of hers--a Miss
Catherwood, Miss Lucia Catherwood, who came to visit her shortly after
the battles in the Wilderness--the 'Beautiful Yankee,' they call her.
Her beauty, her grace and distinction of manner are so great that all
Richmond raves about her. She is modest and would remain in retirement,
but for the sake of her own peace and Miss Grayson's she has been
compelled to enter our social life here."
"And the Secretary?" said Prescott. He was now able to assume an air of
indifference.
"He warms himself at the flame and perhaps scorches himself, too, or it
may be that he wishes to make some one else jealous--Helen Harley, for
instance. I merely venture the suggestion; I do not pretend to know all
the secrets of the social life of Richmond."
Prescott went that very afternoon to the Grayson cottage, and he
prepared himself with the greatest care for his going. He felt a sudden
and strong anxiety about his clothing. His uniform was old, ragged and
stained, but he had a civilian suit of good quality.
"This dates from the fall of '60," he said, looking at it, "and that's
more than four years ago; but it's hard to keep the latest fashions in
Richmond now."
However, it was a vast improvement, and the change to civilian garb made
him feel like a man of peace once more.
He went into the street and found Richmond under the dim cold of a
November sky, distant houses melting into a gray blur and people
shivering as they passed. As he walked briskly along he heard behind him
the roll of carriage wheels, and when he glanced over his shoulder what
he beheld brought the red to his face.
Mr. Sefton was driving and Helen Harley sat beside him. On the rear seat
were Colonel Harley and Lucia Catherwood. As he looked the Secretary
turned back and said something in a laughing manner to Lucia, and she,
laughing in like fashion, replied. Prescott was too far away to
understand the words even had he wished, but Lucia's eyes were smiling
and her face was rosy with the cold and the swift motion. She was
muffled in a heavy black cloak, but her expression was happy.
The carriage passed so swiftly that she did not see Prescott standing on
the sidewalk. He gazed after the disappearing party and others did
likewise, for carriages were becoming too scarce in Richmond not to be
noticed. Some one spoke lightly, coupling the names of James Sefton and
Lucia Catherwood. Prescott turned fiercely upon him and bade him beware
how he repeated such remarks. The man did not reply, startled by such
heat, and Prescott walked on, striving to keep down the anger and grief
that were rising within him.
He concluded that he need not hurry now, because if he went at once to
the little house in the cross street she would not be there; and he came
to an angry conclusion that while he had been upon an errand of hardship
and danger she had been enjoying all the excitement of life in the
capital and with a powerful friend at court. He had always felt a sense
of proprietorship in her and now it was rudely shocked. He forgot that
if he had saved her she had saved him. It never occurred to him in his
glowing youth that she had an entire right to love and marry James
Sefton if fate so decreed.
He walked back and forth so angrily and so thoroughly wrapped in his own
thoughts that he noticed nobody, though many noticed him and wondered at
the young man with the pale face and the hot eyes.
It was twilight before he resumed his journey to the little house. The
gray November day was thickening into the chill gloom of a winter night
when he knocked at the well-remembered door. The shutters were closed,
but some bars of ruddy light shone through them and fell across the
brown earth. He was not coming now in secrecy as of old, but he had come
with a better heart then.
It was Lucia herself who opened the door--Lucia, with a softer face than
in the earlier time, but with a royal dignity that he had never seen in
any other woman, and he had seen women who were royal by birth. She was
clad in some soft gray stuff and her hair was drawn high upon her head,
a crown of burnished black, gleaming with tints of red, like flame,
where the firelight behind her flickered and fell upon it.
The twilight was heavy without and she did not see at once who was
standing at the door. She put up her hands to shade her eyes, but when
she beheld Prescott a little cry of gladness broke from her. "Ah, it is
you!" she said, holding out both her hands, and his jealousy and pain
were swept away for the moment.
He clasped her hands in the warm pressure of his own, saying: "Yes, it
is I; and I cannot tell you how glad I am to see you once more."
The room behind her seemed to be filled with a glow, and when they went
in the fire blazed and sparkled and its red light fell across the floor.
Miss Grayson, small, quiet and gray as usual, came forward to meet him.
Her tiny cool hand rested in his a moment, and the look in her eyes told
him as truly as the words she spoke that he was welcome.
"When did you arrive?" asked Lucia.
"But this morning," he replied. "You see, I have come at once to find
you. I saw you when you did not see me."
"When?" she asked in surprise.
"In the carriage with the Secretary and the Harleys," he replied, the
feeling of jealousy and pain returning. "You passed me, but you were too
busy to see me."
She noticed the slight change in his tone, but she replied without any
self-consciousness.
"Yes; Mr. Sefton--he has been very kind to us--asked me to go with Miss
Harley, her brother and himself. How sorry I am that none of us saw
you."
The feeling that he had a grievance took strong hold of Prescott, and it
was inflamed at the new mention of the Secretary's name. If it were any
other it might be more tolerable, but Mr. Sefton was a crafty and
dangerous man, perhaps unscrupulous too. He remembered that light remark
of the bystander coupling the name of the Secretary and Lucia
Catherwood, and at the recollection the red flushed into his face.
"The Secretary is able and powerful," he said, "but not wholly to be
trusted. He is an intriguer."
Miss Grayson looked up with her quiet smile.
"Mr. Sefton has been kind to us," she said, "and he has made our life in
Richmond more tolerable. We could not be ungrateful, and I urged Lucia
to go with them to-day."
The colour flickered in the sensitive, proud face of Lucia Catherwood.
"But, Charlotte, I should have gone of my own accord, and it was a
pleasant drive."
There was a shade of defiance in her tone, and Prescott, restless and
uneasy, stared into the fire. He had expected her to yield to his
challenge, to be humble, to make some apology; but she did not, having
no excuses to offer, and he found his own position difficult and
unpleasant. The stubborn part of his nature was stirred and he spoke
coldly of something else, while she replied in like fashion. He was sure
now that Sefton had transferred his love to her, and if she did not
return it she at least looked upon him with favouring eyes. As for
himself, he had become an outsider. He remembered her refusal of him.
Then the impression she gave him once that she had fled from Richmond,
partly and perhaps chiefly to save him, was false. On second thought no
doubt it was false. And despite her statement she might really have been
a spy! How could he believe her now?
Miss Grayson, quiet and observant, noticed the change. She liked this
young man, so serious and steady and so different from the passionate
and reckless youths who are erroneously taken by outsiders to be the
universal type of the South. Her heart rallied to the side of her
cousin, Lucia Catherwood, with whom she had shared hardships and dangers
and whose worth she knew; but with the keen eye of the kindly old maid
she saw what troubled Prescott, and being a woman she could not blame
him. Taking upon herself the burden of the conversation, she asked
Prescott about his southern journey, and as he told her of the path that
led him through mountains, the glory of the autumn woods and the peace
of the wilderness, there was a little bitterness in his tone in
referring to those lonesome but happy days. He had felt then that he was
coming north to the struggles and passions of a battleground, and now he
was finding the premonition true in more senses than one.
Lucia sat in the far corner of the little room where the flickering
firelight fell across her face and dress. They had not lighted candle
nor lamp, but the rich tints in her hair gleamed with a deeper sheen
when the glow of the flames fell across it. Prescott's former sense of
proprietorship was going, and she seemed more beautiful, more worth the
effort of a lifetime than ever before. Here was a woman of mind and
heart, one not bounded by narrow sectionalism, but seeing the good
wherever it might be. He felt that he had behaved like a prig and a
fool. Why should he be influenced by the idle words of some idle man in
the street? He was not Lucia Catherwood's guardian; if there were any
question of guardianship, she was much better fitted to be the guardian
of him.
Had he obeyed this rush of feeling he would have swept away all
constraint by words abrupt, disjointed perhaps, but alive with
sincerity, and Miss Grayson gave him ample opportunity by slipping with
excuses into the next room. The pride and stubbornness in Prescott's
nature were tenacious and refused to die. Although wishing to say words
that would undo the effect of those already spoken, he spoke instead of
something else--topics foreign then to the heart of either--of the war,
the social life of Richmond. Miss Harley was still a great favourite in
the capital and the Secretary paid her much attention, so Lucia said
without the slightest change in her tone. Helen's brother had made
several visits to Richmond; General Wood had come once, and Mr. Talbot
once. Mr. Talbot--and now she smiled--was overpowered on his last visit.
Some Northern prisoners had told how the vanguard of their army was held
back in the darkness at the passage of the river by a single man who was
taken prisoner, but not until he had given his beaten brigade time to
escape. That man was discovered to be Talbot and he had fled from
Richmond to escape an excess of attention and compliments.
"And it was old Talbot who saved us from capture," said Prescott. "I've
often wondered why we were not pursued more closely that night. And he
never said anything about it."
"Mrs. Markham, too, is in Richmond," Lucia continued, "and she is,
perhaps, the most conspicuous of its social lights. General Markham is
at the front with the army"--here she stopped abruptly and the colour
came into her face. But Prescott guessed the rest. Colonel Harley was
constantly in Mrs. Markham's train and that was why he came so often to
Richmond. The capital was not without its gossip.
The flames died down and a red-and-yellow glow came from the heart of
the coals. The light now gleamed only at times on the face of Lucia
Catherwood. It seemed to Prescott (or was it fancy) that by this
flickering radiance he saw a pathetic look on her face--a little touch
of appeal. Again he felt a great wave of tenderness and of reverence,
too. She was far better than he. Words of humility and apology leaped
once more to the end of his tongue, but they did not pass his lips. He
could not say them. His stubborn pride still controlled and he rambled
on with commonplace and idle talk.
Miss Grayson came back bearing a lamp, and by chance, as it were, she
let its flame fall first upon the face of the man and then upon the face
of the woman, and she felt a little thrill of disappointment when she
noted the result in either case. Miss Charlotte Grayson was one of the
gentlest of fine old maids, and her heart was soft within her. She
remembered the long vigils of Prescott, his deep sympathy, the
substantial help that he had given, and, at last, how, at the risk of
his own career, he had helped Lucia Catherwood to escape from Richmond
and danger. She marked the coldness and constraint still in the air and
was sorry, but knew not what to do.
Prescott rose presently and said good-night, expressing the hope that it
would not be long until he again saw them both. Lucia echoed his hope in
a like formal fashion and Prescott went out. He did not look back to see
if the light from the window still fell across the brown grass, but
hurried away in the darkness.