slipped away one dark night, carrying the young child with them to bear
her safely to her father's people, knowing nothing of their absence,
pending the soldier's return--for the two never believed him dead; how,
when they had nearly reached the rear lands of the paternal place, they
were met by an irresistible flood which turned them back; and how,
barely escaping with their lives, they were finally rowed in a skiff
quite through the hall of the great house--so high, indeed, that Mammy
rescued a family portrait from the wall as they passed; how the baby
slept through it all, and the dog followed, swimming--
This is part of the inside history never publicly told.
The little party was taken aboard a boat which waited midstream, a tug
which became so overcrowded that it took no account of passengers whom
it carried safely to the city. Of the poor forlorn lot, a few found
their way back to the plantations in search of survivors, but in most
instances, having gone too soon, they returned disheartened.
Madame Le Duc, who, with her guests and servants, had fled from the
homestead at the first warning, did not hear for months of the flight of
the old people with her grandchild, and of their supposed fate. No one
doubted that all three had perished in the river, and the news came as
tardy death tidings again--tidings arriving after the manner of war
news, which often put whole families in and out of mourning, in and out
of season.
VII
There is not space here to dwell upon Harold's final return to Brake
Island, bent and broken, unkempt,--disguised by the marks of sorrow,
unrecognized, as he had hoped to be, of the straggling few of his own
negroes whom he encountered camping in the wood, imprisoned by fear.
These, mistaking him for a tramp, avoided him. He had heard the news _en
route_,--the "news," then several years old,--and had, nevertheless,
yielded to a sort of blind, stumbling fascination which drew him back to
the scene of his happiness and his despair. Here, after all, was the
real battle-field--and he was again vanquished.
When he reached the homestead, he found it wholly deserted. The "big
house," sacred to superstition through its succession of tragedies, was
as Mammy and Israel had left it. Even its larder was untouched, and the
key of the wine-cellar lay imbedded in rust in sight of the cob-webbed
door.
It was a sad man, prematurely gray, and still gaunt--and white with the
pallor of the hospital prison--who, after this sorrowful pilgrimage to
Brake Island, appeared, as from the grave, upon the streets of New
Orleans. When he was reinstated in his broken home, and known once more
of his family and friends, he would easily have become the popular hero
of the hour, for the gay world flung its gilded doors open to him.
The Latin temperament of old New Orleans kept always a song in her
throat, even through all the sad passages of her history; and there was
never a year when the French quarter, coquette that she was, did not
shake her flounces and dance for a season with her dainty toes against
the lower side of Canal Street.
But Harold was not a fellow of forgetful mind. The arch of his life was
broken, it is true, but like that of the bridge he had begun--a bridge
which was to invite the gay world, yes, but which would ever have
dominated it, letting its sails pass under--he could be no other than a
worthy ruin. Had his impetuous temper turned upon himself on his return
to the island, where devastation seemed to mock him at every turn, there
is no telling where it might have driven him. But a lonely mother, and
the knowledge that his father had died of a broken heart upon the report
of his death, the last of his three sons--the pathetic, dependence of
his mother upon him--the appeal of her doting eyes and the exigencies of
an almost hopeless financial confusion--all these combined as a
challenge to his manhood to take the helm in the management of a wrecked
estate.
It was a saving situation. How often is work the great savior of men!
Once stirred in the direction of effort, Harold soon developed great
genius for the manipulation of affairs. Reorganization began with his
control.
Square-shouldered and straight as an Indian, clear of profile,
deep-eyed, and thoughtful of visage, the young man with the white hair
was soon a marked figure. When even serious men "went foolish over him,"
it is not surprising that ambitious mothers of marriageable daughters,
in these scant days of dearth of men, should have exhibited occasional
fluttering anxieties while they placed their broken fortunes in his
hands.
Reluctantly at first, but afterward seeing his way through experience,
Harold became authorized agent for some of the best properties along the
river, saving what was left, and sometimes even recovering whole estates
for the women in black who had known before only how to be good and
beautiful in the romantic homes and gardens whose pervading perfume had
been that of the orange-blossom.
It was on returning hurriedly from a trip to one of these places on the
upper river--the property of one Marie Estelle Josephine Ramsey de La
Rose, widowed at "Yellow Tavern"--that he sought the ferry skiff on the
night old man Israel answered the call.
VIII
Little the old man dreamed, while he waited, midstream, trying to think
out his problem, that the solution was so near at hand.
We have seen how the old wife waited and prayed on the shore; how with
her shaded mind she groped, as many a wiser has done, for a comforting,
common-sense understanding of faith, that intangible "substance of
things hoped for," that elusive "evidence of things not seen."
In a moment after she heard the creaking of the timbers as the skiff
chafed the landing, even while she rose, as was her habit, to see who
might be coming over so late, she dimly perceived two men approaching,
Israel and another; and presently she saw that Israel held the man's
hand and that he walked unsteadily.
She started, fearing that her man was hurt; but before she could find
voice of fear or question, Israel had drawn the stranger to her and was
saying in a broken voice:
"Hannah! Hannah! Heah Mars' Harol'!"
Only a moment before, with her dim eyes fixed upon the sky, she had
experienced a realization of faith, and believed herself confidently
awaiting her master's coming. And yet, seeing him now in the flesh
before her, she exclaimed:
"What foolishness is dis, ole man? Don't practice no jokes on me
to-night, Isrul!"
Her voice was almost gruff, and she drew back as she spoke. But even
while she protested, Harold had laid his hand upon her arm.
"Mammy," he whispered huskily, "don't you know your 'indurin' devil'--?"
(This had been her last, worst name for her favorite during his mischief
period.)
Harold never finished his sentence. The first sound of his voice had
identified him, but the shock had confused her. When at last she sobbed
"Hush! I say, hush!" her arms were about his knees and she was crying
aloud.
[Illustration: "Her arms were about his knees"]
"Glo-o-o--oh--glo-o-o--glo-o-ry! Oh, my Gord!" But presently, wiping her
eyes, she stammered: "What kep' you so, Baby? Hol' me up, chile--hol'
me!"
She was falling, but Harold steadied her with strong arms, pressing her
into her chair, but retaining her trembling hand while he sat upon the
low table beside her.
He could not speak at once, but, seeing her head drop upon her bosom, he
called quickly to Israel. For answer, a clarion note, in no wise muffled
by the handkerchief from which it issued, came from the woodpile. Israel
was shy of his emotions and had hidden himself.
By the time he appeared, sniffling, Hannah had rallied, and was pressing
Harold from her to better study his face at long range.
"What happened to yo' hair, Baby?" she said presently. "Hit looks as
bright as dat flaxion curl o' yoze I got in my Testamen'. I was lookin'
at it only a week ago las' Sunday, an' wishin' I could read de book
'long wid de curl."
"It is much lighter than that, Mammy. It is whiter than yours. I have
lived the sorrows of a long life in a few years."
Israel still stood somewhat aside and was taking no note of their
speech, which he presently interrupted nervously:
"H-how you reckon Mars' Harol' knowed me, Hannah? He--he reco'nized his
horn! You ricollec' when I fotched dat horn f'om de islan' roun' my
neck, clean 'crost de flood, you made game o' me, an' I say I mought
have need of it? But of co'se I didn't ca'culate to have it ac-_chilly_
call Mars' Harol' home! I sho' didn't! But dat's what it done. Cep'n'
for de horn's call bein' so familius, he'd 'a' paid me my dime like a
stranger an' passed on."
At this Harold laughed.
"Sure enough, Uncle Israel; you didn't collect my ferriage, did you? I
reckon you'll have to charge that."
Israel chuckled:
"Lord, Hannah, listen! Don't dat soun' like ole times? Dey don't charge
nothin' in dese han'-to-mouf days, Marse Harol'--not roun' heah."
"But tell me, Uncle Israel, how did you happen to bring that old horn
with you--sure enough?" Harold interrupted.
"I jes fotched it _'ca'se I couldn't leave it_--de way Hannah snatched
yo' po'trit off de wall--all in dat deluge. Hit's heah in de cabin now
to witness de trip. But in co'se o' time de horn, hit come handy when I
tuk de ferry-skift.
"Well, Hannah, when he stepped aboa'd, he all but shuk de ole skift to
pieces. I ought to knowed dat Le Duc high-step, but I didn't. I jes felt
his tread, an' s'luted him for a gentleman, an' axed him for Gord sake
to set down befo' we'd be capsided in de river. I war n't cravin' to
git drownded wid no aristoc'acy.
"De moon she was hidin', dat time, an' we couldn't see much; but he
leant over an' he say, 'Uncle,' he say, 'who blowed dat horn 'crost de
river?' An' I say, 'Me, sir. I blowed it.' Den he say, 'Whose horn _is_
dat?' An' I 'spon', 'Hit's _my_ horn, sir.' Den my conscience begin to
gnaw, an' I sort o' stammered, 'Leastways, it b'longs to a frien' o'
mine wha' look like he ain't nuver gwine to claim it.' I ain't say who
de frien' was, but d'rec'ly he pushed me to de wall. He ax me p'intedly
to my face, 'What yo' frien' name, uncle?' An at dat I got de big head
an' I up an' snap out:
"'Name Le Duc, sir, Harry Le Duc.'
"Jes free an' easy, so, I say it. Lord have mussy! Ef I'd s'picioned dat
was Mars' Harol' settin' up dar listenin' at me callin' his name so
sociable an' free, I'd 'a' drapped dem oa's overbo'ad. I sho' would.
"Well, when I say 'Harry Le Duc,' seem like he got kind o' seasick, de
way he bent his head down, an' I ax him how he come on--ef he got de
miz'ry anywhars. An' wid dat he sort o' give out a dry laugh, an' den
what you reckon he ax me? He say, 'Uncle, is you married?' An' wid dat
_I_ laughed. 'T war n't no trouble for me to laugh at dat. I 'spon',
'Yas, sirree! You bet I is! Does I look like air rovin' bachelor?' I was
jes about half mad by dis time.
"Well, so he kep' on quizzifyin' me: ax me whar I live, an' I tol' 'im I
was a ole risidenter on de levee heah for five years past; an' so we run
on, back an' fo'th, tell we teched de sho'. An' time de skift bumped de
landin' he laid his han' on me an' he say, 'Unc' Isrul, whar's Mammy
Hannah?' An' den--bless Gord! I knowed him! But I ain't trus' myself to
speak. I des nachelly clawed him an' drug him along to you. I seen de
fulfilment o' promise, an' my heart was bustin' full, but I ain't got no
halleluiah tongue like you. I jes passed him along to you an' made for
de woodpile!"
It was a great moment for Harold, this meeting with the only people
living who could tell all there was to know of those who were gone.
Hannah's memory was too photographic for judicious reminiscence. The
camera's great imperfection lies in its very accuracy in recording
non-essentials, with resulting confusion of values. So the old woman,
when she turned her mental search-light backward, "beginning at the
beginning," which to Harold seemed the end of all--the day of his
departure,--recounted every trivial incident of the days, while Harold
listened through the night, often suffering keenly in his eagerness to
know the crucial facts, yet fearing to interrupt her lest some precious
thing be lost.
A reflected sunrise was reddening the sky across the river when she
reached the place in the story relating to the baby. Her description
needed not any coloring of love to make it charming, and while he
listened the father murmured under his breath:
"And then to have lost her!"
"What dat you say, Marse Harol'?" Hannah gasped, her quick ears having
caught his despairing tone.
"Oh, nothing, Mammy. Go on. It did seem cruel to have the little one
drowned. But I don't blame you. It is a miracle that you old people
saved yourselves."
The old woman turned to her husband and threw up her hands.
"Wh-why, Isrul!" she stammered.
"What's de matter wid you--to set heah all night an' listen at me
talkin' all roun' de baby--an' ain't named her yit!"
She rose and, drawing Harold after her, entered the door at her back. As
she pulled aside the curtain a ray of sunlight fell full upon the
sleeping child.
"Heah yo' baby, Baby!" Her low voice, steadied by its passages through
greater crises, was even and gentle.
She laid her hand upon the child.
"Wek up, baby! Wek up!" she cried. "Yo' pa done come! Wek up!"
Without stirring even so much as a thread of her golden hair upon the
pillow, the child opened a pair of great blue eyes and looked from
Mammy's face to the man's. Then,--so much surer is a child's faith than
another's,--doubting not at all, she raised her little arms.
Her father, already upon his knees beside her, bent over, bringing his
neck within her embrace, while he inclosed her slender body with his
arms. Thus he remained, silent, for a moment, for the agony of his joy
was beyond tears or laughter. But presently he lifted his child, and,
sitting, took her upon his lap. He could not speak yet, for while he
smoothed her beautiful hair and studied her face, noting the blue depths
of her darkly fringed eyes, the name that trembled for expression within
his lips was "Agnes--Agnes."
"How beautiful she is!" he whispered presently; and then, turning to
Hannah, "And how carefully you have kept her! Everything--so sweet."
"Oh, yas!" the old woman hastened to answer. "We ain't spared no pains
on 'er, Marse Harol'. She done had eve'ything we could git for her, by
hook or by crook. Of co'se she ain't had no _white kin_ to christen her,
an' dat was a humiliation to us. She didn't have no to say legal person
to bring 'er for'ard, so she ain't nuver been _ca'yed up in church_; but
she's had every sort o' christenin' we could reach.
"I knowed yo' pa's ma, ole Ma'am Toinette, she'd turn in her grave
lessen her gran'chil' was christened Cat'lic, so I had her christened
dat way. Dat ole half-blind priest, Father Some'h'n' other, wha' comes
from Bayou de Glaise, he was conductin' mass meetin' or some'h'n' other,
down here in Bouligny, an' I took de baby down, an' he sprinkled her in
Latin or some'h'n' other, an' ornamented behind her ears wid unctious
ile, an' crossed her little forehead, an' made her eat a few grains o'
table salt. He _done it straight_, wid all his robes on, an' I g'in him
a good dollar, too. An' dat badge you see on her neck, a sister o'
charity, wid one o' dese clair-starched ear-flap sunbonnets on, she put
dat on her. She say she give it to her to wear so 's she could n't git
drownded--_like as ef I'd let her drownd_. Yit an' still I lef' it so,
an' I even buys a fresh blue ribbin for it, once-t an'a while. I hear
'em say dat blue hit's de Hail Mary color--an' it becomes her eyes, too.
Dey say what don't pizen fattens, an' I know dem charms couldn't do her
no hurt, an', of 'co'se, we don't know all. Maybe dey mought ketch de
eye of a hoverin' angel in de air an' bring de baby into Heavenly
notice. Of co'se, I wouldn't put no sech as dat on her. I ain't been
raised to it, an' I ain't no beggin' hycoprite. But I wouldn't take it
off, nuther.
"Den, I knowed ole Mis', yo' ma, she was 'Pistopal, an' Miss Aggie she
was Numitarium; so every time a preacher'd be passin' I'd git him to
perform it his way. Me bein' Baptis' I didn't have no nigger baptism to
saddle on her.
"So she's bounteously baptized--yas, sir. I reasoned it out dat ef dey's
only one _true_ baptism, an' I war n't to say _shore_ which one it was,
I better git 'em all, an' only de _onlies'_ true one would _count_; an'
den ag'in, ef all honest baptisms is good, den de mo' de merrier, as de
Book say. Of co'se I knowed pyore rain-water sprinkled on wid a blessin'
couldn't hurt no chile.
"You see, when one side de house is _French distraction_ an' de yether
is _English to-scent_, an' dey's a dozen side-nations wid _blood to
tell_ in all de branches,--well, hit minds me o' dis _ba'm of a thousan'
flowers_ dat ole Mis' used to think so much of. Hits hard to 'stinguish
out any one flagrams.
"But talkin' about de baby, she ain't been deprived, no mo' 'n de Lord
deprived her, for a season, of her rights to high livin' an'--an'
aristoc'acy--an'--an' petigree, an' posterity, an' all sech as dat.
"An'--
"What dat you say, Mars' Harol'? What _name_ is we--'
"We ain't dast to give 'er no name, Baby, no mo' 'n jes Blossom. I got
'er wrote down in five citi_fic_ates 'Miss Blossom,' jes so. No, sir. I
knows my colored place, an' I'll go so far, an' dat's all de further.
She was jes as much a blossom befo' she was christened as she was
arterwards, so my namin' 'er don't count. I was 'mos' tempted to call
out 'Agnes' to de preachers, when dey'd look to me for a name, seem' it
was her right--like as ef she was borned to it; but--I ain't nuver
imposed on her. No, sir, we ain't imposed on her noways.
"De on'iest wrong I ever done her--an' Gord knows I done it to save her
to my arms, an' for you, marster--de on'iest wrong was to let her go
widout her little sunbonnet an' git her skin browned up so maybe nobody
wouldn't s'picion she was clair white an' like as not try to wrest her
from me. An' _one_ time, when a uppish yo'ng man ast me her name, I
said it straight, but I see him look mighty cu'yus, an' I spoke up an'
say, 'What other name you 'spect' her to have? My name is Hannah Le Duc,
an' I's dat child's daddy's mammy.' Excuse me, Mars' Harold, but you
know I _is_ yo' _black_ mammy--_an' I was in so'e straits_.
"So de yo'ng man, well, he didn't seem to have no raisin'. He jes sort
o' whistled, an' say I sho is got one mighty blon' gran'chil'--an' I
'spon', 'Yas, sir; so it seems.'
"An' dat's de on'ies' wrong I ever done her. She sets up at her little
dinner-table sot wid a table-cloth an' a white napkin,--an' I done buyed
her a ginuine silver-plated napkin-ring to hold it in, too,--an' she
says her own little blessin'--dat short 'Grace o' Gord--material
binefets,' one o' Miss Aggie's; I learned it to her. No, she ain't been
handled keerless, ef she is been livin' on de outside o' de levee, like
free niggers. But we ain't to say _lived_ here, 'not perzackly,
marster. We jes been waitin' along, _so_, dese five years--waitin' for
to-night.
"I ain't nuver sorted her clo'es out into no bureau; I keeps 'em all in
her little trunk, perpared to move along."
For a moment the realization of the culmination of her faith seemed to
suffuse her soul, and as she proceeded, her voice fell in soft, rhythmic
undulations.
"Ya-as, Mars' Harol', Mammy's baby boy, yo' ol' nuss she been waitin',
an' o-ole man Isrul _he_ been waitin', an' de Blossom _she_ been
waitin'. I 'spec' she had de firmes' faith, arter all, de baby did. Day
by day we all waited--an' night by night. An' sometimes when courage
would burn low an' de lamp o' faith grow dim, seem like we'd a' broke
loose an' started a-wanderin' in a sort o' blind search, _'cep'n' for de
river_.
"Look like ef we'd ever went beyan' de river's call, we'd been same as
de chillen o' Isrul lost in de tanglement o' de wilderness. All we river
chillen, we boun' to stay by her, same as toddlin' babies hangs by a
mammy's skirts. She'll whup us one day, an' chastise us severe; den
she'll bring us into de light, same as she done to-night--same as reel
mammies does.
"An', Mars' Harol'--"
She lowered her voice.
"Mars' Harol', don't tell me she don't know! I tell yer, me an' dis
River we done spent many a dark night together under de stars, an' we
done talked an' answered one another so many lonely hours--an' she done
showed us so many mericles on land _an'_ water--
"I tell yer, I done found out some'h'n' about de River, Mars' Harol'.
She's--why, she's--
"Oh, ef I could only write it all down to go in a book! We been th'ough
some _merac'lous_ times together, sho' 's you born--sho' 's you born.
"She's a mericle mystery, sho'!
"You lean over an' dip yo' han' in her an' you take it up an' you say
it's _wet_. You dig yo' oars into her, an' she'll spin yo' boat over her
breast. You dive down into her, an' you come up--_or don't come up_.
Some eats her. Some drinks her. Some gethers wealth outen her. Some
draps it into her. Some drownds in her.
"An' she gives an' takes, an' seem like all her chillen gits
satisfaction outen her, one way an' another; but yit an' still, she
ain't nuver flustered. On an' on she goes--rain or shine--high
water--low water--all de same--on an' on.
"When she craves diamonds for her neck, she reaches up wid long
onvisible hands an' gethers de stars out'n de firmamint.
"De moon is her common breastpin, an' de sun--
"Even he don't faze her. She takes what she wants, an' sends back his
fire every day.
"De mists is a veil for her face, an' de showers fringes it.
"Sunrise or dusklight, black night or midday, every change she answers
_whilst she's passin'_.
"But who ever _in_ticed her to stop or to look or listen? Nobody, Baby.
An' why?
"Oh, Lord! ef eve'ybody only knowed!
"You see, all sech as dat, I used to study over it an' ponder befo' we
started to talk back an' fo'th--de River an' me.
"One dark night she heared me cryin' low on de bank, whilst de ole man
stepped into de boat to row 'crost de water, an' she felt Wood-duck
settle heavy on her breast, an' she seen dat we carried de same
troublous thought--searchin' an' waitin' for the fulfilment o' promise.
"An' so we started to call--an' to answer, heart to heart."
* * * * *
The story is nearly told. No doubt many would be willing to have it stop
here. But a tale of the river is a tale of greed, and must have
satisfaction.
While father and child sat together, Israel came, bringing fresh chips.
He had been among the woodpiles again. This time there followed him the
dog.
"Why, Blucher!" Harold exclaimed. "Blucher, old fellow!" And at his
voice the dog, whining and sniffing, climbed against his shoulder, even
licking his face and his hand. Then, running off, he barked at Israel
and Hannah, telling them in fine dog Latin who the man was who had come.
Then he crouched at his feet, and, after watching his face a moment,
laid his head upon his master's right foot, a trick Harold had taught
him as a pup.
IX
Of course Harold wished to take the entire family home with him at once,
and would hear to nothing else until Hannah, serving black coffee to him
from her furnace, in the dawn, begged that she and Israel might have "a
few days to rest an' to study" before moving.
It was on the second evening following this, at nightfall, while her man
was away in his boat, that the old woman rose from her chair and, first
studying the heavens and then casting about her to see that no one was
near, she went down to the water, slowly picking her way to a shallow
pool between the rafts and the shore. She sat here at first, upon the
edge of the bank, frankly dropping her feet into the water while she
seemed to begin to talk--or possibly she sang, for the low sound which
only occasionally rose above the small noises of the rafts was faintly
suggestive of a priest's intoning.
For a moment only, she sat thus. Then she began to lower herself into
the water, until, leaning, she could lay her face against the sod, so
that a wave passed over it, and when, letting her weight go, she
subsided, with arms extended, into the shallow pool, a close listener
might have heard an undulating song, so like the river's in tone as to
be separable from it only through the faint suggestion of words,
interrupted or drowned at intervals by the creaking and knocking of the
rafts and the gurgling of the sucking eddies about them.
The woman's voice--song, speech, or what not?--_seemed_ intermittent, as
if in converse with another presence.