At home Louise made known her arrival by singing along the hallway that
led to her room. She knew that not a very pleasant reception awaited
her, and she was resolved to meet it with the appearance of careless
gayety. She entered her room, drew back the curtains to admit the light,
deftly touched her hair at the mirror, and sat down in a rocking chair.
She took up a book, an American fad built upon a London failure, and was
aimlessly turning the leaves when she heard her mother's voice.
"Are you in there, Louise?"
"Yes, come."
In the mother's appearance there was no suggestion of a stored rebuke;
her gray hair, faultlessly parted, was smoothed upon her brow, her
countenance bespoke calmness, and her sad eyes were full of tender love.
"Oh, you look so cool and sweet," said the girl. "Have this chair."
"No, thank you, I prefer to sit here."
She sat upon a straight-back chair. In her "day" only grandmothers were
supposed to sit in rockers; younger women were thought to preserve
their health and their grace of form by sitting with rigid dignity upon
chairs which might now be exhibited as relics of household barbarism.
"Did you have a pleasant visit?" the girl asked.
"Yes, very; but it was so warm over there under the hills that I was
glad when the time came to leave."
"Does that Englishman still live alone on the Jasper place?"
"Yes, with his straight pipe and Scotch whisky. Perdue says that he
appears to be perfectly contented there all alone."
"Have they found out anything about him?"
"No, only what he has been pleased to tell, and that isn't much. It
seems that he is the younger son of a good family strayed off from home
to better his condition."
"But why should he try to raise cotton when they say there is so little
money in it, and especially when it requires experience? And the climate
must be trying on him?"
"No, he says that the climate agrees with him. He has lived in India. He
is reading American history and is much taken with the part the South
has borne, so I learned from Mr. Perdue. He did not expect to find so
little prejudice against foreigners. I could have told him that, in the
South, an Englishman is scarcely looked upon as a foreigner--that is,
among the best people."
They talked about many things that concerned them but little, of a new
steamboat that had just entered upon the commerce of the lower river, of
a cotton gin that was burned the night before, of the Catholic priest
who had come to gather the negroes into his church; and surely they were
far from a mention of Pennington. But suddenly Louise moved with
uneasiness, for she had caught something that had not been said, that
had not been looked, and, springing to her feet, she almost threw
herself upon her mother, and with her arms about her, she cried: "Please
don't say a word; please don't. I can argue with father, but I can't
argue with you, for you take everything so to heart and suffer so much.
Please don't speak anybody's name--don't say that father has said
anything to you about anybody. You mustn't cry, either. Leave it all to
me, and if I was born to wring your dear heart--there, let us hush."
She straightened up, putting the hair out of her eyes, and the silent
and stately woman sat there with the tears rolling down her face.
"Please don't, mother. You'll make me think I'm the meanest creature in
the world. And I don't know but that I am, but I can't help it. Just
call me unnatural, as you have done so many times, and let it all go.
There, just listen at father walking up and down the porch; and I know
he's mad at me."
"No, my child, he is not angry; he is hurt."
"Please don't say that. I don't want to hurt him. I would rather make
him mad than to hurt him. Oh, I don't know what ails me, I am so
restless and unhappy. I have tried every way to cure myself, but
can't--I have read and read until I haven't any sense, and now I don't
know what to do. But don't you tell me what not to do; don't say
anything, but be your own sweet self."
She took up a brush from the dresser, touched her mother's hair, and
said: "Let me, please." She loosened the thick coil. "Beautiful," she
said. "Don't you know how I used to tease you to let me comb it, a long
time ago? But it wasn't as pretty then as it is now."
Through her fingers the white hair streamed, glinting in the light now
sobered by the falling of dusk.
The Major's step was heard at the door. "Come in, father. See, I am at
my old employment." And in their faces and in the hair streaming through
his daughter's fingers the old man read that all was well. He stood
smiling at them. Out in the yard the fox-hounds began to yelp, and a
galloping horse stopped with a loud, jolting "gluck" at the gate. Then
came authoritative commands, and then a jar as if some one had leaped
upon the porch. There was brisk walking, the opening and slamming of
doors, and then at Louise's door a voice demanded: "What are you all
doing here in the dark? Ain't supper ready? I'm as hungry as a she
bear."
The Major's son Tom had arrived. And just at that moment, and before any
one replied to him, the supper bell began to ring. "Takes me to bring
things about, eh? You people might have waited here hungry for an hour.
What are you doing here, anyway? Lou brushing mam's hair and pap looking
on like a boy at a show."
"Thomas," said his mother, "I wish you wouldn't be so rough. There,
daughter, that will do. Just coil it. That's it; thank you. Major, I do
wish you wouldn't laugh at the brusqueness of your son; you encourage
him."
Tom took his mother by the shoulders and turned her face toward the
door. He was a clean-looking, blondish fellow, younger than his
sister--an athlete, a boxer, with far more restlessness of muscle than
absorption of mind. He had failed at Harvard, where his
great-grandfather had distinguished himself; he had, with the influence
of a Congressman, secured a West Point cadetship, and there had fallen
under the rapid fire of a battery of mathematics, and had come home
scouting at the humiliation which he had put upon his parents, and was
now ready to submit himself to any other test that might present
itself--was ready to borrow, to lend, or to fight. He picked negro tunes
on a banjo, and had been heard hoarsely to sing a love song under a
cypress tree. He had now just returned from the capital of the state,
where he had spent two days watching the flank movements of a military
drill.
"You people seem to be mighty solemn," was Tom's observation as they sat
down to supper, glancing from one to another, and finally directing a
questioning look at his father. "What's the trouble? What's happened? Is
it possible that old Gideon has paid his rent?"
Louise laughed, a wrinkle crept across Mrs. Cranceford's brow and the
Major sprawled back with a loud "haw." Gid's rent was a standing joke;
and nothing is more sacredly entitled to instant recognition than a joke
that for years has been established in a Southern household.
"I notice that he never goes into the Major's office," Mrs. Cranceford
remarked; and Tom quickly replied: "And I don't blame him for that. I
went in there about a month ago and haven't had a dollar since."
The Major did not laugh at this. The reputed exaction of his executive
chamber was a sore spot to him. "How you robbers, young and old, would
like to fleece me," he said. "And if I didn't turn to defensive stone
once in a while you'd pull out my eye teeth."
"Don't see how anybody could get hold of your eye teeth, dad," Tom
replied. "You are always busy cutting them when I come round. Oh, by
the way," he added with sudden seriousness, "you remember that fellow
Mayo, the one that ran for County Clerk down here some time ago?"
"The scoundrel who swore he was elected?"
"That's the man. He disappeared, you know, after his trouble down here,
then he went on from one community to another, a Democrat one season and
a Republican the next, and now he has returned as a labor leader. I met
him yesterday in Little Rock, and I never have seen a more insolent
ruffian. He makes no secret of his plans, and he says that blood is
bound to flow. I asked him if he had any to spare, and he cocked his eye
at me and replied that he didn't know but he had."
The Major was silent, abstractedly balancing his knife on the rim of his
plate. Mayo, an adventurer, a scoundrel with a brutish force that passed
for frankness, had at one time almost brought about an uprising among
the negroes of Cranceford County, and eager ears in the North, not the
ears of the old soldier, but of the politician, shutting out the
suggestions of justice, heard only the clamor of a political outrage;
and again arose the loud cry that the South had robbed the inoffensive
negro of his suffrage. But the story, once so full of alarm, was
beginning to be a feeble reminiscence; Northern men with business
interests in the South had begun to realize that the white man, though
often in the wrong, could sometimes be in the right. But now a
problem--graver than the over-thrashed straw of political rights, was
about to be presented.
"I was in hopes that somebody had killed that fellow," said the Major,
and his wife looked up with gentle reproof. "Don't say that, dear. The
Lord will take him in His own good time."
The old gentleman winked at Tom. "I don't know about that," he replied.
"I am afraid that the Lord in His management of the universe has
forgotten him."
"John, please don't talk that way." When she was very serious she called
him John. "When you speak so lightly you make me afraid that your
relationship with the church is not very sacred to you."
"It's serious at any rate, Margaret."
"What do you mean by that, John?"
"Why," Tom cried, "it means that you dragged him into the pow-wow."
"Thomas"--and this time her reproof was not very gentle--"I won't stand
that from you. And daughter," she added, speaking to Louise, "it is not
a laughing matter. It all comes from so close an association with that
good-for-nothing old Gideon. I know it does, and you needn't say a word.
Nothing is sacred to him; he has no respect for God and cares nothing
for man except to the extent that he can use him."
The Major strove to wink at Tom, but there was a hitch in his eye. "My
dear, you don't understand the old fellow," said he. "And therefore you
misjudge him. I know that he is weak, but I also know that he is strong,
and he is quite as necessary to me as I am to him. He rests me, and rest
is as essential as work. Sometimes the perfect gentleman is a bore;
sometimes the perfect lady is tiresome. In man there is a sort of
innocent evil, a liking for the half depraved and an occasional feeding
of this appetite heightens his respect for the truly virtuous."
"I don't believe it, John."
"Of course you don't. You are the truly virtuous, and--" he spread
himself back with a loud "haw," and sat there shaking under her cool
gaze. "There, Margaret," he said, wiping his eyes, "don't take it to
heart. I am doing the best I can and that is all the excuse I have to
offer. I'm getting old; do you realize that? The things that used to
amuse me are flat now and I can't afford to kill an amusement when one
does happen to come along. Don't you worry about Gid. Why, Margaret, he
has stood by me when other men turned their backs. The river was
dangerous during my day, and the pop of a pistol was as natural as the
bark of a dog. But old Gid was there by me."
"Oh, I don't doubt that he has some good qualities," she admitted. "But
why doesn't he mend his ways?"
"Oh, he hasn't time for that, Margaret. He's too busy with other
matters. There, now, we won't talk about him. But I promise you, my
dear, that he shall not unduly influence me. I don't exactly know what I
mean by that, either. I mean that you need have no fear of my permitting
him to weaken my respect for the church. Yes, I think that's about what
I mean. But the fact is he has never tried to do that. But what's the
use of this talk. I can sum up the whole situation by reminding you that
I am the master. There, now, don't sigh--don't look so worried."
"But, John, it grieves me to hear you say that you need him."
"Had to step back to pick that up, didn't you? Tom, after you're married
you'll find that your wife will look with coldness or contempt upon your
most intimate friend. It's the absurdest jealousy in woman's nature."
"Thomas," said his mother, "you will find nothing of the sort; but I'll
tell you what you may expect from the right sort of a wife--contempt for
a coarse, low-bred fellow, should you insist upon holding him as your
closest companion."
"Mother," Louise spoke up, "I think you are too severe. Mr. Batts is
hemmed in with faults, but he has many good points. And I can
understand why he is necessary to father. I am fond of him, and I am
almost ready to declare that at times he is almost necessary to me. No,
I won't make it as strong as that, but I must say that at times it is a
keen pleasure to jower with him."
"To do what?" Mrs. Cranceford asked. "Jower with him? Where did you get
that word?"
"It's one of his, picked up from among the negroes, I think, and it
means more than dispute or wrangle. We jower at times--quarrel a little
more than half in earnest."
"Well," said the mother, "perhaps I ought not to say anything, but I
can't help it when I am so often hurt by that man's influence. Why, last
Sunday afternoon your father left the rector sitting here and went away
with that old sinner, and we heard them haw-hawing over in the woods.
But I won't say any more."
"You never do, Margaret," the Major replied, winking at Louise. "But let
us drop him. So you saw Mayo, eh?" he added, turning to Tom.
"Yes, sir, and I understand that he is coming back down here to prove to
the negroes that we are cheating them out of their earnings."
The Major tossed a cigar to Tom, lighted one, and had begun to talk with
a rhetorical and sententious balancing of periods--which, to his mind,
full of the oratory of Prentiss, was the essence of impressiveness--when
a negro woman entered the room. And hereupon he changed the subject.
When bedtime came the old gentleman stood on a rug in front of a large
fire-place, meditatively winding his watch. His wife sat on a
straight-back chair, glancing over the harmless advertisements in a
religious newspaper. In the parlor they had spent an agreeable evening,
with music and with never an allusion to an unpleasant subject, but
there was something finer than an allusion, and it had passed from
husband to wife and back again--a look at each other and a glance toward
Louise. But they had laughed at the girl's imitation of a cakewalk, and
yet in the minds of the father and the mother was the low echo of a
hollow cough. Affectionately she had kissed them good night, and had
started off down the hall in mimicry of a negro belle's walk, but they
had heard her door shut with a quick slam as if she were at last
impelled to be truthful with herself, to close herself in with her own
meditations.
The Major hung his watch on a nail above the mantel-piece. From a
far-off nook of the sprawling old house came the pling-plang of the
boy's banjo.
"Margaret?"
"Yes, dear."
"What did you say to her?"
She began to fold the newspaper. "I didn't say anything. She wouldn't
permit me."
"What do you think?"
"That she will do as she pleases."
"Consoling, by the--consoling, I must say. But I tell you she won't. I
will shame her out of it."