THE PREPARATION.
The excitement produced by the arrival of Tiff, and the fitting out of
Milly to the cottage, had produced a most favorable diversion in Nina's
mind from her own especial perplexities.
Active and buoyant, she threw herself at once into whatever happened to
come uppermost on the tide of events. So, having seen the wagon
dispatched, she sat down to breakfast in high spirits.
"Aunt Nesbit, I declare I was so interested in that old man! I intend to
have the pony, after breakfast, and ride over there."
"I thought you were expecting company."
"Well, that's one reason, now, why I'd like to be off. Do I want to sit
all primmed up, smiling and smirking, and running to the window to see
if my gracious lord is coming? No, I won't do that, to please any of
them. If I happen to fancy to be out riding, I _will_ be out riding."
"I think," said Aunt Nesbit, "that the hovels of these miserable
creatures are no proper place for a young lady of your position in
life."
"My position in life! I don't see what that has to do with it. My
position in life enables me to do anything I please--a liberty which I
take pretty generally. And, then, really, I couldn't help feeling rather
sadly about it, because that Old Tiff, there (I believe that's his
name), told me that the woman had been of a good Virginia family. Very
likely she may have been just such another wild girl as I am, and
thought as little about bad times, and of dying, as I do. So I couldn't
help feeling sad for her. It really came over me when I was walking in
the garden. Such a beautiful morning as it was--the birds all singing,
and the dew all glittering and shining on the flowers! Why, aunt, the
flowers really seemed alive; it seemed as though I could hear them
breathing, and hear their hearts beating like mine. And, all of a
sudden, I heard the most wild, mournful singing, over in the woods. It
wasn't anything very beautiful, you know, but it was so wild, and
strange! 'She is dead and gone to heaven!--she is dead and gone to
heaven!' And pretty soon I saw the funniest old wagon--I don't know what
to call it--and this queer old black man in it, with an old white hat
and surtout on, and a pair of great, funny-looking spectacles on his
nose. I went to the fence to see who he was; and he came up and spoke to
me, made the most respectful bow--you ought to have seen it! And then,
poor fellow, he told me how his mistress was lying dead, with the
children around her, and nobody in the house! The poor old creature, he
actually cried, and I felt so for him! He seemed to be proud of his dead
mistress, in spite of her poverty."
"Where do they live?" said Mrs. Nesbit.
"Why, he told me over in the pine woods, near the swamp."
"Oh," said Mrs. Nesbit, "I dare say it's that Cripps family, that's
squatted in the pine woods. A most miserable set--all of them liars and
thieves! If I had known who it was, I'm sure I shouldn't have let Milly
go over. Such families oughtn't to be encouraged; there oughtn't a thing
to be done for them; we shouldn't encourage them to stay in the
neighborhood. They always will steal from off the plantations, and
corrupt the negroes, and get drunk, and everything else that's bad.
There's never a woman of decent character among them, that ever I heard
of; and, if you were my daughter, I shouldn't let you go near them."
"Well, I'm not your daughter, thank fortune!" said Nina, whose graces
always rapidly declined in controversies with her aunt, "and so I shall
do as I please. And I don't know what you pious people talk so for; for
Christ went with publicans and sinners, I'm sure."
"Well," said Aunt Nesbit, "the Bible says we mustn't cast pearls before
swine; and, when you've lived to be as old as I am, you'll know more
than you do now. Everybody knows that you can't do anything with these
people. You can't give them Bibles nor tracts; for they can't read. I've
tried it, sometimes, visiting them, and talking to them; but it didn't
do them any good. I always thought there ought to be a law passed to
make 'em all slaves, and then there would be somebody to take care of
them."
"Well, I can't see," said Nina, "how it's their fault. There isn't any
school where they could send their children, if they wanted to learn;
and, then, if they want to work, there's nobody who wants to hire them.
So, what can they do?"
"I'm sure I don't know," said Aunt Nesbit, in that tone which generally
means I don't care. "All I know is, that I want them to get away from
the neighborhood. Giving to them is just like putting into a bag with
holes. I'm sure I put myself to a great inconvenience on their account
to-day; for, if there's anything I do hate, it is having things
irregular. And to-day is the day for clear-starching the caps--and such
a good, bright, sunny day!--and to-morrow, or any other day of the week,
it may rain. Always puts me all out to have things that I've laid out to
do put out of their regular order. I'd been willing enough to have sent
over some old things; but why they must needs take Milly's time, just as
if the funeral couldn't have got ready without her! These funerals are
always miserable drunken times with them! And, then, who knows, she may
catch the small-pox, or something or other. There's never any knowing
what these people die of."
"They die of just such things as we do," said Nina. "They have that in
common with us, at any rate."
"Yes; but there's no reason for risking our lives, as I know
of--especially for such people--when it don't do any good."
"Why, aunt, what do you know against these folks? Have you ever known of
their doing anything wicked?"
"Oh, I don't know that I know anything against this family in
particular; but I know the whole race. These squatters--I've know them
ever since I was a girl in Virginia. Everybody that knows anything knows
exactly what they are. There isn't any help for them, unless, as I said
before, they were made slaves; and then they could be kept decent. You
may go to see them, if you like, but _I_ don't want _my_ arrangements to
be interfered with on their account."
Mrs. Nesbit was one of those quietly-persisting people, whose yielding
is like the stretching of an India-rubber band, giving way only to a
violent pull, and going back to the same place when the force is
withdrawn. She seldom refused favors that were urged with any degree of
importunity; not because her heart was touched, but simply because she
seemed not to have force enough to refuse; and whatever she granted was
always followed by a series of subdued lamentations over the necessity
which had wrung them from her.
Nina's nature was so vehement and imperious, when excited, that it was a
disagreeable fatigue to cross her. Mrs. Nesbit, therefore, made amends
by bemoaning herself as we have seen. Nina started up, hastily, on
seeing her pony brought round to the door; and, soon arrayed in her
riding-dress, she was cantering through the pine woods in high spirits.
The day was clear and beautiful. The floor of the woodland path was
paved with a thick and cleanly carpet of the fallen pine-leaves. And
Harry was in attendance with her, mounted on another horse, and riding
but a very little behind; not so much so but what his mistress could, if
she would, keep up a conversation with him.
"You know this Old Tiff, Harry?"
"Oh, yes, very well. A very good, excellent creature, and very much the
superior of his master, in most respects."
"Well, he says his mistress came of a good family."
"I shouldn't wonder," said Harry. "She always had a delicate appearance,
very different from people in their circumstances generally. The
children, too, are remarkably pretty, well-behaved children; and it's a
pity they couldn't be taught something, and not grow up and go on these
miserable ways of these poor whites!"
"Why don't anybody ever teach them?" said Nina.
"Well, Miss Nina, you know how it is: everybody has his own work and
business to attend to--there are no schools for them to go to--there's
no work for them to do. In fact, there don't seem to be any place for
them in society. Boys generally grow up to drink and swear. And, as for
girls, they are of not much account. So it goes on from generation to
generation."
"This is so strange, and so different from what it is in the northern
states! Why, all the children go to school there--the very poorest
people's children! Why, a great many of the first men, there, were poor
children! Why can't there be some such thing here?"
"Oh, because people are settled in such a scattering way they can't
have schools. All the land that's good for any thing is taken up for
large estates. And, then, these poor folks that are scattered up and
down in between, it's nobody's business to attend to them, and they
can't attend to themselves; and so they grow up, and nobody knows how
they live, and everybody seems to think it a pity they are in the world.
I've seen those sometimes that would be glad to do something, if they
could find anything to do. Planters don't want them on their
places--they'd rather have their own servants. If one of them wants to
be a blacksmith, or a carpenter, there's no encouragement. Most of the
large estates have their own carpenters and blacksmiths. And there's
nothing for them to do, unless it is keeping dogs to hunt negroes; or
these little low stores where they sell whiskey, and take what's stolen
from the plantations. Sometimes a smart one gets a place as overseer on
a plantation. Why, I've heard of their coming so low as actually to sell
their children to traders, to get a bit of bread."
"What miserable creatures! But do you suppose it can be possible that a
woman of any respectable family can have married a man of this sort?"
"Well, I don't know, Miss Nina; that might be. You see, good families
sometimes degenerate; and when they get too poor to send their children
off to school, or keep any teachers for them, they run down very fast.
This man is not bad-looking, and he really is a person who, if he had
had any way opened to him, might have been a smart man, and made
something of himself and family; and when he was young and
better-looking, I shouldn't wonder if an uneducated girl, who had never
been off a plantation, might have liked him; he was fully equal, I dare
say, to her brothers. You see, Miss Nina, when _money_ goes, in this
part of the country, everything goes with it; and when a family is not
rich enough to have everything in itself, it goes down very soon."
"At any rate, I pity the poor things," said Nina. "I don't despise them,
as Aunt Nesbit does."
Here Nina, observing the path clear and uninterrupted for some distance
under the arching pines, struck her horse into a canter, and they rode
on for some distance without speaking. Soon the horse's feet splashed
and pattered on the cool, pebbly bottom of a small, shallow stream,
which flowed through the woods. This stream went meandering among the
pines like a spangled ribbon, sometimes tying itself into loops, leaving
open spots--almost islands of green--graced by its waters. Such a little
spot now opened to the view of the two travellers. It was something less
than a quarter of an acre in extent, entirely surrounded by the stream,
save only a small neck of about four feet, which connected it to the
main-land.
Here a place had been cleared and laid off into a garden, which, it was
evident, was carefully tended. The log-cabin which stood in the middle
was far from having the appearance of wretchedness which Nina had
expected. It was almost entirely a dense mass of foliage, being covered
with the intermingled drapery of the Virginia creeper and the yellow
jessamine. Two little borders, each side of the house, were blooming
with flowers. Around the little island the pine-trees closed in unbroken
semicircle, and the brook meandered away through them, to lose itself
eventually in that vast forest of swampy land which girdles the whole
Carolina shore. The whole air of the place was so unexpectedly inviting,
in its sylvan stillness and beauty, that Nina could not help checking
her horse, and exclaiming,--
"I'm sure, it's a pretty place. They can't be such very forsaken people,
after all."
"Oh, that's all Tiff's work," said Harry. "He takes care of everything
outside and in, while the man is off after nobody knows what. You'd be
perfectly astonished to see how that old creature manages. He sews, and
he knits, and works the garden, does the house-work, and teaches the
children. It's a fact! You'll notice that they haven't the pronunciation
or the manners of these wild white children; and I take it to be all
Tiff's watchfulness, for that creature hasn't one particle of
selfishness in him. He just identifies himself with his mistress and her
children."
By this time Tiff had perceived their approach, and came out to assist
them in dismounting.
"De Lord above bless you, Miss Gordon, for coming to see my poor missis!
Ah! she is lying dere just as beautiful, just as she was the very day
she was married! All her young looks come back to her; and Milly, she
done laid her out beautiful! Lord, I's wanting somebody to come and look
at her, because she has got good blood, if she be poor. She is none of
your common sort of poor whites, Miss Nina. Just come in; come in, and
look at her."
Nina stepped into the open door of the hut. The bed was covered with a
clean white sheet, and the body, arrayed in a long white night-dress
brought by Milly, lay there so very still, quiet, and life-like, that
one could scarcely realize the presence of death. The expression of
exhaustion, fatigue, and anxiety, which the face had latterly worn, had
given place to one of tender rest, shaded by a sort of mysterious awe,
as if the closed eyes were looking on unutterable things. The soul,
though sunk below the horizon of existence, had thrown back a twilight
upon the face radiant as that of the evening heavens.
By the head of the bed the little girl was sitting, dressed carefully,
and her curling hair parted in front, apparently fresh from the brush;
and the little boy was sitting beside her, his round blue eyes bearing
an expression of subdued wonder.
Cripps was sitting at the foot of the bed, evidently much the worse for
liquor; for, spite of the exhortation of Tiff, he had applied to the
whiskey-jug immediately on his departure. Why not? He was
uncomfortable--gloomy; and every one, under such circumstances,
naturally inclines towards _some_ source of consolation. He who is
intellectual reads and studies; he who is industrious flies to business;
he who is affectionate seeks friends; he who is pious, religion; but he
who is none of these--what has he but his whiskey? Cripps made a stupid,
staring inclination toward Nina and Harry, as they entered, and sat
still, twirling his thumbs and muttering to himself.
The sunshine fell through the panes on the floor, and there came
floating in from without the odor of flowers and the song of birds. All
the Father's gentle messengers spoke of comfort; but he as a deaf man
heard not--as a blind man did not regard. For the rest, an air of
neatness had been imparted to the extreme poverty of the room by the
joint efforts of Milly and Tiff.
Tiff entered softly, and stood by Nina, as she gazed. He had in his hand
several sprays of white jessamine, and he laid one on the bosom of the
dead.
"She had a hard walk of it," he said, "but she's got home! Don't she
look peaceful?--poor lamb!"
The little, thoughtless, gay coquette had never looked on a sight like
this before. She stood with a fixed, tender thoughtfulness, unlike her
usual gayety, her riding-hat hanging carelessly by its strings from her
hands, her loose hair drooping over her face.
She heard some one entering the cottage, but she did not look up. She
was conscious of some one looking over her shoulder, and thought it was
Harry.
"Poor thing! how young she looks," she said, "to have had so much
trouble!" Her voice trembled, and a tear stood in her eye. There was a
sudden movement; she looked up, and Clayton was standing by her.
She looked surprised, and the color deepened in her cheek, but was too
ingenuously and really in sympathy with the scene before her even to
smile. She retained his hand a moment, and turned to the dead, saying,
in an under-tone, "See here!"
"I see," he said. "Can I be of service?"
"The poor thing died last night," said Nina. "I suppose some one might
help about a funeral. Harry," she said, walking softly towards the door,
and speaking low, "you provide a coffin; have it made neatly."
"Uncle," she said, motioning Tiff towards her, "where would they have
her buried?"
"Buried?" said Tiff. "O Lord! buried!" And he covered his face with his
hard hands, and the tears ran through his fingers.
"Lord, Lord! Well, it must come, I know, but 'pears like I couldn't!
Laws, she's so beautiful! Don't, to-day! don't!"
"Indeed, Uncle," said Nina, tenderly, "I'm sorry I grieved you; but you
know, poor fellow, that must come."
"I's known her ever since she's dat high!" said Tiff. "Her har was
curly, and she used to war such pretty red shoes, and come running after
me in de garden. 'Tiff, Tiff,' she used to say--and dar she is now, and
troubles brought her dar! Lord, what a pretty gal she was! Pretty as you
be, Miss Nina. But since she married _dat ar_," pointing with his thumb
over his shoulder, and speaking confidentially, "everything went wrong.
I's held her up--did all I could; and now here she is!"
"Perhaps," said Nina, laying her hand on his, "perhaps she's in a better
place than this."
"Oh, Lord, dat she is! She told me dat when she died. She saw de Lord at
last,--she did so! Dem's her last words. 'Tiff,' she says, 'I see Him,
and He will give me rest. Tiff,' she says,--I'd been asleep, you know,
and I kinder felt something cold on my hand, and I woke up right sudden,
and dar she was, her eyes so bright, looking at me and breathing so
hard; and all she says was, 'Tiff, I've seen Him, and I know now why
I've suffered so; He's gwine to take me, and give me rest!'"
"Then, my poor fellow, you ought to rejoice that she is safe."
"'Deed I does," said Tiff; "yet I's selfish. I wants to be dere too, I
does--only I has de chil'en to care for."
"Well, my good fellow," said Nina, "we must leave you now. Harry will
see about a coffin for your poor mistress; and whenever the funeral is
to be, our carriage will come over, and we will all attend."
"Lord bless you, Miss Gordon! Dat ar _too_ good on ye! My heart's been
most broke, tinking nobody cared for my poor young mistress! you's too
good, dat you is!"
Then, drawing near to her, and sinking his voice, he said: "'Bout de
mourning, Miss Nina. _He_ an't no 'count, you know--body can see how
'tis with him very plain. But missis was a Peyton, you know; and I's a
Peyton, too. I naturally feels a 'sponsibility he couldn't be 'spected
fur to. I's took de ribbons off of Miss Fanny's bonnet, and done de best
I could trimming it up with black crape what Milly gave me; and I's got
a band of black crape on Master Teddy's hat; and I 'lowed to put one on
mine, but there wasn't quite enough. You know, missis, old family
servants always wars mourning. If missis just be pleased to look over my
work! Now, dis yer is Miss Fanny's bonnet. You know I can't be 'spected
for to make it like a milliner."
"They are very well indeed, Uncle Tiff."
"Perhaps, Miss Nina, you can kind of touch it over."
"Oh, if you like, Uncle Tiff, I'll take them all home, and do them for
you."
"The Lord bless _you_, Miss Gordon! Dat ar was just what I wanted, but
was most 'fraid to ask you. Some gay young ladies doesn't like to handle
black."
"Ah! Uncle Tiff, I've no fears of that sort; so put it in the wagon, and
let Milly take it home."
So saying, she turned and passed out of the door where Harry was
standing holding the horses. A third party might have seen, by the keen,
rapid glance with which his eye rested upon Clayton, that he was
measuring the future probability which might make him the arbiter of his
own destiny--the disposer of all that was dear to him in life. As for
Nina, although the day before a thousand fancies and coquetries would
have colored the manner of her meeting Clayton, yet now she was so
impressed by what she had witnessed, that she scarcely appeared to know
that she had met him. She placed her pretty foot on his hand, and let
him lift her on to the saddle, scarcely noticing the act, except by a
serious, graceful inclination of her head.
One great reason of the ascendency which Clayton had thus far gained
over her, was that his nature, so quiet, speculative, and
undemonstrative, always left her such perfect liberty to follow the more
varying moods of her own. A man of a different mould would have sought
to awake her out of the trance--would have remarked on her abstracted
manner, or rallied her on her silence. Clayton merely mounted his horse
and rode quietly by her side, while Harry, passing on before them, was
soon out of sight.