TWO days passed without a word of hope for John. On the third morning
after his dismissal by Stella he sat pale and listless at breakfast,
scarcely tasting his food, while Susie watched his drawn face with keen
sympathetic eyes. An hour later she entered his office.
“You promised to let me help you,” she said quietly. “I have come.”
He looked at her a moment and wondered why he had never before seen her
striking beauty. A tall figure with exquisite sylph like lines, a serene
and perfectly moulded face with straight, thoughtful brows shadowing the
tenderest gray-blue eyes, and a crown of luxuriant auburn blonde hair.
He caught at once the sincere sympathy of her mood, as he pressed her
hand.
“I never saw you so beautiful, Miss Susie, or your face so sweet and
restful.”
She blushed and looked out the window.
“I can’t tell you how I thank you for coming. I think we must have been
brother and sister in some other world before this.”
The corners of the girl’s lips twitched and she turned her tender eyes
full on John’s.
“You are in love with Stella?”
“Yes.”
“And she has rejected you?”
“No, we have quarrelled and she refuses to see me or read my letters.”
“She loves you?”
“I’ve hoped so, I don’t know. She lets me feel it without words.”
“We are friends, what can I do?”
“See her and beg her for God’s sake to let me call, at least to read my
letters. Will you go to-day?”
“Immediately.”
“Thank you,” he cried, again tenderly pressing her hand. “You must have
loved too, Miss Susie.”
“Perhaps I have,” was the soft reply. “Write your message and I’ll take
it.”
John seated himself and hastily wrote:
_My dear Stella:_
_From the bottom of a heart crushed with anguish I ask your pardon for
my lack of faith. Your pride was right. Give me a chance and I will show
you what the trust of perfect love means for me. I await from you the
words of life or death._
_John Graham_.
Susie promised to return at once with her answer.
She knocked at the door of the old Graham house with a strange conflict
raging in her own breast. She hoped to succeed for the sake of the
aching heart of the man she had left, and yet mingled with the fear of
failure was the half-mad wish that Stella might reject his plea.
Aunt Julie Ann’s face was troubled as she greeted Susie.
“Tell Miss Stella, that I’m very sorry to learn of her illness and I
trust she can see me a moment.”
“Yassum, I tell her--but I’se feard she ain’t well enough.”
Aunt Julie Ann returned immediately, smiling.
“She say come right up to her room, Miss Susie.”
Susie was shocked to note the change-in the beautiful young face lying
still and pale against the white pillow.
“I’m sorry to find you so ill!”
“Yes, I suppose I have nerves,” she said, smiling wanly. “I didn’t know
it before. I think some of them must have snapped--but I’m better now.
I’ll get up this afternoon.”
“I’ve something that will help you, if you will take it.”
Stella’s brow clouded, and her eyes, wide and cold, assumed a sinister
half-mad expression.
“You have a message from Mr. Graham?”
“How did you guess it?”
“He has tried every other possible way. I wondered if he would stoop to
this.”
“Stoop!--what do you mean?”
“To use you for such a purpose.”
“And why not?”
“You ask that of me?” The great brown eyes pierced Susie’s soul.
“Certainly.”
“Then it’s all right,” she said with a light laugh. “You must receive
his message,” Susie said. “You’ve won the heart of the noblest man I
have ever known--a great, beautiful, measureless love. Don’t turn away
from it--you may not know its like again.”
The full lips smiled curiously.
“I’ve brought you a letter from him--you must read it.”
Susie pressed the letter into Stella’s hand and turned away to the
window. She heard the rattle of the paper as it was opened and refolded,
and walked back to the bedside. Before she could ask Stella’s answer,
her eye rested on a letter in Ackerman’s handwriting, lying open on
the white covering. She started violently but managed to suppress an
exclamation. Only that morning she had received herself a letter from
the young Northerner declaring his love in simple, honest fashion. She
couldn’t believe her eyes at first, but a second look convinced her
of its reality. What puzzled her still more was to observe beside this
letter a sheet of paper on which was drawn the diagram of the hall
with the minute accuracy of an architect’s plan, with Ackerman’s notes
interlining it.
“What shall I say?” she stammered in confusion.
Stella looked at her with a momentary start, smiled and answered:
“Tell Mr. Graham I have received and read his letter. I’ll think it over
this evening and reply to-morrow.”
“Then I’ll go,” said Susie, taking her hand. “I’m so glad I saw you.”
As she turned through the door her eye again was drawn irresistibly to
Ackerman’s letter. She returned to John Graham’s office stunned by this
puzzling discovery.
John was bitterly disappointed in the message she brought. Her long
stay had raised in him the highest hope. His own surrender had been so
complete and generous, that he could not conceive it possible that she
would debate in cold blood for twenty-four hours the question of her
answer. It seemed heartless and utterly cruel. He rebelled in fierce
futile protest. He did not try to conceal the bitterness of his
disappointment from Susie, and was too selfishly occupied with his own
grief to note the constraint in her manner as she hurried home from his
office, even before he had found words in which to thank her for the
delicate service she had rendered him.
He sent for Alfred and got word to Aunt Julie Ann that he wished to see
her at her cottage after supper. He knew that Alfred had taken advantage
of Isaac’s long absence to renew his calls on his former love.
When he arrived at nine o’clock Aunt Julie Ann had placed a pot of
coffee and a plate of tea-cakes on a little table for him.
“What’s de matter, honey?” she asked.
“I’m in great trouble, Aunt Julie Ann.”
“Well, Mammy’s baby knows who ter come to when he’s in trouble!” she
said tenderly. She had always called him baby--this bronzed hero of
battle fields. His thirty years meant nothing to her except increasing
faith in his manhood. Since the day she first took his baby form in her
arms she had watched him grow in body and spirit with a brooding mother
pride.
“You must talk to Miss Stella for me,” he said. “Get close to her Aunt
Julie Ann, you’re a woman, and tell her all the good things you remember
about me. You know better than I do--you understand? Make her smile
again and get her to see me.”
“Now, you set down dar sir, an’ drink dat coffee an’ tell me what you
doin’ gwine roun’ here mopin’ an’ pinin’ yo’ life out all ’bout a gal
don’t care two straws whedder you’se er livin’ er dyin’. I’d be shamed
er myself, great big grown man lak you is, what fit froo de war an’
everybody say gwine ter be de guvnor some day.”
“Can’t you get her to see me, Aunt Julie Ann?” he interrupted,
earnestly.
“Drink dat coffee, an’ den I tell ye!”
“It’s too hot for coffee--I’m not hungry--Tell me now.”
“Drink it fur Mammy, boy--I wants de grouns. I’m gwine tell ye somefin
when I looks in de cup. I seed a vision las’ night.”
To humour her John drank the coffee in silence. She took the empty cup,
studied its message, and looked into John’s face.
“Yes, honey, hit’s des lak I see hit las’ night, an’ I warns ye! I see
two purty gals--a fair one and a dark one. Bof lubs ye--but dey’s one
er slippin up behind yer back wid a shinin’ knife in her hand. Her long
black hair is hangin’ loose on her white shoulders an’ all twisted lak
snakes. I see her hide de knife in her bosom an’ slip her arms roun’ yo
neck. She kiss you an’ blindfold ye wid her curly hair an’ slip de knife
from her bosom an’ stab you froo de heart! Mammy’s baby! Mammy’s baby!”
The black woman’s voice sank to a weird whisper full of tears and ‘wild
half-savage music as she seized John’s hand.
“Don’t come to de house no mo,’ Marse John!” she pleaded.
“And why not?” he asked sharply.
“Case I look again in de vision an’ I see her face plain--an’ it wuz
hers!”
“Whose?”
“Miss Stella, honey--I warns ye! she doan lub my baby--keep away from
her!”
“Rubbish, Aunt Julie Ann; you’ve been having a nightmare.”
“I see it all, des ez plain ez I sees you now--I warns ye!”
“I’ll risk it,” John laughed. “I’m hoping for good news
to-morrow--please say your prayers for me to-night.”
Yet in spite of his culture and the inheritance of centuries of
knowledge, the voodoo message of his old nurse shrouded his spirit in
deeper gloom. He walked home with a new sense of dread in his heart,
wondering what answer she would send him to-morrow.