he had been attracted by a woman far superior to himself in education
and social position, although not in this world's goods. She was the
telegraph operator at the station near the iron works. She had felt
that there was a touch of romance and self-abnegation in her fancy for
him, and this titillated her more tutored imagination. His genius was
held in high repute at the iron works, and she had believed him a rough
diamond. She did not realize how she could have appreciated polished
facets and a brilliant lustre and a conventional setting until it was
too late. Then she began to think this genius of hers uncouth, and she
presently doubted if her jewel were genuine. For although of refined
instincts, he had been rudely reared, while she was in some sort inured
to table manners and toilet etiquette and English grammar. She could
not be content with his intrinsic worth, but longed for him to prove
his value to the world, that it might not think she had thrown herself
away. In moments of disappointment and depression his prison record
bore heavily upon her, and there was a breach when, in petulance, she
had once asked, If he were indeed innocent in receiving the stolen
goods, why had he not proved it? And she urged him to much striving to
be rich; and she would fain travel the old beaten road to wealth in the
iron business, and scorned experiments and new ideas and inventions,
that took money out without the certainty of putting it in. And she
had been taught, and was an adept in specious argument. He could not
answer her; he could only keep doggedly on his own way; but obstinacy
is a poor substitute for ardor. Though he had done much, he had done
less than he had expected,--far, far less in financial results than she
had expected. His ambitions were still hot within him, but they were
worldly ambitions now. They scorched his more delicate sensibilities,
and seared his freshest perceptions, and set his heart afire with
sordid hopes. He was often harassed by a lurking doubt of his powers;
he vaguely sought to measure them; and he began to fear that this in
itself was a sign of the approach to their limits. He could still lift
his eyes to great heights, but alas for the wings,--alas!
He had changed greatly: he had become nervous, anxious, concentrated,
yet not less affectionate. He said much about his wife to his old
friends, and never a word but loyal praise. "Em'ly air school-l'arned
fur true, an' kin talk ekal ter the rider."
The idiot 'Lijah was welcome at his side, and the ancient yellow
cur, that used to trot nimbly after him in the old days, rejoiced to
limp feebly at his heels. He came over, one morning, and sat on the
rickety little porch with Cynthia, and talked of her father and mother;
but he had forgotten the mare, whose death she also mentioned, and
the fact that old Suke's third calf was traded to M'ria Baker. His
recollections were all vague, although at some reminiscence of hers
he laughed jovially, and 'lowed that "in them days, Cynthy, ye an' me
hed a right smart notion of keeping company tergether." He did not
notice how pale she was, and that there was often a slight spasmodic
contraction of her features. She was busy with her spinning-wheel, as
she placidly replied, "Yes,--though I always 'lowed ez I counted on
livin' single."
It was only a fragmentary attention that he accorded her. He was full
of his plans and anxious about rains, lest a rise in Caney Fork should
detain him in the mountains; and he often turned and surveyed the
vast landscape with a hard, callous glance of worldly utility. He saw
only weather signs. The language of the mountains had become a dead
language. Oh, how should he read the poem that the opalescent mist
traced in an illuminated text along the dark, gigantic growths of Pine
Mountain!
At length he was gone, and forever, and Cynthia's heart adjusted itself
anew. Sometimes, to be sure, it seems to her that the years of her life
are like the floating leaves drifting down Lost Creek, valueless and
purposeless, and vaguely vanishing in the mountains. Then she remembers
that the sequestered subterranean current is charged with its own
inscrutable, imperative mission, and she ceases to question and regret,
and bravely does the work nearest her hand, and has glimpses of its
influence in the widening lives of others, and finds in these a placid
content.
A-PLAYIN' OF OLD SLEDGE AT THE SETTLEMINT.
"I hev hearn tell ez how them thar boys rides thar horses over hyar
ter the Settlemint nigh on ter every night in the week ter play
kyerds,--'Old Sledge' they calls it; an' thar goin's-on air jes'
scandalous,--jes' a-drinkin' of apple-jack, an' a-bettin' of thar
money."
It was a lonely place: a sheer precipice on one side of the road that
curved to its verge; on the other, an ascent so abrupt that the tall
stems of the pines seemed laid upon the ground as they were marshaled
in serried columns up the slope. No broad landscape was to be seen from
this great projecting ledge of the mountain; the valley was merely a
little basin, walled in on every side by the meeting ranges that rose
so high as to intercept all distant prospect, and narrow the world to
the contracted area bounded by the sharp lines of their wooded summits,
cut hard and clear against the blue sky. But for the road, it would
have seemed impossible that these wild steeps should be the chosen
haunt of aught save deer, or bear, or fox; and certainly the instinct
of the eagle built that eyrie called the Settlement, still higher, far
above the towering pine forest. It might be accounted a tribute to the
enterprise of Old Sledge that mountain barriers proved neither let nor
hindrance, and here in the fastnesses was held that vivacious sway,
potent alike to fascinate and to scandalize.
In the middle of the stony road stood a group of roughly clad
mountaineers, each in an attitude of sluggish disinclination to
the allotted task of mending the highway, leaning lazily upon a
grubbing-hoe or sorry spade,--except, indeed, the overseer, who was
upheld by the single crowbar furnished by the county, the only sound
implement in use among the party. The provident dispensation of
the law, leaving the care of the road to the tender mercies of its
able-bodied neighbors over eighteen and under forty-five years of age,
was a godsend to the Settlement and to the inhabitants of the tributary
region, in that even if it failed of the immediate design of securing a
tolerable passway through the woods, it served the far more important
purpose of drawing together the diversely scattered settlers, and
affording them unwonted conversational facilities. These meetings were
well attended, although their results were often sadly inadequate.
To-day the usual complement of laborers was on hand, except the three
boys whose scandalous susceptibility to the mingled charms of Old
Sledge and apple-jack had occasioned comment.
"They'll hev ter be fined, ef they don't take keer an' come an' work,"
remarked the overseer of the road, one Tobe Rains, who reveled in a
little brief authority.
"From what I hev hearn tell 'bout thar go-in's-on, none of 'em is
a-goin' ter hev nuthin' ter pay fines with, when they gits done
with thar foolin' an' sech," said Abner Blake, a man of weight and
importance, and the eldest of the party.
It did not seem to occur to any of the group that the losses among the
three card-players served to enrich one of the number, and that the
deplorable wholesale insolvency shadowed forth was not likely to ensue
in substance. Perhaps their fatuity in this regard arose from the fact
that fining the derelict was not an actuality, although sometimes of
avail as a threat.
"An' we hev ter leave everythink whar it fell down, an' come hyar ter
do thar work fur 'em,--a-fixin' up of this hyar road fur them ter
travel," exclaimed Tobe Rains, attempting to chafe himself into a rage.
"It's got ter quit,--that's what I say; this hyar way of doin' hev got
ter quit." By way of lending verisimilitude to the industrial figure
of rhetoric, he lifted his hammer and dealt an ineffectual blow at a
large bowlder. Then he picked up his crowbar, and, leaning heavily on
the implement, resigned himself to the piquant interest of gossip.
"An' thar's that Josiah Tait," he continued, "a settled married man,
a-behavin' no better 'n them fool boys. He hain't struck a lick of work
fur nigh on ter a month,--'ceptin' a-goin' huntin' with the t'others,
every wunst in a while. He hev jes' pulled through at the little eend
of the horn. I never sot much store by him, nohow, though when he war
married ter Melindy Price, nigh 'bout a year ago, the folks all 'lowed
ez she war a-doin' mighty well ter git him, ez he war toler'ble well
off through his folks all bein' dead but him, an' he hed what he hed
his own self."
"I wouldn't let _my_ darter marry no man ez plays kyerds," said a very
young fellow, with great decision of manner, "no matter what he hed,
nor how he hed it."
As the lady referred to was only two weeks old, and this solicitude
concerning her matrimonial disposition was somewhat premature, there
was a good-natured guffaw at the young fellow's expense.
"An' now," Tobe Rains resumed, "ef Josiah keeps on the way ez he hev
started, he hain't a-goin' ter hev no more 'n the t'other boys round
the mounting,--mebbe not ez much,--an' Melindy Price hed better hev
a-tuken somebody what owned less but hed a harder grip."
A long silence fell upon the party. Three of the twenty men assembled,
in dearth of anything else to do, took heart of grace and fell to work;
fifteen leaned upon their hoes in a variety of postures, all equally
expressive of sloth, and with slow eyes followed the graceful sweep of
a hawk, drifting on the wind, without a motion of its wings, across
the blue sky to the opposite range. Two, one of whom was the overseer,
searched their pockets for a plug of tobacco, and when it was found
its possessor gave to him that lacked. At length, Abner Blake, who
furnished all the items of news, and led the conversation, removed
his eyes from the flight of the hawk, as the bird was absorbed in the
variegated October foliage of the opposite mountain, and reopened the
discussion. At the first word the three who were working paused in
attentive quietude; the fifteen changed their position to one still
more restful; the overseer sat down on a bowlder by the roadside, and
placed his contemplative elbows on his knees and his chin in his hands.
"I hev hearn tell," said Abner Blake, with the pleasing consciousness
of absorbing the attention of the company, and being able to meet high
expectations, "ez how Josiah hev los' that thar brindled heifer ter
Budd Wray, an' the main heft of his crap of corn. But mebbe he'll take
a turn now an' win 'em back agin."
"'Tain't likely," remarked Tobe Rains.
"No, 'tain't," coincided the virtuous fifteen.
The industrious three, who might have done better in better company,
went to work again for the space of a few minutes; but the next
inarticulate gurgle, preliminary always to Blake's speech,--a sort of
rising-bell to ring up somnolent attention,--brought them once more to
a stand-still.
"An' cornsiderin' ez how Budd Wray,--he it war ez won 'em; I seen
the heifer along o' the cow ter his house yestiddy evenin', ez I
war a-comin' from a-huntin' yander ter the sulphur spring,--an'
cornsiderin' ez he is nuthin' but a single man, an' hain't got no wife,
it do look mighty graspin' ter be a-takin' from a man ez hev got a wife
an' a houseful of his wife's kinsfolks ter look arter. Mighty graspin',
it 'pears like ter me."
"I s'pose," said one of the three workers suggestively,--"I s'pose ez
how Budd won it fair. 'Twarn't no onderhand job, war it?"
There was a portentous silence. The flight of the hawk, again floating
above the mountains, now in the shadow of the resting clouds, now in
the still sunshine, was the only motion in the landscape. The sudden
bark of a fox in the woods near at hand smote the air shrilly.
"That thar ain't fur me ter say," Blake replied at last, with
significant emphasis.
The suspicion fell upon the party like a revelation, with an auxiliary
sense of surprise that it had not been earlier presented, so patent was
the possibility.
Still that instinct of justice latent in the human heart kept the pause
unbroken for a while. Then Blake, whose information on most points at
issue entitled him to special consideration, proceeded to give his
opinion on the subject: "I'm a perfessin' member of the church, an'
I dunno one o' them thar kyerds from the t'other; an' what is more,
I ain't a-wantin' ter know. I hev seen 'em a-playin' wunst, an' I
hearn 'em a-talkin' that thar foolishness 'bout 'n 'high' an' 'low,'
an' sech,--they'll all be low enough 'fore long. But what I say is, I
dunno how come Josiah Tait, what's always been a peart, smart boy, an'
his dad afore him always war a thrivin' man, an' Budd Wray war never
nobody nor nuthin',--he war always mighty no-'count, him an' all his
folks,--an' what I dunno is, how come he kin git the upper hand of
Josiah Tait at these hyar kyerds, an' can't git it no other way. Ef he
keeps on a-playin' of Old Sledge hyar at the Settlemint, he'll be wuth
ez much ez anybody on the mounting what's done been a-workin' all thar
days, an' hed a toler'ble start ter begin with. It don't look fair an'
sensible ter me."
"'Pears like ter me," said the very young fellow, father of the very
young daughter, "ef a man is old enough ter git married, he is old
enough to take keer of hisself. I kin make out no good reason why
Josiah Tait oughter be pertected agin Budd Wray. 'Pears ter me ef one
of 'em kin larn ter play Old Sledge, the t'other kin. An' Josiah hev
got toler'ble good sense."
"That's how come all ye young muskrats dunno nuthin'," retorted Blake
in some heat. "Jes' let one of you-uns git turned twenty year old, an'
ye think ye air ez wise an' ez settled as ef ye war sixty, an' ye can't
l'arn nuthin' more."
"All the same, I don't see ez Josiah Tait needs a dry-nuss ter keep off
Wray an' sech critters," was the response. And here this controversy
ended.
"Somehow," said Tobe Rains, reflectively, "it don't look likely ter me
ez he an' Josiah Tait hev enny call ter be sech frien'ly folks. I hev
hearn ez how Budd Wray war a-follerin' round Melindy Price afore she
war married, an' she liked him fust-rate till Josiah tuk ter comin'
'bout 'n the Scrub-Oak Ridge, whar she lived in them days. That thar
ain't the stuff ter make frien's out'n. Thar is some sort 'n cur'ous
doin's a-goin' on 'bout'n these hyar frien'ly kyerds."
"I knowed that thar 'bout'n his a-follerin' round Melindy afore she
war married. I 'lowed one time ez Melindy hed a mind ter marry Wray
stiddier Josiah," said the young father, shaken in his partisanship.
"An' it always 'peared like ter me ez it war mighty comical ez he an'
Josiah tuk ter playin' of Old Sledge an' sech tergether."
These questions were not easy of solution. Many speculations were
preferred concerning the suspicious circumstance of Budd Wray's
singular proficiency in playing Old Sledge; but beyond disparaging
innuendo and covert insinuation conjecture could not go. Everything was
left doubtful, and so was the road.
It was hardly four o'clock, but the languid work had ceased and the
little band was dispersing. Some had far to go through the deep woods
to their homes, and those who lived closer at hand were not disposed
to atone for their comrades' defection by prolonging their stay. The
echoes for a long time vibrated among the lonely heights with the
metallic sound of their horses' hoofs, every moment becoming fainter,
until at last all was hushed. Dusky shadows, which seemed to be exhaled
from the ground, rose higher and higher up the mountain side from the
reservoir of gloom that lay in the valley. The sky was a lustrous
contrast to the darkling earth. The sun still lingered, large and
red, above the western summits; the clouds about it were gorgeous
in borrowed color; even those hovering in the east had caught the
reflection of the sunset splendor, and among their gold and crimson
flakes swung the silver globe of the hunter's moon. Now and then, at
long intervals, the bark of the fox quivered on the air; once the
laurel stirred with a faint rustle, and a deer stood in the midst of
the ill-mended road, catching upon his spreading antlers the mingled
light of sun and moon. For a moment he was motionless, his hoof
uplifted; the next, with an elastic spring, as of a creature without
weight, he was flying up the steep slope and disappearing amid the
slumberous shades of the dark pines. A sudden sound comes from far
along the curves of the road,--a sound foreign to woods and stream
and sky; again, and yet again, growing constantly more distinct, the
striking of iron against stone, the quick, regular beat of a horse's
tread, and an equestrian figure, facing the moon and with the sun at
his back, rides between the steep ascent and the precipice on his way
to the Settlement and the enticements of Old Sledge.
He was not the conventional type of the roistering blade. There was
an expression of settled melancholy on his face very usual with these
mountaineers, reflected, perhaps, from the indefinable tinge of sadness
that rests upon the Alleghany wilds, that hovers about the purpling
mountain-tops, that broods over the silent woods, that sounds in the
voice of the singing waters. Nor was he like the prosperous "perfessin'
member" of the card-playing _culte_. His listless manner was that of
stolidity, not of a studied calm; his brown jeans suit was old and worn
and patched; his hat, which had seen many a drenching winter rain and
scorching summer sun, had acquired sundry drooping curves undreamed of
in its maker's philosophy. He rode a wiry gray mare without a saddle,
and carried a heavy rifle. He was perhaps twenty-three years of age,
a man of great strength and stature, and there were lines about his
lips and chin which indicated a corresponding development of a firm
will and tenacity of purpose. His slow brown eyes were fixed upon the
horizon as he went around the ledge, and notwithstanding the languid
monotony of the expression of his face he seemed absorbed in some
definite train of thought, rather than lost in the vague, hazy reverie
which is the habitual mental atmosphere of the quiescent mountaineer.
The mare, left to herself, traveled along the rocky way in a debonair
fashion implying a familiarity with worse roads, and soon was around
the curve and beginning the sharp ascent which led to the Settlement.
There was a rickety bridge to cross, that spanned a deep, narrow
stream, which caught among its dark pools now a long, slender, polished
lance of sunlight, and now a dart from the moon. As the rider went on
upward the woods were dense as ever; no glimpse yet of the signet of
civilization set upon the wilderness and called the Settlement. By
the time he had reached the summit the last red rays of the day were
fading from the tops of the trees, but the moon, full and high in the
eastern heavens, shed so refulgent a light that it might be questioned
whether the sun rose on a brighter world than that which he had left.
A short distance along level ground, a turn to the right, and here,
on the highest elevation of the range, was perched the little town.
There was a clearing of ten acres, a blacksmith's shop, four log huts
facing indiscriminately in any direction, a small store of one story
and one room, and a new frame court-house, whitewashed and inclosed by
a plank fence. In the last session of the legislature, the Settlement
had been made the county-seat of a new county; the additional honor of
a name had been conferred upon it, but as yet it was known among the
population of the mountain by its time-honored and accustomed title.
Wray dismounted in front of the store, hitched the mare to a laurel
bush, and, entering, discovered his two boon companions drearily
waiting, and shuffling the cards again and again to while away the
time. An inverted splint-basket served as table; a tallow dip, a great
extravagance in these parts, blinked on the head of a barrel near
by, and gave a most flickering and ineffectual light, but the steady
radiance of the moon poured in a wide, white flood through the open
door, and kindly supplied all deficiencies. The two young mountaineers
were of the usual sad-eyed type, and the impending festivities might
have seemed to those of a wider range of experience than the Settlement
could furnish to be clouded with a funereal aspect. Before the fire,
burning low and sullenly in the deep chimney, were sitting two elderly
men, who looked with disfavor upon Wray as he came in and placed his
gun with a clatter in the corner.
"Ye war a long time a-gittin' hyar, Budd," said one of the
card-shufflers in a gentle voice, with curiously low-spirited
cadences. He spoke slowly, too, and with a slight difficulty, as if he
seldom had occasion to express himself in words and his organs were out
of practice. He was the proprietor of the store, one Tom Scruggs, and
this speech was by way of doing the honors. The other looked up with
recognizing eyes, but said nothing.
"I war hendered some," replied Wray, seating himself in a rush-bottomed
chair, and drawing close to the inverted basket. "Ez I war a-comin'
along, 'bout haffen mile an' better from our house,--'twar nigh on ter
three o'clock, I reckon,--I seen the bigges', fattes' buck I hev seen
this year a-bouncin' through the laurel, an' I shot him. An' I hed to
kerry him 'long home, 'kase suthin' mought hev got him ef I hed a-left
him thar. An' it hendered me some."
"An' we hev ter sit hyar a-wastin' away an' a-waitin' while ye goes
a-huntin' of deer," said Josiah Tait, angrily, and speaking for the
first time. "I could hev gone an' shot twenty deer ef I would hev tuk
the time. Ye said ez how ye war a-goin' ter be hyar an hour by sun, an'
jes' look a-yander," pointing to the lustrous disc of the moon.
"That thar moon war high enough 'fore the sun war a-settin'," returned
Wray. "Ef ye air in sech a hurry, whyn't yer cut them thar kyerds fur
deal, an' stop that thar jowin' o' yourn. I hev hed ez much of that ez
I am a-goin' ter swallow."
"I'll put it down ye with the ramrod o' that thar gun o' mine, ef ye
don't take keer how ye talk," retorted the choleric Tait; "an' ef that
don't set easy on yer stomach, I'll see how ye'll digest a bullet."
"I'm a-waitin' fur yer ramrod," said Wray. "Jes' try that fust, an' see
how it works."
The melancholy-voiced store-keeper interrupted these amenities, not
for the sake of peace,--white-winged angel,--but in the interests of
Old Sledge. "Ef I hed a-knowed ez how ye two boys war a-goin' ter take
ter quarrelin' an' a-fightin' round hyar, a-stiddier playin' of kyerds
sensible-like, I wouldn't hev shet up shop so quick. I hed a good many
little turns of work ter do, what I hev lef' ter play kyerds. An' ye
two mought jow tergether some other day, it 'pears like ter me. Ye air
a-wastin' more time a-jowin', Josiah, than Budd tuk up in comin' an'
deer-huntin' tergether. Ye hev cut the lowest in the pack, so deal the
kyerds, or give 'em ter them ez will."
The suggestion to resign the deal touched Josiah in a tender spot.
He protested that he was only too willing to play,--that was all he
wanted. "But ter be kep' a-waitin' hyar while Budd comes a-snakin'
through the woods, an' a-stoppin' ter shoot wild varmints an' sech, an'
then a-goin' home ter kerry 'em, an' then a-snakin' agin through the
woods, an' a-gittin' hyar nigh on ter night-time,--that's what riles
me."
"Waal, go 'long, now!" exclaimed Wray, fairly roused out of his
imperturbability. "Deal them kyerds, an' stop a-talkin'. That thar
tongue o' yourn will git cut out some o' these hyar days. It jes' goes
like a grist-mill, an' it's enough ter make a man deef fur life."
Thus exhorted, Josiah dealt. In receiving their hands the players
looked searchingly at every card, as if in doubtful recognition of
an old acquaintance; but before the game was fairly begun another
interruption occurred. One of the elderly men beside the fire rose and
advanced upon the party.
"Thar is a word ez we hev laid off ter ax ye, Budd Wray, which will be
axed twict,--wunst right hyar, an' wunst at the Jedgmint Day. War it
ye ez interjuced this hyar coal o' fire from hell, that ye call Old
Sledge, up hyar ter the Settlemint?"
The querist was a gaunt, forlorn-looking man, stoop-shouldered, and
slow in his movements. There was, however, a distinct intimation of
power in his lean, sinewy figure, and his face bore the scarlet scar
of a wound torn by a furious fang, which, though healed long ago, was
an ever-present reminder of a fierce encounter with a wild beast, in
which he had come off victorious. The tones of his voice and the drift
and rhetoric of his speech bespoke the loan of the circuit-rider.
The card-players looked up, less in surprise than exasperation, and
Josiah Tait, fretfully anticipating Wray, spoke in reply: "No, he
never. I fotched this hyar coal o' fire myself, an' ef ye don't look
out an' stand back out'n the way it'll flare up an' singe ye. I larnt
how ter play when I went down yander ter the Cross-Roads, an' I brung
it ter the Settlemint myself."
There was a mingled glow of the pride of the innovator and the
disdainful superiority of the iconoclast kindling within Josiah Tait
as he claimed the patent for Old Sledge. The catechistic terrors of
the Last Day had less reality for him than the present honor and glory
appertaining to the traveled importer of a new game. The Judgment Day
seemed imminent over his dodging head only when beholding the masterly
scene-painting of the circuit-rider, and the fire and brimstone out of
sight were out of mind.
"But ef ye air a-thinkin' of callin' me ter 'count fur sech," said
Wray, nodding at the cards, "I'll hev ye ter know ez I kin stand up
ter anything I does. I hev got no call ter be ashamed ov myself, an' I
ain't afeard o' nuthin' an' nobody."
"Ye gin me ter onderstand, then, ez Josiah l'arned ye ter play?" asked
the self-constituted grand inquisitor. "How come, then, Budd Wray, ez
ye wins all the truck from Josiah, ef ye air jes' a-l'arnin'?"