A FOOL'S ERRAND
When young Roland Bayard left the Forest Rest, with Leonidas Force's
supposed challenge in his pocket and on warlike thoughts intent, he walked
rapidly on toward the Calvert House, an old-fashioned and highly
respectable roadside establishment, half farmhouse, half tavern, notable
for its pure liquors, fine tobacco and rare game--in season. It was a
favorite house of call for travelers on that road, and of sojourn to
strangers who might be detained by business or by accident in the
neighborhood. It was full four miles from Forest Rest, but, as young
Roland owned no saddle horse, he had to walk all the way--no very great
hardship, indeed, for a strong, young man on a fine winter night, when the
moonlit sky and the snow-covered earth made the scene almost as clear as
day.
Roland crunched along the little footpath leading through the wood to the
highway, and then walked rapidly over the hard, frozen road--a very
solitary road at that hour of the night. High woods flanked it on either
side, opening occasionally, now on the right and now on the left, to show
some farmhouse, with its barns, fields, gardens and orchards.
It was still early in the winter evening when he reached the Calvert.
It was a very quiet-looking place, a two-story double brick house, rough
cast, with white stucco, and having four dormer windows in the front roof,
nine long windows in the upper floor and eight on the lower--that is, four
on each side of the entrance door. On the right hand side was the public
parlor; on the left hand side the bar.
A buggy and two saddle horses before the door were the only signs of
business about the place.
Roland went into the bar, and inquired if Col. Anglesea was in the house.
"No; he has not been in since morning," was the answer.
"When is he expected?" inquired Roland.
"Don't know; he said he might not return to-night."
Roland borrowed a newspaper, and sat down to while away a tedious
evening.
People came in and went out, but as early as ten o'clock the barroom was
nearly deserted.
"Do you think the colonel will be likely to return during the night--after
the house is closed, for instance?" inquired Roland.
"Don't know at all. But, even if he should come in after we have shut up,
there'll be somebody to let him in. Is the colonel a friend of yours?"
"Do you want to insult me?" demanded young Roland, firing up.
"Oh, no, not at all--no offense! I only asked because you seemed so
anxious to see him," mildly pleaded the bartender.
"One may be anxious to see a fellow from other motives than friendship,"
said Roland, sulkily.
"So they may," conceded the barkeeper. "And ever since that rumpus in the
church that broke up the wedding there's a good many people who are
anxious to see the colonel out of curiosity."
"Ah, they want to see what the monster looks like who, having a living
wife, tries to marry an heiress!"
"Yes; and I reckon that is why the colonel keeps pretty much out of the
way. He came here the afternoon of the wedding day, before we had heard of
the fuss at the church, and, though we wondered much to see the bridegroom
here alone, we couldn't ask any questions. He engaged a room, and then
hired a horse and buggy and went off. He hadn't been gone an hour before
people began to come in and talk of the broken-up wedding. We took in a
great deal of money all the afternoon on account of people gathering here
to talk and to hear about the affair. And toward night comes a cart from
Mondreer, loaded with all the colonel's trunks, pistol cases, hat boxes,
fowling pieces and what not. They were all taken up to his room, but the
colonel did not come in until near midnight, and he went away again this
morning before sunrise, leaving word that he might not be back to-night."
"Well, it is half-past ten, and he has not returned. I am waiting to see
him on very important business, so I think I must take a bed here, and see
my gentleman in the morning," Roland decided.
"All right," the barkeeper replied, and he rang a bell that brought a
negro waiter to the counter.
"Show this gentleman into the front room over the parlor, and make him
comfortable. Would you like a fire, sir?"
"Fire? No, of course not; thank you, all the same," laughed Roland, as he
followed the negro man upstairs to the room assigned him.
Roland was wholesomely tired, for he had been traveling on horseback or on
foot for nearly forty-eight hours; nevertheless, he waited up until he
heard the house closed for the night. Then, when all the calling up and
down stairs, the walking back and forth along the passages, the banging of
doors and the clattering down of windows had ceased, and the lights were
out and the premises were dark and quiet, Roland went to bed and went to
sleep. He slept the sound, deep, dreamless sleep of youth, health and
fatigue.
It was quite late in the morning when he awoke. The sun was gleaming in
golden needles through the interstices of his window shutters.
For a moment he did not know where he was, or how he had come into the
strange room. In another instant he recollected himself and his errand. He
jumped out of bed and threw open the window shutters. It was very cold,
and there was no fire, and the water on the washstand had a thin layer of
ice over it.
But Roland did not ring for a waiter to bring either fuel or hot water,
for he was inured to hardships and accustomed to waiting on himself.
He broke the ice in his ewer, washed his face and hands, wiped and rubbed
them with a coarse, crash towel until they shone and glowed, then put on
his clothes, and hurried downstairs and into the bar.
There was no one in it at that hour but the bartender and a negro boy.
"Good-morning," said the former. "You are late this morning. Fatigued and
overslept yourself, perhaps."
"Yes. Did Col. Anglesea return last night?"
"He did. He came in about an hour after the house was closed. Pete opened
the door for him."
"And--where is he now? Can I see him at once, do you think?" eagerly
inquired Roland.
"I don't suppose you can see him at once, for Heaven only knows where he
is. He took breakfast at sunrise, and went off in a buggy, saying that he
should not return to-night."
"Oh-h-h-h!" exclaimed Roland, with a perfect howl of disappointment. "And
he has gone?"
"Yes, gone."
"Where? Where?"
"He did not say; so we do not know."
"When will he be back?"
"He said that he should not return to-night; further than that we do not
know."
"Oh, why did you not have me called? Why did you not detain him and send
for me?" demanded Roland, in the tone of a deeply injured individual.
"My dear fellow, I did not happen to see the colonel, or hear of him,
until after he was gone. The head waiter had charge of him, and gave the
message he left for the house," mildly pleaded the bartender.
"Oh-h-h! what a disappointment!" cried Roland, leaving the bar to go in
search of the head waiter.
He found that functionary in the public dining room, and questioned him
closely in regard to the movements of Col. Anglesea; but the head waiter
could only repeat the message left with him by the colonel; and this, of
course, threw no new light on the subject.
Roland went out and questioned the hostler, but the latter knew even less
than the others about the missing guest.
Finally Roland, in spite of his disappointment and anxiety, feeling the
keen hunger of a healthy youth, went in and sat down and ate a very hearty
breakfast.
Then he paid his bill and left the Calvert, leaving every one, from the
host to "boots," wondering what on earth the young man could have wanted
with the colonel, to have kept him waiting all night for him.
But, finally, some one remembered that Mr. Roland Bayard was mate of the
ship which had brought the colonel's forsaken wife--his first wife, as
they called her--from California to Maryland, and that the same Mr. Roland
Bayard had escorted the lady to the neighborhood, and had even introduced
her to his own aunt, the good Miss Sibby Bayard, who had entertained the
stranger without knowing who she really was, or what the nature of her
business in the neighborhood might be.
Therefore, the gossips and wiseacres of the Calvert decided that young
Roland Bayard must be a messenger from "his first wife."
Roland, meanwhile, unmindful of the discussion he had left behind him,
sturdily strode on his way over the frozen highroad, under the winter sky,
toward Greenbushes, to report to Leonidas Force.
Greenbushes was full five miles from Calvert's, so he walked on.