THE following Sunday morning Nelson Floyd went to church. From the
doorway he descried a vacant seat on the side of the house occupied
by the men and boys, and when he had taken it and looked over the
well-filled room, he saw that he had Cynthia Porter in plain view. She
had come alone. A few seats behind her he saw Pole Baker and his wife.
Pole had never looked better. He wore a new suit of clothes and had
recently had his hair trimmed. Floyd tried to catch his eye, but Pole
looked neither to the right nor left, seeming only intent on Hillhouse,
who had risen to read the chapter from the Bible which contained the
text for his sermon. In their accustomed places sat Captain Duncan and
his daughter Evelyn. The old gentleman had placed his silk-hat on the
floor at the end of the bench on which he sat, and his kid-gloved hands
rested on his gold-headed, ebony cane, which stood erect between his
knees.
When the service was over and the congregation was passing out, Floyd
waited for Cynthia, whom he saw coming out immediately behind the
Duncans. “Hello, Floyd; how are you?” the captain exclaimed, cordially,
as he came up. “Going home? Daughter and I have a place for you in the
carriage and will drop you at the hotel--that is, if you won't let us
take you on to dinner.”
Floyd flushed. Cynthia was now quite near, and he saw from her face that
she had overheard the invitation.
“I thank you very much, captain,” Floyd said, as he smiled and nodded
to her, “but I see that Miss Cynthia is alone, and I was just waiting to
ask her to let me walk home with her.”
“Ah, I see!” Duncan exclaimed, with a gallant bow and smile to Cynthia.
“I wouldn't break up a nice thing like that if I could. I haven't
forgotten my young days, and this is the time of the year, my boy, when
the grass is green and the sun drives you into the shade.”
With a very haughty nod to Floyd and Cynthia together, Evelyn Duncan
walked stiffly on ahead of her father.
Outside, Cynthia looked straight into the eyes of her escort.
“Why did you refuse Captain Duncan's invitation?” she asked.
“Why did I?” He laughed, mysteriously. “Because during service I made up
my mind that I'd get to you before the parson did; and then I had other
reasons.”
“What were they?”
“Gossip,” he said, with a low, significant laugh.
“Gossip? I don't understand,” Cynthia said, perplexed.
“Well, I heard,” Floyd replied, “that since I've been finally invited to
Duncan's house I'll run there night and day, and that it will end in
my marrying that little bunch of lace and ribbons. I heard other
speculations, too, on my future conduct, and as I saw our village
talker, Mrs. Snodgrass, was listening just now, I was tickled at the
chance to decline the invitation and walk home with you. It will be all
over the country by night.”
They were traversing a cool, shaded road now, and as most of the
congregation had taken other directions, they were comparatively alone.
“Evelyn Duncan is in love with you,” Cynthia said, abruptly, her glance
on the ground.
“That's ridiculous,” Floyd laughed. “Simply ridiculous.”
“I know--I saw it in her face when you said you were going home with me.
She could have bitten my head off.”
“Good gracious, I've never talked with her more than two or three times
in all my life.”
“That may be, but she has heard dozens of people say it will be just the
thing for you to marry her, and she has wondered--” Cynthia stopped.
“Look here, little woman, we've had enough of this,” Floyd said,
abruptly. “I saw the light in your room the other night, and I stood and
whistled and whistled, but you wouldn't come to me. I had a lot to tell
you.”
“I told you I'd never meet you that way again, and I meant it.” Cynthia
was looking straight into his eyes. .
“I know you did, but I thought you might relent. I was chock full of my
new discovery--or rather Pole Baker's--and I wanted to pour it out on
you.”
“Of course, you are happy over it?” Cynthia said, tentatively.
“It has been the one great experience of my life,” said Floyd,
impressively. “No one who has not been through it, Cynthia, can have any
idea of what it means. It is on my mind at night when I go to bed; it is
in my dreams; it is in my thoughts when I get up.”
“I wanted to know about your mother,” ventured the girl, reverently.
“What was she like?”
“That is right where I'm in the dark,” Floyd answered. “Pole didn't get
my new relative to say a thing about her. I would have written to him at
length, but Pole advised me to wait till I could see him personally. My
uncle seems to be a crusty, despondent, unlucky sort of old fellow,
and, as there was a kind of estrangement between him and my father, Pole
thinks it would irritate him to have to answer my letters. However, I am
going down to Atlanta to call on him next Wednesday.”
“Oh, I see,” said Cynthia. “Speaking of Pole Baker--I suppose you heard
of what the White Caps did the other night?”
“Yes, and it pained me deeply,” said Floyd, “for I was the indirect
cause of the whole trouble.”
“You?”
“Yes, Pole is this way: It is usually some big trouble or great joy that
throws him off his balance, and it was the good news he brought to me
that upset him. It was in my own room at the hotel, too, that he found
the whiskey. A bottle of it was on my table and he slipped it into his
pocket and took it off with him. I never missed it till I heard he was
on a spree. His friends are trying to keep his wife from finding out
about the White Caps.”
“They needn't trouble further,” Cynthia said, bitterly. “I was over
there yesterday. Mrs. Snodgrass had just told her about it, and I
thought the poor woman would die. She ordered Mrs. Snodgrass out of the
house, telling her never to darken her door again, and she stood on the
porch, as white as death, screaming after her at the top of her voice.
Mrs. Snodgrass was so frightened that she actually broke into a run.”
“The old hag!” Floyd said, darkly. “I wish the same gang would take her
out some night and tie her tongue at least.”
“Mrs. Baker came back to me then,” Cynthia went on. “She put her head in
my lap and sobbed as if her heart would break. Nothing I could possibly
say would comfort her. She worships the ground Pole walks on. And she
_ought_ to love him. He's good and noble and full of tenderness. She saw
him coming while we were talking, and quickly dried her eyes.
“'He mustn't see me crying,' she said. 'If he thought I knew this he
would never get over it.'
“He came in then and noticed her red eyes, and I saw him turn pale as
he sat studying her face. Then to throw him off she told him a fib. She
told him I'd been taking her into my confidence about something which
she was not at liberty to reveal.”
“Ah, I see,” exclaimed Floyd, admiringly. “She's a shrewd little
woman--nearly as shrewd as he is.”
“But he acted queerly after that, I must say,”
Cynthia went on. “He at once quit looking at her, and sat staring at me
in the oddest way. I spoke to him, but he wouldn't answer. When I was
going home, he followed me as far as the bam. 'You couldn't tell me that
secret, could you, little sister?' he said, with a strange, excited look
on his face. Of course, I saw that he thought it was some trouble of
mine, but I couldn't set him right and be true to his wife, and so I
said nothing. He walked on with me to the branch, still looking worried;
then, when we were about to part, he held out his hand. 'I want to say
right here, little sister,' he said, 'that I love you like a brother,
and if any harm comes to you, _in any way_, I'll be with you.'”
“He's very queer,” said Floyd, thoughtfully. They were now near the
house and he paused. “I'll not go any farther,” he said. “It will do no
good to disturb your mother. She hates the ground I walk on. She will
only make it unpleasant for you if she sees us together. Good-bye, I'll
see you when I get back from Atlanta.”