IT was almost dark when Pole reached his humble domicile. The mountain
air was cool, and through the front window of the living-room he saw the
flare of a big, cheerful fire. He went into the house, but his wife
was not in sight. Looking into the bedroom, he saw the children sound
asleep, their yellow heads all in a row.
“God bless 'em!” he said, fervently. “I reckon the'r mammy's down at the
barn.” Going out at the back-door, he went to the cow-lot, and then he
heard Sally's voice rising above the squealing of pigs and the cackling
of hens. “So, so, Lil! can't you behave?” he heard her saying. “I git
out o' all patience. I can't keep the brat out. I might as well give up,
an' yet we've _got_ to have milk.”
“What's the matter, Sally?” Pole called out, as he looked over the
rail-fence.
“Why, I can't keep this fool calf away,” she said, turning to him, her
tin pail in her hand, her face red with vexation. “The little imp is
stealin' all the milk. He's had enough already to bust 'im wide open.”
Pole laughed merrily; there was much stored in his mind to make him
joyous. “Let me git at the dern little skunk,” he said; and vaulting
over the fence with the agility of an acrobat, he took the sleek,
fawnlike creature in his strong arms and stood holding it against his
breast as if it were an infant. “That's the way to treat 'im?” he cried.
And carrying the animal to the fence, he dropped it on the outside.
“Thar, you scamp!” he laughed; “you mosey around out here in the
tater-patch till you l'arn some table manners.”
Sally laughed and looked at her husband proudly. “I'm glad you come when
you did,” she said, “fer you wouldn't 'a' had any milk to go on yore
mush; me'n' the childem have had our supper an' they are tucked away in
bed.”
“Let me finish milkin',” Pole said. “An' you go in an' git my mush
ready.” He took the pail and sat down on an inverted soap-box. “I'll
make up fer that calf's stealin' or I'll have old Lil's bag as flabby as
an empty meal-sack.”
In a few minutes he followed Sally into the kitchen where she had his
simple supper ready for him. When he had eaten it, he led her into the
living-room and they sat down before the fire. It was only for a moment,
though, for she heard little Billy talking in his sleep and sprang up
and went to him. She came back to her chair in a moment.
“The very fust spare money I git,” she said, “I'm goin' to have panes o'
glass put in that window in thar. I keep old rags stuffed in the holes,
but the rain beats 'em down, and hard winds blow 'em out. It don't take
as much fire-wood to keep a tight house warm as it does an open one like
this.”
“Sally, we ought to live in a great big fine house,” he said, his eyes
on the coals under the red logs.
“I say!” she sneered. “I've been afeard some'n' mought happen to drive
us out o' this 'un. Pole, to tell the truth, I've been worryin'.”
“You say you have, Sally?”
“Yes, I worry all day, an' sometimes I wake up in the night an' lie
unable to sleep fer thinkin'. I'm bothered about the debt you owe Floyd
& Mayhew. It's drawin' interest an' climbin' higher an' higher. I know
well enough that Nelson wouldn't push us, but, Pole, ef he was to happen
to die, his business would have to be settled up, an' they say Mr.
Mayhew hain't one speck o' mercy on pore folks. When it was reported
that some'n' had happened to Nelson a while back, I was mighty nigh out
o' my head with worry, but I didn't tell you. Pole, we've got to git
free o' that debt by some hook or crook.”
“I think we kin manage it,” Pole said, his eyes kindling with a subtle
glow.
“That's the way you always talk,” Mrs. Baker sighed; “but that isn't
payin' us out.”
“It comes easy to some folks to make money,” Pole said, with seeming
irrelevance; “an' hard to others. Sally, did you ever--have you ever
been on Colonel Price's plantation?”
“Many and many a time, Pole,” Mrs. Baker answered, with a reminiscent
glow in her face. “When I was a girl, he used to let our crowd have
picnics at his big spring, just below the house, and one rainy day he
invited some of us all through it. It was the only time I was ever in as
fine a house as that an' it tuck my breath away. Me'n' Lillie Turnbull
slipped into the big parlor by ourselves and set down an' made out like
we lived thar an' was entertainin' company. She'd rock back an' forth in
one o' the big chairs an' pretend she was a fine lady. She was a great
mimic, an' she'd call out like thar was servants all around, an' order
'em to fetch 'er cool water an' fan 'er an' the like. Poor Lillie!
the last I heard of her she was beggin' bread fer her childern over at
Gainesville whar Ned was killed in an' explosion at the cotton-mill whar
he'd finally got work.
“I jest started to tell you,” Pole said, “that Nelson Floyd bought that
plantation to-day--bought it lock, stock, an' barrel--house, furniture,
hosses, implements--everythin'!”
“You don't say!” Mrs. Baker leaned forward, her eyes wide in surprise.
“Yes, he tuck it in out o' the wet with part o' the money he made on
that Atlanta deal. An' do you know, Sally, I was right thar in the back
end o' his store an' heard 'im contract with a man to manage it fer 'im.
The feller is to git three thousand dollars a year in cash--two hundred
an' fifty dollars a month, mind you, an' also the use of the big
furnished house, an' as much land fer himself as he needed, the use of
the buggies an' carriage an' spring-wagon an' barn--in fact, the whole
blamed lay-out. He axed me about hirin' the feller an' I told 'im
the dem skunk wasn't wuth his salt, but Nelson would have his way. He
engaged 'im on the spot.”
“Who was the man, Pole?” there was just a shade of heart-sick envy in
the tired countenance of the woman.
“Oh, it was a feller that come up from Atlanta about three days ago,”
Pole answered, with his usual readiness. “It seems that him an' Nelson
was sorter friends, an' had had dealin's in one way an' another before.”
“Has this--this new man any wife?” Mrs. Baker inquired, as a further
evidence of secret reflections.
“Yes--a fine woman, and nice childem, Sally. He seemed to be the only
scrub in the bunch.”
Mrs. Baker sighed. “I guess he's got some'n' in 'im,” she said, her eyes
cast down, “or Nelson Floyd, with his eye for business, wouldn't 'a'
give 'im a mansion like that to live in an' all them wages. He must be
an educated man, Pole.”
“No he ain't,” Pole smiled; “he barely kin read an' write an' figure
a little; that's all. Sally, the feller's a-settin' right here in this
room now. I'm the manager o' that big place, Sally.”
She laughed as if to humor him, and then she raised her eyes to his.
“Pole,” she said, in a cold, hard voice, “don't joke about a thing like
that. Somehow I don't believe that men who joke about doin' well, as es
ef the like was clean out o' the'r reach, ever do make money; it's them
that say what one kin do another kin that make the'r way.”
“But I wasn't jokin', little woman.” Pole caught her hand and pressed
it. “As God is my judge, I'm the man, an' you' an' me an' the childern
are a-goin' to move into that fine house right off.”
For a moment she stared into his face incredulously, and then gradually
the truth dawned upon her.
“Oh, Pole,” she cried. “I can't stand it--it will _kill_ me!” and with
a great sob the little woman burst into tears. He tried to stop her, his
rough hand on her frail, thin back, but her emotion swept through her
like a storm. Suddenly she raised a wet, glowing face to his, and,
with her sun-browned hand pressed tightly on her breast, she cried: “It
hurts; it hurts right here--oh, Pole, I'm afraid it will kill me!”
In a few moments she was calmer, and as she sat in the red fire-light
all aglow with her new happiness, she was a revelation to him. Not for
years had he seen her look that way. She seemed young again. The marks
of sorrow, poverty, and carking fear had dropped from her. Her eyes had
the glisten of bedewed youth, her voice the vibrant ring of unquenchable
joy. Suddenly she stood up.
“What you goin' to do?” he asked.
“To wake the childern an' tell 'em,” she said.
“I don't believe I would, Sally,” he protested.
“But I am--I _am!_” she insisted. “Do you reckon I'm goin' to let them
pore little things lie thar an' not know it--not know it till mornin'?”
He let her have her way, and walked out on the little porch and slowly
down to the barn. Suddenly he stretched out his hands and held them up
towards the stars, and took a deep, reverent breath.
“I wish I'd l'arnt to pray when I was a boy,” he said, lowering his
arms. “Somehow I feel like I've at last come through. I've come from
the shadow of the Valley of Death out into God's eternal light. Then I'd
like to put in a word at the Throne fer Nelson. Ef I knowed how to say
it, I'd beg the Almighty to turn Hillhouse down. Hillhouse kin git 'im
another one, but Nelson never kin--never in this world! He hain't got
that look in the eyes. He's got a case o' woman as bad as I have, an'
that's sayin' a lots.”
Pole turned and slowly retraced his steps. Going in and sitting down by
the fire again, he heard his wife's voice rising and falling in a sweet
monotone. After a while she ceased speaking and came back to the fire.
“So you had to wake 'em,” he said, tenderly, very tenderly, as if his
soul had melted into words.
“I tried, Pole, but I couldn't,” she made answer. “I shuck 'em an' shuck
'em. I even tuck little Billy up an' rolled 'im over an' over, but he
was too dead tired to wake. So I give up.”
“But I heard you talkin',” Pole said, wonderingly.
“Yes, I had to talk to somebody, Pole, an'--well, I was a-tellin' 'em.
They was asleep, but I was a-tellin' 'em.”
She sat down by him. “I ain't a-goin' to close my eyes to-night,” she
went on, softly; “but what does it matter? I reckon thar won't be no
sleepin' in heaven, an' that's whar I am right now, Pole.”
She put the side of her flushed face down on his knee and looked into
the fire.