BELLE-ANN'S RECANTED CREED
In mutual contented silence they stood looking after the three officers
leading their sullen prisoner down the mountain trail toward Boon's
Ford. With the first wholesome grin that had touched his face for nearly
two years, Buddy rode on toward the cabin astride Belle-Ann's splendid
horse. Presently Belle-Ann looked up into the pensive face behind her.
"Why didn't you kill Sap, Lem?" she probed, though its answer had been
happily divined.
"I hed a bead on his ear when I heered yore voice, Belle-Ann--I heered
yore voice a callin' 'fo' my sake'--an' I jest couldn't do hit--then I
shot th' snake's haid off."
Knowing Lem as thoroughly as she did, she knew that this humane, gallant
act had been to him a real sacrifice. They sat down upon the log behind
which McGill had hidden. She was waiting for him to speak. With covert,
abashed glance, he was regarding her handsome costume. She knew that he
was puzzled and wondering at this astounding exposition of wealth.
Presently he spoke up:
"Yo'-all look powerful beautiful, Belle-Ann--I never 'lowed they wus
sich fine things in th' worl'."
Her merry, sweet laugh rippled out now as she laid a white hand on his
arm and looked up into his face with a challenge in her eyes. He did not
press her for an explanation. Then with a toss of her curls, she
launched forth and poured her fairy-like tale into his amazed ears, all
about her wondrous discovery of a lovable, priceless grandfather.
Then in wretched contrast to Belle-Ann's glittering conquest below, Lem
recounted his capture by the revenuer, and his tortuous measure of
months in prison. He told of how he had written letter after letter to
her, hoping, always hoping, hourly, daily, monthly, to hear from her.
And the girl's eyes grew misty and her heart went out to him. The very
recital of this experience cast a gloom over him now. Wherefore she
sought to introduce a pleasanter theme and cheer him with prospects of
the future.
"And, Lem," she was saying, "I have ever so much money--oh!--I don't
know how many thousands of dollars--all my own, grandpa says."
Lem had not digested the story of her opulence as enthusiastically as
Belle-Ann had anticipated.
"But I hain't kilt th' revenuer yet--so--so--I 'low----"
"No words can tell you how glad I am, Lem--that you have not succeeded
in killing the revenuer. God will surely lead him to his retribution,
but it is not for you to exact, and I now take back all I said--and you
must promise me not to kill him if you get the chance, and I can't ever
promise you-all anything until you make me this pledge."
Lem rose slowly up off the log and looked curiously down upon her. At
the end of a long minute he spoke:
"Belle-Ann," he said, "I can't understan' yo'--'fore yo' went away t'
school I axed yo' t' promise t' marry me. Yo' wouldn't promise--yo'
wouldn't even 'low me t' kiss yore face then--yo' said thet yo'd never
'low nobuddy t' kiss yo'--thet yo'd never promise t' marry me--lessen I
kilt th' revenuer--an' Gawd knows I been a tryin' t' kill em! Now
yo'-all comes back an' tells me thet yo' don't 'low t' promise me
anythin' ef I _do_ kill th' revenuer--I can't understand thet,
Belle-Ann--I 'low yo'-all is hankerin' t' git shut o' me, Belle-Ann," he
ended despairingly, passing his hand over his eyes as if to brush away
this strange philosophy that had skeined itself in his brain in one
insoluable tangle.
She did not respond straightway. She fully understood the magnitude of
the task she had before her. To convert Lem to her new creed would
enlist all of the gentle diplomacy at her command.
"Belle-Ann, I hev always loved yo'," he resumed solemnly. "I love yo'
now--I love yo' mor'n I love my life--my life hain't as much as thet
daid snake 'sides th' way I love yo'--I'd stand on Henhawk's Knob an'
jump into Hellsfork ef yo'd ax me t'--but, Belle-Ann, I owe th' blood o'
thet revenuer t' pap and t' maw--th' two graves up in th' orchard air a
cryin' out fer th' revenuer's blood. I saved Sap's blood--saved him
'cause yo' called t' me not t' shoot--I let em go, much as I hate th'
pizon mad-dog--saved em as bad as he oughter be daid--but, Belle-Ann,
much as I love yo', yo' can't take th' revenuer 'way from me ef he's
alive yit."
She was appalled at the terrible wave of pain and passion that now swept
his countenance. He poised a clinched fist above his head, as he removed
his derby hat, and casting his eyes upward he added:
"I'll kill thet revenuer--I'll kill thet revenuer, I will, ef lead'll
kill em--I'll have his blood ef I git th' chanct--I'll kill em with my
last lick o' lead--ef I go t' hell th' next minit."
She responded to this volcanic outburst with a soothing pressure on his
arm, as she thrust her arm through his and they walked up the trail
toward the cabin, her mind busily occupied, groping for a mode of
procedure whereby she could convey to him the great divine law of
universal love and charity, prescribing the return of good where evil is
given--a practice not only to shame his erring enemies and brim their
thoughts with penitence; but in its doing to enrich his own soul with a
mollient peace, and clothe his life in a spiritual raiment rarer than
gems and bullion of kings.
When they reached the old honeybee tree, they saw Slab cavorting down to
meet them. His head was back-flung, his arms akimbo, and he showed a
hock action, despite his age, that would have inspired a coach horse
with bitter envy. As he neared them he began yelling:
"Hallalujah--hallalujah--hallalujah!"
He wrung Belle-Ann's hand, tears of joy following the creases in his old
face. He circled around and around her, chanting various adages filched
from the tenets of his sorceristic faith, all of which compared happily
with Belle-Ann's presence. All the way to the cabin Slab's utterances
and antics were effervescent.
"I done tol' dem yo'-all sho'd cum back," he said stoutly. "Den when
yore deah li'lle spirrut cum dat night an' tuck er way dat li'lle
Obeah-stone--den I shore knowed yo' war due--an' ma heart war a shoutin'
all night so hard dat hit keep me wake--an' heah yo' be li'lle gal--heah
yo' be--hits Slab dat knows--Slab he knows."
"Slab," projected Belle-Ann, without the slightest prelude, "Amos
Tennytown wants you."
These words halted Slab with one foot raised. He cautiously let the one
foot down. The smiles that had wreathed his visage when Belle-Ann spoke
were frozen there.
"Come on, Slab," urged Belle-Ann. "Surely you are not scared. Colonel
Amos Tennytown sent you-all a kind message. He wants you to drop in and
see him at Lexington, Slab. Do you remember when that cruel snapping
turtle woke you up?"
Slab was now stumbling along open-mouthed, blinking down at the girl,
his dim eyes shot with a smoldering fire of endeared reminiscences; a
cherished theme that had hovered in his memory since the distant day
when the blue and the gray had dueled,--scenes mellowed by time, but
sweetly mated with "Kitty Wells." Unbelieving and in faltering tones of
half reproach, he said:
"Li'lle gal, don' pesticate de ole man,--I's er ole man, li'lle
gal,--yo' orter be good t' de ole man now--don' fool de ole
man--no--don' fool Slab, li'lle gal--he--he--"
"Slab, I am not fooling you. How could I know about the turtle and old
Hickamohawk if I had not seen Colonel Tennytown? And he wants you down
thah, Slab."
"Li'lle Amos--li'lle Amos?" he repeated, measuring the imaginary height
of a boy with his hand. "Li'lle Amos--he want Slab?"
All doubt vanished.
"Hallalujah--hallalujah--hallalujah!"
Intermittently, Slab advanced stout volumes of oral matter to
demonstrate that the long-looked-for millennium had arrived at last.
At the witch-elm block the old blind hound staggered exultantly about.
Obeying the instinct of his lonely dog-heart, he yelped and yelped with
joy at the vision his senses pictured for him, though which his blank,
sightless eyes could not behold. Belle-Ann fell on her knees and took
his old head to her, stroking his gray face and kissing his ears.
One of the girl's first acts was to gather two great sheaves of
forget-me-nots. These she carried to the orchard. Lem walked beside her,
and now they both fell silent. Dividing the flowers equally, Belle-Ann
knelt down and arranged them with infinite care.
"Maw loved these," she whispered. "Maw loved these best of all, didn't
she, Lem?" She looked up through a film of mist. Their eyes met, and Lem
turned his back and walked slowly away and did not answer.
For half an hour the girl lingered there between these two graves with
her memories. When she finally got to her feet and lifted her swollen
eyes, she saw Slab standing looking at her. The tears were streaming
down his ancient, creased visage. His lips moved helplessly, but no
words crossed them. He could only point to numberless withered flowers,
and seared wreaths scattered hard by, which he had discarded to replace
with fresh ones.
"Yes, Slab--you-all did not forget, did you?" she managed to say.
The old negro shook his white head, too overcome to respond.
Belle-Ann and Lem then made the rounds of the place, followed by little
Buddy, lugging his father's rifle. They walked out beneath the
magnolias, and the giant pines, and visited their old haunts, each of
which stirred memories of hours agone.
When they returned to the house, Slab had a most tasteful meal prepared
for them. The menu consisted of two kinds of bread, hoe-cake, and hot
butter-milk biscuits with honey. It also embraced baked yams with fresh
butter, fried spring chicken, poached eggs, rich, fresh milk, and
blackberries and cream.
As Belle-Ann lingered over this repast, she felt that she had not,
during her absence, tasted anything quite so delicious. Near dusk, Slab
took up his hybrid banjo and repaired to the witch-elm block, followed
by the others. There, with the blind hound's aged head in her lap,
Belle-Ann joined in the chorus of "Kitty Wells." And as the shadows
stole down and put their arms about them, the day lifted, and the
thread-like note of the mock-thrush ebbed away from the blossomed sides
of the mountain. The plaintive callings of the Bob White ceased, and the
forest birds folded their wings. And another choir of voices awoke to
cross and re-cross the void of twilight.
The katydids began to purl. A symphony of crickets trilled away in the
darkling rhododendron thickets. The tree-frogs piped an avalanche of
pleading notes amid the ruby-throated magnolias. The silvery treble of
the nightingale floated down from afar, and the hilarious killdeers,
king of all-night revelers, screamed aloft and flapped their speckled
wings in the early starlight. And above this, in soughing, alternate
waves of sound, a titanic rhythm trailed into this medley of wilderness
voices--the savage, deathless music of the cascade ranting in the
rock-barbed throat of Hellsfork, dying, swelling, reverberating like the
barbaric boom of a tom-tom.
That night Belle-Ann occupied her own little crude apartment in the
four-room cabin. She slept soundly and sweetly in this little wooden
bed, which Slab had reverently preserved unaltered for her coming. And
the night air drifted in upon her face, pungent with the scent of pine,
and the old sweet odors that summoned a hundred memories to vivid life.
There were the self-same multiplicity of night enunciations,
consolidated and merged into a soothing litany, harping a pulsing
consonance that lured the girl's senses away to the fantastic shoals of
dreamdom. And betimes, the same great, friendly moon that had followed
her abroad, came now and stood at her window.