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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Voice of the People, by Ellen Glasgow
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Voice of the People
+
+Author: Ellen Glasgow
+
+Release Date: August 10, 2005 [EBook #16505]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE VOICE OF THE PEOPLE ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Suzanne Shell, Ed Casulli and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+BY THE SAME AUTHOR
+
+"THE DESCENDANT"
+
+AND
+
+"PHASES OF AN INFERIOR PLANET"
+
+
+CROWNED MASTERPIECES OF MODERN FICTION
+
+SPECIAL SUBSCRIPTION EDITION
+
+
+
+The Voice of the People
+
+
+BY
+
+Ellen Glasgow
+
+
+
+NEW YORK, DOUBLEDAY
+PAGE & COMPANY, 1904
+
+Copyright, 1900, by
+ELLEN GLASGOW
+
+Published September, 1902
+
+
+
+TO REBE GORDON GLASGOW
+
+
+
+
+
+THE VOICE OF THE PEOPLE
+
+
+
+
+BOOK I
+
+FAIR WEATHER AT KINGSBOROUGH
+
+
+
+
+I
+
+
+The last day of Circuit Court was over at Kingsborough.
+
+The jury had vanished from the semicircle of straight-backed chairs in
+the old court-house, the clerk had laid aside his pen along with his air
+of listless attention, and the judge was making his way through the
+straggling spectators to the sunken stone steps of the platform outside.
+As the crowd in the doorway parted slightly, a breeze passed into the
+room, scattering the odours of bad tobacco and farm-stained clothing.
+The sound of a cow-bell came through one of the small windows, from the
+green beyond, where a red-and-white cow was browsing among the
+buttercups.
+
+"A fine day, gentlemen," said the judge, bowing to right and left. "A
+fine day."
+
+He moved slowly, fanning himself absently with his white straw hat,
+pausing from time to time to exchange a word of greeting--secure in the
+affability of one who is not only a judge of man but a Bassett of
+Virginia. From his classic head to his ill-fitting boots he upheld the
+traditions of his office and his race.
+
+On the stone platform, just beyond the entrance, he stopped to speak to
+a lawyer from a neighbouring county. Then, as a clump of men scattered
+at his approach, he waved them together with a bland, benedictory
+gesture which descended alike upon the high and the low, upon the rector
+of the old church up the street, in his rusty black, and upon the
+red-haired, raw-boned farmer with his streaming brow.
+
+"Glad to see you out, sir," he said to the one, and to the other, "How
+are you, Burr? Time the crops were in the ground, isn't it?"
+
+Burr mumbled a confused reply, wiping his neck laboriously on his red
+cotton handkerchief.
+
+"The corn's been planted goin' on six weeks," he said more distinctly,
+ejecting his words between mouthfuls of tobacco juice as if they were
+pebbles which obstructed his speech. "I al'ays stick to plantin' yo'
+corn when the hickory leaf's as big as a squirrel's ear. If you don't,
+the luck's agin you."
+
+"An' whar thar's growin' corn thar's a sight o' hoein'," put in an
+alert, nervous-looking countryman. "If I lay my hoe down for a spell,
+the weeds git so big I can't find the crop."
+
+Amos Burr nodded with slow emphasis: "I never see land take so natural
+to weeds nohow as mine do," he said. "When you raise peanuts you're
+raisin' trouble."
+
+He was a lean, overworked man, with knotted hands the colour of the
+soil he tilled and an inanely honest face, over which the freckles
+showed like splashes of mud freshly dried. As he spoke he gave his blue
+jean trousers an abrupt hitch at the belt.
+
+"Dear me! Dear me!" returned the judge with absent-minded, habitual
+friendliness, smiling his rich, beneficent smile. Then, as he caught
+sight of a smaller red head beneath Burr's arm, he added: "You've a
+right-hand man coming on, I see. What's your name, my boy?"
+
+The boy squirmed on his bare, brown feet and wriggled his head from
+beneath his father's arm. He did not answer, but he turned his bright
+eyes on the judge and flushed through all the freckles of his ugly
+little face.
+
+"Nick--that is, Nicholas, sir," replied the elder Burr with an
+apologetic cough, due to the insignificance of the subject. "Yes, sir,
+he's leetle, but he's plum full of grit. He can beat any nigger I ever
+seed at the plough. He'd outplough me if he war a head taller."
+
+"That will mend," remarked the lawyer from the neighbouring county with
+facetious intention. "A boy and a beanstalk will grow, you know. There's
+no helping it."
+
+"Oh, he'll be a man soon enough," added the judge, his gaze passing over
+the large, red head to rest upon the small one, "and a farmer like his
+father before him, I suppose."
+
+He was turning away when the child's voice checked him, and he paused.
+
+"I--I'd ruther be a judge," said the boy.
+
+He was leaning against the faded bricks of the old court-house, one
+sunburned hand playing nervously with the crumbling particles. His
+honest little face was as red as his hair.
+
+The judge started.
+
+"Ah!" he exclaimed, and he looked at the child with his kindly eyes. The
+boy was ugly, lean, and stunted in growth, browned by hot suns and
+powdered by the dust of country roads, but his eyes caught the gaze of
+the judge and held it.
+
+Above his head, on the brick wall, a board was nailed, bearing in black
+marking the name of the white-sand street which stretched like a
+chalk-drawn line from the grass-grown battlefields to the pale old
+buildings of King's College. The street had been called in honour of a
+duke of Gloucester. It was now "Main" Street, and nothing more, though
+it was still wide and white and placidly impressed by the slow passage
+of Kingsborough feet. Beyond the court-house the breeze blew across the
+green, which was ablaze with buttercups. Beneath the warm wind the
+yellow heads assumed the effect of a brilliant tangle, spreading over
+the unploughed common, running astray in the grass-lined ditch that
+bordered the walk, hiding beneath dusty-leaved plants in unsuspected
+hollows, and breaking out again under the horses' hoofs in the sandy
+street.
+
+"Ah!" exclaimed the judge, and a good-natured laugh ran round the group.
+
+"Wall, I never!" ejaculated the elder Burr, but there was no surprise in
+his tone; it expressed rather the helplessness of paternity.
+
+The boy faced them, pressing more firmly against the bricks.
+
+"There ain't nothin' in peanut-raisin'," he said. "It's jest farmin' fur
+crows. I'd ruther be a judge."
+
+The judge laughed and turned from him.
+
+"Stick to the soil, my boy," he advised. "Stick to the soil. It is the
+best thing to do. But if you choose the second best, and I can help you,
+I will--I will, upon my word--Ah! General," to a jovial-faced,
+wide-girthed gentleman in a brown linen coat, "I'm glad to see you in
+town. Fine weather!"
+
+He put on his hat, bowed again, and went on his way.
+
+He passed slowly along in the spring sunshine, his feet crunching upon
+the gravel, his straight shadow falling upon the white level between
+coarse fringes of wire-grass. Far up the town, at the street's sudden
+end, where it was lost in diverging roads, there was visible, as through
+a film of bluish smoke, the verdigris-green foliage of King's College.
+Nearer at hand the solemn cruciform of the old church was steeped in
+shade, the high bell-tower dropping a veil of English ivy as it rose
+against the sky. Through the rusty iron gate of the graveyard the marble
+slabs glimmered beneath submerging grasses, long, pale, tremulous like
+reeds.
+
+The grass-grown walk beside the low brick wall of the churchyard led on
+to the judge's own garden, a square enclosure, laid out in straight
+vegetable rows, marked off by variegated borders of flowering
+plants--heartsease, foxglove, and the red-lidded eyes of scarlet
+poppies. Beyond the feathery green of the asparagus bed there was a bush
+of flowering syringa, another at the beginning of the grass-trimmed
+walk, and yet another brushing the large white pillars of the square
+front porch--their slender sprays blown from sun to shade like
+fluttering streamers of cream-coloured ribbons. On the other side there
+were lilacs, stately and leafy and bare of bloom, save for a few
+ashen-hued bunches lingering late amid the heavy foliage. At the foot of
+the garden the wall was hidden in raspberry vines, weighty with ripening
+fruit.
+
+The judge closed the gate after him and ascended the steps. It was not
+until he had crossed the wide hall and opened the door of his study that
+he heard the patter of bare feet, and turned to find that the boy had
+followed him.
+
+For an instant he regarded the child blankly; then his hospitality
+asserted itself, and he waved him courteously into the room.
+
+"Walk in, walk in, and take a seat. I am at your service."
+
+He crossed to one of the tall windows, unfastening the heavy inside
+shutters, from which the white paint was fast peeling away. As they fell
+back a breeze filled the room, and the ivory faces of microphylla roses
+stared across the deep window-seat. The place was airy as a summer-house
+and odorous with the essence of roses distilled in the sunshine beyond.
+On the high plastered walls, above the book-shelves, rows of bygone
+Bassetts looked down on their departed possessions--stately and severe
+in the artificial severity of periwigs and starched ruffles. They looked
+down with immobile eyes and the placid monotony of past fashions,
+smiling always the same smile, staring always at the same spot of floor
+or furniture.
+
+Below them the room was still hallowed by their touch. They asserted
+themselves in the quaint curves of the rosewood chairs, in the blue
+patterns upon the willow bowls, and in the choice lavender of the old
+Wedgwood. Their handiwork was visible in the laborious embroideries of
+the fire-screen near the empty grate, and the spinet in one unlighted
+corner still guarded their gay and amiable airs.
+
+"Sit down," said the judge. "I am at your service."
+
+He seated himself before his desk of hand-carved mahogany, pushing aside
+the papers that littered its baize-covered lid. In the half-gloom of the
+high-ceiled room his face assumed the look of a portrait in oils, and he
+seemed to have descended from his allotted square upon the plastered
+wall, to be but a boldly limned composite likeness of his race, awaiting
+the last touches and the gilded frame.
+
+"What can I do for you?" he asked again, his tone preserving its
+unfailing courtesy. He had not made an uncivil remark since the close of
+the war--a line of conduct resulting less from what he felt to be due to
+others than from what he believed to be becoming in himself.
+
+The boy shifted on his bare feet. In the old-timed setting of the
+furniture he was an alien--an anachronism--the intrusion of the
+hopelessly modern into the helplessly past. His hair made a rich spot in
+the colourless atmosphere, and it seemed to focus the incoming light
+from the unshuttered window, leaving the background in denser shadow.
+
+The animation of his features jarred the serenity of the room. His
+profile showed gnome-like against the nodding heads of the microphylla
+roses.
+
+"There ain't nothin' in peanut-raisin'," he said suddenly; "I--I'd
+ruther be a judge."
+
+"My dear boy!" exclaimed the judge, and finished helplessly, "my dear
+boy--I--well--I--"
+
+They were both silent. The regular droning of the old clock sounded
+distinctly in the stillness. The perfume of roses, mingling with the
+musty scent from the furniture, borrowed the quality of musk.
+
+The child was breathing heavily. Suddenly he dug the dirty knuckles of
+one fist into his eyes.
+
+"Don't cry," began the judge. "Please don't. Perhaps you would like to
+run out and play with my boy Tom?"
+
+"I warn't cryin'," said the child. "It war a gnat."
+
+His hand left his eyes and returned to his hat--a wide-brimmed harvest
+hat, with a shoestring tied tightly round the crown.
+
+When the judge spoke again it was with seriousness.
+
+"Nicholas--your name is Nicholas, isn't it?"
+
+"Yes, sir."
+
+"How old are you?"
+
+"Twelve, sir."
+
+"Can you read?"
+
+"Yes, sir."
+
+"Write?"
+
+"Y-e-s, sir."
+
+"Spell?"
+
+The child hesitated. "I--I can spell--some."
+
+"Don't you know it is a serious thing to be a judge?"
+
+"Yes, sir."
+
+"You must be a lawyer first."
+
+"Yes, sir."
+
+"It is hard work."
+
+"Yes, sir."
+
+"And sometimes it's no better than farming for crows."
+
+The boy shook his head. "It's cleaner work, sir."
+
+The judge laughed.
+
+"I'm afraid you are obstinate, Nicholas," he said, and added: "Now, what
+do you want me to do for you? I can't make you a judge. It took me fifty
+years to make myself one--a third-rate one at that--"
+
+"I--I'd l-i-k-e to take a bo-b-o-o-k," stammered the boy.
+
+"Dear me!" said the judge irritably, "dear me!"
+
+He frowned, his gaze skimming his well-filled shelves. He regretted
+suddenly that he had spoken to the child at the court-house. He would
+never be guilty of such an indiscretion again. Of what could he have
+been thinking? A book! Why didn't he ask for food--money--his best piece
+of fluted Royal Worcester?
+
+Then a loud, boyish laugh rang in from the garden, and his face softened
+suddenly. In the sun-scorched, honest-eyed little figure before him he
+saw his own boy--the single child of his young wife, who was lying
+beneath a marble slab in the churchyard. Her face, mild and
+Madonna-like, glimmered against the pallid rose leaves in the deep
+window-seat.
+
+He turned hastily away.
+
+"Yes, yes," he answered, "I will lend you one. Read the titles
+carefully. Don't let the books fall. Never lay them face downwards--and
+don't turn down the leaves!"
+
+The boy advanced timidly to the shelves between the southern windows. He
+ran his hands slowly along the lettered backs, his lips moving as he
+spelled out the names.
+
+"The F-e-d-e-r-a-l-i-s-t," "B-l-a-c-k-s-t-o-n-e-'s
+C-o-m-m-e-n-t-a-r-i-e-s," "R-e-v-i-s-e-d Sta-tu-tes of the U-ni-ted
+Sta-tes."
+
+The judge drew up to his desk and looked over his letters. Then he took
+up his pen and wrote several replies in his fine, flowing handwriting.
+He had forgotten the boy, when he felt a touch upon his arm.
+
+"What is it?" he asked absently. "Ah, it is you? Yes, let me see. Why!
+you've got Sir Henry Maine!"
+
+The boy was holding the book in both hands. As the judge laughed he
+flushed nervously and turned towards the door.
+
+The judge leaned back in his chair, watching the small figure cross the
+room and disappear into the hall. He saw the tracks of dust which the
+boy's feet left upon the smooth, bare floor, but he was not thinking of
+them. Then, as the child went out upon the porch, he started up.
+
+"Nicholas!" he called, "don't turn down the leaves!"
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+
+A facetious stranger once remarked that Kingsborough dozed through the
+present to dream of the past and found the future a nightmare. Had he
+been other than a stranger, he would, perhaps, have added that
+Kingsborough's proudest boast was that she had been and was not--a
+distinction giving her preeminence over certain cities whose charters
+were not received from royal grants--cities priding themselves not only
+upon a multiplicity of streets, but upon the more plebeian fact that the
+feet of their young men followed the offending thoroughfares to the
+undignified music of the march of progress.
+
+But, whatever might be said of places that shall be nameless, it was
+otherwise with Kingsborough. Kingsborough was the same yesterday,
+to-day, and forever. She who had feasted royal governors, staked and
+lost upon Colonial races, and exploded like an ignited powder-horn in
+the cause of American independence, was still superbly conscious of the
+honours which had been hers. Her governors were no longer royal, nor did
+she feast them; her races were run by fleet-footed coloured urchins on
+the court-house green; her powder-magazine had evolved through
+differentiation from a stable into a church; but Kingsborough clung to
+her amiable habits. Travellers still arrived at the landing stage some
+several miles distant and were driven over all but impassable roads to
+the town. The eastern wall of the court-house still bore the sign
+"England Street," though the street had vanished beneath encroaching
+buttercups, and the implied loyalty had been found wanting. Kingsborough
+juries still sat in their original semicircle, with their backs to the
+judge and their faces, presumably, to the law; Kingsborough farmers
+still marketed their small truck in the street called after the Duke of
+Gloucester; and Kingsborough cows still roamed at will over the vaults
+in the churchyard. In time trivial changes would come to pass. Tourists
+would arrive with the railroad; the powder-magazine would turn from a
+church into a museum; gardens would decay and ancient elms would fall,
+but the farmers and the cows would not be missed from their accustomed
+haunts. On the hospitable thresholds of "general" stores battle-scarred
+veterans of the war between the States dealt in victorious reminiscences
+of vanquishment. They had fought well, they had fallen silently, and
+they had risen without bitterness. For the people of Kingsborough had
+opened their doors to wounded foes while the battle raged through their
+streets, succouring while they resisted. They lived easily and they died
+hard, but when death came they met it, not in grim Puritanism, but with
+a laugh upon the lips. They made a joy of life while it was possible,
+and when that ceased to be, they did the next best thing and made a
+friend of death. Long ago theirs had been the first part in Virginia,
+and, as they still believed, theirs had been also the centre of all
+things. Now the high places were laid low, and the greatness had passed
+as a trumpet that is blown. Kingsborough persisted still, but it
+persisted evasively, hovering, as it were, upon the outskirts of modern
+advancement. And the outside world took note only when it made tours to
+historic strongholds, or sent those of itself that were adjudged insane
+to the hospitable shelter of the asylum upon the hill.
+
+It was afternoon, and Kingsborough was asleep.
+
+Along the verdurous, gray lanes the houses seemed abandoned, shuttered,
+filled with shade. From the court-house green came the chime of
+cow-bells rising and falling in slow waves of sound. A spotted calf
+stood bleating in the crooked footpath, which traversed diagonally the
+waste of buttercups like a white seam in a cloth of gold. Against the
+arching sky rose the bell-tower of the grim old church, where the
+sparrows twittered in the melancholy gables and the startled face of the
+stationary clock stared blankly above the ivied walls. Farther away, at
+the end of a wavering lane, slanted the shadow of the insane asylum.
+
+Across the green the houses were set in surrounding gardens like cards
+in bouquets of mixed blossoms. They were of frame for the most part,
+with shingled roofs and small, square windows hidden beneath climbing
+roses. On one of the long verandas a sleeping girl lay in a hammock, a
+gray cat at her feet. No sound came from the house behind her, but a
+breeze blew through the dim hall, fluttering the folds of her dress.
+Beyond the adjoining garden a lady in mourning entered a gate where
+honeysuckle grew, and above, on the low-dormered roof, a white pigeon
+sat preening its feathers. Up the main street, where a few sunken bricks
+of a vanished pavement were still visible, an old negro woman, sitting
+on the stone before her cabin, lighted her replenished pipe with a
+taper, and leaned back, smoking, in the doorway, her scarlet
+handkerchief making a spot of colour on the dull background.
+
+The sun was still high when the judge came out upon his porch, a smile
+of indecision on his face and his hat in his hand. Pausing upon the
+topmost step, he cast an uncertain glance sideways at the walk leading
+past the church, and then looked straight ahead through the avenue of
+maples, which began at the smaller green facing the ancient site of the
+governor's palace and skirted the length of the larger one, which took
+its name from the court-house. At last he descended the steps with his
+leisurely tread, turning at the gate to throw a remonstrance to an old
+negro whose black face was framed in the library window.
+
+"Now, Caesar, didn't I--"
+
+"Lord, Marse George, dis yer washed-out blue bowl, wid de little white
+critters sprawlin' over it, done come ter pieces--"
+
+"Now, Caesar, haven't I told you twenty times to let Delilah wash my
+Wedgwood?"
+
+"Fo' de Lord, Marse George, I ain't breck hit. I uz des' hol'n it in
+bofe my han's same es I'se hol'n dis yer broom, w'en it come right ter
+part. I declar 'twarn my fault, Marse George, 'twarn nobody's fault
+'cep'n hit's own."
+
+The judge closed the gate and waved the face from the window.
+
+"Go about your business, Caesar," he said, "and keep your hands off my
+china--"
+
+Then his tone lost its asperity as he held out his hands to a pretty
+girl who was coming across the green.
+
+"So you are back from school, Miss Juliet," he said gallantly. "I was
+telling your mother only yesterday that I didn't approve of sending our
+fairest products away from Kingsborough. It wasn't done in my day. Then
+the prettiest girls stayed at home and gave our young fellows a chance."
+
+The girl shook her head until the blue ribbons on her straw hat
+fluttered in the wind, and blushed until her soft eyes were like
+forget-me-nots set in rose leaves. She possessed a serene, luminous
+beauty, which became intensified beneath the gaze of the beholder.
+
+"I have come back for good, now," she answered in a serious sweetness of
+voice; "and I am out this afternoon looking up my Sunday-school class.
+The children have scattered sadly. You will let me have Tom again, won't
+you?"
+
+"Have Tom! Why, you may have him every day and Sunday too--the lucky
+scamp! Ah, I only wish I were a boy again, with a soul worth saving and
+such a pair of eyes in search of it."
+
+The girl dimpled into a smile and flushed to her low, white forehead, on
+which the soft hair was smoothly parted before it broke into sunny curls
+about the temples. She exhaled an atmosphere of gentleness mixed with a
+saintly coquetry, which produced an impression at once human and divine,
+such as one receives from the sight of a rose in a Bible or a curl in
+the hair of a saint. The judge looked at her warmly, sighing half
+happily, half regretfully.
+
+"And to think that the young rogues don't realise their blessings," he
+said. "There's not one of them that wouldn't rather be off fishing than
+learn his catechism. Ah, in my day things were different--things were
+different."
+
+"Were you very pious, sir?" asked the girl with a flash of laughter.
+
+The judge shook his stick playfully.
+
+"I can't tell tales," he answered, "but in my day we should have taken
+more than the catechism at your bidding, my dear. When your father was
+courting your mother--and she was like you, though she hadn't your eyes,
+or your face, for that matter--he went into her Bible class, though he
+was at least five and twenty and the others were small boys under ten.
+She was a sad flirt, and she led him a dance."
+
+"He liked it," said the girl. "But, if you will give my message to Tom,
+I won't come in. I am looking for Dudley Webb, and I see his mother at
+her gate. Good-bye! Be sure and tell Tom to come Sunday."
+
+She nodded brightly, lifted her muslin skirts, and recrossed the street.
+The judge watched her until the flutter of her white dress vanished down
+the lane of maples; then he turned to speak to the occupants of a
+carriage that had drawn up to the sidewalk.
+
+The vehicle was of an old-fashioned make, bare of varnish, with rickety,
+mud-splashed wheels and rusty springs. It was drawn by an ill-matched
+pair of horses and driven by a lame coloured boy, who carried a peeled
+hickory branch for a whip.
+
+"Ah, General Battle," said the judge to a stout gentleman with a red
+face and an expansive shirt front from which the collar had wilted away;
+"fine afternoon! Is that Eugenia?" to a little girl of seven or eight
+years, with a puppy of the pointer breed in her arms, and "How are you,
+Sampson?" to the coloured driver.
+
+The three greeted him simultaneously, whereupon he leaned forward,
+resting his hand upon the side of the carriage.
+
+"The young folks are growing up," he said. "I have just seen Juliet
+Burwell, and, on my life, she gets prettier every day. We shan't keep
+her long."
+
+"Keep her!" replied the general vigorously, wiping his large face with a
+large pocket handkerchief. "Keep her! If I were thirty years younger,
+you shouldn't keep her a day--not a day, sir."
+
+The little girl looked up gravely from the corner of the seat, tossing
+her short, dark plait from her shoulder. "What would you do with her,
+papa?" she asked. "We've got no place to put her at home."
+
+The general threw back his great head and laughed till his wide girth
+shook like a bag of meal.
+
+"Oh, you needn't worry, Eugie," he said. "I'm not the man I used to be.
+She wouldn't look at me. Bless your heart, she wouldn't look at me if I
+asked her--"
+
+Eugenia clasped her puppy closer and turned her eyes upon her father's
+jovial face.
+
+"I don't see how she could help it if you stood in front of her," she
+answered gravely, in a voice rich with the blending of negro
+intonations.
+
+The general shook again until the carriage creaked on its rusty
+springs, and the coloured boy, Sampson, let the reins fall and joined in
+the hilarity.
+
+"She won't let me so much as look at a girl!" exclaimed the general
+delightedly, stooping to recover the brown linen lap robe which had
+slipped from his knees. "She's as jealous as if I were twenty and had a
+score of sweethearts."
+
+The little girl did not reply, but she flushed angrily. "Don't,
+precious," she said to the puppy, who was licking her cheek with his
+warm, red tongue.
+
+"What have you named him, Eugie?" asked the judge, changing the subject
+with that gracious tact which was mindful of the least emergency. "He is
+nicely marked, I see."
+
+"I call him Jim," replied Eugenia. She spoke gravely, and the gravity
+contrasted oddly with the animation of her features. "But his real name
+is James Burwell Battle. Bernard and I christened him in the
+spring-house--so he'll go to heaven."
+
+"Cap'n Burwell gave him to her, you know," explained the general, who
+laughed whenever his daughter spoke, as if the fact of her talking at
+all was a source of amazement to him, "and she hasn't let go of him
+since she got him. By the way, Judge, you have a first-rate garden spot.
+I hear your asparagus is the finest in town. Ours is very poor this
+year. I must have a new bed made before next season. Ah, what is it,
+daughter?"
+
+"You've forgotten to buy the sugar," said Eugenia, "and Aunt Chris can't
+put up her preserves. And you told me to remind you of the whip--"
+
+"Bless your heart, so I did. Sampson lost that whip a month ago, and
+I've never remembered it yet. Well, good-day--good-day."
+
+The judge raised his hat with a stately inclination; the general nodded
+good-naturedly, still grasping the linen robe with his plump, red hand;
+and the carriage jolted along the green and disappeared behind the
+glazed brick walls of the church.
+
+The judge regarded his walking-stick meditatively for a moment, and
+continued his way. The smile with which he had followed the vanishing
+figure of Juliet Burwell returned to his face, and his features softened
+from their usual chilly serenity.
+
+He had gone but a short distance and was passing the iron gate of the
+churchyard, when the droning of a voice came to him, and looking beyond
+the bars, he saw little Nicholas Burr lying at full length upon a marble
+slab, his head in his hands and his feet waving in the air.
+
+Entering the gate, the judge followed the walk of moss-grown stones
+leading to the church steps, and paused within hearing of the voice,
+which went on in an abstracted drawl.
+
+"The most cel-e-bra-ted sys-tem of juris-pru-dence known to the world
+begins, as it ends, with a code--" He was not reading, for the book was
+closed. He seemed rather to be repeating over and over again words which
+had been committed to memory.
+
+"With a code. From the commencement to the close of its history, the
+ex-posi-tors of Ro-man Law con-sistently em-ployed lan-guage which
+implied that the body of their sys-tem rested on the twelve
+De-cem-viral Tables--Dec-em-vi-ral--De-cem-vi-ral Tables."
+
+"Bless my soul!" said the judge. The boy glanced up, blushed, and would
+have risen, but the judge waved him back.
+
+"No--no, don't get up. I heard you as I was going by. What are you
+doing?"
+
+"Learnin'."
+
+"Learning! Dear me! What do you mean by learning?"
+
+"I'm learnin' by heart, sir--and--and, if you don't mind, sir, what does
+j-u-r-i-s-p-r-u-d-e-n-c-e mean?"
+
+The judge started, returning the boy's eager gaze with one of kindly
+perplexity.
+
+"Bless my soul!" he said again. "You aren't trying to understand that,
+are you?"
+
+The boy grew scarlet and his lips trembled. "No, sir," he answered. "I'm
+jest learnin' it now. I'll know what it means when I'm bigger--"
+
+"And you expect to remember it?" asked the judge.
+
+"I don't never forget," said the boy.
+
+"Bless my soul!" exclaimed the judge for the third time.
+
+For a moment he stood looking silently down upon the marble slab with
+its defaced lettering. Of the wordy epitaph which had once redounded to
+the honour of the bones beneath there remained only the words "who
+departed," but he read these with a long abstracted gaze.
+
+"Let me see," he said at last, speaking with his accustomed dignity.
+"Did you ever go to school, Nicholas?"
+
+"Yes, sir."
+
+"When?"
+
+"I went 'most three winters, sir, but I had to leave off on o'count o'
+pa's not havin' any hand 'cep'n me."
+
+The judge smiled.
+
+"Ah, well," he returned. "We'll see if you can't begin again. My boy has
+a tutor, you know, and his playmates come to study with him. He's about
+your age, and it will give you a start. Come in to-morrow at nine, and
+we'll talk it over. No, don't get up. I am going."
+
+And he passed out of the churchyard, closing the heavy gate with a
+metallic clang. Nicholas lay on the marble slab, but the book slipped
+from his hands, and he gazed straight before him at the oriel window,
+where the ivy was tremulous with the shining bodies and clamorous voices
+of nesting sparrows. They darted swiftly from gable to gable, filling
+the air with shrill sounds of discord, and endowing with animation the
+inanimate pile, wrapping the dead bricks in a living shroud.
+
+On the other side swept the long, colourless grasses, rippling in faint
+waves like a still lake that reflects the sunshine and swaying lightly
+beneath myriads of gauzy-winged bees that flashed with a droning noise
+from blade to blade, to find rest in the yellow hearts of the damask
+roses. Across the white vaults and the low-lying marble slabs
+innumerable shadows chased, and from above the gnarled old locust trees
+swept a fringe of vivid green, the slender blossoms hanging in tassels
+from the branches' ends, and filling the air with a soft and ceaseless
+rain of fragrant petals. Pale as the ghosts of dead leaves, they fell
+always, fluttering night and day from the twisted boughs, settling in
+creamy flakes upon the bending grasses, and outlining in delicate
+tracery the epitaphs upon the discoloured marbles.
+
+Nicholas lay with wide-open eyes, looking up at the oriel window where
+the sparrows twittered. On a near vault a catbird poised for an instant,
+surveying him with bright, distrustful eyes. Then, with an impetuous
+flutter of slate-gray wings, it fled to the poisonous oak on the far
+brick wall. A red-and-white cow, passing along the lane outside, stopped
+before the closed gate, and stood philosophically chewing the cud as she
+looked within through impeding bars. From the judge's garden came the
+faint sound of a negro voice as the old gardener weeded the vegetables.
+Nicholas rolled over again and faced the outstretched wings of the
+noseless angel on the nearest tombstone. The loss of the nose had
+distorted the marble smile into a grimace, which gave a leer to the
+remaining features. As the boy looked at it he laughed suddenly, and his
+voice startled him amid the droning of bees. Then he sat up and glanced
+at his brier-scratched feet stretched upon the slab, and laughed again
+for the sheer joy of discord.
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+
+Nicholas followed the main street to its sudden end at King's College,
+and turned into one of the diverging ways which skirted the whitewashed
+plank fence of the college grounds, and led to what was known in the
+neighbourhood as the Old Stage Road. Passing a straggling group of negro
+cabins, it stretched, naked, bleached, and barren, for a good half-mile,
+dividing with its sandy length the low-lying fields, which were sown on
+the one side in a sparse crop of grain and on the other in the rich
+leaves and round pink heads of ripening clover. At the end of the
+half-mile the road ascended a slight elevation, and the character of the
+soil changed abruptly into clay of vivid red, which, extending a dozen
+yards up the rain-washed hillside, appeared, in a general view of the
+landscape, like the scarlet tongue protruding from the silvery body of a
+serpent.
+
+Far ahead to the right of the highway and beyond the thinly sown wheat a
+stretch of pine woodland was darkly limned against the western horizon,
+standing a gloomy advance guard of the shadows of the night. At its foot
+the newer green of the late spring foliage took a frivolous aspect,
+presenting the effect of deep-tinted foam breaking against the
+impenetrable mass of darkness.
+
+The boy trudged resolutely along the sandy road, reaching at intervals
+to grasp handfuls of sassafras leaves from the bushes beside the way.
+From the ditch on the left a brown toad hopped slowly into the dust of
+the road. On the worm-eaten rails of the fence, on the other side, a
+gray lizard glided swiftly like a stealthy shadow of the leaves of the
+poisonous oak.
+
+Nicholas picked up a stone from the roadside and aimed it at the slimy
+little body, but his throw erred, and the missile fell harmlessly into
+the wheat field beyond, startling a blackbird with scarlet marks, which
+soared suddenly above the bearded grain and vanished, with a tremulous
+cry and a flame of outstretched wings, into the distant wood.
+
+The sun had gone down behind the pines and a warm mist steamed up from
+the cooling earth, condensing into heavy dew on the dusty leaves of the
+plants in the ditch. Above the lowering pines the horizon burned to a
+deep scarlet, like an inverted brazier at red heat, and one gigantic
+tree, rising beyond the jagged line of the forest, was silhouetted
+sharply against the enkindled clouds. Suddenly, from the shadows of the
+long road, a voice rose plaintively. It was rich and deep and
+colourific, and it seemed to hover close to the warmth of the earth,
+weighed down by its animal melody. It had mingled so subtly with the
+stillness that it was as much a part of nature as the cry of a
+whip-poor-will beyond the thicket or the sunset in the pine-guarded
+west. At first it came faintly, and the words were lost, but as Nicholas
+gained upon the singer he caught more clearly the air and the song.
+
+  "_Oh, de Ark hit came ter res'
+      On-de-hill,
+    Oh, de Ark hit came ter res'
+      On-de-hill,
+    En' dar ole Noah stood,
+    En' spread his han's abroad,
+    Er sacri-fice ter-Gawd
+      On-de-hill._"
+
+Nicholas quickened his pace into a run and, in a moment, saw the
+stooping figure of an old negro toiling up the red clay hillside, a
+staff in his hand and a bag of meal on his shoulder. In the vivid light
+of the sunset his stature was exaggerated in size, giving him an
+appearance at once picturesque and pathetic--softening his rugged
+outline and magnifying the distortion of age.
+
+As he ascended the gradual incline he planted his staff firmly in the
+soil, shifting his bag from side to side and uttering inaudible grunts
+in the pauses of his song.
+
+  "_En' dar, mid flame en smoke,
+    De great Jehovah s-poke.
+    En' awful thunder b-roke,
+      On-de-hill._"
+
+"Uncle Ish!" called the boy sharply. The old man lowered the bag from
+his shoulder and turned slowly round.
+
+"Who dat?" he demanded severely. "Ain't I done tell you dar ain' no
+ha'nts 'long dis yer road?"
+
+"It's me, Uncle Ish," said the boy. "It's Nick Burr. I heard you singing
+a long ways off."
+
+"Den what you want ter go a-hollerin' en a-stealin' up on er ole nigger
+fer des' 'bout sundown?"
+
+"But, Uncle Ish, I didn't mean to scare you. I jest heard--"
+
+"Skeer! Who dat you been skeerin'? Ain't I done tole you dar ain' no
+ha'nts round dese parts? What I gwine ter be skeered fer uv er little no
+'count white trash dat ain' never own er nigger in dere life? Who you
+done skeer dis time?"
+
+He picked up his bag, slung it over his shoulder and went on his way,
+the boy trotting beside him. For a time the old man muttered angrily
+beneath his breath, and then, becoming mollified by the boy's silence,
+he looked kindly down on the small red head at his elbow.
+
+"You ain't said howdy, honey," he remarked in a fault-finding tone. "Dar
+ain' no manners dese days, nohow. Dey ain' no manners en dey ain' no
+nuttin'. De niggers, dey is gwine plum outer dey heads, en de po' white
+trash dey's gwine plum outer dey places."
+
+He looked at Nicholas, who flinched and hung his head.
+
+"Dar ain' nobody lef to keep 'em ter dey places, no mo'. In Ole Miss'
+time der wa'nt no traipsin' roun' er niggers en intermixin' up er de
+quality en de trash. Ole Miss, she des' pint out der place en dey stay
+dar. She ain' never stomach noner der high-ferlutin' doin's roun' her.
+She know whar she b'long en she know whar dey b'long. Bless yo' life,
+Ole Miss wuz dat perticklar she wouldn't drink arter Ole Marster,
+hisself, 'thout renchin' out de gow'd twel t'wuz mos' bruck off de
+handle."
+
+He sighed and shifted his bag.
+
+"Ef Ole Miss 'ud been yer thoo' dis las' war, dar wouldn't er been no
+slue-footed Yankees a-foolin' roun' her parlour. She'd uv up en show'd
+'em de do'--"
+
+"Are all Yankees slue-footed, Uncle Ish?"
+
+"All dose I seed, honey--des' es slue-footed. En dar wuz Miss Chris' en
+ole Miss Grissel a-makin' up ter 'em, en a-layin' out er demselves fer
+'em en a-spreadin' uv de table, des' de same es ef dey went straight on
+dey toes. Dar wan't much sense in dat ar war, nohow, an' I ain' never
+knowed yit what 'twuz dey fit about. Hit wuz des' a-hidin' en a-teckin'
+ter de bushes, en a-hidin' agin, en den a-feastin', en a-curtsin' ter de
+Yankees. Dar wan't no sense in it, no ways hits put, but Ise heered
+Marse Tom 'low hit wuz a civil war, en dat's what it wuz. When de
+Yankees come a-ridin' up en a-reinin' in dere hosses befo' de front
+po'ch, en Miss Chris come out a-smilin' en a-axin' howdy, en den dey
+stan' dar a-bowin' en a-scrapin', hit wuz des' es civil es ef dey'd come
+a-co'tin'. But Ole Miss wuz dead en buried, she wuz."
+
+Nicholas shook his head without speaking. There was a shade of
+consolation in the thought that the awful "Ole Miss" was below the earth
+and beyond the possibility of pointing out his place.
+
+The brazier in the west snapped asunder suddenly, and a single forked
+flame shot above the jagged pines and went out in the dove-coloured
+clouds. In a huge oak beyond the rail fence there was a harsh rustling
+of wings where a flock of buzzards settled to roost.
+
+"Yes, Lord, she wuz dead en buried," repeated Uncle Ish slowly. "En dar
+ain' none like her lef' roun' yer now. Dis yer little Euginny is des'
+de spit er her ma, en it 'ud mek Ole Miss tu'n in her grave ter hear
+tell 'bout her gwines on. De quality en de po' folks is all de same ter
+her. She ain' no mo' un inspecter er pussons den de Lord is--ef Ole Miss
+wuz 'live, I reckon she'd lam 'er twel she wuz black en blue--"
+
+"Is she so very bad?" asked Nicholas in an awed voice.
+
+Uncle Ish turned upon him reprovingly.
+
+"Bad!" he repeated. "Who gwine call Ole Miss' gran'chile bad? I don't
+reckon it's dese yer new come folks es hev des' sprouted outer de dut es
+is gwine ter--"
+
+At this instant the sound of a vehicle reached them, gaining upon them
+from the direction of Kingsborough, and they fell to one side of the
+road, leaving room for the horses to pass. It was the Battle carriage,
+rolling heavily on its aged wheels and creaking beneath the general's
+weight.
+
+"Howdy, Marse Tom!" called Uncle Ishmael. The general responded
+good-naturedly, and the carriage passed on, but, before turning into the
+branch road a few yards ahead, it came to a standstill, and the bright,
+decisive voice of the little girl floated back.
+
+"Uncle Ish--I say, Uncle Ish, don't you want to ride?"
+
+"Dar, now!" cried Uncle Ishmael exultantly. "Ain't I tell you she wuz
+plum crazy? What she doin' a-peckin' up en ole nigger like I is?"
+
+He hastened his steps and scrambled into the seat beside the driver,
+settling his bag between his knees; and, with a flick of the peeled
+hickory whip, the carriage rolled into the branch road and disappeared,
+scattering a whirl of mud drops as it splashed through the shallow
+puddles which lingered in the dryest season beneath the heavy shade of
+the wood.
+
+Nicholas turned into the branch road also, for the poor lands of his
+father adjoined the slightly richer ones of the Battles. He felt tired
+and a little lonely, and he wished suddenly that a friendly cart would
+come along in which he might ride the remainder of the way. Between the
+densely wooded thicket on either side, the road looked dark and solemn.
+It was spread with a rotting carpet of last year's leaves, soft and damp
+under foot, and polished into shining tracks in the ruts left by passing
+wheels. Through the dusk the ghostly bodies of beech trees stood out
+distinctly from the surrounding wood, as if marked by a silver light
+falling from the topmost branches. The hoarse, grating notes of
+jar-flies intensified the stillness.
+
+Nicholas went on steadily, spurred by superstitious terror of the
+silence. He remembered that Uncle Ish had said there were no "ha'nts"
+along this road, but the assurance was barren of comfort. Old Uncle
+Dan'l Mule had certainly seen a figure in a white sheet rise up out of
+that decayed oak stump in the hollow, for he had sworn to it in the
+boy's presence in Aunt Rhody Sand's cabin the night of her daughter
+Viny's wedding. As for Viny's husband Saul, he had declared that one
+night after ten o'clock, when he was coming through this wood, the
+"booger-boos" had got after him and chased him home.
+
+At the end of the wood the road came out upon the open again, and in
+the distance Nicholas could see, like burnished squares, the windows of
+his father's house. Between the thicket and the house there was a long
+stretch of clearing, which had been once planted in corn, and now
+supported a headless army of dry stubble, amid a dull-brown waste of
+broomsedge. The last pale vestige of the afterglow, visible across the
+level country, swept the arid field and softened the harsh outlines of
+the landscape. It was barren soil, whose strength had been exhausted
+long since by years of production without returns, tilled by hands that
+had forced without fertilising. There was now grim pathos in its
+absolute sterility, telling as it did of long-gone yields of grain and
+historic harvests.
+
+Nicholas skirted the waste, and was turning into the pasture gate on the
+opposite side of the road, when he heard the shrill sound of a voice
+from the direction of the house.
+
+"Nick!--who--a Nick!"
+
+On one of the cedar posts of the fence of the cow-pen he discerned the
+small figure and green cotton frock of his half-sister, Sarah Jane, who
+was shouting through her hollowed palms to increase the volume of sound.
+
+"I say, Nick! The she-ep hev' been driv-en u-p! Come to sup-per!"
+
+She vanished from the post and Nicholas ran up the remainder of the road
+and swung himself over the little gate which led into the small square
+yard immediately surrounding the house. At the pump near the back door
+his father, who had just come from work, was washing his hands before
+going into supper, and near a row of pointed chicken coops the three
+younger children were "shooing" up the tiny yellow broods. The yard was
+unkempt and ugly, run wild in straggling ailanthus shoots and littered
+with chips from the wood-pile.
+
+As he entered the house he saw his stepmother placing a dish of fried
+bacon upon the table, which was covered with a "watered" oilcloth of a
+bright walnut tint. At her back stood Sarah Jane with a plate of corn
+bread in one hand and a glass pitcher containing buttermilk in the
+other. She was a slight, flaxen-haired child, with wizened features and
+sore, red eyelids.
+
+As his stepmother caught sight of him she stopped on her way to the
+stove and surveyed him with sharp but not unkindly eyes.
+
+"You've been takin' your time 'bout comin' home," she remarked, "an' I
+reckon you're powerful hungry. You can sit down if you want to."
+
+She was long and lean and withered, with a chronic facial neuralgia,
+which gave her an irritable expression and a querulous voice. For the
+past several years Nicholas had never seen her without a large cotton
+handkerchief bound tightly about her face. She had been the boy's aunt
+before she married his father, and her affection for him was proved by
+her allowing no one to harry him except herself.
+
+"How's your face, ma?" asked Nicholas with the indifference of habit as
+he took his seat at the table, while Sarah Jane went to the door to call
+her father. When Burr came in the inquiry was repeated.
+
+"Face any easier, Marthy?" It was a form that had been gone through
+with at every meal since the malady began, and Marthy Burr, while she
+deplored its insincerity, would have resented its omission.
+
+"Don't you all trouble 'bout my neuralgy," she returned with resigned
+exasperation as she stood up to pour the coffee out of the large tin
+boiler. "It's mine, an' I've borne worse things, I reckon, which ain't
+sayin' that 'tain't near to takin' my head off."
+
+Amos Burr drank his coffee without replying, the perspiration standing
+in drops on his large, freckled face and shining on his heavy eyebrows.
+Presently he looked at Nicholas, who was eating abstractedly, his gaze
+on his plate.
+
+"I got that thar piece of land broke to-day," he said, "an' I reckon you
+can take the one-horse harrow and go over it to-morrow. Them peanuts
+ought to hev' been in the ground two weeks ago--"
+
+"They ain't hulled yet," interrupted his wife. "Sairy Jane ain't done
+more'n half of 'em. She and Nick can do the balance after supper. Hurry
+up, Sairy Jane, and get through. Nannie, don't you touch another slice
+of that middlin'. You'll be frettin' all night."
+
+Nicholas looked up nervously. "I don't want to harrow the land
+to-morrow, pa," he began; "the judge said I might come in to school--"
+
+Amos Burr looked at him helplessly. "Wall, I never!" he exclaimed.
+
+"Did you ever hear the likes?" said his wife.
+
+"I can go, pa, can't I?" asked Nicholas.
+
+"He can go, pa, can't he?" repeated Sarah Jane, looking up with her
+mouth wide open and full of corn bread.
+
+Burr shook his head and looked at his wife.
+
+"I don't see as I can get any help," he said. "You're as good as a hand,
+and I can't spare you." Then he concluded with a touch of irritation, "I
+don't see as you want any more schoolin'. You can read and write now a
+heap better'n I can."
+
+Nicholas choked over his bread and his lips trembled.
+
+"I--I don't want to be like you, pa!" he cried breathlessly, and the
+unshed tears stung his eyelids. "I want to be different!"
+
+Burr looked up stolidly. "I don't see as you want any more schoolin',"
+he repeated stubbornly, but his wife came sharply to the boy's
+assistance.
+
+"I wish you'd stop pesterin' the child, Amos," she said, inspired less
+by the softness of amiability than by the genius of opposition. "I don't
+see how you can be everlastingly doin' it--my dead sister's child, too."
+
+Nicholas swallowed his tears with his coffee and turned to his father.
+"I can get up 'fore day and do a piece of the land, and I can help you
+'bout the sowin' when I get back in the evening. I'll be back by
+twelve--"
+
+"Oh, I reckon you can go if you're so set on it," said Amos gruffly. He
+rose and left the room, stopping in the hall to get a bucket of
+buttermilk for the hogs. Nicholas went over to the window and joined
+Sarah Jane, who was shelling the peanuts, carefully separating the outer
+hulls from the inner pink skins, which were left intact for sowing.
+Marthy Burr, who was clearing off the table, let fall a china dish and
+began scolding the younger children.
+
+"I declare, if you don't all but drive me daft!" she said, flinching
+from a twinge of neuralgia and raising her voice querulously. "Why can't
+you take yourselves off and give me some rest? Nannie, you and Jake go
+out to the old oak and see if all the turkeys air up. Be sure and count
+'em--and take Jubal (the youngest) 'long with you. If you see your pa
+tell him I say to look at the brindle cow. She acted mighty queer at
+milkin', and I reckon she'd better have a little bran mash--Sairy Jane,"
+turning suddenly upon her eldest daughter, "if you eat another one of
+them peanuts I'll box your jaws--"
+
+Nicholas finished the peanuts and went upstairs to his little attic
+room. He was not sleepy, and, after throwing himself upon his corn-shuck
+mattress, he lay for a long time staring at the ceiling, thinking of the
+morrow and listening to the groans of his stepmother as she tossed with
+neuralgia.
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+
+In the first glimmer of dawn Nicholas dressed himself and stole softly
+down from the attic, the frail stairway creaking beneath his tread. As
+he was unfastening the kitchen door, which led out upon a rough plank
+platform called the "back porch," Marthy Burr stuck her head in from the
+adjoining room where she slept, and called his name in a high-pitched,
+querulous voice.
+
+"Is that you, Nick?" she asked. "I declar, I'd jest dropped off to sleep
+when you woke me comin' down stairs. I never could abide tip-toein',
+nohow. I don't see how 'tis that I can't get no rest 'thout bein' roused
+up, when your pa can turn right over and sleep through thunder. Whar you
+goin' now?"
+
+Nicholas stopped and held a whispered colloquy with her from the back
+porch. "I'm goin' to drag the land some 'fore pa gets up," he answered.
+"Then I'm goin' in to town. You know he said I might."
+
+His stepmother shook her bandaged head peevishly and stood holding the
+collar of her unbleached cotton gown.
+
+"Oh, I reckon so," she responded. "I was think-in' 'bout goin' in myself
+and hevin' my tooth out, but I s'pose I can wait on you. The Lord knows
+I'm used to waitin'."
+
+Nicholas looked at her in perplexity, his arm resting on the little
+shelf outside, which supported the wooden water bucket and the
+long-handled gourd.
+
+"You can go when I come back," he said at last, adding with an effort,
+"or, if it's so bad, I can stay at home."
+
+But, having asserted her supremacy over his inclinations, Marthy Burr
+relented. "Oh, I don't know as I'll go in to-day," she returned. "I
+ain't got enough teeth left now to chew on, an' I don't believe it's the
+teeth, nohow. It's the gums--"
+
+She retreated into the room, whence the shrill voice of Sairy Jane
+inquired:
+
+"Air you up, ma? Why, 'tain't day!"
+
+Nicholas closed the door and went out upon the porch. The yard looked
+deserted and desolated, giving him a sudden realisation of his own
+littleness and the immensity of the hour. It was as if the wheels of
+time had stopped in the dim promise of things unfulfilled. A broken
+scythe lay to one side amid the straggling ailanthus shoots; near the
+wood-pile there was a wheelbarrow half filled with chips, and at a
+little distance the axe was poised upon a rotten log. From the small
+coops beside the hen-house came an anxious clucking as the fluffy yellow
+chickens strayed beneath the uneven edges of their pointed prisons and
+made independent excursions into the world.
+
+In the far east the day was slowly breaking, and the open country was
+flooded with pale, washed-out grays, like the background of an
+impressionist painting. A heavy dew had risen in the night, and as the
+boy passed through the dripping weeds on his way to the stable they left
+a chill moisture upon his bare feet. His eyes were heavy with sleep,
+and to his cloudy gaze the familiar objects of the barnyard assumed
+grotesque and distorted shapes. The manure heap near the doorway
+presented an effect of unreality, the pig-pen seemed to have suffered
+witchery since the evening before, and the haystack, looming vaguely in
+the drab distance, appeared to be woven of some phantasmal fabric.
+
+He led out the old sorrel mare and followed her into the large ploughed
+field beyond the cow-pen, where the harrow was lying on one side of the
+brown ridges. As he passed the pen the startled sheep huddled into a far
+corner, bleating plaintively, and the brindle cow looked after him with
+soft, persuasive eyes. When he had attached the clanking chains of the
+plough harness to the single-tree, he caught up the ropes which served
+for reins and set out laboriously over the crumbling earth, which
+yielded beneath his feet and made walking difficult.
+
+The field extended from the cow-pen and the bright, green rows of
+vegetables that were raised for market to the reedy brook which divided
+his father's land from that belonging to General Battle. The brook was
+always cool and shady, and silvery with minnows darting over the shining
+pebbles beneath the clear water. As Nicholas looked across the neutral
+furrows he could see the feathery branches of willows rising from the
+gray mist, and, farther still up the sloping hillside, the dew-drenched
+green of the mixed woodlands.
+
+The land before him had been upturned by shallow ploughing some days
+since, and it lay now pale and arid, the large clods of earth showing
+the detached roots of grass and herbs, and presenting a hint of
+menacing destruction rather than the prospect of the peaceful art of
+cultivation. It was the boy's duty to drag the soil free from grass,
+after which it would be laid out into rows some three feet apart. When
+this was done two furrows would be thrown together to give what the
+farmers called a "rise," the point of which would be finally levelled,
+when the ground would be ready for the peanut-sowing, which was
+performed entirely by hand.
+
+The boy worked industriously through the deepening dawn, giving an
+occasional "gee up, Rhody!" to the mare, and following the track of the
+harrow with much the same concentration of purpose as that displayed by
+his four-footed friend. He was strong for his years, lithe as a sapling,
+and as fearless of elemental changes, and as he walked meditatively
+across the bare field he might have suggested to an onlooker the
+possible production of a vast fund of energy.
+
+Presently the gray light was shot with gold and a streak of orange
+fluttered like a ribbon in the east. In a moment a violet cloud floated
+above the distant hill, and as its ends curled up from the quickening
+heat it showed the splendour of a crimson lining. A single ray of
+sunshine, pale as a spectral finger, pointed past the woodlands to the
+brook beneath the willows, and the vague blur of the mixed forest warmed
+into vivid tints, changing through variations from the clear emerald of
+young maples to the olive dusk of evergreens.
+
+Last of all the ploughed field, which had preserved a neutral cast,
+blushed faintly in the sunrise, glowing to pale purple tones where the
+sod was newly turned. From the fugitive richness of the soil a warm
+breath rose suddenly, filling the air with the genial odour of earth and
+sunshine. The shining, dark coils of worms were visible like threads in
+the bright brown clods.
+
+Nicholas raised his head and stared with unseeing eyes at the gorgeous
+east. A rooster crowed shrilly, and he turned in the direction of the
+barnyard. Then he flicked the ropes gently and went on, his gaze on the
+ground. His thoughts, which at first were fixed solely upon the teeth of
+the harrow, took tumultuous flight, and he reviewed for the hundredth
+time his conversation with the judge and the vast avenue of the future
+which was opening before him. He would not be like his father, of this
+he was convinced--his father, who was always working with nothing to
+show for it--whose planting was never on time, and whose implements were
+never in place. His father had never had this gnawing desire to know
+things, this passionate hatred of the work which he might not neglect.
+His father had never tried to beat against the barriers of his ignorance
+and been driven back, and beat again and wept, and read what he couldn't
+understand. The teacher at the public school had told him that he was
+far ahead of his years, and yet they had taken him away when he was
+doing his level best, and put him to dragging the land, and gathering
+the peanuts, and carrying the truck to market, and marking the sheep
+with red paint, and bringing up the cows, and doing all the odd,
+innumerable jobs they could devise. He let the ropes fall for an instant
+and dug his fist into his eye; then he took them up again and went on
+stolidly. At last the sun came out boldly above the hill, and the
+hollows were flooded with light. In the centre of the field the boy's
+head glowed like some large red insect. A hawk, winging slowly above
+him, looked down as if uncertain of his species, and fluttered off
+indifferently.
+
+At six o'clock his stepmother came to the back door and called him to
+breakfast.
+
+When the meal was over Amos Burr went out to the field, and Nicholas was
+sent to drive the sheep to the pasture. With vigorous wavings of a piece
+of brushwood, and many darts from right to left, he succeeded finally in
+driving them across the road and through the gate on the opposite side,
+after which he returned to assist his stepmother about the house. Not
+until nine o'clock, when he had seen the Battle children going up the
+road, was he free to set off at a run for Kingsborough.
+
+As he sped breathlessly along, past the wastelands, into the woods, down
+the road to the hillside, and down the hillside to the road again, he
+went too rapidly for thought. The fresh air brushed his heated face
+gently, and, at the edge of the wood, where the shallow puddles
+lingered, myriads of blue and yellow butterflies scattered into
+variegated clumps of colour at his approach, darting from the moist
+heaps of last year's leaves to the shining rivulets in the wheel ruts by
+the way. A partridge whistled from the yellowing green of the wheat, and
+a rabbit stole noiselessly from the sassafras in the ditch and shot shy
+glances of alarm; but he did not turn his head, and his hand held no
+ready stone.
+
+Though he had run half the way, when at last he reached the judge's
+house, and stood before the little office in the garden where the school
+was held, his courage misgave him, and he leaned, trembling, against the
+arbour where a grapevine grew. The sound of voices floated out to him,
+mingled with bright, girlish laughter, and, looking through the open
+window, he saw the light curls of a little girl against the darker head
+of a boy. He choked suddenly with shyness, and would have hesitated
+there until the morning was over had not the judge's old servant, Caesar,
+espied him from the dining-room window.
+
+"Look yer, boy, what you doin' dar?" he demanded suspiciously, and then
+called to some one inside the house. "Marse George, dat ar Burr boy is
+a-loungin' roun' yo' yawd."
+
+The judge did not respond, but the tutor came to the door of the office
+and intercepted the boy's retreat. He was a pale, long-faced young man
+in spectacles, with weak, blue eyes and a short, thin moustache. His
+name was Graves, and he regarded what he called the judge's "quixotism"
+with condescending good-nature.
+
+"Is that you, Nicholas Burr?" he asked in a slightly supercilious voice.
+"The judge has told me about you. So you won't be a farmer, eh? And you
+won't stay in your class? Well, come in and we'll see what we can make
+of you."
+
+Nicholas followed him into the room and sat down at one of the pine
+desks, while the judge's son, Tom, nodded to him from across the room,
+and Bernard Battle grinned over his shoulder at his sister Eugenia, and
+a handsome boy, called Dudley Webb, made a face which convulsed little
+Sally Burwell, who hid her merriment in her curls. There were several
+other children in the room, but Nicholas did not see them distinctly.
+Something had got before his eyes and there was a lump in his throat. He
+sat rigidly in his seat, his straw hat, with the shoestring around the
+crown, lying upon the desk before him. He looked neither to the right
+nor to the left, keeping his frightened gaze upon the tutor's face.
+
+Mr. Graves asked him a few questions, which he could not answer, and
+then, giving him a book, turned to the other children. As the lessons
+went on it seemed to Nicholas that he had never known anything in his
+life; that he should never know anything; and that he should always
+remain the most ignorant person on earth--unless that lot fell to Sairy
+Jane.
+
+The difficulties besetting the path of knowledge appeared to be
+insurmountable. Even if he had the books and the time he could never
+learn anything--his head would prevent it.
+
+"Bound Beloochistan, Tom," said the tutor, and Tom, a stout, fair-haired
+boy with a heavy face, went through the process to the satisfaction of
+Mr. Graves and to the amazement of Nicholas.
+
+The office was a plain, square room, containing, besides the desks and
+tables, an old secretary and a corner cupboard of an antique pattern,
+which held an odd assortment of cracked china and chemist bottles. There
+was also a square mahogany chest, called the wine-cellar, which had been
+sent from the dining-room when the last bottle of Tokay was opened to
+drink the health of the Confederacy.
+
+Before the war the place had been used by the judge as a general
+business room, but when the slaves were freed and there were fewer
+servants it was found to be little needed, and was finally given over
+entirely to the children's school.
+
+When recess came the tutor left the office, telling Nicholas that he
+might go home with the little girls if he liked. "I shall try to have
+the books you need by to-morrow," he said, and, his natural amiability
+overcoming his assumed superciliousness, he added pleasantly:
+
+"I shouldn't mind being backward at first. The boys are older than you,
+but you'll soon catch up."
+
+He went out, and Nicholas had started towards the door, when Tom Bassett
+flung himself before him, swinging skilfully over an intervening table.
+
+"Hold up, carrot-head," he said. "Let's have a look at you. Are all
+heads afire where you come from?"
+
+"He's Amos Burr's boy," explained Bernard Battle with a grin. "He lives
+'long our road. I saw him hoeing potatoes day before yesterday. He's got
+freckles enough to tan a sheepskin!"
+
+In the midst of the laugh which followed Nicholas stood awkwardly,
+shifting his bare feet. His face was scarlet, and he fingered in
+desperation the ragged brim of his hat.
+
+"I reckon they're my freckles," he said doggedly.
+
+"And I reckon you can keep 'em," retorted Bernard, mimicking his tone.
+"We ain't going to steal 'em. I say, Eugie, here're some freckles for
+sale!"
+
+The dark little girl, who was putting up her books in one corner,
+looked up and shook her head.
+
+"Let me alone!" she replied shortly, and returned to her work, tugging
+at the straps with both hands. Dudley Webb--a handsome, upright boy,
+well dressed in a dark suit and linen shirt--lounged over as he munched
+a sandwich.
+
+He looked at Nicholas from head to foot, and his gaze was returned with
+stolid defiance. Nicholas did not flinch, but for the first time he felt
+ashamed of his ugliness, of his coarse clothes, of his briar-scratched
+legs, of his freckles, and of the unalterable colour of his hair. He
+wished with all his heart that he were safely in the field with his
+father, driving the one-horse harrow across upturned furrows. He didn't
+want to learn anything any more. He wanted only to get away.
+
+"He's common," said Dudley at last, throwing a crust of bread through
+the open window. "He's as common as--as dirt. I heard mother say so--"
+
+"Father says he's _un_common," returned Tom doubtfully, turning his
+honest eyes on Nicholas again. "He told Mr. Graves that he was a most
+uncommon boy."
+
+"Oh, well, you can play with him if you like," rejoined Dudley
+resolutely, "but I shan't. He's old Amos Burr's son, anyway, who never
+wore a whole shirt in his life."
+
+"He had on one yesterday," said Bernard Battle impartially. "I saw it.
+It was just made and hadn't been washed."
+
+Nicholas looked up stubbornly. "You let my father alone!" he exclaimed,
+spurred by the desire to resent something and finding it easier to
+fight for another than himself. "You let my father alone, or I'll make
+you!"
+
+"I'd like to see you!" retorted Dudley wrathfully, and Nicholas had
+squared up for the first blow, when before his swimming gaze a defender
+intervened.
+
+"You jest let him alone!" cried a voice, and the flutter of a blue
+cotton skirt divided Dudley from his adversary. "You jest let him alone.
+If you call him common I'll hit you, an'--an' you can't hit me back!"
+
+"Eugie, you ought to be--" began Bernard, but she pushed the combatants
+aside with decisive thrusts of her sunburned little hand, and planted
+herself upon the threshold, her large, black eyes glowing like shaded
+lamps.
+
+"He wan't doin' nothin' to you, and you jest let him be. He's goin' to
+tote my books home, an' you shan't touch him. I reckon I know what's
+common as well as you do--an' he ain't--he ain't common."
+
+Then she caught Nicholas's arm and marched off like a dispensing
+providence with a vassal in tow. Nicholas followed obediently. He was
+sufficiently cowed into non-resistance, and he felt a wholesome awe of
+his defender, albeit he wished that it had been a boy like himself
+instead of a slip of a girl with short skirts and a sunbonnet. At the
+bottom of his heart there existed an instinctive contempt of the sex
+which Eugenia represented, developed by the fact that it was not force
+but weakness that had vanquished his victorious opponent. Dudley Webb
+was a gentleman, and only a bully would strike a girl, even if she were
+a spitfire--the term by which he characterised Eugenia. He remembered
+suddenly her exultant, "an' you can't hit me back!" and it seemed to him
+that, even in the righteous cause of his deliverance, she had taken an
+unfair and feminine advantage of the handsome boy for whom he cherished
+a shrinking admiration.
+
+As for Eugenia herself, she was troubled by no such misgivings. She
+walked slightly in front of him, her blue skirt swinging briskly from
+side to side, her white sunbonnet hanging by its strings from her
+shoulders. Above the starched ruffles rose her small dark head and white
+profile, and Nicholas could see the determined curve of her chin and the
+humorous tremor of her nostril. It was a vivid little face, devoid of
+colour except for the warm mouth, and sparkling with animation which
+burned steadily at the white heat of intensity--but to Nicholas she was
+only a plain, dark, little girl, with an unhealthy pallor of complexion.
+He was grateful, nevertheless, and when his first regret that she was
+not a boy was over he experienced a thrill of affection. It was the
+first time that any one had deliberately taken his part in the face of
+opposing odds, and the stand seemed to bring him closer to his
+companion. He held her books tightly, and his face softened as he looked
+at her, until it was transfigured by the warmth of his emotion. Then, as
+they passed the college grounds, where a knot of students greeted
+Eugenia hilariously, and turned upon the Old Stage Road, he reached out
+timidly to take the small hand hanging by her side.
+
+"It's better walkin' on this side the road," he said with a mild
+assumption of masculine supremacy. "I wouldn't walk in the dust."
+
+Eugenia looked at him gravely and drew her hand away.
+
+"You mustn't do that," she responded severely. "When I said you weren't
+common I didn't mean that you really weren't, you know; because, of
+course, you are. I jest meant that I wouldn't let them say so."
+
+Nicholas stood in the centre of the road and stared at her, his face
+flushing and a slow rage creeping into his eyes.
+
+For a moment he stood in trembling silence. Then he threw the books from
+him into the sand at her feet, and with a choking sob sped past her to
+vanish amid a whirl of dust in the sunny distance.
+
+Eugenia looked thoughtfully down upon her scattered possessions. She was
+all alone upon the highway, and around her the open fields rolled off
+into the green of far-off forests. The sunshine fell hotly over her, and
+straight ahead the white road lay like a living thing.
+
+She stooped, gravely gathered up the books, and walked resolutely on her
+way, a cloud of yellow butterflies fluttering like loosened petals of
+full-blown buttercups about her head.
+
+
+
+
+V
+
+
+Battie Hall was a square white frame house with bright-green window
+shutters and a deep front porch, supported by heavy pillars, and reached
+from the gravelled walk below by a flight of rugged stone steps. In the
+rear of the house, through which a wide hall ran, dividing the rooms of
+the first floor, there was another porch similar to the one at the
+front, except that the pillars were hidden in musk roses and the long
+benches at either side were of plain, unpainted pine. At the foot of the
+back steps a narrow, well-trodden path led to the vegetable garden,
+which was separated from the yard by what was called "Cattle Lane"--a
+name derived from the morning and evening passage of the cows on their
+way to and from the pasture.
+
+Beginning at the gate into the garden, where the tall white palings were
+gay with hollyhocks and heavy-headed sunflowers, a grapevine trellis
+extended to the farmyard at the end of the lane, whence an overgrown
+walk led across tangled meadows to the negro "quarters"--a long,
+whitewashed row of almost deserted cabins. Since the close of the war
+the "quarters" had fallen partly into disuse and had decayed rapidly,
+though some few were still tenanted by the former slaves, who gathered
+as of old in the doorways of an evening to strum upon broken-stringed
+banjos and to wrap the hair of their small offspring. Beyond this row
+there was a slight elevation called "Hickory Hill," where Uncle Ishmael
+had lived for more than seventy years; and at the foot of the hill, on
+the other side, near "Sweet Gum Spring," there were several neatly
+patched log cabins occupied by the house servants, who held in social
+contempt the field hands in the neighbouring "quarters." Overlooking the
+"Sweet Gum Spring," on a loftier hill, was the family graveyard, which
+was walled off from the orchard near by, where the twisted old fruit
+trees had long since yielded the larger part of their abundance.
+
+At the front of the Hall the view was vastly different. There the great
+blue-grass lawn was thickly studded with ancient elms and maples, whose
+shade fell like a blanket upon the velvety sod beneath. The gravelled
+walk, beginning at the front steps, was bordered on either side by rows
+of closely clipped box, which ended in the long avenue of cedars leading
+from the lawn to the distant turnpike. To the right of the house there
+were three pointed aspens, which shivered like skeletons in silver,
+holding grimly aloof from the vivid pink of the crepe myrtle at their
+feet. Beyond them was the well-house, with a long moss-grown trough
+where the horses and the cows came to drink, and across the road began
+the cornlands, which stretched in rhythmic undulations to the dark belt
+of the pine forest. On the left of the box walk, in a direct line from
+the three aspens, towered a huge sycamore, and from one of its
+protecting arms, shaded by large fan-like leaves, a child's swing
+dangled by a thick hemp rope. Near the sycamore, where an old oak had
+fallen, the rotting stump was hidden by a high "rockery," edged with
+conch shells, and over the rough gray rocks a tangle of garden flowers
+ran wild--sweet-william, petunias, phlox, and the mossy stems of red and
+yellow portulaca. On the western side of the house there was a spreading
+mimosa tree, its sensitive branches brushing the green shutters of a
+window in the second story.
+
+The Hall had been built by the general's father when, because of family
+dissensions, he had decided to move from a central county to the more
+thinly settled country surrounding Kingsborough. There the general had
+passed his boyhood, and there he had left his wife when he had gone to
+the war. At the beginning of the struggle he had freed his slaves and
+buckled on his sword.
+
+"They may have the negroes, and welcome," he had said to the judge. "Do
+you think I'd fight for a damned darkey? It's the principle, sir--the
+principle!"
+
+And the judge, who had not freed his servants, but who would as soon
+have thought of using a profane word as of alluding in disrespectful
+terms to a family portrait, had replied gravely:
+
+"My dear Tom, you will find principle much better to fight for than to
+live on."
+
+But the general had gone with much valour and more vehemence. He had
+enlisted as a private, had risen within a couple of years to a
+colonelcy, and had been raised to the rank of general by the unanimous
+voice of his neighbours upon his return home. After an enthusiastic
+reception at Kingsborough he had mounted a heavy-weight horse and ridden
+out to the Hall, to find the grounds a tangle of weeds and his wife
+with the pallor of death upon her brow. She had rallied at his coming,
+had lingered some sad years an invalid in the great room next the
+parlour, and had died quietly at last as she knelt in prayer beside her
+high white bed.
+
+For days after this the empty house was like a coffin. The children ran
+in tears through the shuttered rooms, and the servants lost their
+lingering shred of discipline. When the funeral was over, the general
+made some spasmodic show of authority, but his heart was not in it, and
+he wavered for lack of the sustaining hold of his wife's frail hand. He
+dismissed the overseer and undertook to some extent the management of
+the farm, but the crops failed and the hay rotted in the fields before
+it was got into the barn. Then, as things were galloping from bad to
+worse, a letter came from his sister, Miss Christina, and in a few days
+she arrived with a cartload of luggage and a Maltese cat in a wicker
+basket. From the moment when she stepped out of the carriage at the end
+of the avenue and ascended the box-trimmed walk to the stone steps, the
+difficulties disentangled and the domestic problems dwindled into the
+simplest of arithmetical sums. By some subtle law of the influence of
+the energetic she assumed at once the rights of authority. From the
+master of the house to the field hands in the "quarters," all bent to
+her regenerating rule. She opened the windows in the airy rooms, cleaned
+off the storeroom shelves with soda and water, and put the marauding
+small negroes to weeding the lawn. Before her passionate purification
+the place was purged of the dust of years. The hardwood floors of the
+wide old halls began to shine like mirrors, the assortment of odds and
+ends in the attic was relegated to an outhouse, and even the general's
+aunt, Miss Griselda Grigsby, was turned unceremoniously out of her
+apartment before the all-pervading soap-suds of cleaning day.
+
+As for the servants, a sudden miraculous zeal possessed them. Within a
+fortnight the garden rows were hoed free from grass, the hops were
+gathered from the fence, and the weeds on the lawn vanished beneath
+small black fingers. Even the annual threshing of the harvest was
+accomplished under the overseeing eye of "Miss Chris," as she was called
+by the coloured population. During the week that the old machine poured
+out its chaffless wheat and the driver whistled in the centre of the
+treadmill Miss Chris appeared at the barn at noon each day to warn the
+hands against waste of time and to see that the mules were well watered.
+
+But the revolutions without were as naught to the internal ones. Aunt
+Verbeny, the cook, whose tyranny had extended over thirty years, was
+assisted from her pedestal, and the hen-house keys were removed from the
+nail of the kitchen wall.
+
+"This will never do, Verbeny," said Miss Chris a month after her
+arrival. "We could not possibly have eaten three dozen chickens within
+the last week. I am afraid you take them home without asking me."
+
+Aunt Verbeny, a fat old woman with a shining black skin, smoothed her
+checked apron with offended dignity.
+
+"Hi! Miss Chris, ain't I de cook?" she exclaimed.
+
+But Miss Chris preserved her ground.
+
+"That is no excuse for you taking what doesn't belong to you," she
+replied severely. "If this keeps up I shall be obliged to let Delphy do
+the cooking. There won't be a chicken in the hen-house by the end of the
+month."
+
+Aunt Verbeny still smoothed her apron, but her authority was shaken, and
+she felt it. She gave a slow grunt of dissatisfaction.
+
+"Dese ain't de doin's I'se used ter," she protested, and then, beneath
+the undaunted eyes of Miss Chris, she melted into propitiation.
+
+"Des' let dat ar chicken alont, Miss Chris," she said, skilfully
+reducing the charge to a single offence. "Des' let dat ar chicken alont.
+'Tain' no use yo' rilin' yo'se'f 'bout dat. Hit's done en it's been
+done. Hit don't becomst de quality ter fluster demse'ves over de gwines
+on uv er low-lifeted fowl. You des' bresh yo'se'f down an steddy like
+hit ain' been fool you ef you knowed yo'se'f. You des' let dat ar
+chicken be er little act uv erdultery betweenst you en me. Ef'n it's
+gone, hit'll stay gone!"
+
+Whereupon Miss Chris retreated, leaving her opponent in possession of
+the kitchen floor.
+
+But from this day forth the hen-house was locked at night and unlocked
+in the morning by the hand of Miss Chris, and Aunt Verbeny's overweening
+ill-temper diminished with her authority.
+
+Miss Chris had been a beauty in her day, but as she passed middle age
+the family failing seized upon her, and she grew huge and unwieldy, the
+disproportion of her enormous figure to her small feet giving her an
+awkward, waddling walk.
+
+She had a profusion of silvery-white hair, worn in fluffy curls about
+her large pink face, soft brown eyes, and a full double chin that fell
+over a round cameo brooch bearing the head of Minerva set in a plain
+gold band. In winter she wore gowns of black Henrietta cloth, made with
+plain bodices and full plaited skirts; in summer she wore the same
+skirts with loosely fitting white linen sacques, trimmed in delicate
+embroideries, with muslin ruffles falling over her plump hands. When she
+came to the Hall she brought with her innumerable reminiscences of her
+childhood, which she told in a musical voice with girlish laughter.
+
+After his sister's arrival the general discontinued his fitful
+overseering. He rose early and spent his long days sitting upon the
+front porch, smoking an old briar pipe and reading the Richmond papers.
+Occasionally he would ride at a jogging pace round the fields, giving
+casual directions to the workers, but as his weight increased he found
+it difficult to mount into the saddle, and, at last, desisted from the
+attempt. He preferred to sit in peace in his cane rocking chair, looking
+down the box walk into the twilight of the cedar avenue, or gazing
+placidly beyond the aspens and the well-house to the streaked ribbons of
+the ripening corn. It was said that he had never been the same man since
+the death of his wife. Certainly he laughed as heartily and his jovial
+face had taken a ruddier tint, but there was a superficiality in his
+exuberant cheerfulness which told that it was not well rooted below the
+surface. His jokes were as ready as ever, but he had fallen into an
+absent-minded habit of repetition, and sometimes repeated the same
+stories at breakfast and supper. He talked freely of his dead wife, he
+even made ill-placed jests about his widowerhood, and he never failed to
+kiss a pair of red lips when the chance offered; but, for all that, his
+gaze often wandered past the huge sycamore to the family graveyard,
+where rank periwinkle grew and mocking-birds nested. Through the long
+summer not a Sunday passed that he did not take fresh flowers to one of
+the neatly trimmed mounds where the marble headpiece read:
+
+         "AMELIA TUCKER,
+
+          BELOVED WIFE OF
+
+          THOMAS BATTLE,
+
+         DIED APRIL 3RD., 18--.
+
+'_I am the Resurrection and the Life, saith
+              the Lord._'"
+
+Sometimes the children were with him, but usually he went alone, and
+once or twice he returned with red eyelids and asked for a julep.
+
+There was little to fill his life now, and he divided it between Bernard
+and Eugenia, whom he adored, and the negroes, whom he reviled for
+diversion and spoiled to make amends.
+
+"They will break me!" he would declare a dozen times a day. "They will
+turn me out of house and home. Here's old Sambo's Claudius come back and
+moved into the quarters. He hasn't a cent to his name, and he's the most
+no 'count scamp on earth. It's worse than before the war--upon my soul
+it is! Then they lived on me and I got an odd piece of work out of
+them. Now they live on me and don't do a damned lick!"
+
+"My dear Tom!" Miss Chris cheerfully remonstrated. She had long been
+reconciled to her brother's swearing propensities, which she regarded as
+an amiable eccentricity to be overlooked by a special indulgence
+accorded the male sex, but she never knew just how to meet him in a
+discussion of the servants.
+
+"What is to be done about it?" she inquired gravely. "Claudius left here
+at the beginning of the war, Aunt Griselda says, and he has never been
+back until now. It seems he has brought his family. He has
+lung-trouble."
+
+"Done about it!" repeated the general heatedly. "What's to be done about
+it? Why, the rascal can't starve. I've just told Sampson to wheel him
+down a barrel of meal. Oh, they'll break me! I shan't have a morsel
+left!"
+
+The next time it was an opposite grievance.
+
+"What do you reckon's happened now?" he asked, marching into the brick
+storeroom, where his sister was slicing ripe, red tomatoes into a blue
+china bowl. "What do you think that fool Ish has done?"
+
+Miss Chris looked up attentively, her large, fresh-coloured face
+expressing mild apprehension. She had rolled back her linen sleeves, and
+the juice of the tomatoes stained her full, dimpled wrists.
+
+"He hasn't killed himself?" she inquired anxiously.
+
+"Killed himself?" roared the general. "He'll live forever. I don't
+believe he'd die if he were strung up with a halter round his neck.
+He's moved off."
+
+"Moved off!" echoed Miss Chris faintly. "Why, I believe Uncle Ish was
+living in that cabin on Hickory Hill before I was born. I remember going
+up there to help him gather hickory nuts when I wasn't six years old. I
+couldn't have been six because mammy Betsey was with me, and she died
+before I was seven. I declare there were always more nuts on those trees
+than any I ever saw--"
+
+But the general broke in upon her reminiscences, and she took up a fresh
+tomato and peeled it carefully with a sharp-edged knife.
+
+"Some idiots got after him," said the general, "and told him if he went
+on living on my land he'd go back to slavery, and, bless your life, he
+has gone--gone to that little one-room shanty where his daughter used to
+live, between my place and Burr's--as if I'd have him," he concluded
+wrathfully. "I wouldn't own that fool again if he dropped into my lap
+straight from heaven!"
+
+Miss Chris laughed merrily.
+
+"It is the last place he would be likely to drop from," she returned;
+"but I'll call him up and talk with him. It is a pity for him to be
+moving off at his age."
+
+So Uncle Ishmael was summoned up to the porch, and Miss Chris explained
+the error of his ways, but to no purpose.
+
+"I ain' got no fault ter fine," he repeated over and over again,
+scratching his grizzled head. "I ain' got no fault ter fine wid you.
+You've been used me moughty well, en I'se pow'ful 'bleeged ter you--en
+Marse Tom, he's a gent'mun ef ever I seed one. I ain' go no fault ter
+fine."
+
+The general lost his temper and started up.
+
+"Then what do you mean by turning fool at your age?" he demanded
+angrily. "Haven't I given you a roof over your head all these years?"
+
+"Dat's so, suh."
+
+"And food to eat?"
+
+"Dat's so."
+
+"And never asked you to do a lick of work since you got the rheumatism?"
+
+"Dat's es true es de Gospel."
+
+"Then what do you mean by going off like mad to that little, broken-down
+shanty with half the roof gone?"
+
+Uncle Ishmael shuffled his heavy feet and scratched his head again.
+
+"Hit's de trufe, Marse Tom," he said at last. "Hit's de Gospel trufe. I
+ain' had so much ter eat sence I'se gone off, en I ain' had much uv er
+roof ter kiver me, en I ain' had nuttin' ter w'ar ter speak on--but, fo'
+de Lawd, Marse Tom, freedom it are er moughty good thing."
+
+Then the general flew into the house in a rage and Uncle Ishmael left,
+followed by two small negroes, bearing on their heads the donations made
+by Miss Chris to his welfare.
+
+On the day that Eugenia encountered Nicholas at school the general was
+sitting, as usual, in his rocking chair upon the front porch, when he
+saw the flutter of a blue skirt, and Eugenia emerged from the avenue and
+came up the walk between the stiff rows of box. It was two o'clock, and
+the general was peacefully awaiting the sound of the dinner bell, but
+at the sight of Eugenia his peacefulness departed, and he called
+angrily:
+
+"Eugie, where's Bernard?"
+
+"Comin'."
+
+"Coming!" returned the general indignantly. "Haven't I told you a dozen
+times not to walk along that road by yourself? Why didn't you wait for
+the carriage? Are you never going to mind what I say to you?"
+
+Eugenia came up the steps and threw her books on one of the long green
+benches. Then she seated herself in a rocking chair and untied her
+sunbonnet.
+
+"I wa'n't by myself," she said. "A boy was with me."
+
+"A boy? Where is he?"
+
+"He ran away."
+
+The general's great head went back, and he shook with laughter. "Bless
+my soul! What did he mean by that? What boy was it, daughter?"
+
+Eugenia sat upright in the high rocker, fanning her heated face with her
+sunbonnet.
+
+"The Burr boy," she answered.
+
+The general gasped for breath, and turned towards the hall.
+
+"Come out here, Chris!" he called. "Here's Eugie been walking home with
+the Burr boy!"
+
+In a moment Miss Chris's large figure appeared in the doorway, and she
+handed a brimming mint julep to the general.
+
+"I don't know what Eugie can be made of," she remarked. "Amos Burr was
+overseer for the Carringtons before he got that place of his own, and I
+remember just as well as if it were yesterday old Mr. Phil Carrington
+telling me once, when I was on a visit there, that the more his man Burr
+worked the less he accomplished. But, as for Eugenia, that isn't the
+worst about her. Just the other morning, when I was looking out of the
+storeroom window, I saw her with her arm round the neck of Aunt
+Verbeny's little Suke. I declare I was so upset I let the quart pot fall
+into the potato bin!"
+
+"But there isn't anybody else, Aunt Chris," protested Eugenia, looking
+up from her father's julep, which she was tasting. "And I'm 'bliged to
+have a bosom friend."
+
+The general shook until his face was purple and the ice jingled in the
+glass.
+
+"Bosom friend, you puss!" he roared. "Why can't you choose a bosom
+friend of your own colour? What do you want with a bosom friend as black
+as the ace of spades?"
+
+"O papa, she ain't black; she's jes' yellow-brown."
+
+"You ought to be ashamed of yourself, Eugie," said Miss Chris severely.
+"Now go upstairs and wash your face and hands before dinner. It is
+almost ready. I wonder where Bernard is!"
+
+"Can't I wait twell the bell rings?" Eugenia asked; but Miss Chris shook
+her head decisively.
+
+"Eugenia, will you never stop talking like a darkey?" she demanded. "How
+often must I tell you that there's no such word as 'twell'? Now, go
+right straight upstairs."
+
+Eugenia rose obediently and went into the hall. She had learned from her
+father and the servants not to dispute the authority of Miss Chris,
+though she yielded to it with a mild surprise at her own docility.
+
+"She don't really manage me," she had once confided to Delphy, the
+washerwoman, "but I jes' plays that she does."
+
+
+
+
+VI
+
+
+When Eugenia came downstairs she found the family seated at dinner, Miss
+Chris and her father beaming upon each other across a dish of fried
+chicken and a home-cured ham. Bernard was on Miss Chris's right hand,
+and on the other side of the table Eugenia's seat separated the general
+from Aunt Griselda, who sat severely buttering her toast before a brown
+earthenware teapot ornamented by a raised design of Rebecca at the well.
+Aunt Griselda was a lean, dried-up old lady, with a sharp, curved nose
+like the beak of a bird, and smoothly parted hair brushed low over her
+ears and held in place by a tortoise-shell comb. There were deep
+channels about her eyes, worn by the constant falling of acrid tears,
+and her cheeks were wrinkled and yellowed like old parchment.
+
+Twenty years ago, when the general had first brought home his young
+wife, before her buoyancy had faltered, and before the five little
+head-boards to the five stillborn children had been set up amid the
+periwinkle in the family graveyard, Aunt Griselda had written from the
+home of her sister to say that she would stop over at Battle Hall on her
+way to Richmond.
+
+The general had received the news joyfully, and the best chamber had
+been made ready by the hospitable hands of his young wife. Delicate,
+lavender-scented linen had been put on the old tester-bed and curtains
+of flowered chintz tied back from the window seats. Amelia Battle had
+placed a bowl of tea-roses upon the dressing table and gone graciously
+down to the avenue to welcome her guest. From the family carriage Aunt
+Griselda had emerged soured and eccentric. She had gone up to the best
+chamber, unpacked her trunks, hung up her bombazine skirts in the
+closet, ordered green tea and toast, and settled herself for the
+remainder of her days. That was twenty years ago, and she still slept in
+the best chamber, and still ordered tea and toast at the table. She had
+grown sourer with years and more eccentric with authority, but the
+general never failed to treat her crotchets with courtesy or to open the
+door for her when she came and went. To the mild complaints of Miss
+Chris and the protestations of Eugenia he returned the invariable
+warning: "She is our guest--remember what is due to a guest, my dears."
+
+And when Miss Chris placidly suggested that the privileges of guestship
+wore threadbare when they were stretched over twenty years, and Eugenia
+fervently hoped that there were no visitors in heaven, the general
+responded to each in turn:
+
+"It is the right of a guest to determine the length of his stay, and, as
+a Virginian, my house is open as long as it has a roof over it."
+
+So Aunt Griselda drank her green tea in acrid silence, turning at
+intervals to reprove Bernard for taking too large mouthfuls or to
+request Eugenia to remove her elbows from the table.
+
+To-day, when Eugenia descended, she was gazing stonily into Miss
+Chris's genial face, and listening constrainedly to a story at which the
+general was laughing heartily.
+
+"Yes, I never look at these forks of the bead pattern that I don't see
+Aunt Callowell," Miss Chris was concluding. "She never used any other
+pattern, and I remember when Cousin Bob Baker once sent her a set of
+teaspoons with a different border, she returned them to Richmond to be
+exchanged. Do you remember the time she came to mother's when we were
+children, Tom? Eugie, will you have breast or leg?"
+
+"I don't think I could have been at home," said the general, his face
+growing animated, as it always did, in a discussion of old times; "but I
+do remember once, when I was at Uncle Robert's, they sent me eighteen
+miles on horseback for the doctor, because Aunt Callowell had such a
+queer feeling in her side when she started to walk. I can see her now
+holding her side and saying: 'I can't possibly take a step! Robert, I
+can't take a step!' And when I brought the doctor eighteen miles from
+home, on his old gray mare, he found that she'd put a shoe on one foot
+and a slipper on the other."
+
+The general threw back his head and laughed until the table groaned,
+while Miss Chris's double chin shook softly over her cameo brooch.
+
+Aunt Griselda wiped her eyes on the border of her handkerchief.
+
+"Aunt Cornelia Callowell was a righteous woman," she murmured. "I never
+thought that I should hear her ridiculed in the house of her
+great-nephew. She scalloped me a flannel petticoat with her own hands.
+Eugenia, in my day little girls didn't reach for the butter. They waited
+until it was handed to them."
+
+Congo, the butler, rushed to Eugenia's assistance, and the general shook
+his finger at her and formed the word "guest" with his mouth. Miss Chris
+changed the subject by begging Aunt Griselda to have a wing of chicken.
+
+"I don't believe in so much dieting," she said cheerfully. "I think your
+nerves would be better if you ate more. Just try a brown wing."
+
+"I know my nerves are bad," Aunt Griselda rejoined, still wiping her
+eyes, "though it is hard to be accused of a temper before my own nephew.
+But I know I am a burden, and I have overstayed my welcome. Let me go."
+
+"Why, Aunt Griselda?" remonstrated Miss Chris in hurt tones. "You know I
+didn't accuse you of anything. I only meant that you would feel better
+if you didn't drink so much tea and ate more meat--"
+
+"I am not too old to take a hint," replied Aunt Griselda. "I haven't
+reached my dotage yet, and I can see when I am a burden. Here, Congo,
+you may put my teapot away."
+
+"O Lord!" gasped the general tragically; and rising to the occasion, he
+said hurriedly: "By the way, Chris, they told me at the post-office
+to-day that old Dr. Smith was dead. It was only last week that I met him
+on his way to town with his niece's daughter, and he told me that he had
+never been in better health in his life."
+
+"Dear me!" exclaimed Miss Chris, holding a large spoonful of
+raspberries poised above the dish to which she was helping. "Why, old
+Dr. Smith attended me forty years ago when I had measles. I remember he
+made me lie in bed with blankets over me, though it was August, and he
+wouldn't let me drink anything except hot flax-seed tea. They say all
+that has been changed in this generation--"
+
+"Leave me plenty of room for cream, Aunt Chris," broke in Bernard, with
+an anxious eye on Miss Chris's absent-minded manipulations. She reached
+for the round, old silver pitcher, and poured the yellow cream on the
+sugared berries without pausing in her soft, monotonous flow of words.
+
+"But even in those days Dr. Smith was behind the times, and he has been
+so ever since. He used to say that chloroform was invented by infidels,
+and he would not let them give it to his son, Lawrence, when he broke
+his leg on the threshing machine. It was a mania with him, for, when I
+was nursing in the hospitals during the war, he told me with his own
+lips that he believed the Lord was on our side because we didn't have
+chloroform."
+
+"He had a good many odd ideas," said the general, "but he is dead now,
+poor man."
+
+"He raised up my dear father when he was struck down with paralysis,"
+murmured Aunt Griselda.
+
+When dinner was over the general returned to the front porch, and
+Eugenia and the puppy went with Bernard to the orchard to look for green
+apples.
+
+They started out in single file; Bernard, a bright-faced, snub-nosed boy
+with a girlish mouth, a little in advance, Eugenia following, and the
+puppy at her heels. On the way across the meadow, where myriads of
+grasshoppers darted with a whirring noise beneath the leaves of coarse
+mullein plants or the slender, unopened pods of milkweed, the puppy made
+sudden desperate skirmishes into the tangled pathside, pointing
+ineffectually at the heavy-legged insects, his red tongue lolling and
+his short tail wagging. Up the steep ascent of the orchard a rocky trail
+ran, bordered by a rail fence. From the point of the hill one could see
+the adjoining country unrolled like a map, olive heights melting into
+emerald valleys, bare clearings into luxuriant crops, running a
+chromatic scale from the dry old battlefields surrounding Kingsborough
+to the arable "bottoms" beside the enrichening river.
+
+After an unsuccessful search for cherries Bernard climbed a tree where
+summer apples hung green, and tossed the fruit to Eugenia, who held up
+her blue skirt beneath the overhanging boughs. The puppy, having dodged
+in astonishment a stray apple, went off after the silvery track of a
+snail.
+
+"That's enough," called Bernard presently, and he descended and filled
+his pockets from Eugenia's lap. "They set my teeth on edge, anyway. Got
+any salt?"
+
+Eugenia drew a small folded envelope from her pocket. Then she threw
+away her apple and pointed to the little brook at the foot of the hill.
+"There's that red-winged blackbird in the bulrushes again. I believe
+it's got a nest."
+
+And they started in a run down the hillside, the puppy waddling behind
+with shrill, impertinent barks.
+
+At the bottom of the hill they lost the blackbird and found Nicholas
+Burr, who was lying face downwards upon the earth, a fishing line at his
+side.
+
+"He's crying," said Eugenia in a high whisper.
+
+Nicholas rolled over, saw them, and got up, wiping his eyes on the
+sleeve of his shirt.
+
+"There warn't nobody lookin'," he said defiantly.
+
+"You're too big to cry," observed Bernard dispassionately, munching a
+green apple he had taken from his pocket. "You're as big as I am, and I
+haven't cried since I was six years old. Eugie cries."
+
+"I don't!" protested Eugenia vehemently. "I reckon you'd cry too if they
+made you sit in the house the whole afternoon and hem cup-towels."
+
+"I'm a boy, Miss Spitfire. Boys don't sew. I saw Nick Burr milking,
+though, one day. What made you milk, Nick?"
+
+"Ma did."
+
+"I'd like to see anybody make me milk. You're jes' the same as a girl."
+
+"I ain't!"
+
+"You are!"
+
+"I ain't!"
+
+"'Spose you fight it out," suggested Eugenia, with an eye for sport,
+settling herself upon the ground with Jim in her lap.
+
+Nicholas picked up his fishing line and wound it slowly round the cork.
+"There's a powerful lot of minnows in this creek," he remarked amicably.
+"When you lean over that log you can catch 'em in your hat."
+
+"Let's do it," said Eugenia, starting up, and they went out upon the
+slippery log between the reedy banks. Over the smooth, pebbly bed of
+the stream flashed the shining bodies of hundreds of minnows, passing
+back and forth with brisk wriggles of their fine, steel-coloured tails.
+On the Battle side of the bank a huge, blue-winged dragonfly buzzed
+above the flaunting red and yellow faces of three tiger-lilies.
+
+Jim sat on the brookside and watched the minnows, having ventured midway
+upon the log, to retreat at the sight of his own reflection in the
+water.
+
+"He's a coward," said Bernard teasingly, alluding to the recreant Jim.
+"I wouldn't have a dog that was a coward."
+
+"He ain't a coward," returned Eugenia passionately. "He jes' don't like
+looking at his own face, that's all. Here, Nick, hand me your hat."
+
+Nick obediently gave her his hat, and Eugenia leaned over the stream,
+her bare arms and vivid face mirrored against the silvery minnows, when
+a shrill call came from the house.
+
+"Nick! Who-a Ni-ck!"
+
+"That's Sairy Jane," said Nicholas, reaching for his hat. "Ma wants me."
+
+"Who is Sairy Jane?"
+
+"Sister."
+
+Eugenia handed him his dripping hat, and stood shaking her fingers free
+from the sparkling drops.
+
+"Will you come and fish with me to-morrow?" she asked.
+
+"If I ain't got to work in the field--"
+
+"Don't work."
+
+"Can't help it."
+
+The call was repeated, and Nicholas sped over the mossy log and across
+the ploughed field, while Bernard and Eugenia toiled up the hillside.
+
+As they passed the Sweet Gum Spring they saw Delphy, the washerwoman,
+standing in her doorway, quarrelling with her son-in-law, Moses, who was
+hoeing a small garden patch in the rear of an adjoining cabin. Delphy
+was a large mulatto woman, with a broad, flat bosom and enormous hands
+that looked as if they had been parboiled into a livid blue tint.
+
+"'Tain' no use fer to hoe groun' dat ain' got no richness," she was
+saying, shaking her huge head until the dipper hanging on the lintel of
+the door rattled, "en'tain' no use preachin' ter a nigger dat ain' got
+no gumption. Es de tree fall, so hit' gwine ter lay, en es a fool's done
+been born, so he gwine ter die. 'Tain' no use a-tryin' fer to do over a
+job dat de Lawd done slighted. You may ding about hit en you may dung
+about hit, but ef'n it won't, hit won't."
+
+Moses, a meek-looking negro with an honest face, hoed silently, making
+no response to his mother-in-law's vituperations, which grew voluble
+before his non-resistance.
+
+"Dar ain' no use er my frettin' en perfumin' over dat ar nigger," she
+concluded, as if addressing a third person. "He wuz born a syndicate en
+he'll die er syndicate. De Debbil, he ain' gwine tu'n 'm en de Lawd he
+can't. De preachin' it runs off 'im same es water off er duck's back.
+I'se done talked ter him day in en day out twell dar ain' no breff lef
+fer me ter blow wid, an' he ain' changed a hyar f'om what de Lawd made
+'im. Seems like he ain' got de sperit uv--"
+
+"Why, Delphy!" exclaimed Bernard, interrupting the flow of speech.
+"What's the matter with Moses?"
+
+Delphy snorted contemptuously and took breath for procedure, when the
+sharp cry of a baby came from Moses' cabin, and Eugenia broke in
+excitedly:
+
+"Why, there's a baby in there, Delphy! Whose baby is that?"
+
+"Git er long wid you, chile," said Delphy. "You knows er plum sight mo'
+now'n you ought ter." Then she added with a snort: "Hit's es black es er
+crow's foot."
+
+"Is it Betsey's baby?"
+
+"I reckon'tis. Moses he says ez what'tis, but he's de mos' outlandish
+nigger on dis yer place. Dar ain' no relyin' on him, noways."
+
+"When did it come, Delphy? Who brought it? I saw Dr. Debs yesterday, an'
+his saddle-bag bulged mightily."
+
+"De Lawd didn't brung hit," returned Delphy emphatically. "De Lawd
+wouldn't er teched hit wid er ten-foot pole. Dis yer Moses, he ain' wuth
+de salt dat's put in his bread. He's de wuss er de hull lot--"
+
+"Why doesn't Betsey get rid of him?" asked Bernard, eyeing the shrinking
+Moses with disfavour. "I heard Aunt Chris say that Mrs. Willie Wilson in
+Richmond got a divorce from her husband for good and all--"
+
+"Lawdy, chile! Huccome you think I'se gwine ter pay fer a dervoge fer
+sech er low-lifeted creetur ez dat? He ain' wuth no dervogin', he ain'.
+When it come ter dervogin', I'll dervoge 'im wid my fis' en foot--"
+
+Here the baby cried again, and the irate Delphy disappeared into Moses'
+cabin, while the meek-looking son-in-law hoed the garden patch and
+muttered beneath his breath.
+
+The children passed the spring, crossed the meadow, and followed the
+grapevine trellis to the back steps, when Eugenia rushed through the
+wide hall with an impetuous flutter of short skirts.
+
+"Papa!" she cried, bursting upon the general as he sat smoking upon the
+front porch. "What do you think has happened? There's a new baby came to
+Moses' cabin, an' Delphy says it's as black as--"
+
+"Well, I am blessed!" groaned the general, knocking the ashes from his
+pipe. "Another mouth to feed. Eugie, they'll ruin me yet."
+
+"I reckon they will," returned Eugenia hopelessly. She seated herself
+upon the topmost step and made a place for Jim beside her.
+
+The general was silent for some time, smoking thoughtfully and staring
+past the aspens and the well-house to the waving cornfield. When he
+spoke it was with embarrassed hesitation.
+
+"I say, daughter."
+
+Eugenia looked up eagerly.
+
+"Didn't that spotted cow of Moses' die last week?"
+
+"That it did," replied Eugenia emphatically. "It got loose in your
+clover, pasture and ate itself too full. Moses says it bu'st."
+
+"Pish!" exclaimed the general angrily. "My clover! I tell you, they
+won't leave me a roof over my head. They'll eat me into the poorhouse.
+But I'll turn them off. I'll send them packing, bag and baggage. My
+clover!"
+
+"Moses ain't got much of a garden patch," said Eugenia. "It looks mighty
+poor. The potato-bugs ate all his potatoes."
+
+The general was silent again.
+
+"I say, daughter," he began at last, blowing a heavy cloud of smoke upon
+the air, "the next time you go by Sweet Gum Spring you had just as well
+tell Moses that I can let him have a side of bacon if he wants it. The
+rascal can't starve. But they won't leave me a mouthful--not one. And
+Eugie--"
+
+"Yes, sir."
+
+"You needn't mention it to your Aunt Chris--"
+
+At that instant a little barefooted negro came running across the lawn
+from the spring-house, a large tin pail in his hand.
+
+"Here, boy!" called the general. "Where're you off to? What have you got
+in that pail?"
+
+"It's Jake," said Eugenia in a whisper, while Jim barked frantically
+from the shelter of her arms. "He's Delphy's Jake."
+
+The small negro stood grinning in the walk, his white eyeballs circling
+in their sockets. "Hit's Miss Chris, suh," he said at last.
+
+"Miss Chris, you rascal!" shouted the general. "Do you expect me to
+believe you've got Miss Chris in that pail? Open it, sir; open it!"
+
+Jake showed a shining row of ivory teeth and stood shaking the pail from
+side to side.
+
+"Miss Chris, she gun hit ter me, suh," he explained. "Hit's Miss Chris
+herse'f dat's done sont me ter tote dish yer buttermilk ter Unk Mose."
+
+"Bless my soul!" cried the general wrathfully. "Get away with you! The
+whole place is bent on ruining me. I'll be in the poorhouse before the
+week's up." And he strode indoors in a rage.
+
+
+
+
+VII
+
+
+Twice a year, on fine days in spring and fall, Aunt Griselda's bombazine
+dresses were taken from the whitewashed closet and hung out to air upon
+the clothesline at the back of the house, while pungent odours of tar
+and camphor were exhaled from the full black folds. On these days Aunt
+Griselda would remain in her room, sorting faded relics which she took
+from a cedar chest and spread beside her on the floor. The door was kept
+locked at such times, but once Eugenia, who had gone with Congo to carry
+Aunt Griselda her toast and tea, had caught a glimpse of a yellowed
+swiss muslin frock and the leather case of a daguerreotype containing
+the picture of a round-eyed girl with rosy cheeks. Aunt Griselda had
+hidden them hastily away at the child's entrance--hidden them with that
+nervous, awkward haste which dreads a dawning jest of itself; but
+Eugenia had seen that her old eyes were red and her voice more rasping
+than usual.
+
+Sixty years ago Aunt Griselda had had her romance, and she still kept
+her love-letters tied up with discoloured ribbons and laid away in the
+cedar chest. It was but the skeleton of a love story--the adolescent
+ardours of a high-spirited country girl and the high-spirited son of a
+neighbouring farmer. When the quarrel came the letters were overlooked
+when the ring went back. Griselda Grigsby had tossed them carelessly
+into the cedar chest and gone out to forget them. Her heart had not
+been deeply touched and it soon mended. No other lovers came, and she
+lived her quiet life in her father's house, gathering garden flowers for
+the great, blue bowls in the parlour, teaching the catechism to small
+black slaves, and making stiff, old-fashioned samplers in crewels. The
+high-spirited lover had loved elsewhere and died of a fever, and, beyond
+a passing regret, she thought little of him. There were nearer
+interests, and she was still the petted daughter of her father's
+house--the eldest and the best beloved. Then the crash came. The old
+people passed away, the house changed hands, Aunt Griselda was stranded
+upon the high tide of hospitality--and crewel work went out of fashion.
+
+In her sister's home she became a constant guest--one to be offered the
+favoured share and to be treated with tender, increasing tolerance--not
+to be loved. Since the death of her parents none had loved her, though
+many had borne gently with her spoiled fancies. But her coming in had
+brought no light, and her going out had left nothing dark. She was old
+and ill-tempered and bitter of speech, and, though all doors opened
+hospitably at her approach, all closed quickly when she was gone. Her
+spoiled youth had left her sensitive to trivial stings, unforgivable to
+fancied wrongs. In a childish oversight she detected hidden malice and
+implacable hate in a thoughtless jest. Her bitterness and her years
+waxed greater together, and she lost alike her youth and her
+self-control. When she had yearned for passionate affection she had
+found kindly tolerance, and the longings of her hidden nature, which
+none knew, were expressed in rasping words and acrid tears. Once, some
+years after Bernard's birth, she had called him into her room as she sat
+among her relics, and had shown him the daguerreotype.
+
+"It's pitty lady," the child had lisped, and she had caught him suddenly
+to her lean old breast, but he had broken into peevish cries and
+struggled free, tearing with his foot the ruffle of the swiss muslin
+gown.
+
+"Oo ain't pitty lady," he had said, and Aunt Griselda had risen and
+pushed him into the hall with sharp, scolding words, and had sat down to
+darn the muslin ruffle with delicate, old-fashioned stitches.
+
+It was only when all living love had failed her that she returned to the
+dead. She had gathered the letters of nearly sixty years ago from the
+bottom of the cedar chest, reading them through her spectacles with
+bleared, watery eyes. Those subtle sentimentalities which linger like
+aromas in a heart too aged for passion were liberated by the bundle of
+yellow scrawls written by hands that were dust. As she sat in her stiff
+bombazine skirts beside the opened chest, peering with worry-ravaged
+face at the old letters, she forgot that she was no longer one with the
+girl in the muslin frock, and that the inciter of this exuberant emotion
+was as dead as the emotion itself.
+
+When the dresses were brought up to her she would put them on again and
+go down to flinch before kindly eyes and to make embittered speeches in
+her high, shrill voice. Outwardly she grew more soured and more
+eccentric. On mild summer evenings she would come down stairs with her
+head wrapped in a pink knitted "nubia," and stroll back and forth along
+the gravelled walk, her gaunt figure passing into the dusk of the cedar
+avenue and emerging like the erratic shadow of one of the sombre trees.
+
+Sometimes Eugenia joined her, but Bernard, her favourite, held shyly
+aloof. In her exercise she seldom spoke, and her words were peevish
+ones, but there was grim pathos in her carriage as she moved slowly back
+and forth between the straight rows of box.
+
+After supper the family assembled on the porch and talked in a desultory
+way until ten o'clock, when the lights were put out and the house
+retired to rest. Eugenia slept in a great, four-post bedstead with Aunt
+Chris, and the bed was so large and soft and billowy that she seemed to
+lose herself suddenly at night in its lavender-scented midst, and to be
+as suddenly discovered in the morning by Rindy, the house-girl, when she
+came with her huge pails of warm water.
+
+Those fresh summer dawns of Eugenia's childhood became among her dearest
+memories in after years. There were hours when, awaking, wide-eyed,
+before the house was astir, she would rise on her elbow and look out
+across the dripping lawn, where each dewdrop was charged with opalescent
+tints, to the western horizon, where the day broke in a cloud of gold.
+The song of a mocking-bird in the poplars of the little graveyard came
+to her with unsuspected melody--a melody drawn from the freshness, the
+loneliness, the half-awakened calls from hidden nests and the lyric
+ecstasy of dawn.
+
+Then, with the rising of the sun, Aunt Chris would turn upon her pillow
+and open her soft, brown eyes.
+
+"It is not good for little folks to be awake so early," she would say,
+and there would rush upon the child a sense of warmth and tenderness and
+comfort, and she would nestle closer to her sweet, white pillow. With
+the beginning of day began also the demands upon the time of Miss Chris.
+First the new overseer, knocking at her door, would call through the
+crack that a cow had calved, or that one of the sheep was too ill to go
+to pasture. Then Rindy, entering with her pails, would shake a
+pessimistic head.
+
+"Lawd, Miss Chris, one er dem ole coons done eat up er hull pa'cel er
+yo' chickens." And Miss Chris, at once the prop and the mainstay of the
+Battle fortunes, would rise with anxious exclamations and put on her
+full black skirt and linen sacque.
+
+When breakfast was over Miss Chris went into the storeroom each morning
+and came out with a basin of corn-meal dough, followed by Sampson
+bearing an axe and Aunt Verbeny jingling the hen-house keys. The slow
+procession then filed out to the space before the hen-house, the door of
+which was flung back, while Aunt Verbeny clucked at a little distance.
+Miss Chris scattered her dough upon the ground and, while her
+unsuspecting beneficiaries made their morning meal, she pointed out to
+Sampson, the executioner, the members of the feathered community
+destined to be sacrificed to the carnivorous habits of their fellow
+mortals.
+
+"Feel that one with the black spots, Sampson," she said with the
+indifference of an abstract deity. "Is it fat? And the domineca pullet,
+and the two roosters we bought from Delphy."
+
+And when Sampson had seized upon the victims of the fiat she turned to
+inspect the bunches of fowls offered by neighbouring breeders.
+
+To-day it was Nicholas Burr who stood patiently in the background, three
+drooping chickens in each hand, their legs tied together with strips of
+a purple calico which Marthy was making into a dress for Sairy Jane.
+
+Seeing that Miss Chris had delivered her judgments, he came forward and
+proffered his captives with an abashed demeanour.
+
+"How much are they worth?" asked Miss Chris in her cheerful tones, while
+Aunt Verbeny gave a suspicious poke beneath one of the flapping wings,
+followed by a grunt of disparagement.
+
+Nicholas stammered confusedly:
+
+"Ma says the biggest ought to bring a quarter," he returned, blushing as
+Aunt Verbeny grunted again, "and the four smallest can go for twenty
+cents."
+
+But when the bargain was concluded he lingered and added shamefacedly:
+"Won't you please let that red-and-black rooster live as long as you
+can? I raised it."
+
+"Why, bless my heart!" exclaimed Miss Chris, "I believe the child is
+fond of the chicken."
+
+Eugenia, who was hovering by, burst into tears and declared that the
+rooster should not die.
+
+"Twenty cents is s-o ch-ea-p for a li-fe," she sobbed. "It shan't be
+killed, Aunt Chris. It shall go in my hen-h-ou-se." And she rushed off
+to get her little tin bank from the top bureau drawer.
+
+When the arrangements were concluded Nicholas started empty-handed down
+the box walk, the money jingling in his pocket. At the end of the long
+avenue of cedars there was a wide, unploughed common which extended for
+a quarter of a mile along the roadside. In spring and summer the ground
+was white with daisies and in the autumn it donned gorgeous vestments of
+golden-rod and sumach. In the centre of the waste, standing alike grim
+and majestic at all seasons, there was the charred skeleton of a
+gigantic tree, which had been stripped naked by a bolt of lightning long
+years ago. At its foot a prickly clump of briars surrounded the
+blackened trunk in a decoration of green or red, and from this futile
+screen the spectral limbs rose boldly and were silhouetted against the
+far-off horizon like the masts of a wrecked and deserted ship. A rail
+fence, where a trumpet-vine hung heavily, divided the field from the
+road, and several straggling sheep that had strayed from the distant
+flock stood looking shyly over the massive crimson clusters.
+
+When Nicholas came out from the funereal dusk of the cedars the field
+was almost blinding in the morning glare, the yellow-centred daisies
+rolling in the breeze like white-capped billows on a sunlit sea. From
+the avenue to his father's land the road was unbroken by a single
+shadow--only to the right, amid the young corn, there was a solitary
+persimmon tree, and on the left the gigantic wreck stranded amid the
+tossing daisies.
+
+The sun was hot, and dust rose like smoke from the white streak of the
+road, which blazed beneath a cloudless sky.
+
+The boy was tired and thirsty, and as he tramped along the perspiration
+rose to his forehead and dropped, upon his shoulder. With a sigh of
+satisfaction he came upon the little cottage of his father and saw his
+stepmother taking the clothes in from the bushes where they had been
+spread to dry. It was Saturday, and ironing day, and he hoped for a
+chance at his lessons before night came, when he was so tired that the
+facts would not stick in his brain. He thought that it must be very easy
+to study in the mornings when you were fresh and eager and before that
+leaden weight centred behind your eyeballs.
+
+When Marthy Burr saw him she called irritably:
+
+
+"I say, Nick, did they take the chickens?"
+
+Nicholas nodded, and, crossing the weeds in the garden, gave her the
+money from his pocket.
+
+"They didn't say nothing 'bout wantin' more, I 'spose? Did you tell 'em
+I was fattenin' them four pairs of ducks?"
+
+Nicholas shook his head. No, he hadn't told them.
+
+"Well, your pa wants you down in the peanut field. You'd better get a
+drink of water first. You look powerful red."
+
+An hour later, when work was over, he carried his book to the orchard
+and flung himself down beneath the trees. The judge had given him a
+biography of Jefferson, and he had learned his hero's life with lips and
+heart. The day that it was finished he put the volume under his arm and
+went to the rector's house.
+
+"I want to join the church," he said bluntly.
+
+The rector, a kindly, middle-aged man, with a love for children, turned
+to him in half-puzzled, half-sympathetic inquiry.
+
+"You are young, my child," he replied, "to be so zealous a Christian."
+
+"'Tain't that, sir," said the boy slowly. "I don't set much store by
+that. But I've got to go to heaven--because I can't see Thomas Jefferson
+no other way."
+
+The rector did not smile. He was wiser than his generation, for he left
+the great man's own religion to himself and God. He said merely:
+
+"When you are older we shall see, my boy--we shall see."
+
+Nicholas left with a chill of disappointment, but as he passed along the
+street his name was called by Juliet Burwell, and she fluttered across
+to him in all her mystifying flounces and her gracious smile.
+
+"I was at the rector's," she said, "and he told me that you wanted to be
+confirmed--and I want you to come into my Sunday-school class."
+
+Nicholas met the kind eyes and blushed purple. Her beauty took away his
+breath and made his pulses leap. The slow, musical drawl of her speech
+soothed him like the running of clear water. He felt the image of Thomas
+Jefferson totter upon its pedestal, but it was steadied with a
+tremendous lurch. Jefferson was a man, after all, and this was only a
+woman.
+
+"Will you come?" asked the soft voice, and he stammered an amazed and
+awkward assent.
+
+
+
+
+VIII
+
+
+On the Saturday after the day upon which Nicholas had pledged himself to
+attend Sunday-school Juliet Burwell asked him to come into Kingsborough
+and talk over the lesson for the following morning. At five o'clock in
+the afternoon he dressed himself with trembling hands and a perturbed
+heart; and for the first time in his life turned to look at his
+reflection in the small, cracked mirror hanging above the washstand in
+his stepmother's room.
+
+As a finishing touch Marthy Burr tied a flaming plaid cravat beneath his
+collar.
+
+"You ain't much on looks," she remarked as she drew back to survey him,
+"but you've got as peart a face as I ever seed. I reckon you'll be
+plenty handsome for a man. I was al'ays kind of set against one of these
+pink an' white men, somehow. They're pretty enough to look at when
+you're feelin' first-rate, but when you git the neuralgy they sort of
+turns yo' stomach. I've a taste for sober colours in men and caliky."
+
+"I think he looks beautiful," said Sairy Jane, her eyes on the cravat,
+and Nicholas felt a sudden glow of gratitude, and silently resolved to
+save up until he had enough money to buy her a hair ribbon.
+
+"I ain't sayin' he don't," returned Marthy Burr with a severe glance in
+the direction of her eldest daughter, who was minding Jubal in the
+kitchen doorway. "Thar's red heads an' red heads, an' his ain't no
+redder than the reddest. But he came honestly by it, which is more than
+some folks can say as is got yellow. His father had it befo' him, an'
+thar's one good thing about it, you've got to be born with it or you
+ain't goin' to come by it no other way. I never seed a dyer that could
+set hair that thar colour 'cep'n the Lord Himself--an' I ain't one to
+deny that the Lord has got good taste in His own line."
+
+Then, as Nicholas took up his hat, she added: "If they ask after me,
+Nick, be sure an' say I'm jes' po'ly."
+
+Nicholas nodded and went out, followed to the road by Sairy Jane and
+Jubal, while his stepmother called after him to walk in the grass and
+try to keep his feet clean.
+
+When he reached Kingsborough and crossed the green to the Burwell's
+house, which was in the lane called "Back Street," he fell to a creeping
+pace, held back by the fluttering of his pulses. Not until he saw Juliet
+standing at the little whitewashed gate did he brace himself to the full
+courage of approaching. When he spoke her name she opened the gate and
+gave him her hand, while all sense of diffidence fell from him.
+
+"I've been looking at you for a long ways," he said boldly, "an' you
+were just like one of them tall lilies bordering the walk."
+
+She blushed, turning her clear eyes upon him, and he felt a great desire
+to kiss the folds of her skirt or the rose above her left temple. He had
+never seen any one so good or so kind or so beautiful, and he vowed
+passionately in his rustic little heart that he would always love her
+best--best of all--that he would fight for her if he might, or work for
+her if she needed it. There was none like her--not his stepmother--not
+Sairy Jane--not even Eugenia. She was different--something of finer
+clay, made to be waited upon and worshipped like the picture of the
+goddess standing on the moon that he had seen in the judge's study.
+
+Juliet smiled upon his ardour, and, leading him to a bench beneath a
+flowering myrtle, made him sit down beside her, while she spoke pious
+things about Adam and the catechism and the salvation of the world--to
+all of which he listened with wide-opened eyes and a fluttering heart.
+He wondered why no one had ever before told him such beautiful things
+about God and the manifold importance of keeping a clean heart and
+loving your neighbour as yourself. It seemed to him that he had been
+living in sin for the twelve years of his life and he feared that he
+should find it impossible to purge his mind of evil passions and to love
+the coloured boy Boss who had stolen his best fishing line. He asked
+Juliet if she thought he would be able to withstand the assaults of
+Satan as the minister told him to do; but she laughed and said that
+there was no Satan who went about like a roaring lion--only cruelty and
+anger and ill-will, and that he must be kind to his brothers and
+sisters, and to animals, and not rob birds' nests, which was very wrong.
+Then she added as an afterthought, with a saintly look in her eyes, that
+he must love God. He promised that he should try to do so, though he
+wished in his heart that she had told him to love herself instead. As
+he sat in the soft light, watching her beautiful face rising against a
+background of lilies, his young brain thrilled with the joy of life. It
+was such a glorious thing to live in a great, kind world, with a big,
+beneficent God above the blue, and to love all mankind--not harbouring
+an angry thought or an ill feeling! He looked into the kind eyes beside
+him and felt that he should like to be a saint or a minister--not a
+lawyer, which might be wicked after all. Then he remembered the
+waxen-faced, choleric clergyman of the church his stepmother attended,
+but he put the memory away. No, he would not be like that; he would not
+preach fire and brimstone from a white-pine pulpit. He would be large
+and just and merciful like God; and Juliet Burwell would come to hear
+him preach, looking up at him with her blue, blue glance. In the
+meantime he would not rob that marsh hen's nest which he had found. He
+would never steal another egg. He wished that he didn't have that
+drawerful at home. He would give them to Sairy Jane if she wanted
+them--all except the snake's egg, which he might keep, because serpents
+were an accursed race. Yes, Sairy Jane might have them all, and he
+wouldn't pull her hair again when he caught her looking at them on the
+sly.
+
+Presently Juliet called Sally and took him into the quaint old
+dining-room and gave him cakes and jam on a table that shone like glass.
+There he saw Mr. Burwell--a pink-cheeked, little gentleman who wore an
+expansive air of innocence and a white pique waistcoat--and Mrs.
+Burwell, a pretty, gray-haired woman, who ruled her husband with the
+velvet-pawed despotism which was the heritage of the women of her race
+and day. She had never bought a bonnet without openly consulting his
+judgment; he had never taken a step in life without unconsciously
+following hers.
+
+"Really, my dear Sally," he had said when he heard of Nicholas's
+reception by his daughter, "Juliet must a--a--be taught to recognise the
+existence of class. Really, I cannot have her bringing all these people
+into my house. You must put a stop to it at once, my dear."
+
+Mrs. Burwell had smiled placidly as she patted her gray fringe.
+
+"Of course you know best, Mr. Burwell," she had replied with that
+touching humility which forbade her to address her husband by his
+Christian name. "Of course you know best about such matters, and I'll
+tell Juliet what you say. Poor child, she has such confidence in your
+judgment that she will believe whatever you say to be right; but she
+does love so to feel that she is exerting a good influence over the
+boys, and, perhaps, helping them to work out their future salvation. She
+thinks, too, that it is so well for them to have a chance of talking to
+you. I heard her tell Dudley Webb that he must take you for an
+example--"
+
+"Ah!--ahem!" said Mr. Burwell, who worshipped the ground his daughter
+trod upon. "I suppose it would be a pity to interfere with her, eh, my
+dear?"
+
+"Well, I can't help wishing myself, Mr. Burwell, that she would select
+children of her own class in life, but, as you say, she has taken a
+fancy to that Burr boy, and he seems to be a decent, respectful kind of
+child. Of course I know it is your soft heart that makes you look at it
+in this way--but I love you all the better for it. I remember the day
+you proposed to me for the sixth time, I had just seen you bandage up
+the head of a little darkey that had cut himself--and I accepted you on
+the spot."
+
+"Yes, yes, my love," Mr. Burwell had responded, kissing his wife as they
+left the room. "I am convinced that I am right, and I am glad that you
+agree with me. We won't speak of it to Juliet."
+
+In the hall below they met Nicholas Burr, and greeted him with
+hospitable kindness.
+
+"So this is your new scholar, eh, Juliet? You must do justice to your
+teacher, my boy."
+
+Juliet laughed and went out into the yard to meet several young men who
+were coming up the walk, and Nicholas noticed with a jealous pang that
+she sat with them beneath the myrtle and talked in the same soft voice
+with the same radiant smile. She was not speaking of heaven now. She was
+laughing merrily at pointless jokes and promising to embroider a
+handkerchief for one and to make a box of caramels for another.
+
+He knew that they all loved her, and it gave him a miserable feeling. He
+felt that they were unworthy of her--that they would not worship her
+always and become ministers for her sake, as he was going to do. He even
+wondered if it wouldn't be better, after all, to become a prize fighter
+and to knock them all out in the first round when he got a chance.
+
+In a moment Juliet called him to her side and laid her hand upon his
+arm. "He has promised not to rob birds' nests and to love me always,"
+she said.
+
+But the young men only laughed.
+
+"Ask something harder," retorted one. "Any of us will do that. Ask him
+to stand on his head or to tie himself into a bow knot for your sake."
+
+Nicholas reddened angrily, but Juliet told the jester to try such
+experiments himself--that she did not want a contortionist about. Then
+she bent over the boy as he said good-bye, and he went down the walk
+between the lilies and out into the lane.
+
+He recrossed the green slowly, turning into the main street at the
+court-house steps. As he passed the church, a little further on, the
+iron gate opened and the rector came out, jingling the heavy keys in his
+hand as he talked amicably to a tourist who followed upon his heels.
+
+"Yes, my good sir," he was saying in his high-pitched, emphatic
+utterance, "this dear old churchyard is never mowed except by living
+lawn-mowers. I assure you that I have seen thirty heads of cattle upon
+the vaults--positively, thirty heads, sir!"
+
+But the boy's thoughts were far from the church and its rector, and the
+words sifted rapidly through his brain. He touched his hat at the
+tourist's greeting and smiled into the clergyman's face, but his actions
+were automatic. He would have nodded to the horse in the street or have
+smiled at the sun.
+
+As he passed the small shops fronting on the narrow sidewalk and
+followed the whitewashed fence of the college grounds until it ended at
+the Old Stage Road, he was conscious of the keen, pulsating harmony of
+life. It was good to be alive--to feel the warm sunshine overhead and
+the warm dust below. He was glad that he had been born, though the idea
+had never formulated itself until now. He would be very good all his
+life and never do a wicked thing. It was so easy to be good if you only
+wanted to. Yes, he would study hard and become learned in the law, like
+those old prophets with whom God spoke as man with man. Then, when he
+had grown better and wiser than any one on earth, his tongue would
+become loosened, and he would go forth to preach the Gospel, and Juliet
+would listen to him for his wisdom's sake. Oh, if she would only love
+him best--best of all!
+
+This evening the road through the wood did not frighten him, though the
+sun was down. He thought neither of the ghosts that Uncle Dan'l had
+seen, nor of the bug-a-boos that had chased Viney's husband home. He was
+too old for these things now. He had grown taller and stronger in a day.
+When he reached the pasture gate opposite the house he opened it and
+went in to look for the sheep.
+
+The west was fast losing colour, like a bright-hued fabric that has been
+drenched in water, and a thick, blue mist, shot with fireflies, shrouded
+the wide common. A fresh, sharp odour rose from the dew-steeped earth,
+giving place, as he gained upon the flock, to the smell of moist wool.
+As he brushed the heavy, purple tubes of Jamestown weeds long-legged
+insects flew out and struck against his arm before they fell in a
+drunken stupor to the grass below.
+
+The boy made his way cautiously, his figure becoming blurred as the
+mist wrapped him like a blanket. The darkness was gathering rapidly.
+From the far-off horizon clouds of lavender were melting, and the pines
+had gone gray.
+
+Presently a white patch glimmered in the midst of the pasture, and he
+began to call softly:
+
+"Coo-sheep! Coo-sheep!"
+
+A tremulous bleat answered, but as he neared the flock it scattered
+swiftly, the errant leaders darting shyly behind the looming outlines of
+sassafras bushes. Again he called, and again the plaintive cry
+responded, growing fainter as several fleeter ewes sped past him to the
+beech trees beside the little stream.
+
+The space before the boy was suddenly spangled with fireflies, and the
+mist grew denser.
+
+He broke off a branch of sassafras and started at a brisk run, rounding
+by some dozen yards the startled ewes. The scattered white blotches
+closed together as he ran towards them, and fled, bleating, to the flock
+where it clustered at the pasture gate.
+
+In a moment he had driven them across the road and behind the bars of
+the cow-pen.
+
+When he entered the house a little later he found that the family had
+had supper, a single plate remaining for himself. His stepmother,
+looking jaded and nervous, was putting salted herring to soak in an
+earthenware bowl, while she scolded Sairy Jane, who was patching Jubal's
+apron.
+
+"It's goin' on ten years sence I've stopped to draw breath," said Marthy
+Burr, "an' I'm clean wore out. 'Tain't no better than a dog's life,
+nohow--a woman an' a dog air about the only creeturs as would put up
+with it, an' they're the biggest pair of fools the Lord ever made. Here
+I've been standin' at the tub from sunrise to sunset, with my jaw a'most
+splittin' from my face, an' thar's yo' pa a-settin' at his pipe as
+unconsarned as if I wa'nt his lawful wife--the more's the pity! It's the
+lawful wives as have the work to do, an' the lawfuller the wives the
+lawfuller the work. If this here government ain't got nothin' better to
+do than to drive poor women till they drop I reckon we'd as well stop
+payin' taxes to keep it goin'."
+
+Nicholas wiped his heated brow on his shirt-sleeve and hung his hat on
+the back of a bottomless chair. Jubal, who was rolling on the floor,
+gave a gurgle and made a grab at it, to be soundly boxed by his mother
+as she reseated him at Sairy Jane's feet. His gurgle wavered dolorously
+and rose into a howl.
+
+"Have you been to supper, ma?" asked Nicholas cheerfully.
+
+"Lord, Nick, it's a long ways past supper-time," answered Sairy Jane,
+relieved by the interruption. "The things air all washed up, ain't they,
+pa?"
+
+Amos Burr scowled heavily upon the boy's head, his phlegmatic nature
+goaded into resentment by his wife's ill-temper and the lamentations of
+Jubal.
+
+"I don't reckon you expect supper to keep waitin' till breakfast," he
+said. "You've given your ma trouble enough 'thout makin' her do an extra
+washin' up on your o'count. You've gone clean crazy sence you've been
+loafin' round with them Battles. I don't see as you air much o'count,
+nohow."
+
+Nicholas raised his eyes to his father's face and looked at him
+fixedly. For a moment he did not speak, and then he said slowly:
+
+"I'm as good as a hand to you."
+
+He was thinking doggedly that he had never hated any one so much as he
+hated his own father, and that he liked the sensation. He wished he
+could do him some real harm--hit him hard enough to hurt or make the
+peanuts rot in the ground. He should like also to choke Jubal, who never
+left off yelling.
+
+Amos Burr spat a mouthful of tobacco juice through the open window,
+flinching before the boy's steady glance. He was a mild-natured man at
+best, whose chief sin was his softness. It would not have entered his
+slow-witted head to protest against the accusations of his wife. When
+they stung him into revolt he revolted in the opposite direction.
+
+But his failures were faults in his son's eyes. To the desperate
+determination of the boy, weakness became as contemptible as crime. What
+was a man worth who worked from morning until night and yet achieved
+nothing? Of what account was the farmer whom the crows outwitted and the
+weather made a mockery? Did not the very crops cry out as they rotted
+that his father was a fool, and the unploughed land proclaim him a
+coward? Had he ever dared a venture in his life or risked a season? And
+yet what had ever returned at his bidding or brought forth at his
+planting?
+
+"You've been mighty little use of late," repeated Amos Burr stubbornly
+when his wife placed the earthenware bowl on the shelf and came to the
+table--her arm outstretched.
+
+"Now, you jes' take yourself right off, Amos Burr," she said. "If you
+can't behave decently to my dead sister's child you shan't hang round
+them as was her own flesh and blood kin. Sairy Jane, you bring that
+plate of hot corn pones from the stove. Here, Nick, set right down an'
+eat your supper! There's some canned cherries if you want 'em."
+
+Nicholas sat down, but the cornbread stuck in his throat and the coffee
+was without aroma. He looked at the figured oilcloth on the table and
+thought of the shining glass and silver at Juliet Burwell's. The flavour
+of the cake she had given him seemed to intensify his distaste for the
+food before him. He felt that he cared for nobody--that he wanted
+nothing. He looked at his stepmother and thought that she was dried and
+brown like a hickory nut; he looked at Sairy Jane and wondered why she
+didn't have any eyelashes, and he looked at Jubal and saw that he was
+all gums.
+
+When he went up to his little attic room after supper he sat on his
+shucks pallet in the darkness and thought of all the evil that he should
+like to do. He should like to pull Sairy Jane's plait and to slap Jubal.
+He should even like to tell Juliet Burwell that he didn't want to keep a
+clean heart, and to call God names. No, he would not become a minister
+and preach the Gospel. He would be a thief instead and break into
+hen-houses and steal chickens. If his father planted watermelons he
+would steal them from the vines as soon as they were ripe. Perhaps
+Eugenia would help him. At any rate he would go halves with her if she
+would be his partner in wickedness. He had just as soon go to hell,
+after all--if it were not for Thomas Jefferson.
+
+He leaned his head on his hands and looked through the narrow window to
+where the peanut fields lay in blackness. From the stable came the faint
+neigh of the old mare, and he remembered suddenly that he had forgotten
+to put straw in her stall and to loosen her halter that she might lie
+down. He rose and stole softly downstairs and out of the house.
+
+
+
+
+IX
+
+
+One evening in late autumn Nicholas went into Delphy's cabin after
+supper and found Eugenia seated upon the hearth, facing Uncle Ish and
+Aunt Verbeny. Between them Delphy's son-in-law, Moses, was helping
+Bernard mend a broken hare trap, while Delphy, herself, was crooning a
+lullaby to one of her grandchildren as she carded the wool which she had
+taken from a quilt of faded patchwork. On the stones of the great
+fireplace the red flames from lightwood splits leaped over a smouldering
+hickory log, filling the cabin with the penetrating odour of burning,
+resinous pine. From the wall above the hearth a dozen roasting apples
+were suspended by hemp strings, and as the heat penetrated the russet
+coats the apples circled against the yawning chimney like small globes
+revolving about a sun.
+
+Eugenia was sitting silently in a low, split-bottomed chair, her hands
+folded in her lap and her animated eyes on the dark faces across from
+her, over whose wrinkled surfaces the dancing firelight chased in ruddy
+lights and shadows.
+
+Uncle Ish had stretched his feet out upon the stones, and the mud
+adhering to his rough, homemade boots was fast drying before the blaze
+and settling in coarse gray dust upon the hearth. His gnarled old palms
+lay upward on his knees, and his grizzled head was bowed upon his chest.
+At intervals he muttered softly to himself, but his words were
+inaudible--suggested by some far-off and disconnected vision. Aunt
+Verbeny was nodding in her chair, arousing herself from time to time to
+give a sharp glance into the face of Uncle Ish.
+
+"Huccome dey let you out ter-night, honey?" asked Delphy suddenly,
+turning her eyes upon Eugenia as she drew a fresh handful of wool from
+between the covers of the quilt.
+
+"I ran away," replied the child gravely. "I saw Bernard with his hare
+trap, and Bernard shan't do nothin' that I can't do."
+
+"Yes, I shall," rejoined Bernard without looking up from his trap. "You
+can't wear breeches."
+
+"I like to know why I can't," demanded Eugenia. "I put on a pair of your
+old ones and they fit me just as well as they do you--only Aunt Chris
+made me get out of them."
+
+"Sakes er live!" exclaimed Aunt Verbeny, awaking from her doze.
+
+Uncle Ish stared dreamily into the flames. "Ole Miss wuz in her grave,
+she wuz," he muttered, while Delphy looked at him and shook her head
+mysteriously.
+
+Then, as Nicholas entered, they made a place for him upon the
+hearthstones, treating him with the forbearing tolerance with which the
+well-born negro regards the low-born white man.
+
+"Pa wants you all to help him in peanut-picking to-morrow," said
+Nicholas, addressing the group indiscriminately. "He's late at it this
+year, but he's been laid up with rheumatism."
+
+"Dar ain' nuttin' ez goes on two foot er fo' ez won' len' er han' at a
+pickin'," remarked Uncle Ish as the boy sat down. "Dar ain' nuttin' in
+de shape, er man er crow ez won't he'p demse'ves w'en dey's lyin' roun'
+loose, nuther."
+
+"Dar's gwine ter be er killin' fros' fo' mawnin'," said Moses, his teeth
+chattering from the draught let in by the opening door. "Hit kilt all
+Miss Chris' hop vines las' year, en it'll kill all ez ain't under kiver
+ter-night. Hit seems ter sort er lay holt er yo' chist en clean grip
+hit."
+
+"You ain' never had no chist, nohow," remarked Delphy disdainfully. "Hit
+don't take mo'n er spit er fros' ter freeze thoo you. You de coldest
+innered somebody I ever lay eyes on. Dar mought ez well be er fence rail
+er roun' on er winter night fer all de wa'mth ez is in yo' bones."
+
+"Dat's so," admitted Moses shamefacedly. "Dat's so. Dese yer nights,
+when de fire is all gone, is moughty near ter freezin' me out er house
+en home. I ain' never seed ne'r quilt ez wuz made fur er hull fambly
+yit. Wid me ter pull en Betsey ter pull en de chillun ter pull, whar de
+quilt?"
+
+"Dar ain' no blankets dese days," said Uncle Ish sadly. "Dey ain' got
+mo'n er seasonin' er wool in dese yer sto' stuff. Dey wa'nt dat ar way
+in ole times, sis Verbeny. Bless yo' soul, sis Verbeny, dey wan't dat ar
+way."
+
+"Ole Miss she use ter have eve'y stitch er her wool carded fo' her own
+eyes," said Aunt Verbeny. "What wa'nt good enough fer her wuz good
+enough fer de res', en we got hit. Ef'n de briars wouldn't come out'n it
+soon ez she laid her han' on 'em, Ole Miss she turnt up her nose en
+thowed de wool on ter de niggers' pile. Hit had ter be pisonous white
+en sof fo' hit 'ud tech Ole Missusses skin. Noner yo' nappy stuff done
+come near her."
+
+Uncle Ish chuckled and hung his head on his breast.
+
+"Doze wuz times!" he cried, "doze wuz times, en dese ain't times!"
+
+Then he looked at Nicholas, who was watching the apples spinning in the
+heat.
+
+"De po' white trash ain' set foot inside my do'," he added, "en de
+leetle gals ain' flirt roun' twell dar wa'nt no qualifyin' der legs f'om
+der arms."
+
+"I don't care!" said Eugenia, looking defiantly at Uncle Ish.
+
+"Lor', chile, don't teck on dat way," remonstrated Aunt Verbeny. "You
+ain't had no raisin' noways, en dar ain' been nobody ter brung you up
+'cep'n yo' pa. Hit's de foolishness uv Miss Chris ez has overturnt de
+hull place."
+
+"She's a-settin' moughty prim now," continued Uncle Ish, his eyes on the
+little girl. "She des' es prim es ef she wuz chiny en glass, but I'se
+had my eye on 'er afo' dis. I'se done tote 'er in dese arms when she
+wa'nt knee high ter Marse Tom's ole mule Jenny, en she ain't cut nairy
+er caper dat I ain't 'sperienced hit."
+
+"I don't care," retorted Eugenia.
+
+"Ain't I done see her plump right out whar sis Delphy wuz a-wallopin'
+her Jeetle nigger Jake, en holler out dat Jake ain' done lay ban's on
+her pa's watermillion--'case she done steal 'em herse'f?"
+
+"I don't care!" repeated Eugenia with tearful defiance.
+
+"An' she ain' no mo' steal dat ar watermillion den I is," finished
+Uncle Ish triumphantly.
+
+"It was just a lie," said Bernard. "Eugie, you know where liars go."
+
+"Des' ez straight ter de bad place ez dey kin walk," added Aunt Verbeny
+severely. "Des' ez straight ez de Lord kin sen' 'em dar."
+
+"It was a good lie," declared Nicholas, in manful defence of the weak.
+"I don't believe she's goin' to be damned for a good lie and a little
+one, too."
+
+"Well, dar's lies en dar's lies," put in Delphy consolingly, "an' I 'low
+dat dar's mo' in de manner uv lyin' den in de lie. Some lies is er long
+ways sweeter ter de tas' den Gospel trufe. Abraham, he lied, en it ain't
+discountenance him wid de Lord. Marse Tom, he lied when he wuz young, en
+it spar'd 'im er whoppin'. Hit's er plum fool ez won't spar' dere own
+hinder parts on er 'count uv er few words."
+
+"George Washington didn't," said Bernard.
+
+"I wish he had," added Eugenia. "Aunt Chris made me read about him and
+his old cherry tree when I told her the red rooster was setting, because
+I didn't want her to kill him."
+
+"Ma asked me once if I had been fishin' when she told me to clean out
+the spring," said Nicholas thoughtfully, "an' I said yes."
+
+"What did she say?" asked Bernard.
+
+"Nothin'. She whacked me on the head."
+
+Just then Betsey came in with her baby in her arms, and Moses shuffled
+aside to give place to her, cowed by an admonishing glance from his
+mother-in-law.
+
+"Bless de Lord!" exclaimed Uncle Ish, lifting his withered, old hands.
+"Ef dar ain' anur er Betsey's babies! How many is de, Mose?"
+
+Moses scratched his head and shrank into the corner.
+
+"I ain' done straighten 'em out yit, Unk Ish," he returned slowly.
+"'Pears like soon es I done add 'em all up anur done come, an' I has ter
+kac'late f'om de bottom agin. I ain' got no head fer figgers, nohow.
+Betsey, she lays dat dar's ten uv 'em, but ter save my soul I can't mek
+out mo'n eight."
+
+"Dar's nearer er dozen," rejoined Betsey with offended pride, "dar's
+nearer er dozen 'cordin' ter de way I count."
+
+"Dar now!" cried Aunt Verbeny. "I ain' never trus' no nigger's
+cac'lations yit, en I ain' gwine ter now. When I wants countin', I want
+white folks' countin'."
+
+"Dey tell me," said Delphy, glancing sternly at the head on Betsey's
+knee, "dat de quality don' set demse'ves up on er pa'sel er chillun no
+mo'. De time done gone by. My Mahaly, she went up ter some outlandish
+place wid er wild Injun name, like Philadelphy, en she sez de smaller de
+fambly de mo' stuck up is de heads er it. She sez ef Ole Miss had gone
+up dar a-puttin' on airs 'case er her fifteen chillun, she wouldn't
+never have helt up 'er head no mo'. Mahaly, she ain' mah'ed no man, she
+ain't. She sez en ole maid in Philadelphy des' looks right spang over
+all de heads, she's so sot up."
+
+"'Tain' so yer," said Aunt Verbeny feelingly. "'Tain' so yer. Hit seems
+like de 'oman nairy a man is laid claim ter ain' wuth claimin'. Ain' dat
+so, bro' Ish?"
+
+But Uncle Ish only grunted in retort, his head nodding drowsily. The
+tremulous tracery the wood-fire cast upon his face gave it an expression
+of dumb intensity which adumbrated all the pathos and the patience of
+his race.
+
+"Mahaly wuz er likely gal," went on Aunt Verbeny, "an' when she las'
+come home, she wuz a-warin' spike-heeled shoes en er veil uv skeeter
+nettin'. 'Tain' so long sence Rhody's Viney went to Philadelphy, too,
+but she ain' had no luck sence she wuz born er twin. Hit went clean agin
+'er."
+
+"Lord a-mercy, Aunt Verbeny, she ain't a-comin' back dis way?" asked
+Betsey, probing the apples with a small pine stick and giving the
+softest to Eugenia.
+
+Aunt Verbeny shook her head.
+
+"She ain' never had no luck on er 'count er bein' er twin," she said.
+"When she sot herse'f on a-gwine up ter de Yankees, Marse Tom, he tuck
+er goose quill en wrote out 'er principles [recommendations] des' es
+plain es writin' kin be writ--which ain't plain enough fer my eyes--en
+he gun' 'em ter Viney wid his own han's. Viney tuck 'n put 'em safe 'way
+down in de bottom uv 'er trunk en went 'long ter de Yankees. But she
+ain' been dar mo'n er week when one night she went a-traipsin' out on de
+street en lef er principles behint 'er, en, bless yo' life, oner dem ar
+Yankees breck right in en stole 'em smack 'way f'om 'er. Yo' trunk is a
+moughty risky place ter kyar yo' principles, but Viney, she wuz dat sot
+up."
+
+A nod of assent passed round the group. The children ate their apples
+silently, and Moses got up to put fresh wood on the fire. As the green
+log fell among the smouldering chips vivid tongues of flame shot up the
+smoked old mortar of the chimney, and the remaining apples burst their
+brown peels and sent out little rivulets of juice. The crackling of the
+fresh bark made a cheerful accompaniment to the chirping of a cricket
+hidden somewhere in the hearthstones.
+
+"Dar now, bro' Ish!" exclaimed Aunt Verbeny, watching Eugenia as she sat
+in the dull red glare. "Ef dat chile ain't de patt'en er young Miss
+Meeley, I'se clean cracked in my head, I is. I 'members Miss Meeley des'
+ez well ez 'twuz yestiddy de day Marse Tom brung her home en de niggers
+stood a-bowin' en axin' howdy at de gate. She wuz all black en white en
+cold lookin' twell she smiled, en den it wuz des' like er lightwood
+blaze in 'er eyes."
+
+Uncle Ish nodded dreamily.
+
+"I use ter ride erlong wid Marse Tom ter co'te 'er," he said, "en de
+gent'men wuz a-troopin' ter see her in vayous attitudes. Dey buzzed
+roun' 'er de same ez bees, but she ain' had no eyes fer none 'cep'n
+Marse Tom."
+
+At that instant the door opened, and Rindy rushed in, breathlesly
+pursuing Eugenia.
+
+"Miss Chris is pow'ful riled," she announced, "an' Marse Tom is
+a-stampin' roun' same ez er bull. I reckon you'se gwine ter ketch it
+when dey once gits dere han's on you." Then, as her eye fell on
+Nicholas, she assumed an indignant air. "Dis ain't de place fer po'
+folks," she added.
+
+Eugenia rose and put a roasted apple in her pocket.
+
+"I ain't goin' to catch anything that Bernard doesn't catch," she said.
+"When he goes I'm goin' too."
+
+And she went out, followed by Rindy and the boys.
+
+The first breath of the chill atmosphere brought a glow to Nicholas's
+cheek, and he started at a brisk run across the fields. He had gone but
+a few yards when he was checked by Eugenia's voice.
+
+"Nick!" she called.
+
+Her small, dark shadow was falling on the ground beside him, and by the
+light of the pale moon he could see the fog of her breath.
+
+As he went towards her she held out her hand.
+
+"Here's an apple I saved for you," she panted. "And--and I don't mind
+about your being poor white trash!"
+
+He took the apple, but before the reply left his lips she had darted
+from him and was speeding homeward across the glimmering whiteness of
+the frost.
+
+
+
+
+
+BOOK II
+
+A RAINY SEASON
+
+
+
+
+I
+
+
+Mrs. Jane Dudley Webb was a lady who supported an impossible present
+upon an important past. She had once been heard to remark that if she
+had not something to look back upon she could not live: and, as her
+retrospective view was racial rather than individual, the consolation
+attained might be considered disproportionate to the needs of the case.
+The lines of her present had fallen in a white frame house in the main
+street of Kingsborough; those of her past began with the first Dudley
+who swung a lance in Merry England, to end with irascible old William of
+the name, who slept in the family graveyard upon James River.
+
+Mrs. Webb herself was straight and elegant, and inclined to the
+ironical, when, as Jane Dudley, the belle of the country-side, she fired
+the fancy of young Julius Webb, an officer in the cavalry of the United
+States. He danced a minuet with her at a ball in Washington, was heard
+to swear an oath by her eyes at punch before the supper was over; and
+proceeded the following week to spur his courtship upon old William as
+daringly as he had ever spurred his horse upon an Indian wigwam.
+
+The last Dudley of the Virginian line withstood, through several stormy
+years, the united appeals of his daughter and her lover. In the end he
+yielded, subdued by opposition and gout, retaining the strength to
+insert but a single stipulation in the marriage contract, to the effect
+that his daughter should drop the name of Jane and be known as Dudley in
+her husband's household. To this the dashing bridegroom acquiesced with
+readiness, and when, within a year of the wedding, his wife presented
+him with a son, he called the boy, as he called the mother, by her
+maiden name.
+
+He was a jovial young buck, who lived in his cards and his cups and
+loathed a quarrel as he loved a fight.
+
+When the war between the States arose he went with Virginia, caring
+little for either cause, but conscious that his heart was where his home
+was. So he kissed the young mother and the boy at her side and rode
+lightly away with a laugh upon his lips, to fall as lightly in the mad
+charge of cavalry at Brandy Station.
+
+When the news came Jane Dudley listened to it in silence, her hands
+clasping the worsteds she was winding. After the words were spoken she
+laid the worsteds carefully aside, stooping to pick up a fallen ball.
+Then she crossed the room and went upstairs.
+
+She said little, refusing herself alike to consolation and to
+acquaintances, spending her days in the shuttered house with her boy
+beside her. When he fretted at the restraint she tied a band of crepe on
+his little jacket and sent him to play on the green, while she took up
+her worsteds again and finished the muffler she had been crocheting. If
+she wept it was in secret, when the lights were out.
+
+Some years later the house was sold over her head, but when she stood,
+penniless, upon the threshold it was to cross it as haughtily as she had
+done as a bride. The stiff folds of her black silk showed no wavering
+ripple, the repose of her lips betrayed no tremor. The smooth, high
+pompadour of her black hair passed as proudly beneath the arched doorway
+as it had done in the days of her wifehood and Julius Webb.
+
+Her neighbours opened their wasted stores to her need, and out of their
+poverty offered her abundance, but she put aside their proffered
+assistance and undertook, unaided, the support and education of her
+child, maintaining throughout the struggle her air of unflinching irony.
+She moved into a small white frame house opposite the church, and let
+out her spare rooms to student boarders. Her pride was never lowered and
+her crepe was never laid aside. She sat up far into the night to darn
+the sleeves of her black silk gown, but the stitches were of such
+exquisite fineness that in the dim light of her drawing-room they seemed
+but an added gloss.
+
+From behind the massive coffee urn at the head of her table she regarded
+her boarders as so many beneficiaries upon her bounty. When she passed a
+cup of coffee she seemed to confer an honour; when she returned a
+receipted bill it was as if she repulsed an insult. People said that she
+had been born to greatness and that she had never adapted herself to the
+obscurity that had been thrust upon her--but they said it when her back
+was turned. To her face the subject was never broached, and her former
+prosperity was ignored along with her present poverty. Of her own
+sorrows she, herself, made no mention. When she spoke from the depths of
+her bitterness of the war and the ruin it had left, her resentment was
+general rather than personal. Above the mantel in her room hung the
+sword of Julius Webb, sheathed under the tattered colours of the
+Confederate States. At her throat she wore a button that had been cut
+from a gray coat, and, once, after the close of the war, she had pointed
+to it before a Federal officer, and had said: "Sir, the women of the
+South have never surrendered!" The officer had looked at the face above
+the button as he answered: "Madam, had the women of the South fought its
+battles, surrender would have been for the men of the North." But Jane
+Webb had smiled bitterly in silence. To her the Federal officer was but
+an individual member of a national army of invasion, and the rights of
+the victors, the wrongs of Virginia.
+
+Her neighbours regarded her with almost passionate pride--rebuking their
+more generous natures by the sight of her unbowed beauty and her
+solitary revolt. When young Dudley grew old enough to attend school the
+general and the judge called together upon his mother and offered, with
+hesitancy, to undertake his education.
+
+"He is only a year or two older than my Tom," began the judge, tripping
+in his usually steady speech. "I assure you it will give me pleasure to
+have the boys thrown together."
+
+Mrs. Webb bowed in unaffirmative fashion.
+
+"On my life, ma'am, I can't forget that Julius Webb fell at Brandy
+Station," put in the general hotly. "Your husband died for Virginia, and
+your boy shall not want while I have a penny in my pocket. I'll send him
+to college with Bernard, and feel it to be a privilege!"
+
+Mrs. Webb bowed again.
+
+"A great privilege, ma'am," protested the general, uneasily.
+
+Mrs. Webb smiled.
+
+"The greatest privilege of my life, ma'am!" cried the general, his face
+flushing and his eyes growing round with agitation.
+
+In the end they gained their point, and Mrs. Webb consented, but with a
+reluctance of reserve which caused the general to choke with
+embarrassment and the judge to become speechless from perplexity. When
+they rose to leave both thanked her with effusion and both bowed
+themselves out as gratefully as if it were a royal drawing-room and they
+had received the honours of knighthood.
+
+"She is a remarkable woman!" exclaimed the general, wiping his eyes on
+his white silk handkerchief as they descended the steps. "A most unusual
+woman! Why, I feel positively unworthy to sit in her presence. Her
+manner brings all my past indiscretions to mind. It is an honour to have
+such a character in the community, sir!"
+
+The judge acquiesced silently.
+
+The interview had tried his Epicurean fortitude, and he was wondering if
+it would be necessary to repeat the call before Christmas.
+
+"If Julius Webb had lived she would have made a man of him," continued
+the general enthusiastically, the purple flush slowly fading from his
+flabby face. "A creature who could live with that woman and not be made
+a man of wouldn't be human; he'd be a hound. There is dignity in every
+inch of her, sir. I will allow no man to question my respect for our
+immortal Lee--but if Jane Webb had been the commander of our armies, we
+should be standing now upon Confederate soil--"
+
+"Or upon the ashes of it," suggested the judge, adding apologetically,
+"she is indeed a woman in a thousand."
+
+He held it to be a lack of courtesy to dissent from praise of any woman
+whose chastity was beyond impeachment, as he held it to be an absence of
+propriety to unite in admiration of one who was wanting in the supremest
+of the feminine virtues. His code was an obvious one, and he had never
+seen cause to depart from it.
+
+"I hope the boy will be worthy of her," he said. "It is a good name that
+he bears."
+
+The general took off his straw hat and mopped his brow.
+
+"Worthy of her!" he exclaimed. "He's got to be worthy of her, sir. If he
+takes any notion in his head not to be, I'll thrash him within an inch
+of his life. Let him try it, the young scamp!"
+
+The judge laughed easily, having regained his self-possession. "Well,
+well, there's no telling," he said; "but he's as bright as a steel trap.
+I wish Tom had half his sense." Then he turned past the church on his
+way home, and the general, declining an invitation to dinner, went on to
+the post-office, where he awaited his carriage.
+
+From this time Dudley Webb attended classes at the judge's house and
+became the popular tyrant of his little schoolroom. He was a dark,
+high-bred looking boy, with a rich voice and a nature that was generous
+in small things and selfish in large ones. There was a convincing air of
+good-fellowship about him, which won the honest heart of slow-witted Tom
+Bassett, and a half-veiled regard for his own youthful pleasures, which
+aroused the wrath of Eugenia.
+
+"I can't abide him," she had once declared passionately to Sally
+Burwell. "Somehow, he always gets the best of everything."
+
+When, after the first few years, Nicholas Burr entered the schoolroom
+and took his place upon one of the short green benches, Mrs. Webb called
+upon the judge in person and demanded an explanation.
+
+"My boy has been carefully brought up," she said; "he is a gentleman,
+and he will not submit to association with his inferiors. His
+grandfather would not have done so before him."
+
+The judge quailed, but it was an uncompromising quailing--a surrender of
+the flesh, not the spirit.
+
+"My dear lady," he began in his softest voice, "your son is a fine,
+spirited fellow, but he is a boy, and he doesn't care a--a--pardon me,
+madam--a continental whether anybody else is his inferior or not. No
+wholesome boy does. He doesn't know the meaning of the word--nor does
+Tom--and I shan't be the one to teach him. Amos Burr's son is a clever,
+hard-working boy, and if he will take an education from me, he shall
+have it."
+
+The judge was firm. Mrs. Webb was firm also.
+
+The judge assumed his legal manner; she assumed her hereditary one.
+
+"It is folly to educate a person above his station," she said.
+
+"Men make their stations, madam," replied the judge.
+
+He sat in his great arm-chair and looked at her with reverent but
+determined eyes. His head was slightly bent, in deference to her
+dissenting voice, and his words wavered, but his will did not. In his
+attitude his respect for her sexually and individually was expressed,
+but he had argued the opposing interests in his mind, and his decision
+was judicial.
+
+"I am deeply pained, my dear lady," he said, "but I cannot turn the boy
+away."
+
+Mrs. Webb did not reply. She gathered up her stiff skirt and departed
+with folded lips.
+
+After she had gone the judge paced his study nervously for a half-hour,
+giving uncertain glances towards the hall door, as if he expected the
+advent of an incarnate thunderbolt. In the afternoon he sent over a
+bottle of his best Madeira as a peace-offering. Mrs. Webb acknowledged
+the Madeira, not the truce. The following day General Battle called upon
+the judge and requested in half-hearted tones the withdrawal of Amos
+Burr's son. He looked excited and somewhat alarmed, and the judge
+recognised the hand of the player.
+
+"My dear Tom Battle," he said soothingly, "you do not wish the poor
+child any harm."
+
+"'Fore God, I don't, George," stammered the general.
+
+"He's a quiet, unoffending lad."
+
+The general fingered his limp cravat with agitated plump fingers. "I
+never passed him on the road in my life that he didn't touch his hat,"
+he admitted, "and once he took a stone out of the gray mare's shoe."
+
+"He has a brain and he has ambition. Think what it is to be born in a
+lower class and to have a mind above it."
+
+The general's great chest trembled.
+
+"I wouldn't injure the little chap for the world George; on my soul, I
+wouldn't."
+
+"I know it, Tom."
+
+"My own great-grandfather Battle raised himself, George."
+
+The judge waved the fact aside as insignificant.
+
+"Of course, Mrs. Webb is a woman," he said with sexual cynicism, "and
+her views are naturally prejudiced. You can't expect a woman to look at
+things as coolly as we do, Tom."
+
+The general brightened.
+
+"'Tisn't nature," he declared. "You can't expect a woman to go against
+nature, sir."
+
+"And Mrs. Webb, though an unusual woman (the general nodded), is still a
+woman."
+
+The general nodded again, though less emphatically.
+
+"On my soul, she's wonderful!" he exclaimed. "Why, damme, sir, if I had
+that woman to brace me up I shouldn't need a julep."
+
+And the judge, flinching from his friend's profanity, called Caesar to
+bring in the decanters.
+
+Some time later the general left and Mr. Burwell appeared, to be met
+and dispatched by the same arguments.
+
+"Naturally my instincts prompt me to side with an unprotected widow,"
+said Mr. Burwell.
+
+"No Virginian could feel otherwise," admitted the judge in the slightly
+pompous tone in which he alluded to his native State.
+
+"But as I said to my wife," continued Mr. Burwell with convincing
+earnestness, "these matters had best be left to men. There is no need
+for our wives and daughters to be troubled by them. It is for us, who
+are acquainted with the world and who have had wide experience, to
+settle all social barriers."
+
+The judge agreed as before.
+
+"I am glad to say that my wife takes my view of it," the other went on.
+"Indeed, I think she has expressed what I have said to Mrs. Webb."
+
+"Your wife is an honour to her sex," said the judge, bowing.
+
+Then Mr. Burwell left, and the judge spent another half-hour walking up
+and down his study floor. He had gained the victory, but he would have
+felt pleasanter had it been defeat. It was as if he had taken some
+secret advantage of a woman--of a widow.
+
+But the future of Amos Burr's son was sealed so far as it lay in the
+judge's power to settle with circumstances, and each morning during the
+school term Mrs. Webb frowned down upon his hurrying figure as it sped
+along the street and turned the corner at the palace green. Sometimes,
+when snow was falling, he would shoot by like an arrow, and Dudley would
+say with quick compassion, as he looked up from his steaming cakes:
+"It's because he hasn't any overcoat, mother. He runs to keep warm."
+
+But Mrs. Webb's placid eyes would not darken.
+
+When the boys grew too old for school Tom and Dudley went to King's
+College for a couple of years, while Nicholas returned to the farm. The
+judge still befriended him, and the contents of Tom's class books found
+their way into his head sooner or later, with more information than
+Tom's brain could hold. One of the instructors at the college--a
+consumptive young fellow, whose ambitions had leaned towards the
+bar--gave the boy what assistance he needed, and when the work of the
+class-room and the farm was over, the two would meet in the dim old
+library of the college and plod through heavy, discoloured pages, while
+the portraits of painted aristocrats glowered down upon the intrusive
+plebeian.
+
+Despite the hard labour of spring ploughing and the cold of early winter
+dawns, when he was up and out of doors, the years passed happily enough.
+He beheld the future through the visions of an imaginative mind, and it
+seemed big with promise. Sitting in the quaint old library, surrounded
+by faded relics and colourless traditions, he felt the breath of hushed
+oratory in the air, and political passion stirred in the surrounding
+dust. There was a niche in a small alcove, where he spent the spare
+hours of many a day, the words of great, long-gone Virginians lying
+before him; behind him, through the small square window, all the
+blue-green sweep of the college grounds ending where the Old Stage Road
+led on to his father's farm.
+
+He plodded ardently and earnestly, the consumptive young instructor
+following his studies with the wistful eyes of one who sees another
+striving where he has striven and failed. The students met him with
+tolerant hilarity, and Tom Bassett, who would have kicked the
+Declaration of Independence across the campus in lieu of a ball, watched
+him with secret mirth and open championship. There had sprung up a
+strong friendship between the two--one of those rare affections which
+bend but do not break. Dudley Webb, the most brilliant member of his
+class and the light of his mother's eyes, began life, as he would end
+it, with the ready grasp of good-fellowship. He had long since outgrown
+his artificial, childish distrust of Nicholas, and he had as long ago
+forgotten that he had ever entertained it. As for Nicholas himself, he
+had not forgotten it, but the memory was of little moment. He had a work
+to do in life, and he did it as best he might. If it were the ploughing
+of rocky soil, so much the worse; if the uprooting of dead men's
+thoughts, so much the better. He slighted neither the one nor the other.
+
+As he grew older he became tall and broad of chest, with shoulders which
+suggested the athlete rather than the student. His hair had darkened to
+a less flaming red, his eyes had grown brighter, and the freckles had
+faded into a general gray tone of complexion.
+
+"He will be the ugliest man in the State," said Mr. Burwell, inflating
+his pink cheeks, with a return of youthful vanity, "but it is the
+ugliness that attracts."
+
+Nicholas had not heard, but, had he done so, the words would have left
+a sting. He possessed an inherent regard for physical perfection,
+rendered the greater by his own tormented childhood. He was strong and
+vigorous and of well-knit sinews, but he would have given his muscle for
+Dudley Webb's hands and his brains for the other's hair.
+
+Once, as a half-grown boy, in a fit of jealousy inspired by Dudley's
+good looks, he had called him "Miss Nancy," and knocked him down. When
+his enemy had lain at his feet on the green he had raised him up and
+made amends by standing motionless while Dudley lashed him with a small
+riding-whip. The jealousy had vanished since then, but the smart was
+still there.
+
+At last the college days were over. Dudley was sent to the university of
+the State; Tom Bassett and Bernard Battle soon followed, and Nicholas,
+still plodding and still hopeful, was left in Kingsborough.
+
+Then, upon his nineteenth birthday, the judge, who had left the bench
+and resumed his legal practice, sent for him and offered to take him
+into his office while he prepared himself for the bar.
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+
+When Nicholas descended the judge's steps he lingered for a moment in
+the narrow walk. His head was bent, and the books which he carried under
+his arm were pressed against his side. They seemed to contain all that
+was needed for the making of his future--those books and his impatient
+mind. His success was as assured as if he held it already in the hollow
+of his hand--and with success would come honour and happiness and all
+that was desired of man. It seemed to him that his lot was the one of
+all others which he would have chosen of his free and untrammelled will.
+To strive and to win; to surmount all obstacles by the determined dash
+of ambition; to rise from obscurity unto prominence through the sheer
+forces that make for power--what was better than this?
+
+Still plunged in thought, he passed the church and followed the street
+to the Old Stage Road. From the college dormitories a group of students
+sang out a greeting, and he responded impulsively, tossing his hat in
+the air. In his face a glow had risen, harmonising his inharmonious
+features. He felt as a man feels who stands before a closed door and
+knows that he has but to cross the threshold to grasp the fulness of his
+aspiration. Yes, to-day he envied no one--neither Tom Bassett nor Dudley
+Webb, neither the general nor the judge. He held the books tightly
+under his arm and smiled down upon the road. His clumsy, store-made
+boots left heavy tracks in the dust, but he seemed to be treading air.
+
+It was three o'clock in the afternoon of a murky day in early November,
+and the clouds were swollen with incoming autumnal rains. The open
+country stretched before him in monotonous grays, the long road gleaming
+pallid in the general drab of the landscape. As he passed along, holding
+his hat in his hand, his uplifted head struck the single, high-coloured
+note in the picture--all else was dull and leaden.
+
+A farmer driving a cow to market neared him, and Nicholas stopped to
+remark upon the outlook. The farmer, a thick-set, hairy man, whose name
+was Turner, gave a sudden hitch to the halter to check the progress of
+the cow, and nodded ominously.
+
+"Bad weather's brewin'," he said. "The wind's blowin' from the
+northeast; I can tell by the way that thar oak turns its leaves. It's a
+bad sign, and if thar ain't a-shiftin' 'fore mornin', we're likely to
+hev a spell."
+
+Nicholas agreed.
+
+"There hasn't been much rainfall lately," he added. "I reckon it has
+come at last and for a long stretch." His eyes swept the western
+horizon, where the clouds hung heavily above the pines.
+
+"Yo' pa got his crops in?"
+
+"Pretty much. The peanuts were harvested after the last frost."
+
+"He ain't had much luck this year, I hear."
+
+Nicholas shook his head.
+
+"No less than usual. Last year he lost the brindle cow that was
+calving. This season the mare died."
+
+"Well, well! He never was much for luck, nohow. Seems like he worked too
+hard to have Providence on his side. I allers said that Providence had
+ruther you'd leave a share of the business to Him. Got through school
+yet?"
+
+"Yes; I'm reading law."
+
+"Reading what?"
+
+"I am going to study law in the judge's office--Judge Bassett, you
+know."
+
+"So you can keep a tongue in yo' head when those plagued cusses come
+'bout the mortgage?"
+
+"So I can take cases to court and earn a living."
+
+"Why don't you stick to the land and make yo' bread honest?"
+
+"The law's honest."
+
+Turner shook his hairy head.
+
+"It cheated me out o' twelve bushels of 'taters las' year," he said.
+"Don't tell me 'bout yo' law. I know it."
+
+Nicholas laughed.
+
+"Come to me when I've set up, if you get in trouble," he rejoined, "and
+I'll get you out."
+
+The cow gave a lunge at the ropes, and the farmer went on his way. When
+the man and cow had passed from sight Nicholas stopped and laughed
+again. He wondered if he could be really of one flesh and blood with
+these people--of one stuff and fibre. What had he in common with his own
+father--hard-working, heavy-handed Amos Burr? No, he was not of them and
+he had never been.
+
+He had turned from the main road into the wood, when a girl on
+horseback dashed suddenly towards him from the gray perspective. She was
+riding rapidly, her short skirts flying, her hair blown darkly across
+her face. A brown-and-white pointer ran at her side.
+
+As she caught sight of Nicholas she half rose in her saddle, giving a
+loud, clear call.
+
+"Hello, Nick Burr! Hello!"
+
+Nicholas stood aside and waited for her to come up, which she did in a
+moment, panting from her exercise, her face flushing into a glowing
+heat.
+
+"I was looking for you," she said, waving a small willow spray in her
+brown hand. "I went by the farm, but you weren't there. So, you are
+nineteen to-day!" Her eyes shone as she looked at him. There was a
+singular brilliance of expression in her face, due partly to the
+exercise, partly to the restless animation of her features. She was at
+the unbecoming age when the child is merging into the woman, but her
+lack of grace was redeemed by her warmth of personality.
+
+Nicholas laid his hand upon the bridle.
+
+"Why, Genia, if I'd known you wanted me I'd have been hanging round
+somewhere. What is it?"
+
+"Let me look at you."
+
+Nicholas flushed, turning his face away from her.
+
+"God knows, I'm ugly enough," he said.
+
+She leaned nearer, shaking back her straight, black hair, which fell
+from beneath the small cap.
+
+"I want to see if you have changed since yesterday."
+
+He turned towards her.
+
+"Have I?" he asked hopefully.
+
+She regarded him gravely, though a smile played over her changeful lips.
+
+"Not a bit. Not a freckle."
+
+"Hang it all! I lost my freckles long ago."
+
+"Then they've come back. There are one--two--three on your nose."
+
+"Hold on! Let my looks alone, please."
+
+Eugenia whistled softly, half grave, half gay.
+
+"Down, darling!" she said to the pointer, and "be still, beauty!" to the
+horse. Then she turned to Nicholas again.
+
+"I've really and truly got something to tell you, Nick Burr."
+
+"Out with it, then. Don't worry."
+
+She swung her long legs idly from the saddle. "Suppose I don't."
+
+"Then don't."
+
+"Suppose I do."
+
+"I'll be hanged if I care!"
+
+"Oh, you do, you story. You're just dying to know--but it's serious."
+
+She patted the horse's neck, watching Nicholas with child-like
+eagerness.
+
+"Well, I'm--I'm--there! I told you you were dying to know!"
+
+"I'm not."
+
+"Guess, anyway."
+
+"Somebody coming on a visit?"
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"Try again, stupid."
+
+"Miss Chris going to be married?"
+
+"Oh, Lord, no. You aren't really a fool, Nick."
+
+"Betsey got a baby?"
+
+"Why, Tecumsey only came last June!"
+
+"Then I give it up. Tell me."
+
+"Say please."
+
+"Please, Genia!"
+
+"Say 'please, dear, good Genia.'"
+
+"Please, dear, darling Genia."
+
+"I didn't say 'darling.' I said 'good.'"
+
+"It's the same thing."
+
+She smiled at him with boyish eyes.
+
+"Am I really a darling?"
+
+"Do you really know something?"
+
+"You bet I do."
+
+"What is it?"
+
+She laughed teasingly.
+
+"It'll make you cry."
+
+"Hurry up, Genia!"
+
+"You'll certainly cry very loud."
+
+"I'll shake you in a moment."
+
+"It isn't polite to shake ladies."
+
+"You aren't a lady. You're a vixen."
+
+"Aunt Verbeny says I'm a limb of Satan. But will you promise not to weep
+a flood of tears, so I can't cross home?"
+
+She leaned still nearer, resting her hand upon his shoulder.
+
+"I'm going away."
+
+"What?"
+
+"I'm going away to-morrow at daybreak. I'm going to school. I shan't
+come back for a whole year. I'm--I'm going to leave papa and Aunt Chris
+and Jim and you."
+
+She began to sob.
+
+"Don't," said Nicholas sharply.
+
+"And--and you don't care a bit. You're just a stone. Oh, I don't want to
+go to school!"
+
+"I'm not a stone. I do care."
+
+"No, you don't. And I may die and never come back any more, and you'll
+forget all about me."
+
+"I shan't. Don't, I say. Do you hear me, Genia, don't."
+
+She looked for a handkerchief, and, failing to find one, wiped her eyes
+on the horse's mane.
+
+"What are you going to do when I am gone?"
+
+"Work hard so you'll be proud of me when you come back."
+
+"I shall be sixteen in two years."
+
+"And I, twenty-one."
+
+"You'll be a man--quite."
+
+"You'll be a woman--almost."
+
+"I don't think I shall like you so much then."
+
+"I shall like you more."
+
+"Why?" she asked quickly.
+
+"Why? Oh, I don't know. Am I so awfully ugly, Genia?"
+
+"Turn this way."
+
+He obeyed her, flushing beneath her scrutiny.
+
+"I shouldn't call you--awful," she replied at last.
+
+"Am I so ugly, then?"
+
+"Honour bright?"
+
+"Of course," impatiently.
+
+"Then you are--yes--rather."
+
+He shook his head angrily.
+
+"I didn't think you'd be mean enough to tell me so," he returned.
+
+"But you asked me."
+
+"I don't care if I did. You might have said something pleasant."
+
+Her sensitive mouth drooped. "I never think of your being ugly when I'm
+with you," she said. "It's a good, strong kind of ugliness, anyway. I
+don't mind it."
+
+He smiled again.
+
+"Looks don't matter, anyway," she went on soothingly. "I'd rather a man
+would be clever than handsome;" then she added conscientiously, "only
+I'd rather be handsome myself."
+
+He looked at her closely.
+
+"I reckon you will be," he said. "Most women are. It's the clothes, I
+suppose."
+
+Eugenia looked down at him for an instant in silence; then she held out
+her hands.
+
+"I am going at daybreak," she said. "Will you come down to the road and
+tell me good-bye?"
+
+"Why, of course."
+
+"But we must say good-bye now, too. Did we ever shake hands before?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Then, good-bye. I must go."
+
+"Good-bye, dear--darling."
+
+She touched her horse lightly with the willow, but promptly drew rein,
+regarding Nicholas with her boyish eyes.
+
+"Do you think it would make it any easier if we kissed?" she asked.
+
+"Geriminy! I should say so!"
+
+He caught her hands; she leaned over and he kissed her lips. She drew
+back with the same frank laugh, but a flush burned his face and his
+eyes were sparkling.
+
+"More, Genia," he said, but she laughed and let the bridle fall.
+
+"No--no--but it made me feel better. There, good-bye, dear, dear Nick
+Burr, good-bye!"
+
+Then she dashed past him, and a whirl of dust filled the solitary air.
+
+He looked after her until she turned her horse into the Old Stage Road,
+and the clatter of the hoofs was gone. When the stillness had fallen
+again he went slowly on his way.
+
+In the woods the pale bodies of the beeches seemed to melt into the
+cloudy atmosphere. There was no wind among the trees, and the pervading
+dampness had robbed the yellowed leaves of their silken rustle. They
+fluttered softly, hanging limp from the drooping branches as if attached
+by invisible threads. As he went on a deep bluish smoke issued from
+among some far-off poplars where a farmer was burning brush in a
+clearing. The smoke hung low above the undergrowth, assuming eccentric
+outlines and varied tones of dusk. Presently the fires glimmered nearer,
+and he saw the red tongues of the flames and heard the parched crackling
+of consuming leaves. The figures of the workers were limned grotesquely
+against the ruddy background with a startling and unreal absence of
+detail. They looked like incarnate shadows--stalking between the dim
+beeches and the blazing brush heaps. A few drops of rain fell suddenly,
+and the fires began slowly to die away. At the foot of the crumbling
+"worm" fence, skirting the edges of the wood, deep wind-drifts of
+russet leaves stirred mournfully. Later they would be hauled away to
+assist in the winter dressing of the fallows; now they beat helplessly
+against the retarding rails like a vanquished army of invasion.
+
+Nicholas left the wood and passed the field of broomsedge on his way to
+the house. Beyond the barnyard he saw the long rows of pine staves that
+had supported the shocks of peanuts, and from the direction of the field
+he caught sight of his father, driven homeward by the threatening rain.
+
+Sairy Jane, who was bringing a string of dried snaps from the outhouse,
+called to him to hurry before the cloudburst. She was a lank, colourless
+girl, with bad teeth and small pale eyes. Jubal, at the churn in the
+hall, rested from his labours as Nicholas entered, and grinned as he
+pointed to his mother in the kitchen. Marthy Burr was ironing. As
+Nicholas crossed the threshold, she stopped in her passage from the
+stove and looked at him, a flash of pride softening her pain-scarred
+features.
+
+"Lord, what a man you are, Nick!" she exclaimed with a kind of triumph.
+"When I heard yo' step on the po'ch I could have swo'ed it was yo'
+pa's."
+
+Nicholas nodded at her abstractedly as he took off his hat.
+
+"Where's pa?" he asked carelessly. "I thought he'd have got in before
+me. I saw him as I came up."
+
+"I reckon he won't git in befo' he gits a drench-in'," responded his
+stepmother, glancing indifferently through the back window. "If he does
+it'll be the first time sence he war born. 'Twarn't nothin' to be done
+in the fields, nohow, an' so I told him, but he ain't never rested yet,
+an' I don't reckon he's goin' to till I bury him."
+
+As she spoke the rain fell heavily, and presently Amos Burr came in,
+shaking the water from his head and shoulders.
+
+"I told you 'twarn't no use yo' goin' to the fields befo' the rain,"
+began his wife admonishingly. "But you're a man all over, an' it seems
+like you're 'bliged to go yo' own way for the sheer pleasure of goin'
+agin somebody else's. If I'd been pesterin' you all day long to go down
+thar to look at that ploughin', you'd be settin' in yo' chair now, plum
+dry."
+
+Amos Burr crossed to the stove and turned his dripping back to the heat.
+
+"Gimme a rubbin' down, Sairy Jane," he pleaded, and his daughter took a
+dry cloth and began mopping off the water.
+
+Marthy Burr placed an iron on the stove and took one off.
+
+"Whar'd you git dinner, Nick?" she inquired suddenly.
+
+"At the judge's."
+
+"What did they have?" demanded Jubal from the hall, ceasing the clatter
+of the churn. "Golly! Wouldn't I like a bite of something!"
+
+"I shouldn't mind some strange cookin', myself," said Marthy Burr,
+shaking her head at one of the children who had come into the kitchen
+with muddy feet. "I ain't tasted anybody else's vittles for ten years,
+an' sometimes I feel my mouth waterin' for a change of hand in the
+dough."
+
+She took one of her husband's shirts from the pile of freshly dried
+clothes, spread it on the ironing-board, and sprinkled it with water.
+Then she moistened her finger and applied it to the iron.
+
+Amos Burr looked up from before the stove, where he still sat drying.
+
+"You're a man now, Nick," he said slowly, as if the words had been
+revolving in his brain for some time and he had just received the power
+of speech.
+
+"Yes, pa."
+
+"Whatever he is, he don't git it from his pa," put in Marthy Burr as she
+bent over the shirt. "He ain't got nothin' of yo'rn onless it's yo'
+hair, an' that's done sobered down till you wouldn't know it."
+
+Amos waited patiently until she had finished, and then went on heavily
+as if the pause had been intentional, not enforced.
+
+"You've got as much schoolin' as most city chaps," he said. "Much good
+it'll do you, I reckon. I never saw nothin' come of larnin' yet, 'cep'n
+worthlessness. But you'd set yo' mind on it, an' you've got it."
+
+"Thar warn't none of yo' hand in that, Amos Burr," cried his wife,
+checking him again before he had recovered breath from his last
+sentence. "Many's the night I've wrastled with you till you war clean
+wore out with sleeplessness, 'fo' you'd let the child keep on at his
+books."
+
+"I ain't never seen no good come of it," repeated Burr stolidly; then he
+returned to Nicholas.
+
+"I reckon you'll want to do somethin' for the family, now," he said,
+"seein' yo' ma is well wore out an' the brindle cow died calvin', an'
+Sairy Jane is a hard worker."
+
+Nicholas looked at him without speaking.
+
+"Yes?" he said inquiringly, and his voice was dull.
+
+"I was talkin' to Jerry Pollard," continued his father, letting his slow
+eyes rest upon his son's, "an' he said you war as likely a chap as thar
+was roun' here, and he reckoned you'd be pretty quick in business."
+
+"Yes?" said Nicholas again in the same tone.
+
+Amos Burr was silent for a moment, and his wife filled in the pause with
+a series of running interjections. When they were over her husband took
+up his words.
+
+"He wants a young fellow about his store, he says, as can look arter the
+books an' the business. He's gittin' too old to keep up with the city
+ways an' look peart at the ladies--he'll pay a nice little sum in cash
+every week."
+
+"Yes?" repeated Nicholas, still interrogatively.
+
+"An' he wants to know if you'll take the place--you're jest the sort of
+chap he wants, he says--somebody as will be bright at praisin' up the
+calicky to the gals when they come shoppin'. Thar's nothin' like a young
+man behind the counter to draw the gals, he says."
+
+Nicholas shook his head impatiently, clasping the books tightly beneath
+his arm. His gaze had grown harsh and repellent.
+
+"But I am going into the judge's office," he answered. "I am going--"
+Then he checked himself, baffled by the massive ignorance he confronted.
+
+Amos Burr drew one shoulder from the fire and offered the other. A slow
+steam rose from his smoking shirt, and the room was filled with the
+odour of scorching cotton.
+
+"Thar ain't much cash in that, I reckon," he said.
+
+Nicholas took a step forward, still facing his father with obstinate
+eyes. One of the books slipped from his arm and fell to the floor, with
+open leaves, but he let it lie. He was watching his father's jaws as
+they rose and fell over the quid of tobacco.
+
+"No, there is not much cash in that," he repeated.
+
+"Things have gone mighty hard," said Amos Burr. "It's been a bad year. I
+ain't sayin' nothin' 'bout the work yo' ma an' Sairy Jane an' me have
+done. That don't seem to count, somehow. But nothin' ain't come
+straight, an' thar ain't a cent to pay the taxes. If we can't manage to
+tide over this comin' winter thar'll have to be a mortgage in the
+spring."
+
+Sairy Jane began to cry softly. One of the children joined in.
+
+"Give me time," said Nicholas breathlessly. "Give me time. I'll pay it
+all in time." Then the sound of Sairy Jane's sobs maddened him and he
+turned upon her with an oath. "Damn you! Can't you be quiet?"
+
+It seemed to him that they were all closing upon him and that there was
+no opening of escape.
+
+Marthy Burr put down her iron and came to where he stood, laying her
+hand upon his sleeve.
+
+"Don't mind 'em, Nick," she said, and her sharp voice broke suddenly.
+"Go ahead an' make a man of yo'self, mortgage or no mortgage."
+
+Nicholas lifted his gaze from the floor and looked into his
+stepmother's face. Then he looked at her hand as it lay upon his arm.
+That trembling hand brought to him more fully than words, more clearly
+than visions, the pathos of her life.
+
+"Don't you worry, ma," he said quietly at last. "It'll be all right.
+Don't you worry."
+
+Then he let her hand slip from his shoulder and left the room.
+
+He passed out upon the back porch and stood gazing vacantly across the
+outlook.
+
+It rained heavily, the drops descending in horizontal lengths like a
+fantastic fall of colourless pine needles. Overhead the clouds were
+black, impenetrable.
+
+Through the falling rain he looked at the view before him, at the
+overgrown yard, at the manure heaps near the stable, at the grim rows of
+staves in the peanut field, at the sombre and deserted landscape. A raw
+wind blew in gusts from the northeast, and the distorted ailanthus tree
+in the yard moaned and wrung its twisted limbs. Sharp, unpleasant odours
+came from the pig-pen in the barnyard, where the rain was scattering the
+slops in the trough. A bull bellowed in a far-off pasture. Before the
+hen-house door several dripping fowls strutted with wilted feathers.
+
+He saw it all in silence, with the dogged eyes of one whose gaze is
+turned inward. He made no gesture, uttered no exclamation. He was as
+motionless as the lintel of the door on which he leaned.
+
+Suddenly a gust of wind whipped the rain into his face. He turned,
+reentered the house, closed the door carefully, and went upstairs.
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+
+The next morning Nicholas went into the judge's study and declined the
+offer of the day before.
+
+"I shan't read law, after all," he said slowly. "There is a business
+opening for me here, and I'll take advantage of it." He spoke in set
+phrases, as if he had rehearsed the sentences many times.
+
+"Business!" echoed the judge incredulously. "Why, what business is going
+on in Kingsborough?"
+
+Nicholas flushed a deep red, but his glance did not waver.
+
+"Jerry Pollard wants me in his store, sir."
+
+The judge removed his glasses, wiped them deliberately on his silk
+handkerchief, put them on again, and regarded the younger man
+attentively.
+
+"And you wish to go into Jerry Pollard's store?" he inquired.
+
+"I think it is the best thing I can do."
+
+"The best paying thing, I presume?"
+
+"Yes, sir."
+
+"Bless my soul!" exclaimed the judge testily. "What is the world coming
+to? I suppose Tom will be writing me next that he intends to keep a
+stall in market. Well, you know best, of course. You may do as you
+please; but may I ask if you are going to bargain in Latin and multiply
+by criminal law in Jerry Pollard's store?"
+
+"No, sir."
+
+"Then, what in the--what in the--I really feel the need of a strong
+expression--what in the world did you take the trouble to educate
+yourself for?"
+
+Nicholas was looking at the floor, and he did not raise his eyes. His
+face was hard and set.
+
+"Because I was a fool," he answered shortly.
+
+"And now, if I may ask?"
+
+"A fool still--but I've found it out."
+
+The judge leaned back in his chair and tapped the ledge of his desk
+meditatively.
+
+"Have you fully decided?" he asked.
+
+Nicholas nodded.
+
+"I have thought it over," he said quietly.
+
+"Then there's nothing to be done, I suppose. I hope the compensation
+will satisfy you. Jerry Pollard is said to be somewhat tight-fisted, but
+your business instincts may be equal to his acquirements. Now, I have a
+number of letters, so, if you don't mind, I will bid you good-day."
+
+He bowed, and Nicholas left the study and went out of the house.
+
+Rain was still falling, and small pools of water had formed on the
+palace green. Straight ahead the lane of maples stretched like a line of
+half-extinguished fires, and the ground beneath was strewn with wet, red
+leaves. The slanting sheets of rain gave a sombre aspect to the town--to
+the time-beaten buildings along the unpaved streets and to the commons,
+where the water stood in grassy hollows. Beneath the gray sky the scene
+assumed a spectre-like suggestion of death and decay--the death of
+laughter that seemed still to echo faintly from the vanished stones--the
+decay of royal charters and of kingly grants. The very air was
+reminiscent of a yesterday that was perished; the red, wet leaves
+painted the brown earth in historic colours.
+
+Nicholas turned the corner at the church and passed on to Jerry
+Pollard's store--a long, low structure fronting on the main street--and
+entered by a single step from the sidewalk. The show windows on either
+side the entrance displayed a motley selection from the varied
+assortment of a "general" store--cheap silks and high-coloured calicos,
+men's shirts and women's shoes, cravats and hairpins, suspenders and
+corsets. On the sidewalk near the doorway there was a baby carriage, a
+saddle, and a collection of farming implements. As Nicholas crossed the
+threshold a pink-cheeked girl passed him, her arms filled with bundles,
+and at the counter an old negro woman was pricing red flannel.
+
+Jerry Pollard, a coarse-featured, full-bearded man of sixty years, was
+behind the counter. Nicholas caught his persuasive tones as he leaned
+over, holding the end of the bolt of flannel in his hands.
+
+"Now, look here, Aunty, you ain't going to find such a bargain as this
+anywhere else in town. Take my oath on that. Every thread wool and
+forty-four inches wide. Only thirty cents a yard, too. I got it at an
+auction in Richmond, or I couldn't let it go at double that price. How
+much? All right."
+
+The flannel was measured off with skilful manipulations of the yardstick
+and the scissors, the parcel was handed to the old negro woman, and the
+change was dropped into the till. Then Jerry Pollard came from behind
+the counter and slapped Nicholas upon the shoulder.
+
+"Hello, my boy!" he said. "So your pa has taken me at my word, and here
+you are. Well, Jerry Pollard's word's his bond, and he ain't going back
+on it. So, when you feel like it, you can step right in and get to
+business. When'll you begin? To-day? No time like the present time's my
+motto."
+
+"To-morrow!" returned Nicholas hastily. "I've got some things to wind
+up. I'll come to-morrow."
+
+
+"All right. I'm your man. To-morrow at seven sharp?"
+
+Then a purchaser appeared, and Jerry Pollard went forward, his business
+smile returning to his face.
+
+The purchaser was Mrs. Burwell, and, as Nicholas passed out, she looked
+up from a pair of waffle-irons she was selecting and nodded pleasantly.
+
+"I am glad to see you, Nicholas," she said. "Juliet was asking after you
+in her last letter. You were always a favourite of Juliet's. I was
+telling Mr. Burwell so only last night."
+
+"She was very kind," returned Nicholas, and added: "Is Miss Juliet--Mrs.
+Galt well?"
+
+Juliet Burwell had married five years before, and he had not seen her
+since.
+
+Mrs. Burwell nodded cheerily. She was still fresh and youthful, her pink
+cheeks and bright eyes giving the gray of her hair the effect of powder
+sprinkled on her brown fringe.
+
+"Yes, Juliet is well," she answered. "They are living in Richmond now.
+Mr. Galt had to give up his practice in New York because the climate did
+not suit Juliet's health. I told him she couldn't stand transplanting to
+the north, and I was right. They had to move south again. Yes, Mr.
+Pollard, the middle-size irons, please. I think they'll fit my stove. If
+they don't, I'll exchange them for the small ones. What did you say,
+Nicholas? Oh! good-morning."
+
+She turned away, and Nicholas stepped over her dripping umbrella and
+went out into the rain.
+
+When he was once outside he shook the water from his shoulders and
+walked rapidly in the direction of the old brick court-house, isolated
+upon the larger green. The door and windows were closed, but he ascended
+the stone steps and stood beneath the portico, looking back upon the way
+that he had come.
+
+The street was deserted, save for a solitary ox-cart rolling heavily
+through the mud. In the distance the gray drops made a sombre veil,
+through which the foliage of King's College showed in a blurred
+discolouration. From the branches of trees a double fall of water
+descended with a melancholy sound.
+
+Presently the ox-cart neared him, and the driver nodded, eyeing him with
+apathetic interest.
+
+When the cart had passed Nicholas came down the steps and started up the
+street at the same rapid walk. He was not thinking of his way, but the
+impulse of action had seized upon him, and he was walking down the
+ferment in his brain. He did not formulate the thought that with bodily
+fatigue would come mental indifference; he merely felt that when he was
+tired--dead tired--he would go home and sit down to dinner and face his
+father and discuss Jerry Pollard's terms. He would do that when he was
+too tired to care--not before.
+
+When he reached the heavy iron gate of the college he swung it open and
+entered the grounds. In the centre of the walk stood the statue of a
+great Colonial governor, and he paused before it for an instant, staring
+up into the battered features of the marble face. He realised suddenly
+that he had never looked at it before. Daily, for twelve years, he had
+passed the college campus, sometimes crossing it so that he might have
+brushed the effigy of the great Englishman with a careless hand--but he
+had never seen the face before. Then he looked through the falling rain
+at the deserted archway of the old brick building. For the first time
+those grim walls, which had been thrice overthrown and had arisen thrice
+from their ashes, impressed him with the triumphant service they had
+rendered in the culture of his kind. He saw it as it was--a sacred
+skeleton, an honourable decay. The long line of illustrious hands that
+had procured its ancient charter seemed to wave a ghostly benediction
+over its ancient learning. Clergy and burgesses, council and governor,
+planters of Virginia and bishops of London had stood by its birth. It
+was the fruit of the union of the old world and the new, and it had
+waxed strong upon the milk of its mother ere it turned rebel. Later, to
+its younger country, it had sent forth its sons as statesmen who gave
+glory to its name. And through all its history it had overcome calamity
+and defied assault. Thrice it had fallen and thrice it had rearisen.
+
+He recalled next the sheltered alcove in the dim library, where he had
+studied with the consumptive young instructor, who was dead. The
+creepers upon the wall were encroaching stealthily upon the alcove
+window. Scarlet tendrils, like forked flames, licked the narrow ledge.
+Several wet sparrows fluttered in and out among the leaves.
+
+He turned hastily away, passed the great Englishman with unseeing eyes,
+clanged the iron gate heavily behind him, and went on towards the house
+of his father.
+
+The family were at dinner when he entered, and he took his seat silently
+in the empty chair at his stepmother's right hand.
+
+As he sat down she reached out and felt his coat sleeve.
+
+"I declar, Nick, you air soaked clean through," she said. "Anybody'd
+think you'd been layin' out in the rain all night. You go up and change
+your clothes an' I'll keep your dinner hot on the stove."
+
+Nicholas went upstairs mechanically, and when he came down his father
+had gone to the stable and his stepmother was alone in the kitchen.
+
+She brought him his dinner, standing beside the table while he ate it,
+watching him with an intentness that was almost wistful.
+
+"Would you like some molasses on your corn pone?" she asked as he
+finished and pushed his plate away. Then, as he shook his head, she
+added hesitatingly, "It come from Jerry Pollard's store."
+
+But he only shook his head again, following with his eyes the wave-like
+design on the mahogany-coloured oilcloth that covered the table.
+
+Marthy Burr set the jug aside, nervously clearing her throat.
+
+"I reckon Jerry Pollard has got one of the finest stores anywhar
+'bouts," she said suddenly.
+
+Nicholas looked up quickly and met her eyes. She was holding a dish of
+baked potatoes in one hand and the other was resting for support upon
+the edge of the table. Her face was yellow and interlined, and a faint
+odour of camphor came from the bandage about her cheek.
+
+"Yes," he replied indifferently. "He does a very good business."
+
+His stepmother put the dish of potatoes back upon the table and took up
+the pitcher of buttermilk. Her hand was trembling nervously. There was a
+slight gasp in her voice when she spoke.
+
+"I don't know but what it's as big a thing to be in a fine store like
+that as 'tis to be a lawyer," she said.
+
+For a moment Nicholas did not answer. His eyes grew darker as she stood
+before him, and a shadow closed upon his face. As in a frame, he saw the
+outline of her figure defined against the square of falling rain between
+the window sashes. Her shoulders, bent slightly forward as if crushed by
+the bearing of heavy burdens, reminded him of a domestic animal, full of
+years and labour.
+
+His face softened and he smiled into her eyes.
+
+"Yes, I don't know but what it is just as well," he responded
+cheerfully. The next day he went into Jerry Pollard's store and began
+his winter's work. He measured off unbleached cotton cloth for a servant
+girl; sold a pair of shoes to a farmer, a cravat to a young fellow from
+the grocery shop next door, and a set of garden tools to an elderly lady
+who lived in the street facing the asylum and had a greenhouse. At odd
+times he looked over Jerry Pollard's books, and after dark he dunned
+several debtors for unpaid bills. He did it quietly and thoroughly,
+neither shirking nor overelaborating the minutest detail. There are men
+who have an immense capacity for taking pains that is rarer than genius,
+and he was one of them. Whether he made a success or a failure of life,
+he would do it with a conscientious use of opportunities, good or bad.
+An eye that is trained to detect the values of circumstances, and a hand
+that is quick to adjust them, have produced the mental forces that make
+or unmake the race.
+
+When the day was over he went home and ascended to his room in silence.
+The work had left him with a curious irritating sense of its
+distastefulness. The second day was as the first--the week was as the
+month. There were no variations, no difficulties, no advancement. With
+the round of monotony his irritation sharpened. When Jerry Pollard spoke
+he responded in monosyllables; when Jerry Pollard's pretty daughter,
+Bessie, smiled in from the doorway, he kept his eyes on the counter. At
+home he was even less responsive. The impulse which had prompted him to
+return a cheering falsehood to his stepmother passed quickly. He
+sacrificed himself to the family interests, but he sacrificed himself
+begrudgingly. His face assumed lines of sullen repression; the tones of
+his voice were full of subdued resentment. He found satisfaction in
+meeting their overtures with irony, their constraint with callousness.
+Since he had given the one thing they required and he valued, he
+justified himself in a series of petty tyrannies. He met his stepmother
+with avoidance, his father with aversion. The children he swore at or
+ignored. Amos Burr, gathering his slow wits together, regarded him with
+a chuckle of self-congratulation. His sensibilities were not susceptible
+to slight friction, and his son's attitude seemed to him of small
+significance. He had got what he wanted, and that was sufficient unto
+the hour.
+
+After the first two months, Nicholas underwent a dogged and indifferent
+adaptation. He ceased to think of the judge, of Juliet, of Eugenia. He
+laughed at Jerry Pollard's jokes and he winked at Jerry Pollard's
+daughter. His horizon narrowed to the four walls of the shop; he told
+himself that he had a roof above his head and fuel for his stomach--that
+Bessie Pollard had skin that was fairer than Eugenia's and lips as red.
+What did it matter, after all?
+
+Sometimes Mrs. Webb entered the store, sweeping him, as she swept the
+counter, with her clear, cold glance, and once Sally Burwell ran in to
+do an errand for her mother and nodded with distant pleasantness as she
+met his eyes. At such times he flushed and ground his teeth, but after
+Mrs. Webb came farmer Turner, who shook his hand and said:
+
+"Wall, I'm proud of you, Nick Burr."
+
+And after Sally Burwell pretty Bessie Pollard threw him a kiss from the
+doorway. It was not that he was ashamed of his work. He knew that at the
+close of the war better men than he sought and accepted gratefully such
+a livelihood as he disdained--that women in whose veins ran good old
+English blood left their wasted homes to teach in public schools, or
+turned their delicate hands to the needle for support. He was ashamed of
+his past ambition--of his vaunted aspiration--and he was ashamed of
+Jerry Pollard and his service.
+
+The winter wore gradually to spring. A brilliant April melted into a
+watery May. Nicholas, coming to Kingsborough in the early mornings,
+would feel the long spring rains in his face as he splashed through the
+puddles in the road. In the wood the white blossoms of dogwood showed
+through interlacing branches like stars in a network of closely wrought
+iron. On their hardy shrubs the pale pink clusters of mountain laurel
+were beaten into shapeless colour-masses by the wind-blown rains.
+Sometimes, up above, where the fiery points of redbud trees shot
+skyward, a thrush sang or a blue jay scolded--and the bird-notes were
+laden, like the air, with the primal ripeness of spring.
+
+Underfoot the earth was fecundating in dampness. Chill blue violets
+emerged from beneath the spread of rotting leaves, and where the
+washed-out sunlight had last shone it had left rays of wandering
+dandelions straying from the open roadside to the edges of the wood.
+
+And the spring passed into Nicholas also. The wonderful renewal of
+surrounding life thrilled through the repression of his nature. With
+the flowing of the sap the blood flowed more freely in his veins. New
+possibilities were revealed to him; new emotions urged him into fresh
+endeavours. All his powerful, unspent youth spurred on to manhood.
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+
+At last the rains were over. The sun came out again, and with it the
+growth of the season burst into abundance. There were bird-notes on the
+air, fragrance in the stillness, bloom on the trees. In the thicket
+dogwood massed itself in clouds of dead-white stars, like an errant
+trail from the Milky Way, lighting the wooded twilight. Wild azalea, so
+deeply rose that the hue seemed of the blood, wafted its sharp,
+unearthly scent across the underbrush to the road. The woods were vocal
+with the mating songs of their winged inhabitants. The music of the
+thrush welled from the sheer forceful joy of living. "It is
+good--good--good to be a lover!" he sang again and again with amorous
+repetition and a full-throated flourish of improvisation. In the pauses
+of the thrush sounded the cheery whistle of the redbird, the crying of
+the catbird, the liquid tones of the song sparrow, and the giddy
+exclamations of the pewee. Sometimes an oriole darted overhead in a
+royal flash of black and yellow, a robin stood in the road and delivered
+a hearty invitation, or a hawk flew past, pursued by martins.
+
+With the spring planting came a chance of outdoor work, and Nicholas
+would sometimes rise at dawn and do a piece of ploughing before
+breakfast. He had driven the team out one morning across the brown, bare
+earth, which the plough had ripped open in a jagged track, when
+something in the silence and the scents of nature smote him suddenly as
+with a vital force. Dropping the reins to the ground, he threw back his
+head and breathed a keen, quick sense of exaltation. A warm mist, sweet
+and fresh as the breath of a cow, overhung hill and field, road and
+meadow. In a black-browed cedar tree a mocking-bird was singing.
+
+With a sudden shout Nicholas voiced the glorification of toil--of honest
+work well done. He felt with the force of a revelation that to throw up
+the clods of earth manfully is as beneficent as to revolutionise the
+world. It was not the matter of the work, but the mind that went into
+it, that counted--and the man who was not content to do small things
+well would leave great things undone. The beasts before him did not
+shirk their labour because it was clay and not gold dust that trailed
+behind the plough; why should he? And where was happiness if it sprung
+not from the soil? Where contentment if it dwelt not near to Nature? For
+what was better than these things--the clear air of sunrise, the keen,
+sweet smell of the fertile earth, the relaxation of tired muscles? Why
+should he, who had been born to the soil, struggle forth to alien ends
+as a sightless earthworm to the harrow's teeth?
+
+On his way in from the fields he stopped an instant at the gate of the
+barnyard to look at the red-and-white cow that was licking her little,
+tottering calf. Some rollicking lambs were skipping near a dignified
+group of ewes, that looked on with half-fearful, half-disapproving
+faces.
+
+At the pump he saw his stepmother filling a water bucket, and he took it
+from her hands.
+
+"I reckon it is too heavy for you to carry," he said timidly.
+
+"'Tain't much to tote," returned Marthy Burr opposingly. "If I'd never
+had nothin' more'n that to bear I'd have as straight a back as yo' pa's
+got. 'Tain't the water buckets as bends a woman, nohow; it's the things
+as the Lord lays on extry."
+
+She relinquished the bucket and followed Nicholas resentfully to the
+house.
+
+"I never did care 'bout havin' folks come 'round interferin' with my
+burdens," she murmured half-aggrievedly. "I ain't done for yet, an' when
+I is I reckon I'll know it as soon as anybody--lessen it's yo' pa, who's
+got powerful sharp eyes at seein' the failin's of other people--an'
+powerful dull ones when it comes to recognisin' his own."
+
+Then she set about preparing breakfast, and Nicholas flung himself into
+a chair on the porch. Nannie, a pretty, auburn-haired girl, was grinding
+coffee in a small mill, and he looked at her thoughtfully; then Jubal
+came out, whittling a stick, and he turned his gaze inquiringly upon
+him.
+
+"What would you like to do in the world, Jubal?" he asked, "best of
+all?"
+
+Jubal looked up in perplexity, his fat forehead wrinkling.
+
+"You ain't countin' in eatin', I s'pose?" he replied doubtfully.
+
+Nicholas shook his head.
+
+"No, leave out eating," he said.
+
+"An' the splittin' open of that durn livered Spike Turner?"
+
+"Yes, that too."
+
+Jubal whittled slowly, his forehead wrinkling more deeply.
+
+"Then I don't know whether it's to give ma a rest or to own Billy
+Flinders's coon dog, Boss," he said.
+
+Nicholas laughed for an instant, but the laugh softened into a smile.
+
+At the table he asked his stepmother and Sairy Jane about the spring
+chickens, and they answered with surprised eagerness.
+
+"I am going to mark the lambs to-morrow," he said. "They're a nice lot."
+And he added: "Some day I'll take the farm and make it pay."
+
+"I don't see what you want to go steppin' in yo' pa's shoes for," put in
+Marthy Burr. "When toes have got p'inted down-hill they ain't goin' no
+other way. Don't you come back to raisin' things on this land. I ain't
+never seen nothin' thrive on it yet, cep'n weeds, an' the Lord knows
+they warn't planted."
+
+Nicholas shook his head.
+
+"Why, look at Turner," he said. "His land is as poor as this, and he
+makes an easy living."
+
+"A Turner ain't a Burr," returned his stepmother with uncompromising
+logic, "an' a Burr ain't a Turner. Whar the blood runs the man follows,
+an' yours ain't runnin' towards the farm. Jeb Turner can fling a handful
+of corn in poor groun', an' thar'll come up a cornfield, an' yo' pa may
+plant with the sweat of his brow an' the groanin' of his spirit, an' the
+crows git it. A farmer's got to be born, same as a fool. You can't make
+a corn pone out of flour dough by the twistin' of it."
+
+"That's so," admitted Amos Burr, laying down his knife and meeting his
+wife's eyes. "That's so. You can't make a corn pone out of flour dough,
+noways you turn it."
+
+"Perhaps I'll try some day," said Nicholas with a laugh; and he rose and
+went out of the house.
+
+When he had reached the little gate he heard a voice behind him, and
+turned to find his half-sister Nannie, her cheeks flushed like a damp,
+wild rose above her faded dress.
+
+"I want you to bring me something from the store, Nick," she stammered.
+"I want a blue ribbon for my hair, it's--it's so worrisome."
+
+She shook her auburn locks, and Nicholas realised suddenly that she must
+be very good to look at--to men who were only in a Scriptural sense her
+brothers. He felt a vague pride in her.
+
+"Why, of course I will," he answered. "Blue let it be."
+
+And he opened the gate and went on his way, leaving Nannie, still
+flushed, in the path.
+
+When he took down Jerry Pollard's shutters a half-hour later he stood
+for an instant looking thoughtfully down upon the assortment in the
+window. Then he leaned over and conscientiously set upright a blue-glass
+vase before going behind the counter to unpin the curtains hanging
+across the dry-goods shelves.
+
+After breakfast Bessie Pollard came in and stood with her elbow resting
+on the showcase as she flirted a small feather duster. She had just
+released her hair from curl paper, and it hung in golden ringlets over
+her forehead. Her face was ripe and red, like a well-sunned peach, and
+the firm curves of her bosom swelled the gathers of her gown.
+
+"You look real spry this morning," she said coquettishly; but he turned
+from her in sudden distaste. Her tawdry refinement irritated the more
+serious manner of his mood.
+
+Presently she went back to her dusting, and he completed his daily
+setting to rights of the shop before he drew up to the desk and made out
+the bills that were due for the month. It was not until some hours later
+that he looked up upon hearing a step on the threshold. At first he
+stood up mechanically at the sight of a girl in a riding-habit. Then he
+started and drew back, for the girl lifted her head, and he saw that it
+was Eugenia Battle. In the same glance he saw also that there was a keen
+surprise in her face.
+
+"Why, Nick Burr!" she said breathlessly. She tripped over her long
+riding-skirt and caught it hastily in one hand; in the other she carried
+a small switch. She had grown tall and straight, and her hair was
+gathered up from her shoulders.
+
+For a moment they were both silent. In Eugenia's face the surprise gave
+place to gladness, and the warmth of her personality gathered to her
+eyes. She held out her ungloved hand.
+
+"Why, Nick Burr!" she said again.
+
+But Nicholas looked at her in silence. All the dogged bitterness of the
+last six months welled to his lips--all his new-found philosophy
+evaporated at the sting of wounded pride. He remembered with a start the
+gray road on the afternoon in November, the sullen cast of the sky, the
+hopeless trend of the wind among the trees, the leaping of the light
+into Eugenia's face. She laughed now as she had laughed then--a hearty
+little burst of surprise in the suddenness of the meeting.
+
+He turned quickly from the outstretched hand.
+
+"What can I do for you?" he asked, and his tone was like Jerry
+Pollard's.
+
+Eugenia's hand fell to her side, closing upon the folds of her skirt.
+She caught her lip between her teeth with a petulant twitch. Then she
+came forward and laid a small brown bit of cloth upon the counter.
+
+"A spool of silk this shade," she said briskly. "Please match it very
+carefully."
+
+Nicholas pulled open the small drawers containing the silk, and compared
+the sample with the row of spools. He made his selection, showing it to
+Eugenia before wrapping it in brown paper.
+
+"Is that all?" he asked grimly.
+
+Eugenia nodded. He gave her the spool, and she lifted her skirt and went
+out of the shop. A moment more, and she passed the door swiftly on the
+brown mare. Nicholas closed the drawer and laid the torn sheet of
+wrapping paper back in its place. A little girl came in for a card of
+hooks and eyes for her mother, a dressmaker, and he gave them to her and
+dropped the nickel in the till. When she went out he followed her to the
+door and stood looking out into the gray dust of the street.
+
+Across the way a lady was gathering roses from a vine that clambered
+over her piazza, and the sunlight struck straight at her gracious
+figure. From afar off came the sound of children laughing. Down the
+street several mild-eyed Jersey cows were driven by a little negro to
+the court-house green. In a near tree a wood-bird sang a score of
+dreamy notes. Gradually the quiet of the scene wrought its spell upon
+him--the insistent languor drugged him like a narcotic. On the wide,
+restless globe there is perhaps no village of three streets, no
+settlement that has been made by man, so utterly the cradle of
+quiescence. From the listless battlefields, where grass runs green and
+wild, to the little whiter washed gaol, where roses bloom, it is a
+petrified memory, a perennial day dream.
+
+The lady across the street passed under her rose vine, her basket filled
+with creamy clusters. The cows filed lazily on the court-house green.
+The wood-bird in the near tree sang over its dreamy notes. The clear
+black shadows in the street lay like full-length figures across the
+vivid sunlight.
+
+The bitterness passed slowly from his lips. He turned, and was
+reentering the shop, when his name was called sharply.
+
+"Why, Nick Burr!"
+
+The words were Eugenia's, but the voice was Tom Bassett's. He had come
+up suddenly with the judge, and as Nicholas turned he caught his hand in
+a hearty grasp.
+
+"Well, I call this luck!" he cried. "I say, Nick, you haven't grown bald
+since I saw you. Do you remember the time you shaved every strand of
+hair off your head so we'd stop calling you 'Carrotty'?"
+
+"I remember you called me 'Baldy,'" said Nicholas, running his hand
+through his thick, red hair. Then he looked at the judge. "I hope you
+are well, sir," he added.
+
+The judge bowed with his fine-flavoured courtesy. "As I trust you are,"
+he returned graciously.
+
+"Well, all I've got to say," put in Tom, as his father finished, "is
+that it's a shame--a confounded shame. What good will Nick's brains do
+him in old Pollard's store? Old Pollard's a skinflint, anyway, and he
+cuffed me once when I was a small chap."
+
+Nicholas glanced back uncertainly into the shop.
+
+"Oh, he isn't so bad when you know him," he said. "Most folks aren't."
+
+"He seems to value Nicholas's services," added the judge politely.
+
+Nicholas flushed. "I don't know about that," he returned awkwardly.
+
+"I know one thing, though," said Tom with slow wrath, "and that is that
+I'm not green enough to be fooled by Nick Burr, if other people are.
+Father told me last night that it was Nick's own choice that took him to
+Jerry Pollard's. Choice, the Dickens! Why, it's those blasted people of
+his that put him here."
+
+Tom was very red in the face, so was Nicholas. They looked at the judge,
+and the judge looked back at them with a humorous twinkle in his eyes.
+
+"My dear Tom," he said at last, "I never gave you credit for being a
+Solomon, but some day your wit may put your father to shame."
+
+Then he held out his hand to Nicholas.
+
+"When you're a little older, my boy," he remarked, "you may learn that,
+though an old fool may be the biggest fool, he's not the only one. Come
+to see us when you feel like it, eh, Tom?"
+
+They passed on together, and Nicholas stood looking after them until a
+man came in to exchange a pair of shoes.
+
+"They're a leetle too skimpy 'cross the toes," he said deprecatingly.
+"The heels air first-rate, but the toes sorter seem to be made fur a
+three-toed somebody. 'Tain't as if I could jest set aroun' in 'em, of
+course; then they'd be a fine fit, but when I go ter stan' up they
+pinches."
+
+Nicholas gave him a larger size and put the box back upon the shelf. He
+was thinking of Tom Bassett and the twinkle in the judge's eyes, and he
+did not hear the man's rambling speech. It seemed to him that his
+friendship with Tom and his father had been restored--that he might once
+more go freely in and out of the judge's house.
+
+When the day was over he walked slowly homeward along the deserted road,
+his mind still busy with recollections of the morning. Yes, life was
+decidedly endurable at worst. If he might not become celebrated, he
+might at least become content. He was _not_ Tom Bassett, but he had Tom
+Bassett's friendship. He would live a simple life in his own class among
+his own people, and he would grow to be respected by those who were
+above him.
+
+He had entered the wood, when he remembered suddenly that he had
+forgotten the ribbon for his sister Nannie. He turned quickly and
+retraced his steps through the thickening twilight.
+
+
+
+
+V
+
+
+So Nicholas's first fight for his manhood was fought and won. He went
+back to his books--went back because his intellect ordained it, and the
+ordinance of intellect is fate--but bitterness had gone out of him, and
+he had come into his own. From the stress of the last year he had found
+security in acceptance. His life might not be such as he had planned
+it--whose was?--his work might not be the thing he wanted--again, whose
+was?--but life and work were with him, and it remained for him to make
+the best of them. Fate might make him a shopkeeper; he would see to it
+that it made him a successful one. Success read backwards spelt work,
+and work was his inheritance--a heritage of sweat and labour.
+
+He went to Jerry Pollard's an hour earlier that he might rearrange to
+advantage the shelves. His employer had secured, below cost, a supply of
+dry goods, and preparations were in the making for the first summer sale
+in Kingsborough. Nicholas conducted the arrangements as conscientiously
+as he might have conducted a legal argument. It was the thing before
+him, and it must not fail.
+
+But at night he found his greater hour. When supper was over and he had
+helped his father with the odd jobs of the farm, he would take the smoky
+kerosene lamp to his room and plunge into the pages of "The Federalist."
+From his sharp, retentive memory nothing passed. He held his knowledge
+with the same vital grip with which he held his friends.
+
+He had the judge's library now and the judge's assistance. Evening after
+evening he sat in the dim, ghost-hallowed room, the shining calf-bound
+volumes girdling the walls, and absorbed the judge as the judge, in his
+own time, had absorbed the men who were gone. From that rich storehouse
+of high principles and simple deeds Nicholas's future was drawing
+nourishment. Judge Bassett had lived his life in a village, but he had
+lived it among statesmen. His book-shelves were green with their
+inspiration, his memory fresh from their impress. In his youth he
+himself had been one of the hopes of his State; in his age he was one of
+her consolations.
+
+He treated the younger man with that quaint courtliness which knew not
+affectation. When he talked to him, as he often did, of the great legal
+minds, it was always with the courtesy of their titles. He spoke of "Mr.
+Chancellor Kent," of "Mr. Justice Blackstone," as he spoke of "President
+Davis" or of "General Lee." To have alluded to them more familiarly he
+would have held to be a breach of etiquette of unpardonable grossness.
+
+One day he had started in Nicholas his old political dreams of
+Jeffersonian lustre.
+
+"Virginia is not dead but sleepeth," the judge had said, as a prelude to
+denunciation of the Readjuster party then in power.
+
+Nicholas was looking at a collection of autograph letters that lay on
+the judge's desk. He glanced up with an impulsive start.
+
+"Oh, but I should like to have lived then!" he exclaimed.
+
+The older man shook his head.
+
+"It is not the times, but the man," he answered. "The time makes the
+man, the great man makes his time."
+
+He leaned his massive old head against the carved back of his chair and
+looked at the other in his kindly, unambitious optimism. He had lost
+most that the world accounts of worth, but life had dealt gently by him,
+on the whole, since it had never infringed upon the sensitiveness of his
+self-esteem.
+
+"It's rough on the man," Nicholas returned brusquely, and a little later
+he went out into the night. He had his periods of depression, when
+desire seemed greater than duty, as he had his periods of exaltation,
+when duty seemed greater than desire. Neither affected, to outward
+seeming, the course of his life, but each left its mark upon his mental
+forces. The chief thing was that he did the work he hated as thoroughly
+as he did the work he loved.
+
+The spring ripened into summer and the summer chilled into autumn. He
+had kept rigidly to his way and to his resolutions. From neither had he
+swerved in one regard. His stepmother, fixing sharp, tired eyes upon him
+mentally drafted, "After all's said an' done, the Lord knows best." She
+believed him to be content, as she had reason to, for he gave no outward
+uneasy sign. When his small savings had paid off Amos Burr's little
+debt, and they started, unhandicapped, upon their shaky progress, it
+seemed to her that she was justified in commending, for the second time,
+the visible methods of Providence--a commendation which faltered only
+before a threatening twinge of neuralgia.
+
+Early in October the judge, whose practice was drawn largely from other
+sections of the State, left home for an absence of several weeks. Upon
+his return he sent for Nicholas in the early afternoon, an unusual
+happening. The young man, dropping in at two o'clock, found him at work
+in his library before the early dinner, a generous mint julep upon a
+silver tray on his desk. Caesar was an acknowledged artist in the mixing
+of the beverage, and Mrs. Burwell had once exclaimed that "the judge was
+prouder of Caesar's fame at the bar than of his own."
+
+"It is an art that is becoming extinct, madam," the judge had replied
+sadly. "I should wager there are more men in the State to-day who can
+make a speech than can mix a julep. Caesar's distinction is greater than
+mine."
+
+To-day, as Nicholas entered, the judge greeted him hospitably and called
+for another concoction. When Caesar brought it, frosted and clear and
+odorous, the judge raised his own goblet and bowed to his caller.
+
+"To your future, my boy," he said graciously; then, as Nicholas blushed
+and stammered, he asked kindly:
+
+"How are you getting on now?"
+
+"Very well."
+
+"So well that you wouldn't like a change?"
+
+Nicholas threw a startled look upon him. His pulse beat swiftly, and his
+skin burned. By these physical reactions he realised the fluttering of
+his hopes.
+
+"A change!" he said slowly, holding himself in hand. "Yes,
+I--should--like a change."
+
+The judge sipped his julep, breathing with enjoyment the strong
+fragrance of the mint.
+
+"I have just seen my friend, Professor Hartwell, of the University," he
+said, "and he mentioned to me that in the work of compiling his law-book
+he found great need of a secretary. It at once occurred to me that it
+was a suitable opening for you, and I ventured to suggest as much to
+him--"
+
+He paused an instant, gazing thoughtfully into his glass.
+
+"And he?" urged Nicholas hurriedly.
+
+"He would like some correspondence with you, I believe; but, if the
+prospect pleases you, and you would care to undertake the work--"
+
+"Care?" gasped the younger man passionately; "care! Why I--I'd sell my
+soul for the chance."
+
+The judge laughed softly.
+
+"Such extreme measures are unnecessary, I think. No doubt it can be
+arranged. I understand from your father that he has tided over his last
+failures."
+
+But Nicholas did not hear him; the words of release were ringing in his
+ears.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The year that Nicholas Burr "worked" his way to a degree at the
+University of the State Tom Bassett returned to Kingsborough and took up
+that portion of the judge's practice which he termed "local"; and his
+fellow citizens, whose daily existence was proof of their belief in
+hereditary virtues, brought their legal difficulties to his door. He was
+a stout, flaxen-haired young fellow, with broad shoulders and honest,
+light-blue eyes, holding an habitual shade of perplexity. People said of
+him that his heart outran his head, but they loved him not the less for
+this--perhaps the more.
+
+Upon his return to Kingsborough he applied himself conscientiously to
+his cases, paid a series of social calls, and fell over head and ears in
+love with Sally Burwell.
+
+"There are two things which every respectable young man in Kingsborough
+goes through with," remarked the rector's wife as she sat at breakfast
+with her husband. "He becomes confirmed and he goes mad about Sally
+Burwell. For my part it does not surprise me. She's not pretty, but no
+man has ever found it out, and no man ever will. Did you notice that
+muslin she had on in church last Sunday--all frills and tucks--"
+
+"My mind was upon my sermon, dear," murmured the rector apologetically.
+
+"But we've eyes as well as minds, and those of every man in the
+congregation were on that dress of Sally's."
+
+The rector meekly stirred his coffee.
+
+"I have no doubt of it," he answered. "But what do you think of Tom's
+chances, my dear?"
+
+"They aren't worth a candle," returned his wife with an emphasis which
+settled the question in the rector's mind.
+
+Within a month Tom's chances were the topic of Kingsborough. They were
+discussed at the post-office, at sewing societies, at church festivals.
+Not a soul in the congregation but knew the number of times he had
+accompanied her to evening services; not an inhabitant of the town but
+was aware of the hour and the afternoon upon which they had last walked
+through Lover's Lane.
+
+When the state of affairs had gone the rounds of the community until
+they were worn threadbare, they effected a final lodgment in the mind of
+Mr. Burwell.
+
+"I have made a little discovery," he announced one evening to his wife
+as she was brushing her hair for the night.
+
+Mrs. Burwell was all delighted attention.
+
+"Why, what can it be?" she murmured with gratifying feminine curiosity.
+
+"You may have noticed, my dear," began Mr. Burwell with a nervous glance
+at Sally's chamber door across the hall, "that our friend Tom Bassett
+has called frequently of late."
+
+His wife nodded smilingly.
+
+"Well, it has occurred to me from something I observed this evening that
+it is Sally who attracts him."
+
+Mrs. Burwell threw back her pretty head and laughed.
+
+"Why, Mr. Burwell!" she exclaimed, "did you think that it was you--or
+I--or your grandfather's portrait?"
+
+Her husband looked slightly abashed.
+
+"So you have observed it?" he asked in an injured tone.
+
+Mrs. Burwell laid her brush aside and crossed the room to where he
+stood.
+
+"Everybody knows you are a very clever man, Mr. Burwell," she said. "I
+have never pretended to have as much sense as a man, and I hope nobody
+has ever accused me of anything so unwomanly--but there are some things
+you can't teach your wife, with all your experience."
+
+Mr. Burwell stroked the plump hand on his arm and smiled in returning
+self-esteem.
+
+"And you are quite sure he fancies Sally?" he inquired.
+
+"I know it," replied his wife decisively.
+
+"Would it not be wise to prepare her, my dear?"
+
+"Prepare Sally?" gasped Mrs. Burwell, and she went back to her mirror
+with dancing eyes.
+
+
+
+
+VI
+
+
+"I have learned all they can teach me here," wrote Eugenia from school
+on her eighteenth birthday, "so I'll be home to-morrow."
+
+"Bless my soul!" exclaimed the general, holding the letter above his
+cakes and coffee. "The child's mad--clean mad! We must put a stop to
+it."
+
+"Write her to stay where she is," said Miss Chris decisively.
+
+"I'll write her, the young puss!" returned the general angrily. "Giving
+herself airs at her age, is she? Why, she's just left her bottle!"
+
+"What else does she say, Tom?" inquired his sister as she passed him the
+maple syrup.
+
+The letter fluttered helplessly in the general's hand. "I can't stay
+away any longer from my dear, bad-tempered, old dad," he read in a
+breaking voice; then he added hesitatingly, "I don't reckon she's right
+about knowing enough, eh, Chris?"
+
+"Certainly not," responded Miss Chris severely. "The child's as
+headstrong as a colt. Get that letter off in time for the train, and
+I'll let Sampson carry it to town."
+
+The general finished his breakfast and went to the old secretary in the
+library to write his letter. When he had given it to Sampson he came
+back to Miss Chris, who was washing the teacups in the pantry.
+
+"I s'pose we might as well get her room ready," he suggested. "She may
+come, anyway, you know."
+
+Miss Chris looked up with a laugh from the delicate saucer she was
+wiping.
+
+"I know it," she admitted; "and I'll see to her room. But your letter
+was positive, I hope?"
+
+"Y-e-s," answered the general lamely, and he returned to the Richmond
+papers with an eager flush in his face.
+
+The next day when Eugenia reached Kingsborough she found the dilapidated
+carriage awaiting her, with Sampson upon the driver's seat. With an
+impetuous flutter she threw her arms about the necks of the old horses.
+"Why, you dear things!" she cried; then she held out her hand to
+Sampson. "I'm glad to see you, Sampson," she said. "But why didn't papa
+come to meet me?"
+
+Her animated eyes glanced joyously from side to side and her lips were
+brimming with the delight of homecoming.
+
+Sampson turned the wheel for her as she got into the carriage, and gave
+her the linen lap-robe.
+
+"You sho is growed, Miss Eugeny," he observed, and then in reply to her
+question, "Marse Tom hev got pow'ful stiff-jinted recentelly. Hit seems
+like he'd ruther sot right still den ease hisse'f outer his cheer. Sence
+Ole Miss Grissel done drop down dead uv er political stroke, he ain'
+step 'roun' mo'n he bleeged ter."
+
+The carriage jolted through Kingsborough, and Eugenia bowed smilingly to
+her acquaintances. Once she stopped to shake hands with the rector and
+again to kiss Sally Burwell, who flew into her arms.
+
+"Why, Eugie! you--you beauty!" she cried. Eugenia laughed delightedly,
+her black eyes glowing.
+
+"Am I good-looking?" she asked. "I'm so glad. But I'll never be as
+pretty as you, you dear, sweet thing. I'm too big."
+
+They laughed and kissed again, and Eugenia stepped from the carriage to
+greet the judge, who was passing.
+
+"This is a sight for sore eyes, my dear," said the judge, his fine old
+face wreathed in smiles. Then, as his gaze ran over her full, straight
+figure, "they make fine women these days," he added. "You're as tall as
+your father--though you're your mother's child. Yes, I can see Amelia
+Tucker in your eyes."
+
+"Thank you--thank you," said the girl in a throaty voice. There was a
+glow, a warmth, a fervour in her face which harmonised the chill black
+and white of her colouring. Her expression was as a lamp to illumine the
+mask of her features.
+
+"I couldn't stay away," she went on breathlessly. "I love Kingsborough
+better than the whole world."
+
+"And Kingsborough loves you," returned the judge. "Yes, it is a good old
+town and well worth dying in, after all."
+
+He assisted Eugenia into the carriage, shook hands again, and the
+lumbering old vehicle jogged on its way. In a moment another halt was
+called, and Mrs. Webb came from her gate to give the girl welcome.
+
+"This is a surprise," she said as she kissed her. "I dined at Battle
+Hall last week, and they didn't tell me you were coming."
+
+"They didn't know it," laughed Eugenia. "I come like a bolt from the
+blue."
+
+Mrs. Webb smiled coldly. She was just as the girl had known her in
+childhood--only the high black pompadour was now white. She still wore
+her stiff black silk gown, fastened at the throat by a Confederate
+button set in a brooch.
+
+"You are like yourself and no one else," said Eugenia simply. "But tell
+me of Dudley--where is he?"
+
+Mrs. Webb's face softened slightly.
+
+"His practice is in Richmond now," she answered. "You know he studied
+law and took great honours at college. But his ambitions, I fear, are
+political. I don't like politics. They aren't for honest men."
+
+Eugenia did not smile. She merely nodded assent and, saying good-bye
+pleasantly, jolted out of Kingsborough into the Old Stage Road.
+
+"When did Mrs. Webb dine at home, Sampson?" she asked suddenly after a
+long silence.
+
+"Hit wa'n' onc't en it wa'n' twice," said Sampson thoughtfully. "Mo'
+like hit wuz tree times. She done been dar monst'ous often dis yer
+winter, an' de mo' she come de mo' 'ristocratical she 'pear ter git. Dar
+wa'n' no placin' her, nohow. We done sot 'er by Ole Mis' Grissel w'en
+she wuz 'live, an' we done sot 'er by Miss Chris, an' we done sot 'er by
+Marse Tom hisse'f, an', fo' de Lawd, I ain' never seen 'er congeal yit."
+
+But Eugenia was seeking other information. "Is Uncle Ish well? And Aunt
+Verbeny, and the dogs? and did you bury Jim in the graveyard?"
+
+"Dey's all well," replied Sampson, flicking at a horsefly on the
+sorrel's back, "an' Jim, he's well en buried. Marse Tom sot up er boa'd
+des' like you tell 'im."
+
+A little later they turned into the cedar avenue, and Eugenia could see
+the large white pillars of the porch.
+
+"There they are!" she cried excitedly, and before the carriage stopped
+she was up the narrow walk and in the general's arms.
+
+"Well, daughter! daughter!" said the general. His eyes were watery, and
+when Eugenia fell upon Miss Chris, he blew his nose loudly with a
+nervous wave of his silk handkerchief.
+
+"I was obliged to come," explained Eugenia. "When I got your letter
+saying I might, I was so happy."
+
+"Tom!" murmured Miss Chris reproachfully, but her eyes were shining and
+she laid an affectionate hand on her brother's arm.
+
+The general blushed like a boy.
+
+"I told her if she'd fully made up her mind to come, I'd--I'd let her,"
+he stammered shamefacedly.
+
+"Oh, I was coming anyway!" announced Eugenia cheerfully as she was
+clasped upon the bosom of Aunt Verbeny.
+
+"Ain't you des' yo' ma all over?" cried Aunt Verbeny enthusiastically.
+"Is you ever see anybody so w'ite en' so' black in de same breff 'cep'n
+Miss Meeley? Can't I see her now same ez 'twuz yestiddy, stannin' right
+dar in dis yer hall en' sayin', 'You b'longs ter me, Verbeny, en' I'se
+gwine ter take cyar you de bes' I kin.'"
+
+Aunt Verbeny fixed her eyes upon the general and he quailed.
+
+"Don't I take care of you, Aunt Verbeny?" he asked appealingly; but
+Eugenia, having greeted the remaining servants, drew him with her into
+the dining-room. When he sat down at last to the heavily laden table, he
+seemed to have grown twenty years younger. As Eugenia hung over him with
+domineering devotion, the irritable expression faded from his face and
+he grew almost jovial. When she weakened his coffee, he protested
+delightedly, and when she refused to allow him his nightly dole of
+preserved quinces, he stormed with rapture. "She wants to starve me, the
+tyrant," he declared. "She'll take the very bread from my mouth next."
+
+Then his enthusiasm overcame him.
+
+"That's the finest girl in the world, Chris! God bless her, her heart's
+as warm as her eyes. Why, she'd damn herself to do a kindness."
+
+Miss Chris appeared to remonstrate.
+
+"I am surprised, Tom," she said disapprovingly, though why she was
+surprised or what she was surprised at the general never knew.
+
+When Eugenia went upstairs that night, she blew out her candle and
+undressed by the full light of the moon as it shone through the giant
+sycamore. Outside, the lawn lay like a sheet unrolled, rent by sharp
+black shadows. All the dear, familiar objects were draped by the
+darkness as by a curtain; the body of the sycamore assumed a spectral
+pallor, and the small rockery near by was as mysterious as a tomb. From
+the dusk beneath the window the fragrance of the mimosa tree floated
+into the room.
+
+Eugenia, in her long, white nightgown, fell upon her bed and slept.
+
+The next day she went the rounds of the farm. "I'm coming back to take
+you for exercise," she remarked to the general as she stood before him
+in her sunbonnet.
+
+The general, who was placidly smoking, groaned in protest.
+
+"Then you'll kill me, Eugie," he urged. "Exercise doesn't suit me. I'm
+too heavy."
+
+"You'll get lighter," returned Eugenia reassuringly. "You don't move
+about half enough, but I'll make you."
+
+The general groaned again, and Miss Chris, pink and fresh in her linen
+sacque, came out upon the porch.
+
+"Bless the child!" she exclaimed. "Where on earth did she lay hands on
+that bonnet? Don't stay out too long in the sun, Eugie, or you'll burn
+black."
+
+The general caught at the straw.
+
+"I wish you'd tell her she ought to sit in the house, Chris. She wants
+to drag me--me out in that heat." But Eugenia drew the sunbonnet over
+her dark head and disappeared across the lawn.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Having inspected the farmyard and the stables, she crossed the ragged
+field to the negro cabins, where she was received with hilarity.
+
+"Ain't I al'ays tell you she uz de fines' lady in delan'?" demanded
+Delphy of the retreating Moses. "Ain't I al'ays tell you dar wa'n't her
+match in dese yer parts or outer dem? I ax you, ain't I?"
+
+"Dat's so," admitted Moses meekly.
+
+"Where's Betsey?" inquired Eugenia, twirling her sunbonnet. "Aunt
+Verbeny told me the baby died. I am so sorry."
+
+"De Lawd He give, en' de Lawd He teck," returned Delphy piously, "en' He
+done been moughty open-handed dis long time. He done give er plum sight
+mo'n He done teck, en' it ain' no use'n sayin' He ain'."
+
+"So the others are well?" ventured Eugenia, and as a bow-legged crawler
+emerged from beneath the doorstep she added: "Is that the youngest?"
+
+Delphy snorted.
+
+"Dat ar brat, Miss Euginney? He ain' Betsey's, nohow. He's Rindy's Lije,
+en' he's de mos' out'n out pesterer sence Mose wuz born."
+
+"Rindy!" exclaimed Eugenia in surprise, lightly touching the small black
+body with her foot. "Why, I didn't know Rindy was married. She's working
+at the house now."
+
+Delphy seized the child and held him at arm's length while she applied a
+sounding box. "Go 'way f'om yer, honey," she said. "Rindy ain' mah'ed.
+He's des' an accident. Shet yo' mouth, you imp er darkness, fo' I shet
+hit fur you."
+
+"Don't hurt him, Delphy," pleaded the girl. "Rindy ought to be ashamed
+of herself, but it isn't his fault. I'm going to send him some clothes.
+He looks fat enough, anyhow."
+
+"He's fitten ter bus'," retorted Delphy sternly.
+
+"He don't do nuttin' fur his livin' but eat all day, en' den when night
+come he don't do nuttin' but holler kaze de time ter leave off eatin'
+done come. He ain' no mo' use'n a weazel."
+
+Eugenia promised to befriend the baby, and left with Delphy's pessimism
+ringing in her ears. "He ain' wuth yo' shoestring, he ain'," called the
+woman after her.
+
+The girl was as popular among the negroes as she had been as a small
+tomboy in pinafores. Her impulsive generosity and, above all, her
+cordial kindness, had not abated with years. She was as ready to serve
+as be served, her heart was as open as her hand; and the shrewd,
+childish race received her as a benignant providence. Her sweetness of
+disposition became a proverb. "As sunshiny ez Miss Euginny," said Aunt
+Verbeny of a clear day--and the general raised her wages.
+
+During the early summer Bernard came home on a vacation. For several
+years he had held a position in a bank in Lynchburg, and his visits to
+Kingsborough took place at uncertain intervals. He was a slight,
+insignificant young fellow, with complacent eyes and a beautiful,
+girlish mouth. His temper was quicker than Eugenia's, and he was in
+continual friction with the general, who had grown absent-minded and
+irritable. He not only forgot his own opinions as soon as he expressed
+them, but, what is still more annoying, he was apt to offer them as some
+one's else in the course of a few hours.
+
+"That young Burr's a scamp," he remarked one morning at breakfast, "a
+regular scamp. Here he's setting up as a lawyer under George Bassett's
+eye, when I happen to know that Jerry Pollard wouldn't have him in his
+store if you paid him."
+
+"My dear Tom," breathed the placid voice of Miss Chris, "I'm quite sure
+you're mistaken. Why, Judge Bassett--"
+
+"Mistaken!" persisted the general angrily. "Am I the man to make a
+statement without authority? I tell you he's a scamp, ma'am--a regular
+scamp! If you please to doubt my word--"
+
+"That's rather rough on a chap, isn't it?" put in Bernard indifferently.
+"He isn't a gentleman, but I shouldn't call him a scamp."
+
+"Why should you call him anything, sir?" demanded the general. "It's no
+business of yours, is it? If I choose to call him a--"
+
+"Now, father," said Eugenia, and at her decisive tones the general broke
+off and turned upon her round, inquiring eyes. "Now, father, you don't
+mean one word that you're saying, and you know it." And she proceeded to
+butter his cakes.
+
+The general was suppressed, and after breakfast he got into the carriage
+beside his daughter and drove slowly into town. When he returned to
+dinner he met Miss Chris with triumphant eyes.
+
+"By the way, Chris, you were mistaken this morning about that Burr boy.
+He's quite a decent person. I don't see how you got it into your head
+there was something wrong about him."
+
+"I'm glad to hear it," responded Miss Chris good-humouredly. She had
+never uttered a harsh word about anybody in her life, but she was a
+long-suffering woman, and she philosophically accepted the accusation.
+
+Twenty-four hours later the general had a passage at arms with Bernard.
+
+"You can watch the threshing this morning, my boy," he remarked as he
+sat down to breakfast. "You won't go in to town, I suppose?"
+
+Bernard shook his head.
+
+"I thought of riding in for the mail," he answered; "there's a letter
+I'm looking for."
+
+The general flushed and put out a preliminary feeler. "How are you
+going?" he inquired; "not on one of my horses, I hope?"
+
+Eugenia shook her head at Bernard, but he went on recklessly:
+
+"Why, yes, I thought I'd take the gray mare."
+
+The general shook his head until his flabby face grew purple.
+
+"The gray mare!" he thundered. "You mean to take out my gray mare, do
+you? Well, I'd like to see you, sir. Not a step does the gray mare
+stir--not a step, sir."
+
+"Oh, all right," agreed Bernard so quietly that the general's rage
+increased. "Keep her in the stables, for all I care." And, having
+finished his breakfast, he bowed to Miss Chris and left the table.
+
+But an hour later, as he passed through the hall, he found the general
+waiting. "Aren't you ready?" he asked irascibly. "Are you going to waste
+the whole morning? Why aren't you in town?"
+
+Bernard's temper was well enough as long as there was no reason it
+should be better; but he couldn't stand his father, and he knew it.
+
+"I'm not going," he returned sullenly.
+
+"Not going!" cried the general hotly, "not going after all the fuss
+you've raised? What do you mean by changing your mind every minute?"
+
+Bernard took his hat from the old mahogany rack. "I've nothing to ride,"
+he replied irritably, "and I don't choose to walk--that's what I mean."
+
+But his answer only exasperated his hovering parent.
+
+"Damme, sir, do you want to make me lose my temper?" he demanded. "Isn't
+the stable full of horses? Where's the gray mare, I'd like to know,
+sir?"
+
+"Eugie!" called Bernard angrily, "come here." And as the girl appeared
+he made a break from the house. He possessed an abiding faith in the
+endurance of Eugenia's clannish soul that was proof against even the
+suggestion that it might succumb. His father was unquestionably trying,
+but Eugie was unquestionably strong, and she loved her people with a
+passion which he felt to be romantically unsurpassable. Yes, Eugie was
+the hope of the family, after all.
+
+As for the girl, she put her arm about the general and drew him to his
+chair. He was failing rapidly; this she saw and suffered at seeing.
+There were wrinkles crossing and recrossing his hanging cheeks, and
+swollen bluish pockets beneath his eyes. When he moved he carried his
+great weight uneasily. During the day she hung over him with multiplied
+caresses; as he sat upon the porch in the afternoon she read to him from
+the Bible and Shakespeare, the only books his library contained.
+
+"After God and Shakespeare, what was left for any man to write?" the
+general had once demanded of the judge.
+
+Now he asked the question of Eugenia, and she smiled and was silent. Her
+eyes passed from the porch to the lawn and the walk and the immemorial
+gloom of the great cedars. Sunshine lay over all the warm, sleepy land,
+and sunshine lay across her white dress and across the senile droop of
+the general's mouth.
+
+"For He maketh sore, and bindeth up," read the girl slowly. "He woundeth
+and His hands make whole."
+
+"He shall deliver thee in six troubles;--yea, in seven there shall no
+evil touch thee."
+
+"In famine He shall redeem thee from death: and in war from the power of
+the sword."
+
+She stopped suddenly and looked up, for the general's eyes were full of
+tears.
+
+
+
+
+BOOK III
+
+WHEN FIELDS LIE FALLOW
+
+
+
+
+I
+
+
+On an October afternoon Nicholas Burr was walking along the branch road
+that led to his father's farm. He carried a well filled bag upon his
+shoulder, the musty surface of which betrayed that it contained freshly
+ground meal, but, despite the additional weight, his figure was
+unflinchingly erect. There was a splendid vigour in his thick-set frame
+and in the swinging strides of his hardy limbs. His face--the
+square-jawed, large-featured face of a philosopher or a
+farmer--possessed, with its uncompromising ugliness, a certain eccentric
+power. Rugged, gray, alert-eyed as it was, large-browed and overhung by
+his waving red hair--it was a face to attract or to repel--not to be
+ignored.
+
+Now, as he swung on vigorously in the October light, there was about him
+a joyousness of purpose which belonged to his age and his aspirations.
+It was an atmosphere, an emanation thrown off by respiring vitality.
+
+Across the road the sunshine fell in long, level shafts. The spirit of
+October was abroad in the wood--veiling itself in a faint, bluish haze
+like the smoke of the greenwood when it burns. Overhead, crimson and
+yellow ran riot among the trees, the flame of the maple extinguishing
+the dull red of the oak, the clear gold of the hickory flashing through
+the gloss of the holly. As yet the leaves had not begun to fall; they
+held tenaciously to the living branches, fluttering light heads in the
+first autumn chill. In the underbrush, where the deerberry showed hectic
+blotches, a squirrel worked busily, completing its winter store, while
+in the slanting sun rays a tawny butterfly, like a wind-blown, loosened
+tiger lily, danced its last mad dance with death.
+
+To Nicholas the scene was without significance. With a gesture he threw
+off the spell of its beauty, as he shifted the "sack" of corn meal upon
+his shoulder. He had found Uncle Ish tottering homeward with the load,
+and he had taken it from him with a careless promise to leave it at the
+old negro's cabin door--then, passing him by a stride, he had gone on
+his kindly, confident way. He forgot Uncle Ish as readily as he forgot
+the bag he carried. His mind was busily reviewing the points of his last
+case and the possible facts of a more important one he believed to be
+coming to him. In this connection he went back to his first fight in the
+little court-house, and he laughed with an appreciation of the humour of
+his success. It was Turner, after all, who had given it to him; Turner,
+who, having bought a horse that died upon the journey home, wanted
+revenge as well as recompense. He remembered his perturbation as he rose
+to cross-examine the defendant--the nervousness with which he drove his
+weapons home. It had all seemed so important to him then--the court,
+his client, the great, greasy horse dealer forced into the witness
+stand.
+
+He had proved his case by the defendant, and he had won as well a mild
+reputation among the farmers who had assembled for the day. Since then
+he had done well, and the judge's patronage had placed much in his hands
+that, otherwise, would have gone elsewhere.
+
+Beyond the wood, the uncultivated wasteland sported its annual carnival
+of golden rod and sumach, and across the brilliant plumes a round, red
+sun hung suspended in a quiet sky. In the corn field, where the late
+crop was fast maturing, negro women chanted shrilly as they pulled the
+"fodder," their high-coloured kerchiefs blending, like autumn foliage,
+with the landscape. Around them the bared stalks rose boldly row on row,
+reserving their scarred and yellow husks for the last harvest of the
+year.
+
+When Nicholas reached his father's house he did not enter the little
+whitewashed gate, but kept on to the log cabin on the edge of General
+Battle's land, where Uncle Ish was passing his declining years in
+poverty and independence. The cabin stood above a little gully which
+skirted the dividing line of the pastures, facing, in its primitive
+nudity, the level stretch of the shadowless highway. It was a rotting,
+one-room dwelling, with a wide doorway opening upon a small, bare strip
+of ground where a gnarled oak grew. In the rear there was a small
+garden, denuded now of its modest vegetables, only the leafy foliage of
+a late pea crop retaining a semblance of fruitfulness.
+
+Nicholas went up the narrow path leading from the road to the hut, and
+placed the bag on the smooth, round stone which served for a step. As he
+did so, the doorway abruptly darkened, and a girl came from the interior
+and paused with her foot upon the threshold. He saw, in an upward
+glance, that it was Eugenia Battle, and, from the light wicker basket on
+her arm, he inferred that, in the absence of Uncle Ish, she had been
+engaged in supplying his simple wants. That the old negro was still
+cared for by the Battles he was aware, though upon the means of his
+livelihood Uncle Ish, himself, was singularly reticent.
+
+As Eugenia saw him she flushed slightly, as one caught in a secret
+charity, and promptly pointed to the bag of meal.
+
+"Whose is that?"
+
+He looked from the girl to the bag and back again, his own cheek
+reddening. At the instant it occurred to him that it was a peculiar
+greeting after a separation of years.
+
+"It belongs to Uncle Ish," he answered, with unreasonable embarrassment.
+"I believe your father gave it to him."
+
+"He might have brought it home for him," was her comment, and
+immediately:
+
+"Where is he?"
+
+"Uncle Ish? He's on the road."
+
+Her next remark probed deeper, and he winced.
+
+"What were you doing with it?"
+
+Her gaze was warming upon him. He met it and laughed aloud.
+
+"Toting it," he responded lightly.
+
+She was still warming. He saw the glow kindle in her eyes and illumine
+her sombre face; it was like the leaping of light to the surface. As she
+stood midway of the entrance, in a frame of unpolished logs, her white
+and black beauty against the smoky gloom of the interior, the red sunset
+before her feet, he recalled swiftly an allegorical figure of Night he
+had once seen in an old engraving. Then, before the charm of her smile,
+the recollection passed as it had come.
+
+"You may bring in the bag," she said, with the authority of one
+accustomed to much service. "I found he had very little left to eat. We
+have to bring him things secretly, and he pretends the Lord feeds him as
+He fed the prophet."
+
+She reentered the hut, and Nicholas, stepping lightly in the fear that
+his weight might hasten the fall of the logs, deposited the bag upon a
+pine table, where an ash cake lay ready for the embers. In a little
+cupboard he saw the contents of Eugenia's basket--a cold fried chicken
+and some coffee and sugar. Before the hearth there was a comfortable
+rocking chair, and a bright coloured quilt was upon the bed. As he
+turned away the girl spoke swiftly:
+
+"It _was_ good of you," she said.
+
+"Good of me?" He met her approbation almost haughtily; then he
+impulsively added: "I always liked Uncle Ish--and he reminds me of old
+times."
+
+She turned frankly to him. In the noble poise of her head she had seemed
+strangely far off; now she appeared to stoop.
+
+"Of our old times?"
+
+Her cordial eyes arrested him.
+
+"Of yours and mine," he answered. "Do you remember the hare traps he
+set for us and the straw mats he taught us to plait? Once you said you
+had stolen a watermelon to save Jake a whipping, and he found you
+out--do you remember?"
+
+He pressed the recollections upon her eagerly, almost violently.
+
+Eugenia shook her head, half laughing.
+
+"No, no," she said; "but I remember you carried me home once when I had
+hurt my foot, and you jumped into the ice pond to save my kitten, and--"
+
+"You shared your lunch with me at school," he broke in.
+
+"And you dug me a little garden all yourself--"
+
+"And you bought me a Jew's harp on my birthday--"
+
+"And you always left half the eggs in a bird's nest because I begged you
+to--"
+
+"And you were an out and out angel," he concluded triumphantly.
+
+"An angel, black-haired and a tomboy?"
+
+He assented. "A little tyrannical angel with a temper."
+
+Her confessions multiplied.
+
+"I scratched your face once."
+
+"Yes."
+
+"I got mad and smashed your best hawk's egg."
+
+"You did."
+
+"I threw your fishing line into the brook when you wouldn't let me
+fish."
+
+"I have never seen it since."
+
+"I was horrid and mean."
+
+"Such were your angelic characteristics."
+
+She thoughtfully swung the basket on her arm, her white sleeve
+fluttering above her wrist. Her head, with its wave, from the clear
+brow, of dead-black hair, was bent frankly towards him.
+
+"It has been so long since I saw you," she said suddenly, "and when I
+last saw you, you were horrid, not I."
+
+He flushed quickly.
+
+"I was a brute," he admitted.
+
+"And you hurt me so, I cried all night."
+
+"Not because you cared?" he asked breathlessly.
+
+"Of course not--because I didn't care a--a rap. I cried for the fun of
+it."
+
+He was sufficiently abashed.
+
+"If I had known--" he began, and stopped.
+
+"You might have known!" she flashed out.
+
+He was at a disadvantage, which he admitted by a blank regard.
+
+"But things were desperate then, and--"
+
+"So were you."
+
+"Not as desperate as I might have been."
+
+In her equable unconsciousness she threw off the meaning of his retort.
+
+"But I like desperateness."
+
+She had crossed the threshold and stood now in the ambient glow, gazing
+across the quiet pasture, where a stray sheep bleated. She reached up
+and broke a bunch of red leaves from the oak, fastening them in her belt
+as they descended the narrow path.
+
+In the road they came upon Uncle Ish, who was hobbling slowly towards
+them. He was wrinkled with age and bent with rheumatism, and his voice
+sounded cracked and querulous.
+
+"Is de Lawd done sont dem vittles?" he demanded suspiciously. "Ef He
+ain', I dunno how I'se gwine ter git mo'n a'er ash cake fur supper.
+'Pears like He's gittin' monst'ous ondependible dese yer las' days. I
+ain' lay eyes on er dish er kebbage sence I lef dat ar patch on Hick'ry
+Hill, en all de blackeye peas I'se done seen is what I raise right dar
+behint dat do'. Es long es Gord A'mighty ondertecks ter feed you, He
+mought es well feed you ter yo' tase."
+
+"There are some eggs in the cupboard," said Eugenia seriously. "You must
+cook some for supper."
+
+Uncle Ish grunted.
+
+"En egg's er wishwashy creeter es ain' got ernuff tase er its own ter
+stan' alont widout salt," he remarked contemptuously; after which he
+grew hospitable.
+
+"Ain' you gwine ter step in es you'se passin'?" he inquired.
+
+Eugenia shook her head.
+
+"Not to-day, Uncle Ish," she responded cheerfully. "I know you're
+tired--and how is your rheumatism?"
+
+"Wuss en wuss," responded the old negro gloomily. "I'se done cyar'ed one
+er dese yer I'sh taters in my pocket twell hit sprouted, en de rhematiks
+ain' never knowed 'twuz dar. Hit's wuss en wuss."
+
+As they passed on, he hobbled painfully up the rocky path, leaning
+heavily upon his stick and grunting audibly at each rheumatic twinge.
+
+Nicholas and Eugenia followed the highway and turned into the avenue of
+cedars. When the house was in sight, he stopped and held out his hand.
+
+"May I see you sometimes?" he asked diffidently.
+
+She spoke eagerly.
+
+"Oh, do come to see us," she said. "Papa would enjoy talking about Judge
+Bassett. He half worships him."
+
+"So do I."
+
+She nodded sympathetically.
+
+"I know--I know. He is splendid! And you are doing well, aren't you?"
+
+"I have work to do, thank God, and I do it. I can't say how."
+
+"What does Judge Bassett say?"
+
+He laughed boyishly. "He says silence."
+
+She was puzzled.
+
+"I don't understand--but I must go--I really must. It is quite dark."
+
+And she passed from him into the box-bordered walk. He watched her tall
+figure until it ascended the stone steps and paused upon the porch,
+whence came the sound of voices. Through the wide open doors he could
+see the swinging lamp in the centre of the great hall and the broad
+stairway leading to the floor above. For a moment he stood motionless;
+then, turning back into the avenue, he retraced his steps to his
+father's house.
+
+In the kitchen, where the table was laid for supper, his half-sister,
+Nannie, was sewing on her wedding clothes. She was to be married in the
+fulness of the winter to young Nat Turner--one of the Turners of
+Nicholas's boyhood. By the light of the kerosene lamp she looked
+wonderfully fair and fresh, her auburn curls hanging heavily against her
+cheek as she bent over the cambric in her lap.
+
+As Nicholas entered she looked up brightly, exclaiming: "Oh, it's you!"
+in disappointed accents.
+
+Nicholas looked about the kitchen inquiringly.
+
+"Where's ma?" he asked, and at the instant Marthy Burr appeared in the
+doorway, a pat of butter in her hand.
+
+"Air you home, Nick?" was her greeting, as she placed the butter upon
+the table. Then she went across to Nannie and examined the hem on the
+cambric ruffle.
+
+"It seems to me you might have done them stitches a little finer," she
+observed critically. "Old Mrs. Turner's got powerful sharp eyes for
+stitches, an' she's goin' to look mighty hard at yours. If thar's one
+stitch shorter'n another, it's goin' to stand out plainer than all the
+rest. It's the nater of a woman to be far-sighted at seeing the flaws in
+her son's wife, an' old Mrs. Turner ain't no better'n God made her, if
+she ain't no worse. 'Tain't my way to be wishin' harm to folks, but I
+al'ays said the only thing to Amos Burr's credit I ever heerd of is that
+he's an orphan--which he ain't responsible for."
+
+"But the sewing's all right," returned Nannie in wounded pride. "Nat
+ain't marrying me for my sewing, anyway."
+
+Her mother shook her head.
+
+"What a man marries for's hard to tell," she returned; "an' what a woman
+marries for's past find-in' out. I ain't never seen an old maid yet that
+ain't had a mighty good opinion of men--an' I ain't never seen a married
+woman that ain't had a feelin' that a few improvements wouldn't be out
+of place. I don't want to turn you agin Nat Turner--he's a man an' he's
+got a mother, an' that's all I've got agin him. No talkin's goin' to
+turn anybody that's got their mind set on marryin', any more than it's
+goin' to turn anybody that's got their mind set on drink. So I ain't
+goin' to open my mouth."
+
+Here Amos Burr appeared, and as he seated himself beside Nannie she drew
+her ruffles away. "You're so dusty, pa," she exclaimed half pettishly.
+
+He fixed his heavy, admiring eyes upon her, receiving the reproof as
+meekly as he received all feminine utterances. He might bully a man, but
+he would always be bullied by a woman.
+
+"I reckon you're pretty near ready," he observed cheerfully, rubbing his
+great hairy hands. "You've got 'most a trunk full of finery. I reckon
+Turner'll know I ain't in the poorhouse yet--or near it."
+
+It was a speech of unusual length, and, after making it, he slowly
+settled into silence.
+
+"Nat wouldn't mind if I was in the poorhouse, so long as he could get me
+out," said his daughter, taking up the cudgels in defence of her lover's
+disinterestedness.
+
+Amos Burr chuckled.
+
+"Don't you set no store by that," he rejoined.
+
+"An' don't you set about judgin' other folks by yourself, Amos Burr,"
+retorted his wife sharply. "'Tain't likely you'd ever pull anybody out
+o' the poorhouse 'thout slippin' in yourself, seein' as I've slaved
+goin' on twenty years to keep you from land-in' thar at last. The less
+you say about some things the better. Now, you'd jest as well set down
+an' eat your supper."
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+
+The next day Nicholas went into Tom Bassett's office, where he met
+Dudley Webb, who was spending a dutiful week in Kingsborough. He was a
+genial young fellow, with a clear-cut, cleanly shaven face and a
+handsome head covered with rich, dark hair. His hands were smooth and
+white, and he gesticulated rapidly as he talked. It was already said of
+him that he told a poor story better than anybody else told a good
+one--a fact which was probably the elemental feature of his popularity.
+
+As Nicholas looked in, he raised himself lightly from Tom's desk chair
+and gave him a hearty handshake.
+
+"Hello, Burr! We were just talking of you. I was telling Tom a jolly
+thing I heard yesterday. Two farmers were discussing you at the
+post-office, and one of them said: ''Tain't that he's got so much
+sense--I had a sight more at his age--but he's so blamed sure of
+himself, he makes you believe in him.' How's that for fame?"
+
+"Not so bad as it is for me," returned Nicholas with a laugh. "If you
+win one or two small cases, there's obliged to be undue influence of the
+devil."
+
+"Which, occasionally, it is," added Tom seriously.
+
+Dudley threw himself back into his chair and crossed his shapely legs.
+For a moment he smoked in silence, then he removed his cigar from his
+mouth and flecked the ashes upon the uncarpeted floor.
+
+"Oh! the mystery to me is," he said, "that you exist down here and live
+to tell the tale--or at least that you earn enough crumbs to feed the
+crows."
+
+"Kingsborough crows aren't high livers," remarked Nicholas as he threw
+himself into the remaining chair.
+
+Dudley laughed softly--a humorous laugh that fell pleasantly on the ear.
+
+"That reminds me," he began whimsically. "I met a tourist with
+spectacles walking along Duke of Gloucester Street. 'Sir,' he said
+courteously, 'I am looking for Kingsborough. I am told that it is a
+city.' 'Sir,' I responded, with a bow that did honour to my
+grandfather's ghost, 'it was once a chartered city; it is now only a
+charter.'"
+
+Then he turned to Tom.
+
+"We haven't got used to the railroad yet, have we?" he asked.
+
+Tom shook his head.
+
+"General Battle's still protesting," he replied. "He swears it makes
+Kingsborough common."
+
+Dudley thoughtfully examined his cigar, an amused smile about his mouth.
+
+"My mother doesn't want the cows turned out of the churchyard," he
+observed, "because it would abolish one of Kingsborough's
+characteristics. She's right, too, by Jove."
+
+"They're having a fight over it now," put in Nicholas with the gravity
+he rarely lost. "The people who own cows call it an 'ancient right.' The
+people who don't, call it sacrilege. The rector leads one faction, and
+the congregation has split."
+
+"And split we smash," added Dudley. "Well, these are exciting times in
+Kingsborough's history; it is almost as lively as Richmond. There we had
+a religious convention and an elopement last week. I don't suppose you
+come up to that?"
+
+Nicholas ran his hand through his hair with a habitual gesture. He was
+idly watching the light of Dudley's cigar and noting the quality by the
+aroma. He could not afford cigars himself, and he wondered how Dudley
+managed to do so.
+
+"We are a people without a present," he returned inattentively. "You've
+heard, I take it, that an old elm has gone near the court-house."
+
+"My mother told me. I believe she knows every brick that used to be and
+is not. I'm trying to get her away with me, but she won't come."
+
+"Sally Burwell was telling me," said Tom, a dawning interest in his
+face, "she had tried to persuade her."
+
+"Yes, we tried and failed. By the way, is it true that Sally's engaged
+to Jack Wyth? I hear it at every turn."
+
+"I--I shouldn't be surprised," gasped Tom painfully.
+
+"I don't believe a word of it," protested Nicholas.
+
+"He isn't much good, eh?"
+
+"Why, he's a brick," said Nicholas.
+
+"He's a cad," said Tom.
+
+Dudley laughed and blew a cloud of smoke in the air.
+
+"Well, she's a daisy herself, and as good as gold. She's the kind of
+woman to flirt herself hoarse and then settle down into dove-like
+domesticity. But what about Eugie? Is she really grown up? My mother
+declares she's splendid."
+
+Nicholas was silent.
+
+"Oh, she's handsome enough," Tom carelessly replied.
+
+"But not like Sally, eh?"
+
+"Oh, no! not like Sally."
+
+Dudley tossed the stump of his cigar through the open window, lit a
+cigarette, and changed the subject. He talked easily, relating several
+laughable stories, referring occasionally to himself and his success,
+illustrating his remarks by his experience at the bar, giving finally
+the exclamation of a fellow-lawyer at the close of an argument he had
+made: "You may be a muff of a jurist, Webb," he had cried, "but, by
+George! you're a devil of an advocate!"
+
+He was, withal, so affable, so confident, so thoroughly a good fellow,
+that an hour passed before Nicholas remembered he had looked in only for
+a moment.
+
+When he rose to go, Dudley gripped his hand again, slapped him on the
+shoulder, declared him to be a "first-rate old chap," and ended by
+pressing him to drop in on him when he ran up to Richmond.
+
+Nicholas gave back the friendly grasp and pledged himself to the
+"dropping in." He resistingly succumbed before the inherent jovial
+charm.
+
+The afternoon being Saturday, he left town earlier than usual and spent
+a couple of hours with his father in the fields. The peanuts were being
+harvested. Amos Burr, with a peanut "share" attached to the plough, was
+separating the yellowed plants from the ripe nuts underground, and
+Nicholas, lifting the roots upon a pitchfork, shook them free from earth
+and threw them over the pointed staves which were the final supports of
+the "shocks." A negro hand went before him, driving the sticks into the
+sandy soil.
+
+"I should say you might count on forty bushels an acre," remarked
+Nicholas cheerfully, as he lifted a detached root from a broken hill.
+"It's a fair yield, isn't it?"
+
+Amos Burr shook his head and muttered that there was "no tellin'.
+Peanuts air one of the things thar's no countin' on," he added. "Wheat
+air another, corn air another, oats air another."
+
+"Life is another," concluded Nicholas lightly. "Still we live and still
+we raise wheat and oats and corn. But I wish you'd look into market
+gardening. I believe it would pay you better."
+
+"'Tain't no use," returned Amos, with his accustomed pessimism. "'Tain't
+no use my plantin' as long as the government ain't goin' to move, nohow.
+It's been promisin' to help the farmer ever since the war, an' it ain't
+done nothin' for him yet but tax him."
+
+But Nicholas, to avoid his father's political drift, fell to talking
+with one of the negro workers.
+
+Several hours later, when he had changed his farm clothes, he joined
+Eugenia in the pasture and walked with her to Battle Hall, where the
+general received him with ready, if condescending, hospitality. Eugenia
+had instructed her family upon the changed conditions of Nicholas's
+social standing, but her logic was powerless to convince her father
+that Amos Burr's son was any better than Amos Burr had been before him.
+
+"Pish! Pish!" he exclaimed testily, "the boy's not a lawyer--only
+gentlemen belong to the bar, but there's nobody too high or too low to
+be a farmer. Polite to him? Did you ever see me impolite in my own house
+even to a chimney sweep?"
+
+"I never saw a chimney sweep in your own house," Eugenia retorted,
+whereupon he pinched her cheek and accused her of "making fun of her old
+father."
+
+Now, when Nicholas sat down on one of the long green benches on the
+porch, the general conversed with him as he conversed with the chicken
+sellers who came of an afternoon to receive payment for their luckless
+fowls.
+
+"This'll be a busy season for you," he observed cheerfully, in the
+slightly elevated voice in which he addressed his inferiors. "You'll be
+cutting your corn before long and seeding your winter crops. What are
+you planting this fall?"
+
+He could not be induced to engage upon social topics with the young man
+or to allude in the most distant manner to his legal profession. He was
+a Burr, and a Burr was a small farmer, nothing more.
+
+"We're ploughing for oats now, sir," responded Nicholas diffidently,
+"and we're going to seed a little rye with clover--if the clover's
+killed, the rye'll last."
+
+"I should advise you to look after the land," said the general, stuffing
+the tobacco into the bowl of his pipe and pressing it down with his fat
+thumb. "What you need is to plant it in cow-peas and turn them down.
+There's nothing like them for fertilising."
+
+Nicholas, who was listening attentively, rose to shake hands with Miss
+Chris who appeared in the doorway.
+
+"The fall comes earlier than it used to," she remarked, drawing a light
+crocheted shawl about her shoulders. "Why, I remember when it used to be
+summer up to the middle of November. I was talking to Judge Bassett
+about it yesterday, and he said he certainly thought the seasons had
+changed since he was a boy."
+
+"I don't reckon your father has much opinion of fertilisers," broke in
+the general, reverting to his pleasant patronage.
+
+Nicholas answered before Eugenia could interpose. "No, sir, he doesn't
+believe in them much," he replied.
+
+"Well, you tell him it's lime he needs," continued the general. "The
+most successful peanut grower I ever knew put about a thousand pounds of
+lime to an acre, and he cleared--"
+
+"Have you seen Dudley Webb?" asked Eugenia, shaking her head at the
+general's frown.
+
+"For an hour this morning. He was in Tom Bassett's office. He told some
+good stories."
+
+Miss Chris heaved a reminiscent sigh.
+
+"That's poor Julius Webb all over again," she said. "He could keep a
+dinner table laughing for two hours and fight a duel at daybreak. I
+remember at his own wedding, when they drank his health, he told such a
+funny story that old Judge Blitherstone, who was upwards of eighty, had
+to have cold bandages put to his head."
+
+The general took his pipe from his mouth. "Dudley's a fine young
+fellow," he said. "I saw him yesterday when I went to the post-office.
+They tell me he's making a name for himself in Richmond."
+
+Eugenia laughed lightly.
+
+"Papa adores Mrs. Webb, so he thinks Dudley splendid," she said.
+
+"That lady is one of the noblest of her sex," loyally asserted the
+general.
+
+"And one of the most trying of either sex," added his daughter. "When I
+came home my last holiday, she asked me what I learned at school, and I
+danced a skirt dance for her."
+
+"I always told you you spoiled Eugie to death, Tom," said Miss Chris in
+justification of her own responsibility. "In my day no young lady knew
+what a skirt dance was."
+
+"But that's what I learned at school," protested Eugenia.
+
+The general, feeling that the conversation excluded Nicholas, renewed
+his attack.
+
+"What do you think of raising garden products?" he inquired affably.
+Then Eugenia rose, and he submissively retired.
+
+"We aren't going to talk farming any more," said the girl. "Nick and I
+are going into the garden for roses," and she descended the steps,
+followed by Nicholas, who was beginning for the first time to breathe
+freely.
+
+"Tell your father to look into the truck-growing," was the general's
+parting shot.
+
+The garden was flushed with the riot of autumn. Over the little
+whitewashed fence double rows of hollyhocks and sunflowers nodded their
+heavy heads, and bordering the narrow walk were lines of chrysanthemums
+and dahlias. October roses, the richest of the year, bloomed and dropped
+in the quaint old squares where the long vegetable rows began. At the
+end of the straight, overgrown walk the hop vines on the fence threw out
+a pungent odour.
+
+"Papa wants to have the garden ploughed," said Eugenia. "He says it
+takes too much time to hoe it. Give me your knife, please."
+
+He opened the blade, and she stooped to cut off a crimson dahlia while
+the Indian summer sunshine slanted from the west upon her dark head and
+white dress. Over all was the faint violet haze of the season, hanging
+above the gay old garden like a delicate effluvium from autumns long
+decayed.
+
+"There aren't many old-time gardens left," said Nicholas regretfully,
+"but I like this one best of all. I always think of you in the midst of
+it."
+
+"Yes, we used to gather calacanthus blossoms and trade them for taffy at
+school. The bushes are almost all dead now. That is the only one left."
+
+She laid the knife upon the grass and raised her arms to fasten a yellow
+chrysanthemum in her hair. As it lay against her ear it cast a clear,
+golden light upon her cheek, as warm as the late sunshine.
+
+"Flowers suit you," he said.
+
+"Do they?" she smiled in a quick, pleased way. "Is it because I love
+them?"
+
+"It is because you are beautiful," he answered bluntly.
+
+Some one had once called Eugenia's besetting vanity the love of giving
+pleasure; it was, perhaps, in reality, the pleasure of being loved. It
+was not the fact that she might be beautiful that now warmed her so
+gratefully, but the evidence that Nicholas was good enough to consider
+her so.
+
+"You have seen so few girls," she remarked reasonably enough.
+
+"I may see many, but it won't alter my view of you."
+
+"How can you tell?"
+
+He shook his head impatiently.
+
+"I shan't tell. I shall prove it."
+
+"And when you have proved it where shall I be?--old and toothless?"
+
+"May be--but still beautiful."
+
+There was a glow in her face, but she did not reply. His eyes and the
+last, long ray of sunshine were upon her. He was revoking from an old
+October a dark-haired, clear-eyed girl amid the dahlias, and it seemed
+to him that Eugenia had shot up in a season like one of the stately
+flowers. As she stood in the grass-grown walk, her skirt half-filled
+with blossoms, her white hands lifting the thin folds above her ruffled
+petticoat, she appeared to be the vital apparition of the place--a
+harbinger of the vivid sunlight and the dark shadows of the passing of
+the year.
+
+"See how many!" she exclaimed, holding her lapful towards him. "You may
+take your choice--only not that last pink papa loves."
+
+He plunged his hands amid the confusion of colours and drew out a yellow
+chrysanthemum.
+
+"I like this," he said simply.
+
+She laughed. "But it doesn't suit your hair," she suggested.
+
+He met her sally gravely.
+
+"It is my favourite flower," he returned.
+
+"Since when, pray?"
+
+"Since--since a half-hour ago."
+
+He stooped and picked up his knife from the grass.
+
+"Are you going away?" he asked, "or shall you stay here always?"
+
+"Always," she promptly returned. "I'm going to live here with this old
+garden until I grow to be an ancient dame--and you may walk over on
+autumn afternoons and I'll be sympathetic about your rheumatism. Isn't
+that a picture that delights your soul?"
+
+"No," he said bluntly; "I see a better one."
+
+"Tell me."
+
+"I can never tell you," he replied gravely--"not even when you are an
+ancient dame and I rheumatic."
+
+She was merry again.
+
+"Then I fear it's wicked," she said, "and I'm amazed at you. But my
+day-dreams are all common ones. I ask only the country and my home and
+horses and cows and chickens--and a rheumatic friend. You see I must be
+happy, I ask so little."
+
+"And you argue that he who demands little gets it," he returned
+lightly. "On the other hand, I should say that he who is content with
+less gets nothing. I ask the biggest thing Fate has to give, and then
+stand waiting for--"
+
+He paused for a breathless instant while he looked at her, and then
+slowly finished:
+
+"For the skies to fall."
+
+They swung open the gate into cattle lane, and stood waiting while the
+cows trooped by to the barnyard.
+
+Eugenia called them by name, and they turned great stupid eyes upon her
+as they stopped to munch the hollyhocks.
+
+"She was named after you," said the girl suddenly.
+
+"She? Who?" he turned a helpless look upon the two small negroes who
+drove the cows.
+
+"Why, Burr Bess, of course--that Jersey there. You know we couldn't name
+her Nick because she wasn't a boy, so Bernard called her Burr Bess. You
+don't seem pleased."
+
+"She's a fine cow," observed Nicholas critically.
+
+"Oh! she was the most beautiful calf! I thought you remembered it. One
+was named after me, but it died, and one was named after Bernard, but it
+went to the butcher. Bernard was so angry about it that he waylaid the
+cart on the road and let it out. But they caught it again. It was too
+bad, wasn't it?"
+
+The garden gate closed behind them with a click, and they crossed the
+lane to the lawn.
+
+Miss Chris, who stood shading her eyes in the back porch, was giving
+directions to Aunt Verbeny in the smoke-house. When she saw Nicholas
+she broke off and asked him to stay to supper, but he declined hastily,
+and, with an embarrassed good-evening, turned back into the lane. The
+hollyhocks over the whitewashed fence brushed him as he passed, and the
+spices of the garden came to him like the essence of the eternal
+Romance.
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+
+Over all hung Indian summer and the happy sunshine. Eugenia, rising at
+daybreak for a gallop across country, would feel the dew in her face and
+the autumn in her blood. As she dashed over fences and ditches to the
+unploughed pasture, the morning was as desolate as midnight--not a soul
+showed in the surrounding fields and the long road lay as pallid as a
+streak of frost. The loneliness and the hour set her eyes to dancing and
+the glad blood to bounding in her veins. When a startled rabbit shied
+from the brushwood she would slacken her speed to watch it, and when, as
+sometimes chanced, she frightened a covey of partridges from their
+retreat, she went softly, rejoicing that no shot was near.
+
+At this time she was possessed, perhaps, of a spirit too elastic, of a
+buoyance almost insolent--she turned, as it were, too round a cheek to
+Fate. In her clear purity romanticism held no part, and her soul, strong
+to adhere, was slow to conform. Her nature was straight as an arrow that
+would not fall though it overshot the mark. She dreamed scant dreams of
+the future because she clove tenaciously to the past--to the rare
+associations and the old affections--to the road and the cedars and the
+Hall as to the men and women whose blood she bore and whose likeness she
+carried. She loved one and all with a fidelity that did not swerve.
+Riding home along the open road that led to the cedars, she marked each
+friendly object in its turn--on one side the persimmon tree where the
+fruit ripened--on the other the blackened wreck of the giant oak,
+towering above the shining spread of life-everlasting. She noted that
+the rail fence skirting the pasture sagged at one corner beneath a
+weight of poisonous oak, that a mud hole had eaten through the short
+strip of "corduroy" road, and that where Uncle Ish's path led to his
+cabin the plank across the gully was rapidly rotting. She saw these
+things with the tender eyes with which we mark decay in one beloved.
+
+Then, pacing up the avenue to the gravelled walk, she would call
+"good-morning" to the general and leap lightly to the ground, fresh as
+the day, bright as the autumn.
+
+It was on one of these early rides that she saw Nicholas again. She was
+returning leisurely through the stretch of woodland, when, catching
+sight of him as he swung vigorously ahead, she quickened her horse's
+pace and overtook him as he glanced inquiringly back.
+
+"Divide the worm, early bird," she cried gaily.
+
+He paused as she did, laying his hand on the horse's neck.
+
+"There wasn't but one and you got it," he retorted lightly. "Have you
+been far?"
+
+"Miles, and I'm as hungry as two bears. Have you anything in your
+pocket?"
+
+Her glowing face rose against a background of maple boughs, which
+surrounded her like a flame. The mist of the morning was on her lips and
+her eyes were shining. He felt her beauty leap like wine to his brain,
+and he set his teeth and looked blankly down the road.
+
+She laughed as she plunged her hand into the pocket of his coat. "You
+used to have apples," she complained, "or honeyshucks, at least--now
+there's only this."
+
+It was a worn little Latin text book, with frayed edges and soiled
+leaves.
+
+"Give it to me," he said quickly, but as he reached to take it from her
+the leaves fell open and she saw her own name written and rewritten
+across the crumpled pages.
+
+She closed it and gave it back to him.
+
+"You used that long ago," she remarked carelessly; "very long ago."
+
+He replaced the book in his pocket, his steady eyes upon her.
+
+"That's what we get for rifling our neighbour's pockets," he said
+quietly, "and what we deserve."
+
+"No," she returned with equal gravity, "sometimes we get apples--or even
+peanuts, which we don't deserve."
+
+He took no notice of the retort, but answered half-absently a former
+question.
+
+"Yes; I used that long ago," he said. "You don't think I would write
+your name 'Genia' now, do you?"
+
+There was a dignity in his assumption of indifference--in his absolute
+refusal to betray himself, which bore upon her conception of his
+manhood. There was strength in his face, strength in his voice, strength
+in his quiet hand that lay upon her bridle. She looked down on him with
+thoughtful eyes.
+
+"If you wrote of me at all," she returned. "It is my name."
+
+"But I am not to call you by it."
+
+"Why not?"
+
+"Why not?" He laughed with a touch of bitterness, and held out his hand,
+fresh from the soil, hardened by the plough. It was a powerful hand,
+brown and sinewy, with distorted knuckles and broken nails. "Oh, not
+that," he said. "I don't mean that. That shows work, but I know
+you--Genia--you will tell me work is manly. So it is, but is ignorance
+and poverty and--and all the rest--"
+
+She leaned over and touched his hand lightly with her own. "All the rest
+is courage and patience and pride," she said; "as for the hand, it is a
+good hand, and I like it."
+
+He shook his head.
+
+"Good enough in its place, I grant you," he answered; "good enough in
+the fields, at the plough; or in the barnyard--good enough even to keep
+this poor farm from collapse and to lift a few of its burdens--but not
+good enough to--"
+
+He raised her hand lightly, regarding it with half-humorous eyes.
+
+"How strong it is to be so light!" he added.
+
+"Strong enough to hold fast to its friends," returned Eugenia gravely.
+
+He let it fall and looked into her face.
+
+"May its friends be worthy ones," he said.
+
+She rode slowly through the wood, and he walked with his hand on her
+bridle. The bright branches struck them as they passed, and sometimes he
+stopped to hold them aside for her. His eyes followed her as she rode
+serenely above him, and he thought, in his folly, of the lady in the old
+romance who was, to the desire of her lovers, as "a distant flame, a
+sword afar off."
+
+"It was here that you told me good-bye when you went off to school," he
+said recklessly.
+
+"Was it?" she asked. "I was very miserable that day and you gave me no
+comfort. You didn't even come down to the road next morning to see me go
+by."
+
+"Yes, I know," he admitted.
+
+"I thought you were asleep, and I was angry."
+
+"No, I was not asleep. I was at work."
+
+"But you might have come."
+
+"Yes, I might have come," he repeated absently, and quickly corrected
+himself. "No, I mean I couldn't come, of course. If you were to go away
+to-morrow, I couldn't come. Something would rise and prevent. I have a
+presentiment that I shall never say good-bye to you."
+
+She dissented. "I've a feeling that I shall say 'God speed' to you when
+you go off to become a great man."
+
+"A great man? Do you mean a rich man?" he asked quickly.
+
+"Oh, dear, yes," she mocked; "a great, gouty gentleman, who owns a
+couple of railroads and wears an electric light in his shirt-front."
+
+His lips laughed, but his eyes were grave.
+
+"And when I came back to you with such trophies," he objected, "you
+would tell me that the railroads belonged to the people and that the
+electric light only served to illuminate my ugliness."
+
+"And I should take it to wear on my forehead," she added. "What
+prophetic insight!"
+
+"But 'going off' does not always mean railroads and electric light," he
+went on half seriously. "Suppose I came back poor, but honest, as they
+say?"
+
+Laughter rippled on her lips. He watched the humorous tremor of her
+nostrils.
+
+"Then I should probably kill the fatted chicken for you," she said.
+
+There was a touch of bitterness in his answer. "Only in that case I
+should stay away." As he spoke he stopped to break off a drooping branch
+from a sweet-gum tree that grew near the road.
+
+"You once called this your colour," he said quietly as he fastened the
+leaves on her horse's head. "There is no tree that turns so clear and so
+fiery."
+
+Then, as she rode on with the branch waving like a banner before her, he
+laughed with a keen delight in the savage brilliance.
+
+"You remind me of--who is it?" he asked--"'_Clear as the sun and
+terrible as an army with banners_.'"
+
+Her smile was warm upon him.
+
+"But my banners fall before the wind," she said as several loosened
+leaves fluttered to the road. "So I am not terrible, after all." The
+glow of the gum-tree was in her face. His eyes fell before it, and he
+did not speak. The soft footfalls of the horse on the damp ground
+sounded distinctly. Overhead the wind rustled among the trees.
+
+As they emerged from the wood and passed the Burr farm they saw Amos
+leaning on his gate, looking moodily upon the morning.
+
+"Good-morning, Mr. Burr!" said Eugenia with the pleasant condescension
+of the general in her manner. "Fine weather, isn't it?"
+
+He nodded awkwardly and admitted, with a muttered reservation, that the
+weather might be worse. Then he looked at Nicholas. "If you ain't got
+nothin' better to do I reckon you might lend a hand at the ploughin',"
+he surlily suggested.
+
+"Why, so I might," assented Nicholas good-humouredly. "I've a couple of
+hours free."
+
+He fastened more securely the branch in the horse's bridle; then,
+raising his hat, he turned and vaulted the whitewashed fence, while
+Eugenia, touching her horse into a gallop, vanished in the distance of
+the open road, blazing her track with scarlet gum leaves that scattered
+royally in the wind.
+
+As Nicholas passed the peanut field he nodded pleasantly to the
+congregation of negroes assembled for the annual festival called "a
+picking." They ranged in degrees from Uncle Ish, the oldest
+representative of his race, to Betsey's five-year-old Jeremiah, who had
+already been detected in an attempt to filch the nuts from an overturned
+shock, and was being soundly admonished by his mother's avenging palm.
+The ground was strewn with baskets and buckets of varying dimensions,
+into which the nuts were gathered before being consigned to the huge
+hamper guarded by Amos Burr. A hoarse clamour, like that produced by a
+flock of crows, went up from the animated swarm as it settled to work.
+
+Nicholas crossed to the adjoining field and ploughed deep furrows in the
+soil, going into breakfast with the smell of the warm earth about him
+and the glow of exercise in his blood. He ate heartily and listened
+without remark to the political vagaries of his father. Amos Burr had
+been "looking into politics" of late, and his stubborn wits had been
+fixed by a grievance. "If he was a fool befo' now, he's a plum fool
+now," Marthy Burr had observed dispassionately. "I ain't never seen no
+head so level that it could bear the lettin' in of politics. It makes a
+fool of a man and a worse fool of a fool. The government's like a mule,
+it's slow and it's sure; it's slow to turn, and it's sure to turn the
+way you don't want it."
+
+"I tell you it's done promised to help the farmer," put in Amos heavily,
+bringing his large red hand down upon the table. "Ain't it been helpin'
+the manufacturer all these years? Ain't it been lookin' arter the
+labourer, black an' white? Ain't it time for it to keep its word to the
+farmer?"
+
+"In the meantime I'd finish that piece of ploughing, if I were you,"
+suggested Nicholas. "The more work in the fall the less in the
+spring--that's a proverb for you."
+
+"I don't want no proverb," returned Amos sullenly. "I want my rights,
+an' I want the country to give 'em to me."
+
+"I ain't never seen no good come of settin' down an' wishin' for
+rights," remarked his wife tartly. "It's a sight better to be up an'
+plantin'."
+
+Nicholas finished his breakfast, and a little later walked in to town.
+He was in exuberant spirits, and his thoughts were high on the
+scaffolding where his future was building. Success and Eugenia startled,
+allured, delighted him. He was at the age of sublime self-confidence,
+but his eyes were not bandaged by it. He knew that without success--such
+success as he dreamed of--there could be, for him, no Eugenia. He
+believed in her as he believed in the sun, and yet he was not sure of
+her--he could not be until he possessed her and she bore his name. That
+she might not love him he admitted; that she might even love another he
+saw to be dimly possible; but he was determined that so long as no other
+man held her his arms should be open. In the first ardour of his mood
+his relative position to that society of which she formed a part was
+lost sight of, if not obscured. Now he realised bitterly that he might
+work for a lifetime in the class in which he was born, and at the end
+still find Eugenia far from him. He must rise above his work and his
+people, he must cut his old name anew, he must walk rough-shod where his
+mind led him--among men who were his superiors only in the accident of a
+better birthright. And if on that higher plane his ambitions did not
+betray, he would bring honour to his State and to Eugenia.
+
+Here the two loves of the boy and the man stood out boldly. The old
+romantic fervour with which he had longed for the days of Marshall and
+Madison, of Jefferson and Henry, still lingered on as an exotic
+patriotism in an era of time-servers and unprofitable servants. There
+was an old-fashioned democracy about him--a pioneer simplicity--as one
+who had walked from the great days of Virginia into her lesser ones. A
+century ago he might have left his plough to fight, and, having fought,
+might have returned thereto; but the battle would have tingled in his
+blood and the furrows have gone crooked. He would have ploughed, not for
+love of the plough, but because the time for the sowing of the grain had
+come.
+
+Now he walked rapidly to his work, seeing Eugenia in the woods, in the
+sunshine, in the very clouds lifted high above. The thought of her
+surrounded him as an atmosphere.
+
+As for the girl, she rode home and spent the long day in the garden
+potting plants for the winter. When she came into the hall in the early
+afternoon, with her trowel in her hand and her sleeves rolled back from
+her white arms, her father called her to the porch, and, going out, she
+found Dudley Webb in one of the cane chairs. He sprang to his feet as
+she reached the threshold, and held out his hand, but she laughed and
+showed the earth that clung to her wrists. "Unclean! unclean!" she cried
+gaily. Her face had flushed from its warm pallor and her hair hung low
+upon her forehead. A long streak of clay lay across her skirt where she
+had knelt in the flower-bed.
+
+He seized her protesting hand, admiration lighting his eyes. "Why,
+little Eugie is a woman!" he exclaimed. "Can you grasp it, General?"
+
+The general shook his head.
+
+"If she wasn't almost as tall as I, I shouldn't believe it," he
+declared, "though she's as old as her mother was when I married her."
+
+Eugenia seated herself upon the bench, still holding the trowel in her
+hand. She was watching the interest in her father's face, and she
+realised, half resentfully, that it was evoked by Dudley Webb.
+
+He had drawn the general's favourite anecdotes from him, and they had
+plunged together into a discussion of the good old days. After a few
+light words she sat silent, listening with tender attention to the
+threadbare stories on the one side and the hearty applause of them on
+the other. She wondered wistfully why Dudley and herself were the only
+persons who understood as well as loved the general. Why was it Dudley,
+and not Nicholas, who brought that youthful look to his face and the
+heartiness to his voice?
+
+"Some one was telling me the other day--I think it was Colonel
+Preston--that he fought beside you at Seven Pines," Dudley was saying
+with that absorption in his subject which won him a friend in every man
+who told him a joke.
+
+"Jake Preston!" exclaimed the general. "Why, bless my soul! I've slept
+under the same blanket with Jake Preston twenty times. I was standing by
+him when he got that bullet in his thigh. Did he tell you?"
+
+Eugenia rose in a moment and went back to her flowers. As she passed she
+threw a grateful glance at Dudley, but when she reached the garden it
+was of Nicholas she was thinking. There was a glow at her heart that
+kept alive the memory of his eyes as he looked at her in the wood, of
+his voice when he called her name, of his hand when it brushed her own.
+
+She fell happily to work, and when Dudley came out, an hour later, to
+find her, she was singing softly as she uprooted a scarlet geranium.
+
+He smiled and looked down on her with frank enjoyment of her ripening
+womanhood, but it did not occur to him to join in the transplanting as
+Nicholas would have done. He held off and absorbed the picture.
+
+"You do papa so much good!" said Eugenia gratefully. "I hope you will
+come out whenever you are in Kingsborough."
+
+She was kneeling upon the ground, her hands buried in the flower-bed,
+her firm arms rising white above the rich earth. The line of her bosom
+rose and fell swiftly, and her breath came in soft pants. There was a
+flush in her cheeks.
+
+"If you wish it I will come," he answered impulsively. "I will come to
+Kingsborough every week if you wish it."
+
+His temperament responded promptly to the appeal of her beauty, and his
+blood quickened as it did when women moved him. There was about him,
+withal, a fantastic chivalry which succumbed to the glitter of false
+sentiment. He would have made the remark had Eugenia been plain--but he
+would not have come to Kingsborough.
+
+"It would please your mother," returned the girl quietly. She had the
+sexual self-poise of the Virginia woman, and she weighed the implied
+compliment at its due value. Had he declared he would die for her once a
+week, she would have received the assurance with much the same smiling
+indifference.
+
+"I'll run down, I think, pretty often this winter," he went on easily.
+"It's a nice old town, after all--isn't it?"
+
+"It's the dearest old town in the world," said Eugenia.
+
+"Well, I believe it is--strange, I used to find it dull, don't you
+think? By the way, will you let me ride with you sometimes? I hear you
+are as great a horsewoman as ever."
+
+Eugenia looked up calmly.
+
+"I go very early," she answered. "Can you get up at daybreak?"
+
+He laughed his pleasant laugh.
+
+"Oh, I might manage it," he rejoined. "I'm not much of an early riser, I
+never knew before what charms the sunrise held."
+
+But Eugenia went on potting plants.
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+
+During the following week Sally Burwell came to spend the night with
+Eugenia, and the girls sat before the log fire in Eugenia's room until
+they heard the cocks crow shrilly from the hen-house. The room was a
+large, old-fashioned chamber, full of dark corners and unsuspected
+alcoves; and the lamp on the bureau served only to intensify the shadows
+that lay beyond its faint illumination.
+
+Sally, her pretty hair in a tumble on her shoulders and the light of the
+logs on her bare arms, was stretched upon the hearth-rug, looking up at
+Eugenia, who lay in an easy-chair, her feet almost touching the embers.
+A waiter of russet apples was on the floor beside them.
+
+"This is my idea of comfort," murmured Sally sleepily as she munched an
+apple. "No men and no manners."
+
+"If you liked it, you'd come often, chick," returned Eugenia.
+
+"Bless you! I'm too busy. I made over two dresses this week, trimmed
+mamma a bonnet, and covered a sofa with cretonne. One of the dresses is
+a love. I wore it yesterday, and Dudley said it reminded him of one he'd
+seen on the stage."
+
+"He says a good deal," observed Eugenia unsympathetically.
+
+"Doesn't he?" laughed Sally. "At any rate, he said that he found you
+reading Plato under the trees, and that any woman who read Plato ought
+to be ostracised--unless she happens to be handsome enough to make you
+overlook it. Is that your Plato? What is he like?"
+
+Eugenia savagely shook her head.
+
+"It's no affair of his," she retorted promptly, meaning not Plato, but
+Dudley.
+
+"Oh! he said he knew it wasn't. I think he even wished it were. You're
+too unconventional for him--he frankly admits it--but he admits also
+that you're good-looking enough to warrant the unconventionality of a
+Hottentot--and you are, you dear, bad thing, though your forehead's too
+high and your chin's too long and your nose isn't all that a nose should
+be."
+
+"Thanks," drawled Eugenia amicably. "But Dudley's a nice fellow, all the
+same. He gets on splendidly with papa--and I bless him for it."
+
+"He gets on well with everybody--even his mother--which makes me suspect
+that he's a Job masquerading as an Apollo. By the way, Mrs. Webb wants
+you to join some society she's getting up called the 'Daughters of
+Duty.'"
+
+"Oh, I can't! I can't!" protested Eugenia distressfully. "I detest
+'Daughter' things, and I have a rooted aversion to my duty. But if she
+comes to me I'll join it--I know I shall! How did you keep out of it?"
+
+"I didn't. I'm in it. It seems that our duty is confined to 'preserving
+the antiquities' of Kingsborough--so I began by presenting a jar of
+pickled cucumbers to Uncle Ish. I trust they won't be the death of him,
+but he was the only antiquity in sight."
+
+She gave the smouldering log a push with her foot, and it broke apart,
+scattering a shower of sparks. "I don't know any other woman so much
+admired and so little loved," she mused of Mrs. Webb.
+
+"Papa worships her," said Eugenia. "All men do--at a distance. She's the
+kind of woman you never get near enough to to feel that she is flesh.
+Now, Aunt Chris is just the opposite. No one ever gets far enough away
+from her to feel that she's a saint--which she is."
+
+"It's odd she never married," wondered Sally.
+
+"She never had time to." Eugenia clasped her hands behind her head and
+looked up at the high, plastered ceiling. "She never happened to be in a
+place where she could be spared. But you know her lover died when she
+was young," she added. "It broke her heart, but it did not destroy her
+happiness. She has been happy for forty years with a broken heart."
+
+"I know," said Sally. "It seems strange, doesn't it? But I've known so
+many like her. The happiest woman I ever knew had lost everything she
+cared for in the war. That war was fought on women's hearts, but they
+went on beating just the same. I'm glad I wasn't I then."
+
+"And I'm sorry. I like stirring deeds and shot and shell and tattered
+flags. They thrill one."
+
+"And kill one," added Sally. "But you've got that kind of pluck. You
+aren't afraid."
+
+"Oh! yes, I am," protested Eugenia. "I'm afraid of bats and of getting
+fat like my forefathers."
+
+Sally shook a reassuring head.
+
+"But you won't, darling. Your mother was thin, and you're the image of
+her--everybody says so."
+
+"But I'm afraid--horribly afraid. I don't dare eat potatoes, and I
+wouldn't so much as look at a glass of buttermilk. The fear is on me."
+
+"It's absurd. Why, your grandma Tucker was a rail--I remember her. I
+know your other grandmother was--enormous; but you ought to strike the
+happy medium--and you do. You're splendid. You aren't a bit too large
+for your height."
+
+Eugenia laughed as she twisted Sally's curls about her fingers. "You're
+the dearest little duck that ever lived on dry land," she said. "If I
+were a man I'd be wild about you."
+
+"A few of them are," returned Sally meekly, casting up her eyes, "but
+I--"
+
+"How about Gerald Smith?"
+
+"He's too tall. I look like an aspiring grasshopper beside him."
+
+"And Jack Wyth?"
+
+"He's too short."
+
+"And Sydney Kent?"
+
+"He's too stupid."
+
+"And Tom Bassett?"
+
+Sally yawned.
+
+"He's too--everything. There's cock crow, and I'm going to bed."
+
+The next afternoon Eugenia drove Sally in to town, and stopped on her
+outward trip to pay a visit to Mrs. Webb. She found that lady serenely
+seated in her drawing-room, as unruffled as if she had not just
+dismissed a cook and cooked a dinner.
+
+"Oh, yes, thank you, dear, all is well," she replied in answer to the
+girl's question; for she held it to be vulgarity to allude, in her
+drawing-room, to the trials of housekeeping. She was not touched by such
+questions because she ignored that she was in any way concerned in them.
+She spent six hours a day with her servants, but had she spent
+twenty-four she would have remained secure in her conviction that they
+did not come within the sphere of her life.
+
+"I have wanted to see you to ask you to join my society, the 'Daughters
+of Duty,'" she went on, her eyes on a piece of fine white damask she was
+hem-stitching. "Its object is to preserve our old landmarks, and when I
+spoke to your father he told me he was quite sure you would care to
+become an active member."
+
+"I'm afraid I don't have much time," began Eugenia helplessly, when Mrs.
+Webb interrupted her, though without haste or discourtesy.
+
+"Not have time, my dear?" she repeated with her slow, fine smile. "If I
+can find time, with all my other duties, don't you think that you might
+be able to do so?"
+
+Eugenia was baffled. "Of course I love Kingsborough," she said, "and I'd
+preserve every inch of it with my own hands if I could--but I can't bear
+meetings--and--and things."
+
+Mrs. Webb took a careful stitch in the damask. "I thought you might care
+enough to assist us," she remarked tentatively; and Eugenia succumbed.
+
+"I'll do anything I can," she declared. "I will, indeed--only you
+mustn't expect much."
+
+In a few moments she rose to go, lingering with a courteous appearance
+of being unwilling to depart, which belonged to her social training. As
+she stood in the doorway, her hand in Mrs. Webb's, the older woman
+looked at her almost affectionately.
+
+"I had a letter from Dudley this morning," she said. "He is coming down
+next week for Sunday."
+
+A flush crossed Eugenia's face, evoking an expression of irritation.
+
+"You must miss him," she observed sympathetically.
+
+"I do miss him, but he comes often. He is a good son. He sent a message
+to you, by the way, but it was not important."
+
+"No, it was not important," repeated Eugenia with a feeling that her
+carelessness appeared to be assumed.
+
+She lightly kissed Mrs. Webb and ran down the steps and into the
+carriage, which was waiting in the road. Her visit had left her with a
+curious sense of oppression, and she breathed a long draught of the
+invigorating air.
+
+As she drove down the street she saw Nicholas coming out of his office
+and offered him a "lift" to his home. He said little on the way, and his
+utterances were forced, but Eugenia talked lightly and rapidly, as she
+always did when with him.
+
+She told him of Sally Burwell, of the last letter from Bernard--who was
+coming home soon--of Mrs. Webb and the "Daughters of Duty."
+
+"The truth is, I like her, but I'm afraid of her--dreadfully."
+
+"She disapproves of your--your liking for me," he said bitterly. "But
+every one does that--even the judge, though he doesn't say anything. And
+they are right--I see it. You know from what I came and what I am."
+
+"Yes, I know what you are," she returned defiantly, "and they shall all
+know some day."
+
+He turned and looked at her as she sat beside him, but he was silent,
+nor did he speak until he said "good-bye" before his father's gate.
+
+It was some days later that she saw him again. She had gone out to
+gather goldenrod for the great blue vases that stood on the dining-room
+mantel-piece, and was standing knee-deep in the ragged field, when he
+leaped the fence that divided the farms and crossed to where she stood.
+
+The sun was going down behind the blackened branches of the dead oak,
+and the wide common, spread with goldenrod and life-everlasting, lay
+like a sea of flame and snow. Eugenia, standing in its midst, a tall
+woman in a dress of brown, fell in richly with the surrounding colours.
+Her arms were filled with the yellow plumes and her dress was tinselled
+with the dried pollen that floated in the air. As Nicholas reached her
+she was seeking to free herself from the clutch of a crimson briar that
+crawled along the ground, and in the effort some of the broken stalks
+slipped from her hold.
+
+Without speaking, he knelt beside her and released her skirt. "You have
+torn it," he said quietly, but he was looking up at her, and there was
+a quality in his voice which thrilled her.
+
+"Have I?" she returned quickly. "Well, I can mend it--but there! it's
+caught again. I've been trying to get free for--hours."
+
+He smiled.
+
+"You came into the field only twenty minutes ago. I saw you. But, hold
+on. I'll uproot this blackberry vine while I'm about it."
+
+He tore it from its tenacious hold to the earth and flung it into the
+field. Then he examined the rent in Eugenia's dress.
+
+"If you had waited until I came you might have spared yourself
+this--patch," he observed.
+
+"I shan't patch it--and I didn't know you were coming."
+
+"Don't I always come--when there's a patch to be saved?" he asked. "I
+hate to see things ruined."
+
+"Then you might have come sooner. There, give me my goldenrod. It's all
+scattered."
+
+He began patiently to gather up the stalks, arranging them in an even
+layer of equal lengths.
+
+Eugenia watched him, laughing.
+
+"How precise you are!" she said.
+
+"Aren't they right?" He looked up for her approval, and she saw that he
+had grown singularly boyish. His face was less rugged, more sensitive.
+He wore no hat, and his thick red hair had fallen across his forehead.
+She felt the peculiar power of his look as she had felt it before.
+
+"No, they're wrong. They aren't Chinese puzzles. Don't fix them so
+tight. Here."
+
+She took them from him, and as his hands touched hers she noticed that
+they were cold. "You're shaking them all apart," he protested, "and I
+took such a lot of trouble."
+
+As she bent her head his eyes followed the dark coil of hair to the
+white nape of her neck where her collar rose. Several loose strands had
+blown across her ear and wound softly about the delicate lobe. He wanted
+to raise his hand and put them in place, but he checked himself with a
+start. With his eyes upon her he recalled the warmth of her woollen
+dress, and he wished that he had put his lips to it as he knelt. She
+would never have known.
+
+Then, by a curious emotional phenomenon, she seemed to be suddenly
+invested with the glory of the sunset. The goldenrod burned at her feet
+and on her bosom, and her fervent blood leaped to her face. The next
+moment he staggered like a man blinded by too much light--the field,
+with Eugenia rising in its midst, flamed before his eyes, and he put out
+his hand like one in pain.
+
+"What is it?" she asked quickly, and her voice seemed a part of the
+general radiance. "You have been looking at the sun. It hurts my eyes."
+
+"No," he answered steadily, "I was looking at you."
+
+She thrilled as he spoke and brought her eyes to the level of his. Then
+she would have looked away, but his gaze held her, and she made a sudden
+movement of alarm--a swift tremor to escape. She held the sheaf of
+goldenrod to her bosom and above it her eyes shone; her breath came
+quickly between her parted lips. All her changeful beauty was startled
+into life.
+
+"Genia!" he said softly, so softly that he seemed speaking to himself.
+"Genia!"
+
+"Yes?" She responded in the same still whisper.
+
+"You know?"
+
+"Yes, I know," she repeated slowly. Her glance fell from his and she
+turned away.
+
+"You know it is--impossible," he said.
+
+"Yes, I know it is impossible."
+
+There was a gasp in her voice. She turned to move onward--a briar caught
+her dress; she stumbled for an instant, and he flung out his arms.
+
+"You know it is impossible," he said, and kissed her.
+
+The sheaf of goldenrod loosened and scattered between them. Her head lay
+on his arm, and he felt her warm breath come and go. Her face was
+upturned, and he saw her eyes as he had never seen them before--light on
+light, shadow on shadow. He looked at her in the brief instant as a man
+looks to remember--at the white brow--the red mouth, at the blue veins,
+and the dark hair, at the upward lift of the chin and the straight
+throat--at all the perfect colouring and the imperfect outline.
+
+"You know it is impossible," he repeated, and put her from him.
+
+Eugenia gathered herself together like one stunned. "I must go," she
+said breathlessly. "I must go."
+
+Then she hesitated and stood before him, her hands on her bosom, a
+single spray of goldenrod clinging to her dress.
+
+He folded his arms as he faced her.
+
+"I have loved you all my life," he said.
+
+She bowed her head; her face had gone white.
+
+"I shall always love you," he went on. "You may as well know it. Men
+change, but I do not. I have never really loved anybody else. I have
+tried to love my family, but I never did. When I was a little,
+God-forsaken chap I used to want to love people, but I couldn't--I
+couldn't even love the judge--whom I would die for. I love you."
+
+"I know it," she said.
+
+"If you will wait I will work for you. I will work until they let me
+have you. I don't mean that I shall ever be good enough for you--because
+I shall not be. I shall always be a brute beside you--but if you will
+wait I will win you. I swear it!"
+
+She had not moved. She was as still as the dead oak that towered above
+them. The sunset struck upon her bowed head and upon the quiet bosom,
+where her hands were clasped.
+
+"I will wait," she answered.
+
+He came nearer and kissed the hands upon her breast. His face was
+flushed and his lips were hot.
+
+"Thank you," he said simply as he drew back.
+
+In a moment he stooped to pick up the scattered goldenrod, heaping it
+into her arms. "This is enough to fill the house," he protested. "You
+can't want so much."
+
+He had regained his rational tone, and she responded to it with a smile.
+
+"I never know when I'm satisfied," she said. "It is my weakness. As a
+child I always ate candy until it made me ill."
+
+They crossed the field, the long plumes brushing against them and
+powdering them with a feathery gold dust. At the fence she gave him the
+bunch and lightly swung herself over the sunken rails. It did not occur
+to him to assist her; she had always been as good as he at vaulting
+bars. Now her long skirts retarded her, and she laughed as she came
+quickly to the ground on the opposite side.
+
+"One of the many disadvantages of my sex," she said. "The best prisons
+men ever invented are women's skirts. Our wings are clipped while we
+wear them."
+
+"It is hard," he returned as he recalled her school-girl feats. "You
+were such a mighty jumper."
+
+"Those halcyon days are done," she sighed. "I can never stray beyond my
+'sphere' again."
+
+They had reached the end of the avenue, so he left her and went homeward
+along the road. The sun had gone slowly down and the western horizon was
+ripped open in a deep red track. The charred skeleton of the oak loomed
+black and sinister against the afterglow, and at its feet the glory went
+out of the autumn field. Straight ahead the sound of shots rang out
+where a flock of bats circled above the road. On the darkening landscape
+the lights began to glimmer in farmhouses far apart, and to Nicholas
+they seemed watchful, friendly eyes that looked upon him. All Nature was
+watchful--all the universe friendly. The glow which irradiated his
+outlook with an abrupt transfiguration was to him the glow of universal
+joy, though he knew it to be but the vanishing beam of youth and the end
+thereof age.
+
+It seemed to him that he was singled out--securely set apart by some
+beneficent hand for some supreme good which, in his limited
+observation, he had never seen put forth in the lots of others. His own
+life lay so much nearer the Divine purpose than did the lives of his
+neighbours--the purpose of Nature, whose end is the happiness that
+conforms to sane and immutable laws. His kiss on Eugenia's lips was to
+him God-given; the answer in her eyes had flamed a Scriptural
+inspiration. In the tumultuous leaping of his thoughts it seemed to him
+that the meaning of existence lay unrolled--a meaning obscured in all
+religions, overlooked in all philosophies--a meaning that could be read
+only by the lamp that was lit in the eyes that loved.
+
+So in his ignorance and his ecstasy he went on his confident way, while
+passion throbbed in his pulses and youth quickened in his brain.
+
+From the far-off pines twilight came to meet him, the lights glimmered
+clearer in distant windows, the afterglow drifted from the west, and the
+shots ceased where the black bats circled above the road.
+
+
+
+
+V
+
+
+Eugenia arranged the goldenrod in the great blue vases and sat in the
+deserted dining-room thinking of Nicholas. Where the damask curtains
+were drawn back from the windows a gray line of twilight landscape was
+visible, and a chill, transparent dusk filled the large room. Outside
+she would see the box-walk, a stretch of lawn, broken by flower-beds,
+and the avenue of cedars leading to the highway. From the porch floated
+the smoke of the general's pipe.
+
+Her brow was on her hand and she sat so motionless that the place seemed
+deserted, save for an errant firefly that vainly palpitated in the
+gloom. The glow that had flamed beneath Nicholas's kiss still lingered
+in her face, and she was conscious of a faint, almost hysterical impulse
+to weep. The fever in her veins had given place to a still tremor which
+ran through her limbs. At first she felt rather than thought. She lapsed
+into an emotional reverie as delicate as the fragrance of the October
+roses on the table. There was a sensation of softness as when one lies
+full length in sunshine or is caressed by firelight. She felt it pervade
+her body even to the palms of her hands. Then her quick mind stirred,
+and she recalled the pressure of his arms, the light in his eyes, the
+quiver of his lips as they touched her hands. His strength had dominated
+her and it still held her--the firm note in the voice that trembled,
+the power in the hand that appealed, the almost savage vigour in the
+arms that he folded on his breast. She had succumbed less to his
+gentleness than to the knowledge that it was she alone who evoked that
+gentleness out of a nature almost adamantine, wholly masculine. His
+faults she knew to be the faults of one who had hewn his own road in
+life--a rugged surface--a strain of rigidity beneath--at worst a
+tendency to dogmatise--and knowing as she did her own control over them,
+they attracted rather than repelled her.
+
+And yet in this pulsating recognition of his manhood there was mingled
+with an emotion half-maternal the memory of her own guardianship of his
+stunted childhood. To a woman at once rashly spirited and profoundly
+feminine the pathos of his boyish struggle appealed no less forcibly
+than did the virility of his manhood. She might have loved him less had
+her thought of him been untouched by pity.
+
+She sat quietly in the twilight until Congo brought in the lamp and a
+prospect of supper. Then she rose and went to join her father on the
+porch.
+
+"Why did you tell Mrs. Webb I would be a 'Daughter,' papa?" she gaily
+demanded.
+
+The general took his pipe from his mouth and stared up at her.
+
+"It's a good cause, Eugie," he replied, "and she's a remarkable woman.
+Her executive ability is astounding--absolutely astounding."
+
+"I joined," said Eugenia. "I had to, after you said that. You know, I
+called on her the day I took Sally in."
+
+The general lowered his eyes and thoughtfully regarded the light that
+was going gray in his pipe.
+
+"Did she happen to say anything about--Dudley?" he inquired.
+
+"Oh, yes. She said he sent me a message in a letter."
+
+"Did she tell you what 'twas?"
+
+"No. I didn't ask her."
+
+He put the stem of his pipe between his teeth and hung on it desperately
+for a moment; then he took it out again.
+
+"He's a fine young fellow," he said at last. "I don't know a finer--and,
+bless my soul! I'd see you married to him to-morrow."
+
+But Eugenia laughed and beat his shoulder.
+
+"You don't want to see me married to anybody," she said, "and you know
+it."
+
+At the end of the ensuing week Dudley came to Kingsborough, and upon the
+first evening of his visit he walked out to Battle Hall. He was looking
+smooth and well groomed, and the mass of his thick dark hair waving over
+his white brow gave him an air of earnestness and ardour. Eugenia
+wondered that she had never noticed before that he was like the portrait
+of an old-time orator, and that his hands were finely rounded.
+
+His voice, with its suggestion of suavity, fell soothingly on her
+nerves. She had never liked him so much, and she had never shown it so
+plainly. Once as she met his genial gaze she held her breath at the
+marvel that he should grow to love her, and in vain. Was it that beside
+his splendid shallows the more luminous depths of Nicholas's nature
+still showed supreme? Or was it a question of fate--and of first and
+last? Had Dudley come upon her in the red sunset, in the little shanty
+beside the road, would she have gone out to him in the mere leaping of
+youth and womanhood? Was it the moment, after all, and not the man? Or
+was it something more unerring still--more profound--the prophetic call
+of individual to individual, despite the specious pleading of the race?
+But she put the thought aside and returned casually to Dudley.
+
+His heartiness was a tonic, and her vanity responded to the unaffected
+admiration in his eyes; but his chief claim to her regard lay in the
+fact that it was the general, and not herself, whom he endeavoured to
+propitiate.
+
+"Well, my dear General!" he exclaimed cordially as he threw himself upon
+the worn horsehair sofa in what was called the "sitting-room," "I find
+your story about the fighting Texans capped by one Major Mason was
+telling me last night about the North Carolinians--" He got no farther.
+
+"I've fought side by side with North Carolina regiments, and I tell you,
+sir, they're the best fighters God ever made!" cried the general. "Did
+you ever hear that story about 'em when I was wounded?"
+
+Dudley shook his head and leaned forward, his hands clasped between his
+knees and an expression of flattering absorption on his face.
+
+"I can't recall it now, sir," he delightfully lied.
+
+The general cleared his throat, laid his pipe aside, and drew up his
+chair.
+
+"It was in my last battle," he began. "You know I got that ball in my
+shoulder and was laid up when Lee surrendered--well, sir, I was propped
+up there close by a company of those raw-boned mountaineers from North
+Carolina, and they stood as still as the pine wood behind 'em, while
+their colonel swore at 'em like mad.
+
+"'Damn you for a troop of babies!' he yelled. 'Ain't you goin' into the
+fight? Can't you lick a blamed Yankee?' And, bless your soul! those
+scraggy fellows stood stock still and sung out:
+
+"'We ain't mad!'
+
+"Well, sir, they'd no sooner yelled that back than a bullet whizzed
+along and took off one of their own men, and, on my oath, the bullet
+hadn't ceased singing in my ears before that company charged the enemy
+to a man--and whipped 'em, too, sir--whipped 'em clean off the field!"
+
+He paused, clapped his knee, and roared.
+
+"That's your North Carolinian," he said. "He's a God Almighty fighter,
+but you've got to make him mad first."
+
+Miss Chris brought her knitting to the lamp, and Eugenia, sitting with
+her hands in her lap, followed the conversation with abstracted
+interest.
+
+It was not until Dudley rose to go that he came over to her and took her
+hand.
+
+"Good-night," he said, his ardent eyes upon her. "I'm to have that ride
+to-morrow? You know I came for it."
+
+The unreasoning blood beat in her face as she turned away, and she was
+conscious that he had seen and misconstrued the senseless blush. It was
+her misfortune to go red or pale without cause and to show an impassive
+face above deep emotion.
+
+The next morning she rode with Dudley, and the day after he came out
+before returning to Richmond. She experienced a certain pleasure in the
+contact with his bouyant optimism, but it was not without a sensation of
+relief that she watched him depart after his last visit. It seemed to
+leave her more to herself--and to Nicholas.
+
+That afternoon she walked with him far across the fields, and they laid
+together phantasmal foundations of their future lives. Perhaps the chief
+thing to be said of their intercourse was that it was to each a mental
+stimulant as well as an emotional delight. Eugenia's quick, untutored
+mind, which had run to seed like an uncultivated garden, blossomed from
+contact with his practical, unpolished intellect. He taught her logic
+and a little law; she taught him poetry and passion. He argued his cases
+to her and swept her back into the days of his old political
+dreams--dreams from which he had awakened, but which still hovered as
+memories in his waking hours. Sometimes he brought his books to Battle
+Hall, and they read together beneath the general's unseeing eyes; but
+more often they sat side by side in the pasture or the wood, the volume
+lying open between them. He was the first man who had ever spurred her
+into thought; she was the first woman he had ever loved.
+
+As they walked across the fields this afternoon they drifted back to the
+question of themselves and their own happiness. It was only a matter of
+waiting, she said, of the patient passage of time; and they were so
+sure of each other that all else was unimportant--to be disregarded.
+
+"But am I sure of you?" he demanded.
+
+It was not a personal distrust of Eugenia that he voiced; it was the
+hardened state of disbelief in his own happiness which showed itself
+when the first intoxication of passion was lived out.
+
+"Why, of course you are," she readily rejoined. "Am I not sure of you?
+You are as much mine as my eyes--or my hand."
+
+"Oh, I am different!" he exclaimed. "A beggar doesn't prove faithless to
+a princess--but what do you see in me, after all?"
+
+She laughed. "I see a very moody lover."
+
+They had reached a little deserted spring in the pasture called "Poplar
+Spring," after the six great poplars which grew beside it. Eugenia
+seated herself on a fallen log beside the tiny stream which trickled
+over the smooth, round stones, bearing away, like miniature floats, the
+yellow leaves that fell ceaselessly from the huge branches above.
+
+"I don't believe you know how I love you," he said suddenly.
+
+"Tell me," she insatiably demanded.
+
+"If I could tell you I shouldn't love you as I do. There are some things
+one can't talk about--but you are life itself--and you are all heaven
+and all hell to me."
+
+"I don't want to be hellish," she put in provokingly.
+
+"But you are--when I think you may slip from me, after all."
+
+The yellow leaves fluttered over them--over the fallen log and over the
+bright green moss beside the little spring. As Eugenia turned towards
+him, a single leaf fell from her hair to the ground.
+
+"Oh! You are thinking of Dudley Webb!" she said, and laughed because
+jealousy was her own darling sin.
+
+"Yes, I am thinking--" he began, when she stopped him.
+
+"Well, you needn't. You may just stop at once. I--love--you--Nick--Burr.
+Say it after me."
+
+He shook his head. Her hand lay on the log beside him, and his own
+closed over it. As it did so, she contrasted its hardened palm with the
+smooth surface of Dudley Webb's. The contrast touched her, and, with a
+swift, warm gesture, she raised the clasped hands to her cheek.
+
+"I told you once I liked your hand," she said. "Well--I love it."
+
+He turned upon her a hungry glance.
+
+"I would work it to the bone for you," he answered. "But--it is long to
+wait."
+
+"Yes, it is long to wait," she repeated, but her tone had not the
+heaviness of his. Waiting in its wider sense means little to a
+woman--and in a moment she cheerfully returned to a prophetic future.
+
+A few days later Bernard came, and she saw Nicholas less often. Her
+affection for her brother, belonging, as it did, to the dominant family
+feeling which possessed her soul, was filled with an almost maternal
+solicitude. He absorbed her with a spasmodic, half selfish, wholly
+insistent appeal. She received his confidences, wrote his letters, and
+tied his cravats. Upon his last visit home he had spent the greater
+part of his time in Kingsborough; now he rode in seldom, and invariably
+returned in a moody and depressed condition.
+
+"You're worth the whole bunch of them," he had said to her of other
+girls, "you dear old Eugie."
+
+And she had warmed and laid a faithful hand on his arm. It was
+characteristic of her that no call for affection went disregarded--that
+the sensitive fibres of her nature quivered beneath any caressing hand.
+
+"Do you really like me best?" she asked.
+
+"Don't I?" He laughed his impulsive, boyish laugh--"I'll prove it by
+letting you go in for the mail this afternoon. I detest Kingsborough!"
+
+"Oh! No, no, I love it, but I suppose it is dull for you."
+
+She ordered the carriage and went upstairs to put on her hat. When she
+came down Bernard was not in sight, and she drove off, wondering why he
+or any one else should detest Kingsborough.
+
+She performed her mission at the post-office, and was mentally weighing
+the probabilities of Nicholas having finished work for the day, when, in
+passing along the main street, she saw him come to the door of his
+office with a round, rosy girl, whom she recognised as Bessie Pollard.
+
+She had intended to take him out with her, but as she caught sight of
+his visitor she gave them both a condescending nod and ordered Sampson
+to drive on. She felt vaguely offended and sharply irritated with
+herself for permitting it. Her annoyance was not allayed by the fact
+that Amos Burr stopped her in the road to inform her that his wife was
+fattening a brood of turkeys which she would like to deliver into the
+hands of Miss Chris. As he stood before her, hairy, ominous, uncouth,
+she realised for the first time the full horror of the fact that he was
+father to the man she loved. Hitherto she had but dimly grasped the
+idea. Nicholas had been associated in her thoughts with the judge and
+her earlier school days; and she had conceived of his poverty and his
+people only in the heroic measures that related to his emancipation from
+them. Now she felt that had she, in the beginning, seen him side by side
+with his father, she could not have loved him. She flinched from Amos
+Burr's shaggy exterior and drew back haughtily.
+
+"I have nothing to do with the housekeeping," she said. "You may ask
+Aunt Chris."
+
+He spat a mouthful of tobacco juice into the dust and fingered the torn
+brim of his hat.
+
+"I wish you'd jest speak to Miss Chris about 'em," he returned, "an'
+send me word by Nick." He gave an awkward lurch on his feet.
+
+The colour flamed in Eugenia's face.
+
+"Aunt Chris will send for the turkeys," she said hurriedly. "Drive on,
+Sampson."
+
+She sat splendidly erect, but the autumn landscape was blurred by a
+sudden gush of tears.
+
+An hour later she remembered that she had promised to let Nicholas join
+her in the pasture, and she left the house with the grievance still at
+her heart.
+
+When she saw him it broke out abruptly.
+
+"I am surprised that you keep up with such people," she said.
+
+He looked at her blankly.
+
+"If you mean Bessie Pollard," he rejoined, "she was in trouble and came
+to me for advice. I couldn't help her, but I could at least be civil.
+She was kind to me when I was in her father's store."
+
+"I do not care to be reminded that you were ever in such a position."
+
+He flinched, but answered quietly:
+
+"I am afraid you will have to face it," he said. "If you become my wife,
+you will, unfortunately, have to face a good deal that you might escape
+by marrying in your own class--I am not in your class, you know," he
+slowly added.
+
+She was conscious of a cloudy irritation which was alien to her usually
+beaming moods. The figure of Amos Burr loomed large before her, and she
+hated herself for the discovery that she was tracing his sinister
+likeness in his son. No, it was only the hair--that was all, but she
+loathed the obvious colour.
+
+Her lip trembled and she set her teeth into it.
+
+"You might at least allow me to forget it," she retorted.
+
+"Why should you wish to forget it? I think I shall be proud of it when I
+have risen far enough above it to claim you. It is no small thing to be
+a self-made man."
+
+She resented the assurance of his tone.
+
+"It is strange that you do not consider my view of it."
+
+"Your view--what is it?"
+
+"That I do not wish the man I love to--to speak to that Pollard girl,"
+she gasped.
+
+"Since you wish it, I will avoid her in future. She is nothing to me;
+but I can't refuse to speak to her. You are unreasonable."
+
+She was regarding the hovering shade of Amos Burr.
+
+"If you think me unreasonable," she returned, "we may as well--"
+
+He reached her side by a single step and flung his arm about her. Then
+he looked into her face and laughed softly.
+
+"May as well what--dearest?" he asked.
+
+She shook an obstinate head.
+
+"You don't love me," was her inevitable feminine challenge.
+
+He laughed again. "Do I love you?" he demanded as he looked at her.
+
+She did not answer, but the shade of Amos Burr melted afar.
+
+Nicholas bent over her with abrupt intensity and kissed her lips until
+his kisses hurt her.
+
+"Do I love you--now?" he asked.
+
+"Yes--yes--yes." She freed herself with a laugh that dispelled the
+lingering cloud. "You may convince me next time without violence," she
+affirmed radiantly.
+
+As he watched her his large nostrils twitched whimsically. "You were
+saying that we might as well--"
+
+"Go home to supper," she finished triumphantly. "The sun has set."
+
+When she left him a little later at the end of the avenue she flew
+joyously up the narrow walk. She was softly humming to herself, and as
+she stepped upon the porch the song ran lightly into words.
+
+  "I love Love, though he has wings,
+    And like light can flee--"
+
+she sang, and paused within the shadow of the porch to glance through
+the long window that led into the sitting-room. The heavy curtains
+obstructed her gaze, and she had put up her hand to push them aside,
+when her father's voice reached her, and at his words her outstretched
+arm fell slowly to her side.
+
+"It's that girl of Jerry Pollard's," he was saying. "She's gotten into
+trouble, and that Burr boy's mixed up in it; the young rascal!"
+
+Miss Chris's placid voice floated in.
+
+"I can't believe it," she charitably murmured; and Bernard, who was on
+the hearth rug, turned at the sound.
+
+"It's all gossip, you know," he said.
+
+Eugenia pushed aside the curtains and stepped into the room. Her hands
+hung at her sides, and the animation had faded from her glance. Her face
+looked white and drawn.
+
+"It is not true," she said steadily. "Papa, it is not true."
+
+"I--I'm afraid it is, daughter," gasped the general. There was an
+abashed embarrassment in his attitude and his hands shook. He had hoped
+to keep such facts beyond the utmost horizon of his daughter's life.
+
+Eugenia crossed to the hearth rug and stood looking into Bernard's
+face. She made an appealing gesture with her hands.
+
+"Bernard, it is not true," she said.
+
+He turned away from her and, nervously lifting the poker, divided the
+smouldering log. A red flame shot up, illuminating the gathered faces
+that stood out against the dusk. The glare lent a grotesque irony to the
+flabby, awe-stricken features of the general, brightened the boyish
+ill-humour in Bernard's eyes, and played peaceably over Miss Chris's
+tranquil countenance.
+
+"Bernard, it is not true," she said again.
+
+The poker fell with a clatter to the hearth; and the noise irritated
+her. Bernard put out a sudden, soothing hand.
+
+"It is what they say in Kingsborough," he answered.
+
+She turned from him to the window, pushed the curtains aside, and went
+out again into the sunset.
+
+
+
+
+VI
+
+
+She ran swiftly along the walk, into the gloom of the avenue, and out
+again to the open road. The sunset colours were flaming in the west, and
+above them a solitary star was shining. The fields lay sombre and
+deserted on either side, but straight ahead, in the lighter streak of
+the road, she saw Nicholas's figure swinging onward. She might have
+called to him, but she did not; she sped like a shadow in his path
+until, hearing her footfalls in the dust, he looked back and halted.
+
+"You!" he exclaimed.
+
+She came up to him, her hand at her throat, her face turned towards the
+sunset. For a moment her breath failed and she could not speak; then all
+the words that she had meant to say--the appeal to him for truth, the
+cry of her own belief in him--rang theatrical and ineffectual in her
+brain.
+
+When at last she spoke, it was to voice the mere tripping of her
+tongue--to utter words which belied the beating of her thoughts.
+
+"You must marry her," she said, and it seemed to her that it was a
+stranger who spoke. She did not mean that--she had never meant it.
+
+He looked at her blankly, and made a sudden movement forward, but she
+waved him off.
+
+"For God's sake, whom?" he demanded.
+
+She wished that he had laughed at her--that he had laid bare the whole
+hideous farce, but he did not; he regarded her gravely, with a grim
+inquiry.
+
+"Whom do you mean?" he repeated.
+
+A light wind sprang up, blowing across the pasture and whirling the dead
+leaves of distant trees into their faces. Overhead other stars came out,
+and far away an owl hooted.
+
+"Oh! you know, you know," she said, with a desperate anger at his
+immobility. "When I saw you with her to-day, I did not--I did not--"
+
+"Do you mean Bessie Pollard?" he asked. His voice was hard; it was
+characteristic of him that, in the supreme test, his sense of humour
+failed him. He met grave issues with a gravity that upheld them.
+
+She bowed her head. At the same time she flung out a despairing hand for
+hope, but he did not notice it. She was softening to him--if she had
+ever steeled herself against him--and a single summons to her faith
+would have vanquished the feeble resistance. But he did not make it--the
+inflexible front which she had seen turned to others she now saw
+presented to herself. He looked at her with an austere tightening of the
+mouth and held off.
+
+"And they have told you that I ruined her," he said, "and you believe
+them."
+
+"No--no," she cried; "not that!"
+
+His eyes were on her, but there was no yielding in them. The arrogant
+pride of a strong man, plainly born, was face to face with her appeal.
+His features were set with the rigidity of stone.
+
+"Who has told you this?" he demanded.
+
+"Oh, it is not true--it is not true," she answered; "but
+Bernard--Bernard believed it--and he is your friend."
+
+Then his smouldering rage burst forth, and his face grew black. It was
+as if an incarnate devil had leaped into his eyes. He took a step
+forward.
+
+"Then may God damn him," he said, "for he is the man!"
+
+She fell from him as if he had struck her. Her spirit flashed out as his
+had done. The anger of her race shot forth.
+
+"Oh, stop! stop! How dare you!" she cried; "for he tried to shield
+you--he tried to shield you--he would shield you if he could."
+
+But he crossed to where she stood and caught her outstretched hands in a
+grasp that hurt her. She winced, and his hold grew gentle; but his voice
+was brutal in its passion.
+
+"Be silent," he said, "and listen to me. They have lied to you, and you
+have believed them--you I shall never forgive--you are nothing to
+me--nothing. As for him--may God, in his mercy, damn him!"
+
+He let her hands drop and went from her into the silence of the open
+road.
+
+When the thud of his footsteps was muffled by the distance Eugenia
+turned and went back through the cedar avenue. She walked heavily, and
+there was a bruised sensation in her limbs as if she had hurt herself
+upon stones. A massive fatigue oppressed her, and she stumbled once or
+twice over the rocks in the road. Her happiness was dead, this she told
+herself; telling herself, also, that it had not perished by anger or by
+disbelief. The slayer loomed intangible and yet inevitable--the shade
+that had arisen from the gigantic gulf between separate classes which
+they had sought, in ignorance, to abridge. The pride of Nicholas was not
+individual, but typical--the pride of caste, and it was against this
+that she had sinned--not in distrusting his honour, but in offending it.
+It was in the clash of class, after all, that their theories had
+crumbled. He might come back to her again--she might go forth to meet
+him--but the bloom had gone from their dreams--in the reunion she saw
+neither permanence nor abiding. The strongest of her instincts--the one
+that made for the blood she bore--had quivered beneath the onslaught of
+his accusation, but had not bent. Wherever and whenever the struggle
+came she stood, as the Battles had always stood, for the clan. Be it
+right or wrong, true or false, it was hers and she was on its side.
+
+As she went beneath the great cedars, their long branches brushed her
+face, like the remembering touch of familiar fingers, and she put up her
+cheek to them as if they were sentient things. Long ago they had soothed
+her as a troubled child, and now their caresses cooled her fever.
+Underfoot she felt the ancient carpet they had spread throughout the
+century--and it smoothed the way for her heavy feet. She was in the
+state of subjective passiveness when the consciousness of external
+objects alone seems awake. She felt a tenderness for the twisted box
+bushes she brushed in passing, a vague pity for a sickly moth that flew
+into her face; but for herself she was without pity or tenderness--she
+had not brought her mind to bear upon her own hurt.
+
+Indoors she found the family at supper. The general, hearing her step,
+called her to her seat and gave her the brownest chicken breast in the
+dish before him. Miss Chris offered her the contents of the cream jug,
+and Congo plied her with Aunt Verbeny's lightest waffles; but the food
+choked her and she could not eat. A lump rose in her throat, and she saw
+the kindly, accustomed faces through a gathering mist. She regarded each
+with a certain intentness, a peculiar feeling that there were hidden
+traits in the commonplace features which she had never seen before--a
+complexity in the benign candour of Miss Chris's countenance, in the
+overwrought youthfulness of Bernard's, in the apoplectic credulity of
+the general's. Familiar as they were, it seemed to her that there were
+latent possibilities--obscure tendencies, which were revealed to her now
+with microscopic exaggeration.
+
+The general put his hand to her forehead and smoothed back the moist
+hair.
+
+"Ain't you well, daughter?" he asked anxiously. "Would you like a
+toddy?"
+
+"It's nothing," said Miss Chris cheerfully. "She's walked too far,
+that's all. Eugie, you must go to bed early."
+
+"I had her out all the morning in the sun," put in Bernard, with an
+affectionate nod at Eugenia, "and she's such a trump she wouldn't give
+out."
+
+"You must learn to consider your sister," said his father testily.
+
+"Oh! I liked it, papa," declared Eugenia. "I'm well and--I'm hungry."
+
+Congo brought more waffles, and she ate one with grim determination. The
+alert affection which surrounded her--which proved sensitive to a
+change of colour or a tremor of voice, filled her with a swift sense of
+security. She felt a sudden impulse to draw nearer in the shelter of the
+race--to cling more closely to that unswerving instinct which had united
+individual to individual and generation to generation.
+
+As they rose from the table, she slipped her arm through her father's
+and went with him into the hall.
+
+"I'm tired," she said, stopping him on his way to the sitting-room, "so
+I'll go to bed."
+
+The general held her from him and looked into her face.
+
+"Anybody been troubling you, Eugie?" he asked.
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"You dear old goose--no!"
+
+He patted her shoulder reassuringly.
+
+"If anybody troubles you, you just let me hear of it," he said. "They'll
+find out Tom Battle wasn't at Appomattox. You've got an old father and
+he's got an old sword--"
+
+"And he's hungry for a fight," she gaily finished. Then she rubbed her
+cheek against his brown linen sleeve, which was redolent of tobacco. The
+firm physical contact inspired her with the courage of life; it seemed
+to make for her a bulwark against the world and its incoming
+tribulations.
+
+She threw back her head and looked up into the puffed and scarlet face
+where the coarse veins were congested, her eyes seeing only the love
+which transfigured it. She was his pet and his pride, and she would
+always be the final reward of his long life.
+
+As she mounted the stairs, he blew his nose and called cheerfully after
+her:
+
+"Just remember, if anybody begins plaguing you, that I'm ready for
+him--the rascal."
+
+Once in her room she threw open the window and sat looking out into the
+night, the chill autumn wind in her face. Far across the fields a pale
+moon was rising, bearing a cloudy circle that betokened rain. It flung
+long, ghostly shadows east and west, which flitted, lean and noiseless
+and black, before the wind. Overhead the stars shone dimly, piercing a
+fine mist. Eugenia leaned forward, her chin on her clasped hands. Beyond
+the gray blur of the pasture she could see, like benighted beacons, the
+lights in Amos Burr's windows, and she found herself vaguely wondering
+if Nicholas were at his books--those books that never failed him. He had
+that consolation at least--his books were more to him than she had been.
+
+She was not conscious of anger; she felt only an indifferent
+weariness--a nervous shrinking from the brutality of his rage. His face
+as she had seen it rose suddenly before her, and she put her hand to her
+eyes as if to shut out the sight. She saw the clear streak of the
+highway, the gray pasture, the solitary star overhanging the horizon,
+and she felt the dead leaves blown against her cheek from denuded trees
+far distant. And lighted by a glare of memory she saw his face--she saw
+the convulsed features, the furrow that cleft the forehead like a seam,
+the heavy brows bent above the half-closed eyes, the spasmodic working
+of the drawn mouth. She saw the man in whom, for its brief instant, evil
+was triumphant--in whom that self-poise, which had been to her as the
+secret of his strength, was tumultuously overthrown.
+
+A great fatigue weighed upon her, as if she had emerged, defeated, from
+a physical contest. Her hands trembled, and something throbbed in her
+temple like an imprisoned bird.
+
+As she sat in the silence, the door opened softly and Miss Chris came
+in, bearing a lamp in her hand.
+
+"Eugie," she said, peering into the darkness, "are you there?"
+
+Eugenia lowered the window and came over to the hearth rug, where she
+stood blinking from the sudden glare of the lamp. There were some
+half-extinguished embers amid the ashes in the fireplace, and she threw
+on fresh wood, watching while it caught and blazed up lightly over the
+old brass andirons.
+
+Miss Chris set the lamp on the table and came over to the fire. She
+carried her key basket in her hand, and the keys jingled as she moved.
+Her smooth, florid face had a fine moisture over it that showed like dew
+on a well-sunned peach.
+
+"You aren't worrying about Nick Burr, Eugie," she said with the amiable
+bluntness which belonged to her. "I wouldn't let it worry me if I were
+you."
+
+Eugenia turned with a flash of pride.
+
+"No, I am not worrying about him," she answered.
+
+Miss Chris lifted a vase from the mantel-piece, dusted the spot where it
+had stood, and replaced it carefully.
+
+"Of course, I know you've seen a good deal of him of late," she went
+on; "but, as I told Tom, I knew it was nothing more than your being
+playmates together. He's a good boy, and I don't believe that scandal
+about him any more than I would about Bernard; but he's Amos Burr's son,
+after all, though he has raised himself a long way above him, and, as
+poor Aunt Griselda used to say, 'When all's said and done, a Battle's a
+Battle.'"
+
+Eugenia was looking into the fire.
+
+"Yes," she repeated slowly, "a Battle's a Battle, after all."
+
+"That's right, dear. I knew you'd say so. I always declared that you
+were more of a Battle than all the rest of us put together--if you do
+look the image of a Tucker. Tom was telling me only last week that he'd
+leave you as free as air and trust the name in your hands sooner than he
+would in his own--and he has a great deal of family pride, you know,
+though he was so wild in his youth. But I remember my father once
+saying: 'A Battle may go a long way down the wrong road, but he'll
+always pull up in time to turn.'"
+
+Her beautiful eyes shone in the firelight, and her placid mouth formed a
+round hole above her dimpled chin, giving her large face an expression
+almost infantile. She took up the key basket, which she had placed on
+the mantel-piece, cast a glance at the pile of logs to see if it had
+been replenished, felt the cover on the bed, after inquiring if it
+sufficed, and, with a cheerful "good-night," passed out, closing the
+door behind her.
+
+Eugenia did not turn as the door closed. She stood motionless upon the
+hearth rug, looking down into the fire. Something in the huge old
+fireplace, with its bent andirons supporting the blazing logs, in the
+increasing bed of embers upon the bricks, in the sharp odour of the knot
+of resinous pine she had thrown on with the hickory, brought before her
+the winter evenings in Delphy's little cabin, when they sat upon
+three-legged stools and roasted early winesaps. She saw the negro faces
+in the glow of the hearth, and she saw Nicholas and herself sitting side
+by side in the shadow. His childish face, with its look of ancient care,
+came back to her with the knotted boyish hands that had carried and
+fetched at her bidding. The whole wistful little figure was imaged in
+the flames, melting rapidly into the boy, eager to act, ardent to
+achieve, who had bidden her good-bye on that November afternoon, and,
+dissolving again, to reappear as the strong man who had come upon her in
+Uncle Ish's little shanty, bearing the old negro's bag upon his
+shoulder.
+
+She had loved him for his strength, his vigour, his gentleness--and she
+still loved him.
+
+Of the men that she had known, who was there so ready to assist, so
+forgetful of services which he had rendered? There was none so powerful
+and yet so kind--so generous or so gentle. An impulse stirred her to
+cross the fields to his door and fling herself into the breach that
+divided them; but again the phantom in the flames grew dim and then sent
+out the face that she had seen that afternoon--convulsed and quivering,
+with its flitting sinister likeness to Amos Burr. A voice that seemed to
+be the voice of old dead Aunt Griselda--of her whole dead race that had
+decayed and been forgotten, and come to life again in her--spoke
+suddenly from the silence:
+
+"When all's said and done, a Battle's a Battle."
+
+The resinous pine blazed up, the pungent odour filled the large room,
+and from the lightwood sticks tiny streams of resin oozed out and
+dripped into the embers, turning the red to gray.
+
+Mingling with the crackling of the flames there was a noise as of the
+soughing of the wind in the pine forests.
+
+The hearth grew suddenly blurred before her eyes; and a passion of grief
+rose to her throat and clutched her with the grip of claws. For an
+instant longer she stood motionless; then, turning from the fire, she
+threw herself upon the floor to weep until the daybreak.
+
+
+
+
+VII
+
+
+When Nicholas left Eugenia it was to stride blindly towards his father's
+gate. The rage which had stunned him into silence before the girl now
+leaped and crackled like flame in his blood. His throat was parched and
+he saw red like a man who kills.
+
+Passing his home, he kept on to Kingsborough, and once within the shadow
+of the wood, he broke into a run, flying from himself and from the goad
+of his wrath. As he ran, he felt with a kind of alien horror that to
+meet Bernard Battle face to face in this hour would be to do
+murder--murder too mild for the man who had lied away his friend's
+honour for the sake of the whiteness of his own skin. It was the
+injustice that he resented with a holy rage--the hideous fact that a
+clean man should be spotted to save an unclean one the splashing he
+merited.
+
+And Eugenia also--he hated Eugenia that he had kept her image
+untarnished in his thoughts; that he had allowed the desire for no other
+woman to shadow it. He had held himself as a temple for the worship of
+her; he had permitted no breath of defilement to blow upon the
+altar--and this was his reward. This--that the woman he loved had hurled
+the first stone at the mere lifting of a Pharisaical finger--that she
+had loved him and had turned from him when the first word was
+uttered--as she would not have turned from the brother of her blood had
+he been damned in Holy Writ. It was for this that he hated her.
+
+The light of the sunset shining through the wood fell dull gold on his
+pathway. A strong wind was blowing among the trees, and the dried leaves
+were torn from the boughs and hurled roughly to the earth, when they
+sped onward to rest against the drifts by the roadside. The sound of the
+wind was deep and hoarse like the baying of distant hounds, and beneath
+it, in plaintive minor, ran the sighing of the leaves before his
+footsteps. Through the wood came the vague smells of autumn--a
+reminiscent waft of decay, the reek of mould on rotting logs, the
+effluvium of overblown flowers, the healthful smack of the pines. By
+dawn frost would grip the vegetation and the wind would lull; but now it
+blew, strong and clear, scattering before it withered growths and subtle
+scents of death.
+
+Out of the wood, Nicholas came on the highway again, and turned to where
+the afterglow burnished the windows of Kingsborough. He followed the
+road instinctively--as he had followed it daily from his childhood up,
+beating out the impression of his own footsteps in the dust,
+obliterating his old, even tracks by the reckless tramp of his delirium.
+
+When he reached the college grounds he paused from the same dazed
+impulse and looked back upon the west through the quiet archway of the
+long brick building. The place was desolate with the desolation of
+autumn. Through the funereal arch he saw the sunset barred by a network
+of naked branches, while about him the darkening lawn was veiled with
+the melancholy drift of the leaves. The only sound of life came from a
+brood of turkeys settling to roost in a shivering aspen.
+
+He turned and walked rapidly up the main street, where a cloud of dust
+hung suspended. Past the court-house, across the green, past the little
+whitewashed gaol, where in a happier season roses bloomed--out into the
+open country where the battlefields were grim with headless corn
+rows--he walked until he could walk no further, and then wheeled about
+to retrace heavily his way. His rage was spent; his pulses faltered from
+fatigue, and the red flashes faded from before his eyes.
+
+When he reached home supper was over, and Nannie sat sewing in the
+little room adjoining the kitchen.
+
+"You're late for supper," she said idly as he entered. "Sairy Jane's
+gone to bed with a headache and ma's in a temper. I'll get you something
+as soon as I've done this seam."
+
+"I've had supper," he answered shortly, adding from force of habit,
+"where's ma?"
+
+Nannie motioned towards the kitchen and drew a little nearer the lamp,
+while Nicholas left the room in search of his stepmother.
+
+Marthy Burr, a pile of newly dug potatoes on the floor beside her, was
+carefully sorting them before storing them for winter use. The sound
+ones she laid in a basket at her right hand, those that were of
+imperfect growth or showed signs of decay she threw into a hamper that
+was kept in the kitchen closet.
+
+"You ought to make Jubal do this," said Nicholas as he entered.
+
+"I wouldn't trust the thickest skinned potato in the field in his
+hands," returned Marthy sharply. "He an' yo' pa made out to store 'em
+last year, an' when I went to look in the first barrel, the last one of
+'em had rotted."
+
+"Let them rot," said Nicholas harshly. "I be damned if I'd care. You
+don't eat them, anyway."
+
+"I reckon if I was a man I might consarn myself 'bout the things that
+tickle my own palate--an' 'taters ain't one of 'em," was his
+stepmother's retort. "But, being a woman, it seems I've got to spend my
+life slavin' for other folks' stomachs. But you're yo' Uncle Nick Sales
+all over again; 'Don't you get up befo' day to set that dough, Marthy,'
+he'd say, but when the bread came on flat as a pancake, he'd look sourer
+than all the rest."
+
+"What was my Uncle Nick Sales like?" asked Nicholas indifferently. He
+knew the name, but he had never heard the man's story.
+
+"All book larnin' an' mighty little sense--just like you," replied his
+stepmother with repressed pride in her voice. "Could read the Bible in
+an outlandish tongue an' was too big a fool to come in out of the rain.
+He used to sit up all night at his books--an' fall asleep the next day
+at the plough. He was the wisest fool I ever see."
+
+"Poor fool!" said Nicholas softly. It was the epitaph over the unmarked
+grave of that other member of his race who had blazed the thorny path
+before him. A strange, pathetic figure rose suddenly in his vision--a
+man with a great brow and a twisted back, with brawny, knotted hands--an
+unlearned student driving the plough, an ignorant philosopher dragging
+the mire.
+
+"Poor fool!" he said again. "What did his learning do for him?"
+
+"It killed him," returned his stepmother shortly.
+
+She stood before him wiping her gnarled hands on her soiled apron. His
+gaze fell upon her, and he wondered angrily whence sprung her
+indomitable energy--the energy that could expend itself upon potatoes.
+Her face was sharpened until it seemed to become all feature--there were
+hollows in the narrow temples, and where the pale, thin hair was drawn
+tightly over the head he could trace the prominent bones of the skull.
+
+As he looked at her his own petty suffering was overshadowed by the
+visible tragedy of her life--the sordid tragedy where unconsciousness
+was pathos. He reached out quickly and took a corner of her apron in his
+hand. It was the strongest demonstration of affection he had ever made
+to her.
+
+"I'll sort them, ma," he said lightly. "There's not a speck in the lot
+of them too fine for my eyes." And he knelt down beside the earthy heap.
+
+But when he went up to his room an hour later and lighted his kerosene
+lamp, it was not of his stepmother that he was thinking--nor was it of
+Eugenia. His stiffened muscles contracted in physical pain, and his
+brain was deadened by the sense of unutterable defeat. The delirium of
+his anger had passed away; the fever of his skin had chilled beneath the
+cold sweat that broke over him--in the reaction from the madness that
+had gripped him he was conscious of a sanity almost sublime. The
+habitual balance of his nature had swung back into place.
+
+He got out his books and arranged them as usual beside the lamp. Then he
+took up the volume he had been reading and held it unopened in his
+hands. He stared straight before him at the whitewashed wall of the
+little room, at the rough pine bedstead, at the crude washstand, at the
+coloured calendar above.
+
+On the unearthly whiteness of the wall he beheld the pictured vision of
+that other student of his race--the kinsman who had lived toiling and
+had died learning. He came to him a tragic figure in mire-clotted
+garments--a youth with aspiring eyes and muck-stained feet. He wondered
+what had been his history--that unknown labourer who had sought
+knowledge--that philosopher of the plough who had died in ignorance.
+
+"Poor fools!" he said bitterly, "poor fools!" for in his vision that
+other student walked not alone.
+
+The next morning he went into Kingsborough at his usual hour, and,
+passing his own small office, kept on to where Tom Bassett's name was
+hung.
+
+It was county court day, and the sheriff and the clerk of the court were
+sitting peaceably in armchairs on the little porch of the court-house.
+As Nicholas passed with a greeting, they turned from a languid
+discussion of the points of a brindle cow in the street to follow
+mentally his powerful figure.
+
+"I reckon he's got more muscle than any man in town," remarked the
+sheriff in a reflective drawl. "Unless Phil Bates, the butcher, could
+knock him out. Like to see 'em at each other, wouldn't you?" he added
+with a laugh.
+
+The clerk carefully tilted his chair back against the wall and surveyed
+his outstretched feet. "Like to live to see him stumping this State for
+Congress," he replied. "There goes the brainiest man these parts have
+produced since before the war--the people want their own men, and it's
+time they had 'em."
+
+Nicholas passed on to Tom's office, and, finding it empty, turned back
+to the judge's house, where he found father and son breakfasting
+opposite each other at a table bright with silver and chrysanthemums.
+
+They hospitably implored him to join them, but he shook his head,
+motioning away the plate which old Caesar would have laid before him.
+
+"I wanted to ask Tom if he had heard this--this lie about me," he said
+quickly.
+
+Tom looked up, flushing warmly.
+
+"Why, who's been such a blamed fool as to tell you?" he demanded.
+
+"You have heard it?"
+
+"It isn't worth hearing. I called Jerry Pollard up at once, and he swore
+he was all wrong--the girl herself exonerates you. Nobody believed it."
+
+Nicholas crushed the brim of his hat in a sudden grip.
+
+"Some believe it," he returned slowly. He sat down at the table, smiling
+gratefully at the judge's protestations.
+
+"They aren't all like you, sir," he declared. "I wish they were. This
+world would be a little nearer heaven--a little less like hell."
+
+There was a trail of lingering bitterness in his voice, and in a moment
+he added quickly: "Do you know, I'd like to get away for a time. I've
+changed my mind about caring to live here. If they'd send me up to the
+legislature next year, I'd make a new beginning."
+
+The judge shook his head.
+
+"I doubt the wisdom of it, my boy," he said. But Tom caught at the
+suggestion.
+
+"Send you," he repeated. "Of course; they'll send you from here to
+Jericho, if you say so. Why, there's no end to your popularity among
+men. Where the ladies are concerned, I modestly admit that I have the
+advantage of you; but they can't vote, God bless them!"
+
+"You're welcome to all the good they may bring you, old boy," was
+Nicholas's unchivalrous retort.
+
+"Oh, you're jealous, Nick!" twitted Tom gaily. "They don't take kindly
+to your carrot locks. Now, I've inherited a way with them, eh, dad?"
+
+The judge complacently buttered his buckwheats. There was a twinkle in
+his eyes and a quiver at the corner of his classic mouth.
+
+"It was the only inheritance I wasn't able to squander in my wild oats
+days," he returned. "May you cherish it, my boy, as carefully as your
+father has done. It would be a dull world without the women."
+
+"And a peaceable one," added Nicholas viciously.
+
+"We owe them much," said the judge, pouring maple syrup from the old
+silver jug. "If Helen of Troy set the world at war, she made men
+heroes."
+
+"You can't get the pater to acknowledge that the fair things are ever
+wrong," put in Tom protestingly. "He would have proved Eve's innocence
+to the Almighty. If a woman murdered ten men before his eyes he'd lay
+the charge on the devil and acquit her."
+
+The judge shook his head with a laugh.
+
+"I might merely argue that the queen can do no wrong," he suggested.
+
+When Tom had finished his breakfast, Nicholas walked with him to his
+office, and, seeing Bessie Pollard, red-eyed and drooping in her
+father's door, he lingered an instant and held out his hand. There was
+defiant sympathy in his act--disdain of the judgment of
+Kingsborough--and of General Battle, who was passing--and pity for a
+bruised common thing that looked at him with beautiful, mindless eyes.
+
+"You aren't looking bright to-day," he said kindly, "but things will
+pull through, never fear--they always do, if you give them time."
+
+Then he responded coolly to the general's cool nod, and, rejoining Tom,
+they went on arm in arm. In his large-minded manhood it had not occurred
+to him to connect the girl with the wrong done upon him--he knew her to
+be more weak than wicked, and, in her soft, pretty sadness, she reminded
+him of a half-drowned kitten.
+
+During the next few months he frequently passed Eugenia in the road.
+Sometimes he did not look at her, and again he met her wistful gaze and
+spoke without a smile. Once he checked an eager movement towards her
+because he had met Bernard just ahead--and he hated him; once he had
+seen the carriage in the distance and had waited in a passionate rush
+of remorse and love to hear her laughter as she talked with Dudley Webb.
+They had faced each other at last with resolute eyes and unswerving
+wills. On his side was the pride of an innocent man accused, the
+bitterness of a proud man on an inferior plane; on hers, the
+recollection of that wild evening in the road, and the belated
+recognition of the debt she owed her race.
+
+In the winter she went up to Richmond and he slowly forced himself to
+renounce her. He began to see his old dream as it was--an emotional
+chimera; a mental madness. As the year grew on he watched his long hope
+wither root and branch, until, with the resurrection of the spring, it
+lay still because there was no life left that might put forth. And when
+his hope was dead he told himself that his unhappiness died with it,
+that he might throw himself single-hearted into the work of his life.
+
+
+
+
+VIII
+
+
+The year passed and was done with--leaves budded, expanded, fell again.
+Eugenia watched their growth, fulfilment, and decay as she had watched
+them other seasons, though with eyes a thought widened by experience, a
+shade darkened by tears. At first she had suffered wildly, then
+passively, at last resignedly. The colour rebloomed in her cheek, the
+gaiety rang back to her voice, for she was young, and youth is ever
+buoyant.
+
+There was work for her to do on the place, and she did it cheerfully.
+She studied farming with her father and overhauled the methods of the
+overseer, to the man's annoyance and the general's delight. "She tells
+me Varly isn't scientific," roared the general with rapturous enjoyment.
+"A scientific overseer! She'll be asking for an honest politician next."
+
+"I'm sure Varly is a very respectable man," protested Miss Chris in her
+usual position of defence. "The servants were always devoted to him
+before the war--that says a good deal."
+
+"There's not a better man in the county," admitted the general, "or a
+worse farmer. Here I've let him go down hill at his own gait for more
+than thirty years, to be pulled up in the end by a chit of a girl. I
+wouldn't, if I were you, Eugie. He's old and he's slow."
+
+"Oh! I'll promise not to hurt him," returned Eugenia. "I save him a lot
+of hard work, and he likes it."
+
+She drew on her loose dogskin gloves and went out to overlook the
+shucking of the corn.
+
+With the exercise in the open air she had gained in suppleness and
+brilliancy. It was the outdoor work that saved her spirit and her
+beauty--that gave her endurance for the indoor monotony and magnified
+the splendid optimism of her saddest hour. She was a woman born for
+happiness; when the Fates failed to accord it she defied them and found
+her own.
+
+In the autumn news came that Nicholas was elected to the General
+Assembly. The judge brought it, riding out on a bright afternoon to chat
+with the general before the blazing logs.
+
+"The lad has a future," said the judge with a touch of pride. "Brains
+don't grow on blackberry vines;" then he laughed softly. "Caesar voted
+for him," he added.
+
+The general slapped his knee.
+
+"Caesar is a gentleman," he exclaimed. "He was the first darkey in
+Kingsborough to vote the Democratic ticket. I walked up to the polls
+with him and the boys cheered him. You weren't there, George."
+
+The judge shook his head.
+
+"They called it undue influence," he said; "but, on my honour, Tom, I
+never spoke a political word to Caesar in my life. Of course he'd heard
+me talk with Tom at dinner. He'd heard me say that the man of his race
+who would dare to vote with white men would be head and shoulders above
+his people, a man of mind, a man that any gentleman in the county would
+be proud to shake by the hand--but seek to influence Caesar! Never, sir!"
+
+"Now, there's that Ishmael of mine," said the general aggrievedly. "He
+no sooner got his vote than he cast it just to spite me. I told the fool
+he didn't know any more about voting than the old mule Sairy did, and he
+said he didn't have to know 'nothin' cep'n his name.' He forgot that
+when they challenged him at the polls, but he voted all the same--voted
+in my face, sir."
+
+They lighted their pipes and sang the praises of that idyllic period
+which they called "before the war," while Eugenia crept away into the
+shadows.
+
+She was glad that Nicholas would go; glad, glad, glad--so glad that she
+wept a little in the cold of a dark corner.
+
+A week later Dudley came down, and she met him with a friendliness that
+dismayed and disarmed him. Could a woman be so frankly cordial with a
+man she loved? Could she face a passion that inspired her with such
+serene self-poise? He questioned these things, but he did not hesitate.
+He was of a Virginian line of lovers, and he charged in courtship as
+courageously as his father had charged in battle. He was magnificent in
+his youthful ardour, and so fitted for success that it seemed already to
+cast a prophetic halo about his head.
+
+"You are superb," Eugenia had said, half insolently, looking up at him
+as he stood in the firelight. "How odd that I never noticed it before."
+
+"You are looking at yourself in my eyes," he returned gallantly.
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"There are so many women who like handsome men, it's a pity you can't
+fall in love with one," she said coldly.
+
+"Am I to infer that you prefer ugly men?" he questioned.
+
+"I--oh! I am too good-looking to care," she replied.
+
+She sprang up suddenly and stood beside him. "We do look well together,"
+she said with grave audacity.
+
+He laughed. "I am flattered. It may weigh with you in your future plans.
+Come, Eugie, let me love you!"
+
+But her mood changed and she dragged him with her out into the autumn
+fields.
+
+In the last days of November a long rain came--a ruinous autumnal rain
+that beat the white roads into livid streams of mud and sent the sad
+dead leaves in shapeless tatters to the earth. The glory of the fall had
+brought back the glory of her love; its death revived the agony of the
+long decay.
+
+At night the rain throbbed upon the tin roof above her. Sometimes she
+would turn upon her pillow, stuffing the blankets about her ears; but,
+muffled by the bedclothes, she heard always the incessant melancholy
+sound. She heard it beating on the naked roof, rushing tumultuously to
+the overflowing pipes, dripping upon the wet stones of the gutter below,
+sweeping from the earth dead leaves, dead blossoms, dead desires.
+
+In the day she watched it from the windows. The flower beds, desolated,
+formed muddy fountains, the gravel walk was a shining rivulet, the
+sycamore held three yellow leaves that clung vainly to a sheltered
+bough, the aspen faced her, naked--only the impenetrable gloom of the
+cedars was secure--sombre and inviolate.
+
+On the third day she went out into the rain; splashing miles through the
+heavy roads and returning with a glow in her cheeks and the savour of
+the dampness in her mouth.
+
+Taking off her wet garments she carried them to the kitchen to be dried.
+With the needed exercise, her cheerful animation had returned.
+
+In the brick kitchen a gloomy group of negroes surrounded the stove.
+
+"Dar's gwine ter be a flood an' de ea'th hit's gwine ter pass away,"
+lamented Aunt Verbeny, lifting the ladle from a huge pot, the contents
+of which she was energetically stirring. "Hit's gwine ter pass away wid
+de men en de cattle en de crops, en de black folks dey's gwine ter pass
+des' de same es dey wuz white."
+
+"I'se monst'ous glad I'se got religion," remarked a strange little negro
+woman who had come over to sell a string of hares her husband had shot.
+"De Lawd He begun ter git mighty pressin' las' mont', so I let 'im have
+His way. Blessed be de name er de Lawd! Is you a church member, Sis
+Delphy?"
+
+"Yes, Lawd, a full-breasted member," responded Delphy, clamping the
+declivity of her bosom.
+
+"I ain' got much use fur dis yer gittin' en ungittin' er salvation," put
+in Uncle Ish from the table where he was eating a late dinner of Aunt
+Verbeny's providing. "Dar's too much monkeyin' mixed up wid it fur me.
+Hit's too much de work er yo' j'ints ter make me b'lieve hit's gwine ter
+salivate yo' soul. When my wife, Mandy, wuz 'live, I tuck 'n cyar'ed her
+long up ter one er dese yer revivals, en' ole Sis Saphiry Baker come
+'long gittin' happy, en fo' de Lawd she rid 'er clean roun' de chu'ch.
+Naw, suh, de religion I wanter lay holt on is de religion uv rest."
+
+"I ain' never sarved my Lawd wid laziness," put in Aunt Verbeny
+reprovingly. "When He come arter me I ain' never let de ease er my limbs
+stan' in de way. Ef you can't do a little shoutin' on de ea'th, you're
+gwineter have er po' sho' ter keep de Lawd f'om overlookin' you at
+Kingdom Come."
+
+The strange little woman faced them proudly. "My husband, Silas, got
+religion in de night time," she said, "an' he bruck clean thoo de slats.
+De bed ain't helt stiddy sence."
+
+Eugenia emerged from the dusk of the doorway, where she had lingered,
+and Delphy rose to take the dripping clothes.
+
+"Des' look at her!" exclaimed Aunt Verbeny at the girl's entrance.
+"Ain't she a sight ter mek a blin' man see?" Then she added to the
+strange little woman, "Dar ain' no lack er beaux roun' yer, needer."
+
+Uncle Ish grunted.
+
+"I ain' seen 'em swum es dey swum roun' Miss Meely," he muttered, while
+Aunt Verbeny shook her fist at him behind the stranger's back. "De a'r
+wuz right thick wid 'em."
+
+"I reckon dis chile'll be mah'r'd soon es she sets her min' on it,"
+returned Delphy indignantly. "She ain' gwineter have ter do much
+cuttin' er de eyelashes, needer. De beaux come natch'ul."
+
+"Dar's Marse Dudley, now," said Aunt Verbeny. "I ain' so ole but my
+palate hit kin taste a gent'mun a mile off. Marse Dudley ain' furgit de
+times I'se done roas' him roas'in' years when he warn' mo'n er chile.
+Hit's 'how's yo' health, Aunt Verbeny?' des' de same es 'twuz den."
+
+Eugenia laughed and flung the heap of garments into Delphy's arms. "The
+rain's over," she said; "but, Uncle Ish, you'd better get Congo to fix
+you up for the night. It is too wet for your rheumatism," and she ran
+singing upstairs to where the general was dozing in the sitting-room.
+"Wake up, dad! it's going to clear!"
+
+The general started heavily from his sleep. There was a dazed look in
+his eyes.
+
+"Clear?" he asked doubtfully, "has it been raining?"
+
+Eugenia shook him into consciousness.
+
+"Raining for three whole days, and I believe you've slept through it.
+Now the clouds are breaking."
+
+
+"What is it the Bible says about 'the winter of our discontent'?--that's
+what it is."
+
+"Not the Bible, dear--Shakespeare."
+
+"It's the same thing," retorted the general testily. His speech came
+thickly as if he held a pebble in his mouth, and the swollen veins in
+his face were livid.
+
+Eugenia bent over him in sudden uneasiness. "Aren't you well, papa?" she
+asked. "Is anything the matter?"
+
+The general laughed and pinched her cheek.
+
+"Never better in my life," he declared, "but I'll have to be getting
+new glasses. These things aren't worth a cent. Find them, Eugie."
+
+Eugenia picked them up, wiped them on his silk handkerchief, and put
+them on his nose.
+
+"You've slept too long," she said. "Come and take a walk in the hall."
+
+She dragged him from his chair, and he yielded under protest.
+
+"You forget that two hundred pounds can't skip about like fifty," he
+complained.
+
+But he followed her to the long hall, and they paced slowly up and down
+in the afternoon shadows. At the end of ten minutes the general declared
+that he felt so well he would go back to his chair.
+
+"I'll get the 'Southern Planter' and read to you," said Eugenia. "Don't
+go to sleep."
+
+She ran lightly upstairs and, coming down in a moment, called him. He
+did not answer and she called again.
+
+The sitting-room was in dusk, and, as she entered, the firelight showed
+the huge body of the general lying upon the hearth rug. A sound of heavy
+snoring filled the room.
+
+She flung herself beside him, lifting the great head upon her lap; but
+before she had cried out Miss Chris was at her elbow.
+
+"Hush, Eugie," she said quickly, though the girl had not spoken. "Send
+Sampson for Dr. Bright, and tell Delphy to bring pillows. Give him to
+me."
+
+Her voice was firm, and there was no tremor in her large, helpful hands.
+
+When Eugenia returned, the general was still lying upon the hearth rug,
+his head supported by pillows. Miss Chris had opened one of the western
+windows, and a cool, damp air filled the room. The rain had begun again,
+descending with a soft, purring sound. Above it she heard the laboured
+breathing from the hearth rug, and in the firelight she saw the regular
+inflation of the swollen cheeks. The distended pupils stared back at
+her, void of light.
+
+As she stood motionless, her hands clenched before her, she followed the
+soft, weighty tread of Miss Chris, passing to and fro with improvised
+applications. The light fall of the rain irritated her; she longed for
+the relentless downpour of the night.
+
+At the end of an hour the roll of wheels broke the stillness, and she
+went out to meet the doctor, passing, with a shiver, the unconscious
+mass on the floor.
+
+They carried him to his bed in the chamber next the parlour, and through
+the night and day he lay an inert bulk beneath the bedclothes. Miss
+Chris and Eugenia and the servants passed in and out of his room. One of
+the dogs came and sat upon the threshold until Eugenia put her arms
+about his neck and drew him away. She had not wept; she was white and
+drawn and silent, as if the shock had dulled her to insensibility.
+During the afternoon of the next day she persuaded Miss Chris to rest,
+and, softly closing the door, sat down in a chair beside her father's
+bed. It was the high white bed that had known the marriage, birth, and
+death of a century of Battles. In it her father was born; beside it,
+kneeling at prayer, her mother had died. The stately tester frame had
+seen generations come and go, and had remained unchanged. Now its stiff
+white curtains made a ghastly drapery above the purple face.
+
+Eugenia sat motionless, her thoughts vaguely circling about the still
+figure before her. It was not her father--this she felt profoundly--it
+was some strange shape that had taken his place, or she was held by some
+farcical nightmare from which she should awake presently with a start.
+The half-used glasses on the little table beside her; the candle burned
+down in the socket, and overlooked; the tightly corked phials of useless
+drugs; the strong odour of mustard from the saucer in which a plaster
+had been mixed--these things struck upon her faltering consciousness
+with a shock of horrible reality. The odour of the mustard was more real
+than the breathing of the body on the bed.
+
+As she sat there, she thought of her mother--the pale, still woman who
+had lain beautiful and dead where her father was dying now. She came to
+her as from a faded miniature, wistful, holy, at rest--blessed and above
+reproach. Her heart went out to her as to one standing near, hidden by
+the long white curtains--nearer than Aunt Chris asleep upstairs, nearer
+than Bernard, who was coming to her, nearer than the great form on the
+bed. Closer than all other things was that spiritual presence. Then she
+thought of her old negro mammy, who had died when she was but a
+baby--her mother's nurse and hers. She recalled the beloved black face
+beneath the snowy handkerchief, the restful bosom in blue homespun, the
+tireless arms that had rocked her into slumber. Then of Jim, the dog,
+true friend and faithful playmate. All the lives that she had loved and
+had been bereft of gathered closer, closer in the gray shadows.
+
+Her gaze passed to the window, seeking in the sad landscape the little
+graveyard where they were lying. The rain came between her and the
+clouded hill--descending softly and insistently between her eyes and the
+end of her search. Against the panes the dripping branches of the
+shivering mimosa tree beat themselves and moaned. A chill seized her
+and, rising, she went to the hearth, noiselessly piling wood upon the
+charred and waning logs, which crumbled and sent up a thin flame. She
+hurried to the bed and sat down again, her eyes on the blanket that rose
+and fell with the difficult breath. As she looked at the large, familiar
+face, tracing its puffed outline and gross colouring, it resolved itself
+into her earliest remembrance--throughout her childhood he had been her
+slave and she his tyrant. What wish of hers had he ever ignored? With
+what demand had he ever failed to comply? At the end of the long life
+what had remained to him except herself--the single compensation--the
+one reward? The pity of it smote her as with a lash. He had lived with
+such fine bravery, and he had had so little--so little, and yet more
+than myriads of the men that live and die. That live and die! About her
+and beyond her she seemed to hear the rushing of great multitudes--the
+passing of the countless souls through the gates of death.
+
+With a cry she threw herself upon her knees, beseeching the dull ears.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Six hours later he died, and when the rain ceased and the sun came out
+they buried him beside his wife in the little graveyard. For days after
+the funeral Eugenia wandered like a shadow through the still rooms.
+Bernard had come and gone, carrying with him his short, sharp grief.
+Miss Chris had put aside her own sorrow and gone back to the management
+of the house; only the girl, worn, idle, tragic, haunted the reminders
+of her loss. Coming upon the general's old slouch hat on the rack, she
+had grasped it in sudden passionate longing; at the sight of his
+half-filled pipe she had rushed from the room and from the house. The
+faint scent of tobacco about the furniture was a continual torture to
+her. In the great chamber next the parlour she would sit for hours,
+staring at the cold white bed, shivering before the fireless hearth. The
+place chilled her like a vault; but she would linger wretchedly until
+led away by Miss Chris, when she would sob upon that broad, unselfish
+bosom.
+
+December passed; the unsunned earth turned itself for a winter rest.
+January came, swift and changeful. With February a snowstorm swept from
+the north, driving southward. At first they felt it in the air; then the
+swollen clouds chased overhead; at last the white flakes arrived,
+falling, falling, falling. Through the night the storm made a glistening
+mantle for the darkness; through the day it hid sombre sky and sombre
+earth in a spotless veil. It covered the far country to the distant
+forests; it weighted the ancient cedars until their green branches bent
+to earth; it wrapped the gravelled walk in a winding sheet; it filled
+the hollows of the box bushes until they hardened into hills of ice. The
+snow was followed by cold winds. The ground froze in the night. Long
+icicles formed on the naked trees, the window panes bore a lacework of
+frost.
+
+One afternoon, when the landscape was white and hard, Eugenia went out
+into the deserted sheep pasture where the dead oak stood. A winter
+sunset was burning like a bonfire in the west, and as far as the red
+horizon swept an unbroken waste of snow. The rail fences shone silver in
+their coat of frost, and from the blackened tree above her pendants of
+ice were shot with light. Across the field a flock of gaunt crows flew,
+casting purple shadows.
+
+Eugenia leaned against the oak and stared vacantly at the landscape--at
+the sunset, and at the waste of snow, across which flitted the demoniac
+shadows of the crows. Her eyes saw only the desolation and the death;
+they were sealed to the grandeur.
+
+A sense of her own loneliness swept over her with the loneliness of
+nature. Her own isolation--the isolation of a strong soul in
+pain--walled her apart as with a wall of ice. That assurance of human
+companionship on which she had based her future seemed suddenly
+annihilated. She was alone and life was before her.
+
+Then, as she turned her gaze, a man's figure broke upon the field of
+snow, coming towards her. It was Dudley Webb, and in the resolute swing
+of his carriage, in the resistless ardour of his eyes, he seemed to
+reach her from east and west, from north and south, surrounding her with
+a warmth of summer.
+
+As he looked at her he held out his arms.
+
+"Eugie--poor girl! dear girl!"
+
+In the desolation of her life he stood to her as the hearth of home to
+a wanderer in the frozen North.
+
+For an instant she held back, and then, with a sob, she yielded.
+
+"I must be loved," she said. "I must be loved or I shall die."
+
+Around them the winter landscape reddened as the sunset broke, and above
+their heads the crows flew, cawing, across the snow.
+
+
+
+
+BOOK IV
+
+THE MAN AND THE TIMES
+
+
+
+
+I
+
+
+The Democratic State Convention had taken an hour's recess. From the
+doors of the opera house of Powhatan City the assembled delegates
+emerged, heated, clamorous, out of breath. The morning session, despite
+its noise, had not been interesting--awaiting the report of the
+Committee on Credentials, the panting body had fumed away the opening
+hours. Of the fifteen hundred representatives of absent voters, the
+favoured few who had held the floor had been needlessly discursive and
+undeniably dull. There had been overmuch of the party platform, and an
+absence of the wit which is the soul of political speaking; and, though
+the average Virginia Convention is able to breast triumphantly the most
+encompassing wave of oratory, the present one had shown unmistakable
+signs of suffocation. At the end of the third speech, metaphor had
+failed to move it, and alliteration had ceased to evoke applause. It had
+heard without emotion similes that concerned the colour of Cleopatra's
+hair, and had yawned through perorations that ranged from Socrates to
+the Senior Senator, who sat upon the stage. Attacks upon the "cormorants
+and harpies that roost in Wall Street" had roused no thrill in the mind
+of the majority that knew not rhetoric. The most patient of the silent
+members had observed that "after all, their business was to nominate a
+candidate for governor," while the unruly spirits, as they brandished
+palm-leaf fans, had wished "that blamed committee would come on."
+
+Now, after hours of restless waiting, they emerged, stiff-kneed and
+perspiring, into the blazing sunshine that filled the little street.
+Once outside, they opened their lungs to the warm air in an attempt to
+banish the tainted atmosphere of the interior; but the original motive
+of expansion was lost in a flow of words. On the sidewalk the crowd
+divided into streams, pulsing in opposite directions. Heated, noisy,
+pervasive, it surged to dinners in hotels and boarding-houses, and
+overflowed where Moloney's restaurant displayed its bill of fare. It
+came out talking, it divided talking; still talking, it swept, a roaring
+sea of flesh, into the far-off buzz of the distance. In a group of three
+men passing into the lobby of the largest hotel, there was a slender man
+of fifty years, with a well-knit figure, half closed, indifferent eyes,
+and an emphatic mouth. In the insistent hum of words about him, his
+voice sounded in a brisk utterance that carried a hint of important
+issues.
+
+"Oh, I don't think Hartley's much account," he was saying. "I'd bet on a
+close shave between Webb and Crutchfield, with Webb in the lead. Small
+will get the lieutenant-governorship, of course. Davis ought to be
+attorney-general, but he'll be beaten by Wray. It's the party reward.
+Davis is the better lawyer, by long odds, but Wray has stuck to the
+party like a burr--I don't mean a pun, if you please."
+
+The younger of his two companions, a spirited youth with high-standing
+auburn hair, laughed uproariously.
+
+"The trouble is they're afraid Burr won't stick to the party," he
+protested. "Major Simms, who is marshalling Crutchfield's forces, you
+know, said to me last night--'Oh, Burr's all right when you let him
+lead, but he's damned mulish if you begin to pull the other way.'"
+
+The third man, a sunburned farmer, with a dogged mouth overhung by a
+tobacco-stained mustache, assented with a nod.
+
+"There's not a better Democrat in Virginia than Nick Burr," he said. "If
+the party's got anything against him it had better out with it at once.
+He made the most successful chairman the State ever had--and he's
+honest--there's not a more honest man in politics or out."
+
+"Oh, I know all that," broke in the auburn-haired young fellow, whose
+name was Dickson; "I'd back Burr against any candidate in the field, and
+I'm sorry he kept out of it. I hoped he'd come forward with you to
+manage his campaign, Mr. Galt," he said to the first speaker.
+
+Galt waived the remark.
+
+"Perhaps he thought his chances too slim for a walkover," he said in
+non-committal fashion, as Burr's best friend. "I hear, by the way, that
+the delegation from his old home is instructed to vote for him on the
+first ballot, whether or not."
+
+"He has a great name down in my parts," put in the farmer. "The people
+think he has the agricultural interests at heart. They wanted to send
+him to Congress in Webb's place, you know."
+
+"Yes, I know," said Galt. "Hello, Bassett," as Tom Bassett joined him.
+"Where've you been? Lost sight of you this morning."
+
+"Oh, I was out with the Committee on Credentials. A member? I should say
+not. I wanted to hear that Madison County case, so I got made
+sergeant-at-arms. By the way, Dick," to Dickson, "I hear you held the
+floor for five minutes this morning and got off five distinct stories
+that landed with Columbus."
+
+"Nonsense. I didn't open my mouth--except to call 'time' on the men who
+did. There's our orator now."
+
+He bowed to an elderly gentleman with a sharply pointed chin beard and
+the type of face that was once called clerical.
+
+"Some one defined oratory the other day," said Galt, "as the fringe with
+which the inhabitants of the Southern States still delighted to trim
+their politics--so I should call the gentleman of to-day 'a political
+tassel.' He's ornamental and he hangs by a thread."
+
+And he passed into the lobby arm-in-arm with Tom Bassett.
+
+The place was swarming with delegates: delegates from country districts,
+red-faced farmers in flapping linen coats and wide-brimmed hats;
+delegates from the cities, dapper, well-groomed, cordial-voiced;
+delegates of the true political type, shaven, obsequious, alert;
+delegates of the cast that belongs at home, outspoken, honest-eyed,
+remote; stout delegates, with half-bursting waistbands, thin delegates,
+with shrunken chests. In the animated throng there was but one condition
+held in common--they were all heated delegates. In one corner a stout
+gentleman in a thin coat, with a scarlet neck showing above his wilted
+collar, held a half-dozen listeners with his eyes, while he plied them
+with emphatic sentences in which the name of Crutchfield sounded like a
+refrain. Moving from group to group, portly, unctuous, insinuating, a
+man with an oily voice was doing battle in the cause of Webb.
+
+The throng that passed in and out of the lobby was continually shifting
+place and principles. One instant it would seem that Crutchfield
+triumphed in a majority sufficient to overwhelm the platform; a moment
+more and the Webb men were vociferously in the ascendant. At the time it
+resolved itself into a question of tongues.
+
+"This is thick," said Ben Galt, dodging the straw hat with which a
+perspiring politician was fanning himself and gently withdrawing himself
+from the arms of a scarlet individual in a wet collar to collide with
+his double. "Let's go to dinner. Ah! there's the Lion of Democracy--how
+are you, Judge?"
+
+The Lion, a striking figure, with a graceful, snow-white mane and a
+colossal memory, held out a tireless hand. "Well met, Ben," he exclaimed
+in effusive tones. "I've been on the outlook for you all day. One
+moment--your pardon--one moment--Ah, my dear sir! my dear sir!" to a
+countryman who approached him with outstretched hand, "I am delighted.
+Remember you? Why, of course--of course! Your name has escaped me this
+instant; but I was speaking of you only yesterday. No, don't tell me!
+don't tell me. I remember. Ah, now I have it--one moment, please--it was
+after the battle of Seven Pines. You lent me a horse after the battle of
+Seven Pines. Thank you--thank you, sir. And your charming lady, who made
+me the delicious coffee. My best regards to her."
+
+The great man was surrounded, and Galt and Bassett, leaving him to his
+assailants, passed into the dining-room.
+
+Glancing hastily down the long room filled with small, overcrowded
+tables, they joined several men who were seated near an open window.
+
+"Hello, Major. Glad to see you, Mr. Slate! How are things down your way,
+Colonel?"
+
+A tired negro waiter, with a napkin slung over his arm, drew back the
+chairs and deposited two plates of lukewarm soup before the newcomers,
+after which he lifted a brush of variegated tissue paper and made
+valiant assault upon the flies which overran the tables. Stale odours of
+over-cooked food weighted the atmosphere, and waiters bearing enormous
+trays above their heads jostled one another as they threaded their
+difficult ways. Occasionally the clamour of voices was lost in the
+clatter of breaking dishes. Tom Bassett pushed his plate away and mopped
+his large forehead. He appeared to have developed without aging in the
+last fifteen years--still presenting an aspect of invincible
+respectability.
+
+"It's ninety-two degrees in the shade, if it's anything," he declared,
+adding, "Has anybody seen Webb to-day?"
+
+The colonel, whose name was Diggs, nodded with his mouth full, and,
+having swallowed at his leisure, proceeded to reply, holding his knife
+and fork poised for service. He was fair to the point of insipidity, and
+his weak blue eyes bulged with joviality.
+
+"Shook hands with him at the train last night," he said. "Hall was a day
+ahead of time. Great politician, Hall. Working for Webb like a beaver.
+Here, waiter! More potatoes."
+
+"I went to sleep last night to the music of Webb's men," said Galt, "and
+I awoke to the tune of Crutchfield. I don't believe either side went to
+bed. My wonder is whom they found to work on."
+
+Slate, a muscular little man, with a nervous affection about the mouth
+that gave him an appearance of being continually on the point of a
+surprising utterance, hesitated over, caught, and finally landed his
+speech. "They're dead against Webb down my way," he said. "Our
+delegation is instructed to vote for anybody that favours retrenchment,
+unless it's Webb--they won't have Webb if he moves to run the State on
+the two-cent system. If we'd cast a quarter of a vote for him they'd
+drum us out of the district. It's all because he voted for that railroad
+bill in Washington last winter. We hate a railroad as a bull hates a red
+flag."
+
+Major Baylor, a courtly gentleman, with a face that bore traces of a
+survival of the old Virginian legal type, spoke for the first time.
+
+"Fauquier stands to a man for Dudley Webb," he said. "He has a large
+following in my section, and I understand, by the way, that if Hartley
+withdraws after the first ballot, it will mean a clear gain for Webb in
+the eighth district. He's safe, I think."
+
+"Oh, we're Crutchfield strong," laughed the colonel good-humouredly,
+reaching for a toothpick from the glass stand in the centre of the
+table. "We think a man deserves something who hasn't missed a convention
+for fourteen years."
+
+There was a spirit of ridicule tempered with good-humour about the
+group, which showed it to be, in the main, indifferent to the result--an
+attitude in vivid contrast to the effervescent partisanship of the
+leaders. With the exception of the colonel, whose heart was in his
+dinner, they appeared to be unconcerned spectators of the events of the
+day.
+
+"Hall was telling me a good story on Webb last week," said Diggs, as he
+waited for his dessert. "It was about the time he seconded the
+nomination of Reed for attorney-general--ever hear it?"
+
+"Fire away!" was Galt's reply, as he leaned back in his chair. The
+colonel's stories were the platform which had supported him throughout a
+not unsuccessful social career.
+
+"It was when Webb was a young fellow, you know, just beginning to be
+heard of as an advocate. He was at his first convention, eager to have
+his say, hard to keep silent; and he was asked to second the nomination
+of Reed, a boyish-looking chap of twenty-six. He didn't know Reed from
+Adam, but he was ambitious to be heard just then--and he'd have spoken
+for the devil if they'd have given him a chance. Well, he launched out
+on his speech in fine style. He began with Noah--as they all did in
+those days--glided down the centuries to Seneca and Caesar, touched upon
+Adam Smith and Jefferson, and finally landed in the arms of Monroe P.
+Reed. There he grew fairly ecstatic over his subject. He spoke of him as
+'the lawyer sprung, full-armed, from the head of learning,' as the
+'nonpareil Democrat who clove, as Ruth to Naomi, to the immortal
+principles of Virginia Democracy,' and in a glorious period, he rounded
+off 'the incomparable services which Monroe P. Reed had rendered the
+deathless cause of the Confederacy!' In an instant the house came down.
+There was a roar of laughter, and somebody in the gallery sang out: 'He
+was at his mother's breast!'
+
+"For a moment Webb quailed, but his wits never left him. He faced the
+man in the gallery like Apollo come to judgment, and his fine voice rang
+to the roof. 'I know it, sir, I know it,' he thundered, 'but Monroe P.
+Reed was one of the stoutest breastworks of the Confederacy. I have it
+from his mother, sir!'
+
+"Of course the house went wild. He was the youngest man on the floor,
+and they gave him an ovation. Since then, he's learned some things, and
+he's become the only orator left among us."
+
+The colonel finished hurriedly as his apple pie was placed before him,
+and did not speak again during dinner.
+
+"He is an orator," said Galt. "He doesn't use much clap-trap business
+either. I've never heard him drag in the Medes and Persians, and I could
+count his classical quotations on my fingers. Personally, I like Burr's
+way better--it's saner and it's sounder--but Webb knows how to talk,
+and he has a voice like a silver bell--Ah, here he is."
+
+As he spoke there was a stir in the crowd at the doorway and Dudley Webb
+entered and took the nearest vacant seat.
+
+The first impression of him at this time was one of extreme
+picturesqueness. A slight tendency to stoutness gave dignity to a figure
+which, had it been thin, would have been insignificant, and served to
+accentuate a peculiar grace of curve which prevented his weight from
+carrying any suggestion of the coming solidity of middle age. His rich,
+rather oily hair, worn longer than the fashion, fell in affected
+carelessness across his brow and lent to his candid eyes an expression
+of intensity and eloquence. His clear-cut nose and the firm, fleshy
+curve of his prominent chin modified the effect of instability produced
+by his large and somewhat loosely moulded lips. The salient quality of
+his personality, as of his appearance, was an ease of proportion almost
+urbane. His presence in the overcrowded room diffused an infectious
+affability. Though he spoke to few, he was at once, and irrepressibly,
+the friend of all. He did not go out of his way to shake a single hand,
+he confined his conversation, with the old absorption, to the men at his
+table--personal supporters, for the most part; but there was about him a
+pacific emanation--an atmosphere at once social and political, which
+extended to the far end of the room and to men whose names he did not
+know.
+
+He talked rapidly in a vibrant, low-toned voice, with frequent gestures
+of his shapely hands. His laugh was easy, full, and inspiriting--the
+laugh of a man with a vital sense of humour. As Galt watched him, he
+smiled in unconscious sympathy.
+
+"But for Burr, I think I'd like to see Webb governor," he said. "After
+all, it is something to have a man who looks well in a procession--and
+he has a charming wife."
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+
+The gas light and electric light illuminating the opera house fell with
+a curious distinction in tone upon the crowd which filled the building
+and overflowed through darkened doors and windows. Beneath the electric
+jets the faces were focussed to a white hush of expectancy, which
+mellowed into a blur of impatient animation where the dim gas flickered
+against the walls.
+
+Since the birth of Virginia Democracy, the people had not witnessed so
+generous an outpouring of delegates. In a State where every man is more
+or less a politician, the convention had assumed the air of a carnival
+of males--the restriction of sex limiting it to an expression of but
+half the population.
+
+The delegations from the congressional districts were marshalled in line
+upon the floor and stage, their positions denoted by numbered placards
+on poles, while in the galleries an enthusiastic swarm of visitors gave
+vent to the opinions of that tribunal which is the public. A straggling
+fringe of feet, in white socks and low shoes, suspended from the red and
+gilt railings of the boxes, illustrated the peculiar privileges enjoyed
+in the absence of the feminine atmosphere. From stage to gallery the
+play of palm-leaf fans produced the effect of a swarm of gigantic
+insects, and behind them rows of flushed and perspiring faces were
+turned upon the gentleman who held the floor.
+
+A composite photograph of the faces would have resulted in a type at
+once alarming and reassuring--alarming to the student of individual
+endeavour, reassuring to the historian of impersonal issues. It would
+have presented a countenance that was unerringly Anglo-Saxon, though
+modified by the conditions of centuries of changes. One would have
+recognised instinctively the tiller of the soil--the single class which
+has refused concessions to the making of a racial cast of feature. The
+farmer would have stamped his impress indelibly upon the
+plate--retaining that enduring aspect which comes from contact with
+natural forces--that integrity of type which is the sole survival of the
+Virginian pioneer.
+
+In the general face, the softening influences of society, the relaxing
+morality of city life would have appeared only as a wrinkle here and
+there, or as an additional shadow. Beneath the fluctuating expression of
+political sins and heresies, there would have remained the unaltered
+features of the steadfast qualities of the race.
+
+The band in a far corner rolled out "Dixie," and the mass heaved
+momentarily, while a cloud of tobacco smoke rose into the air,
+scattering into circles before the waving of the palm-leaf fans. Here
+and there a man stood up to remove his coat or to stretch his hand to
+the vendor of lemonade. Sometimes the fringe of feet overhanging the
+boxes waved convulsively as a howl of approbation or derision greeted a
+fresh arrival or the remarks of a speaker. Again, there would rise a
+tumultuous call for a party leader or a famous story teller. It was a
+jovial, unkempt, coatless crowd that spat tobacco juice as recklessly
+as it applauded a fine sentiment.
+
+As an unwieldy gentleman, in an alpaca coat, made his appearance upon
+the platform, there was an outburst of emotion from where the tenth
+delegation was seated. The unwieldy gentleman was the Honourable
+Cumberland Crutchfield, a popular aspirant to the governorship.
+
+When Galt entered the hall, an athletic rhetorician was declaiming an
+eulogy which had for its theme the graces of his candidate. "You came
+too soon," observed a man seated next a vacant chair, which Galt took.
+"You should have escaped this infliction."
+
+"My dear fellow, I never escaped an infliction in my life," responded
+Galt serenely. "I cut my teeth on them--but here's another," and he
+turned an indifferent gaze on the orator, who had risen upon the
+platform. "Good Lord, it's Gary!" he groaned. "Now we're in for it."
+
+"Mr. Chairman and gentlemen of the convention," Gary was beginning, "it
+is my pleasant duty to second the nomination of the Honourable
+Cumberland Crutchfield of the gallant little county of Botetourt. Before
+this august body, before this incomparable assemblage of the intellect
+and learning of the State, my tongue would be securely tied ("I'd like
+that little job," grunted the man next to Galt) did not the majesty of
+my subject loosen it to eloquence. Would that the immortal Cicero ("Now
+we're in for it," breathed Galt) in his deathless orations had been
+inspired by the illustrious figure of our fellow-countryman. Gentlemen,
+in the Honourable Cumberland Crutchfield you behold one whose public
+service is an inspiration, whose private life is a benediction--one who
+has borne without abuse the grand old title of the Caesar of Democracy,
+and I dare to stand before you and assert that, had Caesar been a
+Cumberland Crutchfield, there would have been no Brutus. Gentlemen, I
+present to you in the Honourable Cumberland Crutchfield the Vested
+Virgin of Virginia!"
+
+The chairman's gavel fell with a thud. In the uproar which ensued hats,
+fans, sticks filled the air. The tenth delegation rose to a man and
+surged forward, but it was howled down. "Go it, old man!" sang the
+boxes, where the fringe of feet was wildly swaying, and "He's all
+right!" screeched the galleries. To a man who may be made fun of a
+Virginia convention can be kind, but in the confusion Gary had sauntered
+out for a drink.
+
+After his exit the seconding motion flowed on smoothly through several
+tedious speeches; and when the virtues of Mr. Crutchfield had been
+sufficiently exploited Major Baylor requested the nomination of Dudley
+Webb. He spoke warmly along the old heroic lines.
+
+"The gentleman whom I ask you to nominate as your candidate for governor
+stands before his people as one of the foremost statesmen of his day.
+The father fell while defending Virginia; the son has pledged his
+splendid ability and his untiring youth to the same service. From a
+child he has been trained in the love of country and the principles of
+Democracy. In his veins he carries the blood of a race of patriots. From
+his mother's breast he has imbibed the immortal milk of morality. He
+has laboured for his people in a single-hearted service that seeketh not
+its own. There is no man rich enough to buy the good-will of Dudley
+Webb; there is none so poor--"
+
+"That he hasn't a vote to sell him!" called a voice from the pit.
+
+In an instant a chorus of yells rang out from stage to gallery. The man
+who spoke was knocked down by a Webb partisan, and assailant and
+assailed were hustled from the house.
+
+When the uproar was subdued, the thin voice of Mr. Slate sounded from
+the platform.
+
+"What he doesn't sell he buys," he cried in his nervous, penetrant
+tones. "Twelve years ago he was accused of lobbying with full hands in
+the legislature. He was the lobbyist of the P.H. & C. railroad. The
+charge was passed over, not disproved. What do you say to this, Major?"
+
+In the effort to restore order the chairman grew purple, but the major
+turned squarely upon his questioner.
+
+"I say nothing, sir. It is unnecessary to assert that a gentleman is not
+a criminal at large."
+
+A burst of applause broke out.
+
+"I repeat the charge," screamed Slate.
+
+"It is false!" retorted the major.
+
+"It's a damned lie!" called a dozen voices.
+
+"Nick Burr knows it. Ask him!" answered Slate.
+
+From a peaceable assemblage the convention had passed into pandemonium.
+Two thousand throats made, in two thousand different keys, a single
+gigantic discord. The pounding of the chairman was a faint
+accompaniment to the clamour. In the first lull, a man's voice with a
+dominant note was heard demanding recognition, and at the sight of his
+towering figure upon the platform there was a short silence.
+
+"It's Nick Burr!" called a man from Burr's district. "Let's hear Nick
+Burr."
+
+There was a protest on the part of the Webb faction. Burr and Webb were
+looked upon as rivals. "He hates Webb like the devil!" cried a delegate,
+and "It's pie for Burr!" sneered another. But as he moved slightly
+forward and faced the chairman a sudden hush fell before him.
+
+Among the men surrounding him his powerful figure towered like a
+giant's. His abundant red hair, waving thickly from his bulging
+forehead, redeemed by its single note of colour the rigidity of his
+features. His eyes--small, keen, deeply set beneath heavy brows--flashed
+from a dull opacity to an alert animation. But in the first and last
+view of his face it was the mouth that marked the man; the straight,
+thin lips would close or unclose at their own will, not at
+another's--the line of the mouth, like the line of the hard, square jaw,
+was the physical expression of his character. He was called ugly, but it
+was at least the ugliness of individuality--the ugliness of an
+unpolished force--of a raw, yet disciplined energy. Now, as he stood at
+his full height upon the stage, his personality was felt before his
+words were uttered. He had but one attribute of recognised oratory--a
+voice; and yet a voice so little vibrant as to seem almost without
+inflections.
+
+It was resonant, far-reaching, incisive; but it rang abruptly and
+without mellowness.
+
+"Mr. Chairman," he began, and his words were heard from pit to gallery.
+"It is perhaps unnecessary for me to state that I do not rise as an
+advocate of Mr. Webb. I am neither his personal friend nor his political
+supporter, but in the year alluded to by the gentleman from Nottoway I
+was upon a committee appointed to investigate the charges which the
+gentleman from Nottoway has seen fit to revive." A silence had fallen in
+which a whisper might have been heard. Every eye in the building was
+turned to where his outstanding mop of hair shone red against the
+smoke-stained wall. "The charges were thoroughly investigated and
+emphatically withdrawn. The gentleman from Nottoway has been misinformed
+or his memory has misled him--since there was abundant evidence brought
+before the committee to prove the suspicions against Mr. Webb's methods
+as a lobbyist to be absolutely without foundation.
+
+"I have made this statement because I believe myself to be in a better
+position to disprove this old and forgotten charge than any man present.
+As I am a recognised opponent of Mr. Webb's political ambition my
+testimony to the integrity of his personal honour may be of additional
+value."
+
+In the thunder of applause that shook the building he turned for the
+first time towards the house. The cheers that went up to him brought the
+animation to his eyes. The faces in the pit were hidden behind a sea of
+handkerchiefs and hats--it was the response which a Virginia audience
+makes to a brave or a generous action. "Hurrah for honest Nick!" yelled
+the floor, and "Go in and win yourself!" shouted a delegate from his own
+district.
+
+He spoke again, and they were silent.
+
+"Men of Virginia, in the naming of your governor, let us have neither
+subterfuge nor slander. Better than the love of party is the love of
+honesty--and the Democracy of Jefferson cannot thrive upon falsehood.
+Fair means are the only means, honest ends are the only ends. The party
+owes its right to existence to the people's will; when its life must be
+prolonged by artificial stimulants it is fit that it should die. It is
+not the people's master, but the people's servant; if it should usurp
+the oppressor's place, it must die the oppressor's death.
+
+"For fifteen years I have worked a Democrat among you, and it is not
+needed that I should put in words my love for the party I have served;
+but I say to you to-day that if that party were doomed to annihilation
+and a lie could save it, I would not speak it."
+
+He sat down and the uproar began again. Beyond the party were the
+people, and he had touched them. With the force of his personality upon
+it he had become suddenly the hero of the house. "Honest Nick! Honest
+Nick!" shouted the galleries, and the cry was echoed from the pit. When
+order was restored Major Baylor completed his speech; it was seconded by
+a sensible young congressman, and the oratory was cut short by a call
+for votes.
+
+In a flash the chairmen of the different delegations were stung into
+action. A buzz like that of bees swarming rose from the pit and white
+slips of paper fluttered from row to row. The Webb leaders were
+whipping their faction into an enthusiasm that drowned the roll call. At
+last, with the reading of the ballot, there was silence, followed by
+applause. Webb led slightly in advance of Crutchfield; Burr came next,
+Hartley last. With the surprise of the third name, round which there had
+been a rally of uninstructed delegations, a cheer went up. In the
+clamour Burr had risen to ask that his name be withdrawn, but the chorus
+of his newly formed followers howled him down. Then Hartley was dropped
+from the race and a second ballot ordered. The excitement in the
+building could be felt like steam. The heat was rising and a nervous
+tension weighted the atmosphere. Through the clouds of tobacco smoke the
+records of changes sounded distinctly. The Hartley delegation that Webb
+had counted on divided and went two ways; the county of Albemarle passed
+over to Burr; the city of Richmond broke its vote into three equal
+parts.
+
+Each change was received with a roar by the opposing factions--while the
+clerks stumbled on, making alteration upon alteration. On the floor and
+the stage the chairmen thickened in the fight. Ben Galt had sprung
+suddenly into life as Burr's manager, and in the aisle Tom Bassett, in
+his shirt sleeves, with a tally sheet in his hand, was inciting his
+battalion to victory. About him the Webb men were summing up the votes
+needed to bring in their leader. The noise had a dull, baying sound, as
+if the general voice were growing hoarse. The odour of good and bad
+tobacco was dense and stifling. In the midst of the clamour a drunken
+man rose to move that the convention consider the subject in prayer.
+
+Upon the reading of the second ballot the confusion deepened. The name
+of Crutchfield went down, and Burr and Webb ran hotly neck to neck. Then
+the Crutchfield party, which had held bravely together, began to go
+over, and, as each change was made, a shout went up from the successful
+force. Hall and Galt had established themselves on opposite sides of the
+stage and were working with drawn breath. Galt, with a cigar in his
+mouth and a fan in his hand, was the only cool man in the house. He had
+caught the wave of popular enthusiasm before it had had time to break,
+and he was giving it no ground upon which to settle. Tom Bassett in the
+centre aisle was cheering on his workers. He was superb, but the Webb
+men were not behind him; it was still neck to neck. Then, at last, with
+the third ballot, Burr led off, and the voting was over.
+
+There was a call upon the name of the successful candidate, but before
+he stood up the Honourable Cumberland Crutchfield rose to eulogise the
+wisdom of the convention in nominating the man he had tried to defeat.
+The Caesar of Democracy was beaming, despite his disappointment--a
+persistent beam of the flesh.
+
+"Gentlemen, you have made your decision, and it is for me to bow to its
+wisdom. In the Honourable Nick Burr your choice has fallen upon the man
+who will most incite to ardour each individual voter. His record is a
+glorious one,"--for an instant he wavered; then his imagination took a
+blinded leap. "He was born a Democrat, he lives a Democrat, he will die
+a Democrat. In the life of his revered and lamented father, the late
+Alexander P. Burr, he has a shining example of unshaken conviction and
+unswerving loyalty to principle. Gentlemen, you have chosen well, and I
+pledge myself to uphold your nominee and to be the foremost bearer of
+your banner when it waves in next November from the line of Tennessee to
+the Atlantic Ocean."
+
+He sat down amid ecstatic cheers and Nicholas Burr came forward.
+
+His face was grave, but there was the light of enthusiasm in his eyes
+and his head was uplifted.
+
+"There's a man who has capitalised his conscience," sneered a Webb
+follower with a smile.
+
+Across the hall Ben Galt was lighting a cigar, the tattered remains of
+his fan at his feet. "There's a statesman that came a century too late,"
+he remarked to Tom Bassett. "He's a leader, pure and simple, but he's
+out of place in an age when every man's his own patriot."
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+
+The successful man was returning to Kingsborough. He had spent the week
+in Richmond, where he had lived for the past ten years, and he was now
+going back to receive the congratulations of the judge--as he would have
+gone twice the distance.
+
+It was the ordinary car of a Southern railroad, and leaning his head
+against the harsh, bristly plush of the seat, he had before him the
+usual examples of Southern passengers.
+
+Across the aisle a slender mother was holding a crying baby, two small
+children huddling beside her. In the seat in front of him slouched a
+mulatto of the new era--the degenerate descendant of two races that mix
+only to decay. Further off there were several men returning from
+business trips, and across from them sat a pretty girl, asleep, her hand
+resting on a gilded cage containing a startled canary. At intervals she
+was aroused by the flitting figure of a small boy on the way to the
+cooler of iced water. From the rear of the car came the amiable drawl of
+the conductor as he discussed the affairs of the State with a local
+drummer, whose feet rested upon a square leathern case.
+
+Nicholas Burr leaned back and closed his eyes, crossing his long legs
+which were cramped by the limited space. He had already exchanged
+pleasantries with the conductor, and he had chatted for twenty minutes
+with a farmer, who had gone back at last to the smoking-car.
+
+The low, irregular landscape was as familiar to him as his own face. He
+knew it so well that he could see it with closed eyes--could note each
+change of expression where the daylight shifted, could tell where the
+thin cornfields ended and the meadows rolled fresh and green, could
+smell the stretch of young pines above the smoke of the engine, and
+could follow to their ends the rain-washed roads that crawled with
+hidden heads into the blue blur of the distance. He knew it all, but he
+was not thinking of it now.
+
+He was thinking of the day, fifteen years ago, when he had left
+Kingsborough to throw himself and his future into the service of his
+State. He had told himself then, fresh from the influence of Jefferson
+and the traditions of Kingsborough, that he had but one love
+remaining--the love of Virginia. Now, with the bitterer wisdom of
+experience, that youthful romance showed half foolish, half pathetic. To
+the man of twenty-three it had been at once the inspiration and the
+actuality. His personal life had turned to ashes in an hour, and he had
+told himself that his public one, at least, should remain vital. He had
+pledged himself to success, and it came to him now that the cause had
+been won by his single-heartedness--by the absolute oneness of his
+desire. There had been a sole divinity before him, and he had not
+wandered in the way of strange gods. He had given himself, and after
+fifteen years he was gaining his recompense--a recompense for more work
+than most men put into a lifetime.
+
+He smiled slightly as he thought of the beginning. In the beginning his
+sincerity, had been laughed at, his ardour had met rebuff. He had gone
+to Richmond to meet an assembly of statesmen; he had found a body of
+well-intentioned, but unprofitable servants. They were men to be led,
+this he saw; and as soon as his vision was adjusted he had determined
+within himself to become their leader. The day when a legislator meant a
+statesman was done with; it meant merely a man like other men, to be
+juggled with by shrewder politicians or to be tricked by more dishonest
+ones. They plunged into errors, and lived to retrieve them; they walked
+blindfold into traps, and with open eyes struggled out again. For he
+found them honest and he found them faithful where their lights led
+them. He remembered, with a laugh, a New Englander who, after a
+fruitless winter spent in scenting the iniquities of the ruling party,
+had angrily exclaimed that "if politicians were made up of knaves and
+fools, Mason and Dixon's was the geographical line dividing the
+species." Nicholas had retorted, "If to be honest means to be a fool, we
+are fools!" and the New Englander had chuckled homeward.
+
+That was his first winter and he had been nobody. Ah, it was hard work,
+that beginning. He had had to fight party plans and personal prejudices.
+He had had to fight the recognised leaders of the legislature, and he
+had had to fight the men who pulled the strings--the men who stood
+outside and hoodwinked the consciences of the powers within. He had had
+to fight, and he had fought well and long.
+
+He recalled the day of his first decisive victory--the day when he had
+stood alone and the people--the great, free people, the beginning and
+the end of all democracies--had rallied to his standard. He had won the
+people on that day, and he had never lost them.
+
+But he was of the party first and last. In his youth he had believed in
+the divine inspiration of the Jeffersonian principles as he believed in
+God. On the Democratic leaders he had thought to find the mantle of
+Apostolic Succession. He had believed as the judge believed--with the
+passionate credulity of an older political age. Time had tempered, but
+it had not dissipated, his fiery partisanship. He sat to-day with the
+honours of a party upon him--honours that a few months would see
+ratified by a voice nominally the people's. He laughed now as he
+remembered that Galt had said that in five years Dudley Webb would be
+the most popular man in the State. "When Senator Withers stops
+delivering orations, there'll be a call for an orator, and Webb will
+arise," he had prophesied. "They don't need him now because the senator
+gets off speeches like hot cakes; but mark my words, the first time Webb
+is asked to make an address at the unveiling of a Confederate statue,
+there won't be a man to stand up against him in Virginia. He's a better
+speaker than Withers--only the public doesn't know it, and there'll be
+hot times when it finds it out."
+
+The train was slackening for a wayside station. Outside a man was
+driving a plough across a field where grain had been harvested. Nicholas
+followed with his eyes the walk of the horses, the purple-brown trail of
+the plough, the sturdy, independent figure of the driver as he passed,
+whistling an air. Over the Virginian landscape--the landscape of a
+country where each ragged inch of ground wears its strange, distinctive
+charm, where each rotting "worm fence" guards a peculiar beauty for
+those who know it--lay the warm hush of full-blown summer.
+
+The man at the plough aroused in Nicholas Burr a sudden exhilaration as
+of physical exertion. It brought back his boyhood which had brightened
+as he had passed farther from it, and he felt that it would be good on
+such an afternoon to follow the horses across fields that were odorous
+of the upturned earth.
+
+The train went on slowly, with the shiftless slouch of Southern trains,
+the man at the plough vanished, and Nicholas returned to his thoughts.
+
+The years had been almost breathless in their flight. He had put himself
+to a purpose, and he had lost sight of all things save its fulfilment.
+The success that men spoke of with astonished eyes--the transformation
+of the barefooted boy into the triumphant politician, had a firm
+foundation, he knew, though others did not. It was his capacity for toil
+that had made him--not his intellect, but his ability to persevere--the
+power which, in the old days, had successfully carried him through Jerry
+Pollard's store. As chairman of the Democratic Party, men had called his
+campaigns brilliant. He alone knew the tedious processes, the infinite
+patience from which these triumphs had evolved--he alone knew the secret
+and the security of his success.
+
+The train stopped with a lurch.
+
+"Kingsborough, sir!" said the conductor with a friendly touch upon his
+arm.
+
+He started abruptly from his reverie, lifted his bag, and left the car.
+On the platform outside a group of stragglers recognised him, and there
+was a hearty cheer followed by frantic handshakes. The incident pleased
+him, and he spoke to each man singly, calling him by name. The sheriff
+was one of them, and the clerk of the court, and the old negro sexton of
+the church. There was a fervour in their congratulations which brought
+the warmth to his eyes. He was glad that the men who had known him in
+his poverty should rise so cordially to approve his success.
+
+He left the station, walking rapidly to the judge's house. He had
+frequently returned to Kingsborough, but to-day the changes of the last
+fifteen years struck him with a sensation of surprise. The wide, white
+street, half in sunshine, half in shadow, trailed its drowsy length into
+the open country where the roads were filled with grass and dust. He
+noticed with a pang that the ivy had been torn from the church and that
+the glazed brick walls flaunted a nudity that was almost immodest. He
+had remembered it as a bower of shade--a gigantic bird's nest. He saw
+that ancient elms were rapidly decaying, and when he reached the judge's
+garden he found that the syringa and the lilacs had vanished. The garden
+had faced the destroyer in the plough, and trim vegetables thrived where
+gaudy blossoms had once rioted.
+
+As he opened the gate he saw old Caesar bending above the mint bed, and
+he went over to him.
+
+"Dar ain' nuttin better ter jedge er gent'mun by den his mint patch,"
+the old negro was muttering, "an' dis yer one's done w'ar out all dose
+no 'count flow'rs, des' like de quality done w'ar out de trash. Hi!
+Marse Nick, dat you?" he shook the proffered hand, his kindly black face
+wrinkling with hospitality. "Marse George hev got de swelled foot," he
+said in answer to a question, "an' he ain' tech his julep sence de day
+befo' yestiddy. Dis yer's fur you," he added, looking at the bunch in
+his hand.
+
+"You're a trump, Caesar!" exclaimed Nicholas as he ascended the steps and
+entered the wide hall, through which a light breeze was blowing.
+
+The library door was open and he went in softly, lightening
+instinctively his heavy tread. The judge was sitting in his great
+arm-chair, his white head resting against the cushioned back, his
+bandaged foot on a high footstool.
+
+"Is it you, my boy?" he asked, without turning.
+
+Nicholas crossed the room and gripped the outstretched hand which
+trembled slightly in the air, the usual rugged composure of his face
+giving place to frank tenderness.
+
+"I'm sorry to see the gout's troubling you again," he said.
+
+The judge laughed and motioned to a chair beside his desk. His fine dark
+eyes were as bright as ever, and there was a youthful ring in his voice.
+
+"I'm paying for my pleasures like the rest of us," he responded. "The
+truth is, Caesar makes me live too high, the rascal--and I go on a
+bread-and-milk diet once in a while to spite him." Then his tone
+changed; he pushed aside a slender vase of "safrano" roses which
+shadowed Nicholas's face and regarded him with genuine delight. "It's
+good news you bring me," he exclaimed. "I haven't had such news since
+they told me the Democratic Party had wiped out Mahonism. And it was a
+surprise. We thought Dudley Webb was too secure for the chances of the
+'dark horse.' Well, well, I'm sorry for Dudley, though I'm glad for you.
+How did you do it?"
+
+Nicholas laughed, but his face was grave. "Ben Galt says I worked up a
+political 'revival,'" he replied. "He declares my methods were for all
+the world the counterpart of those employed in a Methodist camp meeting,
+but he's joking, of course. It was a distinct surprise to me, as you
+know. I had declined to offer myself as a candidate for the nomination,
+because I believed Webb to be assured of victory. However, the
+Crutchfield party proved stronger than we supposed, and they came over
+to my side. I was the 'dark horse,' as you say."
+
+"It's very good," commented the judge. "Very good."
+
+"Galt is afraid that what he calls 'the political change of heart' won't
+last," Nicholas went on, "but he knows, as I know, that I am the choice
+of the people and that, though a few of the leaders may distrust me, the
+Democratic Party as a body has entire confidence in me. You will
+understand that, had I doubted that the decision was free and
+untrammelled, I should not have accepted the nomination."
+
+The judge nodded with a smile. "I know," he said, "and I also know that
+you were not born to be a politician. You will bear witness to it some
+day. You should have stuck to law. But have you seen Dudley?"
+
+The younger man's face clouded. When he spoke there was a triumphant
+zest in his voice. His deeply-set eyes, which had at times a peculiarly
+opaque quality, were now charged with light. The thick red locks flared
+above his brow.
+
+"He spoke pleasantly to me after the convention," he answered. "It was a
+disappointment to him, I know--and I am sorry," he finished in a forced,
+exclamatory manner, and was silent.
+
+The judge looked at him for a moment before he went on in his even
+tones.
+
+"His wife was telling me," he said. "She was down here a week or two
+before the convention. It seems that they are both anxious to return to
+Richmond to live. She's a fine girl, is Eugie. It was a terrible thing
+about that brother of hers, and she's never recovered from it. I can't
+understand how the boy came to commit such a peculiarly stupid forgery."
+
+A flash of bitterness crossed the other's face; his voice was hard.
+
+"He has missed his deserts," he returned harshly.
+
+"Oh, I don't know, poor fellow," murmured the judge, flinching from a
+twinge of gout and settling his foot more carefully upon the stool. "He
+has been a fugitive from the State for years and a stranger to his wife
+and children. There was always something extraordinary in the fact that
+he escaped after conviction, and I suppose there was a kind of honour in
+his not breaking his bail. At least, that's the way Eugie seems to
+regard it--and it is such a pitiful consolation that we might allow her
+to retain it. She tells me that Bernard's wife has been in destitute
+circumstances. It's a pity! it's a pity! I had always hoped that Tom
+Battle's boy would turn out well."
+
+The younger man met his eyes squarely and spoke in an emotionless voice.
+
+"I should like to see him serving his sentence," he said.
+
+An hour later he left the judge's house and walked out to his old home.
+Since his father's death the place had undergone repairs and
+improvements. The lawn had been cleared off and sown in grass, the
+fences had been mended, and the house had been painted white. It could
+never suggest prosperity, but it had assumed an appearance of comfort.
+
+In the little room next the kitchen he heard his stepmother scolding a
+small negro servant, and he broke in good-humouredly upon her discourse.
+
+"All right, ma?" he called.
+
+Marthy Burr turned and came towards him. She had aged but little, and
+her gaunt figure and sharp face still showed the force of her
+indomitable spirit.
+
+"I declar' if 'tain't you, Nick!" she exclaimed.
+
+He took her in his arms and kissed her perfunctorily, for he was chary
+of caresses. Then he lifted Nannie's baby from the floor and tossed it
+lightly.
+
+"Nannie's spending the day," explained his stepmother with an attempt at
+conversation. "She would name that child Marthy, an' it's the best
+lookin' one she's got."
+
+The baby, a pink-cheeked atom in a blue gingham frock, made a frantic
+clutch at the vivid hair of the giant who held her, and set up a tearful
+disclaimer. Nicholas returned her to the rug, where she attempted to
+swallow a string of spools, and looked at his stepmother.
+
+"Where's that dress I sent you?" he demanded.
+
+Marthy Burr sat down and smoothed out the creases in her purple calico.
+
+"Laid away in camphor," she replied with a diffidence that was rapidly
+waning. "Marthy, if you swallow them spools, you won't have anything to
+play with."
+
+Nicholas looked about the common little room--at the coarse lace
+curtains, the crude chromos, the distorted vases--and returned to his
+question.
+
+"You promised me you'd wear it," he went on.
+
+"Wear my best alpaca every day?" she demanded suspiciously. "I wouldn't
+have it on more'n an hour befo' one of them worthless niggers would have
+spilt bacon gravy all over it. There ain't been no peace in this house
+since you sent those no 'count darkies here to help me. If yo' pa was
+'live, he'd turn them out bag an' baggage befo' sundown. Lord, Lord,
+when I think of what yo' poor pa would say if he was to walk in now an'
+find them creeturs in the kitchen."
+
+Her stepson smiled.
+
+"Now, if you'll sit still a moment, I'll tell you a piece of news," he
+said.
+
+"You ain't thinkin' of gettin' married, air you?" inquired Marthy Burr
+with sudden keenness.
+
+"Married!" He laughed aloud. "I've no time for such nonsense.
+Listen--no, let the baby alone, she isn't choking. If the Powers agree,
+and the Democratic Party triumphs in November, I shall be Governor of
+Virginia on the first of January."
+
+His stepmother looked at him in a dazed way, her glance wandering from
+his face to the baby with the string of spools. There was a pleased
+light in her eyes, but he saw that she was striving in vain to grasp the
+full significance of his words.
+
+"Well, well," she said at last. "I al'ays told Amos you wa'nt no
+fool--but who'd have thought it!"
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+
+The Capitol building at Richmond stands on a slight eminence in a grassy
+square, hiding its gray walls behind a stretch of elms and sycamores, as
+if it had retreated into historic shadow before the ruthless advance of
+the spirit of modernism. In the centre of the square, whose brilliant
+green slopes are intersected by gravelled walks that shine silver in the
+sunlight, the grave old building remains the one distinctive feature of
+a city where Iconoclasm has walked with destroying feet.
+
+A few years ago--so few that it is within the memory of the very
+young--the streets leading from the Capitol were the streets of a
+Southern town--bordered by hospitable Southern houses set in gardens
+where old-fashioned flowers bloomed. Now the gardens are gone and the
+houses are outgrown. Progress has passed, and in its wake there have
+sprung up obvious structures of red brick with brownstone trimmings. The
+young trees leading off into avenues of shade soften the harshness of an
+architecture which would become New York, and which belongs as much to
+Massachusetts as to Virginia.
+
+The very girls who, on past summer afternoons, flitted in bareheaded
+loveliness from door to door, have changed with the changing times. The
+loveliness is perhaps more striking, less distinctive; with the
+flower-like heads have passed the old grace and the old dependence, and
+the undulatory walk has quickened into buoyant briskness. It is all
+modern--as modern as the red brick walls that are building where a
+quaint mansion has fallen.
+
+But in the Capitol Square one forgets to-day and relives yesterday.
+Beneath the calm eyes of the warlike statue of the First American little
+children chase gray squirrels across the grass, and infant carriages with
+beruffled parasols are drawn in white and pink clusters beside the
+benches. Jefferson and Marshall, Henry and Nelson are secure in bronze
+when mere greatness has decayed.
+
+To the left of the Capitol a gravelled drive leads between a short
+avenue of lindens to the turnstile iron gates that open before the
+governor's house. Here, too, there is an atmosphere of the past and the
+picturesque. The lawn, dotted with chrysanthemums and rose trees, leads
+down from the rear of the house to a wall of grapevines that overlooks
+the street below. In front the yard is narrow and broken by a short
+circular walk, in the centre of which a thin fountain plays amid
+long-leaved plants. The house, grave, gray, and old-fashioned--the
+square side porches giving it a delusive suggestion of length--faces
+from its stone steps the thin fountain, the iron gates, beyond which
+stretches the white drive beneath the lindens, and the great bronze
+Washington above his bodyguard of patriots. Between the house and the
+city the square lies like a garden of green.
+
+It was on a bright morning in January that Ben Galt entered one of the
+iron gateways of the square and walked rapidly across to the Capitol.
+
+He ascended the steep flight of stone steps, and paused for an instant
+in the lobby which divided the Senate Chamber from the House of
+Delegates. The legislature had convened some six weeks before, and the
+building was humming like a vast beehive.
+
+In the centre of the tesselated floor of the lobby, which was fitted out
+with rows of earthenware spittoons, stood Houdon's statue of Washington,
+and upon the railing surrounding it groups of men were leaning as they
+talked. Occasionally a speaker would pause to send a mouthful of tobacco
+juice in aimless pursuit of a spittoon, or to slice off a fresh quid
+from the plug he carried in his pocket.
+
+Galt, stopping behind a stout man with sandy hair, tapped him carelessly
+on the shoulder.
+
+"Eh, Major?" he exclaimed.
+
+The major turned, presenting a florid, hairy face, with small, shrewd
+eyes and an unpleasant mouth. His name was Rann, and he was the most
+important figure in the Senate. It was said of him that he had never
+made a speech in his life, but that he was continually speaking through
+the mouths of others. He could command more votes in both branches than
+any member of the Assembly, but his ambition was confined to the
+leadership of the men about him; he had been in the State Senate fifteen
+years, and he had never tried to climb higher, though it was reported
+that he had sent a United States senator to Washington.
+
+"Ah, we'll see you oftener among us now," he said as he wheeled round,
+holding out a huge red hand, "since your friend sits above." He laughed,
+with a motion towards the ceiling, signifying the direction of the
+governor's office. "By the way, I was sorry about that bill you were
+interested in," he went on; "upon my word I was--but we're skittish just
+now on the subject of corporations. Charters are dangerous things--you
+can't tell where they're leading you, eh?--but, on my word, I was
+sorry."
+
+"So was I," responded Galt with peculiar dryness--adding, with the
+frankness for which he was liked and hated, "I'd been dining that
+committee for weeks. Seven of them swore to back me through, and the
+eighth man said he'd go as the others went. My mind was so easy I lost
+sight of them for six hours, and every man John of them voted against
+the bill. I believe you got in a little work in those six hours."
+
+Rann laughed and lowered one puffy eyelid in a blandly unembarrassed
+wink. "Oh, we don't like corporations," he replied, "I think I remarked
+as much. How-de-do, Colonel? Where'd you dine last night? Missed you at
+table."
+
+The colonel was Diggs, and, after a curt nod in his direction, Galt
+pushed his way through the lobbyists and glanced into the House of
+Delegates, where an animated discussion of an oyster bill was in
+progress.
+
+Owing to the absolute supremacy of the Democrats, the body presented the
+effect of a party caucus rather than a legislative branch of opposing
+elements. The few Republicans and Populists were lost in the ruling
+faction.
+
+Galt was nodding here and there to members who recognised him, when his
+arm was touched by a lank countryman who was standing near.
+
+"Eh?" he inquired absently.
+
+"I jest axed you if you reckoned we paid that gentleman over yonder for
+talking that gosh about oyschers?"
+
+Galt bowed. "Why, I suppose so," he responded gravely. "It's a good
+day's work. Am I to presume that you are not interested in oysters?"
+
+"An' he gits fo' dollars a day for saying them things," commented the
+other shortly. "I tell you 'tain't wo'th fo' cents, suh."
+
+He lifted his bony hand and gave a tug at his scraggy beard. In a moment
+he spoke again.
+
+"Can you p'int out the young fellow from Goochland?" he inquired.
+"That's whar I come from."
+
+Galt pointed out the representative in question, and smiled because it
+was a man who had dined with him the evening before.
+
+"That he?" exclaimed the countryman contemptuously. "Why, I've been down
+here sence Saturday, an' that young spark ain't opened his mouth. I
+ain't heerd him mention Goochland sence I come."
+
+"Oh, there's time enough," ventured Galt good-humouredly. "He's young
+yet, and Goochland is immortal!"
+
+"An' I reckon he gits fo' dollars same as the rest," went on the
+stranger reflectively, "jest for settin' thar an' whittlin' at that
+desk. I used to study a good deal about politics fo' I come here, but
+they air jest a blamed swindle, that's what they air."
+
+He turned on his heel, and in a moment Galt entered the elevator and
+ascended to the office of the chief executive.
+
+Reaching the landing he crossed a small gallery, where hung portraits of
+historic Virginians--governors in periwigs and lace ruffles and
+statesmen of a later age in high neckcloths. At the end of a short
+passage he opened the door of the anteroom and faced the private
+secretary, who was busy with his typewriter.
+
+The secretary glanced up, recognised Galt, and gave a cordial nod.
+
+"The governor's got a gentleman in just now who called about the
+boundary line between Virginia and Maryland," he said as Galt sat down.
+"He wants to see you, though, so you'd better wait. For a wonder there's
+nobody else here. Two-thirds of the legislature were up a while ago."
+
+He spoke with an easy intimacy of tone, while the click of the
+typewriter went on rapidly.
+
+Galt nodded in response and, as he did so, the door opened and the
+caller came out.
+
+"You're the very man!" exclaimed a hearty voice, and Nicholas Burr was
+holding out his hand. "Come in. You're the only human being I know who
+is always the right man in the right place. How do you manage it?"
+
+He sat down before his desk, pushing aside the litter of letters and
+pamphlets. "I should like you to glance over this list of appointments,"
+he went on.
+
+"It is what I dropped in about," responded Galt.
+
+He flung himself into an easy chair and stretched his long legs
+comfortably before him. He did not take the list at once, but sat
+staring abstractedly at the freshly papered green walls above the large
+Latrobe stove whose isinglass doors shone like bloodshot eyes.
+
+It was a long cheerful room with three windows which overlooked the
+grassy square. There was a bright red carpet on the floor, and before
+the desk lay a gaudy rug enriched with stiff garlands. In one corner a
+walnut bookcase was filled with papers filed for reference, and the
+shelves across from it were lined with calf-bound "Codes of Virginia."
+Among the pictures on the pale-green walls there were several of
+historic subjects--Washington among his generals and Lee mounted upon
+Traveller. Over the mantel hung an engraving of the United States Senate
+with Clay for the central figure. Beside the desk a cracker box was
+filled with unanswered letters.
+
+"Yes, I dropped in about that," repeated Galt, his gaze returning to the
+rugged features of the man at the desk. "You're not looking well, by the
+way."
+
+The other laughed. "The office seekers have been at me," he replied;
+"but I'm all right. What were you going to say?"
+
+His large, muscular hand lay upon the desk, and as he spoke he fingered
+an open pamphlet. His penetrating eyes were on Galt's face.
+
+Galt lifted the list of names and read it in silence.
+
+"A-ahem!" he said at last and laid it down; then he took it up again.
+
+"I have given a good deal of attention to the educational boards,"
+continued the governor slowly.
+
+"I do not think it is sufficiently realised that only men of the
+highest ability should be placed in control of institutions of
+learning."
+
+"Ah, I see," was Galt's comment. In a moment he spoke abruptly:
+
+"I say, Nick, has it occurred to you to ascertain the direction in which
+the influence of these men will go in the next senatorial election?"
+
+The other hesitated an instant. "Frankly, I have done my best to put
+such questions aside," he answered.
+
+Galt squared round suddenly and faced him; there was a decisive ring in
+his voice.
+
+"The next election comes in two years," he said quietly. "I have it on
+excellent authority that Withers will not seek to succeed himself. His
+health has given out and he is going to the country. Now, remove
+Withers, and there are two men who might take his place in the Senate.
+You know whom I mean?"
+
+"Yes, I know."
+
+Galt went on quickly:
+
+"You want the senatorship?"
+
+"Yes, I want it."
+
+"Very good. Now, Webb and yourself will run that race, and one of you
+will lose it. It's going to be a hot race and a hard winning. There'll
+be some pretty unpleasant work to be done by somebody. You've been in
+the business long enough to know that the methods aren't exactly such as
+you can see your face in."
+
+"All the more need for clean men," broke in Nicholas shortly.
+
+"Just so. But the man who spends his days in the bathtub doesn't walk
+about where mud is flinging. I'm an honest man, please God. You're an
+honest man, and that's why a lot of us are running you with might and
+main and money. But there's an honesty that verges on imbecility, and
+that's the kind that talks itself hoarse when it ought to keep silent.
+Save your talking until you get to the Senate, and then let fly as much
+morality as you please; it won't hurt anybody there, heaven knows. You
+are the man we need, and a few of us know it, though the majority may
+not. But for the next two years give up trying to purify the Democratic
+Party. The party's all right, and it's going to stay so."
+
+"It has been my habit to express my convictions," returned the other
+quickly.
+
+"Then drop the habit," replied Galt with an affectionate glance that
+softened the shrewd alertness of his look. "My dear and valued friend, a
+successful politician does not have convictions; he has emotions.
+Convictions were all right when Madison was President, but that
+gentleman has been in heaven these many years, and they don't thrive
+under the present administration. A party man has got to be a party
+mouthpiece. He may laugh and weep with the people, but he has got to
+vote with the party--and it's the party man who comes out on top. Why,
+look at Withers! Hunt about in his senatorial record and you'll find
+that he has voted against himself time out of number. You and I may call
+that cowardliness, but the party calls it honour and applauds every
+time. That applause has kept him the exponent of the machine and the
+idol of the people, who hear the fuss and imagine it means something.
+Now Webb is like Withers, only smarter. He is just the man to become a
+sounding brass reflector, and there's the danger."
+
+"And yet I defeated him!" suggested the governor.
+
+Galt laughed, with a wave of his thin, nervous hand.
+
+"My dear governor, you are the one great man in State politics, but that
+unimportant fact would not have landed you into your present seat had
+not the little revivalistic episode befuddled the brains of the
+convention."
+
+Nicholas shook his head impatiently. "You make too much of that," he
+said.
+
+"Perhaps. I want to impress upon you that you have a hard fight before
+you. The Webb men are already putting in a little quiet work in the
+legislature--and they have even been after the guards at the
+penitentiary. Major Rann is your man, and he tells me the Webb leaders
+are the quietest, most insidious workers he has ever met. As it is, he
+is your great card, and his influence is immense. Webb would give his
+right hand for him."
+
+The governor tossed the hair from his brow with a quick movement.
+
+"I have the confidence of the people," he said.
+
+"The people! How long does it take a clever politician to befuddle them?
+You aren't new to the business, and you know these things as well as I
+do--or better. I tell you, when Dudley Webb begins to stump the State
+the people will begin to howl for him. He'll win over the women and the
+old Confederates when he gets on the Civil War, and the rest will come
+easy. There won't be need of bogus ballots and disappearing election
+books when the members of the Democratic caucus are sent up next
+session."
+
+"What do you want?" demanded the governor abruptly. He leaned forward,
+his arms on the desk.
+
+Galt tapped the list of appointments significantly.
+
+"As a beginning, I want you to scratch out a good two-thirds of these
+names. The others will go all right. The men I have cross marked are not
+all Webb men to-day, but they will throw their influence on Webb's side
+when the pull comes."
+
+Nicholas took up the list and reread it carefully. "The men I have named
+I believe to be best suited to the positions," he returned. "One, you
+may observe, is a Republican--that will call for hostile criticism--but
+he was beyond doubt the best man. I regret the fact that the majority of
+these men are Webb partisans, but I wish to make these appointments for
+reasons entirely apart from politics."
+
+Galt had risen, and he now stood looking down upon the governor with a
+smile in his eyes.
+
+"So it goes?" he asked, pointing to the sheet of paper.
+
+The other nodded.
+
+"Yes, it goes. I am not a fool, Ben. I wish things were different--but
+it goes."
+
+"And so do I," laughed Galt easily. "You won't mind my remarking, by the
+way, that you are a brick, but a brick in the wrong road. However, you
+hold on to Rann, and the rest of us will hold on to you. Oh, we'll see
+you to-night at Carrie's coming-out affair, of course. The child
+wouldn't have you absent for worlds. If my wife and daughter
+represented the community you might become Dictator of Richmond. Good
+morning!"
+
+As he crossed the little gallery where the portraits hung there was an
+abstracted smile about the corners of his shrewd mouth.
+
+
+
+
+V
+
+
+"Juliet!" called Galt as he swung open his house door.
+
+It was his habit to call for his wife as soon as he crossed the
+threshold, and she was accustomed to respond from the drawing-room, the
+pantry, or the nursery, as the case might be. This evening her voice
+floated from the dining-room, and following the sound he stumbled over a
+shadowy palm and came upon Juliet as she put the last touches to a long
+white table, radiant with cut glass and roses.
+
+She wore a faded blue dressing-gown, caught loosely together, and her
+curling hair, untouched by gray, fell carelessly from its coil across
+her full, fair cheek. She had developed from a fragile girl into a
+rounded matron without losing the peculiar charm of her beauty. The
+abundant curve of her white throat was still angelic in its outline. As
+she leaned over to settle the silver candelabra on the table, the light
+deepened the flush in her face and imparted a shifting radiance to her
+full-blown loveliness.
+
+"How is it, little woman?" asked Galt as he put his arm about the blue
+dressing-gown. "Working yourself to death, are you?"
+
+Since entering his home he had lost entirely the air of business-like
+severity which he had worn all day. He looked young and credulous.
+Juliet laughed with the pettish protest of a half-spoiled wife and drew
+back from the table.
+
+"It is almost time to dress Carrie," she said, "and the ice-cream hasn't
+come. Everything else is here. Did you get dinner downtown?"
+
+"Such as it was--a miserable pretence. For heaven's sake, let's have
+this over and settle down. I only wish it were Carrie's wedding; then we
+might hope for a rest."
+
+"Until Julie comes out--she's nearly fourteen. But you ought to be
+ashamed, when we've been working like Turks. Eugenia cut up every bit of
+the chicken salad and Emma Carr made the mayonnaise--she makes the most
+delicious you ever tasted. Aren't those candelabra visions? Emma lent
+them to me, and Mrs. Randolph sent her oriental lamps. There's the bell
+now! It must be Eugie's extra forks; she said she'd send them as soon as
+she got home."
+
+"Good Lord!" ejaculated Galt feebly. "You are as great at borrowing as
+the children of Israel."
+
+His comments were cut short by the entrance of Eugenia's silver basket,
+accompanied by an enormous punch bowl, which she sent word she had
+remembered at the last moment.
+
+"Bless her heart!" exclaimed Juliet. "She forgets nothing; but I hope
+that bowl won't get broken, it is one somebody brought the general from
+China fifty years ago. Eugie is so careless. She invited the children to
+tea the other afternoon and I found her giving them jam on those old
+Tucker Royal Worcester plates."
+
+She broke off an instant to draw Galt into the reception rooms, where
+her eyes roved sharply over the decorations.
+
+"They look lovely, don't they?" she inquired, rearranging a bowl of
+American Beauty roses. "I got that new man to do them Mrs. Carrington
+told me about--Yes, Carrie, I'm coming! Why, I declare, I haven't seen
+the baby since breakfast. Unnatural mother!"
+
+And she rushed off to the nursery, followed by Galt.
+
+An hour later she was in the drawing-room again, her fair hair caught
+back from her plump cheeks, her white bosom shining through soft falls
+of lace.
+
+"I wonder how a man feels who isn't married to a beauty," remarked Galt,
+watching her matronly vanity dimple beneath his gaze. He was as much her
+lover as he had been more than twenty years ago when pretty Juliet
+Burwell had put back her wedding veil to meet his kiss. The very
+exactions of her petted nature had served to keep alive the passion of
+his youth; she demanded service as her right, and he yielded it as her
+due. The unflinching shrewdness of his professional character, the
+hardness of his business beliefs, had never entered into the atmosphere
+of his home. Juliet possessed to a degree that pervasive womanliness
+which vanquishes mankind. After twenty years of married life in which
+Galt had learned her limitations and her minor sins of temperament, he
+was not able to face her stainless bosom or to meet her pure eyes
+without believing her to be a saint. In his heart he knew Sally Burwell
+to be a nobler woman than Juliet, and yet he never found himself
+regarding Sally through an outward and visible veil of her virtues.
+Even Tom Bassett, who was married to her, had lost the lover in the
+husband, as his emotions had matured into domestic sentiment. Galt had
+seen Sally wrestle for a day with one of her father's headaches, to be
+rewarded by less gratitude than Juliet would receive for the mere laying
+of a white finger on his temple--Sally's services were looked upon by
+those who loved her best as one of the daily facts of life; Juliet's
+came always as an additional bounty.
+
+To Galt himself, the different developments of the two women had become
+a source of almost humorous surprise. After her marriage Sally had sunk
+her future into Tom's; Galt had submerged his own in Juliet's. Behind
+Tom's not too remarkable success Galt had seen always Sally's quicker
+wit and more active nature; to his own ambitions, his love for Juliet
+had been the retarding influence. He had been called "insanely aspiring"
+in his profession, and yet he had sacrificed his career without a murmur
+for the sake of his wife's health. He had sundered his professional
+interests in New York that he might see the colour rebloom in her cheek,
+and neither he nor she had questioned that the loss was justified. In
+return she had rendered him a jealous loyalty and an absorbing wifehood,
+and he had found his happiness apart from his ambition.
+
+Now she dimpled as he looked at her and he pinched her cheek.
+
+"The mother of six children!" he exclaimed; "they're changelings." He
+looked at Carrie, who was flitting nervously from room to room.
+
+"It's a shame she didn't take after you," he added. "She carries the
+curse of my chin."
+
+"She's splendid!" protested Juliet. "I never had such a figure in my
+life; Sally says so. Carrie is a new woman, that's the difference."
+
+"But the old lady's good enough for me," finished Galt triumphantly;
+then he melted towards his daughter. "I dare say she's stunning," he
+observed. "Come here, Carrie, and bear witness that you're as handsome
+as your parents."
+
+Carrie floated up, a straight, fine figure in white organdie, her smooth
+hair shining like satin as it rolled from her brow. Her mouth and chin
+were too strong for beauty, but she was frank and clean and fresh to
+look at.
+
+"Oh, I am just like you," she declared, "and I'm not half so pretty as
+mamma. There's the bell. Somebody's coming!"
+
+There was a rustle of women's skirts on the way upstairs, and in a
+moment several light-coloured gowns were fringed by the palms in the
+doorway.
+
+When the governor entered, several hours later, the rooms were filled
+with warmth and laughter and the vague perfume of women's dresses
+mingled with the odour of American Beauty roses. An old-fashioned polka
+was in the air, and beyond the furthest doorway he saw young people
+dancing. The red candles were burning down, and drops of wax lay like
+flecks of blood upon the floor. Near the entrance, a small, dark woman
+was leaning upon a marble table, and as she saw him she held out a
+cordial hand. She was plain and thin, with pale, startled eyes and a
+mouth that slanted upward at one corner, like a crooked seam. She spoke
+in an abrupt, skipping manner that possessed a surprising fascination.
+
+"Behold the conquering hero!" she exclaimed, her pale eyes roving from
+side to side. "I suppose if you were never late, you would never be
+longed for."
+
+"My dear Miss Preston," protested pretty little Mrs. Carrington, who was
+soft and drowsy, with eyes that reminded one of a ruminating heifer's.
+
+"I assure you, I have been positively longing to have you gratify my
+curiosity," declared Miss Preston. "You know you do such dear, eccentric
+things that we couldn't exist without you--at least I couldn't because I
+should perish of boredom. No, you shan't escape just yet, so stop
+looking at that beautiful Mrs. Galt. You must tell me first if it is
+really true that you once carried a woman out of a burning building in
+your right hand. It is so delightful to be strong, don't you think?"
+
+The governor regarded her gravely. Before her animated chatter his
+gravity became almost grotesque. "The only burning building I was ever
+in was a burning smoke-house," he returned quietly. "I never carried a
+woman out of anything in either hand."
+
+There was a bored expression in his eyes, and he glanced beyond the
+group to where Juliet stood surrounded.
+
+"Pardon me," he said in a moment, and passed on.
+
+In the crowd about him, where pretty women were as plentiful as pinks in
+a garden bed, he moved awkwardly, with the hesitating steps of a man
+who is uncertain of his pathway. His powerful frame and the splendid
+vigour in his daring strides seemed out of place amid a profusion of
+exotics that trembled as he passed. His appearance suggested the
+battlegrounds of nature--high places, or the breadth of the open fields;
+at the plough he would have been grandly picturesque, in the centre of a
+throng of graceful men and women he loomed merely large and ill at ease.
+Above his evening clothes his face showed rough, rather than refined,
+and his stubborn jaw gave an impression of heaviness.
+
+As he reached Juliet she uttered an exclamation of pleasure and held out
+her hand. "Emma, you have heard of my Sunday-school scholar," she said
+to a girl beside her. "My prize scholar, I mean. Sally, have you seen
+the governor?"
+
+Emma Carr, a pink-and-white girl who bore herself with the air of an
+acknowledged belle, bowed, with a platitude that sounded original on her
+lovely lips, and Sally Bassett turned with a hearty handshake.
+
+"And he is our Nick Burr!" she exclaimed. "Tom, where are you?"
+
+She spoke with an impulsive flutter which he had remembered as the
+sparkle of mere girlish liveliness. Now he saw that it had degenerated
+into a restlessness that appeared to result from a continued waste of
+nervous energy. She looked older than Juliet, though she was in fact
+much younger, and her face was drawn and heavily lined as if by years of
+ill-health. Her physical strength was prodigious; one perceived it with
+the suddenness of surprise. Much the same impression was produced by
+her youthful manner in connection with her worn features; yet, in spite
+of her faded prettiness, there was a singular charm in her unabated
+vivacity.
+
+She darted off in pursuit of Tom, to be arrested by the first newcomer
+she encountered, and Nicholas was responding gravely to Juliet's banter
+when his eyes fell full upon Eugenia Battle as she stood at a little
+distance.
+
+He had not seen her for fifteen years, and he started quickly as if from
+an unsuspected shock. She was talking rapidly in her fervent voice, the
+old illumination in her look. Her noble figure, in a straight flaxen
+gown, was drawn against a background of green, her head was bent forward
+on her long white neck, her kindly hands were outstretched. She had
+developed from a girl into a woman, but to him she was unchanged. Her
+face was, perhaps, older, her bosom fuller, but he did not see it--to
+him she appeared as the resurrected spirit of his youth. Miss Carr was
+speaking and he made some brief rejoinder. Eugenia had turned and was
+looking at him; in a moment he heard her voice.
+
+"Are old friends too far beneath the eyes of your excellency?" she
+asked, and he heard the soft laugh pulse in her throat.
+
+Her hand was outstretched, and he took it for an instant in his own.
+
+"I am very glad to see you," he remarked lamely as he let it fall--so
+lamely that he bit his lip at the remembrance. "You are looking well,"
+he added.
+
+"Of course--a woman always looks well at night," she answered lightly.
+"And you," she laughed again, her kindly, unconscious laugh; "you are
+looking--large."
+
+He did not smile. "I have no doubt of it," he responded, and was silent.
+
+Juliet Galt broke in with an affectionate protest. "Eugie is as great a
+tease as ever," she said. "She will be the death of my baby yet. I tell
+her to choose one of her own size, but she never does. She always
+plagues those smaller than herself--or larger."
+
+But Eugenia had turned away to greet a stranger, and in a moment
+Nicholas drew back into a windowed embrasure where the lights were dim.
+
+Suddenly a voice broke upon his ear addressing Juliet Galt--the vibrant
+tones of Dudley Webb. He had come in late and was standing in mock
+helplessness before Juliet and Carrie, his plump white hand vacillating
+between the two.
+
+"I am at a loss!" he exclaimed with an appealing shrug of his shoulders.
+"Which is the debutante?"
+
+Juliet laughed, her cheeks mantling with a pleased blush.
+
+"You're a sad flatterer, Dudley! Isn't he, Eugie?"
+
+Eugenia turned with a questioning glance.
+
+"Oh, it's just his way," she returned good-humouredly. "A kindly
+Providence has decreed that he should cover over my deficiencies."
+
+Dudley protested affably, and ended by giving a hand to each. In the
+crowded rooms he had become at once the picturesque and popular figure.
+His magnetism was immediately felt, and men and women surrounded him in
+small circles, while his pleasant words ran on smoothly, accompanied by
+the ring of his infectious laugh. The luminous pallor of his clear-cut,
+yet fleshy face, was accentuated by the sweep of his dark hair that
+clung closely to his forehead. He seemed to have brought with him into
+the heated rooms the spirit of humour and the zest of life.
+
+From the deep embrasure Nicholas Burr watched curiously the flutter of
+women's skirts and the flicker of candle light on shining heads. Eugenia
+moved easily from group to group, the straight fall of her flaxen gown
+giving her an added height, the dark coil of hair on the nape of her
+long neck seeming to rise above the shoulders of other women. She was
+never silent--for one and all she had some ready words, and her manner
+was cordial, almost affectionate. It was as if she were in the midst of
+a great family party, held together by the ties of blood.
+
+In a far corner Juliet Galt and Emma Carr, the prettiest women in the
+room, sat together upon a corn-coloured divan, and in front of them a
+file of men passed and repassed slowly on their way to and from the
+dining-room, pausing to exchange brief remarks and drifting on
+aimlessly. Near them a fair, pale gentleman, robust and slightly bald,
+with protruding eyes and anaemic lips, had flung himself upon a gilded
+chair, a glass of punch in his hand. He had danced incessantly for hours
+in the adjoining room, and at last, wearied, winded, with a palpitating
+heart, he had found a punch bowl and a gilded chair.
+
+Through the doorway floated music and the laughter of young girls
+intoxicated with the dance. In the hall, some had sought rest upon the
+stairway, and sat in radiant clusters, fanning themselves briskly as
+they talked. There was about them an absence of coquetry as of
+self-consciousness; they were frank, cordial-voiced, almost boyish.
+
+The governor stepped suddenly from the embrasure and ran against Ben
+Galt, who caught his arm.
+
+"I've been searching the house for you," he exclaimed, "after landing my
+twelfth matron in the dining-room." Then catching sight of the other's
+face, he inquired blandly:
+
+"Bored?"
+
+"I am."
+
+Galt gave a comprehending wink.
+
+"So am I. These things are death. I say, don't go! Come into the library
+and we'll lock the door and have supper shoved in through the window,
+while we talk business. I've a decanter of the finest Madeira you ever
+tasted behind the bookcase. Juliet will never know, and I don't care a
+continental if she does. I'm a desperate man!"
+
+"I was just going," replied the governor. "I'm not up to parties; but
+lead off, if it's out of this."
+
+
+
+
+VI
+
+
+It was one o'clock when the governor left Galt's house, and turning into
+Grace Street strolled leisurely in the direction of the Capitol Square.
+The night was sharp with frost and a rising wind drove the shadows on
+the pavement against darkened house-fronts, while behind a far-off
+church spire, a wizened moon shivered through a thin cloud. On the
+silence came the sound of fire bells ringing in the distance.
+
+The bronze Washington in the deserted square shone silver beneath the
+moonlight, and down the frozen slopes the trees stretched out stiffened
+limbs. From the governor's house a broad light streamed, and quickening
+his pace he entered the iron gate, which closed after him with a
+rheumatic cough, and briskly ascended the stone steps. As he drew the
+latch-key from his pocket he was thinking of his library, where the
+firelight fell on cheerful walls and red leathern chairs, and with the
+closing of the door he crossed the hall and entered the first room on
+the left.
+
+A red fire burned in the grate, and the furniture reflected the colour
+until the place seemed pervaded by a visible warmth. The desk in the
+centre of the room, the shining backs of law books, the crimson rugs,
+the engravings on the walls, the easy chair drawn up before the hearth,
+presented to him as he entered now the security of individual isolation.
+He had felt the same sense of restfulness when he had ascended, after
+the day's work, to the little whitewashed attic of his father's house.
+To-night he liked the glow because it suggested warmth, but he could not
+have told off-hand the colour of the carpet or the subjects of the
+engravings on the wall; and had he found a white pine chair in place of
+the red leathern one, he would have used it without an admission of
+discomfort. In the midnight hours he liked the empty house about
+him--the silence and the safeguard of his loneliness. The deserted
+reception-rooms at the end of the hall pleased him by their stillness
+and the cold of their fireless grates. Even the stiff, unyielding
+furniture, in its fancy dress of satin brocade, soothed him by its
+remoteness when he passed it wrapped in thought.
+
+He flung himself into the easy chair, raised the light by which he read,
+and unfolded a newspaper lying upon his desk. As he did so an article
+which concerned himself caught his eye, and he read it with curious
+intentness.
+
+    "THE MAN WITH THE CONSCIENCE.
+
+  REFUSES TO RECOMMEND THE PROPOSED
+    RESTRICTION OF THE SUFFRAGE.
+
+  ATTACHES HIS SIGNATURE TO SEVERAL BILLS.--TO
+    AMEND AND RE-ENACT THE CHARTER OF THE
+       TOWN OF CULPEPER--TO ESTABLISH A
+         FERRY ACROSS THE PIANKITANK."
+
+He reread it abstractedly, pondering not the future of Culpeper or of
+the Piankitank River, but the title by which he was beginning to be
+known:
+
+"The Man with the Conscience!" He had been in office less than a month,
+and three times within the last week he had been called "The Man with
+the Conscience." Once a member of the Senate had declared on the floor
+that the "two strongest factors in present State politics are found to
+be in the will of the people and the conscience of the governor." The
+morning papers had reported it, and when, several days later, he had
+vetoed a bill providing to place certain powers in the hands of a
+corporation that was backed by large capital, he had been hailed again
+as "The Man with the Conscience!" Now he wondered as he read what the
+verdict would be to-morrow, when his refusal to sign a document which
+lay at that moment upon his desk must become widely known. He had
+refused, not because the bill granted too great rights to a corporation,
+but because it needlessly restricted the growth of a railroad. Would his
+refusal in this instance be dubbed "conscience" or "inconsistency"?
+
+At the moment he was the people's man--this he knew. His name was
+cheered by the general voice. As he passed along the street bootblacks
+hurrahed! him. He had determined that the governorship should cease to
+represent a figurehead, and for right or wrong, he was the man of the
+hour.
+
+He laid the paper aside, and lifting a pipe from his desk, slowly
+lighted it. As the smoke curled up, it circled in gray rings upon the
+air, filling the room with the aroma of the Virginia leaf. He watched it
+idly, his mind upon the pile of unopened letters awaiting his attention.
+Above the mantel hung a small oil painting of a Confederate soldier
+after Appomattox, and it reminded him vaguely of some one whom he had
+half forgotten. He followed the trail for a moment and gave it up.
+Higher still was an engraving of Mr. Jefferson Davis, with the
+well-remembered Puritan cast of feature and the severe chin beard.
+Beneath the pictures a trivial ornament stood on the mantel and beside
+it a white rose in water breathed a fading fragrance. A child who had
+come to feed the squirrels in the square had put the rose in his coat,
+and he had transferred it to the glass of water.
+
+He turned towards his desk and took up several cards that he had not
+seen. So Rann had called in his absence--and Vaden and Diggs. As he
+pushed the cards aside, he summoned mentally the men before him and
+weighed the possible values of each. Why had Rann called, he
+wondered--he had an object, of course, for he did not pay so much as a
+call without a purpose. The name evoked the man--he saw him plainly in
+the circles of gray smoke--a stout, square figure, with short legs, his
+plaid socks showing beneath light trousers; a red, hairy face, with a
+wart in his left eyebrow, which was heavier than his right one; a large
+head, prematurely bald, and beneath an almost intellectual forehead, a
+pair of shrewd, intelligent eyes. Rann was a match for any man in
+politics, he knew--the great, silent voice, some one had said--the man
+who was clever enough to let others do his talking for him. Yes, he was
+glad that Rann would back him up.
+
+The remaining callers appeared together in his reverie--Vaden and Diggs.
+They were never mentioned apart, and they never worked singly. They
+were honest men, whose honesty was dangerous because it went with dull
+credulity. In appearance they were so unlike as to make the connection
+ludicrous. Vaden was long, emaciated, with a shrunken chest in which a
+consumptive cough rattled. His face was scholarly, pallid, pleasant to
+look at, and there was a sympathetic quality in his voice which carried
+with it a reminder of past bereavements. Beside the sentimental languor
+which enveloped him, Diggs loomed grotesquely fair and florid, with eyes
+bulging with joviality, and red, repellent, almost gluttonous lips. He
+was a teller of stories and a maker of puns.
+
+They were both honest men and ardent Democrats, but they were in the
+leading strings of sharper politicians. Perhaps, after all, the fools
+were more to be feared than the villains.
+
+Somewhere in the city a clock rang the hour, and, as his pipe died out,
+he rose and went to his desk.
+
+The next morning Vaden and Diggs dropped in to breakfast, and before it
+was over he had ascertained that they were seeking to sound him upon his
+attitude towards the recent National Party Platform. As he dodged their
+laboured cross-examination he laughed at the overdone assumption of
+indifference. Before they had risen from the table, Rann joined them,
+and the conversation branched at once into impersonal topics. Diggs told
+a story or two, at which Rann roared appreciatively, while Vaden
+fingered his coffee spoon in pensive abstraction.
+
+As they left the dining-room, which was in the basement, and ascended to
+the hall, Diggs glanced into the reception-rooms and nodded respectfully
+at the brocaded chairs.
+
+"I like the looks of that, governor," he said, "but it's a pity you
+can't find a wife. A woman gives an air to things, you know." Then he
+cocked an eye at the ceiling. "This old house ain't much more than a
+fire trap, anyway," he added. "The trouble is it's gotten old-fashioned
+just like the Capitol building over there. My constituents are all in
+favour of doing the proud thing by Virginia and giving her a real
+up-to-date State House. Bless my life, the old Commonwealth deserves a
+brownstone front--now don't she?"
+
+He appealed to Rann, who dissented in his broad, if blunt, intelligence.
+
+"I wouldn't trade that old building for all the brownstone between here
+and New York harbour," he declared.
+
+The governor laughed abstractedly, but a week later he recalled the
+proposition as he sat in Juliet Galt's drawing-room, and repeated it for
+the sake of her frank disgust.
+
+"I shall tell Eugie," she exclaimed. "Eugie finds everything so new that
+she suffers a perpetual homesickness for Kingsborough."
+
+"There's nobody left down there except the judge and Mrs. Webb," broke
+in Carrie; "and you know she gets on dreadfully with Mrs. Webb--now
+doesn't she, Aunt Sally?"
+
+"She never told me so," laughed Sally, "but I strongly suspect it. I
+don't disguise the fact that I consider Mrs. Webb to be a terror, and
+Eugie's a long way off from saintship."
+
+"I hardly think that Mrs. Webb would consent to join our colony,"
+observed Nicholas indifferently.
+
+"May Kingsborough long enjoy her rule," added Juliet. "I hear that she
+has grown quite amiable towards the judge since she prophesied that he
+would have chronic gout and he had it."
+
+"It would be so nice of them to marry each other," suggested Carrie with
+an eye for matrimonial interests. "You needn't shake your head, mamma.
+Aunt Sally said the same thing to Uncle Tom."
+
+She was standing on the hearth rug in her walking gown, slowly fastening
+her gloves. Sally looked at her and laughed in her nervous way.
+
+"Well, I confess that it did cross my mind," she admitted. "Tom, like
+all men, believed Mrs. Webb to be a martyr until I convinced him that
+she martyred others."
+
+"Oh, he still believes it behind your back," said Nicholas.
+
+Juliet turned upon him frankly. "It's a shame to destroy wifely
+confidence," she protested. "Sally hasn't been married long enough to
+know that the only way to convince a husband is to argue against
+oneself."
+
+Her head rested upon the cushions of her chair, and her pretty foot was
+on the brass fender. There was a cordial warmth about her which turned
+the simple room into home for even the casual caller. The matronly grace
+of her movements evoked the memory of infancy and motherhood; to
+Nicholas Burr she seemed, in her beauty and her abundance, the supreme
+expression of a type--of the joyous racial mother of all men.
+
+Her youngest child, a girl of three, that she called "baby," had come in
+from a walk and was standing at her knee in white cap and cloak and
+mittens, her hand clutching Juliet's dress, her solemn eyes on the
+governor. He had tried to induce her to approach, but she held off and
+regarded him without a smile.
+
+"Now, now, baby," pleaded Juliet, "who fed the bunnies with you the
+other day?"
+
+"Man," responded the baby gravely.
+
+"Who gave you nice nuts for the dear bunnies?"
+
+"Man."
+
+"Who carried you all round the pretty square?"
+
+"Man."
+
+"Who gave you that lovely picture book full of animals?"
+
+"Man."
+
+"Then don't you love the kind man?"
+
+"Noth."
+
+"Yes, you do--you've forgotten. Go and speak to him."
+
+The child approached gravely to make a grab at his watch-chain; he
+lifted her to his knee, and friendship was established. They were at
+peace a moment later when a voice was heard in the hall, and the
+curtains were swung back as Eugenia Webb entered, tall and glowing, her
+head rising from a collar of fur. She brought with her the breath of
+frost, and the winter red was in her cheeks, fading slowly as she sat
+down and threw off her wraps. He saw then that she looked older than he
+thought and that her elastic figure had settled into matronly lines.
+
+She raised her spotted veil and drew off her gloves.
+
+"I mustn't talk myself out," she was saying lightly, "because Dudley
+means to make me bring him to call this evening. I can't induce him to
+come by himself--he simply won't. He considers, my mission in life to be
+the combined duties of paying his calls and entertaining his
+legislators. We had six senators to dinner last night, and we pay six
+visits this evening. Come here, Tweedle-dee," to the baby. "Come to your
+own Aunt Eugie and give her a kiss."
+
+The child looked at her thoughtfully and shook her head.
+
+"Kith man," she responded shortly.
+
+The swift red rose to Eugenia's face. Nicholas was looking at her, and
+her eyes flashed with the old anger at a senseless blush.
+
+"That's right, old lady," said the governor to the child. "Tell her
+you'd rather kiss a man every time."
+
+"Of course she had," replied Eugenia half angrily. "She's going to be
+her mother all over again."
+
+Juliet laughed her full, soft laugh. "Now, Eugie," she protested gaily,
+"my sins are many, but spare me a public confession of them."
+
+"She takes after her aunt," put in Sally frankly. "I always liked men
+better, and I think it's unwomanly not to--don't you, governor?"
+
+Nicholas put the child down and rose.
+
+"I'm afraid my womanliness is only skin deep," he returned, "but I
+wouldn't give one honest man for all the women since Eve."
+
+"Behold our far-famed gallantry!" exclaimed Sally.
+
+Eugenia looked up, laughing. She had seized upon the child, and he saw
+her dark eyes above the solemn blue ones.
+
+"I'm afraid you aren't much of a politician, Governor Burr, if you tell
+the truth so roundly," she said. "The first lesson in politics is to lie
+and love it; the second lesson is to lie and live it. Oh, we've been in
+Congress, Dudley and I."
+
+She moved restlessly, and her colour came and went like a flame that
+flickers and revives. He wondered vaguely at her nervous animation--she
+had not possessed a nerve in her girlhood--nor had he seen this shifting
+restlessness the other night. It did not occur to him that the meeting
+with himself was the cause--he knew her too well--but had his presence,
+or some greater thing, aroused within, her painful memories of the past?
+
+As he walked down Franklin Street a little later he contrasted boldly
+the two Eugenias he had known--the Eugenia who was his and the Eugenia
+who was Dudley Webb's. After fifteen years the rapture and the agony of
+his youth showed grotesque to his later vision; men did not love like
+that at forty years. He could see Eugenia now without the quiver of a
+pulse; he could sit across from her, knowing that she was the wife of
+another, and could eat his dinner. His passion was dead, but where it
+had bloomed something else drew life and helped him to live. He had
+loved one woman and he loved her still, though with a love which in his
+youth he would have held to be as ashes beside his flame. There were
+months--even years--when he did not think of her; when he thought
+profoundly of other things; but in these years the thrill of no woman's
+skirts had disturbed his calm. And again, there were winter
+evenings--evenings when he sat beside the hearth, and there came to him
+the thought of a home and children--of a woman's presence and a child's
+laugh. He could have loved the woman well had she been Eugenia, and he
+could have loved the child had it been hers; but beyond her went neither
+his vision nor his desire.
+
+Now he swung on, large, forceful, a man young enough to feel, yet old
+enough to know. He entered his door quickly, as was his custom,
+impatient for his work and his fireside. On his desk lay the papers that
+had been brought over by his secretary, and he ran his fingers
+carelessly through them, gleaning indifferently the drift of their
+contents. As he did so a light flashed suddenly upon him, and the
+meaning of Eugenia's restlessness was made clear, for upon his desk was
+an application for the pardon of Bernard Battle.
+
+
+
+
+VII
+
+
+The paper was still in his hand when the door behind him opened.
+
+"A lady to see you, suh."
+
+"A lady?" He turned impatiently to find himself facing Eugenia Webb. She
+had come so swiftly, with a silence so apparitional, that he fell back
+as from a blow between the eyes. For a moment he doubted her reality,
+and then the glow in her face, the mist on her furs, the fog of her
+breath, proclaimed that she had followed closely upon his footsteps. She
+must have been almost beside him when he hurried through the frost.
+
+"You wish to speak to me?" he asked blankly, as he drew a chair to the
+hearth rug. "Will you not sit down?"
+
+There was an unfriendly question in his eyes, and she met it boldly with
+the old dash of impulse.
+
+"They told me that to-morrow would be too late," she said. "I went to
+Ben Galt's to ask him to come to you in my place, but he is out of town.
+I found you there instead. It is a matter of life and death to me, so I
+came."
+
+She sat down in the chair he had drawn up for her, her muff fell to the
+floor, and he placed it upon the desk where the petition lay unrolled.
+As he did so he saw the list of names that presented the appeal--judge,
+jury, prosecuting attorney, all were there.
+
+She followed his gaze and moved slightly towards him. "It can't be true
+that you--that you will not--" she said.
+
+He was stirring the fire into flame, but as she broke off he turned
+squarely upon her.
+
+"I have not looked into the case," he answered harshly.
+
+He was standing beside his own hearthstone and he was at ease. There was
+no awkwardness about him now; his height endowed him with majesty, and
+in his inflexible face there was no suggestion of heaviness. He looked a
+man with a sublime self-confidence.
+
+Her colour beat quickly back, warming her eyes.
+
+"Oh, I am so glad," she said. "When you know all you will do as we ask
+you, because it is right and just. If he did not serve that two years'
+sentence he has served six years of poverty and sickness. He is a
+wreck--we should not know him, they say--and he has not seen his wife
+and children for--"
+
+He raised his hand and stopped her. A rising anger clouded his face,
+and, as she met his eyes, she slowly whitened.
+
+"And you ask me--me of all men--to show mercy to Bernard Battle? Was
+there not a governor of Virginia before me?"
+
+She shook her head.
+
+"Oh, it was different then--he did not know, and we did not know,
+everything. For years we had not heard from him--"
+
+"So my predecessor refused?" he asked.
+
+She bowed her head. "But it is so different now--every one is with us."
+
+He was looking her over grimly in an anger that seemed an emotional
+reversion to the past--as he felt himself reverting with all his
+strength to the original savage of the race. The hour for which he had
+starved sixteen years ago was unfolding for him at last. He gloated over
+it with a passion that would sicken him when it was done.
+
+"When you came to me," he said slowly, "did you remember--"
+
+She had risen and was standing before him, her hands hidden in the fur
+upon her bosom. She was pleading now with startled eyes and cold
+lips--she who had turned from him when the first lie was spoken--she was
+pleading for the man who had blackened his friend's honour that he might
+shield his own--she was pleading though she knew his baseness. The very
+nobility of her posture--the nobility that he had found outwardly in no
+other woman--hardened the man before her. The cold brow, the fervent
+mouth, the fearless eyes, the lines with which Time had chastened into
+womanliness her girlish figure--these had become the expression of an
+invincible regret. As he faced her the iron of his nature held him as in
+a vise, for life, which had made him a just man, had not made him a
+gentle one.
+
+But her spirit had risen to match with his. "He wronged you once," she
+said; "let it pass--we have all been young and very ignorant; but we do
+not make our lives, thank God."
+
+He looked at her in silence.
+
+Then, as he stood there, the walls of the room passed from before his
+eyes, and the gray light from the western window was falling upon the
+white road beyond the cedars. The vague pasture swept to the far-off
+horizon where hung the solitary star above the sunset. From the west a
+light wind blew, and into their faces dead leaves whirled from denuded
+trees far distant. But surest of all was this--he hated now as he hated
+then. "As for him--may God, in His mercy, damn him," he had said.
+
+"Because he wronged you do not wrong yourself," she spoke fearlessly,
+but she fell back with an upward movement of her hands. The man was
+before her as the memory had been for years--she knew the distorted
+features, the convulsed, closed mouth, the furrow that cleft the
+forehead like a scar. She saw the savage as she had seen it once before,
+and she braved it now as she had braved it then.
+
+"You are hard--as hard as life," she said.
+
+"Life is as we make it," he retorted. He lifted her muff from the desk
+and she took it from him, turning towards the door. As he followed her
+into the hall he spoke slowly: "I shall read the papers that relate to
+the case," he said. "I shall do my duty. You were mistaken if you
+supposed that your coming to me would influence my decision. Personal
+appeal rarely avails and is often painful."
+
+He unlatched the outer door and she passed out and descended the steps.
+
+When he returned to the fire he was shivering from the draught let in by
+the opening doors, and, lifting the fallen poker, he attacked almost
+fiercely the slumbering coals. The physical shock had not tempered the
+rage within; he felt it gnawing upon his entrails like a beast of prey.
+Once only in his life had he found himself so powerless before a
+devouring passion, and then, as now, he had glutted it with wounded
+love. Then, as now, he had hated with a terrible desire.
+
+The application lay upon his desk, and he pushed it out of sight. He
+could not read it now--he wondered if the time would ever come when he
+could read it. The thought smote him with the lash of fear--the fear of
+himself. He who an hour ago had held his assurance to be beyond assault
+was now watching for the death of his hate as he might have watched for
+the death of a wolf whose fangs he had felt.
+
+Lifting his head, he could see through the curtained window the chill
+slopes of the square and the circular drive beneath the great bronze
+Washington. Beyond the distant gates rose the church spires of the city,
+suffused with the pink flush of sunset. The atmosphere glowed like a
+blush upon the perspective, which was shading through variations of
+violet remoteness. All was frozen save the winter sunset and the
+advancing twilight.
+
+He turned from the window and faced the painting of the Confederate
+soldier. For a moment he regarded it blankly, then, pushing aside
+Eugenia's chair he threw himself into one across from it. He was
+thinking of Bernard Battle, and he remembered suddenly that he must have
+hated him always--that he had hated him long ago in his childhood when
+the weak-faced boy had headed a school faction against him. True, Dudley
+Webb had incited the attempt at social ostracism, but he bore no
+resentment against Dudley--on the contrary, he was convinced that he
+liked him in spite of all--in spite, even, of Eugenia. With the
+inflexible fairness that he never lost, he knew that, with Eugenia,
+Dudley had not wronged him. It had been a fight in open field, and
+Dudley had won. He had even liked the vigour of his wooing, and some
+years later, when they had met, he had given the victor a hearty
+handshake. He distrusted him as a politician, but he liked him as a man.
+
+And Bernard Battle. That was an honest hate, and he hugged it to him.
+Before him still, so vivid that it seemed but yesterday, hovered the
+memory of that wild evening in the road, and the unforgotten sunset
+faced him as he hurried through the wood. In the acuteness of his
+remembered senses he could hear the dead leaves rustle in his pathway
+and could smell the vague scents of autumn drifting on the wind. Through
+all the years of public life and passionate endeavour he had not lost
+one colour of the painted clouds or missed one note from the sharp
+tangle of autumn odours. To this day the going down of the sun in red
+and gold awoke within him the impulse of revenge, and the effluvium of
+rotting flowers or the tang of pines revived the duller ache of his
+senseless rage.
+
+On that evening he had buried his youth with his youthful passion. The
+hours between the twilight and the dawn had seen his emotions consumed
+and his softer side laid waste. Since then he had not played saint or
+martyr; he had gone his way among women, and he had liked some good ones
+and some bad ones--but the turn of Eugenia's head or the trick of her
+voice had haunted him in one and all. He had followed the resemblance
+and had found the vacancy; he had been from first to last a man of one
+ideal. His nature had broadened, hardened, rung metallic to the senses;
+but it had not yielded to the shock of fresh emotions. He had loved one
+woman from her childhood up.
+
+And again she rose before him as in that Indian summer when he knew her
+best--her beauty flaming against the autumn landscape, "clear as the
+sun, and terrible as an army with banners." He saw her red or pale,
+quivering or cold, always passing from him in a splendour of colours
+that was like the clash of music.
+
+That was sixteen years ago and it seemed but yesterday. He had lost her,
+and yet he had not been unhappy, for he had learned that it is not gain
+that makes happiness nor loss that kills it. Life had long since taught
+him the lesson all great men learn--that happiness is but one result of
+the adjustment of the individual needs to the Eternal Laws. A man had
+once said of him, "Burr must think a lot of life; he bears it so blamed
+well. He's the happiest man I know," and Burr, overhearing him, had
+laughed aloud:
+
+"Am I? I have never thought about it."
+
+He did not think about life, he lived it; this was the beginning and the
+end of his success.
+
+The face of Eugenia faded slowly into the firelight, and he rose and
+shook himself like a man who awakes from a nightmare. There was work for
+him at his desk, and he settled to it with sudden determination.
+
+A week later the papers were still in his desk. He told himself at first
+that he would send them to Kingsborough to Judge Bassett and abide by
+his decision; but the course struck him as cowardly and he put it from
+him. The work was his and he would do it. Then for a week longer he went
+on his way and did not think of them. His days were filled with work and
+it was easy to leave disturbing thoughts alone; what was not easy was to
+consider them judicially.
+
+At last Galt spoke of the matter, and he could not refuse to listen.
+
+"By the way, I am hearing a good deal about that Battle pardon," Galt
+said. "You are looking into the matter, I suppose?"
+
+The other shook his head.
+
+"I have not done so as yet," he answered. "I am waiting."
+
+"Don't wait too long or the poor devil may apply higher. He's ill, I
+believe, and if he insists on returning to the State, as they say he
+will, the law can't help but arrest him. It's a sad case. So far as I
+can see he was a catspaw for the real criminal and didn't have sense
+enough to hold on to a share of the money after he sold himself. His
+sister has been to see you, hasn't she? She's a superb woman, and it was
+a good day for Dudley Webb when he married her."
+
+He looked up inquiringly.
+
+"Ah, what were you saying?" asked the governor.
+
+That night he locked himself in with the papers and plunged into the
+case. He read and reread each written word until he was in possession of
+the minutest detail. In another instance he knew that the reasons for
+granting the pardon would have seemed sufficient, and he would probably
+have had it made out at once. As it was, he admitted the force of the
+appeal, but something stronger than himself held him back. Above the
+name before him he saw the girlish face of the man he hated--saw it
+accusing, defying, beseeching--and beyond it he saw the gray road and
+the solitary star above the sunset. In the silence his own voice echoed,
+"As for him--may God, in His mercy, damn him."
+
+He locked the papers away again. "I cannot do it," he said.
+
+Several days later he sent for a member of the legislature from the town
+where the crime was committed. He questioned him closely, but without
+result--the people up there were tired of it, the man said--at first
+they had been wrought up, but six years is a long time, and they didn't
+care much about it now. As the governor closed the interview he realised
+that he had hoped a bitter hope that his revenge might be justified.
+When the door had shut, he went back to the case again, and again he
+left it. "It ought to be done, but, God help me, I cannot do it," he
+said.
+
+The next morning, while he was at work in his office in the Capitol, his
+secretary came in to tell him that Miss Christina Battle was in the
+anteroom. He rose hurriedly. "I will see her at once," he said, and he
+opened the door as Miss Chris came in, panting softly from her ascent in
+the elevator.
+
+She had changed so little that he took her hand in sudden timidity,
+recalling the days when he had sold her chickens before her hen-house
+door. But when he had settled her in one of the cane rocking-chairs
+beside the stove, his confidence returned and he responded heartily to
+her beneficent beam. Her florid face, shining large and luminous above
+the stiff black strings of her bonnet, reminded him of illustrations he
+had seen in which the sun is endowed with human features and an
+enveloping smile.
+
+"This is the greatest honour my office has brought me," he said with
+sincerity.
+
+She laughed softly, smoothing her black kid glove above her plump wrist.
+
+"I don't know what they mean by saying you aren't a lady's man, Governor
+Burr," she returned. "I am sure old Judge Blitherstone himself never
+turned a prettier compliment, and he lived to be upwards of ninety and
+did them better every day of his life. They used to say that when Mrs.
+Peachy Tucker dropped in to see him as he was breathing his last, and
+told him to look forward to the joys of heaven and the communion of
+saints, he replied, 'Madam, if you remain with me I shall merely pass
+from one heaven to another,' and they were his last words."
+
+The governor smiled into her beautiful, girlish eyes. "Men have spoken
+worse ones," he said, her kindliness warming him like a cordial.
+
+"It was good of you to come," he added.
+
+"Not a bit of it," protested Miss Chris with emphasis. "It's all about
+that poor, foolish boy--he's still a boy to me, and so are you for that
+matter. You know how wicked he has been and how miserable he has made us
+all, for you can't stop loving people just because they are bad. Now you
+are a good man, Governor Burr, and that's why I came to you. You'll do
+right if it kills you, and whatever you do in this matter is going to
+be the right thing. You can't help being good any more than he can help
+being bad, and I hope the Lord understands this as well as I do--I don't
+know, I'm sure--sometimes it looks as if He didn't; but we'd just as
+well trust Him, because there's nothing else for us to do.
+
+"Now the foolish boy wronged you more than he wronged us; but you'll
+forgive him as we forgave him, when you know what he's suffered. It's
+better to be sinned against than to sin, God knows."
+
+Her eyes were moist and her lips trembled. The governor crossed to where
+she sat and took her hand.
+
+"Dear Miss Chris," he said, "women like you make men heroes." And he
+added quickly, "The pardon is being made out. When it is ready I will
+sign it."
+
+She looked at him an instant in silence; then she rose heavily to her
+feet, leaning upon his arm. "You're a great man, Nick Burr," she said
+softly.
+
+An hour later Nicholas Burr looked calmly down upon his signature that
+meant freedom for Bernard Battle. He had won the victory of his life,
+and he was feeling with a glow of self-appreciation that he had done a
+generous thing.
+
+
+
+
+VIII
+
+
+Miss Chris, in her hired carriage, rolled leisurely into Franklin
+Street, where pretty women in visiting gowns were going in and out of
+doorways. She leaned out and bowed smilingly several times, but she was
+not thinking of the gracefully dressed callers or of the houses into
+which they went. When Emma Carr threw her a kiss from Galt's porch, she
+responded amiably; but she was as blind to the affectionate gesture as
+to the striking beauty of the girl in her winter furs.
+
+Up the quiet street the leafless trees made a gray vista that melted
+into transparent mist. The sunshine stretched in pale gold bars from
+sidewalk to sidewalk, and overhead the sky was of a rare Italian blue.
+But for the frost in the air and the naked boughs, it might have been a
+day in April.
+
+Presently the carriage turned into Main Street, halting abruptly while a
+trolley car shot past. "Please be very careful," called Miss Chris
+nervously, gathering herself together as they stopped before a big gray
+house that faced a gray church on the opposite corner. A flight of stone
+steps ran from the doorway to a short tesselated entrance leading to the
+street, where two scraggy poplars still held aloft the withered
+skeletons of last year's tulips. The Webbs had taken the house because
+the box bushes in the yard reminded Eugenia of Battle Hall, while
+Dudley declared it to be the best breathing space he could get for the
+money.
+
+"We done git back, Mistis," announced the negro driver, descending from
+his perch, and at the same instant the door of the house flew open and
+Eugenia ran out, bareheaded, followed by Dudley.
+
+"I saw you from the window, Aunt Chris," she cried, "and now I want to
+know the meaning of this mystery. Dudley suspects you of having a lover,
+but I am positive that you've stolen a march on me and have been to
+market. What a pity I confessed to you that I couldn't tell brains from
+sweetbreads."
+
+"Let me get there, Eugie," said Dudley, as Miss Chris emerged with the
+assistance of the driver. "Take my arm, Aunt Chris, and I'll hoist you
+into the house before you know it."
+
+"Well, I declare," remarked Miss Chris, carefully stepping forth. "I
+don't know when I've had such a turn. These street car drivers have lost
+all their manners. If we hadn't pulled up in time, I believe he would
+have gone right into us. And to think that a few years ago we never got
+ready to go to market until the car was at the door. Betty Taylor used
+to call to the driver every morning to wait till she put on her
+bonnet--and time and again I've seen him stop because she had forgotten
+her list of groceries. Now, if you weren't standing right on the corner,
+I actually believe they'd go by without you."
+
+"That's progress, Aunt Chris," responded Dudley cheerfully.
+
+Here the driver insisted upon lending a hand, and between them they
+established Miss Chris before the fire in the sitting-room. "I wish
+you'd make Giles go out and pick up that loose paper that's scattered on
+the pavement," she said to Eugenia. "It looks so untidy. If I wasn't
+rheumatic I'd do it myself."
+
+Dudley and Eugenia seated themselves across from her. "Now where have
+you been, Aunt Chris?" they demanded.
+
+Miss Chris laughed softly as she took off her bonnet and gloves and gave
+them to Eugenia; then she unfastened her cape and passed it over.
+
+"You'll never find out that, my dears," she returned. "I'm not too old
+to keep a secret. Why, I've gone and lost my bag. Didn't I carry that
+bag with me, Eugenia?"
+
+"Of course you did," said Eugenia. "Never mind, I'll make you another."
+She went out to put away Miss Chris's wraps, and came back presently,
+laughing.
+
+"Have you found out her secret, Dudley?" she asked. "If she doesn't tell
+you, it will die with her."
+
+"I know better than to ask," returned Dudley good-humouredly. "That's
+the reason I'm her favourite. I don't ask impertinent questions, do I,
+Aunt Chris?"
+
+"Bless you, no," responded Miss Chris serenely, as she stretched out her
+feet in their cloth shoes.
+
+"You're her favourite because you happen to be a man," protested
+Eugenia. "She comes of a generation of man spoilers. I believe she
+thinks I ought to bring you your slippers in the evening--now don't you,
+Aunt Chris?"
+
+"My dear mother always brought them to my father," replied Miss Chris
+placidly. "It was her pleasure to wait on him."
+
+"And it is mine to have Dudley wait on me. But you do make an unfair
+difference between us, Aunt Chris. Why did you call me 'uncharitable'
+when I said Mrs. Gordon painted immodestly! Dudley said the same thing
+this morning, and you only smiled."
+
+"It was uncharitable, my dear, and besides it is too palpable to need
+mention--but men will be men."
+
+Eugenia frowned. "I wish you would occasionally remember that women will
+be women," she suggested. She wore a scarlet shirtwaist, and the glow
+from the fire seemed to follow her about.
+
+"I won't have Aunt Chris bullied, Eugie," declared Dudley as he rose.
+"Well, I'm off again. I may bring a legislator or two back to dinner.
+What have we got?"
+
+"The Lord knows," replied Eugenia desperately. "Our third cook this
+month for one thing, and Congo refuses to serve dinner in courses. He
+says 'dar's too much shufflin' er de dishes for too little victuals.'"
+
+Dudley laughed at her mimicry.
+
+"Oh, I suppose we'll do," he said. "By the way, don't forget to call on
+Mrs. Rann to-day."
+
+Miss Chris was gazing placidly into the fire. As Dudley turned with his
+hand on the door knob, she looked up.
+
+"I was surprised to find the Capitol so dirty," she observed
+regretfully.
+
+Dudley swung round breathlessly.
+
+"Well, I am--blessed!" he gasped.
+
+"So that's where you've been!" cried Eugenia. She threw herself beside
+Miss Chris's chair. "What did he say, Aunt Chris?" she implored.
+
+Miss Chris blushed with confusion.
+
+"Well, if I haven't let it out!" she exclaimed. "Who'd have thought I
+couldn't keep a secret at my age." Then she patted Eugenia's hand. "He's
+a good man," she said softly, "and it's all right about Bernard."
+
+"I knew it would be," said Dudley quickly. "You know, Eugie, I always
+told you he'd do it."
+
+But Eugenia had turned away with swimming eyes. "I must tell Lottie,"
+she said hurriedly. "Oh, Aunt Chris, how could you keep it? To think the
+children are at school!"
+
+Dudley, with an afterthought, turned from the door and gave her an
+affectionate pat on the shoulder. "It's fine news, old girl," he said
+cheerfully, and Eugenia smiled at him through her tears.
+
+As he went out she followed him into the hall and slowly ascended the
+stairs. On the landing above she entered a room where Bernard's wife was
+lying on a wicker couch, cutting the pages of a magazine.
+
+"Lottie, I've good news for you," she exclaimed, "the best of news."
+
+Lottie tossed aside the magazine and raised herself on her elbow. She
+had a pretty, ineffectual face and a girlish figure, and, despite her
+faded colouring, looked almost helplessly young. Her round white hands
+were as weak as a child's.
+
+"I'm sure I don't know what it can be," she returned. "You look awfully
+well in that red waist, Eugie. I think I'll get one like it."
+
+Eugenia picked up a child's story book from the rug and laid it on the
+table; then she stood looking gravely down on the younger woman.
+
+"Can't you guess what it is?" she asked.
+
+Lottie looked up with a nervous blinking of her eyes. She had paled
+slightly and she leaned over and drew an eiderdown quilt across her
+knees.
+
+"It--it's not about Bernard?" she asked in a whisper.
+
+"Yes, it is about Bernard. You may go to him and bring him home. You may
+go to-morrow. Oh, Lottie, doesn't it make you happy?"
+
+Lottie drew the eiderdown quilt still higher. She was not looking at
+Eugenia, and her mouth had grown sullen. "I don't see why you send me,"
+she said. "Why can't Jack Tucker bring him home? He's with him."
+
+"But I thought you wanted to go," returned Eugenia blankly.
+
+"I haven't seen him for six years," said Lottie, her face still turned
+away. "He is almost a stranger--and I am afraid of him."
+
+"Oh, Lottie, he loves you so!"
+
+"I don't know," protested Lottie. "He has been so wicked."
+
+Eugenia was looking down upon her with dismayed eyes.
+
+"Don't you love him, Lottie?" she asked.
+
+For a moment the other did not reply. Her lips trembled and her knees
+were shaking beneath the eiderdown quilt. Then with a slow turn of the
+head she looked up doggedly. "I believe I hate him," she answered.
+
+A swift flush rose to Eugenia's face, her eyes flashed angrily, she took
+a step forward. "And you are his wife!" she cried.
+
+But Lottie had turned at last. She flung the quilt aside and rose to her
+feet, her girlish figure quivering in its beribboned wrapper. There were
+bright pink spots in her cheeks.
+
+"Yes, I am his wife, God help me," she said.
+
+Eugenia had drawn back before the childish desperation. Lottie had never
+revolted before--she had thought Eugenia's thoughts and weakly lived up
+to Eugenia's conception of her duty. She had been meek and amiable and
+ineffectual; but it came to Eugenia with a shock that she had never
+admired her until to-day--until the hour of her rebellion.
+
+She spoke sternly--as she might have spoken to herself in a moment of
+dear, but dismal failure.
+
+"Hush," she commanded. "You are one of us, and you have no right to
+desert us. It is because you are his wife that my home is yours and your
+children's. I am only his sister, and I have stood by him through it
+all. Do you think, if his sins were twenty times as great, that I should
+fall away from him now?"
+
+Lottie looked at her and laughed--a little heartless laugh.
+
+"Oh, but I am not a Battle," she replied bitterly. "Battle sins are just
+like other people's sins to me."
+
+Then she raised her pretty, nerveless hands to her throat.
+
+"I have wanted to be free all these years," she said. "All these years
+when you would not let me forget Bernard Battle--when you shut me up and
+hid me away, and made me old when I was young. And now--just as I am
+beginning to be happy with my children--you tell me that I must go back
+to him and start afresh."
+
+Her voice grated upon Eugenia's ears, and she realised more acutely than
+her pity the fact that Lottie was common--hopelessly common. For an
+instant she forgot Bernard's greater transgressions in the wonder that a
+Battle should have married a woman who did not know how to behave in a
+crisis--who could even chant her wrongs from the housetop. At the moment
+this seemed to her the weightier share of the family remissness. The
+loyalty of the Battle wives had been as a lasting memorial to the Battle
+breeding--which, after all, was more invincible than the Battle virtue.
+
+She crossed to the window and stood looking out upon the winter sunshine
+falling on the gray church across the way. On the stone steps a negro
+nurse was sitting, drowsily trundling back and forth before her a
+beruffled baby carriage. Nearer at hand, in the yard on the left of the
+tesselated entrance below, a pointed magnolia tree shone evergreen
+beside the naked poplars, and a bevy of sparrows fluttered in and out
+amid the sheltering leaves.
+
+"Oh, you will never understand," wailed Lottie. She had flung herself
+upon the couch and was sobbing weakly. "It is so different with you and
+Dudley."
+
+Eugenia turned and came back. "I do understand," she returned gently,
+and before Lottie could raise her lowered head she left the room.
+
+She had promised Dudley that the calls should be made, and she put on
+her visiting gown without a thought of shirking the fulfilment of her
+pledge. From the day of her marriage she had zealously accepted the
+obligations forced upon her by Dudley's political aspirations, and Mrs.
+Rann became to-day simply a heavier responsibility than usual. Her world
+was full of Mrs. Ranns, and she braved them with dauntless spirits and
+triumphant humour. As she buttoned her gloves on the way downstairs she
+was conscious of a singularly mild recognition of the fact that the
+world might have been the gainer had Mrs. Rann abided unborn.
+
+But the fresh air restored her courage, and by the time she sat in Mrs.
+Rann's drawing-room, face to face with her hostess, she was at ease with
+herself and her surroundings. She gave out at once the peculiar social
+atmosphere of her race; she uttered her gay little nothings with an
+intimate air; she laughed good-humouredly at Mrs. Rann's gossip, and she
+begged to see photographs of Mrs. Rann's babies. It was as if she had
+immediately become the confidential adviser of Mrs. Rann's domestic
+difficulties.
+
+Mrs. Rann, herself, was little and plain and obsolete. She appeared to
+have been left behind in the sixties, like words that have become vulgar
+from disuse. She wore bracelets on her wrists, and her accent was as
+flat as her ideas. Before the war--and even long after--nobody had heard
+of the Ranns; they had arrived as suddenly as the electric lights or
+the trolley cars. When Miss Chris had alluded to them as "new people,"
+and Juliet Galt had declared that she "did not call there," Dudley had
+thrown out an uncertain line to Eugenia. "Rann is a useful man, my
+dear," he had said. "He may be of great help to me," and the next day
+Eugenia had left her card. Where Dudley's ambitions led she cheerfully
+followed.
+
+"We are politicians," was her excuse to Juliet, "and we can't afford to
+be exclusive. Of course, with Emma Carr and yourself it is different.
+You may exclude half society if you please, and, in fact, you do; but
+Dudley and I really don't mind. He wants something, and I, you know, was
+born without the instinct of class."
+
+So she sat in Mrs. Rann's drawing-room and received her confidences,
+while Juliet and Emma Carr were gossiping across the street.
+
+"The greatest trouble I have with Mr. Rann when he comes to town," said
+Mrs. Rann, "is that he refuses to wear woollen socks. I don't know
+whether Mr. Webb wears woollen socks or not."
+
+Eugenia shook her head.
+
+"I've no doubt he would be a better and a wiser man if he did," she
+responded.
+
+"Then he doesn't catch cold when he puts on thin ones with his dress
+suit. Now Mr. Rann says woollen socks don't look well in the
+evening--and he takes cold every time he goes out at night. He won't
+even let me put red flannel in the soles of his shoes."
+
+"Then he's not the man I thought him," said Eugenia as she rose. "Do you
+know, the baby is so pretty I stopped her carriage. If she were mine I
+shouldn't let her grow up."
+
+Mrs. Rann glowed with pride, and in the depths of her shallow eyes
+Eugenia read a triumphant compassion. This little vulgar countrywoman,
+upon whom she looked so grandly down, was pitying her in her narrow
+heart.
+
+She flushed and turned away.
+
+"You have never had a child?" asked the little common voice.
+
+Eugenia faced her coldly. "I lost one--a week old," she replied, and she
+hated herself that she was proud of her seven days' motherhood. She had
+mourned the loss, but she had never vaunted the possession until now.
+
+As she left the house her name was called by Juliet Galt from her window
+across the way. "Come over, Eugie," she cried. "We've been watching
+you," and as Eugenia ascended the steps the door was opened and she was
+clasped in Emma Carr's arms. "We've shut our eyes and ground our teeth
+and put ourselves in your place," she said. "Oh, Eugie, she's worse than
+the dentist!"
+
+"I went to the dentist's first," was Eugenia's reply.
+
+She followed Miss Carr into the drawing-room and sank into the
+window-seat beside Juliet, who was bending over her embroidery frame.
+Then she laughed--a full, frank laugh.
+
+"You dear women," she said, "if you knew the lot of a politician's wife,
+you'd--marry a footman."
+
+"Provided he were Dudley Webb," returned Emma Carr. She seized Eugenia's
+hand and they smiled at each other in demonstrative intimacy. "You
+know, of course, that we are all in love with your husband--desperately,
+darkly in love--and you ought to be gray with jealousy. If I were
+married to the handsomest man in Virginia I'd get me to a nunnery."
+
+"That's not Eugie's way," said Juliet, snapping off her silk. "If she
+went, she'd drag him after."
+
+"Oh, he's just Dudley," protested Eugenia. "I'd as soon be jealous of
+Aunt Chris--and he's waiting at home this instant with his senators come
+to judgment on my dinner. If I were free, I'd spend the day with you.
+Juliet, but I've married into servitude."
+
+
+
+
+IX
+
+
+When Eugenia went upstairs that night she softly opened Lottie's door
+and glanced into the room. By the sinking firelight she saw Lottie lying
+asleep, her hand upon the pillow of her younger child, who slept beside
+her. The pretty, nerveless hand, even in sleep, tremored like a caress,
+for whatever Lottie's wifely failings, as a mother she was without
+reproach. Lottie--vain, hysterical, bewailing her wrongs--was the same
+Lottie now resting with a protecting arm thrown out--this Eugenia
+admitted thoughtfully as she looked into the darkened room where the
+thin blue flame cast a spectral light upon the sleepers. From this
+shallow rooted nature had bloomed the maternal ardour of the Southern
+woman, in whom motherhood is the abiding grace.
+
+Eugenia closed the door and crossed the hall to Miss Chris, who was
+reading her Bible as she seeded raisins into a small yellow bowl. The
+leaves of the Bible were held open by her spectacle case which she had
+placed between them; for while her hands were busy with material matters
+her placid eyes followed the text.
+
+"I thought I'd get these done to-night," she remarked as Eugenia
+entered. "I'm going to make a plum pudding for Dudley to-morrow. Where
+is he now?"
+
+"A political barbecue, I believe," responded Eugenia indifferently as
+she knotted the cord of her flannel dressing-gown. She yawned and threw
+herself into a chair. "I wonder why everybody spoils Dudley so," she
+added. "Even I do it. I am sitting up for him to-night simply because I
+know he'll want to tell me about it all when he comes in."
+
+"It's a good habit for a wife to cultivate," returned Miss Chris,
+shaking the raisins together. "If my poor father stayed out until four
+o'clock in the morning he found my mother up and dressed when he came
+in."
+
+"I should say it was 'poor' grandmamma," commented Eugenia drily. "But
+Dudley won't find me after midnight." Then she regarded Miss Chris
+affectionately. "What a blessing that you didn't marry, Aunt Chris," she
+said. "You'd have prepared some man to merit damnation."
+
+"My dear Eugie," protested Miss Chris, half shocked, half flattered at
+the picture. "But you're a good wife, all the same, like your mother
+before you. The only fault I ever saw in poor Meely was that she
+wouldn't put currants in her fruit cake. Tom was always fond of
+currants--" in a moment she abruptly recalled herself. "My dear, I don't
+say you haven't had your trials," she went on. "Dudley isn't a saint,
+but I don't believe even the Lord expects a man to be that. It doesn't
+seem to set well on them."
+
+"Oh, I am not blaming Dudley," returned Eugenia as leniently as Miss
+Chris. "We live and let live--only our tastes are different. Why, the
+chief proof of his affection for me is that he always describes to me
+the object of his admiration--which means that his eyes stray, but his
+heart does not, and the heart's the chief thing, after all."
+
+"I'm glad you aren't jealous," said Miss Chris. "I used to think you
+were--as a child."
+
+"Oh, I was--as a child," replied Eugenia. Her kindly face clouded. It
+was borne in upon her with a twinge of conscience that the absence of
+jealousy which had become the safeguard of Dudley's peace proved her own
+lack of passion. What a hell some women--good women--might have made of
+Dudley's life--that genial life that flowed as smoothly as a song. In
+the flights and pauses of his temperament what discord might have
+shocked the decent measure of their marriage? Persistent passion would
+have bored him; exacting love would have soured the charm of his radiant
+egotism. It was because she was not in love with him, that her love had
+wisely meted out to him only so much or so little of herself as he
+desired--and with a sudden arraignment of Fate she admitted that because
+she had failed in the first requirement of the marriage sacrament, she
+had made that sacrament other than a mockery. Out of her own
+unfulfilment Dudley's happiness was fulfilled.
+
+"Yes, Dudley suits me," she said absently, "and, what's the main thing,
+I suit Dudley."
+
+"Well, well, I'm glad of it," returned Miss Chris, but in a moment
+Eugenia was kneeling beside her, her hand upon the open Bible.
+
+"Dear Aunt Chris, you haven't told me all," she said.
+
+"All?" Miss Chris wavered. "You mean about Bernard?"
+
+"I mean about the governor." She closed the. Bible and pushed it from
+her. "Do you think he is quite, quite happy?"
+
+Miss Chris laughed in protest.
+
+"Do I believe him to be pining of hopeless love? No, I don't," she
+retorted.
+
+"Oh, not that!" exclaimed Eugenia impatiently. She appeared vaguely to
+resent Miss Chris's assurance. She was feminine enough to experience an
+irrational jealousy at the idea of a vacancy which she had done her best
+to create. It destroyed an example of the permanence of love.
+
+"I don't suppose anybody could be happy on politics," observed Miss
+Chris. "It doesn't seem natural." And she slowly added: "I wish some
+good woman would marry him."
+
+"I don't!" said Eugenia sharply. She rose with a spring from the rug,
+and left Miss Chris to her reflections and her raisins. In her own room
+she sat down before the fire and loosened her hair from the low coil on
+her neck. She drew out the hairpins one by one, until her hands were
+full, and the thick black rope fell across her bosom. Then she tossed
+the pins upon her bureau and shook a veil over her face and shoulders.
+As she settled herself into her chair she glanced impatiently at the
+clock. Dudley was late, and she listened for his footsteps with the
+composure of a woman from whom the flush of marriage has passed away.
+His footsteps were as much a part of her days as the ticking of the
+clock upon the mantel. If the clock were to stop, she would miss the
+accustomed sound, but so long as it went on she was almost unconscious
+of its presence. Her affection for Dudley had grown so into her nature
+that it was like the claim of kinship--quiet, unimpassioned, full of
+service--the love that is the end of many happy marriages, the beginning
+of few.
+
+As she sat there she fell vaguely to wondering what her lot would have
+been had her pulses fluttered to his footsteps as they came and went.
+She would have known remorseless waitings and the long agony of jealous
+nights--all the passionate self-torture that she had missed--that she
+had missed, thank God! She made the best of her life to-day, as she
+would have made the best of blows and bruises. It was the old buoyant
+instinct of the Battle blood--the fighting of Fate on its ground with
+its own weapons. She had insisted strenuously upon her own
+happiness--and she had found it not in the great things of life, but in
+the little ones. She was happy because happiness is ours in the cradle
+or not at all--because it is of the blood and not of the environment.
+
+During the first years of her marriage she had intensely sought the
+relief of outside interests. She had worked zealously on hospital boards
+and had exhausted herself in the service of the city mission. Then a new
+call had quivered in her life, and she had let these things go. With the
+passion of her nature she had pledged herself to motherhood, and that,
+too, had foiled her--for the child had died. Looking back upon the years
+she saw that those months of tranquil waiting were the happiest of her
+life--those monotonous months when each day was as the day before it,
+when her hands were busy for the love that would come to her, and her
+heart warmed itself before the future. The child was hers for a single
+week, and afterwards she had put her grief away and gone back to the old
+beginning. She had given herself to little kindnesses and trivial
+interests, for the fulfilment of her nature had withered in the bud.
+
+The key turned in the door downstairs and in a moment she heard Dudley
+in the hall. As her door opened she looked up brightly. "Up, old girl?"
+he asked cheerfully, and as he came to the fire he bent to kiss her.
+
+"Did you make a speech? and what did you say?" she inquired.
+
+"Oh, they got a good deal out of me," he responded with a genial
+recollection which he proceeded to unfold. His eyes shone and his face
+was flushed. As he stood on the hearth rug before her she admitted with
+a sigh of satisfaction his physical splendour. The glow of his
+personality warmed her into an emotion half maternal. She regarded him
+with the eyes of tolerant affection.
+
+"Oh, yes, I think I made a friend of Diggs," he was adding complacently
+as he flecked a particle of cigar ash from his coat. "He got off a
+capital story, by the way. I'd give it to you, but I'm half
+afraid--you're so squeamish."
+
+"His jokes don't amuse me," returned Eugenia indifferently. "Who else
+was there?"
+
+"Well, the governor was very much there. He did some stiff talking. I
+say, Eugie, do you know, I believe he used to have a pretty strong fancy
+for you--didn't he?"
+
+Eugenia looked at him with a laugh. "Oh, a fancy?" she repeated.
+
+She moved away, gathering her hair from her shoulders; but in a moment
+she came back again and rubbed her cheek against Dudley's arm as she
+used to rub it against General Battle's old linen sleeve. "Dudley," she
+said with a sudden break, "the baby would have been ten years old
+to-night--do you remember?"
+
+Dudley was looking into the fire; his face grew grave, and he patted
+Eugenia's head. "You don't say so! Poor little chap!" he exclaimed.
+
+They were both silent. Dudley's eyes were still on the flame, but the
+shadow lifted from his brow. Eugenia's lips quivered and grew firm. She
+gently drew herself away and began braiding her hair, but her hands were
+unsteady.
+
+In a moment Dudley spoke again. "It was a great pity I lost that
+governorship," he said abstractedly.
+
+A week after this Eugenia went with Juliet Galt to the Capitol to hear a
+speech in which Dudley was interested. The Senate Chamber was crowded,
+and as the atmosphere grew oppressive while Dudley's gentleman held the
+floor, she rose and went out into the lobby where a noisy circle pulsed
+round Houdon's Washington. She had spoken to several acquaintances, and
+her hand was in the clasp of a house member from her old county, when
+she started at the sound of a shrill voice rising above the persistent
+hum of the legislators and the lobbyists.
+
+"I'm a-lookin' for the governor, Nick Burr," it said.
+
+"I didn't know the governor posed as a cavalier," laughed the house
+member, and as a wave of humour lighted the faces around her, Eugenia
+turned to find Marthy Burr standing in the doorway. She wore a stiff
+alpaca dress, and beneath the green veil above her bonnet she cast
+alert, nervous glances from side to side. Her hands clutched, in a
+deathlike grip, a cotton umbrella and a small, covered basket.
+
+Eugenia hesitated for a single instant, and then took a step forward
+with outstretched hand, a kindly glow in her face; but as she did so the
+crowd parted and Nicholas Burr reached his stepmother's side.
+
+"Why, this is a treat, ma!" he said heartily, and he took the umbrella
+and the basket from her reluctant hands, despite her warning whisper,
+"thar's new-laid eggs in thar!"
+
+"My dear Mrs. Burr!" exclaimed Eugenia. She lifted her gaze from the
+homely figure in its awkward finery, to the man who stood beside her.
+Then she stooped and kissed Marthy Burr on the cheek.
+
+"Do let her come home with me," she said.
+
+Her eyes fell and a wave of colour beat into her face. An instant before
+she had felt her act to be entirely admirable; now it flamed before her
+in a mental revelation that she was a sycophant who sought the reward of
+an assumed virtue. With the reward had come the knowledge--she had found
+both in Nicholas's eyes; and as she felt the thrust of self-abasement,
+she felt also that for the sake of that look she would have kissed a
+dozen Burrs a dozen times.
+
+"You are very kind," said the governor. "But you know I have an empty
+house."
+
+Then he put his arm about Marthy Burr and assisted her down the steps to
+the walk below. She looked about her with half-frightened, half-defiant
+eyes, and clung grimly to his powerful figure.
+
+As Eugenia watched them, a quick remembrance shot before her. She saw
+Nicholas Burr as she had seen him in his youth--ardent, assured, holding
+out his arms to the future, which was to be love, love, love. Now the
+future had become the present, and the one affection that remained to
+him was that of the old, illiterate woman, with the rasping voice. He
+had lost the thing he had lived for--and he was happy.
+
+
+
+
+BOOK V
+
+THE HOUR AND THE MAN
+
+
+
+
+I
+
+
+On one of the closing days of the legislative session, Ben Galt lounged
+into the anteroom of the governor's office and cornered the private
+secretary. "Look here, Dickson, what's the latest demonstration of Old
+Nickism? I hear he's giving Rann trouble about that bill of his."
+
+Dickson nodded significantly towards the closed door. "Rann's with him
+now," he replied; "they're having it hot in there. Rann may bluster till
+he's blue, but he won't make the governor give an inch. That bill's as
+dead as a door nail. The governor's got a fit of duty on."
+
+"Or his everlasting obstinacy," returned Galt irritably. "His duty does
+more harm than most men's devilment--it stands like a stone wall between
+him and his ambition. Of course, that bill is a political swindle, but
+there isn't another politician in the State who would interfere in
+Rann's little game."
+
+"Oh, between us, I think Rann's honest enough. He believes he's up to a
+good thing, but the governor disagrees with him--there's where the row
+begins."
+
+"What does the governor say about it?"
+
+"Say?" laughed Dickson. "Why, I asked him if he would approve the
+measure and he said 'No!' That's the beginning and the end of his
+discourse--a 'No' long drawn out."
+
+The door opened abruptly, and Rann put out his head. "Will you step in
+here, Mr. Galt?" he asked, and his voice was husky with anger. "With
+pleasure, my dear Major," responded Galt easily, as he crossed the
+threshold and closed the door after him. "I am always at your service as
+a peacemaker."
+
+The governor was standing before his desk, his eyes upon Rann, who faced
+him, red and trembling. Galt had seen Burr wear this impassive front
+before, and it had always meant trouble. His eyes were opaque and
+leaden, his face as expressionless as a mask. He was motionless save for
+the movement of one hand that drummed upon the desk. "If you possess any
+influence with the governor," said Rann to Galt, "will you tell him that
+his course is ruinous--ruinous to imbecility? If he thinks I am going to
+throw away a winter's work on that bill he's mistaken his man. It's
+taken me the whole session to get that measure through the legislature,
+and I'm not going to have it defeated now by any crack-brained moralist.
+He'll sign that bill or--"
+
+Burr spoke at last. "Am I the governor of this State or are you?" he
+thundered. His face did not change, but his powerful voice rang to the
+full.
+
+Rann gave an ugly little sneer, his cheek purpling. "I may not be
+governor, but I made you so," he retorted.
+
+"Your mistake, my dear Major, was that you neglected to create him in
+your own likeness," put in Galt coolly.
+
+"By the people's will I am governor, and governor I'll be," said
+Nicholas grimly; "as for this bill you speak of, I might have saved you
+the trouble of working for your pitiable majority. Since you have seen
+fit to deride my motive, it is sufficient for me to say that the measure
+will not become a law over my opposition, and I shall oppose it to the
+death."
+
+Rann was shaking on his short legs and his hands were trembling. "So you
+defy me, do you, Governor?" he demanded.
+
+"Defy you?" the governor laughed shortly, "I don't trouble to defy you.
+I laugh at you--the whole lot of you who come to cozen me with party
+promises. So long as I spoke your speech and did your bidding I might
+have the senatorship for the asking. I was honest Nick Burr, though I
+might belie my convictions at every step. So long as I wore the collar
+of your machine upon my neck my honesty was the hall-mark of the party.
+Where is my honesty, the first instant that I dare to stand against you?
+Defy you? Pshaw! You aren't worth defying!"
+
+"Hold on!" said Galt hastily. "Nick, for God's sake, leave our friend
+alone. You're both good fellows--too good to quarrel--"
+
+"Oh, there's no use," protested Rann, wiping his flaming brow. "I've
+offered a dozen compromises--but compromise I won't without that bill.
+Bear witness that I've upheld him from the start. I'd have run him for
+the presidency itself if I'd had the power, and when I ask a little
+friendly return he talks about his damned duty. But I tell you, he's
+signed his own warrant. He's as dead in this State as if his grave was
+dug. He's held his last office in the Democratic Party."
+
+"I shall certainly not owe my second to you," responded the governor;
+then he looked vacantly before him. "I have the pleasure to wish you
+good morning," he said.
+
+When Rann had gone, and the door had slammed after him, Galt turned,
+with a laugh.
+
+"Shake!" he exclaimed, and as Nicholas grasped his hand, added lightly,
+"My dear friend, you may as well have a quiet conscience, since you'll
+never have the senatorship."
+
+Nicholas drew his hand away impatiently. "I'm not beaten yet," he said.
+"I'll fight and I'll win, or my name's not Burr! Do you think I'm afraid
+of a sneak like that? Why, he offered me the senatorship as coolly as if
+he had it in his pocket!"
+
+Galt laughed. "I'm not sure he hasn't; at any rate he's the power of the
+ring, and the ring's the power of the party."
+
+"Then I'll fight the ring," said Nicholas, "and, if need be, I'll fight
+the party. So long as right and the people are with me the party may go
+hang."
+
+"My dear old Nick, history teaches us that the party hangs the people.
+By the way, you've done Webb a good turn; Rann is going to fight you
+fair and foul--mostly foul."
+
+"Oh, I'm not afraid of Rann, or of Webb."
+
+"Or yet of the devil!" added Galt. "When I come to think of it, I never
+called you timid. But wait a few days and Rann will have this little
+passage reported to his credit. I'll get ahead of him with the story, or
+I'll find some cocked-up account of it circulating in the lobby. It's
+easier to blacken the best man than to whiten the worst. Well, I'm
+going. Good day!"
+
+When the door closed, the governor crossed to the window and stood
+looking down upon the gray drive beneath the leafless trees. The sun was
+obscured by a sinister cloud that had blotted out all the fugitive
+brightness of the morning. A fine moisture was in the air, and the
+atmosphere hung heavily down the naked slopes, where the grass was
+colourless and dead. Beyond the gates, the city was lost in a blurred
+and melancholy distance, from which several indistinct church spires
+rose and sank in a sea of fog.
+
+But blue and gray were as one to Nicholas. He was not exhilarated by
+sunshine nor was he depressed by gloom; only the inner forces of his
+nature had power to quicken or control his moods. His inspiration, like
+his destiny, lay within, and so long as he maintained his wonted
+equilibrium of judgment and desire it was, perhaps, impossible that an
+outside assault should severely shake the foundations of his life.
+
+Now, while the glow of his anger still lingered in his brain, it was
+characteristic of the man that he was feeling a pity for Rann's
+disappointment--for the discomfiture of one whose methods he despised.
+In Rann's place, he felt that he should probably have risen to the
+charge as Rann rose--implacable, unswerving; but he was not in Rann's
+place, nor could he be so long as personal reward was less to him than
+personal honour. Yes, he could pity Rann even while he condemned him.
+For an instant--a single instant--he had found himself shrinking from
+the combat, and in the shock of self-contempt which followed he had
+hurled the shock of his resentment upon the tempter. In that moment of
+weakness it had seemed to him an easy thing to let one's self go; to
+yield to a friendly, if distrusted force; to place gratified ambition
+above the sting of wounded scruples. Was he infallible that he should
+make his judgment a law, or without reproach that he should set his
+conscience as an arbiter?
+
+Then in a sudden illumination he had seen the betrayal of his sophistry,
+and he had stood his ground--for the strong man is not he who is
+impervious to weaknesses, but he who, scorning his failures, towers over
+them. He had felt the temptation and he had wavered, but not for long.
+In all his periods of storm and stress he had found that his nature
+rebounded in the end. Disquietude might waste his ardour; but give him
+time to reorganise his forces, and his moral energy would triumph at the
+last.
+
+As he looked out upon the great bronze Washington against the
+sad-coloured sky, he realised, with a pang like the thrust of
+homesickness, the isolation in which he stood. An instinctive need to
+justify himself had risen within him, and with it awoke the knowledge
+that beyond that uncertain abstraction which he called "the People," he
+was an alien among his kind. Galt was his friend, Tom Bassett he could
+count on, a score of others would stand or fall in his service, but
+where was the single emotion which bound him to humanity? Where the
+common claim of kinship which belonged to Galt, to Bassett, and to all
+mankind? He had known many men, but he knew not one who was not drawn by
+some connecting link that was apart from patriotism, or ambition, or
+desire. Then quickly there came to him, not the judge, who was the
+parent of his intellect, but the withered little woman, who was not even
+the mother of his body. The only happiness that rose and set in him was
+that pitiable happiness that could not think his thoughts or speak his
+speech. It had never occurred to him that he loved Marthy Burr--his
+kindness had been wholly compassionate--it was the knowledge that she
+loved him that now illuminated her image. It was the old blind craving
+born again, to be first with somebody--for there are moods in which it
+is better to be adored by a dog than to adore a divinity. He beheld
+Eugenia's womanhood as "A sword afar off"; but with him was the eternal
+commonplace--his stepmother's sharp, pained eyes and shrivelled hands.
+He had loved Eugenia until there was nothing left; now he wanted to be
+loved, if by a dog.
+
+He raised his head and smiled upon the bronze Washington and the
+sad-coloured sky. In the drive below men were passing, and from time to
+time he recognised a figure. He saw only men down there, and the thought
+came to him that his was a man's world--only in the outside circle might
+he catch the flutter of a woman's dress. He turned and went back to his
+desk and his work.
+
+Two days later the papers chronicled without comment his opposition to
+Rann's bill. He was aware that Rann possessed no uncertain influence
+with the editors of the "Morning Standard," and he was surprised at the
+apparent indifference displayed by the curt announcement. Did Rann's
+resentment hang fire? Or was the press prepared to uphold the governor?
+
+On the morning of the same day a member of the legislature with whom he
+was slightly acquainted came in to congratulate him upon his stand. His
+name was Saunders, and he was a man of some ability, whom Nicholas had
+always regarded as a partisan of Webb.
+
+"I've been fighting that bill this whole session," he said emphatically,
+"and I'd given up all hope of defeating it when you had the pluck to
+knock it over. You've made enemies, Governor, but you've made friends,
+and I'm one of them. Give me the man who dares!" He held out his hand as
+he rose, and Nicholas responded with a hearty grip. Before the
+legislature closed he found that Saunders spoke the truth--he had made
+friends as well as enemies. The inborn Anglo-Saxon love of "the man who
+dares" was with him--a regard for daring for its own heroic sake. The
+hour was his, and he braved his shifting popularity as he would brave
+its final outcome.
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+
+One afternoon in early May, Dudley Webb came out upon his front steps
+and paused to light a cigar before descending to the street. A spring of
+happy promise was unfolding, for overhead the poplars bloomed against an
+enchanted sky. In the shadow of the church across the way, children were
+romping, their ecstatic trebles floating like bird-song on the air.
+
+With the cigar between his teeth, Dudley heaved a sudden reminiscent
+sigh--the sigh of a man who possesses an excellent digestion and a
+complacent conscience. Things had gone well with him of late--the fact
+that a trivial domestic interest darkened for the moment his serene
+horizon proved it to be the solitary cloud of a clear day. The cloud in
+question had gathered in the shape of no less a person than Mrs. Jane
+Dudley Webb. She had been on a visit to Richmond, and he had seen her
+only two hours before safely started on her homeward journey. The truth
+was that Mrs. Webb and Eugenia had asserted for the past two days an
+implacable hostility, and Dudley's genial efforts at pacification had
+resulted merely in diverting a share of the unpleasantness upon his own
+head. It was a lamentable fact that Eugenia, who was amiable to the
+point of weakness where members of the Battle family were concerned,
+found it impossible to harmonise with the elder Mrs. Webb. They had
+disagreed upon such important subjects as Miss Chris's housekeeping and
+Dudley's moral welfare, until Eugenia, after an inglorious defeat, had
+relapsed into silence--a silence broken only upon Dudley's return from
+the station, when she had unbosomed herself of the declaration that she
+"couldn't stand his mother, and it was as much as she could do to stand
+him." Dudley had met this alarming outburst with its logical retort,
+"Hadn't you better see a doctor, Eugie?" whereupon Eugenia had protested
+that "if she wasn't fit for an asylum, he needn't thank Mrs. Webb," and
+had dissolved in tears.
+
+At the moment Dudley had experienced a warm recognition of his
+generosity in refraining from the use of his own endurance of many
+Battles, as an illustration of the opposite and virtuous course; but
+upon later reflection he frankly admitted that the cases were by no
+means similar. It had not occurred to him, he recalled, to deny that
+Mrs. Webb was singularly trying, though he wondered, half resentfully,
+why Eugenia could not be brought to regard that lady's foibles from his
+own gently humorous point of view. He was not in the least disconcerted
+by his mother's solicitude as to the condition of his soul, or by the
+fact that she still felt constrained to allude to the governor of the
+State as "a person of low antecedents." Personally, he was inclined to
+admire--and frankly to admit it--the ability which had brought Burr into
+prominence from a position of evident obscurity, while he regarded Mrs.
+Webb's eccentric attitude as a kind of antedated comedy. What he
+objected to was his wife's inability to grasp the keynote of the
+situation.
+
+It was pleasant to reflect, however, as he leisurely descended the
+steps, that he had brought Eugenia round by less heroic measures than an
+assault upon her family altars. He was glad to think that he had given
+her a cup of tea instead.
+
+Crossing slowly to Franklin Street, he hesitated an instant on the
+corner, and turned finally in the direction of his office. There was a
+nearer way down town, but he always chose this one because experience
+had taught him that if pretty women were abroad here they would be
+found. With the same instinct of enjoyment he might have gone out of his
+way daily to pass the window of a florist.
+
+As he walked on in the spring sunshine he held his handsome head erect,
+blowing the smoke of his cigar in the scented air. He moved leisurely,
+finding life too good to be wasted in rushing. The soft atmosphere; the
+fragrance of his fine cigar; the beauty of the women he passed--these
+sufficed to bring the glow of animation to his smooth, full face.
+
+Once he stopped to shake hands with pretty Emma Carr, detaining her by a
+jest and a laugh--and again he paused to exchange a word with Juliet
+Galt, who was at her window. It was only when he turned into the
+business street again that he brought his mind to bear upon less
+engaging subjects.
+
+Then it was that he remembered he had delivered the evening before his
+most successful oration. He had spoken to a large audience upon
+"Personal Morality in Politics," and he had received an appreciation
+that was prolonged and thundering. When it was over some one had called
+him a "greater orator than Withers," to add quickly, "and a better
+Democrat than Burr." He could still see the whimsical smile Burr had
+turned upon the speaker, and he could still feel his own sense of
+elation.
+
+Well, as for that matter, he was a better Democrat than Burr--if to be a
+better Democrat meant to place the party will above his personal
+opinion. After all, what was a party for if not to unite individual
+effort and to combine individual differences? If organisation was not
+worth the sacrifice of personal prejudices it might as well dissolve
+before the next election day. It was, of course, a pity that a man like
+Burr should dissent from the views of important politicians, but one
+might as well talk of a ship without officers as of a party without
+organised leaders. It was a pity from Burr's point of view, he was
+willing to admit, but so long as Burr would make trouble it was just as
+well that the ill wind should blow his own side good--he was honestly
+glad that it had blown Rann's influence in his direction. He had never
+felt more hopeful of anything in his life than he now felt of the
+senatorship. Indeed, he was inclined to think that he might have
+something very like a "walk over."
+
+"Hold on, Webb," a voice called behind him, and a moment later he was
+joined by Diggs, who congratulated him upon his speech of the evening
+before. Webb tossed back the congratulations with a laugh. "Yes, it's a
+popular subject just now," he said. "Since the negroes have stopped
+voting in large numbers we're even going in for honest elections."
+
+"Well, I reckon it's as well," admitted Diggs. "We used to have some
+rampant rascality under the old system, I dare say; it took clever
+trickery to bring in the white rule sometimes. We have a large negro
+majority down my way, that obliged us to devise original methods of
+disposing of it. It was fighting the devil with fire, I suppose; but
+self-preservation was a law long before Universal Suffrage was heard of.
+At any rate, I had my hand in it now and then. Once, I remember, on an
+election day when every darkey in the neighbourhood had turned out to
+vote, I hit on the idea that the man who was to carry the returns across
+the river should pretend to get drunk and upset the boat. It was a
+pretty scheme and would have worked all right, but, will you believe it,
+the blamed fool got drunk in earnest, and when the boat upset he was
+caught under it and drowned." He paused an instant and complacently
+added: "But we lost those returns, all the same."
+
+Webb threw his cigar stump in the gutter and turned to Diggs with a
+laugh. "That reminds me," he began, and started a story which he
+finished on his office steps.
+
+When he went home some hours later he found that Eugenia had regained
+her high good-humour. She was sitting before the fire in her bedroom,
+her hair flowing in the hands of Delphy, who had moved up from
+Kingsborough, and was doing a thriving trade as a shampooer. It was her
+fortnightly custom to pass from head to head in a round of the
+Kingsborough colony, promoting an intimate trend of gossip among her
+patrons.
+
+As Dudley entered, she was seeking to induce Eugenia to consent to an
+application from one of the many bottles she carried in an ancient
+travelling bag, which had long since descended to her from General
+Battle.
+
+"Lawd, Miss Euginny, dis yer ain' gwineter hu't you. Hit ain' nuttin but
+ker'sene oil nohow. Miss Sally Burwell des let me souse her haid in it
+de udder day. Hit'll keep you f'om gittin' gray, sho's I live."
+
+"You shan't touch me with it, Delphy. And you ought to be ashamed--I
+haven't a gray hair. Have I, Dudley?"
+
+Delphy returned the bottle with a sigh, and applied herself to a
+vigorous brushing of Eugenia's hair.
+
+"You sho is filled out sence I see you, Marse Dudley," she observed at
+last.
+
+"Yes, I'm getting fat, Delphy," returned Dudley with a laugh. "It's old
+age, you know. It's a long time since the days when you spanked me with
+a heavy hand."
+
+"Go 'way f'om yer, Marse Dudley; you know I ain' never spank you none
+ter hu't. En you ain' er bit too fat ter fit yo' skin, nohow."
+
+Dudley regarded her with a kindly, patriarchal eye as he straightened
+himself against the mantel. "Any news from down your way, Delphy?" he
+inquired with interest. "What's become of Moses? Moses was always a
+friend of mine. He used to bring me a pocketful of peanuts from every
+picking he went to."
+
+Delphy shook her head, her huge lips tightening. "He's down wid de
+purple headache," she replied gloomily, "twel he can't smell de
+diff'ence between er 'possum en er polecat. Yes, suh, Mose he's moughty
+low down, en' ter dis yer day he ain' never got over Marse Nick Burr's
+ous'in' you en Miss Euginny outer de cheer you all oughter had down
+yonder at de cap'tol. I ain' got much use fer Marse Nick myse'f. He's
+monst'ous hard on po' folks. I ain' been able to rent out mo'n oner my
+rooms sence he's been down dar. Dat's right, Miss Euginny, yo' hyar's
+des es dry es I kin git it."
+
+When Delphy had gone, Dudley leaned down and put his arm about Eugenia
+as he kissed her. "All right, Eugie?" he asked cheerfully. Eugenia
+returned his caress with a startled pleasure, looking up at him
+affectionately, fascinated by the glow which hung about him.
+
+"Oh, I really don't think I could do without you, Dudley," she said
+quickly.
+
+"Well, it's a good thing you don't have to," responded Dudley as he
+kissed her again.
+
+It was several days after this that Eugenia came to him one evening as
+he stood before the fire and laid her cool cheek against his arm.
+
+"Oh, Dudley," she said breathlessly, "I am so happy--so absurdly happy."
+
+She raised her head and Dudley, looking at her in the firelight, found
+her more beautiful than she had been even in the radiant days of her
+girlhood. He had seen that high resolve in her face but once before, and
+he grasped the meaning now as then--it was the dawn of motherhood that
+enveloped her. She had heard the call of the generations in the end--the
+appeal of the race that moved her nature more profoundly than did the
+erratic ardours of the individual. There was a clear light in her eyes,
+and her features had taken an almost marble-like nobility. The look in
+her face reminded him of moments in the old days at Battle Hall, when
+she had wrapped the wandering general in a tenderness that was maternal.
+With a sudden penetrant insight into her heart, he realised that her
+natural emotions were her nobler ones--that as child and mother the
+greatness of her nature assumed its visible form. He drew her closer,
+the best in him responding to the mystery he beheld dimly in her eyes.
+For ten years they had not touched natures so nearly; it was the vital
+breath needed to vivify a union which was not rooted in the permanence
+of an enduring passion.
+
+And as the months went on the wonder deepened in Eugenia's eyes. The old
+restlessness was gone; she was like one who, having looked into the holy
+of holies, keeps the inward memory clear. She was in the supreme mental
+state--attained only by religious martyrs or maternal, yet childless,
+women long married--when physical pain loses its relative values before
+the exaltation of an abiding vision. And, above all, she was what each
+woman of her race had been before her--a mother from her birth?
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+
+From the day of the child's birth it did not leave Eugenia's sight. Her
+eyes followed it when it was carried about the room, and she watched
+wistfully the dressing and undressing of the round little body. She knew
+each separate frock that she had made before its coming, and each day
+she called for a different and a daintier one. "I must make new ones,"
+she said at last, "he is such a beauty!" And she would hold out her arms
+for him, half dressed as he was, and, as he lay beside her, fresh and
+cool and fragrant as a cowslip ball, she would cover the soft pink flesh
+with passionate kisses. Her motherhood was an obsession, jealous,
+intense, unreasoning.
+
+They had named him after the general--Thomas Battle Webb, but to Eugenia
+he was "the baby," the solitary baby in a universe where birth is as
+common as death. And, indeed, he was a thing of joy--the nurse, Dudley,
+Miss Chris, all admitted it. There was never so round, so rosy, so
+altogether marvellous a baby, and never one that laughed so much or
+cried so little. "He was born with a silver spoon in his mouth,"
+declared Miss Chris. "I can see his luck already in his eyes."
+
+At first Eugenia had been tortured by a fear that the little life would
+go out as the other had done; but, as the weeks went on and he lived and
+fed and fattened, her fear was lost in the wondering rapture of
+possession. Nothing so perfectly alive could cease to be.
+
+When she was well again she dismissed the nurse and took, herself,
+entire charge of the child. "There are no mammies these days," she had
+said in reply to Dudley's remonstrances, "and I can't trust him with one
+of the new negroes--I really can't. Why, I saw one slap a baby once." So
+she bathed and dressed him in the mornings and rocked him to sleep at
+midday and at dark, and in the brightness of the forenoon gave him an
+airing on the piazza that overlooked the back garden. From the time of
+her getting up to her lying down he left her arms only when he was laid
+asleep in the little crib beside her bed.
+
+But, for all this, he was a healthy, hearty baby, with a round bald
+head, great blue eyes like china marbles, and a ridiculous mouth that
+would not shut over the pink gums and hide the dimples at the corners.
+He did not cry because, as yet, he hadn't seen the moon, and the lamp
+had been carefully emptied and given to him as soon as he was big enough
+to hold out his hands. Pins had not stuck him, because Eugenia had
+guarded against the danger by sewing ribbons on his tiny innumerable
+slips. And he was as amiable as his elders are apt to be so long as they
+are permitted to regard the visible universe as a possible plaything.
+
+At this time it was Eugenia's custom to hold him on her lap while she
+ate her meals, or to leave Miss Chris in charge if the small tyrant
+chanced to be asleep. Miss Chris had become a willing servitor; but she
+occasionally felt it to be her duty to put a modest check upon Eugenia's
+maternal frenzy.
+
+"My dear, there were ten of us," she remarked one day, "and I am sure we
+never required as much attention as this one."
+
+"And nine of you died," Eugenia solemnly retorted.
+
+Miss Chris was compelled to assent; but she immediately added: "Not
+until we had reached middle age. Belinda died youngest, and it was of
+pneumonia, at the age of forty-one. You don't think neglect during her
+infancy had anything to do with it, do you? Nobody ever accused my poor
+dear mother of not looking after her children."
+
+But Eugenia stood her ground. "One can never tell," was all she said,
+though a moment later she wiped her eyes and sobbed: "Oh, papa! If papa
+could only see him! He would be so proud."
+
+"Of course, darling," said Miss Chris. "He was always fond of children.
+I remember distinctly the way he carried on when his first child was
+born--but he lost him of croup before he was a month old."
+
+She left the room to see after the housekeeping, and Eugenia hugged the
+baby to her bosom, and cried over him and kissed him, and thought his
+eyes were like her father's--though, for that matter, the general's were
+gray and watery, with weak red lids that blinked. The baby gurgled and
+showed his gums still more and clutched the lace upon his mother's
+breast until it hung in shreds. It was a new gown, but neither Eugenia
+nor the baby cared for that--if he had wanted to pull her hair out,
+strand by strand, she would have submitted rather than have brought a
+wrinkle to his cloudless brow.
+
+A little later she took him out upon the sidewalk, after swathing him
+from head to foot in a light-blue veil that floated about her like a
+strip of sky. It was here that Juliet Galt found her, as she was
+passing, and, throwing back her pretty head, she laughed until the tears
+came.
+
+"O Eugie, Eugie, if you had six!" she gasped.
+
+Eugenia flinched slightly at her merriment. "But, Juliet, I can't trust
+him with a nurse. Why, you told me only the other day that your faithful
+old Fanny called Elizabeth an 'imp of Satan.'"
+
+Juliet only wrung her hands and laughed the more. "It's too funny," she
+panted at last; "but I'm sure if Fanny said it about Elizabeth it was
+true--she never tells stories." Then she rippled off again. "Oh, my poor
+Dudley! How does he endure it? Why, Ben would ship the babies off to
+boarding school if I attempted this."
+
+"Dudley tries to be good about it," replied Eugenia, "but he hates it
+awfully."
+
+Juliet went by, and Eugenia kept up her slow promenade until Dudley came
+up to dinner. Then she followed him into the house and upstairs to her
+room, where he turned upon her reproachfully:
+
+"I say, Eugie, I wish you'd stop this sort of thing. It isn't fair to
+me, you know."
+
+"How absurd, Dudley!"
+
+"But it isn't. People will begin to say that I'm bankrupt or a beast. If
+you will go parading round like this, for heaven's sake hire a servant
+or two to follow after; it'll look more decent."
+
+Eugenia's response was far from satisfactory, and the next morning,
+before going to his office, he drew Miss Chris aside and unburdened
+himself into her sympathetic ear. "You don't think Eugie's a--a--exactly
+crazy, do you, Aunt Chris?" he wound up with, for Miss Chris was on his
+side, and he knew it.
+
+"I don't wonder you ask, Dudley, I really don't," was her comforting
+rejoinder. "Why, she actually had the face to tell me yesterday that I'd
+never had any children, so I couldn't advise her. It is provoking. I
+don't pretend to deny it."
+
+Dudley took up his hat and carefully examined the inside lining. "Well,
+I'll settle it," he said at last, and went out.
+
+The next day, when Eugenia went upstairs from dinner, she found Delphy
+in a nurse's cap and apron, installed in a low chair before the fire,
+jolting the baby on her knees with a peculiar rhythmic motion.
+
+Eugenia fell back, regarding her with blank amazement. "Why, Delphy,
+where did you come from?" she exclaimed. "I didn't know you were in
+service. Whom are you nursing for?"
+
+Delphy responded with a passive nod. "I'se nussin' for Marse Dudley,"
+she retorted.
+
+"But I don't want a nurse, Delphy. I take care of the baby myself. I
+like to do it."
+
+Delphy kept up her drowsy jolting, shaking at the same time an
+unrelenting head. "Go 'long wid you, honey," she returned. "I ain' oner
+yo' new-come niggers. I'se done riz mo' chillun den you'se got teef in
+yo' haid, en I ain' gwine ter have Marse Dudley's chile projecked wid
+'fo' my eyes. You ain' no mo' fitten ter nuss dis chile den Marse
+Dudley hisse'f is."
+
+"O Delphy!" gasped Eugenia reproachfully. She made a dart at the baby,
+but he raised a shrill protest, which caused her hopelessly to desist.
+"O Delphy, you've come between us!" she cried.
+
+"I 'low ef I hadn't you'd 'a' run plum crazy," was Delphy's
+justification. "Dis yer chile's my bizness, en yourn it's down yonder in
+de parlour wid Marse Dudley."
+
+Eugenia wavered and stood irresolute. Delphy's authority, rooted in
+superior knowledge, appeared to be unshakable, but she made a last
+desperate effort. "Suppose he should get sick without me, Delphy?"
+
+Delphy positively snorted. "Ef you wanter raise dis yer chile, Miss
+Euginny," she replied, "you'd des better let me alont. Hit's a won'er
+you ain' been de deaf er him 'fo' I got yer wid yo' sto' physicks en yo'
+real doctahs es dunno one baby f'om anur when dey meet 'im in de street.
+I reckon, ef he'd got de colic you'd have kilt 'im terreckly, you en yo'
+sto' physicks en yo' real doctahs! Now, you'd des better dress yo'se'f
+an' go down yonder ter de parlour."
+
+But as she finished Dudley strolled in and stood beaming down upon his
+offspring as it lay, round and pinkly impressive, in Delphy's lap. "Fine
+boy, eh, Delphy?" he inquired proudly.
+
+"Dat 'tis, suh," responded Delphy heartily, "an' he's des de spit er you
+dis we'y minit."
+
+The following morning Dudley went to Washington for several days, and
+Eugenia was left with Miss Chris and the child. Lottie and the little
+girls were with Bernard, who was dragging to a tedious end in Florida,
+where he had been ordered as a last resource. Poor, pretty, ineffectual
+Lottie had succumbed to the unrelenting pressure of her duty. She had
+sacrificed herself from sheer lack of the force necessary to withstand
+fate.
+
+During Dudley's absence Eugenia gave herself up to as much of the baby
+as Delphy grudgingly allowed her, sewing, in the long intervals, on tiny
+slips as delicate as cobwebs. Even this occupation was not wholly a
+peaceful one. "Des wait twel he begin ter crawl, en' den whar'l dose
+spider webs be?" propounded Delphy in the afternoon of the third day.
+"Dey'll be in de ash-ba'r'l er at de back er de fireplace, en dat's whar
+dey b'long. Marse Dudley ain' never wo' no sech trash ner is you
+yo'se'f."
+
+Eugenia did not respond. She seated herself beside the window, and with
+one eye on her child and one on her work sewed silently, her white hands
+gleaming amid the laces in her lap. The training of her slave-holding
+ancestors was strong upon her, and she regarded Delphy's liberty of
+speech as an inherent right of her position. The Battle servants had
+always spoken their minds to their mistresses in a manner which caused
+them to become hopeless failures when they hired themselves into strange
+families, where the devotion of their lives could not be offered in
+extenuation of the freedom of their tongues.
+
+So when Eugenia spoke, after a placid pause, it was merely to suggest
+that the baby's head was hanging too far over Delphy's knee. "That can't
+be healthful, Delphy," she said, half timidly. Delphy grunted and
+adjusted matters with a protest. "Hit's de way yourn done hung en Miss
+Meely's done hung befo' you," she muttered. Eugenia turned to the window
+and looked out upon the back yard, where the horse-chestnut tree was a
+mass of bloom, delicate as a cloud. In the beds below, roses were out in
+red and white, and against the gray wall of the stable at the end of the
+brick walk purple flags were flaunting in the shadow. Across the city,
+beyond the tin roofs and the chimney-pots, the sun was going down in a
+mist as sheer as gauze, and the surrounding atmosphere was charged with
+opalescent lights.
+
+Her eyes rested upon it with a quick sense of its beauty; then the
+sunset lost itself in the round of her thoughts. She had missed Dudley,
+and she was glad that he was coming home to-night. For the first time
+during the fifteen years of her marriage she experienced a vague
+uneasiness at his absence. A year ago she had not known a tremor of
+loneliness when he was away--but then the child was unborn. Now, in some
+subtle way, the child's existence was bound and rebound in Dudley's. The
+two stood together in her thoughts; she could not separate them--the
+child was but a smaller, a closer, a dearer Dudley--a Dudley of her
+dreams and visions, the ideal ending to life's realities.
+
+As she sat beside the window, her eyes wandering from the sunset to the
+baby asleep in Delphy's lap, she wondered that she had never before
+suffered this incipient thrill of nervous fear. Was it that her
+affection for her child had revivified all lesser emotions? Or was it
+that with supreme love came the vague, invincible perception of supreme
+loss? Did great happiness bear within itself the visible reflection of
+great sorrow? Her life before this had been more peaceful--it had been
+also less complete. With the coming of her heart's desire had awakened
+her heart's inquietude--both had dawned after years of restless waiting
+and uncertain wandering. It was borne in upon her, with something like a
+pang, that the fulness of life had blossomed for her only when her first
+youth was withered, when she had long since relinquished high
+expectations or keen desire. She had set her young mind and her quick
+passion on a far-away good, she had shed vain tears over the lack of it;
+yet, in the end, she found compensation where she would least have
+sought it--in the things which made up her destiny. She had learned the
+wisdom of acceptance, and Fate had rewarded her, not by yielding to her
+what she had called her heart's necessity, but by fitting her heart to
+the necessity that was already hers. She had not known the fulfilment of
+her young ideals, but she was content at last with an existence which
+was a personal surrender to older realities. For herself she asked now
+only busy days of domestic interests and the unbroken serenity of middle
+age--but, despite herself, another life was before her, for she lived
+again in her child.
+
+The twilight fell. She put her work aside, and, coming to the hearth
+rug, took the baby from Delphy's arms. He was in his night-dress, and
+his big blue eyes were drugged with sleep. As Eugenia took him he gave a
+whimpering cry and clutched her with his little hands before he nestled
+into the lace at her bosom.
+
+Some hours later, while Eugenia awaited Dudley in the dining-room, Miss
+Chris came in to see that his late supper was in preparation. "The train
+is over-due," she said, with a glance at the clock. "He will be hungry
+when he gets in. He always is."
+
+Eugenia looked up anxiously. "I am beginning to feel alarmed," she
+replied. "Can anything have happened, do you think? He is an hour late."
+
+Miss Chris shook her head as she refilled the sugar-bowl. "Why, he's
+often late," she rejoined. "I never knew you to be nervous before. What
+is it?"
+
+"Oh, I don't know," said Eugenia. She rose and stood looking at the
+clock, her brow wrinkling. "If he isn't here in five minutes I'm going
+to the station," she added, and went upstairs for her wraps.
+
+When she returned Miss Chris resorted to argument. "Don't be absurd,
+Eugie," she urged. "You can't go alone. It's too late and too far."
+
+"But I sent for a carriage," replied Eugenia decisively. "If anything
+happens to the baby come after me," and a moment later she rolled away,
+leaving Miss Chris transfixed upon the doorstep.
+
+As the carriage passed along the lighted streets she smiled at the
+recollection of the face Miss Chris had turned upon her. Well, she was
+absurd, of course, but one couldn't go through life being reasonable.
+And if anything were to happen to Dudley she would always remember that
+she had refused to go to walk with him the afternoon before he went
+away, because the baby was crying for the flames and couldn't be left
+with Delphy. Dudley was provoked about it, but men never understood
+these matters. He had even gone so far as to declare that his son would
+get only his deserts if he were to cry himself hoarse; and she had felt
+impelled to resent so hard-hearted an utterance. How could the baby know
+that the fire was the only thing in the world he couldn't have for his
+own?
+
+When she drew up at the station the train was just coming in, and she
+rushed through the waiting-room to the gate from which the passengers
+were streaming. As she reached it Dudley came through, talking
+animatedly to the man who walked beside him. "That was the very point,
+my dear sir--" he was saying, when he caught sight of Eugenia, and
+paused abruptly, domestic affairs asserting their supremacy in his mind.
+"Why, Eugie!" he gasped. "What's happened?"
+
+Eugenia seized his arm impatiently. "Oh, you were so late, Dudley," she
+cried, half angrily. "You made me miserable--it wasn't right of you!"
+
+She hesitated an instant and, looking up, found that his companion was
+Nicholas Burr. His eyes were upon her, and he lifted his hat without
+speaking, but Dudley at once turned to him.
+
+"You are old friends with Mrs. Webb, Governor," he said lightly, "but
+you don't know the ways of a woman who thinks her husband may lose
+himself between Washington and Richmond."
+
+Nicholas met the impatient flicker in Eugenia's eyes and laughed.
+
+"Oh, she hardly fancied you had fallen overboard," he returned. "It's
+too difficult in these days. I trust you have had no great anxiety,
+Mrs. Webb."
+
+And he passed on, his bag in his hand.
+
+When Dudley and Eugenia were in the carriage she held herself erect and
+attacked him with asperity. "You might at least not laugh at me," she
+said.
+
+For reply he smiled and flung his arm about her. "My darling girl, it's
+one of the things that make life worth living," he retorted. "When I
+cease to laugh at you I'll cease to love you--and that's a long way
+off."
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+
+The campaign which would decide the election of a United States Senator
+was warming to white heat. On the last day of October Tom Bassett,
+dropping into Galt's office, greeted him with the exclamation: "So
+you've taken to the stump!"
+
+Galt put aside his papers and rose with a laugh, holding out his hand.
+"My dear fellow, may I ask where you have spent the last fortnight? Is
+it possible that my oratorical fame has just penetrated to your
+retreat?"
+
+Tom sat down, and taking off his hat, ran his hand through his hair with
+an exhausted gesture. "Oh, I've been West. I got back last night, and
+I'm off to New York in an hour. So it's a fact that you've been on the
+stump?"
+
+"It is! I don't mean to allow the Webb men to do all the talking. You
+heard about my joint debate with Diggs at Amelia Court-house, didn't
+you? That, my dear Tom, was the culminating point of my glorious career.
+I squared him off as nicely as you please, and with no rough edges
+either."
+
+But Tom refused to be impressed. "Oh, anybody could do up Diggs," he
+said. "I hear, however, that you had some hot words between you."
+
+Galt shook his head. "Ah, the words were as nothing to the drinks that
+followed," he sighed. "Diggs mayn't be much on speeches, but he's great
+on cocktails. It was a glorious day!" Then he grew serious. "When he
+was fairly wound up I got a good deal out of him," he said. "We came
+down on the train together, and I found out that he was against Burr
+simply because the Webb men had told him that he pledged himself to them
+when he allowed them to send him to the Legislature. It's all rot, of
+course; his constituents are strong for Burr, but he's a good deal of a
+fool, and Rann has put it into his head that he must do the 'honest
+thing' by coming out for Webb. He has a great idea of party honour, so
+out he's come."
+
+"Rann's a born organiser," commented Tom.
+
+"Ah, there's where we aren't even with him. He and his assistants have
+been drilling their forces ever since he had that clash with Burr, and
+the discipline's so good they are beginning to convince the people that
+the opinions of a dozen men represent the principles of the party. What
+Burr aims at, of course, is to organise the mass of Democratic voters as
+effectively as Rann has organised the ring."
+
+"That's a tough job," said Tom, "but if it's to be done, Burr's the man
+to do it. As it is, I haven't a doubt that the majority is with us."
+
+"Well, I live in hope," returned Galt easily. "It seems to me there's a
+clear chance of our having a good deal over half the votes in the
+caucus. Now, grant that there'll be a hundred and twenty regular
+Democratic votes--"
+
+"Of which Webb already claims sixty-five."
+
+"Claims!" growled Galt. "He may claim the whole confounded lot if he
+wants to. The question is--will he get them?"
+
+"He will if Rann can manage it. It isn't mere party bitterness that
+actuates that man--there's a good deal of personal spite mixed with it.
+He hates Burr."
+
+"Oh, I dare say. But he overreached himself when he tried to get
+control of the committee. They decided in favour of Saunders in the last
+Southside contest, and Saunders is pledged to Burr."
+
+Tom drew out his watch and moved towards the door, but having reached
+it, he swung round with a question: "Seen Webb since your debate?" he
+inquired.
+
+Galt nodded. "I had a chat with him in the lobby at the 'Royal' last
+night, and I must admit that, so far as Webb's concerned, this campaign
+is a particularly decent one. He can't help being a gentleman any more
+than he can help being a demagogue. Both instincts are in the blood."
+
+"Yes, I rather think you're right. Well, good-bye. I'll see you
+Tuesday."
+
+He ran downstairs, breaking into a whistle on the way, and Galt, after a
+moment's hesitation, took up his hat and followed him. He had an
+appointment with Burr's campaign manager, who had his headquarters at
+the Royal Hotel.
+
+It was there that Galt found him, holding a jubilant gathering in his
+rooms. He was absolutely sanguine of success, and when Galt left an hour
+later, he sought to impart to him his emphatic confidence. "My dear sir,
+I can conclusively prove to you that we shall win," he said, one eye on
+Galt and one on a reporter who had just entered. "I can prove it to you
+in figures--and figures never lie. There is not the faintest doubt that
+Burr will have seventy votes by the meeting of the caucus."
+
+"Glad to hear it," was Galt's response; but in passing through the lobby
+on his way out he encountered an equal assurance in the opposite camp.
+Rann, who was the centre of a small group, broke away and came towards
+him.
+
+"I suppose the governor has reconciled himself to defeat, eh, Mr. Galt?"
+
+Galt shook his head with a laugh. "Defeat! Why, Major, we're just
+beginning to enjoy our triumph. Burr has his seventy votes in his hand
+and he keeps it closed."
+
+Rann flushed angrily, his mouth twitching. "If you will come this way,
+sir, I can prove to you on paper--on paper, sir--that Webb has his
+majority as plain as if the caucus was over. Seventy votes! Why, bless
+my soul, he must have counted in every Republican and Independent that
+will be sent up. Seventy votes! I tell you he won't have forty--not
+forty, sir!"
+
+"Ah, he laughs best that laughs last, my dear Major."
+
+And he left the hotel, walking rapidly in the direction of the Capitol.
+Once or twice he stopped to speak to an acquaintance who wanted his
+opinion of Burr's chances, and to such inquiries his response was
+invariably an expression of perfect conviction. But when alone his
+uncertainty appeared--and he acknowledged to himself that he was afraid
+of Rann's last card. What it was he did not know, but he knew that when
+the time came it would be well played. Bassett was right--it was not
+party bitterness that moved Rann, it was personal hatred.
+
+The square was flooded with sunshine, and down the green slopes gray
+squirrels were feeding from the hands of children. Overhead the elms
+were russet from a sharp frost, and the golden leaves of the sycamores
+shone against the leprous whiteness of the branches.
+
+Near a fountain he came upon his own small daughter building huts of
+pebbles. As she saw him she gave a shrill scream and caught his knees in
+a tight embrace. He raised her in his arms for a kiss, and then spoke
+cordially to the old negro janitor of the Capitol, who was watching him.
+"Is that you, Carter? Good-morning!"
+
+"Well, I declar, boss, I ain' seen you fur a mont' er Sundays."
+
+"You must have been looking at the clouds, Carter."
+
+"Naw, suh, I'se been lookin' right out yer, an' I ain' seen you. Is you
+gwine ter 'lect de gov'nor?"
+
+Galt was holding his daughter high enough to reach the branches of an
+elm. "I'm trying to, Carter," he returned good-humouredly, "but I can't
+do it by myself. Won't you lend a hand?"
+
+"I'll len' 'em bofe, if you want 'em, boss. I'se been stedyin' 'bout dis
+bizness, an' I'se got a plan all laid out in my haid. Dey's a lot er
+coloured folks in dis State, suh."
+
+"That's so, man."
+
+"An' dey's all got a vote des de same es de white?"
+
+Galt laughed. "Sure's you live," he replied.
+
+"Well, I'se gwine ter git my friend Bob Viars ter git up er meetin' er
+all de coloured folks roun' in Cumberland County, an' I'se gwine ter put
+on de bes' I'se got an' git up on de platform an' Bob's gwine tell 'em
+I'se de janitor er de Capitol dat knows all de ways de laws are
+made--an' when Bob says dat, I'se gwine ter bow an' flirt my hank'chif."
+
+Galt nodded. "Oh, I see," he said.
+
+"Den I'se gwine say I'se come ter tell 'em ter 'lect de gov'nor 'case
+he's de bes' man in de State an' de greates' gent-man dey's ever lay
+eyes on--an' I'se gwine flirt my hank'chif some mo'."
+
+"What else?" said Galt.
+
+"I'se gwine tell 'em I kin prove de gov'nor's de bes' man in de State
+by'splainin' er de tarif--dat I kin prove it by'splainin' er de tarif so
+dey'll unnerstan' it ev'y word--an' when I flirt my hank'chif dat time,
+Bob's gwine call out 'Yo' time's up, boss!' an' I'se gwine answer back,
+'Naw 'tain't, Bob, des lemme 'splain de tarif. I'se got de
+'splanification er de tarif right on de tip er my tongue,' an' Bob's
+gwine holler out, 'Not anudderword, boss, not anudder word!' an' he
+gwine shuffle me right spang out."
+
+Galt put down his daughter and shook Carter's hand. "If you ever get out
+of a job, my man," he said, "go into politics. Is the governor in his
+office?"
+
+"I'se des dis minit seen him come out fer dinner."
+
+"All right, I'll find him," and he went on to the governor's house.
+
+Nicholas was in his library, a law-book open before him. When he saw
+Galt he turned from his desk and motioned to a chair beside him. "Come
+in, Ben, and sit down. I'm glad to see you."
+
+Galt threw himself into the chair. "I've just seen Ryan," he said, "and
+I never met a more sanguine man. He doesn't give Webb a chance."
+
+"Ah, is that so?" asked the governor; his tone was almost indifferent,
+but in a moment he leaned forward and spoke rapidly:
+
+"I fear there's trouble in Kingsborough, Ben. They've brought a negro
+there to the gaol from' Hagersville, where there were threats of a
+lynching."
+
+"The devil! Well, you aren't afraid that Kingsborough will turn lawless?
+My dear friend, there isn't enough vitality down there to make one
+first-class savage."
+
+Nicholas fell back again, his vivid hair drawings the superb outline of
+his head on the worn leather against which he leaned.
+
+"Oh, I'm not afraid of Kingsborough," he returned, "but Hagersville is
+only three miles distant, and the country people are much wrought up.
+God knows they have reason to be."
+
+"Ah, the usual thing."
+
+"I don't know the details--but there is sufficient evidence against the
+man, they say, to hang him twenty times. He's as dead as if the noose
+had left his neck--but he must die by law. There hasn't been a lynching
+in the State since I've been in office."
+
+He spoke quietly, but Galt saw the anxiety in his face and met it
+bravely.
+
+"Nonsense, my dear Nick, don't let your hobby run away with you. If
+there had been any danger they'd have got the wretch away. By the bye,
+Tom Bassett has gone to New York. I saw him this morning."
+
+"Yes, he dropped in last night. You haven't seen this, I dare say--it's
+a copy of Diggs's' speech at Danville. So they have fallen on my private
+life at last."
+
+He handed Galt a typewritten sheet, watching him closely as he read it.
+"This looks as if they feared me, doesn't it?" he asked.
+
+Galt's reply was an oath of sudden anger. "This is Rann!" he cried. "I
+see his mark!" A flush of red rose to his face and his voice came again
+in a long-drawn whistle of helpless rage. "The scoundrel!" he said
+sharply. "He's raked up that old Kingsborough scandal of Bernard
+Battle's and made you the man. Oh, the sneaking scoundrel!"
+
+His passion appeared in quick contrast to the other's composure. He was
+resenting the slander with a violence that he would not have wasted on
+it had it touched himself--for the fame of his friend was a cause for
+which his easy-going nature would spring at once into arms.
+
+Burr came over to him and laid a hand on his shoulder. "When you come to
+think of it, Ben," he said, "it's no great matter."
+
+"Then what steps have you taken about it?"
+
+Nicholas's arm fell to his side. "I have done nothing. What's the use?"
+
+Galt strode to the window and back again to the fireplace. His eyes were
+blazing. "The use? Why, man, use or no use, I'll send the last one of
+them to hell, but they'll stop it! It's Rann--Rann from the beginning.
+I'd take my oath on it--but I'm his match, and he'll find it out. I'll
+have Diggs retract this lie by six o'clock this evening or I'll--"
+
+He checked himself abruptly. "How long have you had this?"
+
+"A half-hour. The speech goes in the evening papers."
+
+"A half-hour! And you sit here snivelling about your lynching. Why, what
+are the necks of ten such devils worth to your good name? When I come to
+think of it, I'd like to lend a hand at a lynching myself. If I had Rann
+here--"
+
+The governor laughed dryly. "To tell the truth, my dear fellow, I don't
+take it seriously. The people know me."
+
+Galt uttered an angry exclamation and flung out his hand. "Oh, give
+over, Nick," he implored. "Don't drive me to frenzy! I can't stand much
+more."
+
+He took up a sheet of paper and wrote several lines in pencil. "After
+all, I've been thinking to some purpose," he said. "Judge Bassett is the
+man we need. I'll telegraph to him from your office, and I'll have his
+reply scattered broadcast. If it riddles Webb like shot, I'll have it
+out."
+
+"Oh, it isn't Webb," said Nicholas. He was looking into the fire, but as
+the door closed behind Galt he turned and seated himself at his desk.
+The law-book he had been reading lay to one side, and he opened it and
+followed up the question that perplexed him. His face was grave, but his
+eyes were shot with light. When Galt came back he entered slowly and
+hesitated an instant before speaking, then he said:
+
+"There's bad news, Nick. The judge has had a stroke of paralysis. He is
+now unconscious. Tom can't be reached, and you--"
+
+Nicholas took out his watch. "I have fifteen minutes in which to make
+that train," was his answer. "Will you tell Dickson to repeat all
+messages?" Then, as Galt followed him into the hall, he looked back and
+spoke again. "Until to-morrow," he said, and went out.
+
+Galt delivered the message to Dickson and walked uptown to Webb's house,
+where he expected to find him. He had not lunched, and he remembered
+suddenly that Nicholas had also gone hungry; but the thought brought a
+smile as he rang Webb's bell. "Oh, for once in a lifetime a man may be
+heroic," he said. Then he entered the house and found, not Dudley, but
+Eugenia.
+
+At the sound of his name she had risen and come swiftly forward with
+outstretched hand. Her face was white and her eyes heavy with anxiety,
+but he felt then, as always, the calm nobility of her carriage. In the
+added fulness of her figure her beauty showed majestic.
+
+He took her hand, holding it warmly in his own. "My dear Eugenia, if you
+are in trouble, remember that I am an ignoble edition of Juliet."
+
+"Oh, I want you, not Juliet," she said. "I have sent for Dudley, but he
+has not come--I took the paper at the door by chance--and I find that
+Colonel Diggs has brought up that old dead lie about the governor. He
+dares to say that the people of Kingsborough believe it--the coward!
+They never believed it--it is false--as false as the lie itself. Oh, if
+I were a man I would kill him for it, but I am a woman, and you--"
+
+"Kill him!" He laughed harshly. "We don't kill men who blacken our
+friend's honour; we wait till they attack our own lives--that's our code
+for you. If it were otherwise, I should act upon it with pleasure. But I
+came to see Webb about this thing. Where is he?"
+
+"Oh, he is coming."
+
+She sat down, keeping her excited eyes upon him. "It was Bernard, my own
+brother," she said passionately. "You know this, and the world must know
+it. The world shall know it if I have to utter it from the housetops.
+Oh, I have sinned enough in ignorance; now I will speak."
+
+She bit her lips to keep back the quick tears, tapping her foot upon the
+floor. The red was in her cheeks and her eyes were as black as night.
+Her bosom quivered from the lash of her scorn.
+
+"But you must keep out of it, my dear Eugie. Dudley and I will manage
+it. We'll see Diggs and get a retraction from him--that's sensible and
+simple. There's no scandal the better for dragging a woman into it."
+
+She stopped him fiercely. "Then I give you fair warning. If you do not
+stop it, I shall. Ah, here's Dudley!"
+
+She met him as he entered the room, clasping her hands upon his arm.
+"Dudley, have you seen it--this falsehood?"
+
+He let her hands fall from his arm and drew her with him to the
+fireside. "Yes; I have seen it," he answered, and as he shook hands
+heartily with Galt he made a casual remark about the weather.
+
+"Oh, Dudley, what does the weather matter?" cried Eugenia. "No, don't
+sit down. You are to go at once to Colonel Diggs and tell him
+everything--and not spare any one--and you may tell him also that--I
+despise him!"
+
+He smiled at her vehemence--it was so unlike Eugenia. "I didn't know you
+took so much interest in these things," he said lightly. "I thought the
+baby had cured you."
+
+But she caught his hand and held it in her own. "Don't, Dudley," she
+implored. "You know what it means to me. You know all."
+
+His face softened as he met her eyes; but instead of replying to her
+appeal he turned with a question to Galt. "Can I do any good?" he asked.
+"I am willing, of course, to do what I can."
+
+"I was going to ask you to see Diggs," said Galt quietly. "We shall
+endeavour to keep his speech out of the morning papers, but it has
+already appeared in the evening issue. You might secure a card from him
+retracting his statements. I hardly think he knew them to be false."
+
+"I'll go at once," replied Dudley. He went into the hall and took up his
+hat, but as Galt opened the door he lingered an instant and looked at
+his wife. She came to him, her eyes shining, and in a flash he realised
+that to Eugenia it was a question of his own honour as well as of the
+governor's. With a smile he lifted her chin and met her gaze. "Are you
+satisfied, my lady?" he asked; but before she could respond he had
+joined Galt upon the pavement.
+
+There he paused to light a cigar, while Galt hesitated and looked at his
+watch. "I suppose I may leave it in your hands," suggested the older
+man. "Diggs isn't on the best of terms with me, you know."
+
+Dudley took the cigar from his mouth and threw the match over the
+railing into the grass. "Oh, I'll do my best," he answered readily, "and
+I'll see that the statements are delivered to the newspapers at once. I
+am as much interested in it as you are. It was a dirty piece of work."
+And leaving Galt, he quickened his pace as he crossed the street.
+
+Diggs was at his hotel and somewhat relieved at the sudden turn of
+affairs. "Honestly, I hated it," he frankly admitted. "It's the kind of
+job I'd like to wash my hands of. But Major Rann took oath on the truth
+of the story, and he convinced me that I owed it to the community to
+expose Burr's character. I don't know why I believed it, except that it
+never occurs to one to doubt evil. However, I'm glad you called. I
+assure you I'll take more pleasure in retracting the statements than I
+did in making them."
+
+He wrote the notes and gave them into Dudley's hands. "If they don't get
+in to-morrow's issue, they must wait over till election day. It's a pity
+this is Saturday--but you'll have them in, I dare say."
+
+"Yes; I'll take them down," said Dudley. He descended in the elevator,
+walking rapidly when he reached the pavement. Diggs's parting words came
+back to him and he repeated them as he went. Tomorrow's was the last
+paper before election day. If the speech were reported in the morning
+issue and Burr's friends made no denial, there would be, as far as the
+country voters were concerned, a silence of two days. The contest was
+not yet decided, this he knew--it would be a close one, and a straw's
+weight might turn the scales of public favour. Rann realised this too,
+for he did not fling slime at men for nothing--there was a serious
+purpose underneath the last act of his play. He was doing it for the
+sake of those Democrats whose constituents were divided against
+themselves, and he was trusting to himself to hold the votes that came
+his way when the cloud should have passed from Burr again. It was all so
+evident that Dudley held his breath for one brief instant. The whole
+scheme lay bare before him--he had but to drop these letters into the
+nearest box, and Rann's purpose would be fulfilled. In the howl of
+reprobation that followed the hounding of Burr his own hour would come.
+And granted that the governor was cleared before the meeting of the
+caucus--well, men are easier to keep than to win--and he might not be
+cleared after all.
+
+A clock near at hand struck the hour. He raised his head and saw the
+"Standard" office across the street--and the temptation passed as
+swiftly as it had come. The instinct of generations was stronger than
+the appeal of the moment--he might sin a great sin, but he could never
+commit a meanness.
+
+With sudden energy he crossed the street and ran up the stairs.
+
+
+
+
+V
+
+
+Again he was returning to Kingsborough. The familiar landscape rushed by
+him on either side--green meadow and russet woodland, gray swamp and
+dwarfed brown hill, unploughed common and sun-ripened field of corn. It
+was like the remembered features of a friend, when the change that
+startles the unaccustomed eye seems to exist less in the well-known face
+than in the image we have carried in our thoughts.
+
+It was all there as it had been in his youth--the same and yet not the
+same. The old fields were tilled, the old lands ran waste in broomsedge,
+but he himself had left his boyhood far behind--it was his own vision
+that was altered, not the face of nature. The commons were not so wide
+as he had thought them, the hills not so high, the hollows not so
+deep--even the blue horizon had drawn a closer circle.
+
+A man on his way to the water-cooler stopped abruptly at his side.
+"Well, I declar, if 'tain't the governor!"
+
+Nicholas looked up, and recognising Jerry Pollard, shook his
+outstretched hand. "When did you leave Kingsborough?" he inquired.
+
+"Oh, I jest ran up this morning to lay in a stock of winter goods.
+Trade's thriving this year, and you have to hustle if you want to keep
+up with the tastes of yo' customers. Times have changed since I had you
+in my sto'."
+
+"I dare say. I am glad to hear that you are doing well. Was the judge
+taken ill before you left Kingsborough?"
+
+"The judge? Is he sick? I ain't heard nothin' 'bout it. It wa'n't more'n
+a week ago that I told him he was lookin' as young as he did befo' the
+war. It ain't often a man can keep his youth like that but his Caesar is
+just such another. Caesar was an old man as far back as I remember, and,
+bless you, he's spryer than I am this minute. He'll live to be a hundred
+and die of an accident."
+
+"That's good," said the governor with rising interest. "Kingsborough's a
+fine place to grow old in. Did you bring any news up with you?"
+
+"Well, I reckon not. Things were pretty lively down there last night,
+but they'd quieted down this morning. They brought a man over from
+Hagersville, you know, and befo' I shut up sto' last evening Jim Brown
+came to town, talkin' mighty big 'bout stringin' up the fellow. Jim
+always did talk, though, so nobody thought much of it. He likes to get
+his mouth in, but he's right particular 'bout his hand. The sheriff said
+he warn't lookin' for trouble."
+
+"I'm glad it's over," said the governor. The train was nearing
+Kingsborough, and as it stopped he rose and followed Jerry Pollard to
+the station.
+
+
+There was no one he knew in sight, and, with his bag in his hand, he
+walked rapidly to the judge's house. His anxiety had caused him to
+quicken his pace, but when he had opened the gate and ascended the
+steps he hesitated before entering the hall, and his breath came
+shortly. Until that instant he had not realised the strength of the tie
+that bound him to the judge.
+
+The hall was dim and cool, as it had been that May afternoon when his
+feet had left tracks of dust on the shining floor. Straight ahead he saw
+the garden, lying graceless and deserted, with the unkemptness of
+extreme old age. A sharp breeze blew from door to door, and the dried
+grasses on the wall stirred with a sound like that of the wind among a
+bed of rushes.
+
+He mounted the stairs slowly, the weight of his tread creaking the
+polished wood. Before the threshold of the judge's room again he
+hesitated, his hand upraised. The house was so still that it seemed to
+be untenanted, and he shivered suddenly, as if the wind that rustled the
+dried grasses were a ghostly footstep. Then, as he glanced back down the
+wide old stairway, his own childhood looked up, at him--an alien figure,
+half frightened by the silence.
+
+As he stood there the door opened noiselessly, and the doctor came out,
+peering with shortsighted eyes over his lowered glasses. When he ran
+against Nicholas he coughed uncertainly and drew back. "Well, well, if
+it isn't the governor!" he said. "We have been looking for Tom--but our
+friend the judge is better--much better. I tell him he'll live yet to
+see us buried."
+
+A load passed suddenly from Nicholas's mind. The ravaged face of the old
+doctor--with its wrinkled forehead and its almost invisible
+eyes--became at once the mask of a good angel. He grasped the
+outstretched hand and crossed the threshold.
+
+The judge was lying among the pillows of his bed, his eyes closed, his
+great head motionless. There was a bowl of yellow chrysanthemums on a
+table beside him, and near it Mrs. Burwell was measuring dark drops into
+a wineglass. She looked up with a smile of welcome that cast a cheerful
+light about the room. Her smile and the colour of the chrysanthemums
+were in Nicholas's eyes as he went to the bed and laid his hand upon the
+still fingers that clasped the counterpane.
+
+The judge looked at him with a wavering recognition. "Ah, it is you,
+Tom," he said, and there was a yearning in his voice that fell like a
+gulf between him and the man who was not his son. At the moment it came
+to Nicholas with a great bitterness that his share of the judge's heart
+was the share of an outsider--the crumbs that fall to the beggar that
+waits beside the gate. When the soul has entered the depths and looks
+back again it is the face of its own kindred that it craves--the
+responsive throbbing of its own blood in another's veins. This was Tom's
+place, not his.
+
+He leaned nearer, speaking in an expressionless voice. "It's I,
+sir--Nicholas--Nicholas Burr."
+
+"Yes, Nicholas," repeated the judge doubtfully; "yes, I remember, what
+does he want? Amos Burr's son--we must give him a chance."
+
+For a moment he wandered on; then his memory returned in uncertain
+pauses. He looked again at the younger man, his sight grown stronger.
+"Why, Nicholas, my dear boy, this is good of you," he exclaimed. "I had
+a fall--a slight fall of no consequence. I shall be all right if Caesar
+will let me fast a while. Caesar's getting old, I fear, he moves so
+slowly."
+
+He was silent, and Nicholas, sitting beside the bed, kept his eyes on
+the delicate features that were the lingering survival of a lost type.
+The splendid breadth of the brow, the classic nose, the firm, thin lips,
+and the shaven chin--these were all downstairs on faded canvases,
+magnificent over lace ruffles, or severe above folded stocks. Over the
+pillows the chrysanthemums shed a golden light that mingled in his mind
+with the warm brightness of Mrs. Burwell's smile--giving the room the
+festive glimmer of an autumn garden.
+
+A little later Caesar shuffled forward, the wineglass in his hand. The
+judge turned towards him. "Is that you, Caesar?" he asked.
+
+The old negro hurried to the bedside. "Here I is, Marse George; I'se
+right yer."
+
+The judge laughed softly. "I wouldn't take five thousand dollars for
+you, Caesar," he said. "Tom Battle offered me one thousand for you, and I
+told him I wouldn't take five. You are worth it, Caesar--every cent of
+it--but there's no man alive shall own you. You're free, Caesar--do you
+hear, you're free!"
+
+"Thanky, Marse George," said Caesar. He passed his arm under the judge's
+head and raised him as he would a child. As the glass touched his lips
+the judge spoke in a clear voice. "To the ladies!" he cried.
+
+"He is regaining the use of his limbs," whispered Mrs. Burwell softly.
+"He will be well again," and Nicholas left the room and went downstairs.
+At the door he gave his instructions to a woman servant. "I shall return
+to spend the night," he said. "You will see that my room is ready. Yes,
+I'll be back to supper." He had had no dinner, but at the moment this
+was forgotten. In the relief that had come to him he wanted solitude and
+the breadth of the open fields. He was going over the old ground
+again--to breathe the air and feel the dust of the Old Stage Road.
+
+He passed the naked walls of the church and followed the wide white
+street to the college gate. Then, turning, he faced the way to his
+father's farm and the distant pines emblazoned on the west.
+
+A clear gold light flooded the landscape, warming the pale dust of the
+deserted road. The air was keen with the autumn tang, and as he walked
+the quick blood leaped to his cheeks. He was no longer conscious of his
+forty years--his boyhood was with him, and middle age was a dream, or
+less than a dream.
+
+In the branch road a fall of tawny leaves hid the ruts of wheels, and
+the sun, striking the ground like a golden lance, sent out sharp, fiery
+sparks as from a mine of light. Overhead the red trees rustled.
+
+It was here that Eugenia had ridden beside him in the early
+morning--here he had seen her face against the enkindled branches--and
+here he had placed the scarlet gum leaves in her horse's bridle. The
+breeze in the wood came to him like the echo of her laugh, faded as the
+memory of his past passion. Well, he had more than most men, for he had
+the ghost of a laugh and the shadow of love.
+
+Passing his father's house, he went on beyond the fallen shanty of
+Uncle Ish into the twilight of the cedars. At the end of the avenue he
+saw the rows of box--twisted and tall with age--leading to the empty
+house, where the stone steps were wreathed in vines. Did Eugenia ever
+come back, he wondered, or was the house to crumble as Miss Chris's
+rockery had done? On the porch he saw the marks made by the general's
+chair, which had been removed, and on one of the long green benches
+there was an E cut in a childish hand. At a window above--Eugenia's
+window--a shutter hung back upon its hinges, and between the muslin
+curtains it seemed to him that a face looked out and smiled--not the
+face of Eugenia, but a ghost again, the ghost of his old romance.
+
+He went into the garden, crossing the cattle lane, where the footprints
+of the cows were fresh in the dust. Near at hand he heard a voice
+shouting. It was the voice of the overseer, but the sound startled him,
+and he awoke abruptly to himself and his forty years. The spell of the
+past was broken--even the riotous old garden, blending its many colours
+in a single blur, could not bring it back. The chrysanthemums and the
+roses and the hardy zenias that came up uncared for were powerless to
+reinvoke the spirit of the place. If Eugenia, in her full-blown
+motherhood, had risen in an overgrown path he might have passed her by
+unheeding. His Eugenia was a girl in a muslin gown, endowed with
+immortal youth--the youth of visions unfulfilled and desire unquenched.
+His Eugenia could never grow old--could never alter--could never leave
+the eternal sunshine of dead autumns. In his nostrils was the keen
+sweetness of old-fashioned flowers, but his thoughts were not of them,
+and, turning presently, he went back as he had come. It was dark when at
+last he reached the judge's house and sat down to supper.
+
+He was with the judge until midnight, when, before going to his room, he
+descended the stairs and went out upon the porch. He had been thinking
+of the elections three days hence, and the outcome seemed to him more
+hopeful than it had done when he first came forward as a candidate. The
+uncertainty was almost as great, this he granted; but behind him he
+believed to be the pressure of the people's will--which the schemes of
+politicians had not turned. Tuesday would prove nothing--nor had the
+conventions that had been held; when the meeting of the caucus came, he
+would still be in ignorance--unaware of traps that had been laid or
+surprises to be sprung. It was the mark to which his ambition had
+aimed--the end to which his career had faced--that now rose before him,
+and yet in his heart there was neither elation nor distrust. He had done
+his best--he had fought fairly and well, and he awaited what the day
+might bring forth.
+
+Above him a full moon was rising, and across the green the crooked path
+wound like a silver thread, leading to the glow of a night-lamp that
+burned in a sick-room. The night, the air, the shuttered houses were as
+silent as the churchyard, where the tombstones glimmered, row on row.
+Only somewhere on the vacant green a hound bayed at the moon.
+
+He looked out an instant longer, and was turning back, when his eye
+caught a movement among the shadows in the distant lane. A quick thought
+came to him, and he kept his gaze beneath the heavy maples, where the
+moonshine fell in flecks. For a moment all was still, and then into the
+light came the figure of a man. Another followed, another, and another,
+passing again into the dark and then out into the brightness that led
+into the little gully far beyond. There was no sound except the baying
+of the dog; the figures went on, noiseless and orderly and grim, from
+dark to light and from light again to dark. There were at most a dozen
+men, and they might have been a band of belated workmen returning to
+their homes or a line of revellers that had been sobered into silence.
+They might have been--but a sudden recollection came to him, and he
+closed the door softly and went out. There was but one thing that it
+meant; this he knew. It meant a midnight attack on the gaol, and a man
+dead before morning, who must die anyway--it meant vengeance so quiet
+yet so determined that it was as sure as the hand of God--and it meant
+the defiance of laws whose guardian he was.
+
+He broke into a run, crossing the green and following the path that rose
+and fell into the gullies as it led on to the gaol. As he ran he saw the
+glow of the night-lamp in the sick-room, and he heard the insistent
+baying of the hound.
+
+The moonlight was thick and full. It showed the quiet hill flanked by
+the open pasture; and it showed the little whitewashed gaol, and the
+late roses blooming on the fence. It showed also the mob that had
+gathered--a gathering as quiet as a congregation at prayer. But in the
+silence was the danger--the determination to act that choked back
+speech--the grimness of the justice that walks at night--the triumph of
+a lawless rage that knows control.
+
+As he reached the hill he saw that the men he had followed had been
+enforced by others from different roads. It was not an outbreak of swift
+desperation, but a well-planned, well-ordered strategy; it was not a mob
+that he faced, but an incarnate vengeance.
+
+He came upon it quickly, and as he did so he saw that the sheriff was
+ahead of him, standing, a single man, between his prisoner and the rope.
+"For God's sake, men, I haven't got the keys," he called out.
+
+Nicholas swung himself over the fence and made his way to the entrance
+beneath the steps that led to the floor above. He had come as one of the
+men about him, and they had not heeded him. Now, as he faced them from
+the shadow he saw here and there a familiar face--the face of a boy he
+had played with in childhood. Several were masked, but the others raised
+bare features to the moonlight--features that were as familiar as his
+own.
+
+Then he stood up and spoke. "Men, listen to me. In the name of the Law,
+I swear to you that justice shall be done--I swear."
+
+A voice came from somewhere. "We ain't here to talk--you stand aside,
+and _we'll_ show you what we're here for."
+
+Again he began. "I swear to you--"
+
+"We don't want no swearing." On the outskirts of the crowd a man
+laughed. "We don't want no swearing," the voice repeated.
+
+The throng pressed forward, and he saw the faces that he knew crowding
+closer. A black cloud shut out the moonlight. Above the pleading of the
+sheriffs tones he heard the distant baying of the hound.
+
+He tried to speak again. "We'll be damned, but we'll get the nigger!"
+called some one beside him. The words struck him like a blow. He saw
+red, and the sudden rage upheld him. He knew that he was to fight--a
+blind fight for he cared not what. The old savage instinct blazed within
+him--the instinct to do battle to death--to throttle with, his single
+hand the odds that opposed. With a grip of iron he braced himself
+against the doorway, covering the entrance.
+
+"I'll be damned if you do!" he thundered.
+
+A quick shot rang out sharply. The flash blinded him, and the smoke hung
+in his face. Then the moon shone and he heard a cry--the cry of a
+well-known voice.
+
+"By God, it's Nick Burr!" it said. He took a step forward.
+
+"Boys, I am Nick Burr," he cried, and he went down in the arms of the
+mob.
+
+They raised him up, and he stood erect between the leaders. There was
+blood on his lips, but a man tore off a mask and wiped it away. "By God,
+it's Nick Burr!" he exclaimed as he did so.
+
+Nicholas recognised his voice and smiled. His face was gray, but his
+eyes were shining, and as he steadied himself with all his strength, he
+said with a laugh. "There's no harm done, man." But when they laid him
+down a moment later he was dead.
+
+He lay in the narrow path between the doorstep and the gate where roses
+bloomed. Some one had started for the nearest house, but the crowd stood
+motionless about him. "By God, it's Nick Burr!" repeated the man who had
+held him.
+
+The sheriff knelt on the ground and raised him in his arms. As he folded
+his coat about him he looked up and spoke.
+
+"And he died for a damned brute," was what he said.
+
+
+
+
+VI
+
+
+It was the afternoon of election day, and Eugenia sat in her
+drawing-room with Sally Bassett.
+
+Outside there was the sound of tramping feet, for the people were giving
+him burial. They had been passing so for half an hour and they still
+went on, on, on--he was going to his grave in state.
+
+"There are the drums," said Sally, turning her ear. "All Virginia has
+come to town, I believe. The whole city is in mourning, and by and by
+they will put up his statue in the Capitol Square--but if he had lived,
+would he have had the senatorship?"
+
+"Ah, who knows?" said Eugenia. She played idly with the spoon of her
+teacup, her eyes on the coals.
+
+"As you say--who knows?" murmured the other. "And, after all, it is
+perhaps better that he died just now. He would have tried to lift us too
+high, and we should have fallen back. He was a hero, and the public
+can't always keep to the heroic level."
+
+There were tears in her voice.
+
+Eugenia turned from her and said nothing.
+
+After, Sally had gone she still sat with her cup in her hand before the
+fire. Her child was rolling on the floor at her feet, but she did not
+stoop to him. She was not thinking--she was merely resting from
+emotion--as she would rest for the remainder of her days.
+
+The sound of tramping feet died away. The cars passed once more, and
+along the block a boy went whistling a tune. Everything was beginning
+again--everything would go on as it had gone since the dawn of time, and
+she would go with it. The best or the worst of it was that she would go
+happily--neither regretting nor despairing, but filled to the
+finger-tips with the cheerful energy of a busy life.
+
+Suddenly she caught up her child with a frantic rapture and held him to
+her bosom, kissing the small hands that reached up to her lips. This was
+her portion, and even to-day she was content.
+
+An hour later Dudley found her sitting there when he entered, and as he
+straightened himself against the mantel he looked down on her with an
+affectionate gaze.
+
+"He was a great man," he said simply, and his generous spirit rang in
+his voice.
+
+"Yes, he was a great man," repeated Eugenia. She looked up at her
+husband as he stood before her--buoyant with expectation, mellowed by
+the glow of assured success. He smiled into her face, and she smiled
+back again with quick tenderness. Then she bent above her child and
+kissed his lips, and the sunlight coming from the day without shone in
+her eyes.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's The Voice of the People, by Ellen Glasgow
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