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The Shadow

by Mary White Ovington · English · Gutenberg #33101 · 589,090 chars · public domain (US)

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Title: The Shadow

Author: Mary White Ovington


        
Release date: July 6, 2010 [eBook #33101]

Language: English

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THE SHADOW

by

MARY WHITE OVINGTON

Author of "Half a Man"







New York
Harcourt, Brace and Howe
1920

Copyright, 1920, by
Harcourt, Brace and Howe, Inc.

The Quinn & Boden Company
Rahway. N. J.




TO
MY MOTHER




CONTENTS


         PROLOGUE

       I THE PINES

      II KATHLEEN

     III DICK

      IV THE LIVE OAKS




THE SHADOW




PROLOGUE


When George Ogilvie, distinguished Judge of Palmetto County, Florida,
read of the death in the papers--the quick death after the surgeon's
knife--he felt glad and inexpressibly relieved. To play the part of
avenger was sadly out of keeping with his gentle temperament. His wife
could have done it without a qualm but since this was not permitted her
she would in time have forced the role upon him. Fate, however, had
taken her revenge without using him as her instrument, and the man who
had brought disgrace into his home had slipped from the world honored by
his associates, without visible taint upon his career. Remembering this,
the Judge's sense of relief changed to a desire to play the familiar
role, to sit himself upon the throne of justice and pronounce sentence
upon this fresh-faced, laughing, persuasive criminal. Would he at the
Most High Tribunal be given his full penalty?

But this autumn night, as the wind howled about the old house shaking
the windows in their frames, as the rain tore the leaves from the
branches and beat them upon the sodden ground, he almost wished the lad
was alive again. He would then find some way to tie the loose, careless
life to the life that it had maimed, to the life it had brought into
existence. In this driving storm of circumstance that a week since had
hurled a human being out of the world and last night had brought a
second to take its place, he found himself helpless. His long career, a
career in which he had decided with quiet assurance the guilt or
innocence of men and women standing fearful before him, was of no
assistance. This was not another man's problem but his own. He poured
himself a drink from the old, ruby-glass decanter upon the sideboard,
and found his hand trembling so that the liquor was spilled upon the
cloth. His head swirled with the swirling leaves that the rain tore from
their sockets. All that he had believed and preached was taken from him
by his own world's tragic storm.

In the south room, however, it was peaceful and quiet. The wind spent
its strength in the north, and here one could listen to the creak of the
chair as the old nurse rocked slowly back and forth. Near her, on the
bed, upon her back, was a young girl. Her curling brown hair lay a braid
on either side of her delicate face. Her eyes were closed, but not in
sleep, for every now and then she would move her right arm as though to
draw something toward her. At length, opening her eyes, and looking to
the far corner of the room, she said: "Mammy, I want it."

The old colored woman left her seat and walked to where a cradle stood.
"Not right now, lil' lamb."

"Why not?"

"It done sleep now."

The girl turned upon her side and, crooking her arm, rested her head
within it. She listened, her brow slightly wrinkled, to the rain as it
beat upon the roof of the gallery.

Presently: "Why doesn't it cry, mammy?"

"Ain't I tole yer, chile, it done sleep. Ain't I tole yer?"

Downstairs the man of the house had stepped across the hall and joined a
little thin old gentleman who sat close to a blazing fire.

"Doctor!"

"Yes, George."

"Remember Lillias when you gave her to me, eighteen years ago?"

"What of it?"

"Nothing. How helpless she was. I reckon all baby things are helpless."
In lowered voice: "That baby upstairs now. It seems worse being a girl."

The doctor made no reply, but crouched by the fire.

"It's up to us what their lives shall be, eh? Queen or beggar maid."

The man of the house looked forlornly at his silent visitor. "Have a
drink?" he asked suddenly. "I'll get you one. Julia fixed it mighty well
getting the servants out of the way, but it don't make for hospitality."

Turning on him, the doctor raised his head and said, querulously: "Stop
talking, can't you, man, and think. What are you going to do?"

What was he going to do? He, Judge Ogilvie, did not know what he was
going to do. He looked helplessly into his friend's eyes.

Rising wearily the doctor went toward the door.

"You aren't going?" the man of the house cried in alarm.

"Yes, for a little. I've other work to do."

"See here, don't leave us like this! Supposing anything happens."

"Nothing should happen; only remember she is very weak. I should fear a
shock."

"But what are we going to do?"

"Talk with your wife." The doctor spoke with a note of command. "I'm not
the one to say what you should do." He pulled on his coat and, turning,
held out his hand to his friend. "I'll be back soon," he said more
gently. "I'll be with you through the night."

Then he opened the door upon the howling wind and rain and was gone.

Judge Ogilvie walked back into the living-room to see his wife standing
before the open fire.

She was a small woman, with a small, hard mouth. Usually it was firmly
set, but to-night it trembled with her trembling chin. The judge noted
that the old dress she wore, long discarded, was wet; that her hair lay
damp against her forehead. Her hands, too, were wet, as she held them
out to the flames.

"Where's the doctor?" she asked.

"Gone, for a little."

"And Lillias?"

"She has been quiet for some time. But you have been with her; you
should know."

"No," the woman answered, "I have been acting for Lillias while you two
have gaped and talked and risked her future with every hour. Something
has been done."

"Yes?" The man of the house found his heart beating fast, but he put his
question quietly, deliberately. "You have had many plans. Which have you
used?"

"I've hidden it; hidden her shame. It can never cross her path in this
world."

"What do you mean?"

"Oh, I've not committed murder." She clenched her trembling hands
together. "Not that it mightn't be the best thing. But it's buried,
buried. You will never see it again."

"Buried?"

"Buried from the world into which it was born. Hidden in the sure way
that one in the South can hide. I did it myself," she went on in a
whisper. "I put some money in its dress and carried it in my arms that
no one might know. I went through the alleys over the slippery road. The
blacks' cabin was empty, and I hid it on the bed."

"God! A white child! And you did this thing!"

The man of the house for a moment faced his wife as judge.

"Yes," she answered, looking full into his stern face. "I left it there.
And I was right, I was right! You wanted to do something to hide the
disgrace. You said you did, you and the doctor both. But you talked and
talked, and sat here by the fire. Well, something is done now. We've
saved our daughter from disgrace. Let the baby begin an outcast. It's
better than becoming one at eighteen."

Then of a sudden her strength left her, and she fell, sobbing, into a
chair.

"You'll tell her, George?" she asked after a few moments. "She will know
it's for the best. But you are so quiet and gentle, and she must have no
shock."

"Yes," he answered slowly, "she must have no shock, but she will mind
very much. If she cries bitterly, may I bring it back?"

"No, no!" His wife faced him in arms again. And then, more quietly, "For
her sake, no."

"For her sake," he repeated to himself, and left the room.

As he walked up the stairs a great dog rose from where it lay in the
hallway and, following, rubbed his nose in his master's hand.

"Go back!" he commanded as he reached the door of the south room.
"Likely you'll be a comfort later, but go back now."

He went to the side of the bed and found his daughter lying, her eyes
wide open, looking out on the rain. He laid his hand gently upon her
head and she drew it down and kissed it. She had always known that he
would never fail her in his tender sympathy.

"The baby has slept a long time," she whispered. "Bring it to me,
please."

He stooped and kissed her.

"It's a little girl, and it looks like you. It does truly."

He stroked her forehead again, but did not speak.

She roused herself and turned her head toward the dark corner of the
room. "Bring it to me, mammy!" she called.

The old woman walked to the cradle and made as though to lift a child
from the blankets, but her arms were empty.

"Bring it to me!"

"Lillias!" her father was at her side where she sat erect staring at the
cradle. "Lillias, darling, your mother thought it best."

"Bring it to me!"

The old woman drew aside the blankets and showed an empty bed. "Chile,"
she moaned, "dis ain't my work."

There was a long silence; then the girl sank back in the sheets and
turned toward the window. "You might have let me kiss it good-by," she
said.

Her back was to them both and again she laid her head in the crook of
her arm. Her breath came softly, so very softly that what time it died
away neither of the watchers knew.

But when her father again touched her forehead it was quite cold, and he
felt as though another baby had been sent away to be hidden out in the
rain.




I

THE PINES




CHAPTER I


In the far south of the United States, where through the winter months
the sun holds in warmth the blue encircling sky, opening the buds of the
roses in December, where palmetto and white sand meet deep green swamp
and heavily scented magnolia, there flows a great river. From its narrow
source it deepens and widens until toward the end of its course it
becomes an estuary, and for many miles dwellers on one side can dimly
distinguish the contour of the opposite shore. The dwellers, as it
happens, are not many, and the little boat that makes its daily trip to
and from the busy city at the river's mouth is not overburdened with
freight or passengers. It zigzags from shore to shore, stopping at one
port for timber, at another to land an itinerant preacher, at a third to
receive a fragrant load of oranges or grapefruit destined for a market
in the north.

Merryvale is one of the oldest and most important of its stops. As long
as the state has had a history there has been a Merryvale living on the
river bank. In the days when the alligators climbed up the long wharf to
sun themselves, and the moccasins dropped from the overhanging trees
into the stream, the Merryvales owned thousands of acres at the water's
edge and other thousands back in the pine forests. Then there was a
Merryvale in Congress and another in the State Senate, while scores of
slaves tilled the land and tended the cherished orange groves. But with
the passing of time the alligators slipped from the wharf, the moccasins
retreated to where gunshots were less frequent, and vast stretches of
pines and of river-front passed into other hands.

Nevertheless, in the year 1910, when Lee Merryvale came back from
college, there was astonishingly little apparent change in the old
estate. To be sure, the timber had been depleted, acres of pines had
been shipped down the river to some sawmill; and, worse, noble trees had
been gashed in the trunks, their lifeblood drawn from them, drop by
drop, and then left to decay and fall. But the hyacinth still choked the
river near its bank where the gaunt cows waded in to chew the tough
leaves, and the great house at the front among the live-oaks and the
little cabins in the rear among the pines held descendants of old
masters and old slaves and viewed life in much the timeworn way.

You approached Merryvale, of course, from the water; only the ignorant
newcomer drove or motored the weary miles along the sandy road from the
railway station. The true approach from the city was up the wide river
for some three or four hours to the Merryvale landing. Here,
disembarking with a friendly good-by from the captain, you walked down
the long wharf, and, turning to the right, followed a narrow path in the
white sand until you came out upon the great house.

Unchanged since the first Merryvale built it many decades ago, it stands
a beautiful mansion of cool, high-ceilinged rooms and broad hallways.
Across the front, which faces east, are spacious verandas or galleries
that protect the rooms from the summer heat and afford pleasant places
to sun oneself on chill winter days. The kitchen and sheds, screened by
hardy bamboo, are in the rear; but at the front, before the house, as
far as the bank at the river's edge, is a broad open expanse that in the
North would be a lawn, but that here is sand dotted with tufts of grass
and strewn with fallen leaves. For the glory of the open space is the
live-oaks. These immense spreading trees stand well apart with huge
roots that twist along the ground to disappear in the sand, there to
send out other roots whose hungry mouths drink up the hidden moisture.
The leaves are small, a dark rich green; but neither the leaves nor the
great trunks attract your gaze; you are fascinated by the bunches of
white, fibrous moss that hang from each bough. On a still day they are
motionless, but the slightest breeze sends them softly waving, and in a
storm they swing back and forth, the wind tearing through their long,
thin strands, dragging off a bit here and a bit there, but in the end
leaving them still companions of the live-oak. Birds use the moss for
their nests, and probably no child in the Merryvale household has failed
at some time to fashion of the soft fibres a long white beard with which
to make the magic change from youth to venerated age. On either side of
the house, extending in both directions, are orange groves, and back of
the groves comes the second world, the world of the black folk.

As the world of the rulers has been among the live-oaks, so the world of
the workers has been among the pines. Back of the great house you come
to the clearing dotted with cabins that belong to the period before the
war, rough affairs of hewn logs, well-ventilated by their many cracks.
Whether of logs or the more modern clapboard, they are all set on
supports away from the earth, and under their flooring hens with their
chickens move about industriously scratching with their toes and
penetrating the inhospitable-looking sand with their strong beaks.
Occasionally a dog or a pig joins them and there is a general, but since
they are all good friends, quite senseless cackle of dissent. Numberless
weeds grow in the sand and flowers are about all the cabins; in the
spring, violets and red lilies, in the summer, cosmos and zinnias, and
the year through, red roses at the cabin doors.

Kindly monotony has been the keynote of Merryvale. To live on what you
have, parting when necessary with a piece of timberland among the pines
or a stretch of acres at the waterfront, this has been the history for
many years at the great house. And monotony has triumphed, too, among
the pines. After the war there were heart-throbbings and a sense of
portentous changes; but when freedom had come and gone; when the Negro
learned that he was still wholly dependent upon his old master, a
liberated laborer but without the tools that made possible a new life,
he turned to work again in his old surroundings at his familiar tasks.
Industrious and ambitious colored fathers and mothers at Merryvale had
been known to save enough to buy their homes; but their children, fed
too by ambition, left them for the North. Thus Aunt Lucindy had a son
who was head waiter in a hotel in Philadelphia, and Brother Jonathan's
daughter made a thousand dollars a year teaching school in Washington.
These depletions, so common in the country that pours her best stock
into the city, held the settlement back. Altogether, the old place was
full of pleasant, uneventful life touched with kindly decay.

And then Merryvale experienced a change. It came to black Merryvale
first. In 1905 the colored school lacked a teacher and the colored
Methodist church a preacher. These positions had been held by the same
person who, to the lasting benefit of the community, was called to a
wider field. Word came that the Church was sending a worthy and
well-known brother who had filled a pulpit in a distant city, but whose
failing health necessitated a change. With him was a daughter who would
teach school. Then of an autumn evening the Williams family arrived and
with them a multitude of envied possessions. Wealth entered the
four-roomed cabin that was scrubbed with furious intensity before the
white iron beds, the modern cooking-stove, the books--in all, a
multitude of bewildering furnishings were placed within its walls. A
period of whitewashing followed, of fencing in of chickens and garden,
of trimming and pruning. It was as though some modern machine with its
driving power, its whirring engine, had dropped into a medieval town.

Brother Williams was a feeble, kindly old man who preached but a short
six months before death came and the Methodist church was again without
a spiritual guide. After his death the preaching was by an itinerant,
but by that time the church had lost its preeminent place in the
community life. Salvation was taught indeed, but in a new guise and
under a new roof, and the leader and prophet of the new gospel was the
school teacher, Brother Williams' daughter Ellen.

Ellen Williams had been educated in one of the Negro colleges, founded
shortly after the Civil War by northern philanthropy, and conducted by
white women, and she had been filled with an unquenchable zeal to help
her race. She went into this poor, remote country school with the zeal
of the missionary to Africa; and if she was confronted by no wild beasts
or savage chieftains she met with disheartening indifference, with envy
and even with malice. But the true missionary burns with so pure a flame
that she destroys in her bright fire the obstructions that are placed in
her path. Moreover, she is made to rule and men and women obey, first
critically, then enthusiastically, her decrees. There were mutterings at
Ellen's demands. First the children must be washed beyond the strength
and dignity of those who have to tote their every pail of water; then an
unprecedented amount of needlework was needed to close up rents; and,
last, they must forever give money, money that might go for whisky, for
patent medicine, for the lodge or for the church, money needed to fill
out the meager four months' salary by the county to the seven months
demanded by the teacher as a minimum school year. Like all fanatics,
Ellen saw one supreme duty--the bringing of education to the children of
Merryvale. Other things, even preaching, might languish if this could be
accomplished.

Ellen had her triumph at the end of seven months, when all the pupils of
the school took part in the spring exhibition, from five-year-old
Samantha Johnson who recited an evening hymn, to twenty-year-old
Ebenezer, a half-witted youth and former laughing-stock, who displayed a
beautifully woven basket that had already been sold for two dollars to
some Rockefeller of the north, ("and the school is to have one dollar of
it for books," the teacher said emphatically). The Negro parent is
ambitious for his children, he looks forward with unfaltering hope to
the recognition of merit that shall come when his boy enters the world
and acquits himself like a man. And though the recognition be never
accorded, though to the average American the Negro who is not performing
humble tasks is a cross between an impudent upstart and a "nigger"
minstrel dude, the parent hopes on until death comes and his son, like
himself, turns for his hope to his offspring. Ellen had builded on this
firm foundation of parental ambition, and after the first year she
received the cooperation of the people among whom she had come to give
her life. A few evil spirits mocked, but they did not affect the success
of the Merryvale school. And indeed marvels can be accomplished in a
small community where, day and night, one may keep watch over one's
charges, and where the county superintendent is too indifferent or too
lazy to interfere with suggestion or criticism. So Ellen, a modern in
educational methods, with the zealot's untiring energy, taught her
children to keep clean and decent, to work steadily and to relate their
study to their daily life. As they learned to write they indited letters
to absent uncles and aunts, and (the teacher was judiciously blind to
this) begged stamps from old Mr. Merryvale. They did number work,
counting their chickens and multiplying their eggs with sober
intentness. When readers grew scarce they got the discarded newspapers
from the great house, and the older boys and girls began to watch the
happenings in the outer world. They dug in the school garden and planted
vegetables in gardens of their own. They even learned to cook and
introduced new dishes into the limited regimen of their homes.

It would not have been possible for Ellen to have carried her school to
the final triumph of the spring exhibition had she not been in touch
with the college, as it was somewhat grandiosely called, at which she
had received her education. Gifts of discarded blackboards, old but
still useful maps, song-books, tools, many essentials to her
undertaking, arrived at odd times on the river boat. Nor could she have
kept always well and strong, neatly dressed and abundantly fed, had it
not been for her mother's presence. Aunt Maggie, as Mrs. Williams was
called, while not as energetic as her daughter was a capable woman who
contributed her full part to the school's success. She earned more at
laundry-work than Ellen could at teaching; and the two, by selling eggs
and chickens and pork, by making jellies and candies for the hotel
people four miles away whose laundry more than anything else kept them
in funds, lived in decent comfort and put by for the future.

The second change that came to Merryvale dropped upon the great house.
Five years after the Williams' advent, Lee Merryvale, only son of an
only son, came back from college. He had made but two brief visits home
since he had left to take up his freshman work, offering the expense of
the trip as his excuse; and while his father missed him more with each
year of slackened strength, he confessed that Lee made small demands
upon his purse. He would write in affectionate and wondering solicitude
that no land need slip from the estate to be converted into bank-checks,
and would receive answer from his son that the college had given him a
scholarship and that he worked in the summer months. It was wisest not
to question but to wait until Lee returned to take up law, the
traditional Merryvale profession.

With long explanations, with pacing up and down what remained of the old
plantation, Lee Merryvale expounded to his father his ambition to become
a grower of vegetables and fruits. In his summer months, it seemed, he
had earned his way sweating on other men's farms, and he returned eager
to bring life and prosperity to the old place. Other people were making
money in his state, northerners of course, and why not he? He knew the
secret of northern success--the careful oversight of workers and the
willingness to pitch in and do things yourself. What if frost did come
every few years and destroy all you had? You made allowance for that in
your years of plenty. And so he argued, answering expressed doubts and
unexpressed questionings, until at length his father answered: "How
should I object when it will keep you by my side? You have your mother's
energy."

Lee had only a few recollections of his mother, but one was a bright
picture of a young girl with golden-red hair digging energetically at
the roots of a rose-bush. It was pleasant to think that, like him, she
had loved the taste of the earth and the fragrance of growing things.
His ambition was to down all the scoffers along the river and in the
city who thought his ambition a passing amusement, and predicted
abandonment and a season of gaiety during the coming winter.

Of the other members of the two households there were, at the great
house, Miss Patty, as every one called her, John Merryvale's sister who
came to him after his wife's death; and at the cabin in the pines, Tom,
the son of the household, a serious, reliable boy, deliberate to
slowness.

And lastly, there was Hertha. Ellen had insisted when they moved to
Merryvale that Hertha remain a second year at her college, and the girl
stayed away for that time; but the next season, the year Lee Merryvale
went North, she made her entrance, a girl of nineteen, into Merryvale
life. It was a modest entrance and she played her part shyly in the
background. Hertha bore no resemblance to her sister and brother. Among
the cabins in the pines you noticed her tightly curling hair and deep
brown eyes, but as she moved about the great house you saw her graceful
figure, her slender feet and hands, her small head on its long neck, her
delicate nose and mouth, her white skin. She was a good needlewoman, and
Miss Patty quickly seized upon her as her maid, and, for a pittance,
Hertha worked for her by day, while at night and on Sundays she joined
mother and brother and sister in the cabin. "You's a contented chile,"
her mother used to say, "an' 'member, dat's a gift." She had not been so
contented in the city where she spent her childhood, but this new world
by the river touched her spirit. She loved the quiet days, sewing and
waiting on Miss Patty whose indolence and advancing years made her
increasingly dependent. She loved on Sundays to take walks with Tom
through the woods to where the creek set in, black, mysterious, a long
line of cypresses guarding the stream. She was contented with her home,
and her mind sometimes wandered when Ellen talked in the evening of
plans for the future. Ellen was full of plans, she lived not for to-day
but for to-morrow, but Hertha lived in to-day. Life was not always
pleasant, the autumn tempests that lashed the great oaks and uprooted
the pines were terrifying, but there were more days of sunshine than of
storm. Lee Merryvale might sweat over his orange grove and swear at his
workers, Ellen might lead out the whole settlement in a mad orgy of
whitewashing, but no one expected anything disturbing from Hertha. Tom,
once, painstakingly reading through a collection of poems acquired by
Ellen in her school days as a prize, found the lines that suited the
lady of his home; for, to Tom, Hertha was not only sister but queen.

    "And hers shall be the breathing balm,
     And hers the silence, and the calm
        Of mute, insensate things."




CHAPTER II


In a week Tom was going away to school. It should not come as a
surprise, Ellen repeatedly told him, for she had from time to time
apprised him of the approaching fulfilment of her plans; but Tom had
rested, like Hertha, in the present moment, believing, too, that Ellen's
plans might go astray. This, however, was little likely to take place,
for in his older sister he dealt with a general, intelligent,
resourceful, and with a contempt for the enemy, poverty. Her efforts had
at length secured a scholarship, and four years of savings were to be
expended for traveling and necessary clothes. The rest depended upon Tom
who would be equipped to go out and do his share in gaining an
education.

"Surely," Ellen said at the supper-table when the announcement of the
final arrangements was made, "you know I'm right, Tom, and that a
colored boy needs an education more than a white boy."

Aunt Maggie wiped her eyes. "We sure need Tom," she said.

The older sister looked around the table, at Hertha's sad face, at Tom's
sullen one, at her mother's tears, and for a moment felt the severity of
the coming catastrophe; but for a moment only. Emotion soon gave place
to reasoned thought.

"Tom has a right to an education," she said solemnly. "If he doesn't
learn a trade at school he never will learn one, and we shouldn't keep
him here no matter how much we shall need him and miss him."

Aunt Maggie rose. "You don' know what it means," she said, "to part a
mudder f'om her only son." Her rich voice sounded with a certain
finality as though, while appreciating Ellen's power, she wished her to
understand her responsibility. "You's taken a deal upon you'self." And
she left her children and went into her room.

Tom and Hertha slipped out of doors. In time of trouble they always got
away from the house, and now in silence they made their way to the
river.

It was a hot night in late September with a wind blowing from the east.
In the summer, unless held home by some imperative need, all the people
of the plantation, black and white, came in the evening to the wharf to
taste the fresh breeze. But the wharf was long and seclusion possible,
so the two slipped to their favorite place at the far end, and leaning
against a post dangled their feet over the water.

"If it would do any good," Tom said morosely, "I'd run away."

Hertha laughed.

"Ellen thinks she can boss the whole of us," he went on, "but the time
am coming when she can't boss me."

"'Is,' Tom."

"Yes, ma'am."

Tom's speech was a queer mixture of good English acquired from his
sisters, who had been drilled by northern teachers, and colloquial
speech picked up from his surroundings.

"It does seem too bad," Hertha declared, "to leave just now when Mr.
Merryvale has come back and you can have work with some pay."

"I ain't going for more'n a year," Tom declared.

"You'll be grown up by that time."

"I'm as tall as you now."

Hertha looked across the water into the deep, velvet sky, and thought of
the long days in which she would have to go about her work without her
baby. Tom was seven years younger than she and since his birth had been
her special charge. Hundreds of times she had washed his face and his
soft little brown hands to which the grubby earth was as dear as to the
roots of a flower. She it was who had always shielded him from severity,
finding many and ingenious excuses for him. He had grown up a quiet,
serious boy of a meditative cast, and sometimes came out with unusual,
even startling remarks. Tom's "thinking" was one of the jokes of the
family. Hertha found it hard to imagine life without him.

"Do you remember," she said after they had sat silent for a time; "once
I struck you?"

"Naw!"

"Of course you don't remember, you weren't more than three. We were out
visiting at Aunt Mary's and I had dressed you for the afternoon. We were
on the steps. I had some sewing and you slipped away and went off
berrying. Oh, but weren't you a sight when you came back!"

Tom grunted.

"You came right up to me and leaned against my knee, not a bit afraid. I
scolded and you looked up and smiled. You were very little then, seems
to me you weren't more than a baby."

"Yes?"

"I slapped you on your cheek!"

"Whew! I don't believe it would have killed a mosquito."

"You were so grieved! You looked at me as though I had bruised your
heart. Your mouth trembled and you hid your face in my lap and cried."

"And then you took me in your lap and petted me and told me about the
three little pigs and washed me and got me into another dress without
Mammy's knowing!"

"You can't remember, Tom!"

"Yes, I can."

"I don't believe you were as old as three."

"Well," meditatively, "if I don't remember that time I remembers heaps
of others like it. You never went back on me."

"Probably Ellen is right," Hertha remarked later, "she usually is,
though I don't think it was worth while my spending that last year in
school, I was so homesick."

"You can never tell about an education," Tom said, wise in another's
case.

Behind them came the sound of conversation, broken occasionally by a
boisterous laugh. Some one was thrumming on a banjo and now and then
singing a few lines from a popular song.

"What do you reckon it'll be like at school?" Tom asked.

"Oh, doing things. First one thing and then another until you're so
tired at night you fall at once to sleep and wake up and start to do
more things."

"That ain't much different from home."

Hertha did not answer. She never disputed but she thought Tom would find
a difference.

They looked out into the starlight. "I was thinking," the boy said,
"you're like that star up there." He pointed to a planet, bright in the
heavens. "That's like you, beautiful and alone."

"Well!" She gave his arm a little squeeze. "But I'm not alone and
neither is the star. See the little stars about."

"They don't count."

They sat for two hours looking into the starlight, talking a little and
dreaming a good deal more until, growing sleepy, they rose and went
home.

"What do you two find to say to one another?" Ellen asked, not unkindly,
as she met them on their return. But part of their pleasure in one
another's company was that they did not need to talk.

The days before a long parting are always difficult. We see the
inevitable before us, we try to adjust ourselves, we wait impatient and
yet anxious to make each minute last, watching the closing in of time.
Mammy got some consolation in looking over and over again her son's
clothes that Hertha always attended to and kept in neat repair, and in
cooking his favorite dishes. "After the feast he'll surely feel the
famine," Ellen thought, remembering the scanty fare of her school days;
but she tried in every way to be as considerate as she could,
appreciating that she had brought a sorrow, though a necessary one, to
the household. For Hertha, who had known a year's tragic homesickness,
the future looked black for Tom as well as for herself. She dared not
face it and lived each day trying to forget the dark hours that were to
come.

Lee Merryvale had been genuinely provoked at losing one of his best
hands. He talked earnestly to Tom, who sent him to Ellen, and after a
lengthy but fruitless controversy with the older sister he turned to the
younger one. "See here," he said to Hertha one day as she was arranging
the living-room of the great house, "can't you keep Tom at home?"

"I'd like to."

"He doesn't want to go."

"It seems best," was all Hertha could answer.

"There isn't much in learning a trade these days. Everything is done in
the factory. A carpenter doesn't make his doors or his sashes, his sills
or his windows; he simply puts together other people's work. I can teach
Tom a lot about orange-growing right here, and then he can go off if he
wants and have a grove of his own and grow blossoms for his bride."

He laughed at his joke, but added seriously, "Why don't you keep him at
home?"

"Ask Ellen," was all Hertha could answer.

As she went home that night Merryvale met her in the grove, and again
held her in conversation about her brother until Tom himself came upon
them.

"I'm trying to get your sister to persuade you to stay at home," said
Merryvale, addressing the boy but looking at the girl. "You know you
don't want to go. Why do you let a woman boss you?"

"Perhaps," said Tom cannily, "ef I let her do a big bit o' bossing now,
I'll be rid of it fer good by-and-by."

"You mean you'll be your own boss when you get away? Don't you think it!
They'll boss you every hour of the twenty-four at school. Better stay
here and work for me."

"I like you, boss, all right," the boy answered soberly. Then, turning
to walk away, he called, "Coming, Sister?" and Hertha went with him.

"Sister, rot!" said Merryvale impatiently, looking after them. "They
adopted that girl. She never came out of that nest."

That evening, seated at the table about the large lamp, Ellen went over,
not for the first time, Tom's school course, and explained from the
catalogue the studies he was to pursue. His mother was all interest,
examining the pictures depicting the boys at their various tasks. Hertha
sewed at the flannel shirt that was a farewell gift and occasionally put
in a word. Tom was profoundly silent. Except when questioned he refused
to make any contribution to their discussion. "One 'ud think," his
mother said at last, "as it was Ellen goin' ter school, not you."

"Why don't she?" was his sole answer.

Ellen looking into his sullen face was both indignant and troubled. Many
colored boys, she knew, had walked hundreds of miles to secure entrance
at this institution and, once admitted, had accepted privations without
a murmur, intent only on gaining the power that comes through knowledge.
Tom was to travel in comparative comfort, he would have money for his
actual needs, and yet he did not wish to avail himself of this unique
opportunity. It was not as though he were a stupid boy; he had done well
for every one for whom he had worked. Evidently he simply did not wish
to leave home.

The older sister rose and closed the catalogue. "It's time we all went
to bed," she announced. "To-morrow you and Hertha will want to have a
long walk together, I know," turning to Tom, "and we'll have dinner when
you get back; and then it'll be Mammy's turn to be with you."

She put herself in the background, genuinely anxious to do all she could
to make endurable her immutable decree. Life to her was like a quilt
made up of great, glowing patches, each patch an achievement; and if the
weaving together of the patches brought with it pricks of pain they were
essential to the completed whole. But Tom not only objected to the
pricking, but had his own ideas as to the color and fabric of his quilt.

The next day found him with Hertha two miles down the river. It had been
very warm in the pine country, and they had followed the open stream.

"I's gwine the way they all go," Tom said meditatively, looking to the
north. "The brooks flow to the rivers and the rivers to the sea. Don't
you want to go too?"

"I? No, indeed."

"I've been thinking, Sister, it must be mighty slow here fer you; and
when I'm gone it'll be worse. Why don't you settle in the city this
winter and go out to work?"

At Merryvale the city always meant the port, twenty-five miles away.

"What a strange notion, Tom. I'd be lonesome there."

"Oh, there'd be lots to do. Church every Sunday, and picnics, and
excursions. You're so pretty, you'd be the best liked girl in the
place."

Hertha laughed. "Now, don't you begin to plan for me! I like it right
where I am at home."

"Most girls marry," Tom remarked after a few moments, "and so do most
fellers. The boys round here ain't your kind. I don't wonder you don't
notice 'em. But they's fine chaps down there," pointing down the stream,
"lawyers, and doctors and teachers."

The girl looked at her brother a little curiously as though wondering if
he meant more than he said.

"Well, this is the first time you've tried to marry me off! Mammy talks
that way and Ellen wants me to choose a career, but I thought you loved
Merryvale like I do and were only sorry to go away."

"It's natural for the human being ter marry," Tom went on sententiously.
"Don't think I will though," he added, "Ef you marry you don't have a
chance to think. Now it might be, jest as I was thinking something very
important, my wife 'ud interrupt and have a baby!"

There was a finality in this remark that left them in silence, and
dropping plans for the future they watched the light clouds gather in
masses in the deep blue sky until it was time to start homeward.

When they were within a short distance of the great house, rain began to
fall, and by the time they had reached the live-oaks there was a
downpour.

"Come up here," Lee Merryvale called authoritatively from the porch.

It was the front porch and they had no thought of setting foot on it,
expecting instead to run for shelter to the kitchen door. Hertha moved
forward but Tom drew back until Merryvale again commanded them to come.

"You're wet," he said to Hertha as she stepped on the porch. And then
turning sharply to Tom: "Can't you take care of your sister better than
this?"

"I'm all right," Hertha said quickly, abashed at the importance given to
her. "Come up, Tom," she said calling to him, but he remained standing
in the rain.

"You can go home if you want," Lee Merryvale nodded his head toward Tom,
"and Hertha can stay here until it stops. Don't you know we're sure to
have a shower in the afternoon?"

"It arrived ahead of time to-day," Hertha explained. And then noting Tom
on the wet sand, the rain beginning to soak through his coat, her
motherliness got the better of her embarrassment. "Come up on the
porch," she said coaxingly. "I'll run upstairs and get a coat I keep
here for just such a time as this. I won't be a moment. Please!"

He mounted the steps to please her and then walked to the end that was
furthest from Merryvale.

The white man sat down in a porch chair, threw his head back, crossed
his knees, and began to smoke.

"You smoke, Tom?"

"No, sir."

"The first thing you'll do when you go to school will be to smoke; not
because you like it but because it's against the rules. Break all the
rules you can, my boy, and get sent home, for you're needed here."

"Naw," Tom replied turning at him and almost snarling, "I ain't no use."

Young Merryvale regarded the boy with some amazement, then noting the
grimness of his expression, said nothing further. In a moment Hertha,
wearing her long coat, came down the stairs and she and her brother went
on their way.

Before he went to his room that night, Tom spoke a word alone with
Ellen. "Don't let Sister grieve too much," he said.

Ellen looked at him sadly. "You put me in a very hard position, Tom. You
make me seem almost cruel."

"Never mind about that. What's done can't be mended. But don't let
Hertha grieve--not if you can help it."

He kissed his older sister good-night and went into his little room,
there to sit upon his trunk and with his face in his hands bury himself
in thought.

"Ef I was any use," he said, "Ellen couldn't drag me away; but I ain't
the brother she needs."

He stepped up the gangway into the little boat the next morning like a
man. They were all there to see him off: his mother wiping her eyes and
telling him to be her good boy; Ellen, resolute, not giving way to her
sorrow; and Hertha, his beautiful sister, waving her handkerchief, her
lips trying to smile. He watched them until the boat was far out in the
stream; and then, with a very sober face, took his seat where he could
look ahead toward the nearing sea.




CHAPTER III


It was still early morning when the boat left the dock and the three
women walked back toward their home after their good-by to Tom. No one
spoke for a time and then Aunt Maggie said impressively, "Dere ain't no
use in cryin' 'bout what yer can't help. Tom's gone, but maybe it'll
make a man o' him; maybe it were best fer him ter leabe de women folk.
Heah 'tis, Monday morning. Ellen, hab yer settle in yer mind which o' de
boys gits de washin' ter my folks?"

"I suppose," said Hertha, "it will be either Thaddeus Jackson or Obadiah
Thomas."

"It will be Thaddeus," Ellen answered. "He will do it all right, Mammy,
because his father lets him save his money."

"I hope he isn't saving to go to school," said Hertha; and then, quite
unexpectedly to herself, laughed. She had been living so many days
weighted with sorrow that the sailing of the boat had come as a relief.
There was no good, as her mother said, to rebel against the inevitable;
and while she would miss her brother, who had grown to be a companion in
thought and interests, and who yet could never outgrow his place as her
baby, it could not be right to look upon his absence as a calamity like
sickness or death. So she gave her little laugh and her mother looked at
her with pleasure and relief.

"Dere goes Ellen," Aunt Maggie said, as her elder daughter went past
them the sooner to get to her work. "You an' I believes as de door o'
heben's open ter dem as walks slow. I's glad you kin laugh, honey. We
ain't lose Tom fer good. An' soon de winter'll come, an' moe folks
a-staying at de great house, an' den de summer an' de dear boy home
ag'in."

Talking on in slow, comfortable phrases, stopping often to get her
breath, Hertha's mammy walked with her among the pines to their tidy
front yard where golden glow and asters told of the autumn.

"It seems later than it is, doesn't it?" said Hertha, "we've been up so
long. I think I'll go to Miss Patty right now."

There were two paths to the great house. The well-traveled one led past
a number of cabins, and ended near the kitchen door. It was the shorter
but Hertha chose a more attractive way among the pines to where a
cypress marked the beginning of the orange grove. She had taken this
route long before Lee Merryvale's return; and while he had closed it
generally to dwellers among the pines, Miss Patty assured her maid she
could use it as much as she wished.

She had only walked a little way when she saw Merryvale himself
examining his cherished possessions.

"Come over here, won't you?" he called out. "There's no one up at the
house yet."

Hertha went shyly toward him. He was a handsome man with reddish gold
hair, clear eyes, and a glowing skin. His hat was off, he wore a soft
shirt with collar thrown open, and altogether looked an attractive
combination of the farmer and the gentleman.

As she came up he said sympathetically, "You must be feeling pretty
badly to-day at saying good-by to Tom."

"Yes," said Hertha, and added almost confidentially, "you see, Tom's the
baby. I took care of him when he wasn't any longer than that,"
indicating the length with her hands.

"You couldn't have been much longer yourself."

She shook her head smiling and then turned to go away.

"Can't we have a little talk?" he asked. "Don't run into the house such
a wonderful morning as this. I say, what a day it is! A day for the
gods--Zeus, Apollo, Diana--we ought to worship the sun!"

It was a wonderful morning. The newly risen sun sent its golden light
through the grove, brightening the deep green leaves, showing the pale
yellow in the ripening fruit; and then danced on to the river where it
lay, a limitless mass of golden mist, upon the shining stream.

As Hertha stopped and looked out over the river, Merryvale stepped to
her side. "You're as beautiful as a goddess," he said.

"Don't go, please," he cried as she moved away from from him. "Stop and
play! Let's play ball. The goddesses, you know, did that. Here, catch!"
and he threw an orange into her hands.

He was so near that she could scarcely fail to catch it, yet it slipped
from her grasp and fell to the ground where she picked it up, awkwardly
enough, and threw it back again.

He had moved away from her but was quick to catch her wavering throw.
"Better next time," he said.

She grew more expert, lost her shyness, and the ball flew back and forth
until, squeezed too hard in the man's strong hand, it collapsed into a
sticky mass of skin and pulp.

"It was extravagant of you," Hertha laughed, as she watched him wipe his
fingers. "You wouldn't let any one else waste good fruit."

"It wasn't wasted," he declared, "it gave us a good time. Isn't that a
worthy way to end life?"

She did not answer. The play over, she was self-conscious again.

"Try once more," he cried, picking another orange.

"No, no," she answered. "I must be going."

"You aren't needed yet."

"Yes I am, truly. Miss Patty is wondering why I'm not there with the hot
water."

He tossed the orange, but she dodged it and ran through the trees.
Pursuing her, in a few seconds he was at her side.

"Please don't go," he pleaded.

"I must."

"Well, promise you'll come and play again."

"Perhaps."

"Promise!"

"Perhaps," and she left him.

The blood was throbbing in his temples as he went back to his trees. He
had admired her beauty from the time he had first noticed her, three
months before, moving about his home. What must her father have been to
have given her such poise, such a delicate throat, such a pure white
skin! And her charm did not end with her face or her carriage. Her
speech was that of the white girl, not of the Negro--careful speech,
learned, as it happened, of her northern teachers. He had not
encountered her often these summer months, for she was Miss Patty's
personal servant and spent her days in his aunt's upper rooms or on the
gallery; but he never saw her that he did not want to speak with her, to
see the light come to her questioning face. She seemed to him in every
way a lady. What was she doing living in a black woman's home?

The mid-day meal at the great house was stirred from its usual quiet by
a discussion of the visitor who was expected by the evening boat. The
Merryvales had never taken boarders, but from time to time they had
staying with them what the English call "paying guests." Every winter,
two or three northerners, visitors from the year before or carefully
introduced by former visitors, came to Merryvale and made a substantial
payment for the privilege of living in the old house. Usually these
guests were elderly ladies, either unmarried or with busy husbands who
could not take the time to accompany them, and they lived quietly on the
place; taking little walks, knitting, playing cards, and occasionally
going by boat to the city for a day's shopping. Miss Patty depended on
them for her entertainment more, perhaps, than she was ready to admit.
They taught her a new game of solitaire or a new way of making a baby's
sack, and they listened, with every appearance of attention, to her
innumerable tales about her family. To-day's arrival was a Miss
Witherspoon, a friend of one of their pleasantest Boston guests, and
everything was being planned for her comfort.

"Put my best linen on the bed, Hertha," Miss Patty said as she came
upstairs after her mid-day meal, "and you can take your sewing to the
gallery while I have my nap."

Hertha did as she was bidden, and, the guest-room in perfect order, went
out upon the shady corner of the upper porch. A wind was blowing from
the river, tossing the gray moss of the live-oaks, and brushing against
her fingers the thin lace she was trying to sew upon a dress. It called
her to play, pushed the little curls in her eyes, and spilled the spool
of thread upon the floor. She laughed to herself as she picked it up,
and then sat, her work in her lap, looking wistfully out into the
swaying moss and the green leaves.

So the gods and goddesses played at ball. Which god was he? Apollo, of
course, the god of the sunlight, the gold gleaming in his ruddy hair.
What good times they must have had in those old days when no one seemed
to be busy, when you might run through the meadows singing as you went,
when no one minded if you danced in the moonlight and played in the
morning. Why should you not do such simple, happy things!

She took up her needle again, and of a sudden thought of Tom going away
alone. The remembrance of the boy's face held her to her task.

Along the lane came an automobile, its horn tooting as it bumped over
the uneven road. Hertha started, and putting down her work watched to
see the car stop in front of the Merryvale door. It was most unusual to
have guests arrive in this fashion and at this hour. The men were not
about; Pomona, the cook, was unequal to receiving such a visitor, so
though it was not her specified task, Hertha, mindful for the good
ordering of the house, went to the door.

Descending from the automobile was an alert-looking lady, neither young
nor old, in a plain, good-fitting, tailor-made suit and small hat, with
the business-like air of one who has done much traveling and is
accustomed to finding herself in new surroundings.

"I am Miss Witherspoon," she said at once. "I had expected to arrive
later in the afternoon by boat, but it seemed wiser at the last to come
part of the way by train. I hope I am not inconveniencing you by my
early arrival."

"It is no inconvenience," Hertha replied, "but I am sorry that Miss
Merryvale is lying down."

"Don't think of disturbing her," the newcomer said. And then, smiling at
Hertha, asked, "Is this another Miss Merryvale?"

"No," Hertha answered, "I am Miss Merryvale's maid."

She was quite accustomed to being taken for a white girl, and felt no
embarrassment; but the same could not be said of Miss Witherspoon. That
well-bred lady almost stared; and then, turning, dismissed her car and
followed Hertha, who had laden herself with bags, to the bedroom.

"I hope everything is as you like it," the girl said to the "paying
guest" who looked with approval at the cool room, high-ceilinged, with
white walls, white iron bed and simple furnishings.

"Thank you," said Miss Witherspoon, "I am sure I like it very much; and
really, I believe there is nothing I should like better than to lie down
myself."

She smiled again at Hertha, this time the pleasant, patronizing smile of
one who praises a good servant's work.

"I'll bring you some hot water," Hertha said.

When she had completed her arrangements for the new guest, she went back
to her seat, and laboriously, intently, worked on the white muslin with
its fine white lace.

There was a good deal to tell when she got home that night. Her mother
wanted all the details of Miss Witherspoon's appearance, and after a
lengthy description, ventured her opinion of the newcomer's laundry
value. "I reckon she don' wear any o' dem crinkly gowns an' chemises dat
you do up yoursel'. Dey matches de folks wid der money bangin' agin der
knees in der petticoat pockets. Did she duck down, dearie, ter git her
purse?"

"No, Mammy," Hertha answered.

"But she'll be de keerful kin', allus 'memberin' ter tak' off a white
skirt if it begin ter rain, an' half de time dryin' her han'chiefs on de
winder-pane. Dat's de kin' as comes here. It takes de hotel folks ter
make a payin' business."

"She's younger than our boarders usually are, anyway," Hertha said. "Not
that she's young but she looks so."

"Everybody looks young these days," Ellen remarked; "or if they don't
they let you know they're trying to."

"Was dere laughin' an' carr'in' on at de table?"

"Yes, a little. Yes, Mammy, I think she's entertaining."

"Dat's good. I hope she 'spectin' ter stay de winter."

"I think not, Mammy. I think she's to leave next month."

"Dat's too bad. Ef I was Miss Patty I'd hab some nice gal or udder heah
all de time ter keep Mister Lee company. If dey don't gib him a good
time he'll up an' leab de family an' de orange an' grapefruit business.
Dere ain't nottin' a boy needs so much as de right kin' ob a lil' gal
ter play wid."

"You're to have Tom's room now, Sister," Ellen said as they started for
bed.

Hertha expostulated. "You need a room to yourself, Ellen, I know you
do."

Ellen knew it too, but she was desirous to give her sister everything
within her power. "No, I'm all right," she said decidedly. "It's all
arranged. Mother and I didn't say anything before because we wanted to
surprise you. You've wanted, I know, to be by yourself, dear; and Tom
would be glad to think you were in his room."

She showed her sister the little things she had done for her comfort,
and with a kiss left her to herself. It had been a long day and the
young girl went at once to bed and fell asleep. But after a little she
awoke and lay for hours in the still heat of the night, living again the
morning's happenings. She went over in her mind, her heart beating fast,
the foolish little game that carried with it so much happiness. He
thought her as beautiful as a goddess; and he had not said it cheaply as
though she were some common, gaily daubed plaything that one dangled
to-day to throw away to-morrow. His eyes looked honestly into hers. He
was strong and capable, loving the fresh air and sunshine and the green
trees. He was gentle, kind to the people here, kind to her. With her
eyes fixed on the dim window square that saved the room from utter
darkness, she dreamed of his near presence, feeling his breath upon her
cheek, until, her whole body swept with emotion, she clenched her hands
and pressed them to her lips to keep back the welling tears. For then
came the dread reality: her color, her station, these two facts loomed
above her, fell and crushed her with their weight. No young white man
should choose as his companion a Negro servant. She must forget the
morning playtime, and never commit the fault again. Striving to drive
him from her thoughts, she made plans for the morrow--the finishing of
Miss Patty's dress, the letter she would write to Tom. And, tossing on
her bed, between her new-found happiness and her misgivings, she cried
herself to sleep.

Is there any greater difference than that between night and morning? All
the hobgoblins, the fears, the morbid misgivings disappear with the
bright sunlight and the feel of cold water. As the fresh drops fell from
Hertha's face she was sure she had misjudged the pleasant facts of
yesterday. She coiled her hair that fell in little curls as the brush
left its silky fineness, and hummed a song to her smiling face in the
glass. Fastening the last hook of her blue cotton dress, the soft,
gray-blue that she and Miss Patty liked, she went in to help the others
with the breakfast, master of her fate. There was no hesitation in her
step when, a little earlier than her wont, she turned toward the orange
grove.

"Honey," her mother called after her. "Jes' ask Pomona ef she'll gib me
her big stew-pot to-day. I's layin' ter make some jelly. An' don' work
too hard. Dat ole black woman's allus tryin' ter git you ter do her
work."




CHAPTER IV


"Good morning, Princess."

"Good morning." And then, shyly, "It isn't nice to drop from a goddess
even to a princess."

"Wait until I tell you the princess that you are! You're Snowdrop who
was given to the dwarfs to keep. You remember her, don't you?"

"I think she had a cruel mother who wanted to get her out of the way."

"Yes, but it was all because Snowdrop was the most beautiful woman in
the world; no one else was half so fair. How was it? When the mother
looked into her mirror and asked if any one were fairer than she, she
saw Snowdrop's face. Of course, no woman could stand that, so she cast
Snowdrop out and the ugly dwarfs took care of her."

"The dwarfs were kinder to her than her own people."

Merryvale, with a hasty glance at the girl, sensed the ugly reality of
his story and, turning very red, began plucking the dead leaves from the
nearest tree.

"It must be wonderful," he remarked, rather clumsily, "to be a new
person every day. Who will you be to-morrow?"

"Miss Patty's maid." All her brightness had gone and she moved as if
about to leave him.

"Oh, no," he exclaimed, "not that! Cinderella, perhaps. To-morrow you
will be Cinderella before the fairy godmother came to take her to the
ball."

"Yes, because nothing had happened then."

"Not before the ball, but after; the next morning when the prince
searches with the golden slipper in his hand."

"If I were going to be Cinderella at all," Hertha was gently emphatic,
"I would be at the ball itself, a beautiful ball in a long, golden room
filled with lights and blooming flowers, where every one wore filmy silk
dresses and danced to swaying music."

"You and I would dance together, you in soft blue silk, the color of the
dress you have on, and I--what should I wear?"

"Pale pink satin," she answered, laughter in her eyes, "and your hair in
long curls."

He chuckled. "What fools they must have looked, those Fauntleroy
princes. I wonder if they ever did a stroke of work?"

"No, others planted while they picked the blossoms."

"There's a heap of that in this world, isn't there? Do you know,"
earnestly, "one reason I came home was because I thought I'd like to see
a Merryvale digging his own garden."

"You do it very nicely."

"Thank you." He said this seriously, and then, realizing for a moment
her station, turned away.

"What's this?" She was running among the trees; he dashed after her and
in a moment had her cornered.

"The clock struck twelve."

"No it didn't! Truly it didn't. Besides, you're not Cinderella to-day,
you're Snowdrop. You mustn't change parts as fast as that. It isn't
Cinderella until to-morrow."

"I'm afraid I forgot."

"Of course you did. Come now, and play."

She shook her head, and then half whispered, looking wistfully into his
face, "My clock is always striking."

They stood close to one another. The sun shining through the leaves on
her young face showed all its beauty; the small mouth with its
delicately curved upper lip; the line of hair over the forehead, two
graceful curves that came together in a little peak; the deep, shining
eyes that dropped now under his gaze.

"Just one kiss," he pleaded.

She shook her head, and he could see her hand clench as though to stop
her trembling.

His own trembled as he placed it over hers and stood so close that,
though he did not touch her, his presence felt like an embrace.

All the emotions of the night of which she had believed herself master
returned, but with redoubled strength. Her whole self, the slender body,
the delicate senses, the shy spirit that before had rested happy in the
love of home and wood and river, was a wild tumult of passionate desire.
To lift up her face and kiss him would be to enter through the golden
gates of paradise. But while her heart beat so fast that the blood
flooded her cheeks and she was Snowdrop no longer, she did not raise her
head.

And then a cock that had strayed from its family among the pines and
wandered in their direction raised itself upon its toes and began to
crow.

They both started, the pink on Hertha's cheeks turned to lifeless white,
and like a shadow she slipped away.

Merryvale stood motionless for a time among the trees. "You wouldn't
think it," he said to himself, looking out upon the golden river, "but
it's a black world."

"You're late," declared Pomona shortly, as Hertha entered the kitchen.
The girl did not answer, but, glancing at the clock, saw that she was on
time.

Pomona was not in good humor; indeed, Pomona's gloomy moods were
frequent, and the household, to some extent, revolved about them. "I
don't know what I should do without Hertha," Miss Patty was fond of
saying, when Pomona was especially exasperating, "she is always the
same."

But on this day, if Miss Patty had noticed, she would have found in her
maid's manner a little trembling unquiet. She did not notice, however,
being deeply occupied with Miss Witherspoon, who was proving a
stimulating companion. The two had exchanged notes upon the subject of
religion to find themselves in pleasant accord, and now were on that
most dangerous ground, domestic service.

"You have a wonderful maid," Miss Witherspoon said, after examining the
delicate, handmade waist which Hertha had just finished.

"Hertha is surely a treasure. But she likes it here, so don't, my dear
lady, hope by offering her better wages, to entice her North."

"I had no thought of anything so basely ungrateful to you."

"Others have, then. But Hertha's not restless like that sister of hers,
Ellen--though I'm sure they're no relation. I can't endure that girl.
Her influence isn't good over my maid."

"Have I seen Ellen yet?"

"No and you won't see her about this place. She teaches in the colored
school."

"How interesting! I shall have to go to her."

Miss Patty's face showed disapproval bordering on disgust. Miss
Witherspoon was not the first of her guests who had at once expressed an
interest in Ellen, and, later, helped on the already over-prosperous
school. She turned the conversation back to her favorite.

"There are not many girls like Hertha to be found to-day. She has a
natural aptitude for service, and her white blood makes her very
intelligent. My cousin, Carrie (she died in Savannah two years ago), had
a maid like that who was the most faithful creature--her constant nurse
for fifteen years."

"Indeed!"

"I'm fixing to have Hertha with me for as long as I live."

"But don't you think she'll get married--she's so pretty."

"I hope not; I certainly hope not. I don't encourage her to go out to
any of the parties with the rough boys and girls here. But she herself
realizes that she's above them in station. No, Hertha will do much
better not to marry. I can understand her falling in love with a colored
man of her own complexion, but we haven't confidence in the 'yaller
niggers,' as the darkies call them. They have the bad qualities of both
races, you know; they're a thieving lot."

"Yes?" ejaculated Miss Witherspoon, and then, a little maliciously,
"Does Hertha steal?"

"Hertha? Why, of course not!" Miss Patty looked very indignant. "Have
you lost anything?"

"No, no," Miss Witherspoon answered quickly, anxious to make her
question clear. "I only thought you said that all mulattoes stole."

There are few things more exasperating than to have one's generalities
taken literally. Miss Patty felt provoked both for herself and for her
maid. "Hertha," she explained, with some feeling, "is an unusual girl,
with, I reckon, an unusual heritage. It is of benefit to her to stay
here in private service with a lady. She is an affectionate child and a
great favorite with me. As I grow older I hope she will want to stay and
make life pleasant for me as I have tried to make it pleasant for her."

At that moment Hertha came to where they sat upon the porch.

"Haven't I, honey?"

"Haven't you----" Hertha questioned.

"Made life pleasant for you?"

"Oh, yes indeed."

"Miss Witherspoon was talking like she thought you ought to get married,
but I told her you were happy here with me and not thinking of anything
of the sort."

"No," Hertha said, "I'm not expecting to get married."

"I'd like to have you get your work and show Miss Witherspoon the dress
you're making. She does her own sewing here as well as mine," Miss Patty
explained as Hertha left, "and I'm as much interested in it as she is."

It was a long day for Miss Patty's maid, but when she was released she
did not at once go home, but walked to the river bank and wandered a
little time by the shore. Every one was within the great house, the
twilight had come, and she could stop, as Tom loved to stop, and think.

As she went slowly along the path that she and Tom had traversed only
two days ago, she felt as though it were she, not he, who had gone away
from home and all its surroundings out to the open sea. Every landmark
with which she was familiar was left behind, her reserve, her modesty,
her pride. Two days ago she was anchored to her home in the cabin, to
her black mother and sister and brother; they were first, supreme in her
thoughts. She was attached to Miss Patty, who petted her and made her
feel less a servant than a loved child. Two days ago as she walked over
this path, she was at peace, and every murmuring sound, every flicker of
sunlight, every sweet, pungent odor sank into her spirit, and held her,
as she would have put it, close to God. Her religion, as she had
unconsciously evolved it from the crude, but poetic gospel of the
colored preacher, and from the commune she had held with nature, was
harmony, the oneness of man's spirit with the eternal goodness. It had
been largely an unconscious belief, born of her own tranquillity. But
now the tranquillity was broken, and peace would not return. Shutting
her eyes, she listened to the air singing in her ears; she tried to feel
herself carried out of the turmoil of the morning into the tabernacle of
the spirit.

But it was of no use. It was gone, home, work, religion. She had left
the shore and was in a little boat, blinded by the spray, tossed on a
sea of tumultuous desire. Tom, too, was out there somewhere on the
ocean, but it was the same Tom who had walked with her Sunday. If their
boats should meet, his and hers, he would not know his sister. She did
not know herself, and stopped amazed to find that she was weeping.

A cow, wearied with her attempt to get some nourishment out of the tough
hyacinth, moved out of the river, and, shaking the water from her wet
flanks, started home. Hertha suddenly found herself hungry and tired and
very much ashamed. The excitement that had brought the tears to her
cheeks was gone, leaving a dull depression behind. She turned on her
way, and as her mother's cabin came in sight, with a light in the
window, for it was late, she felt relieved and safe. After all, nothing
had happened, nothing. She was the same girl she had always been and
needed only to forget the happenings of the morning.

Her supper tasted good, and when it was over she thought that she was
ready to write a letter to Tom. The table cleared, however, and her pen
in hand, she could not find a word to say. How could she forget those
two meetings, the only events worth recording, of which Tom must never
learn a word? So she bit her pen, and at length, at her mother's
suggestion, postponed the letter to another day.

"Honey-lamb," mammy said, "you' eyes look close ter tears. Don't you
want Ellen to go wid yer down ter de dock? She jes' step out a minute
ter see de Theodore Roosevelt Jackson baby, but she'll come ef I call."

"Don't call, Mammy; I don't want to go. Miss Patty kept me running all
day and I'm tired. I'll stay here with you and read."

"Dar are de books, den; but you mostly knows 'em by heart."

"I suppose I do," Hertha said drearily.

She picked up _The Life of Abraham Lincoln_. Almost all the books in the
Williams household had been bought of agents and paid for on the
installment plan. There were volumes of universal knowledge and other
volumes of the world's best literature--all eminently instructive, but
none calculated to soothe an aching heart. Turning over the pages idly,
looking at a picture here, reading a paragraph there, Hertha occupied a
few minutes and then went to where her mother sat in her big,
comfortable chair. Leaning over, she put her arms around the old woman's
neck.

"Um, um," the mother crooned, patting the girl's hands.

"Sing for me, Mammy."

"You must git inter my lap, den. Reckon it'll hold a lil' flower like
you."

"This is better." The girl knelt so that her head came on her mother's
breast. "Now sing."

"What'll I sing fer yer?"

"Oh, anything. Sing 'Nobody knows de trouble I's seen.'"

"Laws, chile, does yer feel as bad as all dat! Poor lil' lily. An' you
was lookin' a rosebud dis mornin'. Dey cer'enly don' know much 'bout
carin' fer my flower up dar." Then, smoothing the girl's hair with her
strong hand, she sang:

    "Nobody knows de trouble I's seen,
        Nobody knows but Jesus.
     Nobody knows de trouble I's seen,
        Glory Hallelujah."

The people at the great house were nervous, tiring; but mammy was
restful like the deep, lower waters of a stream. Her mellow voice sang
on:

    "I know de Lawd, I know de Lawd,
     I know de Lawd has laid his hands on me."

"De Lawd" came out in three long, rolling syllables, descending from the
high call, "I know." Hertha found herself breathing slowly, quietly, her
mother's hand smoothing her forehead and soft, curling hair.

    "I was a wandering sheep----"

Mammy had slipped into a hymn that belonged to the church where for many
years she had worshiped, proud in being the wife of the holy man who
occupied the preacher's desk. She had sung all her children to sleep
with this hymn.

    "I was a wandering sheep,
      I did not love the fold,
    I did not love my shepherd's voice,
      I would not be controlled.
    I was a wayward child----"

Hertha rose from her knees. Quietly going into her mother's room, she
turned down the bed, a task she performed every night for Miss Patty and
her guests.

"Honey," her mother called, "what yer up ter?"

"Nothing," Hertha answered, "only fixing to do something for you and
Ellen, and now I'm going to bed myself."

For a week she never let the thought of the morning's happiness take
possession of her mind. It might press close, but it encountered a wall
of resolution that held it back. She made her way to her work among the
chickens and pigs through the pines to the kitchen door. Miss Patty
liked to have her about, and when the work in the rooms was finished
often called her to her side. She and Miss Witherspoon had taken to
spending a part of their afternoons over a new and elaborate kind of
embroidery, and Hertha was essential to Miss Patty's accomplishment.
Indeed, after Hertha had counted stitches and drawn threads and outlined
the pattern, Miss Patty's part became a last triumphant progress. During
this period of the day, when the women were on the gallery, Lee would
often join them. He and Miss Witherspoon found many things to talk
about, for the Boston woman had a keen interest in this southern youth
who had gotten the best out of his studies and returned ambitious to
bring new life to his ancestral acres. "You're quite a missionary," she
said once to his aunt's disgust. Lee might fuss about his trees if he
liked, but business acumen was a little vulgar and at the least should
be concealed, while criticism of the South, the suggestion that it was a
mission field, was rank impertinence.

Sometimes Lee brought a book and read to them here and there, for Miss
Patty did not care for a continuous story. One afternoon it was a poem
written by a classmate who had died before his college days were over.
Coming from one who left the earth so young, its promise of future
endeavor, of service to humanity, made it a tragic little verse. Miss
Patty wiped her eyes when it was over and called on Hertha to set her
work right. During these times Lee never spoke to Hertha nor seemed to
look in her direction, but he always knew when she had left the porch
and rarely stayed long after her absence. Miss Patty felt pleased that
her Boston guest was interesting her boy so that she had more of his
company.

On Sunday Ellen proposed to her sister that they take a walk, and they
went among the pines and dark cypresses, through the swamp, and by the
black creek. It was hot and humid, the mosquitoes were annoying, and
they were both tired when they returned to the cabin steps.

"I don't like this time of year," Hertha said when they sat down. "It's
so silent. The birds ceased singing long ago; they only call to one
another now."

"The mosquitoes haven't ceased singing, I notice," Ellen replied,
laughing. "Now I like this time of year best of all. October means the
beginning of cool weather and work."

When Hertha went to her room that night a little breeze greeted her as
she sat down by her window. It was cloudy at first, but in a few moments
the clouds broke and the moonlight streamed upon the dark trees and the
white sand. She watched the moon sailing through the clouds, she smelt
the roses by the porch, and the wall that her will had built against her
sweet and rapturous thoughts broke down, and with a rush her spirit was
swept with tumultuous love.

"Cinderella," Lee said to her the next morning as she turned into the
orange grove, "you've been a shockingly long time coming."

"I know it," she answered, "but there were so many things to think of,
sitting by the fire."

"Don't think," he urged. "I've given it up. Don't think, but live."

And this time she lifted up her face and, without a thought, gave him a
kiss.




CHAPTER V


"Hertha," Ellen said the next afternoon, "have you any plans for the
future?"

School had just closed, Miss Patty had given her maid an afternoon off,
and the two sisters were walking together toward their home.

"Any plans?" Hertha was startled. "I thought our plans were made for
good when we came here."

"I hope not!" Ellen declared decidedly. "I'm willing to work here now
for next to nothing, but I shall try for a bigger job some day; and you,
honey, you don't always want to be Miss Patty's maid."

"I don't know; why shouldn't I?"

"This is a dull life for you, Hertha. Sometimes I think we ought never
to have come here."

"Ellen!"

"It's different for mammy and me; we're older."

"You're only four years older than I."

"I think that really I'm a great deal older than you. But I get so much
more out of Merryvale than you do. The people who live in these
cabins--well, they're problems to me, human problems that I'm trying to
solve. There's hardly a home that hasn't in it some boy or girl whom I'm
watching almost as though he were my child. I'm working for the
children, Hertha, the colored children who will soon be men and women
and who ought to have just as good a chance as white children in this
world."

"They never will in America."

"I'm not so sure," Ellen answered.

They were walking in the pine region back of the river. To a newcomer
many of the cabins would have looked untidy; the ubiquitous hog would
have been pronounced a public nuisance, and the facilities for washing
inadequate; but to Ellen the settlement in which she had been working
for five years was a garden of progress, and if a few of the plants made
a determined stand to remain weeds, she did not let them hide her
numerous hardy flowers. In her heart she meant ultimately to uproot
them. Old Mr. Merryvale would never stand for severity, but the next
generation was at work upon the place and might be induced to aid her in
exiling the degenerate few.

"I love it here!" Ellen exclaimed, stopping and looking about her. "I
never worked in a school before where it was so easy to get at the
people, or where the children seemed so anxious to learn. Do you know, I
suppose no one would believe me if they heard it, but I'm glad that I'm
colored."

"Why not?" Hertha asked sharply. "If you love your work and these
people, why should you want to be white?"

"You know that's a foolish question," and Ellen looked sadly at her
sister. "You know as well, better than I, the handicap of color. Haven't
I seen you have to bear it? But still it's great to belong to a rising
race, not to one that's on top and likely to fall."

"To fall? How silly."

"Is it? Well, perhaps it's improbable. But, anyway, that isn't what I
started to talk about. I didn't mean to talk of myself, but of you. I'm
afraid this isn't the right place for you."

"I love it here, too!" Hertha cried, showing more animation than was
usual with her. "I like the country; you know I do. Why, I love
everything about the place, all the flowers in our yard, the pigs, the
chickens, the pines. I think it's the most beautiful spot in the world,
and so does Tom."

She drew in a long breath and threw out her arms as though to take in
the whole of Merryvale.

"That's all right, but you can't live just on flowers and views; you
need people."

Hertha made no response, and they walked on for a time in silence.

"It's like this," Ellen continued. "You're a generation ahead of these
cabins, and you don't enjoy the people socially who live in them. It
isn't snobbish to say this; it's just true. You haven't a single friend
here. I can't think what it would mean if you went away. It would be
like losing the color out of the sky; everything would be dull gray. But
if you ought to go, you ought, and I should help you."

"Haven't you made unhappiness enough, Ellen, with your plans, making Tom
go, but you must get rid of me too?"

"That isn't fair."

"That's what it seems like."

"Let's talk reasonably. Of course it isn't the same with you as with
Tom; you're not a child."

"I'm glad you realize that."

"Why, Hertha, you're almost cross. Please let me explain what I mean.
I'm glad you like it here, but we all have to look ahead, and I can't
look ahead and see you a servant in a white man's home."

"Why not?"

"You're too refined, too delicate. You ought to enter the front door,
and if you can't enter there, isn't it better not to enter at all?"

There was no answer.

"I know I've talked this way before, and I'll try not to do so again,
but I want to make myself quite clear. It isn't as though I didn't
believe in colored girls going into domestic service; I do. There are
lots of people who belong at the back door, and it would be silly to
deny it and to put them at work beyond their ability; but you're not one
of them. Because Miss Patty is white is no reason that she should have a
maid who has a better education and knows more than she does."

"Aren't you drawing on your imagination?"

"No, I'm telling the exact truth. Miss Patty is getting something she
has no right to, and you're not getting your birthright, to be yourself,
to develop the highest in you."

"What great talent have I neglected?"

Ellen threw her arm over her sister's shoulder. "You have talent,
Hertha, you know you have, only you won't recognize it, but keep dancing
attendance on that old lady. With a little instruction you would be a
skillful dressmaker, an _artiste_, as the advertisements say. You sew
beautifully and have lots of taste, and you've style. With such a gift
in any large city you could surely get ahead. You could have custom,
too, if you wanted, from our people."

"I don't expect to get ahead."

"But why?"

"I don't know." The girl stopped a moment and then said slowly, "I don't
believe I've as much ambition as you. I don't like study. I hate the
city, and I'm contented and happy here. When work is over I've you and
mother to go to; I belong to you two and I don't want to leave you."

Her face was aflame as she said this, realizing that it was only a
partial truth. Her deception made her angry, and she turned in retort
upon her sister. "Why does it worry you so that I should love Miss
Patty? Are you jealous?"

"You know as well as I do that it isn't that."

"It sounds like that to me. I like my work. Why should I accept a lot of
responsibility, set up a shop, which I should hate, or go about making
cheap gowns for stout black people when I can stay at home and wait on a
sweet, refined person like my mistress?"

The "my mistress" was given with an emphasis that closed the subject.
Ellen had said that her sister was not a child like Tom, and for the
time at least she must accept the verdict against her.

"Well, chillen," their mother said as they came up to the cabin, "de
best o' news, a letter f'om Tom!"

They both were upon her, but Hertha got the letter.

"Mister Lee were walkin' dis-a-way an' bring it ter me. It were kind o'
him; he knowed I wan' ter see it mighty quick."

"How short!" Hertha said, reading it through rapidly.

Mammy was at once up in arms for her son. "What done you 'spec'? Dar's
de paper civered. He tells 'bout de journey, an' what he gits fer his
meals, an' how big de ocean look, an' how he can't rightly say no mo'
'kase de bell done ring fer chapel. Dat a heap, but it ain't much fer
waitin' hearts."

"He doesn't say what studies he's taking," Ellen remarked when she had
finished with the sheet.

"We're foolish, Mammy," Hertha exclaimed, seeing the disappointment on
the old woman's face. "It's a dear letter, and it's Tom's
handwriting--I'd know it in Timbuctoo. Oh, how I wish he were here!"

"You sho do, honey; but dere ain't no use in wishin'. Come, git yer
supper an' den we-all'll jes' go down to Uncle Eben, an' Granny Rose an'
de folks as ain't gittin' letters ebery day."

There was no need to go out. The news of the letter reached the
settlement before sundown, and many were the visitors who came to see it
and who departed to tell all and more than it contained. It was really a
gay evening, and when the three women were left alone they sat up a
little longer than usual talking about it.

"Everything all right?" Ellen asked as she kissed her sister good-night.

"Yes," Hertha answered, smiling; but when she was alone in her room the
smile left her lips. Did Ellen suspect anything? Probably not, but how
strange to have a secret from those at home.




CHAPTER VI


Never before did an October boast so many wonderful mornings. Sometimes
it rained in the night, but the rising sun dispersed the clouds and
brought a golden day to Hertha's world. And as she went about her tasks,
her brief playtime over, she still sensed the fragrant orange grove and
moved among the trees, her lover by her side. Deftly helping Miss Patty
with her hair or dress, guiding Miss Witherspoon in her embroidery,
cheering Pomona through an intricate dinner, his voice was in her ears
and his touch upon her cheek. From morning until night was a lovely,
precious, fearsome dream.

For there was reality in the dream that brought fear. Her lover wanted
so much. She was content to stand on the threshold, but each day he
asked that they might enter within the gates. It was hard to resist his
pleading. If for a moment he had been rough, if he had endeavored to
take by force what she hesitated to give, she could have resisted him;
but his gentleness was his power. And each morning as she saw him leave
her to go into the world of white men and women, a world as irrevocably
closed to her as the world of light is closed to the blind, her fear
took form. Would he remain faithful if she failed to give him all that
he desired? If she dallied, if she strove to keep him at love's portal,
some time he might not be there when she turned from her path to make
her way among the orange trees. If that should happen, if he should
neglect her, she would die of angry shame. Within her nature there was
modesty and self-effacement, but also pride that could not brook a
slight. She had never wooed; it had been he who had called, beckoning
her from her place among the cabins in the pines. She had not given a
glance or said a word to draw him from his favored place; he had come
because he loved her beauty and her shy reserve. To hold him and yet not
to sacrifice herself. This was the problem, when fear crept into her
heart.

She had pushed it from her day after day, but she could not wholly
ignore it; and this autumn morning as she sat in church, seemingly
intent upon the preacher's word, she told herself that she must decide
what she was willing to give. He had pleaded with her to meet him that
night within the orange grove, promising to wait for her near the
cypress where her world met his. His passion was in the ascendant; he
begged her to trust him, to give herself to his keeping.

"An' de mantle ob Elijah was blue wid de blue ob de eternal heaben,"
cried out the preacher, "an' de linin' was rose wid de blood ob de
Lamb."

Could she go? Why did the world give her such a terrible problem? Why,
why was she colored! She felt a momentary revulsion to be listening to
an ignorant preacher amid these clumsy black folk. It was wicked that a
few drops of Negro blood forced her to this seat when she should be
yonder with the white people where the clergyman read the beautiful
service of the Church of England. Why was she not at Lee Merryvale's
side? As Ellen had said, she was no maid; she was his equal, and only
those drops of colored blood kept her here. No, not the drops of blood,
but the hideous morality of a cruel race.

But the world was here as the white people had made it, and you had to
accept it and then decide what you should do. Perhaps he was holding the
hymnal now and Miss Witherspoon was singing with him from the same book.
There would always be some one like that to come between him and
herself. Always a white face, but no whiter than her own; always a world
that claimed him and despised her. But if she gave herself to him, if
she trusted that he would love and protect her as he so passionately
promised; if she left mother and sister and brother for his sake; then
no other face would blot out hers. What her life would be she could not
picture, but it would not be a life without him.

The service over, she walked with her mother and sister among the cabins
that Ellen so loved. The people standing outside their doorways were
dressed in their best and a pleasant Sunday air pervaded the place.
Every one was decorous, and yet with an undercurrent of jollity; for the
sermon had stirred their imaginations, and ahead was a good dinner.
Uncle Ebenezer talked with authority of Elijah and eagerly awaited the
preacher's presence that he might discuss his theory of the color of the
mantle of the prophet. "It were white as de wool ob de Lamb," he
declaimed as he saw the man of God in his long black coat walking up to
him. "Jes' riccolec', Brudder, de waters dat it smote apart an' dat wash
it whiter'n snow." Aunt Lucindy was on ahead, a little boy's hand in
hers, a waif for whom she was caring; for, though old and frail, Aunt
Lucindy was always mothering some child. One of Ellen's pupils walked
proudly at his teacher's side, carrying her Bible. "I knows what I's
gwine ter be when I grows up, teacher," he said. "I's gwine ter be a
preacher; I's gwine ter preach de word o' God." "I hope you will,
Joshua," Ellen answered, "but remember you must first practise what you
preach." "Yes'm, I know dat;" and then, proudly, "I's practising ter
pray an' holler right now. I can holler as good as Aunt Lucindy when she
gits happy." Mammy had gone ahead to visit Granny Rose, who was too
feeble to attend church. It was all usual to Hertha; she had seen such
Sundays without comment all her life. She let the scene slip by as she
tried to make her choice.

On one of the cabin steps sat an untidy, ragged girl who turned and went
inside as she saw Ellen draw near. Maranthy, Sam Peter's daughter, was
one of Ellen's failures. She was a bold, ignorant young woman of
eighteen, who worked as little as she could and, brazenly open in her
ways, strove to allure the growing boys whom their teacher was training
in health and cleanliness and decent living. She looked maliciously at
both the sisters as she went within her house.

Slipping away from her sister, Hertha sought one of the little paths in
the sand that led toward the river. It brought her out behind the small,
ecclesiastical-looking church at which the white people worshiped.
Stopping to listen, she could hear Mr. Merryvale's voice through the
open window reading from the prayerbook. Often the little settlement was
without a clergyman and the owner of the place himself conducted the
service. Now there was the rustle of people rising to their feet and the
morning's devotion was done.

In the background where she could see, yet not be seen, Hertha watched
the congregation as it emerged from the church. It was a small
group--the Merryvales and some dozen neighbors from up and down the
river. She knew them all, and yet this morning they took on sinister
significance. The stylishly dressed women, the men in their well-fitting
clothes, the gestures and modulations of voice, these were not of her
world. As they went down the path she saw one of the women beckon to Lee
Merryvale, who turned, all attention, to listen to what she had to tell
him. With head bent toward his companion, he walked on and at a turn of
the path was gone. Soon their voices, too, died away and there was
nothing left but the empty path and the endless murmur of the wind among
the pines.

Erect, head thrown back, hands clenched, the colored girl stood for a
moment staring down the path. Her lips parted as though to cry out
against the cruelty that denied her the right to walk among these white
people, white herself, by the side of the man she loved. But no cry
came, and presently her hands relaxed, her face resumed its pallor, and
with drooping head she turned toward home.

Always quiet, at the afternoon dinner her preoccupation was so
noticeable that her mother, the dishes cleared away, tried to draw her
from it.

"Come an' sit wid me on de step, honey," she called. "You don' want ter
go an' do mo' work like Ellen. I neber knowed a chile befo' so greedy.
She can't help eatin' up oder folks' jobs. You come hyar an' talk ter
yo' mammy."

"You talk to me," Hertha said.

"What woll I talk 'bout?"

"Tell me about it again. Tell me about how I came to you."

The mother gave a big happy laugh. "You allays likes dat story, don'
you, honey? An' I likes it too. Reckon dis would hab been a poor home
widout you was in it. Well, sit hyar an' I tell it ter yer, jes' as
'twas."

Looking down on the little garden, gay with autumnal flowers, Hertha
took the step below her mother's on the porch so that she might lean
against her. As she sat there, listening to the rich drawling voice, she
rested as she had not rested before that day. With mammy one felt safe.
Both she and Tom had noticed it.

"Well, honey, it were twenty-t'ree year ago las' September----"

"The twenty-ninth," Hertha interrupted.

"De twenty-nine. You' pappy, Ellen an' me, we gwine ter de church fer a
celebration. We was spectin' ter git home early in de ebenin', but it
done pour so we wait round till it were night. Den we see de rain
weren't gwine ter stop, not fer t'ree 'fraid-cats, so we start off. My,
how de trees shake in de roarin' wind. Ellen, she hung close ter daddy,
an' once she give a lil' sniffle, like she want awful ter cry, but jes'
wouldn't."

"I know," Hertha broke in, "Ellen is like that now. If I'd been there,
I'd have cried and daddy would have taken me in his arms, wouldn't he?"

"I reckon so. You was a delicate chile an' dere weren't not'in' he
wouldn't do fer you. But you weren't dere, an' we jes' push on till de
house were in sight. We went in by de kitchen do' an' fer a space stan'
by de fire, our coats drippin' pails o' water on de flo'. Den, when we
was feelin' mo' like libin', I leabes de odder two an' goes inter de
bedroom."

Hertha slipped up close.

"Dere was a candle burnin' on de dresser by de bed. I was all in a
wonder! I neber lef' a light burnin' in my house when I gwine out, no,
sir; I don' wan ter waste no candle grease. But dere was a lil' yeller
flame shinin' straight up fer me ter see. I done look hard, an' rub my
eyes, an' den I look down ter where it drop its light on my bed."

Mammy made a dramatic stop, and Hertha, ready with her part, gave the
knee against which she leaned an impatient shake.

"On de bed," Mammy went on, prolonging every word, "wid its head on my
pillow, was a new-born chile. It were wrop in a sof white shawl, its
tiny face turned ter de light. I bent ober ter look. It were fast
asleep.

"I don' know how long I stayed watchin', but I heard daddy call, an'
by-'n-by he come inter de room. He gib a cry an' dat wake de baby, an'
it cry too. In course, dat bring Ellen, an' when she see de chile on de
bed she jes' clap her hands an' call, 'It done come! My baby sister done
come!'

"She were dat cute; wen' right up an' loosen de shawl an' croon an'
croon till it stop its cryin'. Me an' my ole man jes' look; we couldn't
do a t'ing, not at fust.

"Well, by-'n-by we send Ellen away ter de kitchen ter fetch some
t'ings--she don' want ter leab dat baby, not fer an instant--an' we look
at one anudder an' can't say nuthin'. Den I picks up de mite, taks off
de shawl, an' foun' one lil' garment unnerneath. But fasten ter dat wee
slip were a letter. We tear it open an' I reckon we both tremble. But we
tremble mo' when we see what it hol'--ten ten-dollar bills! Dat were it,
jes' one hunnerd dollars.

"Ellen come sidlin' back an' snuggle up close ter me where I hol' de
lil' ting. She done see no money, but dat wouldn't ha' made no
diff'ence. What'll a chile care fer such trash? She were all eyes an'
heart fer dat bit er flesh an' blood.

"We took de baby inter de warm kitchen an' I gits Ellen ter hold it
while I fin' her ole nursin' bottle, an' gibs de chile some food. My ole
man move about restless-like. 'What yer mean ter do?' he ask. 'I mean
ter feed an' clothe it,' I says. 'What else could I do?' He didn't make
no answer, but sit down an' watch his lil' gal o' four croonin' to de
baby in her arms.

"Sech a pretty baby! I done nurse a heap er babies, black an' white, but
neber sech a pretty one as my baby. Jes' sof an' pink, wid sech deep
eyes an' a mouf dat look like it couldn't hardly feed at its mudder's
breast. Dere weren't nuttin' 'bout it ter make it seem right in a house
whar black folks libed, 'cept de lil' curls on its head, an' dey mought
er bin a white chile's.

"My ole man an' me, we set an' talk an' talk ater de baby been fed an'
put ter sleep an' Ellen done shut her eyes at las'. We was honest folk,
maybe we hadn't oughter kep' de baby?"

Mammy bent over to kiss Hertha. "But we did, you knows dat, chile, an'
we ain't neber regret it. Dat chile's bin a blessin' eber since she open
her eyes, lyin' dar in de candlelight. Dat chile were her daddy's
delight an' her mammy don't know how ter go tru a day widoud her. An' as
fer her sister, Ellen, she'd walk tru fire ter git her what she ought
ter hab. She come into a poor home, sure 'nough, but she welcome ter all
it hold."

Mammy finished her recital with a broad wave of the hand, while Hertha
clasped her round the neck and gave her a hug that ruffled the pretty
curls, the curls that alone linked her to the colored race.

"Now tell me about my name?" she questioned when they had settled back
again.

"You asks dat, honey, an' de ain't nuthin' ter tell. Seems like I made
it up, an' den agin, seems like it were meant fer Bertha, but kinder
gentler an' deeper, same as you."

"You never heard any least thing about my people?"

The question was asked with a certain knowledge of the answer, and yet
with a wistful interrogation. Never before had this foundling, dropped
into a black preacher's cabin, desired so much to know something of the
two lives that gave her birth.

"No, neber." Mammy's answer was final. "Dey gib yer a start an' leab de
res' fer us. I used ter fear as some un ud claim yer, but I stop dat
now. De pusson I fears is de man as my baby'll say yes to when he axes
her ter be his wife."

"He won't come, Mammy."

"Quit yer foolin'!" The old woman laughed into the serious young face.
"Don' I know how de fellers at school broke der hearts ober yer, an' out
in de city you was de putties' gal o' de lot. I's feared sometimes dis
ain't de place fer a young t'ing like you."

"I'm very happy here," Hertha made answer.

"I's glad o' dat. Ellen, now, she's t'inkin' as yer need company."

"I wish Ellen wouldn't worry over me."

"She ain't worryin', honey." The mother spoke soothingly, seeing that
her remark had awakened annoyance. "She jes' wants yer ter hab what's
rightly yours."

"I'm very happy," Hertha reiterated. "Only," she added, "I do miss Tom.
He used to love to be on the porch with us Sunday afternoons, didn't
he?"

"Yes, dearie."

"I think Tom's going to be a splendid man; you can always trust him."

"Dat's so, dat's so. An' dat's de bes' t'ing yer can say ob any man."

They sat together a little longer, the sun lengthening the shadow of the
cabin upon the white sand, and then, with the coming twilight, went
within.




CHAPTER VII


John Merryvale was growing old, people were beginning to say; and then
would add that the world, when he should pass away, would miss an
old-time gentleman. He was a tall, thin man, long of limb and deliberate
of speech. The impatient northern guest who tried to hurry him with the
mail could fidget to her fill without decreasing by a moment the time he
chose to spend upon his task. He could not be hurried but he could
easily be duped, and many of the acres that Lee Merryvale coveted, but
saw in other hands, had slipped from his father's by reason of
over-confidence in some speculator or old acquaintance. But, no matter
how often he was imposed upon, he never lost his equanimity. The man who
took advantage of him was not to be condemned; it was not his fault if
he had not been born a gentleman; the overreaching tradesman was to be
pitied. That he, John Merryvale, was to be pitied did not even enter his
thoughts.

The Negroes of the place loved and looked up to him, and he on his part
treated them as beloved children. When they were ill he doctored them;
when they quarreled, he acted as judge, and, without the cost of a
lawsuit, gave them more rational judgment than they would have obtained
in a court. While bearing a large part of the expense of the Episcopal
church under the live-oaks at the water's edge, he helped to keep open
the Methodist meeting among the pines where his black children went on
Sunday mornings. He looked askance at first at Ellen; and while he never
grew to like her ways, believing that she put false notions of equality
into the children's heads, he was just and admitted that she had
improved the morals of the place. For himself, he should always look
upon the Negro as the white man's charge and make every allowance for
his wrong-doing. What would be a sin in a white man, in a Negro would be
only the misdemeanor of a child. Once, when one of his Negro tenants
murdered a black neighbor in a drunken fight, he urged the judge to show
clemency, to make the sentence lenient. "Remember," he admonished, "this
man is black, and it is not one-tenth as bad for a black man to do a
deed like this as for a white one." This attitude did not prevent his
treating with respect the Negroes, men and women, whom he knew both at
his own place and up and down the river, and they in their turn loved to
drop a word with him, and looked with affectionate regard upon the tall
figure in its well-worn cutaway coat, its straw hat with the black
ribbon, its big, comfortable collar. One might see him of a Sunday
walking among the pines, inquiring for Lucindy or Rose or Ebenezer, as
the case might be.

On this Sunday afternoon, while Hertha sat with her mother on the steps,
John Merryvale was walking with his son in the orange grove. They had
been examining the trees when two colored lads, dressed in their Sunday
best, bowed in crossing their path. Lee nodded carelessly to the young
men, but his father raised his hat. The son noticed it, and spoke, half
jestingly, of this act of courtesy.

"There isn't another man in the state would do that, Father. A nigger's
a nigger to the folk I know about here."

"I remember," his father answered, "the retort Jefferson Davis gave when
questioned for returning the bow of a black man. 'I can't afford,' he
said, 'to be less of a gentleman than he.'"

Young Merryvale was silent, wondering whether the day had passed of both
the old-time white and colored gentleman.

"This is a beautiful tree," his father said, stopping to look with pride
at a plant filled with fast ripening fruit. "It's bearing well this
season."

"Yes."

"I cannot tell you, Son, how happy I am that you are redeeming these old
acres."

"So you're converted," Lee said, with a bright smile.

"Yes, entirely. And the best of it is the realization that you are busy
in your old home and do not stay in it merely for Patty and me."

"Oh, I couldn't keep away! This place grips me. It's well enough to go
to New York for a month to study the market, but this is the land of my
choice, darkies and all. I wish they could do a good day's work; but,
then, I don't pay them for a day's work, white man's reckoning."

A few steps further brought them to the tree where he and Hertha had
first played together.

The older man stopped again. "Why, here's a blossom at the end of a
bough," he said.

"Yes, but don't pick it!" Lee seized his father's arm. "I've a fancy to
keep it there--for good luck," he added, somewhat lamely.

Over the blossom, the previous morning, Hertha had bent like a happy
child, blowing upon the petals and calling on them to open.

"Lee!" The young man started at his father's voice; there was in it a
note of admonition, almost of severity. But there was nothing of
severity in the words that followed:

"I wish I could express to you my happiness that this old home that my
father and my father's father loved and strove to make beautiful will
now be guarded by you. And you will do better with it than we did."

"Oh, I don't know about that," Lee said.

"Yes, this is a mere fragment that comes into your hands."

"A pretty good fragment, I think."

"Only a fragment. The acres stretching back through the pines should be
yours, and other acres by the river's edge. I did not know how to use
the place aright, but you will be wiser than I."

"Well, if I am wiser about such things," Lee admitted, "it's because the
world is wiser to-day than when you took over the place. People have
learned a heap of science since then."

John Merryvale did not heed this remark, but, turning his gaze from his
son, looked away down the river. "I could not give you the heritage in
land which should be yours," he said gravely, "but I hope I have given
you a heritage of kindly relationship to those about you, of
friendliness and honorable dealing."

"Indeed," Lee answered, "I know how you are loved and honored."

"And you, too, shall be honored by all on this old estate down to the
humblest colored child. It is a great consolation to me," he went on,
still looking away from his son and out over the water, "that the rights
of the poorest black girl have been respected from my father's father's
day through my own. There are no white faces among these cabins to tell
of our passion and our shame. I think of this sometimes when I see that
young servant of your aunt's. In her beautiful countenance is the sin
and the disgrace of the Southern gentleman."

"Don't you believe," Lee answered sharply, "that her mother thought she
was honored?"

"That's as it may be, but she was not honored, and her child was left to
the chance care of a black woman."

"He was a beast who did that!"

The father turned at this heated speech to see his son, face flushed,
anger in his eyes.

"If he took a responsibility, he had no right later to dodge it."

Lee spoke with vehemence. He had told Hertha that he had ceased to
think, but in reality he was thinking, every hour of the day, of the
thing that he was doing.

"Whoever started the damned business going," he went on, with an attempt
at a laugh, "got America into a frightful mess. But some one did start
it, and here they are, women--well, women such as you speak of, with all
the instincts and the beauty of the white race. Don't you believe a
woman like that would be happier under the protection of a white man who
loved her than if she took up with some coarse fellow as black as her
shoes?"

"No," John Merry vale answered, "the life of such a woman is the
loneliest life in the world. She may not enter the white world and the
black world casts her off."

"Aren't you mistaken?" The question came quickly, with an undertone of
anxiety. "It seems to me that the black race must understand that
there's nothing for it but to get whiter."

"There's nothing for it but to get blacker, Son. All, black and white,
are learning to know this. Within its own circle it may build up a
civilization that shall be a humble imitation of the civilization of the
white race, a race that has had a start of thousands of years. We must
be patient, helping when we can, not hindering."

Lee scanned his father's face, but could see nothing to show that he was
thinking of any present issue; rather he was striving to express his
belief on a vexed question that would trouble this country long after he
was gone. Nor did he glance at his listener, but stood, a tall, thin
figure in his long black coat, kindly, serious.

"It is a great problem, that of the two races," he continued musingly,
"a problem that the South alone can solve, since we know the black man,
his virtues and his limitations. He has come to us in his trouble and we
have helped and advised him. That is as it should be, but increasingly
he will have to live without our surveillance. For after all, no man is
fit to be the master of another; and not even the gentlemen of the South
were wise enough to be entrusted with the lives of other men. My father
fought to perpetuate the peculiar institution of slavery, and as a boy I
put a gun on my shoulder and went out in the last year of the war. We
thought that we were right, but we know now that we were mistaken."

"Yes."

"Sometimes I am afraid that as the country develops, as industry
increases, the friendly relations between the whites and the blacks will
wholly cease, and each will go his way, regardless of the other. But
that will never happen while you are here, I feel sure."

"Oh, no," Lee answered cheerfully, glad of the turn the conversation had
taken, "I like the darkies all right."

"That is not enough." John Merryvale turned and for the first time
looked straight into his son's face. "Men have stolen my acres from me,
but I have stolen from no man. I have tried to do no one an injustice,
honoring the least of His children. I have little to give you in money
and in acres; but I can give you this: the assurance that I have
wittingly wronged no man or woman. And I shall believe that when you
stand here, your hair gray, moving with slow feet, you will be able to
say to your son, 'I have wittingly wronged no man or woman.'

"It's getting late," he concluded, turning to leave. "I'll go to the
house to see if your aunt is needing me."

Lee stood alone for some minutes under the orange tree. He ran his hand
caressingly along the trunk as though he were touching something dear
and precious. Then, with sober face, as slowly as his father, he walked
through the twilight to the great house.




CHAPTER VIII


It seemed to Hertha as she sat at the open window after the others had
gone to bed that it was the most beautiful night she had ever known.
Utterly still, except for the eternal sound of the wind among the pines,
it yet was full of music; for, borne on the breeze from the river, some
one was calling, beseechingly, insistently, and she was answering in her
heart.

The young moon was sinking in the west. She could not see it, but she
could see the fleecy clouds that reflected its light. How lovely they
were, moving wherever the light wind, high in the heavens, might desire.
They had no will, these clouds, but were wafted into the shadow or the
silvery brightness, living as they had the right to live, pliant to the
spirit of the strong wind.

The house was perfectly still. The little watch that Ellen had given her
when she went away to school told her that it lacked but a few minutes
of the hour when he had called her to come. All day she had questioned
and doubted and hesitated. She had asked her black mother to tell her
the story of her adoption that she might surely guard her virtue and
resist temptation; but now, looking into the night, she refused to
believe that this was temptation, rather it was a glorious opportunity
to give generously, without stint or questioning.

She slipped a coat over the white dress she was wearing, walked
stealthily into the hallway, lifted the latch and was under the stars.
No one had heard her, and she ran swiftly across the open yard, bright
in the moonlight, to the darkness of the trees.

Standing in the gloom of the path and looking back at the cabin she
hesitated. There were the roses by the porch and the goldenrod and
aster, bits of bright weed, growing in the sand. Close to her were the
chickens asleep upon their perches. She was leaving this friendly,
familiar home to enter the white world; and to enter, not even at the
kitchen door, but through a dark, hidden passage that no one but herself
could tread. She did not want to say good-by. Doubting, she took a step
toward the little house, and then the wind from the river blew in her
face and she fancied some one called her by name.

No, she would not go back. His love lifted her above her home, above her
doubting self, on, up to the clouds, the moon, to paradise. Love was an
immense power that hewed its way through the routine of life. It was
eternal, from the creation of the world.

The way was very dark to the grove, but overhead were the stars, and if
for a moment she felt fear, she stopped peering through the trees to
look to them for reassurance. There is no starlight so beautiful as that
of the southern sky where the heavenly bodies are not cold, sparkling
pinpricks, as in the North, but luminous globes that breathe a soft
radiance to the warm earth. They are companions, and the slave who
followed the North Star through the swamp and bed of the black stream
must have felt warmed and comforted by its near and tremulous light,
only later to see it grow distant and cold. So Hertha looked to the
stars for light and courage and with pounding heart at length reached
her trysting-place.

He had not come. It was the hour, she felt sure, for she had set her
watch by the clock in the living-room of the great house. He had never
been late in the morning. Perhaps Miss Patty had detained him, or his
father; sometimes they sat up for a long time, though, she thought,
never so late as this. But he must soon arrive when she would no longer
be alone, but safe from fear with him.

Waiting, she cheered her heart recalling the many pretty things that he
had said to her. Whether, knowing her station as a servant, he realized
that she was happy to be wholly lifted from it, or whether he believed
her really to be above any other woman, he never failed to call her by
some new and lovely name. Yesterday she had been the good fairy who
brought him her best gift in her outstretched hands. Though it was
chill, she threw off her dark coat and in her white dress ran for a
minute out beyond the cypress into the grove. She longed to dance, to
sing, to call him to her in the stillness of the night. Moving a little
among the trees and peering down the long vista of straight trunks and
arching branches, within her heart she pleaded with him to hurry, not to
let her stay here alone. But no figure came to meet her, only a firefly
twinkled in the distance, and above her head a mockingbird gave a sleepy
chirp. The earth was asleep, breathing deep, fragrant breaths, wrapped
in the soft air of night. She only was alert, listening, a vivid spirit
of wakefulness in the deserted grove.

Returning to the gloom of the cypress she put on her coat and waited,
slow-ticking minute following slow-ticking minute, until the young moon
set and the chill wind made her shiver and crouch in terror and
loneliness and miserable shame.

The night that had been so still as she crept back was full of evil
noises. The sand crackled under her feet, and the twigs upon which she
stepped gave a quick, explosive sound. Sometimes she imagined she heard
people coming toward her and left the path for the trees, to wait in
trembling terror until the fancied tread had died away. In one of these
manoeuvers she lost her bearing and stood for many minutes close to
the path, not recognizing it, terrified to go or to remain. And when at
length she found her way again and walked ahead, her little mouth and
childish chin working in a paroxysm of fright, a screech owl called and
made her almost scream with terror. Then she pulled herself together.
She and Tom had often listened to the owls and he had mimicked them. The
thought of him gave her courage and she went on, trembling and
determined, until the end of the path was reached and she could look
upon the open yard and home.

Then she did hear people coming. Off to the right were voices, a girl's
loud, coarse laughter and a man's rough tones. She crouched down that
her white dress might not show among the trees. The figures came into
sight, Maranthy, with old Jim, an ill-natured, ugly fellow, known to
neglect his wife and children. The two walked boldly over the white
sand, and as Hertha watched them the man caught the girl and hugged her
hard. She laughed and swore, pushing him away, and then, with an
animal-like motion, sidled up to him. Together they moved across the
yard, his arm tight about her waist, while she, lolling on his shoulder
and calling on Christ and God to damn him, gave him a smacking kiss upon
the mouth.

The room was reached at last. Hertha tore off her clothes, slipped into
her nightdress, and lay, a little huddled mass of shame and woe, upon
her bed. Her feet and hands were icy cold, her teeth were chattering,
but her brain was on fire. Pride and shame took equal possession of her
spirit. She had risked everything, she had been ready to give
everything, only to find herself despised. Ellen was right, her place
belonged with her own race. She was black, and she must never again
trust the white race that felt for her only an amused tolerance or
scorn. She was black, and hers was the black man's table, the black
man's home, the black man's burial-place. Never again would she think to
enter the white man's world.

And the beauty of her love was wholly gone. The courage with which her
lover had armed her had disappeared, and her affection, that had seemed
to her something pure and delicate, almost holy, became a common lust
that this man had awakened and then, disgusted at his choice of anything
so cheap, had cast aside. Nothing was left to her of the glory and
gladness of the morning.

But while shame and hurt pride swept over her, there came in their wake
an inexpressible relief. She was safe from harm. She was not like
Marantha but just Hertha Williams who had slipped out of her room to see
the stars and then slipped back again. She was safe here, in Tom's room,
at home.

Kneeling beside her bed she prayed for strength, strength to be good
though she was young and pretty and colored. She could not see ahead,
probably it would be wise to go away somewhere, she wished it might be
near Tom--it was hard to be alone; but she must never again trust the
white man's world.

Back in her bed terror crept over her once more and she shook with fear;
but at length, in sheer exhaustion, she lay quiet, and when the first
morning light entered the room it found her asleep.




CHAPTER IX


"Mercy on us!"

Miss Patty was overcome. She fell back in her chair, her hands trembling
violently, her breath coming short and quick.

"My dear," cried Miss Witherspoon hurrying toward her and fanning her
with the newspaper that lay on the table with the morning mail.

"It's incredible," the southern woman said. She picked up the letter she
had been reading, scanned it a moment, and put it on the table again.
Her companion, devoured with curiosity but strong in the belief that
good manners required that she should show indifference, continued her
ministrations for a few seconds and then turned to her own mail.

"You'll have to advise me," Miss Patty said tremulously, the letter
wavering in her hand, her small head with its white hair shaking up and
down as she talked. "Why should John and Lee have gone away this
morning! I don't know what to do."

"If I can be of any service----"

"This letter is from an old friend, my dear, a very old friend. I
haven't seen him for a long time--I'm such an invalid, you know--but he
writes as an old friend should and asks me to break the news to the dear
child as best I may."

"The dear child?" Miss Witherspoon echoed, interrogation in her voice.

"Yes, and she always has been a dear child; you know how I have cared
for her and shown an interest in her. And to think that this should have
happened! It's incredible."

"What has happened?" The northern woman's tone was peremptory. If she
was to offer advice she would no longer be kept in suspense.

"Why, this amazing story. I should never believe it if it came from
another source, but Bostwick Unthank is the best lawyer in the state. It
is very considerate and polite, I must say, for him to write to me
instead of to John, though Hertha of course is my maid--and then I used
to know him very well indeed. But I can't believe it, I can't believe
that such a thing could have happened."

Impatient at such incoherence and nervous garrulousness, Miss
Witherspoon yet understood that something of vital importance was in the
letter which Miss Patty waved back and forth, and unable longer to
maintain her indifference she touched the old lady on the arm.

"Shall I read what your lawyer writes?" she asked, "or will you read it
to me?"

"Oh, he isn't my lawyer," Miss Patty exclaimed, "I never had a lawyer in
my life, I have never believed in getting into lawsuits. He's only an
old friend. But his letter is of such importance that I will ask you to
read it aloud to me. I want to be sure that I understand it."

Nothing could better have pleased Miss Witherspoon. She took up the
typewritten sheet and in a clear, distinct voice began:

        "'BOSTWICK UNTHANK,
    Attorney and Counsellor-at-law,
         Jonesville, Florida.

    "'My dear Miss Merryvale----'"

"How strange it seems," Miss Patty interpolated, "to have him address me
in that formal way."

"It's a business letter," the reader explained.

"I know that," Miss Patty said tartly, "otherwise I should not have
given it to you to read."

     "'My dear Miss Merryvale,'" Miss Witherspoon began again, "'I
     am inclosing a letter to your maid, Hertha Williams, retailing
     to her an extraordinary piece of news. George Ogilvie, whom you
     will remember, I am sure, has died and in his will he leaves a
     small legacy to a granddaughter, Hertha Williams, the
     illegitimate child of his daughter Lillias who died two days
     after its birth. The birth was successfully concealed by
     placing the infant with a colored family. Evidently Ogilvie, at
     the last, felt unable to keep the secret for he leaves an
     account of the extraordinary proceeding, recognizes his
     granddaughter, and asks that she take the family name. It is
     likely to be a great shock to the young woman and I am
     inclosing the firm's letter to your care, knowing that you will
     understand in your great kindness how best to break the news.

     "'Believe me, Madam, with esteem,

    "'Your obedient servant,

            "'BOSTWICK UNTHANK.'"

As Miss Witherspoon put down the letter and looked at her hostess's
shaking head she wondered whether the lawyer had made a careful choice
in his method of relating the story to Hertha; and she resolved to take
a part herself, if advisable, in the breaking of the news. While
extraordinary, it was tidings that a colored girl might easily bear. Two
legacies, one of money, one of race, were wonderful gifts. "Where is
Hertha?" she asked.

"Ellen stopped in this morning to say that she had been awake with a bad
headache and had then overslept. The dear child, she should have all her
strength for this news."

"Did you ever hear of anything like it before?"

"No, no, it is most extraordinary, most extraordinary. I remember George
Ogilvie well, a handsome man. His wife was a pretty woman with a small
mouth. They said she spent every penny he had. She died two years ago.
You may be sure _she_ would never have allowed the story to be known."

"Hertha should have known it years ago."

"No, my dear, no." Miss Patty sat erect ready to dispute such a
suggestion. Her voice quavered and her head had not ceased to shake, but
she was alert to defend her conception of what was right and proper.
"She should never have known it. This has put a stain forever upon her
mother's name."

"Her mother is long since dead," the northern woman answered sharply,
"while the child is living. I can think of nothing more cruel than to
save a daughter's honor by giving her infant to be reared by Negroes.
It's frightful."

"I don't agree with you." Miss Patty was herself once more. "The whole
thing is very sad and wicked, of course, but life among the Negroes is
not frightful, they are the happiest people in the world. One day is
just as good as another to them. If the sun doesn't shine this morning
it will the next. Hertha won't know what trouble means until she becomes
white."

"It's too bad, then, that you don't have more white children brought up
by blacks," Miss Witherspoon retorted. "Why not give the poor
unfortunates a fair chance in life?"

Sarcasm was lost upon her companion. "Grown-ups must take responsibility
whether they like it or not," Miss Patty said sententiously. "Negroes
are a child race and the white race must govern them. Hertha will be a
grown person now, one of the ruling class, and seeing she's an Ogilvie
it's likely she'll take easily to the position."

"Hertha has always seemed grown-up to me, too serious for her youth. She
loves to day dream, but I don't believe she ever dreamed of anything so
wonderful as this. What do you suppose she'll do?"

"Marry, of course, as every white girl should. The fact that you and I
sent away our beaus makes us all the surer that others shouldn't. Her
legacy should be a help in getting her settled."

"Now I hope she won't get married for some time."

Miss Patty was indignant. "And I hope she'll marry at once before she
becomes too fond of her liberty. When she was colored it was different.
I always discouraged, as you know, her going with the men of her race.
Dear me, how mixed up I am getting. And she is really white! I shall
have to remember that. Dear, dear!"

"Here comes Hertha now."

Looking up Miss Patty saw Hertha in her maid's dress, her cheeks a
little whiter than usual, dark shadows under her eyes, but modest,
quiet, standing in the doorway. "My dear," she began, and collapsed
again.

Hertha ran to her all anxious attention. "Is it bad news?" she asked
turning to Miss Witherspoon while she rubbed her mistress's hands.

"No, Hertha," was the answer, "it isn't bad news. It's about you."

The girl grew sick with fright. What had they found out?

"It's this," Miss Witherspoon said, pushing over the letter inclosed in
Miss Patty's and addressed to the girl.

"What are you doing?" Miss Patty recovered at once when she saw her
prerogative as vendor of news about to be destroyed. "Bostwick Unthank
wrote to me that the shock might not be too great. Don't look at that
letter, honey," turning to Hertha with deep affection and concern in her
voice. "Wait till I've told you about it. It's from a lawyer, my dear,
and it seems a little money has been left you. We don't know how much
but it should be a little help, I'm sure."

"Who has left it?" Hertha asked.

She was tense with excitement, afraid. She could not dissociate this
happening with the night through which she had passed. She dared not
trust herself to tear open her own letter before these two women.
Despairing, she turned to Miss Witherspoon who stood quiet, composed,
just as one of her teachers would have stood at school. "Please tell me
at once," she asked, "what this means?"

And Miss Witherspoon answered in a matter-of-fact tone such as a teacher
might have used: "It seems, Hertha, that you are not colored but white."

The girl turned from one woman to another. "Don't mock me," she gasped.

"My darling!" Miss Patty held out her arms to her favorite. "There,
dear, there, don't look so frightened, though I must say," glancing with
scorn at her guest, "it would be enough to frighten any one into her
grave to be told a piece of news that way. You are white, dear, and you
have been left some money, and you ought to be very happy." And with
many pats and kisses she told all of the story that she knew.

Hertha's letter was brief and ended by stating that she had been
bequeathed two thousand dollars, and that, as all legacies left by the
late George Ogilvie were to be paid at once, she was requested to come
at her earliest convenience to the lawyer's office.

"What is she thinking about?" the two women asked themselves as the girl
read her letter and said no word. But could they have looked into her
mind they would have been perplexed to find an answer. Her brain was a
blur of strange, magnificent impressions. A dying mother, an old man
delaying restitution until after his death, money, freedom. As she
looked down at her maid's dress, as she thought of herself last night
crouched under the trees, she drew a deep breath. She was white, of good
name. No one should play with her again and throw her away. In the
multitude of emotions that rushed through her being the one that held
her longest in its grip was pride. No white man now should expect her to
give everything and in return receive only humiliation. "I'm white, I'm
white," she repeated over and over to herself.

"Two thousand dollars is a good deal of money to get all at once,
Hertha--or Miss Ogilvie, as I suppose I ought to say," Miss Witherspoon
remarked, more to take Hertha's mind from herself than anything else. "I
hope you'll use it wisely."

"Some of it," Hertha replied, "belongs to Mammy."

"She'll never touch it," Miss Patty said sharply; and in this she
prophesied aright.

Hertha rose slowly and went into her mistress's bedroom.

"What are you doing?" Miss Patty called out.

"Making your bed," was the answer. "And then, if you don't mind, I'd
like to go home."

Calling the girl to her, Miss Patty rose and said tenderly, "You're your
own mistress now and you mustn't think of work this morning. Pomona can
come upstairs and put things to rights. This has been a terrible
excitement for you, terrible! If only John and Lee were home. How could
they go away this particular morning!"

"I don't see that that makes any difference."

"Yes, of course it does; one needs a man in a case of business. But sit
down, dear, get your sewing and we'll talk about it." Miss Patty settled
herself again. "To think that you're an Ogilvie! Almost as good a family
as the Merryvales."

"Miss Patty, I'm afraid I can't sit down and talk about it now."

"Of course, you must be excited, though you appear wonderfully calm.
Don't you want to lie down on my bed?"

"No, I think I want to go home."

"Very well, you'll want to tell your mammy. And then you can begin
packing your things."

"Packing my things?"

"Of course. You mustn't sleep another night in a darky's house."

"Oh," Hertha gasped.

Until now she had been thinking of herself in her relation to the white
world. The past night had racked her, body and spirit, and to-day had
brought release. She was white, she was rich, she had a name. Now, at
Miss Patty's words she saw that in the world she was to enter she must
walk alone. Her mother, the only mother she had ever known, who had
given her home and food and tender care, who had prepared her breakfast
for her that morning, who had washed the dress she had on, who had
kissed her when she went away and told her not to work so hard, that her
mammy could always make enough to care for them both--this mother was a
"darky" under whose roof she must not sleep again.

"I'm going home," she said; and without another word left them.

"Poor little thing," remarked Miss Witherspoon, "it's very grand to be
white, but she will find it lonely."

"Perhaps at first," the other answered, "but she'll soon get used to
things. When I was little I cared more for Lindy, our cook's little
girl, than for any one else in the world. We two played together the
whole day long. She was a dear child, with big soft eyes and a laughing
mouth. What fun we used to have! And if we got into a scrape her mammy'd
see to it that no one knew more about it than was good for them. I cried
my eyes out the day my mother said I was too old to play with Lindy any
more. For months I couldn't bear to go by a pine tree where we'd had our
best times together. And when I'd see Lindy she'd look so wistfully at
me! But other things came to fill my life and they'll come to fill
Hertha's."

"It's not at all the same thing," Miss Witherspoon said, "you had your
home."

"And Hertha will make hers. You shall see."




CHAPTER X


Hurrying past the kitchen and by the cabins, Hertha's mind began to work
quickly. At first she had been too full of the remembrance of the
previous night to recognize fully what had befallen her; but now, with a
sharp delight that carried pain with it, she saw herself in the white
world. She was so accustomed to the circumscription of the world of
black people that only when freedom was granted did she fully realize
her slavery. As the slave was bound to its master so she was bound to
the Negroes, unable, except through deceit or sin, to leave their world.
And suddenly the bond was gone and she was free. With her little fortune
she could go out into a marvelous new life without a thought of race. A
white-skinned girl among black people, she had often winced at the
coarse jokes or pitying remarks that had been made upon her appearance.
White men had leered at her, and she had never known when she would be
free from insult. But after to-day she would take the place that
belonged to her. She would no longer be a "white-faced nigger," but
Hertha Ogilvie--Miss Ogilvie, as Miss Witherspoon had said--the
granddaughter of a distinguished southern judge.

As the Williams cottage came into sight, Hertha's thoughts suddenly
changed and the white world slipped from her as she saw her black mother
standing in the doorway. Running forward, she threw her arms about the
old woman's neck and broke into passionate sobs, half of excitement,
half of dread, but that to her mother meant only sorrow.

"Honey, baby, why you cryin'? Who hurt my baby? You ain't rightly been
you'self, not since Tom lef'. Tell you' mammy, dear."

Her mother led her into her room, and there, as they sat together on the
bed, Hertha tried to tell her story. She made one or two excited
attempts, and then, pressing her hands together, said simply: "I'm
white!"

"Oh, my Gawd!" her mother cried.

The two women stood up, the black one looking into the beautiful white
face with its clear, dark eyes, its sweet mouth, its little trembling
chin. As Hertha thought of it afterwards it seemed to her that her
mother said good-by to her at that moment. Then the big, heavy mouth
broke and it was the mother who was sobbing in her child's arms.

Hertha was a long time telling her story. When she described the little
that she knew of her birth the colored woman cried angrily: "De dirty
hogs! Dat's de way dey treats de black chillen--I allays knows
dat--t'row 'em out fer us ter care fo'; neber a helpin' hand fer de
chile o' der sin. But ter treat der own like it was an outcast, oh,
Lawd." At the story of the will she grew much excited. "You's got some
money, honey, I's glad o' dat. Seems like I can see you gwine away ef
you's somet'ing dat's you' own." The suggestion, timidly given, that
some of it belonged to her was received with regal anger. "You want ter
pay me?" she asked. And Hertha's swift, tearful denial ended with a kiss
and the agreement between them that that subject be forever closed. Her
pleasure in the thought of the name Hertha was to bear was real indeed.
"An' dere ain't no borrowed finery 'bout it," she declared in triumph.

It was a hard day. Hertha did not return to Miss Patty, and by the time
afternoon arrived the news had spread, and neighbor after neighbor came
to learn more of the amazing story. How the girl wished them away! She
wanted to be by herself, to think what it all meant. Above all she
wanted to talk to Ellen, to Ellen who had not yet come in and who might
learn the story from some child. As soon as she could find a chance to
get away, she ran from the cabins on through the pines to the school.
Her heart beat violently and then stopped for a moment as she saw Lee
Merryvale coming toward her. Turning, she hurried back to her home,
entered her bedroom and shut the door. He would not dare to obtrude
there.

"Hertha, Hertha darling!" It was Ellen who was knocking and in a moment
she had her sister in her arms.

"I'm so glad for you, dear," Ellen said.

She had been told the story and was sitting very soberly by the window.
"This colored world is too hard and ugly for you. I don't mind much
because I'm so busy, but if I stopped to think about it I'd go half mad.
I have felt that way for you at times. I want you to have everything
that's fine and beautiful and you'll have a chance to now."

"I suppose white people have ugly lives," Hertha put in.

"Yes, but they have a chance for something else, while when you're
colored you might have the genius of a Shakespeare but it wouldn't give
you the opportunity to be a playwright. Or if you wrote a play, they
wouldn't let you into the theater to see it. And it's just the same with
everything else. You were shut out because you were black. But you won't
be shut out any longer now; you're free and I'm so glad."

She showed her gladness by breaking down. Hertha had not seen her cry
since she was a child. Even at her father's death she had kept dry-eyed
while she comforted the others; but now she sobbed pitifully. "I'm
glad," she reiterated through her tears. "I'd give my life for you, and
I reckon that's what it'll be. It won't seem like living when you've
said good-by."

"It's going to be awful," Hertha said choking over the words: "you've
always advised and encouraged me, Sister. I wouldn't have kept on in
school but for you; and now I'll have to go ahead alone. I feel lost."

Ellen, much ashamed of her emotion, dried her eyes. "I've done all I
can, Hertha," she said solemnly, "after this you'll have to go alone."

A step was heard on the porch and a voice asked: "Is Miss Hertha there?"

"Yes, Mr. Lee," Mammy's voice answered; "Miss Hertha, she's right hyar.
Was you wantin' ter speak wid her?"

"Tell her I came to fetch her up to the house. My aunt is expecting
her."

"I won't go," Hertha whispered. "Tell him I won't go."

Ellen rose and left the room. Hertha heard her explain to the young man
that the white girl could not go away yet. "She is very tired, Mr. Lee,"
she declared, "and wants to remain here at present."

Lee seemed to demur but after a few minutes he left the house.

When he had gone Hertha walked into the living-room. There was the
familiar table, the straight-backed chairs, and the comfortable rocker;
there was the reading-lamp with its green shade and the china with the
pink flowers set upon the sideboard; there were the books upon the
shelf; and yet everything seemed strange. Did her own thoughts give it
unreality, her thoughts that roamed continually through the white world
that she was soon to enter, or was it the two people whom she so loved
who were already oddly constrained? "Miss Hertha," she had heard her
black mother say--the mother who had cared for her, had fed and clothed
her, had watched by her bedside in her illnesses. "Miss Hertha"! Was her
home to slip from her like this?

"Ellen," she cried, "I shall have to go away before long, I know that,
but don't push me out upon the Merryvales because I don't want to go."

"I'll do what I can," Ellen answered.

"Honey," her mammy exclaimed, "it don't seem like we could eber let you
leab us. Dis home been you's mo'n our own. But you is white, now, baby,
an' you can't be wid colored folks no mo'."

"Why can't I if I choose to?" Hertha asked, her mouth quivering. "I want
to stay here until I leave. I have to visit that lawyer soon and get my
money, and then, I suppose, I'll go somewhere up North. But while I'm in
Merryvale I want to be with you."

"Baby, I's feared it ain't de right way."

"Have you had anything to eat, Sister?" Ellen inquired. "This must have
been a terribly exciting day for you. I'll hurry and get supper."

Hertha rose to help but her black mother pushed her back into her chair.
"You jes' stay hyar while Ellen an' me gits de t'ings."

"But I want to work," the white girl insisted. "I don't want you two to
do everything."

"It ain't much we kin do," the old woman went on as though apologizing
for the house, "not much fer an Ogilvie. Miss Hertha Ogilvie, dat's what
dey'll call yer. Miss Hertha Ogilvie! Oh, my Lawd!"

Hertha rose from the seat into which she had been pushed and began to
set the table. But while handling the knives and forks and smoothing the
tablecloth into place, she found herself repeating, "Miss Hertha
Ogilvie, _Miss_ Hertha Ogilvie, _Miss_"!

How the white people had steadily refused to give her that title! No
matter how refined she was, how well educated, since she had colored
blood she must always hear her first name. But Lee Merryvale had said,
"Miss Hertha," and Miss Witherspoon had said, "Miss Ogilvie."

"Sister," she said, turning to Ellen with attempted gaiety, "can't we
have sugared sweet potatoes to-night to celebrate? You cook them so
well. Just think, I'm going to have two thousand dollars. Isn't that
rich?"

"It depends on how you use it," replied the always practical Ellen. "If
you want you can get rid of it quickly enough; but I do hope, Hertha,
you'll use some of it for your education."

"What do you want me to study?"

"You know what I told you the other day, but now you'll have a better
chance of success."

"You mean dressmaking. I think myself I'll try stenography."

It was a wild statement, an exciting jump into an unknown business
world.

"Why, Hertha," Ellen said in surprise, "I didn't know you had any bent
that way."

"I haven't, but I believe I should like it. Stenographers work in
offices, and have short hours and good wages."

"Not colored ones. Oh, I forgot." Ellen lost her composure, and to cover
her slip went into the kitchen.

There was a knock and Mammy went outside to admit Mr. John Merryvale. He
at once entered the room and seeing Hertha walked up to her and took her
hand. "My dear," he said, "we have done you a great injustice."

"Yes?" Hertha said, questioning.

She was angry at his coming, but his kindly manner made it difficult for
her to maintain her anger. He crossed over to where her mammy stood,
saying gravely: "Aunt Maggie, it seems like you were the only one who
did the right thing in all this tangle. You and your husband opened your
hearts and brought up this forsaken child. You surely deserve your
reward."

"I don' want no reward," the colored woman replied. "I had my reward
ebery day dis chile lib. Wat you t'ink a lil' bread an' a shelterin'
roof mean to yer when yer hab a lily like dis by you' side? An' oh, how
is I eber ter git on wid her away?"

"I haven't gone yet, Mammy," Hertha said with an attempt at a laugh.
"I'm right here."

"No, but I can't keep you no longer; you's crossed de line when you is
Miss Hertha Ogilvie. You's gone across."

"Well, I'm Hertha Williams just at present, and I'm going to see how
Ellen's sweet potatoes are getting on," and she left the room.

When she returned a few minutes later she found Mr. Merryvale seated in
the rocker while Aunt Maggie stood by the table. He rose as she entered,
a tribute he had never paid her before. The girl felt it acutely as the
old woman had remained standing while the man sat. "White, white,
white," she said to herself. "That's the way the people treat you when
you're white. I'm white now, and they'll rise when I enter the room, and
they'll serve me instead of my serving them."

"Supper is most ready, Mammy," she called out. "Ellen will bring in the
potatoes as soon as you tell her to."

She tried to ignore their visitor, but he was oblivious of her attempt.

"Your mammy and I have been talking things over," he said, "and we
think, Hertha, that it would be well for you to go home with me. I came
to reiterate Miss Patty's invitation. Come and visit with us until you
decide what you will do and whether you desire to go away to complete
your education."

"This is my home." The girl's voice trembled despite her efforts to
control it. "Mammy has told me she won't turn me out."

"Turn you out, my baby!"

"Yes, I'm the baby you took in, Mammy, and I want to stay on here now
with you. Don't send me away! Ellen," she called into the kitchen, "come
in, won't you?"

Ellen appeared at the doorway and all three turned to her expectantly:
Mr. Merryvale, tall, quiet; Mammy, tearful, bewildered; and Hertha with
the new excited look upon her face. "Ellen," she cried again, "don't let
them take me from my only home!"

The colored girl put down the dish that she was carrying and said to the
gentleman who stood looking at her so pleasantly and yet with such a
gently persistent manner: "Hertha is very tired, Mr. Merryvale, I think
she had better eat a little supper and then go right to bed. She looks
like she hadn't slept a wink last night, and to-day's news is enough to
get any one crazy! You'll excuse her, I know, if she doesn't go back
with you."

"You're a right good woman, Ellen," Mr. Merryvale replied, "and likely
you'll understand. We want Hertha to be with us very much."

The white girl moved to where Ellen stood and, clasping her erstwhile
sister by the arm, pressed close to the strong figure as though nothing
should draw her away.

"Hertha is over twenty-one," Ellen remarked, "I suppose that gives her
the right to do as she likes."

Mr. Merryvale looked at the two young women and then addressed himself
directly to Hertha. He seemed very impressive as he stood before her
clad in his long coat. His voice was more serious than usual, and he
spoke gently, with deliberation.

"Everybody in Merryvale has heard of your good fortune, Hertha," he
said, "and I reckon the earth won't be a day older before everybody
knows it up and down the river. It's a wonderful story and if you lived
in the city the newspaper men would be rushing in and taking your
picture, and they only know what foolishness they might say. For a
little time you'll be a person of prominence. Now, I understand there
isn't anything your mammy wouldn't do for you, but right now she can't
help you, you need the protection of my home. Everybody's wondering if
it's true, and asking themselves and others all sorts of questions. If
you come with me the questions will stop, and you will be Hertha Ogilvie
to all the world. Miss Patty would have come herself," he added, "but
she didn't feel rightly that she could walk so far."

"Of course not," Hertha assented, her affection for her mistress at once
asserting itself, "she never walks as far as this."

"Don't you think then that you had better come with me like a wise young
lady? Mammy and Ellen will know that your affection for them has not
changed, and they will be glad to have you escape any gossip or unkind
talk. It isn't like we were strangers to you. You love my sister and she
loves you and will be glad to advise you regarding the new place you
will take in the world. Maggie," he said, turning to the older woman,
"you understand, and I think Ellen is beginning to. I leave it to you
both to convince Hertha that she will do best by coming with me. Your
chickens look likely this year," he said with apparent irrelevance, "I'm
going out to see them;" and with a slow step he left the room.

Ellen was the first to speak. "Look after the supper, Mammy," she said,
"while Hertha comes with me." And she led the girl into Tom's bedroom.

"Is there a special reason why you don't want to go?" she asked; and
then, as Hertha did not answer, in a lower tone, "Has it anything to do
with Mr. Lee Merryvale?"

Still Hertha did not speak.

"Hertha!"

"Oh, you needn't worry." The girl looked up quickly. "Nothing has
happened. Only," and she spoke with bitterness, "I found out he despised
me."

"Well," Ellen observed after a pause, "you're a white girl now, you can
despise him."

"Yes," Hertha answered, but her tone did not carry conviction.

Ellen looked at the delicate face, at the slender hands, at the shy
figure, and swallowed hard. "Sister," she said authoritatively, "the
time has come for you to hold up your head. You've got to make your own
way. You'll be lonely and frightened and you'll miss home, but you've
got to do it. As for Mr. Lee, I'm pretty sure he won't bother you if you
let him see you don't like it. He'll have to take a little time to find
his bearings, now he knows you're white."

"I don't want him around."

"If he wants to be around he can see you one place as well as another.
You can't stay forever in these few rooms."

"Then you send me away?" Hertha turned to her former sister, her head
up.

"You're going to your lawyer, you're taking the name of Hertha Ogilvie,
you're coming into two thousand dollars from your grandfather's estate;
isn't that so?"

"Yes."

"Then, Hertha, haven't you gone away already? You know the South. You
can't be both white and black."

Hertha took down her hat from the shelf and put it on. It was a pretty
white straw with a blue ribbon. She had trimmed it herself but the straw
and the ribbon were a gift from Ellen.

"I suppose I may come back to pack up my things?" she asked angrily.

"Little sister, little sister!" Ellen cried.

Throwing off the hat Hertha flung her arms around her sister's neck.
"Let me stay just a little longer," she beseeched. "Tell him I will come
after supper. Tell him that I am too ill to come now but that you will
bring me later in the evening. Let me stay and have supper with you and
Mammy and then you may take me to his house. I'll go with you but not
with him."

"Oh, you darling!" Ellen said, hugging her. "You're the truest! And I'm
glad for you, I am, I am! You'll never forget, oh, I know you'll never
forget! You know that black and white mean nothing, just nothing, that
it's hearts and souls, it's whether people are mean or generous, whether
they're kind or cruel, that counts. You'll never talk about 'cute
niggers' the way the women do who come to my school. You won't think
black people can't feel shame and mortification the same as white. You
won't say the women are all immoral and the men are all----"

"Oh, Ellen," Hertha cried, "I've said good-by to Tom!" She sat down at
the window and shook as though she were ill. "I can't help loving him
most. I love him the way you love me; I took care of him when he was a
baby."

"Yes, dear!"

"Go and tell that man that I'm coming by and by with you, and let me
stay here a while alone."

It was dark among the pines, but the clouds broke and the silver
moonlight greeted them as they turned under the live-oaks to Hertha's
new home. For the first time since they had come to Merryvale and the
great house they made their way to the front door. There, on the porch,
they kissed each other good-by; and standing outside, Ellen saw Hertha
Ogilvie, the baby that she had nursed, the child for whom she had made
daily sacrifice, leave her in the darkness to enter the white man's
world.




CHAPTER XI


"I never knew lawyers before to be so expeditious," Miss Witherspoon was
saying, "I shall not talk again of the dilatoriness of the South."

"It has all happened very quickly," Hertha answered.

A week had passed since the receipt of the letter, and Hertha and Miss
Witherspoon were sitting together on the gallery while Miss Patty took
her afternoon nap. The younger woman was sewing on some underwear but
the older sat with empty hands, looking now at the girl, now at the
landscape.

"You have been wise at once to bank your money, Hertha." Miss
Witherspoon had started with Miss Ogilvie, but had slipped back into the
familiar appellation. "You can draw it any time, but this way will make
you careful."

Hertha smiled.

"I am glad that you have decided to accompany me and enter upon work in
Boston. It seems a special providence that I should have come to
Merryvale at just this time, when I can be of use."

"I'm sure it is fortunate for me."

"I have made all the arrangements that we spoke of, and I know that you
will like the Institute. The course there in dressmaking is admirable.
It's a little late to enter, but as a special favor to me you will be
allowed to go at once into your class. I said that you were clever with
your needle and could easily make up the lessons you had missed."

"I hope I can."

"Of course you can, my dear. You have only to exert yourself, and
everything will go as it should. And about your board. I have written to
Clay House, and they will take you in with their first vacancy. It is
always so crowded. You see, it is the best place for working-girls in
Boston for the money. You might have to share your room with some one
but I don't believe you would mind that. A single room is seven dollars
a week, but with another girl it costs only five dollars. You wouldn't
want to start in spending more than that, I presume. You agree with me?"

If Hertha was in disagreement she did not show it in her face, but
neither did she express approval of Miss Witherspoon's plans; she simply
allowed the lady to talk on.

And she did talk on. She told Hertha about Boston, its streets, its
public gardens, its library, its admirable educational facilities. Her
knowledge of the city was prodigious and she apparently was on the
boards of half its institutions. When she was through, for the time
being, with Boston, she turned to Hertha's personal affairs. It had been
arranged that the two should leave together in three days, going by
train to New York and on to Boston. Miss Witherspoon had definite ideas
of what Hertha would and would not need for the trip. She cautioned her
at present against buying any clothes beyond absolute necessities. There
would be time for that later. And from this she turned to the general
question of expenditure. "Two thousand dollars, you know, Hertha, is a
very small sum. You must not think of it in terms of principal but of
interest. At five per cent it means only a hundred dollars a year, or a
little less than nine dollars a month. Of course you cannot live on
that."

"No, of course not."

"And while I approve an immediate expenditure for education you will
need continually to remember that your little patrimony as far as
possible should be kept intact. If you touch the principal try to make
it up afterwards. It is a great comfort to have a bank account."

Miss Patty came in at this point, fresh and pretty from her nap, and
took the comfortable rocker near Hertha.

"What is Miss Witherspoon advising you now?" she asked, smiling.

"To be careful of my money," Hertha answered.

"A great mistake," the southern woman said, rocking lazily back and
forth. "I would advise your spending at the outset at least five hundred
dollars for clothes."

"What!" cried Hertha.

"Yes!" said Miss Patty, enjoying the annoyance on Miss Witherspoon's
face. "I don't approve of your learning dressmaking, you know, my dear,
it will lower your station. Get a lot of beautiful clothes in New York
and then let me persuade Cousin Sally to take you about with her this
winter. I'm sure she would enjoy toting a pretty southern girl around
and if she didn't have you married in six months she should never have
been born in Baltimore."

"It sounds very attractive," said Hertha, smiling. She knew Miss Patty
was only half in earnest and that she liked above all things to shock
her northern guest. "But think how terrible it would be for her if I
didn't marry and Cousin Sally was left with me and the dresses!"

"If you wanted to support yourself at the start," Miss Witherspoon said,
exactly as though no one but herself had spoken, "you could take up
operating work."

"Operating work?" asked Hertha.

"Yes, operating power-machines. Good workwomen begin at ten dollars."

"I like the sound of that," Hertha said with more animation than she had
yet shown. "I always enjoy using a machine."

Miss Patty was genuinely horrified. "Factory work!" she cried. "Factory
work for this child! You're crazy. It would ruin her social position."

Hertha was startled. It was hard for her to remember that being an
Ogilvie she had a social position.

"Take my advice," Miss Patty went on, "and if you must work, get a
genteel job. Why not go as a companion? Now I had a pretty little
relative, Dolly Simmons, not exactly a relative but we were kin, her
father's brother and my nephew's wife were cousins. The Simmonses never
had anything, or if they did they only kept it long enough to lose it in
a jack-pot, and Dolly had to support herself. She was a nice little
child, with eyes like yours, and she went into a family as companion. It
was in Chicago and the woman, she had an immense fortune, took Dolly
with her to Palm Beach. There Dolly was a raving success, so much so
that she had three proposals in one winter. The Chicago woman was quite
nasty about it, jealous of course, and sent Dolly off, but not before
she had captured a widower with five children and three houses, one in
the country, one at the beach and one in St. Louis. That was doing well
for a Simmons. How I wish," Miss Merryvale looked affectionately at
Hertha, "that I had the strength to take you away and give you a season.
I wouldn't be jealous, my dear, but proud of all your conquests. But I
fear it's out of the question."

"Yes," Hertha made haste to say, "you couldn't possibly, though it is
very kind of you to want to."

"It's hard your not having any near relations. I'd love to have you stay
with me, but I can understand your leaving. You're white and you don't
want to remain where you've been black. But when you get North, don't
make the mistake of lowering your social position, Hertha."

Hertha made no response, and then Miss Witherspoon, who had kept silent
as long as was humanly possible burst out: "It is natural that Miss
Merryvale and I should not agree on this matter, Hertha, but as long as
you are going to live in the North I want you to understand northern
conditions. I really believe you will be more likely to marry and to
marry happily if you think nothing about it. Take up work that interests
you and that you can do well. When you can take care of yourself then
you may accept the man who wants to take care of you."

"Well, of all the extraordinary pieces of advice," Miss Patty murmured.
But at this point Hertha arose and announced that she was going to her
room.

Once by herself she drew a sigh of relief. These two women, she feared,
would drive her to do something desperate. She had at once accepted Miss
Witherspoon's invitation to travel with her to the North and had been
grateful for her suggestions as to her education; but she had not
expected to have everything arranged before she set foot in Boston. She
would have preferred to look about and to plan for herself. Of Miss
Patty's scheming she gave no thought, she was not in a humor to consider
getting married; but her future career did interest her and she could
but wish that it did not have an equal interest for Miss Witherspoon.
Would she want to be closely in touch with this energetic woman? She
reminded her of a teacher she had had at school, a Miss Smith--also from
Boston. Miss Smith, who was a terror to the idler or the dreamer, had
never missed a day from her work for twenty-two years. Was Miss
Witherspoon like that? She was very particular about her room. Would all
the people in Boston be so thorough and so emphatic?

She bestirred herself for a few minutes and then sat down idly by the
window. She could see the broad stream and against the sky was a line of
birds. They were too far away at first for her to name them, but
suddenly the sunlight glistened on their snowy wings and she saw that
they were ibises flying south. In a little while she would be flying
North. What would her welcome there be like?

Of one thing she was sure. She wanted with all the intensity of her
nature to get away, to leave Merryvale and all its inhabitants, black
and white. Why, there was no place to which she could go! To turn down
the path to her black mother's cottage, there to find herself a
stranger, was more than she could bear; she would not go again until she
went to say good-by. But here at the great house life was always
difficult. She wearied of Miss Witherspoon and even of her dear Miss
Patty; they were so bent upon running her as though she were a private
show. She liked Mr. Merryvale sincerely, but she often avoided him, for
once he asked her to walk with him and on the way they met his son; and
she was in terror lest they two be left together.

For it was the younger man who made life difficult. He would not give up
trying to speak with her, while never for a moment would she permit him
to see her alone. She had resolved upon this course the night that she
had come into his home and she did not mean to swerve from it. If Hertha
Williams had not been worthy of a lasting love neither was Hertha
Ogilvie. She avoided him, and when he had written her put back the
letter unread in his room. But as she saw him at table, his bright face
looking all attention if she spoke the simplest word; as she was the
recipient of every courtesy from him, when, with the others, they sat in
the living-room; as she caught his eye, the rare times that she glanced
up when he was near and saw the old look in his face; she feared she
could not trust herself if he should speak.

A knock at her door. She did not open it but asked who was there.

There was no answer; and though the knock was repeated she made no
motion to open the door.

No, she would not talk with him. He had despised her, and now, as Ellen
said, she could despise him. There was tonic in the thought.

"Hertha!" a voice called.

She was standing at the window and despite herself looked down to where
Lee Merryvale stood below.

"Come!" he cried.

It sounded like a command. She shook her head angrily and walked back
into the room. This was persecution. There was no place for her. Mammy's
home was closed and in this she must continually evade one of the
household.

Another knock. This time it was Miss Witherspoon. "May I come in just
for a moment?" that lady said.

Hertha smiled pleasantly but inwardly felt resentment.

"I want so much to let you know what I've been thinking about," Miss
Witherspoon announced as she entered the room. "I've just remembered a
nice old couple whom I haven't seen for more than a year who live only a
block from the Institute. I believe they would be delighted to take you
to board."

"Yes?"

"Mrs. Palmer Field. I remember her well now. Her husband at one time was
a clerk in a bank, though I don't know what he may be doing at present.
The last time I saw him he looked too old to be a clerk. Probably they
would be very glad to take you in, and would charge you only a dollar
more than at Clay House. And there is something, you know, in what Miss
Merryvale says about your having some social life. They are quiet,
elderly people who sometimes take a student to board. I'll write and
tell them about you and see whether they will take you in."

"I would rather wait, Miss Witherspoon; we start North in a few days."

"It doesn't do any harm to write; then when we go to see them they will
know who you are."

"Are you telling every one about me?" The question came with a touch of
anger.

"Why, yes, what else should I do? You have to tell something of your
past, and how much better to have it known so that there will be no
questioning. I assure you every one will be most considerate. Your
story, with the legacy left you, has a touch of romance; and what a
pretty name, too, 'Hertha,' Is it German?"

"Perhaps."

"Please excuse me," the Boston woman said as she moved apologetically
toward the door, "I shouldn't have come in for I know you're tired of
all our talk, but I had a new idea and I wanted you to hear it."

She looked pleasant as she spoke and Hertha smiled back, but when the
door was shut the girl threw herself face downward upon the bed. It was
a new thought to her that people would know her story, and she resented
it. It was partly to escape the story that she was leaving here, and now
she was to be discussed and pointed at in Boston as the white girl who
grew up among Negroes. Instead of escaping from her past it was to
follow her into the land where she had expected to be free.

Another knock at the door. Hertha rose slowly, and without opening,
called, "Who is it?"

"Jes' me, _Miss_ Hertha."

She opened, to find the cook, Pomona, outside.

"Some one wantin' ter speak wid you, _Miss_ Hertha."

"Who?" Hertha asked.

Pomona rolled her eyes and grinned. Her sides shook as though with
repressed laughter. "I can' guess, honey, an' he don' gib his name."

"I won't see any one," Hertha said angrily.

"You's mighty hard on folks now you's white." Pomona did not go away but
continued to stand in the door grinning at the girl who had recently
been a servant like herself. "Ain't yer gwine ter do nuthin' fer him?
Seems like ater all dat huggin' an' kissin' in de orange grobe----"

"Come in!" Hertha drew the woman into the room and shut the door behind
them. Her face was drawn with fear.

"Don' you worry, chile," the black woman said kindly. "I won't tell on
yer; but I's Mr. Lee's frien' an' I ain't gwine ter see him put about,
not for no white-faced brat."

Hertha's eyes were very bright as she looked the big woman in the face.
"Pomona," she said, "you must help me. Go down to him and ask him not to
try to speak to me. Tell him that I ask him as a gentleman not to try to
see me alone. I'm going away in three days, it isn't long for him to do
as I ask. Go down to him, Pomona, and bring his answer back to me."

She spoke with such earnestness that the colored woman was impressed,
and muttering, "I'll t'ink about it," turned to go.

Hertha ran to her and clutched her arm. "Do it for me," she whispered.

In a few minutes the woman came back. "He's gone," she said. "Went down
de road an' he says ter tell yer he won't trouble yer agin."

Then she closed the door with much dignity.

Through the open window came a gentle rustle of the wind among the
live-oaks. Hertha stood in the middle of the room, her head drooping,
the shadows dark under her tired eyes. She felt utterly alone. The old
world was lost to her and she had closed the door upon the new.

Going to the window she looked beyond the oaks and down the road, and in
the warm afternoon light saw the man she loved slowly walking away.
Moving across the room she put her hand upon the knob of the door; but
after a moment's hesitation she turned back, a determined look on her
face.

"Reckon I won't trouble him again," she echoed.




CHAPTER XII


In the dim twilight of a November morning, before the sun was up, a
young lady stood outside the Williams' cabin. She wore a dark blue
traveling suit and a small hat set stylishly on her curling brown hair.
In her right hand was a little leather hand-bag and in her left a neatly
rolled silk umbrella. Above her well-cut pumps were silk stockings. She
looked surprisingly out of place, and seeming to realize it herself, she
hastily lifted the latch and went into the house.

The table was set with three places; from the kitchen the steaming
coffee-pot sent forth a delicious fragrance, while the scent of frying
bacon mingled with the almost imperceptible odor of hot rolls. A big
bunch of red roses lay by one of the places that was also graced by a
cup decorated with pink and white flowers.

"Is that you, Hertha?" came a voice from the kitchen.

"Yes, Sister," was the answer.

Ellen appeared at the kitchen doorway and after a glance gave a little
laughing bow, saying, "Good morning, Miss Ogilvie."

There are few people who look always the same; we vary in our appearance
with a headache or a drop in the thermometer; but perhaps nothing is so
quick to change our aspect as a reversal in our fortunes. Hertha had
worn a pretty suit before, she had been well-shod, but never previously
had she stood with such a quiet air of self-confidence. She blushed at
Ellen's greeting, her head drooped, and she was Hertha Williams again.

"Oh, it's great!" Ellen exclaimed. "Don't droop your head. Think what a
pity it would have been if Hertha Ogilvie had turned out to look like
Minnie Barker!"

A picture of Minnie Barker, very freckled, with a snub nose, reddish
hair and a shirtwaist that was always pulling up from her skirt at the
back, came to Hertha and she laughed. Then sobering, she said, "I'm not
going to any one who'll care. If I had a relative or two!"

"There are relatives and relatives," Ellen answered sagely. "This world
is such a raffle you might not have inherited the right kind."

"It isn't likely," Hertha added, "that I'd have gotten another set as
good as the first," and she smiled at her former sister.

"Good morning, honey," said Mammy, appearing with a plate of biscuit.

They joked a good deal during the meal to which Hertha had invited
herself and which she had planned even to the guava jelly, slightly
liquid, amorously sweet, which Miss Witherspoon assured her she would
never get in the North. The meal over they went outside and the visitor
stood with Mammy while she fed the scraps to the chickens, watching them
peck and push at one another, each trying to get the best piece.

"Hertha," Ellen said hesitatingly, "there's something Mammy and I want
to say."

Hertha shrank within herself. She was fearful when Ellen started in this
serious tone, dreading too careful an analysis of their emotions.
Understanding this the older woman spoke.

"Honey, dear," she said looking at Hertha with moist eyes, "you's gwine
away alone, for we's alone ef we ain't wid some'un we lobes. I 'spects
it gwine ter be mighty hard fer you, but ef eber you's discouraged jes'
'member dat here in dis lil' cabin dere's you' sister an' you' mammy,
lobin' yer an' prayin' fer yer day an' night. You's close in our hearts,
foreber and eber, an' we knows we's close in yours.

"But, honey, dar's anudder t'ing. Keep us in you' heart, but don' try
ter lib in our worl', not at fust. It ain't gwine ter be so easy, allus
ter remember as you's white. You can't fergit a lifetime in a day. An'
it's mighty mean ter be swingin' fust on one foot, den on de udder, not
knowin' whar you stan'. When yer gits yer place firm in de white worl',
den yer kin turn back ter look at de black. But not now, dearie, not
now."

Hertha could not speak, but she nodded her head in acceptance of her
exile.

"We don't need to worry," Ellen said with a laugh that had a sob in it.
"We sha'n't have to wait long. You'll soon stand on both your feet."

"I ain't gwine ter de dock," Mammy announced when Ellen in a moment said
it was time for them to leave. "I don't wan' no white folks starin' at
me an' talkin'; I'se gwine to say good-by hyar in my home. Baby,"
turning to the child of her adoption, "you's so pretty-like, allus be
good."

"Yes, Mammy," Hertha promised.

"Lay you' head on my breas'. Dere! Lil lamb, you's gwine out inter de
worl' alone. But you know de way ter safety. Lobe de Lord Jesus. Don'
never forgit Him fer a moment, but keep close ter His bosom."

On the dock Miss Witherspoon was fidgeting among the hand-luggage. She
looked annoyed when Hertha came up with Ellen. "Oh, here you are," she
said. "Don't you think you had better express this bag? No. Why not? But
I thought I explained to you that you could express it on the train.
However, it doesn't much matter. How many pieces of hand-luggage have
you? Two? And you have two other things to carry, your hand-bag and your
umbrella. It's always well to count the number of pieces you have and
then when you get up from your seat you can go over them--one, two,
three, four. Do you see? I'm sorry though that you didn't pack so that
you could express one of the bags through."

Ellen looked on, feeling that she was only beginning to realize how much
of tragedy there was in this good-by. Not even she had appreciated,
until she stood there on the dock, how far removed was the world of
white and black. There was something terrible and ridiculous in sending
her little sister away with a stranger, and denying to her the right to
know again the people among whom she had been reared and who had given
her the training and the education that made it possible for her so
easily to take her place in the white world. "Well, I'm mighty glad I
was ambitious," she thought with a rush of pride as she looked at the
well-bred, ladylike figure in its stylish traveling dress. "Supposing
she'd been handed over to poor white trash!"

"Ellen," Hertha whispered, "I'm going to try to make something of myself
but I'm more easily discouraged than you."

"You must be courageous, Hertha. Go ahead and do things."

"I don't know how to do that. But perhaps things will happen."

Miss Patty had said good-by at the house, but now Pomona came hurrying
down with a basket of Japanese persimmons for the journey. With the
bunch of red roses these made two more things not to be forgotten when
you left your seat, and Hertha felt Miss Witherspoon look disapprovingly
at them. Then with the rising sun the boat came toward them around the
bend seeming, to the young girl who stood there, like some sea monster
that would drag her away from everything familiar and carry her to an
alien land. She grew almost sick with fear, but a glance at Ellen made
her rally. A step up the gangplank and she had left the world of
friends, of mother and sister and brother, of lovely skies, of beautiful
trees, of mockingbirds and whistling quail, the world of long walks with
Tom and of evenings out under the stars; the world that had been a world
of rest and peace until Tom left it on this same boat less than two
months ago.

"The porter has both your bags, I hope," said Miss Witherspoon
anxiously. But it proved that Lee Merryvale was carrying them, and as
she spoke he deposited them at Hertha's side. Then, taking off his hat,
he said good-by. "I am coming North this winter," he remarked
decisively, "and I shall expect to see you. I hope you'll enjoy going
into a new land."

"I think I shall," Hertha managed to answer, and was grateful that he
had not tried to shake hands. When he left them the moorings were cast
off, and the boat turned out into the stream.

On the dock stood the Merryvales, father and son. A little way from
them, by herself, was Ellen. Now they were going past the great house,
the trees were tossing their mossy beards and from the gallery Miss
Patty was waving to her. Cows grazed in the river, and high above a
turkey buzzard soared, gazing down to find death on the earth. Then the
river made a bend and the familiar world was gone.

Before she left the boat Hertha took out a letter from Tom and read it
once again. Tom had shown his thoughtfulness in every line. There was no
surprise in his receipt of the news and there was much gladness for her.
"Sister," he wrote, "we are all in a cage, we black folk. It's a big
cage, and we get used to it and have a good time in it, and after a
while we don't much notice when we strike our wings against the bars.
But it's a cage. Do you remember that funny, old white woman in the city
who used to let us look in her room and see her family of canaries? They
were breeding right there in her parlor, building their nests and
bringing up their young. Those canaries were just as busy and as much
taken up with their goings on as if they had been out in the trees. But
they were prisoners all the same. Well, they've opened the cage door for
you and set you free. It wasn't right for you to be shut up; it weren't
meant for you. Now you're free and folks won't come just to play with
you in your cage. I'm glad, Sister, and don't forget you're free."

"I wonder if I really am free," Hertha said to herself. "I'd like to
find out."

The railroad journey was uneventful to Miss Witherspoon, but full of
novelty to Hertha. Accustomed to the jim-crow coach, the Pullman with
its comfortable bed, its luxurious dining-car, was a revelation. But she
showed no sign of unfamiliarity and moved through the day, and even
climbed to her high perch at night as though it were a usual routine.
But all the time she was revolving a plan and wondering whether she
would have the courage to carry it out. She had told Ellen that she
could not go ahead and make things happen, but she felt that it was
possible, if you did not like a thing, quietly to avoid it. The
conception of freedom of which Tom wrote was taking a strong hold upon
her. As she lay awake looking up at the lighted ceiling of the car,
feeling the presence of the many people traveling like herself to the
strange North, people who were now of her world, she grew impatient at
the circumscription that was being prepared for her. The story of her
life had been told to Miss Witherspoon's friends, Miss Witherspoon had
planned her future, and she would be an ever pervasive factor in her
life in the months to come. Hertha suspected that to be with her would
be like going to school again. But the cage door was open and she might,
if she had the courage, make a genuine flight, alone. Yes, alone. If she
could not be with those she loved, she did not wish at once to link her
life to some one whom she was growing to dislike, some one who intended
to fashion the order of her ways. Why not slip away from this new
chaperon who, after all, was only a chance acquaintance? So she reasoned
as she lay awake at night, and as she looked out of her window during
the day while the train swung steadily northward and prosperous cities,
belching factories, well tilled fields, great barns, and spacious
farmhouses whizzed past, her courage and her desire for adventure grew.
She had money, she was white, she would learn what it meant to be free.

"We shall soon be in New York," Miss Witherspoon said on the second day.
"We arrive, you know, at the Pennsylvania station and we take a taxi
there for the Grand Central. I am sorry that I can't stop to show you
New York, but I delayed my departure from Merryvale longer than I
expected, that I might bring you with me, and it is imperative that I go
at once to Boston."

"I certainly do not want to put you to any inconvenience."

Hertha's tone was polite, but at heart she felt angry. She wanted to see
New York and her companion had killed all desire she might have had to
see Boston. She was hot with excitement when later they drew into the
station.

"What did you give your bags to another boy for?" Miss Witherspoon
questioned.

They were in a crowd of people, hurrying off the trains. Miss
Witherspoon had seized upon a porter to whom she had given her luggage,
and, on turning around, had found that her companion had extravagantly
engaged another.

The young girl murmured an unintelligible reply and her chaperon, intent
upon getting a taxi, hurried on ahead.

"Let's not walk so fast," Hertha said to her boy, who answered, smiling,
"Reckon you're from the South."

"Reckon I am," was the reply.

"Your friend's getting away from us!" he announced after they had moved
slowly down the platform.

"I want her to."

Meanwhile Miss Witherspoon, reaching a taxi, had her luggage settled in
it and then looked back for her charge, who was nowhere to be seen.
Nervous, yet sure that Hertha would appear in a moment, she stood by her
cab, refusing to get inside.

"I got ter go," cried the chauffeur.

"I've got to wait," said Miss Witherspoon emphatically, "until my
companion comes."

Without a word the man drove off to take his stand in the rear of the
line while another taxi swept up, gathered in a group of travelers, and
went on.

"How provoking," Miss Witherspoon cried. She was separated from her
luggage and from Hertha. Never was anything so stupid.

Suddenly some one spoke at her elbow. "The young lady asked me to give
you this."

It was Hertha's porter, holding out a note.

Miss Witherspoon opened it and read the few words written in the girl's
careful hand.

"Thank you so much for your kindness, but I have decided to stay in New
York. I think I shall prefer to be where no one knows anything about me.
I'm sorry I put you to so much trouble." And below, written more
hurriedly: "Don't worry over me, and thank you again."

"Where did she go?" Miss Witherspoon asked the boy, who was watching her
with interest.

"I don't know," he answered, "I put her on a street car."

"Here's your taxi again," called out the starter.

Miss Witherspoon was startled and indignant. She looked about as though
hoping by some miracle Hertha would appear at her side. Then,
appreciating the futility of attempting any search, she got into the
taxi with her bags and, chagrined and disappointed, was driven through
the crowded streets.

"What shall I say to them in Boston?" she asked herself.




II

KATHLEEN




CHAPTER XIII


Noise! Thundering, reverberating noise. Noise that never ceases, noise
that deadens the brain and makes the hand jerk in response to the jarred
nerves; always, day and night, throughout the length of the city
streets, the clamor of inanimate things.

In the morning when Hertha slipped to her seat, the last but one in the
fourth line, she started her own thundering whir. The forty machines,
all going at once, sounded like nothing so much as the great beetles
that flew about her southern home in the summer evenings. But the
beetles came but rarely and went with the withdrawal of the lamp, while
here in the workroom the drumming was incessant. Always it was hurrying
her, calling upon her to make better speed, to push the white fabric
more quickly that the needle might make a greater number of punctures to
the minute; to hasten, though her hands trembled, and though the tension
drew her mouth into a narrow line and brought her brows together in a
frown.

When noon came and the whirring stopped, Hertha would look down the long
line of beetle-beasts, for so she called them to herself. At length they
were quiet. Surely they had had enough. For hours they had been
devouring, eating up the muslin fed to them. No, rather they had
disgorged; for the muslin was left, and with it thousands of yards of
cotton thread that they had doled out through their small needle jaws.
But their rest would be short and they would soon thunder tirelessly on
again.

Usually she went out to her luncheon. The nearby restaurant furnished
appetizing and inexpensive things to eat, but they were accompanied by a
new and disturbing clamor. As she took her seat at one of the many long
tables, she was enveloped in a sound of falling plates. Heavy china cup
struck heavy china saucer and both struck the marble table. Knives,
forks and spoons fell on platters, and platters fell on trays and
slipped and rattled one against another. Little plates dropped on big
plates and all went with a terrific smash into the dumb waiter; while
from some inexhaustible source new knives and forks and plates came
clattering up to take the places of the old.

"Butter cakes, please."

Hertha's voice was scarcely audible. As she ate, she listened
attentively, hoping that for a moment the noise would cease; but it only
varied in intensity, rising now to such a height that it seemed as if an
avalanche of white pottery was falling into space; again dropping to a
steady, clanging sound of utensils taking their appointed places. But no
one but herself seemed to notice, and the men and women about her ate on
diligently, silent for the most part, concerned only with securing
needed nourishment in a short period of time.

The noises on the avenue down which she walked to and from her home were
not wearying like those in the shop and the restaurant, for they came
and went. The silent moving motors had their horns that gave warning
with a silly, childish squeak or with a deep note as hoarse as a frog's.
At the corner where she turned east to go home a policeman was
stationed, and she enjoyed waiting for the sound of his shrill whistle.
But the avenue left behind, the way was less pleasant. Three busy
thoroughfares must be crossed without the policeman's aid, the last a
dirty boulevard where heavy trains crashed overhead and surface cars
clanged swiftly by. She would stand waiting on the sidewalk until a
friendly cart from a side street opened up a path of safety that brought
her a little breathless to the opposite walk.

Now she was almost home--the second door, three flights up, and then
restful quiet. Kathleen, her new friend, with whom she had come to live,
was away, and with windows closed she would sit in the front room, quite
by herself, her hands in her lap, enjoying the silence. Later, dinner
over, she would take up a novel, one of the books she had always wanted
to read, but could not afford to buy, that here in New York any one
might have at the library for the asking. Immersed in _Lorna Doone_, she
forgot the pounding machines and the clattering dishes and was very
happy; but when the book was put away and she lay down to sleep, through
the open window the world of tumult came back again.

"Why do men invent so many things that make a noise?" she would ask
herself. She had heard city people when they came to the Merryvales'
complain bitterly to her of being wakened in the morning by the cock's
crowing; but she had not made the cocks, and, moreover, they did not
crow all night. Here in her room, however, near the ugly boulevard of
the East Side, the man-made cocks never ceased to crow. The trolley cars
were the most aggressive; their wheels ground on their axles and jarred
upon the rails; they stopped with a loud jolt, and with another jar and
jolt were off again. They were always jerking, Hertha felt. Overhead the
elevated road vibrated to the heavy cars that moved over its rails day
and night. You heard the coming train a long way off. First, a gentle,
rumbling noise that you might imagine to be the sea; then a louder and
louder roar, and, finally, a crash as the long line of cars rushed past.
Sometimes she was sure they would sway too far and fall thundering into
the street. And hardly had their sound died away when a second rumbling
would be heard and another train come tearing after its fellow, or a
third dash by from the opposite side.

After a time the clamor ceased to be incessant. Trains followed at
longer intervals, and would-be street car passengers waited for some
minutes at the corner. But in these intervals there was always upon the
street the sound of footsteps. And long after midnight, if Hertha awoke
from her troubled sleep, she heard the tread of feet. Sometimes they
were slow and hesitating, sometimes swift and hurried, oftenest a
steady, quiet step. Where do all these footsteps lead, she thought. What
were the people doing who thronged the elevated railroad, crowding one
upon another so that it was difficult to breathe if one pushed one's way
among them? And the surface cars were filled with a hurrying crowd,
while underneath the city the subways carried their millions of women
and men. Was there any need of moving about so much? It might be
necessary to travel to and from your work, but why go on and on?
Supposing all these cars should stop suddenly, should cease their jar
and clang? There would still be the footsteps in the street, for man was
always moving, some way, somewhere. Had not Tom moved? And now she, too,
was moving, to the whir of the machine, to the crash of the advancing
train, moving through the new, clamorous world.

"And you didn't sleep well last night, darling," Kathleen said to her as
she came in to breakfast. "Your eyes are looking tired this lovely
morning. I'm thinking the trains kept you awake. Don't notice them.
They'll go on and never once jump the tracks, but make big profits for
their owners and a fine place to hang on the strap for you and me.
You'll soon be used to the clatter. Once I heard it, but now I don't
mind it any more than I do the sparrows. Take a help of the oatmeal, and
tell me what you'll like for dinner, for I'm staying home to-night."




CHAPTER XIV


Hertha, when she slipped from Miss Witherspoon's charge, experienced no
difficulty in finding a suitable dwelling place in New York. She had not
studied for years in a school conducted by northern teachers without
learning of the philanthropies that were showered upon people in the
North. The Young Women's Christian Association was for just such girls
as she, and therefore, under the direction of a friendly policeman, she
soon reached headquarters and was given temporary shelter. As she walked
about in the comfortable rooms, luxurious in her eyes, she felt that she
had indeed entered the white world, her lawful heritage; and if it was
hard to lose all family ties--mother, sister, brother, swept away as
though in some swift disaster of nature--on the other hand, life of a
sudden had become strangely simplified. How easy it was to move through
the world if you were white! She had always been conspicuous, a mark for
astonished comment when with her black brother and sister, for whispered
commiseration when working out in service. Now no one could comment at
all. She was like every one else. She need not shrink if she were rudely
treated, she might answer back; no longer must she "keep her place,"
hers was the place of the dominant race. When she remembered her lover,
her cheeks flamed. No need to fear that she, a white girl, would ever
again think to give herself without exacting a full return.

But what should she do? She was young and white and had something less
than two thousand dollars to her credit at the bank; moreover, she had
stored in her mind a multiplicity of suggestions to be turned over and
reviewed as she made her way through the streets or lay in her bed at
night. Had she gone to Boston with Miss Witherspoon, she would at once
have used a fair share of her fortune on her education; but, perhaps
because she had cut loose from old plans, she rejected the taking up of
dressmaking. She inclined to stenography and typewriting; but Ellen, who
knew her better than any one else, had looked surprised on learning that
she considered this means of earning a livelihood. She knew she was no
scholar, and a chosen career that involved the swift jotting down of the
ideas of others, later to be transcribed in black type on a white sheet
from which a misspelled word shone with hideous clearness, might end in
disgrace. So stenography was set aside.

Equally she was sure she would not take the advice of Miss Patty. To be
a companion was the highest position that could have been reached by
Hertha, colored; but it was menial service to Hertha, white. She had
renounced a sheltered home; now that she was in the North she meant to
live a new life of freedom.

After three days of happy wandering about the city and of careful
consideration of her personal problem, she made a practical decision.
Her legacy was small, and for the present she knew too little of the
life about her or of her own ability to risk spending it upon an
education. The operating work of which Miss Witherspoon had once spoken
lay along the line of her natural aptitude. Why, then, not try it? If
you were a good workwoman, it paid well. She was in a mood for the
unusual, and therefore, under the guidance of the efficient and
business-like Association secretary, she found herself, a week after her
arrival in New York, doing her part in manufacturing muslin shirtwaists.

Kathleen she had discovered herself. She could not remain long at the
Association, since the rooms for permanent guests were occupied; and
with a list provided her by the secretary, she went out one afternoon to
secure a suitable boarding place. The first and only house she entered
was in charge of a thin, meager woman, the type of Miss Witherspoon, but
with a more domineering manner and a flatter bust. The room for rent had
a red carpet which smelt moldy, and brilliantly painted blue walls.
Hertha hated it at once, but with difficulty succeeded in leaving
without renting it, so persistent was the person in charge. Indeed, she
only escaped with the proviso that she might look in again.

Once in the street, her confidence returned and she resolved to have
nothing to do with this or any other cheap boarding place. In so immense
a city it must be possible to find an attractive home.

She looked no further that day, and in the evening, standing in the
office, she saw a large, fine looking Irish woman come up to the desk.
Laughing and talking to a friend, her cheeks pink with her exertions
from the gymnasium, her gray eyes glowing, Kathleen seemed the exact
opposite of the disturbing landlady of the afternoon. "I know I'm
bothering you, Miss Jones," she began, addressing the secretary, who was
insignificant beside her, "but it's what you like. You couldn't be happy
if you didn't have a dozen girls wanting you at once. What I'm after is
some one to share my flat with me this winter. The boss has sent my
brother to Chicago, where they need his work more than they do here.
Hard luck for me, for he was bringing in a good wage! And now I've a
little flat and only myself in it. Is there any girl here, do you think,
would like a bedroom and the use of a kitchen and parlor? I'd let her
have it for fifteen dollars a month."

Hertha was standing at the end of the desk, quite by Miss Jones's elbow.
She expected that the secretary would introduce them, but instead Miss
Jones looked down, moved some papers, and handed an elaborately ruled
card for Kathleen to fill.

The Irishwoman took it up clumsily. "You fill it in," she said. "It's
Kathleen O'Connor, 204 East 8th Street, fourth floor. I'll be home
to-morrow night to any one who comes."

When she had gone Hertha asked for the address, explaining that she
would like to see the room.

"Would you?" Miss Jones questioned, looking her over as though to place
her again. "I thought of you, but did not know whether it was what you
desired. It's rather a poor neighborhood, and yet it costs as much as a
better one. Kathleen is Irish, you know. She only comes to the
gymnasium, and she's irregular at that. She's a sort of nurse; not
trained, of course, but good of her kind. Take the address; it's near
your, work, and if you like----" and her voice trailed off as she turned
to the next girl who came to her for guidance.

Hertha did "like." She went to Kathleen's the following evening and
settled the bargain with a week's rent in advance. She liked the rear
alcove room with its iron bed and fresh cover; and, though it was dark,
it opened with wide doors into the parlor. "For the both of us,"
Kathleen explained, "unless you're wanting to go straight to bed and
then it's yours." The parlor had little furniture--a plain table, two
straight chairs, a comfortable rocker and a couch with a Bagdad cover.
Kathleen had a small bedroom opening into a court; but the attractive
spot was the kitchen. It faced the south and its two windows were filled
with red geraniums in full bloom. The walls were light buff, the kitchen
table was covered with a white oilcloth, and the wooden chairs were
painted like the wall. For convenience, it was beyond anything Hertha
had ever known with its gas stove, its hot and cold water for sink and
tubs. She remembered the thousands of pails of water that her mother and
Ellen had carried during the years she had been with them, and the
millions of pieces of wood that Tom had piled up and brought into the
kitchen. Getting meals and washing your clothes here would be fun, not
work.

"I can make corn bread for breakfast," she said to Kathleen
confidentially, as they looked into the closet with its wealth of pots
and pans, spoons and egg beaters, skillets and toasters--more kitchen
utensils than Hertha had imagined any one could own.

Kathleen regarded her quizzically.

"When do you go to work?" she queried.

"At eight o'clock."

"That's better than it used to be, but if you make corn bread it's
likely it will only be for a week. Then you'll be so tired when you wake
that the best tasting food in the world won't equal an extra nap,
cuddled under the clothes, with the sure knowledge that it's wrong. It
will be oatmeal cooked the night before and warmed up, and coffee made
the way that's quickest, and a slice of toast, maybe, from the bread
bought of the baker. You can boil yourself an egg, but they put the
price on eggs up every winter to pay for the chemicals they use to keep
them young."

"How about Sunday morning?" Hertha queried.

"Sundays you won't be getting up until it's time for dinner."

And while Kathleen's prophecy was in part true, while the increasingly
cold weather and the hard hours made the morning nap imperative, Hertha
did more for their little home than her companion had expected. She made
curtains for the windows; she bought occasional attractive magazines;
she framed a striking picture taken from the Sunday supplement. It was a
landscape by Inness of great trees with heavy foliage, the clouds massed
as though about to break in storm. Before a month was over the tenement
rooms took on a deeper look of home.

The life within the rooms was very quiet. Kathleen's work made her hours
most irregular. As an "experienced nurse" she was rarely on a case for
more than two or three days and nights, so poor were the people among
whom she worked. She had no diploma and was not recognized by the
profession. During one year of her hard life she had acted as nurse in a
woman's prison, but the time had never come when she could afford to go
into a hospital. "And now it's too late; I'm too old," she would
explain, "and besides I haven't got the education. Schooling don't go
with starting in at the mill with your dresses at your knees, and your
hands so little you can hardly manage the machine." Her hands were still
small and well formed, and she had a pleasant touch. She was skillful at
massage, and in the winter season had a few society women whose surplus
flesh she vigorously rubbed off and whose faces she smoothed into
comparative youth. Leaving the sumptuous house of some wealthy woman,
she would hurry to a dark room in a tenement, where the cold and poverty
made her eyes flame with anger, to spend the night by an ailing child,
ministering with patience and even merriment to its many wants. And as
her life carried her from one extreme to another, so she herself varied
in mood, from the smiling, youthful looking woman whom Hertha had seen
and loved from the first to an intense, angry iconoclast who found life
for the many both cruel and unjust. She never ministered and brought to
health the one ailing without remembering the ten others who were
needlessly suffering and whom she could not aid. "I know that my work is
nothing but putting courtplaster on a cancer," she would say to Hertha
savagely as she came back from a home where she had coaxed the growing
boy back to life, to see him in his convalescence go out to a ten-hour
day of racking work. "I ain't fooled, though. I done what I could, but
why won't his father fight for better hours and living conditions? He
sits there and lets the boss use his boy worse than he'd use a machine.
He's got the backbone of a chocolate eclair, that man." And then she
would take up a copy of the daily "Worker" and become absorbed in the
vision of the successful class struggle and a world set free.

"What shall we have for dinner to-night?" she had smilingly asked
Hertha. "Shall we celebrate together with an Irish stew and ice cream
and then go to the movies?"

"But this is your evening for the Y. W. C. A.," Hertha answered.

The smile left Kathleen's face. "I'm through there," she said. "It's not
for me."

Hertha wanted to know more, but she was reticent with questions. As it
happens, however, the silent person learns more of another's life than
one who shows a voluble sympathy, and Kathleen was soon telling her
friend that all girls' clubs and Christian Associations were nothing but
charities; that she could have nothing to do with a charity herself, and
that, had it not been for a moment's temptation, offered by a friend,
she would never have entered the class. It was the exercise that she
needed and the marc

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