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Jupiter Lights

by Constance Fenimore Woolson · English · Gutenberg #34282 · 540,636 chars · public domain (US)

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Title: Jupiter Lights

Author: Constance Fenimore Woolson


        
Release date: November 11, 2010 [eBook #34282]
                Most recently updated: May 14, 2026

Language: English

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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK JUPITER LIGHTS ***




JUPITER LIGHTS

A Novel

BY

CONSTANCE FENIMORE WOOLSON

AUTHOR OF "ANNE" "EAST ANGELS" "FOR THE MAJOR" ETC.

NEW YORK
HARPER & BROTHERS, FRANKLIN SQUARE
1889

Copyright, 1889, by HARPER & BROTHERS.

_All rights reserved_.




JUPITER LIGHTS.




I.


"It's extraordinary navigation, certainly," said Miss Bruce.

"Oh, mem, if you please, isn't it better than the hother?" answered
Meadows, respectfully.

Meadows was Miss Bruce's maid; one could have told that she was English
(even if one had not heard her speak) from her fresh, rosy complexion,
her smooth hair put plainly and primly back from her forehead, her
stiff-backed figure with its elbows out, and her large, thick-soled
boots.

"I don't mind being 'umped-up on the bank, miss, if you please," she
went on in her sweet voice, dropping her h's (and adding them, too) in
unexpected places. "It's those great waves we 'ad last week, mem, if you
please, that seemed so horful."

"I am sorry you will have to see them again so soon," Miss Bruce
answered, kindly.

For Meadows was to return to England immediately; she was accompanying
the American lady for the journey only. Miss Bruce was not rich; in her
own land she did not intend to give herself the luxury of a
lady's-maid--an indulgence more unusual in the great Republic (at least
the northern half of it) than fine clothes, finer houses, or the finest
diamonds.

The little steamboat which carried these travellers was aground in a
green plain, a grassy, reedy prairie, which extended unbroken as far as
the eye could reach on all sides save one; here there was, at some
distance, a bank or shore of dark land, dark in comparison with the
green. Beyond this shore--and one could easily see over it--stretched
the sea, "the real sea," as Miss Bruce called it, "and not all this
grass!" It was this remark of hers which had drawn out the protest of
poor Meadows.

Miss Bruce had crossed from England to New York; she had then journeyed
southward, also by sea, to Savannah, and from that leafy town, as fair
as is its name, she had continued her voyage in this little boat, the
_Altamaha_, by what was called the Inland Route, a queer, amusing
passage, winding in and out among the sounds and bays, the lagoons and
marsh channels of the coast, the ocean almost always in sight on the
left side, visible over the low islands which constantly succeeded each
other, and which formed the barrier that kept out the "real sea," that
ravaging, ramping, rolling, disturbing surface upon whose terrific
inequalities the Inland Route relied for its own patronage. There were
no inequalities here, certainly, unless one counted as such the
sensation which Meadows had described as "being 'umped up." The channel
was very narrow, and as it wound with apparent aimlessness hither and
thither in the salt-marsh, it made every now and then such a short turn,
doubling upon itself, that the steamer, small as she was, could only
pass it by running ashore, and then allowing her bows to be hauled
round ignominiously by the crew in a row-boat; while thus ashore, one
side half out of water, her passengers, sitting on that side, had the
sensation which the English girl had pictured. At present the _Altamaha_
had not run herself aground purposely, but by accident; the crew did not
descend to the row-boat this time, but, coming up on deck, armed with
long poles, whose ends they inserted in the near bank with an air of
being accustomed to it, they shoved the little craft into deep water
with a series of pushes which kept time to their chorus of

    "Ger-long!  Ger-long! _Mo_-ses!"

"I don't see how we are to get on here at all at night," said Miss
Bruce.

But before night the marsh ended as suddenly as it had begun, and the
_Altamaha_ was gliding onward again between banks equally low and near,
but made of solid earth, not reeds. The sun sank in the west, the
gorgeous colors of the American sunset flamed in the sky. The returning
American welcomed them. She was not happy; she was as far as possible
from being what is called amiable; but for the moment she admired,
forgetting her own griefs. Then the after-glow faded; Meadows brought a
shawl from their tiny cabin and folded it round her mistress; it was the
23d of December, and the evening air was cool, but not cold. By-and-by
in the dusky twilight a gleam shone out ahead, like an immense star.

"What is that, captain?" Miss Bruce asked, as this official happened to
pass near her chair.

"That? Jupiter Light."

"Then we must be near Warwick?" She gave to the name its English
pronunciation, the only one she knew.

The captain declined to say whether they were near it or not, as it was
a place he had never heard of. "The next landing is War-wick," he
announced, impersonally, pronouncing the name according to its spelling.

"So near?" said Miss Bruce, rising.

"No hurry. Ain't there yet."

And so it proved. A moon rose, and with it a mist. The _Altamaha_,
ceasing her nosing progress through the little channels, turned sharply
eastward, and seemed suddenly to have entered the ocean, for great waves
began to toss her and knock her about with more and more violence, until
at last the only steady thing in sight was the blazing star of Jupiter
Light, which still shone calmly ahead. After half an hour of this rough
progress a low beach presented itself through the mist, and the blazing
star disappeared, its place being taken by a spectral tower, tall and
white, which stood alone at the end of a long curving tongue of sand.
The steamer, with due caution, drew near a lonely little pier.

"It isn't much of a place, then?" said Miss Bruce, as the captain, in
the exigencies of making a safe landing with his cockle-shell, again
paused for a moment near her chair.

"Place? Post-office and Romney; that's all. Slacken off that line
there--you hear? Slacken, I tell you!"

A moment later the traveller, having made her way with difficulty
through the little boat's dark, wet, hissing lower regions, emerged, and
crossed a plank to the somewhat safer footing beyond.

"Is this Cicely?" she asked, as a small figure came to meet her.

"Yes, I am Cicely."

Eve Bruce extended her hand. But Cicely put up her face for a warmer
greeting.

"Are those your trunks? Oh, you have brought some one with you?"

"It's only Meadows, my maid; she goes back to-morrow when the boat
returns."

"There's room for her, if you mean that; the house is large enough for
anything. I was only wondering what our people would make of her; they
have never seen a white servant in their lives."

"You didn't bring--the baby?" asked Eve Bruce.

"Jack? Oh, no; Jack's asleep."

Eve quivered at the name.

"Are you cold?" said Cicely. "We'll start as soon as that hissing boat
gets off. I hope you don't mind riding behind a mule? Oh, look!" and she
seized her companion's arm. "Uncle Abram is shocked that your maid--what
did you call her--Fields?--should be carrying anything--a white lady, as
he supposes; and he is trying to take the bag away from her. She's
evidently frightened; Pomp and Plato haven't as many clothes on as they
might have, I acknowledge. Oh, do look!"

Eve, still quivering, glanced mechanically in the direction indicated.

A short negro, an old man with abnormally long arms, was endeavoring to
take from Meadows's grasp a small hand-bag which she was carrying. Again
and again he tried, and the girl repulsed him. Two more negroes
approached, and lifted one of the trunks which she was guarding. She
followed the trunk; and now Uncle Abram, coming round on the other
side, tried to get possession of a larger bag which she held in her left
hand. She wrenched it from him several times desperately, and then, as
he still persisted, she used it as a missile over the side of his head,
and began to shriek and run.

The noise of the hissing steam prevented Miss Bruce from calling to her
distracted handmaid.

Cicely laughed and laughed. "I didn't expect anything half so funny,"
she said.

The little _Altamaha_ now backed out from the pier into rough water
again, and the hissing ceased. Besides the dark heaving waves, the tall
light-house, and the beach, there was now nothing to be seen but a row
of white sand-hills which blocked the view towards the north.

"This is the sea-shore, isn't it?" said Eve. As she asked her question
her voice had in her own ears a horribly false sound; she was speaking
merely for the sake of saying something; Cicely's "I didn't expect
anything half so funny" had hurt her like the edge of a knife.

"Oh, no; this isn't the sea; this is the Sound," Cicely answered. "The
sea is round on the other side. You will hear it often enough at Romney;
it booms dreadfully after a storm."

Plato and Pomp now emerged from the mist, each leading a mule; one of
these animals was attached to a wagon which had two seats, and the other
to a rough cart.

"Will you get in, please?" said Cicely, going towards the wagon. "I
reckon your maid had better come with us."

"Meadows! Meadows!" called Miss Bruce. "Never mind the luggage; it is
quite safe. You are to come with us in this wagon."

"Yes, mem," responded the English voice. The girl had ceased running;
but she still stood guard over the trunks. "And shall I bring the
dressing-bags with me, mem?" she added.

"She is bringing them whether or no," said her mistress; "I knew she
would. She likes to pretend that one contains a gold-mounted
dressing-case and the other a jewel-casket; she is accustomed to such
things, and considers them the proper appendages of a lady." Her voice
still had to herself a forced sound. But Cicely noticed nothing.

The two ladies climbed into the wagon and placed themselves on the back
seat; Meadows, still hugging the supposed treasures, mounted gingerly to
her place beside Uncle Abram, disarmed a little by his low brows; and
then, after some persuasion, the mule was induced to start, the cart
with the luggage following behind, Plato and Pomp beside it. The road
was deeply covered with sand; both mules could do no more than walk. At
last, after passing the barrier of sand-hills, they came to firmer
ground; bushes began to appear, and then low trees. The trees all
slanted westward.

"The wind," Cicely explained.

The drive lasted half an hour. "Meadows, put down those bags," said Eve;
"they are too heavy for you. But not too near Mrs. Bruce--to trouble
her."

The wagon was passing between two high gate-posts (there was no gate);
it entered an avenue bordered with trees whose boughs met overhead,
shutting out the moonlight. But Uncle Abram knew the way; and so did the
mule, who conducted his wagon over the remaining space, and up to the
porch of a large low house, in a sudden wild gallop. "Hi-yi!" said Uncle
Abram, warningly; "All ri', den, ef yer wanter," he added, rattling the
reins. "Lippity-clip!"

The visitor's eyes perceived lights, an open door, and two figures
waiting within. The wagon stopped, and Meadows dismounted from her
perch. But Cicely, before following her, put her face close to Eve's,
and whispered: "I'd better tell you now, so that you won't call me that
again--before the others: I'm not Mrs. Bruce any longer; my name is
Morrison. I married Ferdinand Morrison six months ago." After this
stupefying declaration she pressed Eve's hand, and, jumping lightly to
the ground, called out, "Bring the steps, some of you."

There was a sudden dispersion of the group of negroes near the porch; a
horse-block with a flight of steps attached was brought, and placed in
position for the visitor's descent. It appeared that she needed this
assistance, for she had remained motionless in the wagon, making no
effort to follow Cicely's example. Now she descended, jealously aided by
Meadows, who had retained but one clear idea amid all these
bewilderments of night-drives with half-dressed blacks and mad mules
through a desert of sand, and that was to do all in her power for the
unfortunate lady whom for the moment she was serving; for what must her
sufferings be--to come from Hayling Hall to this!

"Here is Eve," Cicely said, leading the visitor up the steps.

The white-haired man and the tall woman who had been waiting within,
came forward.

"Grandpa," said Cicely, by way of introduction. "And Aunt Sabrina."

"My father, Judge Abercrombie," said the tall lady, correctingly. Then
she put her arms round Eve and kissed her. "You are very welcome, my
dear. But how cold your hands are, even through your gloves! Dilsey,
make a fire."

"I am not cold," Eve answered.

But she looked so ill that the judge hastily offered her his arm.

She did not accept it. "It is nothing," she said. Anger now came to her
aid, Cicely's announcement had stunned her. "I am perfectly well," she
went on, in a clear voice. "It has been a long voyage, and that, you
know, is tiresome. But now that it is over, I shall soon be myself
again, and able to continue my journey."

"Continue! Are you going any further, then?" inquired Miss Abercrombie,
mildly. "I had hoped--we have all hoped--that you would spend a long
time with us." Miss Abercrombie had a soft voice with melancholy
cadences; her tones had no rising inflections; all her sentences died
gently away.

"You are very kind. It will be impossible," Miss Bruce responded,
briefly.

While speaking these words they had passed down the hall and entered a
large room on the right. A negro woman on her knees was hastily lighting
a fire on the hearth, and, in another moment, the brilliant blaze,
leaping up, made a great cheer. Cicely had disappeared. Judge
Abercrombie, discomfited by the visitor's manner, rolled forward an
arm-chair vaguely, and then stood rubbing his hands by the fire, while
his daughter began to untie Miss Bruce's bonnet strings.

"Thanks; I will not take it off now. Later, when I go to my room." And
the visitor moved away from the friendly fingers. Miss Sabrina was very
near-sighted. She drew her eye-glasses furtively from her pocket, and,
turning her back for an instant, put them on; she wished to have a
clearer view of John Bruce's sister. She saw before her a woman of
thirty (as she judged her to be; in reality Eve was twenty-eight), tall,
broad-shouldered, slender, with golden hair and a very white face. The
eyes were long and rather narrow; they were dark blue in color, and they
were not pleasant eyes--so Miss Sabrina thought; their expression was
both angry and cold. The cheeks were thin, the outline of the features
bold. The mouth was distinctly ugly, the full lips prominent, the
expression sullen. At this moment Cicely entered, carrying a little
child, a boy of two years, attired only in his little white night-gown;
his blue eyes were brilliant with excitement, his curls, rumpled by
sleep, was flattened down on one side of his head and much fluffed up on
the other. The young mother came running across the slippery floor, and
put him into Miss Bruce's arms. "There he is," she said--"there's your
little Jack. He knows you; I have talked to him about you scores of
times."

The child, half afraid, put up a dimpled hand and stroked Eve's cheek.
"Auntie?" he lisped, inquiringly. Then, after inspecting her carefully,
still keeping up the gentle little stroke, he announced with decision,
"Ess; Aunty Eve!"

Eve drew him close, and hid her face on his bright hair. Then she rose
hurriedly, holding him in her arms, and, with an involuntary motion,
moved away from Cicely, looking about the room as if in search of
another place, and finally taking refuge beside Miss Sabrina, drawing a
low chair towards her with the same unseeing action and sinking into it,
the baby held to her breast.

Tall Miss Sabrina seemed to understand; she put one arm round their
guest. Cicely, thus deserted, laughed. Then she went to her grandfather,
put her arm in his, and they left the room together. When the door had
closed after them, Eve raised her eyes. "He is the image of Jack!" she
said.

"Yes, I know it," answered Miss Sabrina. "And I knew how it would affect
you, my dear. But I think it is a comfort that he does look like him;
don't you? And now you must not talk any more about going away, but stay
here with us and love him."

"Stay!" said Eve. She rose, and made a motion as if she were going to
give the child to her companion. But little Jack put up his hand again,
and stroked her cheek; he was crooning meanwhile to himself composedly a
little song of his own invention; it was evident that he would never be
afraid of her again. Eve kissed him. "Do you think she would give him to
me?" she asked, hungrily. "She cannot care for him--not as I do."

Miss Sabrina drew herself up (in the excess of her sympathy, as well as
near-sightedness, she had been leaning so far forward that her flat
breast had rested almost on her knees). "Give up her child--her own
child? My niece? I think not; I certainly think not." She took off her
glasses and put them in her pocket decisively.

"Then I shall take him from her. And you must help me. What will she
care in a month from now--a year? She has already forgotten his father."

Miss Sabrina was still angry. But she herself had not liked her niece's
second marriage. "The simplest way would be to stay here for the
present," she said, temporizing.

"Stay here? Now? How can you ask it?"

Tears rose in the elder lady's eyes; she began to wipe them away
clandestinely one by one with her long taper finger. "It's a desolate
place now, I know; but it's very peaceful. The garden is pretty. And we
hoped that you wouldn't mind. We even hoped that you would like it a
little--the child being here. We would do all we could. Of course I know
it isn't much."

These murmured words in the melancholy voice seemed to rouse in Eve
Bruce an even more stormy passion than before. She went to Miss Sabrina
and took hold of her shoulder. "Do you think I can stand seeing _him_,"
she demanded--"here--in Jack's place? If I could, I would go to-night."
Turning away, she broke into tearless sobs. "Oh Jack--Jack--"

Light dawned at last in Sabrina Abercrombie's mind. "You mean Mr.
Morrison?" she said, hurriedly rising. "You didn't know, then? Cicely
didn't tell you?"

"She told me that she had married again; nothing more. Six months ago.
She let me come here--you let me come here--without knowing it."

"Oh, I thought you knew it," said Miss Sabrina, in distress. "I did not
like the marriage myself, Miss Bruce; I assure you I did not. I was very
fond of John, and it seemed too sudden. If she had only waited the
year--and two years would have been so much more appropriate. I go there
very often--to John's grave--indeed I do; it is as dear to me as the
graves of my own family, and I keep the grass cut very carefully; I will
show you. You remember when I wrote you that second time? I feared it
then, though I was not sure, and I tried to prepare you a little by
saying that the baby was now your chief interest, naturally. And _he_
wasn't going to be married," she added, becoming suddenly incoherent,
and taking hold of her throat with little rubs of her thumb and
forefinger as Eve's angry eyes met hers; "at least, not that we knew. I
did not say more, because I was not sure, Miss Bruce. But after it had
really happened, I supposed of course that Cicely wrote to you."

"She!"

"But Mr. Morrison is not here; he is not here, and never has been. She
met him in Savannah, and married him there; it was at a cousin's. But
she only stayed with him for a few months, and we fear that it is not a
very happy marriage. He is in South America at present, and you know how
far away that is. I haven't the least idea when he is coming back."

The door at the end of the room opened. Cicely's little figure appeared
on the threshold. Miss Sabrina, who seemed to know who it was by
intuition, as she could see nothing at that distance, immediately began
to whisper. "Of course we don't _know_ that it is an unhappy marriage;
but as she came back to us so soon, it struck us so--it made that
impression; wouldn't it have made the same upon you? She must have
suffered extremely, and so we ought to be doubly kind to her." And she
laid her hand with a warning pressure on Eve's arm.

"I am not likely to be unkind as long as there is the slightest hope of
getting this child away from her," answered Eve. "For she is the mother,
isn't she? She couldn't very well have palmed off some other baby on
you, for Jack himself was here then, I know. Oh, you needn't be afraid,
I shall defer to her, yield to her, grovel to her!" She bent her head
and kissed the baby's curls. But her tone was so bitter that poor Miss
Sabrina shrank away.

Cicely had called to them, "Supper is ready." She remained where she was
at the end of the long room, holding the door open with her hand.




II.


The father of John and Eva Bruce was an officer in the United States
army. His wife had died when Eve was born. Captain Bruce brought up his
children as well as he could; he would not separate himself from them,
and so he carried them about with him to the various military stations
to which he was ordered. When his boy was sixteen, an opportunity
presented itself to him: an old friend, Thomas Ashley, who was
established, and well established, in London, offered to take the lad,
finish his education, and then put him into the house, as he called it,
the house being the place of business of the wealthy English-American
shipping firm to which he had the good-fortune to belong.

Captain Bruce did not hesitate. Jack was sent across the seas. Eve, who
was then ten years old, wept desperately over the parting. Six years
later she too went to England. Her father had died, and, young as she
was, her determination to go to her brother was so strong that nothing
could stand against it. During the six years of separation Jack had
returned to America twice to see his father and sister; the tie between
the three had not been broken by absence, but only made stronger. The
girl had lived a concentrated life, therefore an isolated one. She had
had her own way on almost all occasions. It was said of her, "Any one
can see that she has been brought up by a man!" In reality there were
two men; for Jack had seemed to her a man when he was only twelve years
old. Her father gone, her resolve to go to Jack was, as has been said,
so strong that nothing could stand against it. But in truth there was
little to oppose to it, and few to oppose her; no one, indeed, who could
set up anything like the force of will which she was exhibiting on the
other side. She had no near relatives; as for her father's old friends,
she rode over them.

"You'll have to let her go; she puts out her mouth so!" said Mrs. Mason,
the colonel's wife, at last. The remark, as to its form, was incoherent;
but everybody at the post understood her. At sixteen, then, Eve Bruce
was sent to England. As soon as she was able she took a portion of the
property which came to her from her mother, to make a comfortable home
for Jack. For Jack had only his salary, and it was not a large one. He
had made himself acceptable in the house, and in due time he was to have
a small share of the profits; but the due time was not yet, and would
not be for some years. His father's old friend, who had been his friend
also, as well as his sponsor in the firm, had died. But his widow, who
liked the young American--she was an American herself, though long
expatriated--continued to extend to him much kindness; and, when his
sister came over, she included her in the invitations. Eve did not care
much for these opportunities, nor for the other opportunities that
followed in their train; occasionally she went to a dinner; but she
found her best pleasure in being with her brother alone. They remained
in London all the year round, save for six weeks in August and
September. Eve could have paid many a visit in the country during the
autumn and winter; but their small, ugly house near Hans Place was more
beautiful in her eyes, Jack being there, than the most picturesque
cottage with a lawn and rose garden, or even than an ivy-grown mansion
in a deer-haunted park.

Thus brother and sister lived on for eight years. Then one morning,
early in 1864, Jack, who had chafed against his counting-house chains
ever since the April of Sumter, broke them short off; he too had a
determined mouth. "I can't stand it any longer, Eve; I am going home.
Fortunately you are provided for, or I couldn't. I shall lose my place
here, of course; but I don't care. Go I must." A week later he sailed
for New York. And he was soon in the army. "Blood will tell," said his
father's regimental companions--the few who were left.

Eve, in London, now began to lead that life of watching the telegraphic
despatches and counting the days for letters which was the lot of
American women during those dark times of war. She remained in London,
because it was understood between them that Jack was to return. But she
rented their house, and lived in lodgings near by, so as to have all the
more money ready for him when he should come back.

But Jack did not come back. When the war reached its end, he wrote that
he was going to be married; she was a Southern girl--he was even
particular as to her name and position: Cicely Abercrombie, the
granddaughter of Judge Abercrombie of Abercrombie's Island. Eve scarcely
read these names; she had stopped at "marry."

He did marry Cicely Abercrombie in October of that year, 1865.

He wrote long letters to his sister; he wished her to come out and join
them. He had leased two of the abandoned cotton plantations--great
things could be done in cotton now--and he was sure that he should make
his fortune. Eve, overwhelmed with her disappointment and her grief,
wrote and rewrote her brief replies before she could succeed in filling
one small sheet without too much bitterness; for Jack was still Jack,
and she loved him. He had never comprehended the exclusiveness, the
jealousy of her affection; he had accepted her devotion and enjoyed it,
but he had believed, without thinking much about it at any time, that
all sisters were like that. In urging her, therefore, to join them, he
did not in the least suspect that the chief obstacle lay in that very
word "them," of which he was so proud. To join "them," to see some one
else preferred; where she had been first, to take humbly a second place!
And who could tell whether this girl was worthy of him? Perhaps the
bitterest part of the suffering would be to see Jack himself befooled,
belittled. The sister, wretchedly unhappy, allowed it to be supposed,
without saying so--it was Jack who suggested it--that she would come
later; after she had disposed of the lease of their house, and sold
their furniture to advantage. In time the furniture was sold, but not to
advantage. The money which she had taken from her capital to make a
comfortable home for her brother was virtually lost.

Presently it was only a third place that could be offered to her, for,
during the next winter, Jack wrote joyfully to announce the birth of a
son. He had not made his fortune yet; but he was sure to do so the next
year. The next year he died.

Then Eve wrote, for the first time, to Cicely.

In reply she received a long letter from Cicely's aunt, Sabrina
Abercrombie, giving, with real grief, the particulars of Jack's last
hours. He had died of the horrible yellow-fever. Eve was ill when the
letter reached her; her illness lasted many months, and kind-hearted
Mrs. Ashley took her, almost by force, to her place in the country,
beautiful Hayling Hall, in Warwickshire. When at last she was able to
hold a pen, Eve wrote again to Cicely; only a few lines (her first
epistle had not been much longer); still, a letter. The reply was again
from Miss Abercrombie, and, compared with her first communication, it
was short and vague. The only definite sentences were about the child;
"for _he_ is the one in whom you are most interested, _naturally_," she
wrote, under-scoring the "he" and the "naturally" with a pale line; the
whole letter, as regards ink, was very pale.

And now Eve Bruce had this child. And she determined, with all the
intensity of her strong will, of her burning, jealous sorrow, that he
should be hers alone. With such a mother as Cicely there was everything
to hope.




III.


While the meal, which Cicely had announced as supper, was going on in
the dining-room, Meadows was occupying herself in her accustomed evening
effort to bring her mistress's abiding-place for the night, wherever it
might happen to be, into as close a resemblance to an English bedroom as
was, under the circumstances, possible. The resemblance had not been
striking, so far, with all her toil, there having been something
fundamentally un-English both in the cabins of the _Ville de Havre_ and
in the glittering salons which served as bedrooms in the Hotel of the
Universe in New York. The Savannah boat had been no better, nor the
shelf with a roof over it of the little _Altamaha_; on the steamer of
the Inland Route her struggle had been with an apartment seven feet
long; here at Romney it was with one which had six times that amount of
perspective.

A fire, freshly lighted, flared on the hearth, the spicy odor of its
light wood still filling the air. And there was air enough to fill, for
not one of the doors nor of the row of white windows which opened to the
floor fitted tightly in its casing; there were wide cracks everywhere,
and Meadows furthermore discovered, to her horror, that the windows had
sashes which came only part of the way down, the lower half being closed
by wooden shutters only. She barred these apertures as well as she could
(some of the bars were gone), and then tried to draw the curtains; but
these muslin protections, when they reached the strong current of air
which came through the central crack of the shutters, were blown out
towards the middle of the room like so many long white ghosts. Meadows
surveyed them with a sigh; with a sigh she arranged the contents of Miss
Bruce's dressing-bag on the outlandish bare toilet-table; she placed the
slippers by the fire and drew forward the easiest chair. But when all
was done the room still remained uncomfortably large, and uncomfortably
empty. Outside, the wind whistled, the near sea gave out a booming
sound; within, the flame of the candle flared now here, now there, in
the counter-draughts that swept the room.

"It certainly is the farawayest place!" murmured the English girl.

There came a sound at the door; not a knock, but a rub across the
panels. This too was alarming. Meadows kept the door well bolted, and
called fearfully, "Who's there?"

"It's ony me--Powlyne," answered a shrill voice. "I's come wid de wines;
Miss S'breeny, she sont me."

The tones were unmistakably feminine; Meadows drew back the bolt and
peeped out. A negro girl of twelve stood there, bearing a tray which
held a decanter and wineglass; her wool was braided in little tails,
which stood out like short quills; her one garment was a calico dress,
whose abbreviated skirt left her bare legs visible from the knees
down-ward.

"Do you want to come in?" said Meadows. "I can take it." And she
stretched out her hand for the tray.

"Miss S'breeny she done tole me to put 'em myse'f on de little table
close ter der bed," answered Powlyne, craning her neck to look into the
room.

Meadows opened the door a little wider, and Powlyne performed her
office. Seeing that she was very small and slight, the English girl
recovered courage.

"I suppose you live here?" she suggested.

"Yass, 'm."

"And when there isn't any one else 'andy, they send you?"

"Dey sonds me when dey wanster, I's Miss S'breeny's maid," answered
Powlyne, digging her bare heel into the matting.

"Her maid?--for gracious sake! What can _you_ do?"

"Tuckenoffener shoes. _En_ stockin's."

"Tuckenoffener?"

"Haul'em off. Yass,'m."

"Well, if I hever!" murmured Meadows, surveying this strange coadjutor,
from the erect tails of wool to the bare black toes.

There was a loud groan in the hall outside. Meadows started.

"Unc' Abram, I spec, totin' up de wood," said Powlyne.

"Is he ill?"

"Ill!" said the child, contemptuously. "He's dat dair sassy ter-night!"

"Is he coming in here? Oh, don't go away!" pleaded Meadows. She had a
vision of another incursion of black men in bathing costumes.

But Uncle Abram was alone, and he was very polite; he bowed even before
he put the wood down, and several times afterwards. "Dey's cookin'
suppah for yer, miss," he announced, hospitably. "Dey'll be fried
chickens en fixin's; en hot biscuits; en jell; en coffee."

"I should rather have tea, if it is equally convenient," said Meadows,
after a moment's hesitation.

"Dere, now, doan yer _like_ coffee?" inquired Uncle Abram, looking at
her admiringly. For it was such an extraordinary dislike that only very
distinguished people could afford to have it. "Fer my part," he went on,
gazing meditatively at the fire which he had just replenished, "I 'ain't
nebber had 'nuff in all my borned days--no, not et one time. Pints
wouldn't do me. Ner yet korts. I 'ain't nebber had a gallion."

Voices were now heard in the hall. Cicely entered, followed by Eve
Bruce.

"All the darkies on the island will be coming to look at her to-morrow,"
said Cicely, after Meadows had gone to her supper; "they'll be immensely
stirred up about her. She's still afraid--did you see?--she kept as far
away as she could from poor old Uncle Abram as she went down the hall.
The field hands will be too much for her; some of the little nigs have
no clothes at all."

"She won't see them; she goes to-morrow."

"That's as you please; if I were you, I would keep her. They will bring
a mattress in here for her presently; perhaps she has never slept on the
floor?"

"I dare say not. But she can for once."

Cicely went to one of the windows; she opened the upper half of the
shutter and looked out. "How the wind blows! Jupiter Light shines right
into your room."

"Yes, I can see it from here," said Eve. "It's a good companion--always
awake." She was speaking conventionally; she had spoken conventionally
through the long supper, and the effort had tired her: she was not in
the least accustomed to concealing her thoughts.

"Always awake. Are _you_ always awake?" said Cicely, returning to the
fire.

"I? What an idea!"

"I don't know; you look like it."

"I must look very tired, then?"

"You do."

"Fortunately you do not," answered Eve, coldly. For there was something
singularly fresh about Cicely; though she had no color, she always
looked fair and perfectly rested, as though she had just risen from a
refreshing sleep. "I suppose you have never felt tired, really tired, in
all your life?" Eve went on.

"N--no; I don't know that I have ever felt _tired_, exactly," Cicely
answered, emphasizing slightly the word "tired."

"_You_ have always had so many servants to do everything for you," Eve
responded, explaining herself a little.

"We haven't many now; only four. And they help in the fields whenever
they can--all except Dilsey, who stays with Jack."

Again the name. Eve felt that she must overcome her dread of it. "Jack
is very like his father," she said, loudly and decidedly.

"Yes," answered Cicely. Then, after a pause, "Your brother was much
older than I."

"Oh, Jack was _young_!"

"I don't mean that he was really old, he hadn't gray hair. But he was
thirty-one when we were married, and I was sixteen."

"I suppose no one forced you to marry him?" said the sister, the flash
returning to her eyes.

"Oh, yes."

"Nonsense!"

"I mean he did--Jack himself did. I thought that perhaps you would feel
so."

"Feel how?"

"Why, that we made him--that we tried, or that I tried. And so I have
brought some of his letters to show you." She took a package from her
pocket and laid it on the mantelpiece. "You needn't return them; you can
burn them after reading."

"Oh, probably," answered Eve, incoherently. She felt choked with her
anger and grief.

There was a murmuring sound in the hall, and Miss Sabrina, pushing the
door open with her foot, entered apologetically, carrying a jar of
dark-blue porcelain, ornamented with vague white dragons swallowing
their tails. The jar was large; it extended from her knees to her chin,
which rested upon its edge with a singular effect. "My dear," she said,
"I've brought you some po-purry; your room hasn't been slept in for some
time, though I _hope_ it isn't musty."

The jar had no handles; she had difficulty in placing it upon the high
chest of drawers. Eve went to her assistance. And then Miss Sabrina
perceived that their guest was crying. Eve changed the jar's position
two or three times. Miss Sabrina said, each time, "Yes, yes; it is much
better so." And, furtively, she pressed Eve's hand.

Jack Bruce's wife, meanwhile--forgotten Jack--stood by the hearth,
gazing at the fire. She was a little creature, slight and erect, with a
small head, small ears, small hands and feet. Yet somehow she did not
strike one as short; one thought of her as having the full height of her
kind, and even as being tall for so small a person. This effect was due,
no doubt, to her slender litheness; she was light and cool as the wind
at dawn, untrammelled by too much womanhood. Her features were delicate;
the oval of her face was perfect, her complexion a clear white without
color. Her lustreless black hair, very fine and soft, was closely
braided, the plaits arranged at the back of the head as flatly as
possible, like a tightly fitting cap. Her great dark eyes with long
curling lashes were very beautiful. They had often an absent-minded
look. Under them were bluish rings. Slight and smooth as she was--the
flesh of her whole body was extraordinarily smooth, as though it had
been rubbed with pumice-stone--she yet seemed in one way strong and
unyielding. She was quiet in her looks, in her actions, in her tones.

Eve had now choked down her tears.

"I sent Powlyne with some cherry-bounce," said Miss Sabrina, giving
Eve's hand, secretly, a last pressure, as they came back to the hearth.
"Your maid will find it--such a nice, worthy person as she seems to be,
too; so generally desirable all round. If she is really to leave you
to-morrow, you must have some one else. Let me see--"

"I don't want any one, thanks," Eve answered. Two spots of color rose in
her cheeks. "That is, I don't want any one unless I can have Jack?" She
turned to Cicely, who still stood gazing at the fire. "May Jack sleep
here?"

"With Dilsey?" said Cicely, lifting her eyes with a surprised glance.

"Yes, with Dilsey. The room is large."

"I am sure I don't care; yes, if you like. He cries at night sometimes."

"I hope he will," responded Eve, and her tone was almost fierce. "Then I
can comfort him."

"Dilsey does that better than any one else; he is devoted to her; when
he cries, I never interfere," said Cicely, laughing.

Eve bit her lips to keep back the retort, "But _I_ shall!"

"It is a sweet idea," said Miss Sabrina, in her chanting voice. "It is
sweet of Miss Bruce to wish to have him, and sweet of you, Cicely, to
let him go. We can arrange a little nursery at the other end of this
room to-morrow; there's a chamber beyond, where no one sleeps, and the
door could be opened through, if you like. I am sure it will be very
nice all round."

Eve turned and kissed her. Cicely pushed back a burning log with her
foot, and laughed again, this time merrily. "It seems so funny, your
having the baby in here at night, just like a mother, when you haven't
been married at all. Now I have been married twice. To be sure, I never
meant to be!"

"My precious child!" Miss Sabrina remonstrated.

"No, auntie, I never did. It came about," Cicely answered, her eyes
growing absent again and returning to the fire.

Meadows now came in with deferential step, and presently she was
followed by her own couch, which Uncle Abram spread out, in the shape of
a mattress, on the floor. The English girl looked on, amazed. But this
was a house of amazements; it was like a Drury Lane pantomime.

Later, when the girl was asleep, Eve rose, and, taking the package of
letters, which she had put under her pillow, she felt for a candle and
matches, thrust her feet into her slippers, and, with her dressing-gown
over her arm, stole to the second door; it opened probably into the
unoccupied chamber of which Miss Sabrina had spoken. The door was not
locked; she passed through, closing it behind her. Lighting her candle,
she looked about her. The room was empty, the floor bare. She put her
candle on the floor, and, kneeling down beside it, opened the letters.
There were but four; apparently Cicely had thought that four would be
enough to confirm what she had said. They were enough. More passionate,
more determined letters man never wrote to woman; they did not plead so
much as insist; they compelled by sheer force of persistent
unconquerable love, which accepts anything, bears anything, to gain even
tolerance.

And this was Jack, her brother Jack, who had thus prostrated himself at
the feet of that indifferent little creature, that cold, small, dark
girl who already bore another name! She was angry with him. Then the
anger faded away into infinite pity. "Oh, Jack, dear old Jack, to have
loved her so, she caring nothing for you! And I am to burn your poor
letters that you thought so much about--your poor, poor letters."
Sinking down upon the floor, she placed the open pages upon her knees,
laying her cheek upon them as though they had been something human.
"Some one cares for you," she murmured.

There was now a wild gale outside. One of the shutters was open, and
she could see Jupiter Light; she sat there, with her cheek on the
letters, looking at it.

Suddenly everything seemed changed, she no longer wept; she felt
sluggish, cold. "Don't I care any more?" she thought, surprised. She
rose and went back to her bed, glad to creep into its warmth, and
leaving the letters on a chair by her bedside. Then, duly, she put them
under her pillow again.




IV.


On Christmas Day, Eve was out with little Jack and Dilsey. Dilsey was a
negro woman of sixty, small and thin, with a wise, experienced face; she
increased her dignity as much as she could by a high stiff white turban,
but the rest of her attire was poor and old, though she was not
bare-legged like Powlyne; she wore stockings and shoes. Little Jack's
wagon was a rude cart with solid wooden wheels; but the hoops of its
hood had been twined with holly by the negroes, so that the child's face
was enshrined in a bower of green.

"We will go to the sea," said Eve. "Unless it is too far for you and the
wagon?"

"No, 'm; push 'em easy 'nuff."

The narrow road, passing between unbroken thickets of glittering
evergreen bushes, breast-high, went straight towards the east, like an
unroofed tunnel; in twenty minutes it brought them to the shore. The
beach, broad, firm, and silver white, stretched towards the north and
the south, dotted here and there with drift-wood; a breeze from the
water touched their cheeks coolly; the ocean was calm, little
foam-crested wavelets coming gurgling up to curl over and flatten
themselves out on the wet sand. "Do you see it, Jack?" said Eve,
kneeling down by the wagon. "It's the sea, the great big sea."

But Jack preferred to blow his whistle, and that done, he proceeded to
examine it carefully, putting his little fat forefinger into all the
holes. Eve sat down on the sand beside him; if he scorned the sea, for
the moment she did too.

"I's des sauntered ober, Dilsey; dey 'ain't no hurry 'bout comin' back,"
said a voice. "En I 'low'd miss might be tired, so I fotched a cheer."
It was old Temp'rance, the cook.

"Did you bring that chair all the way for me?" asked Eve, surprised.

"Yass, 'm. It's sut'ny pleasant here; it sut'ny is."

"I am much obliged; but I shall be going back soon."

The two old women looked at each other. "Dat dere ole wrack down der
beach is moughty cu'us--ef yer like ter walk dat way en see 'em?"
suggested Dilsey, after a pause.

"Too far," said Eve.

Both of the old women declared that it was very near. The wind
freshened; Eve, who had little Jack in her arms, feared lest he might
take cold, thinly clad as he was--far too thinly for her Northern
ideas--with only one fold of linen and his little white frock over his
breast. She drew the skirt of her dress over his bare knees. Then after
a while she rose and put him in his wagon. "We will go back," she said.

Again the two old women looked at each other. But they were afraid of
the Northern lady; the munificent presents which she had given them that
morning did not bring them any nearer to her. Old Temp'rance, therefore,
shouldered her chair again, Dilsey turned the wagon, and they entered
the bush-bordered tunnel on their way home, walking as slowly as they
could. In only one place was there an opening through the serried green;
here a track turned off to the right. When Eve had passed its entrance
the first time, there was nothing to be seen but another perspective of
white sand and glittering foliage; but on their return her eyes,
happening to glance that way, perceived a group of figures at the end.
"Who are those people?--what are they doing?" she said, pausing.

"Oh, nutt'n," answered Temp'rance. "Des loungjun roun'."

As Eve still stood looking, Uncle Abram emerged from the bushes. "Shall
I kyar your palasol fer yer, miss?" he asked, officiously. "'Pears like
yer mus' be tired; been so fur."

Eve now comprehended that the three were trying to keep something from
her. "What has happened?" she said. "Tell me immediately."

"Dey' ain' nutt'n happen," answered Uncle Abram, desperately; "dey's too
brash, dem two! Miss S'breeny she 'low'd dat yer moutn't like ter see
her go a moanin', miss; en so she tole us not ter let yer come dishyer
way ef we could he'p it. But dem two--dey's boun' ter do some fool ting.
It's a cohesion of malice 'mong women--'tis dat!"

"Does that road lead to the cemetery, too?" said Eve. "I went by another
way. Take baby home, Dilsey"--she stooped and kissed him; "I will join
Miss Abercrombie." She walked rapidly down the side track; the three
blacks stood watching her, old Temp'rance with the chair poised on her
turban.

The little burying-ground was surrounded by an old brick wall; its high
gate-posts were square, each surmounted by a clumsy funeral urn. The
rusty iron gate was open, and a procession was passing in. First came
Miss Sabrina in her bonnet, an ancient structure of large size, trimmed
with a black ribbon; the gentle lady, when out-of-doors, was generally
seen in what she called her "flat;" the presence of the bonnet,
therefore, marked a solemn occasion. She likewise wore a long scarf,
which was pinned, with two pins, low down on her sloping shoulders, its
broché ends falling over her gown in front; her hands were encased in
black kid gloves much too large for her, the kid wrists open and
flapping. Behind her came Powlyne, Pomp, and Plato, carrying wreaths of
holly. Eve drew near noiselessly, and paused outside. Miss Sabrina first
knelt down, bowing her head upon her hands for a moment; then, rising,
she took the wreaths one by one, and arranged them upon the graves, the
three blacks following her. When she had taken the last, she signed to
them to withdraw; they went out quietly, each turning at the gate to
make a reverential bow, partly to her, partly to the circle of the dead.
Eve now entered the enclosure, and Miss Sabrina saw her.

"Oh, my dear! I didn't intend that _you_ should come," she said,
distressed.

"And why not? I have been here before; and my brother is here."

"Yes; but to-day--to-day is different."

Eve looked at the graves; she perceived that three of them were decked
with small Confederate flags.

"Our dear cousins," said Miss Sabrina; "they died for their country, and
on Memorial Day, Christmas Day, and Easter I like to pay them such small
honor as I can. I am in the habit of singing a hymn before I go; don't
stay, my dear, if it jars upon you."

"It doesn't," said Eve. She had seated herself on the grass beside her
brother's grave, with her arm laid over it.

Miss Sabrina turned her back and put on her glasses. Then, resuming her
original position, she took a small prayer-book from her pocket, opened
it, and, after an apologetic cough, began:

    "Rise, my soul, and stretch thy wings,
    Thy better portion trace."

Eve, sitting there, looked at her. Miss Sabrina was tall and slender;
she had once been pretty, but now her cheeks were wan, her eyes faded,
her soft brown hair was very thin. She had but a thread of a voice.

    "There is everlasting peace,
    Rest, enduring rest, in heaven,"

she sang in her faint, sweet tones; and when she came to the words,
"There will sorrows ever cease," she raised her poor dim eyes towards
the sky with such a beautiful expression of hope in them that the
younger woman began to realize that there might be acute griefs even
when people were so mild and acquiescent, so dimly hued and submissive,
as was this meek Southern gentlewoman.

The hymn finished, Miss Sabrina put her prayer-book in her pocket, and
came forward. "My mother," she said, touching one of the tombs. "My
grandfather and grandmother. My brother Marmaduke, Cicely's father.
Cicely's mother; she was a Northerner, and we have sometimes thought
Cicely rather Northern."

"Oh, no!"

"Well, her grandmother was from Guadeloupe. So perhaps that balances
it."

The older tombs were built of brick, each one covered with a heavy
marble slab, upon which were inscribed, in stately old-fashioned
language, and with old-fashioned arrangement of lines and capitals, the
names, the virtues, and the talents of the one who lay beneath. The
later graves were simple grassy mounds.

"My brother Augustus; my great-uncle William Drayton; my aunt Pamela,"
Miss Sabrina continued, indicating each tomb as she named its occupant,
much as though she were introducing them. "My own place is already
selected; it is here," she went on, tapping a spot with her slender
foot. "It seems to me a good place; don't you think so? And I keep an
envelope, with directions for everything, on top of my collars, where
any one can find it; for I do so dislike an ill-arranged funeral. For
instance, I particularly desire that there should be fresh water and
glasses on the hall-table, where every one can get them without asking;
_so_ much better than hidden in some back room, with every one
whispering and hunting about after them. I trust you don't mind my
saying," she concluded, looking at Eve kindly, "that I hope you may be
here."

They left the cemetery together.

"I suppose it was a shock to you that your niece should marry a Union
officer?" Eve said, as they took the shorter path towards the house.

"Ye-es, I cannot deny it; and to my father also. But we liked John for
himself very much; and Cicely felt--"

But John's sister did not care to hear what Cicely felt! "And was it on
this island that he expected to make his fortune--in cotton?"

"No; these are rice lands, and they are worthless now that the dikes are
down."

"And the slaves gone."

"Yes. But we never had many slaves; we were never rich. Now we are very
poor, my dear; I don't know that any one has mentioned it to you."

"And yet you keep on all these infirm old negroes--those who would be
unable to get employment anywhere else."

"Oh, we should never turn away our old servants," replied Miss Sabrina,
with confidence.

That evening, at the judge's suggestion, Cicely took her guitar. "What
do you want me to sing, grandpa?"

"'Sweet Afton.'"

So Cicely sang it. Then the judge himself sang, to Cicely's
accompaniment, "They may rail at this life." He had made a modest bowl
of punch: it was Christmas night, and every one should be merry. So he
sang, in his gallant old voice:

    "'They may rail at this life; from the hour I began it
      I've found it a life full of kindness and bliss;
    And until they can show me some happier planet,
      More social, more gay, I'll content me with this.'"

He was contented with it--this life "full of kindness and bliss," on his
lonely sea-island, with its broken dikes and desolated fields, in his
half-ruined old house, with its wooden walls vibrating, with more than
one pane of glass gone, more than one floor whose planks were loosened
so that they must walk carefully. At any rate, he trolled out his song
as though he were: it was Christmas night, and every one should be
merry.

There was one person who really was merry, and that was Master Jack, who
sat on the lap of his Northern aunt, laughing and crowing, and demanding
recognition of his important presence from each in turn, by the despotic
power of his eye. In truth, it was this little child who held together
the somewhat strangely assorted group, Miss Sabrina in an ancient white
lace cape, with flowers in her hair; the old judge in a dress-coat and
ruffled shirt, Cicely in a gay little gown of light-blue tint (taken
probably, so Eve thought, from her second trousseau), and Eve herself in
her heavy black crape; she alone had made no concessions to Christmas;
her mourning attire was unlightened by any color, or even by white.

"'Macgregor's Gathering,'" called the judge.

Cicely sang it. After finishing the song, she began the lament a second
time, changing the words:

    "We're niggerless, niggerless, niggerless, Gregorlach!
    Niggerless, niggerless, nig-ig-ig-gerless!"

she sang. "For we're not 'landless' at all; we've got miles and miles of
land. It's niggers that are lacking."

The judge laughed, patting her little dark head as she sat on a stool
beside him. "Let us go out to the quarters, grandpa; they will be
dancing by now. And Jack must go too."

The judge lifted his great-grandson to his shoulder. Eve had already
noticed that Cicely never took the child from her with her own hands;
she let some one else do it. When the door was opened, distant sounds of
the thrumming of banjoes could be heard. Seeing a possible intention on
Eve's face, Cicely remarked, in her impersonal way, "Are you coming?
They won't enjoy it, they are afraid of you."

"I don't see why they should be," said Eve, when she and Miss Sabrina
were left alone.

"You are a stranger, my dear; it is only that. And they are all so fond
of Cicely that it wouldn't be Christmas to them if she did not pay them
a visit; they worship her."

"And after she has sung that song!"

"That song?"

"'Niggerless,'" quoted Eve, indignantly.

"Well, we are niggerless, or nearly so," said Miss Sabrina, mystified.

"It's the word, the term."

"Oh, you mean nigger? It is very natural to us to say so. I suppose you
prefer negroes? If you like, I will try to call them so hereafter.
Negroes; yes, negroes." She pronounced it "nig-roes." "I don't know
whether I have told you," she went on, "how much Cicely dislikes
dreams?"

"Well she may!" was the thought of Jack Bruce's sister. What she said,
with a short laugh, was, "You had better tell her to be careful about
eating hot breads."

"Would you have her eat _cold_ bread?" said Miss Sabina, in surprise. "I
didn't mean that her nights were disturbed; I only meant that she
dislikes the _telling_ of dreams--a habit so common at breakfast, you
know. I thought I would just mention it."

Eve gave another abrupt laugh. "Do you fear I am going to tell her mine?
She would not find them all of sugar."

"I did not mean yours especially. She has such a curious way of shutting
her teeth when people begin--such pretty little white teeth as they are,
too, dear child! And she doesn't like reading aloud either."

"That must be a deprivation to you," said Eve, her tone more kindly.

"It is. I have always been extremely fond of it. Are you familiar with
Milton? His 'Comus'?"

"'Sabrina fair, listen where thou art sitting?" quoted Eve, smiling.

"Yes.

    "'Sabrina fair, listen where thou art sitting,
      Under the glassy, cool, translucent wave,
    In twisted braids of lilies knitting--'"

said the Southern lady in her murmurous voice. "You don't know what a
pleasure it has always been to me that I am named Sabrina. The English
originated 'Comus;' I like the English, they are so cultivated."

"Do you see many of them here?"

"Not many. I am sorry to say my father does not like them; he thinks
them affected."

"That is the last thing I should call them."

"Well, those who come here really do say 'serpents' and 'crocodiles.'"

"Do you mean as an oath?" said Eve, thinking vaguely of "Donner und
blitzen."

"As an oath? I have never heard it used in that way," answered Miss
Sabrina, astonished. "I mean that they call the snakes serpents, and the
alligators crocodiles; my father thinks that so very affected."

Thus the wan-cheeked mistress of Romney endeavored to entertain their
guest.

That night Eve was sitting by her fire. The mattress of Meadows was no
longer on the floor; the English girl had started on her return journey
the day before, escorted to the pier by all the blacks of the island,
respectful and wondering. The presence of little Jack asleep in his crib
behind a screen, with Dilsey on her pallet beside him, made the large
wind-swept chamber less lonely; still its occupant felt overwhelmed with
gloom. There was a light tap at the door, and Cicely entered; she had
taken off her gay blue frock, and wore a white dressing-gown. "I thought
I'd see if you were up." She went across and looked at Jack for a
moment; then she came back to the fire. "You haven't touched your hair,
nor unbuttoned a button; are you always like that?"

"Like what?"

"Trim and taut, like a person going out on horse-back. I should love to
see you with your hair down; I should love to see you run and shriek!"

"I fear you are not likely to see either."

Cicely brought her little teeth together with a click. "I've got to get
something over in the north wing; will you come? The wind blows so, it's
splendid!"

"I will go if you wish," said Eve.

They went down the corridor and turned into another, both of them
lighted by the streaks of moonlight which came through the half-closed
or broken shutters; the moon was nearly at its full, and very brilliant;
a high wind was careering by outside--it cried at the corner of the
house like a banshee. At the end of the second hall Cicely led the way
through a labyrinth of small dark chambers, now up a step, now down a
step, hither and thither; finally opening a door, she ushered Eve into a
long, high room, lighted on both sides by a double row of windows, one
above the other. Here there were no shutters, and the moonlight poured
in, making the empty space, with its white walls and white floor, as
light as day. "It's the old ballroom," said Cicely. "Wait here; I will
be back in a moment." She was off like a flash, disappearing through a
far door.

Eve waited, perforce. If she had felt sure that she could find her way
back to her room, she would have gone; but she did not feel sure. As to
leaving Cicely alone in that remote and disused part of the house, at
that late hour of the night, she cared nothing for that; Eve was hard
with people she did not like; she did not realize herself how hard she
was. She went to one of the windows and looked out.

These lower windows opened on a long veranda. The veranda was only a
foot above the ground; any one, Eve reflected, could cross its uneven
surface and look in; she almost expected to see some one cross, and peer
in at her, his face opposite hers on the other side of the pane. The
moonlight shone on the swaying evergreens; within sight were the waters
of the Sound. Presently she became conscious of a current of wind
blowing through the room, and turned to see what caused it. There had
been no sound of an opening door, or any other sound, but a figure was
approaching, coming down the moonlit space rapidly with a waving motion.
It was covered with something transparent that glittered and shone; its
outlines were vague. It came nearer and nearer, without a sound. Then a
mass of silvery gauze was thrown back, revealing Cicely attired in an
old-fashioned ball dress made of lace interwoven with silver threads and
decked with little silvery stars; there was a silver belt high up under
her arms, and a wreath of the silvery stars shone in her hair. She stood
a moment; then snatching up the gauze which had fallen at her feet, she
held one end of it, and let the other blow out on the strong cold wind
which now filled the room. With this cloudy streamer in her hand, she
began lightly and noiselessly to dance, moving over the moonlit floor,
now with the gauze blowing out in front of her, now waving behind her as
she flew along. Suddenly she let it drop, and, coming to Eve, put her
arms round her waist and forced her forward. Eve resisted. But Cicely's
hands were strong, her hold tenacious; she drew her sister-in-law down
the room in a wild gallopade. In the midst of it, giving a little jump,
she seized Eve's comb. Eve's hair, already loosened, fell down on her
shoulders. Cicely clapped her hands, and began to take little dancing
steps to the tune of "Niggerless, niggerless, nig-ig-ig-gerless!"
chanted in a silvery voice. When she came to "less," she held out her
gleaming skirt, and dipped down in a wild little courtesy.

Eve picked up her comb and turned back towards the door.

Cicely danced on ahead, humming her song; they passed through the
labyrinth of dark little rooms, the glimmering dress acting as guide
through the dimness. Cicely went as far as the second hall; here she
stopped.

"It's the wind, you know," she said, in her usual voice; "when it blows
like this, I always have to do something; sometimes I call out and
shout. But I don't care for it, really; I don't care for anything!" Her
face, as she spoke, looked set and melancholy. She opened a door and
disappeared.

The next day there was nothing in her expression to indicate that there
had been another dance at Romney the night before, besides the one at
the negro quarters.

Eve was puzzled. She had thought her so unimaginative and quiet; "a
passionless, practical little creature, cool and unimpulsive, whose
miniature beauty led poor Jack astray, and made him believe that she had
a soul!" This had been her estimate. She was alone with the baby; she
took him to the window and looked at him earnestly. The little man
smiled back at her, playing with the crape of her dress. No, there was
nothing of Cicely here; the blue eyes, golden hair, and frank smile--all
were his father over again.

"We'll make that Mr. Morrison come back, baby; and then you and I will
go away together," she whispered, stroking his curls.

"Meh Kiss'm," said Jack. It was as near as he could come to "Merry
Christmas."

"Before another Christmas I'll get you away from her _forever_!"
murmured the aunt, passionately.




V.


"Out rowing? If you are doing it to entertain me--" said Eve.

"I should never think of that; there's only one thing here that
entertains you, and that's baby," Cicely answered. She spoke without
insistence; her eyes had their absent-minded expression.

"Cicely, give him to me," Eve began. She must put her wish into words
some time. "If I could only make you feel how much I long for it! I will
devote my life to him; and it will be a pleasure to me, a charity,
because I am so alone in the world. You are not alone; you have other
ties. Listen, Cicely, I will make any arrangement you like; you shall
always have the first authority, but let me have him to live with me;
let me take him away when I go. I will even acknowledge everything you
have said: my brother _was_ much older than you were; it's natural that
those months with him should seem to you now but an episode--something
that happened at the beginning of your life, but which need not go on to
its close."

"I _was_ young," said Cicely, musingly.

"Young to marry--yes."

"No; I mean young to have everything ended."

"But that is what I am telling you, it must not be ended; Mr. Morrison
must come back to you."

"He may," answered Cicely, looking at her companion for a moment with
almost a solemn expression.

"Then give baby to me now, and let me go away--before he comes."

Cicely glanced off over the water; they were standing on the low bank
above the Sound. "He could not go north now, in the middle of the
winter," she answered, after a moment.

"In the early spring, then?"

"I don't know; perhaps."

Eve's heart gave a bound. She was going to gain her point.

Having been brought up by a man, she had learned to do without the
explanations, the details, which are dear to most feminine minds; so all
she said was, "That's agreed, then." She was so happy that a bright
flush rose in her cheeks, and her smile, as she spoke these last few
words, was very sweet; those lips, which Miss Sabrina had thought so
sullen, had other expressions.

Cicely looked at her. "You may marry too."

Eve laughed. "There is no danger. To show you, to make you feel as
secure as I do, I will tell you that there have been one or two--friends
of Jack's over there. Apparently I am not made of inflammable material."

"When you are sullen--perhaps not. But when you are as you are now?"

"I shall always be sullen to that sort of thing. But we needn't be
troubled; there won't be an army! To begin with, I am twenty-eight; and
to end with, every one will know that I have willed my property to baby;
and that makes an immense difference."

"How does it make a difference?"

"In opportunities for marrying, if not also--as I really believe--for
falling in love."

"I don't see what difference it makes."

"True, you do not," Eve replied; "you are the most extraordinary people
in the world, you Southerners; I have been here nearly a month, and I am
still constantly struck by it--you never think of money at all. And the
strangest point is, that although you never think of it, you don't in
the least know how to get on without it; you cannot improve anything,
you can only endure."

"If you will tell Dilsey to get baby ready, I will see to the boat,"
answered Cicely. She was never interested in general questions.

Presently they were afloat. They were in a large row-boat, with Pomp,
Plato, Uncle Abram, and a field hand at the oars; Cicely steered; Eve
and little Jack were the passengers. The home-island was four miles
long, washed by the ocean on one side, the Sound on the other; on the
north, Singleton Island lay very near; but on the south there was a
broad opening, the next island being six miles distant. Here stood
Jupiter Light; this channel was a sea-entrance not only to the line of
Sounds, but also to towns far inland, for here opened on the west a
great river-mouth, through which flowed to the sea a broad, slow stream
coming from the cotton country. They were all good sailors, as they had
need to be for such excursions, the Sounds being often rough. The bright
winter air, too, was sharp; but Eve was strong, and did not mind it, and
the ladies of Romney, like true Southerners, never believed that it was
really cold, cold as it is at the North. The voyages in the row-boat had
been many; they had helped to fill the days, and the sisters-in-law had
had not much else with which to fill them; they had remained as widely
apart as in the beginning, Eve absorbed in her own plans, Cicely in her
own indifference. Little Jack was always of the party, as his presence
made dialogue easy. They had floated many times through the salt marshes
between the rattling reeds, they had landed upon other islands, whose
fields, like those of Romney, had once been fertile, but which now
showed submerged expanses behind the broken dikes, with here and there
an abandoned rice-mill. Sometimes they went inland up the river, rowing
slowly against the current; sometimes, when it was calm, they went out
to sea. To-day they crossed to the other side of the Sound.

"What a long house Romney is!" said Eve, looking back. She did not add,
"And if you drop anything on the floor at one end it shakes the other."

"Yes, it's large," Cicely answered. She perceived no fault in it.

"And the name; you know there's a Romney in Kent?"

"Is there?"

"And your post-office, too; when I think of your Warwick, with its one
wooden house, those spectral white sand-hills, the wind, and the tall
light-house, and then when I recall the English Warwick, with its small,
closely built streets, and the great castle looking down into the river
Avon, I wonder if the first-comers here didn't feel lost sometimes. All
the rivers in central England, put together, would be drowned out of
sight in that great yellow stream of yours over there."

But Cicely's imagination took no flight towards the first-comers, nor
towards the English rivers; and, in another moment, Eve's had come
hastily homeward, for little Jack coughed. "He is taking cold!" she
exclaimed. "Let us go back."

"It's a splendid day; he will take no cold," Cicely answered. "But we
will go back if you wish." She watched Eve fold a shawl round the little
boy. "You ought to have a child of your own, Eve," she said, with her
odd little laugh.

"And you ought never to have had one," Eve responded.

As they drew near the landing, they perceived Miss Sabrina on the bank.
"She has on her bonnet! Where can she be going?" said Cicely. "Oh, I
know; she will ask you to row to Singleton Island, to return Mrs.
Singleton's call."

"But Jack looks so pale--"

"You're too funny, Eve! How do you suppose we have taken care of him all
this time--before you came?" Eve's tone was often abrupt, but Cicely's
was never that; the worst you could say of it was that its sweetness was
sometimes mocking.

When they reached the landing, Miss Sabrina proposed her visit; "that
is, if you care to go, my dear. Dilsey told me that she saw you coming
back, so I put on my bonnet on the chance."

"Eve is going," remarked Cicely, stepping from the boat; "she wants to
see Rupert, he is such a sweet little boy."

Dilsey took Jack, and presently Miss Sabrina and her guest were floating
northward. Eve longed to put her triumph into words: "The baby is mine!
In the spring I am to have him." But she refrained. "When does your
spring begin?" she asked. "In February?"

"In March, rather," answered Miss Sabrina. "Before that it is dangerous
to make changes; I myself have never been one to put on thin dresses
with the pinguiculas."

"What are pinguiculas?--Birds?"

"They are flowers," responded Miss Sabrina, mildly.

"It will be six weeks, then; to-day is the fifteenth."

"Six weeks to what?"

"To March; to spring."

"I don't know that it begins on the very first day," remarked Miss
Sabrina.

"Mine shall!" thought Eve.

Romney was near the northern end of the home-island; the voyage,
therefore, was a short one. The chimneys of Singleton House came into
view; but the boat passed on, still going northward. "Isn't that the
house?" Eve asked.

"Yes, but the landing is farther on; we always go to the landing, and
then walk back through the avenue."

But when the facade appeared at the end of the neglected road--a walk of
fifteen minutes--there seemed to Eve hardly occasion for so much
ceremony; the old mansion was in a worse condition than Romney; it
sidled and leaned, and one of its wings was a roofless ruin, with the
planking of the floor half tilted up, half fallen into the cellar. Miss
Sabrina betrayed no perception of the effect of this upon a stranger;
she crossed the veranda with her lady-like step, and said to a solemn
little negro boy who was standing in the doorway: "Is Mrs. Singleton at
home this evening, Boliver? Can she see us?--Miss Bruce and Miss
Abercrombie."

An old negro woman came round the corner of the house, and, cuffing the
boy for standing there, ushered the visitors into a room on the right
of the broad hall. The afternoon had grown colder, but the doors and
windows all stood open; a negro girl, who bore a strong resemblance to
Powlyne, entered, and chased out a chicken who was prowling about over
the matted floor; then she knelt down, with her long thin black legs
stretched out behind, and tried to light a fire on the hearth. But the
wind was evidently in the wrong direction for the requirements of that
chimney; white smoke puffed into the room in clouds.

"Let us go out on the veranda," suggested Eve, half choked.

"Oh, but surely--When they have ushered us in here?" responded Miss
Sabrina, remonstratingly, though she too was nearly strangled. "It will
blow away in a few minutes, I assure you."

Much of it still remained when Mrs. Singleton entered. She paid no more
attention to it than Miss Sabrina had done; she welcomed her guests
warmly, kissing Eve on both cheeks, although she had never seen her
before. "I have been so much interested in hearing that you are from
England, Miss Bruce," she said, taking a seat beside her. "We always
think of England as our old home; I reckon you will see much down here
to remind you of it."

Eve looked about her--at the puffing smoke, at the wandering chicken,
who still peered through one of the windows. "I am not English," she
said.

"But you have lived there so long; ever since you were a child; surely
it is the same thing," interposed Miss Sabrina. A faint color rose in
her cheeks for a moment. Eve perceived that she preferred to present an
English rather than a Northern guest.

"We are all English, if you come to that," said Mrs. Singleton,
confidently. She was small, white-haired, with a sweet face, and a sweet
voice that drawled a little.

"Eve is much interested in our nig-roes," pursued Miss Sabrina; "you
know to her they are a novelty."

"Ah dear, yes, our poor, poor people! When I think of them, Miss Bruce,
scattered and astray, with no one to advise them, it makes my heart
bleed. For they must be suffering in so many ways; take the one instance
of the poor women in their confinements; we used to go to them, and be
with them to cheer their time of trial. But now, separated from us, from
our care and oversight, what _can_ they do? If the people who have been
so rash in freeing them had only thought of even that one thing! But I
suppose they did not think of it, and naturally, because the
abolitionist societies, we are told, were composed principally of old
maids."

Eve laughed. "Why can't they have nurses, as other people do?"

"You don't mean regular monthly nurses, of course?"

"Why not?--if they can afford to pay for them. They might club together
to supply them."

"Oh, I don't think that would be at all appropriate, really. And Eve
does not mean it, I assure you," said Miss Sabrina, coming to the
rescue; "her views are perfectly reasonable, dear Mrs. Singleton; you
would be surprised."

"You would indeed!" Eve thought.

But they talked no more of the nig-roes.

"How is Miss Hillsborough?" Miss Sabrina asked.

"Right well, I am glad to say. My dear Aunt Peggy, Miss Bruce; and what
she is to me I can hardly tell you! You know I am something of a
talker"--here Mrs. Singleton laughed softly. "And we are so much alone
here now, that, were it not for Aunt Peggy, I should fairly have to talk
to the chickens!" (One at least would be ready, Eve thought.) "Don't you
know that there are ever so many little things each day that we want to
_say_ to somebody?" Mrs. Singleton went on. "Thinking them is not
enough. And these dear people, like Aunt Peggy, who sit still and
listen;--it isn't what they answer that's of consequence; in fact they
seldom say much; it's just the chance they give us of putting our own
thought into words and seeing how it looks. It _does_ make such a
difference."

"You are fortunate," Eve answered. "And then you have your little boy,
too; Cicely has told me about him--Rupert; she says he is a dear little
fellow."

"Dear heart!" exclaimed Miss Sabrina, distressed. "Cicely is
sometimes--yes--"

But Mrs. Singleton laughed merrily. "I will show him to you presently,"
she said.

"Mr. Singleton is so extraordinarily agreeable!" said Miss Sabrina, with
unwonted animation.

"Oh yes, he is wonderful; and he is a statesman too, a second Patrick
Henry. But then as regards the little things of each _day_, you know, we
don't go to our husbands with _those_."

"What do you do, then?--I mean with the husbands," Eve asked.

"I think we admire them," answered Mrs. Singleton, simply.

Lucasta, the negro girl, now appeared with a tray. "Pray take some
Madeira," said their hostess, filling the tiny glasses. "And plum-cake."

Eve declined. But Miss Sabrina accepted both refreshments, and Mrs.
Singleton bore her company. The wine was unspeakably bad, it would have
been difficult to say what had entered into its composition; but Madeira
had formed part of the old-time hospitality of the house, and something
that was sold under that name (at a small country store on the mainland
opposite) was still kept in the cut-glass decanter, to be served upon
occasion.

Presently a very tall, very portly, and very handsome old man (he well
merited three verys) came in, leaning on a cane. "Miss Bruce--little
Rupert; our dear little boy," said Mrs. Singleton, introducing him. She
had intended to laugh, but she forgot it; she gazed at him admiringly.

The master of the house put aside his cane, and looked about for a
chair. As he stood there, helpless for an instant, he seemed gigantic.

Eve laughed.

Miss Sabrina murmured, "Pleasantry, dear Mr. Singleton;--our foolish
pleasantry."

After the old gentleman had found his chair and seated himself, and had
drawn a breath or two, he gave a broad slow smile. "Nanny, are you in
the habit of introducing me to your young lady friends as your dear
little Rupert?--your little Rupe?"

"Rupe? Never!" answered Mrs. Singleton, indignantly.

"Only our foolish pleasantry," sighed Miss Sabrina, apologetically.

"It was Cicely," Eve explained.

"If it was Cicely, it was perfect," the lame colossus answered,
gallantly. "Cicely is heavenly. Upon my word, she is the most engaging
young person I have ever seen in my life."

He then ate some plum-cake, and paid Eve compliments even more handsome
than these.

After a while he imparted the news; he had been down to the landing to
meet the afternoon steamer, which brought tidings from the outside
world. "Melton is dead," he said. "You know whom I mean? Melton, the
great stockbroker; one of the richest men living, I suppose."

"Oh! where is his soul _now_?" said Mrs. Singleton. Her emotion was
real, her sweet face grew pallid.

"Why, I have never heard that he was a bad man, especially," remarked
Eve, surprised.

"He was sure to be--making all that money; it could not be otherwise.
Oh, what is his agony at this very moment!"

But Rupert did not sympathize with this mournfulness; when three ladies
were present, conversation should be light, poetical. "Miss Bruce," he
said, turning towards Eve--he was so broad that that in itself made a
landscape--"have you ever noticed the appropriateness of 'County Guy' to
this neighborhood of ours?"

"No," Eve answered. But the words brought her father to her mind with a
rush: how often, when she was a child, had he beguiled a dull walk with
a chant, half song, half declamation:

    "Oh, County Guy, the hour is nigh,
      The sun has left the lea."

She looked at her host, but she did not hear him; a mist gathered in her
eyes.

    "'Oh, County Guy, the hour is nigh,'"

began the colossus, placing his plum-cake on his knee provisionally.

    "'The sun has left the lea;
    The orange flower perfumes the bower,
      The breeze is on the sea.
    The lark his lay who trilled all day
      Sits hushed his partner nigh.
    Breeze, bird, and flower confess the hour;
      But where is County Guy?'

"The orange flower perfumes the bower; here we have the orange flower
and the lea, the bower and the sea; and it's very rarely that you find
all four together. 'The lark his lay who trilled all day'--what music it
is! There's no one like Scott."

His lameness prevented him from accompanying his guests on their walk
back to the boat; he stood in the doorway leaning on his cane and waving
a courtly farewell, while the chicken, with slowly considering steps,
crossed the veranda and entered the drawing-room again.

"Miss Sabrina, please tell me what you know of Ferdinand Morrison," Eve
began, as soon as a turn in the road hid the old house from their view.

Miss Sabrina had expected to talk about the Singletons. "Oh, Mr.
Morrison? we did not see him ourselves, you know."

"But you must have heard."

"Certainly, we heard. The Singletons are delightful people, are they
not? So cultivated! Their house has always been one of the most
agreeable on the Sound."

"I dare say. But about Ferdinand Morrison?" Eve went on. For it was not
often that she had so good an opportunity; at Romney, if there was no
one else present, there were always the servants, who came in and out
like members of the family. "Cicely met him first in Savannah, didn't
she?"

"Yes," answered Miss Sabrina (but giving up the Singletons with regret);
"she went to pay a visit to our cousin Emmeline; and there she met him.
From the very beginning he appeared to be much in love with her, Cousin
Emmeline wrote. And Cicely too--so we heard--appeared to care for him
from the first day. At least Cousin Emmeline received that impression;
Cicely, of course, did not take her into her confidence."

"Why of course?"

"At that early stage? But don't you think that those first sweet
uncertainties are always private? Mr. Morrison used to come every day,
and take her out for a drive; I have been in Savannah myself, and I have
often thought that probably they went to Bonaventure--_so_ delightful!
At last, one evening, Cicely told Cousin Emmeline that she was engaged.
And the next day she wrote to us. She did not come home; they were
married there at Emmeline's."

"And none of you went to the wedding?"

"There were only father and I to go; we have not always been able to do
as we wished," replied Miss Sabrina, gently.

"Mr. Morrison had money, I suppose?"

"I think not; we have never been told so."

"Didn't you ask?"

"That was for Cicely, wasn't it? I dare say she knows. We could only
hope, father and I, that she would be happy; but I fear that she has not
been, ah no." And Miss Sabrina sighed.

"But we must not give it up so, she is still so young. Why don't you
write to Mr. Morrison yourself, and tell him, command him, to come
back?" suggested Eve, boldly.

"But--but I don't know where he is," answered Miss Sabrina, bewildered
by this sudden attack.

"You said South America."

"But I couldn't write, 'Ferdinand Morrison, Esquire, South America.'"

"Some one must know. His relatives."

"Yes, there is his brother, and a most devoted brother, we are told,"
responded Miss Sabrina, speaking more fluently now that she had launched
upon family affection. "Yes, indeed--from all we have heard of Paul
Tennant, we are inclined to think him a most excellent young man. He may
not have Ferdinand's beauty (we are told that Ferdinand is remarkably
handsome); and it is probable, too, that he has not Ferdinand's
cultivation, for he is a business man, and has always lived at the
North.--I beg your pardon, my dear, I am sure," said the Southern lady,
interrupting herself in confusion.

"It doesn't matter; the North won't die of it. If you know where this
brother is--But why has he a different name?"

"The mother, Mrs. Tennant, who was a widow with this one boy, Paul,
married one of the Maryland Morrisons--I reckon you know the family.
Ferdinand is the child of this second marriage. His father and mother
are dead; his only near relative is this half-brother, Paul."

"Write to Paul, then, and find out where Ferdinand is."

"This is a plot, isn't it?" answered Miss Sabrina, smiling. "But I like
it; it's so sweet of you to plan for our poor Cicely's happiness."

"You needn't thank me! Then you will write?"

"But I don't know where Mr. Tennant is either.--I dare say Cicely
knows."

"But if you ask her, she will suspect something. And if I ask her, it
will be worse still! Doesn't anybody in the world know where this Paul
Tennant is?" said Eve, irritably.

"I think we heard that it was some place where it is very cold--I
remember that. It might have been Canada," suggested Sabrina,
reflectively.

"Canada and South America--what a family!" said Eve, in despair.

The wind had risen, the homeward voyage was rough. They reached Romney
to find little Jack ill; before morning he was struggling with an attack
of croup.




VI.


"Cicely, what did you say to those people, that they stared at us so
when they passed?"

"Oh, they asked me if you were the man who went round with the
panorama--to explain it, you know. So I told them that you were the
celebrated Jessamine family--you and Miss Leontine; and that you were
going to give a concert in Gary Hundred to-night; I advised them to go."

"Bless my soul!--the celebrated Jessamine family? What possessed you?"

"Well, they saw the wagon, and they thought it looked like a panorama.
They seemed to want something, so I told them that."

Eve broke into a laugh.

But the judge put on his spectacles, and walked round the wagon with
indignant step. "It is an infernal color," he declared, angrily.

"Our good Dickson had that paint on hand--he told me about it,"
explained Miss Leontine. "It was left over"--here she paused. "I don't
know what you will think, but I believe it really was left over after a
circus--or was it a menagerie? At any rate, the last thing that was
exhibited here before the war."

The vehicle in question was a long-bodied, two seated wagon, with a
square box behind, which opened at the back like the box of a carrier's
cart; its hue was the liveliest pea green.

"Dickson had no business to give it to us; it was a damned
impertinence!" said the judge, with a snort.

"Don't spoil your voice, when you've got to sing to-night, grandpa,"
remarked Cicely. "And you will have to lead out Miss Leontine--who will
sing 'Waiting.'"

The judge glanced at Miss Leontine. He could not repress a grin.

But tall Miss Leontine remained amiable, she had never heard of
"Waiting." In any case she seldom penetrated jokes; they seemed to her
insufficiently explained; often, indeed, abstruse. She was fifty-two,
and very maidenly; her bearing, her voice, her expression, were all
timidly virginal, as were also the tints of her attire, pale blues and
lavenders, and faint green. Her face bore a strong resemblance to the
face of a camel; give a camel a pink-and-white complexion, blue eyes,
and light-brown hair coming down in flat bands on each side of its long
face, and you have Miss Leontine. She was extraordinarily tall--she
attained a stature of nearly six feet. Her step, as if conscious of
this, was apologetic; her long narrow back leaned forward as though she
were trying to reduce her height in front as she came towards one. She
wore no crinoline; her head was decked with a large gypsy hat, from
which floated a blue tissue veil.

The little party of four--Eve, Cicely, the judge, and Miss
Leontine--with Master Jack, had driven from Gary Hundred to Bellington;
their hostess, Cousin Sarah Cray, had an old horse, and this wagon had
been borrowed from Dickson, the village grainer (who had so mistakenly
saved the circus paint); it would be a pleasant excursion in itself, and
it would be good for Jack--which last was the principal point with them
all.

For the much longer excursion from Abercrombie Island to this inland
South Carolina village had been taken on Jack's account; the attack of
croup had left him with a harassing cough, a baby's little cough, which
is so distressing to the ears of those who love him. Eve had walked
about, day and night, carrying him in her arms, his languid head on her
shoulder; she could not bear to see how large his eyes looked in his
little white face; she did not sleep; she could scarcely speak.

"We might go to Cousin Sarah Cray's for a while, away from the coast,"
Cicely suggested. She was always present when Eve walked restlessly to
and fro; but she did not interfere, she let Eve have the child.

Eve had no idea who or where was Cousin Sarah Cray, but she agreed to
anything that would take Jack away from the coast. It was very cold now
at Romney; the Sound was dark and rough all the time, the sea boomed,
the winds were bitter. They had therefore journeyed inland, Jack and
Eve, Cicely and her grandfather, leaving Miss Sabrina to guard the
island-home alone.

When they reached Gary Hundred and the softer air, Jack began to revive;
Eve too revived, she came back to daily life again. One of the first
things she said was: "I ought not to be staying here, Cicely; you must
let me go to the hotel; your cousin is not my cousin."

"She's Jack's."

"Do you mean by that that Jack must stay, and if he does, I shall? But
it isn't decent; here we have all descended upon her at a moment's
notice, and filled up her house, and tramped to and fro. She doesn't
appear to be rich."

"We are all as poor as crows, but we always go and stay with each other
just the same. As for Cousin Sarah Cray, she loves it. Of course we take
her as we find her."

"We do indeed!" was Eve's thought. "It is all very well for you," she
went on, aloud. "But I am a stranger."

"Cousin Sarah Cray doesn't think so; she thinks you very near--a sister
of her cousin."

"If you count in that way, what families you must have! But why
shouldn't we all go to the hotel, and take her with us? There's an
idea."

"For one reason, there's no hotel to go to," responded Cicely, laughing.

They continued, therefore, to stay with Cousin Sarah Cray; they had been
there ten days, and Jack was so much better that Eve gladly accepted her
obligations, for the present. She accepted, too, the makeshifts of the
rambling housekeeping. But if the housekeeping was of a wandering order,
the welcome did not wander--it remained fixed; there was something
beautiful in the boundless affection and hospitality of poverty-stricken
Cousin Sarah Cray.

Bellington was a ruin. In the old days it had been the custom of the
people of Gary Hundred, and the neighboring plantations, to drive
thither now and then to spend an afternoon; the terraces and fish-ponds
were still to be seen, together with the remains of the Dutch
flower-garden, and the great underground kitchens of the house, which
had been built of bricks imported from Holland a hundred and twenty
years before. In the corner of one of the fields bordering the river
were the earthworks of a Revolutionary fort; in a jungle a quarter of a
mile distant there was a deserted church, with high pews, mouldering
funeral hatchments, and even the insignia of George the Third in faded
gilt over the organ-loft. Bellington House had been destroyed by fire,
accidentally, in 1790. Now, when there were in the same neighborhood
other houses which had been destroyed by fire, not accidentally, there
was less interest in the older ruin. But it still served as an excuse
for a drive, and drives were excellent for the young autocrat of the
party, to whom all, including Miss Leontine, were shamelessly devoted.

The judge did his duty as guide; he had visited Bellington more times
than he could count, but he again led the way (with appropriate
discourse) from the fish-ponds to the fort, and from the fort to the
church, Miss Leontine, in her floating veil, ambling beside him.

When the sun began to decline they returned to their pea-green wagon.
The judge walked round it afresh. Then he turned away, put his head over
a bush, and muttered on the other side of it.

"What is he saying?" Eve asked.

"I am afraid 'cuss words,' as the darkies call them," answered Cicely,
composedly. "He is without doubt a very desperate old man."

Miss Leontine looked distressed, she made a pretext of gathering some
leaves from a bush at a little distance; as she walked away, her skirt
caught itself behind at each step upon the tops of her prunella boots,
which were of the pattern called "Congress," with their white straps
visible.

"She is miserable because I called him that," said Cicely; "she thinks
him perfect. Grandpa, I have just called you a desperate old man."

But the judge had resumed his grand manner; he assisted the ladies in
climbing to their high seats, and then, mounting to his own place, he
guided the horse down the uneven avenue and into the broad road again.
The cotton plantations of this neighborhood had suffered almost as much
as the rice fields of Romney: they had been flooded so often that much
of the land was now worthless, disintegrated and overgrown with
lespedeza. They crossed the river (which had done the damage) on--or
rather in--a long shaking wooden bridge, covered and nearly dark, and
guarding in its dusky recesses a strong odor of the stable. Beyond it
the judge had an inspiration: he would go across the fields by one of
the old cotton-tracks, thus shortening the distance by more than two
miles.

"Because you're ashamed of

    'Our pea-green wagon, our wagon of green,
    Lillibulero, bullen-a-la,'"

chanted Cicely on the back seat.

"Cecilia!" said the judge, with dignity.

Eve sat beside him; courteously he entertained her. "Have you ever
reflected, Miss Bruce, upon the very uninteresting condition of the
world at present? Everything is known. Where can a gentleman travel now,
with the element of the unexpected as a companion? There are positively
no lands left unvulgarized save the neighborhood of the Poles."

"Central Africa," Eve suggested.

"Africa? I think I said for gentlemen."

"You turbulent old despot, curb yourself," said Cicely, _sotto voce_.

"In the old days, Miss Bruce," the judge went on, "we had Arabia, we had
Thibet, we had Cham-Tartary; we could arrive on camels at Erzerum. Hey!
what are you about there, boy? Turn out!"

"Turn out yourself."

The track had passed down into a winding hollow between sloping banks
about six feet high; on the other side of a curve they had come suddenly
upon an empty hay-cart which was approaching from the opposite
direction, drawn by two mules; the driver, an athletic young negro with
an insolent face, was walking beside his team. His broad cart filled
every inch of the track; it was impossible to pass it without climbing
the bank. The judge, with his heavy wagon and one horse, could not do
this; but it would have been easy for the mules to take their light cart
up the slope, and thus leave room for the wagon.

The old planter could not believe that he had heard aright. "Turn out,
boy!" he repeated, with the imperious manner which only a lifetime of
absolute authority can give.

The negro brought his mules up until their noses touched the nose of the
horse; then, putting his hands in his pockets, he planted himself, and
called out, "W'at yer gwine ter do 'bout it?"

In an instant the judge was on his feet, whip in hand. But Cicely
touched him. "You are not going to fight with him, grandpa?" she said,
in a low tone. "For he will fight; he isn't in the least afraid of you."

The judge had now reached the ground. In his rage he was white, with his
eyes blazing. Eve, greatly alarmed, clasped little Jack closer.

Cicely jumped lightly down. "Grandpa," she said, under her breath, "he
is a great deal stronger than you are, and after he has struck you down
we shall be here alone with him--think of that. We will all get out, and
then you can lead the horse up the bank, and go by him. Dear grandpa, it
is the only way; this isn't the island, this is South Carolina."

Eve, seeing the speechless passion of the old man, had not believed that
Cicely would prevail; she had closed her eyes with a shuddering,
horrible vision of the forward rush, the wrested whip, and the
silver-haired head in the dust. But, with a mighty effort, trembling
like a leaf with his repressed rage, the judge put up his hand to help
her in her descent. She accepted his aid hurriedly, giving Jack to
Cicely; Miss Leontine had climbed down alone, the tears dropping on her
cheeks behind her veil. The judge then led the horse up the bank and
past the wagon, the negro keeping his position beside his mules; the
ladies followed the wagon, and mounted to their places again when it had
reached the track, Cicely taking the seat by the side of her
grandfather. Then they drove off, followed by the negro's jeering
laughter.

The old planter remained perfectly silent. Eve believed that, after he
had deposited them safely at home, he would go back in search of that
negro without fail. She and Cicely tried to keep up a conversation; Miss
Leontine joined them whenever she was able, but the tears constantly
succeeded each other on her long face, and she was as constantly putting
her handkerchief to her eyes in order to repress them, the gesture much
involved with her blue veil. On the borders of the village they passed
the little railway station. By the side of the station-house there was a
new shop, which had a broad show-window filled with wooden wash-tubs.

"This is the shop of Thomas Scotts, the tar-and-turpentine man who is in
love with Matilda Debbs," said Cicely. "How is that coming on now, Miss
Leontine?"

Miss Leontine took down her handkerchief. "The family do not consent."

"But there's nothing against the man, is there?"

Miss Leontine took down the handkerchief again--she had already
replaced it. "As regards his character, n-nothing. But he is a
manufacturer of tubs. It appears that it is the business of the family;
his father also manufactures them. In Connecticut."

"If Thomas Scotts should make a beautiful new tub for each of the Misses
Debbs, it wouldn't be a bad idea; there are twelve or fourteen of them,
aren't there?"

"Ner-nine," replied the afflicted maiden lady, with almost a convulsion
of grief. "But two of them are yer-young yet."

"And seven are not. Now seven new tubs."

"Cecilia, let us have no more of this," said the judge.

It was the first time he had spoken; Cicely put her hand behind her and
furtively pinched Eve's knee in token of triumph.

They came into the main street of Gary Hundred. It was a broad avenue,
wandering vaguely onward amid four rows of trees; there was no pavement;
the roadway was deeply covered with yellow sand; the spacious sidewalks
which bordered it were equally in a state of nature. The houses, at some
distance back from the street, were surrounded by large straggling
gardens. Farther down were the shops, each with its row of
hitching-posts across the front.

They left Miss Leontine at her own door, and went on towards the
residence of Cousin Sarah Cray.

"Here comes Miss Polly's bread-cart, on the way back from Mellons," said
Cicely. "Grandpa, wouldn't it be a good idea to buy some little cakes?"

The judge stopped the horse; Cicely beckoned to the old negro who was
wheeling the covered hand-cart along the sandy road. "Uncle Dan, have
you any cakes left?"

Uncle Dan touched his hat, and opened the lid of the cart; there,
reposing on snowy napkins, were biscuit and bread, and little cakes of
inviting aspect. While Cicely made her selection, Eve bent down and took
one of the circulars which were lying, neatly piled, in a corner. It
announced, not in print, but in delicate hand-writing, that at the
private bakery, number ten Queen Street, Gary Hundred, fresh bread,
biscuits, and rolls could be obtained daily; muffins, crumpets, and
plum-cake to order. The circular was signed "Mary Clementina Diana
Wingfield."

"They have names enough, those sisters," Eve commented. "Miss Leontine's
is Clotilda Leontine Elizabeth; I saw it in her prayer-book."

Cousin Sarah Cray's residence was a large white house, with verandas
encircling it both up stairs and down; the palings of the fence were
half gone, the whole place looked pillaged and open. The judge drove up
to the door and helped Cicely to descend; and then Eve, who had little
Jack, fast asleep, in her arms. Cicely motioned to Eve to go into the
house; she herself followed her grandfather as he led the horse round to
the stables. Eve went in, carrying Jack and the cakes. Cousin Sarah
Cray, hurrying down the stairs to meet her, took the child
affectionately. "Dear little fellow, he begins to look right rosy." She
was delighted with the cakes. "They will help out the tea be-u-tifully;
we've only got waffles."

Instead of going to her room, Eve took a seat at the window; she was
anxious about the judge.

"Miss Polly's cakes are always so light," pursued Cousin Sarah Cray,
looking at them; "she never makes a mistake, there's never the tinetiest
streak of heaviness in _her_ little pounds! And her breads are elegant,
too; when one sees her beautiful hands, one wonders how she can do all
the kneading."

"Does she do it herself?"

"Every single bit; their old Susannah only heats the oven. It was a
courageous idea, Miss Bruce, from the beginning; you know they are among
our best people, and, after the war, they found themselves left with
nothing in the world but their house. They could have kept school in it,
of course, for they are accomplished beyond everything; Miss Leontine
paints sweetly--she was educated in France. But there was no one to come
to the school; the girls, of course, could not afford to go away."

"You mean pupils?--to leave their homes and come here?"

"No, I mean the girls, Polly and Leontine; they could not open a school
anywhere else--in Charleston, for instance; they had not money enough."

"I beg your pardon--it was only that I did not recognize them as 'the
girls.'"

"Well, I suppose they really are not quite girls any longer," responded
Cousin Sarah Cray, thoughtfully. "Polly is forty-four and Leontine
fifty-two; but I reckon they will always be 'the girls' to us, even if
they're eighty," she added, laughing. "Well, Polly had this idea. And
she has been so successful--you can't think! Her bread-cart goes over to
Mellons every day of your life, as regularly as the clock. And they buy
a great deal."

"It's the camp, isn't it?--Camp Mellons?"

"No; it has always been Mellons, Mellons Post-office. The camp is near
there, and it has some Yankee name or other, I believe; but of course
you know, my dear, that _we_ never go there."

"You only sell them bread. I am glad, at least, that they buy Miss
Polly's. And does Miss Leontine help?"

"I fancy not. Dear Miss Leontine is not as practical as Miss Polly; she
has a soft poetical nature, and she makes beautiful afghans. But the
judge prefers Miss Polly."

"Does he really admire her?" said Eve, with a sudden inspiration.

"Beyond everything," answered Cousin Sarah Cray, clasping her plump
hands.

"Then will you please go out and tell him that she is coming here to
tea, that she will be here immediately?"

"Mercy! But she won't."

"Yes, she will; I will go and ask her. Do please make haste, Mrs. Cray;
we are so afraid, Cicely and I, that he will try to whip a negro."

"Mercy!" said Cousin Sarah Cray again, this time in alarm; stout as she
was, she ran swiftly through the hall and across the veranda, her cap
strings flying, and disappeared on the way to the stables.

Eve carried little Jack up-stairs, and gave him to Deely, the
house-maid; then, retracing her steps, she went out through the
side-gate, and up the street to the home of the Misses Wingfield. The
door stood open, Miss Polly was in the hall. She was a handsome woman,
vigorous, erect, with clear blue eyes, and thick sandy hair closely
braided round her well-shaped head. Eve explained her errand. "But
perhaps Miss Leontine told you?" she added.

"No, Lonny told me nothing; she went straight to her room. I noticed
that she had been crying; but she is so sweet that she cries rather
easily. Whip, indeed! _I'd_ rather shoot."

"We must keep the _judge_ from being whipped," Eve answered.

"Yes, I suppose so; he is an old man, though he doesn't look it. I will
go with you, of course. Or rather I will follow you in a few moments."

The post-office of Gary Hundred was opposite the Wingfield house; as Eve
crossed the broad street on her way back, the postmaster appeared at his
door, and beckoned to her mysteriously. He was a small elderly negro,
with a dignified manner; he wore blue goggles; Eve knew him slightly,
she had paid several visits to the office, and had been treated with
deferential attention. When she reached the sidewalk, therefore, she
paused.

"Would yer min' droppin' in fer one brief momen', miss? 'Portant
marter."

Eve stepped over the low sill of the small building--it was hardly more
than a shed, though smartly whitewashed, and adorned with bright green
blinds--and the postmaster immediately closed the door. He then
cautiously took from his desk a letter.

"Dere's sump'n' rudder quare 'bout dishyer letter, miss," he said,
glancing towards the window to see that no one was looking in. "Carn't
be too pertikler w'en it's guv'ment business; en so we 'lowed to ax de
favior ef you'd sorter glimpse yer eye ober it fer us."

"Read a letter?" said Eve. "Whose letter?"

"Not de letter, but him _outside_, miss. Whoms is it? Dat's de p'int. En
I wouldn't have you s'pose we 'ain't guv it our bes' cornsideration. We
knows de looks ob mos' ob 'em w'at comes yere; but dishyer one's
diffunt. Fuddermo', de stamp's diffunt too."

The postmaster's wife, a little yellow woman, was looking anxiously at
them from the small window in the partition of the real post-office, a
space six feet by three.

Eve took the letter. "It's an English stamp. And the name is plainly
written, 'Henry Barker, Esquire; Gary Hundred.'"

"No sech pusson yere. Dat's w'at I tol' Mister Cotesworth," said the
yellow woman, triumphantly.

"Do you mean to tell me that you cannot read?" said Eve, surveying
"Mister Cotesworth," with astonishment.

The government official had, for the moment, an abashed look. "We
'lowed," he began, "dat as you's fum de Norf--"

But his wife interrupted him. "He reads better'n mos', miss, Mister
Cotesworth does. But his eyes done got so bad lately--dat's w'at. Take
de letter, Mister Cotesworth, and doan' trouble de lady no mo'. Fine
wedder, miss." She came round and opened the door officiously; "seem lak
we 'ain't nebber see finer."

Miss Polly arrived at Cousin Sarah Cray's; she walked with apparent
carelessness round towards the stables, where the judge was
superintending the rubbing down and the feeding of the horse. A saddle
had been brought out, and was hanging on the fence; Cousin Sarah hovered
anxiously near.

"Grandpa is going out for a ride," explained Cicely. "But I told him
that the poor horse must be fed first, in common charity; he has been
so far already--to Bellington and back."

"Oh, but the judge is not going, now that I have come," said Miss Polly;
"he wouldn't be so uncivil." She went up to him; smiling winningly, she
put out her beautiful hand.

The judge was always gallant; he took the fair hand, and, bending his
head, deposited upon it a salute.

Miss Polly smiled still more graciously. "And is a stable-yard a place
for such courtesies, judge?" she said, in her rich voice, with her
luscious, indolent, Southern pronunciation. "Oh, surely not--surely not.
Let us go to Cousin Sarah Cray's parlor; I have something to tell you;
in fact, I came especially to see you." Looking very handsome and very
straight, she took his arm with a caressing touch.

The judge admired Miss Polly deeply.

And Miss Polly kept a firm hold upon his arm.

The judge yielded.




VII.


"Sea-beaches," said Eve,--"the minds of such people; you can trace the
line of their last high tide, that is, the year when they stopped
reading. Along the judge's line, one finds, for instance, Rogers; he
really has no idea that there have been any new poets since then."

"Dear me! We have always thought Horatio remarkably literary," protested
Cousin Sarah Cray. "That's his step now, I think."

The judge came in, little Jack on his shoulder. "I believe he has
dropped some--some portions of his clothing on the stairs," he said,
helplessly. "It's astonishing--the facility he has."

"And he has pulled off his shoes," added Eve, taking the little
reprobate and kissing him. "Naughty Jack. Tacks!"

"Esss, tacks!" repeated Jack, in high glee. "Dey gets in Jack's foots."
That was all he cared for her warning legend.

The judge sat down and wiped his forehead. "I have received a shock," he
said.

"Pity's sake!--what?" asked Cousin Sarah Cray, in alarm. Poor Cousin
Sarah dealt in interjections. But it might be added that she had lived
through times that were exclamatory.

"Our old friend, Roland Pettigru, is dead, Sarah; the news comes to us
in this--this Sheet, which, I am told, is published here." He drew a
small newspaper from his pocket. "With your permission, ladies, I will
read to you the opening sentence of an obituary notice which this--this
Sheet--has prepared for the occasion." He put on his spectacles, and,
holding the paper off at a distance, read aloud, with slow, indignant
enunciation, as follows: "'The Great Reaper has descended amongst us.
And this time he has carried back with him sadly brilliant sheaves; for
his arrows have been shot at a shining mark' (arrows for a reaper!"
commented the judge, surveying his audience squintingly, over his
glasses), "'and the aim has been only too true. Gaunt Sorrow stalks
abroad, we mourn with Pettigru Hill; we say--and we repeat--that the
death of Roland Pettigru has left a vortex among us.' Yes, vortex,
ladies;--the death of a quiet, cultivated gentleman a vortex!"

At this moment Deely, the house-maid, appeared at the door; giving her
calico skirt a twist by way of "manners," she announced, "Miss Wungfy."

Miss Leontine entered, carrying five books standing in a row upon her
left arm as though it had been a shelf. She shook hands with Cousin
Sarah Cray and Eve; then she went through the same ceremony with the
judge, but in a confused, downcast manner, and seated herself on a
slippery ottoman as near as possible to the door.

"I hope you liked the books? Pray let me take them," said Eve, for Miss
Leontine was still balancing them against her breast.

"Literature?" remarked the judge, who also seemed embarrassed. He took
up one of the volumes and opened it. "Ah, a novel."

"Yes, but one that will not hurt you," Eve answered. "For Miss Leontine
prefers those novels where the hero and heroine are married to begin
with, and then fall in love with each other afterwards; everything on
earth may happen to them during this process--poisonings and murders and
shootings; she does not mind these in the least, for it's sure in any
case to be _moral_, don't you see, because they were married in the
beginning. And marriage makes everything perfectly safe; doesn't it,
Miss Leontine?"

"I am sure I don't know," answered Miss Leontine, still a prey to
nervousness; "but--but I have always _supposed_ so. Yes. We read them
aloud," she added, turning for relief to Cousin Sarah Cray; "that is, I
read to Polly--in the evenings."

"These modern novels seem to me poor productions," commented the judge,
turning over the pages of the volume he had taken.

"Naturally," responded Eve.

"May I ask why 'naturally'?"

"Oh, men who read their Montaigne year after year without change, and
who quote Charles Lamb, never care for novels, unless, indeed, it may be
'Tom Jones.' Montaigne and Lamb, Latin quotations that are not hard, a
glass of good wine with his dinner, and a convexity of person--these
mark your non-appreciator of novels, from Warwickshire to Gary Hundred."

"Upon my word, young lady--" began the judge, laughing.

But Miss Leontine, by her rising, interrupted him. "I think I must go
now. Yes. Thank you."

"But you have only just come," said Cousin Sarah Cray.

"I stopped to leave the books. Yes; really; that was all. Thanks, you
are very kind. Yes; thank you." She fumbled ineffectually for the handle
of the door, and, when it was opened for her, with an embarrassed bow
she passed out, her long back bent forward, her step hurried.

"I can't imagine what is the matter with her," said Cousin Sarah Cray,
returning.

"I am afraid, Sarah, that I can inform you," answered the judge gravely,
putting down the volume. "I met her in her own garden about an hour ago,
and we fell into conversation; I don't know what possessed me, but in
relating some anecdote of a jocular nature which happened to be in my
mind at the time, by way of finish--I can't imagine what I was thinking
of--but I up and chucked her under the chin."

"Chucked Miss Leontine!" exclaimed Cousin Sarah Cray, aghast, while Eve
gave way to irrepressible mirth. "Was she--was she deeply offended?"

"She was simply paralyzed with astonishment. I venture to say"--here the
judge sent an eye-beam towards the laughing Eve--"I venture to say that
Miss Leontine has never been chucked under the chin in all her life
before."

"Certainly not," answered Cousin Sarah Cray; "she is far too dignified."
Then, with a desire to be strictly truthful, she added, "Perhaps when
she was a baby?"

But even this seemed doubtful.

Not long after this the Misses Wingfield (it was really Miss Polly) gave
a party.

"Must we go?" said Eve.

"Why, it will be perfectly delightful!" answered Cousin Sarah Cray,
looking at her in astonishment. "Every one will be there. Let me see:
there will be ourselves, four; and Miss Polly and Miss Leontine, six;
then the Debbses, thirteen--fourteen if Mrs. Debbs comes; the Rev. Mr.
Bushey and his wife, sixteen. And perhaps there will be some one else,"
she added, hopefully; "perhaps somebody has some one staying with them."

"Thomas Scotts, the tub man, will not be invited," remarked Cicely. "He
will walk by on the outside. And look in."

"There's nothing I admire more than the way you pronounce that name
Debbs," observed Eve. "It's plain Debbs; yet you call it Dessss--holding
on to all the s's, and hardly sounding the b at all--so that you almost
make it rhyme with noblesse."

"That's because we like 'em, I reckon," responded Cousin Sarah Cray.
"They certainly are the _sweetest_ family!"

"There's a faint trace of an original theme in Matilda. The others are
all variations," said the caustic Miss Bruce.

They went to the party.

"Theme and variations all here," said Cicely, as they passed the open
door of the parlor on their way up-stairs to lay aside their wraps;
"they haven't spared us a trill."

"Well, you won't be spared either," said Cousin Sarah Cray. "_You'll_
have to sing."

She proved a true prophet; Cicely was called upon to add what she could
to the entertainments of the evening. Her voice was slender and clear;
to-night it pleased her to sing straight on, so rapidly that she made
mince-meat of the words of her song, the delicate little notes almost
seeming to come from a flute, or from a mechanical music-bird screwed to
a chandelier. Later, however, Miss Matilda Debbs supplied the missing
expression when she gave them:

    "Slee--ping, I _dreamed_, love,
      Dreamed, love, of thee;
    O'er--ther--bright _waves_, love,
      Float--ing were we."

Cicely seemed possessed by one of her wild moods. "I've been to the
window; the tar-and-turpentine man is looking over the gate," she said,
in a low voice, to Eve. "I'm going out to say to him, 'Scotts, wha hae!
Send in a tub.'"

Presently she came by Eve's chair again. "Have you seen the geranium in
Miss Leontine's hair? Let us get grandpa out on the veranda with her,
alone; she has been madly in love with him ever since he chucked her
under the chin. What's more, grandpa knows it, too, and he's awfully
frightened; he always goes through the back streets now, like a thief."

There was a peal at the door-bell. "Tar-and-turpentine man coming in,"
murmured Cicely.

Susannah appeared with a letter. "Fer Mis' Morrison," she said.

There was a general laugh. For "Mister Cotesworth," not sure that Eve
would keep his secret, and alarmed for the safety of his official
position, had taken to delivering his letters in person; clad in his
best black coat, with a silk hat, the blue goggles, and a tasselled
cane, he not only delivered them with his own hands, but he declaimed
the addresses in a loud tone at the door. Not finding Cicely at home, he
had followed her hither. "Fer Mis' Fer'nen Morrison. A _ferwerded_
letter," he said to Susannah in the hall, at the top of his voice.

The judge had gone to the dining-room with Miss Polly, to see her little
dog, which was ailing. Cicely put the letter in her pocket.

After a while she said to Eve, "I never have any letters, hardly."

"But you must have," Eve answered.

"No; almost never. I am going up-stairs for a moment, Eve. Don't come
with me."

When she returned, more music was going on. As soon as she could, Eve
said, inquiringly, "Well?"

"It was from Ferdie."

"Is he coming back?"

"Yes," responded Cicely, unmoved.

Eve's thoughts had flown to her own plans. But she found time to think,
"What a cold little creature it is, after all!"

At that moment they could say no more.

About midnight, when Eve was in her own room, undressing, there was a
tap at the door, and Cicely entered. She had taken off her dress; a
forlorn little blue shawl was drawn tightly round her shoulders.

She walked to the dressing-table, where Eve was sitting, took up a
brush, and looked at it vaguely. "I didn't mean to tell any one; but I
have changed my mind, I am going to tell you." Putting down the brush,
she let the shawl fall back. There across her white breast was a long
purple scar, and a second one over her delicate little shoulder. "He did
it," she said. Her eyes, fixed upon Eve's, were proud and brilliant.

"You don't mean--you don't mean that your _husband_--" stammered Eve, in
horror.

"Yes, Ferdie. He did it."

"Is he mad?"

"Only after he has been drinking."

"Oh, you poor little thing!" said Eve, taking her in her arms
protectingly. "I have been so hard to you, Cicely, so cruel! But I did
not know--I did not know." Her tears flowed.

"I am telling you on account of baby," Cicely went on, in the same
unmoved tone.

"Has he dared to touch baby?" said Eve, springing up.

"Yes, Eve; he broke poor baby's little arm; of course when he did not
know what he was doing. When he gets that way he does not know us; he
thinks we are enemies, and he thinks it is his duty to attack us. Once
he put us out-of-doors--baby and me--in the middle of the night, with
only our night-dresses on; fortunately it wasn't very cold. That time,
and the time he broke baby's arm (he seized him by the arm and flung him
out of his crib), we were not in Savannah; we were off by ourselves for
a month, we three. Baby was so young that the bone was easily set.
Nobody ever knew about it, I never told. But--but it must not happen
again." She looked at Eve with the same unmoved gaze.

"I should rather think not! Give him to me, Cicely, and let me take him
away--at least for the present. You know you said--"

"I said 'perhaps.' But I cannot let him go now--not just now. I am
telling you what has happened because you really seem to care for him."

"I think I have showed that I care for him!"

"Well, I have let you."

"What are we to do, then, if you won't let me take him away?" said Eve,
in despair. "Will that man come here?"

"He may. He will go to Savannah, and if he learns there that I am here,
he may follow me. But he will never go to Romney, he doesn't like
Romney; even in the beginning, when I begged him to go, he never would.
He--" She paused.

"Jealous, I suppose," suggested the sister, with a bitter
laugh--"jealous of Jack's poor bones in the burying-ground. Your two
ghosts will have a duel, Cicely."

"Oh, _Ferdie_ isn't dead!" said Cicely, with sudden terror. She grasped
Eve's arm. "Have you heard anything? Tell me--tell me."

Eve looked at her.

"Yes, I love him," said Cicely, answering the look. "I have loved him
ever since the first hour I saw him. It's more than love; it's
adoration."

"You never said that of Jack."

"No; for it wouldn't have been true."

The two women faced each other--the tall Eve, the dark little wife.

"Oh, if I could only get away from this hideous country--this whole
horrible South!" said Eve, walking up and down the room like a caged
tigress.

"You would like him if you knew him," Cicely went on, gently. "It seldom
happens--that other; and when it doesn't happen, Eve--"

Eve put out her hand with a repelling gesture. "Let me take baby and
go."

"Not now. But he will be safe at Romney."

"In Heaven's name, then, let us get him back to Romney."

"Yes; to-morrow."

Little Jack was asleep in his crib by the side of Eve's bed, for she
still kept him with her at night. Cicely went to the crib and looked at
her child; Eve followed her.

The little boy's night-dress had fallen open, revealing one shoulder and
arm. "It was just here," whispered Cicely, kneeling down and softly
touching the baby-flesh. She looked up at Eve, her eyes thick with
tears.

"Why, you care?" said Eve. "Care for him?--the baby, I mean." She spoke
her thoughts aloud, unwittingly.

"Did you think I didn't care?" asked Cicely, with a smile.

It was the strangest smile Eve had ever seen.




VIII.


Early spring at Romney. The yellow jessamine was nearly gone, the other
flowers were coming out; Atamasco lilies shone whitely everywhere; the
long line of the islands and the opposite mainland were white with
blossoms, the salt-marshes were freshly green; shoals, which had
wallowed under water since Christmas, lifted their heads; the great
river came back within its banks again.

Three weeks had passed since their return to the island. They had made
the journey without the judge, who had remained in South Carolina to
give his aid to the widow of his old friend, Roland Pettigru, who had
become involved in a lawsuit. The three weeks had been slow and
anxious--anxious, that is, to Eve. Cicely had returned to her muteness.
Once, at the beginning, when Eve had pressed her with questions, she
said, as general answer, "In any case, Ferdie will not come here." After
that, when again--once or twice--Eve had asked, "Have you heard anything
more?" Cicely had returned no reply whatever; she had let her passive
glance rest upon Eve and then glide to something else, as though she had
not spoken. Eve was proud, she too remained silent. She knew that she
had done nothing to win Cicely's confidence; women understand women, and
Cicely had perceived from the first, of course, that Jack's sister did
not like her.

But since that midnight revelation at Cousin Sarah Cray's, Eve no longer
disliked Cicely; on the contrary, she was attracted towards her by a
sort of unwilling surprise. Often, when they were with the others, she
would look at her twenty times in a half-hour, endeavoring to fathom
something of the real nature of this little girl (to Eve, Cicely always
seemed a school-girl), who had borne a tragedy in silence, covering it
with her jests, covering it also with her coldness. But was Cicely
really cold to all the world but Ferdie? She was not so, at least, as
regarded her child; no one who had seen her on her knees that night
beside the crib could doubt her love for him. Yet she let Eve have him
for hours at a time, she let her have him at night, without even Dilsey
to look after him; she never interfered, constantly as Eve claimed him
and kept him. In spite of her confidence in her own perceptions, in
spite of her confidence, too, in her own will, which she believed could
force a solution in almost every case, Eve Bruce was obliged to
acknowledge to herself that she was puzzled.

Now and then she would be harassed by the question as to whether she
ought not to tell Miss Sabrina what she knew, whether she ought not to
tell the judge. But Cicely had spared them, and Cicely had asked her to
be equally merciful. At night, when lying awake, the horror of the poor
baby's broken arm would sometimes come to her so vividly that she would
light the candle in haste to see if he were safe. If Ferdie should come
here, after all! Cicely had said that he would not; but who could trust
Cicely,--loving the man as she did? To Eve, after all that had happened,
Cicely's love seemed a mania as insane as the homicidal deliriums of
the husband.

As to these deliriums, she tried to picture what they must be: the baby
hurled from his little crib--that made her shudder with rage; she should
not be afraid of the madman, then; she should attack him in return!
Sometimes it was Cicely whom she saw, Cicely, shrinking under blows; it
must have been something heavy and sharp, a billet of wood, perhaps,
that had caused the scars across her white breast. She remembered that
once, when inwardly exasperated by Cicely's fresh fairness, she had
accused her of never having known what it was to be really tired in all
her life. Cicely had answered, rather hesitatingly, "I don't know that I
have ever been _tired_, exactly." She had not been tired--no. She had
only been half killed.

The poor little girl's muteness, her occasional outbursts of wild sport,
her jests and laughter, her abstractions, and the coldness sometimes
seen in her beautiful eyes, were these the results of suffering? She
questioned Miss Sabrina a little.

"She has always been the same, except that since her second marriage she
is much more quiet," replied the unconscious aunt. "Until then she was
like quicksilver, she used to run through the thickets so swiftly that
no one could follow her, and she used to play ball by the hour with--"
Here the speaker paused, disconcerted.

"With Jack," Eve added, her face contracting with the old pain.

Miss Sabrina had at last perceived this pain, and the discovery had
stopped her affectionate allusions. But she did not forget--Eve often
found her carefully made wreaths laid upon Jack's grave. As for Eve
herself, she never brought a flower; she walked to and fro beside the
mound, and the sojourn generally ended in angry thoughts. Why should
other people keep their loved ones, and she be bereft? What had she
done, what had Jack done, that was so wrong? God was not good, because
He was not kind; people did not ask Him to create them, but when once He
had done it for His own pleasure, and there they were, helpless, in His
world, why should He torture them so? To make them better? Why didn't He
make them better in the beginning, when He was creating them? Or else
not make them at all!

One afternoon during the fourth week after their return to Romney, she
was on her way back with Miss Sabrina from Singleton Island; the two had
been dining there, the Southern three-o'clock dinner, and now at sunset
the row-boat was bringing them home. To Eve the visit had been like a
day's truce, a short period, when one merely waits; the afternoon was
beautiful, the Sound like a mirror; the home-island, when they left it,
had been peacefully lovely, the baby from his wagon kissing his hand to
them, and Dilsey squatting on the bank by his side, a broad grin of
contentment on her dusky face. Cicely had declined the invitation,
sending a jocular message to "little Rupert," which inspired him with
laughter all day.

The dinner had been excellent as regards the succulence of its South
Carolina dishes. The damask tablecloth was thin from age, the
dinner-service a mixture of old Canton blue and the commonest, thickest
white plates; coarse dull goblets stood beside cut-glass wine-glasses;
the knives were in the last stage of decrepitude, and there was no
silver at all, not even a salt-spoon; it had been replaced by cheaply
plated spoons and forks, from which the plate was already half gone.
Blanche, the old negro woman, waited, assisted by the long-legged
Lucasta, and by little Boliver, who was attired for the occasion in a
pair of trousers which extended from his knees to his shoulders, over
which they were tightly strapped by means of strings. Boliver's part was
to bring the hot dishes from the outside kitchen, which was in a cabin
at some distance--a task which he performed with dignity, varied,
however, by an occasional somerset on the veranda, when he thought no
one was looking. Rupert was genial, very gallant to the ladies; he
carried his gallantry so far that he even drank their health several
times, the only wine being the mainland Madeira. Mrs. Singleton was
hospitable and affectionate, remaining unconscious (in manner) as to the
many deficiencies. And Eve looked on admiringly, as though it had been a
beautiful, half-pathetic little play; for to her it was all
pictorial--these ruined old houses on their blooming desolate islands,
with the ancient hospitality still animating them in spite of all that
had passed. The short voyage over, the row-boat stopped at Romney
landing. There was no one waiting for them; Abram assisted Miss Sabrina,
and then Eve, to step from one of the boat's seats to the dock. Eve
lingered for a moment, looking at the sunset; then she too turned
towards the house. The path winding under the trees was already dusky,
Miss Sabrina was a dozen yards in advance; as she approached a bend, Eve
saw some one come round it and meet her. It was a figure too tall to be
the judge; it was a young man; it was a person she had not seen; she
made these successive discoveries as she drew nearer. She decided that
it was a neighbor from one of the southern islands, who had taken
advantage of the lovely afternoon for a sail.

When she came up she found Miss Sabrina half laughing, half crying; she
had given the stranger both her hands. "Oh, Eve, it is Ferdinand. And I
did not know him!"

"How could you expect to know me, when you have never seen me in your
life?" asked the young man, laughing.

"But we have your picture. I ought to have known--"

"My dear aunt, never accuse yourself; your dearest friends will always
do that for you. I dare say my picture doesn't half do me justice."

He spoke jestingly; but there was still twilight enough to show Eve that
what he had said was simply the truth. The photograph was handsome, but
the real face was handsomer, the features beautiful, the eyes blue and
piercing.

"This is Cicely's sister Eve," said Miss Sabrina. "She has come out--so
kindly--from England to pay us a visit."

Ferdinand put out his hand with a bright smile. He had a smile which
would have been a fitting one for a typical figure of youthful Hope.

Eve could not refuse, conspicuously, to give him her hand in return. It
all seemed to her a dream--his sudden appearance in the dusky path, and
his striking beauty. She did not speak. But her muteness passed
unnoticed, because for once in her life Miss Sabrina was voluble, her
words tumbled over one another. "Such a surprise! _So_ nice! _so_
delightful! How little we thought this morning, when we rose as usual,
and everything was the same--how little we thought that it would be such
a sweet, such a happy day!"

Ferdinand laughed again, throwing back his handsome head a little--a
movement that was habitual with him. He gave Miss Sabrina his arm, drew
her hand through it and held it in his own, as they moved onward towards
the house. On the veranda, Cicely was waiting for them, her cheeks
flushed with pink. Eve expected a defiant look, a glance that would dare
her to express either her surprise or her fear; instead of that,
Cicely's eyes, meeting hers, were full of trust and sweetness, as if she
believed that Eve would sympathize with her joy, as if she had entirely
forgotten that there was any reason why Eve should not share it. Miss
Sabrina sympathized, if Eve did not; she kissed Cicely with a motherly
tenderness, and then, as she raised her wet eyes again towards
Ferdinand, she looked so extraordinarily pleased that the young man bent
and kissed her faded cheek. "There, auntie," he said, "now we've made
acquaintance; you must take me in as a genuine nephew. And improve me."

"Oh, improve," murmured Miss Sabrina, gazing at him near-sightedly. She
put on her glasses (without turning her back) in order to see him more
clearly. It marked a great emotion on her part--the not turning her
back.

Eve went to her room; she thought that Cicely would follow her. But no
one came until Powlyne knocked to say that tea was ready. At first Eve
thought that she would not go to the dining-room, that she would send
an excuse. The next moment she felt driven not only to go, but to
hasten; to be always present in order to see everything and hear
everything; this would be her office; she must watch for the incipient
stages of what she dreaded. Cicely had said that it happened rarely.
Would to God that the man would be touched by poor Miss Sabrina's loving
welcome, and by little Cicely's deep joy, and refrain. But perhaps these
very things would excite the longing that led to the madness!

When she reached the dining-room and saw the bright faces at the table,
Miss Sabrina looking younger than she had looked for years, and wearing
the white lace cape, Cicely, too, freshly dressed, and Ferdinand, they
seemed to her like phantasmagoria. Or was it that these were the
realities, and the phantasms the frightful visions which had haunted her
nightly during all these waiting weeks?

As Ferdie talked (already Miss Sabrina had begun to call him Ferdie), it
was impossible not to listen; there was a frankness in what he said, and
in his sunny smile, which was irresistibly winning. And the contrast
between these and his height and strength--this too was attractive. They
sat long at the table; Eve felt that she was the foreign element, not
he; that she was the stranger within their gates. She had made no change
in her dress; suddenly it occurred to her that Ferdie must hate her for
her mourning garb, which of course would bring Jack Bruce to his mind.
As she thought of this, she looked at him. His eyes happened to meet
hers at the moment, and he gave her a charming smile. No, there was no
hate there. In the drawing-room, later, he told them comical stories of
South America; he took Cicely's guitar and sang South American songs;
the three women sat looking at him, Cicely in her mute bliss, Miss
Sabrina with her admiration and her interest, Eve with her perplexity.
His hand, touching the strings, was well-shaped, powerful; was that the
hand which had struck a woman? A little child? As the evening wore on,
she almost began to believe that Cicely had invented the whole of her
damning tale; that the baby's arm had never been broken, and that her
own hurts had been received in some other way. She looked at Cicely. But
there was something very straightforward in her pure little face.

At ten o'clock she rose. Cicely made no motion, she was evidently not
coming with her.

"Can I speak to you for a moment, Cicely?"

"Oh, yes," answered Cicely, with alacrity. "What is it?" She followed
Eve into the hall.

Eve closed the door; then she drew her into the dining-room, which was
still lighted. "You said he would not come here."

"Oh!" with a long breath; "he never would do it for me before, though I
asked him, and asked him. And yet he has done it now! Think of that!"

Eve put her hands on Cicely's shoulders as if to keep her, to call her
back to realities. "Have you forgotten all you said that night at Mrs.
Cray's?"

Cicely gave a joyful laugh. "Yes." Then, more defiantly, "Yes, I have
forgotten the whole!" But her tone changed back swiftly to its happy
confidence again: "Nothing will happen, Eve; you needn't be afraid."

"Has he told you so?"

"Oh, we never _speak_ of it," answered Cicely, looking at her with
large, surprised eyes. "Did you think we _spoke_ of it--of such a thing
as that? A husband and wife--people who love each other? But you needn't
be troubled; it's over forever." She disappeared.

Eve waited a moment; then she went to her room. Before she reached her
door Cicely overtook her; she had run swiftly after her down the long
corridor. She put her arms round Eve from behind, and whispered, with
her lips against Eve's throat, "I ran after you to say that I hope that
_you_ will have, some day, as much happiness as mine." Then she was
gone, as swiftly as she had come.

To wish her a love like her own, this seemed almost a curse, a
malediction. But, fortunately, there was no danger that she, Eve Bruce,
should ever fall a victim to such miseries; to love any man so
submissively was weakness, but to love as Cicely loved, that was
degradation!

Her image gazed back at her from the mirror, fair in its tints, but
strangely, almost fiercely, proud; at that moment she was revolting,
dumbly, against the injustice of all the ages, past, present, and to
come, towards women.




IX.


Ferdie had been two weeks at Romney.

Halcyon days they had seemed, each one beautiful from morning to night,
with blue skies and golden sunshine; blossoms covered the trees, the air
was full of perfume. Ferdie must always be doing something; besides the
hunting and fishing, he had made a new swing, a new dock; he had taught
the negroes base-ball; he had rowed and sailed hither and thither--up
the river, out to sea, and north and south along the sounds, paying
visits at the various islands when Cicely desired them. Every one was
delighted with him, from Miss Sabrina down to the smallest darky; the
captains of the Inland Route steamers grew accustomed to seeing him on
the dock at Jupiter Light; the store-keeper on the mainland opposite
looked out every morning for his sail coming across the Sound. Cicely,
in the same state of mute bliss, accompanied him everywhere; Miss
Sabrina went whenever the excursion was not too long. The negroes
followed him about in a troop; of their own accord they gave him the
title of "young marse."

Through these days Eve felt herself an alien; Cicely said nothing to her
save when she was with the others; she never came to her in her own
room. And Eve could not feel that this neglect was caused by dislike; it
was simply the egotism of perfect happiness. When Eve was present,
Cicely talked to her; when she was not present, Cicely hardly remembered
her existence. Miss Sabrina was not quite so forgetful, but she too was
absorbed; Eve sometimes sat all the evening without speaking;
fortunately she could make her stay short, under the pretext of not
disturbing Jack by coming in late. She was not a timid woman, not a
woman easily disheartened; each long, solitary day (for she seldom
accompanied them), each silent evening, only strengthened her purpose of
carrying away the child. She kept him with her constantly; Cicely
allowed it, and Ferdie, after one or two good-natured attempts to carry
off the little boy for a romp, left him undisturbed to his aunt. Whether
Cicely had told him to do this, Eve did not know.

Strangely enough, Ferdie talked to her more than the others did. Several
times, seeing her in the grove with Jack, he had come out to join her.
And always, as he approached, Eve would make some excuse, and send the
child farther away; this action on her part was involuntary. One morning
she had gone to the beach. She had been there half an hour when she saw
his figure emerging from the bush-bordered road. "Take Jack away," she
said quickly to Dilsey.

Dilsey, vexed at being ordered off when handsome "young marse" was
approaching, took her charge round a point entirely out of sight, so
that Eve and Ferdie were alone. The child gone, Eve could turn all her
attention to the man by her side; her watching mood came upon her, the
mood in which she spent her evenings. Ferdie had thrown himself down on
the sand; handsome as he was, Eve had discovered faults in his face; the
features were in danger of becoming too sharp; a little more, and the
cheeks would be thin. The mouth had a flattening at the corners, a
partly unconscious, partly voluntary action of the muscles, like that
which accompanies a "dare" (so Eve described it to herself) on the part
of a boy who has come off conqueror in one fight, but who is expecting
another and severer one in a moment. This expression (it was visible
when he was silent) and a look in his eyes sometimes--these two things
seemed to Eve signs of the curse. They were slight signs, however; they
would not have been discovered by one woman in a thousand; for Ferdie
was not only handsome, there was also something charming about him. But
Eve had small admiration for the charming.

To-day, as Ferdie lounged beside her, she determined to try an
experiment.

"I am very anxious to have Jack," she began.

"It seems to me that you do have him; it's a complete possession,"
answered Ferdie, laughing; "I've scarcely been able to touch the
youngster since I came."

"I mean that I want him to live with me, as though he were my own child;
I would bring him up with all possible care."

"Have you made a vow, then, never to marry?" Ferdie demanded, looking at
her with a merry gleam in his eyes.

"Should you object--if Cicely were willing to give him to me?" Eve
continued, a slight haughtiness in her manner alone replying to his
remark.

"I suppose I couldn't, though I'm fond of the little chap." ("Fond!" Eve
thought. She looked at him, with parted lips, in suspense.) "But I can't
imagine Cicely's consenting," Ferdie went on; "she is devoted to the
child."

"Not so much as she is to you."

"Do you want _me_ to urge her to give him to you?"

"Yes," Eve answered.

"Why do you want him? For your own pleasure?"

Eve hesitated a moment. "Partly."

"Are you by any possibility fancying that you can take better care of
him than we can?" asked Ferdie, relapsing into his laugh, and sending
another pebble skimming over the shining waters. "Leaving Cicely aside,
I am the jolliest of fathers."

"It must be that he does not know," Eve thought; "whatever his faults,
hypocrisy is not one of them."

But this only made him the more terrible to her--a man who could change
so unconsciously into a savage.

"Granting the jolliness, I wish you would ask Cicely," she said; "do it
for my sake. I am lonely, I shall grow lonelier. It would be everything
to me to have him."

"Of course you will grow lonelier," said Ferdie. He turned towards her,
leaning on his elbow. "Come, let me advise you; don't be a forlorn old
maid. All women ought to marry; it is much better for them."

"Are they then so sure to be happy?" asked Eve, sarcastically.

"Of course they are.--The nice ones."

Eve looked at him. "Even when married to brutes?--to madmen?"

"Oh, you wouldn't select a brute. As for the madmen, they are locked
up," answered Ferdie, comfortably.

Eve rose. "I don't know what I shall say next--if I stay here," was her
thought.

"I wish you knew my brother Paul," remarked Ferdie as he lifted himself
from the sand. "_I_ can't argue with you, _I_ can't put you down" (his
smile as he said "put you down" was wonderfully sweet). "But he
could--Paul could; and what's more, he would, too! He hates a woman who
goes on as you do."

"Your brother lives in Canada, I believe?" said Eve, coldly.

"Canada?--what gave you that idea? He loathes Canada. He has charge of a
mine on Lake Superior. He has always worked tremendously hard, poor old
Paul! I have never approved of it, such a steady grind as that."

"What is the name of the place?"

"Port aux Pins; called by the natives Potterpins. Are you thinking of
going there?"

"I may," Eve answered. Her tone was defiant in spite of herself; what
did she care for Port aux Pins and his brother, save for their
connection with his wretched self?

They had begun to walk towards home; Dilsey was in advance with Jack. "I
beg you to urge Cicely to let me have him," Eve began again, her eyes
resting on Jack's little wagon.

"You have made up your mind to ask a favor of me; you must want it
terribly," Ferdie responded. He took off his hat and let the breeze blow
over his forehead. "I will do what I can for you. Of course we cannot,
Cicely and I, give up her child to you entirely; but he might live with
you for part of the year, as you desire it so much. My intention is to
go back to Valparaiso; I like the life there, and I shall make it my
home; there are excellent houses to be had, I have one in view at this
moment. Later, of course, Cicely would wish her boy to come to her
there. But in the meantime, while he is still so young--yes, I will do
what I can for you; you may count upon me."

"Thanks," answered Eve. Her words were humble, but she did not look
humble as she spoke them; Ferdie with his favors and his good-nature
seemed to her more menacing than ever.

The tranquil life went on. Every morning she said to herself, "To-day
something must happen!" But the Arcadian hours continued, and two more
weeks passed slowly by. Eve began to hate the sunshine, the brilliant,
undimmed southern stars.

"My dear, you are growing paler," said Miss Sabrina one day. "Perhaps
this sea-air of ours is not good for you."

Eve wanted to reply: "Is it good to be watching every instant?--to be
listening and starting and thinking one hears something?" "You are
right; it is not," she answered aloud; "all the same, I will stay awhile
longer, if you will let me."

"Oh, my dear--when we want you to _live_ here!"

"Perhaps I shall die here," Eve responded, with a laugh.

Miss Sabrina looked at her in surprise; for the laugh was neither gentle
nor sweet.

Eve was tired, tired mentally and physically; this state of passive
waiting taxed her; action of some sort, even though accompanied by the
hardest conditions, would have been easier to her ardent unconquered
will. She occupied herself with Jack; she said as little as she could to
Ferdie; and she watched Cicely. Underneath this watchfulness there grew
up a strong contempt for love.




X.


"Eve!" A hand on Eve's shoulder.

Eve sat up in bed with a start; Cicely stood beside her, candle in hand.
"Help me to dress Jack," she said.

Eve was out of bed in an instant. She lighted her own candle.

Cicely lifted the sleeping child from his crib, and began hastily to
dress him. Eve brought all the little garments quickly. "Are you going
to take him out of the house?" she asked. (They spoke in whispers.)

"Yes."

Eve threw on her own clothes.

After a moment, during which the hands of both women moved rapidly, Eve
said, "Where is he?"

"Outside--out of the house for the moment. But he will come back; and
then, if he comes down this hall, we must escape."

"Where? We must have the same ideas, you know," said Eve, buttoning her
dress, and taking her hat and shawl from the wardrobe.

"I thought we could go through the ballroom, and out by the north wing."

"And once outside?"

"We must hide."

"But where?"

"In the thicket."

"It isn't a very large space. Supposing Jack should cry?"

Cicely went on fastening Jack's little coat. "I can't talk!"

"You needn't," said Eve; "I'll take care of you!"

The hasty dressing completed, the two candles were extinguished. Jack
had fallen asleep again. Cicely held him herself; she would not let Eve
take him. They opened the door softly, and stood together outside in the
dark hall. The seconds passed and turned into minutes; the minutes
became three, then five; but the space of time seemed a half-hour. Eve,
standing still in the darkness, recovered her coolness; she stepped
noiselessly back into her room for a moment or two; then she returned
and resumed the watch. Cicely's little figure standing beside her looked
very small.

By-and-by the door at the far end of the hall opened, and for the first
time in her life Eve saw a vision: Ferdie, half dressed and carrying a
lighted candle, appeared, his eyes fierce and fixed, his cheeks flushed.
At that moment his beauty was terrible; but he saw nothing, heard
nothing; he was like a man listening to something afar off.

"Come," whispered Cicely.

Swiftly and noiselessly she went round the angle of the corridor, opened
a door, and, closing it behind them, led the way to the north wing; Eve
followed, or rather she kept by her side. After a breathless winding
transit through the labyrinth of halls and chambers, they reached the
ballroom.

"Now we can run," Cicely whispered. Silently they ran.

Before they had quite reached the door at the far end, they heard a
sound behind them, and saw a gleam across the floor: he had not waited
in Eve's room, then; he had divined their flight, and was following.
Cicely's hand swiftly found and lifted the latch; she opened the door,
and they passed through. Eve gave one glance over her shoulder; he was
advancing, but he was not running; his eyes had the same stare.

Cicely threw up a window, gave Jack to Eve, climbed by the aid of a
chair to the sill and jumped out; then she put up her arms for Jack, and
Eve followed her; they drew down the window behind them from the
outside. There was a moon, but dark clouds obscured its light; the air
was still. Cicely led the way to the thicket; pushing her way within,
she sank down, the bushes crackling loudly as she did so. "Hurry!" she
said to Eve.

Eve crouched beside her beneath the dense foliage. They could see
nothing, but they could hear. They remained motionless.

After several minutes of suspense they heard a step on the plank floor
of the veranda; he had made his way out. Then followed silence; the
silence was worse than the sound of his steps; they had the sense that
he was close upon them.

After some time without another sound, suddenly his candle gleamed
directly over them; he had approached them unheard by the road, Eve not
knowing and Cicely having forgotten that it was so near. For an instant
Eve's heart stopped beating, she thought that they were discovered;
escape was cut off, for the thorns and spiny leaves held their skirts
like so many hands. But the fixed eyes did not see them; after a moment
the beautiful, cruel face, lit by the yellow gleam of the candle,
disappeared from above; the light moved farther away. He was going down
the road; every now and then they could see that he threw a ray to the
right and the left, as if still searching.

"He will go through the whole thicket, now that he has the idea," Cicely
whispered. They crept into the road, Eve carrying Jack. But, once
outside, Cicely took him again. They stood erect, they looked back; he
and his candle were still going on towards the sea.

Cicely turned; she took a path which led to the north point. "There's no
thicket there. And if he comes, there's a boat."

The distance to the point was nearly a mile. The white sand of the track
guided them through the dark woods.

"Shouldn't you be safer, after all, in the house?" Eve asked.

"No, for this time he is determined to kill us; he thinks that I am some
one else, a woman who is going to attack his wife; and he thinks that
Jack is some other child, who has injured _his_ Jack."

"He shall never touch Jack! Give him to me, Cicely; he is too heavy for
you."

"I will not give him to any one--any one," Cicely answered, panting.

As they approached the north point, the moon shone through a rift in the
clouds; suddenly it was as light as day; their faces and hands were
ivory white in the radiance.

"What is that on your throat, and down the front of your dress?" said
Eve. "It's wet. Why, it's blood!"

"Yes; I am cut here a little," Cicely answered, making a gesture with
her chin towards her left shoulder; "I suppose it has begun to bleed
again. He has a knife to-night. That is what makes me so afraid."

The Sound now came into view. At the same instant Eve, looking back,
perceived a point of yellow light behind them; the path was straight for
a long distance, and the light was far away; but it was advancing in
their direction. Little Jack, fully awakened by their rapid flight, had
lifted his head, trying to see his mother's face; as no one paid any
attention to him, he began to cry. His voice seemed to make Cicely
frantic; clasping him close, pressing his head down against her breast,
she broke into a run.

"Get into the boat and push off, don't wait for me; _I'm_ in no danger,"
Eve called after her. She stood there watching.

Cicely reached the beach, put Jack into the boat, and then tried to push
it off. It was a heavy old row-boat, kept there for the convenience of
the negroes who wished to cross to Singleton Island; to-night it was
drawn up so high on the sands that with all her effort Cicely could not
launch it. She strained every muscle to the utmost; in her ears there
was a loud rushing sound; she paused dizzily, turning her head away from
the water for a moment, and as she did so, she too saw the gleam, pale
in the moonlight, far down the path. She did not scream, there was a
tension in her throat which kept all sound from her parched mouth; she
climbed into the boat, seized Jack, and staggered forward with the vague
purpose of jumping into the water from the boat's stern; but she did not
get far, she sank suddenly down.

"She has fainted; so much the better," Eve thought. Jack, who had fallen
as his mother fell, cried loudly. "He is not hurt; at least not
seriously," she said to herself. Then, turning into the wood, she made
her way back towards the advancing point of light. After some progress
she stopped.

Ferdie was walking rapidly now; in his left hand he held his candle high
in the air; in his right, which hung by his side, there was something
that gleamed. The moonlight shone full upon his face, and Eve could see
the expression, whose slight signs she had noticed, the flattening of
the corners of the mouth; this was now so deepened that his lips wore a
slight grin. Jack's wail, which had ceased for several minutes, now
began again, and at the same instant his moving head could be seen above
the boat's side; he had disengaged himself, and was trying to climb up
higher, by the aid of one of the seats, in order to give larger vent to
his astonishment and his grief.

Ferdie saw him; his shoulders made a quick movement; an inarticulate
sound came from his flattened, grimacing mouth. Then he began to run
towards the boat. At the same moment there was the crack, not loud, of a
pistol discharged very near. The running man lunged forward and fell
heavily to his knees; then to the sand. His arms made one or two
spasmodic movements. Then they were still.

Eve's figure went swiftly through the wood towards the shore; she held
her skirts closely, as if afraid of their rustling sound. Reaching the
boat, she made a mighty effort, both hands against the bow, her body
slanting forward, her feet far behind her, deep in the sand and pressing
against it. She was very strong, and the boat moved, it slid down slowly
and gratingly; more and more of its long length entered the water, until
at last only the bow still touched the sand. Eve jumped in, pushed off
with an oar, and then, stepping over Cicely's prostrate form to reach
one of the seats, she sat down and began to row, brushing little Jack
aside with her knee (he fell down more amazed and grief-stricken than
ever), and placing her feet against the next seat as a brace. She rowed
with long strokes and with all her might; perhaps he was not much hurt,
after all; perhaps he too had a pistol, and could reach them. She
watched the beach breathlessly.

The Sound was smooth; before long a wide space of water, with the
silvery path of the moon across it, separated them from Abercrombie
Island. Still she could not stop. She looked at Cicely's motionless
figure; Jack, weary with crying, had crawled as far as one of her knees
and laid his head against it, sobbing "Aunty Eve? Aunty Eve?"

"Yes, darling," said Eve, mechanically, still watching the other shore.

At last, with her hands smarting, her arms strained, she reached
Singleton Island. After beaching the boat, she knelt down and chafed
Cicely's temples, wetting her handkerchief by dipping it over the boat's
side, and then pressing it on the dead-white little face. Cicely sighed.
Then she opened her eyes and looked up, only half consciously, at the
sky. Next she looked at Eve, who was bending over her, and memory came
back.

"We are safe," Eve said, answering the look; "we are on Singleton
Island, and no one is following us." She lifted the desperate little
Jack and put him in his mother's arms.

Cicely sat up, she kissed her child passionately. But she fell back
again, Eve supporting her.

"Let me see that--that place," Eve said. With nervous touch she turned
down the little lace ruffle, which was dark and limp with the stain of
the life-tide.

"It's nothing," murmured Cicely. The cut had missed its aim, it was low
down on the throat, near the collar-bone; it was a flesh-wound, not
dangerous.

Cicely pushed away Eve's hands and sat up. "Where is Ferdie?" she
demanded.

"He--he is on the other island," Eve answered, hesitatingly. "Don't you
remember that he followed us?--that we were trying to escape?"

"Well, we have escaped," said Cicely. "And now I want to know where he
is."

She got on her feet, stepped out of the boat to the sand, and lifted
Jack out; she muffled the child in a shawl, and made him walk with her
to the edge of the water. Here she stood looking at the home-island,
straining her eyes in the misty moonlight.

Eve followed her. "I think the farther away we go, Cicely, the better;
at least for the present. The steamer stops at Singleton Landing at
dawn; we can go on board as we are, and get what is necessary in
Savannah."

"Why don't I see him on the beach?" said Cicely. "I could see him if he
were there--I could see him walking. If he followed us, as you say, why
don't I see him!" She put a hand on each side of her mouth, making a
circle of them, and called with all her strength, "Ferdie? Fer-die?"

"Are you mad?" said Eve.

"Fer-die?" cried Cicely again.

Eve pulled down her hands. "He can't hear you."

"Why can't he?" said Cicely, turning and looking at her.

"It's too far," answered Eve, in a trembling voice.

"Perhaps he has gone for a boat," Cicely suggested.

"Yes, perhaps he has," Eve assented, eagerly. And for a moment the two
women gazed southward with the same hopefulness.

Then Eve came back to reality. "What are we thinking of? Do you want to
have Jack killed?"

Cicely threw up her arms. "Oh, if it weren't for Jack!" Her despair at
that moment gave her majesty.

"Give him to me; let _me_ take him away," urged Eve again.

"I will never give him to any one; I will never leave him, never."

"Then you must both go with me for the present; we will go farther north
than Savannah; we will go to New York."

"There is only one place I will go to--one person, and that is Paul;
Ferdie _loves_ Paul;--I will go nowhere else."

"Very well; we will go to Paul."

The struggle was over; Cicely's voice had grown lifeless. Little Jack,
tired out, laid himself despairingly down on the sand; she sat down
beside him, rearranged the shawl under him and over him, and then, as he
fell asleep, she clasped her hands round her knees, and waited inertly,
her eyes fixed on the opposite beach.

Eve, standing behind her, also watched the home-island. "If I could only
see him!" was her constant prayer. She was even ready to accept the
sight of a boat shooting from the shadows which lay dark on the western
side, a boat coming in pursuit; he would have had time, perhaps, to get
to the skiff which was kept on that side, not far from the point; he
knew where all the boats were. Five minutes--six--had elapsed since they
landed; yes, he would have had time. She looked and looked; she was
almost sure that she saw a boat advancing, and clasped her hands in joy.

But where could they go, in case he should really come? To Singleton
House, where there was only a lame old man, and women? There was no door
there which he could not batter down, no lock which could keep him
out--the terrible, beautiful madman. No; it was better to think, to
believe, that he _could_ not come.

She walked back to the trees that skirted the beach, leaned her clasped
arms against the trunk of one of them, and, laying her head upon the arm
that was uppermost, stood motionless.




XI.


The dawn was still very faint when the steamer stopped at Singleton
Landing. There was no one waiting save an old negro, who caught the
shore rope, and there was no one stirring on the boat save the gruff
captain, muffled in an overcoat though the night was warm, and two
deck-hands, who put ashore a barrel and a sack. Lights were burning
dimly on board; the negro on the dock carried a lantern.

Two women came from the shadows, and crossed the plank to the lower
deck, entering the dark space within, which was encumbered with loose
freight--crates of fowls, boxes, barrels, coils of rope. The taller of
the two women carried a sleeping child.

For Cicely had come to the end of her strength; she could hardly walk.

Eve found the sleepy mulatto woman who answered to the name of
stewardess, and told her to give them a cabin immediately.

"Cabin? Why, de cabin's dish-yere," answered the woman, making a motion
with her hand to indicate the gaudy little saloon in which they stood.
She surveyed them with wonder.

"State-room," murmured Cicely.

Upon the lower bed in the very unstately white cell which was at last
opened for them, her little figure was soon stretched out,
apathetically. Her eyes remained closed; the dawn, as it grew brighter,
did not tempt her to open them; she lay thus all day. Jack slept
profoundly for several hours on the shelf-like bed above her. Then he
woke, and instantly became very merry, laughing to see the shining green
water outside, the near shores, the houses and groves and fields, and
now and then a row-boat under sail. Eve brought him some bread and milk,
and then she gave him a bath; he gurgled with laughter, and played all
his little tricks and games, one after the other. But Cicely remained
inert, she could not have been more still if she had been dead; the rise
and fall of her chest as she breathed was so slight that Eve was obliged
to look closely in order to distinguish it at all. Just before they
reached Savannah she raised her to a sitting position, and held a cup of
coffee to her lips. Cicely drank. Then, as the steamer stopped, Eve
lifted her to her feet.

Cicely's eyes opened; they looked at Eve reproachfully.

"It will only take a few moments to go to the hotel," Eve answered.

She called the stewardess and made her carry Jack; she herself half
carried Cicely. She signalled to the negro driver of one of the
carriages waiting at the dock, and in a few minutes, as she had said,
she was undressing her little sister-in-law and lifting her into a cool,
broad bed.

Jack asleep, she began her watch. The sun was setting, she went to one
of the windows, and looked out. Below her was a wide street without
pavement, bordered on each side by magnificent trees. She could see this
avenue for a long distance; the perspective made by its broad roadway
was diversified, every now and then, by a clump of greenery standing in
the centre, with a fountain or a statue gleaming through the green.
Trees were everywhere; it was a city in a grove. She remembered her
first arrival off this coast, when she came from England,--Tybee Light,
and then the lovely river; now she was passing through the same city,
fleeing from--danger?--or was it from justice? Twilight deepened; she
left the window and sat down beside the shaded lamp; her hands were
folded upon her lap, her gaze was fixed unseeingly upon the carpet.
After ten minutes had passed, she became conscious of something, and
raised her eyes; Cicely was looking at her. Eve rose and went to her.
"Are we in Savannah?" Cicely asked.

"Yes."

Cicely continued to look at her. "If you really want me to go on, you
had better take me at once."

"But you were too tired to go on--"

"It is not a question of tired, I shall be tired all my life. But if you
don't want me to go back by the first boat to-morrow, you had better
take me away to-night."

"By the midnight train," Eve answered.

And at midnight they left Savannah.

At Charleston they were obliged to wait; there had been a flood, and the
track was overflowed.

Some purchases were necessary for their comfort; Eve did not dare to
leave Cicely with Jack, lest she should find them both gone on her
return; she therefore took them with her, saying to the negro coachman,
privately, "If that lady should tell you to return to the hotel or to
drive to the steamer when I am not with you, pay no attention to her;
she is ill, and not responsible for what she says."

As she was coming out of a shop, a face she knew met her eyes--Judge
Abercrombie. He had come from Gary Hundred that morning, and was on his
way to Romney; he intended to take the evening boat.

He recognized them; he hurried to the carriage door, astonished,
alarmed. Eve seemed cowed by his presence. It was Cicely who said, "Yes,
we are here, grandpa. Get in, and I will tell you why."

But when the old man had placed himself opposite to her, when Eve had
taken her seat again and the carriage was rolling towards the hotel,
Cicely still remained mute. At last she leaned forward. "I can't tell
you," she said, putting her hand into his; "at least I can't tell you
now. Will you wait, dear? Do wait." Her voice, as she said this, was
like the voice of a little girl of ten.

The old man, wondering, held her hand protectingly. He glanced at Eve.
But Eve's eyes were turned away.

The drive was a short one. As they entered Cicely's room, Eve took Jack
in her arms and went out again into the hall, closing the door behind
her.

The hall was long, with a window at each end; a breeze blew through it,
laden with the perfume of flowers. Jack clamored for a game; Eve raised
him to her shoulder, and went to the window at the west end; it
overlooked a garden crowded with blossoms; then she turned and walked to
the east end, Jack considering it a march, and playing that her shoulder
was his drum; the second window commanded a view of the burned walls of
the desolated town. Eight times she made the slow journey from the
flowers to the ruins, the ruins to the flowers. Then Cicely opened the
door. "You can come in now. Grandpa knows."

Grandpa's face, in his new knowledge, was pitiful to see. He had
evidently been trying to remain calm, and he had succeeded so far as to
keep his features firm; but his cheeks, which ordinarily were tinted
with pink, had turned to a dead-looking yellow. "I should be greatly
obliged if you would come with me for a walk," he said to Eve; "I have
travelled down from Gary Hundred this morning, and, after being shut up
in the train, you know, one feels the need of fresh air." He rose, and
gave first one leg and then the other a little shake, with a pathetic
pretence of preparing for vigorous exercise.

"I don't think I can go," Eve began. But a second glance at his
dead-looking face made her relent, or rather made her brace herself. She
rang the bell, and asked one of the chamber-maids to follow them with
Jack; once outside, she sent the girl forward. "I have taken Jack
because we cannot trust Cicely," she explained. "If she had him, she
might, in our absence, take him and start back to the island; but she
will not go without him."

"Neither of them must go back," said the judge. He spoke mechanically.

They went down the shaded street towards the Battery. "And there's
Sabrina, too, poor girl! How do we know what has happened to her!" Eve
hesitated. Then she said, slowly, "Cicely tells me that when these
attacks are on him, he is dangerous only to herself and Jack."

"That makes him only the greater devil!" answered the judge. "What I
fear is that he is already on her track; he would get over the attack
soon--he is as strong as an ox--and if he should reach her,--have a
chance at her with his damned repentant whinings--We must get off
immediately! In fact, I don't understand why you are stopping here at
all," he added, with sudden anger.

"We couldn't go on; the track is under water somewhere. And perhaps we
need not hurry so." She paused. "I suppose you know that Cicely will go
only to Paul Tennant," she added. "She refuses to go anywhere else."

"Where the devil is the man?"

"It's a place called Port aux Pins, on Lake Superior. I really think
that if we don't take her to him at once, she will leave us and get back
to Ferdie, in spite of all we can do."

"If there's no train, we'll take a carriage, we'll drive," declared the
judge. "This is the first place he'll come to; we won't wait _here_!"

"There'll be a train this evening; they tell me so at the hotel," Eve
answered. Then she waited a moment. "We shall have to stop on the way,
Cicely is so exhausted; I suppose we go to Pittsburgh, and then to
Cleveland to take the lake steamer; if you should write to Miss Sabrina
from here, the answer might meet us at one of those places."

"Of course I shall write. At once."

"No, don't write!" said Eve, grasping his arm suddenly. "Or at least
don't let her send any answer until the journey is ended. It's better
not to know--not to know!"

"Not to know whether poor Sabrina is safe? Not to know whether that
brute is on our track? I can't imagine what you are thinking of; perhaps
you will kindly explain?"

"It's only that my head aches. I don't know what I am saying!"

"Yes, you must be overwrought," said the judge. He had been thinking
only of Cicely. "You protected my poor little girl, you brought her
away; it was a brave act," he said, admiringly.

"It was for Jack, I wanted to save my brother's child. Surely that was
right?" Eve's voice, as she said this, broke into a sob.

"They were in danger of their lives, then?" asked the grandfather, in a
low tone. "Cicely didn't tell me."

"She did not know, she had fainted. A few minutes more, and I believe he
would--We should not have them now."

"But you got the boat off in time."

"But I got the boat off in time," Eve repeated, lethargically.

They had now reached the Battery Park; they entered and sat down on one
of the benches; the negro girl played with Jack on the broad walk which
overlooks the water. The harbor, with Sumter in the distance, the two
rivers flowing down, one on each side of the beautiful city--beautiful
still, though desolated by war--made a scene full of loveliness. The
judge took off his hat, as if he needed more air.

"You are ill," said Eve, in the same mechanical voice.

"It's only that I cannot believe it even now--what Cicely told me. Why,
it is my own darling little grandchild, who has been treated so, who has
been beaten--struck to the floor! His strong hand has come down on _her_
shoulder so that you could hear it!--_Cicely_, Eve; my little _Cicely_!"
His old eyes, small and dry, looked at Eve piteously.

She put out her hand and took his in silence.

"She has always been such a delicate little creature, that we never let
her have any care or trouble; we even spoke to her gently always,
Sabrina and I. For she was so delicate when she was a baby that they
thought she couldn't live; she had her bright eyes, even then, and she
was so pretty and winning; but they said she must soon follow her
mother. We were so glad when she began to grow stronger. But--have we
saved her for this?"

"She is away from him now," Eve answered.

"And there was her father--my boy Marmaduke; what would Duke have
said?--his baby--his little girl!" He rose and walked to and fro; for
the first time his gait was that of a feeble old man.

"They can't know what happens to us here!--or else that they see some
way out of it that we do not see," said Eve, passionately. "Otherwise,
it would be too cruel."

"Duke died when she was only two years old," the judge went on.
"'Father,' he said to me, just at the last, 'I leave you baby.' And this
is what I have brought her to!"

"You had nothing to do with it, she married him of her own free will.
And she forgot everything, she forgot my brother very soon."

"I don't know what she forgot, I don't care what she forgot," the old
man answered. He sat down on the bench again, and put his hands over his
face. He was crying--the slow, hard tears of age.

At sunset they started. The negro chamber-maid, to whom Jack had taken a
fancy, went with them as nurse, and twenty shining black faces were at
the station to see her off.

"_Good-bye_, Porley; take keer yersef."

"Yere's luck, Porley; doan yer forgot us."

"Step libely, Jonah; Porley's a-lookin' at yer."

"Good-lye, Porley!"

The train moved out.




XII.


A dock on the Cuyahoga River, at Cleveland. The high bows of a propeller
loomed up far above them; a wooden bridge, with hand-rails of rope,
extended from a square opening in its side to the place where they were
standing--the judge, bewildered by the deafening noise of the
letting-off of steam and by the hustling of the deck-hands who ran to
and fro putting on freight; little Jack, round-eyed with wonder,
surveying the scene from his nurse's arms; Cicely, listless, unhearing;
and Eve, with the same pale-cheeked self-control and the same devoted
attention to Cicely which had marked her manner through all their rapid
journey across the broad country from Charleston to Washington, from
Washington to Pittsburgh, from Pittsburgh to Cleveland.

"I think we cross here," she said; "by this bridge." She herself went
first. The bridge ascended sharply; little slats of wood were nailed
across its planks in order to make the surface less slippery. The yellow
river, greasy with petroleum from the refineries higher up the stream,
heaved a little from the constant passing of other craft; this heaving
made the bridge unsteady, and Eve was obliged to help the nurse when she
crossed with Jack, and then to lead Cicely, and to give a hand to the
judge, who came last.

"You are never dizzy," said the judge.

"No, I am never dizzy," Eve answered, as though she were saying the
phrase over to herself as a warning.

She led the way up a steep staircase to the cabin above. This was a long
narrow saloon, decked with tables each covered with a red cloth, whereon
stood, in white vases representing a hand grasping a cornucopia, formal
bouquets, composed principally of peonies and the foliage of asparagus.
Narrow doors, ornamented with gilding, formed a panelling on each side;
between the doors small stiff sofas of red velvet were attached by iron
clamps to the floor, which was covered with a brilliant carpet; above
each sofa, under the low ceiling, was a narrow grating. Women and a few
men sat here and there on the sofas; they looked at the new passengers
apathetically. Lawless children chased one another up and down the
narrow spaces between the sofas and the tables, forcing each person who
was seated to draw in his or her legs with lightning rapidity as they
passed; babies with candy, babies with cookies, babies with apples,
crawled and tottered about on the velvet carpet, and drew themselves up
by the legs of the tables, leaving sticky marks on the mahogany
surfaces, and generally ending by striking their heads against the top,
sitting down suddenly and breaking into a howl. Eve led the way to the
deck; she brought forward chairs, and they seated themselves. A
regularly repeated and deafening clash came from the regions below; the
deck-hands were bringing steel rails from a warehouse on the dock, and
adding them one by one to the pile already on board by the simple method
of throwing them upon it. After the little party had sat there for
fifteen minutes, Eve said, "It is--it is insupportable!"

"You feel it because you have not slept. You haven't slept at all since
we started," said Cicely, mentioning the fact, but without evident
interest in it.

"Yes I have," responded Eve, quickly.

There came another tremendous clash. Eve visibly trembled; her cheeks
seemed to grow more wan, the line between her eyes deepened.

"This noise must be stopped!" said the old planter, authoritatively. He
got up and went to the side.

"_They_ won't stop," said Cicely.

Eve sat still, the tips of the fingers of each of her hands pressed hard
into the palm, and bits of her inner cheek held tightly between her
teeth. At last the rails were all on board and the gangways hauled in;
the propeller moved slowly away from her dock, a row of loungers, with
upturned faces, watching her departure, and visibly envying the captain,
who called out orders loudly from the upper deck--orders which were
needed; for the river was crowded with craft of all kinds, and many
manoeuvres were necessary before the long steamer could turn herself
and reach the open lake. She passed out at last between two piers, down
which boys ran as fast as they could, racing with the engine to see
which should reach the end first. At last they were away, and the noises
ceased; there was only the regular throb of the machinery, the sound of
the water churned by the screw. The sun was setting; Eve looked at the
receding shores--the spires of Cleveland on the bluffs which rise from
the Cuyahoga, the mass of roofs extending to the east and the west,
bounded on the latter side by the pine-clad cliffs of Rocky River. After
the splendid flaming sunset, the lake grew suddenly dark; it looked as
vast and dusky as the ocean. Cicely sprang up. "I know I shall never
come back across all this water!--I know I never, never shall!"

"Yes, you will, little girl," answered her grandfather, fondly.

"I don't mind. But I can't stay here and think! They must be doing
something in there--all those people we saw in the cabin; I am going in
to see." She went within, and Eve followed her; the nurse carried Jack
after his mother. But the judge remained where he was; he sat with one
hand laid over the other on the top of his cane. He looked at the dark
lake; his feeling was, "What is to become of us?"

Within, all was animation; the tables had been pushed together by a
troop of hurrying darkies in white aprons, and now the same troop were
bringing in small open dishes, some flat and some bowl-like, containing
an array of food which included everything from beefsteak to ice-cream.
The passengers occupying the sofas watched the proceedings; then, at the
sound of a tap on the gong, they rose and seated themselves on the round
stools which did duty as chairs.

"Come," said Cicely, "let us go too." She seated herself; and again Eve
patiently followed her. Cicely tasted everything and ate nothing. Eve
neither tasted nor ate; she drank a glass of water. When the meal was
over she spoke to one of the waiters, and gave him a fee; ten minutes
later she carried out to the old man on the deck, with her own hands, a
tray containing freshly cooked food, toast and tea; she arranged these
on a bench under the hanging lamp (for the deck at the stern was
covered); then she drew up a chair. The judge had not stirred.

"Won't you come?" said Eve, gently. "I have brought it for you."

The judge rose, and, coming to the improvised table, sat down. He had
not thought that he could touch anything, but the hot tea roused him,
and before he knew it he was eating heartily. "Do you know, I--I believe
I was cold," he said, trying to laugh. "Yes--even this warm night!"

"I think we are all cold," Eve answered; "we are all numbed. It will be
better when we get there--wherever it is."

The judge, warmed and revived, no longer felt so dreary. "You are our
good angel," he said. And, with his old-fashioned courtesy, he bent his
head over her hand.

But Eve snatched her hand away and fled; she fairly ran. He looked after
her in wonder.

Within, the tables had again been cleared, and then piled upon top of
one another at one end of the saloon; in front of this pile stretched a
row of chairs. These seats were occupied by the orchestra, the same
negro waiters, with two violins and a number of banjoes and guitars.

    "Forward one; forward two--
      De engine keeps de time;
    Leabe de lady in de centre,
      Bal-unse in er line,"

sang the leader to the tune of "Nelly Bly," calling off the figures of
the quadrille in rhymes of his own invention. Three quadrilles had been
formed; two thin women danced with their bonnets on; a tall man in a
linen duster and a short man in spectacles bounded about without a
smile, taking careful steps; girls danced with each other, giggling
profusely; children danced with their mothers; and the belle of the
boat, a plump young woman with long curls, danced with two youths,
changing impartially after each figure, and throwing glances over her
shoulder meanwhile at two more who stood in the doorway admiring. The
throb of the engine could be felt through the motion of the twenty-four
dancers, through the clear tenor of the negro who sang. Outside was the
wide lake and the night.

Sitting on one of the sofas, alone, was Cicely. She was looking at the
dancers intently, her lips slightly parted. Eve sat down quietly by her
side.

"Oh, how you follow me!" said Cicely, moving away.

Then suddenly she began to laugh. "See that man in the linen duster! He
takes such mincing little steps in his great prunella shoes. See him
smile! Oh! oh!" She pressed her handkerchief over her lips to stifle her
spasmodic laughter. But she could not stifle it.

"Come," said Eve, putting her arm round her. Their state-room was near,
she half carried her in. Light came through the gilded grating above.
Cicely still laughed, lying in the lower berth; Eve undressed her; with
soothing touch she tried to calm her, to stop her wild glee.

"He turned out his toes in those awful prunella shoes!" said Cicely,
breaking into another peal of mirth.

"Hush, dear. Hush."

"I wish you would go away. You always do and say the wrong thing," said
Cicely, suddenly.

"Perhaps I do," answered Eve, humbly enough.

Jack was asleep in the upper berth; she herself (as she would not leave
them) was to occupy an improvised couch on the floor. But first she went
out softly, closing the door behind her; she was going to look for her
other charge. The judge, however, had gone to bed, and Eve came back.
The dancing had ceased for the moment; a plump young negro was singing,
and accompanying himself on the guitar; his half-closed eyes gazed
sentimentally at the ceiling; through his thick lips came, in one of the
sweetest voices in the world,

    "No one to love,
      None to cay-ress;
     Roam-ing alone _through_
      This world's wilderness--"

Eve stood with her hand on her door for an instant looking at him; then
she looked at the listening people. Suddenly it came over her: "Perhaps
it is all a dream! Perhaps I shall wake and find it one!"

She went in. Cicely was in her lethargic state, her hands lying
motionless by her sides, her eyes closed. Eve uncoiled her own fair hair
and loosened her dress; then she lay down on her couch on the floor.

But she could not sleep; with the first pink flush of dawn she was glad
to rise and go out on deck to cool her tired eyes in the fresh air. The
steamer was entering the Detroit River; deep and broad, its mighty
current flowed onward smoothly, brimming full between its low green
banks; the islands, decked in the fresh verdure of early summer, looked
indescribably lovely as the rising sun touched them with gold; the
lonely gazer wished that she might stop there, might live forever, hide
forever, in one of these green havens of rest. But the steamer did not
pause, and, laggingly, the interminable hours followed one another
through another day. They were now crossing Lake Huron, they were out of
sight of land; the purity of the cool blue water, ruffled by the breeze
into curls of foam, made a picture to refresh the weariest vision. But
Eve looked at it unseeingly, and Cicely did not look at all; the judge,
too, saw nothing--nothing but Cicely. There had been no letter at
Cleveland; for tidings they must still wait. Cicely had written a few
lines to Paul Tennant, announcing their arrival. But to Eve it seemed as
if they should never arrive, as if they should journey forever on this
phantom boat, journey till they died.

At last Lake Huron was left behind; the steamer turned and went round
the foaming leap of the St. Mary's River, the Sault Sainte Marie (called
by lake-country people the Soo), and entered Lake Superior. Another
broad expanse of water like a sea. At last, on the fifth day, Port aux
Pins was in sight, a spot of white amid the pines. They were all
assembled at the bow--Cicely, Eve, the judge, and Porley with little
Jack; as the pier came into view with the waiting group of people at its
end, no one spoke. Nearer and nearer, now they could distinguish
figures; nearer and nearer, now they could see faces. Cicely knew which
was Paul immediately, though she had never seen him. The judge took the
knowledge from her eyes. Now people began to call to friends on the
pier. Now the pier itself touched the steamer's side, the gangways were
put out, and persons were crossing; in another minute a tall man had
joined them, and, bending his head, had kissed Cicely.

"Mr. Tennant?" the judge had asked.

"Yes," answered Paul Tennant. He was looking at Cicely, trying to
control a sudden emotion that had surprised him,--a man not given to
emotions; he turned away for a moment, patting Jack's head. "She is so
young!" he murmured to the judge.

"Paul," said Cicely, coming to them, "you have heard from Ferdie? There
are letters?"

"No, I haven't heard lately. There are two letters for you, but they are
not in his handwriting."

"Are they here?"

Paul's eyes turned rapidly, first to the judge, then to Eve. Eve's eyes
answered him.

"At the house," he said.

"Is it far? Let us go at once." And Cicely turned towards the stairs.

"It's at the other end of the town; I've a wagon waiting."

Cicely was already descending. She crossed the gangway with rapid step;
she would not wait for their meagre luggage. "Take me there at once,
please; the wagon can come back for the others."

"I must go too," said Eve. The tone of her voice was beseeching.

"Get in, then," said Cicely. "Paul, take us quickly, won't you?" In her
haste she seized the reins and thrust them into his hands. She would not
sit down until he had taken his seat.

"I will send the wagon back immediately," Paul said to the judge. Then,
seeing the lost look of the old planter, he called out: "Hollis! Here a
moment."

A thin man with gray hair detached himself from the group of loungers on
the pier, and hurried towards them.

"Judge Abercrombie, this is Mr. Christopher Hollis," said Paul; "he
lives here, and he is a great friend of mine. Hollis, will you help
about the baggage? I'm coming back immediately."

They drove away, but not before Cicely had asked Paul to let her sit
beside him; Eve was left alone on the back seat.

"I wanted to sit beside you, Paul; but I'm afraid I can't talk," Cicely
said. She put the back of her hand under her chin, as if to support her
head; she looked about vaguely--at the street, the passing people.

"That's right, don't say anything; I like it better. You must be
terribly tired," answered Paul, reassuringly.

They stopped before a white cottage. Upon entering, Paul gave an
inquiring glance at Eve; then he left the room, and came back with two
letters.

Cicely tore them open.

Eve drew nearer.

In another instant Cicely gave a cry which rang through the house. "He
is hurt! Some one has shot him--has shot him!" Clutching the pages, she
swayed forward, but Paul caught her. He laid her upon a couch; with his
large, strong hands he placed a cushion under her head.

Eve watched him. She did not help him. Then she came to the sofa. "Is he
dead, Cicely?" she asked, abruptly.

Cicely looked at her. "You want him to be!" Springing up suddenly, like
a little tigress, still clutching her letters, she struck Eve with her
left hand. Her gloved palm was soft, but, as she had exerted all her
strength in the blow, the mark across Eve's cheek was red.

"Never mind," said Eve, hastily, as Paul started forward; "I am glad she
did it." Her eyes were bright; the red had come into her other cheek; in
spite of the mark of the blow, her face looked brilliant.

Cicely had fallen back; and this time she had lost consciousness.

"You can leave her to me now," Eve went on. "Of course what she said
last means that he is not dead!" she added, with a long breath.

"Dead?" said Paul Tennant. "Poor Ferdie dead? Never!"

Eve had knelt down; she was chafing Cicely's temples. "Then you care for
him very much?" she asked, looking at him for a moment over her
shoulder.

"I care for him more than for anything else in the world," said the
brother, shortly.




XIII.


It was the afternoon of the same day.

"I shall go, grandpa," said Cicely; "I shall go to-night. There's a
boat, somebody said."

"But, my dear child, listen to reason; Sabrina does not say that he is
in danger."

"And she does not say that he is out of it."

The judge took up the letter again, and, putting on his glasses, he read
aloud, with a frown of attention: "'For the first two days Dr. Daniels
came over twice a day'"--

"You see?--twice a day," said Cicely.

--"'But as he is beginning to feel his age, the crossing so often in the
row-boat tired him; so now he sends us his partner, Dr. Knox, a new man
here, and a very intelligent person, I should judge. Dr. Knox comes over
every afternoon and spends the night'"--

"You see?--spends the night," said Cicely.

--"'Going back early the following morning. He has brought us a nurse,
an excellent and skilful young man, and now we can have the satisfaction
of feeling that our poor Ferdie has every possible attention. As I
write, the fever is going down, and the nurse tells me that by
to-morrow, or day after to-morrow, he will probably be able to speak to
us, to talk.'"

"I don't know exactly how many days it will take me to get there," said
Cicely, beginning to count upon her fingers. "Four days--or is it
three?--to Cleveland, where I take the train; then how many hours from
there to Washington? You will have to make it out for me, grandpa; or
rather Paul will; Paul knows everything."

"My poor little girl, you haven't had any rest; even now you have only
just come out of a fainting-fit. Sabrina will write every day; wait at
least until her next letter comes to-morrow morning."

"You are all so strange! Wouldn't you wish me to see him if he were
dying?" Cicely demanded, her voice growing hard.

"Of course, of course," replied the old man, hastily. "But there is no
mention of dying, Sabrina says nothing that looks like it; Daniels, our
old friend--why, Daniels would cross twenty times a day if he thought
there was danger."

"I can't argue, grandpa. But I shall go; I shall go to-night," Cicely
responded.

She was seated on a sofa in Paul Tennant's parlor, a large room,
furnished with what the furniture dealer of Port aux Pins called a
"drawing-room set." The sofa of this set was of the pattern named
tête-à-tête, very hard and slippery, upholstered in hideous green
damask. Cicely was sitting on the edge of this unreposeful couch, her
feet close together on a footstool, her arms tight to her sides and
folded from the elbows in a horizontal position across the front of her
waist. She looked very rigid and very small.

"But supposing, when you get there, that you find him up,--well?"
suggested the judge.

"Shouldn't I be glad?" answered Cicely, defiantly. "What questions you
ask!"

"But _we_ couldn't be glad. Can't you think a little of us?--you are all
we have left now."

"Aunt Sabrina doesn't feel as you do--if you mean Aunt Sabrina; she
would be delighted to have me come back. _She_ likes Ferdie; it is only
you who are so hard about him."

"Sabrina doesn't know. But supposing it were only I, is my wish nothing
to you?" And the old man put out his hand in appeal.

"No," answered Cicely, inflexibly. "I am sorry, grandpa; but for the
moment it isn't, nothing is anything to me now but Ferdie. And what is
it that Aunt Sabrina doesn't know, pray? There's nothing to know; Ferdie
had one of his attacks--he has had them before--and I came away with
Jack; that is all. Eve has exaggerated everything. I told her I would
come here, come to Paul, because Ferdie likes Paul; but I never intended
to stay forever, and now that Ferdie is ill, do you suppose that I will
wait one moment longer than I must? Of course not."

The door opened and Eve came in. Cicely glanced at her; then she turned
her eyes away, looking indifferently at the whitewashed wall.

"She is going to take the steamer back to-night," said the judge,
helplessly.

"Oh no, Cicely; surely not to-night," Eve began. In spite of the
fatigues of the journey, Eve had been a changed creature since morning;
there was in her eyes an expression of deep happiness, which was almost
exaltation.

"There is no use in explaining anything to Eve, and I shall not try,"
replied Cicely. She unfolded her arms and rose, still standing, a rigid
little figure, close to the sofa. "I love my husband, and I shall go to
him; what Eve says is of no consequence, because she knows nothing about
such things; but I suppose _you_ cared for grandma once, didn't you,
grandpa, when she was young? and if she had been shot, wouldn't you have
gone to her?"

"Cicely, you are cruel," said Eve.

"When grandpa thinks so, it will be time enough for me to trouble
myself. But grandpa doesn't think so."

"No, no," said the old man; "never." And for the moment he and his
grandchild made common cause against the intruder.

Eve felt this, she stood looking at them in silence. Then she said, "And
Jack?"

"I shall take him with me, of course. That reminds me that I must speak
to Porley about his frocks; Porley is so stupid." And Cicely turned
towards the door.

Eve followed her. "Another long journey so soon will be bad for Jack."

"There you go again! But I shall not leave him with you, no matter what
you say; useless, your constant asking." She opened the door. On the
threshold she met Paul Tennant coming in.

He took her hand and led her back. "I was looking for you; I have found
a little bed for Jack; but I don't know that it will do."

"You are very good, Paul, but Jack will not need it. I am going away
to-night; I have only just learned that there is a boat."

"We don't want to hear any talk of boats," Paul answered. He drew her
towards the sofa and placed her upon it. "Sit down; you look so tired!"

"I'm not tired; at least I do not feel it. And I have a great deal to
do, Paul; I must see about Jack's frocks."

"Jack's frocks can wait. There's to be no journey to-night."

"Yes, there is," said Cicely, with a mutinous little smile. Her glance
turned towards her grandfather and Eve; then it came back to Paul, who
was standing before her. "None of you shall keep me," she announced.

"You will obey your grandfather, won't you?" Paul began, seriously.

The judge got up, rubbing his hands round each other.

"No," Cicely answered; "not about this. Grandpa knows it; we have
already talked it over."

"You are wrong; you ought not to be willing to make him so unhappy."

"Never mind about that, Tennant; I'll see to that," said the judge. He
spoke in a thin old voice which sounded far away.

Paul looked at him, surprised. Then his glance turned towards Eve. "Miss
Bruce too; I am sure she does not approve of your going?"

"Oh, if I should wait for _Eve's_ approval!" said Cicely. "Eve doesn't
approve of anything in the world except that she should have Jack, and
take him away with her, Heaven knows where. She hasn't any feelings as
other people have; she has never cared for anybody excepting herself,
and her brother, and I dare say that when she had him she tried to rule
him, as she tries now to rule me and every one. She is jealous about
him, and that makes her hate Ferdie: perhaps you don't know that she
hates Ferdie? She does; she was sorry this morning, absolutely sorry,
when she heard that, though he was dreadfully hurt, he wasn't dead."

"Oh, Cicely!" said Eve. She turned away and walked towards one of the
windows, her face covered by her hands.

Paul's eyes followed her. Then they came back to Cicely. "Very well,
then, since it appears to be left to me, I must tell you plainly that
you cannot go to-night; we shall not allow it."

"We!" ejaculated Cicely. "Who are we?"

"I, then, if you like--I alone."

"What can you do? I am free; no one has any authority over me except
Ferdie." Paul did not reply. "You will scarcely attempt to keep me by
force, I suppose?" she went on.

"If necessary, yes. But it will not be necessary."

"Grandpa would never permit it. Grandpa?" She summoned him to her side
with an imperious gesture.

The old man came towards her a step or two. Then he left the room
hurriedly.

Cicely watched him go, with startled eyes. But she recovered herself,
and looked at Paul undaunted.

"Why do you treat me so, Cicely?" he said. "I care about Ferdie as much
as you do; I have always cared about him,--hasn't he ever told you?
There never were two boys such chums; and although, since he has grown
up, he has had others, I have never had any one but him; I haven't
wanted any one. Is it likely, then, that I should try to set you
against him?--that I should turn against him myself?--I ask you that."

"It is setting me against him not to let me go to him. How do we know
that he is not dying?" Her voice was quiet and hard.

"We know because the letters do not speak of danger; on the contrary,
they tell us that the ball has been extracted, and that the fever is
going down. He will get well. And then some measures must be taken
before you can go back to him; otherwise it would not be safe."

"And do I care about safe? I should like to die if _he_ did!" cried
Cicely, passionately. She looked like a hunted creature at bay.

"And your child; what is your idea about him?"

"That's it; take up Eve's cry--do! You know I will never give up baby,
and so you both say that." She sank down on the sofa, her head on her
arms, her face hidden.

Her little figure lying there looked so desolate that Eve hurried
forward from the window. Then she stopped, she felt that Cicely hated
her.

"I say what I think will influence you," Paul was answering. "Ferdie has
already thrown the boy about once; he may do it again. Of course at such
times he is not responsible; but these times are increasing, and he must
be brought up short; he must be brought to his senses." He went to the
sofa, sat down beside her, and lifted her in his arms. "My poor little
sister, do trust me. Ferdie does; he wrote to me himself about that
dreadful time, that first time when he hurt you; isn't that a proof? I
will show you the letter if you like."

"I don't want to see it. Ferdie and I never speak of those things;
there has never been an allusion to them between us," replied Cicely,
proudly.

"I can understand that. You are his wife, and I am only his big brother,
to whom he has always told everything." He placed her beside him on the
sofa, with his arm still round her. "Didn't you know that we still tell
each other everything,--have all in common? I have been the slow member
of the firm, as one may say, and so I've stayed along here; but I have
always known what Ferdie was about, and have been interested in his
schemes as much as he was."

"Yes, he told me that you gave him the money for South America," said
Cicely, doubtfully.

"That South American investment was his own idea, and he deserves all
the credit of it; he will make it a success yet. See here, Cicely: at
the first i

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