"Who owns it now? Who owns the hilltop?"
"I don"t know, mam. We been sellin" off considerable."
"Well, I must find out about that at once. I"ll send an agent out to-morrow to look into the matter. Colonel Ca.r.s.ey left only one daughter, I believe, and she never married?"
Uncle Jimpson jerked the reins and looked a bit nettled.
"Not yit," he said, "but she ain"t no old maid, Miss Lady ain"t. Dere neber wuz a Ca.r.s.ey lady yit dat withered on de stalk; de trouble wif _dem_ is dey git picked too soon. Ez fer Miss Lady"s ma, she wasn"t but jes turned sebenteen when me an" de Cunnel went down to Alabama to marry her."
"Who are Miss Ca.r.s.ey"s relatives, her advisers?"
"She ain"t got none. She didn"t hab a livin", breathin" soul but her paw, "ceptin" me an" Carline, an" Carline"s liable to drop off mos"
anytime."
"But who is going to live with her?"
"I spec she gwine git married some day," Jimpson said hopefully, "all de boys been plumb "stracted "bout dat chile since she wuz a little girl.
But she wuz so crazy "bout her paw, she jes laff at "em. Now de Cunnel"s gone, she"ll hab to git somebody else to make ober."
"Well, I must find out about that hill," said Mrs. Sequin, turning for a last glimpse. "Whose old place is this we are coming to?"
"Dis is our place, dis is Thornwood," said Uncle Jimpson, half in pride, half in apology, as he skirted the holes in the road. "It don"t look lak itself. It"s a terrible pretty place when it"s fixed up."
"Dreadfully run down," said Mrs. Sequin to herself, making a sweeping survey of the premises, "all this front lawn ought to be terraced and have granitoid walks and formal approaches. The house could be made quite imposing."
They had turned in the long winding avenue, and were following the old gray wall that swept in a wide circle past the negro cabins, then toward the house.
Suddenly Mrs. Sequin pointed dramatically to the little porch of one of the cabins.
"A Sheraton! Great heavens! Where did it come from? What is it doing there?"
Uncle Jimpson, following the direction of her finger, looked surprised: "Dat ain"t no sheraton, dat"s a sideboard. Leastwise it wuz one "fore I fixed it into a chicken coop. I took out de drawers and put on dem cross-pieces. Got forty de purtiest little chickens you eber seen!"
"And the legs are curved and have k.n.o.bs, haven"t they?"
"No, mam, dey ain"t no more bow-legged dan most chickens. Do you raise chickens on your place?"
"No, but we may when we get to the country. By the way, you don"t happen to know of a good colored man around here, do you? One who understands horses, and would look well in livery?"
Uncle Jimpson"s eyes set in their sockets. Old John and the rattling buggy faded from his consciousness. In their place he saw himself on the box seat of a grand Victoria, in a double-breasted coat and high hat, lightly shaking the reins across the backs of two sleek thoroughbreds.
It was even more alluring than his cherished dream of butlerhood!
Already he felt his swelling chest strain against the gold b.u.t.tons!
But what about Miss Lady? Who was going to stay at Thornwood and take care of her? Domestic infelicities had rendered him callous to Aunt Caroline"s claims, but Miss Lady, his "little Missis"?
"No, mam," he said dejectedly as he a.s.sisted Mrs. Sequin to alight. "I can"t say ez I do, not jes" at present. Sometime I might heah ob a good man, say "bout my size an" build. You, Mike!"
Mike had rushed at the small poodle with the apparent intention of swallowing her at a mouthful, but at Uncle Jimpson"s stern reproof he snapped at a fly instead, and tried to give the impression that that was what he was after all along.
"Ain"t you "shamed ob yourself?" Uncle Jimpson muttered. "Fussin" "round here an" stickin" out yer lip at white folks? Come on "round back where you b"longs. You an" me is corn-field n.i.g.g.e.rs, dat"s all we is!"
And with that irritable dejection that often follows self-sacrifice, Uncle Jimpson limped away with the subdued Mike skulking at his heels.
CHAPTER IX
As Mrs. Basil Sequin swept up the broad steps at Thornwood, she congratulated herself upon a duty about to be accomplished. She had not foregone a bridge luncheon to make this tiresome trip to the country for purely altruistic reasons. She had come to prove to herself, and to her circle, the bond of friendship that existed between her and her distinguished cousin. Experience had taught her that an occasional reference to "my favorite cousin, John Jay Queerington, the author, you know," had its influence. "His is the only great intellect," she was fond of telling her husband, "to which I am related either by blood or marriage."
Doctor Queerington"s reputation was one of those local a.s.sumptions that might be described as prenatal rather than posthumous. It was what he was going to be, that made his name an awe-inspiring word in the community, more than what he was already. It was the conviction of his friends and colleagues that a tardy world would too late recognize his genius.
After waiting impatiently for some one to respond to her vigorous use of the heavy knocker, Mrs. Sequin tucked Fanchonette under her arm and pushed open the door. The hall had doors to right and left, but before making further investigations she paused to examine minutely the tall mahogany clock, and the quaint silver candlesticks that stood on an old table at the foot of the steps.
While bending to inspect the latter, she heard a door open, and looking up saw a pretty, slender girl in a short white petticoat and a sleeveless black dress lining, which displayed a pair of remarkably shapely arms.
"Oh, I didn"t know you had come!" exclaimed the young person, cordially extending a smiling welcome. "What a darling little dog! Is he a poodle?"
"She is a French poodle," said Mrs. Sequin with a manner intended to impress this exceedingly casual person. "Where shall I find my cousin, Doctor Queerington?"
"The front room up-stairs, on that side. I"d go up with you, only Miss Ferney Foster, our neighbor, is fitting this lining and she has to get back to her pickles. I wish we were born feathered like birds, don"t you?"
Mrs. Sequin, who had a masculine susceptibility to a pretty face, could not repress a smile.
"I know this lining looks queer," went on the girl with an answering twinkle. "But it doesn"t look any queerer than it feels. Miss Ferney doesn"t know what"s the matter, and neither do I. Would you mind taking a peep at it up there between the shoulders? I"ll hold the doggie."
To her surprise, Mrs. Sequin found herself removing her gloves, and adjusting a badly cut lining across a smooth white neck, while the girl before her, having shifted all responsibility, fell to making love to the poodle which she cuddled in her arms.
"It"s too tight here," said Mrs. Sequin, pinning and adjusting, "and too loose there. Have her take up the side seams to the place I have marked, and lengthen the shoulder seams at least an inch."
"Thank you so much. It feels heavenly now. You go right up-stairs! You can take your things off in my room, if you like, just across the hall from the Doctor"s." And without further ceremony the young hostess went tripping down the hall, leaving Mrs. Sequin to ascend the stairs alone.
Ascending was one of Mrs. Sequin"s chief accomplishments. Twenty-five years" experience on the social ladder had made her exceedingly surefooted. Her reward now was in sitting on the top rung and dictating arbitrarily to all those below. She had acquired a pa.s.sion for dictating, for arranging, and setting in order. The crooked seams which she had just pinned straight gave her a satisfaction that almost counteracted her annoyance at the informality of her reception.
Once established at the Doctor"s bedside, with the nurse detailed to exercise Fanchonette in the yard below, she gave herself up to the pleasure of recounting at length her troubles of the past few months.
She enjoyed talking, as a prima donna enjoys singing: she loved to hear the cadences of her own voice, and to watch the gestures of her jeweled hands.
"It"s an unspeakable relief," she a.s.sured the Doctor, "to actually see with my own eyes that you aren"t a mangled cripple from the terrible wreck! You can"t imagine how frightfully anxious I"ve been, but then this whole spring has been a veritable nightmare. Donald and Lee Dillingham both involved in this unspeakable sc.r.a.pe, Margery on the verge of nervous prostration, you perhaps fatally injured, and Basil Sequin too engrossed in his own affairs to give mine a moment"s consideration."
"Basil has grave responsibilities as president of the People"s Bank, Katherine," said the Doctor, keeping his fingers between the leaves of the ma.s.sive volume which he had regretfully closed at her entrance. "I, for one, owe him a debt of grat.i.tude for relieving me of all financial anxiety. Besides you are always thoroughly capable of taking the reins in a family crisis."
"Yes, but it"s telling on me. I notice it in bridge. I am not the player I was a year ago. This trial of Lee Dillingham"s has been a hideous strain. Of course, if he had been convicted, I should have compelled Margery to break her engagement, and that would have complicated things frightfully. You know his grandfather, the old general, is the largest stockholder in the People"s Bank, and Basil insists that he must not be offended. That was one reason why I was so anxious to keep Don out of the way. Even if Lee was guilty, Don couldn"t appear against him when he was engaged to Margery. The only possible course was to hush up the entire affair with as little publicity as possible. Thank heaven, General Dillingham has gotten Lee off, and I am beginning to breathe again."
"And you have heard nothing from Donald?"
"No, indeed, and I hope I won"t for the present. I wrote immediately after the shooting to every place I could possibly think of his going, and implored him, if he had a grain of grat.i.tude for me, or affection for Margery, that he would keep away, and not even let his whereabouts be known until this wretched affair had blown over. I can nearly always appeal to Don on the score of grat.i.tude. I must say for him that, like the rest of the Morley men, he sows his wild oats like a gentleman. You remember Uncle Curtis? They said at the club he was a frightful drinker, and yet not a woman of his family ever saw him intoxicated. Then look at Grandfather Morley!" Mrs. Sequin was mounted on a favorite hobby.
She had a large and varied collection of family skeletons, some of rare antiquity, which she delighted in exhibiting. She could recount the details of the unfortunate matrimonial alliances on both sides of the family for generations back, and was even more infallible in the matter of birth dates than the family Bible. If a relative by any chance got a trifle confused, and acknowledged to thirty-nine next June instead of last June, Mrs. Sequin pounced upon the error like a cat on a mouse. She could prove to him immediately that he was born the spring that Uncle Lem Miller died, and that was the same year that Grandmother Weller married the second time, therefore he _was_ thirty-nine _last_ June.