Mrs. Garwood"s laugh was pleasant to hear, and her blushes were worth looking at as she referred to Dr. Buxton. Miss Tewksbury laughed sympathetically but primly.
"It was quite romantic," Mrs. Garwood went on, an a half-humorous, half-confidential tone. "Ephraim was the school teacher here, and I was his eldest scholar. He was young, green, and awkward, but the best-hearted, most generous mortal I ever saw. I made quite a hero of him."
"Well," said Miss Tewksbury, in her matter-of-fact way, "I have never seen anything very heroic about Dr. Buxton. He comes and goes, and prescribes his pills, like all other doctors."
"Ah, that was forty years ago," said Mrs. Garwood, laughing. "A hero can become very commonplace in forty years. Dr. Buxton must be a dear, good man. Is he married?"
"No," said Miss Tewksbury. "He has been wise in his day and generation."
"What a pity!" exclaimed the other. "He would have made some woman happy."
Mrs. Garwood asked many questions concerning the physician who had once taught school at Azalia; and the conversation of the two ladies finally took a range that covered all New England, and, finally, the South. Each was surprised at the remarkable ignorance of the other; but their ignorance covered different fields, so that they had merely to exchange facts and information and experiences in order to entertain each other.
They touched on the war delicately, though Miss Tewksbury had never cultivated the art of reserve to any great extent. At the same time there was no lack of frankness on either side.
"My son has been telling me of the little controversies he had with you," said Mrs. Garwood. "He says you fairly bristle with arguments."
"The general never heard half my arguments," replied Miss Tewksbury. "He never gave me an opportunity to use them."
"My son is very conservative," said Mrs. Garwood, with a smile in which could be detected a mother"s fond pride. "After the war he felt the responsibility of his position. A great many people looked up to him.
For a long time after the surrender we had no law and no courts, and there was a great deal of confusion. Oh, you can"t imagine! Every man was his own judge and jury."
"So I"ve been told," said Miss Tewksbury.
"Of course you know something about it, but you can have no conception of the real condition of things. It was a tremendous upheaval coming after a terrible struggle, and my son felt that some one should set an example of prudence. His theory was, and is, that everything was for the best, and that our people should make the best of it. I think he was right," Mrs. Garwood added with a sigh, "but I don"t know."
"Why, unquestionably!" exclaimed Miss Tewksbury. She was going on to say more; she felt that here was an opening for some of her arguments: but her eyes fell on Hallie, whose pale face and sombre garb formed a curious contrast to the fresh-looking young woman who sat beside her.
Miss Tewksbury paused.
"Did you lose any one in the war?" Hallie was asking softly.
"I lost a darling brother," Helen replied.
Hallie laid her hand on Helen"s arm, a beautiful white hand. The movement was at once a gesture and a caress.
"Dear heart!" she said, "you must come and see me. We will talk together. I love those who are sorrowful."
Miss Tewksbury postponed her arguments, and after some conversation they took their leave.
"Aunt Harriet," said Helen, when they were alone, "what do you make of these people? Did you see that poor girl, and hear her talk? She chilled me and entranced me."
"Don"t talk so, child," said Miss Tewksbury; "they are very good people, much better people than I thought we should find in this wilderness. It is a comfort to talk to them."
"But that poor girl," said Helen. "She is a mystery to me. She reminds me of a figure I have seen on the stage, or read of in some old book."
When Azalia heard that the Northern ladies had been called on by the mistress of Waverly, that portion of its inhabitants which was in the habit of keeping up the forms of sociability made haste to follow her example, so that Helen and her aunt were made to feel at home in spite of themselves. General Garwood was a frequent caller, ostensibly to engage in sectional controversies with Miss Tewksbury, which he seemed to enjoy keenly; but Mrs. Haley observed that when Helen was not visible the general rarely prolonged his discussions with her aunt.
The Rev. Arthur Hill also called with some degree of regularity; and it was finally understood that Helen would, at least temporarily, take the place of Miss Lou Hornsby as organist of the little Episcopal church in the Tacky settlement, as soon as Mr. Goolsby, the fat and enterprising book-agent, had led the fair Louisa to the altar. This wedding occurred in due time, and was quite an event in Azalia"s social history. Goolsby was stout, but gallant; and Miss Hornsby made a tolerably handsome bride, notwithstanding a tendency to giggle when her deportment should have been dignified. Helen furnished the music, General Garwood gave the bride away, and the little preacher read the ceremony quite impressively; so that with the flowers and other favors, and the subsequent dinner--which Mrs. Haley called an "infair"--the occasion was a very happy and successful one.
Among those who were present, not as invited guests, but by virtue of their unimportance, were Mrs. Stucky and her son Bud. They were followed and flanked by quite a number of their neighbors, who gazed on the festal scene with an impressive curiosity that can not be described.
Pale-faced, wide-eyed, statuesque, their presence, interpreted by a vivid imagination, might have been regarded as an omen of impending misfortune. They stood on the outskirts of the wedding company, gazing on the scene apparently without an emotion of sympathy or interest. They were there, it seemed, to see what new caper the townspeople had concluded to cut, to regard it solemnly, and to regret it with grave faces when the lights were out and the fantastic procession had drifted away to the village.
The organ in the little church was a fine instrument, though a small one. It had belonged to the little preacher"s wife, and he had given it to the church. To his mind, the fact that she had used it sanctified it, and he had placed it in the church as a part of the sacrifice he felt called on to make in behalf of his religion. Helen played it with uncommon skill--a skill born of a pa.s.sionate appreciation of music in its highest forms. The Rev. Mr. Hill listened like one entranced, but Helen played unconscious of his admiration. On the outskirts of the congregation she observed Mrs. Stucky, and by her side a young man with long, sandy hair, evidently uncombed, and a thin stubble of beard. Helen saw this young man pull Mrs. Stucky by the sleeve, and direct her attention to the organ. Instead of looking in Helen"s direction, Mrs.
Stucky fixed her eyes on the face of the young man and held them there; but he continued to stare at the organist. It was a gaze at once mournful and appealing--not different in that respect from the gaze of any of the queer people around him, but it affected Miss Eustis strangely. To her quick imagination, it suggested loneliness, despair, that was the more tragic because of its isolation. It seemed to embody the mute, pent-up distress of whole generations. Somehow Helen felt herself to be playing for the benefit of this poor creature. The echoes of the wedding-march sounded grandly in the little church, then came a softly played interlude, and finally a solemn benediction, in which solicitude seemed to be giving happiness a sweet warning. As the congregation filed out of the church, the organ sent its sonorous echoes after the departing crowd--echoes that were taken up by the whispering and sighing pines, and borne far into the night. Mrs. Stucky did not go until after the lights were out; and then she took her son by the hand, and the two went to their lonely cabin not far away. They went in, and soon had a fire kindled on the hearth. No word had pa.s.sed between them; but after a while, when Mrs. Stucky had taken a seat in the corner, and lit her pipe, she exclaimed:
"Lordy! what a great big gob of a man! I dunner what on the face er the yeth Lou Hornsby could "a" been a-dreamin" about. From the way she"s been a-gigglin" aroun" I"d "a" thought she"d "a" sot her cap fer the giner"l."
"I say it!" said Bud, laughing loudly. "Whatter you reckon the giner"l "ud "a" been a-doin" all that time? I see "er now, a-gigglin" an"
a-settin" "er cap fer the giner"l. Lordy, yes!"
"What"s the matter betwixt you an" Lou?" asked Mrs. Stucky grimly.
""Taint been no time senst you wuz a-totin" water fer her ma, an"
a-hangin" aroun" whilst she played the music in the church thar." Bud continued to laugh. "But, Lordy!" his mother went on, "I reckon you"ll be a-totin" water an" a-runnin" er"n"s fer thish yer Yankee gal what played on the orgin up thar jess now."
"Well, they hain"t no tellin"," said Bud, rubbing his thin beard reflectively. "She"s mighty spry "long er that orgin, an" she"s got mighty purty han"s an" nimble fingers, an" ef she "uz ter let down her ha"r, she"d be plum ready ter fly."
"She walked home wi" the giner"l," said Mrs. Stucky.
"I seed "er," said Bud. "He sent some yuther gals home in the carriage, an" him an" the Yankee gal went a-walkin" down the road. He humped up his arm this away, an" the gal tuck it, an" off they put." Bud seemed to enjoy the recollection of the scene; for he repeated, after waiting a while to see what his mother would have to say: "Yes, siree! she tuck it, an" off they put."
Mrs. Stucky looked at this grown man, her son, for a long time without saying anything, and finally remarked with something very like a sigh: "Well, honey, you neenter begrudge "em the"r walk. Hit"s a long ways through the san"."
"Lordy, yes"n!" exclaimed Bud with something like a smile; "it"s a mighty long ways, but the giner"l had the gal wi" "im. He jess humped up his arm, an" she tuck it, an" off they put."
It was even so. General Garwood and Helen walked home from the little church. The road was a long but a shining one. In the moonlight the sand shone white, save where little drifts and eddies of pine-needles had gathered. But these were no obstruction to the perspective, for the road was an avenue, broad and level, that lost itself in the distance only because the companionable pines, interlacing their boughs, contrived to present a background both vague and sombre--a background that receded on approach, and finally developed into the village of Azalia and its suburbs. Along this level and shining highway Helen and General Garwood went. The carriages that preceded them, and the people who walked with them or followed, gave a sort of processional pomp and movement to the gallant Goolsby"s wedding--so much so that if he could have witnessed it, his manly bosom would have swelled with genuine pride.
"The music you gave us was indeed a treat," said the general.
"It was perhaps more than you bargained for," Helen replied. "I suppose everybody thought I was trying to make a display, but I quite forgot myself. I was watching its effect on one of the poor creatures near the door--do you call them Tackies?"
"Yes, Tackies. Well, we are all obliged to the poor creature--man or woman. No doubt the fortunate person was Bud Stucky. I saw him standing near his mother. Bud is famous for his love of music. When the organ is to be played, Bud is always at the church; and sometimes he goes to Waverly, and makes Hallie play the piano for him while he sits on the floor of the veranda near the window. Bud is quite a character."
"I am so sorry for him," said Helen gently.
"I doubt if he is to be greatly pitied," said the general. "Indeed, as the music was for him, and not for us, I think he is to be greatly envied."
"I see now," said Helen laughing, "that I should have restrained myself."
"The suggestion is almost selfish," said the general gallantly.
"Well, your nights here are finer than music," Helen remarked, fleeing to an impersonal theme. "To walk in the moonlight, without wraps and with no sense of discomfort, in the middle of December, is a wonderful experience to me. Last night I heard a mocking-bird singing; and my aunt has been asking Mrs. Haley if watermelons are ripe."
"The mocking-birds at Waverly," said the general, "have become something of a nuisance under Hallie"s management. There is a great flock of them on the place, and in the summer they sing all night. It is not a very pleasant experience to have one whistling at your window the whole night through."
"Mrs. Haley," remarked Helen, "says that there are more mocking-birds now than there were before the war, and that they sing louder and more frequently."
"I shouldn"t wonder," the general a.s.sented. "Mrs. Haley is quite an authority on such matters. Everybody quotes her opinions."
"I took the liberty the other day," Helen went on, "of asking her about the Ku Klux."