"Sent me up here this mawnin"."
"That"s one point gained, but won"t mother be frightened when she hears of it?" thought Marcy, leaning his elbows on his knees and covering his face with his hands so that his visitor could not see it. "Some of the best men in the country have so far forgotten their manhood, and the friendship they once had for our family, that they can send this sneaking fellow here to worm something out of us."
"I don"t believe a word of it," he cried, jumping to his feet and confronting his visitor.
"Ye--ye don"t believe it?" faltered Kelsey, springing up in his turn.
"Well, I--I--look a-here, Mister Marcy, mebbe this is something else you don"t believe. Them men whose names I jest give you, say that you an"
your maw an" all the rest of the Gray family is Union. What do ye say to _that?_"
"I say that they had better attend to their own business and let me attend to mine," answered Marcy. "Are Colonel Shelby and the rest of them for the Union?"
"Not much; an" nuther be I."
"Are you in favor of secession?"
"I reckon." replied Kelsey earnestly; and Marcy knew all the while that he could not have told what the word secession meant.
"Then why don"t you prove it--you and Colonel Shelby, and the rest of the neighbors who are saying things behind my back that they don"t care to say to my face? Why don"t you prove your loyalty to the South by shouldering a musket and going into the army?"
"Why, we uns has got famblies to look out fur," exclaimed the visitor, who had never had this matter brought squarely home to him before.
"That makes no difference," answered the boy, who wondered if Kelsey"s family would fare any worse while he was in the army than they did now, while he was out of it. "Every man in this country must show his good will in one way or another. And there"s that loudmouthed fellow Allison, who went out of his way to insult me in the post-office just before I went to sea. Nashville is full of such braggarts as he is. When they can"t find anything else to talk about they talk about me; and I have smelt powder while they haven"t." ["No odds if it was our own powder and the wind blew the smoke into my face," he said to himself.]
By this time Marcy had the satisfaction of seeing that he had taken the wind completely out of Kelsey"s sails, and that the man who had come there to trouble him was troubled himself. He even began to fear that he had gone too far, and that if he did not change his tactics the visitor would go away without giving a hint of the errand that had brought him to the house; for Kelsey picked up the hat he had placed upon the floor beside his chair, put it on his head and leaned forward with his hands on his knees, as if he were about to get upon his feet. That wouldn"t do at all. There was something in the wind--something that Captain Beardsley, aided by Colonel Shelby and others, had studied up on purpose to get Marcy into a sc.r.a.pe of some kind, and Marcy was very anxious to know what it was.
"You hinted a while ago that Colonel Shelby had sent you here to tell me some bad news," said the young pilot, in a much pleasanter tone of voice than he had thus far used in addressing his visitor. "Are you ready now to obey orders and tell me what it is?"
"Well, I dunno. I reckon mebbe I"d best ride down an" see the colonel first," replied the man. But his actions said plainly that he _did_ know, and that he had no intention of facing his employer again until he could tell him that his instructions had been carried out.
"Of course, you must do as you think best about that; but if it is anything that concerns my mother or myself----"
"I should say so," exclaimed Kelsey. "I don"t reckon it"ll do any harm to tell you--but ain"t there anybody to listen? It"s very important an"
private."
"I think you may speak with perfect freedom; but in order to make sure of it----" Marcy finished the sentence by getting up and closing both the doors that opened upon the veranda. "Now we"re safe," said he; whereupon Kelsey revealed the whole plot in less than a score of words.
"Mebbe you don"t know it," said he, in a whisper which was so loud and piercing that it could have been heard by an eavesdropper (if there had been one) at least fifty feet away, "but you are harboring a traitor right here on the place."
"Who is it?"
"Your mean sneak of an overseer."
It was now Marcy"s turn to be astonished. He knew that there was not a word of truth in what the man said, and that if the overseer really was a Union man the planters round about would have sent a person of more influence and better social standing than Kelsey to tell him of it; but after all the plot was not as simple as it looked at first glance.
"Where"s your proof?" was the first question he asked.
"Well, Hanson has been talkin" a heap to them he thought to be Union, but it turned out that they wasn"t. They was true to the flag of the "Federacy."
"What do Colonel Shelby and the rest want me to do?" inquired Marcy, catching at an idea that just then flashed through his mind. "If they will write me a note stating the facts of the case and asking me to discharge Hanson, I will attend to it before the sun goes down."
"Well, you see they don"t keer to take a hand in the furse at all, seein" that there"s so many Union folks in the settlement," said Kelsey.
"They"ve got nice houses an" n.i.g.g.e.r quarters, an" they don"t want "em burned up."
"But they are willing that I should get into trouble by discharging Hanson, and put myself in the way of having my house and quarters destroyed, are they?" exclaimed the boy, his face growing red with indignation, although, as he afterward told his mother, there wasn"t really anything to arouse his indignation. "You may tell those gentlemen that if they want the overseer run off the plantation, they can come here and do it. If the Union men are as vindictive as Colonel Shelby seems to think they are, I don"t care to get them down on me."
"But the Union folks won"t pester you uns," said Kelsey, speaking before he thought.
"Ah! Why won"t they?"
"Kase--kase they think you"re one of "em."
"I don"t see how they can think so when they know that I belong to a Confederate privateer."
"Them men, whose names I give ye a minute ago, thought that mebbe you"d be willing to turn Hanson loose when you heared how he had been swingin"
his tongue about that there money."
Kelsey had come to the point at last. He looked hard at Marcy to see what effect the words would have upon him, and Marcy returned his gaze with an impa.s.sive countenance, although he felt his heart sinking within him.
"What money?" he demanded, in so steady a voice that the visitor was fairly staggered. The latter believed that there was rich booty hidden somewhere about that old house, and he hoped in time to have the handling of some of it.
"I mean the money your maw got when she went to Richmon" an" around,"
replied the man, who, in c.o.o.n hunters" parlance, began to wonder if he wasn"t "barking up the wrong tree."
"Can you prove that she brought any money back with her?"
"No, I can"t," answered Kelsey, in a tone which said as plainly as words that he wished he could. "I--me--I mean that the neighbors suspicion it."
"Oh, that"s it. Let those officious neighbors keep on talking; and when they have talked themselves blind, you may tell them, for me, that what money we have is safe," said Marcy, with a good deal of emphasis on the adjective. "If you want to see what mother brought back from the city, go and look at the servants. Every one of them is dressed in a new suit.
Now go on and tell me the bad news. I"m getting impatient to hear it."
"Heavings an" "arth! Haven"t I told it to ye already?" Kelsey almost shouted. "I think it is bad enough when you an" your maw are keepin", right here on the plantation, a man who is all the time waitin" an"
watchin" fur a chance to do harm to both of ye. If you don"t think so, all right. I was a fule fur comin" here, an" I reckon I"d best be lumberin". If anything happens to ye, bear in mind that I give ye fair warnin"."
"I will," answered Marcy. "And in the mean time do you bear in mind that I am ready to discharge Hanson at any time Colonel Shelby proves to my satisfaction that he is a dangerous man to have around; but I shall make no move unless the colonel says so, for I don"t want to get into trouble with my neighbors." ["I wonder if I have done the right thing," thought Marcy, as the visitor mounted his mule and rode out of the yard. "The next plotter I hear from will be Hanson himself."]
The boy remained motionless in his chair until Kelsey disappeared behind the trees that bordered the road, and then got up and walked into the sitting-room, where he found his mother pacing the floor. Her anxiety and her impatience to learn what it was that brought Kelsey to the house were so overpowering that she could not sit still.
"Another plot to ruin us," whispered the boy, as he entered the room and closed the door behind him.
"Oh, Marcy, it is just what I was afraid of," replied Mrs. Gray. "Who is at the bottom of it this time?"
"The same old rascal, Lon Beardsley; but he"s got backing I don"t like.
There"s Colonel Shelby for one, the postmaster for another, and Major Dillon for a third."
"The most influential men in the neighborhood," gasped Mrs. Gray, sinking into the nearest chair. "And the best."
"They used to be the best, but they are anything but that now. When men will stoop as low as they have, they are mean enough for anything. I suppose you ought to hear what that fellow said to me, but I don t know how I can tell it to you."
"Go on," said his mother, trying to bear up bravely. "I must hear every word."