He plunged down the levee and bounded through the low weeds to the edge of the bank. It was sheer, and the water about four feet below. He did not stand quite on the edge, but fell upon his knees a couple of yards away, wringing his hands, moaning and weeping, and staring through his watery eyes at a fine, long crevice just discernible under the matted gra.s.s, and curving outward on either hand toward the river.
"My G.o.d!" he sobbed aloud; "my G.o.d!" and even while he called, his G.o.d answered: the tough Bermuda gra.s.s stretched and snapped, the crevice slowly became a gape, and softly, gradually, with no sound but the closing of the water at last, a ton or more of earth settled into the boiling eddy and disappeared.
At the same instant a pulse of the breeze brought from the garden behind, the joyous, thoughtless laughter of the fair mistresses of Belles Demoiselles.
The old Colonel sprang up and clambered over the levee. Then forcing himself to a more composed movement he hastened into the house and ordered his horse.
"Tell my children to make merry while I am gone," he left word. "I shall be back to-night," and the horse"s hoofs clattered down a by-road leading to the city.
"Charlie," said the planter, riding up to a window, from which the old man"s nightcap was thrust out, "what you say, Charlie,--my house for yours, eh, Charlie--what you say?"
"Ello!" said Charlie; "from where you come from dis time of to-night?"
"I come from the Exchange in St. Louis Street." (A small fraction of the truth.)
"What you want?" said matter-of-fact Charlie.
"I come to trade."
The low-down relative drew the worsted off his ears. "Oh! ya.s.s," he said with an uncertain air.
"Well, old man Charlie, what you say: my house for yours,--like you said,--eh, Charlie?"
"I dunno," said Charlie; "it"s nearly mine now. Why you don"t stay dare youse"f?"
"_Because I don"t want!_" said the Colonel savagely. "Is dat reason enough for you? You better take me in de notion, old man, I tell you,--yes!"
Charlie never winced; but how his answer delighted the Colonel! Quoth Charlie:
"I don"t care--I take him!--_mais_, possession give right off."
"Not the whole plantation, Charlie; only"--
"I don"t care," said Charlie; "we easy can fix dat _Mais_, what for you don"t want to keep him? I don"t want him. You better keep him."
"Don"t you try to make no fool of me, old man," cried the planter.
"Oh, no!" said the other. "Oh, no! but you make a fool of yourself, ain"t it?"
The dumbfounded Colonel stared; Charlie went on:
"Ya.s.s! Belles Demoiselles is more wort" dan tree block like dis one. I pa.s.s by dare since two weeks. Oh, pritty Belles Demoiselles! De cane was wave in de wind, de garden smell like a bouquet, de white-cap was jump up and down on de river; seven _belles demoiselles_ was ridin" on horses. "Pritty, pritty, pritty!" says old Charlie. Ah! _Monsieur le Pere_, "ow "appy, "appy, "appy!"
"Ya.s.s!" he continued--the Colonel still staring--"le Compte De Charleu have two familie. One was low-down Choctaw, one was high up _n.o.blesse_.
He gave the low-down Choctaw dis old rat-hole; he give Belles Demoiselles to you gran-fozzer; and now you don"t be _satisfait_. What I"ll do wid Belles Demoiselles? She"ll break me in two years, ya.s.s. And what you"ll do wid old Charlie"s house, eh? You"ll tear her down and make you"se"f a blame old fool. I rather wouldn"t trade!"
The planter caught a big breathful of anger, but Charlie went straight on:
"I rather wouldn"t, _mais_ I will do it for you;--just the same, like Monsieur le Compte would say, "Charlie, you old fool, I want to shange houses wid you.""
So long as the Colonel suspected irony he was angry, but as Charlie seemed, after all, to be certainly in earnest, he began to feel conscience-stricken. He was by no means a tender man, but his lately-discovered misfortune had unhinged him, and this strange, undeserved, disinterested family fealty on the part of Charlie touched his heart. And should he still try to lead him into the pitfall he had dug? He hesitated;--no, he would show him the place by broad daylight, and if he chose to overlook the "caving bank," it would be his own fault;--a trade"s a trade.
"Come," said the planter, "come at my house to-night; to-morrow we look at the place before breakfast, and finish the trade."
"For what?" said Charlie.
"Oh, because I got to come in town in the morning."
"I don"t want," said Charlie. "How I"m goin" to come dere?"
"I git you a horse at the liberty stable."
"Well--anyhow--I don"t care--I"ll go." And they went.
When they had ridden a long time, and were on the road darkened by hedges of Cherokee rose, the Colonel called behind him to the "low-down"
scion:
"Keep the road, old man."
"Eh?"
"Keep the road."
"Oh, yes; all right; I keep my word; we don"t goin" to play no tricks, eh?"
But the Colonel seemed not to hear. His ungenerous design was beginning to be hateful to him. Not only old Charlie"s unprovoked goodness was prevailing; the eulogy on Belles Demoiselles had stirred the depths of an intense love for his beautiful home. True, if he held to it, the caving of the bank, at its present fearful speed, would let the house into the river within three months; but were it not better to lose it so, than sell his birthright? Again,--coming back to the first thought,--to betray his own blood! It was only Injin Charlie; but had not the De Charleu blood just spoken out in him? Unconsciously he groaned.
After a time they struck a path approaching the plantation in the rear, and a little after, pa.s.sing from behind a clump of live-oaks, they came in sight of the villa. It looked so like a gem, shining through its dark grove, so like a great glow-worm in the dense foliage, so significant of luxury and gayety, that the poor master, from an overflowing heart, groaned again.
"What?" asked Charlie.
The Colonel only drew his rein, and, dismounting mechanically, contemplated the sight before him. The high, arched doors and windows were thrown wide to the summer air; from every opening the bright light of numerous candelabra darted out upon the sparkling foliage of magnolia and bay, and here and there in the s.p.a.cious verandas a colored lantern swayed in the gentle breeze. A sound of revel fell on the ear, the music of harps; and across one window, brighter than the rest, flitted, once or twice, the shadows of dancers. But oh! the shadows flitting across the heart of the fair mansion"s master!
"Old Charlie," said he, gazing fondly at his house, "You and me is both old, eh?"
"Yaas," said the stolid Charlie.
"And we has both been bad enough in our times eh, Charlie?"
Charlie, surprised at the tender tone, repeated "Yaas."
"And you and me is mighty close?"
"Blame close, yaas."
"But you never know me to cheat, old man!"
"No,"--impa.s.sively.