"You have come home early!"
It was not hospitably done. Indeed, Miss Liz, sister of the Colonel"s angelic wife, inherited few of that departed lady"s endearments. While both had pa.s.sed their girlhood in the Shenandoah, this one alone managed to absorb and retain all the stern qualities from the surroundings of her nativity. Now a spinster of perhaps sixty years, this firmness had become imbedded in her nature as unalterably as the Blue Ridge rock; her eyes and hair were as gray, and her voice--unless she were deeply moved--as hard; also was her sense of duty as unyielding. Before her sister"s death she regularly visited Arden, and afterwards the Colonel had insisted upon her making it a permanent home.
He paid the price for this, as he knew he would pay; but without a word, and with as few outward signs as possible. For Miss Liz could not have been termed in sympathy with the easy-going Colonel, nor, in her self-righteous moods, sympathetic with any man. From long practice and research she had at her fingers" tips the measurements of every male transgressor from Cain to Judas Iscariot, and could work up about as unhappy an hour for gay Lotharios as might be found this side of the Spanish Inquisition. At any rate, Miss Liz did come to Arden, finding rest and quiet and peace--not imparting them.
The little darkies never tired of twisting pieces of bale-wire into an imitation of lorgnettes and airily strutting in her wake when she visited the garden---being careful to keep their carousal well away from the danger zone. At the same time, all who had been allowed peeps into her gentler side were gripped with tentacles of affection as firm as was her own relentless adherence to duty. In just one respect might Miss Liz have been rated below par, and this was a hopeless incapacity to see when others were teasing her. She took all in good faith when they looked her straight in the eyes and told the most flagrant absurdities.
Brent now smiled blandly into her face and accepted the implied rebuke a moment in silence.
"Isn"t it extraordinary," he said at last, "that I guessed you would be having on that becoming gown, and looking just this cool and attractive?"
In spite of her stiffening shoulders and frown of extreme displeasure, an echo of color crept slowly into her cheeks. For it is a curious fact that, while stern and self-denying people may be found who are impregnable to the fiercest attacks of pa.s.sion, indifferent to the most insidious lures of avarice, unmoved by the most convincing whispers of jealousy, and impartial in every act toward fellowman--all, all will yield an inch to the smile of flattery.
"Fiddlesticks!" she exclaimed. "I am old enough to be your grandmother!"
The lorgnette never faltered, and Brent"s eyes lowered in feigned distress.
"Yes, I suppose so," he quietly admitted. "The fact is, when you come out on the porch this way and begin to talk so pleasantly, I"m always forgetting that you"re so--so terribly old as you insist. I"ll try to remember, Miss Liz."
"I am not inviting old age," she smiled, with a freezing lack of mirth; but yet she may have yielded the inch, for one of her thin hands went timidly up to the iron gray curls which hung before her ears, and her eyes turned to gaze dreamily over the fields as though in search of some long past, golden memory.
His own eyes took this opportunity to cast another sly look at the tell-tale goblet, hoping to light upon some method of spiriting it away.
"Mr. McElroy," she suddenly exclaimed, "I have been talking to brother John, and have told him my views about you!"
Brent"s mouth opened a moment in surprise and then he frankly began to laugh.
"I"m glad I wasn"t in hearing distance!"
"You might have heard to your advantage. I told him that I considered marriage to some determined girl your only chance of reformation."
"Marriage!" he almost rose out of his chair. "Heavens, Miss Liz! I"ve got an alarm clock that does that sort of thing!"
"Alarm clock?" she gasped. "Pray, what do you suppose marriage is?"
"I"ve never tried to suppose! I don"t want to suppose"
She arose with dignity and went toward the door. There was another minute, while he stood making humble apologies to which she seemed indifferent, and then her voice came like the crackling of dry twigs. "I bid you good morning, Mr. McElroy!"
CHAPTER IX
AT THE UNPAINTED HOUSE
Brent sat down and took a deep breath, as men do when they have narrowly escaped disaster. He saw Zack on a mule, heading for the gate, and called him.
"Uncle Zack," he whispered, when the old darky had come hat in hand up the steps, "rustle me another julep!"
"Lawd, Ma.r.s.e Brent," he cast a suspicious glance toward the front hall, "I"se gotter go clar to Ma.r.s.e Bob"s an" cut his haih!" But, translating the look, Brent gave a low laugh, saying:
"She won"t be out again for awhile. Hustle, Zack! I"ve just been frozen to death!"
The old man thrust the empty goblet under his coat and quickly returned with another, invitingly frosted.
"Ain" she turr"ble sometimes, Ma.r.s.e Brent?" he asked in a confidential undertone. "She done tol" me yisterday dat I"se gwine git th"owed clar to de bottom of h.e.l.l, an" den criss-cross all over de coals, ef I don"
stop makin" juleps for Ma.r.s.e John an" you! Do you reckon I"se gwine git all dat misery?"
"Betcher life," Brent answered, taking a few swallows and leaning back with a sigh of satisfaction. "That"s all coming to you; but d"you want to know what the Colonel and I"ve decided to do if you quit making us juleps, you old devil?"
Zack grinned.
"We"ll take you out to the tool house, and press your teeth down on a dry grinding-stone till they get hot and squeak and--"
"Hush, man, hush! In de name of goodness, hush!" Zack covered his wrinkled mouth. "You makes mah jaws feel all scrouged up!"
And after he was again astride the mule, plodding toward Bob"s place, his hand continued to stroke with affectionate care those jaws that had been thrown into such spasms of suggested torture, muttering:
"Who ever heerd tell of sech misery as puttin" mah onlies" toof on de grind-stone!"
A mile from Arden stood a house, too near the road to give it the air of being a place of many comforts, even were it in other respects pretentious. But its lightly built porch, precariously nailed to an unpainted frame front, stamped it with poverty.
Here dwelt Tom Hewlet, proprietor of ten acres and a bad name. It was said that his first wife had all but died of neglect, and then burst an artery in her brain while pursuing him with a skillet. The second Mrs.
Hewlet still held on. Both, no doubt, possessed virtues, but neighborly sympathy cl.u.s.tered around the present inc.u.mbent, because she was the present, and because of a frequently expressed regret that the good Lord had not spared her predecessor until the skillet and Tom had made connection. It was but a whispered wish, for Tom"s second choice came from the meek and lowly. He was taking no more chances.
Besides that exciting memory, however, the first Mrs. Hewlet, previously the widow of a country parson, had left him a daughter by that marriage, and this girl, Nancy, had stayed--for Tom"s house was, after all, the only place she had to stay. Arden"s people and those of Bob"s home had felt in a mild way sorry for this girl, sometimes sending over "things,"
and in other ways showing a long-distance interest; yet the very fact that she lived beneath the roof of such an old reprobate const.i.tuted a barrier which many of the less established neighbors would not venture to cross. Just, or unjust, this had made her shunned--at least, not sought; and as she grew into young womanhood, she also grew into a life of solitude. The native swains did not approach because they were afraid of Tom, and girl friends were denied by a far more unrelenting danger--compromise.
This particular spring, however, two events occurred which were vitally affecting her life. The first, when she stopped Jane in the road and asked if she might come to school. From that time forth the teacher began to see many things which others had not given themselves the opportunity to see, and her previous long-distance interest merged with the girl"s spirit of secret envy into a companionship--bounded for the most part by school hours, yet a companionship, nevertheless.
Not until then was there exposed a lovelier side of character, doubtless formed in early childhood with her father, the country parson. Jane learned of the mutual adoration which had existed between these two, and, when he had died, how death seemed also to lay a hand upon her budding hopes of life and future. The mother"s background she found more difficult to place, and the only glimpse she could get of it was through Nancy"s possession of four books left from that forlorn woman"s more forlorn estate: the Bible, Swinburne"s poems, "Adam Bede" and "Household Hints." That she had been superior to Tom might be accepted without question, and why she married him was simply one of those anomalies which makes our neighbors interesting.
But the seed implanted by the father, a man of honest impulses, remained somewhere the girl"s consciousness--latent, nearly parched by the brutality of subsequent environments; until Jane had begun to moisten it with encouragement, and now it was budding. On the other hand, she had seen in Nancy tendencies of less promise: a physical desire to be away from the frame house by the roadside, and a character--not entirely weak, but irresolute--easing its sense of obligation by the devil"s insidious argument of poverty; also, that the recent application to perfect her modest learning was in parallel with an unexpressed hope of independence in the cities. Frequently--and invariably after nights when old Tom was on his sprees--Jane had found her pathetically near the precipice of desperation, and it required some pointed talks to hold her steady.
The second event in her life had been of more recent date: Brent.
As old Zack now neared the ramshackle house, he saw her leaning over the crooked gate. Not infrequently of late he had carried a note to her, and he rather felt that she might be looking for one today.
She smiled, showing a really exquisite line of teeth between lips full and inviting. Her mouth was large, as though Nature, realizing her possession of one exceptional quality, had made the most of it. Around her neck hung a simple garnet pendant which Zack had noticed only in the last few days; and now, as she stood with chin up-tilted, the sunlight struck this stone sending a soft, crimson gleam of dull fire across the white skin below her throat.
"Mawnin", Miss Nancy," he made a perfunctory bow.
"Good mornin", Uncle Zack."
"How"s yoh folks?" the old man asked. It was warm, he was weary of the ride and wanted to talk.
"They"re well, thanks." She did not ask after those at Arden.