Here Adelaide paused; she had come to the house of the friend she proposed to visit, and from the gate she pointed out the trees that grew so abundantly on the Bowden place, and her att.i.tude seemed to say to the young man that should he get lost, he would be safe so long as she was within calling distance. He had been used to more dignity and less charm on the part of most of the young women he knew, and he rather preferred the variety which he had now come in contact with for the first time.
And yet, when he came to the old homestead, where his grandfather lived and died, and where his mother was born, he was attacked by none of the emotions that would have seized upon the soul of his mother. He had been educated in a different environment, and he was essentially modern in his sense of the importance of business affairs. As he read the friendly inscription on the tomb of his grandfather--the family burying-ground being not far from the picturesquely simple old house--he was conscious of a strong desire to know whether failure or success would crown his negotiations with Mr. Jonas Whipple.
The vagrant winds blew through the tops of trees more than two centuries old, the house frowned grimly over the reminiscences of past hospitality, and the whole scene appealed strongly to sentiments that are now said not to be strictly scientific. But it must not be supposed that the young man had no poetry in his soul, or that his nature was free from emotions of a sentimental character. He lived entirely in the present, and the past had no meaning for him save that which was coldly historical. He found his inspiration in the rhythmical clatter and cackle of intricate machinery; he was stirred by the interweaving and interlacing business problems, and the whole movement, shape, and pattern of huge commercial enterprises.
Nor was this a misfortune. Being modern and practical, he was wholly free from the entanglements and misconceptions of prejudices that had outlived the issues that gave rise to them; and he went about his business with a mind at once clear, clean, and cheerful, bearing the signal of hope on his forehead. As he walked about the old place, it was characteristic of him, that he should be seeking the solution of the puzzle which Mr. Sanders had placed before him in the shape of a "royal straight flush," but in a matter of this kind, his mathematics availing him nothing: nor did it occur to him that the solution was to be found somewhere in the region from which the nations of the world draw their not over-abundant supplies of poetical metaphor. After an interval which he deemed seemly and proper, he turned his steps in the direction whence he had come. The street being straight as well as wide, afforded a fine perspective of sun and shade, to say nothing of the sand. As he went on, he walked more and more rapidly, so that he could have been accused of fleeing from the ghosts of his ancestors; but the propelling influence was the sight of Adelaide, who, having completed her morning call, was emerging from the gate-way that led to the house of her friend. She was for moving on, but seemed suddenly to remember about the young man.
Turning, she saw him coming, and waited, sauntering slowly, her mind full of a swarm of thoughts that had been fighting for its possession since she first saw him.
"The sight of your mother"s old home doesn"t seem to have saddened you,"
she remarked, as he came up.
"No," he replied, "but that is because I have no refreshing memory of the old place. All my ideas about it are second hand; and besides, it seems to be a very cheerful place. I imagine that the soil round about is still fertile."
"I never thought of that," she answered; "but men are always more practical than women. In your place, I should have searched over the old homestead for the favourite walks of my grandfather; and I should have known, before I came away, where my mother ran, and hid herself when her feelings were hurt; and where she played with her dolls, and just how she did when she was a little bit of a girl."
The young man had an uneasy idea that Adelaide was poking fun at him, but her face was so grave that he dismissed the idea, and it was then that he felt himself stirred by a dim conception of the region in which the thoughts of this beautiful young woman wandered and ranged.
"What I was really thinking of all the time," he said, with a laugh that somehow conveyed a regret that his thoughts were on a plane so much lower than hers, "was how I shall prevail on your uncle to convey to the railway company a right of way through his land. It means a great deal to me."
"Oh, _that_ is why you are here!" exclaimed Adelaide. "Well, I was wondering." She regarded him very seriously for a moment and he felt that he had fallen a notch in her estimation. "If you"ll take my advice," she said, "you will leave the whole affair to Randall."
"But how can I? Randall is a negro. I"m sure I don"t understand what you mean!" His pride, his self-esteem, had been wounded to the very core, and his face was very red.
"Yes, leave it to Randall and Mr. Sanders," Adelaide replied, "and you"d not lose anything if you could manage to introduce the ghost of your grandfather." This was said airily, but it had far more meaning that young Somers was able to read into it.
"I never saw just such a place as this is," he remarked somewhat petulantly, "where the people can only help you along by means of riddles and parables and jokes. Mr. Sanders tells me to say nothing to your uncle about the business on which I have been sent. And then he says that I already have a royal straight flush in my hand. What am I to infer from that?"
Young Somers, without intending it, revealed the essential boyishness of his nature, and Adelaide relished it immensely. "You are to infer just what he intended you should," she declared. "The jokes of Mr. Sanders mean a great deal more than another man"s wisdom. You"ll discover that for yourself when you come to know him well."
"But you can"t do business by means of jokes," the young fellow protested.
"That"s the way Mr. Sanders transacts his business," Adelaide responded, "and he"s a very prosperous man. As for your grandfather"s ghost, Uncle Jonas will raise it if you give him half an opportunity. You"ll learn a great deal from Mr. Sanders and Uncle Jonas if you stay here long enough." The expression of her face was demureness itself, but the blue eyes sparkled with humour.
Now, young Somers was neither slow nor dull, but the peculiar atmosphere he found at Shady Dale was something new in his experience, and he was compelled to tunnel through it before he could clearly understand it.
His business training, as far as it had gone, and all his business a.s.sociations, had accustomed him to methods of procedure that were not only direct, but blunt. He never went around obstacles but through or over them. But he knew, after giving the matter some consideration, and after discovering that the ordinary commercial and cold-blooded methods would be useless here, that he would have to enter into the spirit of the place. He was a very attractive young man when at his best, and he made himself more attractive than ever by acquiring a quick sympathy for the things that interested the sincere and simple people about him.
He had several long talks with Mr. Sanders, during which he never once mentioned business nor anything relating thereto. Instead, he seemed to be very much interested in Adelaide and her personality, her nature and individuality. On this subject Mr. Sanders was eloquent. He could discourse on it for hours, and was only humorous when he wanted to make people believe he was in earnest. He told Somers all about Cally-Lou, and asked the young man what he thought about the child that was a little more than make-believe, and yet remained on the very verge of visibility. Now, the young man was very practical; circ.u.mstances had made him so. His spirit had had so little exercise, his dreams remained so persistently on the hither side of concrete things, he was so completely invested with the cold and critical views that were the result of his education, that his mind never ventured much beyond his material interests, and he never tried to peep around the many corners that life presents to a curious and sincere observer. Consequently, he was all at sea, as the saying is, when Mr. Sanders told him about Cally-Lou. He thought it was some form of a new joke, and he would have had a hearty laugh had the old philosopher given him the wink.
But the wink was not forthcoming. On the contrary, much to the young man"s surprise, Mr. Sanders appeared to be very serious. But the young man was as frank as it is possible for a youngster to be. "I"ll be honest with you, Mr. Sanders," he said. "I don"t know a thing about such matters. If I were not in Shady Dale, where everything seems to be so different, I would say at once that you are talking nonsense--that you are trying to play some kind of a practical joke--but, as it is, I don"t know what to think."
When the young man said that everything is different in Shady Dale, he meant that Adelaide was different, and Mr. Sanders knew it; so he said, "When you git so that you kin mighty nigh see Cally-Lou, you"ll be wuth lookin" at twice."
Somers took this more seriously than he would have taken it twenty-four hours previously--and he carried it to the tavern with him, and thought it over a long time; and then, as if that were not sufficient, he carried it to the Bowden place in the dusk of the evening, and worried with it until he had no difficulty in discovering where his grandfather had walked, and where his mother had hid herself when her feelings were hurt, and where she had played with her dolls.
The experience helped him in many ways, so much that when Adelaide saw him only a few hours later she exclaimed, "Why, how well you are looking! Our climate must be fine to make such a change in you." And Mr.
Sanders--"Well, well! ef you stay here long, you"ll turn out to be a purty nice lookin" chap. The home air is mighty good for folks, so I"ve been told." And, somehow or other, without further explanation, the young fellow knew what Mr. Sanders had meant by his talk about the "royal straight flush." When he called on old Jonas, he went as the grandson of Judge Bowden, and not as the agent of the promoter of the new railway, and endeavoured to learn everything that the old man knew about his grandfather.
Mr. Sanders joined the two before they had been conversing very long, and he was surprised, as well as pleased, to find how completely old Jonas had thawed out. There was not a frown on his face, and, on occasion, he laughed heartily over some incident that his memory drew from the past. And, presently, Adelaide glided in from the innermost recesses of the house, and sat near her uncle. She was a charming addition, and a most interesting one, for she was able to remind old Jonas of many things he had told her about the dead judge. Mr. Sanders, not to be outdone, contributed some of his own reminiscences, so that the evening became a sort of memorial of a good man who had long pa.s.sed away.
When the visitors were going away, Adelaide accompanied them to the door, and went with them on the veranda. Before Mr. Sanders could say good-bye, she caught him by his sleeve--"Do you remember what I told you the other day? Well, she has returned."
"What did she say?" he inquired, his finger on his chin. Adelaide blushed, but no one could see her embarra.s.sment. "Why, she says that everything looks a great deal better by lamplight."
Young Somers heard the conversation, but kept on moving away. "Did you hear that?" inquired Mr. Sanders, as he overtook the other. "She was talking about Cally-Lou. It seems she run away the day you showed your face here, and now she"s come back." And further than that, the Sage of Shady Dale said not a word. But the next day, he met the young fellow on the street, and gave him a congratulatory slap on the back. "You showed up purty strong, sonny; an" now that you"ve diskiver"d for yourself that thar"s a whole lot of ingineerin" that"s nuther civil nor mechanical, an" that aint got a thing in the world to do wi" figgers, you"ll manage to git along ruther better than you thought--in fact, mighty nigh fustrate.
"But don"t fergit Cally-Lou!"
And the young fellow did get along first-rate in more ways than one. The railroad was allowed to run right through old Jonas"s land, and when it was completed there was nothing to do but to celebrate the event by a marriage, in which the young man was aided and abetted by Adelaide. Then when everything had settled down, he took hold of Randall"s water-power and furnished lights for the town, and power for two or three mills in which Mr. Sanders was interested. I think this is all, but if you are in doubt about it, and want to find out something more, just enclose a stamp to William H. Sanders, Esq., Shady Dale, Georgia.
By JOEL CHANDLER HARRIS
Uncle Remus--His Songs and His Sayings Nights with Uncle Remus Uncle Remus and His Friends Mingo Little Mr. Thimblefinger On the Plantation Daddy Jake, the Runaway Balaam and His Master Mr. Rabbit at Home The Story of Aaron Sister Jane Free Joe Stories of Georgia Aaron in the Wild Woods Tales of the Home Folks Georgia, from the Invasion of De Soto to Recent Times Evening Tales Stories of Home Folks Chronicles of Aunt Minerva Ann On the Wing of Occasions The Making of a Statesman Gabriel Tolliver Wally Wanderoon A Little Union Scout The Tar Baby Story and Other Rhymes of Uncle Remus Told by Uncle Remus The Yankee Hater, etc.