I never saw a face so unconsciously marked with misery as Gholson"s was when we started downstairs. I stopped him on a landing. "Understand, you and I are friends,--hmm? I think Lieutenant Helm owes you an apology, and if you"ll keep away from him I"ll try to bring it to you."
The reply began with a vindictive gleam. "You needn"t; I ain"t got any more use for it than for him. I never apologized to a man in my life, Smith, nor I never accepted an apology from one; that"s not my way."
Near the bottom of the second flight we met Charlotte, who, to make bad worse, would have pa.s.sed with no more than a smile, but the look of Gholson startled her and she noticed our arms. With an arresting eye I offered a sprightly comment on the heat of the day, and while she was replying with the same gaiety I whispered "Take him with you."
How nimbly her mind moved! "Oh Mr. Gholson!" she said, and laughed to gain an instant for invention.
"Mr. Gholson, can you tell me the first line of the last hymn we sang this morning?" Her beam was irresistible, and they went to the large parlor. I turned into the smaller one, opposite, where Squire Sessions started from a stolen doze and, having heard of my feeling for books, thrust into my hands, and left me with, the "Bible Defense of Slavery."
As I moved to a window which let out upon the side veranda the two lieutenants came around from the front and stood almost against it, outside; and as I intended to begin upon Harry as soon as Squire Sessions was safely upstairs, this suited me well enough. But the moment they came to the spot I heard Ned Ferry doing precisely what I had planned to do. At the same time, from across the hall came the sound of the piano and of Charlotte"s voice, now a few bars, then an interval of lively speech, again a few bars, then more speech, and then a sustained melody as she lent herself to the kind flattery of Gholson"s songless soul.
"But he is!" I overheard the aide-de-camp say; "he is a backbiting sneak, and I tell you again he"s backbitten n.o.body more than he has you!"
"And I tell you again, Harry, that is my business."
"If he wants to fight me he can; I"ll waive my rank."
"No, you will not, you have no right; our poor little rank, it doesn"t belong to us, Harry, "tis we belong to it. "If he wants to fight!"--Do you take him for a rabbit? He is a brave man, you know that, old fellow. Of course he wants to fight. But he cannot! For the court-martial he would not care so much; I would not, you would not; "tis his religion forbids him."
"O--oh!" groaned Harry in Gholson"s exact tone, ""Hark from the tombs"!"
"Ah!" said Ferry, "he does not live up to it? Well, of course! who does? But we will pa.s.s that; the main question is, Will you express the regret, and so forth, as I have suggested, and do yourself credit, Harry, as an officer and a gentleman, or--will you fight?"
"But you say his religion, so called, won"t let him fight!"
"That"s what I think; but if it forbids him, and if consequently he will not, well,--Harry,--I will."
"You will what!"
"I will have to fight you in his place."
"Why, Ned!--Ned!--you--you astound me! Wha"--what do you mean?"
"That is what I mean, Harry. You know--many times you have heard me say--I don"t believe in that kind of thing; I find that worse than the religion of Gholson; yet still,--what shall I say?--we are but soldiers anyhow--this time I make an exception in your favor. And of course this is confidential, on both sides; but you must make peace with Gholson, or you must fight with me."
"Oh, good Lord!--Ned!--Good Lord A"mighty! but this is too absurd. Why, Ned, don"t you see that the bottom cause of this trouble isn"t--"
"I know what is the bottom cause of this trouble very well, Harry; you can hear her in yonder, now, singing. Wherever Gholson is he hears her, too, like-wise. Perchance "tis to him she is singing. If she can sing to him, are you too good to apologise?"
"Oh, I"ll give him the benefit of the doubt, Ned, d.a.m.ned if I don"t! George! I"ll apologize! Rather than lose your friendship I"d apologize to the devil!"
Ferry"s thanks came eagerly. "Well, anyhow, old boy," he added, "in such a case to back down is braver than to fight; but to apologize to the devil--that is not hard; on the contrary, to keep from apologizing to the devil--ah! I wish I could always do that!--I wonder where is d.i.c.k Smith."
I stealthily laid down the "Bible Defense of Slavery" and was going upstairs three steps at a stride, when I came upon Camille and Estelle. My aim was to get Harry"s revolver to him before he should have the exasperating surprise of finding Gholson armed, and to contrive a pretext for so doing; and happily a word from the two sisters gave me my cue. With the fire-arms of both officers I came downstairs and out upon the veranda loud-footed, humming--
""To the lairds o" Convention "twas Claverhouse spoke, Ere the sun shall go down there are heads to be--"
"Gentlemen, I hope I"m not too officious; they say we"re all going for a walk in the lily-pond woods, and I reckon you"d rather not leave these things behind."
Both thanked me and buckled on their belongings, but Ferry"s look was peculiarly intelligent; "I was in the small parlor, looking for you," he said; "I thought you would be near the music." And so he had seen Gholson with his revolver on him, and must have understood it!
"Smith," said Harry, "will you be so kind as to say to Gholson--oh, Lord! Ned, this is heavy drags on a sandy road! I--"
"That"s all right, Harry, I withdraw the request."
"Well, you needn"t; I was in the wrong. Smith, will you say to Gholson--" His voice dropped to a strictly private rumble.
"Yes, Lieutenant, I"ll do so with pleasure, and I"m sure what you say will have the proper--here are the ladies."
x.x.xIII
TORCH AND SWORD
"Now give me your hand, Miss Camille; now jump!" So twice and once again the rivulet was pa.s.sed which ran from the lily-pond, she and I leading all the others on the return from the woodland afternoon walk. We turned and faced away from the declining sun and across the clear pool to where its upper end, dotted with lily-pads, lay in a deep recess of the woods. There were green and purple garlands of wild pa.s.sion-flower around her hat and about the white and blue fabrics at her waist. At the head of the pond, with Ferry beside her, stood black-haired Cecile canopied by overhanging boughs, her hat bedecked with the red spikes of the Indian-shot and wound with orange ma.s.ses of love-vine. Nearer to us around the sh.o.r.e was Estelle of the red-brown hair and red-brown eyes and brows and lashes, whose cheek seemed always to glow with ever rising but never confessed emotion; and with her walked Gholson. Near the waterside also, but farthest up the path, came Miss Harper and Charlotte Oliver.
Harry was not with us. The settlement of his trouble with Gholson awaited his return out of the region north of us, whither Ferry had suggested his riding on an easy reconnaissance. Camille and I were just turning again, when there came abruptly into our scene the last gallant show of martial finery any of us ever saw until the war was over and there was nothing for our side to make itself fine for. On the road from the house we heard a sound of galloping, and the next moment General Austin and his entire staff (less only Harry) reined up at the edge of the pond, ablaze with all the good clothes they could muster and betraying just enough hard usage to give a stirring show of the war"s heroic reality. The General, on a beautiful cream-colored horse, wore long yellow gauntlets and a yellow sash; from throat to waist the sunlight glistened upon the over-abundant gold lace of his new uniform, his legs were knee-deep in shining boots, and his soft gray hat was looped up on one side and plumed according to Regulations with one drooping ostrich feather. Behind halted in pleasing confusion captains and captains, flashing with braids, bars, buckles, b.u.t.tons, bands, sword-knots, swords and brave eyes, and gaily lifting hats and caps, twice, and twice again, and once more, to the ladies--G.o.d bless them! Major Harper, the oldest, most refined and most soldierly of them all, was also the handsomest. Old Dismukes was with them; burly, bushy, dingy, on a huge roan charger. Camille asked me who he was, and I was about to reply that he was a bloodthirsty brute without a redeeming trait, when he lifted his s.h.a.ggy brows at me and smiled, and as I smiled back I told her he was our senior colonel, rough at times, but the bravest of the brave. Meantime the General rode forward over a stretch of shallow water, Ned Ferry ran back along the margin to meet him, and at the saddlebow they spoke a moment together privately, while at more distance but openly to us all Major Harper informed his sister that with one night"s camp and another day"s dust the brigade would be down in Louisiana. Camille turned upon me and hurrahed, the Arkansas colonel smiled upon her approvingly, the ladies all waved, the General lifted his plumed hat, faced about, pa.s.sed through his turning cavalcade and drew it after him at a gallop.
Our promenaders hurried into close order and with quick step and eager converse we moved toward the house. In raptures scintillant with their own beauty the three Harper girls inflated each item of the day"s news and the morrow"s outlook, and it was almost as pretty to see Miss Harper"s keen black eyes and loving-tolerant smile go back and forth from Camille to Estelle, from Estelle to Cecile, and round again, as each maiden added some new extravagance to the glad vaunting of the last, and looked, for confirmation, to the gallant who toiled to keep her under her parasol. Suddenly the three girls broke into song with an adaptation of "Oh, carry me back" which subst.i.tuted "Louisiana" for "Virginia," but whose absurd quaverings I will not betray in words to a generation that never knew the frantic times to which they belonged. I felt a shamefacedness for them even then, yet when I glanced behind, Miss Harper was singing with us in the most exalted earnest. We had nearly reached the field-gate, the big white one on the highway, and were noting that the dust of the General and his retinue had barely vanished from the southern stretch of the road, when one feminine voice said "What"s that?" another exclaimed "See yonder!" and Miss Harper cried "Why, gentlemen, somebody"s house is burning!"
Beyond the grove and the fields north of it, and beyond their farther bound of trees, in the northwest, was rising and unfolding into the peaceful Sabbath heavens a ma.s.sive black column of the peculiar heavy smoke made by the burning of baled and stored cotton. We ran, two and two, into the road and up toward the grove-gate. "Don"t stumble," I warned Camille as she looked back to see if any one besides me was holding his partner"s hand. Inside the gate we paused, we two, still hand in hand. Her brown hair had shaken low upon her temples in two voluptuous ma.s.ses between which she lifted her eyes to mine, my hand tightened on hers, and hers gave a little spasm of its own.
"Oh, d.i.c.k!" she whispered; but before I could rally from the blissful shock of it to reply, her face changed distressfully, and pointing beyond me, she drank a great breath, and cried, "Look!"
Sure enough, out there on the sky-line, in the north-east this time, another column of smoke was lifting its first billow over the tree-tops. "Oh, d.i.c.k!" she exclaimed, in beautiful alarm, "what does it mean?"
"It means the Yankees,--love," I said, and when she gasped her dismay without letting on to have heard the last word, I felt that fires were cheap at any price.
"There are others there besides Yankees," said Gholson to the general company as they joined us; "Yankees have got more sense than to start fires ahead of their march." On the same instant with Ned Ferry I sprang half-way to the top of the grove fence and peered out across road and fields upon the farthest point in line with the second fire. There we saw two hors.e.m.e.n reconnoitring, one a very commanding figure, the other mean enough. Ferry used his gla.s.s, but no gla.s.s was needed to tell either of us that Gholson"s reckoning was true; those two were not Federals.
The ladies flew to the house and the rest of us to the stable. In its door Ferry stopped to look back upon the road while Gholson and I darted in, but now he, too, sprang to his horse"s side. "How many, Lieutenant?" I cried, as the three of us saddled up.
"About a hundred; same we saw yesterday; captain at the rear; that means our fellows are close behind them."
For a moment more I could hear the thunder of their speeding column; then the grove seemed to swallow it up, and the stillness was grim. "Come on!" cried Ferry, swinging up, and after him we sprang. "They"ve dismounted on the far edge of the grove," said Gholson to me as we rode abreast, with Ferry a length ahead; "they"ll form line on each side the road at right angles to it!" and again he was right. Ferry led northeastward, but hardly had we made half a dozen leaps when he waved me to a near corner of the flower-garden palings and I saw Miss Harper beckoning and Charlotte holding up my carbine and his sword. Miss Harper was drawn up as straight as a dart, her black eyes flashing and her lips charged with practical information that began to flow the moment I was near enough to hear her guarded voice. "They"ve all put their horses in the locks of the road fence, just beyond the big white gate--"
"We know," I interrupted, leaning and s.n.a.t.c.hing the weapons from Charlotte"s hands. She kissed them good-bye.
"Ah, yes, yes!" she said, "they know all we can tell them and all we can"t!"
The only response I could give was the shower of loose earth thrown upon both women by my horse"s heels as I whirled and sped after my leader. He and Gholson were half a broad field ahead of me, but I followed only at their speed, designing to hand over the sword so nearly at the moment of going into action that I might stay by its owner"s side unrebuked; and my plan was not in vain. Up the highway our Louisianians burst into view in column at full speed; I knew them by their captain, a man noted throughout the brigade for the showiness of his dress; and the next instant, away across the fields beyond the highroad, Quinn and his scouts broke out of the woods, heading for the gap in the woods-pasture fence. As each friendly column caught sight of the other, long cheers rang across the narrowing interval between them. Through that other gap which I had noted in my walk with Ferry he and Gholson reached the road, sped forward on it to a rise that overlooked the fields, and halted. Ferry rose on tiptoe in the stirrups, lifted his cap in air, pointed triumphantly backward to the grove, and was recognized by both columns at once. Again they cheered; at a full run I reached his side and threw his sword into his hand. Both columns saw him belt it on and flash it out, their cheers swelled again, the Louisianians hurtled down upon us, and we turned and were at the front of the onset.