"That"s just it; she"ll have to eat mule the first one. She"s at the Governor day and night with her wiles, and in my mind it"s her dimity influence that is making him see things with this slant. They say she put her brand on him in early youth. He"s the soul of honor but what chance has a man"s soul-honor got when a woman wants to cash it in for a fortune with which to lead a gay life? None! None, sir!" And the countenance of my Uncle, the General Robert, became so fierce that it was difficult to find words to answer.
"Oh, my Uncle Robert, is it that a woman would make a cheat in giving the mule animal of not sufficient strength to carry food to poor boys of France in the trenches when there is too much mud for gasoline!" I exclaimed with a great horror from knowledge given me by my Capitaine, the Count de La.s.selles.
"Just exactly what she is trying to do, boy. Let those poor chaps with guns in their hands to defend her civilization as well as theirs, die for want of a supply train hauled by reliable mules when unreliable gasoline fails. That"s what women are like." And as he spoke I perceived the depth of dislike that was in the heart of my Uncle, the General Robert, for all of womankind.
"There are some women who would not so comport themselves, my Uncle Robert. I give you my word as one--" Then as I hesitated in terror at the revelation of my woman"s estate I had been about to make, my Uncle, the General Robert, made this remark to me:
"Women are like crows, all black; and the exceptional white one only makes the rest look blacker. The only way to stop them in their depredations is to trap them, since the law forbids shooting them."
And as he made this judgment of women I forgot for a moment that we discussed that Madam Whitworth, whom it was causing me great pain to discover to be the enemy of France, and I thought of my beautiful mother, whom he had judged without ever having encountered, and a great longing rose in my heart so to comport myself that his heart should learn to trust in me as a man and then discover the honor of woman through me at some future time. I took a resolve that such should be the case and to that end I asked of him:
"How is it that I can serve you in these serious troubles, my Uncle Robert?" And as I asked that question I made also a vow in my heart against that black crow woman.
"Now that"s what I"m coming to. The French Government is sending an army expert down here to look over the situation and make the contracts. I can"t speak their heathenish tongue or read it, and I want somebody whom I can trust--trust, mind you--to help me talk with him and make any necessary translations. That Whitworth hussy has been translating for us and I don"t trust her. Your letter was handed to me in the Governor"s private office and both he and I saw what a help it would be to have you here when this Frenchie--who is a Count Something or Other--and his servants and secretaries, what he calls his suite, arrive. By George, sir, we need your advice in eating and drinking them! Do you suppose they"ll have intelligence enough to eat the manna of the G.o.ds, which is corn pone, and drink the nectar, which is plain whiskey, or will we be expected to furnish them with snails and absinthe?"
At that I laughed a very large laugh and made this answer to the perturbation of my Uncle, the General Robert:
"I will tell you after luncheon, my Uncle Robert, because I have not as yet eaten in this Harpeth country of America."
"All right, we"ll talk about it after you"ve had one of old Kizzie"s fried chicken dinners. Here we are at the Mansion. Remember, you know the _whole_ situation and are only supposed to know the part that Governor Bill _thinks_ is the whole. Look at me, boy!" And as the big car drove up to the curb before a great stone house with tall pillars on guard of its front, he laid both his hands upon my shoulders and turned me towards him with force and no gentleness and then with his keen eyes did he look down into the very soul of me.
"Yes, I see I can trust you, sir. G.o.d bless you, boy!" he said after a very long moment of time.
"Yes, my Uncle Robert," I answered him without turning my eyes from his.
"Well, then, here we are. I came to the side door so I wouldn"t have to introduce you to any of the boys this morning, for we want to have a talk with the Governor before dinner and I don"t dare keep Kizzie waiting. It riles her, and a riled woman burns up things: masters, husbands, cooking or worse. Come on." And as we walked up the broad side steps of that Mansion of the Gouverneur, my Uncle Robert"s hand was on my arm and I felt that I was being marched up to the mouth of the gun of Fate and I wished very much I could have been habited in my corduroy or cheviot skirts, no matter how short or narrow they might be. A number of gentlemen sat upon the wide verandah smoking pipes or long cigars under the budding rose vine that trailed from one tall pillar to another, and more stood and talked in groups beside the large front door that opened into the wide hall. At the back of the hall before a closed door stood a very large black man who was very old and bent and who had tufts of white wool of the aspect of a sheep upon his head. He was attired in a long gray coat of a military cut that I afterwards learned was of the late Confederacy, and I soon had much affection for him because of his reminiscences of that war and also because of his affection for my n.o.ble father, to whom he had told the same stories" in his early youth.
My Uncle, the General Robert, had not paused to present to me any of the gentlemen with whom he had exchanged jovial greetings, but he stopped beside the old black man and said:
"This is Henry"s boy, Robert, Cato. Fine young chap, eh?"
"Yes, sir, Mas" Robert," answered Cato as he peered into my face with the nicest affection in his black eyes set in large s.p.a.ces of white.
"Like Henry, isn"t he?"
""Fore G.o.d, yes, sir!"
"Look after him, Cato. He"ll be about considerable."
"Dat I will--Mas" Henry"s boy!"
"No lobbying dimity chasing him, Cato!"
"Yes, sir; I understands, sir."
"Is the Governor ready for me?"
"Yes, sir, you"s to go right in, Mas" Robert. Mr. Clendenning is with him jest now, but he"ll be out in a turkey"s call of time. Jest walk in, sir, and you, the young marster," and with a bow that almost allowed that the tails of the long gray coat swept the floor, the old black man opened the door and motioned us into the room of the Gouverneur of the State of Harpeth.
It has been given to me in the very short time of my life to be often in the home of the President of France, to be presented at the court of England with my father, to the Czar at Petrograd and to the old Franz Joseph, as well as to the beloved Albert and Elizabeth in Brussels, where I did go often to play with the young princess, and I do know very well how to manage skirts whether very tight, or very wide with ruffles, in the case of such presentations, but my heart rose very high up and beat so near to the roots of my tongue that it was impossible for me to speak as I was presented, in the traveling tweeds of a young man of American fashion, to the very wonderful and beautiful and fearful Gouverneur Williamson Faulkner of the State of Harpeth.
"Here"s my boy, Governor," was all the introduction my Uncle, the General Robert, administered to me, and I stood and looked into the face of him whom afterwards I discovered to be the greatest gentleman in the world, with my heart beating in my throat and yet astir under my woman"s breast in the place it had always before resided.
CHAPTER VI
"WE BOTH NEED YOU"
I do not know how it is that I shall find words in which to write down the loveliness of that Gouverneur of Old Harpeth. He was not as tall as my Uncle, the General Robert, and he was slender and lithe as some wild thing in a forest, but the power in the broadness of his shoulders and in the strength of his nervous hands was of a greatness of which to be frightened; that is, I think, of which a man should be frightened but in which a woman would take much glory. His hair was of the tarnished gold of a sunset storm and upon his temples was a curved crest of white that sparkled like the spray of a wave. All of which I must have seen with some kind of inward eyes, for from the moment my eyes lifted themselves from contemplating the carpet in embarra.s.sment over my tweed trousers they were looking into his in a way which at dawn my eyes have gazed into the morning star rising near to me over the little wood at the Chateau de Grez. I did not for many days know whether those eyes were gray or blue or purple, for when I regarded them I forgot to decide, and also they were so deep and shadowed by the blackness of their lashes and brows that such a decision was difficult. At this time I only knew that in them lay the fire of the lightning over Old Harpeth when the storm breaks, the laugh of the very small boy who splashes bare feet in the water with glee, and also a coldness of the stars upon the frost of winter. I was glad that I came across the dark ocean to flee from the cruel guns into a strange land to look into those eyes.
"It is good that you have come, Robert Carruthers, for the General and I both need you," were the words I heard him saying to me in a voice that was as deep and of as much interest as the eyes, and as he spoke those words he took one of my hands in both of his strong ones. "And if you say snails, snails it shall be, if Cato and I have to invade every rose garden in Hayesville and vicinity and stay up all night to catch them."
"I think I shall choose that corn pone and whiskey that my Uncle, the General Robert, has promised to me from one bad tempered cook at the time of my luncheon," I found myself saying with a laugh that answered the bare-footed boy who suddenly looked at me out of the cool eyes.
"I thought I would let him have a try-out with Kizzie before we decided what to feed the savages," also said my Uncle, the General Robert, with a laugh. "Besides, he"s one himself and I"ll have to go slow and tame him gradually."
"No, he"s ours. He"s just come back to his own from a strange land, General, and you"ll kill the fatted calf or rooster, whichever Kizzie decides, with joy at getting him." And this time the star eyes gave to me the quick sympathy for which I had prayed before the Virgin with the Infant in her arms in the little chapel of the old convent just before we had to flee from the sh.e.l.ls, leaving my father to the Sisters to bury after the enemy had come. I think my eyes did tell that tale to his and the tears ached in my throat.
"I know, boy," he said softly and then turned and presented me to the Mr. Clendenning who was arranging papers at a desk beside the window.
I do like with my whole heart that funny Buzz Clendenning, who has the reddest hair, the largest brown speckles on his face and the widest mouth that I have ever beheld. Also, his laugh is even wider than is his mouth and overflows the remainder of his face in ripples of what is called grin. He is not much taller than am I, but of much more powerful build, as is natural, though he did not at that moment recognize the reason thereof.
"Shake hands, boys; don"t stand looking at each other like young puppies," said my Uncle, the General Robert, as he clapped his hand on the back of the Mr. Buzz Clendenning. "You don"t have to fight it out.
Your fathers licked each other week about for twenty years."
"Can"t I even ask him to take off his coat once, General?" answered that Mr. Buzz with the grin all over his face and spreading to my countenance as he took my hand in his to administer one of those shakes of which I had had so many since my arrival in America. For a second he looked startled and glanced down at my white hand that he held in his and from it to my eyes that were looking into his with the entire friendliness of my heart. Suddenly I had a great fright of discovery within me and my knees began to again tremble together for their skirts, but before that fright had reached my eyes quite, I had born to me an elder brother in the person of that Buzz Clendenning, and I now know that I can never lose him, even when he knows that--
"I"m no shakes in the duel, Prince, so let"s kiss and make up before you get out your sword," he said as he also, as my Uncle, the General Robert, had done, laid an arm across my shoulders in an embrace of affection. It was then I made a discovery in the strange land into which I was penetrating: Men have much sentiment in their hearts that it is impossible for a woman to discover from behind a fan. They keep it entirely for each other as comrades, and I received a large portion of such an affection when that Mr. Buzz Clendenning adopted me in what he thought was my foreign weakness, as a small brother to be protected in his large heart.
"I am very happy to so salute you instead of the duel," I made answer and did immediately put a kiss on his one cheek, expecting that he would return it upon my cheeks, first one and then another, as is the custom of comrades and officers in France.
"Here, help! Don"t do that again or I"ll call out the police,"
responded that funny Mr. Buzz Clendenning, as he shook me away from him, while my Uncle, the General Robert, and the great Gouverneur did both indulge in laughter.
"I am abashed and I beg your pardon for offending against the customs of your country. I do remember now that my father did not permit such a salutation from his brother officers, and I will not do so again, Monsieur Buzz Clendenning," I said as my cheeks became crimson with mortification and tears would have come over my eyes had my pride permitted.
"This is what he meant you to do, Buzz, you duffer. I said good-bye to twenty-two of my friends this way the day I set sail from old Heidelberg," and as he spoke, that great and beautiful and exalted Gouverneur Faulkner did bend his head to mine and give to me the correct comrade salute of my own country on first one of my cheeks and then upon the other.
"I thank you, your Excellency," I murmured with grat.i.tude. I wonder what that Russian Count Estzkerwitch or Mr. Peter Scudder or Lord Leigholm on those Scotch moors, would have thought to hear Roberta, Marquise of Grez and Bye, express such grat.i.tude for two small pecks upon her cheek delivered in America.
"Yes, sir, it"s mighty pretty to look at but I reckon the kid had better stow the habit before he is introduced to Jeff Whitworth and Miles Menefee and the rest of the bunch," said that Mr. Buzz as he left off wiping from his cheek with the back of his hand the kiss I had put there, and administered to me another embrace on my shoulders with his long arm. "Besides, youngster, there are _girls_ in Hayesville," he added with a grin that again was reflected on my face without my will and which did entirely take away my anger and embarra.s.sment at his repulse.
"Girls! Girls!" exploded my Uncle, the General Robert. "The female young generally known as girls are about as much use to humanity as a bunch of pin feathers tied with a pink ribbon would be in the place of the household feather duster that the Lord lets them grow into after they reach their years of discretion. Robert has no time to waste with the unfledged. Don"t even suggest it to him, Clendenning. And now you can take him around to my house and tell Kizzie to begin filling you both up while I wait for a moment to go over these papers with the Governor. And both of you avoid the female young, for we"ve work for you; mind you, work and no gallivanting. Now go! Depart!"
"The old boy is a forty-two centimeter gun that fires at the mention of the lovely s.e.x and doesn"t stop until the ammunition gives out,"
said Mr. Buzz Clendenning as he slid into the seat of his slim gray racer beside me and started from the curb on high without a single kick of the engine. "I"d like to wish a nice girl, whom he couldn"t shake off, onto him for about a week and watch him squirm along to surrender. Wait until you see Sue Tomlinson get hold of him down on the street some day. He shuts his eyes and just fires away at her while she purrs at him, and it is a sight for the G.o.ds. Sue"s father died and left her with her invalid mother and not enough money to invite in the auctioneer, but the General took some old accounts of the Doctor"s, collected and invested them and made up plenty of money for Sue"s grubstake, though he goes around three blocks to get past her. Sue adores him and approaches him from all sides, but has never made a landing yet. Say, you"ll like Sue. She is pretty enough to eat, but don"t try to bite. It"s no use."