"Why?"
"I have already told you why."
"If your present position is irksome to you," he said, "you have merely to name a deputy and feel entirely at liberty to pursue your pleasure.
Or--you are at least the Laird of Northesk if you are nothing greater.
There is a commission in my Highlanders--if you desire it.... And your salary, of course, continues also."
He looked hard at me: "Augmented by--half," he added in his slow, cold voice. "And this, with your income, should properly maintain a young man of your age and quality."
I had been Brent-Meester to Sir William, for lack of other employment; and had been glad to take the important office, loving as I do the open air. Also the addition of a salary to my slender means had been acceptable. But it was one matter to serve Sir William as Brent-Meester, and another to serve Sir John in any capacity whatsoever. And as for the remainder of the family,--Guy Johnson and Colonel Claus--and their intimates the Butlers, I had now had more than enough of them, having endured these uncongenial people only because I had loved Sir William.
Yet, for his father"s sake, I now spoke to Sir John politely, using him most kindly because I both liked and pitied his lady, too.
Said I: "My desire is to become a Tryon County farmer, Sir John; and to that end I happily became possessed of the parcel at Fonda"s Bush. For that reason I am clearing it. And so I must beg of you to accept my resignation as Brent-Meester at the Hall, for I mean to start as soon as convenient to occupy my glebe."
There was a silence; Sacharissa gazed at me in pity, astonishment, and unfeigned horror; Lady Johnson gave me an odd, unhappy look; and Billy Alexander a meaning one, half grin.
Then Sir John"s slow and heavy voice invaded the momentary silence: "As my father"s Brent-Meester, only an Indian or a Forest Runner knows the wilderness as do you. And we shall have great need of such forest knowledge as you possess, Mr. Drogue."
I think we all understood the Baronet"s meaning.
I considered a moment, then replied very quietly that in time of stress no just cause would find me skulking to avoid duty.
I think my manner and tone, as well as what I said, combined to stop Sir John"s mouth. For n.o.body could question such respectable sentiments unless, indeed, a quarrel was meant.
But Sir John Johnson, in his way, was as slow to mortal quarrel as was I in mine. And whatever suspicion of me he might nurse in his secret mind he now made no outward sign of it.
Also, other people were coming across the gra.s.s to join us; and presently grave greetings were exchanged in sober voices suitable to the occasion when a considerable company of ladies and gentlemen are gathered at a house of mourning.
Turning away, I noticed Mr. Duncan and the Highland officers at the magazine, all wearing their black badges of respect and a knot of c.r.a.pe on the basket-hilts of their claymores; and young Walter Butler, still stiff in his bandages, gazing up at the June sky out of melancholy eyes, like a d.a.m.ned man striving to see G.o.d.
Sir John had now given his arm to his lady. His left hand rested on his sword-hilt--the same left hand he had offered to poor Claire Putnam--and to which the child still clung, they said.
Claudia turned from Billy Alexander and came toward me. Her face was serious, but I saw the devil looking out of her blue eyes.
Nature had given this maid most lovely proportions--that charming slenderness which is plumply moulded--and she stood straight, and tall enough, too, to meet on a level the love-sick gaze of any stout young man she had bedevilled; and she wore a most bewitching countenance--short-nosed, red-lipped, a skin as white as a water-lily, and thick soft hair as black as night, which she wore unpowdered--the dangerous jade!
"Jack," says she in honeyed tones, "are you truly designing to become a hermit?"
"Oh, no," said I, smilingly, "only a farmer, Claudia."
"Why?"
"Because I am a poor man and must feed and clothe myself."
"There is a commission from Sir John in the Scotch regiment----"
"I"m Scotch enough without that," said I.
"Jack?"
"Yes, Madam?"
"Are you a little angry with me?"
"No," said I, feeling uncomfortable and concluding to beware of her, for she stood now close to me, and the scent of her warm breath troubled me.
"Why are you angry with me, Jack?" she asked sorrowfully. And took one step nearer.
"I am not," said I.
"Am--am I driving you into the wilderness?" she inquired.
"That, also, is absurd," I replied impatiently. "No woman could ever boast of driving me, though some may once have led me."
"Oh, I feared that I had sapped, perhaps, your faith in women, John."
I forced a laugh: "Why, Claudia? Because I lately--and vainly--was enamoured of you?"
"_Lately?_"
"Yes. I did love you, once."
"_Did_ love?" she breathed. "Do you not love me any more, Jack?"
"I think not," said I, very cheerfully.
"And why? Sure I used you kindly, Jack. Did I not so?"
"You conducted as is the privilege of maid with man, Sacharissa," said I uneasily. "And that is all I have to say."
"How so did I conduct, Jack?"
"Sweetly--to my undoing."
"Try me again," she said, looking up at me, and the devil in her eyes.
But already I was becoming sensible of the ever-living enchantment of this young thing, so wise in stratagems and spoils of Love, and I chose to leave my scalp hang drying at her lodge door beside the scanter pol of Billy Alexander.
For G.o.d knows this vixen-virgin spared neither young nor old, but shot them through and through at sight with those heavenly darts from her twin eyes.
And no man, so far, could boast of obtaining from Mistress Swift the least token or any serious guerdon that his quest might lead him by a single step toward Hymen"s altar, but only to that cruel arena where all her victims agonized under the mocking sweetness of her smile, and her pretty, down-turned and merciless thumbs--the little Vestal villain!
"No, Claudia," quoth I, "you have taken my bow and spear, and shorn me of my thatch like any Mohawk. No; I go to Fonda"s Bush----" I smiled, "--to heal, perhaps, my heart, as you say; but, anyhow, to consult my soul, and armour it in a wilderness."
"A hermit!" she exclaimed scornfully, "--and afeard of a maid armed only with two matched eyes, a nose, a mouth and thirty teeth!"
"Afeard of a monster more frightful than that," said I, laughing.