There was something in Jean which fairly leaped out to meet the newly awakened world and springtide. From a little child she had lived very close indeed to nature"s heart. The first balmy breath of spring seemed to intoxicate her; the first bird-call could throw her into an ecstacy; an early spring blossom invariably caused a rapture; summer"s languor and richness bore her off into a beautiful world of her own; autumn"s "mellow, yellow, ripening days, floating in a golden coating of a dreamy, listless haze," conveyed her instantly into dreamland; winter"s frost and sparkle produced the wildest exhilaration. Was it any wonder that, coming out into the early morning sunlight of that soft springlike day, with bird notes filling the air, and her own pulses thrilling with life at its dawn, Jean"s cheeks glowed and her eyes sparkled with the very joy of living?
It was still very early and no one yet astir. Over in Mammy"s cottage a faint smoke wraith floated up from the chimney, telling that Mammy was astir. Jean had thrown a warm cape about her, for the morning air still had its chill, and, enticed by the sunlight, she ran down the piazza steps, inhaling deep breaths of the delicious air. Pausing a moment to revel in it all, her eyes fell upon the stable. The next second she was darting away like a swallow, no premonition in her heart of what lay behind its closed doors.
Opening the door she entered with a soft whistle. When had there failed to be an instant response to that whistle? This time there was silence only.
"Oh, Baltie, dear! Come, Baltie!" she called, running across to the box stall and opening the door. Then there was a low cry, and Jean stood for a moment as though petrified. On the sweet, clean straw lay the old horse, body inert, limbs relaxed, head resting upon its bed of soft straw as a tired, worn-out veteran"s might rest upon his pillow, his eyes closed, and without a flutter of the delicate nostrils to indicate breathing. Life seemed extinct. With a piteous cry Jean glided to the horse"s head and dropped upon her knees, clasping her arms about the silky neck.
"Baltie, oh, Baltie, dear, look at me! Speak to me," she begged.
The eyelids fluttered, and the faintest possible nicker was breathed through the nostrils as he strove to raise his head. Too late! The angel of death was about to claim one of his most faithful creatures, and, let us hope, the recording angel was already checking off the deeds of a devoted life and a disposition which many of his friends claiming immortality might emulate.
"Oh, my Baltie, my Baltie!" sobbed Jean, slipping into a sitting position and lifting the horse"s head into her lap. "Must you leave me?
Must your life end now? I love you so, Baltie, I love you so! You have been so good, so faithful! How can I let you die? how can I?" and with heartbreaking sobs Jean buried her head in the silky forelock as her arms clasped the great head.
Slowly the sunlight which Baltie and Jean so loved crept around and looked into the window of the stall. On a branch just beyond the window a bluebird caroled as though not in all the sunlit world was there sorrow or death.
In the stall Jean sat motionless. Her first impulse had been to rush for aid; but who could aid in this extremity? Instinctively the girl knew it to be the end, and somehow, in her great love for her pet, she did not wish anyone else to intrude upon the moment of his pa.s.sing. She had no idea of the flight of time. Ten minutes or an hour might have pa.s.sed without her noting them. Baltie lay perfectly still, his head in her lap, her arms clasping his neck. Gently, sweetly as he had lived, so was Baltie slipping out of the world of sentient creatures. Only the faintest flutter of breath indicated that life lingered. His effort to greet the one he loved seemed to have demanded his last atom of vitality. After a little Jean"s sobs ceased, though tears still fell upon the satiny head. She did not know how long she had been in the stall, when just the softest sigh was breathed from the delicate nostrils, a faint quiver pa.s.sed over the great frame, and Baltie was at rest forever. Gently as he had lived, so had Baltie died.
Two hours later Mammy came out to the stable in quest of Jean.
CHAPTER XIV
IN THE SPRINGTIDE.
It is probable that not even those who loved her best realized how Jean had loved the pet which had been her daily companion for nearly four years. The very fact that she had rescued him from a miserable death, nursed and tended him to restored health, had felt his love for her growing with each day, made Baltie nearer and dearer to her than a young, vigorous horse could ever have been.
Baltie was now resting in his lowly bed at the foot of the garden, but Jean did not cease to grieve for him. When Mammy had found her with Baltie"s head in her lap that morning there had been a pathetic little scene-for Mammy loved the old horse as dearly as Jean loved him; but had she been entirely indifferent to him, the fact that her baby loved him would have been enough to exalt him above all other animals in Mammy"s sight. Jean was utterly exhausted by her grief and benumbed from her cramped position when Mammy found her, and the good old soul was genuinely alarmed when she tried to help the child to her feet. Baltie"s weight and her cramped position had completely arrested circulation. In spite of her own grief Mammy lifted Baltie"s head from Jean"s lap, laid it gently upon the straw and then helped the girl up, or tried to, for Jean was too numb to stand.
"Bress Gawd, what comin" to us nex"?" she cried, half carrying Jean to the house, where Constance met them.
It was hours before Jean could walk unaided, and many days before the girl smiled again. Mrs. Carruth grew troubled, and one afternoon spoke to Hadyn about her.
"I am so distressed about it. She is filled with remorse for having taken Baltie out that night, and that, added to her grief for him, is making the child positively ill. I have done my best to make her understand that Baltie had already lived far beyond a horse"s allotted years, and that very soon he must have come into his long rest, but I seem to make no impression."
"If I had been on hand when needed he would be alive this minute, and my little girl happy and cheery as ever," protested Hadyn. "I"ll never, never forgive myself that lapse as long as I live, and nothing I can do will ever atone for it. It was the most contemptible failure of which I have ever been guilty; but I declare to you, I"m going to do something to make reparation. Where is Jean now?"
"She went down to the Arcade for Constance about an hour ago, but she ought to be back very soon."
"I"ll walk down and meet my little sister. I"ve a scheme simmering far back in my witless mind which may take form and shape if I can keep awake. Au revoir, little mother," and with the grace so characteristic of him, Hadyn raised her hand and pressed his lips to it! There was no one on earth he loved as he loved this gentle, gracious woman.
Riveredge in its late April dress was very dainty. She seemed to be preparing for Easter, which this year fell late in the month, and over all the world lay the softest veil of gossamer green. The air was redolent of cherry and apple blossoms, and filled with bird notes.
As Hadyn walked down the steep roadway, which led from the Carruth"s to the broader highway, he saw Jean coming toward him and waved his hand in greeting. As he hurried toward her he called:
"Well met, little sister," raising his hat and extending his hand.
A quick light sprung into Jean"s eyes. "I like that," she said, with a quaint, little upraising of her head.
"Like what, Jean?"
"I like to have a man bow as you do, Champion. Because I"m only fourteen and still wear short skirts some of them seem to think a nod and "how-d"-do" is all that is required of them, but I don"t agree with them."
Hadyn did not betray the amus.e.m.e.nt this characteristic little comment caused him. He knew Jean to be more observing of the amenities than most girls of her age, and that all her Southern instincts demanded the chivalrous attention which generations of her ancestors had received from men. Many of her girl friends laughed at her and teased her, but that did not lower her standard of what was due womanhood from manhood.
"I should be unworthy the name you"ve given me if I forgot," said Hadyn.
"It wouldn"t make one bit of difference whether I had given you that name or not, you couldn"t be different."
"Thank you. But where are you going now?"
"Nowhere in particular. Amy is away and Connie up to her eyes in the month"s accounts. So I"m adrift."
"How would you like to come for a walk in the woods with me? I am not going back to the office this afternoon, for the fever is on me. The call of the woods gets into my blood sometimes, and then I"ve got to tramp. Only trouble is, I can"t always get a tramping companion. Will you come?"
"I"d love to, but I must let mother know, she might worry."
"She won"t, because she knows I came to ask you to go with me if I could find you."
They struck into a side road, which presently became a mere wood path leading up the mountain, and from which a little higher up an exquisite picture of the river and opposite mountains could be seen. Hadyn, pausing at a broad, flat rock, said:
"Let"s sit down and enjoy all this. Come, sit beside me, little sister."
Jean dropped down upon the lichen-covered rock, warm and dry in the afternoon sunshine which fell upon it, and said:
"Isn"t it beautiful? Isn"t all the world beautiful? Why need anybody or anything in it ever die, and why will other people make them. Oh, Champion, if I only hadn"t made Baltie!" and quick tears sprung into her eyes. During the two weeks since Baltie"s death Jean had actually lost flesh and grown pale in her sorrow and remorse for what she believed to be purely the result of her want of thought.
Hadyn put his hand on hers and, looking into her eyes, asked:
"Little sister, do you know how that hurts _me_? It was not your want of forethought that night, but my faithlessness which carried you out into that terrible storm, and I shall never, never forgive myself. You might have been the victim instead of old Baltie, but as it is his life paid the penalty of my lapse. True, he was very old and might not have lived a great deal longer, but his end certainly would not have been hastened, or your loving heart grieving as it now is had I done my duty. Can you ever forgive me, dear?"
As Hadyn talked a swift change swept over Jean"s expressive face; a new light sprung into her eyes, and she said:
"Why, Champion, I never for one single second blamed you. Did you think I did? Oh, you couldn"t think that, not when you know how dearly I love you, and how good you"ve always been to Baltie and me. Why, you saved his life, you know, and have always helped me look out for him; and you"ve done hundreds and hundreds of things for us both. Please, please never say that again. You didn"t know I was going to signal that night."
"Ah, but I _did_ know it, and it was only upon that condition that Constance consented to go upstairs to bed. She thought she could trust me to answer that signal, but you see she couldn"t, and all this is the result. You are grieving for your pet until you are almost ill from it, and I feel like-like, oh, like the most contemptible thing that ever happened. What can I do to help, little one? It hurts me to see you or yours unhappy."
"I shall not be unhappy," was Jean"s instant a.s.sertion. "I do miss Baltie terribly, for I loved him, and-and he seemed so much mine, and was so good and faithful-" here a little sob checked her words. Hadyn slipped his arms about her, and she leaned her head upon his shoulder.
This big "brother" was a great source of strength and comfort to her.
Then she resumed: "But I shall not let it make you unhappy, too. I dare say I am silly-the girls laugh at me and say I am, but I can"t help it-when I love anybody, or anything, I _love_ them, and that"s all there is about it. Baltie knew me better than he knew anyone else, and loved me better. No one knows or believes how he understood me, or I him, and it is no use trying to make them; but I feel as if some part of me had gone without having him to love and visit and pet every day, and have him snuggle up to me. I wish horses could have monuments raised to their memory, and some record kept of their good deeds and faithfulness for people to read. My goodness, more good things could be said of Baltie this minute, and they"d be true, too, than can be said of that dreadful old Jabe Raulsbury; and yet when he died last year they put up a tombstone for him the very first thing, and what do you think they had inscribed on it?"
"I"m sure I don"t know," and Hadyn smiled at the thought of any commendatory legend being placed upon the monument of the irascible Jabe, whose life had been one long series of quarrels with his neighbors, brutality to the dumb creatures which had lucklessly fallen into his hands, and whose last act had been to fly into a wild rage and beat his wife. Fortunately, it had been his last transgression, for a neighbor, hearing her screams, had rushed to her aid, and Jabe, hearing his approach, and starting to escape by a back door, had pitched headlong through an open trap-door and into his cellar. Several broken bones and some internal injuries brought him his just desserts of four months" torture, ending in his death, and the town drew a sigh of relief. Then his widow erected a monument to his memory. It bore this memorial to the deceased Jabe:
"A loving husband, tender brother.
Never shall we find another,"