The sweet intoxication of the first kiss
“The sweet intoxication of the first kiss.” Page 36.
“So you will wait for me until I have made a name that will grace you! How brave of you to make me that promise. Cherokee are you all mine? Then there are only two more things required in this—the sanction of the State, and the blessing of God. May He keep a watch over both our lives.”
“I pray that your wish be granted,” she murmured, with a tender voice.
“Now, my little woman, be very careful of the people you meet. Unfortunately, one forgets sometimes when one is in danger. You are a woman, sweet, passionate and kind; just the favorite prey.”
She looked at him intently, as if endeavoring to divine his underlying thoughts.
“What do you mean, sweetheart?”
He knew by the tremor in her voice she was hurt.
“I mean, dear, that lions are admitted into the fold because they are tame lions—look out for them.”
The next moment he was gone.
Carriages, formed in double ranks by the police, lined the pavement of several blocks on —— street, and from them alighted, as each carriage made a brief stop at the entrance, men and women of fashion, enveloped in heavy wraps, for the night was cold. Beneath the heavy opera coats, sealskins, etc., ball dresses were visible, and feet encased in fur-lined boots caught the eyes of those who stood watching the guests of the —— ball as they entered the building.
Music filled the vast dance-hall. High up in the galleries musicians were stationed, who toiled away at their instruments, furnishing enlivening strains of waltzes or polkas for the dancers. To the right, adown corridors of arched gold, the reception rooms were filled with metropolitan butterflies.
The scene was an interesting study. Foremost of all could be noticed the voluptuous freedom of manner, though the picturesque grace of the leading lights was never wholly lost. They weredissolute, but not coarse; bold, but not vulgar. They took their pleasure in a delicately wanton way, which was infinitely more dangerous in its influence than would have been gross mirth or broad jesting. Rude licentiousness has its escape-valve in disgust, but the soft sensualism of a cultured aristocrat is a moral poison, the effects of which are so insidious as to be scarcely felt until all the native nobility is almost withered.
It is but justice to them to say, there was nothing repulsive in the mischievous merriment of these revelers; their witticisms were brilliant and pointed, but never indelicate. Some of the dancers, foot-weary, lounged gracefully about, and the attendant slaves were often called upon to refill the wine glasses.
In every social gathering, as in a garden, or in the heavens, there is invariably one particular and acknowledged flower, or star. Here all eyes followed the beautiful, spirited, inspiring girl, who was under the chaperonage of Mrs. Stanhope. This fresh, beaming girl, unspoiled by flattery, remained naive, affectionate and guileless.
During the changing of groups and pairs, this girl heard the sweet, languid voice of Willard Frost. Through the clatter of other men it came like the silver stroke of a bell in a storm at sea. Sheflushed radiantly as he and Miss Baxter joined her party.
“Ah, my dear Miss Bell, you are looking charming,” he exclaimed, effusively. He took her hand, a little soft pink one, that looked like a shell uncurled.
“Come, honor Miss Baxter and me by taking just one glass of sherry,” and he called a passing waiter.
Cherokee looked at him with startled surprise. “How often, Mr. Frost, will I have a chance to decline your offers like this? I tell you again, I have never taken wine, and I congratulate myself.”
“Are you to be congratulated or condoled with?” There was irony in Miss Baxter’s tone, though her laugh was good natured, as she continued, “I see you are yet a beautiful alien, for a glass of good wine, or an occasional cigarette is never out of place with us. All of these nervous fads are city equipments.”
“Then, if not to smoke and not to drink are country virtues, pray introduce them into city life,” was Cherokee’s answer.
“Ah, no indeed, I would never take the liberty of reversing the order of things, for they just suit me,” and Miss Baxter’s bright eyes twinkled under drooping lashes. As she smiled she raiseda glass of wine to her lips, kissed the brim, and gave it to Willard Frost with an indescribably graceful swaying gesture of her whole form.
“Here’s to your pastoral sweetheart, the sorceress, sovereign of the South.”
your pastoral sweetheart
“‘Here’s to your pastoral sweetheart, the sorceress, sovereign of the South.’” Page 40.
He seized the glass eagerly, drank, and returned it with a profound salutation.
The consummate worldlings were surprised to hear Miss Bell answer:
“Thank you, but how much more appropriate would be, ‘Here’s to a Fool in Spots!’”
Willard replied, with a shake of the head:
“Ah, no, you have too much ‘snap’ to be called a fool in any sense, besides, you only need being disciplined—you’ll be enjoying life by and by. When I first met our friend Milburn he was saying the same thing, but where is he now?——”
Here Miss Baxter laid her pretty jeweled hand warningly upon his arm.
“Come, you would not be guilty of divulging such a delicious secret, would you?”
He treated the matter mostly as a joke, and returned with a tantalizing touch in his speech:
“Robert didn’t mean to do it. We must forgive.”
Cherokee looked puzzled as she caught the exchange of significant smiles. She spoke, as always, in her own soft, syllabled tongue.
“What do you mean, may I ask?”
Willard Frost coughed, and took her fan with affectionate solicitude.
“It may not be just fair to answer your question. I am sorry.”
“Mr. Milburn is a friend of mine, and if anything has happened to him why shouldn’t I know it?” she inquired, somewhat tremulously.
No combination of letters can hope to convey an idea of the music of her rare utterance of her sweetheart’s name.
“But you wouldn’t like him better for the knowing,” he interrupted. “Besides, he will come out all right if he follows my instructions implicitly.”
She stared blankly at him, vainly trying to comprehend what he meant. Then there came an anxious look on her face, such a look as people wear when they wish to ask something of great moment, but dare not begin. At last she summoned up courage.
“Mr. Frost,” she said, in a weak, low voice, “he—Robert—hasn’t done anything wrong?”
“Wrong, what do you call wrong?” was the laconic question, “but I trust the matter is not so serious as it appears.”
“Ah, I am so foolish,” and she smiled gently.
“No, it is well enough to have a friend’s interest at heart, and you won’t cut him off if you hear it—you are not that sort. I know you are clever and thoughtful, and all that, but you possess the forgiving spirit. Now, unlike some men, I judge people gently, don’t come down on other men’s failings. Who are we, any of us, that we should be hard on others?”
“Judge gently,” she replied.
“I hope I always do that.”
“If I only dared tell her now,” said Frost to himself, “but it’s not my affair.”
He saw the feminine droop of her head, and the dainty curve of her beautiful arm.
“She is about to weep,” he muttered.
Miss Baxter, who had been amusing herself with other revelers, turned to interrupt: “Mr. Frost, you haven’t given him dead away?”
This, so recklessly spoken, only added to Cherokee’s discomfort. A flush rose to her cheek. She asked, with partial scorn:
“Do you think he should have aroused my interest without satisfying it?”
“Please forgive him, he didn’t intend to be so rude; besides, he would have told you had I not interrupted. It was thoughtless of you to make mention of it,” she said, reproachfully, to the artist.
The while he seemed oddly enjoying the girl’s strange dry-eyed sorrow.
Just here, Fred Stanhope came up to tell them the evening pleasures were done. Cherokee could have told him that sometime before.
Willard Frost looked remarkably bright and handsome as he walked away with Miss Baxter leaning upon his arm.
“What made you punish that poor girl so? What pleasure was there in giving Mr. Milburn away, especially since you were the entire cause of it?” she went on earnestly, and a trifle dramatically. “A man has no right to give another away—no right—he should——”
“But Frances,” remonstrated Frost, lightly, and apparently unimpressed by her theory, “I was just dying to tell her that Milburn was as drunk as a duchess.”
In his fashionable apartments, Willard Frost walked back and forth in his loose dressing-gown. Rustling about the room, his softly slippered feet making no noise on the floor, he moved like a refined tiger—looked like “some enchanted marquis of the impenitently wicked sort, in story, whose periodical change into tiger from man was either just going off or just coming on.”
A good opportunity for consideration, surrounded by the advantages of solitude. He moved from end to end of his voluptuous room, looking now and again at a picture which hung just above a Persian couch, covered with a half dozen embroidered pillows.
What unmanageable thoughts ran riot in his head, as he surveyed the superb image and thought that only one thing was wanting—the breath of life—for which he had waited through all these months.
For two heavy hours he walked and thought; now he would heave a long, low sigh, then hold his breath again.
When at last he dropped down upon his soft bed, he lay and wondered if the world would go his way—the way of his love for a woman.
* * * * * *
Cherokee met Willard Frost on Broadway the next morning—he had started to see her.
“Let me go back with you and we will lunch together—what do you say?” he proposed.
“Very well, for I am positively worn out to begin with the day, and a rest with you will refresh me,” she said sweetly.
They took the first car down town and went to a café for lunch. Willard laughed mischievously as he glanced down the wine list on the menu card.
“What will you have to-day?”
“What I usually take,” she answered, in the same playful mood.
“I received that perplexing note of yours, but don’t quite interpret it,” he began, taking it from his pocket and reading:
‘Dear Mr. Frost:I am anxious to sit for the picture at once. Of course you will never speak of it. Don’t let anyone know it.Yours, in confidence,Cherokee.’
‘Dear Mr. Frost:
I am anxious to sit for the picture at once. Of course you will never speak of it. Don’t let anyone know it.
Yours, in confidence,Cherokee.’
“It is very plain,” she pouted. “Don’t you remember I had told you I was going to have my portrait made for Mrs. Stanhope on her birthday. That doesn’t come just yet, in fact it is three months off, but you know we are going to ‘Frisco’ for the winter, and there isn’t much time to lose; I have been busy two months making preparations.”
“What! Are you going, too? I was thinking a foolish thought,” he sighed. “I was thinking maybe you would remain here while they were away.”
“Not for anything; I have been planning and looking forward to this trip a whole year.” She seemed perfectly elated at the thought.
“There is nothing to induce you to remain?”
“Nothing,” she answered, with emphasis.
“I have an aunt with whom you could stay, and we could learn much of each other. Do stay,” he insisted.
“I must go, though I shall not forget you in the ‘winter of our content.’”
“That’s very kind, I am sure, but I have set my heart on seeing you during the entire season, for Milburn, poor boy, is so hard at work he will not intrude upon my time often. Besides, he is getting careless of late—doesn’t want society. The fact is, I believe he is profoundly discouraged. This work of art is a slow and tedious one. But he keeps onat it, except when he has been drinking too heavily.”
“Drinking! Mr. Frost, you surely are misinformed; Robert never drinks.”
Her manner was dignified, though she did not seem affected, for she was too certain there was some mistake.
“I hope I have been,” he said, simply.
He saw at once that she would not believe him. For love to her meant perfect trust; faith in the beloved against all earth or heaven. Whoever dared to traduce him would be consumed in the lightning of her luminous scorn, yet win for him, her lover, a tenderer devotion.
“So you are going to ‘Frisco,’ and I cannot see you for three long months? Well, I must explain something,” he began. “It is rather serious, it didn’t start out so, but is getting very serious. I got your note about the money more than a week ago—” His voice trembled, broke down, then mastering himself, he went on, “I could not meet the demand. Ah, if I could only get the model I wanted, I could paint a picture whose loveliness none but the blind could dispute—a picture that would bring more than three times the amount I owe you.”
He watched the girl eagerly, the while soft sensations and vague desires thrilled him.
Wasn’t it a wonder that something did not tell him, “It is monstrous, inhuman to thus prey upon the credulity of an impulsive, over sensitive nature.” Not when it is learned that whatever of heart, conscience, manliness, courage, reverence, charity, nature had endowed him at his birth, had been swallowed up in that one quality—selfishness.
“I wish I could help you,” Cherokee said timidly, “for I need the money. All I had has gone for my winter wardrobe.”
“Then I will tell you how to help us both. The model I want is yourself.” He spoke bravely now.
“Me?”
“Yes, if you will let me, I can do us both justice, and you will be counted the dream of all New York.”
She listened to his speech like the bird that flutters around the dazzling serpent; she was fascinated by this dangerous man, and neither able nor honestly willing to escape.
“Besides, I will make your portrait for Mrs. Stanhope free of charge,” was the artist’s afterthought.
“I could not accept so much from you,” she answered, promptly.
“I offered it by way of rewarding your own generosity, but come, say you will pose for me anyhow.”
She regarded him frankly and without embarrassment.
“I will if it is perfectly proper for me to do so. Surely, though, you would not ask me to do it if it were wrong.”
“Not for the world,” he replied magnanimously. “It is entirely proper, many a lady comes there alone. ‘In art there is no sex, you know.’”
“But I am not prepared now, how should I be dressed?”
“In a drapery, and I have all that is necessary. Say you will go,” he pleaded.
She hesitated a moment.
“Well, I will,” was the unfortunate answer.
Within an hour, master and model entered the studio.
“Now, first of all,” observed the master, “you must lay aside all reserve or foolish timidity, remembering the purity of art, and have but one thought—the completion of it. In that room to your right you will find everything that is needed, and over the couch is a study by which you may be guided in draping yourself.”
As the door closed behind Cherokee, Willard Frost caught a glimpse of a beautiful figure, “The Nymph of the Stream.” He listened for a couple of minutes or more, expecting or fearing she wouldbe shocked at first, but as there was no such evidence he had no further misgivings. A thousand beautiful visions floated voluptuously through the thirsting silence. They flushed him as in the wakening strength of wine. And his body, like the sapless bough of some long-wintered tree, suddenly felt all pulses thrilling.
His hot lips murmured, “Victory is mine. Aye, life is beautiful, and earth is fair.”
Then the door opened and the model entered. She did not speak but stood straight and silent, her hands hanging at her side with her palms loosely open—the very abandonment of pathetic helplessness.
The master drew nearer and put out his hands. “Cherokee,” he said.
But he was suddenly awed by a firm “Stop there! I have always tried to be pure-minded, high-souled, sinless, but all this did not shield me from insult,” she cried, with a look of self-pitying horror.
he was suddenly awed
“But he was suddenly awed by a firm ‘Stop there!’” Page 50.
He drew back, and his temper mounted to white heat, but he managed to preserve his suave composure.
“My dear girl, you misunderstand me; art makes its own plea for pardon. You are not angry, are you?”
She looked straight at him, her bosom rose and fell with her quick breathing, and there was such an eloquent scorn in her face that he winced under it, as though struck by a scourge.
“You are not worth my anger; one must have something to be angry with, and you are nothing—neither man, nor beast, for men are brave and beasts tell no lies. Out of my way, coward!”
And she stood waiting for him to obey, her whole frame vibrating with indignation like a harp struck too roughly. The air of absolute authority with which she spoke, stung him even through his hypocrisy and arrogance. He bit his lips and attempted to speak again, but she was gone from the studio.
Every step of her way she saw a serpent crawl back and forth across her hurried path, and she mused to herself: “Let him keep the money, my virtue is worth more to me than all that glitters or is gold.”
Robert Milburn, bent at his desk, his fair head in his hands, was bewildered, angry, in despair.
“Can this be true?” he asked himself. “Is there a possibility of truth in it?”
The air of the gray room grew close, oppressive to the spirit, and at the darkening window he arose from the desk. He put on his long rain-coat, and with a hollow, ominous sound, the door closed behind him and he left the house.
As along he went, Robert caught sight of the bony face of an American millionaire and a beautiful woman in furs, behind the rain-streaked panes of a flashing carriage. On the other side he observed a gigantic iron building from which streams of shop-people poured down every street homeward; these ghastly weary human machines made a pale concourse through the sleet.
Further on his way a girl stood waiting for some one on the curb. He looked at her, dark hair curled on her white neck, her attire poor and common; but she was pretty, with her dark eyes. Areckless, plebeian little piece of earth, shivering, her hands bare and rough, the sleet whipping her face, on the side of which was a discoloration—the result of a blow, perchance. Then he turned his eyes from her who had drawn them.
The arc light above him hung like a dreadful white-bellied insect hovering on two long black wings, and he saw a woman in sleet-soaked rags, bent almost double under a load of sticks collected for firewood. Her hair hung thin and gray in elf-locks, her red eyelids had lost their lashes so that the eyes appeared as those of a bird of prey. The wizened hands clutching the cord which bound the sticks seemed like talons. She importuned a passer-by for help, and, being denied, she cursed him; and Robert watched the wretched creature crawl away homeward—back to the slums.
These were manifestations of the life of thousands in metropolitan history. Robert shook himself, shuddering, as though aroused from a trance.
He had started out to go anywhere or nowhere, but the next hour found him in the presence of Cherokee, and she was saying:
“How awfully fond you are of giving pleasant surprises.”
“I am amazed at myself for coming such a night, and that too without your permission.”
“We are always glad to see you, but Fred and I had contemplated braving the weather to go to hear Paderewski,” she said, sweetly.
“Then don’t let me detain you, I beg of you,” he answered, with profound regret.
“Oh, that’s all right, we have an hour or more, I am all ready, so you stay and go in as we do.”
“No, I will not go with you, but will stay awhile, since you are kind enough to permit me.” And he laughed, a little mournfully.
“Cherokee, I have come for two reasons—to tell you that I am going home to Maryland to see a sick mother, and to tell you——” He paused, hesitating, a great bitterness welled up in his breast; a firmness came about his mouth and he went on:
“It is folly for you to persuade yourself that you could accommodate your future life to sacrifice, poverty—this is all wrong. When we look it coldly in the face it is a fact, and we may dispute facts but it is difficult to alter them.”
There was no response from her except the clasping of the hand he held over his fingers for a moment.
“I had no right that you should wait for me through years, for your young life is filled with possibilities. I, alone, make them impossible, and I must remove that factor.”
“Robert! Robert! What does all this mean?” Her breathless soul hung trembling on his answer.
“It means that I am going to give you back your liberty.”
“And you?” she gasped.
“I will do the best I can with my life. Please God, you shall never be ashamed to remember that you once fancied that you could have cared for me.”
And then he could trust himself no further; the trembling fingers, the soft perfume he knew so well in the air, and the surging realization that the end was at hand, made him weak with longing.
Cherokee was at first shocked and stunned at what he was saying? For a moment the womanly conclusion that he no longer cared for her seemed the only impression, but she put it from her as being unworthy of them both.
Her manner was dignified, yet tender, as she began:
“Robert, I suppose you have not spoken without consideration, and if you think I would be a burden to you, it is best to go on without me.” She ended with a deep-drawn breath.
“That sound was not a sob,” she said bravely, “I only lost my breath and caught it hard again.”
“Yes, Cherokee, I am going without you, going out of your life. Good bye.”
“You cannot go out of it,” she answered, “but good bye.”
“Good bye,” he repeated, which should only mean, “God bless you.”
There was a flutter of pulses, and Robert walked away with head upheld, dry-eyed, to face the world. Unfaltering, she let him go, the while she had more than a suspicion of the lips whose false speaking had wrought her such woe.
When he reached his room he unlocked the drawer, produced from it a card, and looked long and tenderly upon the face he saw. He bent over and kissed the unresponsive lips. This was his requiem in memory of a worthier life. Then lighting a match he set it afire, and watched it burn to a shadowy cinder, which mounted feebly in the air for a moment, making a gray background against whose dullness stood out, in its round finished beauty, the life he had lost—echoing with a true woman’s beautiful soul.
As the ashes whitened at his feet, he thought, “Thus the old life is effaced, I will go into the new.”
The midnight train took him out of town, and Cherokee was weeping over a basket of white roses which had come just at evening.
Now and again Cherokee kissed the roses with pangs of speechless pain. The fragrance that floated from their lips brought only anguish. To her, white roses must ever mean white memories of despair, and their pale ghosts would haunt long after they were dead.
All day the family had been busy packing, for soon the Stanhopes would close the house and take flight. Cherokee had been forced to tell them she had changed her mind and would go to the country; she needed quiet, rest. Pride made her withhold the humiliating fact that she had just money enough to take her down to the South country.
There was a kind, generous friend, who, at her father’s death, offered her a home under his roof for always, and now that promise came to her, holding out its inducement, but she would not accept it; somehow she felt glad that the time of leaving the Stanhopes was near. This pleasant house, these cheerful, affectionate surroundings, had become most intolerable since she must keep anythingfrom them—even though it be but an error of innocence.
“Let me forget the crushing humiliation of the past month,” she told herself, “I must try to be strong, reasonable, if not happy.” She must find some calling, something to sustain herself, to occupy her hands and time. The soft, idle, pleasant existence offered by the friend would enervate rather than fortify—would force her back on herself and on useless regrets.
As she sat in her own room, holding the blank page of her coming life, and studying what the truth should be, there arose before her inner gaze two scenes of a girlish life; fresh, vivid were they, as of yesterday, though both were now of a buried past.
First she recalled the hour when sorrow caught her by the hand, dragged her from the couch of childhood to a darkened room where lay the sphinx-like clay of her mother—the lids closed forever over what had been loving gleams of sympathy—the hands crossed in still rigidity. Her little child heart had no knowledge of the mysteries—love, anguish, death—in whose shadow the zest of life withers. She knew their names but they stood afar off, a veiled and waiting trio.
She crept, sobbing, from that terrible semblance of a mother to the out-door sunshine, and the yard,where the crape-myrtle nodded cheerfully to her just as it did before they frightened her so. The dark house she was afraid of, so she had gone far out of doors. The little lips that had lately quivered piteously, sang a tune in unthinking gaiety, and life was again the same, for she could not then understand.
The other scene was a radiant, sparkling, wildly joyous picture. The world, enticing as a fairy garden, received her in her bright, petted youth—her richly endowed orphanhood had been a perpetual feast. In this period not one single voice of cold or ungracious tenor could she recall.
But now she looked full over that garden, once all abloom. Here a flower with blight in its heart, yonder one whose leaves were falling. There whole bushes were only stems enthorned, and stood brown and bitter, leaves and flowers withered or dead.
“So,” thought she, “it is with my life.” A rap on the door brought her into the present. It was the delivery of the latest mail: some papers, a magazine, and one letter. The letter was postmarked Winchester, Ky. With a little sigh of triumphant expectation, she broke the seal. It, to her thinking, might contain good news from friends at home.
It only took her a moment to scan it all.
“I am sick and needy. Won’t you help me for I am dying from neglect.” This was signed:“Black Mammy,“Judy, (her X mark.)”
“I am sick and needy. Won’t you help me for I am dying from neglect.” This was signed:
“Black Mammy,“Judy, (her X mark.)”
Cherokee read it again. Her eyes closed, and then opened, dilating in swift terror. Her slave-mother suffering for the necessities of life. She who had spent years in chivalrous devotion to the Bell family now appealed to her, the last of that honored name.
A swift pain shot through her veins—a sudden increased anguish—a sense of something irremediable, hopeless, inaccessible, held her in its grip, and a voiceless, smothered cry rent her breast. Tears gushed from her eyes, scalding waters which fell upon her hands and seemed to wither them. Even the fern-leaf, the birth-mark, looked shrunken and shrivelled, as she gazed at it; something told her to remember it held the wraith of a life.
Cherokee was wild with grief. She went to the window and looked far out into the night, letting her sight range all the Southern sky, and the stars looked down with eyes that only stared and hurt her with their lack of sympathy. A gentle windcrept by, and a faint sibilance, as of taut strings throbbed through the coming night. It was Fred, with his violin, waiting for her to come down to accompany him. But she did not go—she had no thought of it being time to eat or time to play—she had forgotten everything, except that a soul had cried to her and she must answer it in so niggardly and miserly a fashion.
Now three, four, five hours had gone since the sunken sun laved the western heaven with lowest tides of day. The tired world, that ever craves for great dark night to come brooding in with draught of healing and blessed rest that recreates, had been lulled to satisfaction. Still mute sorrow held Cherokee, and it was nearly day when peace filled her unremembering eyes and she had forgotten all.
It was a dull, wintry day; blank, ashen sky above—grassland, sere and stark, below. Weedy stubble wore shrouding of black; everything was still—so still, even the birds yet drowsed upon their perch, nor stirred a wing or throat to enliven the depressing wood. A soiled and sullen snowdrift lay dankly by a road that had fallen into disuse. It was crossed now for the first time, maybe, in a full year. A young woman tramped her way along the silent waste to a log shanty. Frozen drifts of the late snow lay packed as they had fallen on the door sill.
She rapped at the door and bent her head to listen; then she rattled it vigorously, and still no answer. She tried the latch, it yielded, and she entered. The light inside was so dim that it was hard at first to make out what was about her. Two hickory logs lay smouldering in a bank of ashes. She stirred the poor excuse for fire, and put on some smaller sticks that lay by the wide fireplace. By this time her eyes had become accustomed to the dimness, and she looked about her. Therewere a few splint-bottomed chairs, a “safe,” a table, and a bed covered with patched bedding and old clothes, and under these—in a flash she was by the bed and had pushed away the covering at the top.
“She is dead,” Cherokee heard herself say aloud, in a voice that sounded not at all her own; but no, there was a feeble flicker of pulse at the shrunken wrist that she instinctively fumbled for under the bed clothes.
“Mammy wake up! I have come to see you—it’s Cherokee, wake up!” she called.
The faintest stir of life passed over the brown old face, and she opened her eyes. It did not seem as though she saw her or anything else. Her shrivelled lips moved, emitting some husky, unintelligible sounds. Cherokee leaned nearer, and strained her ears to catch these terrible words:
“Starvin’—don’t—tell—my—chile.”
With a cry she sprang to her feet; the things to be done in this awful situation mapped themselves with lightning swiftness before her brain; she started the fire to blazing, with chips and more wood that somehow was already there. Then she opened the lunch she had been thoughtful enough to bring; there was chicken, and crackers, and bread. She seized a skillet, warmed the food,hurried back to the bed, and fed the woman as though she had been a baby.
Soon she thought she could see the influence of food and warmth; but it hurt her to see in the face no indication of consciousness; there was a blank stare that showed no hope of recognition.
As she laid the patient back upon the pillow of straw there was a sound at the door, a sound as of some one knocking the mud from clumsy shoes. A colored woman stepped in.
“How you do, Aunt Judy?”
“Don’t disturb her now, she is very weak,” warned Cherokee.
The visitor looked somewhat shocked to see a white lady sitting with Aunt Judy’s hand in hers, softly rubbing it. “What’s ailin’ her?” she questioned in a whisper, “we-all ain’t hearn nothin’ at all.”
“I came and found her almost dead with hunger, and she is being terribly neglected.”
“Well! fo’ de lawd, we-all ain’t hearn nary, single word! I ’lowed she was ’bout as common; course I know de ole ’oman bin ailin’ all de year, but I didn’t know she was down. I wish we had ha’ knowed it, we-all would a comed up and holped.”
“It is not too late yet,” said Cherokee, gently.
“Yes um, we all likes Aunt Judy, she’s a good ole ’oman, I thought Jim was here wid her. Don’t know who he is? Jim is her gran’son, a mighty shiftless, wuthless chap, but I thought arter she bin so good to him he’d a stayed wid her when she got down. But I’ll stay and do all I kin.”
Cherokee thanked her gravely, gratefully.
The darkey went on whispering:
“De ole ’oman bin mighty ’stressed ’bout dyin’. She didn’t mind so much the dyin’ ez she wanted to be kyaried to de ole plantation to be buried ’long wid her folks. Dat’s more’n ten or ’leven miles, and she knowd dey wouldn’t haul her dat fur—’spec’ly ef de weather wus bad. I ’spec worrin’ got her down.”
Cherokee told the visitor to try and arouse her, now that she had had time to rest after her meal.
She took up one of her worn brown hands.
“How do you feel, Aunt Judy?”
“Porely, porely,” she stammered almost inaudibly.
“Why didn’t you let we-all know?”
“Thar warn’t nobody to sen’ ’roun’.”
“Whars Jim?” the visitor enquired.
Her face gloomed sadly.
“Law, hunny, he took all de money Mas’r left me, and runned away.” She looked up with tears in her eyes.
“Tildy, I mout’ent o’ grieved ’bout de money, but now dey’ll bury me jes like a common nigger—out in de woods.”
“Maybe not, sumpin’ mite turn up dat’ll set things right,” she said, comfortingly.
The old woman talked with great effort, but she seemed interested in this one particular subject.
“Tildy, I ain’t afeard ter die, and I’se lived out my time, but we-all’s folks wus buried ’spectable—buried in de grabe-yard at home. One cornder wus cut off for we-all in deir buryin’ groun’; my ole man, he’s buried dar, and Jerry, my son, he’s buried dar, and our white people thought a sight o’ we-all. Dey’ed want me sent right dar.”
“Whar dey-all—your white folks?” asked Tildy, wistfully.
“All daid but one—my chile, Miss Cheraky. I wus her black mammy, and she lub’d me—if she was here I’d——” She broke down, crying pitifully—lifting her arms caressingly, as though a baby were in them.
Cherokee knew now that she would recognize her, so she came up close to her.
“Yes, Mammy, you are right, our loved ones should rest together, I will see that you go back home.”
“Oh, my chile!”—she caught her breath in a sob of joy, “God A’mighty bless you, God A’mighty bless you!”
“Don’t excite yourself, I shall stay until you are well, or better.” Cherokee stooped and patted her tenderly.
“My chile’s dun come to kyar ole mammy home,” she repeated again and again, until at last, exhausted from joy, she fell asleep.
Tildy and the young white lady kept a still watch, broken only by stalled cattle that mooed forth plaintive pleadings.
Cheerless winter days were gone. Spring had grown bountiful at last, though long; like a miser
“Had kept much wealth of bloom,Had hoarded half her treasures up in winter’s tomb.”
“Had kept much wealth of bloom,Had hoarded half her treasures up in winter’s tomb.”
“Had kept much wealth of bloom,Had hoarded half her treasures up in winter’s tomb.”
“Had kept much wealth of bloom,
Had hoarded half her treasures up in winter’s tomb.”
But her penitence was wrought in raindrops ringed with fragile gold—the tears that April sheds. Now vernal grace was complete; the only thing to do was to go out in it, to rejoice in its depth of color, in its hours of flooded life, its passion pulse of growth.
“Ashland,” that peerless Southern home, was set well in a forest lawn. The great, old-fashioned, deep-red brick house, with its broad verandas, outlined by long rows of fluted columns, ending with wing rooms, was half ivy-covered. A man came out upon the steps and looked across his goodly acres. Day-beams had melted the sheet of silvery dew. A south wind was asweep through fields of wheat, a shadow-haunted cloth of bearded gold, and blades of blue grass were all wind-tangled too. How thewind wallowed, and shook, with a petulant air, and a shiver as if in pain. The man looked away to the eastward, to where even rows of stalls lined his race-course—a kite-shaped track.
A darkey boy came up with a saddled mare, and the master took the reins, put foot in the stirrup and mounted to the saddle. He was a large, finely built man, fresh in the forties; kindness and determination filled the dark eyes, and the broad forehead was not unvisited by care. The hand that buckled the bridle was fat, smooth and white, very much given to hand-shaking and benedictions. As he was about to ride away, the jingling pole-chains of a vehicle arrested his attention. Looking around the curve, he saw a carriage coming up—a smartly dressed man stepped out, who asked:
“Have I the honor—is this Major McDowell?”
“That is my name, sir; and yours?”
“Frost—Willard Frost,” returned the other, cordially extending his hand.
The Major said, warmly:
“Glad to know you, Mr. Frost; will you come in?” and the Major got down from his horse.
“Thanks. I came with the view of buying a racer. Had you started away?”
“Only down to the stables; you will come right over with me,” he proposed.
“Very good. To go over a stock farm has been a pleasure I have held in reserve until a proper opportunity presented itself. Shall I ride or walk?”
“Dismiss the carriage and be my guest for the day, I will have you a horse brought to ride.”
“Oh, thank you, awfully,” returned the profuse stranger. And he indicated his acceptance by carrying out the host’s suggestion.
“Call for me in time for the east-bound evening train,” he said, to the driver.
Pretty soon the Major had the horse brought, and they rode down to the stables.
“I think, Mr. Frost, I have heard your name before.”
The other felt himself swelling. “I shouldn’t wonder; I am a dauber of portraits, from New York, and you I have heard quite a deal of, through young Milburn.”
“Robert Milburn! Why bless the boy, I am quite interested in his career; he, too, had aspirations in that line. How did he turn out?” asked the Major, with considerable interest.
“Well, he is an industrious worker, and may yet do some clever work, if drink doesn’t throw him.”
“Drink!” exclaimed the other, “I can scarcely believe it. He impressed me as a sober youth, fullof the stuff that goes to make a man. What a pity; I suppose it was evil associations.”
“A pretty girl is at the bottom of it, I understand. You know, ‘whom nature makes most fair she scarce makes true.’”
The Major re-adjusted his hat, and breathed deeply.
“Ah! well, I don’t believe in laying everything on women. Maybe it was something else. Has he had no other annoyance, vexations or sorrow?”
“Yes, he lost his mother in mid-winter, but I saw but little change in him; true, he alluded to it in a casual way,” remarked Frost, lightly.
“But such deep grief seeks little sympathy of companions; it lies with a sensitive nature, bound within the narrowest circles of the heart; they only who hold the key to its innermost recesses can speak consolation. From what I know of Robert Milburn this grief must have gone hard with him.”
Here they came upon the track where the trainer was examining a new sulky.
“Bring out ‘Bridal Bells,’ Mr. Noble. I want to show the gentleman some of our standard-breds.”
The trainer’s lean face lighted with native pride. With little shrill neighs “Bridal Bells” came prancing afield; she seemed impatient to dash headlongthrough the morning’s electric chill. Pride was not prouder than the arch of her chest.
“What a beauty, what a poem!” Frost’s enthusiasm seemed an inspiration to the Major.
“She is marvellously well favored, sir; comes from the ‘Beautiful Bells’ family, that is, without a doubt, one of the richest and most remarkable known. If you want a good racer she is your chance. Racing blood speaks in the sharp, thin crest, the quick, intelligent ear, the fine flatbone and clean line of limb.”
Frost looked in her mouth, put on a grave face, as though he understood “horseology.”
The Major gave her age, record, pedigree and price so fast that the other found it difficult to keep looking wise and listen at the same time.
The trainer then brought out another, a brown horse with tan muzzle and flanks.
“Here, sir, is ‘Baron Wilkes’; thus far he has proven an extremely worthy son of a great sire, the peerless ‘George Wilkes.’ He was bred in unsurpassed lines, is 15½ hands high, and at two years old took a record of 2:34¼.”
“Ah! he is a handsome individual; look what admirable legs and feet,” exclaimed the guest.
“And a race horse all over. But here comes my ideal,” he added, with pride, as across the swardpranced a solid bay without any white; black markings extending above his knees and hocks. A horse of finish and symmetrical build, well-balanced and adjusted in every member. The one prevailing make-up was power—power in every line and muscle. Forehead exceedingly broad and full, and a windpipe flaring, trumpet like, at the throttle.
“Now I will show you a record-breaker,” the while he patted him affectionately.
“This is ‘Kremlin,’ unquestionably the fastest trotter, except illustrious ‘Alix.’ Under ordinary exercise his disposition is very gentle, there being an independent air of quiet nonchalance that is peculiarly his own. Harnessing or unharnessing of colts, or the proximity of mares, doesn’t disturb his serene composure. But roused into action his mental energies seem to glow at white heat. He is all life, a veritable equine incarnation of force, energy, determination—a horse that ‘would meet a troop of hell, at the sound of the gong,’ and, I might add, beat them out at the wire. His gait, as may be judged from his speed, is the poetry of motion; no waste action, but elastic, quick, true. He is a natural trotting machine. His body is propelled straight as an air line, and his legs move with the precision of perfect mechanism.”
“What shoe does he carry?” asked the New Yorker.
“Ten ounces in front, five behind.”
“He is certainly a good animal, I should like to own him; but, all around, I believe I prefer ‘Bridal Bells.’ To own one good racer is a pleasure. I take moderate, not excessive, interest in races,” explained Frost.
“It is rather an expensive luxury, if you only view it from the standpoint of pleasure and pride.”
“Oh, when we can afford these things, it is all very well, I have always been extravagant, self-indulgent,” and he took out his pocket book.
“I must have her,” counting out a big roll of bills and laying them in the Major’s hand. “There is your price for my queen.” And “Bridal Bells” had a new master.
Like most Southerners, Major McDowell had the happy faculty of entertaining his guests royally.
The New Yorker was there for the day, at the kind solicitation of the Major and his most estimable wife. Afternoon brought a rimming haze; the wind had hushed, and the thick, lifeless air bespoke rain. A cloud no bigger than a man’s hand had gathered at low-sky; then mounted, swelling, to the zenith, and wrapped the heavens in a pall and covered the earth’s face with darkness that was fearfully illumined by the lightning’s glare.
Host and guest stood by an open window looking to the southward. Rain came down, pelting the earth with a sheeted fall that soon sent muddy runnels adown every fresh furrow. Before the rain was half over, horses were led from their stalls to the dripping freedom of wide pasture lands.
How green, and still, and sweet-smelling it lies. No wonder the animals ran ecstatically about,neighing, prancing, nipping one at the other, snatching lush, tender mouthfuls between rolls on the soft, wet turf.
“A goodly sight, Major; I see that you have peculiar advantages of soil and climate for stock-raising,” remarked the guest.
“That must be true, and it is a recognition of that superiority that sends breeders from all parts of the world to Kentucky. ‘Kentucky for fine horses, good whiskey, and pretty women,’ is a maxim old and doubtless true.”
“I can vouch for the first two, but it has not been my luck to meet many of your fair women.”
“Well, it is proof true,” said the Major; “look for yourself,” and he pointed to the forest lawn where a young woman was coming between the elm rows, a child’s hand in each of her own. Her figure preserved that girlish accent which few women manage to carry over into womanhood.
She had blonde-brown hair, and blue eyes—very dark and tender. She looked up as she passed the window, and was none the less charming for her startled look. The quick averted glance sent a blush to the face of Willard Frost.
Some imagine that only virgins blush; that is a mistake. A blush signifies but a change in the circulation of the blood; animals can blush. Therabbit is so sensitive that its ears are dyed crimson at the least sudden impression.
“That is Cherokee Bell, the prettiest of them all; yes, and the best.” The Major’s tone was deep and earnest.
The guest immediately grasped the water bottle, poured himself a glass and drank it off slowly, with majestic mien, to calm himself.
“She is beautiful!” he exclaimed, and shutting his teeth together: “Why in the name of heaven did I run upon her”—this to himself.
“My wife and I have always been very fond of her—she is our governess.”
“Your governess!” Frost’s smile of superiority lighted his face as he added: “I had thought I would like to know more of her, but——”
“She seldom meets strangers,” said the Major quietly, and looking steadily at him. “She has had some little experience in the outer world. She is more contented here with us.”
“How long has she been with you?”
“Six months and more.”
Frost’s voice was unsteady as he asked, “Hasn’t hers been a life of romance? She looks like a woman with a history.”
“You are a regular old gypsy at fortune telling. She has had a varied life, poor child.”
“And the scar I noticed upon the back of her right hand. How did that happen?”
“I will tell you,” answered the Major, suggesting—“Maybe you’d like a smoke; suppose we go on the veranda?”
The guest assented, and taking his hat from a table, followed the other.
Scent of the lilacs fanned through the ivy, and the sodden trees dropped rain on the drenched grass.
“I think,” said the Major, as they turned at the end of the veranda to retrace it again: “as you seem greatly interested in my pretty governess, I will give you the history of what you call a scar—that is a fern-leaf—a birth-mark.”
Frost puffed away in a negligent manner of easy interest, and said:
“I should like to hear it.”
“It takes me back to distant, cruel days of war—her father, Darwin Bell, was my friend; we were comrades; he had been brought up on a big plantation, just this side of the mountainous region—it is sixty miles from here—to the northwest. That mountain and the valley on which he lived were favorite haunts of mine in those memorable early days of my life. I was three years Darwin’s junior, and never had I realized his being ahead of me until, at twenty-one, he brought home a wife.Soon the war broke out; he was no coward, not half-hearted, and when the summons came he was ready to go. I was to enlist at the same time. We, like hundreds of others, had only time to make hasty and almost wordless farewells. He had to leave this young wife in the care of servants, Aunt Judy, and I believe her husband’s name was Lige, and she had a son. They were to guard his love-nest while he went out to fight for the Southern cause.
“Aunt Judy made many promises; I remember how good were her words of comfort. He respected her as sacredly as the leaves of his dead mother’s Bible, and the safety of his saber. Her brown, leathery face was showered with tears as the young husband and wife, hand in hand, went to the gate; she drew back and sat down on the door-steps, not daring to intrude on those last few moments.
“The pale little wife could not trust herself to speak; she could only cling to Darwin, as, whispering tender words of endearment, he caught her in his arms in a last embrace; then tearing himself away, and strangling a sob, he mounted his horse and started for the war.
“She watched us go, and, no doubt, deadly fear for his safety must have clutched at her heart, and the longing to call him back, to implore him for hersake not to risk his life, must have been almost irresistible.
“But the thought of manhood and country flashed into her mind, no doubt, and nerved her; for, when he turned to wave a last farewell, her face lighted with a brave, cheering smile, which lived in his heart the whole war-time. I will not take time to tell of the trials and discomforts; you know enough of that by what you’ve read.
“It was six or maybe seven months afterward when we were back in old ‘Kaintuck;’ the day of which I speak, we of the cavalry, against customary plans, were set in the forefront, not on the wings.
“As the mist lifted, we looked across the valley to see the Kentucky river gleaming in the sun. It was a familiar sight, a house here and there, nearer to us a little church, with its graveyard surrounding; we could see the white headstones, and the old slate ones like black coffin lids upright. The noise of war, it seemed to me, was enough to rouse the dead from the buried rest of years.
“The church reminded me that it was Sunday; with some prickings of conscience for having forgotten, I lowered my head, and asked that the right might triumph, and that a peace founded on righteousness might be won through the strife.”
“And don’t you think your prayer has been answered?” asked the listener, interrupting.
The other dropped his voice:
“I am not discussing that question,” and he kept on with his recital.
“Later in the day, Darwin came to me, his face aglow, his eyes bright with eager delight, and in great excitement.
“‘I am just two miles from home; if I can get a permit I am going there to-night.’
“I exclaimed: ‘You are mad, man, they are so close to us that the sentinels almost touch each other, we will have a skirmish inside of an hour!’
“‘I am going when the fight is done, if I am spared.’
“I knew him, and he meant it, but I was almost certain he would be killed. My prediction proved true, we did have a fight; and for a time they had the advantage, and no one knew how the day would have gone had not a gallant soldier, too impulsive to obey orders, charged with his men too close to our cannon. Poor fellow! he died bravely, but his rash act gave us the victory; they retreated in good order and molested us no further. Darwin arranged for a leave of an hour’s absence and went home, but his unthinking haste nearly cost him his life. He barely made into the mountainway whena scout fired upon him. The scout could not risk the unknown way of the mountain, so Darwin was saved.
“He galloped about the gloomy gorges fanged with ledges of rock, and it was as easy for him to find his way there as in a beaten path. He fired, now here, now there, until the mountain seemed alive with armed men. By the time the smoke reached the tree tops here, he was away a hundred yards.
“By midnight he had rejoined us; having assurance of his wife’s well-being, and the faithfulness of Aunt Judy, who nightly slept on the family silver, Darwin, pretty well fagged out, dropped down to sleep. I had gotten aroused by his coming, and could not go back to sleep, myself.
“I marvelled, as I looked across at the young soldier, to find neither bitterness nor dissatisfaction on his face, which, even in repose, retained something of its former bright expression; and it bore no traces of the weary war, save in a certain hollowness of the cheeks. I thought that to have to be away from a young wife was enough to justify a man in cursing war, but he looked happy, as he lay there wrapped in profound slumber; beside him lay his saber, and the keen wind flapped vigorously at the gray cloak in which he wasenveloped, without in the least disturbing him. A more perfect picture of peace in the midst of war, of rest in strife, you could not find.
“I said to myself, proudly: ‘The man that can wear that look after continued hard duty, without comfortable quarters, is made of brave mettle.’
“Lying in damp fields of nights was calculated to make us feel little else but cold and stiffness.
“The next night, by some means, he went home again to say ‘good bye,’ he told me, though, I suppose, he had said that when he left before; but that was none of my business; I was glad he could have the privilege again.
“Aunt Judy stood sentinel, and for safe quarters, the wife took Darwin up-stairs. He had told them how he got into camp the night before. The good woman-guard had to strain her eyes, for night was coming fast; the fog, a sad, dun color, was dense, deadly.
“Pretty soon she heard the sound of horses’ feet; she was all nervous, for she feared it was ‘dem blue coats comin’.’ With trembling voice she called, ‘Leetle Massa! dey’s comin’, dey’s comin’!’ Jerry was standing inside the buggy-house, with Massa’s horse ready for him. Aunt Judy couldn’t make the captain hear. Her alarm was not unfounded; already two Federals shook the door, while a third watchedthe surroundings, ready to give the alarm; they were pretty certain a Confederate was visiting here, and were determined to capture him.
“Quick as a flash Aunt Judy took in the situation; she could hear them storming at the door; they meant to be admitted, if by force. There was handling of a faded gray coat—a sacred keep-sake of hers—and a hurried whisper:
“‘Run to de mountain, dey’ll follow; do as massa done.’
“The next minute horse and rider, as one, went dashing through the dusk; the scheme acted like a charm. The Federals soon followed in swift pursuit, and, until it was almost over, Darwin knew nothing of his peril. He was deeply moved by this heroic act, the while his mind was filled with grave fears for the safety of the boy. They waited until ample time for his return, and kept up spirits until the horse came up, riderless. A great unwonted tumult stirred and lashed the calm currents of his blood into a whirling storm.
“This was enough; he started out on his search. The women would go with him—what more natural—any of us would have let them go. The faint flarings of dawn lit their perilous way. Of course the women were more or less nervous; though the whole world was ‘still as the heart of the dead,’they were being alarmed by all sorts of imaginary things. Aunt Judy was pitiful. She bore up under it for the young woman’s sake, but now and then she would lag behind and cry softly to herself, for her boy was dear to that old heart. When they began to go up the side of the mountain, Darwin had to go first to break back the thick undergrowth. Presently he stumbled and had to catch at hazel bushes to keep from falling.
“‘Good God!’ he exclaimed, ‘and he tried to save me from this!’
“But his words seemed to die away within his lips, and in dreadful self-reproach he bent over Jerry, shuddering at the deathly cold of his face and hands. There, before them, the boy Jerry lay, spent and done. His head rested upon a bed of blood-withered ferns.”
Frost gazed at the vaulted expanse a moment, then said:
“So that accounts for the birth-mark?”
“Yes, and partially for her being here. Loyal to that noble slave, she came down and nursed Aunt Judy five weeks, until she followed her boy to that land lit by the everlasting sun. Listen!” The Major heard the piano; taking his handkerchief he wiped his eyes. “Pshaw, tears! why I am as soft as a girl, but that music makes my eyes blur; Iam back in my twenties when I hear ‘Marching Through Georgia.’”
“Darwin’s child has been badly used since he died. He left her the small sum of thirty-seven hundred dollars—not much. No, but enough to keep a girl in a modest way. But she was deluded into going away to New York in high society, and she got back here without a cent. She is working now to pay for the burial of Aunt Judy.”
The other did not ask what became of her money, but the Major answered as if he had.
“My wife tells me that a man actually borrowed a part of it; what a contemptible thing for a man to do.”
The singing was still heard, and Frost appeared absorbed in that. He made no answer, but commented:
“What a delicious quality of voice she has. It seems as though it were impregnated with the tender harmony that must reign in her soul. But, pardon me, I must go into Lexington, the carriage is waiting.”
“Won’t you spend the night, Mr. Frost?” asked the Major.
“Thank you, sir, I have greatly enjoyed your hospitality, but I must catch the first east-bound train.”
The crouching heart within him quailed like a shuddering thing, and he went away very like a cur that is stoned from the door.