Softly now the Easter sunlightFalls on Judea’s wooded hills,Shining redly through the tree tops,Lighting up the running rills.While all things in earth and heavenSing aloud with one acclaimGlory in the highest, Glory,Glory be to Jesus’ name.
Softly now the Easter sunlightFalls on Judea’s wooded hills,Shining redly through the tree tops,Lighting up the running rills.While all things in earth and heavenSing aloud with one acclaimGlory in the highest, Glory,Glory be to Jesus’ name.
Softly now the Easter sunlightFalls on Judea’s wooded hills,Shining redly through the tree tops,Lighting up the running rills.
Softly now the Easter sunlight
Falls on Judea’s wooded hills,
Shining redly through the tree tops,
Lighting up the running rills.
While all things in earth and heavenSing aloud with one acclaimGlory in the highest, Glory,Glory be to Jesus’ name.
While all things in earth and heaven
Sing aloud with one acclaim
Glory in the highest, Glory,
Glory be to Jesus’ name.
“There was a lot more, but I can’t remember how it goes. Carlyle spoke a piece, too, and did first rate for a little shaver. I taught it to him, but ’twas hard work, as he’d rather play with Don,—that’s the dog. Tell him good-bye, and good-bye Fan-an-Ann, and Ann-an-Fan. Queer that there’s two of you. I don’t believe he knew, but I’ll tell him, and that they were good to me and didn’t let ’em catch me. Now say ‘Our Father,’ for I am getting sleepy, and it is growing dark.â€
It was Fan who said it; I could not speak, for I saw the death pallor gather on the face of the boy, who repeated with Fan the familiar words.
“That makes it about square with me and Jesus, and I guess that he won’t turn off a poor boy like me,†he said, and then for a time he was back again at Fredericksburg, fighting like a little bear; then with Charlie in the woodssinging a low lullaby such as mothers sing to their restless infants; then in the meal chest and under the bed and in the pounding barrel, shivering with fear, and at last with Fan-an-Ann, who he said was abrick. Then he seemed to listen intently, and whispered, “Hark. Don’t you hear the guns? how they bang away; and how red the river runs; and how fast the men go down! Oh, God, have pity on us all.â€
For a moment he lay quiet; then, rousing again, called out triumphantly, “The war is over; the victory is won; Hurrah for——.†He meant to say “The boys in blue.†He had said it often in his delirium, but something in Fan’s eyes checked him, and after looking steadily at her an instant he raised his right arm in the air and called out in a clear, shrill voice, “Hurrah for Fan-an-Ann; three cheers and a tiger, too!†then the hand dropped upon his breast and The Boy was dead.
The neighbors for miles around had heard of him and many had come to us bringing delicacies and flowers and offering assistance, if it were needed. The aid Fan declined, but took the flowers and fruit to the boy, telling him who sent them.
“They are very kind,†he said. “I guess I’m some reconstructed, though I am a Yank yet and stick to the flag.Yes, sir!â€
Neither Fan nor I could repress a smile at the energy with which he asserted his loyalty to his cause, and neither liked him the less for it. Fan, too, must have been “some reconstructed,†for she cared for him to the last as tenderly as if he had been her brother, and when he was dead, she with Phyllis made him ready for the grave, crying over him as she had not cried when Charlie died. Then her tears would not come, but now they fell in torrentsas she brushed his wavy hair, which had grown rather long and lay in soft rings about his forehead, giving him the look of a young girl, rather than a boy, whose age we could not guess. We cut off two or three of his curls and put them, with the letter he had written for Charlie, into the pocket of the blue uniform which, with the grey, we left hanging on the wall in Charlie’s room.
We buried him on Easter day, and he had the largest funeral ever seen in the neighborhood, for everybody came, and his coffin, over which we hung the Federal flag, was heaped with lilies, which were afterwards dropped into his grave. Then we tried to find his friends, but with only Aunt Martha and Carlyle and the little town in Maine to guide us, it proved a fruitless task.
Fan wrote to the postmaster of the town in Maine, giving all the particulars, and after two months or more she received an answer from the postmaster’s wife, who said that during the first year of the war a company had gone from an adjoining town and in it was a boy, who gave his name as Joseph Wilde. He was a comparative stranger in town and had been for a short time in the employ of a grocer, who spoke very highly of him. But where he came from no one knew, or if he had any friends. And that was all we could learn of “The Boy,†whom we buried on the hillside beside our brother. At the head of his grave is a plain marble slab, and on it “The Boy, who died Good Friday, 1863.†This was Fan’s idea, and every Decoration Day after the war was over she used to hang the Stars and Bars over Charlie’s grave and the Stars and Stripes over the grave of The Boy, who has slept there now for many a year and will sleep there until from the North and the South, the East and the West, the boysin blue and the boys in grey will come together, a vast army, and what was crooked to them here will be made plain and we, who now see through a glass darkly, will then see face to face in the light of the Resurrection morning.
We had done our best to win and had failed. We were conquered, but in Lovering at least we accepted the situation and rejoiced for the peace and quiet which came to us with the disappearance of the soldiers from our soil. Even Fan was glad to go to bed feeling sure that her sleep would not be disturbed by the tramp of horses’ feet or the clamor of hungry men for food and shelter. Our little town had been visited so often by both armies and levied on so frequently for means to carry on the war that its people were greatly impoverished. Whether it were that our house was larger and our accommodations generally more ample, or that our father’s manner of receiving an unwelcome visitor was different from our neighbors, we seemed to have suffered most. Our horses and cows and sheep were gone. Our negroes were gone with the exception of Phyllis, who, after her first attempt to leave, stood firmly by us, refusing wages after she knew she was free.
Only poor white truck work for pay, and she wasn’t one of them, she said.
Our timber was damaged for the soldiers had cut down the trees in our woods for their camp fires, and worst of all our father’s patients were mostly gone. Belonging to the old school, in which he believed as he did in his religion, he adhered strictly to his morphine and calomel, and when a young physician from Richmond opened an officein town, with little bottles and little pills, and prices to correspond, the people flocked to him, and father was left with only a few patients and a long list of uncollectible bills against some of the deserters. Both Fan and I inclined to homeopathy and urged him to adopt it to some extent, but he shook his head. He had sat on the fence during the war, he said, and received only kicks from either side, and now he should stick to his principles and allopathy if he starved. We did not starve, but we were at times in great straits. Fan and I made over our old dresses for ourselves and little Katy, and we brushed and mended father’s clothes, which, in spite of our care grew more and more threadbare and shabby until his dress coat was the only garment which was not shiny and had not more or less darns in it. This he always wore to dinner, partly from habit, partly to please us, and more I think to please old Phyllis, who felt that the glory of the family had not quite departed so long as the swallow tail appeared at dinner, even if it were laid aside the moment the meal was over. There was no denying the fact that grim poverty was staring us in the face, and no one felt it more keenly than Phyllis, who, although she would take nothing from us, offered to hire out for wages which she would give to us. This we would not allow, and we struggled on through the summer, raising and selling what we could from our land, which we all worked together, and living on as little as it was possible for five people to live upon. Fan suffered the most, she was so proud and so luxurious in her tastes and so averse to any thing like economy.
“I’d do anything for money,†she said one day to Jack Fullerton, who was helping us pick our grapes, which he was to sell for us in Petersburg.
Jack had won his shoulder-straps and was a lieutenant when the war closed, but he dropped the title with his uniform and was only Jack to us,—a handsome, honest-hearted young man, whom everybody liked, whom I adored in secret, and whom Fan worried and teased and flirted with outrageously. She knew he loved her, and I believed she loved him in return. But she encouraged him one day and repelled him the next, saying often in his presence that she should never marry unless the man had money and it would be useless for one without it to offer himself to her.
“Then I’d better not do it,†Jack would say, jokingly, with the most intense love burning in his eyes and sounding in his voice.
“No, you’d better not, if you don’t want me to refuse to speak to you again,†she would answer, with a laugh and a look which only made him more in love than ever.
He knew she cared for him, and that it was only the barrier of poverty which stood between them. And so they joked and quarreled and made up, and he was with us every day, helping in the garden and yard and at last with the grapes, of which we had quantities that year. Father was in Boston, where he had gone on some business which he hoped might result in a little profit. While there he had, through the influence of a friend, been called to see a Mrs. Haverleigh, who was very ill. As her family physician was in Europe she had asked him to attend her until she was better. To this he had consented and had been gone from home three or four weeks. Knowing that our grapes must be picked Jack had offered his services and on a lovely September morning we were all out by the vines filling the baskets with great purple clusters of fruit which Jack sometimes cut for us and sometimes Fan,who was in wild spirits. She had taken her turn at cutting and was sitting half way up the step-ladder, looking very lovely and picturesque against the green background, in her old black skirt and scarlet jacket, with the bright color in her face and her hair blowing around her forehead. A handsome carriage drawn by a span of fine horses had gone by. Its occupants,—a gentleman and lady,—seemed to be scanning our house curiously. We could see the lady distinctly and felt sure she was from some city, Richmond presumably, and Fan was speculating about her and wishing she could ride in her carriage, when I heard a step on the grass, and a tall distinguished-looking man came towards us. In his citizen’s dress I did not at once recognize him; but Fan did, and, without coming from her perch, exclaimed, “Col. Errington!â€
Then I knew the handsome officer, who had once been our guest and who now greeted us with the smile I remembered so well, because it had in it something so cold and patronizing.
“Good afternoon, Colonel,†Fan said to him. “You have come back to see your conquered enemies, I suppose. We heard of your promotion and of the bullet wound some of our boys gave you at Petersburg. Was it in your back?â€
She was very saucy, and for an instant a hot color flamed into the Colonel’s face, and there came into his grey eyes a red look such as I had seen once or twice when he was quartered upon us and his men displeased him. But it quickly faded under the spell of Fan’s beauty, and the light which flashed from her eyes and belied her words.
Laughing good-humoredly, the colonel replied, “Rebellious as ever, I see; I hoped I might find you reconstructed.â€
“Not a bit of it,†Fan said, stepping down from the ladder and running her fingers through her hair, by which means she left a long mark of grape juice on her forehead. “We are just as big rebels as ever. You beat us because you had more men and money, and we were obliged to give up. It was like a big dog fighting a little dog, which has just as much courage and more, too, than the big one, but is finally worn out by strength rather than by skill. Do you see the point?â€
“Yes, I see,†he said, “and in Constantinople I have also seen the big dog, after the fight was over, take the little one in its paws and toss it up and fondle it as if there had been no bone of contention. I hope it may be so in this case.â€
There was no mistaking the admiration with which the Colonel regarded Fan. Jack saw it and drew a step nearer to her, while she answered hotly, “Never! We are not Turks, and only a dog would suffer itself to be fondled by the hand which had whipped it.†Then she added with a laugh: “Don’t let us quarrel over spilled milk, but let me present to you my friend, Lieut. Fullerton, Col. Errington.â€
During the skirmish between the Colonel and Fan, I had mentally contrasted the two men, Jack and the Colonel, between whose ages there was a difference of several years. Both were tall and erect, with a bearing which comes only from military discipline. By the majority of people the Colonel would have been called the finer looking, as he was the moredistingué, with his polish and air of fashion and city breeding. But to me he bore no comparison to Jack Fullerton, with his honest face and kindly smile and eyes which met yours fearlessly. His clothes were shabby and country made, it is true; hisshoes were worn and grey, and his hands were not as soft and white as those which the Colonel had a trick of rubbing together as he talked, and on one of which a small diamond was shining. But they were helpful hands, ready always for service both to friend or foe, and in his heart no passions had ever stirred like those which at times showed themselves on Col. Errington’s face.
After the introduction the two men, who had fought against each other in more than one battle, shook hands as cordially as if they had been old friends and for a few moments chatted together pleasantly. Then, turning to Fan, the Colonel explained that he had come to Petersburg on business and that his sister Cornelia, who kept his house in Washington, had accompanied him. Remembering his visit to our neighborhood a little more than a year ago, and desirous to see the place again, he had suggested to his sister that they drive out from Petersburg.
“We started early,†he said, “and have enjoyed ourselves immensely. Cornie is delighted with your Virginia scenery. She is at the Golden Horn, and if agreeable to you I will bring her to call.â€
Both Fan and I gasped at the thought of so great a lady, as we felt sure Miss Cornelia Errington must be, coming to call upon us. But we soon rallied and said we should be pleased to see her, and then to my amazement Fan added: “We would invite you to lunch if we were going to have anything but potatoes, green corn, hoe-cake and grapes. We don’t have very elaborate meals since you Yankees spoiled us.â€
The Colonel took no notice of the last remark, but said: “Grapes, hoe-cake, green corn and baked potatoes, the four things I like best in all the culinary department, andso does Cornie; we’ll come. To say the truth I did not much like the looks of the Golden Horn. What time do you lunch?â€
Fan told him, and then extended an invitation to Jack to lunch with us. But he declined, and I could see a shadow on his face as he walked away from the house, followed soon by the Colonel, who was going for his sister.
“Fanny Hathern!†I exclaimed, when we were alone, “are you crazy to ask those people here when you know we’ve nothing fit to offer them.â€
“What is good enough for us is good enough for them,†Fan answered, proudly, starting for the kitchen and a conference with Phyllis, while I began to put our rooms in order for the expected visitors.
Cornelia Errington, whom her brother called Cornie, was a very handsome woman of twenty-eight or thirty, but seemingly as cold as a block of marble, except when she smiled. Then the whole expression of her face changed as completely as if she had been another person. She was born in New York, but had lived many years in Washington, where she superintended her brother’s house. She was highly accomplished, had traveled extensively, knew the best people everywhere, and was in every sense a lady. She met us very graciously, and affected to be delighted with our rambling old Virginia house; which she said was her ideal of a planter’s home, with its great airy rooms, wide hall and broad piazzas.
“But my papa ain’t a planter, he’s a doctor and a gentleman,†Katy said.
She had been greatly impressed with the lady’s manner and dress and diamond rings, and evidently wished to impress her in turn with her father’s greatness. Drawing Katy to her and stroking her golden hair Miss Erringtonreplied, “I am sure he is a gentleman, whether he is a doctor or a farmer, and you are a dear little creature. Was it you I heard singing in the yard before lunch?â€
Katy was always singing and so accustomed were we to it that we seldom paid much attention, except sometimes to wonder if it were she or the canary bird in its cage trilling so loud and clear. Now, however, we remembered to have heard her imitating a mocking bird just before Phyllis, with her red turban built up five or six inches higher than usual, announced with a low courtesy that lunch was served. There was in the room our old piano brought from Charleston by our mother and seldom used for neither Fan nor I were very musical. Going up to it Miss Errington ran her fingers up and down the keys in a way which showed that she was mistress of the instrument.
“Shocking!†she said, involuntarily, then apologetically to Fan, “I beg your pardon, but with such a voice in embryo as that I heard outside you ought to have a better piano;†then to Katy, “Sing to me, child, something, I don’t care what.â€
Nothing could suit Katy better. She had often sang alone in school and Sunday school, and striking her stage attitude, as Fan called it she sang as I had never heard her sing before, soaring up and up until she touched high C without the slightest effort or break in her voice.
“You will be a second Patti, you sing just as I have heard she sang when a child,†Miss Errington said when Katy finished. Then, turning to us, she continued: “Do you know there is a fortune in that voice. She must have instruction; the best, too, there is to be had, and one day you will be proud when she stands before thousands and holds them spellbound as she has me, even with her simple songs.â€
Miss Errington was evidently an enthusiast in music, but Fan cut her short by saying scornfully, “Do you think a daughter of Dr. Hathern would ever go on the stage? Never! We have not fallen so low as that, poor as we are. I’d rather see her dead.â€
She was greatly excited, and Miss Errington looked at her wonderingly, while Katy pulled Fan’s dress and whispered, “What is it? What did I do? Didn’t I sing well?â€
“Yes, too well; never sing again,†Fan answered fiercely, and Katy replied, half crying, “But I must; I can’t help it; it will come; it would choke me if I didn’t.â€
“Choke, then,†Fan said, while the Colonel, who had listened with an expression, half cynical and half amused, on his face, now spoke and said, “Quite a tempest in a teapot over nothing; Cornie is music mad, and the child certainly has a wonderful voice for one so young.â€
Just then a robin flew down upon a sprig of honeysuckle near the window and began to trill its evening song; quick as thought Katy darted through the door, and unmindful of Fan’s injunction never to sing again, began to imitate the bird, which stopped a moment and poising itself first on one foot and then upon the other looked around for the fellow-songster it seemed to think was near it.
“I never heard anything like it,†Miss Errington said. “That talent must be cultivated, but she must not strain her voice while growing. I see no reason why she should not have as much a night as Patti, or if you object so to the stage, there are the churches where she could command a large salary.â€
As she spoke her eyes wandered about the room and I felt sure they were taking an inventory of our faded carpet and worn, old-fashioned furniture. She seemed tome more and more like a woman accustomed to dictate and to have her own way, and I could not rid myself of a feeling that having once seen Katy she would not readily forget her. The songs outside had ceased by this time; the robin had flown away, and the child had disappeared. Col. Errington had Fan all to himself at one end of the piazza to which we had repaired, and I was listening to a dissertation from Miss Errington on the best method for removing stains and spots from old carpets and dresses and feeling sure she had seen them in ours and was taking this way to instruct me. We had heard the whistle of the mail train from the east, and twenty minutes later Black Beauty went galloping down the lane at one side of the house with Katy on his back, bareheaded, with her fair hair blowing in the wind and her face turned smilingly towards us as she passed. We were expecting a letter from father and she was going to the Postoffice, as she often did on Black Beauty, saddleless and sometimes bridleless, for she was a fearless little rider and Black Beauty the most gentle of beasts.
“See, Cornie, that is the pony I told you about, the one some of my rascally soldiers stole,†the Colonel said to his sister, who looked admiringly after the horse and rider, saying, “Upon my word, she sits the creature well, and without a saddle, too. She has more than one accomplishment.â€
“You will be advising us next to train her for a circus,†Fan said sarcastically, but Miss Errington did not reply, and went on giving me good advice until Katy came cantering back, holding a letter in her hand and reining Beauty up to the side of the piazza.
Springing from his back and handing the letter to me she stood holding the pony by the mane, while Miss Erringtonbent forward and began to examine him with the eye of a connoisseur.
“Really,†she said to her brother, “he is a beauty and no mistake; I should like him for my own when we go to our place in the country. Is he yours?†and she looked at me.
I shook my head, and nodded towards Fan, to whom she said, “What will you take for him?â€
“He is not for sale,†Fan answered, decidedly, stepping down by the horse and winding her arm around his neck.
The brother and sister, so much alike in looks, were also so far alike in disposition that opposition only increased their determination to succeed. In this instance Miss Errington was the more earnest of the two and seemed resolved to carry her point and have Black Beauty whether we were willing or not, and her brother seconded her wishes. Two hundred dollars cash down in crisp greenbacks were finally offered, and I shall never forget the look on Fan’s face as she put it down on Beauty’s neck, thinking intently, as I well knew, of the many things we needed and which two hundred dollars would buy. Of our worn furniture generally, our house, from which the paint was gone, our shutters, unhinged and loose, and more than all father’s darned and threadbare coats and shocking hat, and our own dresses, made over so many times. Two hundred dollars seemed a fortune, and Beauty was only a luxury. Father had his saddle horse for visiting the few patients who lived beyond walking distance, and Black Beauty was really more ornamental than useful to us. This was the train of thought passing through her mind, while I watched her curiously. Lifting her head at last she said proudly, with great tearsstanding on her long lashes, “Next to father, Ann and Katy, I love Black Beauty better than any living thing. You can see that we are poor enough, made so by the war,†here her voice began to break, but she steadied it and went on: “We need many things, but until poverty has a firmer foothold in our house than it has now I cannot let Black Beauty go. If a time comes when I must part with him I will let you know; I’d rather you had him than any one, for I believe you would be kind to him.â€
Taking her arm from the horse’s neck she gave a peculiar whistle, saying, “Go, Beauty, go.â€
He understood her and went prancing down the rear lane towards his pasture; sometimes with his heels in the air and sometimes his forefeet, as if giving vent to his delight at having escaped some threatened danger. I had thought Miss Errington cold and emotionless and was surprised at the sudden transformation in her manner after this as she talked to Fan, who was soon herself again, chatting gaily and repeating ludicrous and exaggerated stories of the Colonel when he was our unbidden guest and our place full of blue coats.
It was now five o’clock and Phyllis brought in the tea service for our five o’clock tea, a custom Fan, who was extravagantly fond of tea, had introduced in imitation of an English family recently come to town and with whom we were on terms of intimacy. In our low financial state this seemed to me a useless expenditure, but when I remonstrated Phyllis silenced me by saying, “Lors, honey, what’s a pinch of tea and dust of sugar, and don’t I bile de groun’s over in de mornin’ for my breakfast. Let Miss Fanny ’lone. All de quality in England does it, dat big red coat at Mass’r Harwood’s say, an’ ain’t we quality, if we is poor.â€
So we had our five o’clock tea, in which Jack often joined us, while other young people sometimes dropped in so that the occasion was usually a very enjoyable one. This afternoon it was especially so. With the appearance of the china and silver teapot Fan’s spirits increased. She liked to be “quality†quite as well as Phyllis, and did the honors gracefully, serving Miss Errington from a red Dresden cup which had been one of our mother’s wedding presents, and giving the colonel a royal Worcester, which belonged to Katy’s mother. Whether it was the pleasure of being waited upon by Fan, or whether he was really so fond of tea, the Colonel took so many cups that several “pinches†were added to the pot, and the next morning I saw a bowl full of grounds on Phyllis’s kitchen table, but knew by the fresh, pungent odor of old Hyson which permeated the room that she was indulging in something more than a “bilin’ over.†After our tea-drinking the carriage came for our guests who expressed themselves as delighted with their call.
“Come to Washington and I will show you all the sights,†Miss Errington said to us both; then to me, “Take care of Katy’s voice.â€
Just what the Colonel said to Fan I did not hear. He was talking very low and looking at her with his cold, steely eyes, which kindled as he looked and brought a hot flush to her face.
“No, no. I don’t think I will,†I heard her say, and that was all.
After he was gone she stood watching the carriage until it was out of sight; then said to me, “That man had the effrontery to ask me to write to him, and he squeezed my hand so hard that it aches now; the old idiot! I am going to wash it.â€
Bouncing out of the room she ran into the arms of Jack Fullerton, who came to say that all the grape baskets at the vines were full and to ask if there were more to be filled. I am afraid we were rather a shiftless lot; at least we were told so often enough in the future—coming on apace. We were certainly thoughtless, and while visiting and tea-drinking entirely forgot that the baskets must be ready that night if they went on the early morning train to Richmond. But Jack had not forgotten, and while I talked to Miss Errington and Fan flirted with the Colonel, he worked steadily on, occasionally crushing a cluster of the ripe fruit so hard that the juice spurted over his coat as he caught the sound of Fan’s rippling laughter and the deep tones of the man whom he began to dread as his rival. But Fan more than made amends now.
Seizing his arm with both hands and rubbing her cheek against it, she exclaimed, “You dear old Jack, how good you are to us, doing our work, while we entertain those people for whom we don’t care a pin; and don’t you think, he asked me to correspond with him!â€
“He did?†Jack said, indignantly, and Fan replied, “Yes, he did, and he’s forty, if he’s a day.â€
She knew he wasn’t forty, but she was trying to appease Jack, whose brown eyes shone with delight as he looked at her, and who, when he thought I did not see him, tried to raise her hand to his lips. But she wrenched it away, and stood back from him, saying laughingly, “No, you don’t. No man has ever kissed me except father and Charlie and the boy, and never will until——â€
She didn’t say when, but Jack did not seem at all disturbed, and that night long after I was in bed he sat upon the piazza with her, and I heard the low murmur of their voices and felt again the old pain in my heart,and knew that I would give years of my life for the love for which Fan cared so little.
The letter which Katy brought us from the office was from father, who was still in Boston and attending Mrs. Haverleigh. She was better, he wrote, but unwilling he should leave her until all danger of a relapse was past, consequently we need not expect him until the end of a week when he hoped to bring us a big fee, as his patient was said to be very wealthy. He did not mention Mr. Haverleigh, but of course there was such an appendage to Mrs. Haverleigh and he would pay the bill. Then we began to speculate as to the probable amount and what we should buy with it. Fan decided upon new boots and gloves; Katy was to have a doll; while I hoped she might also have music lessons, for aside from her wonderful voice she had a great fondness for the piano and had already picked out a few simple tunes which she played with a good deal of expression. Jack, who was always included in our family councils, as if he were our brother, laughingly told us not to count our chickens until they were hatched, and the sequel proved the wisdom of his advice.
At the end of the week father came home, looking fresher and younger and more erect than when he went away. The trip had done him a great deal of good. He had met several old friends and made some new ones. When we inquired for Mrs. Haverleigh he did not seeminclined to talk much of her, but in answer to Fan’s direct question he told us the amount of his fee. He had made her so many professional visits and received the usual city price for each visit; fifty dollars in all. It was not a large sum, and it went mostly to pay the little household bills which in spite of our economy accumulated so fast. I gave up the music lessons for Katy, while Fan called Mr. Haverleigh a stingy old man, as she blacked her shabby boots and mended her worn gloves.
Sometime in November Jack went into an insurance office in Richmond, and life at the Elms moved in so monotonous a groove that Fan, who craved excitement, sometimes wished the war back upon us to keep us from stagnating. There were one or two letters from Miss Errington, addressed to me and full of Katy’s future.
Several times the Colonel sent Fan papers and magazines and once he wrote her a letter which she promptly tore up, and then cried for half a day. Every week father had a letter from Boston which he answered within a few days. Once in passing the hall stand where he had laid a letter while he went to his room for his gloves, I glanced hastily at it and read, as I supposed, “Mr. Thomas Haverleigh, No. — Beacon St., Boston, Mass.†Fan would have taken it up and made sure of the direction, but I only gave it a look and wondered why he was writing to Mr. Haverleigh. He was a good deal changed these days and he seemed silent and abstracted and I often saw him looking at us in a wistful way as if there was something on his mind which he hated to tell us.
“It’s money matters and the miserable bills we owe everywhere that trouble him,†Fan said, when I spoke of it to her.
“Oh, if I were rich, and could help him; and I can. There is a way.â€
“What way?†I asked, and she replied, “I can sell Black Beauty, or—myself, which is better. Isn’t it sometimes a duty to sacrifice one’s self for others? I didn’t tell you that Col. Errington proposed to me in that letter I burned up! Well, he did, in an assured kind of way, as if he thought I would be overwhelmed with the honor and say yes at once; then, as if a doubt crept into his mind, he told me to weigh the matter carefully before answering, for if a favor were once refused him he never asked for it a second time. Iamweighing the matter carefully. I have not answered his letter. I keep hoping something will turn up. If it don’t I shall marry the Colonel.â€
“And what of Jack?†I asked.
At the mention of his name Fan flushed a little, then replied, “I like Jack and always shall, but what can he do, hampered with an invalid mother and only an insurance clerk’s salary. I was never intended for a poor man’s wife and would rather live at home in poverty with you than in Jack’s home with his mother and old black Patsey, who was always running away during the war and only came back after it was over because she couldn’t do better.â€
There was no use arguing with Fan when in this mood, and the subject was not mentioned again for months. I knew she did not write to Col. Errington, and she did write occasionally to Jack during the winter, which passed rather slowly, for Lovering was never very gay at its best, and the war had left too many aching hearts for us to be very hilarious. Father, however, seemed in unusually good spirits and I occasionally heard him whistling or humming softly to himself when he was alone. When March came round he surprised us one morning saying he was going to Boston again on some important business which he hoped would result favorably for us all. He did not tellus what the business was, but when Fan asked if it had anything to do with Mr. Haverleigh, he answered, “Not directly; no,†and we said good-bye to him with no suspicion of the truth. He had bought himself a new suit of clothes, which he greatly needed, and we were very proud of him when he put them on. We told him he looked quite the Virginia gentleman again, and Fan came near boxing Phyllis’s ears when she heard her muttering something about “ole mas’r savin’ his money to pay his debts instead of scurripen’ roun’ de country an’ makin’ a fool of hisself.â€
“As if our father could make a fool of himself! What does Phyllis mean?â€
“I believe he has been speculating,†Fan said to me, “I feel sure something good is going to turn up, if we wait long enough.â€
Dr. Hathern had been gone two weeks and in that time had written but one letter to his daughters. This was addressed to Fanny and in it he said that the business which had taken him to Boston was progressing favorably and he should soon feel at liberty to tell what it was and return home a happier and more prosperous man than when he left it. Meanwhile his daughters were to enjoy themselves and get whatever was needed for their comfort. Then he added as if it were an afterthought:
“By the way, I think it would be well for Phyllis to give the whole house a regular overhauling,—housecleaning they call it at the north, and I remember when I wasa boy that every thorough housekeeper did this twice a year,—taking up and beating carpets, washing curtains and blankets and paint and floors and putting the furniture out to air. I have no doubt southern housekeepers do the same, and it seems to me there were some such upheavals which made me very uncomfortable when your mother was living; but nothing of the sort has occurred since. You were too young when your own mother and Katy’s died to know about such things, and Phyllis, who has been in charge so long, has not thought of it. Negroes are apt to be slack.
“Consult Mrs. Fullerton, if you don’t know what to do, and if extra help is needed for Phyllis, get it, of course. Tell her to take especial pains with my room. I think I have detected a faint musty smell in it when the air was damp. This can be remedied by beating the carpet thoroughly and letting in a great deal of sunshine. I may have kept it shut up too much. You will hear from me again in about two weeks and then I shall tell you when to expect me.
“Your loving father,“Samuel Hathern.â€
“Your loving father,“Samuel Hathern.â€
“Your loving father,“Samuel Hathern.â€
“Your loving father,
“Samuel Hathern.â€
This letter Fanny read aloud to Annie, with running comments upon it as she read.
“Is father growing crazy, or what has got into him to write in such a strain.Must, indeed, in his room! It’s his old boots and shoes and saddlebags of medicines which he keeps in his closet. House cleaning twice a year, with everything turned out of the windows! Thinks we have never had one since mother died! Haven’t we?â€
Annie didn’t think they had, and the most she could recall during her mother’s lifetime was a faint remembrance of bare floors and dirt and straw and litter, and soap and suds and discomfort generally, with a scurrying here and there of negroes with Phyllis at the helm; then a great quiet, with the fireplaces full of green boughs andpeonies and snowballs and herself and Fanny told not to put their little soiled fingers on the window panes because they had just been washed. This was very far back, and neither Annie nor Fanny could remember any housecleaning since so extreme as that. Certainly there had been none since Katy’s mother died, and Phyllis had managed the household. In short, as they confessed to each other, they were rather easy-going young ladies, who, accustomed to many servants before the war, had fallen into the habit of leaving everything to Phyllis. And that functionary was very willing to have it left to her, and waited upon them and petted them and scolded them alternately with all the freedom of an old and trusty family servant.
In the days of slavery there had been no more valuable negro in Lovering than herself, and she knew it, and prided herself upon it and the respectability of her ancestors generally as proven by the fact that there was not a drop of white blood in her veins.
“I’d be ashamed if there was, and blush for my mother. Black is a good color, which wears well, and I thank de Lord I am as black as a Guiney nigger,†she said; but she was equally proud of the fair faces of the twins and little Katy, whom she loved as if they were her own.
She had nursed them when they were babies; had walked the floor with them many a night when they were teething or had the colic; had drawn them miles and miles from cabin to cabin in a baby cart—proud of her twins and proud of herself as “Mas’r Hathern’s nigger, who was worth more’n a thousand dollars, and who he wouldn’t sell for nothin’;†she had closed the eyes of both her mistresses, and prepared them for the grave. She had comforted the two little motherless girls with cake and honey and a most wonderful rag doll, and taken the new-bornbaby, Katy, to her bosom and bed. She had tried to run away with a part of the Federal army, but found that she could not, so great was her love for her master and his family. She was a part of them, or rather they were a part of her, and after she assumed the entire management of the household she owned them just as they once owned her, and sometimes ruled them more rigorously than she had ever been ruled.
In this condition of things it was natural that the young ladies should settle down into a state of listless dependence, allowing her to do what she pleased and when she pleased, and giving but little thought to what was done or left undone, provided they were comfortable and the general look of the house was neat and tidy. At long intervals she had her times of “clarin’ up,†when the house was full of brooms and brushes and mops and clouds of dust and the odor of soap suds. On these occasions, in a petticoat patched with many colors, which stopped half way between her knees and her feet and a knit jacket left by one of the soldiers, Phyllis would march from room to room, rating the young ladies soundly for the disorderly condition in which she found them, and wondering what their poor mother would say if she knew how they slatted their things and left them for her to pick up, when every bone in her old body ached. But if they tried to help her she spurned their offers disdainfully. She reckoned she knew what “de quality ought to do, an’ it wan’t for her young misseses to sile dar white hands, when dar was a big pair of black ones, made to soil and spin. What did cussed be Canan mean if it wan’t that the blacks was to sweat an’ slave and have der bad times in dis world an’ de whites der good, an’ in de nex’wise wersa.â€
Phyllis was great on theology and powerful in a prayermeeting, where she could be heard for nearly a quarter of a mile, when she was moved by thesperritto let herself out. Naturally her arguments prevailed when she brought forward the Bible to prove their validity, and Annie and Fanny usually succumbed and let her have her way.
Occasionally when she wished to try some fancy dish Fanny made a raid upon the kitchen, greatly to the discomfiture of Phyllis, who fluttered like a hen when its brood of chickens is disturbed, while a close observer might have thought she was fearful of having something discovered which she wished to hide. But Fanny knew better, and after the time she found the nutmeg grater in Phyllis’s pocket and the rolling pin, which had been lost for two or three days, on the floor under the table, she abandoned the kitchen, and the old negress was left monarch of all she surveyed.
Now, however, there must be a general cleaning,—a thorough overhauling,—and Fanny was deputed to notify Phyllis, whom she found eating her dinner on a stool outside her cabin door, her turban somewhat awry and her usually good-humored face clouded over as she shoo-ed the chickens and screamed at the dog, which from an adjoining garden had strayed into her domains.
“A reg’lar overhaulin’, wid de carpets all up and whaled, an’ de furniture turned out of do’ to a’r, an’ his room smellin’ of musk,†she said, when Fanny told what her father had written. “Is Mas’r Hathern ’sinuatin’ that I’m dirty, an’ I sarvin’ him so long an’ faithful? I wouldn’t have ble’ved it,†and her voice trembled and her head shook till her turban was displaced and took an upward turn, as it was wont to do when she was displeased.
It was a saying of the young ladies that they could tellPhyllis’s state of mind from the height of her turban, and when Fan saw it begin to lengthen she knew there was a storm brewing, and braced herself to meet it.
“Who’s to take up dem carpets an’ wallop ’em, and put ’em down again I’d like to know. Last time I clar’d up I done cotched such a misery in my back and laigs that I’ve had rheumatis’ ever since, and I didn’t hist up de carpets nuther.â€
Fanny explained that she was to have help, but this only brought out a snort from the old woman, who went on: “Extra help, as if I was an onery nigger like old Patsey. An’ for de Lord’s sake whar’s de money to come from to pay de help? Mas’r can’t pay de bills now, unless he sells me, an’ sometimes I think I’ll ’vise him to do dat an’ get out of debt.â€
“But you are free. We can’t sell you, and wouldn’t if we could; that is all in the past,†Fanny suggested.
“Dat’s so; more’s de pity,†Phyllis rejoined, and went on to say that she reckoned she wan’t so old yet that she couldn’t wallop a carpet and put it down, if her knees were not too stiff and she should do it, too; and begin the next day; help indeed, when she was ’round.
By this time the Fullerton chickens were on the strawberry patch again and the Fullerton dog had his nose in the refuse pail, which he finally upset. But in her excitement Phyllis did not notice it. She was too intent upon the housecleaning, which was commenced the next morning with a vengeance, and without the slightest system or order. Every room and closet from cellar to garret was turned upside down, with carpets up and furniture out, and not a spot where one could sit and be comfortable. They ate on the pantry shelf and slept on the floor while the worst of the pandemonium continued. True toher determination Phylliswallopedthe carpets herself and did it so effectually that one of them, the oldest and most tender waswallopedinto tatters and could not be used again. When it came to putting them down Phyllis gave out. Her knees would not bend, and her back and arms were too lame, while not a negro was to be found willing to help. Fortunately in this emergency Jack had an off day, which he spent with Fan-and-Ann, who pressed him into service. Arrayed in one of Phyllis’s clean turbans and aprons, and armed with hammer and nails, he attacked the carpets vigorously and with the help of the young ladies and with a great deal of joking and fun they were put down as few carpets were ever put down before,—crooked and puckered, and loose, while Jack had a blood blister on his thumb and Fanny a bruise on her knuckles, where she struck them with the hammer, and Annie a headache, which lasted two whole days. But they were down and seemed very fresh and clean, as did the entire house when Phyllis was through with it and free to nurse her swollen arms and hands, the result of so much lifting and carpet beating. The odor of must, if there had ever been any, had disappeared from the Doctor’s room, with his old boots and saddlebags. As it was his carpet which had been beaten to tatters, its place had been supplied with some light, pretty matting bought at a reduced rate at a forced sale.
“I wish we could afford a new chamber set, too,†Fan said, looking ruefully at the high post bedstead, with its canopy and valance, and at the bureau and chairs older than she was, as they had come from the south with her mother.
But this was out of the question. The family purse was too low. The chamber set was given up. The postbedstead, with its feather bed, was made high and soft, and the best white counterpane put upon it. There were clean covers upon the bureau and square stand, where the Book of Psalms, which the first Mrs. Hathern had used, was still lying, and with it a prayer-book which had belonged to Katy’s mother. Fan brought a pretty pin cushion from her room, with a slipper case and tidy, and when all was done, called Phyllis to see the effect.
“Mighty fine and invitin’;†Phyllis said, “’pears like you’re expectin’ a bride, te-he-he.â€
The laugh had in it a sound of sobbing, rather than of merriment, and Phyllis’s turban was slightly elongated as she went back to her work. All her insinuations, however, were lost upon the daughters, who, with no suspicion of her meaning, sat down to enjoy the quiet and freshness of their home, daily expecting a letter telling when their father was coming to enjoy it with them.
After a ten days’ siege the housecleaning came to an end, with no worse disaster than the entire demolition of one carpet, literally beaten to death,—the breaking of one or two windows, a caster split off from a bureau, and a cupboard with dishes in it knocked flat in our attempts to move it. Phyllis had a “misery†in her back and we were all more or less afflicted with colds we had caught during the upheaval. But we had a heap of fun with Jack, who helped us out, and the house was clean, or we thought it so, and only father’s presence was needed to make us quite happy again. But he did not come and hedidn’t write. Every morning we said “we shall hear from him to-day,†and every night a fresh disappointment awaited us, for he neither wrote nor came, and in our anxiety we were beginning to think of telegraphing to his address in Boston and inquiring if any thing had happened to him. It was Fan who suggested this one morning, about a week after the cleaning was over.
“Wait one more day,†I said, “and if we do not hear to-night we’ll telegraph to-morrow.â€
It was now past the middle of April, but the day was cold and cloudy, and late in the afternoon the rain began to fall, softly at first like a gentle April shower, but gradually increasing until by the time we heard the train from the east and Fan started for the office it was a regular downpour, which beat against the windows and ran in great streams from a defective eaves-trough over the door. In all lives there are some days which so impress themselves upon our minds that the minutest detail is never forgotten, but comes to us over and over again, with the joy or the sorrow which wrote itself so indelibly upon our memories. Such a day was this, and as I write I hear again the soughing of the wind through a great pine tree which stood in a corner of the yard, and the rain sifting down upon the turf beneath it, and see the blaze from the pine knots which Phyllis had lighted on the hearth, and as the blaze leaps up, filling the room with warmth and light I see at my side Katy’s golden head bent over the picture-book she is reading, while one of her small white hands rests upon my lap. In the kitchen I hear old Phyllis crooning a well-known melody, consisting mostly of inquiries as to the whereabouts of the Hebrew children, as she prepares our evening meal.
During father’s absence we had dispensed with our sixo’clock dinner and contented ourselves with lunch and our five o’clock tea, but this night I had ordered a substantial supper, with a vague presentiment that father might surprise us, and I can smell the savory dishes as I smelled them then and feel the same appetizing sensation which they brought to me. As the light and heat from the pine knot increased and the flames went rolling up the chimney in graceful curves, the faces of the dead looked at me from the blaze,—faces of the boy in grey and the boy in blue whose graves were on the hillside. That of the boy in blue was the more distinct, and I saw again the great sunken blue eyes which had turned to us so wistfully as the pale lips pleaded that we would not “let them get him,†or “let her find him.†We knew whom he meant bythem, and were reasonably sure that theherwas the Aunt Martha, for whom neither Fan nor myself entertained a great amount of respect.
Now, as I watched the fire,—half asleep it may be,—and saw alternately the faces of my brother and theboy, Aunt Martha came also and stood before me on the hearth,—a tall thin woman of the New England type, with firm-set lips and hard, unsympathetic eyes, which never softened a whit when I questioned her of “the boy,†and asked why she had never come to inquire for him before, and who was the Carlyle he had spoken of so kindly. Just as she was about to answer me Katy started up exclaiming, “There she is,†and I awoke to hear the sound of voices outside.—Fan’s voice, and with it another which always made my heart beat faster, although it never spoke to me except as a brother might speak to his sister. Jack had come home that evening and Fan had met him and brought him with her, and they came in laughing and chatting merrily, and shaking the rain drops from their umbrellas and wraps.
“How perfectly delightful that fire is,†Fan said, holding one of her wet boots near it to dry, and bidding Phyllis bring a plate for Jack and hurry on the supper, as she was nearly famished. “I have a letter from father,†she continued, as we drew up to the table, “but it will keep till after tea.â€
We were a very merry party, as we always were when Jack was with us, for he had the happy faculty of knowing how to bring out the best of everybody. He had been promoted and his salary increased, and he was in high spirits, as we all were, and not one of us dreamed of what was in store for us, when, as Jack asked me for his third cup of coffee, Fan, who had finished her supper, said, “If you are going to drink coffee all night and don’t mind, I’ll see what father has written.â€
She took his letter from her pocket; looked at it very leisurely; opened it carefully with a knife, as if afraid of spoiling the envelope, and then began to read it. I was pouring Jack some hot coffee, which Phyllis had just brought in, and did not look at her until Jack startled me by saying, “Why, Fan, what is the matter?â€
Then I turned to her and saw that her face was nearly as white as the letter over which her eyes were traveling with lightning speed.
“Fanny, Fanny,†I exclaimed; “what is it? what has happened? Is father ill, or dead?â€
“Neither,†she answered, in a voice very unlike herself. “Neither ill nor dead, as you mean it; but dead to us. He is to be married to-night at eight o’clock.â€
For a moment everything turned black around me, and I might have fallen from my chair if Phyllis, who was standing near me, had not put her hand upon me as she said, “Surmised it all ‘long. I done tol’ you so.â€
Neither Fan nor I paid any attention to her then; we were too intent upon the letter, which Fan at last read aloud and which ran thus: