Jean Baptiste smiled a smile of vanity. He was getting anxious to meet Miss Pitt himself—inasmuch as he expected to ask her to become his wife on the morrow.
"Ting-aling-aling!" went the bell on the street door, and little Miss Rankin rushed forth to open it.
"Special for Mr. Jean Baptiste," he heard and went to get it. After signing, he broke the seal a little nervously, and drawing the contents forth, read the enclosed message.
He sighed when it was over. Miss Pitt had been taken with a severe attack of neuralgia in New York, was indisposed and under the care of a physician, but would be in Chicago in six days. He studied the calendar on the wall. Six days would mean October second!
Too late, Miss Pitt, your chance is gone. And now we turn to the party of the third part who will follow us through our story.
From a painting by W.M. Farrow."MISS PITT WAS SO ANXIOUS TO MEET YOU AND I WAS, TOO, BECAUSE I THINK YOU AND HER WOULD LIKE EACH OTHER. SHE'S AN AWFULLY GOOD GIRL AND WILLING TO HELP A FELLOW."
From a painting by W.M. Farrow.
"MISS PITT WAS SO ANXIOUS TO MEET YOU AND I WAS, TOO, BECAUSE I THINK YOU AND HER WOULD LIKE EACH OTHER. SHE'S AN AWFULLY GOOD GIRL AND WILLING TO HELP A FELLOW."
MEMORIES—N. JUSTINE MCCARTHY
"SHE will not be in tomorrow," said Baptiste, handing the letter to Miss Rankin.
"Oh, is that so!" cried Miss Rankin in a tone of deep disappointment, as she took the letter. "Now isn't that just too bad!"
"It is," agreed Baptiste. "I will not get to see her, since I shall have to return to the West not later than two or three days." He was extremely disappointed. He sat down with a sigh and rested his chin in his palm, looking before him thoughtfully.
"I'm sure sorry, so sorry," mused Miss Rankin abstractedly. "And you cannot possibly wait until next week?" she asked, anxiously.
He shook his head sadly.
"Impossible, absolutely impossible."
"It is certainly too bad. Miss Pitt was so anxious to meet you. And I was, too, because I think you and her would like each other. She's an awfully good girl, and willing to help a fellow. Just the kind of a girl you need."
He shifted his position now and was absorbed in his thoughts. He had come back to his purpose. He was sorry for Miss Pitt; but he had also been sorry that Miss Grey had not answered his letter.... The association with neither, true, had developed into a love affair, so would notbe hard to forget. He had agreed with himself that love was to come later. He had exercised discretion. Any one of the three was a desirable mate from a practical point of view. After marriage he was confident that they could conform sufficiently to each other's views to get along, perhaps be happy. Miss McCarthy was, in his opinion, the most intelligent of the three, as she had been to school and had graduated from college. He had confidence in education uplifting people; it made them more observing. It helped them morally. And with him this meant much. He was very critical when it came to morals. He had studied his race along this line, and he was very exacting; because, unfortunately as a whole their standard of morals were not so high as it should be. Of course he understood that the same began back in the time of slavery. They had not been brought up to a regard of morality in a higher sense and they were possessed with certain weaknesses. He was aware that in the days of slavery the Negro to begin with had had, as a rule only what he could steal, therefore stealing became a virtue. When accused as he naturally was sure to be, he had resorted to the subtle art of lying. So lying became an expedient. So it had gone. Then he came down to the point of physical morality.
The masters had so often the slave women, lustful by disposition, as concubine. He had, in so doing of course, mixed the races, Jean Baptiste knew until not more than one half of the entire race in America are without some trait of Caucasian blood. There had been no defense then, and for some time after. There was no law that exacted punishment for a master's cohabitation with slave women, so it had grown into a custom and was practiced in the South in a measure still.
So with freedom his race had not gotten away from these loose practices. They were given still to lustful, undependable habits, which he at times became very impatient with. His version was that a race could not rise higher than their morals. So in his business procedure of choosing a wife, one thing over all else was unalterable, she must be chaste and of high morals.
Orlean McCarthy, however she as yet appeared from a practical standpoint, could, he estimated rightly, boast of this virtue. No doubt she was equally as high in all other perquisites. But strangely he did not just wish to ask Miss McCarthy to become his wife. He could not understand it altogether. He was confident that no girl lived who perhaps was likely, as likely, to conform to his desires as she; but plan, do as he would, that lurking aversion still remained—infinitely worse, it grew to a fear.
He sighed perceptibly, and Miss Rankin, catching the same, was deeply sympathetic because she thought it was due to the disappointment he felt in realizing that he was not to see Miss Pitt on the morrow. She placed her arm gently about his shoulders, leaned her small head close to his, and stroked his hair with her other hand.
"Well," said he, after a time, and to himself, "I left the West to find a wife. I've lived out there alone long enough. I want a home, love and comfort and only a wife can bring that." He paused briefly in his mutterings. His face became firm. That will that had asserted itself and made him what he was today, became uppermost. He slowly let the sentiment out of him, which was at once mechanically replaced by a cold set purpose. He smiled then; not a sentimental smile, but one cold, hard, and singularly dry.
"Oh, by the way, Miss Rankin," he essayed, rising, apparently cheerful. "Do you happen to be acquainted with a family here by the name of McCarthy?"
"McCarthy?"
"Yes. I think the man's a preacher. A Rev. N.J. McCarthy, if I remember correctly." She looked up at him. Her face took on an expression of defined contempt as she grunted a reply.
"Humph!"
"Well...."
"Who doesn't know that old rascal!"
"Indeed!" he echoed, in affected surprise; but in the same instant he had a feeling that he was to hear just this. Still, he maintained his expression of surprise.
"The worst old rascal in the state of Illinois," she pursued with equal contempt.
"Oh, really!"
"Really—yes,positively!"
"I cannot understand?"
"Oh well," she emitted, vindictively. "You won't have to inquire far to get the record of N.J. McCarthy. Lordy, no! But now," she started with a heightening of color, "He's got a nice family. Two fine girls, Orlean and Ethel, and his wife is a good little soul, rather helpless and without the force a woman should have; but very nice. But that husband—forget him!"
"This is—er—rather unusual, don't you think?"
"Well, it is," she said. "One would naturally suppose that a man with such a family of moral girls as he has, would not be so—not because he is a preacher." She paused thoughtfully. "Because you know that does not count for a high morality always in our society.... But N.J. McCarthy has been like he is ever since I knew him. He's a rascal of the deep water if the Lord ever made one.And such a hypocrite—there never lived! Added to it, he is the most pious old saint you ever saw! Looks just as innocent as the Christ—and treats his wife like a dog!"
"Oh, no!"
"No!" disdainfully. "Well, you'd better hush!" She paused again, and then as if having reconsidered she turned and said: "I'll not say any more about him. Indeed, I don't like to discuss the man even. He is the very embodiment of rascalism, deceit and hypocrisy. Now, I've said enough. Be a good boy, go out and buy me some cream." And smilingly she got his hat and ushered him outside.
"Well, now what do you think of that," he kept repeating to himself, as he went for the ice cream, "what do you think of that?" Suddenly he halted, and raised his hands to his head. He was thinking, thinking, thinking deeply, reflectively. His mind was going back, back, away back into his youth, his earliest youth—no! It was going—had gone back to his childhood!
"N.J. McCarthy,N.J. McCarthy? Where did Iknow you! Where, where,where!" His head was throbbing, his brain was struggling with something that happened a long time before. A saloon was just to his left, and into it he turned. He wanted to think; but hedidn'twant to think too fast. He took a glass of beer. It was late September, but rather warm, and when the cold beverage struck his throat, his mind went back into its yesterdays.
It had happened in the extremely southern portion of the state, in that part commonly referred to as "Egypt," where he then lived. He recalled the incident as it occurred about twenty years before, for he was just five years of age at the time. His mother's baby boy they called him, because he was the youngest of four boys in a large family of children. It was a day in the autumn. He was sure of thisbecause his older brothers had been hunting; they had caught several rabbits and shot a few partridges. He had been allowed to follow for the first time, and had carried the game.... How distinctly it came back to him now.
He had picked the feathers from the quail, and had held the rabbits while his brothers skinned them. And, later, they had placed the game in cold water from their deep well, and had thereupon placed the pan holding the same upon the roof of the summer kitchen, and that night the frost had come. And when morning was again, the ice cold water had drawn the blood from the meat of the game, and the same was clear and white.
"Now, young man," his mother said to him the following morning, "you will get into clean clothes and stay clean, do you understand?"
"Yes, mama, I understand," he answered. "But, mama, why?" he inquired. Jean Baptiste had always asked such questions and for his doing so his mother had always rebuked him.
"You will ask the questions, my son," she said, raising his child body in her arms and kissing him fondly. "But I don't mind telling you." She stood him on the ground then, and pointed to him with her forefinger. "Because we are going to have company from town. Big people. The preachers. Lots of them, so little boys should be good, and clean, and be scarce when the preachers are around. They are big men with no time, or care, to waste with little boys!"
"M-um!" he had chimed.
"And, why, mama, do the preachers have no time for little boys? Were they not little boys once themselves?"
"Now, Jean!" she had admonished thereupon, "you are entirely too inquisitive for a little boy. There will be other company, also. Teachers, and Mrs. Winston, do you understand! So be good." With that she went about her dinner, cooking the rabbits and the quail that he had brought home the day before.
It had seemed an age before, in their spring wagon followed by the lumber wagon, the dignitaries of the occasion wheeled into the yard. He could not recall now how many preachers there were, except that there were many. He was in the way, he recalled, however, because, unlike his other brothers, he was not bashful. But the preachers did not seem to see him. They were all large and tall and stout, he could well remember. But the teachers took notice of him. One had caught him up fondly, kissed him and thereupon carried him into the house in her arms. She talked with him and he with her. And he could well recall that she listened intently to all he told her regarding his adventures of the day before in the big woods that was at their back. How beautiful and sweet he had thought she was. When she smiled she showed a golden tooth, something new to him, and he did not understand except that it was different from anything he had ever seen before.
After a long time, he thought, dinner was called, and, as was the custom, he was expected to wait. He had very often tried to reason with his mother that he could sit at the corner of the table in a high chair and eat out of a saucer. He had promised always to be good, just as good as he could be, and he would not talk. But his mother would not trust him, and it was understood that he should wait.
At the call of dinner he slid from the teacher's lap upon the floor and went outside. He peeped through the window from where he stood on a block. He saw them eat, and eat, and eat. He saw the quail the boys had shot disappear one after another into the mouths of the big preachers,and since he had counted and knew how many quail there were, he had watched with a growing fear. "Will they not leave one?" he cried.
At last, when he could endure it no longer, he ran into the house, walked into the dining room unseen, and stood looking on. Now, the teacher who had the golden tooth happened to turn and espy him and thereupon she cried:
"Oh, there is my little man, and I know he is hungry! Where did you go, sweet one? Come, now, quick to me," whereupon she held out loving arms into which he went and he had great difficulty in keeping back the tears. But he was hungry, and he had seen the last quail taken from the plate by a preacher who had previously taken two.
Upon her knee she had sat him, and he looked up into all the faces about. He then looked down into her plate and saw a half of quail. His anxious eyes found hers, and then went back to the plate and the half of quail thereon.
"That is for you, sweetness," she cried, and began to take from the table other good things, while he fell to eating, feeding his mouth with both hands for he was never before so hungry.
After a few moments he happened to lift his eyes from the plate. Just to the side of the beloved teacher, he observed a large, tall and stout preacher. He wore a jet black suit and around his throat a clerical vest fit closely; while around his neck he wore a white collar hind part before. The preacher's eyes had found Jean's and he gave a start. The eyes of the other were upon him, and they were angry eyes. He paused in his eats and gazed not understanding, into the eyes that were upon him. Then suddenly he recalled that he had observed that the preacher had been smiling upon the teacher. He had laughed and joked; and said many things that little Jean had not understood. As far as he could see, it appeared as if the teacher had not wished it; but the flirtation had been kept up.
At last, in his child mind he had understood. His crawling upon the teacher's lap had spoiled it all! The preacher was angry, therefore the expression in his eyes.
From across the table his mother stood observing him. She seemed not to know what to say or do, for it had always been so very hard to keep this one out of grown people's way. So she continued to stand hesitatingly.
"Didn't your mother say that you were to wait," growled the preacher, and his face was darker by the anger that was in it. This frightened Jean. He could find no answer in the moment to such words. His little eyes had then sought those of the teacher, who in reply drew him closely to her.
"Why, Reverend," she cried, amazed, "he's a little boy, a nice child, and hungry!" Whereupon she caressed him again. He was pacified then, and his eyes held some fire when he found the preacher's again. The others, too, had grown more evil. The preacher's lips parted. He leaned slightly forward as he said lowly, angrily:
"You're an impudent, ill mannered little boy, and you need a spanking!"
Then suddenly the child grew strangely angry. He couldn't understand. Perhaps it was because he had helped secure the quail, all of which the preachers were eating, and felt that in view of this he was entitled to a piece of one. He could not understand afterward how he had said it, but he extended his little face forward, close to the preacher's, as he poured:
"I ain't no impudent 'ittle boy, either! I went to hunt with my brothers yistidy and I carried all the game, andnow you goin' eat it all and leave me none when I'm hungry. You're mean man and make me mad!"
As he spoke everything seemed to grow dark around him. He recalled that he was suddenly snatched from the teacher's lap, and carried to the summer kitchen which was all closed and dark inside. He recalled that switches were there, and that soon he felt them. As a rule he cried and begged before he was ever touched; but strangely then he never cried, and he never begged. He just kept his mouth shut tightly, and had borne all the pain inflicted by his mother, and she had punished him longer than she had ever done before. Perhaps it was because she felt she had to make him cry; felt that hemustcry else he had not repented. After a time he felt terribly dazed, became sleepy, and gradually fell into a slumber while the blows continued to fall.
How long he slept he could not remember, but gradually he came out of it. There were no more blows then. Yet, his little body felt sore all over. When he looked up (for he was lying on his back in the summer kitchen), his mother sat near and was crying and wiping the tears with her apron, while over him bent the teacher, and she was crying also. And as the tears had fallen unchecked upon his face he had heard the teacher saying:
"It's a shame, an awful shame! The poor, poor little fellow! He was hungry and had helped to get the game. And to be punished so severely because he wanted to eat is a shame! Oh, Mrs. Baptiste, you must pray to your God for forgiveness!" And his mother had cried more than ever then.
Presently he heard a heavy footfall, and peeped upward to see his father standing over him. His father was fair of complexion, and unlike his mother, never said much andwas not commonly emotional. But when he was angry he was terrible, and he was angry now. His blue eyes shone like fire.
"What is this, Belle," he cried in a terrible voice, "you've killed my boy about that d—n preacher!" His father stooped and looked closely into his face. In fear he had opened his eyes. "Jean!" he heard his father breathe, "God, but it's a blessing you are alive, or there would be a dead preacher in that house."
"Oh, Fawn," his mother cried and fell on him, weeping. The teacher joined in to pacify him, and in that moment Jean was forgotten. Stiffly he had slipped from the room, and had gone around near the kitchen step of the big house to a place where the dogs had their bed. Here he kept a heavy green stick, a short club. He passed before the door, and observed the preacher still sitting at the table, talking with Mrs. Winston. He glared at him a moment and his little eyes narrowed to mere slits. Then he thought of something else.... It was Mose Allen, Mose Allen, a hermit who lived in the woods. It was miles—in his mind—to where Mose lived, through heavy forests and timber; but he was going there, he was going there to stay with old Mose and live in the woods. He had done nothing wrong, yet had been severely punished. Before this he had thought several times that when he became a man he would like to be a preacher, a big preacher, and be admired; but, now—never! He would go to old Mose Allen's, live in the woods—and hate preachers forever!
Later, deep into the forest he plodded. Deep, deeper, until all about him he was surrounded with overgrowth, but resolutely he struggled onward. He crossed a branch presently, and knew where he was. The branch divided their land with Eppencamp's, the German. From there theforest grew deeper, the trees larger, and the underbrush more tangled. But he was going to Mose Allen and remembered that that was the way. He grasped his green club tighter and felt like a hunter in the bear stories his big brothers had read to him. He crossed a raise between the branch and the creek where the water flowed deeply, and where they always went fishing. He paused upon reaching the creek, for there a footlog lay. For the first time he experienced a slight fear. He didn't like foot logs, and had never crossed one alone. He had always been carried across by his brothers; but his brothers were not near, and he was running away! So he took courage, and approached the treacherous bridge. He looked down at the whirling waters below with some awe; but finally with a grimace, he set his foot on the slick trunk of the fallen tree and started across. He recalled then that if one looked straight ahead and not down at the water, it was easy; but his mind was so much on the waters below. He kept his eyes elsewhere with great effort, and finally reached the middle. Now it seemed that he could not go one step further unless he saw what was below him. He hesitated, closed his eyes, and thought of the whipping he had received and the preacher he hated, opened them, and with calm determination born of anger, crossed safely to the other side.
He sighed long and deeply when he reached the other side. He looked back at the muddy waters whirling below, and with another sigh plunged into the forest again and on toward Mose Allen's.
He gained the other side of the forest in due time, and came into the clearing. A cornfield was between him and another forest, and almost to the other side of this Mose Allen lived. The sun was getting low, and the large oaksbehind him cast great shadows that stretched before him and far out into the cornfield. He thought of ghosts and hurried on. He must reach Mose Allen's before night, that was sure.
It was a long way he thought when he reached the other side, and the forest before him appeared ominous. He was inclined to be frightened, but when he looked toward the west and home he saw that the sun had sunk and he plunged grimly again into the deep woodland before him.
Now the people of the neighborhood had made complaints, and it was common talk about the country, that chickens, and young pigs, and calves had been attacked and destroyed by something evil in the forests. At night this evil spirit had stolen out and ravaged the stock and the chickens.
Accordingly, those interested had planned a hunt for what was thought to be a catamount. It was not until he had gone deeply into the woods, and the darkness was everywhere about him, that he remembered the catamount. He stopped and tried to pick the briers out of his bleeding hands, and as he did so, he heard a terrible cry. He went cold with fear. He hardly dared breathe, and crouched in a hole he had found where only his shoulders and head were exposed. He awaited with abated breath for some minutes and was about to venture out when again the night air and darkness was rent by the terrible cry. He crouched deeper into the hole and trembled, for the noise was drawing nearer. On and on it came. He thought of a thousand things in one minute, and again he heard the cry. It was very near now, and he could hear the crunch of the animal's feet upon the dry leaves. And still on and on it came. Presently it was so close that he could see it. The body of the beast became dimly outlined beforehim and he could see the eyes plainly, as it swung its head back and forth, and its red eyes shone like coals of fire. Again the varmint rent the night air with its yell, as it espied its prey crouching in the hole.
By watching the eyes he observed the head sink lower and lower until it almost touched the earth. And thereupon he became suddenly calm and apprehensive. He held his breath and met it calmly, face to face. His club was drawn, his eyes were keen and intense. He waited. Suddenly the air was rent with another death rendering cry, and the beast sprung.
It had reckoned well, but so had he. He had, moreover, struck direct. The blow caught the beast on the point of its nose and muffled and spoiled its directed spring. He quickly came out of the hole and then, before the animal could get out of his reach, he struck it again with such force at the back of the head, that the beast was stunned. Again and again he struck until the head was like a bag of bones. When his strength was gone, and all was quiet, he became conscious of a drowsiness. He sank down and laid his head upon the body of the dead animal, and fell into a deep sleep.
And there they found him during the early hours of the morning and took him and the dead catamount home.
"Another beer, Cap'n?" he heard from the bartender. He quickly stood erect and gazed about in some confusion.
"Yes," he replied, throwing a coin upon the bar. He drank the beer quickly, went out, bought Miss Rankin the cream and after delivering it to her, went outside again and up State Street.
He was overcome with memories, was Jean Baptiste. He had a task to accomplish. He was going to Vernon Avenuewhere Miss McCarthy lived to ask her to become his wife.
And the preacher who had been the cause of his severe punishment twenty years before was her father, the Rev. N.J. McCarthy.
ORLEAN
"OH, MAMA," cried Orlean E. McCarthy, coming hastily from the hallway into the room where her mother sat sewing, and handing her a note, "Mr. Baptiste is in the city and wishes to call at the earliest possible convenience."
"Indeed," replied her mother, affecting a serious expression, "this is rather sudden. Have you sent him word when he could?"
"Yes, mama, I wrote him a note and returned it by the boy that brought this one, that he could call at two o'clock." Her mother's gaze sought the clock automatically.
"And it is now past one," she replied. "You will have to get ready to receive him," she advised ceremoniously.
"All right, mama," said Orlean cheerfully, and suddenly bending forward, kissed her mother impulsively upon the cheek, and a moment later hurried upstairs.
"What is this I hear about somebody coming to call," inquired another, coming into the room at that moment. Mrs. McCarthy looked up on recognizing the voice of her younger daughter, Ethel, who now stood before her. She gave a perceptible start as she did so, and swallowed before she replied. In the meantime the other stood, regarding her rather severely, as was her nature.
She was very tall, was Ethel, and because she was so very thin she appeared really taller than she was. She didnot resemble her mother, who was a dumpy light brown skinned woman. She was part Indian, and possessed a heavy head of hair which, when let down, fell over her shoulders.
Ethel, on the other hand, was somewhat darker, had a thin face, with hair that was thick, but rather short and bushy. Her eyes were small and dark, out of which she never seemed to look straight at one. They appeared always to be lurking and without any expression, unless it was an expression of dislike. Forsooth, she was a known disagreeable person, ostentatious, pompous, and hard to get along with.
She was a bride of a few weeks and was then resting after a short honeymoon spent in Racine, Wisconsin, sixty miles north of Chicago.
"Why, Mr. Baptiste is coming. Coming to call on your sister. He has been corresponding with her for some time, you understand," her mother returned in her mild, trained manner.
"Oh!" echoed Ethel, apparently at a loss whether to be pleased or displeased. She was as often one way as the other, so her mother was apprehensive of something more.
"I think you have met him, have you not?" her mother inquired.
"Yes, I've met him," admitted Ethel. "Last winter while teaching."
"And what do you think of him, my dear?"
"Well, he has some ways I don't like."
"What ways, please?" She had started to say "naturally" but thought better of it.
"Oh, he does not possess the dignity I like in a man. Struck me as much too commonplace."
"Oh," her mother grunted. She was acquainted withEthel's disposition, which was extremely vain. She loved pomp and ceremony, and admired very few people.
"What's he calling to see Orlean for?"
Her mother looked up in some surprise. She regarded her daughter keenly. "Why, my dear! Why do you ask such a question! Why do young men call to see any young ladies?" Both turned at this moment to see Orlean coming down the stairway, and attention was fastened upon her following.
"All 'dolled' up to meet your farmer," commented Ethel with a touch of envy in her voice. In truth she was envious. Her husband was just an ordinary fellow—that is, he was largely what she was making of him. It was said that she had found no other man who was willing to tolerate her evil temper and that, perhaps, was why she had married him. While with him, he had been anxious to marry her to satisfy his social ambition. Although an honest, hardworking fellow, he had come of very common stock. From the backwoods of Tennessee where his father had been a crude, untrained preacher, he had come to Chicago and had met and married her after a courtship of six years.
"You look very nice, my dear," said her mother, addressing Orlean. Between the two children there was a great difference. Although older, Orlean was by far the more timid by disposition. An obedient girl in every way, she had never been known to cross her parents, and had the happy faculty of making herself generally liked, while Ethel invited disfavor.
She was not so tall as Ethel, and while not as short as her mother, she was heavier than either. She was the image of her father who was dark, although not black. After her mother she had taken her hair, which, while not as fine, was nevertheless heavy, black and attractive. Her eyeswere dark like her mother's, which were coal black. They were small and tender. Her expression was very frank; but she had inherited her mother's timidness and was subservient unto her father, and in a measure unto her younger sister, Ethel.
She was a year older than the man who was coming to see her, and had never had a beau.
"Do I look all right, mama?" she asked, turning so that she might be seen all around.
"Yes, my dear," the other replied. She always used the term "my dear." She had been trained to say that when she was a young wife, and had never gotten out of the habit.
"Now sit down, my daughter," she said judiciously, "and before the young man comes to call on you, tell me all about him."
"Yes, and leave out nothing," interposed Ethel.
"She is talking to your mother, Ethel. You will do her a favor by going to your room until it is over," advised their mother.
"Oh, well, if I'm not wanted, then I'll go," spit out Ethel wickedly, whereupon she turned and hastened up the stairs to her room and slammed the door behind her.
"Ethel has such a temper," her mother sighed deploringly. "She is so different from you, dear. You are like your mother, while she—well, she has her father's ways."
"Papa is not as mean as Ethel," defended Orlean, ever obedient to her mother, yet always upholding her father, it mattered not what the issue.
Her mother sighed again, shifted in her chair, and said no more on that subject. She knew the father better than Orlean, and would not argue. She had been trained not to....
"Now where did you meet Mr. Baptiste, my dear?" she began.
"Where I taught last winter, mother," she replied obediently.
"And how did you come to meet him, daughter?"
"Why, he was calling on a girl friend of mine, and I happened along while he was there, and the girl introduced us."
"M-m. Was that the first time you had seen him?"
"No, I had met him on the street when he was on the way down there."
"I see. Did he speak to you on the street?"
"Oh, no, mother. He did not know me."
"But he might have spoken anyhow...."
"But he was a gentleman, and he never spoke." She paused briefly, and then, her voice a trifle lower, said: "Of course he looked at me. But—"
"Well, any man would do that. We must grant that men are men. How were you impressed with him when you met him later at this friend's house?"
"Well, I don't know," returned Orlean hesitatingly. "He seemed to be a great talker, was very commonplace, dressed nicely but not showily. He knew quite a few people in Chicago that we know, and was born near the town in which I met him. He was just returning from New York, and—well, I rather admired him. He is far above the average colored man, I can say."
"M-m," her mother mused thoughtfully, and with an air of satisfaction. She couldn't think of anything more to say just then, and upon looking at the clock which showed ten minutes of two, she said: "Well, you had better go in the parlor, and after he has called, when convenient, call me and permit me to meet him. You will be careful, mydear, and understand that we have raised you to be a lady, and exercise your usual dignity."
"Yes, mama."
On the hour the street door bell was pulled with a jerk, and arising, Orlean went toward the door expectantly.
"Oh, how do you do," she cried, a moment later, her face lighted with a radiant smile as she extended her hand and allowed it to rest in that of Jean Baptiste's.
"Miss McCarthy," he cried, with her hand in one of his, and his hat in the other, he entered the door.
"May I take your hat?" asked Orlean, and taking it, placed it on the hall tree. In the meantime, his habitually observing eyes were upon her, and when she turned she found him regarding her closely.
"Come right into the parlor, please, Mr. Baptiste, and be seated." She hesitated between the davenport and the chairs; while he, without ado, chose the davenport and became seated, and the look he turned upon her commanded more than words that she, too, be seated. With a little hesitation, she finally sank on the davenport at a conventional distance, beside him.
"I was not certain, judging by your last letter, just when you would get here," she began timidly. He regarded her out of his searching eyes attentively. He was weighing her in the balance. He saw in those close glances what kind of a girl she was, apparently, for, after a respite, he relaxed audibly, but kept his eyes on her nevertheless.
"I was not certain myself," he said. "I am so rushed these days that I do not know always just what comes next. But I am glad that I am here at last—and to see you looking so well."
They exchanged the usual words about the weather, and other conventional notes, and then she called her mother.
"Mama, I wish you to meet Mr. Baptiste. Mr. Baptiste, this is my mother."
"Mr. Baptiste," said her mother, giving him her hand, "I am glad to know you."
"The same here, madam," he returned cheerfully. "Guess your health is good!"
"Very good, I'm glad to say."
They talked for a time, and all were cheered to find themselves so agreeable.
"I think I can slightly recall your people, Mr. Baptiste," her mother remarked, thoughtfully. "My husband, Dr. McCarthy," she said, giving him an honorary term, "pastored the church in the town near where you were born, many years ago."
"I do say," he echoed non-commitally.
"Do you recall it?" she asked.
He appeared to be thinking.... He hardly knew what to say, then, after some deliberation he brightened and said: "I think I do. I was very young then, but I think I do recall your husband...."
"Your name—the name of your family has always remained in my mind," said she then, reflectively.
"Indeed. It is a rather peculiar name."
"It is so, I should say," she cried. "If it is quite fair, may I ask where or how your father came by such a name?"
"Oh, it is very simple. My father, of course, was born a slave like most—almost all Negroes previous to the war—and took the name from his master who I suppose was of French descent."
"Oh, that explains it. Of course that is natural. M-m; but it's a beautiful name, I must say."
He smiled.
"It is an illustrious name, also," she commented further.
"But the man who carries it in this instance, is much to the contrary notwithstanding," he laughed depreciatingly.
"It is a very beautiful day without, my dear," she said, addressing her daughter, "and perhaps Mr. Baptiste might like to walk out and see some of the town."
"I most assuredly would," he cried, glad of something for a change. He was restless, and estimated that if he felt the air, with her at his side, it might help him.
Orlean arose, went upstairs, and returned shortly wearing a large hat that set off her features. He rather liked her under it, and when they walked down the street together, he was conscious of an air of satisfaction.
"Where would you like to go?" she asked as they neared the intersection.
"For a car ride on the elevated," he replied promptly.
"Then we will go right down this street. This is Thirty-third, and there's an elevated station a few blocks from here."
They walked along leisurely, she listening attentively, while he talked freely of the West, his life there and what he was doing. When they reached the L. he assisted her upstairs to the station, and in so doing touched her arm for the first time. The contact gave him a slight sensation but he felt more easy when they had entered the car and taken a seat together. A moment later they were gazing out over the great city below as the cars sped through the air.
It was growing dark when they returned, and she invited him to dinner. He accepted and thereupon met Ethel and her husband.
Ethel was all pomp and ceremony, while her husband, with his cue from her, acted in the same manner, and they rather bored Jean Baptiste with their airs. He was gladwhen the meal was over. He followed Orlean back to the parlor, where they took a seat on the davenport again, and drew closer to her this time. Soon she said: "Do you play?"
"Lord, no!" he exclaimed; "but I shall be glad to listen to you."
"I can't play much," she said modestly; "but I will play what little I know." Thereupon she became seated and played and sang, he thought, very well. After she had played a few pieces, she turned and looked up at him, and he caught the full expression of her eyes. He could see that they were tender eyes; eyes behind which there was not apparently the force of will that he desired; but Orlean McCarthy was a fine girl. She was fine because she was not wicked; because she was intelligent and had been carefully reared; she was fine because she had never cultivated the society of undesirable or common people; but she was not a fine girl because she had a great mind, or great ability; or because she had done anything illustrious. And this Jean Baptiste, a judge of human nature could readily see; but he would marry her, he would be good to her; and she would, he hoped, never have cause to regret having married him. And thereupon he bent close to her, took her chin in his hand and kissed her upon the lips. She turned away when he had done this. In truth she was not expecting such from him and knew not just how to accept it. Her lips burned with a new sensation; she had a peculiar feeling about the heart. She arose and went to the piano and her fingers wandered idly over the keys as she endeavored to still her beating heart.
Shortly she felt his hand upon her shoulder and she turned to hear him say:
"Won't you come back into the parlor? I—would like to speak to you?"
She consented without hesitation, and arising followed him timidly back to the seat they had occupied a few minutes before. Again seated he drew closely but did not deign to place his arm about her, looked toward the rear of the house where the others were, and, seeing that the doors were closed between them, sighed lightly and turned to her.
"Now, Miss McCarthy," he began, evenly. "I am going to say something to you that I have never said to a woman before." He paused while she waited with abated breath.
"I haven't known you long; but that is not the point. What I should say is, that in view of our brief correspondence, it will perhaps appear rather bold of me to say what I wish to. Yet, there comes a time in life when circumstances alter cases.
"Now, to be frank, I have always regarded matrimony as a business proposition, and while sentiment is a very great deal in a way, business considerations should be the first expedient." She was all attention. She was peculiarly thrilled. It was wonderful to listen to him, she thought, and not for anything would she interrupt him. Butwhatdid he mean; what was hegoingto say.
"Well, I, Miss McCarthy, need a wife. I want a wife; but my life has not been lived where social intercourse with girls of my race has been afforded, as you might understand." She nodded understandingly, sympathetically. Her woman's nature was to sympathize, and what she did was only natural with all women.
"It has not been my privilege to know any girl of my race intimately; I am not, as I sit here beside you able to conscientiously, or truly, go to one and say: 'I love you,dear, and want you to be my wife,' in the conventional sense. Therefore, can I be forgiven if I say to you; if I ask you, Miss McCarthy," and so saying, he turned to her, his face serious, "to become my wife?"
He had paused, and her soul was afire. Wasthisa proposal or was it a play? For a time she was afraid to say anything. She wouldn't say no, and she was afraid to say yes, until—well, until she was positive that he had actually asked her to marry him. As it was, she hesitated. But it was so wonderful she thought. It was so beautiful to be so near such a wonderful young man, such a strong young man. The young men she had known had not been like this one. And, really, she wanted to marry. She was twenty-six, and since her sister had married, she had found life lonely. To be a man's wife and go and live alone with him must be wonderful. She was a reader, and he had sent her books. In all books and life and everything there was love. And love always had its climax in a place where one lived alone with a man. Oh, glorious! She wasready to listen to anything he had to say.
"Now, I do not profess love to you, Miss McCarthy, in trying to make this clear. I could not, and be truthful. And I have always tried to be truthful. Indeed, I could not feel very happy, I am sure, unless I was truthful. To pretend that which I am not is hypocrisy, and I despise a hypocrite. I am an owner of land in the West, and I believe you will agree with me, that it behooves any Negro to acquire all he can. We are such a race of paupers! We own so little, and have such little prestige. Thankfully, I am at present, on the high road to success, and, because of that, I want a wife, a dear, kind girl as a mate, the most natural thing in the world." She nodded unaware. What he was saying had not been said to her in that way; but theway he said it was so much to the point. She had not been trained to observe that which was practical; indeed, her father was regarded as a most impractical man; but she liked this man beside her now, and was anxious for him to go on. He did.
"I own 520 acres of very valuable land, and have consummated a deal for 480 more acres. This land is divided into tracts of 160 acres each, and must be homesteaded before the same is patented.
"Now, my grandmother, and also a sister are already in the West, and will homestead on two places. The other, I have arranged for you. The proceeding is simple. It will be necessary only for you to journey out West, file on this land as per my directions, after which we can be married any time after, and we can then live together on your claim. Do you understand?"
"I think so," she said a bit falteringly.
"Now, my dear, do not feel that I am a charter barterer; we can simply acquire a valuable tract of land by this process and be as we would under any other circumstances. Once you were out there all would be very plain to you, but at this distance, it is perhaps foreign to you, that I understand."
She looked up into his face trustingly. Right then she wanted him to kiss her. It was all so irregular; but he was a man and she a maid, and she had never had a love.... He seemed to understand, and passionately he caught her to him, and kissed her many, many times.
It was all over then, as far as she was concerned. She had not said yes or no with words, but her lips had been her consent, and she knew she would love him. It was the happiest hour in the simple life she had lived, and she was ready to become his forever.
A PROPOSAL; A PROPOSITION; A CERTAIN MRS. PRUITT—AND A LETTER
"OH, MAMA, Mr. Baptiste has asked me to marry him," cried Orlean, rushing into the room and to the bed where her mother lay reading, after Jean Baptiste had left.
"Why, my child, this—this is rather sudden, is it not? Mr. Baptiste has known you only a few months and has been corresponding with you just a little while," her mother said with some excitement, suddenly sitting erect in the bed.
"Yes, mama, what you say is true, but he explained. He said—well, I can't quite explain, but he—he wants to marry me, mama, and you know—well, mama, you understand, don't you?"
"Yes, I understand. All girls want husbands, but it must be regular. So take off your clothes, dear, get into bed and tell me just what Mr. Baptiste did say."
The other did as instructed, and as best she could, tried to make plain what Jean had said to her regarding the land and all. She didn't make it very plain, and the matter rather worried her, but the fact that he had asked her to marry him, was uppermost in her mind, and she finally went to sleep happier than she had ever been in her life before.
"Now, when the young man calls today, you will have him take his business up with me," her mother instructed judiciously the following morning.
"He will explain it all, mama. He can do so very easily," she said, glad to be relieved of the difficult task. Yet she had her worries withal. Her mother was a very difficult person to explain anything to; besides, Orlean knew her mother was in constant fear of her father who was a Presiding Elder, traveling over the southern part of the state, and who came into the city only every few months. And if her mother was hard to make understand anything, her father was worse—and business, he knew next to nothing about although he was then five and fifty.
Jean Baptiste had accomplished a great many more difficult tasks than explaining to his prospective mother-in-law in regard to the land. When she seemed to have sensed what it all meant, he observed that she would give a peculiar little start, and he would have to try it all over again. In truth she understood better than she appeared to; but it was the girl's father whom she feared to anger—for in all her life she had never been able to please him.
But she found a way out along late that afternoon when a caller was announced.
The visitor was a woman possessed of rare wits, and of all the people that Mrs. McCarthy disliked, and of all who disliked Mrs. McCarthy, Mrs. Pruitt was the most pronounced. Yet, it was Mrs. Pruitt who settled the difficulty and saved the day for Orlean and Jean Baptiste. But as to why Mrs. Pruitt should dislike Mrs. McCarthy, and Mrs. McCarthy should dislike Mrs. Pruitt, there is a story that was known among all their friends and acquaintances.
When Miss Rankin had said what she did about Rev. N.J. McCarthy, she had not told all, nor had she referred to any woman in particular. She was not a scandal monger. But she knew as all Chicago knew, that in so far as the parties in question were concerned there was a friendshipbetween Mrs. Pruitt and the Reverend that was rather subtle, and had been for years. And it was this which caused the two mentioned to dislike each other with an unspoken hatred.
But Mrs. McCarthy trusted Orlean's going eight hundred miles west to file on a homestead, and what might come of it, to Mrs. Pruitt rather than to herself. While she could—was aware of it—she did not dare venture anything to the contrary where it might come back to her husband's ears, she knew Mrs. Pruitt had more influence with her husband than had she.... Therefore when she invited Jean Baptiste to meet Mrs. Pruitt, who had met him years before, she breathed a sigh of relief.
It was over in a few hours. Mrs. Pruitt would accompany Orlean to the West and back, with Jean Baptiste paying expenses, and preparations were made thereto.
In two days they had reached Gregory where the great land excitement was on. From over all the country people had gathered, and the demand for the land had reached its greatest boom since Jean Baptiste had come to the country.
His sister and grandmother had arrived during his absence, and, after greeting them, he was handed a letter, which read:
My dear Mr. Baptiste:Your most delightful letter was received by me today, and that you may see just how much I appreciate it, I am answering atonceand hope you will receive the same real soon.To begin with: the reason I have not answered sooner is quite obvious. I was away on a short visit, and only returned home today, to find that yourmostinteresting letterhad been here several days. Think of it, and I would have given mostanythingto have had it sooner.Well, in reference to what you intimated in your letter regarding the land up there, I am deeply interested. Nothing strikes my fancy so much as homesteading—which I think you meant. I would the best in the world like to hold down a claim, and am sure I would make a great homesteader. But why write more! An hour with you will explain matters more fully than a hundred letters, so I will close with this: You hinted about coming down, and my invitation is to do so, and do so atyour earliest possible convenience. I am waiting with great anxiety your honored appearance.In the meantime, trusting that you are healthy, hopeful and happy, please believe me to be,Cordially, sincerely—and anxiously yours,Irene Grey.
My dear Mr. Baptiste:
Your most delightful letter was received by me today, and that you may see just how much I appreciate it, I am answering atonceand hope you will receive the same real soon.
To begin with: the reason I have not answered sooner is quite obvious. I was away on a short visit, and only returned home today, to find that yourmostinteresting letterhad been here several days. Think of it, and I would have given mostanythingto have had it sooner.
Well, in reference to what you intimated in your letter regarding the land up there, I am deeply interested. Nothing strikes my fancy so much as homesteading—which I think you meant. I would the best in the world like to hold down a claim, and am sure I would make a great homesteader. But why write more! An hour with you will explain matters more fully than a hundred letters, so I will close with this: You hinted about coming down, and my invitation is to do so, and do so atyour earliest possible convenience. I am waiting with great anxiety your honored appearance.
In the meantime, trusting that you are healthy, hopeful and happy, please believe me to be,
Cordially, sincerely—and anxiously yours,
Irene Grey.
He regarded the letter a little wistfully, and the next moment tore it to bits, flung it to the winds, and went about his business.
THE PRAIRIE FIRE
"MY MOTHER grabbed me, kissed and hugged me time and again when I returned," Jean Baptiste read in the letter he received from his wife-to-be a few days after she had returned to the windy city, and he was satisfied. "She had been so worried, you see, because she had written father nothing about it, and this was the first time in her married life that she has dared do anything without a long consultation with him. But she is glad I went now, and thinks you are a very sensible fellow therefor. Papa sent a telegram advising that he had been reappointed Presiding Elder over the same district, and would come into Chicago for a few days before entering into another year of the work."I am deluged with questions regarding the West, and it gives me a great deal of pleasure to explain everything, and of the wonderful work you are doing. Now, papa will be home in a few days, and, knowing how hard he is to explain anything to, I am preparing myself for quite a task. I will close now. With love and kisses to you, believe me to be,"Your own,"Orlean."
"MY MOTHER grabbed me, kissed and hugged me time and again when I returned," Jean Baptiste read in the letter he received from his wife-to-be a few days after she had returned to the windy city, and he was satisfied. "She had been so worried, you see, because she had written father nothing about it, and this was the first time in her married life that she has dared do anything without a long consultation with him. But she is glad I went now, and thinks you are a very sensible fellow therefor. Papa sent a telegram advising that he had been reappointed Presiding Elder over the same district, and would come into Chicago for a few days before entering into another year of the work.
"I am deluged with questions regarding the West, and it gives me a great deal of pleasure to explain everything, and of the wonderful work you are doing. Now, papa will be home in a few days, and, knowing how hard he is to explain anything to, I am preparing myself for quite a task. I will close now. With love and kisses to you, believe me to be,
"Your own,
"Orlean."
Jean now went about his duties. His sister and grandmother were with him, and he had planned to put them on their claims at once, so as to enable them to prove up assoon as possible. Therefore to their places he hauled lumber, coal and provisions. Their claims lay some forty-five miles to the northwest beyond the railroad which now had its terminus at Dallas. And, referring to that, we have not found occasion to mention what had taken place in the country in the two years passed.
When the railroad had missed Dallas and struck Gregory and the other two government townsites, Dallas was apparently doomed, and in a few months most of the business men had gone, and the business buildings, etc., had been moved to Gregory. This town, because of the fact that it was only five miles from the next county line—the county that had been opened and which contained the land that Jean Baptiste had secured for his relatives and bride—was, for a time, expected to become the terminus. And to this end considerable activity had transpired with a view to getting the heavy trade that would naturally come with the opening and settlement of the county west, which had twice the area of the county in which Gregory lay.
Now, it was shortly after the railroad was under course of construction that one, the chief promoter of the townsite, called on the "town Dad's" of Gregory with a proposition. The proposition was, in short, to move Dallas to Gregory, and thereupon combine in making Gregory a real city.
Unfortunately for Gregory, her leaders were men who had grown up in a part of the country where the people did not know all they might have known. They consisted in a large measure of rustic mountebanks, who, because, and only because, Gregory happened to have been in the direct line of the railroad survey, and had thereby secured the road, took unto themselves the credit of it all. So, instead of entertaining the offer in a logical, business and appreciative manner, gave the promoter the big haw! haw! and turned their backs to him.
There was a spell of inactivity for a time on the part of the said promoter. But in the fall, when the ground had frozen hard, and the corn was being gathered, all that was left in the little town of Dallas, laying beside the claim of Jean Baptiste, was suddenly hauled five miles west of the town of Gregory. And still before the Gregory illogics had time even to think clearly, business was going on in what they then chose to call New Dallas—and the same lay directly on the line of the two counties, and where the railroad survey ended.
It is needless to detail the excitement which had followed this. "Lies, lies, liars!" were the epithets hurled from Gregory. "The railroad is in Gregory to stay; to stay for"—oh, they couldn't say how many years, perhaps a hundred; but all that noise to the west was a bluff, a simon pure bluff, and that ended it. That is, until they started the same noise over again. But it had not been a bluff. The tracks had been laid from Gregory to Dallas early in the spring that followed, and now Dallas wasthetown instead of Gregory, and the boom that had followed the building of the town, is a matter never to be forgotten in the history of the country.
Gregory's one good fortune was that she had secured the land office which necessitated that all filings should be entered there, and in this way got more of the boom that was occasioned by the land opening at the west than it had expected to when the railroad company had pushed its way west out of the town.
It was about this time while great excitement was on and thousands of people were in the town of Dallas that something occurred that came near literally wiping that townoff the map. Jean Baptiste had loaded his wagons and was on the way from his land to the claims of his sister when the same came to pass.
The greatest danger in a new country comes after the grass has died in the fall and before the new grass starts in the spring. But in the fall when the grass is dry and crisp, and the surface below is warm and dry, is the time of prairie fires. No time could have been more opportune for such an episode than the time now was. The wind had been blowing for days and days, and had made the short grass very brittle, and the surface below as hot as in July. Jean Baptiste was within about a mile of where New Dallas now reposed vaingloriously on a hillside, her many new buildings rising proudly, defiantly, as if to taunt and annoy Gregory, against the skyline, when with the wind greeting him, he caught the smell of burning grass. He reached a hillside presently, and from there he could see for miles to the west beyond, and the sight that met his gaze staggered him.
"A prairie fire," he cried apprehensively, and urged his teams forward toward Dallas. One glance had been sufficient toconvincehim what it might possibly mean. A prairie fire with the wind behind it as this was, would bid no good for Dallas, and once there he could be of a little service, since he knew how to fight it.
When he arrived at the outskirts of the embryo city, he was met by a frightened herd of humanity. With bags and trunks and all they could carry; with eyes wide, and mouths gaped, in terror they were hurrying madly from the town to an apparent place of safety—a plowed field nearby. Miles to the west the fire and smoke rose in great, dark reddened clouds, and cast—even at that distance, dark shadows over the little city. As he drew into the town,he could see a line of figures working at fire breaks before the gloom. They were the promoters and the townspeople, and he imagined how they must feel with death possible—and destruction, positive, coming like an angry beast directly upon them.
Soon, Jean Baptiste, with wet horse blankets, was with them on the firing line. The speed at which the wind was driving the fire was ominous. Soon all the west was as if lost in the conflagration, for the sun, shining out of a clear sky an hour before was now shut out as if clouds were over all. The dull roar and crackle of the burning grass brought a feeling of awe over all before it. The heat became, after a time, intense; the air was surcharged with soot, and the little army worked madly at the firebreaks.
Rolling, tumbling, twisting, turning, but always coming onward, the hurricane presently struck the fire guards. In that moment it was seen that a mass of thistles, dried manure, and all refuse from the prairie was sweeping before it, as if to draw the fire onward. The fire plunged over the guards as though they had not been made, pushed back the little army and rushed madly into the town.
It was impossible now to do more. The conflagration was beyond control. Now in the town, an effort was therefore made to get the people out of their houses where some had even hidden when it appeared that all would be swept away in the terrible deluge of fire. One, two, three, four, five, six—ten houses went up like chaff, and the populace groaned, when, of a sudden, something happened. Like Napoleon's army at Waterloo there was a quick change. One of those rare freaks—but what some chose to claim in after years as the will of the Creator in sympathy with the hopeful builders, the wind gradually died down, whipped around, and in less than five minutes, was blowingfrom the east, almost directly against its route of a few minutes before. The fire halted, seemed to hesitate, and then like some cowardly thing, turned around and started back of the same ground it had raged over where it lingered briefly, sputtered, flickered, and then quickly died. And the town, badly frightened, hard worked, but thankful withal, was saved.