Look out for Mister Swaller when de sun swings low—Watch him swoop an' sway!He keeps a mighty dippin', like he don' know whar to go,A-saggin' every way.He starts sort o' nimbly,But he settles mighty wimblyWhen he scurries for de chimbleyWhen de sun swings low.Does you see a cloud a-risin' when de sun swings low?Listen ef it sings.Hit 's a swarm o' gray muskitties, 'bout a million strong or so,A-sharpenin' up der stings.Dey keeps a mighty filin',An' dey tries to sing beguilin',But de 'skitties' song is rilin'When de sun swings low.Oh, de woods is all conversin' when de sun swings low—Bird an' beast an' tree;Dey all communes together in de languages dey know,An' sperits rise to see.De nightmares prances,An' de will-o'-wisp dances,When de moonlight advancesAn' de sun swings low.
Look out for Mister Swaller when de sun swings low—Watch him swoop an' sway!He keeps a mighty dippin', like he don' know whar to go,A-saggin' every way.He starts sort o' nimbly,But he settles mighty wimblyWhen he scurries for de chimbleyWhen de sun swings low.
Does you see a cloud a-risin' when de sun swings low?Listen ef it sings.Hit 's a swarm o' gray muskitties, 'bout a million strong or so,A-sharpenin' up der stings.Dey keeps a mighty filin',An' dey tries to sing beguilin',But de 'skitties' song is rilin'When de sun swings low.
Oh, de woods is all conversin' when de sun swings low—Bird an' beast an' tree;Dey all communes together in de languages dey know,An' sperits rise to see.De nightmares prances,An' de will-o'-wisp dances,When de moonlight advancesAn' de sun swings low.
But most naïve and characteristic of them all perhaps was "Ol' Marse Adam."
Ole Mister Devil took a walk in Paradise—Lady Mis' Eve she's a-walkin', too—Hoped to meet Mars' Adam, she was steppin' mighty nice—Lady Mis' Eve she's a-walkin', too.Dis was 'fo' de fig-time, so my lady picked a rose—Lady Mis' Eve she's a-walkin', too—An' she helt it 'g'inst de sunlight, as she felt de need o' clo'es—Lady Mis' Eve she's a-walkin', too.Den she shuk 'er yaller ringlets down an' 'lowed dat she was dressed—Lady Mis' Eve, she's a-walkin', too—Mister Devil he come quoilin'—everbody knows de rest—Lady Mis' Eve she's a-walkin', too.
Ole Mister Devil took a walk in Paradise—Lady Mis' Eve she's a-walkin', too—Hoped to meet Mars' Adam, she was steppin' mighty nice—Lady Mis' Eve she's a-walkin', too.
Dis was 'fo' de fig-time, so my lady picked a rose—Lady Mis' Eve she's a-walkin', too—An' she helt it 'g'inst de sunlight, as she felt de need o' clo'es—Lady Mis' Eve she's a-walkin', too.
Den she shuk 'er yaller ringlets down an' 'lowed dat she was dressed—Lady Mis' Eve, she's a-walkin', too—Mister Devil he come quoilin'—everbody knows de rest—Lady Mis' Eve she's a-walkin', too.
Then, changing to a solemn, staccato measure, it went on:
Ole Marse Adam! Ole Marse Adam!Et de lady's apple up an' give her all de blame.Greedy-gut, greedy-gut, whar is yo' shame?Ole Marse Adam, man, whar is yo' shame?Ole Marse Adam! Ole Marse Adam!Caught de apple in 'is neck an' made it mighty so'e,An' so we po' gran'chillen has to swaller roun' de co'e.Ole Marse Adam, man, whar is yo' shame?Ole Marse Adam! Ole Marse Adam!Praised de lady's attitudes an' compliment 'er figur'—Didn't have de principle of any decent nigger.Ole Marse Adam, man, whar is yo' shame?
Ole Marse Adam! Ole Marse Adam!Et de lady's apple up an' give her all de blame.Greedy-gut, greedy-gut, whar is yo' shame?Ole Marse Adam, man, whar is yo' shame?
Ole Marse Adam! Ole Marse Adam!Caught de apple in 'is neck an' made it mighty so'e,An' so we po' gran'chillen has to swaller roun' de co'e.Ole Marse Adam, man, whar is yo' shame?
Ole Marse Adam! Ole Marse Adam!Praised de lady's attitudes an' compliment 'er figur'—Didn't have de principle of any decent nigger.Ole Marse Adam, man, whar is yo' shame?
It was a long pull of five miles up the winding stream, but the spirit of jollity had dispelled all sense of time, and when at last the foremost boat, doubling a jutting clump of willows, came suddenly into the open at the foot of the hill, the startling presentment of the white house illuminated with festoons of Chinese lanterns, which extended across its entire width and down to the landing, was like a dream of fairyland.
It was indeed a smiling welcome, and exclamations of delight announced the passage of the boats in turn as they rounded the willow bend.
The firing of a single cannon, with a simultaneous display of fireworks, and music by the plantation band, celebrated the landing of the last boat.
Servants in the simple old-fashioned dress—checked homespun with white accessories, to which were added for the occasion, great rosettes of crimson worn upon the breast—took care of the party at the landing, bringing up the rear with hand-luggage, which they playfully balanced upon their heads or shifted with fancy steps.
The old-time supper—of the sort which made the mahogany groan—was served on the broad back "gallery," while the plantation folk danced in the clearing beyond, a voice from the basement floor calling out the figures.
This was a great sight.
Left here to their own devices as to dress, the negroes made so dazzling a display that, no matter how madly they danced, they could scarcely answer the challenge of their own riotous color schemes.
Single dancers followed; then "ladyes and gentiles" in pairs, taking fantastic steps which would shame a modern dancing-master without once awakening a blush in a maiden's cheek.
The dancing was refined, even dainty, to-night, the favorite achievement of the women being the mincing step taken so rapidly as to simulate suspension of effort, which set the dancers spinning like so many tops, although there was much languid posing, with exchange of salutations and curtsying galore.
Yet not a twirl of fan or dainty lift of flounce—to grace a figure or display a dexterous foot—but expressed a primitive idea of high etiquette.
The "fragments" left over from the banquet of the upper porch—many of them great unbroken dishes, meats, game, and sweets—provided a great banquet for the dancers below, and the gay late feasters furnished entertainment, fresh and straight from life, to the company above, for whose benefit many of their most daring sallies were evidently thrown out—and who, after their recent experiences, were pleased to be so restfully entertained.
Toasts, drunk in ginger-pop and persimmon beer innocent of guile, were offered after grace at the beginning of the supper, the toaster stepping out into the yard and bowing to the gallery while he raised his glass or, literally, his tin cup—the passage of the master's bottle among the men, later in the evening, being a distinct feature.
The first toast was offered to the ladies—"Mistus an' Company-ladies"; and the next, following a suggestion of the first table, where the host had been much honored, was worded about in this wise:
"We drinks to de health, an' wealth,an'de long life of deleadin' gentlemano'Brake Island, who done put 'isself to so much pains an' money to give dis party. But to make de toast accordin' to manners, so hit'll fit de gentleman's visitors long wid hisself, I say let's drink to who but 'Ole Marse Adam!'"
It is easy to start a laugh when a festive crowd is primed for fun, and this toast, respectfully submitted with a low bow by an ancient and privileged veteran of the rosined bow, was met with screams of delight.
A resourceful little island it was that could provide entertainment for a party of society folk for nearly a fortnight with never a repetition to pall or to weary.
The men, equipped for hunting or fishing, and accompanied by several negro men-servants with a supplementary larder on wheels,—which is to say, a wagon-load of bread, butter, coffee, condiments, and wines, with cooking utensils,—left the house early every morning, before the ladies were up.
They discussed engineering schemes over their fishing-poles and game-bags, explored the fastnesses of the brake, eavesdropped for the ultimate secret of the woods, and plumbed for the bayou's heart, bringing from them all sundry tangible witnesses of geologic or other conditions of scientific values.
Most of these "witnesses," however, it must be confessed, were immediately available for spit or grill, while many went—so bountiful was the supply—to friends in the city with the cards of their captors.
There are champagne bottles even yet along the marshes of Brake Island, bottles whose bellies are as full of suggestion as of mud, and whose tongueless mouths fairly whistle as if to recount the canards which enlivened the swampland in those halcyon days of youth and hope and inexperience.
Until the dressing-hour, in the early afternoons which they frankly called the evening, the young women coddled their bloom in linen cambric night-gowns, mostly, reading light romance and verse, which they quoted freely under the challenge of the masculine presence.
Or they told amazing mammy-tales of voudoo-land and the ghost-country for the amused delectation of their gentle hostess, who felt herself warmed and cheered in the sunshine of these Southern temperaments. It seemed all a part of the poetry and grace of a novel and romantic life.
Here were a dozen young women, pretty and care-free as flowers, any one of whom could throw herself across the foot of a bed and snatch a superfluous "beauty-sleep" in the midst of all manner of jollity and laughter.
Most of them spoke several languages and as many dialects, frequently passing from one to another in a single sentence for easy subtlety or color, and with distinct gain in the direction of music.
Possibly they knew somewhat of the grammar of but a single tongue beside their own, their fluency being more of a traditional inheritance than an acquisition. Such is the mellow equipment of many of our richest speakers.
Not one but could pull to pieces her Olympe bonnet and nimbly retrim it with pins, to match her face or fancy—or dance a Highland fling in her 'broidered nightie, or sing—
How they all did sing—and play! Several were accomplished musicians. One knew the Latin names of much of the flora of the island, and found time and small coins sufficient to interest a colony of eager pickaninnies to gather specimens for her "herbarium."
Without ever having prepared a meal, they could even cook, as they had soon amply proven by the heaping confections which were always in evidence at the man-hour—bon-bons, kisses, pralines, what not?—all fragrant with mint, orange-flower, rose-leaf, or violet, or heavy with pecans or cocoanut.
In the afternoon, when the men came home, they frequently engaged in contests of skill—in rowing or archery or croquet; or, following nature's manifold suggestions, they drifted in couples, paddling indolently among the floating lily-pads on the bayou, or reclining among the vines in the summer-houses, where they sipped iced orange syrup or claret sangaree, either one a safe lubricator, by mild inspiration or suggestion, of the tongue of young love, which is apt to become tied at the moment of most need.
With the poems of Moore to reinforce him with easy grace of words, a broad-shouldered fellow would naïvely declare himself a peri, standing disconsolate at the gate of his lady's heart, while she quoted Fanny Fern for her defense, or, if she were passing intellectual and of a broader culture, she would give him invitation in form of rebuff from "The Lady of the Lake," or a scathing line from Shakspere. Of course, all the young people knew their Shakspere—more or less.
They had their fortunes told in a half-dozen fashions, by withered old crones whose dim eyes, discerning life's secrets held lightly in supension, mated them recklesslyon suspicion.
Visiting the colored churches, they attended some of the novel services of the plantation, as, for instance, a certain baptismal wedding, which is to say a combined ceremony, which was in this case performed quite regularly and decorously in the interest of a coal-black piccaninny, artlessly named Lily Blanche in honor of two of the young ladies present whom the bride-mother had seen but once out driving, but whose gowns of flowered organdy, lace parasols, and leghorn hats had stirred her sense of beauty and virtue to action.
Although there was much amusement over this incongruous function, the absence of any sense of embarrassment in witnessing so delicate a ceremony—one which in another setting would easily have become indelicate—was no doubt an unconscious tribute to the primitive simplicity of the contracting parties.
And always there were revival meetings to which they might go and hear dramatic recitals of marvelous personal "experiences," full of imagery,—travels in heaven or hell,—with always the resounding human note which ever prevails in vital reach for truth. Through it all they discerned the cry which finds the heart of a listener and brings him into indissoluble relation with his brother man, no matter how great the darkness out of which the note may come. It is universal.
The call is in every heart, uttered or unexpressed, and one day it will pierce the heavens, finding the blue for him who sends it forth, and for the listener as well if his heart be attuned.
Let who will go and sit through one of these services, and if he does not come away subdued and silent, more tender at heart, and, if need be, stronger of hand to clasp and to lift, perhaps—well, perhaps his mind is open only to the pictorial and the spectacular.
There is no telling how long the house-party would have remained in Paradise but for the inexorable calendar which warned certain of its members that they would be expected to answer the royal summons of Comus at the approaching carnival; and of course the important fact that certain bills from the legislature affecting the public weal were awaiting the governor's signature.
A surprising number of marriages followed this visit, seeming to confirm a report of an absurd number of engagements made on the island.
There is a certain old black woman living yet "down by the old basin" in French New Orleans, a toothless old crone who, by the irony of circumstance, is familiarly known as "Ol' Mammy Molar," who "remembers" many things of this time and occasion, which she glibly calls "de silveringineer party," and who likes nothing better than an audience.
If she is believed, this much too literal account of a far-away time is most meager and unfaithful, for she does most strenuously insist that, for instance, there was served at the servants' table on that first night—
But let her have her way of it for a moment—just a single breath:
"Why, honey," she closes her eyes as she begins, the better to see memory behind them. "Why, honey, de champagne wine was passed aroun' to de hands all dat indurin' infair inwater-buckets, an' dipped out ingou'd dippers-full, bilin' over so fast an' fizzin' so it'd tickle yo' mouf to drink it. An' Marse Harol' Le Duc, he stood on apianner-stool on de back gallery an' th'owed out gol' dollars by de hatful for any of us niggers to pick up; an' de guv'ner, ol' Marse Abe Lincolm, he fired off sky-rockers an' read out freedom papers.
"An' mids' all de dance an' reveltry, a bolt o' thunder fell like a cannon-ball outen a clair sky, an' we looked up an' lo an' beholst, here was a vision of a big hand writin' on de sky, an' a voice say, 'Eat up de balance ef anything is found wantin'!' an' wid dat, dey plunged in like a herd o' swine boun' for de sea, an' dey devoured de fragmints an' popped mo' corks, an' dipped out mo' champagne wine, an' de mo' dey dipped out champagne wine, de mo' dey 'd dance. An' de mo' dey 'd dance, de mo' de wine would flow."
Possibly the old woman's obvious confusion of thought has some explanation in the fact of the presence of the governor of the State, who, introduced as a high dignitary, did make a little speech late that night, thanking the colored people in terms of compliment for their dancing; and any impression made here was so quickly overlaid by the deeper experiences of the war that a blending can easily be explained.
There was a shower of coins—"picayunes" only—thrown during the evening by the master, a feature of the dance being to recover as many of them as possible without breaking step. So the old woman's memory is not so far afield, although as a historian she might need a little editing. But such even as this is much of the so-called "history" which, bound in calf, dishonors the world's libraries to-day.
It is so easy, seeing cobwebs upon a record,—cobwebs which may not be quite construed as alphabet,—to interpret them as hieroglyphics of import, instead of simply brushing them away, or relegating them, where they belong, to the dusky domain of the myth out of which we may expect only weird suggestion, as from the mold of pressed rosemary, typifying remembrance dead.
The house-party, which in this poor retrospect seems to have devoted itself almost wholly to pleasure, was nevertheless followed by immediate work upon the project in behalf of which it was planned.
With this main motive was also the ulterior and most proper one in Harold's mind of introducing his wife in so intimate a fashion to some of the important members of society, who would date life-friendships from the pleasant occasion of helping him to open his own door to them.
Some thousands of dollars went into the quicksands of the marshes before the foundations were laid for the arch of a proposed great bridge, beneath which his boats should sail to their landing. With the arrogant bravado of an impulsive boy challenged to action, he began his arch first. Its announcement of independence and munificence would express the position he had taken. Sometimes it is well to put up a bold front, even if one needs work backward from it.
Harold moved fast—but the gods of war moved faster!
Scarcely had a single column of solid masonry risen above the palmetto swamp when Fort Sumter's guns sounded. The smell of gunpowder penetrated the fastnesses of the brake, and yet, though his nostrils quivered like those of an impetuous war-horse, the master held himself in rein with the thought of her who would be cruelly alone without him. And he said to himself, while he reared his arch: "Two out of three are enough! I have taken their terror island for my portion. They may have garlands upon my bridge—when they come sailing up my canal as heroes!"
But the next whiff from the battleground stopped work on the arch. The brothers had fallen side by side.
Madly seizing both the recovered swords, declaring he would "fight as three," the brave, unthinking fellow, after embracing his beloved, put one of her hands in Hannah's and the other in Israel's, and, commending them to God by a speechless lift of his dark eyes, mounted his horse and dashed, as one afraid to look back, to the front.
Every one knows the story of "poor Harold Le Duc"—how, captured, wounded, he lay for more than a year on the edge of insanity in a Federal hospital. Every one knows of the birth of his child on the lonely island, with only black hands to receive and tend it, and how the waiting mother, guarded by the faithful two, and loved by the three hundred loyal slaves who prayed for her life, finally passed out of it on the very day of days for which she had planned a great Christmas banquet for them in honor of their master's triumphant return.
The story is threadbare. Everyone knows how it happened that "the old people," Colonel and Madame Le Duc, having taken flight upon report of a battle, following their last son, had crossed the lines and been unable from that day to communicate with the island; of the season of the snake-plague in the heart of the brake, when rattlers and copperheads, spreading-adders, moccasins, and conger-eels came up to the island, squirming, darting, or lazily sunning themselves in its flowering grounds and lily-ponds, some even finding their way into the very beds of the people; when the trees were deserted of birds, and alligators prowled across the terraces, depredating the poultry-yard and even threatening the negro children.
In the presence of so manifold disaster many of the negroes returned to voodooism, and nude dances by weird fires offered to Satan supplanted the shouting of the name of Christ in the churches. A red streak in the sky over the brake was regarded as an omen of blood—the thunderbolt which struck the smoke-stack of the sugar-house a command to stop work.
Old women who had treated the sick with savory teas of roots and herbs lapsed into conjuring with bits of hair and bones. A rabbit's foot was more potent than medicine; a snake's tooth wet with swamp scum and dried in the glare of burning sulphur more to be feared than God.
War, death and birth and death again, followed by scant provender threatening famine, and then by the invasion of serpents, had struck terror into hearts already tremulous and half afraid.
The word "freedom" had scarcely reached the island and set the air vibrating with hope, commingled with dread, when the reported death of the master came as a grim corroboration of the startling prospect.
All this is an open story.
But how Israel and Hannah, aided in their flight by a faithful few, slipped away one dark night, carrying the young child with them to bear her safely to her father's people, knowing nothing of their absence, pending the soldier's return—for the two never believed him dead; how, when they had nearly reached the rear lands of the paternal place, they were met by an irresistible flood which turned them back; and how, barely escaping with their lives, they were finally rowed in a skiff quite through the hall of the great house—so high, indeed, that Mammy rescued a family portrait from the wall as they passed; how the baby slept through it all, and the dog followed, swimming—
This is part of the inside history never publicly told.
The little party was taken aboard a boat which waited midstream, a tug which became so overcrowded that it took no account of passengers whom it carried safely to the city. Of the poor forlorn lot, a few found their way back to the plantations in search of survivors, but in most instances, having gone too soon, they returned disheartened.
Madame Le Duc, who, with her guests and servants, had fled from the homestead at the first warning, did not hear for months of the flight of the old people with her grandchild, and of their supposed fate. No one doubted that all three had perished in the river, and the news came as tardy death tidings again—tidings arriving after the manner of war news, which often put whole families in and out of mourning, in and out of season.
There is not space here to dwell upon Harold's final return to Brake Island, bent and broken, unkempt,—disguised by the marks of sorrow, unrecognized, as he had hoped to be, of the straggling few of his own negroes whom he encountered camping in the wood, imprisoned by fear. These, mistaking him for a tramp, avoided him. He had heard the newsen route,—the "news," then several years old,—and had, nevertheless, yielded to a sort of blind, stumbling fascination which drew him back to the scene of his happiness and his despair. Here, after all, was the real battle-field—and he was again vanquished.
When he reached the homestead, he found it wholly deserted. The "big house," sacred to superstition through its succession of tragedies, was as Mammy and Israel had left it. Even its larder was untouched, and the key of the wine-cellar lay imbedded in rust in sight of the cob-webbed door.
It was a sad man, prematurely gray, and still gaunt—and white with the pallor of the hospital prison—who, after this sorrowful pilgrimage to Brake Island, appeared, as from the grave, upon the streets of New Orleans. When he was reinstated in his broken home, and known once more of his family and friends, he would easily have become the popular hero of the hour, for the gay world flung its gilded doors open to him.
The Latin temperament of old New Orleans kept always a song in her throat, even through all the sad passages of her history; and there was never a year when the French quarter, coquette that she was, did not shake her flounces and dance for a season with her dainty toes against the lower side of Canal Street.
But Harold was not a fellow of forgetful mind. The arch of his life was broken, it is true, but like that of the bridge he had begun—a bridge which was to invite the gay world, yes, but which would ever have dominated it, letting its sails pass under—he could be no other than a worthy ruin. Had his impetuous temper turned upon himself on his return to the island, where devastation seemed to mock him at every turn, there is no telling where it might have driven him. But a lonely mother, and the knowledge that his father had died of a broken heart upon the report of his death, the last of his three sons—the pathetic, dependence of his mother upon him—the appeal of her doting eyes and the exigencies of an almost hopeless financial confusion—all these combined as a challenge to his manhood to take the helm in the management of a wrecked estate.
It was a saving situation. How often is work the great savior of men!
Once stirred in the direction of effort, Harold soon developed great genius for the manipulation of affairs. Reorganization began with his control.
Square-shouldered and straight as an Indian, clear of profile, deep-eyed, and thoughtful of visage, the young man with the white hair was soon a marked figure. When even serious men "went foolish over him," it is not surprising that ambitious mothers of marriageable daughters, in these scant days of dearth of men, should have exhibited occasional fluttering anxieties while they placed their broken fortunes in his hands.
Reluctantly at first, but afterward seeing his way through experience, Harold became authorized agent for some of the best properties along the river, saving what was left, and sometimes even recovering whole estates for the women in black who had known before only how to be good and beautiful in the romantic homes and gardens whose pervading perfume had been that of the orange-blossom.
It was on returning hurriedly from a trip to one of these places on the upper river—the property of one Marie Estelle Josephine Ramsey de La Rose, widowed at "Yellow Tavern"—that he sought the ferry skiff on the night old man Israel answered the call.
Little the old man dreamed, while he waited, midstream, trying to think out his problem, that the solution was so near at hand.
We have seen how the old wife waited and prayed on the shore; how with her shaded mind she groped, as many a wiser has done, for a comforting, common-sense understanding of faith, that intangible "substance of things hoped for," that elusive "evidence of things not seen."
In a moment after she heard the creaking of the timbers as the skiff chafed the landing, even while she rose, as was her habit, to see who might be coming over so late, she dimly perceived two men approaching, Israel and another; and presently she saw that Israel held the man's hand and that he walked unsteadily.
She started, fearing that her man was hurt; but before she could find voice of fear or question, Israel had drawn the stranger to her and was saying in a broken voice:
"Hannah! Hannah! Heah Mars' Harol'!"
Only a moment before, with her dim eyes fixed upon the sky, she had experienced a realization of faith, and believed herself confidently awaiting her master's coming. And yet, seeing him now in the flesh before her, she exclaimed:
"What foolishness is dis, ole man? Don't practice no jokes on me to-night, Isrul!"
Her voice was almost gruff, and she drew back as she spoke. But even while she protested, Harold had laid his hand upon her arm.
"Mammy," he whispered huskily, "don't you know your 'indurin' devil'—?" (This had been her last, worst name for her favorite during his mischief period.)
Harold never finished his sentence. The first sound of his voice had identified him, but the shock had confused her. When at last she sobbed "Hush! I say, hush!" her arms were about his knees and she was crying aloud.
"Glo-o-o—oh—glo-o-o—glo-o-ry! Oh, my Gord!" But presently, wiping her eyes, she stammered: "What kep' you so, Baby? Hol' me up, chile—hol' me!"
She was falling, but Harold steadied her with strong arms, pressing her into her chair, but retaining her trembling hand while he sat upon the low table beside her.
He could not speak at once, but, seeing her head drop upon her bosom, he called quickly to Israel. For answer, a clarion note, in no wise muffled by the handkerchief from which it issued, came from the woodpile. Israel was shy of his emotions and had hidden himself.
By the time he appeared, sniffling, Hannah had rallied, and was pressing Harold from her to better study his face at long range.
"What happened to yo' hair, Baby?" she said presently. "Hit looks as bright as dat flaxion curl o' yoze I got in my Testamen'. I was lookin' at it only a week ago las' Sunday, an' wishin' I could read de book 'long wid de curl."
"It is much lighter than that, Mammy. It is whiter than yours. I have lived the sorrows of a long life in a few years."
Israel still stood somewhat aside and was taking no note of their speech, which he presently interrupted nervously:
"H-how you reckon Mars' Harol' knowed me, Hannah? He—he reco'nized his horn! You ricollec' when I fotched dat horn f'om de islan' roun' my neck, clean 'crost de flood, you made game o' me, an' I say I mought have need of it? But of co'se I didn't ca'culate to have it ac-chillycall Mars' Harol' home! I sho' didn't! But dat's what it done. Cep'n' for de horn's call bein' so familius, he'd 'a' paid me my dime like a stranger an' passed on."
At this Harold laughed.
"Sure enough, Uncle Israel; you didn't collect my ferriage, did you? I reckon you'll have to charge that."
Israel chuckled:
"Lord, Hannah, listen! Don't dat soun' like ole times? Dey don't charge nothin' in dese han'-to-mouf days, Marse Harol'—not roun' heah."
"But tell me, Uncle Israel, how did you happen to bring that old horn with you—sure enough?" Harold interrupted.
"I jes fotched it'ca'se I couldn't leave it—de way Hannah snatched yo' po'trit off de wall—all in dat deluge. Hit's heah in de cabin now to witness de trip. But in co'se o' time de horn, hit come handy when I tuk de ferry-skift.
"Well, Hannah, when he stepped aboa'd, he all but shuk de ole skift to pieces. I ought to knowed dat Le Duc high-step, but I didn't. I jes felt his tread, an' s'luted him for a gentleman, an' axed him for Gord sake to set down befo' we'd be capsided in de river. I war n't cravin' to git drownded wid no aristoc'acy.
"De moon she was hidin', dat time, an' we couldn't see much; but he leant over an' he say, 'Uncle,' he say, 'who blowed dat horn 'crost de river?' An' I say, 'Me, sir. I blowed it.' Den he say, 'Whose hornisdat?' An' I 'spon', 'Hit'smyhorn, sir.' Den my conscience begin to gnaw, an' I sort o' stammered, 'Leastways, it b'longs to a frien' o' mine wha' look like he ain't nuver gwine to claim it.' I ain't say who de frien' was, but d'rec'ly he pushed me to de wall. He ax me p'intedly to my face, 'What yo' frien' name, uncle?' An at dat I got de big head an' I up an' snap out:
"'Name Le Duc, sir, Harry Le Duc.'
"Jes free an' easy, so, I say it. Lord have mussy! Ef I'd s'picioned dat was Mars' Harol' settin' up dar listenin' at me callin' his name so sociable an' free, I'd 'a' drapped dem oa's overbo'ad. I sho' would.
"Well, when I say 'Harry Le Duc,' seem like he got kind o' seasick, de way he bent his head down, an' I ax him how he come on—ef he got de miz'ry anywhars. An' wid dat he sort o' give out a dry laugh, an' den what you reckon he ax me? He say, 'Uncle, is you married?' An' wid datIlaughed. 'T war n't no trouble for me to laugh at dat. I 'spon', 'Yas, sirree! You bet I is! Does I look like air rovin' bachelor?' I was jes about half mad by dis time.
"Well, so he kep' on quizzifyin' me: ax me whar I live, an' I tol' 'im I was a ole risidenter on de levee heah for five years past; an' so we run on, back an' fo'th, tell we teched de sho'. An' time de skift bumped de landin' he laid his han' on me an' he say, 'Unc' Isrul, whar's Mammy Hannah?' An' den—bless Gord! I knowed him! But I ain't trus' myself to speak. I des nachelly clawed him an' drug him along to you. I seen de fulfilment o' promise, an' my heart was bustin' full, but I ain't got no halleluiah tongue like you. I jes passed him along to you an' made for de woodpile!"
It was a great moment for Harold, this meeting with the only people living who could tell all there was to know of those who were gone.
Hannah's memory was too photographic for judicious reminiscence. The camera's great imperfection lies in its very accuracy in recording non-essentials, with resulting confusion of values. So the old woman, when she turned her mental search-light backward, "beginning at the beginning," which to Harold seemed the end of all—the day of his departure,—recounted every trivial incident of the days, while Harold listened through the night, often suffering keenly in his eagerness to know the crucial facts, yet fearing to interrupt her lest some precious thing be lost.
A reflected sunrise was reddening the sky across the river when she reached the place in the story relating to the baby. Her description needed not any coloring of love to make it charming, and while he listened the father murmured under his breath:
"And then to have lost her!"
"What dat you say, Marse Harol'?" Hannah gasped, her quick ears having caught his despairing tone.
"Oh, nothing, Mammy. Go on. It did seem cruel to have the little one drowned. But I don't blame you. It is a miracle that you old people saved yourselves."
The old woman turned to her husband and threw up her hands.
"Wh-why, Isrul!" she stammered.
"What's de matter wid you—to set heah all night an' listen at me talkin' all roun' de baby—an' ain't named her yit!"
She rose and, drawing Harold after her, entered the door at her back. As she pulled aside the curtain a ray of sunlight fell full upon the sleeping child.
"Heah yo' baby, Baby!" Her low voice, steadied by its passages through greater crises, was even and gentle.
She laid her hand upon the child.
"Wek up, baby! Wek up!" she cried. "Yo' pa done come! Wek up!"
Without stirring even so much as a thread of her golden hair upon the pillow, the child opened a pair of great blue eyes and looked from Mammy's face to the man's. Then,—so much surer is a child's faith than another's,—doubting not at all, she raised her little arms.
Her father, already upon his knees beside her, bent over, bringing his neck within her embrace, while he inclosed her slender body with his arms. Thus he remained, silent, for a moment, for the agony of his joy was beyond tears or laughter. But presently he lifted his child, and, sitting, took her upon his lap. He could not speak yet, for while he smoothed her beautiful hair and studied her face, noting the blue depths of her darkly fringed eyes, the name that trembled for expression within his lips was "Agnes—Agnes."
"How beautiful she is!" he whispered presently; and then, turning to Hannah, "And how carefully you have kept her! Everything—so sweet."
"Oh, yas!" the old woman hastened to answer. "We ain't spared no pains on 'er, Marse Harol'. She done had eve'ything we could git for her, by hook or by crook. Of co'se she ain't had nowhite kinto christen her, an' dat was a humiliation to us. She didn't have no to say legal person to bring 'er for'ard, so she ain't nuver beenca'yed up in church; but she's had every sort o' christenin' we could reach.
"I knowed yo' pa's ma, ole Ma'am Toinette, she'd turn in her grave lessen her gran'chil' was christened Cat'lic, so I had her christened dat way. Dat ole half-blind priest, Father Some'h'n' other, wha' comes from Bayou de Glaise, he was conductin' mass meetin' or some'h'n' other, down here in Bouligny, an' I took de baby down, an' he sprinkled her in Latin or some'h'n' other, an' ornamented behind her ears wid unctious ile, an' crossed her little forehead, an' made her eat a few grains o' table salt. Hedone it straight, wid all his robes on, an' I g'in him a good dollar, too. An' dat badge you see on her neck, a sister o' charity, wid one o' dese clair-starched ear-flap sunbonnets on, she put dat on her. She say she give it to her to wear so 's she could n't git drownded—like as ef I'd let her drownd. Yit an' still I lef' it so, an' I even buys a fresh blue ribbin for it, once-t an'a while. I hear 'em say dat blue hit's de Hail Mary color—an' it becomes her eyes, too. Dey say what don't pizen fattens, an' I know dem charms couldn't do her no hurt, an', of 'co'se, we don't know all. Maybe dey mought ketch de eye of a hoverin' angel in de air an' bring de baby into Heavenly notice. Of co'se, I wouldn't put no sech as dat on her. I ain't been raised to it, an' I ain't no beggin' hycoprite. But I wouldn't take it off, nuther.
"Den, I knowed ole Mis', yo' ma, she was 'Pistopal, an' Miss Aggie she was Numitarium; so every time a preacher'd be passin' I'd git him to perform it his way. Me bein' Baptis' I didn't have no nigger baptism to saddle on her.
"So she's bounteously baptized—yas, sir. I reasoned it out dat ef dey's only onetruebaptism, an' I war n't to sayshorewhich one it was, I better git 'em all, an' only deonlies'true one wouldcount; an' den ag'in, ef all honest baptisms is good, den de mo' de merrier, as de Book say. Of co'se I knowed pyore rain-water sprinkled on wid a blessin' couldn't hurt no chile.
"You see, when one side de house isFrench distractionan' de yether isEnglish to-scent, an' dey's a dozen side-nations widblood to tellin all de branches,—well, hit minds me o' disba'm of a thousan' flowersdat ole Mis' used to think so much of. Hits hard to 'stinguish out any one flagrams.
"But talkin' about de baby, she ain't been deprived, no mo' 'n de Lord deprived her, for a season, of her rights to high livin' an'—an' aristoc'acy—an'—an' petigree, an' posterity, an' all sech as dat.
"An'—
"What dat you say, Mars' Harol'? Whatnameis we—'
"We ain't dast to give 'er no name, Baby, no mo' 'n jes Blossom. I got 'er wrote down in five citificates 'Miss Blossom,' jes so. No, sir. I knows my colored place, an' I'll go so far, an' dat's all de further. She was jes as much a blossom befo' she was christened as she was arterwards, so my namin' 'er don't count. I was 'mos' tempted to call out 'Agnes' to de preachers, when dey'd look to me for a name, seem' it was her right—like as ef she was borned to it; but—I ain't nuver imposed on her. No, sir, we ain't imposed on her noways.
"De on'iest wrong I ever done her—an' Gord knows I done it to save her to my arms, an' for you, marster—de on'iest wrong was to let her go widout her little sunbonnet an' git her skin browned up so maybe nobody wouldn't s'picion she was clair white an' like as not try to wrest her from me. An'onetime, when a uppish yo'ng man ast me her name, I said it straight, but I see him look mighty cu'yus, an' I spoke up an' say, 'What other name you 'spect' her to have? My name is Hannah Le Duc, an' I's dat child's daddy's mammy.' Excuse me, Mars' Harold, but you know Iisyo'blackmammy—an' I was in so'e straits.
"So de yo'ng man, well, he didn't seem to have no raisin'. He jes sort o' whistled, an' say I sho is got one mighty blon' gran'chil'—an' I 'spon', 'Yas, sir; so it seems.'
"An' dat's de on'ies' wrong I ever done her. She sets up at her little dinner-table sot wid a table-cloth an' a white napkin,—an' I done buyed her a ginuine silver-plated napkin-ring to hold it in, too,—an' she says her own little blessin'—dat short 'Grace o' Gord—material binefets,' one o' Miss Aggie's; I learned it to her. No, she ain't been handled keerless, ef she is been livin' on de outside o' de levee, like free niggers. But we ain't to saylivedhere, 'not perzackly, marster. We jes been waitin' along,so, dese five years—waitin' for to-night.
"I ain't nuver sorted her clo'es out into no bureau; I keeps 'em all in her little trunk, perpared to move along."
For a moment the realization of the culmination of her faith seemed to suffuse her soul, and as she proceeded, her voice fell in soft, rhythmic undulations.
"Ya-as, Mars' Harol', Mammy's baby boy, yo' ol' nuss she been waitin', an' o-ole man Isrulhebeen waitin', an' de Blossomshebeen waitin'. I 'spec' she had de firmes' faith, arter all, de baby did. Day by day we all waited—an' night by night. An' sometimes when courage would burn low an' de lamp o' faith grow dim, seem like we'd a' broke loose an' started a-wanderin' in a sort o' blind search,'cep'n' for de river.
"Look like ef we'd ever went beyan' de river's call, we'd been same as de chillen o' Isrul lost in de tanglement o' de wilderness. All we river chillen, we boun' to stay by her, same as toddlin' babies hangs by a mammy's skirts. She'll whup us one day, an' chastise us severe; den she'll bring us into de light, same as she done to-night—same as reel mammies does.
"An', Mars' Harol'—"
She lowered her voice.
"Mars' Harol', don't tell me she don't know! I tell yer, me an' dis River we done spent many a dark night together under de stars, an' we done talked an' answered one another so many lonely hours—an' she done showed us so many mericles on landan'water—
"I tell yer, I done found out some'h'n' about de River, Mars' Harol'. She's—why, she's—
"Oh, ef I could only write it all down to go in a book! We been th'ough somemerac'loustimes together, sho' 's you born—sho' 's you born.
"She's a mericle mystery, sho'!
"You lean over an' dip yo' han' in her an' you take it up an' you say it'swet. You dig yo' oars into her, an' she'll spin yo' boat over her breast. You dive down into her, an' you come up—or don't come up. Some eats her. Some drinks her. Some gethers wealth outen her. Some draps it into her. Some drownds in her.
"An' she gives an' takes, an' seem like all her chillen gits satisfaction outen her, one way an' another; but yit an' still, she ain't nuver flustered. On an' on she goes—rain or shine—high water—low water—all de same—on an' on.
"When she craves diamonds for her neck, she reaches up wid long onvisible hands an' gethers de stars out'n de firmamint.
"De moon is her common breastpin, an' de sun—
"Even he don't faze her. She takes what she wants, an' sends back his fire every day.
"De mists is a veil for her face, an' de showers fringes it.
"Sunrise or dusklight, black night or midday, every change she answerswhilst she's passin'.
"But who everinticed her to stop or to look or listen? Nobody, Baby. An' why?
"Oh, Lord! ef eve'ybody only knowed!
"You see, all sech as dat, I used to study over it an' ponder befo' we started to talk back an' fo'th—de River an' me.
"One dark night she heared me cryin' low on de bank, whilst de ole man stepped into de boat to row 'crost de water, an' she felt Wood-duck settle heavy on her breast, an' she seen dat we carried de same troublous thought—searchin' an' waitin' for the fulfilment o' promise.
"An' so we started to call—an' to answer, heart to heart."
The story is nearly told. No doubt many would be willing to have it stop here. But a tale of the river is a tale of greed, and must have satisfaction.
While father and child sat together, Israel came, bringing fresh chips. He had been among the woodpiles again. This time there followed him the dog.
"Why, Blucher!" Harold exclaimed. "Blucher, old fellow!" And at his voice the dog, whining and sniffing, climbed against his shoulder, even licking his face and his hand. Then, running off, he barked at Israel and Hannah, telling them in fine dog Latin who the man was who had come. Then he crouched at his feet, and, after watching his face a moment, laid his head upon his master's right foot, a trick Harold had taught him as a pup.
Of course Harold wished to take the entire family home with him at once, and would hear to nothing else until Hannah, serving black coffee to him from her furnace, in the dawn, begged that she and Israel might have "a few days to rest an' to study" before moving.
It was on the second evening following this, at nightfall, while her man was away in his boat, that the old woman rose from her chair and, first studying the heavens and then casting about her to see that no one was near, she went down to the water, slowly picking her way to a shallow pool between the rafts and the shore. She sat here at first, upon the edge of the bank, frankly dropping her feet into the water while she seemed to begin to talk—or possibly she sang, for the low sound which only occasionally rose above the small noises of the rafts was faintly suggestive of a priest's intoning.
For a moment only, she sat thus. Then she began to lower herself into the water, until, leaning, she could lay her face against the sod, so that a wave passed over it, and when, letting her weight go, she subsided, with arms extended, into the shallow pool, a close listener might have heard an undulating song, so like the river's in tone as to be separable from it only through the faint suggestion of words, interrupted or drowned at intervals by the creaking and knocking of the rafts and the gurgling of the sucking eddies about them.
The woman's voice—song, speech, or what not?—seemedintermittent, as if in converse with another presence.
Suddenly, while she stood thus, she dropped bodily, going fully under the water for a brief moment, as if renewing her baptism, and when she presently lifted herself, she was crying aloud, sobbing as a child sobs in the awful momentary despair of grief at the untwining of arms—shaken, unrestrained.
While she stood thus for a few minutes only,—a pathetic waste of sorrow, wet, dark and forlorn, alone on the night-shore,—a sudden wind, a common evening current, threw a foaming wave over the logs beside her so that its spray covered her over; while the straining ropes, breaking and bumping timbers, with the slow dripping of the spent wave through the raft, seemed to answer and possibly to assuage her agitation; for, as the wind passed and the waters subsided, she suddenly grew still, and, climbing the bank as she had come, walked evenly as one at peace, into her cabin.
No one will ever know what, precisely, was the nature of this last communion. Was it simply an intimate leave-taking of a faithful companionship grown dear through years of stress? Or had it deeper meaning in a realization—or hallucination—as to the personality of the river—the "secret" to which she only once mysteriously referred in a gush of confidence on her master's return?
Perhaps she did not know herself, or only vaguely felt what she could not tell. Certainly not even to her old husband, one with her in life and spirit, did she try to convey this mystic revelation. We know by intuition the planes upon which our minds may meet with those of our nearest and dearest. To the good man and soldier, Israel,—the prophet, even, who held up the wavering hands of the imaginative woman when her courage waned, pointing to the hour of fulfilment,—the great river, full of potencies for good or ill, could be only a river. As a mirror it had shown him divinity, and in its character it mighttypifyto his image-loving mind another thing which service would make it precious. But what he would have called his sanity—had he known the word—would have obliged him to stop there.
The stars do not tell, and the poor moon—at best only hinting what the sun says—is fully half-time off her mind. And thesoul of the River—if, indeed, it has once broken silence—may not speak again.
And, so, her secret is safe—safe even if the broken winds did catch a breath, here and there, sending it flurriedly through and over the logs until they trembled with a sort of mad harp-consciousness, and were set a-quivering for just one full strain—one coherent expression of soul-essence—when the wave broke. Perhaps the arms of the twin spirits were untwined—and they went their separate ways smiling—the woman and the river.
When, after a short time, the old wife came out, dressed in fresh clothing, her white, starched tignon shining in the moonlight, to sit and talk with her husband, her composure was as perfect as that of the face of the water which in its serenity suggested the voice of the Master, when Peter would have sunk but for his word.
This was to be their last night here. Harold was to bring a carriage on the next day to take them to his mother and Blossom, and, despite the joy in their old hearts, it cost them a pang to contemplate going away. Every woodpile seemed to hold a memory, each feature of the bank a tender association. Blucher lay sleeping beside them.
Israel spoke first.
"Hannah!" he said.
"What, Isrul?"
"I ready to go home to-night, Hannah. Marse Harol' done come. We done finished our 'sponsibility—an' de big river's a-flowin' on to de sea—an' settin' heah, I 'magines I kin see Mis' Aggie lookin' down on us, an' seem like she mought want to consult wid us arter our meetin' wid Marse Harol' an' we passin' Blossom along. What you say, Hannah?"
"I been tired, ole man, an' ef we could 'a' went las' night, like you say, seem like I 'd 'a' been ready—an', of co'se, I'm ready now, ef Gord wills. Peace is on my sperit. Yit an' still, when we rests off a little an' studies freedom free-handed, we won't want to hasten along maybe. Ef we was to set heah an' wait tell Gord calls us,—He ain't ap' to call us bofe together, an' dey'd be lonesome days for the last one. But ef we goes 'long wid Marse Harol', he an' Blossom'll be a heap o' comfort to de one what's left."
"Hannah!"
"Yas, Isrul."
"We's a-settin' to-night close to de brink—ain't dat so?"
"Yas, Isrul."
"An' de deep waters is in sight, eh, Hannah?"
"Yas, Isrul."
"An' we heah it singin', ef we listen close, eh, Hannah?"
"Yas, Isrul."
"Well, don't let 's forgit it, dat 's all. Don't let's forgit, when we turns our backs on dis swellin' tide, dat de river o' Jordan is jes befo' us, all de same—an' it can't be long befo' our crossin'-time."
"Amen!" said the woman.
The moon shone full upon the great river, making a shimmering path of light from shore to shore, when the old couple slowly rose and went to rest.
Toward morning there was a quick gurgling sound in front of the cabin. Blucher caught it, and, springing out, barked at the stars. The sleepers within the levee hut slept on, being overweary.
The watchman in the Carrollton garden heard the sound,—heard it swell almost to a roar,—and he ran to the new levee, reaching its summit just in time to see the roof of the cabin as it sank, with the entire point of land upon which it rested, into the greedy flood.
When Harold Le Duc arrived that morning to take the old people home, the river came to meet him at the brim of the near bank, and its face was as the face of smiling innocence.
While he stood awe-stricken before the awful fact so tragically expressed in the river's bland denial, a wet dog came, and, whining, crouched at his feet. He barked softly, laid his head a moment upon his master's boot, moaned a sort of confidential note, and, looking into the air, barked again, softly.
Did he see more than he could tell? Was he trying to comfort his master? He had heard all the sweet converse of the old people on that last night, and perhaps he was saying in his poor best speech that all was well.
Mammy Hannah and Uncle Israel, having discharged their responsibility, had crossed the River together.