CHAPTER XXII
THE STRAINING OF ANOTHER FRIENDSHIP
Captain Lige asked but two questions: where was the Colonel, and was it true that Clarence had refused to be paroled? Though not possessing over-fine susceptibilities, the Captain knew a mud-drum from a lady's watch, as he himself said. In his solicitude for Virginia, he saw that she was in no state of mind to talk of the occurrences of the last few days. So he helped her to climb the little stair that winds to the top of the texas,—that sanctified roof where the pilot-house squats. The girl clung to her bonnet Will you like her any the less when you know that it was a shovel bonnet, with long red ribbons that tied under her chin? It became her wonderfully. "Captain Lige," she said, almost tearfully, as she took his arm, "how I thank heaven that you came up the river this afternoon!"
"Jinny," said the Captain, "did you ever know why cabins are called staterooms?"
"Why, no," answered she, puzzled.
"There was an old fellow named Shreve who ran steamboats before Jackson fought the redcoats at New Orleans. In Shreve's time the cabins were curtained off, just like these new-fangled sleeping-car berths. The old man built wooden rooms, and he named them after the different states, Kentuck, and Illinois, and Pennsylvania. So that when a fellow came aboard he'd say: 'What state am I in, Cap?' And from this river has the name spread all over the world—stateroom. That's mighty interesting," said Captain Lige.
"Yea," said Virginia; "why didn't you tell me long ago."
"And I'll bet you can't say," the Captain continued, "why this house we're standing on is called the texas."
"Because it is annexed to the states," she replied, quick a flash.
"Well, you're bright," said he. "Old Tufts got that notion, when Texas came in. Like to see Bill Jenks?"
"Of course," said Virginia.
Bill Jenks was Captain Brent's senior pilot. His skin hung on his face in folds, like that of a rhinoceros It was very much the same color. His grizzled hair was all lengths, like a worn-out mop; his hand reminded one of an eagle's claw, and his teeth were a pine yellow. He greeted only such people as he deemed worthy of notice, but he had held Virginia in his arms.
"William," said the young lady, roguishly, "how is the eye, location, and memory?"
William abandoned himself to a laugh. When this happened it was put in the Juanita's log.
"So the Cap'n be still harpin' on that?" he said, "Miss Jinny, he's just plumb crazy on a pilot's qualifications."
"He says that you are the best pilot on the river, but I don't believe it," said Virginia.
William cackled again. He made a place for her on the leather-padded seat at the back of the pilot house, where for a long time she sat staring at the flag trembling on the jackstaff between the great sombre pipes. The sun fell down, but his light lingered in the air above as the big boat forged abreast the foreign city of South St. Louis. There was the arsenal—grim despite its dress of green, where Clarence was confined alone.
Captain Lige came in from his duties below. "Well, Jinny, we'll soon be at home," he said. "We've made a quick trip against the rains."
"And—and do you think the city is safe?"
"Safe!" he cried. "As safe as London!" He checked himself. "Jinny, would you like to blow the whistle?"
"I should just love to," said Virginia. And following Mr. Jenks's directions she put her toe on the tread, and shrank back when the monster responded with a snort and a roar. River men along the levee heard that signal and laughed. The joke was certainly not on sturdy Elijah Brent.
An hour later, Virginia and her aunt and the Captain, followed by Mammy aster and Rosetta and Susan, were walking through the streets of the stillest city in the Union. All that they met was a provost's guard, for St. Louis was under Martial Law. Once in a while they saw the light of some contemptuous citizen of the residence district who had stayed to laugh. Out in the suburbs, at the country houses of the first families, people of distinction slept five and six in a room—many with only a quilt between body and matting. Little wonder that these dreamed of Hessians and destruction. In town they slept with their doors open, those who remained and had faith. Martial law means passes and explanations, and walking generally in the light of day. Martial law means that the Commander-in-chief, if he be an artist in well doing, may use his boot freely on politicians bland or beetle-browed. No police force ever gave the sense of security inspired by a provost's guard.
Captain Lige sat on the steps of Colonel Carvel's house that night, long after the ladies were gone to bed. The only sounds breaking the silence of the city were the beat of the feet of the marching squads and the call of the corporal's relief. But the Captain smoked in agony until the clouds of two days slipped away from under the stars, for he was trying to decide a Question. Then he went up to a room in the house which had been known as his since the rafters were put down on that floor.
The next morning, as the Captain and Virginia sit at breakfast together with only Mammy Easter to cook and Rosetta to wait on them, the Colonel bursts in. He is dusty and travel-stained from his night on the train, but his gray eyes light with affection as he sees his friend beside his daughter.
"Jinny," he cries as he kisses her, "Jinny, I'm proud oil you, my girl!
You didn't let the Yankees frighten you—But where is Jackson?"
And so the whole miserable tale has to be told over again, between laughter and tears on Virginia's part, and laughter and strong language on Colonel Carvel's. What—blessing that Lige met them, else the Colonel might now be starting for the Cumberland River in search of his daughter. The Captain does not take much part in the conversation, and he refuses the cigar which is offered him. Mr. Carvel draws back in surprise.
"Lige," he says, "this is the first time to my knowledge."
"I smoked too many last night," says the Captain. The Colonel sat down, with his feet against the mantel, too full of affairs to take much notice of Mr. Brent's apathy.
"The Yanks have taken the first trick—that's sure," he said. "But I think we'll laugh last, Jinny. Jefferson City isn't precisely quiet. The state has got more militia, or will have more militia in a day or two. We won't miss the thousand they stole in Camp Jackson. They're organizing up there. And I've got a few commissions right here," and he tapped his pocket.
"Pa," said Virginia, "did you volunteer?"
The Colonel laughed.
"The Governor wouldn't have me," he answered. "He said I was more good here in St. Louis. I'll go later. What's this I hear about Clarence?"
Virginia related the occurrences of Saturday. The Colonel listened with many exclamations, slapping his knee from time to time as she proceeded.
"By gum!" he cried, when she had finished, "the boy has it in him, after all! They can't hold him a day—can they, Lige?" (No answer from the Captain, who is eating his breakfast in silence.) "All that we have to do is to go for Worington and get a habeas corpus from the United States District Court. Come on, Lige." The Captain got up excitedly, his face purple.
"I reckon you'll have to excuse me, Colonel," he said. "There's a cargo on my boat which has got to come off." And without more ado he left the room. In consternation they heard the front door close behind him. And yet, neither father nor daughter dared in that hour add to the trial of the other by speaking out the dread that was in their hearts. The Colonel smoked for a while, not a word escaping him, and then he patted Virginia's cheek.
"I reckon I'll run over and see Russell, Jinny," he said, striving to be cheerful. "We must get the boy out. I'll see a lawyer." He stopped abruptly in the hall and pressed his hand to his forehead. "My God," he whispered to himself, "if I could only go to Silas!"
The good Colonel got Mr. Russell, and they went to Mr. Worington, Mrs. Colfax's lawyer, of whose politics it is not necessary to speak. There was plenty of excitement around the Government building where his Honor issued the writ. There lacked not gentlemen of influence who went with Mr. Russell and Colonel Carvel and the lawyer and the Commissioner to the Arsenal. They were admitted to the presence of the indomitable Lyon, who informed them that Captain Colfax was a prisoner of war, and, since the arsenal was Government property, not in the state. The Commissioner thereupon attested the affidavit to Colonel Carvel, and thus the application for the writ was made legal.
These things the Colonel reported to Virginia; and to Mrs. Colfax, who received them with red eyes and a thousand queries as to whether that Yankee ruffian would pay any attention to the Sovereign law which he pretended to uphold; whether the Marshal would not be cast over the Arsenal wall by the slack of his raiment when he went to serve the writ. This was not the language, but the purport, of the lady's questions. Colonel Carvel had made but a light breakfast: he had had no dinner, and little rest on the train. But he answered his sister-in-law with unfailing courtesy. He was too honest to express a hope which he did not feel. He had returned that evening to a dreary household. During the day the servants had straggled in from Bellegarde, and Virginia had had prepared those dishes which her father loved. Mrs. Colfax chose to keep her room, for which the two were silently thankful. Jackson announced supper. The Colonel was humming a tune as he went down the stairs, but Virginia was not deceived. He would not see the yearning in her eyes as he took his chair; he would not glance at Captain Lige's empty seat. It was because he did not dare. She caught her breath when she saw that the food on his plate lay untouched.
"Pa, are you ill?" she faltered.
He pushed his chair away, such suffering in his look as she had never seen.
"Jinny," he said, "I reckon Lige is for the Yankees."
"I have known it all along," she said, but faintly.
"Did he tell you?" her father demanded. "No."
"My God," cried the Colonel, in agony, "to think that he kept it from me
I to think that Lige kept it from me!"
"It is because he loves you, Pa," answered the girl, gently, "it is because he loves us."
He said nothing to that. Virginia got up, and went softly around the table. She leaned over his shoulder. "Pa!"
"Yes," he said, his voice lifeless.
But her courage was not to be lightly shaken. "Pa, will you forbid him to come here—now?"
A long while she waited for his answer, while the big clock ticked out the slow seconds in the hall, and her heart beat wildly.
"No," said the Colonel. "As long as I have a roof, Lige may come under it."
He rose abruptly and seized his bat. She did not ask him where he was going, but ordered Jackson to keep the supper warm, and went into the drawing-room. The lights were out, then, but the great piano that was her mother's lay open. Her fingers fell upon the keys. That wondrous hymn which Judge Whipple loved, which for years has been the comfort of those in distress, floated softly with the night air out of the open window. It was "Lead, Kindly Light." Colonel Carvel heard it, and paused.
Shall we follow him?
He did not stop again until he reached the narrow street at the top of the levee bank, where the quaint stone houses of the old French residents were being loaded with wares. He took a few steps back-up the hill. Then he wheeled about, walked swiftly down the levee, and on to the landing-stage beside which the big 'Juanita' loomed in the night. On her bows was set, fantastically, a yellow street-car.
The Colonel stopped mechanically. Its unexpected appearance there had served to break the current of his meditations. He stood staring at it, while the roustabouts passed and repassed, noisily carrying great logs of wood on shoulders padded by their woollen caps.
"That'll be the first street-car used in the city of New Orleans, if it ever gets there, Colonel."
The Colonel jumped. Captain Lige was standing beside him.
"Lige, is that you? We waited supper for you."
"Reckon I'll have to stay here and boss the cargo all night. Want to get in as many trips as I can before—navigation closes," the Captain concluded significantly.
Colonel Carvel shook his head. "You were never too busy to come for supper, Lige. I reckon the cargo isn't all."
Captain Lige shot at him a swift look. He gulped.
"Come over here on the levee," said the Colonel, sternly. They walked out together, and for some distance in silence.
"Lige," said the elder gentleman, striking his stick on the stones, "if there ever was a straight goer, that's you. You've always dealt squarely with me, and now I'm going to ask you a plain question. Are you North or South?"
"I'm North, I reckon," answered the Captain, bluntly. The Colonel bowed his head. It was a long time before he spoke again. The Captain waited like a man who expects and deserve, the severest verdict. But there was no anger in Mr. Carvel's voice—only reproach.
"And you wouldn't tell me, Lige? You kept it from me."
"My God, Colonel," exclaimed the other, passionately, "how could I? I owe what I have to your charity. But for you and—and Jinny I should have gone to the devil. If you and she are taken away, what have I left in life? I was a coward, sir, not to tell you. You must have guessed it. And yet,—God help me,—I can't stand by and see the nation go to pieces. Your nation as well as mine, Colonel. Your fathers fought that we Americans might inherit the earth—" He stopped abruptly. Then he continued haltingly, "Colonel, I know you're a man of strong feelings and convictions. All I ask is that you and Jinny will think of me as a friend—"
He choked, and turned away, not heeding the direction of his feet. The Colonel, his stick raised, stood looking after him. He was folded in the near darkness before he called his name.
"Lige!"
"Yes, Colonel."
He came back, wondering, across the rough stones until he stood beside the tall figure. Below them, the lights glided along the dark water.
"Lige, didn't I raise you? Haven't I taught you that my house was your home? Come back, Lige. But—but never speak to me again of this night! Jinny is waiting for us."
Not a word passed between them as they went up the quiet street. At the sound of their feet in the entry the door was flung open, and Virginia, with her hands out stretched, stood under the hall light.
"Oh, Pa, I knew you would bring him back," she said.
CHAPTER XXIII
OF CLARENCE
Captain Clarence Colfax, late of the State Dragoons, awoke on Sunday morning the chief of the many topics of the conversation of a big city. His conduct drew forth enthusiastic praise from the gentlemen and ladies who had thronged Beauregard and Davis avenues, and honest admiration from the party which had broken up the camp. The boy had behaved well. There were many doting parents, like Mr. Catherwood, whose boys had accepted the parole, whose praise was a trifle lukewarm, to be sure. But popular opinion, when once aroused, will draw a grunt from the most grudging.
We are not permitted, alas, to go behind these stern walls and discover how Captain Colfax passed that eventful Sunday of the Exodus. We know that, in his loneliness, he hoped for a visit from his cousin, and took to pacing his room in the afternoon, when a smarting sense of injustice crept upon him. Clarence was young. And how was he to guess, as he looked out in astonishment upon the frightened flock of white boats swimming southward, that his mother and his sweetheart were there?
On Monday, while the Colonel and many prominent citizens were busying themselves about procuring the legal writ which was at once to release Mr. Colfax, and so cleanse the whole body of Camp Jackson's defenders from any, veiled intentions toward the Government, many well known carriages drew up before the Carvel House in Locust Street to congratulate the widow and the Colonel upon the possession of such a son and nephew. There were some who slyly congratulated Virginia, whose martyrdom it was to sit up with people all the day long. For Mrs, Colfax kept her room, and admitted only a few of her bosom friends to cry with her. When the last of the callers was gone, Virginia was admitted to her aunt's presence.
"Aunt Lillian, to-morrow morning Pa and I are going to the Arsenal with a basket for Max. Pa seems to think there is a chance that he may come back with us. You will go, of course."
The lady smiled wearily at the proposal, and raised her hands in protest, the lace on the sleeves of her dressing gown falling away from her white arms.
"Go, my dear?" she exclaimed, "when I can't walk to my bureau after that terrible Sunday. You are crazy, Jinny. No," she added, with conviction, "I never again expect to see him alive. Comyn says they may release him, does he? Is he turning Yankee, too?"
The girl went away, not in anger or impatience, but in sadness. Brought up to reverence her elders, she had ignored the shallowness of her aunt's character in happier days. But now Mrs. Colfax's conduct carried a prophecy with it. Virginia sat down on the landing to ponder on the years to come,—on the pain they were likely to bring with them from this source—Clarence gone to the war; her father gone (for she felt that he would go in the end), Virginia foresaw the lonely days of trial in company with this vain woman whom accident made her cousin's mother. Ay, and more, fate had made her the mother of the man she was to marry. The girl could scarcely bear the thought—through the hurry and swing of the events of two days she had kept it from her mind.
But now Clarence was to be released. To-morrow he would be coming home to her joyfully for his reward, and she did not love him. She was bound to face that again and again. She had cheated herself again and again with other feelings. She had set up intense love of country in the shrine where it did not belong, and it had answered—for a while. She saw Clarence in a hero's light—until a fatal intimate knowledge made her shudder and draw back. And yet her resolution should not be water. She would carry it through.
Captain Lige's cheery voice roused her from below—and her father's laugh. And as she went down to them she thanked God that this friend had been spared to him. Never had the Captain's river yarns been better told than at the table that evening. Virginia did not see him glance at the Colonel when at last he had brought a smile to her face.
"I'm going to leave Jinny with you, Lige," said Mr. Carvel, presently. "Worington has some notion that the Marshal may go to the Arsenal to-night with the writ. I mustn't neglect the boy."
Virginia stood in front of him. "Won't you let me go?" she pleaded
The Colonel was taken aback. He stood looking down at her, stroking his goatee, and marvelling at the ways of woman.
"The horses have been out all day, Jinny," he said, "I am going in the cars."
"I can go in the cars, too."
The Colonel looked at Captain Lige.
"There is only a chance that we shall see Clarence," he went on, uneasily.
"It is better than sitting still," cried Virginia, as she ran away to get the bonnet with the red strings.
"Lige,—" said the Colonel, as the two stood awaiting her in the hall, "I can't make her out. Can you?"
The Captain did not answer.
It was a long journey, in a bumping car with had springs that rattled unceasingly, past the string of provost guards. The Colonel sat in the corner, with his head bent down over his stick At length, cramped and weary, they got out, and made their way along the Arsenal wall, past the sentries to the entrance. The sergeant brought his rifle to a "port".
"Commandant's orders, sir. No one admitted," he said.
"Is Captain Colfax here?" asked Mr. Carver
"Captain Colfax was taken to Illinois in a skiff, quarter of an hour since."
Captain Lige gave vent to a long, low whistle.
"A skiff!" he exclaimed, "and the river this high! A skiff!"
Virginia clasped his arm in terror. "Is there danger?"
Before he could answer came the noise of steps from the direction of the river, and a number of people hurried up excitedly. Colonel Carvel recognized Mr. Worington, the lawyer, and caught him by the sleeve.
"Anything happened?" he demanded.
Worington glanced at the sentry, and pulled the Colonel past the entrance and into the street. Virginia and Captain Lige followed.
"They have started across with him in a light skiff——four men and a captain. The young fool! We had him rescued."
"Rescued!"
"Yes. There were but five in the guard. And a lot of us, who suspected what they were up to, were standing around. When we saw 'em come down, we made a rush and had the guard overpowered But Colfax called out to stand back."
"Well, sir."
"Cuss me if I understand him," said Mr. Worington. "He told us to disperse, and that he proposed to remain a prisoner and go where they sent him."
There was a silence. Then— "Move on please, gentlemen," said the sentry, and they started to walk toward the car line, the lawyer and the Colonel together. Virginia put her hand through the Captain's arm. In the darkness he laid his big one over it.
"Don't you be frightened, Jinny, at what I said, I reckon they'll fetch up in Illinois all right, if I know Lyon. There, there," said Captain Lige, soothingly. Virginia was crying softly. She had endured more in the past few days than often falls to the lot of one-and-twenty.
"There, there, Jinny." He felt like crying himself. He thought of the many, many times he had taken her on his knee and kissed her tears. He might do that no more, now. There was the young Captain, a prisoner on the great black river, who had a better right, Elijah Brent wondered, as they waited in the silent street for the lonely car, if Clarence loved her as well as he.
It was vary late when they reached home, and Virginia went silently up to her room. Colonel Carvel stared grimly after her, then glanced at his friend as he turned down the lights. The eyes of the two met, as of old, in true understanding.
The sun was still slanting over the tops of the houses the next morning when Virginia, a ghostly figure, crept down the stairs and withdrew the lock and bolt on the front door. The street was still, save for the twittering of birds and the distant rumble of a cart in its early rounds. The chill air of the morning made her shiver as she scanned the entry for the newspaper. Dismayed, she turned to the clock in the hall. Its hands were at quarter past five.
She sat long behind the curtains in her father's little library, the thoughts whirling in her brain as she watched the growing life of another day. What would it bring forth? Once she stole softly back to the entry, self-indulgent and ashamed, to rehearse again the bitter and the sweet of that scene of the Sunday before. She summoned up the image of the young man who had stood on these steps in front of the frightened servants. She seemed to feel again the calm power and earnestness of his face, to hear again the clear-cut tones of his voice as he advised her. Then she drew back, frightened, into the sombre library, conscience-stricken that she should have yielded to this temptation then, when Clarence—She dared not follow the thought, but she saw the light skiff at the mercy of the angry river and the dark night.
This had haunted her. If he were spared, she prayed for strength to consecrate herself to him A book lay on the table, and Virginia took refuge in it. And her eyes glancing over the pages, rested on this verse:—
"Thy voice is heard thro' rolling drums,
That beat to battle where he stands;
Thy face across his fancy comes,
And gives the battle to his hands."
The paper brought no news, nor mentioned the ruse to which Captain Lyon had resorted to elude the writ by transporting his prisoner to Illinois. Newspapers were not as alert then as now. Colonel Carvel was off early to the Arsenal in search of tidings. He would not hear of Virginia's going with him. Captain Lige, with a surer instinct, went to the river. What a morning of suspense! Twice Virginia was summoned to her aunt, and twice she made excuse. It was the Captain who returned first, and she met him at the door.
"Oh, what have you heard?" she cried.
"He is alive," said the Captain, tremulously, "alive and well, and escaped South."
She took a step toward him, and swayed. The Captain caught her. For a brief instant he held her in his arms and then he led her to the great armchair that was the Colonel's.
"Lige," she said,—are you sure that this is not—a kindness?"
"No, Jinny," he answered quickly, "but things were mighty close. I was afraid last night. The river was roarin'. They struck out straight across, but they drifted and drifted like log-wood. And then she began to fill, and all five of 'em to bail. Then—-then she went down. The five soldiers came up on that bit of an island below the Arsenal. They hunted all night, but they didn't find Clarence. And they got taken off to the Arsenal this morning."
"And how do you know?" she faltered.
"I knew that much this morning," he continued, "and so did your pa. But the Andrew Jackson is just in from Memphis, and the Captain tells me that he spoke the Memphis packet off Cape Girardeau, and that Clarence was aboard. She picked him up by a miracle, after he had just missed a round trip through her wheel-house."
End of Project Gutenberg's The Crisis, Volume 5, by Winston Churchill