X

THE RIVER LEADING TO THE SEA

If there is one thing a girl loves more than another, it's being a martyr. If there is any such thing as sweet sorrow, that's where it may be found. And of all kinds of martyrdom the love kind is the sweetest. Now in all this a woman is so different from a man. A man enjoys the suffering that comes with love—if some one else does the suffering; but a woman glories in it—if some one else does the loving. And that was pretty much my case.

For I was having lots of love—from Charlie. This was all very well so far as it went; nor can it be denied that it went a considerable way. For every girl prizes a strong man's love, though she return it never so faintly. Like some preachers, she highly esteems a call—even if she has little or no thought of accepting it. But there is nothing, nothing in all the world, so troublesome as love; unless it utterly swamps you—then is the solution simple. But to have just enough to marry on, with no surplus for the years—that's dreadful. That is like launching some mighty ship when the tide is out—and it must be awful to hear the keel grating on the sand.

Yes, that's where the martydom comes in, to recall the noble word with which I began the chapter. And when the Judgment Day shall dawn—concerning which I have no doubt, but much misgiving—the most oft-repeated charge against our poor weak womanhood will be that we sold ourselves for nought. Some of our loveliest will be the first to learn, in that great day, how deadly was the barter of their bodies—and of so much more. I have often heard uncle say that when a horse is sold its halter always goes along—but no one ever told me that when a girl sells her body, that sale includes the soul. Reluctant, protesting, even horrified, it yet must cleave to its tenement of clay and meet the tenant's doom. And what a doom! if it be fitting destiny for those who have bartered the sanctity of life, some for bread, some for home, some for gold, some for fame, some for earthly station; and some, nobler these, for very hungriness of heart, crying out for the nameless something that shall satisfy the soul.

I hardly know just how or when I resigned myself to such a martyrdom. But I did. I decided to marry Charlie, right soon too—despite the defiant vow I had registered in my diary that night. One thing I'm sure of—and that is, that Europe and the yacht had mighty little to do with it. But whether it was because I feared Charlie might throw himself from the deck of the aforesaid yacht if I didn't marry him; or whether I felt it was a matter of honour; or whether I knew it would throw mother's life into eclipse; or whether I agreed with that semi-intelligent philosopher who once said that all life was a gamble in probabilities, or something of that sort, I cannot say. But anyhow, one midnight hour, I drew my pen through the first half of that diary vow, the part which declared I could never marry Charlie, and I left uninjured the savage promise to myself that I would never, never marry the Reverend Gordon Laird.

Besides, he had been horrid. Not in any positive sense, of course, for Mr. Laird was such a perfect gentleman. And yet he was a gentleman after a fashion I had never seen before. He was not in the least like our Southern gallants; he couldn't bow like them, nor make pretty speeches—and he wouldn't jump across the floor to pick up my handkerchief, though I once saw him give Dinah a hand up the back steps with a heavy block of ice that had slipped from her grasp and fallen to the bottom. And he never brought me flowers, or candies, except some wild violets he might sometimes pluck—and once he did give me some molasses taffy, of which his reverence himself partook with almost juvenile enthusiasm.

But he was scrupulously polite, and that's so hard for a girl to stand if she's interested in a man at all. And he seemed so strong, and self-possessed, that he was distant without meaning to be—the distance of a sort of superiority, all the worse because you knew he wasn't trying to make you realize it at all; and I had the intolerable feeling that his world was an altogether different one from mine, and that he was interested in things I didn't know about, yet which I felt might be just as much mine as his if I only had a chance. As it was, however, I was a good deal like a child standing knee high to some man whose face was half hidden by the telescope to his eye; if he knew you were there at all, you felt the very most he'd do would be to pat your head and ask you if you'd lost your ball.

I don't know what finally decided me. But anyhow I wrote Charlie a letter, and told him Yes. "Yes, right away," was the burden of what I said, "as soon as I can get ready." I thought at the time what a cruel term that was, "getting ready"—as if the milliner and dressmaker had any part to play in that. All the world I would have given to have known how to really "get ready" in my inmost heart and life. But I wrote the letter, and sealed it, and kissed it on the outside—which I felt was the proper thing to do—and then I placed it in the Bible on my dressing-table, taking quite a pious satisfaction in the fancy. Then I sat down and cried till my eyes were sore and the Bible all stained with bitter tears. Later on, I told my mother; her joy was quite enough for two, quite too much for me.

And I told Mr. Laird too. Some will ask why, and perhaps make merry over that delicate reserve which Southern women pride themselves upon. But let them ask, and let them make merry as they will. Besides, I had already told Mr. Laird so much that it was surely natural enough for me to tell him this. Moreover, was he not a minister—and what are they for if not to be confided in?

So I told him I was going to post a letter. It was the gathering dusk, for such a letter should never sure be launched in the garish light of day. Then I told him what was in it, or, at least, told him enough to let him know; for he was remarkably "quick in the uptake," to adopt a phrase of his own countrymen; I think I referred, too, to his own counsel in the matter.

He didn't speak for a little, nor could I see his face. But when he did break the silence, it was to say he'd walk to the post-office with me; he added that the exercise would do him good, since he hadn't had much of an appetite for supper—which was, I thought, one of the shabbiest speeches he could have framed. But I let him come.

"Why not row down?" he suddenly suggested as we came to the bend in the road beside the river. Our boat-house, its door wide open, was at the water's edge. "We can land within a square of the office," he enlarged.

I should have refused, I know; for the letter to Charlie was in my hand. But I didn't. And I remember yet the sense of sweet helplessness I felt as he turned and led the way to the boat-house. It all comes back to me again. I stand once more alone, outside, while the tall form disappeared within the low-roofed house. The sound of pushing and rolling I hear again as the boat emerged slowly from its home. The rattle of oars comes back, idly rolling to and fro in the rocking skiff; the metallic chink as they were being adjusted in the iron sockets; and the lapping waves, and the soft breath of evening, and the distant noises of the drowsy town. I remember, too, that there was neither moon nor star, the sky all veiled with the gentle haze that often marks our Southern spring. He rowed; and I sat in the armchair in the stern.

"You're going too far out," I said suddenly, for we were near the middle of the river.

"I want to get a last look at the place," he said, "and one can see better from out here. Doesn't the town look lovely in the dusk?—see all those twinkling lights."

"Yes," I agreed, "it's beautiful. Why do you say that?" I asked, trying to conceal the tremor in my voice.

"Say what?"

"What you said a moment ago—about a last look—why the last?"

"Because it is," he answered slowly, the oars hardly moving now. "I'm going away."

I looked down at the dimpling track my hand was making in the water.

"When?" I said; oh, so carelessly.

"To-morrow."

"Where?" as I caught at the little throb in my voice.

"To Canada—they've got an opening for me there. I'm going to take a mission field."

I made no response. But I knew for the first time, in all this life of mine, what it really meant to have a heart on fire. He was not looking, so he could not see the quick rise and fall of my bosom as I looked out through the deepening darkness towards the twinkling shore. I could see the dim outline of a few tall elms on the bank; and muffled sounds floated towards us across the darkling water. But what I remember most was the wonderful stillness that reigned without, while the first real heart-storm I had ever known raged deep within.

One hand was in the water, troubling the unconscious element; in the other I still held the letter I had written Charlie. And I leaned far out over the edge of the boat, withdrawing my gaze from the shore; but the silent river gave back nothing except murky blankness. Life had the selfsame colour to me then, poor child and changeling that I was. Suddenly I felt that his eyes were on me, though the gloom was deepening—and I trembled, actually trembled; if I had been alone with him in mid-ocean I could not have trembled more. Perhaps I glanced down the sullen river and remembered that its home was the far waiting sea.

Then he moved—and towards me. If there had been a mile between us, instead of a few paltry feet, I could not have been more conscious of his coming. For he never spoke, and I neither spoke nor stirred. In a moment he was beside me, or at my feet, or both. And such a transformation I had never seen. His voice was low and unsteady, choking almost, and I could catch the wonderful fire of his eyes as they were fastened on me in the gloom.

"Don't," I said faintly, "please don't—let us row in—we'll miss the mail."

But he made no movement, never even glancing at one of the oars which had been lifted from its socket and slipped with a little splash into the stream. The other sulked alone in the darkly dimpling water.

"Oh! Helen," he said in an altered voice, such a voice as I had never heard before, "you know—you know all I want to say."

He had hold of my hand, the one that held the letter. And still I did not move or speak. But a swift thought flashed through my mind; it was of another day, when another man had thus laid siege to me—and I knew now what life's real passion meant. Yes, I will tell it—and they may smile who will—my whole soul leaped in silent ecstasy, and triumph, and hope. But the greatest of these was hope. I knew, at long last, what it meant to love and to be loved—and no queen ever gloried in the hour of her coronation as I silently rejoiced in mine. I forgot that he was stronger than I, and greater, and nobler; forgot all about the strength of intellect that I had felt as a gulf between us; all the difference, too, of life's aim and purpose was sunk and forgotten now. I even forgot that he was a minister at all, set apart for life to duties and sacrifices for which I had neither gift nor inclination. I only knew I loved him, and that we were alone together—and that he was at my feet.

"Helen," he began again, "I'm going away—and you'll forget all about me, won't you, Helen?"

It was sweet to hear him speak my name. And his words would mean, of course, that he wanted me to forget—but I knew what they really meant, and I held every tone sacred to my heart.

Then I said, and the words were soft as the breeze about us: "I won't."

I knew it was wrong—for Charlie's letter was still in the hand he held. But it was glorious. Oh, how I revelled in the words I spoke! They were simple and insignificant, I know,—but the wild breath of a new-born love pulsed through them, and I could see by the kindled face, though the dark was round about us, how his heart had leaped to recognize their meaning. And then his own soul poured itself out in a great gust of passion, pure and holy and resistless and triumphant; all the strength and silentness and self-control that had provoked my wonder through the days seemed now to be turned to leaping flame as he told me—oh, so eloquently and yet so brokenly—of such a love as I had never dreamed could be offered any maiden's heart.

"Can you see that steeple there?" he said, his voice hoarse with feeling as he pointed to the distant town; "no, it's too dark—but I can see it. I see it even in my dreams. It was under its shadow I met you first, when your uncle and I were coming from the train. And I knew then, Helen—in that instant I knew, and have known ever since, that there was only one love for me—and it was you, my darling. And I knew, I knew, who put the roses in that attic room of mine—and they made the place like heaven to me ever since. And give me this, Helen—surrender it to me," he went on passionately, his fingers closing stealthily around the letter in my hand.

"I cannot," I cried, protesting, summoning what strength I might. "Oh, I cannot—that's my letter to Charlie."

His clasp relaxed a little. "I know," he said; "that's why I want it—and you cannot, you must not, send it now."

"But you told me, you told me more than once," I pleaded; "you said how true I ought to be—you know you did," and I trembled lest his own counsel should prevail.

He seemed to sink back a little—and awful silence reigned a moment. "But I didn't know," he soon began, new earnestness in his voice, "I only knew then that I loved you—and I could have given you up, I really could—but I didn't know then that you belonged to me—to me, my darling," his voice rising to the masterful with the words; "I didn't know then that God meant you for me, and that that was why He led my steps across the sea. I could have given you up—I swear I could," he cried almost fiercely, "if it had meant nothing but a wounded life for me—but when it's you—oh, when it's you, my darling, when your life would be wounded and broken too. For you love me, my own," and his voice had the tenderest strain that ever filled woman's heart with rapture; "don't you, Helen?" he went pleadingly on; "oh, say you do—or tell me, tell me, Helen, if you don't."

Then the silence of death reigned about us both, though heaven knows I tried my best to break it, but could make no sound. And then, then—with all the stealth of love and of a strong man's will—he gently drew the letter from my hand, my heart fluttering till it hurt, and without a word he tore it up, slowly, noiselessly, almost reverently, into a hundred pieces, and a moment later they fluttered through the dark out onto the bosom of the silent river.

I was like one in a dream, unspeaking still. Perhaps I had a great sense of weakness, even of wrong. But I do not think so. I only knew that life was changed to me in that wonderful hour, and that I cared nothing for the future, all that it might bring, all my unfitness for it. I only knew that I had found at last what my poor, tired, frivolous heart had been seeking in alien ways for long. And I knew that love's great lie, so desperately cherished, had retreated before Love's great Reality. And when he took me in his arms, so strong, so tight, I shut my eyes and rested there; and when he kissed me—only once—I prayed, a swift, wonderful prayer. And I knew at last that love was holy, stainless, and that God was good.

XI

A MOTHER CONFESSOR

They were waiting for us when we got home, wondering a little why we were so late. We told them we had been on the river, and Mr. Laird apologized for the loss of the oar; I remember uncle said it was lucky he was able to paddle his own canoe.

I went into mother's room when I went up-stairs to fix my hair—and she noticed that Charlie's ring was absent from my hand. I expected her to, for it was a source of constant joy to her. Then I told her. I shall not describe the gust that followed, except to say that what I remember best about it was mother's appeal to my sense of unfitness for the life of a minister's wife. There was a lot more—Europe and the yacht were not forgotten—about the folly of giving myself to a life of obscurity and poverty when a very different one was open to me.

"I'm sick of money," I said foolishly; "I've always had nearly everything I wanted—and I wasn't happy."

"You'll know the difference when you don't have your uncle to give you everything you want," said my mother.

"He's been the kindest man that ever was," I agreed, "but no uncle that ever lived could give a girl everything she wants. There's only one can do that," I went on, for my heart was singing—"and I've found him at last."

It was then that mother appealed to me on the ground of my unfitness for the life I had chosen. And I must admit that did hit me pretty hard.

"Look at our minister's wife," she said; "she's meant for it. It's true she looks half starved, and she's always dowdy, and has to make a dress do for years—but she's happy in that kind of life."

"Maybe I'll be happy too," I ventured to predict.

"How could you be?" retorted my mother. "How could you ever hope to be, when you're not fitted for that kind of work? Mrs. Furvell can lead in prayer."

"Well, I can't," I said—"but I can follow. And Mr. Laird says that's better."

"And she can take the chair at meetings—and she knows how to talk to ministers when they come—and they say she looks over her husband's sermons, and makes suggestions."

"My husband's sermons won't need any," I made reply. And at this I blushed furiously: the word sounded like a beautiful judgment day. I knew how crimson my face and neck all grew, for I was standing in front of a pier glass at the time, my hair flowing down about my shoulders. And I wondered if I was beautiful—I hoped I was, but not for my own sake at all—I can honestly say no vanity was in my thought. Everything was different now.

"Of course," conceded my mother, "I believe in a girl marrying for love—but you haven't known him long enough. Now Charlie's different; you've known him so long."

"That's just where it comes in," said I, dimly groping for what I felt was a great point.

"What do you mean?" said mother.

"I don't know," I answered, which was gloriously true.

"Besides," digressed my mother, leaving this obscure point unsettled, "what reason have you got to think you'll ever get along agreeably with his folks?"

"I'd get along with Choctaw Indians," quoth I, "if it would make him any happier; besides, I won't have to—they're all in Scotland."

"Whose happiness do you mean?" enquired my mother, though she knew right well.

"Why, his—Mr. Laird's, of course."

"Are you going to call him Mr. Laird?" pursued my mother, for womanly curiosity will show itself even amid high tragedy.

"I reckon so—I don't know," and I laughed as I spoke; "that never occurred to me."

"He didn't ask you to—to call him Gordon?"

"Mercy, no—why should he?" I exclaimed aghast.

"Why shouldn't he?" replied my mother. "I remember the night your father asked me to marry him—but then, there's no use of that; that's all over now. When is he going to speak to me about it, Helen?"

"Oh, mother," I said, putting my arms about her neck, "you're such a woman! I know you're just counting the minutes till you'll be alone with him when he's pleading with you to give your daughter to him. That's the next best thing to getting a proposal yourself, isn't it, mother?"

But she was not yet ready for surrender. "It's very easy for you, Helen," she said seriously, "to treat it all as a trifling matter—but you don't know what a heavy heart you've given me. And there's another thing," she went on, a little timidly, I thought: "I suppose you don't forget that his father's a shepherd—a man that takes care of sheep, on the hills?" she enlarged.

"No, I haven't forgotten it," I answered, and I felt my colour rising, "nor has he forgotten. And I wouldn't care if his father were a chimney-sweep. Do you mean that, mother?" I demanded, my voice about as stern as she had ever heard it.

"Mean what, Helen?"

"Do you mean that that—about his father being a shepherd—should make any difference to me? When I love him?" I added, my voice shaking a little.

"No, child, no. No, of course not," my mother hastened to reply; "only it'll be a little awkward, I'm afraid. You've got to consider everything, you know."

"That's just what I'm doing," I retorted quickly. "And if he's good, and true, and noble—and he is—what difference does it make to me who his father is, or what he does? It won't be as awkward as to be married to a man you don't love—that's what I would call awkward," I cried, "and that's what nearly happened me. And he—Mr. Laird—he tore the letter up and threw it into the river, thank God!" as the tears that could no longer be restrained poured forth at last.

Her tender arms tightened about me as she soothed me with some explanation of what she meant, telling me meantime that I was tired and needing rest. Nor did the interview last much longer, being fruitful of but little satisfaction on either side. Mother loved me too well to make any real unpleasantness about it; and, before we finished, she laid most of her grief to the score of Charlie's broken heart. But she did add, rather sorrowfully, that in all probability now I would live and die without ever seeing Europe.

I believe there's no place where a girl so feels the trembling joy of love as in her own little room when first she returns to it with her lips still moist from the sacramental kiss. I have often wondered since why this is so. And I do not know. But I remember well, with quickening heart, that almost bridal hour. I did not light the gas—and I wondered at the time why I shrank from doing so—but kindled instead the candle on my dressing-table. The soft and tender light accorded better with my mood, and the flitting shadows that fell across the room seemed beautiful. When I was undressed and robed for the night, I sat long, my hair still flowing on my shoulders, before the pier glass, gazing into my own eyes for very joy. The shallow will say it was empty vanity; but it was not. It was a kind of communion time, searching, so far as I could, the mystic depths of a personality that had been so suddenly wakened to a new and holy life.

I know not how long I lingered thus, peering into the hidden future—once or twice I buried my hot face in my hands—marvelling at the ministry of love, before I put the candle out and went to bed. And then, strangely enough, there stole into my mind the verse Charlie used to love to hear me sing. I hummed it softly to myself:—

"Still must you call me tender names
    Still gently stroke my tresses;
Still shall my happy answering heart
    Keep time to your caresses."

But now the words seemed all on fire and I wondered why their beauty had never appeared to me before. I lilted them again and again, the image of my lover, my first real lover, before me all the time—and I wondered when, if ever, I would sing the words for him.

But all of a sudden I felt that this was frivolous. For it was beginning to be borne in upon me—scarcely thought of in the first rush of joy—what manner of man this was whose lot I was to share. I was to be a minister's wife! With a wave of cowardice I hid my face under the snowy covers as I thought of it; while visions of other days, of dances and parties and cards, and all sorts of alien things, floated before my eyes. I fought against them all with an intensity they did not deserve, really trying to lead my thoughts into higher channels. And there came into my mind—which I have always considered an intervention from a Higher Source—a line or two of a psalm I had heard Mr. Laird sing more than once. The words came back to me so readily, and I said them over and over again to myself:—

"I to the hills will lift mine eyes
From whence doth come mine aid,"

and, almost before I knew it, I had slipped out of bed and was on my knees in prayer. I must confess that I barely knew how to pray—that is, outside of a little groove along which my devotions had tripped since I was a child. But this time I really did pray—out of my own heart—though I fear it was a very broken and halting prayer, a poor sort of thing compared to those finished efforts of Mrs. Furvell to which my mother had referred. Yet I think it was sincere. I asked God to guard my love—but especially his—and to not let anything happen to spoil it; and to help me give up everything that was wrong or frivolous, and to make me some help to him in his life-work.

I was hardly snuggled up in bed again before I heard Mr. Laird coming up-stairs to the attic. I suppose he had been doing some thinking on his own account, all alone in the parlour. His room was right over mine—and that was why I had such a luxurious night. For very soon he began walking up and down the floor—I don't think he knew I was just beneath—and he kept up that lonely tramp for hours. Every step he took was music to me. Back and forward, forward and back, he walked, and I could fairly see the tall, noble form, the serious face, the deep, penetrating eyes. Once or twice he stopped, for a few minutes; and I began to fear he didn't love me as he should. But soon the firm tread began again and then I knew how really dear I was.

Dozens of times since then, when I have teased him about it, he has told me those little silences came when he threw himself on his bed and snatched a few minutes' sleep; but that he knew I was listening, so he would shake himself, dash some cold water on his face or wrap a towel about his head, and start on his beat again. But I knew better—and anyhow, he confessed to me once that nothing short of chloroform could have kept him still that night.

When we assembled at breakfast the next morning Mr. Laird didn't eat anything except one little half slice of toast—and I could see how this appealed to mother, though she maintained a sad gravity throughout.

When the meal was finished he asked mother if he might have a few minutes with her alone. And she asked him what could it possibly be about!

XII

THE WAIL OF THE LOWLY

It was "Gordon" now, always "Gordon"—though of course nobody called him that but me. For he had made yet another little addition to his visit—and he and I had improved the time. But his departure was near at hand.

And it does seem sad that what occurred had to happen just before he left. For everything had gone so beautifully. Mother, it is true, used to sigh sometimes, and once or twice expressed the hope that Charlie hadn't killed himself when he got the tidings and the ring. I had no such fears; for the brief note that came back informed me that he would say nothing till he came and saw me; which, he said, he would do as soon as some very urgent business would permit. But mother declared she knew this was only said to conceal the fact that he was prostrate in his bed.

I believe Aunt Agnes and Uncle Henry were quite composed about the whole affair—they thought so much of Gordon. And even mother was getting fond of him; she couldn't very well have helped it, he was so strong and tender and dignified and true. And I can't tell how happy it made me to see mother warming up to him; a few days before he intended to go away—and the very day of the explosion I am about to describe—I saw mother pull his hair. Just a little tug, it's true, a little playful pinch of a few of the auburn strands—but it filled my soul with joy, for I think it means more for certain kinds of women to give the hair a little pull like that than if they took the whole man into their arms. So I pretended not to see, lest my Gordon's hair should never be pulled again.

We were all pretty resigned, as I have said—especially Gordon and myself. And if Gordon had only gotten away to his Canadian field before that eventful night—or if every negro in the South had only died or been deported the day before—the whole tenor of our after lives might have been changed.

We were seated on the porch, uncle and Gordon and I. My mood, I fear, was a rather plaintive one, for I didn't know when my lover would be coming back. Uncle, however, seemed in a very jovial frame of mind; but the worst storms always come on the most placid evenings. He had just been telling Gordon that he thought I would make a pretty fair minister's wife after all.

"You know, Mr. Laird," he remarked in mock seriousness, "there's one feature of Helen's record that makes me think she's right religious after all."

"Let us have the symptoms," said Gordon, and he couldn't have looked at me more tenderly if he hadn't had a drop of Scotch blood in his whole make-up.

"Well, it's this," drawled my uncle; "I've never known Helen to miss a Sunday-school picnic since she was able to toddle—she'd go without her lessons before she'd miss one. Now don't you think that's a good sign?" and uncle indulged himself in the merriment his little joke deserved.

Gordon made some laughing response, I have forgotten what. And it was then that uncle began the fatal strain. It really seemed as if it had to be; for, ever since that other darkey outbreak, both men had been careful to steer clear of the dangerous topic.

"You'll have to look out," uncle began, "that those folks up North don't tramp on your wife's Southern corns." Gordon gave me a funny look—whether it referred to the sublime word, or the grotesque one, I couldn't tell. "For instance," uncle went on, "the first thing you know, some of them'll be expressing their opinion about slavery and airing their views on the whole question of the darkies. Now I want you to protect her from that—don't let them bring the subject up if you can help it. And, just as like as not, they'll be flaunting that Uncle Tom's Cabin nigger show under your noses. There was a company brought it down here once—but we read the riot act to them. It was 'Katy, bar the door' for them. Some of them just got off with their necks. And I want you to promise me, Helen, that you'll never look at their infernal show; they say it's all whips, and handcuffs, and bloodhounds, and all the rest of the lies that Harriet Beecher Stowe concocted. You'll promise me, won't you, Helen?"

"Don't trouble yourself about that, uncle," I answered evasively, being always a cautious maiden along certain lines; "most likely Mr. Laird doesn't know what you're talking about. Do you, Gordon?" I enquired, the change of name very sweet.

"Oh, yes," he promptly replied. "Yes, I've read the book—read it on the heathery hills, when I was quite a wee laddie."

"Did you ever read such a parcel of lies, sir?" demanded my uncle, fully expecting that there could be only one answer.

"I'm really not in a position to give an opinion," Gordon replied judiciously; "you see, I never saw slavery."

"Well, I have," uncle responded vigorously, "and the book's a bunch of lies. Of course, I suppose some brutes might mistreat their niggers. But it wasn't natural, sir—it wasn't to their interest to do so—a man wouldn't do it with his horse. And the niggers were enough sight happier then than they are now—they were perfectly contented, sir."

"That's the worst of it," said Gordon tersely.

"What say, sir? I don't know that I understand you."

"That was the saddest feature of it—that they were contented," repeated Gordon calmly; "that's what slavery did for them. But it seems to me, Mr. Lundy," he went on, warming a little to the argument, "it seems to me the book in question doesn't deny that most of the negroes were well used."

"It doesn't?" uncle began in a rather fiery tone; "it doesn't, doesn't it? It's the most one-sided book that was ever written—has niggers dying under the lash, and hunted with hounds, and all that sort of thing. What's that, if it isn't one-sided, sir?"

"As far as I remember, 'Uncle Tom's Cabin' impressed me as decidedly fair, quite impartial," Gordon ventured, his voice very calm.

"It's a pack of Yankee lies, sir," interrupted my uncle warmly.

Gordon flushed a little. "That's hardly argument, Mr. Lundy," he replied slowly. "You remind me of what Burke said of Samuel Johnson—he said Johnson's style of argument reminded him of a highwayman; if his pistol missed fire, he knocked you down with the butt end of it."

"What's that got to do with niggers?" enquired my uncle blankly.

"Nothing—just with the argument," answered Gordon. "I said I thought 'Uncle Tom's Cabin' impressed me as impartial—and you retorted it was Yankee lies. That's like calling Euclid a liar because you dissent from his proposition, as your great Lincoln said."

"He wasn't ours—and he isn't great," retorted uncle vigorously.

"Half of that may be true," Gordon answered in the most amiable tone. "But about the book—I'll state my position. Mrs. Stowe portrays three men, if I remember right, who had to do with slaves. Shelby, St. Clair, Legree, were the names, I think. Well, one of them, Legree, is depicted as a brute—but the other two were like fathers to their slaves. Now, if that isn't fair—two to one—I don't know what is," concluded Gordon placidly, "especially as you've just admitted yourself that the brutal type was always to be found, even if the exception."

I was growing nervous by this time, and with abundant cause. It was with a sense of hearty relief I heard Aunt Agnes hurrying towards the porch; and before the argument could further go, she blew in upon the scene with tidings of an invitation she had just received for me and Gordon for that very evening. I wasn't slow to make the most of the digression, and soon the ship of domestic peace was clear of the threatening rocks.

Yet I could see, all through the early evening, that the debate had left its impress upon Gordon. It was really wonderful how a question of this kind took hold of him; anything human, especially if connected with sorrow or injustice, seemed to kindle him as nothing else could do. More than once he harked back to it within the next hour or two when he and I were alone. "It's beyond my understanding," he broke out, "how any man—especially a Christian gentleman like your uncle—can defend an institution that made one man a slave of another."

"But they were good to them," I defended.

"Yet they were in bondage," was his terse reply; "and besides, Helen, you know they often had to sell them—even when they didn't want to. I've talked to coloured women on the streets here, who told me their children were sold away from them long years ago—and they've never seen them since. And they cried," he added, his voice taking what was almost a shrill note, plaintive with sympathy. "And I don't care if they did keep their slaves in luxury—-if they had clothed them in purple and fine linen and fanned them all day long—any institution that makes it possible for a child to be sold from his mother, it's—it's damnable," he declared passionately, "and neither God nor man could convince me to the contrary."

I was almost frightened at Gordon's vehemence—and I was powerless before his argument. A kind of chill foreboding had me in its grip, I knew not why, that his strange intensity on this so fiery theme was yet to work us ill. For, like other strangers, he had no conception of how deep, almost desperately deep, were the convictions of Southern men on the subject that seemed so thoroughly to engross him. He harboured the romantic notion that all men were created equal, as the framers of our Constitution solemnly decreed, their slaves cringing at their feet the while. He held the quixotic view, too, that it was wrong to cheat the darkies out of their votes—I always thought he was astray on this point, and I think so yet. Gordon contended, also, that they had the same kind of feelings as white folks—but I suppose that will be a debated point while time shall last. Gordon did not know, however, how necessary it was that the darkies should be kept in their proper place; nor did he know the long purgatory our Southland had gone through in the days of reconstruction, and carpetbaggers, and negro rule, and all that sort of thing. He had no idea of the fiery zeal with which white men had to guard their supremacy, enforcing the social distinction, keeping the negro where he belonged, piously preserving the curse of Ham upon him. In a word, Gordon hadn't grasped this fundamental truth—which the world may just as well accept first as last—that, no matter how the negro race may predominate in numbers, or grow in wealth, or develop in intelligence, the white man never will be ruled by the black man. And the only way to prevent his being on top is to keep him at the bottom. So I have heard ten thousand times—and so I heartily believe.

I think Gordon and I were discussing this very matter that night as we were walking home from the little gathering of which I have made mention already. Coming along the street that skirts the river, my attention was suddenly attracted by the sound of voices from near the water's edge, negro voices evidently, and marked by tokens of excitement. I at once stopped and called Gordon's attention to it.

"They're darkies," I whispered; "what can they be doing there at this hour of the night?" For it was midnight. "And that's uncle's property," which was true enough, he being the possessor of a shed and warehouse there that stood on the river's bank.

"What indeed?" Gordon echoed. "You don't suspect anything wrong, do you?"

I made some incoherent reply, muttering something about fire, I think. For that is a constant form of dread to the Southern mind.

"I'll go over and see," said Gordon. "You come part of the way—wait there, I won't let you out of my sight," as he moved on towards the shadowy figures that could be seen moving in the darkness. A low mysterious wail broke from them at frequent intervals.

"What are you doing here?" I heard Gordon's stern Scotch voice ring out a moment after he had left me. A sharp cry of fear broke from the two crouching forms as they turned their dusky faces up to his through the night. They were two negro women and their rolling eyes shone white in the darkness. They stood before him trembling.

"Come, speak; what are you doing here?" Gordon's voice came sterner than before.

"Please, sah, we's lookin' fo' our chil'uns," one liquid voice wailed forth.

I was Southern born and Southern bred—and I had been taught, as carefully as any, the non-humanity of the black. Yet I do not know that I ever felt such a gush of inward tears as rushed upon my heart that moment. The scene is before me yet; the stalwart frame in clerical attire, towering above the cowed and obeisant figures of the stooping women who seemed to crave, rather than expect, some word of human sympathy, some hand of human help. Poor, despised, ignorant, their cry yet echoed with the great note of love, the throb of primal passion pulsing through it; the age-old cry of the mother calling for her child. And I felt a wave of pity surging over me, such as I had never felt before. I rushed forward to where they stood; for the time, at least, we belonged to the self-same race—mine, too, was a woman's heart.

Their story was soon told, for it was brief. The two children, a son of each, had been out playing together in the early evening. The last they could learn of them was to the effect that a negro man, named Simkins, had been seen talking to them. Simkins was a drunken loafer. The unhappy women had themselves discovered that a little skiff, in which Simkins had a part interest, was missing from its place—and the tracks of boyish feet in the sand could be seen where the bow of the boat had been. Doubtless Simkins had beguiled them with the prospect of a cruise—and what then?

In a moment Gordon was questioning them with eager interest, interpreting their replies with difficulty; for their dialect, unfamiliar to him at the best, was now more unintelligible by reason of their grief. While he spoke with them the women instinctively drew closer, as if confident of a friend.

"Where do you suppose he rowed them to?" he asked quickly.

The women didn't know.

"Where does this man Simkins live?" he asked, after some further questioning.

"'Way down by Pickett's Landin'—by de long wauf," one of the women said. "But he done started from heah, sah."

"The long wharf," repeated Gordon, turning to me, "where is that wharf? For that's where he'd try to land, likely enough—and if anything's happened, that's where it likely occurred."

"I know the place," I answered, "but it's about a mile away."

"We'll search this place first," he said decisively, "and if we find no sign we'll look there. Have you any idea where we could get a lantern?"

I thought there might possibly be one in uncle's warehouse. A minute later Gordon was inside, having found an unlocked window. Two or three matches flared and spluttered; then a steady light, and in a moment he had reappeared with the lantern.

Up and down he strode, examining all the locality, the moaning women following at his heels.

"There isn't a sign of anything here," he announced as he jumped down from a little landing from which he had been flashing his lantern on the water. "I've got a feeling, somehow, that this man Simkins would try to land at the wharf nearest his home. Come away—we'll go there."

"But you'll have to take me home first," I interposed.

"Is it on the way?" Gordon paused long enough to ask.

"No, it's the opposite direction."

"Then it can't be done," he answered, in a tone no Southern woman is accustomed to hear; "you'll have to come with us," and with a word or two more which I have forgotten, but whose tone of mastery I remember well, he asked the women which road to take. If his manner had been less noble and self-forgetful I would have said he was lacking in the chivalric deference I was accustomed to receive at the hands of gentlemen. But this never seemed to enter Gordon's mind, surrendered as it was to the business in hand. Before I knew it he was off, and I had no option but to follow.

A strange procession we must have made as we wound our way through the silent streets. In front marched Gordon, the lantern swinging to his stride, pausing now and then to enquire about a turn in the way; behind him shuffled the crooning women, gratitude and woe mingling in their constant moan; last of all came I, keeping up as best I could.

As we moved out on the rickety wharf, to which we came at last, I heard Gordon utter an exclamation of some sort and rush forward. Then he stopped, holding the lantern low; its beams revealed the face of a negro man, lying in drunken oblivion on the wharf. With shrill intonation, rudely shaking him, the women demanded of the unconscious Simkins the whereabouts of their children. But Simkins' only response was a temporarily half-opened eye, immediately reclosed, and a groan of drunken content as he sank deeper into his bestial slumber. An empty bottle lay beside him.

Gordon turned from him with a murmur of contempt, bidding the women cease from their pitiful pleading with the unconscious man. Swinging the lantern high, its farthest beams just disclosed a little skiff floating idly near the shore. "He's upset it climbing out, as sure as death," I heard him mutter—"it has shot out from under him." Then like a flash he made his way over the side, creeping stealthily down the unsteady timbers till he was at the water's edge, the lantern still in his hand.

A cry of horror broke from his lips, echoed in unreasoning woe from the women above him. He was peering down into the water.

"They're there—in each others' arms," broke from him a moment later in a tone of ineffable sadness. "Come down and hold the lantern, Helen." He reached up his hand to me without a word; and, to the accompaniment of sounds of anguish strangely and suddenly subdued, I clambered down till I stood on the broad beam beside him. Still the strange, low chant went on above us, still the silent stars looked down. Slowly, resolutely, still gazing into the placid depths, Gordon removed his coat and vest while I held the lantern as he directed. But I kept my eyes upward to the stars. A swift plunge, a half minute's silence, and he reappeared, one of the hapless playmates in his hand. A second pilgrimage into the depths, and both were side by side upon the beam on which we stood. One by one, he bore them, climbing, and laid them together on the wharf. With loud outcry of anguish the women flung themselves upon their unresponsive dead.

They lay together, those little offshoots of an unhappy race, their own life tragedy past and done. Dripping they lay, the peace of death upon their faces, as though the relentless wave had given them kindly welcome. About eight or nine years of age, poor, ragged, despised, they had yet been seeking some scant share of pleasure—out to play—when death claimed them for his own. It was the birthday of one of them—so his mother said, while each wailed above her own—and that was why they had been permitted to play late. Each had her simple tale of love, of admiration; each told, with alternating gusts of grief, of the goodness of her own. Each spoke of the brothers and sisters at home; each wondered what life would be without the one who was gone.

I stood, helpless. But I saw, and for the first time, that God had called Gordon to be a pastor. For he knelt beside them—I think sometimes his dripping white-clad arm rested gently on the shoulder of one or the other—and he tried to comfort them. He spoke, so low and tenderly that sometimes I could scarcely hear his voice, of many things; most of which I have forgotten. But I do remember that he said God didn't love them any less than they; and I recall yet how wonderfully he spoke of Everlasting Life. Those very words, and he couldn't have said them more grandly if it had been a Cathedral service. And I think he helped them a little, for they sometimes lifted their heads and looked at him in a dumb, grateful way. But their hearts were broken. It came over me strangely that this was the first time I had ever stood so close to death, and to sorrow—and these mourners were of the dusky race.

There was little more that we could do. Of course, Gordon roused somebody and sent for the proper persons. But finally we had to leave them alone, the women and their dead. Silently, as if he were revolving some thought in which I had no share, Gordon walked home beside me. Only one thing I can remember that he said. I think he stood still and looked at me through the dark as he said it:

"Helen, the Bible says that God made of one blood all the nations of the earth, doesn't it?"

"Yes," I agreed, wondering what was coming.

"They don't believe it down here, do they?—the white folks, I mean?"

"Maybe not," I answered hesitatingly; "at least, I reckon they don't think it's meant to be taken literally."

"Perhaps not," and his eyes glowed like fire and his voice cut like steel; "perhaps not—but He's made of one blood all the mothers of the earth, by God," the words coming out aflame with passion as if his soul were rent with bitter protest. Which indeed it was.

"What's that?" I suddenly cried, pointing in the direction of our house, from which we were not far distant now. "Oh, Gordon, quick, what's that?" as the dread sound fell upon my ear again.

For a dread sound it was indeed. I do not know that I had ever heard it before—certainly not more than once, and then when but a child—but it had the awful note that can be best described as the baying of furious and avenging men. The Southern heart, I fancy, would recognize it anywhere, just as a huntsman's child would know the far-off voice of hounds. I have heard many sounds since then, sounds that might well strike terror to the stoutest heart, but none so fraught with the savage omen of death and doom as the voice of strong and noble men when they are maddened with revengeful hate and aflame with thirst for blood.

Gordon was already hurrying. "Good heavens," I heard him murmur as we turned a sudden jog in the road, "what a furious scene! They're mad, Helen, they're mad," he cried as we hurried closer; "what on earth means this?—look, they've got a halter round the wretch's neck."

"Take me home," I said faintly, pointing towards the house, now but a few yards from us.

"What does it mean, I say?" he repeated huskily, pressing on as though he did not hear.

"It means death," I faltered; "they're going to kill him—— Oh! take me home," as I clutched his arm and staggered half fainting towards the door.

XIII

THE LYNCHING

Needless to say the household was astir. For our house had a fatal location—at least, so it proved that night—standing as it did in a quiet part of the town close to the long bridge that spanned the river. And the crowd was making for the bridge; this was to serve as a scaffold.

Uncle was not at home. He had gone forth about midnight, as my aunt told me. A few minutes later he returned, but only for a moment, to explain the cause of his absence, and to tell them not to expect him till they saw him. His eyes were bloodshot, my mother said, and his lips were dry. Yet uncle was the most peaceable of men—but this one thing seems to make savages out of the mildest of Southern gentlemen. It was the old story; this wretched negro had assaulted a woman on the street, a poor ignorant white girl who had been sitting up with a sick friend, and who thought she could slip unattended across the couple of blocks that separated her from her home. He had dragged her into an alley—but God sent somebody.

None of these infuriated men—and they comprised the flower of our population, many of them men of wealth and culture—had ever heard of the woman upon whom the black had attempted violence. But this mattered not—had she been the beauty of the city, or the belle of the South itself, their fury could not have been greater. She was white; he was black—that was enough, esteemed by them as a warrant from God Himself. For no thought of the right or wrong of their deadly zeal ever took possession of their minds. No knight of the middle ages was ever more sincere in the ardour that gave the Crusades their glory. If ever men believed they were doing God service, they were these hot-hearted men who hurried their trembling sacrifice onward to the bridge.

My aunt had put out the lights; whether to render the house less conspicuous, or to help us see the better, I do not know. For few words passed as the three white faces peered out at the wild scene before us. The moon had risen now, and we could see the faces of some of the men, though many were in masks. A peculiar quietness seemed to come over the throng as they came closer to the bridge, once so tense that we could catch distinctly the pleading wail of the central figure, tugging desperately at the rope around his neck. Poor creature, he knew not the ways of Southern men; or perhaps he did—and yet one drowning in mid-ocean would still swim towards the shore.

We saw them drag the miserable culprit on to the bridge—then we turned away. I suppose every Southern woman would cry out in horror at the thought of following them thus far—and every one would have done the same as we. Yet now we turned, faint, from the window—that last dread scene was for other eyes than ours.

But suddenly we heard a mighty shout, marvelling what it might portend. A kind of gleeful cry it was, as if something had been discovered, or some better plan devised; which proved to be the case. For I looked again, and lo! they were bearing the wretch back from the bridge. A swift vision of mercy quickened my heart, for I took this to be a reprieve. Yet the doomed man seemed reluctant to be moved, clinging desperately to the railing of the bridge—for his hands were free. The rope about his neck tightened as they dragged him back, and when it relaxed I could hear his piteous appeals, breaking now into loud wails of anguish. They dragged him on.

In a moment all was clear. A large post, or pole, stood close beside the bridge; towards this they hauled him, new zeal seeming to animate the breast of every executioner. I saw two or three of the younger men running towards the pole. They had something in their arms. It was wood—and a hot flush came over me from head to foot.

"Oh, God," I moaned to myself, "they're going to burn him," and even as I spoke they were tying the struggling man tight to the post, others piling the wood up about him.

In an instant all was ready—and I caught the gleam of a lighted match. I stood, transfixed with horror. Then I felt my aunt and my mother tugging faintly at my dress, clutching at my arm, their faces averted meantime.

"Come away; for God's sake, come away," they pleaded, faint and sick at heart.

I was just obeying and had already turned from the window, when I heard a shout, full of savage wrath and protest—whereat I turned and looked once more.

And my eyes fell on a scene that even yet, after all the intervening years, I cannot recall without a bounding heart. For suddenly from out the crowd there had rushed one man, tall, powerful, clothed in black, his face as savage as the others, though it was savagery of a different sort. He has told me since—though we have only spoken of it once or twice through all the years—that his own life was as nothing to him that night. He saw nothing but hundreds of bloodthirsty men, and one guilty wretch, and the first lick of flame about his feet. Out from the crowd had Gordon rushed with sudden impulse, and, when my eyes fell on him, the sticks and faggots were going this way and that, some by his feet, some by his hands outflung. Then, before the wonder-stricken men who were closest to him could interfere, he had trampled on the two or three already lighted brands, trampled them in fury deep into the ground.

Then he stood before them; he was close beside the black, whose quivering face was upturned to his in an agony of pleading. There he stood, a mighty figure of a man; at least, so he appeared to me as I gazed, petrified, at the awesome scene. And his pose was the very incarnation of defiance as he towered above them, his face aflame with indignation and courage and contempt.

Then I saw a movement in the crowd—or felt it rather—that chilled my heart with terror. I knew what would happen now, knew it, with unerring instinct—and I trembled as a fawn quivers when it hears the first low cry of distant dogs. And swiftly, silently, scorning both aunt and mother, I flew through the door on to the porch, down the steps, gliding like a shadow till I found shelter behind an ancient elm on the outskirts of the swaying crowd. I was as safe there, and as unobserved, as though I had been a hundred miles away.

It only took a minute, but Gordon had begun to speak before I got there, his quivering voice ringing like a bell through the night. The men before me were just beginning to recover from the first shock of surprise.

"Who is that —— fool?" I heard one enquire, not more than four feet ahead of me.

"I know him," a voice answered. I recognized the informant at once—he had been to our house for supper only a few nights before. "He's a parson that's visiting the Lundys. A —— Scotchman," he went on contemptuously; "his father's a collie dog over there—takes care of sheep on the hills, he told me."

I knew how helpless I was, but my blood was boiling. I shook my fist at the horrid creature from where I stood—I could have lynched him, right then and there.

"If you must kill him before he's proved guilty," came Gordon's voice, "kill him like white men, not like Indians."

A mighty roar went up at this, and the crowd swayed nearer to the central figures. A loud howl of terror came from the negro. But the immediate peril was not for him—the storm was raging now about another head than his. I think a moment later would have seen Gordon in the clutches of the mob, had it not been temporarily restrained by one of the oldest and most honoured of our citizens. I saw him lift his hand as a signal for silence; in a moment he and Gordon seemed to be carrying on an animated argument. I couldn't hear Colonel Mitford, for such was his name; but I could catch Gordon's voice.

"I've heard plenty about your Southern chivalry—would you lynch a white man if he offered the same indignity to a black woman as this wretch has done?"

The Colonel seemed to pause for a season. And really, it's not much wonder that he should—I am as Southern as any one who ever lived, but that question makes me pause even yet. Soon the Colonel broke out again, this time into quite a prolonged speech.

"It's all your rightful heritage," came back Gordon's voice, ringing high; "it's the legacy slavery has left you. You're only reaping what you sowed."

At this the clamour was renewed, the crowd pressing in again—and I half started from my hiding-place. But again the Colonel persuaded them to silence, and again he directed his remarks to Gordon He was evidently saying something about the relation of the races.

Then came Gordon's thunderbolt: "It seems to me," he cried hotly, recklessly, "it seems to me you couldn't have much more fusion than you have already—this negro's half white himself;" which proved more, as I knew it would, than any Southern man would stand.

"Then you can take what you deserve, curse you for a nigger-lover," I heard the Colonel retort madly, his voice lost in the roar of hate, the wild outcry for vengeance that burst from the infuriated crowd. All resistance was now swept away, and a few ringleaders at the front fairly clutched at Gordon. One had him by the throat, the others pressing in upon him with wolfish fury gleaming in their eyes.