Book 2. A Rainy Season - Chapter 2

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_ BOOK II. A RAINY SEASON
CHAPTER II

When Nicholas descended the judge's steps he lingered for a moment in the narrow walk. His head was bent, and the books which he carried under his arm were pressed against his side. They seemed to contain all that was needed for the making of his future--those books and his impatient mind. His success was as assured as if he held it already in the hollow of his hand--and with success would come honour and happiness and all that was desired of man. It seemed to him that his lot was the one of all others which he would have chosen of his free and untrammelled will. To strive and to win; to surmount all obstacles by the determined dash of ambition; to rise from obscurity unto prominence through the sheer forces that make for power--what was better than this?

Still plunged in thought, he passed the church and followed the street to the Old Stage Road. From the college dormitories a group of students sang out a greeting, and he responded impulsively, tossing his hat in the air. In his face a glow had risen, harmonising his inharmonious features. He felt as a man feels who stands before a closed door and knows that he has but to cross the threshold to grasp the fulness of his aspiration. Yes, to-day he envied no one--neither Tom Bassett nor Dudley Webb, neither the general nor the judge. He held the books tightly under his arm and smiled down upon the road. His clumsy, store-made boots left heavy tracks in the dust, but he seemed to be treading air.

It was three o'clock in the afternoon of a murky day in early November, and the clouds were swollen with incoming autumnal rains. The open country stretched before him in monotonous grays, the long road gleaming pallid in the general drab of the landscape. As he passed along, holding his hat in his hand, his uplifted head struck the single, high-coloured note in the picture--all else was dull and leaden.

A farmer driving a cow to market neared him, and Nicholas stopped to remark upon the outlook. The farmer, a thick-set, hairy man, whose name was Turner, gave a sudden hitch to the halter to check the progress of the cow, and nodded ominously.

"Bad weather's brewin'," he said. "The wind's blowin' from the northeast; I can tell by the way that thar oak turns its leaves. It's a bad sign, and if thar ain't a-shiftin' 'fore mornin', we're likely to hev a spell."

Nicholas agreed.

"There hasn't been much rainfall lately," he added. "I reckon it has come at last and for a long stretch." His eyes swept the western horizon, where the clouds hung heavily above the pines.

"Yo' pa got his crops in?"

"Pretty much. The peanuts were harvested after the last frost."

"He ain't had much luck this year, I hear."

Nicholas shook his head.

"No less than usual. Last year he lost the brindle cow that was calving. This season the mare died."

"Well, well! He never was much for luck, nohow. Seems like he worked too hard to have Providence on his side. I allers said that Providence had ruther you'd leave a share of the business to Him. Got through school yet?"

"Yes; I'm reading law."

"Reading what?"

"I am going to study law in the judge's office--Judge Bassett, you know."

"So you can keep a tongue in yo' head when those plagued cusses come 'bout the mortgage?"

"So I can take cases to court and earn a living."

"Why don't you stick to the land and make yo' bread honest?"

"The law's honest."

Turner shook his hairy head.

"It cheated me out o' twelve bushels of 'taters las' year," he said. "Don't tell me 'bout yo' law. I know it."

Nicholas laughed.

"Come to me when I've set up, if you get in trouble," he rejoined, "and I'll get you out."

The cow gave a lunge at the ropes, and the farmer went on his way. When the man and cow had passed from sight Nicholas stopped and laughed again. He wondered if he could be really of one flesh and blood with these people--of one stuff and fibre. What had he in common with his own father--hard-working, heavy-handed Amos Burr? No, he was not of them and he had never been.

He had turned from the main road into the wood, when a girl on horseback dashed suddenly towards him from the gray perspective. She was riding rapidly, her short skirts flying, her hair blown darkly across her face. A brown-and-white pointer ran at her side.

As she caught sight of Nicholas she half rose in her saddle, giving a loud, clear call.

"Hello, Nick Burr! Hello!"

Nicholas stood aside and waited for her to come up, which she did in a moment, panting from her exercise, her face flushing into a glowing heat.

"I was looking for you," she said, waving a small willow spray in her brown hand. "I went by the farm, but you weren't there. So, you are nineteen to-day!" Her eyes shone as she looked at him. There was a singular brilliance of expression in her face, due partly to the exercise, partly to the restless animation of her features. She was at the unbecoming age when the child is merging into the woman, but her lack of grace was redeemed by her warmth of personality.

Nicholas laid his hand upon the bridle.

"Why, Genia, if I'd known you wanted me I'd have been hanging round somewhere. What is it?"

"Let me look at you."

Nicholas flushed, turning his face away from her.

"God knows, I'm ugly enough," he said.

She leaned nearer, shaking back her straight, black hair, which fell from beneath the small cap.

"I want to see if you have changed since yesterday."

He turned towards her.

"Have I?" he asked hopefully.

She regarded him gravely, though a smile played over her changeful lips.

"Not a bit. Not a freckle."

"Hang it all! I lost my freckles long ago."

"Then they've come back. There are one--two--three on your nose."

"Hold on! Let my looks alone, please."

Eugenia whistled softly, half grave, half gay.

"Down, darling!" she said to the pointer, and "be still, beauty!" to the horse. Then she turned to Nicholas again.

"I've really and truly got something to tell you, Nick Burr."

"Out with it, then. Don't worry."

She swung her long legs idly from the saddle. "Suppose I don't."

"Then don't."

"Suppose I do."

"I'll be hanged if I care!"

"Oh, you do, you story. You're just dying to know--but it's serious."

She patted the horse's neck, watching Nicholas with child-like eagerness.

"Well, I'm--I'm--there! I told you you were dying to know!"

"I'm not."

"Guess, anyway."

"Somebody coming on a visit?"

She shook her head.

"Try again, stupid."

"Miss Chris going to be married?"

"Oh, Lord, no. You aren't really a fool, Nick."

"Betsey got a baby?"

"Why, Tecumsey only came last June!"

"Then I give it up. Tell me."

"Say please."

"Please, Genia!"

"Say 'please, dear, good Genia.'"

"Please, dear, darling Genia."

"I didn't say 'darling.' I said 'good.'"

"It's the same thing."

She smiled at him with boyish eyes.

"Am I really a darling?"

"Do you really know something?"

"You bet I do."

"What is it?"

She laughed teasingly.

"It'll make you cry."

"Hurry up, Genia!"

"You'll certainly cry very loud."

"I'll shake you in a moment."

"It isn't polite to shake ladies."

"You aren't a lady. You're a vixen."

"Aunt Verbeny says I'm a limb of Satan. But will you promise not to weep a flood of tears, so I can't cross home?"

She leaned still nearer, resting her hand upon his shoulder.

"I'm going away."

"What?"

"I'm going away to-morrow at daybreak. I'm going to school. I shan't come back for a whole year. I'm--I'm going to leave papa and Aunt Chris and Jim and you."

She began to sob.

"Don't," said Nicholas sharply.

"And--and you don't care a bit. You're just a stone. Oh, I don't want to go to school!"

"I'm not a stone. I do care."

"No, you don't. And I may die and never come back any more, and you'll forget all about me."

"I shan't. Don't, I say. Do you hear me, Genia, don't."

She looked for a handkerchief, and, failing to find one, wiped her eyes on the horse's mane.

"What are you going to do when I am gone?"

"Work hard so you'll be proud of me when you come back."

"I shall be sixteen in two years."

"And I, twenty-one."

"You'll be a man--quite."

"You'll be a woman--almost."

"I don't think I shall like you so much then."

"I shall like you more."

"Why?" she asked quickly.

"Why? Oh, I don't know. Am I so awfully ugly, Genia?"

"Turn this way."

He obeyed her, flushing beneath her scrutiny.

"I shouldn't call you--awful," she replied at last.

"Am I so ugly, then?"

"Honour bright?"

"Of course," impatiently.

"Then you are--yes--rather."

He shook his head angrily.

"I didn't think you'd be mean enough to tell me so," he returned.

"But you asked me."

"I don't care if I did. You might have said something pleasant."

Her sensitive mouth drooped. "I never think of your being ugly when I'm with you," she said. "It's a good, strong kind of ugliness, anyway. I don't mind it."

He smiled again.

"Looks don't matter, anyway," she went on soothingly. "I'd rather a man would be clever than handsome;" then she added conscientiously, "only I'd rather be handsome myself."

He looked at her closely.

"I reckon you will be," he said. "Most women are. It's the clothes, I suppose."

Eugenia looked down at him for an instant in silence; then she held out her hands.

"I am going at daybreak," she said. "Will you come down to the road and tell me good-bye?"

"Why, of course."

"But we must say good-bye now, too. Did we ever shake hands before?"

"No."

"Then, good-bye. I must go."

"Good-bye, dear--darling."

She touched her horse lightly with the willow, but promptly drew rein, regarding Nicholas with her boyish eyes.

"Do you think it would make it any easier if we kissed?" she asked.

"Geriminy! I should say so!"

He caught her hands; she leaned over and he kissed her lips. She drew back with the same frank laugh, but a flush burned his face and his eyes were sparkling.

"More, Genia," he said, but she laughed and let the bridle fall.

"No--no--but it made me feel better. There, good-bye, dear, dear Nick Burr, good-bye!"

Then she dashed past him, and a whirl of dust filled the solitary air.

He looked after her until she turned her horse into the Old Stage Road, and the clatter of the hoofs was gone. When the stillness had fallen again he went slowly on his way.

In the woods the pale bodies of the beeches seemed to melt into the cloudy atmosphere. There was no wind among the trees, and the pervading dampness had robbed the yellowed leaves of their silken rustle. They fluttered softly, hanging limp from the drooping branches as if attached by invisible threads. As he went on a deep bluish smoke issued from among some far-off poplars where a farmer was burning brush in a clearing. The smoke hung low above the undergrowth, assuming eccentric outlines and varied tones of dusk. Presently the fires glimmered nearer, and he saw the red tongues of the flames and heard the parched crackling of consuming leaves. The figures of the workers were limned grotesquely against the ruddy background with a startling and unreal absence of detail. They looked like incarnate shadows--stalking between the dim beeches and the blazing brush heaps. A few drops of rain fell suddenly, and the fires began slowly to die away. At the foot of the crumbling "worm" fence, skirting the edges of the wood, deep wind-drifts of russet leaves stirred mournfully. Later they would be hauled away to assist in the winter dressing of the fallows; now they beat helplessly against the retarding rails like a vanquished army of invasion.

Nicholas left the wood and passed the field of broomsedge on his way to the house. Beyond the barnyard he saw the long rows of pine staves that had supported the shocks of peanuts, and from the direction of the field he caught sight of his father, driven homeward by the threatening rain.

Sairy Jane, who was bringing a string of dried snaps from the outhouse, called to him to hurry before the cloudburst. She was a lank, colourless girl, with bad teeth and small pale eyes. Jubal, at the churn in the hall, rested from his labours as Nicholas entered, and grinned as he pointed to his mother in the kitchen. Marthy Burr was ironing. As Nicholas crossed the threshold, she stopped in her passage from the stove and looked at him, a flash of pride softening her pain-scarred features.

"Lord, what a man you are, Nick!" she exclaimed with a kind of triumph. "When I heard yo' step on the po'ch I could have swo'ed it was yo' pa's."

Nicholas nodded at her abstractedly as he took off his hat.

"Where's pa?" he asked carelessly. "I thought he'd have got in before me. I saw him as I came up."

"I reckon he won't git in befo' he gits a drench-in'," responded his stepmother, glancing indifferently through the back window. "If he does it'll be the first time sence he war born. 'Twarn't nothin' to be done in the fields, nohow, an' so I told him, but he ain't never rested yet, an' I don't reckon he's goin' to till I bury him."

As she spoke the rain fell heavily, and presently Amos Burr came in, shaking the water from his head and shoulders.

"I told you 'twarn't no use yo' goin' to the fields befo' the rain," began his wife admonishingly. "But you're a man all over, an' it seems like you're 'bliged to go yo' own way for the sheer pleasure of goin' agin somebody else's. If I'd been pesterin' you all day long to go down thar to look at that ploughin', you'd be settin' in yo' chair now, plum dry."

Amos Burr crossed to the stove and turned his dripping back to the heat.

"Gimme a rubbin' down, Sairy Jane," he pleaded, and his daughter took a dry cloth and began mopping off the water.

Marthy Burr placed an iron on the stove and took one off.

"Whar'd you git dinner, Nick?" she inquired suddenly.

"At the judge's."

"What did they have?" demanded Jubal from the hall, ceasing the clatter of the churn. "Golly! Wouldn't I like a bite of something!"

"I shouldn't mind some strange cookin', myself," said Marthy Burr, shaking her head at one of the children who had come into the kitchen with muddy feet. "I ain't tasted anybody else's vittles for ten years, an' sometimes I feel my mouth waterin' for a change of hand in the dough."

She took one of her husband's shirts from the pile of freshly dried clothes, spread it on the ironing-board, and sprinkled it with water. Then she moistened her finger and applied it to the iron.

Amos Burr looked up from before the stove, where he still sat drying.

"You're a man now, Nick," he said slowly, as if the words had been revolving in his brain for some time and he had just received the power of speech.

"Yes, pa."

"Whatever he is, he don't git it from his pa," put in Marthy Burr as she bent over the shirt. "He ain't got nothin' of yo'rn onless it's yo' hair, an' that's done sobered down till you wouldn't know it."

Amos waited patiently until she had finished, and then went on heavily as if the pause had been intentional, not enforced.

"You've got as much schoolin' as most city chaps," he said. "Much good it'll do you, I reckon. I never saw nothin' come of larnin' yet, 'cep'n worthlessness. But you'd set yo' mind on it, an' you've got it."

"Thar warn't none of yo' hand in that, Amos Burr," cried his wife, checking him again before he had recovered breath from his last sentence. "Many's the night I've wrastled with you till you war clean wore out with sleeplessness, 'fo' you'd let the child keep on at his books."

"I ain't never seen no good come of it," repeated Burr stolidly; then he returned to Nicholas.

"I reckon you'll want to do somethin' for the family, now," he said, "seein' yo' ma is well wore out an' the brindle cow died calvin', an' Sairy Jane is a hard worker."

Nicholas looked at him without speaking.

"Yes?" he said inquiringly, and his voice was dull.

"I was talkin' to Jerry Pollard," continued his father, letting his slow eyes rest upon his son's, "an' he said you war as likely a chap as thar was roun' here, and he reckoned you'd be pretty quick in business."

"Yes?" said Nicholas again in the same tone.

Amos Burr was silent for a moment, and his wife filled in the pause with a series of running interjections. When they were over her husband took up his words.

"He wants a young fellow about his store, he says, as can look arter the books an' the business. He's gittin' too old to keep up with the city ways an' look peart at the ladies--he'll pay a nice little sum in cash every week."

"Yes?" repeated Nicholas, still interrogatively.

"An' he wants to know if you'll take the place--you're jest the sort of chap he wants, he says--somebody as will be bright at praisin' up the calicky to the gals when they come shoppin'. Thar's nothin' like a young man behind the counter to draw the gals, he says."

Nicholas shook his head impatiently, clasping the books tightly beneath his arm. His gaze had grown harsh and repellent.

"But I am going into the judge's office," he answered. "I am going--" Then he checked himself, baffled by the massive ignorance he confronted.

Amos Burr drew one shoulder from the fire and offered the other. A slow steam rose from his smoking shirt, and the room was filled with the odour of scorching cotton.

"Thar ain't much cash in that, I reckon," he said.

Nicholas took a step forward, still facing his father with obstinate eyes. One of the books slipped from his arm and fell to the floor, with open leaves, but he let it lie. He was watching his father's jaws as they rose and fell over the quid of tobacco.

"No, there is not much cash in that," he repeated.

"Things have gone mighty hard," said Amos Burr. "It's been a bad year. I ain't sayin' nothin' 'bout the work yo' ma an' Sairy Jane an' me have done. That don't seem to count, somehow. But nothin' ain't come straight, an' thar ain't a cent to pay the taxes. If we can't manage to tide over this comin' winter thar'll have to be a mortgage in the spring."

Sairy Jane began to cry softly. One of the children joined in.

"Give me time," said Nicholas breathlessly. "Give me time. I'll pay it all in time." Then the sound of Sairy Jane's sobs maddened him and he turned upon her with an oath. "Damn you! Can't you be quiet?"

It seemed to him that they were all closing upon him and that there was no opening of escape.

Marthy Burr put down her iron and came to where he stood, laying her hand upon his sleeve.

"Don't mind 'em, Nick," she said, and her sharp voice broke suddenly. "Go ahead an' make a man of yo'self, mortgage or no mortgage."

Nicholas lifted his gaze from the floor and looked into his stepmother's face. Then he looked at her hand as it lay upon his arm. That trembling hand brought to him more fully than words, more clearly than visions, the pathos of her life.

"Don't you worry, ma," he said quietly at last. "It'll be all right. Don't you worry."

Then he let her hand slip from his shoulder and left the room.

He passed out upon the back porch and stood gazing vacantly across the outlook.

It rained heavily, the drops descending in horizontal lengths like a fantastic fall of colourless pine needles. Overhead the clouds were black, impenetrable.

Through the falling rain he looked at the view before him, at the overgrown yard, at the manure heaps near the stable, at the grim rows of staves in the peanut field, at the sombre and deserted landscape. A raw wind blew in gusts from the northeast, and the distorted ailanthus tree in the yard moaned and wrung its twisted limbs. Sharp, unpleasant odours came from the pig-pen in the barnyard, where the rain was scattering the slops in the trough. A bull bellowed in a far-off pasture. Before the hen-house door several dripping fowls strutted with wilted feathers.

He saw it all in silence, with the dogged eyes of one whose gaze is turned inward. He made no gesture, uttered no exclamation. He was as motionless as the lintel of the door on which he leaned.

Suddenly a gust of wind whipped the rain into his face. He turned, reentered the house, closed the door carefully, and went upstairs. _

Read next: Book 2. A Rainy Season: Chapter 3

Read previous: Book 2. A Rainy Season: Chapter 1

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