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The Maid-At-Arms, a novel by Robert W. Chambers |
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Chapter 7. Aftermath |
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_ CHAPTER VII. AFTERMATH Cato at my bedside with basin, towel, and razor, a tub of water on the floor, and the sun shining on my chamber wall. These, and a stale taste on my tongue, greeted me as I awoke. First to wash teeth and mouth with orris, then to bathe, half asleep still; and yet again to lie a-thinking in my arm-chair, robed in a banyan, cheeks all suds and nose sniffing the scented water in the chin-basin which I held none too steady; and I said, peevishly, "What a fool a man is to play the fool! Do you hear me, Cato?" He said that he marked my words, and I bade him hold his tongue and tell me the hour. "Nine, suh." "Then I'll sleep again," I muttered, but could not, and after the morning draught felt better. Chocolate and bread, new butter and new eggs, put me in a kinder humor. Cato, burrowing in my boxes, drew out a soft, new suit of doeskin with new points, new girdle, and new moccasins. "Oh," said I, watching him, "am I to go forest-running to-day?" "Mars' Varick gwine ride de boun's," he announced, cheerfully. "Ride to hounds?" I repeated, astonished. "In May?" "No, suh! Ride de boun's, suh." "Oh, ride the boundaries?" "Yaas, suh." "Oh, very well. What time does he start?" "'Bout noontide, suh." The old man strove to straighten my short queue, but found it hopeless, so tied it close and dusted on the French powder. "Curly head, curly head," he muttered to himself. "Dess lak yo' pap's!... an' Miss Dorry's. Law's sakes, dishyere hair wuf mo'n eight dollar." "You think my hair worth more than eight dollars?" I asked, amused. "H'it sho'ly am, suh." "But why eight dollars, Cato?" "Das what the redcoats say; eight dollars fo' one rebel scalp, suh." I sat up, horrified. "Who told you that?" I demanded. "All de gemmen done say so--Mars' Varick, Mars' Johnsing, Cap'in Butler." "Bah! they said it to plague you, Cato," I muttered; but as I said it I saw the old slave's eyes and knew that he had told the truth. Sobered, I dressed me in my forest dress, absently lacing the hunting-shirt and tying knee-points, while the old man polished hatchet and knife and slipped them into the beaded scabbards swinging on either hip. Then I went out, noiselessly descending the stairway, and came all unawares upon the young folk and the children gathered on the sunny porch, busy with their morning tasks. They neither saw nor heard me; I leaned against the doorway to see the pretty picture at my ease. The children, Sam and Benny, sat all hunched up, scowling over their books. Close to a fluted pillar, Dorothy Varick reclined in a chair, embroidering her initials on a pair of white silk hose, using the Rosemary stitch. And as her delicate fingers flew, her gold thimble flashed like a fire-fly in the sun. At her feet, cross-legged, sat Cecile Butler, velvet eyes intent on a silken petticoat which she was embroidering with pale sprays of flowers. Ruyven and Harry, near by, dipped their brushes into pans of brilliant French colors, the one to paint marvellous birds on a silken fan, the other to decorate a pair of white satin shoes with little pink blossoms nodding on a vine. Loath to disturb them, I stood smiling, silent; and presently Dorothy, without raising her eyes, called on Samuel to read his morning lesson, and he began, breathing heavily:
"That teaches us to obey God," said Ruyven, severely, dipping his brush into the pink paint-cake. "What's the good of obeying God if we're all to go to hell?" asked Cecile. "We're not all going to hell," said Dorothy, calmly. "God saves His elect." "Who are the elect?" demanded Samuel, faintly hopeful. "Nobody knows," replied Cecile, grimly; "but I guess--" "Benny," broke in Dorothy, "read your lesson! Cecile, stop your chatter!" And Benny, cheerful and sceptical, read his lines:
"Benjamin," said Cecile, in an awful voice, "are you not terrified at what you read?" "Huh!" said Benny, "I'm not a 'pretty maid'; I'm a boy." "It's all the same, little dunce!" insisted Cecile. "Doeth God thay little boyth are born to be damned?" he asked, uneasily. "No, no," interrupted Dorothy; "God saves His elect, I tell you. Don't you remember what He says?
"Are you sure?" asked Cecile, gloomily. Dorothy, stitching serenely, answered: "I am sure God is fair." "Oh, everybody knows that," observed Cecile. "What we want to know is, what does He mean to do with us." "If we're good," added Samuel, fervently. "He will damn us, perhaps," said Ruyven, sucking his paint-brush and looking critically at his work. "Damn us? Why?" inquired Dorothy, raising her eyes. "Oh, for all that sin we were born in," said Ruyven, absently. "But that's not fair," said Dorothy. "Are you smarter than a clergyman?" sneered Ruyven. Dorothy spread the white silk stocking over one knee. "I don't know," she sighed, "sometimes I think I am." "Pride," commented Cecile, complacently. "Pride is sin, so there you are, Dorothy." "There you are, Dorothy!" said I, laughing from the doorway; and, "Oh, Cousin Ormond!" they all chorused, scrambling up to greet me. "Have a care!" cried Dorothy. "That is my wedding petticoat! Oh, he's slopped water on it! Benny, you dreadful villain!" "No, he hasn't," said I, coming out to greet her and Cecile, with Samuel and Benny hanging to my belt, and Harry fast hold of one arm. "And what's all this about wedding finery? Is there a bride in this vicinity?" Dorothy held out a stocking. "A bride's white silken hose," she said, complacently. "Embroidered on the knee with the bride's initials," added Cecile, proudly. "Yours, Dorothy?" I demanded. "Yes, but I shall not wear them for ages and ages. I told you so last night." "But I thought Dorothy had best make ready," remarked Cecile. "Dorothy is to carry that fan and wear those slippers and this petticoat and the white silk stockings when she weds Sir George." "Sir George who?" I asked, bluntly. "Why, Sir George Covert. Didn't you know?" I looked at Dorothy, incensed without a reason. "Why didn't you tell me?" I asked, ungraciously. "Why didn't you ask me?" she replied, a trifle hurt. I was silent. Cecile said: "I hope that Dorothy will marry him soon. I want to see how she looks in this petticoat." "Ho!" sneered Harry, "you just want to wear one like it and be a bridesmaid and primp and give yourself airs. I know you!" "Sir George Covert is a good fellow," remarked Ruyven, with a patronizing nod at Dorothy; "but I always said he was too old for you. You should see how gray are his temples when he wears no powder." "He has fine eyes," murmured Cecile. "He's too old; he's forty," repeated Ruyven. "His legs are shapely," added Cecile, sentimentally. Dorothy gave a despairing upward glance at me. "Are these children not silly?" she said, with a little shrug. "We may be children, and we may be silly," said Ruyven, "but if we were you we'd wed our cousin Ormond." "All of you together?" inquired Dorothy. "You know what I mean," he snapped. "Why don't you?" demanded Harry, vaguely, twitching Dorothy by the apron. "Do what?" "Wed our cousin Ormond." "But he has not asked me," she said, smiling. Harry turned to me and took my arm affectionately in his. "You will ask her, won't you?" he murmured. "She's very nice when she chooses." "She wouldn't have me," I said, laughing. "Oh yes, she would; and then you need never leave us, which would be pleasant for all, I think. Won't you ask her, cousin?" "You ask her," I said. "Dorothy," he broke out, eagerly. "You will wed him, won't you? Our cousin Ormond says he will if you will. And I'll tell Sir George that it's just a family matter, and, besides, he's too old--" "Yes, tell Sir George that," sneered Ruyven, who had listened in an embarrassment that certainly Dorothy had not betrayed. "You're a great fool, Harry. Don't you know that when people want to wed they ask each other's permission to ask each other's father, and then their fathers ask each other, and then they ask each--" "Other!" cried Dorothy, laughing deliciously. "Oh, Ruyven, Ruyven, you certainly will be the death of me!" "All the same," said Harry, sullenly, "our cousin wishes to wed you." "Do you?" asked Dorothy, raising her amused eyes to me. "I fear I come too late," I said, forcing a smile I was not inclined to. "Ah, yes; too late," she sighed, pretending a doleful mien. "Why?" demanded Harry, blankly. Dorothy shook her head. "Sir George would never permit me such a liberty. If he would, our cousin Ormond and I could wed at once; you see I have my bride's stockings here; Cecile could do my hair, Sammy carry my prayer-book, Benny my train, Ruyven read the service--" Harry, flushing at the shout of laughter, gave Dorothy a dark look, turned and eyed me, then scowled again at Dorothy. "All the same," he said, slowly, "you're a great goose not to wed him.... And you'll be sorry ... when he's dead!" At this veiled prophecy of my approaching dissolution, all were silent save Dorothy and Ruyven, whose fresh laughter rang out peal on peal. "Laugh," said Harry, gloomily; "but you won't laugh when he's killed in the war, ... and scalped, too." Ruyven, suddenly sober, looked up at me. Dorothy bent over her needle-work and examined it attentively. "Are you going to the war?" asked Cecile, plaintively. "Of course he's going; so am I," replied Ruyven, striking a careless pose against a pillar. "On which side, Ruyven?" inquired Dorothy, sorting her silks. "On my cousin's side, of course," he said, uneasily. "Which side is that?" asked Cecile. Confused, flushing painfully, the boy looked at me; and I rescued him, saying, "We'll talk that over when we ride bounds this afternoon. Ruyven and I understand each other, don't we, Ruyven?" He gave me a grateful glance. "Yes," he said, shyly. Sir George Covert, a trifle pallid, but bland and urbane, strolled out to the porch, saluting us gracefully. He paused beside Dorothy, who slipped her needle through her work and held out her hand for him to salute. "Are you also going to the wars?" she asked, with a friendly smile. "Where are they?" he inquired, pretending a fierce eagerness. "Point out some wars and I'll go to 'em post haste!" "They're all around us," said Sammy, solemnly. "Then we'd best get to horse and lose no time, Mr. Ormond," he observed, passing his arm through mine. In a lower voice he added: "Headache?" "Oh no," I said, hastily. "Lucky dog. Sir Lupus lies as though struck by lightning. I'm all a-quiver, too. A man of my years is a fool to do such things. But I do, Ormond, I do; ass that I am. Do you ride bounds with Sir Lupus?" "If he desires it," I said. "Then I'll see you when you pass my villa on the Vlaie, where you'll find a glass of wine waiting. Do you ride, Miss Dorothy?" "Yes," she said. A stable lad brought his horse to the porch. He took leave of Dorothy with a grace that charmed even me; yet, in his bearing towards her I could detect the tender pride he had in her, and that left me cold and thoughtful. All liked him, though none appeared to regard him exactly as a kinsman, nor accorded him that vague shade of intimacy which is felt in kinship, not in comradeship alone, and which they already accorded me. Dorothy walked with him to the stockade gate, the stable lad following with his horse; and I saw them stand there in low-voiced conversation, he lounging and switching at the weeds with his riding-crop; she, head bent, turning the gold thimble over and over between her fingers. And I wondered what they were saying. Presently he mounted and rode away, a graceful, manly figure in the saddle, and not turning like a fop to blow a kiss at his betrothed, nor spurring his horse to show his skill--for which I coldly respected him. Harry, Cecile, and the children gathered their paints and books and went into the house, demanding that I should follow. "Dorothy is beckoning us," observed Ruyven, gathering up his paints. I looked towards her and she raised her hand, motioning us to come. "About father's watch," she said. "I have just consulted Sir George, and he says that neither I nor Ruyven have won, seeing that Ruyven used the coin he did--" "Very well," cried Ruyven, triumphantly. "Then let us match dates again. Have you a shilling, Cousin Ormond?" "I'll throw hunting-knives for it," suggested Dorothy. "Oh no, you won't," retorted her brother, warily. "Then I'll race you to the porch." He shook his head. She laughed tauntingly. "I'm not afraid," said Ruyven, reddening and glancing at me. "Then I'll wrestle you." Stung by the malice in her smile, Ruyven seized her. "No, no! Not in these clothes!" she said, twisting to free herself. "Wait till I put on my buckskins. Don't use me so roughly, you tear my laced apron. Oh! you great booby!" And with a quick cry of resentment she bent, caught her brother, and swung him off his feet clean over her left shoulder slap on the grass. "Silly!" she said, cheeks aflame. "I have no patience to be mauled." Then she laughed uncertainly to see him lying there, too astonished to get up. "Are you hurt?" she asked. "Who taught you that hold?" he demanded, indignantly, scrambling to his feet. "I thought I alone knew that." "Why, Captain Campbell taught you last week and ... I was at the window ... sewing," she said, demurely. Ruyven looked at me, disgusted, muttering, "If I could learn things the way she does, I'd not waste time at King's College, I can tell you." "You're not going to King's College, anyhow," said his sister. "York is full o' loyal rebels and Tory patriots, and father says he'll be damned if you can learn logic where all lack it." She held out her hand, smiling. "No malice, Ruyven, and we'll forgive each other." Her brother met the clasp; then, hands in his pockets, followed us back through the stockade towards the porch. I was pleased to see that his pride had suffered no more than his body from the fall he got, which augured well for a fair-minded manhood. As we approached the house I heard hollow noises within, like groans; and I stopped, listening intently. "It is Sir Lupus snoring," observed Ruyven. "He will wake soon; I think I had best call Tulip," he added, exchanging a glance with his sister; and entered the house calling, "Cato! Cato! Tulip! Tulip! I say!" "Who is Tulip?" I asked of Dorothy, who lingered at the threshold folding her embroidery into a bundle. "Tulip? Oh, Tulip cooks for us--black as a June crow, cousin. She is voodoo." "Evil-eye and all?" I asked, smiling. Dorothy looked up shyly. "Don't you believe in the evil-eye?" I was not perfectly sure whether I did or not, but I said "No." "To believe is not necessarily to be afraid," she added, quickly. Now, had I believed in the voodoo craft, or in the power of an evil-eye, I should also have feared. Those who have ever witnessed a sea-island witch-dance can bear me out, and I think a man may dread a hag and be no coward either. But distance and time allay the memories of such uncanny works. I had forgotten whether I was afraid or not. So I said, "There are no witches, Dorothy." She looked at me, dreamily. "There are none ... that I fear." "Not even Catrine Montour?" I asked, to plague her. "No; it turns me cold to think of her running in the forest, but I am not afraid." She stood pensive in the doorway, rolling and unrolling her embroidery. Harry and Cecile came out, flourishing alder poles from which lines and hooks dangled. Samuel and Benny carried birchen baskets and shallow nets. "If we're to have Mohawk chubbs," said Cecile, "you had best come with us, Dorothy. Ruyven has a book and has locked himself in the play-room." But Dorothy shook her head, saying that she meant to ride the boundary with us; and the children, after vainly soliciting my company, trooped off towards that same grist-mill in the ravine below the bridge which I had observed on my first arrival at Varick Manor. "I am wondering," said Dorothy, "how you mean to pass the morning. You had best steer wide of Sir Lupus until he has breakfasted." "I've a mind to sleep," I said, guiltily. "I think it would be pleasant to ride together. Will you?" she asked; then, laughing, she said, frankly, "Since you have come I do nothing but follow you.... It is long since I have had a young companion, ... and, when I think that you are to leave us, it spurs me to lose no moment that I shall regret when you are gone." No shyness marred the pretty declaration of her friendship, and it touched me the more keenly perhaps. The confidence in her eyes, lifted so sweetly, waked the best in me; and if my response was stumbling, it was eager and warm, and seemed to please her. "Tulip! Tulip!" she cried, "I want my dinner! Now!" And to me, "We will eat what they give us; I shall dress in my buckskins and we will ride the boundary and register the signs, and Sir Lupus and the others can meet us at Sir George Covert's pleasure-house on the Vlaie. Does it please you, Cousin George?" I looked into her bright eyes and said that it pleased me more than I dared say, and she laughed and ran up-stairs, calling back to me that I should order our horses and tell Cato to tell Tulip to fetch meat and claret to the gun-room. I whistled a small, black stable lad and bade him bring our mounts to the porch, then wandered at random down the hallway, following my nose, which scented the kitchen, until I came to a closed door. Behind that door meats were cooking--I could take my oath o' that--so I opened the door and poked my nose in. "Tulip," I said, "come here!" An ample black woman, aproned and turbaned, looked at me through the steam of many kettles, turned and cuffed the lad at the spit, dealt a few buffets among the scullions, and waddled up to me, bobbing and curtsying. "Aunt Tulip," I said, gravely, "are you voodoo?" "Folks says ah is, Mars' Ormon'," she said, in her soft Georgia accent. "Oh, they do, do they? Look at me, Aunt Tulip. What do my eyes tell you of me?" Her dark eyes, fixed on mine, seemed to change, and I thought little glimmers of pure gold tinted the iris, like those marvellous restless tints in a gorgeous bubble. Certainly her eyes were strange, almost compelling, for I felt a faint rigidity in my cheeks and my eyes returned directly to hers as at an unspoken command. "Can you read me, aunty?" I asked, trying to speak easily, yet feeling the stiffness growing in my cheeks. "Ah sho' can," she said, stepping nearer. "What is my fate, then?" "Ah 'spec' yo' gwine fine yo'se'f in love," she said, softly; and I strove to smile with ever-stiffening lips. A little numbness that tingled spread over me; it was pleasant; I did not care to withdraw my eyes. Presently the tightness in my face relaxed, I moved my lips, smiling vaguely. "In love," I repeated. "Yaas, Mars' Ormon'." "When?" "'Fore yo' know h'it, honey." "Tell me more." "'Spec' ah done tole yo' too much, honey." She looked at me steadily. "Pore Mars' Gawge," she murmured, "'spec' ah done tole yo' too much. But it sho' am a-comin', honey, an' h'it gwine come pow'ful sudden, an' h'it gwine mek yo' pow'ful sick." "Am I to win her?" "No, honey." "Is there no hope, Aunt Tulip?" She hesitated as though at fault; I felt the tenseness in my face once more; then, for one instant, I lost track of time; for presently I found myself standing in the hallway watching Sir Lupus through the open door of the gun-room, and Sir Lupus was very angry. "Dammy!" he roared, "am I to eat my plate? Cato! I want my porridge!" Confused, I stood blinking at him, and he at table, bibbed like a babe, mad as a hornet, hammering on the cloth with a great silver spoon and bellowing that they meant to starve him. "I don't remember how I came here," I began, then flushed furiously at my foolishness. "Remember!" he shouted. "I don't remember anything! I don't want to remember anything! I want my porridge! I want it now! Damnation!" Cato, hastening past me with the steaming dish, was received with a yelp. But at last Sir Lupus got his spoon into the mess and a portion of the mess into his mouth, and fell to gobbling and growling, paying me no further attention. So I closed the door of the gun-room on the great patroon and walked to the foot of the stairway. A figure in soft buckskins was descending--a blue-eyed, graceful youth who hailed me with a gesture. "Dorothy!" I said, fascinated. Her fringed hunting-shirt fell to her knees, the short shoulder-cape from throat to breast; gay fringe fluttered from shoulder to wrist, and from thigh to ankle; and her little scarlet-quilled moccasins went pat-patter-pat as she danced down the stairway and stood before me, sweeping her cap from her golden head in exaggerated salute. She seemed smaller in her boy's dress, fuller, too, and rounder of neck and limb; and the witchery of her beauty left me silent--a tribute she found delightful, for she blushed very prettily and bowed again in dumb acknowledgment of the homage all too evident in my eyes. Cato came with a dish of meat and a bottle of claret; and we sat down on the stairs, punishing bottle and platter till neither drop nor scrap remained. "Don't leave these dishes for Sir Lupus to fall over!" she cried to Cato, then sprang to her feet and was out of the door before I could move, whistling for our horses. As I came out the horses arrived, and I hastened forward to put her into her saddle, but she was up and astride ere I reached the ground, coolly gathering bridle and feeling with her soft leather toes for the stirrups. Astonished, for I had never seen a girl so mounted, I climbed to my saddle and wheeled my mare, following her out across the lawn, through the stockade and into the road, where I pushed my horse forward and ranged up beside her at a gallop, just as she reached the bridge. "See!" she cried, with a sweep of her arm, "there are the children down there fishing under the mill." And she waved her small cap of silver fox, calling in a clear, sweet voice the Indian cry of triumph, "Koue!" _ |
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