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The Bondwoman, a novel by Marah Ellis Ryan |
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Chapter 15 |
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_ CHAPTER XV "Do tell me every blessed thing about her--a real Marquise--I love titles;" and Evilena clasped her hands rapturously. "Do you, now? Faith, then I'm glad I secured mine before I came over," and the laughing Irish eyes met hers quizzically. "Oh, I never meant titles people earn themselves, Mr. Doctor, for--" "Then that puts the Judge and Col. Kenneth and myself on the outside of your fence, does it? Arrah now! I'll be looking up my pedigree in hopes of unearthing a king--every true Irishman has a traditional chance of being the descendant of rulers who ran barefoot, and carried a club to teach the court etiquette." She made a mutinous little grimace and refused to discuss his probable ancestors. "Does not the presence of a French Marquise show how Europe sides with us?" she demanded, triumphantly. "Quantities of noblemen have been the guests of the South lately, and isn't General Wolseley, the most brilliant officer of the British Army, with our General Lee now? I reckon all that shows how we are estimated. And now the ladies of title are coming over. Oh, tell me all about her; is she very grand, very pretty?" "Grand enough for a queen over your new monarchy," replied Delaven, who derived considerable enjoyment from teasing the girl about affairs political--"and pretty? No, she's not that; she's just Beauty's self, entirely." "And you knew her well in Paris?" asked Evilena, with a hesitating suspicion as to why he had not announced such a wonderful acquaintance before--this woman who was Beauty's self, and a widow. She wondered if she had appeared crude compared with those grand dames he had known and forgotten to mention. "Oh, yes, I knew her while the old Marquise was living, that was when your mother and Col. Kenneth met her, but afterwards she took to travel for a change, and has evidently taken your South on her way. It will be happiness to see her again." "And brother Ken knew her, too?" asked the girl, with wide-open eyes; "and he never mentioned her, either--well!" "The rascal!--to deprive you of an account of all the lovely ladies he met! But you were at school when they returned, were you not?--and Ken started off hot foot for the West and Indian fighting, so you see there were excuses." "And Kenneth does not know you are here still, and will not know the beautiful Marquise is here. Won't he be surprised to see you all?" "I doubt if I cause him such a shock," decided Delaven; "when he gets sight of Judithe, Marquise de Caron, he will naturally forget at once whether I am in America or Ireland." "Indeed, then, I never knew Kenneth to slight a friend," said the girl, indignantly. "But maybe you never saw him face to face with such a temptation to make a man forget the universe." "Sh--h!" she whispered, softly. Gertrude had come out on the veranda looking for the Judge. Seeing him down at the landing she walked leisurely in that direction. "You do say such wild, extravagant things," continued Evilena, "that I just had to stop you until Gertrude was out of hearing. I suppose you know she and Kenneth are paired off for matrimony." "Are they, now? Well, he's a lucky fellow; when are we to dance at the wedding?" "Oh, they never tell me anything about serious things like that," complained Evilena. "There's Aunt Sajane; she can tell us, if any one can; everybody confides love affairs to her." "Do they, now? Might I ask how you know?" "Yes, sir; you may ask!" Then she dropped that subject and returned to the first one. "Aunt Sajane, when do you reckon we can dance at Kenneth's wedding--his and Gertrude's? Doctor Delaven and I want to dance." "Evilena--honey!" murmured Aunt Sajane, chidingly, the more so as Matthew Loring had just crept slowly out with the help of his cane, and a negro boy. His alert expression betrayed that he had overheard the question. "You know," she continued, "folks have lots to think of these days without wedding dances, and it isn't fair to Gertrude to discuss it, for I don't know that there really has been any settled engagement; only it would seem like a perfect match and both families seem to favor it." She glanced inquiringly at Loring, who nodded his head decidedly. "Of course, of course, a very sensible arrangement. They've always been friends and it's been as good as settled ever since they were children." "Settled by the families?" asked Delaven. "Exactly--a good old custom that is ignored too often these days," said Mr. Loring, promptly. "Who is so fit to decide such things for children as their parents and guardians? That boy's father and me talked over this affair before the children ever knew each other. Of course he laughed over the question at the time, but when he died and suggested me as the boy's guardian, I knew he thought well of it and depended on me, and it will come off right as soon as this war is over--all right." "A very good method for this country of the old French cavaliers," remarked Delaven, in a low tone, to the girl, "but the lads and lassies of Ireland have to my mind found a better." Evilena looked up inquiringly. "Well, don't you mean to tell me what it is?" she asked, as he appeared to have dropped the subject. He laughed at the aggrieved tone she assumed. "Whist! There are mystical rites due to the telling, and it goes for nothing when told in a crowd." "You have got clear away from Kenneth," she reminded him, hastily. "Did you mean that he was--well, in love with this magnificent Marquise?" Low as she tried to speak, the words reached Loring, who listened, and Delaven, glancing across, perceived that he listened. "In love with the Marquise? Bless your heart, we were all of course." "But my brother?" insisted Evilena. "Well, now he might have been the one exception--in fact he always did get out of the merely social affairs when he could, over there." "Showed his good sense," decided Loring, emphatically. "I don't approve of young people running about Europe, learning their pernicious habits and customs; I've had my fill of foreign places and foreign people." Mrs. Nesbitt opened her lips with a shocked expression of protest, and as promptly closed them, realizing the uselessness of it. Evilena laughed outright and directed an eloquent glance towards the only foreigner. "Me, is it?" he asked, doubtingly. "Oh, don't you believe it. I've been here so long I'm near a Southerner myself." "How near?" she asked, teasingly. "Well, I must acknowledge you hold me at arms length in spite of my allegiance," he returned, and in the laugh of the others, Mr. Loring's tirade against foreigners was passed over. It was only a few hours since Pluto arrived with the letter from Mobile telling of the early arrival of Mrs. McVeigh and her guest. Noting that the letter had been delayed and that the ladies might even now be in Savannah, Judge Clarkson proposed starting at once to meet them, but was persuaded to wait until morning. Pluto was also told to wait over--an invitation gladly accepted, as visits to Loringwood were just now especially prized by the neighboring darkies, for the two runaways were yet subjects of gossip and speculation, and Uncle Nelse scattered opinions in the quarters on the absolute foolishness in taking such risks for freedom, and dire prophesies of the repentance to follow. That his own personal feeling did not carry conviction to his listeners was evidenced by the sullen silence of many who did not think it wise to contradict him. Pluto was the only person to argue with him. But this proved to be the one subject on which Pluto could not be his natural good-natured self. His big black eyes held threatening gleams, rebellious blood throbbed through every vein of his dark body. He championed the cause of the runaways; he knew of none who had left a good master; old man Masterson was unreasonable as Matthew Loring; he did not blame them for leaving such men. "I got good a mistress--good a master as is in all Carolina," he stated, bluntly, "but you think I stay here to work for any of them if it wan't for my boy?--my Rose's baby? No, I wouldn't! I'd go North, too! I'd never stop till I reached the men who fight against slave states. You all know what keeps me here. I'd never see my boy again. I done paid eighteen dollars towards Rose's freedom when she died. Then I ask Mr. Jean Larue if he wouldn't let that go on the baby. He said yes, right off, an' told me I could get him for hundred fifty dollars; that why I work 'long like I do, an' let the other men fight fo' freedom But I ain't contented so long as any man can sell me an' my child." None of the other blacks made any verbal comment on his feelings or opinions, but old Nelse easily saw that Pluto's ideas outweighed his own with them. "I un'stan' you to say Mahs Jean Larue promise he keep yo' boy till such time as the money is raised?" he asked, cautiously. "That's the way it was," assented Pluto. "I ain't been to see him--little Zekal--for nigh on two months now. I'm goen', sure, soon as Mrs. McVeigh come home an' get settled. It's quite a jaunt from our place to Mahs Larue's--thirty good mile." Aunt Chloe poured him out some more rye and corn-meal coffee and insisted on him having more sweet potato pie. She swept an admonishing glance towards the others as she did so. "I did heah some time ago one o' the Larue's gwine way down to the Mexico country," she remarked, carelessly. "I don't reckon though it is this special Larue. I mind they did have such a monstrous flock o' them Larue boys long time back; some got killed in this heah war what's maken' trouble all roun'. How much you got paid on yo' little boy, Pluto?" "Most thirty dollars by time I make next trip over. Takes mighty long time to save money these days, quarters scarcer than dollars use to be." His entertainers agreed with him; then the little maid Raquel entered to say Pluto was wanted by Miss Sajane soon as his lunch was over. And as he walked across the grounds Evilena pointed him out to Delaven. "That is our Pluto," she said, with a certain note of pride in her tone; "three generations of his family belonged to us. Mama can always go away feeling the whole plantation is safe so long as Pluto is in charge. We never do have trouble with the folks at the quarters as Mr. Loring does. He is so hard on them I wonder they don't all run away; it would be hard on Gertrude, though--lose her a lot of money. Did you know Loringwood is actually offered for sale? Isn't it a shame? The only silver lining to the cloud is that then Gertrude will have to move to The Pines--I don't mean to the woods"--as he turned a questioning glance on her. "I mean to Gertrude's plantation joining ours. It is a lovely place; used to belong to the Masterson tracts, and was part of the wedding dowery of that Miss Leo Masterson Uncle Nelse told of--Gertrude's mother, you know. It is not grand or imposing like Loringwood, but I heard the Judge say that place alone was enough to make Gertrude a wealthy woman, and the loveliest thing about it is that it joins our plantation--lovely for Gertrude and Kenneth, I mean. Look here, Doctor Delaven, you roused my curiosity wonderfully with that little remark you made about the beautiful Marquise; tell me true--were they--did Ken, even for a little while, fall in love with her?" She looked so roguishly coaxing, so sure she had stumbled on some fragment of an adventure, and so alluringly confident that Delaven must tell her the rest, that there is no telling how much he might have enlightened her if Miss Loring had not entered the room at that moment through a door nearest the window where they stood. Her face was serene and self possessed as ever. She smiled and addressed some careless remark to them as she passed through, but Delaven had an uncomfortable feeling that she had overheard that question, and Evilena was too frightened to repeat it. _ |
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