SMOKING FLAX

BY

Hallie Erminie Rives

SECOND EDITION

F. TENNYSON NEELY

PUBLISHER

LONDON    NEW YORK

“Smoking Flax” is a story of the South written by a young Kentucky woman. Undoubtedly in the South its advent will be saluted with enthusiastic bravos. What will be the nature of its reception in the North it is hazardous to predict. One thing, however, can be confidently prophesied for it everywhere—consideration. This the subject and manner of its treatment assures.

The methods of Judge Lynch viewed from most standpoints are, without extenuation, evil; from a few aspects they may appear to be perhaps not wholly without [Pg 6]justification. Miss Rives, through the medium of romance, presents the question as seen from many sides, and then leaves to the reader the responsibility of determining “what is truth,” though where her own sympathies lie she does not leave much in doubt.

The authoress comes of an old Virginia stock to whom the gift of narrative and literary expression seem to be a birthright. Since revolutionary days literature has been more or less enriched by contributions from successive members of the family—the well known contemporary novelist and the youthful author of this book sharing at the present time the responsibility of upholding the hereditary traditions. It seems, therefore, happily [Pg 7]appropriate that Miss Rives should have taken upon herself the task of placing before the world southern views of the problem of lynching, which, be it understood, are far from unanimous. The subject is handled with admirable tact, the author steering clear alike from prudish affectations of modesty and shocking details of inartistic realism: and throughout is maintained a judicial impartiality infrequent in the treatment of such burning questions.

Miss Rives will achieve distinction in the South and at least notability elsewhere.

H. F. G.

Rochester, N. Y.

September 22nd, 97.

The house faced the college campus and was the only one in the block. This, in Georgetown, implies a lawn of no small dimensions; the place had neither gardener’s house nor porter’s lodge—nothing but that old home half hidden by ancient elms. For many a year it had stood with closed doors in the very heart of that prosperous Kentucky town, presenting a gloomy aspect and exercising for many a singular attraction. Near the deep veranda a great tree, whose boughs were no longer held in check by trimming, had thrust one of its branches through the frontmost window. Dampness had attacked [Pg 10]everything. The upper balcony was loosened, the roof warped, and lizards sunned themselves on the wall.

As for the garden, long ago it had lapsed into a chaotic state. The thistle and the pale poppy grew in fragrant tangle with the wild ivy and Virginia creeper, and wilful weeds thrust their way across the gravel walks.

Sadly old residents saw the place approaching the last stages of decay—saw this house, once the pride of the town, in its decrepitude and loneliness the plaything of the elements.

“A noble wreck! It must have a history of some kind,” strangers would remark.

“Ah, that it has, and a sombre one it is!” any man or woman living near would [Pg 11]have answered, as they recalled the history of Richard Harding’s home. For the fate of Richard Harding was a sad memory to them. They remembered how he had been the representative of a fine old family and that much of his fortune had been spent in beautifying this place, to make it a fitting home for Catharine Field, his bride.

She too had been of gentle birth and held an important place in their memory as one who brought with her to this rural community the wider experience usual to a young woman educated in Boston, who, after a few seasons of social success in an ultra fashionable set, has crowned her many achievements by a brilliant marriage.

[Pg 12]

Her husband adored her and showed his devotion by humoring her extravagant tastes and prodigal fancies. He detested gayeties, yet complied with her slightest wish for social pleasures.

Although it was generally agreed that this young couple got on well together, at the end of two years the husband had to admit to himself that his efforts to render his wife happy had not been entirely successful. He saw that she fretted for her northern life, was bored by everything about her. She cherished a bitter resentment for the slaveholders, vowing that it was barbarous and inhuman to own human beings as her husband and neighbors did. Though expressing pity for the poor, simple, dependent creatures, she did little[Pg 13] to make their tasks more healthful and reasonable ones, or to render them more capable and contented.

Her baby’s nurse was the one servant of her household who met with gracious treatment at her hands. This old slave came to her endowed with the womanly virtues of honor, self-respect and humility. But in marveling at her on these accounts, Mrs. Harding forgot that it was the former mistress—her husband’s mother—that had made her what she was.

At length the truth became clearly apparent that she was an obstinate, intensely prejudiced and very unreasonable woman, who, having lived for a time at a centre of fashionable intelligence in a city of culture, supposed herself to be quite [Pg 14]beyond the reach of and entirely superior to ordinary country folk. Eventually, her morbid dissatisfaction became so extreme that her husband yielded to her importunities, closed the house, and with her and their baby boy, went to live in Boston.

This sacrifice he made quietly and uncomplainingly, his closest friends not then knowing how it wrenched his heart. A year passed, then another, and at the end of the third, the papers announced the death of Richard Harding.

Though never again seeing his southern home, where he had planned to live his life in peace and useful happiness, it had held to the end a most sacred place in his memory—a memory which he truly hoped [Pg 15]would be transmittted to the heart and mind of his son. It was his last wish that the old homestead should remain as it was—closed to strangers—that no living being, unless of his own blood, should inhabit that abode of love and sorrow, that it be kept from the careless profanation of aliens.

The world prophesied that his widow would soon forget the wishes of the dead, but as witness that she had thus far kept faith, there stood the closed, abandoned home, upon which Nature alone laid a destroying hand.

In process of time, hardly a brick was to be seen in this old house that had not grown purple with age and become cloaked with moss and ivy. Antiquity looked out from covering to foundation stone. Only the flowers were young, and flowers spring from a remote ancestry. This house, inlaid in solitude, was as quiet as some cloister hidden away within some French forest.

One summer afternoon, the quiet was broken by a group of college girls looking for some new flower for their botanical collection. But so full of youthful spirits were they that they hardly saw [Pg 17]the valley lilies with stems so short that they could scarcely bear up their innocent, sweet eyes, distressed, and stare like children in a crowd.

Among these girls was one whom the most casual observer would have singled out from her companions for a beauty rare even in that land of beautiful women. She had wandered off alone and found a sleepy little primrose. As she freed the blossom from its stem and held it in her hand, a tide of thought surged up from her memory and deepened the color of her face. Quietly she dropped down upon the grass and began turning the leaves of her floral diary until she came to a similar flower pressed between its pages.

In a corner was written: “Gathered in the mountains on the 18th of August.”

[Pg 18]

“How strange,” she thought, “to note how late it was found there, while it blooms so early here.”

Commonplace as that discovery seemed to be, the face so radiant a moment before, became thoughtfully drawn.

She looked at the name “E. Harding” written below the dry, dead blossom, and thought of the time when it had been written, thence back to her first meeting with its owner—one of those happy chances of travel, which have all the charm of the unexpected—as fresh in her memory as though it had been but yesterday. That summer had been one of those idyllic periods which are lived so unconsciously that their beauty is only realized in memories. To become conscious of such [Pg 19]charm at the time would be to break the spell which lies in the very ignorance of its existence.

She, this ardent novice in learning, fresh from graduating honors, and full of unmanageable, new emotions did not comprehend that the same youthful impetuosity which had made the two fast friends in so brief a time, had also made it possible for a few heedless words even more quickly to separate them. An older or more experienced woman would have missed the sudden bloom and escaped the no less sudden storm.

“Primroses are his favorite flowers,” she said half aloud, and a dainty little smile lifted ever so slightly the corners of her mouth as if there were pleasure in [Pg 20]the thought. Then she took up her pencil and studiously began to jot down the botanical notes concerning the primrose. “Primrose, a biennial herb, from three to six inches tall. The flower is regular, symmetrical and four parted.”

A twig snapped. The girl looked up quickly. “Welcome to my flowers,” said a voice beside her, and a young man smiled frankly, as he bowed and raised his white straw hat.

“Mr. Harding!” she exclaimed, opening her eyes in wonder and staring at him with the prettiest face of astonishment. Alarm had brought color to her cheeks, while the level rays of the sun, which forced her to screen her eyes with one hand, clothed her figure in a broad belt [Pg 21]of gold. “How did you happen to be here?”

“I did not happen. Man comes not to his place by accident.”

His answer, though given with a laugh, had a touch of truth.

Through the bright excitement of her eyes, a sudden gleam of archness flashed.

“Have you come to write us up, or rather down?” she asked.

“I have come to help those who won’t help themselves, but first let us make peace, if such a thing be necessary between us. Here is my offering,” and smilingly he laid two fresh white roses in her hand.

She answered his smile with one of her own as she thrust the long generous stems through her waist belt; but she did not thank him with words, and he was glad [Pg 22]that she did not. Just as he would have spoken again, a number of girlish voices called in chorus:

“Come, Dorothy, we are going now.”

In the same year that Elliott Harding was graduated from Princeton, he came into possession of his estate, which he at once began to share with his mother. Her love of good living and luxury, her craving for such elegancies as sumptuous furniture, expensive bric-à-brac, and stylish equipages had well nigh exhausted her means, and she was now almost entirely dependent upon a half-interest in the small estate in Kentucky. Considering that Elliott had a leaning towards the learned professions and political and social pursuits, added to a constitutional abhorrence of a business career, his financial[Pg 24] condition was not altogether uncomfortable. He longed to own a superb library, a collection of books, great both in number and quality, and, furthermore, he wanted to complete his education by travel abroad, followed by a year or two of serious research in the South. He realized how ill these aspirations mated with the pleasure loving habits of his mother and how impossible it would be for him to realize his dreams, so long as his purse remained the joint source of supply.

To many a young man the outlook would have been deeply discouraging. To him it was a means of developing the endurance and the strength of will which were among his distinguishing characteristics.

Nature had fashioned Elliott Harding [Pg 25]when in one of her kindly moods. She had endowed him with many gifts; good birth, sound health of body and mind, industry, resolution and ambition. Besides possessing these goodly qualifications, he stood six feet in height, and in breadth of shoulder, depth of chest, sturdiness of legs and arms, he had few superiors. There was, too, a nobility of proportion in his forehead that indicated high breeding and broad intellectuality, and his face was full of force and refinement. His steel blue eyes gleamed with a superb self-confidence.

By profession, Elliott Harding was a lawyer; by instinct, a writer. He practiced law for gain. He wrote because it was his ruling passion. He was a man who had been early taught to have faith in his [Pg 26]own destiny and to consider himself an agent called by God to do a great work. When he came to his southern home he came with a purpose—a purpose which he determined to carry out quietly but with mighty earnestness. When he first arrived in the town he was content to rest unheralded, and his presence was not understood by the villagers. Nearly every morning now, he could be seen from the opposite window of the college to enter the old abandoned house and sit for hours near the door, his head bowed, his fingers busy with note-book and pencil.

For some weeks this proceeding had continued with little variation. People noted it with diverse conjectures. Old men and women feared lest this man, whoever he [Pg 27]might be,—a real estate agent perhaps—would bring about the restoration and sale of the old Harding home. These old-time friends, who had known and loved the father, Richard Harding, through youth and manhood, now rebelled against the possible disregard of his last request, which had become a heritage of the locality. With anxiety they watched the maneuvers of this mysterious individual and drearily wondered what would result from his stay.

To young Harding the anxiety he had caused was unknown. Absorbed in his own affairs, he was too much occupied to think of the impression he was creating. His whole thought was given to gleaning the knowledge he required for the writing of [Pg 28]the book by which he hoped to permanently mould southern opinion in conformity with his own against what he believed to be the shame of his native land.

It was an evening in the third month of his residence in Georgetown. Elliott Harding paused in his walk along the street not quite decided which way to go.

“She writes me she has drawn a ten-day draft for twenty-two hundred dollars,” he said to himself. “How on earth can I meet it? What shall I do about it? Let me think it out.” And checking his steps, which had begun to tend towards the college, where a reception to which he had been invited was being held, he took a turn or two in the already darkening street, and then started back to his [Pg 29]rooms. In his mind, step by step, he traced out the possible consequences of action in the matter, but long consideration only confirmed his first impression that it was too late now to change the course of affairs so long existing.

“But how am I to meet this last demand?” he questioned. “There is but one way open to me,” he finally thought. “The old home must go.”

He nervously walked on, repeating to himself, “Mother! mother! I could never do this for anyone but you.”

With the memory of his beloved father so strong within him, it was difficult to bring himself to face the inevitable with composure. The turbulent working of his heart contended against the resignation of [Pg 30]his brain, and, when for a moment he felt resigned, then the memory of his dead father’s wish would rise up and protest, and the battle would have to be fought over again.

But what he considered to be duty to the living triumphed over what he held as loyalty to the dead, so the next time he went to the old homestead, “For Sale” glared coldly and, he even imagined, reproachfully at him. It was then that Elliott realized the immensity of his sacrifice and bowed his head in silent sorrow.

After that one time, Elliott Harding determined to face the inevitable and passed into the house without seeming to see the placard.

One day while sitting in his accustomed writing place, which was the parlor, now furnished with a table and office chair, a man walked up the front steps. Elliott had just finished writing the words “The glimpses of light I have gained make the darkness more apparent,” when the man entered the doorway.

The stranger was a tall, lean individual with iron gray beard curving out from under the chin. Eyes dark, keen and deep set; [Pg 32]cheekbones as high as an Indian’s; hair iron gray and thick around the base of the skull, but thin and tangled over the top of the head, formed a combination striking and not unattractive. Though apparently far past his prime, he appeared to be as hearty and hale as if half the years of his life were yet to come. After gazing a moment at Elliott, he opened the conversation by saying:

“Good morning! I suppose you are the agent for this property?”

“I am, sir,” answered Elliott, courteously. “Come in and have a seat,” offering him his chair as he stood up and leaned against the writing table.

“I have come to make a bid for this place. I would like to buy it, if it is to be [Pg 33]had at a reasonable figure. It is not for the land value alone that I want it,” he went on, “it is the old home of my only sister. Besides, for another and more sacred reason, I never want it to pass out of the family.”

“Your sister’s old home,” said Elliott, without appearing to have heard the offer, “then you are Mr. Field—Philip Field?”

“That is my name—and yours?”

“Elliott Field Harding.”

“My nephew?” questioned the elder.

“Your nephew, I suppose,” assented Elliott.

“And you did not know you had an uncle here?” the old man asked quickly.

“Well, I knew you were living somewhere in the South, but was not certain of the exact locality.”

[Pg 34]

At this, the face of the visitor softened, a strange glow leaping to life in his quiet eyes.

“Your mother discarded me years ago for marrying a Southern girl not—not exactly up to her ideal, and I thought you might not have known she had a cast-off brother, whom she thought had shamed his blood and name,” was the low spoken comment.

Then, half-unconsciously he stammered, “Catharine—your mother, is she well?”

“Quite well, I thank you,” said Elliott.

“Will she come here to—to see you?”

“Not likely, no; I don’t think she will ever come South again,” was the contemplative reply.

“Then she has not changed; she still [Pg 35]hates us here!” commented the other half sadly.

“Well ‘hate’ is perhaps too strong a word; but I think that her inflexible disapproval of the social conditions here will never alter. You know her character. Her ideas are not easily changed and she thinks little outside of Boston and Boston ideals worthy of much consideration.”

“Poor, dear sister! I had hoped that maternity and her early widowhood would awake in her a sense of the vast duties and responsibilities attached to her position as a southern woman. How I have longed to hear that she had learned the blessed lesson.”

To these words Elliott listened intently, his breath coming quick with rebellious mortification.

[Pg 36]

“If she had learned that lesson I might not now have to sacrifice the old home,” said Elliott, somewhat impetuously.

“Sacrifice!” repeated the other, “and did you care to hold it?”

“It was the dearest wish of my life to do so,” was the reply.

Mr. Field gazed at the young man with a look of admiration.

“Elliott, my nephew,” he fervently said, holding out his hand as he spoke, “if it will please you to call me friend as well as uncle, I shall refuse neither the name nor the duties.”

“Uncle Philip, I thank you and accept your kindly offer,” and Elliott’s face brightened. The furrow which care had been ploughing between his brows the past [Pg 37]few days, smoothed itself out. Then in a burst of confidence, he continued:

“It has long been my ambition to do something with this place, worthy of the memory of my father; but my mother is a little extravagant, I am afraid, and I have not as yet been able to carry out my wish. She lately drew upon me for twenty-two hundred dollars and it came at a time when my only recourse was either to sell the place or dishonor her paper.”

“Elliott, it is very pleasing to me that you should speak thus frankly with me. Let me help you. I will gladly lend you the money so that you may not be forced to sell. I am well-to-do and can afford to help you.”

Elliott listened in pleased surprise. He [Pg 38]felt touched beyond expression, but emotion irresistibly impelled him to seize his uncle’s hand, to bend low and press his lips upon it. This unexpected offer again buoyed up the hope of his intense desire to keep the homestead. For a time he stared steadily at this friend, his whole soul reflected upon his face.

Mr. Field eyed his nephew closely during this silence and noted the evidence of strength in the serious young face, and the unmistakable air of a thinker it bore, and rightly judged that here was one who had given over play for work.

“The memory of your kind offer will live with me forever,” said Elliott, his voice full of deep feeling, breaking the silence. “But I cannot accept your generosity.[Pg 39] I have no assurance that my labors will be attended with success, and I have a horror of starting out in debt.”

“Very well, my boy,” kindly spoke the other, “that spirit will win. I will buy the place, and it will still be in the family.”

“Thank you, uncle! You don’t know how grateful I am for that.”

“And I am doubly pleased to be the owner since meeting you,” interrupted the elder. “This old heart of mine beats warmly for your father. He was a good man and I want to see the boy who bears his name winning a way up to the level of life which was once Richard’s. Yes, I want to see you foremost amongst just and honored men.”

[Pg 40]

“Uncle Philip,” heartily spoke Elliott, “for the sake of my father’s memory, I hope to fulfill that hope.”

“Ah, yes, yes, you will, my boy!” The old man arose to go and as he and Elliott clasped hands in a hearty good-bye, he added: “I shall be glad to see you at my home, which is two miles south of here, or at the Agricultural Bank of which I am president. I am a widower, have no children, and your presence in my home would fill a void,” and as though not wishing to trust himself further along the mournful trend of thought, he hastily withdrew.

As Elliott watched his uncle walking down the gravelled path, his offer of friendship took a tempting form. A week before,[Pg 41] he would have scornfully repelled any such advances.

“Only to think of it!” Elliott soliloquized, “an offer of sympathy and help from this man for whom my mother, his sister, has not one gleam of sympathy, or even comprehension! It is strange that he should be the first to come in when all the world seems gone out.”

Thus, without further heralding and no outward commercial negotiation, the old Harding homestead passed quietly into Mr. Field’s possession, and this matter once settled, Elliott began in earnest the practice of his profession. Accordingly, his law card at once appeared in the local papers and his “shingle” was hung out beside another, bearing the name “John [Pg 42]Holmes, Attorney at Law,” at the door of a building containing numerous small offices.

Elliott knew his literary work was not enough to satisfy his insistent appetite for occupation, and for this reason, besides the necessity of earning something toward his modest expenses, he went into the practice of law.

As Mr. Field felt he had been largely instrumental in his nephew’s settling here, he took an active interest in furthering his success.

“That is Elliott Harding, my nephew,” he would say, with an affectionate familiarity, dashed with pride. “He is a most worthy young man, deserving of your confidence,” a commendation usually agreed [Pg 43]to, with the unspoken thought sometimes, “and a very conceited one.”

Why does the world look with such disapproval on self confidence? When a person is endowed with a vigorous brain, there is no better way for him to face the world than to start out with a full respect for his own talents, and unbounded faith in the possibilities that lie within him.

Elliott Harding’s belief in himself was not small, and the consciousness of his ability led him to work diligently for both honor and profit. He expected labor and did not shrink from it. Very soon he riveted the attention of a few, then of the many, and it was not long before he rose to a position of considerable importance in the community and began to feel financial ground more solid beneath his feet.

It was a glorious morning in August, when summer’s wide-set doors let in a torrent of later bloom.

As early as ten o’clock the Riverside road was thronged with all manner of conveyances, moving toward the country, bound for an out-of-door fête of the character known in that region as a “bran-dance and barbecue.” This country road, prodigally overhung with the foliage of trees in the very heyday of their southern vigor is bounded on one side by goodly acres of farmland, and on the other by the Elkhorn, a historic river.

The neighboring farms were still to-day. [Pg 45]The light wind rustling the silken tassels of the corn was all the sound that would be heard until the morrow, unless, maybe, the neighing of the young horses left behind.

From the topic of stock and farming, called forth by what they saw in passing, Elliott Harding and his uncle, as they rode along, fell to discussing the grim details of a murder and lynching that had but recently taken place just over the boundary, in Tennessee.

“What a tremendous problem is this lynching evil,” said Elliott, looking keenly at his uncle, who shook his head seriously as he answered:

“It is a very grave question that confronts us, and by far the less easier of settlement[Pg 46] because we are placed in the full light of public observation, all our doings heightened by its glare, and the passion of the people aroused. It is not that we will, but that we must lynch in these extreme cases. There seems no other way, and that is a poor enough one.”

“How many persons do you suppose have lost their lives by lynch law in the south during the past ten years?” asked Elliott.

“I should say at least a thousand,” replied Mr. Field.

“Heavens! What a record!” exclaimed Elliott, who became silent, a look of brooding thoughtfulness taking the place of the happy expression that had lighted up his face. His uncle, noticing his preoccupation, endeavored to distract his thoughts [Pg 47]by calling attention to the distant sound of a big bass fiddle and a strong negro voice that called out many times, “balance all, swing yo par-d-ners.”

“I suppose on this festive occasion I shall also hear some political aspirant promising poor humanity unconditional prosperity and deliverance from evil?” asked Elliott, by way of inquiry as to what other diversions might be expected.

“Oh, yes, Holmes and Feland, the candidates for prosecuting attorney, are sure to be on hand,” replied Mr. Field.

A little further on they came upon the crowd gathered in the woods. On the bough-roofed dancing ground the youths were tripping with lissome maids, who, with their filmy skirts a little lifted, [Pg 48]showed shapely ankles at every turn. The lookers-on seemed witched with the rhythmic motion and the sensuous music. Old and young women, as well as men, the well-to-do and the poor, were there. Neat, nice-looking young people, with happy, intelligent faces, kept time to the waltz and the cotillion, which were the order of the day. As the graceful figures animated the arbor, far away in the depths of the wood could be heard echoes of light-hearted talk and happy laughter. The very genius of frolic seemed to preside over the gathering.

Elliott stood near one end of the arbor and drew a long breath of pure delight at this, to him, truly strange and delightful pastoral. The mellow tints of nature’s [Pg 49]verdure, the soft languor of the warm atmosphere, gave a happy turn to his thoughts as he looked upon his first “bran-dance.”

“Come! finish this with me,” cried a sturdy farmer boy.

“Do, dear mamma!” begged the gasping maiden at her side, “I am so tired. Do take a round with him.”

Thus appealed to, the stout, handsome matron threw aside her palm-leaf fan and held out her hands to the boy. Although she had but reached that age when those of the opposite sex are considered just in their prime, she, being old enough to be the mother of the twenty-year-old daughter at her side, was considered too old to be one of the dancers. But at the hearty [Pg 50]invitation she too became one of the tripping throng and entered into the fun with all the sweetness and spontaneity in voice and gesture which made herself and others forget how far her Spring was past. The waltz now became a waltz indeed. The musicians played faster and faster and the girl clapped her hands as the couple whirled round and round, as though nothing on earth could stop them.

“Please let’s stop. I beg you to stop, now!” cried the matron, panting for breath but the enraptured youth paid no heed to her pleadings, but swifter and swifter grew his pace, wilder and wilder his gyrations, till, fortunately for her, he encountered an unexpected post and was brought to a sudden halt. The waltz, too, had come to an end, [Pg 51]and the onlookers clapped their hands in hearty applause. Even the veterans of the community seemed to enjoy the spirit of the sport. Elliott particularly noted the rapt enjoyment of a group of old men silver haired, ruddy skinned, keen eyed, who once seen, remained penciled upon the gazer’s memory—each head a worthy sketch.

These patriarchs were bent with toil as well as age, their hands were roughened by labor, the Sunday broadcloth became them less than the week-day short coat, yet each figure had a dignity of its own. In one aged man, with snow-white hair, Roman nose and tawny, beardless face, the staunch Southerner of old lived again. Here was that calm and resolution betokening[Pg 52] the indomitable spirit, the unswerving faith that led men to brave fire and sword, ruin and desolation, rather than surrender principle.

In strong relief were these sombre figures of the group set forth by the light, airy frocks and the young faces and graceful forms of the pretty girls, with beflowered hats coquettishly perched above their heads, or swinging from their hands. One could step easily from the verge of the white holiday keeper to the confines of the pleasure loving black. But it was a great distance—like the crossing of a vast continent—between the habitats of alien races.

On the outskirts of the crowd, here and there, under the friendly shade of some [Pg 53]wide spreading tree, could be seen a darkey busily engaged in vending watermelons and cool drinks. Coatless and hatless, with shirt wide open at neck and chest, and sleeves rolled elbow high, he transferred the luscious fruit from his wagon to the eager throng about him; while he passed compliments without stint upon the unbleached domestics who came to “trade” with him, not forgetting to occasionally lift his voice and proclaim the superior quality of his stock, verifying his assurances by taking capacious mouthfuls from the severed melon lying on the top of the load.

Without ceremony, the darkeys, male and female, swarmed about the vender, some seating themselves in picturesque [Pg 54]ease upon the ground in pairs and groups. There were mulattos and octoroons of light and darker shades, to the type of glossy blackness, discussing last week’s church “festival,” to-morrow’s funeral, the Methodists’ protracted meeting which begins one Christmas and lasts till the next.

In astonishing quantities did the “culled folks” stow away “red meat” and “white meat,” and with juice trickling from the corners of their mouths down over their best raiment, gave ready ear to the vender’s broad jokes and joined in his loud laughter, showing, as only negroes can, their ready appreciation of the feast and holiday. Their hilarity kept up an undiminished flow until the participants were called to serve the midday meal for the “white folks.”

[Pg 55]

Hundreds partook of the delicious pig which had been roasted whole, that meat of which the poet wrote, “Send me, gods, a whole hog barbecued.”

Animals spitted on pointed sticks sputtered and fizzled over a hole in the ground filled with live coals. Mindful attendants shifted the appetizing viands from side to side, seasoning them with salt, pepper, vinegar or lemon as the case might require, and when set forth, offered a feast as close to primitive nature as the trees under which it was served.

Very soon after the feast was ended, Elliott saw John Holmes and a party of men coming toward him.

To a casual reader of the human countenance, it would be evident at a first glance that Holmes was a man of no small worldly knowledge, and as he now appeared with his companions one could discern that this superiority was recognized by them and that he held a certain position of authority, in fact that he was a man accustomed to rule rather than be ruled.

As he approached Elliott, he addressed him with a pleased smile, saying: “I am [Pg 57]glad to see you here, Mr. Harding. Maybe you can help us out of a difficulty.”

“In what way?” asked Elliott, surprised.

“My political opponent was to have been here and we were to briefly address the people this afternoon, but, so far, he has failed to put in an appearance. The toiling folk have come here to-day, even laying aside important work in some instances, to hear a ‘speaking,’ and unless they hear some sort of an address (they are not particular about the subject) it will be hard to bring them together again when we need them more.

“I, as a representative of the committee, request you to lend us a helping hand. It is generally desired that you be the orator upon this occasion.”

[Pg 58]

“What! address this gathering offhand and wholly unprepared? It would blight my prospects forever with them,” laughed Elliott.

“On the other hand, it would give you an opportunity for a wider acquaintance and perhaps elect you to the first office to which you may yet aspire. Come! I will take no excuse,” persisted Holmes, while his companions seconded his insistence.

After considerable pressing, Elliott was escorted to the platform, from which the musicians had moved. Without delay Holmes stepped to the front and in a loud, clear voice which hushed the crowd, said:

“Ladies and gentlemen, I have the honor of introducing Mr. Elliott Harding, who [Pg 59]will speak in place of Mr. Feland, that gentleman, for some reason or other, having failed to put in an appearance.”

Amid a storm of cheers, Elliott arose, straightening his eloquent shoulders as he came forward. His blonde face was full of eager life when he began.

“Ladies and gentlemen: The unexpected compliment paid me by your committee has given me the pleasure of addressing you to-day. I accept the invitation the more gladly inasmuch as it gives me the opportunity of telling you that my heart, linked to the South by birth, has retained its old love in spite of absence and distance, and brings me back to my own place with a fonder and, if possible, a greater and nobler pride in this Southland[Pg 60] of yours and mine. And, it is a land to be proud of. More magnificent a country God has never made. It has seen the fierce harrowing of war. Gazing through the past years my fancy sees the ruin that has confronted the home-coming soldier—ashes instead of homes, burnt stubble instead of fences, the slaves on whose labor he had long depended for the cultivation of his fertile fields, with their bonds cast off, meeting him as freemen. Without money, provisions or even the ordinary implements of husbandry, he at once began the toilsome task of repairing his fallen fortunes. Having converted his sword into a plowshare, his spear into a pruning hook, he lost no time, but manfully set to work to restore his lost estate, and bring a measure[Pg 61] of comfort to the dear ones deprived of their former luxuries.

“So it is to the soldier of the ‘Lost Cause’ that all honor and praise must be given for the present prosperity of the land. And it becomes us as heirs of his sacrifice and of the fruits of his toil, to lend our every effort to the full garnering of the harvest.

“As the giant West has sprung up from the sap of the East, so must the South rise up by strength drawn from the soil of the North. What the South needs to-day more than any other one thing is an influx of intelligent laborers from the North. It needs its sturdy folk of industrious habit, economy and indomitable energy; it needs a more profitable system of agriculture. [Pg 62]Accustomed as that people is to economy, to frugality and to forcing existence out of an unwilling soil, if only they could be induced to come here in sufficient numbers, the country would soon blossom into mellow prosperity. And, my friends, I want to see them coming—coming with their capital to aid us in developing the inexhaustible mineral resources of our mines, the timber of our forests, to build our mills and rear our infant manufactures to the full stature of lusty manhood. Our future with all its limitless possibilities—this future which is to warm the great breast of the business world toward us, this future which shall shower upon us the fullness of earth—is all with you.

“Therefore, with such a vista of promise [Pg 63]opening before our gaze, ill would it become us to fail in our duty toward ourselves, toward our country and toward Him who giveth all. Thus it befits us to lend every effort to the furtherance of this, our future salvation. To those upon whose coming so much depends, every inducement must be offered. And be it remembered that capital seeks its home in sections wherein life and prosperity enjoy the greatest security under the law. This is a conclusion founded on the great law of caution, upon which intelligent capital is planted and reared. It becomes necessary, then, to ask ourselves seriously, ‘Are we making every effort to solidify peace and order by the protection of life and the supreme establishment of law?’

[Pg 64]

“I need not answer this question. Circumstances have done so for me. The electric wire is still hot from flashing to the furtherest corner of our Nation, in all its revolting details, news of the recent awful crime in our sister state.

“I am well aware that in touching upon this point I am wounding the sensibilities of a people who have been shadowed by personal injury and embittered by a natural race prejudice; but I feel that I can speak the more boldly because I touch the matter not as an alien whose sympathies are foreign and whose theories are theoretical chimeras, but as a southerner—one whose interest is the stronger because he is a southerner. My audience may refuse to grant the justice of my [Pg 65]argument, but it must admit the truth of the situation I outline. Whichever way we turn the tremendous problem of the lynching evil stares us in the face. It baits us, it defies us, it shames us.

“Think of it! More than one thousand human lives forfeited to Judge Lynch form the South’s record for the past ten years. What a horrible record! It seems almost incredible that such lawlessness can exist in communities supposed to be civilized. Would to God it were but an evil dream and that I could to-day assure the world that this terrible condition is but the unfounded imagining of a nightmared mind.

“Lynching is a peculiarly revolting form of murder, and to tolerate it is to [Pg 66]pave the way for anarchy and barbarism. It cannot be truthfully denied that one of the most potent factors militating against the progress of this country is this frequent resort to illegal execution, and before we can realize the full benefits of your natural inheritance, your laws—our laws—must be impartially enforced, property must be protected, and life sacredly guarded by rigid legal enforcement, backed by an elevated public conception of duty.

“It is no greater crime for one man to seize a brother man and take his life than it is for a lawless multitude to do the same act. The first, if there be any difference, is less criminal than the latter for it, at least often has the merit of individual [Pg 67]courage and the plea for revenge on the ground of personal injury. But when a man is deprived of his liberty by incarceration in the jail and thus shorn of his power of self protection, it is the acme of dishonor and cowardice to wrest him from the grasp of the law and deprive him of his life upon evidence that possibly might not convict him before a jury.

“I do not wish to be understood as saying that brave and good men do not sometimes, under strong excitement, participate in this outrage against human rights and organized society, for it is a fact that such rebellions are not infrequently led by the most prominent citizens, and, from this very fact, it is the more to be deplored.

[Pg 68]

“My friends, have you never thought to what this practice may lead? Has the frequency of mob violence no alarming indications for you? Directed, as it more often is, against our negro population, instead of making better citizens of the depraved and deterring them from crime, it has a tendency to cultivate a race prejudice and stir up the worst of human passions. It is inculcating a disregard of law because it ignores that greatest principle of freedom—that every man is to be considered innocent until proven to be guilty by competent testimony.

“Judge Lynch is the enemy of law and strikes at the very foundation of order and civil government. His rule is causing large classes to feel that the law of the [Pg 69]land affords them no protection. The courts furnish an adequate remedy for every wrong. One legal death on the scaffold has a more salutary effect than a score of mob executions. The former teaches a proper dread of offended law, leaves no unhealing wounds in the hearts of the living, stirs up no revengeful impulses, creates no feuds and causes no retaliatory murders. What a field of home mission stretches before us! We owe it to the South to remove this blot on our good name. Let us hasten the day when Judge Lynch shall be spoken of with a shudder, as a hideous memory.

“This pitiful people, our former slaves, if instructed by intelligent ministers and teachers, might be delivered from the [Pg 70]cramped mind, freed from the brutalized spirit which causes these crimes among us. They are naturally a religious people and this principle, which seems to be strong within them, under the guidance of an earnest enlightened ministry, might prove to be the key to the race problem find open up a social and political reformation, unequalled in modern times.

“Already the negro race is doing much for its own advancement and good. To-day there are thirty-five thousand negro teachers in the elementary schools of the South. Six hundred ministers of the gospel have been educated in their own theological halls. They own and edit more than two hundred newspapers. They have equipped and maintain more than three [Pg 71]hundred lawyers and four hundred doctors and have accumulated property which is estimated at more than two hundred and fifty millions. I note this fact with pleasure. It makes them better citizens by holding a stake in their community. Let us show our appreciation of what they have already done by helping them to do more.”

The strange faces, the new scene, the suddenness of the call had shaken Elliott’s self-possession, and he breathed a sigh of relief as he finished his speech.

The mayor and municipal council crowded around him with outstretched hands, foremost amongst them, an old man with Roman features.

“I was interested in your speech, young man,” said he, “but wait until this thing strikes home before you condemn our code.”

“You’re right, Mr. Carr, you’re right!” cried several voices in chorus.

The old gentleman talked on during the [Pg 73]intervals of greetings and ended by inviting young Harding to his home, where a lawn party was to be held that night.

As the volume of general applause lessened, the cry of “Holmes! Holmes!” was kept up with an insistence which might have induced a less capable man to respond. Nor would the enthused throng be quieted until John Holmes mounted the platform.

“It had not been my purpose, ladies and gentlemen,” said he, “to address you to-day upon the subject touched upon by Mr. Harding, but, since he has modestly lectured us on our barbarity, I must say a word in defense of the South and southerners. He intimates that the curse of slavery still rests upon the southern states. I wonder[Pg 74] if Mr. Harding knows whether or not the curse of slave-trade, which to be accurate is called ‘the sum of all villainies,’ really rests upon Great Britain, who was the originator of the inhuman system and not upon us southerners?

“The most careful statistics show that in the beginning over 19,000,000 Africans were imported into the British West Indies and so severely were they dealt with that when emancipation came, only a little over 600,000 were left to benefit by it. The slave trade was fastened on the American colonies by the greed of English kings, who, over and over again, vetoed the restrictive legislation of the Colonial Assemblies on the ground that it interfered with the just profits of their sea-faring subjects. Is there no work for Nemesis here?

[Pg 75]

“That the system of slavery, as it existed in the southern states, was accompanied by many cases of hardship and cruelty, we freely admit; that its abolition is a proper ground for sincere rejoicing, we do not hesitate to affirm. But, it is nevertheless true, that, looked at in a large way, slavery was a lifting force to the negro race during the whole period of its existence here. The proof lies just here—when the war of emancipation came, the 4,000,000 negroes in the southern states stood on a higher level of civilization than did any other equal number of people of the same race anywhere on the globe.

“As to the mental and moral advancement of the negro, we have not done enough to [Pg 76]render us boastful or self-satisfied, but enough to dull the shafts of the mistaken or malicious who would convict us of heathenish indifference to his elevation. We have from childhood had a lively appreciation of the debt we owe to the race. Nobody owes them as much as we do; nobody knows them as well; nobody’s future is so involved in their destiny as our own. Is it not natural that we should help them in their pathetic struggle against poverty, ignorance and degradation?

“Mr. Harding, in speaking of their progress, intimates that these results have been reached by their own unaided efforts. The fact is that the elementary schools of which he speaks are sustained almost entirely[Pg 77] by the southern white people, who, in the midst of their own grinding poverty, have taxed themselves to the extent of $50,000,000 to educate the children of their former slaves. The colored churches of to-day are the legitimate fruit of the faithful work done amongst the slaves before the war by white missionaries.

“Two hundred and fifty millions is a vast sum. Could a race gather and hold so much in a commonwealth where its rights are being trampled upon with impunity? The question answers itself. There is, in truth, no place on earth where the common negro laborer has so good an opportunity as between the Potomac and Rio Grande. Here he is admitted to all the trades, toils side by side with white [Pg 78]workmen, and is protected in person and property so long as he justifies protection.

“As to the statement that one thousand have been lynched in the past ten years, doubtless Mr. Harding accepts without further examination the crooked figures of partisan newspapers. But, granting this horrible record to be true, it must be acknowledged that the man does something to call forth such treatment. Along with the telling of our alleged bloodthirstiness, there should be related the frequency and atrocity of his outrages against our homes. The south willingly appeals to the judgment of civilized mankind as to the truth of her declaration that the objects of enlightened government are as well secured here as on any portion of the globe.

[Pg 79]

“That Mr. Harding and his sympathizers are actuated by excellent motives, I do not mean to question.

“We are as mindful as others of the dangerous tendency of resorting to lawlessness, but strangers cannot understand the situation as well as those who are personally familiar with it and have suffered by it. It is much to be regretted, of course, that lynchings occur, but it is far more to be regretted that there are so many occasions for them. When the sanctity of woman is violated, man, if man he be, cannot but choose to avenge it. If the villain did not commit the crime for which this penalty is inflicted, then we would not be inflamed to summary vengeance. The perpetrator of this deed, the most heinous of [Pg 80]all crimes and to which death is often added, need not complain when vengeance is visited upon him in a swift and merciless manner, according with the teaching of his own villainy.

“Unquestionably it would be better if judicial formalities could be duly observed, but the law should make special provisions for summary execution when such grave offenses occur. Then, too, there is something to be said for the peculiar indignation which such cases incite. This anger is the just indignation of a community against a peculiarly vile class of criminal, not against a race, as Mr. Harding and others have grown to believe and to set forth. That it has seemed a race question with the south, has been because for [Pg 81]every negro in the north we have one hundred here.

“Mid the stormy scenes a quarter of a century ago, when the bugle called the sons of the south to war, they went, leaving their wives, mothers, children and homes in the hands of the slaves who, though their personal interests were on the other side, were true to their trust, protected the helpless women and children and earned for them their support by the sweat of their own brow, and with a patience unparalleled left the question of freedom to the arbitrament of war. Their behavior under manifold temptations was always kindly and respectful, and never one raised an arm to molest the helpless. In the drama of all humanity, there is not a [Pg 82]figure more pathetic or touching than the figure of the slave, who followed his master to the battle-field, marched, thirsted and hungered with him, nursed, served and cheered him—that master who was fighting to keep him in slavery. This subject comprises a whole vast field of its own and if the history of it is ever written, it will be written in the literature of the south, for here alone lies the knowledge and the love.

“Who has taught him to regard liberty as a license? Who has sown this seed of animosity in his mind? Until they who have sown the seed of discord shall root up and clear away the tares, the peace and prosperity that might reign in this southern land can be but a hope, a dream. It is [Pg 83]this rooting of the tares, and this more surely than anything else, that will bring nearer the union and perfect good fellowship which is so greatly needed. Sound common sense and sterling Americanism can and will find a way to prosperity and peace.”

The sun had set; off beyond the glistening green woodline, the sky was duskily red. The air was full of that freshness of twilight, which is so different from the dew of morning.

Elliott left the bran-dance by a new road which was plain and characterless until he had passed through an unpretentious gate and was driving along the old elm avenue, a part of the Carr domain, which was undeniably picturesque. Shortly the elm branches came to an end and he entered a park, indifferently cared for, according to modern ideas, but well stocked with timber of magnificent growth and of almost[Pg 85] every known native variety. Perhaps the oaks dominated in number and majesty, but they found worthy rivals in the towering elms.

Neglect is very picturesque in its effect, whether the thing neglected be a ruined castle or an unkept tangle. The unpicturesque things are those in which man’s artificial selection reigns supreme.

Had Elliott’s order-loving mother been with him, she would have observed that this park was ill-maintained, and that she would dearly love to have the thinning out and regulating of its trees. Whereas, to his less orderly fancy, it presented a most agreeable appearance. There was Nature’s charm wholly undisturbed by man, and what perhaps added the finishing[Pg 86] touch to his satisfaction was the exceeding number of maples, in the perfect maturity of their growth. These straight and goodly trees so screened the house that he was very close before it could be seen. Even at the instant and before he had looked upon more than its gray stone frontage almost smothered in Virginia creepers, up to the very top of its rounded gables, Elliott was pleased.

It was a secluded place. Its position was, according to his taste, perfect. It had the blended charm of simple, harmonious form and venerable age. It faced almost southeast, the proper aspect for a country house, as it ensures morning cheerfulness all the year round, and the full advantage of whatever sunshine there [Pg 87]is in winter from dawn practically to sundown and the exquisite effects of the rising of the moon.

Low-growing lilies breathed seductive fragrance, and the softness of the air permitted the gay party assembled to indulge in what would have been indiscretion in a more northerly climate. Young girls discarded their straw hats and danced upon the smooth, green lawn, while elderly chaperons could retire to the halls and porches if they feared the chill night air.

As Elliott approached the moonlit crowd of figures, Dorothy Carr came out to greet him. A young woman, tall and slight, with a figure lithe and graceful, made more perfect by ardent exercise. A skin which had never been permitted to lose [Pg 88]its infant softness, with lips as pure as perfect health and lofty thoughts could make them. Her blown gold hair was lustrous and soft, and she carried herself with the modesty of the gentlewoman. Her blue eyes were dark, their brows pencilled with delicate precision combining a breadth that was both commanding and sweet.

“I am delighted to see you again, Mr. Harding,” Dorothy Carr said, graciously.

“And I am delighted to be here,” replied Elliott, as he turned with his fair hostess to a rude seat fixed about the bole of an oak.

“It was upon your grounds that we last met,” she added after a slight pause.

“Yes, and I have waited with some impatience[Pg 89] for an invitation here, which came just to-day. You see how quickly I accepted.”

“What a dainty reproof,” she said, laughing. “But I have been away all the summer or you should have been invited here long ago.”

A few such commonplaces passed between them, then Dorothy referred to Elliott’s speech, which she had listened to with interest.

“I was so suddenly called upon that I did little justice to the subject, and it is a subject of such grave responsibility. But perhaps it is just as well that I did not have time to present it more strongly for it appears to have been already misunderstood, and I hear that not a few [Pg 90]have branded me with all sorts of bad names. I trust I have not fallen under your condemnation.”

“Well, to be frank, I think you exhibited a somewhat fanatical anxiety to lecture people differently circumstanced,” she answered gravely. “Yet I did not condemn you. I hope you give me credit for more liberality than that. You are new to our land, and have much to grow accustomed to. We should not expect you at once to see this matter as we do,” was the evasive reply.

“She certainly does not lack the courage of her convictions,” he thought. Then aloud:

“You evidently think I shall alter my views?” this in his airily candid manner; [Pg 91]“I stated the true conditions of affairs, just as I understand them.”

“There is the trouble. The true condition is not as you and many others understand it.”

“Then let us hope that I may fully comprehend before a great while. I at least intend to make the best of this opportunity, for, as you may know, I have settled permanently in Georgetown.”

She looked up with a beautiful aloofness in her eyes. The brave mouth, with its full, sensitive lips, was strong, yet delicate.

“I am glad to hear that, for then you can hardly fail, sooner or later, to feel as we do about the subject of your to-day’s discussion. I hope to help you to think kindly of your new home.”

[Pg 92]

“Nothing could be more comforting than this from you,” he assured her, with that frank manner which suited well the fearless expression of his face. “I am now delightfully quartered with my kinsman, Mr. Field, whose acres join yours, I believe; so we shall be neighbors.”

Then they laughed. “We are really to be neighbors after all our quarrel in the mountains? Well!” she added, hospitably, “a cover will always be laid for you at our table, and you shall have due warning of any entertainment that may take place. It shall be my duty to see that you are thoroughly won over to the South; to her traditions as well as her pleasures.”

“But changing this flippant subject to one of graver importance, just now; there [Pg 93]is one thing absolutely necessary for you Kentuckians to learn before you win me.” His face lighted with a charming smile.

“What is that?” she asked.

“You must first know how to make Manhattan cocktails.”

She answered with a pretty pout, “I—we can make them now; why shouldn’t we? Doesn’t all the good whiskey you get up North come from the bluegrass state?”

Amused at her loyalty, Elliott assented willingly: “That is a fact. And I like your whiskey,—a little of it—I like your state—all of it—its bluegrass, its thoroughbreds, and its women. But, you will pardon me, there is something wanting in its cocktails, perhaps—it’s the cherry!”

“A fault that can be easily remedied, [Pg 94]and—suppose we did succeed, would you belong to us?”

“I’m afraid I would,” he agreed smilingly.

Here the music of the two-step stopped, and Uncle Josh, the old negro fiddler, famous the country over for calling the figures of the dance, straightened himself with dignity, and called loudly:

“Pardners for de las’ waltz ’fore supper!”

Dorothy could not keep the mirth from her lips. Uncle Josh was not measuring time by heartbeats but the cravings of his stomach; his immortal soul was his immortal appetite. However, whatever motive inspired him to fix the supper time, it proved efficacious, and partners [Pg 95]were soon chosen and the dancing began again as vigorously as ever.

Dorothy and Elliott were not slow in joining the other dancers and glided through the dreamy measures which Uncle Josh, despite his longing to eat, drew forth sweetly from his old, worn fiddle. He was the soul of melody and had an eye to widening his range of selections and his inimitable technique appreciating the demands upon his art. When, with an extra flourish, Uncle Josh eventually brought the music to an end, Mr. Carr, with his easy Southern manner, courteously invited every one in to supper. He led the way, accompanied by Elliott Harding and Dorothy.

How pretty the dining-room looked! Its [Pg 96]half-light coming through soft low tones of pink. Big rosy balls of sweet clover, fresh from the home fields, were massed in cream tinted vases, bunched over pictures and trailed down in lovely confusion about the window and straggling over door frames. Upon the long table stood tall candlesticks and candelabras many prismed, with branching vines twisted in and out in quaint fashion, bearing tall candles tipped with pink shades. From the centre of the ceiling to each corner of the room first, then to regular distances, were loosely stretched chains of pink and white clovers. Large bows of ribbon held these lengths in place where they met the chair board. In each corner close to the wall were jars which, [Pg 97]in their pretty pink dresses of crinkled paper held in place by broad ribbon sashes, would scarcely be recognized as the old butter pots of our grandmothers’ days. From these jars grew tufts of rooted clover. Even the old fireplace and broad mantel were decked with these blossoms.

At each side of the table stood two glass bowls filled with branches of clover leaves only; one lot tied with pink ribbon, the other with white. When supper was served these bowls were passed around while Dorothy repeated the pretty tradition of the four-leaf clover. Then commenced the merry hunt for the prize that only two could win. Bright eyes and deft fingers searched their leaves through.

While this went on, in the dining-room [Pg 98]just outside, under the moon and the maples, near the kitchen door, was another scene as joyous, if not so fair. At the head of the musician’s banquetting board sat Uncle Josh, hospitably helping each to the good things Aunt Chloe had heaped before them in accordance with the orders of “her white folks.” She was considered one of the most important members of the Carr household, having been in the service of the family for thirty years, being a blend of nurse, cook and lady’s maid.

As Uncle Josh’s brown, eager hands greedily grasped the mint julep, and held it sparkling between him and the light, with a broad smile on his beaming face, he exultantly exclaimed:

“De Lawd love her soul, Miss Dor’thy, [Pg 99]nebber is ter fergit we all. Talk erbout de stars! She’s ’way ’bove dem.”

While he and his companions drank mint julep in token that his grateful sentiment was recognized as a toast to the fine hostess, the dining-room was ringing with laughter and congratulations over Elliott Harding’s victory, he having found one of the four-leaved trophies.

“Where is its mate?” was the eager question as nimble fingers and sharp eyes searched over the little bunches right and left again, anxious to find this potent charm against evil. The search, however, was vain. Some one asked if its loss meant that Mr. Harding should live unwedded for the rest of his days.

The evening closed with jokes of his bachelorhood.

[Pg 100]

By midnight the dining-room was still, the table cleared, the only sign of what had been was the floor with its scattered leaves.

All tired out with the long hours of gayety, Dorothy had hurried off to bed. There was a little crushed four-leaved clover fastened upon her nightgown as she lay down to her sweet, mysterious, girlish dreams.

Dorothy’s father, Napoleon Carr, was a man well known and greatly respected throughout the south country where he had always lived. His existence had been a laborious one, for he had entered the lists heavily handicapped in the matter of education. Intellectual enjoyment, dimly realized, had never been his; but he struggled that his family might have a fairer chance. Much of his comfortable income of late years had been generously devoted to the education of his daughter.

He had been happily wedded, though long childless. At length, when Dorothy was born it was at the price of her mother’s[Pg 102] life. This was a terrific blow to the husband and father. He was inconsolable with grief. The child was sent to a kinsman for a few months, after which time Mr. Carr felt that he must have her ever with him. To him there was nothing so absorbing as the tender care of Dorothy. He was very prideful of her. He watched her daily growth and then, all at once, while he scarcely realized that the twilight of childhood was passing, the dawn came, and, like the rose vine by his doorway, she burst into bloom.

With what a reverential pride he saw her filling the vacant place, diffusing a fragrance upon all around like the sweet, wet smell of a rose.

He was a splendid horseman and crack [Pg 103]shot, and it had been one of his pleasures to teach her to handle horse and gun. Together they would ride and hunt, and no day’s outing was perfect to him unless Dorothy was by his side.

It was not surprising, therefore, to find her a little boyish in her fondness for sport. However, as she grew to womanhood, she sometimes, from a fancy that it was undignified, would decline to take part in these sports. But when he had started off alone with dogs and gun, the sound of running feet behind him would cause him to turn to find Dorothy with penitent face before him. Then lovingly encircling his neck with arms like stripped willow boughs, the repentant words: “I do want to go. I was only in fun,” [Pg 104]would be a preface to a long day of delight.

In time these little moods set him thinking, and he began to realize that their beautiful days of sporting comradeship were in a measure over. How he wished she might never outgrow this charm of childhood.

Ah! those baby days, not far past! How often of nights the father went to her bedroom, just touching his child to find out if the covering was right and that she slept well. How many, many times had he leaned over her sleeping form in the dim night light, seeming to see a halo around her head as he watched the dimpling smile about her infant mouth, and, recalling the old nurse saying, that when a baby smiles, [Pg 105]angels are whispering to it, took comfort in the thought that maybe it was all true, that the mother was soothing her child to deeper slumber, and so, perhaps, was also beside him. All unconsciously she had slept, never hearing the prayer to God that when the day should come when she would leave him for the man of her heart, death might claim his lone companionship.

How it hurt when the neighbors would says “You have a grown daughter now,” or “Dorothy is a full fledged woman.” It was not until then that Mr. Carr had let his daughter know that it would almost break his heart if she should ever leave him for another. But he made absolutely no restrictions against her meeting young men.

[Pg 106]

Of course this rare creature had sweethearts not a few, for the neighboring boys began to nourish a tender sentiment for her before she was out of short dresses. Her playmates were free of the house; their coming was always welcome to her and encouraged by her father though this past year, when a new visitor had found his way there, the father took particular note of her manner toward this possible suitor. The kind old eyes would follow her with pathetic eagerness, not reproaching or reproving, only always questioning: “Is this to be the man who shall open the new world’s doors for her; who shall give her the first glimpse of that wonderful joy called love?”

Yet so truly unselfish was her nature,—despite[Pg 107] the unlimited indulgences when, visiting in congenial homes where she was petted and admired, full of the intoxication of the social triumphs, she had out of the abundance of her heart exclaimed: “Oh, I am so happy! happy! happy!”—there was sure to follow a time of anxious solicitude, when she asked herself, “But how has it been with him—with dear old father?”

It was so generous of him to spare so much of her society; so good of him to make her orphan way so smooth and fair. She could read in his pictured face something of the loneliness and the disappointments he had borne; something of the heartaches he must have suffered. All this she recalled, the pleasure of it and [Pg 108]the pain of it, the pride and joy of it. What a delight it was to make her visit short, and surprise him by returning home before he expected her.

Time went swiftly. The seasons followed each other without that fierceness in them to which one is accustomed in the North. The very frosts were gentle; slowly and kindly they stripped the green robes from tree and thicket, gave ample warning to the robin, linnet and ruby-throat before taking down the leafy hangings and leaving their shelter open to the chill rains of December. The wet kine and horses turned away from the North and stood in slanting rains with bowed heads.

Christmas passed, and New Year. Pretty soon spring was in the valleys, creeping [Pg 110]first for shelter shyly, in the pause of the blustering wind that was blowing the last remnants of old winter from the land.

There was a general spreading of dry brush over the spaded farm country; then the sweet, clean smell of its burning and a misty veil of thin blue smoke hanging everywhere throughout the clearing. As soon as the fear of frost was gone, all the air was a fount of freshness. The earth smiled its gladness, and the laughing waters prattled of the kindness of the sun. When the dappled softness of the sky gave some earnest of its mood, a brisk south wind arose and the blessed rain came driving cold, yet most refreshing. At its ceasing, coy leaves peeped out, and the bravest blossoms; the dogwoods, full-flowered,[Pg 111] quivered like white butterflies poised to dream. In every wet place the little frogs began to pipe to each other their joy that spring was holding her revel. The heart of the people was not sluggish in its thankfulness to God, for if there were no spring, no seed time, there would be no harvest. Now summer was all back again. Song birds awakening at dawn made the woods merry carolling to mates and younglings in the nests. All nature was in glad, gay earnest. Busy times, corn in blossom rustling in the breeze, blackberries were ripe, morning-glories under foot, the trumpet flower flaring above some naked girdled tree. Open meadows full of sun where the hot bee sucks the clover, the grass tops gather [Pg 112]purple, and ox-eyed daisies thrive in wide unshadowed acres.

“Just a year ago since I came to the South,” mused Elliott Harding, as he walked back and forth in his room, the deep bay window of which overlooked a lawn noticeably neat and having a representative character of its own.

As a rule, South country places in thickly settled regions are pronounced unlovely at a glance, either by reason of the plainness of their architecture or by the too close proximity of other buildings. Here was an exception for the outhouses were numerous but in excellent repair and red-tiled like the house itself. The tiles were silvered here and there with the growth and stains of unremoved lichens.[Pg 113] There was not an eye-sore anywhere about this quiet home of Mr. Field.

Elliott’s intimates had expressed a pity for him. Surely this quiet must dull his nerves so used to spurring, and he find the jog-trot of the days’ monotony an insupportable experience. That Elliott belonged to the world, loved it, none knew better than himself. He had revelled in its delights with the indifferent thought, “Time enough for fireside happiness by-and-by.” His interest in life had been little more than that which a desire for achievement occasions in an energetic mind.

In spite of his past association, his past carelessness, this moment found him going over the most trivial event that had [Pg 114]the slightest connection with Dorothy Carr. He tried to recall every word, every look of hers. Often when he had had a particularly hard day’s work, it rested him to stop and take supper with the Carrs. The sight of their home life fascinated him. He had never known happy family life; he had little conception of what a pure, genial home might be. The simple country customs, the common interests so keenly shared, the home loyalty—all these were new to him, and impressed him forcibly. And how like one of them he had got to feel walking in the front hall often, hanging up his hat, and reading the evening papers if the folks were out, and sometimes when Aunt Chloe told him where Dorothy had gone, he felt [Pg 115]the natural inclination to go in pursuit of her. He remembered once finding her ankle deep in the warm lush garden grasses, pulling weeds out from her flowers, and he had actually got down and helped her. That was a very happy hour; the freshness of the sweet air gave her unconventional garb a genuine loveliness—gave him a sense of manliness and mastery which he had not felt in the old life. How infinitely sweet she looked! Something about her neatness, grace and order typified to him that palladium of man’s honor and woman’s affection—the home. She appealed to the heart and that appeal has no year, no period, no fashion.

Daylight was dying now; he looked longingly towards the gray gables, the [Pg 116]only indication of the Carr homestead. Afar beyond the range of woodland the day’s great stirrup cup was growing fuller. Up from the slow moving river came a breath of cool air, and beyond the landline quivered the green of its willows. Dusk had fallen—the odorous dusk of the Southland. In the distance somewhere sounds of sweet voices of the negroes singing in the summer dark, their music mingling with the warm wind under the stars. The night with its soft shadings held him—he leaned long against the window and listened.

“Whar’s dat bucket? Whar’s dat bucket? Here it is done sun up an’ my cows aint milked yit!”

Aunt Chloe floundered round in a hurry, peering among the butter bowls and pans on the bench, in search of her milk bucket.

“I’se ransacked dis place an’ it kyant be paraded,” she said, placing her hands on her ample hips to pant and wonder. Meanwhile she could hear the impatient lowing of the cows and the hungry bleating of the calves from their separate pens. Presently her thick lips broadened into a knowing smile.

“Laws ter gracious! If Miss Dorothy [Pg 118]aint kyard my las’ ling’rin basket an’ bucket to dem cherry trees. She ’lowed to beat de birds dar. Do she spec me to milk in my han’? I’m gwine down dar an’ git dat.”

Here she broke off with a second laugh, and with a natural affection in the midst of her hilarity, which had its tender touch with it.

“I’se lyin’! I’d do nuthin’ ob de sort. If she’d wanted me ter climb dem trees myself I’d done it even if I’d knowed I’d fall out and bust my ole haid.”

Again Aunt Chloe looked about her for something which would do service for a milkpail. Out in the sun stood the big cedar churn, just where she had placed it the night before that it might catch the [Pg 119]fresh morning air and sunshine. At sight of it she looked relieved.

“Well! dis here doan leak, and aint milk got to go in it arter all?” So shouldering the awkward substitute, she hurried to the “cup pen” with the thought: “Lemme make ’aste an’ git thro’, I’se gwine ter he’p Miss Dorothy put up dem brandy cherries.”

Down in the orchard Dorothy was picking cherries to fill the last bucket whose loss had caused Aunt Chloe’s mind such vexation, and whose substitute—the churn—was now causing her a vast deal more, as the cow refused to recognize any new airs, and so moved away from its vicinity as fast as she set it beside her.

Presently Dorothy heard the sound of a [Pg 120]horse’s tread, at the same time a voice called out:

“Oh, little boy, is this the road to Georgetown?”

Elliott Harding had drawn in rein, and was looking up through the leaves.

“How mean of you!” she stammered, her face flushing. “What made you come this way?”

He only laughed, and did not dare admit that Aunt Chloe had been the traitor, but got down, hitched his horse, and went nearer. Dorothy was very lovely as she stood there in the gently swaying tree, one arm holding to a big limb, while the other one was reaching out for a bunch of cherries. Her white sunbonnet with its long streamers swayed over her shoulders. [Pg 121]Her plenteous hair, inclined to float, had come unplaited at the ends and fell in shimmering gold waves about her blue gingham dress. Nothing more fragrant with innocent beauty had Elliott ever seen, as her lithe, slim arms let loose their hold to climb down. She was excited and trembling as she put out her hands and took both his strong ones that he might help her to the ground.

“I suppose it is tomboyish to climb trees,” she commenced, in a confused sort of way. “But, the birds eat the cherries almost as fast as they ripen, and I wanted to save some nice ones for your cocktails.”

A look of embarrassment had been deepening in Dorothy’s face. Her voice [Pg 122]sounded tearful, and looking at her he saw that her lips quivered and her nostrils dilated, and at once comprehended that the frank confession was prompted by embarrassment rather than gayety. Remembering her diffidence at times with him, he quickly reassured her, feeling brutal for having chaffed her.

“It is all right to climb if you wish,” he said. “I admire your spirit of independence as well as your fearlessness. You are a wholesome-minded girl; you will never be tempted to do anything unbecoming.”

As he stood idly tapping the leaves with his whip, a strange softening came over him against which he strove. He wanted to find some excuse to get on his horse and [Pg 123]ride away without another word. He looked off toward the path along which he had come. At the turn of it was Aunt Chloe’s cabin, half hidden by a jungle of vines and stalks of great sunflowers. Festoons of white and purple morning-glories ran over the windows to the sapling porch around which a trellis of gourd vines swung their long-necked, grotesque fruit. Flaming hollyhocks and other bits of brilliant bloom gave evidence of the warm native taste that distinguished the negro of the old regime. The sun flaring with blinding brilliancy against the white-washed fence made him turn back to the shade where he could see only Dorothy’s blue eyes, with just that mingling of love and pain in them; the sweet mouth a little [Pg 124]tremulous, the color coming and going in the soft cheeks.

“And a cocktail with the cherry will be perfect.” He had almost forgotten to take up the conversation where she had left off. “But your dear labor has brought a questionable reward. You will remember the cherry was the one thing lacking to make me yours?”

“Oh, yes!” her face lightening with a sudden recollection. “Now you do belong to us.”

“If ‘us’ means you, I grant you that I have been fairly and squarely won.”

Dropping his whip, Elliott leaned over and took Dorothy’s face between his hands bringing it close to his own, their hearts and lips together for one delicious moment.

[Pg 125]

“Dorothy, we belong to each other,” he said, gazing straight into her eyes.

She had been beautiful to him always, but loveliest now with the look of love thrilling her as he felt her tapering wrists close around his neck.

“It seems as though I have loved you all my life, Elliott.”

“Oh, if in loving me, the sweetness of you, the youth, the happiness should be wasted! Shall I always make you happy, I often ask myself. I want to know this, Dorothy, for I hope to make you my wife.”

At the word “wife,” delicate vibrations glided through her, deepening into pulsations that were all a wonder and a wild delight, throbbing with the vigor of love [Pg 126]and youth that drenched her soul with a rapturous sense.

“Oh, Elliott! Elliott! You are mine. All mine.”

Happy weeks! Happy moons! uncounted days of uncounted joys! For Elliott and Dorothy the summer passed away in blissful Arcadian fashion. She was to him that most precious and sustaining of all good influences—a woman gently wise and kindly sympathetic, an influence such as weans men by the beauty of purity from committing grosser sins and elevates them above low tastes and its objects by the exquisite ineffable loftiness of soul, which is the noblest attribute of pure womanhood.

There was a bond between these two, real eternal, independent of themselves, made not by man, but God.

[Pg 128]

With the hope of sparing her father sorrow over the fact that another shared her affection, Dorothy did not at first tell him of her engagement, and Elliott was not unnaturally reticent about it, having so often heard that Mr. Carr would feel it a heavy blow to have his daughter leave him alone.

September was now well advanced and the equinoctial storms were bold and bitter on the hills. Many trees succumbed to their violence, broken branches filled the roads and tall tree trunks showed their wounds. The long blue grass looked like the dishevelled fur of an animal that had been rubbed the wrong way. There were many runnels and washouts trending riverward in the loose soil. By the time [Pg 129]the storm showed signs of abating, considerable damage had been done. Many barns, cabins and even houses were unroofed or blown down. Among other victims of the wind was Mr. Field, inasmuch as the old homestead which he had purchased of Elliott was one of the buildings wrecked.

It happened that the morning after the storm, Elliott was to drive into town with Dorothy. As they passed along, they noted here and there the havoc wrought. Finally, as they approached the old Harding place, they saw that the fury of the storm had counted it among its playthings. Elliott gazed lingeringly and sadly at the wreck. Then he stopped the horses and helping Dorothy out of the vehicle he [Pg 130]tied the team and together they went up the pathway, looking often at each other in mute sorrow. She felt that any words of consolation would be out of place while the first shock lasted, so kept silent, letting her eyes tell of her sympathy. For a time they stood and looked at the scene of devastation, the ruins covered with abundant ivy that gleamed and trembled in the light of the sun. Then Elliott said slowly:

“My father’s wish is now beyond the reach of possible denial. Nature has destroyed it, just as he wished it should be done.”

Walking about, looking now at this, now at that remnant of the wreck, he kept biting his lips to keep back the tears, but [Pg 131]the sight was so like looking upon a loved one dead, that he could not long keep them back—hot tears came in a passionate gush, and he must allow himself relief of them.

Business successes eventually rendered it possible for Elliott to gratify his old ambition about the homestead and thinking that the time for action had come the next day, when his uncle dropped into his office to talk over the storm and its destroying of the old homestead, Elliott suggested:

“Uncle Philip, I have a mind to buy that lot from you. Would you sell it?”

“Why do you ask? Are you going to get married?”

“If I can ever get the father’s blessing [Pg 132]of the woman I love, I am,” was Elliott’s straightforward reply.

Mr. Field looked solemn. “I am afraid no man will ever get his willing consent, if you refer to Mr. Carr,” he remarked.

“Well, never mind, that has no connection with this proposition. I have long had a desire to do something to perpetuate my father’s memory. Since fate has removed the house, I have an idea of erecting a building and presenting it as an institution for the manual education of colored children.”

The astonished look on Mr. Field’s face gave place to one of admiration as Elliott proceeded and he quickly interrupted:

“My dear boy, I am glad to say I have anticipated you. The bank has in its [Pg 133]safe keeping a deed already made out in your name. The property has always been and now is yours to do with as you please.”

“Uncle Philip, you overwhelm me with surprise and gratitude,” exclaimed Elliott grasping the old man’s hand firmly in his. “You are too good to me.”

Mr. Field rested his face in his hand and regarded his nephew with all the fondness of a parent. After a pause, Elliott continued:

“Since you have so greatly aided me by giving me such a generous start, I will myself erect the building, but together we will make the gift of it in my father’s name, and call it the ‘Richard Harding Institute.’”

[Pg 134]

Mr. Field showed the warmth of his appreciation by grasping his nephew’s hand, and together they discussed at length the plan of the buildings.

As Elliott drove briskly home that evening, hope pointed enthusiastically forward. The two ambitions he was about to realize had long been interwoven with the whole tenor of his existence. The possibility of making a fitting memorial to his father’s name had been unexpectedly brought about, and following close upon this good luck came the gratifying news that the book he had been so long at work upon had been favorably received by the publishers, who were assured not only of its literary merit, but of its commercial value as well, since it dealt with the popular side of the lynching evil, as viewed by [Pg 136]the outer world. His subject was at the time attracting so much attention and causing so many heated discussions, that he had hardly dared to hope that his first attempt in serious literature would meet with the success of acceptance.

When he got home he found his uncle looking over the manuscript which had been returned to him for final review and quietly took a seat beside him to listen to his comments while awaiting the supper hour.

Mr. Field laid the papers on his knee.

“This is very good, as a story. I can truthfully say that I am more than pleased with it from a literary standpoint. But that alone is no reason for publishing. This haste to rush into print is one of the [Pg 137]bad signs of the times. Your views as herein expressed are more pardonable than reasonable, for they are your inheritance rather than your fault.”

“I have been conscientious, am I to blame for that?”

“Who is to blame?” asked his uncle. “First, your mother had something to do with the forming of your opinions. She had the training of your mind at that critical age when the bend of the twig forms the shape of the tree, and no doubt the society in which you have been thrown has helped to make you an agitator.”

“Society must then take the consequences of its own handiwork. As for my mother, I will say in her defense, that if her teachings were not always the best, she [Pg 138]aimed toward what she considered a high ideal.”

Mr. Field knew there was a deep sincerity, an almost fanatical earnestness in his nephew, and he respected him none the less for it. He was at that critical season of life in which the mind of man is made up in nearly equal proportions of depth and simplicity.

“I see your convictions are real, yet I strongly advise you to give more time to the matter and make further investigation before you give your views to the world.”

“The more I search, the more I find that condemns lynching.” Elliott spoke in a deferential tone, for despite his own strong convictions, the soundness of his uncle’s views on other matters made him respect his opinion of this.

[Pg 139]

“I wish you would give over reading those unprincipled authors, my boy, whose aim is to excite the evil passions of the multitude; and shut your ears to the extravagant statements of people who make tools of enthusiastic and imaginative minds to further their own selfish ends. An intelligent conservatism is one of the needs of the day.”

“I am profoundly sorry that my work is so objectionable to you. My publishers tell me it is worth printing, and as evidence of their assurance, they offer me a good round sum, besides a royalty.”

“I grant the probabilities of the book being a pecuniary success, but there are other considerations. You must recollect that all your prospects are centered in the [Pg 140]South, and now the affections of your heart bind you here; therefore you should give up all this bitter feeling against us. As you know more of this race, you will find that it is by no means as ill used as you are taught to believe. I advise you most earnestly, as you value your future here, to suppress this book, which would do the South a great injury and yourself little credit.”

Mr. Field leaned wearily back on the high armchair. He had swayed Elliott in some things, but it was clear that in one direction one would always be opposed to that which the other advocated. They could never agree, nor even affect a compromise. The nephew was grieved, yet his purpose was fixed, and he fed on the hope [Pg 141]of one day winning reconciliation through fame if not conviction, and in reuniting the sister and brother in the mutual pride of his success.

With half a sigh Elliott began rearranging the pages, when a finely written line in an obscure corner of one page caught his eye. Holding it toward the light he read:

“Are you my country’s foe, and therefore mine?”

At her urgent request, he had allowed Dorothy to read the manuscript, and had been happy in the thought that she had returned it into his own hands without a word of criticism. As he read this question, he felt and appreciated both her love for him and her loyalty to her people. [Pg 142]And, while she had not openly condemned his work, he knew he had not her approval of its sentiment. He felt a growing knowledge that any success, no matter its magnitude, would be hollow unless she shared his rejoicings.

As soon as the quiet meal was done, he set out for the Carr’s. Twilight was well advanced. A white frost was on the stubble fields and the stacked corn and the crimson and russet foliage of the woodside had the moist look of colors on a painter’s palette.

At the window, Dorothy stood and watched her sweetheart come. The same constancy shone in her gentle face for him as ever and her greeting was as warm as his fondest anticipations could have pictured.

[Pg 143]

“Have I displeased you? You do not share a pride in my work, Dorothy?”

“Since you guess it,” she answered, “I may be spared the pain of confessing.”

Elliott was silent for a time, but his expression showed the deep disappointment he felt.

At length in an undertone, he said:

“Don’t reproach me. Of course you have not felt this as I feel it, being so differently situated and looking at it from another point of view.”

Seeing that he paused for her answer, Dorothy replied: “I have considered all this. But do you not see what a reflection your clever plot is upon us, or what a gross injustice it will do the South?”

“Cold facts may sound harsh, but you [Pg 144]will be all the better for your chastening. The South will advance under it.”

“I wish I could believe it; the chances are all against us. Why did you ever want to take such a risk?” and the air of the little, slender, determined maiden marked the uncompromising rebel.

Elliott deliberately arose. His face was earnest and full of a strange power.

“It hurts me to displease you, Dorothy, but I must direct my own will and conscience. To hold your respect and my own, I must be a man,—not a compromise.”

There was such lofty sentiment in that calm utterance from his heart that Dorothy, acknowledging the strength of it, could not resist the impulse of admiring [Pg 145]compassion and stifling any lingering feeling of resentment, she quietly laid her hand on his and looked into his face with eyes that Fate must have purposed to be wells of comfort to a grieving mind. At her touch Elliott started, looked down and met her soothing gaze.

“If it were not for our mistakes, failures and disappointments, the love we bear our treasures would soon perish for lack of sustenance. It is the failures in life that make one gentle and forgiving with the weak and I almost believe it is the failures of others that mostly endear them to us. Do what you may, let it bring what it will, all my love and sanction goes with it,” she said softly.

October days! The sumacs drabbled in the summer’s blood flaunt boldly, and green, gold and purple shades entrance the eye. The mullein stands upon the brown land a lonely sentinel. The thistle-down floats ghost-like through the haze, and silvery disks of a spider’s web swing twixt the cornrows.

Sunday. Elliott remained at home until late in the afternoon. While he feared the result, he still held to his fixed resolve to go that day and definitely ascertain what was to come of his love for Dorothy. He said to Mr. Field, as he started off, “I shall not be back to supper—I[Pg 147] am going to see Mr. Carr.” His voice was hopeful and his face wore a smile.

His nephew’s assumed hopefulness had long been more painful to Mr. Field than this despondency he sought to cover by it. It was so unlike hopefulness, had in it something so fierce in its determination—was so hungry and eager, and yet carried such a consciousness of being forced, that it had long touched his heart.

Dorothy knew the object of this call, and when her father came into the parlor she withdrew, full of sweet alarm, and left the two together. A tender glance, a soft rustling of pretty garments, and Elliott knew that he and her father were alone. He had scarcely taken his chair, when he began:

[Pg 148]

“Mr. Carr, I have come upon the most sacred and important duty of my life.”

“Draw your chair closer, I cannot see you well,” said Mr. Carr. “I am growing old and my sight is failing me.” And the way his voice faded into silence was typical of what he had said.

Elliott obeying his request, continued:

“I have had the honor of being received in this house for some time—nearly two years now, and I hope the topic on which I am about to speak will not surprise you.”

“Is it about Dorothy?”

“It is. You evidently anticipate what I would say, though you cannot realize my hopes and fears. I love her truly, Mr. Carr, and I want to make her my wife.”

[Pg 149]

“I knew it would come. But why not a little later?” he said, pathetically.

It was so like a cry of pain, this appeal, that it made Elliott’s heart ache and hushed him into silence. After a little, Mr. Carr said, solemnly:

“Go on!”

“I know, after seeing you together from day to day, that between you and her there is an affection so strong, so closely allied to the circumstances in which it has been nurtured, that it has few parallels. I know that mingled with the love and duty of a daughter who has become a woman, there is yet in her heart all the love and reliance of childhood itself. When she is clinging to you the reliance of baby, girl and woman in one is upon you. All this I [Pg 150]have known since first I met you in your home life.”

With an air of perfect patience the old man remained mute, keeping his eyes cast down as though, in his habit of passive endurance, it was all one to him if it never came his turn to speak.

“Feeling that,” Elliott went on, “I have waited as long as it is in the nature of man to do. I have felt, and even now feel, that perhaps to interpose my love between you and her is to touch this hallowed association with something not so good as itself, but my life is empty without her, and I must know now if you will entrust her to my care.”

The old man’s breathing was a little quickened as he asked, mournfully: “How [Pg 151]could I do without her? What would become of me?”

“Do without her?” Elliott repeated. “I do not mean to stand between you two—to separate you. I only seek to share with her her love for you, and to be as faithful always as she has been; to add to hers a son’s affection and care. I have no other thought in my heart but to double with Dorothy her privileges as your child, companion, friend. If I harbored any thought of separating her from you, I could not now touch this honored hand.” He laid his own upon the wrinkled one as he spoke.

Answering the touch for an instant only, but not coldly, Mr. Carr lifted his eyes with one grave look at Elliott, then gazed anxiously toward the door. These last [Pg 152]words seemed to awaken his subdued lips.

“You speak so manfully, Mr. Harding, that I feel I must treat your confidence and sincerity in the same spirit.”

“With all my heart I thank you, Mr. Carr, for I well understand that without you I have no hope. She, I feel sure, would not give it, nor would I ask her hand without your consent.”

The old man spoke out plainly now.

“I am not much longer for this world, I think, for I am very feeble, and of all the living and dead world, this one soul—my child—is left to me. The tie between us is the only one that now remains unbroken, therefore you cannot be surprised that its breaking would crowd all my suffering into the one act. But I believe you to be [Pg 153]a good man. I believe your object to be purely and truthfully what you have stated, and as a proof of my belief, I will give her to you—with my blessing,” and extending his hand, he allowed Elliott to grasp it warmly.

“God bless you for this, Mr. Carr,” was all that he could say.

Elliott had had a succession of busy months, when the case was called for the notorious moonshiner, Burr Chester, who had killed the sheriff while resisting arrest. The Grand Jury had found a true bill against him for murder in the first degree and Elliott Harding had been engaged to aid in the prosecution. It was no common case to deal with, and he was keenly conscious of this fact. After two long weeks of incessant work, a verdict of guilty was brought in, but as a last resort to save his client’s neck, an appeal was taken to the higher courts.

After this Elliott had gone home weak, [Pg 155]nervous and excited beyond natural tension. He spent a restless night, and the next morning was unexpectedly called to Boston to attend to business that required his immediate presence. He went over to let Dorothy know of his plans. Under a spell of sadness and impulse he said passionately:

“If I left, not knowing that a near day was to bring me back to you I could not bear it. Our wedding day is just three weeks off, and from that time on you are to be inseparably mine—mine forever!”

She clung to him quivering, tears, despite her efforts to be strong, escaping down her cheek. He held her to his heart and soothed her back to something of the calm she had lost.

[Pg 156]

Just ten days he expected to be gone.

The intervening time busily passed in preparations for the approaching wedding. Besides that, Dorothy’s heart had feasted upon the letters that had daily come on the noon train out of the North. Each afternoon since Elliott’s absence, she had been to town for the mail, having no patience to await its coming from the office by any neighboring messenger who chanced to pass that way.

To-day’s expected letter was to be the last, for to-morrow Elliott would be with her again.

Oh, Love! Love! life is sweet to all mortals, but it was particularly sweet to these two.

After receiving her letter Dorothy [Pg 157]started the short way home, singing lightly some old love tune. In the deep forest around her the faithful ring-dove poured forth his anthem of abiding peace.

John Holmes, the staunch friend of the family, had an engagement that evening with the Carr’s; so he started out to overtake Dorothy, hearing she had gone on just ahead of him.

As he hurried along through the coming night, the moon’s white beams fell deep down in the beechen stems. Now and again wood-folk wakened from their dreams and carolled brokenly. The spirit of delicious peace that pervaded the lowering twilight enriched and beautified the reverie that rendered the dreamer oblivious[Pg 158] to the present. His thoughts, his hopes were far afield—wandering along beckoning paths of the unexplored future. The office of prosecuting attorney was only the first step. He dreamed of Congress, too.

“Why shouldn’t one do whatever one wants to do?”

Thus he mused, when suddenly the sound of crashing underbrush startled him into consciousness of the present and a dark outline dashed into the road just ahead from out of the dense thicket that lay to his left. Before he could collect his scattered senses sufficiently to question or intercept the excited runner, the man dodged to one side, and sped along the road until he passed out of sight around an angle of [Pg 159]the wood. Holmes called after him to stop, but his command was not obeyed.

“What’s the matter?” he shouted after the flying figure; but receiving no answer, again he cried:

“Stop, I say.” And this time a reply came in the shape of a faint groan from near by in the wood. He dashed into the darkness of the forest in the direction from whence the sound had come, his flesh quivering and his breath coming in gasps as an overwhelming sense of apprehension seized him.

At first the gloom was such that he could see nothing distinctly and he groped his way forward with difficulty. The moon that for a moment had passed under a cloud now again shone brightly out, filling all [Pg 160]the open spaces with a play of wavering light. He forced himself into the thicket from where he again heard a low sound—writhing, twisting his way through the thick, hindering stems, and there before him, in a little opening, he saw what appeared to be a prostrate human form.

He sprang toward it and drew the clinging boughs aside to let the moonlight in. Then he saw it was the figure of a woman. Two ghastly gashes, edged with crimson, stained the white flesh of her throat.

The awful meaning of the crime, as he thought of the headlong haste of the flying man, surged over Holmes. He quickly knelt to gaze into her face and as he gazed a terrible cry broke from his lips.

“Dorothy! Oh, my God!”

[Pg 161]

Raising the light form in his arms, he cried passionately on her name.

The wind sobbed a dirge in the bare boughs above, but beside that, all the country-side was still.

The girl hung heavy and limp in his arms as he bore her to the road. She made no answer to his cry—he felt blindly for a pulse—a heart—but found none.

One short, sharp gasp convulsed her breast as he gently laid her down—a faint tremor passed over her frame, and she was dead!

John Holmes looked into her face, distraught with agony. The blood drummed in his ears, his heart beat wildly; dazed and bewildered, a moment he stood—the power of action almost paralyzed. But he [Pg 162]felt that something must be done, and done quickly.

With a superhuman effort he lifted the dead girl and carried her toward her home. When he reached the door, after what seemed an eternity of travel, he waited, struggling for composure. How could he meet her father and break the news? Seeing no one around he slipped quietly in and laid the body upon a couch in the room which so long had been her own. When he entered the father’s room a deep calm filled the place. There sat the old man in his armchair, his head fallen to one side in the unstudied attitude of slumber. Upon his face there was more than a smile—a radiance—his countenance was lit up with a vague expression of content and [Pg 163]happiness. His white hairs added sweet majesty to the cheerful light upon his face. He slept peacefully—perhaps dreaming that his child was well and would soon be home.

An inexpressible pity was in his voice as John Holmes gently aroused the sleeper and told him the mournful truth. He would never forget that old face so full of startled grief—that awful appeal to him—that withered hand upraised to heaven. Then darkness came before the dim old eyes, when for a time all things were blotted out of his remembrance.

The truth was so terrible that at first he could not grasp it. The moan he uttered was inarticulate and stifled. Gently John Holmes led him tremblingly to the couch where Dorothy lay—the blood still oozing [Pg 164]from her throat; the dew of agony yet fresh on her brow, her dainty nostrils expanded by their last convulsive effort to retain the breath of life, appearing almost to quiver.

A moment, motionless and staring, he stood above her—dead!

Slowly awaking to the awful reality, he threw his hands up with the vehemence of despair and horror—then fell forward by her side, saying by the motion of his lips, “Dead!”

Slowly his speech returned, and he reached out one hand.

“My boy, she is not dead. I feel her heart in mine, I see her love for me in her face. No! she is not dead!—not dead!” his voice fell to a whispered groan.

[Pg 165]

The other tried to stay his tears and to reply, but he could only touch her cold, bruised hand, hoping that he might grow to a perfect understanding of the tragedy.

The father turned his head. His look was full of supplicating agony. In a plaintive and quivering voice he cried:

“My God! My God! My God!”

Presently John Holmes went away to give the alarm. Returning later, he went through the dreary house and darkened the windows—the windows of the room where the dead girl lay he darkened last. He lifted her cold hand and held it to his heart—and all the world seemed death and silence, broken only by the father’s moaning.

The news flashed over the country as if by the lightning’s spark and by nine o’clock the district was aroused to a state of frenzied passion. From near and far they gathered to the stricken home, till in an hour a mob had assembled, vowing torture and death to the fiend. A brief questioning revealed the fact that the Carrs’ cook had seen a negro man pass the kitchen door about dusk, and he had asked for a drink of water. She would know him again, she said.

A fierce yell rent the silence as Holmes told of the fleeing man and grim curses filled the air, followed by the thunder of [Pg 167]hoofbeats as the horsemen dashed away in pursuit. On they rode through the darkness, galloping where the way was clear, and everywhere and at all times urging their horses to their utmost, every minute pressing forward with increasing rage and recklessness. Uphill, downhill the searchers went, scouring every nook and corner for miles around. Their panting horses needed not to be urged. They seemed to have caught the same fierce spirit that inspired their riders, their straining muscles and distended nostrils telling of their eagerness and exertion.

The night was going, but the searchers had as yet found no trace. If the earth had opened and swallowed the one they sought, the mystery of his disappearance could have been greater.

[Pg 168]

Shrewder than those of unthinking haste, the sheriff permitted the excited crowd to go ahead, that his plans would not be interfered with. Then, with his deputies and a bloodhound, he went to the scene of the murder. There he found a sprinkling of blood on the ground, and the imprints of the heavy shoes in the moist earth showed the direction which the murderer had taken. He quickly drew the hound’s nose to the trail and cheered him on. The dark, savage beast was wonderful at trailing, and had more than once overtaken fleeing criminals. He sniffed intelligently for a few minutes, then gave an eager yelp and plunged along the road, made an abrupt turn, then struck down through a narrow hollow, [Pg 169]deep and dark. The men put spurs to their horses and dashed after him, heedless of the thorns that tore and reckless of sharp blows from matted undergrowth and low-lying boughs.

The hound, with his deep guide-note, despite their efforts, was soon far ahead; his lithe, long body close to the earth, leaving no scent untouched.

The trail led through what is known as “Robbers’ Hollow,” a ravine that runs in a trough through the winding hills, whose rugged sides looked jagged and terrible, surrounded by a savage darkness full of snares, where it was fearful to penetrate and appalling to stay. In spite of all, they hurried on faster and faster.

Far ahead the pilot note of the hound [Pg 170]called them on and they were well nigh exhausted when they came upon him, baying furiously at a cabin built on the naked side of a hill, around which there was not a tree or bush to shelter a man from bullets, should the occupants resist arrest. As the sheriff and his men arrived, the hound flung his note in the air and sent up a long howl, then dashed against the door, which shook and strained from the shock.

The sheriff called him to heel and placed his men at corners of the cabin. He then rapped on the door and repeated it half a dozen times before there was a response. Finally a man came to the front.

“Who wants me this time of night?” he grumbled, in a deep, gruff voice, as he [Pg 171]stood in the doorway, his broad chest and arms showing strongly dark in the light of the lamp he held.

“I do,” answered the sheriff. “Do you live here?”

“No, sir.”

“When did you come here, and from where?”

“From the other side of Georgetown, and I got here ’bout an hour before dark.”

“Why, Mr. Cooley,” whispered a voice at his elbow, “it was way arter dark.”

“Sh!” he stuttered, shuffling his feet that the men might not hear anything else she said.

“What is your name and occupation?” resumed the sheriff, calmly.

[Pg 172]

“Ephriam Cooley, and I teach school ten miles north of Georgetown.”

His speech was not that of a common negro, but of a lettered man, and seemed strangely at variance with his bearded, scowling face.

“Have you a knife? I would like to borrow it, if you’ve got one?”

“No, sir, I left my knife in my other pants’ pocket.”

“But you’ve got a razor, haven’t you? Let me have it,” said the sheriff. “One of our men broke his girth and unfortunately we have no way of fixing it, as there is not a knife in the crowd.”

There was a slight agitation in the negro’s manner as he turned to find the razor, or rather to pretend to search for it. The sheriff pushed in after him.

[Pg 173]

“Maybe I can help you find it?” he said, as he picked up a coat from under one corner of the rumpled bed. A razor dropped to the floor. The negro made a move toward it, but the sheriff’s foot held it fast.

“You need not trouble yourself; I will get it,” he said, as he stooped and raised it. “Bloodstained? Why, what does this mean?”

“I killed a dog,” the negro muttered, his mouth parched with terror, his vicious eyes shooting forth venomous flashes. “I’d kill anybody’s dog before I’d let him bite me. Was it your dog?” and he shrank slightly away.

“No,” said the sheriff, “it was not mine, but I am afraid you made a great mistake [Pg 174]in killing that dog! Come, get yourself dressed and show it to me.”

“I threw him in the creek,” he said, angrily.

“You are under arrest. Come, we are going to take you to Georgetown.” The sheriff caught him by the arm.

“What! for killing a dog, and a yellow dog at that?” He scowled blackly and fiercely. “I’m in hopes you won’t get me into court about this matter. I am willing to pay for it,” he said in a husky voice.

“Very likely you will be called upon to pay—in full, but I will protect you to the extent of my authority. Hurry up! we’ve no time to lose. It is late and it’s going to rain.”

The negro cast his eyes wildly about [Pg 175]him, the last mechanical resource of despair, but saw nothing else to do.

Mounting the prisoner handcuffed behind him, the sheriff was soon off for the Scott county jail, one of the party being sent ahead to have the Carr cook in waiting. The negro had nothing to say, but rode on in savage silence, his head dropped forward on his breast.

A storm was gathering and the sheriff thought by hard riding he might reach the nearest railway station before it broke. He knew his prisoner’s life depended upon his getting him to a place of safety with all speed. The whole country was alive with armed men.

Far off the ordnance of the sky boomed as the battle of the elements began. The lightning cut the clouds and soon the rain came, a dark falling wall. As far as the eye could bore into the darkness, only one light could be seen. They dared not take shelter under the roof of any man. So the sheriff and his men rode on through [Pg 177]the storm, picking their way as best they could.

Drenched and fagged, they reached the station only to find that the Elkhorn trestle had sustained some damage and in consequence delayed the Georgetown train. It would probably be three hours before the wreck could be repaired.

The position of the sheriff was now serious; he could not think of such folly as remaining there at the mercy of the telegraph wires; he must try to make the trip by the river road and that, too, before daybreak.

A pint of whiskey was brought from the little corner saloon and the party determined to start out again. The horses still bearing marks of hard riding stood in [Pg 178]waiting. As they set off the rain ceased, the clouds broke and the moon came out brightly. Soon the sheriff thought he heard the sound of a gun, the signal that the searchers were on his track. They quickened their pace.

“We are treed, I am afraid,” he said to his companions, and he could almost see the mob surrounding them, and their pitiless joy after the humiliation of having for awhile lost the trail.

The prisoner began to show signs of anxiety. Every sound startled him and he kept looking expectantly about. The men urged their horses and rode on in a state of nervous tension to the ford where they must cross the river. It was away out of its banks. They halted and there was a moment’s silence.

[Pg 179]

“She looks pretty high. What do you say?” asked the sheriff of one of his deputies.

The man shook his head forbiddingly. To attempt to cross the river would be running a frightful risk.

“There goes a gun again.”

It required no longer an effort of the imagination to hear it. It was a fact and with all the terror that reality possesses, the prisoner shuddered, his restless eyeballs full of fear rolling wildly.

The sheriff tried to collect his startled thoughts and resist the strange certainty which possessed him. His own frame felt the shudder that convulsed the form behind him.

“Well!” he asked, once more addressing his deputy, “what say you?”

[Pg 180]

“We’ll take the danger before us,” the other answered and, touching their horses, they plunged in. Half way across, the sheriff convulsively seized his horse’s neck for he could not swim. He was struggling desperately against the waves, clinging frantically around the neck of his swimming horse, when he heard a cry:

“Great God, he’s gone!” and turning to look behind him, he saw that the negro had disappeared into the water. All eyes turned toward the spot where the manacled wretch had gone down.

The drowning man arose to the surface a dizzy moment then sank again as quickly. Not a cry, not a word could be heard. The river went on booming heavily, its hoarse roar rising to a deafening intensity. [Pg 181]The chief deputy, meanwhile, had managed to slip from his horse and float down stream, and with a violent swinging movement he succeeded in thrusting one arm between the negro’s handcuffed ones and sustaining him, just as he rose for the last time. Supporting him against his horse an instant he tightened his hold, that he might keep both heads above water. He was taking desperate chances against tremendous odds.

With an indescribable feeling, the sheriff looked on but could render no assistance. The swimmer fought hard, but, after pulling some distance, it seemed clear that he had miscalculated his strength. Inch by inch, the two swept downward, notwithstanding the almost [Pg 182]superhuman efforts of the desperate deputy. Gradually his stroke became more feeble and he saw the gap between them and the bank grow wider, the lost inches grew to feet, the feet to yards, and finally with utter despair, he thought the whole world had turned to water. He felt terrified. Exhaustion could be distinguished in all his limbs and his arms felt miserably dragged. He was going, not forward, but round and round, and with dizziness came unconsciousness.

The next thing he remembered was an awful stiffness in every joint and muscle, a scent of whiskey, and the sheriff kneeling beside him upon the wet ground, forcing the warm liquid through his lips. As he gazed about him, he slowly asked:

[Pg 183]

“Did that d——d nigger die after all?”

The sheriff had not time to tell him that the negro was safe, for the next minute there came a volley of yells and sounds of oaths with the dull thunder of rapidly advancing hoofbeats, and before either man could speak again, a party of armed riders reined up in front of the ford.

“Stop! men, stop!” The sheriff’s voice was heard eagerly hailing those on the opposite side. “You will risk your lives to try to cross here.”

The quivering negro, terrified by the idea that the pursuers were upon them, made an effort to rise.

“My God! don’t let them take me! Don’t give me up!”

There was something savage and frenzied [Pg 184]in the accent that went with those words. He clutched at the sheriff’s knees, his eyes became wild and fixed and filled with terror.

“We must have your prisoner,” someone shouted. “Will you surrender him?”

“Not yet,” was the sheriff’s answer. “I deliver him only to the law.”

“You’ll give him up!” cried a score of determined voices.

“Never! Never!”

“Then we will fire on him!”

Like a flash, the sheriff jumped in front of his prisoner. “Fire ahead,” he said.

The next instant, there were a number of reports. All but one had fired in the air.

“Cowards!” yelled the leader, “kill ’em all!”

[Pg 185]

“Look here,” answered one, “that sheriff lives neighbor to me.”

“We’re out for the nigger, not a white man!” said another. “Wait boys, we’ll get him yet!”

The sheriff calmly mounted, forming a bar between the rifles and his prisoner and rode away, leaving the mob to await the fall of the stream. Half an hour later they reached the jail.

“Chloe Carr,” the sheriff distinctly pronounced her name, as he summoned the negro cook, “did you ever see this man before?”

“Yas, sah.”

“Will you tell me when and where?”

The prisoner made a desperate sign, his fiendish face blazing with mingled rage [Pg 186]and terror. Wildly he shook his head. “She lies!” he growled, with a sudden threatening movement. “She never saw me before.”

An animal-like snarl came from his throat. His face was shining with sweat, the veins of his neck were twisted and knotted. His body shook with savage fear, and the woman trembled.

She said excitedly: “He’s de one I saw pass de do’ awhile befo’ Miss Dor’thy was found dead. I give him a drink ov water.”

The prisoner was in a frenzy now. Fiercely he glared like a great black beast, caged. The woman saw the officers fairly carry him into the cell, but she felt less fear than sorrow now, as her heart [Pg 187]was full of the memory of the girl she had loved and had watched from the cradle-side.

Elliott Harding was coming home—home to Dorothy, and joy was so strong within him that it almost touched the edge of tears. The rising sun was trying hard to struggle out of a bluish haze, as he stepped from the train at Georgetown. Nodding to a negro driver, he walked to the hack, saying, “Drive me to my office, first, then you may take me out to Mr. Carr’s.”

The negro cast a glance behind, and stammered excitedly, as he mounted to the seat:

“Boss, dey’s erbout to mob yo’ man—de moonshiner dat you like ter got hung, I reck’n. Dey’s done at de jail by now.”

[Pg 189]

A mob! A multitude in passion! Anticipation of the consequences flashed all too plainly upon Elliott Harding. A thrill shot through him! He leaped into the back, and commanded:

“Drive to the jail with all your might.”

The negro’s white eyeballs rolled with swift alarm. He seized the lines, laid on the whip and shouted:

“Git up, git up.”

The horses dashed forward and turned down the main street, the cumbrous wheels tearing up the mud and flinging it to right and left.

Elliott’s breath fluttered in his throat. A fellow being—the man for whose conviction he had pleaded was in personal peril. In law he was against this poor wretch; in [Pg 190]humanity he was for him—humanity has no distinctions. He saw but the slaughter!—the struggle!—the united forces on the one side; the lone desperation on the other.

The good horses were doing their best now, and with a final lurch and swing were pulling up at the jail. Elliott bounded to his feet, rushed into the stirring crowd, and pushed through the circle that was moving toward the door.

Low mutterings, fierce as the roar of a wounded lion, went forth as one man threw up his clinched hand, from which dangled a rope. As if impelled by a single spirit, they raged against the jail doors, clamoring at the oak.

“Hang him! hang him! Give us the keys!”

[Pg 191]

The terror stricken criminal heard and cowered in his cell, his giant muscles quivering in tense knots. He gathered himself for the last struggle with a dogged fierceness born of savage courage.

“Break down the doors!”

At this command there was a crash and commotion below—and then silence. Suddenly a man appeared facing them. He held up his hand, and all recognized that it was Elliott Harding.

“Fellow citizens,” he cried, his voice ringing out over the gathering. “Don’t do this thing! This man will die by the hands of the law. Don’t stain yours!”

Directly there was a universal hush. The crowd stood like stone before the calm courage of this remarkable arraignment. [Pg 192]The men doubting their senses, gazed at each other curiously, then they looked at Elliott again. With indescribable speed a spirit flew from mind to mind, seizing them all alike. Then without a word, silently, and as though abashed, they turned away. Elliott was left alone, surprised at his sudden triumph, gazing with a curious stare at the frowning walls of the dingy jail.

A half hour before, Elliott had been in a delicious reverie passing what were, perhaps the sweetest moments of his life. He had awakened early from a dream. He had dreamed that he felt the touch of soft fingers upon his cheek and the beating of a loving heart against his, and the memory of the ecstasy lingered like some charmed spell. Dorothy was his very own—Dorothy, crowned with the beauty which combined all of the woman and all of the angel. He saw nothing in the world save her radiant face. He praised God for giving him her love, and the hope of preserving that nearest likeness on earth to heaven—a[Pg 194] home. This sweet foretokening of life’s full, ripe completeness had filled his heart.

Joyous, enraptured, young, he had stepped upon the railway platform at Georgetown. From such thoughts to the vivid scene at the jail, was an abrupt and wild plunge into a whirling abysm. His mind was in a turmoil, and he felt the need of cooling air and brisk movement to regain his composure.

As he set out on foot for the Carr’s, the sheriff, relieved from the anxiety of the jail attack, overtook him. Laying hand on his shoulder, he said earnestly:

“Mr. Harding, you are a credit to your principles. I’m mightily obliged to you. When you need a friend, I’m your man. [Pg 195]Nobody could have stopped that mob but you.”

“I—why anyone else could have done so as well.”

“No, because it was known that Miss Carr and you was goin’ to be married soon. They naturally thought you ought to be the man to fix the scoundrel’s sentence.”

Elliott sprang round with such a start that the sheriff shrank back instinctively.

“What!” he gasped, “you don’t mean—you don’t mean—”

“My God!” said the sheriff. “Haven’t you heard?”

“Heard, heard what, man? not Dorothy? You can’t mean that it was Dorothy Carr—what—what—”

[Pg 196]

He stopped, a thrill of terror froze his blood.

“It’s true—too true! Mr. Harding, she is dead!”

“You lie! You lie!” Elliott shrieked.

Then in a different tone, he huskily whispered:

“Give me the keys, man, give me the keys! Quick! Quick!”

It was all that the sheriff could do to make him understand that the jailer had the keys. A whirlwind of ungovernable fury swept over him.

“Good God!” he panted, “The driver said the mob was for the moonshiner!” His senses reeled; staggering, he leaned against a wall near by.

“What shall I do, my God! What shall I do!”

[Pg 197]

“I advise you to go first to her poor old father. They say the shock has pretty near killed him,” said the sheriff.

“You are right. I must go to him.” Elliott’s face knit convulsively as he spoke, crushing back the horror that almost paralyzed him. Then the sheriff proposed to get a buggy and drive him to Mr. Carr’s. As they rode along silently, all nature was still and peaceful—cruelly peaceful it seemed to Elliott, as he sat with his head inclined, his body shaken with deep grief, his breast laboring hard.

They soon reached the hushed, dark home. A long trail of blood lay in ruddy streaks from the gateway to the door where the white crape swayed so gently—so gently.

[Pg 198]

Elliott walked slowly and as if stunned. He went into the house, turned and looked about him.

The parlor door was slightly open. He went in and began to walk the floor—the resource of those who suffer. There are instincts for all the crises of life—he felt that he was not alone.

Nervously he unclasped and threw open the window blind, then, turning, cast his eyes sadly about him.

There sat the old father in a posture of dejection, his eyes almost closed. Just beyond lay his child! Clasping his hands with an expression full of the most violent, most gentle entreaty, Elliott uttered a piercing cry!

“Dorothy! Dorothy, my little girl, come [Pg 199]back to me! Come back!” And with this appeal he sank upon his knees with both hands upon his eyes.

“Elliott! Elliott!”

He raised his head at length and looked steadily at Mr. Carr—this venerable, manly face, upon which God had imprinted goodness and heroism.

“Yes, father,” and leaning forward he embraced his white head. Drawing it to his breast, his overcharged heart found relief in tears.

The intense calm and silence of the father’s beautiful, mute resignation finally silenced him.

Rigid before the fire, as if it were a charmed flame that was turning him old, he sat, with the dark lines deepening in [Pg 200]his face; its stare becoming more and more haggard; its surface turning whiter and whiter, as if it were being overspread with ashes—the very texture and color of his hair appearing to change.

A sunbeam shot in and faltered over the face of the girl asleep. This fair, white bride, robed in her wedding gown.

Elliott got up and went to her side. He turned away again, and dropped upon the broad divan, utterly helpless, hopeless. Here he lay face downward, with his elbows on the cushions and his hands clutching his chin, his sad eyes staring steadily. He lay for hours gazing upon her face, moving not from the first position he had assumed. He took no heed of time—time and he were separate that day. [Pg 201]He was neither hungry nor thirsty—only sick at the heart which lay like lead in him.

By and by a long procession was seen moving from the house. Six bearers deposited their burden. Dorothy’s grave had been made beside her mother’s in the family burying ground, at the back of the garden.

The preliminary inquiry into the case of Ephriam Cooley resulted in his being held over to the next meeting of the Grand Jury, which was yet some months away.

Mr. Carr was not left alone in his grief. Elliott Harding gave up residence at his uncle’s home and went to live with and care for him.

Among the neighboring people, there prevailed a respect for these two in their distress which was full of gentleness and delicacy. Men kept apart when they were seen walking with slow steps on the street, or stood in knots talking compassionately among themselves.

[Pg 203]

At length the day came when the Grand Jury was in session. The absence of witnesses, upon which the defense had relied to argue the innocence of the accused, caused the prisoner’s counsel no little uneasiness as the hour for the opening of the court drew near. As he paced restlessly to and fro in the reserved space before the bench, there was a look of anxiety on his countenance and a frown upon his brow.

When the hands of the big clock pointed to nine, the judge ascended the bench and took his seat. It was the signal for breathless silence, and as if to emphasize this silence, his honor rapped sharply with his gavel upon the desk in front of him.

The clerk read the minutes of the preceding[Pg 204] day and took the volume over for the judicial signature.

“The case of the State against Ephriam Cooley,” called the clerk. “Are both sides ready?”

The look of concern grew deeper on the face of the defendant’s attorney. He asked for a few minutes’ consultation with his witnesses and retired into an ante-room. Presently the door of this room opened and the attorney reappeared. The expression of anxiety and suspense had not left his face.

“Your Honor,” he said, “the defense must ask for a continuance. We had hoped to be ready to proceed with the case without delay or cost to the state, but a witness whose testimony is essential and whom [Pg 205]the defense has spared no diligence to secure, has failed to appear. Believing that the just interests of our client will suffer if we enter into trial without this witness, we have decided to ask Your Honor to continue the case until the next term.”

The audience could scarcely restrain its impatience, and the judge found it necessary to call for order before stating that the postponement was granted.

The courtroom was soon cleared. Groups of excited men gathered upon the street, their looks indicating sullen anger and desperate resolve. The bayonets of the militia had been set bristling around the jail and their gleam was all that kept the crowds back.

Meanwhile, the strain upon Elliott Harding[Pg 206] was telling. He walked erect with an effort and spent much of the time alone in his office, with his head bowed upon the desk, moaning in unutterable anguish. His suffering had drained his very soul—he could weep no more. Since the tragedy, every hour, every day had been a lifetime of misery. Fate had employed his bravest deeds for the breaking of his stout heart. Unheld, unhindered, he had long chosen his road but now he was grasped with sovereign indifference while there was brought upon him punishment for the insufferable egotism of his stubborn contentions. This was the bitterest cup he was ever called upon to drain, and he was never the same after draining it. He was experiencing perhaps what the earth experiences[Pg 207] when it is furrowed with the share that the grain may be sown; it feels the wound alone, the thrill of the germ and the joy of the fruit are not yet come to comfort it.

Mr. Carr was rapidly growing feeble. He was quite shut in. But with every fiber of the Carr endurance, he clung to life, with every desire intensified into the longing to live until the murderer’s trial was ended. On this night he sat in a large wooden rocker near the window, with a pillow at his shoulders. His pathetic figure, with its long attenuated frame, testified to his rapid decline. The soft south wind waved the white locks fringing his temples. One shaking hand lay helplessly on the arm of the chair, the other [Pg 208]held loose grasp of a remotely-dated family monthly. His gray eyes, bright and clear in spite of their fine, crape-like setting of wrinkles, were absently turned to the sky. They kindled as Elliott laid a hand gently upon his shoulder.

“How is my dear father by now?”

“Pretty well,” he answered faintly—his old reply.

“That’s good!” and Elliott tried to smile as he sank wearily into a chair.

Mr. Carr, noticing how thinly his lips fitted about his white, even teeth, asked, “What have they done to my boy?”

“Done enough, father,” said Elliot, starting up and revealing his haggard, agitated face. “They have postponed the trial.”

The coming of October brought the next term of court. What seemed an age had at last terminated and Ephriam Cooley was again brought to trial. His removal from the prison to the courthouse was without incident. The prisoner was guarded in the most thorough manner against possible molestation. The regular police guards were reinforced by deputies sworn in by the sheriff, and the vicinity of the court had, in consequence, the appearance of an armed camp.

Police were stationed at every approach as well as in the hall and every preparation had been made to quell instantly any [Pg 210]attempt at lawless interference with the ordinary course of law.

When the doors opened, the waiting crowd was allowed to enter and in a few minutes all the available space within the courtroom was densely packed.

The judge took his seat.

Ephriam Cooley entered between two officers, handcuffed, his bold, insulting eyes wearing a look of sullen defiance, his unkempt beard lending more than ever an animal look to his face.

The selection of the jury occupied the greater portion of the morning, but at length twelve citizens were impaneled and listened to the reading of the indictment.

The temper of the people might be seen in the burst of rage that swept over the [Pg 211]crowd when the atrocious deed was described.

Elliott Harding, with his usual aspect of dignity, had schooled his face into a cold passiveness, but though outwardly calm, his pulse was throbbing with the fierceness of fever beats. A stranger entering the courtroom would never have selected him from the group of men as the one whose life had been crushed out by the object of this trial.

When the reading was finished, the witnesses for the state were called. The first name which rang through the courtroom was that of John Holmes. The prisoner drew himself together and watched him keenly as the oath was administered; his face, despite its defiant mask, had a restless,[Pg 212] haunted look which sat strangely on his hard, grim features.

Skillfully aided by questions from the court, Holmes unfolded the whole awful story of the first discovery of the dead body of Dorothy Carr. Passing rapidly over the painful details, the sheriff told then of the man-hunt, of the finding of the bloody razor as it had dropped from the pocket of the prisoner’s coat.

The negro cook of the Carrs swore that the prisoner was the man to whom she had given a drink of water about half an hour before her mistress had been brought home.

Toward the close of the State’s evidence, the chain binding the prisoner to the gallows had become all but complete. In [Pg 213]the face of such evidence and in the atmosphere of such bitter resentment, the counsel appointed for his defense struggled against overwhelming odds.

He contented himself with belittling the value of circumstantial evidence adduced by the prosecution, and presenting the argument that the prisoner’s education and his social position as a school teacher attested to his inability to commit a crime so revolting in its conception and so brutal in its execution. He stated that the woman at whose house the prisoner had been arrested, had repeatedly said that he had been at her house, some fifteen miles away from the scene of the crime, at the very hour the deed was said to have been committed, that she would testify to that statement[Pg 214] here if she had not moved away and could not now be located. Whatever effect the counsel thus produced was more than neutralized when the prisoner was called to the stand for a specious denial.

The sinister fear with which the negro peered about the courtroom, the affected nonchalance and thinly veiled defiance of his mumbled answers told damningly against him. The passions of raging fear and terror had driven from his low-browed face every trace of intellectuality or culture, leaving only the cunning cruelty and ferocity of the animal. His cross-examination left him without a vestige of self control, and before it had well finished, in a violent passion he poured forth a volley of oaths, his huge frame [Pg 215]quivering as he burst into a raving, shrieking arraignment of the white man, in which he had to be almost throttled into silence by the deputies.

When the prosecuting attorney arose to review the case, there hung over the courtroom the ominous hush that is significant of but one thing. After a brief recital of the details of the evidence, the counsel appealed to the jury to do its sworn duty.

The judge’s charge was a cool, impartial exposition of the law as it applied to the case. When finished, the jury arose amid a general movement of relief upon the part of the audience and as the twelve men filed out, there was considerable excited conversation, mingled with whispered[Pg 216] speculations as to how long they would be out. Within the courtroom proper, as soon as the jury had retired, the Court instructed the sheriff to announce a recess.

A half hour passed and there was a commotion in the outer hall. The sheriff wore an agitated air. Presently, one by one, a half-dozen men walked inside the railing and dropped carelessly into chairs.

The prisoner looked at his new companions and evidently read aright their mission. They were deputy sheriffs. Four of them sat in chairs ranged behind the prisoner and one sat at either side of him.

Directly across the aisle sat Elliott Harding, apparently cool and patient.

[Pg 217]

Very soon it became generally known that a verdict had been reached.

During the next five minutes, the rooms filled rapidly. The sheriff rapped for order and shouted:

“Let everyone within the courtroom sit down.”

From that moment the stillness of death prevailed. Every eye was turned toward the prisoner. His fingers worked convulsively and his whole body trembled. But few seconds elapsed before the twelve men slowly and gravely filed into their places.

“Have you reached a verdict, gentlemen?” asked the Court, as they lined up.

“We have, Your Honor,” answered the foreman.

[Pg 218]

The Court then announced: “I want everyone to understand that the least attempt at an expression of approval or disapproval of this verdict, as it is read, will be punished by a fine for contempt. Mr. Clerk, read the verdict.”

The clerk obeyed. His voice was clear and everyone heard: “We, the jury, agree and find the defendant, Ephriam Cooley, guilty of the murder of Dorothy Carr, and fix his punishment at death.”

Elliott Harding quietly left the scene, feeling already a lightening of the intolerable load which had so long weighed upon him.

Mr. Carr, who had been slowly succumbing to his great grief, was ill the closing day of the trial. Dragging heavily through an existence that was not life, he was but a wraith of his former self. Waiting patiently, submitting with lifted head to the law’s justice. When he was told of the doom of Cooley, he seemed hardly to hear it, and he made no comment. It seemed now as if little else of life remained and yet occasional incoherent phrases showed the signs of some duty neglected and weighing heavily on the wandering mind.

One morning, Elliott, seeing the longing [Pg 220]visibly reflected on the old man’s countenance, asked:

“What is it, father? Is there anything I can do?” And he laid his face to the withered palm of the outstretched hand. The sick man suddenly seemed to realize that his reason was abandoning him, and he made a supreme effort to collect his ideas and frame them into coherent speech.

“Help me!” he said piteously. Then turning his head toward the window where he could see the grave so lately made for Dorothy, his worn face quivered and the big, slow tears ran down his furrowed cheeks.

“Is it something of her you would say?” Elliott inquired.

But the aged lips made no answer. For [Pg 221]a time Elliott sat beside him, silent. Suddenly the old face lighted. Lifting up his sorrowful eyes, he said:

“It has come, Elliott—my will! I have left everything to you, and, don’t forget Chloe.”

Then once again, the look of blank abstraction spread over his features and he sank into a state of collapse as if the effort to think had exhausted his share of vitality.

Elliott and his neighbors stood by and saw him grow feebler, his breath fainter. The old and eternal Mother Nature was silently slipping her pitying arms around her tired child. Presently the uncomplaining eyes were to be dimmed and the lips silenced forever. And as the end [Pg 222]came, peacefully and quietly, Elliott forgot all—himself, his heartbreak, his wrath, forgot everything in the realization of the peace, the rest now possessing this long tired soul.

The memory of the past swept over him. He recalled all that Dorothy had been to her father from the time when she had first stretched out her baby arms to him, all the little ways by which she had brought back his youth and made his house home, and his heart soft again.

Two days later, all that was mortal of Napoleon Carr lay prone and cold in a new grave. He himself had chosen the spot between the two mounds, over which the grass lay in long windrows above his wife and child.

[Pg 223]

Chloe was faithful to the end and was there when death darkened the eyes of her master.

She was given the home she then lived in and ample provision for its maintenance.

The Carr homestead was closed and Elliott went again to live with his uncle, Mr. Field.

The day set by the court, upon which Ephriam Cooley was to pay the penalty for the crime of which he had been adjudged guilty, was the thirteenth of June.

Long before that time, the colored population had been aroused to a lively interest in their convicted brother. There was a movement on foot to make a fight for his life. The negroes had gained the idea that the evidence of the woman at whose house Cooley had been arrested, and who could not be found to give evidence at the trial, would have cleared him. It was now rumored that she had been located away up in the East Kentucky mountains, where [Pg 225]she had moved the year before. This story flew like thistle-down in the wind. Negro petitions were got up calling for mercy and commutation and were poured in upon the governor from all parts of the state.

Sometimes it was rumored that the governor would commute the sentence to penal servitude for life. Then the rumor was contradicted, and so it went on. The governor had an eye to his own reelection and it was the current belief that he was not averse to doing that which might further the ends of his own ambition.

It was well on in June and up to this time the governor had arrived at no decision, or if he had, had given no indication of it.

Elliott was almost prostrate, the prey of a long drawn agony. This effort to [Pg 226]soften the sentence weighed upon his weak nerves so that the phantom silence of his nights had been peopled by visions. His life became one oppression and a terror, and rest a thing never to be his. Again and again, amid the whirl of memory, he pressed the sad accusing words, “Are you my country’s foe and therefore mine?” upon the inward wound, tasting, cherishing the smart of them.

He no longer had opinions: his opinions had become sympathies.

There had come a day when, in his room alone, he took a pile of manuscript from his desk and looked at it long and hard, then held it to a blaze and watched it burn to a charred tissue on the hearthstone. It was his book.

Tuesday, June the twenty-ninth, was an Eastwind day and it had nearly ended when Elliott Harding met the sheriff and inquired:

“Any news from the governor?”

He shook his head as he answered: “And none likely to come.” Taking out a silver watch he added: “The hanging is set for eleven o’clock to-morrow morning. Umph! This is tough work.”

“I shall breathe more freely to-morrow,” was Elliott’s comment, as he passed on.

A little further down he met John Holmes.

[Pg 228]

“I was just going to your office,” said Holmes almost tenderly.

Being near that place, they locked arms and went silently together. When they were seated, Holmes broke the silence.

“Has any reprieve come yet?” he said abruptly as a man plunges into a critical subject.

“No, I am glad to say!” and the lined face that lifted to the other was worn, the eyes strained and bloodshot.

“Holmes, I have been thinking of my old views. God knows I have had time to think and cause to think! I am appreciating now the problem you of the South could not solve.” His voice grew unsteady.

“Harding, I am sorry for you. You [Pg 229]have suffered greatly. It is useless to attempt to convey in words what the South has long endured, but I believe she is on the point of struggling from beneath the crushing burden that weighs her down. A time will come when our southern governors will order a special term of Superior Court to try speedily a criminal and invariably fix the death penalty for the offense which is largely responsible for lynching. How much graver, deeper, more human now, must seem to you our tragedies and our defense. We would indeed welcome a worthier mode or the day when there will be no such tragedies.”

That night as the sheriff and his family sat in their lighted room, a man outside [Pg 230]kept patient tryst, every fiber of his being directly concerned in the slightest movement or sound.

As the night wore on and no one entered the door, his soul illumined with hope and seemed loosening itself from pain and desire.

Presently there was a sound, a sight that startled him. A messenger was at the door holding a yellow slip. The sheriff came out rubbing his eyes.

“What is it?” he asked sleepily.

“A reprieve! A reprieve!”

Holding it to the lamp in the hall, the sheriff read:

“Sheriff of Scott County, Georgetown, Ky.—Ephriam Cooley’s sentence commuted to life imprisonment. Hurry prisoner to Frankfort. ——, Governor.”

[Pg 231]

The sheriff hastily pencilled an answer and sent the boy speeding back.

“Hitch the horse!” he called to his man.

“Oh my God!” In that supreme cry, hope quivered in its death throb. Elliott Harding received the lance thrust of despair. He stood defenseless: alone with Destiny.

All was done quietly and swiftly. The sleeping town knew nothing of the change.

As the midnight train whistled in the distance, the sheriff with his handcuffed prisoner stepped from behind his sweating horse onto the empty platform. When the iron monster, like a great strong savior came rushing in, the criminal looked as if he could have embraced it. It was a thing of life to him.

One or maybe two drowsy travelers [Pg 232]shook themselves and scrambled to the platform. The sheriff and his man lost no time in seating themselves. The murderer was within a hair’s breadth of safety. The engine was ready to start. Snorting, trembling, as if in frightened pain, she moved off slowly, slowly.

There was a sudden rush and speeding through the darkness; an unkempt figure, running staggeringly as though in exhaustion, leaped to the platform and pursued the moving train. A sudden flash, a sharp report, and Ephriam Cooley fell back dead, shot through the heart.

By the time the train had drawn back to the station, the platform was deserted; only the shrouding mists of blue smoke remained.

THE END.