The Crisis — Complete

by Winston Churchill

  CHAPTER IV. THE LIST OF SIXTY

  One chilling day in November, when an icy rain was falling on the blackmud of the streets, Virginia looked out of the window. Her eye wascaught by two horses which were just skeletons with the skin stretchedover them. One had a bad sore on his flank, and was lame. They werepulling a rattle-trap farm wagon with a buckled wheel. On the seat aman, pallid and bent and scantily clad, was holding the reins in hisfeeble hands, while beside him cowered a child of ten wrapped in aragged blanket. In the body of the wagon, lying on a mattress presseddown in the midst of broken, cheap furniture and filthy kitchen ware,lay a gaunt woman in the rain. Her eyes were closed, and a hump on thesurface of the dirty quilt beside her showed that a child must be there.From such a picture the girl fled in tears. But the sight of it, and ofothers like it, haunted her for weeks. Through those last dreary days ofNovember, wretched families, which a year since had been in health andprosperity, came to the city, beggars, with the wrecks of their homes.The history of that hideous pilgrimage across a state has never beenwritten. Still they came by the hundred, those families. Some broughtlittle corpses to be buried. The father of one, hale and strong whenthey started, died of pneumonia in the public lodging-house. The wallsof that house could tell many tales to wring the heart. So could Mr.Brinsmade, did he choose to speak of his own charities. He foundtime, between his labors at the big hospital newly founded, and hiscorrespondence, and his journeys of love,--between early morning andmidnight,--to give some hours a day to the refugees.

  Throughout December they poured in on the afflicted city, alreadyovertaxed. All the way to Springfield the road was lined with remainsof articles once dear--a child's doll, a little rocking-chair, a coloredprint that has hung in the best room, a Bible text.

  Anne Brinsmade, driven by Nicodemus, went from house to house to solicitold clothes, and take them to the crowded place of detention. Christmaswas drawing near--a sorry Christmas, in truth. And many of the wandererswere unclothed and unfed.

  More battles had been fought; factions had arisen among Union men.Another general had come to St. Louis to take charge of the Department,and the other with his wondrous body-guard was gone.

  The most serious problem confronting the new general--was how to carefor the refugees. A council of citizens was called at headquarters, andthe verdict went forth in the never-to-be-forgotten Orders No. 24.

  "Inasmuch," said the General, "as the Secession army had driven thesepeople from their homes, Secession sympathizers should be made tosupport them." He added that the city was unquestionably full of these.

  Indignation was rife the day that order was published. Sixty prominent"disloyalists" were to be chosen and assessed to make up a sum of tenthousand dollars.

  "They may sell my house over my head before I will pay a cent," criedMr. Russell. And he meant it. This was the way the others felt. Who wereto be on this mysterious list of "Sixty"? That was the all-absorbingquestion of the town. It was an easy matter to pick the conspicuousones. Colonel Carvel was sure to be there, and Mr. Catherwood and Mr.Russell and Mr. James, and Mr. Worington the lawyer. Mrs. Addison Colfaxlived for days in a fermented state of excitement which she declaredwould break her down; and which, despite her many cares and worries,gave her niece not a little amusement. For Virginia was human, and onemorning she went to her aunt's room to read this editorial from thenewspaper:-- "For the relief of many palpitating hearts it may be wellto state that we understand only two ladies are on the ten thousanddollar list."

  "Jinny," she cried, "how can you be so cruel as to read me that, whenyou know that I am in a state of frenzy now? How does that relieve me?It makes it an absolute certainty that Madame Jules and I will have topay. We are the only women of importance in the city."

  That afternoon she made good her much-uttered threat, and drove toBellegarde. Only the Colonel and Virginia and Mammy Easter and Ned wereleft in the big house. Rosetta and Uncle Ben and Jackson had beenhired out, and the horses sold,--all save old Dick, who was running,long-haired, in the fields at Glencoe.

  Christmas eve was a steel-gray day, and the sleet froze as it fell.Since morning Colonel Carvel had sat poking the sitting-room fire, orpacing the floor restlessly. His occupation was gone. He was observednight and day by Federal detectives. Virginia strove to amuse him, toconceal her anxiety as she watched him. Well she knew that but for herhe would long since have fled southward, and often in the bitterness ofthe night-time she blamed herself for not telling him to go. Ten yearshad seemed to pass over him since the war had begun.

  All day long she had been striving to put away from her the memory ofChristmas eves past and gone of her father's early home-coming from thestore, a mysterious smile on his face; of Captain Lige stamping noisilyinto the house, exchanging uproarious jests with Ned and Jackson. TheCaptain had always carried under his arm a shapeless bundle which hewould confide to Ned with a knowing wink. And then the house would belighted from top to bottom, and Mr. Russell and Mr. Catherwood and Mr.Brinsmade came in for a long evening with Mr. Carvel over great bowls ofapple toddy and egg-nog. And Virginia would have her own friends in thebig parlor. That parlor was shut up now, and icy cold.

  Then there was Judge Whipple, the joyous event of whose year was hisChristmas dinner at Colonel Carvel's house. Virginia pictured him thisyear at Mrs. Brice's little table, and wondered whether he would missthem as much as they missed him. War may break friendships, but itcannot take away the sacredness of memories.

  The sombre daylight was drawing to an early close as the two stoodlooking out of the sitting-room window. A man's figure muffled ina greatcoat slanting carefully across the street caught their eyes.Virginia started. It was the same United States deputy marshal she hadseen the day before at Mr. Russell's house.

  "Pa," she cried, "do you think he is coming here?"

  "I reckon so, honey."

  "The brute! Are you going to pay?"

  "No, Jinny."

  "Then they will take away the furniture."

  "I reckon they will."

  "Pa, you must promise me to take down the mahogany bed in your room.It--it was mother's. I could not bear to see them take that. Let me putit in the garret."

  The Colonel was distressed, but he spoke without a tremor.

  "No, Jinny. We must leave this house just as it is." Then he added,strangely enough for him, "God's will be done."

  The bell rang sharply. And Ned, who was cook and housemaid, came in withhis apron on.

  "Does you want to see folks, Marse Comyn?"

  The Colonel rose, and went to the door himself. He was an imposingfigure as he stood in the windy vestibule, confronting the deputy.Virginia's first impulse was to shrink under the stairs. Then she cameout and stood beside her father.

  "Are you Colonel Carvel?"

  "I reckon I am. Will you come in?"

  The officer took off his cap. He was a young man with a smooth face, anda frank brown eye which paid its tribute to Virginia. He did not appearto relish the duty thrust upon him. He fumbled in his coat and drew fromhis inner pocket a paper.

  "Colonel Carvel," said he, "by order of Major General Halleck, I serveyou with this notice to pay the sum of three hundred and fifty dollarsfor the benefit of the destitute families which the Rebels have drivenfrom their homes. In default of payment within a reasonable time suchpersonal articles will be seized and sold at public auction as willsatisfy the demand against you."

  The Colonel took the paper. "Very well, sir," he said. "You may tell theGeneral that the articles may be seized. That I will not, while in myright mind, be forced to support persons who have no claim upon me."

  It was said in the tone in which he might have refused an invitation todinner. The deputy marvelled. He had gone into many houses that week;had seen indignation, hysterics, frenzy. He had even heard men and womenwhose sons and brothers were in the army of secession proclaim theirloyalty to the Union. But this dignity, and the quiet scorn of the girlwho had stood silent beside them, were new. He bowed, and c
asting hiseyes to the vestibule, was glad to escape from the house.

  The Colonel shut the door. Then he turned toward Virginia, thoughtfullypulled his goatee, and laughed gently. "Lordy, we haven't got threehundred and fifty dollars to our names," said he.

  The climate of St. Louis is capricious. That fierce valley of theMissouri, which belches fitful blizzards from December to March, issometimes quiet. Then the hot winds come up from the Gulf, and sleetmelts, and windows are opened. In those days the streets will be fetlockdeep in soft mud. It is neither summer, nor winter, nor spring, noranything.

  It was such a languorous afternoon in January that a furniture van,accompanied by certain nondescript persons known as United StatesPolice, pulled up at the curb in front of Mr. Carvel's house. Eugenie,watching at the window across the street, ran to tell her father, whocame out on his steps and reviled the van with all the fluency of hisFrench ancestors.

  Mammy Easter opened the door, and then stood with her arms akimbo, amplyfilling its place. Her lips protruded, and an expression of defiancehard to describe sat on her honest black face.

  "Is this Colonel Carvel's house?"

  "Yassir. I 'low you knows dat jes as well as me." An embarrassedsilence, and then from Mammy, "Whaffor you laffin at?"

  "Is the Colonel at home?"

  "Now I reckon you knows dat he ain't. Ef he was, you ain't come here'quirin' in dat honey voice." (Raising her own voice.) "You tink Idunno whaffor you come? You done come heah to rifle, an' to loot, an'to steal, an' to seize what ain't your'n. You come heah when young Marseain't to home ter rob him." (Still louder.) "Ned, whaffor you hidin'yonder? Ef yo' ain't man to protect Marse Comyn's prop-ty, jes han' overMarse Comyn's gun."

  The marshal and his men had stood, half amused, more than half baffledby this unexpected resistance. Mammy Easter looked so dangerous that itwas evident she was not to be passed without extreme bodily discomfort.

  "Is your mistress here?"

  This question was unfortunate in the extreme.

  "You--you white trash!" cried Mammy, bursting with indignation. "Who isyou to come heah 'quiring fo' her! I ain't agwine--"

  "Mammy!"

  "Yas'm! Yas, Miss Jinny." Mammy backed out of the door and clutched ather bandanna.

  "Mammy, what is all this noise about?" The torrent was loosed once more.

  "These heah men, Miss Jinny, was gwine f'r t' carry away all yo' pa'sblongin's. I jes' tol' 'em dey ain't comin' in ovah dis heah body."

  The deputy had his foot on the threshold. He caught sight of the face ofMiss Carvel within, and stopped abruptly.

  "I have a warrant here from the Provost Marshal, ma'am, to seizepersonal property to satisfy a claim against Colonel Carvel."

  Virginia took the order, read it, and handed it back. "I do not see howI am to prevent you," she said. The deputy was plainly abashed.

  "I'm sorry, Miss. I--I can't tell you how sorry I am. But it's got to bedone."

  Virginia nodded coldly. And still the man hesitated. "What are youwaiting for?" she said.

  The deputy wiped his muddy feet. He made his men do likewise. Then heentered the chill drawing-room, threw open the blinds and glanced aroundhim.

  "I expect all that we want is right here," he said. And at the sight ofthe great chandelier, with its cut-glass crystals, he whistled. Then hewalked over to the big English Rothfield piano and lifted the lid.

  The man was a musician. Involuntarily he rested himself on the mahoganystool, and ran his fingers over the keys. They seemed to Virginia,standing motionless in the ball, to give out the very chords of agony.

  The piano, too, had been her mother's. It had once stood in the brickhouse of her grandfather Colfax at Halcyondale. The songs of Beatricelay on the bottom shelf of the what-not near by. No more, of an eveningwhen they were alone, would Virginia quietly take them out and playthem over to the Colonel, as he sat dreaming in the window with hiscigar,--dreaming of a field on the borders of a wood, of a young girlwho held his hand, and sang them softly to herself as she walked by hisside. And, when they reached the house in the October twilight, she hadplayed them for him on this piano. Often he had told Virginia of thosedays, and walked with her over those paths.

  The deputy closed the lid, and sent out to the van for a truck. Virginiastirred. For the first time she heard the words of Mammy Easter.

  "Come along upstairs wid yo' Mammy, honey. Dis ain't no place for us,I reckon." Her words were the essence of endearment. And yet, while shepronounced them, she glared unceasingly at the intruders. "Oh, de goodLawd'll burn de wicked!"

  The men were removing the carved legs. Virginia went back into the roomand stood before the deputy.

  "Isn't there something else you could take? Some jewellery?" Sheflushed. "I have a necklace--"

  "No, miss. This warrant's on your father. And there ain't nothing quiteso salable as pianos."

  She watched them, dry-eyed, as they carried it away. It seemed like acoffin. Only Mammy Easter guessed at the pain in Virginia's breast, andthat was because there was a pain in her own. They took the rosewoodwhat-not, but Virginia snatched the songs before the men couldtouch them, and held them in her arms. They seized the mahoganyvelvet-bottomed chairs, her uncle's wedding present to her mother; and,last of all, they ruthlessly tore up the Brussels carpet, beginning nearthe spot where Clarence had spilled ice-cream at one of her children'sparties.

  She could not bear to look into the dismantled room when they had gone.It was the embodied wreck of her happiness. Ned closed the blinds oncemore, and she herself turned the key in the lock, and went slowly up thestairs.