Sons and Fathers
Page 30
CHAPTER XXX.
THE RAINBOW IN THE MIST.
Mary had lighted his room and handed him the lamp; "sweet sleep andpleasant dreams," she had said, gravely bowing to him as she withdrew--afamily custom, as he had afterward learned. But the sleep was not sweetnor the dreams pleasant. Excited and disturbed he dozed away the hoursand was glad when the plantation bell rang its early summons. He dressedand made his way to the veranda, whence he wandered over the flowergarden, intercepting the colonel, who was about to take his morning lookabout. Courteously leaving his horse at the gate that gentleman went onfoot with him. It was Edward's first experience on a plantation and heviewed with lively interest the beginning of the day's labor. Cotton wasopening and numbers of negroes, old and young, were assembling withbaskets and sacks or moving out with a show of industry, for, as it wasexplained to him, it is easy to get them early started in cotton-pickingtime, as the work is done by the hundred pounds and the morning dewcounts for a great deal. "Many people deduct for that," said Montjoy,"but I prefer not to. Lazy and trifling as he is, the negro is butpoorly paid."
"But," said Edward, laughing, "you do not sell the dew, I suppose?"
"No. Generally it evaporates, but if it does not the warehouse deductsfor it."
"I noticed at one place on the way south that the people were usingwheel implements, do you not find them profitable?" The colonel pointedto a shed under which were a number of cultivators, revolving plows,mowing machines and a dirt turner. "I do not, the negro cannot keepawake on the cultivator and the points get into the furrows and so throwout the cotton and corn that they were supposed to cultivate. Somehowthey never could learn to use the levers at the right place, with therevolving plow, and they wear its axle off. They did no better with themower; they seemed to have an idea that it would cut anything fromblades of grass up to a pine stump, and it wouldn't."
"The disk harrow," he continued laughingly, "was broken in a curiousway. I sent a hand out to harrow in some peas. He rode along all rightto the field and then deliberately wedged the disks to keep them fromrevolving, not understanding the principle. I sometimes think that theyare a little jealous of these machines and do not want them to workwell."
"You seem to have a great many old negroes."
"Too many; too many," he said, sadly; "but what can be done? Thesepeople have been with me all my life and I can't turn them adrift intheir old age. And the men seem bent upon keeping married," he added,good-naturedly. "When the old wives die they get new and young ones, andthen comes extravagant living again."
"And you have them all to support?"
"Of course. The men do a little chopping and cotton-picking, but notenough to pay for the living of themselves and families. What is it,Nancy?"
"Pa says please send him some meal and meat. He ain't had er mouthful infour days." The speaker was a little negro girl. "Go, see your youngmistress. That is a specimen," said the old gentleman, half-laughing,half-frowning. "Four days! He would have been dead the second! Oursystem does not suit the new order of things. It seems to me the maintrouble is in the currency. Our values have all been upset bylegislation. Silver ought never have been demonetized; it was fatal,sir. And then the tariff."
"Is not overproduction a factor, Colonel? I read that your last crops ofcotton were enormous."
"Possibly so, but the world has to have cotton, and an organizationwould make it buy at our own prices. There are enormous variations, ofcourse, we can't figure in advance, and whenever a low price rules, thecountry is broke. The result is the loan associations and cotton factorsare about to own us."
The two men returned to find Mary with the pigeons upon her shouldersand a flock of poultry begging at her feet.
"You are going with me to the general's," he said, pleadingly, as hestood by her. She shook her head.
"I suppose not this time; mamma needs me." But at the breakfast table,when he renewed the subject, that lady from her little side table saidpromptly: "Yes." Mary needed the exercise and diversion, and then therewas a little mending to be done for the old general. He always saved itfor her. It was his whim.
So they started in Edward's buggy, riding in silence until he saidabruptly:
"I am persevering, Miss Montjoy, as you will some day find out, and I amcounting upon your help."
"In what?" She was puzzled by his manner.
"In getting Moreau in Paris to look into the little mamma's eyes." Shereflected a moment.
"But Dr. Campbell is coming."
"It is through him I going to accomplish my purpose; he must send her toParis."
"But," she said, sadly, "we can't afford it. Norton could arrange it,but papa would not be willing to incur such a debt for him."
"His son--her son!" Edward showed his surprise very plainly.
"You do not understand. Norton has a family; neither papa nor mammawould borrow from him, although he would be glad to do anything in theworld he could. And there is Annie----" she stopped. Edward saw thedifficulty.
"Would your father accept a loan from me?" She flushed painfully.
"I think not, Mr. Morgan. He could hardly borrow money of his guest."
"But I will not be his guest, and it will be a simple businesstransaction. Will you help me?" She was silent.
"It is very hard, very hard," she said, and tears stood in her eyes."Hard to have mamma's chances hang upon such a necessity."
"Supposing I go to your father and say: 'This thing is necessary andmust be done. I have money to invest at 5 per cent. and am going toParis. If you will secure me with a mortgage upon this place for thenecessary amount I will pay all expenses and take charge of your wifeand daughter.' Would it offend him?"
"He could not be offended by such generosity, but it would distresshim--the necessity."
"That should not count in the matter," he said, gravely. "He is alreadydistressed. And what is all this to a woman's eyesight?"
"How am I to help?" she asked after a while.
"The objection will be chiefly upon your account, I am afraid," he said,after reflection. "You will have to waive everything and second myefforts. That will settle it." She did not promise, but seemed lost inthought. When she spoke again it was upon other things.
"Ah, truant!" cried the general, seeing her ascending the steps andcoming forward, "here you are at last. How are you, Morgan? Sit down,both of you. Mary," he said, looking at her sternly, "if you neglect methis way again I shall go off and marry a grass widow. Do you hear me,miss? Look at this collar." He pointed dramatically to the offendingarticle; one of the Byronic affairs, to which the old south clingsaffectionately, and which as affectionately clings to the garment it issupposed to adorn, since it is a part of it. "I have buttoned that notless than a dozen times to-day." She laughed and, going in, presentlyreturned with thread and needle and sitting upon his knee restored thebuttonhole to its proper size. Then she surveyed him a moment.
"Why haven't you been over to see us?"
"Because----"
"You will have to give the grass widow a better excuse than that. 'Tis awoman's answer. But here is Mr. Morgan, come to see if he can catch thetune your waterfall plays--if you have no objection." Edward explainedthe situation.
"Go with him, Mary. I think the waterfall plays a better tune to a manwhen there is a pretty girl around." She playfully stopped his mouth andthen darted into the house.
"General," said Edward, earnestly, "I have not written to you. Ipreferred to come in person to express anew my thanks and appreciationof your kindness in my recent trial. The time may come--"
"Nonsense, my boy; we take these things for granted here in the south.If you are indebted to anybody it is to the messenger who brought me thenews of your predicament, put me on horseback and sent me hurrying offin the night to town for the first time in twenty years."
"And who could have done that?" Edward asked, overwhelmed with emotion."From whom?"
"From nobody. She summed up the situation, got behind the little mareand came over
here in the night. Morgan, that is the rarest girl inGeorgia. Take care, sir; take care, sir." He was getting himselfindignant over some contingency when the object of his eulogiumappeared.
"Now, General, you are telling tales on me."
"Am I? Ask Morgan. I'd swear on a stack of Bibles as high as yonder pineI have not mentioned your name."
"Well, it is a wonder. Come on, Mr. Morgan."
The old man watched them as they picked their way through the hedge andconcluded his interrupted remark: "If you break that loyal heart--if youbring a tear to those brown eyes, you will meet a different man fromRoyson." But he drove the thought away while he looked affectionatelyafter the pair.
Down came the little stream, with an emphasis and noise disproportionedto its size, the cause being, as Edward guessed, the distance of thefall and the fact that the rock on which it struck was not a solidfoundation, but rested above a cavity. Mary waited while he listened,turning away to pluck a flower and to catch in the falling mist thecolors of the rainbow. But as Edward stood, over him came a flood ofthoughts; for the air was full of a weird melody, the overtone of onegreat chord that thrilled him to the heart. As in a dream he saw herstanding there, the blue skies and towering trees above her, a bit oflight in a desert of solitude. Near, but separated from him by aninfinite gulf. "Forever! Forever!" all else was blotted out.
She saw on his face the white desperation she had noticed once before.
"You have found it," she said. "What is the tone?"
"Despair," he answered, sadly. "It can mean nothing else."
"And yet," she said, a new thought animating her mobile face, as shepointed into the mist above, "over it hangs the rainbow."