CHAPTER II
THE RITUAL
"Well, it's a sensation all right, Major," said David as he stood infront of the major's fire early in the morning after the ceremonies ofthe presentation of sketches of the statue out at the Temple of Arts."Mrs. Matilda told me the news and helped me sandwich it into my speechbetween that time and the open-up talk. People had asked so often who wasgiving the statue, laid it on so many different people, and wondered overit to such an extent all fall that they had got tired and forgot thatthey didn't know all about it. When I presented it in the name ofCaroline Darrah Brown in memory of her mother and her grandfather,General Darrah, you could have heard a pin drop for a few seconds, thenthe applause was almost a sob. It was as dramatic a thing as has beenhanded this town in many a day. Still it was a bit sky-rockety, don't youthink--keeping it like that and--"
"David," interrupted the major quickly, "she never intended to tell it.She had done the business part of it through her solicitors. She _never_wanted us to know. I persuaded her to let it be presented in her name,myself, just before Matilda went out with you. She shrinks--"
"Wait a minute, Major, don't get the two sides of my brain crossed. Youpersuaded her--she isn't in town is she?--don't tell me she's hereherself!" And David ruffled his auburn forelock with a gesture ofperplexity.
"Yes," answered the major, "Caroline Darrah Brown is here and is, I hope,going to stay for a time at least. I wanted to tell you about ityesterday but I hadn't seen her and I--"
"And, David dear," interrupted Mrs. Buchanan who had been standing bywith shining eyes waiting for an opening to break in on Kildare'sastonishment with some of the details of her happiness over herdiscovery. "I didn't tell you last night for the major didn't want me to,but she _is_ so lovely! She's your inherited friend, for your mother andhers were devoted to each other. I do want you to love her and everybodyhelp me to make her feel at home. Don't mind about her father beinga--you know a--a carpetbagger. Three of her Darrah grandfathers havebeen governors of this state; just think about them and don't talk abouther father or any carpet--you know. Please be good to her!"
"Be good to her," exclaimed David heartily, "just watch me! I am lovingher already for making you so happy by this down-from-the-sky drop, Mrs.Matilda. And we'll all be careful about the carpetbags; won't evenmention a rug; lots of talk can be got out of the dead governors I'mthinking. My welcome's getting more enthusiastic every moment. When can Ihand it to her?"
"She's resting now and I think she ought to be quiet for to-day, becauseshe has been under a strain," answered Mrs. Buchanan as she glancedtenderly at a closed door across the hall. "Oh, I'm so glad you think youare going to love her in spite of--of--"
"The Brown graft on the Darrah family tree?" finished David quizzically.His eyes danced with delighted amusement across her puffs at the major ashe added, "Must have been silversmiths dangling on most of his ancestralbranches, judging from his propensity for making dollars; a million ortwo, stocks, bonds, any kind of flimflam,--eh, Major?"
"Yes," answered the major as he blew a ring of smoke into the air, "yes,just about that; any kind of flimflam. And I can not conceive of PetersBrown rejoicing at having thirty thousand of those dollars put into an InMemoriam to the women who sniffed at him and his carpetbags for a goodtwenty years after the war. But the child doesn't take any of that in.Those were twenty rich years he put in in reconstructing us, but when hetook those same heavy carpetbags North he took Mary Caroline Darrah, theprettiest woman in the county with him. This girl--as I have said before,isn't love a strange thing? And you say the populace was astonished?"
"Almost to the point of paralyzation," answered David as he filled astray pipe with some of the major's most choice heart-leaf tobacco. "Butwe managed to open up the picture show all right. The entire hive of busyart-bees was there in a queer kind of clothes; but proud of it. Theyacted as if we were dirt under their feet. They smiled on the wholeglad-crowd of us with pity and let us rave over the wrong pictures. Theportrait of Mrs. Peyton Kendrick by the great Susie Carrie Snowis--er--well, a little more of it shows than seems natural about the leftoff arm, but it's a Susie Carrie all right. You ought to have gone,Major, you would take with the art-gang, but we didn't; we were tooafraid of them. After we had been shooed in front of most of the picturesand told how to see things in them that weren't there at all, Hob Caperssaid:
"'Let's all go down to the University Club and get drunk to forget 'em.'That's why Mrs. Matilda came home so late."
"And I want Hobson to be nice to her too," continued Mrs. Buchanan as ifshe had not been interrupted in planning for her guest. "And Tom andPeyton Kendrick. I'll ask them to come and see her right away."
"Don't! Wait a bit, Mrs. Matilda," exclaimed David. "Hob saw a mysteriousgirl in an orchid hat out in the park day before yesterday. He says hisheart creaked with expansion at just the glimpse of a chin he got fromunder her veil. Suppose she's the girl. Let him have first innings."
"David," remarked the major, "flag the sun, moon and stars in theircourses and signal time to reverse a day or a year, but don't try to turnaside a maker of matches from her machinations."
David laughed as the major's wife shook her head at him in gentlereproof, and he asked interestedly:
"When may we come to call, madam? I judge the lady is under your roof?"
"Soon, dear. She is very tired to-day, and I feel sure you will--"
"Miss Matilda," called Tempie from the hall, "Miss Phoebe is holdin' thephone fer you. She's at Mis' Cantrell's and she wants ter speak with youright away."
"Wait, wait, don't answer her right now--ring her off, Tempie! If she hastrouble getting you, Mrs. Matilda, and you keep her talking I can catchher. Let me get a good start and then answer. Good-by! Keep talking toher!" And with determination in his eyes David took his hurrieddeparture.
"Good-by, good luck--and good hunting!" called the major after him.
And with the greatest skilfulness Mrs. Buchanan held Phoebe in hand forenough minutes to insure David's capture before she returned to thelibrary.
"Major," she said as she rubbed her cheek against his velvet coat sleeve,"why do you suppose Phoebe doesn't love David? I can't understand it."
"Matilda," answered the major as he blew a little curl over one of thesoft puffs of her white hair, "you were born in a day when women were allrun into a love-mold. They are poured into other assorted fancy shapes inthese times, but heat from the right source melts them all the same. Wecan trust David's ardor, I think."
"Yes, I believe you are right," she answered judicially, "and Phoebeinherits lovingness from her mother. I feel that she is more affectionatethan she shows, and I just go on and love her anyway. She lets me do itvery often."
And from the depth of her unsophisticated heart Mrs. Buchanan had evolveda course of action that had gone far in comforting a number of the lonelyyears through which Phoebe Donelson had waded. She had been young, andhigh-spirited and intensely proud when she had begun to fight her ownbattles in her sixteenth year. Many loving hands of her mother's andfather's old friends had been held out to her with a bounty ofprotection, but she had gone her course and carved her own fortune. Hersocial position had made things easy for her in a way and now her societyeditorship of the leading journal had become a position from which shewielded much power over the gay world that delighted in her wit andbeauty, took her autocratic dictums in most cases, and followed her voguealmost absolutely.
Her independence prompted her to live alone in a smart down-townapartment with her old negro mammy, but her affections demanded that shetake refuge at all times under the sheltering wings of Mrs. Buchanan, whokept a dainty nest always in readiness for her.
The tumultuous wooing of David Kildare had been going on since her earlyteens under the delighted eyes of the major, who in turn both furtheredand hindered the suit by his extremely philosophical advice.
Phoebe was the crystallization of an infusion of the blood of manycultured, high-bred, haughty women which had
been melted in the retort ofa stern necessity and had come out a rather brilliant specimen of themodern woman, if a bit hard. Viewed in some ways she became an alarmingaugury of the future, but there are always potent counter-forces at workin life's laboratory, and the kind of forces that David Kildare broughtto bear in his wooing were never exactly to be calculated upon. And sothe major spent much time in the contemplation of the problem presented.
And when she had come in after a late lunch to call upon their guest, ithad been intensely interesting to the major to regard the effect of themeeting of Phoebe's and Caroline Darrah's personalities. Caroline'slovely, shy child's eyes had melted with delight under Phoebe's straight,gray, friendly glances and her fascination for the tall, strong, radiantwoman, who sat beside her, had been so obvious that the major hadchuckled to himself under his breath as he watched them make friends,under Mrs. Matilda's poorly concealed anxiety that they should at onceadopt cordial relations.
"And so he consented to undertake the commission for you because he wasinterested?" Phoebe was asking as they talked about the sketches of thestatue. A very great sculptor was doing the work for Caroline DarrahBrown, and it interested Phoebe to hear how he had consented to accept sounimportant a commission.
"Yes," answered Caroline in her exquisite voice which showed only thefaintest liquid trace of her southern inheritance. "I told him all aboutit and he became interested. He is very great, and simple, and kind. Hemade it easy to show him how I felt. I couldn't tell him much excepthow I felt; but I think it has something of--that--in--it. Don't youthink so?" As she spoke she laid her white hand on the arm of Phoebe'schair and leaned forward with her dewy tender eyes looking straight intothe gray ones opposite her.
For a moment Phoebe returned the glance with a quiet seriousness, thenher eyes lighted a second, were suffused with a quick moisture, and witha proud gesture she bent forward, laying both hands on Caroline'sshoulders as she pressed a deep kiss on the girl's red lips.
"I do think so," she answered with a low laugh as she arose to her feet,drew Caroline up into the bend of her arm and faced Mrs. Buchanan and themajor. "I know the loveliness in the statue is what the great man got outof the loveliness in your heart, and the major and Mrs. Matilda think so,too. And I'm going quick because I must; and I'm coming back as soon as Ican because I'm going to find you here--that is _partly_, Major," andbefore they could stop her she had gone on down the hall and they heardher answer Jeff's farewell as he let her out the door.
"That, Caroline Darrah Brown, was your first and most importantconquest," observed the major. "Phoebe has a white rock heart but acrystal cracked therefrom is apt to turn into a jewel of price. Hersis a blood-ruby friendship that pays for the wearing and cherishing. Butit's time for the nap Mrs. Matilda decides for me to take and I mustleave you ladies to your dimity talk." With which he betook himself tohis room, still plainly pleased at the result of Phoebe's call on thestranger.
The two women thus left to their own devices spent a delightful half-hourwandering over the house and discussing its furnishings and arrangements.Mrs. Buchanan never tired of the delights of her town home. The house wasvery stately and old-world, with its treasures of rare ancestral rosewoodand mahogany that she had brought in from the Seven Oaks Plantation. Therooms in the country home had been so crowded with treasures of bygonegenerations that they were scarcely dismantled by the furnishing ofthe town house.
She was in her glory of domesticity, and as she passed from one room toanother she told Caroline bits of interesting history about this piece orthat. In her naivet? she let the girl see into the long hard years thathad been a hand-to-hand struggle for her and the major on their wornfarm lands out in the beautiful Harpeth Valley.
The cropping out of phosphate on the bare fields had brought acomfortable fortune in its train to the old soldier farmer and they hadmoved into this town house to spend the winter in greater accessibilityto their friends. Her own particular little world had welcomed her withdelight, and Caroline could see that she was taking a second bellehood asif it had been an uninterrupted reign.
Most of the financiers of the city were the major's old friends and theymanaged enormously advantageous contracts with mining companies for him,and had taken him into the schemes of the mighty with the most manifestcordiality.
His study became the scene of much important plot and counter-plot. Theyfound in his mind the quality which had led them to outwit many an enemywhen he scouted ahead of their tattered regiment, still available whenthe enemy appeared under commercial or civic front. Also it naturallyhappened that his library gradually became the hunting-grounds for Mrs.Matilda's young people, who were irresistibly drawn into the circle ofhis ever ready sympathy.
The whole tale and its telling was absorbingly interesting to CarolineDarrah Brown and she listened with enraptured attention to it all. Sherepeated carefully the names of her mother's friends as they came up inthe conversation; and she was pathetically eager to know all about thisworld she had come back into, from, what already seemed to her, her birthin a strange land. Two days in this country of her mother, and theenchantment of traditions that had been given to her unborn was alreadyat work with its spell!
And so they rambled around and talked, unheeding the time until the earlytwilight began to fall and Mrs. Buchanan was summoned by Jeff to aconsultation in the domestic regions with the autocratic Tempie.
Left to herself, Caroline Darrah wandered back again through the roomsfrom one object to another that inspired the stories. It was likefairy-land to her and she was in a long dream of pleasure. Out of theshadows she seemed to be drawing her wistful young mother, and hand inhand they were going over the past together.
When it was quite deep into the twilight she sauntered back to thecrackling comfort of the major's fragrant logs. A discussion with Jeffover his toilet had delayed the major in his bedroom and she found thelibrary deserted, but hospitable with firelight.
How long she had been musing and castle-building in the coals shescarcely knew, when a step on the polished floor made her look up, andwith a little exclamation she rose to her full, slim, young height andturned to face a man who had come in with the unannounced surety of amember of the household. He was tall, broad and dark, and hisknickerbockers were splashed with mud and covered with clinging burrs andpine-needles. One arm was lashed to his side with a silk sling and heheld a huge bunch of glowing red berries in his free hand. They werebranches of the red, coral-strung buck bushes and Caroline had never seenthem before. Their gorgeousness fairly took her breath and she exclaimedwith the ingenuous delight of a child.
"How lovely, how lovely!" she cried as she stretched out her hands forthem. "I never saw any before. Do they grow here?"
"Yes," answered the man with a gleam of amusement in his dark eyes, "yes,they came from Seven Oaks. The fields are full of them now. Do you wantthem?" And as he spoke he laid the bunch in her arms.
"And they smell woodsy and piny and delicious. Thank you! I--they arelovely. I--" She paused in wild confusion, looked around the room as ifin search of some one, and ended by burying her face in the berries. "Idon't know where Major Buchanan is," she murmured helplessly.
"Well, it doesn't matter," he said with a comforting smile as he came upbeside her on the rug. "They'll introduce us when they come. I'm AndrewSevier and the berries are yours, so what matter?"
"Oh," said Caroline Darrah in an awed voice, and as she spoke she raisedher head from the wood flowers and her eyes to his face, "oh, are youreally Andrew Sevier?"
"Yes, _really_," he answered with another smile and a slightly puzzledexpression in his own dark eyes.
"But I read everything I can find about you, and the papers say you areill in Panama. I've been so worried about you. I saw your play last weekin New York and I couldn't enjoy it for wondering how you were. Iwouldn't read your poem in this month's _Review_ because I was afraid youwere dead--and I didn't know it. I'm so relieved." With which astonishingremark she drew a deep breath and laid her
cheek against the fieldbouquet.
"I am--that is I was smashed up in Panama until David came down andbrought me home. It was awfully good of you to--to know that I--thatI--" Andrew Sevier paused as mirth, wonder and gratitude spread inconfusion over his suntanned face.
"How did it happen? Was it very dreadful?" And again those distractinglysolicitous eyes, full of sympathetic anxiety, were raised to his. Andrewshook himself mentally to see if it could possibly be a dream he washaving, and a little thrill shot through him at the reality of it all.
"Nothing interesting; end of a bridge collapsed and put a rib or two outof commission," he managed to answer.
"I _knew_ it was something dreadful," said Caroline Darrah Brown as shemoved a step nearer him. "I was really unhappy about it and I wondered ifall the other people who read your poems and watch for them and--and lovethem like I do, were worried, too. But I concluded that they would knowhow to find out about you; only I didn't. I'm glad you are here safe andthat I know it."
The puzzled expression in Andrew Sevier's face deepened. Of course he hadbecome more or less accustomed to the interest which his work had causedto be attached to his personality, and this was not the first time he hadhad a stranger read the poet into the man on first sight. They had evengone so far as to expect him to talk in blank verse he felt sure,especially when his admirer had been a member of the opposite and fairsex, but a thing like this had never happened to him before. It was, atthe least, disturbing to have a lovely woman rise out of the major's veryhearthstone and claim him as a familiar spirit with the exquisitefrankness of a child. It smacked of the wine of wizardry. He glanced ather a moment and was on the point of making a tentative inquiry when themajor came into the room.
"Well, Andy boy, you're in from the fields, I see. How's the farm? Everything shipshape?" As he spoke the major shot a keen glance from under hisbeetling old brows at the pair and wisely let the situation developitself.
Andrew answered his salutation promptly, then turned an amused glanceon the girl at his side.
"He isn't going to introduce us," she laughed with a friendly little lookup into his face. "I ought to have done it myself when you did, but I wasso astonished--and relieved to find you. I'm Caroline Darrah Brown."
The words were low and laughing and warm with a sweet friendliness, butthey crashed through the room like the breath of a swarm of furies.Andrew Sevier's face went white and drawn on the instant, and everymuscle in his body stiffened to a tense rigidity. His dark eyes narrowedthemselves to slits and glowed like the coals.
The major's very blood stopped in his veins and his fine old face lookeddrawn and gray as he stretched out his hand and laid it on Caroline'syoung shoulder. Not a word came to his lips as he looked in Andrew'sface and waited.
And as he waited a wondrous thing and piercing sweet unfolded itselfunder his keen old eyes and sank like a balm into his wise old heart.From the two deep purple pools of womanhood that were raised to his, shywith homage of him and unconscious of their own tender reverencing,Andrew Sevier drew a deep draught into his very soul. Slowly the colormounted into his face, his eyes opened themselves and a wonderful smilecurled his lips. He held out his hand and took her slender fingers into astrong clasp and held them for a long moment. Then with a smile at themajor, which was a mixture of dignity tinged with an infinite sadness, hebent over and gently kissed the white hand as he let it go. The littleceremony had more chivalry than she understood.
"Its part of our ritual of welcome I'm claiming," he said lightly as sheblushed rose pink and the divine shyness deepened in her eyes. She againburied her face in the berries.
Then with a proud look into Andrew's face the major laid his hand on theyoung man's bandaged arm and bent and raised Caroline's hand to his lips.
"It's a ritual, my dear," he said, "that I'm honored in observing withhim. Friendship these days has need of rituals of ratification and thepomp of ceremonials to give it color. There's danger of its becomingprosaic. Jefferson, turn on the lights."
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