Red Rock: A Chronicle of Reconstruction

by Thomas Nelson Page

  CHAPTER III

  THE VISITORS START SOUTH AGAIN; AND THEIR FORMER HOSTS GO TO MEET THEM

  Both Larry Middleton and Mr. Welch were to visit Red Rock again; butunder circumstances little anticipated by anyone at the time theinvitation to return was given.

  When Middleton came of age he turned over the manufacturing businesshe had inherited, to the family’s agent, Mr. Bolter, and, on leavingcollege, accepted the invitation of his cousin, Mr. Welch, to go inhis law-office. He made only one condition: that the same invitationshould be extended to his college chum, Reely Thurston, whom Middletondescribed to Mr. Welch as “at once the roundest and squarest fellow”in his class. This was enough for Mr. Welch, and within a few monthsthe two young men were at adjoining desks, professing to practise lawand really practising whatever other young gentlemen of their age andkind are given to doing: a combination of loafing, working, and airingthemselves for the benefit of the rest of mankind, particularly of thatportion that wears bonnets and petticoats.

  Both Mr. and Mrs. Welch were glad to have Middleton with them; forMrs. Welch was fond of him as a near relation, and one who in personalappearance and address was a worthy representative of the old stockfrom which they had both come. And she had this further reason forwishing to have Middleton near her: that she had long observed histendency to be affected unduly, as she termed it, by his surroundings,and she meant to counteract this defect of character by her personalinfluence.

  It was enough for Mrs. Welch to see a defect of any kind to wish tocorrect it, and her wish was usually but a step in advance of heraction. One might see this in the broad brow above which the hair wasbrushed so very smoothly; in the deep gray eyes; in the firm mouthwith its fine, even teeth; in the strong chin, almost too strong fora woman; and especially, in the set of her head, and the absolutestraightness of her back. She was at heart a missionary: one of thoseintrepid and unbending spirits who have carried their principlesthrough the world by the sheer energy of their belief. She would nomore have bowed in the house of Rimmon than she would have committedtheft. If she had lived in Rome, she would have died before takinga pinch of incense for Diana, unless, indeed, she had been on theother side, when she would have fed the lions with fervor. If she hadbeen in Spain on Torquemada’s side, she could have sung Te Deums atan _auto-da-fé_. As someone said of her, she would have burned likea candle. The only difficulty was that she wanted others to burntoo—which they were not always so ready to do. As a girl, she had beenon the eve of going out as missionary to the Sandwich Islands, when sheheard the splendid oratory of one of the new apostles of abolitionism,one evening in company with Mr. Welch, then a young engineer, when herphilanthropical direction changed from West to South, and she devotedherself thenceforth to the cause of the negroes—and of the youngengineer.

  She had great hopes of Lawrence Middleton and deplored the influenceon him of the young man whom he had chosen at college as his especialfriend; and she grieved over the effect that his visit South, alreadydescribed, had on him. He had come home much impressed by the charmof the life there. Indeed, he had become actually an apologist forSlavery. But Mrs. Welch did not despair. She never despaired. Itimplied weakness, and so, sin. She was urgent to have Larry Middletonaccept her husband’s proposal to take a place in his office, and thoughshe would have preferred to separate him from young Thurston, as towhom she had misgivings, yet when he made this condition she yielded;for it brought Middleton where she could influence him, and had, atleast, this advantage: that it gave her two persons to work on insteadof one.

  When her daughter, Ruth Welch, a young Miss with sparkling eyes, camehome in her vacations, it was natural that she should be thrown a greatdeal with her cousin, and the only singular thing was that Mrs. Welchappeared inclined to minimize the importance of the relationship. This,however, made little difference to the gay, fun-loving girl, who,enjoying her emancipation from school, tyrannized over the two youngsprigs of the Law to her heart’s content. She soon reduced Thurstonto a condition of abject slavery which might well have called forththe intervention of so ardent an emancipator as her mother, and did,indeed, excite some solicitude in her maternal bosom. Mrs. Welch wasbeginning to be very anxious about him when events, suddenly crowdingon each other, gave her something widely different to think of, andunexpectedly relieved her from this cause of care to give her othersfar weightier.

  Both the young men had become politicians. Middleton was a Whig, thoughhe admitted he did not see how Slavery could be interfered with; whileThurston announced tenets of the opposite party, particularly when Mrs.Welch was present.

  The cloud which had been gathering so long above the Country suddenlyburst.

  Middleton and Thurston were sitting in their office one afternoon whenthere was a scamper outside; the door was flung open, and a paperthrown in—an extra still wet from the press. Thurston seized it, hisseat being nearest the door, and gave a long whistle as his eye fellon the black headlines:

  The Flag Fired on: Open Rebellion. The Union Must Be Saved At Any Cost. Etc., etc.

  He sank into his seat and read rapidly the whole account, ending withthe call for troops to put down the Rebellion; while Middleton listenedwith a set face. When Thurston was through, he flung the paper down andsat back in his chair, thinking intently. The next moment he hammeredhis fist on his desk and sprang to his feet, his face white withresolve.

  “By God! I’ll go.”

  With a single inquiring look at Middleton, he turned to the door andwalked out. A moment later Middleton locked his desk and followedhim. The street was already filling with people, crowding to hear thedetails, and the buzz of voices was growing louder.

  Within a few hours the two young men were both enrolled in a companyof volunteers which was being gotten up—Middleton, in right of hisstature and family connections, as a Sergeant, and little Thurston as aCorporal, and were at work getting others enrolled.

  As they were so engaged, Thurston’s attention was arrested by a manin the crowd who was especially violent in his denunciations, and wasurging everybody to enlist. His voice had a peculiar, penetratingwhine. As Thurston could not remember the man among those who hadsigned the roll, he asked him his name.

  “Leech, Jonadab Leech,” he said.

  When Thurston looked at the roster, the name was not on it, and thenext time Leech came up in the crowd, the little Corporal called him:

  “Here; you have forgotten to put your name down.”

  To his surprise, Leech drew back and actually turned pale.

  “What’s the matter?” asked Thurston.

  “I have a wife.”

  The little volunteer gave a sniff.

  “All right—send her in your place. I guess she’d do as well.”

  “If he has, he’s trying to get rid of her,” said someone standing by,in an undertone.

  “Why—ah!—my eyes are bad; I’m too near-sighted.”

  “Your eyes be hanged! You can see well enough to read this paper.”

  “I—ah!—I cannot see in the dark at all,” stammered Leech as a numberof the new volunteers crowded around them.

  “Neither can I—neither can anybody but a cat,” declared the littleCorporal, and the crowd around cheered him. Leech vanished.

  “Who is he?” asked Thurston, as Leech disappeared.

  “He is a clerk in old Bolter’s commissary.”

  The crowd was patriotic.

  There was great excitement in the town all night: bells rang; crowdsmarched up and down the streets singing; stopping at the houses ofthose who had been opposed to ultra measures, and calling on them toput up flags to show their loyalty. The name of Jonadab Leech appearedin the papers next morning as one of the street-orators who made themost blood-thirsty speech.

  Next day was Sunday. Sober second thought had succeeded the excitementof the previous day, the faces of the people showed it. The churcheswere overflowing. The preachers all alluded to the crisis that hadcome, and the tears of the congregations testified how
deeply they weremoved. After church, by a common impulse, everyone went to the publicsquare to learn the news. The square was packed. Suddenly on the polethat stood above the old court-house, someone ran up the flag. At theinstant that it broke forth the breeze caught it, and it fluttered outfull and straight, pointing to the southward. The effect was electric.A great cheer burst from the crowd below. As it died down, a youngman’s clear voice struck up “My Country, ’Tis of Thee,” and the nextmoment the whole crowd was singing and weeping.

  That flag and that song made more soldiers from the old town than allthe newspapers and all the speeches, and Larry Middleton, for havingstruck up the song, found himself suddenly of more note in his own homethan he could have been later if he had stormed a battery.

  Loudest among the shouters was the street-orator of the evening before,Jonadab Leech, the clerk in Bolter’s commissary.

  Within a week the two young men were on their way South.

  A little later, Mr. Welch, having taken time to settle up his affairs,and also those of his cousin, Larry Middleton, went off to join thefirst corps of engineers from his State, with abundance of tears fromRuth and a blessing from his wife, whose mouth was never firmer, or hereye clearer, than when she kissed him, and bade him God-speed.

  She replied to the astonished query of Mrs. Bolter, “You did not cry?”with another question:

  “Why should I cry, when I knew it was his duty? If I had wept it wouldhave been because I could not go myself to strike a blow for thefreedom of the poor African!”

  “You are an unusually strong woman,” said Mrs. Bolter, with a shake ofher head, and, indeed, Mrs. Welch looked it; for though Bolter had goneto Washington, he had not gone to war, but to see about contracts.

  * * * * *

  Just at the time that the two young students from Mr. Welch’s officewere in the street of their town enrolling their names as soldiersto fight for the flag of the Union, the young men, and the eldersas well, whom Middleton had met at Red Rock a thousand miles to thesouthward, were engaged in similar work—enlisting to fight againstInvasion, to fight for their State.

  There had been much discussion—much dissension in the old county, andall others like it, during the interim since the night when Middletonand Mr. Welch had appeared unexpectedly at Red Rock among the weddingguests. Some were for radical measures, for Secession, for War; otherswere conservative. Many were for the Union. Matters more than once hadreached a white heat in that section, and it had looked for a long timeas though an explosion must come. Yet the cooler heads had controlled,and when the final elections for the body that was to settle themomentous questions at issue at last came on, the most conservativemen in the country had been selected. In our county, Dr. Cary and Mr.Bagby, both strong Union men, had been chosen over Major Legaie and Mr.Gray, both ardent Democrats; and one, the former, a hot Secessionist.

  When they arrived at the capital to attend the session of theConvention they found, perhaps, the most distinguished body that hadsat in the State in fifty years. In this great crisis both sides hadput forward their best men, and in face of the nearing peril thewildest grew conservative. The body declared for Peace.

  Affairs moved rapidly, however; excitement grew; feeling changed. Yetthe more conservative prevailed.

  One morning Dr. Cary received a report of a great public meeting heldat the county seat, instructing him to vote for Secession. Many of hisold supporters had signed it. He presented the resolutions at the desk,and stated their purport fully and strongly, amid cheers from the otherside.

  “Now you will vote with us?” said one of the leaders on that side.

  “Not if every man in my county instructed me.”

  “Then you must resign?”

  “Not if every man in my county demanded it.”

  “Are you the only wise man in the county?”

  The voice trembled. Feeling was rising.

  The Doctor was looking his questioner full in the eyes.

  “If they signed such a paper, I should think so.” And there werecheers from his side, and the vote was stayed for that day at least.Dr. Cary made an appeal for the Union that men remembered all theirlives. However they disagreed with him, they were moved by him. But themagazine was being stored fuller every moment.

  Then the spark fell and the explosion came.

  A week after this the call for troops by the President to put downRebellion appeared in an extra in the city where the Convention sat.

  Invasion!

  The whole people rose. From the time of Varrus down they had done so.The defences that conservatives like Dr. Cary had laboriously built upwere swept away in an instant. The State went out with a rush.

  At the announcement the population poured into the streets and publicsquares in a great demonstration. It was tremendous—a maelstrom—atornado—a conflagration. Men were caught up and tossed on platforms,that appeared as if by magic from nowhere, to makes speeches; bonfireswere lighted and bells were rung; but the crowd shouted louder than theringing of the bells, for it meant War: none could now withstand it.Suddenly from some public place a gun, which had been found and runout, boomed through the dusk, and the crowd roared louder than before,and made a rush in that direction, cheering as if for a great victory.

  Dr. Cary, stalking through the throng, silent and white, was recognizedand lifted unresisting to a platform. After a great roar, the tumulthushed down for a moment; for he was waiting with close-shut mouth andblazing eye, and he had the reputation of being, when he chose toexert himself, an orator. Besides, it was not yet known what he woulddo, and he was a power in his section.

  He broke the silence with a calm voice that went everywhere. Withoutappearing to be strong, his voice was one of those strange instrumentsthat filled every building with its finest tone and reached overevery crowd to its farthest limit. With a gesture that, as men saidafterward, seemed to sweep the horizon, he began:

  “The time has passed for talking. Go home and prepare for War. For itis on us.”

  “Oh! there is not going to be any war,” cried someone, and a part ofthe crowd cheered. Dr. Cary turned on them.

  “No war? We are at war now—with the greatest power on earth: the powerof universal progress. It is not the North that we shall have to fight,but the world. Go home and make ready. If we have talked like fools, weshall at least fight like men.”

  That night Dr. Cary walked into his lodgings alone and seated himselfin the dusk. His old body-servant, Tarquin, silent and dark, broughta light and set it conveniently for him. He did not speak a word; buthis ministrations were unusually attentive and every movement expressedadherence and sympathy. Suddenly his master broke the silence:

  “Tarquin, do you want to be free?”

  “Lawd Gawd!” exclaimed Tarquin, stopping quite still and gazing inamazement. “Me! Free?”

  “If you do I will set you free, and give you money enough to live inPhiladelphia.”

  “No, suh; Marster, you know I don’ wan’ be free,” said Tarquin.

  “Pack my trunk. I am going home.”

  “When, suh?”

  “I do not know exactly; but shortly.”

  Within a week Dr. Cary was back at home, working, along with MajorLegaie and the other secessionists, making preparation for equippingthe companies that the county was going to send to the war.

  What a revolution that week had made in the old county! In the faceof the menace of invasion, after but ten days one would scarcely haveknown it. All division was ended: all parties were one. It was as ifthe county had declared war by itself and felt the whole burden of thestruggle on its shoulders. From having been one of the most quiet,peaceful and conservative corners of the universe, where a fox-hunt oran evening-party was the chief excitement of the year, and where theadvent of a stranger was enough to convulse the entire community, itbecame suddenly a training ground and a camp, filled with bustle andpreparation and the sound of arms. The haze of dust from men gallopingby, hung over
the highways all day long, and the cross-roads andthe county seat, where the musters used to meet quarterly and wherethe Fourth of July celebrations were held, became scenes of almostmetropolitan activity.

  Men appeared to spring from the ground as in the days of Cadmus, readyfor war. Red Rock and Birdwood became recruiting-stations and depots ofsupply. From the big estates men came; from the small homesteads amidtheir orchards, and from the cabins back among the pines—all eager forwar and with a new light in their eyes. Everyone was in the movement.Major Legaie was a colonel and Mr. Gray was a captain; Dr. Cary wassurgeon, and even old Mr. Langstaff, under that fire of enthusiasm,doffed his cassock for a uniform, merged his ecclesiastical title ofrector in the military one of chaplain, and made amends for the pacificnature of his prescribed prayers in church, by praying before hiscompany outside, prayers as diverse from the benignity of his nature,as the curses of Ezekiel or Jeremiah from the benediction of St. Johnthe Aged.

  Miss Thomasia, who was always trying to meet some wants which onlythe sensitiveness of her own spirit apprehended, enlarged her littleacademy in the office at Red Rock, so as to take in all the children ofthe men around who had enlisted; made them between their lessons picklint, and opened her exercises daily with the most martial hymns shecould find in the prayer-book, feeling in her simple heart that shecould do God no better service than to inculcate an undying patriotismalong with undying piety. As for Blair, she had long deserted theanti-war side, horse, foot, and dragoons, and sewed on uniforms andpicked lint; wore badges of palmetto, and single stars on little blueflags sewed somewhat crookedly in the front of her frocks, and sang“Dixie,” “Maryland,” and “The Bonny Blue Flag” all the time.

  Steve Allen and Morris Cary, on an hour’s notice, had left theUniversity where all the students were flocking into companies, andwith pistols and sabres strapped about their slender waists gallopedup to the county seat together one afternoon, in a cloud of dust,having outsped their telegrams, and, amid huzzas and the waving ofhandkerchiefs from the carriages lining the roadside, spurred theirsweating horses straight to the end of the line that was drillingunder Colonel Legaie in the field beside the court-house. And so, withradiant faces and bounding hearts were enlisted for the war. LittleAndy Stamper, the rescuer of the two visitors at the ford, was alreadythere in line at the far end on one of his father’s two farmhorses;and Jacquelin, on a blooded colt, was trying to keep as near in linewith him as his excited four-year-old would permit. Even the servants,for whom some on the other side were pledging their blood, were warmlyinterested, and were acting more like clansmen than slaves.

  Hiram Still, Mr. Gray’s tall manager, had a sudden return of his oldenemy, rheumatism, and was so drawn up that he had to go on crutches;but was as enthusiastic as anyone, and lent money to help equip thecompanies—lent it not to the county, it is true, but to Mr. Gray andDr. Cary on their joint security. He and Andy Stamper were not on goodterms, yet he even offered to lend money to Andy Stamper to buy a horsewith. Jacquelin, however, spared Andy this mortification.

  The boy, emancipated from school, partly because his father was goingoff so shortly to the war, and partly because Dr. Maule himself hadenlisted and Mr. Eliphalet Bush, his successor, was not consideredaltogether sound politically, spent his time breaking his colt to standthe excitement of cavalry drill. Jacquelin and Andy were sworn friends,and hearing that Andy had applied to Hiram Still to borrow money tobuy a horse with, Jacquelin asked his father’s consent to give him hiscolt, and was rewarded by the pick of the horses on the place, afterthe carriage horses, his father’s own riding horse and Steve’s. It wasa proud moment for the boy when he rode the high-mettled bay he chose,over to the old Stamper place.

  Andy, in a new gray jacket, was sitting on the front steps, polishinghis scabbard and accoutrements, old Mrs. Stamper was in her low,split-bottomed chair behind him, knitting a yarn sock for her soldier,and Delia Dove, with her plump cheeks glowing under her calicosun-bonnet, which she had pushed back from her round face, was seatedon the bench in the little porch, toying with the wisteria-vine aboveher, and looking down on Andy with her black eyes softer than usual.

  Andy rose to greet Jacquelin as the boy galloped up to the gate.

  “Come in, Jack. What’s up? Look out or he’ll git you off him. That’sthe way to set him! Ah!” as Jacquelin swung himself down.

  “Here’s a present for you,” said Jacquelin.

  “What?”

  “This horse!”

  “What!”

  “Yes: he’s mine: papa gave him to me this morning and said I might givehim to you. I took the pick——”

  “Well, by—” Andy was too much dazed to swear.

  “Jack—” This also ended. “Now let that Hiram Still ask for s’curity.Delia, I’ll lick a regiment.” He faced his sweetheart, who suddenlyturned and caught Jacquelin and kissed him violently, bringing the redblood to the boy’s fresh face.

  “If you’ll do that to me I’ll give him to you right now. D——d ’f Idon’t!” And the little recruit looked Miss Delia Dove in the eyes andgave a shake of his head for emphasis. The girl looked for one momentas if she were going to accept his offer. Then as Andy squared himselfand opened his arms wide she considered, and, with a toss of her headand a sparkle in her eyes, turned away.

  That moment the latch clicked and Hiram Still’s daughter, Virgy, stoodbeside them, shy and silent, veiled within her sun-bonnet.

  “Mr. Stamper, pappy says if you’ll come over to see him about thatbusiness o’ yourn, maybe he can make out to help you out.”

  She delivered the message automatically, and, with a shy glance atJacquelin, and another, somewhat different, at Delia Dove, retired oncemore within the deep recesses of her sun-bonnet.

  “Well, you tell your pappy that I say I’m much obliged to him; but Iain’t got any business with him that I knows on; ’t somebody else’sdone helped me out.” The voice was kind, though the words weresarcastic.

  “Yes, sir. Good-even’.” And with another shy glance and nod to each onein turn, the girl turned and went off as noiselessly as a hare.

  “That girl always gives me the creeps,” said Delia, when Virgy hadreached a safe distance.

  “How about Washy?” asked Andy, at which Delia only sniffed disdainfully.

  Jacquelin Gray was not the only one of the youngsters whose patrioticfervor was rewarded. The ladies of the neighborhood made a banner foreach of the companies that went forth, and Blair Cary was selectedto present the banner to the Red Rock company, which she did from thecourt-house balcony, with her laughing eyes sobered by excitement, herglowing face growing white and pink by turns, and her little tremulousspeech, written by her father and carefully conned by heart for days,much swallowed and almost inaudible in face of the large crowd fillingall the space around, and of the brave company drawn up in the roadbelow her. But she got through it—that part about “emulating theSpartan youth who came back with his shield or on it,” and all; and atthe close she carried everyone away by a natural clasp of her littlebrown hands over her heart, as she said, “And don’t you let them takeit away from you, not ever,” outstretching her arms to her father, whosat with moist eyes at one end of the line a little below her, withJacquelin close beside him, his eyes like saucers for interest in, andadmiration of, Blair.

  “Blair, that’s the best speech that ever was made,” cried the boy,enthusiastically, when he saw her; “and Steve says so, too. Don’t youwish I was old enough to go?” The little girl’s cheeks glowed withpleasure.

  The evening before Jacquelin’s father went off, he called Jacquelininto his office, and rising, shut the door himself. They were alone,and Jacquelin was mystified. He had never before been summoned foran interview with his father unless it were for a lecture, or worse.He hastily ran over in his mind his recent acts, but he could recallnothing that merited even censure, and curiosity took the place ofwonderment. Wonder came back, however, when his father, motioning himto a seat, stood before him and began to ad
dress him in an entirelynew and unknown tone. He talked to him as if he were a man. Jacquelinsuddenly felt all his old timidity of his father vanish, and a newspirit, as it were, rise up in his heart. His father told him that nowthat he was going away to the war, he might never come back; but heleft, he said, with the assurance that whatever happened, he wouldbe worthily succeeded; and he said that he was proud of him, and hadthe fullest confidence in him. He had never said anything like this toJacquelin before, in all his life, and the boy felt a new sensation.He had no idea that his father had ever been satisfied with him, muchless been proud of him. It was like opening the skies and giving him aglimpse beyond them into a new heaven. The boy suddenly rose, and flunghis arms about his father’s neck, and clung there, pouring out hisheart to him. Then he sat down again, feeling like a shriven soul, andthe father and son understood each other like two school-fellows.

  Mr. Gray told Jacquelin of his will. He had left his mother everything;but it would be the same thing as if he had left it to him and Rupert.He, as the oldest, was to have Red Rock, and Rupert the estate in theSouth. “I leave it to her, and I leave her to you,” he said, puttinghis hand on the boy’s shoulder. Jacquelin listened, his mind suddenlysobered and expanded to a man’s measure.

  “And, Jacquelin,” he said, “keep the old place. Make any sacrifice todo that. Landholding is one of the safeguards of a gentry. Our people,for six generations, have never sold an acre, and I never knew a manwho sold land that throve.”

  “I will keep it, father,” said the boy, earnestly.

  There were some debts, but not enough to amount to anything, his fathertold him; the principal one was to Hiram Still. Still had wanted himto keep his money, and he had done so. It could be paid any time, ifnecessary. Still was a better man than he was given credit for. Abad manner made those who did not know him well, suspicious of him.But he was the best business man he had ever known, and he believeddevoted to his interest. His father, old Mr. Still, had been overseerfor Jacquelin’s grandfather when Mr. Gray was a boy, and he could notforget him, and though Still was at present in poor health, he hadcontracted the disease while in their service at the South, and hewould be glad to have him kept in his position as long as he treatedthe negroes well, and cared to remain.

  “And, Jacquelin, one other thing: be a father to Rupert. See that hegets an education. It is the one patrimony that no accident—not evenwar—can take away.”

  Jacquelin promised his father that he would remember his injunctions,and try faithfully to keep them, every one; and when the two walkedout, it was arm in arm like two brothers, and the old servants, lookingat them, nodded their heads, and talked with pride of Jacquelin’sgrowing resemblance to his grandfather.

  Next day the companies raised in the county started off to the war,taking almost every man of serviceable age and strength, and many whowere not.

  When they marched away it was like a triumphal procession. The bluehaze of spring lay over the woods, softening the landscape, and fillingit with peace. Tears were on some cheeks, no doubt; and many eyes weredimmed; but kerchiefs and scarfs were waved by many who could not see,and fervent prayers went up from many hearts when the lips were tootremulous to speak.