54-40 or Fight Part 7

"There you have the measure of England's sincerity," she went on, with contempt. "England is selfish, that is all. Do you not suppose I have something to do besides feeding a canary? To read, to study--that is my pleasure. I know your politics here in America. Suppose you invade Texas, as the threat is, with troops of the United States, before Texas is a member of the Union? Does that not mean you are again at war with Mexico? And does that not mean that you are also at war with England?

Come, do you not know some of those things?"

"With my hand on my heart, Madam," I a.s.serted solemnly, "all I know is that you must go to see my master. Calhoun wants you. America needs you.

I beg you to do what kindness you may to the heathen."

"_Et moi?_"

"And you?" I answered. "You shall have such reward as you have never dreamed in all your life."

"How do you mean?"

"I doubt not the reward for a soul which is as keen and able as your heart is warm, Madam. Come, I am not such a fool as you think, perhaps.

Nor are you a fool. You are a great woman, a wonderful woman, with head and heart both, Madam, as well as beauty such as I had never dreamed.

You are a strange woman, Madam. You are a genius, Madam, if you please.

So, I say, you are capable of a reward, and a great one. You may find it in the grat.i.tude of a people."

"What could this country give more than Mexico or England?" She smiled quizzically.

"Much more, Madam! Your reward shall be in the later thought of many homes--homes built of logs, with dingy fireplaces and couches of husks in them--far out, all across this continent, housing many people, many happy citizens, men who will make their own laws, and enforce them, man and man alike! Madam, it is the spirit of democracy which calls on you to-night! It is not any political party, nor the representative of one.

It is not Mr. Calhoun; it is not I. Mr. Calhoun only puts before you the summons of--"

"Of what?"

"Of that spirit of democracy."

She stood, one hand ungloved, a finger at her lips, her eyes glowing. "I am glad you came," she said. "On the whole, I am also glad I came upon my foolish errand here to America."

"Madam," said I, my hand at the fastening of the door, "we have exchanged pledges. Now we exchange places. It is you who are the messenger, not myself. There is a message in your hands. I know not whether you ever served a monarchy. Come, you shall see that our republic has neither secrets nor hypocrisies."

On the instant she was not shrewd and tactful woman of the world, not student, but once more coquette and woman of impulse. She looked at me with mockery and invitation alike in her great dark eyes, even as I threw down the chain at the door and opened it wide for her to pa.s.s.

"Is that my only reward?" she asked, smiling as she fumbled at a glove.

In reply, I bent and kissed the fingers of her ungloved hand. They were so warm and tender that I had been different than I was had I not felt the blood tingle in all my body in the impulse of the moment to do more than kiss her fingers.

Had I done so--had I not thought of Elisabeth--then, as in my heart I still believe, the flag of England to-day would rule Oregon and the Pacific; and it would float to-day along the Rio Grande; and it would menace a divided North and South, instead of respecting a strong and indivisible Union which owns one flag and dreads none in the world.

CHAPTER VII

REGARDING ELISABETH

Without woman the two extremities of this life would be dest.i.tute of succor and the middle would be devoid of pleasure.--_Proverb_.

In some forgotten garret of this country, as I do not doubt, yellowed with age, stained and indistinguishable, lost among uncared-for relics of another day, there may be records of that interview between two strange personalities, John Calhoun and Helena von Ritz, in the arrangement of which I played the part above described. I was not at that time privileged to have much more than a guess at the nature of the interview. Indeed, other things now occupied my mind. I was very much in love with Elisabeth Churchill.

Of these matters I need to make some mention. My father's plantation was one of the old ones in Maryland. That of the Churchills lay across a low range of mountains and in another county from us, but our families had long been friends. I had known Elisabeth from the time she was a tall, slim girl, boon companion ever to her father, old Daniel Churchill; for her mother she had lost when she was still young. The Churchills maintained a city establishment in the environs of Washington itself, although that was not much removed from their plantation in the old State of Maryland. Elmhurst, this Washington estate was called, and it was well known there, with its straight road approaching and its great trees and its wide-doored halls--whereby the road itself seemed to run straight through the house and appear beyond--and its tall white pillars and hospitable galleries, now in the springtime enclosed in green. I need not state that now, having finished the business of the day, or, rather, of the night, Elmhurst, home of Elisabeth, was my immediate Mecca.

I had clad myself as well as I could in the fashion of my time, and flattered myself, as I looked in my little mirror, that I made none such bad figure of a man. I was tall enough, and straight, thin with long hours afoot or in the saddle, bronzed to a good color, and if health did not show on my face, at least I felt it myself in the lightness of my step, in the contentedness of my heart with all of life, in my general a.s.surance that all in the world meant well toward me and that everything in the world would do well by me. We shall see what license there was for this.

As to Elisabeth Churchill, it might have been in line with a Maryland-custom had she generally been known as Betty; but Betty she never was called, although that diminutive was applied to her aunt, Jennings, twice as large as she, after whom she had been named. Betty implies a snub nose; Elisabeth's was clean-cut and straight. Betty runs for a saucy mouth and a short one; Elisabeth's was red and curved, but firm and wide enough for strength and charity as well. Betty spells round eyes, with brows arched above them as though in query and curiosity; the eyes of Elisabeth were long, her brows long and straight and delicately fine. A Betty might even have red hair; Elisabeth's was brown in most lights, and so liquid smooth that almost I was disposed to call it dense rather than thick. Betty would seem to indicate a nature impulsive, gay, and free from care; on the other hand, it was to be said of Elisabeth that she was logical beyond her kind--a trait which she got from her mother, a daughter of old Judge Henry Gooch, of our Superior Court. Yet, disposed as she always was to be logical in her conclusions, the great characteristic of Elisabeth was serenity, consideration and charity.

With all this, there appeared sometimes at the surface of Elisabeth's nature that fire and lightness and impulsiveness which she got from her father, Mr. Daniel Churchill. Whether she was wholly reserved and reasonable, or wholly warm and impulsive, I, long as I had known and loved her, never was quite sure. Something held me away, something called me forward; so that I was always baffled, and yet always eager, G.o.d wot. I suppose this is the way of women. At times I have been impatient with it, knowing my own mind well enough.

At least now, in my tight-strapped trousers and my long blue coat and my deep embroidered waistcoat and my high stock, my shining boots and my tall beaver, I made my way on my well-groomed horse up to the gates of old Elmhurst; and as I rode I pondered and I dreamed.

But Miss Elisabeth was not at home, it seemed. Her father, Mr. Daniel Churchill, rather portly and now just a trifle red of face, met me instead. It was not an encounter for which I devoutly wished, but one which I knew it was the right of both of us to expect ere long. Seeing the occasion propitious, I plunged at once _in medias res_. Part of the time explanatory, again apologetic, and yet again, I trust, a.s.sertive, although always blundering and red and awkward, I told the father of my intended of my own wishes, my prospects and my plans.

He listened to me gravely and, it seemed to me, with none of that enthusiasm which I would have welcomed. As to my family, he knew enough.

As to my prospects, he questioned me. My record was not unfamiliar to him. So, gaining confidence at last under the insistence of what I knew were worthy motives, and which certainly were irresistible of themselves, so far as I was concerned, I asked him if we might not soon make an end of this, and, taking chances as they were, allow my wedding with Elisabeth to take place at no very distant date.

"Why, as to that, of course I do not know what my girl will say," went on Mr. Daniel Churchill, pursing up his lips. He looked not wholly lovable to me, as he sat in his big chair. I wondered that he should be father of so fair a human being as Elisabeth.

"Oh, of course--that," I answered; "Miss Elisabeth and I--"

"The skeesicks!" he exclaimed. "I thought she told me everything."

"I think Miss Elisabeth tells no one quite everything," I ventured. "I confess she has kept me almost as much in the dark as yourself, sir. But I only wanted to ask if, after I have seen her to-day, and if I should gain her consent to an early day, you would not waive any objections on your own part and allow the matter to go forward as soon as possible?"

In answer to this he arose from his chair and stood looking out of the window, his back turned to me. I could not call his reception of my suggestion enthusiastic; but at last he turned.

"I presume that our two families might send you young people a sack of meal or a side of bacon now and then, as far as that is concerned," he said.

I could not call this speech joyous.

"There are said to be risks in any union, sir," I ventured to say. "I admit I do not follow you in contemplating any risk whatever. If either you or your daughter doubts my loyalty or affection, then I should say certainly it were wise to end all this; but--" and I fancied I straightened perceptibly--"I think that might perhaps be left to Miss Elisabeth herself."

After all, Mr. Dan Churchill was obliged to yield, as fathers have been obliged from the beginning of the world. At last he told me I might take my fate in my own hands and go my way.

Trust the instinct of lovers to bring them together! I was quite confident that at that hour I should find Elisabeth and her aunt in the big East Room at the president's reception, the former looking on with her uncompromising eyes at the little pageant which on reception days regularly went forward there.

My conclusion was correct. I found a boy to hold my horse in front of Gautier's cafe. Then I hastened off across the intervening blocks and through the grounds of the White House, in which presently, having edged through the throng in the ante-chambers, I found myself in that inane procession of individuals who pa.s.sed by in order, each to receive the limp handshake, the mechanical bow and the perfunctory smite of President Tyler--rather a tall, slender-limbed, active man, and of very decent presence, although his thin, shrunken cheeks and his cold blue-gray eye left little quality of magnetism in his personality.

It was not new to me, of course, this pageant, although it never lacked of interest. There were in the throng representatives of all America as it was then, a strange, crude blending of refinement and vulgarity, of ease and poverty, of luxury and thrift. We had there merchants from Philadelphia and New York, politicians from canny New England and not less canny Pennsylvania. At times there came from the Old World men representative of an easier and more opulent life, who did not always trouble to suppress their smiles at us. Moving among these were ladies from every state of our Union, picturesque enough in their wide flowered skirts and their flaring bonnets and their silken mitts, each rivalling the other in the elegance of her mien, and all unconsciously outdone in charm, perhaps, by some demure Quakeress in white and dove color, herself looking askance on all this form and ceremony, yet unwilling to leave the nation's capital without shaking the hand of the nation's chief. Add to these, gaunt, black-haired frontiersmen from across the Alleghanies; politicians from the South, clean-shaven, pompous, immaculately clad; uneasy tradesmen from this or the other corner of their commonwealth. A motley throng, indeed!

A certain air of gloom at this time hung over official Washington, for the minds of all were still oppressed by the memory of that fatal accident--the explosion of the great cannon "Peacemaker" on board the war vessel _Princeton_--which had killed Mr. Upshur, our secretary of state, with others, and had, at one blow, come so near to depriving this government of its head and his official family; the number of prominent lives thus ended or endangered being appalling to contemplate. It was this accident which had called Mr. Calhoun forward at a national juncture of the most extreme delicacy and the utmost importance. In spite of the general mourning, however, the informal receptions at the White House were not wholly discontinued, and the administration, unsettled as it was, and fronted by the gravest of diplomatic problems, made such show of dignity and even cheerfulness as it might.

I considered it my duty to pa.s.s in the long procession and to shake the hand of Mr. Tyler. That done, I gazed about the great room, carefully scan-fling the different little groups which were accustomed to form after the ceremonial part of the visit was over. I saw many whom I knew. I forgot them; for in a far corner, where a flood of light came through the trailing vines that shielded the outer window, my anxious eyes discovered the object of my quest--Elisabeth.

It seemed to me I had never known her so fair as she was that morning in the great East Room of the White House. Elisabeth was rather taller than the average woman, and of that splendid southern figure, slender but strong, which makes perhaps the best representative of our American beauty. She was very bravely arrayed to-day in her best pink-flowered lawn, made wide and full, as was the custom of the time, but not so clumsily gathered at the waist as some, and so serving not wholly to conceal her natural comeliness of figure. Her bonnet she had removed. I could see the sunlight on the ripples of her brown hair, and the shadows which lay above her eyes as she turned to face me, and the slow pink which crept into her cheeks.

Dignified always, and reserved, was Elisabeth Churchill. But now I hope it was not wholly conceit which led me to feel that perhaps the warmth, the glow of the air, caught while riding under the open sky, the sight of the many budding roses of our city, the scent of the blossoms which even then came through the lattice--the meeting even with myself, so lately returned--something at least of this had caused an awakening in her girl's heart. Something, I say, I do not know what, gave her greeting to me more warmth than was usual with her. My own heart, eager enough to break bounds, answered in kind. We stood--blushing like children as our hands touched--forgotten in that a.s.semblage of Washington's pomp and circ.u.mstance.

"How do you do?" was all I could find to say. And "How do you do?" was all I could catch for answer, although I saw, in a fleeting way, a glimpse of a dimple hid in Elisabeth's cheek. She never showed it save when pleased. I have never seen a dimple like that of Elisabeth's.

Absorbed, we almost forgot Aunt Betty Jennings--stout, radiant, snub-nosed, arch-browed and curious, Elisabeth's chaperon. On the whole, I was glad Aunt Betty Jennings was there. When a soldier approaches a point of danger, he does not despise the cover of natural objects. Aunt Betty appeared to me simply as a natural object at the time. I sought her shelter.