Gabriel Tolliver Part 15

"Do which, suh?" exclaimed Rev. Jeremiah, pausing with his broom suspended in the air. When Gabriel repeated his inquiry, the Rev.

Jeremiah drew a deep breath, his nostrils dilated, and he seemed to grow several inches taller. "No, suh, she do not; no, suh, she do not belong ter my chu'ch. You kin look at her, suh, an' see de mark er de Ol' Boy on her. She got de hoodoo eye, suh; an' de blue gums dat go long wid it, an' ef she wuz ter jine my chu'ch, she'd be de only member."

It was very clear to Gabriel that nothing was to be gained by remaining, so he bade the Rev. Jeremiah good-bye, and went toward Shady Dale. When he was well out of sight, the negro approached the blackboard, and, with the most patient curiosity, examined the inscription or announcement that Gabriel had written. With his forefinger, he traced over the lines, as if in that way he might absorb the knowledge that was behind the writing. Then, stepping back a few paces, he viewed the writing critically. Finally he shook his head doubtfully, exclaiming aloud: "Dat's whar dey'll git us--yes, suh, dat's whar dey sho' will git us."

After which, he carefully closed the doors of the school-house and followed the path leading to Shady Dale--the path that Gabriel had taken. The Rev. Jeremiah mumbled as he walked along, giving oral utterance to his thoughts, but in a tone too low to reveal their import.

He had taken a step which it was now too late to retrace. He was not a vicious negro. In common with the great majority of his race--in common, perhaps with the men of all races--he was eaten up by a desire to become prominent, to make himself conspicuous. Generations of civilisation (as it is called) have gone far to tone down this desire in the whites, and they manage to control it to some extent, though now and then we see it crop out in individuals. But there had been no toning down of the Rev. Jeremiah's egotism; on the contrary, it had been fed by the flattery of his congregation until it was gross and rank.

It was natural, therefore, under all the circ.u.mstances, that the Rev.

Jeremiah should become the willing tool of the politicians and adventurers who had accepted the implied invitation of the radical leaders of the Republican Party to a.s.sist in the spoliation of the South. The Rev. Jeremiah, once he had been patted on the back, and addressed as Mr. Tomlin by a white man, and that man a representative of the Government, was quite ready to believe anything he was told by his new friends, and quite as ready to aid them in carrying out any scheme that their hatred of the South and their natural rapacity could suggest or invent.

Therefore, let it not be supposed that the Rev. Jeremiah, as he went along the path, mumbling out his thoughts, was expressing any doubt of the wisdom or expediency of the part he was expected to play in arraying the negroes against the whites. No; he was simply putting together as many sonorous phrases as he could remember, and storing them away in view of the contingency that he would be called on to address those of his race who might be present at the organisation of the Union League.

He had been very busy since his conference with the agent of the Freedman's Bureau, and, in one way and another, had managed to convey information of the proposed meeting to quite a number of the negroes; and in performing this service he was careful that a majority of those notified should be members of his church--negroes with whom his influence was all-powerful. But he had also invited Uncle Plato, Clopton's carriage-driver, Wiley Millirons, and Walthall's Jake, three of the worthiest and most sensible negroes to be found anywhere.

While the Rev. Jeremiah, full of his own importance, and swelling with childish vanity, was making his way toward Neighbour Tomlin's, on whose lot he had a house, rent free, there were other plotters at work. In addition to Gabriel Tolliver, Nan Dorrington was a plotter to be reckoned with, especially when she had as her copartner Tasma Tid, who was as cunning as some wild thing.

When the day was far spent, or, as Mrs. Absalom would say, "along to'rds the shank of the evenin'," Nan and Tasma Tid went wandering out of town in the direction of the school-house. The excuse Nan had given at home was that she wanted to see Tasma Tid's hiding-place. As they pa.s.sed Tomlin's, they saw the Rev. Jeremiah splitting wood for his wife, who was the cook. At sight of Jeremiah, Tasma Tid began to laugh, and she laughed so long and so loud that the parson paused in his labours and looked at her. He took off his hat and bowed to Nan, whereupon Tasma Tid raised her hand above her head, and indulged in a series of wild gesticulations, which, to the Rev. Jeremiah, were very mysterious and puzzling. He shook his head dubiously, and mopped his face with a large red handkerchief.

"What are you trying to do to Jeremiah?" inquired Nan, as they went along.

"Him fool n.i.g.g.e.r. We make him dream bad dream," responded Tasma Tid curtly.

The two were in no hurry. They sauntered along leisurely, and, although the sun had not set, by the time they had entered the woods in which the school-house stood, the deep shadows of the trees gave the effect of twilight to the scene. Tasma Tid led Nan to the old building, and told her to wait a moment. The African crawled under the house, and then suddenly reappeared at the back door, near which Nan stood waiting.

Tasma Tid had crawled under the house, and lifted a loose plank in the floor of the closet, making her entrance in that way. The front door was locked and the key was safe in the pocket of the Rev. Jeremiah, but the back door was fastened on the inside, and Tasma Tid had no trouble in getting it open.

It is fair to say that Nan hesitated before entering. Some instinct or presentiment held her a moment. She was not afraid; her sense of fear had never developed itself; it was one of the attributes of human nature that was foreign to her experience; and this was why some of her actions, when she was younger, and likewise when she was older, were inexplicable to the rest of her s.e.x, and made her the object of criticism which seemed to have good ground to go upon. Nan hesitated with her foot on the step, but it was not her way to draw back, and she went in. Tasma Tid refastened the door very carefully, and then turned and led the way toward the closet. The room was not wholly dark; one or two of the shutters had fallen off, and in this way a little light filtered in. Nan followed Tasma Tid to the closet, the door of which was open.

"Dis-a we house," said Tasma Tid; "dis-a de place wey we live at."

"Why did you come here?" Nan asked.

"We had no nurrer place; all-a we frien' gone; da's why."

What further comment Nan may have made cannot even be guessed, for at that moment there was a noise at one of the windows; some one was trying to raise the sash. Nan and Tasma Tid held their breath while they listened, and then, when they were sure that some one was preparing to enter the building, the African closed the closet door noiselessly, and pulled Nan after her to the narrowest and most uncomfortable part of the musty and dusty place--the s.p.a.ce next the stairway, where it was so low that they were compelled to sit flat on the floor.

The intruder, whoever he might be, crawled cautiously through the window--they could hear the b.u.t.tons of his coat strike against the sill--and leaped lightly to the floor. He lowered the window again, and then, after tiptoeing about among the benches, came straight to the closet. As Tasma Tid had not taken time to fasten it on the inside, the door was easily opened. Dark as it was, Nan and the African could see that the intruder was a man, but, beyond this, they could distinguish nothing. Nan and her companion would have breathed freer if recognition had been possible, for the new-comer was Gabriel, who had determined to take this method of discovering the aim and object of the Union League.

Once in the closet, Gabriel took pains to make the inside fastenings secure. It was one of the whims of Mr. McMa.n.u.s, the school-master, who had so often caused Gabriel's head and the blackboard to meet, that the fastenings of this closet should be upon the inside. It tickled his humour to feel that a refractory boy should be his own jailer, able, and yet not daring, to release himself until the master should rap sharply on the door.

Gabriel was less familiar with these fastenings than he had formerly been, and he fumbled about in the dark for some moments before he could adjust them to his satisfaction. He made no effort to explore the closet, taking for granted that it could have no other occupant. This was fortunate for Nan, for if he had moved about to any extent, he would inevitably have stumbled over the African and her young mistress, who were crouched and huddled as far under the stairway as they could get.

Gabriel stood still a moment, as if listening, and then he sat flat on the floor, and stretched out his legs with a sigh of relief. After that there was a long period of silence, during which Nan had a fine opportunity to be very sorry that she had ever ventured out on such a fool's errand. "If I get out of this sc.r.a.pe," she thought over and over again, "I'll never be a tomboy; I'll never be a harum-scarum girl any more." She had no physical fear, but she realised that she was placed in a very awkward position.

She was devoured with curiosity to know whether the intruder really was Gabriel. She hoped it was, and the hope caused her to blush in the dark.

She knew she was blushing; she felt her ears burn--for what would Gabriel think if he knew that she was crouching on the floor, not more than an arm's length from him? Why, naturally, he would have no respect for her. How could he? she asked herself.

As for Gabriel, he was sublimely unconscious of the fact that he was not alone. Once or twice he fancied he heard some one breathing, but he was a lad who was very close to nature, and he knew how many strange and varied sounds rise mysteriously out of the most profound silence; and so, instead of becoming suspicious, he became drowsy. He made himself as comfortable as he could, and leaned against the wall, pitting his patience against the loneliness of the place and the slow pa.s.sage of time.

Being a healthy lad, Gabriel would have gone to sleep then and there, but for a mysterious splutter and explosion, so to speak, which went off right at his elbow, as he supposed. He was in that neutral territory between sleeping and waking and he was unable to recognise the sound that had startled him; and it would have remained a mystery but for the fact that a sneeze is usually accompanied by its twin. Nan had for some time felt an inclination to sneeze, and the more she tried to resist it the greater the inclination grew, until finally, it culminated in the spluttering explosion that had aroused Gabriel. This was followed by a sneeze which he had no difficulty in recognising.

The fact that some unknown person was a joint occupant of the closet upset him so little that he was surprised at himself. He remained perfectly quiet for awhile, endeavouring to map out a course of action, little knowing that Nan Dorrington was chewing her nails with anger a few feet from where he sat.

"Who are you?" he asked finally. He spoke in a firm low tone.

In another moment Nan's impulsiveness would have betrayed her, but Tasma Tid came to her rescue.

"Hucc.u.m you in we house? Whaffer you come dey? How you call you' name?"

"Oh, shucks! Is that you, Tiddy Me Tas?"--this was the way Gabriel sometimes twisted her name. "I thought you were the booger-man. You'd better run along home to your Miss Nan. She says she wants to see you.

What are you hiding out here for anyway?"

"We no hide, Misser Gable. 'Tis-a we house, dis. Honey Nan no want we; she no want n.o.body. She talkin' by dat Misser Frank what live-a down dey at Clopton. Dee got cake, dee got wine, dee got all de bittle dee want."

Tasma Tid told this whopper in spite of the fact that Nan was giving her warning nudges and pinches.

"Yes, I reckon they are having a good time," said Gabriel gloomily.

"Miss Nan gave me an invitation, but I couldn't go." It was something new in Nan's experience to hear Gabriel call her Miss Nan, and she rather relished the sensation it gave her. She was now ready to believe that she was really and truly a young lady.

"Whaffer you ain't gone down dey?" inquired Tasma Tid. "Ef you kin come dis-a way, you kin go down dey."

"I was obliged to come here," responded Gabriel.

"Shoo! dem fib roll out lak dey been had grease on top um," exclaimed Tasma Tid derisively. "Who been ax you fer come by dis way? 'Tis-a we house, dis. You better go, Misser Gable; go by dat place wey Honey Nan live, an' look in de blin' wey you see dat Misser Frank, and dat Misser Paul Tomlin, an' watch um how dee kin make love. Maybe you kin fin' out how fer make love you'se'f."

Gabriel laughed uneasily. "No, Tiddy Me Tas--no love-making for me. I'm either too old or too young, I forget which."

They ceased talking, for they heard footsteps outside, and the sound of voices. Presently some one opened the door, and it seemed from the noise that was made, the shuffling of feet, and the repressed tones of conversation, that a considerable number of negroes had responded to the Rev. Jeremiah's invitation.

The first-comers evidently lit a candle, for a phantom-like shadow of light trickled through a small crack in the closet door, and a faint, but unmistakable, odour of a sulphur match readied Gabriel's nostrils.

There were whispered consultations, and a good deal of m.u.f.fled and subdued conversation, but every word that was distinctly enunciated was clearly heard in the sound-box of a closet. But suddenly all conversation ceased, and complete silence took possession of those present.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

_The Union League Organises_

The silence was presently broken by a very clear and distinct voice, which both Nan and Gabriel recognised as that of the stranger whom they had overheard talking to the Rev. Jeremiah.

"Before we proceed to the business that has called us together," said the voice, "it is best that we should come to some clear understanding.

I am not here in my own behalf. I have nothing to lose except my life, and nothing to gain but the betterment of those who have been released from the horrors of slavery. Very few of you know even my name, but the very fact that I am here with you to-night should go far to rea.s.sure you. It is sufficient to say that I represent the great party that has given you your freedom. That fact const.i.tutes my credentials."

"Bless G.o.d!" exclaimed the Rev. Jeremiah, piously. He rolled the word "credentials" under his tongue, and resolved to remember it and bring it out in one of his sermons. The stranger had a very smooth and pleasing delivery. There was a sort of Sunday-school cadence to his voice well calculated to impress his audience. The language he employed was far above the heads of those to whom he spoke, but his persuasive tone, and his engaging manner carried conviction. The great majority of the negroes present were ready to believe what he said whether they understood it or not.

"My name," he went on, "is Gilbert Hotchkiss, and I belong to a family that has been striving for more than a generation to bring about the emanc.i.p.ation of the negroes. My father worked until the day of his death for the abolition of slavery; and now that slavery has been abolished, I, with thousands of devoted women and men whom you have never seen and doubtless never will see, have begun the work of uplifting the coloured people in order that they may be placed in a position to appreciate the benefits that have been conferred on them, and enable them to enjoy the fruits of freedom. It is a great work, a grand work, and all we ask is the active co-operation and a.s.sistance of the coloured people themselves."

These were the words of Mr. Hotchkiss, the philanthropist; but now Mr.