John March, Southerner Part 74

"Ah! a 'diligent and vigilant patience'--yes, I don't doubt it would serve me best--provided, my dear sir, it didn't turn out simply a virtue of impotency; or, worse yet, what I once heard called 'the thrifty discretion of a short-winded courage!'"

When Fair responded this time March let him speak long. Johanna bent her ear anxiously. Her patient seemed to be neglecting his food; but as he began to reply she resumed her needle.

"Fair," she heard him say, "--why--why, Fair, that's a mighty handsome offer to come from such a prudent business man as you. My George! sir, men don't often put such valuable freight into a boat that's aground.

Why--why, you spoil my talk; I positively don't know what--what to say!"

There was a choke in his voice. Fair made some answer which March gratefully cut short.

"O! I wish I could! It hurts me all over and through to decline it. But I must; I've got to! 'Think it over'--O! I've thought it over probably before you ever thought of it at all! I know my capabilities. I'm not in such a fierce hurry for things as I used to be, but I've got what brains I ever had--and spine, too--and I know that even without your offer there's a better chance for me North than here. But--O! it's no use, Fair, I just can't go! I mustn't! Yes. Yes. O! yes, I know all that, but, my dear sir, I can't afford--You know, this Suez soil isn't something I can shake off my shoes as you might. George! I'm part of it!

I'm not Quixotic--not a bit! I'm only choosing between two sorts of selfishness, one not quite so narrow as the other; but--I've got to stay here."

Fair, after a short silence, asked if this was his only reason.

"Only reason? Why--why, yes, that's my only reason! To be sure, there's a sense in which--why, conscience! isn't it enough? O! of course, I could _think up_ other considerations, but they're not reasons--I don't allow them to bias me at all! Fact is, I was never before quite so foot-free. Why did you ask? Did you fancy I might be contemplating marriage? O, go 'long! why, my good gracious, Fair, I--it's an honest fact--I haven't even _been to see_ one marriageable girl since I came back from Europe! No, the reason I give is _the_ reason. It covers everything else.

"O! if you are thinking of debts, I could cancel them at least as fast if I went as if I stayed. They're not large, the money debts. O! no; it's--Fair--I spent a year in Europe coaxing men to leave their mother-country for better wages in this. Of course, that was all right.

But it brought one thing to my notice: that when our value is not mere wages, it isn't every man who's got the unqualified right to pick up and put out just whenever he gets ready. Look out that window. There's the college where for five years I got my education--at half price!--and with money borrowed here in Suez! Look out this one. Mr. Fair, right down there in those streets truth and justice are lying wounded and half-dead, and the public conscience is being drugged! We Southerners, Fair, don't believe one man's as good as another; we think one man in his right place is worth a thousand who can't fill it. My place is here!--No! let me finish; I'm not fatigued at all! How I'm to meet this issue G.o.d only knows, but who'll even try to do it if I don't?

Halliday's too far off. Ravenel looks on as silent as a gallows!

Proudfit--poor old Proudfit hasn't been sober since the day he got home.

Father Tombs has grown timid and slow-sighted, and the whole people, Fair, the whole people! have let themselves be seduced in the purse and are this day betrayed as foully in their fortunes as in their souls!"

The speaker ended in a high key. He was trembling with nervous exhaustion. In an effort to jerk higher in the pillow his knee struck the tray, the crockery slid and crashed, and Johanna found him in the middle of the room, fiercely shaking the skirt of his dressing-gown.

"O! never mind me; get the milk out of the bed!"

She saw how overwrought he was, yet turned to obey. Fair, to aid her, s.n.a.t.c.hed away the pillows. A small thing from under them fluttered out upon the carpet and lay before the three. With a despairing murmur the invalid picked it up, and the two men stood facing each other. Fair colored slightly, March slowly crimsoned. Then Fair smiled. March smiled too, but foolishly. Johanna made herself very busy with the bed, but she saw all. Fair pushed forward a rocking-chair, into which March sank.

Then with gentle insistence he drew from March's hand the worn photograph--for such it was--leaned against a window and gazed on it, while March turned his brow into the cushioned back of his chair and wept as comfortably as any girl.

Johanna took out the tray and its wreck, and in a moment was back with fresh sheets. March had lain down on the bare mattress and, with his cheek on a pillow, was smiling in mild amus.e.m.e.nt at Fair's account of a brief talk he had had with Leggett while the train waited at Pulaski City.

"Yes," said March, moving enough to let the bed be made, "he pretends to keep a restaurant there now; but where he gets all the money he spends is more than I can make out, unless it's from men who can't afford to let him tell what he knows."

A servant of the house tapped at the door and said Major Garnet was in the office, waiting for Johanna. March rose to his elbow and gave her a hand.

"Why, I shan't ever know how to be sick without you any mo'!" he said, as her dark fingers slipped timidly from his friendly hold.

"Johanna!--now--now, don't you go tellin' things you'd oughtn't to; will you?"

"No, seh," came from the maid slowly, yet with a suspicious readiness quite out of keeping with the limp diffidence of her att.i.tude.

"Hold on a moment, Johanna," he called, as she turned to go. "Just wait an instant--sounds like----" He rose higher. Fair stepped to the west window. Loud words were coming from the sidewalk under it. March started eagerly. "That's Proudfit's----" Before he could finish the bang of a pistol rang, evidently in the office door, another, farther within, roared up through the house, and a third and fourth re-echoed it amid the wailings of Johanna as she flew down the stairs crying:

"Mahs John Wesley! O Lawdy, Lawdy! Mahs John Wesley! Mahs John Wesley!"

At the same instant came Tom Hersey's voice, remote, but clear:

"Stop! Great G.o.d! Stop! Don't you see he's dying?"

Fair was already on the staircase and March was whipping on his boots, when Shotwell, coming up by leaps, waved them back into the room. "It's all ova, Mr. Fair. Po' Proudy's gone, John. He fi-ud an' missed, and got Garnet's first bullet in his heart an' the othe's close to it. Garnet's locked himself into Tom Hersey's private room an' sent for Fatheh Tombs, to----"

"Fair!" interrupted March, "go! Go tell her he's safe and will not be--interfered with! I'll make your word good; go, Fair, go!"

But Fair answered with hardly less emotion, "I cannot, March! It isn't a man's errand! It isn't a man's errand!"

"Take Mrs. Ravenel!" cried March, and read quick a.s.sent in his friend's face. "But make her go dressed as she is; you've got to outrun rumor!

Captain, go tell Tom to give him Firefly, won't you? She's mine, Fair,"

he continued, following to the stairs; "she's the mare I cured for Bulger; perfectly gentle, only--Fair!--don't touch her with the whip!"

"If you do," drawled Shotwell to Fair, as they hurried down into the lamplight, "you'll think the devil's inside of her with the jimjams.

Still, she's lovely as long as you don't. Ah me! this is no time to jest! Po' Proudfit! He leaves a spotless characteh!"

Through the unnatural bustle, amid which Crickwater at the door of the closed office stood answering or ignoring questions and showing his intimates where Proudfit's wild shot had chopped out a large lock of his hair, they went to Hersey's door and so on to the stable. "Garnet's the man to pity, Mr. Fair. I couldn't say it befo' March, who's got family reasons--through his motheh--faw savin' Garnet whateveh he can of his splendid reputaation, but I'm mighty 'fraid they won't be a rag of it left, seh, big enough for a gun-wad! Mr. Fair, you've got a hahd drive befo' you, seh, an' if you'll allow me to suggest it, seh, I think it would be only wise, befo' you staht, faw us to take a drink, seh."

"Thank you," said the Northerner, "I hardly think--Do you suppose Major Garnet's firing those last two shots after----"

"Will ruin him? O Lawd, not that! We all know, and always have, that he's perfectly cra-azy when he's enra-aged. No, my deah seh, Miz Proudfit has confessed! She says----"

"Are you not surprised that Major Garnet was armed?" Fair interrupted.

"O! no, seh, Colonel Proudfit was too much of a gentleman to be lookin'

faw a man, with a gun, an' not send him word! And, besides, Miz Proudfit's revela-a-tions----"

But the horse and buggy were ready, and at last March--to whom, as he stood at his window fully dressed, the few moments had seemed an hour--saw Fair drive swiftly by and fade into the gloom. Charlie Champion came toward the hotel, bringing Parson Tombs. March put on his hat, but for many minutes only paced the darkening room. Finally he started for the stairs, and half way down them met the Doctor.

"Why, bless my soul, John," he good-naturedly cried, "this is quite _too_ fast."

"I reckon not, Doctor; I believe I'm well. I don't understand it, but it's so." He endured the Doctor's hand for a moment on his wrist and temples.

"Why, I declare!" laughed the physician with noisy pleasure, "I believe yo' right!" As they descended he explained how such recoveries are possible and why they are so rare, citing from medical annals a case or two whose mention John thought very unflattering.

"I should like to know what's become of Johanna," said March at the foot of the stairs.

"Johanna? O they say she ran all the way to Fannie Ravenel's, and they harnessed up the fast colt and put off for Rosemont, Johanna driving!"

"Why, of course! I might have known it! But"--John stopped--"Why, then, where's Fair?"

"O I saw him. He drove on to overtake 'em. He'll have a job of it!"

"Firefly can do it," said March, picturing the chase to himself. "But I--I wonder what--This is no time--Why--why, what did he want to do it for?"

"O he may have had the best of reasons," said the amiable Doctor, and departed.

Outside a certain door--"Why, John March!" murmured Tom Hersey. The voices of Garnet and Parson Tombs could be heard within. They ceased as the landlord modestly rattled the k.n.o.b, and when he gave the visitor's name Garnet's voice said:

"Ask him in."

As March entered, only Parson Tombs rose to meet him. He had a large handkerchief in his fingers, his eyes were very red, and he gave his hand in silence. Garnet, too, had been weeping. He shaded his downcast eyes from the lamp. March had determined to give himself no time for feelings, but his voice was suddenly not his own as he began, "Major Garnet," and stopped, while Garnet slowly lifted his face until the light shone on it. March stood still and felt his heart heave between loathing and compa.s.sion; for on that lamp-lit face one hour of public shame had written more guilt than years of secret perfidy and sin, and the question rushed upon the young man's mind, Can this be the author of all my misfortunes and the father of?--he quenched the thought and driving back a host of memories said:

"Major, Doctor Coffin has just p.r.o.nounced me well. I am at your disposal, sir, for anything that ought to be done."

Garnet shaded his eyes again. "Thank you, John," was his subdued reply.

"It's such a clear case of self-defence--I hear there will be no arrest.