Kennedy Square Part 26

Here was indeed something on which he had not counted! For him to forego the luxuries that enriched his daily life was easy--he had often in his hunting trips lived for weeks on sweet potato and a handful of cornmeal, and slept on the bare ground with only a blanket over him, but that his servants should be reduced to similar privations suggested possibilities which appalled him. For the first time since the cruel announcement fell from Rutter's lips the real situation, with all that it meant to his own future and those dependent upon him, stared him in the face.

He looked up and caught Harry's anxious eyes scanning his own. His old-time, unruffled spirit came to his a.s.sistance.

"No, son!" he cried in his cheeriest voice, springing to his feet--"no, we won't worry. It will all come out right--we'll buckle down to it together, you and I. Don't take it too much to heart--we'll get on somehow."

But the boy was not rea.s.sured; in fact, he had become more anxious than ever. Not only did the chill continue, but the lump in his throat grew larger every minute.

"But, Uncle George--you told me you borrowed the money to pay those bills my father sent me. And will you now have to pay that back as well?" He did not ask of whom he had borrowed it, nor on what security, nor would either Pawson or his uncle have told him, that being a confidential matter.

"Well, that depends, Harry; but we won't have to pay it right away, which is one comfort. And then again, I can go back to the law. I have yet to make my maiden speech before a jury, but I can do it. Think of it!--everybody in tears, the judge mopping his eyes--court-room breathless. Oh, you just wait until your old uncle gets on his feet before a bench and jury. Come along, old fellow--let us go up into the house." Then in a serious tone--his back to Harry--"Pawson, please bring the full accounts with you in the morning, and now let me thank you for your courtesy. You have been extremely civil, sir, and I appreciate it most highly."

When they had reached the front walk and were about to climb the immaculate steps, St. George, still determined to divert the boy's thoughts from his own financial straits, said with a laugh:

"Todd told you, of course, about your father paying me a visit this morning, did he not?"

"Oh, yes!--a most extraordinary account. You must have enjoyed it,"

replied Harry, trying to fall into his uncle's mood, his heart growing heavier every moment. "What did he want?"

One of St. George's heat-lightning smiles played over his face: "He wanted two things. He first wanted you, and then he wanted a receipt for a month's board--YOUR board, remember! He went away without either."

A new perspective suddenly opened up in Harry's mind; one that had a gleam of sunshine athwart it.

"But, Uncle George!" he burst out--"don't forget that my father owes you all the money you paid for me! That, of course, will eventually come back to you." This came in a tone of great relief, as if the money was already in his hand.

St. George's face hardened: "None of it will come back to me," he rejoined in a positive tone. "He doesn't owe me one single penny and he never will. That money he owes to you. Whatever you may happen to owe me can wait until you are able to pay it. And now while I am talking about it, there is another thing your father owes you, and that is an humble apology, and that he will pay one of these days in tears and agony. You are neither a beggar nor a cringing dog, and you never will be so long as I can help it!" He stopped, rested his hand on the boy's shoulder, and with a quiver in his voice added:

"Your hand, my son. Short commons after this, may be, but we will make the fight together."

When the two pa.s.sed through the front door and stepped into the dining-room they found it filled with gentlemen--friends who had heard of the crash and who had come either to extend their sympathy or offer their bank accounts. They had heard of the catastrophe at the club and had instantly left their seats and walked across the park in a body.

To one and all St. George gave a warm pressure of the hand and a bright smile. Had he been the master of ceremonies at a state reception he could not have been more self-possessed or more gallant; his troubles were for himself, never for his guests.

"All in a lifetime--but I am not worrying. The Patapsco pulled out once before and it may again. My only regret is that I cannot, at least for a time, have as many of you as I would wish under my mahogany. But don't let us borrow any trouble; certainly not to-day. Todd, get some gla.s.ses and bring me that bottle of Madeira--the one there on the sideboard!"

Here he took the precious fluid from Todd's hand and holding high the crusted bottle said with a dry smile--one his friends knew when his irony was aroused: "That wine, gentlemen, saw the light at a time when a man locked his money in an iron box to keep outside thieves from stealing it; to-day he locks his money in a bank's vault and locks the thieves in with it. Extraordinary, is it not, how we gentlemen trust each other? Here, Todd, draw the cork!... Slowly.... Now hand me the bottle--yes--Clayton, that's the same wine that you and Kennedy liked so much the night we had Mr. Poe with us. It is really about all there is left of my father's Black Warrior of 1810. I thought it was all gone, but Todd found two more the other day, one of which I sent to Kennedy.

This is the other. Kennedy writes me he is keeping his until we can drink it together. Is everybody's gla.s.s full? Then my old toast if you will permit me: 'Here's to love and laughter, and every true friend of my true friend my own!'"

Before the groups had dispersed Harry had the facts in his possession--princ.i.p.ally from Judge Pancoast, who gave him a full account of the bank's collapse, some papers having been handed up to him on the bench that morning. Summed up, his uncle was practically ruined--and he, Harry, was the cause of it--the innocent cause, perhaps, but the cause all the same: but for his father's cruelty and his own debts St. George would never have mortgaged his home. That an additional sum--his uncle's entire deposit--had been swallowed up in the crash was but part of the same misfortune. Poe's lines were true, then--never so true as now:

"Some unhappy master whom unmerciful disaster Followed fast and followed faster..."

This, then, was ever after to be his place in life--to bring misery wherever he went.

He caught up his hat and walked through the park beside the judge, hoping for some further details of his uncle's present plight and future condition, but the only thing his Honor added to what he already knew was his wonderment over the fact that St. George, having no immediate use for the money except to pay his bills, should have raised so large a sum on a mortgage instead of borrowing it from his friends. It was here that Harry's heart gave a bound:--no one, then, but his uncle, Pawson, and himself knew that he alone was responsible for the catastrophe!

That his father should have learned of his share in it did not enter the boy's head.

Todd answered his knock on his return, and in reply to his inquiry informed him that he must not sit up, as "Ma.r.s.e George" had left word that he would be detained until late at a meeting of the creditors of the bank.

And so the unhappy lad, his supper over, sought his bed and, as had occurred more than once before, spent the earlier hours of the night gazing at the ceiling and wondering what would become of him.

CHAPTER XVIII

With the breaking of the dawn Harry's mind was made up. Before the sun was an hour high he had dressed hurriedly, stolen downstairs so as to wake no one, and closing the front door softly behind him had taken the long path through the park in the direction of the wharves. Once there, he made the rounds of the shipping offices from Light Street wharf to the Falls--and by the time St. George had finished dressing--certainly before he was through his coffee--had entered the name of Henry Rutter on two sets of books--one for a position as supercargo and the other, should nothing better be open, as common seaman. All he insisted upon was that the ship should sail at once. As to the destination, that was of no consequence, nor did the length of the voyage make any difference.

He remembered that his intimate friend, Gilbert, had some months before gone as supercargo to China, his father wanting him to see something of the world; and if a similar position were open he could, of course, give references as to his character--a question the agent asked him--but, then, Gilbert had a father to help him. Should no such position be available, he would ship before the mast, or serve as cook or cabin-boy, or even scullion--but he would not live another day or hour dependent on his dear Uncle George, who had impoverished himself in his behalf.

He selected the sea instead of going into the army as a common soldier because the sea had always appealed to him. He loved its freedom and its dangers. Then again, he was young and strong--could climb like a cat--sail a boat--swim--Yes!--the sea was the place! He could get far enough away behind its horizons to hide the struggle he must make to accomplish the one purpose of his life--the earning of his debt.

Filled with this idea he began to perfect his plans, determining to take no one into his confidence until the day before the ship was ready to sail. He would then send for his mother and Alec--bring them all down to St. George's house and announce his intention. That was the best and wisest way. As for Kate--who had now been at home some weeks--he would pour out his heart to her in a letter. This was better than an interview, which she would doubtless refuse:--a letter she would be obliged to read and, perhaps, answer. As for his dear Uncle George--it would be like tearing his heart out to leave him, but this wrench had to be met and it was best to do it quickly and have done with it.

When this last thought took possession a sudden faintness crept over him. How could he leave his uncle? What St. George was to him no one but himself knew--father, friend, comrade, adviser--standard of men and morals--all and more was his beloved uncle. No thought of his heart but he had given him, and never once had he been misunderstood. He could put his arm about his uncle's neck as he would about his mother's and not be thought effeminate or childish. And the courtesy and dignity and fairness with which he had been treated; and the respect St. George showed him--and he only a boy: compelling his older men friends to do the same. Never letting him feel that any foolish act of his young life had been criticised, or that any one had ever thought the less of him because of them.

Breakfast over, during which no allusion was made either to what St.

George had accomplished at the conference of creditors the night before, or to Harry's early rising--the boy made his way into the park and took the path he loved. It was autumn, and the mild morning air bespoke an Indian summer day. Pa.s.sing beneath the l.u.s.ty magnolias, which flaunted here and there their glossy leaves, he paused under one of the big oaks, whose branches, stripped of most of their foliage, still sheltered a small, vine-covered arbor where he and Kate had often sat--indeed, it was within its cool shade that he had first told her of his love. Here he settled himself on a small wooden bench outside the retreat and gave his thoughts full rein--not to repine, nor to revive his troubles, which he meant to put behind him--but to plan out the letter he was to write Kate. This must be clear and convincing and tell the whole story of his heart. That he might empty it the better he had chosen this place made sacred by her presence. Then again, the park was generally deserted at this hour--the hour between the pa.s.sing of the men of business and the coming of the children and nurses--and he would not be interrupted--certainly not before this arbor--one off by itself and away from pa.s.sers-by.

He seated himself on the bench, his eyes overlooking the park. All the hours he had pa.s.sed with Kate beneath the wide-spreading trees rose in his mind; the day they had read aloud to each other, her pretty feet tucked under her so that the dreadful ants couldn't touch her dainty stockings; the morning when she was late and he had waited and fumed stretching minutes into hours in his impatience; that summer night when the two had hidden behind the big oak so that he could kiss her good-night and none of the others see.

With these memories stirring, his letter was forgotten, and his head dropped upon his breast, as if the weight of all he had lost was greater than he could bear. Grasping his walking-stick the tighter he began tracing figures in the gravel, his thoughts following each line.

Suddenly his ears caught the sound of a quick step--one he thought strangely familiar.

He raised his eyes.

Kate had pa.s.sed him and had given no sign of her presence!

He sprang from his seat:

"Kate!--KATE!--Are you going to treat me as my father treated me! Don't, please!--You'll never see me again--but don't cut me like that: I have never done anything but love you!"

The girl came to a halt, but she did not turn her head, nor did she answer.

"Please, Kate--won't you speak to me? It may be the last time I shall ever see you. I am going away from Kennedy Square. I was going to write you a letter; I came out here to think of what I ought to say--"

She raised her head and half turned her trembling body so that she could see his face, her eyes reading his.

"I didn't think you wanted me to speak to you or you would have looked up."

"I didn't see you until you had pa.s.sed. Can't we sit down here?--no one will see us."

She suffered him to take her hand and lead her to the bench. There she sat, her eyes still searching his face--a wondering, eager look, discovering every moment some old remembered spot--an eyebrow, or the line at the corner of the mouth, or the round of the cheek--each and every one bringing back to her the days that were past and gone never to return.

"You are going away?" she said at last--"why? Aren't you happy with Uncle George? He would miss you, I am sure." She had let the scarf fall from her shoulders as she spoke, bringing into view the full round of her exquisite throat. He had caught its flash, but he could not trust himself to look the closer.

"Not any more than I shall miss him," he rejoined sadly; "but he has lost almost everything he had in the bank failure and I cannot have him support me any longer--so I am going to sea."

Kate started forward and laid her hand on his wrist: "To sea!--in a ship! Where?" The inquiry came with such suddenness and with so keen a note of pain in her voice that Harry's heart gave a bound. It was not St. George's losses then she was thinking of--she was thinking of him!