The Battle Ground Part 9

"I--I reckon a dol-lar m-i-g-h-t," she gasped, and caught a sob before it burst out.

"Well, you get up and I'll give you a dollar. There ain't many boys worth a dollar, I can tell you."

Betty got up and held out one hand as she wiped her eyes with the other.

"I shall never speak to a boy again," she declared, as she took the money.

That was when she was thirteen, and a year later Dan went away to college.

VI

COLLEGE DAYS

"My dear grandpa," wrote Dan during his first weeks at college, "I think I am going to like it pretty well here after I get used to the professors.

The professors are a great nuisance. They seem to forget that a fellow of seventeen isn't a baby any longer.

"The Arcades are very nice, and the maples on the lawn remind me of those at Uplands, only they aren't nearly so fine. My room is rather small, but Big Abel keeps everything put away, so I manage to get along. Champe sleeps next to me, and we are always shouting through the wall for Big Abel. I tell you, he has to step lively now.

"The night after we came, we went to supper at Professor Ball's. There was a Miss Ball there who had a pair of big eyes, but girls are so silly.

Champe talked to her all the evening and walked out to the graveyard with her the next afternoon. I don't see why he wants to spend so much of his time with young ladies. It's because they think him good-looking, I reckon.

"We are the only men who have horses here, so I am glad you made me bring Prince Rupert, after all. When I ride him into town, everybody turns to look at him, and Batt Horsford, the stableman, says his trot is as clean as a razor. At first I wished I'd brought my hunter instead, they made such a fuss over Champe's, and I tell you he's a regular timber-topper.

"A week ago I rode to the grave of Mr. Jefferson, as I promised you, but I couldn't carry the wreath for grandma because it would have looked silly--Champe said so. However, I made Big Abel get down and pull a few flowers on the way.

"You know, I had always thought that only gentlemen came to the University, but whom do you think I met the first evening?--why, the son of old Rainy-day Jones. What do you think of that? He actually had the impudence to pa.s.s himself off as one of the real Joneses, and he was going with all the men. Of course, I refused to shake hands with him--so did Champe--and, when he wanted to fight me, I said I fought only gentlemen. I wish you could have seen his face. He looked as old Rainy-day did when he hit the free negro Levi, and I knocked him down.

"By the way, I wish you would please send me my half-year's pocket money in a lump, if you can conveniently do so. There is a man here who is working his way through Law, and his mother has just lost all her money, so, unless some one helps him, he'll have to go out and work before he takes his degree. I've promised to lend him my half-year's allowance--I said 'lend'

because it might hurt his feelings; but, of course, I don't want him to pay it back. He's a great fellow, but I can't tell you his name--I shouldn't like it in his place, you know.

"The worst thing about college life is having to go to cla.s.ses. If it wasn't for that I should be all right, and, anyway, I am solid on my Greek and Latin--but I can't get on with the higher mathematics. Mr. Bennett couldn't drive them into my head as he did into Champe's.

"I hope grandma has entirely recovered from her lumbago. Tell her Mrs. Ball says she was cured by using red pepper plasters.

"Do you know, by the way, that I left my half-dozen best waistcoats--the embroidered ones--in the bottom drawer of my bureau, at least Big Abel swears that's where he put them. I should be very much obliged if grandma would have them fixed up and sent to me--I can't do without them. A great many gentlemen here are wearing coloured cravats, and Charlie Morson's brother, who came up from Richmond for a week, has a pair of side whiskers.

He says they are fashionable down there, but I don't like them.

"With affectionate greeting to grandma and yourself,

"Your dutiful grandson,

"DANDRIDGE MONTJOY."

"P.S. I am using my full name now--it will look better if I am ever President. I wonder if Mr. Jefferson was ever called plain Tom.

"DAN."

"N.B. Give my love to the little girls at Uplands.

"D."

The Major read the letter aloud to his wife while she sat knitting by the fireside, with Mitty holding the ball of yarn on a footstool at her feet.

"What do you think of that, Molly?" he asked when he had finished, his voice quivering with excitement.

"Red pepper plasters!" returned the old lady, contemptuously. "As if I hadn't been making them for Cupid for the last twenty years. Red pepper plasters, indeed! Why, they're no better than mustard ones. I reckon I've made enough of them to know."

"I don't mean that, Molly," explained the Major, a little crestfallen. "I was speaking of the letter. That's a fine letter, now, isn't it?"

"It might be worse," admitted Mrs. Lightfoot, coolly; "but for my part, I don't care to have my grandson upon terms of equality with any of that rascal Jones's blood. Why, the man whips his servants."

"But he isn't upon any terms, my dear. He refused to shake hands with him, didn't you hear that? Perhaps I'd better read the letter again."

"That is all very well, Mr. Lightfoot," said his wife, clicking her needles, "but it can't prevent his being in cla.s.ses with him, all the same.

And I am sure, if I had known the University was so little select, I should have insisted upon sending him to Oxford, where his great-grandfather went before him."

"Good gracious, Molly! You don't wish the lad was across the ocean, do you?"

"It matters very little where he is so long as he is a gentleman," returned the old lady, so sharply that Mitty began to unwind the worsted rapidly.

"Nonsense, Molly," protested the Major, irritably, for he could not stand opposition upon his own hearth-rug. "The boy couldn't be hurt by sitting in the same cla.s.s with the devil himself--nor could Champe, for that matter.

They are too good Lightfoots."

"I am not uneasy about Champe," rejoined his wife. "Champe has never been humoured as Dan has been, I'm glad to say."

The Major started up as red as a beet.

"Do you mean that I humour him, madam?" he demanded in a terrible voice.

"Do pray, Mr. Lightfoot, you will frighten Mitty to death," said his wife, reprovingly, "and it is really very dangerous for you to excite yourself so--you remember the doctor cautioned you against it." And, by the time the Major was thoroughly depressed, she skilfully brought out her point. "Of course you spoil the child to death. You know it as well as I do."

The Major, with the fear of apoplexy in his mind, had no answer on his tongue, though a few minutes later he showed his displeasure by ordering his horse and riding to Uplands to talk things over with the Governor.

"I am afraid Molly is breaking," he thought gloomily, as he rode along.

"She isn't what she was when I married her fifty years ago."

But at Uplands his ill humour was dispelled. The Governor read the letter and declared that Dan was a fine lad, "and I'm glad you haven't spoiled him, Major," he said heartily. "Yes, they're both fine lads and do you honour."

"So they do! so they do!" exclaimed the Major, delightedly. "That's just what I said to Molly, sir. And Dan sends his love to the little girls," he added, smiling upon Betty and Virginia, who stood by.

"Thank you, sir," responded Virginia, prettily, looking at the old man with her dovelike eyes; but Betty tossed her head--she had an imperative little toss which she used when she was angry. "I am only three years younger than he is," she said, "and I'm not a little girl any longer--Mammy has had to let down all my dresses. I am fourteen years old, sir."

"And quite a young lady," replied the Major, with a bow. "There are not two handsomer girls in the state, Governor, which means, of course, that there are not two handsomer girls in the world, sir. Why, Virginia's eyes are almost a match for my Aunt Emmeline's, and poets have immortalized hers. Do you recall the verses by the English officer she visited in prison?--

"'The stars in Rebel skies that shine Are the bright orbs of Emmeline.'"