The Fortunes of Oliver Horn Part 28

Malachi had not the slightest idea what he was talking about. He had not been sick a minute since Oliver left. His heart was too near bursting with pride at his appearance and joy over his return for his mind to work intelligently.

"Dem Yankees ain't sp'iled ye; no, dey ain't. Gor-a-mighty, ain't Malachi glad." Tears were standing in his eyes now. There was no one but Richard he loved better than Oliver.

No fatted calf was spitted and roasted this night on Aunt Hannah's swinging crane for this "probable son," but there was corn-pone in plenty and a chafing dish of terrapin--Malachi would not let Aunt Hannah touch it; he knew just how much Madeira to put in; Hannah always "drowned" it, he would say. And there was sally-lunn and Maryland biscuit; here, at last, Aunt Hannah was supreme--her elbows told the story. And last of all there was a great dish of escalloped oysters cooked in fossil scallop sh.e.l.ls thousands of years old, that Malachi had himself dug out of the marl-banks at Yorktown when he was a boy, and which had been used in the Horn family almost as many times as they were years old. Oh, for a revival of this extinct conchological comfort! But no! It is just as well not to recall even the memories of this toothsome dish. There are no more fossils, neither at Yorktown nor anywhere else, and no subst.i.tute in china, tin, or copper will be of the slightest use in giving their flavor.

Supper served and over, with Oliver jumping up half a dozen times to kiss his mother and plumping himself down again to begin on another relay of pone or terrapin or oysters, much to Malachi's delight ("He do eat," he reported to Aunt Hannah. "I tell ye. He's bearin' very heavy on dem scallops. Dat's de third sh.e.l.l.")--the doors were opened with a flourish, and the three, preceded by Malachi, entered the drawing-room in time to welcome the neighbors.

Nathan, who was already inside sitting by the fire, his long, thin legs stretched out, his bunchy white hair, parted in the middle, falling to his collar's edge, sprang up and shook Oliver's hand heartily. He had charged Malachi, when he admitted him, to keep his presence secret. He wanted them to have Oliver all to themselves.

Miss Clendenning entered a moment later with both hands held out. She would not stop in the hall to unwind her nubia or take off her little fur boots, but motioned Oliver to her knees after she had kissed him joyously on both cheeks, and held out those two absurd little feet for his ministrations, while Mrs. Horn removed her nubia and cloak.

The rat-a-tat at the door was now constant. Judge Bowman and old Dr.

Wallace and four or five of the young men, with the young girls, entered, all with expressions of delight at Oliver's return home, and later, with the air of a Lord High Mayor, Colonel John Clayton, of Pongateague, with Sue on his arm. Clayton was always a picture when he entered a room. He stood six feet and an inch, his gray hair brushed straight back, his goatee curling like a fish-hook at its end.

"Handsome Jack Clayton" was still handsome at sixty.

After the Colonel had grasped Oliver's hand in his warmest manner, Sue laid all of her ten fingers in his. It was as good as a play to watch the little witch's face as she stood for a moment and looked Oliver over. She had not written to him for months. She had had half a dozen beaus since his departure, but she claimed him all the same as part of her spoils. His slight mustache seemed to amuse her immensely.

"Are you glad to see me, Ollie?" she asked, looking archly at him from under her lashes.

"Why, Sue!"

Of course he was glad--for a minute--not much longer. How young she is, he thought, how provincial. As she rattled on he noticed the ma.s.s of ringlets about her face and the way her head was set on her shoulders.

Her neck, he saw, was much shorter than Margaret's, and a little out of drawing. Nor was there anything of that fearless look or toss of the head like a surprised deer, which made Margaret so distinguished.

Oliver had arrived at that stage in his affection when he compared all women to one.

All this time Sue was reading his mind. Trust a young girl for that when she is searching a former lover's eyes for what lies behind them.

She was evidently nettled at what she found and had begun by saying "she supposed the Yankee girls had quite captured his heart," when the Colonel interrupted her by asking Oliver whether the Northern men really thought they could coerce the South into giving up their most treasured possessions.

He had been nursing his wrath all day over a fresh attack made on the South by some Northern paper, and Oliver was just the person to vent it upon--not that he did not love the lad, but because he was fresh from the despised district.

"I don't think they want to, sir. They are opposed to slavery and so are a good many of us. You have a wrong idea of the life at the North, Colonel. You have never been North, I believe?"

"No, my dear Oliver, and I never intend to. If ever I go it will be with a musket. They have had it all their own way lately with their Harriet Stowes, William Lloyd Garrisons, and John Browns; it is our turn now."

"Who do you want to run through the body, Clayton?" asked Richard, joining the group and laying his hands affectionately on the Colonel's shoulders.

"Anybody and everybody, Richard, who says we are not free people to do as we please."

"And is anybody really saying so?"

"Yes; you see it every day in every Northern editorial--another to-day--a most villainous attack which you must read. These Puritans have been at it for years. This psalm-singing crew have always hated us. Now, while they are preaching meekness and lowliness and the rights of our fellow-men--black ones they mean--they are getting ready to wad their guns with their hymn-books. It's all a piece of their infernal hypocrisy!"

"But why should they hate us, Clayton?" asked Richard in a half-humorous tone. He had no spirit of contention in him to-night, not with Oliver beside him.

"Because we Cavaliers are made of different stuff; that's why! All this talk about slavery is nonsense. These Nutmeg fellows approved of slavery as long as they could make a dollar out of the traffic, and then, as soon as they found out that they had given us a commercial club with which to beat out their brains, and that we were really dominating the nation, they raised this hue and cry about the downtrodden negro and American freedom and the Stars and Stripes and a lot of such tomfoolery. Do you know any gentleman who beats his negroes? Do you beat Malachi? Do I beat my Sam, whom I have brought up from a boy and who would lay down his life any day for me? I tell you, Richard, it is nothing but a fight for financial and political mastery.

They're afraid of us; they've been so for years. They cried 'Wolf' when the fugitive slave law was pa.s.sed and they've kept it up ever since."

"No, I don't believe it," exclaimed Richard, with a positive tone in his voice "and neither do you, Clayton. It's largely a question of sentiment. They don't believe one man should hold another in bondage."

"That's where you are wrong. They don't care a fippenny bit about the negro. If they ever succeed in their infernal purpose and abolish slavery, and set the negro adrift, mark my words, they won't live with him, and they won't let him come North and work alongside of their own people. They'll throw him back on us after they have made a beggar and a criminal of him. Only a Southerner understands the negro, and only a Southerner can care for him. See what we have done for them! Every slave that landed on our sh.o.r.es we have changed from a savage into a man. They forget this."

Judge Bowman joined in the discussion--so did Dr. Wallace. The Judge, in his usual ponderous way, laid down the law, both State and National--the Doctor, who always took the opposite side in any argument, asking him rather pointed questions as to the rights of the Government to control the several States as a unit.

Richard held his peace. He felt that this was not the night of all others to discuss politics, and he was at a loss to understand the Colonel's want of selfrestraint. He could not agree with men like Clayton. He felt that the utterance of such inflammatory speeches only added fuel to the smouldering flame. If the ugly jets of threatening smoke that were creeping out everywhere because of the friction between the two sections were in danger of bursting into flame, the first duty of a patriot, according to his creed, was to stand by with pails of water, not with kegs of gunpowder. So, while Clayton's outspoken tirade still filled the room, he with his usual tact did all he could to soften the effect of his words. Then again, he did not want Oliver's feelings hurt.

Malachi's entrance with his tray, just as the subject was getting beyond control, put a stop to the discussion. The learned group of disputants with the other guests quickly separated into little coteries, the older men taking their seats about an opened card-table, on which Malachi had previously deposited several thin gla.s.ses and a pair of decanters, the ladies sitting together, and the younger people laughing away in a corner, where Oliver joined them.

Richard and Nathan, now that the danger was averted (they were both natural born peace-makers), stepped across the room to a.s.sist in entertaining Miss Clendenning. The little lady had not moved from the chair in which she sat when Oliver relieved her of her fur boots. She rarely did move when once she had chosen a place for herself in a drawing-room. She was the kind of woman who could sit in one place and still be surrounded--by half-moons of adorers if she sat against the wall, by full moons if she sat in the open. She had learned the art when a girl.

"If Clayton would go among these people, my dear Lavinia," said Richard, in a deprecating tone, drawing up a chair and seating himself, beside her, "he would find them very different from what he thinks.

Some of the most delightful men I have ever met have come from the States north of us. You know that to be so."

"That depends, Richard, on how far North you go," Miss Clendenning answered, spreading her fan as she spoke, looking in between the sticks as if searching for specimens. "In Philadelphia I find some very delightful houses, quite like our own. In New York--well, I rarely go to New York. The journey is a tiresome one and the hotels abominable.

They are too busy there to be comfortable, and I do not like noisy, restless people. They give me a headache."

"Oliver has met some charming people, he tells me," said Richard. "Mr.

Slade took him into his own home and treated him quite like a son."

"Of course he did; why not?" Miss Clendenning was erect now, her eyes snapping with roguish indignation. "Anybody would be glad to take Oliver into their home, especially when they have two marriageable daughters. Oliver's bow as he enters a room is a pa.s.sport to any society in the world, my dear Richard. My Lord Chesterfield Clayton has no better manners nor any sweeter smile than our own Lorenzo. Watch Oliver now as he talks to those girls."

Richard had been watching him; he had hardly taken his eyes from him.

Every time he looked at him his heart swelled the more with pride.

"And you think, Lavinia, Mr. Slade invited him because of his manners?"

He was sure of it. He only wanted her to confirm it.

"Of course. What else?" and she cut her eye at him knowingly. "How many of the other clerks did he invite? Not one. I wanted to find out and I made Ollie write me. They are queer people, these Northerners. They affect to despise good blood and good breeding and good manners. That's all fol-de-rol--they love it. They are eternally talking of equality--equality; one man as GOOD as another. When they say that one man is as GOOD as another, Richard, they mean that THEY are as good, never the other poor fellow."

"Now, my dear Lavinia, stop a moment," laughed the inventor in protest.

"You do not mean to say there are really no gentlemen north of us?"

"Plenty of gentlemen, Richard, but few thoroughbreds. There is a distinction, you know."

"Which do you value most?"

"Oh, the thoroughbred. A gentleman might some time offend you by telling you the truth about yourself or your friends. The thoroughbred, never," and she lifted her hands in mock horror.

"And he could be a rogue and yet his manners would save him?"

"Quite true, dear Richard, quite true. The most charming man I ever met except your dear self"--and she smiled graciously and lowered her voice as if what she was about to tell was in the strictest confidence--"was a shrivelled-up old prince who once called on my father and myself in Vienna. He was as ugly as a crab, and walked with a limp. There had been some words over a card-table, he told me, and the other man fired first. I was a young girl then, but I have never forgotten him to this day. Indeed, my dear Nathan," and she turned to the old musician and laid her wee hand confidingly on his knee, "but for the fact that the princess was a most estimable woman and still alive, I might have been--well, I really forget what I might have been, for I do not remember his name, but it was something most fascinating in five or six syllables. Now all that man ever did to make that unaccountable impression upon me was just to pick up my handkerchief. Oh, Nathan, it really gives me a little quiver to this day! I never watch Oliver bow but I think of my prince. Now I have never found that kind of quality, grace, bearing, presence--whatever you may choose to call it--in the Puritan. He has not time to learn it. He despises such subtle courtesies. They smack of the cavalier and the court to him. He is content with a nod of the head and a hurried handshake. So are his neighbors. They would grow suspicious of each other's honesty if they did more. Tut, tut, my dear Richard! My prince's grooms greeted each other in that way."

Richard and Nathan laughed heartily. "And you only find the manners of the ante-chamber and the throne-room South?" asked the inventor.

"Um--not always. It used to be so in my day and yours, but we are retrograding. It is unpardonable in our case because we have known better. But up there" (and she pointed in the direction of the North Star) "they never did know better; that's some excuse for them."

"Ah, you incorrigible woman, you must not talk so. You have not seen them all. Many of the men who do me the honor to come to my workroom are most delightful persons. Only last week there came one of the most interesting scientists that I have met for--"

"Of course, of course, I have not a doubt of it, my dear Richard, but I am talking of men, my friend, not dried mummies."