The Haunted Homestead Part 16

"Life is all a wariorum, And we cares not how it goes!"

"You will frighten the horses presently. Can't you behave yourself with common decency?" exclaimed Valentine, shaking off the hand that had been laid upon his shoulder.

"Let them talk about decorum, As has characters to lose,"

sang the inebriate, chuckling and slapping the boy upon the back.

"If you do not be quiet, I'll get out of this buggy, and leave you to drive home as you can," said Valentine, impatiently.

This seemed to amuse the other very much; he burst out into a peal of laughter, falling back, and clasping his knees, and rolling with the tipsy enjoyment of the joke. When he had laughed himself into a fit of the hiccoughs, and hiccoughed himself into comparative calmness, he still seemed to enjoy the drollery of the idea, and recommenced laughing and singing by fits, and slapping Valentine upon the back.

"I tell you, if you do not quit this, I will get out!" exclaimed the boy, angrily. "You a gentleman!"

This language, instead of rousing Oswald to anger, seemed to strike him as the drollest of speeches, for he fell back into another peal of laughter; and when he had recovered himself he began, not in displeasure, but in a maudlin, jesting way, and with a very thick utterance, to taunt Valentine:

"Why, you ins'lent f'low, do you know who you're talking to? You're a spoiled negro--that is what you are! Now, don't you know, if I wa'n't the most forgivin' f'low in the world, that I'd have you tied up and whipt for such language?"

"Me?"

It is utterly impossible to convey in words any idea of the fierce, savage, almost demoniac glare of hatred and defiance with which that single monosyllable was uttered. But it was lost upon the tipsy master, who replied, nodding and chuckling:

"Yes, you, my little fellow! and I think it will have to be done, too, to bring you to a sense of your condition. Sit down, sir! What the devil do you mean by standing up and looking at me in that way?"

Valentine had risen to his feet, still unconsciously holding the reins, but no longer guiding the horses, who went on their own way, while he stood and glared at his master, with an almost maniacal light blazing from those pale-gray eyes.

"Sit down, sir, I say! What the h--ll do you mean? Sit down, I say, or, by the Lord Harry! I'll do as I've threatened!"

This is not a proper scene to go on with. Both were mad with wine, and one also with rage. The master, though not angry, nor by any means disposed to punish, grew every moment, from very wantonness, more taunting in his manner--the man became each instant more insolent; words rose higher between them; Valentine grew frenzied, dashed his clenched fist with all his strength into his master's face, and sprang from the buggy, leaving him to his fate.

CHAPTER IV.

AN HUMBLE WEDDING.

Habitual evils change not on a sudden, But many days must pa.s.s, and many sorrows; Conscious remorse and anguish must be felt, To curb desire, to break the stubborn will, And work a second nature in the soul, Ere virtue can resume the place she lost.--ROWE'S ULYSSES.

Valentine awoke the next morning with a heavy weight upon his heart and a thick cloud over his brain.

The first fact that attracted his attention was the circ.u.mstance that he was not in his own apartment, but in his mother's bedchamber. A small wood fire was burning in the fireplace, and a teakettle was hanging over the blaze; the red hearth was neat and bright, and the only window was darkened by the lowered paper blind.

Phaedra sat in her flag-bottomed elbow-chair, at the chimney corner; her work was on her lap, but she sat with her hands clasped upon it in idleness, and in an att.i.tude of deepest grief. Such was the picture immediately before him.

He could not tell the hour, but supposed it to be near midday. He strove, through the aching of his head and heart, to recall the latest events of his waking consciousness, before he had fallen into the sleep or the insensibility from which he had just recovered. And, as memory came back in a rushing flood, bringing the hideous phantoms of the previous night's history, overcome with shame and sorrow, he groaned aloud, and buried his face in the pillow. Still he was in ignorance of what had occurred after he had sprung from the buggy; and in terror for what might have happened to Mr. Waring, whom he had left there to guide as he could, in a state of extreme intoxication, the frightened and rearing horses.

Phaedra arose and approached the bed.

"Mother! tell me what has happened, for I remember nothing after getting home," said the boy, in a voice half smothered in emotion.

But Phaedra sank down by the bedside, buried her face in the coverlid, and sobbed.

"Mother! tell me the worst at once. Was he thrown out? Is he dead?"

asked Valentine, in a deep, breathless, husky voice, as he raised upon his elbow and leaned forward, his light eyes, from the tangled thicket of his dark hair, turning upon her like coals at a white heat.

"No, no, he is not dead. But it was a very narrow escape. Oh! Valley, such a good Providence, my boy," she said, taking his disengaged hand and hugging it closely to her bosom, and weeping over it, as if that hand had been saved from some great calamity.

"Tell me all about it, mother."

But Phaedra was sobbing and choking, and could not utter a word more then.

"Where is he now, mother?" asked Valentine, after a little while.

"In his room--unable to rise, but out of danger, the doctor says."

A few more minutes pa.s.sed in silence. Phaedra rose and resumed her chair and her needlework, though the sudden sobs and deep heavings of her bosom betrayed the storm of grief still beating.

"Mother," said Valentine, after a few moments longer, "can you tell me now all about it? How did I get home? How did he? What happened to the buggy?"

"Oh, Valentine, first of all, you came home in a state that made my heart sick to see. I can't tell you how; but I hope never to see the like again. I could not have got you upstairs without help, but I managed to get you in here, and to bed, without any one seeing you."

"Mother----"

This single word, uttered in a tone of deepest regret, and humiliation; and then his voice broke down, and he covered his face with his hands.

"I had not more than got you to bed, when a violent barking of the dogs startled me, and I went out, and found it was master that Mr. Hewitt's n.i.g.g.e.rs had brought home on a door. Dr. Carter, who was coming home from a night call, had found him lying on the side of the road that runs along by Mr. Hewitt's cotton field. And he had ridden up to Mr. Hewitt's house, and roused up the old gentleman and some of the n.i.g.g.e.rs; and they took a barn door off its hinges, and spread a bed and laid him on it, and brought him home. It was well that it happened to be Dr. Carter who found him; for he stayed with him all night, and that has been the means of saving his life. Oh, Valley, it was such a kind Providence that saved him!" said Phaedra, breaking off suddenly, and clasping her hands.

"And this morning, mother?" said Valentine, anxiously.

"Oh! This morning the horses were found near the stables, with a part of the gearing hanging to their necks; and the buggy was found on the road, broken all to pieces."

"I don't mean them--I mean Mr. Waring."

"He is out of danger this morning, as I told you before. He was stunned and very much bruised by being thrown from the buggy, but not otherwise injured."

"What does he say about the accident?"

"He says he doesn't know much about it. He says he supposes he must have been taking too much wine, and that the horses got unruly, and he couldn't manage them; and that was how they threw him out, and broke the carriage."

"Mother! I must get up and go to him now!" said Valentine, hastily.

"Oh, stop! Stay one moment, Valentine! Lie there, and let me speak to you! I have been praying for you all night, in my master's room, here, wherever I have been. Reflect; have you no thanks to offer to the Lord for his providential care, when you so little deserved it? And no sorrow, Valentine, for what has pa.s.sed, and no promises for the future?

Oh, Valentine, how is this course you and your master have begun, going to end?"

"Mother! for my own part, I can affirm that this is the first time I ever was in such a state as you saw me in last night. All I feel about it, shall be said in this one oath--I will never taste intoxicating drink again, so help me Heaven--and shall be proved every day of my life, in the way I keep it!" exclaimed Valentine, impetuously, earnestly, tearfully.

Phaedra grasped his hand once more, and hugged it to her heart, and prayed "G.o.d bless" him.