The Tinder-Box Part 11

"They want you to be the next Governor," I said quickly. "And you will be, too," I added, again using that queer place in my brain that seems to know perfectly unknowable things and that only works in matters that concern him.

"No!"

"Yes, Your Excellency," I hurled at him defiantly.

"You witch, you," he answered me with a pleased, teasing whimsicality coming into his eyes. "Of course, you guessed the letter and it was dear to have you do it, but we both know it is impossible. n.o.body must hear of it, and the telling you has been the best I could get out of it anyway. Jasper, take my compliments to Petunia, this chicken is perfection!"

That eighth wonder of the world which got lost was something even more mysterious than the Sphinx. It was a marvel that could have been used for women to compare men to. That man sat right there at my side and ate four waffles, two large pieces of chicken and a liver-wing, drank two cups of coffee, and then devoured a huge bowl of peaches and cream, with three m.u.f.fin-cakes, while enduring the tragedy of the realization of having to decline the Governorship of his State.

I watched him do it, first in awe and then with a dim understanding of something, I wasn't sure what. Most women, under the circ.u.mstances, would have gone to bed and cried it out or at least have refused food for hours. We've got to get over those habits before we get to the point of having to refuse to be Governors of the States and railroad presidents and things like that.

And while he ate, there I sat not able to more than nibble because I was making up my mind to do something that scared me to death to think about. That gaunt, craggy man in a shabby gray coat, cut ante-bellum wise, with a cravat that wound itself around his collar, snowy and dainty, but on the same lines as the coat and evidently of rural manufacture in the style favored by the flower and chivalry of the day of Henry Clay, had progressive me as completely overawed for several minutes as any painted redskin ever dominated a squaw--or as Jasper did Petunia in my own kitchen.

But after we were left alone with the roses and the candles and his cigar, with only Jasper's gratified voice mumbling over compliments to Petunia in the distance, I took my courage in my hands and plunged.

This can he used as data for the Five.

"James." I said, with such cool determination in my voice that it almost froze my own tongue, "I meant to tell you about it several weeks ago, I have decided to adopt Sallie and all the children. I intend to legally adopt the children and just nominally adopt Sallie, but it will amount to the same thing. I don't have to have your consent but I think it is courteous to ask for it."

"What!" he exclaimed, as he sat up and looked at me with the expression an alienist might use in an important examination.

"Yes," I answered, gaining courage with time. "You see, I was crying out here on the porch with loneliness when you found me. I can't stand this any longer. I must have a family right away and Sallie's just suits me.

I have to take a great deal of interest in them anyway and it would be easier if I had complete control of them. It will leave you with enough family to keep you from being lonely and then we can all be happy together down into old age."

"Have you said anything about this to Sallie?" he asked weakly as he dipped the end of his cigar into his gla.s.s of water and watched the sputter with the greatest interest.

"Not yet, but don't you feel sure that she will consent?" I asked, with confidence in my plan at fever heat. "Sallie is so generous and she can't want to see me live lonely always, without any family at all. Now, will she?"

"She would consent!" he answered slowly, and then he laid his head down on the table right against my arm and shook so that the candlesticks rattled against the candles. "But I don't," he gasped, and for the life of me I couldn't tell whether he was crying or laughing, until he sat up again.

"Eve," he said, with his eyes fairly dancing into mine, "if women in general mean to walk over political difficulties as you are planning to walk away with this one of mine, I'm for feminine rule. Don't you dare say one word about such a thing to Sallie. Of course, it is impossible as it is funny."

It was a tragedy to have such a lovely scheme as I had thought up on the spur of the moment, knocked down suddenly by a half dozen positive words from a mere man, and for a moment my eyes fought with his in open rebellion. Then I rose haughtily and walked out on the front porch.

"Dear," he said, as he followed me and took my hand in his and drew me near him, "don't you know that your wanting to put your shoulder under any burden I may be bearing lifts it completely? There are things in this situation that you can't understand. If I seem to make sacrifices, they come from the depths of my heart and are not sacrifices. Will you believe me?"

How can he help loving Sallie with her so emphatically there?

I answered him I suppose to his liking and he went on across the road to Widegables and left me alone in the cruel darkness.

Please, G.o.d, when things seem to be drowning me like this make me swim with head up. Amen!

CHAPTER VII

SOME SMOLDERINGS

I'm a failure! Yes, Jane, I am!

Polk Hayes is an up-to-date, bright man of the world, with lots of brains and I should say about the average masculine nature, and a great deal more than the average amount of human charm. However, he has got no more brains than I have, has had really fewer advantages, and it ought to be easy for me to hold my own against him. But I am about to fail on him.

For the last two weeks he has been constantly with Nell and has got her in a dreamy state that shows in her face and every movement of her slim body. And yet I know without the shadow of a doubt that he is just biding his time to try me out and get me on his own terms. My heart aches for Nell, and I just couldn't see him murder her girlhood, and it will amount to that if he involves her heart any more than it is. I made up my mind to have it out with him and accordingly let him come and sit on my side steps with me late yesterday afternoon, when I have avoided being alone with him for a month.

"Polk," I asked him suddenly without giving him time to get the situation into his own hands, skilled in their woman-handling, "do you intend to marry Nell or just plain break her heart for the fun you get out of it?"

His dangerous eyes smoldered back at me for a long minute before he answered me:

"Men don't break women's hearts, Evelina."

"I think you are right," I answered slowly, "they do just wring and distort them and deform them for life. But I intend to see that Nell's has no such torturous operation performed on it if I can appeal to you or convince her."

"When you argue with Nell be sure and don't tell her just exactly the things _you_ have done to _me_ all this summer through, Evelina." he answered coolly.

"What do you mean?" I demanded, positively cold with a kind of astonished fear.

"I mean that I have never offered Nell one half of the torture you have offered me, every day since you came home, with your d.a.m.ned affectionate friendliness. When I laugh, you answer it before it gets articulate, and when I gloom, you are as sympathetic as sympathy itself. I have held your hand and kissed it, inst.i.tuting and not quenching a raging thirst thereby, as you are experienced enough to know. You have made yourself everything for me that is responsive and desirable and beautiful and worthy and have put me back every time I have reached out to grasp you.

You don't want me, you don't want to marry me at all, you just want --excitement. You are as cold as ice that grinds and generates fire.

Very well, you don't have to take me--and I'll get what I can from Nell--and others."

"Oh, Polk, how could you have misunderstood me like this?" I moaned from the depths of an almost broken heart. But as I moaned I understood--I understood!

I'm doing it all wrong! I had the most beautiful human love for him in my heart and he thought it was all dastardly, cold coquetting. An awful spark has been struck out of the flint. I'm not worthy to experiment with this dreadful man-and-woman question. I just laid my head down on my arms, resting on my knees and cowered at Polk's feet.

"Don't--Evelina, I didn't mean it." he said quickly in a shaken voice.

But he did!

I couldn't answer him and as I sat still and prayed in my heart for some words to come that would do away with the horror I heard Sallie's voice from my front walk, and she and Mr. Haley, each carrying a sleeping twin, came around the corner of the porch.

That interruption was a direct answer to prayer, for G.o.d knew that I just must have time to think before having this out with Polk. I sometimes feel ashamed of the catastrophes I have to pray quick about, but what would I do if I couldn't?

I don't know how I got through the rest of this evening, but I did--I pray for sleep. Amen!

Watching the seasons follow each other in the Harpeth Valley gives me the agony of a dumb poet, who can feel though not sing.

It was spring when I came down here four months ago, a young, tender, mist-veiled, lilac-scented spring that nestled firmly in your heart and made it ache with sweetness that you hardly understood yourself.

But before I knew it the young darling, with her curls and buds and apple-blooms had gone and summer was rioting over the gardens and fields and hills, rich, lush colored, radiant, redolent, gorgeous, rose-scented and pulsing with a life that made me breathless. Even the roads along the valley were bordered with flowers that the sun had wooed to the swooning point.

But this week, early as it is, there has been a hint of autumn in the air, and a haze is beginning to creep over the whole world, especially in the early mornings, which are so dew-gemmed that they seem to be hinting a warning of the near coming of frost and snow.

My garden has grown into a perfect riot of blooms, but for the last two weeks queer slugs have begun to eat the tender buds that are forming for October blooming, and I have been mourning over it by day and by night and to everybody who will listen.

Aunt Augusta insists that the only thing to do is to get up with the first crack of dawn and carefully search out each slug, remove it and destroy it. She says if this is done for a week they will be exterminated.

I carefully explained it all to Jasper and when I came down to breakfast he was coming in with three queer green things, also with an injured air of having been kept up all night. I didn't feel equal to making him go on with the combat and ignored the question for two days until I saw all the buds on my largest Neron done for in one night.