The Victim: A romance of the Real Jefferson Davis Part 3

"Served him right, too," broke in the Tennesseean, removing his pipe, with a nod of his s.h.a.ggy head.

"But it don't help him on the way to Washington!" The Major grunted, suddenly rising and dismissing the subject for the night.

The Boy's curiosity was kindled to see the great man whose name had filled the world.

The distance to Nashville was quickly covered. The Major pressed straight through the town without pause and drew rein at the General's gate.

The welcome they received from their distinguished host was so simple, so genuine, so real, the Boy's heart went out in loyal admiration.

The house was a big rambling structure of logs, in front of which stood a stately grove of magnificent forest trees. Behind it stretched the grain and cotton fields.

Nothing could surpa.s.s the unaffected and perfect courtesy with which the General welcomed his guests. The tall, stately figure, moving with the unconscious grace of perfect manhood, needed no rules of a dancing master for his guidance. He had sprung from the common people, but he was a born leader and ruler of men.

The Boy listened with keen ears to hear him rip out one of those terrible oaths of which so much had been said. His speech was gentle and kind, and he asked a blessing at every meal exactly as his own quiet, dignified father at home. In all the three weeks they remained his guests not an oath or an ugly word fell from his lips. The Boy wondered how people could tell such lies.

The General liked boys, too. It was easy to see that. He gave hours of his time to the games and sports of his adopted son, Andrew Jackson, Jr., and his two little guests. He got up contests of all sorts. They raced their ponies. They ran and jumped. They played marbles. They followed the hounds. And always with them as friend and counselor, the General, gentle, kind, considerate. The only thing he prohibited was wrestling.

"No, boys," he said with a frown. "That's not a good sport for high spirited youth. To feel the hand of a rival on your body may lead to a fight."

The deep set eyes flashed with the memory of his own hot blooded boyhood and young manhood.

The General's wife won the Boy's whole heart from the moment he saw her.

"How could they tell such lies!" he kept repeating with boyish indignation. Pure and sweet as the face of his own mother was hers.

Loving, unselfish, tender and thoughtful, she moved through her house with the gentle step of a ministering angel. The knightly deference with which the General attended her slightest wish, stirred the Boy's imagination. He could see him standing erect, pistol in hand, in the gray dawn of the morning on which he faced the enemy who had slandered her. He could see the big firm hand grip the pistol's handle in a clasp of steel as he waited the signal of Death. He wondered what sort of wound d.i.c.kenson's bullet had made in the General's breast. Anyhow, it had not been fatal. His enemy lived but a few hours.

He set his lips firmly, and repeated the Tennesseean's verdict:

"Served him right, too."

The Boy left the Hermitage under the spell of Old Hickory's personality for life. He had seen a great man.

IV

THE MONASTERY BELLS

The journey from Nashville to Springfield, Kentucky, was quick and uneventful. Long before the spire of St. Thomas' church loomed on the horizon, they pa.s.sed through the wide, fertile fields of the Dominican monks. The grim figure of a black friar was directing the harvest of a sea of golden-yellow wheat. His workmen were sleek negro slaves. Herds of fat cattle grazed on the hills. A flock of a thousand sheep were nipping the fresh sweet gra.s.s in the valley. They pa.s.sed a big flour mill, whose lazy wheel swung in rhythmic unison with the laughing waters of the creek that watered the rich valley. The monks were vowed to poverty and self-denial. But their Order was rich in slaves and land, in mills and herds and flocks and generous harvests.

As the sun sank in a smother of purple and red behind the hills, they saw the church and monastery. The bells were chanting their call to evening prayer.

The Boy held his breath in silent ecstasy. He had never heard anything like it before. It was wonderful--those sweet notes echoing over hill and valley in the solemn hush of the gathering twilight.

They waited for the priests to emerge from the chapel before making their presence known. Through the open windows the deep solemn throb of the organ pealed. The soul of the Boy rose enchanted on new wings whose power he had never dreamed. Hidden depths were sounded of whose existence he could not know. There was no organ in the little bare log church the Baptists had built near his father's farm in Mississippi. His father and mother were Baptists and of course he was going to be a Baptist some day. But why didn't they have stained gla.s.s windows like those through which he saw the light now streaming--wonderful flashing lights, whose colors seemed to pour from the soul of the organ. And why didn't they have a great organ?

He was going to like these Roman Catholics. He wondered what his mother would say to that?

It all seemed so familiar, too. Where had he heard those bells? Where had he heard the peal of that organ and seen the flash of those gorgeous lights? In the sky at sunset perhaps, and in the rumble of the storm.

Maybe in dreams--and now they had come true.

In a few months, he found himself the only Protestant boy in school and the smallest of all the scholars. The monks were kind. They seemed somehow to love him better than the others. Father Wallace reminded him of his big brother. He was so gentle.

The Boy made up his mind to join the Catholic Church and went straight to Father Wilson, the venerable head of the college.

The old man smiled pleasantly:

"And why do you wish this, my son?"

"Oh, it's so much more beautiful than the Baptist Church. Besides it's so much easier--"

"Indeed?"

"Yes, sir. The Baptists have such a hard time getting religion. They seek and mourn so long--"

"Really?"

"Indeed they do--yes, sir--I've seen stubborn sinners mourn all summer in three protracted meetings and then not come through!"

"And you don't like that sort of penance?"

"No, sir. I've always dreaded it. And the worst thing is the new converts have to stand right up in church before all the crowd and tell their experience out loud. I'd hate that--"

"And you like our ways better?"

"A great deal better. The Catholics manage things so nicely. All you have to do is to go to church, learn the catechism and the good priests do all the rest--"

"Oh--I see!"

"Yes, sir."

Father Wilson laid his wrinkled hand tenderly on the Boy's head:

"You are very, very young, my son, and you are growing rapidly. What you really need is good Catholic food. Sit down and have a piece of bread and cheese with me."

The Boy sat down and ate the offered bread and cheese in silence.

"I can't join, Father Wilson?" he asked at last.

The priest smiled again:

"No, my son."

"You don't like me, Father?" the boy asked wistfully.

"We like you very much, sir. But we are responsible for the trust your father and mother have put in us. In G.o.d's own time when you are older and know the full meaning of your act, I should be glad--but not this way."