Westerfelt Part 35

Westerfelt was impatient for two o'clock to arrive. It was one when he left Bradley's after dinner. He went to the stable and ordered Jake to get out his horse and buggy. He would call for her at once; he could not wait any longer. He felt a sort of sinking sensation at his heart as Jake gave him the whip and reins, and he was actually trembling when he stopped at the hotel. Harriet came out on the veranda above and told him she would be down at once. She did not keep him waiting long, and when she came down, prettily flushed and neatly attired, his heart bounded and his pulse quickened. Had she been a queen he could not have felt more respect for her than he did as he stood shielding her skirt from the wheels and helped her get seated. He was just about to get in himself when an old man came down the sidewalk from Worthy's store, headed for the buggy. It was old John Wambush with a basket of eggs on his arm.

"Howdy' do," he said, nodding to them both. "Miss Harriet, is yore ma needin' any more eggs now? I diskivered another nest this mornin', an'

'lowed she mought be able to use 'em. She's about the only one in the place 'at ever has cash to pay fer produce."

"I don't know, Mr. Wambush," Harriet replied, politely. "She is in the house; you might go in and see her."

The old man shifted his basket to his other arm and hesitated.

Westerfelt got into the buggy and took up the reins.

"I reckon, Miss Harriet, you hain't heerd frum Toot sence I seed you?"

"No, Mr. Wambush." Westerfelt was not looking at her as she spoke, and the saddest part of it lay in the fact that he was trying to save her from what he imagined must be a very embarra.s.sing situation. "No, he has not written me."

"Well"--the old man turned--"as fur as I'm concerned, I'm not one bit afeerd that he'll not be able to take keer o' hisse'f, but his mammy is pestered mighty nigh to death about 'im."

Just then Mrs. Floyd came out on the porch and threw a kiss at Harriet.

The act and its accompanying smile reminded Westerfelt of the deception the old lady had played on Bates, and that added weight to the vague convictions once more alive in his brain. Mrs. Floyd's smile implied a certain confidence in his credulity and pliability that was galling to his proud spirit.

His horse was mettlesome, and Westerfelt drove rapidly over a good road which ran along the foot of the mountain. The day was fine, the scenery glorious, but he was oblivious of their charm. His agony had never been so great. He kept his eyes on his horse; his face was set, his glance hard. Once he turned upon her, maddened by the sweet, half-confiding ring in her voice when she asked him why he was so quiet, but the memory of his promise never to reproach her again stopped him. With that came a sudden reckless determination to rid himself of the whole thing by going away, at least temporarily, and then he remembered that he really had some business affairs to attend to in Atlanta.

"I am going away awhile, Miss Harriet," he told her.

"You are, really?"

"Yes; I'm needed down in Atlanta for a while. I reckon I'll get back in a few weeks."

He saw her face change, but he did not read it correctly. At that moment he could not have persuaded himself that she cared very much one way or the other. Surely a girl who had, scarcely six weeks before, sobbed in old Wambush's arms about her love for his son could not feel anything deeply pertaining to another man whom she had known such a short time.

"Let's go back," he proposed, suddenly, and almost brutally. "I reckon we've gone far enough. Night comes on mighty quick here in the valley."

She raised her eyes to his in a half-frightened glance, and said:

"Yes; let's go back."

He turned his horse, and for fifteen minutes they drove along in silence. There was now absolutely no pity in his heart. The vast black problem of his own tortured love seemed to be soaking into him from the very air about him.

He broke the silence.

"So you refused Bates?"

She looked at him again. "How did you know that?"

He laughed bitterly.

"He told me so; he's another fool."

"Mr. Westerfelt!"

"I beg your pardon," he amended, quickly; "but any man is a fool to be simply crazy about a woman, and he is."

He saw her raise her little shapely hand to her twitching mouth and experienced one instant's throbbing desire to catch it and hold it and beg her to have mercy on him and help him throw off the h.e.l.lish despair that rested on him. It was a significant fact that she said nothing to protract the conversation on the line of Bates's proposal. To her the proposal and rejection of a king by her would have found no place in her thoughts, facing the incomprehensible mood of the man she loved.

It was growing dark when they reached the hotel. As he aided her to alight he gave her his hand. "It's good-bye for a while, anyway," he said.

She started; her hand was heavy and cold. She caught her breath.

"When are you going, Mr. Westerfelt?"

"In the morning after breakfast, by the hack to Darley."

That was all. She lowered her head and pa.s.sed into the house. In the hall she met her mother.

"Great goodness, dear!" exclaimed the old woman; "what on earth did you run away from him so sudden for?"

Harriet pushed past her into the parlor and stood fumbling with the b.u.t.tons of her cloak.

"Answer me, daughter," pursued Mrs. Floyd; "what did--"

"Oh, G.o.d! don't bother me, mother," cried Harriet.

Mrs. Floyd held her breath as she drew her daughter down on a sofa and stared into her face.

"What's the matter, daughter? _Do_ tell me."

"He's going away," said Harriet. "Oh, mother, I don't know what ails him! I never saw anybody act as he did. He had little to say, and when he spoke it looked as if he was mad with me. Oh, mother, sometimes I think he loves me, and then again--"

"He _does_ love you," declared Mrs. Floyd. "I hid behind the curtains in the parlor and watched him on the sly while he was waiting for you to come down. I never saw a man show love plainer; he kept looking up at your window, and his face fairly shone when you come out. You can't fool me. He's in love, but he's trying to overcome it for--for some reason or other. High-spirited men do that way, sometimes. Men don't like to give up their liberty and settle down. But he'll come to time, you see if he don't."

Harriet stood up and started to the door. "Where are you going?" asked her mother.

"Up-stairs," sighed Harriet. "Mother, can you do without my help at supper? I want to lie down and be alone."

"Of course; I won't need you; everything is attended to, and Hettie come while you was away. She fairly danced when she heard you had gone to drive with Mr. Westerfelt. She hopes you will speak to him about Toot. She's heard from him. He wants to come back home and marry her, if Mr. Westerfelt can be persuaded to withdraw the charges. Do you think he would, daughter?"

"Oh, I don't know, mother!" Harriet slowly ascended the stairs to her room, and Mrs. Floyd sat down in the darkening parlor to devise some scheme; she finally concluded that Harriet was too much in love to manage her own affairs, and that she would take them in hand.

"He loves her, that's certain," she mused, "and he is a man who can be managed if he is worked just right." She had evidently arrived at an idea as to what should be done in the emergency, for she put on her cloak and hat and went up to Harriet's room. The girl sat near the bed, her head bent over to a pillow.

"Daughter," Mrs. Floyd said, laying her hand on Harriet's head, "you stay here, and don't come down-stairs to-night for all you do. I'm not going to have people see you looking like that. It will set 'em to talking, after you've been to ride with Mr. Westerfelt. Stay here; I'll have Hettie fetch you something to eat."

Harriet did not look up or reply, and Mrs. Floyd descended to the street.

Chapter XXIII

Westerfelt was in the yard back of the stable. He had just started home when he saw a m.u.f.fled figure enter the front door, and heard Mrs.

Floyd asking Washburn if he were in.

"Here I am," he called out; and he approached her as she waited at the door.