Throckmorton Part 8

The general and Mrs. Temple saw nothing; a man might have made love to Judith and have run away with her under their very noses before they would have realized that it was possible for any man to dare falling in love with Beverley's widow; and if Jacqueline's eyes saw anything, she kept it wisely to herself.

Freke certainly added a new and picturesque element to their lives; even Judith could not deny that, although she habitually denied Freke the possession of any of the graces as well as the virtues. But that Freke was a wonderful, a gifted, a fascinating talker, she was forced to admit. His conversation was quite different from Throckmorton's manly plainness of speech, who, with more brains than Freke, had not them as readily soluble in talk. Judith was acute enough to see the difference between the two men--one the man of conversation, and the other the man of action. Throckmorton knew many things, and one thing surpa.s.singly well--his profession. Freke excelled in conversation; what he knew was imposing, but what he could do was not. However, he had not only traveled, but he had observed as well as read. He never made himself the hero of his own stories; and there was a sparkle in his eyes, an animation that gave a deeper tone to his voice, and Judith, in her dull and colorless life, could not but feel the charm of it. Nevertheless, it was not all charm. Judith felt as strongly as ever the incongruity of Freke with his surroundings.

So, some days more pa.s.sed. Judith found that in finesse she was no match for Freke. Indifferent to him as she might be, he could always place himself where he wanted--he managed to have a great deal more of her society than she would willingly have given him; but she reasoned shrewdly with herself--women being naturally clever in these things: "He will soon give it up. The game is not worth the candle." And so it proved; for in a little while he began to shadow Jacqueline, and Jacqueline succ.u.mbed like a bird to the charmer. If Freke was present, Jacqueline, who was wont to be impatient when not noticed, would sit quite quietly by her sister-in-law's side, sewing demurely, or walk beside her gravely, not opening her mouth but listening intently, as her changing color showed. One day, when Jacqueline went into the gloomy, darkened drawing-room to play, Freke followed her. Jacqueline sat down, and began some short familiar piece, but she could not render it. She missed notes, became confused, and finally gave up and left the piano in mortification.

"It is because you are here," she said to Freke, with a child's resentment.

"Is it, little girl?" he asked.

He was sitting quite at the other end of the room and did not come near her, but something in his tone made Jacqueline halt, and brought the ever-ready blood into her cheeks. Freke, after a moment, rose and sauntered toward her. As he came up to her he took a stray lock of hair that had escaped, in curly perversity, from the comb; and, just as he stood with it in his fingers, the door opened and Simon Peter announced:

"Walk right in, Ma.r.s.e George. Mistis, she countin' de tuckeys in de coop, but Miss Judy, she be 'long pres'n'y. Hi! Here Miss Jacky!"

Throckmorton walked in. His eye, which was as quick as a hawk's, caught the whole thing in an instant, and a sort of jealousy sprang into life.

Of course, he did not display the smallest symptom of it. He shook hands pleasantly with Jacqueline, and also with Freke, whom he had met several times. With his easy, worldly judgment, he by no means ranked Freke as the chief of sinners, but, without regarding him as a model citizen, found him extremely good company, which Freke certainly was. Jacqueline looked painfully embarra.s.sed, but Freke's coolness was simply indomitable. The two men made conversation naturally enough, while Jacqueline, awkwardly silent, sat and twisted the unlucky lock of hair in her fingers until a diversion was created by Judith's entrance, with little Beverley clinging to her skirts. A faint, girlish blush came into Judith's face when she met Throckmorton; and for his part he felt always the charm, the refinement, the sprightliness, more piquant because subdued, that exhaled like a perfume wherever Judith was. Beverley made for Throckmorton, and, before his mother could interpose a warning hand, was perched on the arm of Throckmorton's chair, whence both of them defied her. Jacqueline made but one remark. She asked Throckmorton, timidly:

"How is young Mr. Throckmorton?"

At which the major scowled, but responded carelessly that Jack was all right, as far as he knew.

_Young_ Mr. Throckmorton! and from those lovely lips!

Presently there was a grinding of wheels, and a commotion at the front door.

"Mrs. Sherrard, I know!" said Judith. "She always begins her salutations at the gate."

Sounds were distinguishable.

"Mistis be mighty glad ter see you an' Ma.r.s.e Edmun'. She down at de fattenin'-coop countin' de tuckeys, kase we didn't have no luck wid de tuckey-aigs lars' season, an' de wuffless hen-tuckeys--"

So much for Simon Peter, when Delilah's voice broke in:

"Miss Kitty, 'twan' de hen-tuckeys 'tall. Ef de gobblers wuz ter take turns, like de pigeons, a-settin' on de aigs--"

"I allus did think dem he-pigeons look like de foolishest critters _I_ ever see a-settin' on de nes' while de she-pigeons hoppin' roun' de groun' 'stid o' mindin' dey business--"

"You are right, Simon Peter," answered Mrs. Sherrard, still invisible.

"I wonder that Delilah hasn't profited by Mrs. Temple's example. You've got visitors. Whose hat is this?"

"Ma.r.s.e George Throckmorton's an' Ma.r.s.e Temple Freke's. I gwi' tell mistis you here. Ma.r.s.e c'yarn leave de charmber yet, he gout so bad."

Mrs. Sherrard marched in, followed by Edmund Morford. She wore her most commanding and hostile air. She had pooh-poohed Mrs. Temple's dread of Freke, but she meant to give him to understand that his goings on, and particularly his matrimonial difficulties, were perfectly well known in the Severn neighborhood, and properly reprobated. So she shook hands all around, followed by the Rev. Edmund, who never trusted himself at Barn Elms, with those two pretty young women, alone and unprotected.

"I understand you have bought Wareham," remarked Mrs. Sherrard, tartly, to Freke.

"I have," answered Freke, very mildly.

"You'll repent it."

"Not if you make yourself as agreeable as you ought," answered Freke.

The impudence of this tickled Mrs. Sherrard.

"I hear you are an entertaining fellow," she said. "Come and talk to me."

Just then Mrs. Temple entered, but Mrs. Sherrard kept fast hold of Freke. In half an hour he had won her over. Judith, responding with an intelligent glance to a rather cynical smile on Throckmorton's part, saw it. Not satisfied with winning Mrs. Sherrard over, Freke applied himself to Morford, and that excellent but guileless person fell an instant victim to Freke's tact and power. Mrs. Sherrard was so pleased with her morning's visit, that she invited them all over to Turkey Thicket to spend the following Thursday evening.

CHAPTER VI.

In the few days that followed, Judith saw more plainly that Freke was deliberately casting his spell over Jacqueline, and, from the soft and seductive flattery he had tried on her, Judith, at first, he exchanged something like sarcasm. He would discuss constancy before her, Judith meanwhile keeping her seat resolutely, but she could not prevent the tell-tale color from rising into her face. But when, as Freke generally did, he surmised that all the so-called constancy in this world wasn't exactly what it purported to be, she grew pale beneath his gaze. He watched her intently whenever she was with Throckmorton, and the mere consciousness of being watched embarra.s.sed while it angered her. Freke, whose perceptions were of the quickest, saw far into the future, and often repeated in his own mind the old, old truth that all the pa.s.sions of human nature--love, hope, despair, jealousy, and revenge--could be found within the quietest and most peaceful circle.

The very next evening after Mrs. Sherrard's visit, Freke appeared in the dusky drawing-room, where Jacqueline sat crouched over the fire, and Judith, with her child in her arms, sang him quaint Mother Goose melodies. When Freke came within the fire's red circle of light, Judith observed that he had a violin and bow under his arm. Jacqueline jumped up delightedly.

"Oh, oh! do you know any music?"

"I can fiddle a little," answered Freke, smiling.

He settled himself, and, in the midst of the deep silence of twilight in the country, began a concerto of Brahms. The first movement, an _allegro_, he played with a dainty, soft trippingness that was fit for fairies dancing by moonlight. The next, a _scherzo_, was full of tender suggestiveness--a dream told in music. The third movement was deeper, more tragic, full of sorrow and wailing. As Freke drew the bow across the G-string, he would bring out tones as deep as the 'cello, while suddenly the sharp cry of the treble would cut into the somber depths of the ba.s.so like the shriek of a soul in torment. A melody like a wandering spirit appeared out of the deep harmonies, and lost, yet ever found, would make itself heard with a sweet insistence, only to be swallowed up in a tempest of sound, like a bird lost in a storm. And presently there was an abatement, then a calm, and the music died, literally, amid the twilight dusk and gloom.

As Freke, with strange eyes, and his bow suspended, tremblingly, as if waiting for the spirit to return, ceased, there was a perfect silence.

Jacqueline, who had never heard anything like it in her life, and who, all unknown to herself, was singularly susceptible to music, gazed at Freke as the magician who had made her dream dreams, and after a while cried out:

"Why do you play like that? I never heard anybody play so before."

In answer, Freke again smiled, and played a wild Hungarian dance, fit for the dancing of bacchantes, so full of barbaric clash and rhythm, that Jacqueline suddenly sprang up and began to dance around the chairs and tables. Freke half turned to glance at her; he r.e.t.a.r.ded the time, and softened the tones, when Jacqueline, too, danced slowly and dreamily--until presently, with a storm and a rush of music, _fortissimo_ and _prestissimo_, and a resounding blare of chords that sounded like the shouts of a victorious army, he stopped and lay back in his chair, still smiling.

But, although Judith had twice Jacqueline's knowledge of music, with all her feeling for it, Freke was piqued to see that she did not for a moment confound his music with his personality. She seemed to take a malicious pleasure in complimenting him glibly, which is the last snub to an artist. Freke was so vexed by her indifference, that he began to play cats mewing and dogs barking, on his fiddle, to frighten little Beverley, who looked at him with wide, scared eyes.

"Never mind, my darling," cried Judith, laughing. "Be a brave little boy--only girls are scared at such things."

Beverley, thus exhorted, summoned up his courage and proposed to get grandfather's sword to defend himself. Judith's laughter, the defiant light in her eyes, the pa.s.sionate kiss she gave the boy as a reward for his bravery, annoyed Freke. His vanity as an artist, however, was consoled by hearing Simon Peter's voice, in an awed and solemn whisper from the door, through which his woolly head was just visible in the surrounding darkness:

"I 'clar' ter G.o.d, dat fiddle is got evils in it. I hear some on 'em hollerin' an' cryin' fur ter git out, an' some on 'em larfin' an'

jumpin'. Ma.r.s.e Temple, dem is spirits in dat fiddle. I knows it."

"They are, indeed; and, if I go down to the grave-yard at midnight and play, all the dead and gone Temples will rise out of their graves and dance around in their grave-clothes. Do you hear that?" said Freke, gravely.

"Lord G.o.d A'mighty!" yelled Simon Peter, "I gwi' sleep wid a sifter" (a sieve) "over my hade ev'y night arter dis. Sifters keeps away de evils, kase dey slips th'u de holes." And, sure enough, a sieve was hung up over Simon Peter's bed that very night, with a rabbit's foot as an additional safeguard, and a bunch of peac.o.c.k's feathers over the fireplace was ruthlessly thrown into the fire to propitiate "de evils."

When Thursday evening came, General Temple was high and dry with the gout, and Mrs. Temple, of course, could not leave him alone to fight it out with Delilah.

"Ole ma.r.s.e, you gwi' keep on havin' de gout twell you w'yar a ole h'yar foot in yo' pocket. I done tole you so, an' I ain' feerd ter keep on tellin' you so," was Delilah's Job-like advice.

"That's true," snapped the general. "Gad, if I had had a thousand men in my brigade as little 'feerd' as you, I'll be d.a.m.ned if I ever would have surrendered at Appomattox! G.o.d forgive me for swearing."