The Jucklins Part 7

The next morning, when with quick stride, to make up for an anxious lingering in the pa.s.sage way, I hastened toward the school, I heard the gallop of a horse, and turning about, saw old General Lundsford coming like a dragoon. Upon seeing me he drew in his horse and had sobered him to a walk by the time he reached a brook, on the brink of which I halted to let him pa.s.s.

"Why, good morning, Mr. Hawes. Beautiful day, sir. I am going your way a short distance, and if you'll get up here behind me, sir, you shall ride."

I thanked him, telling him that I much preferred to walk. "All right, sir, and I will get down and walk with you until duty, sir," he said sonorously, with a bow; "until duty, sir, shall call us apart."

I urged him not to get down, telling him that I could easily keep pace with his horse, but he dismounted even before crossing the stream, preferring, he said, with another bow, to take his chances with me. And thus we walked onward, the horse following close, now and then "nosing"

his master's shoulder to show his preference and his loyalty. The season was mellowing and the old gentleman was airily dressed in white, low shoes neatly polished and a Panama hat. He was delighted, he said, to hear that I was getting along so well with the school, and he knew that I would be of vast good to the community. "I have heard of the Aimes conspiracy," said he, "and I am glad that I met you, for I wanted to talk to you about it. The truth of it all is, not that you once larruped that fellow Bentley, but that old Aimes wishes to put a sly indignity upon me by misusing one who has been entertained at my house. That's the point, sir. He heard that I had given you countenance at my board, and what his sister afterward told him was an excuse for the exercise, sir, of his distemper. But, by--I came within one of swearing, sir. I used to curse like an overseer, but I joined the church not long ago, and I've been walking a tight rope ever since. But as I was about to say, you are not going to let those people humiliate you."

"I am going to do my duty," I answered, "and my duty does not tell me to be humiliated."

"Good, sir; first-rate. As a general thing, we do not look for the highest spirit in a school-teacher--pardon my frankness, for, as you know, one who is dependent upon a whole community, one who seeks to please many and varied persons, is not as likely to exhibit that independence and vigor of action which is characteristic of the man who stands solely upon honor, with nothing to appease save his own idea of right. But I forgot. The grandson of Captain Hawes needs no such homily.

The Aimes family is a hard lot, sir, but a gentleman can at all times stand in smiling conquest above a tough. Scott Aimes, a burly scoundrel, and, therefore, the pet of his father, at one time threatened to chastize my son Chydister, who is now off at college. And I said not a word in reply, when my son told me of the threat. I merely pointed to a shot-gun above the library door and went on with my reading of the death notices in the newspaper. That gun is there now, sir, and whenever you want it, speak the word and it shall be yours."

I laughed to myself and thought that I must be getting on well with the old General--first the offer of his library and now of his gun--and I thanked him for the interest which he had shown in me, a mere stranger.

"A well-bred Southerner is never a stranger in the South," said he. "We are held together by an affection stronger than any tie that runs from heart to heart in any other branch of the human family. But," he added, sadly shaking his head, "I fear that this affection is weakening. Our young men are becoming steeped in the strong commercial spirit of the North. I should like to continue this pleasant and elevating conversation, but here's where I am compelled to leave you."

"Can I a.s.sist you to mount?" I asked, hardly knowing what else to say.

He shoved his hat back and looked at me in astonishment. "You are kind, sir, but I am not yet on the lift." But he instantly recognized that this was harsh, and with a broad smile he added: "Pardon me for my shortness of speech, but the truth is that a man who has spent much of his life in the saddle contemplates with horror the time when he must be helped to his seat."

"General, I am the one to ask pardon," I replied, bowing in my turn.

"Oh, no, I a.s.sure you!" he exclaimed, mounting his horse with more ease than I had expected to see. "It was your kindness of heart, sir; a courtesy, and though a courtesy may be a mistake, it is still a virtue.

Look at that old field out there," he broke off. "Do you call that an advancement of civilization. By--the tight rope, again--it is desolation."

It seemed that while walking he had regarded me as his guest, but that now, astride his horse and I on foot, he looked upon me as a man whom he had simply met in the road.

"A return of prosperity," he said, gathering up his bridle rein, "a fine return, indeed. About another such a return and this infernal world won't be fit to live in. I wish you good morning, sir."

That very day there came to school the sullen-looking boy whom I had seen in the tobacco patch. I asked him his name and he answered that he had forgotten to bring it with him. "Perhaps," said I, "it would be well to go back and get it."

"If you want it wus'n I do I reckon you better go atter it."

This set the children to laughing. My humiliation was begun.

"I understand why you have come," said I, "and I must tell you that you must obey the rules if you stay here. What is your name?"

"Gibblits," he answered. The children laughed and he stood regarding me with a leer lurking in the corners of his evil-looking mouth.

"All right, Mr. Gibblits, where are your books?" He grinned at me and answered: "Ain't got none."

"Well, sit down over there and I'll attend to you after a while."

"Won't set down and won't be attended to."

"Well, then, I'll attend to you right now." I grabbed him by the collar, jerked him to me and boxed his jaws. He ran out howling when I turned him loose, and for a time he stood off in the woods, throwing stones at the house. The war was begun. And I expected to encounter the Aimes forces on my way home, but saw nothing of them as I pa.s.sed within sight of the house. I hoped to see a look of sweet alarm on Guinea's face, when I should tell her of the danger that threatened me, and there was sweetness in her countenance, when I told her, though not a look of alarm, but a smile of amus.e.m.e.nt. Was it that she felt no interest in me?

The other members of the family were much concerned, but that was no recompense for the girl's apparent indifference. The old man snorted, Mrs. Jucklin was so wrought upon that she strove to prepare me a soothing dish at supper, but Guinea remained undisturbed. I could not help but speak to Alf about it when we had gone up to our room. "Oh, you never can tell anything about her," he said. "It's not because she isn't scared, but because she hates to show a thing of that sort. I'm mighty sorry it has come about. But there's only one way out--fight out if they jump on you. I don't know how soon they intend to do anything, but I'll nose around and come over to the school this evening if I hear anything. Don't let it worry you; just put it down as a thing that couldn't be helped."

It did not worry me--the fact that I might be on the verge of serious trouble, did not; but the thought of Guinea's careless smile lay cold upon my heart, and all night I was restless under it. And when I went down stairs at dawn I met her in the pa.s.sage way, carrying a light. She looked up at me, s.h.i.+elding the light with her hand to keep the breeze from blowing it out, and smiled, and in her smile there was no coolness, and yet there was naught to show me that she had pa.s.sed an anxious night. Ah, love, we demand that you shall not only be happy, but miserable at our wish. We would dim your eye when our own is blurred; we would smother your heart when our own is heavy, and would pierce it with a pain. Upon her children this old world has poured the wisdom of her gathered ages, and could we look from another sphere we might see the minds of great men twinkling like the stars, but the human heart is yet unschooled, yet has no range of vision, but chokes and sobs in its own emotion, as it did when the first poet stood upon a hill and cried aloud to an unknown G.o.d.

Away across the valley and over the hills the peeping sun was a glaring scollop when I came out to take my course through the woods toward the school. I knew that the girl stood in the door behind me. Alf and the old man were already in the field; I could hear them talking to their horses; and Mrs. Jucklin was up stairs--Guinea and I were alone. I turned and looked at her and again she smiled.

"The world seems to be holding its breath, waiting for something to happen," she said. "To me it always appears so when there is a lull in the air just at sunrise."

"What a fanciful little creature you are," I replied.

"Little! Oh, you mustn't call me little. I'm taller than mother. I don't want to be little, although it is more appealing. I want to be commanding."

"But what can be more commanding than an appeal?" I asked.

"Yes, when the appeal is pitiful, but I don't want any one to pity me,"

she said, laughing. "You big folks have such a patronizing way. You don't look well this morning, Mr. Hawes. Is it because you have been worrying over those wretched Aimes boys? Won't you please forgive me?"

she quickly added. "I don't know why I said that, for I ought to know that you are not afraid of them."

"I didn't sleep very well," I answered, "but I was not thinking of the Aimes boys. Shall I tell you what worried me?"

"Yes, surely."

"It may require almost an unwarranted frankness on my part, but I will tell you. It seemed to me that----" I hesitated. "Go on," she said.

"Well, it seemed that you were strangely unconcerned when I told you that I was likely to have trouble with those people."

She stood with her head resting against the door-facing. I looked hard at her, striving to catch some sign of emotion, but I saw no evidence of feeling; she was cool and reserved.

"I don't know why you should have thought that," she said. "Why should I be so uncharitable. I was very sorry that anything was likely to interrupt the school."

"Oh," I replied, and perhaps with some bitterness, "it really amounts to but little--the threat of those ruffians, I mean--and to speak about it almost puts me down as a fool. I hope you will forgive me."

I hastened away, with a senseless anger in my heart, and I think that it is well that I saw no member of the Aimes family that morning on my way to school.

Everything went forward as usual; play-time came, and the children shouted in the woods, and the hour for dismissal had nearly arrived when in stalked Alf with a shot-gun. He nodded at me and took a seat far to the rear of the room, as if careful lest he might interrupt the closing ceremonies. And when the last child was gone my friend came forward, shaking his head.

"What's the trouble now?" I asked, taking down my hat.

"Put your hat right back there, unless you want to wear it in the house," he said. "I have found out that those fellows are laying for you, and it won't be safe to start home now; we'll have to wait until dark. Oh, they'll get you sure if you go now. They have been to town, I understand, and have come back pretty well loaded up with whisky. Oh, they are as bold as lions now. But we'll fix them all right. We'll wait until dark and not go by the road, and to-morrow morning we'll go over and see what they've got to say."

"Alf, I don't know how to express my thanks to you. You are running a great risk----"

"Don't mention that, Bill. You stood by me, you understand--walked right into the General's house with me, and I said to myself that if you ever got into a pinch that I'd be on hand and stand with you. Did you bring a pistol?"

"Yes, and I am very glad that I didn't meet one of those fellows as I came along. However, I should not know one of them if I were to meet him in the road."

"But you'll know them after a while. Do these doors lock?"

"I think not, or, at least, they could be easily forced open. Do you think they are likely----"

"They are likely to do anything now," he broke in. "And there are just four of them big enough to fight--of the boys, I mean, for the old man has sense enough to keep out of it."

"It is a wonder, then," said I, "that he hasn't sense enough to keep his sons out of it, as he must know that no good can be the result."

"That's all true enough," Alf replied, "but I have heard that you can't argue with the instinct of a brute, and I know that it is useless to argue with red liquor. Here, let's shove the writing desk against this door," he added. "Once more, shove again. That's it. Now we'll pile benches against the other one. We can't do anything with the windows, but must simply keep out of the way of them."