Joy in the Morning Part 5

And the world had turned over and come up right side on top. "Mawnin', Miss. Yas'm, I was fixin' to go in dat big do' yander, but I dunno as I'm 'lowed. Is I 'lowed, young miss, to go in dar an' gib my two hun'erd to Unc' Sam?"

"What?" The tone was kindness itself, but bewildered.

Aunt Basha elucidated. "I got two hun'erd, young miss, and I cert'nly want to gib it to Unc' Sam to buy clo'se for dem boys what's fightin'

for us in Franch."

"I wonder," spoke the girl, gazing thoughtfully, "if you want to get a Liberty Bond?"

"Yas'm--yas, miss. Dat's sho' it, a whatjer-ma-call-'em. I know'd 'twas some cu'is name lak dat." The vision nodded her head.

"I'm going in to do that very thing myself," she said. "Come with me.

I'll help you get yours."

Aunt Basha followed joyfully in the wake, and behold, everything was easy. Ready attention met them and shortly they sat in a private office carpeted in velvet and upholstered in grandeur. A personage gave grave attention to what the vision was saying.

"I met--I don't know your name," she interrupted herself, turning to the old negro woman.

Aunt Basha rose and curtsied. "Dey christened me Bathsheba Jeptha, young miss," she stated. "But I'se rightly known as Aunt Basha. Jes'

Aunt Basha, young miss. And marster."

A surname was disinterred by the efforts of the personage which appeared to startle the vision.

"Why, it's our name, Mr. Davidson," she exclaimed. "She said Cabell."

Aunt Basha turned inquiring, vague eyes. "Is it, honey? Is yo' a Cabell?"

And then the personage, who was, after all, cas.h.i.+er of the Ninth National Bank and very busy, cut in. "Ah, yes! A well known Southern name. Doubtless a large connection. And now Mrs.--ah--Cabell--"

"I'd be 'bleeged ef yo' jis' name me Aunt Basha, marster."

And marster, rather _intrigue_ because he, being a New Englander, had never in his life addressed as "aunt" a person who was not sister to his mother or his father, nevertheless became human and smiled. "Well, then, Aunt Basha."

At a point a bit later he was again jolted when he asked the amount which his newly adopted "aunt" wanted to invest. For an answer she hauled high the folds of her frock, unconscious of his gasp or of the vision's repressed laughter, and went on to attack the clean purple alpaca petticoat which was next in rank, Mr. Davidson thought it wise at this point to make an errand across the room. He need not have bothered as far as Aunt Basha was concerned. When he came back she was again _a la mode_ and held an ancient beaded purse at which she gazed. Out of a less remote pocket she drew steel spectacles, which were put on. Mr.

Davidson repeated his question of how much.

"It's all hyer, marster. It's two hun'erd dollars, sir. I ben savin' up fo' twenty years an' mo', and me'n Jeems, we ben countin' it every mont, so I reckon I knows."

The man and the girl regarded the old woman a moment. "It's a large sum for you to invest," Mr. Davidson said.

"Ya.s.sir. Yas, marster. It's right smart money. But I sho' am glad to gib dis hyer to Unc' Sam for dem boys."

The cas.h.i.+er of the Ninth National Bank lifted his eyes from the blank he was filling out and looked at Aunt Basha thoughtfully. "You understand, of course, that the Government--Uncle Sam--is only borrowing your money.

That you may have it back any time you wish."

Aunt Basha drew herself up. "I don' wish it, sir. I'm gibin' dis hyer gif,' a free gif' to my country. Ya.s.sir. It's de onliest country I got, an' I reckon I got a right to gib dis hyer what I earned doin' fine was.h.i.+n' and i'nin. I gibs it to my country. I don't wan' to hyer any talk 'bout payin' back. Naw, sir."

It took Mr. Davidson and the vision at least ten minutes to make clear to Aunt Basha the character and habits of a Liberty Bond, and then, though gratified with the owners.h.i.+p of what seemed a brand new $200 and a valuable slip of paper--which meandered, shamelessly into the purple alpaca petticoat--yet she was disappointed.

"White folks sho' am cu'is," she reflected, "Now who'd 'a thought 'bout dat way ob raisin' money! Not me--no, Lawd! It do beat me." With that she threw an earnest glance at Mr. Davidson, lean and tall and gray, with a clipped pointed beard. "'Scuse me, marster," said Aunt Basha, "mout I ask a quexshun?"

"Surely," agreed Mr. Davidson blandly.

"Is you'--'scuse de ole 'oman, sir--is you' Unc' Sam?"

The "quexshun" left the personage too staggered to laugh. But the girl filled the staid place with gay peals. Then she leaned over and patted the wrinkled and bony worn black knuckles. "Bless your dear heart," she said; "no, he isn't, Aunt Basha. He's awfully important and good to us all, and he knows everything. But he's not Uncle Sam."

The bewilderment of the old face melted to smiles. "Dar, now," she brought out; "I mout 'a know'd, becaze he didn't have no red striped pants. An' de whiskers is diff'ent, too. 'Scuse me, sir, and thank you kindly, marster. Thank you, young miss. De Lawd bress you fo' helpin' de ole 'oman." She had risen and she dropped her old time curtsey at this point. "Mawnin' to yo', marster and young miss."

But the girl sprang up. "You can't go," she said. "I'm going to take you to my house to see my grandmother. She's Southern, and our name is Cabell, and likely--maybe--she knew your people down South."

"Maybe, young miss. Dar's lots o' Cabells," agreed Aunt Basha, and in three minutes found herself where she had never thought to be, inside a fine private car.

She was dumb with rapture and excitement, and quite unable to answer the girl's friendly words except with smiles and nods. The girl saw how it was and let her be, only patting the calico arm once and again rea.s.suringly. "I wonder if she didn't want to come. I wonder if I've frightened her," thought Eleanor Cabell. When into the silence broke suddenly the rich, high, irresistible music which was Aunt Basha's laugh, and which David Lance had said was pitched on "Q sharp." The girl joined the infectious sound and a moment after that the car stopped.

"This is home," said Eleanor.

Aunt Basha observed, with the liking for magnificence of a servant trained in a large house, the fine facade and the huge size of "home."

In a moment she was inside, and "young miss" was carefully escorting her into a suns.h.i.+ny big room, where a wood fire burned, and a bird sang, and there were books and flowers.

"Wait here, Aunt Basha, dear," Eleanor said, "and I'll get Grandmother."

It was exactly like the loveliest of dreams, Aunt Basha told Jeems an hour later. It could not possibly have been true, except that it was.

When "Grandmother" came in, slender and white-haired and a bit breathless with this last surprise of a surprising granddaughter, Aunt Basha stood and curtsied her stateliest.

Then suddenly she cried out, "Fo' G.o.d! Oh, my Miss Jinny!" and fell on her knees.

Mrs. Cabell gazed down, startled. "Who is it? Oh, whom have you brought me, Eleanor?" She bent to look more closely at Aunt Basha, kneeling, speechless, tears streaming from the brave old eyes, holding up clasped hand imploring. "It isn't--Oh, my dear, I believe it _is_ our own old nurse, Basha, who took care of your father!"

"Yas'm. Yas, Miss Jinny," endorsed Aunt Basha, climbing to her feet.

"Yas, my Miss Jinny, bress de Lawd. It's Basha." She turned to the girl.

"Dis yer chile ain't nebber my young Ma.r.s.e Pendleton's chile!"

But it was; and there was explanation and laughter and tears, too, but tears of happiness. Then it was told how, after that crash of disaster was over; the family had tried in vain to find Basha and Jeems; had tried always. It was told how a great fortune had come to them in the turn of a hand by the discovery of an unsuspected salt mine on the old estate; how "young Ma.r.s.e Pendleton," a famous surgeon now, had by that time made for himself a career and a home in this Northern state; how his wife had died young, and his mother, "Miss Jinny," had come to live with him and take care of his one child, the vision. And then the simple annals of Aunt Basha and Uncle Jeems were also told, the long struggle to keep respectable, only respectable; the years of toil and frugality and saving--saving the two hundred dollars which she had offered this morning as a "free gif" to her country. In these annals loomed large for some time past the figure of a "young ma.r.s.e" who had been good to her and helped her much and often in spite of his own "_res augusta domi_,"--which was not Aunt Basha's expression. The story was told of his oration in the little hall bedroom about Liberty "whatjer-m'-call-'ems," and of how the boy had stirred the soul of the old woman with his picture of the soldiers in the trenches.

"So it come to me, Miss Jinny, how ez me'n Jeems was thes two wuthless ole n.i.g.g.e.rs, an' hadn't fur to trabble on de road anyways, an' de Lawd would pervide, an' ef He didn't we could scratch grabble some ways. An'

dat boy, dat young Ma.r.s.e David, he tole me everbody ought to gib dey las' cent fo' Unc' Sam an' de sojers. So"--Aunt Basha's high, inexpressibly sweet laughter of pure glee filled the room--"so I thes up'n handed over my two hun'erd."

"It was the most beautiful and wonderful thing that's been done in all wonderful America," p.r.o.nounced Eleanor Cabell as one having authority.

She went on. "But that young man, your young Ma.r.s.e David, why doesn't he fight if he's such a patriot?"

"Bress gracious, honey," Aunt Basha hurried to explain, "he's a-honin'

to fight. But he cayn't. He's lame. He goes a-limpin'. Dey won't took him."

"Oh!" retracted Eleanor. Then: "What's his name? Maybe father could cure him."

"He name Lance. Ma.r.s.e David Lance."

Why should Miss Jinny jump? "David Lance? It can't be, Aunt Basha."

With no words Aunt Basha began hauling up her skirts and Eleanor, remembering Mr. Davidson's face, went into gales of laughter. Aunt Basha baited, looked at her with an inquiring gaze of adoration. "Yas'm, my young miss. He name dat. I done put the cyard in my ridicule. Yas'm, it's here." The antique bead purse was opened and Lance's card was presented to Miss Jinny.