Mingo Part 9

"Some days they er gwine rippitin' aroun' like the woods wuz afire, an'

then ag'in they er mopin' an' a-moonin' like ever' minnit wuz a-gwine to be the nex'. I bin a-studyin' Sis sence she wan't no bigger'n a skinned rabbit, an' yit I hain't got to A, B, C, let alone _a_-b ab, _u_-b ub. When a man lays off for to keep up wi' the wimmiu folks, he kin thes make up his min' that he'll have to git in a dark corner an'

scratch his head many a time when he oughter be a-diggin' for his livin'. They'll addle 'im thereckly."

"Well," said Woodward, with an air of determination, "I'm going back with you and hear what Miss Sis has to say. Sit down. Didn't you say you wanted to see me on business?"

"I did start out wi' that idee," said Teague, slipping into a chair and smiling curiously, "but I disremember mostly what 'twuz about.

Ever'thing is been a-pesterin' me lately, an' a man that's hard-headed an' long-legged picks up all sorts er foolish notions. I wish you'd take keer this pickle-bottle, Cap," he continued, drawing a revolver from his coat-tail pocket and placing it on the table. "I uv bin afeard ever sence I started out that the blamed thing 'ud go off an' far my jacket wrong-sud-outerds. Gimme a gun, an' you'll gener'lly fin' me somewheres aroun'; but them ar cliokety-cluckers is got mos' too many holes in 'em for to suit my eyesight."

Usually, it is a far cry from Atlanta to Hog Mountain, but Teague Poteet and Woodward lacked the disposition of loiterers. They shortened the distance considerably by striking through the country, the old mountaineer remarking that if the big road would take care of itself he would try and take care of himself.

They reached Poteet's one afternoon, creating a great stir among the dogs and geese that were sunning themselves outside the yard. Sis had evidently seen them coming, and was in a measure prepared; but she blushed painfully when Woodward took her hand, and she ran into her father's arms with a little hysterical sob.

"Sis didn't know a blessed word 'bout my gwine off to Atlanty," said Teague awkwardly but gleefully. "Did you, honey?"

Sis looked from one to the other for an explanation. Woodward was smiling the broad, unembarra.s.sed smile of the typical American lover, and Teague was laughing. Suddenly it occurred to her that her father, divining her secret--her sweet, her bitter, her well-guarded secret-- had sought Woodward out and begged him to return. The thought filled her with such shame and indignation as only a woman can experience. She seized Teague by the arm--

"Pap, have you been to Atlanta?"

"Yes, honey, an' I made 'as'e to come back."

"Oh, how could you? How _dare_ you do such a thing!" she exclaimed pa.s.sionately. "I will never forgive you as long as I live--never!"

"Why, honey----"

But she was gone, and neither Teague nor her mother could get a word of explanation from her. Teague coaxed, and wheedled, and threatened, and Puss cried and quarrelled; but Sis was obdurate. She shut herself in her room and remained there. Woodward was thoroughly miserable. He felt that he was an interloper in some measure, and yet he was convinced that he was the victim of a combination of circ.u.mstances for which he was in nowise responsible. He had never made any special study of the female mind, because, like most young men of sanguine temperament, he was convinced that he thoroughly understood it; but he had not the remotest conception of the tragic element which, in spite of social training or the lack of it, controls and gives strength and potency to feminine emotions. Knowing nothing of this, Woodward knew nothing of women.

The next morning he was stirring early, but he saw nothing of Sis. He saw nothing of her during the morning, and at last, in the bitterness of his disappointment, he saddled his horse, and made preparations to go down the mountain.

"I reckon it hain't no use to ast you to make out your visit," said Teague gloomily. "That's what I says to Puss. I'm a free n.i.g.g.e.r ef Sis don't beat my time. You'll be erbleege to stop in Gullettsville to-night, an' in case er accidents you thes better tie this on your coat."

The old mountaineer produced a small piece of red woollen string, and looped it in Woodward's b.u.t.ton-hole.

"Ef any er the boys run up wi' you an' begin to git limber-jawed,"

league continued, "thes hang your thum' in that kinder keerless like, an' they'll sw'ar by you thereekly. Ef any of 'em asts the news, thes say they's a leak in Sugar Creek. Well, well, well!" he exclaimed, after a little pause; "hit's thes like I tell you. Wimmin folks is mighty kuse."

When Woodward bade Puss good-bye, she looked at him sympathetically and said--

"Sometime when youer pa.s.sin' by, I'd be mighty thankful ef you 'ud fetch me some maccaboy snuff."

The young man, unhappy as he was, was almost ready to accuse Mrs.

Poteet of humour, and he rode off with a sort of grim desire to laugh at himself and the rest of the world. The repose of the mountain fretted him; the vague blue mists that seemed to lift the valleys into prominence and carry the hills further away, tantalised him; and the spirit of spring, just touching the great woods with a faint suggestion of green, was a mockery. There was a purpose--a decisiveness--in the stride of his horse that he envied, and yet he was inclined to resent the swift amiability with which the animal moved away.

But it was a wise steed, for when it came upon Sis Poteet standing by the side of the road, it threw up its head and stopped. Woodward lifted his hat, and held it in his hand. She gave him one little glance, and then her eyes drooped.

"I wanted to ask you something," she said, pulling a dead leaf to pieces. Her air of humility was charming. She hesitated a moment, but Woodward was too much astonished to make any reply. "Are you very mad?"

she asked with bewitching inconsequence.

"Why should _I_ be mad, Miss Sis? I am glad you have given me the opportunity to ask your pardon for coming up here to worry you."

"I wanted to ask you if pap--I mean, if father went to Atlanta to see you," she said, her eyes still bent upon the ground.

"He said he wanted to see me on business," Woodward replied.

"Did he say anything about me?"

"Not that I remember. He never said anything about his business even,"

Woodward went on. "I told him about some of my little troubles, and when he found I was coming back here, he seemed to forget all about his own business. I suppose he saw that I wouldn't be much interested in anybody else's business but my own just then." Sis lifted her head and looked steadily at Woodward. A little flush appeared in her cheeks, and mounted to her forehead, and then died away.

"Pap doesn't understand--I mean he doesn't understand everything, and I was afraid he had----Why do you look at me so?" she exclaimed, stopping short, and blus.h.i.+ng furiously.

"I ask your pardon," said the young man; "I was trying to catch your meaning. You say you were afraid your father----"

"Oh, I am not afraid now. Don't you think the weather is nice?"

Woodward was a little puzzled, but he was not embarra.s.sed. He swung himself off his horse and stood beside her.

"I told your father," he said, drawing very near to the puzzling creature that had so wilfully eluded him--"I told your father that I was coming up here to ask his daughter to marry me. What does the daughter say?"

She looked up in his face. The earnestness she saw there dazzled and conquered her. Her head drooped lower, and she clasped her hands together. He changed his tactics.

"Is it really true, then, that you hate me?"

"Oh! if you only knew!" she cried, and with that Woodward caught her in his arms.

An hour afterwards, Teague Poteet, sitting in his low piazza, cleaning and oiling his rifle, heard the sound of voices coming from the direction of the Gullettsville road. Presently Sis and Woodward came in sight. They walked slowly along in the warm suns.h.i.+ne, wholly absorbed in each other. Woodward was leading his horse, and that intelligent animal improved the opportunity to nip the fragrant sa.s.safras buds just appearing on the bushes. Teague looked at the two young people from under the brim of his hat and chuckled, but when Sis caught sight of him, a little while after, he was rubbing his rifle vigorously, and seemed to be oblivious to the fact that two young people were making love to each other in full view. But Sis blushed all the same, and the blushes increased as she approached the house, until Woodward thought in his soul that her rosy shyness was the rarest manifestation of loveliness to be seen in all the wide world. As she hovered a moment at the gate, blus.h.i.+ng and smiling, the old mountaineer turned the brim of his hat back from his eyes and called out with a great pretence of formal hospitality--

"Walk in an' rest yourselves; thes walk right in! Hit's lots too soon in the season for the dogs to bite. Looks to me, Cap, like you hain't so mighty tender wi' that 'ar hoss er your'n. Ef you uv rid 'im down to Gullettsville an' back sence a while ago, he'll be a-needin' feed thereckly. Thes come right in an' make yourselves at home."

Woodward laughed sheepishly, but Sis rushed across the yard, flung her arms around Teague's neck, and fell to crying with a vehemence that would have done credit to the most broken-hearted of damsels. The grizzled old mountaineer gathered the girl to his bosom and stroked her hair gently, as he had done a thousand times before. He looked at Woodward with glistening eyes.

"Don't min' Sis, Cap. Sis hain't nothin' but a little bit of a slip of a gal, an' sence the day she could toddle 'roun' an' holler--good news or bad, mad er glad--she's bin a-runnin' an' havin' it out wi' her ole pappy. Wimmen an' gals hain't like we all, Cap; they er mighty kuse.

She never pestered wi' Puss much," continued league, as his wife came upon the scene, armed with the plaintive air of slouchiness, which is at once the weapon and s.h.i.+eld of women who believe that they are martyrs--"she never pestered wi' Puss much, but, cry or laugh, fight or frolic, she allers tuck it out on her ole pappy."

Puss asked no questions. She went and stood by Teague, and toyed gently with one of Sis's curls.

"Sis don't take airter none er the Pringles," she said after a while, by way of explanation. "They hain't never bin a day when I couldn't look at Teague 'thout battin' my eyes, an' ma use to say she 'uz thes that away 'bout pap. I never know'd what the all-overs wuz tell thes about a hour before me an' Teague wuz married. We 'uz thes about ready for to go an' face the preacher, when ma comes a-rus.h.i.+n' in--an' she won't never be no paler when she's laid out than she wuz right that minnit. 'In the name er the Lord, ma, is you seed a ghost?' s' I.

'Puss!' se' she, 'the cake hain't riz!' I thes tell you what, folks, I like to a-went through the floor--that I did!"

At this Sis looked up and laughed, and they all laughed except Puss, who eyed Woodward with an air of faint curiosity, and dryly remarked--

"I reckon you hain't brung me my maccaboy snuff. I lay me an' my snuff wan't in your min'. 'Let the old hen cluck,' ez the sparrer-hawk said when he courted the pullet. Well," she continued, smiling with genuine satisfaction as she saw that Woodward no more than half-relished the comparison, "I better be seein' about dinner. Ol' folks like me can't live on love."

The days that followed were very happy ones for the two young people-- and for the two old people for that matter. Teague enjoyed the situation immensely. He would watch the young lovers from afar, and then go off by himself and laugh heartily at his own conceits. He was very proud that Sis was going to marry Somebody--a very broad term, as the old mountaineer employed it. At night when they all sat around the fire (spring on Hog Mountain bore no resemblance to summer) Teague gave eager attention to Woodward's stories, and laughed delightedly at his silliest jokes.

If Teague was delighted with Woodward, he was astounded at Sis. She was no longer the girl that her surroundings seemed to call for. She was a woman, and a very delightful one. From the old scholar, whom fate or circ.u.mstance had sent to preside over the Gullettsville Academy, she had caught something of the flavour and grace of cultivation--a gentle dignity, leaning always to artlessness, and a quick appreciation, which was in itself a rare accomplishment.

The day for the wedding was set, and Woodward went his way to Atlanta.

He had urged that the ceremony be a very quiet one, but Teague had different views, and he beat down all opposition.