Part 18

Alan hurried away after the trunks and a porter. He was almost blind with a rage that was new to him. Was Miller deliberately beginning a flirtation with Adele at a moment's notice? And had she been so spoiled by the “fast set” of Atlanta during her stay there that she would allow it--even if Miller was a friend of the family? He found a negro porter near the heap of luggage that had been hurled from the baggage-car, and ordered his sister's trunks taken to the hotel. Then he followed the couple moodily up to the hotel parlor. He was destined to undergo another shock, for, on entering that room, he surprised Miller and Adele on a sofa behind the big square piano with their heads suspiciously near together, and so deeply were they engaged in conversation that, although he drew up a chair near them, they paid no heed to him further than to recognize his appearance with a lifting of their eyes. They were talking of social affairs in Atlanta and people whose names were unfamiliar to Alan. He rose and stood before the fireplace, but they did not notice his change of position. Truly it was maddening. He told himself that Adele's pretty face and far too easy manner had attracted Miller's attention temporarily, and the fellow was daring to enter one of his flirtations right before his eyes. Alan would give him a piece of his mind at the first opportunity, even if he was under obligations to him. Indeed, Miller had greatly disappointed him, and so had Adele. He had always thought she, like Dolly Barclay, was different from other girls; but no, she was like them all. Miller's attention had simply turned her head. Well, as soon as he had a chance he would tell her a few things about Miller and his views of women. That would put her on her guard, but it would not draw out the poisoned sting left by Miller's presumption, or indelicacy, or whatever it was. Alan rose and stood at the fire unnoticed for several minutes, and then he showed that he was at least a good chaperon, for he reached out and drew on the old-fashioned bell-pull in the chimney-corner. The porter appeared, and Alan asked: “Is my sister's room ready?”

“Yes, it's good and warm now, suh,” said the negro. “I started the fire an hour ago.”

Miller and Adele had paused to listen.

“Oh, you are going to hurry me off to bed,” the girl said, with an audible sigh.

“You must be tired after that ride,” said Alan, coldly.

“That's a fact, you must be,” echoed Miller. “Well, if you have to go, you can finish telling me in the morning. You know I'm going to spend the night here, where I have a regular room, and I 'll see you at breakfast.”

“Oh, I'm so glad,” said Adele. “Yes, I can finish telling you in the morning.” Then she seemed to notice her brother's long face, and she laughed out teasingly: “I 'll bet he and Dolly are no nearer together than ever.”

“You are right,” Miller joined in her mood; “the Colonel still has his dogs ready for Alan, but they 'll make it up some day, I hope. Dolly is _next_ to the smartest girl I know.”

“Oh, you _are_ a flatterer,” laughed Adele, and she gave Miller her hand. “Don't forget to be up for early breakfast. We must start soon in the morning. I'm dying to see the home folks.”

Alan was glad that Miller had a room of his own, for he was not in a mood to converse with him; and when Adele had retired he refused Miller's proffered cigar and went to his own room.

Miller grunted as Alan turned away. “He's had bad news of some sort,” he thought, “and it's about Dolly Barclay. I wonder, after all, if she would stick to a poor man. I begin to think some women would. Adele is of that stripe--yes, she is, and isn't she stunning-looking? She's a gem of the first water, straight as a die, full of pluck and--she's all right--all right!”

He went out on the veranda to smoke and enjoy repeating these things over to himself. The bonfires in the street were dying down to red embers, around which stood a few stragglers; but there was a blaze of new light over the young man' s head. Along his horizon had dawned a glorious reason for his existence; a reason that discounted every reason he had ever entertained. “Adele, Adele,” he said to himself, and then his cigar went out. Perhaps, his thoughts ran on in their mad race with happiness--perhaps, with her fair head on her pillow, she was thinking of him as he was of her.

Around the corner came a crowd of young men singing negro songs. They passed under the veranda, and Miller recognized Frank Hillhouse's voice. “That you, Frank?” Miller called out, leaning over the railing.

“Yes--that you, Ray?” Hillhouse stepped out into view. “Come on; we are going to turn the town over. Every sign comes down, according to custom, you know. Old Thad Moore is drunk in the calaboose. They put him in late this evening. We are going to mask and let him out. It's a dandy racket; we are going to make him think we are White Caps, and then set him down in the bosom of his family. Come on.”

“I can't to-night,” declined Miller, with a laugh. “I'm dead tired.”

“Well, if you hear all the church bells ringing, you needn't think it's fire, and jump out of your skin. We ain't going to sleep to-night, and we don't intend to let anybody else do it.”

“Well, go it while you are young,” Miller retorted, with a laugh, and Hillhouse joined his companions in mischief and they passed on singing merrily.

Miller threw his cigar away and went to his room. He was ecstatically happy. The mere thought that Adele Bishop was under the same roof with him, and on the morrow was going to people who liked him, and leaned on his advice and experience, gave him a sweet content that thrilled him from head to foot.

“Perhaps I ought to tell Alan,” he mused, “but he 'll find it out soon enough; and, hang it all, I can' t tell him how I feel about his own sister, after all the rot I've stuffed into him.”

XXX

HE next morning, as soon as he was up, Alan went to his sister's room. He found her dressed and ready for him. She was seated before a cheerful grate-fire, looking over a magazine she had brought to pass the time on the train.

“Come in,” she said, pleasantly enough, he reflected, now that Miller was not present to absorb her attention. “I expected you to get up a little earlier. Those guns down at the bar-room just about daybreak waked me, and I couldn't go to sleep again. There is no use denying it, Al, we have a barbarous way of amusing ourselves up here in North Georgia.”

He went in and stood with his back to the fire, still unable to rid his brow of the frown it had worn the night before.

“Oh, I reckon you've got too citified for us,” he said, “along with other accomplishments that fast set down there has taught you.”

Adele laid her book open on her lap.

“Look here, Alan,” she said, quite gravely. “What's the matter with you?”

“Nothing, that I know of,” he said, without meeting her direct gaze.

“Well, there is,” she said, as the outcome of her slow inspection of his clouded features.

He shrugged his shoulders and gave her his eyes steadily.

“I don't like the way you and Miller are carrying on.” He hurled the words at her sullenly. “You see, I know him through and through.”

“Well, that's all right,” she replied, not flinching from his indignant stare; “but what's that got to do with my conduct and his?”

“You allow him to be too familiar with you,” Alan retorted. “He's not the kind of a man for you to--to act that way with. He has flirted with a dozen women and thrown them over; he doesn't believe in the honest love of a man for a woman, or the love of a woman for a man.”

“Ah, I am at the first of this!” Adele, instead of being put down by his stormy words, was smiling inwardly. Her lips were rigid, but Alan saw the light of keen amusement in her eyes. “Is he _really_ so dangerous? That makes him doubly interesting. Most girls love to handle masculine gunpowder. Do you know, if I was Dolly Barclay, for instance, an affair with you would not be much fun, because I'd be so sure of you. The dead level of your past would alarm me.”

“Thank Heaven, all women are not alike!” was the bolt he hurled at her. “If you knew as much about Ray Miller as I do, you'd act in a more dignified way on a first acquaintance with him.”

“On a first--oh, I see what you mean!” Adele put her handkerchief to her face and treated herself to a merry laugh that exasperated him beyond endurance. Then she stood up, smoothing her smile away. “Let's go to breakfast. I'm as hungry as a bear. I told Rayburn--I mean your dangerous friend, Mr. Miller--that we'd meet him in the dining-room. He says he's crazy for a cup of coffee with whipped cream in it. I ordered it just now.”

“The dev--” Alan bit the word in two and strode from the room, she following. The first person they saw in the big dining-room was Miller, standing at the stove in the centre of the room warming himself. He scarcely looked at Alan in his eagerness to have a chair placed for Adele at a little table reserved for three in a corner of the room, which was presided over by a slick-looking mulatto waiter, whose father had belonged to Miller's family.

“I've been up an hour,” he said to her. “I took a stroll down the street to see what damage the gang did last night. Every sign is down or hung where it doesn't belong. To tease the owner, an old negro drayman, whom everybody jokes with, they took his wagon to pieces and put it together again on the roof of Harmon's drug-store. How they got it there is a puzzle that will go down in local history like the building of the Pyramids.”

“Whiskey did it,” laughed Adele; “that will be the final explanation.”

“I think you are right,” agreed Miller.

Alan bolted his food in grum silence, unnoticed by the others. Adele's very grace at the table, as she prepared Miller's coffee, and her apt repartee added to his discomfiture. He excused himself from the table before they had finished, mumbling something about seeing if the horses were ready, and went into the office. The last blow to his temper was dealt by Adele as she came from the dining-room.

“Mr. Miller wants to drive me out in his buggy to show me his horses,” she said, half smiling. “You won't mind, will you? You see, he 'll want his team out there to get back in, and--”

“Oh, I don't mind,” he told her. “I see you are bent on making a goose of yourself. After what I've told you about Miller, if you still--”

But she closed his mouth with her hand.

“Leave him to me, brother,” she said, as she turned away. “I'm old enough to take care of myself, and--and--well, I know men better than you do.”

When Alan reached home he found that Miller and Adele had been there half an hour. His mother met him at the door with a mysterious smile on her sweet old face, as she nodded at the closed door of the parlor.

“Don't go in there now,” she whispered. “Adele and Mr. Miller have been there ever since they come. I railly believe they are in love with each other. I never saw young folks act more like it. When I met 'em it looked jest like he wanted to kiss me, he was so happy. Now wouldn't it be fine if they was to get married? He's the nicest man in the State, and the best catch.”

“Oh, mother,” said Alan, “you don't understand. Rayburn Miller is--”

“Well, Adele will know how to manage him,” broke in the old lady, too full of her view of the romance to harken to his; “she ain't no fool, son. She 'll twist him around her finger if she wants to. She's pretty, an' stylish, an' as sharp as a brier. Ah, he's jest seen it all and wants her; you can't fool me! I know how people act when they are in love. I've seen hundreds, and I never saw a worse case on both sides than this is.”

Going around to the stables to see that his horses were properly attended to, Alan met his uncle leaning over the rail-fence looking admiringly at a young colt that was prancing around the lot.

“Christmas gift,” said the old man, suddenly. “I ketched you that time shore pop.”

“Yes, you got ahead of me,” Alan admitted.

The old man came nearer to him, nodding his head towards the house. “Heerd the news?” he asked, with a broad grin of delight.

“What news is that?” Alan asked, dubiously. “Young Miss,” a name given Adele by the negroes, and sometimes used jestingly by the family--“Young Miss has knocked the props clean from under Miller.” Alan frowned and hung his head for a moment; then he said:

“Uncle Ab, do you remember what I told you about Miller's opinion of love and women in general?”

The old man saw his drift and burst into a full, round laugh.

“I know you told me what he said about love an' women in general, but I don't know as you said what he thought about women in _particular_. This heer's a particular case. I tell you she's fixed 'im. Yore little sis has done the most complete job out o' tough material I ever inspected. He's a gone coon; he 'll never make another brag; he's tied hand an' foot.”

Alan looked straight into his uncle's eyes. A light was breaking on him. “Uncle Ab,” he said, “do you think he is--really in love with her?”

“Ef he ain't, an' don't ax yore pa an' ma fer 'er before a month's gone, I 'll deed you my farm. Now, look heer. A feller knows his own sister less'n he does anybody else; that's beca'se you never have thought of Adele follerin' in the trail of womankind. You'd hate fer a brother o' that town gal to be raisin' sand about you, wouldn't you? Well, you go right on an' let them two kill the'r own rats.”

Alan and his uncle were returning to the house when Pole Baker dismounted at the front gate and came into the yard.

Since becoming a landed proprietor his appearance had altered for the better most materially. He wore a neat, well-fitting suit of clothes and a new hat, but of the same broad dimensions as the old. Its brim was pinned up on the right side by a little brass ornament.

“I seed Mr. Miller drive past my house awhile ago with Miss Adele,” he said, “an' I come right over. I want to see all of you together.”

Just then Miller came out of the parlor and descended the steps to join them.

“Christmas gift, Mr. Miller!” cried Pole. “I ketched you that time.”

“And if I paid up, you'd cuss me out,” retorted the lawyer, with a laugh. “I haven't forgotten the row you raised about that suit of clothes. Well, what's the news? How's your family?”

“About as common, Mr. Miller,” said Pole. “My wife's gittin' younger an' younger ever'day. Sence she moved in 'er new house, an' got to whitewashin' fences an' makin' flower-beds, an' one thing another, she looks like a new person. I'd 'a' bought 'er a house long ago ef I'd 'a' knowed she wanted it that bad. Oh, we put on the lugs now! We wipe with napkins after eatin', an' my littlest un sets in a high-chair an' says 'Please pass the gravy,' like he'd been off to school. Sally says she's a-goin' to send 'em, an' I don't keer ef she does; they 'll stand head, ef they go; the'r noggin' s look like squashes, but they're full o' seeds, an' don't you ferget it.”

“That they are!” intoned Abner Daniel.

“I've drapped onto a little news,” said Pole. “You know what a old moonshiner cayn't pick up in these mountains from old pards ain't wuth lookin' fer.”

“Railroad?” asked Miller, interestedly.

“That's fer you-uns to make out,” said Baker. “Now, I ain't a-goin' to give away my authority, but I rid twenty miles yesterday to substantiate what I heerd, an' know it's nothin' but the truth. You all know old Bobby Milburn's been buyin' timber-land up about yore property, don't you?”

“I didn't know how much,” answered Miller, “but I knew he had secured some.”

“Fust and last in the neighborhood o' six thousand acres,” affirmed Pole, “an' he's still on the war-path. What fust attracted my notice was findin' out that old Bobby hain't a dollar to his name. That made me suspicious, an' I went to work to investigate.”

“Good boy!” said Uncle Abner, in an admiring undertone.

“Well, I found out he was usin' Wilson's money, an' secretly buyin' fer him; an' what's more, he seems to have unlimited authority, an' a big bank account to draw from.”

There was a startled pause. It was broken by Miller, whose eyes were gleaming excitedly.

“It's blame good news,” he said, eying Alan.

“Do you think so?” said Alan, who was still under his cloud of displeasure with his friend.

“Yes; it simply means that Wilson intends to build that road. He's been quiet, and pretending indifference, for two reasons. First, to bring us to closer terms, and next to secure more land. Alan, my boy, the plot thickens! I'm getting that fellow right where I want him. Pole, you have brought us a dandy Christmas gift, but I 'll be blamed if you get a thing for it. I don't intend to get shot.”

Then they all went to find Bishop to tell him the news.

XXXI

T was a cold, dry day about the middle of January. They were killing hogs at the farm. Seven or eight negroes, men and women, had gathered from all about in the neighborhood to assist in the work and get the parts of the meat usually given away in payment for such services.

Two hogsheads for hot water were half buried in the ground. A big iron pot with a fire beneath it was heating water and a long fire of logs heaped over with big stones was near by. When hot, the stones were to be put into the cooling water to raise the temperature, it being easier to do this than to replace the water in the pot. The hogs to be killed were grunting and squealing in a big pen near the barn.

Abner Daniel and old man Bishop were superintending these preparations when Alan came from the house to say that Rayburn Miller had just ridden out to see them on business. “I think it's the railroad,” Alan informed his father, who always displayed signs of almost childish excitement when the subject came up. They found Miller in the parlor being entertained by Adele, who immediately left the room on their arrival. They all sat down before the cheerful fire. Miller showed certain signs of embarrassment at first, but gradually threw them off and got down to the matter in hand quite with his office manner.

“I've got a proposition to make to you, Mr. Bishop,” he opened up, with a slight flush on his face. “I've been making some inquiries about Wilson, and I am more and more convinced that he intends to freeze us out--or you rather--by holding off till you are obliged to sell your property for a much lower figure than you now ask him for it.”

“You think so,” grunted Bishop, pulling a long face.

“Yes; but what I now want to do is to show him, indirectly, that we are independent of him.”

“Huh!” ejaculated Bishop, even more dejectedly--“huh! I say!”

Alan was looking at Miller eagerly, as if trying to divine the point he was about to make. “I must confess,” he smiled, “that I can' t well see how we can show independence right now.”

“Well, I think I see a way,” said Miller, the flush stealing over his face again. “You see, there is no doubt that Wilson is on his high horse simply because he thinks he could call on you for that twenty-five thousand dollars and put you to some trouble raising it without--without, I say, throwing your land on the market. I can' t blame him,” Miller went on, smiling, “for it's only what any business man would do, who is out for profit, but we must not knuckle to him.”

“Huh, huh!” Bishop grunted, in deeper despondency.

“How do you propose to get around the knuckling process?” asked Alan, who had caught the depression influencing his parent.

“I'd simply take up that note,” said the lawyer. “You know, under the contract, we are privileged to pay it to-morrow if we wish. It would simply paralyze him. He's so confident that you can' t take it up that he has not even written to ask if you want to renew it or not. Yes; he's confident that he 'll rake in that security--so confident that he has been, as you know, secretly buying land near yours.”

Old Bishop's eyes were wide open. In the somewhat darkened room the firelight reflected in them showed like illuminated blood-spots. He said nothing, but breathed heavily.

“But,” exclaimed Alan, “Ray, you know we--father has invested that money, and the truth is, that he and mother have already had so much worry over the business that they would rather let the land go at what was raised on it than to--to run any more risks.”

Bishop groaned out his approval of this elucidation of his condition and sat silently nodding his head. The very thought of further risks stunned and chilled him.

Miller's embarrassment now descended on him in full force.

“I was not thinking of having your father disturb his investments,” he said. “The truth is, I have met with a little financial disappointment in a certain direction. For the last three months I have been raking and scraping among the dry bones of my investments to get up exactly twenty-five thousand dollars to secure a leading interest in a cotton mill at Darley, of which I was to be president. I managed to get the money together and only yesterday I learned that the Northern capital that was to guarantee the thing was only in the corner of a fellow's eye up in Boston--a man that had not a dollar on earth. Well, there you are! I've my twenty-five thousand dollars, and no place to put it. I thought, if you had just as soon owe me the money as Wilson, that you'd really be doing me a favor to let me take up the note. You see, it would actually floor him. He means business, and this would show him that we are not asking any favors of him. In fact, I have an idea it would scare him out of his skin. He'd think we had another opportunity of selling. I'm dying to do this, and I hope you 'll let me work it. Really, I think you ought to consent. I'd never drive you to the wall and--well--_he_ might.”

All eyes were on the speaker. Bishop had the dazed expression of a bewildered man trying to believe in sudden good luck. Abner Daniel lowered his head and shook with low, subdued laughter.

“You are a jim-dandy, young man,” he said to Miller. “That's all there is about it. You take the rag off the bush. Oh, my Lord! They say in Alt's meeting-house that it's a sin to play poker with no stakes, but Alf's in a game with half the earth put up agin another feller's wad as big as a bale o' hay. Play down, Alf. Play down. You've got a full hand an' plenty to draw from.”

“We couldn't let you do this, Ray,” expostulated Alan.

“But I assure you it is merely a matter of business with me,” declared the lawyer. “You know I'm interested myself, and I believe we shall come out all right. I'm simply itching to do it.”

Bishop's face was ablaze. The assurance that a wise young business man would consider a purchase of his of sufficient value to put a large amount of money on pleased him, banished his fears, thrilled him.

“If you feel that way,” he said, smiling at the corners of his mouth, “go ahead. I don't know but what you are plumb right. It will show Wilson that we ain't beholden to him, an' will set 'im to work ef anything will.”

So it was finally settled, and no one seemed so well pleased with the arrangement as Miller himself. Adele entered the room with the air of one half fearful of intruding, and her three relatives quietly withdrew, leaving her to entertain the guest.

“I wonder what's the matter with your brother,” Miller remarked, as his eyes followed Alan from the room.

“Oh, brother?” laughed Adele. “No one tries to keep up with his whims and fancies.”

“But, really,” said Miller, in a serious tone, “he has mystified me lately. I wonder if he has had bad news from Dolly. I've tried to get into a confidential chat with him several times of late, but he seems to get around it. Really, it seems to me, at times, that he treats me rather coldly.”

“Oh, if you waste time noticing Al you 'll become a beggar,” and Adele gave another amused laugh. “Take my advice and let him alone.”

“I almost believe you know what ails him,” said Miller, eying her closely.