Chapter 20

THE BETROTHAL

"For I'll believe I have his heart, As much as he has mine."

Betsy came home the last week in October. Even her mother, the least observant of women, noticed her daughter's unusual silence and restlessness for the first few days after her return, and, attributing it to loneliness, wished Betty had brought Mary Winston home with her for a visit.

"Rantin' 'roun' 'mong fine folks doan seem to 'gree wid you, honey," old Aunt Dilsey said one morning when she found Betsy in the parlor, her hands folded listlessly on the unheeded sewing in her lap, as she gazed dreamily before her. "You'se all onsettled sence you'se come home. Things would go tah rack an' ruin heah, wid yo' ma allus ailin', an' you so no-'count, ef 'twan't fur ole Dilsey tah keep dese lazy niggahs frum gwinetah sleep en thah tracks. I usetah think you'd be a he'p an' a comfo't to yo' old brack mammy, an' turn out ez fine a man'ger an' housekeepah ez Miss Abby; but you hain't been yo'se'f sence thet camp-meetin'. I 'lowed et fust 'twuz too much 'ligion wuckin' in you, an' thought it would bring you all right to go to Miss Mary Winston's fine place; but you'se come back wussen evah. You hain't gwinetah be sick, is you, chile? One minit you looks lak thah warn't a drap o' blood in yo' body, then suddent lak, you flash up an' look so narvous an' so excited thet I fears you'se tekin' the fevahs."

"No, mammy, I'm not the least sick. Nothing ails me, except that I feel the change a little from the gay times I've been having at Maybrook. I'll be all right presently."

Soon after dinner upon the first day of November, Betsy, evading Aunt Dilsey's watchful eyes, called Jock, the old house-dog who was dozing in the south porch, and set off for a ramble. The balmy air and the brisk walk refreshed her, and by the time she reached the bars separating the upper from the lower woods, she felt lighter hearted than she had for a long time. Her eyes glowed with exercise, a bright tinge showed in her cheeks, and her red cloak and brown quilted bonnet lined with crimson made a warm bit of color in the landscape, and blended harmoniously with the rich shades of the trees. Nature was steeped in that tender, dreamy haze peculiar to Indian Summer, and the air held a pleasing odor like that of burning leaves. The songbirds had gone away to winter homes in the South, and the stillness of the forest was broken only by the dropping of nuts from the hickory-trees.

"The first day of November!" she thought, as she stood leaning on the bars, with old Jock lying at her feet. "I wonder how soon he will come," and she smiled tenderly. "Not to-day or to-morrow, I know; for he has gone to Lexington again, so Susan said, and will not be back until the last of the week. It has been four months since I saw him. Perhaps I should not have kept him so long in suspense, but a girl should not be too easily won, and he must never know how nearly I came to complete surrender when he rode by my side that May day. How hard it was to resist the pleading tenderness of his eyes! Oh, Abner, Abner! how I love you!" she murmured, leaning her head upon the bars.

Approaching footsteps made no noise on the carpeting of leaves and moss in the pathway over which she had come; and Betty, absorbed in her love and yearning, did not look up, even when Jock gave a joyous bark of welcome to the young man standing behind her.

"I have come for my answer, Betty," he said, laying his hand over hers clasped on the topmost bar.

Her eyes lit up with gladness as she raised her face, suffused with crimson, toward him; but she uttered no word of welcome.

"You surely expected me," he said; "you did not think I'd wait one hour beyond the time, did you? Ah, sweetheart, did you but know what a torment of suspense and longing these last six months have been, you'd---- But now it's November, your favorite month, you said, because Thanksgiving comes in it. So now, my darling, say the word that alone can give me a thankful heart. You'll listen to me now, won't you, dear?" he asked of her as she still stood in trembling silence.

"I suppose I must, sir," she said, dimpling and blushing, with a saucy toss of her head. "I can't very well stop my ears, seeing that you have imprisoned both hands. Oh, don't! don't! I haven't pledged myself yet," she stammered, as he, raising her hands, drew them around his neck, folded her in his arms, and kissed her brow. Then, still holding her closely in one arm, with the other he turned her face to meet his, murmuring, "Not just your forehead, sweetness--O sweetheart! darling! wife!" as his lips closed over hers in a clinging kiss. "It is thus I take my pledge. You are mine, mine, you bewildering, tormenting Betty."

"No! no!" she protested stammeringly, as she struggled to free herself. "Oh, you're too--too--you hold me so close! You lose count of time and season, sir," she added presently with an attempt at playfulness, and trying to assume an ease and nonchalance she was far from feeling. "This is November, remember--solemn, quiet Thanksgiving time. The summer of fulfillment hasn't come yet."

"Yes, it has," boldly asserted her lover. "Winter is past, and summer is here--glorious, satisfying harvest time--and--and--it is thus I garner in my wealth," he murmured with tender rapture, gathering her still closer, and kissing the sweet eyes and throat and mouth. "No more half-way measures between us now! No more tormenting reserve! You trust me, sweetheart? You give yourself to me, do you not?"

"I don't seem to have much liberty of choice," she replied with a resumption of her old sauciness, as she again freed herself from his embrace. "As you have already stolen my heart, I may as well trust you with the rest--and I do, I do," she added solemnly. "My welfare, my happiness, my life itself, I commit to your keeping," placing both hands in his. "I give all unreservedly. You are worthy the trust."

"No," she said presently, in answer to the inevitable question as to when she had first begun to love him; "I shan't tell you that. You're too conceited and masterful as it is."

"But you have promised to tell me everything," he said teasingly.

"No, some things are better left unsaid, and if I were to tell you that, I'd never be able to get the upper hand with you again."

"But you know you always did obey me," he answered, smiling reminiscently, "though it was often with a sweet rebellious look in your eyes; and besides, a wife is bound to obey her husband."

"I don't know about that, sir. If that is the rule, I mean to be the exception that proves it; for I fully intend that you shall be the submissive one in our future relationship."

"In that case, fair lady mine, the sooner you marry me, the better; for even with so competent a ruler as yourself, it will take long and close application on my part to learn the role of submissive husband. You see, my position of schoolmaster has weakened my natural talent for meekness and submission, so that at present these qualities are far from being in perfect condition."

"You needn't tell me that," rejoined Betsy, with a demure smile and nodding her head sagely. "Cupid hasn't so blindfolded me but that I can still see a wee bit out of the corner of my eye--well enough, at least, to perceive that my lover has several imperfections in addition to a lack of meekness."

"That, my dear, isn't the fault of Cupid's bandages, but it is due to your always having held me at a distance," he answered placidly, drawing her nearer to him. "Seen at close range, these little peculiarities of mine, which you have labeled defects, will turn out to be budding virtues of the finest quality."

"Ah, then, most perfect and approved good master, you must give me back my pledge. I could stand a few faults and minor vices in my future lord; but such an array of excellencies appals me. I wed you not, Sir Paragon," she said, looking him full in the face and then dropping him a mocking little courtesy.

"'By my troth and holidame,' I could have better spared a better Betty!" Abner exclaimed with mock fervor. "No, no, sweet mistress mine, rather than resign this dimpled hand of thine, I'll begin at once to uproot all my promising little sprouts of virtue, and plant in their stead an assortment of fine, robust misdemeanors, for which, in truth, the soil is well adapted."

"Very well, then," she said with an air of resignation, "I foresee that I shall have to grow a few additional faults myself, to compete with you."

"And I don't think, my dearest, that you'll have much difficulty in doing so," was his audacious rejoinder, as he pinched her cheek. "Natural aptitude counts for a great deal, you know."

"Methinks, my lord, too much happiness hath weakened thy brain; what nonsense thou dost chatter," and she laughed with joyous abandon.

"Oh, anybody can talk sense, but it takes a heap o' sense to talk nonsense sensibly," he said suavely, with a fine air of self-complacency. "Until to-day I did not know I had it in me to be so brilliant a conversationalist. Happiness is bringing out all my latent abilities. Ah, Betty, sweetest, dearest, most bewitching of girls," he added, fervently, "how happy you have made me!"

They were now seated on a fallen tree, he indulging in a blissful sense of happiness realized, she sitting quiet and somewhat pensive. Presently he asked: "Of what are you thinking? Your brown eyes are filled with something that is almost sadness. Have you any regrets, any unfilled wish? I haven't--except that November might have come sooner."

"Yes, I have a regret," said Betty, laying her hand upon his shoulder and looking wistfully at him. "I give you everything--my present, my future, and my past; but you--I know you love me now, but I am not the one you loved first. That is what makes me sad. I want your past as well as your present and future. Perhaps you think I didn't see. You supposed, when you were so miserable after Abby went away, that I didn't understand! Many and many a night have I lain awake, sorrowing over your sorrow and my inability to help you."

"Listen to me, Betty dear. My feeling for your cousin, though pure and tender, was as nothing compared to what I have for you. Even when I was most under the spell of her beauty and sweetness, I thought of you as one who might well stir the pulse and thrill the heart of any man not made armor-proof by love for another."

"But you did love Cousin Abby?" she questioned with another wistful, half-timid look.

"Yes, I did, in a dreamy, poetical way. Or, rather, I was in love with love and romance, and all that, and she seemed the embodiment of beauty and poetry. But I never touched even the outer edges of her susceptibilities, and it was this complete unresponsiveness that healed my wound, even before I was aware. A man, warm-blooded, ardent, as I am, must have an answering love to keep his own alive. There was nothing in that first romantic feeling that need give you a pang of regret. It was a mere boyish fancy; this, dear, is the love of my manhood. And in fact, my darling, I don't believe there is so much as a kiss to choose between your love for me and mine for you. If there is," he added humorously, "this will restore the balance," and he kissed her fondly. "And now, my dear girl," he went on, speaking soberly, but with a glad light in his eyes, "I have great news for you; but first, let me ask, by what name do you propose to be known when we are married?"

"Well," exclaimed the girl in some bewilderment, "I said awhile ago that happiness had addled your brains; but I really did not suspect the trouble to be so serious as this. By what name, pray, should I be known but that of Mistress Betsy Dudley--ugly though it be? Oh, I see!" she cried, thinking she understood his meaning. "You don't like the name Betsy. Neither do I. It's perfectly horrid; and it is my standing grievance against my parents that they saddled upon their innocent babe so uncouth a prenomen. If father did wish to honor his mother by endowing his first-born with the name, why could he not have softened it into Betty, or Bettina, or Bessie, or, better still, have christened me Elizabeth, instead of insisting, as he always does, that I shall be called Betsy? I'll tell you what," she added archly, "when I'm married, I shall insist that everybody shall address me as Elizabeth. Isn't that more to your taste, my lord?"

"Elizabeth what?" he persisted.

"Upon my word, I begin to think you really are daft! Why, Elizabeth Dudley, of course," she said, flushing and looking shy and embarrassed; "that is, unless you mean for me to wed some saner man than this Abner Dudley, Esquire," she added saucily.

"Would not the name Elizabeth or Betty or Betsy Logan suit you better?" asked her lover, who then proceeded to tell her all.

She was greatly astonished, and rejoiced to learn of his brightened worldly prospects; but when he told her his full name, her countenance changed.

He was too absorbed to note this, and went on: "The question now is, my dearest, how soon will you marry me? I need you now. Every day, every hour, I long for you, my pet. So I shall speak to your father at once. For some time he has been rather cool with me--ever since last summer, when I argued with him about Barton Stone's views. But he's too just and reasonable to refuse me your hand, upon no other objection than that I did not side with him in a church quarrel. I will see him to-morrow, and----"

"No, no!" Betsy interrupted, "do not speak with him yet; and please do not let him know that your name is Logan. Let me tell him that, and also about your new inheritance."

"But, my dear girl, why should not I tell him?"

"I can't make it plain to you, I'm afraid," answered Betty; "but I have an instinctive feeling that things will not run at all smoothly--just at first, you know--when he learns your news."

"All the more reason, then," Abner said, "for my telling him at once, and thus get over this rough part as soon as possible."

"No, please let me speak to father first," urged Betsy.

"I fail to see why you should wish to do so," Abner said; "and it certainly is my duty to speak to your father myself. Nor would it be manly in me to shirk this duty off upon you."

"As I said," Betsy persisted, "I can't make my meaning clear to you. In truth, I can't understand myself why I wish this; but of one thing I am quite sure, both my father and mother, for some unknown cause, are greatly prejudiced against the name 'Logan.' Mother, in particular, abhors it. At some period of her life, she must have had some terrible knowledge of some one of the name--you know there are many Logans in this State and in Virginia--but whatever the reason for her extreme aversion to the name, that aversion certainly exists. Therefore, it behooves us to be very tactful in telling father and mother that you are a Logan. Just now I feel sure it would be unwise to tell them; for mother is unusually weak and nervous this fall, and father is so harassed over this church trouble that he is irritable and unreasonable, even with mother and me. We can't very well be married before spring, anyway; and long before then father'll be as cordial as ever with you; and he and mother will be fully reconciled to your new name, too. I'm your promised wife, and--and--I love you with all my heart. Isn't that happiness enough for you for awhile?"

"But, dearest, I think your parents should be told at once that you are my betrothed wife. I don't like any appearance of secrecy. I'm too proud of my love for that."

"No," Betsy still urged, "I know father better than you do. Please be guided by me in this, and say nothing to him for awhile."

"But I can not delay much longer to make public that my name is Logan, and about my newly acquired property. There's business to be transacted in regard to this Henderson County land; and your father must inevitably soon hear of my name, from some one; and it would be better from me than from an outsider."

However, Abner finally yielded to Betsy's pleadings, and agreed that they should take no one into their confidence at present in regard to their engagement; and that he should tell the Rogerses and James Drane about his real name, and of the inheritance left him by the will of the late Colonel Hite.

"And you mustn't even come to see me," said Betty. "In father's present mood it would only irritate him to have you come. Besides, if you did come, they'd be sure to find us out; for we couldn't act toward each other just in the old, quiet, friendly way--at least, I couldn't and--and--oh, I know it will be hard, this restraint, this secrecy; not to see you, and not to let every one know that we are pledged to each other. But for my sake, and because it is for the best, you will be patient, won't you?"

"I will try; but Heaven send your father a speedy change of heart toward your poor lover!" Abner fervently exclaimed as he kissed Betty good-by.