Part 12

We went together to the corn-barn. Senator was extended on the floor at the farther end of the room. He lifted his head when we entered, and then, as if compelled by an instinctive courtesy, rose to his fettered feet. I saw at once that there had been no more harshness than was needful for security; it even seemed that this had not been very anxiously provided for. The slender shackles would be no more than withes of the Philistines to such a Samson. A chain, indeed, fastened to a strong staple in the floor, passed to a ring in an iron belt about his waist; but it was long enough to allow him considerable liberty of movement. His hands were free. Perhaps Westlake had half expected to find the room empty. He stopped, a little startled, when he heard the first clank of the chain, and watched his prisoner as he slowly lifted himself from the ground and rose to his full height. Then, recollecting himself, he went forward. One ignorant of what had gone before might have mistaken between the culprit and the judge.

"Senator," Westlake began, in a voice whose faltering he could not control, "I have been a kind master to you."

No answer.

"You allow that?"

Senator was inflexible.

"I would never have sent you away of my own free will. This is your doing, not mine. You cannot _want_ to go!" This in indignant surprise,--for something like a smile had relaxed the features of the imperious slave.

Senator spoke.

"This is my home, as it is yours. I was born here, as you were. This land is dear to me as it is to you; dearer,--for I have given my labor to it, and you never have. In return, I have had a support, and the exercise of my strength and my skill. This has been enough for me until now. But I am a man. I look round and see how other men live. I want somebody else to do for: not you, but somebody that could not do without me."

"Things might have gone differently," Westlake began, recovering his self-complacency, as visions, doubtless, of the fine wedding he would have given Senator, of the fine names he would have bestowed upon his children, rose before his fancy. "Things might have gone differently, if you had been"----

"If I had been what I am not," answered Senator, becoming impatient as Westlake relapsed into pomposity. "It is enough, Master. We have done with each other, and we both know it. Let me go."

"I will let you go,"--Westlake spoke now with real dignity,--"but not as you think. If I would have you remember what I have been to you, it is for your own sake, not for mine. I am used to ingratitude; I do not complain of yours. I have never sold a servant left me by my father, and I do not mean to begin with you. You shall not drive me to it. You are to go, and forever, but by your own road. I will set you on it myself. Is there any one in the neighborhood you can trust? We shall need help."

A doubtful smile passed over Senator's face.

"There is no one, then? Think! no one?"

"I am not so unhappy. There are those whom I trust."

"Then I will trust them. Tell me who they are and where they are. And quick! This news will be everywhere soon. To-morrow morning the neighbors will be coming in. What is done must be done to-night. Senator, do not ruin yourself! I mean right by you. Here is Mr. Colvil to witness to what I say. Is this mad obstinacy only? or do you _dare_ not to trust yourself to me?"

"I do not trust to you those who trust me."

"Do you suppose I would give up those whose aid I have asked?"

"You would know where to find them when they give aid you have not asked."

"Colvil, speak to him! If he goes off by himself, I cannot hide it long. The country will be roused. I shall have to hunt him down myself. My honor will be at stake. I shall have to do it!"

The obdurate slave studied his master's features with curiosity mingled with triumph.

"Help me, Colvil! Help him! Tell him to listen to my plan and join in it! The useful time is passing!"

"Senator," I said at last, being so adjured, "your master means you well. He is not free to set you free,--you know it. You have done work for him,--good and faithful work; but never yet have you done him a pleasure, and he has intended you a good many. This is your last chance. Gratify him for once!"

Senator looked again, and saw, through the intent and wistful eyes, the poor, imploring soul within, which, hurried unconsenting towards crime, clung desperately to his rescue as its own. He comprehended that here was no tyrant, but a wretched victim of tyranny. A laugh, deep, reluctant, uncontrollable, no mirth in it, yet a certain bitter irony, and Senator had recovered his natural bearing, self-possessed and authoritative; he spoke in his own voice of composed decision.

"What is the plan, Master?"

Westlake told it eagerly. He was to save his authority with his people and his reputation with his neighbors by selling the rebellious servant,--that is to say, by pretending to sell him. Senator was to entitle himself to a commutation of his sentence into simple banishment by lending himself to the pious fraud and acting his part in it becomingly. Westlake had been so long accustomed to smooth his path of life by open subterfuges and falsehoods whose only guilt was in intention, that he had formed a very high opinion of his own address, and a very low one of the penetration of the rest of the world. As he proceeded with the details of his plot, childishly ingenious and childishly transparent, Senator listened, at first with attention, then with impatience, and at last not at all. When Westlake stopped to take breath, he interposed.

"Now hear me. Order the long wagon out, with the roans. Have me handcuffed and fastened down in it. Tell those whom you trust that you are taking me to Goosefield."

"To Goosefield?"

"To Dick Norman."

"Dick Norman! He help you! He is not an ----?"

Westlake could not bring himself to associate the word abolitionist with a man who had dined with him three days before.

"He is a slave-trader."

The blood, which had rushed furiously to the proud planter's cheeks, left them with a sudden revulsion. To be taken in by a disguised fanatic might happen to any man too honorable to be suspicious. He could have forgiven himself. But to have held a slave-trader by the hand! to have asked him to his table! Westlake knew that Senator never said anything that had to be taken back.

Richard Norman was a man of name and birth from old Virginia. Of easy fortune, so it was reported, still unmarried, he spent a great part of the year in travelling; and especially found pleasure in renewing old family ties with Virginian emigrants or their children in newer States. When he favored our neighborhood, he had his quarters at Goosefield, where he always took the same apartments in the house of a man, also Virginian by birth, who was said to be an old retainer of his family. Norman's father had been the fathers' friend of most of our principal planters. He was welcome in almost every household for the sake of these old memories, and apparently for his own. He was well-looking, well-mannered, possessed of various information, ready with amusing anecdote. And yet all the time it was perfectly known to every slave on every plantation where he visited what Mr. Richard Norman was. It was perfectly known to every planter except Westlake, and possibly Harvey. I do not remember to have heard of him at Harvey's. Those who never sold their servants, those who never separated families, those who never parted very young children from their mothers, found Norman a resource in those cases of necessity which exempt from law.

The slaves talked of him among themselves familiarly, though fearfully. He was the central figure of many a dark history; the house at Goosefield was known to them as Dick Norman's Den. The masters held their knowledge separately, each bound to consider himself its sole depository. If, arriving at the house of a friend, soon after a visitation of Richard Norman, one missed a familiar hand at his bridle, a kind old face at the door, curiosity was discreet; it would have been very ill manners to ask whether it was Death or Goosefield.

"Dick Norman starts at midnight. He has been ready these three days. He only waited to eat his Christmas dinner at old Rasey's."

Westlake had pondered and understood. "Where shall I really take you?" he asked, despondingly.

"Leave me anywhere six or eight miles from here, and I will do for myself."

"Colvil, you will ride along beside?"

"No."

I find in myself such an inaptitude for simulation or artifice of any kind, that I do not believe it was intended I should serve my fellow-men by those means.

"No," repeated Senator,--"not if we are going to Goosefield."

"It is true," assented Westlake, sadly; "nobody would believe you were going with me there!"

I rode off without taking leave of Senator. I felt sure of seeing him again. I thought I knew where the aid he would seek was to be found. Mine was just the half-way house to it. He would not be afraid of compromising me, for his master himself had called me to be witness to their compact. Senator would have the deciding voice, as usual; and Westlake would be guided by him now the more readily that he himself would tend in the direction of his only confidant. When I had put up my horse, I went into the house only for a few moments to tell my mother what I had seen and what I was expecting.

I walked up and down between the gate and the brook that evening,--I could not tell how long. I had time to become anxious,--time to invent disasters,--time to imagine encounters Westlake might have had on the way, with officious advisers, with self-proposed companions. I was disappointed more than once by distant wheels, which came nearer and nearer only to pass on, and farther and farther away, on the road which, crossing ours, winds round behind our place to Winker's Hollow. At last I caught sound of an approach which did not leave me an instant in uncertainty. This time, beyond mistake, it was the swift, steady tramp of Westlake's roans. As they entered our sandy lane, their pace slackened to a slow trot, and then to a walk. Westlake was on the lookout for me. I went into the middle of the road. He saw me; I heard him utter an exclamation of relief.

Senator, who had been stretched out on the bottom of the wagon, sat up when the horses stopped, took the manacles from his wrists and threw them down on the straw. With his master's help, he soon disencumbered himself of his fetters, and sprang lightly to the ground. Westlake followed, and the two stood there in the starlight confronting each other for the last time.

The face of the banished man was inscrutable. His master's worked painfully. This boy, born on his own twenty-first birthday, had been assigned to him, not only by his father's gift, but also, so it seemed, by destiny itself. He had had property in him; he had had pride in him; he had looked for a life-long devotion from him. And now, in one moment, all was to be over between them forever. The scene could not be prolonged. There was danger in every instant of delay.

"Westlake, he must go."

"He must go," Westlake repeated, but hesitatingly. And then, with a sudden impulse, he put out his hand to his forgiven, even if unrepentant, servant.

The movement was not met.

"No, Master; I will not wrong you by thanking you. This is not my debt." Senator raised towards heaven the coveted hand. "It is His who always pays."

TUESDAY, April 16, 1844.

You can always tell what view of certain questions Harry Dudley will take. You have only to suppose them divested of all that prejudice or narrow interest may have encumbered them with, and look at them in the light of pure reason. One of the charms of your intercourse with Dr. Borrow is that it is full of surprises.

"I have a weakness for Westlake, I own it," said the Doctor, when we were seated at the tea-table after our return from The Two Farms. "If you had known him when he was young, as I did, Colvil! Such an easy, soft-hearted, dependent fellow! You couldn't respect him very greatly, perhaps; but like him you must! His son Reginald you ought to like. I do. And--what you will think more to the purpose--so does Harry."

Harry enforced this with a look.

Reginald Westlake is a handsome boy, rather sullen-looking, but with a face capable of beaming out into a beautiful smile. He is always distant in his manners to me, I do not know whether through shyness or dislike.

"He will make a man," Doctor Borrow went on; "if I am any judge of men, he will make a man."

The Doctor was interrupted by the brisk trot of a horse coming up the road. The rider did not stop at the gate; he cleared it. In another moment Westlake's jolly red face was looking down on us through the window. I might have found this arrival untimely; but turning to Harry to know how he took it, I saw in his eyes the "merry sparkle" the Doctor had told of, and divined that there was entertainment in a colloquy between the classmates.

Westlake made a sign with his hand that he was going to take his horse to the stable. I went out to him, Harry following. I welcomed him as cordially as I could, but his manner was reserved at first. We had not met in a way to be obliged to shake hands since Shaler went away. Westlake knew that I was greatly dissatisfied with him at that time. Not more so, though, than he was with himself, poor fellow! He was evidently sincerely glad to see Harry again, and Harry greeted both him and his horse very kindly. Westlake is always well-mounted, and deserves to be: he loves his horses both well and wisely. It is something to be thoroughly faithful in any one relation of life, and here Westlake is faultless. The horse he rode that afternoon--one raised and trained by himself--bore witness in high spirit and gentle temper to a tutor who had known how to respect a fiery and affectionate nature. We all three gave our cares to the handsome creature, and this common interest put me quite in charity with my unexpected guest before we went into the house.

"This is a way to treat an old friend!" cried Westlake, as he gave his hand to the Doctor, who had come down the door-steps to meet him. "I cannot get two whole days from you, and then you come here and stay on as if you meant to live here!"

Tabitha watched my mother's reception of the new-comer, and, seeing it was hospitable, placed another chair at the table with alacrity. She knew he was out of favor here, but had never thought very hardly of him herself. Her race often judges us in our relations with itself more mildly than we can judge each other. In its strange simplicity, it seems to attribute to itself the part of the superior, and pities where it should resent.

"You cannot make it up to me, Borrow," Westlake went on, as soon as we had taken our places, "except by going right back with me to-night, or coming over to me to-morrow morning, and giving me as many days as you have given Colvil. Next week is the very time for you to be with us. I want you to see us at a gala season: next week is the great marrying and christening time of the year. It usually comes in June; but this year we have it two months earlier, on account of Dr. Baskow's engagements. My little Fanny is to give all the names. She has a fine imagination."

"Westlake, I would do all but the impossible to show my sense of your kindness. For the rest, my appreciation of little Miss Fanny's inventive powers could not be heightened."

"Does that mean no? Borrow, I shall think in earnest that you have done me a wrong in giving so much time away from me, if these are really your last days in our parts."

"We will make it up to you. I will tell you how we will make it up to you. Come to us,--come to Massachusetts: I will give you there a week of my time for every day we have taken from you here. Come to us in June: that is the month in which New England is most itself. Come and renew old associations."

"You will never see me again, if you wait to see me there."

"What now? You used to like it."

"I am not so sure that I used to like it, when I think back upon it. At any rate, if you want to see _me_, you must see me in my own place. I am not myself anywhere else. Equality, Borrow, equality is a very good thing for people who have never known anything better: may be a very good thing for people who can work themselves up out of it. But for a man who has grown up in the enjoyment of those privileges inappreciable by the vulgar, but which by the noble of every age have been regarded as the most real and the most valuable,--for such a man to sit, one at a long table, feeling himself nobody, and knowing all the time he has a right to be somebody! You can talk very easily about equality. You have never suffered from it. You have your learning and---- Well, you know how to talk. I have no learning, and I can't talk, except to particular friends. A man cannot ticket himself with his claims to estimation. Even Paris has too much equality for me. Flora liked it; she had her beauty and her toilet. But I! how I longed to be back here among my own simple, humble people! As soon as she was married, I made off home. In my own place, among my own people, I am, I might almost say, like a god, if I were not afraid of shocking you. And is not their fate in my hands? My frown is their night, my smile is their sunshine. The very ratification of their prayers to a Higher Power is intrusted to my discretion. Homage, Borrow, homage is the sweetest draught ever brought to mortal lips!"

"The homage of equals I suppose may be," said Dr. Borrow, modestly.

"You do not understand. How should you? Our modes of thinking and feeling are not to be comprehended by one brought up in a society so differently constituted. We avow ourselves an aristocracy."

"You do well: something of the inherent meaning of a word will always make itself felt. _Aristocracy!_ It is vain to try to dispossess it of its own. The world will not be disenchanted of the beautiful word. Cover yourselves with its prestige. It will stand you in good stead with outsiders. But, between ourselves, Westlake, how is it behind the scenes? Can you look each other in the face and pronounce it? Or have you really persuaded yourselves down here that you are governed by your best men?"

"We do not use the word so pedantically down here. By an aristocracy we mean a community of gentlemen."

"And, pronouncing it so emphatically, you of course use the word gentleman in the sense it had when it had a sense. You bear in mind what the gentleman was pledged to, when to be called one was still a distinction. 'To eschew sloth,' 'to detest all pride and haughtiness,'--these were among his obligations: doubtless they are of those most strictly observed in your community. He was required 'to be true and just in word and dealing'; 'to be of an open and liberal mind.' You find these conditions fulfilled in Rasey, your leading man."

"Our leading man?"

"Certainly, your leading man. Whose lead did you follow, when you joined in worrying Charles Shaler out of your community of gentlemen?"

Westlake shrank. He was conscious that he had been going down hill ever since Shaler left the neighborhood. The hold that Rasey took of him then the crafty old man has never let go.

When Westlake's plantation came into his possession by the death of his father, he undertook to carry it on himself, and has been supposed to do so ever since. It was carried on well from the time that Senator was old enough to take charge; but with his disappearance disappeared all the credit and all the comfort his good management had secured to his master. Westlake needed some one to lean on, and Rasey was ready to take advantage of this necessity. His ascendancy was not established all at once. It is only during the last year that it has been perfected. In the beginning, he gave just a touch of advice and withdrew; showed himself again at discreet intervals, gradually shortened; but, all the time, was casting about his victim the singly almost impalpable threads of his deadly thraldom, until they had formed a coil which forbade even an effort after freedom. Westlake had put no overseer between himself and his people; but he had, without well knowing how it came about, set a very hard one over both. He found the indulgences on his plantation diminished, the tasks more rigidly enforced, the holidays fewer. The punishments, which were before sometimes capriciously severe, but more often threatened and remitted, he was now expected to carry out with the inflexibility of fate. He has found himself reduced to plotting with his servants against himself,--to aiding them in breaking or evading his own laws; reduced--worst humiliation of all--to ordering, under the sharp eye and sharp voice of his officious neighbor, the infliction of chastisement for neglect which he himself had authorized or connived at.

All came of that unhappy Christmas I have told you of. If Westlake could only have been silent, the simple plot devised by Senator would have worked perfectly. All the neighborhood would have respected a secret that was its own. But Westlake could not be silent; he was too uneasy. It was not long before the culprit's escape and his master's part in it were more than surmised. In view of the effect of such a transaction on the servile imagination, Westlake's weakness was ignored by common consent; but it was not the less incumbent upon him to reinstate himself in opinion on the first opportunity. The opportunity was offered by the storm then brewing against Shaler.

Westlake's sufferings are, happily for him, intermittent. Rasey is away from the neighborhood one month out of every three, looking after the estates of yet more unlucky vassals,--his through debt, and not from simple weakness. During these intervals, Westlake takes his ease with his people, as thoughtless as they of consequences no more within his ability to avert than theirs. He has lately had an unusual respite. Rasey has been confined to the house by an illness,--the first of his life.

I do not know how far Dr. Borrow is aware of Westlake's humiliations; and Westlake, I think, does not know. When he was able to speak again, he sheltered himself under a question.

"Do you know Rasey?"

"He is owner of the plantation which lies south of yours and Shaler's, larger than both together."

"His plantation;--but do you know _him_?"

"Root and branch. But who does not know him, that knows anybody here? In the next generation his history may be lost in his fortune, but it is extant yet. His father was overseer on a Georgia plantation, from which he sucked the marrow: his employer's grandchildren are crackers and clay-eaters; his are--of your community."

"Not exactly."

"Strike out all who do not yet belong to it, and all who have ceased to have a full claim to belong to it, and what have you left?"

"Do you know old Rasey personally? Have you ever seen him?"

"I have seen him."

"Lately? I hear that a great change has come over him. He has lost his elder son."

"You might say his only one. He turned the other out of doors years ago, and has had no word of him since. The old man has a daughter; but her husband has challenged him to shoot at sight. He has lost his partner and heir, and, in the course of Nature, cannot himself hold on many years longer. If a way could be found of taking property over to the other side, he might be consoled. The old Gauls used to manage it: they made loans on condition of repayment in the other world; but I doubt whether Rasey's faith is of force to let him find comfort in such a transaction.