Part 12

There could be no question but that the overture was kindly meant, on the Major's part, but it was one that Bergan could not possibly accept. Judging from present indications, it would be long before his professional income would suffice for his own support, to say nothing of the additional expense of a servant and horse. Besides, he had never regarded either Brick or the filly as actual gifts, but only convenient loans, for his use while at the Hall. Any other view of the matter would, by no means, have suited his independent character. And, if this had been the case before the rupture with his uncle, it was doubly so, now. Major Bergan must not be suffered to think that his resentment had given way, or that his good will had been restored, by the aid of any gifts, however valuable, or kindly bestowed.

Yet he would be glad to send his uncle a friendly message, to show that he was really grateful for his kindness, and ready to accept any overture which would not burden him with too heavy a sense of obligation. To ensure its safe delivery, without the risk of hopeless travesty, at Brick's hands, he went to his desk, and wrote:

"DEAR UNCLE: Thank you for sending me your love; _that_ is a thing which I am glad to get and keep. But I cannot keep either Brick or Vic,--I have no present use for them, and no means of providing for them, if I had. Besides, I never regarded either as mine, except while I remained at the Hall. Many thanks, all the same, for your kind intentions.

"Your affectionate nephew, 'HARRY.'"

The signature was written only after considerable hesitation. His note would be sure to fail of the desired conciliatory effect, if it wholly ignored the name upon which his uncle had so strenuously insisted. Yet he could not bring himself to incorporate it with his lawful sign-manual. He was forced to compromise matters by thus using it as a sort of _sobriquet_.

Giving the note to Brick, he bade him take it straightway to his master. The negro's face instantly fell; then, it brightened again with the light of a plausible explanation.

"I 'spec I'se to come back, arter I'se 'livered it?" he asked, anxiously.

"No, Brick," Bergan gravely answered. "I cannot afford to keep you; it is as much as I can do, just now, to keep myself."

"But, massa Harry," remonstrated Brick, "don't you know I 'longs to you? I'se your nigger, sure as deff; ole massa gib me to you, an' tole me to wait on you, don' you 'member? An' how's I a goin' to wait on you, I'd jes' like to know, wid tree good miles atween us? 'Sides, I'd feel so mortify to go right back dar, like a dog dat don' own no massa, arter I done tole 'em all I's coming to lib wid you."

It was not without difficulty that Brick was convinced of the inevitableness of his return to Major Bergan. Not only did his heart yearn to be in the service of his young master, but he was fully persuaded that he could help, rather than hinder, his fortunes. He forcibly expressed his willingness to work his fingers off in the cause, and gravely proposed to put himself on a course of semi-starvation, in the matter of "keep." All this being of no avail, he was finally forced to mount Vic, and turn homeward, a picture of the blackest despair.

On the way, his mind was illumined with a gleam of hope. Like all the negroes of the plantation, he had large faith in the occult power of old Rue. His present journey, he well knew, was mainly owing to her influence. If she could be made to see the propriety of his immediate return to Bergan's service, as he did, no doubt she could find a way to bring it to pass. And her conversion to his views could be effected, he shrewdly thought, by a skilful use of Bergan's confession of straitened circumstances, as well as a certain suggestive increase of gravity that he had observed in the young man's manner. His smile had not come quite so readily and brightly to his lips as in the old days at Bergan Hall. No doubt he was poor, lonely, and troubled. He needed some one to take care of him, and watch over him. And who so eligible to this position as himself? For Brick had inherited his grandmother's devotion to the Bergan blood, and believed that the chief end of his being was to live and die loyally in its service. Moreover, his young master had not only taken tenacious hold of his affections, but also of that still stronger faculty of the negro mind--his imagination. Though he might be a distressed knight, just at present, Brick's faith was firm that his time of triumph was not far off; and then, he wanted to be "there to see!"

He lost no time, therefore, in presenting himself before Rue, on his arrival at Bergan Hall. And so dexterously did he work upon her love and pride, by the deplorable picture that he drew of Bergan's sadness and poverty, that the faithful old nurse straightway betook herself to her master, and never left him till she had persuaded him to mount his horse, and set forth, at a brisk trot, toward Berganton.

In truth, the Major was only too glad to be so persuaded. His anger towards his nephew had quickly burned out, by reason of its own fury; and in thinking the matter over, he had come to be more tickled by the young man's prowess than he had, at first, been displeased by his flight.

"You should have seen him knocking those fellows around, like so many ninepins!" he exclaimed, exultingly, to Rue. "I couldn't have done it more neatly myself, in my best days. I tell you, he is a true Bergan at bottom, if he has got a few crinks and cranks at top. What a pity he could not make up his mind to stay quietly on the old place, where he belongs; and which he might have done what he pleased with, if he had only taken me on the right tack! But he'll come back--he'll come back! Estates like Bergan Hall don't grow on every bush. It won't take him long to find out that he can't raise one from the law. And then, he'll be glad to come back to me; and I'll receive him as the father did the prodigal son!"

But, as time rolled on, and Bergan did not appear to claim this welcome, the Major began to feel a chagrin that would quickly have been intensified into anger, but for the happy suggestion that the young man delayed merely because he was dubious as to his reception. This view of the matter was an excellent salve to whatever of bitter or wounded feeling the Major still retained. Bergan longing, yet fearing, to return to him, was a vision that gently soothed his pride, while it appealed powerfully to his sympathies.

Matters having reached this point, he yielded easily to Rue's suggestion that Bergan's horse and servant should be sent to him, as a hint that hostilities had ceased. And though their prompt return was, at first, new matter of wrath, Bergan's note, Brick's report, and Rue's representations and entreaties, availed to smother the half-kindled flame, and send him forth toward Berganton in a most forgiving and patronizing frame of mind. He was ready to make any concessions to his nephew's principles and habits. If Bergan would but return to the Hall, he might dictate his own terms, and order his life in his own way. The Major had missed him more than he would have been willing to allow. The old place had not seemed the same without him. Its present had lost a strong element of cheer and energy, and its future had faded into dimness.

Arriving, in due time, at Mrs. Lyte's gate, the Major dismounted, and was about to enter, when his eyes fell on the little tin plate, in Bergan's office window, which has before been mentioned. If it had been the head of Medusa, with all its supernatural powers intact, it could scarcely have wrought a more complete change in the expression of his face. First, he glared at it in incredulous wonder; then, he nearly choked with inarticulate rage; finally, words came to his relief. To the consternation of Mrs. Lyte, and the intense gratification of the crowd of boys and negroes which quickly gathered at a safe distance, he proceeded to pour forth a volley of the bitterest curses that he could frame upon the author of what he chose to consider an insult to himself, and a disgrace to his lineage.

"That I should live to see the name of Bergan on a snip of a tin sign, like that!" he growled, shaking his fist at the offending plate, and trembling with rage;--"what right had the scoundrel to put it there, I should like to know? 'Attorney at Law,' indeed!--he shall have law enough, since he likes it so well! I'll sue him for trespass, libel, forgery,--I'll horsewhip him, and then have him indicted for assault and battery,--I'll--." But here his indignation choked him, for a moment.

Recovering his voice, his anger took a new direction. "'Bergan Arling,' indeed!" he muttered,--"I suppose he was ashamed of the 'Harry,' though he could put it at the end of his note,--smooth-faced hypocrite that he is! Where is he?" he went on, lifting his voice. "Why don't he come out, and face me, like a man? Must I go in and drag him out, by the nape of the neck,--the mean, sneaking, insulting puppy!"

"Mr. Arling is out, I regret to say," said Dr. Remy, appearing in the doorway, and confronting the furious Major with his cool, cynical smile. "He went out for a walk some fifteen or twenty minutes ago. If he were here, no doubt it would give him great pleasure to meet you."

Major Bergan scowled in a way to show how willingly he would transfer his wrath to this timely object, if he could only find a reasonable excuse. But, discovering not the shadow of one in the doctor's polite, careless manner, he contented himself with growling,--

"Out, is he? I wish he were out of the county--and a good riddance! When will he be in?"

"Not under an hour or two," answered the doctor, wisely postponing the era of Bergan's return to the utmost limit.

"Umph! that's the way he spends his time, is it? loafing about the country when he should be in his office! Well, I've got something to do, besides wait for him. Just tell him, will you? that I owe him a good, sound horse-whipping, and I'll pay it to him the first time I meet him."

"I will take charge of your kind message with pleasure," returned the doctor, blandly. "Any further commands?"

"No!" roared the Major, with a dim suspicion that he was being made to appear ridiculous,--"not unless you like to come out and take the horsewhipping yourself. On the whole, I'd just as soon give it to you."

"Many thanks," replied the doctor, with imperturbable coolness. "But I could not consent to appropriate anything designed for Mr. Arling."

"If it hurts your conscience, you can pass it over to him," rejoined Major Bergan, with grim humor.

"It would lose its flavor at second-hand," said the doctor, smiling.

"It would be your own fault, if it did," responded the Major. "At any rate, take care that my message don't lose anything, on the way. And while you're about it, just tell him that he shall never have Bergan Hall, nor an inch of ground that belongs to it, never! I'll give it to--Astra Lyte, first!"

The doctor slightly shrugged his shoulders, as an intimation that the Major's disposition of his property was a matter that did not interest him; but the latter mistook it for a sign of incredulity.

"I will! I swear I will!" he repeated, with an oath. "And why shouldn't I?" he went on, after a slight pause, as if the sudden idea had unexpectedly commended itself to him,--"why shouldn't I? Her father was my cousin; and he had Bergan blood in his veins, too, through his mother; and he was a right good fellow, besides. Where is she?"

"Miss Lyte is in New York, on a visit," replied the doctor.

"Umph! I should like to see her. Is she growing up bright and handsome?"

"She is both," returned the doctor, briefly.

"Then, she shall have it!" exclaimed the Major, with sudden decision. "I'll go home, and make my will. Tell Harry so, for his comfort, when he comes back."

And the Major, delighted that he had bethought himself of a revenge so swift and ample, mounted his horse, and rode off.

On Bergan's return, the scene was described to him by Doctor Remy, with a minuteness and accuracy of detail and coloring that did great credit to that gentleman's powers both of observation and description. Nevertheless, there was something of cynicism, or of satire, that grated on his listener's ear; and he finally stopped the doctor's flow of eloquence with the question,--

"Who is Astra Lyte?"

The doctor looked at him, with much surprise. "Is it possible that you have not yet heard of her?" he asked. "She is Mrs. Lyte's eldest daughter; and a genius, too,--or, at least, an artist;--they are not always synonymous terms, I believe. But where have you been living, not to have become acquainted with her name before this? It is always on Mrs. Lyte's lips; at least, she is ready to talk of her by the hour, with a little encouragement."

"My conversations with Mrs. Lyte have not been many nor long," replied Bergan. "An artist, did you say?"

But Doctor Remy had fallen into a fit of thought. He merely answered the question by a nod; and very shortly, he left Bergan to his own reflections.

V.

UNDER THE OAKS.

Not many weeks after the preceding incidents, Bergan went out, early one afternoon, for a long, solitary ramble. It was not his wont to leave his office before dusk, but his head ached with study, and his heart with loneliness and discouragement; an intolerable weariness and irksomeness had taken possession of him; his book seemed meaningless, and his brain paralyzed; there was nothing for it but to turn from the world of thought, that had suddenly grown so insufferably arid and dead, to the living, breathing world of nature. Forest, and field, and wave, if they could not give him intelligent sympathy, could at least furnish him gentle distraction.

And, oftentimes, there was a subtile harmony, almost amounting to sympathy, between his lonely moods, and the soft, rich, yet melancholy, Southern landscape,--for melancholy it always seemed to him, though that effect may have been partly owing to the gray medium of isolation and depression through which he viewed it. But, whatever its origin, this gentle mournfulness was the landscape's consummate charm,--at least, for any burdened human heart. It is possible that Eden wore a soft grace of pensive beauty, after the fall, which Adam and Eve, wandering back thither, would have counted a dearer delight, in their then mood, than its old, unshadowed brightness.

On his way out, Bergan found Nix stretched at full length across the threshold. With the usual preference of his race for masculine over feminine society, the dog had early attached himself to the young man, as much as was consistent with a different ownership. He now rose, shook himself, wagged his tail, and looked wistfully in Bergan's face. Meeting with no rebuff, he made bold to follow him.

Leaving the town behind as quickly as possible, Bergan first struck into a long, lonely lane, shut in, on either side, by a thick border of multifarious foliage. Trees and shrubs, both deciduous and evergreen, not only mingled their boughs along its sides, but were tied together in an intricate polygamous knot by tangled vines. There was an endless diversity of form and color,--every shape of leaf, and every hue and shade of green and brown, with occasional tints of red, purple, and orange, both pale and bright,--and everywhere the gray fringe of the Spanish moss.

By and by, the lane terminated in the inevitable pine barren, which frames all Southern landscape pictures. It stretched away, in every direction, as far as the eye could reach,--a vast, dim solitude, with a thick, blue-green roof, upheld by innumerable slender columns, and a carpet of fallen needles, on which the foot fell without a sound. A mysterious sigh pervaded it, even when no breeze was astir; its light was but a gentle gloom; and it had a soft, aromatic atmosphere of its own, as if it were another world. No fitter place could have been found for the indulgence of a youthful day dream, with enough of inherent light and color to overcome the prevailing sombreness, or, at least, to set itself in stronger relief against so darksome a background. But to Bergan, the vast, dim monotony, with its suggestive correspondence to the circumstances of his own life, brought only added heartache. The chance openings into the sky were so few, and the sunshine never fell save flickeringly, at the farther extremity of some long vista! He soon began to yearn for outlook and aspiration, some spot affording at least a glimpse of the surrounding world, as well as a fair look at the open sky. Happily, he knew where to find it.

Long since, he had discovered for himself a convenient and attractive out-door haunt,--a kind of natural amphitheatre, on the edge of one of the numerous bays, or creeks, of the vicinity. Great, patriarchal live-oaks, with hoary beards of moss trailing even to the ground, had ranged themselves in a semi-circle, on a high bank, overlooking the water. Standing in attitudes of ponderous grace, each one scattered shade and quietude over fifty, sixty, or, it might be, an hundred, feet of sward. Through a broad opening, in the midst of the dignified circle, the cheerful sunshine fell unbrokenly; and on the water-side, there was a fair stretch of blue waves, with a sea-green horizon-line afar; and over all, a wide half-dome of sky, with its changeable tracery of clouds, and its transparent concord of color. It was hard to believe that the hand of man had not wrought with that of nature, to produce a spot so perfect. Many a sunset had Bergan enjoyed there; many a twilight had he mused away, under the rustling oak-boughs; many a time, the rising moon had found him there, and surrounded him with weird enchantment.

All along, this spot had been the goal of his steps, though--by way of trying first what help and heart were to be found in exercise--he had chosen to reach it by a most circumlocutory route. So far as he knew, it was his own, by right of occupancy, as well as discovery; never had it showed a sign that it knew the pressure of any other human foot.

As he drew near, the sun was sending long, slanting beams of ruddy light athwart the amphitheatre, and dyeing the polished oak-leaves in rich tints of gold and orange. He quickened his steps, the sooner to reach the point whence sunset-splendors were to be seen to the best advantage; and upon which he had taken occasion to construct a low, rustic seat.

To his amazement, it was already occupied. A lady was quietly seated therein, her cheek resting on her hand, her eyes (as he judged from her pose, for her back was toward him) fixed on the glowing sky.

He stopped short, uncertain whether to advance or retreat.

Nix--who had lingered behind, to make a feint of hunting a squirrel--settled the question for him. Coming upon the scene, he first sniffed the air, and then dashed at the intruder. Fearing lest his intentions might be unfriendly,--or, at least, that the lady would be startled by his sudden appearance,--Bergan sternly called after him;--

"Nix! Nix! Here! Come back, you scamp!"

But Nix, if he heard, certainly did not heed. He was fawning upon the lady, in a way to indicate a previous acquaintance of considerable standing and intimacy. She, on her part, received his rude caresses quite as a matter of course, and cordially patted his rough head. Then she turned to Bergan.

"Nix does not mean to be disobedient," said she, apologetically. "Only, he recognizes in me an older friend than Mr. Arling, and, perhaps,"--she smiled,--"a superseding authority."

Bergan bowed. "He is fortunate," said he,--"that is, in finding a friend, old or new, where he did not look for one."

He spoke with a slight bitterness of tone, in involuntary recognition of the fact that no such pleasant discovery was ever the reward of his own aimless rambles. At the same time, he looked curiously at the lady, seeking a clue to her identity. She had seemed to know him; yet he could not remember that he had ever met her before.

Apparently, she was young; certainly, she was small, and somewhat slender. Without being absolutely pretty, her face was exceedingly interesting, by reason of its mobility and vivacity of expression;--albeit, its changes were not always to be easily understood, nor its language at once interpreted. Her eyes were of the darkest gray, with a clear and penetrative glance, that seemed to go straight to the depths of whatever object they sought. Her manner, though perfectly feminine, had an air of strength and energy, in marked contrast with the languid grace which is the more frequent product of Southern soil. She was very simply dressed,--in some soft, gray material, the one beauty of which was its ability to fall in artistic folds about her figure;--nevertheless, there was a certain pleasant peculiarity, a kind of sober picturesqueness, about her attire, that lifted it more surely out of the region of the common-place than any richness of texture, or newness of fashion, could have done. Moreover, it satisfied the eye with a sense of fitness; it was plainly the legitimate outgrowth of the wearer's character. Not that it bid defiance to fashion, but it did not conform to it to the extent of a complete sacrifice of individuality.

Her only ornament was a cluster of bright scarlet leaves, that she had doubtless found on her way thither, and fastened on her breast; and which an opportune sun-ray now touched into vivid splendor. This, too, suited her. It seemed the subtile outward expression of some correspondingly warm and rich characteristic within; glowing soft against the gray texture of an otherwise grave, earnest, almost severe character. It might be sparkling wit, or warm affections, or both, that were thus pleasantly symbolized.

She met Bergan's curious glance with a quiet smile, that seemed to understand its object, and enjoy, beforehand, its discomfiture. She even answered it with a brief scrutiny, that was hardly less in earnest, though not at all puzzled,--scarcely, even, inquiring.

At this moment, the sun suddenly disappeared. The two faces, that had been so clearly and ruddily lit up by his declining beams, were left pale and shadowed, looking at each other under the solemn old trees; through the branches of which the wind now began to whisper softly, as if moved to utter some sombre prediction, which yet it could not make quite plain.

"Do you believe in omens?" asked the young lady, with a kind of playful shiver.

"Not at all," answered Bergan, looking a little surprised.

"It is as well that you do not. For I suspect that they are like certain modes of medical treatment; they require a large element of faith to make them efficacious. And, to say truth, neither do I believe in them--except in a poetical way. If I did, I should say that this sudden shadow augurs but badly for our future acquaintance, and influence upon each other."

"If it means," replied Bergan, "that we are to know sunshine and shade together, little more could be predicted--or desired--of any earthly acquaintance."

"Perhaps not. Still, as I _do_ believe in omens, as I said before, in a poetical way, I am glad to see that the sun is not really set, after all. He only sank into a deceptive line of cloud. There! he comes forth again, to give us another bright glance before his final leave-taking. And, in order to leave the omen in its present satisfactory state, I will anticipate his departure. Good evening."

Slightly inclining her head, as she passed Bergan, she quickly disappeared under the low-hanging oak boughs.