Part 7

Sandy turned north up the village street, walking irresolutely. It might be thirty miles to Wimberton. The squire had sent him money. He could reach the railroad and make Wimberton that night, but he did not seem to care about it.

Out of the village, he fell into the long marching stride, and the motion set his blood tingling. Presently he felt better; some burden was shaken off; he was foot-loose and free of the open road, looking to the friction of event. At the end of five miles he remembered a saying of Kid Sadler's, chuckled over it, and began humming other verses of the “Sing Song,” so called by the outcast poet.

“Oh, when I was a little boy, I laughed an then I cried,

An ever since I done the same, more privately, inside.

There's a joke between this world an me 'n it's tolerable grim,

An God has got his end of it, an some of it's on him.

For he made a man with his left han, an the rest o' things

with his right;

An the right knew not what the left han did, for he hep

it out o' sight.

It's maybe a Wagner opery, it ain't no bedtime croon,

When the highest note in the universe is a half note out

o' tune''

“That appears to be pretty accurate,” he thought. “Wonder how the Kid comes to know things.”

He swung on enjoying the growth of vigor, the endless, open, travelled road, and the wind blowing across his face.

SANDERSON OF BACK MEADOWS

|Back Meadows lies three miles to the northwest of Hagar, rich bottom-lands in Sanderson Hollow, and the Cattle Ridge shelters it on the north. Five generations of Sandersons have added to the Sanderson accumulation of this world's goods, without sensible interference on the part of moths or rust or thieves that break through and steal. Cool, quiet men, slow of speech and persistent of mood, they prospered and lived well where other families, desiring too many things or not desiring anything enough, found nothing at all desirable and drifted away. The speculative traveller, hunting “abandoned farms,” or studying the problem of the future of New England's outlying districts, who should stand on the crest of the Cattle Ridge overlooking the sheltered valley, would note it as an instance of the problem satisfactorily solved and of a farm which, so far from abandonment, smiled over all its comfortable expanse in the consciousness of past and certainty of future occupancy. These were ready illustrations for his thesis, if he had one: the smooth meadows, square stone walls and herds of fawn-colored cattle, large bams and long stables of the famous Sanderson stud; also the white gabled house among the maples with spreading ells on either side, suggesting a position taken with foresight and carefully guarded and secured--a house that, recognizing the uncertainties and drifting currents of the world, had acted accordingly, and now could afford to consider itself complacently. The soul of any individual Sanderson might be required of him, and his wisdom relative to eternity be demonstrated folly, but the policy of the Sanderson family had not so far been considered altogether an individual matter. Even individually, if the question of such inversion of terms ever occurred to a Sanderson, it only led to the conclusion that it was strictly a Pickwickian usage, and, in the ordinary course of language, the policy of building barns, stowing away goods and reflecting complacently thereon, still came under the head of wisdom.

Mrs. Cullom Sanderson, sister of Israel Sanderson of the last generation and married into a distant branch of the Sanderson family, carried her materialism with an unconscious and eccentric frankness that prevented the family from recognizing in her a peculiar development of its own quality. When Israel's gentle wife passed from a world which she had found too full of unanswered questions, it was Mrs. Cullom who plunged bulkily into the chamber of the great mystery and stopped, gulping with astonishment.

“I just made her some blanc-mange,” she gasped. “Isn't that too bad! Why, Israel!”

Israel turned from the window and contemplated her gravely with his hands clasped behind him.

“I think you had better move down to the Meadows, Ellen,” he said. “If you will contrive to say as little as possible to me about Marian, and one or two other matters I will specify, we shall get along very well.”

He went out with slow step and bent head, followed by Mrs. Cullom trying vainly to find an idea on the subject suggested, which she was quite positive she had somewhere about her. What Israel may have thought of the thing that had whispered within his doors in an unknown tongue, and had taken away what was his without receipt or equivalent exchange, it were hard to say; equally hard even to say what he had thought of Marian these twenty years. If her cloistral devotions and visionary moods had seemed to him, in uninverted terms, folly, he had never said so. Certainly he had liked her quiet, ladylike ways, and possibly respected a difference of temperament inwardly as well as outwardly. At any rate, tolerance was a consistent Sanderson policy and philosophy of life.

There was a slight movement in the chamber, after the silence which followed the departing footsteps of Israel and Mrs. Cullom. A small person in pinafores crept stealthily from under the bed and peered over the edge. It was a hard climb but he persisted, and at last seated himself on it panting, with his elbows on his knees, gravely considering. A few hours since, the silent lips had whispered, among many things that came back to his memory in after years like a distant chime of bells, only this that seemed of any immediate importance: “I shall be far away to-night, Joe, but when you say your prayers I shall hear.” The problem that puckered the small brow was whether prayers out of regular hours were real prayers. Joe decided to risk it and, getting on his knees, said over all the prayers he knew. Then he leaned over and patted the thin, cold cheek (Joe and his mother always tacitly understood each other), slid off the bed with a satisfied air, and solemnly trotted out of the room.

Mrs. Cullom Sanderson was a widow; “Which,” Israel remarked, “is a pity. Cullom would have taken comfort in outliving you, Ellen.”

“Well,” remonstrated Mrs. Cullom, “I'm sure I don't know what you mean, Israel. I've always respected his memory.”

Israel, gravely regarding her, observed, “You'd better not try to train Joe,” and departed, leaving her to struggle with the idea that between Joe and Cullom's comfort Israel was getting very disconnected. Disconnection of remark did not imply any changeableness in Israel's temperament. He observed a silent sequence of character, and possibly a sequence of thought of which he did not care to give evidence, on matters which he found no profit in discussing. Twelve years later the mystery again whispered within his doors, and he rose and followed it in his usual deliberate and taciturn way, without disclosing any opinion on the question of the inversion of terms. The story of each generation is put away when its time comes with a more or less irrelevant epitaph, whether or not its threads be gathered into a satisfactory finale. The Spirit-of-things-moving-on is singularly indifferent to such matters. Its only literary principle seems to be, to move on. The new Sanderson of Back Meadows grew up a slight, thin-faced young fellow. The Sanderson men were always slight of build, saving a certain breadth of shoulders. A drooping mustache in course of time hid the only un-Sanderson feature, a sensitive mouth. The cool gray eyes, slightly drawling speech, and deliberate manner were all Sanderson, indicating “a chip of the old block,” as Mr. Durfey remarked to the old Scotchman who kept the drag store in Hagar. If the latter had doubts, he kept them to himself.

The Sanderson stud sprang from a certain red mare, Martha, belonging to Blake Sanderson of Revolutionary times. They were a thin-necked, generally bad-tempered breed, with red veins across the eyes, of high repute among “horsey” men. Blake Sanderson was said to have ridden the red mare from Boston in some astonishingly quick time on some mysterious errand connected with the evacuation of New York, whereby her descendants were at one time known as the Courier breed; but as no one seemed to know what the errand was, it was possibly not a patriotic one. Three of these red, thinnecked mares and a stallion were on exhibition at the Hamilton County Fair of '76. Notable men of the county were there, mingled with turfmen of all shades of notoriety; several immaculately groomed gentlemen, tall-hatted, long-coated, and saying little, but pointed out with provincial awe as coming from New York and worth watching; a few lean Kentuckians, the redness of whose noses was in direct ratio with their knowledge of the business, and whose artistic profanity had a mercantile value in expressing contempt for Yankee horse-flesh. There was the Honorable Gerald and the some-say Dishonorable Morgan Map, originally natives of Hagar, with young Jacob Lorn between them undergoing astute initiation into the ways of the world and its manner of furnishing amusement to young men of wealth; both conversing affably with Gypsy John of not even doubtful reputation, at present booming Canadian stock in favor of certain animals that may or may not have seen Canada. Thither came the manager of the opera troupe resident in Hamilton during the Fair, and the Diva, popularly known as Mignon, a brown-haired woman with a quick Gallic smile and a voice, “By gad, sir, that she can soak every note of it in tears, the little scamp,” quoth Cassidy, observing from a distance. Cassidy was a large fleshy man with a nickel shield under his coat.

“A face to launch a thousand ships,

And burn the topless towers of Ilium''

misquoted a tall, thin personage with an elongated face and sepulchral voice. “The gods made you poetical, Mr. Cassidy. Do you find your gift of sentiment of use on the force?”

“Yes, sir,” shouted Cassidy, inadvertently touched on one of innumerable hobbies and beginning to pound one hand excitedly with the fist of the other. “In fine cases, sir, the ordinary detective slips up on just that point. Now let me tell you, Mr. Mavering--”

“Tell me whether that is not Mignon's 'mari.' What sort of a man is he?”

“Mignon's what? Oh--Manager Scott. He isn't married, further than that he's liable to rows on account of Mignon, who--has a face to upset things as you justly observe, not to speak of a disposition according. At least, I don't know but what they may be married. If they are, they're liable to perpetuate more rows than anything else.”

“'Does something smack, something grow to, has a kind of taste?”'

“Eh?” said Cassidy, inquiringly.

Sanderson, standing silently by, as silently turned and walked toward the crowd drifting back and forth in front of the stables. Portly Judge Carter of Gilead, beaming through gold-rimmed glasses, side-whiskered and rubicund, stopped him to remark tremendously that he had issued an injunction against the stallion going out of the state. “A matter of local patriotism, Joe, eh?”

“Hear, hear,” commented the Honorable Gerald Map. A crowd began to gather anticipating a conference of notables. Sanderson extricated himself and walked on, and two small boys eventually smacked each other over the question whether Judge Carter was as great a man as Mr. Sanderson.

Mavering's eyes followed him speculatively.

“What's the particular combination that troubles the manager's rest?”

“Eh?” said Cassidy. “Oh, I don't know. Bob Sutton mostly. He's here somewhere. Swell young fellow in a plush vest, fashionable proprietor of thread mills.”

The yellow, dusty road ran between the stables and a battle line of sycamores and maples. Over the stables loomed the brick wall of the theatre, and at the end of them a small green door for the private use of exhibitors gave exit from the Fair Grounds. Sanderson stopped near a group opposite it, where Mignon stood slapping her riding-boot with her whip.

“Mr. Sanderson,” said Mignon, liquidly, “how can I get out through that door?”

Sanderson considered and suggested opening it.

“But it's locked! Ciel! It's locked!”

Sanderson considered again. “Here's a key,” he said hopefully.

“There!” shouted the plush vest. “I knew there'd be some solution. You see, mademoiselle, what Ave admire in Sanderson is his readiness of resource. Mademoiselle refused to melt down the fence with a smile or climb over it on a high C, and we were quite in despair.”

Outside the gate, in the paved courtyard between the theatre and the hotel, Mignon lifted her big brown eyes which said so many things, according to Cassidy, that were not so, and observed demurely, “If you were to leave me that key, Mr. Sanderson, well, I should steal in here after the performance tonight and ride away on the little red mare, certainly.”

Sanderson gravely held out the key, but Mignon drew back in sudden alarm and clasped her hands tragically.

“Oh, no! You would be on guard and, what! cut up? Yes. Ah, dreadfully! You are so wise, Mr. Sanderson, and secret.”

And Jack Mavering, following slowly after, chuckled sepulchrally to himself. “Pretty cool try sting. Peace to the shades of Manager Scott. I couldn't have done it better myself.”

The Fair Grounds were as dark and lonely at eleven o'clock as if the lighted street were not three hundred feet away with its gossipy multitude going up and down seeking some new thing. The stands yawned indifferently from a thousand vacant seats and the race-track had forgotten its excitement. Horses stamped and rustled spectrally in their stalls. The shadow under the maples was abysmal and the abyss gave forth a murmur of dialogue, the sound of a silken voice.

“Oh,” it sighed in mock despair, “but Americans, they are so very impassive. Look! They make love in monosyllables. They have no passion, no action. They pull their mustachios, say 'Damn!'--so, and it is tragedy. They stroke their chins, so, very grave. They say 'It is not bad, and it is comedy. Ah, please, Joe, be romantique!”

“Why,” drawled the other voice, “I'll do whatever you like, except have spasms.”

“Indifferent! Bah! That's not romantique. How would I look in the house of your fathers?”

“You'd look like thunder.”

“Would I?” The silken voice sank low and was quiet for a moment. “Well then, listen. This shall you do. You shall give me that key and an order to your man that I ride the little mare of a Sunday morning, which is to-morrow, because she is the wind and because you are disagreeable. Is it not so?”

A ripple of low laughter by the green door, and “There then. You drive a hard bargain in love, monsieur.” The door opened and she stepped with a rustle of skirts into and through the paved courtyard, now unlit by lamps at the theatre entrance, dark enough for the purposes of Manager Scott, in an angle of the entrance pulling his mustache and speaking after the manner described by Mignon as tragedy.

In the valley of the Wyantenaug many stopped and listened breathlessly by barn-yard and entry door to a voice that floated along the still air of the Sabbath morning, now carolling like a bobolink, now fluting like a wood-thrush, now hushed in the covert of arching trees, and now pealing over the meadows by the river bank; others only heard a rush of hoofs and saw a little red horse and its rider go by with the electric stride of a trained racer. Each put his or her interpretation thereon, elaborately detailed after the manner of the region, and approximated the fact of Mignon and her purposes as nearly as might be expected. Delight in the creation of jewelled sounds as an end in itself; delight in the clear morning air of autumn valleys, the sight of burnished leaves and hills in mad revelry of color; delight in following vagrant fancies with loose rein, happy, wine-lipped elves that rise without reason and know no law; delight in the thrill and speed of a sinewy horse compact of nerves; however all these may have entered in the purposes of Mignon, they are not likely to have entered the conjectures of the inhabitants of Wyantenaug Valley, such pleasures of the flesh. Mignon let the mare choose her road, confining her own choice to odd matters of going slow or fast or not at all, pausing by the river bank to determine the key and imitate the quality of its low chuckle, and such doings; all as incomprehensible to the little red mare as to the inhabitants of Wyantenaug Valley.

The valley is broad with cup-shaped sides, save where the crowding of the hills has thrust one forward to stand in embarrassed projection. Some twenty miles above Hamilton rises Windless Mountain on the right, guarding from the world the village of Hagar behind it. Northward from Windless lie irregular hills, and between them and the long westward-inclining tumulus of the Cattle Ridge a narrow gorge with a tumbling brook comes down. Up this gorge goes a broad, well-kept road, now bridging the brook, now slipping under shelving ledges, everywhere carpeted with the needles of pines, secret with the shadows of pines, spicy and strong with the scent of pines, till at the end of half a mile it emerges from beneath the pines into Sanderson Hollow. The little red mare shot from the gloom into the sunlight with a snort and shake of the head that seemed to say: “Oh, my hoofs and fetlocks! Deliver me from a woman who makes believe to herself she is n't going where she is, or if she is that it's only accidental.”

Mrs. Cullom Sanderson ponderously made ready for church, not with a mental preparation of which the minister would have approved unless he had seen as clearly as Mrs. Cullom the necessity of denouncing in unmeasured terms the iniquity of Susan. Susan was a maid who tried to do anything that she was told, and bumped her head a great deal. Her present iniquity lay in her fingers and consisted in tying and buttoning Mrs. Cullom and putting her together generally so that she felt as if she had fallen into her clothes from different directions. A ring at the door-bell brought Mrs. Cullom down from heights of sputtering invective like an exhausted sky-rocket, and she plumped into a chair whispering feebly, “Goodness, Susan, who's that?” Susan vaguely disclaimed all knowledge of “that.”

“You might find out,” remonstrated Mrs. Cullom, the reaction precluding anything but a general feeling of injury. Susan went down-stairs and bumped her head on the chandelier, opened the door and bumped it on the door.

“Ouch,” she remarked in a matter-of-fact tone. “Please, ma'am, Miss Sanderson wants to know, who's that?”

“Ah,” said the trim little lady in riding-habit, “will you so kindly ask Miss Sanderson that I may speak to her?”

But Mrs. Cullom was already descending the stairs, each step appearing to Mignon to have the nature of a plunge. “My goodness, yes. Come in.” Mignon carried her long skirt over the lintel.

“I am quite grieved to intrude, mademoi--” Mrs. Cullom's matronly proportions seemed to discountenance the diminutive, “a--madame. Mr. Sanderson permitted me to ride one of his horses. He is so generous. And the horse brought me here, oh, quite decisively,” and Mignon laughed such a soft, magical laugh that Susan grinned in broad delight. “It is such a famous place, this, is it not,--Back Meadows? I thought I might be allowed to--to pay tribute to its fame.”

Mrs. Cullom's cordiality was such that if, strictly speaking, two hundred pounds can flutter, she may be said to have fluttered. She plunged through two sombre-curtained parlors, Mignon drifting serenely in the wake of her tumult. Something in the black, old colonial furniture sent a feeling of cold gruesomeness into her sunny veins, and she was glad when Mrs. Cullom declared it chilly and towed her into the dining-room, where a warm light sifted through yellow windows of modern setting high over a long, irregular sideboard, and mellowed the portraits of departed Sandersons on the walls: honorables numerous of colonial times (Blake, first of the horse-breeding Sandersons, booted and spurred but with too much thinness of face and length of jaw for a Squire Western type), all flanked by dames, with a child here and there, above or below--all but the late Israel, whose loneliness in his gilt frame seemed to have a certain harmony with his expression.

“That was Joseph's father, my brother Israel,” said Mrs. Cullom, as Mignon's eyes travelled curiously along and rested on the last. “Joseph keeps his mother hung up in his den.”

“Hung up? Den?” cried Mignon, with a recurrence of the gruesome feeling of the parlors. “Oh, ciel! What does he keep there? Bones?”

“Bones! Goodness no. Books.”

Mrs. Cullom pushed open a door to the right and entered a long, low room piled to the ceiling and littered with books, which, together with the leathern chair and red-shaded lamp before the fireplace, gave a decided air of studious repose, nothing suggesting a breeder of fancy stock. An oil painting of a lady hung over the mantel, and near it some mediæval Madonna, not unresembling the portrait in its pale cheeks, unworldly eyes, and that faint monastic air of vigil and vision and strenuous yearning of the soul to throw its dust aside. Nevertheless the face of the lady was a sweet face, quiet and pure, such as from many a Madonna of the Old World in tawdry regalia looks pityingly down over altar and winking tapers, seeming to say with her tender eyes, “Is it very hard, my dear, the living? Come apart then and rest awhile.” Mignon turned to Mrs. Cullom. “You are dressed for going out, madame,” she said, looking at that lady's well-to-do black silk. “Am I not detaining you?”

“Oh, I was going to church. Goodness, are n't you going to church?” A sudden thought struck her and she added severely: “And you've been riding that wicked little mare on Sunday. And she might have thrown you, and how'd you look pitched headfirst into heaven dressed so everybody ud know you weren't going to church!”

“Oh,” cried Mignon, “but I was good when I was a child. Yes! I went to mass every day, and had a little prie-dieu, oh, so tiny!”

“Mass!” gasped Mrs. Cullom. “Well, I declare. What's a pray-do?”

Mignon surveyed her riding-skirt regretfully. “Would it not be appropriate, madame? I should so like to go with you,” she said plaintively.

“Goodness! I'll risk it if you will. I'd like to see the woman who'd tell me what to wear to church.” She plunged suddenly out of the room, leaving Mignon thinking that she would not like to be the woman referred to. She listened to the ponderous footsteps of Mrs. Cullom climbing the stairs, and then sank into the leathern chair facing the picture. Possibly the living and the dead faced each other on a point at issue; they seemed to debate some matter gravely and gently, as is seldom done where both are living. Possibly it was Mignon's dramatic instinct which caused her to rise at last, gathering up her riding-skirt, at the approaching footsteps of Mrs. Cullom, and bow with Gallic grace and diminutive stateliness to the pure-faced lady with the spiritual eyes. “C'est vrai, madame,” she said, and passed out with her small head in the air.