Chapter 9

Suddenly he rose, uncovered, and with graceful dignity bowed. Then he unfolded a paper with large seals attached, and in a trembling but clear voice began to read. In the name and by the authority of his Majesty Christian VIII, King of Denmark, he proclaimed freedom to every slave in the Danish West Indies.

Our cries of dismay were drowned in the huzzas of the black mob: "Free! Free! God bless de gub'nor! Obbe is free!"

The retinue moved again; but the crowd, ignoring the command to disperse to their homes, surged after it in transports of rejoicing. At the fort the proclamation, with the order to disperse, was read again. But the mob, suddenly granted all its demands, could not instantly return to quiet toils made odious by slavery. Mad with joy and drink, it broke into small companies, some content to stay in town carousing, others roaming out among the island estates to pillage and burn. Here the governor, in failing to employ prompt measures of police, proved himself weak.

At evening, leaving our house in care of Jack and Tom, we went to spend the night at Mr. Kenyon's, where several neighbors were gathered, under arms. Our way led us by the ruined court-house, where for several squares the ground was completely covered with torn records, books, and other documents.

The night wore by in fitful sleep or anxious vigils. Near us all was quiet; but the distant sky was in many places red with incendiary fires. At dawn Mr. Kenyon, Gilbert, and others ventured out, and returned with sad tidings brought by courier from Christiansted. At the signal on Sunday night the negroes had swarmed there by thousands. Next day, when the governor had just departed for our town, leaving word to do nothing in his absence, they had attacked the fort as they had ours. But its commander, of a sturdy temper, had opened fire, killing and wounding many. This had only defended the town at the expense of the country, into which thousands scattered to break, pillage, and burn. Yet even so no whites had been killed except two or three men who had opposed the blacks single-handed, although the whole island, outside the two towns, was at the mercy of the insurgents.

However, there was better news. A Danish man-of-war was near by. A schooner was gone to look her up, and another to ask aid in the island of Porto Rico, only seventy miles away and heavily garrisoned with Spaniards. Still it was deemed wise to accept for Fredericksted the offer from the ships and send the women and children on board, so that the military might be free to hold the uprising in check until a stronger force could extinguish it.

"Tom," Mr. Kenyon said, "is to have a boat at the beach to take us off to an American schooner. Pack no trunks. Gather your lightest valuables in small bundles. Be quick; if a crowd gets there before you you may be refused."

We hurried home over a carpet of archives and title-deeds, swallowed a sort of breakfast, and began the hard task of choosing the little we could take from the much we must leave, in a dear home that might soon be in ashes.

On the schooner we found a kind welcome, amid a throng of friends and strangers, and a chaos of boxes, bundles, and _trunks_. Children were crying to go home, or viewing with babbling delight the wide roadstead dotted with boats still bringing the fugitives to every anchored vessel. Women were calling farewells and cautions to the men in the returning boats, and meeting friends were telling in many tongues the droll or sad distresses of the hour.

A friend, with his wife and little daughter, gave us a thrilling story. Except their house-keeper, a young English girl, they three were the only white persons on their beautiful "North End" estate when on Sunday night their slaves came to them in force demanding "freedom papers."

"Not under compulsion, never!"

"Den obbe set eb'ryt'ing on fiah! Wen yo' house bu'n up we try t'ink w'at too do wid you and de missie!" They rushed away to the sugar-works, yelling: "Git bagasse foo bu'n him out!"

The household loaded all the firearms in the house, filled all vessels with water, and piled blankets here and there to fight fire. Then they made merry. The wife played her piano till after midnight. Whether moved by this show or not, the blacks failed to return, and next day the family escaped to the schooner.

To grandmamma and the wife of the American consul, the oldest ladies on the vessel, was given, at nightfall, the only sofa on board. The rest dropped asleep on boxes and bundles anywhere. For my couch the boatswain lent me his locker, and for a pillow a bag of something that felt like rope ends, and for three successive mornings I was wakened with:

"Sorry to disturb you, little miss, but I must get to my locker."

XXXIII

(AUTHORITY, ORDER, PEACE)

Three days of heat, glare, hubbub, and anxious suspense dragged away, and Thursday's gorgeous sunset brought a change. The Danish frigate, bright with flags and swarming with sailors, swept in, dropped anchor, and wrapped herself in thunder and white smoke. Soon she lowered a boat, a glittering officer took its tiller-ropes, its long oars flashed, and it bore away to the fort. But evening fell, a starry silence reigned, and when a late moon rose we slept.

Next morning we knew that Captain Erminger, of the frigate, had assumed command over the whole island, declared martial law, landed his marines, and begun operations. Soon the harbor was populous again, with refugees returning home. Tom came with his boat. Just as we started landward a schooner came round the bluffs bringing the Spaniards. At early twilight these landed and marched with much clatter through the vacant streets to the town's various points of entrance, there to mount guard, the Danes having gone to scatter the insurgents.

The pursuing forces, in two bodies, were to move toward each other from opposite ends of the island, spanning it from sea to sea and meeting in the centre, thus entirely breaking up the bands of aimless pillagers into which the insurrection had already dispersed. This took but a few days. Buddoe was almost at once trapped by the baldest flatteries of two leading Danish residents and, finding himself without even the honor of armed capture, betrayed his confederates and disappeared.

Only one small band of blacks made any marked resistance. Under a certain "Moses" they occupied a hill, hurling down stones upon their assailants, but were soon captured. Many leaders of the revolt were condemned and shot, displaying in most cases a total absence of fortitude.

In less than a week from the day of flight to the ships quiet was restored, and a meeting of planters was adopting rules and rates for the employment of the freed slaves. Some estates resumed work at once; on others the ravages of the torch had first to be repaired. Some negroes would not work, and it was months before all the windmills on the hills were once more whirling. The Spaniards lingered long, but were finally relieved by a Danish regiment. Captain Erminger was commended by his home government. The governor was censured and superseded. The planters got no pay for their slaves.

The government may have argued that the ex-master should no more be paid for his slave than the ex-slave recover back pay for his labor; and that, after all, a general emancipation was only a moderate raising of wages unjustly low and uniform. Both kings and congresses will at times do the easy thing instead of the fair one and let two wrongs offset each other. Make haste, rising generations! and, as you truly honor your fathers, bring to their graves the garlandry of juster laws and kinder, purer days.

To different minds this true story will speak, no doubt, a varying counsel. Some will believe that the lovely island was saved from the agonies of a Haytian revolution only through iron suppression. To others it will appear that the old governor's rashly timorous edict was, after all, the true source of deliverance. Certainly the question remains, whether even the most sudden and ill-timed concession of rights, if only backed by energetic police action, is not a prompter, surer cure for public disorder than whole batteries of artillery without the concession of rights. I believe the most blundering effort for the prompt undoing of a grievous wrong is safer than the shrewdest or strongest effort for its continuance. Meanwhile, with what patience doth God wait for man to learn his lessons! The Holy Cross still glitters on the bosom of its crystal sea, as it shone before the Carib danced on its snowy sands, and as it will still shine when some new Columbus, as yet unborn, brings to it the Christianity of a purer day than ours.

Chester shook the pages together on his knee.

"Oh-h-h!" cried Mlle. Corinne to Yvonne, to Aline, to Mlle. Castanado, "the en'! and--where is all that abbout that beautiful cat what was the proprity of Dora? Everything abbout that cat of Dora--_scratch out_! Ah, Mr. Chezter! Yvonne and me, we find that the moze am-using part--that episode of the cat--that large, wonderful, mazculine cat of Dora! Ah, madame" [to the chair], "hardly Marie Madeleine is more wonderful than that--when Jack pritend to lift his li'l' miztress through the surf of the sea, how he _flew_ at the throat of Jack, that aztonishing mazculine cat! Ah, M'sieu' Beloiseau!--and to scradge that!"

But Beloiseau was judicially calm. "Yes, I rim-ember that portion. Scientific-ally I foun' that very interezting; but, like Mr. Chezter, I thing tha'z better _art_ that the tom-cat be elimin-ate."

"Well," said the chair, "w'at we want to settle--shall we accep' that riv-ision of Mr. Chezter, to combine it in the book--'Clock in the Sky,' 'Angel of the Lord,' 'Holy Crozz'--seem' to me that combination goin' to sell like hot cake'."

"Yes! Agcept!" came promptly from two or three.

"Any oppose'? There is not any oppose'--Seraphine--Marcel--you'll be so good to pazz those rif-reshment?"

XXXIV

"Tis gone--to the pewblisher?"

M. De l'Isle, about to enter his double gate, had paused. In his home, overhead, a clock was striking five of the tenth day after that second reading in the Castanados' parlor. The energetic inquiry was his.

A single step away, in the door of the iron-worker's shop, Beloiseau, too quick for Chester, at whose elbow he stood, replied: "Tis gone better! Tis gone to the editor--of the greatez' magazine of the worl'!"

"Bravo! Sinze how long?"

"A week," Chester said.

"Hah! and his _rip_-ly?"

"Hasn't come yet."

"Ah, look out, now! Look out he don' steal that! You di'n' write him: 'Wire answer'? You muz' do that! I'll pay it myseff!"

"I thought I'd wait one more day. He may have other manuscripts to consider."

"Mr. Chezter, that manuscrip' is not in a prize contess; 'tis only with itseff! You di'n' say that?"

"I--implied it--as gracefully as I could."

"Ah! graze'--the h-only way to write those fellow, tha'z with the big stick! 'Wire h-answer!'"

Beloiseau lifted a finger: "I don' think thad way. Firz' place, big stick or no, that hiztorie is sure to be accept'."

M. De l'Isle let out a roar that seemed to tear the lining from his throat: "Aw-w-w! tha'z not to compel the agceptanze; tha'z to scare them from stealing it! And to privend that, there's another thing you want to infer them: that you billong to the Louisiana Branch of the Authors' Protegtive H-union! Ah, doubtlezz you don't--billong; but all the same you can infer them!"

Beloiseau's response crowded Chester's out: "Well, they are maybe important, those stratagem'; but to me the chieve danger is if maybe _that_ editor shou'n' have the sagacitie--artiztic--commercial--to perceive the brilliancy of thad story."

"Never mine! in any'ow two days we'll know. Scipion! The day avter those two, tha'z a pewblic holiday--everything shut!"

"Yes, well?"

"If that news come, 'accepted,' all of us we'll be so please' that we'll be compel to egsprezz that in a joy-ride! and even if 'rifused,' we'll need that joy-ride to swallow the indignation."

"Ah! but with whose mash-in', so it won't put uz in bankrup'cy?"

"With two mash-in'--the two of Thorndyke-Smith! He's offer' to borrow me those whiles he's going to be accrozz the lake. You'll drive the large, me the small."

"Hah! Tha'z a gran' scheme. At the en', dinner at Antoine', all the men chipping in! Castanado--Dubroca--me--Mr. Chezter, eh?"

"With the greatest pleasure if I'm included."

"Include'--hoh! By the laws of nature!" M. De l'Isle went on up-stairs.

"We had a dinner like that," Beloiseau said, "only withoud the joy-ride and withoud those three Mlles. Chapdelaine, juz' a few week' biffo' we make' yo' acquaintanze. That was to celebrade that great victory in France and same time the news of savety of our four boys ad the front."

Chester stood astounded. "What four boys?"

"You di'n' know abboud those? Ah, well, tha'z maybe biccause we don' speak of them biffo' those ladies Chapdelaine. An' still tha'z droll you di'n' know that, but tha'z maybe biccause each one he's think another he's tol' you, and biccause tha'z not a prettie cheerful subjec', eh? Yes, they are two son' of Dubroca and Castanado, soldier', and two of De l'Isle and me, aviateur'."

"And up to a few weeks ago they were all well?"

"Ah, not well--one wounded, one h'arm broke, one trench-fivver, but all safe, laz' account."

"Tell me more about them, Beloiseau. You know I don't easily ask personal questions. Tell me all I'm welcome to know, will you?"

"I want to do that--to tell you all; but"--M. Ducatel, next neighbor above, was approaching--"better another time--ah, Rene, tha'z a pretty warm evening, eh?"

XXXV

For two days more the vast machinery of the United States mail swung back and forth across the continent and the oceans beyond, and in unnumbered cities and towns the letter-carriers came and went; but nothing they brought into Bienville or Royal Street bore tidings from that execrable editor in New York who in salaried ease sat "holding up" the manuscript once the impressionable Dora's, now the gentle Aline's. The holiday--"everything shut up"--had arrived. No carrier was abroad. Neither reason given for the joy-ride held good. Yet the project was well on foot. The smaller car was at the De l'Isles' lovely gates, with monsieur in the chauffeur's seat, Mme. Alexandre at his side, and Dubroca close behind her. The larger machine stood at the opposite curb, with Beloiseau for driver, and Mme. Dubroca--a very small, trim, well-coiffed woman with a dainty lorgnette--in the first seat behind him. Castanado waited in the street door at the foot of his stair, down which Mme. Castanado was coming the only way she could come.

Her crossing of the sidewalk and her elevation first to the running-board and then to a seat beside Mme. Dubroca took time and the strength of both men, yet was achieved with a dignity hardly appreciated by the street children, who covered their mouths, averted their faces, and cheered as the two cars, the smaller leading, moved off and turned from Royal Street into Conti on their way to pick up the three Chapdelaines.

For nearly two hundred years--ever since the city had had a post-office--the post-office had been not too superior to remain in the _vieux carré_. Now, like so many old Creole homes themselves, it was "away up" in the American quarter--or "nine-tenth'"--at Lafayette Square. On holidays any one anxious enough for his mail to go "away up yondah" between nine and ten A.M., could have it for the asking. And such a one was Chester.

He had his reward. Twice and again he read the magazine's name on the envelope as he bore it to the Camp Street front of the building, but would not open the missive. That should be _her_ privilege and honor. He lifted his eyes from it and behold, here came the two cars! But where was she? Certainly not in the front one. There he made out, in pairs, M. De l'Isle and Mme. Alexandre. Mlle. Yvonne and M. Dubroca, M. Castanado, and Mme. De l'Isle. Then in the rear car his alarmed eye picked out Beloiseau and Mlle. Corinne, with Cupid between them; Mmes. Dubroca and Castanado, especially the latter; and then, oh, then! Behind the smaller woman a vacant seat and behind the vaster one Aline Chapdelaine.

"You've heard?" cried M. De Elsie, slowing to the curb. Chester fluttered his prize. "Click, clap!"--he was in without the stopping of a wheel and had passed the letter to Aline.

"Accepted?" asked several, while both cars resumed their speed up-town.

"We'll open it in Audubon Park," she said to Chester, and Mme. Castanado and Dubroca passed the word forward to Beloiseau and Mlle. Corinne. These soon got it to Castanado and Mme. De l'Isle.

"Not to be open' till Audubon Park," sped the word still forward till Mlle. Yvonne and Dubroca had passed it to Mme. Alexandre and M. De l'Isle.

"Ahah!" he said, as he turned Lee Circle and went spinning up St. Charles Avenue. "Not in the pewblic street, but in Audubon Park, and to the singing of bird'!"

XXXVI

Out near the riverside end of the park the two cars stopped abreast under a vast live-oak, and Aline, rising, opened the letter and read aloud:

MY DEAR MR. CHESTER:

Your manuscript, "The Holy Cross," accompanied by your letter of the -- inst., is received and will have our early attention.

Very respectfully,

THE EDITOR.

All other outcries ceased half-uttered when the Chapdelaine sisters clapped hands for joy, crying:

"Agcepted! Agcepted! Ah, Aline! by that kindnezz and sag-acitie of Mr. Chezter--and all the rez' of our Royal Street frien'--you are biccome the diz-ting-uish' and _lucrative_ authorezz, Mlle. Chapdelaine!"

M. De l'Isle's wrath was too hot for his tongue, but Scipion stood waiting to speak, and Mme. Castanado beckoned attention and spoke his name.

"_Messieurs et mesdames_" he said, "that manuscrip' is no mo' agcept' than rij-ect'. That stadement, tha'z only to rilease those insuranze companie' and----"

"And to stop us from telegraphing!" M. De l'Isle broke in, "and to make us, ad the end, glad to get even a small price! Ah, mesdemoiselles, you don't know those razcal' like me!"

"Oh!" cried the tender Yvonne--original rescuer of Marie Madeleine from boy lynchers--"you don't have charitie! That way you make _yo'seff_ un'appie."

"Me, I cann' think," her sister persevered, "that tha'z juz' for the insuranse. The manuscrip' is receive'? Well! 'ow can you receive something if you don't agcept it? And 'ow can you agcep' that if you don' receive it? Ah-h-h!"

"No," Beloiseau rejoined, "tha'z only to signify that the editorial decision--tha'z not decide'."

Mlle. Corinne lifted both hands to the entire jury: "Oh, frien', I assure you, that manuscrip' is agcept'. And tha'z the proof; that both Yvonne and me we've had a presentiment of that already sinze the biggening! Ah-h-h!"

Castanado intervened: "Mademoiselle, that lady yonder"--he gave his wife a courtier's bow--"will tell you a differenze. Once on a time she receive' a h-offer of marriage; but 'twas not till after many days thad she agcept' it." [Applause.] "But ad the en', I su'pose tha'z for Mr. Chezter, our legal counsel, to conclude."

Mr. Chester "thought that although receipt did not imply acceptance the tardiness of this letter did argue a probability that the manuscript had successfully passed some sort of preliminary reading--or readings--and now awaited only the verdict of the editor-in-chief."

"Or," ventured Mme. Alexandre, "of that editorial board all together."

M. De l'Isle shook his head and then a stiff finger: "I tell you! They are sicretly inquiring Thorndyke-Smith--lit'ry magnet--to fine out if we are truz'-worthy! And tha'z the miztake we did---not sen'ing the photograph of Mlle. Aline ad the biggening. But tha'z not yet too late; we can wire them from firz' drug-store, 'Suspen' judgment! Portrait of authorezz coming!'"

All eyes, even Cupid's, turned to her. She was shaking her head. "No," she responded, with a smile as lovely, to Chester's fancy, as it was final; as final, to the two aunts' conviction, as it was lovely.

"No photograph would be convincing," Chester began to plead, but stopped for the aunts.

"Oh, impossible!" they cried. "That wou'n' be de-corouz!"

"Ladies an' gentlemen," said M. Castanado, "we are on a joy-ride."

"An' we 'ave reason!" his wife exclaimed.

"Biccause hope!" Mme. Alexandre put in.

"Yes!" said Dubroca. "That manuscrip' is not allone receive'; sinze more than a week 'tis _rittain'_, whiles they dillib-rate; and the chateau what dillib-rate'--you know, eh? M'sieu' De l'Isle, I move you we go h-on."

They went, the De l'Isle car and then Scipion's, back to St. Charles Avenue, and turned again up-town. On the rearmost seat----

"Why so silent?" Aline inquired of Chester.

"Because so content," he said, "except when I think of the book."

"The half-book?"

"Exactly. We've only half enough stories yet.

"Though with the _vieux carré_ full of them?"

"Oh! mostly so raw, so bald, so thin!"

"Ah, I knew you would see that. As though human life and character were--what would say?"

"I'd say crustacean; their anatomy all on the surface. Such stories are not life, life in the round; they're only paper silhouettes--of the real life's poorest facts and moments. I state the thought poorly but you get it, don't you?"

The girl sparkled, not so much for the thought as for their fellowship in it. "Once I heard mamma say to my aunts: 'So many of these _vieux carré_ stories are but pretty pebbles--a quadroon and a duel, a quadroon and a duel--always the same two peas in the baby's rattle.'"

"There are better stories for a little deeper search," Chester said.

"Ah, she said that too! 'And not,' she said, 'because the _vieux carré_ is unlike, but so like the rest of the world.'"

Thus they spoke, happily--even a bit recklessly--conscious that they were themselves a beautiful story without the flash of a sword or the cloud of a misdeed in range of their sight, and not because the _vieux carré_ was unlike, but so like the rest of the world.

"Where are we going?" Aline inquired, and tried to look forward around Mme. Castanado.

"You and I," Chester said, "are going back to your father's story. You said, the other day, his life was quiet, richer within than without."

"Yes. Ah, yes; so that while of the inside I cannot tell half, of the outside there is almost nothing to tell."

"All the same, tell it. Were not he and these Royal Street men boys together?"

"Yes, though with M. De l'Isle the oldest, and though papa was away from them many years, over there in France. Yes, they were all his friends, as their fathers had been of _grandpère_. And they'll all tell you the same thing; that he was their hero, while at the same time that his story is destitute of the theatrical. Just he himself, he and mamma--they are the whole story."

"A sea without a wave?"

"Ah, no; yet without a storm. And, Mr. Chester, I think a sea without a storm can be just as deep as with, h'm?"

XXXVII

"Well, they married, your father and mother, over there where her people are fighting the Germans right now, and came and lived in Bourbon Street with your aunts, eh?"

"Yes, or rather my aunts with them, they were of so much more strong natures than my aunts--more strong and large while just as sweet, and that's saying much, you know."

"I see it is."

"Mr. Chester, what you see, I think, is that my aunts are perhaps the two most--well--unworldly women you ever knew."

"True. In that quality they're childlike."

"Yes, and because they are so childlike in--above all--the freedom of their speech, what I want to say of them, just this one time, is the more to their honor: that in my _whole_ life I've never heard them speak one word against anybody."

"Not even Cupid?"