Chapter 18

Almost every Saturday Mavis would go down to stay till Monday with her grandfather Hawn. Gray would drift down there to see her--and always, while Mavis was helping her grandmother in the kitchen, Gray and old Jason would sit together on the porch. Gray never tired of the old man's shrewd humor, quaint philosophy, his hunting tales and stories of the feud, and old Jason liked Gray and trusted him more the more he saw of him. And Gray was a little startled when it soon became evident that the old man took it for granted that in his intimacy with Mavis was one meaning and only one.

"I al'ays thought Mavis would marry Jason," he said one night, "but, Lordy Mighty, I'm nigh on to eighty an' I don't know no more about gals than when I was eighteen. A feller stands more chance with some of 'em stayin' away, an' agin if he stays away from some of 'em he don't stand no chance at all. An' agin I rickollect that if I hadn't 'a' got mad an' left grandma in thar jist at one time an' hadn't 'a' come back jist at the right time another time, I'd 'a' lost her--shore. Looks like you're cuttin' Jason out mighty fast now--but which kind of a gal Mavis in thar is, I don't know no more'n if I'd never seed her."

Gray flushed and said nothing, and a little later the old man went frankly on:

"I'm gittin' purty old now an' I hain't goin' to last much longer, I reckon. An' I want you to know if you an' Mavis hitch up fer a life-trot tergether I aim to divide this farm betwixt her an' Jason, an' you an' Mavis can have the half up thar closest to the mines, so you can be close to yo' work."

The boy was saved any answer, for the old man expected and waited for none, so simple was the whole matter to him, but Gray, winding up the creek homeward in the moonlight that night, did some pretty serious thinking. No such interpretation could have been put on the intimacy between him and Mavis at home, for there companionship, coquetry, sentiment, devotion even, were possible without serious parental concern. Young people in the Blue-grass handled their own heart affairs, and so they did for that matter in the hills, but Gray could not realize that primitive conditions forbade attention without intention: for life was simple, mating was early because life was so simple, and Nature's way with humanity was as with her creatures of the fields and air except for the eye of God and the hand of the law. A license, a few words from the circuit rider, a cleared hill-side, a one-room log cabin, a side of bacon, and a bag of meal--and, from old Jason's point of view, Gray and Mavis could enter the happy portals, create life for others, and go on hand in hand to the grave. So that where complexity would block Jason in the Blue-grass, simplicity would halt Gray in the hills. To be sure, the strangeness, the wildness, the activity of the life had fascinated Gray. He loved to ride the mountains and trails--even to slosh along the river road with the rain beating on him, dry and warm under a poncho. Often he would be caught out in the hills and have to stay all night in a cabin; and thus he learned the way of life away from the mines and the river bottoms. So far that poor life had only been pathetic and picturesque, but now when he thought of it as a part of his own life, of the people becoming through Mavis his people, he shuddered and stopped in the moonlit road-aghast. Still, the code of his father was his, all women were sacred, and with all there would be but one duty for him, if circumstances, as they bade fair to now, made that one duty plain. And if his father should go under, if Morton Sanders took over his home and the boy must make his own way and live his life where he was--why not? Gray sat in the porch of the house on the spur, long asking himself that question. He was asking it when he finally went to bed, and he went with it, unanswered, to sleep.

XXXVII

The news reached Colonel Pendleton late one afternoon while he was sitting on his porch--pipe in mouth and with a forbidden mint julep within easy reach. He had felt the reticence of Gray's letters, he knew that the boy was keeping back some important secret from him as long as he could, and now, in answer to his own kind, frank letter Gray had, without excuse or apology, told the truth, and what he had not told the colonel fathomed with ease. He had hardly made up his mind to go at once to Gray, or send for him, when a negro boy galloped up to the stile and brought him a note from Marjorie's mother to come to her at once--and the colonel scented further trouble in the air.

There had been a turmoil that afternoon at Mrs. Pendleton's. Marjorie had come home a little while before with Jason Hawn and, sitting in the hallway, Mrs. Pendleton had seen Jason on the stile, with his hat in one hand and his bridle reins in the other, and Marjorie halting suddenly on her way to the house and wheeling impetuously back toward him. To the mother's amazement and dismay she saw that they were quarrelling--quarrelling as only lovers can. The girl's face was flushed with anger, and her red lips were winging out low, swift, bitter words. The boy stood straight, white, courteous, and unanswering. He lifted his chin a little when she finished, and unanswering turned to his horse and rode away. The mother saw her daughter's face pale quickly. She saw tears as Marjorie came up the walk, and when she rose in alarm and stood waiting in the doorway, the girl fled past her and rushed weeping upstairs.

Mrs. Pendleton was waiting in the porch when the colonel rode to the stile, and the distress in her face was so plain even that far away, that the colonel hurried up the walk, and there was no greeting between the two:

"It's Marjorie, Robert," she said simply, and the old gentleman, who had seen Jason come out of the yard gate and gallop toward John Burnham's, guessed what the matter was, and he took the slim white hands that were clenched together and patted them gently:

"There--there! Don't worry, don't worry!"

He led her into the house, and at the top of the steps stood Marjorie in white, her hair down and tears streaming down her face:

"Come here, Marjorie," called Colonel Pendleton, and she obeyed like a child, talking wildly as she came:

"I know what you're going to say, Uncle Bob--I know it all. I'm tired of all this talk about family, Uncle Bob, I'm tired of it."

She had stopped a few steps above, clinging with one trembling hand to the balcony, as though to have her say quite out before she went helplessly into the arms that were stretched out toward her:

"Dead people are dead, Uncle Bob, and only live people really count. People have to be alive to help you and make you happy. I want to be happy, Uncle Bob--I want to be happy. I know all about the Pendletons, Uncle Bob. They were Cavaliers--I know all that--and they used to ride about sticking lances into peasants who couldn't afford a suit of armor, but they can't do anything for me now, and they mustn't interfere with me now. Anyhow, the Sudduths were plain people and I'm not a bit ashamed of it, mother. Great-grandfather Hiram lived in a log cabin. Grandfather Hiram ate with his knife. I've SEEN him do it, and he kept on doing it when he knew better just out of habit or stubbornness, but Jason's people ate with their knives because they didn't HAVE anything but TWO-pronged forks--I heard John Burnham say that. And Jason's family is as good as the Sudduths, and maybe as the Pendletons, and he wouldn't know it because his grandfathers were out of the world and were too busy, fighting Indians and killing bears and things for food. They didn't have TIME to keep their family trees trimmed, and they didn't CARE anything about the old trees anyhow, and I don't either. John Burnham has told me--"

"Marjorie!" said the colonel gently, for she was getting hysterical. He held out his arms to her, and with another burst of weeping she went into them.

Half an hour later, when she was calm, the colonel got her to ride over home with him, and what she had not told her mother Marjorie on the way told him--in a halting voice and with her face turned aside.

"There's something funny and deep about him, Uncle Bob, and I never could reach it. It piqued me and made me angry. I knew he cared for me, but I could never make him tell it."

The colonel was shaking his old head wisely and comprehendingly.

"I don't know why, but I flew into a rage with him this afternoon about nothing, and he never answered me a word, but stood there listening--why, Uncle Bob, he stood there like--like a--a gentleman--till I got through, and then he turned away--he never did say anything, and I was so sorry and ashamed that I nearly died. I don't know what to do now--and he won't come back, Uncle Bob--I know he won't."

Her voice broke again, and the colonel silenced her by putting one hand comfortingly on her knee and by keeping still himself. His shoulders drooped a little as they walked from the stile toward the house, and Marjorie ran her arm through his:

"Why, you're a little tired, aren't you, Uncle Bob?" she said tenderly, and he did not answer except to pat her hand, against which she suddenly felt his heart throb. He almost stumbled going up the steps, and deadly pale he sank with a muffled groan into a chair. With a cry the girl darted for a glass of water, but when she came back, terrified, he was smiling:

"I'm all right--don't worry. I thought thas sun to-day was going to be too much for me."

But still Marjorie watched him anxiously, and when the color came back to his face she went behind him and wrapped her arms about his neck and put her mouth to his ear:

"I'm just a plain little fool, Uncle Bob, and, as Gray says, I talk through my aigrette. Now, don't you and mother worry--don't worry the least little bit," and she tightened her arms and kissed him several times on his forehead and cheek. "I must go now--and if you don't take better care of yourself I'm going to come over here and take care of you myself."

She was in front of him now and looking down fondly; and a wistfulness that was almost childlike had come into the colonel's face:

"I wish you could, little Marjorie--I wish you would."

He watched her gallop away--turning to wave her whip to him as she went over the slope, her tears gone and once more radiant and gay--and the sadness of the coming twilight slowly overspread the colonel's face. It was the one hope of his life that she would one day come over to take care of him--and Gray. On into the twilight he sat still and thoughtful. It looked serious for her and Gray. Back his mind flashed to that night of the dance in the mountains, when the four were children, and his wonder then as to what might take place if that mountain boy and girl should have the chance in the world that had already come to them. He began to wonder how much of her real feeling Marjorie might have concealed--how much Gray in his letters was keeping back of his. Such a union was preposterous. He realized too late now the danger to youth of simple proximity--he knew the exquisite sensitiveness of Gray in any matter that meant consideration for others and for his own honor, the generous warmhearted impulsiveness of Marjorie, and the appeal that any romantic element in the situation would make to them both. Perhaps he ought to go to the mountains. There was much he might say to Gray, but what to Jason, or to Marjorie, with that life-absorbing motive of his own--and his affairs at such a crisis? The colonel shook his head helplessly. He was very tired, and wished he could put the matter off till morning when he was rested and his head was clear, but the questions had sunk talons into his heart and brain that would not be unloosed, and the colonel rose wearily and went within.

Marjorie looked serious after she told her mother that night that she feared her uncle was not well, for Mrs. Pendleton became very grave:

"Your Uncle Robert is very far from well. I'm afraid sometimes he is sicker than any of us know."

"Mother!"

"And he is in great trouble, Marjorie."

The girl hesitated:

"Money trouble, mother?" she asked at last, "Why, you--we--why don't--"

The mother interrupted with a shake of her head:

"He would go bankrupt first."

"Mother?"

The older woman looked up with apprehension, so suddenly charged with an incredible something was the girl's tone:

"Why don't you marry Uncle Robert?"

The mother clutched at her heart with both hands, for an actual spasm caught her there. Every trace of color shot from her face, and with a rush came back--fire. She rose, gave her daughter one look that was almost terror, and quickly left the room.

Marjorie sat aghast. She had caught with careless hand the veil of some mystery--what long-hidden shrine was there behind it, what sacred deeps long still had she stirred?

XXXVIII

Jason Hawn rode rapidly to one of Morton Sanders' great stables, put his horse away himself, and, avoiding the chance of meeting John Burnham, slipped down the slope to the creek, crossed on a water gap, and struck across the sunset fields for home. He had felt no anger at Marjorie's mysterious outbreak--only bewilderment; and only bewilderment he felt now.

But as he strode along with his eyes on the ground, things began to clear a little. The fact was that, as he had become more enthralled by the girl's witcheries, the more helpless and stupid he had become. Marjorie's nimble wit had played about his that afternoon like a humming-bird around a sullen sunflower. He hardly knew that every word, every glance, every gesture was a challenge, and when she began stinging into him sharp little arrows of taunt and sarcasm he was helpless as the bull's-hide target at which the two sometimes practised archery. Even now when the poisoned points began to fester, he could stir himself to no anger--he only felt dazed and hurt and sore. Nobody was in sight when he reached his mother's home and he sat down on the porch in the twilight wretched and miserable. Around the corner of the house presently he heard his mother and Steve coming, and around there they stopped for some reason for a moment.

"I seed Babe Honeycutt yestiddy," Steve was saying. "He says thar's a lot o' talk goin' on about Mavis an' Gray Pendleton. The Honeycutts air doin' most o' the talkin' an' looks like the ole trouble's comin' up again. Old Jason is tearin' mad an' swears Gray'll have to git out o' them mountains--"

Jason heard them start moving and he rose and went quickly within that they might know he had overheard. After supper he was again on the porch brooding about Mavis and Gray when his mother came out. He knew that she wanted to say something, and he waited.

"Jason," she said finally, "you don't believe Colonel Pendleton cheated Steve--do you?"

"No," said the lad sharply. "Colonel Pendleton never cheated anybody in his life--except himself."

"That's all I wanted to know," she sighed, but Jason knew that was not all she wanted to say.

"Jason, I heerd two fellers in the lane to-day' talkin' about tearin' up Colonel Pendleton's tobacco beds."

The boy was startled, but he did not show it.

"Nothin' but talk, I reckon."

"Well, if I was in his place I'd git some guards."

Marjorie sat at her window a long time that night before she went to sleep. Her mother had come in, had held her tightly to her breast, and had gone out with only a whispered good-night. And while the girl was wondering once more at the strange effect of her naive question, she recalled suddenly the yearning look of her uncle that afternoon when she had mentioned Gray's name. Could there be some thwarted hope in the lives of Gray's father and her mother that both were now trying to realize in the lives of her and Gray? Her mother had never spoken her wish, nor doubtless Gray's father to him--nor was it necessary, for as children they had decided the question themselves, as had Mavis and Jason Hawn, and had talked about it with the same frankness, though with each pair alike the matter had not been mentioned for a long time. Then her mind leaped, and after it leaped her heart--if her Uncle Robert would not let her mother help him, why, she too could never help Gray, unless--why, of course, if Gray were in trouble she would marry him and give him everything she had. The thought made her glow, and she began to wish Gray would come home. He had been a long time in those hills, his father was sick and worried--and what was he doing down there anyhow? He had mentioned Mavis often in his first letters, and now he wrote rarely, and he never spoke of her at all. She began to get resentful and indignant, not only at him but at Mavis, and she went to bed wishing more than ever that Gray would come home. And yet playing around in her brain was her last vision of that mountain boy standing before her, white and silent--"like a gentleman"--and that vision would not pass even in her dreams.

Through Colonel Pendleton's bed-room window an hour later two pistol shots rang sharply, and through that window the colonel saw a man leap the fence around his tobacco beds and streak for the woods. From the shadow of a tree at his yard fence another flame burst, and by its light he saw a crouching figure. He called out sharply, the figure rose and came toward him, and in the moonlight the colonel saw uplifted to him, apologetic and half shamed, the face of Jason Hawn.

"No harm, colonel," he called. "Somebody was tearing up your tobacco beds and I just scared him off. I didn't try to hit him."

The colonel was dazed, but he spoke at last gently.

"Well, well, I can't let you lose your sleep this way, Jason; I'll get some guards now."

"If you won't let me," said the boy quickly, "you ought to send for Gray."

The old gentleman looked thoughtful.

"Of course, perhaps I ought--why, I will."

"He won't come again to-night," said Jason. "I shot close enough to scare him, I reckon, Good-night, colonel."

"Thank you, my boy--good-night."

XXXIX

It was court day at the county-seat. A Honeycutt had shot down a Hawn in the open street, had escaped, and a Hawn posse was after him. The incident was really a far effect of the recent news that Jason Hawn was soon coming back home--and coming back to live. Straightway the professional sneaks and scandal-mongers of both factions got busy to such purpose that the Honeycutts were ready to believe that the sole purpose of Jason's return was to revive the feud and incidentally square a personal account with little Aaron. Old Jason Hawn had started home that afternoon almost apoplectic with rage, for word had been brought him that little Aaron had openly said that it was high time that Jason Hawn came home to look after his cousin and Gray Pendleton went home to take care of his. It was a double insult, and to the old man's mind subtly charged with a low meaning. Old as he was, he had tried to find little Aaron, but the boy had left town.

Gray and Mavis were seated on the old man's porch when he came in sight of his house, for it was Saturday, and Mavis started the moment she saw her grandfather's face, and rose to meet him.

"What's the matter, grandpap?" The old man waved her back. "Git back inter the house," he commanded shortly. "No--stay whar you air. When do you two aim to git married?" Had a bolt of lightning flashed through the narrow sunlit space between him and them, the pair could not have been more startled, blinded. Mavis flushed angrily, paled, and wheeled into the house. Gray rose in physical response to the physical threat in the old man's tone and fearlessly met the eyes that were glaring at him.

"I don't know what you mean, Mr. Hawn," he said respectfully. "I--"

"The hell you don't," broke in the old man furiously. "I'll give ye jes two minutes to hit the road and git a license. I'll give ye an hour an' a half to git back. An' if you don't come back I'll make Jason foller you to the mouth o' the pit o' hell an' bring ye back alive or dead." Again the boy tried to speak, but the old man would not listen.

"Git!" he cried, and, as the boy still made no move, old Jason hurried on trembling legs into the house. Gray heard him cursing and searching inside, and at the corner of the house appeared Mavis with both of the old man's pistols and his Winchester.

"Go on, Gray," she said, and her face was still red with shame. "You'll only make him worse, an' he'll kill you sure."

Gray shook his head: "No!"

"Please, Gray," she pleaded; "for God's sake--for my sake."

That the boy could not withstand. He started for the gate with his hat in hand--is head high, and, as he slowly passed through the gate and turned, the old man reappeared, looked fiercely after him, and sank into a chair sick with rage and trembling. As Mavis walked toward him with his weapons he glared at her, but she passed him by as though she did not see him, and put the Winchester and pistols in their accustomed places. She came out with her bonnet in her hand, and already her calmness and her silence had each had its effect--old Jason was still trembling, but from his eyes the rage was gone.

"I'm goin' home, grandpap," she said quietly, "an' if it wasn't for grandma I wouldn't come back. You've been bullyin' an' rough-ridin' over men-folks and women-folks all your life, but you can't do it no more with ME. An' you're not goin' to meddle in MY business any more. You know I'm a good girl--why didn't you go after the folks who've been talkin' instead o' pitchin' into Gray? You know he'd die before he'd harm a hair o' my head or allow you or anybody else to say anything against my good name. An' I tell you to your face"--her tone fiercened suddenly--"if you hadn't 'a' been an old man an' my grandfather, he'd 'a' killed you right here. An' I'm goin' to tell you something more. He ain't responsible for this talk--_I_ am. He didn't know it was goin' on--_I_ did. I'm not goin' to marry him to please you an' the miserable tattletales you've been listenin' to. I reckon _I_ ain't good enough--but I KNOW my kinfolks ain't fit to be his--even by marriage. My daddy ain't, an' YOU ain't, an' there ain't but one o' the whole o' our tribe who is--an' that's little Jason Hawn. Now you let him alone an' you let me alone."

She put her bonnet on, flashed to the gate, and disappeared in the dusk down the road. The old man's shaggy head had dropped forward on his chest, he had shrunk down in his chair bewildered, and he sat there a helpless, unanswering heap. When the moon rose, Mavis was seated on the porch with her chin in both hands. The old circuit rider and his wife had gone to bed. A whippoorwill was crying with plaintive persistence far up a ravine, and the night was deep and still about her, save for the droning of insect life from the gloomy woods. Straight above her stars glowed thickly, and in a gap of the hills beyond the river, where the sun had gone down, the evening star still hung like a great jewel on the velvety violet curtain of the night, and upon that her eyes were fixed. On the spur above, her keen ears caught the soft thud of a foot against a stone, and her heart answered. She heard a quick leap across the branch, the sound of a familiar stride along the road, and saw the quick coming of a familiar figure along the edge of the moonlight, but she sat where she was and as she was until Gray, with hat in hand, stood before her, and then only did she lift to him eyes that were dark as the night but shining like that sinking star in the little gap. The boy went down on one knee before her, and gently pulled both of her, hands away from her face with both his own, and held them tightly.

"Mavis," he said, "I want you to marry me--won't you, Mavis?"