CHAPTER IV.

For a week after the party Jacqueline lived in a kind of dream. She could do nothing but talk of the party. The whole current of her life had been disturbed. Since this one taste of excitement there was no satisfying her. The daily routine was going down to a solemn breakfast, and then getting through the forenoon as best she might, with her flowers, and her pets among the ducks and chickens, and romping with the little Beverley--for this unfortunate Jacqueline had no regular employments--and then the still more solemn three o'clock dinner, after which she practiced fitfully on the wheezy piano in the dark drawing-room; then a country walk with Judith, if the day was fine, coming back in time to watch the creeping on of the twilight before the sitting-room fire. This was the happiest time of the day to Jacqueline. She would sit flat on the rug, clasping her knees, and gazing into the fire until her mother would say, with a smile:

"What do you see in the fire, Jacky?"

"Oh, endless things--a beautiful young man, and a new piano, and a diamond comb like Mrs. Sherrard's, and--Oh, I can't tell you!"

"Miss Jacky she see evils, I know she do," solemnly announced Simon Peter. "When folks sits fo' de fire studyin' 'bout nuttin' 'tall, de evils an' de sperrits dat's 'broad come sneakin' up ahine an' show 'em things in de fire."

General Temple, a few days after the party, fell a victim to a seductive pudding prepared by Delilah, and was immediately invalided with the gout. Dr. Wortley was sent for, and at once demanded to know what devilment Delilah had been up to in the way of puddings and such, and soon found out the true state of the case. A wordy war ensued between Dr. Wortley and Delilah, and the doctor renewed the threat he had been making at intervals for twenty-five years.

"Temple," he screeched, "you may take your choice between that old ignoramus and me--between ignorance and science!"

"Ef ole marse was ter steal six leetle sweet 'taters an' put 'em in he pocket," began Delilah, undauntedly.

"Why don't you advise him to steal a wheelbarrowful instead of a pocketful?" retorted the doctor.

"Kase he doan 'quire but six, an' he got ter _steal_ 'em, fur ter make de conjurin' wuk. Den ev'y day he th'ow 'way a 'tater, an' when he th'ow de 'tater 'way he th'ow de gout 'way, too. De hy'ars from a black cat's tail is mighty good, too--"

"Temple, how do you put up with this sort of thing being uttered in your hearing?" snapped the doctor.

General Temple looked rather sheepish. He had never actually tried stealing six potatoes, or testing the virtue in hairs from a black cat's tail, as a relief from gout, but he had not been above a course of tansy tea, and decoctions of jimson-weed, and other of Delilah's remedies that scientifically were on a par with the black cat's tail. But, being racked with pain, he took refuge in pessimism and profanity.

"Excuse me, Wortley, but all medicine is a damned humbug!--I mean--er--an empirical science. What is written is written. The Great First Cause, that decrees from the hour of our birth every act of our lives, has decreed that I should suffer great pain, anguish, and discomfort from this hereditary disease."

"Marse, ef you wuz ter repent an' be saved--"

"Hold your infernal tongue!"

"An' jine de Foot-washers--"

"Damn the Foot-washers!" howled the general.

"Plague on it!" snarled Dr. Wortley, whirling round with his back to the fire. "If you've got as far as predestination, you're in for a six weeks' spell. I can cure the gout, but I'll be shot if I can do anything when it's complicated with religion and black cats' tails and a constant diet like a Christmas dinner!"

In the midst of the discussion, the doctor's shrill voice rising high over Delilah's, who, with arms akimbo and a defiant air, only awaited Dr. Wortley's departure to get in her innings with the patient, Mrs. Temple, serene and sweet, came in and quelled the insurrection. Delilah at once subsided, Dr. Wortley began to laugh, and the general directed that Mrs. Temple's chair be put next to his.

"As your presence, my love, makes me forget my most unhappy foot," he said.

Mrs. Temple's adherence to either Delilah or Dr. Wortley would have caused victory to perch upon that side; but Mrs. Temple, like the general, had more faith in Delilah than she was willing to own up to. So, between Delilah's feeding him high all the time, while the doctor only saw him once or twice a week, General Temple bade fair to remain an invalid for a considerable time. The attack of gout, though, just at that time, had its consolatory aspects. General Temple really wished to call at Millenbeck, but Mrs. Temple showed no sign of yielding. For the present, however, there could be no notion of his stirring out of doors. As long as the gout lasted there was a good excuse. But General Temple worried over it.

"My love," he said one night, while Mrs. Temple and Jacqueline and Judith sat around the table in his room, where they had assembled to make his evening less dull, "I am troubled in my mind regarding George Throckmorton. It unquestionably seems heathenish for us to have one so intimately connected with our early married life--that truly blissful period--within a stone's throw of us, and then to deny him the sacred rites of hospitality."

Jacqueline gave a half glance at Judith which was full of meaning, and Judith could not for her life keep a slight blush from rising in her cheek.

Mrs. Temple said nothing, but looked hard at the fire, sighing profoundly. She had made herself some sort of a vague revengeful promise, that no man wearing a blue uniform should ever darken her doors. She had yielded first one thing, then another, of that scrupulous and daily mourning and remembrance she had promised herself, for Beverley--but this--

The pause was long. Mrs. Temple, looking at General Temple, was touched by something in his expression--a longing, a patient, but genuine desire. Occasionally she indulged him, as she sometimes relaxed a little the discipline over Jacqueline in her childish days. She put her hand over her eyes and waited a moment as if she were praying. Then she said in broken voice, "Do what seems best to you, my husband."

General Temple took her hand.

"But, my own, I do not wish to coerce you. No matter what I think is our duty in the case, if it does not satisfy you, it shall not be done. I would rather anything befell Throckmorton, than you, my beloved Jane, should be grieved or troubled."

Mrs. Temple received this sort of thing as she always did, with a shy pleasure like a girl.

"I have said it, my dear, and you know I do not easily recede. Like you, this thing has been upon me ever since Throckmorton's return. I have felt it every day harder to maintain my attitude. Now, for your sake, I will abandon it. Have Throckmorton when you like. I will invite him over to tea on Sunday evening."

General Temple fairly beamed. When Mrs. Temple gave in to him, which was not oftener than once a year, she gave in thoroughly.

"Thank you, my wife. It certainly seems unnatural that Millenbeck and Barn Elms should be estranged. It shall be so no longer, please God. And that George Throckmorton is a high-toned gentleman"--General Temple paused a little before saying this, hunting for a term magniloquent enough for the occasion--"no one, I think, will deny."

This was early in the week. The very next afternoon, Jacqueline finding time more than usually hard to kill, went up into the garret and began rummaging over the remains of Mrs. Temple's wedding finery of thirty years before. She dived down into a capacious chest, and brought forth two or three faded silk dresses, the bridal bonnet and veil, yellowed from age; and, among other antiques, a huge muff almost as big as Jacqueline herself. This suddenly put the notion of a walk into her head. Judith was engaged in reading Napier's History of the Peninsular Wars to General Temple, and Jacqueline had only herself for company. So, carrying her huge muff in which she plunged her arms up to her elbows, she started off. It was a raw autumn afternoon. The leaves had not yet all fallen, although the ground was dank with them, and the peculiar stillness of a lonely and lowland country was upon the monotonous landscape. The entire absence of sounds is a characteristic of that sort of country, and it makes a gloomy day more gloomy. Jacqueline, tripping along very fast, did not find it cheerful. She would go as far as the gate of the lane that led into the main road, and then turn back. This lane was also the entrance to Millenbeck, and Jacqueline had some sort of a faint expectation that she might run across Jack Throckmorton. She looked longingly toward Millenbeck, visible at intervals through the straggling fringe of pines. What an infinity of pleasure could be had, if her mother only came round thoroughly regarding the Throckmortons! What rides and dances she could have with Jack, and Judith could talk to the major! "What a dull life Judith must lead!" she thought, stepping lightly along. It was true, Judith liked to read; but Jacqueline, who frankly confessed she could not read a novel through from cover to cover, hardly appreciated reading as a resource. Jacqueline's imagination, with this superstructure to build upon, went ardently to work, and in a few minutes had installed Judith as mistress of Millenbeck, and herself as the young lady of the establishment. To do Jacqueline justice, she longed for Judith's happiness, who, she sometimes bitterly felt, was her only friend. Just as she had arranged this scheme to her satisfaction, she looked up, and saw, not twenty feet ahead of her, Major Throckmorton coming out of the underbrush at the side of the lane. A big slouch hat half concealed his face. His usual trim and natty dress, with that unmistakable "military cut," was exchanged for a shooting suit of corduroy, much stained, and otherwise the worse for wear. His stylish and immaculate hat was replaced by the flapping felt, and his gun and game-bag proclaimed his day's employment. Yet Jacqueline thought she had never seen him look so handsome, and in some way she was not half so much afraid of him in his shooting-togs as in his perfectly fitting evening clothes. Jacqueline's face turned a rosy red. As for Throckmorton, he too felt a thrill of pleasure. This pretty child, as he called her, had been in his mind rather constantly since he saw her at the party. He quickened his pace, and took his hat off while still some distance away.

"Any more parties in prospect?" he asked, smiling, as he took her little hand in his.

"No, I don't suppose there will be. Delicious parties like that don't happen very often," answered Jacqueline, quite seriously, and not in the least understanding Throckmorton's smile as she said this. "And--and young Mr. Throckmorton--oh, how I enjoyed dancing with him!"

The major did not smile at this. To have "young Mr. Throckmorton" thrust at him by a charming young girl was not particularly pleasing.

"Jack is a very jolly young fellow," he replied, shortly. "We are great friends, Jack and I."

Jacqueline had turned around, and they were now walking together toward Barn Elms.

"I--I should think," said Jacqueline, giving him one of her half-glances from under the dark fringe of her eyelashes--"that J--Jack would be afraid of you."

Throckmorton laughed aloud.

"Why should he be afraid of me?"

"Oh, I don't know. Everybody is afraid of one's father," replied Jacqueline, candidly.

"Jack and I entertain sentiments of mutual respect," laughed Throckmorton again. "The only fault I find with him is that he is unduly filial sometimes. For example, when I am enjoying the society of a charming young lady he thinks too young for me, he behaves as if I were his great-grandfather instead of his father. Jack has a good deal of Satan in him."

Jacqueline did not always follow Throckmorton's remarks, but she noticed he had a rich voice, and he was the straightest, most soldierly-looking man she ever saw in her life. Throckmorton slung his game-bag around and held it open.

"Do you like robins?" he said. "They are delicious broiled on toast"--and he took out a bird by the legs and showed it to her.

Jacqueline stood perfectly still. Her eyes dilated and her breath came quickly. She took the bird out of his hand. It had long stopped bleeding, and its little cold head, with half-closed eyes, fell over piteously. Jacqueline took out her handkerchief and wrapped the poor robin in it.

"Oh, the poor bird!" she said, and suddenly two large tears ran down her cheeks.

Throckmorton stood surprised, touched, delighted, and almost ashamed. He had been a sportsman all his life, and could see no harm in knocking over a few birds in the season; but the picture of this tender-hearted child, that could not see a dead bird without weeping, struck him as beautifully feminine. But what could he say? If he was a bloodthirsty brute to shoot a robin, what must all the slaughter of birds he had been guilty of in his lifetime make him? He could only say, half shamefacedly and half laughing "My dear little friend, you wouldn't have men as squeamish as women, would you?"

But to this Jacqueline only responded by pressing the poor bird's cold breast to her cheek.

Throckmorton, however, with an air of gentle authority, took the bird from her and put it back in the bag.

"If you cry for such things as this, you will have a hard time in life," he said.

Jacqueline's face did not clear up at once.

"I want you to do something for me--to promise me something," she said, gravely.

"What is it?" asked Throckmorton. Jacqueline had laid her charm upon him in the last ten minutes, but he did not forget his caution entirely.

"It is," said Jacqueline, punctuating her words with tender, appealing glances, "that you won't kill any more robins--never, never, as long as you live."

Throckmorton refrained from smiling, as he felt inclined, but it was plainly no laughing matter to Jacqueline. And if he gave the promise--nobody knew the absurdity of it more than Throckmorton--suppose Jack heard of it, what endless fun would he poke at his father on the sly! Nevertheless, Throckmorton, calling himself an old fool, made the promise.

Jacqueline, flushed with triumph, now conceived a bold design. She would--that is, if her courage held out--tell him that her mother had at last come round. This delightful information she proceeded to impart.

"Do you know," she said, smiling and showing her little even white teeth, "that mamma has at last agreed to--to let us have something to do with you and Jack?"

"Has she, indeed?" replied Throckmorton, with rather a grim smile.

"Yes," continued Jacqueline, with much seriousness. "Occasionally she gives papa a little treat. You know she always liked you, and papa has been dying to call to see you. But mamma can't forget the war and Beverley. At last, though--she's been thinking about it ever since that first day at church--she concluded to give in--and--and--you're to be asked to tea next Sunday evening!"

The way this was told was not particularly flattering to Throckmorton, but he was sincerely grateful and attached to Mrs. Temple, and he knew and pitied the state of feeling that had caused her to intrench herself in her prejudices. She must indeed remember those old days when she was willing to do what Throckmorton suspected she had promised herself never to do. "I want to be friends with Mrs. Temple--that's plain enough," he said, "and if she asks me I shall certainly come."

"Do you know," said Jacqueline, after a pause, in a very confidential voice, "I sometimes wish--now this is a secret, remember--that papa and mamma would forget Beverley a little--and think--of Judith and me? They seem to expect Judith to wear black all the time, and never to smile or to laugh or to sing, as if Beverley could know. I don't believe the dead in their graves know or care anything about us."

She was on delicate ground, but, her tongue being unloosed, Throckmorton's attempt to check her was a complete failure.

"Judith, you know," she continued, cutting in on Throckmorton's awkward remonstrance, "only knew Beverley a little while. Her father and mother were dead, and papa was her guardian. She came to Barn Elms to live after she left school, and Beverley came home from the war, and they were married right away--almost as soon as they were acquainted. It was so sudden because Beverley's leave was up, and Delilah says that Beverley knew he was going to be killed soon. She says he dreamed it, or something. Do you believe in dreams?"

"No, and you mustn't believe all Delilah tells you."

"Anyhow, he went away, and he never came back. That broke papa and mamma's hearts. And you know--little Beverley--Judith's child--is like her--and not a bit like Beverley, and mamma talks sometimes as if it was a crime on the child's part. She says to everybody, 'Don't you think the child is like his father?' and nobody answers her quite truthfully, and she knows it."

Throckmorton hardly knew how to receive these family confidences, but he could not but admire the color coming and going in Jacqueline's cheeks, and the fitful light that burned in her eyes as she talked.

"And Judith--I do love Judith. It seems hard--now this is another secret--that she should never have any more pleasure in this world. And she is so bright and clever. She understands the most wonderful books. And there's something--I can't help telling you this."

"Perhaps you had better not tell me," said Throckmorton in a warning voice.

"But I can't help it, you are so--so sympathetic: I don't believe Judith cared for Beverley much."

Jacqueline drew off to see the effect of this on Throckmorton. She did not at all suspect him of any interest in Judith; but this family tragedy, that had stalked beside her nearly all her life, she thought was of immense importance, and she wanted to see how it affected Throckmorton. In fact, it only embarrassed him. He said, rather briefly:

"Mrs. Beverley is very handsome--very charming."

"She's the best sister in the world," exclaimed Jacqueline. "Some people think that sisters-in-law can't love each other. Sometimes I would throw myself in the river if it wasn't for Judith."

"Why should such a tender little thing as you want to throw herself in the river?" he asked; and if Jack had heard the tone in which this was spoken, he would, no doubt, have found food for ungodly mirth in it.

"You don't know what sorrows I have," responded Jacqueline, gravely. And then they were almost at the gate of Barn Elms, and Throckmorton bade her good-by, and tramped back home, while Jacqueline scudded into the house to confide the wonderful adventures of the afternoon to Judith.

In a day or two a note from General Temple came, inviting Throckmorton and Jack to tea at Barn Elms the following Sunday evening. It was rather a letter than a note, General Temple spreading himself--his honest soul loved a rhetorical flourish--and containing many references to their early association. Throckmorton accepted, in a reply in which he told, much more glibly than his tongue could, the grateful affection he had cherished from his neglected and unhappy boyhood toward the whole family at Barn Elms. On the Sunday evening, therefore, Throckmorton, with Jack, presented himself, and was effusively received by the general and Simon Peter, who were not unlike in their overpowering courtesy to guests. Judith was cordial and dignified, and Jacqueline full of a shy delight. No doubt they would be invited to Millenbeck, and she would see with her own eyes the Bruskins carpets and other royal splendors Delilah was never weary of recounting.

General Temple was able to be down in the drawing-room, but Mrs. Temple was not present. Delilah, however, soon put her head in the door, and, crossing her hands under a huge white apron she wore, brought a message.

"Mistis, she say, won't Marse George please ter come in de charmber."

Throckmorton at once followed her. The "charmber" at Barn Elms was a sort of star chamber, and utterances within its precincts were usually of a solemn character. As Throckmorton entered, Mrs. Temple rose from the big rush-bottomed chair in which she sat. Throckmorton remembered the room perfectly, in all the years since he had been in it--the dimity curtains, the high-post mahogany bed, the shining brass fender and andirons, the tall candlesticks on the high wooden mantel. He remembered, with a queer, boyish feeling, sundry moral discourses gently administered to him in that room on certain occasions when he had been caught in the act of fishing on Sunday, or poking a broomstick up the chimney to dislodge the sooty swallows that built their nests there in the summer-time, and other instances of juvenile turpitude. And he well recollected once, when Mrs. Temple was ill, he had hung about the place, a picture of boyish misery; and when at last he was admitted into the room where she lay, white and feeble, on the broad, old-fashioned lounge, how happy, how glad, how honored he had felt. He went forward eagerly and raised Mrs. Temple's hand to his lips.

"George Throckmorton, this is nearer forgiveness than I ever expected to come," she said.

"Dear Mrs. Temple, don't let us talk about forgiveness. Let us only remember that we are friends of more than thirty years' standing--because I can't remember the time when I was a boy that I didn't love you."

"And I loved you, too--next to my own Beverley. I sent for you here that I might tell you my trouble as you used to tell me yours so long ago. Often you have sat on that little cricket over there and told me of your grandfather's cruel ways to you--he was a godless man, George."

"He was indeed," fervently assented Throckmorton.

"And now I want to tell you of _my_ sorrows, George."

Throckmorton listened patiently while she went over all of Beverley's life. She told it with a touching simplicity. Throckmorton well saw how that still stern unforgiveness might rankle in her gentle but immovable mind. Then he told her of his marriage--something he had never in all his life spoken of to any one in that manner; but the force of sweet and early habit was upon him--he could talk to Mrs. Temple about the young creature so much loved and so long dead. Mrs. Temple, who knew what such revealing meant from a man of Throckmorton's strong and self-contained nature, was completely won by this. An hour afterward, when they came into the drawing-room, and found Jack and Jacqueline in a perfect gale of merriment, with Judith looking smilingly on, Mrs. Temple laid her hand on Throckmorton's shoulder, and said to General Temple, with sweet gravity, "He is the same George Throckmorton."

Judith was leaning a little forward in her chair, with her arm around her child. The boy was a beautiful, manly fellow, and gazed at Throckmorton with friendly, serious eyes. Throckmorton, whose heart was tender toward all children, smiled at him. Beverley at this marched forward and climbed upon Throckmorton's knee, his little white frock, heavy with embroidery worked by Judith's patient fingers, spreading all around him. The boy immediately launched into conversation, eying Throckmorton boldly, although his eyes usually had the shy expression of his mother's. He wanted to know if Throckmorton had a gun, and could he beat the drum; also, if he could ride a horse. Sometimes grandfather would take him up and let him ride as far as the gate. Throckmorton answered all these questions satisfactorily, and then told about a pony he had at Millenbeck--a pony that had been Jack's, when Jack was no bigger than Beverley, and that was now too old and slow for any but a very little boy. While Throckmorton talked to the child, Judith listened with a smiling look in her eyes. Throckmorton could not but be struck by the pretty picture the young mother and her child made. He saw the resemblance between them at once, and when he told of a tragic adventure Jack had with the pony, falling through a bridge, both pairs of large, soft eyes grew wide with grave amazement. Unconsciously Judith assumed the child's expression. Beverley seemed determined to monopolize his new acquaintance, but presently Judith with a little air of authority sent him off with Delilah. Beverley paused at the door to say:

"You come again and bring the pony."

Presently they went into the dining-room, and the old-fashioned tea was served. There was enough to feed a regiment, and all of the best kind, but nothing approaching vulgar display. Mrs. Temple put Throckmorton at her right, and every time she spoke to Jack she called him George. Throckmorton had forgotten nothing of the old days, and he not only began to feel young himself, but he made General and Mrs. Temple feel that time had turned backward. Jacqueline, on the opposite side of the table, smiled at him and talked a little. In her heart she could not quite make out Throckmorton. He had arrived at an age that seemed to her almost venerable; yet he quite ignored the fact that he ought to be old, and certainly was not old, nor could anybody say that he was young. Jack's boyish fun she understood well enough, but Throckmorton's shrewd humor, his confident, experienced way of looking at things, was rather beyond her. And as the case had been, whenever Throckmorton saw her, he had to exercise a certain restraint, lest everybody should see how strangely and completely she magnetized him. If anybody had asked him to compare Judith and Jacqueline, he would have given Judith the palm in everything--even in beauty; but Jacqueline's young prettiness in some way caught his fancy more than Judith's deeper and more significant beauty.

But Judith had her charm too for him. She captivated his judgment as Jacqueline captivated some inner sense to which he could give no name. Judith's talk was seasoned with liveliness, and Throckmorton, who possessed a dry and penetrating humor of his own, could always count on a responsive sparkle in Judith's eye.

When they returned to the drawing-room, Mrs. Temple said:

"Judith, my dear, sing us some of your sweet hymns."

Judith sat down to the piano and in her clear and bell-like soprano sang some old-fashioned hymns, so sweetly and unaffectedly that Throckmorton thought it was like angels singing. The sound of the simple music, the soft light of fire and lamp, the atmosphere of love and courtesy that seemed to breathe over the quaint circle, had a fascination for him. It was the poetry of domestic life. He had often dreamed of what "home" might be, but he had never known it, for that brief married life of his had been too short, too flickering; they were boy and girl lovers, and, before the new life had had time to crystallize, he was left alone. But here he saw the sweet privacy of home, the repose, the family nest, safe and warm. He sighed a little. Money could not buy it, else he would have had it at Millenbeck, comfortable handsome country-house that it was. But here, at this shabby old Barn Elms, it was in perfection, in all its naturalness and simplicity. After all, women were necessary to make a home; even money, with a Sweeney as presiding genius, couldn't do it.

It was late when they left. Mrs. Temple's parting was as solemn as her greeting:

"I have done that which I never expected to do, and all because in my heart I can't but love you, George Throckmorton!"

Throckmorton's keen pleasure showed in his dark eyes.

"I always knew, if you would only listen to that dear, kind heart of yours, you would forgive the Yankees," he laughed.