The Storm Centre. Mary Noailles Murfree

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      "Dey ain't got no butler now—he's in a restauroar up north—nor no car'age driver; dat fool nigger went off wid de Union army, an' got killed in a scrimmage. He would hev' stayed wid Marster, dough, if de Fed'ral folks hedn't tuk de hosses off wid de cavalry; he 'lowed he wuz too lonesome yere, wid jes' nuffin' but two-footed cattle ter 'sociate wid."

      Once more he whisked the turkey wing along the clean, smooth hearth; then, still on his knees before the fire, he again addressed himself to the explanations he deemed fit as to the reduced status of his master's household.

      "Me an' my wife is all de servants dey got now—she's Chaney, de cook in de kitchen. Dey hatter scuse me, fur I never waited in de house afore. No, sah! jes' a wuckin' hand; jes' a cawnfield hand, out'n de cawnfield straight!"

      Whisk went the turkey wing.

      "Dat's whut I tell Miss Leonora—dat's Mrs. Gwynn, de widder 'oman, Marster's niece whut's been takin' keer ob de house yere sence his wife died—I say I dunno no better when I break de dishes, an' Miss Leonora, she say a b'ar outer a holler tree would know better. Yah! yah!"

      The officer, feeling these domestic confidences a burden, began to scrutinize with an appearance of interest the Dresden china shepherd and shepherdess at either end of the tall white wooden mantelpiece, and then the clock of the same ware in the centre.

      Old Janus mistook the nature of his motive. "'Tis gittin' late fur shore! Gawd! dem ladies is a-dressin' an' a-dressin' yit! It's a pity Miss Leonora—dat's de widder 'oman—don't fix herself up some; looks ole, fur true, similar to a ole gran'mammy of a 'oman. But, sah, whut did she ever marry dat man fur?"

      Captain Baynell, in the stress of an unusual embarrassment, rose and walked to one of the tall book-cases, affecting to examine the title of a long row of books, but the old servant was not sensitive; he resorted to the simple expedient of raising his voice to follow the guest in a detail that brought Captain Baynell back to his chair in unseemly haste, where a lower tone was practicable.

      "She could hev' married my Marster's son, Julius, an' him de flower ob de flock! But no! She jus' would marry dis yere Gwynn feller, whut nobody wanted her ter marry, an' eloped wid him—she did! An' shore 'nuff, dey do say he pulled her round de house by de hair ob her head, dough some 'lows he jus' bruk a chair ober her head!"

      The officer was a brave man, but now he was in the extremity of panic. What if some one were at the door on the point of entering?—the "widder 'oman" herself, for instance!

      "I don't need you any longer, Uncle Ephraim," he ventured to remonstrate.

      "I'm gwine, Cap'n, jus' as soon as I git through wid de ha'th," and Uncle Ephraim gave it a perfunctory whisk.

      He interpolated an explanation of his diligence. "I don't want Miss Leonora—dat's de widder 'oman—ter be remarkin' on it. Nobody kin do nuthin' ter suit her but Chaney, dis cook dey got, who belong ter Miss Leonora, an' befo' de War used ter be her waitin'-'oman. Chaney is all de estate Miss Leonora hes got lef—an' ye know dat sort o' property ain't wurf much in dis happy day o' freedom. Miss Leonora wuz rich once in her own right. But she flung her marriage-settlements—dat dey had fixed to tie up her property so Gwynn couldn't sell it nor waste it—right inter de fiah! She declared she would marry a man whut she could trust wid her fortune! An'," the narrator concluded his story impressively, "when dat man died—his horse throwed him an' bruk his neck—I wondered dey didn't beat de drum fur joy, 'twuz sich a crownin' mercy! But he hed spent all her fortune 'fore he went!"

      The whisking wing was still; Uncle Ephraim's eyes dwelt on the fire with a glow of deep speculation. He lowered his voice mysteriously.

      "Dat man wuz de poorest stuff ter make an angel out'n ever you see! I dunno whut's become of him."

      There was a stir outside, a footfall; and, as Captain Baynell sprang to his feet, feeling curiously guilty in receiving, however unwillingly, these revelations of the history of the family, Judge Roscoe entered, his welcome the more cordial and expressed because he noticed a certain constraint in his guest's manner, which he ascribed to the unintentional breach of decorum in the failure to properly receive him.

      "I had hoped my niece, Mrs. Gwynn, might have been here to save you a dull half hour, or perhaps my granddaughters—where are the ladies and Mrs. Gwynn, Ephraim?" he broke off to ask of "the double-faced Janus," scuttling out with his basket of chips and his turkey wing.

      "De ladies is dressin' ter see de company," replied Janus, with a grin wide enough to decorate both his faces. "Miss Leonora, she is helpin' 'em!"

      Captain Baynell experienced renewed embarrassment, but Judge Roscoe laughed with obvious relish.

      The host, pale, thin, nervous, old, was of a type ill calculated to endure the stress of excitement and turmoil of incident of the Civil War; indeed, he might have succumbed utterly in the mortality of the aged, so general at that period, but for the incongruous rest and inaction of the storm centre. The town was heavily garrisoned by the Federal forces; the firing line was far afield. He had two sons in the Confederate army, but too distant for news, for speculation, for aught but anxiety and prayer. The elder of them was a widower, the father of "the ladies," and hence in his absence Judge Roscoe's charge of his granddaughters.

      The phrase "the ladies and Mrs. Gwynn" grated on Captain Baynell. It seemed incongruous with the punctilious old Southern gentleman to make a discourteous distinction thus between his granddaughters and his niece. Baynell dated his sympathy with her from that moment. However old and faded and reduced the house-keeperish "widder 'oman" might be, it was an affront to thus segregate her. He felt an antagonism toward "the ladies" in their exclusive aristocratic designation even before he heard the first dainty touch of their slippered feet upon the great stairway, or a gush of fairylike treble laughter. As a silken rustle along the hall heralded their bedizened approach, he arose ceremoniously to greet them.

      The door flew open with a wide swing; his eyes rested on nothing beyond, for he was looking two feet over range. There rushed into the room three little girls, six and eight years of age, all hanging back for a moment till their grandfather's encouraging "Come, ladies!" nerved them for the introduction of Captain Baynell. Although sensible of a deep disappointment and a sudden cessation of interest in the storm centre, he could hardly refrain from laughing at the downfall of his own confident expectations.

      Yet "the ladies," in their way, were well worth looking at, and their diligent care of their toilette had not been in vain. The two younger ones were twins, very rosy, with golden hair, delicately curled and perfumed. The other was far more beautiful than either. Her hair was of a chestnut hue; her dark blue eyes were eloquent with meaning—"speaking eyes." She had an exquisitely fair complexion and an entrancing smile, and amidst the twittering words and fluttering laughter of the others she was silent; it was a sinister, weighty, significant silence.

      "A deaf mute," her grandfather explained with a note of pathos and pain.

      Captain Baynell's acceptance of the fact had the requisite touch of sympathy and interest, but no more. How could he imagine that the child's infirmity could ever concern him, could be a factor of import in the most notable crisis of his life!

      Indeed, he might have forgotten it within the hour had naught else riveted his attention to the house. He had begun to look forward to a dull evening—the reaction from the expectation of charming feminine society of a congenial age. "The ladies" failed in that particular, lovely though they were in the quaint costumes of the day, the golden-haired twins respectively in faint blue and dark red СКАЧАТЬ