The Quest of the Silver Fleece: A Novel Page 9

  _Eight_

  MR. HARRY CRESSWELL

  The Cresswells, father and son, were at breakfast. The daughter wastaking her coffee and rolls up stairs in bed.

  "P'sh! I don't like it!" declared Harry Cresswell, tossing the letterback to his father. "I tell you, it is a damned Yankee trick."

  He was a man of thirty-five, smooth and white, slight, well-bred andmasterful. His father, St. John Cresswell, was sixty, white-haired,mustached and goateed; a stately, kindly old man with a temper and muchfamily pride.

  "Well, well," he said, his air half preoccupied, half unconcerned, "Isuppose so--and yet"--he read the letter again, aloud: "'Approaching youas one of the most influential landowners of Alabama, on a confidentialmatter'--h'm--h'm--'a combination of capital and power, such as thisnation has never seen'--'cotton manufacturers and cotton growers.' ...Well, well! Of course, I suppose there's nothing in it. And yet, Harry,my boy, this cotton-growing business is getting in a pretty tight pinch.Unless relief comes somehow--well, we'll just have to quit. We simplycan't keep the cost of cotton down to a remunerative figure with niggersgetting scarcer and dearer. Every year I have to pinch 'em closer andcloser. I had to pay Maxwell two hundred and fifty to get that old darkyand his boys turned over to me, and one of the young ones has run awayalready."

  Harry lighted a cigarette.

  "We must drive them more. You're too easy, father; they understand that.By the way, what did that letter say about a 'sister'?"

  "Says he's got a sister over at the nigger school whom perhaps we know.I suppose he thinks we dine there occasionally." The old man chuckled."That reminds me, Elspeth is sending her girl there."

  "What's that?" An angry gleam shot into the younger man's eye.

  "Yes. She announced this morning, pert as you please, that she couldn'ttote clothes any more--she had to study."

  "Damn it! This thing is going too far. We can't keep a maid or aplough-boy on the place because of this devilish school. It's going toruin the whole labor system. We've been too mild and decent. I'm goingto put my foot down right here. I'll make Elspeth take that girl out ofschool if I have to horse-whip her, and I'll warn the school againstfurther interference with our tenants. Here, in less than a week, go twoplough-hands--and now this girl."

  The old man smiled.

  "You'll hardly miss any work Zora does," he said.

  "I'll make her work. She's giving herself too many damned airs. I knowwho's back of this--it's that nigger we saw talking to the white womanin the field the other day."

  "Well, don't work yourself up. The wench don't amount to much anyhow. Bythe way, though, if you do go to the school it won't hurt to see thisTaylor's sister and size the family up."

  "Pshaw! I'm going to give the Smith woman such a scare that she'll keepher hands off our niggers." And Harry Cresswell rode away.

  Mary Taylor had charge of the office that morning, while Miss Smith,shut up in her bedroom, went laboriously over her accounts. Miss Marysuddenly sat up, threw a hasty glance into the glass and felt the backof her belt. It was--it couldn't be--surely, it was Mr. Harry Cresswellriding through the gateway on his beautiful white mare. He kicked thegate open rather viciously, did not stop to close it, and rode straightacross the lawn. Miss Taylor noticed his riding breeches and leggings,his white linen and white, clean-cut, high-bred face. Such apparitionswere few about the country lands. She felt inclined to flutter, butgripped herself.

  "Good-morning," she said, a little stiffly.

  Mr. Cresswell halted and stared; then lifting the hat which he hadneglected to remove in crossing the hall, he bowed in stately grace.Miss Taylor was no ordinary picture. Her brown hair was almost golden;her dark eyes shone blue; her skin was clear and healthy, and her whitedress--happy coincidence!--had been laundered that very morning. Herhalf-suppressed excitement at the sudden duty of welcoming the greataristocrat of the county, gave a piquancy to her prettiness.

  "The--devil!" commented Mr. Harry Cresswell to himself. But to MissTaylor:

  "I beg pardon--er--Miss Smith?"

  "No--I'm sorry. Miss Smith is engaged this morning. I am Miss Taylor."

  "I cannot share Miss Taylor's sorrow," returned Mr. Cresswell gravely,"for I believe I have the honor of some correspondence with MissTaylor's brother." Mr. Cresswell searched for the letter, but did notfind it.

  "Oh! Has John written you?" She beamed suddenly. "I'm so glad. It's morethan he's done for me this three-month. I beg your pardon--do sitdown--I think you'll find this one easier. Our stock of chairs islimited."

  It was delightful to have a casual meeting receive this social stamp;the girl was all at once transfigured--animated, glowing, lovely; all ofwhich did not escape the caller's appraising inspection.

  "There!" said Mr. Cresswell. "I've left your gate gaping."

  "Oh, don't mind ... I hope John's well?"

  "The truth is," confessed Cresswell, "it was a business matter--cotton,you know."

  "John is nothing but cotton; I tell him his soul is fibrous."

  "He mentioned your being here and I thought I'd drop over and welcomeyou to the South."

  "Thank you," returned Miss Taylor, reddening with pleasure despiteherself. There was a real sincerity in the tone. All this confirmed somany convictions of hers.

  "Of course, you know how it is in the South," Cresswell pursued, theopening having been so easily accomplished.

  "I understand perfectly."

  "My sister would be delighted to meet you, but--"

  "Oh I realize the--difficulties."

  "Perhaps you wouldn't mind riding by some day--it's embarrassing tosuggest this, but, you know--"

  Miss Taylor was perfectly self-possessed.

  "Mr. Cresswell," she said seriously, "I know very well that it wouldn'tdo for your sister to call here, and I sha'n't mind a bit coming by tosee her first. I don't believe in standing on stupid ceremony."

  Cresswell thanked her with quiet cordiality, and suggested that when hewas driving by he might pick her up in his gig some morning. Miss Taylorexpressed her pleasure at the prospect. Then the talk wandered togeneral matters--the rain, the trees, the people round about, and,inevitably--the Negro.

  "Oh, by the bye," said Mr. Cresswell, frowning and hesitating over therecollection of his errand's purpose, "there was one matter"--he paused.Miss Taylor leant forward, all interest. "I hardly know that I ought tomention it, but your school--"

  This charming young lady disarmed his truculent spirit, and the usuallycollected and determined young man was at a loss how to proceed. Thegirl, however, was obviously impressed and pleased by his evidence ofinterest, whatever its nature; so in a manner vastly different from theone he had intended to assume, he continued:

  "There is a way in which we may be of service to you, and that is byenlightening you upon points concerning which the nature of yourposition--both as teacher and socially--must keep you in the dark.

  "For instance, all these Negroes are, as you know, of wretchedly lowmorals; but there are a few so depraved that it would be suicidal totake them into this school. We recognize the good you are doing, but wedo not want it more than offset by utter lack of discrimination inchoosing your material."

  "Certainly not--have we--" Miss Mary faltered. This beginning was a bitominous, wholly unexpected.

  "There is a girl, Zora, who has just entered, who--I must speakcandidly--who ought not to be here; I thought it but right to let youknow."

  "Thank you, so much. I'll tell Miss Smith." Mary Taylor suddenly feltherself a judge of character. "I suspected that she was--not what sheought to be. Believe me, we appreciate your interest."

  A few more words, and Mr. Cresswell, after bending courteously over herhand with a deference no New Englander had ever shown, was riding awayon his white mare.

  For a while Mary Taylor sat very quietly. It was like a breath of airfrom the real world, this hour's chat with a well-bred gentleman. Shewondered how she had done her part--had she been too eager andschool-girlish? Had sh
e met this stately ceremony with enough breedingto show that she too was somebody? She pounced upon Miss Smith theminute that lady entered the office.

  "Miss Smith, who do you think has been here?" she burst outenthusiastically.

  "I saw him on the lawn." There was a suspicious lack of warmth in thisbrief affirmation.

  "He was so gracious and kindly, and he knows my brother. And oh, MissSmith! we've got to send that Zora right away."

  "Indeed"--the observation was not even interrogatory. The preceptress ofthe struggling school for Negro children merely evinced patience for theyounger woman's fervency.

  "Yes; he says she's utterly depraved."

  "Said that, did he?" Miss Smith watched her with tranquil regard. MissTaylor paused.

  "Of course, we cannot think of keeping her."

  Miss Smith pursed her lips, offering her first expression of opinion.

  "I guess we'll worry along with her a little while anyhow," she said.

  The girl stared at Miss Smith in honest, if unpardonable, amazement.

  "Do you mean to say that you are going to keep in this school a girl whonot only lies and steals but is positively--_immoral_?"

  Miss Smith smiled, wholly unmoved.

  "No; but I mean that _I_ am here to learn from those whose ideas ofright do not agree with mine, to discover _why_ they differ, and to letthem learn of me--so far as I am worthy."

  Mary Taylor was not unappreciative of Miss Smith's sternhigh-mindedness, but her heart hardened at this, to her, misdirectedzeal. Echo of the spirit of an older day, Miss Smith seemed, to her, tobe cramped and paralyzed in an armor of prejudice and sectionalisms.Plain-speaking was the only course, and Mary, if a little complacentperhaps in her frankness, was sincere in her purpose.

  "I think, Miss Smith, you are making a very grave mistake. I regardZora as a very undesirable person from every point of view. I look uponMr. Cresswell's visit today as almost providential. He came offering anolive branch from the white aristocracy to this work; to bespeak hisappreciation and safeguard the future. Moreover," and Miss Taylor'svoice gathered firmness despite Miss Smith's inscrutable eye, "moreover,I have reason to know that the disposition--indeed, the plan--in certainquarters to help this work materially depends very largely on yourwillingness to meet the advances of the Southern whites half way."

  She paused for a reply or a question. Receiving neither, she walked withdignity up the stairs. From her window she could see Cresswell'sstraight shoulders, as he rode toward town, and beyond him a black speckin the road. But she could not see the smile on Mr. Cresswell's lips,nor did she hear him remark twice, with seeming irrelevance, "Thedevil!"

  The rider, being closer to it, recognized in Mary Taylor's "black speck"Bles Alwyn walking toward him rapidly with axe and hoe on shoulder,whistling merrily. They saw each other almost at the same moment andwhistle and smile faded. Mr. Cresswell knew the Negro by sight anddisliked him. He belonged in his mind to that younger class ofhalf-educated blacks who were impudent and disrespectful toward theirsuperiors, not even touching his hat when he met a white man. Moreover,he was sure that it was Miss Taylor with whom this boy had been talkingso long and familiarly in the cotton-field last Spring--an offencedoubly heinous now that he had seen Miss Taylor.

  His first impulse was to halt the Negro then and there and tell him afew plain truths. But he did not feel quarrelsome at the moment, andthere was, after all, nothing very tangible to justify a berating. Thefellow's impudence was sure to increase, and then! So he merely reinedhis horse to the better part of the foot-path and rode on.

  Bles, too, was thinking. He knew the well-dressed man with hismilk-white face and overbearing way. He would expect to be greeted withraised hat but Bles bit his lips and pulled down his cap firmly. Theaxe, too, in some indistinct way felt good in his hand. He saw the horsecoming in his pathway and stepping aside in the dust continued on hisway, neither looking nor speaking.

  So they passed each other by, Mr. Cresswell to town, Bles to the swamp,apparently ignorant of each other's very existence. Yet, as the spacewidened between them, each felt a more vindictive anger for the other.

  How dares the black puppy to ignore a Cresswell on the highway? If thiswent on, the day would surely come when Negroes felt no respect or fearwhatever for whites? And then--my God! Mr. Cresswell struck his mare avicious blow and dashed toward town.

  The black boy, too, went his way in silent, burning rage. Why should hebe elbowed into the roadside dust by an insolent bully? Why had he notstood his ground? Pshaw! All this fine frenzy was useless, and he knewit. The sweat oozed on his forehead. It wasn't man against man, or hewould have dragged the pale puppy from his horse and rubbed his face inthe earth. It wasn't even one against many, else how willingly, swinginghis axe, would have stood his ground before a mob.

  No, it was one against a world, a world of power, opinion, wealth,opportunity; and he, the one, must cringe and bear in silence lest theworld crash about the ears of his people. He slowly plodded on in bittersilence toward the swamp. But the day was balmy, the way was beautiful;contempt slowly succeeded anger, and hope soon triumphed over all. Foryonder was Zora, poised, waiting. And behind her lay the Field ofDreams.