"You are very kind," said the governor. "But you know I have an empty house."

Then he put his arm about Marthy Burr and assisted her down the steps to the walk below. She looked about her with half-frightened, half-defiant eyes, and clung grimly to his powerful figure.

As Eugenia watched them, a quick remembrance shot before her. She saw Nicholas Burr as she had seen him in his youth—ardent, assured, holding out his arms to the future, which was to be love, love, love. Now the future had become the present, and the one affection that remained to him was that of the old, illiterate woman, with the rasping voice. He had lost the thing he had lived for—and he was happy.



BOOK V

THE HOUR AND THE MAN



I

On one of the closing days of the legislative session, Ben Galt lounged into the anteroom of the governor's office and cornered the private secretary. "Look here, Dickson, what's the latest demonstration of Old Nickism? I hear he's giving Rann trouble about that bill of his."

Dickson nodded significantly towards the closed door. "Rann's with him now," he replied; "they're having it hot in there. Rann may bluster till he's blue, but he won't make the governor give an inch. That bill's as dead as a door nail. The governor's got a fit of duty on."

"Or his everlasting obstinacy," returned Galt irritably. "His duty does more harm than most men's devilment—it stands like a stone wall between him and his ambition. Of course, that bill is a political swindle, but there isn't another politician in the State who would interfere in Rann's little game."

"Oh, between us, I think Rann's honest enough. He believes he's up to a good thing, but the governor disagrees with him—there's where the row begins."

"What does the governor say about it?"

"Say?" laughed Dickson. "Why, I asked him if he would approve the measure and he said 'No!' That's the beginning and the end of his discourse—a 'No' long drawn out."

The door opened abruptly, and Rann put out his head. "Will you step in here, Mr. Galt?" he asked, and his voice was husky with anger. "With pleasure, my dear Major," responded Galt easily, as he crossed the threshold and closed the door after him. "I am always at your service as a peacemaker."

The governor was standing before his desk, his eyes upon Rann, who faced him, red and trembling. Galt had seen Burr wear this impassive front before, and it had always meant trouble. His eyes were opaque and leaden, his face as expressionless as a mask. He was motionless save for the movement of one hand that drummed upon the desk. "If you possess any influence with the governor," said Rann to Galt, "will you tell him that his course is ruinous—ruinous to imbecility? If he thinks I am going to throw away a winter's work on that bill he's mistaken his man. It's taken me the whole session to get that measure through the legislature, and I'm not going to have it defeated now by any crack-brained moralist. He'll sign that bill or—"

Burr spoke at last. "Am I the governor of this State or are you?" he thundered. His face did not change, but his powerful voice rang to the full.

Rann gave an ugly little sneer, his cheek purpling. "I may not be governor, but I made you so," he retorted.

"Your mistake, my dear Major, was that you neglected to create him in your own likeness," put in Galt coolly.

"By the people's will I am governor, and governor I'll be," said Nicholas grimly; "as for this bill you speak of, I might have saved you the trouble of working for your pitiable majority. Since you have seen fit to deride my motive, it is sufficient for me to say that the measure will not become a law over my opposition, and I shall oppose it to the death."

Rann was shaking on his short legs and his hands were trembling. "So you defy me, do you, Governor?" he demanded.

"Defy you?" the governor laughed shortly, "I don't trouble to defy you. I laugh at you—the whole lot of you who come to cozen me with party promises. So long as I spoke your speech and did your bidding I might have the senatorship for the asking. I was honest Nick Burr, though I might belie my convictions at every step. So long as I wore the collar of your machine upon my neck my honesty was the hall-mark of the party. Where is my honesty, the first instant that I dare to stand against you? Defy you? Pshaw! You aren't worth defying!"

"Hold on!" said Galt hastily. "Nick, for God's sake, leave our friend alone. You're both good fellows—too good to quarrel—"

"Oh, there's no use," protested Rann, wiping his flaming brow. "I've offered a dozen compromises—but compromise I won't without that bill. Bear witness that I've upheld him from the start. I'd have run him for the presidency itself if I'd had the power, and when I ask a little friendly return he talks about his damned duty. But I tell you, he's signed his own warrant. He's as dead in this State as if his grave was dug. He's held his last office in the Democratic Party."

"I shall certainly not owe my second to you," responded the governor; then he looked vacantly before him. "I have the pleasure to wish you good morning," he said.

When Rann had gone, and the door had slammed after him, Galt turned, with a laugh.

"Shake!" he exclaimed, and as Nicholas grasped his hand, added lightly, "My dear friend, you may as well have a quiet conscience, since you'll never have the senatorship."

Nicholas drew his hand away impatiently. "I'm not beaten yet," he said. "I'll fight and I'll win, or my name's not Burr! Do you think I'm afraid of a sneak like that? Why, he offered me the senatorship as coolly as if he had it in his pocket!"

Galt laughed. "I'm not sure he hasn't; at any rate he's the power of the ring, and the ring's the power of the party."

"Then I'll fight the ring," said Nicholas, "and, if need be, I'll fight the party. So long as right and the people are with me the party may go hang."

"My dear old Nick, history teaches us that the party hangs the people. By the way, you've done Webb a good turn; Rann is going to fight you fair and foul—mostly foul."

"Oh, I'm not afraid of Rann, or of Webb."

"Or yet of the devil!" added Galt. "When I come to think of it, I never called you timid. But wait a few days and Rann will have this little passage reported to his credit. I'll get ahead of him with the story, or I'll find some cocked-up account of it circulating in the lobby. It's easier to blacken the best man than to whiten the worst. Well, I'm going. Good day!"

When the door closed, the governor crossed to the window and stood looking down upon the gray drive beneath the leafless trees. The sun was obscured by a sinister cloud that had blotted out all the fugitive brightness of the morning. A fine moisture was in the air, and the atmosphere hung heavily down the naked slopes, where the grass was colourless and dead. Beyond the gates, the city was lost in a blurred and melancholy distance, from which several indistinct church spires rose and sank in a sea of fog.

But blue and gray were as one to Nicholas. He was not exhilarated by sunshine nor was he depressed by gloom; only the inner forces of his nature had power to quicken or control his moods. His inspiration, like his destiny, lay within, and so long as he maintained his wonted equilibrium of judgment and desire it was, perhaps, impossible that an outside assault should severely shake the foundations of his life.

Now, while the glow of his anger still lingered in his brain, it was characteristic of the man that he was feeling a pity for Rann's disappointment—for the discomfiture of one whose methods he despised. In Rann's place, he felt that he should probably have risen to the charge as Rann rose—implacable, unswerving; but he was not in Rann's place, nor could he be so long as personal reward was less to him than personal honour. Yes, he could pity Rann even while he condemned him. For an instant—a single instant—he had found himself shrinking from the combat, and in the shock of self-contempt which followed he had hurled the shock of his resentment upon the tempter. In that moment of weakness it had seemed to him an easy thing to let one's self go; to yield to a friendly, if distrusted force; to place gratified ambition above the sting of wounded scruples. Was he infallible that he should make his judgment a law, or without reproach that he should set his conscience as an arbiter?

Then in a sudden illumination he had seen the betrayal of his sophistry, and he had stood his ground—for the strong man is not he who is impervious to weaknesses, but he who, scorning his failures, towers over them. He had felt the temptation and he had wavered, but not for long. In all his periods of storm and stress he had found that his nature rebounded in the end. Disquietude might waste his ardour; but give him time to reorganise his forces, and his moral energy would triumph at the last.

As he looked out upon the great bronze Washington against the sad-coloured sky, he realised, with a pang like the thrust of homesickness, the isolation in which he stood. An instinctive need to justify himself had risen within him, and with it awoke the knowledge that beyond that uncertain abstraction which he called "the People," he was an alien among his kind. Galt was his friend, Tom Bassett he could count on, a score of others would stand or fall in his service, but where was the single emotion which bound him to humanity? Where the common claim of kinship which belonged to Galt, to Bassett, and to all mankind? He had known many men, but he knew not one who was not drawn by some connecting link that was apart from patriotism, or ambition, or desire. Then quickly there came to him, not the judge, who was the parent of his intellect, but the withered little woman, who was not even the mother of his body. The only happiness that rose and set in him was that pitiable happiness that could not think his thoughts or speak his speech. It had never occurred to him that he loved Marthy Burr—his kindness had been wholly compassionate—it was the knowledge that she loved him that now illuminated her image. It was the old blind craving born again, to be first with somebody—for there are moods in which it is better to be adored by a dog than to adore a divinity. He beheld Eugenia's womanhood as "A sword afar off"; but with him was the eternal commonplace—his stepmother's sharp, pained eyes and shrivelled hands. He had loved Eugenia until there was nothing left; now he wanted to be loved, if by a dog.

He raised his head and smiled upon the bronze Washington and the sad-coloured sky. In the drive below men were passing, and from time to time he recognised a figure. He saw only men down there, and the thought came to him that his was a man's world—only in the outside circle might he catch the flutter of a woman's dress. He turned and went back to his desk and his work.

Two days later the papers chronicled without comment his opposition to Rann's bill. He was aware that Rann possessed no uncertain influence with the editors of the "Morning Standard," and he was surprised at the apparent indifference displayed by the curt announcement. Did Rann's resentment hang fire? Or was the press prepared to uphold the governor?

On the morning of the same day a member of the legislature with whom he was slightly acquainted came in to congratulate him upon his stand. His name was Saunders, and he was a man of some ability, whom Nicholas had always regarded as a partisan of Webb.

"I've been fighting that bill this whole session," he said emphatically, "and I'd given up all hope of defeating it when you had the pluck to knock it over. You've made enemies, Governor, but you've made friends, and I'm one of them. Give me the man who dares!" He held out his hand as he rose, and Nicholas responded with a hearty grip. Before the legislature closed he found that Saunders spoke the truth—he had made friends as well as enemies. The inborn Anglo-Saxon love of "the man who dares" was with him—a regard for daring for its own heroic sake. The hour was his, and he braved his shifting popularity as he would brave its final outcome.



II

One afternoon in early May, Dudley Webb came out upon his front steps and paused to light a cigar before descending to the street. A spring of happy promise was unfolding, for overhead the poplars bloomed against an enchanted sky. In the shadow of the church across the way, children were romping, their ecstatic trebles floating like bird-song on the air.

With the cigar between his teeth, Dudley heaved a sudden reminiscent sigh—the sigh of a man who possesses an excellent digestion and a complacent conscience. Things had gone well with him of late—the fact that a trivial domestic interest darkened for the moment his serene horizon proved it to be the solitary cloud of a clear day. The cloud in question had gathered in the shape of no less a person than Mrs. Jane Dudley Webb. She had been on a visit to Richmond, and he had seen her only two hours before safely started on her homeward journey. The truth was that Mrs. Webb and Eugenia had asserted for the past two days an implacable hostility, and Dudley's genial efforts at pacification had resulted merely in diverting a share of the unpleasantness upon his own head. It was a lamentable fact that Eugenia, who was amiable to the point of weakness where members of the Battle family were concerned, found it impossible to harmonise with the elder Mrs. Webb. They had disagreed upon such important subjects as Miss Chris's housekeeping and Dudley's moral welfare, until Eugenia, after an inglorious defeat, had relapsed into silence—a silence broken only upon Dudley's return from the station, when she had unbosomed herself of the declaration that she "couldn't stand his mother, and it was as much as she could do to stand him." Dudley had met this alarming outburst with its logical retort, "Hadn't you better see a doctor, Eugie?" whereupon Eugenia had protested that "if she wasn't fit for an asylum, he needn't thank Mrs. Webb," and had dissolved in tears.

At the moment Dudley had experienced a warm recognition of his generosity in refraining from the use of his own endurance of many Battles, as an illustration of the opposite and virtuous course; but upon later reflection he frankly admitted that the cases were by no means similar. It had not occurred to him, he recalled, to deny that Mrs. Webb was singularly trying, though he wondered, half resentfully, why Eugenia could not be brought to regard that lady's foibles from his own gently humorous point of view. He was not in the least disconcerted by his mother's solicitude as to the condition of his soul, or by the fact that she still felt constrained to allude to the governor of the State as "a person of low antecedents." Personally, he was inclined to admire—and frankly to admit it—the ability which had brought Burr into prominence from a position of evident obscurity, while he regarded Mrs. Webb's eccentric attitude as a kind of antedated comedy. What he objected to was his wife's inability to grasp the keynote of the situation.

It was pleasant to reflect, however, as he leisurely descended the steps, that he had brought Eugenia round by less heroic measures than an assault upon her family altars. He was glad to think that he had given her a cup of tea instead.

Crossing slowly to Franklin Street, he hesitated an instant on the corner, and turned finally in the direction of his office. There was a nearer way down town, but he always chose this one because experience had taught him that if pretty women were abroad here they would be found. With the same instinct of enjoyment he might have gone out of his way daily to pass the window of a florist.

As he walked on in the spring sunshine he held his handsome head erect, blowing the smoke of his cigar in the scented air. He moved leisurely, finding life too good to be wasted in rushing. The soft atmosphere; the fragrance of his fine cigar; the beauty of the women he passed—these sufficed to bring the glow of animation to his smooth, full face.

Once he stopped to shake hands with pretty Emma Carr, detaining her by a jest and a laugh—and again he paused to exchange a word with Juliet Galt, who was at her window. It was only when he turned into the business street again that he brought his mind to bear upon less engaging subjects.

Then it was that he remembered he had delivered the evening before his most successful oration. He had spoken to a large audience upon "Personal Morality in Politics," and he had received an appreciation that was prolonged and thundering. When it was over some one had called him a "greater orator than Withers," to add quickly, "and a better Democrat than Burr." He could still see the whimsical smile Burr had turned upon the speaker, and he could still feel his own sense of elation.

Well, as for that matter, he was a better Democrat than Burr—if to be a better Democrat meant to place the party will above his personal opinion. After all, what was a party for if not to unite individual effort and to combine individual differences? If organisation was not worth the sacrifice of personal prejudices it might as well dissolve before the next election day. It was, of course, a pity that a man like Burr should dissent from the views of important politicians, but one might as well talk of a ship without officers as of a party without organised leaders. It was a pity from Burr's point of view, he was willing to admit, but so long as Burr would make trouble it was just as well that the ill wind should blow his own side good—he was honestly glad that it had blown Rann's influence in his direction. He had never felt more hopeful of anything in his life than he now felt of the senatorship. Indeed, he was inclined to think that he might have something very like a "walk over."

"Hold on, Webb," a voice called behind him, and a moment later he was joined by Diggs, who congratulated him upon his speech of the evening before. Webb tossed back the congratulations with a laugh. "Yes, it's a popular subject just now," he said. "Since the negroes have stopped voting in large numbers we're even going in for honest elections."

"Well, I reckon it's as well," admitted Diggs. "We used to have some rampant rascality under the old system, I dare say; it took clever trickery to bring in the white rule sometimes. We have a large negro majority down my way, that obliged us to devise original methods of disposing of it. It was fighting the devil with fire, I suppose; but self-preservation was a law long before Universal Suffrage was heard of. At any rate, I had my hand in it now and then. Once, I remember, on an election day when every darkey in the neighbourhood had turned out to vote, I hit on the idea that the man who was to carry the returns across the river should pretend to get drunk and upset the boat. It was a pretty scheme and would have worked all right, but, will you believe it, the blamed fool got drunk in earnest, and when the boat upset he was caught under it and drowned." He paused an instant and complacently added: "But we lost those returns, all the same."

Webb threw his cigar stump in the gutter and turned to Diggs with a laugh. "That reminds me," he began, and started a story which he finished on his office steps.

When he went home some hours later he found that Eugenia had regained her high good-humour. She was sitting before the fire in her bedroom, her hair flowing in the hands of Delphy, who had moved up from Kingsborough, and was doing a thriving trade as a shampooer. It was her fortnightly custom to pass from head to head in a round of the Kingsborough colony, promoting an intimate trend of gossip among her patrons.

As Dudley entered, she was seeking to induce Eugenia to consent to an application from one of the many bottles she carried in an ancient travelling bag, which had long since descended to her from General Battle.

"Lawd, Miss Euginny, dis yer ain' gwineter hu't you. Hit ain' nuttin but ker'sene oil nohow. Miss Sally Burwell des let me souse her haid in it de udder day. Hit'll keep you f'om gittin' gray, sho's I live."

"You shan't touch me with it, Delphy. And you ought to be ashamed—I haven't a gray hair. Have I, Dudley?"

Delphy returned the bottle with a sigh, and applied herself to a vigorous brushing of Eugenia's hair.

"You sho is filled out sence I see you, Marse Dudley," she observed at last.

"Yes, I'm getting fat, Delphy," returned Dudley with a laugh. "It's old age, you know. It's a long time since the days when you spanked me with a heavy hand."

"Go 'way f'om yer, Marse Dudley; you know I ain' never spank you none ter hu't. En you ain' er bit too fat ter fit yo' skin, nohow."

Dudley regarded her with a kindly, patriarchal eye as he straightened himself against the mantel. "Any news from down your way, Delphy?" he inquired with interest. "What's become of Moses? Moses was always a friend of mine. He used to bring me a pocketful of peanuts from every picking he went to."

Delphy shook her head, her huge lips tightening. "He's down wid de purple headache," she replied gloomily, "twel he can't smell de diff'ence between er 'possum en er polecat. Yes, suh, Mose he's moughty low down, en' ter dis yer day he ain' never got over Marse Nick Burr's ous'in' you en Miss Euginny outer de cheer you all oughter had down yonder at de cap'tol. I ain' got much use fer Marse Nick myse'f. He's monst'ous hard on po' folks. I ain' been able to rent out mo'n oner my rooms sence he's been down dar. Dat's right, Miss Euginny, yo' hyar's des es dry es I kin git it."

When Delphy had gone, Dudley leaned down and put his arm about Eugenia as he kissed her. "All right, Eugie?" he asked cheerfully. Eugenia returned his caress with a startled pleasure, looking up at him affectionately, fascinated by the glow which hung about him.

"Oh, I really don't think I could do without you, Dudley," she said quickly.

"Well, it's a good thing you don't have to," responded Dudley as he kissed her again.

It was several days after this that Eugenia came to him one evening as he stood before the fire and laid her cool cheek against his arm.

"Oh, Dudley," she said breathlessly, "I am so happy—so absurdly happy."

She raised her head and Dudley, looking at her in the firelight, found her more beautiful than she had been even in the radiant days of her girlhood. He had seen that high resolve in her face but once before, and he grasped the meaning now as then—it was the dawn of motherhood that enveloped her. She had heard the call of the generations in the end—the appeal of the race that moved her nature more profoundly than did the erratic ardours of the individual. There was a clear light in her eyes, and her features had taken an almost marble-like nobility. The look in her face reminded him of moments in the old days at Battle Hall, when she had wrapped the wandering general in a tenderness that was maternal. With a sudden penetrant insight into her heart, he realised that her natural emotions were her nobler ones—that as child and mother the greatness of her nature assumed its visible form. He drew her closer, the best in him responding to the mystery he beheld dimly in her eyes. For ten years they had not touched natures so nearly; it was the vital breath needed to vivify a union which was not rooted in the permanence of an enduring passion.

And as the months went on the wonder deepened in Eugenia's eyes. The old restlessness was gone; she was like one who, having looked into the holy of holies, keeps the inward memory clear. She was in the supreme mental state—attained only by religious martyrs or maternal, yet childless, women long married—when physical pain loses its relative values before the exaltation of an abiding vision. And, above all, she was what each woman of her race had been before her—a mother from her birth?



III

From the day of the child's birth it did not leave Eugenia's sight. Her eyes followed it when it was carried about the room, and she watched wistfully the dressing and undressing of the round little body. She knew each separate frock that she had made before its coming, and each day she called for a different and a daintier one. "I must make new ones," she said at last, "he is such a beauty!" And she would hold out her arms for him, half dressed as he was, and, as he lay beside her, fresh and cool and fragrant as a cowslip ball, she would cover the soft pink flesh with passionate kisses. Her motherhood was an obsession, jealous, intense, unreasoning.

They had named him after the general—Thomas Battle Webb, but to Eugenia he was "the baby," the solitary baby in a universe where birth is as common as death. And, indeed, he was a thing of joy—the nurse, Dudley, Miss Chris, all admitted it. There was never so round, so rosy, so altogether marvellous a baby, and never one that laughed so much or cried so little. "He was born with a silver spoon in his mouth," declared Miss Chris. "I can see his luck already in his eyes."

At first Eugenia had been tortured by a fear that the little life would go out as the other had done; but, as the weeks went on and he lived and fed and fattened, her fear was lost in the wondering rapture of possession. Nothing so perfectly alive could cease to be.

When she was well again she dismissed the nurse and took, herself, entire charge of the child. "There are no mammies these days," she had said in reply to Dudley's remonstrances, "and I can't trust him with one of the new negroes—I really can't. Why, I saw one slap a baby once." So she bathed and dressed him in the mornings and rocked him to sleep at midday and at dark, and in the brightness of the forenoon gave him an airing on the piazza that overlooked the back garden. From the time of her getting up to her lying down he left her arms only when he was laid asleep in the little crib beside her bed.

But, for all this, he was a healthy, hearty baby, with a round bald head, great blue eyes like china marbles, and a ridiculous mouth that would not shut over the pink gums and hide the dimples at the corners. He did not cry because, as yet, he hadn't seen the moon, and the lamp had been carefully emptied and given to him as soon as he was big enough to hold out his hands. Pins had not stuck him, because Eugenia had guarded against the danger by sewing ribbons on his tiny innumerable slips. And he was as amiable as his elders are apt to be so long as they are permitted to regard the visible universe as a possible plaything.

At this time it was Eugenia's custom to hold him on her lap while she ate her meals, or to leave Miss Chris in charge if the small tyrant chanced to be asleep. Miss Chris had become a willing servitor; but she occasionally felt it to be her duty to put a modest check upon Eugenia's maternal frenzy.

"My dear, there were ten of us," she remarked one day, "and I am sure we never required as much attention as this one."

"And nine of you died," Eugenia solemnly retorted.

Miss Chris was compelled to assent; but she immediately added: "Not until we had reached middle age. Belinda died youngest, and it was of pneumonia, at the age of forty-one. You don't think neglect during her infancy had anything to do with it, do you? Nobody ever accused my poor dear mother of not looking after her children."

But Eugenia stood her ground. "One can never tell," was all she said, though a moment later she wiped her eyes and sobbed: "Oh, papa! If papa could only see him! He would be so proud."

"Of course, darling," said Miss Chris. "He was always fond of children. I remember distinctly the way he carried on when his first child was born—but he lost him of croup before he was a month old."

She left the room to see after the housekeeping, and Eugenia hugged the baby to her bosom, and cried over him and kissed him, and thought his eyes were like her father's—though, for that matter, the general's were gray and watery, with weak red lids that blinked. The baby gurgled and showed his gums still more and clutched the lace upon his mother's breast until it hung in shreds. It was a new gown, but neither Eugenia nor the baby cared for that—if he had wanted to pull her hair out, strand by strand, she would have submitted rather than have brought a wrinkle to his cloudless brow.

A little later she took him out upon the sidewalk, after swathing him from head to foot in a light-blue veil that floated about her like a strip of sky. It was here that Juliet Galt found her, as she was passing, and, throwing back her pretty head, she laughed until the tears came.

"O Eugie, Eugie, if you had six!" she gasped.

Eugenia flinched slightly at her merriment. "But, Juliet, I can't trust him with a nurse. Why, you told me only the other day that your faithful old Fanny called Elizabeth an 'imp of Satan.'"

Juliet only wrung her hands and laughed the more. "It's too funny," she panted at last; "but I'm sure if Fanny said it about Elizabeth it was true—she never tells stories." Then she rippled off again. "Oh, my poor Dudley! How does he endure it? Why, Ben would ship the babies off to boarding school if I attempted this."

"Dudley tries to be good about it," replied Eugenia, "but he hates it awfully."

Juliet went by, and Eugenia kept up her slow promenade until Dudley came up to dinner. Then she followed him into the house and upstairs to her room, where he turned upon her reproachfully:

"I say, Eugie, I wish you'd stop this sort of thing. It isn't fair to me, you know."

"How absurd, Dudley!"

"But it isn't. People will begin to say that I'm bankrupt or a beast. If you will go parading round like this, for heaven's sake hire a servant or two to follow after; it'll look more decent."

Eugenia's response was far from satisfactory, and the next morning, before going to his office, he drew Miss Chris aside and unburdened himself into her sympathetic ear. "You don't think Eugie's a—a—exactly crazy, do you, Aunt Chris?" he wound up with, for Miss Chris was on his side, and he knew it.

"I don't wonder you ask, Dudley, I really don't," was her comforting rejoinder. "Why, she actually had the face to tell me yesterday that I'd never had any children, so I couldn't advise her. It is provoking. I don't pretend to deny it."

Dudley took up his hat and carefully examined the inside lining. "Well, I'll settle it," he said at last, and went out.

The next day, when Eugenia went upstairs from dinner, she found Delphy in a nurse's cap and apron, installed in a low chair before the fire, jolting the baby on her knees with a peculiar rhythmic motion.

Eugenia fell back, regarding her with blank amazement. "Why, Delphy, where did you come from?" she exclaimed. "I didn't know you were in service. Whom are you nursing for?"

Delphy responded with a passive nod. "I'se nussin' for Marse Dudley," she retorted.

"But I don't want a nurse, Delphy. I take care of the baby myself. I like to do it."

Delphy kept up her drowsy jolting, shaking at the same time an unrelenting head. "Go 'long wid you, honey," she returned. "I ain' oner yo' new-come niggers. I'se done riz mo' chillun den you'se got teef in yo' haid, en I ain' gwine ter have Marse Dudley's chile projecked wid 'fo' my eyes. You ain' no mo' fitten ter nuss dis chile den Marse Dudley hisse'f is."

"O Delphy!" gasped Eugenia reproachfully. She made a dart at the baby, but he raised a shrill protest, which caused her hopelessly to desist. "O Delphy, you've come between us!" she cried.

"I 'low ef I hadn't you'd 'a' run plum crazy," was Delphy's justification. "Dis yer chile's my bizness, en yourn it's down yonder in de parlour wid Marse Dudley."

Eugenia wavered and stood irresolute. Delphy's authority, rooted in superior knowledge, appeared to be unshakable, but she made a last desperate effort. "Suppose he should get sick without me, Delphy?"

Delphy positively snorted. "Ef you wanter raise dis yer chile, Miss Euginny," she replied, "you'd des better let me alont. Hit's a won'er you ain' been de deaf er him 'fo' I got yer wid yo' sto' physicks en yo' real doctahs es dunno one baby f'om anur when dey meet 'im in de street. I reckon, ef he'd got de colic you'd have kilt 'im terreckly, you en yo' sto' physicks en yo' real doctahs! Now, you'd des better dress yo'se'f an' go down yonder ter de parlour."

But as she finished Dudley strolled in and stood beaming down upon his offspring as it lay, round and pinkly impressive, in Delphy's lap. "Fine boy, eh, Delphy?" he inquired proudly.

"Dat 'tis, suh," responded Delphy heartily, "an' he's des de spit er you dis we'y minit."

The following morning Dudley went to Washington for several days, and Eugenia was left with Miss Chris and the child. Lottie and the little girls were with Bernard, who was dragging to a tedious end in Florida, where he had been ordered as a last resource. Poor, pretty, ineffectual Lottie had succumbed to the unrelenting pressure of her duty. She had sacrificed herself from sheer lack of the force necessary to withstand fate.

During Dudley's absence Eugenia gave herself up to as much of the baby as Delphy grudgingly allowed her, sewing, in the long intervals, on tiny slips as delicate as cobwebs. Even this occupation was not wholly a peaceful one. "Des wait twel he begin ter crawl, en' den whar'l dose spider webs be?" propounded Delphy in the afternoon of the third day. "Dey'll be in de ash-ba'r'l er at de back er de fireplace, en dat's whar dey b'long. Marse Dudley ain' never wo' no sech trash ner is you yo'se'f."

Eugenia did not respond. She seated herself beside the window, and with one eye on her child and one on her work sewed silently, her white hands gleaming amid the laces in her lap. The training of her slave-holding ancestors was strong upon her, and she regarded Delphy's liberty of speech as an inherent right of her position. The Battle servants had always spoken their minds to their mistresses in a manner which caused them to become hopeless failures when they hired themselves into strange families, where the devotion of their lives could not be offered in extenuation of the freedom of their tongues.

So when Eugenia spoke, after a placid pause, it was merely to suggest that the baby's head was hanging too far over Delphy's knee. "That can't be healthful, Delphy," she said, half timidly. Delphy grunted and adjusted matters with a protest. "Hit's de way yourn done hung en Miss Meely's done hung befo' you," she muttered. Eugenia turned to the window and looked out upon the back yard, where the horse-chestnut tree was a mass of bloom, delicate as a cloud. In the beds below, roses were out in red and white, and against the gray wall of the stable at the end of the brick walk purple flags were flaunting in the shadow. Across the city, beyond the tin roofs and the chimney-pots, the sun was going down in a mist as sheer as gauze, and the surrounding atmosphere was charged with opalescent lights.

Her eyes rested upon it with a quick sense of its beauty; then the sunset lost itself in the round of her thoughts. She had missed Dudley, and she was glad that he was coming home to-night. For the first time during the fifteen years of her marriage she experienced a vague uneasiness at his absence. A year ago she had not known a tremor of loneliness when he was away—but then the child was unborn. Now, in some subtle way, the child's existence was bound and rebound in Dudley's. The two stood together in her thoughts; she could not separate them—the child was but a smaller, a closer, a dearer Dudley—a Dudley of her dreams and visions, the ideal ending to life's realities.

As she sat beside the window, her eyes wandering from the sunset to the baby asleep in Delphy's lap, she wondered that she had never before suffered this incipient thrill of nervous fear. Was it that her affection for her child had revivified all lesser emotions? Or was it that with supreme love came the vague, invincible perception of supreme loss? Did great happiness bear within itself the visible reflection of great sorrow? Her life before this had been more peaceful—it had been also less complete. With the coming of her heart's desire had awakened her heart's inquietude—both had dawned after years of restless waiting and uncertain wandering. It was borne in upon her, with something like a pang, that the fulness of life had blossomed for her only when her first youth was withered, when she had long since relinquished high expectations or keen desire. She had set her young mind and her quick passion on a far-away good, she had shed vain tears over the lack of it; yet, in the end, she found compensation where she would least have sought it—in the things which made up her destiny. She had learned the wisdom of acceptance, and Fate had rewarded her, not by yielding to her what she had called her heart's necessity, but by fitting her heart to the necessity that was already hers. She had not known the fulfilment of her young ideals, but she was content at last with an existence which was a personal surrender to older realities. For herself she asked now only busy days of domestic interests and the unbroken serenity of middle age—but, despite herself, another life was before her, for she lived again in her child.

The twilight fell. She put her work aside, and, coming to the hearth rug, took the baby from Delphy's arms. He was in his night-dress, and his big blue eyes were drugged with sleep. As Eugenia took him he gave a whimpering cry and clutched her with his little hands before he nestled into the lace at her bosom.

Some hours later, while Eugenia awaited Dudley in the dining-room, Miss Chris came in to see that his late supper was in preparation. "The train is over-due," she said, with a glance at the clock. "He will be hungry when he gets in. He always is."

Eugenia looked up anxiously. "I am beginning to feel alarmed," she replied. "Can anything have happened, do you think? He is an hour late."

Miss Chris shook her head as she refilled the sugar-bowl. "Why, he's often late," she rejoined. "I never knew you to be nervous before. What is it?"

"Oh, I don't know," said Eugenia. She rose and stood looking at the clock, her brow wrinkling. "If he isn't here in five minutes I'm going to the station," she added, and went upstairs for her wraps.

When she returned Miss Chris resorted to argument. "Don't be absurd, Eugie," she urged. "You can't go alone. It's too late and too far."

"But I sent for a carriage," replied Eugenia decisively. "If anything happens to the baby come after me," and a moment later she rolled away, leaving Miss Chris transfixed upon the doorstep.

As the carriage passed along the lighted streets she smiled at the recollection of the face Miss Chris had turned upon her. Well, she was absurd, of course, but one couldn't go through life being reasonable. And if anything were to happen to Dudley she would always remember that she had refused to go to walk with him the afternoon before he went away, because the baby was crying for the flames and couldn't be left with Delphy. Dudley was provoked about it, but men never understood these matters. He had even gone so far as to declare that his son would get only his deserts if he were to cry himself hoarse; and she had felt impelled to resent so hard-hearted an utterance. How could the baby know that the fire was the only thing in the world he couldn't have for his own?

When she drew up at the station the train was just coming in, and she rushed through the waiting-room to the gate from which the passengers were streaming. As she reached it Dudley came through, talking animatedly to the man who walked beside him. "That was the very point, my dear sir—" he was saying, when he caught sight of Eugenia, and paused abruptly, domestic affairs asserting their supremacy in his mind. "Why, Eugie!" he gasped. "What's happened?"

Eugenia seized his arm impatiently. "Oh, you were so late, Dudley," she cried, half angrily. "You made me miserable—it wasn't right of you!"

She hesitated an instant and, looking up, found that his companion was Nicholas Burr. His eyes were upon her, and he lifted his hat without speaking, but Dudley at once turned to him.

"You are old friends with Mrs. Webb, Governor," he said lightly, "but you don't know the ways of a woman who thinks her husband may lose himself between Washington and Richmond."

Nicholas met the impatient flicker in Eugenia's eyes and laughed.

"Oh, she hardly fancied you had fallen overboard," he returned. "It's too difficult in these days. I trust you have had no great anxiety, Mrs. Webb."

And he passed on, his bag in his hand.

When Dudley and Eugenia were in the carriage she held herself erect and attacked him with asperity. "You might at least not laugh at me," she said.

For reply he smiled and flung his arm about her. "My darling girl, it's one of the things that make life worth living," he retorted. "When I cease to laugh at you I'll cease to love you—and that's a long way off."



IV

The campaign which would decide the election of a United States Senator was warming to white heat. On the last day of October Tom Bassett, dropping into Galt's office, greeted him with the exclamation: "So you've taken to the stump!"

Galt put aside his papers and rose with a laugh, holding out his hand. "My dear fellow, may I ask where you have spent the last fortnight? Is it possible that my oratorical fame has just penetrated to your retreat?"

Tom sat down, and taking off his hat, ran his hand through his hair with an exhausted gesture. "Oh, I've been West. I got back last night, and I'm off to New York in an hour. So it's a fact that you've been on the stump?"

"It is! I don't mean to allow the Webb men to do all the talking. You heard about my joint debate with Diggs at Amelia Court-house, didn't you? That, my dear Tom, was the culminating point of my glorious career. I squared him off as nicely as you please, and with no rough edges either."

But Tom refused to be impressed. "Oh, anybody could do up Diggs," he said. "I hear, however, that you had some hot words between you."

Galt shook his head. "Ah, the words were as nothing to the drinks that followed," he sighed. "Diggs mayn't be much on speeches, but he's great on cocktails. It was a glorious day!" Then he grew serious. "When he was fairly wound up I got a good deal out of him," he said. "We came down on the train together, and I found out that he was against Burr simply because the Webb men had told him that he pledged himself to them when he allowed them to send him to the Legislature. It's all rot, of course; his constituents are strong for Burr, but he's a good deal of a fool, and Rann has put it into his head that he must do the 'honest thing' by coming out for Webb. He has a great idea of party honour, so out he's come."

"Rann's a born organiser," commented Tom.

"Ah, there's where we aren't even with him. He and his assistants have been drilling their forces ever since he had that clash with Burr, and the discipline's so good they are beginning to convince the people that the opinions of a dozen men represent the principles of the party. What Burr aims at, of course, is to organise the mass of Democratic voters as effectively as Rann has organised the ring."

"That's a tough job," said Tom, "but if it's to be done, Burr's the man to do it. As it is, I haven't a doubt that the majority is with us."

"Well, I live in hope," returned Galt easily. "It seems to me there's a clear chance of our having a good deal over half the votes in the caucus. Now, grant that there'll be a hundred and twenty regular Democratic votes—"

"Of which Webb already claims sixty-five."

"Claims!" growled Galt. "He may claim the whole confounded lot if he wants to. The question is—will he get them?"

"He will if Rann can manage it. It isn't mere party bitterness that actuates that man—there's a good deal of personal spite mixed with it. He hates Burr."

"Oh, I dare say. But he overreached himself when he tried to get control of the committee. They decided in favour of Saunders in the last Southside contest, and Saunders is pledged to Burr."

Tom drew out his watch and moved towards the door, but having reached it, he swung round with a question: "Seen Webb since your debate?" he inquired.

Galt nodded. "I had a chat with him in the lobby at the 'Royal' last night, and I must admit that, so far as Webb's concerned, this campaign is a particularly decent one. He can't help being a gentleman any more than he can help being a demagogue. Both instincts are in the blood."

"Yes, I rather think you're right. Well, good-bye. I'll see you Tuesday."

He ran downstairs, breaking into a whistle on the way, and Galt, after a moment's hesitation, took up his hat and followed him. He had an appointment with Burr's campaign manager, who had his headquarters at the Royal Hotel.

It was there that Galt found him, holding a jubilant gathering in his rooms. He was absolutely sanguine of success, and when Galt left an hour later, he sought to impart to him his emphatic confidence. "My dear sir, I can conclusively prove to you that we shall win," he said, one eye on Galt and one on a reporter who had just entered. "I can prove it to you in figures—and figures never lie. There is not the faintest doubt that Burr will have seventy votes by the meeting of the caucus."

"Glad to hear it," was Galt's response; but in passing through the lobby on his way out he encountered an equal assurance in the opposite camp. Rann, who was the centre of a small group, broke away and came towards him.

"I suppose the governor has reconciled himself to defeat, eh, Mr. Galt?"

Galt shook his head with a laugh. "Defeat! Why, Major, we're just beginning to enjoy our triumph. Burr has his seventy votes in his hand and he keeps it closed."

Rann flushed angrily, his mouth twitching. "If you will come this way, sir, I can prove to you on paper—on paper, sir—that Webb has his majority as plain as if the caucus was over. Seventy votes! Why, bless my soul, he must have counted in every Republican and Independent that will be sent up. Seventy votes! I tell you he won't have forty—not forty, sir!"

"Ah, he laughs best that laughs last, my dear Major."

And he left the hotel, walking rapidly in the direction of the Capitol. Once or twice he stopped to speak to an acquaintance who wanted his opinion of Burr's chances, and to such inquiries his response was invariably an expression of perfect conviction. But when alone his uncertainty appeared—and he acknowledged to himself that he was afraid of Rann's last card. What it was he did not know, but he knew that when the time came it would be well played. Bassett was right—it was not party bitterness that moved Rann, it was personal hatred.

The square was flooded with sunshine, and down the green slopes gray squirrels were feeding from the hands of children. Overhead the elms were russet from a sharp frost, and the golden leaves of the sycamores shone against the leprous whiteness of the branches.

Near a fountain he came upon his own small daughter building huts of pebbles. As she saw him she gave a shrill scream and caught his knees in a tight embrace. He raised her in his arms for a kiss, and then spoke cordially to the old negro janitor of the Capitol, who was watching him. "Is that you, Carter? Good-morning!"

"Well, I declar, boss, I ain' seen you fur a mont' er Sundays."

"You must have been looking at the clouds, Carter."

"Naw, suh, I'se been lookin' right out yer, an' I ain' seen you. Is you gwine ter 'lect de gov'nor?"

Galt was holding his daughter high enough to reach the branches of an elm. "I'm trying to, Carter," he returned good-humouredly, "but I can't do it by myself. Won't you lend a hand?"

"I'll len' 'em bofe, if you want 'em, boss. I'se been stedyin' 'bout dis bizness, an' I'se got a plan all laid out in my haid. Dey's a lot er coloured folks in dis State, suh."

"That's so, man."

"An' dey's all got a vote des de same es de white?"

Galt laughed. "Sure's you live," he replied.

"Well, I'se gwine ter git my friend Bob Viars ter git up er meetin' er all de coloured folks roun' in Cumberland County, an' I'se gwine ter put on de bes' I'se got an' git up on de platform an' Bob's gwine tell 'em I'se de janitor er de Capitol dat knows all de ways de laws are made—an' when Bob says dat, I'se gwine ter bow an' flirt my hank'chif."

Galt nodded. "Oh, I see," he said.

"Den I'se gwine say I'se come ter tell 'em ter 'lect de gov'nor 'case he's de bes' man in de State an' de greates' gent-man dey's ever lay eyes on—an' I'se gwine flirt my hank'chif some mo'."

"What else?" said Galt.

"I'se gwine tell 'em I kin prove de gov'nor's de bes' man in de State by'splainin' er de tarif—dat I kin prove it by'splainin' er de tarif so dey'll unnerstan' it ev'y word—an' when I flirt my hank'chif dat time, Bob's gwine call out 'Yo' time's up, boss!' an' I'se gwine answer back, 'Naw 'tain't, Bob, des lemme 'splain de tarif. I'se got de 'splanification er de tarif right on de tip er my tongue,' an' Bob's gwine holler out, 'Not anudderword, boss, not anudder word!' an' he gwine shuffle me right spang out."

Galt put down his daughter and shook Carter's hand. "If you ever get out of a job, my man," he said, "go into politics. Is the governor in his office?"

"I'se des dis minit seen him come out fer dinner."

"All right, I'll find him," and he went on to the governor's house.

Nicholas was in his library, a law-book open before him. When he saw Galt he turned from his desk and motioned to a chair beside him. "Come in, Ben, and sit down. I'm glad to see you."

Galt threw himself into the chair. "I've just seen Ryan," he said, "and I never met a more sanguine man. He doesn't give Webb a chance."

"Ah, is that so?" asked the governor; his tone was almost indifferent, but in a moment he leaned forward and spoke rapidly:

"I fear there's trouble in Kingsborough, Ben. They've brought a negro there to the gaol from' Hagersville, where there were threats of a lynching."

"The devil! Well, you aren't afraid that Kingsborough will turn lawless? My dear friend, there isn't enough vitality down there to make one first-class savage."

Nicholas fell back again, his vivid hair drawings the superb outline of his head on the worn leather against which he leaned.

"Oh, I'm not afraid of Kingsborough," he returned, "but Hagersville is only three miles distant, and the country people are much wrought up. God knows they have reason to be."

"Ah, the usual thing."

"I don't know the details—but there is sufficient evidence against the man, they say, to hang him twenty times. He's as dead as if the noose had left his neck—but he must die by law. There hasn't been a lynching in the State since I've been in office."

He spoke quietly, but Galt saw the anxiety in his face and met it bravely.

"Nonsense, my dear Nick, don't let your hobby run away with you. If there had been any danger they'd have got the wretch away. By the bye, Tom Bassett has gone to New York. I saw him this morning."

"Yes, he dropped in last night. You haven't seen this, I dare say—it's a copy of Diggs's' speech at Danville. So they have fallen on my private life at last."

He handed Galt a typewritten sheet, watching him closely as he read it. "This looks as if they feared me, doesn't it?" he asked.

Galt's reply was an oath of sudden anger. "This is Rann!" he cried. "I see his mark!" A flush of red rose to his face and his voice came again in a long-drawn whistle of helpless rage. "The scoundrel!" he said sharply. "He's raked up that old Kingsborough scandal of Bernard Battle's and made you the man. Oh, the sneaking scoundrel!"

His passion appeared in quick contrast to the other's composure. He was resenting the slander with a violence that he would not have wasted on it had it touched himself—for the fame of his friend was a cause for which his easy-going nature would spring at once into arms.

Burr came over to him and laid a hand on his shoulder. "When you come to think of it, Ben," he said, "it's no great matter."

"Then what steps have you taken about it?"

Nicholas's arm fell to his side. "I have done nothing. What's the use?"

Galt strode to the window and back again to the fireplace. His eyes were blazing. "The use? Why, man, use or no use, I'll send the last one of them to hell, but they'll stop it! It's Rann—Rann from the beginning. I'd take my oath on it—but I'm his match, and he'll find it out. I'll have Diggs retract this lie by six o'clock this evening or I'll—"

He checked himself abruptly. "How long have you had this?"

"A half-hour. The speech goes in the evening papers."

"A half-hour! And you sit here snivelling about your lynching. Why, what are the necks of ten such devils worth to your good name? When I come to think of it, I'd like to lend a hand at a lynching myself. If I had Rann here—"

The governor laughed dryly. "To tell the truth, my dear fellow, I don't take it seriously. The people know me."

Galt uttered an angry exclamation and flung out his hand. "Oh, give over, Nick," he implored. "Don't drive me to frenzy! I can't stand much more."

He took up a sheet of paper and wrote several lines in pencil. "After all, I've been thinking to some purpose," he said. "Judge Bassett is the man we need. I'll telegraph to him from your office, and I'll have his reply scattered broadcast. If it riddles Webb like shot, I'll have it out."

"Oh, it isn't Webb," said Nicholas. He was looking into the fire, but as the door closed behind Galt he turned and seated himself at his desk. The law-book he had been reading lay to one side, and he opened it and followed up the question that perplexed him. His face was grave, but his eyes were shot with light. When Galt came back he entered slowly and hesitated an instant before speaking, then he said:

"There's bad news, Nick. The judge has had a stroke of paralysis. He is now unconscious. Tom can't be reached, and you—"

Nicholas took out his watch. "I have fifteen minutes in which to make that train," was his answer. "Will you tell Dickson to repeat all messages?" Then, as Galt followed him into the hall, he looked back and spoke again. "Until to-morrow," he said, and went out.

Galt delivered the message to Dickson and walked uptown to Webb's house, where he expected to find him. He had not lunched, and he remembered suddenly that Nicholas had also gone hungry; but the thought brought a smile as he rang Webb's bell. "Oh, for once in a lifetime a man may be heroic," he said. Then he entered the house and found, not Dudley, but Eugenia.

At the sound of his name she had risen and come swiftly forward with outstretched hand. Her face was white and her eyes heavy with anxiety, but he felt then, as always, the calm nobility of her carriage. In the added fulness of her figure her beauty showed majestic.

He took her hand, holding it warmly in his own. "My dear Eugenia, if you are in trouble, remember that I am an ignoble edition of Juliet."

"Oh, I want you, not Juliet," she said. "I have sent for Dudley, but he has not come—I took the paper at the door by chance—and I find that Colonel Diggs has brought up that old dead lie about the governor. He dares to say that the people of Kingsborough believe it—the coward! They never believed it—it is false—as false as the lie itself. Oh, if I were a man I would kill him for it, but I am a woman, and you—"

"Kill him!" He laughed harshly. "We don't kill men who blacken our friend's honour; we wait till they attack our own lives—that's our code for you. If it were otherwise, I should act upon it with pleasure. But I came to see Webb about this thing. Where is he?"

"Oh, he is coming."

She sat down, keeping her excited eyes upon him. "It was Bernard, my own brother," she said passionately. "You know this, and the world must know it. The world shall know it if I have to utter it from the housetops. Oh, I have sinned enough in ignorance; now I will speak."

She bit her lips to keep back the quick tears, tapping her foot upon the floor. The red was in her cheeks and her eyes were as black as night. Her bosom quivered from the lash of her scorn.

"But you must keep out of it, my dear Eugie. Dudley and I will manage it. We'll see Diggs and get a retraction from him—that's sensible and simple. There's no scandal the better for dragging a woman into it."

She stopped him fiercely. "Then I give you fair warning. If you do not stop it, I shall. Ah, here's Dudley!"

She met him as he entered the room, clasping her hands upon his arm. "Dudley, have you seen it—this falsehood?"

He let her hands fall from his arm and drew her with him to the fireside. "Yes; I have seen it," he answered, and as he shook hands heartily with Galt he made a casual remark about the weather.

"Oh, Dudley, what does the weather matter?" cried Eugenia. "No, don't sit down. You are to go at once to Colonel Diggs and tell him everything—and not spare any one—and you may tell him also that—I despise him!"

He smiled at her vehemence—it was so unlike Eugenia. "I didn't know you took so much interest in these things," he said lightly. "I thought the baby had cured you."

But she caught his hand and held it in her own. "Don't, Dudley," she implored. "You know what it means to me. You know all."

His face softened as he met her eyes; but instead of replying to her appeal he turned with a question to Galt. "Can I do any good?" he asked. "I am willing, of course, to do what I can."

"I was going to ask you to see Diggs," said Galt quietly. "We shall endeavour to keep his speech out of the morning papers, but it has already appeared in the evening issue. You might secure a card from him retracting his statements. I hardly think he knew them to be false."

"I'll go at once," replied Dudley. He went into the hall and took up his hat, but as Galt opened the door he lingered an instant and looked at his wife. She came to him, her eyes shining, and in a flash he realised that to Eugenia it was a question of his own honour as well as of the governor's. With a smile he lifted her chin and met her gaze. "Are you satisfied, my lady?" he asked; but before she could respond he had joined Galt upon the pavement.

There he paused to light a cigar, while Galt hesitated and looked at his watch. "I suppose I may leave it in your hands," suggested the older man. "Diggs isn't on the best of terms with me, you know."

Dudley took the cigar from his mouth and threw the match over the railing into the grass. "Oh, I'll do my best," he answered readily, "and I'll see that the statements are delivered to the newspapers at once. I am as much interested in it as you are. It was a dirty piece of work." And leaving Galt, he quickened his pace as he crossed the street.

Diggs was at his hotel and somewhat relieved at the sudden turn of affairs. "Honestly, I hated it," he frankly admitted. "It's the kind of job I'd like to wash my hands of. But Major Rann took oath on the truth of the story, and he convinced me that I owed it to the community to expose Burr's character. I don't know why I believed it, except that it never occurs to one to doubt evil. However, I'm glad you called. I assure you I'll take more pleasure in retracting the statements than I did in making them."

He wrote the notes and gave them into Dudley's hands. "If they don't get in to-morrow's issue, they must wait over till election day. It's a pity this is Saturday—but you'll have them in, I dare say."

"Yes; I'll take them down," said Dudley. He descended in the elevator, walking rapidly when he reached the pavement. Diggs's parting words came back to him and he repeated them as he went. Tomorrow's was the last paper before election day. If the speech were reported in the morning issue and Burr's friends made no denial, there would be, as far as the country voters were concerned, a silence of two days. The contest was not yet decided, this he knew—it would be a close one, and a straw's weight might turn the scales of public favour. Rann realised this too, for he did not fling slime at men for nothing—there was a serious purpose underneath the last act of his play. He was doing it for the sake of those Democrats whose constituents were divided against themselves, and he was trusting to himself to hold the votes that came his way when the cloud should have passed from Burr again. It was all so evident that Dudley held his breath for one brief instant. The whole scheme lay bare before him—he had but to drop these letters into the nearest box, and Rann's purpose would be fulfilled. In the howl of reprobation that followed the hounding of Burr his own hour would come. And granted that the governor was cleared before the meeting of the caucus—well, men are easier to keep than to win—and he might not be cleared after all.

A clock near at hand struck the hour. He raised his head and saw the "Standard" office across the street—and the temptation passed as swiftly as it had come. The instinct of generations was stronger than the appeal of the moment—he might sin a great sin, but he could never commit a meanness.

With sudden energy he crossed the street and ran up the stairs.



V

Again he was returning to Kingsborough. The familiar landscape rushed by him on either side—green meadow and russet woodland, gray swamp and dwarfed brown hill, unploughed common and sun-ripened field of corn. It was like the remembered features of a friend, when the change that startles the unaccustomed eye seems to exist less in the well-known face than in the image we have carried in our thoughts.

It was all there as it had been in his youth—the same and yet not the same. The old fields were tilled, the old lands ran waste in broomsedge, but he himself had left his boyhood far behind—it was his own vision that was altered, not the face of nature. The commons were not so wide as he had thought them, the hills not so high, the hollows not so deep—even the blue horizon had drawn a closer circle.

A man on his way to the water-cooler stopped abruptly at his side. "Well, I declar, if 'tain't the governor!"

Nicholas looked up, and recognising Jerry Pollard, shook his outstretched hand. "When did you leave Kingsborough?" he inquired.

"Oh, I jest ran up this morning to lay in a stock of winter goods. Trade's thriving this year, and you have to hustle if you want to keep up with the tastes of yo' customers. Times have changed since I had you in my sto'."

"I dare say. I am glad to hear that you are doing well. Was the judge taken ill before you left Kingsborough?"

"The judge? Is he sick? I ain't heard nothin' 'bout it. It wa'n't more'n a week ago that I told him he was lookin' as young as he did befo' the war. It ain't often a man can keep his youth like that but his Caesar is just such another. Caesar was an old man as far back as I remember, and, bless you, he's spryer than I am this minute. He'll live to be a hundred and die of an accident."

"That's good," said the governor with rising interest. "Kingsborough's a fine place to grow old in. Did you bring any news up with you?"

"Well, I reckon not. Things were pretty lively down there last night, but they'd quieted down this morning. They brought a man over from Hagersville, you know, and befo' I shut up sto' last evening Jim Brown came to town, talkin' mighty big 'bout stringin' up the fellow. Jim always did talk, though, so nobody thought much of it. He likes to get his mouth in, but he's right particular 'bout his hand. The sheriff said he warn't lookin' for trouble."

"I'm glad it's over," said the governor. The train was nearing Kingsborough, and as it stopped he rose and followed Jerry Pollard to the station.

There was no one he knew in sight, and, with his bag in his hand, he walked rapidly to the judge's house. His anxiety had caused him to quicken his pace, but when he had opened the gate and ascended the steps he hesitated before entering the hall, and his breath came shortly. Until that instant he had not realised the strength of the tie that bound him to the judge.

The hall was dim and cool, as it had been that May afternoon when his feet had left tracks of dust on the shining floor. Straight ahead he saw the garden, lying graceless and deserted, with the unkemptness of extreme old age. A sharp breeze blew from door to door, and the dried grasses on the wall stirred with a sound like that of the wind among a bed of rushes.

He mounted the stairs slowly, the weight of his tread creaking the polished wood. Before the threshold of the judge's room again he hesitated, his hand upraised. The house was so still that it seemed to be untenanted, and he shivered suddenly, as if the wind that rustled the dried grasses were a ghostly footstep. Then, as he glanced back down the wide old stairway, his own childhood looked up, at him—an alien figure, half frightened by the silence.

As he stood there the door opened noiselessly, and the doctor came out, peering with shortsighted eyes over his lowered glasses. When he ran against Nicholas he coughed uncertainly and drew back. "Well, well, if it isn't the governor!" he said. "We have been looking for Tom—but our friend the judge is better—much better. I tell him he'll live yet to see us buried."

A load passed suddenly from Nicholas's mind. The ravaged face of the old doctor—with its wrinkled forehead and its almost invisible eyes—became at once the mask of a good angel. He grasped the outstretched hand and crossed the threshold.

The judge was lying among the pillows of his bed, his eyes closed, his great head motionless. There was a bowl of yellow chrysanthemums on a table beside him, and near it Mrs. Burwell was measuring dark drops into a wineglass. She looked up with a smile of welcome that cast a cheerful light about the room. Her smile and the colour of the chrysanthemums were in Nicholas's eyes as he went to the bed and laid his hand upon the still fingers that clasped the counterpane.

The judge looked at him with a wavering recognition. "Ah, it is you, Tom," he said, and there was a yearning in his voice that fell like a gulf between him and the man who was not his son. At the moment it came to Nicholas with a great bitterness that his share of the judge's heart was the share of an outsider—the crumbs that fall to the beggar that waits beside the gate. When the soul has entered the depths and looks back again it is the face of its own kindred that it craves—the responsive throbbing of its own blood in another's veins. This was Tom's place, not his.

He leaned nearer, speaking in an expressionless voice. "It's I, sir—Nicholas—Nicholas Burr."

"Yes, Nicholas," repeated the judge doubtfully; "yes, I remember, what does he want? Amos Burr's son—we must give him a chance."

For a moment he wandered on; then his memory returned in uncertain pauses. He looked again at the younger man, his sight grown stronger. "Why, Nicholas, my dear boy, this is good of you," he exclaimed. "I had a fall—a slight fall of no consequence. I shall be all right if Caesar will let me fast a while. Caesar's getting old, I fear, he moves so slowly."

He was silent, and Nicholas, sitting beside the bed, kept his eyes on the delicate features that were the lingering survival of a lost type. The splendid breadth of the brow, the classic nose, the firm, thin lips, and the shaven chin—these were all downstairs on faded canvases, magnificent over lace ruffles, or severe above folded stocks. Over the pillows the chrysanthemums shed a golden light that mingled in his mind with the warm brightness of Mrs. Burwell's smile—giving the room the festive glimmer of an autumn garden.

A little later Caesar shuffled forward, the wineglass in his hand. The judge turned towards him. "Is that you, Caesar?" he asked.

The old negro hurried to the bedside. "Here I is, Marse George; I'se right yer."

The judge laughed softly. "I wouldn't take five thousand dollars for you, Caesar," he said. "Tom Battle offered me one thousand for you, and I told him I wouldn't take five. You are worth it, Caesar—every cent of it—but there's no man alive shall own you. You're free, Caesar—do you hear, you're free!"

"Thanky, Marse George," said Caesar. He passed his arm under the judge's head and raised him as he would a child. As the glass touched his lips the judge spoke in a clear voice. "To the ladies!" he cried.

"He is regaining the use of his limbs," whispered Mrs. Burwell softly. "He will be well again," and Nicholas left the room and went downstairs. At the door he gave his instructions to a woman servant. "I shall return to spend the night," he said. "You will see that my room is ready. Yes, I'll be back to supper." He had had no dinner, but at the moment this was forgotten. In the relief that had come to him he wanted solitude and the breadth of the open fields. He was going over the old ground again—to breathe the air and feel the dust of the Old Stage Road.

He passed the naked walls of the church and followed the wide white street to the college gate. Then, turning, he faced the way to his father's farm and the distant pines emblazoned on the west.

A clear gold light flooded the landscape, warming the pale dust of the deserted road. The air was keen with the autumn tang, and as he walked the quick blood leaped to his cheeks. He was no longer conscious of his forty years—his boyhood was with him, and middle age was a dream, or less than a dream.

In the branch road a fall of tawny leaves hid the ruts of wheels, and the sun, striking the ground like a golden lance, sent out sharp, fiery sparks as from a mine of light. Overhead the red trees rustled.

It was here that Eugenia had ridden beside him in the early morning—here he had seen her face against the enkindled branches—and here he had placed the scarlet gum leaves in her horse's bridle. The breeze in the wood came to him like the echo of her laugh, faded as the memory of his past passion. Well, he had more than most men, for he had the ghost of a laugh and the shadow of love.

Passing his father's house, he went on beyond the fallen shanty of Uncle Ish into the twilight of the cedars. At the end of the avenue he saw the rows of box—twisted and tall with age—leading to the empty house, where the stone steps were wreathed in vines. Did Eugenia ever come back, he wondered, or was the house to crumble as Miss Chris's rockery had done? On the porch he saw the marks made by the general's chair, which had been removed, and on one of the long green benches there was an E cut in a childish hand. At a window above—Eugenia's window—a shutter hung back upon its hinges, and between the muslin curtains it seemed to him that a face looked out and smiled—not the face of Eugenia, but a ghost again, the ghost of his old romance.

He went into the garden, crossing the cattle lane, where the footprints of the cows were fresh in the dust. Near at hand he heard a voice shouting. It was the voice of the overseer, but the sound startled him, and he awoke abruptly to himself and his forty years. The spell of the past was broken—even the riotous old garden, blending its many colours in a single blur, could not bring it back. The chrysanthemums and the roses and the hardy zenias that came up uncared for were powerless to reinvoke the spirit of the place. If Eugenia, in her full-blown motherhood, had risen in an overgrown path he might have passed her by unheeding. His Eugenia was a girl in a muslin gown, endowed with immortal youth—the youth of visions unfulfilled and desire unquenched. His Eugenia could never grow old—could never alter—could never leave the eternal sunshine of dead autumns. In his nostrils was the keen sweetness of old-fashioned flowers, but his thoughts were not of them, and, turning presently, he went back as he had come. It was dark when at last he reached the judge's house and sat down to supper.

He was with the judge until midnight, when, before going to his room, he descended the stairs and went out upon the porch. He had been thinking of the elections three days hence, and the outcome seemed to him more hopeful than it had done when he first came forward as a candidate. The uncertainty was almost as great, this he granted; but behind him he believed to be the pressure of the people's will—which the schemes of politicians had not turned. Tuesday would prove nothing—nor had the conventions that had been held; when the meeting of the caucus came, he would still be in ignorance—unaware of traps that had been laid or surprises to be sprung. It was the mark to which his ambition had aimed—the end to which his career had faced—that now rose before him, and yet in his heart there was neither elation nor distrust. He had done his best—he had fought fairly and well, and he awaited what the day might bring forth.

Above him a full moon was rising, and across the green the crooked path wound like a silver thread, leading to the glow of a night-lamp that burned in a sick-room. The night, the air, the shuttered houses were as silent as the churchyard, where the tombstones glimmered, row on row. Only somewhere on the vacant green a hound bayed at the moon.

He looked out an instant longer, and was turning back, when his eye caught a movement among the shadows in the distant lane. A quick thought came to him, and he kept his gaze beneath the heavy maples, where the moonshine fell in flecks. For a moment all was still, and then into the light came the figure of a man. Another followed, another, and another, passing again into the dark and then out into the brightness that led into the little gully far beyond. There was no sound except the baying of the dog; the figures went on, noiseless and orderly and grim, from dark to light and from light again to dark. There were at most a dozen men, and they might have been a band of belated workmen returning to their homes or a line of revellers that had been sobered into silence. They might have been—but a sudden recollection came to him, and he closed the door softly and went out. There was but one thing that it meant; this he knew. It meant a midnight attack on the gaol, and a man dead before morning, who must die anyway—it meant vengeance so quiet yet so determined that it was as sure as the hand of God—and it meant the defiance of laws whose guardian he was.

He broke into a run, crossing the green and following the path that rose and fell into the gullies as it led on to the gaol. As he ran he saw the glow of the night-lamp in the sick-room, and he heard the insistent baying of the hound.

The moonlight was thick and full. It showed the quiet hill flanked by the open pasture; and it showed the little whitewashed gaol, and the late roses blooming on the fence. It showed also the mob that had gathered—a gathering as quiet as a congregation at prayer. But in the silence was the danger—the determination to act that choked back speech—the grimness of the justice that walks at night—the triumph of a lawless rage that knows control.

As he reached the hill he saw that the men he had followed had been enforced by others from different roads. It was not an outbreak of swift desperation, but a well-planned, well-ordered strategy; it was not a mob that he faced, but an incarnate vengeance.

He came upon it quickly, and as he did so he saw that the sheriff was ahead of him, standing, a single man, between his prisoner and the rope. "For God's sake, men, I haven't got the keys," he called out.

Nicholas swung himself over the fence and made his way to the entrance beneath the steps that led to the floor above. He had come as one of the men about him, and they had not heeded him. Now, as he faced them from the shadow he saw here and there a familiar face—the face of a boy he had played with in childhood. Several were masked, but the others raised bare features to the moonlight—features that were as familiar as his own.

Then he stood up and spoke. "Men, listen to me. In the name of the Law, I swear to you that justice shall be done—I swear."

A voice came from somewhere. "We ain't here to talk—you stand aside, and we'll show you what we're here for."

Again he began. "I swear to you—"

"We don't want no swearing." On the outskirts of the crowd a man laughed. "We don't want no swearing," the voice repeated.

The throng pressed forward, and he saw the faces that he knew crowding closer. A black cloud shut out the moonlight. Above the pleading of the sheriffs tones he heard the distant baying of the hound.

He tried to speak again. "We'll be damned, but we'll get the nigger!" called some one beside him. The words struck him like a blow. He saw red, and the sudden rage upheld him. He knew that he was to fight—a blind fight for he cared not what. The old savage instinct blazed within him—the instinct to do battle to death—to throttle with, his single hand the odds that opposed. With a grip of iron he braced himself against the doorway, covering the entrance.

"I'll be damned if you do!" he thundered.

A quick shot rang out sharply. The flash blinded him, and the smoke hung in his face. Then the moon shone and he heard a cry—the cry of a well-known voice.

"By God, it's Nick Burr!" it said. He took a step forward.

"Boys, I am Nick Burr," he cried, and he went down in the arms of the mob.

They raised him up, and he stood erect between the leaders. There was blood on his lips, but a man tore off a mask and wiped it away. "By God, it's Nick Burr!" he exclaimed as he did so.

Nicholas recognised his voice and smiled. His face was gray, but his eyes were shining, and as he steadied himself with all his strength, he said with a laugh. "There's no harm done, man." But when they laid him down a moment later he was dead.

He lay in the narrow path between the doorstep and the gate where roses bloomed. Some one had started for the nearest house, but the crowd stood motionless about him. "By God, it's Nick Burr!" repeated the man who had held him.

The sheriff knelt on the ground and raised him in his arms. As he folded his coat about him he looked up and spoke.

"And he died for a damned brute," was what he said.



VI

It was the afternoon of election day, and Eugenia sat in her drawing-room with Sally Bassett.

Outside there was the sound of tramping feet, for the people were giving him burial. They had been passing so for half an hour and they still went on, on, on—he was going to his grave in state.

"There are the drums," said Sally, turning her ear. "All Virginia has come to town, I believe. The whole city is in mourning, and by and by they will put up his statue in the Capitol Square—but if he had lived, would he have had the senatorship?"

"Ah, who knows?" said Eugenia. She played idly with the spoon of her teacup, her eyes on the coals.

"As you say—who knows?" murmured the other. "And, after all, it is perhaps better that he died just now. He would have tried to lift us too high, and we should have fallen back. He was a hero, and the public can't always keep to the heroic level."

There were tears in her voice.

Eugenia turned from her and said nothing.

After, Sally had gone she still sat with her cup in her hand before the fire. Her child was rolling on the floor at her feet, but she did not stoop to him. She was not thinking—she was merely resting from emotion—as she would rest for the remainder of her days.

The sound of tramping feet died away. The cars passed once more, and along the block a boy went whistling a tune. Everything was beginning again—everything would go on as it had gone since the dawn of time, and she would go with it. The best or the worst of it was that she would go happily—neither regretting nor despairing, but filled to the finger-tips with the cheerful energy of a busy life.

Suddenly she caught up her child with a frantic rapture and held him to her bosom, kissing the small hands that reached up to her lips. This was her portion, and even to-day she was content.

An hour later Dudley found her sitting there when he entered, and as he straightened himself against the mantel he looked down on her with an affectionate gaze.

"He was a great man," he said simply, and his generous spirit rang in his voice.

"Yes, he was a great man," repeated Eugenia. She looked up at her husband as he stood before her—buoyant with expectation, mellowed by the glow of assured success. He smiled into her face, and she smiled back again with quick tenderness. Then she bent above her child and kissed his lips, and the sunlight coming from the day without shone in her eyes.

THE END