Payne Erskine

“ That great youth ought to relieve her of such tasks. Where was he? Little did he dream that the eyes of the great youth were at that moment fixed darkly upon him from the small pane of glass set in under the cabin roof, which lighted Frale's garret room.
David stabled the horse in the log shed built by Doctor Hoyle for his own beast,—for what is life in the mountains without a horse,—then lingered awhile in his doorway looking out over the billows of ranges seen dimly through the fine veil of the falling rain. ”

“ It was done, and Frale looked at his hands helplessly, feeling himself a second time a murderer. Yet he was in no way more to blame for the first than for this. As yet a boy untaught by life, he had not learned what to do with the forces within him. They rose up madly and mastered him. With a man's power to love and hate, a man's instincts, his untamed nature ready to assert itself for tenderness or cruelty, without a man's knowledge of the necessity for self-control, where some of his kind would have been inert and listless, his inheritance had made him intense and fierce. ”

“ He had gone out and seen men chasing phantoms and shadows thinking therein to find joy—joy—the need of the world—one in a coronet, one in a crown, and the beggar in a golden sovereign—while he—he had found it in his own heart and in Cassandra's eyes.
David had passed the Fall Place, seeing no one; for the widow had ridden over to spend the day with Sally Carew, her niece was in the spring-house skimming cream, while Cotton was dawdling in the corn patch whistling and pulling the ripened ears from the stalks. ”

“ Somehow our viewpoints have got mixed. Sacrifice myself? Why, Cassandra, if I were to lose you out of my life, I should be a broken-hearted man. What did I sacrifice? Phantoms, vanities, and emptiness. Oh, Cassandra, Cassandra, my priestess of all that is good! Open your eyes, love, and see as I see—as you have taught me to see.
"Much that we strive for and reckon as gain is really worthless. Why, sweet, I would far, far rather have you at your loom for the mother of my son, than Lady Clara at her piano. ”

“ His appetite sharpened by the climb and the bracing air, David investigated the contents of one of those melon-shaped baskets which Cassandra had given him when he started for his new home that morning, with little Hoyle as his guide.
Ah, what hospitable kindness they had shown to him, a stranger! Here were delicate bits of fried chicken, sweet and white, corn-bread, a glass of honey, and a bottle of milk. Nothing better need a man ask; and what animals men are, after all, he thought, taking delight in the mere acts of eating and breathing and sleeping. ”

“ The argument for repentance having come back to him void, the bishop began again. "You tell me Cassandra has given you her promise? What are you going to do about it?"
"Hit's 'twixt her an' me," said the youth proudly.
"No," thundered the bishop, all the man in him roused to beat into this crude, triumphant animal some sense of what Cassandra had really done. "No. It's betwixt you and the God who made you. You have to answer to God for what you do." He towered above him, and bending down, looked into Frale's eyes until the boy cowered and looked down, with lowered head, and there was silence. ”

“ All was quiet and lonely around Carew's Crossing when Frale dropped from the train and struck off over the mountain. Soon there would be bustle and stir and life about the place, for the hotel would be open and people would be crowding in, some to escape the heat of the far South and the low countries, some from the cities either North or South to whom the bracing air of the mountains would bring renewed vitality—business men with shattered nerves and women whose high play during the winter at the game of social life had left them nervous wrecks. ”

“ Ere long such a spring as David had never dreamed of swept up the mountain, with a charm so surpassing and transcending any imagined beauty that he was filled with a sort of ecstasy. He was constantly out upon the hills revelling in the lavish bounty of earth and sky, of rushing waters, and all the subtile changes in growing things, as if at last he had been clasped to the heart of nature. He visited the cabins wherever he was called, and when there was need for Cassandra's ministrations he often took her with him ”

“ Was it right, Doctor? Was there no other way?" she wailed.
"As far as human knowledge goes, there was no other way. Listen, Miss Cassandra, I have been where such accidents were frequent. Many a man's leg have I taken off. Surgery is my work in life—don't be horrified. I chose it because I wished to be a saver of life and a helper of my fellows." She was shivering more from the nervous reaction than from the cold, and to David it seemed as if she were trying to draw farther away from him. ”

“ She spoke dreamily and with the same look of seeing things beyond, except that now she fixed her eyes, not on the mountain top, but on his own.
"Is it in my eyes you see the long path of light? Are we together in it? I see you always with the light about you. I saw you so first in your own home before the blazing fire—such a hearth fire as I had never seen before. You have appeared to me in my dreams with light about you ever since, and in my visions when I have been riding over these hills alone. ”

“ She'll never say a word, but that's what she'll do."
"Why, Doctor!" cried David, appalled. "I love her as my own life—my very soul."
"Of—of course. That goes without saying. We all do, we men, but we—damn it all! Do you suppose I've lived all these years and not seen? Why—we think of ourselves first every time. D—don't we, though? Rather!"
"But selfish as we are, we can love—a man can, if he sets himself to it honestly,—love a woman and make her happy, even without the appreciation of others, in spite of environment,—everything. It's the destiny of women to love us, thank God. ”

“ CHAPTER XXXII IN WHICH CASSANDRA BRINGS THE HEIR OF DANESHEAD CASTLE BACK TO HER HILLTOP, AND THE SHADOW LIFTS
"Cassandry Merlin, whar did you drap from?" cried the Widow Farwell, as she looked up from the supper she was preparing at the great fireplace, and saw her daughter in the doorway with her baby. Her old face radiated light and warmth and love as she took them both in her arms. "Whar's David?"
Cassandra smiled wearily, returning her mother's kiss and yielding her the baby. "You'll have to be satisfied with me and little son, mother. David was still in Africa, so I came home again." ”

“ Cassandra stiffened proudly and drew away, taking up her shuttle and beginning her work calmly as if nothing had happened to destroy her composure.
"I've not written David—anything to disturb him—or make him hurry home."
"Oh, Cassandra, Cassandra! You're not treating either him or yourself fairly."
"For him—I can't help it; and for me, I don't care. Other women have got along as best they could in these mountains, and I can bear what they have borne." ”

“ In spite of her calmness, Cassandra lay wakeful and patient, and when at last she did sleep, it seemed to her she stood with her husband on her father's path, looking out under overarching boughs, upon blue distances of heaped-up mountain tops, and David's flute notes, silvery sweet, were raining down upon her. She awoke to discover day was breaking, and a pealing of bells from some distant church tower was announcing the fact.
She gathered her babe to her throbbing heart and thought, to-day she was to go out and meet her husband's people. How should she go? How should she conduct herself? ”

“ Stretton.
"I can write to Cassandra. She will understand more easily than my mother. She sees into the heart of things. Her thoughts go to the truth like arrows of light. She will see that I must go, but she must never know—I must save her from it if I have to do so at the expense of my own soul—that the reason I cannot take her with me now is that our great friends over there are too small to understand her nature and might despise her. ”

“ All will be yours, whatever you see and touch in those stately homes—for you will be the Lady Thryng, and, being the Lady Thryng, you will be no more wonderful or beautiful than you were when you climbed to me, following my flute notes, or when you bent between me and the fire preparing my supper, or when you were weaving at your loom, or when you came to me from our cabin door with your arms outstretched and the light of all the stars of heaven in your eyes. ”

“ Had the youth been a trained wrestler, David would have known what to expect, and would have been able to use method in his defence. As it was, he had to deal with an enraged creature who fought with the desperate instinct of an antagonist who fights to the death. He knew that the odds were against him, and felt rising within him a wild determination to win the combat, and, thinking only of Cassandra, to settle thus the vexed question, to fight with the blind passion and the primitive right of the strongest to win his mate. ”

“ Old Time, the unfailing, who always marches apace, bringing with him changes for good or evil, brought the dear old doctor back to the Fall Place—brought the small Adam Hoyle, with his queer little twisted neck and hunched back, drawn by harness and plaster into a much improved condition, although not straight yet—brought many letters from David filled with postponements and regrets therefor—and brought also a little son for Cassandra to hold to her bosom and dream and pray over. ”

“ Betty Towers, intent on her sewing, felt the thrill that intensified David's tone, and she, too, thought of Cassandra. She dropped her work in her lap and looked earnestly in her husband's face.
"James, I feel just as Doctor Thryng does—when I think of some things. When I see a tragedy coming to a human soul, I feel that a lifetime of transitory things like that is hard to endure. Fancy, James! Think of Cassandra. You know her, Doctor Thryng, of course. They live just below your place. She is the Widow Farwell's daughter, but her name is Merlin." ”

“ Then they were silent, a long silence, until, seated together in their cabin before a bright log fire, as she held their baby to her breast, Cassandra broke the stillness.
"Now I see it better, David. As you came here and lived my life, and loved me just as I was—so to be truly one, I must go with you and live your life. I must not fail you there."
"You have been tried as by fire and have not failed—nor are you the kind of woman who ever fails." ”

“ How came Cassandra there listening? He could stand this mystery no longer—and he cried out to her.
"Cass, hear. Listen to that."
"Yes, Frale." She spoke wearily, but did not pause.
"Wait, Cass. What be hit, ye reckon? Hit sure hain't no fiddle. Thar! Heark to hit. Whar be hit at?"
"I reckon it's up yonder at Doctor Thryng's cabin. He has a little pipe like, that he blows on and it makes music like that." ”

“ Having learned not to expect any response to remarks not absolutely demanding one, and not wishing the silence to dominate, David talked on, as he led Frale into the cabin and carefully closed the door behind them.
Thryng's intuition was subtle and his nature intense and strong. He had been used to dealing with men, and knew that when he wished to, he usually gained his point. Feeling the antagonism in Frale's heart toward himself, he determined to overcome it. Be it pride, jealousy, or what not, it must give way. ”

“ She glanced back at him and smiled. "I reckon you find it hard because you are not used to living like we do; we're soon there now, see yonder?"
A turn in the path brought them in sight of the cabin, set in its bare, desolate patch of red soil. About the door swarmed unkempt children of all sizes, as bees hang out of an over-filled hive, the largest not more than twelve years old, and the youngest carried on the mother's arm. It was David's first visit to one of the poorest of the mountain homes, and he surveyed the scene before him with dismay. ”

“ They talked late that night of Hoyle and his future, but never a word more of David. The old man thought he now understood her feeling, and respected it. She certainly had a right to one small weakness, this strong fair creature of the hills. Her husband must release himself from his absorbing cares and return simply for love of her—not at the call of his baby's wail.
So the doctor and his diminutive namesake drove contentedly away next morning in the great covered wagon, and Cassandra, standing by her mother's door, smiled and lifted her baby for one last embrace from his loving little uncle. ”

“ He lifted his head and saw Frale's eyes fixed upon him sadly—almost as if he knew the bishop's thoughts. Yes, here was a soul worth while. Plainly there was but one course to pursue, and but one thread left to hold the young man to steadfast purpose. Using that thread, he would try. If he could be made to sacrifice for Cassandra some of his physical joy of life, seeking to give more than to appropriate to himself for his own satisfaction—if he could teach him the value of what she had done—could he rise to such a height, and learn self-control? ”

“ Sometimes the little log house would be perched like a lonely eagle's nest on a mere shelflike ledge jutting out from the mountain wall, but always below it or above it or off at one side he found the inevitable pocket of rich soil accumulated by the wash of years, where enough corn and cow-peas could be raised for cattle, and cotton and a few sheep to provide material for clothing the family, with a few fowls and pigs to provide their food. ”

“ I didn't want you to see all I saw, David. I don't know how comes it, but all the [Pg 205] time, even in the midst of our great gladness—right when it is most beautiful—far before me, right across our way, is a place that is dim. It seems 'most like the shadows that fall on the hills when those great piles of clouds pass through the sky, when it is deep blue all around them and the sun shines everywhere else."
"Your soul is still an undiscovered country to me, Cassandra."
"I should think you'd like that. Don't men love to go discovering? ”

“ Under the great holly tree in the shadows Cassandra sat, watching, as he watched, the crescent moon and the lone star sailing in the pale amber light, with the deepening purple mountain hiding the dim distance below them. Often in the early evening when her mother and Hoyle were sleeping, she would climb up here to pray for Frale that he might truly repent, and for herself that she might [Pg 112] be strong in her purpose to give up all her cherished hopes and plans, if thereby she might save him from his own wild, reckless self. ”

“ The long trestle crossed, the engines labored slowly upward for a time, then, turning a sharp curve, began to descend, tearing along the narrow track with a speed that caused the coaches to rock and sway; and thus they reached Carew's Crossing, dropping down to it like a rushing torrent.
Immediately Thryng found himself deposited in the melting snow some distance from the station platform, and at the same instant, above the noise of the retreating train, he heard a cry: "Oh, suh, help him, help him! It's poor little Hoyle!" ”

“ Even here in the wild he found them, evil and unwholesome, clinging to the well and strong, slowly but surely sapping the vitality of those who gave them life. Every evil, he thought, must, in the economy of nature, have its antidote. So, with the ardor of the scientist, he divided with care the nasty, pasty growth he had found and prepared his plates. Systematically he made drawings and notes as he studied the magnified atoms beneath his powerful lens, and while he sat absorbed in his work, Hoyle's childish voice piped at him from the doorway.
"Howdy, Doctah Thryng." ”