The Storm Centre.

by Charles Egbert Craddock.

CHAPTER I

The place reminded him then and later of the storm centre of a cyclone.

Outside the tempests of Civil War raged. He could hear, as he sat in the quiet, book-lined room, the turbulent drums fitfully beating in tented camps far down the Tennessee River. Through the broad, old-fashioned window he saw the purple hills opposite begin to glow with a myriad of golden gleams, pulsing like fireflies, that told of thousands of troops in bivouac. He read the mystic message of the signal lights, shining with a different l.u.s.tre, moving athwart the eminence, then back again, expunged in blackness as a fort across the river flashed out an answer.

A military band was playing at headquarters, down in the night-begloomed town, and now and again the great blare of the bra.s.ses came widely surging on the raw vernal gusts. In the shadowy grove in front of this suburban home his own battery of horse-artillery was parked. It had earlier made its way over many an obstacle, and, oddly enough, through its agency he was recently enabled to penetrate the exclusive reserve of this Southern household, always. .h.i.therto coldly aloof and averse to the invader.

He had chanced to send a pencilled message on his card to the mansion.

It merely expressed a warning to lift the sashes of the windows during the trial practice of a new gun, lest in the firing the gla.s.s be shattered by the concussion of the air. His name was unusual, and seeing it on the card recalled many pleasant reminiscences to the mind of old Judge Roscoe. Another "Fluellen Baynell" had been his college chum, and inquiry developed the fact that this Federal captain of artillery was the son of this ancient friend. An interchange of calls ensued. And here sat Captain Baynell in the storm centre, the quiet of evening closing in, the lamp on the table serenely aglow, the wood fire flashing on the high bra.s.s andirons and fender, the lion delineated on the velvet rug respectfully crouching beneath his feet. But in this suave environment he was beginning to feel somewhat embarra.s.sed, for the old colored servant who had admitted him and replenished the fire, and whom he had politely greeted as "Uncle Ephraim," in deference to his age, now loitered, volubly criticising the unseen, unknown inmates of the house, who would probably overhear, for at any moment the big oak door might usher them into the room.

His excuses for his master's delay to appear absorbed but little time, and he a.s.siduously brushed the polished stone hearth with a turkey wing to justify his lingering in conversation with the guest. Unexpected business had called Judge Roscoe to the town, thus preventing him from being present upon the arrival of Captain Baynell, invited to partake of tea _en famille_.

"But den, he 'lowed dat Miss Leonora--dat's Mrs. Gwynn, his niece, a widder 'oman--would be ready, but Marster mought hev' knowed dat Miss Leonora ain't never ready for nuffin till day arter ter-morrow! Den dere's de ladies--dey hes been dressin' fur ye fur better dan an hour.

But shucks! de ladies is so vain dat dey is jus' ez liable ter keep on dressin' fur anodder hour yit!"

This was indubitably flattering information; but Captain Baynell, a blond man of thirty, of a military stiffness in his brilliant uniform, and of a most uncompromising dignity, glanced with an uneasy monition at the door, a trifle ajar. He was sensible, notwithstanding, of an unusually genial glow of expectation. The rude society of camps was unacceptable to a man of his exacting temperament, and, the sentiment of the country being so adverse to the cause he represented, he had had scant opportunities here to enter social circles of the grade that would elsewhere have welcomed him. He had not adequately realized how he had missed these refinements and felt the deprivation of his isolation till the moment of meeting the ladies of Judge Roscoe's household was at hand. He had hardly expected, however, to create so great a flutter amongst them, and he was at once secretly elated and disdainful.

Although a stranger to the ladies, the officer was well known to the old servant. The guns had hardly been unlimbered in the beautiful grove in front of the house ere the ancient slave had appeared in the camp to express his ebullient patriotism, to thank his liberators for his freedom,--for this was the result of the advance of the Federal army, a military measure and not as yet a legal enactment.

Despite his exuberant rhetoric, there was something tenuous about his fervent protestations, and the fact that he still adhered to his master's service suggested a devotion to the old rgime incongruous with his loudly proclaimed welcome of the new day.

"Why don't you leave your servitude, then, Uncle Ephraim?" one of the younger officers had tentatively asked him.

"Dat is jes' whut I say!" diplomatically replied Uncle Ephraim, who thus came to be called "the double-faced Ja.n.u.s."

Now indeed, instead of a vaunt of liberty, he was disposed to apologize, for the sake of the credit of the house, that there were no more slaves to make a braver show in servitude.

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

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

"Me an' my wife is all de servants dey got now--she's Chaney, de cook in de kitchen. Dey hatter scuse me, fur I never waited in de house afore.

No, sah! jes' a wuckin' hand; jes' a cawnfield hand, out'n de cawnfield straight!"

Whisk went the turkey wing.

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

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

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

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

"She could hev' married my Marster's son, Julius, an' him de flower ob de flock! But no! She jus' would marry dis yere Gwynn feller, whut n.o.body wanted her ter marry, an' eloped wid him--she did! An' sh.o.r.e 'nuff, dey do say he pulled her round de house by de hair ob her head, dough some 'lows he jus' bruk a chair ober her head!"

The officer was a brave man, but now he was in the extremity of panic.

What if some one were at the door on the point of entering?--the "widder 'oman" herself, for instance!

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

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

He interpolated an explanation of his diligence. "I don't want Miss Leonora--dat's de widder 'oman--ter be remarkin' on it. n.o.body kin do nuthin' ter suit her but Chaney, dis cook dey got, who belong ter Miss Leonora, an' befo' de War used ter be her waitin'-'oman. Chaney is all de estate Miss Leonora hes got lef,--an' ye know dat sort o' property ain't wurf much in dis happy day o' freedom. Miss Leonora wuz rich once in her own right. But she flung her marriage-settlements--dat dey had fixed to tie up her property so Gwynn couldn't sell it nor waste it--right inter de fiah! She declared she would marry a man whut she could trust wid her fortune! An'," the narrator concluded his story impressively, "when dat man died--his horse throwed him an' bruk his neck--I wondered dey didn't beat de drum fur joy, 'twuz sich a crownin'

mercy! But he hed spent all her fortune 'fore he went!"

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

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

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

"I had hoped my niece, Mrs. Gwynn, might have been here to save you a dull half hour, or perhaps my granddaughters--where are the ladies and Mrs. Gwynn, Ephraim?" he broke off to ask of "the double-faced Ja.n.u.s,"

scuttling out with his basket of chips and his turkey wing.

"De ladies is dressin' ter see de company," replied Ja.n.u.s, with a grin wide enough to decorate both his faces. "Miss Leonora, she is helpin'

'em!"

Captain Baynell experienced renewed embarra.s.sment, but Judge Roscoe laughed with obvious relish.

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

The phrase "the ladies and Mrs. Gwynn" grated on Captain Baynell. It seemed incongruous with the punctilious old Southern gentleman to make a discourteous distinction thus between his granddaughters and his niece.

Baynell dated his sympathy with her from that moment. However old and faded and reduced the house-keeperish "widder 'oman" might be, it was an affront to thus segregate her. He felt an antagonism toward "the ladies"

in their exclusive aristocratic designation even before he heard the first dainty touch of their slippered feet upon the great stairway, or a gush of fairylike treble laughter. As a silken rustle along the hall heralded their bedizened approach, he arose ceremoniously to greet them.

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

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

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

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

Indeed, he might have forgotten it within the hour had naught else riveted his attention to the house. He had begun to look forward to a dull evening,--the reaction from the expectation of charming feminine society of a congenial age. "The ladies" failed in that particular, lovely though they were in the quaint costumes of the day, the golden-haired twins respectively in faint blue and dark red "satin faced" merino, the brown-haired child in rich orange. Over their bodices all three wore sheer spencers of embroidered Swiss muslin, with embroidered ruffles below the waist line. This was encircled with silken sashes, the tint of their gowns. The skirts were short, showing long, white, clocked stockings and red morocco slippers with elastic crossing the instep. The trio were swift in making advances into friendship, and soon were swarming about the officer, counting his shining b.u.t.tons with great particularity, and squealing with greedy delight when an unexpected row was discovered on the seam of each of his sleeves.

As the door again opened, the very aspect of the room altered--a new presence pervaded the life of Fluellen Baynell that made the idea of strife indeed alien, aloof; the past a forgotten trifle; the future remote, in indifferent abeyance, and the momentous present the chief experience of his existence. It was partially the effect of surprise, although other elements exerted a potent influence.

Instead of the forlorn, faded "widder 'oman" of his fancy, there appeared a girlish shape, whose young, fair face was a magnet to all the romance within him. What mattered it with such beauty that the expression was a dreary la.s.situde, the pose indifference, the garb a shabby black dress worn with no touch of distinction, no thought, no care for appearances. As he rose, with "the ladies" affectionately clinging about him, and bowed low in the moment of introduction, his searching eyes discerned every minute detail. It was like a sun picture upon his consciousness, realized and fixed in his mind as if he had known it forever. And with a sudden ign.o.ble recollection his face flushed from his forehead to his high military collar. Was it her hair, the old gossip had said, or was it a chair?

It was impossible to look at her without noticing her hair. A rich, golden brown, it waved back from her white brow in heavy undulations, caught and coiled in a great glittering knot at the back of her head, with no ornament, simplicity itself. Certainly, he reflected, no preparations were in progress in this quarter for his captivation. One of the ready-made c.r.a.pe collars of the period was about her neck, the delicate, fine contour of her throat displayed by the cut of her dress.

Her luminous gray eyes, with their long black lashes, cast upon him a mere glance, cool, casual, unfriendly, it might even seem, if it were worth her languid while.

He sought to win her to some demonstration of interest when they were presently at table, with old Ja.n.u.s skirmishing about the dining room with a silver salver, hindering the meal rather than serving it. Only conventional courtesy characterized her, although she gave Baynell a radiant smile when offering a second cup of tea; an official smile, so to speak, strictly appertaining to her pose as hostess, as she sat behind the ma.s.sive silver tea service that had been in the Roscoe family for many years.