Books: The Heart Of The Hills
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John Fox, Jr. >> The Heart Of The Hills
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Her voice broke again, and the colonel silenced her by putting one
hand comfortingly on her knee and by keeping still himself. His
shoulders drooped a little as they walked from the stile toward
the house, and Marjorie ran her arm through his:
"Why, you're a little tired, aren't you, Uncle Bob?" she said
tenderly, and he did not answer except to pat her hand, against
which she suddenly felt his heart throb. He almost stumbled going
up the steps, and deadly pale he sank with a muffled groan into a
chair. With a cry the girl darted for a glass of water, but when
she came back, terrified, he was smiling:
"I'm all right--don't worry. I thought thas sun to-day was going
to be too much for me."
But still Marjorie watched him anxiously, and when the color came
back to his face she went behind him and wrapped her arms about
his neck and put her mouth to his ear:
"I'm just a plain little fool, Uncle Bob, and, as Gray says, I
talk through my aigrette. Now, don't you and mother worry--don't
worry the least little bit," and she tightened her arms and kissed
him several times on his forehead and cheek. "I must go now--and
if you don't take better care of yourself I'm going to come over
here and take care of you myself."
She was in front of him now and looking down fondly; and a
wistfulness that was almost childlike had come into the colonel's
face:
"I wish you could, little Marjorie--I wish you would."
He watched her gallop away--turning to wave her whip to him as she
went over the slope, her tears gone and once more radiant and gay-
-and the sadness of the coming twilight slowly overspread the
colonel's face. It was the one hope of his life that she would one
day come over to take care of him--and Gray. On into the twilight
he sat still and thoughtful. It looked serious for her and Gray.
Back his mind flashed to that night of the dance in the mountains,
when the four were children, and his wonder then as to what might
take place if that mountain boy and girl should have the chance in
the world that had already come to them. He began to wonder how
much of her real feeling Marjorie might have concealed--how much
Gray in his letters was keeping back of his. Such a union was
preposterous. He realized too late now the danger to youth of
simple proximity--he knew the exquisite sensitiveness of Gray in
any matter that meant consideration for others and for his own
honor, the generous warmhearted impulsiveness of Marjorie, and the
appeal that any romantic element in the situation would make to
them both. Perhaps he ought to go to the mountains. There was much
he might say to Gray, but what to Jason, or to Marjorie, with that
life-absorbing motive of his own--and his affairs at such a
crisis? The colonel shook his head helplessly. He was very tired,
and wished he could put the matter off till morning when he was
rested and his head was clear, but the questions had sunk talons
into his heart and brain that would not be unloosed, and the
colonel rose wearily and went within.
Marjorie looked serious after she told her mother that night that
she feared her uncle was not well, for Mrs. Pendleton became very
grave:
"Your Uncle Robert is very far from well. I'm afraid sometimes he
is sicker than any of us know."
"Mother!"
"And he is in great trouble, Marjorie."
The girl hesitated:
"Money trouble, mother?" she asked at last, "Why, you--we--why
don't--"
The mother interrupted with a shake of her head:
"He would go bankrupt first."
"Mother?"
The older woman looked up with apprehension, so suddenly charged
with an incredible something was the girl's tone:
"Why don't you marry Uncle Robert?"
The mother clutched at her heart with both hands, for an actual
spasm caught her there. Every trace of color shot from her face,
and with a rush came back--fire. She rose, gave her daughter one
look that was almost terror, and quickly left the room.
Marjorie sat aghast. She had caught with careless hand the veil of
some mystery--what long-hidden shrine was there behind it, what
sacred deeps long still had she stirred?
XXXVIII
Jason Hawn rode rapidly to one of Morton Sanders' great stables,
put his horse away himself, and, avoiding the chance of meeting
John Burnham, slipped down the slope to the creek, crossed on a
water gap, and struck across the sunset fields for home. He had
felt no anger at Marjorie's mysterious outbreak--only
bewilderment; and only bewilderment he felt now.
But as he strode along with his eyes on the ground, things began
to clear a little. The fact was that, as he had become more
enthralled by the girl's witcheries, the more helpless and stupid
he had become. Marjorie's nimble wit had played about his that
afternoon like a humming-bird around a sullen sunflower. He hardly
knew that every word, every glance, every gesture was a challenge,
and when she began stinging into him sharp little arrows of taunt
and sarcasm he was helpless as the bull's-hide target at which the
two sometimes practised archery. Even now when the poisoned points
began to fester, he could stir himself to no anger--he only felt
dazed and hurt and sore. Nobody was in sight when he reached his
mother's home and he sat down on the porch in the twilight
wretched and miserable. Around the corner of the house presently
he heard his mother and Steve coming, and around there they
stopped for some reason for a moment.
"I seed Babe Honeycutt yestiddy," Steve was saying. "He says
thar's a lot o' talk goin' on about Mavis an' Gray Pendleton. The
Honeycutts air doin' most o' the talkin' an' looks like the ole
trouble's comin' up again. Old Jason is tearin' mad an' swears
Gray'll have to git out o' them mountains--"
Jason heard them start moving and he rose and went quickly within
that they might know he had overheard. After supper he was again
on the porch brooding about Mavis and Gray when his mother came
out. He knew that she wanted to say something, and he waited.
"Jason," she said finally, "you don't believe Colonel Pendleton
cheated Steve--do you?"
"No," said the lad sharply. "Colonel Pendleton never cheated
anybody in his life--except himself."
"That's all I wanted to know," she sighed, but Jason knew that was
not all she wanted to say.
"Jason, I heerd two fellers in the lane to-day' talkin' about
tearin' up Colonel Pendleton's tobacco beds."
The boy was startled, but he did not show it.
"Nothin' but talk, I reckon."
"Well, if I was in his place I'd git some guards."
Marjorie sat at her window a long time that night before she went
to sleep. Her mother had come in, had held her tightly to her
breast, and had gone out with only a whispered good-night. And
while the girl was wondering once more at the strange effect of
her naive question, she recalled suddenly the yearning look of her
uncle that afternoon when she had mentioned Gray's name. Could
there be some thwarted hope in the lives of Gray's father and her
mother that both were now trying to realize in the lives of her
and Gray? Her mother had never spoken her wish, nor doubtless
Gray's father to him--nor was it necessary, for as children they
had decided the question themselves, as had Mavis and Jason Hawn,
and had talked about it with the same frankness, though with each
pair alike the matter had not been mentioned for a long time. Then
her mind leaped, and after it leaped her heart--if her Uncle
Robert would not let her mother help him, why, she too could never
help Gray, unless--why, of course, if Gray were in trouble she
would marry him and give him everything she had. The thought made
her glow, and she began to wish Gray would come home. He had been
a long time in those hills, his father was sick and worried--and
what was he doing down there anyhow? He had mentioned Mavis often
in his first letters, and now he wrote rarely, and he never spoke
of her at all. She began to get resentful and indignant, not only
at him but at Mavis, and she went to bed wishing more than ever
that Gray would come home. And yet playing around in her brain was
her last vision of that mountain boy standing before her, white
and silent--"like a gentleman"--and that vision would not pass
even in her dreams.
Through Colonel Pendleton's bed-room window an hour later two
pistol shots rang sharply, and through that window the colonel saw
a man leap the fence around his tobacco beds and streak for the
woods. From the shadow of a tree at his yard fence another flame
burst, and by its light he saw a crouching figure. He called out
sharply, the figure rose and came toward him, and in the moonlight
the colonel saw uplifted to him, apologetic and half shamed, the
face of Jason Hawn.
"No harm, colonel," he called. "Somebody was tearing up your
tobacco beds and I just scared him off. I didn't try to hit him."
The colonel was dazed, but he spoke at last gently.
"Well, well, I can't let you lose your sleep this way, Jason; I'll
get some guards now."
"If you won't let me," said the boy quickly, "you ought to send
for Gray."
The old gentleman looked thoughtful.
"Of course, perhaps I ought--why, I will."
"He won't come again to-night," said Jason. "I shot close enough
to scare him, I reckon, Good-night, colonel."
"Thank you, my boy--good-night."
XXXIX
It was court day at the county-seat. A Honeycutt had shot down a
Hawn in the open street, had escaped, and a Hawn posse was after
him. The incident was really a far effect of the recent news that
Jason Hawn was soon coming back home--and coming back to live.
Straightway the professional sneaks and scandal-mongers of both
factions got busy to such purpose that the Honeycutts were ready
to believe that the sole purpose of Jason's return was to revive
the feud and incidentally square a personal account with little
Aaron. Old Jason Hawn had started home that afternoon almost
apoplectic with rage, for word had been brought him that little
Aaron had openly said that it was high time that Jason Hawn came
home to look after his cousin and Gray Pendleton went home to take
care of his. It was a double insult, and to the old man's mind
subtly charged with a low meaning. Old as he was, he had tried to
find little Aaron, but the boy had left town.
Gray and Mavis were seated on the old man's porch when he came in
sight of his house, for it was Saturday, and Mavis started the
moment she saw her grandfather's face, and rose to meet him.
"What's the matter, grandpap?" The old man waved her back. "Git
back inter the house," he commanded shortly. "No--stay whar you
air. When do you two aim to git married?" Had a bolt of lightning
flashed through the narrow sunlit space between him and them, the
pair could not have been more startled, blinded. Mavis flushed
angrily, paled, and wheeled into the house. Gray rose in physical
response to the physical threat in the old man's tone and
fearlessly met the eyes that were glaring at him.
"I don't know what you mean, Mr. Hawn," he said respectfully. "I--
"
"The hell you don't," broke in the old man furiously. "I'll give
ye jes two minutes to hit the road and git a license. I'll give ye
an hour an' a half to git back. An' if you don't come back I'll
make Jason foller you to the mouth o' the pit o' hell an' bring ye
back alive or dead." Again the boy tried to speak, but the old man
would not listen.
"Git!" he cried, and, as the boy still made no move, old Jason
hurried on trembling legs into the house. Gray heard him cursing
and searching inside, and at the corner of the house appeared
Mavis with both of the old man's pistols and his Winchester.
"Go on, Gray," she said, and her face was still red with shame.
"You'll only make him worse, an' he'll kill you sure."
Gray shook his head: "No!"
"Please, Gray," she pleaded; "for God's sake--for my sake."
That the boy could not withstand. He started for the gate with his
hat in hand--is head high, and, as he slowly passed through the
gate and turned, the old man reappeared, looked fiercely after
him, and sank into a chair sick with rage and trembling. As Mavis
walked toward him with his weapons he glared at her, but she
passed him by as though she did not see him, and put the
Winchester and pistols in their accustomed places. She came out
with her bonnet in her hand, and already her calmness and her
silence had each had its effect--old Jason was still trembling,
but from his eyes the rage was gone.
"I'm goin' home, grandpap," she said quietly, "an' if it wasn't
for grandma I wouldn't come back. You've been bullyin' an' rough-
ridin' over men-folks and women-folks all your life, but you can't
do it no more with ME. An' you're not goin' to meddle in MY
business any more. You know I'm a good girl--why didn't you go
after the folks who've been talkin' instead o' pitchin' into Gray?
You know he'd die before he'd harm a hair o' my head or allow you
or anybody else to say anything against my good name. An' I tell
you to your face"--her tone fiercened suddenly--"if you hadn't 'a'
been an old man an' my grandfather, he'd 'a' killed you right
here. An' I'm goin' to tell you something more. He ain't
responsible for this talk--_I_ am. He didn't know it was goin' on-
-_I_ did. I'm not goin' to marry him to please you an' the
miserable tattletales you've been listenin' to. I reckon _I_ ain't
good enough--but I KNOW my kinfolks ain't fit to be his--even by
marriage. My daddy ain't, an' YOU ain't, an' there ain't but one
o' the whole o' our tribe who is--an' that's little Jason Hawn.
Now you let him alone an' you let me alone."
She put her bonnet on, flashed to the gate, and disappeared in the
dusk down the road. The old man's shaggy head had dropped forward
on his chest, he had shrunk down in his chair bewildered, and he
sat there a helpless, unanswering heap. When the moon rose, Mavis
was seated on the porch with her chin in both hands. The old
circuit rider and his wife had gone to bed. A whippoorwill was
crying with plaintive persistence far up a ravine, and the night
was deep and still about her, save for the droning of insect life
from the gloomy woods. Straight above her stars glowed thickly,
and in a gap of the hills beyond the river, where the sun had gone
down, the evening star still hung like a great jewel on the
velvety violet curtain of the night, and upon that her eyes were
fixed. On the spur above, her keen ears caught the soft thud of a
foot against a stone, and her heart answered. She heard a quick
leap across the branch, the sound of a familiar stride along the
road, and saw the quick coming of a familiar figure along the edge
of the moonlight, but she sat where she was and as she was until
Gray, with hat in hand, stood before her, and then only did she
lift to him eyes that were dark as the night but shining like that
sinking star in the little gap. The boy went down on one knee
before her, and gently pulled both of her, hands away from her
face with both his own, and held them tightly.
"Mavis," he said, "I want you to marry me--won't you, Mavis?"
The girl showed no surprise, said nothing--she only disengaged her
hands, took his face into them, and looked with unwavering silence
deep into his eyes, looked until he saw that the truth was known
in hers, and then he dropped his face into her lap and she put her
hands on his head and bent over him, so that her heart beat with
the throbbing at his temples. For a moment she held him as though
she were shielding him from every threatening danger, and then she
lifted his face again.
"No, Gray--it won't do--hush, now." She paused a moment to get
self-control, and then she went on rapidly, as though what she had
to say had been long prepared and repeated to herself many times:
"I knew you were coming to-night. I know why you were so late. I
know why you came. Hush, now--I know all that, too. Why, Gray,
ever since I saw you the first time--you remember?--why, it seems
to me that ever since then, even, I've been thinkin' o' this very
hour. All the time I was goin' to school when I first went to the
Blue-grass, when I was walkin' in the fields and workin' around
the house and always lookin' to the road to see you passin' by--I
was thinkin', thinkin' all the time. It seems to me every night of
my life I went to sleep thinkin'--I was alone so much and I was so
lonely. It was all mighty puzzlin' to me, but that time you didn't
take me to that dance--hush now--I began to understand. I told
Jason an' he only got mad. He didn't understand, for he was wilful
and he was a man, and men don't somehow seem to see and take
things like women--they just want to go ahead and make them the
way they want them. But I understood right then. And then when I
come here the thinkin' started all over again differently when I
was goin' back and forwards from school and walkin' around in the
woods and listenin' to the wood-thrushes, and sittin' here in the
porch at night alone and lyin' up in the loft there lookin' out of
the little window. And when I heard you were comin' here I got to
thinkin' differently, because I got to hopin' differently and
wonderin' if some miracle mightn't yet happen in this world once
more. But I watched you here, and the more I watched you, the more
I began to go back and think as I used to think. Your people ain't
mine, Gray, nor mine yours, and they won't benot in our lifetime.
I've seen you shrinkin' when you've been with me in the houses of
some of my own kin--shrinkin' at the table at grandpap's and here,
at the way folks eat an' live--shrinkin' at oaths and loud voices
and rough talk and liquor-drinkin' and all this talk about killin'
people, as though they were nothin' but hogs--shrinkin' at
everybody but me. If we stayed here, the time would come when
you'd be shrinkin' from me--don't now! But you ain't goin' to stay
here, Gray. I've heard Uncle Arch say you'd never make a business
man. You're too trustin', you've been a farmer and a gentleman for
too many generations. You're goin' back home--you've got to--some
day--I know that, and then the time would come when you'd be
ashamed of me if I went with you. It's the same way with Jason and
Marjorie. Jason will have to come back here--how do you suppose
Marjorie would feel here, bein' a woman, if you feel the way you
do, bein' a man? Why, the time would come when she'd be ashamed o'
him--only worse. It won't do, Gray." She turned his face toward
the gap in the hills.
"You see that star there? Well, that's your star, Gray. I named it
for you, and every night I've been lookin' out at it from my
window in the loft. And that's what you've been to me and what
Marjorie's been to Jason--just a star--a dream. We're not really
real to each other--you an' me--and Marjorie and Jason ain't. Only
Jason and I are real to each other and only you and Marjorie,
Jason and I have been worshippin' stars, and they've looked down
mighty kindly on us, so that they came mighty nigh foolin' us and
themselves. I read a book the other day that said ideals were
stars and were good to point the way, but that people needed lamps
to follow that way. It won't do, Gray. You are goin' back home to
carry a lamp for Marjorie, and maybe Jason'll come back to these
hills to carry a lantern for me."
Throughout the long speech the boy's eyes had never wavered from
hers. After one or two efforts to protest he had listened quite
intensely, marvelling at the startling revelation of such depths
of mind and heart-the startling penetration to the truth, for he
knew it was the truth. And when she rose he stayed where he was,
clinging to her hand, and kissing it reverently. He was speechless
even when, obeying the impulse of her hand, he rose in front of
her and she smiled gently.
"You don't have to say one word, Gray--I understand, bless your
dear, dear heart, I understand. Good-by, now." She stretched out
her hand, but his trembling lips and the wounded helplessness in
his eyes were too much for her, and she put her arms around him,
drew his head to her breast, and a tear followed her kiss to his
forehead. At the door she paused a moment.
"And until he comes," she half-whispered, "I reckon I'll keep my
lamp burning." Then she was gone.
Slowly the boy climbed back to the little house on the spur, and
to the porch, on which he sank wearily. While he and Marjorie and
Jason were blundering into a hopeless snarl of all their lives,
this mountain girl, alone with the hills and the night and the
stars, had alone found the truth--and she had pointed the way. The
camp lights twinkled below. The moon swam in majestic splendor
above. The evening star still hung above the little western gap in
the hills. It was his star; it was sinking fast: and she would
keep her lamp burning. When he climbed to his room, the cry of the
whippoorwill in the ravine came to him through his window--futile,
persistent, like a human wail for happiness. The boy went to his
knees at his bedside that night, and the prayer that went on high
from the depths of his heart was that God would bring the wish of
her heart to Mavis Hawn.
XL
Gray Pendleton was coming home. Like Jason, he, too, waited at the
little junction for dawn, and swept along the red edge of it, over
the yellow Kentucky River and through the blue-grass fields. Drawn
up at the station was his father's carriage and in it sat
Marjorie, with a radiant smile of welcome which gave way to sudden
tears when they clasped hands--tears that she did not try to
conceal. Uncle Robert was in bed, she said, and Gray did not
perceive any significance in the tone with which she added, that
her mother hardly ever left him. She did not know what the matter
was, but he was very pale, and he seemed to be growing weaker. The
doctor was cheery and hopeful, but her mother, she emphasized, was
most alarmed, and again Gray did not notice the girl's peculiar
tone. Nor did the colonel seem to be worried by the threats of the
night riders. It was Jason Hawn who was worried and had persuaded
the colonel to send for Gray. The girl halted when she spoke
Jason's name, and the boy looked up to find her face scarlet and
her eyes swerve suddenly from his to the passing fields. But as
quickly they swerved back to find Gray's face aflame with the
thought of Mavis. For a moment both looked straight ahead in
silence, and in that silence Marjorie became aware that Gray had
not asked about Jason, and Gray that Marjorie had not mentioned
Mavis's name. But now both made the omission good-and Gray spoke
first.
Mavis was well. She was still teaching school. She had lived a
life of pathetic loneliness, but she had developed in an amazing
way through that very fact, and she had grown very beautiful. She
had startled him by her insight into--he halted--into everything--
and how was Jason getting along? The girl had been listening,
covertly watching, and had grown quite calm. Jason, too, was well,
but he looked worried and overworked. His examinations were going
on now. He had written his graduating speech but had not shown it
to her, though he had said he would. Her mother and Uncle Robert
had grown very fond of him and admired him greatly, but lately she
had not seen him, he was so busy. Again there was a long silence
between them, but when they reached, the hill whence both their
homes were visible Marjorie began as though she must get out
something' that was on her mind before they reached Colonel
Pendleton's gate.
"Gray," she said hesitantly and so seriously that the boy turned
to her, "did it ever cross your mind that there was ever any
secret between Uncle Robert and mother?"
The boy's startled look was answer enough and she went on telling
him of the question she had asked her mother.
"Sometimes," she finished, "I think that your father and my mother
must have loved each other first and that something kept them from
marrying. I know that they must have talked it over lately, for
there seems to be a curious understanding between them now, and
the sweetest peace has come to both of them."
She paused, and Gray, paralyzed with wonder, still made no answer.
They had passed through the gate now and in a moment more would be
at Gray's home. Around each barn Gray saw an armed guard; there
was another at the yard gate, and there were two more on the steps
of the big portico.
"Maybe," the girl went on naively, almost as though she were
talking to herself, "that's why they've both always been so
anxious to have us--" Again she stopped--scarlet.
XLI
Jason Hawn's last examination was over, and he stepped into the
first June sunlight and drew it into his lungs with deep relief.
Looking upward from the pavement below, the old president saw his
confident face.
"It seems you are not at all uneasy," he said, and his keen old
eyes smiled humorously.
Jason reddened a little.
"No, sir--I'm not."
"Nor am I," said the old gentleman, "nor will you forget that this
little end is only the big beginning."
"Thank you, sir."
"You are going back home? You will be needed there."
"Yes, sir."
"Good!"
It was the longest talk Jason had ever had with the man he all but
worshipped, and while it was going on the old scholar was
painfully climbing the steps--so that the last word was flung back
with the sharp, soldier-like quality of a command given by an
officer who turned his back with perfect trust that it would be
obeyed, and in answer to that trust the boy's body straightened
and his very much about changing his ways, that he no longer had
any resentment against Colonel Pendleton, and wanted now to live a
better life. His talk might have fooled Jason but for the fact
that he shrewdly noted the little effect it all had on his mother.
Entering the mouth of the lane, Jason saw Steve going from the
yard gate to the house, and his brows wrinkled angrily--Steve was
staggering. He came to the door and glared at Jason.
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