Books: Janice Meredith

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When the drill had terminated, a result due largely to the
smell of cooking which began to steal from the houses facing
the green, Charles drew Bagby aside, and after a moment's
talk, the two, followed by most of the others, crossed to the
squire.

"Mr. Meredith," said Charles, "I've passed my word to
Bagby that you'll pay your share if he'll but release you, and
that you won't try to prosecute him. Wilt back up my pledge?"

The prisoner, though blue and faint with cold, shook his
head obstinately.

"There! I told you how it would be," sneered Bagby.

"But I tell you he'll be frosted in another hour. 'T will be
nothing short of murder, man."

"Then let him contribute his share," insisted Bagby.

"'T is unfair to force a man on a principle."

"Look here," growled Bagby. "We are getting tired of
your everlasting hectoring and attempting to run everything.
Just because you know something of the manual don't make
you boss of the earth."

The bondsman glanced at the squire, and urged, "Come,
Mr. Meredith, you 'd better do it. Think how anxious Mrs.
Meredith and--will be, aside from you probably taking a
death cold, or losing a hand or foot."

At last the squire nodded his head, and without more ado
Bagby stooped and unlocked the log. Mr. Meredith was so
cramped that Charles had to almost lift him to his feet, and
then give him a shoulder into the public room of the tavern,
where he helped him into a chair before the fire. Then the
servant called to the publican:--

"A jorum of sling for Mr. Meredith, and put an extra pepper
in it."

"That sounds pretty good," said Bagby. "Just make that
order for the crowd, and the squire'll pay for it."

While the favourite drink of the period was sizzling in the
fire, Mr. Meredith recovered enough to pull out his purse and
pay up the debatable levy. A moment later the steaming
drink was poured into glasses, and Bagby said:--

"Now, squire, do the thing up handsome by drinking to the
toast of liberty."

"I'll set you a better toast than that," offered the bondsman.

"'T ain't possible," cried one of the crowd.

The servant raised his glass and with an ironical smile
said:--

"Here 's to liberty and fair play, gentlemen."

"That 's a toast we can all drink," responded Bagby, "just
as often as some one'll pay for the liquor."

XIII
THE WORLD IN MINIATURE

The exposure of the squire brought on a sharp attack
of the gout which confined him to the house for
nigh a month. Incidentally it is to be noted that
his temper during this period was not confined,
and when Philemon appeared one morning he was met with a
reception that drove him away without a chance to plead his
cause. Mrs. Meredith and Janice were compelled to listen to
many descriptions as to what punitive measures their particular
lord of creation intended to set in motion against the villagers
when he should attend the Assembly, or when King George
had reduced the land to its old-time order.

One piece of good fortune the attack brought its victim was
its putting him in bed on the particular day selected for the
committee of the town meeting to inform the squire as to the
instruction voted by that gathering for his conduct in the
Assembly. In default of an interview, they merely left an
attested copy of the resolution, and had to rest satisfied, without
knowing in what way their representative received it. Mrs.
Meredith, Janice, and Peg did not remain in any such doubt.

Another unfortunate upon whom the vials of his wrath were
poured out was the parson, who came a-calling one afternoon.
News that he was in the parlour was sufficient to bring Mr.
Meredith downstairs prematurely, where he enacted a high scene,
berating the caller, and finally ordering him from the house.

A relapse followed upon the exertion and outburst, but even
gout had its limitations, and finally the patient was sufficiently
convalescent for preparations to begin for the journey to
Trenton and Burlington.

It did not take Janice long one morning to pack her little
leather-covered and brass-nail studded trunk, and, this done,
her conduct became not a little peculiar. After dinner she spent
some time in spinet practice, and then rising announced to the
elders that she must pack for the morrow's journey. Her
absence thus explained, she left the room, only to steal through
the kitchen, and catch Sukey's shawl from its hook in the passage
to the wood-shed. Regardless of slippers and snow, she
then sped toward the concealing hedge, and behind its friendly
protection walked quickly to the stable. The door was rolled
back enough to let the girl pass in quietly, and when she had
done so, she glanced about in search of something. For an
instant a look of disappointment appeared on her face, but the
next moment, as a faint sound of scratching broke upon her ear,
she stole softly to the feed and harness room, and peeked in.

The groom was sitting on a nail barrel, in front of the meal-bin,
the cover of which was closed and was thus made to
serve for a desk. On this were several sheets of what was
then called pro patria paper, or foolscap, and most of these
were very much bescribbled. An ink-horn and a sand-box
completed the outfit, except for a quill in the hands of the bond-servant,
which had given rise to the sound the girl had heard.
Now, however, it was not writing, for the man was chewing
the feather end with a look of deep thought on his face.

"O Clarion," he sighed, as the girl's glance was momentarily
occupied with the taking in of these details, "why canst
thou not give me a word to rhyme with morn? 'T will not
come, and here 't is the thirteenth."

A low growl from Clarion, sounding like anything more
than the desired rhyme, made the servant glance up, and the
moment he saw the figure of some one, he rose, hastily bunched
together the sheets of paper, and holding them in his hand
cried, "Who 's that?" in a voice expressing both embarrassment
and anger. Then as his eyes dwelt on the intruder, he
continued in an altered tone, "I ask your pardon, Miss Janice;
I thought 't was one of the servants. They are everlastingly
spying on me. Can I serve you?" he added, rolling the
papers up and stuffing them into his belt.

Janice's eyes sought the floor, as she hesitatingly said, "I
--I came to--to ask a favour of you."

"'T is but for you to name," replied the man, eagerly.

"Will you let me--I want--I should like Tibbie to see
the--the picture of me, and I wondered if--if you would
let me take it to Trenton--I'll bring it back, you know,
and--"

"Ah, Miss Janice," exclaimed the servant, as the girl halted,
"if you 'd but take it as a gift, 't would pleasure me so!"
While he spoke, without pretence of concealment he unbuttoned
the top button of his shirt and taking hold of a string
about his neck pulled forth a small wooden case, obviously
of pocket-knife manufacture. Snapping the cord, he offered
its pendant to Janice.

"I--I would keep it, Charles," replied Janice, "but you
know mommy told me--"

"And what right has she to prevent you?" broke in Charles,
warmly. "It does her no wrong, nor can it harm you to keep
it. What right have they to tyrannise over you? 'T is all
of a piece with their forcing you to marry that awkward, ignorant
put. Here, take it." The groom seized her hand, put
the case in her palm, closed her fingers over, and held them
thus, as if striving to make her accept the gift.

"Oh, Charles," cried the girl, very much flustered, "you
should n't ask--"

"Ah, Miss Janice," he begged, "won't you keep it?
They need never know."

"But I only wanted to show it to Tibbie," explained the
girl, "to ask her if mommy was right when she said 't was
monstrous flattered."

"'T is an impossibility," responded the man, earnestly,
though he was unable to keep from slightly smiling at the
unconscious naivete of the question. "I would she could see
it in a more befitting frame, to set it off. If thou 't but let me,
I'd put it in the other setting. Then 't would show to proper
advantage."

"Would it take long?"

"A five minutes only."

The girl threw open the shawl, and thrusting her hand
under her neckerchief into the V-cut of her bodice, produced
the miniature.

The servant recoiled a step as she held it out to him.
Then snatching rather than taking the trinket from her hand,
he said, "That is no place for this."

"Why not?" asked Janice.

"Because she is unfit to rest there," cried the man. He
pulled out a knife, and with the blade pried up the rim, and
shook free the protective glass and slip of ivory. "Now
't is purged of all wrong," he said, touching the setting to his
lips. "I would it were for me to keep, for 't has lain near
your heart, and 't is still warm with happiness."

The speech and act so embarrassed Janice that she hurriedly
said, "I really must n't stay. I've been too long as 't is,
and--"

"'T will take but a moment," the servant assured her
hastily. "Wilt please give me t' other one?" Throwing the
miniature he had taken from the frame on the floor, he set
about removing that of Janice from its wooden casing and
fitting it to its new setting.

"Don't," cried Janice, in alarm, stooping to pick up the slip
of ivory. "'T is not owing to you that 't was n't spoiled," she
added indignantly, after a glance at it.

"Small loss if 't were!" responded the man, bitterly.
"Promise me, Miss Janice, that you'll not henceforth carry
it in your bosom?"

"'T is a monstrous strange thing to ask."

"I tell thee she's not fit to rest near a pure heart."

"How know you that?"

"How know I?" cried the man, in amazement. "Why--"
There he stopped and knit his brows.

"I knew thou wert deceiving us when thee said 't was not
thine," charged the girl.

"Nay, Miss Janice, 't was the truth I told you, though
a quibble, I own. The miniature never was mine, tho' 't was
once in my possession."

"Then how came you by it?"

"I took it by force from--never mind whom." The old bitter
look was on the man's face, and anger burned in his eyes.

"You stole it!" cried the girl, drawing away from him.

"Not I," denied the man. "'T was taken from one who
had less right to 't than I."

"You knew her?" questioned the girl.

"Ay," cried the man, with a kind of desperation. "I
should think I did!"

"And--and you--you loved her?" she asked with a
hesitancy which might mean that she was in doubt whether
to ask the question, or perhaps that she rather hoped her
surmise would prove wrong.

The young fellow halted in his work of trimming the ivory
to fit the frame, and for a moment he stood, apparently looking
down at his half-completed job, as it lay on the top of
the meal-box. Then suddenly he put his hand to his throat
as if he were choking, and the next instant he leaned forward,
and, burying his face in his arms, as they rested on the
whilom desk, he struggled to stifle the sobs that shook his
frame.

"Oh, I did n't mean to pain you!" she cried in an agony
of guilt and alarm.

Charles rose upright, and dashing his shirt sleeve across his
eyes, he turned to the girl. "'T is over, Miss Janice," he
asserted, "and a great baby I was to give way to 't."

"I can understand, and I don't think 't was babyish," said
Janice, her heart wrung with sympathy for him. "She is so
lovely!"

The man's lips quivered again, despite of his struggle to
control himself. "That she is," he groaned. "And I--I
loved her--My God! how I loved her! I thought her an
angel from heaven; she was everything in life to me. When
I fled from London, it seemed as if my heart was--was dead
for ever."

"She was untrue?" asked Janice, with a deep sigh.

The servant's face darkened. "So untrue--Ah! 'T is
not to be spoken. The two of them!"

"You challenged and killed him!" surmised Janice, excitedly.
"And that's why you came to America."

The groom shook his head sadly. "Not that, Miss Janice.
They robbed me of both honour and revenge. I was powerless
to punish either--except by--Bah! I've done with them
for ever."

"Foh mussy's sakes, chile," came Sukey's voice, "what
youse dam' hyar? Run quick, honey, foh your mah is 'quirin'
foh youse."

"Oh, Luddy!" cried the girl, reaching out for the miniature.

"'T is not done, but I'll see to 't that you get it this evening,"
exclaimed Charles.

The girl turned and fled toward the house, closely followed
by Sukey.

"Peg she come to de kitchen foh youse," the cook explained;
"an' 'cause I dun see youse go out de back do', I
specks whar youse gwine, an' I sens her back to say dat young
missus helpin' ole Sukey, an' be in pretty quick, an' so dey
never know."

"Oh, Sukey, you're a dear!"

"But, missy dear, doan youse do nuthin' foolish 'bout dat
fellah, 'cause I 'se helped youse. Doan youse--"

"Of course I won't," asserted the girl. "I could n't,
Sukey. You know I couldn't."

"Dat 's right, honey. Ole Sukey knows she can trust
youse. Now run right along, chile."

"What have you been doing, Janice?" asked her mother, as
the girl entered the parlour.

"I've been in the kitchen with Sukey, mommy," replied
Janice. And if there was wrong in the quibble, both father
and mother were equally to blame with the girl, for "Ole
Sukey" was actually better able to enter into her feelings and
thoughts than either of them; and where obedience is enforced
from authority and not from sympathy and confidence,
there will be secret deceit, if not open revolt.

Left to himself, the bondsman finished trimming the ivory
to a proper size, and neatly fitted it into the frame. Then he
spread the papers out, and in some haste, for the winter's day
was fast waning, he resumed his scribbling, varied by intervals
of pen-chewing and knitting of brows. Finally he gave a sigh
of relief, and taking a blank sheet he copied in a bold hand-writing
what was written on the paper he had last toiled over.
Then picking up the miniature, he touched it to his lips.
"She was sent to give me faith again in women," he said, as
he folded the miniature into the paper.

"Well, old man," he remarked, as he passed from the stable,
to the dog, who had followed in his footsteps, and sought to
attract his attention by fawning upon him, "has blindman's
holiday come at last? Wait till I bestow this, and get a bite
from Sukey to put in my pocket, and we'll be off for a look at
the rabbits. 'T is a poor sport, but 't will do till something
better comes. Oh for a war!"

The bondsman passed into the kitchen, and made his plea
to Sukey for a supper he could take away with him. The
request was granted, and while the cook went to the larder to
get him something, Charles stepped into the hall and listening
intently he stole upstairs and tapped gently on a door. Getting
no reply, he opened it, and tiptoeing hastily to the dressing-stand,
he tucked the packet under the powder-box. A
minute later he was back in the kitchen, and erelong was
stamping through the snow, whistling cheerfully, which the
hound echoed by yelps of excited delight.

Janice was unusually thoughtful all through supper, and
little less so afterwards. She was sent to her room earlier than
usual, that she might make up in advance for the early start
of the journey, and she did not dally with her disrobing, the
room being almost arctic in its coldness. But after she had
put on the short night-rail that was the bed-gown of the period,
the girl paused for a moment in front of her mirror, even
though she shivered as she did so.

"I really thought 't was for me he cared," she said. "But
she is so much more beautiful that--" Janice tucked the flyaway
locks into the snug-fitting nightcap, which together with
the bed-curtains formed the protections from the drafts inevitable
to leaky windows and big chimneys, and having thus
done her best to make herself ugly, she blew out her candle,
and as she crept into bed, she remarked, "'T was very foolish
of me."

XIV
A QUESTION CONCERNING THALIA

All was animation at Greenwood the next morning,
while yet it was dark, and as Janice dressed by
candle-light, she trembled from something more
than the icy chill of the room. The girl had been
twice in her life to New York, once each to Newark and to
Burlington, and though her visits to Trenton were of greater
number, the event was none the less too rare an occurrence
not to excite her. Her mother had to order her sharply to
finish what was on her plate at breakfast, or she would scarce
have eaten.

"If thou dost not want to be frozen, lass, before we get to
Trenton," warned the squire, "do as thy mother says. Stuff
cold out of the stomach, or 't is impossible to keep the scamp
out of the blood."

"Yes, dadda," said the girl, obediently falling to once more.
After a few mouthfuls she asked, "Dadda, who was Thalia?"

"'T was a filly who won the two-year purse at the Philadelphia
races in sixty-eight," the squire informed her, between
gulps of sausage and buckwheat cakes.

"Was she very lovely?" asked Janice, in a voice of surprise.

"No. An ill-shaped mare, but with a great pace."

The girl looked thoughtful for a moment and then asked,
"Is that the only one there is?"

"Only what?" demanded her mother.

"The only Thalia?"

"'T is the only one I've heard of," said the squire.

"Thou 'rt wrong, Lambert," corrected his spouse, in wifely
fashion. "'T was one of those old heathens with horns, or
tail, or something, I forget exactly. What set thy mind on
that, child? Hast been reading some romance on the sly?"

"No, mommy," denied the girl.

"Put thy thoughts to better uses, then," ordered the mother.
"Think more of thy own sin and corruption and less of what
is light and vain."

It had been arranged that Thomas was to drive the sleigh,
the squire preferring to leave Fownes in care of the remaining
horses. It was Charles, however, who brought down the two
trunks, and after he had put them in place he suggested, "If
you'll take seat, Miss Janice, I'll tuck you well in." Spreading
a large bearskin on the seat and bottom of the sleigh, he put in
a hot soapstone, and very unnecessarily took hold of the little
slippered feet, and set them squarely upon it, as if their owner
were quite unequal to the effort. Then he folded the robe
carefully about her, and drew the second over that, allowing the
squire, it must be confessed, but a scant portion for his share.

"Thank you, Charles," murmured the girl, gratefully. "Of
course he's a bond-servant and he has a horrid beard," she
thought, "but it is nice to have some one to--to think of your
comfort. If he were only Philemon!"

The bondsman climbed into the rear of the sleigh, that he
might fold the back part of the skin over her shoulders. The
act brought his face close to the inquirer, and she turned her
head and whispered, "Who was Thalia?"

"'T was one of--"

"Charles, get out of that sleigh," ordered Mrs. Meredith,
sharply. "Learn thy place, sir. Janice, thou 'rt quite old
enough to take care of thyself. We'll have no whispering or
coddling, understand."

The bondsman sullenly obeyed, and a moment later the
sleigh started. The servant looked wistfully after it until the
sound of the bells was lost, and then, with a sigh, he went to
his work.

With all the vantage of the daylight start, it took good driving
among the drifts to get over the twenty-eight miles that lay
between Greenwood and Trenton before the universal noon
dinner, and as the sleigh drew up at the Drinkers' home on
the main street of the village, the meal was in the air if not on
the table.

[Illustration: "You set me free."]

For this reason the two girls had not a chance for a moment's
confidence before dinner; and though Janice was fairly
bursting with all that had happened since Tibbie's visit, the
departure of the squire for Burlington immediately the meal
was ended, and the desire of Tabitha's father and aunt to have
news of Mrs. Meredith and of the doings "up Brunswick way,"
filled in the whole afternoon till tea time--if the misnomer
can be used, for, unlike the table at Greenwood, tea was a
tabooed article in the Drinker home. One fact worth noting
about the meal was that Janice asked if any of them knew
who Thalia was.

"Ay," said Mr. Drinker, "and the less said of her the
better. She was a lewd creature that--"

"Mr. Drinker!" cried Tabitha's aunt. "Thee forgets there
are gentlewomen present. Wilt have some preserve, Janice?"

"No, I thank you," said the girl. "I'm not hungry." And
she proved it by playing with what was on her plate for the rest
of the meal.

Not till the two girls retired did they have an opportunity to
exchange confidences. The moment they were by themselves,
Tabitha demanded, "What made thee so serious to-night?"

"Oh, Tibbie," sighed Janice, dolefully," I'm very unhappy!"

"What over?"

"I--he--Charles--I'm afraid he--and yet--'T is
something he wrote, but whether in joke or--Mr. Evatt said
he insulted me at the tavern--Yet 't is so pretty that--and
mommy interrupted just--"

"What art thou talking about, Jan?" exclaimed Tibbie.

Janice even in her disjointed sentences had begun to unlace
her travelling bodice,--for with a prudence almost abnormal
this one frock was not cut low,--and she now produced from
her bosom a paper which she unfolded, and then offered to
Tibbie with a suggestion of hesitation, asking "Dost think he
meant to insult me?"

Tabitha eagerly took the sheet, and read--

TO THALIA
These lines to her my passion tell,
Describe the empire of her spell;
A love which naught will e'er dispel,
That flames for sweetest Thalia.

The sun that brights the fairest morn,
The stars that gleam in Capricorn,
Do not so much the skies adorn
As does my lovely Thalia.

The tints with which the rose enchants,
The fragrance which the violet grants;
Each doth suggest, but ne'er supplants,
The charms of dainty Thalia.

To gaze on her is sweet delight:
'T is heaven whene'er she 's in my sight,
But when she's gone, 't is endless night--
All 's dark without my Thalia.

I vow to her, by God above,
By hope of life, by depth of love,
That from her side I ne'er will rove,
So much love I my Thalia.

"How monstrous pretty!" cried Tabitha. "I'm sure he
meant it rightly."

"I thought 't was a beautiful valentine," sighed Janice,--
"and 't was the first I ever had--but dadda says she was an
ill-shaped mare--and mommy says 't was something with a
tail--and 't is almost as bad to have her a wicked woman--
so I'm feared he meant it in joke--or worse--"

"I don't believe it," comforted Tibbie. "He may have
made a mistake in the name, but I'm sure he meant it; that
he--well--thee knows. And if thee copies it fair, and puts
in 'Delia,' or 'Celia,' 't will do to show to the girls. I wish
some one would send me such a valentine."

Made cheerful by her friend's point of view, Janice went
on with more spirit,--

"Nor is that the end." She took from her trunk a handkerchief
and unwrapping it, produced the unset miniature.
"He let me keep it," she said.

"How mighty wonderful!" again exclaimed Tibbie, growing
big-eyed. "Who--"

"Furthermore, and in continuation, as Mr. McClave always
says after his ninthly," airily interrupted Janice, drawing from
her bosom the portrait of herself. "Who 's that, Tibbie
Drinker?"

"Janice!" cried the person so challenged. "How lovely!
Who--Did Mr. Peale come to Greenwood?"

"Not he. Who, think you, did it?"

"I vow if I can guess."

"Charles!

"No!" gasped Tibbie, properly electrified. "Thee is
cozening me."

"Not for a moment," cried Janice, delightedly.

"Tell me everything about all" was Tabitha's rapturous
demand.

It took Janice many minutes, and Tibbie was called upon
to use many exclamation and question marks, ere the tale of
all these surprises was completed. Long before it had come
to a finish, the two girls were snuggled together in bed, half
in real love, as well as for the mutual animal heat, and half
that they might whisper the lower. The facts, after many
interruptions and digressions, having been narrated, Janice
asked,--

"Whom, think you, Charles loves, Tibbie?"

"'T is very strange! From his valentine and miniature I
should think 't was thee. But from what he told thee--"

"'T is exactly that which puzzles me."

"Oh, Janice! He--Perhaps thee was right. He may
be a villain who is trying to beguile thee."

"For what could--Then why should he tell me about
her?"

"That--well--'t is beyond me."

"If't had not been for coming away, I--that is--" The
girl hesitated and then said, "Tibbie?"

"What?"

"Dost think--I mean--" The girl drew her bedfellow
closer, and in an almost inaudible voice asked, "Would it
be right, think you--when I go back, you know--to--to
encourage him--that is, to give him a chance to tell me--so
as to find out?"

The referee of this important question was silent for long
enough to give a quality of consideration to her opinion, and
then decided, "I think thee shouldst. 'T is a question that
thou hast a right to know about." Having given the ruling,
this most upright judge changed her manner from one conveying
thought to one suggesting eagerness, and asked, "Oh,
Janice, if he does--if thee finds out anything, wilt thee tell
it me?"