BOOK II (continued 2)

"Dat's so," admitted Moses meekly.

"Where's Betsey?" inquired Eugenia, twirling her sunbonnet. "Aunt Verbeny told me the baby died. I am so sorry."

"De Lawd He give, en' de Lawd He teck," returned Delphy piously, "en' He done been moughty open-handed dis long time. He done give er plum sight mo'n He done teck, en' it ain' no use'n sayin' He ain'."

"So the others are well?" ventured Eugenia, and as a bow-legged crawler emerged from beneath the doorstep she added: "Is that the youngest?"

Delphy snorted.

"Dat ar brat, Miss Euginney? He ain' Betsey's, nohow. He's Rindy's Lije, en' he's de mos' out'n out pesterer sence Mose wuz born."

"Rindy!" exclaimed Eugenia in surprise, lightly touching the small black body with her foot. "Why, I didn't know Rindy was married. She's working at the house now."

Delphy seized the child and held him at arm's length while she applied a sounding box. "Go 'way f'om yer, honey," she said. "Rindy ain' mah'ed. He's des' an accident. Shet yo' mouth, you imp er darkness, fo' I shet hit fur you."

"Don't hurt him, Delphy," pleaded the girl. "Rindy ought to be ashamed of herself, but it isn't his fault. I'm going to send him some clothes. He looks fat enough, anyhow."

"He's fitten ter bus'," retorted Delphy sternly.

"He don't do nuttin' fur his livin' but eat all day, en' den when night come he don't do nuttin' but holler kaze de time ter leave off eatin' done come. He ain' no mo' use'n a weazel."

Eugenia promised to befriend the baby, and left with Delphy's pessimism ringing in her ears. "He ain' wuth yo' shoestring, he ain'," called the woman after her.

The girl was as popular among the negroes as she had been as a small tomboy in pinafores. Her impulsive generosity and, above all, her cordial kindness, had not abated with years. She was as ready to serve as be served, her heart was as open as her hand; and the shrewd, childish race received her as a benignant providence. Her sweetness of disposition became a proverb. "As sunshiny ez Miss Euginny," said Aunt Verbeny of a clear day—and the general raised her wages.

During the early summer Bernard came home on a vacation. For several years he had held a position in a bank in Lynchburg, and his visits to Kingsborough took place at uncertain intervals. He was a slight, insignificant young fellow, with complacent eyes and a beautiful, girlish mouth. His temper was quicker than Eugenia's, and he was in continual friction with the general, who had grown absent-minded and irritable. He not only forgot his own opinions as soon as he expressed them, but, what is still more annoying, he was apt to offer them as some one's else in the course of a few hours.

"That young Burr's a scamp," he remarked one morning at breakfast, "a regular scamp. Here he's setting up as a lawyer under George Bassett's eye, when I happen to know that Jerry Pollard wouldn't have him in his store if you paid him."

"My dear Tom," breathed the placid voice of Miss Chris, "I'm quite sure you're mistaken. Why, Judge Bassett—"

"Mistaken!" persisted the general angrily. "Am I the man to make a statement without authority? I tell you he's a scamp, ma'am—a regular scamp! If you please to doubt my word—"

"That's rather rough on a chap, isn't it?" put in Bernard indifferently. "He isn't a gentleman, but I shouldn't call him a scamp."

"Why should you call him anything, sir?" demanded the general. "It's no business of yours, is it? If I choose to call him a—"

"Now, father," said Eugenia, and at her decisive tones the general broke off and turned upon her round, inquiring eyes. "Now, father, you don't mean one word that you're saying, and you know it." And she proceeded to butter his cakes.

The general was suppressed, and after breakfast he got into the carriage beside his daughter and drove slowly into town. When he returned to dinner he met Miss Chris with triumphant eyes.

"By the way, Chris, you were mistaken this morning about that Burr boy. He's quite a decent person. I don't see how you got it into your head there was something wrong about him."

"I'm glad to hear it," responded Miss Chris good-humouredly. She had never uttered a harsh word about anybody in her life, but she was a long-suffering woman, and she philosophically accepted the accusation.

Twenty-four hours later the general had a passage at arms with Bernard.

"You can watch the threshing this morning, my boy," he remarked as he sat down to breakfast. "You won't go in to town, I suppose?"

Bernard shook his head.

"I thought of riding in for the mail," he answered; "there's a letter I'm looking for."

The general flushed and put out a preliminary feeler. "How are you going?" he inquired; "not on one of my horses, I hope?"

Eugenia shook her head at Bernard, but he went on recklessly:

"Why, yes, I thought I'd take the gray mare."

The general shook his head until his flabby face grew purple.

"The gray mare!" he thundered. "You mean to take out my gray mare, do you? Well, I'd like to see you, sir. Not a step does the gray mare stir—not a step, sir."

"Oh, all right," agreed Bernard so quietly that the general's rage increased. "Keep her in the stables, for all I care." And, having finished his breakfast, he bowed to Miss Chris and left the table.

But an hour later, as he passed through the hall, he found the general waiting. "Aren't you ready?" he asked irascibly. "Are you going to waste the whole morning? Why aren't you in town?"

Bernard's temper was well enough as long as there was no reason it should be better; but he couldn't stand his father, and he knew it.

"I'm not going," he returned sullenly.

"Not going!" cried the general hotly, "not going after all the fuss you've raised? What do you mean by changing your mind every minute?"

Bernard took his hat from the old mahogany rack. "I've nothing to ride," he replied irritably, "and I don't choose to walk—that's what I mean."

But his answer only exasperated his hovering parent.

"Damme, sir, do you want to make me lose my temper?" he demanded. "Isn't the stable full of horses? Where's the gray mare, I'd like to know, sir?"

"Eugie!" called Bernard angrily, "come here." And as the girl appeared he made a break from the house. He possessed an abiding faith in the endurance of Eugenia's clannish soul that was proof against even the suggestion that it might succumb. His father was unquestionably trying, but Eugie was unquestionably strong, and she loved her people with a passion which he felt to be romantically unsurpassable. Yes, Eugie was the hope of the family, after all.

As for the girl, she put her arm about the general and drew him to his chair. He was failing rapidly; this she saw and suffered at seeing. There were wrinkles crossing and recrossing his hanging cheeks, and swollen bluish pockets beneath his eyes. When he moved he carried his great weight uneasily. During the day she hung over him with multiplied caresses; as he sat upon the porch in the afternoon she read to him from the Bible and Shakespeare, the only books his library contained.

"After God and Shakespeare, what was left for any man to write?" the general had once demanded of the judge.

Now he asked the question of Eugenia, and she smiled and was silent. Her eyes passed from the porch to the lawn and the walk and the immemorial gloom of the great cedars. Sunshine lay over all the warm, sleepy land, and sunshine lay across her white dress and across the senile droop of the general's mouth.

"For He maketh sore, and bindeth up," read the girl slowly. "He woundeth and His hands make whole."

"He shall deliver thee in six troubles;—yea, in seven there shall no evil touch thee."

"In famine He shall redeem thee from death: and in war from the power of the sword."

She stopped suddenly and looked up, for the general's eyes were full of tears.