CHAPTER 18.
THE SPIRIT OF '76 AND THE SHADOW OF '61
One night, in the following April, there was a great dance inLexington. Next day the news of Sumter came. Chad pleaded to be let offfrom the dance, but the Major would not hear of it. It was afancy-dress ball, and the Major had a pet purpose of his own that hewanted gratified and Chad had promised to aid him. That fancy was thatChad should go in regimentals, as the stern, old soldier on the wall,of whom the Major swore the boy was the "spit and image." The Majorhimself helped Chad dress in wig, peruke, stock, breeches, boots,spurs, cocked hat, sword and all. And then he led the boy down into theparlor, where Miss Lucy was waiting for them, and stood him up on oneside of the portrait. To please the old fellow, Chad laughingly struckthe attitude of the pictured soldier, and the Major cried:
"What'd I tell you, Lucy!" Then he advanced and made a low bow.
"General Buford," he said, "General Washington's compliments, and willGeneral Buford plant the flag on that hill where the left wing of theBritish is entrenched?"
"Hush, Cal," said Miss Lucy, laughing.
"General Buford's compliments to General Washington. General Bufordwill plant that flag on ANY hill that ANY enemy holds against it."
The lad's face paled as the words, by some curious impulse, sprang tohis lips, but the unsuspecting Major saw no lurking significance in hismanner, nor in what he said, and then there was a rumble of carriagewheels at the door.
The winter had sped swiftly. Chad had done his work in college onlyfairly well, for Margaret had been a disturbing factor. The girl was animpenetrable mystery to him, for the past between them was not onlywiped clean--it seemed quite gone. Once only had he dared to open hislips about the old days, and the girl's flushed silence made a likemistake forever impossible. He came and went at the Deans' as hepleased. Always they were kind, courteous, hospitable--no more, noless, unvaryingly. During the Christmas holidays he and Margaret hadhad a foolish quarrel, and it was then that Chad took his little flingat his little world--a fling that was foolish, but harmful, chiefly inthat it took his time and his mind and his energy from his work. He notonly neglected his studies, but he fell in with the wild young bucks ofthe town, learned to play cards, took more wine than was good for himsometimes, was on the verge of several duels, and night after nightraced home in his buggy against the coming dawn. Though Miss Lucylooked worried, the indulgent old Major made no protest. Indeed he wasrather pleased. Chad was sowing his wild oats--it was in the blood, andthe mood would pass. It did pass, naturally enough, on the very daythat the breach between him and Margaret was partly healed; and theheart of Caleb Hazel, whom Chad, for months, had not dared to face, wasmade glad when the boy came back to him remorseful and repentant--theold Chad once more.
They were late in getting to the dance. Every window in the old Hunthome was brilliant with light. Chinese lanterns swung in the big yard.The scent of early spring flowers smote the fresh night air. Music andthe murmur of nimble feet and happy laughter swept out the wide-opendoors past which white figures flitted swiftly. Scarcely anybody knewChad in his regimentals, and the Major, with the delight of a boy, ledhim around, gravely presenting him as General Buford here and there.Indeed, the lad made a noble figure with his superb height and bearing,and he wore sword and spurs as though born to them. Margaret wasdancing with Richard Hunt when she saw his eyes searching for herthrough the room, and she gave him a radiant smile that almost stunnedhim. She had been haughty and distant when he went to her to pleadforgiveness: she had been too hard, and Margaret, too, was repentant.
"Why, who's that?" asked Richard Hunt. "Oh, yes," he added, getting hisanswer from Margaret's face. "Bless me, but he's fine--the very spiritof '76. I must have him in the Rifles."
"Will you make him a lieutenant?" asked Margaret.
"Why, yes, I will," said Mr. Hunt, decisively. "I'll resign myself inhis favor, if it pleases you."
"Oh, no, no--no one could fill your place."
"Well, he can, I fear--and here he comes to do it. I'll have to retreatsome time, and I suppose I'd as well begin now." And the gallantgentleman bowed to Chad.
"Will you pardon me, Miss Margaret? My mother is calling me."
"You must have keen ears," said Margaret; "your mother is upstairs."
"Yes; but she wants me. Everybody wants me, but--" he bowed again withan imperturbable smile and went his way.
Margaret looked demurely into Chad's eager eyes.
"And how is the spirit of '76?"
"The spirit of '76 is unchanged."
"Oh, yes, he is; I scarcely knew him."
"But he's unchanged; he never will change."
Margaret dropped her eyes and Chad looked around.
"I wish we could get out of here."
"We can," said Margaret, demurely.
"We will!" said Chad, and he made for a door, outside which lanternswere swinging in the wind. Margaret caught up some flimsy garment andwound it about her pretty round throat--they call it a "fascinator" inthe South.
Chad looked down at her.
"I wish you could see yourself; I wish I could tell you how you look."
"I have," said Margaret, "every time I passed a mirror. And otherpeople have told me. Mr. Hunt did. He didn't seem to have much trouble."
"I wish I had his tongue."
"If you had, and nothing else, you wouldn't have me"--Chad started asthe little witch paused a second, drawling--"leaving my friends andthis jolly dance to go out into a freezing yard and talk to an agedColonial who doesn't appreciate his modern blessings. The next thingyou'll be wanting, I suppose--will be--"
"You, Margaret; you--YOU!"
It had come at last and Margaret hardly knew the choked voice thatinterrupted her. She had turned her back to him to sit down. She pauseda moment, standing. Her eyes closed; a slight tremor ran through her,and she sank with her face in her hands. Chad stood silent, trembling.Voices murmured about them, but like the music in the house, theyseemed strangely far away. The stirring of the wind made the suddendamp on his forehead icy-cold. Margaret's hands slowly left her face,which had changed as by a miracle. Every trace of coquetry was gone. Itwas the face of a woman who knew her own heart, and had the sweetfrankness to speak it, that was lifted now to Chad.
"I'm so glad you are what you are, Chad; but had you beenotherwise--that would have made no difference to me. You believe that,don't you, Chad? They might not have let me marry you, but I shouldhave cared, just the same. They may not now, but that, too, will makeno difference." She turned her eyes from his for an instant, as thoughshe were looking far backward. "Ever since that day," she said, slowly,"when I heard you say, 'Tell the little gurl I didn't mean nothin'callin' her a little gal'"--there was a low, delicious gurgle in thethroat as she tried to imitate his odd speech, and then her eyessuddenly filled with tears, but she brushed them away, smilingbrightly. "Ever since then, Chad--" she stopped--a shadow fell acrossthe door of the little summer house.
"Here I am, Mr. Hunt," she said, lightly; "is this your dance?" Sherose and was gone. "Thank you, Mr. Buford," she called back, sweetly.
For a moment Chad stood where he was, quite dazed--so quickly, sounexpectedly had the crisis come. The blood had rushed to his face andflooded him with triumphant happiness. A terrible doubt chilled him asquickly. Had he heard aright?--could he have misunderstood her? Had thedream of years really come true? What was it she had said? He stumbledaround in the half darkness, wondering. Was this another phase of herunceasing coquetry? How quickly her tone had changed when RichardHunt's shadow came. At that moment, he neither could nor would havechanged a hair had some genie dropped them both in the midst of thecrowded ball-room. He turned swiftly toward the dancers. He must see,know--now!
The dance was a quadrille and the figure was "Grand right and left."Margaret had met Richard Hunt opposite, half-way, when Chad reached thedoor and was curtseying to him with a radiant smile. Again the boy'sdoubts beat him fiercely; and then Margaret turned her head, as t
houghshe knew he must be standing there. Her face grew so suddenly seriousand her eyes softened with such swift tenderness when they met his,that a wave of guilty shame swept through him. And when she came aroundto him and passed, she leaned from the circle toward him, merry andmock-reproachful:
"You mustn't look at me like that," she whispered, and Hunt, close athand, saw, guessed and smiled. Chad turned quickly away again.
That happy dawn--going home! The Major drowsed and fell asleep. Thefirst coming light, the first cool breath that was stealing over theawakening fields, the first spring leaves with their weight of dew,were not more fresh and pure than the love that was in the boy's heart.He held his right hand in his left, as though he were imprisoning therethe memory of the last little clasp that she had given it. He looked atthe Major, and he wondered how anybody on earth, at that hour, could beasleep. He thought of the wasted days of the past few months; thesilly, foolish life he had led, and thanked God that, in the memory ofthem, there was not one sting of shame. How he would work for her now!Little guessing how proud she already was, he swore to himself howproud she should be of him some day. He wondered where she was, andwhat she was doing. She could not be asleep, and he must have criedaloud could he have known--could he have heard her on her knees at herbedside, whispering his name for the first time in her prayers; couldhe have seen her, a little later, at her open window, looking acrossthe fields, as though her eyes must reach him through the morning dusk.
That happy dawn--for both, that happy dawn!
It was well that neither, at that hour, could see beyond the rim of hisown little world. In a far Southern city another ball, that night, hadbeen going on. Down there the air was charged with the prescience ofdark trouble, but, while the music moaned to many a heart like a god inpain, there was no brooding--only a deeper flush to the cheek, abrighter sparkle to the eye, a keener wit to the tongue; to the dance,a merrier swing. And at that very hour of dawn, ladies, slippered, bareof head, and in evening gowns, were fluttering like white moths alongthe streets of old Charleston, and down to the Battery, where FortSumter lay, gray and quiet in the morning mist--to await with jest andlaughter the hissing shriek of one shell that lighted the fires of afour years' hell in a happy land of God-fearing peace and God-givenplenty, and the hissing shriek of another that Anderson, Kentuckian,hurled back, in heroic defence of the flag struck for the first time byother than an alien hand.