Part 61 (1/2)
The wind again rushed up the gorge, a great stir of air that swayed the trees, and filled the ravine with a sound like the sea. Rand listened dully, staring down the steeps of pine and hemlock, giant trees that had dwelt there long. A desolation came upon him. The air appeared to darken and grow cold, the wind pa.s.sed, and the gorge lay very still. Rand bowed himself together, and at last, with a dull and heavy throb, his heart spoke. ”What shall I do,” it asked, ”O G.o.d?”
The Absolute within him made answer. ”The simple right.”
The wind returned, and the trees of the forest shook to the blast. The simple right! Where was the simple right in so complex a wrong? Step forward, backward, to either side--harm and misery every way! And pride, and ambition, and love, and human company--to close the door, to close the door on all! ”No,” said Rand, and set his teeth. ”No, no!”
The afternoon deepened in the gorge of the Blue Ridge. Now the wind swept it and now the wind was still. The sunlight touched the treetops, or fell through in shafts upon the early flowers. From the mould of a million generations stalk and leaf arose for their brief hour of light and life. When it was spent, they would rest for aeon, then stir again.
In the silence was heard the fall of the pine cone.
Rand lay, face down, upon the rock. In his mind there was now no thought of Cary, no thought of Jacqueline, nor of Fairfax Cary, nor of any other of the dead and living. It was the valley of the shadow of death, and his soul was at grips with Apollyon.
He lay there until all the sunlight was withdrawn from the gorge, and until Young Isham, frightened into disobedience, came and touched him upon the shoulder. He lifted a grey and twisted face. ”Yes, yes, Young Isham, it is late! Go back, and I will come in a moment.”
The negro went, and Rand arose from the rock, crossed the road, and stood looking down toward the hidden water. From somewhere out of the green gloom sounded the bird's throbbing note, then all again was quiet, dank, and still. He raised his arms, resting them and his face upon them against the red bark of a giant pine. The thought of death in the pool below came to him, but he shook his head. The door was open, truly, but it led nowhere. His soul looked at the chasm it must cross, shuddered, and crossed it. His arms dropped from the tree and he raised his eyes to the blue above. He was yet in a land of effort and anguish, but the G.o.d within him saw the light.
CHAPTER x.x.xVIII
M. DE PINCORNET
Malplaquet was a Cary place, leagued in friends.h.i.+p as in blood with Greenwood. For seven months it had esteemed itself in mourning for the kinsman who had ridden from its gates to a violent death. But there were young girls in the house, and now, in the bright May weather, it was hard not to put forth leaf and bud and be gay once more. Actual gayety would not do, the place felt that, and very heartily; but pleasure that was also education, pleasure well within bounds, and education insisted upon, this might now be temperately indulged in. There seemed no good reason why, in mid-spring, the dancing cla.s.s should not be held at Malplaquet, since it was the most convenient house to a large neighbourhood, and there were in the family three young girls.
The age esteemed dancing a highly necessary accomplishment, and its acquisition meant work, and hard work, no less than delightful play.
Half a dozen young people came to stay three days at the house; half a score more drove or rode over in the afternoons, going home after ten by moonlight or by starlight Their elders came with them, it was a business of minuets and contra-dances, painstakingly performed and solicitously watched A large old parlour gave its waxed floor, Mr Pincornet's violin furnished the music, and Mr Pincornet himself, lately returned to Albemarle from his season in Richmond, imparted instruction and directed the dance. The house was full from garret to cellar, neighbours' horses in the stables, neighbours' servants in the quarter. The long, low brick office standing under the big oaks in the yard made, according to custom, a barracks for the young men who, high of mettle, bold, and gay, rode in from twenty miles around, ready to dance from dusk till dawn, and then, in a bright garden and May weather, to pursue some bits of muslin throughout a morning. Malplaquet was in a state of sober glee when, inconveniently enough, the one Cary whose mourning had not lightened chanced, in ignorance of the dancing cla.s.s, to ride through the gates and up the hill.
It was his intention, it appeared, to spend the night which was fast falling, and to ride back to Charlottesville in the morning. The head of the Malplaquet Carys met him with affection and apology. ”Young people will be young, Fair, and Molly and I thought it best to humour them in this no great thing! It's a mere lesson they're having. But I'm sorry, cousin--”
”You need not be, sir,” said the other. ”Ludwell would have been the last man on earth to wish their spirit less, or their pleasure less.
It's time and the weather, sir,--Malplaquet feels it with all the world.
You must not be troubled, and you must not disturb my cousins. I might ride on--”
”No, no, Fair! No, no!”
”Then I won't. Give me a room in the office--I see the house is full--and let Remus bring me supper there. If you'll come over later, sir, we'll talk Embargo, and I'll give you the up-county news. I'll to bed early, I think.”
”I wish I could come! By George, it would be a relief to get away from all the bowing and sc.r.a.ping! You're sure you aren't hurt, Fair?”
”Quite sure,” answered the other, with his old smile. ”I'll go now to the office, if I may. No need even to tell them I am here.”
Not to tell them was a thing more easily said than done. Time was when Fairfax Cary would have been hailed delightedly, drawn at once to the centre of things, and kept there by the quick glances of young women, the emulative gaze of neighbourhood gallants, and the approving consideration of the elder folk. His presence was wont to make itself felt. Now, when the news spread that he was at Malplaquet, there was a break in the dance, a pause, a hush. ”What shall we do?” asked in distress the daughters of the house.
”Go on dancing,” was the reply. ”He'll have no difference made. But when the lesson's over, you'll remember, one and all, that he is here.”
In the far room of the office, quiet, and with a porch of its own, Cary got rid of the dust of the road, then ate the supper, bountiful and delicate, brought by Remus and presided over by the mistress of the house, who talked to him of Greenwood and of his father. ”The best dancer, Fair, and, after Henry Churchill, the handsomest man,--with _the_ air, you know, and always brave and gay and true as steel! They said he was a good hater, and I know he was a good friend. You take after him, Fair.”
”Ludwell did.”
”Yes, I know, I know--but you the most. Ludwell had much from your mother--that strength and patience and grace were Lucy Meade's. Well, well, I cry when I think of it, so I'll not think! Is there nothing more you'll have? Remus is to wait upon you--you hear, Remus? And now, Fair, I'll go back to the children”
Cary kissed her. ”Give them all three my love, and tell little Anne to mind her steps. I've got a book to read, and I'll go to bed early.”