Part 35 (1/2)
”O you hadn't ought to have done that, sir! I wa'n't worth it.”
”Ah! yes you air! Johnnie, I've watched yo' ev'y step an' stumble all yo' days. I've had faith faw you when many a one was savin' you was jess bound to go to the bad--which you know it did look that way, brotheh.
But, s' I, Satan's a-siftin' of him! He's in the gall o' bitterness jess as I was at his age!”
”You! Ha-ha! Why, my dear Mr. Tombs, you don't know who you're talking about!”
”Yes, I do, brotheh. I was jess so! An' s' I, he'll pull through! His motheh's prayers 'll prevail, evm if mine don't! An' now, when ev'ybody sees you a-changin' faw the better----”
”Better! Great Sc----”
”Yes, an' yet 'ithout the least sign o' conversion--I say, s' I, it's restrainin' grace! Ah! don't I know? Next 'll come savin' grace, an'
then repentance unto life. Straight is the way, an' I can see right up it!”
”Why, Mr. Tombs, you're utterly wrong! I've only learned a little manners and a little sense. All that's ever restrained me, sir, was lack of sand. The few bad things I've kept out of, I kept out of simply because I knew if I went into 'em I'd bog down. It's not a half hour since I'd have liked first-rate to be worse than I am, but I didn't have the sand for that, either. Why, sir, I'm worse to-day than I ever was, only it's deeper hid. If men went to convict camps for what they are, instead of what they do, I'd be in one now.”
”Conviction of sin! Praise Gawd, brotheh, you've got it! O bring it to-night to the inquirer's seat!”
But the convicted sinner interrupted, with a superior smile: ”I've no inquiries to offer, Mr. Tombs. I know the plan of salvation, sir, perfectly! We're all totally depraved, and would be d.a.m.ned on Adam's account if we wa'n't, for we've lost communion with G.o.d and are liable to all the miseries of this life, to death itself, and the pains of h.e.l.l forever; but G.o.d out of his mere good pleasure having elected some to everlasting life, the rest of us--O I know it like a-b-c! Mother taught it to me before I could read. Yes, I must, with grief and hatred of my sin, turn from it unto G.o.d--certainly--because G.o.d, having first treated the innocent as if he were guilty, is willing now to treat the guilty as if he were innocent, which is all right because of G.o.d's sovereignty over us, his propriety in us, and the zeal he hath for his own wors.h.i.+p--O----
”But, Mr. Tombs, what's the use, sir? Some things I can repent of, but some I can't. I'm expecting a letter to-day tha'll almost certainly be a favorable answer to an extensive proposition I've made for opening up my whole tract of land. Now, I've just been told by one of my squatters that if I bring settlers up there he'll kill 'em; and I know and you know he speaks for all of them. Well, d' you s'pose I won't kill him the minute he lifts a hand to try it?” The speaker's eyes widened pleasantly. He resumed:
”There's another man down here. He's set his worm-eaten heart on something--perfect right to do it. I've no right to say he sha'n't. But I do. I'm just _honing_ to see him to tell him that if he values his health he'll drop that scheme at the close of the year, which closes to-day.”
”O John, is that what yo' father--I don't evm say yo' pious mother--taught you to be?”
”No, sir; my father begged me to be like my mother. And I tried, sir, I tried hard! No use; I had to quit. Strange part is I've got along better ever since. But now, s'pose I should repent these things. 'Twouldn't do any good, sir. For, let me tell you, Mr. Tombs, underneath them all there's another matter--you can't guess it--please don't try or ask anybody else--a matter that I can't repent, and wouldn't if I could!
Well, good-day, sir, I'm sure I reciprocate your----”
”Come to the meeting, my brotheh. You love yo' motheh. Do it to please her.”
”I don't know; I'll see,” replied John, with no intention of seeing, but reflecting with amused self-censure that if anything he did should visibly please his mother, such a result would be, at any rate, unique.
x.x.xIX.
SAME AFTERNOON
Suez had never seen so busy a winter. Never before in the same number of weeks had so much cotton been hauled into town or s.h.i.+pped from it. Goods had never been so cheap, gross sales so large, or Blackland darkeys and Sandstone crackers so flush.
And naturally the prosperity that worked downward had worked upward all the more. Rosemont had a few more students than in any earlier year; Montrose gave her young ladies better mola.s.ses; the white professors in the colored ”university,” and their wives, looked less starved; and General Halliday, in spite of the fact that he was part owner of a steamboat, had at last dropped the t.i.tle of ”Agent.” Even John March had somehow made something.
Barbara, in black, was shopping for Fannie. Johanna was at her side. The day was brisk. Ox-wagons from Clearwater, mule-teams from Blackland, bull-carts from Sandstone, were everywhere. Cotton bales were being tumbled, torn, sampled, and weighed; products of the truck-patch and door-yard, and spoils of the forest, were changing hands. Flakes of cotton blew about under the wheels and among the reclining oxen. In the cold upper blue the buzzards circled, breasted the wind, or turned and scudded down it. From chimney tops the smoke darted hither and yon, and went to shreds in the cedars and evergreen oaks. On one small s.p.a.ce of sidewalk which was quiet, Johanna found breath and utterance.
”Umph! dis-yeh town is busy. Look like jess ev'ybody a-makin' money.”
She got her mistress to read a certain sign for her. ”Jawn Mawch, Gen'lemun!--k-he-he!--da.s.s a new kine o' business. An' yit, Miss Barb, I heah Gen'l Halliday tell Miss Fannie 'istiddy dat Mr. Mawch done come out ahade on dem-ah telegraph pole' what de contractors done git sicken'
on an' th'ow up. He mus' be pow'ful smart, dat Mr. Mawch; ain't he, Miss Barb?”
”I don't know,” murmured Barbara; ”anybody can make money when everybody's making it.” She bent her gaze into a milliner's window.