第11章 THE INHERITANCE(11)

"If you want a drink of water thar's a bucket in the porch," said Fletcher, as he opened the back door and reached out into the moonlight."Wait thar a second and I'll hand you the dipper."He stepped out upon the porch, and a moment later Carraway heard a heavy stumble followed by a muttered oath.

"Why, blast the varmints! I've upset the boy's cage of white mice and they're skedaddling about my legs.Here! hold the lamp, will you--I'm squashing a couple of 'em under each of my hands."Carraway, leaning out with the lamp, which drew a brilliant circle on the porch, saw Fletcher floundering helplessly upon his hands and knees in the midst of the fleeing family of mice.

"They're a plagued mess of beasts, that's what they are," he exclaimed, "but the little lad sets a heap of store by 'em, and when he comes down tomorrow he'll find that I got some of 'em back, anyway."He fastened the cage and placed it carefully beneath the bench.

Then, closing and bolting the door, he took the lamp from Carraway and motioned him up the dusky staircase to the spare chamber at the top.

CHAPTER V.The Wreck of the Blakes When Christopher left Blake Hall, he swung vigorously in the twilight across the newly ploughed fields, until, at the end of a few minutes' walk, he reached the sunken road that branched off by the abandoned ice-pond.Here the bullfrogs were still croaking hoarsely, and far away over the gray-green rushes a dim moon was mounting the steep slope of bluish sky.

The air was fresh with the scent of the upturned earth, and the closing day refined into a tranquil beauty; but the young man, as he passed briskly, did not so much as draw a lengthened breath, and when presently the cry of a whip-poor-will floated from the old rail fence, he fell into a whistling mockery of the plaintive notes.The dogs at his heels started a rabbit once from the close cover of the underbrush, and he called them to order in a sharp, peremptory tone.Not until he reached the long, whitewashed gate opening before the frame house of the former overseers did he break the easy swing of his accustomed stride.

The house, a common country dwelling of the sort used by the poorer class of farmers, lost something of its angularity beneath the moonlight, and even the half-dried garments, spread after the day's washing on the bent old rose-bushes, shone in soft white patches amid the grass, which looked thick and fine under the heavy dew.In one corner of the yard there was a spreading peach-tree, on which the shriveled little peaches ripened out of season, and against the narrow porch sprawled a gray and crippled aspen, where a flock of turkeys had settled to roost along its twisted boughs.

In one of the lower rooms a lamp was burning, and as Christopher crunched heavily along the pebbled path, a woman with a piece of sewing in her hand came into the hall and spoke his name.

"Christopher, you are late."

Her voice was deep and musical, with a richness of volume which raised deluding hopes of an impassioned beauty in the speaker--who, as she crossed the illumined square of the window-frame, showed as a tall, thin woman of forty years, with squinting eyes, and a face whose misshapen features stood out like the hasty drawing for a grotesque.When she reached him Christopher turned from the porch, and they walked together slowly out into the moonlight, passing under the aspen where the turkeys stirred and fluttered in their sleep.

"Has her cat come home, Cynthia?" were the young man's first anxious words.

"About sunset.Uncle Boaz found her over at Aunt Daphne's, hunting mice under the joists.Mother had fretted terribly over the loss.""Is she easier now?"

"Much more so, but she still asks for the port.We pretend that Uncle Boaz has mislaid the key of the wine-cellar.She upbraided him, and he bore it so patiently, poor old soul!"Christopher quickly reached into the deep pocket of his overalls and drew out the scanty wages of his last three days' labour.

"Send this by somebody down to Tompkins," he said, "and get the wine he ordered.He refuses to sell on credit any longer, so Ihad to find the money."

She looked up, startled.

"Oh, Christopher, you have worked for Fletcher?"Tears shone in her eyes and her mouth quivered."Oh, Christopher!" she repeated, and the emotional quality in her voice rang strong and true.He fell back, angered, while the hand she had stretched out dropped limply to her side.

"For God's sake, don't snivel," he retorted harshly."Send the money and give her the wine, but dole it out like a miser, for where the next will come from is more than I can tell.""The pay for my sewing is due in three days," said Cynthia, raising her roughened hand on which the needle-scars showed even in the moonlight."Mother has worried so to-day that I couldn't work except at odd moments, but I can easily manage to sit up to-night and get it done.She thinks I'm embroidering an ottoman, you see, and this evening she asked to feel the silks."He uttered a savage exclamation.

"Oh, I gave her some ravellings from an old tidy," she hastened to assure him."She played with them awhile and knew no better, as I told her the colours one by one.Afterward she planned all kinds of samplers and fire-screens that I might work.Her own knitting has wearied her of late, so we haven't been obliged to buy the yarn.""She doesn't suspect, you think?"

Cynthia shook her head."After fifteen years of deception there's no danger of my telling the truth to-day.I only wish I could,"she added, with that patient dignity which is the outward expression of complete renouncement.When she lifted her tragic face the tears on her cheeks softened the painful hollows, as the moonbeams, playing over her gown of patched and faded silk, revived for a moment the freshness of its discoloured flowers.