Читать книгу: «The Sins of the Father: A Romance of the South», страница 21

"Yes," Norton answered tremblingly, "and I ought to have done it!"

"But you didn't?"

"No."

"Why?"

The father fumbled his watch chain, moved uneasily and finally said with firmness:

"I am Helen's guardian!"

The boy lifted his brows:

"You are supposed to be his attorney only. Why did you, of all men on earth, accept such a position?"

"I felt that I had to."

"And the possibility of my meeting this girl never occurred to you? You, who have dinned into my ears from childhood that I should keep myself clean from the touch of such pollution – why did you take the risk?"

"A sense of duty to one to whom I felt bound."

"Duty?"

"Yes."

"It must have been deep – what duty?"

Norton lifted his hand in a movement of wounded pride:

"My boy!"

"Come, come, Dad, don't shuffle; this thing's a matter of life and death with me and you must be fair – "

"I'm trying – "

"I want to know why you are Helen's guardian, exactly why. We must face each other to-day with souls bare – why are you her guardian?"

"I – I – can't tell you."

"You've got to tell me!"

"You must trust me in this, my son!"

"I won't do it!" the boy cried, trembling with passion that brought the tears blinding to his eyes. "We're not father and son now. We face each other man to man with two lives at stake – hers and mine! You can't ask me to trust you! I won't do it – I've got to know!"

The father turned away:

"I can't betray this secret even to you, my boy."

"Does any one else share it?"

"Why do you use that queer tone? What do you mean?" The father's last question was barely breathed.

"Nothing," the boy answered with a toss of his head. "Does any one in this house suspect it?"

"Possibly."

Again Tom paused, watching keenly:

"On the day you returned and found Helen here, you quarrelled with Cleo?"

Norton wheeled with sudden violence:

"We won't discuss this question further, sir!"

"Yes, we will," was the steady answer through set teeth. "Haven't you been afraid of Cleo?"

The father's eyes were looking into his now with a steady stare:

"I refuse to be cross-examined, sir!"

Tom ignored his answer:

"Hasn't Cleo been blackmailing you?"

"No – no."

The boy held his father's gaze until it wavered, and then in cold tones said:

"You are not telling me the truth!"

Norton flinched as if struck:

"Do you know what you are saying. Have you lost your senses?"

Tom held his ground with dogged coolness:

"Have you told me the truth?"

"Yes."

"It's a lie!"

The words were scarcely spoken when Norton's clenched fist struck him a blow full in the face.

A wild cry of surprise, inarticulate in fury, came from the boy's lips as he staggered against the table. He glared at his father, drew back a step, his lips twitching, his breath coming in gasps, and suddenly felt for the revolver in his pocket.

With a start of horror the father cried:

"My boy!"

The hand dropped limp, he leaned against the table for support and sobbed:

"O God! Let me die!"

Norton rushed to his side, his voice choking with grief:

"Tom, listen!"

"I won't listen!" he hissed. "I never want to hear the sound of your voice again!"

"Don't say that – you don't mean it!" the father pleaded.

"I do mean it!"

Norton touched his arm tenderly:

"You can't mean it, Tom. You're all I've got in the world. You mustn't say that. Forgive me – I was mad. I didn't know what I was doing. I didn't mean to strike you. I forgot for a moment that you're a man, proud and sensitive as I am – "

The boy tore himself free from his touch and crossed the room with quick, angry stride and turned:

"Well, you'd better not forget it again" – he paused and drew himself erect. "You're my father, but I tell you to your face that I hate and loathe you – "

The silver-gray head drooped:

"That I should have lived to hear it!"

"And I want you to understand one thing," Tom went on fiercely, "if an angel from heaven told me that Helen's blood was tainted, I'd demand proofs! You have shown none, and I'm not going to give up the woman I love!"

Norton supported himself by the table and felt his way along its edges as if blinded. His eyes were set with a half-mad stare as he gripped Tom's shoulders:

"I love you, my boy, with a love beyond your ken, a love that can be fierce and cruel when God calls, and sooner than see you marry this girl, I'll kill you with my own hands if I must!"

The answer came slowly:

"And you can't guess what's happened?"

"Guess – what's – happened!" the father repeated in a whisper. "What do you mean?"

"That I'm married already!"

With hands uplifted, his features convulsed, the father fell back, his voice a low piteous shriek:

"Merciful God! – No!"

"Married an hour before you dragged me away in that campaign!" he shouted in triumph. "I knew you'd never consent and so I took matters into my own hands!"

With a leap Norton grasped the boy again and shook him madly:

"Married already? It's not true, I tell you! It's not true. You're lying to me – lying to gain time – it's not true!"

"You wish me to swear it?"

"Silence, sir!" the father cried in solemn tones. "You are my son – this is my house – I order you to be silent!"

"Before God, I swear it's true! Helen is my lawful – "

"Don't say it! It's false – you lie, I tell you!" Again the father shook him with cruel violence, his eyes staring with the glitter of a maniac.

Tom seized the trembling hands and threw them from his shoulders with a quick movement of anger:

"If that's all you've got to say, sir, excuse me, I'll go to my wife!"

He wheeled, slammed the door and was gone.

The father stared a moment, stunned, looked around blankly, placed his hands over his ears and held them, crying:

"God have mercy!"

He rushed to a window and threw it open. The band was playing "For He's a Jolly Good Fellow!" The mocking strains rolled over his prostrate soul. He leaned heavily against the casement and groaned:

"My God!"

He slammed the sash, staggered back into the room, lifted his eyes in a leaden stare at the portrait over the mantel, and then rushed toward it with uplifted arms and streaming eyes:

"It's not true, dearest! Don't believe it – it's not true, I tell you! It's not true!"

The voice sank into inarticulate sobs, he reeled and fell, a limp, black heap on the floor.

CHAPTER XXV
THE ONE CHANCE

The dim light began to creep into the darkened brain at last. Norton's eyes opened wider and the long arms felt their way on the floor until they touched a rug and then a chair. He tried to think what had happened and why he was lying there. It seemed a dream, half feverish, half restful. His head was aching and he was very tired.

"What's the matter?" he murmured, unable to lift his head.

He was whirling through space again and the room faded. Once before in his life had he been knocked insensible. From the trenches before Petersburg in the last days of the war he had led his little band of less than five hundred ragged, half-starved, tatterdemalions in a mad charge against the line in front. A bomb from a battery on a hilltop exploded directly before them. He had been thrown into the air and landed on a heap of dead bodies, bruised and stunned into insensibility. He had waked feeling the dead limbs and wondering if they were his own.

He rubbed his hands now, first over his head, and then over each limb, to find if all were there. He felt his body to see if a bomb had torn part of it away.

And then the light of memory suddenly flashed into the darkened mind and he drew himself to his knees and fumbled his way to a chair.

"Married? Married already!" he gasped. "O, God, it can't be true! And he said, 'married an hour before you dragged me away in that campaign'" – it was too hideous! He laughed in sheer desperation and again his brain refused to work. He pressed his hands to his forehead and looked about the room, rose, staggered to the bell and rang for Andy.

When his black face appeared, he lifted his bloodshot eyes and said feebly:

"Whiskey – "

The negro bowed:

"Yassah!"

He pulled himself together and tried to walk. He could only reel from one piece of furniture to the next. His head was on fire. He leaned again against the mantel for support and dropped his head on his arm in utter weariness:

"I must think! I must think!"

Slowly the power to reason returned.

"What can I do? What can I do?" he kept repeating mechanically, until the only chance of escape crept slowly into his mind. He grasped it with feverish hope.

If Tom had married but an hour before leaving on that campaign, he hadn't returned until to-day. But had he? It was, of course, a physical possibility. From the nearby counties, he could have ridden a swift horse through the night, reached home and returned the next day without his knowing it. It was possible, but not probable. He wouldn't believe it until he had to.

If he had married in haste the morning he had left town and had only rejoined Helen to-night, it was no marriage. It was a ceremony that had no meaning. In law it was void and could be annulled immediately. But if he were really married in all that word means – his mind stopped short and refused to go on.

He would cross that bridge when he came to it. But he must find out at once and he must know before he saw Tom again.

His brain responded with its old vigor under the pressure of the new crisis. One by one his powers returned and his mind was deep in its tragic problem when Andy entered the room with a tray on which stood a decanter of whiskey, a glass of water and two small empty glasses.

The negro extended the tray. Norton was staring into space and paid no attention.

Andy took one of the empty glasses and clicked it against the other. There was still no sign of recognition until he pushed the tray against Norton's arm and cleared his throat:

"Ahem! Ahem!"

The dazed man turned slowly and looked at the tray and then at the grinning negro:

"What's this?"

Andy's face kindled with enthusiasm:

"Dat is moonshine, sah – de purest mountain dew – yassah!"

"Whiskey?"

"Yassah," was the astonished reply, "de whiskey you jis ring fer, sah!"

"Take it back!"

Andy could not believe his ears. The major was certainly in a queer mood. Was he losing his mind?

There was nothing to do but obey. He bowed and turned away:

"Yassah."

Norton watched him with a dazed look and cried suddenly:

"Where are you going?"

"Back!"

"Stop!"

Andy stopped with a sudden jerk:

"Yassah!"

"Put that tray down on the table!"

The negro obeyed but watched his master out of the corners of his eye:

"Yassah!"

Again Norton forgot Andy's existence, his eyes fixed in space, his mind in a whirl of speculation in which he felt his soul and body sinking deeper. The negro was watching him with increasing suspicion and fear as he turned his head in the direction of the table.

"What are you standing there for?" he asked sharply.

"You say stop, sah."

"Well, get away – get out!" Norton cried with sudden anger.

Andy backed rapidly:

"Yassah!"

As he reached the doorway Norton's command rang so sharply that the negro spun around on one foot:

"Wait!"

"Y – yas – sah!"

The master took a step toward the trembling figure with an imperious gesture:

"Come here!"

Andy approached gingerly, glancing from side to side for the best way of retreat in case of emergency:

"What's the matter with you?" Norton demanded.

Andy laughed feebly:

"I – I – I dunno, sah; I wuz des wonderin' what's de matter wid you, sah!"

"Tell me!"

The negro's teeth were chattering as he glanced up:

"Yassah! I tell all I know, sah!"

Norton fixed him with a stern look:

"Has Tom been back here during the past four weeks?"

"Nasah!" was the surprised answer, "he bin wid you, sah!"

The voice softened to persuasive tones:

"He hasn't slipped back here even for an hour since I've been gone?"

"I nebber seed him!"

"I didn't ask you," Norton said threateningly, "whether you'd 'seed' him" – he paused and dropped each word with deliberate emphasis – "I asked you if you knew whether he'd been here?"

Andy mopped his brow and glanced at his inquisitor with terror:

"Nasah, I don't know nuttin', sah!"

"Haven't you lied to me?"

"Yassah! yassah," the negro replied in friendly conciliation. "I has pér-var-i-cated sometimes – but I sho is tellin' you de truf dis time, sah!"

The master glared at him a moment and suddenly sprang at his throat, both hands clasping his neck with a strangling grip. Andy dropped spluttering to his knees.

"You're lying to me!" Norton growled. "Out with the truth now" – his grip tightened – "out with it, or I'll choke it out of you!"

Andy grasped the tightening fingers and drew them down:

"Fer Gawd's sake, major, doan' do dat!"

"Has Tom been back here during the past weeks to see Miss Helen?"

Andy struggled with the desperate fingers:

"Doan' do dat, major – doan' do dat! I ain't holdin' nuttin' back – I let it all out, sah!"

The grip slackened:

"Then out with the whole truth!"

"Yassah. Des tell me what ye wants me ter say, sah, an' I sho say hit!"

"Bah! You miserable liar!" Norton cried in disgust, hurling him to the floor, and striding angrily from the room. "You're all in this thing, all of you! You're all in it – all in it!"

Andy scrambled to his feet and rushed to the window in time to see him hurry down the steps and disappear in the shadows of the lawn. He stood watching with open mouth and staring eyes:

"Well, 'fore de Lawd, ef he ain't done gone plum crazy!"

CHAPTER XXVI
BETWEEN TWO FIRES

So intent was Andy's watch on the lawn, so rapt his wonder and terror at the sudden assault, he failed to hear Cleo's step as she entered the room, walked to his side and laid her hand on his shoulder:

"Andy – "

With a loud groan he dropped to his knees:

"De Lawd save me!"

Cleo drew back with amazement at the prostrate figure:

"What on earth's the matter?"

"Oh – oh, Lawd," he shivered, scrambling to his feet and mopping his brow. "Lordy, I thought de major got me dat time sho!"

"You thought the major had you?" Cleo cried incredulously.

Andy ran back to the window and looked out again:

"Yassam – yassam! De major try ter kill me – he's er regular maniacker – gone wild – "

"What about?"

The black hands went to his throat:

"Bout my windpipes, 'pears like!"

"What did he do?"

"Got me in de gills!"

"Why?"

"Dunno," was the whispered answer as he peered out the window. "He asked me if Mr. Tom been back here in de past fo' weeks – "

"Asked if Tom had been back here?"

"Yassam!"

"What a fool question, when he's had the boy with him every day! He must have gone crazy."

"Yassam!" Andy agreed with unction as he turned back into the room and threw both hands high above his head in wild gestures. "He say we wuz all in it! Dat what he say – we wuz all in it! All in it!"

"In what?"

"Gawd knows!" he cried, as his hands again went to his neck to feel if anything were broken, "Gawd knows, but he sho wuz gittin' inside er me!"

Cleo spoke with stern appeal:

"Well, you're a man; you'll know how to defend yourself next time, won't you?"

"Yassam! – yas, m'am!" Andy answered boldly. "Oh, I fit 'im! Don't you think I didn't fight him! I fit des lak er wild-cat – yassam!"

The woman's eyes narrowed and her voice purred:

"You're going to stand by me now?"

"Dat I is!" was the brave response.

"You'll do anything for me?"

"Yassam!"

"Defend me with your life if the major attacks me to-night?"

"Dat I will!"

Cleo leaned close:

"You'll die for me?"

"Yassam! yassam – I'll die fer you – I'll die fer ye; of cose I'll die for ye! B-b-but fer Gawd's sake what ye want wid er dead nigger?"

Andy leaped back in terror as Norton's tall figure suddenly appeared in the door, his rumpled iron-gray hair gleaming in the shadows, his eyes flashing with an unnatural light. He quickly crossed the room and lifted his index finger toward Cleo:

"Just a word with you – "

The woman's hands met nervously, and she glanced at Andy:

"Very well, but I want a witness. Andy can stay."

Norton merely glanced at the negro:

"Get out!"

"Yassah!"

"Stay where you are!" Cleo commanded.

"Y – yassam" – Andy stammered, halting.

"Get out!" Norton growled.

Andy jumped into the doorway at a single bound:

"Done out, sah!"

The major lifted his hand and the negro stopped:

"Tell Minerva I want to see her."

Andy hastened toward the hall, the whites of his eyes shining:

"Yassah, but she ain't in de kitchen, sah!"

"Find her and bring her here!" Norton thundered. His words rang like the sudden peal of a gun at close quarters:

Andy jumped:

"Yassah, yassah, I fetch her! I fetch her!" As he flew through the door he repeated humbly:

"I fetch her, right away, sah – right away, sah!"

Cleo watched his cowardly desertion with lips curled in scorn.

CHAPTER XXVII
A SURPRISE

For a while Norton stood with folded arms gazing at Cleo, his eyes smouldering fires of wonder and loathing. The woman was trembling beneath his fierce scrutiny, but he evidently had not noted the fact. His mind was busy with a bigger problem of character and the possible depths to which a human being might fall and still retain the human form. He was wondering how a man of his birth and breeding, the heir to centuries of culture and refinement, of high thinking and noble aspirations, could ever have sunk to the level of this yellow animal – this bundle of rags and coarse flesh! It was incredible! His loathing for her was surpassed by one thing only – his hatred of himself.

He was free in this moment as never before. In the fearlessness of death soul and body stood erect and gazed calmly out on time and eternity.

There was one thing about the woman he couldn't understand. That she was without moral scruple – that she was absolutely unmoral in her fundamental being – he could easily believe. In fact, he could believe nothing else. That she would not hesitate to defy every law of God or man to gain her end, he never doubted for a moment. But that a creature of her cunning and trained intelligence could deliberately destroy herself by such an act of mad revenge was unreasonable. He began dimly to suspect that her plans had gone awry. How completely she had been crushed by her own trap he could not yet guess.

She was struggling frantically now to regain her composure but his sullen silence and his piercing eyes were telling on her nerves. She was on the verge of screaming in his face when he said in low, intense tones:

"You did get even with me – didn't you?"

"Yes!"

"I didn't think you quite capable of this!"

His words were easier to bear than silence. She felt an instant relief and pulled herself together with a touch of bravado:

"And now that you see I am, what are you going to do about it?"

"That's my secret," was the quiet reply. "There's just one thing that puzzles me!"

"Indeed!"

"How you could willfully and deliberately do this beastly thing?"

"For one reason only, I threw them together and brought about their love affair – "

"Revenge – yes," Norton interrupted, "but the boy – you don't hate him – you can't. You've always loved him as if he were your own – "

"Well, what of it?"

"I'm wondering – "

"What?"

His voice was low, vibrant but quiet:

"Why, if your mother instincts have always been so powerful and you've loved my boy with such devotion" – the tones quickened to sudden menace – "why you were so willing to give up your own child that day twenty years ago?"

He held her gaze until her own fell:

"I – I – don't understand you," she said falteringly.

He seized her with violence and drew her squarely before him:

"Look at me!" he cried fiercely. "Look me in the face!" He paused until she slowly lifted her eyes to his and finally glared at him with hate. "I want to see your soul now if you've got one. There's just one chance and I'm clutching at that as a drowning man a straw."

"Well?" she asked defiantly.

Norton's words were hurled at her, each one a solid shot:

"Would you have given up that child without a struggle – if she had really been your own?"

"Why – what – do you – mean?" Cleo asked, her eyes shifting.

"You know what I mean. If Helen is really your child, why did you give her up so easily that day?"

"Why?" she repeated blankly.

"Answer my question!"

With an effort she recovered her composure:

"You know why! I was mad. I was a miserable fool. I did it because you asked it. I did it to please you, and I've cursed myself for it ever since."

Norton's grip slowly relaxed, and he turned thoughtfully away. The woman's hand went instinctively to the bruises he had left on her arms as she stepped back nearer the door and watched him furtively.

"It's possible, yes!" he cried turning again to face her suddenly. "And yet if you are human how could you dare defy the laws of man and God to bring about this marriage?"

"It's not a question of marriage yet," she sneered. "You've simply got to acknowledge her, that's all. That's why I brought her here. That's why I've helped their love affair. You're in my power now. You've got to tell Tom that Helen is my daughter, and yours – his half sister! Now that they're in love with one another you've got to do it!"

Norton drew back in amazement:

"You mean to tell me that you don't know that they are married?"

With a cry of surprise and terror, the woman leaped to his side, her voice a whisper:

"Married? Who says they are married?"

"Tom has just said so."

"But they are not married!" she cried hysterically. "They can't marry!"

Norton fixed her with a keen look:

"They are married!"

The woman wrung her hands nervously:

"But you can separate them if you tell them the truth. That's all you've got to do. Tell them now – tell them at once!"

Never losing the gaze with which he was piercing her soul Norton said in slow menacing tones:

"There's another way!"

He turned from her suddenly and walked toward the desk. She followed a step, trembling.

"Another way" – she repeated.

Norton turned:

"An old way brave men have always known – I'll take it if I must!"

Chilled with fear Cleo glanced in a panic about the room and spoke feebly:

"You – you – don't mean – "

Minerva and Andy entered cautiously as Norton answered:

"No matter what I mean, it's enough for you to know that I'm free – free from you – I breathe clean air at last!"

Minerva shot Cleo a look:

"Praise God!"

Cleo extended a hand in pleading:

"Major – "

"That will do now!" he said sternly. "Go!"

Cleo turned hurriedly to the door leading toward the stairs.

"Not that way!" Norton called sharply. "Tom has no further need of your advice. Go to the servants' quarters and stay there. I am the master of this house to-night!"

Cleo slowly crossed the room and left through the door leading to the kitchen, watching Norton with terror. Minerva broke into a loud laugh and Andy took refuge behind her ample form.