The Quest of the Silver Fleece: A Novel

  _Twenty_

  THE WEAVING OF THE SILVER FLEECE

  The Silver Fleece, darkly cloaked and girded, lay in the cottonwarehouse of the Cresswells, near the store. Its silken fibres, crampedand close, shone yellow-white in the sunlight; sadly soiled, yetbeautiful. Many came to see Zora's twin bales, as they lay, handlingthem and questioning, while Colonel Cresswell grew proud of hispossession.

  The world was going well with the Colonel. Freed from money cares,praised for his generalship in the cotton corner, able to entertainsumptuously, he was again a Southern gentleman of the older school, andso in his envied element. Yet today he frowned as he stood pokingabsently with his cane at the baled Fleece.

  This marriage--or, rather, these marriages--were not to his liking. Itwas a _mesalliance_ of a sort that pricked him tenderly; it savoredgrossly of bargain and sale. His neighbors regarded it withdisconcerting equanimity. They seemed to think an alliance withNorthern millions an honor for Cresswell blood, and the Colonel thumpedthe nearer bale vigorously. His cane slipped along the iron bandssuddenly, and the old man lurching forward, clutched in space to savehimself and touched a human hand.

  Zora, sitting shadowed on the farther bale, drew back her hand quicklyat the contact, and started to move away.

  "Who's that?" thundered the Colonel, more angry at his involuntaryfright than at the intrusion. "Here, boys!"

  But Zora had come forward into the space where the sunlight of the widefront doors poured in upon the cotton bales.

  "It's me, Colonel," she said.

  He glared at her. She was taller and thinner than formerly, darklytransparent of skin, and her dark eyes shone in strange and duskybrilliance. Still indignant and surprised, the Colonel lifted his voicesharply.

  "What the devil are you doing here?--sleeping when you ought to be atwork! Get out! And see here, next week cotton chopping begins--you'll goto the fields or to the chain-gang. I'll have no more of your loafingabout my place."

  Awaiting no reply, the Colonel, already half ashamed of his vehemence,stormed out into the sunlight and climbed upon his bay mare.

  But Zora still stood silent in the shadow of the Silver Fleece, hearingand yet not hearing. She was searching for the Way, groping for thethreads of life, seeking almost wildly to understand the foundations ofunderstanding, piteously asking for answer to the puzzle of life. Allthe while the walls rose straight about her and narrow. To continue inschool meant charity, yet she had nowhere to go and nothing to go with.To refuse to work for the Cresswells meant trouble for the school andperhaps arrest for herself. To work in the fields meant endless toil anda vista that opened upon death.

  Like a hunted thing the girl turned and twisted in thought and facedeverywhere the blank Impossible. Cold and dreamlike without, her shutteeth held back seething fires within, and a spirit of revolt thatgathered wildness as it grew. Above all flew the dream, the phantasy,the memory of the past, the vision of the future. Over and over shewhispered to herself: "This is not the End; this can not be the End."

  Somehow, somewhere, would come salvation. Yet what it would be and whatshe expected she did not know. She sought the Way, but what way andwhither she did not know, she dared not dream.

  One thing alone lay in her wild fancy like a great and wonderful factdragging the dream to earth and anchoring it there. That was the SilverFleece. Like a brooding mother, Zora had watched it. She knew how thegin had been cleaned for its pressing and how it had been baled apartand carefully covered. She knew how proud Colonel Cresswell was of itand how daily he had visitors to see it and finger the wide white woundin its side.

  "Yes, sir, grown on my place, by my niggers, sir!" he assured them; andthey marvelled.

  To Zora's mind, this beautiful baled fibre was hers; it typifiedhappiness; it was an holy thing which profane hands had stolen. When itcame back to her (as come it must, she cried with clenched hands) itwould bring happiness; not the great Happiness--that was goneforever--but illumination, atonement, and something of the power and theglory. So, involuntarily almost, she haunted the cotton storehouse,flitting like a dark and silent ghost in among the workmen, greetingthem with her low musical voice, warding them with the cold majesty ofher eyes; each day afraid of some last parting, each nighttriumphant--it was still there!

  The Colonel--Zora already forgotten--rode up to the Cresswell Oaks,pondering darkly. It was bad enough to contemplate Helen's marriage indistant prospect, but the sudden, almost peremptory desire for marryingat Eastertide, a little less than two months away, was absurd. Therewere "business reasons arising from the presidential campaign in thefall," John Taylor had telegraphed; but there was already too muchbusiness in the arrangement to suit the Colonel. With Harry it wasdifferent. Indeed it was his own quiet suggestion that made John Taylorhurry matters.

  Harry trusted to the novelty of his father's new wealth to make thelatter complacent; he himself felt an impatient longing for the haven ofa home. He had been too long untethered. He distrusted himself. Thedevil within was too fond of taking the bit in his teeth. He wouldremember to his dying day one awful shriek in the night, as of a soultormenting and tormented. He wanted the protection of a good woman, andsometimes against the clear whiteness of her letters so joyous andgenerous, even if a bit prim and didactic, he saw a vision of himselfreflected as he was, and he feared.

  It was distinctively disconcerting to Colonel Cresswell to find Harryquite in favor of early nuptials, and to learn that the sole objectioneven in Helen's mind was the improbability of getting a wedding-gown intime. Helen had all a child's naive love for beautiful and daintythings, and a wedding-gown from Paris had been her life dream. On thispoint, therefore, there ensued spirited arguments and muchcorrespondence, and both her brother and her lover evincedcharacteristic interest in the planning.

  Said Harry: "Sis, I'll cable to Paris today. They can easily hurry thething along."

  Helen was delighted; she handed over a telegram just received from JohnTaylor. "Send me, express, two bales best cotton you can get."

  The Colonel read the message. "I don't see the connection between thisand hurrying up a wedding-gown," he growled. None of them discerned thehandwriting of Destiny.

  "Neither do I," said Harry, who detected yielding in his father's tone."But we'd better send him the two prize bales; it will be a fineadvertisement of our plantation, and evidently he has a surprise instore for us."

  The Colonel affected to hesitate, but next morning the Silver Fleecewent to town.

  Zora watched it go, and her heart swelled and died within her. Shewalked to town, to the station. She did not see Mrs. Vanderpool arrivingfrom New Orleans; but Mrs. Vanderpool saw her, and looked curiously atthe tall, tragic figure that leaned so dolorously beside the freightcar. The bales were loaded into the express car; the train pulled away,its hoarse snorting waking vague echoes in the forest beyond. But to thegirl who stood at the End, looking outward to darkness, those echoesroared like the crack of doom. A passing band of contract hands calledto her mockingly, and one black giant, laughing loudly, gripped herhand.

  "Come, honey," he shouted, "you'se a'dreaming! Come on, honey!"

  She turned abruptly and gripped his hand, as one drowning grips anythingoffered--gripped till he winced. She laughed a loud mirthless laugh,that came pouring like a sob from her deep lungs.

  "Come on!" she mocked, and joined them.

  They were a motley crowd, ragged, swaggering, jolly. There were husky,big-limbed youths, and bold-faced, loud-tongued girls. To-morrow theywould start up-country to some backwoods barony in the kingdom ofcotton, and work till Christmas time. Today was the last in town; therewas craftily advanced money in their pockets and riot in their hearts.In the gathering twilight they marched noisily through the streets; intheir midst, wide-eyed and laughing almost hysterically, marched Zora.

  Mrs. Vanderpool meantime rode thoughtfully out of town toward CresswellOaks. She was returning from witnessing the Mardi Gras festivities atNew Orleans and at the urgent invitation of th
e Cresswells had stoppedoff. She might even stay to the wedding if the new plans matured.

  Mrs. Vanderpool was quite upset. Her French maid, on whom she haddepended absolutely for five years or more, had left her.

  "I think I want to try a colored maid," she told the Cresswells,laughingly, as they drove home. "They have sweet voices and they can'tdoff their uniform. Helene without her cap and apron was often mistakenfor a lady, and while I was in New Orleans a French confectioner marriedher under some such delusion. Now, haven't you a girl about here whowould do?"

  "No," declared Harry decisively, but his sister suggested that she mightask Miss Smith at the colored school.

  Again Mrs. Vanderpool laughed, but after tea she wandered idly down theroad. The sun behind the swamp was crimsoning the world. Mrs. Vanderpoolstrolled alone to the school, and saw Sarah Smith. There was nocordiality in the latter's greeting, but when she heard the caller'serrand her attention was at once arrested and held. The interests of hercharges were always uppermost in her mind.

  "Can't I have the girl Zora?" Mrs. Vanderpool at last inquired.

  Miss Smith started, for she was thinking of Zora at that very instant.The girl was later than usual, and she was momentarily expecting to seeher tall form moving languidly up the walk.

  She gave Mrs. Vanderpool a searching look. Mrs. Vanderpool glancedinvoluntarily at her gown and smiled as she did it.

  "Could I trust you with a human soul?" asked Miss Smith abruptly.

  Mrs. Vanderpool looked up quickly. The half mocking answer that roseinvoluntarily to her lips was checked. Within, Mrs. Vanderpool was alittle puzzled at herself. Why had she asked for this girl? She had felta strange interest in her--a peculiar human interest since she first sawher and as she saw her again this afternoon. But would she make asatisfactory maid? Was it not a rather dangerous experiment? Why had sheasked for her? She certainly had not intended to when she entered thehouse.

  In the silence Miss Smith continued: "Here is a child in whom thefountains of the great deep are suddenly broken up. With peace and careshe would find herself, for she is strong. But here there is no peace.Slavery of soul and body awaits her and I am powerless to protect her.She must go away. That going away may make or ruin her. She knowsnothing of working for wages and she has not the servant's humility; butshe has loyalty and pluck. For one she loves there is nothing she wouldnot do; but she cannot be driven. Or rather, if she is driven, it mayrouse in her the devil incarnate. She needs not exactly affection--shewould almost resent that--but intelligent interest and care. In returnfor this she will gradually learn to serve and serve loyally. Frankly,Mrs. Vanderpool, I would not have chosen you for this task of humaneducation. Indeed, you would have been my last thought--you seem tome--I speak plainly--a worldly woman. Yet, perhaps--who can tell?--Godhas especially set you to this task. At any rate, I have little choice.I am at my wits' end. Elspeth, the mother of this child, is not longdead; and here is the girl, beautiful, unprotected; and here am I,almost helpless. She is in debt to the Cresswells, and they are pressingthe claim to her service. Take her if you can get her--it is, I fear,her only chance. Mind you--if you can persuade her; and that may beimpossible."

  "Where is she now?"

  Miss Smith glanced out at the darkening landscape, and then at herwatch.

  "I do not know; she's very late. She's given to wandering, but usuallyshe is here before this time."

  "I saw her in town this afternoon," said Mrs. Vanderpool.

  "Zora? In town?" Miss Smith rose. "I'll send her to you tomorrow," shesaid quietly. Mrs. Vanderpool had hardly reached the Oaks before MissSmith was driving toward town.

  A small cabin on the town's ragged fringe was crowded to suffocation.Within arose noisy shouts, loud songs, and raucous laughter; thescraping of a fiddle and whine of an accordion. Liquor began to appearand happy faces grew red-eyed and sodden as the dances whirled. At theedge of the orgy stood Zora, wild-eyed and bewildered, mad with the painthat gripped her heart and hammered in her head, crying in tune with thefrenzied music--"the End--the End!"

  Abruptly she recognized a face despite the wreck and ruin of its beauty.

  "Bertie!" she cried as she seized the mother of little Emma by the arm.

  The woman staggered and offered her glass.

  "Drink," she cried, "drink and forget."

  In a moment Zora sprang forward and seized the burning liquid in bothhands. A dozen hands clapped a devil's tattoo. A score of voices yelledand laughed. The shriek of the music was drowned beneath the thunder ofstamping feet. Men reeled to singing women's arms, but above the roarrose the song of the voice of Zora--she glided to the middle of theroom, standing tip-toed with skirts that curled and turned; she threwback her head, raised the liquor to her lips, paused and looked into theface of Miss Smith.

  A silence fell like a lightning flash on the room as that white facepeered in at the door. Slowly Zora's hands fell and her eyes blinked asthough waking from some awful dream. She staggered toward the woman'soutstretched arms....

  Late that night the girl lay close in Miss Smith's motherly embrace.

  "I was going to hell!" she whispered, trembling.

  "Why, Zora?" asked Miss Smith calmly.

  "I couldn't find the Way--and I wanted to forget."

  "People in hell don't forget," was the matter-of-fact comment. "And,Zora, what way do you seek? The way where?"

  Zora sat up in bed, and lifted a gray and stricken face.

  "It's a lie," she cried, with hoarse earnedstness, "the way nowhere.There is no Way! You know--I want _him_--I want nothing on earth buthim--and him I can't ever have."

  The older woman drew her down tenderly.

  "No, Zora," she said, "there's something you want more than him andsomething you can have!"

  "What?" asked the wondering girl.

  "His respect," said Sarah Smith, "and I know the Way."