Anthony ignored these remarks, and pushing aside his protesting and ridiculing admirers with his elbows he returned to Adelaide, whose little face was bright red with shame and anger. He apparently did not see this, but sat beside her again, and laid the plate in her lap. She stared at it miserably, her eyes full of tears. Her throat was choking.
“Go on, eat,” he said, kindly. “You don’t want me to feed you, do you?”
She tried to eat. The ice-cream stuck in her throat in an icy ball. She swallowed and choked. He gave her a large white handkerchief without comment. Her humiliation was complete.
“Go away!” she cried, strangling.
“What for?” he asked, bluntly. “I like you. I don’t like the other girls much. I won’t go away. I told you: I like you.”
She struggled against her tears, while he watched her, no longer smiling, but very intent and serious. He waited until she was composed again, and saw that she was trembling and shivering.
Then he said: “The moment I saw you, I knew I’d like you. You are so different from the other girls. Foolish, silly creatures, always giggling and trying to flirt like their elders.” He paused. “You are so pretty,” he added, in a low and gentle voice. “So unusual. Your eyes are the prettiest eyes I’ve ever seen.”
Her heart flooded with pure ecstasy and incredulous joy. She gazed at him with mute pleading through her wet eyelashes. He took her hand and pressed it warmly and firmly. “Nice little girl,” he whispered. Then he filled a spoon with ice cream and put it to her lips, and she took it with silent gratitude.
In the meantime, while Adelaide pathetically allowed her cousin to feed her, the sound of gay music had come from the parlours, and the young guests had joyously streamed away to dance. Dozens of happy and laughing voices mingled with the strains of piano and violin and cello and harp. Anthony and Adelaide were left alone in silence at the window of the disordered dining-room.
They looked at each other long and seriously, faintly smiling. The last of the ice-cream was gone, and Anthony helped Adelaide finish the cake. They enjoyed it immensely.
Then Anthony said: “Would you like to dance, Adelaide?”
She shrank back against the window again, her happiness fading away. “Oh, no!” she murmured. “I don’t dance well.” Then quite pale once more, she said: “But you haven’t met my sisters. They are so very pretty. Every one says so.”
“I’ve met them,” replied Anthony, with the most miraculous indifference. “I think Lavinia is very bold, and I believe that Louisa is sly. I don’t like them in the least.”
Family loyalty made Adelaide protest indignantly: “Perhaps they didn’t like you!”
He laughed. “Indeed they did! That’s why I came here to hide in the window. And there you were, not at all like your sisters. Why are you so different?”
But Adelaide was speechless. After looking at her with his long and intelligent kindness, Anthony took her hand again, and stroked it gently. Adelaide resisted a moment, then submitted. His hand imparted to hers a most soothing and peaceful sensation, secure and warm and good. She smiled at him tremulously.
Two young couples came back into the dining-room on a wave of high excited laughter and gaiety. Adelaide, seeing them, tried to disappear into the shadows. For the girls were Lavinia and Louisa, accompanied by two vigorous boys, with whom they were flirting in the most indecorous manner.
Her sisters were hardly in the room when they saw the two lurking in the window, and Lavinia shrieked: “Oh, there’s Tony, and that little toad! Whatever is he doing there with her?”
Anthony rose slowly. His sharp and finely-cut features became hard and cold, and his gray eyes resembled dark slate on a bitter winter twilight. But he bowed courteously to Lavinia, who was lumberingly coquettish, and at the serene and dainty Louisa, who swept her golden lashes on her cheek in a most devastating fashion. Adelaide, in spite of her shrinking, was more frightened by Anthony’s stony change of countenance than she was of her sisters’ teasing, and the stare of the two strange youths.
Lavinia bridled her head at her newly found cousin, and simpered. Her black eyes sparkled; her firm cheeks were very round and red. “Why did you hide yourself with that little wretch?” she demanded, in a cajoling voice. “We’ve looked all over for you.”
“I found Adelaide very good company,” said Anthony, coldly. He glanced tentatively at the other youths, waiting for an introduction.
“Good company!” shrieked Lavinia, with a burst of boisterous laughter. “She’s only a child! And the nastiest little sneak.” But there was no venom in her voice, and the restless glance she gave Adelaide was mirthful. “There, I’m sorry, Addy. But Cinderella always gets the prince, doesn’t she?”
Adelaide was overcome with misery. Then, all at once, to Lavinia’s startled confusion, that wild and fiery light which had so appalled Miss Hamlin flashed into the child’s eyes as she looked at her sister. It was gone in an instant, and Adelaide was as still and silent as she had been before. But Lavinia gazed at her, her mouth momentarily agape.
Louisa prettily performed the introductions, sweeping her lashes up and down and speaking in her soft and mellifluous voice. “Anthony, Patrick Brogan, and Rufus Hastings, old friends of ours. Patrick, Rufus, Anthony Bollister is our cousin, our second cousin, to be entirely correct.”
The youths bowed ceremoniously, but furtively eyed each other like young gamecocks. Anthony, after one swift and appraising glance, decided that he liked neither of the other two, though both were prepossessing in appearance. Patrick Brogan was about sixteen, a handsome twinkling young Irishman, tall and florid of colour, with little deepset eyes of intense dark blue, sparkling and smiling. His hair was very black and thick, with a smooth rolling wave that girls found very bewitching. He had a big and fleshy body, with heavy muscles, and was elegantly if somewhat flashily dressed. He smiled almost constantly, with a wide white grin under a thick and tilted nose, and it was this smile that antagonized Anthony, for he knew at once that Patrick Brogan was a rascal, a schemer and a budding reprobate even at his present age. Patrick was indeed a rogue, by natural inheritance, and ruthless, though he had no inherent cruelty or viciousness, but was rather possessed of cunning and monumental villainy. In short, a young reprobate, good-natured and colourful, brutal and humorous, with a loud and ingratiating voice full of meaningless affection.
But it was Rufus Hastings that Anthony instinctively detested. The son of an enormously wealthy gentleman associated with the Vanderbilts and their railroads, Rufus was constantly if silently impressing upon all who came in contact with him his vast superiority to others. He was about Patrick’s own age, and slightly taller, very thin, almost lathelike, and dressed with exquisite taste. His face was neutral, long and thin and somewhat sallow, with a thin ridge of a long nose and close tight lips. Under sparse blond brows his eyes were a curious greenish yellow, intent and narrow. His hair was dun-coloured and thin, and he had large transparent ears. He moved slowly and impressively, and spoke in a low and almost inaudible voice, beautifully modulated and quiet. His manner was indifferent, supremely egotistic and regal, and he always gave the impression of pale ennui. In all physical attributes, he became dim in contrast to the more ebullient and flamboyant Patrick Brogan, but Anthony, young as he was, saw that here was pure wickedness, amoral and relentless, cold as death. He had seen this wickedness in his own father, and had recognized it at once, and the same subtlety. Here was a plotter, but not a schemer. What Rufus possessed was so superior to Patrick’s jovial cunning as to make the latter appear lovable, in comparison. While Patrick was a good-natured bully, he might at times have generosity and warmth. But Rufus, though not a bully, was virulent.
His aloof glance quickened, after the first instant, upon Anthony. “I say,” he murmured, “aren’t you in the fourth form at Bullard’s? I thought I’d seen you there. I am in the sixth form.”
“Yes. That is right,” replied Anthony. His gray eyes were piercing, but Rufus all
owed no thought at all to touch his green eyes, and while he did not yawn, he gave that impression. “Beastly place, Bullard’s,” he murmured. “I’m to go to Exeter next September. One meets the most impossible people at Bullard’s.”
Anthony said nothing, but his nostrils widened for an instant.
Patrick laughed his rich and rollicking laugh. “I like Bullard’s,” he said. “I’m to go there myself, in September. Good playing fields, and boxing. I’m a good boxer,” and he lifted his strong and meaty fists and gaily made a feinting motion at Rufus, who dropped his hooded eyelids and averted his head.
“Unless,” added Patrick, heartily, “I decide to enlist.”
“You!” cried Lavinia, hootingly. “You’re too young! They aren’t taking boys of sixteen.”
“I look eighteen,” said Patrick, with a complacent grin.
“Feel those muscles,” and he flexed his arm and offered it to Lavinia. But she recoiled, very coyly. However, Lavinia placed her little white fingers on the proffered member and looked properly impressed and admiring.
“Beastly thing, this war,” said Rufus, with much ennui. “Very vulgar. Imagine white men fighting over blackamoors. Not to be thought of, really.”
“Odious,” said Anthony, mimicking the other’s voice. “Really odious.”
Rufus turned to him and stared at him with eyes suddenly deadly and quiet. The girls noticed nothing, but Patrick was not so obtuse. He laughed loudly. He took Anthony by the arm and shook him. “I like you!” he cried. “Damned if I don’t!”
Louisa clapped her hands to her ears and looked horrified. “Patrick! What language! So unrefined, I do declare!”
Anthony shook off Patrick’s friendly hand and said nothing. Lavinia’s attention returned to him, and she gazed at him with frank admiration. “It’s really entrancing, you know, to find you are our cousin. We didn’t know at all.”
“No, indeed,” breathed Louisa, with a devastating smile in her blue eyes. “It’s lovely, though.”
Patrick, who was much smitten by Louisa, scowled suddenly at Anthony. These Protestants didn’t mind marrying cousins, he reflected.
“What’s your subjects at Bullard’s?” he demanded, returning to his former sincere friendliness.
“The humanities,” replied Anthony, coolly.
Patrick stared. “And what in hell are they, sir?”
Rufus smiled thinly. “You wouldn’t know, Pat. Nebulous things. Brotherly love and such, history of human thought and religion. You wouldn’t know.”
“You wouldn’t know,” repeated Anthony, but he looked fixedly at Rufus.
“Sounds messy,” said Patrick, frankly. But he looked from one to the other of the youths with his twinkling dark blue eyes.
A louder burst of music, accompanied by clapping, sounded from the parlours. It was a Virginia reel which had excited that applause. Patrick masterfully took Louisa’s hand, and Rufus turned elegantly to Lavinia. With a last long look at their cousin, the girls drifted away with their cavaliers, Louisa pausing once at the door to flash Anthony a killing glance, provoking and inviting. But Anthony sat down again beside little Adelaide, whom every one had forgotten, as usual.
“So,” he said, looking down at her and smiling quietly, “those are your sisters. They are very pretty.”
“Yes,” said Adelaide, dully.
“But not like you, my little love,” said Anthony.
They paused and gazed at each other in a long and shining silence.
They began to talk, happily and contentedly. Adelaide shyly told Anthony of her music. He could play the violin, himself, he said, with enthusiasm. They must play a duet together. He was full of plans for the rest of the summer. And Adelaide, as she listened, saw heaven, glistening and rain-bowed, opening before her.
But they did not see each other again for a very long time.
CHAPTER 32
Mr. Everett Livingston was a very old man now, old and white and broken, his body bent and full of the slowness and heaviness of movement which is not entirely age, but also composed of a sickness of soul. Where he had once been erect, he was bowed. Where his face had once possessed a sunken and noble aristocracy, it was withered and shrunken now, small and ill under a white skull which had appeared to grow larger and more impressive as the countenance beneath it shrivelled.
He had called John Turnbull and Mr Wilkins in to see him. Behind him, on the bare wall, no longer hung the portrait of Queen Victoria, smugly and arrogantly staring before her. It had been replaced by a fine painting of President Lincoln, draped in the flag of the Union. He sat in his chair, huddled as if very cold, but his frosty blue eyes had taken on a living quality rare in these days. It was as if for the last time the hidden fires of him, so long banked under ashes, had leapt upwards in a final blaze. His hands, skeletal but distinguished old hands, clutched the arms of his chair convulsively, and he looked at John and Mr. Wilkins with bitter denunciation and wrath. His bluish lips shook.
“Mr. Turnbull, sir,” he began, in a thin but burning tone, “I must ask you a most momentous question.”
John inclined his head in respectful silence, and waited. Mr. Wilkins, however, leaned forward a little, with the most affable attention.
Mr. Livingston drew a deep breath, and put his hand to his forehead for a moment. Then he resumed in a stronger voice: “I must ask you how it is possible for you to secure cotton in these days of war, from the South.”
John was silent for a little, then he said quietly and carefully: “We have much cotton stored in the warehouses, as you know, sir.”
Mr. Livingston stared at him stonily, and then the blue fire flashed into his eyes again. He struck his desk with his trembling palm. “Do you dare to insult me, sir, with such a remark? We have been at war with the South for three years. How have you been able to store such vast amounts of cotton? I am well aware of the capacity of our warehouses, to the last cubic inch. You insult my intelligence, sir, you deride my common sense!”
John regarded the old man inscrutably, and still answered with neutral quietness: “I did not mean to do either, Mr. Livingston. However, I had hoped I might spare you some—unpleasantness. Too, I did not think the matter would disturb you.” He paused. The blue fire quickened in Mr. Livingston’s eyes, and he drew in his withered lips as if preparing to protect himself against a blow. John continued: “As you know, I have travelled extensively in the South, and have been entertained by wealthy cotton planters. I found my friends, and clients, very agreeable gentlemen. We had much in common. Their regard for England was very warm, for, after all, are not the best of the American people of English stock? In spite of the rabble which has poured into America, this country, thank God, is still controlled by the Anglo-Saxon, and will continue to be so controlled. I share that devout hope with you, sir.
“When war broke out between the States, my sympathies were with the South. They still are. I knew the underlying principle: the Northern industrialists wish to destroy slave-labour in the South, with which they cannot compete. Now, I was faced with a quandary. The South has always shipped vast quantities of cotton to the Lancastershire cotton mills, and I knew that after this war, if the South lost, her natural anger and vindictiveness would compel her to ship even larger quantities to England, and thus deprive our own mills of cotton. Again, we would run second to England in the manufacture of textiles. I did not want that. I am sure that you would not wish that, either.”
He paused. Mr. Livingston listened with a frozen intensity which was almost agonized. But Mr. Wilkins, after his first apprehension, had begun to smile. John, however, was very grave, his voice candid with sincerity.
“What, then, was I to do? We faced ruin. The Livingston mills, after the war, would be deprived of everything except the minimum of raw cotton. As I said, I have always had the warmest relationships with the Southern planters. Knowing, then, that war was inevitable, I made my last tour among them, and bought up large quantlties of cotton. Then,” he hesitated, “I a
rranged with them for future deliveries, war or no war. Moreover, because of their personal regard for me, we are assured of deliveries after the war.”
Mr. Livingston whispered painfully, putting his hand to his eyes for a moment: “‘War or no war.’”
John, his lips tightening, glanced impatiently at Mr. Wilkins, but he answered courteously enough: “Yes, Mr. Livingston.”
The old man dropped his hand slowly, and there was a strange hard gleam in his eyes. “How do you contrive the deliveries, with the blockade interference?”
John was silent. Then he looked straightly at Mr. Livingston: “I cannot tell you that. It would mean ruin, probably imprisonment for me, and destitution for my friends, if not worse.”
“And,” said Mr. Livingston quietly, “you pay them with gold, of course?”
John inclined his head.
Mr. Livingston leaned back in his chair, and he looked fixedly at John. His eyes were like frozen lightning, bitter, and as sharp as swords.
“You are a traitor, sir!”
He stood up. His bent old back straightened. He towered over John, who remained seated for some moments, then rose also. The old man’s face was bright and fierce with condemnation.
“You, sir, and other scoundrels like you, are guilty of murder! Each time that the blockade is run, and gold exchanged for contraband goods, you prolong this murder between brothers! For money, for expediency, you continue this war, this ghastly blood-letting of kinsmen! You are a murderer, sir, a conscienceless murderer, an assassin!”
He began to shake, and staggered. He caught at the edge of his desk, then fell again in his chair. He covered his eyes with his hands. John glanced at Mr. Wilkins, who was smiling malevolently. For one instant, John’s fist clenched, and a black tide of hatred for the genial Lucifer rose up in him like a wash of poisonous gall. So often, he tasted this gall, felt the corrosive of hatred in his heart, so that the sensation was not new to him. But each time it left him more malignant, more corrupted, more eaten by corrosion. Then, he sat down and faced Mr. Livingston, a long and curious trembling running down every nerve in his body. A horrible sickness made him swallow convulsively.