won't tell him."
"Stand away from that horse!" she said, her whole face taking thegrayish color of her lips, but her black eyes growing smaller andbrighter. "Hand me those reins, and let me pass! What canaille are youto stop me?"
"I thought so," returned the man, without altering his position; "youdon't know ME. You never saw ME before. Well, I'm Jim Dawson, the nephewof L'Hommadieu, YOUR OLD MASTER!"
She gripped the iron rail of the seat as if to leap from it, but checkedherself suddenly and leaned back, with a set smile on her mouth thatseemed stamped there. It was remarkable that with that smile she flungaway her old affectation of superciliousness for an older and ruderaudacity, and that not only the expression, but the type of her faceappeared to have changed.
"I don't say," continued the man quietly, "that he didn't MARRY youbefore he died. But you know as well as I do that the laws of his Statedidn't recognize the marriage of a master with his octoroon slave! Andyou know as well as I do that even if he had freed you, he couldn'tchange your blood. Why, if I'd been willing to stay at Avoyelles to be anigger-driver like him, the plantation of 'de Fontanges'--whose nameyou have taken--would have been left to me. If YOU had stayed there,you might have been my property instead of YOUR owning a square man likeRandolph. You didn't think of that when you came here, did you?" he saidcomposedly.
"Oh, mon Dieu!" she said, dropping rapidly into a different accent,with her white teeth and fixed mirthless smile, "so it is a claim forPROPERTY, eh? You're wanting money--you? Tres bien, you forget we arein California, where one does not own a slave. And you have a fine storythere, my poor friend. Very pretty, but very hard to prove, m'sieu. Andthese peasants are in it, eh, working it on shares like the farm, eh?"
"Well," said Dawson, slightly changing his position, and passing hishand over the horse's neck with a half-wearied contempt, "one of thesemen is from Plaquemine, and the other from Coupee. They know all thel'Hommadieus' history. And they know a streak of the tar brush when theysee it. They took your measure when they came here last year, and sizedyou up fairly. So had I, for the matter of that, when I FIRST saw you.And we compared notes. But the major is a square man, for all he is yourhusband, and we reckoned he had a big enough contract on his hands totake care of you and l'Hommadieu's half-breeds, and so"--he tossed thereins contemptuously aside--"we kept this to ourselves."
"And now you want--what--eh?"
"We want an end to this foolery," he broke out roughly, stepping backfrom the vehicle, and facing her suddenly, with his first angry gesture."We want an end to these airs and grimaces, and all this dandy niggerbusiness; we want an end to this 'cake-walking' through the wheat, andflouting of the honest labor of your betters. We want you and your 'deFontanges' to climb down. And we want an end to this roping-in of whitefolks to suit your little game; we want an end to your trying to mixyour nigger blood with any one here, and we intend to stop it. We drawthe line at the major."
Lashed as she had been by those words apparently out of all semblance ofher former social arrogance, a lower and more stubborn resistance seemedto have sprung up in her, as she sat sideways, watching him with her setsmile and contracting eyes.
"Ah," she said dryly, "so SHE IS HERE. I thought so. Which of you is it,eh? It's a good spec--Mallory's a rich man. She's not particular."
The man had stopped as if listening, his head turned towards the road.Then he turned carelessly, and facing her again, waved his hand with agesture of tired dismissal, and said, "Go! You'll find your driver overthere by the tool-shed. He has heard nothing yet--but I've given youfair warning. Go!"
He walked slowly back towards the shed, as the woman, snatching upthe reins, drove violently off in the direction where the men haddisappeared. But she turned aside, ignoring her waiting driver in herwild and reckless abandonment of all her old conventional attitudes, andlashing her horse forward with the same set smile on her face, the sameodd relaxation of figure, and the same squaring of her elbows.
Avoiding the main road, she pushed into a narrow track that intersectedanother nearer the scene of the accident to Rose's buggy three weeksbefore. She had nearly passed it when she was hailed by a strange voice,and looking up, perceived a horseman floundering in the mazes of thewheat to one side of the track. Whatever mean thought of her past lifeshe was flying from, whatever mean purpose she was flying to, she pulledup suddenly, and as suddenly resumed her erect, aggressive stiffness.The stranger was a middle-aged man; in dress and appearance a dweller ofcities. He lifted his hat as he perceived the occupant of the wagon tobe a lady.
"I beg your pardon, but I fear I've lost my way in trying to make ashort cut to the Excelsior Company's Ranch."
"You are in it now," said Mrs. Randolph, quickly.
"Thank you, but where can I find the farmhouse?"
"There is none," she returned, with her old superciliousness, "unlessyou choose to give that name to the shanties and sheds where thelaborers and servants live, near the road."
The stranger looked puzzled. "I'm looking for a Mr. Dawson," he saidreflectively, "but I may have made some mistake. Do you know MajorRandolph's house hereabouts?"
"I do. I am Mrs. Randolph," she said stiffly.
The stranger's brow cleared, and he smiled pleasantly. "Then this is afortunate meeting," he said, raising his hat again as he reined in hishorse beside the wagon, "for I am Mr. Mallory, and I was looking forwardto the pleasure of presenting myself to you an hour or two later. Thefact is, an old acquaintance, Mr. Dawson, telegraphed me yesterday tomeet him here on urgent business, and I felt obliged to go there first."
Mrs. Randolph's eyes sparkled with a sudden gratified intelligence, buther manner seemed rather to increase than abate its grim precision.
"Our meeting this morning, Mr. Mallory, is both fortunate andunfortunate, for I regret to say that your daughter, who has not beenquite herself since the earthquake, was missing early this morning andhas not yet been found, though we have searched everywhere. Understandme," she said, as the stranger started, "I have no fear for her PERSONALsafety, I am only concerned for any INDISCRETION that she may commit inthe presence of these strangers whose company she would seem to preferto ours."
"But I don't understand you, madam," said Mallory, sternly; "you arespeaking of my daughter, and"--
"Excuse me, Mr. Mallory," said Mrs. Randolph, lifting her hand withher driest deprecation and her most desiccating smile, "I'm not passingjudgment or criticism. I am of a foreign race, and consequently do notunderstand the freedom of American young ladies, and their familiaritywith the opposite sex. I make no charges, I only wish to assure you thatshe will no doubt be found in the company and under the protection ofher own countrymen. There is," she added with ironical distinctness, "ayoung mechanic, or field hand, or 'quack well-doctor,' whom she seems toadmire, and with whom she appears to be on equal terms."
Mallory regarded her for a moment fixedly, and then his sternnessrelaxed to a mischievously complacent smile. "That must be young Bent,of whom I've heard," he said with unabated cheerfulness. "And I don'tknow but what she may be with him, after all. For now I think of it, achuckle-headed fellow, of whom a moment ago I inquired the way to yourhouse, told me I'd better ask the young man and young woman who were'philandering through the wheat' yonder. Suppose we look for them. Fromwhat I've heard of Bent he's too much wrapped up in his inventions forflirtation, but it would be a good joke to stumble upon them."
Mrs. Randolph's eyes sparkled with a mingling of gratified malice andundisguised contempt for the fatuous father beside her. But before shecould accept or decline the challenge, it had become useless. A murmurof youthful voices struck her ear, and she suddenly stood upright andtransfixed in the carriage. For lounging down slowly towards them outof the dim green aisles of the arbored wheat, lost in themselves and theshimmering veil of their seclusion, came the engineer, Thomas Bent, andon his arm, gazing ingenuously into his face, the figure of Adele,--herown perfect daughter.
"I don't think, my dear," said Mr. Mallory, as the a
nxious Rose flewinto his arms on his return to San Jose, a few hours later, "that itwill be necessary for you to go back again to Major Randolph's before weleave. I have said 'Good-by' for you and thanked them, and your trunksare packed and will be sent here. The fact is, my dear, you see thisaffair of the earthquake and the disaster to the artesian well haveupset all their arrangements, and I am afraid that my little girl wouldbe only in their way just now."
"And you have seen Mr. Dawson--and you