CHAPTER IV.
THE MOTHER'S ROOM.
The house before which Morgan stood overlooked the city two miles awayand was the center of a vast estate now run to weeds. It was a fineexample of the old style of southern architecture. The spacious roof,embattled, but unbroken by gable or tower, was supported in front byeight massive columns that were intended to be Ionic. The space betweenthem and the house constituted the veranda, and opening from the centerof the house upon this was a great doorway, flanked by windows. Thisarrangement was repeated in the story above, a balcony taking the placeof the door. The veranda and columns were reproduced on both sides ofthe house, running back to two one-story wings. The house was of slightelevation and entered in front by six marble steps, flanked by carvednewel posts and curved rails; the front grounds were a hundred yardswide and fifty deep, inclosed by a heavy railing of iron. These detailscame to him afterward; he did not even see at that time the magnoliasand roses that grew in profusion, nor the once trim boxwood hedges andonce active fountain. He sounded loudly upon the front door with theknocker.
At length a woman came around the wing room and approached him. She wasmiddle-aged and wore a colored turban, a white apron hiding her dress.The face was that of an octoroon; her figure tall and full of dignity.She did not betray the mixed blood in speech or manner, but her form ofaddress proclaimed her at once a servant. The voice was low and musicalas she said, "Good-morning, sir," and waited.
Morgan studied her in silence a moment; his steady glance seemed toalarm her, for she drew back a step and placed her hand on the rail.
"I want to see the people who have charge of this house," said the youngman. She now approached nearer and looked anxiously into his face.
"I have the care of it," she answered.
"Well," said he, "I am Edward Morgan, the new owner. Let me have thekeys."
"Edward Morgan!" She repeated the name unconsciously.
"Come, my good woman, what is it? Where are the keys?" She bowed herhead. "I will get them for you, sir." She went to the rear again, andpresently the great doors swung apart and he entered.
The hallway was wide and opened through massive folding doors into thedining-room in the rear, and this dining-room, by means of other foldingdoors, entering the wing-rooms, could be enlarged into a princely salon.The hall floor was of marble and a heavy frieze and centerpiecedecorated walls and ceiling. A gilt chandelier hung from the center.Antique oak chairs flanked this hallway, which boasted also a hatrack,with looking-glass six feet wide. A semicircular stairway, guarded by acarved oak rail, a newel post and a knight in armor, led to apartmentsabove. A musty odor pervaded the place.
"Open the house," said Edward; "I must have better air."
And while this was being done he passed through the rooms into which nowstreamed light and fresh air. On the right was parlor and guest chamber,the hangings and carpets unchanged in nearly half a century. On the leftwas a more cheerful living-room, with piano and a rack of yellow sheetmusic, and the library, with an enormous collection of books. There werealso cane furniture, floor matting and easy-chairs.
In all these rooms spacious effects were not lessened by bric-a-brac andcollections. A few portraits and landscapes, a candelabra or two, a pairof brass fire dogs, one or two large and exquisitely painted vases madeup the ornamental features. The dining-room proper differed in that itsfurnishings were newer and more elaborate. The wing-rooms were evidentlyintended for cards and billiards. Behind was the southern back porchclosed in with large green blinds. Over all was the chill of isolationand disuse.
Edward made his way upstairs among the sleeping apartments, full of oldand clumsy furniture, the bedding having been removed. Two rooms onlywere of interest; to the right and rear a small apartment connected withthe larger one in front by a door then locked. This small room seemed tohave been a boy's. There were bows and arrows, an old muzzle-loadinggun, a boat paddle, a dip net, stag horns, some stuffed birds and smallanimals, the latter sadly dilapidated, a few game pictures, boots, shoesand spurs--even toys. A small bed ready for occupancy stood in onecorner and in another a little desk with drop lid. On the hearth wereiron fire dogs and ashes, the latter holding fragments of charred paper.
For the first time since entering the house Edward felt a humanpresence; it was a bright sunny room opening to the western breeze andthe berries of a friendly china tree tapped upon the window as heapproached it. He placed his hand upon the knob of the door, leadingforward, and tried to open it; it was locked.
"That," said the woman's low voice, "is Col. Morgan's mother's room,sir, and nobody ever goes in there. No one has entered that room but himsince she died, I reckon more than forty years ago."
Edward had started violently; he turned to find the sad, changeless faceof the octoroon at his side.
"And this room?"
"There is where he lived all his life--from the time he was a boy untilhe died."
Edward took from his pocket the bunch of keys and applied the largest tothe lock of the unopened door; the bolt turned easily. As he crossed thethreshold a thrill went through him; he seemed to trespass. Here had theboy grown up by his mother, here had been his retreat at all times. Whenshe passed away it was the one spot that kept fresh the heart of thegreat criminal lawyer, who fought the outside world so fiercely andwell. Edward had never known a mother's room, but the scene appealed tohim, and for the first time he felt kinship with the man who precededhim, who was never anything but a boy here in these two rooms. Even whenhe lay dead, back there in that simple bed, over which many a night hismother must have leaned to press her kisses upon his brow, he was a boygrown old and lonely.
One day she had died in this front room! What an agony of grief musthave torn the boy left behind. In the dim light of the room he hadopened, objects began to appear; almost reverently Edward raised awindow and pushed open the shutters. Behind him stood ready foroccupancy a snowy bed, with pillows and linen as fresh seemingly as ifplaced there at morn. By the bedside was a pair of small worn slippers,a rocking chair stood by the east window, and by the chair was a littlesewing stand, with a boy's jacket lying near, and threaded needle thrustinto its texture. On the little center table was a well-worn Bible by asmall brass lamp, and a single painting hung upon the wall--that of alittle farmhouse at the foot of a hill, with a girl in frock and pokebonnet swinging upon its gate.
There was no carpet on the floor; only two small rugs. It had been thehome of a girl simply raised and grown to womanhood, and her simplicityhad been repeated in her boy. The great house had been the design of herhusband, but there in these two rooms mother and son found the charm ofa bygone life, delighting in those "vague feelings" which science cannotfathom, but which simpler minds accept as the whispering of heredity.
One article only remained unexamined. It was a small picture in a framethat rested upon the mantel and in front of which was draped a velvetcloth. Morgan as in a dream drew aside the screen and saw the face of awondrously beautiful girl, whose eyes rested pensively upon him. A lowcry escaped the octoroon, who had noiselessly followed him; she wasnodding her head and muttering, all unconscious of his presence. Whenshe saw at length his face turned in wonder upon her she glidednoiselessly from the room. He replaced the cloth, closed the windowagain and tiptoed out, locking the door behind him.
He found the octoroon downstairs upon the back steps. She was now calmand answered his questions clearly. She had not belonged to John Morgan,she said, but had always been a free woman. Her husband had been free,too, but had died early. She had come to keep house at Ilexhurst manyyears ago, before the war, and had been there always since, caring foreverything while Mr. Morgan was in the army, and afterward; when he wasaway from time to time. No, she did not know anything of the girl in thepicture; she had heard it said that he was once to have married a lady,but she married somebody else and that was the end of it. John Morganhad kept the room as it was. No, he was never married. He had no cousinsor kinfolks that she had heard of except a sis
ter who died, and her twosons had been killed in battle or lost at sea during the war. Neither ofthem was married; she was certain of that. She herself cooked and kepthouse, and Ben, a hired boy, attended to the rest and acted as butler.
Edward was recalled to the present by feeling her eyes fixed upon him.He caught but one fleeting glance at her face before it was averted; ithad grown young, almost beautiful, and the eyes were moistened andtender and sad. He turned away abruptly.
"I will occupy an upper room to-night," he said, "and will send newfurniture to-morrow." His baggage had come and he went back with theexpress to the city. He would return, he said, after supper.
Sometimes the mind, after a long strain imposed upon it, relieves itselfby a refusal to consider. So with Edward Morgan's. That night he stoodby his window and watched the lessening moon rise over the easternhills. But he seemed to stand by a low picket fence beyond which a girl,with bare arms, was feeding poultry. He felt again the power of herfrank, brown eyes as they rested upon him, and heard her voice, musicalin the morning air, as it summoned her flock to breakfast.
In New York, Paris and Italy, and here there in other lands, were a fewwho called him friend; it would be better to wind up his affairs and goto them. It did not seem possible that he could endure this new life.Already the buoyancy of youth was gone! His ties were all abroad.
Thoughts of Paris connected him with a favorite air. He went to hisbaggage and unpacked an old violin, and sitting in the window, he playedas a master hand had taught him and an innate genius impelled. It wasSchubert's serenade, and as he played the room was no longer lonely;sympathy had brought him friends. It seemed to him that among them camea woman who laid her hand on his shoulder and smiled on him. Her facewas hidden, but her touch was there, living and vibrant. On his cheekabove the mellow instrument he felt his own tears begin to creep andthen--silence. But as he stood calmer, looking down into the night, amovement in the shrubbery attracted him back to earth; he called aloud:
"Who is there?" A pause and the tall figure of the octoroon crossed thewhite walk.
"Rita," was the answer. "The gate was left open."