Sunlight Patch. Credo Fitch Harris
is satisfying enough with you and Ann and Bip," she lightly replied, "unless you want to get rid of me!"
He flushed, and turned almost angrily.
"There, I take it back," she said in tones as soft as the night. "It was horrid! You've been so splendid in giving me a home—although I do sometimes feel guilty for not being with the Colonel after all he's done! Yet, were I there, I couldn't give nearly as much time to Bip. Nothing can—"
"I wish you'd chop that," he growled. "You talk like you're under an obligation, when you know darn well—"
"I was saying," she looked up brightly, "that nothing can take its place, not even your suggested slavery; and there isn't a man in the world whom I wouldn't despise for asking me. I just don't feel a bit like it!"
"Lord help us!" he cried. "When will D. Cupid, Esquire, discover this pristine hunting ground? You've a blue ribbon surprise in store for you, that's all!"
"Perhaps Mr. D. Dawson will spring it," she laughed.
"Or the blasé B. McElroy," he suggested.
She made a grimace at this.
Lucy whinnied, and they saw the Colonel and Dale waiting at the bottom step.
"Come in for awhile," the old gentleman urged.
"Now, Colonel," Bob said reproachfully, "do you know anything of Ann's temper when under suspense?"
"I see, sir," his eyes wrinkled into a merry smile, "that you're as much of a nigger about the house over there as I was when she honored me by living here. Go home to your tyrant, sir, but come over, all of you, tomorrow for dinner."
Lucy, now free of her burden, crossed to the silent but watchful mountaineer and nestled her nose in his arm. It was an evidence of affection which touched them all.
As Bob and Jane were leaving, in the buggy this time, they heard the Colonel ask Uncle Zack if Mr. McElroy were home, and that old darky of diminutive stature answer:
"No, sah, Cunnel, he done rid off harf hour ago."
"Maybe," Jane presently suggested, when they were well on their way, "he's gone over to our house!"
"Maybe," Bob replied, wondering where of late the young engineer had been spending his evenings.
"Do you know," she said irrelevantly, after a silence of several minutes, "I believe a man in whom animals show implicit faith is to be trusted."
"In this particular case, perhaps," he agreed, for it just so happened that he, too, now was thinking of Dale. "Yet old Tom Hewlet has a lot of dogs which fawn all over him!"
"That's so," she acquiesced, and both again fell silent.
CHAPTER V
AN INTERRUPTED BREAKFAST
About the time that Colonel May was finishing breakfast, consisting this particular morning of strawberries raised in his own greenhouse, calf's brains, omelet, fried apples and bacon, fried sweet potatoes, beaten biscuits, rice cakes, and coffee, Bob Hart was riding across the open country toward Arden. His right arm hung limberly down in a graceful perpendicular, unaffected by the galloping motion of his horse, and his fingers were clasped about the lock of a repeating rifle, pointed muzzle to the ground. On his face was stamped a look of stern absorption that relaxed only as he neared occasional fences, but when these had been hurdled and his mount had again caught its stride, the preoccupation returned. Although his eyes were lowered, he did not see the ground, nor the mild surprise of grazing Jerseys past which he dashed. He saw nothing now beyond a most unpleasant picture which circumstance was holding up to him.
Jumping into an open woodland pasture he reined to a more leisurely canter; for here were the very young colts, now crowding nearer the protection of their dams, which, in one or two instances, with heads and tails high, trotted toward this impertinent horseman as though questioning his right of entrance. They soon abandoned this, but stood looking after him like watchful sentinels until he had risen to the next fence, and they felt that their foals were free from menace. But he cantered on, hardly mindful of their unrest. Through ancient beeches now he went, trees whose downward sweeping boughs spread out in mute protection above the carpet of spring grass and violets; then he turned into the cedar-bordered avenue, and soon passed between the crumbling brick-and-plaster gate-posts to the tangled yard of Arden.
It was then, glancing across the side terrace, that Colonel May observed him, and laying aside his napkin he went somewhat hastily through the cool, deep hall and out upon the front porch. A tender expression lingered about his strong face as the younger man swung into the circle; a tenderness mingled with approval for the stylish animal that picked up its feet from the odorous tanbark with a precision bespeaking generations of thoroughbred ancestors. The Colonel was a great believer in breeding.
Only when Bob dismounted did the old gentleman see the rifle, and the seriousness in his eyes. He made no move or comment, but waited while a darky led back the horse and Bob was seated.
"Has Brant gone out to work?" were the young man's first words.
"I think he's not yet up," the Colonel's look of anxiety deepened. "You don't want to see him for—for anything?"
"No," Bob smiled. "And Dale—er—Dawson?"
"Left before I came downstairs, sir," the Colonel answered. "What is it, Bob? Tell me!"
Bob's eyes passed the Colonel and rested on the drive up which he had just come. With an attempt at casualness he said:
"That Potter fellow did more yesterday than I guessed."
There was no alteration in the old gentleman's attitude; he did not sit bolt upright in his chair, or grasp its arms until his knuckles showed white, but simply said:
"Tell me!"
"She went straight to her room when we got home," Bob continued in a more excited undertone. "Ann followed, of course, and found her desperately nervous, half crying with rage." He then related practically what had happened at the school, concluding: "Aunt Timmie slept in her room all night, and when Jane asks her to do that you know she's upset."
They heard Uncle Zack moving inside the hall, and the Colonel called him:
"Have Tempest brought up," he said, and to Bob: "I shall be right down, sir."
Uncle Zack came quickly back to the porch, for his eyes had seen things which electrified him. This old darky, shriveled up with his burden of toil and years, who had been the Colonel's servant, adviser, and comforter since both of them were boys, was too truly a member of the family to permit anything to occur without pushing well into its secrets. Until a few years ago, his wife, Aunt Timmie, had divided this welcome office with him; but after the wedding, and about the time when Bob's household began to walk on tiptoe in fearful and happy expectancy, old Timmie left, bag and baggage, for the younger home, where she had thereafter remained as nurse, comforter, scolder and chief director of the new heir, as well as of the premises in general. The Colonel having lately suggested that Mr. Hart, Jr.—or Bip, for short—being now six years of age, was too big for her to manage, had called forth an eloquent outburst, which concluded with the terse observation: "If I could handle his Pappy an' Mammy, an' his Gran'pappy an' Gran'mammy befoh him, an' all de Mays an' Harts borned dese las' hund'ed yeahs, how-cum I ain' able to handle him?" And that had settled it, so each household gloried in the possession of one of these rare servants, spoiled by love, mellowed by age, and wise by scores of years of experience.
Old Zack now whispered, looking Bob squarely in the eyes:
"Whar you-all