The Flower of the Chapdelaines Read online

  "Ah!" Madame's voice grew in sweetness as it rose: "So much thebetter! So much the more room for those advertisement'!--and picture'!"

  "And portrait of mademoiselle!" said Mme. Alexandre, and Mme. De l'Islesmiled assent.

  Yet a disappointed silence followed, presently broken by the perfumer:"All the same, what is the matter to make it a pamphlet?"

  Beloiseau objected: "No, then you compete aggains' those magazine'.But if you permit one of those magazine' to buy it you get theadvantage of all the picture' in the whole magazine."

  "Ah!" several demurred, "and let that magazine swallow whole all thoseprofit' of all those advertisement'!"

  Chester spoke: "I have an idea--" But others had ideas and the floorbesides.

  Castanado lifted a hand: "Frien'--our counsel."

  Counsel tried again: "I have a conviction that we should first offerthis to a magazine--through--yes, of course, through some influentialfriend. If one doesn't want it another may----"

  Chorus: "Ho! they will all want it! That was not written laz' night!'Tis fivty year' old; they cannot rif-use that!"

  "However," Chester persisted, "if they should--if all should--I'dadvise----"

  "Frien's," Castanado pleaded, "let us hear."

  "I should advise that we gather together as many such old narratives aswe can find, especially such as can be related to one another----"

  "They need not be ril-ated!" cried Dubroca. "_We_ are not ril-ated,and yet see! Ril-ated? where you are goin' to find them, ril-ated?"

  "Royal Street!" Scipion retorted. "Royal Street is pave' with oldnarration'!"

  "Already," said Castanado, "we chanze to have three or four.Mademoiselle has that story of her _grand'mere_, and Mr. Chezter hehas--sir, you'll not care if I tell that?--Mr. Chezter has _the sequalto that_, and written by his uncle!"

  "Yes," Chester put in, "but Ovide Landry finds it was printed yearsago."

  "Proof!" proclaimed Mme. Alexandre, "proof that 'tis good to printag-ain! The people that read that before, they are mozely dead."

  "At the same time," Chester responded, rising and addressing the chair,his hostess, "because that is a sequel to the _grand'-mere's_ story,and because _this_--this West Indian episode--is not a sequel and hasno sequel, and particularly because we ought to let mademoiselle befirst to judge whether my uncle's _memorandum_ is fit company for hertwo stories, I propose, I say, that before we read this West Indianthing we read my uncle's _memorandum_, and that we send and beg her tocome and hear it with us. It's in my pocket."

  Patter, patter, patter, went a dozen hands.

  "Marcel," the hostess cried in French, "go!"

  "I will go with you," Mme. Alexandra proposed, "she will never comewithout me."

  "Tis but a step," said Mme. De l'Isle, "the three of us will gotogether." They went.

  Those who waited talked on of their city's true stories. The vastestand most monstrous war in human history was smoking and roaring justacross the Atlantic, and in it they had racial, national, personalinterests; but for the moment they left all that aside. "One troub',"Dubroca said, "'tis that all those three stone'--and all I canrim-ember--even that story of M'sieu' Smith about the fall of thecity--1862--they all got in them _somewhere_, alas! the nigger. The_publique_ they are not any longer pretty easy to fascinate on thatsubjec'."

  "Ho!" Beloiseau rejoined, "_au contraire_, he's an advantage! If onlyyou keep him for the back-_ground_; biccause in the mind ofevery-_body_ tha'z where he is, and that way he has the advantage toril-ate those storie' together and----"

  Mademoiselle came. Her arrival, reception, installation near thehostess and opposite Chester are good enough untold. If elsewhere inthat wide city a like number ever settled down to listen to an untamedwriter's manuscript in as sweet content with one another _their_ storyought to be printed. "Well," Mme. Castanado chanted, "commence." AndChester read:

  X

  THE ANGEL OF THE LORD

  When I was twenty-four I lived at the small capital of my nativeSouthern State.

  My parental home was three counties distant. My father, a slaveholdingplanter, was a noble gentleman, whom I loved as he loved me. But wecould not endure each other's politics and I was trying to exist on myprofessional fees, in the law office of one of our ex-governors. I waskindly tolerated by everybody about me but had neglected socialrelations, being a black sheep on every hot question of the time--1860.

  In the world's largest matters my Southern mother had the sanestjudgment I ever knew, and it was from her I had absorbed my notions onslavery. It was at least as much in sympathy for the white man as forthe black that she deprecated it, yet she pointed out to me how idle itwas to fancy that any mere manumission of our slaves would cure us of awhole philosophy of wealth, society, and government as inbred as it wasantiquated.

  One evening my two fellow boarders--state-house clerks, good boys--soglaringly left me out of their plan for a whole day's fishing on themorrow, that I smarted. I was so short of money that I could not havesupplied my own tackle, but no one knew that, and it stung me to beslighted by two chaps I liked so well. I determined to be revenged insome playful way that would make us better friends, and as I walkeddown-street next morning I hit out a scheme. They had been gone sincedaybreak and I was on my way to see a client who kept a livery-stable.

  Now, in college, where I had intended to leave all silly tricks behindme, my most taking pranks had been played in female disguise; for attwenty-four I was as beardless as a child.

  My errand to the stableman was to collect some part of my fee in a suitI had won for him. But I got not a cent, for as to cash his victoryhad been a barren one. However, a part of his booty was an old coachbuilt when carriage people made long journeys in their own equipages.This he would "keep on sale for me free of charge," etc.

  "Which means you'll never sell it," I said.

  Oh, he could sell it if any man could!

  I smiled. Could he lend me, I asked, for half a day or so, a good spanof horses? He could.

  "Then hitch up the coach and let me try it."

  He bristled: "What are you going to find out by 'trying' it? Whatd'you 'llow it'll do? Blow up? Who'll drive it? _I_ can't spare anyone."

  I was glad. Any man of his would know me, and my scheme called for astranger to both me and the coach. I must find such a person.

  "If I send a driver," I said, "you'll lend me the span, won't you?"

  "Oh, yes."

  But all at once I decided to do without the whole rig. I went back tomy room and had an hour's enjoyment making myself up as a lady dressedfor travel. For a woman I was of just a fine stature. In years Ilooked a refined forty. My hands were not too big for black lacemitts, my bosom was a success, and my feet, in thin morocco, were outof sight and nobody's business. A little oil and a burnt matchdarkened my eyebrows, my wig sat straight, under the weest of bonnets Iwore a chignon, behind one ear a bunch of curls, and, unseen at oneside of a modest bustle, my revolver. Though I say it myself, Imanaged my crinoline with grace.

  ["That was pritty co'rect," the costumer remarked. "Humph!" saidChester. The three mesdames exchanged glances, and the reading wenton.]

  XI

  Leaving a note on her door to tell our landlady that business wouldkeep me away an indefinite time, I got out at the front gateunobserved, and with a sweet dignity that charmed me with myself walkedaway under a bewitching parasol, well veiled.

  I knew where to find my two sportsmen. A few hundred paces put thetown and an open field at my back; a few more down a bushy lane broughtme where a dense wood overhung both sides of the narrow way, and thedamp air was full of the smell of penny-royal and of creek sands. Fromhere I proposed to saunter down through the woods to the creek, locatemy fishermen, and draw them my way by cries of distress.

  On their reaching my side my story, told through my veil and betweenmeanings and clingings, was to be that while on a journey in my owncoach, a part of its running-gear having broke
n, I had sent it on to bemended; that through love of trees and wild flowers I had ventured tostay alone meantime among them, and that a snake had bitten me on theankle. I should describe a harmless one but insist I was poisoned, andyet refuse to show the wound or be borne back to the road, or to leteither man stay with me alone while the other went for a doctor, or todrink their whiskey for a cure. On getting back to the road--with thetwo fellows for crutches--I should send both to town for my coach,keeping with me their tackle and fish. Then I should get myself and myspoils back to our dwelling as best I could and--await the issue. Ifthis poor performance had so come off--but see what occurred instead!

  I had shut my parasol and moved into hiding behind some wild vines tomop my face, when near by on the farther side of the way came slylyinto view a negro and negress. They were in haste to cross the roadyet quite as wishful to cross unseen. One, in home-spun gown andsunbonnet, was ungainly, shoeless, bird-heeled, fan-toed, ragged, andwould have been painfully ugly but for a grotesqueness almost winsome.

  "She's a field-hand," was my thought.

  The other, in very clean shirt, trousers, and shoes, looking ten yearsyounger and hardly full-grown, was shapely and handsome. "That boy,"thought I, "is a house-servant. The two don't belong in the sameharness. And yet I'd bet a new hat they're runaways."

  Now they gathered courage to come over. With a childish parade ofunconcern and with all their glances up and down the road, they came,and were within seven steps of me before they knew I was near. I shallnever forget the ludicrous horror that flashed white and black from theeyes in that sun-bonnet, nor the snort with which its owner, like afrightened heifer, crashed off a dozen yards into the brush and assuddenly stopped.

  "Good morning, boy," I said to the other, who had gulped withconsternation, yet stood still.

  "Good mawnin', mist'ess."

  The feminine title came luckily. I had forgotten my disguise, sodisarmed was I by the refined dignity of the dark speaker's mellowvoice and graceful modesty. After all, my prejudices were Southern. Ihad rarely seen negroes, at worship, work, or play, without an inwardgroan for some way--righteous way--by which our land might be clean ridof them. But here, in my silly disguise, confronting this unmixedyoung African so manifestly superior to millions of our human swarmwhite or black, my unsympathetic generalizations were clear put toshame. The customary challenge, "Who' d'you belong to?" failed on mylips, and while those soft eyes passed over me from bonnet to mitts Igave my head as winsome a tilt as I could and inquired: "What is yourname?"

  "Me?"

  "Yes, you; what is it?"

  "I'm name', eh, Euonymus; yass'm."

  "Oh, boy, where'd your mother get that name?"

  "Why, mist'ess, ain't dat a Bible name?"

  "Oh, yes," I said, remembering Onesimus. With my parasol I indicatedthe other figure, sunbonneted, motionless, gazing on us through thebrush.

  "Has she a Bible name too?"

  "Yass'm; Robelia."

  Robelia brought chin and shoulder together and sniggered. "Euonymus,"I asked, "have you seen two young gentlemen, fishing, anywhere nearhere?"

  "Yass'm, dey out 'pon a san'bar 'bout two hund'ed yards up de creek."The black finger that pointed was as clean as mine.

  "You and this woman," thought I again, "are dodging those men." With asmile as of curiosity I looked my slim informant over once more. I hadnever seen slavery so flattered yet so condemned.

  All at once I said in my heart: "You, my lad, I'll help to escape!"But when I looked again at the absurd Robelia I saw I must help bothalike.

  "Euonymus, did you ever drive a lady's coach?"

  "Me? No'm, I never drove no lady's coach."

  "Well, boy, I'm travelling--in my own outfit."

  "Yass'm."

  "But I hire a new driver and span at each town and send the othersback."

  "Yass'm," said Euonymus. Robelia came nearer.

  "My coach is now at a livery-stable in town, and I want a driver and alady's maid."

  "Yass'm."

  "I'd prefer free colored people. They could come with me as far asthey pleased, and I shouldn't be responsible for their return."

  "Yass'm," said Euonymus, edging away from Robelia's nudge.

  "Now, Euonymus, I judge by your being out here in the woods this timeof day, idle, that you're both free, you and your sister, h'm?"

  "Ro'--Robelia an' me? Eh, ye'--yass'm, as you may say, in a manneh,yass'm."

  "She is your sister, is she not?"

  "Yass'm," clapped in Robelia, with a happy grin, and Euonymus quietlyadded:

  "Us full sisteh an' brotheh--in a manneh."

  "Umh'm. Could you drive my coach, Euonymus?"

  "What, me, mist'ess? Why, eh, o' co'se I kin drive _some_, but--" Thesoft, honest eyes, seeking Robelia's, betrayed a mental conflict. Iguessed there were more than two runaways, and that Euonymus wasdebating whether for Robelia's sake to go with me and leave the othersbehind, or not.

  "You kin drive de coach," blurted the one-ideaed Robelia. "You knowsyou kin."

  "No, mi'ss, takin' all roads as dey come I ain't no ways fitt'n'; no'm."

  "Well, daddy's fitt'n'!" said the sun-bonnet.

  Euonymus flinched, yet smilingly said:

  "Yass, da's so, but I ain't daddy, no mo'n you is."

  "Well, us kin go fetch him--in th'ee shakes."

  Euonymus flinched again, yet showed generalship. "Yass'm, us kin go axdaddy."

  I smiled. "Let Robelia go and you stay here."

  Robelia waited on tiptoe. "Go fetch him," murmured Euonymus, "an' makehas'e."

  "Wait! You're a good boy, Euonymus, ain't you?"

  "I cayn't say dat, mi'ss; but I'm glad ef you thinks so."

  "Y' is good!" said Robelia. "You knows you is!"

  "Never mind," I said; "do you belong to--Zion?"

  The dark face grew radiant. "Yass'm, I does!"

  "Euonymus, how many more of you-all are there besides _daddy andmammy_?"

  The surprise was cruel. The runaway's eyes let out a gleam of alarmand then, as I lighted with kindness, filled with rapt wonder at mymiraculous knowledge: "Be'--be'--beside'--beside' d-daddy an' m-mammy?D'ain't no mo', m-mist'ess; no'm!"

  "Yass'm," put in Robelia, "da's all; us fo'."

  "Just you four. Euonymus, a bit ago I noticed on your sister's anklessome white mud."

  "Yass'm." Another gleam of alarm and then a fine, awesome courage.Robelia stared in panic.

  "The nearest white mud--marl--in the State, Robelia, is forty milessouth of here."

  "Is d'--dat so, mist'ess?"

  "Yes, and so you also are travellers, Euonymus."

  "Trav'--y'--yass'm, I--I reckon you mought call us trav'luz, in amanneh, yass'm."

  "Well, my next town is thirty miles north of----"

  "Nawth!" Euonymus broke in, thinking furiously.

  "Now, if instead of hiring just your sister and her daddy I should----"

  "Yass'm!"

  "Suppose I should take all four of you along, as though you were myslaves----"

  "De time bein'," Euonymus alertly slipped in.

  "Certainly, that's all. How would that do?"

  "Oh, mist'ess! kin you work dat miracle?"

  "I can do it if it suits you."

  "Lawd, it suit' _us_! Dey couldn't be noth'n' mo' rep'ehensible!"

  Robelia vanished. Euonymus gazed into my eyes.

  [Had my disguise failed?] "What is it, boy?"

  "May I ax you a question, mi'ss?"

  "You may ask if you won't tell."

  "Oh, I won't tell! Is you a sho' enough 'oman?--Lawd, I knowd youwa'n't! No mo'n you is a man! I seen it f'om de beginnin'!"

  "Why, boy, what do you imagine I am?"

  "Oh, I don't 'magine, I knows! 'T'uz me prayed Gawd to sen' you. Y'ain't man, y' ain't 'oman! an' yit yo' bofe! Yo' de same what visitAb'am, an' Lot, an' Dan'l, and de motheh de Lawd!"

  "Stop! Stop! Never mind who I am; I've got t
o put you fifty milesfrom here before bedtime."

  "Yes, my Lawd. Oh, yes, my Lawd!"

  "Euonymus! you mustn't call me that!"

  "Ain't dat what Ab'am called you?"

  "I forget! but--call me mistress!--only!"

  "Yass, suh--yass, mi'ss!"

  "Good. Now, lad, I can take you alone, horseback, which'll be farswifter, safer, surer----"

  A new alarm, a new exaltation--"Oh, no, my--mist'ess; no, no! you knowsyou on'y a-temptin' o' dy servant!"

  "You wouldn't leave daddy and mammy?"

  "Oh, daddy kin stick to mammy, an' her to he! but Robelia got neitherfaith nor gumption, an' let me never see de salvation o' de Lawd ef Icayn't stick by dat--by--by my po' Robelia!"

  "But suppose, my boy, we should be mistaken for runaways and trackedand run down."

  "Yass'm, o' co'se. Yass'm."

  "Can you fight--for your sister?"

  "Yass, my La'--yass'm, I kin an' I will. I's qualified my soul to'dat, suh; yass'm."

  "Dogs?"

  "Yass'm, dawgs. Notinstandin' de dawgs come pass me roun' about, in dename o' de Lawd will I lif up my han' an' will perwail."

  "Have you only your hands?"

  "Da's all David had, ag'in lion an' bah."

  "True. Euonymus, I need a man's clothes."

  "Yass'm, on a pinch dey mowt come handy."

  XII

  Here Robelia came again, conducting "Luke" and "Rebecca." Luke'sgarments were amusingly, heroically patched, yet both seniors werethoroughly attractive; not handsome, but reflecting the highest,gentlest rectitude. One of their children had inherited all that wasbest from both parents, beautifully exalting it; the other all that waspoorest in earlier ancestors. They were evolution and reversionpersonified.