CHAPTER XXXII.
THE LETTERS.
Tuesday evening's mail brought him two letters, post-marked Newbury. The sight of them came with a sort of a heart-blow. They were not wholly expected, and he felt that there might still be a little struggle for him, although he was certain that this must be the last.
The well-known hand of Judge Markham addressed one of them. The writing of the other he did not recognize; only after he had lost its envelope, he remembered that it very much resembled the hand that wrote the Greer warning. He put the letters into an inside pocket, and tried to go on with his book; like a very young man he fancied that he was observed. So he took his hat and went to the room he occupied with Case. He pulled open the unknown, knew the hand, ran down and turned over to the second page, and found "Julia" at the bottom, and below, the words "with the profoundest gratitude." It ran:
"NEWBURY, April 8, 1838.
"BARTON RIDGELEY:
"Dear Sir,—Is it characteristic of a brave and generous man to confer the greatest obligations upon another, and not permit that other the common privilege of expressing gratitude? Were I a man, I would follow and weary you with a vain effort to utter the thanks I owe you. But I can only say a few cold words on paper at the risk of being misunderstood." ("Um-m, I don't see what danger she could apprehend on that score," said Bart quite sharply.) "When I had wandered beyond the help of my father and friends, into danger, and, I think, to certain death, you were inspired with the heart, skill and strength, to find and save me. Next to God, who led you, I owe my life to you. When this is said, I cannot say more. I know of no earthly good that you do not deserve; I can think of no gift of Heaven, that I do not ask of It for you.
"You will not be offended that I should most anxiously insist that some little benefit should in some way come to you, from my father; and you will certainly, when you first return to Newbury, give me an opportunity to say to you how much I owe you, and how heavy the obligation rests upon me. You promised me this and will fulfil it. My mother, who sees this note, wants you to realize her profound sense of your service to us, enhanced if possible by the noble and manly way in which you rendered it. She was always your discerning and discriminating friend."
"Discriminating,"—Bart did not like that, but no matter. That was all.
"A very pretty letter, my lady Julia," said Bart with a long breath. "Quite warm. I confess I don't care much for your gratitude—but very pretty and condescending. And it is kind to advise me that whatever may have been your estimate of me, your sweet lady mother 'discerned' differently. What you mean by discriminating is a very pretty little woman mystery, that I shall never know."
"And now for my Lord Judge:"
"NEWBURY, April 8, 1838.
"BARTON RIDGELEY, ESQ.:
"My Dear Sir,—I was disappointed at not finding you at Wilder's, where your noble exertions had placed my daughter. I was more disappointed on calling at your mother's the following morning, hoping to carry you to my house. If anything in my conduct in the past contributed to these disappointments, I regret it." ("Very manly, Judge Markham," remarked Bart. "Don't feel uneasy, I should have acted all the same.") "You saved to us, and to herself, our daughter, and can better understand our feelings for this great benefit than I can express them." ("All right Judge, I would not try it further, if I were you.") "Whoever confers such a benefaction, also confers the right upon the receiver, not only to express gratitude by words, but by acts, which shall avail in some substantial way." ("Rather logical, Judge!") "I shall insist that you permit me to place at your disposal means to launch you in your profession in a way commensurate with your talents and deservings." ("Um-m-m.") "I trust you will soon return to Newbury, or permit me to see you in Jefferson, and when the past may" ("I don't care about wading the Chagrin, Judge, and helping your daughter out of the woods was no more than leading out any other man's daughter, and I don't want to hear more of either. Just let me alone.") "be atoned for. I need not say that my wife unites with me in gratitude, and a hearty wish to be permitted to aid you; nor how anxious we are to learn the details of your finding our daughter, all of which is a profound mystery to us.
"Sincerely yours,
"EDWARD MARKHAM."
There was a postscript to the Judge's, instead of Julia's, and Bart looked at it two or three times with indifference, and walked up and down the room with a sore, angry feeling that he did not care to understand the source of, nor yet to control. "Very pretty letters! very well said! Why did they care to say anything to me? When I came away they might have known—but then, who and what am I? Why the devil shouldn't they snub me one day and pat me on the head the next? And I ought to be glad to be kicked, and glad to be thanked for being kicked—only I'm not—-though I don't know why! Well, this is the last of it; in my own good time—or somebody's time, good or bad—I will walk in upon my Lord Judge, my discriminating Lady the Mother, and the Lady Julia, and hear them say their pieces without danger of misapprehension." And his eye fell again on the Judge's postscript. Reads:
"Before I called at your mother's on that morning, I set apart the chestnut 'Silver-tail,' well caparisoned, as your property. I thought it a fitting way in which one gentleman might indicate his appreciation of another. I knew you would appreciate him; I hoped he would be useful to you. He is your property, whether you will or no, and will be held subject to your order, and the fact that he is yours will not diminish the care he will receive. May I know your pleasure in reference to him?
"E.M."
This found the weak place, or one of the weak places, in Bart's nature. The harshness and bitterness of his feelings melted out of his heart, and left him to answer his letters in a spirit quite changed from that which had just possessed him.
To Julia he wrote:
"JEFFERSON, April 11, 1838.
"Miss JULIA MARKHAM:
"Yours has just reached me. I am so little used to expressions of kindness that yours seem to mock me like irony. You did not choose to become involved in discomfort and danger, nor were you left to elect who should aid you, and I can endure the reflection that you might prefer to thank some other.
"If your sense of obligation is unpleasant, there is one consideration that may diminish it. A man of spirit, whose folly had placed him in the position I occupied towards you, would have eagerly sought an opportunity to render you any service, and would have done his poor best in your behalf. When it was accomplished he would not have been covetous of thanks, and might hope that it would be taken as some recompense for the past, and only ask to forget and be forgotten. No matter; so little that is pleasant has happened to me, that you surely can permit me to enjoy the full luxury of having saved you without having that diminished by the receipt of anything, in any form, from anybody, by reason of it. It is in your power to explain one thing to your father; by which he will see that I must be left to my own exertions so far as he is concerned. I do believe that your gracious mother was my one friend, who looked kindly upon my many faults, and who will rejoice if I ever escape from them.
"When in Newbury hereafter I shall feel at liberty to call at your father's house.
"With the sincerest wishes for your welfare, I remain
"Your obedient servant,
"A.B.E."
To the Judge:
"Hon. EDWARD MARKHAM:
"Dear Sir,—I am in receipt of yours. It was, perhaps, necessary for you to say some words to me. I may not judge of what would be fitting; I feel that you have said more than was required. I had a boy's sincere liking for you; but when I failed to secure the good-will of anybody, it is certain that there were radical defects in my character, and you but entertained the common feeling towards me. It was an honest, hearty dislike, which I have accepted—as I accept other things—without complaint or appeal. There is one near you who can explain how impossible it is that I can become an object of your interest or care. I am poor; let me remain so; I like it. Let me alone to buffet and be buffetted. The atmosphere in which I live is cold and thin, and exercise is needful for me. I have not deserved well of the world, and the world has not been over kind to forget it. Leave me to wage the war with it in my own way. It was God's pleasure to remove from me those upon whom I had natural claims, and I do not murmur, nor do I allude to it only as an indication that I am to go on alone.
"I am aware that I do not meet you in the spirit which prompts your generous and manly kindness—no matter. Think that it proceeds from something ignoble in my nature, and be glad that you may in no way be involved in any failure that awaits me.
"I am sure Mrs. Markham has always been most kind to me, and if on the miserable night when I left my own mother I could have stolen to her somewhere, and have touched her robe with my lips, it would have been most grateful to me. We shall meet probably again, and I am sure our intercourse may be that at least of pleasant acquaintances.
"With the sincerest respect,
"A.B.E.
"P.S.—Your postscript takes me at disadvantage. What can I say? Its kindness is most unkind. The horse is a mount fit for a Prince. I wish he might be found useful to Miss Markham; if she will accept him, I would be glad that he might be devoted to her service. More than this I cannot say.
"B."
I am inclined to follow these letters back to Newbury. It took a round week for a letter and its answer to pass between Newbury and Jefferson both ways. Somehow, it so happened that Julia, on the third day after mailing hers to Bart, was at the Post-office every day, on the arrival of the Northern mail, with the air of an unconcerned young woman who did not expect anything. On the seventh, two letters in a hand she knew were handed her by the clerk, who looked at the time as if he thought these were the letters, but said nothing.
On her way home she opened one of them and read it, and paused, and read, and studied as if the hand was illegible, and looked grave and hurt, and as if tears would start, and then calm and proud. "When she got home she silently handed the other to her father, and her own to her mother; then she went to her room. An hour later she came back, took her letter, and going into her father's office, laid it open before him, receiving his in return. This she read with a sad face; once or twice a moisture came into her eyes in spite of her, and then she sat and said nothing; and her mother came in and read her husband's letter also.
"Mother," said Julia, "are all young men really like this proud, haughty, sensitive fellow? and yet he is so unhappy! Was father at all like him?"
"I don't know. You must remember that few at his age have been placed in such trying positions, and had he been less, or more, or different, we might have been without cause for gratitude to him."
"Well, he graciously permits us to know that he may at least once again approach 'Your father's house!'"
"Julia! Could he have done it before?"
"Could he not, mother, when he saved my life?"
"Julia, was this poor youth more than human?"
"Mother, I have sometimes felt that he was, and that somehow more was to be required of him than of common men."
The Judge sat in silence, with an expression that indicated that his reflections were not wholly cheerful. The frank words that this youth had always liked him, and that the Judge had cause for dislike, so generous, were like so many stabs.
"Papa Judge," said Julia, suddenly springing to her father's side, "may I have him?"
"Have him! Who?"
"Why, Silver-tail, of course," laughing. "There is nobody else I can have;" rather gravely.
"Will you accept him?"
"Of course I will, and ride him too. I've always coveted him. My old 'Twilight' has almost subsided into night, and is just fit for Nell and Pearly. They may ride her; and when this prince wants his charger, as he will, he must come to me for him—don't you see?"
An hour later a splendid dark chestnut, with silver mane and tail, round-limbed, with a high dainty head, small ears, and big nostrils, with a human eye, spirited and docile, was brought round, caparisoned for a lady, and Julia stood by him with his bridle in her hand, caressing and petting him, while waiting for something ere she mounted. "Your name shall not be 'Silver-tail' any longer; you are 'Prince'"—whispering something in his ear. "Do you hear, Prince? You shall be my good friend, and serve me until your own true lord and master comes for you. Do you hope it will be soon?" Prince slightly shook his head, as if the wish was not his, at any rate. "Well, soon or late, you naughty Prince, he alone shall take you from my hand. Do you hear?" and being mounted, she galloped away.