IX.
Arabella Chapman was the neatest of housekeepers. The sitting room of the home of David Chapman was a pattern of tidiness and cleanliness, the furniture was rubbed and polished until it shone like glass, every picture, rug and curtain was as speckless as newly fallen snow.
Miss Arabella seemed especially created to form the central figure of her surroundings, as seated on a low rocking chair, she plied a neat little needle on some nice little article of lace-work.
No tiny, tidy wren was ever brighter and more chipper in its shining little brass cage than was Miss Arabella, as, bird-like, she peeped at her brother, when he drew the cover from the violoncello which stood in one corner of the room.
“I am glad to see that you intend passing the evening at home, David,” piped up the ancient maiden.
“It has really been so long since we had any music that I am delighted to see you uncover your violoncello,” continued the twin sister of David Chapman.
“Well, Arabella, the fact is that in my many excursions during the last year I have collected such a quantity of food for thought, that, like a well filled camel I feel it necessary to pause and chew the cud awhile,” replied David arranging some sheets of music on a stand and passing his hand lovingly over the chords of the instrument that he held.
“I must admit that I should prefer to remain hungry mentally forever if to procure food for thought it were necessary to don the apparel of a tramp, and prowl around at all hours of the night, seeking, doubtless, in the vilest dens, among the lowest vagabonds for mental sustenance,” chirped Arabella sharply, prodding her needlework spitefully.
“Perhaps, my good sister, you will never quite understand that some men are born investigators. By nature they are led to investigate any phenomenon that presents itself.”
“Then I insist that it is a most unfortunate thing for one so born,” pecked Miss Arabella with the sharpness of a quarrelsome English sparrow.
“It causes one to make a Paul Pry of himself and wander about in a very questionable manner at unseemly hours, to the injury of both health and reputation. When one of your age, David, is so endowed by nature it is a positive misfortune.”
Chapman appeared greatly amused by the irritated manner of his sister, for he smiled in that ghastly way of his as he leaned back in his chair, still with his violoncello resting between his legs, and said,
“You see, Arabella, there may be a great difference in the way we regard the affairs of life. Doubtless scientific researches may not afford much pleasure to a spinster of your age, but such researches are very attractive to me.”
“All I can add to the opinion already expressed is that when your so-called scientific researches not alone lead you to assume the character of an outcast, and cause you to wander about at night like a homeless cat, but also induce you to make our home a receptacle for all the stray, vulgar, dirty negroes that happen to come to Boston, I must certainly protest against indulgence in such researches by you,” retorted the elderly maiden severely, as she cast her glances about her immaculately clean apartment, and remembered some disagreeable event of the last few months.
David was highly amused by this speech, for he gave utterance to a cackling kind of laugh and exclaimed,
“Arabella, you’ll never get to heaven if the road be muddy. You will be fearful of getting your skirts soiled. I shall be right sorry for your soul if the path to the other place be clean. I fear in that event that nothing could hold you back from going straight to Hades.”
“Don’t be ridiculous, David. You know full well that I am no more particular about tidiness than every other decent woman.”
What monomaniac on the subject of cleanliness ever thought otherwise?
“I insist,” continued Miss Arabella indignantly, “that when one indulges a fad to the extent of disarranging an entire household, under the pretense that it is part of a scientific research, it is time to protest against such proceedings.”
“Oh, I don’t imagine that the entire household has seriously suffered by my investigations in the field of ethnology,” replied the brother still enjoying his sister’s perturbation of mind as she recalled some recent experiences.
“It may be highly amusing to you, David. I hope that you enjoy the joke, but it has been anything but amusing to me and to Bridget, having to clean, rub and air every article of furniture in the house two or three times each week, and it is no laughing matter to freeze while the cold wind blows the disgusting odors left by your guest out of the rooms. Bridget has notified me that she will leave if you continue to make a hostelry for dirty darkies out of the house,” said the sister fairly shivering at the remembrance of the condition in which she had found her spotless premises after a visit of some of her brother’s newly found associates.
“I don’t think that I am the only member of this family that has a hobby, Arabella,” replied Chapman grinning at the flushed little lady.
“I am unaware of what you refer to, David. I certainly have no such uncomfortable idiosyncrasy as a hard ridden hobby.”
“Don’t you think even cleanliness may become a most pestiferous hobby?” queried Chapman with assumed guilelessness.
“Cleanliness and tidiness are but other words for common decency, and can never be classed with the vagaries of a ‘born investigator,’” said the spinster sarcastically, sticking her dictum into her needlework, savagely.
“You doubtless have heard, Arabella, of the woman who possessed so much of what you call ‘common decency’ that she forced her family to live in the barn in order that the dwelling might remain clean and tidy,” answered Chapman, to whom the wrath of Arabella was the greatest pleasure imaginable.
“I only wish that we had a barn. I would soon enough force you to entertain your negro visitors there instead of bringing their odoriferous persons and filthy accompaniments into this house,” cried the sister vindictively.
“You must be reasonable, my most precise sister,” said David.
“When I became interested in the science of ethnology, I deemed it expedient to begin by studying the negro race, their habits, characteristics, manners and tendencies. Being a man born and bred in a northern state I have never had the opportunities possessed by southerners, who are surrounded by negroes from infancy, to know the traits of that most interesting race. Hence I have been forced, on behalf of science, to go forth and gather such material as was obtainable for subjects of study and observation.”
“David, don’t be hypocritical with me; you know that neither ethnology nor the negro race possessed the slightest interest for you, until you learned that Walter Burton had a strain of negro blood in his veins.”
“I do not deny that my zeal was not diminished by that fact,” answered Chapman shortly and dryly.
“And I maintain that your zeal is caused entirely by that fact, and I wish to say further, David Chapman,” exclaimed the withered wisp of a woman, drawing herself up very straight in her chair and looking angrily at her brother, “if all this investigation and research lead to anything that may cause trouble, annoyance or pain to Lucy Dunlap, whom I have held in these arms as a baby, then I say that you are a wicked, ungrateful man, and I wish to know nothing of your diabolic designs, nor of the disgusting science that you call ethnology.”
God bless the dried-up spinster! God bless thy bony, skinny arms that held that baby! Thrice blessed be the good and kindly heart that beats warmly in thy weak and withered little body.
Seriously and steadily did Chapman gaze for a minute at the vehement, fragile figure before him, then said meditatively,
“I believe she loves the Dunlap name as much as I do myself.”
“More, indeed a great deal more, for I could not cause pain to one of that name even though I benefited all the other Dunlaps who have ever been born by so doing,” quickly cried the old maid.
“Don’t alarm yourself needlessly, sister,” said Chapman earnestly.
“My investigations are neither undertaken to injure Lucy nor could they do so even had I that intention. It is too late. I am perfectly frank and truthful when I state that the subject is exceedingly interesting to me, and the developments fascinating. Since I have familiarized myself somewhat with the leading peculiarities of the negro race I recognize much more of the negro in Burton than I imagined could possibly exist in one possessing so great a preponderance of the blood of the white race.”
“I am glad to learn that no harm can come to Lucy by your persistent pursuit after knowledge of ethnology, but I must say it does not seem to me a very genteel course of conduct for a man of you age and education to be spying about and watching an associate in business,” said the candid Arabella.
“I assure you that I am not obliged either to play the spy or watch particularly, for it seems to me that the negro in Burton positively obtrudes itself daily. In fact I am certain that it is neither because I am watching for such evidences, nor because I can now recognize negro traits better than formerly, but simply because the negro in the man becomes daily more obtrusively apparent,” answered Dunlap’s superintendent as he began tuning and testing his favorite musical instrument.
Even the most prejudiced critic would be forced to admit that whatever David Chapman undertook to do he accomplished well. He never relaxed in persistent effort until an assigned task was performed. He became for the time being absolutely fanatic upon any subject he had before him. His performance on the violoncello was of the same character as his efforts in other directions where his attention was demanded. It was artistic, magnificent, sympathetic and impressive.
To the violoncello Chapman seemed to tell his soul-story; through it he breathed those hidden sentiments that were so deeply buried in the secret recesses of his heart that their existence could never be suspected. Music seemed the angel guarding with flaming sword the gateway of this peculiar man’s soul. When music raised the barrier glimpses of unexpected beauties surprised all those who knew the jealous, prying, cynical nature of the man.
As David Chapman began playing his sister with closed eyes rested her head on the back of the rocking chair and bathed her lonely old heart in the flood of melody that poured from the instrument in her brother’s hands.
How that music spoke to the poor, craving, hungry heart within her flat and weazen bosom. Youth and hope seemed singing joyous songs of life’s springtime; love then burst forth blushing while whispering the sweet serenade of that glorious summer season of womankind. Then in cadence soft and tender, gently as fall the autumn leaves, the music sadly told of blighting frosts. Youth and hope like summer roses withered and vanished. Now the gloom, despair and disappointment of life’s winter wailing forth filled the heart of the forlorn old maiden; tears rolled down her wrinkled cheeks unheeded and almost a sob escaped from her quivering lips.
Weep no more sad heart. The music in pealing tones of triumph is shouting the Glad Tidings of that eternity of endless spring, where all is Love and all is Joy; where the flowers of everlasting summer never fade and die; where no blighting frost can come to wither the blossoms of Youth and Hope; where the cold blasts of winter’s gloom and disappointment never blow to chill and sadden the soul.
Grandly resound those notes triumphant; open seem the gates of that promised future, together brother and sister their souls seem ascending; above all is bright, refulgent with the great light of gladness, now, coming sweetly, faintly, they catch the sound of welcome, sung above by that heavenly chorus.
The music died away in silence. Brother and sister sat for a long time, each busy with their own thoughts. Who but the All-wise can ever tell what thoughts come on such occasions to those who in silence hold self-communion in the sanctuary of their own souls.
“David, it seems strange to me that one having the tenderness of heart that you have, should never have found some good woman to love,” said the sister softly when the silence was finally broken.
“Indeed, sister, I sometimes think I might have done so and been happier far than I am, had I not early in life given, in the intense way that is part of my nature, all the love of my heart and consecrated all my devotion to the business in which I then engaged and submerged my every emotion in the glory and honor of the house of ‘J. Dunlap.’”
“Ah, brother, I often think of that and wonder what would happen if aught should go wrong with the object of your life-long devotion.”
“It would kill me, Arabella,” said Chapman quietly.
The certainty of the result to the man, should misfortune shatter the idol of his adoration, was more convincingly conveyed to the listener by that simple sentence and quiet tone than excited exclamation could have carried; Arabella uttered a sigh as she thought of the unshared place that ‘J. Dunlap’ held in the strenuous soul of her brother.
“Brother, you should not allow your mind and heart to become so wrapped up in the house of Dunlap; remember the two old gentlemen, in the course of nature, must soon pass away and that then there is no Dunlap to continue the business, and the career of the firm must come to an end.”
“No, Arabella, that may not happen,” replied Chapman. His voice, however, gave no evidence of the pleasure that such a statement from him seemed to warrant.
“There was an ante-nuptial contract entered into by Burton, in which it is agreed that any child born to James Dunlap’s granddaughter shall bear the name of Dunlap; hence the career of our great house will not necessarily terminate upon the death of the twin brothers.”
“I am so glad to know that, David. I have been much concerned for your sake, brother, fearing the dire consequences of the death of both of the old gentlemen whom you have served so devotedly for forty odd years.” The reassured little creature paused and then a thought, all womanly, occurred to her mind reddening her peaked visage as she exclaimed,
“What beautiful children the Burton-Dunlaps should be!”
A worried, anxious, doubtful look came over Chapman’s countenance. He gazed at the floor thoughtfully for several minutes and then apparently speaking to himself said,
“That is the point; there is where I am at sea; it is that question that gives me most anxiety.”
“Why, what can you mean, most inscrutable man, Mr. Burton is one of the handsomest men that I ever saw and surely no prettier woman ever lived than sweet Lucy Dunlap,” cried the loyal-hearted old maid.
“It is not a question of beauty, it is a question of blood. If it be only a matter of appearances Lucy Burton’s children would probably be marvels of infantine loveliness, but it is a scientific problem,” replied David seriously and earnestly.
“What in the name of all that is nonsensical has science to do with Lucy’s babies if any be sent to her?” cried out Miss Arabella, forgetting in her excitement that maidenly reserve that was usually hers.
“I regret to say that science has a great deal to do with the subject,” answered the brother quietly. “It is a matter of grave doubt in the minds of many scientific men whether, under any circumstances, an octoroon married to one of the white race ever can produce descendants; it is claimed by many respectable authorities that negro blood is not susceptible of reduction beyond the point attained in the octoroon; that it must terminate there or breed back through its original channel,” continued Chapman.
“It is not true! I don’t believe a word of such stuff,” ejaculated Miss Arabella, dogmatically.
“Authorities admit, it is true, that there may be exceptions to the invariability of this law, but claim that such instances are faults in nature and likely, as all faults in nature, to produce the most astounding results. These authorities assert that the progeny of an octoroon and one of the white race being the outcome of a fault in nature, are certain to be deficient in strength and vigor, are apt to be deformed, and even may possibly breed back to a remote coal-black ancestor,” said Chapman, speaking slowly, punctuating each sentence with a gasping sound, almost a groan.
“Stuff and nonsense!” exclaimed his sister rising in indignation from her chair and moving toward the door, saying,
“I positively will hear no more of your absurd science. It’s all foolishness. If that be the idiocy that you learn from ethnology I think that you had better occupy your time otherwise. Thanks to your ‘authorities’ and their crazy notions, I suppose that I shall dream all night of monkeys and monsters, but even that is better than sitting her and listening to my brother, whom I supposed had some brains, talk like a fit subject for the lunatic asylum.” With the closing sentence, as a parting shot at her brother the incensed spinster sailed out of the door and with a whisk went up stairs to her virgin chamber.