A FRIEND IN NEED
Jessie seated herself on the milking-stool by old Cleo’s side, while I leaned against the corral bars, watching her.
“You’re tired, aren’t you, Leslie?” she asked, glancing up at me, as under her nimble fingers, the streams of milk began to rattle noisily into the pail.
“Yes; I am, rather. I think I’m some disappointed too, maybe. What did Mr. Wilson say?”
“He said that my best plan—for it must go in my name, now—is to get to town to-morrow before Mr. Horton does, explain to the agent about father’s death—he must have heard of it, Mr. Wilson says, but he is not obliged to take official note of a thing that has not been reported to him, and that he has only heard of incidentally—and ask him to make out the deed to me, as the present head of the family. Mr. Wilson says that I must be there, ready to tell my story, the minute the office opens. He hopes that, in that way, we may frustrate Mr. Horton, who is likely, he says, to be one of the very first on hand to-morrow morning. After I have explained matters to the agent, he will be forced to wait the arrival of my witnesses, of course, before he can do anything. But Mr. Wilson thinks that anything that Mr. Horton may say, after the agent has seen me, and heard my story, will be likely to work in my favor, it will show so plainly what Mr. Horton is up to. Mr. Wilson says that I had better take a horse and start for town to-morrow, just as soon as it is light enough to see.”
“Twenty miles!” I said. “How long will it take you to ride it?” I knew how long it would take me, on Frank’s back, but Jessie is less wonted to the saddle than I.
“It will take me nearly four hours, I should think, shouldn’t you?” She stopped milking while she looked at me, anxiously awaiting my reply.
“Just about that, Jessie.”
“It would kill me to keep up such a gait as you and Frank seem to both take delight in,” she continued. “So I must be poking along for four hours doing the distance that you could cover in two. The Land Office opens at seven o’clock—there’s a rush of business just now, Mr. Wilson says—and I must start not later than half-past two.”
“Dear me, Jessie, I hate to have you start out alone in the night, that way!”
“I don’t like it very well myself,” Jessie admitted. “But Mr. Wilson thought we’d better not say a word to any one about my going—lest it should get to Mr. Horton’s ears some way, and he will drive around later in the morning and pick up the witnesses and bring them down. Oh, and Leslie, above all things, don’t forget the Bible. Be sure to put that in the wagon when Mr. Wilson comes.”
“Certainly I shall! Do you imagine that I would forget the one fundamental clause of our proving up?”
“No, of course you wouldn’t. Mr. Wilson said that he would go down with me—we could drive his fast horse down in the light cart, if only Joe were here to bring down our witnesses. But he isn’t, and I must go alone.”
It was evident that Jessie did not relish the prospect of taking a lonely night ride.
“I will leave the money—what little there is of it—for Mr. Wilson to bring down,” Jessie presently remarked. “Then, if I am held up, we will have saved that much, anyhow.”
“And much good it will do us, with our fundamental clause in the hands of brigands,” I retorted laughingly. For, indeed, there was about as much danger of a hold-up as of an earthquake.
“What a fuss you are making, Guard—what’s the matter?” Jesse said, in a tone of remonstrance, as she resumed the milking. The dog had been looking toward the house, growling and bristling, for some minutes. His response to Jessie’s remonstrance was a tumultuous rush toward the house, around the corner of which he disappeared. Presently we saw him bounding away into the oak scrub beyond, apparently in hot pursuit of some retreating object, for his voice, breaking out occasionally in angry clamor, soon died away in the distance.
“I hope there isn’t another wildcat after the chickens,” Jessie remarked, as, the milking finished, we started toward the house.
“I don’t think it’s a wildcat,” I said; “from all the legends we have heard lately, a wildcat would have stood its ground: more likely it was a polecat.”
Entering the house that we had left vacant, save for the sleeping child in the bed-room, we were startled at sight of a dusky, silent figure, sitting motionless before the fire—for, in the mountain country, a blaze is always welcome after night-fall, even in midsummer. At the sound of our approaching footsteps the figure turned toward us a head crowned with white wool, and smiled benignly.
“Joe!” we both cried, in a breath.
“Joe I is!” returned the old man, placidly, stretching his gnarled hands toward the blaze, and grinning delightedly; “I reckon you all begin fur to projec’ ‘Whar’s Joe?’ long ’bout dish yer time o’ day, so I done p’inted my tracks in dish yer way.”
“It must have been you that Guard was barking at,” I said, stirring the fire into a brighter blaze.
“No; hit wa’nt me. I yeard his racketin’ as I come up along. Hit war’ some udder varmint, I reckons. What fur he want ter bark at me?”
“True enough. Well, we’re just awful glad you’ve come back, Joe,” Jessie told him. “Leslie has been out all the afternoon and she hasn’t had her supper. I waited for her before eating mine, so now I’ll fix yours on this little table beside the fire and we can all eat at the same time.”
Joe accepted the proposition thankfully, and, after seeing him comfortably established, we seated ourselves at the large table near the window. I was hungry after my long ride and fell to with a will, but I presently observed that Jessie ate nothing.
“Why don’t you eat your supper, Jessie?”
“I can’t,” she replied, pushing away her plate; “I’m so worried. Leslie, have you thought that if the agent refuses to issue a deed to us we shall have no home? I feel just sure of it, for we haven’t money enough to re-enter the claim, hire a surveyor, and all that.”
“Must there be a new survey made?”
“So Mr. Wilson says; he says that it will be the same, in the eye of the law, as if no entry had ever been made.”
“The eye of the law must be half blind, then!” I exclaimed, indignantly. “As if the survey already made and paid for, was not good enough, and when we know that a new one would only follow the same lines!”
“That’s just what I said to Mr. Wilson. He said that surveyors had to have a chance to earn their living, and this way of doing business was one of the chances,” Jessie replied, dropping her head dejectedly on her hand.
“Well; don’t let’s worry about it, Jessie dear, we must keep on hoping, as father used to say. He used to say, you know, that no one was ever really poor until he had ceased to hope. We will do our best and God will look out for the rest, I guess. I don’t believe He intends to let our home be taken from us. He wouldn’t have given us such good men for witnesses if He had.”
“Yes, they are good. If we were only able to borrow a little more money now I should feel quite safe. If we could just borrow money enough to—”
“Woe unto him that goeth up an’ down de lan’ seeking fur t’ borrow money! Borrowed money, hit stingeth like an adder; hit biteth like a surpunt! Hit weaves a chain what bin’s hit’s victims han’ an’ foot! Hit maketh a weight what breaks his heart, amen!”
In the interest of our conversation we had, for the nonce, forgotten Joe, who was quietly toasting his ragged shoes before the fire, until his voice thus solemnly proclaimed his presence.
“Dat’s w’at ole Mas’r Gordon, yo’ chillen’s gran’fadder, used fur t’ say, an’ hit’s true. Hit’s true! He knowed; Good Heaven, didn’t he know!”
There was the tragedy of some remembered bitter suffering in the old man’s voice, and, recalling father’s stern determination to endure all things, to lose all things, if need be, rather than to become a borrower, I felt that the misery hinted at in old Joe’s words had been something very real and poignant in the days of those Gordons, now beyond all suffering.
“Hit may be,” continued the old man reflectively, “dat I ain’ got all dem verses jess right, but dat was deir senses. W’at s’prises me, Miss Jessie, is dat yo’ alls is talkin’ ob wantin’ fur to borrow money, too. W’at fur yo’ wan’ ter borry money, w’en de’re’s a plenty in de fambly? A plenty ob hit, yes. W’at yo’ reckons I’s been doin’ all dese yer weeks, off an’ on? T’inks I’s a ’possum, an’ doan know w’en hit’s time ter come t’ life? Ain’ I been a knowin’ ’bout dish yer lan’ business an’ a gittin’ ready fur hit, ebber sense long ’fore Mas’r Ralph was took. I didn’t git drownded w’en he did—wish’t I had, I does—an’ long ’fore dat, I’se been sabin’ up my wages agin’ a time w’en Mas’r Ralph goin’ need ’em wustest. I reckoned he goin’ need ’em w’en hit comes to de provin’ up on dish yer claim. Hit doan tek’ much ter keep a ole nigger like me, an’ I ain’ been crippled wid de rheumatiz so bad until ’long dis summah, an’ so, chillen, I’se done got five hundred dollahs in de bank at Fa’hplay, fo’ de credit ob Mas’r Ralph Gordon—dat’s yo’s now, Miss Jessie, honey, cause yo’s ob age.”
Joe had remembered that important fact, too, it seemed. We could only stare at him in speechless amazement, while he concluded, abruptly: “So doan let’s heah no more fool talk ’bout borrowin’ money. We’s got a plenty, I tells yo’. I been a-keepin’ hit in de bank at Arnold—whar’ Mas’r Ralph an’ me stopped fur quite a spell ’afore we done come yer—an’ so, a few days ago, I done slipped ober to Arnold an’ drawed de money out, an’ put it in de bank at Fa’hplay, subject to de order ob Miss Jessie Gordon—dat’s yo’, honey,” he added, as if fearful that Jessie might not recognize herself under this formal appellation. He was holding his coffee-cup suspended, half-way to his lips, while he looked at us exultantly, and then we both expressed our feelings in a characteristic manner. I ran to him, and threw my arms around his neck.
“Oh, Joe! Joe! you are an angel!” I sobbed, dropping my head on his shoulder.
“Maybe I is,” the old man admitted, stiffly, edging away; “but if dere’s airy angel, w’ite or black, w’at likes ter hab hot coffee spilled ober his laigs, I ain’ nebber met up wid him!”
“I’ll get you another cup, Joe,” I said, laughing, as I brushed away my tears. While I was getting it, Jessie clung to his rough old hand.
“God bless you, Joe! Oh, you have lifted such a weight from my heart! I don’t know how to thank you; but Joe, we’ll pay it all back to you! We will, if it takes the place to do it!”
Joe, freeing his hand from her clasp, rose to his feet—not stiffly, this time, but with a certain grave dignity. Motioning aside the coffee that I was bringing, he picked his ragged old hat up from the floor beside his chair, put it on, pulled it down over his eyes, and started for the door.
“’Fore Heaben! I wouldn’t ’a’ beliebed dat one ob Mas’r Ralph Gordon’s chillen gwine fur insult me like dis!” he muttered, huskily; “Talk ob payin’ me! Me, like I was a stranger, an’ didn’ belong to de fambly!”
“Wait!” cried Jessie, springing forward, as the old man laid a trembling hand on the door knob. “Wait, sit down, Joe, dear Joe, don’t desert us when we need you most! As for the money, God bless you for making sure of our home, for, of course, it’s your home, too, always, always! And I’ll never pay a cent of the money back; not if I use it all!”
“Yo’s gwine hab to use hit all, honey,” Joe returned, with a beaming face, as he resumed his seat. “Dere’s de fence buildin’ an’ breakin’ de new groun’, and de seedin’.”
“True enough! Oh, we shall come out all right, now, thanks to you, Joe.”
And Jessie spoke with the happy little laugh that we had not heard for a long, long time.