A NORTHERN FAMILY IN KENTUCKY
Titus's eldest daughter, Mildred, had written to her Uncle Noah in New Hampshire the particulars of the death of his brother after the fact had been telegraphed to him by Colonel Cosgrove. The letter was hardly more than an announcement of the decease of her Kentucky uncle, and the date of the funeral. It was not possible for Noah to reach Barcreek in season to be present at the last rites; but he wrote to Titus without delay.
A few days after the telegram a letter from Colonel Cosgrove, the executor, came to Noah Lyon, containing a copy of the will of his brother. The lawyer, who had been the intimate friend and confidant of Colonel Lyon, wrote with entire freedom to the distant brother. He stated that his deceased friend had little confidence in Titus, and in Barcreek he was not considered as an entirely reliable man.
The most important item in the letter was that Colonel Lyon had passed a whole day with him only a week before his death, talking most of the time about his estate. He had lived at Riverlawn twenty-five years, had developed the place from a wilderness, and was very much attached to it. In his will he had left it to Noah, and he desired that he should move to Kentucky and take possession of the estate.
It required a week of consideration in the comfortable home of the Derry farmer, in which the children, their own and the adopted ones, took part, before a conclusion could be reached; but it was a compliance with the request of Colonel Lyon. Within a year before his death the planter had spent a month with the New Hampshire farmer, during which he had told him all about his estate and his surroundings at Barcreek. They had not met before since the elder brother first went to Kentucky; and the Kentuckian formed a very high opinion of his New England brother, which was quite in contrast with his estimate of Titus, who had been his neighbor for six years.
The colonel's will was dated within two months of this visit, and doubtless he was thinking of his last testament when he went to New Hampshire. As soon as it was settled that the family should make their home in Kentucky, Noah wrote a long letter to his only surviving brother, announcing his intention to leave Barcreek as soon as he could settle up his business in Derry. He expressed himself with all brotherly kindness, and was glad that they were again to live near each other.
Titus did not even reply to this letter, though his wife wrote to Mrs. Noah, expressing the pleasure she felt that they were again to be neighbors. It was about two months after the death of Colonel Lyon that Noah and his family arrived at Bowling Green, the county town, which was the nearest railroad station to Barcreek, fifteen miles distant. Noah Lyon had kept up his correspondence with the executor of his brother, and Colonel Cosgrove was at the station when the family arrived. Titus was not there, and he did not manifest much interest in the coming of his only remaining brother.
The distinguished lawyer extended a hearty welcome to the family, and invited them all to dinner at his mansion. He wondered that Titus or some member of his family was not there to greet the new-comers; but he said little about him, though enough to show that he had not a very exalted opinion of him.
"You will find the mansion of your late brother in perfect order, Mr. Lyon," said Colonel Cosgrove, as they rose from the dinner-table. "I was over there yesterday, and satisfied myself that every thing was in condition for your reception. The furniture remains just as it was in the time of Colonel Lyon."
"You have been very kind, Colonel Cosgrove, and I am very grateful to you for all the attention you have given to my brother's affairs and to me," replied Noah, taking the hand of the hospitable executor. "Does my brother Titus live near Riverlawn?"
"About a mile from it, in the village of Barcreek," answered the lawyer. "Your brother, the colonel, had several boats; and when he went to the village in the open season he usually made the trip by the river, rowed by half a dozen of his boys."
"I was not aware that he had any boys," added Noah.
"His hands, his negroes; and he always called them boys. He was the best friend they ever had," the colonel explained. "That reminds me that I have a letter which your late brother required me to deliver personally into your hands;" and the lawyer went to his office for it.
He returned in a few minutes, and gave the letter, which was heavily sealed with wax, to the new owner of Riverlawn. He had mentioned this epistle in one of his letters to the new proprietor, and Noah wondered as he looked upon its elaborate seals what could be the subject of the communication. The colonel was speaking of the boys, which reminded him of the letter; and he suspected that it had some connection with the negroes. He put it in his pocket very carefully, and then looked at his watch.
"How far is it from this town to Barcreek?" he asked, still holding the watch in his hand.
"Fifteen miles; and as the roads are not in the best condition at this season of the year, it will take about two hours and a half to make the trip," replied the lawyer. "But it is only two o'clock, and you have plenty of time."
"But I must look up a conveyance," suggested the new proprietor of Riverlawn.
"A conveyance is all ready for you, Mr. Lyon," added the colonel. "I directed Mr. Bedford to come over for you and your family, and he has been here since nine o'clock this morning. He came with the road-wagon, which will comfortably accommodate your whole family; and one of the boys came over with another wagon to tote your baggage over."
"You have been very thoughtful and considerate, Colonel Cosgrove, and I am under very great obligations to you," said Noah.
"Don't mention it, Mr. Lyon. I should be happy to have you spend the night with me, for we have still a great deal to talk about," answered the executor.
"My family, as well as myself, are naturally quite impatient to see our new home," suggested the New Hampshire farmer. "Fifteen miles is not a very long distance even in New England, and I hope we shall meet often."
"I shall visit Riverlawn often until you are well settled in your new home. I have a plantation myself on the road to Barcreek, and about half way there, which I visit two or three times a week; and I shall be glad to give you all the information you need in regard to your surroundings, or in relation to the management of your estate. You will see me occasionally at Riverlawn, and I shall hope to meet you and your family here, or at my estate, which is called Belgrade."
"Thank you, Colonel; I am sure we shall be good friends in spite of my antecedents as a Northern farmer, for I am not a bigot or a fanatic."
"I have no doubt we shall be good friends and good neighbors," said the Kentuckian, as he took the hand of his new client, and struck the bell on the table. "Now I will send for Mr. Bedford, who has been the overseer or manager of your brother for the last ten years. As the colonel was, he is a bachelor of fifty, and has been one of the family at Riverlawn. He is a thoroughly reliable man, and one of the late colonel's best friends."
A servant was sent for the overseer, and presently he appeared. He was a rather stout man, and his round face seemed to be overflowing with pleasantry and good-nature. He was duly presented to all the six members of the family, and heartily shook the hand of each of them. He did not at all answer to the description of plantation overseers which Noah Lyon had obtained from the books he had read, depicting the horrors of slavery. In spite of his occupation he took a fancy to him at first sight; and all the family were pleased with him.
The manager, as Noah preferred to call him, was Levi Bedford. He had never been very successful in the management of his own affairs; but he was a man after Colonel Lyon's own heart, and in his will he had given him five thousand dollars, which was one of the grievances Titus had against the testament. One of the virtues of Levi, as his late employer always called him, was his extreme fondness for horses, with his skill in raising and managing them; for this had been an important branch of the planter's business.
"I have started Pink over to the place with all your baggage, Major Lyon, and I am ready to leave with the family when you say the word," said Mr. Bedford, after they had conversed a few minutes.
"I am not a major, Mr. Bedford," replied Noah; and all the family laughed when they heard the military title applied to him.
"Your brother was not exactly a colonel; but that is a fashion we have down here of expressing our respect for a man by giving him rank in the military," laughed the manager. "But I want you to call me 'Levi,' as your brother did, and as Colonel Cosgrove does when there is no company present."
"Very well, Levi; I intend to conform to the customs of the country. We are all ready to leave at once," added Noah.
"My team will be at the door in four minutes and three-quarters, Major Lyon," answered the manager as he left the room.
"Call it five, Levi," added the colonel.
"Less than that, Colonel," replied Levi as he closed the door.
"I would give that man double the wages I pay my present overseer if I could have him at Belgrade; and I should make money by the change," said the host, as he went to the window of the drawing-room, to which the party had retired from the dining-room. "The only fault he has is that he is too gentle and indulgent to the negroes. The neighbors say he is spoiling the niggers all over two counties. But I reckon the colonel was more to blame for that, if anybody was to blame, for he had a soft heart. I never saw two men less alike than your two Kentucky brothers," continued Colonel Cosgrove, as Noah joined him at the window. "There is your team, and Levi hasn't been gone quite five minutes."
"Four horses!" exclaimed Noah.
"Levi likes a good team and enough of it," added the lawyer.
"And I never saw four handsomer horses in all my life," added the new owner of Riverlawn, as he gazed with admiration on the magnificent animals; and all the family hastened to the windows to see the turnout.
"You will find at least thirty more of them when you get to Riverlawn."
The road-wagon was a covered vehicle with four seats, large enough for a dozen passengers. It was neatly painted and upholstered, and the harnesses on the horses were elegant enough for a city turnout. The whole family promptly realized that they were entering upon a style to which they had never been accustomed. But Noah Lyon had suddenly become a rich man.
The colonel gallantly assisted the ladies to their seats. The horses danced and pranced; but they were so well trained that they did not offer to start till Levi drew up his four reins and gave them the word to go. Hasty adieux were spoken, and the horses went off, gently at first, but soon put in a lively pace.
Noah and his wife took the back seat, Dorcas and Hope took the next one, for all of them had been handed to these places by the colonel; Dexter installed himself at the side of Levi, and Artemas had a seat all to himself behind them. All was new and strange to them, and they observed the buildings in the town till they passed out of the village. Then the scenery was quite different from that of their former home.
Only two of the four children were those of Noah and his wife. Dexter was his son, and was sixteen years old at this time, while his sister Hope was thirteen. Both of them had received a high-school education in part, and they were both very bright scholars. People in Derry called Deck an "old head," which meant that his judgment and knowledge had ripened beyond his years. Without being a "goody," he was a good boy, with high aims and noble impulses.
Ten years before, Cyrus Lyon, one of the four brothers of whom Colonel Duncan was the eldest, was a resident of Hillsburg in the State of Vermont, where he had settled on a valley farm, which he had hired with the intention of buying it when he was able to do so. He was married in Derry, and had two children, with whom he moved to his new home. He lived in an old house, between which and the public road flowed a small river, nearly dry most of the year, but exceedingly turbulent in the spring when the snow melted on the mountains.
A freshet came, and the house was surrounded by water. The bridge over the stream was raised, and Cyrus went out to secure it. His wife followed to assist him, and while both of them were on it, a rush of waters came which tore the structure into fragments, and both of them were swept away by the mad torrent. They were drowned in spite of the efforts of the neighbors to rescue them. But they saved the two children who remained in the house.
Noah had taken these two children and brought them up as his own, for the father did not leave property enough to pay his debts. Artemas was fifteen and Dorcas was seventeen. The colonel paid for their support for ten years, and left each a handsome legacy, in trust with Noah.
In two hours from the county town, Levi Bedford reined in his four horses at the front door of the Riverlawn mansion.