Madge Morton's Trust

by Amy D. V. Chalmers

From the appearance of Madge's clothes she might easily have been mistaken for a tramp. Her long coat was wet to her ankles and her shoes and stockings were muddy. She had long since lost her little cap and her hair was rough and tumbled from her night's sleep in the boat, while her face was white and haggard. Instead of following the line of the river, where she was sure to find some life stirring in another hour or so, Madge foolishly pushed up over the hill. She did not find a path, so she might have guessed that she was off the beaten track. She must have walked up the hill for half a mile when she saw a sight that at last gave her hope. An old, broken-down horse was tethered to a tree, eating grass. Surely he was a sign-post to some human habitation farther on.

Madge spied a cornfield to the left of her, though some distance off. She knew that the Virginia farmers cultivated the low hills for their crops, and that she was near some house. She sniffed the fresh morning air. A delicious odor wafted toward her, the smell of boiling coffee, which came from the thickest part of the hillside, away to the right of the cornfield.

Madge made straight for it. She had to push aside branches and underbrush, and the place was farther off than she supposed, but she found it at last. Seated on the ground before a small fire was an old woman, the oldest the little captain had ever seen. She was weather-beaten and brown, withered like a crumpled autumn leaf. She was roasting something in the fire and muttering to herself. A little farther on a man was drinking coffee from a quart cup. They were rough-looking people to come across in the woods. But Madge knew that in the harvest season many tramps and gypsies traveled about through Virginia, living on the crops of the fruitful land. They were usually harmless people, so she felt no fear of the strangers. They had no tent, but a few logs with branches over them formed a sort of hiding place.

"Please," began Madge timidly, "will you tell me where I am?"

The man sprang up and rushed toward her with a big stick in his hand. He seemed not so angry as frightened. The little captain's appearance disarmed his suspicions. He dropped his stick to the ground. The strange girl was a gypsy or tramp herself.

"Will you give me some coffee?" asked Madge pleadingly. She was beginning to feel weak and faint.

With the instant hospitality of the road the man passed Madge his own quart can. She took it, shuddering a little, but she was too thirsty to hesitate. She held the cup to her lips and drank. Then she went over and dropped down on the ground by the side of the old woman, who, although her eyes were fastened on the girl, had never ceased to mutter to herself. Madge began telling the story of her night's adventure.

"I haven't any money with me," she declared as she finished her story, "but if the man will get an oar and take me down the river to my friends, I will pay him whatever he thinks is right. I dragged my rowboat up on the shore not very far from here. I must return to my friends at once."

The old woman looked at the man questioningly. Madge's eyes were also on him. It did not dawn on her that the fellow could have any reason for refusing her simple request.

The man shook his head doggedly. "I can't row," he announced.