In February, a week after a convention of the people was called at Richmond, the old gentleman surrendered to a sharp siege of the gout, and through the long winter days he sat, red and querulous, before the library fire, with his bandaged foot upon the ottoman that wore Aunt Emmeline's wedding dress. From Leicesterburg a stanch Union man had gone to the convention; and the Major still resented the selection of his neighbours as bitterly as if it were an affront to aspirations of his own.
“Dick Powell! Pooh! he's another Peyton Ambler,” he remarked testily, “and on my word there're too many of his kind—too many of his kind. What we lack, sir, is men of spirit.”
When his friends came now he shot his angry questions, like bullets, from the fireside. “Haven't they done anything yet, eh? How much longer do you reckon that roomful of old women will gabble in Richmond? Why, we might as well put a flock of sheep to decide upon a measure!”
But the “roomful of old women” would not be hurried, and the Major grew almost hoarse with scolding. For more than two months, while North and South barked at each other across her borders, Virginia patiently and fruitlessly worked for peace; and for more than two months the Major writhed a prisoner upon the hearth.
With the coming of the spring his health mended, and on an April morning, when Betty and the Governor drove over for a quiet chat, they found him limping painfully up and down the drive with the help of a great gold-knobbed walking-stick.
He greeted them cordially, and limped after them into the library where Mrs. Lightfoot sat knitting. While he slowly settled his foot, in its loose “carpet” slipper, upon the ottoman, he began a rambling story of the War of 1812, recalling with relish a time when rations grew scant in camp, and “Will Bolling and myself set out to scour the country.” His thoughts had made a quick spring backward, and in the midst of events that fired the Governor's blood, he could still fondly dwell upon the battles of his youth.
The younger man, facing him upon the hearth, listened with his patient courtesy, and put in a sympathetic word at intervals. No personal anxiety could cloud his comely face, nor any grievance of his own sharpen the edge of his peculiar suavity. It was only when he rose to go that he voiced, for a single instant, his recognition of the general danger, and replied to the Major's inquiry about his health with the remark, “Ah, grave times make grave faces, sir.”
Then he bowed over Mrs. Lightfoot's hand, and with his arm about Betty went out to the carriage.
“The Major's an old man, daughter,” he observed, as they rolled rapidly back to Uplands.
“You mean he has broken—” said Betty, and stopped short.