It was near about dusk, and the serving man had brought me my supper on a tray, when Arnold opened the door for the first time and found me at my post.
“Lord, Captain Page!” he said. “Have you been here all the afternoon? You took me too literally. Go down to the dining-room and have yourself served in some comfort. Afterward, you may come and get a letter for Mistress Arnold, leaving Sergeant Champe on duty in the lower hall. We are in no such peril as to need a death watch.”
That matter of carrying another letter to Margaret Shippen set me to blowing hot and cold in the same instant; elate with the thought that I might see Beatrix again, and apprehensive from the fear that if I should see her, I must be put to it harder than ever to defend my secret. Also, there was another thing to add a chill, if not of apprehension, at least of decent reluctance. How could I brazenly face the dear lady, who was so good to Beatrix and me, with a lie in my eyes and false words on my lips, carrying her husband’s love-billets on the very eve of a deed which would crush her into the dust of affliction?
I was half minded to ask Arnold to make Champe his messenger, pressing the resolve so far as to inquire of the sergeant if he could find the way in the dark to a certain house across the open square from Mr. Justice Smith’s. When he was doubtful about it, I braced myself and said I would go; which, when I had posted Champe in the lower hall, and had got the letter from Arnold, I did.
The promise of a bad night weather-wise was beginning to come to pass when I set out—a bit warily for the sake of Lieutenant Castner’s shrewd and watchful enmity—to thread the poorly lighted streets. A cold rain was falling and the wind off the bay was sharp-edged, with a threat of more to follow.
Though it was not the shortest way to my destination, I went, for a purpose of my own, up Broad Way, past the wretched, makeshift shelters that were taking the place of many fair homes destroyed in the great fire of ’76, past Trinity Church standing as a ghostly ruin on the left, its walls only partly down and a corner of its bell tower still rearing itself high above the fire-killed trees in the churchyard. Beyond the church I made a détour to the westward to get a glimpse of the river. It was not very rough as yet, but a heavy swell was running up with the tide to tell of rough weather to the southward. I recalled the light craft which must be our dependence. It would do very well in a seaway, always provided there was not enough wind to make the waves break over its low gunwale. There were as yet no white-caps to show their teeth on the black and heaving expanse, so I turned back to my errand with rising hope.
As on the former occasion, it was the old negro servant who admitted me to the Vandeventer house and took Arnold’s letter above-stairs; and almost before I had had time to feel the cheer of the fire in the luxurious little reception-room whither I went to await whatever answer there might be, the door opened to show me, not Mistress Margaret, nor yet Beatrix, but Mistress Julianna Pettus, Jack’s aunt, and Beatrix’s cousin, once removed.
Now, truly, Beatrix had told me very plainly that she was expecting “Cousin Ju”; was delaying her departure for Virginia only until that good lady should come over from Philadelphia to accompany her. But this fact, like some others, had gone completely out of my mind, else I think I should never have had the courage to come within speaking distance of the Vandeventer house that night. For Cousin Julianna was fair, fat and forty, with a mind of her own and a tongue sharper than any whip-lash; and being my own second cousin on my mother’s side, she had a sense of proprietorship in me which she had exercised impartially since she stood godmother for me in the old church in Williamsburg.
“Well, Dick Page!” she cried. “So you have come to show me your new clothes, have you? Was there no other ditch that you could wallow in, but you must be the first to disgrace a long line of honorable Virginia gentlemen? Merciful suz! Shame, hot shame on you, boy—to make us all hide our heads this way! Beatrix Leigh will never marry you now; her father would disinherit her flat, and so, too, would I. And you’ve fairly thrown her into Howard Seytoun’s arms, brute beast as he is! No, don’t try to explain it; there is no explanation—there can’t be!”
What could I do, other than bow my head to the righteous storm and let it exhaust itself, if it would? It raged—oh, how scathingly it raged!—for a full quarter of an hour, I believe, during which time I could scarcely get a word in edgewise; but when the hurricane had blown itself out, my cousin sat down and condescended to ask me news of Jack, and of the doings in the camps on the Hudson, remembering herself now and then to flay me afresh for the coat I was wearing.