Tales of the Chesapeake

by George Alfred Townsend

"I do so every night, sir."

"Good-night!"

Paul heard the agent sobbing as he stole away; but when he knocked at Mrs. Everett's door she answered petulantly, and at first she refused to rise. She had little self-denial; it would pain her to enter a dying chamber; and she would have left Wait to perish, had not some strange passage from the romance entered her head of dead folk, with secrets on their minds, haunting the living. It would be very terrible to be haunted, and the old woman was frightened into obedience. When she returned her mind was disquieted, and she made Paul stay in her room to compose her with cheerful talk. Finally she fell asleep, and he hastened to the agent's chamber. It was very dark within, and he waited a moment that the other might recognize him. Wait seemed to be in deep slumber, though Paul could not hear him breathe; but as the lad ventured to place his head upon the quilt, it encountered a hand so cold and hard that it seemed to be marble. Paul knew that he need no longer remember his enemy in his prayers.

What transpired between his mistress and her agent at this dying interview Paul could not surmise, but he believed that it concerned himself. He perceived that Mrs. Everett treated him more considerately afterward; and many times, as he looked up from a long silence, he found her regarding him inquisitively. She asked him strange questions once, bearing upon his early life, and he was almost encouraged to reveal the secret of his birth; but she seemed to divine his purpose, and changed the theme. Something troubled her, he knew; and when he applied himself to conciliate and cheer her, at those moments she suffered most. Had she loved the stern, ambitious man whose closed chamber still chilled her mansion? Was it because she was childless, and travelling graveward? Or did she cherish a mother's feeling for Paul, and wish that he was of her race, and worthy to be her son? Toward each of these theories he inclined, favoring the last, and finally he concluded that she did not love, but feared him. He had grown tall and manly. An individual beauty, rather of mind than of face, developed in him, and his mistress had been prodigal of favors, so that his dress and ornaments corresponded with his person. He might have ruled, rather than served in her dwelling; but content with the recognition of his equality, he maintained the same modest guise, and his mistress felt an uneasy pride in his promotion. One day he found her weeping, and when he spoke she answered bitterly:

"Paul, you have ceased to love me; you are ungrateful; you wish to be free—you would leave me!"

He responded pleasantly—for he had become familiar with such moods—that he had found a new romance which he would read. It was not a long story, but a thrilling one, and based upon the simple narrative of Joseph in bondage. The outline was true, the details were fabulous, and the old lady marvelled that a theme so trite could be so well embellished. He read far into the night, and she bade him leave the book upon her table, that she might peruse it again.

"It is manuscript," he said, "and this is the only copy."

"Why, Paul," she said, "how came you by it?"

"I wrote it myself."

Paul was indeed the author, having filled in the sorrows of his hero from his own experiences. Mrs. Everett was loud in its praises; she was sure that it indicated genius, and she lay awake that night meditating an act of charity and of justice. She would make a free man of Paul, and he should find in far lands that equality which he could not obtain in his own. They would journey together. He should have means and advantages, and become her protégé and heir. But the strong self-love defeated this resolve. If Paul were not bound to her by law, he might forsake her, and she could not bear to lose him, for he had become a part of her heart; but when she broached the matter, Paul gave his parole never to leave her without consent.