Cal laughed, half under his breath.
“It isn’t much to tell,” he replied; “but if you’re interested I’ll tell you about it. You see the old families down here are a good deal mixed up in their relationships, just as the old families in Massachusetts are, because of frequent intermarriages. The Rutledges and the Calhouns, and the Hugers, and the Huguenins, and Barnwells, and Haywards, and the rest, are all more or less related to each other. Indeed, there is such a tangle of relationships that I long ago gave up trying to work out the puzzle. It is enough for you to know that the particular Mr. Hayward who owns all this wild land around here and half a dozen plantations besides is my kinsman—my mother’s uncle, I believe. Anyhow, from my earliest childhood there was never anything that I liked so well as visiting at Uncle Hayward’s. Perfect candor compels me to say that I was not particularly fond of Uncle Hayward or of any member of the family, for that matter. Uncle Hayward used to take me for long rides on a marsh tackey by way of entertaining me in the way he thought I liked best, and I resented that whenever I wanted to do something else instead. He is one of the best and kindliest men alive and I am very fond of him now, but when I was a little fellow I thought he interfered with my own plans too much, and so I made up my mind that I didn’t like him. As for the ladies of the family, I detested them because they were always combing my hair and ‘dressing me up’ when I didn’t want to be dressed up.
“Nevertheless, nothing delighted me like a prolonged visit at Uncle Hayward’s. That was because I particularly appreciated an intimate association with Sam. Sam was a black boy—or young man, rather—who seemed to me to be the most delightfully accomplished person I had ever known. He could roll his eyes up until only the white below the iris was visible. He could stand on his head, walk on his hands, turn handsprings, and disjoint himself in the most astonishing fashion imaginable. He could move his scalp and wiggle his ears. His gifts and accomplishments in such ways as these seemed to me without limit.
“As Uncle Hayward could never keep Sam out of the woods, he made up his mind to assign him to duty in the woods as a sort of ranger. There was plenty for Sam to do there, for besides all these vast tracts of wild land, Uncle Hayward had a deer park consisting of many thousand acres of woodland under a single fence. To watch for fires, to keep poachers out, to catch and tame half a dozen marsh tackeys every now and then, and a score of similar duties were assigned to Sam.
“When I was a little fellow my customary reward for being a particularly ‘good boy’ for a season was permission to go into the woods with Sam and live like a wild creature for weeks at a time. In that way, and under Sam’s tuition, I learned much about these regions and about the waterways, for Sam seemed always to know where a boat of some kind lay hidden, and he and I became tireless navigators and explorers.
“That, in brief, is the history of the ‘good-boy’ epoch. The story of the other is a trifle more dramatic, perhaps. It occurred three or four years ago when Larry and I were planning to go to Virginia to prepare for college. I was fourteen or fifteen years old then and I had continued to spend a part of every year down here in the woods with Sam for guide, servant, and hunting factotum. At the time I speak of I had some rather ‘lame ducks’ in my studies. The fact is, I had idled a good deal, while Larry had mastered all the tasks set him. Accordingly, when my father and mother went North that year—they go every summer on account of mother’s health—Larry went up country to visit some of our relatives there, while I decided to stay at home and work with a tutor whom my father had hired for me.
“He and I lived alone in the house with only the servants, and I found him to be in many ways disagreeable. He was an Englishman, for one thing, and at that period of my life I had not yet got over the detestation of Englishmen which the school histories and revolutionary legends had instilled into my mind. He was brusque and even unmannerly at times, judged by the standards of courtesy that we Carolinians accept. More important than all else, he and I entertained irreconcilable views as to our relations with each other. He thought he was employed to be my master, while I held that he was hired only as my tutor. This led to some friction, but we managed to get on together for a time until I found that the difference of opinion between him and me extended to other things than our personal relations. He seemed to think himself not only my master but master of the house also in my father’s absence. He did not know how to treat the servants. He gave them orders in a harsh, peremptory way to which house servants in Carolina are not accustomed. His manner with them was rather that of an ox-driver toward his cattle than that of a gentleman dealing with well-mannered and well-meaning servants.
“This grated on me, and I suppose I have a pretty well-defined temper when occasion arouses it. The Rutledges generally have. At any rate I one day remonstrated with the tutor on the subject, intending the remonstrance to be all there was of the incident, but he answered me in that tone of a master which I more and more resented. High words followed, from which he learned my opinion of his character and manners much more definitely than I had cared to express it before.
“At last he threatened me with a flogging, and picked up a cane with which to administer it. I was mad all over and clear through by that time. I had never had a flogging and I certainly would not submit to one at his hands. But my anger had passed beyond expression in words by that time. I did not feel the flush of it—I felt deathly pale instead. I was no longer hot; on the contrary I was never cooler in my life. I did not threaten my antagonist or give him warning as he advanced toward me with the cane uplifted. I simply selected a certain plank in the floor which I made up my mind should be his Rubicon. I stood perfectly still, waiting for him to cross it.
“Presently he stepped across the line I had fixed upon. The instant he did so I sprang upon him, delivering my blows so fast and furiously that in two or three seconds he went down in a heap. He claimed to be an expert boxer, and I suppose he was, but my attack was so sudden and so unexpected that his science seemed to have no chance. At any rate, he was so nearly ‘knocked out’ that he had no disposition to renew the contest. He went to his room, washed himself, packed his trunk, leaving it to be called for later, and left the house.