The boy was on his feet. He was struggling to hide his emotion. Griffith, still holding his hand, arose. He drew the boy toward him. Suddenly Beverly understood his father's wish. He threw both arms about his neck and kissed him as he had not done since he was a little fellow. Mr. Davenport held the boy close to his breast. Beverly was the taller of the two, but the father's form had filled out into portly proportions during these past years and Beverly's was very slight.
"There, there, there!" exclaimed Griffith, presently, blowing a blast upon his handkerchief. "What are we two precious fools crying over? Wasting time! Wasting time! Better go tell your mother all about it and let her get about fixing you up to go. Editor Davenport!" he exclaimed, holding the boy at arm's length. "Well, well, well! what next? Tut, tut, tut, tut! I expect Roy will be wanting to set up a law-office—or a boxing school—in a day or two." Roy's exploit with his fists in behalf of Aunt Judy had always been a family joke. "But, look here, Beverly, I want you to promise me you will be mighty careful to keep out of trouble out there. It's a hot State just now. The times are scorching, and—God only knows what's in store for the country. Keep out of trouble and hasty words, son. Bless me, but I'm glad it's not Roy! He'd be in trouble before he got his first stick set up. They call it a stick. don't they? I'll have to coach up on journalistic language if I'm to have an editor for a son. The proof of the editorials will be in the reading thereof," he added, smiling at the play upon the old saying. "But I stipulate right now that you send me every one you write marked in red, so I won't have to wade through all the other stuff to find yours. If they're as good as that last essay of yours at the Delta, I'll be proud of you, my boy. Only—only don't be too radical! Young blood boils too easy. Mine did. Go slow on this question, Bev. It's bigger than you think it is. In one form or another it has burdened my whole life, and I've never been able to solve it yet—for others, for others. I solved it for myself—as Judy's presence here proves," he added, laughing. Judy's presence and her triumph over the law was a family jest, and Roy's fight on her behalf not wholly a memory of regret.
"He fit fur the ould naiger," remarked the envious Rosanna, from time to time, "but it would be the rear of me loif, shure, before he'd do the same, er even so much as jaw back, fer the loikes o' me!"
CHAPTER XI.
"I'll stand as if a man were author of himself,
And knew no other kin."
Shakespeare.
Since Beverly was a Virginian, and since it was well known that at least one of the new owners of the paper was from Massachusetts, it was deemed wise to have Beverly sign all of his editorials where they touched—as they usually did—upon the ever-present, and ever-exciting topic of slave extension. The young fellows were advised by the original owner that the border people were in no mood to accept arguments opposed to the opinions of a large proportion of the property owners, if they supposed these arguments came from persons in any way hostile to their interests—as all the New England people were supposed to be.
But, he reasoned, if these arguments came from the pen of one who had known the institution of slavery at its best and had loved the old order of things where it was an established institution and where its roots were, as even Beverly believed, in normal earth and not to be disturbed—if from his pen came the protest against its farther extension—it was believed the natives would accept it in kindness whether they agreed with him or not. Beverly still adhered to the old order of things for the old states. He, like his father, had seen how hard it was to be rid of even a small portion of its power and its responsibility.