"Pray, Miss Boone, tell him to be very circumspect. I know the Southern nature. When they give you their heart they give entirely. But the least sign of—of—distrust will turn them into something worse than indifference. We may see our way out soon. Caution Wesley against any act—any act"—he emphasized the words—"that may lead these kind people to think that he doesn't trust them, or that he would take advantage of servile insurrection to gain his liberty. Of course, they know that we are all restive here; that we shall be even more impatient when Vincent goes—but they could not understand any surreptitious movement on our part, to enable us to get away."
He hoped that, if she were in Wesley's confidence, she would understand his meaning. But she gave no sign. She assented with an affirmative movement of the head, and they walked through the fragrant paths, plucking a rose now and then that seemed more tempting than its fellows. At the end of the field of roses a Cherokee hedge grew so thick and high that it formed a screen and rampart between the house land and a dense grove of pines which was itself bordered by a stream that here and there spread out into tiny lakelets. On the larger of these there were rude "dug-outs," made by the darkies to cut off the long walk from their quarters to the tobacco and corn fields.
"Was there ever an Eden more perfect than this delicious place?" Kate cried, as the flaming sun sent banners of gold, mingled in a rainbow baldric with the blooming parterres of roses.
"I don't know much about Eden, and the little I do know doesn't give me
a sympathetic reminiscence of the place; but I agree with you that
Rosedale is about as near a paradise as one can come to on this earth,"
Jack qualifiedly replied.
"And yet we want to fly from it?"
"Ah, yes; because the tree of our life, the volume of our knowledge, or, in plain prose, our hearts, are not here, and scenic beauty is a poor substitute for that. Duty, I am convinced, is the key of the best life. There are hearts here, noble ones—duties here, inspiring ones. But they do not satisfy us: they are become a torment to me. I feel like a soldier brought from duty; a priest fallen into the ways of the flesh."
"Your rhapsodies are like most fine-sounding things, more to the hope than the heart," Kate murmured, gazing dreamily into the purple mass of color hovering changefully over the opaque water at their feet. "You mean they do not reach your heart; that your soul is far away as to what is here. I think Vincent and Rosa would not agree that life has any more or narrower limitations here than we recognize at Acredale."
"Let us go on the water." He pulled the rude shallop to her feet and they got in and went on, Jack not heeding her gibe. "These brackish, threatening deeps remind me of all sorts of weird and uncanny things; Stygian pools—Lethe—what not mystic and terrifying. See, the tiny waves that curl before our boat are like thin ink; a thousand roots and herbs and who knows what mysterious vegetable mixture colors these dark deeps? I could fancy myself on an uncanny pilgrimage, seeking some demon delight."
There was but one oar in the boat, which the negroes used as a scull. Jack made a poor fist with this, but there was no need of rowing. Kate, catching a projecting limb from the thick bushes on the margin, sent the little, wabbling craft onward in noisless, spasmodic plunges. Deep fringes of wild columbine fell in fluffy sprays from the higher banks as the boat drifted along the other side. The thickets were musical with the chattering cat-birds and whip-poor-wills, mingled with a score of woodland melodists that Jack's limited woodcraft did not enable him to recognize.
"Who would think that we are within a half-mile of a completely appointed country house? We are as isolated here from all vestiges of civilization as we should be in a Florida everglade," Kate said, as the little craft swam along in an eddy.