A Little Union Scout

by Joel Chandler Harris

"It is better to bear no malice," remarked the younger woman, calmly. "The Bible will tell you so."

"It is better to tell me the cause of the trouble," interrupted her elder.

"Why, I hardly know. I asked for my hat, and from one word to another we went till she flamed out at me, and said she hated me, and had a great contempt for me; and then she fell on the floor in a faint. I thought she was dead, but when I laid her on the bed there I saw her eyelids twitching."

The two women eyed each other in a way that displeased me greatly. "I told you so," said one. "It's the world's wonder," replied the other. And then Jane Ryder opened her eyes. It was natural that they should fall on me. She closed them again with a little shiver and then the natural color returned to her face. "I thought you were gone," she whispered.

"Did you think I would go and leave you like this? Do you really think I am a brute—that I have no feeling?" She closed her eyes again, as if reflecting.

"But I told you I hated you. Didn't you hear me? Couldn't you understand?"

"Perfectly," I replied. "I knew it before you told me; but, even so, could I go and leave you as you were just now? Consider, madam. Put yourself in my place—I who have never done you the slightest injury under the blue sky——" I was going on at I know not what rate, but she refused to listen.

"Oh, don't! don't! Oh, please go away!" she cried, holding her arms out toward me in supplicating fashion. It was an appeal not to be resisted, least of all by me. I looked at her—I gave her one glance, as the elderly woman took me by the arm.

"Come with me," she said; "you shall have a hat, though I hardly think it will fit you with the bandage round your head."

She led me downstairs, and, after some searching, she fished out a hat from an old closet, and it did as well as another. She asked me many questions as she searched. How long had I known the poor lady upstairs? and where did I meet her? She would have made a famous cross-questioner. I answered her with such frankness that she seemed to take a fancy to me.