"No, son; I am as well in body as ever I was; but I'm greatly troubled. I wish to heaven I could go back to the beginning, and tell you all about it; but I can't—I just can't."
Paul also had his troubles, and he regarded his father gloomily enough. "Why can't you tell me?" he asked, somewhat impatiently. "But I needn't ask you that; you never tell me anything. I heard something to-day that made me ashamed."
"Ashamed, Paul?" gasped his father.
"Yes—ashamed. And if it is true, I am going away from here and never show my face again."
Silas fell, rather than leaned, against the mantel-piece, his face ghastly white. He tried to say, "What did you hear, Paul?" His lips moved, but no sound issued from his throat.
"Two or three persons told me to-day," Paul went on, "that they had heard of your intention to join the radicals, and run for the legislature. I told each and every one of them that it was an infernal lie; but I don't know whether it is a lie or not. If it isn't I'll leave here."
Silas Tomlin's heart had been in his throat, as the saying is, but he gulped it down again and smiled faintly. If this was all Paul had heard, well and good. Compared with some other things, it was a mere matter of moonshine. Paul took up his book again, but he turned the leaves rapidly, and it was plain that he was impatiently waiting for further information.
At last Silas spoke: "All the truth in that report, Paul, is this—It has been suggested to me that it would be better for the whites here if some one who sympathises with their plans, and understands their interests, should pretend to become a Republican, and make the race for the legislature. This is what some of our best men think."
"What do you mean by our best men, father?"
"Why, I don't know that I am at liberty to mention names even to you, Paul," said Silas, who had no notion of being driven into a corner. "And then, on the other hand, the white Republicans are not as fond of the negroes as they pretend to be. And if they can't get some native-born white man to run, who do you reckon they'll have to put up as a candidate? Why, old Jerry, Pulaski's man of all work."