Conducting him through the wide, marbled hall, she ushered him into the drawing-room, where for a time he stood perfectly bewildered. It was his first introduction to rosewood, velvet, and brocatelle, and it seemed to him as if he had suddenly been transported to fairy-land.
“Maddy would like this—it’s her nature,” he whispered, advancing a step or two, and setting down his feet as softly as if stepping on eggs.
Happening to lift his eyes before one of the long mirrors, he spied himself, wondering much what that “queer-looking chap” was doing there in the midst of so much elegance, and why Mrs. Noah did not turn him out! Then mentally asking forgiveness for this flash of pride, and determined to make amends, he bowed low to the figure in the glass, which bowed as low in return, but did not reply to the very good-natured remark: “How d’ye do—pretty well, to-day?”
There was a familiar look about the round cape of the camlet cloak, and Grandpa Markham’s face turned crimson as the truth burst upon him.
“How ’shamed of me Maddy would be,” he thought, glancing sidewise at Mrs. Noah, who had witnessed the blunder, and was now looking from the window to hide her laughter.
Grandpa believed she did not see him, and comforted with that assurance, he began to remark upon the mirror, saying “it made it appear as if there was two of you,” a remark which Mrs. Noah fully appreciated. He saw the silk chairs, slyly touching one to see if it did feel like the gored, peach-blossom dress worn by his wife forty-two years ago that very spring. Then he tried one of them, examined the rare ornaments, and came near bowing again to the portrait of the first Mrs. Remington, so natural and lifelike it looked standing out from the canvas.
“This will last Maddy a week. I thank you, ma’am. You have added some considerable to the happiness of a young girl, who wouldn’t disgrace even such a room as this,” he said, as he passed into the hall.
Mrs. Noah received his thanks graciously, and led him to the yard, where Sorrel stood waiting for him.
“Odd, but clever as the day is long,” was Mrs. Noah’s comment, as, after seeing him safe out of her yard, she went back to her vegetable oysters boiling on the stove.
Driving at a brisk trot through the grounds, Sorrel was soon out upon the highway; and with spirits exhilarated by thoughts of going home, he kept up the trot until, turning a sudden corner, his master saw the carriage from Aikenside approaching at a rapid rate. The driver, Paul, saw him too, but scorning to give half the road to such as Sorrel and the square-boxed wagons, he kept steadily on, while Grandpa Markham, determined to speak with Guy, reined his horse a little nearer, raising his hand in token that the negro should stop. As a natural consequence, the wheels of the two vehicles became interlocked, and as the powerful grays were more than a match for Sorrel, the front wheel of Grandpa Markham’s wagon was wrenched off, and the old man precipitated to the ground; which, fortunately for him, was in that locality covered with sand banks, so that he was only stunned for an instant, and thus failed to hear the insolent negro’s remark: “Served you right, old cove; might of turned out for gentlemen;” neither did he see the sudden flashing of Guy Remington’s eye, as, leaping from his carriage, he seized the astonished African by the collar, and, hurling him from the box, demanded what he meant by serving an old man so shameful a trick and then insulting him.