"Oh, no," Lee answered cheerfully, glad of the turn the conversation had taken, "I like the darkies all right."
"That is not enough." John Merryvale turned and for the first time looked straight into his son's face. "Men have stolen my acres from me, but I have stolen from no man. I have tried to do no one an injustice, honoring the least of His children. I have little to give you in money and in acres; but I can give you this: the assurance that I have wittingly wronged no man or woman. And I shall believe that when you stand here, your hair gray, moving with slow feet, you will be able to say to your son, 'I have wittingly wronged no man or woman.'
"It's getting late," he concluded, turning to leave. "I'll go to the house to see if your aunt is needing me."
Lee stood alone for some minutes under the orange tree. He ran his hand caressingly along the trunk as though he were touching something dear and precious. Then, with sober face, as slowly as his father, he walked through the twilight to the great house.
CHAPTER VIII
It seemed to Hertha as she sat at the open window after the others had gone to bed that it was the most beautiful night she had ever known. Utterly still, except for the eternal sound of the wind among the pines, it yet was full of music; for, borne on the breeze from the river, some one was calling, beseechingly, insistently, and she was answering in her heart.
The young moon was sinking in the west. She could not see it, but she could see the fleecy clouds that reflected its light. How lovely they were, moving wherever the light wind, high in the heavens, might desire. They had no will, these clouds, but were wafted into the shadow or the silvery brightness, living as they had the right to live, pliant to the spirit of the strong wind.
The house was perfectly still. The little watch that Ellen had given her when she went away to school told her that it lacked but a few minutes of the hour when he had called her to come. All day she had questioned and doubted and hesitated. She had asked her black mother to tell her the story of her adoption that she might surely guard her virtue and resist temptation; but now, looking into the night, she refused to believe that this was temptation, rather it was a glorious opportunity to give generously, without stint or questioning.
She slipped a coat over the white dress she was wearing, walked stealthily into the hallway, lifted the latch and was under the stars. No one had heard her, and she ran swiftly across the open yard, bright in the moonlight, to the darkness of the trees.