"Don't be hard on Davy, Judge," he said, interrupting my father's apologies for my rudeness. "He's just a boy. I don't know but what, if I were in his place, I should do exactly the same thing—feel exactly the same way."
This was small consolation to me, for Penelope's head was buried in his shoulder; her face was hidden by her tousled hair, but I could hear her sobbing: "Uncle—uncle—let me stay with Davy."
In the plea alone she acknowledged her kin to him and surrendered. He could well afford to be generous. By every law of custom I had merited severe punishment at my father's hands, and that his hands were stayed by Mr. Blight's intercession was but another evidence of his power. When my father reasoned with me kindly, instead of whipping me, I yielded, not to his sophistry but to that masterful influence before which even he seemed to bend. I realized the hopelessness of my cause, and found myself facing Mr. Blight again, an humble suppliant for his pardon. Humbly I asked him if I might not soon see Penelope again, and she joined in my petition. Humbly I asked that some day he would bring her back to the valley, and she seconded my prayer, standing at my side, clasping my hand and looking up at her uncle from tearful eyes. He promised everything. He took my hand and hers, and for the moment it seemed that this little circle was my real family, and that my father and mother, standing over us, were hardly more than law-given preceptors. Before our guest's expanding smile and the magic of his tongue the clouds fled. Those which hung heaviest he brushed away with his restless hands. Soon, very soon, I was to go to that bustling, pushing town of Pittsburgh and with Penelope explore its wonders. We should ride behind the fastest pair of trotters in the State—his trotters; we should see the greatest mills in the country—his mills—where steel was worked like wax into a thousand giant forms; we should take long excursions on the river in a wonderful new boat—his boat— Why it would make a boy of him just to have us with him!
Under the spell of his words an hour flew by, and then my mother led Penelope away to make her ready for the journey. She brought her back to us decked in a hat and frock born of many days of planning and three trips to the county town. The humble art of Malcolmville had not been intrusted with so important a commission as Penelope's best clothes. For these the shops of Martinsburg, crammed with the latest fashions of Philadelphia, had been ransacked; the smartest modiste in Martinsburg had trimmed the hat with many yards of tulle and freighted it with pink roses; the smartest couturiere in Martinsburg had created that wonderful blue chintz frock, with ribbons woven through mazes of flounces; the last touch was my mother's—the plait of hair, done so masterfully that even the weight of the great blue bow could not bend it.
I looked at Penelope in awe. She was no longer the little girl whom I had met by the mountain stream. I was still an uncouth boy, with face smudged with the dust of the fields and hands blackened in play. Yet she did not see the wide gulf which separated us, and, forgetting the hat, the frock, the chaff that clung to my matted hair and the grime of my shirt, she ran to me, threw her arms about my neck and cried: "Davy—Davy—I don't want to go!"
I knew that she had to go, and though the tears seemed to burst up in a great flood from my heart, I would not show them in my eyes. Tears are unmanly—unboyly rather—and I fought them back, but for them I could not speak. My father took Penelope from me. He lifted her in his arms and carried her out of the house and down the path to the gate, where the carriage was waiting. He placed her on the seat; he straightened out her rumpled frock, and even crossed her hands upon her lap, as though she were quite incapable of doing anything for herself. Then he kissed her. It was the first time I had ever seen him kiss her. When he spoke it was to say good-by to Rufus Blight, who was in his seat, pulling on a pair of yellow gloves.
"We shall all meet again, very soon," said Mr. Blight omnipotently, as though Fate were a henchman of his. "You must all come to Pittsburgh to see us. It's a lively, pushing town, and you'll enjoy it." Leaning from the carriage and holding out his hand to me, he added: "And you, Davy—you will come very, very soon."
I believed him. But the dream that he had conjured for us of the days to come, of his lively, pushing town, the fastest trotters, the wonderful boat, were shattered by contact with the harsh fact of this parting.
I looked past him at Penelope, sitting very straight, with her hands in her lap as my father had placed them. There was a giant frog in my throat, but I conquered it as I had conquered my tears, and speaking very steadily, I said: "Good-by, Penelope—I'll not forget. Some day I will take care of you."
She did not turn. Her eyes held right ahead, but she answered bravely:
"Good-by, Davy. I'll see you soon—very soon. Remember——"