I smiled, gazing up at him in sweet content. "Count the years, uncle."
"The years!" he broke out with the old fiery intenseness; "count the years—haven't I counted them?—and the days, and the hours—waiting, always waiting. Oh, Helen, it's been long—it's been so long. But what could I do?—what could any gentleman have done, when I passed my word that—— If your husband——"
I laid my finger on his lips; then leaned up and kissed them. And our speech flowed back, half of it almost incoherent, into the sweeter channels that laved the happy past in which we were both content to dwell. Much of it was of my mother, my sainted mother, for whom life's conflict had so long been over—and uncle's tears were mingled with my own.
"There's only one thing I reproach you for now, Helen," the gentle voice began, when the dusk had deepened into dark; "one thing you should have done—and that would have made our happiness complete."
"What's that, uncle?" I asked, greatly wondering.
"You should have brought Gordon with you—the only difference there was, was with him, you know. Surely he doesn't think I'm one of those old vipers that carries things till death?" his voice less steady than before.
"He's here," I said softly; "he's down-stairs."
Uncle sprang to his feet as if the years had withheld their enfeebling hand. "Bring him up—send for him at once," he ordered, as though commanding a regiment of soldiers. "Ring the bell—where's that boy?—are the servants all asleep? These rascally dogs they've got in the North—I wouldn't give Moses or any good nigger for a bushel of them. And are your children—is the little girl with him now?"
His question cut me like a knife. For I had kept back part of our life's story, the bitter part, when uncle had enquired about our children. We only brought one of them, I had said—but hoped he might see Harold later on. Which was true enough, so true, alas!
"I don't need you," uncle said abruptly as a servant's head appeared at the door. "I'll go to him," he announced to me—"I'll go to Gordon. I hope I don't forget what's becoming in a Southern gentleman—besides, he's come far enough. You wait here—I'd know him in a thousand, unless he's enough sight plainer than he used to be. Always did have a hankerin' for him, I believe, like a nigger for a watermelon. You wait here, Helen," and he made his way, straightening himself with all the old-time dignity, upon his courtly errand.