"Do you want to know?" said I, straightening up.
"That's what I asked you for—what makes you so white?"
"I don't know. But I think he's glorious—just glorious," I said, looking very straight at uncle. "And I don't care who knows it," I added. I believe I stood up as I spoke—and I could feel my eyes flashing. "And you were horrid to him," I cried, my voice trembling.
"Helen," my mother broke in reproachfully, "you forget yourself, Helen. And do you know you're taking up with a stranger, against your uncle?"
But the latter didn't seem to hear what my mother said. He was staring at me in a way that let me know the battle was won. He was a true Southerner, was uncle, and if anything in the world appealed to him, it was courage. Yet he had by no means surrendered.
"Then you can meet him when he comes back," he said slowly in a minute, nodding towards the river; "you can meet him and say good-bye for the rest of us. You'll make our farewells to him, you see. And tell him the world is wide—you can remember that, can't you, Helen?"
I smiled up into uncle's face. "I won't say good-bye for anybody but Helen Randall," I replied, speaking just as slowly as he had done, "but I'll do that—if I have to. And I'll tell him—I'll tell him," I repeated, gazing down the sunlit river towards the sea, "that the world isn't so wide after all." And I know not why, but a strange thrill swept over me from head to foot; for the day was beautiful, and the fleecy clouds were overhead, and the air was laden with the sweet breath of flowers, and God's sunlight was on the river—and the river flowed on in silence to the sea.
Uncle Henry turned away and presently began a little pace up and down the piazza. Fragments of the storm could still be heard: "Preach the Gospel, indeed—act as assistant to a nigger. A pretty pass, when our guests turn nurse for darkey coons—the attic's too small for him now," as he crossed and recrossed the porch's sounding floor.
Presently he stopped and looked out over the river. The rest of us did not need to look—we had been watching all the time. And, away at the end of the long bridge—it was one of the longest in the state, nearly a mile—we could just descry the moving figure, all in black again, of our returning guest. He was coming back afoot, leaving the skiff to its owners.
Aunt Agnes took advantage of a long silence on uncle's part. "Well," she said, "I guess I'll order dinner served; we can't wait any longer."