"They have gone too far with the child," he cried out at last, mastering his ebullient emotions. "She is too high-strung for our rude handling. I swear she shall not be persecuted any longer—not if I have to take her away myself. No—not a word, not a word, Debby! Not another word! I'll just step across the yard and speak to Doctor John. Be good enough to wait here till I return."
Without hat or stick he ramped tempestuously across to his brother's office, in the opposite wing of the big, white-porticoed, red-doored house which they occupied together. He left old Debby well content with the first step in her undertaking. She had but a little to wait ere he returned, noisy, hurried, and decisive.
"Now, my good Debby," he shouted, "I'm ready to accompany you. I will fetch Barbara myself. Doctor John is going over to lay our views before Mistress Ladd, and I'll warrant that wise and gentle lady will see the matter clearly, just as we do. Yes, yes, my good Debby, we have all been forgetting that the little wild rose of Maryland cannot be at once inured to the rigours of our New England air. Eh, what?"
When Doctor Jim and the old woman reached the cabin they found Barbara sound asleep, curled up in the sun beside the stoop, one arm around the gray-and-white cat, which lay, fast asleep also, against her breast. There was a darkness about her eyes, a hurt droop at the corners of her full red mouth, but the colour came wholesomely under the transparent tan of her cheeks. The picture stirred a great ache in Doctor Jim's childless heart, and with a tender growl he strode forward to snatch her up from her hard couch.
"S't! Don't ye frighten the poor baby!" said old Debby. Whereupon Doctor Jim went softly, mincing his big steps, and knelt down, and gathered the little figure in his arms. Waking slowly, Barbara slipped her arms around his neck, thrust her face under his chin, drew a long sigh of satisfaction; and so, the revolt and cruel indignation for the time all quenched in her wild spirit, she was carried down to the punt. Everything seemed settled without explanation or argument or promise. The trouble was all shifted to Doctor Jim's broad shoulders.
"Good-bye, Debby dear!" she murmured to the old woman, reaching down a caressing hand; "I'll come to see you in a few days, as soon as Aunt Hitty will let me!"
During the journey homeward Barbara threw off her languor, and became animated as the punt surged ahead under Doctor Jim's huge strokes. The conversation grew brisk, touching briefly such diverse topics as the new bay mare which the doctor had just purchased from Squire Hopgood of Westings Centre, and the latest point of exasperation between the merchants of Boston and the officers of the king's customs at that unruly port. This latter subject was one on which Doctor Jim and Barbara had already learned to disagree with a kind of affectionate ferocity. The child was a rebel in every fibre, while Doctor Jim had a vigorous Tory prejudice which kept his power of polemic well occupied in Second Westings. The two were presently so absorbed in controversy that the rocky point of the morning's attempted tragedy was passed without the tribute of a shudder or even a recognition. At last, with a mighty, half wrathful surge upon the oars, Doctor Jim beached the punt at the landing-place. As the distracted wave of his violence seethed hissing up the gravel and set the neighbour sedges a-swinging, he leaned forward and fixed the eager girl with a glare from under the penthouse of his eyebrows. Open-mouthed and intent, Barbara waited for his pronouncement.
"Child!" said he, waving a large, but white and fine forefinger for emphasis, "Don't you let that amiable and disreputable old vagabond, Debby Blue, or that pestilent rebel, Doctor John Pigeon, stuff your little head with notions. It's your place to stand by the Crown, right or wrong. Remember your blood. You know right well which side your father would have stood upon! Eh, what?"
The disputatious confidence died out of Barbara's face. For a moment her head drooped, for she knew in her heart how thoroughly that worshipped father would have identified himself with the king's party as soon as occasion arose. Then she looked up, and a mocking light danced in her gray eyes, while her mouth drew itself into lines of solemnity.
"I promise," she exclaimed, leaning forward and laying a thin little gipsy hand on Doctor Jim's knee, as if registering a vow, "that I won't harm your dear King George!"