He must see him at once. As he turned away to recross the street and learn from Mr. Pegloe by what road Thicket Point might be reached, Norton himself galloped into the village. Catching sight of the judge, he reined in his horse and swung himself from the saddle.
“I was hoping, sir, I might find you,” he said, as they met before the tavern.
“A wish I should have echoed had I been aware of it!” responded the judge. “I was about to do myself the honor to wait upon you at your plantation.”
“Then I have saved you a long walk,” said Norton. He surveyed the judge rather dubiously, but listened with great civility and kindness as he explained the business that would have taken him to Thicket Point.
“The house is quite at your service, sir,” he said, at length.
“The rent—” began the judge. He had great natural delicacy always in mentioning matters of a financial nature.
But Mr. Norton, with a delicacy equal to his own, entreated him not to mention the rent. The house had come to him as boot in a trade. It had been occupied by a doctor and a lawyer; these gentlemen had each decamped between two days, heavily in debt at the stores and taverns, especially the taverns.
“I can't honestly say they owed me, since I never expected to get anything out of them; however, they both left some furniture, all that was necessary for the kind of housekeeping they did, for they were single gentlemen and drew the bulk of their nourishment from Pegloe's bar. I'll turn the establishment over to you with the greatest pleasure in the world, and wish you better luck than your predecessors had—you'll offend me if you refer to the rent again!”
And thus handsomely did Charley Norton acquit himself of the mission he had undertaken at Betty Malroy's request.
That same morning Tom Ware and Captain Murrell were seated in the small detached building at Belle Plain, known as the office, where the former spent most of his time when not in the saddle. Whatever the planter's vices, and he was reputed to possess a fair working knowledge of good and evil, no one had ever charged him with hypocrisy. His emotions lay close to the surface and wrote themselves on his unprepossessing exterior with an impartial touch. He had felt no pleasure when Murrell rode into the yard, and he had welcomed him according to the dictates of his mood, which was one of surly reticence.