“Ah, I see,” exclaimed Floyd, admiringly. “She's a shrewd little woman—nearly as shrewd as he is.”
“But he acted queerly after that, I must say,”
Cynthia went on. “He at once quit looking at her, and sat staring at me in the oddest way. I spoke to him, but he wouldn't answer. When I was going home, he followed me as far as the bam. 'You couldn't tell me that secret, could you, little sister?' he said, with a strange, excited look on his face. Of course, I saw that he thought it was some trouble of mine, but I couldn't set him right and be true to his wife, and so I said nothing. He walked on with me to the branch, still looking worried; then, when we were about to part, he held out his hand. 'I want to say right here, little sister,' he said, 'that I love you like a brother, and if any harm comes to you, in any way, I'll be with you.'”
“He's very queer,” said Floyd, thoughtfully. They were now near the house and he paused. “I'll not go any farther,” he said. “It will do no good to disturb your mother. She hates the ground I walk on. She will only make it unpleasant for you if she sees us together. Good-bye, I'll see you when I get back from Atlanta.”
XXV
THE following Wednesday afternoon, when he had concluded his business at one of the larger wholesale houses in Atlanta, Nelson Floyd took a street-car for his uncle's residence. Reaching it, he was met at the door by the white woman who had admitted Pole Baker to the house on his visit to Atlanta. She explained that her master had only gone across the street to see a neighbor, and that he would be back at once. She led Floyd into the old-fashioned parlor and gave him one of the dilapidated, hair-cloth chairs, remaining in the room to put a few things to rights, and dusting the furniture with her apron. On either side of the mantel-piece hung a crude oil-portrait, in cracked and chipped gilt frames of very massive make. The one on the right was that of a dark-haired gentleman in the conventional dress of seventy-five years previous. The other was evidently his wife, a woman of no little beauty. They were doubtless family portraits, and Floyd regarded them with reverential interest. The servant saw him looking at them and remarked: “They are Mr. Floyd's mother and father, sir. The pictures were made a long time ago. Old Mr. Floyd was a very smart man in his day, and his wife was considered a great beauty and a belle, so I've heard folks say, though I'm sure I don't see how any woman could be popular with her hair fixed that bungly way. But Mr. Floyd is very proud of the pictures. He wouldn't sell them for any price. We thought the house was going to burn down one day when the kitchen-stove turned over, and he sprained his ankle climbing up in a chair to get them down.”
“They are my grandparents,” he told her.
“You don't say! Then you are Mr. Floyd's—”