Charles doffed his hat and bowed as she turned away, Frazier's arm still about her waist. He went to the unfinished row of cotton-plants and began to work. His back was turned to the receding pair. How different his outlook was from that of the day before! Then a veritable new existence seemed to have opened out before him, an existence that was a divinely bestowed transition from sordid misery to far-reaching happiness. All the ills of life seemed to have taken wing, leaving him free to grow and expand as the plants he was nurturing; but now there was nothing to face but the grim fact that he was a drudging outcast from conventional civilization. As he toiled on his breast ached under a pain that was superphysical. Had he brought it on himself? he wondered. Was all this the inevitable punishment for the reckless folly of his youth? It might be so, he told himself, and the sacrifice he had made for William and Celeste and Ruth was not sufficient. He had caused his dying mother great mental distress; he had led young men astray; he had been ostracized by his club and college fraternity; he had been sentenced by a judge in a police court; he had disgraced his family. He ceased working and looked toward the house. Mary and Frazier were still in sight. The heavy arm was still about the slender waist. The fellow bore himself with the air of a man confident of the prize he was winning, and yet unconscious of its inestimable value. Charles stood staring till they disappeared in the house, then he resumed his work, but without any part of the interest of the day before. A wonderful thing had happened to him. He had scoffed all his life at the idea of a man's supreme devotion to any particular woman, and yet within only a few hours he had found himself bound hand and foot, mind and soul, to a young girl he had never seen before. What had brought it about? Ah, she was suffering and he was suffering! It was the kinship of his soul to hers. But what could come of it? he asked, gloomily. Nothing, not even if she were to withhold her love from her present suitor, for Charles could never prove himself worthy of her. She belonged to a proud old family, and he was virtually a nameless man. For William's sake he had promised to obliterate himself, and he must keep his promise. He toiled on. The sun was hot and the perspiration oozed from him and dampened his clothing. He worked with the despair of a shackled convict bent on forgetting all that lay beyond his prison walls.
CHAPTER VIII
The next day was a wet one. Charles heard the rain beating on his window when he waked. Dressing hurriedly, for his watch showed that he was late, he went down-stairs. No one was in sight. Going to the dining-room, he saw Zilla putting his coffee at his plate.
"I heard yer comin'," she said, agreeably. "My white folks ain't up yit. Marse Andy al'ays sleeps late on er wet day, en young miss just got back from town en is in 'er room, tryin' ter res'. She saddled de hoss 'erse'f 'bout midnight en rode off. She said she couldn't sleep nohow widout knowin' how Tobe Keith was gittin' on. I tried ter stop 'er, en so did 'er pa, but she would go."
"And did she get favorable news?" Charles asked.
"He's des de same as he was," Zilla replied, with a sigh. "He's powerful critical. She waited dar all night at de hotel wid Miz' Quinby. One minute she'd hear one thing, and den ergin sumpin' else. Po' chile talk erbout war-times en slave days? Dat po' chile has mo' ter bear dan 'er ma en pa ever went th'oo when dey was all fightin' fer de ole state."
The rain was still falling heavily when he left the table, and as he stood in the front doorway and realized that it was too wet for hoeing, he suddenly thought of the blacksmith shop and the work he had planned to do in sharpening the tools. Glad of something to busy himself with, he went to the shop, kindled a fire in the antiquated forge, and began to work. There was something vaguely soothing in the splash and patter of the rain on the low, blackened roof of split oaken boards, the sucking of the air into the bellows, the creaking of the bellows chains, the ringing of the anvil, and the spray of metallic sparks in the half darkness of the room.
It was near noon. The rain had ceased, though the clouds were still heavy and lowering. He was hammering on a red plowshare when Mary suddenly appeared in the doorway. Her back was to the outer daylight, her face dimly lighted by the slow blaze of the forge. She advanced into the shop, paused and scanned the heap of sharpened tools on the ground near the tub of blackened water which was used for cooling the metal.
"What a wonder you are!" she cried, with an attempt at a lightness he knew she did not feel. "You have already done ten dollars' worth of work this morning. You see I know, for I pay the bills."