From Kingdom to Colony
"Why, surely," he replied, wondering at the words, and at her way of
speaking them. But he smiled as he looked into her troubled face.
"Do you not think, Jack," she asked, still with that strange look in
her eyes, "that when love comes in, it changes all of one's world?"
He now laughed outright. But she paid no attention to his gayety,
going on in a way to have troubled him had he been less selfishly happy
at the moment, "If you know this so well, Jack, you will never cease to
love me, if ever love comes to change my own world, the same as it has
yours? No matter what you may feel is wrong about it, you will not
blame me?"
"Why, Dot, little girl, whatever are you dreaming about,--what should
make you talk in this way?" And he looked at her with real anxiety.
But she only laughed, and passing her hand across her eyes, answered
nervously, "I don't know, Jack,--I was but thinking on future
possibilities."
"Rather upon the most remote impossibilities," he said laughingly.
"But come, child, think no more of anything but this,--that 't is high
time for you to put on your cloak and come to see your brother take
unto himself a wife, who is to be your own dear sister."
"I am glad it is Mary Broughton," Dorothy said quietly, as she took her
cloak from a chair.
"So am I," he laughed, as he wrapped the warm garment about her,
shutting away all her pink sweetness with its heavy folds. Then, while
he helped her to draw the hood over her curly head, "What if it were
Polly Chine, now?"
"Then," she answered with an odd smile, "you would have to fight Hugh
Knollys."
They were passing through the door, and he said with a keen glance at
her, "I've good cause to know better than that, Dot."
But she gave no heed to this, and they joined the others outside.
The old family sleigh moved sedately along the hard, snow-packed road,
the moon making a shadowy, grotesque mass of it along the high drifts,
while Leet, enveloped in furs, sat soberly erect, full of the
importance now attaching to him.
When they were well on their way, a body of mounted Britishers swept
by, evidently bound for the town; and Joseph Devereux remarked to his
son, as the two sat opposite one another, while Dorothy, riding
backwards with her brother, seemed lost in the contemplation of the
snowy fields they were passing, "I trust, Jack, those fellows will stir
up no trouble this night."
"They are most likely to do so," was the low-spoken reply; "for you
know the mere sight of their red coats acts upon our men much as the
like color affects an angry bull."
"I wish they might be ordered from the Neck," observed Aunt Lettice,
who sat alongside her brother-in-law, and had caught enough to guess at
the rest of the talk.
"They must wish so themselves, by this time," Jack said with a laugh.
"It must now be rarely cold quarters for them over there."
"Why did you not ask them to your wedding, Cousin Jack?"
The question came from small 'Bitha, who was sitting between Dorothy
and her brother. "I wonder if the one Mary pushed over the rocks last
summer would not like to see her married?"
"'Bitha!" Dorothy exclaimed sharply, seeming to awaken to what was
being said. "Why will you always put it so? Mary did not push him
over; he fell himself."
"Aye,--but, Cousin Dot, he fell over while he was stepping back from
her," the child answered. "She looked so angry that I think he was
sorely frightened."
Dorothy did not reply; but her brother said gayly, "Well, 'Bitha, I
hope Mary will never look at me in a way to frighten me so much as
that."
"She never would," 'Bitha asserted with confidence, "for you are not a
Britisher."
"What a stanch little rebel it is," Joseph Devereux said laughingly;
and Jack went on in a teasing way to 'Bitha, "I expect we shall all go
to see 'Bitha married to a redcoat as soon as she is big enough."
"You will see no such thing, Cousin Jack," the child replied angrily.
"I'd run away, so that no one could ever find me, before I'd do such a
thing. Would not you, Cousin Dorothy?"
Dorothy did not answer, and 'Bitha repeated the question.
"Would I do what, 'Bitha?" Dorothy now asked, but indifferently, and as
though with the object of quieting the child.
"Why, marry a redcoat?"
"Nonsense, 'Bitha,--don't let Jack tease you." And Dorothy turned away
again to look off over the snow fields through which they were passing.
But she wondered if the others noticed how oddly her voice sounded, and
what a tremble there was in it.
The Horton house loomed up full of importance from amid its darker
fellows, and warm lights twinkled out here and there where a parted
curtain let them through to shine forth like welcoming smiles into the
cold night.
Within there was much bustle and good-natured badinage, as the
neighbors, bidden to the feast, assisted the people of the
house,--playing the part of entertainer or caterer, hairdresser or
maid, as the needs of the other guests demanded.
It was a simple, homely wedding, as was the custom of the day; and the
festivities were enjoyed with all the more zest by reason of the relief
they offered from the anxiety felt by all, on account of the disturbed
condition of public affairs.
There were games--such as "Twirl the Trencher" and "Hunt the
Slipper"--for those who liked them; and the elders endeavored to enter
at least into the spirit of all that was going on, and not dampen the
younger folks' pleasure by the exhibition of gloomy faces and
constrained actions.
Later in the evening there was dancing. And it was a goodly sight to
look at the handsome groom and his lovely bride go through the stately
minuet, with his father and Aunt Lettice opposite them,--the slow,
dignified step making the feat a no-wise difficult one for the old
gentleman, who had in his day been accounted one of the most graceful
of dancers.
Dorothy acted for a time as though she were made of quicksilver. She
was leader in all the games and frolics, and seemed the very
impersonation of happy, laughter-loving girlhood. Then, and without
any apparent reason, another and different mood took possession of her,
and she suddenly became very quiet, taking but little part in what was
going on.
Her father's fond eyes were quick to notice this; but when he hastened
to draw her to one side and ask for the cause, she made light of his
anxiety, and gave him a smiling assurance of her perfect well-being.
As a matter of fact, something had occurred to disturb the girl very
seriously.
During one of the games she had been alone for a few minutes in a room
facing upon the side yard,--a small orchard; and chancing to glance
toward the window, she saw, as if pressed against the glass, the face
of Cornet Southorn.
While she stood, silent and rigid, staring at it, the face disappeared;
and some of the other guests now entering the room, she slipped away to
recover her composure.
What, she asked herself, did he seek, and why was he here? She
dismissed at once the thought of his meaning any harm, for surely he
would not bring about any disturbance upon this, her brother's wedding
night. And even should he seek to intrude himself upon them, there
could be no just cause to warrant such an act, for although the King
might expect to enforce the Acts of his Parliament, he had not as yet
sought to control the marrying or giving in marriage of his American
subjects.
But even so, she was startled, almost alarmed; and the matter filled
her thoughts for the remainder of the evening.
It had been arranged that Aunt Lettice and 'Bitha were to remain with
the Hortons for a time, while Joseph Devereux was to accept the
invitation of his friend, Colonel Lee, to pass a few days at the
latter's house, not far away.
This would make the bride and groom the only ones who would return with
Leet to the farm, as Dorothy was going to the home of a girl friend,
feeling that it would be a relief to be among new faces and in a
strange house.
"Dorothy, are you going to let me be a good sister to you,--one of the
sort you will come to with all your joys and troubles?"
The two girls were standing close to each other in one of the upper
rooms, where Mary was donning a dark gray slip pelisse and hood, with
warm fur linings peeping about the edges, while Mistress Horton was
bustling about out of earshot, getting some last stray articles bundled
for their conveyance to the sleigh waiting below.
The earnest blue eyes were bent searchingly upon Dorothy's face, as if
the speaker had more than a passing notion of the impulses stirring the
heart lying beneath the laces of the dainty pink gown.
But Dorothy laughed, albeit a little constrainedly, and replied, "I
thought you knew all about that long ago, Mary."
"Do you know, Dot,"--and Mary's white brows contracted into a puzzled
frown--"somehow you are changed. What is it, dear?"
"Your imaginings, I should say," was the careless reply. "My hair is
not turning gray, is it?" And she touched her dark curls.
"Well, never mind now," said Mary, diplomatically, and not caring to
press the matter, "but you will tell me when we are together again,
won't you, Dot?"
Dorothy only smiled, and said nothing.
Jack had spoken to Mary more than once of some change that had come
over his sister. But his words were not needed, as she herself, not
having seen much of the girl these last few months, would have observed
it had he not spoken.
Dorothy was as impulsive and affectionate as of old, but to Mary's keen
eyes there now seemed a new-born womanliness about her. She was
sensible of the absence of that childish frankness and ingenuousness
which had been so much a part of the girl's nature. She was now more
like a woman, and one whose mind held a secret she herself tried to
evade, as well as have others blind to its existence.
It was as if a new self had been born, dominating the old self, and
sending her thoughts far from where her body might be.
"She must be in love with some one, and 't is sure to be Hugh Knollys,"
said Mary to herself, with a glow of happiness, as the two went
downstairs, Mistress Horton and a servant following them, both laden
with packages to be stowed away in the Devereux equipage, whereon Leet
sat rigidly upright, the darkness hiding his black face and its unusual
grin.
"Take good care of her, Strings," Joseph Devereux cautioned, as he took
his place within the vehicle, and pointing to the open doorway, where a
pink gown and dark curly head showed foremost amongst the guests
crowded there to see the bride and groom on their way. The pedler--an
humble onlooker at the wedding--had urged his protection for Dorothy's
safer piloting through the town to her friend's house; and this her
father and brother had been glad to accept.
"That I will, sir,--never fear," was the hearty response; and as Jack
Devereux sprang into the sleigh, Leet turned the horses' heads to the
street and drove off, followed by a shower of old shoes and peals of
merry laughter from the doorway.
CHAPTER XXIII
The town was as silent as a city of the dead when the four started on
their way, Master Storms--a fussy, irritable old gentleman--in advance,
with his pretty daughter Patience hanging on his arm, and followed
closely by the small erect figure of Dorothy, wrapped in her dark
cloak; while Johnnie Strings, on guard against any unseen danger,
walked directly behind her.
There were hurrying masses of cloud overhead that made gorges and
ravines, hemming in the glittering stars, now grown brighter since the
moon had set; and the sound of the sea came faintly hoarse, as the
little party bent their steps in its direction. For near it lay the
Storms domicile,--up near what was known as "Idler's Hill."