A Woman Named Smith | Page 7

might buy an
old print, or a bit of pottery; just as I am content to admire the print or
the pottery in the shop window, feeling sure that when they are finally
sold to somebody better able to buy them, something else I can admire
just as much will take their place. Mine is a philosophy not altogether
to be despised, though Alicia rejects it. She handled the blue-and-white
ware with tender hands, laid the silver together, and set the tray upon
the window-ledge. Then, on a leaf of my pocket memorandum--she
never carries one of her own--she scribbled the following absurdity and
pinned it to the linen cover:

Ariel, accept the gratitude of mortals set down hungry in the house of
Sycorax. Gay and kind spirit, when we broke your bread you broke her
spell: the wishbone of your chicken has cooked her goose! Maker of
Music, Donator of Dinners, thanks!
"And now," said she, "having been serenaded, and satisfied with
nothing short of perfection, let's go up-stairs, Sophy, and decide where
we shall sleep to-night."
We chose the front room because of a gate-legged table that Alicia
wanted to say her prayers beside, and because of the particularly fine
portrait of a colonial gentleman above the mantel, a very handsome
man in claret-colored satin, with a vest of flowered gold brocade, a
gold-hilted sword upon which his fine fingers rested, and a pair of
silk-stockinged legs of which he seemed complacently aware.
"I wish you weren't dead," Alicia told him regretfully. "Your taste in
clothes is above all praise, though I fancy you were somewhat too vain
of your legs, sir. I never knew before that men had legs like that, did
you, Sophy?"
"I take no pleasure in the legs of a man." I quoted the Psalmist acridly
enough.
"Don't pay any attention to Sophy," Alicia advised the portrait,
naughtily. "Just to prove how much we both admire you, you shall have
Ariel's roses." She had brought them up-stairs with us, and now she
walked over to the mantel to place them beneath the picture.
"Why!" exclaimed Alicia, "why!" and she held up nothing more
remarkable than a package of cigarettes, evidently left there recently,
for it was not dusty.
"I dare say Judge Gatchell forgot it, when he was looking over the
house. That reminds me: the silver you admired so much was marked
'G.' Then, in all probability, Judge Gatchell sent us that spread, and
very thoughtful it was of him, I must say."

"Rheumatic old judges don't smoke superfine cigarettes, Sophy, nor
send black tray-bearers in terra-cotta robes out on rainy days for the
entertainment of strange ladies. No: this is something, or somebody,
young. But since when did Ariel take to tobacco?"
"Let's go down-stairs," I suggested, "and wait for that old darky, if he is
a real darky and ever means to return." I did not fancy those big forlorn
rooms, with their great beds that didn't seem made for people to sleep
and dream in, but to stay awake and worry over their sins--and then die
in.
The down-stairs halls had grown darker, and the rain came down in a
gray sheet, so that the open window seemed a hole cut into it. The tray
we had left on the window-ledge was gone. In its place was nothing
more romantic than a freshly filled and trimmed kerosene lamp, two
candles, and a box of matches.
When our Jehu finally returned he rummaged out some firewood from
the sooty kitchen and built us a fire in the hall. He was a pleasant old
negro, garrulous and kindly, by name Adam King, or, as he informed
us, "Unc' Adam" to all Hyndsville folks.
"Uncle Adam," Alicia asked, while he was drying himself before the
blazing logs, "Uncle Adam, who's the violinist around here?"
Uncle Adam looked at the Yankee lady a bit doubtfully. The old fellow
was slightly deaf, but he would have died rather than admit it.
"Wellum," he told us, "since ol' Mis' Scarlett's gone, folks does say de
doctor is. Dat's 'cause ob de Hynds' blood in 'im. All dem Hyndses was
natchelly de violentest kind o' pussons, an' Doctor, he ain't behin' de
do'." He rubbed his hands and chuckled. "Lawd, yes! I know de Doctor,
man an' boy, an' he suttinly rips an' ta'hs when he's riled! You ought ter
seen 'im de day ol' Mis' Scarlett let fly wid 'er shot-gun an' blowed de
tails spang off'n two of 'is hens an' de haid off'n 'is prize rooster! De
fowls come thoo' de haidge, an' ol' Mis' grab 'er gun an' blaze away. De
Doctor hear de squallation, an' come flyin' outer de office an' right ovah
de haidge. I 'uz totin' fiahwood fo' ol' Mis' dat day,