The Battle Ground | Page 6

be glad enough to do it then, I warrant you,--but are you all alone,
young lady?" As Betty nodded, he opened the door and stepped
gingerly down. "I can't turn the horses' heads, poor things," he
explained; "but if you will allow me, I shall have the pleasure of
escorting you on foot."
With his hat in his hand, he smiled down upon the little girl, his face
shining warm and red above his pointed collar and broad black stock.
He was very tall and spare, and his eyebrows, which hung thick and
dark above his Roman nose, gave him an odd resemblance to a bird of
prey. The smile flashed like an artificial light across his austere
features.
"Since my arm is too high for you," he said, "will you have my
hand?--Yes, you may drive on, Big Abel," to the driver, "and remember
to take out those bulbs of Spanish lilies for your mistress. You will find
them under the seat."
The whip cracked again above the fat old roans, and with a great creak
the coach rolled on its way.
"I--I--if you please, I'd rather you wouldn't," stammered the child.
The Major chuckled again, still holding out his hand. Had she been
eighty instead of eight, the gesture could not have expressed more
deference. "So you don't like old men any better than boys!" he
exclaimed.
"Oh, yes, sir, I do--heaps," said Betty. She transferred the frog's foot to
her left hand, and gave him her right one. "When I marry, I'm going to
marry a very old gentleman--as old as you," she added flatteringly.
"You honour me," returned the Major, with a bow; "but there's nothing
like youth, my dear, nothing like youth." He ended sadly, for he had

been a gay young blood in his time, and the enchantment of his wild
oats had increased as he passed further from the sowing of them. He
had lived to regret both the loss of his gayety and the languor of his
blood, and, as he drifted further from the middle years, he had at last
yielded to tranquillity with a sigh. In his day he had matched any man
in Virginia at cards or wine or women--to say nothing of horseflesh;
now his white hairs had brought him but a fond, pale memory of his
misdeeds and the boast that he knew his world--that he knew all his
world, indeed, except his wife.
"Ah, there's nothing like youth!" he sighed over to himself, and the
child looked up and laughed.
"Why do you say that?" she asked.
"You will know some day," replied the Major. He drew himself erect in
his tight black broadcloth, and thrust out his chin between the high
points of his collar. His long white hair, falling beneath his hat, framed
his ruddy face in silver. "There are the lights of Uplands," he said
suddenly, with a wave of his hand.
Betty quickened her pace to his, and they went on in silence. Through
the thick grove that ended at the roadside she saw the windows of her
home flaming amid the darkness. Farther away there were the small
lights of the negro cabins in the "quarters," and a great one from the
barn door where the field hands were strumming upon their banjos.
"I reckon supper's ready," she remarked, walking faster. "Yonder
comes Peter, from the kitchen with the waffles."
They entered an iron gate that opened from the road, and went up a lane
of lilac bushes to the long stuccoed house, set with detached wings in a
grove of maples. "Why, there's papa looking for me," cried the child, as
a man's figure darkened the square of light from the hall and came
between the Doric columns of the portico down into the drive.
"You won't have to search far, Governor," called the Major, in his
ringing voice, and, as the other came up to him, he stopped to shake

hands. "Miss Betty has given me the pleasure of a stroll with her."
"Ah, it was like you, Major," returned the other, heartily. "I'm afraid it
isn't good for your gout, though."
He was a small, soldierly-looking man, with a clean-shaven, classic
face, and thick, brown hair, slightly streaked with gray. Beside the
Major's gaunt figure he appeared singularly boyish, though he held
himself severely to the number of his inches, and even added, by means
of a simplicity almost august, a full cubit to his stature. Ten years
before he had been governor of his state, and to his friends and
neighbours the empty honour, at least, was still his own.
"Pooh! pooh!" the older man protested airily, "the gout's like a woman,
my dear sir--if you begin to humour it, you'll get no rest. If you deny
yourself a