The Cromptons | Page 3

course of the morning. One man, bolder than the rest, told him it was a fine day and a fine trip, but that the "Hatty" was getting a little too _pass��e_ for real comfort. At the word _pass��e_ the stranger looked up with something like interest, and admitted that the boat was _pass��e_, and the day fine, and the trip, too. A cigar was next offered, but politely declined, and then the attempt at an acquaintance ceased on the part of the first to make it. Later on an old Georgian planter, garrulous and good-humored, swore he'd find out what stuff the Yankee was made of, and why he was down there where few of his kind ever came. His first move was the offer of tobacco, with the words: "How d'ye, sir? Have a chew?"
The stranger's head went up a little higher than its wont, and the proud look on the pale face deepened as he declined the tobacco civilly, as he had the cigar.
"Wall, now, don't chew tobacky? You lose a good deal. I couldn't live without it. Sorter soothin', an' keeps my jaws goin', and when I'm so full of vim,--mad, you know,--that I'm fit to bust, why, I spit and spit,--backy juice in course,--till I spit it all out," the Georgian said, taking an immense chew, and sitting down by the stranger, who gave no sign that he knew of his proximity, but still kept his eyes on the river as if absorbed in the scenery.
The Georgian was not to be easily rebuffed. Crossing his legs and planting his big hat on his knees, he went on:
"You are from the North, I calculate?"
"Yes."
"I thought so. We can mostly tell 'em. From Boston, I reckon?"
"No."
"New York, mabby? No? Chicago? No? Wall, where in--" the Georgian stopped, checked by a look in the bluish-gray eyes which seldom failed in its effect.
Evidently the stranger didn't choose to tell where he lived, but the Georgian, though somewhat subdued, was not wholly silenced, and he continued: "Ever in Florida before?"
"No."
"Wall, I s'pose you're takin' a little pleasure trip like the rest of us?"
To this there was no response, the stranger thinking with bitterness that his trip was anything but one of pleasure. There was still one chord left to pull and that was Tom Hardy, who in a way was voucher for this interloper, and the Georgian's next question was: "Do you know Tom well?"
"Do you mean, Mr. Hardy?" the stranger asked, and the Georgian replied. "In course, but I allus calls him Tom. Have known him since he wore gowns. My plantation jines old man Hardy's."
There was no doubt, now, that the stranger was interested, and had his companion been a close observer he would have seen the kindling light in his eyes, and the spots of red beginning to show on his face. Whether to talk or not was a question in his mind. Cowardice prompted him to remain silent, and something which defied silence prompted him at last to talk.
"I was with Mr. Thomas Hardy in college," he said, "and I have visited him in his home. He is my best friend."
"To-be-sure!" the Georgian said, hitching nearer to the stranger, as if there was a bond of relationship between them.
The man had given no inkling of the date of his visit, and as it was some years since Tom was graduated the Georgian did not dream of associating the visit with a few weeks before, when he had heard that a high buck was at old man Hardy's and with Tom was painting the neighborhood red and scandalizing some of the more sober citizens with his excesses. This quiet stranger with the proud face and hard eyes never helped paint anything. It was somebody else, whose name he had forgotten, but of whom he went on to speak in not very complimentary terms.
"A high buck, I never happened to see squar in the face," he said. "Had glimpses of him in the distance ridin' ole man Hardy's sorrel, like he was crazy, and oncet reelin' in the saddle. Yes, sar, _reelin'_, as if he'd took too much. I b'lieve in a drink when you are dry, but Lord land, whar's the sense of _reelin'_? I don't see it, do you?"
The stranger said he didn't and the Georgian went on, now in a lower, confidential voice.
"I actually hearn that this chap,--what the deuce was his name? Have you an idee? He was from the North?"
If the stranger had an idee he didn't give it, and the Georgian continued: "These two young chaps--Tom ain't right young though, same age as you, I reckon--called on some Cracker girls back in the woods and the Northern feller staid thar two or three days. Think of it--Cracker girls! Now, if'ted been niggers, instead