The Man in Gray | Page 5

reached the boys' room after the dance, his head in a
whirl of excitement. Sleep was the last thing he wished. His
imagination was on fire. He had heard of Southern hospitality. He had
never dreamed of such waste of good things, such joy in living, such
genuine pleasure in the meeting of friends and kinfolks. Custis had
insisted on every boy staying all night. A lot of them had stayed. The
wide rooms bulged with them. There were cots and pallets everywhere.
He had seen the housemaids and the menservants carrying them in after
the dance. Their own room contained four beds and as many pallets,
and they were all full.
He tried to sleep and couldn't. He dozed an hour, waked at dawn and
began day-dreaming. There was no sense of weariness. His mind was
too alert. The great house, in which he was made to feel as much at
home as in the quiet cottage of his mother in Ohio, fascinated him with
its endless menservants, housemaids, serving boys, cooks, coachmen
and hostlers.
He thought of the contrast with the quiet efficiency and simplicity of
his mother's house. He could see her seated at the little table in the
center of the room, a snow-white cap on her head. The work of the
house had been done without a servant. It had been done so simply and
quietly, he had never been conscious of the fact that it was work at all.
It had seemed a ministry of love for her children. Their help had been
given with equal joy, unconscious of toil, her kitchen floor was always
spotless, with every pot and pan and shining dish in its place as if by
magic.
He wondered how Custis' mother could bear the strain of all these
people. He wondered how she could manage the army of black servants

who hung on her word as the deliverance of an oracle. He could hear
the hum of the life of the place already awake with the rising sun.
Down in the ravine behind the house he caught the ring of a hammer on
an anvil and closer in the sweep of a carpenter's plane over a board. A
colt was calling to his mother at the stables and he could hear the
chatter and cries of the stable boys busy with the morning feed.
He rose, stepped gingerly beside the sleepers on the floor and stood by
an open window. His mind was stirring with a curious desire to see the
ghost that haunted this house, its spacious grounds and fields. He, too,
had read Uncle Tom's Cabin, and wondered. The ghost must be here
hiding in some dark corner of cabin or field--the ghost of deathless
longing for freedom--the ghost of cruelty--the ghost of the bloodhound,
the lash and the auction block.
Somehow he couldn't realize that such things could be, now that he was
a guest in a Southern home and saw the bright side of their life. Never
had he seen anything brighter than the smiles of those negro musicians
as they proudly touched their instruments: the violin, the banjo, the
flute, the triangle and castanets, and watched the dancers swing through
each number. There could be no mistake about the ring of joy in Sam's
voice. It throbbed with unction. It pulsed with pride. Its joy was
contagious. He caught himself glancing at his rolling eyes and swaying
body. Once he muttered aloud:
"Just look at that fool nigger!"
But somewhere in this paradise of flowers and song birds, of music and
dance, of rustling silk, of youth and beauty, the Ghost of Slavery
crouched.
In a quiet way he would watch for it to walk. He had to summon all his
pride of Section and training in the catch words of the North to keep
from falling under the charm of the beautiful life he felt enfolding him.
He no longer wondered why every Northern man who moved South
forgot the philosophy of the Snows and became a child of the Sun. He
felt the subtle charm of it stealing into his heart and threw off the spell

with an effort.
A sparrow chirped under the window. A redbird flashed from a
rosebush and a mocking bird from a huge magnolia began to softly sing
his morning love song to his mate.
He heard a yawn, turned and saw Custis rubbing his eyes.
"For heaven's sake, Phil, why don't you sleep?"
"Tried and can't."
"Don't like your bed?"
"Too much excited."
"One of those girls hooked you?"
"No. I couldn't make up my mind. So many beauties they rattled me."
"All right," Custis said briskly. "Let's get up and look around the old
plantation."
"Good," Phil cried.
Custis called Jeb Stuart in vain. He refused to