第33章 High Walk and the Ladies(2)

What private matter of his own had I ever learned from him?It was other people,invariably,who told me of his troubles.There had been that single,quickly controlled outbreak about his position in the Custom House,and also he had let fall that touching word concerning his faith and his liking to say his prayers in the place where his mother had said them;beyond this,there had never yet been anything of all that must at the present moment be intimately stirring in his heart.

Should I "like to take orders from a negro?"Put personally,it came to me now as a new idea came as something which had never entered my mind before,not even as an abstract hypothesis I didn't have to think before reaching the answer though;something within me,which you ma call what you please--convention,prejudice,instinct--something answered most prompt and emphatically in the negative.I revolved in my mind as I tried to pack into a box a number of objects that I had bought in one or to "antique"shops.They wouldn't go in,the objects;they were of defeating and recalcitrant shapes,and of hostile materials--glass and brass--and Imust have a larger box made,and in that case I would buy this afternoon the other kettle-supporter (I forget its right name)and have the whole lot decently packed.Take orders from a colored man?Have him give you directions,dictate you letters,discipline you if you were unpunctual?No,indeed!And if such were my feeling,how must this young Southerner feel?

With this in my mind,I made sure that the part in my back hair was right,and after that precaution soon found myself on my way,in a way somewhat roundabout,to the kettle-supporter sauntering northward along High Walk,and stopping often;the town,and the water,and the distant shores all were so lovely,so belonged to one another,so melted into one gentle impression of wistfulness and tenderness!I leaned upon the stone parapet and enjoyed the quiet which every surrounding detail brought to my senses.How could John Mayrant endure such a situation?I continued to wonder;and I also continued to assure myself it was absurd to suppose that the engagement was broken.

The shutting of a front door across the street almost directly behind me attracted my attention because of its being the first sound that had hap-pened in noiseless,empty High Walk since I had been strolling there;and I turned from the parapet to see that I was no longer the solitary person in the street.Two ladies,one tall and one diminutive,both in black and with long black veils which they had put back from their faces,were evidently coming from a visit.As the tall one bowed to me I recognized Mrs.Gregory St.Michael,and took off my hat.It was not until they had crossed the street and come up the stone steps near where I stood on High Walk that the little lady also bowed to me;she was Mrs.Weguelin St.

Michael,and from something in her prim yet charming manner I gathered that she held it to be not perfectly well-bred in a lady to greet a gentleman across the width of a public highway,and that she could have wished that her tall companion had not thus greeted me,a stranger likely to comment upon Kings Port manners.In her eyes,such free deportment evidently went with her tall companion's method of speech:hadn't the little lady informed me during our first brief meeting that Kings Port at times thought Mrs.Gregory St.Michael's tongue "too downright"?

The two ladies having graciously granted me permission to join them while they took the air,Mrs.Gregory must surely have shocked Mrs.Weguelin by saying to me,"I haven't a penny for your thoughts,but I'll exchange.""Would you thus bargain in the dark,madam?"

"Oh,I'll risk that;and,to say truth,even your back,as we came out of that house,was a back of thought.""Well,I confess to some thinking.Shall I begin?"It was Mrs.Weguelin who quickly replied,smiling:"Ladies first,you know.At least we still keep it so in Kings Port.""Would we did everywhere!"I exclaimed devoutly;and I was quite aware that beneath the little lady's gentle smile a setting down had lurked,a setting down of the most delicate nature,administered to me not in the least because I had deserved one,but because she did not like Mrs.

Gregory's "downright"tongue,and could not stop her.

Mrs.Gregory now took the prerogative of ladies,and began."I was thinking of what we had all just been saying during our visit across the way--and with which you are not going to agree--that our young people would do much better to let us old people arrange their marriages for them,as it Is done in Europe.""O dear!"

"I said that you would not agree;but that is because you are so young.""I don't know that twenty-eight is so young.""You will know it when you are seventy-three."This observation again came from Mrs.Weguelin St.Michael,and again with a gentle and attractive smile.It was only the second time that she had spoken;and throughout the talk into which we now fell as we slowly walked up and down High Walk,she never took the lead;she left that to the "downright"tongue--but I noticed,however,that she chose her moments to follow the lead very aptly.I also perceived plainly that what we were really going to discuss was not at all the European principle of marriage-making,but just simply young John and his Hortense;they were the true kernel of the nut with whose concealing shell Mrs.Gregory was presenting me,and in proposing an exchange of thoughts she would get back only more thoughts upon the same subject.It was pretty evident how much Kings Port was buzzing over all this!They fondly believed they did not like it;but what would they have done without it?What,indeed,were they going to do when it was all over and done with,one way or another?As a matter of fact,they ought to be grateful to Hortense for contributing illustriously to the excitement of their lives.