The fair Mississippian

The simplest fact of this life of ours is subject to manifold and diverse interpretations. It was the faithful belief of Edward Desmond, and his inward protest, that he did not care for money. He had the true scholar’s disdain of the froth and fret of fashion that can but scantily disguise the mental shallowness of society. He was not fond of luxury. He had an ardor for hard work and a passionate ambition for achievement. He desired but a modest competence and the opportunity for mental development along the lines which his expanding capacities gave promise of compassing. Nevertheless, at twenty-four years of age, his elaborate education at length complete, in the prime of his intellectual powers, tingling with the consciousness of ability, he found that he had become suddenly solicitous in small matters of social precedence; he experienced a pained deprecation of the presence of wealth; he winced with a sensitive realization of poverty; he had acquired a wavering yet proud self-assertion, consciously futile.

The change had been wrought in a time of grievous tragedy, full of poignancies scarcely to be adequately appreciated by the practical world. For less sensitive men have suffered more bitter woes. It was a trite tragedy, with no traits of dramatic potentialities. On the sudden death of his father ensued the revelation of a shattered estate, the usual frantic, useless effort to avert total wreck, final defeat culminating in the forced sale of an old home with all its appurtenances. The memories, the dreams, the traditions, the broken hopes that had hallowed the old chattels were too immaterial even for the cormorant-like comprehensiveness of the inventories, and these sanctities were all that was left for the heir.

His friends, however, took an optimistic view. When the struggle was over,—brief, but hopeless and conclusive,—they found solace in the completeness of his equipment; his education was at length finished; he had returned to his Maryland home only the previous June from an elaborate course of study abroad; the world was before him. As to the profession of the law for which he had been destined, they cheerfully argued that the preliminary training and the necessary library would be expensive, success uncertain,—and he must needs live pending its delay,—the tardy emoluments disproportioned to the labor and ability involved. Since there seemed no vacancy in the professorial ranks of the small western colleges, where they had hoped he might find a chair, they spoke of him as having fallen upon his feet when the unusual brilliancy of his scholastic record brought him the offer of the tutorship of the three sons in a wealthy family, dwelling in the isolation of a secluded Mississippi plantation, the opportunity coming at the ultimate crisis of the painful financial emergency. For although the salary was small, in comparison with the allowance which the generosity of his father had heretofore afforded an only son, his prospective earnings would have abashed the honoraria of a fledgeling lawyer’s professional labors, even had he already attained admission to the bar. Thus, followed by few regrets, the last month of the year found him arrived at the scene of his pedagogical work.

“It is Mrs. Faurie’s chief desire that her sons shall be adequately prepared for college. She is a great believer in individual instruction by a thoroughly competent educator, who can discern and—ah—strengthen the weaknesses, and—ah—develop special capacities in the mind of youth,—ah, yes! She fears that our frequent and extended tours abroad have cultivated their powers of superficial observation and love of travel at the expense of their love of study, and—ah—capacity to absorb theories and to concentrate their thoughts, and to take an interest in books, and—ah—that is the reason,—_one_ of the reasons,”—with a bow and smile,—“why we esteem ourselves so fortunate,—so very fortunate to have you with us.” Nothing could be more suave than the old gentleman beaming upon him from the foot of the table, but Edward Desmond, after an effort at a receptive and grateful smile, looked down at his fork and turned it aimlessly in his hand, without a word in response.

He had had full range of the pastures, and the harness galled him. Yet logically he could not find aught of fault in this smooth courtesy and tone of appreciation. It so became even a quasi-employer, though conscious of his magnanimity and sense of noblesse oblige. The fact that Desmond had grown gradually aware that Mr. Stanlett was but basking in the reflection of his niece’s splendors, and, although having some indeterminate income of his own, was content to spend the evening of his days in her embellished entourage, scarcely mitigated his secret displeasure. He felt that the old gentleman assumed a patronage which he had no right to exercise. Yet this resentment was inconsistent with his own theory that mere money had no title to homage from him. Thus Mr. Stanlett’s patronage, poor, should not have been less acceptable than Mr. Stanlett’s patronage, rich. Mrs. Faurie had not hastened to make Desmond welcome, but indeed he had been in the house only for an hour or so, and Mr. Stanlett’s urbanity was surely expansive enough to atone. He gave the newcomer his choice of excuses in Mrs. Faurie’s behalf: first the fatigue of a long drive, and again he mentioned a sore throat as her reason for not joining the group at the dinner-table. “She will see you later in the evening,” Mr. Stanlett promised.

If the lady did not choose to appear at her own board for any reason which might seem to her good and sufficient, Desmond was in no position to cavil, but the old gentleman’s inadvertences in the matter gave him an impression of insincerity about the methods of the household which grated on his exacting and sensitive mood. Even the manners of the domestics, smooth, and deft, and obsequious in the extreme, were incongruous with the veiled scorn of the stranger, as a man of scant means, which he subtly detected in their eyes, for, the servitors of wealth and large pretensions, they had slight toleration of poverty out of their own rank of life. He perceived, too, the relish which Joel, the antiquated negro butler, took in the elaboration of the details of the daily dinner service, especially the old-fashioned custom of removing the cloth with each successive course, which was so deftly accomplished, revealing the fresh one spread below, that it seemed a prandial miracle. Mr. Stanlett, however, apologized in some sort.

“We keep up the old style, you see. My niece says she despairs of ever inducing Joel to condescend to one cloth for the table at dinner, though she brought some very fancy centrepieces and such gimcracks from Paris expressly to stimulate his ambition for novelty.”

Desmond felt little drawn toward his prospective pupils, one seated beside him and the other two opposite. They were of a type with which he had scant sympathy. They were younger, too, than he had reason to expect from the amount of the salary and his own scholastic pretensions, and his consequence seemed further diminished in that he should be called upon to teach in effect mere children. While they were not handsome of feature, they were extremely handsomely built and tall for their respective ages; but he perceived with disapproval that they lacked muscle. They were very apt and delicate in all the usages of the table, and in their elegant nicety of attire “mamma’s darling” was writ large. They all had good eyes, and they held up their heads in a frank, gentlemanlike way; but their cosmopolitan air, their easy assurance, their ready phrasings far beyond their years, though evidently the superficial result of their travels and their precocious relations with the world, did not serve to commend them to one who loved a boy for his crude boyishness. These seemed little men of the world, and they sat smug and silent and looked at their great-uncle with faces of filial gravity when, under the influence of too much old port, he began to show traits of the ridiculous, albeit in a genteel and refined fashion. Yet Desmond admitted to himself that he would not have thought it becoming that they should laugh. The clear pallor of the old gentleman’s lean face grew delicately flushed. His white hair was sparse on his long head, showing its bony structure. He had a white mustache, and a factitious idea of youth was suggested by the gleam of a very natural set of false teeth beneath it. Presently he began to hum, as if absent-minded, and at length he sang out:—

“My girl so fair, my friend so rare, With these what mortal could be richer? Give me but these,—a fig for care, My sweet girl, my friend, and pitcher.”

It was the echo of what had been a very pretty tenor voice in its prime, and its resonant vibrations reached and roused a parrot asleep in a cage, hanging in a broad, deep bay-window. The bird suddenly fluffed its feathers and sent out a sharp, harsh cry; then, twisting on its perch and swinging inverted by one claw, it sang with a painfully realistic imitation and with all the taunting effect of mockery:—

“My sweet girl, my friend, and pitcher.”

It was too much for the decorum of the youngest of the three boys. He broke into an irresistible puerile cackle, and the old man, catching suddenly to his senses and his sobriety, flushed deeply, the crimson stealing through his sparse white hair and all along his polished white scalp.

The eldest of the boys, a lad of fourteen, came at once to the rescue with the tact of a Chesterfield, as smooth as cream.

“The idea of Polly remembering your old ‘pitcher-song,’ Uncle Clarence,—that’s quite a compliment. And after so long an absence.”

“Very true,—very true,” said the old gentleman, readily reassured. “Pretty Polly,”—smiling blandly at the accomplished fowl. “Want a cracker?”

“My pitcher,” repeated Polly, as if with the intention of prompting the nature of the refreshment.

“Why, we have been away—let me see—my memory fails me about these little details. How long were we in Europe this time, Reginald?—how long is it since Polly heard that song?”

“Eighteen months, Uncle Clarence. I shouldn’t have thought Polly capable of such an effort. May we be excused, sir?”

“Certainly—by all means.” Then, turning to Desmond, “I don’t care to see young boys linger at the table after the cloth is drawn and the bottle is stirring over the mahogany.”

The disaffected Desmond thought a continuance here might prove a salutary object-lesson as to the pernicious effects of vinous indulgence, and his eyes followed with no great favor the little gentlemen as, prettily bowing, they nattily made their exit. Somehow he was reassured to hear a clumsy shuffling of feet in the hall as, to judge by auricular evidence, they engaged in a scuffle outside the closed door. Suddenly one of them was thrown with a great bang against it,—then an abrupt and awe-stricken silence ensued.

“Eighteen months,” Mr. Stanlett repeated. “I did not realize the length of our absence. In truth,” he added, with a spark of mischief kindling the wine in his eyes, “we stayed as long as we could,—as long as our money held out. My niece, Mrs. Faurie, said that she had run the full length of her tether. You see, Mr. Desmond,”—his voice had a confidential intonation,—“by the provisions of the will,”—he spoke as if it were the sole and singular testamentary document in human experience,—“Mrs. Faurie has a large income,—a very large income,—but she cannot go beyond it,—she cannot touch the principal.”