Sandy written by Alice Hegan Rice

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11

"Now they're off!" cried Annette, excitedly. "Mercy, how they g-go!
Nettie is a little ahead; look, Sandy! She's gaining! No; the sorrel's
ahead. Carter, your driver is g-going too close! He's g-going to smash
in--Oh, look!"

There was a crash of wheels and a great commotion. Several women
screamed, and a number of men rushed into the ring. When Sandy got
there, the greater crowd was not around the sorrel's driver, who lay
in a heap against the railing with a broken leg and a bruised head; it
was around Ricks Wilson in angry protest and indignation.

The most vehement of them all was Judge Hollis,--the big, easy-going
judge,--whose passion, once roused, was a thing to be reckoned with.

"It was a dastardly piece of cowardice," he cried. "You all saw what
he did! Call the sheriff, there! I intend to prosecute him to the full
extent of the law."

Ricks, with snapping eyes and snarling mouth, glanced anxiously
around at the angry faces. He was looking for Carter Nelson, but
Carter had discreetly departed. It was Sandy whom he spied, and
instantly called: "Kilday, you'll see me through this mess? You know
it wasn't none of my fault."

Sandy pushed his way to the judge's side. He had never hated the sight
of Ricks so much as at that moment.

"It's Ricks Wilson," he whispered to the judge--"the boy I used to
peddle with. Don't be sending him to jail, sir. I'll--I'll go his bail
if you'll be letting him go."

"Indeed you won't!" thundered the judge. "You to take money you've
saved for your education to help this scoundrel, this rascal, this
half murderer!"

The crowd shouted its approval as it opened for the sheriff. Ricks was
not the kind to make it easy for his captors, and a lively skirmish
ensued.

As he was led away he turned to the crowd back of him and shook his
fist in the judge's face.

"You done this," he cried. "I'll git even with you, if I go to hell
fer it!"

The judge laughed contemptuously, but Sandy watched Ricks depart with
troubled eyes. He knew that he meant what he said.

CHAPTER XIV

A COUNCIL OF WAR

While the frivolous-minded of Clayton were bent upon the festivities
of fair week, it must not be imagined that the grave and thoughtful
contingent, which acts as ballast in every community, was idle.

Mr. Moseley was a self-constituted leader in a crusade against
dancing. At his earnest suggestion, every minister in town agreed to
preach upon the subject at prayer-meeting the Wednesday evening of the
hop.

They held a preliminary meeting before services in the study of the
Hard-Shell Baptist Church. Mr. Moseley occupied the chair, a Jove of
righteousness dispensing thunderbolts of indignation to his
satellites. A fringe of scant hair retreated respectfully from the
unadorned dome which crowned his personal edifice. His manner was most
serious and his every utterance freighted with importance.

Beside him sat his rival in municipal authority, the Methodist
preacher. He had a short upper lip and a square lower jaw, and a way
of glaring out of his convex glasses that gave a comical imitation of
a bullfrog in debate. This was the first occasion in the history of
the town when he and Mr. Moseley had met in friendly concord. For the
last few days the united war upon a common enemy had knitted their
souls in a bond of brotherly affection.

When the half-dozen preachers had assembled, Mr. Moseley rose with
dignity. "My dear brethren," he began impressively, "the occasion is
one which permits of no trifling. The dancing evil is one which has
menaced our community for generations--a viper to be seized and
throttled with a firm hand. The waltz, the--the Highland fling,
the--the--"

"German?" suggested some one faintly.

"Yes, the german--are all invasions of the Evil One. The crowded
rooms, the unholy excitement, are degenerating and debasing. I am glad
to report one young soul who has turned from temptation and told me
only to-day of his intention of refraining from partaking in the
unrighteous amusement of this evening. That, brethren, was the nephew
of my pastor."

The little Presbyterian preacher, thus thrust into the light cast from
the halo of his regenerate nephew, stirred uneasily. He was
contemplating the expediency of his youthful kinsman in making the
lack of a dress-suit serve as a means of lightening his coming
examinations at the academy.

Mr. Moseley, now fully launched upon a flood of eloquence, was just
concluding a brilliant argument. "Look at the round dance!" he cried.
"Who can behold and not shudder?"

Mr. Meech, who had not beheld and therefore could not shudder,
ventured a timid inquiry:

"Mr. Moseley, just what is a round dance?"

Mr. Moseley pushed back his chair and wheeled the table nearer the
window. "Will you just step forward, Mr. Meech?"

With difficulty Mr. Meech extricated himself from the corner to which
the pressure of so many guests had relegated him. He slipped
apologetically to the front and took his stand beneath the shadow of
Mr. Moseley's presence. Prayer-meeting being but a semi-official
occasion, he wore his second-best coat, and it had followed the
shrinking habit established by its predecessors.

"Now," commanded Mr. Moseley, "place your hand upon my shoulder."

Mr. Meech did so with self-conscious gravity and serious apprehensions
as to the revelations to follow.

"Now," continued Mr. Moseley, "I place my arm about your waist--thus."

"Surely not," objected Mr. Meech, in embarrassment.

But Mr. Moseley was relentless. "I assure you it is true. And the
other hand--" He stopped in grave deliberation. The Methodist brother,
who had been growing more and more overcharged with suppressed
knowledge, could contain himself no longer.

"That's not right at all!" he burst forth irritably. "You don't hook
your arm around like that! You hold the left arm out and saw it up and
down--like this."

He snatched the bewildered Mr. Meech from Mr. Moseley's embrace, and
humming a waltz, stepped briskly about the limited space, to the
consternation of the onlookers, who hastened to tuck their feet under
their chairs.

Mr. Meech, looking as if he were being backed into eternity, stumbled
on the rug and clutched violently at the table-cover. In his downfall
he carried his instructor with him, and a deluge of tracts from the
table above followed.

In the midst of the confusion there was a sound from the church next
door. Mr. Meech sat up among the debris and listened. It was the
opening hymn for prayer-meeting.

CHAPTER XV

HELL AND HEAVEN

The events of the afternoon, stirring as they had been, were soon
dismissed from Sandy's mind. The approaching hop possessed right of
way over every other thought.

By the combined assistance of Mrs. Hollis and Aunt Melvy, he had been
ready at half-past seven. The dance did not begin until nine; but he
was to take Annette, and the doctor, whose habits were as fixed as the
numbers on a clock, had insisted that she should attend prayer-meeting
as usual before the dance.

In the little Hard-Shell Baptist Church the congregation had assembled
and services had begun before Mr. Meech arrived. He appeared
singularly flushed and breathless, and caused some confusion by
giving out the hymn which had just been sung. It was not until he
became stirred by the power of his theme that he gained composure.

In the front seat Dr. Fenton drowsed through the discourse. Next to
him, her party dress and slipper-bag concealed by a rain-coat, sat
Annette, hot and rebellious, and in anything but a prayerful frame of
mind. Beside her sat Sandy, rigid with elegance, his eyes riveted on
the preacher, but his thoughts on his feet. For, stationary though he
was, he was really giving himself the benefit of a final rehearsal,
and mentally performing steps of intricate and marvelous variety.

"Stop moving your feet!" whispered Annette. "You'll step on my dress."

"Is it the mazurka that's got the hiccoughs in the middle?" asked
Sandy, anxiously.

Mr. Meech paused and looked at them over his spectacles in plaintive
reproach.

Then he wandered on into sixthlies and seventhlies of increasing
length. Before the final amen had died upon the air, Annette and Sandy
had escaped to their reward.

The hop was given in the town hall, a large, dreary-looking room with
a raised platform at one end, where Johnson's band introduced
instruments and notes that had never met before.

To Sandy it was a hall of Olympus, where filmy-robed goddesses moved
to the music of the spheres.

"Isn't the floor g-grand?" cried Annette, with a little run and a
slide. "I could just d-die dancing."

"What may the chalk line be for?" asked Sandy.

"That's to keep the stags b-back."

"The stags?" His spirits fell before this new complication.

"Yes; the boys without partners, you know. They have to stay b-back of
the chalk line and b-break in from there. You'll catch on right away.
There's your d-dressing-room over there. Don't bother about my card;
it's been filled a week. Is there anyb-body you want to dance with
especially?"

Sandy's eyes answered for him. They were held by a vision in the
center of the room, and he was blinded to everything else.

Half surrounded by a little group stood Ruth Nelson, red-lipped,
bright-eyed, eager, her slender white-clad figure on tiptoe with
buoyant expectancy. The crimson rose caught in her hair kept impatient
time to the tap of her restless high-heeled slipper, and she swayed
and sang with the music in a way to set the sea-waves dancing.

It was small matter to Sandy that the lace on her dress had belonged
to her great-grandmother, or that the pearls about her round white
throat had been worn by an ancestor who was lady in waiting to a queen
of France. He only knew she meant everything beautiful in the world to
him,--music and springtime and dawn,--and that when she smiled it was
sunlight in his heart.

"I don't think you can g-get a dance there," said Annette, following
his gaze. "She is always engaged ahead. But I'll find out, if you
w-want me to."

"Would you, now?" cried Sandy, fervently pressing her hand. Then he
stopped short. "Annette," he said wistfully, "do you think she'll be
caring to dance with a boy like me?"

"Of course she will, if you k-keep off her toes and don't forget to
count the time. Hurry and g-get off your things; I want you to try it
before the crowd comes. There are only a few couples for you to bump
into now, and there will be a hundred after a while."

O the fine rapture of that first moment when Sandy found he could
dance! Annette knocked away his remaining doubts and fears and boldly
launched him into the merry whirl. The first rush was breathless,
carrying all before it; but after a moment's awful uncertainty he
settled into the step and glided away over the shining floor,
counting his knots to be sure, but sailing triumphantly forward
behind the flutter of Annette's pink ribbons.

He was introduced right and left, and he asked every girl he met to
dance. It made little difference who she happened to be, for in
imagination she was always the same. Annette had secured for him the
last dance with Ruth, and he intended to practise every moment until
that magic hour should arrive.

But youth reckons not with circumstance. Just when all sails were set
and he was nearing perfection, he met with a disaster which promptly
relegated him to the dry-dock. His partner did not dance!

When he looked at her, he found that she was tall and thin and
vivacious, and he felt that she must have been going to hops for a
very long time.

"I hate dancing, don't you?" she said. "Let's go over there, out of
the crowd, and have a nice long talk."

Sandy glanced at the place indicated. It seemed a long way from base.

"Wouldn't you like to stand here and watch them?" he floundered
helplessly.

"Oh, dear, no; it's too crowded. Besides," she added playfully, "I
have heard _so_ much about you and your awfully romantic life. I just
want to know all about it."

As a trout, one moment in mid-stream swimming and frolicking with the
best, finds himself suddenly snatched out upon the bank, gasping and
helpless, so Sandy found himself high and dry against the wall, with
the insistent voice of his captor droning in his ears.

She had evidently been wound and set, and Sandy had unwittingly
started the pendulum.

"Have you ever been to Chicago, Mr. Kilday? No? It is such a dear
place; I simply adore it. I'm on my way home from there now. All my
men friends begged me to stay; they sent me so many flowers I had to
keep them in the bath-tub. Wasn't it darling of them? I just love
men. How long have you been in Clayton, Mr. Kilday?"

He tried to answer coherently, but his thoughts were in eager pursuit
of a red rose that flashed in and out among the dancers.

"And you really came over from England by yourself when you were just
a small boy? Weren't you clever! But I know the captain and all of
them made a great pet of you. Then you made a walking tour through the
States; I heard all about it. It was just too romantic for any use. I
love adventure. My two best friends are at the theological seminary.
One's going to India,--he's a blond,--and one to Africa. Just between
us, I am going with one of them, but I can't for the life of me make
up my mind which. I don't know why I am telling you all these things,
Mr. Kilday, except that you are so sweet and sympathetic. You
understand, don't you?"

He assured her that he did with more vehemence than was necessary, for
he did not want her to suspect that he had not heard what she said.

"I knew you did. I knew it the moment I shook hands with you. I felt
that we were drawn to each other. I am like you; I am just full of
magnetism."

Sandy unconsciously moved slightly away: he had a sudden uncomfortable
realization that he was the only one within the sphere of influence.

After two intermissions he suggested that they go out to the
drug-store and get some soda-water. On the steps they met Annette.

"You old f-fraud," she whispered to Sandy in passing, "I thought you
didn't like to sit out d-dances."

He smiled feebly.

"Don't you mind her teasing," pouted his partner; "if we like to talk
better than to dance, it's our own affair."

Sandy wished devoutly that it was somebody else's. When they returned,
they went back to their old corner. The chairs, evidently considering
them permanent occupants, assumed an air of familiarity which he
resented.

"Do you know, you remind me of an old sweetheart of mine," resumed the
voice of his captor, coyly. "He was the first real lover I ever had.
His eyes were big and pensive, just like yours, and there was always
that same look in his face that just made me want to stay with him all
the time to keep him from being lonely. He was awfully fond of me, but
he had to go out West to make his fortune, and he married before he
got back."

Sandy sighed, ostensibly in sympathy, but in reality at his own sad
fate. At that moment Prometheus himself would not have envied him his
state of mind. The music set his nerves tingling and the dancers
beckoned him on, yet he was bound to his chair, with no relief in
view. At the tenth intermission he suggested soda-water again, after
which they returned to their seats.

"I hope people aren't talking about us," she said, with a pleased
laugh. "I oughtn't to have given you all these dances. It's perfectly
fatal for a girl to show such preference for one man. But we are so
congenial, and you do remind me--"

"If it's embarrassing to you--" began Sandy, grasping the straw with
both hands.

"Not one bit," she asserted. "If you would rather have a good
confidential time here with me than to meet a lot of silly little
girls, then I don't care what people say. But, as I was telling you, I
met him the year I came out, and he was interested in me right off--"

On and on and on she went, and Sandy ceased to struggle. He sank in
his chair in dogged dejection. He felt that she had been talking ever
since he was born, and was going to continue until he died, and that
all he could do was to wait in anguish for the end. He watched the
flushed, happy faces whirling by. How he envied the boys their wilted
collars! After eons and eons of time the band played "Home, Sweet
Home."

"It's the last dance," said she. "Aren't you sorry? We've had a
perfectly divine time--" She got no further, for her partner, faithful
through many numbers, had deserted his post at last.

Sandy pushed eagerly through the crowd and presented himself at Ruth's
side. She was sitting with several boys on the stage steps, her cheeks
flushed from the dance, and a loosened curl falling across her bare
shoulder. He tried to claim his dance, but the words, too long
confined, rushed to his lips so madly as to form a blockade.

She looked up and saw him--saw the longing and doubt in his eyes, and
came to his rescue.

"Isn't this our dance, Mr. Kilday?" she said, half smiling, half
timidly.

In the excitement of the moment he forgot his carefully practised bow,
and the omission brought such chagrin that he started out with the
wrong foot. There was a gentle, ripping sound, and a quarter of a yard
of lace trailed from the hem of his partner's skirt.

"Did I put me foot in it?" cried Sandy, in such burning consternation
that Ruth laughed.

"It doesn't matter a bit," she said lightly, as she stooped to pin it
up. "It shows I've had a good time. Come! Don't let's miss the music."

He took her hand, and they stepped out on the polished floor. The
blissful agony of those first few moments was intolerably sweet.

She was actually dancing with him (one, two, three; one, two, three).
Her soft hair was close to his cheek (one, two, three; one, two,
three). What if he should miss a step (one, two, three)--or fall?

He stole a glance at her; she smiled reassuringly. Then he forgot all
about the steps and counting time. He felt as he had that morning on
shipboard when the _America_ passed the _Great Britain_. All the joy
of boyhood resurged through his veins, and he danced in a wild
abandonment of bliss; for the band was playing "Home, Sweet Home,"
and to Sandy it meant that, come what might, within her shining eyes
his gipsy soul had found its final home.

[Illustration: "Then he forgot all about the steps and counting time"]

When the music stopped, and they stood, breathless and laughing, at
the dressing-room door, Ruth said:

"I thought Annette told me you were just learning to dance!"

"So I am," said Sandy; "but me heart never kept time for me before!"

When Annette joined them she looked up at Sandy and smiled.

"Poor f-fellow!" she said sympathetically. "What a perfectly horrid
time you've had!"

CHAPTER XVI

THE NELSON HOME

Willowvale, the Nelson homestead, lay in the last curve of the river,
just before it left the restrictions of town for the freedom of fields
and meadows.

It was a quaint old house, all over honeysuckles and bow-windows and
verandas, approached by an oleander-bordered walk, and sheltered by a
wide circle of poplar-and oak-trees that had nodded both approval and
disapproval over many generations of Nelsons.

In the dining-room, on the massive mahogany table, lunch was laid for
three. Carter sat at the foot, absorbed in a newspaper, while at the
head Mrs. Nelson languidly partook of her second biscuit. It was
vulgar, in her estimation, for a lady to indulge in more than two
biscuits at a meal.

When old Evan Nelson died six years before, he had left the bulk of
his fortune to his two grandchildren, and a handsome allowance to his
eldest son's widow, with the understanding that she was to take charge
of Ruth until that young lady should become of age.

Mrs. Nelson accepted the trust with becoming resignation. The prospect
of guiding a wealthy and obedient young person through the social
labyrinth to an eligible marriage wakened certain faculties that had
long lain dormant. It was not until the wealthy and obedient young
person began to develop tastes of her own that she found the burden
irksome.

Nine months of the year Ruth was at boarding-school, and the remaining
three she insisted upon spending in the old home at Clayton, where
Carter kept his dogs and horses and spent his summers. Hitherto Mrs.
Nelson had compromised with her. By adroit management she contrived
to keep her, for weeks at a time, at various summer resorts, where she
expected her to serve a sort of social apprenticeship which would fit
her for her future career.

At nineteen Ruth developed alarming symptoms of obstinacy. Mrs. Nelson
confessed tearfully to the rest of the family that it had existed in
embryo for years. Instead of making the most of her first summer out
of school, the foolish girl announced her intention of going to
Willowvale for an indefinite stay.

It was indignation at this state of affairs that caused Mrs. Nelson to
lose her appetite. Clayton was to her the limit of civilization; there
was too much sunshine, too much fresh air, too much out of doors. She
disliked nature in its crude state; she preferred it softened and
toned down to drawing-room pitch.

She glanced up in disapproval as Ruth's laugh sounded in the hall.

"Rachel, tell her that lunch is waiting," she said to the colored
girl at her side.

Carter looked up as Ruth came breezily into the room. She wore her
riding-habit, and her hair was tossed by her brisk morning canter.

"You don't look as if you had danced all night," he said. "Did the
mare behave herself?"

"She's a perfect beauty, Carter. I rode her round the old mill-dam,
'cross the ford, and back by the Hollises'. Now I'm perfectly
famished. Some hot rolls, Rachel, and another croquette, and--and
everything you have."

Mrs. Nelson picked several crumbs from the cloth and laid them
carefully on her plate. "When I was a young lady I always slept after
being out in the evening. I had a half-cup of coffee and one roll
brought to me in bed, and I never rose until noon."

"But I hate to stay in bed," said Ruth; "and, besides, I hate to miss
a half-day."

"Is there anything on for this afternoon?" asked Carter.

"Why, yes--" Ruth began, but her aunt finished for her:

"Now, Carter, it's too warm to be proposing anything more. You aren't
well, and Ruth ought to stay at home and put cold cream on her face.
It is getting so burned that her pink evening-dresses will be worse
than useless. Besides, there is absolutely nothing to do in this
stupid place. I feel as if I couldn't stand it all summer."

This being a familiar opening to a disagreeable subject, the two young
people lapsed into silence, and Mrs. Nelson was constrained to address
her communications to the tea-pot. She glanced about the big,
old-fashioned room and sighed.

"It's nothing short of criminal to keep all this old mahogany buried
here in the country, and the cut-glass and silver. And to think that
the house cannot be sold for two more years! Not until Ruth is of age!
What _do_ you suppose your dear grandfather _could_ have been
thinking of?"

This question, eliciting no reply from the tea-pot, remained suspended
in the air until it attracted Ruth's wandering attention.

"I beg your pardon, aunt. What grandfather was thinking of? About the
place? Why, I guess he hoped that Carter and I would keep it."

Carter looked over his paper. "Keep this old cemetery? Not I! The day
it is sold I start for Europe. If one lung is gone and the other
going, I intend to enjoy myself while it goes."

"Carter!" begged Ruth, appealingly.

He laughed. "You ought to be glad to get rid of me, Ruth. You've
bothered your head about me ever since you were born."

She slipped her hand into his as it lay on the table, and looked at
him wistfully.

"The idea of the old governor thinking we'd want to stay here!" he
said, with a curl of the lip.

"Perfectly ridiculous!" echoed Mrs. Nelson.

"I don't know," said Ruth; "it's more like home than any place else. I
don't think I could ever bear to sell it."

"Now, my dear Ruth," said Mrs. Nelson, in genuine alarm, "don't be
sentimental, I beg of you. When once you make your debut, you'll feel
very different about things. Of course the place must be sold: it
can't be rented, and I'm sure you will never get me to spend another
summer in Clayton. You could not stay here alone."

Ruth sat with her chin in her hands and gazed absently out of the
window. She remembered when that yard was to her as the garden of
Eden. As a child she had been brought here, a delicate, faded little
hot-house plant, and for three wonderful years had been allowed to
grow and blossom at will in the freedom of outdoor life. The glamour
of those old days still clung to the place, and made her love
everything connected with it. The front gate, with its wide white
posts, still held the records of her growth, for each year her
grandfather had stood her against it and marked her progress. The huge
green tub holding the crape myrtle was once a park where she and
Annette had played dolls, and once it had served as a burying-ground
when Carter's sling brought down a sparrow. The ice house, with its
steep roof, recalled a thrilling tobogganing experience when she was
six. Grandfather had laughed over the torn gown, and bade her do it
again.

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11