Hugh Wynne, Free Quaker Part 26

"Madam," he said, "I am charged with a letter from Miss p.e.n.i.ston."

"You may put it on the table," says Mistress Wynne. "My brother may choose his society. I ask the same privilege. It will not consist of gentlemen of your profession."

Mr. Wynne's face grew black under its dark skin. "Madam," he said, "I stay nowhere as an unwelcome guest. I thank you for past kindness, and I humbly take my leave. I could have done you a service as to this business of the quartering of officers, and you shall still have my good offices for the sake of the many pleasant hours I have pa.s.sed in your house. As my Cousin Hugh says nothing, I am glad to think that he is of a different opinion from that which you have put in words so agreeably."

With this he went away, leaving my aunt red in the face, and speechless with wrath.

I thought he had the best of it; but I merely said, "My dear aunt, you should not have been so hard with him." I did, indeed, think it both unwise and needless.

"Stuff and nonsense!" says Miss Wynne, walking about as my father used to do. "I do not trust him, and he has got that girl in his toils, poor child! I wonder what lies he has told her. How does he hold her? I did think that was past any man's power; and she is unhappy too. When a woman like Darthea begins to find a man out, she can't help showing it, and some are more frank on paper than in talk; that is her way. I am afraid I made mischief once, for I told him long ago that I meant her to marry you; and then I saw he did not like it, and I knew I had been a goose. Whatever is the reason he hates you, Hugh? Oh yes, he does--he does. Is it the woman? I will have no redcoats in my house."

I got a chance to say--what I was sorry to have to say--how little need there was for him to fear poor me, whom Darthea wished to have nothing to do with, I thought.

"Her loves are like her moods, my dear Hugh; who knows how long they will last? Until a woman is married she is not to be despaired of."

I shook my head sadly and went out.

I returned late in the evening, to order my horse to be saddled and sent to me before breakfast next morning; for I kept it at no cost in my aunt's ample stable. To my horror, I found a sentinel at the door, and the hall full of army baggage. In the parlour was a tall Hessian, General von Knyphausen, and Count Donop and others, smoking, much at their ease. They were fairly civil, but did not concern themselves greatly if I liked it or not. I found my aunt in bed, in a fever of vain anger.

She had the bed-curtains drawn, and when I was bid to enter, put aside the chintz so as to make room for her head, which appeared in a tall nightcap. I am unfit, I fear, to describe this gear; but it brought out all her large features very strongly, and to have seen her would have terrified a Hessian regiment.

"My house is full of Dutch dogs," she cried. "As soon as they came they ordered bones." In fact, they had asked quite civilly if they might have supper.

"I saw them at their feed," says my aunt, "and the big beast, General Knyphausen, spread my best b.u.t.ter on his bread with his thumb, sir--his thumb! Count Donop is better; but Von Heiser! and the pipes! heavens!"

Here she retreated within her curtains, and I heard her say, "Bessy Ferguson saw them come in, and must sail across the street and tell Job--the page with the turban--to congratulate me for her, and to advise me to get a keg of sauerkraut."

I a.s.sured my aunt that fortunately these were gentlemen, but she was inconsolable, declaring herself ill, and that Dr. Rush must come at once.

"But," I said, "he is gone with all the Congress to York."

"Then I shall die," moaned my aunt.

At last, knowing her well, I said, "Is it not too sad?"

"What's that? What?"

"Mr. Howe has taken Mrs. Pemberton's carriage and the pair of sorrels for his own use."

At this my Aunt Gainor's large face reappeared, not as melancholic as before, and I added, "Friend Waln has six to care for, and Thomas Scattergood has the Hessian chaplain and a drunken major. The rest of Friends are no better off."

"Thank the Lord for all His mercies!" said Miss Wynne.

"And Mr. Cadwalader's house on Little Dock street Sir William has."

"A pity that, Hugh. The fine furniture will pay for it, I fear. I think, Hugh, I am better, or I shall be soon."

"They talk of the Meeting over the way for a barrack, Aunt Gainor." Now this was idly rumoured, but how could one resist to feed an occasion so comic?

"I think I should die contented," said Miss Wynne. "Now go away, Hugh.

I have had my medicine, and I like it." She was quick at self-a.n.a.lysis, and was laughing low, really happier for the miseries of her Tory acquaintances.

After the bedroom comedy, which much amused me and out of which my aunt got great comfort, she was inclined to be on better terms with the officers so abruptly thrust upon her. For a while, however, she declined to eat her meals with them, and when told that they had had Colonel Montresor to dine, and had drunk the king's health, she sent all the gla.s.ses they had used down to the blacks in the kitchen, and bade them never to dare set them on her table again. This much delighted Count Donop, who loved George of Hanover no better than did she, and I learned that she declared the bread-and-b.u.t.ter business was the worst of Von Knyphausen, and was no doubt a court custom. As to Count Donop, she learned to like him. He spoke queer French, and did not smoke. _"Je ne foume pas chamais, madame,"_ he said; _"mais le Cheneral, il foume touchours, et Von Heiser le meme,"_ which was true. The count knew her London friends, and grieved that he was sent on a service he did not relish, and in which later he was to lose his life.

My aunt fed them well, and won at piquet, and declared they were much to be pitied, although Von Heiser was a horror. When he had knocked down her red-and-gold Delft vase, the G.o.ds and the other china were put away, and then the rugs, because of the holes his pipe ashes burned, and still she vowed it was a comfort they were not redcoats. Them she would have poisoned.

Captain Andre alone was an exception. When, in 1776, he was made a prisoner by Montgomery in Canada, and after that was on parole at Lancaster, I met him; and as he much attracted me, my aunt sent him money, and I was able to ease his captivity by making him known to our friends, Mr. Justice Yeates and the good Cope people, who, being sound Tories, did him such good turns as he never forgot, and kindly credited to us. Indeed, he made for my aunt some pretty sketches of the fall woods, and, as I have said, was welcome where no other redcoat could enter.

My aunt was soon easier in mind, but my own condition was not to be envied. Here was Arthur Wynne at my father's, the Hessians at my aunt's, the Tories happy, seven or eight thousand folks gone away, every inn and house full, and on the street crowds of unmannerly officers. It was not easy to avoid quarrels. Already the Hessian soldiers began to steal all manner of eatables from the farms this side of Schuylkill. More to my own inconvenience, I found that Major von Heiser had taken the privilege of riding my mare Lucy so hard that she was unfit to use for two days.

At last my aunt's chicken-coops suffered, and the voice of her pet rooster was no more heard in the land. I did hear that, as this raid of some privates interfered with the Dutch general's diet, one of the offenders got the strappado. But no one could stop these fellows, and they were so bold as to enter houses and steal what they wanted, until severe measures were taken by Mr. Howe. They robbed my father boldly, before his eyes, of two fat Virginia peach-fed hams, and all his special tobacco. He stood by, and said they ought not to do it. This, as they knew no tongue but their own, and as he acted up to his honest belief in the righteousness of non-resistance, and uttered no complaint, only served to bring them again. But this time I was at home, and nearly killed a corporal with the Quaker staff Thomas Scattergood gave my father. The adventure seemed to compensate Miss Wynne for her own losses. The corporal made a lying complaint, and but for Mr. Andre I should have been put to serious annoyance. Our boys used to say that the Hessian drum-beat said, "Plunder, plunder, plun, plun, plunder." And so for the sad remnant of Whig gentles the town was made in all ways unbearable.

There are times when the life sands seem to run slowly, and others when they flow swiftly, as during this bewildering week. All manner of things happened, mostly perplexing or sad, and none quite agreeable. On the 28th, coming in about nine at night, I saw that there were persons in the great front sitting-room, which overlooked Dock Creek. As I came into the light which fell through the open doorway, I stood unnoticed.

The room was full of pipe smoke, and rum and Hollands were on the table, as was common in the days when Friends' Meeting made a minute that Friends be vigilant to see that those who work in the harvest-fields have portions of rum. My father and my cousin sat on one side, opposite a short, stout man almost as swarthy as Arthur, and with very small piercing eyes, so dark as to seem black, which eyes never are.

I heard this gentleman say, "Wynne, I hear that your brother is worse.

These elder brothers are unnatural animals, and vastly tenacious of life." On this I noticed my cousin frown at him and slightly shake his head. The officer did not take the hint, if it were one, but added, smiling, "He will live to bury you; unfeeling brutes--these elder brothers. d.a.m.n 'em!"

I was shocked to notice how inertly my father listened to the oath, and I recalled, with a sudden sense of distress, what my aunt had said of my father's state of mind. The young are accustomed to take for granted the permanency of health in their elders, and to look upon them as unchanging inst.i.tutions, until, in some sad way, reminded of the frailty of all living things.

As I went in, Arthur rose, looked sharply at me, and said, "Let me present my cousin, Mr. Hugh Wynne, Colonel Tarleton."

I bowed to the officer, who lacked the politeness to rise, merely saying, "Pleased to see you, Mr. Wynne."

"We were talking," said Arthur, "when you came of the fight at the river with the queer name--Brandywine, isn't it?"

"No," said my father; "thou art mistaken, and I wished to ask thee, Arthur, what was it thou wert saying. We had ceased to speak of the war.

Yes; it was of thy brother."

"What of thy brother?" said I, glad of this opening.

"Oh, nothing, except Colonel Tarleton had news he was not so well."

He was so shrewd as to think I must have overheard enough to make it useless to lie to me. A lie, he used to say, was a reserve not to be called into service except when all else failed.

"Oh, was that all?" I returned. "I did hear, Cousin Arthur, that the Wyncote estate was growing to be valuable again; some coal or iron had been found."

"So my mother writes me," said Tarleton. "We are old friends of your family."

"You know," I said, "we are the elder branch." I was bent on discovering, if possible, the cause of my cousin's annoyance whenever Wyncote was mentioned.

"I wish it were true about our getting rich," said Arthur, with the relaxed look about the jaw I had come to know so well; it came as he began to speak. "If it were anything but idle gossip, Tarleton, what would it profit a poor devil of a younger son? They did find coal, but it came to nothing; and indeed I learn they lost money in the end."

"I have so heard," said my father, in a dull way. "Who was it told me? I forget. They lost money."'

I looked at him amazed. Who could have told him but Arthur, and why?

Until a year back his memory had been unfailing.

I saw a queer look, part surprise, part puzzle, go over Tarleton's face, a slight frown above, as slight a smile below. I fancy he meant to twit my cousin for he said to me:

"And so you are of the elder branch, Mr. Hugh Wynne. How is that, Arthur? How did the elder branch chance to lose that n.o.ble old house?"

My cousin sat rapping with his fingers on the table what they used to call the "devil's tattoo," regarding me with steady, half-shut eyes--a too frequent and not well-mannered way he had, and one I much disliked.