The Entailed Hat Part 98

Then, after the lapse of years, the issue came to trial at the old Dutch-English town of New Castle, and from the magnitude of the damages claimed, the weight and number of counsel, and the novelty of trying a great corporation, it interested the lawyers and burdened the newspapers, and was popularly supposed to belong to the cla.s.s of French spoliation claims, or squaring-the-circle problems--something that would be going on at the final end of the world.

"Never you mind, Bob Frame! Walter Jones is a great advocate, but, Goy!

he don't know a Delaware jury. I'll get my country-seat, up here on the New Castle hills, out of this case," Clayton said, as he pitched quoits with his fellow-lawyers from Was.h.i.+ngton and Philadelphia, on the green battery where the Philadelphia steamer came in with the Southern pa.s.sengers for the little stone-silled railroad.

John Randel, Jr., had ruined a fine engineer, to become a litigious man all his life.

He sued his successor and fellow New-Yorker, Engineer Wright, and was nonsuited. He garnisheed the ca.n.a.l officers, and beset the Legislature for remedial legislation, and threatened Clayton himself with damages; yet had such a fund of experience and such vitality that he kept the outer public beaten up, like the driving of wild beasts into the circle of the hunters. He had surveyed the great city of New York and planned its streets above the new City Hall. Elevated railroads were his projection half a century before they came about. He now looked upon engineering with indifference, and considered himself to have been born for the law.

In the midst of many other duties, Clayton, in course of time, convicted Whitecar of kidnapping, on negro testimony, having obtained a ruling to that end from his cousin, the chief-justice; and a const.i.tuent named Sorden (_not_ the personage of our tale), being prosecuted for kidnapping, in order to spite Clayton, was cleared by him at Georgetown after a marvellous exhibition of jury eloquence, and repaid the obligation, years after our story closes, by breaking a party dead-lock in the Legislature of Delaware, where he became a member, and sending Mr. Clayton for the fourth time to the American senate.

The Entailed Hat became more common in the streets of Annapolis than it had been in Princess Anne, as Milburn pressed his bill for a.s.sistance year after year, and was shot through the back with slanders from home and hustled in front by overwhelming opposition.

Judge Custis took the field for Congress on the railroad issue, and was elected, through the Forest vote, and his wife went through a Was.h.i.+ngton season with as much dignity as enjoyment, few suspecting that she was not the Judge's social equal.

The ancestral hat defied all worldly hostility, but became the iron helmet to bend its wearer's back. He prayed in secret for some pitying angel to break the spell that bound him to it, but none conceived that he would let it go.

His boy grew strong, and took his father's dress to be a matter of course; his wife pressed upon him the nauseous ornament he had so long affected; a wide conspiracy seemed to have been formed to drive his head into that hereditary wigwam, and he could not escape it.

Even Grandmother Tilghman, who now was an inmate of Teackle Hall, in William's absence of years, forgot all about the queer hat, and rejoiced to herself that "Bill" had not married "that political girl."

Milburn had maintained his financial solvency by turns and sorties that even his enemies admired, but a railroad built along one man's spine and terminated by a steeple depot on his head must wear out the unrelieved individual at last.

The banks in Baltimore began to break; fierce riots ensued; the state debt had mounted up, through aid to public works, to fifteen million dollars; the Eastern Sh.o.r.e Railroad obtained, too late, the vote of the subsidy expected, and the state treasurer could not find funds to pay it.

The gazettes announced the failure of Meshach Milburn, Esq., of the Eastern Sh.o.r.e.

Without an instant's hesitation, Vesta surrendered her own property, and she and Rhoda Custis opened a select school in a part of Teackle Hall, and let the remainder for residences.

"Why do you make this sacrifice?" asked her husband; "n.o.body expected it."

"They may say we were married to protect my parents," Vesta answered, "but not that it was to secure myself. My boy shall have a clear name."

His failure ended the active life of Meshach Milburn; too considerate of his family to renew his former low endeavors, he became a clerk in the county offices, through Judge Custis's influence, and wore his hat to stipendiary labor with the regularity, but not the rebellious instincts, of old days, becoming, instead, the victim of a certain religious trance or apathy, which deepened with time.

Vesta saw that Milburn's misfortune extinguished the last remnant of animosity in her father's mind, and the two men went about together, like two old boys who had both been prisoners of war, and were cured of ambition.

Milburn resumed his forest walks and bird-tamings, all traces of ambition left his countenance, and he was as dead to business things as if he had never risen above his forest origin.

He often talked of William Tilghman, and seemed to wish to see him, though for no apparent purpose.

The Asiatic cholera, having begun to make annual visits to the United States, singled out, one day, the wearer of the obsolete hat, and put to the sternest test of affection and humanity the household at Teackle Hall.

Whether from the respect his steady purposes had given them, or the natural devotion in a sequestered society, no soul left his side.

But it brought the final visitation of poverty upon Vesta. Her school was broken up in a day. She dismissed it herself, and calmly sat by her husband's bed, to soothe his dying weakness, and await the providence of G.o.d.

He rapidly pa.s.sed through the stages of cramp and collapse, a nearly perished pulse, and the cadaverous look of one already dead, yet his intellect by the law of the disease, lived unimpaired.

"The stream cannot rise above the fountain," he spoke, huskily; "all we can get from life is love. My darling, you have showered it on me, and been thirsty all your days."

"I have been happy in my duty," Vesta said; "you have been kind to me always. We have nothing to regret."

He wandered a little, though he looked at her, and seemed thinking of his mother.

"Where can we go?" he muttered, pitifully; "I burned the dear old hut down. It would have been a roof for my boy."

His chin trembled, as if he were about to cry, and sighed:

"Fader an' mammy's quarrelled; the mocking-bird won't sing. Ride for the doctor! ride hard! Oh! oh! too late, little chillen! They'se both dead!"

He returned to perfect knowledge in a moment, and fixed his eyes on Vesta, saying,

"I leave you poor. I tried hard. Perhaps--"

His eye was here arrested by some conflict at the door, where Aunt Hominy, notwithstanding her imperfect wits, was striving to keep guard.

"De debbil's measurin' him in! Measurin' him in at las'!" the old woman said; "Miss Vessy's 'mos' free!"

"Admit me!" spoke a clear, familiar voice, "I must see him. Mr. Clayton has won the lawsuit, and two hundred and twenty-six thousand dollars damages! Cousin Meshach is rich again."

"That friendly voice," spoke Meshach, with a happy light in his eyes; "oh, I wanted to hear it again!"

Yet he put his hand up with all his little strength to push away the intruder, who would have kissed him, and whispered,

"No. The cholera!"

"It's the bishop, uncle!" cried Mrs. Custis; "Bishop Tilghman, from the West."

"Don't I know him," Milburn whispered, with sinking voice and powers.

"Honest man! Bishop of our church! Bishop in the free West! G.o.d bless him!"

He was lost again, as if he had fainted, for some time, and, all kneeling, the young bishop made a prayer.

When they arose Milburn seemed speechless, yet he tried to raise his hand, and, Vesta coming to his aid, his long, lean fingers closed around hers, and he signalled to William Tilghman with his eyes.

The bishop came near, and, by a painful effort, Milburn put his wife's hand in her cousin's. His lips framed a word without a sound:

"_Rest.i.tution._"

"Glory to G.o.d!" suddenly exclaimed Grandmother Tilghman, who seemed to see without sight all that was going on.

"I knew it would be so, if both would wait," sighed Rhoda to her husband, through her tears.

There was still something on Milburn's mind, though he was unable to explain it. Every attempt was made to interpret his want, but in vain, till Aunt Hominy broke the silence by mumbling:

"He want dat debbil's hat!"