East Angels Part 79

He took her hand, though she did not extend it. "You have been extremely unreasonable," he said. Though he obeyed, she should feel that he had the mastery still.

He left her, and rode back to the hotel. Mr. Moore learned a few hours later, that he had returned to East Angels.

This had happened three days before. It was now late in the afternoon of the third day, and the house was prepared for "Mis' Horrel's" departure.

Mr. Moore, standing on the low bank, waved his hand in farewell as the boat, rowed by two old negroes, carried her down the river.

The five miles seemed short. When the men turned in towards the hotel, twilight had fallen, the river had a veil of mist. Margaret's eyes rested vaguely on the sh.o.r.e; suddenly, in a low voice, she said, "Stop!"

The men obeyed. She strained her eyes to see more clearly a figure under the trees near the landing; it was a man, dressed in gray clothes, he was walking up and down; they could see him as he moved to and fro, but he could not see their low boat, pausing out there in the fog.

Margaret appeared to have satisfied herself. "Row out now into the stream," she said, briefly.

And in a few minutes the sh.o.r.e, left behind them, was but a dark line.

"I have changed my mind, I shall not sleep at the hotel, after all. You can take me back home--to the house on the point. Then, to-morrow morning, you can be there again at dawn, and bring me up in time for the steamer; it will do quite as well."

The old men, without comment either of mind or tongue, patiently rowed her back down the river.

When they reached the point, Margaret, after charging them to be punctual, dismissed them, and walked up the path alone towards the house. No lights were visible anywhere. There was a young moon, and she looked at her watch, it was not yet nine o'clock; Mr. Moore had apparently gone to bed at a very early hour.

The truth was that during all this visit of his on the river Mr. Moore had kept much later hours than he was in the habit of keeping at home.

At home Penelope, who believed that he needed a great deal of sleep, was in the habit of saying, about ten o'clock, "Now, Middleton--" And Middleton, as Dr. Kirby once expressed it, always "now'd."

On the present occasion, after partaking of the supper which Dinah had prepared for him, he had sent the old woman to her home; then, remembering that he had a week of arrears to make up, he had gone to his room, though there was still a gleam of sunset in the west.

Margaret understood what had happened, she determined that she would not disturb him; probably it would not be difficult to find a way into the house. As she had expected, among the numerous windows on the ground-floor she found one which she could raise; light and lithe, she easily effected an entrance, and stole on tiptoe to a room up-stairs in the south wing, where she knew there was a lounge whose pillows had been left in place. She had her travelling-bag with her, but she did not intend to undress; she would take what sleep she could on the lounge until dawn, covered by her travelling shawl. But she was more weary than she knew, and nature was kind that night at least; very soon she fell asleep.

The figure she had seen on the sh.o.r.e, was, as she had thought, that of Evert Winthrop. He had come back.

It might have been that he did not consider a return to the river prohibited, so long as he did not go down to the house on the point; there was no law, certainly, against a man's travelling where he pleased. He had not been down to the house on the point, he had stayed at the hotel all day. He had seen her trunks when they arrived, and he knew from their being there that she must be expecting to take the next morning's steamer, northward-bound; was she coming herself to the hotel to sleep? After a while he made the inquiry; his tone was careless, he asked at what hour they expected her.

"I will be surprised if she is not here by supper-time," was the answer he received.

At sunset he went down to the sh.o.r.e and strolled to and fro. But though he thus kept watch, he did not see the boat that stole up in the fog, floated off-sh.o.r.e for a moment, and then disappeared.

That night, at three o'clock Middleton Moore woke with the feeling that he had been attacked by asthma, and that Penelope was trying to relieve him with long smoking wisps of thick brown paper, her accustomed remedy.

Then consciousness became clearer, and he perceived that there was no Penelope and no candle; but that there was smoke. He sprang up and opened the door, there was smoke in the hall also. "The house is on fire," was his thought; "how fortunate that there is no one here!" He threw on his clothes, drew on his boots, and seizing his coat and hat, ran down the hall. His room was on the ground-floor, he looked into the other rooms as he pa.s.sed; there was smoke, but no flame; yet he could distinctly perceive the odor of burning wood. "It must be up-stairs," he said to himself. He unlocked the house door, and ran across the lawn in order to see the upper story.

Yes, there were the flames. At present only little tongues, small and blue, creeping along under the cornice; they told him that the fire had a strong hold within, since it had made its way outward through the main wall. It would be useless for him to attempt to fight it, with the water at a distance and no one to a.s.sist. The old mansion was three stories high. "It will go like tinder," he thought.

His next idea was to save for Margaret all he could; jamming his clerical hat tightly down on his forehead, he began to carry out articles from the lower rooms, and pile them together at the end of the lawn. He worked hard; he ran, he carried, he piled up; then he ran again. He lifted and dragged ponderous weights, the perspiration stood in drops on his face. But even then he made a mental list of the articles he was saving: "Six parlor chairs. One centre table of mahogany. A work-table with fringe. A secretary with inlaid top. A sofa." In the lower rooms the smoke was blinding now. Outside, the tongues of flame had grown into a broad yellow band.

Presently the fire burst through the roof in half a dozen places, and, freed, rose with a leap high in the air; heretofore there had been but little noise, now there was the sound of crackling and burning, and the roar of flames under headway; the sky was tinged with the red glow, the garden took on a festal air, with all its vines and flowers lighted up.

Mr. Moore did not stop to look at this, nor to call the flames "grand."

In the first place, he did not think them grand, eating up as they were a good house and a large quant.i.ty of most excellent furniture. In the second, he had not time for adjectives, he was bent upon saving a certain low bookcase he remembered, which stood in the upper hall. He had always admired that bookcase, he had never seen one before that was unconnected with a.s.sociations of step-ladders, or an equally insecure stepping upon chairs.

He jammed his hat hard down upon his forehead again (he should certainly be obliged to have a new one), and ran back into the house. But the flames had now reached the lower hall, they had burned down as well as up; he was obliged to content himself with a hat-stand near the door. As he was dragging this out he heard shouts, and recognized the voices as those of negro women; when he had reached the lawn, there they were, Dinah and Rose and four other women; they had seen the light, and had come running from their cabins, half a mile down the sh.o.r.e. They were greatly excited; one young girl, black as coal, jumped up and down, bounding high like a ball each time; she was unconscious of what she was doing, her eyes were on the roaring flames, every now and then she gave a tremendous yell. Old Rose and Dinah wept and bewailed aloud.

"Dar goes de settin'-room winders--_ow_!"

"Dar goes de up-steers chimbly--_ow_!"

Another of the women, a thin old creature, clapped her hands incessantly on her legs, and shouted, "De glory's a-comin', de glory's a-comin', a-comin'!"

Mr. Moore deposited his hat-stand under a tree, and standing still for a moment, wiped his hot forehead. He did not attempt to stop their shouting, he knew that it would be useless; he thought with regret of that bookcase.

And now there came a shout louder, or at least more agonized, than any of the others, and round the corner of the house appeared the boy Primus; he ran towards them, shouting still, with each step he almost fell--"She's _dar_--Mis' Horrel!"

He too had seen the light, and, approaching the place from the south, he had pa.s.sed, in running towards the front, the narrow high south wing; here at a window he had seen a face--the face of Margaret Harold.

Mr. Moore was gone at the boy's first cry. The others followed.

The south wing was not visible from the front. Its third story was in flames, and the back and sides of the ground-floor had caught, but at a second-story window (which she had opened) they all saw a face--that of Margaret Harold; the glare of the main building showed her features perfectly. They could not have heard her, even if she had been able to call to them, the roar of the fire was now so loud.

"She cannot throw herself out, it's too high; and we have no blanket.

There's a door below, isn't there? And stairs?" It was Mr. Moore's voice that asked.

"Yes, pa.s.son, yes. But it's all _a-bu'nin_'!"

Mr. Moore clasped his hands and bowed his head, it did not take longer than a breath. Then he started towards the wing.

"Oh, pa.s.son, yer da.s.sent!"

"Oh, pa.s.son, yer can't help her now, de sweet lady, it's too late. Pray for her _yere_, pa.s.son; she'll go right straight up, she's wunner der Lawd's _own_ chillun, de dove!"

"Oh, pa.s.son! de Lawd ain't willin' fer _two_ ter die."

The negro women clung about him, but he shook them off; going hastily forward, he broke in the door and disappeared. His moment's prayer had been for his wife, in the case--which he knew was probable--that he should not come from that door alive.

The gap he had made revealed the red fire within; behind the stairs the back of the wing was a glowing furnace.

The negroes now all knelt down, they had no hope; they began to sing their funeral hymn.

The fire had reached the second story; Margaret's face had disappeared.

A bravery which does not reason will sometimes conquer in the teeth of reason. One chance existed, it was one amid a dozen probabilities of a horrible death; it lay in swiftness, and in the courage to walk, without heeding burned feet, directly across floors already in a glow.

Middleton Moore crossed such floors; he went unshrinkingly up the scorching stairs. He found Margaret by sense of touch in the smoke-filled room above, and tearing off his coat, he lifted her as she lay unconscious, wrapped her head and shoulders in it, and bore her swiftly down the burning steps, and through the fiery hall, and so out to the open air. His eyebrows, eyelashes, and hair were singed, his face was blistered; brands and sparks had fallen like hail upon his shoulders and arms, and scorched through to the skin; his boots were burned off, the curled leather was dropping from his burned feet; his breath was almost gone.

He gave Margaret to the women, and sank down himself upon the gra.s.s; he could not see, he felt very weak; something was tightening in his throat. The boy Primus, with great sobs, ran like a deer to the well for water, and bringing it back, held a cupful to the lips of the blinded man.

Margaret, though still unconscious, appeared to be unhurt. The skirt of her dress was burned in several places. The women chafed her hands, and bathed her face with the fresh water; once she opened her eyes, but unconsciousness came over her again.

With a crash the northern wing fell in.

"De front'll go nex'," said Primus. "We mus' git 'em 'way from dish yer."