 | CHAPTER XIV. Master William Mitten, or, A youth of brilliant talents, who was ruined by bad luck |  |
14. CHAPTER XIV.
Captain Thompson had ample cooling time before he reached his
sister's residence, for it was full two hundred yards from Mr. West's
store; “but contrary to the law in such case made and provided,” instead
of cooling, he got hotter and hotter with every step of the way.
Business at home demanded his attention just at this time—the
weather was still cold, and might in a day or two turn much colder.
When and where he should overtake Tom, and how he should dispose
of him and his load when overtaken, were perplexing considerations.
Then his sister's unconquerable indulgence of her son, with its probable
consequences, coming upon the raw places of his mind which it had
already produced, was quite irritating. Nor was he entirely forgetful
of the fun of the village already enjoyed at his expense, and likely
to be renewed on his return. All these things pressing upon a
mind naturally excitable, were not calculated to lull it into repose.
The reader therefore will not be surprised to learn that they so completely
absorbed the Captain's attention, that he became wholly forgetful
of the claims of dignity, and “the poetry of motion,” and that
he reached his sister's steps in a palpable trot.
As soon as his sister saw him she showed signs of great alarm, for
she observed that he was in a state of very unusual excitement. Her
alarms had a good effect upon the Captain; they reduced his feelings
instantly to a little above temperate.
“What,” said he, “was in those boxes you sent off by Tom, this
morning?”
“One contained some clothing for William, and—”
“More finery, I suppose!”
“No, not a stitch of finery.”
“What then?”
“Two suits of coarse negro cloth, (I may call it) some cotton
homespun shirts, and a few home-knit stockings.”
This was refreshing to the Captain. “Well, I rejoice,” continued
he, “that your love for your boy is beginning to show itself in the
right way at last. And what was in the other box?”
“Some refreshments—”
“More cakes, raisins, almonds, sugar-pums, &c., &c., of course?”
“No, not a single one of either.”
“What then?
She named the contents of the box.
“Well, if he must be crammed, better this than the first lot. Now
I've got to pack off after that fool negro, pressed as I am with business,
just at this time; for he'll never find the way to Waddel's
while the world stands—”
“Brother, I am sure you need not take upon yourself that trouble.
Tom is a very intelligent negro—”
“Humph!”
“— And I have no doubt but that he will go straight to Mr.
Waddel's without a blunder. I give him such particular directions
that he can't miss the way—”
“You gave him directions! Why, there never was a woman—
a town woman—on the face of the earth, who could find the way to
a house fifteen miles from her own, after going to it twenty times;
and there never was one who could direct Solomon to a place tem
miles off, so that he could find it; and here you've sent off a stupid
jackass of a negro to go sixty miles under your directions, and to a
place that you've never been to yourself!”
“Well, if he doesn't find the way, it will be all your fault—”
“How the devil will it be my fault?”
“I got the directions from you, and I gave them to Tom just precisely
as I received them from you, and sister Mary will prove it.”
“I didn't pretend to go into the details, for I did not know what
you and Mary were fishing for; and if I had given them, there is
not a Tom in the world that could have followed them.”
“I think, brother, you underrate the negro character, as you are
too apt to do with all character, except that of the `lords of creation.'
I must think that there is a little sense in the world that does not
belong to them. Perhaps, however, I am mistaken.”
“Well, what directions did you give Tom?”
She repeated them.
“And you think Tom can't miss the way under these directions?”
“I am sure he will not, for I have proved him to be uncommonly
shrewd at finding roads.”
“Well, he did not get ten miles from town before he got lost—
took the Augusta road, and told Joshua Houghton that he was going
to Mr. Wodden's who kept school at Mr. Williston's, in Carolina!”
“Oh! Mr. Houghton must have misunderstood him. He couldn't
have miscalled Mr. Waddel's name, for it has been repeated in his
hearing over and over, and over again. Isn't Burke's Meeting-house
on the Washington road?”
“Near it.”
“And isn't it more than ten miles off?”
“Yes.”
“Well, he knows the way to Burke's Meeting-house, for he has
taken me there repeatedly.”
“Yes, and if you had told him to go by Burke's Meeting-house,
he would have gone that far straight, at least.”
“I couldn't have told him that, for I didn't know that Burke's
Meeting-house road and the Washington road were the same myself.”
“I suppose not. But it is not worth while to stand talking about
it. I know that he will not find the way to Waddel's in a week, if
ever, and I must go after him. Was old Ball shod or bare-foot
when he set out?”
“Newly shod.”
“Did you give him any money to bear his expenses?”
“I gave Tom money.”
“Did you understand me to ask whether you gave old Ball money
to pay his expenses?”
The Captain, without waiting for an answer to his last question,
went home with his “foot down,” and of course his wife was all meekness
and obsequiousness. He did not speak to her at all, but called
out in her presence to Dick, “to have his horse ready at the peep of
day, for him to pack off after Anna's Tom.”
“Master, is Tom runaway?”
“Ask your mistress there—she can tell you.”
“Miss'ess is Tom—”
“Go about your business, you black rascal,” said Mrs. Thompson,
in an undertone.”
“Kigh!” whispered Dick, “some 'en wrong here!”
The Captain fell to writing letters furiously—jumped up and ordered
Dick to grease the chaise—resumed his pen, and jumped up
up again and jerked open a drawer, looked in and shut it up again—
folded up a letter and commenced another—jumped up and ordered
Delphy to get him some warm water to shave—wrote again—stopped,
punched the fire, and told Suckey to tell Dick to bring in some wood,
“plenty of it, for I don't know that I shall go to bed to night.” Wrote
again—rose, went out and stayed a little while, and came in again.
Folded another letter or note, and went to writing again. Finished
another note, and called for the water to shave. Just here, Mrs.
Thompson, in a very subdued tone, informed him that supper was
ready. It consisted of tea, biscuit, butter, cheese, sliced ham, cold
tongue, and a few cold sausages. The Captain took his seat, and
looked at them as if they were all laughing at him, and then fell to
work upon them, as if he were fighting them for their rudeness.
“What clothes shall I put up for you, husband?” said Mrs. Thompson,
tenderly.
“I reckon you'd best put up all I've got, for I expect to wear them
all out before I find Tom, and get him safely home again. It will be
at the very least, four days before this can be accomplished. Upon
this hint the good lady stocked him for a week.
After supper, the Captain shaved, went to the stable to see that
old Roan was in travelling order, returned, handed the letters to his
wife, and went to bed. The letters were all left open, from which
the wife understood prefectly, that her duty concerning them was to
be learned from their contents.
And now having put the Captain quietly to bed, we beg leave to
indulge in a few reflections upon his conduct towards his sister and
wife. We can find it in our heart to palliate, if not wholly excuse
his gusts of temper before his lovely sister. The heat of his mind
would not cool, even in cooling time. But how can we justify him,
in a direct issue between them upon the capacity of the negro race
generally, and of Tom, in particular, for ascribing his blunder wholly
to stupidity, when he knew and must have remembered, that negro
stupidity had nothing to do with it! It was the result, as the
reader has seen, of a symbolical delusion (if we may be allowed the
expression) and not of mental imbecility. It was not in keeping
with the Captain's usual candor to suppress this important fact.
Nor can we find a single apology for the Captain's long protracted
crustiness to his wife. He had relieved himself at his sister's of his
redundant steam, there was nothing to raise it again on his way
home, her playful “fishing” frolic was certainly no offence, and her
and kindness. But so it is with these “lords of creation;”
they must not only be allowed to become furious, but they must be
allowed to spend their wrath upon the dearest object they have on
earth. Is it likely that women will continue to marry if such eonduct
be persisted in? And what is to become of the world when
they cease to marry?
Having made no allowance for the six or eight miles that he had
lost on the Augusta road, Tom concluded, at the end of seventeen
miles from home that he must not be far distant from John Smith's;
and that he might not pass his stopping place from ignorance of its
location, he determined to keep himself well advised of his approaches
to it, from such travellers as he might meet. His mind
was no sooner made up to seek light, than an opportunity was afforded
him in the person of one who entered his road but a few
yards ahead of him.
“Master,” said he to the stranger, “how far is it to Mr.
Smith's?”
“Which Smith?”
“John Smith.”
“Parson John Smith?”
“Well, I reckon he's a Parson, for Mis'ess is a mighty good
Christian, and she told me I must be sure to stay at his house to-night,
any how, day or night.”
“That's the road to Parson Smith's,” said the traveller, pointing
to the road he had just left. “It's just three miles to his house.”
Tom took the road and went on his way rejoicing. He soon
reached the Parson's, and without introduction, or question, to the
good man, he commenced ungearing. Mr. Smith, noticing him from
his window, walked out and asked him what he was doing.
“Ain't this Parson Smith's?” enquired Tom.
“Yes.”
“Mis'ess told me I must stay here any how, no matter what time
I got here.”
“Who is your Mistress, my boy?”
“Mrs. Mitten—mighty good woman.”
“I don't know her—I reckon there's some mistake—Have you
any paper?”
“Yes sir,” said Tom, handing his pass.
The Parson read it, and said, “Tommy, my boy you've come out
right on the road you left, just this side of Washington.”
“Emp-e-e-e-eh! How far is it Master?”
“Why, if you go back to the Washington road it is about fourteen
miles, but if you'll take that road that turns around the horse
lot, you will save near two miles.” Tom took it, fell again into the
Washington road and reached Smith's an hour or two in the night.
The next morning the Captain and Tom had au even start; they
both left their respective stations as soon as they could see to drive.
As it was next to impossible for Tom to miss his way after being set
right by Houghton, until he passed little River, the Captain made
no inquiries for him up to this point, but employed himself in a
close look-out for the tracks of the cart wheels, and of old Ball.
Every now and then he would espy traces of a two wheeled vehicle,
drawn by a new-shod horse, which he felt pretty sure was the equipage
he was in pursuit of; but still he was far from certainty upon
this head. He stopped at the first house he came to after he passed
the river, and enquired whether a negro, driving a large bald-faced
sorrel, in a blue cart, with two boxes in it, had passed that way.
“Yes,” said the man whom he accosted, “I met him yesterday at
the forks of the road up here, axing for Parson Smith's, and I put
him in the road to the Parson's.”
“Parson Smith! who the devil made him a parson? A month
or two ago, he was one of the profanest men I ever saw.”
“You don't know the man, sir. Brother Smith is one of the most
religiousist men in all this country.”
“What! John Smith, just this side of Washington?”
“Oh no, not him! Parson Smith, who lives over here by Bethesda
Meeting House.”
Here the Captain, contrary to his habit, let fall a very bad word
against Tom, and proceeded:
“What could have put it into the head of that addled-brained
goose to quit the plain beaten road and run off into by-ways to hunt
up Parsons and Meeting-houses!”
“Stranger, I don't know but that I am to blame for that. He
axed for John Smith; I axed him if he meant Parson John Smith;
and he said he reckoned he was a Parson, for his Mistress was a
mighty good woman, and told him he must stay all night—”
“Well, please direct me the way to Parson Smith's.”
“Stranger, I hope you won't think hard of me—”
“Oh, no sir, no! I don't blame you the least in the world. Direct
hurry.”
“I'm mighty sorry if I turned him out of the way; but he axed
me—”
“I give you my word and honor I don't blame you at all—but I
shall blame you if you don't tell me the way to Smith's as you did
the negro.”
“Oh, yes, well I will with a great deal of pleasure. Go on till
you pass a little old field to your left, and you'll come to a road winding
round the fur edge of it; take that, and it will lead you straight
to Parson Smith's.”
As the Captain turned off, the other continued:
“Stop one minute stranger!”
The Captain stopped.
“Have you ever thought, stranger, of the sin of profane swearing?”
“Yes,” said the Captain, cutting up old Roan. “I never do it
unless I am very angry.”
The Captain had no difficulty in finding the road to Parson
Smith's, but he had great difficulty in solving a mystery which presented
itself to him as soon as he reached it. As the road was but
little traveled, the tracks of the cart wheels and of old Bald remained
entirely unobliterated. They proved to be the same that he
had caught glimpses of on the way, and supposed to be Tom's tracing;
but while they showed plainly that he had gone to the Parson's,
there was no sign that he had returned to the direct road from
the Parson's. This perplexed him seriously, and made him wonder
whether Tom had not gone to a camp meeting with the Parson.
There was no alternative, so he determined to go to the Parson's
even at the hazard of getting a more serious lecture from him than
he had already received from one of his flock. He soon reached
the house, and saw a lady standing in the door. He called to her to
know “whether Parson John Smith lived there?” The lady looked
at him intently, but gave him no answer. He repeated the question,
but still received no response. “Why what upon earth does the
woman mean?” muttered he. “If there was a fatal disease on this
earth called `The Woman,' I should die of it, to a dead certainty.”
At length the kind woman broke silence:
“Light and come in, and warm yourself.”
“No, I thank you, madam, I am not cold, and am in a great hurry.
Did a negro man stop here with a cart and a blaze-faced horse,
yesterday?”
The lady made no answer, but advanced slowly towards him. Coming
near the chaise she said: “You'll have to speak a little loud to
me; I'm a little hard of hearing.”
“Is this Parson Smith's?” asked the Captain in a pretty loud
tone.
“Yes, sir.”
“Where is he?”
“He's at the pig pen, sp— 'tending to his pigs.”
“Did a negro man and blaze-faced horse stop here yesterday?”
“You'll have to speak a little loud to me; I'm a little hard of
hearing.”
The Captain repeated the question louder.
“I think he did.”
“Which way did he go?”
“Sir?”
“Which-way did-the-negro-boy-go?” balwed the Captain to the
top of his voice.
“Well, I'm not so deaf as all that comes to—I think he went
round the lot there.”
The Captain wheeled off, soon struck the trail, and “opened on
it” loudly.
At the true John Smith's, he learned the history of Tom for the
preceding night. Smith told him that he had given Tom such directions
as would carry him on his way through Washington.
The Captain pushed on through the village, struck the trail on the
Petersburg road, followed it for two miles, and stopped for the night
at Mr. Brown's. Brown told him that Tom had passed there early
on the preceding morning, and that this was all the information he
could give of him, except that he seemed to be getting along very
well. A little after night-fall another gentleman stopped at Brown's,
whom the landlord greeted with all the cordiality of intimate friendship,
under the name of Col. White. “Here's a man,” said Brown,
“who can probably tell you something about your boy; he lives
right on the road about five miles this side of Petersburg. “A
boy,” continued Brown to White, “in a cart, with a balled sorrell
in it.”
“Oh yes,” said White, “he stopped at my house and enquired
for `the Hobot,' but I understood him and put him in the road to
Rehoboth.”
At Col. White's Tom was much nearer to Doctor Waddel's than
he was to “the Hobot;” but he had promised “to go like a streak
of lightning,” and he was verifying his pledge.
As his game had “doubled,” the Captain determined to quit the
trail and push directly for Rehoboth. By this movement he had
gained greatly upon Tom; but not enough to overtake him that day.
We will not detain the reader with further particulars of the chaise,
suffice it to say that about two hours by sun on the third day, in a
rugged by-way, about two hundred yards from the highway leading
from Augusta to Barkesdale's Ferry, and about three miles from the
ferry, he came up with Tom under very interesting circumstances.
On a washed hill side, Tom, as a classic reader is reported to have
said, “in trying to avoid Skilly he had rushed upon Caribogus”—
or (leaving the classics) in trying to avoid a deep gully on the one
hand he had run over a log on the other; and though he did not
quite upset his cart, he tilted it far enough to pour out both boxes
in the gully. The top of one of the boxes was so far opened by the
fall, that it discharged four biscuits and two crackers in the gully.
The top of the other burst entirely off, and the tumblers of preserves
were broken, having delivered a part of their contents to the
top of the box, part to the package, part to the road, and having retained
a part. As the biscuit and crackers were too dirty to be replaced,
as the jelly and jam were irretrievably lost to William, and
as Tom, from fatigue and long fasting, was very hungry, he rightly
conceived that he could make no better use of them than to eat
them. As well as he could with a biscuit, he cleaned the package,
then the board, (which happened to rest bottom upward) then skimmed
the top off what was on the ground, and topped off with what
was left in the tumblers. As he did not observe the rule of proportion
in eating, his biscuit and crackers gave out before he had dispatched
the last tumbler, and he was just wiping it out with his fore-finger,
and sucking it, when the Captain came up with him.
“Lor gor' a' mighty, Mas David!” exclaimed Tom, as the Captain
approached him, “I never was so glad to see anybody in all my
born days. These people 'bout here been 'foolin' me all day long—”
“How did you get here, you wooly-headed scoundrel?”
“One man told me I'd save three miles by comin' this way.”
As the Captain got to saying bad words again early in the interview,
notwithstanding; the lecture he had received, and as what
farther passed between him and Tom was of little interest, we omit it.
They were now but about six miles from Willington and the Captain,
very reluctantly, concluded to pilot Tom himself for the remainder
of the way. The idea of appearing at Willington, with a cart load
of provisions for his nephew, was very annoying; but the thought
was still more annoying; so he chose the least painful alternative.
Things were righted, and the two set out for the ferry. They
reached it and found a wagon waiting the return of the flat from the
South Carolina side. His heart leaped at this good fortune, for he
knew that the wagon could hardly cross without going through Willington.
He was not disappointed. The wagoner lived but five
miles from Willington, was going through it, and knew everybody
who lived within six miles of it. The Captain took his name, placed
the boxes and Mrs. Mitten's letter in his charge, offered to pay
freight, but the wagoner would receive nothing, placed Tom's unexpended
cash (seven dollars) in his hands for William, dropped a
line in pencil to Newby explaining things, and set his face homeward
rejoicing. Nothing of interest occurred on the way back.
The Captain's good fortune prepared him for receiving Tom's account
of his adventures which were wonderful indeed, and which Tom
never got done recounting during his life. The moral of it, as drawn
by himself, may perchance be of service to the reader: “If I had
forty thousand niggers, I'd never sen' one so far from home by
he'self 'less he know de road firs' chop.”
The Captain reached home early on the fifth day from his departure.
He gave the particulars of his trip to his wife and sister by
snatches, as he happened to be in the humor, until they were all
told. The fate of the jelly and jam was very provoking to Mrs.
Mitten who was “sure if she had been there, she could have saved
some of it.” The Captain was too busy to visit the public square
for more than a week after his return; and his visits were very brief
for more than a fortnight. But Tom became for a long while a distinguished
character on the square.
| CHAPTER XIV. Master William Mitten, or, A youth of brilliant talents, who was ruined by bad luck | |