University of Virginia Library

10. CHAPTER X.

“I am decidedly one of the best-natured mortals
in existence,” said Horsey, when Vernon joined him
in the little area in front of the cottage, “but there is
something, Harry, in being knocked over, that would
turn the sweet milk sour in the best of bosoms. I bore
with this thing as patiently as possible while in the
presence of the women folk, but my gall has been
rising for the last half-hour, and I can stomach it no
longer. It must out, and nothing will help me,
Harry, but a clip or two at the muzzle of this same
Master Mabry. You must stand by, and see fair
play whilst I give him quits. Doubt not that I can
do it, Harry. `I have the back trick simply as
strong as any man in Illyria.”'

“It will make matters worse, Horsey. You
were wrong in pressing upon the girl at first. She
is something more than a child, and the customs of
our country—”

“I know all that, Harry, and had I not been a
sort of chicken under the wings, at one time, of the
good old clucking hen, her mother, I had, perhaps,

never thought of kissing the girl; though by the
divinity of Rosalind, there's justification enough in
the lips themselves for the rashness of my pursuit.
The guilt is equal between the tempter and the
tempted. She who pouts a pretty mouth under
one's nose can no more blame a body for snatching
a civil kiss from the offender, than you can blame a
hawk for stooping down upon a plump partridge
that runs too freely from under the briars, and
tempts the appetite it is yet unwilling to satisfy.”

“You are supported in this notion,” said Vernon,
with a smile, “by an authority no less moral than
that of Dr. Johnson, who says that if you tempt a
man you do him an injury, and if you overcome him
you share his guilt. His view is also sustained by
the decision of an English justice, who once committed
the master to prison for laying money in the
servant's way, and at the same time discharged the
servant who stole it.”

“'Gad, Harry, those were wise fellows. If I had
known so much could be said in my favour, I had
not stopped short at a single kiss. That man, Johnson,
didn't he once write a play?”

“Yes,—a tragedy—”

“I'll read it—a devilish clever sort of fellow. A
fellow that knows so well how to justify a kiss, must
have made a very amorous piece of business of it.
Wasn't it so, Harry?”

“Nay,—quite the contrary, I believe. The play
was rather a cold performance,—the author was a
phlegmatic. It does not follow, you know, that a
good judge is a good performer; and to kiss a pretty
woman is a movement of one's blood rather than
his thought—an instinct, not a reflection. But—to
return to our subject. You can gain but a paltry
satisfaction, Mr. Horsey, by punishing this young
man; and I should say, judging from mere appearances,

that he is too stout for you. He has more
brawn and muscle, and though not so tall is a much
heavier man.”

“You shall see, Harry. I have what he has not.
I have the trick of fence, and I have played long
enough with muffles to venture a little upon the bare
mutton. The stage is no bad school for acquiring
agility of motion in foot and fist—a keen eye and
sudden thrust makes me more than a match for this
pudding-headed fellow, as I shall convince him no
less than yourself, when I have laid eyes on him for
awhile. Here is the path which I saw through the
window. They made for yonder thicket, where, I
reckon, we shall find them.”

“I will stand by you,” said Vernon, with recovered
gravity, “and see yo through with this
business, but while we keep together, Mr. Horsey, I
trust, for my sake, you will provoke no more difficulties.
I have some right to expostulate with you,
I think, as you have constituted yourself my companion,
not merely without my desire, but against
my wish. My objects in this country are such as
might suffer material detriment from any collision
with the people.”

“Pshaw, Harry, my dear boy, `still harping on
my daughter,' still at thy old `humours;”' replied
the unthinking fellow. “It won't do, I tell you. Our
objects are the same, though the range of character
may be somewhat different; as I confess myself to
be somewhat erratic, and a jump from Romeo to
Dogberry has been a folly of mine more than once
already. When you see me resolved, head and
heels, to go on with you `to the last gasp with truth
and loyalty,' why, what the devil's the use of shamming
any longer? You can't get rid of me, do what
you will, unless, as I told you before, you put a bullet

through my brains, and that were only to scatter
them worse than ever, without doing me or yourself
any great service. Be generous, man—do as I have
done, make a clear bosom of it, and we will down
upon little Tilton with a concerted plan of operations
which shall make the rascal stare. We can
do as we please then with all the arrangements—
get our own terms, declare our own casts, and—
By the way, Harry, you have not seen my dress in
Hal. You shall see it to-morrow—you shall see me
in it `rise from the ground like feathered Mercury'—
made a d—d ugly hole in dad's crop to pay for that
dress, I tell you. What would the old fellow say,
were I to count up to him the cost of stars and
spangles, beaver, crosses, images and plumes, in
cotton bags. Ha! ha! I think I see him now, his
game leg in air, his sound one thundering on the
floor, his eyes shooting out from their spheres, red
and fiery, and his voice hoarse and choking, still
resolute to roar the anathema, which sticks in his
throat, at last, more rigidly than a better sentiment
in that of Macbeth. Oh, Harry, what a scene!—
But hold!—Here's our enemy.”

A bright moon helped the progress of the several
parties. Yarbers and young Mabry stood in a
small open space among a clump of pines apparently
in earnest conversation, as the two approached
them. Mabry held his horse by the bridle, one
foot already in the stirrup, as if, the important matters
of which they spoke being fairly discussed, he
lingered only for a parting word. That they were
seriously engaged was likely enough, since they

neither saw nor heard the approach of the two
strangers, till they had already passed into the same
opening with themselves. It was then that Mabry,
as if apprehending the object of his enemy, or, as
was more probable, desiring an opportunity to
renew a conflict in which his success had been so
unequivocal already, withdrew his foot from the
stirrup, and once more threw the bridle from his
steed's neck over the stunted sapling which had before
confined him. This done, he kept his place
where the eyes of the two had first encountered
him, while Yarbers, with some agitation of manner,
advanced and addressed them.

“A fine evening, gentlemen,—fine for a walk,
and—”

“Ay, or for any other purpose which needs a
cool temperature and a clear sky;” was the ready
answer of Horsey, who, at the same time passing by
Yarbers, continued his speech to his companion—
“I am glad this clear moon has helped me to find
you, young un, since I should not have slept so
comfortably with the thought of being your involuntary
debtor. I bear, sir, some tokens of your favour
on my cheek. I am not willing that you should go
unrequited. Do you understand me, sir?”

This apostrophe did not seem at all ungrateful to
the rustic, who had rather hoped than expected so
early an opportunity to renew his punishment of an
offence which he had shown himself so unwilling to
tolerate, and which had been repeated so audaciously
before his eyes. That he could punish the
impudent stranger, he had no sort of doubt. His
own physical prowess had been generally acknowledged
among the young Spartans of the neighbourhood,
and the sudden and easy overthrow of
Horsey by his single blow, but a little while before,
and the good-natured forbearance of the latter immediately

after, had given him but a mean idea as
well of the courage as of the strength of his opponent.
That Horsey should, with open eyes and
cool deliberation, come once more within his
clutches, was no less satisfactory than surprising;
and boldly confronting him, he answered his salutation
in language that left little possibility of a reconciliation
being effected by either of the bystanders,
both of whom attempted a consummation which
was so proper and desirable. Yarbers strove with
Mabry, and Vernon, though to a far more moderate
extent, with Horsey. He knew that the popular
sentiment made the course of Horsey one of retributive
justice only, and his first overtures being
unsuccessful, he forebore renewing them, and patiently
waited in silence the progress of events.
Yarbers, also, after a while, gave up, as useless, the
effort to mollify the champion on his side of the hill,
and the parties at length stood fitted, both ready and
anxious, to “feed fat the ancient grudge.”

Nothing surely could have been more curious than
the difference of mood which the two exhibited while
in this position. Mabry, at first, like a young bull
simply bent on mischief, approached his enemy with
slow steps, his rising temper indicated only by occasional
sudden jerks of the head, and a slight fitful
stamping of the feet. A muttered growl escaped
his lips at intervals, and his fists were clenched
and opened alternately—his long fingers, the nails
of which were quite as threatening as any other
premonitory symptom of danger, being sometimes
thrust upward, as if, of themselves, anxious to rend
from their sockets the eyes of all who beheld them
with hostility. Vernon regarded this threat as so
unequivocal that he interposed, and insisted upon
“an up-and-down, straight fight, fist, head and feet,
but no gouging—no rough-and-tumble;” but this

was to deprive the enemy of one of his most
favourite weapons, and that which he meditated to
use with more malignant efficiency in this strife
than any other.

“I fight as I please—according to my own fashion
—and let him do the same,” replied Mabry. “If
he's afraid of my fingers let him say so, and I'll let
him off.”

“Afraid of your fingers, you catamount!” exclaimed
the actor with contemptuous scorn, and a
coolness that was really edifying; “use tooth and
nail, my good fellow, if you please, or if you can.
Don't trouble yourself, Harry, about me,—'egad I'll
swallow him, claws and all, though his scales were
as rough and large as those of the biggest alligator
that ever picked his teeth with a cypress on the
banks of Pontchartrain.”

“You will, will you?” cried the other, the foam
gathering about his mouth, his teeth gnashing with
rage, and his whole body in motion, like that of the
bull, whose gradually accumulating fury, moves it
from petty mischief to a destroving madness. He
bounded from the earth, ran round his enemy, slapping
his thighs with his hands the while, in the most
savage fashion, and at length, with a whooping shriek,
imitated from that of some wild beast of the forest,
he threw a summerset, his feet aiming to strike the
breast of the actor, who followed all his movements
with eyes and hands in constant readiness. The
preliminaries of Mabry had warned Horsey of the
mode in which his attack was likely to begin, and
for which he prepared himself. It must not be forgotten
that Horsey was Yorkshire too—that is to
say, he was quite as well accomplished in the arts of
the forest-fighter as was his opponent—with the additional
advantage of knowing other arts which were
even of more avail in such warfare as the present.

The heels of Mabry were no sooner in the air, than
the actor, sinking on his knees, removed the mark
which they were meant to strike; but, rising the
moment after, he sprang to the spot where the other
had alighted, and dealt him a blow between the
eyes which gave him an apparition of the four
moons of Jupiter, with a very fine display of crossfires
playing in the centre, such as never yet blessed
the vision of Herschel or Dick. This tumbled him
over for an instant; but, nothing daunted, though
confounded, he renewed his attack in a different
form, and with a caution which had been more advantageously
exercised in the first instance. The
actor, no ways elated, but seeming to regard the
proceeding so far, as one which had been the result
of the plainest calculation, calmly approached his
enemy, speaking as he did so, apologetically, as it
were, to the two spectators for continuing the fight.

“Blow for blow is quite enough in all ordinary
cases; but this fellow tumbled me unawares, and in
the presence of the women, and, by the valour of
Orlando, he shall have another fall, ere our accounts
balance. This I have sworn to, Harry,—as firm an
oath as if I had pressed my lips on the pocket
Shakspeare. I will give the lad a lesson which he
will remember whenever he has occasion to take
his measure by that of mother earth. Are you
ready, young un?”

Once more they stood before each other,—the
language of superiority which Horsey employed,
goading his rustic opponent to a degree of ferocity
which made him forget his hurts; and conscious of
his superior strength, he rushed in upon the actor,
employing no art, and only seeking to come to the
close hug—the grapple of sinews—in which lay his
chief and only hope. But Horsey had no disposition
to gratify him in this desire. He well knew

the danger to him of such an issue. Once closed
with, his “cunning of fence” would avail him nothing;
and once down, his eyes had no farther security
against the long claws which had already
been stretched out to pluck them forth. It was fortunate,
perhaps, that the rage of his enemy deprived
him of his deliberation. His blind attack was not
dangerous. His approach was met with cool, keen-eyed
determination—a characteristic in which Vernon
never could have conceived his companion to
have been so strong. Talking all the while, and
quoting as much Shakspeare as ever, he parried the
blows of the rustic, for awhile utterly forbearing to
put in any of his own. At length, as if he had
yielded a sufficiently fair time to his opponent's
play, he exclaimed—

“Now, sir, is my turn. I will close up your eyes,
without putting you to sleep; though, let me tell
you, it would be very easy for me to do that too.”

“I don't fear you, d—n you—I'll down you yet!”
roared the other in a rage of fury that increased
with every failure of his own efforts.

“Your right eye first!” said the actor, answering
this ebullition at the same moment with word and
blow; “and now your left!”

Both blows took effect, in spite of the desperate
efforts of the victim to defend himself, and he lay at
the feet of his foe almost without motion. Yarbers
assisted him to rise, but he was in no condition for
farther conflict. Blinded and staggering he stood,
and still his lips breathed nothing but defiance.

“The fellow's game,” said Horsey. The voice,
the words, roused the instinct of hate anew in the
vanquished man, and he struggled in the arms of
Yarbers to rush once more upon his foe. Restrained
in this, his hand suddenly plucked a spring-knife
from his bosom, the blade of which was

instantly shot out, and, but for the timely grasp of
Vernon, he had sheathed it in the body of the man
who held him. The weapon, spite of his struggles,
was taken from him, and a stupor which followed,
seemed to possess his mind and body with equal
apathy. He murmured incoherently while it lasted,
his words consisting mostly of bitter denunciation,
which, to the surprise of the two travellers, seemed
chiefly to fall upon Yarbers.

“Your villains, John Yarbers—you would shut
my mouth up—wouldn't have me tell what I know—
and have made your villains do this. But I will
speak—I'll write it down—I'll declare your roguery
to all Madison. They shall know who—”

“He raves!” exclaimed Yarbers in no little agitation;
“you've beat all the sense out of him, Mr.
Horsey, and he don't know what he says. But
don't you mind him. Go home at once. Bess is
waiting supper for you by this time, and there's no
need that you should wait. I'll tend to him, and see
him carried home.”

“I'm truly sorry I had to thump him so hard,
Harry,” said Horsey apologetically to his companion,
as they took their way back to the cottage,
“but I had sworn it, you know, and couldn't so well
get off. Besides, it's absolutely necessary now and
then to make an example of these fellows. They
rely on superior strength to be insolent, and nothing
would have pleased this chap so much as carrying
home my eyes as a trophy. Years hence he would
have a history for Dick Jenkins, and Jim Dobbins,
and Peter Pinchback and a dozen others, of the
dandy from below that he met at Yarbers' house,
and `how he caught,”'—imitating the patois of the
country—“`how he caught the chap mighty soptious
with the gal, and how he gin him the cross-buttock,
and, before he could say Jack Robinson, had a

finger in his shock and a thumb in his eye, and sent
him off with the blind-staggers and two holes in his
forehead that could make no use of specks, though
he was mighty glad to wear them;' and then, to
prove the truth of what he said, he would bring
forth a bottle of eyes preserved in whisky—my
eyes with fifty others, the Tom's, Dick's, and
Harry's, the Ned's, Ben's and Peter's, the Billy's
and Timothy's, that have been the heroes of the
barbacue and gin-shop from time immemorial—all
in attestation of the superior excellence of the
claws that plucked them out. The eyes of Tom
Horsey preserved in whisky! Whew! The thought
makes me shudder again. Eyes, Harry Vernon,
are absolutely necessary to an actor.”

“Keep yours about you as a traveller. You have
made an enemy of this youth, who will not forget
you. We travel in a wild region, and the securities
are few for life and limb. A man may be tumbled in
these swamps, and the wildcat alone will find out
his hiding-place. You, who have no sort of reason
to be in this neighbourhood, cannot too soon take
yourself out of it.”

“To-morrow, Harry—you would not have me
set off to-night?”

“No—to-morrow will be time enough. Return
to Raymond, set yourself in safety and your father's
mind at rest.”

“`Ha! ha, boy! Say'st thou so? Art thou there,
truepenny?' Now hear me, Harry Percy, I look on
it that you fear me—I hold thee jealous of my attributes,
my attitudes, my carriage, my certain something,
which, being peculiar to the individual man,
is vulgarly called genius. I will outshine thee before
Jim Tilton—outdo thee—take the rag off the
bush in Benton; and leave thee `the mere lees to
brag of.' You give me counsel but no confidence,—

why should I keep terms with thee? Urge me again
upon this matter, and I declare against thee. Thou
shalt know me as a rival rather than an ally; and I
will foil all thy best points with my own. Look to
it, Harry,—the gall rises within me.”

Vernon regarded the speaker with mixed feelings
of pity and vexation. But the monomania was too
strong to be overcome by argument, or resisted by
any thing short of violence—a measure to which,
as there was no present necessity to rid himself of
his companion, there was no occasion to resort.
Suppressing, therefore, some stern expressions which
had risen to his lips, he suffered the other to chuckle
in the prospect of his theatrical superiority, inly
consoling himself with the idea that before the close
of another day he should be rid of his thoughtless
but well-intentioned tormentor; and he, disabused of
the unhappy error which had probably, more than
any thing beside, seduced him from the home to
which he had only just returned. When they
reached the house, the actor resumed his random
and rhapsodical chit-chat with all around him, as if
nothing had happened either within or without to
discompose him for an instant. The hostess he reminded
of old times, and of a thousand practical
jokes which he had played, of which she herself
had been more than once the victim. With a fresh
memory he accompanied the vital requisites of narration,
lively comment, and felicitous gesture; and,
speaking with all the frank exuberance of boyhood,
which his playhouse habits had been rather calculated
to increase than diminish, he had the satisfaction
of seeing the blushing Mary watching and
listening with an attentiveness scarcely less sweet
and anxious than that of “the gentle lady wedded
to the Moor,”—her white neck stretched forward—
her head bent towards him—her lips slightly parted,

and in her eyes that glistering eagerness of gaze
which betrays mingled pleasure and curiosity. It
is more than probable that the likeness between his
own situation and that of Othello, forced itself upon
him when he made this discovery, for a moment
after, without any preface, he began half aloud to
mutter the fine description of the scene—

The summons to supper, twice, thrice repeated by
the hostess herself, scarcely succeeded in diverting
him from this theme and stopping him in the full
swell and torrent of his declamation. But the old
lady was already handling the coffee-pot, and there
was no time to finish the quotation; yet, as if to revenge
himself for the interruption, he seized the
hands of the damsel, who still sat, almost as inattentive
to ordinary matters as himself, and gently
pressing them the while, he conducted her to the
vacant seat beside his own at the table.