University of Virginia Library

3. CHAPTER III.
OUTSTRIPPED IN THE RACE.

Diedrich Stein was getting old — if that could be
said with truth of a man who was old at thirty, and had
been growing younger ever since. Not that he had
gone back to the days of innocence, or sunk into the
imbecility of second childhood, but in all those things
which make a man active, prompt, and efficient, Stein's
faculties were in their prime. Every year had made his
features sharper, his eyes more deeply sunken, his frame
more emaciated; but every year had served also to
sharpen and intensify the inner man, until the sluggish,
unsocial youth had ripened into the ubiquitous, mercurial
little despot, whose eye, voice, and hand were, like
every thing else in his household, the servants of his will.
To look sharp, move quick, speak often and to the
purpose, were not the promptings of his nature, but they
were the necessities of his business. Diedrich understood
his business, overcame his nature, and through
force of habit became a new man. In his small sphere
and countrified fashion, he was an autocrat, a diplomatist,
almost a courtier.

“Glad to see you, farmer!” was his salutation to
Rycker. “You're too late for the races, but just in
season for the ball. Your good woman has been warming
her feet at the fire up stairs for a half hour or more.
If you're for something hot, one o' the gals will wait
on you at the bar.” “Off, Mr. Winn? You start
early — but you carry weight, eh?” he exclaimed,
addressing a young man in riding boots, and with a
long whip in his hand, who had just appeared in the
doorway. “I'll join you presently, Rycker” — spoken
over his shoulder to the farmer, who looked shy and
sheepish in the presence of the city gentry. “Some
o' my guests just going — make yourself at home!”
“You're lucky on the course” — with a congratulatory
nod to Mr. Winn; “always are — runs in some families,
you knew.” “You for town, too, Mr. Cipher?” —
to a still younger man, with a crest-fallen countenance.
“I thought, perhaps, you'd stay a while, and join the
juveniles in a dance.”

“Dance! What, I?” responded young Cipher, with
an oath which seemed too big for his mouth, and so only
half escaped.

“O, you're not quite up to it? Is that it, my boy?
Your mind's running on your nag's broken knees. Never
fear; he'll be all right in a week or two; just leave him
in my stable; we'll fetch him round. That was an ugly
stumble, but you must try him again one o' these days.
Fortin's wheel 's always going round, — remember that;
it will be your turn to be uppermost next time.”

Here a sudden slap on Stein's shoulder caused him
to turn quickly. “Stein, old fellow,” exclaimed the
jocular voice of a red-faced man, who had given the
blow, “Ned Knuckle's in for a supper — Thursday of
next week — that's the date! The best the market
affords — that's the bill o' fare! Supper for twelve,
and Ned Knuckle foots the bill.”

“What does Stein care who foots the bill?” cried
Ned Knuckle, emerging from the bar-room with an
unsteady gait, and a cigar in his mouth. “What
matter is it to Stein, so long 's it brings grist to his
mill?”

This remark was received with a laugh by a group
of men who followed Knuckle into the hall.

“Stein hasn't any favorites!” cried one.

“He spiles all his boys,” said another.

“Makes no excep-ep-tions, and shows no p-p-partialities,”
hiccoughed a third.

“Only when he tips a wink to a customer,” interrupted
the red-faced man.

“And makes or breaks a bargain,” growled a disappointed
jockey.

Shouts, winks, and horse-laughs accompanied and
echoed these little insinuations. Stein laughed too, a
mechanical laugh of his, which chimed in equally well
with genuine mirth, drunken mirth, mirth of which he
himself was the subject. He had the discretion, however,
to deprive his guests of their butt by stepping
outside the doorway, where, standing with his hands

behind his back, he watched, or facilitated, the departure
of one after another who was in haste to be off.

“Fine evening, cap'n!” he remarked to a young
man who was walking slowly up and down a little
wooden platform that stretched across the front of the
tavern. The young man, who had seemed abstracted
and lost in reflection paused on being thus addressed.
“Yes, a very fine evening, landlord.” Then, as if
rousing himself for the first time to an observation of
the scene around him, he added, “Many of your
guests seem to be leaving, Mr. Stein? Driving back
to the city, I suppose.”

“Yes, the folks keep us pretty busy just about nightfall
— what with going and coming both. How's your
arm to-night, sir?” and Stein glanced at the young
man's arm, which was suspended in a sling.

“Better, thank you — a little weak, that's all. The
wound has healed entirely. I only wear the sling now
when I am out of doors, as an additional protection
from the cold.”

“That's good,” replied the landlord. “The country
air suits you, sir; you've picked up wonderfully since
you've done me the honor to put up at my house.”

“Yes, the climate and the accommodations have both
suited me. You've made me very comfortable, Mr.
Stein.”

This was complimentary — so much so that the landlord
bowed, as became him, and said a few words about
having done his best. The young man had the easy air

of one who feels quite at home. Still it was only necessary
to watch Stein's manner towards him to be convinced
that this guest at the tavern was looked upon as
a distinguished personage. He talked familiarly enough
with the landlord, questioning him with a listless sort
of interest concerning local matters, especially the races;
but he had the stylish air of a man of the world, and
Stein's obsequious manner was unmistakable. The
stranger's presence, too, seemed to exert an imposing effect
upon the bystanders. The country people stared at him
with mingled curiosity and awe, and the ambitious city
blades who had chanced to exchange a few words with
him on the race-course, or in the bar-room, which was
the general lounging place of the town guests, evidently
courted his further notice; but the former he seemed
quite unconscious of, and although he returned the salutations
of the latter, it was with a glance of surprise,
or a good-humored condescension, which were more
calculated to disconcert than to encourage. Only professed
jockeys had the impudence to assume an air of
intimacy in bidding him good night, and his careless
response was so much in the same tone in which he
would have addressed his horse, that only a jockey could
be flattered by it.

He sauntered up and down the platform a few times
after his short conversation with Stein, tapping his boots
somewhat affectedly with his bamboo stick, then paused
again in the open doorway, towards which the landlord
was backing, accompanying the action with a succession

of bows and scrapes to Ned Knuckle and his party, who
were just driving off. “It is growing cold, Mr. Stein,
very cold,” said the young man, slightly shivering and
buttoning up his coat; — it was a military coat, and
looked more military still as he buttoned it up tight.

“Good night! you, cap'n; you!” shouted Ned
Knuckle, in drunken recklessness of military and aristocratic
prerogative.

The captain gave the party very much such a glance
as a naturalist might bestow upon poor specimens of a
familiar species of insect. “Hurrah for Ameriky!”
shouted Ned, and the captain turned away in apparent
disgust.

“Cold, Cap'n Josselyn, did you say?” said Stein, as
anxiously as if it were his duty to apologize for the
weather. “True, it is very cold.”

“Is the fire lit in my room, Mr. Stein?”

“Fire — lit? Well, no, I'm afraid not. We'll have
it done in a twinkling. Tea there, cap'n?”

“Yes.”

“In half an hour, say?”

“As soon as convenient.”

“Have it immediately, sir;” and Stein bustled out in
the direction of the kitchen, while Captain Josselyn walked
up stairs to his room, scattering to the right and left,
as he did so, a flock of young things who had settled
round the staircase and balusters, and who, as he came
up, fled to the bed-rooms or angles in the passage, not,
however, until his ears had been assailed by the flutter

of garments, and many a “Hush! — quick! There he
comes — that's the cap'n!” &c., accompanied by a
subdned giggle; and one voice predominating above the
rest, and saying, “Pooh! what are you afraid of?
If you only knew him, girls — why, he's as perlite as
he is handsome! Law, Cap'n Josselyn, I didn't know as
you was within hearin',” and Polly Stein, who had purposely
stood with her back to the stairs while her companions
fled, bolted round just in time to meet the
captain face to face at the head of the staircase.

“Ah! Miss Stein, you are all ready for the ball, I
see;” and the captain, with an air of gallantry, glanced
approvingly at her white dress and tea-colored shoes.

“Of course I am,” said Polly, with a toss of the head.
“I hope you mean to honor the ball with your presence,
Cap'n Josselyn?” She spoke with a bold familiarity
which astonished the other girls; but then she lived,
in the house, and knew him so well.

They heard him answer, “Certainly, Miss Stein, and
shall hope to enjoy a dance with you. Promise me
now.”

How polite he was, to be sure! How they all envied
her! and how triumphant she looked when she came
back after giving the promise!

The noise, excitement, and bustle that had prevailed
ever since noon in the neighborhood of Stein's Tavern
was now concentrated within doors. Only two men
lingered on the front platform after Stein and his guest
went in. The younger of these two had stood for some

minutes gloomily eying the captain. “Who is he, any
way?” he abruptly inquired of his companion, as the
slight military figure disappeared from view.

“They call him cap'n,” replied the party thus addressed,
— a coarse, clumsy fellow, with a dissipated countenance;
“but I guess that's somethin' of a stretcher.
He's only a lieutenant, if my information 's sound.”

“A lieutenant o' what?”

“Of His Majesty's roy'l navy.”

“A Britisher, then! and an enemy! I thought as
much.”

“A Britisher, Mr. George, but not an inemy. He's
laid by jest now, and can't fight. Besides, some folks
say as how peace is goin' to be declared soon, and then
we'll all be friends agin.”

“O, hang the peace!” growled Mr. George, “and
hang me if ever I'll be friends with such a puppy as that.
What's he doing here?”

“Kind of amusin' himself. He's a gintleman prisoner,
yer know, on a prowl, as they say, — leastways has
been. I believe he's been swapped off fur one of our
men lately, an' so's free to come an' go now.”

“Amusing himself at other folks' expense! Devil
take him!” muttered Mr. George. “Why don't he
go if he's going? He's too big to keep company with
Jersey folks. Why don't he take himself off?”

“P'raps he will,” said the man, “when he gets
through with his business in these parts.”

“Business!” retorted the angry youth. “Unless

he's got better business to do in the world than what
he's been turning his hand to here, I wish our commodore
had swung him up at the yard arm, instead of
bringing him into port. I'd like to give him a piece o'
my mind, Nick, in a hand to hand fight,” and the
speaker clinched his fist as he spoke.

“Why, Mr. Geordie,” said Nick, with an irritating
sort of laugh, “what great harm has the stranger done
to you?”

“Brought my mare into disgrace, for one thing,”
answered George, “though that ain't the chief grudge
I have against him neither,” he added in an under tone.

“Wal, now, 'bout your mare,” said Nick, in a conciliatory
way, “that was clear, sheer accident, wan't it?
—jest as much as my givin' my finger a devil of a jam
in a crack o' the barn door. Deuce take the plaguy
thing, how it smarts!” and the man, as he spoke, unwound
a dirty rag from the wounded member, examined
the festering wound, and bound it clumsily up again.”

“Accident! What? his presuming to mate a mean
yellow-legged brute against my Nancy?”

“No, not that; that was jest the cap'n's ignorance.
He's lived at sea, yer remember—what should he know
'bout hosses? But your Nancy's stoppin' short on the
course, an' takin' steps to the tune o' Yankee Doodle—
who'd a thought o' sich a thing as that?”

“I should,” responded George, promptly. “Didn't I
bring her up to it? It was one of her accomplishments.
How should I know somebody in the crowd would
whistle her off the course?”

“They did it, p'raps, by way o' cheerin' her on,”
intimated Nick. “It was showin' a preference for
Nancy over the Britisher's nag, but unfort'nately it
worked the other way.”

“Just my luck!” said George, despondently. “There's
always somebody stands ready to cheer me on to ruin.”

“'Cause you're so good-natured, Mr. George. You're
jest like Miss Nancy — ready to dance to every body's
tune.”

“Good-natured, am I?” questioned George, his boyish
features contracted by a fierce frown, which seemed
sufficiently to contradict Nick's assertion.

“Wal, not jest this minute,” replied Nick, with his
provoking laugh, and following the direction of George's
eyes, which were fixed on an object coming slowly
down the cross road. “You're dead set agin the
Englishman jest now. But the quarrel 's all on one side
fur 's I can see. He don't scowl on you partiklerly.”

“He? O, no! he's so tall he sees over my head.”
(Mr. George was six feet high, the captain a little
fellow.) “Besides he's too much taken up with himself
to have any time to spare for other folks. A peacock
strutting round don't mind how many grasshoppers he
treads on.”

“It's a fact,” said Nick, “he's mighty indifferent —
the most free an' easy chap ever I see. Lose or win
it's all the same to him; he don't care.”

“Then he'd better look out how he interferes with
them that do,” said George; and as he spoke he darted

forward, his gesture betraying a sudden recognition of
the object whose approach he had been watching.

It was an old-fashioned carryall — high, narrow, and
rocking to and fro on its springs like a ship in a heavy
sea. As it came within the circle of light which radiated
from the tavern windows, the polished lustre of the
door-handle, of the plated bar that formed a finish to the
dasher, and of the rings in the horse's harness, bespoke
the care bestowed upon the equipage; and though the
leather of the carriage-top was rusty brown, and the
horse old and blind of one eye, the former was free from
every spot of the red Jersey mud with which every other
carriage-top in the district was habitually encrusted, and
the latter, however much he might have loitered on the
road, had, as usual, sufficient spirit in reserve at the end
of his journey to dash up to the door in fine style. As
the arrival of this decrepit, but still genteel establishment,
never failed to produce a sensation, it was not strange
that Mr. George should dart forward, that the attentive
landlord should be on hand to welcome the occupants,
and that still a third parson, hearing the sound of the
wheels, should run down stairs to assist the party in
alighting.

Stein, bareheaded, and looking, in his loose-fitting
brown suit, very much like a crumpled autumn leaf,
stood bowing on the platform, before the small boy, who
officiated as coachman, could climb down and open the
carriage door.

“Welcome, very welcome, Mr. Cousin!” he said,

addressing a spry little gentleman in a powdered wig,
surmounted by a three-cornered beaver, who, as he
leaned forward and put his head out of the window to
give unintelligible directions to the boy concerning
the management of the rickety door-handle, contrived to
obscure whomever else the carriage might contain.
“You keep genteel hours, Mr. Cousin; but then you're
always genteel! — none the less welcome for being late,
though every body else has come, and we'd almost given
you up.”

Here Stein, whose sharp eyes had been peering diligently
into the carriage, caught sight of a bit of pink silk
hood, and announced his discovery in the words: “Ah,
Miss Angie, you're there, I see! I was beginning to
think we should need to light extra lamps if your bright
eyes were to be among the missing; but you've come
at last. The last drop 's always the sweetest, you
know;” and old Stein smacked his lips as if he were
thirsty, and had recognized in the pink hood something
to drink.

Here the carriage door unexpectedly flew open, compelling
the landlord to retreat a step or two, the little
old gentleman in the cocked hat fell back into his own
corner, — the farther corner, — and a figure wrapped in
an old-fashioned silk mandarin, topped by a jaunty little
hood, made a quick motion to alight. As she did so,
she found herself face to face with Mr. George, whose
manly form and bold movement, as he stepped up beside
the carriage, were in strange contrast with the timid,

beseeching look with which he met her eye. Before she
could respond to it, either by smile or frown, before she
could even trip down the steps (there was quite a little
staircase of them), all communication between herself
and Mr. George was intercepted. A light, active figure
had come between them; a civil “Excuse me, young
man! stand aside a little, if you please!” had effectually
disconcerted Mr. George; and with an adroit, but graceful
and courtly manner, the military stranger had caught
the young girl's hand and drawn it through his arm. At
the same time, although his other arm was a little stiff,
he had managed to render with it that aid and civility to
the old gentleman in the powdered wig, which is becoming
from youth to age, and had convoyed his daughter
within the doorway, whispering in her ear a well-turned
compliment. In a word, he had taken complete
possession of the prize, and, though a fresh actor in
the scene, had reduced all competitors to the rank of
supernumeraries. Of course she was immensely flattered.
It was such a tribute to her charms. To what
other girl in New Jersey would this young aristocrat
have shown such condescension? For a moment vanity
quite paralyzed every other emotion. What must Geordie
think at seeing her the object of so much gallantry?
was a natural query in this connection. She could not
resist giving one look to see how he took it.

He evidently took it hard. He was leaning against the
door-post, with his arms folded; the timid expression
was gone out of his face, his lips were set tight, his

attitude was dogged, and his eye dangerous. Some
girls would have been frightened at seeing him so moved,
but not Angie. She knew her power; there was coquetry
in her, and courage, so she took the offensive.

“What makes you look so cross, Geordie?” she found
time to say, as she passed him in the doorway.

There was no time for an answer, — a spoken answer
at least, — but he started, and glared fiercely at her, as a
mastiff might do when struck. She answered him with
a glance of scornful rebuke. He sunk under it, subdued,
as the faithful mastiff is subdued when he discovers that
it is a master's hand which has dealt the blow. Did I
say the girl knew her power? No, she only half knew
it. She knew she could anger; she believed she could
soothe him. She little suspected that while triumphing
over the man she was evoking the brute. She saw the
fire in his eye, and was proud of the heart she held in her
hand. Had she seen the poor fellow shrink mortified beneath
her scorn, she would have felt that there is something
degrading in a love that may be trampled on at will.

Geordie felt it. As he turned his back on the light,
and the mirth, and the woman he loved, and dashed
out in the direction of the cold, dark stable, he was less a
man than he had been a few moments before. Hate,
revenge, desperate resolve, all those evil passions that
degrade humanity, were rampant in him. His soul was
imbittered against the world, his fellow-men, his destiny;
but that was not the worst of it. He despised himself.
He had sunk one step lower in his own esteem. Scarce

caring where he went, he made for the stable, strolled
into an empty stall, and threw himself down on some
fresh hay. As he sat with his chin resting on his knees,
and listened to the breathing of some tired horses (his
own among the rest), who had spent their strength in
that day's race, and failed to win, the sum of his reflections
was, “Just such a poor beast am I.”