University of Virginia Library

3. CHAPTER III.
INTRODUCES A LEGAL PORCUPINE.

This was the voice of the Squire. It came just in time to
create a diversion.

“Why, there are my antlers!” cried the good-humored Squire.
“Look, Rushton! did you ever see finer?”

“Often,” growled a voice in reply; and the Squire and his
companion entered.

Mr. Rushton was a rough-looking gentleman of fifty or fifty-five,
with a grim expression about the compressed lips, and
heavy grey eyebrows, from beneath which rolled two dark
piercing eyes. His hair was slowly retreating, and thought or
care had furrowed his broad brow from temple to temple. He
was clad with the utmost rudeness, and resembled nothing so
much as a half-civilized bear.

He nodded curtly to Miss Lavinia, and took no notice whatever
of either Redbud or Verty.

“Why, thank for the antlers, Verty!” said the good-humored
Squire. “I saw Cloud, and knew you were here, but I had no
idea that you had brought me the horns.”

And the Squire extended his hand to Verty, who took it with
his old dreamy smile.

“I could have brought a common pair any day,” he said,
“but I promised the best, and there they are. “Oh, Squire!
said Verty, smiling, “what a chase I had! and what a fight with
him! He nearly had me under him once, and the antlers you
see there came near ploughing up my breast and letting out my

heart's blood! They just grazed—he tried to bite me—but I
had him by the horn with my left hand, and before a swallow
could flap his wings, my knife was in his throat!”

As Verty spoke, his eyes became brighter, his lips more smiling,
and pushing his tangled curls back from his face, he bestowed his
amiable glances even upon Miss Lavinia.

Mr. Rushton scowled.

“What do you mean by saying this barbarous fight was
pleasant?” he asked.

Verty smiled again:—he seemed to know Mr. Rushton well.

“It is my nature to love it,” he said, “just as white people
love books and papers.”

“What do you mean by white people?” growled Mr. Rushton,
“you know very well that you are white.”

“I?” said Verty.

“Yes, sir; no affectation: look in that mirror.

Verty looked.

“What do you see?”

“An Indian!” said Verty, laughing, and raising his shaggy
head.

“You see nothing of the sort,” said Mr. Rushton, with
asperity; “you see simply a white boy tanned—an Anglo-Saxon
turned into mahogany by wind and sun. There, sir! there,”
added Mr. Rushton, seeing Verty was about to reply, “don't
argue the question with me. I am sick of arguing, and won't
indulge you. Take this fine little lady here, and go and make
love to her—the Squire and myself have business.”

Then Mr. Rushton scowled upon the company generally, and
pushed them out of the room, so to speak, with his eyes; even
Miss Lavinia was forced to obey, and disappeared.

Five minutes afterwards, Verty might have been seen taking
his way back sadly, on his little animal, toward the hills, while
Redbud was undergoing that most disagreeable of all ceremonies,
a “lecture,” which lecture was delivered by Miss Lavinia, in her

own private apartment, with a solemnity, which caused Redbud
to class herself with the greatest criminals which the world had
ever produced. Miss Lavinia proved, conclusively, that all persons
of the male sex were uninterruptedly engaged in endeavoring
to espouse all persons of the female sex, and that the world,
generally, was a vale of tears, of scheming and deception. Having
elevated and cheered Redbud's spirits, by this profound
philosophy, and further enlivened her by declaring that she must
leave Apple Orehard on the morrow, Miss Lavinia descended.

She entered the dining-room where the Squire and Mr. Rushton
were talking, and took her seat near the window. Mr. Rushton
immediately became dumb.

Miss Lavinia said it was a fine day.

Mr. Rushton growled.

Miss Lavinia made one or two additional attempts to direct the
conversation on general topics; but the surly guest strangled her
incipient attempts with pitiless indifference. Finally, Miss
Lavinia sailed out of the room with stately dignity, and disappeared.

Mr. Rushton looked after her, smiling grimly.

“The fact is, Squire,” he said, “that your cousin, Miss
Lavinia, is a true woman. Hang it, can't a man come and talk
a little business with a neighbor without being intruded upon?
Outrageous!”

The Squire seemed to regard his guest's surliness with as little
attention as Verty had displayed.

“A true woman in other ways is she, Rushton,” he said, smiling—“I
grant you she is a little severe and prim, and fond of
taking her dignified portion of every conversation; but she's a
faithful and high-toned woman. You have seen too much
character in your Courts to judge of the kernel from the husk.”

“The devil take the Courts! I'm sick of 'em,” said Mr.
Rushton, with great fervor, “and as to character, there is no
character anywhere, or in anybody.”

Having enunciated which proposition, Mr. Rushton rose to go.

The Squire rose too, holding him by the button.

“I'd like to argue that point with you,” he said, laughing.
“Come now, tell me how—”

“I won't—I refuse—I will not argue.”

“Stay to dinner, then, and I promise not to wrangle.”

“No—I never stay to dinner! A pretty figure my docket
would cut, if I staid to your dinners and discussions! You've
got the deeds I came to see you about; my business is done; I'm
going back.”

“To that beautiful town of Winchester!” laughed the Squire,
following his grim guest out.

“Abominable place!” growled Rushton; “and that Roundjacket
is positively growing insupportable. I believe that fellow
has a mania on the subject of marrying, and he runs me nearly
crazy. Then, there's his confounded poem, which he persists in
reading to himself nearly aloud.”

“His poem?” asked the Squire.

“Yes, sir! his abominable, trashy, revolting poem, called—
`The Rise and Progress of the Certiorari.' The consequence of
all which, is—here's my horse; find the martingale, you black
cub!—the consequence is, that my office work is not done as it
should be, and I shall be compelled to get another clerk in addition
to that villain, Roundjacket.”

“Why not exchange with some one?”

“How?”

“Roundjacket going elsewhere—to Hall's, say.”

Mr. Rushton scowled.

“Because he is no common clerk; would not live elsewhere,
and because I can't get along without him,” he said. “Hang
him, he's the greatest pest in Christendom!”

“I have heard of a young gentleman called Jinks,” the Squire
said, with a sly laugh, “what say you to him for number two?”

“Burn Jinks!” cried Mr. Rushton, “he's a jack-a-napes, and

if he comes within the reach of my cane, I'll break it over his
rascally shoulders! I'd rather have this Indian cub who has just
left us.”

“That's all very well; but you can't get him.”

“Can't get him?” asked Rushton, grimly, as he got into the
saddle.

“He would never consent to coop himself up in Winehester.
True, my little Redbud, who is a great friend of his, has taught
him to read, and even to write in a measure, but he's a true
Indian, whether such by descent or not. He would die of the
confinement. Remember what I said about character just now,
and acknowledge the blunder you committed when you took the
position that there was no such thing.”

Rushton growled, and bent his brows on the laughing Squire.

“I said,” he replied, grimly, “that there was no character
to be found anywhere; and you may take it as you choose,
you'll try and extract an argument out of it either way. I
don't mean to take part in it. As to this cub of the woods,
you say I couldn't make anything of him—see if I don't! You
have provoked me into the thing—defied me—and I accept the
challenge.”

“What! you will capture Verty, that roving bird?”

“Yes; and make of this roving swallow another bird called a
secretary. I suppose you've read some natural history, and know
there's such a feathered thing.”

“Yes.”

“Very well,” said Mr. Rushton, kicking his horse, and
cramming his cocked hat down on his forehead. “I'll show you
how little you know of human nature and character. I'll take
this wild Indian boy, brought up in the woods, and as free and
careless as a deer, and in six months I'll change him into a
canting, crop-eared, whining pen-machine, with quills behind his
ears, and a back always bending humbly. I'll take this honest
barbarian and make a civilized and enlightened individual out of

him—that is to say, I'll change him into a rascal and a hypocrite.”

With which misanthropic words Mr. Rushton nodded in a
surly way to the smiling Squire, and took his way down the
road toward Winchester.

“Well, well,” said the old gentleman, looking after him,
“Rushton seems to be growing rougher than ever;—what a pity
that so noble a heart should have such a husk. His was a hard
trial, however—we should not be surprised. Rough-headed
fellow! he thinks he can do everything with that resolute will of
his;—but the idea of chaining to a writing-desk that wild boy,
Verty!”

And the old gentleman re-entered the house smiling cheerfully,
as was his wont.