University of Virginia Library

16. CHAPTER XVI.
THE RETURN.

AS long as he could, Charlton kept Katy at Glenfield.
He amused her by every means in his
power; he devoted himself to her; he sought to
win her away from Westcott, not by argument, to
which she was invulnerable, but by feeling. He
found that the only motive that moved her was an emotion
of pity for him, so he contrived to make her estimate his misery
on her account at its full value. But just when he thought
he had produced some effect there would come one of Smith
Westcott's letters, written not as he talked (it is only real simple-heartedness
or genuine literary gift that can make the personality
of the writer felt in a letter), but in a round business hand with
plenty of flourishes, and in sentences very carefully composed.
But he managed in his precise and prim way to convey to Katy
the notion that he was pining away for her company. And
she, missing the giggle and the playfulness from the letter,
thought his distress extreme indeed. For it would have required
a deeper sorrow than Smith Westcott ever felt to make
him talk in the stiff conventional fashion in which his letters
were composed.

And besides Westcott's letters there were letters from her

mother, in which that careful mother never failed to tell how
Mr. Westcott had come in, the evening before, to talk about
Katy, and to tell her how lost and heart-broken he was. So
that letters from home generally brought on a relapse of Katy's
devotion to her lover. She was cruelly torn by alternate fits
of loving pity for poor dear Brother Albert on the one hand,
and poor, dear, dear Smith Westcott on the other. And the
latter generally carried the day in her sympathies. He was
such a poor dear fellow, you know, and hadn't anybody, not
even a mother, to comfort him, and he had often said that if
his charming and divine little Katy should ever prove false, he
would go and drown himself in the lake. And that would be
so awful, you know. And, besides, Brother Albert had plenty
to love him. There was mother, and there was that quiet kind
of a young lady at the City Hotel that Albert went to see so
often, though how he could like anybody so cool she didn't
know. And then Cousin Isa would love Brother Albert maybe,
if he'd ask her. But he had plenty, and poor Smith had often
said that he needed somebody to help him to be good. And
she would cleave to him forever and help him. Mother and
father thought she was right, and she couldn't anyway let
Smith drown himself. How could she? That would be the
same as murdering him, you know.

During the fortnight that Charlton and his sister visited in
Glenfield, Albert divided his time between trying to impress
Katy with the general unfitness of Smith Westcott to be her
husband, and the more congenial employment of writing long
letters to Miss Helen Minorkey, and receiving long letters from
that lady. His were fervent and enthusiastic; they explained
in a rather vehement style all the schemes that filled his brain

for working out his vocation and helping the world to its goal:
while hers discussed everything in the most dispassionate temper.
Charlton had brought himself to admire this dispassionate temper.
A man of Charlton's temper who is really in love, can bring
himself to admire any traits in the object of his love. Had
Helen Minorkey shown some little enthusiasm, Charlton would
have exaggerated it, admired it, and rejoiced in it as a priceless
quality. As she showed none, he admired the lack of it in her,
rejoiced in her entire superiority to her sex in this regard, and
loved her more and more passionately every day. And Miss
Minorkey was not wanting in a certain tenderness toward her
adorer. She loved him in her way, it made her happy to be
loved in that ideal fashion.

Charlton found himself in a strait betwixt two. He longed
to worship again at the shrine of his Minerva. But he disliked
to return with Katy until he had done something to break
the hold of Smith Westcott upon her mind. So upon one
pretext or another he staid until Westcott wrote to Katy that
business would call him to Glenfield the next week, and he
hoped that she would conclude to return with him. Katy was
so pleased with the prospect of a long ride with her lover, that
she felt considerable disappointment when Albert determined to
return at once. Brother Albert always did such curious things.
Katy, who had given Albert a dozen reasons for an immediate
return, now thought it very strange that he should be in such
a hurry. Had he given up trying to find that new kind of
grasshopper he spoke of the day before?

One effect of the unexpected arrival of Albert and Katy in
Metropolisville, was to make Smith Westcott forget that he
ever had any business that was likely to call him to Glenfield.

Delighted to see Katy back. Would a died if she'd staid away
another week. By George! he! he! he! Wanted to jump into
the lake, you know. Always felt that way when Katy was out
of sight two days. Curious. By George! Didn't think any
woman could ever make such a fool of him. He! he! Felt
like ole Dan Tucker when he came to supper and found the
hot cakes all gone. He! he! he! By George! You know!
Let's sing de forty-lebenth hymn! Ahem!
How much? Pailful! By George! He! he! he! That's so!
You know. Them's my sentiments. 'Spresses the 'motions of
my heart, bredren! Yah! yah! By hokey! And here comes
Mr. Albert Charlton. Brother Albert! Just as well learn to say
it now as after a while. Eh, Katy? How do, brother Albert?
Glad to see you as if I'd stuck a nail in my foot. By George!
he! he! You won't mind my carryin' on. Nobody minds me.
I'm the privileged infant, you know. I am, by George! he! he!
Come, Kate, let's take a boat-ride.

And so forth. Too hoarse to sing. But I am not too feeble to
paddle my own canoe. Come, Katy Darling. You needn't
mind your shawl when you've got a Westcott to keep you
warm. He! he! By George!

And then he went out singing that her lips was red as roses
or poppies or something, and “wait for the row-boat and we'll
all take a ride.”

Albert endeavored to forget his vexation by seeking the
society of Miss Minorkey, who was sincerely glad to see him
back, and who was more demonstrative on this evening than he
had ever known her to be. And Charlton was correspondingly
happy. He lay in his unplastered room that night, and counted
the laths in the moonlight, and built golden ladders out of them
by which to climb up to the heaven of his desires. But he was
a little troubled to find that in proportion as he came nearer
to the possession of Miss Minorkey, his ardor in the matter of
his great Educational Institution—his American Philanthropinum,
as he called it—abated.

I ought here to mention a fact which occurred about this
time, because it is a fact that has some bearing on the course
of the story, and because it may help us to a more charitable
judgment in regard to the character of Mr. Charlton's step-father.
Soon after Albert's return from Glenfield, he received an appointment
to the postmastership of Metropolisville in such a
way as to leave no doubt that it came through Squire Plausaby's
influence. We are in the habit of thinking a mean man wholly
mean. But we are wrong. Liberal Donor, Esq., for instance,
has a great passion for keeping his left hand exceedingly well
informed of the generous doings of his right. He gives money
to found the Liberal Donor Female Collegiate and Academical
Institute, and then he gives money to found the Liberal Donor
Professorship of Systematic and Metaphysical Theology, and
still other sums to establish the Liberal Donor Orthopedic
Chirurgical Gratuitous Hospital for Cripples and Clubfooted.

Shall I say that the man is not generous, but only ostentatious?
Not at all. He might gratify his vanity in other ways. His
vanity dominates over his benevolence, and makes it pay tribute
to his own glory. But his benevolence is genuine, notwithstanding.
Plausaby was mercenary, and he may have seen some
advantages to himself in having the post-office in his own house,
and in placing his step-son under obligation to himself. Doubtless
these considerations weighed much, but besides, we must
remember the injunction that includes even the Father of Evil
in the number of those to whom a share of credit is due. Let
us say for Plausaby that, land-shark as he was, he was not
vindictive, he was not without generosity, and that it gave him
sincere pleasure to do a kindness to his step-son, particularly
when his generous impulse coincided so exactly with his own
interest in the matter. I do not say that he would not have
preferred to take the appointment himself, had it not been that
he had once been a postmaster in Pennsylvania, and some old
unpleasantness between him and the Post-Office Department
about an unsettled account stood in his way. But in all the
tangled maze of motive that, by a resolution of force, produced
the whole which men called Plausaby the Land-shark,
there was not wanting an element of generosity, and that element
of generosity had much to do with Charlton's appointment.
And Albert took it kindly. I am afraid that he was
just a little less observant of the transactions in which Plausaby
engaged after that. I am sure that he was much less vehement
than before in his denunciations of land-sharks. The post office
was set up in one of the unfinished rooms of Mr. Plausaby's
house, and, except at mail-times, Charlton was not obliged to
confine himself to it. Katy or Cousin Isa or Mrs. Plausaby was
always glad to look over the letters for any caller, to sell stamps
to those who wanted them, and tell a Swede how much postage
he must pay on a painfuily-written letter to some relative in
Christiana or Stockholm. And the three or four hundred dollars
of income enabled Charlton to prosecute his studies. In his
gratitude he lent the two hundred and twenty dollars—all that
was left of his educational fund—to Mr. Plausaby, at two per
cent a month, on demand, secured by a mortgage on lots in
Metropolisville.

Poor infatuated George Gray—the Inhabitant of the Lone
Cabin, the Trapper of Pleasant Brook, the Hoosier Poet from
the Wawbosh country—poor infatuated George Gray found his
cabin untenable after little Katy had come and gone. He came
up to Metropolisville, improved his dress by buying some ready-made
clothing, and haunted the streets where he could catch
a glimpse now and then of Katy.

One night, Charlton, coming home from an evening with
Miss Minorkey at the hotel, found a man standing in front of
the fence.

“What do you want here?” he asked sharply.

“Didn' mean no harm, stranger, to nobody.”

“Oh! it's you!” exclaimed Charlton, recognizing his friend
the Poet. “Come in, come in.”

“Come in? Couldn' do it no way, stranger. Ef I was to
go in thar amongst all them air ladies, my knees would gin
out. I was jist a-lookin' at that purty creetur. But I 'druther
die'n do her any harm. I mos' wish I was dead. But 'ta'n't
no harm to look at her ef she don' know it. I shan't disturb
her; and ef she marries a gentleman, I shan't disturb him nuther.
On'y, ef he don' mind it, you know, I'll write po'try about her

now and then. I got some varses now that I wish you'd show
to her, ef you think they won't do her no harm, you know, and
I don't 'low they will. Good-by, Mr. Charlton. Comin' down
to sleep on your claim? Land's a-comin' into market down thar.”

After the Poet left him, Albert took the verses into the house
and read them, and gave them to Katy. The first stanza was,
if I remember it rightly, something of this sort: