University of Virginia Library

13. CHAPTER XIII.
HOW HUGH PAID HIS DEBTS.

The perspiration was standing in great drops about
Hugh's quivering lips, and his face was white as ashes, as,
near the close of that interview, he hoarsely asked,

“Do I understand you, sir, that Rocket will cancel
this debt and leave you my debtor for one hundred
dollars?”

“Yes, that was my offer, and a most generous one, too,
considering how little horses are bringing,” and Harney
smiled villianously as he thought within himself, “Easier
to manage than I supposed. I believe my soul I offered
too much. I should have made it an even thing.”

He did not know Hugh Worthington, or dream of the
volcano pent up beneath that calm exterior. Hugh had
demurred to the fifty-dollar silk as a mistake, and when
convinced that it was not, his wrath had known no bounds.
Forgetting Golden Hair he had sworn so roundly that
even Harney cowered before the storm; but that was over
now, and ashamed of his passion, Hugh was making a
strong effort to meet his fate like a man. Step by step
as he knew so well how to do, Harney had reached the
point of which for more than a year he had never lost
sight.

“If Mr. Worthington had not the ready money, and,
in these hard times, it was natural to suppose he had not,
why then he would, as an accommodation, take Rocket,
paying one hundred dollars extra, and Hugh's debt would
be cancelled.”

Hugh knew how long this plan had been premeditated,
and his blood boiled madly when he heard it suggested,
as if that moment had given it birth. Still he restrained

himself, and asked the question we have recorded, adding,
after Harney's reply,

“And suppose I do not care to part with Rocket?”

Harney winced a little, but answered carelessly,

“Money, of course, is just as good. You know how
long I've waited. Few would have done as well.”

Yes, Hugh knew that, but Rocket was as dear to him
as his right eye, and he would almost as soon have plucked
out the one as sold the other.

“I have not the money,” he said frankly, “and I cannot
part with Rocket. Is there nothing else? I'll give a
mortgage on Spring Bank.”

Harney did not care for a mortgage, but there was
something else, and the rascally face brightened, as, stepping
back, while he made the proposition, he faintly suggested
“Lulu.” He would give a thousand dollars for
her, and Hugh could keep his horse. For a moment the
two young men regarded each other intently, Hugh's eyes
flashing gleams of fire, and his whole face expressive of
the contempt he felt for the wretch who cowed at last beneath
the look, and turned away muttering that “he saw
nothing so very heinous in wishing to purchase a nigger
wench.”

Then, changing his tone to one of defiance, he added,

“You'll be obliged to part with her yet, Hugh Worthington.
I know how you are straitened and how much
you think of her. You may not have another so good a
chance to provide her with a kind master. Surely, you
should be satisfied with that fair-haired New York damsel,
and let me have the nigger.”

Harney tried to smile, but the laugh died on his lips, as,
springing to his feet, Hugh, with one blow, felled him to
the floor, exclaiming,

“Thus do I resent the insult offered to Adah Hastings,
as pure and true a woman as your own sister. Villain!”
and he shook fiercely his prostrate foe struggling to rise.

Some men are decidedly better for being knocked down,
and Harney was one of them. Feminine in figure and
cowardly in disposition, he knew he was no match for the
broad, athletic Hugh, and shaking down his pants when
permitted to stand upright, he muttered something about
“hearing from him again.” Then, as the sight of the unpaid
bill brought back to his mind the cause of his present
unpleasant predicament he returned to the attack, by
saying,

“Since you are not inclined to part with either of your
pets, you'll oblige me with the money, and before to-morrow
night. You understand me, I presume?”

“I do,” and bowing haughtily, Hugh passed through
the open door.

In a kind of desperation he mounted Rocket, and
dashed out of town at a speed which made more than
one look after him, wondering what cause there was for
his headlong haste. A few miles from the city he slacked
his speed, and dismounting by a running brook, sat down
to think. The price offered for Lulu would set him free
from every pressing debt, and leave a large surplus, but
not for a moment did he hesitate.

“I'd lead her out and shoot her through the heart, before
I'd do that,” he said.

Then turning to the noble animal cropping the grass
beside him, he wound his arms around his neck, and tried
to imagine how it would seem to know the stall at home
was empty, and Rocket gone. He could not sell him,
he said, as he looked into the creature's eyes, meeting
there an expression almost human, as Rocket rubbed his
nose against his sleeve, and uttered a peculiar sound.

“If I could pawn him,” he thought, just as the sound
of wheels was heard, and he saw old Colonel Tiffton driving
down the turnpike.

Stopping suddenly as he caught sight of Hugh, the
colonel called out cheerily, “How d'ye, young man?

What are you doing there by the brook? Huggin' your
horse, as I live! Well, I don't wonder. That's a fine
nag of yours. My Nell is nigh about crazy for me to buy
him. What'll you take?”

Hugh knew he could trust the colonel, and after a moment's
hesitation told of his embarrassments, and asked
the loan of five hundred dollars, offering Rocket as security,
with the privilege of redeeming him in a year.
Hugh's chin quivered, and the arm thrown across Rocket's
neck pressed more tightly as he made this offer. Every
change in the expression of his face was noted by
the colonel, and interpreted with considerable accuracy.
He had always liked Hugh. There was something in his
straight-forward manner which pleased him, and when
he learned why he was not at his daughter's birth-day
party, he had raised a most uncomfortable breeze about
the capricious Nellie's ears, declaring she should apologize,
but forgetting to insist upon it as he at first meant
to do.

“You ask a steep sum,” he said, crossing one fat limb
over the other and snapping his whip at Rocket, who
eyed him askance. “Pretty steep sum, but I take it, you
are in a tight spot and don't know what else to do. Got
too many hangers on. There's Aunt Eunice — you can't
help her, to be sure, nor your mother, nor your sister,
though I'd break her neck before I'd let her run me into
debt. Your bill at Harney's, I know, is most all of her
contracting, though you don't tell me so, and I respect
you for it. She's your sister — blood kin. But that girl
in the snow bank — I'll be hanged if that was ever made
quite clear to me.”

“It is to me, and that is sufficient,” Hugh answered
haughtily, while the old colonel laughingly replied,

“Good grit, Hugh. I like you for that. In short, I
like you for every thing, and that's why I was sorry about
that New York lady. You see, it may stand in the way
of your getting a wife by and by, that's all.”

“I shall never marry,” Hugh answered, moodily, kicking
at a decaying stump, and involuntarily thinking of
the Golden Haired.

“No?” the colonel replied, interrogatively. “Well
there ain't many good enough for you, that's a fact; “there
ain't many girls good for any body. I never saw but one
except my Nell, that was worth a picayune, and that was
Alice Johnson.”

“Who? Who did you say?” And Hugh grew white
as marble, while a strange light gleamed in the dark eyes
fastened so eagerly upon the colonel's face.

Fortunately for him the colonel was too much absorbed
in dislodging a fly from the back of his horse to notice his
agitation; but he heard the question and replied, “I said
Alice Johnson, twentieth cousin of mine — blast that fly!
— lives in Massachusetts; splendid girl — hang it all, can't
I hit him? — I was there two years ago. Never saw a
girl that made my mouth water as she did. Most too pious,
though, to suit me. Wouldn't read a newspaper
Sunday, when that's the very day I take to read 'em —
there, I've killed him.” And well satisfied with the achievement,
the old colonel put up his whip, never dreaming of
the effect that name had produced on Hugh, whose heart
gave one great throb of hope, and then grew heavy and
sad as he thought how impossible it was that the Alice
Johnson the colonel knew, could be the Golden Haired.

“There are fifty by that name, no doubt,” he said, “and
if there were not, she is dead. But oh, if it could be
that she were living, that somewhere I could find her.”

There was a mist before Hugh's vision, and the arm encircling
Rocket's neck clung there now for support, so
weak and faint he grew. He dared not question the colonel
farther, and was only too glad when the latter came
back to their starting point and said, “If I understand you,
I can have Rocket for five hundred dollars, provided I let
you redeem him within a year. Now that's equivalent to

my lending you five hundred dollars out and out. I see,
but seeing it's you, I reckon I'll have to do it. As luck
will have it, I was going down to Frankfort this very day
to put some money in the bank, and if you say so, we'll
clinch the bargain at once;” and taking out his leathern
wallet, the colonel began to count the required amount.

Alice Johnson was forgotten in that moment of painful
indecision, when Hugh felt as if his very life was dying
out.

“Oh, I can't let Rocket go,” he thought, bowing his face
upon the animal's graceful neck. Then chiding himself as
weak, he lifted up his head and said: “I'll take the money.
Rocket is yours.”

The last words were like a smothered sob; and the generous
old man hesitated a moment. But Hugh was in
earnest. His debts must be paid, and five hundred dollars
would do it.

“I'll bring him round to-morrow. Will that be time
enough?” he asked, as he rolled up the bills.

“Yes,” the colonel replied, while Hugh continued entreatingly,
“and, colonel, you'll he kind to Rocket. He's
never been struck a blow since he was broken to the saddle.
He wouldn't know what it meant.”

“Oh, yes, I see — Rarey's method. Now I never could
make that work. Have to lick 'em sometimes, but I'll remember
Rocket. Good day,” and gathering up his reins
Col. Tiffton rode slowly away, leaving Hugh in a maze of
bewilderment.

That name still rang in his ears, and he repeated it
again and again, each time assuring himself how impossible
it was that it should be she — the only she to him in
all the world. And supposing it were, what did it
matter? What good could her existence do him? She
would despise him now — no position, no name, no money,
no Rocket, and here he paused, for above all thoughts
of the Golden Haired towered the terrible one that

Rocket was his no longer — that the evil he most
dreaded had come upon him. “But I'll meet it like a
man,” he said, and springing into his saddle he rode back
to Frankfort and dismounted at Harney's door.

In dogged silence Harney received the money, gave his
receipt, and then, without a word, watched Hugh as he
rode again from town, muttering to himself, “I shall remember
that he knocked me down, and some time I'll repay
it.”

It was dark when Hugh reach home, his lowering
brow and flashing eyes indicating the fierce storm which
was gathering, and which burst the moment he entered the
room where 'Lina was sitting. In tones which made
even her tremble he accused her of her treachery, pouring
forth such a torrent of wrath that his mother urged him
to stop, for her sake if no other. She could always
quiet Hugh, and he calmed down at once, hurling but
one more missile at his sister, and that in the shape
of Rocket, who, he said, was sold for her extravagance.

'Lina was proud of Rocket, and the knowledge that he
was sold touched her far more than all Hugh's angry
words. But her tears were of no avail; the deed was
done, and on the morrow Hugh, with an unflinching hand,
led his idol from the stable and rode rapidly across the
fields, leading another horse which was to bring him
home.

Gloomily the next morning broke, and at rather a late
hour for him, Hugh, with a heavy sigh, had raised himself
upon his elbow, wondering if it were a dream, or if during
the night he had really heard Rocket's familiar tramp
upon the lawn, when Lulu came running up the stairs,
exclaiming, joyfully,

“He's done come home, Rocket has. He's at the kitchen
door.”

It was as Lulu said, for the homesick brute, suspecting

something wrong, had broken from his fastenings, and
bursting the stable door had come back to Spring Bank,
his halter dangling about his neck, and himself looking
very defiant, as if he were not again to be coaxed away.
At sight of Hugh he uttered a sound of joy, and bounding
forward planted both feet within the door ere Hugh had
time to reach it.

“Thar's the old colonel now,” whispered Claib, just as
the colonel appeared to claim his runaway.

But Rocket kept them all at bay, snapping, striking,
and kicking at every one who ventured to approach him.
With compressed lip and moody face Hugh watched the
proceeding for a time, now laughing at the frightened
negroes hiding behind the lye leach to escape the range
of Rocket's heels, and again groaning mentally as he met
the half human look of Rocket's eyes turned to him as if
for aid. At last rising from the spot where he had been
sitting he gave the whistle which Rocket always obeyed,
and in an instant the sagacious animal was at his side,
trying to lick the hands which would not suffer the caress
lest his courage should give way.

“I'll take him home myself,” he said to the old colonel,
emerging from his hiding place behind the leach, and
bidding Claib follow with another horse, Hugh went a
second time to Colonel Tiffton's farm.

Leading Rocket into the stable he fastened him to the
stall, and then with his arms around his neck talked to
him as if he had been a refractory, disobedient child. We
do not say he was understood, but after one long, despairing
cry, which rang in Hugh's ears for many a day and
night, Rocket submitted to his fate, and staid quietly
with the colonel, who petted him if possible more than
Hugh had done, without, however, receiving from him
the slightest token of affection in return.