Читать книгу Marked "Personal" - Anna Katharine Green - Страница 5

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It was seven o’clock in the evening. Though it was by no means dark, New York City had been subject on this day to so many outrages, that more than one house was already closed for the night. In the old street called Amity, this was especially noticeable. Wherever there were negroes there was alarm, and in this quarter there were at this time many negroes employed in the various old dwellings stretching between Sixth Avenue and Broadway.

There was one house, however, which if closed was brilliantly lighted. This was the occasion of much remark in the neighborhood, for till within a day or two the place had been empty, and, beyond the fact that a large negro had been seen fastening the shutters and lighting the gas, nothing was known of its occupants. It was one of those old houses common in this district, with low stoop, flanked by wrought-iron posts of quaintly forged work. A balcony ran along the front of the parlor windows, and over the door was a half-oval glazing, through which the hall light shone invitingly. Two dormer windows at the top completed the picture, which was common enough at that time, but which is fast disappearing from our ever changing and constantly remodeled streets.

But the curiosity which had been raised by this sudden occupancy of an empty house soon gave way to an alarm which made this and many other things forgotten. For the rumor had entered the street of a coming mob, and already in the far distance the ominous sound was heard of treading feet and clamoring voices, which, to those who have ever listened to the roar of maddened men, is so much worse than that of beasts, or of that element to which it is sometimes likened—an angry sea. But as yet the noise was distant, and the street quiet, almost unoccupied. So much the more distinctly were two men to be observed who at this moment appeared at the two ends of the block on which this house was situated. One was finely formed and handsome, with a blond mustache and melancholy eyes, which seemed fixed in an anxious stare, as he hurriedly walked along. The other was spare, and bent about the shoulders, but with an expression so baffling that it would have made his face remembered if any one had been there to see it. Both were unencumbered, and walked like persons driven by some other will than their own. In front of the house I have already mentioned, they stopped. Both had advanced with lifted eyes gazing straight before them, but not till they thus paused did they appear to see each other. Then the shock which passed through both was instantaneous. Each opened his lips to speak, and each closed them again without uttering a word. But they bowed like persons moved by some strong, sympathetic impulse, and, glancing hurriedly at the number of the house before which they stood, moved mechanically toward the door, the larger man giving place to the slighter.

Once on the stoop, they looked again at each other, and both stretched out their hands to the bell. But there was hesitancy in the mutual action, and both hands fell again. “You have changed,” ventured the younger man in a low tone to his companion.

The other did not answer. He was trembling visibly. “I have not your courage,” came finally from his lips.

His companion started and nervously jerked at the bell. “Let us have it over,” said he; then, as he heard an advancing step within, whispered rapidly, “Have you made arrangements for secrecy? Have you a family?”

“Come in, sirs,” invited an unctuous voice from behind. “You are from Washington, are you not, and you from Buffalo? All right, sirs, the gentleman is expecting you.”

The door had opened, and in the gap stood the large, smiling, and excessively courteous negro, over whose identity the neighborhood had been speculating for the last twenty-four hours.

The two gentlemen, different as they were in both personal and mental characteristics, gave a similar start as they were thus addressed; and each, without paying further heed to the other, cast a peculiar and not easily explainable look at the sky, and at the street below them, like men who felt themselves parting forever with the world and all that there is in it.

If they heard the low rumbling of the approaching mob, they did not show it. Other fears were at work in their breasts; and not from without this house, but from within, sprang the cause of dread under which both seemed laboring.

After that one look—to all appearance one of farewell—they passed in, and the negro closed the door behind them.

He was a very affable, well-bred servant. Taking their hats from their unresisting hands, he ushered them into the large front room at the right.

“The gentleman will be here soon,” he assured them, and softly withdrew.

The two men paused in the doorway and looked anxiously about them. Evidently the well-spread table upon which their eyes first fell was a surprise to them. Advancing involuntarily toward it, the larger man, whom we have already recognized as Mr. White, pointed to the chairs about it, and uttered in significant tones the one word:

“Three!”

The other, who was strangely like the Mr. Phillips of Buffalo, whom we know, gave a slight shudder and advanced in turn to the table, about which he began slowly to pace, eying as he did so the various articles of service with which it was loaded, with a fascinated gaze, that was not without its element of wonder.

“He intends that we shall eat with him,” he finally observed.

“A course dinner,” continued the other, with a significant gesture toward the cluster of glasses standing beside each plate.

“I am not hungry,” protested the student, shrinking back. “This farce unnerves me. I had rather have found nothing in the room but two—”

He stopped, glanced again at the table, and darting forward, lifted the cover from a dish which stood directly in front of one of the plates. “I thought so,” he continued, staggering back.

Mr. White, paling a trifle, lifted in his turn the cover from a similar dish standing in front of another plate, and after a short look gently replaced it.

“The man has been studying comedy in Paris,” he remarked. Then, after a moment, “You see, there are but two covered dishes.”

The other, with a wild look, stretched out his hand to the dish he had so boldly uncovered. A small pistol was lying on the bottom, cocked and ready for use.

“Let us have it over,” he cried, clutching his weapon in frantic haste.

But his companion protested. “No,” said be, “the line I received said eight o’clock. It yet lacks fifteen minutes to that hour.” And he pointed to the clock which stood beating out the moments on the mantelshelf.

“Fifteen minutes? Fifteen eternities!” gasped the other. But he let the pistol fall back into the dish and moved back, while Mr. White quietly replaced the cover.

“We are certainly expected to dine,” observed the latter, “but we can decline the honor.” And a silence came over them which was both solemn and pregnant.

It was broken by the reentrance of the negro bearing some bottles of champagne. His imperturbable face and deferential manner seemed to irritate Mr. White beyond endurance.

“Did you set this table?” he asked, with harsh demand.

“I did, sir.”

“All of it?”

“Certainly, sir.”

Mr. White interrogated him no further. There was nothing but respect in the even tones of the negro, nothing but the mild surprise of the disciplined servant in the eyes that were neither withdrawn nor dropped before Mr. White’s searching gaze.

“My master must be here very soon now,” the man added, with a short glance at the clock, and again bowed himself out.

Mr. Phillips started from the fireplace where he had been standing during this short colloquy.

“You asked me,” he said, addressing Mr. White in eager hurry, “if I had a family. I have one child—a daughter—young—merry—motherless . . . For her sake—”

The other’s hand went up in protest. There could not be much speech between these men. But the next moment he was holding out a carte de visite which he had taken from his breast-pocket. “I have an invalid wife, and—this,” he faltered, in an odd, muffled tone.

Mr. Phillips took the card from the other’s hand and glanced at it.

“A boy!” he cried, almost as if startled. A lightning flash seemed to pass between the two; then Mr. White said, almost in a whisper:

“He is only ten, but I understand now: that is why I am so submissive.”

Mr. Phillips’s slight form shook, but he did not offer to return the picture. It seemed to charm him and hold his thoughts in check through all the excitement under which he was laboring.

“Noble! Beautiful!” he exclaimed, devouring the photograph in his hand with a growing wistfulness.

The father gave a sigh which seemed to rend his heart. “I do not know his equal,” cried he, and took the picture from his companion’s reluctant hand.

He did not venture to look at it himself, but put it back carefully over his heart. Mr. Phillips, watching him, seemed about to speak, when the noises, which had been rapidly increasing in the street without, rose to such a violent pitch that they were obliged at last to hear them, despite their absorption.

“What is that?” demanded Mr. Phillips, wonderingly, but with no especial interest.

He was answered by the negro, who at that moment entered.

“Do not be alarmed, gentlemen,” he anxiously entreated. “There is a slight disturbance in the street, outside. Colored people are at a discount just now, and I think the mob has heard of me.”

Amazed, in spite of his own profound preoccupation, at the ease and quiet assurance of the man who thus announced his own danger in the most correct and mellifluous English, Mr. White was about to ask if the mob did not mean mischief, when Mr. Phillips’s voice rose in ringing tones:

“The mob! The rioters! Are they coming here?” And he glanced at the table in sudden hopefulness.

“They are in the street,” answered the negro, with unwavering calmness. “But there are two dwelling-houses employing negroes between us and the corner, which means two short fights, or, if the police come up in time, two sufficiently long ones to enable you gentlemen—to—to finish your dinner.”

The significance and suavity with which this latter clause was uttered brought the hue of anger to Mr. White’s cheek, but it seemed to awake different emotions in the breast of Mr. Phillips, as was shown by the wondering question he put to the negro.

“Are you not afraid?” he asked. “These rioters, I hear, stop at nothing.”

“I am only concerned about one thing,” returned the man. “My master expected to come by the way of Sixth Avenue. If he does, he may fall into the crowd, and so not be able to keep his appointment.”

The start given by Mr. Phillips at this, and the no less eloquent change of color on Mr. White’s part, may have been observed by the speaker; but, if so, he gave no evidence of it in his manner.

“These windows had better remain barred,” he suggested, pointing to the front of the house. “But, if you please, I will go up another flight and look out.” And seeming to take it for granted that their agitated silence meant consent, he left the room and proceeded softly to the floor above.

Left alone, the two men stood for a moment without movement. Then Mr. White observed in a constrained tone:

“The tool is as much to be feared as the hand wielding it. This is no common serving-man. If he whom we dread fails to appear, there will still be a witness left.”

“But the mob is shouting, ‘Death to the negroes!’ If a diversion occurs—we still have five minutes left—who knows what may happen to release us?”

There was the quick, ringing tone of hope in his voice. For the last minute he had been a different man.

Mr. White, who had shown but little change in manner, quietly shook his head.

“Would we not still be bound by our oath?”

The other, startled and shocked, drew slowly back with dilating eyes.

“Is that the way you look at it?” he asked. “If yonder man should be hurt—killed, say,—would you still—”

He stopped, trembling; the negro had slid again with velvety tread into the room.

“It looks bad,” he gravely remarked. “Though it is too dark for me to see plainly, I can hear stones flying in all directions, and not a few groans and cries. Somebody is being hurt.”

“And where are the rioters now?”

“In front of a gentleman’s house lower down the block.”

Here an unusually loud yell came through the uproar.

“They have battered in the door,” commented the negro, imperturbably. “That will delay them a few minutes.”

Neither of the gentlemen spoke; they were looking at the clock, it was on the verge of eight. Suddenly Mr. Phillips moved and excitedly remarked, with a side glance at the negro:

“If your master is not here at the hour he appointed I shall consider myself at liberty to leave the house.”

“He will be here,” was the quiet response, with the simple qualification added, “if he is alive.”

“But,” triumphantly began the other as the first stroke of the clock sounded, “it is already eight, and—”

His voice ceased, his forehead fell, and his whole frame suddenly collapsed. A short, sharp ringing at the door-bell had proclaimed that some one stood on the stoop outside.

“You see,” observed the negro, with a deferential bow, “my master is a man of his word.”

He went to open the door, and while he was gone the two men, without a glance at each other, mechanically approached the table and took their places behind the chairs evidently intended for them. To see them standing there, pale, absorbed, statue-like, the one with lifted head and determined aspect, the other with chin fallen on his breast in a gloomy despair he made no attempt to hide, one would not have dreamed that within a few rods of them a work of demolition was going on amid a rattling of musket shots, crashing stones, and demoniac yells.

And for them there was at this moment no outside tumult or overthrow. All the disturbance present was within their own breasts, and if death were near, its breath came not to them from the midst of the mob.

Had the rafters cracked over their heads they would scarcely have looked up.

The opening of the door behind them they did hear, however; at the sound, both men stretched out their hands to the covered dishes before them, but neither spoke and neither turned. A minute of silence followed, then a voice spoke in tones so unexpected that they both wheeled suddenly about, only to again confront the negro.

“I am sorry, gentlemen,” said he, “but my master cannot get here. He has just sent a street urchin to say he is detained by the mob in which he has become entangled, and begs you to wait a few minutes till he can free himself. The dinner shall not suffer, gentlemen. I shall see to that myself.”

“No doubt,” screamed Phillips, angrily, “but one loses appetite after the hour is passed. I shall have to beg to be excused.”

“It would not be safe for you to leave the house,” remarked the negro, calmly. “Bullets fly about freely at such a time.”

“Have you a weapon yourself?” asked Mr. White, suddenly, stepping up quickly to the table.

“Two,” answered the negro, drawing his hands from behind his back.

“I see,” remarked the other, quietly retreating again. “We had better wait for our host,” he suggested to Mr. Phillips with a sigh.

The negro smiled; neither noted it. It might have been better if they had.