Читать книгу Goose Creek Folks - Isabel Graham Bush - Страница 6

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When Talitha alighted from the train the sun had not yet risen, but the rosy banners which heralded its coming floated wide across the eastern sky. It was on a morning like this that she and Martin had started homeward with such elation of spirits, such hopes for the coming year. But then summer was just begun; now it had gone and her hopes with it.

She started across the foothills and up the long mountain trail, the old elasticity gone from her step, the hardness of her lot weighting her down. It seemed as though her feet could never carry her the long, weary way home. Upon a jutting crag she stopped and looked back. Far in the distance, cradled among the foothills of the Cumberlands, it lay, the place of her heart’s desire. Would she ever see it again?

Talitha looked at the sky. The breakfast bell would be ringing by this time, and happy, laughing faces gathered around the long tables. Her head bowed as though she could hear the fervent grace, and a sob rose in her throat. Suddenly the petition of a young leader at prayers, the night before, came to her: “Wilt Thou give us strength and courage to meet bravely the trials and temptations of each day.” How full of meaning they were to the one who uttered them Talitha well knew. Owen Calfee’s face showed with what high courage he was meeting the hardships which had beset his path from early youth.

Talitha fiercely blinked back the tears. “I’m plumb spoilin’ everythin’ by my foolishness,” she thought aloud, unconsciously relapsing into the speech of the mountains. “I reckon hit ain’t pleasin’ ter the Lord—my thinkin’ sech sorry thoughts. I’ve clean forgotten that I’d ought ter be thankful that Martin could stay and that Gincy’s havin’ a chance. My, but if she isn’t the happiest child!” Talitha rose reluctantly. “I shouldn’t like to be caught in the dark, and that’s what I’m bound to be if I stop here any longer.” She stretched out her hands toward the valley with a wistful gesture of parting. “I’m so glad you’re there, Gincy,” she whispered. “I wouldn’t have you home for nothing.”

Through the long forenoon’s weary climb up the mountain’s interminable slope and over its craggy crest to the other side, she resolutely laid aside all thoughts of her disappointment and began making plans to be put into execution as soon as possible after reaching home.

At noon she was almost thankful that she had not reached the creek where the little party had lunched so happily two days before. Now she spread her simple fare upon a smooth ledge and watched the varied light and shadow across the fast changing foliage as she ate. The birds fluttered and sang in the pines above her head. Now and then one grew bold enough to fly down for the crumbs she scattered upon the ground. Over the opposite edge of the flinty table a pair of bright eyes peered longingly. Talitha laughed as she flung the bushy-tailed visitor her last morsel, and rose to resume her journey.

She planned to reach home by supper time, but it had not been so easy to travel without the aid of a strong arm over the roughest places. No thought of fear had entered her mind until that moment; now the prospect of being alone at night on those wooded heights where the darkness was dense under the thick branching trees made her shrink.

The afternoon was half gone when Talitha dropped down at the foot of a pine, tired and footsore. She was not yet rested from the journey of the two days previous, and it seemed as though her aching feet could never carry her home that night. She sat debating with herself as to the possibility of finding a nearby shelter. Not a cabin was in sight. She looked around anxiously, shading her eyes with her hand, to peer along the ridges. A broad shaft of sunlight lay across the leafage of the opposite mountain. How vividly it brought out the autumn tints which flecked the green like rich tapestry. Then, with a frightened gasp of dismay, she noticed for the first time the pile of threatening clouds in the west, and the long, deep shadows which lay in the hollows of those great hills.

Over the highest peak of the ridge beyond, they were coming—the slim, mist-coloured lances of the storm. Down the mountain-side they marched, legion after legion. A swift line of fire zigzagged above their heads, and suddenly the sky seemed filled with the rattle of musketry.

Talitha fled, at the first sign of approach, to the shelter of a thick cluster of oaks. She reached it trembling and breathless only to see a cabin a few rods beyond. Without waiting to speculate who its occupants might be, she ran to it, the storm at her back, the wind contesting each step over the rough slope. Her little bundle was a cumbrous weight upon her shoulders.

At the door the girl knocked hurriedly. Her heart was beating fast. It was twilight around her, and the voice of the storm came up with a terrible roar. There was no answer from within the cabin and the door did not open, but in her great stress Talitha entered timidly.

The wind closed the door violently behind her before she realized that the place was not empty. The feeble flame in the fireplace left the one room mostly in shadow, but it revealed the occupant, a weazened old man, wrapped in a faded quilt, sitting before the hearth. Talitha felt a sudden relief that she was not alone while such a storm raged outside. A man sick and perhaps in need of care was not to her an object of fear even though a stranger.

“I declar’ if hit ain’t Tally Coyle!” came in wheezy tones from the depths of the bed-quilt. “I ’lowed you war off ter the valley school long ’fore this.”

Talitha could hardly find her voice so great was her astonishment. She had gone farther out of her way than she knew to stumble upon her old teacher’s cabin. “Why, howdy, Mr. Quinn, you aren’t sick, are you?” she said, throwing down her bundle and shaking the raindrops from her moist skirts.

“Jest ailin’ a leetle mite. I hevn’t been what you mought call robustious the hull summer, and last week I was took with a mis’ry in my chist. I’ve been honin’ the hull day ter see some one and here you’ve come. I reckon the Lord sent you.” The old man broke into a wheezing cough which left him panting.

Talitha went to the fireplace and piled on fresh wood with a lavish hand. There was a brisk crackling as the flames shot upward merrily. “I’m going right to get supper,” she declared, forgetful of her weariness.

Si Quinn spread his hands before the blaze with a sigh of content, and watched the girl as she bustled about the cabin. There was much to do before even a simple meal could be prepared, for the schoolmaster’s housekeeping even in health was sadly at variance with the methods Talitha had learned at school the past year.

She brushed the floor as best she could with the stubby old broom, and then attacked the pile of soiled dishes energetically. Outside, the storm raged with fury, and a little rivulet trickled from under the door across the rough boards of the floor. Later the corn pone was set to baking, while the girl fried a platter of bacon and a dish of potatoes. In a corner of the fireplace, on a few coals among the hot ashes, the coffee pot sent forth an odour delightful to the nostrils of a half-famished man. Si Quinn sniffed it eagerly.

“I hain’t set down ter sech a meal o’ vittles sence I war ter your house,” he remarked gleefully as he drew his chair to the table and helped himself liberally to the homely fare. “A squar’ meal will do me a heap more good’n medsun. If I war reel sodden in selfishness, I’d wish you hadn’t any kin and could stay right along here with me. But I ain’t, I’m thankful you’ve got a better place’n this ol’ shack.”

Talitha looked at him curiously. She had never seen her old schoolmaster in such a kindly, paternal mood. In her younger days, the lean, spectacled face had inspired her with awe and a kind of terror. But since her return from Bentville she thought of him with pity, not unmingled with contempt, at his ignorance and dogged belief in the strange theories which still prevailed in the isolated portions of the mountains. She looked at the haggard old face that showed unmistakable signs of past suffering, with a troubled conscience.

At last Si Quinn leaned back with a long sigh of satisfaction. “I reckon you’ve ’bout saved my life, Tally. I war beginnin’ ter feel hit warn’t much use ter hold on ter this world when thar warn’t nobody seemin’ ter care speshul. Then you came along jest as though you’d been blowed acrost the mountings. I’m mighty cur’us ’bout hit, Tally. Only a couple o’ days ago, Dan Gooch looked in and said you-uns, and Ab and Gincy, hed started fer school. Did the folks down thar reckon you’d hed ’nough larnin’ and send you back?”

Talitha hesitated. She wisely felt the need of being very cautious as to the report which would go abroad. “We did go,” she acknowledged, “but the Girls’ Hall was full—just running over, the dean said—and the folks around had taken all they could. There wasn’t another one could be squeezed in, so I came—back,” she concluded, a renewed sense of her disappointment nearly overwhelming her.

“Whar’s Gincy?” demanded the old man keenly.

“Oh, she stayed. She hasn’t ever had a chance, you know. She’d have been terribly disappointed to have had to come home, and so would her father; he’s been lottin’ on it all summer. I’m so glad they let her stay,” Talitha added, fervently hoping that her secret had not slipped out unaware.

“Hit’s cur’us, mighty cur’us,” mused Si Quinn, looking off into the fire as though he had not heard a word Talitha had been saying. “Here I’d been askin’ and askin’ the Lord ter send you here, then Dan Gooch comes ’long and ’lows I won’t set eyes on you agin till next summer and here you be. Ain’t hit cur’us?”

“I never heard you were sick,” faltered the girl. “I’d have come before if I’d only known.”

“That wan’t hit,” rejoined the schoolmaster. “I’ve allers done fer myself, sick or well. I hain’t ever been used ter bein’ coddled afore, that ain’t what’s on my mind, Tally. I wanted ter tell you thet I’ve been a sorry teacher, but I never sensed hit till you-uns came back from Bentville. I never had no sech chance ter git larnin’, and hit seems a turrible pity you couldn’t hev stayed, but I know ’thout your tellin’ me that you-uns came back ter give Gincy a chanct—”

“Oh, you mustn’t tell,” implored Talitha. “Father’d be so angry.”

“Hit shan’t git no further, but hit war jest like Tally Coyle ter do hit, and mebbe the Lord had a hand in hit, too. I cal’late He knew jest how much the Goose Creek school needed a teacher, fer I ain’t ever goin’ back thar agin, Tally. My teachin’ days air over, but my heart hones fer those pore lambs that’s so set on gittin’ larnin’. I want you ter take ’em and teach ’em all you kin. Mebbe next year you-uns kin go back ter Bentville. Hit seems queer they couldn’t hev put up some kind of a shack fer the gals ter stay in. A lot of strong, young fellers like Mart, now, could hev taken holt.”

“Oh, yes, of course,” agreed Talitha, “but it would take money to make it comfortable, and the Bentville folks haven’t any to spare.”

The old man nodded thoughtfully. “Hit’s mighty strange when I’ve heerd thar’s folks livin’ in cities that’s more money’n they can anyways spend. And here’s the mounting boys and gals a-thirstin’ fer the larnin’ they can’t git.” The girl crouched before the fire puzzled over this new problem, while Si Quinn creaked back and forth in the old rocker.

Suddenly it stopped. “I wish you’d git the Book, Tally, over on the chist, and read a spell; you do hit so easy-like.”

Outside, in the wild night, the wind wailed loudly along the wooded ridges of the great hills and hurled itself in angry gusts against the little cabin unnoticed, as Talitha read chapter after chapter in clear, unfaltering tones. The old man looked fondly down at her with a paternal pride. His heart was at peace, for he had bequeathed his life work to younger, more capable hands, and he rested content.