When 'Bear Cat' Went Dry Part 50

"None-the-less, hit wouldn't amaze me none ter see ye git ter be the president of this hull world," declared the other with simple hero-wors.h.i.+p. "Whar are ye ridin' ter?"

"I'm going over into Fletcher county to see that school there. I'm hopin' that we can have one like it over here."

The farmer nodded. "I reckon we kin manage hit," he affirmed.

Turner had heard much of that school to which Matthew Blakey had taken his three children--so much that all of it could hardly be true. Now he was going to see for himself.

But his thoughts, as he rode, were beyond his control and memories of Blossom crowded out the more impersonal things.

At last he came to a high backbone of ridge. From there he ought to be able to catch his first glimpse of the tract which the school had redeemed from overgrown raggedness into a model farm, but as yet the dense leaf.a.ge along the way cut off the view of the valley.

Then he came to a more open s.p.a.ce and reined in his horse, and as he looked out his eyes widened in astonishment.

Spreading below him, he saw such even and gracious s.p.a.ces of cultivation as were elsewhere unknown to the hills.

Down there the fences were even and the fields smooth, but what astonished him most were the buildings. Cl.u.s.tered over a generous expanse of hill and valley, of field and garden all laid out as though some landscape gardener had made it a labor of love, were houses such as he had dreamed of--houses with dignity of line and proportion, with architectural beauty of design.

Everything, even at that distance, could be seen to be substantially designed for usefulness, and yet everything combined with that prime object of service the quality of art.

He was looking down on a tiny village, uncrowded and nestling on the varied levels of an undulating valley, and he counted out a dozen houses, recognizing some of them--the tiny hospital on its hill--the model dairies at one edge--the saw-mill sending out its fragrance--the dormitories with sleeping porches and the school-buildings themselves.

This was what he had visioned--and yet he realized how cramped had been his dream as he urged his tired horse forward and listened to the whistle of a bob-white in the stubble.

"Ef Blossom could know that we're goin' ter have a school like this over there!" he breathed to himself. Then as he rode along the twisting descent of road, between park-like forest trees and ma.s.ses of rhododendron, and dismounted before a large house he saw a broad porch with a concrete foundation, and easy chairs and tables littered with magazines and books. From the door came a lady, smiling to greet him.

It was Miss Pendleton, the woman who from small beginnings had built here in the wilderness such an achievement, and as she came to the stairs she held out her hand.

"I've been greatly interested in your letters, Mr. Stacy," she said, "and I don't see why we can't repeat over there what we have done here.

We have grown from very small beginnings--and now I want to show you around our premises--unless you are too tired."

With wonderment that grew, he followed her, and a swarm of happy-faced children went with them; children keen of eye and rosy of cheek, and when they had inspected together the buildings where the pupils were taught from books, and the dairies and gardens where they were taught by practice, the lady showed him into a log house as artistic and charming as a swiss chalet and said: "This will be your abiding place while you're here. I'll send one of the boys to see that you have everything you need--and later on I'll introduce you to a lady who is much interested in your plans for a school on Little Slippery and who can discuss the details."

Left alone on the porch of his "pole-house," Bear Cat sat gazing upward to the American flag that floated from a tall staff before his door, and as he did so a small boy with clear and intelligent eyes came and said: "I've done been named ter look atter ye."

In the young face was none of that somber shyness which shadows the faces of many mountain children. Turner put his hand on the boy's head.

"Thank you, son," he said slowly. "Haven't I seen you before somewhar?"

The boy laughed. "I remembers _you_" he a.s.serted. "I seed ye when my paw was fotchin' me an' my brother an' sister over hyar. I'm Matthew Blakey's boy."

"You had right-sore eyes then, didn't you?"

The child laughed. "I did then--but I hain't now." After a moment's pause he added with a note of pride: "See thet flag? Hit's ther American flag an' hit's my job ter put hit up every day at sun-up an'

take hit down at sun-set. I aims ter show ye right now how I does. .h.i.t."

Bear Cat met young women from Eastern colleges who had come here to aid in the work. In their presence he felt very uncouth and ignorant, but they did not suspect that inner admission. They saw a young man who reminded them of a bronze athlete, with clear and fearless eyes, touched with a dreamer's zeal, and in his manner they recognized a simple dignity and an inherent chivalry.

CHAPTER XXVIII

On the porch of Miss Pendleton's house that night, guitars were tinkling. From inside came the glow of shaded lamps softly amber--and outside along the hillsides where the whippoorwills called plaintively, slept a silver wash of moonlight.

The stars were large and low-hanging and a pale mist tempered the slopes that rose in a nocturne of majesty and peace.

Bear Cat Stacy sat there immersed in reverie. He was seeing such a school grow up on the spot where he had hoped to build a house for Blossom and himself--then that vision faded and his face grew set because the other and more personal picture had intervened--the picture of the dwelling-house to which he had looked forward.

He did not notice that the guitars and the singing voices had come to silence, and that the white patches of the women's dresses had vanished from the shaded porch--he was looking out into the summer mists--and thinking his own thoughts.

Then he heard Miss Pendleton's voice, and came out of his abstraction with a start, looking about to realize for the first time that the two of them stood alone out there.

"Now you must talk business," smiled the lady. "I haven't introduced you yet to the person who is best of all fitted to discuss the details.

She knows just what we seek to do here and how we do it. She knows the needs of mountain children, too--because she is a mountain girl herself. She came here really as a pupil--but she's much more than that now. She teaches the younger children while she studies herself--and she has developed a positive genius for this work."

Miss Pendleton paused and then added: "I'm going to let the two of you talk together first--and then I'll join you."

Bear Cat rose and stood courteously acquiescent, then his hostess left him and he saw another figure appear to stand framed in the door. His heart rose out of his breast into the throat and choked him, for he believed that his dreaming had unsettled his mind.

There stood Blossom with the amber light kindling her soft hair into a nimbus of radiance, and in her cheeks was the old color like the heart of the laurel's flower.

She stood slim and straight, no longer pallid or thin, and in her eyes danced a light of welcome.

"Blossom," he stammered--and she left her frame and its amber background to come forward--with her hands extended.

"Turney," was all she said.

"How came you here?" he demanded, forgetting to release her slim hands.

"How did this come to pa.s.s?"

She looked out over the blue and silver leagues of the June night, and said simply. "There's lots to tell you--let's go out there and talk."

They were standing on a great bowlder where the moss and ferns grew, and about them twinkled myriads of fireflies. They had been silent for a long time and Turner's voice had a strained note as he said slowly.

"I promised ye ... thet I wouldn't ever pester ye again with ...

love-making ... but to-night it's right hard ter keep thet pledge."

The breeze was stirring her hair and her own eyes were deep as she gazed away, but suddenly she turned and her long lashes were raised as she met his gaze.

"I don't want ... that you should keep it," she whispered. "I give you back your pledge."

As in those old days the hills seemed to rock about him and the arms that came forward and paused were unsteady.

"Ye means ... thet...."

"I means thet I loved ye first, Turney." The words came tremulously, almost whispered, and in them was something of self-accusation. "Maybe I ought to be ashamed--but somehow I can't. All of what happened seems to me like a dream that doesn't really belong in my life. It seems to me that I was dazzled and couldn't tell the true from the seeming....

It seems as I look back that a little piece of my life was torn loose from the rest--but that the real me has always been yours."

She laid her hands on his shoulders, and as he caught her in his arms, the light breath of the night breeze brought the fragrance of honeysuckle to them both. She rested for a moment in his embrace with the serene feeling that she was at home.

Between them fell a silence but in the bath of silvery light through the fragrant stillness of dove gray night-tones and cobalt shadows the girl's eyes were brightly eloquent. Yet after a moment a shade of troubling thought came into them and the lips moved into the tremulousness of a self-searching and somewhat self-accusing whisper.