Sir Christopher: A Romance of a Maryland Manor in 1644

"Mistress Brent?" he said questioningly, looking from Mary to Elinor.

"I am she," said Mary, stepping forward and holding out her hand with even more than her usual warmth of hospitality. "Can I be of service to you?"

"The question is, rather, are you willing to allow my claim upon your far-famed hospitality?"

"I think it has never yet been denied any one."

"I believe it well, but perhaps no one ever yet claimed it who lay under such a shadow. If you consent in your goodness to shelter a traveller, you must know that you are harboring the brother of Richard Ingle."

Mary Brent started, for her brother had confided to her Richard Ingle's treasonable speeches, and in her eyes treason ranked next to blasphemy among the unpardonable sins. For an instant she hesitated and half withdrew her hand, then stretching it out again she looked full at him and said, —

"'Twere a pity frank truth-telling like yours should cost you dear. Let me ask but one question, Do you hold with your brother in his treason?"

A pained look came into Ralph Ingle's eyes. "Lady," he said, "'tis a hard matter to hear or speak evil of one's brother – one's only brother." His lip trembled, but the voice rang clear and steady. "Yet when the time comes to choose between brotherly affection and one's duty to King and Commonwealth, the knot must be cut though the blood flows. So I told Richard yesterday, there on the deck of The Reformation, and hereafter we have sworn to forget that the same father called us both son."

"You speak like a true man," said Mary Brent, "and shall be taken at your word. You find us celebrating the tenancy of Sir Christopher Neville yonder, who is taking up land of Mistress Calvert and her son.

"Elinor, this is Master Ingle. Judge him on his deeds – not his name!"

Ingle swept the ground with the plumes of his hat before Elinor as he murmured, —

"Nay, rather judge me of your own gentleness, and let mercy temper the verdict."

Neville stood, looking coldly at the intruder. He was jealous, for he saw the light of a new interest dawning in Elinor Calvert's face, and he saw the hot, passionate light of love at first sight as clear as day in Ralph Ingle's eyes.

For the first time he was conscious with angry protest that he was growing old. His cast-down glance fell upon his grizzled mustachios, and he inwardly cursed the sign of age. "The conceited stripling!" he muttered, as he looked at the bowing golden curls. "I know I am not just. I have no ambition to be just. I hate him. Come, Cecil," he said, crossing over to where the child stood holding a wine cup in one hand and a distressingly large slice of fruit cake in the other, "thou and I have no larger part to play here than the cock in Hamlet."

"What part did he play?" asked Cecil, crowding his mouth with plums, while he held the remaining cake high above his head to escape Knut's jumping.

"Oh, the important office was his to announce the daybreak and put an end to the ghost's walking. Do ghosts walk nowadays dost thou think, Cecil?"

"Sure."

"I think so too; I have seen them, – in fact, I feel sometimes as if I were one of them."

"Art thou really?" Cecil's eyes were round as saucers.

"Well, never mind that question just now. Perhaps I am – perhaps I am not; do thou drain thy wine, and let us be off outside to build a snow-man in the road."

Nothing loath, the child slipped his hand into the big, muscular one held out to him, and unobserved by the preoccupied group around the fire, they slipped out.

Ralph Ingle turned as they passed him. "I must watch that man," he thought. "He who takes a child by the hand takes the mother by the heart."

"Wait," said Cecil at the door. "I must doff my finery, for who knows when I may need it to receive another tenant?"

"Prudent lad! I will do the same, lest I catch the fever and then thou must needs seek a new tenant. But, Cecil, promise me one thing."

"Ay, a dozen if you wish."

"Promise me that, whatever tenants thou mayst have hereafter, thou wilt like me best."

"Why, so I will, especially if you give me the bow and arrows you promised. I liked you right away last night, and mother likes you, and Cousin Mary likes you, and Father White likes you a little; but I'll tell you who doth not."

"Let us hear, then; who is he that has such poor taste in likings?"

"Father Mohl."

"Why do you think that?"

"He thmiled at you."

"Oh! Is that a bad sign with the reverend Mohl."

"You mutht not call him that – you mutht call him holy Father. But you are right, it is a bad sign when he smiles that way. It is how he looks when he complains to Mother of me, and gets me a whipping. Father White smiles like a kind old pussy-cat; but Father Mohl smiles like a wolf."

"But thou wilt stand my friend even if Father Mohl like me not?"

"Pooh, that makes no difference!"

"And thou wilt help thy mother to go on liking me?"

"Yes. She does everything I ask her to, and I'll tell her you are going to be my best friend."

"I thank thee."

"Well, you are, you know. Of course you are rather old and somewhat plain, and I cannot promise not to think Master Ingle within there is handsomer, but I shall always like you best, and beauty doth not count when you know a person."

"No, but 'tis an amazing good letter of introduction. Now fly up and change to thine old suit and we will build a snow-man as high as the window and we will put curls on him as long as those on that jackanapes inside – I mean as those of the beautiful young man who calls himself Ralph Ingle."

When Cecil had changed to his every-day clothes he came down again looking more comfortable in mind and body. "I think," he confided to Neville, "that I could eat another piece of cake. The belt of this doublet is so much looser than in my best."

"Ay, but there is dinner to come, and 'tis best to make allowance for this future; besides, who is this at the wharf in the in-bound boat?"

"Why, 'tis Couthin Margaret."

"So it is. For a moment I thought her a man in that long cloak and those heavy boots. Let us go down to meet her!"

When they reached the dock, the man in the ketch was already clewing up the sails, while the woman on the wharf stood giving orders. At the sound of approaching footsteps she turned.

Despite her rough attire and forty-odd years, Margaret Brent was a woman worth looking at. Her personality was marked by a noble largeness which obliterated detail, and cast a mantle of oblivion over defects. The first impression made upon all who came in contact with her was of her adequacy to the situation before her, whether it was a rout or a riot. This it was which a few years later won her the thanks of the Maryland Assembly for her prompt action in a political crisis, which led her kinsman to leave her sole executrix of his great estate with the brief instruction, "Take all – pay all!" and which, finally, before her death made her the most famous woman in the colony.

Through all the vicissitudes of pioneer life she kept the air and bearing of race. Even now, though a wave of gray wind-blown hair had escaped from her hood, and her falling band was pulled awry, yet no princess in full regalia could have been more the great lady than she as she came forward to meet Cecil and his companion.

"Sir Christopher, I greet you. I would I had known of your coming yesterday that I might have had your company and protection."

Neville bowed, smiling. "The advantage of both would have been on my side, for Mistress Brent's prowess is a byword."

"Say they so indeed!" Margaret answered without attempt at disclaimer and with a smile which showed her strong white teeth, "I am glad of that, for I may need the repute in the near future. Sorry was I to hear that you had thoughts of taking up land in this part of the country and deserting Kent Fort. I count you the strongest man we have among us, and since Claiborne's rebellious efforts we need all the help we can claim. 'Tis in regard to this that I have followed my brother hither."