Hempfield

The tender new shoots of the Virginia creeper were uncurling themselves at the window ledge and feeling their way upward toward freedom – and Nort put his head in among them.

"Hello, David!"

Though I had just been thinking of him, the sound of his voice startled me. I looked around and saw him smiling very much in his old way.

"Nort, you rascal!" said I.

"David," he said, "I couldn't stay away another minute. I had to know what the old Captain said and did when the flying-machine came to Hempfield."

"Is that all you came back for?"

"May I come in?" And with that he climbed in at the window. I took him by both his shoulders and looked him in the eye. I had a curious sense of gladness in having him once more under my hand.

"You look thin, Nort, but I haven't any pity or sympathy for you. What have you been up to now?"

We both forgot all about the flying-machine.

"Well, David," said he, "I've been finding out some things I didn't know before – some things I can't do."

He was in a mood wholly unfamiliar to me, a sort of restrained, sad, philosophical mood.

"You know," he continued, "I had a great idea for a novel – "

He paused and looked up at me, smiling rather sheepishly.

"Well, I started it – "

"You have!"

"Yes, I got the first two paragraphs written. And there I stuck. You see I didn't know where to get hold; and then I thought I'd jump right into the middle of the action, where it was hottest and most interesting – but I found that my hero insisted on explaining everything to the heroine, and wouldn't do anything, and then, when I tried to think how I should have it all come out, I found it didn't have any end, either. I leave it to you, David, how any man is going to write a novel which he can neither get into nor get out of?"

His face wore such a rueful, humorous look that I laughed aloud.

"It looks funny, I know," he said, "but it's really no laughing matter. It seems to me I'm a complete fizzle."

"At twenty-five, Nort! And all this beautiful world around you! Why, you've only to reach out your hand and take what you want."

I shall never forget the look on Nort's face as he leaned forward in his chair, nor the words that seemed to be wrung out of his very soul:

"That's all right as philosophy, David, but I – want – Anthy."

I suppose I had known it all along, and should not have been surprised or pained, and yet it was a moment before I could reply.

"Take her then, Nort," I said, "if you're big enough. But you can't steal her, as they once stole their women; and you can't buy her, as they do still."

Nort looked at me steadily.

"How, then?"

"You've got to win her, earn her. She's as able to take care of herself as you are."

"I guess it's hopeless enough. There isn't much chance that a girl like Anthy will see anything in a perfectly useless chap like me."

We sat for some time silent, Nort there in the chair at the end of the table, I here by the window, and the warm air of spring coming in laden with the heavy sweet odour of lilac blossoms. And I had a feeling at the moment as though my hand were upon the destinies of two lives.

I don't know yet quite why I did it, but I leaned over presently and opened the drawer in my desk where I keep my greatest treasures, and took out a small package of letters. It was my prize possession, the knowledge I had of the deep things in Anthy's life, a possession that I had never thought I could share with any one, and yet at that moment it seemed to me I wanted most of all to have Nort know with what a high and precious thing he was dealing – the noble heart of a good woman.

So I gave him a glimpse of the Anthy I knew, told him about the secret post-office box behind the portrait of Lincoln in the study of her father's home, and of the letters she wrote and posted there. Then I opened one of the letters and handed it to him. I watched him as he read it, his hand trembling just a little. At last he looked up at me – with his bare soul in his eyes. He got up slowly from his chair and looked all about him, and then he said in a low voice, as if to himself:

"She was in here once, in this room, in this chair."

I have never been quite sure what Nort's mental processes were at that moment, but at least they were swift, and as terribly serious as only youth knows how to be. And absurd? Probably.

"David," he said, "I'm going away."

"Going away? Why?"

"David," said he, "I don't suppose there was ever in this world such a great character as Anthy – I mean such a truly great character."

He paused, looking at me intensely. If I had known that the next moment was to be my last I should still have laughed, laughed irresistibly. It was the moment when the high mood became unbearable. Moreover, I had a sudden vision of Anthy herself, in her long gingham apron, going sensibly, cheerfully, about the printing-office, a stick of type in her hand, and, very likely, a smudge of printer's ink on her nose! Why do such visions smite us at our most solemn moments? Nort was taken aback at my laughter, and evidently provoked.

"I couldn't help it, Nort," I said. "I wonder if Anthy herself wouldn't laugh if she were to hear you say such things."

"That's so," said Nort. "She would. I've never known any one, man or woman, who had such a keen sense of humour as Anthy has."

"Sensible, too, Nort – "

"Sensible!" he exclaimed. "I should rather say so! I have never seen any one in my life who was as sensible – I mean sound and wise– as Anthy is."

Two months before, Nort himself would have been the first to laugh at such a situation as this: he would have laughed at himself, at me, and even at Anthy, but now he was in no such mood. I prize the memory of that moment; it was one of those rare times in life when it is given us to see a human spirit at the moment of its greatest truth, simplicity, passion. And is it not a worthy moment when everything that is selfish in a human heart is consumed in the white heat of a great emotion?

Toward noon, when Harriet came in, greatly astonished to find a visitor with me, Nort quite shocked her by jumping up from his chair and seizing her by both hands.

"I'm terribly glad to see you, Miss Grayson," he said.

During dinner he seemed unable to tell whether he was eating chicken or pie, and no sooner were we through than he insisted upon hurrying away. He pledged me to secrecy concerning his whereabouts, but left his address.

CHAPTER XXVII

FERGUS MACGREGOR GOES TO THE HILLS

I think of no act in all the drama of the Star of Hempfield with greater affection, return in memory to none with deeper pleasure, than that which now opened upon the narrow stage of our village life. It centred around Nort and Anthy, of course, but it began with the old Captain, and about a week after Nort's visit at the farm.

The old Captain was sick in bed with one of his periodical "attacks." The old Captain was a man of great robustity and activity of both body and mind, and he made no docile invalid. At one moment he seemed to be greatly depressed, groaned a good deal, and considered that he had not long to live; but at the next moment he would become impatient, and want to be up immediately and save the nation from the ravages of the Democratic party. I went over to see him on the second day of his illness, and the first thing he said when I came in was this:

"Where's Nort? I'd like to know what's become of the boy. I never thought he'd leave Hempfield without at least saying good-bye. It isn't like him."

In writing to Nort that night, I told him of my visit to the old Captain and what the Captain said, and on the second morning, when I walked into the office of the Star, what was my astonishment to see Nort down on his knees tinkering the gasoline engine.