Chapter 7 THE SATSUMA VASE

"Well, howdy to-day, Mis' Poteet!" exclaimed Mrs. Rucker as she came across her side yard and leaned over the Poteet fence right opposite the Poteet back porch. "I brought you this pan of rolls to set away for Mr. Poteet's supper. When I worked out the sponge looked like my pride over 'em riz with the dough and I just felt bound to show 'em off to somebody; I know I can always count on a few open mouths in this here nest."

"That you can and thanky squaks, too, Mis' Rucker. I don't know however I would feed 'em all if it wasn't for the drippings from your kitchen," answered the placid and always improvident Mrs. Poteet as she picked up Shoofly and came over to the fence, delighted at a chance for a few minutes parley with the ever busy and practical Mrs. Rucker. She balanced the gingham-clad bunch on its own wobbly legs beside her, while through the pickets of the fence in greeting were thrust the pink hands of Petie, the bond, who had followed in the wake of his own maternal skirts. Shoofly responded to this attention with a very young feminine gurgle of delight and licked at the chubby fist thrust toward her like an overjoyed young kitten.

"Well, Monday is always a scrap day, so I try to kinder perk up my Monday supper. Singing in the quire twict on Sunday and too much confab with the other men on the store steps always kinder tires Mr. Rucker out so he can't hardly get about with his sciatica on Monday, and I have to humor him some along through the day. That were a mighty good sermon circuit rider preached last night."

"Yes, I reckon it were, but my mind was so took up with the way Louisa Helen flirted herself down the aisle with Bob on one side of her and Mr. Crabtree on the other, I couldn't hardly get my mind down to listening. And when she contrived Mr. Crabtree into the pew next to Mis' Plunkett, as she moved down for 'em, I most gave a snort out loud. Didn't Mis' Plunkett look nice in that second mourning tucker it took Louisa Helen and all of Sweetbriar to persuade her into?"

"Lou Plunkett is as pretty as a chiny aster that blooms in September and what she's having these number-two conniptions over Mr. Crabtree for is more than I can see. I look on a second husband as a good dessert after a fine dinner and a woman oughter swallow one when offered without no mincing. I wouldn't make two bites of taking Mr. Crabtree after poor puny Mr. Plunkett if it was me. Of course there never was such a man as Mr. Satterwhite, but he was always mighty busy, while Cal Rucker is a real pleasure to me a-setting around the house on account of his soft constitution. Mr. Satterwhite, I'm thankful to say, left me so well provided for that I can afford Mr. Rucker as a kind of play ornament."

"Yes, they ain't nothing been thought up yet to beat marrying," answered Mrs. Poteet. "Now didn't Emma Satterwhite find a good chanct when Todd Crabtree married her and took her away after all that young Tucker Alloway doings? It were a kind of premium for flightiness, but I for one was glad to get her gone off'en Rose Mary's hands. I couldn't a-bear to see her tending hand and foot a woman she were jilted for."

"Well, a jilt from some men saves a woman from being married with a brass ring outen a popcorn box, in my mind, and Tucker Alloway were one of them kind of men. But talking about marrying, I'm kinder troubled in my mind about something, and I know I can depend on you not to say nothing to nobody. Mr. Gid Newsome stopped at my gate last week and got me into a kinder hinting chavering that have been a-troubling me ever since. Now that's where Mr. Rucker is such a comfort to me, he'll stay awake and worry as long as I have need of, while I wouldn't a-dared to speak to Mr. Satterwhite after he put out the light. But this is about what I've pieced outen that talk with the Senator, with Cal's help. That mortgage he has got on the Briars about covers it, like a double blanket on a single bed, and with the interest beginning to pile up it's hard to keep the ends tucked in. The time have come when Mr. Tucker can't make it no more and something has got to be done. But they ain't no use to talk about moving them old folks. I gather from a combination of what Mr. Gid looked and didn't say that he were entirely willing to take over the place and make some sorter arrangement about them all a-staying on just the same. That'd be mighty kind of him."

"You don't reckon he'd do no such take-me-or-get-out co'ting to Rose Mary, do you?" asked the soft-natured little Mrs. Poteet with alarmed sympathy in her blue eyes.

"Oh, no, he ain't that big a fool. Every man knows in marrying an unwilling woman he's putting himself down to eat nothing but scraps around the kitchen door. But I wisht Rose Mary could make up her mind to marry Mr. Newsome. She might as well, for in the end a woman can't tell nothing about taking a man; she just has to choose a can of a good brand and then be satisfied, for they all season and heat up about alike. I never gave him no satisfaction about talking his praises to her, but I reckon I'm for the tie-up if Rose Mary can see it that way." And Mrs. Rucker glanced along the Road toward Rose Mary's milk-house with a kindly, though calculating matchmaking in her practical eyes.

"I'm kinder for Mr. Mark," ventured the more sentimental Mrs. Poteet with a smile. "He's as handsome as Rose Mary are, and wouldn't they have pretty-"

"Oh, shoo, I don't hold with no marrying outen the Valley for Rose Mary! She's needed here and ain't got no call to gallivant off to New York and beyont with a strange man, beauty or no beauty. Besides she's pretty enough herself to hand it down even to the third and fourth generation. But I must go and see to helping Granny out on the side porch in the sun. I never want to neglect her, for she's the only child poor Mr. Satterwhite left me. Now Mr. Rucker-Why there comes Mis' Amandy down the front walk! Let's you and me go to meet her and see what she wants. We can help her across the Road if she is a-going to see anybody but us!" And with eager affection the two strong young women with their babies in their arms hurried across the street in order to serve if need be the delicate little old lady who, with her gray skirts fluttering and the little shawl streaming out behind, was coming at her tottering full speed in that direction. In her hand she held carefully a bit of sheer, yellow, old muslin, and her bright eyes were beaming with delight as she met the two neighbors at the gate.

"It's the dress," she exclaimed, all out of breath and her sweet little voice all a-tremble. "Sister and me and Tucker were all baptized in it when we were babies. Sister Viney has had me a-going through boxes and bundles for it ever since little Tucker was named for us, and here it is! It's hand-made and fine linen, brought all the way from New York down to the city in a wagon before the railroad run. It's all the present we have got for little Tucker, but we thought maybe-" And Miss Amanda paused with a shy diffidence in offering her gift.

"Gracious me, Miss Amandy, they didn't nothing ever happen to me like this little dress being gave to one of my children. I am going to let him be named in it and then keep it in the box with my Bible, where it won't be disturbed for nothing," exclaimed Mrs. Poteet in a tone of voice that was tear-choking with reverence as she took the dainty yellow little garment into her hand. "And to think how you all have wored yourself out a-looking for it!" she further exclaimed.

"Oh, me and Sister Viney have had a good time a-going through things; we haven't seen some of them for thirty or forty years. We found the flannel petticoat Ma was a-making for me when she died over forty-five years ago. The needle is a-sticking in it, and I'm a-going to finish it to wear next winter. I'll feel like it is a comfort for my old age she just laid by for me. I've got a little lace collar Ma's mother wore when she come over from Virginy, and it's in the very style now, so we're going to bleach it out to give to Rose Mary. Come on up to the house with me and see it and set with Sister Viney a spell, can't you? She's got mighty sore joints this morning, though Rose Mary rubbed her most a hour last night" And in response to the eager invitation they all three went back up the front walk together. The thrifty Mrs. Rucker cast a satisfied glance back towards her own side yard, where upturned tub and drying wash were in plain view. Mrs. Poteet had put off the task of the wash until a later day of the week and thus could make her visit with a mind unharrassed by the vision of suds boiling over on the stove and soap melting in the tub.

And there ensued several hours of complete absorption for the four women closeted in Miss Lavinia's room in reviewing the events of the last half century by means of the reminiscences which were inspired by one unearthed heirloom after another. Pete and Shoofly were happy on the floor enveloping themselves and each other in long wisps of moth-eaten yarn that Miss Amandy had unearthed in a bureau drawer and donated to their amusement. Mrs. Poteet had with her usual happy forgetfulness of anything but the very immediate occupation, lost sight of the fact that she had left young Tucker asleep on the bed in her room, which location, counting the distance across the two yards and down the Road, was at least slightly remote from aid in case of a sudden restoration to consciousness for the young sleeper.

And in the natural course of events the young Alloway namesake did awaken and gave lusty vent to a demand for human companionship, which was answered promptly by the General, who happened to be passing the front gate in pursuits of his own. Finding the house deserted, with his usual decision of action Stonie picked up the baby and kept on his way, which led past the garden up the hill to the barn. Young Tucker accepted this little journey in the world with his usual imperturbability, and his sturdy little neck made unusual efforts to support his bald head over the General's shoulders as if in pride at being in the company of one of his peers and not in the usual feminine thraldom.

Finding the barn also deserted, Stonie laid young Tucker on the straw in the barrel with two of Sniffer's sleeping puppies and began to attend to his errand, which involved the extraction of several long, stout pieces of string from a storehouse of his own under one of the feed bins and the plaiting of them into the cracker of a whip which he had brought along with him.

Down below the store the rest of the Swarm were busy marking out a large circus ring and discussing with considerable heat their individual rights to the various star parts to be performed in the coming exhibition. The ardors of their several ambitions were not at all dampened by the knowledge of the fact that the audience that would be in attendance to witness their triumphs would in all probability consist of only Granny Satterwhite, whom little Miss Amanda always coaxed to attend in her company, with perhaps a few moments of encouragement from Mr. Crabtree if he found the time. To which would always be added the interested and jocular company of Mr. Rucker, who always came, brought a chair to sit in and stayed through the entire performance. And in the talented aggregation of performers there was of course just one r?le that could have been assumed by General Jackson, that of ringmaster; so to that end he sat on the floor of the barn beside the sleeping puppies and young Tucker and plaited the lash by means of which he intended to govern the courses of his stars.

And it was here that Everett found him a few minutes later as he walked rapidly up the milk-house path and stood in the barn door in evident hurried search for somebody or some thing.

"Hello, General," he said with a smile at the barrel full of sleepers at Stonie's side, "do you know where Rose Mary is?"

"Yes," answered the General, "she are in her room putting buttermilk on the five freckles that comed on her nose when she hoed out in the garden without no sunbonnet. I found 'em all for her this morning, and she don't like 'em. You can go on in and see if they are any better for her, I ain't got the time to fool with 'em now."

"Not for worlds!" exclaimed Everett as he sat down on an upturned peck measure in close proximity to the barrel. "Have you decided to have Mrs. Poteet and Mrs. Sniffer swap-er-puppies, Stonie?" he further remarked.

"No, I didn't," answered Stonie with one of his rare smiles which made him so like Rose Mary that Everett's heart glowed within him. Stonie was, as a general thing, as grave as a judge, with something hauntingly, almost tragically serious in his austere young face, but his smiles when they came were flashes of the very divinity of youth and were a strange incarnation of the essence of Rose Mary's cousinly loveliness. "He was crying because he was by hisself and I bringed him along to wait till his mother came home. He belongs some to us, 'cause he's named for Uncle Tuck, and I oughter pester with him same as Tobe have to. It's fair to do my part."

"Yes, General, you always do your part-and always will, I think," said Everett, as he looked down at the sturdy little chap so busy with his long strings, weaving them over and over slowly but carefully. "A man's part," he added as two serious eyes were raised to his.

"In just a little while I'll be a man and have Uncle Tucker and Aunt Viney and Aunt Amandy to be mine to keep care of always, Rose Mamie says," answered Stonie in his most practical tone of voice as he began to see the end of the long strings draw into his weaving of the cracker.

"What about Rose Mamie herself?" asked Everett softly, his voice thrilling over the child's name for the girl with reverent tenderness.

"When I get big enough to keep care of everything here I'm going to let Rose Mamie get a husband and a heap of children, like Mis' Poteet-but I'm a-going to make 'em behave theyselves better'n Tobe and Peggie and the rest of 'em do. Aunt Viney says Mis' Poteet spares the rod too much, but I'll fix Rose Mamie's children if they don't mind her and me." The General's mouth assumed its most commanding expression as he glanced down at the little Poteet sleeping beside him, unconscious of the fact that he was, in the future, to be the victim of a spared rod.

"Stonie," asked Everett meekly, "have you chosen a husband for Rose Mary yet?"

"No," answered Stonie as he wove in the last inch of string. Then he paused and raised his eyes to Everett thoughtfully. "It's jest got to be the best man in the world, and I'm a-going to find him for her. If I can't I'll keep care of her as good as I can myself."

"General," said Everett as he held the child's eyes with a straight level compelling glance, "you are right-she must have only the best. And you 'keep care' until he comes. I am going away to-night and I don't know when I can come back, but you must always-always 'keep care' of her-until the good man comes. Will you?"

"I will," answered the General positively. "And if anybody of any kind bothers her or any of them I'll knock the stuffins outen 'em, and Tobe'll help. But say," he added, as if suddenly inspired by a brilliant idea, "couldn't you look for him for me? You'd know the good kind of a man and you could bring him here. I would give you one of the spotted puppies to pay for the trouble," and a hot wave engulfed Everett as the trustful friendly young eyes looked straight into his as Stonie made this extremely practical business proposition.

"Yes, General, I will come and bring him to you, and when he comes he will be the best ever-or he will have died in the attempt."

"All right," answered Stonie, completely satisfied with the terms of the bargain, "and you can take your pick of the puppies. Are you going on the steam cars from Boliver?"

"Yes," answered Everett, "and I want to find your Uncle Tucker to ask him-"

"Well, here he is to answer all inquiries at all times," came in Uncle Tucker's quizzical voice as he stood in the doorway of the barn with a bucket in one hand and a spade in the other. "Old age is just like a hobble that tithers up stiff-jinted old cattle to the home post and keeps 'em from a-roving. I haven't chawed the rope and broke over to Boliver in more'n a month now. Did you leave Main Street a-running east to west this morning?"

"Yes," answered Everett, "still the same old Boliver. But I wanted to see you right away to tell you that I have had a wire from the firm that makes it necessary for me to get back to New York immediately. I must catch that train that passes Boliver at midnight."

"Oh, fly away, you can't pick up and go like that!" exclaimed Uncle Tucker with alarmed remonstrance. "Such a hurry as that are unseemly. Good-byes oughter to be handled slowly and careful, like chiny, to save smashed feelings. Have you told Rose Mary and the sisters?"

"No; I've just come back from Boliver, and I couldn't find Rose Mary, and Miss Lavinia and Miss Amanda had company. I must go on over to the north field while there is still light to-to collect some-some instruments I-that is I may have left some things over there that I will need. I will hurry back. Will-you tell them all for me?" As Everett spoke he did not look directly at Uncle Tucker, but his eyes followed the retreating form of the General, who, with the completed whip, the nodding baby and the two awakened puppies was making his way down Providence Road in the direction of the circus band. There was a strange controlled note of excitement in his voice and his hands gripped themselves around the handles of his kit until the nails went white with the strain.

"Yes, I'll tell 'em," answered Uncle Tucker with a distressed quaver coming into his voice as he took in the fact that Everett's hurried departure was inevitable. "I'm sorry you have got to go, boy, but I'll help you get off if it's important for you. I'll have them get your supper early and put up a snack for the train."

"I don't want anything-that is, it doesn't matter about supper. I-I will be back to see Miss Lavinia and Miss Amanda before they retire." And Everett's voice was quiet with a calmness that belied the lump in his throat at the very mention of the farewell to be said to the two little old flower ladies.

"I'll go on and tell 'em now," said Uncle Tucker with an even increased gloom in his face and voice. "Breaking bad news to women folks is as nervous a work as dropping a basket of eggs; you never can tell in which direction the lamentations are a-going to spatter and spoil things. I'll go get the worst of the muss over before you get back."

"Thank you," answered Everett with both a laugh and a catch in his voice as they separated, he going out through the field and over the hill and Uncle Tucker along the path to the house.

And a little later Uncle Tucker found Rose Mary moving alone knee deep in the flowers and fruit of her beloved garden. For long moments she bent over the gray-green, white-starred bed of cinnamon pinks which sent up an Arabian fragrance into her face as she carefully threaded out each little weed that had dared rear its head among the white blossoms. As she walked between the rows the tall lilies laid their heads against her breast and kissed traces of their gold hearts on her hands and bare arms, while on the other side a very riot of blush peonies crowded against her skirts. Long trails of pod-laden snap beans tangled around her feet and a couple of round young squashes rolled from their stems at the touch of her fingers. She was the very incarnation of young Plenty in the garden of the gods, and she reveled as she worked.

"Rose Mary," said Uncle Tucker as he came and stood beside her as she began to train the clambering butter-bean vines around their tall poles, "young Everett has got to go on to New York to-night on the train from Boliver, and I told him you would be mighty glad to help him off in time. I'd put him up a middling good size snack if I was you, for the eating on a train must be mighty scrambled like at best. We'll have to turn around to keep him from being late." And it was thus broadside that the blow was delivered which shook the very foundations of Rose Mary's heart and left her white to the lips and with hands that clutched at the bean vines desperately.

"When did he tell you?" she asked in a voice that managed to pass muster in the failing light.

"Just a little while ago, and the news hit Sister Viney so sudden like it give her a bad spell of asthma, and Sister Amandy was sorter crying and let the jimson-weed smoke get in her mouth and choke her. They are a-having a kind of ruckus, with nobody but Stonie helping 'em put Sis' Viney to bed, so I reckon you'd better go in and see 'em. He's gone over to the north field to get a hammer or something he left and will be back soon. Hurry that black pester up with the supper, I'm so bothered I feel empty," with which injunction Uncle Tucker left Rose Mary at the kitchen steps.

And it was a strenuous hour that followed, in which things were so crowded into Rose Mary's hands that the fullness of her heart had to be ignored if she was to go on with them. After a time Miss Lavinia was eased back on her pile of pillows and might have dropped off to sleep, but she insisted on having her best company cap arranged on her hair and a lavender shawl put around her shoulders and thus in state take a formal leave of the departing guest-alone. And it was fully a half hour before Everett came out of her room, and Rose Mary saw him slip a tiny pocket testament which had always lain on Miss Lavinia's table into his inside breast pocket, and his face was serious almost to the point of exhaustion. The time he had spent in Miss Lavinia's room little Miss Amanda had busily occupied in packing the generous "snack," which Uncle Tucker hovered over and saw bestowed to his entire satisfaction with the traps Everett had strapped up in his room. Stonie's large eyes grew more and more wistful, and after he and Uncle Tucker retired with their good-byes all said he whispered to Rose Mary that he wanted to say just one more thing to Mr. Mark.

Tenderly Everett bent over the cot until the blush rosebud that Miss Amanda had shyly pinned in his buttonhole as her good-by before she had retired, brushed the little fellow's cheek as he ran his arm under the sturdy little nightgowned shoulders and drew him as close as he dared.

"Say," whispered Stonie in his ear, "if you see a man that would buy Sniffer's other two spotted pups I would sell 'em to him. I want to get them teeth for Aunt Viney. I could get 'em to him in a box."

"How much do you want for them?" asked Everett with a little gulp in his voice as his heart beat against the arm of the young provider assuming his obligations so very early in life.

"A dollar a-piece, I guess, or maybe ten," answered Stonie vaguely.

"I'll sell them right away at your price," answered Everett. "I'll see that Mr. Crabtree has them packed and shipped." He paused for a moment. He would have given worlds to have taken the two little dogs with him and have left the money with Stonie-but he didn't dare.

"And," murmured Stonie drowsily, "don't forget that good man for Rose Mamie if you see him-and-and-" but suddenly he had drifted off into the depths, thus abandoning himself to the crush of a hug Everett had been hungry to give him.

And out in the starlit dusk he found Rose Mary sitting on the steps, freed at last, with her responsibilities all asleep-and before him there lay just this one-good-by.

Silently he seated himself beside her and as silently lit his cigar and began to puff the rings out into the air. In the perfect flood of perfume that poured around and over them and came in great gusts from the garden he detected a new tone, wild and woodsy, sweet with a curious tang and haunting in its alien and insistent note in the rhapsody of odors.

"There's something new in bloom in your garden, Lady of the Rose?" he asked questioningly.

"Yes, it's the roses on the hedges coming out; don't they smell briary and-good? Just this last night you will be able to carry away with you a whiff of real sweetbriar. To-morrow the whole town will be in bloom. It is now I think if we could only see it." Rose Mary had gained her composure and the poignant wistfulness in her voice was but a part of the motif of the briar roses in the valley dusk.

"I'll see it all right to-morrow and often. Sweetbriar-it's going to blind me so that I won't be able to make my way along Broadway. Everything hereafter will be located up and down Providence Road for me." Everett's voice held to a tone of quiet lightness and he bravely puffed his rings of smoke out on the breezes.

"Perhaps some day you'll pass us again along the road to your Providence," said Rose Mary gently, and the wistful question was all that her woman's tradition allowed her to ask-though her heart break with its pride.

"Some day," answered Everett, and underneath the quiet voice sounded a savage note and his teeth bit through his cigar, which he threw out into the dew-carpeted grass. Just then there came from up under the eaves a soft disturbed flutter of wings and a gentle dove note was answered reassuringly and tenderly in kind.

"Rose Mary," he said as he turned to her and laid his hand on the step near her, "once you materialized your heart for me, and now I'm going to do the same for mine to you. Yours, you say, is an old gabled, vine-clad, dove-nested country house, a shelter for the people you love-and always kept for your Master's use. It is something just to have had a man's road to Providence lead past the garden gate. I make acknowledgement. And mine? I think it is like one of those squat, heathen, Satsuma vases, inlaid with distorted figures and symbols and toned in all luridness of color, into which has been tossed a poor sort of flower plucked from any bush the owner happened to pass, which has been salted down in frivolity-or perhaps something stronger. I'll keep the lid on to-night, for you wouldn't like the-perfume."

"If you'd let me have it an hour I would take it down to the milk-house and empty and scrub it and then I could use it to pour sweet cream into. Couldn't you-you leave it here-in Uncle Tucker's care? I-I-really-I need it badly." The raillery in her voice was as delicious and daring as that of any accomplished world woman out over the Ridge. It fairly staggered Everett with its audacity.

"No," he answered, coolly disapproving, "no, I'll not leave it; you might break it."

"I never break the crocks-I can't afford to. And women never break men's hearts; they do it themselves by keeping a hand on the treasure so as to take it back when they want it, and so between them both it sometimes gets-shattered."

"Very well, then-the lid's off to you-and remember you asked for-the rummage, Rose Mary," answered Everett in a tone as light as hers. Then suddenly he rose and stood tall and straight in front of her, looking down into her upraised eyes in the dusk. "You don't know, do you, you rose woman you, what a man's life can hold-of nothingness? Yes, I've worked hard at my profession and thrown away the proceeds-in a kind of-riotous living. Other men's vast fortunes have been built on my brains, and my next year I'm going to enter as a penniless thirty-niner. When I came South three months ago I drew the last thousand dollars I had in bank, I have a couple of hundreds left, and that's all, out of over twenty thousand made in straight fees from mineral tests in the last year. Yes-a bit of riotous living. It's true about those poor flowers plucked off frail stems off frailer bushes-but-if it hadn't been-a sort of fair play all around I wouldn't stand here telling you about it, you in your hedge of briar roses. And now suddenly something has come into my life that makes me regret every dollar tossed to the winds and every cent burned in the fires-and in spite of it all I must make good. I'm going away from you and I don't know what is going to happen-but as I tell you from now on my feet do not stray from Providence Road, my eyes will turn from across any distance to catch a sight of the crown of old Harpeth, and my heart is in your milk-house to be of any kind of humble use. Ah, comfort me, rose girl, that I can not say more and that go I must if I catch my train." And he stretched out his hands to Rose Mary as she arose and stood close at his side, her eyes never leaving his and her lips parted with the quick breathing of her lifted breast.

"And you'll remember, won't you, when things go wrong, or you are tired, that the sunny corner in the old farm-house is yours? Always I shall be here in Harpeth Valley with my nest in the Briars, and because you are gone I'll be lonely. But I won't be in the least anxious, for whatever it is that calls you, I know you will give the right answer, because-because-well, aren't you one of my own nesties, and don't I know how strong and straight your wings can fly?"

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