LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume XXII, Issue 1996, 17 July 1880, Page 3

LITERATURE.

CRUTCH, THE PAGE. ' [Br " Gath."] (Concluded) ' Joyce,'he continued, 'yonhave a doable duty ; one to your mother and this poor invalid, whose journey towardgthat Father's house not made with hands is swiftly has tening ; another duty toward your noble self —the future that is in you and your woman's heart. I tell you again that you are beautiful, and the slavery to which you are condemning yourself for ever is an offence against the creator of such perfection, Co you know what it is to love ?' ' I know what it is to feel kindness,' she answered after a time of silence. ' I ought to know no more. Your goodness is very dear to me. We never sleep, brother and I, but we say your name together, and ask God to bless you.' Reybild sought in vain to suppress a confession he had resisted. The contact of her form, her large dark eyeß now fixfd upon him in emotion, the birth of the conscious woman in the virgin, and her Jaffection still in the leashes of a slavish sacrifice, tempted him onward to the conquest. ■ I am about to retire from Congress,' he said. 'ltis no place for me in times so insubstantial. There are darkness and beggary ahead for all your Southern race. There is a crisis coming whicn will be followed by desolation. The generation to which your parents belong is doomed I I open my arms to you, dear girl, and offer you a home never yet gladdened by a wife. Accept it and leave Washington with me and yonr brother. I love you wholly.' A happy light shone in her face a moment. She was weary to the bone with her day's work, and had not the strength, if she had the will, to pievent the Congressman drawing her to his heart- Sobbing there, she spoke with bitter agony. ' Heaven bless you, dear Mr Reybold, with a wife good enough to deserve you .' Blessings on your generous heart. But I cannot leave Washington. I love another here! ' llL—Dust. Ti*e Lake and Bayou Committee reaped the reward of a good action. Crutch, the page, as they all called Uriel Basil, affected the sensibility of the whole committee to the extent that profanity almost ceased there, and vulgarity became a crime in the presenoe of a child. Gentle words and wishes became the rnle; a glimmer of reverence and a thought of piety were not unknown in that little chamber. ' Dog my skin 1 ' said Jeems Bee, 'if I ever made a 'ointment that give me such satisfaction 1 I feel as if I had sot a nigger free!' The youthful abstractionist, Lowndes Oleburn, expressed it even better. *Crutoh'- ' he said, 'is like an angel reduced to his bones. Them air wings or pinions, that he might have flew off with, being a pair of crutches here, keeps him to tarry awhile in our service. But, gentlemen, he's not got long to stay. His crutches is growing too heavy for that expandin' speret. Some day we'll look up and miss him through our tears.'

They gave him many a present; they put a silver watch in his pocket, and dressed him in a jacket and gilt buttons. He had a bouquet of flowers to take home every day to that marvellous sister of whom he spoke so often ; and there were times when the whole committee, seeing him drop off to sleep as he often did through frail and weary nature, sat sileut'y watching lest he might be wakened before his rest was over. But no persuasion could take him off the floor of Congress. In tnat solemn old Hall of Representatives, under the semi-circle of gray columns, he darted with agility from noon to dusk, keeping speed npon his crutches with the healthiest of the pages, and racing into the document-room, and through the dark and narrow corridors of the old Capitol loft, where the Houße library was lost in twilight. Visitors looked with interest and sympathy at the narrow back and body of this invalid child, whose eyes were full of bright, beaming spirit. He sometimes nodded on the steps by the Speaker's chair ; and these spells of dreaminess and fatigue increased as his disease advanced upon his wasting system. Once he did not awaken at all until adjournment. The great Congress and audience passed out, and the little fellow still slept, with his head against the clerk's desk, while all the other pages were grouped around him, and they finally bore him off to the committee-room in their arms, where, amongst the sympathetic watchers, was old Beau. When Uriel opened his eyes the old mendicant was looking into them.

'Ah! little Major,'he said, 'poor Beau has been waiting for yon to take those bad words back. Old Beau thought it was all bob with his little cove.'

' Beau,' said the boy, ' I've had such a dream! I thought my dear father, who is working so hard to bring mo home to him, had carried me out on the river in a beat. We sailed through the greenest marshes, among white lillies where the wild ducks were diving and diving, and they brought up long stalks of celery from the water and gave them to us. Father ate all his. But mine turned into lilies, and grew up so high that I felt myself going with them, and the higher I went the more beautiful grew the birds. Oh' let me sleep and see if it will be so again.' The outcast raised his gold-headed cane and hobbled np and down with a laced handkerchief at hia eyes. ' Great God! ' he exclaimed, ' another generation is going out, and here I stay without a stake, playing a lone hand for ever and for ever.'

' Beau,' said Reybold, 'there's hope while one can feel. Don't go away until you have a good word from our little passenger.' 'f he outstretched hand of the Northern Congressman was not refused by the vagrant, whose eccentric sorrow yet amused the Southern committeemen.

' Ole Beau's jib-boom of a mustache 'll put his eye out,' said Pontotoc Bib, 'ef he fetches another groan like that.' ' Bau'a very shaky around the hams an' knees,' said Box Izwd; ' he's been a good figger, but even figgers can lie ef they stand up too long.' The little boy unclosed his eyes and looked around on all those kindly, watching faces. 'Did anybody fire a gun ?' he said. ' Oh ! no. I was only dreaming thac I was hunting with father, and he shot at the beautiful pheasants that were making such a whirring of wings for me. It was music. When can I hunt with father, dear gentlemen ?' They all felt the tread of the mighty hunter before the Lord very near at hand, the hunter whose name is Death.

' There are little tiny birds along the beach,' muttered the boy. "They twitter a \d run into th 3 surf aud back again, aud am I one of them ? I must be, for I feel the water coin I; and yet I see you all, so kind to me. Don't whistle for me now, for I don't get much play, gentlemen. Will the Speaker turn me out if I play with the beach birds just once? I'm only a little boy working for my mother.' 'Dear Uriel,'whispered Beybold, 'here's Old Beau, to whom you once spoke angrily. Don't you see him. The little boy's eyes came back from farland somewhere, and he saw the ruined gamester at his feet. ' Dear Beau,' ho Baid, 'I can't get off to go home with you. They won't excuse me, and I give all my money to mother. But you go to the back gate. Ask for Joyce. She'll give you a nice warm meal every day. Go wi;h him, Mr Beybold. If you ask fcr him it will be all right j for Joyce—dear Joyce ! she loves you.' The beach birds played again along the strand ; the boy ran into the foam with his companions and felt the spray once more The Mighty Hunter shot his bird—a little cripple that twittered the swaetest of them all. Nothing moved in the solemn chamber of the committee but the voice of an old forsaken man, sobbing bitterly. IV.—Cake.

The funeral was over, and Mr Beybold marvelled much that the Judge had not put iu an appearance. The whole committee had attended the obsequies of Crutch and acted as pall-bearers. Reybold had escorted the page's sister to the Congressional cemetery, and had observed even Old Beau to come with a wreath of flowers and hobble to the grave and depo3it them there. _ But the Judge, remorseless in death as frivo'ous in life, nevor came near his mourning wife and daughter iu ;their severest sorrow. _ Mrs Tryphonia Basil, seeing that this singular want of behaviour on the Judge's partlwaa

making some ado, raised her voice above the general din of meals. 'Judge Basil,' she exclaimed, 'has [been on his Tennessee purchase. These Christmas times there's no getting through the snow in the Cumberland Gap. He's stopped off thaw to shoot the—ahem ! —the wild turkey—a great passion with the Jedge. His half unole, Gineral Johnson, of Awkineo, was a tor key-killer of high celebrity. He was a Deshay on his Maw's side. I s'pose you haven't the torkey in the Butch country, Mr Eeybold?' 'Madame,'said Mr Reybold in a quieter moment, * have you written to the Judge the fact of his son's death V ' Oh yes—to Fawquear.' 1 Mrs Basil,' continued the Congressman, ' I want yon to be explicit with me. Where is the Judge, your husband, at this moment ?' ' Excuse me, Colonel Reybold, this is a little of a assumption, sir. The Jedge might call you out, sir, for intruding upon his incog. He's very fine on his incog., yoa are awair.' ' Madame,' exclaimed Reybold straightforwardly, ' there are reasons why I should communicate with your Husband. My term in Congres3 ia nearly expired. I might arouse your interest, if I chose, by recalling to your mind the memorandum of about seven hundred dollars in which you are my debtor. That would be a reason for seeing your husband anywhere north of the Potomac, but Ido not intend to mention it. Is he aware— are you ?—that Joyce Basil is in love with some one in this city ?' Mrs Basil drew a long breath, raised both hands, and ejaculated : ' We'll, I declaw 1' 'I have it from her own lips,'continued Reybold. ' She told me as a secret, but all my suspicions are awakened. If I can prevent it, madame, that girl shall not follow the example of hundreds of her class in Washington, and descend, through the boarding-house or lodging quarter to be the wife of some common and unambitious clerk, whose penury she must some day sustain by her labor, I love her myself, but I will never take her until I know her heart to be free. Who is this lover of your daughter ? ' An expression of agitation and cunning passed over Mr Basil's face. 'Colonel Reybold,' she whined, 'I pity your blasted hopes. If I wa3 a widow they should be comforted. Alas! my daughter is in love with one cf the Fitzchews of Fawqueath. His parents is cousins of the Jedge, and attached to the military.' The Congressman looked disappointed, but not yet satisfied ' Give me at once the address of your husband,* he spoke. 'lf yoa do not, I shall ask yonr daughter for it, and she cannot refuse me.'

The mistress of the boarding-house wa3 not without alarm, but she dispelled it with an outbreak of anger. ' If my daughter disobeys her mother,'she cried, 'and betrays the Jedges incog., she ia no Basil, Colonel Reybold. The Basils repudiate her, and she may jine the Dutch and other foreigners at her pleasure.' ' That is her only safety,' exclaimed Reybold. 'I hope to break every string that holds her to yonder barren honor and exhausted soil.'

He pointed towards Virginia, and hastened away to the Capitol. All the way ap the aquallid and mnddy avenue ot that day he mused and wondered : ' Who ia Fitzhngh ? la there such a person any more than a Judge Basil ? And yet there is a Judge for Joyce has told me so. She, at least cannot lie to me. At last,' he thought, ' the dream of my happiness is over. Invincible in her prejudice as all;theae Virginians, Joyce Basil has made her bed amongst the starvelling First Families, and there she means to live and die. Five years hence she will have her brood aronnd her. In ten years she will keep a boarding house and borrow money. As her daughters grow up to the stature and grace of their mother, they will be proud and poor again, and breed in and out, until the race will perish from the earth.' Slow to love, deeply interested, baffled but unsatisfied, Beybold made up his mind to out his perplexity short by leaving the city for the county of Fauquier. As he passed down the avenue late that afternoon, he turned into E street, near the theatre, to engage a carriage for his expedition. It was a street of livery stables, gambling dens, drinking houses, and worse ; murders had been committed along its sidewalks. The more pretentious canaille of the city harbored there to prey on the hotels clof e at hand and aspire to the chance acquaintance of gentlemen. As Bey bold stood in the archway of this street, just as the evening shadows deepened above the line of sunßet, he saw something pass which made his heart start to his throat and fastened him to the spot. Veiled and walking fast, as if escaping detection or pursuit, the figure of Joyce Basil flitted over the pavement and disappeared injthe door about at the mii-d!* of this Alsatian quarter of the Capital. • What house is that ?' he asked of a constable passing by, pointing to the door she entered. • Gambling den,' answered the officer ; 'it used to be old Phil Pendleton's." Beybold knew the reputation of the house; a resort for the scions of the old tidewater families, where hospitality thinly veiled the paramount design of plunder. The connection established the truth of Mrs Basil's statement. Here, perhaps, alreadymarried to the dissipated heir of some unproductive estate, Joyce Basil's lot was cast for ever. It might even be that she had been tempted here by some wretch whose villainy she knew not of. Keybold's brain took fire at the thought, nnd he pursued the fugitive into the doorway. A negro steward unfastened a slide and peeped at Beybold knocking in the hall; and, seeing him of respectable appearance, bowed ceremoniously as he let down a chain and opened the door.

'Short cards in the front salocn,' he cried : ' supper and faro. Chambers on the third floor. Walk up.' Reybold only tarried a moment as the gaming tables, where the silent, monotonous deal from the tin box, the lazy Etroke of the markers, and the transfer of ivory "chips'" from card to card of the sweat-cloth, irepressed him as the dullest form of vice he had ever found. Treading softly up the stairs, he was attracted by the light of a door partly ajar, and a deep groan, as of a dying person. He peeped through the crack of the door, and beheld Joyce Basil leaning over an old man, whose brow ehe moistened with her handkerchief. ' Dear father,' he heard her say, and it brought consolation to more than the sick man. Reybold threw open the door and entered into the presence of Mrs Basil and her daughter. Tho former arose with surprise and shame, and cried ' * Jedge Basil, the Dutch have hunted you down. He's here —the Yankee creditor.'

Joyco Basil held up her hand in implcration, but Beybold did not heed the woman's remark. He felt a weight rising from bis heart, and the blindness of many months lifted'from hia eyes. The dying mortal npon the bed, over whose face the blue billow of death was rolling rapidly, and whose eyes sought in his daughter's the promise of mercy from on high, was the mysterous parent who had never arrived, the Judge from Fauquier. In that old man's long wised mutt che, crlmpled hair, and threadbare finery the Congressman recognized Old Beau, the outcast gamester and mendicant, and the father of Joyce aud Uriel Basil. « Colonel Key bold,'faltered that old wreck of manly beauty and of promise long departed. ' Old Beau's passing in his cheeks. The chant covea will be telling to-morrcw what they knew of his life in the papers, but I've dropped a cold deck on 'em these twenty years. Not one knows Old Beau, the Bloke, to be Tom Basil, cadet at West Point in the last generation. I've kept nothing of my own but my children's coed name. My little boy never knew me to be his father. I tried to keep the secret from my daughter, but her affection broke down my disguises. Thank God! t he old rounder's deal has run out at last. For his wife he'll tlash her diles no more, nor be taken on the vag.' 'Basil,' said Beybold, 'what trust do you leave to me in your family ?' Mrs Basil strove to interpose, but the dying man raised his voice: ' Tryphonee can go hotie to Fauquier. She was always welcome there—without me. I waß disinher ted. But here, Colonel! My last drop of blood is in the girl. She love 3 you.' A rattle arose in the sinner's throat. -He made an effort, and transferred his daughter's hand to the Congressman's. Not taking it away' she knelt with her future husband at the bedside and raised her voice : ' Lc-d, when Thou earnest into Thy kingdom, remember him !'