The Sherwood Ring (16 page)

He swung himself up on his own horse with a disgusted snarl, and we filed out of the stable and down the drive in silence. The party in the kitchen had apparently not yet discovered that anything was wrong. The fires and lights were still blazing festively behind the drawn curtains as we passed them, and the man with the high sweet voice had begun to sing "Barbara Allen" again. The last plaintive, reproachful notes floated lingeringly after us on the clear evening air:

"O mother, mother, make my bed,

O make it saft and narrow:

My love has died for me to-day,

I'll die for him to-morrow."

Then the house fell away behind us again, and there was nothing to be heard but the faint jingle of the harness as the horses turned into the orchard road and quickened their pace a little. A handful of winter sunset was burning fierily on the dark edge of the western hills, the sky above it clear gold and citron deepening slowly to a luminous blue that was already pricked with stars. Dick lifted his head and looked at them.

"Fair day tomorrow," he said thoughtfully. Then, in precisely the same tone, "I'd give ten years of my life to know exactly how this happened."

"I told you," I answered, rather shortly: I did not feel like talking just then. "I put Aunt Susanna's sleeping drops in his wine."

"And I suppose that was all there was to it?" retorted Dick. "I said I wanted to know what happened. You may be a very remarkable young lady, my dear sister, as I seem to remember somebody observing in the cellar, but you'll never make me believe that you just poured Aunt Susanna's sleeping drops into Peaceable Sherwood's cup and he drank them down like a good little boy without any trouble whatever."

"I don't know what you'd call trouble. He asked me to marry him, if that's what you mean."

"Barbara!" said Dick sternly. "Barbara, do you remember what happens to little girls who tell lies?"

"He asked me to marry him."

"Not truth and honor?"

"Truth and honor. He also informed me that he usually got what he wanted."

"He did, did he?" Dick gave a long whistle of amazement and then suddenly began to laugh. "I believe that he's supposed to have made the same remark once before — when he tried a perfectly impossible attack on an army outpost last August. One of his men was telling me about it this morning. He said that Peaceable had no more chance of taking that place than he had of flying away to the moon."

"Did he take it?"

"Oh, yes," said Dick. "I'm sorry for you, Barbara. When's the wedding?"

"I think you are behaving in an extremely rude and ungentlemanly manner," I replied with calm dignity. "And besides, how can there possibly be any wedding when he's under lock and key in the Goshen jail?"

"I expect you'll find that out," said Dick, placidly.

"Peggy!"

I glanced up — it was Uncle Enos again, calling to me from the study — and when I looked back, Barbara Grahame was gone. Only, for an instant, lingering like a cool breath on the heavy summer air, I thought I felt the faintest possible winter tang of Christmas pine and wood smoke. Then a great puff of hot wind came tearing through the east windows and swept it away as the curtains billowed and the study door blew open with a crash. At the same moment the room darkened suddenly and there was an ominous rumbling roar overhead. The long heat of the afternoon was breaking at last in a thunderstorm.

"Peggy! Where are you?"

Uncle Enos was standing at the open window of his study struggling frantically with the catch. Heavy drops of rain were beginning to spatter all around him. Loose papers and notes were blowing in showers about the floor and the Venetian glasses on the blotter rocked and tinkled perilously in another rumbling gust of wind. The small leather¬bound book Uncle Enos had been reading that afternoon slipped from the edge of the desk and fell, carrying a stack of manuscript over with it. I sprang forward to catch the glasses — there was a tremendous roar of thunder — and then the window had slammed shut and I was down on my knees trying to gather up the scattered pages of the article Uncle Enos was writing for
Antiques and Collectors.

Uncle Enos paid no attention to me. He was back at the desk examining the Venetian glasses with trembling hands to make sure they had come to no harm. Mercifully, it was all over so quickly that nothing had really been hurt. The sheets of manuscript were out of order, but none was missing and only two appeared to be even slightly blotted by the rain. The small leatherbound book was lying open face-down on the rug, and for a moment I thought the fall must have split it apart, but when I picked it up and ran my finger along the spine, it did not seem to be damaged at all.

It was a nice little book, very old and smelling faintly of dry paper. Rather to my surprise, there was no title on the spine — not even a few faint traces to show where a title had once been before it was worn away — nothing but a coat of arms stamped in faded gold on the center of the front cover, with a —

"Peggy!"

The book was snatched out of my hand, and Uncle Enos stood over me, glaring down, his lips white and his eyes blazing with fury. I had not seen that look on his face since the appalling afternoon when he had driven Pat out of the house, almost a month before.

"And just what did you think you were doing?" he demanded fiercely.

"But, Uncle Enos, I was only trying to see — "

"I want it clearly understood here and now," said Uncle Enos, "that I will have no more of this sneaking and spying into my private papers." He thrust the little book into one of the desk drawers, his hand shaking so much that he could hardly turn the key in the lock.

"But, Uncle Enos, I was only — "

"Go to your room at once," said Uncle Enos, turning his back on me.

There were twenty-nine rooms at Rest-and-be-thankful, without a soul in any one of them except the study and the kitchen, but Uncle Enos's notions of discipline dated from the days when a naughty child was sent upstairs in disgrace to spend the rest of the afternoon in lonely misery away from his brothers and sisters.

"But, Uncle Enos — "

"Did you hear what I said?"

It was obviously useless even to reply. I got to my feet with what dignity I could and trailed away unhappily up the stairs.

I went slowly, running one finger absent-mindedly along the polished rail of the banister and frowning to myself. I was trying to remember the exact shape of the coat of arms which had been stamped on the brown leather cover of the little book.

The work must have been skillfully done; the gold was slightly rubbed and faded, but even after a hundred years or so, the small impression had looked perfectly clear. I could still see it as I had in that single flash before Uncle Enos snatched it away from me. The shield had been blank except for three little points like rayed stars clustered in the upper left-hand corner. And under the shield itself was the usual narrow twist of ribbon divided into stiff folds to carry the motto. Three folds, with a word on each: Latin words.
Quod,
something — I shut my eyes for an instant in my effort to concentrate —
quod . . . quod desidero obtineo.

"But that isn't possible!" I thought, shaking my head as though to untangle it. "I can't have remembered properly. What would Uncle Enos be doing with one of Peaceable Sherwood's books? Unless, perhaps ..."

I paused on the landing and glanced speculatively up at the great Copley portrait gleaming down from the wall. After a moment I even murmured coaxingly, "Did he ever really get what he wanted, Barbara?" But this time there was not even a whisper or a rustle in reply. The painted hand remained lifted in the way it always was to tuck back the dark curl that was blowing out of the crimson hood; and the painted eyes continued to look over my head in the way they always did, as if they were smiling about some secret of their own.

"In Scarlet Town, where I was born,

There was a fair maid dwellin' — "

I crooned happily to myself, giving the big chocolate pot one last swish through the soapy water before I lifted it out to drain. It skittered dangerously against the edge of the dishpan and I snatched it back, glancing around the pantry door to make sure Uncle Enos had not seen what happened — Uncle Enos already had quite enough on his mind that morning without the chocolate pot to add to the rest of his difficulties. It was the Fourth of July, and the Fourth of July meant that the Independence Day Ball was hanging over his head again.

The Independence Day Ball always took place annually on the Fourth of July for the simple reason that it had taken place annually on the Fourth of July ever since the first Richard Grahame had given that original Independence Day Ball in 1780. Any other day of the year, I think Uncle Enos would sooner have cut his own throat than gone to the trouble of arranging a party. But much as he hated frivolity and disturbance, he hated the thought of breaking a family custom still more — and so, though he had grumbled and rumbled and sputtered like a volcano for days beforehand, in the end he had set his teeth and grimly got on with the job, finding what satisfaction he could out of making it a mercilessly accurate reproduction of an eighteenth-century "assembly," from the first curl in my powdered wig down to the last clove in the cold Virginia ham.

By the morning of the Day itself, Rest-and-be-thankful had reached an almost hysterical pitch of excitement. Uncle Enos had harried the entire household out of their beds at sunrise, fretting about the weather, which was perfect; his costume, which he wished to send back because he thought the design on the lace was modern; and the last-minute preparations for the evening, which he changed so often that by ten o'clock none of us knew whether we were on our heads or our heels. I was in the big pantry off the dining room, washing a set of ancestral china and wondering whether there was any chance of talking Uncle Enos into adding a few modern dances to the relentless program of minuets and Virginia reels he had laid out for the entertainment of his company. Through the open door of the pantry I could see Christopher Seven in the dining room arranging chairs against the wall, and Petunia steadying a ladder while Gladiola set fresh candles in the chandelier. Uncle Enos was out of sight somewhere down by the sideboard, passionately trying to persuade the six hired waiters he had imported for the occasion that it was absolutely necessary for them to put on the apricot coats and black satin knee breeches all the Grahame men-servants had worn as livery back in the eighteenth century.

"S-ss-sst! Peggy!"

I spun around so hastily that the chocolate pot skidded out of my hands again and toppled over the edge of the drainboard altogether. Pat, outside in the garden, swung himself halfway through the low window, caught it before it fell, and returned it to me.

"Good lord, of all people!" I gasped. "How on earth did you get here?"

"Betsy," said Pat complacently, climbing up on the window sill and settling down there comfortably with his shoulder against the jamb. "I was going over to do a little work at the Goshen Historical Society, but it seems all the colonials around here are celebrating some sort of local holiday and the place is closed. Would you care to come for a nice long ride with me instead? There's an old inn over at Chester that I really ought to see."

"Ride!" I echoed bitterly. "Have you gone clean crazy, coming straight up to the house like this? There are only ten people on the other side of that door, if you're interested."

"People? I thought it was a herd of maddened elephants," said Pat, cocking his head to listen to the tumult in the dining room. Gladiola was imploring her sister not to joggle the ladder. Petunia was shrilly denying that she had ever joggled anything. Christopher Seven was ordering them to make less noise. The six hired waiters were all explaining together that the rules of their particular union did not allow them to wear "none of dese fency costooms," and Uncle Enos was insisting frenziedly that they put them on at once if they felt the slightest pride or reverence for the glorious past of their native land.

"Oooooh! A party!" said Pat. "Am I invited?"

"You couldn't get in," I retorted, laughing. "You don't know what an exclusive and patriotic gathering this is going to be! Uncle Enos has hired three large footmen on purpose to make sure that all you redcoats are kept outside."

I might have known that that was the wrong line to take with him. Pat merely clasped his hands around one knee and began to smile thoughtfully.

"Three large footmen, I think you said?" he inquired casually.

"Now, Pat! Please! If you have any ridiculous notion — "

"I never have ridiculous notions," said Pat, in a deeply injured voice. "I was only going to remark that I'll dance with you before the night has ended, my proud beauty," he added, and vanished like a shadow over the window sill just as Uncle Enos appeared at the pantry door.

Uncle Enos was looking rather harrowed and tragic and muttering under his breath. Christopher Seven, also looking harrowed and tragic, was coming up behind him carrying the great silver punch bowl designed by Paul Revere that Uncle Enos really valued more than anything else in the house. It was usually kept locked up somewhere in his study. Even I myself had seen it only once before, on the truly frightful occasion when the minister's wife attempted to borrow it for the Lemonade Table at the church fair.

"Set it down there," said Uncle Enos, pointing to a small table in the corner of the dining room as magnificently as the Revolutionary colonel showing the American gunners how to blow down his own house at the Battle of Yorktown, "and if it's dented, then I suppose it will just have to be dented, that's all. Now pull that screen around here in front of the table — so. Peggy!"

"Yes, Uncle Enos? Did you want me?"

Uncle Enos sighed heavily. "Yes, I'm afraid I do," he said. "While going over the family records of the Independence Day Balls last night, I discovered that in the eighteenth century the guests were always served punch from this particular bowl by the daughter of the house herself. Under ordinary circumstances, as you know, nothing could compel me to risk the bowl in any such manner; but since custom requires it, and since you are in all respects the daughter of the house — "