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BETTY’S VIRGINIA
CHRISTMAS

By

MOLLY ELLIOT SEAWELL

AUTHOR OF “THE SPRIGHTLY ROMANCE OF MARSAC,” “PAPA
BOUCHARD,” “THE JUGGLERS,” “LITTLE JARVIS,” ETC.

WITH ILLUSTRATIONS IN COLOR BY

HENRY J. SOULEN

AND DECORATIONS BY

EDWARD STRATTON HOLLOWAY

PHILADELPHIA & LONDON

J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY

1914

BETTY’S VIRGINIA
CHRISTMAS

THIRD EDITION

NOW BETTY KNEW EXACTLY HOW TO DESCEND THE STAIRS INTO THE DANCING HALL

[Page 48]

COPYRIGHT, 1913, BY J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY

COPYRIGHT, 1914, BY J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY

PUBLISHED SEPTEMBER, 1914

PRINTED BY J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY

AT THE WASHINGTON SQUARE PRESS

PHILADELPHIA, U.S.A.

TO BETTY RANDOL

A TALL SISTER OF THE LILIES

THIS BOOK IS INSCRIBED

CONTENTS

ILLUSTRATIONS

CHAPTER I
CAPTIVATING BETTY

It was as cold as Christmas, and Christmas Eve it was. A thin crust of snow lay over the level landscape of lower Virginia, and the declining sun cast a lovely rose-red light upon the silver world. Afar off lay the river that led to the great bay, both river and bay frozen hard and fast as steel. The crystal air was sharp and still, and in the opaline sky a little crescent moon smiled at the sparkling stars. Along the broad lane that led from the wooded heights to the spacious brick mansion of Rosehill, seated on the river bank, a great four-horse team trotted merrily, the stout farm-horses snorting with delight, and the negro driver and his helpers laughing, and singing Christmas catches, their voices echoing in the clear, cold air. The Rosehill mansion itself seemed to radiate Christmas cheer. From the warm, wide-throated chimneys curled delicate wreaths of blue smoke, and a venturesome peacock had climbed upon the flat roof and stood on one leg, warming himself comfortably against the hot chimney. The panes of the many windows glittered in the sinking sun, and on the frozen river a couple of skaters flew back and forth like birds upon the wing, their shrill little cries and laughter resounding gaily in the crisp cold.

A mile down the river lay another cheerful homestead, not stately and wide and long, with marble steps and a fine carriage drive, like Rosehill, but little and low and with a single chimney. No gorgeous peacock huddled against its one chimney, but a family of blue pigeons, finding the pigeon-cote chilly, circled about the solitary chimney, and were as merry as if they had been great splendid peacocks instead of the humble little birds that they were. The tall holly trees in all their Christmas glory of red and green, on each side of the little porch, gave the place its name of Holly Lodge. From its windows, too, streamed cheerfulness, and a golden fire sang and danced upon the broad hearth in its one small sitting-room. But Holly Lodge could not be otherwise than gay, because in it dwelt Betty Beverley, the gayest young creature alive.

Now, Betty had a splendid dowry; that is to say, she had youth, health, gaiety of heart, an indomitable spirit, and a pair of the softest, loveliest, most misleading dark eyes that were ever seen. Betty was the soul of sincerity and truth, yet she was also an arrant hypocrite and flatterer to those she loved. Likewise, she had the heart of a lion concerning burglars, tramps, runaway horses, and dangers of all sorts; but when it came to caterpillars and daddy-long-legs, small spiders and frightened mice, Betty was cowardly beyond words, and shrieked and fled at the mere sight of those harmless creatures. Music and dancing were like foretastes of Heaven to Betty, who could dance twenty-five miles a night without the slightest fatigue. But she was the same gay little Betty in the long wintry days at Holly Lodge, with no one for company except her grandfather, Colonel Beverley, and his rheumatism, and Uncle Cesar and his wife, Aunt Tulip, the two old servants who had followed them into exile. For Colonel Beverley was born and reared in the great house of Rosehill, and Betty, too, was born there, and had passed the whole of her short life in its stately rooms and its old walled garden, except the last year. Evil times had come upon Colonel Beverley, and the piled up mortgages at last drove him forth. The Colonel, tall and straight as an Indian, grim to look at, but gentle at heart, said truly that for himself he minded not Holly Lodge, with its few cramped rooms and its mite of a garden patch; but for little Betty—— Here, the Colonel’s voice would break, and whenever this point was reached in the discussion, Betty always rushed at the Colonel and kissed him all over his handsome clear-cut, pallid face, and declared that he had insulted her by his hateful remarks, and that she would a thousand times rather live at Holly Lodge with him, than live at Rosehill with millions of dollars, without him. As Betty was very young and unsophisticated, she really believed this, and it comforted the Colonel’s weary heart to hear it.

This was their first Christmas at Holly Lodge, but as Betty said to the Colonel on the afternoon of Christmas Eve:

“Granddaddy, I mean this to be the very happiest Christmas we ever had, because we are together, and your rheumatism is better, and I am going to a dance every night this week, and have a perfectly brand new white muslin gown to wear, and goodness knows what will be left of it after six dances, because I never really begin to enjoy myself until I have torn my gown all to pieces!”

While Betty was saying this, she was standing, delicately poised, on a table, putting a wreath of laurel leaves around the portrait of Colonel Beverley, taken in his youth, when he was a boy officer, with his first epaulets, his hand sternly grasping his sword. Above the portrait hung the same sword, and Betty was wont to decorate the hilt with a sprig of laurel, too. The portrait was a handsome picture, and the Colonel was secretly proud of it. A part of Betty’s outrageous flattery of Colonel Beverley was that to assure the Colonel, solemnly, that nothing would induce her to marry until she could find a man as handsome as he was in his youth. The Colonel, sitting in his great chair, listened to this for the hundredth time with the greatest pleasure. Since that St. Martin’s summer of his youth, there had been a long period of tranquil life at Rosehill. Then had come the great tragedy of the wartime, and Colonel Beverley had put on a gray uniform, and ridden at the head of the regiment the county raised, his stalwart son, Betty’s father, riding by his bridle. The Colonel came back in four years to Rosehill, but the young son lay buried on the Bed of Honor, with a bullet through his brave young heart. Betty was a dark-eyed baby girl in those days. Now, she was a dark-eyed girl of twenty, and was all the Colonel had left in this world. Even Rosehill went with the rest. The back of Colonel Beverley’s chair was against the window which looked toward Rosehill, for the Colonel was sixty-eight, and could not forget wholly the sixty-seven years when Rosehill had been his home, and did not like to look toward the place. To make it worse, Rosehill had been bought by some rich Northern people, who had wickedly and sacrilegiously, as the Colonel considered, put a furnace in the house, electric lights and many other modern and devilish inventions, which harrowed the Colonel’s soul. So, like a wise man, he turned his eyes away.

Within the plain little room were some relics that had survived the universal wreck. There was Betty’s harp, to which she sang the old-fashioned ballads the Colonel loved. Then, there was the Beverley punch-bowl—a great bowl of old Lowestoft porcelain, with three medallions, representing hunting scenes, and an inscription in faded gilt, “For John Beverley, Esq., of Virginia.” It had belonged to many John Beverleys, Esquires, before it came to the Colonel, and was regarded as a sort of fetich in the family. Betty alone had the responsibility of dusting it, and Uncle Cesar would say solemnly:

“I’d heap ruther break my arm than break that thur bowl.”

Beside the bowl, there was some quaint old silver and the 1807 decanters, huge things of pink and white cut glass, that had known good vintages in their day. By Betty’s harp lay her grandfather’s fiddle-case, for the Colonel loved his fiddle, and he and Uncle Cesar, his “boy,” fiddled seriously together, as they had done since they were small boys together, sixty years before, and had got rapped over the head with the same fiddle-bow.

There were a plenty of windows in the little room, and, as muslin curtains are cheap, there were plenty of curtains, and geraniums and verbenas too were abundant, as they cost nothing at all. On the walls was a pretty paper, all roses and green leaves, pasted on by Betty’s own hands, with Uncle Cesar holding the stepladder while Betty had worked, singing while she worked. It was Betty too who had painted the shabby woodwork white, daubing away gaily, and laughing at her blunders. Nevertheless, she had succeeded, for Betty was a very efficient person. The chimney had a wide throat and drew like a windlass. So, on the whole, the sitting-room at Holly Lodge was a cheerful place.

Betty, standing on a little table, was so engrossed in her occupation of getting the laurel wreath straight over the Colonel’s picture, that she did not hear the tramp of a horse’s hoofs outside, nor a knock at the front door, nor Uncle Cesar opening it and a man’s tread in the little hall. In her eagerness, she reached up very far, and although she was a slim creature, the rickety table trembled under her light foot, and the Colonel cried out:

“Mind, Betty, mind!”

But it was too late. The table swayed, and Betty uttered a little shriek and came down with a crash, not upon the floor, but in the arms of a handsome young officer in his cap and military cloak, who appeared to have dropped down the chimney.

CHAPTER II
A YOUNG SOLDIER

The Colonel started up and Uncle Cesar rushed in from the hall, followed by Aunt Tulip from the kitchen. Betty managed to disengage her skirts from the spurs of the young officer, and then stood upon her feet, utterly bewildered. The only person who was not panic-stricken was the young officer himself, who stood bowing, cap in hand.

“Pray excuse me,” he said to Betty, and bowing low to her and then to the Colonel. “Just as I was about to enter the room, I saw that you were tottering, and ran forward and caught you just in time. I am afraid you would have had a bad fall, otherwise.”

“You are perfectly excusable, sir,” said the Colonel, rising grandly. “Your advent was most fortunate, as, although I saw my granddaughter’s danger, I had not the agility, with my years and rheumatism, to catch her as you did. May I ask to whom I am indebted?”

“I am Mr. Fortescue,” said the young officer, laying a card down on the table, “of the United States Army, and the son of Mr. Fortescue of Rosehill.”

Betty’s quick eyes read the card as it lay on the table. “Lieutenant John Hope Fortescue, United States Army.”

At that the Colonel’s face changed a little. He had not yet grown used to the name of Fortescue of Rosehill. But Betty did not mind. She saw only that Mr. Fortescue was young and had a fine, supple figure and a pair of laughing eyes like her own, and a trim little black mustache and a close-cropped black head and a very graceful manner.

“I thank you, too, Mr. Fortescue,” she said, holding out her slim hand, which the young lieutenant took. “I think our acquaintanceship has had a very auspicious beginning.”

To this Fortescue replied gallantly:

“If it saved you from a fall, I shall certainly consider it most auspicious.”

Then, they looked into each other’s eyes and laughed, as young creatures do who have the sweet and subtle understanding of youth. The Colonel then said:

“Perhaps you know my name—Colonel Beverley—and this is my granddaughter, Miss Elizabeth Beverley. Will you be seated?”

“Grandfather only calls me Elizabeth when he is introducing me, or is very much vexed with me. On all other occasions, I am Betty,” explained Betty gravely.

“Miss Betty Beverley—what a charming name!” answered Fortescue, determined to admire everything concerning this adorable Betty.

Uncle Cesar took Fortescue’s military cloak away, and the young officer sat with his handsome head and elegant figure outlined against the strong light of the window.

“I must beg pardon for my intrusion,” he said to the Colonel, “but I have come upon official business—hence my uniform.”

“I understand, sir,” replied the Colonel. “I have worn both the cadet gray and the army blue. Later, I resigned and spent some tranquil years at Rosehill. When the irrepressible conflict came, I put on a gray uniform, as did my son—my only son—the father of this young lady.”

Here the Colonel indicated Betty, who spoke quickly and with pride:

“Yes, I am a soldier’s daughter and proud of it.”

“The soldier should be proud of it,” promptly answered Fortescue, with a smile. Betty was no Quaker maiden, but came of fighting stock.

“My errand,” continued Fortescue, turning to the Colonel, “is from my superior officer, Major Studly, who is engaged in making some military surveys in this neighborhood. We hope to go in camp by March. I have found an excellent place for our encampment, with running water for the animals, and a spring, about five miles from here, in the rolling country. I understand that the land is yours, and Major Studly asks your permission to occupy it for a month or six weeks, perhaps. Of course—er—er—compensation will be made for its use by the Government.”

“Compensation be hanged!” replied the Colonel blandly. “It gives me pleasure to oblige a brother officer, although the United States Government may go to the devil!”

Fortescue smiled at this. From the great fortress forty miles away, he had made various incursions into the country, and had happened upon many gallant old irreconcilables, like Colonel Beverley, who felt it their duty to hurl defiance upon the United States Government, although they were really among its best citizens.

“I thank you very much,” said Fortescue, in a manner as courtly as the Colonel’s, “not only for myself, but for Major Studly. We will do as little damage as possible. No doubt we shall be able to buy the wood we need for our encampment.”

“Not from me, sir,” promptly replied the Colonel. “You are welcome to all the wood you need, and if it is too much trouble to cut it down, burn up the fence-rails, sir.”

Colonel Beverley liked to act the grand seigneur, but, owing to unfortunate circumstances, he was able to be grand only in small matters, like fence-rails.

During this conversation, Betty sat demurely in her chair. At the mention of compensation, a rosy vision passed before her eyes of a new roof to the kitchen, and possibly a new gown for herself. But when the Colonel magnanimously presented the Government of the United States with the use of his land and as many fence-rails as were necessary for fires, Betty, with a lofty spirit not unlike the Colonel’s, dismissed the hope of repairing the kitchen and the dream of the new gown.

Fortescue, however, had no intention of confining his conversation to the Colonel, and so, looking toward Betty, said:

“This is my first visit to this county.”

“I hope you are pleased with Rosehill,” replied Colonel Beverley. “Rosehill has sheltered seven generations of Beverleys. The present mansion was built by my grandfather, succeeding a smaller house built by the first Beverley of Rosehill.”

“I admire the house very much,” said Fortescue. “I am only sorry that my profession will prevent me from spending much time there.”

“Rosehill is a noble inheritance.”

They were upon delicate ground, but it was impossible that the subject of Rosehill could be avoided at their first meeting. Fortescue congratulated himself on getting smoothly over a difficult subject.

“I hope, however,” he continued, still smiling at Betty, “to make frequent visits here as long as I am stationed on this coast. I believe both the hunting and shooting are fine.”

“Excellent,” said the Colonel. “It has been a good many years since I indulged in either. My granddaughter, however, likes the hunting field.”

“Yes,” answered Betty. “We haven’t a swell hunt club like you have at the North, but our foxes are just as wary and our dogs as intelligent. Day after to-morrow there is to be the grand Christmas hunt.”

“That, sir,” explained Colonel Beverley, “is an annual custom in the county. The gentlemen in this vicinity all assemble at daybreak at the house of some gentleman in the neighborhood, for at daybreak the scent lies. The huntsmen have a hasty breakfast by lamp-light, and start out before sunrise. The fox is seldom caught for several hours, because we have the red fox in this county, which can double many times on his pursuers. Then the victorious huntsman presents the brush to the lady he wishes to compliment. It is a little ceremony of great antiquity. And then they have the hunt breakfast, with eggnog, the flower of all seductive beverages which bloom at Christmas time.”

“Do you think it is possible,” asked Fortescue of Betty, “that I, with three of my brother officers, who are spending Christmas with me, could be permitted to join in the Christmas hunt day after to-morrow?”

“Certainly,” cried Betty. “The huntsmen are to meet at Bendover, the Carteret place, and Sally Carteret is my best friend. I’ll ask Sally to invite you.”

Although the great fortress lay only forty miles off, and was well known by sight to Betty Beverley and Sally Carteret and all the other girls in the county, the dashing young officers were not much in evidence, and Betty secretly gloried at the idea of presenting four of these adorable creatures at the Christmas hunt. As for Fortescue, who knew the world well, the frank confidence and the cordial hospitality of these unsophisticated country gentlepeople delighted him beyond words.

Then they talked awhile on what the rest of the world was talking about, Betty listening with all her ears, and putting in an occasional word. Most of Fortescue’s conversation was addressed to the Colonel, but his eyes were furtively fixed on Betty’s charming face and her little feet, with buckles on her low shoes showing coquettishly from the edge of her gown. Fortescue professed an admiration and affection for Rosehill which, it must be admitted, was very much accentuated by Betty’s bright eyes. Colonel Beverley, with finely shaded sarcasm, expressed regret that Fortescue’s father, the great New York banker, should not spend more time at Rosehill, and Fortescue assumed an apologetic attitude for his father, and was full of regret that he himself was debarred from being much at Rosehill.

“You chose the profession of a soldier,” said the Colonel, “when, as I understand, you might very well have been a well fed drone in the hive.”

“Hardly,” replied Fortescue, laughing. “My father doesn’t like drones. He is himself a man of action and achievement, and my two brothers have been trained to work in my father’s own line. But I always loved the military profession, and have no taste nor, indeed, capacity for any other. It is one of the sacrifices of an army life that I can only come to Rosehill at intervals. But wait until I retire, thirty-six years from now. Then I intend to settle myself at Rosehill permanently.”

“I am afraid I can’t wait so long to welcome you,” said the Colonel, smiling.

“But I—can,” answered Betty. “And when you come back you will find me on the retired list, too, still Miss Betty Beverley, of Holly Lodge.”

Of this Fortescue expressed the utmost disbelief.

Then Fortescue and Betty talked about the gaieties of the Christmas week. There was to be a dance every night, in addition to the Christmas hunt. Fortescue expressed the deepest regret that, being unknown in the county, neither he nor his guests at Rosehill would be likely to receive invitations, but on this point he was reassured by Colonel Beverley.

“I understand,” he said, “that you and your friends arrived only yesterday. My granddaughter told me yesterday morning that for the first time this winter smoke was coming out of the Rosehill chimneys. As soon as people find out that you are in the county, you will certainly receive invitations to everything that is desirable.”

Fortescue expressed a pious hope that this might come true. Then, feeling that he had stayed as long as he possibly could for a first visit, Fortescue rose and shook hands with the Colonel, who cordially invited him and his friends to Holly Lodge. When Betty laid her little hand in his, Fortescue said, as he gave it a delicate pressure:

“If Miss Sally Carteret is kind enough to invite my friends and myself to the Christmas hunt, may I hope that you will chaperon us?”

“Yes,” replied Betty; “provided you are not too lazy. On hunting mornings, I am in the saddle by six o’clock. I haven’t a very imposing mount. Old Whitey pulls the rockaway, and isn’t above hauling wood and going to the mill, but he has a strain of Diomede blood in him, and there’s life in the old horse yet.”

This gave Fortescue an inspiration, but, being a natural diplomat, he kept it to himself.

Uncle Cesar was waiting in the narrow little passage with Fortescue’s military cloak, and brought up his horse, which had been standing with the reins thrown over a limb of one of the great holly trees. As Fortescue rode past the window, sitting straight and square on his high-bred chestnut, Betty glued her nose to the window-pane, and, much to her embarrassment, was seen by Fortescue, who raised his cap, and bowed to his saddle-bow.

CHAPTER III
THROUGH A DORMER WINDOW

Betty watched Fortescue as he galloped along the road that lay through the open fields to Rosehill. The vision of the Christmas hunt grew bright. She would see Sally Carteret that night at the dance at Marrowbone, and Sally was no more likely to deny an invitation to four captivating young officers than Betty herself. Betty brought her mind back with a jerk from this new and brilliant element which had suddenly burst into her placid life, to the preparations for Christmas. They were such as would be made in the small household of a bankrupt Virginia colonel and his granddaughter, his “boy” of sixty-five and the “boy’s” wife of sixty, but they were illuminated by the true Christmas spirit, that sweet inspiration and good will, the radiance of the Star of Bethlehem. By much scheming and saving, Betty had acquired enough money to buy for the Colonel a military history in several volumes, for which he had expressed a wish. Equally, with infinite pains and secrecy, the Colonel had contrived out of his scanty purse to buy for Betty a little locket and chain; and there were simple presents for Uncle Cesar and Aunt Tulip, useful things that would make them more comfortable. And from the two old faithful servants were humble gifts that were highly rated by Betty and the Colonel. Then there were the preparations for the Christmas dinner the next day. Although there was not much money in the little brown house of Holly Lodge, there were oysters a-plenty upon the river shore, and a green turtle had been lying on his back for a week in the cellar, to be made into turtle soup for the Christmas dinner, and Aunt Tulip had a dozen bronze turkeys which kept her busy, of which the patriarch, a noble gobbler, had gobbled his last morituri salutamus. A dish of terrapin, and a half dozen partridges, knocked over by Uncle Cesar, who had a rusty old gun, and a monumental plum pudding, were mere adjuncts to the feast.

It had been the Colonel’s practice, at the old mansion at Rosehill, to invite half the county to his Christmas dinner. In the little sitting-room at Holly Lodge, there was not much room for anybody or anything except the big furniture and the Colonel’s fiddle-case and Betty’s harp; besides, the Colonel, after his misfortune, had, as yet, not much heart for company. He and Betty had had dozens of invitations from all over the county and beyond, for Christmas, but, as Betty said: “Granddaddy and I have always been together at Christmas ever since I can remember, and he has nobody but me and I have nobody but him, and so we must stay together on Christmas Day, Granddaddy and I.”

The dusk came before Betty had finished her preparations for the next day, and then it was time to dress for the party at Marrowbone, the Lindsay place, where there were young students home from the University of Virginia, and a great jollification was to be had. The clutch of cold upon the world had tightened as the red sun disappeared and the stars came out in the dark blue heavens. In Betty’s little white bedroom, however, a glorious wood fire was roaring, and the scent of the odoriferous wood and the geraniums in the window made a delicious atmosphere. Betty stood before the fire, warming her little feet, and saying to herself:

“How I wish we could afford to have a boy to bring up wood and pick up chips and do so many things that Uncle Cesar has to do, and really isn’t able, poor old soul!”

Then Betty’s mind reverted to former Christmases, at Rosehill, when there were plenty of servants and plenty of everything except money, and Betty in her ignorance knew nothing of debts and duns and mortgages and such unpleasant things. She looked about her with a little air of discontent, and thought of her beautiful big corner bedroom at Rosehill, with its marble mantel and the ornamental plaster frieze around the ceiling, and the bell to ring, by which a maid always appeared. But, being a courageous person, Betty took herself in hand, and put an immediate stop to painful reflections. She went up to the little dressing table, lighted by a candle on each side of the mirror, and, shaking her small fist wrathfully at her reflection in the glass, proceeded to lecture herself severely.

“Now, Betty Beverley,” she said sternly, puckering her forehead, “this sort of useless repining is perfectly disgraceful, and has got to stop. Do you understand, Betty? It has got to stop. You have got your grandfather and a great many comforts and blessings, and you don’t owe any money, and you are young and very, very pretty——”

At this point, Betty’s brow smoothed out, her eyes assumed a beatific expression, and her rosy lips came wide open, showing a lovely, elusive dimple in her left cheek.

“It is no use denying it, it is a fact and a very agreeable one, but, as Aunt Tulip says, ‘Beauty ain’t nothin’; behavior’s all.’ Your good looks won’t amount to anything if you are a coward and a poltroon; and you, a soldier’s daughter and granddaughter, with no more pluck than a chicken! Betty, I am ashamed of you. Now, make up your mind to act like a soldier’s daughter and granddaughter——”

And at this moment, Fortescue, whose image had been lingering in Betty’s memory, suddenly came to the front. She saw him in her mind’s eye, galloping past the window, his military cloak around him, his cap set firmly on his handsome head, his look, his attitude, everything about him, proclaiming the soldier. Betty’s smile changed from mirth to one of dreamy anticipation. There is much flavor in the wine of life at twenty.

She went to the window, and, putting her hands on each side of her eyes, so that she could look out into the gathering gloom of the winter night, saw afar off the windows of Rosehill shining with light. On the day after Christmas she would see that young soldier again. Betty made a rapid calculation—it would be just twenty-six hours. At the thought a smile began in Betty’s soft eyes and ended on her rosy lips.

CHAPTER IV
KETTLE

Beginning with Christmas Eve, there was a party every night for Betty, and as wind and weather count for nothing where merry young people are concerned, Betty prepared to go, in spite of the biting cold, and a knife-like wind that came howling down from Labrador. Uncle Cesar was to take her to the parties, in the little, old-fashioned rockaway, drawn by the one horse which was all the stable of Holly Lodge could boast. The homeliness of her equipage did not in the least disconcert Betty.

“Because,” as Betty said to herself, “everybody knows I am Betty Beverley of Rosehill, and the Rosehill Beverleys can do as they please about carriages and clothes, and a blessed good thing it is, as the family is down on its luck at present.”

Betty had a variety of euphemisms to disguise the unpleasant facts of life. Poverty was being down on one’s luck; simple clothes were a joke; and shabbiness, a mere romantic incident, for such was the glorious philosophy of pretty Betty.

There were, however, no sighs or regrets for Betty that Christmas Eve, as she looked with shining eyes into her mirror. Her white gown, made by her own clever fingers, fitted to perfection, and revealed all the delicate loveliness of her white neck and her slender arms. Around her throat was her great-grandmother’s amethyst necklace, and her simple bodice was draped with her great-grandmother’s lace bertha. Her rich hair, with its soft tendrils curling upon her neck, was adorned with a wreath of ivy leaves, and tiny moss rosebuds from the rosebush in the window of the sitting-room. This little wreath gave Betty the look of a woodland nymph. Aunt Tulip, who acted as lady’s maid, during the intervals of her duty as cook, housemaid, and what not, was lost in admiration, and suggested that Betty would “cert’n’y ketch a beau.” This simple flattery delighted Betty, especially as all the time she was dressing her mind was fixed upon the charms of Lieutenant John Hope Fortescue of the United States Army.

When Betty was quite dressed, and had given herself a final survey in the glass, Aunt Tulip went down to see if the rockaway was hitched up with old Whitey. Betty, left alone, blew out the candles, and, drawing the curtains, looked out of her window once more at Rosehill, a mile across the open fields. Yes, the house was lighted up cheerfully—it was Betty’s pet grievance that the place was unoccupied for such long intervals. In some way, after that visit from Jack Fortescue, Betty was more reconciled to Mr. Fortescue’s owning Rosehill. She could imagine how jolly it must be there with half a dozen young officers, and if they were all as charming as Lieutenant John Hope Fortescue—— Betty blushed at the remembrance of her descent from the top of the table into Fortescue’s arms.

While Betty was chasing these fancies, like white butterflies in the sun, she noticed a small black figure far down the lane. It was coming toward Holly Lodge, tramping with short steps through the crust of snow. As the object drew nearer, Betty’s keen eyes discovered that it was a small boy—a very small boy. Betty wondered why so small a child should be sent out in the winter night. When he came within the circle of red light from the front door, Betty saw that the boy was black and very ragged.

By this, it was time for Betty to go downstairs and show herself to the adoring eyes of her grandfather. Colonel Beverley, sitting in his great chair by the fire, surveyed Betty with profound satisfaction as she marched solemnly up and down, and pirouetted before him to show her new white satin slippers, with glittering buckles. From the wreath of roses down to these little slippers, the Colonel found Betty altogether adorable, and told her so.

While Betty was giving stern orders to the Colonel to go to bed promptly at ten o’clock, and not to smoke more than two pipes, Aunt Tulip came into the sitting-room from the nearby kitchen.

“Miss Betty,” proclaimed Aunt Tulip, with the air of announcing a catastrophe, “what you think done happen now? Them good-for-nothin’ niggers that come here from I dunno where, and brought a little boy wid ’em, done gone away—they tooken the boat to-day at the landin’. And this heah boy as ain’t got no father nor no mother, and say he doan’s believe he never had none, got skeered at the steamboat, and turn ’roun’ and run away heah! What we gwine ter do ’bout him?”

“Bring him in,” cried Betty, suddenly remembering the little boy she had seen creeping through the snow.

Aunt Tulip disappeared and returned with a small colored boy, very black, very ragged, almost shoeless, but with beady eyes cheerful as Betty’s own, and a row of shining teeth which he showed freely. The solemn book of life evidently had no terrors for him.

As he saw Betty in her party gown, with the wreath on her delicate head, a rapturous look came into the eyes of the waif, his grin broadened, he seemed to have a vision of Paradise.

“Why,” cried Betty, “he’s as black as the kettle! What’s your name, little boy?”

“Solomon ’Zekiel Timons,” replied the waif, now fairly laughing with joy amid his rags.

“Where did you come from?” asked the Colonel.

Then Solomon ’Zekiel Timons, prompted by Aunt Tulip, told his story. He lived with some colored people who were always on the move. Lately, they had been living not far from Holly Lodge, and the waif knew Miss Betty by sight, and thought she was “the beautifulest lady ever I see.” He did not know whether the colored people were related to him or not, nor where he was born, nor anything except his name. He had not been ill-treated, but he did not always have enough to eat, and he knew his “clo’es was mighty raggety.” The colored people were going somewhere by the steamboat, and he had gone that day to the wharf with them, their belongings packed on an ox-cart. But on reaching the wharf, and seeing the steamboat, Solomon Ezekiel’s heart had fainted within him. The grin left his little black face, and his round beady eyes grew terrified when he described in jerky sentences the horrors of the steamboat.

“There wuz two gre’t wheels,” he gasped, opening his arms wide, “as big as dis heah house—an’ they keeps on a-churnin’ and a-churnin’! An’ a awful thing on top de boat goin’ up an’ down like dis”—here Solomon ’Zekiel gave a very realistic imitation of the propeller of a side-wheel steamer in motion.

“An’ den”—his frightened voice sank to a whisper—“’fo’ it reach de wharf, de steamboat hollered—it jes’ keep on hollerin’ an’ screechin’ an’ de smoke jes’ po’ outen a chimley, an’ de steamboat everlastin’ hollerin’. An’ I wuz so skeered, I jes’ run offen de wharf an’ come heah.”

Solomon ’Zekiel coolly ignored the fact that the steamboat landing was five miles away, and that he had trudged through the biting cold and the snow, in his poor rags and broken shoes, all that distance—and he was a very little fellow indeed.

“Have you had anything to eat since breakfast?” asked Betty, with melting eyes.

“Naw, ’m,” promptly answered Solomon ’Zekiel.

“And this is Christmas Eve!” cried Betty. “Now Aunt Tulip will take you into the kitchen and give you a good supper, Solomon ’Zekiel—oh, I can’t stand all that name—you are as black as the kettle, so we’ll just call you Kettle for the present.”

His new name and the prospect of supper seemed to delight the little negro beyond words.

By that time Uncle Cesar had driven the rockaway up to the door, and the Colonel was handing Betty in and muffling her up, as one muffles up his chief and only treasure. Aunt Tulip brought out Uncle Cesar’s fiddle-case with his fiddle, for Uncle Cesar was an essential person in that neighborhood, on account of his expert fiddling. Old Whitey, a big, handsome horse, was dancing about in a manner so sprightly, in spite of his thirteen years, that Betty felt certain he would make a good appearance at the Christmas hunt.

CHAPTER V
CHRISTMAS COMES BUT ONCE A YEAR

It was not much after seven o’clock, but early hours are kept in the country, and there was a six-mile drive between Holly Lodge and Marrowbone. Betty enjoyed the drive, inhaling the icy, crisp night air as if it were champagne. Old Whitey did the six miles in less than an hour, and Betty was in the thick of the arrivals for the party. The hospitable host, Major Lindsay—for there were many majors and colonels in Virginia in those days—met his guests on the great portico, with the big wooden Doric columns.

“How do you do, Miss Betty?” Major Lindsay said. “And where is the Colonel, pray?”

“Granddaddy sent his compliments and regrets, but he says he is really too rheumatic to go out to dances,” answered Betty, slipping out of the rockaway.

“Nonsense, nonsense!” shouted the Major, who was big and florid and handsome. “The Colonel is as able to shake a leg as ever he was, by George! I hope Cesar has brought the fiddle, because we are reckoning upon him.”

“Yes, sirree,” answered Uncle Cesar, with important emphasis. “I got some rheumatiz, too, same like ole Marse, but mine is in my legs, thank God A’mighty, and ain’t tech my bow arm yet, praise the Lamb!”

Betty tripped up the steps, and Major Lindsay gallantly escorted her into the wide hall.

Within this great hall were Christmas mirth and cheeriness, and laughter and bright eyes and gay smiles. The house, following the plan of most houses of eastern Virginia, had a splendid great hall, big enough for a ball-room, and always used for dancing; for the people of Virginia are inveterate dancers, and a house is but poorly provided which cannot furnish space for balls. Holly wreaths were everywhere, and over each door was a sprig of mistletoe, causing the ladies to scamper through the doorways with little shrieks of laughter, while the gentlemen used strategies to intercept them.

Already dancing had begun, though the orchestra was by no means complete without Uncle Cesar. But the impatient young feet could not wait. Isaac Minkins, a saddle-colored person, who combined the profession of driving a fish-cart in the day-time and fiddling in the evening, was the director of the orchestra, and his sole assistant, until Uncle Cesar arrived, was a coal black youth who also helped on the fish-cart, and who performed upon the concertina, or, as the negroes call it, the “lap organ.” Uncle Cesar, who was quickly hustled into the hall, promptly tuned up and played second fiddle.

By that time Betty had run upstairs, thrown off her cloak, taken one hasty but satisfactory view of herself in the mirror, and was stepping daintily down the staircase. Now, Betty, who was a scheming and designing creature, knew exactly how to descend the stairs into the dancing hall. This descent down the fine staircase in full view of the assembled company was an effective part of the programme, and the artful Betty, with an outspread fan in one hand and holding up her filmy white skirts with the other just enough to show her little white satin slippers, was the prettiest picture imaginable. So thought Lieutenant John Hope Fortescue of the United States Army, and several other admirers, both old and new. As Betty came down the stairs with what appeared to be unstudied grace, but was not, her soft eyes swept the dancers below, and she nodded and smiled back at those who recognized her. But she did not see Fortescue until she was almost at the last step, when he came forward and took her hand. He had been strikingly handsome in uniform, and he was scarcely less so in his well fitting evening clothes, although Betty, like all women, had a secret hankering for uniforms.

“Good evening, Miss Beverley,” said Fortescue, and Betty gave a pretty little start of real surprise.

“Good evening,” she said, and then hesitated.

“And how did I get here?” said Fortescue, laughing and answering the look of surprised inquiry in Betty’s eloquent face. “The greatest streak of luck that ever happened! When I got back to Rosehill, I found Major Lindsay had come to call—the kindest and most hospitable people that ever lived are in Virginia, I believe—and he invited us to come over to this party. We fairly jumped down his throat, I can tell you, we were so glad to accept.”

“And I am so glad you did,” said Betty affably.

She had never laid eyes on Fortescue until four hours before, but Betty was Southern, and a Virginian at that, and readily assumed a tone of the warmest friendship with every personable young man she met, immediately after making his acquaintance.

“And now,” continued Betty in an imploring tone, as if there were not another man within a hundred miles, “will you be kind enough to take me up to Mrs. Lindsay to speak to her?”

“Certainly,” replied Fortescue, placing her little gloved hand within his arm, and improving his opportunities as he did so.

It was not an easy matter for Betty to reach Mrs. Lindsay, standing at the other end of the hall. Betty was stopped every minute by girls speaking to her, and by young men asking dances of her. The girls called her “Betty” and the young men called her “Miss Betty,” so Fortescue promptly dropped the formal “Miss Beverley” and called her “Miss Betty,” as if he had known her for a hundred years.

Meanwhile, the first fiddle and the “lap organ,” reinforced by Uncle Cesar’s stout bow arm, were playing energetically “I’se Gwine Back to Dixie,” and Betty’s slender feet danced rather than walked up the hall. At last they were standing before Mrs. Lindsay, stout, handsome, and florid, like the Major, and receiving her guests with heartfelt hospitality like her husband. The hostess greeted Betty warmly, and, above the music and merry chatter, screamed without any punctuations whatever:

“How do you do Betty so glad to see you sorry your grandfather can’t be here tell him to rub his knees with turpentine every night. Tom’s brought four of his friends from the University and you must dance with them all so delighted to have Mr. Fortescue and the other officers from Rosehill go right into the library and get some hot biscuit and coffee you must be so cold after your drive how do you do,” etc., etc., saying the same kind things to the next arrival.

And then Tom Lindsay, a University of Virginia sophomore, swooped down on Betty; but just as he caught her hand, Fortescue, who knew both how to act and to think, put his arm around Betty’s waist, and they whirled off to the strains of “I’se gwine back to Dixie, where the orange-blossoms blow.” Betty, however, managed to put her hand for a second in Tom Lindsay’s and to say, as everybody said to everybody else:

“Oh, so glad to see you! Have just been dying of loneliness without you;” and when safely out of Tom’s hearing Betty whispered into Fortescue’s ear, “Such a nice boy! We used to play together. Of course, I have to say things like that to the child.” By which it may be seen that Miss Betty Beverley was a most unprincipled person when it came to dealing with personable young men, and did not have the New England conscience or any other conscience, where flattering a person of the other sex was concerned.

When the dance was over, Fortescue, like an able commander, following up his advantage, mentioned to Betty that they should accept Mrs. Lindsay’s suggestion and go into the library and have the coffee and biscuits which were always served immediately upon the arrival of guests at a Virginia party. This did not appeal particularly to Betty, but when Tom Lindsay came up and told her that he wanted to introduce his fellow students to her, and they would all go into the library together for coffee, Fortescue suddenly remembered that he must introduce his brother officers also to Betty. This was enough to send Betty rapidly into the library, where she found herself in an Elysium of University students and second lieutenants. Being a generous soul, Betty seized upon Sally Carteret, a tall, handsome girl, and divided her plunder of students and officers with Sally. It was only necessary to mention that Mr. Fortescue and his friends would stay over Christmas day, for Sally to invite them to the Christmas hunt and breakfast at Bendover. Seeing there was no chance of monopolizing Betty, Fortescue found Sally, with her gypsy beauty, by no means a bad substitute.

Between the dances, raids were made into the library, where from a big table hot coffee and buttered biscuits, with “old ham” that had been cured in the smoke from hickory ashes for a couple of years—a great Virginia luxury—and a round of beef, were served as a mere preliminary to the big supper which was coming later. By the great fireplace stood a table with a huge bowl of apple toddy. The older gentlemen, who were at cards in the drawing-room with prim, elderly ladies, made frequent incursions upon the apple toddy. The ladies carefully avoided this seductive brew and kept to weak tea and thin biscuit. Over all was the true spirit of Christmas gaiety, the heart-whole and heart-given hospitality of a hospitable people.

The dancing went on gaily until half past eleven o’clock, when the concoction of the Christmas eggnog began. Every gentleman was supplied with a silver fork and a plate in which had been broken the whites of four eggs. They had to be beaten so stiff that the plate could be held over the head of a lady without dropping upon her. Such was the tradition, but only a few ladies took the risk, holding out, meanwhile, their dainty handkerchiefs over their heads to catch the whipped-up whites in case they fell. Betty was one of the venturesome ones, and Fortescue was her cavalier, and turned the plate over her head, but not a drop fell upon Betty’s outspread lace handkerchief. Then the whites of the eggs were mixed with the beaten up yolks and the whipped cream and the “stiffening” as Major Lindsay called it, who, as host, did the mixing, and then ladled out the foaming eggnog. At twelve o’clock exactly Major Lindsay held up his glass and shouted, “Merry Christmas!” and a great chorus went up of “Merry Christmas! Merry, merry Christmas!” Then, Isaac Minkins, with a magnificent flourish of his bow, burst forth into the strains of “The Flowing Bowl.” All joined in the great Christmas song, Major Lindsay’s big baritone leading the chorus:

“For to-night we’ll merry, merry be,
For to-night we’ll merry, merry be,
For to-night we’ll merry, merry be,
And to-morrow we’ll be sober.”

Then the gentlemen roared out:

“Here’s to the man who drinks good ale and goes to bed quite mellow.
He lives as he ought to live, and dies a damned good fellow.
He lives as he ought to live,
He lives as he ought to live,
He lives as he ought to live,
And dies a damned good fellow.

“Here’s to the man who drinks no ale and goes to bed quite sober.
He withers as the leaves do, and dies in the month of October.
He withers as the leaves do.
He withers as the leaves do.
He withers as the leaves do.
And dies in the month of October.”

Then came the verse in which all the ladies joined with great enthusiasm:

“Here’s to the girl who gets a kiss, and runs and tells her mother.
May she live to be an old maid, and never get another!”

The chorus pealed out, Betty Beverley’s clear and ringing soprano above all the rest:

“May she live to be an old maid,
May she live to be an old maid,
May she live to be an old maid,
And never get another.”

Then the folding doors to the dining-room were thrown open and the real supper was served, to which coffee, biscuit, “old ham,” and the round of beef were merely the appetizers. An emperor of a turkey was at the head of the table, with another at the foot, and one at each side scarcely inferior in imperial splendor. There were cold pickled oysters, and hot oysters, creamed, steamed, fried, stewed, and in scallop shells. There were great dishes of terrapin, not indeed the diamond-back of Maryland fame, but the slider, a dry-land terrapin, an excellent creature when accompanied with the butter, cream, eggs, sherry, and brandy which are lavished upon him. There were, of course, more old hams, rounds of beef, and a gigantic saddle of Southdown mutton, which Major Lindsay himself carved with a magnificent flourish. The boned turkey was a gem, the work in the case being done by Dr. Markham, the cheery, pleasant-faced village doctor, who, it was popularly reported, in getting the bones out of the turkey used the identical instruments with which he cut off legs and arms. But the doctor’s services being in demand by hostesses at Christmas time, no prejudice existed against either the boned turkey or the doctor.

There were pigeon-pie, wild ducks, chicken salad, and a few other incidentals, to be topped off by ices, custards, jellies, and cakes of innumerable varieties. It took an hour to get through with the supper, and when the guests had feasted and left the dining-room, there was still enough left to feed a couple of regiments.

The musicians had had their supper and a glass of apple toddy, and eggnog in addition, and were ready again with fiddles and “lap organ” to start the flying feet once more. Betty had more partners than she could accommodate, and told each one the same story in various forms, punctuated by a sidelong glance, which was Betty’s own—that she only wished she could dance with him all the evening. Tom Lindsay, a handsome youngster, who called Betty by her first name and assumed proprietary rights over her, was encouraged to do so by this arch-hypocrite of a girl. But in this Betty only followed the prevailing fashion. All of the university students and young officers present, except Fortescue, found themselves involved in at least half a dozen desperate flirtations, which promised to continue during the whole week, and then never to be heard of again.

It was four o’clock in the wintry Christmas morning before the musicians tuned up for the final Virginia reel. The two lines were formed down the great hall, and extending through the folding doors into the library. The elders sat around, the card-players in the drawing-room giving up their games of old-fashioned whist to watch the dancers. Betty Beverley had the honor of leading off with Major Lindsay, an agile and graceful dancer in spite of his two hundred pounds. Fortescue, with the eye of a strategist, took the least desirable position at the other end of the line, but by this he acquired the privilege of meeting Betty in the middle of the line, swinging her around first by the right hand and then by the left, next by both hands and then dos-à-dos, and passing under the arch. The musicians played with the fire and enthusiasm peculiar to their race. The fiddlers wagged their heads, beat time with their feet, flourished their bows, while the youth with the “lap organ” stood up and fairly danced with delight as the strains of “Forked Deer” and “Billy in the Low Grounds” rent the air.

When the two ends of the reel were danced, Major Lindsay and Betty tripped down the middle, the Major cutting the pigeon-wing and taking many quaint and curious steps, which were followed by Betty’s twinkling feet. Then they danced back again, and began swinging the row of dancers until they had reached the end of the line again. The march followed next, Betty leading the ladies, and the Major leading the men, all clapping time rhythmically with the dashing music. This was gone through religiously with every couple in the reel, and it took an hour to be danced. Then, at last, it finished up in the grand chain, everybody shaking hands with everybody else, and wishing each other “Merry Christmas.”

It was still pitch dark in the December morning, although past five o’clock. The carriages were brought up to the door, and the ladies were shot into them, the horses prancing in the freezing air and restless to take the road. Betty was one of the last to leave, as Uncle Cesar had to “wrop up” his fiddle carefully, put it in the case, and carry it tenderly out to the rockaway. Old Whitey came up to the big Doric portico, stepping high and snorting as if he were a colt. Major Lindsay escorted Betty down the steps of the great portico, but at the foot Fortescue, bareheaded in the winter darkness, was waiting. He gave Betty’s slender hand one last pressure, wrapped her delicate feet up warmly in the blanket, and got a sweet parting glance from the girl’s fair eyes before Uncle Cesar called out:

“Gee up, ole hoss!”

Betty leaned back in the rockaway as old Whitey trotted briskly along the frozen road. She was in one of those happy dreams that are the glorious heritage of sweet and twenty. Her mind was divided between the charms of dashing university students and charming young officers, together with speculations as to whether her white muslin gown really would last through Christmas week. There were several alarming rents in it already, for Betty had enjoyed herself very, very much.

Then her thoughts turned to soberer things, such as the way the brave old Colonel stood the translation from Rosehill to Holly Lodge, and the necessity for making both ends meet, and the building of a stable for their one cow. For Betty’s outside and inside by no means corresponded. On the outside, she was all laughter and singing and dancing, like a silver fountain in the golden sun. Inside, she was the most level-headed, the most thoughtful, and the most courageous creature in the world. Betty was practical and sentimental, tender and cruel, gay and sad, bold and timorous, and always Betty.

CHAPTER VI
KETTLE AND OTHER THINGS

Meanwhile, things had happened at Holly Lodge. The Colonel had taken out his violin and played dreamily the old airs, von Weber’s “Last Waltz,” “Love Not,” and “Bygone Hours.” At sixty-eight, one has many Christmas days to look back upon. The faithful heart of Aunt Tulip in the kitchen was touched when the delicate strains of the violin floated upon the air.

“Ole Marse, he jes’ cipherin’.” Ciphering, in the negro language, means brooding with sadness and melancholy.

But then Aunt Tulip’s attention was distracted by the newcomer, Kettle. The boy, huddled close to the fire, his hands locked around his knees, his shining black eyes fixed on the blaze, was filled with deep content; he was warm, he had had a good supper, and he had escaped the dangers of the screaming steamboat. Those who had left him behind had not been too kind to him, and he had no regrets for them. Suddenly his enjoyment of the dolce far niente was rudely interrupted by Aunt Tulip, who herself seldom indulged in the sweet-do-nothing.

“Look a-heah, boy,” she said, “I’m agoin’ to give you a good washin’ and put you to bed. Boys oughter be abed by this time, so they k’yarn’ git in no mo’ mischief ’twell to-morrer mornin’.”

With that Kettle was ruthlessly seized, his clothes stripped off him, and he was soused in a washtub of warm water, while Aunt Tulip, with a scrub-brush, and soft soap of her own manufacture, scrubbed him from head to foot, including his woolly head. Kettle, who had rather dreaded the unusual experience, enjoyed it before he got through. Then Aunt Tulip, putting a nightgown of her own on him, covered him up in a little pallet she had made upon the floor of her own room, next the kitchen, and in two minutes Kettle had passed into the dreamless sleep of a tired little boy. Aunt Tulip began to examine the boy’s worn clothes. They were very ragged, and his shoes quite beyond help. But clothes, however ragged, may be washed and mended. So Aunt Tulip, who had worked hard all that day and every day, set herself the task of having something decent for Kettle to put on Christmas morning. She toiled at the washtub while Betty, afar off, was dancing, and the Colonel had long since gone to his bedroom on the ground floor. After Kettle’s poor clothes were washed and ironed, they were hung before the kitchen fire to dry, and then Aunt Tulip, getting out her big work-basket and brass thimble and putting on her horn spectacles, began the work of mending Kettle’s rags. She patched and darned industriously, and at last, with a sigh of profound satisfaction, she folded up and laid upon a chair Kettle’s clothes, including his jacket and trousers, neatly washed and mended and decent. Nothing could be done with his shoes, except to put some shoe-polish on them, and this she did. The Christmas stars looked down kindly upon the poor negro woman toiling for one of God’s poor, and the Christmas angels wafted a benediction upon her humble head.

When her labor was over, Aunt Tulip lay down to rest for a couple of hours. She knew well enough when Betty would return, and the fire had to be started up in Betty’s room, and, after old Whitey had been put in the stable, Uncle Cesar must have his hot coffee and corn pone. For Aunt Tulip, like many of her humble sort, was a minister of kindness to all around her.

It was six o’clock, but still the world was all inky blackness when the wheels of the rockaway crunched before the door of Holly Lodge. The fire in Betty’s room had been stirred into a cheering blaze, and Aunt Tulip was ready to help her out of her simple evening gown.

“I declar, Miss Betty,” said Aunt Tulip, as she unhooked Betty, “how some folks kin let a chile go as raggety as that air boy, I doan’ see.”

Betty’s mind came back from officers and university students to Kettle.

“We must try and get him some decent clothes, Mammy,” answered Betty, Aunt Tulip having been Betty’s mammy in her baby days.

“Anyhow,” continued Aunt Tulip, “the boy has got sumpin’ decent fur Chris’mus mornin’. I done washed his clo’es an’ mended ’em up the bes’ I could.”

“And were you washing and ironing and mending all this Christmas night?” asked Betty.

“Well,” replied Aunt Tulip, “I didn’t mind settin’ up an’ gittin’ the boy’s things kinder decent. But, Miss Betty, the boy has got to have a Chris’mus stockin’.”

“Of course,” cried Betty. “You can put some apples and oranges and nuts in it.”

“An’ Cesar an’ me kin give him a quarter apiece to’des a new pair of shoes. His shoes ain’ nothin’ ’tall.”

Betty dived into her dressing-table drawer and took out of her little purse a dollar bill.

“And this is from Grandfather, for the shoes, too. He would never forgive us if something wasn’t put into the boy’s stocking from him. Now, what can I think of to give him?”

“He ain’ got no collar nor cravat,” said Aunt Tulip. “He would look right nice to-morrer if he jes’ had a collar and cravat.”

Betty was well off in collars, and produced four. Then, unfastening the scarlet ribbon from around her waist, she seized her needle and thimble, and in five minutes had sewed the ribbon into a large and very presentable cravat, and proceeded to fringe out the ends. Aunt Tulip watched her with delighted eyes.

“Lord!” she said, “that chile will be tickled to death when he gits his Chris’mus stockin’. An’ you know, Miss Betty, I been thinkin’ that boy could be mighty useful at Holly Lodge, pickin’ up chips and carryin’ the wood upstairs and huntin’ up the turkeys.”

“I think so, too,” replied Betty, rolling up the cravat and the collars. “If he is any good, he could save you and Uncle Cesar a great many steps.”

Presently, Betty was in her little white bed for a short nap, because she could not think of not being up and dressed on Christmas morning, although she had danced twenty-five miles between eight o’clock in the evening and five in the morning. Aunt Tulip, too, took what she called her “cat nap,” and at eight o’clock on Christmas morning everything was awake and stirring at Holly Lodge.

CHAPTER VII
FORTESCUE AND ROSES AND BIRDSEYE

The Christmas sun was shining brilliantly, and it was not so desperately cold as the day before. Betty had hopes that the thin skim of snow would melt, so that the scent would lie for the fox-hunt the next morning. She ran downstairs as soon as she was dressed, and found the Colonel standing on the hearth-rug, his back to the fire, and his eyes turned resolutely away from Rosehill. Betty kissed him all over his face, and commanded him to be cheerful, as everybody should be on Christmas morning. Then Aunt Tulip and Uncle Cesar were called in for their simple gifts, and Kettle appeared with them, his clothes clean and respectable-looking. There was much talk between the Colonel and Uncle Cesar over Christmas days long past, and the Colonel, whatever his heart might be, carried out to the letter Betty’s injunction to be cheerful. As for Kettle, the sight of his Christmas stocking and his treasures, the collars and the gorgeous red cravat, and the magnificent prospect of a pair of new shoes, completely overwhelmed him. He could only look first at Betty and then at Aunt Tulip, and say to himself:

“This is the fust Chris’mus I ever see; the fust Chris’mus I ever see.”

“Didn’t you ever have a Christmas stocking before, Kettle?” asked Betty.

“Naw, Miss,” answered Kettle. “I done heah ’bout ’em, but I ain’t never had none befo’.”

Kettle’s bliss was further augmented when Aunt Tulip put a standing collar around his neck and tied the flaming red necktie under his chin. All was then swallowed up in Kettle’s rapture over his own appearance. He stood before the old-fashioned mirror over the pier table, his head barely reaching the top; his mouth came open as if it were on hinges, his eyes danced in his head, and words failed him. There are moments of rapture when speech is a superfluity, and so it was with Kettle when he beheld himself in his first cravat, and that a large one of brilliant red.

“Now, boy,” said Aunt Tulip severely, who did not believe in wasting indulgences on boys, “now that Miss Betty and ole Marse done been so good to you, you got to do all you kin to holp along. You got to pick up chips an’ fotch water an’ black ole Marse’s shoes an’ do everything you know how.”

“I cert’n’y will,” answered Kettle fervently. And then the divine spirit of gratitude appeared in his eyes, and he said:

“An’ I ain’ gwine to fergit that you washed my clo’es.”

“An’ washed you, too,” replied Aunt Tulip. “An’ you got to do it yourself every day, or I’ll see to you.”

This awful and indefinite threat impressed Kettle with a wholesome fear of the most harmless creature on earth—Aunt Tulip.

Then breakfast was served, and Kettle received his first lessons in bringing in batter-cakes. In the intervals between the relays of hot batter-cakes, Kettle glued his eyes to his own image in the glass with a vanity second only to that of Narcissus.

Of course, the Colonel had to hear all about the party, and who was there, and if the regulation Christmas festivities were thoroughly carried out.

“Once,” said the Colonel, “we celebrated Christmas that way at Rosehill, with an unstinted hospitality. Now——”

“Haven’t I told you,” cried Betty, sternly from across the table, “that you were not to make a single complaint against Fate on Christmas Day? Didn’t I tell you yesterday I knew this was going to be the pleasantest Christmas I ever had? So far it certainly has been. The dance last night was the most heavenly thing—my gown is in ribbons, but I can mend it up all right, and put in a couple of new breadths later in the week. And Mr. Fortescue told me he thought that a white muslin gown at Christmas time, with scarlet ribbons and a wreath of geranium leaves, with moss rosebuds, was the most beautiful and poetic costume a girl could wear.”

The Colonel’s white teeth showed under his trim gray moustache.

“Fortescue knows how to pay compliments, my dear,” he said.

“All right,” cried Betty. “A man who doesn’t know how to pay compliments and isn’t equal to telling colossal fibs to the girl he is dancing with, isn’t the man for me.”

When breakfast was over Uncle Cesar brought in the only melancholy news of the day. Old Whitey had gone lame, and there was no going to church that day, nor was it likely that he would be fit to ride the next day at the hunt. Betty sighed deeply. The crust of snow was rapidly disappearing, and the ground would be in good condition for the hunt. However, Betty was of a hopeful nature, and felt sure that a horse would drop down out of the clouds for her to ride.

The Christmas dinner was to be served at the old-fashioned hour of four o’clock, so when breakfast was over and Betty had paid a visit to old Whitey, she went up to her room and, throwing herself upon her bed, began to make up her lost arrears of sleep. The Colonel was downstairs absorbed in his new histories, which Betty had given him for his Christmas gift, and Betty slept peacefully until it was quite three o’clock, and the winter sun was beginning to decline. Then, as she lay awake thinking pleasant thoughts, her door was noiselessly opened, and Kettle appeared above his red cravat, carrying a big bouquet of white roses. He laid the roses down on Betty’s pillow, and said:

“The gent’man who fotch ’em is downstairs—Mr. Fortescue.”

Betty sat up and buried her face in the fresh roses. She knew them well. They came from the greenhouse at Rosehill, and she herself had taught them to bloom late and luxuriantly.

“Tell the gentleman I will be down immediately,” she said, and then, running to her mirror, proceeded to make a fetching toilette out of very simple elements. Her well fitting dark blue gown set off her slender figure, and when she came into the sitting-room, carrying her huge bunch of roses, Fortescue, who sat talking to the Colonel, thought she looked like a peach ripening on the southern wall.

“I thank you so much,” said Betty sweetly to Fortescue. “I tended the roses in the greenhouse at Rosehill as long as we lived there. We have no greenhouse here, so we couldn’t bring the rosebushes with us. But I always had roses for Christmas.”

“And I hope you will always have roses for Christmas,” replied Fortescue gallantly.

Then they sat and talked gaily together as young people do, of dances and hunting and all of the great affairs of youth, the Colonel putting in a word occasionally. Fortescue was lucky enough to be asked to all the Christmas parties.

“I should like,” he said, “to give a party at Rosehill, but I don’t know how. I am only a man, you know. I should wish to do it right, but I am afraid I can’t make it quite as it ought to be on short notice. Now, next Christmas, if I can get leave, I will have a party, too. That is, if you, Miss Betty, will help me.”

The Colonel liked the modesty of this speech, and at once said that Betty would help.

Then Betty told the melancholy story of old Whitey’s lameness. Fortunately, Sally Carteret, knowing that old Whitey had to be saved for the hunt, had invited Betty to go with her to the party that evening at Red Plains, which was close by.

”Do you mean,” asked Fortescue, “that you are to miss the hunt?”

“I am afraid so,” said poor Betty dolefully.

“But that isn’t to be thought of,” cried Fortescue. “I have several horses at Rosehill, and I can give you a mount. Birdseye, that I rode over here, is the gentlest and kindest horse that ever stepped. Although not a regular hunter, she can get along the road and over the fences all right.”

“Oh!” exclaimed Betty, jumping up, “do let me see her! Granddaddy, may I ride Birdseye to-morrow morning?”

The Colonel hesitated a moment.

“I should require, my love,” he said, “to see Birdseye. Perhaps she has never had a side-saddle on her, or known what a riding-skirt is.”

“We can try her,” suggested Fortescue.

Betty ran out into the little hall, and, picking up a red scarf, threw it over her head, calling back to the Colonel:

“Don’t you dare, Granddaddy, to come out on the porch. You can see from the window.”

Fortescue was not a foot behind Betty, and they both ran to where Birdseye, dancing to keep herself warm, stood under a great holly tree. From the kitchen window peeped a little round, black face.

“We can try Birdseye with that little black boy,” said Fortescue. “She wouldn’t hurt a baby.”

Betty beckoned to Kettle, who came out willingly enough, his constitutional grin over-spreading his face.

“Run to the stable and get a horse-blanket,” said Betty, which Kettle proceeded to do, and returned in a couple of minutes.

But Kettle’s face suddenly changed when Fortescue, catching him by the shoulder, wrapped the horse-blanket around him as if it were a skirt, and Betty supplied a couple of hair-pins with which to fasten it. Then Fortescue, flinging the boy on Birdseye’s back, put the reins in his hand, saying:

“Now, you little scamp, gallop around the lawn.”

Kettle, his scared eyes nearly bouncing out of his little black face, his grin wholly disappeared, was quite incapable of taking a gallop around the lawn of his own initiative. He clung desperately to the reins, and began to stutter.

“G-g-g-g-ood Gord A’mighty, Miss Betty! I’s jes’ skeered to death of this heah hoss!”

Birdseye, however, well bred, well behaved, and intelligent, paid no attention to the squirming, frightened burden upon her shapely back. Fortescue, taking her by the bridle, led her to the paling around the little lawn, and then, with a twig broken from a big holly tree, gave her a sharp cut on the flank. Birdseye knew what was expected, and, rising, she made a beautiful standing jump over the paling. At that Kettle, with a yell, dropped the reins and grabbed the mare around the neck with both arms. Not even this could disturb Birdseye’s admirable poise. Fortescue himself made a standing leap over the paling and, running Birdseye around, made her do another beautiful jump over the paling. By that time, not even fear of Fortescue or love of Betty could keep Kettle on Birdseye’s back another minute. As soon as she came to a standstill, he tore off the horse-blanket and, dropping to the ground, ran as fast as his short legs could carry him into the kitchen, and disappeared.

The Colonel, who was watching from the window, tapped his approval on the window-pane. Fortescue then mounted, and, riding off some distance in the field, came back at a swinging gallop, and Birdseye took the paling most beautifully in her stride, flying over it like a bird. Betty immediately fell deeply in love with Birdseye, and declared that she must go upstairs and put on her habit, and test the horse for herself. In a little while, she came down, more bewitching than ever to Fortescue’s eyes, in her trim black habit and little beaver hat.

Fortescue, mindful of Colonel Beverley’s scrutiny, put Betty on horseback in the old way, by taking her slim foot in his hand, and Betty stiffening her knee and rising into the side-saddle, which had been put on Birdseye’s back. Betty did the standing leap beautifully half a dozen times, and then, riding off in the field, turned and came back, and Birdseye made a running leap like the flight of a lapwing. Fortescue had no doubt that Betty was quite safe by her own horsemanship on Birdseye’s back. They were so interested in their pastime that they forgot the passing of the hours. The Christmas dinner at Holly Lodge was served at four o’clock, and just before the hour Uncle Cesar came out of the house and said with a courtly bow to Fortescue:

“Ole Marse, he say it is mos’ fou’ o’clock, an’ you mus’ come in an’ have Christmas dinner with Miss Betty an’ him.”

Fortescue demurred a little, meaning all the while to accept. His riding clothes were hardly suitable, he said. But Betty clinched the matter by saying to Uncle Cesar: