"Mind your manners. You say you have learned a heap in Jacksonville."
"To be shoo'. I've seen de quality thar in Miss Perkins's house," Mandy Ann replied, and hence the courtesy she thought rather fetching, although she shook a little as she confronted the stranger, whose features never relaxed in the least, and who did not answer her. "How d'ye, Mas'r," which she felt it incumbent to say, as there was no one else to receive him.
Mandy Ann was very bright, and as she knew no restraint in her Florida home, when alone with her old Miss and young Miss, she was apt to be rather familiar for a negro slave, and a little inclined to humor. She knew whom the gentleman had come to see, but when he said. "Is your mistress at home?" she turned at once to the piece of parchment in the rocking-chair and replied. "To be shoo. Dar she is in de char over dar. Dat's ole Miss Lucy."
Going up to the chair, she screamed in the woman's ear, "Wake up, Miss Lucy. I'se done comed home an' thar's a gemman to see you? Wake up!"
She shook the bundle of shawls vigorously, until the old lady was thoroughly roused and glared at her with her dark, beady eyes, while she mumbled, "You hyar, shakin' me so, you limb. You, Mandy Ann! Whar did you come from?"
"Jacksonville, in course. Whar'd you think? An' hyar's a gemman come to see you, I tell you. Wake up an' say how d'ye."
"Whar is he?" the old woman asked, beginning to show some interest, while the stranger arose and coming forward said, "Excuse me, madam. It is the young lady I wish to see—your daughter."
"She hain't her mother. She's her granny," Mandy Ann chimed in with a good deal of contempt in her voice, as she nodded to the figure in the chair, who, with some semblance of what she once was, put out a skinny hand and said, "I'm very pleased to see you. Call Dory. She'll know what to do."
This last to Mandy Ann, who flirted away from her and said to the stranger, "She hain't no sense mostly—some days more, some days littler, an' to-day she's littler. You wants to see Miss Dory? She's upstars changin' her gown, 'case she knows you're hyar. I done tole her, an' her face lit right up like de sun shinin' in de mawnin'. Will you gim me your caird?"
This was Mandy Ann's master-stroke at good manners. She had seen such things at "Miss Perkins's" in Jacksonville, and had once or twice taken a card on a silver tray to that lady, and why not bring the fashion to her own home, if it were only a log-cabin, and she a bare-foot, bare-legged waitress, instead of Mrs. Perkins's maid Rachel, smart in slippers and cap, and white apron. For a moment the stranger's face relaxed into a broad smile at the ludicrousness of the situation. Mandy Ann, who was quick of comprehension, understood the smile and hastened to explain.
"I done larn't a heap of things at Miss Perkins's, which we can't do hyar, 'case of ole Miss bein' so quar. Miss Dory'd like 'em right well."
"Certainly," the stranger said, beginning to have a good deal of respect for the poor slave girl trying to keep up the dignity of her family.
Taking a card from his case he handed it to Mandy Ann, who looked at it carefully as if reading the name, although she held it wrong side up. There was no silver tray to take it on—there was no tray at all—but there was a china plate kept as an ornament on a shelf, and on this Mandy Ann placed the card, and then darted up the stairs, finding her mistress nearly dressed, and waiting for her.
"Oh, his card? He gave it to you?" Eudora said, flushing with pleasure that he had paid her this compliment, and pressing her lips to the name when Mandy Ann did not see her.
"In course he done gin it to me. Dat's de way wid de quality both Souf and Norf. We livin' hyar in de clarin' doan know noffin'." Mandy Ann replied.
On the strength of her three months sojourn with Mrs. Perkins, who was undeniably quality, she felt herself capable of teaching many things to her young mistress, who had seldom repressed her, and who now made no answer except to ask, "How do I look?"
She had hesitated a moment as to the dress she would wear in place of the one discarded. She had very few to select from, and finally took down a white gown sacred to her, because of the one occasion on which she had worn it. It was a coarse muslin, but made rather prettily with satin bows on the sleeves, and shoulders, and neck. Several times, since she had hung it on a peg under a sheet to keep it from getting soiled, she had looked at it and stroked it, wondering if she would ever wear it again. Now she took it down and smoothed the bows of ribbon, and brushed a speck from the skirt, while there came to her eyes a rush of glad tears as she put it on, with a thought that he would like her in it, and then tried to see its effect in the little eight by twelve cracked glass upon the wall. All she could see was her head and shoulders, and so she asked the opinion of Mandy Ann, who answered quickly, "You done look beautiful—some like de young ladies in Jacksonville, and some like you was gwine to be married."
"Perhaps I am," Eudora replied, with a joyous ring in her voice. "Would you like to have me get married?"
Mandy Ann hesitated a moment and then said, "I'se promised never to tole you no mo' lies, so dis is de truffe, ef I was to drap dead. I'd like you to marry some de gemmans in Jacksonville, or some dem who comes to de Brock House, but not him downstars!"
"Why not?" Eudora asked, and there was a little sharpness in her voice.
"'Case," Mandy Ann began, "you as't me, an' fo' de Lawd I mus' tell de truffe. He's very tall an' gran', an' w'ars fine close, an' han's is white as a cotton bat, but his eyes doan set right in his head. They look hard, an' not a bit smilin', an' he looks proud as ef he thought we was dirt, an' dem white han's—I do' know, but pears like they'd squeeze body an' soul till you done cry wid pain. Doan you go for to marry him, Miss Dory, will you?"
At first Mandy Ann had opened and shut her black fingers, as she showed how the stranger's white hands would squeeze one's body and soul; then they closed round her mistress's arm as she said, "Doan you marry him, Miss Dory, will you?"
"No," Eudora answered, "don't be a silly, but go down and bring me a rose, if you can find one two-thirds open. I wore one with this dress before and he liked it, and as't me to give it to him. Mebby he will now," she thought, while waiting for Mandy Ann, who soon came back with a beautiful rose hidden under her apron.
"Strues I'm bawn, I b'lieve he's done gone to sleep like ole Miss—he's settin' thar so still," she said.
But he was far from being asleep. He had gone over again and again with everything within his range of vision, from the old woman nodding in her chair, to the bucket of water standing outside the door, with a gourd swimming on the top, and he was wondering at the delay, and feeling more and more that he should take Tom Hardy's advice, when he heard steps on the stairs, which he knew were not Mandy Ann's, and he rose to meet Eudora.
CHAPTER III
THE INTERVIEW
She was a short, slender little girl, not more than sixteen or seventeen, with a sweet face and soft brown eyes which drooped as she came forward, and then looked at him shyly through a mist of tears which she bravely kept back.
"How d'ye. I'm so glad to see you," she said, looking up at him with
