The Loves of Ambrose

CHAPTER I

THE DEPARTURE

Ambrose Thompson opened his front door and looked out. It was May, the sun had just risen over Pennyroyal, and before him lay Kentucky's carnival of spring.

The boy drew a deep breath that seemed to rise and quiver over his face like a breeze coming away at the end of his long, curiously emotional nose.

"Glory, what a day!" he whispered; "seems about good enough to eat!" And then he vanished, only to reappear five minutes afterward dressed as a traveller and wearing a linen duster, a stovepipe hat, and carrying a carpet-bag.

Out in the cinder path his glance embraced the quiet street.

"Right foot, left foot" – without a change of expression the boy broke into an irrepressible jig. He was nineteen and stood six feet four in his stocking feet; the wind tilted his tall hat, showing his high forehead, his straight, straw-coloured hair, and solemn, light blue eyes; it whipped back his linen duster, disclosing his lean legs clad in tight trousers, his frock coat, and white stock. An indescribable air of adventure enveloped him. So Abraham Lincoln may have looked on some dress-occasion morning in his youth – all big bones and promises waiting for something to happen.

"I sure am going to give 'em the slip this time," Ambrose panted, stopping to readjust his costume and to take another careful survey of the neighbourhood. In his garden several lilac bushes were in their first bloom, and above his doorway an ardent, over-early honeysuckle had blossomed in the night. The young man put the honeysuckle in his buttonhole.

"I reckon," he remarked, "there ain't nothin' sweet that don't grow in Kentucky," and then with a smile whose shine radiated through his homeliness and a blush that spread to the tips of his big ears, he added: "I ain't just figurin' on the growth of flowers," and was off tiptoeing down his garden walk and stepping across his gate to avoid the creak of opening it.

This was fifty-five years ago in Kentucky, in a little village of some three or four hundred inhabitants, shut in by hills and by inclination in the southwestern part of the state; a community not to be confounded with their high-living, high-stepping blue grass neighbours, for dwellers in the "Pennyrile" were a plainer people, who perhaps drew some of their characteristics from the bittersweet, pungent "Pennyrile" grass that gave the locality its name.

As for the town itself, it rested primly in a cup-shaped hollow with three main streets. One of them, travelling farther than the rest, led in a way to the end of things for the residents of Pennyroyal as it climbed a hill at the foot of the village, set thick with hardy perennials, evergreens, and small white stones, while encircling this hill was Peter's Creek, that by and by grew up to be a river, but it had a tranquil movement, proceeding slowly on its course by reason of sharing the Pennyroyalian distaste for getting any distance from home.

Then the houses in Pennyroyal: although the beautiful open country was all about them, they crowded so close together that they seemed almost to touch elbows, and now and then one of them had appeared to shove the other back in its determination to get the best view of the street. They were mostly cottages, with no front porches, but with sloping roofs and little Gothic wooden fences, and painted white, with green outside blinds, except Ambrose's, and his had been touched with a boy's imagination, its intention being plainly rose colour.

Now in a double row along the outside wooden sidewalk this morning the linden trees were dropping fragrant yellow plumes inches deep in the ruts of the clay road, while over the chimneys whirled the last of the spring's apple blossoms. Bees buzzed among the flowers, birds chattered, flying nervously from one tree to another in an effort to be through with breakfast before the disturbing human element should get about; and hitched to a nearby post Ambrose's horse and gig were waiting.

The young man surveyed his equipage with the eyes of an idealist.

Old Liza had seen service, but her toilet had been made in the spirit of the best foot foremost; her coat had been freshly curried, her gray mane and tail carefully combed, and in her manner there was an air of emotional anticipation.

With one foot hovering above the step of his gig, Ambrose suddenly paused. The laprobe inside the carriage was quivering.

"Holy Moses!" Reaching underneath, the young man drew forth a small black and brown object whose legs and tail were five upturned points of supplication. Setting it upright on the ground, his face hardened. "Ain't I told you you couldn't come with me, Moses?" he began sternly. "Ef ever there was a crittur, human or otherwise, with a talent for bein' where it wasn't wanted, it's you! Besides, ain't I just locked you in the stable?"

The softening in his master's manner, visible in his last question, in the twitching of his eyebrows, in the slight movement of the tip of his long nose, was familiar to Moses. Casually he approached Ambrose's leg, but midway there, sensing defeat and not being an amiable beast, he planted his feet wide apart, barked as loudly as chronic hoarseness permitted, and straightway the young man humbled himself before him.

"Fer the lands sakes don't give me away," he pleaded. "I ain't never had such luck before this, getting off without being pestered." Down on his knees, he patted the stiff bristles, apologetically whispering: "Sorry not to be wishing your company, but Susan and Aunt Ca'line will look after you. Ain't nothin' on God's earth that will keep Susan Barrows from lookin' after every mortal thing she sets eyes on."

Without deigning a farewell, Moses trotted away. A ridiculous looking animal with an ancestry as mixed as any son of Adam, yet he had an enormous self-esteem. You see, though a dog, Moses possessed a self-sustaining ego, which requires no special ancestry or talents to uphold it. For there is a vanity that feeds itself, and many nobler personalities go down before it. Invariably Ambrose's did. Merely christened after the Hebrew lawmaker because of having been found amid some bulrushes, yet Moses may have felt that the name carried its anointment.

But now at last the traveller had fairly started. Swinging into his gig, he arranged his long legs in a comfortable right-angle triangle, taking a final hurried glance around him. "Move on, Liza, faster'n you can, or it's all over with me," he urged, "for things is lookin' kind of nervous."

Three times his wagon wheels had revolved in the clay road when a shutter on the house next door banged open, and like the explosion of a gun a child's voice rent the air.

"He's off! I tell you I see him. He's gettin' away unbeknownst." And a thin, brown figure hopping out of the window on the grass ran toward the street, twittering and moving its head from side to side like an excited bird. An instant later from the same opening a second pair of legs protruded – longer and thinner than the others, clad in white stockings and black cloth gaiters. Like the feelers of a beetle turned over on its back they waved in the air. And from behind a kind of barrel-shaped opening came a voice so tragic and compelling that even old Liza, stopping short, turned an inquiring eye toward the source of the disturbance.

As for Ambrose, although filled with a boy's impatience at interruption, the sight was overpowering. His reins dropped loosely, he stared, gasped, and then shook with silent laughter. Susan Barrows was living in the days of hoopskirts, and now in her effort to slide through the window had been held fast.

Nevertheless, in her time, desire has probably removed as many mountains as faith, so, notwithstanding her present difficulty, Susan's gave her power soon to set herself upright on the ground, and still with her full rigging to continue moving toward her goal like a ship with a full gale behind it.

A thin middle-aged woman, Mrs. Barrows was, of medium height and of terrific energy. The drama of her personal existence in a small town with no outside interests being always insufficient, Susan had filled in her hunger with an insatiate appetite for other people's affairs. Never could her curiosity about her neighbours be wholly gratified, and yet, like the possessor of any other great passion, its owner did her level best to satisfy it.

Out in the road, with one hand she grasped Ambrose's coat sleeve while the other was unconsciously raised toward heaven. Two bright spots of colour burned on her high cheek bones, her bunches of black corkscrew curls trembled with eagerness, her eyes challenged.

"Tell me where you be goin' and what you be a-goin' fer, Ambrose Thompson. It ain't fair you stealin' off this way each year and nobody findin' out where or why. Seems like us bein' neighbours and me seein' to you since your ma's death, that you might leastways have put your trust in me."

Removing her hand from his sleeve, Ambrose patted it gently before returning it to its owner. "No, ma'am, I ain't goin' to tell you no more this time than before," he replied. "And I was hopin' to get off once without remarks."

During this temporary delay the younger Susan had been industriously pecking and poking about in the lower part of their neighbour's gig. Now as the young man moved on for the second time the child's voice again rang after him.

"He's goin' courtin'; Ambrose Thompson is always runnin' after girls! It's Peachy Williams, for I seen his leg under his duster, and he's wearing his Sunday clothes!"

These last words were a triumph of evidence, but not for a moment would Ambrose look back nor appear to have heard. A humorous affection he might feel for the older Susan, but for the younger his dislike was to last for more than fifty years. Nevertheless, a little later he did turn around, and root and branch, the Susans had vanished, so that even now the news of his departure was stirring through Pennyroyal as the wind moves the leaves in a group of closely planted trees.

Something it is to know when one is beaten. Swearing a trifle and yet grinning, the boy settled himself more comfortably in his gig. "Might as well drive through town now kind of slow, and give folks a treat," he relented. "Mebbe I was shirkin' duty in tryin' to sneak off. Pennyrile ain't to say starvin' for food and clothes, but she certainly is pinin' for excitement, and who says that ain't just as bad? Seems like Christian charity for me to give this town something to talk about at least once a year."

And truly these yearly spring migrations of young Ambrose Thompson had aroused more interest and unrest in Pennyroyal than the yearly mystery of the earth's rebirth. Because, for the past five years on a certain May morning (and there never was a way of discovering just which morning he might choose) Ambrose had set out, at first on foot and later with his gig, and been away from his home eight and forty hours. Returning, he had given no clue as to where he had been.

Now like the music of a calliope the squeak of his wagon wheels awoke the village. Windows and doors flew open, heads in nightcaps and bald heads and heads with curls were thrust forth, but to their volley of questionings and accusations, Ambrose offered only the morning's greetings.

Travelling with praiseworthy slowness, he neglected no street in Pennyroyal, and, by the dozen, girls went fluttering in and out of houses, to wave farewells to the adventurer, while bolder voices called out Peachy Williams's name with every teasing inflection. One girl to whom Ambrose threw the spray of honeysuckle from his buttonhole cast it scornfully back, refusing to accept what she so plainly thought another's spoils.

Then the young man drove past Brother Bibbs, the Baptist minister, who, framed in the vestibule of his wooden church, beamed upon him with such heavenly condescension toward earthly affection that his expression of "Bless you, my children," was almost equivalent to a marriage ceremony. Next, along his route, appeared three maiden sisters, the Misses Polly. They stood in a line in their front yard, Miss Zeruiah, the literary one, always in advance, then Miss Narcissa, instructor in mathematics and the sciences, and last and humblest because most useful of the family trio, Miss Jane, the domestic one. Upon her Ambrose smiled with especial kindness, remembering certain heart-shaped cookies presented in early youth, which even in the form of sweet cakes held a kind of romantic suggestion. The Mistress Polly were directors of the "Polly Institute," where Ambrose and Peachy had started their technical education at about the same time, and yet this youthful acquaintance hardly justified the present arrangement of a love motif. Nevertheless Ambrose distinctly heard the three ladies breathing in unison the name of "Peachy" as he passed them by.

Two hours later, well away from Pennyroyal, having turned off the high road to a less frequented lane, the traveller brought old Liza to her first halt. Then, drawing out a large red handkerchief, he wiped his moist brow and, removing his collar, gazed furtively about him.

The glory of his early morning face had departed; he looked older and almost haggard.

"Ain't it awful, human curiosity!" he murmured. "Reckon I was most too brave in tryin' to make things worse, and yet I never dreamed folks would think I was runnin' after Peachy Williams this trip. She – "

Lower and lower Ambrose seemed to be gradually settling down into his gig, although finding some trouble in disposing of so great a length of leg.

Finally he sighed: "Kind of wish I had brought old Moses along fer comp'ny." For the boy was feeling that need for companionship that comes after all mental strain. "But then Moses ain't like dogs; he's so bothersome he's most human – always either wantin' you to do something fer him or to set up and take notice of what he is doin'."

Relapsing into silence after this, which was soon followed by a more usual and serene state of mind, the young man shortly after took out from his duster pocket a withered russet apple left over from the winter store, and thoughtfully sunk his teeth in it. Then gradually his tranquillity deepened, increased by the recollection of his having just passed through the fire of the enemy and escaped. Behind him lay the village of Pennyroyal, suspicious yet still unsatisfied, and before him the open, empty, springtime road. At will Liza was cropping wayside grass: the traveller's hands had let slip the reins, and sometimes his eyes wandered to the far-off blue horizon and sometimes dwelt on the closer beauty of the roadsides, where elderberry, sumach and Virginia creeper were tangled in thick hedges, and where young grapevines hung like silver-green garlands under their fine coating of May dust.

In a Kentucky landscape, to those who comprehend it, there is ever a sense of generous growth, of nature's yielding herself gladly to life's eternal purpose. Now dimly this country boy began to understand the motive in the new beauties and new fragrances of each returning spring.

Again the eagerness of the dawn overtook him; and stiffening, he picked up his reins, starting off again, when, turning in from an elbow up the road, Ambrose beheld the one person whom above all others his desire had been to escape.

The figure was occupying the entire seat of a buggy, but was driving along apparently so lost in thought as to seem oblivious of anything or anybody in his vicinity.

"Morning, Ambrose," Doctor Webb began, however, as he appeared directly alongside the other gig, and yet there was nothing either in his tone or manner to suggest that he thought it unusual for a young man to be turning his back upon his natural field of labour at this hour of the morning to drive off in exactly the opposite direction.

"Morning," Ambrose returned, warily attempting to creep past without further conversation. For if the doctor should open the broadside of his humour the secret of his journey might yet be wrested from him. Nevertheless, although the older man had stopped his horse too deliberately to be ignored, he showed no present desire to ask questions. Indeed, the usual smile had disappeared from his kind face, and his deeply lined eyes appeared anxious and worried. Just such a look Ambrose had seen while the doctor sat watching by the bedside of a critically ill patient.

"What troubles you, doctor?" he inquired.

In answer the man leaned across from his buggy, taking one of Ambrose's lean hands in his, and, unaccustomed to a touch with such magnetic power in it, a kind of electric thrill passed through the susceptible boy.

"It's you I've been troubling about lately, my son," Doctor Webb answered, "and now it seems as if Providence had just sent you along for me to speak to this morning. I've brought you out of children's diseases, chicken pox, measles and the like, but I've been seein' symptoms in you lately that have made me powerful uneasy, 'cause in this trouble it ain't in my power to help you through."

Ambrose's tongue was thickening, and his Adam's apple moving convulsively. "Is the disease so serious, then?" he whispered, feeling a hitherto unsuspected though general weakness creeping over him.

The doctor bowed his great head until his double, treble chin rested upon his shirt bosom, concealing his face from view. "Sometimes it's fatal, my boy," he returned, appearing so moved that his big voice sounded hoarse and unnatural. "It's true there's some that gets over it, but nobody ain't ever quite the same afterward."

Ambrose was trying to keep his knees from knocking together. "How have I showed symptoms of the disease?" he asked.

And Doctor Webb's whole body rocked slowly back and forth. "My son, you're showin' 'em uncommon bad this mornin'. I could notice 'em soon as I was ridin' up toward you; your colour is a-comin' an' a-goin', your eyes is shinin' unnatural bright, your heart is a-thumpin' too quick." And here he sighed, so that Ambrose braced his lean shoulders for the worst, although his lips were dry.

"Tell me quick, doctor; ef I kin bear it, what is it ails me?"

"Puppy love," the doctor shouted, and then giving his old horse an unexpected cut with his clean willow switch, off he drove, shaking with laughter.

"Puppy love!" Twice Ambrose repeated the words in a stupid fashion, and then his laughter rang out until it sounded like an echo of the older man's heavier roar. "Durn it," he said to himself, "ef that ain't just another way of sayin' 'Peachy'!"

When finally the traveller entered the shelter of a certain group of low hills near the Kentucky river, it was well past the middle of the afternoon, and there in a hollow he fed and watered his horse and then lay down behind a tree.

CHAPTER II

THE VOICE OF THE TURTLE

In the mean time, however, Mrs. Barrows and her offspring had not been idle. Indeed, no sooner had they become convinced that no information could be had out of Ambrose than they both set off at once hurrying across back lots, the younger preceding her mother like an outrider, thrusting her head and her news into every open door.

Within a few minutes the mother and daughter had arrived together at a small house set midway in the next street, and there, without even pausing to knock, Mrs. Barrows, pulling at a side door, entered a dining-room. Seated at a breakfast table were six girls and one young man, and immediately the six pairs of inquiring feminine eyes were upraised toward Susan, although the solitary male continued the eating of three large fried eggs in spite of the fact that his appearance plainly indicated a bilious temperament.

"Miner Hobbs, he's gone!" said Susan. "Got off most without my seein' him, though I ain't had a good night's rest come this month of May!"

Obviously this information should have been regarded as interesting, and yet, except for a curt nod, Miner apparently had not heard. From earliest boyhood notwithstanding that two more unlike fellow creatures could not be imagined, he and Ambrose Thompson had been closest friends. For while Ambrose was long and fair, Miner was considerably below medium height and dark, with one gloomy, indestructible curl rising above his already furrowed brow. Alike only in both being orphans, Ambrose was untroubled by other ties, while Miner was guardian to six beautiful blond sisters, all exceeding him in size and tranquillity. The drygoods firm of Hobbs & Thompson had been opened up in Pennyroyal a year before, so that to-day Ambrose's unexplained disappearance was not only a failure in personal confidence but a downright business backsliding.

By and by, Miner arose. Still his fit of abstraction appeared too deep to have been pierced from the outside, and yet, sliding past Mrs. Barrows, he attempted to get out of the door. However, his visitor sprang upon him.

"You're sneakin' off to try to catch up with Ambrose," she announced triumphantly. "Well, the Lord knows I ain't one to want to hinder you. But I'm thinkin' you won't succeed, for Ambrose Thompson will lead all of us that aims to keep up with him a powerful long journey before ever we are through with him."

Notwithstanding, in the following of his partner Miner Hobbs fully understood that one must proceed warily; therefore he did not attempt starting until after Ambrose was well out of town, and then he rode slowly along on horseback, never coming into the range of the other traveller's vision, but trying to keep his wheel tracks in evidence, and now and then making inquiries of wayfarers. So that about an hour after Ambrose's entrance into the woods his friend came to the same place and there sought the thicket in which he believed him to have hidden himself.

Face downward Ambrose was lying on the soft earth; but if he felt surprise or anger at hearing the sound of a horse's hoofs, and later a human footfall, he made no sign. Flopping over he merely called, "Hello," keeping his eyes fixed upon the line of hills on the opposite bank of the river. His fishing-pole, fastened to a bush near by, was extended over the water, but Ambrose's only visible occupation was the chewing of a blade of "pennyrile" grass.

In contrast, Miner Hobbs appeared fatigued and harassed.

"I got to find out why you come off to yourself every year, Ambrose," he began angrily. "I know you're doin' somethin' you're ashamed of or you wouldn't be hidin'."

"Wherefore?" smiled the other boy. "Look here, Miner, we're friends, have been since the first hour we met, yet I can't see as that gives you the right to know my business. Friends has got their places, and in my opinion a man can tell his friend just what he wants him to know, no more, and no less, and the friend ain't the privilege to spy out a single other thing."

"But you're doin' somethin' sinful or you would 'a' told me," Miner repeated doggedly, and then, although uninvited, he sat down on the ground close by, commencing to smooth out the Hyperion curl over his brow which his dejection and the heat of his trip had considerably tightened.

"Then we'll let it go at that," drawled Ambrose.

And for the next five minutes both boys sulked, Miner gnawing savagely at his plug of tobacco, Ambrose still chewing on the blade of "pennyrile" grass.

There were no informing signs about the place, so Miner decided that the truant must now merely be resting on his journey.

"You hadn't a right to run off from business," Miner spluttered next. Having made up his mind not to make this accusation, the little man was surprised upon hearing it explode of its own strength.

However, Ambrose, instead of appearing disturbed, attempted to arrange himself more comfortably on the grass, but finding this impossible, his voice suggested richer repose.

"Miner, ain't it ever come to you that the Lord has given human bein's time for more than one thing?" he queried, resting his chin upon his hand. "I hold with work myself most always, but now and then there comes a time, maybe it's just a short time, that is meant for something else, something that belongs to you and is intended for you to do same as your work. Maybe it's restin' and maybe it ain't."