predestinatured to git evm wid bofe of'm de prompes' way I kin. You
neveh seed me mad, did you? Well, when you see Cawnelius Leggett mad you
wants to run an' hide. He wou'n't hu't a chile no mo'n he'd hu't a
chicken, but ef dere's a _man_ in de way--jis' on'y in de _way_--an'
specially a _white_ man--Lawd! he betteh teck a tree!"

The windows of Rosemont had for some time been red with lamplight when
they fastened their horse to a swinging limb near the spring-house and
walked up through the darkening grove to the kitchen. Virginia received
her son with querulous surprise. "Gawd's own fool," she called him, "fuh
runnin' off, an' de same fool double' an' twisted fo' slinkin' back."
But when he arrogantly showed the Judge's letter she lapsed into silent
disdain while she gave him an abundant supper. After a time the child
was left sitting beside the kitchen fire, holding an untasted biscuit.
Throughout the yard and quarters there was a stillness that was not
sleep, though Virginia alone was out-of-doors, standing on the moonlit
veranda looking into the hall.

She heard Major Garnet ask, with majestic forbearance, "Well, Cornelius,
what do you want?"

The teamster advanced with his ragged hat in one hand and the letter in
the other. The Major, flushing red, lifted his sound arm, commandingly,
and the mulatto stopped. "Boy, can it be that in my presence and in the
presence of your mistress you dare attempt to change the manners you
were raised to?"

Cornelius opened his mouth with great pretense of ignorance, but----

"Go back and drop that hat outside the door, sir!" The servant went.

"Now, bring me that letter!" The bearer brought it and stood waiting
while the Major held it under his lame arm and tore it open.

Judge March wrote that he had found a way to dispense with Cornelius at
once, but his main wish was to express the hope--having let a better
opportunity slip--that President Garnet as the "person best fitted in
all central Dixie to impart to Southern youth a purely Southern
education," would reopen Rosemont at once, and to promise his son to the
college as soon as he should be old enough.

But for two things the Major might have felt soothed. One was a feeling
that Cornelius had in some way made himself unpleasant to the Judge, and
this grew to conviction as his nostrils caught the odor of strong drink.
He handed the note to his wife.

"Judge March is always complimentary. Read it to Jeff-Jack. Corneliu