III.

GRISTLE, THE GRAY PONY, BEGINS HIS STORY.

The ride on Timoleon, which was an exciting one from start to finish, was enough fun for the children for one day. They sought no other amusement. When they had seen Aaron feed and groom the horse, they went to the big house, where they knew the ride had created a sensation. There, in answer to numberless questions asked by their mother, they told a part of the story of their ride. They said nothing about hearing Timoleon talk, for they knew that not even their grandfather would believe that part of the story. But they told all about the ride, how swiftly and easily the horse went, and how gentle he was. Buster John was, of course, quite a hero, and Sweetest Susan shared all the honors with him.

The children’s mother had more than half a notion to read them a lecture; but the white-haired grandfather protested against this. He said the youngsters were perfectly safe in Aaron’s care. He declared he didn’t want to see boys play the part of girls, nor girls act like dolls. Then he began to talk about Little Crotchet, who had been so fond of Aaron. It was curious to the children to hear the white-haired grandfather talk of their uncle (whom they had never seen) as though he were a little boy.

“It seems but yesterday,” said the old gentleman, with a gentle sigh that ended in a smile, “that Little Crotchet was hobbling through the house on his crutches, or scampering about the neighborhood on the Gray Pony. But the Gray Pony is grazing out there in the orchard, and Little Crotchet has been dead these fifteen years. If he were alive now, he would be twenty-nine years old.”

The old gentleman fell to musing, and sat silent for a little while. Then he went on, as if talking to himself:—

“And I am seventy-three, and Aaron is forty, and, let me see, the pony is eighteen, and Timoleon seventeen. All getting old.”

“Uncle Crotchet wasn’t always crippled, was he, grandfather?” asked Sweetest Susan.

“Oh, no,” replied the old gentleman. “Until he was seven years old he was as healthy a child as I ever saw. Then he was suddenly taken ill, and lay in his bed for months. After that he was never able to walk without crutches. Twenty-nine years old! Why, he’d be a man grown. As it is, he is still a little boy. I remember,” the grandfather continued, becoming reminiscent, “when he wanted me to buy Aaron. From the very first the two had a fancy for each other. Aaron came from Virginia in a speculator’s caravan. He became so unmanageable that he had to be sold. Little Crotchet begged me to buy him, but I stood joking with the little fellow, and before I knew it our neighbor across the creek had bought him.”

“Old Mr. Gossett?” inquired Buster John.

“Yes,” replied the grandfather. “Mr. Gossett bought Aaron. Little Crotchet was so distressed about it that I offered Mr. Gossett half as much more for Aaron than he had given. But he refused it. Then I offered him twice as much, and he refused that, and I didn’t feel able to give any more.”

“Why wouldn’t Mr. Gossett sell Aaron?” asked Buster John. “I’ve heard he’s very fond of money.”

“He’s a queer man,” responded the grandfather, “hard in some things and clever enough in others. He had heard the speculator say that Aaron was a very dangerous character, and so Mr. Gossett declared that he was going to tame him. Gossett was a much younger man then than he is now, and about as reckless as any one in the county. I remember he said something in a light way that made Little Crotchet angry, and the lad spurred the Gray Pony at him and would have rode him down but for me.”

“Was he riding the Gray Pony, grandfather?” asked Buster John.

“Yes,” replied the old gentleman with a sigh: “yes, the Gray Pony. It was fifteen years ago, but it seems but yesterday.”

The grandfather was silent after that, and the children said no more. They went to bed when bedtime came, but not before Buster John had made up his mind to rise bright and early the next morning and call on the Gray Pony. He told Sweetest Susan and Drusilla of his plan, and they said they were anxious to go, too. So it was arranged that the housemaid should wake them when she came in from the quarters.

This was done, and to the surprise of everybody whose business it was to be up early, the children sallied forth a little after sunrise. They went into the orchard, hunting for the Gray Pony. Before they had gone far, a rabbit jumped up right at their feet, ran off a little distance, and then sat up and looked at them.

“He’s very much like Mr. Rabbit,” said Sweetest Susan.

“He’s lots better lookin’,” remarked Drusilla, who had never forgiven Mr. Rabbit for mistaking her for the Tar Baby.

While they were standing there looking at the rabbit, Sweetest Susan lifted her hands suddenly and uttered an exclamation that startled Buster John and Drusilla, and sent the rabbit scurrying off through the sedge.

“What is the matter?” asked Buster John.

“Oh, to-day is Sunday!” cried Sweetest Susan.

“Why, of course it is Sunday,” said Buster John. “What of it? Is it any harm to walk through an old peach orchard hunting for a pony?”

[Illustration: A RABBIT JUMPED UP AT THEIR FEET]

“No-o-o,” replied Sweetest Susan, hesitatingly.

“What is the matter, then?”

“Nothing. I had forgotten it was Sunday, and just happened to think about it,” Sweetest Susan replied demurely.

Going forward and looking about the orchard, the children soon saw the Gray Pony grazing in a fence corner at the further side. As they went toward him, the Gray Pony saw them and began to move away, backing his ears and showing signs of irritation.

“Leave me alone,” said the Pony. “I don’t want to run through these briars and scratch myself. Go away. I don’t want to see you.”

“Wait,” cried Buster John; “I want to talk to you.”

“Shucks and smutty nubbins!” exclaimed the Pony. “You can hardly talk to yourselves. I don’t want you about me. All you can do is to throw rocks and poke sticks at me through the fence. Go away. I might accidentally hurt you. I wouldn’t be sorry if I did, but they’d send me off to the river place, and I don’t want to go there and get curkle burrs in my mane and tail.”

“But I can talk to you,” persisted Buster John. “I can understand everything you say.”

The Gray Pony tossed his head contemptuously. “Go off—go off. Yonder comes Aaron. The Son of Ben Ali will make you let me alone.”

Sure enough, Aaron was coming along the orchard path with a bucket of bran. Presently he called the Gray Pony. “Come, Gristle, come.”

The Pony kicked up his heels, shook his head, and went galloping toward Aaron as hard as he could go. When the children came up to where the Pony was eating his bran, they found him disputing with Aaron. If the children didn’t know how to talk to him day before yesterday, how could they talk now? That’s what he’d like to know.

“Gristle, listen! If you didn’t have this bran-mash an hour ago, how can you be sticking your nose in it now? That’s what I’d like to know.”

The Pony snorted so hard that he blew the wet bran all around. “How did they learn to talk to us?” he asked.

“They have been touched,” replied Aaron.

“Well,” said the Gray Pony, “that changes things. That alters the case. I’m sorry I abused them. But that boy there hasn’t been very good to me. I’ve seen no boy like Little Crotchet. I saw them riding the black stallion yesterday. How was that?”

“Haven’t I told you, Gristle? They have been touched. They have the sign.”

“I see,” responded the Gray Pony. “That changes things. That alters the case. But what do they want with me?”

“They can answer for themselves, Gristle. They are here.”

“Why, we wanted you to tell us about the time when my Uncle Crotchet asked grandfather to buy Uncle Aaron.”

The Pony drew away from the bucket of wet bran and looked at the children. Then he looked at Aaron. “Well!” he snorted, “how did they know?”

Aaron laughed and pointed toward the big house. “They heard it there, from the White-haired Master. They are our friends, Gristle. They know the sign.”

“That alters the case,” said the Gray Pony for the third time, “but the story is a long one. To-day is the day when you get in the carriage and go where the talking-man lives. I used to carry the Little Master there, one day in every week, from the time he could ride.”

“He means to preaching,” explained Aaron, and the explanation made the children laugh.

“Come to-morrow,” said the Gray Pony; “then everybody will be at work, and we shall have no one to bother us.”

Aaron thought that this was a good idea, and at his suggestion, the children agreed to it, though not with a very good grace. To-morrow seemed to be so far off.

But time rolled away on the plantation as it did elsewhere, and some time during the night, when the children were fast asleep, and snoring, maybe, to-morrow became to-day. After breakfast, when they had gone over their lessons with their grandfather, who taught them, to amuse himself, they went out and found the Gray Pony, carrying him some green corn.

[Illustration: THEY CARRIED HIM SOME GREEN CORN]

“Now, I like that,” said the Pony switching his tail vigorously. “I’ve had a bad taste in my mouth all day, and this green corn will drive it away.” He munched at it a little while, looking at the children occasionally, and then began:

“I was very fond of the Little Master from the first. The White-haired Master found me in a drove of mules and horses in a pen in town. We had traveled hundreds of miles, and though I was young and tough, I was very stiff and tired. But the drover cracked his whip, separated me from the rest, and ran me into a corner of the pen, where I stood trembling, because I didn’t know what moment the lash would crack on my back, as it had cracked many times before. The White-haired Master—his hair was as gray as mine even then—held the Little Master in his arms, and when they came near I stood still and allowed the little fellow to pat my back and stroke my neck. The Little Master cried: ‘Father buy him! I like him!’

“That was enough. A negro came and put a halter on me, and led me from the pen. Soon some one brought a bridle, and then a small saddle. After awhile the Little Master was placed on my back, and some one handed him two heavy sticks. I was alarmed at first, fearing I was to be beaten with them, but when I flinched the Little Master stroked my neck, and I had no more fear. The sticks he carried along to help him over the ground when he was not riding, and he used them nimbly.

“So we came home, and grew to know each other. In cold weather I had a warm stable to rest in, and a heavy blanket to sleep under. In pleasant weather I had cool water twice a day, and young corn and green barley. People used to say he rode me too hard at times, but it was not so. It was a pleasure to him and no harm to me.

“One day there came to him from far away a teacher—a young man with brown hair and blue eyes—and for a time the Little Master was troubled. He had no desire to sit in the house for hours and do nothing but read in the books. I used to watch for him through the fence, and he was very proud indeed when he found that I knew his voice from the rest and would follow him about without bridle or halter. I missed him when the teacher came, and I used to go to the fence and call him.

“But I missed him only a day or two. The teacher was a wise young man, and he soon saw that if the Little Master was to be taught at all, the teaching must go on in the open air, with no more books to bother with than he could carry in one hand. So it came to pass that every day the little master would call for me, and then we would go on long journeys through the woods and fields, the teacher walking with me.

“Sometimes the teacher would carry books in his hand, but he carried more in his head. He was wise. He knew the poisonous plants and vines almost as well as I did, and I used to wonder how he found them out, not having to eat them. This went on whenever the weather was pleasant, and I heard the teacher from far away say to the little master that he was learning a great deal more of the things that were in the books, than if he were shut up in a tight room with the books themselves. If I could have remembered all I heard, I’d be pretty well educated myself.

“One morning I was fed early. I heard the negroes say that the White-haired Master, the Little Master, and the teacher were going to town. It was court week, they said. The judge and jury were going to sit and punish men for being meaner than the animals. I thought it was very funny. But I ate my breakfast with a better appetite, because I knew none of my kith and kin were to be hauled up before the judge and jury for cheating and swindling, and drinking and gambling.

“So we went to town, the Little Master and I. The White-haired Master and the teacher rode in the buggy. We kept with them a little way, but the weather was fine and the roads were good, and after a while the Little Master gave me the rein, which I had been asking for ever so long, and I cantered forward, leaving the buggy far behind and out of sight.

“I cantered on in this way, up hill and down hill—for it was as easy as walking—until we came nearly to the town. Then suddenly the Little Master reached forward and touched me on the shoulder. It was the way he had of warning me. We were coming to a point where another road led into ours, and it was well the Little Master warned me when he did. Else, when I saw what I did, I should have given a start that would have unseated him; for right before me, coming slowly our road, was a train of huge wagons, covered with white cloth. There were five wagons, each pulled by two mules. In front of the foremost wagon a file of negroes was marching, two by two. There must have been forty odd in all. At first I thought they were pulling the wagon, for there was a stout rope reaching from the end of the wagon tongue to the foremost negro of the file, and the end was fastened to his waist. On each side of this rope the other negroes walked, and I soon saw that every one was handcuffed to the rope.

[Illustration: THE SLAVE TRAIN]

“The sight of all this,” said the gray pony, continuing his story, “surprised me so that I stopped in the road, and came near tucking tail and running back the way I came. But the Little Master was never afraid of anything. He stroked my shoulder and scolded me, too, and urged me forward. Now there was nothing about this wagon train to frighten me. I had seen wagon trains before. But this one loomed up so suddenly and unexpectedly that it made me have a queer, shivery feeling, as when I hear a horse-fly zooning around and don’t know where he is going to light. It happened that the wagons were on a sandy level, and neither their wheels nor the mules’ feet made any noise. The negroes were marching along as silently as the shadows that run on the ground when the moon is shining and the clouds are flying. It was the first time I had ever seen negroes going along the road together in utter silence. They were neither talking nor laughing, and they seemed to be very far from singing.

“Going nearer, I saw that the negro drivers were chained to the wagons. On each side of the file of marching negroes rode a white man, a shotgun lying across his lap. I thought the negroes were prisoners, and that the men were carrying them to court for the judge and jury to sit on them. So the Little Master thought, for he urged me forward until we came up with the man who rode near the tall negro at the head of the file.

“‘Good-morning,’ said the Little Master to the man.

“‘Good-day, sonny,’ replied the man, but he kept his eye on the negro at the head of the file.

“‘Whose negroes are these?’ the Little Master asked.

“‘Mine,’ said the man, smacking his lips over it; ‘every one mine.’

“Then we went on in silence. The Little Master had a way, when he was puzzled, of reaching over the saddle and twisting a wisp of mane between his fingers. He did this now. He curled the wisp of hair on his forefinger and uncurled it ever so many times, as we went on in silence. I noticed that the negro at the head of the file had his arms tied at the elbows. The whole weight of the long rope, which was a big one, fell on this negro, but he was tall and strong and moved forward without sign of distress.

“Presently the Little Master spoke to the man again. ‘What have your negroes done that they should be carried to jail?’

“The man laughed loudly, as he replied: ‘I’m not carrying them to jail. They are for sale.’

“‘Then you are a negro speculator,’ said the Little Master.

“‘That’s what some people call me, sonny; speculator or what not, I have negroes for sale. If you want to buy one, I’ll sell you that buck at the head of the gang. He’s the finest of the lot, but I’ll sell him cheap. He’s worse than a tiger.’

“The Little Master urged me forward until we came to the side of the man at the head of the file. That was my first sight of the Son of Ben Ali. I knew at once that he was no negro. The Little Master spoke to him, and he smiled as he answered.

“‘I’ll sell him cheap, sonny,’ said the man; ‘name your own price, give me the money, and take him.’

“The Little Master slapped the pommel of his saddle, and I knew by that he was angry. But what he intended to say was never said, for just then the White-haired Master and the teacher came by in the buggy, going at a sweeping trot, and the Little Master gave me the rein to follow, which I was more than glad to do. Never before had I seen the White-haired Master use the whip on old Sorrel, the buggy horse, but he used it that day, and I had hard work to catch up and keep up. The teacher had turned in his seat and watched the file of negroes and the covered wagons as far as he could see them. There was a frown on his face, and his eyes had a queer light in them. I always dodge when a man looks at me that way.

“I think the White-haired Master wanted to get the teacher away from that procession of negroes. I heard them talking as I cantered behind the buggy.

“‘You are from the North, and, of course, you don’t understand these things,’ said the White-haired Master.

“‘You are right,’ replied the teacher. ‘I don’t understand them at all. I’m truly sorry I saw that sight. I shall see it again in my dreams.’

“‘I have been living here fifty years,’ the White-haired Master remarked, ‘and that is the second time I ever saw it.’

“The teacher said nothing more, and we soon entered the town, where there was a great many people. Hitched to one of the racks I saw a roan mule that had given me a vicious bite when we were in the drove together. He was poor enough now, and his ears hung dejectedly. I wanted to stop and read him a moral, but the Little Master bade me go on, and I had no opportunity to speak to my old tormentor.”