Roxy

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23. Bonamy, Senior



Bonamy the elder talked up and down his office Moor. It was a week after Mark's betrothal, and a hot, still, summer day, disturbed by nothing; for the drowsy sound of the distant hammering of the village smith could not I said to disturb anything. The elder Bonamy wasa broad" shouldered, raw-boned man. His heavy chin was close* shaven, there was an under lip that indicated stubbornness, and :i certain droop of the eyelids over his black eyes and a close-shutness of the mouth that stood for a Booretiveness which knew by ways to an end where highways were obstructed. But over the firmness and the shrewdness of his character a mantle was thrown by his innate dignity, He was one "I those who treat themselves with sincere t'everence a Now and then ; stopped in his lolitary pacing to and fro to look out of the open window of the office at the brass ball on the top of the courl house. But either because the brass ball, blazing in the summer's sun, did not give him the inspiration he sought, or for some 'ilicr good Mini sufficient reason, he always uttered between his teeth, as he turned away from the window, an ejaculation which is in the English tongue accounted profane, and forbidden to be put down in books. The objeol of the colonel's cursing was an impersonal "it." What the " it " was which he wished to have put under male-diction, an eavesdropper could not have guessed.

Colonel Bonamy was not an eloquent lawyer, It was not from him that Mark inherited His outspoken vehemence. Secretive men we good diplomatists, but i diplomatist is not often an orator. He loved the struggle of litigation as he loved a game of poker. He fought now in this way, now in that way, now by sudden and abrupt attack, and again by ambuscade, sometimes by coo' and lofty assurance, sometimes by respectful considerate ness, but by this or that he managed to win whenever success was within reach without compromise of his exterior dignity, which was with him a makeshift for conscience, He studied the juries, their prejudices of politics or religion and their susceptibilities, tie took them almost one by one, awing some, flattering others, reasoning with others, He was never brilliant but he won his suits ; defeat was the only thing in heaven or earth that he dreaded.

Those who knew his habits would have said that in present instance he had a case in which he could not quite see his way to success. This striding up and down the floor, this staring with half-shut eves at the ball on the belfry, this short, abrupt, half-smothered and rather uncharitable damning of the neuter pronoun, betokened a difficult case, But there were certainly no cases to perplex him until the " Fall " term of the circuit court should come round. Neither had ho been overthrown iu his tilt at poker the night before, None the less was be wrestling with a hard problem, He had tried to "bluff" Mark and had failed. But all the more was he resolved to find some way to accomplish his purpose. Hence this striding to and fro, diagonally across the office. For do not the leg pump blood into the brain ! And hence, too, this starting at the brass ball, and this swearing at some undefined " it."

The colonel had just uttered his little curse a dozen time, when the lank Lathers darkened, in a perpendicular way, the threshold of the open door. Some business about a subpoena was the occasion for his call. The aristocratic lawyer and the rude Lathers were a line contrast of the patrician and the plebeian in manner and appearance. When Lathers had finished his errand, and stood again in the open door about to depart, ho said :

" Mark, don't come home early these nights, I 'low, Colonel."

" I don't know," answered the diplomatic lawyer.

"Seems to me, Colonel, but then 'taint none of my business," and the sheriff passed out into the hot sunshine.

" Come back, Lathers," said Bonamy, adding to the invitation his half-smothered oath, fired in the air at nobody in particular.

" What the dickens do you mean ? Has Mark been doing anything worse than going to those confounded Methodist meetings ? " And the colonel took a turn toward the window, and another pull at the economical and non-committal little curse. It was a vent to nervous irritation.

" Well, I don' know what you call wuss and what you call better. Texas and preaching and girls awfullv mixed up in Mark's head a sort of jumble, like a Fourth of July speech, or the sermon of a red-hot young exhauster and the like, you know. But I reckon it'll clarify, as the old woman said of the duck-puddle when she spilled her eggs into it "

" What girls do you think of, that Mark likes ? "

" Oh ! last summer it was that Kirtley witch, now it's Turn Adams's Roxy. She's the very angel Gabriel, and the like, you know."

"Oh, well, I didn't know but it was something worse. Every young man has to be a fool about something. You and I, we had our turn, Major." And Bonamy smiled condescendingly.

" We rekivered mighty devilish airly though, Colonel, and we haint had many relapses. Playing poker with an old hand like you is my very worst, ColoneL When I do that I'm like Samson in the lion's den." And with this the sheriff departed, smiling.

Colonel Bonamy had treated Lathers's communication with dignified indifference, but Lathers knew hew to estimate this affectation. He had seen the colonel's immovable face when he lost and when he won at poker.

' He's mad as a black bear," said Lathers to himself. And when, half an hour later, he saw the lawyer enter the shop of Adam-, he was continued in his surmise.

" What cut is the old felloe taking t " was the question that Lathers could not answer. That Bonamy meant to break off Mark's attachment to Roxy he did not doubt, but how ?

" He's powerful deep, that Colonel Bonamy. He's deeper n the Old Boy." It was thus he comforted himself for his inability to guess what was the old lawyer's line of attack.

Nevertheless, he saw his opportunity to serre his own ends. He watched for Mark and took him aside to tell him that the old man was " lookin' after " his love affairs, and had been " inquirin' round " about Mark's attachment to Roxy. For his part, he disapproved of " meddlin' " and the like, and felt bound, as an old friend of Mark's, to give him a sly hint and the like, you know, that the old man had been over to see Adams on the subject. Whereupon Mark, of course, grew red in the face. Was he not able to settle such matters for himself? It is a way we civilized men have. We are all able to take care of ourselves in love affairs when we are young, and when we get old, we are all convinced of the inability of other folks in youth, to look out for themselves.