Cain, or, the vagabond of Nod

CHAPTER 1. ''But thou

If thou shouldst never see my face again.

Pray for my soul. More things are wrought hy prayer

Than this world dreams of.

Wherefore, let thy voice rise like a fountain, for me, night and day.**

— Tennyson.

Silence ! A stillness intense, which one might think would never end. Every wandering echo was asleep; and on the summer air no breeze disturbed the perfect tranquillity that brooded over the beautiful valley of the Cumberland. Even the song-bird’s melody was lulled to sleep in the heavy, sultry air.

When God fashioned the perfect garden of Eden, and forbade the intrusion of sin; when He caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, there in that wonderful moment of Creation’s most beauti-

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ful conception — ^that of woman — there was no silence more intense than that which slumbered on the bosom of the Cumberland. The margin of this beautiful river was lined with pebble-banks and fringed with great luxurious clusters of honeysuckles. Beyond these, stretched like a great verdant canvas, was the broad-meadowed valley, bedecked with daisies and clover blossoms. One beholding the beautiful valley is at once reminded of the flowery meads of Sicily.

In the distance stretched the woodland foliage, dim and purplish, — the proudest boast of sylvan production. The tall oaks and poplars seemed to be trying to tower in majesty above each other; and, up there, among their uppermost foliage, a faint breeze was stirring. The brilliant sun, apparently taking advantage of the opportunity, gilded the crimped silvery sides of the upturned leaves and painted everything else with similar hues. The transmuting hand of the legendary Midas had touched all things around, and converted them into gold.

There was a little brook that stole its way from under a ledge of rocks hidden away in a dense wild- wood east of the river and wound its meandering course through the rocks and rapids near its source, then unrolled itself, like a silver ribbon, across the narrow plain, penetrating the foliage of ferns and overlapping honeysuckles, till at last it found itself lost in the body of the Cumberland. All was a wonderful, dreamful existence ; and under the soothing power of Morpheus in the beauty of that summer afternoon, like an everlasting and ever-sleeping somnipathist.

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A slender girl, twelve years old, stood under the shade of a large, beautiful apple-tree, by the trembling, rippling brook, dabbling in the clear water with a broken reed. She had been sitting there, reading her New Testament, and fatuitously lifted her eyes to the brook, when she noticed two little fish swimming near the surface of the clear pool. With a suppressed and smothered cry of delight, she threw her Testament upon the grass, and, enjoining silence by placing her finger upon her lips, went cautiously near the water’s edge. At her approach they darted away and vanished. She stood for some moments gazing across the grain-fields toward the south, while she splashed the water with her reed.

In her beautiful brown eyes there was a fascination. There lurked in their mild, sparkling depths a singularly charmful pensiveness, mingled with tender love and childish happiness; the flexible red lips stood listlessly apart, and there was a mutiable expression on their gracefully curved lines of perfection ; while the full, polished, classical forehead, with its noble excellency, could not fail to engender in the mind and heart of the ordinary observer as well as of the skilled physiognomist, a vision of her beautiful face which could never be forgotten. Her hair was of a beautiful chestnut hue, the beauty of which was increased by the few tiny waves intermingled in the tresses which hung around her shoulders.

She stooped down, and with her little hands dipped what water they would hold, and quickly showered the cold drops upon her head, laughing gleefully as the little streamlets trickled down

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over the white roses with which she had crowned her beautiful hair. As she laughed, her parted lips revealed perfect teeth which gleamed like rare pearls between the flexible red lips. The music of her laughter was like a stray chant of an Orphean lyre — so powerful was its fragment of melody.

She wore a sleeveless dress made of pink dimity, and a little bodice in it served to show her soft white throat and to admit the cool breezes. She wore a string of diamond beads set with bits of pearl and polished opals, about her neck. She had a peculiarly fanciful desire to wear this costly necklace, because of its singular signiflcance relating to her earlier history.

Her merry laugh at her baptismal performance had brought a rosy tint upon her pretty face, and long after the water had ceased dripping from her glistening hair, the smile was still gleaming in her eyes and on her cheeks.

A few steps in advance of her, stood a large white albatross, which seemed in his grandeur to outrival the beauty of his kind and as if he would feign scorn his fellow sea-creatures.

In the strange stillness and solemn beauty of this summer late afternoon, the girl seemed to have forgotten herself entirely; but, as she lingered, the sun lowered his regal self near the horizon and paused, seemingly, as if to hear the faint requiem which had begun to murmur among the chestnuts and oaks and poplars, then dropped behind the horizon, and left the scene for twilight’s gentle display. At last the hired-man’s homeward singing, across the glen where he had

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labored all day, admonished her that the day had given place to a charming twilight ; and she heaved a long-drawn sigh, as if just aroused from a short sleep. She advanced one step toward home, when she caught the pageant glory of the calm evening, and stopped to look at it. The beautiful albatross waddled along the path ahead of her. He was her dearest friend and playmate, and his graceful bearing showed that he had been trained and fondled. As he walked on slowly, he tossed his regal head proudly, as if he were proud of his majesty, Eoyal King Felix.

While the girl beheld the beautiful scene about her, she smiled as if her soul were gratified. She knew nothing of the strifes and struggles and hardships of the outside world. To her all was a tranquil dream of love and peace. Her young heart was as guileless as the spirit of an angel, and she stood drinking in the charm of that peaceful twilight with a heart full of innocence and joy. She was nature’s child, and loved the babbling brooks, the gentle breezes, the singing birds, the beautiful flowers, her friend, Eoyal King Felix, and those who cared for her.

She stooped to pick up her book which she had left upon the grass under the apple-tree; and suddenly thought of a passage of Scripture which she had just read from the Prophecy of Jeremiah before she left home, and rising in all her childish majesty, she stretched her dimpled, snow-white hands and arms over her head, and repeated with gravity and eloquence: —

‘The young lions roared upon him, and yelled, and they made his lands waste. . . . How

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beautiful upon the land are the feet of him that bringeth good tidings, that publisheth peace; . . . . that sayeth unto Zion, Thy God

reigneth/

These words of divine inspiration had become indelibly written upon her memory; and who knew what good they were destined to do some day?

She walked on up the daisy-lined pathway, banging on her knees as she walked the tin bucket in which she had been carrying water to the laboring man whose homeward song had caused her to realize that the day had lain down to sleep, — and the prophecy burst once more from her lips: —

“ ^The young lions roared upon him, and yelled, and they made his lands waste.’ ”

Mamie Homean was an orphan girl, who only vaguely remembered her mother, and who had entirely forgotten her father, so early in life had she lost them. She was found by Mr. Homean one day, drifting about in a boat near the shore of Nova Scotia. He rescued her and brought her to his home on the Cumberland river. No one knew her identity. She was a lost child upon the mercies of the world, and her only vigil was the God for whose great kingdom she worked and pleaded years afterward.

When Mr. Homean found her, she was so weak from excessive hunger that she could scarcely speak. Being a child of only three years she could never tell them who her parents were.

Mr. Homean’s mansion was some ten or twelve miles from Nashville; and, being hidden away in

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a dense forest near the river, made a fit location for a hermitage. The mansion was a beautiful edifice of brick; and, at each corner, exquisite, luxuriant creepers embellished the building with their coiling tendrils. The yard and house were amply shaded by the finest specimens of the sugar-tree. A clear, sparkling spring gushed out from the bluff south of the house. From the eminence upon which the mansion stood, one could see the beautiful Cumberland river. The location was magnificent. Babylon, with all her boasted opulence and fortifications and luxury before the Medo-Persian invasion and conquest, could not have offered a palace more desirable than the Homean mansion with all its luxuries of peace and tranquillity. There was no one living near it for miles around, and a visit from a neighbor was a very rare event in the daily routine of the home. Therefore the child grew up without the advantage of any associates or playmates. Her time was almost entirely occupied in studying the lessons which Mrs. Homean assigned her, and she, as a natural consequence, became a close, thoughtful student. From the time she first crossed Mr. Homean’s threshold she had displayed a great taste for books and literature in general ; and Mr. Homean spared no little time and money in procuring the proper literature for her. It was too far away to send the young child to school, therefore Mrs. Homean became her faithful governess, teaching her the truths of the religion of the Christ which had been inculcated into her pure little soul by that mother whom she had not altogether forgotten. After her lessons

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were recited, she was allowed to go out among the birds and flowers, and seek such pleasures and amusements as her childish notions would dictate. To her childish nature, every gentle breeze was a breath of inspiration ; every bird-song was a familiar voice, to which she often responded with a merry laugh; and every beautiful flower was a poem of love. She spent hours wading up and down the brook and in building dams to catch the water in a deeper pool that her faithful friend. Royal King Felix, might have a pond to swim in. She constructed flutter-mills along the brook, and built little ships and boats and floated them about over the water. During her earlier years Mr. Homean would carry her to his woodshop, place her on the shavings and give her a little primer that she might spell and read and look at the pictures while he toiled away at his workbench. When this failed to interest her, she would gather up the bits of sawed blocks and build playhouses out under the poplar-tree that stood in front of the shop.

Mr. Homean was a very wealthy man, yet he had always been a laboring man, working as a carpenter. He boasted of his brawny muscles and strong, healthy body, and excessively indulged the fanatical opinion that he who obtained his daily subsistence other than by daily labor was not sincerely honest. His father had died when the son was only sixteen years of age, leaving him the only heir of the valuable homestead on which he continued to live, and to a legacy of several million dollars, which he carefully preserved, claiming that it was no part of his honest earnings. He

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was a man sixty years old, and had accumulated a handsome sum of money at his trade, — this he called his own.

Mrs. Homean had been a woman of society; but when she married Mr. Homean, she became his faithful and devoted companion, isolating herself entirely from the social circles of Nashville, and choosing to share the love of her kind husband in his hermitage home.

They had had no children; and when Mamie Homean was brought into their home, they lavished excessive affection upon her. She was the idol of their hearts. Therefore, being the only child in that neighborhood, and being constantly associated with old and thoughtful people, is it any wonder that she grew up to be such a thoughtful, earnest child, almost prematurely?

Mr. Homean’s library was amply furnished with the purest selections of literature, to which, of course, Mamie had free access.

And now, when we begin our story of her, at the age of twelve, we find her with a pure heart, full of love for nature, love for books, an earnest piety and deep religious enthusiasm, the noblest traits of a young soul left to wander over the rugged highways of life with the only pilot of Truth to guide her, which principles she imbibed from the pages of the purest literature. From her early childhood she had been inspired with a peculiar ambition by the words of the Saviour in his Sermon on the Mount, ^‘Let your light so shine that men may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.” It was this which filled her heart with such a wonderful re-

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ligious enthusiasm, which in after years brought forth fruit in abundance. It was this that pictured to her youthful mind the holy conception of a beautiful world whose people did glorify the Father which is in heaven, and where all was love and peace and happiness. And not until the fatal hour when she saw horrors of murder and suicide, did she know that her race was pollutted with such blackness of sin. This was the first mad wave to sweep over her shell-built palace of peace and fidelity and wash it away. This was the first key that opened life’s great mystery ; and she heard the first knell of a shattered and dying confidence. And it is no wonder that Mamie Homean was shocked and horrified at the sight of what is a common occurrence in the conventional world — Murder and Suicide!

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Chapter II

Just twelve miles from Nashville stood Mr. Homean's mansion, shaded with a beautiful grove of sugar-trees, the finest production of Cumberland mountain. Only one solitary road led past his house, about a quarter of a mile away.

His woodshop was an amply furnished establishment, where he worked day after day, making fancy doors, window-sashes, furniture, etc. There was only one workman who helped him in his shop, his name being Alton Tolliver.

Alton Tolliver was a Nashville ^^dude’’ who had come to Mr. Homean’s workshop just a few weeks before our story begins, and had applied for apprenticeship under Mr. Homean, who willingly and cordially granted him the place. Just why this young man had chosen to leave the society and varied amusements of city life to take up an occupation of daily labor in a lonely, secluded country workshop is hard to say.

Alton Tolliver had chanced that way one afternoon on his bicycle. He had lost his way, and had stopped at the woodshop to inquire his way back to Nashville and to rest and cool a moment. While there, little Mamie Homean came to the shop, carrying a bucket of water to Mr. Homean,

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Her face was slightly flushed by the exercise, adding greatly to her loveliness as she stood with childish innocence regarding the stranger with his bicycle. Once he smiled, and she quickly averted her gaze and a fain expression of contempt flitted across her face; it was a strange, doubtful smile. She saw something in those eyes that she could not trust. She did not tarry long at the shop, but hurried back to the house. The boy passed on after he had rested ; but it was some lovely charm in the beautiful face of the child that caused him to come back afterward and apply for the apprenticeship. To his disappointment, she always managed to stay at home until Alton had gone to his boarding-place, then she would join Mr. Homean and stay with him till twilight began to steal over the land, then take him home, where a delicious supper always awaited him.

Mamie was out among the flowers, wading the dewy grass. Mr. Homean had left his pipe and tobacco, and Mamie had brought it to him and was on her way home. On this particular morning Alton had been detained and was later getting off to his work than usual, and, besides, he had chosen to come another route than the usual one. On his way he chanced to meet Mamie, who was gathering flowers alone the path.

‘^Good morning. Miss Homean,” he bowed, and saluted her.

'^Good morning,” she responded briefly, and turned away toward the shop.

“I would be pleased to walk with you. Miss Homean ?”

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"1 choose to be alone, thank you.” She walked on faster.

'^But here, child,” he insisted, ^Tiere is something valuable for you.”

She turned her head to see what it was, and he held up a beautiful gold band.

is yours if you will accept it.”

She stopped and held out her hand, but kept her eyes toward the ground. He slipped the ring on her finger, then clasped the little white hand in his so tightly that she almost cried out from the pain.

‘^Now, may I walk with you?”

“I beg your pardon, sir. I am not accustomed to walk with strangers. And why have you given me this ring? It is very beautiful.”

is a token of my respect for you, and ”

‘^Regard for me?” and she repeated it half to herself as she looked down at the ring.

He lifted his hat and started away.

She remembered his face years afterward. It was a face with a strange, doubtful expression on it. The keen black eyes gave a magnetic hint of something like a dangerous spirit and warned one not to trifle with it. The fiendish smile that sometimes lurked in them always repelled and chilled the spirit, and Mamie shuddered with a sense of foreboding danger when she caught a glimpse of his visage.

She walked on toward her home. Accustomed to ramble alone through the woods, she walked leisurely along the cool, shady woods-road, now and then inhaling the fragrance of the beautiful flowers which she had gathered, and pausing oc-

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casionally to watch the mocking-birds as they would perch upon the branches over her head and trill their grand morning hymn. The unbroken calm of that beautiful morning, the cool, still atmosphere and the tranquil sunshine filled her pure, guileless soul with a rapture of divine inspiration, and she began to sing:

**0, the morning, happy morning,

That will break on the other shore. When the march of life is ended.

And our harvest work is o^er!**

Before she could finish the song, the clatter of horses’ hoofs and the rattle of carriage wheels broke tl ' melody of her hymn, and she looked back as a rough voice shouted impatiently:

^^Look out there, kid, or a horse’s hoof will crush your head !”

The driver cheeked his beautiful span of irongrays till the child could get out of the way; then a kinder voice spoke to her:

^‘Good morning.”

‘^Good morning,” she responded, and glancing up she saw a tall, strong man, well dressed, descending from the carriage. He lifted his hat and smiled pleasantly. He took a little china mug from the driver’s hand, and took a drink from the little spring near by.

^‘How far yet to Mr. Homean’s house?” inquired the driver of the gentleman. r ^About a quarter of a mile,” was the gentle answer. Then turning to the girl, he asked :

'Are they well to-day — I mean Mr. and Mrs. Homean ?”

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'‘Yes sir, they are well.”

“What is your name, please?”

“Mamie Homean.”

He glanced at the driver, and said as he smiled, “I told you so;” and turning to the child he said so tenderly that she never forgot it:

“Yes, that is your name, God bless you; and some time you will not only know my name, but you will know meT

He lifted his hat and climbed back into the carriage, bidding the driver to drive on. When they disappeared behind the clump of trees which stood near a bend of the road, Mamie found herself gazing earnestly and steadfastly after the carriage. The flowers had dropped from her listless hands, and a strange, wistful expression lingered about the parted crimson lips and the big, brown eyes in whose tender depths could be seen the mirrored beauty of a passionate, sensitive, but earnest soul. Something had awakened in her dreaming heart and faintly stirred, and a restless look stole over her countenance as she sighed and stooped to pick up the flowers and started home. She pondered in her mind why the gentleman had seemed so interested in Mr. and Mrs. Homean; why he had said that she would not only know his name some day, but that she would know him ; who he was. He was so handsome and so pleasant.

When she came in sight of the house, she saw the carriage and horses standing at the fence. Something startled her, and she stood still. Her heart fluttered, and a pleasant sensation, mingled with dread, touched her heart. While she hesi-

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tated, she heard a voice calling her from the house, and glancing up, she saw Mrs. Homean standing at the yard gate, beckoning her to come on. Then she hurried on, skipping and twirling along the smooth, hard pathway. When she reached the gate, she saw that there was a happy smile upon Mrs. Homean’s face, and that a few stray tears lingered among the blushes on her cheeks.

^^Why, mamma, you have been crying!’^ said Mamie, as Mrs. Homean folded her in her arms and kissed her.

^^Hush, child; I have cause to cry. Leland has come home to visit us. Oh, I am so glad ! He is in the drawing-room, waiting to meet you.”

Mrs. Homean led the child into the drawing-room, and Leland Burnett rose as they entered.

Mr. Burnett bowed with demure grace over the little hand that was placed in his, and a radiant smile sparkled mischievously in his eyes as he saluted her. There was a brief silence, and their eyes drank in the beauty which each saw in the other’s eyes. Down through all the ages of time, these supreme moments of silence have been cherished as the sweetest, ineffable golden moments of delight. They are the moments when the celestial seraph of Love knocks at the door of the heart and awakens a dormant, noble passion; startles the sensitive, quiescent soul; inflicts a painless wound, then pours in the oil of ardent passion, and enters and proclaims himself king!

Leland was an orphan also. He had been taken from the streets of Nashville, a poor, ragged newspaper boy, by Mr. Homean, and brought to the

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Homean mansion, where he fonnd a beautiful home. He was now a tall, strong, handsome young man, with black hair, which curling in glossy clusters about his temples showed his massive forehead with exquisite charm. His features were fair, almost effeminate, and his passionate black eyes seemed to be flashing jewels set in the face of an alabaster statue. They flashed a wonderful magnetic power when they turned upon any one with a sudden sweeping gaze. They were full of passion of the deepest and noblest sort, and when they smiled, they revealed the fact of his wonderful intellect. His lips were expressive of firmness of character, and they would always remain closed, except when he was talking or laughing, when they would disclose a regular line of beautiful white teeth. Mr. Homean had kept him in school every year since he had become an inmate of the home. He entered school in Nashville at the age of eleven, and in a few years prepared himself to enter the Vanderbilt University, where he had completed the theological course a short time before he came home to visit those to whom all his success as a brilliant scholar was and should be attributed — Mr. and Mrs. Homean. He had done well at the University, and had received the highest honors. This was his flrst visit home in several years, for during the vacations the student traveled in the east for recreation, therefore he and Mamie had never before seen each other. But Mamie had often heard Mr. and Mrs. Homean speak of the orphan boy whom they had rescued from the jaws of ignorance and poverty, and had brought up to live a purer, nobler, more ambitious

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life; and she had imbibed a deep, warm, but secret sympathy for the dear unknown orphan boy. She had longed to see him; and when, at last, she realized that he had indeed come home, the surprise was almost too great for her. Leland had longed to see the beautiful child ever since he had first heard that she was living with his foster-parents. He loved all things and everybody that were good, and very special had been his affection for this child of whom he had read so many lovely things. Mrs. Homean had said that she was noble, gentle and intelligent.

In the afternoon Mamie escorted Mr. Burnett down to the little spring where they had first met, and there they rested and talked a long time. The evening was serene, and they were pleased to talk about it; the birds were joyful, and they were merry with them; when they looked toward heaven they saw Love smiling upon them; when they looked into each other’s eyes, they were filled with rapture to see Love smiling there also. The while that they were there was the supreme hour when the rapture of two souls blended into one heavenly song and sang their first song of love. In the ecstasy of that little hour of romance, they forgot that they started to the woodshop to greet Mr. Homean; and Mamie, at length realizing the fact, suggested that they should be going.

The sun had wandered near the horizon, and the road was cool and shady. Mrs. Homean overtook them just before they reached the shop. She had been running, and was very much exhausted. The exercise had fiushed her face till it looked like the blushing face of a maiden; and when

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Mamie suddenly looked around, she laughed and exclaimed :

“Why, just look at mamma’s face, Leland ! It looks, I imagine, like Rachel’s did when Jacob kissed her.”

Leland laughed heartily.

“Ah, children,” said Mrs. Homean, mischievously, as she held out a basket of big ripe strawberries, “do you think my Jacob will kiss me when I give him these ?”

“0, mamma ! would a kiss from our lips purchase that basket and its contents ? If so, we will shower your face over with kisses !”

“Wait till we reach the shop ; then we will serve an evening repast in honor of the good ^Carpenter.’ ”

There was a happy re-union when the good old carpenter met Leland. It was a delightful event after his day’s hard work to meet one so dear, one who had been gone so long, one who shared his sincere confidence and highest esteem.

Late that afternoon, or rather, that evening, they all rested under the shade of the large poplar tree and ate strawberries and laughed and talked till twilight began to wrap its maze of dusk about the hills and valleys and forests. A new moon did its best to dispel the approaching darkness, and the vast universe of stars yielded forth a feeble yet sufficient light to make the way agreeably visible for them. A whippoorwill sang his mournful song down among the honeysuckles near the river. The evening was so still and ^fionesome” that to the morose character it would be dreary in-

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deed ; but to the four who walked in its cool calm, it was very pleasant.

As day after day passed, Leland became more and more delighted with the novelty of spending his vacation in the country, free from the everlastingly obnoxious whirl and din of a sultry city, and at peace with God. Many days did Mamie and Leland spend fishing along the fishing streams; then they would go out driving in the late afternoons; or sit in the cool, shady grove, and read and talk. Leland’s presence in the home made Mamie’s heart glad and served to break the monotony of a companionless life. She became greatly interested in his happiness. Her every thought was for him. Each morning she rose early, and was out among the flowers, clipping the dewy roses to make a beautiful bouquet; and when Burnett came to the breakfast table he always found the exquisite bouquet by his plate. From the very first time they met at the little spring, there had been engendering in their hearts a wonderfully strange attachment for each other; and day after day, as they were constantly associated together, this attachment grew stronger; and almost unconsciously Leland began to love the beautiful child-girl with an ardency that was wonderful to realize.