The Savannah morning news., 1903-10-25
BY ALFRED HENRY LEWIS
Copyrighted, 1908, by
A. j. DreXel Biddle.
Entered at StatiOner's
Hall, London.
PEGGY O'NEAL \

GSSZg9SSa&@NSIAG @S@@Sgz@SSSAk sg
ag'in to go torch you; an arter sort O.
hesitatin' round between a balk an a
properest move, 1 reckons mebbe I'd
better come an tell you arter ALL"
ITS as well you did," / said, turning
back to the Generals door.
That's all right, Marse Major" Jim
called this after me in severe tones.
I'm boun I'm gwine look arter you-all
JeS d same" Then in a wheeling
voice: Say, Marse Major would you
all mind if 1 heps myself to a dram
outen d. demijohn in your closet? What
with all dish we're talkin' an frettin'
about you, Jim's mouth is as dry as a
! kivered bridge"
/ zone, mind you; no more"
The General. in converse with a call
er, was considering Van Buren,, and
party lines and issues in New York.
l would have told him of Peg, and that
L was about to see her, but the pres
ence of his visitor put it out of reach.
On the whole, l decided, it would be as
| we'll to meet Peg first and tell the
! General later. 1 interrupted, and ex-
planned that 1 was going to the parlors
for moment; we would get to his
! letters on my return.
No hurry, Major, no hurry" he re-
| piled; I'm quite content to put them
Oil L am already SelZeQ on by the
spirit of laZiness that pervades this
place, and which caused Randolph to
say: 1 never wind my watch whilst
in Washington, as l feel that all time
spent here is wasted and thrown away
It's not quite that bad, perhaps; still,
Wen willingly put off the letters until
Tomorrow"
And now, since 1 am to tell you of
Peg, 1 would that I possessed some
what the art of petticoats-a little po-
lite skill for flounce and fathingale-
some shadow of a parlor or a boudoir
grace.
Peg, then, was the truth itself for
hight and mould, and her pretty hands
and feet told of no tavern in their gene
sis, even though the lip of envy did.
l give you my first impression of her,
earned eye to eye and ear to voice.
say the latter because her voice was
as honey and wove conviction like a
3 spell. She had your pansy face a face
regular and ineffably good. And how
any, even woman and rival, might
look her deep eyes through and doubt
her. masters conjecture! Pegs hair
/ hanging in long curls about her neck
and shoulders-was black; fine as silk
or cobwebs; black, yet with the gold
black of the black Saxon. And her
skin was snow and peachblow. There
was meditation, too, in her wide brow:
ha
was both firm and loving. Also, there
was that in her atmosphere to bring
brave men to her. 1t was upon one in
, a moment that Peg, while tender to
be hurt, was hard to conquer; sensitive
she would feel her fate; yet she would
face it-face it with the faithful cour-
age OF an angel. But I'll have done; ;
why furnish the fragments and queer
| splinters of a portrait I'm too inaptly
, duu to offer as a whole!
Peg O'Neal came this day, and max
ing herself known, gave me my first
| sight of her in the drawing room of the
( Indian Queen. There was a look about
her, lonely, bitter and pathetic; a look
that should be long with one hunted,
and who waits to be made sure of her
| friends. She gave me her hand; white
and soft and small and yielding-it was
as though 1 took hold on a lily. My
| heart went out to her before she spoke
| as I've confessed, l was warm for her
/ cause on the instant.
Peg had read the cabinet list in the
paper; 1 think, too, she foresaw the woe
and worry to become the tail of it more
clearly than did either the General or
myself, or even the portwine Duff
! Green. 1t was of that she desired to
! talk; she would see the General; but
! first she would see me.
This preference for myself before the
! General was a common custom into
which Peg readily stepped. All who
| knew the General, knew me for his
I other self; and 1 will say, despite the
| inference of a boast, knew me for his
| calmer and more prudent self.
Peg did not come to me until the
| afternoon, and before go to the story
of our converse it would be as we'll to
\ sketch a handful of incidents which
preceded her advent and which should
| be understood to teach one the whole
! truth of this tale.
This Washington day have on my
minds edge, being the one next before
| the day Peg came to me, was the 14th
! of February, st. Valentines Day, al
! belt the latter has nothing of part here
| in. We had arrived, the General and
myself, on the 10th, and housed at the
| Indian Queen. This tavern was not the
| tavern of old, when that O'Neal who
was Pegs father prevailed as master;
a born conservative like myself, the
| new is ever the defective-it was a
first hostel of the capital.
Our advent discovered a crust of ice
| and snow to our feet, and a mortal
sharpness in the air that was like a
tonic. During those three or four days
| since our coming, a thaw had befallen
which left thoroughfareS a discouraging
swale of mire, and made going about a
! foulest possible employ. Withal, as
! though sponsor for the softening tenn
| perature, there descended a fog-fairly
a hash of misty rain that one might
wash ones face inland the air was as
full of water as a sponge.
These were no true conditions for
! the General, with lungs never the hard
| ist and whose health was more than
| commonly broken by the blow of his
| wife's death. She was soundly, deep
| ly sleeping in her grave in Tennessee,
| and the new sods above her counted
| but twelve weeks for their age, when
we rode into Washington. She had
heard the guns and the music which
told of her hero's triumph; and then,
| heart-stricken OF shafts of Islander
| aimed against her sinlessness by an OPP
| position willing to conquer with black
| means, she bowed her gentle head and
| passed. She was not to multiply a
| White House honor by sharing it, and
| left her lover-husband to go his presi-
! Dental way alone unlighted of her
! eyes.
Those dark scenes at the Hermitage
when the Generals angel went from us.
and storms of grief-so utter, so beyond
repair!-fair beat upon him to a point
| which all but laid him beneath the
| grass-roots to keep her company, have
neither part nor lot in this relation.
! They may be guessed at, however; and
| the General came forth of them Woe
worn and shaken, and with the thought
| in his soul that she persisted by the
| venom of his enemies, who had struck
at his fortunes by striking at her pure
repute.
After his wife died I had been in