Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1911-09-05
CHAPTER ".
Mercy Poole.

Mercy Poole.
She opened a door on the other side
Of the passage The hand which had
subjugated Mr.. Brown was now
trembling like a leaf.
This way" she said, in an agitated
tone, father is in the barroom with
his cronies. How you frightened me!
I never thought to see you again"
They stepped together into an empty
living room, where bright fire was
burning. Greylock went up to the girl
with a careless smile on his blond face.
Shake hands, will you not, Mercy?
So you are here in the old place still?
l feared that should not find you to-
night; in fact, l was mortally certain
that some fortunate fellow had carried
off the belle of Blackport months ago."
She was very tall for woman, and
her full figure looked like Juno. She
had a handsome, regular face, tanned
brown as a berry by sun and wind, and
richly colored on lip and cheek. Mas
sive braids of ink-black hair covered
black, devil eyes looked straight
into Greylock's blue ones.
She would not touch his hand, but
thrust her own out of his reach.
"All day long have been thinking
of you," she said.
Indeed! l am glad that some one
takes the trouble to think of me-" he
answered. Were your thoughts of an
agreeable nature, Mercy?"
They were curses, every one of
them!" said Mercy Poole.
He assumed protesting air.
MY dear girl, am satiated with
high tragedy. In all my relations with
womankind l am, and have ever been,
a most unlucky dog! Come, do 1 not
deserve a warmer welcome than this,
after an absence from Blackport of
eighteen months?" He flung himself
wearily into a chair and without wait
ing for an answer-indeed he did not
care for one-added: II am dead tired,
and now that think OF it, I have eaten
nothing since morning. Pray allow me
to order supper, the best that Poole's
Inn affords"
She gave him a furious look. She
was really an imposing creature, this
brown young giantess, sullen but vol
canic. Compared to Iris Greylock, she
was like a cyclone to summer breeze,
a mountain torrent to shallow April
brook. Without another word she
swept through a door leading to the
kitchen and left Greylock to his own
reflections.
These were particularly unpleasant.
Chilled, hungry, disgusted with life, he
stretched out his limbs to the merry
fire and looked around the familiar
room. Eighteen months and more had
passed since he had sat there, max
ing love TO Mercy Poole. Alas; love-
making had ever been the besetting
weakness of Robert Greylock's nature.
BLOW hot, blow cold;" that was how
the history of all his youthful attach
ments ran.
He saw that nothing had been
changed in the old room-things never
did change much at Blackport. Here
were the stiff, cane -bottomed chairs,
the snow white floor, the brass-bound
buffet; all the same as when he used to
dawdle about the inn, signing like a
furnace for Ike Poole's tall, black-eyed
daughter. Even the dried grass in the
china vases might have been the very
stuff that he had found Mercy gather
ing on the brown marsh one day at the
beginning of his foolish infatuation.
The time I've lost in wooing
Has been my undolng,
Quoted Robert Greylock, as he stared
moodily into the fire." and the readi-
ness of women to listen to and believe
in me is a strange thing to remember!
They have, may say, ruined me with
kindness. If the sex had smiled less
and frowned more, should not be in
my present plight"
Directly Mercy reappeared bearing a
supper tray crowded with smoking,
odorous dishes-Poole's Inn was noted
for it's excellent fare. Silently she
spread the table, and then turned, as II
to depart, but Greylock detained her.
i've something to say to you, Mer-
cy," he began. Stay moment, VIII
you not, for old acquaintance sake?"
She paused with the table betwiXt
herself and this man whom she both
hated and adored.
Say on" she answered, dryly.
Greylock attacked his supper with
the appetite of one who had tasted an
unreasonable number of hours.
First of ALL" said he, lis my father
at Greylock Woods?
Yes"
And Aunt PAM"
She nodded.
when did you last see my paternal
relative?"
Yesterday"
May / ask how he looks"
"As gray and stern as ever"
Good Heaven! cannot you be more
communicative? l came to Blackport
tonight, Mercy, to visit my father Do
you chance to know if time and alb
sence have softened his heart toward
his prodigal?"
She kept her sullen. black eyes fixed
on the floor. Her whole appearance
was rigid and forbidding.
Il know nothing about it. qe has
been away from the Woods for months.
He returned only three days ago. You
understand his nature-you can best
iudge whether time or absence, or any
thing on earth, or above it, or under It,
would work the change you mention.
He stared gloomily into the fire.
III own the prospect is not cheer
full one He is an iron man-is my ia
ther- infiexble, and with more water
than blood in his veins. He was badly
cut up about my marriage, Mercy"
Her brown hands moved up and
down on the table. There was an opal