Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: June 23, 2025
Then afar in front a curled cloud of white dust arose and out of it came the sound of galloping horses. "Who's this?" asked Miss Taylor. "The Cresswells, I think; they usually ride to town about this time." But already Miss Taylor had descried the brown and tawny sides of the speeding horses. "Good gracious!" she thought. "The Cresswells!"
"I am glad to hear you say that," she said methodically, "for Jason was a brave adventurer " "I thought he was a thief." "Oh, well those were other times." "The Cresswells are thieves now." Miss Taylor answered sharply. "Bles, I am ashamed to hear you talk so of your neighbors simply because they are white." But Bles continued.
She might even stay to the wedding if the new plans matured. Mrs. Vanderpool was quite upset. Her French maid, on whom she had depended absolutely for five years or more, had left her. "I think I want to try a colored maid," she told the Cresswells, laughingly, as they drove home. "They have sweet voices and they can't doff their uniform.
She thought of the golden sheen of the cotton, and the cold March winds of New England; of her brother who apparently noted nothing of leaves and winds and seasons; and of the mighty Cresswells whom Miss Smith so evidently disliked. Suddenly she became aware of her long silence and the silence of the boy. "Bles," she began didactically, "where are you from?"
John had met this objection with, "Humph!" as he left for his office. Next day he had returned to the subject. "Been looking up Tooms County. Find some Cresswells there big plantations rated at two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Some others, too; big cotton county." "You ought to know, John, if I teach Negroes I'll scarcely see much of people in my own class." "Nonsense! Butt in. Show off.
Great heavens! and he'd been starving on a bare couple of thousand and trying to keep up appearances! today the Cresswells were almost millionaires; aye, and he might be married to more millions. He sat up with a start. Today Mary was going North. He had quite forgotten it in the wild excitement of the cotton corner. He had neglected her.
It was her neighbor, Tolliver a gaunt, yellow-faced white man, ragged, rough, and unkempt; one of the poor whites who had struggled up and failed. He spent no courtesy on the "nigger" teacher, but sat in his saddle and called her to the gate, and she went. "Say," he roughly opened up, "I've got to sell some land and them damn Cresswells are after it.
"But," presently, "how can we sell it without the Cresswells knowing?" "We won't try; we'll just take it to them and give them half, like the other tenants." "But the swamp is mortal thick and hard to clear." "We can do it." Zora had sat still, listening; but now, suddenly, she leapt to her feet.
But Miss Smith stopped him. "Robert, where is the land Cresswell offers you?" "It's on the Tolliver place." "The Tolliver place?" "Yes, he is going to buy it." Miss Smith dismissed the boy absently and sat down. The crisis seemed drawing near. She had not dreamed the Tolliver place was for sale. The old man must be hard pressed to sell to the Cresswells. She started up. Why not go see him?
He had sold the school its first land to pique the Cresswells; but he would not sell any more, she was sure, even now when the promise of wealth faced the school. She lay back and closed her eyes and fell lightly asleep. As she slept an old woman came toiling up the hill northward from the school, and out of the eastward spur of the Cresswell barony.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking