But she didn’t marry any of them. Her eyes had seen the glory of the coming of the Lord and then she had seen the glory of the Lord hung up by the thumbs.
Just home from market she called to the maid:
“I’ll answer, Candy.”
But on the way to the door her hoop slipped from its seam and tripped her and she only called through:
“Who is it?”
“I want to see Dr. Pilgrim.”
Josie hesitated. Her brother was asleep.
“I’m afraid he can’t see you now,” she said.
But as she turned away from the door the bell rang again, harsh and imperative. This time Candy had lumbered up from the kitchen.
“Tell him the Doctor can’t see anybody this morning.”
She went into the drawing room and rested a moment. Candy interrupted her.
“Miss Josie—that’s a right funny man out there. Look to me he fixin to do some mischief to y’all. He got kind of black gloves on him that wobble when he talk.”
“What did he say?” asked Josie in alarm.
“He only say he want to see your brother.”
Josie went out into the hall again. It was a small quadrangle, lit by a semicircular window that shed a blue and olive glow. Candy had left the door faintly ajar and Josie peered out cautiously from the safe semi-darkness. She saw half a hat and half a coat.
“What do you want?”
“I’ve got to see Dr. Pilgrim.”
She had a peremptory “No” ready when another visitor came into view on the door-step, and she hesitated, feeling unjustified in sending away two callers without consulting her brother. Reassured by this second presence she threw open the door. In a second she wished she hadn’t because the two figures standing there brought back in a sudden rush of memory another July day three years before. The man just arrived was the young French aide-de-camp who had been with Prince Napoleon; the other, the one in whose tone Candy had scented undefined danger Josie had last seen in a crumpled mass of agony on a farmhouse table. The Frenchman was the first to speak.
“You probably do not recollect me, Miss Pilgrim. My name is Silve. I am now military attache at the French embassy here and we have met on that day that your brother rendered such service to Prince Napoleon in the war.”
Josie steadied herself against the door-frame, with an effort restraining the impulse to cry out, “Yes, but what is the Southerner doing here?”
Tib had not spoken, but Josie’s mind was working so fast that words could not have made plainer to her the nature of his errand, though her appearance and the simultaneous arrival of the other visitor had confused him. The light in his eyes was of a purpose long conceived, long planned; for two years he had so haunted Josie’s dreams that she had reconstructed in her imagination his awful return to consciousness that night, his escape before sunrise and the desperate agony that must have accompanied his search for shelter that morning—after her months in the soldiers’ hospital Josie could envisage the amputation of his torn thumbs.
The Frenchman spoke again: “It is only because the Paquebot Rochambeau leaves on the day after tomorrow that I dare present myself at such an hour. Miss Pilgrim, the Prince has not forgotten the great service that your brother rendered him. This morning even cables of the most serious nature have been postponed so that I should come to see your brother. At this moment there is a toothache in Europe of such international significance—” For the first time in a cautious glance he became fully cognizant of Tib’s presence, but there was no mutual recognition. “If I could talk to your brother for a moment?”
A voice spoke suddenly over Josie’s shoulder:
“I am Dr. Pilgrim. Who wants to speak to me?”
Instinctively Josie blocked the space of sunlight between Tib Dulany, ex-sergeant of Stuart’s cavalry, and her brother.
“I’m sorry, gentlemen,” said Dr. Pilgrim, “but I can’t see you now.” To Josie he said, “This is the morning that I’ve promised to devote to Candy’s tooth—that’s why I got up so confounded early.” He pressed past her and faced the two men. “We have a faithful negro servant whom I have long intended to supply with a tooth and I am afraid that I can have no other appointments for this morning. My sister will take your addresses and arrange any consultations.”
Josie saw he was in one of his icy humors. On his way downstairs he had called Candy from the kitchen; she was bustling behind him with a basket on her arm.
Josie, the only one of the five who grasped the entirety of the situation, sparred for time.
“Very well. If you gentlemen will give me your addresses—”
“I only ask for a moment of the Doctor’s time,” said Captain Silve.
“I will give you just that moment,” said the Doctor impatiently. “This poor colored woman needs me more than anyone and I have never thought to put white before black with those who need my services.”
For the next few minutes while Captain Silve explained himself and Dr. Pilgrim unbent to the extent of walking with him to the edge of the veranda, Josie was alone with Tib—alone with him in spirit. She could not untie those old cords which she had once cut through—but for that little time she could hold him with her bright beauty.
“My brother doesn’t know who you are,” she said quickly. “What do you want here?”
Again she read through to the dark hours and brooding years that lay behind his eyes.
Tib looked aside.
“I only came to get an appointment.”
Dr. Pilgrim turned about. “My time is limited as I said. Josie, you may tell any further callers that I will be available after four o’clock.”
Nodding briefly to Tib he started down the steps still listening with a distant air to Silve’s plea. All of a sudden the five of them were in motion down the sunny street, Josie, without a bonnet, walking beside Tib, and Candy bringing up the rear.
“—but it’s a court appointment,” Silve pled earnestly. “You will be assistant to the great Doctor Evans, patronized by everyone in Paris. It is what the English would call a ‘command,’ you comprehend, Doctor.”
Dr. Pilgrim stopped and the procession stopped behind him.
“I am an American first and I shall depend entirely upon my own judgment as to whether or not to accept an offer so suddenly—if at all.”
Captain Silve flung up his hands in despair. “Surgeon to the French Empire! High fees, probably the Legion d’honneur, a fine equipage to drive in the Bois de Boulogne—yet you would consider staying here in this mud hole?”
Dr. Pilgrim had begun to walk again.
“It is not a mud hole to me,” he said. “You have seen that building on our left?”
“Certainly. It is the Capitol.”
“It was from those steps that our martyred president delivered the second inaugural.”
A voice behind Josie breathed humbly:
“I don’t know whether you all is goin where you is goin on account of me but I feels as if I’s jest trailin along.”
Candy’s urging made Josie realize that she herself was simply an element in a parade, and she called to her brother in her most positive voice, “Where are we going, Ernest?”
“We’re going to the jeweler’s of course,” Dr. Pilgrim answered, “I can’t make a gold tooth out of nothing, and I told you I used the last piece of gold leaf yesterday afternoon.”
If the young Southerner would only speak Josie might have been able to resolve the situation but he only reflected her uncertainty as to the next step.
At the next corner she turned upon him with an almost intimate anger:
“Will you kindly excuse us, sir? You may call another time when my brother is able to see you.”
“I think I shall accompany your brother,” said Tib grimly.
“Oh please,” she whispered, “is this some more of that awful war?”
“I hope there will be no violence in your presence,” said Tib.
Setting the pace Dr. Pilgrim threw a glance over his shoulder.
“Walking is more healthful if one makes better time.” And he continued his discourse upon the Capitol up to the portal of Viner’s Jewelry Store on Pennsylvania Avenue.
At this point his two early callers became conscious that they were upon an errand in which they had no concern, and momentarily fell back while Dr. Pilgrim, Josie, and Candy went in.
“I cannot understand it,” said Captain Silve. “No pleasure except duty would hold me in Washington. Two or three buildings, some beautiful girls like Miss Pilgrim and nothing more.”
He reached for the door-knob at the same moment as Tib and withdrew his own hand with a start. His thumb had pressed through another thumb, soft and tangible within its black kid covering.
“Have I hurt you?” he exclaimed.
“What? Oh I see.” What Tib saw was that the thumb of his stuffed glove had been crushed flat by the accidental encounter. Instinctively his other hand bent to reshape it while he held the door open with his elbow. “You didn’t hurt me—that was an accident I was in. I haven’t any thumbs.”
Captain Silve, brought up in the proudest traditions of Saint Cyr, would request no information when none had been offered. But he looked curiously at Tib as they went into the store. Then, being French, he became fascinated by the bargain that was being transacted therein.
Mr. Viner had produced from his stock a velvet covered board on which reposed several dozen gold pieces, each of them representing some badge of office, distinction or occasion, or obscure foreign coinage. Some were topped by multi-color ribbons. Over them bent Candy,
