ned, the horses began to canter, and, the leafy road bending
sharply, the party for the Court House passed suddenly from view as
though the earth had swallowed them up.

Miranda bent her eyes upon her mistress. "Hit's time you wuz in de
schoolroom. An' Lan' o' Goshen! Jes' look at yo' wet shoes! I reckon
Mammy Chloe gwine whup me!"

Deb considered her stockings and slippers. "There's no school to-day.
Mr. Drew's going to the Court House to vote. Uncle Edward says it is the
duty of every gentleman to vote against this damned upstart and the
Democrat-Republican party. The damned upstart's other name is Lewis
Rand. I'll ask Jacqueline to beg Mammy Chloe not to whip you. I like wet
feet."

The parlour at Fontenoy was large and high and cool, hung with green
paper, touched with the dull gold of old mirrors, of a carved console or
two, of oval frames enclosing dim portraits. Long windows opened to the
April breeze, and from above the high mantel a Churchill in lovelocks
and plumed hat looked down upon Jacqueline seated at her harp. She was
playing Water parted from the Sea, playing it dreamily, with an absent
mind. Deb, hearing the music from the hall, came and stood beside her
sister. They were orphans, dwelling with an uncle.

"Jacqueline," said the child, "do you believe in the Devil?"

Jacqueline played on, but turned a lovely face upon her sister. "I don't
know, honey," she said. "I suppose we must, but I had rather not."

"Uncle Edward doesn't. He says 'What the Devil!' but he doesn't believe
in the Devil. Then why do he and Uncle Dick call Mr. Lewis Rand the
Devil?"

Jacqueline's hands left the strings. "They neither say nor mean that,
Deb. Uncle Dick and Uncle Edward are Federalists. They do not like
Republicans, nor Mr. Jefferson, nor Mr. Jefferson's friends. Mr. Lewis
Rand is Mr. Jefferson's friend, and he is his party's candidate for the
General Assembly, and so they do not like him. But they do not call him
such names as that."

"Mr. Ludwell Cary doesn't like him either," said Deb. "Why, Jacqueline?"

"Mr. Ludwell Cary is his political opponent."

"And Mr. Fairfax Cary called him a damned tobacco-roller's son."

Jacqueline reddened. "Mr. Fairfax Cary might be thankful to have so
informed a mind and heart. It is well to blame a man for his birth!"

"Mr. Ludwell Cary said, 'A man's a man for a' that.' What does that
mean, Jacqueline?"

"It means," said Jacqueline, "that--that man stamps the guinea, bu