The two brothers broke into laughter.  “I say, Fair!” cried the elder.  “Has Lewis Rand a cloven hoof?  I’ve scarcely seen him, you know, since I went to England!”

“He’s all cloven hoof, damn him!” the other answered cheerfully.  “Best ride on.  He’ll have been at the Court House this hour!”

Ludwell Cary glanced at his watch.  “Early or late, the result will be the same.  The county’s going for him twice over!”

“A damned tobacco-roller’s son!” growled the other.

The elder brother laughed. “‘A man’s a man for a’ that,’ Fair.  I dare say old Gideon rolled tobacco with all his might.  As for his son, his worst enemy—­and I don’t know that I am that—­couldn’t deny him courage and energy.”

“He’s a dangerous man—­”

“Most men are who have won by fighting.  But I don’t think he loves violence.  Well, well, I’m coming!  Good-bye, little one!”

Deb curtsied and Miranda bobbed, the gentlemen touched their hats, black Eli grinned, 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.”