HEARTS OF GOLD

4. MRS. UNDERWOOD'S CHARGE

83 MRS. UNDERWOOD’S CHARGE. Chapter IV. Regenia Underwood could scarcely remember when she did not live at the Elms. She was born in Canada. Around her life hung a mystery, as impenetrable as Egyptian darkness, to the curious, but perfectly clear to those who knew the history of Judge Underwood’s family. Mrs. Underwood had cared for Regenia from childhood. Little by little, as the child as able to understand it, Mrs. Underwood had related to Regenia the story of her birth. The good woman, wisely determined to circumvent future heart rendings, by leaving no sad revelations, certain to creep out when most to be regretted, to mar the life and hopes of the sweet girl that day by day more closely entwined around her heart. Some things concerning the child’s mother, discretion bade her withhold, but all that was necessary to acquaint Regenia with her lineage and race was duly disclosed. There was a note of sorrow discernible in Mrs. Underwood’s voice when speaking of Regenia. No one who saw the beautiful girl with Mrs. Underwood would have suspected that she was an Afro-American. Regenia knew it; but gave the fact no more thought than any other child does who is aware that it is of German, Irish or French descent. She never understood the soft, sad tone which Mrs. Underwood assumed, unintentionally , perhaps, when she spoke of Afro-Americans. If Regenia’s associates knew of the romance of her birth, they were too well bred to make the fact a cause for insult. She grew to womanhood feeling and acting not unlike the other children of her age, little dreaming of the sad awakening she was destined some day to experience. Regenia’s mother was Mrs. Underwood’s only child. Judge Underwood, a man of pronounced views on every subject, was an ardent disciple of Wendell Phillips. A lover of freedom, his home was the centre of the abolition 84 j. mchenry jones movement in his county. A man of wealth and influence, a hater of every form of oppression, the cause of the slave appealed with unusual force to his keen sense of justice. His house was a station of the underground railroad , a peculiar method of assisting runaway slaves to Canada, conducted for years by the most courageous and daring lovers of personal liberty that ever graced American soil. One dark, rainy night, a few years previous to the great political upheaval which swept away slavery and its attendant evils, a fugitive slave was spirited into Judge Underwood’s barn. The slave slept that night in a cave on the premises, the sleuth hounds of oppression being hard on his track. The judge was away on his circuit; but his wife, who, though born in the south, sympathized with her husband’s views of slavery, was severely taxed to invent some means of shielding the half-starved, hunted wretch, until opportunity occurred to forward him to Canada. The laws of the land made harboring fugitive slaves a crime that entailed upon those who disregarded them the most severe punishment. How to feed this poor slave, when every movement about the house was watched, became to Mrs. Underwood a question of grave concern. To go to the cave or to send anyone there would attract suspicion in that direction. All the next day, the poor fugitive, half wild from hunger and fear, awaited the coming of succor. Before the sun went down Mrs. Underwood had solved the vexatious problem. She made two long, wide bags, filled them with bread and meat, and pinning them securely to the dress of Ethel, her daughter, she bade her put on her apron and bonnet and drive home the cows. “When you approach the cave,” said Mrs. Underwood, “look carefully about you, and, if no one is near, go into the cave, unpin the bags and leave them for the poor man, who must be almost starved by this time.” Ethel was an intelligent child and quickly comprehended the nature of her mission. Fired with sympathy for the poor slave, she executed her mother’s wish in a remarkably short time. In this cave, Ethel first met Regenia ’s father. George Stewart, a mulatto, with a shock of black hair and dark brown, dreamy eyes, was still in his teens. The southern man-hunters were thrown off the scent and George remained at Judge Underwood’s as a servant. Ethel was always fond of the young man...