Page:The Conquest.djvu/132

 outside the chamber door. A smile wreathed the faces of all; there was no dinner; they were simply visiting near the table.

With children and grandchildren around him, the house at Mulberry Hill was always full. At Christmas or Thanksgiving, when Lucy came with her boys from Locust Grove, "Well, my children," father Clark would say, "if I thought we would live, mother and I, five years longer, I would build a new house."

But the day before Christmas, 1798, the silky white hair of Ann Rogers Clark was brushed back for the last time, in the home that her taste had beautified with the groves and flowers of Mulberry Hill.

More and more frequently the old cavalier retired to his rustic arbour in the garden.

"I must hunt up father, he will take cold," William would say; and there on a moonlight night, on his knees in prayer, the old man would be found, among the cedars and honeysuckles of Mulberry Hill.

"Why do you dislike old John Clark," some one asked of a neighbour when the venerable man lay on his death-bed.

"What? I dislike old John Clark? I revere and venerate him. His piety and virtues may have been a reproach, but I reverence and honour old John Clark."

By will the property was divided, and the home at Mulberry Hill went to William.

"In case Jonathan comes to Kentucky he may be willing to buy the place," said William. "If he does I shall take the cash to pay off these creditors of yours."

"Will you do that?" exclaimed George Rogers Clark gratefully. "I can make it good to you when these lands of mine come into value."

"Never mind that, brother, never mind that. The honour of the family demands it. And those poor Frenchmen are ruined."

"Indians are at the Falls!"

Startled, even now the citizens of Louisville were ready to fly out with shotguns in memory of old animosities.

Nothing chills the kindlier impulses like an Indian war.