Produced by Polly Stratton







THE PRODIGAL JUDGE BY VAUGHAN KESTER


By Vaughan Kester




CHAPTER I. THE BOY AT THE BARONY


The Quintards had not prospered on the barren lands of the pine woods
whither they had emigrated to escape the malaria of the low coast, but
this no longer mattered, for the last of his name and race, old General
Quintard, was dead in the great house his father had built almost a
century before and the thin acres of the Barony, where he had made his
last stand against age and poverty, were to claim him, now that he had
given up the struggle in their midst. The two or three old slaves about
the place, stricken with a sense of the futility of the fight their
master had made, mourned for him and for themselves, but of his own
blood and class none was present.

Shy dwellers from the pine woods, lanky jeans-clad men and sunbonneted
women, who were gathering for the burial of the famous man of their
neighborhood, grouped themselves about the lawn which had long since
sunk to the uses of a pasture lot. Singly or by twos and threes they
stole up the steps and across the wide porch to the open door. On the
right of the long hall another door stood open, and who wished could
enter the drawing-room, with its splendid green and gold paper, and the
wonderful fireplace with the Dutch tiles that graphically depicted the
story of Jonah and the whale.

Here the general lay in state. The slaves had dressed their old master
in the uniform he had worn as a colonel of the continental line, but the
thin shoulders of the wasted figure no longer filled the buff and blue
coat. The high-bred face, once proud and masterful no doubt, as became
the face of a Quintard, spoke of more than age and poverty--it was
infinitely sorrowful. Yet there was something harsh and unforgiving
in the lines death had fixed there, which might have been taken as the
visible impress of that mystery, the bitterness of which had misshaped
the dead man's nature; but the resolute lips had closed for ever on
their secret, and the broken spirit had gone perhaps to learn how poor a
thing its pride had been.

Though he had lived continuously at the Barony for almost a quarter of a
century, there was none among his neighbors who could say he had looked
on that thin, aquiline face in all that time. Yet they had known much
of him, for the gossip of the slaves, who had been his only friends in
those years he had chosen to deny himself to other friends, had gone far
and wide over the county.

That notable man of business, Jonathan Crenshaw--and this superiority
was especially evident when the business chanced to be his own--was
closeted in the library with a stranger to whom rumor fixed the name of
Bladen, supposing him to be the legal representative of certain remote
connections of the old general's.

Crenshaw sat before the flat-topped mahogany desk in the center of the
room with several well-thumbed account-books open before him. Bladen, in
riding dress, stood by the window.

"I suppose you will buy in the property when it comes up for sale?" the
latter was saying.

Mr. Crenshaw had already made it plain that General Quintard's creditors
would have lean pickings at the Barony, intimating that he himself was
the chiefest of these and the one to suffer most grievously in pocket.
Further than this, Mr. Bladen saw that the old house was a ruin,
scarcely habitable, and that the thin acres, though they were many and
a royal grant, were of the slightest value. Crenshaw nodded his
acquiescence to the lawyer's conjecture touching the ultimate fate of
the Barony.

"I reckon, sir, I'll want to protect myself, but if there are any of
his own kin who have a fancy to the place I'll put no obstacle in their
way."

"Who are the other creditors?" asked Bladen.

"There ain't none, sir; they just got tired waiting on him, and when
they began to sue and get judgment the old general would send me word
to settle with them, and their claims passed into my hands. I was in too
deep to draw out. But for the last ten years his dealings were all with
me; I furnished the supplies for the place here. It didn't amount to
much, as there was only him and the darkies, and the account ran on from
year to year."

"He lived entirely alone, saw no one, I understand," said Bladen.

"Alone with his two or three old slaves--yes, sir. He wouldn't even see
me; Joe, his old nigger, would fetch orders for this or that. Once or
twice I rode out to see him, but I wa'n't even allowed inside that door;
the message I got was that he couldn't be disturbed, and the last time
I come he sent me word that if I annoyed him again he would be forced
to terminate our business relations. That was pretty strong talk, wa'n't
it, when you consider that I could have sold the roof from over his
head and the land from under his feet? Oh, well, I just put it down to
childishness." There was a brief pause, then Crenshaw spoke again.
"I reckon, sir, if you know anything about the old general's private
affairs you don't feel no call to speak on that point?" he observed,
and with evident regret. He had hoped that Bladen would clear up the
mystery, for certainly it must have been some sinister tragedy that had
cost the general his grip on life and for twenty years and more had made
of him a recluse, so that the faces of his friends had become as the
faces of strangers.

"My dear sir, I know nothing of General Quintard's private, history. I
am even unacquainted with my clients, who are distant cousins, but his
nearest kin--they live in South Carolina. I was merely instructed
to represent them in the event of his death and to look after their
interests."

"That's business," said Crenshaw, nodding.

"All I know is this: General Quintard was a conspicuous man in these
parts fifty years ago; that was before my time, Mr. Crenshaw, and I take
it, too, it was before yours; he married a Beaufort."

"So he did," said Crenshaw, "and there was one child, a daughter; she
married a South Carolinian by the name of Turberville. I remember that,
fo' they were married under the gallery in the hall. Great folks,
those Turbervilles, rolling rich. My father was manager then fo' the
general--that was nearly forty years ago. There was life here then, sir;
the place was alive with niggers and the house full of guests from one
month's end to another." He drummed on the desktop. "Who'd a thought it
wa'n't to last for ever!"

"And what became of the daughter who married Turberville?"

"Died years ago," said Crenshaw. "She was here the last time about
thirty years back. It wa'n't so easy to get about in those days, no
roads to speak of and no stages, and besides, the old general wa'n't
much here nohow; her going away had sort of broken up his home, I
reckon. Then the place stood empty fo' a few years, most of the slaves
were sold off, and the fields began to grow up. No one rightly knew, but
the general was supposed to be traveling up yonder in the No'th, sir.
As I say, things ran along this way quite a while, and then one morning
when I went to my store my clerk says, 'There's an old white-headed
nigger been waiting round here fo' a word with you, Mr. Crenshaw.' It
was Joe, the general's body servant, and when I'd shook hands with him I
said, 'When's the master expected back?' You see, I thought Joe had been
sent on ahead to open the house, but he says, 'General Quintard's at the
Barony now,' and then he says, 'The general's compliments, sir, and will
you see that this order is filled?' Well, Mr. Bladen, I and my father
had factored the Barony fo' fifteen years and upward, but that was the
first time the supplies fo' the general's table had ever been toted here
in a meal sack!

"I rode out that very afternoon, but Joe, who was one of your mannerly
niggers, met me at the door and says, 'Mr. Crenshaw, the general
appreciates this courtesy, but regrets that he is unable to see you,
sir.' After that it wa'n't long in getting about that the general was a
changed man. Other folks came here to welcome him back and he refused to
see them, but the reason of it we never learned. Joe, who probably knew,
was one of your close niggers; there was, no getting anything out of
him; you could talk with that darky by the hour, sir, and he left you
feeling emptier than if he'd kept his mouth shut."

They were interrupted by a knock at the door.

"Come in," said Crenshaw, a trifle impatiently, and in response to his
bidding the door opened and a small boy entered the room dragging after
him a long rifle. Suddenly overcome by a speechless shyness, he paused
on the threshold to stare with round, wondering eyes at the two men.
"Well, sonny, what do you want?" asked Mr. Crenshaw indulgently.

The boy opened his mouth, but his courage failed him, and with his
courage went the words he would have spoken.

"Who is this?" asked Bladen.

"I'll tell, you presently," said Crenshaw. "Come, speak up, sonny, what
do you want?"

"Please, sir, I want this here old spo'tin' rifle," said: the child.
"Please, sir, I want to keep it," he added.

"Well, you run along on out of here with your old spo'tin' rifle!" said
Crenshaw good-naturedly.

"Please, sir, am I to keep it?"

"Yes, I reckon you may keep it--least I've no objection." Crenshaw
glanced at Bladen.

"Oh, by all means," said the latter. Spasms of delight shook the small
figure, and with a murmur that was meant for thanks he backed from the
room, closing the door. Bladen glanced inquiringly at Crenshaw.

"You want to know about him, sir? Well, that's Hannibal Wayne Hazard."

"Hannibal Wayne Hazard?" repeated Bladen.

"Yes, sir; the general was the authority on that point, but who Hannibal
Wayne Hazard is and how he happens to be at the Barony is another
mystery--just wait a minute, sir--" and quitting his chair Mr.
Crenshaw hurried from the room to return almost immediately with a tall
countryman. "Mr. Bladen, this is Bob Yancy. Bob, the gentleman, wants to
hear about the woman and the child; that's your story."

"Howdy, sir," said Mr. Yancy. He appeared to meditate on the mental
effort that was required of him, then he took a long breath. "It was
this a-ways--" he began with a soft drawl, and then paused. "You give me
the dates, Mr. John, fo' I disremember."

"It was four year ago come next Christmas," said Crenshaw.

"Old Christmas," corrected Mr. Yancy. "Our folks always kept the old
Christmas like it was befo' they done mussed up the calendar. I'm agin
all changes," added Mr. Yancy.

"He means the fo'teenth of December," explained Mr. Crenshaw.

"Not wishin' to dispute your word, Mr. John, I mean Christmas," objected
Yancy.

"Oh, very well, he means Christmas then!" said Crenshaw.

"The evening befo', it was, and I'd gone to Fayetteville to get my
Christmas fixin's; there was right much rain and some snow falling." Mr.
Yancy's guiding light was clearly accuracy. "Just at sundown I hooked up
that blind mule of mine to the cart and started fo' home. As I got shut
of the town the stage come in and I seen one passenger, a woman. Now
that mule is slow, Mr. John; I'm free to say there are faster mules,
but a set of harness never went acrost the back of a slower critter
than that one of mine." Yancy, who thus far had addressed himself to
Mr. Crenshaw, now turned to Bladen. "That mule, sir, sees good with his
right eye, but it's got a gait like it was looking fo' the left-hand
side of the road and wondering what in thunderation had got into it
that it was acrost the way; mules are gifted with some sense, but mighty
little judgment."

"Never mind the mule, Bob," said Crenshaw.

"If I can't make the gentleman believe in the everlasting slowness of
that mule of mine, my story ain't worth a hill of beans," said Yancy.

"The extraordinary slowness of the mule is accepted without question,
Mr. Yancy," said Bladen.

"I'm obliged to you," rejoined Yancy, and for a brief moment he appeared
to commune with himself, then he continued. "A mile out of town I heard
some one sloshing through the rain after me; it was dark by that time
and I couldn't see who it was, so I pulled up and waited, and then I
made out it was a woman. She spoke when she was alongside the cart and
says, 'Can you drive me on to the Barony?' and it came to me it was the
same woman I'd seen leave the stage. When I got down to help her into
the cart I saw she was toting a child in her arms."

"What did the woman look like, Bob?" said Crenshaw.

"She wa'n't exactly old and she wa'n't young by no manner of means;
I remember saying to myself, that child ain't yo's, whose ever it is.
Well, sir, I was willing enough to talk, but she wa'n't, she hardly
spoke until we came to the red gate, when she says, 'Stop, if you
please, I'll walk the rest of the way.' Mind you, she'd known without a
word from me we were at the Barony. She give me a dollar, and the last
I seen of her she was hurrying through the rain toting the child in her
arms."

Mr. Crenshaw took up the narrative.

"The niggers say the old general almost had a fit when he saw her.
Aunt Alsidia let her into the house; I reckon if Joe had been alive she
wouldn't have got inside that door, spite of the night!"

"Well?" said Bladen.

"When morning come she was gone, but the child done stayed behind; we
always reckoned the lady walked back to Fayetteville sometime befo' day
and took the stage. I've heard Aunt Alsidia tell as how the old general
said that morning, pale and shaking like, 'You'll find a boy asleep
in the red room; he's to be fed and cared fo', but keep him out of my
sight. His name is Hannibal Wayne Hazard.' That is all the general ever
said on the matter. He never would see the boy, never asked after him
even, and the boy lived in the back of the house, with the niggers to
look after him. Now, sir, you know as much as we know, which is just
next door to nothing."

The old general was borne across what had once been the west lawn to his
resting-place in the neglected acre where the dead and gone of his race
lay, and the record of the family was complete, as far as any man knew.
Crenshaw watched the grave take shape with a melancholy for which he
found no words, yet if words could have come from the mist of ideas in
which his mind groped vaguely he would have said that for themselves the
deeds of the Quintards had been given the touch of finality, and that
whether for good or for evil, the consequences, like the ripple which
rises from the surface of placid waters when a stone is dropped, still
survived somewhere in the world.

The curious and the idle drifted back to the great house; then the
memory of their own affairs, not urgent, generally speaking, but still
of some casual interest, took them down the disused carriage-way to the
red gate and so off into the heat of the summer day. Crenshaw's wagon,
driven by Crenshaw's man, vanished in a cloud of gray dust with the
two old slaves, Aunt Alsidia and Uncle Ben, who were being taken to the
Crenshaw place to be cared for pending the settlement of the Quintard
estate. Bladen parted from Crenshaw with expressions of pleasure at
having had the opportunity of making his acquaintance, and further
delivered himself of the civil wish that they might soon meet again.
Then Crenshaw, assisted by Bob Yancy, proceeded to secure the great
house against intrusion.

"I make it a p'int to always stay and see the plumb finish of a thing,"
explained Yancy. "Otherwise you're frequently put out by hearing of what
happened after you left; I can stand anything but disapp'intment of that
kind."

They passed from room to room securing doors and windows, and at last
stepped out upon the back porch.

"Hullo!" said Yancy, pointing.

There on a bench by the kitchen door was a small figure. It was Hannibal
Wayne Hazard asleep, with his old spo'tin' rifle across his knees. His
very existence had been forgotten.

"Well, I declare to goodness!" said Crenshaw.

"What are you going to do with him, Mr. John?"

This question nettled Crenshaw.

"I don't know as that is any particular affair of mine," he said. Now,
Mr. Crenshaw, though an excellent man of business, with an unblinking
eye on number one, was kindly, on the whole, but there was a Mrs.
Crenshaw, to whom he rendered a strict account of all his deeds, and
that sacred institution, the home, was only a tolerable haven when
these deeds were nicely calculated to fit with the lady's exactions.
Especially was he aware that Mrs. Crenshaw was averse to children as
being inimical to cleanliness and order, oppressive virtues that drove
Crenshaw himself in his hours of leisure to the woodshed, where he might
spit freely.

"I reckon you'd rather drop a word with yo' missus before you toted him
home?" suggested Yancy, who knew something of the nature of his friend's
domestic thraldom.

"A woman ought to be boss in her own house," said Crenshaw.

"Feelin' the truth of that, I've never married, Mr. John; I do as I
please and don't have to listen to a passel of opinion. But I was going
to say, what's to hinder me from toting that boy to my home? There are
no calico petticoats hanging up in my closets."

"And no closets to hang 'em in, I'll be bound!" rejoined Crenshaw. "But
if you'll take the boy, Bob, you shan't lose by it."

Yancy rested a big knotted hand on the boy's shoulder.

"Come, wake up, sonny! Yo' Uncle Bob is ready fo' to strike out home,"
he said. The child roused with a start and stared into the strange
bearded face that was bent toward him. "It's yo' Uncle Bob," continued
Yancy in a wheedling tone. "Are you the little nevvy what will help him
to hook up that old blind mule of hisn? Here, give us the spo'tin' rifle
to tote!"

"Please, sir, where is Aunt Alsidia?" asked the child.

Yancy balanced the rifle on his great palm and his eyes assumed a
speculative cast.

"I wonder what's to hinder us from loading this old gun, and firing this
old gun, and hearing this old gun go-bang! Eh?"

The child's blue eyes grew wide.

"Like the guns off in the woods?" he asked, in a breathless whisper.

"Like the guns a body hears off in the woods, only louder--heaps
louder," said Yancy. "You fetch out his plunder, Mr. John," he added in
a lower tone.

"Do it now, please," the child cried, slipping off the bench.

"I was expectin' fo' to hear you name me Uncle Bob, sonny; my little
nevvies get almost anything they want out of me when they call me
that-a-ways."

"Please, Uncle Bob, make it go bang!"

"You come along, then," and Mr. Yancy moved off in the direction of his
mule, the child following. "Powder's what we want fo' to make this old
spo'tin' rifle talk up, and I reckon we'll find some in a horn flask
in the bottom of my cart." His expectations in this particular were
realized, and he loaded the rifle with a small blank charge. "Now," he
said, shaking the powder into the pan by a succession of smart taps on
the breech, "sometimes these old pieces go off and sometimes they don't;
it depends on the flint, but you stand back of your Uncle Bob, sonny,
and keep yo' fingers out of yo' ears, and when you say--bang!--off she
goes."

There was a moment of delightful expectancy, and then--

"Bang!" cried the child, and on the instant the rifle cracked. "Do it
again! Please, Uncle Bob!" he cried, wild with delight.

"Now if you was to help yo' Uncle Bob hook up that old mule of hisn and
ride home with him, fo' he's going pretty shortly, you and Uncle Bob
could do right much shootin' with this old rifle." Mr. Crenshaw had
appeared with a bundle, which he tossed into the cart. Yancy turned to
him. "If you meet any inquiring friends, Mr. John, I reckon you may say
that my nevvy's gone fo' to pay me a visit. Most of his time will be
agreeably spent shootin' with this rifle at a mark, and me holdin' him
so he won't get kicked clean off his feet."

Thereafter beguiling speech flowed steadily from Mr. Yancy's bearded
lips, in the midst of which relations were established between the mule
and cart, and the boy quitted the Barony for a new world.

"Do you reckon if Uncle Bob was to let you, you could drive, sonny?"

"Can she gallop?" asked the boy.

Mr. Yancy gave him a hurt glance.

"She's too much of a lady to do that," he said. "No, I 'low this ain't
'so fast as running or walking, but it's a heap quicker than standing
stock-still." The afternoon sun waned as they went deeper and deeper
into the pine woods, but at last they came to their journey's end, a
widely scattered settlement on a hill above a branch.

"This," said Mr. Yancy, "are Scratch Hill, sonny. Why Scratch Hill? Some
say it's the fleas; others agin hold it's the eternal bother of making a
living here, but whether fleas or living you scratch fo' both."




CHAPTER II. YANCY TELLS A MORAL TALE


In the deep peace that rested like a benediction on the pine-clad slopes
of Scratch Hill the boy Hannibal followed at Yancy's heels as that
gentleman pursued the not arduous rounds of temperate industry which
made up his daily life, for if Yancy were not completely idle he was
responsible for a counterfeit presentment of idleness having most of the
merits of the real article. He toiled casually in a small cornfield and
a yet smaller truck patch, but his work always began late, when it began
at all, and he was easily dissuaded from continuing it; indeed, his
attitude toward it seemed to challenge interference.

In the winter, when the weather conditions were perfectly adjusted to
meet certain occult exactions he had come to require, Yancy could be
induced to go into the woods and there labor with his ax. But as he
pointed out to Hannibal, a poor man's capital was his health, and he
being a poor man it behooved him to have a jealous care of himself. He
made use of the dull days of mingled mist and drizzle for hunting, work
being clearly out of the question; one could get about over the brown
floor of the forest in silence then, and there was no sun to glint the
brass mountings of his rifle. The fine days he professed to regard with
keen suspicion as weather breeders, when it was imprudent to go far from
home, especially in the direction of the Crenshaw timber lands, which
for years had been the scene of all his gainful industry, and where he
seemed to think nature ready to assume her most sinister aspect.
Again in the early spring, when the young oak leaves were the size of
squirrel's ears and the whippoorwills began calling as the long shadows
struck through the pine woods, the needs of his corn ground battled with
his desire to fish. In all such crises of the soul Mr. Yancy was fairly
vanquished before the struggle began; but to the boy his activities were
perfectly ordered to yield the largest return in contentment.

The Barony had been offered for sale and bought in by Crenshaw for
eleven thousand dollars, this being the amount of his claim. Some six
months later he sold the plantation for fifteen thousand dollars to
Nathaniel Ferris, of Currituck County.

"There's money in the old place, Bob, at that figure," Crenshaw told
Yancy.

"There are so," agreed Yancy, who was thinking Crenshaw had lost no time
in getting it out.

They were seated on the counter in Crenshaw's store at Balaam's Cross
Roads, where the heavy odor of black molasses battled with the sprightly
smell of salt fish. The merchant held the Scratch Hiller in no small
esteem. Their intimacy was of long standing, for the Yancys going down
and the Crenshaws coming up had for a brief space flourished on the
same social level. Mr. Crenshaw's rise in life, however, had been
uninterrupted, while Mr. Yancy, wrapped in a philosophic calm and deeply
averse to industry, had permitted the momentum imparted by a remote
ancestor to carry him where it would, which was steadily away from
that tempered prosperity his family had once boasted as members of the
land-owning and slaveholding class.

"I mean there's money in the place fo' Ferris," Crenshaw explained.

"I reckon yo're right, Mr. John; the old general used to spend a heap
on the Barony and we all know he never got a cent back, so I reckon the
money's there yet.

"Bladen's got an answer from them South Carolina Quintards, and they
don't know nothing about the boy," said Crenshaw, changing the subject.
"So you can rest easy, Bob; they ain't going to want him."

"Well, sir, that surely is a passel of comfort to me. I find I got all
the instincts of a father without having had none of the instincts of a
husband."

A richer, deeper realization of his joy came to Yancy when he had
turned his back on Balaam's Cross Roads and set out for home through the
fragrant silence of the pine woods. His probable part in the young life
chance had placed in his keeping was a glorious thing to the man. He had
not cared to speculate on the future; he had believed that friends or
kindred must sooner or later claim Hannibal, but now he felt wonderfully
secure in Crenshaw's opinion that this was not to be.

Just beyond the Barony, which was midway between Balaam's and the Hill,
down the long stretch of sandy road he saw two mounted figures, then as
they drew nearer he caught the flutter of skirts and recognized one of
the horsewomen. It was Mrs. Ferris, wife of the Barony's new owner. She
reined in her horse abreast of his cart.

"Aren't you Mr. Yancy?" she asked.

"Yes, ma'am, that's me--Bob Yancy." He regarded her with large gray eyes
that were frankly approving in their expression, for she was more than
commonly agreeable to look upon.

"I am Mrs. Ferris, and I am very pleased to make your acquaintance."

"The same here," murmured Yancy with winning civility.

Mrs. Ferris' companion leaned forward, her face averted, and stroked her
horse's neck with gloved hand.

"This is my friend, Miss Betty Malroy."

"Glad to know you, ma'am," said Yancy.

Miss Malroy faced him, smiling. She, too, was very good to look upon,
indeed she was quite radiant with youth and beauty.

"We are just returning from Scratch Hill--I think that is what you call
it?" said Mrs. Ferris.

"So we do," agreed Yancy.

"And the dear little boy we met is your nephew, is he not, Mr. Yancy?"
It was Betty Malroy who spoke.

"In a manner he is and in a manner he ain't," explained Yancy, somewhat
enigmatically.

"There are quite a number of children at Scratch Hill?" suggested Mrs.
Ferris.

"Yes, ma'am, so there are; a body would naturally notice that."

"And no school--not a church even!" continued Mrs. Ferris in a grieved
tone.

"Never has been," rejoined Yancy cheerfully. He seemed to champion the
absence of churches and schools on the score of long usage.

"But what do the people do when they want to go to church?" questioned
Mrs. Ferris.

"Never having heard that any of 'em wanted to go I can't say just
offhand, but don't you fret none about that, ma'am; there are churches;
one's up at the Forks, and there's another at Balaam's Cross Roads."

"But that's ten miles from Scratch Hill, isn't it?"

"It's all of that," said Yancy. He sensed it that the lady before
him, was a person of much force and energy, capable even of reckless
innovation. Mr. Yancy himself was innately conservative; his religious
inspiration had been drawn from the Forks and Balaam's Cross Roads. It
had seemed to answer very well. Mrs. Ferris fixed his wavering glance.

"Don't you think it is too bad, Mr. Yancy, the way those children have
been neglected? There is nothing for them but to run wild."

"Well, I seen some right good children fetched up that-a-ways--smart,
too. You see, ma'am, there's a heap a child can just naturally pick up
of himself."

"Oh!" and the monosyllable was uttered rather weakly. Mr. Yancy's name
had been given her as that of a resident of weight and influence in the
classic region of Scratch Hill. Miss Malroy came to her friend's rescue.

"Mrs. Ferris thinks the children should have a chance to learn at
home. Poor little tots!--they can't walk ten or fifteen miles to
Sunday-school, now can they, Mr. Yancy?"

"Bless yo' heart, they won't try to!" said Yancy reassuringly. "Sunday's
a day of rest at Scratch Hill. So are most of the other days of the
week, but we all aspire to take just a little mo' rest on Sunday than
any other day. Sometimes we ain't able to, but that's our aim."

"Do you know the old deserted cabin by the big pine?--the Blount place?"
asked Mrs. Ferris.

"Yes, ma'am, I know it."

"I am going to have Sunday-school there for those children; they shan't
be neglected any longer if I can help it--I should feel guilty, quite
guilty! Now won't you let your little nephew come? Perhaps they'll not
find it so very terrible, after all." From which Mr. Yancy concluded
that when she invaded it, skepticism had rested as a mantle on Scratch
Hill.

"Every one said we would better talk with you, Mr. Yancy, and we were
hoping to meet you as we came along," supplemented Miss Malroy, and her
words of flattery were wafted to him with so sweet a smile that Yancy
instantly capitulated.

"I reckon you-all can count on my nevvy," he said.

When he reached Scratch Hill, in the waning light of day, Hannibal, in
a state of high excitement, met him at the log shed, which served as a
barn.

"I hear you-all have been entertaining visitors while Uncle Bob was
away," observed Yancy, and remembering what Crenshaw had told him, he
rested his big hand on the boy's head with a special tenderness.

"There's going to be a school in the cabin in the old field!" said the
boy. "May I go?--Oh, Uncle Bob, will you please take me?"

"When's this here school going to begin, anyhow?"

"To-morrow at four o'clock, she said, Uncle Bob."

"She's a quick lady, ain't she? Well, I expected you'd be hopping around
on one leg when you named it to me. You wait until Sunday and see what I
do fo' my nevvy," said Yancy.

He was as good as his implied promise, but the day began discouragingly
with an extra and, as it seemed to Hannibal, an unnecessary amount of
soap and water.

"You owe it to yo'self to show a clean skin in the house of worship.
Just suppose one of them nice ladies was to cast her eye back of yo'
ears! She'd surely be put out to name it offhand whether you was black
or white. I reckon I'll have to barber you some, too, with the shears."

"What's school like, Uncle Bob?" asked Hannibal, twisting and squirming
under the big resolute hands of the man.

"I can't just say what it's like."

"Why, didn't you ever go to school, Uncle Bob?"

"Didn't I ever go to school! Where do you reckon I got my education,
anyhow? I went to school several times in my young days."

"On a Sunday, like this?"

"No, the school I tackled was on a week-day."

"Was it hard?" asked Hannibal, who was beginning to cherish secret
misgivings; for surely all this soap and water must have some sinister
portent.

"Well, some learn easier than others. I learned middling easy--it didn't
take me long--and when I felt I knowed enough I just naturally quit and
went on about my business."

"But what did you learn?" insisted the boy.

"You-all wouldn't know if I told you, because you-all ain't ever been
to school yo'self. When you've had yo' education we'll talk over what I
learned--it mostly come out of a book." He hoped his general statement
would satisfy Hannibal, but it failed to do so.

"What's a book. Uncle Bob?" he demanded.

"Well, whatever a body don't know naturally he gets out of a book. I
reckon the way you twist, Nevvy, mebby you'd admire fo' to lose an ear!"
and Mr. Yancy refused further to discuss the knowledge he had garnered
in his youth.

Hannibal and Yancy were the first to arrive at the deserted cabin in the
old field that afternoon. They found the place had been recently cleaned
and swept, while about the wall was ranged a row of benches; there was
also a table and two chairs. Yancy inspected the premises with the eye
of mature experience.

"Yes, it surely is a school; any one with an education would know that.
Just look!--ain't you glad yo' Uncle Bob slicked you up some, now you
see what them ladies has done fo' to make this place tidy?"

Shy children from the pine woods, big brothers with little sisters and
big sisters with little brothers, drifted out of the encircling forest.
Coincident with the arrival of the last of these stragglers Mrs. Ferris
and Miss Malroy appeared, attended by a colored groom.

"It was so good of you to come, Mr. Yancy! The children won't feel so
shy with you here," said Mrs. Ferris warmly, as Yancy assisted her to
dismount, an act of courtesy that called for his finest courage.

Mrs. Ferris' missionary spirit manifested itself agreeably enough on
the whole. When she had ranged her flock in a solemn-faced row on the
benches, she began by explaining why Sunday was set apart for a day
of rest, touching but lightly on its deeper significance as a day
of worship as well; then she read certain chapters from the Bible,
finishing with the story of David, a narrative that made a deep
impression upon Yancy, comfortably seated in the doorway.

"Can't you tell the children a story, Mr. Yancy? Something about their
own neighborhood I think would be nice, something with a moral," the
pleasant earnest voice f Mrs. Ferris roused the Scratch Hiller from his
meditations.

"Yes, ma'am, I reckon I can tell 'em a story." He stood up, filling
the doorway with his bulk. "I can tell you-all a story about this here
house," he said, addressing himself to the children. He smiled happily.
"You-all don't need to look so solemn, a body ain't going to snap at
you! This house are the old Blount cabin, but the Blounts done moved
away from it years and years ago. They're down Fayetteville way now.
There was a passel of 'em and they was about as common a lot of white
folks as you'd find anywhere; I know, because I come to a dance here
once and Dave Blount called me a liar right in this very room." He
paused, that this impressive fact might disseminate itself. Hannibal
slid forward in his seat, his earnest little face bent on Yancy.

"Why did he call you a liar, Uncle Bob?" he demanded.

"Well, I scarcely know, Nevvy, but that's what he done, and he stuck
some words in front of it that ain't fitten I should repeat."

Miss Malroy's cheeks had become very red, and Mrs. Ferris refused
to meet her eye, while the children were in a flutter of pleased
expectancy. They felt the wholly contemporary interest of Yancy's story;
he was dealing with forms of speech which prevailed and were usually
provocative of consequences more or less serious. He gave them a wide,
sunny smile.

"When Dave Blount called me that, I struck out fo' home." At this
surprising turn in the narrative the children looked their disgust, and
Mrs. Ferris shot Betty a triumphant glance. "Yes, ma'am, I struck out
across the fields fo' home, I didn't wish to hear no mo' of that loose
kind of talk. When I got home I found my old daddy setting up afo' the
fire, and he says, 'You come away early, son.' I told him what Dave
Blount had called me and he says, 'You acted like a gentleman, Bob, with
all them womenfolks about."'

"You had a very good and sensible father, Mr. Yancy. How much better
than if--" began Mrs. Ferris, who feared that the moral might elude him.

"Yes, ma'am, but along about day he come into the loft where I was
sleeping and says to me, 'Sun-up, Bob--time fo' you to haul on yo' pants
and go back yonder and fetch that Dave Blount a smack in the jaw.'" Mrs.
Ferris moved uneasily in her chair: "I dressed and come here, but when
I asked fo' Dave he wouldn't step outside, so I just lost patience with
his foolishness and took a crack at him standing where I'm standing now,
but he ducked and you can still see, ma'am"--turning to the embarrassed
Mrs. Ferris--"where my knuckles made a dint in the door-jamb. I got him
the next lick, though!"

Mr. Yancy's moral tale had reached its conclusion; it was not for him to
boast unduly of his prowess.

"Uncle Bob, you lift me up and show me them dints!" and Hannibal slipped
from his seat.

"Oh, no!" said Betty Malroy laughing. She captured the boy and drew him
down beside her on a corner of her chair. "I am sure you don't want to
see the dents--Mr. Yancy's story, children, is to teach us how important
it is to guard our words--and not give way to hasty speech--"

"Betty!" cried Mrs. Ferris indignantly.

"Judith, the moral is as obvious as it is necessary."

Mrs. Ferris gave her a reproachful look and turned to the children.

"You will all be here next Sunday, won't you?--and at the same hour?"
she said, rising.

There was a sudden clatter of hoofs beyond the door. A man, well dressed
and well mounted had ridden into the yard. As Mrs. Ferris came from the
cabin he flung himself out of the saddle and, hat in hand, approached
her.

"I am hunting a place called the Barony; can you tell me if I am on the
right road?" he asked. He was a man in the early thirties, graceful and
powerful of build, with a handsome face.

"It is my husband you wish to see? I am Mrs. Ferris."

"Then General Quintard is dead?" His tone was one of surprise.

"His death occurred over a year ago, and my husband now owns the Barony;
were you a friend of the general's?"

"No, Madam; he was my father's friend, but I had hoped to meet him." His
manner was adroit and plausible.

Mrs. Ferris hesitated. The stranger's dress and bearing was that of a
gentleman, and he could boast of his father's friendship with General
Quintard. Any doubts she may have had she put aside.

"Will you ride on with us to the Barony and meet my husband, Mr.--?" she
paused.

"Murrell--Captain Murrell. Thank you; I should like to see the old
place. I should highly value the privilege," then his eyes rested on
Miss Malroy.

"Betty, let me present Captain Murrell."

The captain bowed, giving her a glance of bold admiration.

By this time the children had straggled off into the pine woods as
silently as they had assembled; only Yancy and Hannibal remained. Mrs.
Ferris turned to the former.

"If you will close the cabin door, Mr. Yancy, everything will be ready
for next Sunday," she said, and moved toward the horses, followed by
Murrell. Betty Malroy lingered for a moment at Hannibal's side.

"Good-by, little boy; you must ask your Uncle Bob to bring you up to the
big house to see me," and stooping she kissed him. "Good-by, Mr. Yancy,
I liked your story."

Hannibal and Yancy watched them mount and ride away, then the boy said:

"Uncle Bob, now them ladies have gone, won't you please show me them
dints you made in the doorjamb?"




CHAPTER III. TROUBLE AT SCRATCH HILL


Captain Murrell had established himself at Balaam's Cross Roads. He
was supposed to be interested in the purchase of a plantation, and in
company with Crenshaw visited the numerous tracts of land which the
merchant owned; but though he professed delight with the country, he
was plainly in no haste to become committed to any one of the several
propositions Crenshaw was eager to submit. Later, and still in the guise
of a prospective purchaser, he met Bladen, who also dealt extensively
in land, and apparently if anything could have pleased him more than
the region about the Cross Roads it was the country adjacent to
Fayetteville.

From the first he had assiduously cultivated his acquaintance with
the new owners of the Barony. He was now on the best of terms with Nat
Ferris, and it was at the Barony that he lounged away his evenings,
gossiping and smoking with the planter on the wide veranda.

"The Barony would have suited me," he told Bladen one day. They had
just returned from an excursion into the country and were seated in the
lawyer's office.

"You say your father was a friend of the old general's?" said Bladen.

"Years ago, in the north--yes," answered Murrell.

"Odd, isn't it, the way he chose to spend the last years of his life,
shut off like that and seeing no one?"

Murrell regarded the lawyer in silence for a moment out of his deeply
sunk eyes.

"Too bad about the boy," he said at length slowly.

"How do you mean, Captain?" asked Bladen.

"I mean it's a pity he has no one except Yancy to look after him," said
Murrell, but Bladen showed no interest and Murrell went on. "Don't you
reckon he must have touched General Quintard's life mighty close at some
point?"

"Well, if so, it eluded me," said Bladen. "I went through General
Quintard's papers and they contained no clue to the boy's identity that
I could discover. Fact is, the general didn't leave much beyond an old
account-book or two; I imagine that before his death he destroyed the
bulk of his private papers; it looked as if he'd wished to break with
the past. His mind must have been affected."

"Has Yancy any legal claim on the boy?" inquired Murrell.

"No, certainly not; the boy was merely left with Yancy because Crenshaw
didn't know what else to do with him."

"Get possession of him, and if I don't buy land here I'll take him West
with me," said Murrell quietly. Bladen gave him a swift, shrewd glance,
but Murrell, smiling and easy, met it frankly. "Come," he said, "it's
a pity he should grow up wild in the pine woods--get him away
from Yancy--I am' willing to spend five hundred dollars on this if
necessary."

"As a matter of sentiment?"

"As a matter of sentiment."

Bladen considered. He was not averse to making five hundred dollars, but
he was decidedly averse to letting slip any chance to secure a larger
sum. It flashed in upon him that Murrell had uncovered the real purpose
of his visit to North Carolina; his interest in land had been merely a
subterfuge.

"Well?" said Murrell.

"I'll have to think your proposition over," said Bladen.

The immediate result of this conversation was that within twenty-four
hours a man driving two horses hitched to a light buggy arrived at
Scratch Hill in quest of Bob Yancy, whom he found at dinner and to
whom he delivered a letter. Mr. Yancy was profoundly impressed by the
attention, for holding the letter at arm's length, he said,

"Well, sir, I've lived nigh on to forty years, but I never got a piece
of writing befo'--never, sir. People, if they was close by, spoke to
me, if at a distance they hollered, but none of 'em ever wrote." After
gazing at the written characters with satisfaction Mr. Yancy made a
taper of the letter and lit his pipe, which he puffed meditatively.
"Sonny, when you grow up you must learn so you can send writings to yo'
Uncle Bob fo' him to light his pipe with."

"What was in the paper, Uncle Bob?" asked Hannibal.

"Writin'," said Mr. Yancy, and smoked.

"What did the writin' say, Uncle Bob?" insisted the boy.

"It was private," said Mr. Yancy, "very private."

"What's your answer?" demanded the stranger.

"That's private, too," said Mr. Yancy. "You tell him I'll be monstrous
glad to talk it over with him any time he fancies to come out here."

"He said something about some one I was to carry back with me," objected
the man.

"Who said that?" asked Mr. Yancy.

"Bladen did."

"How's a body to know who yore talking about unless you name him?" said
Yancy severely.

"Well, what am I to tell him?"

"It's a free country and I got no call to dictate. You-all can tell
him whatever you like." Further than this Mr. Yancy would not commit
himself, and the man went as he came.

The next day Yancy had occasion to visit Balaam's Cross Roads.
Ordinarily Hannibal would have gone with him, but he was engaged in
digging out a groundhog's hole with Oglethorpe Bellamy, grandson of
Uncle Sammy Bellamy, the patriarch of Scratch Hill. Mr. Yancy forbore to
interrupt this enterprise which he considered of some educational value,
since the ground-hog's hole was an old one and he was reasonably certain
that a family of skunks had taken possession of it. When Yancy reached
the Cross Roads, Crenshaw gave him a disquieting opinion as to the
probable contents of his letter, for he himself had heard from Bladen
that he had decided to assume the care of the boy.

"So you reckon it was that--" said Yancy, with a deep breath.

"It's a blame outrage, Bob, fo' him to act like this!" said the merchant
with heat.

"When do you reckon he's going to send fo' him?" asked Yancy.

"Whenever the notion strikes him."

"What about my having notions too?" inquired Yancy, flecked into
passion, and bringing his fist down on the counter with a crash.

"You surely ain't going to oppose him, Bob?"

"Does he say when he's going to send fo' my nevvy?"

"He says it will be soon."

"You take care of my mule, Mr. John," said Yancy, and turned his back on
his friend.

"I reckon Bladen will have the law on his side, Bob!"

"The law be damned--I got what's fair on mine, I don't wish fo' better
than that," exclaimed Yancy, over his shoulder. He strode from the store
and started down the sandy road at a brisk run. Miserable forebodings of
an impending tragedy leaped up within him, and the miles were many that
lay between him and the Hill.

"He'll just naturally bust the face off the fellow Bladen sends!"
thought Crenshaw, staring after his friend.

That run of Bob Yancy's was destined to become a classic in the annals
of the neighborhood. Ordinarily a man walking briskly might cover
the distance between the Cross Roads and the Hill in two hours. He
accomplished it in less than an hour, and before he reached the branch
that flowed a full quarter of a mile from his cabin he was shouting
Hannibal's name as he ran. Then as he breasted the slope he came within
sight of a little group in his own dooryard. Saving only Uncle Sammy
Bellamy, the group resolved itself into the women and children of the
Hill, but there was one small figure he missed, and the color faded from
his cheeks while his heart stood still. The patriarch hurried toward
him, leaning on his cane, while his grandson clung to the skirts of his
coat, weeping bitterly.

"They've took your nevvy, Bob!" he cried, in a high, thin voice.

"Who's took him?" asked Yancy hoarsely. He paused and glanced from one
to another of the little group.

"Hit were Dave Blount. Get your gun, Bob, and go after him--kill the
miserable sneaking cuss!" cried Uncle Sammy, who believed in settling
all difficulties by bloodshed as befitted a veteran of the first war
with England, he having risen to the respectable rank of sergeant in a
company of Morgan's riflemen; while at sixty-odd in '12, when there was
recruiting at the Cross Roads, his son had only been able to prevent his
tendering his services to his country by hiding his trousers. "Fetch his
rifle, some of you fool women!" cried Uncle Sammy. "By the Fayetteville
Road, Bob, not ten minutes ago--you can cut him off at Ox Road forks!"

Yancy breathed a sigh of relief. The situation was not entirely
desperate, for, as Uncle Sammy said, he could reach the Ox Road forks
before Blount possibly could, by going as the crow flies through the
pine woods.

"Hit wouldn't have happened if there'd been a man on the Hill, but there
was nothing but a passel of women about the place. I heard the boys
crying when Dave Blount lifted your nevvy into the buggy," said Uncle
Sammy; "all I could do was to cuss him across two fields. I hope you
blow his hide full of holes!" for a rifle had been placed in Yancy's
hands.

"Thank you-all kindly," said Yancy, and turning away he struck off
through the pine woods. A brisk walk of twenty minutes brought him to
the Ox Road forks, as it was called, where he could plainly distinguish
the wheel and hoof marks left by the buggy and team as it went to
Scratch Hill, but there was only the single track.

This important point being settled, sense of sweet peace stole in upon
Yancy's spirit. He stood his rifle against a tree, lit his pipe with
flint and steel, and rested comfortably by the wayside. He had not long
to wait, for presently the buggy hove in sight; whereupon he coolly
knocked the ashes from his pipe, pocketed it, and prepared for action.
As the buggy came nearer he recognized his ancient enemy in the person
of the man who sat at Hannibal's side, and stepping nimbly into the road
seized the horses by their bits. At sight of him Hannibal shrieked his
name in an ecstasy of delight.

"Uncle Bob--Uncle Bob--" he, cried.

"Yes, it's Uncle Bob. You can light down, Nevvy. I reckon you've rid far
enough," said Yancy pleasantly.

"Leggo them horses!" said Mr. Blount, recovering somewhat from the
effect of Yancy's sudden appearance.

"Light down, Nevvy," said Yancy, still pleasantly. Blount turned to the
boy as if to interfere. "Don't you put the weight of yo' finger on the
boy, Blount!" warned Yancy. "Light down, Hannibal!"

Hannibal instantly availed himself of the invitation. At the same moment
Blount struck at Yancy with his whip and his horses reared wildly,
thinking the blow meant for them. Seeing that the boy had reached the
ground in safety, Yancy relaxed his hold on the team, which instantly
plunged forward. Then as the buggy swept past him he made a dexterous
grab at Blount and dragged him out over the wheels into the road, where,
for the second time in his life, he proceeded to fetch Mr. Blount
a smack in the jaw. This he followed up with other smacks variously
distributed about his countenance.

"You'll sweat for this, Bob Yancy!" cried Blount, as he vainly sought to
fend off the blows.

"I'm sweating now--scandalous," said Mr. Yancy, taking his unhurried
satisfaction of the other. Then with a final skilful kick he sent Mr.
Blount sprawling. "Don't let me catch you around these diggings again,
Dave Blount, or I swear to God I'll be the death of you!"

Hannibal rode home through the pine woods in triumph on his Uncle Bob's
mighty shoulders.

"Did you get yo' ground-hog, Nevvy?" inquired Mr. Yancy presently when
they had temporarily exhausted the excitement of Hannibal's capture and
recovery.

"It weren't a ground-hog, Uncle Bob--it were a skunk!"

"Think of that!" murmured Mr. Yancy.




CHAPTER IV. LAW AT BALAAM'S CROSS-ROADS


But Mr. Yancy was only at the beginning of his trouble. Three days later
there appeared on the borders of Scratch Hill a lank gentleman armed
with a rifle, while the butts of two pistols protruded from the depths
of his capacious coat pockets. He made his presence known by whooping
from the edge of the branch, and his whoops shaped themselves into the
name of Yancy. It was Charley Balaam, old Squire Balaam's nephew. The
squire lived at the crossroads to which his family had given its name,
and dispensed the little law that found its way into that part of the
county. The whoops finally brought Yancy to his cabin door.

"Can I see you friendly, Bob Yancy?" Balaam demanded with the lungs of a
stentor, sheltering himself behind the thick bole of a sweetgum, for he
observed that Yancy held his rifle in the crook of his arm and had no
wish to offer his person as a target to the deadly aim of the Scratch
Hiller who was famous for his skill.

"I reckon you can, Charley Balaam, if you are friendly," said Yancy.

"I'm a family man, Bob, and I ask you candid, do you feel peevish?"

"Not in particular," and Yancy put aside his rifle.

"I'm a-going to trust you, Bob," said Balaam. And forsaking the shelter
of the sweetgum he shuffled up the slope.

"How are you, Charley?" asked Yancy, as they shook hands.

"Only just tolerable, Bob. You've been warranted--Dave Blount swore hit
on to you." He displayed a sheet of paper covered with much writing and
decorated with a large seal. Yancy viewed this formidable document with
respect, but did not offer to take it.

"Read it," he said mildly. Balaam scratched his head.

"I don't know that hit's my duty to do that, Bob. Hit's my duty to
serve it on to you. But I can tell you what's into hit, leavin' out the
law--which don't matter nohow."

At this juncture Uncle Sammy's bent form emerged from the path that led
off through the woods in the direction of the Bellamy cabin. With the
patriarch was a stranger. Now the presence of a stranger on Scratch
Hill was an occurrence of such extraordinary rarity that the warrant
instantly became a matter of secondary importance.

"Howdy, Charley. Here, Bob Yancy, you shake hands with Bruce
Carrington," commanded Uncle Sammy. At the name both Yancy and Balaam
manifested a quickened interest. They saw a man in the early twenties,
clean-limbed and broad-shouldered, with a handsome face and shapely
head. "Yes, sir, hit's a grandson of Tom Carrington that used to own the
grist-mill down at the Forks. Yo're some sort of wild-hog kin to him,
Bob--yo' mother was a cousin to old Tom. Her family was powerful upset
at her marrying a Yancy. They say Tom cussed himself into a 'pleptic fit
when the news was fetched him."

"Where you located at, Mr. Carrington?" asked Yancy. But Carrington was
not given a chance to reply. Uncle Sammy saved him the trouble.

"Back in Kentucky. He tells me he's been follerin' the water. What's the
name of that place where Andy Jackson fit the British?"

"New Orleans," prompted Carrington good naturedly.

"That's hit--he takes rafts down the river to New Orleans, then he comes
back on ships to Baltimore, or else he hoofs it no'th overland." Uncle
Sammy had acquired a general knowledge of the stranger's habits and
pursuits in an incredibly brief space of time. "He wants to visit the
Forks," he added.

"I'm shortly goin' that way myself, Mr. Carrington, and I'll be pleased
of your company--but first I got to get through with Bob Yancy," said
Balaam, and again he produced the warrant. "If agreeable to you, Bob,
I'll ask Uncle Sammy, as a third party friendly to both, to read this
here warrant," he said.

"Who's been a-warrantin' Bob Yancy?" cried Uncle Sammy, with shrill
interest.

"Dave Blount has."

"I knowed hit--I knowed he'd try to get even!" And Uncle Sammy struck
his walking-stick sharply on the packed earth of Yancy's dooryard.
"What's the charge agin you, Bob?"

"Read hit," said Balaam. "Why, sho'--can't you read plain writin', Uncle
Sammy?" for the patriarch was showing signs of embarrassment.

"If you gentlemen will let me--" said Carrington pleasantly. Instantly
there came a relieved chorus from the three in one breath.

"Why, sure!"

"Would my spectacles help you any, Mr. Carrington?" asked Uncle Sammy
officiously.

"No, I guess not."

"They air powerful seein' glasses, and I'm aweer some folks read a heap
easier with spectacles than without 'em." After a moment's scrutiny of
the paper that Balaam had thrust in his hand, Carrington began:

"To the Sheriff of the County of Cumberland: Greetings."

"He means me," explained Balaam. "He always makes 'em out to the
sheriff, but they are returned to me and I serve 'em." Carrington
resumed his reading,

"Whereas, It is alleged that a murderous assault has been committed on
one David Blount, of Fayetteville, by Robert Yancy, of Scratch Hill,
said Blount sustaining numerous bruises and contusions, to his great
injury of body and mind; and, whereas, it is further alleged that said
murderous assault was wholly unprovoked and without cause, you will
forthwith take into custody the person of said Yancy, of Scratch Hill,
charged with having inflicted the bruises and contusions herein set
forth in the complaint of said Blount, and instantly bring him into our
presence to answer to these various and several crimes and misdemeanors.
You are empowered to seize said Yancy wherever he may be at; whether on
the hillside or in the valley, eating or sleeping, or at rest.

           "De Lancy Balaam, Magistrate.

"Fourth District, County of Cumberland, State of North Carolina. Done
this twenty-fourth day of May, 1835.

"P.S. Dear Bob: Dave Blount says he ain't able to chew his meat. I
thought you'd be glad to know."

Smilingly Carrington folded the warrant and handed it to Yancy.

"Well, what are you goin' to do about hit, Bob?" inquired Balaam.

"Maybe I'd ought to go. I'd like to oblige the squire," said Yancy.

"When does this here co't set?" demanded Uncle Sammy.

"Hit don't do much else since he's took with the lumbago," answered
Balaam somewhat obscurely.

"How are the squire, Charley?" asked Yancy with grave concern.

"Only just tolerable, Bob."

"What did he tell you to do?" and Yancy knit his brows.

"Seems like he wanted me to find out what you'd do. He recommended I
shouldn't use no violence."

"I wouldn't recommend you did, either," assented Yancy, but without
heat.

"I'd get shut of this here law business, Bob," advised Uncle Sammy.

"Suppose I come to the Cross Roads this evening?"

"That's agreeable," said the deputy, who presently departed in company
with Carrington.

Some hours later the male population of Scratch Hill, with a gravity
befitting the occasion, prepared itself to descend on the Cross Roads
and give its support to Mr. Yancy in his hour of need. To this end those
respectable householders armed themselves, with the idea that it might
perhaps be necessary to correct some miscarriage of justice. They were
shy enough and timid enough, these remote dwellers in the pine woods,
but, like all wild things, when they felt they were cornered they were
prone to fight; and in this instance it was clearly iniquitous that Bob
Yancy's right to smack Dave Blount should be questioned. That denied
what was left of human liberty. But beyond this was a matter of even
greater importance: they felt that Yancy's possession of the boy was
somehow involved.

Yancy had declared himself simply but specifically on this point. Law
or no law, he would kill whoever attempted to take the boy from him, and
Scratch Hill believing to a man that in so doing he would be well within
his rights, was prepared to join in the fray. Even Uncle Sammy, who
had not been off the Hill in years, announced that no consideration
of fatigue would keep him away from the scene of action and possible
danger, and Yancy loaned him his mule and cart for the occasion. When
the patriarch was helped to his seat in the ancient vehicle he called
loudly for his rifle.

"Why, pap, what do you want with a weapon?" asked his son indulgently.
"If there air shootin' I may take a hand in it. Now you-all give me a
fair hour's start with this mule critter of Bob's, and if nothin' busts
I'll be at the squire's as soon as the best of you."

Uncle Sammy was given the time allowance he asked and then Scratch Hill
wended its way down the path to the branch and the highroad. Yancy led
the straggling procession, with the boy trotting by his side, his little
sunburned fist clasped in the man's great hand. He, too, was armed.
He carried the old spo'tin' rifle he had brought from the Barony, and
suspended from his shoulder by a leather thong was the big horn flask
with its hickory stopper his Uncle Bob had fashioned for him, while a
deerskin pouch held his bullets and an extra flint or two. He understood
that beyond those smacks he had seen his Uncle Bob fetch Mr. Blount, he
himself was the real cause of this excitement, that somebody, it was
not plain to his mind just who, was seeking to get him away from Scratch
Hill, and that a mysterious power called the Law would sooner or later
be invoked to this dread end. But he knew this much clearly, nothing
would induce him to leave his Uncle Bob! And his thin little fingers
nestled warmly against the man's hardened palm. Yancy looked down and
gave him a sunny, reassuring smile.

"It'll be all right, Nevvy," he said gently.

"You wouldn't let 'em take me, would you, Uncle Bob?" asked the child in
a fearful whisper.

"Such an idea ain't entered my head. And this here warranting is just
some of Dave Blount's cussedness."

"Uncle Bob, what'll they do to you?"

"Well, I reckon the squire'll feel obliged to do one of two things.
He'll either fine me or else he won't."

"What'll you do if he fines you?"

"Why, pay the fine, Nevvy--and then lick Dave Blount again for stirring
up trouble. That's the way we most in general do. I mean to say give him
a good licking, and that'll make him stop his foolishness."

"Wasn't that a good licking you gave him on the Ox Road, Uncle Bob?"
asked Hannibal.

"It was pretty fair fo' a starter, but I'm capable of doing a better
job," responded Yancy.

They overtook Uncle Sammy as he turned in at the squire's.

"I thought I'd come and see what kind of law a body gets at this here
co't of yours," the patriarch explained to Mr. Balaam, who, forgetting
his lumbago, had hurried forth to greet him.

"But why did you fetch your gun, Uncle Sammy?" asked the magistrate,
laughing.

"Hit were to be on the safe side, Squire. Where air them Blounts?"

"Them Blounts don't need to bother you none. There air only Dave, and he
can't more than half see out of one eye to-day."

The squire's court held its infrequent sittings in the best room of the
Balaam homestead, a double cabin of hewn logs. Here Scratch Hill was
gratified with a view of Mr. Blount's battered visage, and it was
conceded that his condition reflected creditably on Yancy's physical
prowess and was of a character fully to sustain that gentleman's
reputation; for while he was notoriously slow to begin a fight, he
was reputed to be even more reluctant to leave off once he had become
involved in one.

"What's all this here fuss between you and Bob Yancy?" demanded the
squire when he had administered the oath to Blount. Mr. Blount's
statement was brief and very much to the point. He had been hired by Mr.
Bladen, of Fayetteville, to go to Scratch Hill and get the boy who
had been temporarily placed in Yancy's custody at the time of General
Quintard's death.

"Stop just there!" cried the magistrate, leveling a pudgy finger at
Blount. "This here co't is already cognizant of certain facts bearing on
that p'int. The boy was left with Bob Yancy mainly because nobody else
would take him. Them's the facts. Now go on!" he finished sternly.

"I only know what Bladen told me," said Blount sullenly.

"Well, I reckon Mr. Bladen ought to feel obliged to tell the truth,"
said the squire.

"He done give me the order from the judge of the co't--I was to show it
to Bob Yancy--"

"Got that order?" demanded the squire sharply. With a smile, damaged,
but clearly a smile, Blount produced the order. "Hmm--app'inted guardeen
of the boy--" the squire was presently heard to murmur. The crowded room
was very still now, and more than one pair of eyes were turned pityingly
in Yancy's direction. When the long arm of the law reached out from
Fayetteville, where there was a real judge and a real sheriff, it
clothed itself with very special terrors. The boy looked up into Yancy's
face. That tense silence had struck a chill through his heart.

"It's all right," whispered Yancy reassuringly, smiling down upon him.
And Hannibal, comforted, smiled back, and nestled his head against his
Uncle Bob's side.

"Well, Mr. Blount, what did you do with this here order?" asked the
squire.

"I went with it to Scratch Hill," said Blount.

"And showed it to Bob Yancy?" asked the squire.

"No, he wa'n't there. But the boy was, and I took him in my buggy and
drove off. I'd got as far as the Ox Road forks when I met Yancy--"

"What happened then?--but a body don't need to ask! Looks like the law
was all you had on your side!" and the squire glanced waggishly about
the room.

"I showed Yancy the order--"

"You lie, Dave Blount; you didn't!" said Yancy. "But I can't say as it
would have made no difference, Squire. He'd have taken his licking just
the same and I'd have had my nevvy out of that buggy!"

"Didn't he say nothing about this here order from the colt, Bob?"

"There wa'n't much conversation, Squire. I invited my nevvy to light
down, and then I snaked Dave Blount out over the wheel."

"Who struck the first blow?"

"He did. He struck at me with his buggy whip."

"What you got to say to this, Mr. Blount?" asked the squire.

"I say I showed him the order like I said," answered Blount doggedly.
Squire Balaam removed his spectacles and leaned back in his chair.

"It's the opinion of this here co't that the whole question of assault
rests on whether Bob Yancy saw the order. Bob Yancy swears he didn't see
it, while Dave Blount swears he showed it to him. If Bob Yancy didn't
know of the existence of the order he was clearly actin' on the idea
that Blount was stealin' his nevvy, and he done what any one would have
done under the circumstances. If, on the other hand, he knowed of this
order from the co't, he was not only guilty of assault, but he
was guilty of resistin' an officer of the co't." The squire paused
impressively. His audience drew a long breath. The impression prevailed
that the case was going against Yancy, and more than one face was turned
scowlingly on the fat little justice.

"Can a body drap a word here?" It was Uncle Sammy's thin voice that cut
into the silence.

"Certainly, Uncle Sammy. This here co't will always admire to listen to
you."

"Well, I'd like to say that I consider that Fayetteville co't mighty
officious with its orders. This part of the county won't take nothin'
off Fayetteville! We don't interfere with Fayetteville, and blamed
if we'll let Fayetteville interfere with us!" There was a murmur of
approval. Scratch Hill remembered the rifles in its hands and took
comfort.

"The Fayetteville co't air a higher co't than this, Uncle Sammy,"
explained the squire indulgently.

"I'm aweer of that," snapped the patriarch. "I've seen hit's steeple."

"Air you finished, Uncle Sammy?" asked the squire deferentially.

"I 'low I am. But I 'low that if this here case is goin' agin Bob Yancy
I'd recommend him to go home and not listen to no mo' foolishness."

"Mr. Yancy will oblige this co't by setting still while I finish this
case," said the squire with dignity. "As I've already p'inted out, the
question of veracity presents itself strongly to the mind of this here
colt. Mr. Yancy has sworn to one thing, Mr. Blount to another. Now
the Yancys air an old family in these parts; Mr. Blount's folks air
strangers, but we don't know nothing agin them--"

"And we don't know nothing in their favor," Uncle Sammy interjected.

"Dave's grandfather came here from Virginia about fifty years back and
settled near Scratch Hill--"

"We never knowed why he left Virginia or why he came here," said Uncle
Sammy, and knowing what local feeling was, was sure he had shot a
telling bolt.

"Then, about twenty-five years ago Dave's father pulled up and went to
Fayetteville. Nobody ever knowed why--and I don't remember that he ever
offered any explanation--" continued the squire.

"He didn't--he just left," said Uncle Sammy.

"Consequently," pursued the squire, somewhat vindictively, "we ain't had
any time in which to form an opinion of the Blounts; but for myself, I'm
suspicious of folks that keep movin' about and who don't seem able to
get located permanent nowheres, who air here to-day and away tomorrow.
But you can't say that of the Yancys. They air an old family in the
country, and naturally this co't feels obliged to accept a Yancy's
word before the word of a stranger. And in view of the fact that the
defendant did not seek litigation, but was perfectly satisfied to let
matters rest where they was, it is right and just that all costs should
fall on the plaintiff."




CHAPTER V. THE ENCOUNTER


Betty Malroy had ridden into the squire's yard during the progress of
the trial and when Yancy and Hannibal came from the house she beckoned
the Scratch Hiller to her. She was aware that Mr. Yancy, moving along
the line of least industrial resistance, might be counted of little
worth in any broad scheme of life. Nat Ferris had strongly insisted
on this point, as had Judith, who shared her husband's convictions;
consequently, the rumors of his present difficulty had merely excited
them to adverse criticism. They had been sure the best thing that could
happen the boy would be his removal from Yancy's guardianship, but this
was not at all her conclusion. She considered Mr. Bladen heartless and
his course without justification, and she regarded Yancy's affection for
the boy as in itself constituting a benefit that quite outweighed his
unprogressive example.

"You are not going to lose your nephew, are you, Mr. Yancy?" she asked
eagerly, when Yancy stood at her side.

"No, ma'am." But his sense of elation was plainly tempered by the
knowledge that for him the future held more than one knotty problem.

"I am very glad! I know Hannibal will be much happier with you than with
any one else," and she smiled brightly at the boy, whose small sunburned
face was upturned to hers.

"I think that-a-ways myself, Miss Betty, but this trial was only for
my smacking Dave Blount, who was trying to steal my nevvy," explained
Yancy.

"I hope you smacked him well and hard!" said the girl, whose mood was
warlike.

"I ain't got no cause to complain, thank you," returned Mr. Yancy
pleasantly.

"I rode out to the Hill to say good-by to Hannibal and to you, but they
said you were here and that the trial was today."

Captain Murrell, with Crenshaw and the squire, came from the house, and
Murrell's swarthy face lit up at sight of the girl. Yancy, sensible
of the gulf that yawned between himself and what was known as "the
quality," would have yielded his place, but Betty detained him.

"Are you going away, ma'am?" he asked with concern.

"Yes--to my home in west Tennessee," and a cloud crossed her smooth
brow.

"That surely is a right big distance for you to travel, ma'am," said
Yancy, his mind opening to this fresh impression. "I reckon it's rising
a hundred miles or mo'," he concluded, at a venture.

"It's almost a thousand."

"Think of that! And you are that ca'm!" cried Yancy admiringly, as a
picture of simply stupendous effort offered itself to his mind's eye.
He added: "I am mighty sorry you are going. We-all here shall miss
you--specially Hannibal. He just regularly pines for Sunday as it is."

"I hope he will miss me a little--I'm afraid I want him to!" She glanced
down at the boy as she spoke, and into her eyes, very clear and very
blue and shaded by long dark lashes, stole a look of wistful tenderness.
She noted how his little hand was clasped in Yancy's, she realized the
perfect trust of his whole attitude toward this big bearded man, and she
was conscious of a sudden feeling of profound respect for the Scratch
Hiller.

"But ain't you ever coming back, Miss Betty?" asked Hannibal rather
fearfully, smitten with the awesome sense of impermanence which dogs our
footsteps.

"Oh, I hope so, dear--I wish to think so. But you see my home is not
here." She turned to Yancy, "So it is settled that he is to remain with
you?"

"Not exactly, Miss Betty. You see, there's an order from the
Fayetteville co't fo' me to give him up to this man Bladen."

"But Uncle Bob says--" began Hannibal, who considered his Uncle Bob's
remarks on this point worth quoting.

"Never mind what yo' Uncle Bob said," interrupted Yancy hastily.

"Oh, Mr. Yancy, you are not going to surrender him--no matter what the
court says!" cried Betty. The expression on Yancy's face was so grim and
determined on the instant with the latent fire that was in him flashing
from his eyes that she added quickly, "You know the law is for you as
well as for Mr. Bladen!"

"I reckon I won't bother the law none," responded Yancy briefly. "Me and
my nevvy will go back to Scratch Hill and there won't be no trouble
so long as they leave us be. But them Fayetteville folks want to keep
away--" The fierce light slowly died out of his eyes. "It'll be all
right, ma'am, and it's mighty good and kind of you fo' to feel the way
you do. I'm obliged to you."

But Betty was by no means sure of the outcome Yancy seemed to predict
with such confidence. Unless Bladen abandoned his purpose, which he was
not likely to do, a tragedy was clearly pending for Scratch Hill.
She saw the boy left friendless, she saw Yancy the victim of his own
primitive conception of justice. Therefore she said:

"I wonder you don't leave the Hill, Mr. Yancy. You could so easily go
where Mr. Bladen would never find you. Haven't you thought of this?"

"That are a p'int," agreed Yancy slowly. "Might I ask what parts you'd
specially recommend?" lifting his grave eyes to hers.

"It would really be the sensible thing to do!" said Betty. "I am sure
you would like West Tennessee--they say you are a great hunter." Yancy
smiled almost guiltily.

"I like a little spo't now and then yes, ma'am, I do hunt some," he
admitted.

"Miss Betty, Uncle Bob's the best shot we got! You had ought to see him
shoot!" said Hannibal.

"Mr. Yancy, if you should cross the mountains, remember I live near
Memphis. Belle Plain is the name of the plantation--it's not hard to
find; just don't forget--Belle Plain."

"I won't forget, and mebby you will see us there one of these days.
Sho', I've seen mighty little of the world--about as far as a dog can
trot it a couple of hours!"

"Just think what it will mean to Hannibal if you become involved further
with Mr. Bladen." Betty spoke earnestly, bending toward him, and Yancy
understood the meaning that lay back of her words.

"I've thought of that, too," the Scratch Hiller answered seriously.
Betty glanced toward the squire and Mr. Crenshaw. They were standing
near the bars that gave entrance to the lane. Murrell had left them
and was walking briskly down the road toward Crenshaw's store where his
horse was tied. She bent down and gave Yancy her slim white hand.

"Good-by, Mr. Yancy--lift Hannibal so that I can kiss him!" Yancy swung
the child aloft. "I think you are such a nice little boy, Hannibal--you
mustn't forget me!" And touching her horse lightly with the whip she
rode away at a gallop.

"She sho'ly is a lady!" said Yancy, staring after her. "And we mustn't
forget Memphis or Belle Plain, Nevvy."

Crenshaw and the squire approached.

"Bob," said the merchant, "Bladen's going to have the boy--but he made
a mistake in putting this business in the hands of a fool like Dave
Blount. I reckon he knows that now."

"I reckon his next move will be to send a posse of gun-toters up from
Fayetteville," said the squire.

"That's just what he'll do," agreed Crenshaw, and looked disturbed.

"They certainly air an unpeaceable lot--them Fayetteville folks! It's
always seemed to me they had a positive spite agin this end of the
county," said the squire, and he pocketed his spectacles and refreshed
himself with a chew of tobacco. "Bladen ain't actin' right, Bob. It's a
year and upwards since the old general 'died. He let you go on thinking
the boy was to stay with you and now he takes a notion to have him!"

"No, sir, it ain't right nor reasonable. And what's more, he shan't have
him!" said Yancy, and his tone was final.

"I don't know what kind of a mess you're getting yourself into, Bob,
I declare I don't!" cried Crenshaw, who felt that he was largely
responsible for the whole situation.

"Looks like your neighbors would stand by you," suggested the squire.

"I don't want them to stand by me. It'll only get them into trouble,
and I ain't going to do that," rejoined Yancy, and lapsed into momentary
silence. Then he resumed meditatively, "There was old Baldy Ebersole who
shot the sheriff when they tried to arrest him for getting drunk down in
Fayetteville and licking the tavern-keeper--"

"Sho', there wa'n't no harm in Baldy!" said the squire, with heat. "When
that sheriff come along here looking for him, I told him p'inted that
Baldy said he wouldn't be arrested. A more truthful man I never knowed,
and if the damn fool had taken my word he'd be living yet!"

"But you-all know what trouble killing that sheriff made fo' Baldy!"
said Yancy. "He told me often he regretted it mo' than anything he'd
ever done. He said it was most aggravatin' having to always lug a gun
wherever he went. And what with being suspicious of strangers when he
wa'n't suspicious by nature, he reckoned in time it would just naturally
wear him out."

"He stood it until he was risin' eighty," said Crenshaw.

"His, father lived to be ninety, John, and as spry an old gentleman as
a body'd wish to see. I don't uphold no man for committing murder, but
I do consider the sheriff should have waited on Baldy to get mo'
reasonable, like he'd done in time if they'd just let him alone--but
no, sir, he reckoned the law wa'n't no respecter of persons. He was a
fine-appearin' man, that sheriff, and just elected to office. I remember
we had to leave off the tail-gate to my cart to accommodate him. Yes,
sir, they pretty near pestered Baldy into his grave--and seein' that
pore old fellow pottering around year after year always toting a gun was
the patheticest sight I most ever seen, and I made up my mind then if
it ever seemed necessary for me to kill a man, I'd leave the county or
maybe the state," concluded the squire.

"Don't you reckon it would be some better to leave the state afo' you.
done the killing?" suggested Yancy.

"Well, a man might. I don't know but what he'd be justified in getting
shut of his troubles like that."

When Betty Malroy rode away from Squire Balaam's Murrell galloped
after her. Presently she heard the beat of his horse's hoofs as he came
pounding along the sandy road and glanced back over her shoulder. With
an exclamation of displeasure she reined in her horse. She had not
wished to ride to the Barony with him, yet she had no desire to treat
him with discourtesy, especially as the Ferrises were disposed to like
him. Murrell quickly gained a place at her side.

"I suppose Ferris is at the Barony?" he said, drawing his horse down to
a walk.

"I believe he is," said Betty with a curt little air.

"May I ride with you?" he gave her a swift glance. She nodded
indifferently and would have urged her horse into a gallop again, but
he made a gesture of protest. "Don't--or I shall think you are still
running away from me," he said with a short laugh.

"Were you at the trial?" she asked. "I am glad they didn't get Hannibal
away from Yancy."

"Oh, Yancy will have his hands full with that later--so will Bladen," he
added significantly. He studied her out of those deeply sunken eyes of
his in which no shadow of youth lingered, for men such as he reached
their prime early, and it was a swiftly passing splendor. "Ferris tells
me you are going to West Tennessee?" he said at length.

"Yes."

"I know your half-brother, Tom Ware--I know him very well." There was
another brief silence.

"So you know Tom?" she presently observed, and frowned slightly. Tom was
her guardian, and her memories of him were not satisfactory. A burly,
unshaven man with a queer streak of meanness through his character.
She had not seen him since she had been sent north to Philadelphia, and
their intercourse had been limited to infrequent letters. His always
smelled of strong, stale tobacco, and the well-remembered whine in the
man's voice ran through his written sentences.

"You've spent much of your time up North?" suggested Murrell.

"Four years. I've been at school, you know. That's where I met Judith."

"I hope you'll like West Tennessee. It's still a bit raw compared with
what you've been accustomed to in the North. You haven't been back in
all those four years?" Betty shook her head. "Nor seen Tom--nor any one
from out yonder?" For some reason a little tinge of color had crept into
Betty's cheeks. "Will you let me renew our acquaintance at Belle Plain?
I shall be in West Tennessee before the summer is over; probably I shall
leave here within a week," he said, bending toward her. His glance dwelt
on her face and the pliant lines of her figure, and his sense swam.
Since their first meeting the girl's beauty had haunted and allured
him; with his passionate sense of life he was disposed to these
violent fancies, and he had a masterful way with women just as he had
a masterful way with men. Now, however, he was aware that he was viewed
with entire indifference. His vanity, which was his whole inner self,
was hurt, and from the black depths of his nature his towering egotism
flashed out lawless and perverted impulses. "I must tell you that I am
not of your sort, Miss Malroy--" he continued hurriedly. "My people were
plain folk out of the mountains. For what I am I have no one to thank
but myself. You must be aware of the prejudices of the planter class,
for it is your class. Perhaps I haven't been quite frank at the
Barony--I felt it was asking too much when you were there. That was a
door I didn't want closed to me!"

"I imagine you will be welcome at Belle Plain. You are Tom's friend."
Murrell bit his lip, and then laughed as his mind conjured up a picture
of the cherished Tom. Suddenly he reached out and rested his hand on
hers. He lived in the shadow of chance not always kind, his pleasures
were intoxicating drafts snatched in the midst of dangers, and here was
youth, sweet and perfect, that only needed awakening.

"Betty--if I might think--" he began, but his tongue stumbled. His
love-making was usually of a savage sort, but some quality in the girl
held him in check. The words he had spoken many times before forsook
him. Betty drew away from him, an angry color on her cheeks and an angry
light in her eyes. "Forgive me, Betty!" muttered Murrell, but his heart
beat against his ribs, and passion sent its surges through him. "Don't
you know what I'm trying to tell you?" he whispered. Betty gathered up
her reins. "Not yet--" he cried, and again he rested a heavy hand on
hers. "Don't you know what's kept me here? It was to be near you--only
that--I've been waiting for this chance to speak. It was long in coming,
but it's here now--and it's mine!" he exulted. His eyes burned with a
luminous fire, he urged his horse nearer and they came to a halt. "Look
here--I'll follow you North--I swear I love you--say I may!"

"Let me go--let me go!" cried Betty indignantly.

"No--not yet!" he urged his horse still nearer and gathered her close.
"You've got to hear me. I've loved you since the first moment I rested
my eyes on you--and, by God, you shall love me in return!" He felt her
struggle to free herself from his grasp with a sense of savage triumph.
It was the brute force within him that conquered with women just as it
conquered with men.

Bruce Carrington, on his way back to Fayetteville from the Forks, came
about a turn in the road. Betty saw a tall, handsome fellow in the first
flush of manhood; Carrington, an angry girl, very beautiful and very
indignant, struggling in a man's grasp.

At sight of the new-comer, Murrell, with an oath, released Betty, who,
striking her horse with the whip galloped down the road toward the
Barony. As she fled past Carrington she bent low in her saddle.

"Don't let him follow me!" she gasped, and Carrington, striding forward,
caught Murrell's horse by the bit.

"Not so fast, you!" he said coolly. The two men glared at each other for
a brief instant.

"Take your hand off my horse!" exclaimed Murrell hoarsely, his mouth hot
and dry with a sense of defeat.

"Can't you see she'd rather be alone?" said Carrington.

"Let go!" roared Murrell, and a murderous light shot from his eyes.

"I don't know but I should pull you out of that saddle and twist your
neck!" said Carrington hotly. Murrell's face underwent a swift change.

"You're a bold fellow to force your way into a lover's quarrel," he said
quietly. Carrington's arm dropped at his side. Perhaps, after all,
it was that. Murrell thrust his hand into his pocket. "I always give
something to the boy who holds my horse," he said, and tossed a coin in
Carrington's direction. "There--take that for your pains!" he added. He
pulled his horse about and rode back toward the cross-roads at an easy
canter.

Carrington, with an angry flush on his sunburnt cheeks, stood staring
down at the coin that glinted in the dusty road, but he was seeing the
face of the girl, indignant, beautiful--then he glanced after Murrell.

"I reckon I ought to have twisted his neck," he said with a deep breath.




CHAPTER VI. BETTY SETS OUT FOR TENNESSEE


Bruce Carrington came of a westward-looking race. From the low coast
where they had first settled, those of his name had followed the rivers
to their headwaters. The headwaters had sent them forth toward the
foot-hills, where they made their, clearings and built their cabins in
the shadow of the blue wall that for a time marked the furthest goal of
their desires. But only for a time. Crossing the mountains they found
the headwaters once more, and following the streams out of the hills saw
the roaring torrents become great placid rivers.

Carrington's father had put the mountains at his back thirty years
before. The Watauga settlements had furnished him a wife, and some
four years later Bruce was born on the banks of the Ohio. The senior
Carrington had appeared on horseback as a wooer, but had walked on foot
as a married man, each shift of residence he made having represented
a descent to a lower social level. On the death of his wife he had
embarked in the river trade with all that enthusiasm and hope he had
brought to half-a-dozen other occupations, for he was a gentleman of
prodigious energy.

Bruce's first memories had to do with long nights when he perched beside
his father on the cabin roof of their keel-boat and watched the stars,
or the blurred line of the shore where it lay against the sky, or the
lights on other barges and rafts drifting as they were drifting, with
their wheat and corn and whisky to that common market at the river's
mouth.

Sometimes they dragged their boat back up-stream, painfully,
laboriously; three or four months of unremitting toil sufficed for this,
when the crew sweated at the towing ropes from dawn until dark, that
the rich planters in Kentucky and Tennessee might have tea and wine for
their tables, and silks and laces for their womenfolk. More often
they abandoned their boat and tramped north, armed and watchful, since
cutthroats and robbers haunted the roads, and river-men, if they had not
drunk away their last dollar in New Orleans, were worth spoiling. Or,
if it offered, they took passage on some fast sailing clipper bound for
Baltimore or Philadelphia, and crossed the mountains to the Ohio and
were within a week or two of home.

Bruce Carrington had seen the day of barge and raft reach its zenith,
had heard the first steam packet's shrieking whistle which sounded the
death-knell of the ancient order, though the shifting of the trade was
a slow matter and the glory of the old did not pass over to the new at
once, but lingered still in mighty fleets of rafts and keel-boats and
in the Homeric carousals of some ten thousand of the half-horse,
half-alligator breed that nightly gathered in New Orleans. Broad-horns
and mud-sills they were called in derision. A strange race of aquatic
pioneers, jeans and leather clad, the rifle and the setting-pole equally
theirs, they came out of every stream down which a scow could be thrust
at flood-time; from tiny settlements far back among the hills; from
those bustling sinks of iniquity, the river towns. But now, surely, yet
almost imperceptibly, their commerce was slipping from them. At all the
landings they were being elbowed by the newcomers--men who wore brass
buttons and gold braid, and shiny leather shoes instead of moccasins;
men with white hands and gold rings on their fingers and diamonds in
their shirts--men whose hair and clothing kept the rancid smell of oil
and smoke and machinery.

After the reading of the warrant that morning, Charley Balaam had shown
Carrington the road to the Forks, assuring him when they separated that
with a little care and decent use of his eyes it would be possible to
fetch up there and not pass plumb through the settlement without knowing
where he was. But Carrington had found the Forks without difficulty. He
had seen the old mill his grandfather had built almost a hundred years
before, and in the churchyard he had found the graves and read the
inscriptions that recorded the virtues of certain dead and gone
Carringtons. It had all seemed a very respectable link with the past.

He was on his way to Fayetteville, where he intended to spend the night,
and perhaps a day or two in looking around, when the meeting with
Betty and Murrell occurred. As Murrell disappeared in the direction of
Balaam's, Carrington took a spiteful kick at the unoffending coin, and
strode off down the Fayetteville pike. But the girl's face remained with
him. It was a face he would like to see again. He wondered who she was,
and if she lived in the big house on the other road, the house beyond
the red gate which Charley Balaam had told him was called the Barony.

He was still thinking of the girl when he ate his supper that night
at Cleggett's Tavern. Later, in the bar, he engaged his host in idle
gossip. Mr. Cleggett knew all about the Barony and its owner, Nat
Ferris. Ferris was a youngish man, just married. Carrington experienced
a quick sinking of the heart. A fleeting sense of humor succeeded--had
he interfered between man and wife? But surely if this had been the case
the girl would not have spoken as she had.

He wound Mr. Cleggett up with sundry pegs of strong New England rum. He
had met a gentleman and lady on the road that day; he wondered, as he
toyed with his glass, if it could have been the Ferrises? Mounted? Yes,
mounted. Then it was Ferris and his wife--or it might have been Captain
Murrell and Miss Malroy the captain was a strapping, black-haired chap
who rode a big bay horse. Miss Malroy did not live in that part of
the country; she was a friend of Mrs. Ferris', belonged in Kentucky or
Tennessee, or somewhere out yonder--at any rate she was bringing her
visit to an end, for Ferris had instructed him to reserve a place for
her in the north-bound stage on the morrow.

Carrington suddenly remembered that he had some thought of starting
north in the morning himself, but he was still undecided. How about it
if he deferred his decision until the stage was leaving? Mr. Cleggett
consulted his bookings and was of the opinion that his chances would
not be good; and Carrington hastily paid down his money. Later in the
privacy of his own room he remarked meditatively, viewing his reflection
in the mirror that hung above the chimneypiece, "I reckon you're plain
crazy!" and seemed to free himself from all further responsibility for
his own acts whatever they might be.

The stage left at six, and as Carrington climbed to his seat the next
morning Mr. Cleggett was advising the driver to look sharp when he
came to the Barony road, as he was to pick up a party there. It was
Carrington who looked sharp, and almost at the spot where he had seen
Betty Malroy the day before he saw her again, with Ferris and Judith and
a pile of luggage bestowed by the wayside. Betty did not observe him as
the coach stopped, for she was intent on her farewells with her friends.
There were hasty words of advice from Ferris, prolonged good-byes to
Judith, tears--kisses--while a place was being made for her many boxes
and trunks. Carrington viewed the luggage with awe, and listened without
shame. He gathered that she was going north to Washington; that her
final destination was some point either on the Ohio or Mississippi,
and that her name was Betty. Then the door slammed and the stage was in
motion again.

Carrington felt sensibly enriched by the meager facts now in his
possession. He was especially interested in her name. Be liked the
sound of it. It suited her. He even tried it under his breath softly.
Betty--Betty Malroy--next he fell to wondering if those few hurried
words she had addressed to him could possibly be construed as forming a
basis for a further acquaintance. Or wasn't it far more likely she would
prefer to forget the episode of the previous day, which had clearly been
anything but agreeable?

All through the morning they swung forward in the heat and dust and
glare, with now and then a brief pause when they changed horses, and at
midday rattled into the shaded main street of a sleepy village and drew
up before the tavern where dinner was waiting them--a fact that was
announced by a bare-legged colored boy armed with a club, who beat upon
a suspended wagon tire.

Betty saw Carrington when she took her seat, and gave a scarcely
perceptible start of surprise. Then her face was flooded with a rich
color. This was the man who saw her with Captain Murrell yesterday I
What must he think of her! There was a brief moment of irresolution and
then she bowed coldly.

"You just barely managed it. I reckon nobody could misunderstand that.
By no means cordial--but of course not!" Carrington reflected. His own
handsome face had been expressionless when he returned her bow, and
Betty could not have guessed how consoled and comforted he was by it.
With great fortitude and self-denial he forbore to look in her direction
again, but he lingered at the table until the last moment that he might
watch her when she returned to the coach. Mr. Carrington entertained
ideals where women were concerned, and even though he had been the
one to profit by it he would not have had Betty depart in the minutest
particular from those stringent rules he laid down for her sex.
Consequently that distant air she bore toward him filled him with
satisfaction. It was quite enough for the present--for the present--that
three times each day his perseverance and determination were rewarded by
that curt little acknowledgment of her indebtedness to him.

It was four days to Richmond. Four days of hot, dusty travel, four
nights of uncomfortable cross-road stations, where Betty suffered
sleepless nights and the unaccustomed pangs of early rising. She
occasionally found herself wondering who Carrington was. She approved of
the manner in which he conducted himself. She liked a man who could be
unobtrusive. Traveling like that day after day it would have been so
easy for him to be officious. But he never addressed her and refused
to see any opportunity to assist her in entering or quitting the stage,
leaving that to some one else. Presently she was sorry she had bowed
to him that first day--so self-contained and unpresuming a person as he
would evidently have been quite satisfied to overlook the omission.
Then she began to be haunted by doubts. Perhaps, after all, he had not
recognized her as the girl he had met in the road! This gave her a very
queer feeling indeed--for what must he think of her? And the next time
she bowed to this perfect stranger she threw a chilling austerity into
the salutation quite at variance with her appearance, for the windy
drive had tangled her hair and blown it in curling wisps about her face.
This served to trouble Carrington excessively, and furnished him with
food for reflection through all his waking moments for the succeeding
eight and forty hours.

The next morning he found himself seated opposite her at breakfast. He
received another curt little nod, cool and distant, as he took his seat,
but he felt strongly that a mere bowing acquaintance would no longer
suffice; so he passed her a number of things she didn't want, and
presently ventured the opinion that she must find traveling as they
were, day after day, very fatiguing. Surprised at the sound of his
voice, before she knew what she was doing, Betty said, "Not at all,"
closed her red lips, and was immediately dumb.

Carrington at once relapsed into silence and ventured no further opinion
on any topic. Betty was left wondering whether she had been rude, and
when they met again asked if the stage would reach Washington at the
advertised hour. She had been consulting the copy of Badger's and
Porter's Register which Ferris had thrust into her satchel the morning
she left the Barony, and which, among a multiplicity of detail as to
hotels and taverns, gave the runnings of all the regular stage lines,
packets, canal-boats and steamers, by which one could travel over
the length and breadth of the land. "You stop in Washington?" said
Carrington.

Betty shook her head. "No, I am going on to Wheeling."

"You're fortunate in being so nearly home," he observed. "I am going on
to Memphis." He felt it was time she knew this, or else she might think
his movements were dictated by her own.

Betty exclaimed: "Why, I am going to Memphis, too!"

"Are you? By canal to Cumberland, and then by stage over the National
Road to Wheeling?"

Betty nodded. "It makes one wish they'd finish their railroads, doesn't
it? Do you suppose they'll ever get as far west as Memphis?" she said.

"They say it's going to be bad for the river trade when they're built
on something besides paper," answered Carrington. "And I happen to be a
flatboat-man, Miss Malroy."

Betty gave him a glance of surprise.

"Why, how did you learn my name?" she asked.

"Oh, I heard your friends speak it," he answered glibly. But Betty's
smooth brow was puckered thoughtfully. She wondered if he had--and if he
hadn't. It was very odd certainly that he should know it.

"So the railroads are going to hurt the steamboats?" she presently said.

"No, I didn't say that. I was thinking of the flatboats that have
already been hurt by the steamers," he replied. Now to the western mind
the river-men typified all that was reckless and wild. It was their
carousals that gave an evil repute to such towns as Natchez. But this
particular river-man looked harmless. "Carrington is my name, Miss
Malroy," he added.

No more was said just then, for Betty became reserved and he did not
attempt to resume the conversation. A day later they rumbled into
Washington, and as Betty descended from the coach, Carrington stepped to
her side.

"I suppose you'll stop here, Miss Malroy?" he said, indicating the
tavern before which the stage had come to a stand. "Yes," said Betty
briefly.

"If I can be of any service to you--" he began, with just a touch of
awkwardness in his manner.

"No, I thank you, Mr. Carrington," said Betty quickly.

"Good night... good-by," he turned away, and Betty saw his tall form
disappear in the twilight.



CHAPTER VII. THE FIGHT AT SLOSSON'S TAVERN


Murrell had ridden out of the hills some hours back. He now faced the
flashing splendors of a June sunset, but along the eastern horizon
the mountains rose against a somber sky. Night was creeping into their
fastnesses. Already there was twilight in those cool valleys lying
within the shadow of mighty hills. A month and more had elapsed since
Bob Yancy's trial. Just two days later man and boy disappeared from
Scratch Hill. This had served to rouse Murrell to the need of immediate
action, but he found, where Yancy was concerned, Scratch Hill could keep
a secret, while Crenshaw's mouth was closed on any word that might throw
light on the plans of his friend.

"It's plain to my mind, Captain, that Bladen will never get the boy.
I reckon Bob's gone into hiding with him," said the merchant, with
spacious candor.

The fugitives had not gone into hiding, however; they had traversed
the state from east to west, and Murrell was soon on their trail and
pressing forward in pursuit. Reaching the mountains, he heard of them
first as ten days ahead of him and bound for west Tennessee, the ten
days dwindled to a week, the week became five days, the five days three;
and now as he emerged from the last range of hills he caught sight of
them. They were half a mile distant perhaps, but he was certain that the
man and boy he saw pass about a turn in the road were the man and boy he
had been following for a month.

He was not mistaken. The man was Bob Yancy and the boy was Hannibal.
Yancy had acted with extraordinary decision. He had sold his few acres
at Scratch Hill for a lump sum to Crenshaw--it was to the latter's
credit that the transaction was one in which he could feel no real pride
as a man of business--and just a day later Yancy and the boy had
quitted Scratch Hill in the gray dawn, and turned their faces westward.
Tennessee had become their objective point, since here was a region to
which they could fix a name, while the rest of the world was strange to
them. As they passed the turn in the road where Murrell had caught
his first sight of them, Yancy glanced back at the blue wall of the
mountains where it lay along the horizon.

"Well, Nevvy," he said, "we've put a heap of distance between us and old
Scratch Hill; all I can say is, if there's as much the other side of
the Hill as there is this side, the world's a monstrous big place fo' to
ramble about in." He carried his rifle and a heavy pack. Hannibal had a
much smaller pack and his old sporting rifle, burdens of which his Uncle
Bob relieved him at brief intervals.

For the past ten days their journey had been conducted in a leisurely
fashion. As Yancy said, they were seeing the world, and it was well to
take a good look at it while they had a chance. He was no longer fearful
of pursuit and his temperament asserted itself--the minimum of activity
sufficed. Usually they camped just where the night overtook them; now
and then they varied this by lodging at some tavern, for since there
was money in his pocket, Yancy was disposed to spend it. He could not
conceive that it had any other possible use.

Suddenly out of the silence came the regular beat of hoofs. These grew
nearer and nearer, and at last when they were quite close, Yancy faced
about. He instantly recognized Murrell and dropped his rifle into the
crook of his arm. The act was instinctive, since there was no reason to
believe that the captain had the least interest in the boy. Smilingly
Murrell reined in his horse.

"Why--Bob Yancy!" he cried, in apparent astonishment.

"Yes, sir--Bob Yancy. Does it happen you are looking fo' him, Captain?"
inquired Yancy.

"No--no, Bob. I'm on my way West. Shake hands." His manner was frank and
winning, and Yancy met it with an equal frankness.

"Well, sir, me and my nevvy are glad to meet some one we've knowed
afore. The world are a lonesome place once you get shut of yo'r own
dooryard," he said. Murrell slipped from his saddle and fell into step
at Yancy's side as they moved forward.

"They were mightily stirred up at the Cross Roads when I left, wondering
what had come of you," he observed.

"When did you quit there?" asked Yancy.

"About a fortnight ago," said Murrell. "Every one approves of your
action in this matter, Yancy," he went on.

"That's kind of them," responded Yancy, a little dryly. There was no
reason for it, but he was becoming distrustful of Murrell, and uneasy.

"Bladen's hurt himself by the stand he's taken it this matter," Murrell
added.

They went forward in silence, Yancy brooding and suspicious. For the
last mile or so their way had led through an unbroken forest, but
a sudden turn in the road brought them to the edge of an extensive
clearing. Close to the road were several buildings, but not a tree had
been spared to shelter them and they stood forth starkly, the completing
touch to a civilization that was still in its youth, unkempt, rather
savage, and ruthlessly utilitarian. A sign, the work of inexpert hands,
announced the somewhat dingy structure of hewn logs that stood nearest
the roadside a tavern. There was a horse rack in front of it and a
trampled space. It was flanked by its several sheds and barns on one
hand and a woodpile on the other. Beyond the woodpile a rail fence
inclosed a corn-field, and beyond the barns and sheds a similar fence
defined the bounds of a stumpy pasture-lot.

From the door of the tavern the figure of a man emerged. Pausing by the
horse rack he surveyed the two men and boy, if not with indifference, at
least with apathy. Just above his head swung the sign with its legend,
"Slosson--Entertainment"; but if he were Slosson, one could take the last
half of the sign either as a poetic rhapsody on the part of the painter,
or the yielding to some meaningless convention, for in his person,
Mr. Slosson suggested none of those qualities of brain or heart that
trenched upon the lighter amenities of life. He was black-haired and
bull-necked, and there was about him a certain shagginess which a recent
toilet performed at the horse trough had not served to mitigate.

"Howdy?" he drawled.

"Howdy?" responded Mr. Yancy.

"Shall you stop here?" asked Murrell, sinking his voice. Yancy nodded.
"Can you put us up?" inquired Murrell, turning to the tavern-keeper.

"I reckon that's what I'm here for," said Slosson. Murrell glanced about
the empty yard. "Slack," observed Slosson languidly. "Yes, sir, slack's
the only name for it." It was understood he referred to the state of
trade. He looked from one to the other of the two men. As his eyes
rested on Murrell, that gentleman raised the first three fingers of
his right hand. The gesture was ever so little, yet it seemed to have a
tonic effect on Mr. Slosson. What might have developed into a smile had
he not immediately suppressed it, twisted his bearded lips as he made
an answering movement. "Eph, come here, you!" Slosson raised his voice.
This call brought a half-grown black boy from about a corner of the
tavern, to whom Murrell relinquished his horse.

"Let's liquor," said the captain over his shoulder, moving off in the
direction of the bar.

"Come on, Nevvy!" said Yancy following, and they all entered the tavern.

"Well, here's to the best of good luck!" said Murrell, as he raised his
glass to his lips.

"Same here," responded Yancy. Murrell pulled out a roll of bills, one of
which he tossed on the bar. Then after a moment's hesitation he detached
a second bill from the roll and turned to Hannibal.

"Here, youngster--a present for you;" he said good-naturedly. Hannibal,
embarrassed by the unexpected gift, edged to his Uncle Bob's side.

"Ain't you-all got nothing to say to the gentleman?" asked Yancy.

"Thank you, sir," said the boy.

"That sounds a heap better. Let's see--why, if it ain't ten
dollars--think of that!" said Yancy, in surprise.

"Let's have another drink," suggested Murrell.

Presently Hannibal stole out into the yard. He still held the bill in
his hand, for he did not quite know how to dispose of his great wealth.
After debating this matter for a moment he knotted it carefully in one
corner of his handkerchief. But this did not quite suit him, for he
untied the knot and looked at the bill again, turning it over and over
in his hand. Then he folded it carefully into the smallest possible
compass and once more tied a corner of his handkerchief about it, this
time with two knots instead of one; these he afterward tested with his
teeth.

"I 'low she won't come undone now!" he said, with satisfaction. He
stowed the handkerchief away in his trousers pocket, ramming it very
tight with his fist. He was much relieved when this was done, for
wearing a care-free air he sauntered across the yard and established
himself on the top rail of the corn-field fence.

The colored boy, armed with an ax, appeared at the woodpile and began to
chop in the desultory fashion of his race, pausing every few seconds to
stare in the direction of his white compatriot, who met his glance
with reserve. Whereupon Mr. Slosson's male domestic indulged in certain
strange antics that were not rightly any part of woodchopping. This yet
further repelled Hannibal.

"The disgustin' chattel!" he muttered under his breath, quoting his
Uncle Bob, with whom, in theory at least, race feeling was strong. Yancy
appeared at the door of the bar and called to him, and as the boy slid
from the fence and ran toward him across the yard, the Scratch Hiller
sauntered forth to meet him.

"I reckon it's all right, Nevvy," he said, "but we don't know nothing
about this here Captain Murrell--as he calls himself--though he seems a
right clever sort of gentleman; but we won't mention Belle Plain." With
this caution he led the way into the tavern and back through the bar to
a low-ceilinged room where Murrell and Slosson were already at table. It
was intolerably hot, and there lingered in the heavy atmosphere of the
place stale and unappetizing odors. Only Murrell attempted conversation
and he was not encouraged; and presently silence fell on the room
except for the rattle of dishes and the buzzing of flies. When they had
finished, the stale odors and the heat drove them quickly into the bar
again, where for a little time Hannibal sat on Yancy's knee, by the
door. Presently he slipped down and stole out into the yard.

The June night was pulsing with life. Above him bats darted in short
circling flights. In the corn-field and pasture-lot the fireflies lifted
from their day-long sleep, showing pale points of light in the half
darkness, while from some distant pond or stagnant watercourse came the
booming of frogs, presently to swell into a resonant chorus. These were
the summer night sounds he had known as far back as his memory went.

In the tavern the three men were drinking--Murrell with the idea that
the more Yancy came under the influence of Slosson's corn whisky the
easier his speculation would be managed. Mr. Yancy on his part believed
that if Murrell went to bed reasonably drunk he would sleep late and
give him the opportunity he coveted, to quit the tavern unobserved at
break of day. Gradually the ice of silence which had held them mute at
supper, thawed. At first it was the broken lazy speech of men who were
disposed to quiet, then the talk became brisk--a steady stream of rather
dreary gossip of horses and lands and negroes, of speculations past and
gone in these great staples.

Hannibal crossed to the corn-field. There, in the friendly gloom, he
examined his handkerchief and felt of the rolled-up bill. Then he made
count of certain silver and copper coins which he had in his other
pocket. Satisfied that he had sustained no loss, he again climbed to the
top rail of the fence where he seated himself with an elbow resting on
one knee and his chin in the palm of his hand.

"I got ten dollars and seventy cents--yes, sir--and the clostest
shooting rifle I ever tossed to my shoulder." He seemed but small to
have accomplished such a feat. He meditated for a little space. "I
reckon when we strike the settlements again I should like to buy my
Uncle Bob a present." With knitted brows he considered what this should
be, canvassing Yancy's needs. He had about decided on a ring such as
Captain Murrell was wearing, when he heard the shuffling of bare feet
over the ground and a voice spoke out of the darkness.

"When yo' get to feelin' like sleep, young boss, Mas'r Slosson he says I
show yo' to yo' chamber." It was Slosson's boy Eph.

"Did you-all happen to notice what they're doing in the tavern now?"
asked Hannibal.

"I low they're makin' a regular hog-killin' of it," said Eph smartly.
Hannibal descended from the fence.

"Yes, you can show me my chamber," he said, and his tone was severe.
What a white man did was not a matter for a black man to criticize. They
went toward the open door of the tavern. Mr. Slosson's corn whisky had
already wrought a marked transformation in the case of Slosson himself.
His usually terse speech was becoming diffuse and irrelevant, while
vacant laughter issued from his lips. Yancy was apparently unaffected
by the good cheer of which he had partaken, but Murrell's dark face
was flushed. The Scratch Hiller's ability to carry his liquor exceeded
anything he had anticipated.

"You-all run along to bed, Nevvy," said Yancy, as Hannibal entered the
room. "I'll mighty soon follow you."

Eph secured a tin candle-stick with a half-burnt candle in it and led
the way into the passage back of the bar.

"Mas'r Slosson's jus' mo' than layin' back!" he said, as he closed the
door after them.

"I reckon you-all will lay back, too, when you get growed up," retorted
Hannibal.

"No, sir, I won't. White folks won't let a nigger lay back. Onliest time
a nigger sees co'n whisky's when he's totin' it fo' some one else."

"I reckon a nigger's fool enough without corn whisky," said Hannibal.
They mounted a flight of stairs and passed down a narrow hall. This
brought them to the back of the building, and Eph pushed open the door
on his right.

"This heah's yo' chamber," he said, and preceding his companion into the
room, placed the candle on a chair.

"Well--I low I clean forgot something!" cried Hannibal.

"If it's yo' bundle and yo' gun, I done fotched 'em up heah and laid 'em
on yo' bed," said Eph, preparing' to withdraw.

"I certainly am obliged to you," said Hannibal, and with a good night,
Eph retired, closing the door after him, and the boy heard the patter of
his bare feet as he scuttled down the hall.

The moon was rising and Hannibal went to the open window and glanced
out. His room overlooked the back yard of the inn and a neglected truck
patch. Starting from a point beyond the truck patch and leading straight
away to the woodland beyond was a fenced lane, with the corn-field and
the pasture-lot on either hand. Immediately below his window was the
steeply slanting roof of a shed. For a moment he considered the night,
not unaffected by its beauty, then, turning from the window, he moved
his bundle and rifle to the foot of the bed, where they would be out of
his way, kicked off his trousers, blew out the candle and lay down. The
gossip of the men in the bar ran like a whisper through the house, and
with it came frequent bursts of noisy laughter. Listening for these
sounds the boy dozed off.

Yancy had become more and more convinced as the evening passed that
Murrell was bent on getting him drunk, and suspicion mounted darkly to
his brain. He felt certain that he was Bladen's agent. Now, Mr. Yancy
took an innocent pride in his ability to "cool off liquor." Perhaps it
was some heritage from a well living ancestry that had hardened its head
with Port and Madeira in the days when the Yancys owned their acres and
their slaves. Be that as it may, he was equal to the task he had set
himself. He saw with satisfaction the flush mount to Murrell's swarthy
cheeks, and felt that the limit of his capacity was being reached.
Mr. Slosson had become a sort of Greek chorus. He anticipated all the
possible phases of drunkenness that awaited his companions. He went from
silence to noisy mirth, when his unmeaning laughter rang through the
house; he told long witless stories as he leaned against the bar; he
became melancholy and described the loss of his wife five years before.
From melancholy he passed to sullenness and seemed ready to fasten a
quarrel on Yancy, but the latter deftly evaded any such issue.

"What you-all want is another drink," he said affably. "With all you
been through you need a tonic, so shove along that extract of cornshucks
and molasses!"

"I'm a rip-staver," said Slosson thickly. "But I've knowed enough sorrow
to kill a horse."

"You have that look. Captain, will you join us?" asked Yancy. Murrell
shook his head, but he made a significant gesture to Slosson as Yancy
drained his glass.

"Have a drink with me!" cried Slosson, giving way to drunken laughter.

"Don't you reckon you'll spite yo' appetite fo' breakfast, neighbor?"
suggested Yancy.

"Do you mean you won't drink with me?" roared Slosson.

"The captain's dropped out and I 'low it's about time fo' these here
festivities to come to an end. I'm thinking some of going to bed
myself," said Yancy. He kept his eyes fixed on Murrell. He realized
that if the latter could prevent it he was not to leave the bar. Murrell
stood between him and the door; more than this, he stood between him and
his rifle, which leaned against the wall in the far corner of the room.
Slosson roared out a protest to his words. "That's all right, neighbor,"
retorted Yancy over his shoulder, "but I'm going to bed." He never
shifted his glance from Murrell's face. Scowling now, the captain's eyes
blazed back their challenge as he thrust his right hand under his coat.
"Fair play--I don't know who you are, but I know what you want!" said
Yancy, the light in his frank gray eyes deepening. Murrell laughed and
took a forward step. At the same moment Slosson snatched up a heavy club
from back of the bar and dealt Yancy a murderous blow. A single startled
cry escaped the Scratch Hitler; he struck out wildly as he lurched
toward Murrell, who drew his knife and drove it into his shoulder.

Groping wildly, Yancy reached his rifle and faced about. His scalp
lay open where Slosson's treacherous blow had fallen and his face was
covered with blood; even as his fingers stiffened they found the hammer,
but Murrell, springing forward, kicked the gun out of his hands. Dashing
the blood from his eyes, Yancy threw himself on Murrell. Then, as
they staggered to and fro, Yancy dully bent on strangling his enemy,
Slosson--whom the sight of blood had wonderfully sobered--rushed out
from the bar and let loose a perfect torrent of blows with his club.
Murrell felt the fingers that gripped him grow weak, and Yancy dropped
heavily to the floor.


How long the boy slept he never knew, but he awoke with a start and a
confused sense of things. He seemed to have heard a cry for help. But
the tavern was very silent now. The distant murmur of voices and the
shouts of laughter had ceased. He lifted himself up on his elbow
and glanced from the window. The heavens were pale and gray. It was
evidently very late, probably long after midnight but where was his
Uncle Bob?

He sank back on his pillow intent and listening. What he had heard, what
he still expected to hear, he could not have told, but he was sure he
had been roused by a cry of some sort. A chilling terror that gripped
him fast and would not let him go, mounted to his brain. Once he thought
he heard cautious steps beyond his door. He could not be certain, yet
he imagined the bull-necked landlord standing with his ear to some crack
seeking to determine whether or not he slept. His thin little body grew
rigid and a cold sweat started from him. He momentarily expected the
latch to be lifted, then in the heavy silence he caught the sound of
some stealthy movement beyond the lath and plaster partition, and an
instant later an audible footfall. He heard the boards creak and give,
as the person who had been standing before his door passed down the
hall, down the stairs, and to the floor below.

Limp and shivering, he drew his scanty covering tight about him. In the
silence that succeeded, he once more became aware of the tireless
chorus of the frogs, the hooting of the owls, and the melancholy and
oft-repeated call of the whippoorwill. But where was his Uncle Bob? Why
didn't he come to bed? And whose was that cry for help he had heard?
Memories of idle tales of men foully dealt with in these lonely taverns,
of murderous landlords, and mysterious guests who were in league with
them, flashed through his mind.

Murrell had followed them for this--and had killed his Uncle Bob, and
he would be sent back to Bladen! The law had said that Bladen could
have him and that his Uncle Bob must give him up. The law put men in
prison--it hanged them sometimes--his Uncle Bob had told him all about
it--by the neck with ropes until they were dead! Maybe they wouldn't
send him back; maybe they would do with him what they had already done
with his Uncle Bob; he wanted the open air, the earth under his feet,
and the sky over his head. The four walls stifled him. He was not afraid
of the night, he could run and hide in it--there were the woods and
fields where he would be safe.

He slid from the bed, and for a long moment stood cold and shaking, his
every sense on the alert. With infinite caution he got into his trousers
and again paused to listen, since he feared his least movement might
betray him. Reassured, he picked up his battered hat from the floor and
inch by inch crept across the squeaking boards to the window. When the
window was reached he paused once more to listen, but the quiet that was
everywhere throughout the house gave him confidence. He straddled the
low sill, and putting out his hand gripped the stock of his rifle and
drew that ancient weapon toward him. Next he secured his pack, and was
ready for flight.

Encumbered by his belongings, but with no mind to sacrifice them, he
stepped out upon the shed and made his way down the slant of the roof
to the eaves. He tossed his bundle to the ground and going down on his
knees lowered his rifle, letting the muzzle fall lightly against the
side of the shed as it left his hand, then he lay flat on his stomach
and, feet first, wriggled out into space. When he could no longer
preserve his balance, he gave himself a shove away from the eaves and
dropped clear of the building.

As he recovered himself he was sure he heard a door open and close, and
threw himself prone on the ground, where the black shadow cast by the
tavern hid him. At the same moment two dark figures came from about a
corner of the building. He could just distinguish that they carried
some heavy burden between them and that they staggered as they moved.
He heard Slosson curse drunkenly, and a whispered word from Murrell. The
two men slowly crossed the truck patch, and the boy's glance followed
them, his eyes starting from his head. Just at the mouth of the lane
they paused and put down their burden; a few words spoken in a whisper
passed between them and they began to drag some dark thing down the
lane, their backs bent, their heads bowed and the thing they dragged
bumping over the uneven ground.

They passed out of sight, and breathless and palsied, Hannibal crept
about a corner of the tavern. He must be sure! The door of the bar stood
open; the lamps were still burning, and the upturned chairs and a broken
table told of the struggle that had taken place there. The boy rested
his hand on the top step as he stared fearfully into the room. His palm
came away with a great crimson splotch. But he was not satisfied yet.
He must be sure--sure! He passed around the building as the men had
done and crossed the truck patch to the mouth of the lane. Here he slid
through the fence into the corn-field, and, well sheltered, worked his
way down the rows. Presently he heard a distant sound--a splash--surely
it was a splash--.

A little later the men came up the lane, to disappear in the direction
of the tavern. Hannibal peered after them. His very terrors, while they
wrenched and tortured him, gave him a desperate kind of courage. As
the gloom hid the two men, he started forward again; he must know the
meaning of that sound--that splash, if it was a splash. He reached the
end of the cornfield, climbed the fence, and entered a deadening of
slashed and mutilated timber. In the long wet grass he found where the
men had dragged their burden. He reached down and swept his hand to
and fro--once--twice--the third time his little palm came away red and
discolored.

There was the first pale premonition of dawn in the sky, and as he
hurried on the light grew, and the black trunks of trees detached
themselves from the white mist that filled the woods and which the
dawn made visible. There was light enough for him to see that he was
following the trail left by the men; he could distinguish where the dew
had been brushed from the long grass. Advancing still farther, he heard
the clear splash of running water, an audible ripple that mounted into
a silver cadence. Day was breaking now. The lifeless gray along the
eastern horizon had changed to orange. Still following the trail, he
emerged upon the bank of the Elk River, white like the woods with its
ghostly night sweat.

The dull beat of the child's heart quickened as he gazed out on the
swift current that was hurrying on with its dreadful secret. Then
the full comprehension of his loss seemed to overwhelm him and he was
utterly desolate. Sobs shook him, and he dropped on his knees, holding
fast to the stock of his rifle.

"Uncle Bob--Uncle Bob, come back! Can't you come back!" he wailed
miserably. Presently he staggered to his feet. Convulsive sobs still
wrenched his little body. What was he to do? Those men--his Uncle Bob's
murderers--would go to his room; they would find his empty bed and their
search for him would begin! Not for anything would he have gone back
through the corn-field or the lane to the road. He had the courage to
go forward, but not to retrace his steps; and the river, deep and
swift, barred his path. As he glanced about, he saw almost at his feet a
dug-out, made from a single poplar log. It was secured to an overhanging
branch by a length of wild grape-vine. With one last fearful look off
across the deadening in the direction of the tavern, he crept down to
the water's edge and entered the canoe. In a moment, he had it free from
its lashing and the rude craft was bumping along the bank in spite of
his best efforts with the paddle. Then a favoring current caught it and
swept it out toward the center of the stream.

It was much too big and clumsy for him to control without the stream's
help, though he labored doggedly with his paddle. Now he was broadside
to the current, now he was being spun round and round, but always he
was carried farther and farther from the spot where he had embarked. He
passed about a bend; and a hundred yards beyond, about a second bend;
then the stream opened up straight before him a half-mile of smooth
running water. Far down it, at the point where the trees met in the
unbroken line of the forest and the water seemed to vanish mysteriously,
he could distinguish a black moving object; some ark or raft, doubtless.

In the smoother water of the long reach, Hannibal began to make head
against the flood. The farther shore became the nearer, and finally he
drove the bow of his canoe up on a bit of shelving bank, and seizing
his pack and rifle, sprang ashore. Panting and exhausted, he paused just
long enough to push the canoe out into the stream again, and then, with
his rifle and pack in his hands, turned his small tear-stained face
toward the wooded slope beyond. As he toiled up it in the wide silence
of the dawn, a mournful wind burst out of the north, filling the air
about him with withered leaves and the dead branches of trees.




CHAPTER VIII. ON THE RIVER


Betty stood under a dripping umbrella in the midst of a drenching
downpour, her boxes and trunks forming a neat pyramid of respectable
size beside her. She was somewhat perturbed in spirit, since they
contained much elaborate finery all in the very latest eastern fashion,
spoils that were the fruit of a heated correspondence with Tom, who
hadn't seemed at all alive to the fact that Betty was nearly eighteen
and in her own right a young woman of property. A tarpaulin had been
thrown over the heap, and with one eye on it and the other on the
stretch of yellow canal up which they were bringing the fast packet
Pioneer, she was waiting impatiently to see her belongings transferred
to a place of safety.

Just arrived by the four-horse coach that plyed regularly between
Washington and Georgetown, she had found the long board platform beside
the canal crowded with her fellow passengers, their number augmented
by those who delight to share vicariously in travel and to whom the
departure of a stage or boat was a matter of urgent interest requiring
their presence, rain or shine. Suddenly she became aware of a tall,
familiar figure moving through the crowd. It was Bruce Carrington. At
the same moment he saw her, and with a casual air that quite deceived
her, approached; and Betty, who had been feeling very lonely and very
homesick, was somehow instantly comforted at sight of him. She welcomed
him almost as a friend.

"You're leaving to-night?" he asked.

"Yes--isn't it miserable the way it rains? And why are they so slow--why
don't they hurry with that boat?"

"It's in the last lock now," explained Carrington.

"My clothes will all be ruined," said Betty. He regarded the dress she
wore with instant concern. "No--I mean the things in my trunks; this
doesn't matter," and Betty nodded toward the pile under the steaming
tarpaulin. Carrington's dark eyes opened with an expression of mild
wonder. And so those trunks were full of clothes--Oh, Lord!--he looked
down at the flushed, impatient face beside him with amusement.

"I'll see that they are taken care of," he said, for the boat was
alongside the platform now; and gathering up Betty's hand luggage, he
helped her aboard.

By the time they had reached Wheeling, Betty had quite parted with
whatever superficial prejudice she might have had concerning river-men.
This particular one was evidently a very nice river-man, an exception
to his kind. She permitted him to assume the burden of her plans, and
no longer scanned the pages of her Badger's and Porter's with a puckered
brow. It reposed at the bottom of her satchel. He made choice of the
steamer on which she should continue her journey, and thoughtfully chose
The Naiad--a slow boat, with no reputation for speed to sustain. It
meant two or three days longer on the river, but what of that? There
would be no temptation in the engine-room to attach a casual wrench or
so to the safety-valve as an offset to the builder's lack of confidence
in his own boilers. He saw to it that her state-room was well
aft--steamers had a trick of blowing up forward.

Ne had now reached a state of the utmost satisfaction with himself and
the situation. Betty was friendly and charming. He walked with her, and
he talked with her by the hour; and always he was being entangled deeper
and deeper in the web of her attraction. "When alone he would pace the
deck recalling every word she had spoken. There was that little air
of high breeding which was Betty's that fascinated him. He had known
something of the other sort, those who had arrived at prosperity with
manners and speech that still reflected the meaner condition from which
they had risen.

"I haven't a thing to offer her--this is plain madness of mine!" he kept
telling himself, and then the expression of his face would become grim
and determined. No more of the river for him--he'd get hold of some land
and go to raising cotton; that was the way money was made.

Slow as The Naiad was, the days passed much too swiftly for him. When
Memphis was reached their friendly intercourse would come to an end.
There would be her brother, of whom she had occasionally spoken--he
would be pretty certain to have the ideas of his class.

As for Betty, she liked this tall fellow who helped her through the
fatigue of those long days, when there was only the unbroken sweep of
the forest on either hand, with here and there a clearing where some
outrageous soul was making a home for himself. The shores became duller,
wilder, more uninteresting as they advanced, and then at last they
entered the Mississippi, and she was almost home.

Betty was not unexcited by the prospect. She would be the mistress of
the most splendid place in West Tennessee. She secretly aspired to be a
brilliant hostess. She could remember when the doors of Belle Plain
were open to whoever had the least claim to distinction--statesmen
and speculators in land; men who were promoting those great schemes of
improvement, canals and railroads; hard-featured heroes of the two
wars with England--a diminishing group; the men of the modern army, the
pathfinders, and Indian fighters, and sometimes a titled foreigner. She
wondered if Tom had maintained the traditions of the place. She found
that Carrington had heard of Belle Plain. He spoke of it with respect,
but with a noticeable lack of enthusiasm, for how could he feel
enthusiasm when he must begin his chase after fortune with bare
hands?--he suffered acutely whenever it was mentioned. The days, like
any other days, dwindled. The end of it all was close at hand. Another
twenty-four hours and Carrington reflected there would only be good-by
to say.

"We will reach New Madrid to-night," he told her. They were watching the
river, under a flood of yellow moonlight.

"And then just another day--Oh, I can hardly wait!" cried Betty
delightedly. "Soon I shall hope to see you at Belle Plain, Mr.
Carrington," she added graciously.

"Thank you, your--your family--" he hesitated.

"There's only just Tom--he's my half-brother. My mother was left a widow
when I was a baby. Later, some years after, she married Tom's father."

"Oh--then he's not even your half-brother?"

"He's no relation at all--and much older. When Tom's father died my
mother made Tom, manager, and still later he was appointed my guardian."

"Then you own Belle Plain?" and Carrington sighed.

"Yes. You have never seen it?--it's right on the river, you know?" then
Betty's face grew sober: "Tom's dreadfully queer--I expect he'll require
a lot of managing!"

"I reckon you'll be equal to that!" said-Carrington, convinced of
Betty's all-compelling charm.

"No, I'm not at all certain about Tom--I can see where we shall have
serious differences; but then, I shan't have to struggle single-handed
with him long; a cousin of my mother's is coming to Belle Plain to
make her home with me--she'll make' him behave," and Betty laughed
maliciously. "It's a great nuisance being a girl!"

Then Betty fell to watching for the lights at New Madrid, her elbows
resting on the rail against which she was leaning, and the soft curve
of her chin sunk in the palms of her hands. She wondered absently what
Judith would have said of this river-man. She smiled a little dubiously.
Judith had certainly vindicated the sincerity of her convictions
regarding the importance of family, inasmuch as in marrying Ferris she
had married her own second cousin. She nestled her chin a little closer
in her palms. She remembered that they had differed seriously over Mr.
Yancy's defiance, of the law as it was supposed to be lodged in the
sacred person of Mr. Bladen's agent, the unfortunate Blount. Carrington,
with his back against a stanchion, watched her discontentedly.

"You'll be mighty glad to have this over with, Miss Malroy--" he said at
length, with a comprehensive sweep toward the river.

"Yes--shan't you?" and she opened her eyes questioningly.

"No," said Carrington with a short laugh, drawing a chair near hers and
sitting down.

Betty, in surprise, gave him a quick look, and then as quickly glanced
away from what she encountered in his eyes. Men were accustomed to talk
sentiment to her, but she had hoped--well, she really had thought that
he was, superior to this weakness. She had enjoyed the feeling that here
was some one, big and strong and thoroughly masculine, with whom she
could be friendly without--she took another look at him from under the
fringe of her long lashes. He was so nice and considerate--and good
looking--he was undeniably this last. It would be a pity! And she had
already determined that Tom should invite him to Belle Plain. She didn't
mind if he was a river-man--they could be friends, for clearly he was
such an exception. Tom should be cordial to him. Betty stared before
her, intently watching the river. As she looked, suddenly pale points of
light appeared on a distant headland.

"Is that New Madrid?--Oh, is it, Mr. Carrington?"' she cried eagerly.

"I reckon so," but he did not alter his position.

"But you're not looking!"

"Yes, I am--I'm looking at you. I reckon you'll think me crazy, Miss
Malroy-presumptuous and all that but I wish Memphis could be wiped off
the map and that we could go on like this for ever!--no, not like this
but together--you and I," he took a deep breath. Betty drew a little
farther away, and looked at him reproachfully; and then she turned to
the dancing lights far down the river. Finally she said slowly:

"I thought you were--different."

"I'm not," and Carrington's hand covered hers.

"Oh--you mustn't kiss my hand like that--"

"Dear--I'm just a man--and you didn't expect, did you, that I could see
you this way day after day and not come to love you?" He rested his arm
across the back of her chair and leaned toward her.

"No--no--" and Betty moved still farther away.

"Give me a chance to win your love, Betty!"

"You mustn't talk so--I am nothing to you--"

"Yes, you are. You're everything to me," said Carrington doggedly.

"I'm not--I won't be!" and Betty stamped her foot.

"You can't help it. I love you and that's all there is about it. I
know I'm a fool to tell you now, Betty, but years wouldn't make any
difference in my feeling; and I can't have you go, and perhaps never
see you again, if I can help it. Betty--give me a chance--you don't hate
me--"

"But I do--yes, I do--indeed--"

"I know you don't. Let me see you again and do what I can to make you
care for me!" he implored. But he had a very indignant little aristocrat
to deal with. She was angry with him, and angry with herself that in
spite of herself his words moved her. She wouldn't have it so! Why,
he wasn't even of her class--her kind! "Betty, you don't mean--" he
faltered.

"I mean--I am extremely annoyed. I mean just what I say." Betty regarded
him with wrathful blue eyes. It proved too much for Carrington. His arm,
dropped about her shoulders.

"You shall love me--" She was powerless in his embrace. She felt his
breath on her cheek, then he kissed her. Breathless and crimson, she
struggled and pushed him from her. Suddenly his arms fell at his side;
his face was white. "I was a brute to do that!--Betty, forgive me! I am
sorry--no, I can't be sorry!"'

"How do you dare! I hope I may never see you again--I hate you--" said
Betty furiously, tears in her eyes and her pulses still throbbing from
his fierce caress.

"Do you mean that?" he asked slowly, rising.

"Yes--yes--a million times, yes!"

"I don't believe you--I can't--I won't!" They were alongside the New
Madrid wharf now, and a certain young man who had been impatiently
watching The Naiad's lights ever since they became visible crossed the
gang-plank with a bound.

"Betty--why in the name of goodness did you ever, choose this
tub?--everything on the river has passed it!" said the newcomer. Betty
started up with a little cry of surprise and pleasure.

"Charley!"

Carrington stepped back. This must be the brother who had come up the
river from Memphis to meet her--but her brother's name was Tom! He
looked this stranger--this Charley--over with a hostile eye, offended by
his good looks, his confident manner, in which he thought he detected an
air of ownership, as if--certainly he was holding her hands longer
than was necessary! Of course, other men were in love with her, such
a radiant personality held its potent attraction for men, but for all
that, she was going to belong to him--Carrington! She did like him; she
had shown it in a hundred little ways during the last week, and he would
give her up to no man--give her up?--there wasn't the least tie between
them--except that kiss--and she was furious because of it. There was
nothing for him to do but efface himself. He would go now, before the
boat started--and an instant later, when Betty, remembering, turned to
speak to him, his place by the rail was deserted.




CHAPTER IX. JUDGE SLOCUM PRICE


On that day Hannibal was haunted by the memory of what he had heard and
seen at Slosson's tavern. More than this, there was his terrible sense
of loss, and the grief he could not master, when his thin, little body
was shaken by sobs. Marking the course of the road westward, he clung
to the woods, where his movements were as stealthy as the very
shadows themselves. He shunned the scattered farms and the infrequent
settlements, for the fear was strong with him that he might be followed
either by Murrell or Slosson. But as the dusk of evening crept across
the land, the great woods, now peopled by strange shadows, sent him
forth into the highroad. He was beginning to be very tired, and hunger
smote him with fierce pangs, but back of it all was his sense of bitter
loss, his desolation, and his loneliness.

"I couldn't forget Uncle Bob if I tried--" he told himself, with
quivering lips, as he limped wearily along the dusty road, and the
tears welled up and streaked his pinched face. Now before him he saw
the scattered lights of a settlement. All his terrors, the terrors that
grouped themselves about the idea of pursuit and capture, rushed back
upon him, and in a panic he plunged into the black woods again.

But the distant lights intensified his loneliness. He had lived a whole
day without food, a whole day without speech. He began to skirt the
settlement, keeping well within the thick gloom of the woods, and
presently, as he stumbled forward, he came to a small clearing in the
center of which stood a log dwelling. The place seemed deserted. There
was no sign of life, no light shone from the window, no smoke issued
from the stick-and-mud chimney.

Tilted back in a chair by the door of this house a man was sleeping. The
hoot of an owl from a near-by oak roused him. He yawned and stretched
himself, thrusting out his fat legs and extending his great arms. Then
becoming aware of the small figure which had stolen up the path as
he slept and now stood before him in the uncertain light, he fell to
rubbing his eyes with the knuckles of his plump hands. The pale night
mist out of the silent depths of the forest had assumed shapes as
strange.

"Who are you?" he demanded, and his voice rumbled thickly forth from his
capacious chest. The very sound was sleek and unctuous.

"I'm Hannibal," said the small figure. He was meditating flight; he
glanced over his shoulder toward the woods.

"No, you ain't. He's been dead a thousand years, more or less. Try
again," recommended the man.

"I'm Hannibal Wayne Hazard," said the boy. The man quitted his chair.

"Well--I am glad to know you, Hannibal Wayne Hazard. I am Slocum
Price--Judge Slocum Price, sometime major-general of militia and
ex-member of congress, to mention a few of those honors my fellow
countrymen have thrust upon me." He made a sweeping gesture with his two
hands outspread and bowed ponderously.

The boy saw a man of sixty, whose gross and battered visage told its own
story. There was a sparse white frost about his ears; and his eyes,
pale blue and prominent, looked out from under beetling brows. He wore
a shabby plum-colored coat and tight, drab breeches. About his fat neck
was a black stock, with just a suggestion of soiled linen showing above
it. His figure was corpulent and unwieldy.

The man saw a boy of perhaps ten, barefoot, and clothed in homespun
shirt and trousers. On his head was a ruinous hat much too large for
him, but which in some mysterious manner he contrived to keep from quite
engulfing his small features, which were swollen and tear-stained. In
his right hand he carried a bundle, while his left clutched the brown
barrel of a long rifle.

"You don't belong in these parts, do you?" asked the judge, when he had
completed his scrutiny.

"No, sir," answered the boy. He glanced off down the road, where lights
were visible among the trees. "What town is that?" he added.

"Pleasantville--which is a lie--but I am neither sufficiently drunk nor
sufficiently sober to cope with the possibilities your question offers.
It is a task one should approach only after extraordinary preparation,"
and the sometime major-general of militia grinned benevolently.

"It's a town, ain't it?" asked Hannibal doubtfully. He scarcely
understood this large, smiling gentleman who was so civilly given to
speech with him, yet strangely enough he was not afraid of him, and his
whole soul craved human companionship.

"It's got a name--but you'll excuse me, I'd much prefer not to tell you
how I regard it--you're too young to hear. But stop a bit--have you so
much as fifty cents about you?" and the judge's eyes narrowed to a slit
above their folds of puffy flesh. Hannibal, keeping his glance fixed
on the man's face, fell back a step. "I can't let you go if you are
penniless--I can't do that!" cried the judge, with sudden vehemence.
"You shall be my guest for the night. They're a pack of thieves at the
tavern," he lowered his voice. "I know 'em, for they've plucked me!" To
make sure of his prey, he rested a fat hand on the boy's shoulder
and drew him gently but firmly into the shanty. As they crossed the
threshold he kicked the door shut, then with flint and steel he made a
light, and presently a candle was sputtering in his hands. He fitted
it into the neck of a tall bottle, and as the light flared up the boy
glanced about him.

The interior was mean enough, with its rough walls, dirt floor and
black, cavernous fireplace. A rude clapboard table did duty as a desk,
a fact made plain by a horn ink-well, a notary's seal, and a rack with a
half-dozen quill pens. Above the desk was a shelf of books in worn calf
bindings, and before it a rickety chair. A shakedown bed in one corner
of the room was tastefully screened from the public gaze by a tattered
quilt.

"Boy, don't be afraid. Look on me as a friend," urged the judge, who
towered above him in the dim candle-light. "Here's comfort without
ostentation. Don't tell me you prefer the tavern, with its corrupt
associations!" Hannibal was silent, and the judge, after a brief moment
of irresolution, threw open the door. Then he bent toward the small
stranger, bringing his face close to the child's, while his thick lips
wreathed themselves in a smile ingratiatingly genial. "You can't look
me squarely in the eye and say you prefer the tavern to these scholarly
surroundings?" he said banteringly.

"I reckon I'll be glad to stop," answered Hannibal. The judge clapped
him playfully on the back.

"Such confidence is inspiring! Make yourself perfectly at home. Are you
hungry?"

"Yes, sir. I ain't had much to eat to-day," replied Hannibal cautiously.

"I can offer you food then. What do you say to cold fish?" the judge
smacked his lips to impart a relish to the idea. "I dare swear I can
find you some corn bread into the bargain. Tea I haven't got. On the
advice of my physician, I don't use it. What do you say--shall we light
a fire and warm the fish?"

"I 'low I could eat it cold."

"No trouble in the world to start a fire. All we got to do is to go out,
and pull a few palings off the fence," urged the judge.

"It will do all right just like it is," said Hannibal.

"Very good, then!" cried the judge gaily, and he began to assemble
the dainties he had enumerated. "Here you are!" he cleared his throat
impressively, while benignity shone from every feature of his face. "A
moment since you allowed me to think that you were solvent to the
extent of fifty cents--" Hannibal looked puzzled. The judge dealt him a
friendly blow on the back, then stood off and regarded him with a glance
of great jocularity, his plump knuckles on his hips and his arms akimbo.
"I wonder"--and his eyes assumed a speculative squint "I wonder if you
could be induced to make a temporary loan of that fifty cents? The sum
involved is really such a ridiculous trifle I don't need to point out
to you the absolute moral certainty of my returning it at an early
date--say to-morrow morning; say to-morrow afternoon at the latest; say
even the day after at the very outside. Meantime, you shall be my
guest. The landlady's son has found my notarial seal an admirable
plaything--she has had to lick the little devil twice for hooking
it--my pens and stationery are at your disposal, should you desire to
communicate to absent friends; you can have the run of my library!" the
judge fairly trembled in his eagerness. It was not the loss of his money
that Hannibal most feared, and the coin passed from his possession into
his host's custody. As it dropped into the latter's great palm he was
visibly moved. His moist, blue eyes became yet more watery, while
his battered old face assumed an expression indicating deep inward
satisfaction. "Thank you, my boy! This is one of those intrinsically
trifling benefits which, conferred at the moment of acute need, touch
the heart and tap the unfailing springs of human gratitude--I must step
down to the tavern--when I return, please God, we shall know more of
each other." While he was still speaking he had produced a jug from
behind the quilt that screened his bed, and now, bareheaded, and with
every indication of haste, took himself off into the night.

Left alone, Hannibal gravely seated himself at the table. What the
judge's larder lacked in variety it more than made up for in quantity,
and the boy was grateful for this fact. He was half famished, and
the coarse, abundant food was of the sort to which he was accustomed.
Presently he heard the judge's heavy, shuffling step as he came up the
path from the road, and a moment later his gross bulk of body filled the
doorway. Breathing hard and perspiring, the judge entered the shanty,
but his eagerness, together with his shortness of breath, kept him
silent until he had established himself in his chair beside the table,
with the jug and a cracked glass at his elbow. Then, bland and smiling,
he turned toward his guest.

"Will you join me?" he asked.

"No, sir. Please, I'd rather not," said Hannibal.

"Do you mean that you don't like good liquor?" demanded the judge. "Not
even with sugar and a dash of water?--say, now, don't you like it that
way, my boy?"

"I ain't learned to like it no ways," said Hannibal.

"You amaze me--well--well--the greater the joy to which you may
reasonably aspire. The splendid possibilities of youth are yours. My
tenderest regards, Hannibal!" and he nodded over the rim of the cracked
glass his shaking hand had carried to his lips. Twice the glass was
filled and emptied, and then again, his roving, watery eyes rested
meditatively on the child, who sat very erect in his chair, with his
brown hands crossed in his lap. "Personally, I can drink or not,"
explained the judge. "But I hope I am too much a man of the world to
indulge in any intemperate display of principle." He proved the first
clause of his proposition by again filling and emptying his glass. "Have
you a father?" he asked suddenly. Hannibal shook his head. "A mother?"
demanded the judge.

"They both of them done died years and years ago," answered the boy.
"I can't tell you how long back it was, but I reckon I don't know much
about it. I must have been a small child."

"Ho--a small child!" cried the judge, laughing. He cocked his head
on one side and surveyed Hannibal Wayne Hazard with a glance of comic
seriousness. "A small child and in God's name what do you call yourself
now? To hear you talk one would think you had dabbled your feet in the
Flood!"

"I'm most ten," said Hannibal, with dignity.

"I can well believe it," responded the judge. "And with this weight of
years, where did you come from and how did you get here?"

"From across the mountains."

"Alone?"

"No, sir. Mr. Yancy fetched me--part way." The boy's voice broke when he
spoke his Uncle Bob's name, and his eyes swam with tears, but the judge
did not notice this.

"And where are you going?"

"To West Tennessee."

"Have you any friends there?"

"Yes, sir."

"You've money enough to see you through?" and what the judge intended
for a smile of fatherly affection became a leer of infinite cunning.

"I got ten dollars."

"Ten dollars--" the judge smacked his lips once. "Ten dollars" he
repeated, and smacked his lips twice. There was a brief silence, in
which he seemed to give way to pleasant reveries.

From beyond the open door of the shanty came a multitude of night
sounds. The moon had risen, and what had been a dusty country road was
now a streak of silver in the hot light. The purple flush on the judge's
face, where the dignity that belonged to age had gone down in wreck,
deepened. The sparse, white frost above his ears was damp with sweat.
He removed his stock, opened his shirt at the neck, and cast aside his
coat; then he lighted a blackened pipe, filled his glass, and sank back
in his chair. The long hours of darkness were all before him, and his
senses clothed themselves in rich content. Once more his glance rested
on the boy. Here, indeed, was a guest of whom one might make much and
not err--he felt all the benevolence of his nature flow toward him. Ten
dollars!

"Certainly the tavern would have been no place for you! Well, thank God,
it wasn't necessary for you to go there. You are more than welcome here.
I tell you, when you know this place as I know it, you'll regard every
living soul here with suspicion. Keep 'em at arm's length!" he sank his
voice to an impressive whisper. "In particular, I warn you against a
certain Solomon Mahaffy. You'll see much of him; I haven't known how to
rebuff the fellow without being rude--he sticks to me like my shadow.
He's profited by my charity and he admires my conversation and affects
my society, but don't tell him you have so much as a rusty copper, for
he will neither rest nor eat nor sleep until he's plucked you--tell him
nothing--leave him to me. I keep him--there--" the judge extended his
fat hands, "at arm's length. I say to him metaphorically speaking--'so
close, but no closer. I'll visit you when sick, I'll pray with you when
dying, I'll chat with you, I'll eat with you, I'll smoke with you,
and if need be, I'll drink with you--but be your intimate? Never! Why?
Because be's a damned Yankee! These are the inextinguishable feelings
of a gentleman. I am aware they are out of place in this age, but
what's bred in the bone will show in the flesh. Who says it won't, is
no gentleman himself and a liar as well! My place in the world was
determined two or three hundred years ago, and my ancestors spat on such
cattle as Mahaffy and they were flattered by the attention!" The judge,
powerfully excited by his denunciation of the unfortunate Mahaffy,
quitted his chair and, lurching somewhat as he did so, began to pace the
floor.

"Take me for your example, boy! You may be poor, you may possibly be
hungry you'll often be thirsty, but through it all you will remain that
splendid thing--a gentleman! Lands, niggers, riches, luxury, I've had
'em all; I've sucked the good of 'em; they've colored my blood, they've
gone into the fiber of my brain and body. Perhaps you'll contend that
the old order is overthrown, that family has gone to the devil? You are
right, and there's the pity of it! Where are the great names? A race
of upstarts has taken their place--sons of nobody--nephews of
nobody--cousins of nobody--I observe only deterioration in the trend of
modern life. The social fabric is tottering--I can see it totter--" and
he tottered himself as he said this.

The boy had watched him out of wide eyes, as ponderous and unwieldy he
shuffled back and forth in the dim candlelight; now shaking his head and
muttering, the judge dropped into his chair.

"Well, I'm an old man-the spectacle won't long offend me. I'll die
presently. The Bench and Bar will review my services to the country, the
militia will fire a few volleys at my graveside, here and there a flag
will be at half-mast, and that will be the end--" He was so profoundly
moved by the thought that he could not go on. His voice broke, and he
buried his face in his arms. A sympathetic moisture had gathered in
the child's eyes. He understood only a small part of what his host was
saying, but realized that it had to do with death, and he had his own
terrible acquaintance with death. He slipped from his chair and stole
to the judge's side, and that gentleman felt a cool hand rest lightly on
his arm.

"What?" he said, glancing up.

"I'm mighty sorry you're going to die," said the boy softly.

"Bless you, Hannibal!" cried the judge, looking wonderfully cheerful,
despite his recent bitterness of spirit. "I'm not experiencing any of
the pangs of mortality now. My dissolution ain't a matter of to-night
or to-morrow--there's some life in Slocum Price yet, for all the rough
usage, eh? I've had my fun--I could tell you a thing or two about that,
if you had hair on your chin!" and the selfish lines of his face twisted
themselves into an exceedingly knowing grin.

"You talked like you thought you were going to die right off," said
Hannibal gravely, as he resumed his chair. The judge was touched. It had
been more years than he cared to remember since he had launched a decent
emotion in the breast of any human being. For a moment he was silent,
struck with a sense of shame; then he said:

"You are sure you are not running away, Hannibal? I hope you know
that boys should always tell the truth--that hell has its own especial
terrors for the boy who lies? Now, if I thought the worst of you, I
might esteem it my duty to investigate your story." The judge laid a fat
forefinger against the side of his nose, and regarded him with drunken
gravity. Hannibal shook with terror. This was what he had feared.
"That's one aspect of the case. Now, on the other hand, I might draw
up a legal instrument which could not fail to be of use to you on
your travois, and would stop all questions. As for my fee, it would be
trifling, when compared with the benefits I can see accruing to you."

"No, I ain't running away. I ain't got no one to run away from," said
the boy chokingly. He was showing signs of fatigue. His head drooped and
he met the judge's glance with tired, sleepy eyes. The latter looked at
him and then said suddenly:

"I think you'd better go to bed."

"I reckon I had," agreed Hannibal, slipping from his chair.

"Well, take my bed back of the quilt. You'll find a hoe there. You can
dig up the dirt under the shuck tick with it--which helps astonishingly.
What would the world say if it could know that judge Slocum Price makes
his bed with a hoe! There's Spartan hardihood!" but the boy, not
knowing what was meant by Spartan hardihood, remained silent. "Nearing
threescore years and ten, the allotted span as set down by the
Psalmist--once man of fashion, soldier, statesman and lawgiver--and
makes his bed with a hoe! What a history!" muttered the judge with weary
melancholy, as one groping hand found the jug while the other found the
glass. There was a pause, while he profited by this fortunate chance.
"Well, take the bed," he resumed hospitably.

"I can sleep most anywhere. I ain't no ways particular," said Hannibal.

"I say, take the bed!" commanded the judge sternly. And Hannibal quickly
retired behind the quilt. "Do you find it comfortable?" the judge asked,
when the rustling of the shuck tick informed him that the child had lain
down.

"Yes, sir," said the boy.

"Have you said your prayers?" inquired the judge.

"No, sir. I ain't said 'em yet."

"Well, say them now. Religion is as becoming in the young as it is
respectable in the aged. I'll not disturb you to-night, for it is God's
will that I should stay up and get very drunk."




CHAPTER X. BOON COMPANIONS


Some time later the judge was aware of a step on the path beyond
his door, and glancing up, saw the tall figure of a man pause on his
threshold. A whispered curse slipped from between his lips. Aloud he
said:

"Is that you, Mr. Mahaffy?" He got no reply, but the tall figure,
propelled by very long legs, stalked into the shanty and a pair of keen,
restless eyes deeply set under a high, bald head were bent curiously
upon him.

"I take it I'm intruding," the new-comer said sourly.

"Why should you think that, Solomon Mahaffy? When has my door been
closed on you?" the judge asked, but there was a guilty deepening of the
flush on his face. Mr. Mahaffy glanced at the jug, at the half-emptied
glass within convenient reach of the judge's hand, lastly at the judge
himself, on whose flame-colored visage his eyes rested longest.

"I've heard said there was honor among thieves," he remarked.

"I know of no one better fitted to offer an opinion on so delicate a
point than just yourself, Mahaffy," said the judge, with a thick little
ripple of laughter.

But Solomon Mahaffy's long face did not relax in its set expression.

"I saw your light," he explained, "but you seem to be raising first-rate
hell all by yourself."

"Oh, be reasonable, Solomon. You'd gone down to the steamboat landing,"
said the judge plaintively. By way of answer, Mahaffy shot him a
contemptuous glance. "Take a chair--do, Solomon!" entreated the judge.

"I don't force my society on any man, Mr. Price," said Mahaffy, with
austere hostility of tone. The judge winced at the "Mr." That registered
the extreme of Mahaffy's disfavor.

"You feel bitter about this, Solomon?" he said.

"I do," said Mahaffy, in a tone of utter finality.

"You'll feel better with three fingers of this trickling through your
system," observed the judge, pushing a glass toward him.

"When did I ever sneak a jug into my shanty?" asked Mahaffy sternly,
evidently conscious of entire rectitude in this matter.

"I deplore your choice of words, Solomon," said the judge. "You know
damn well that if you'd been here I couldn't have got past your place
with that jug! But let's deal with conditions. Here's the jug, with some
liquor left in it--here's a glass. Now what more do you want?"

"Have I ever been caught like this?" demanded Mahaffy.

"No, you've invariably manifested the honorable disabilities of a
gentleman. But don't set it all down to virtue. Maybe you haven't had
the opportunity, maybe the temptation never came and found you weak
and thirsty. Put away your sinful pride, Solomon--a sot like you has no
business with the little niceties of selfrespect."

"Do I drink alone?" insisted Mahaffy doggedly.

"I never give you the chance," retorted his friend. Mr. Mahaffy drew
near the table. "Sit down," urged the judge.

"I hope you feel mean?" said Mahaffy.

"If it's any satisfaction to you, I do," admitted the judge.

"You ought to." Mahaffy drew forward a chair. The judge filled his
glass. But Mr. Mahaffy's lean face, with its long jaws and high
cheek-bones, over which the sallow skin was tightly drawn, did not relax
in its forbidding expression, even when he had tossed off his first
glass.

"I love to see you in a perfectly natural attitude like that, Solomon,
with your arm crooked. What's the news from the landing?"

Mahaffy brought his fist down on the table.

"I heard the boat churning away round back of the bend, then I saw
the lights, and she tied up and they tossed off the freight. Then she
churned away again and her lights got back of the trees on the bank.
There was the lap of waves on the shore, and I was left with the
half-dozen miserable loafers who'd crawled out to see the boat come in.
That's the news six days a week!"

By the river had come the judge, tentatively hopeful, but at heart
expecting nothing, therefore immune to disappointment and equipped
for failure. By the river had come Mr. Mahaffy, as unfit as the judge
himself, and for the same reason, but sour and bitter with the world,
believing always in the possibility of some miracle of regeneration.

Pleasantville's weekly paper, The Genius of Liberty, had dwelt at length
upon those distinguished services judge Slocum Price had rendered the
nation in war and peace, the judge having graciously furnished an array
of facts otherwise difficult of access. That he was drunk at the time
had but added to the splendor of the narrative. He had placed his ripe
wisdom, the talents he had so assiduously cultivated, at the services of
his fellow citizens. He was prepared to represent them in any or all
the courts. But he had remained undisturbed in his condition of
preparedness; that erudite brain was unconcerned with any problem beyond
financing his thirst at the tavern, where presently ingenuity, though it
expressed itself with a silver tongue, failed him, and he realized that
the river's spent floods had left him stranded with those other odds and
ends of worthless drift that cumbered its sun-scorched mud banks.

Something of all this passed through his mind as he sat there sodden and
dreamy, with the one fierce need of his nature quieted for the moment.
He had been stranded before, many times, in those long years during
which he had moved steadily toward a diminishing heritage; indeed,
nothing that was evil could contain the shock of a new experience. He
had fought and lost all his battles--bitter struggles to think of even
now, after the lapse of years, and the little he had to tell of
himself was an intricate mingling of truth and falsehood, grotesque
exaggeration, purposeless mendacity.

He and Mahaffy had met exactly one month before, on the deck of the
steamer from which they had been put ashore at the river landing two
miles from Pleasantville. Mahaffy's historic era had begun just there.
Apparently he had no past of which he could be brought to speak. He
admitted having been born in Boston some sixty years before, and was a
printer by trade; further than this, he had not revealed himself, drunk
or sober.

At the judge's elbow Mr. Mahaffy changed his position with nervous
suddenness. Then he folded his long arms.

"You asked if there was any news, Price; while we were waiting for the
boat a raft tied up to the bank; the fellow aboard of it had a man he'd
fished up out of the river, a man who'd been pretty well cut to pieces."

"Who was he?" asked the judge.

"Nobody knew, and he wasn't conscious. I shouldn't be surprised if he
never opens his lips again. When the doctor had looked to his cuts, the
fellow on the raft cast off and went on down the Elk."

It occurred to the judge that he himself had news to impart. He must
account for the boy's presence.

"While you've been taking your whiff of life down at the steamboat
landing, Mahaffy, I've been experiencing a most extraordinary
coincidence." The judge paused. By a sullen glare in his deep-sunk eyes
Mr. Mahaffy seemed to bid him go on. "Back east--" the judge jerked
his thumb with an indefinite gesture "back east at my ancestral
home--" Mahaffy snorted harshly. "You don't believe I had an ancestral
home?--well, I had! It was of brick, sir, with eight Corinthian columns
across the front, having a spacious paneled hall sixty feet long. I had
the distinguished honor to entertain General Andrew Jackson there."

"Did you get those dimensions out of the jug?" inquiry Mahaffy, with a
frightful bark that was intended for a sarcastic laugh.

"Sir, it is not in your province to judge me by my present degraded
associates. Near the house I have described--my father's and his
father's before him, and mine now--but for the unparalleled misfortunes
which have pursued me--lived a family by the name of Hazard. And when I
went to the war of '12--"

"What were you in that bloody time, a sutler?" inquired Mahaffy
insultingly.

"No, sir--a colonel of infantry!--I say, when I went to the war, one of
these Hazards accompanied me as my orderly. His grandson is back of that
curtain now--asleep--in my bed!" Mahaffy put down his glass.

"You were like this once before," he said darkly. But at that instant
the shuck tick rattled noisily at some movement of the sleeping boy.
Mahaffy quitted his chair, and crossing the room, drew the quilt aside.
A glance sufficed to assure him that in part, at least, the judge spoke
the truth. He let the curtain fall into place and resumed his chair.

"He's an orphan, Solomon; a poor, friendless orphan. Another might
have turned him away from his door--I didn't; I hadn't the heart to. I
bespeak your sympathy for him."

"Who is he?" asked Mahaffy.

"Haven't I just told you?" said the judge reproachfully. Mahaffy
laughed.

"You've told me something. Who is he?"

"His name is Hannibal Wayne Hazard. Wait until he wakes up and see if it
isn't."

"Sure he isn't kin to you?" said Mahaffy.

"Not a drop of my blood flows in the veins of any living creature,"
declared the judge with melancholy impressiveness. He continued with
deepening feeling, "All I shall leave to posterity is my fame."

"Speaking of posterity, which isn't present, Mr. Price, I'll say it is
embarrassed by the attention," observed Mahaffy.

There was a long silence between them. Mr. Mahaffy drank, and when
he did not drink he bit his under lip and studied the judge. This was
always distressing to the latter gentleman. Mahaffy's silence he
could never penetrate. What was back of it--judgment, criticism,
disbelief--what? Or was it the silence of emptiness? Was Mahaffy dumb
merely because he could think of nothing to say, or did his silence
cloak his feelings-and what were his feelings? Did his meditations
outrun his habitually insulting speech as he bit his under lip and
glared at him? The judge always felt impelled to talk at such times,
while Mahaffy, by that silence of his, seemed to weigh and condemn
whatever he said.

The moon had slipped below the horizon. Pleasantville had long since
gone to bed; it was only the judge's window that gave its light to the
blackness of the night. There was a hoofbeat on the road. It came nearer
and nearer, and presently sounded just beyond the door. Then it ceased,
and a voice said:

"Hullo, there!" The judge scrambled to his feet, and taking up the
candle, stepped, or rather staggered, into the yard. Mahaffy followed
him.

"What's wanted?" asked the judge, as he lurched up to horse and rider,
holding his candle aloft. The light showed a tail fellow mounted on a
handsome bay horse. It was Murrell.

"Is there an inn hereabouts?" he asked.

"You'll find one down the road a ways," said Mahaffy. The judge said
nothing. He was staring up at Murrell with drunken gravity.

"Have either of you gentlemen seen a boy go through here to-day? A
boy about ten years old?" Murrell glanced from one to the other. Mr.
Mahaffy's thin lips twisted themselves into a sarcastic smile. He turned
to the judge, who spoke up quickly.

"Did he carry a bundle and rifle?" he asked. Murrell gave eager assent.

"Well," said the judge, "he stopped here along about four o'clock and
asked his way to the nearest river landing." Murrell gathered up his
reins, and then that fixed stare of the judge's seemed to arrest his
attention.

"You'll know me again," he observed.

"Anywhere," said the judge.

"I hope that's a satisfaction to you," said Murrell.

"It ain't--none whatever," answered the judge promptly. "For I don't
value you--I don't value you that much!" and he snapped his fingers to
illustrate his meaning.




CHAPTER XI. THE ORATOR OF THE DAY


"Hannibal!" the judge's voice and manner were rather stern. "Hannibal, a
man rode by here last night on a big bay horse. He said he was looking
for a boy about ten years old--a boy with a bundle and rifle." There was
an awful pause. Hannibal's heart stood still for a brief instant, then
it began to beat with terrific thumps against his ribs. "Who was that
man, Hannibal?"

"I--please, I don't know--" gasped the child.

"Hannibal, who was that man?" repeated the judge.

"It were Captain Murrell." The judge regarded him with a look of great
steadiness. He saw his small face go white, he saw the look of abject
terror in his eyes. The judge raised his fist and brought it down with
a great crash on the table, so that the breakfast dishes leaped and
rattled. "We don't know any boy ten years old with a rifle and bundle!"
he said.

"Please--you won't let him take me away, judge I want to stop with you!"
cried Hannibal. He slipped from his chair, and passing about the table,
seized the judge by the hand. The judge was visibly affected.

"No!" he roared, with a great oath. "He shan't have you--I'll see him in
the farthest corner of hell first! Is he kin to you?"

"No," said Hannibal.

"Took you to raise, did he--and abused you--infernal hypocrite!" cried
the judge with righteous wrath.

"He tried to get me away from my Uncle Bob. He's been following us since
we crossed the mountains."

"Where is your Uncle Bob?"

"He's dead." And the child began to weep bitterly. Much puzzled, the
judge regarded him in silence for a moment, then bent and lifted him
into his lap.

"There, my son--" he said soothingly. "Now you tell me when he died, and
all about it."

"He were killed. It were only yesterday, and I can't forget him! I don't
want to--but it hurts--it hurts terrible!" Hannibal buried his head in
the judge's shoulder and sobbed aloud. Presently his small hands stole
about the judge's neck, and that gentleman experienced a strange thrill
of pleasure.

"Tell me how he died, Hannibal," he urged gently. In a voice broken by
sobs the child began the story of their flight, a confused narrative,
which the judge followed with many a puzzled shake of the head. But as
he reached his climax--that cry he had heard at the tavern, the men in
the lane with their burden--he became more and more coherent and his
ideas clothed themselves in words of dreadful simplicity and directness.
The judge shuddered. "Can such things be?" he murmured at last.

"You won't let him take me?"

"I never unsay my words," said the judge grandly. "With God's help
I'll be the instrument for their destruction." He frowned with a
preternatural severity. Eh--if he could turn a trick like that, it would
pull him up! There would be no more jeers and laughter.

What credit and standing it would give him! His thoughts slipped
along this fresh channel. What a prosecution he would conduct--what a
whirlwind of eloquence he would loose! He began to breathe hard. His
name should go from end to end of the state! No man could be great
without opportunity--for years he had known this--but here was
opportunity at last! Then he remembered what Mahaffy had told him of the
man on the raft. This Slosson's tavern was probably on the upper waters
of the Elk. Yancy had been thrown in the river and had been picked up in
a dying condition. "Hannibal," he said, "Solomon Mahaffy, who was here
last night, told me he saw down at the river landing, a man who had been
fished up out of the Elk--a man who had been roughly handled."

"Were it my Uncle Bob?" cried Hannibal, lifting a swollen face to his.

"Dear lad, I don't know," said the judge sympathetically. "Some people
on a raft had picked him up out of the river. He was unconscious and no
one knew him. He was apparently a stranger in these parts."

"It were Uncle Bob! It were Uncle Bob--I know it were my Uncle Bob! I
must go find him!" and Hannibal slipped from the judge's lap and ran for
his rifle and bundle.

"Stop a bit!" cried the judge. "He was taken on past here, and he was
badly injured. Now, if it was your Uncle Bob, he'll come back the moment
he is able to travel. Meantime, you must remain under my protection
while we investigate this man Slosson."

But alas--that thoroughfare which is supposed to be paved exclusively
with good resolutions, had benefited greatly by Slocum Price's labors in
the past, and he was destined to toil still in its up-keep. He borrowed
the child's money and spent it, and if any sense of shame smote his
torpid conscience, he hid it manfully. Not so Mr. Mahaffy; for while
he profited by his friend's act, he told that gentleman just what
he thought of him with insulting candor. On the eighth day there was
sobriety for the pair. Deep gloom visited Mr. Mahaffy, and the judge was
a prey to melancholy.

It was Saturday, and in Pleasantville a jail-raising was in progress.
During all the years of its corporate dignity the village had never
boasted any building where the evil-doer could be placed under
restraint; hence had arisen its peculiar habit of dealing with crime;
but a leading citizen had donated half an acre of ground lying midway
between the town and the river landing as a site for the proposed
structure, and the scattered population of the region had assembled for
the raising. Nor was Pleasantville unprepared to make immediate use of
the jail, since the sheriff had in custody a free negro who had knifed
another free negro and was awaiting trial at the next term of court.

"We don't want to get there too early," explained the judge, as they
quitted the cabin. "We want to miss the work, but be on hand for the
celebration."

"I suppose we may confidently look to you to favor us with a few
eloquent words?" said Mr. Mahaffy.

"And why not, Solomon?" asked the judge.

"Why not, indeed!" echoed Mr. Mahaffy.

The opportunity he craved was not denied him. The crowd was like most
southwestern crowds of the period, and no sooner did the judge appear
than there were clamorous demands for a speech. He cast a glance of
triumph at Mahaffy, and nimbly mounted a convenient stump. He extolled
the climate of middle Tennessee, the unsurpassed fertility of the soil;
he touched on the future that awaited Pleasantville; he apostrophized
the jail; this simple structure of logs in the shadow of the primeval
woods was significant of their love of justice and order; it was a
suitable place for the detention of a citizen of a great republic; it
was no mediaeval dungeon, but a forest-embowered retreat where, barring
mosquitoes and malaria, the party under restraint would be put to no
needless hardship; he would have the occasional companionship of the
gentlemanly sheriff; his friends, with such wise and proper restrictions
as the law saw fit to impose, could come and impart the news of the day
to him through the chinks of the logs.

"I understand you have dealt in a hasty fashion with one or two
horse-thieves," he continued. "Also with a gambler who was put ashore
here from a river packet and subsequently became involved in a dispute
with a late citizen of this place touching the number of aces in a pack
of cards. It is not for me to criticize! What I may term the spontaneous
love of justice is the brightest heritage of a free people. It is this
same commendable ability to acquit ourselves of our obligations that is
making us the wonder of the world! But don't let us forget the law--of
which it is an axiom, that it is not the severity of punishment, but the
certainty of it, that holds the wrong-doer in check! With this safe
and commodious asylum the plow line can remain the exclusive aid to
agriculture. If a man murders, curb your natural impulse! Give him
a fair trial, with eminent counsel!" The judge tried not to look
self-conscious when he said this. "If he is found guilty, I still say,
don't lynch him! Why? Because by your hasty act you deny the public
the elevating and improving spectacle of a legal execution!" When the
applause had died out, a lank countryman craning his neck for a sight of
the sheriff, bawled out over the heads of the crowd:

"Where's your nigger? We want to put him in here!"

"I reckon he's gone fishin'. I never seen the beat of that nigger to go
fishin'," said the sheriff.

"Whoop! Ain't you goin' to put him in here?" yelled the countryman.

"It's a mighty lonely spot for a nigger," said the sheriff doubtingly.

"Lonely? Well, suppose he ups and lopes out of this?"

"You don't know that nigger," rejoined the sheriff warmly. "He ain't
missed a meal since I had him in custody. Just as regular as the clock
strikes he's at the back door. Good habits--why, that darky is a lesson
to most white folks!"

"I don't care a cuss about that nigger, but what's the use of building a
jail if a body ain't goin' to use it?"

"Well, there's some sense in that," agreed the sheriff.

"There's a whole heap of sense in it!"

"I suggest"--the speaker was a young lawyer from the next county--"I
suggest that a committee be appointed to wait on the nigger at
the steamboat landing and acquaint him with the fact that with his
assistance we wish completely to furnish the jail."

"I protest--" cried the judge. "I protest--" he repeated vigorously.
"Pride of race forbids that I should be a party to the degradation of
the best of civilization! Is your jail to be christened to its high
office by a nigger? Is this to be the law's apotheosis? No, sir! No
nigger is worthy the honor of being the first prisoner here!" This was
a new and striking idea. The crowd regarded the judge admiringly.
Certainly here was a man of refined feeling.

"That's just the way I feel about it," said the sheriff. "If I'd
athought there was any call for him I wouldn't have let him go fishing,
I'd have kept him about."

"Oh, let the nigger fish--he has powerful luck. What's he usin',
Sheriff; worms or minnies?"

"Worms," said the sheriff shortly.

Presently the crowd drifted away in the direction of the tavern.
Hannibal meantime had gone down to the river. He haunted its banks as
though he expected to see his Uncle Bob appear any moment. The judge and
Mahaffy had mingled with the others in the hope of free drinks, but in
this hope there lurked the germ of a bitter disappointment. There was
plenty of drinking, but they were not invited to join in this pleasing
rite, and after a period of great mental anguish Mahaffy parted with
the last stray coin in the pocket of his respectable black trousers, and
while his flask was being filled the judge indulged in certain winsome
gallantries with the fat landlady.

"La, Judge Price, how you do run on!" she said with a coquettish toss of
her curls.

"That's the charm of you, ma'am," said the judge. He leaned across
the bar and, sinking his voice to a husky whisper, asked, "Would it be
perfectly convenient for you to extend me a limited credit?"

"Now, Judge Price, you know a heap better than to ask me that!" she
answered, shaking her head.

"No offense, ma'am," said the judge, hiding his disappointment, and with
Mahaffy he quitted the bar.

"Why don't you marry the old girl? You could drink yourself to death in
six months," said Mahaffy. "That would be a speculation worth while--and
while you live you could fondle those curls!"

"Maybe I'll be forced to it yet," responded the judge with gloomy
pessimism.

With the filling of Mahaffy's flask the important event of the day
was past, and both knew it was likely to retain its preeminence for a
terrible and indefinite period; a thought that enriched their thirst
as it increased their gravity while they were traversing the stretch of
dusty road that lay between the cavern and the judge's shanty. When they
had settled themselves in their chairs before the door, Mahaffy, who was
notably jealous of his privileges, drew the cork from the flask and
took the first pull at its contents. The judge counted the swallows
as registered by that useful portion of Mahaffy's anatomy known as his
Adam's apple. After a breathless interval, Mahaffy detached himself
from the flask and civilly passing the cuff of his coat about its neck,
handed it over to the judge. In the unbroken silence that succeeded the
flask passed swiftly from hand to hand, at length Mahaffy held it up to
the light. It was two-thirds empty, and a sigh stole from between his
thin lips. The judge reached out a tremulous hand. He was only too
familiar with his friend's distressing peculiarities.

"Not yet!" he begged thickly.

"Why not?" demanded Mahaffy fiercely. "Is it your liquor or mine?" He
quitted his chair end stalked to the well where he filled the flask with
water. Infinitely disgusted, the judge watched the sacrilege. Mahaffy
resumed his chair and again the flask went its rounds.

"It ain't so bad," said the judge after a time, but with a noticeable
lack of enthusiasm.

"Were you in shape to put anything better than water into it, Mr.
Price?" The judge winced. He always winced at that "Mr."

"Well, I wouldn't serve myself such a trick as that," he said with
decision. "When I take liquor, it's one thing; and when I want water,
it's another."

"It is, indeed," agreed Mahaffy.

"I drink as much clear water as is good for a man of my constitution,"
said the judge combatively. "My talents are wasted here," he resumed,
after a little pause. "I've brought them the blessings of the law, but
what does it signify!"

"Why did you ever come here?" Mahaffy spoke sharply.

"I might ask the same question of you, and in the same offensive tone,"
said the judge.

"May I ask, not wishing to take a liberty, were you always the same old
pauper you've been since I've known you?" inquired Mahaffy. The judge
maintained a stony silence.

The heat deepened in the heart of the afternoon. The sun, a ball of
fire, slipped back of the tree-tops. Thick shadows stole across the
stretch of dusty road. Off in the distance there was the sound of
cowbell. Slowly these came nearer and nearer--as the golden light
slanted, sifting deeper and deeper into the woods.

They could see the crowd that came and went about the tavern, they
caught the distant echo of its mirth.

"Common--quite common," said the judge with somber melancholy.

"I didn't see anything common," said Mahaffy sourly. "The drinks weren't
common by a long sight."

"I referred to the gathering in its social aspect, Solomon," explained
the judge; "the illiberal spirit that prevailed, which, I observe, did
not escape you."

"Skunks!" said Mahaffy.

"Not a man present had the public spirit to set 'em up," lamented the
judge. "They drank in pairs, and I'd blistered my throat at their damn
jail-raising! What sort of a fizzle would it have been if I hadn't been
on hand to impart distinction to the occasion?"

"I don't begrudge 'em their liquor," said Mahaffy with acid dignity.

"I do," interrupted the judge. "I hope it's poison to 'em.

"It will be in the long run, if it's any comfort to you to know it."

"It's no comfort, it's not near quick enough," said the judge
relentlessly. The sudden noisy clamor of many voices, highpitched and
excited, floated out to them under the hot sky. "I wonder--" began the
judge, and paused as he saw the crowd stream into the road before the
tavern. Then a cloud of dust enveloped it, a cloud of dust that came
from the trampling of many pairs of feet, and that swept toward them,
thick and impenetrable, and no higher than a tall man's head in the
lifeless air. "I wonder if we missed anything," continued the judge,
finishing what he had started to say.

The score or more of men were quite near, and the judge and Mahaffy made
out the tall figure of the sheriff in the lead. And then the crowd, very
excited, very dusty, very noisy and very hot, flowed into the judge's
front yard. For a brief moment that gentleman fancied Pleasantville had
awakened to a fitting sense of its obligation to him and that it was
about to make amends for its churlish lack of hospitality. He rose from
his chair, and with a splendid florid gesture, swept off his hat.

"It's the pussy fellow!" cried a voice.

"Oh, shut up--don't you think I know him?" retorted the sheriff tartly.

"Gentlemen--" began the judge blandly.

"Get the well-rope!"

The judge was rather at loss properly to interpret these varied remarks.
He was not long left in doubt. The sheriff stepped to his side and
dropped a heavy hand on his shoulder.

"Mr. Slocum Price, or whatever your name is, your little game is up!"

"Get the well-rope! Oh, hell--won't some one get the well-rope?" The
voice rose into a wail of entreaty.

The judge's eyes, rather startled, slid around in their sockets. Clearly
something was wrong--but what--what?

"Ain't he bold?" it was a woman's voice this time, and the fat landlady,
her curls awry and her plump breast heaving tumultuously, gained a place
in the forefront of the crowd.

"Dear madam, this is an unexpected pleasure!" said the judge, with his
hand upon his heart.

"Don't you make your wicked old sheep's eyes at me, you brazen thing!"
cried the lady.

"You're wanted," said the sheriff grimly, still keeping his hand on the
judge's shoulder.

"For what?" demanded the judge thickly. The sheriff had no time in which
to answer.

"I want my money!" shrieked the landlady.

"Your money--Mrs. Walker, you amaze me!" The judge drew himself up
haughtily, in genuine astonishment.

"I want my money!" repeated Mrs. Walker in even more piercing tones.

"I am not aware that I owe you anything, madam. Thank God, I hold
your receipted bill of recent date," answered the judge with chilling
dignity.

"Good money--not this worthless trash!" she shook a bill under his nose.
The judge recognized it as the one of which he had despoiled Hannibal.

"You have been catched passing counterfeit," said the sheriff. A light
broke on the judge, a light that dazzled and stunned. An officious and
impatient gentleman tossed a looped end of the well-rope about his neck
and the crowd yelled excitedly. This was something like--it had a taste
for the man-hunt! The sheriff snatched away the rope and dealt the
officious gentleman a savage blow on the chin that sent him staggering
backward into the arms of his friends.

"Now, see here, now--I'm going to arrest this old faller! I am going to
put him in jail, and I ain't going to have no nonsense--do you hear me?"
he expostulated.

"I can explain--" cried the judge.

"Make him give me my money!" wailed Mrs Walker.

"Jezebel!" roared the judge, in a passion of rage.

"Ca'm's the word, or you'll get 'em started!" whispered the sheriff.
The judge looked fearfully around. At his side stood Mahaffy, a yellow
pallor splotching his thin cheeks. He seemed to be holding himself there
by an effort.

"Speak to them, Solomon--speak to them--you know how I came by the
money! Speak to them--you know I am innocent!" cried the judge,
clutching his friend by the arm. Mahaffy opened his thin lips, but the
crowd drowned his voice in a roar.

"He's his partner--"

"There's no evidence against him," said the sheriff.

A tall fellow, in a fringed hunting-shirt, shook a long finger under
Mahaffy's aquiline nose.

"You scoot--that's what--you make tracks! And if we ever see your ugly
face about here again, we'll--"

"You'll what?" inquired Mahaffy.

"We'll fix you out with feathers that won't molt, that's what!"

Mr. Mahaffy seemed to hesitate. His lean hands opened and closed, and he
met the eyes of the crowd with a bitter, venomous stare. Some one gave
him a shove and he staggered forward a step, snapping out a curse.
Before he could recover himself the shove was repeated.

"Lope on out of here!" yelled the tall fellow, who had first challenged
his right to remain in Pleasantville or its environs. As the crowd fell
apart to make way for him, willing hands were extended to give him the
needed impetus, and without special volition of his own.

Mahaffy was hurried toward the road. His hat was knocked flat on his
head--he turned with an angry snarl, the very embodiment of hate--but
again he was thrust forward. And then, somehow, his walk became a run
and the crowd started after him with delighted whoopings. Once more,
and for the last time, he faced about, giving the judge a hopeless,
despairing glance. His tormentors were snatching up sods and stones and
he had no choice. He turned, his long strides taking him swiftly over
the ground, with the air full of missiles at his back.

Before he had gone a hundred yards he abandoned the road and, turning
off across an unfenced field, ran toward the woods and swampy bottom.
Twenty men were in chase behind him. The judge was the sheriff's
prisoner--that official had settled that point--but Mr. Mahaffy was
common property, it was his cruel privilege to furnish excitement; his
keen rage was almost equal to the fear that urged him on. Then the woods
closed about him. His long legs, working tirelessly, carried him over
fallen logs and through tall tangled thickets, the voices behind him
growing more and more distant as he ran.




CHAPTER XII. THE FAMILY ON THE RAFT


That would unquestionably have been the end of Bob Yancy when he was
shot out into the muddy waters of the Elk River, had not Mr.
Richard Keppel Cavendish, variously known as Long-Legged Dick,
and Chills-and-Fever Cavendish, of Lincoln County, in the state of
Tennessee, some months previously and after unprecedented mental effort
on his part, decided that Lincoln County was no place for him. When
he had established this idea firmly in his own mind and in the mind of
Polly, his wife, he set about solving the problem of transportation.

Mr. Cavendish's paternal grandparent had drifted down the Holston and
Tennessee; and Mr. Cavendish's father, in his son's youth, had poled
up the Elk. Mr. Cavendish now determined to float down the Elk to its
juncture with the Tennessee, down the Tennessee to the Ohio, and if need
be, down the Ohio to the Mississippi, and keep drifting until he found
some spot exactly suited to his taste. Temperamentally, he was well
adapted to drifting. No conception of vicarious activity could have been
more congenial.

With this end in view he had toiled through late winter and early
spring, building himself a raft on which to transport his few belongings
and his numerous family; there were six little Cavendishes, and they
ranged in years from four to eleven; there was in addition the baby, who
was always enumerated separately. This particular infant Mr. Cavendish
said he wouldn't take a million dollars for. He usually added feelingly
that he wouldn't give a piece of chalk for another one.

June found him aboard his raft with all his earthly possessions bestowed
about him, awaiting the rains and freshets that were to waft him
effortless into a newer country where he should have a white man's
chance. At last the rains came, and he cast off from the bank at that
unsalubrious spot where his father had elected to build his cabin on a
strip of level bottom subject to periodic inundation. Wishing fully to
profit by the floods and reach the big water without delay, Cavendish
ran the raft twenty-four hours at a stretch, sleeping by day while Polly
managed the great sweep, only calling him when some dangerous bit of the
river was to be navigated. Thus it happened that as Murrell and Slosson
were dragging Yancy down the lane, Cavendish was just rounding a bend in
the Elk, a quarter of a mile distant. Leaning loosely against the long
handle of his sweep, he was watching the lane of bright water that ran
between the black shadows cast by the trees on either bank. He was in
shirt and trousers, barefoot and bareheaded, and his face, mild and
contemplative, wore an expression of dreamy contentment.

Suddenly its expression changed. He became alert and watchful. He had
heard a dull splash. Thinking that some tree had been swept into the
flood, he sought to pierce the darkness that lay along the shore. Five
or six minutes passed as the raft glided along without sound. He was
about to relapse into his former attitude of listless ease when he
caught sight of some object in the eddy that swept alongside. Mr.
Cavendish promptly detached himself from the handle of the sweep and ran
to the edge of the raft.

"Good Lord--what's that!" he gasped, but he already knew it was a face,
livid and blood-streaked. Dropping on his knees he reached out a pair
of long arms and made a dexterous grab, and his fingers closed on the
collar of Yancy's shirt. "Neighbor, I certainly have got you!" said
Cavendish, between his teeth. He drew Yancy close alongside the raft,
and, slipping a hand under each arm, pulled him clear of the water. The
swift current swept the raft on down the stream. It rode fairly in the
center of the lane of light, but no eye had observed its passing. Mr.
Cavendish stood erect and stared down at the blood-stained face, then he
dropped on his knees again and began a hurried examination of the still
figure. "There's a little life here--not much, but some--you was well
worth fishing up!" he said approvingly, after a brief interval. "Polly!"
he called, raising his voice.

This brought Mrs. Cavendish from one of the two cabins that occupied the
center of the raft. She was a young woman, still very comely, though
of a matronly plumpness. She was in her nightgown, and when she caught
sight of Yancy she uttered a shriek and fled back into the shanty.

"I declare, Dick, you might ha' told a body you wa'n't alone!" she said
reproachfully.

Her cry had aroused the other denizens of the raft. The tow heads of the
six little Cavendishes rose promptly from a long bolster in the smaller
of the two shanties, and as promptly six little Cavendishes, each draped
in a single non-committal garment, apparently cut by one pattern and not
at all according to the wearer's years or length of limb, tumbled forth
from their shelter.

"Sho', Polly, he's senseless! But you dress and come here quick. Now,
you young folks, don't you tetch him!" for the six small Cavendishes,
excited beyond measure, were crowding and shoving for a nearer sight of
Yancy. They began to pelt their father with questions. Who was it? Sho',
in the river? Sho', all cut up like that--who'd cut him? Had he hurt
himself? Was he throwed in? When did pop fish him out? Was he dead? Why
did he lay like that and not move or speak--sho'! This and much more
was flung at Mr. Cavendish all in one breath, and each eager questioner
seized him by the hand, the dangling sleeve of his shirt, or his
trousers--they clutched him from all sides. "I never seen such a
family!" said Mr. Cavendish helplessly. "Now, you-all shut up, or I 'low
I'll lay into you!"

Mrs. Cavendish's appearance created a diversion in his favor. The six
rushed on her tumultously. They seized her hands or struggled for a
fragment of her skirt to hold while they poured out their tale. Pop had
fished up a man--he'd been throwed in the river! Pop didn't know if he
was dead or not--he was all cut and bloody.

"I declare, I've a mind to skin you if you don't keep still! Miss
Constance," Polly addressed her eldest child, "I'm surprised at you! You
might be a heathen savage for all you got on your back--get into some
duds this instant!" Cavendish was on his knees again beside Yancy, and
Polly, by a determined effort, rid herself of the children. "Why, he's a
grand-looking man, ain't he?" she cried. "La, what a pity!"

"You can feel his heart beat, and he's bleeding some," said Cavendish.

"Let me see--just barely flutters, don't it? Henry, go mind the sweep
and see we don't get aground! Keppel, you start a fire and warm some
water! Connie, you tear up my other petticoat for bandages now, stir
around, all of you!" And then began a period of breathless activity.
They first lifted Yancy into the circle of illumination cast by the fire
Keppel had started on the hearth of flat stones before the shanties.
Then, with Constance to hold a pan of warm water, Mrs. Cavendish deftly
bathed the gaping wound in Yancy's shoulder where Murrell had driven his
knife. This she bandaged with strips torn from her petticoat. Next she
began on the ragged cut left by Slosson's club.

"He's got a right to be dead!" said Cavendish.

"Get the shears, Dick--I must snip away some of his hair."

All this while the four half-naked youngest Cavendishes, very still
now, stood about the stone hearth in the chill dawn and watched their
mother's surgery with a breathless interest. Only the outcast Henry at
the sweep ever and anon lifted his voice between sobs of mingled rage
and disappointment, and demanded what was doing.

"Think he is going to die, Polly?" whispered Cavendish at length. Their
heads, hers very black and glossy, his very blond, were close together
as they bent above the injured man.

"I never say a body's going to die until he's dead," said Polly. "He's
still breathing, and a Christian has got to do what they can. Don't you
think you ought to tie up?"

"The freshet's leaving us. I'll run until we hit the big water down by
Pleasantville, and then tie up," said Cavendish.

"I reckon we'd better lift him on to one of the beds--get his wet
clothes off and wrap him up warm," said Polly.

"Oh, put him in our bed!" cried all the little Cavendishes.

And Yancy was borne into the smaller of the two shanties, where
presently his bandaged head rested on the long communal pillow. Then his
wet clothes were hung up to dry along with a portion of the family wash
which fluttered on a rope stretched between the two shanties.

The raft had all the appearance of a cabin dooryard. There was, in
addition to the two shelters of bark built over a light framework of
poles, a pen which housed a highly domestic family of pigs, while half a
dozen chickens enjoyed a restricted liberty. With Yancy disposed of,
the regular family life was resumed. It was sun-up now. The little
Cavendishes, reluctant but overpersuaded, had their faces washed
alongside and were dressed by Connie, while Mrs. Cavendish performed
the same offices for the baby. Then there was breakfast, from which
Mr. Cavendish rose yawning to go to bed, where, before dropping off to
sleep, he played with the baby. This left Mrs. Cavendish in full command
of her floating dooryard. She smoked a reflective pipe, watching the
river between puffs, and occasionally lending a hand at the sweeps.
Later the family wash engaged her. It had neither beginning nor end, but
serialized itself from day to day. Connie was already proficient at the
tubs. It was a knack she was in no danger of losing.

Keppel and Henry took turns at the sweeps, while the three smaller
children began to manifest a love for the water they had not seemed
to possess earlier in the day. They played along the edge of the raft,
always in imminent danger of falling in, always being called back, or
seized, just in time to prevent a catastrophe. This ceaseless activity
on their part earned them much in the way of cuffings, chastisements
which Mrs. Cavendish administered with no great spirit.

"Drat you, why don't you go look at the pore gentleman instead of
posterin' a body 'most to death!" she demanded at length, and they stole
off on tiptoe to stare at Yancy. Presently Richard ran to his mother's
side.

"Come quick--he's mutterin' and mumblin' and moving his head!" he cried.
It was as the child said. Yancy had roused from his heavy stupor. Words
almost inaudible and quite inarticulate were issuing from his lips and
there was a restless movement of his head on the pillow.

"He 'pears powerful distressed about something," said Mrs. Cavendish. "I
reckon I'd better give him a little stimulant now."

While she was gone for the whisky, Connie, who had squatted down beside
the bed, touched Yancy's hand which lay open. Instantly his fingers
closed about hers and he was silent; the movement of his head ceased
abruptly; but when she sought to withdraw her hand he began to murmur
again.

"I declare, what he wants is some one to sit beside him!" said Mrs.
Cavendish, who had returned with the whisky, a few drops of which she
managed to force between Yancy's lips. All the rest of that day some one
of the children sat beside the wounded man, who was quiet and satisfied
just as long as there was a small hand for him to hold.

"He must be a family man," observed Mr. Cavendish when Polly told him of
this. "We'll tie up at Pleasantville landing and learn who he is."

"He had ought to have a doctor to look at them cuts of his," said Mrs.
Cavendish.

It was late afternoon when the landing was reached. Half a score of men
were loafing about the woodyard on shore. Mr. Cavendish made fast to
a blasted tree, then he climbed the bank; the men regarding him
incuriously as he approached.

"Howdy," said Cavendish genially.

"Howdy," they answered.

"Where might I find the nearest doctor?" inquired Cavendish.

"Within about six foot of you," said one of the group.

"Meaning yourself?"

"Meaning myself."

Briefly Cavendish told the story of Yancy's rescue.

"Now, Doc, I want you should cast an eye over the way we've dressed his
cuts, and I want the rest of you to come and take a look at him and tell
who he is and where he belongs," he said in conclusion.

"I'll know him if he belongs within forty miles of here in any
direction," said the doctor. But he shook his head when his eye rested
on Yancy. "Never saw him," he said briefly.

"How about them bandages, Doc?" demanded Cavendish.

"Oh, I reckon they'll do," replied the doctor indifferently.

"Will he live?"

"I can't say. You'll know all about that inside the next forty-eight
hours. Better let the rest have a look."

"Just feel of them bandages--sho', I got money in my pants!" Mr.
Cavendish was rapidly losing his temper, yet he controlled himself until
each man had taken a look at Yancy; but always with the same result--a
shake of the head. "I reckon I can leave him here?" Cavendish asked,
when the last man had looked and turned away.

"Leave him here--why?" demanded the doctor slowly.

"Because I'm going on, that's why. I'm headed for downstream, and he
ain't in any sort of shape to say whether he wants to go or stop,"
explained Cavendish.

"You picked him up, didn't you?" asked one of the men.

"I certainly did," said Cavendish.

"Well, I reckon if you're so anxious for him to stay hereabout, you'd
better stop, yourself," said the owner of the woodyard. "There ain't a
house within two miles of here but mine, and he don't go there!"

"You're a healthy lot, you are!" said Cavendish. "I wonder your
largeness of heart ain't ruptured your wishbones long ago!" So saying,
he retired to the stern of his raft and leaned against the sweep-handle,
apparently lost in thought. His visitors climbed the bank and
reestablished themselves on the wood-ranks.

Presently Mr. Cavendish lifted his voice and addressed Polly and the six
little Cavendishes at the other end of the raft. He asserted that he was
the only well-born man within a radius of perhaps a hundred miles--he
excepted no one. He knew who his father and mother were, and they had
been legally married--he seemed to infer that this was not always the
case. Mr. Cavendish glanced toward the shore, then he lifted his voice
again, giving it as his opinion that he was the only Christian seen in
those parts in the last fifty years. He offered to fight any gentleman
who felt disposed to challenge this assertion. He sprang suddenly aloft,
knocked his bare heels together and uttered an ear-piercing whoop. He
subsided and gazed off into the red eye of the sun which was slipping
back of the trees. Presently he spoke again. He offered to lick any
gentleman who felt aggrieved by his previous remarks, for fifty cents,
for a drink of whisky, for a chew of tobacco, for nothing--with one hand
tied behind him! He sprang aloft, cracked his heels together as before
and crowed insultingly; then he subsided into silence. An instant later
he appeared stung by the acutest pangs of remorse. In a cringing tone
he begged Polly to forgive him for bringing her to such a place. He
bewailed that they had risked pollution by allowing any inhabitant of
that region to set foot on the raft--he feared for the innocent minds of
their children, and he implored her pardon. Perhaps it was better that
they should cast off at once--unless one of the gentlemen on shore felt
himself insulted, in which event he would remain to fight.

Then as he slowly worked the raft out toward the middle of the stream,
he repeated all his former remarks, punctuating them with frequent
whoops. He recapitulated the terms on which he could be induced to
fight-fifty cents, a drink of liquor, a chew of tobacco, nothing! His
shouts became fainter and fainter as the raft was swept down-stream, and
finally died away in the distance.




CHAPTER XIII. THE JUDGE BREAKS JAIL


The sheriff had brought the judge's supper. He reported that the
crowd was dispersing, and that on the whole public sentiment was not
particularly hostile; indeed, he went so far as to say there existed
a strong undercurrent of satisfaction that the jail should have so
speedily justified itself. Moreover, there was a disposition to exalt
the judge as having furnished the crowning touch to the day's pleasure.

"I reckon, sir, they'd have felt obliged to string you up if there
wa'n't no jail," continued the sheriff lazily from the open door where
he had seated himself. "I don't say there ain't them who don't maintain
you had ought to be strung up as it is, but people are funny, sir; the
majority talk like they might wish to keep you here indefinite. There's
no telling when we'll get another prisoner. Tomorrow the blacksmith will
fix some iron bars to your window so folks can look in and see you. It
will give a heap more air to the place--"

"Unless I do get more air, you will not be troubled long by me!"
declared the judge in a tone of melancholy conviction.

The building was intolerably hot, the advantages of ventilation having
been a thing the citizens of Pleasantville had overlooked. But the judge
was a reasonable soul; he was disposed to accept his immediate personal
discomfort with a fine true philosophy; also, hope was stirring in his
heart. Hope was second nature with him, for had he not lived all these
years with the odds against him?

"You do sweat some, don't you? Oh, well, a man can stand a right
smart suffering from heat like this and not die. It's the sun that's
dangerous," remarked the sheriff consolingly. "And you had ought to
suffer, sir! that's what folks are sent to jail for," he added.

"You will kindly bear in mind, sir, that I have been convicted of no
crime!" retorted the judge.

"If you hadn't been so blamed particular you might have had company;
politest darky you would meet anywhere. Well, sir, I didn't think the
boss orator of the day would be the first prisoner--the joke certainly
is on you!"

"I never saw such bloody-minded ruffians! Keep them out and keep me
in--all I ask is to vindicate myself in the eyes of the world," said the
judge.

"Well," began the sheriff severely, "ain't it enough to make 'em
bloody-minded? Any one of 'em might have taken your money and got stuck.
Just to think of that is what hets them up." He regarded the judge with
a glance of displeasure. "I hate to see a man so durn unreasonable in
his p'int of view. And you picked a lady--a widow-lady--say, ain't you
ashamed?"

"Well, sir, what's going to happen to me?" demanded the judge angrily.

"I reckon you'll be tried. I reckon the law will deal with you--that is,
if the public remains ca'm. Maybe it will come to the conclusion that
it'd prefer a lynching--people are funny." He seemed to detach himself
from the possible current of events.

"And, waking and sleeping, I have that before me!" cried the judge
bitterly.

"You had ought to have thought of that sooner, when you was unloading
that money. Why, it ain't even good counterfeit! I wonder a man of your
years wa'n't slicker."

"Have you taken steps to find the boy, or Solomon Mahaffy?" inquired the
judge.

"For what?"

"How is my innocence going to be established--how am I going to clear
myself if my witnesses are hounded out of the county?"

"I love to hear you talk, sir. I told 'em at the raising to-day that
I considered you one of the most eloquent minds I had ever listened
to--but naturally, sir, you are too smart to be honest. You say you
ain't been convicted yet; but you're going to be! There's quite a
scramble for places on the jury already. There was pistols drawed up at
the tavern by some of our best people, sir, who got het up disputin' who
was eligible to serve." The judge groaned. "You should be thankful them
pistols wasn't drawed on you, sir," said the sheriff amiably. "You've
got a heap to be grateful about; for we've had one lynching, and we've
rid one or two parties on a rail after giving 'em a coat of tar and
feathers."

The judge shuddered. The sheriff continued placidly:

"I'll take it you'll get all that's coming to you, sir, say about twenty
years--that had ought to let you out easy. Sort of round out your
earthly career, and leave something due you t'other side of Jordan."

"I suppose there is no use in my pointing out to you that I did not
know the money was counterfeit, and that I was quite innocent of
any intention to defraud Mrs. Walker?" said the judge, with a weary,
exasperated air.

"It don't make no difference where you got the money; you know that, for
you set up to be some sort of a lawyer."

Presently the sheriff went his way into the dusk of the evening, and
night came swiftly to fellowship the judge's fears. A single moonbeam
found its way into the place, making a thin rift in the darkness. The
judge sat down on the three-legged stool, which, with a shake-down
bed, furnished the jail. His loneliness was a great wave of misery that
engulfed him.

"Well, just so my life ain't cut short!" he whispered.

He had known a varied career, and what he was pleased to call his
unparalleled misfortunes had reduced him to all kinds of desperate
shifts to live, but never before had the law laid its hands on him.
True, there had been times and seasons when he had been grateful for the
gloom of the dark ways he trod, for echoes had taken the place of the
living voice that had once spoken to his soul; but he could still rest
his hand upon his heart and say that the law had always nodded to him to
pass on.

Where was Solomon Mahaffy, and where Hannibal? He felt that Mahaffy
could fend for himself, but he experienced a moment of genuine concern
when he thought of the child. In spite of himself, his thoughts returned
to him again and again. But surely some one would shelter and care for
him!

"Yes--and work him like a horse, and probably abuse him into the
bargain--"

Then there was a scarcely audible rustle on the margin of the woods, a
dry branch snapped loudly. A little pause succeeded in which the judge's
heart stood still. Next a stealthy step sounded in the clearing. The
judge had an agonized vision of regulators and lynchers. The beat of his
pulse quickened. He knew something of the boisterous horseplay of the
frontier. The sheriff had spoken of tar and feathers--very quietly he
stood erect and picked up the stool.

"Heaven helping me, I'll brain a citizen or two before it comes to
that!" he told himself.

The cautious steps continued to approach. Some one paused below the
closely shuttered window, and a hand struck the boards sharply. A
whisper stole into the jail.

"Are you awake, Price?" It was Mahaffy who spoke.

"God bless you, Solomon Mahaffy!" cried the judge unsteadily.

"I've got the boy--he's with me," said Mahaffy.

"God bless you both!" repeated the judge brokenly. "Take care of him,
Solomon. I feel better now, knowing he's in good hands."

"Please, Judge--" it was Hannibal

"Yes, dear lad?"

"I'm mighty sorry that ten dollars I loaned you was bad--but you don't
need ever to pay it back!"

Mahaffy gave way to mirth.

"Never mind!" said the judge indulgently. "It performed all the
essential functions of a perfectly legal currency. Just suppose we had
discovered it was counterfeit before I took it to the tavern--that would
have been a hardship!"

"It were Captain Murrell gave it to me," explained Hannibal.

"I consecrate myself to his destruction! Judge Slocum Price can not be
humiliated with impunity!"

"I should think you would save your wind, Price, until you'd waddled out
of danger!" Mahaffy spoke, gruffly.

"How are you going to get me out of this, Solomon--for I suppose you are
here to break jail for me," said the judge.

Mahaffy inspected the building. He found that the door was secured by
two ponderous hasps to which were fitted heavy padlocks, but the solid
wooden shutter which closed the square hole in the gable that served as
a window was fastened by a hasp and peg. He withdrew the peg, opened
the shutter, and the judge's face, wreathed in smiles, appeared at the
aperture.

"The blessed sky and air!" he murmured, breathing deep. "A week of this
would have broken my spirit!"

"If you can, Price, you'd better come feet first," suggested Mahaffy.

"Not sufficiently acrobatic, Solomon--it's heads or I lose!" said the
judge.

He thrust his shoulders into the opening and wriggled outward. Suddenly
his forward movement was arrested.

"I was afraid of that!" he said, with a rather piteous smile. "It's
my stomach, Solomon!" Mahaffy seized him by the shoulders with lean
muscular hands. "Pull!" cried the judge hoarsely. But Mahaffy's vigorous
efforts failed to move him.

"I guess you're stuck, Price!"

"Get your wind, Solomon," urged the judge, "and then, if Hannibal will
reach up and work about my middle with his knuckles while you pull, I
may get through." But even this expedient failed.

"Do you reckon you can get me back? I should not care to spend the night
so!" said the judge. He was purple and panting.

"Let's try you edgewise!" And Mahaffy pushed the judge into the jail
again.

"No," said the judge, after another period of resolute effort on his
part and on the part of Mahaffy. "Providence has been kind to me in
the past, but it's clear she didn't have me in mind when they cut this
hole."

"Well, Price, I guess all we can do is to go back to town and see if I
can get into my cabin--I've got an old saw there. If I can find it,
I can come again to-morrow night and cut away one of the logs, or the
cleats of the door."

"In Heaven's name, do that to-night, Solomon!" implored the judge. "Why
procrastinate?"

"Price, there's a pack of dogs in this neighborhood, and we must have
a full night to move in, or they'll pull us down before we've gone ten
miles!"

The judge groaned.

"You're right, Solomon; I'd forgotten the dogs," and he groaned again.

Mahaffy closed and fastened the shutter, then he and Hannibal stole
across the clearing and entered the woods. The judge flung off his
clothes and went to bed, determined to sleep away as many hours as
possible. He was only aroused by the arrival of his breakfast, which the
sheriff brought about eight o'clock.

"Well, if I was in your boots I couldn't sleep like you!" remarked that
official admiringly. "But I reckon, sir, this ain't the first time the
penitentiary has stared you in the face."

"Then you reckon wrong," said the judge sententiously, as he hauled on
his trousers.

"No?--you needn't hurry none. I'll get them dishes when I fetch your
dinner," he added, as he took his leave.

A little later the blacksmith appeared and fitted three iron bars to the
window.

"I reckon that'll hold you, old feller!" he observed pleasantly.

He was disposed to linger, since he was interested in the mechanical
means employed in the making of counterfeit money and thirsted for
knowledge at first hand. Also, he had in his possession a one-dollar
bill which had come to him in the way of trade and which local experts
had declared to be a spurious production. He passed it in between the
bars and demanded the judge's opinion of it as though he were the first
authority in the land. But he went no wiser than he came.

It was nearing the noon hour when the judge's solitude was again
invaded. He first heard the distant murmur of voices on the road and
passed an uneasy and restless ten minutes, with his eye to a crack in
the door. He was soothed and reassured, however, when at last he caught
sight of the sheriff.

"Well, judge, I got company for you," cried the sheriff cheerfully, as
he threw open the door. "A hoss-thief!"

He pushed into the building a man, hatless and coatless, with a pair
of pale villainous eyes and a tobacco-stained chin. The judge viewed the
new-comer with disfavor. As for the horse-thief, he gave his companion
in misery a coldly critical stare, seated himself on the stool, and with
quite a fierce air devoted all his energy to mastication. He neither
altered his position nor changed his expression until he and the judge
were alone, then, catching the judge's eye, he made what seemed a casual
movement with his hand, the three fingers raised; but to the judge this
clearly was without significance, and the horse-thief manifested no
further interest where he was concerned. He did not even condescend to
answer the one or two civil remarks the judge addressed to him.

As the long afternoon wore itself away, the judge lived through the many
stages of doubt and uncertainty, for suppose anything had happened to
Mahaffy! When the sheriff came with his supper he asked him if he had
seen or heard of his friend.

"Judge, I reckon he's lopin' on yet. I never seen a man of his years
run as well as he done--it was inspirin' how he got over the ground!"
answered the sheriff. Then he attempted conversation with the
horse-thief, but was savagely cursed for his pains. "Well, I don't envy
you your company none, sir," he remarked as he took leave of the judge.

Standing before the window, the judge watched the last vestige of light
fade from the sky and the stars appear. Would Mahaffy come? The suspense
was intolerable. It was possibly eight o'clock. He could not reasonably
expect Mahaffy until nine or half past; to come earlier would be too
great a risk. Suddenly out of the silence sounded a long-drawn whistle.
Three times it was repeated. The horse-thief leaped to his feet.

"Neighbor, that means me!" he cried.

The moon was rising now, and by its light the judge saw a number of
horsemen appear on the edge of the woods. They entered the clearing,
picking their way among the stumps without haste or confusion. When
quite close, five of the band dismounted; the rest continued on about
the jail or cantered off toward the road. By this time the judge's teeth
were chattering and he was dripping cold sweat at every pore. He
prayed earnestly that they might hang the horsethief and spare him. The
dismounted men took up a stick of timber that had been cut for the jail
and not used.

"Look out inside, there!" cried a voice, and the log was dashed against
the door; once--twice--it rose and fell on the clapboards, and under
those mighty thuds grew up a wide gap through which the moonlight
streamed splendidly. The horse-thief stepped between the dangling cleats
and vanished. The judge, armed with the stool, stood at bay.

"What next?" a voice asked.

"Get dry brush--these are green logs--we'll burn this jail!"

"Hold on!" the judge recognized the horse-thief as the speaker. "There's
an old party in there! No need to singe him!"

"Friend?"

"No, I tried him."

The judge tossed away the stool. He understood now that these men were
neither lynchers nor regulators. With a confident, not to say jaunty
step, he emerged from the jail.

"Your servant, gentlemen!" he said, lifting his hat.

"Git!" said one of the men briefly, and the judge moved nimbly away
toward the woods. He had gained its shelter when the jail began to glow
redly.

Now to find Solomon and the boy, and then to put the miles between
himself and Pleasantville with all diligence. As he thought this, almost
at his elbow Mahaffy and Hannibal rose from behind a fallen log. The
Yankee motioned for silence and pointed west.

"Yes," breathed the judge. He noted that Mahaffy had a heavy pack, and
the boy his long rifle. For a mile or two they moved forward without
speech, the boy in the lead; while at his heels strode Mahaffy, with the
judge bringing up the rear.

"How do you feel, Price?" asked Mahaffy at length, over his shoulder.

"Like one come into a fortune! Those horse-thieves gave me a fine scare,
but did me a good turn."

Hannibal kept to the woods by a kind of instinct, and the two men
yielded themselves to his guidance; but there was no speech between
them. Mahaffy trod in the boy's steps, and the judge, puffing like an
overworked engine, came close upon his heels. In this way they continued
to advance for an hour or more, then the boy paused.

"Go on!" commanded Mahaffy.

"Do you 'low the judge can stand it?" asked Hannibal.

"Bless you, lad!" panted the judge feelingly.

"He's got to stand it--either that, or what do you suppose will happen
to us if they start their dogs?" said Mahaffy.

"Solomon's right--you are sure we are not going in a circle, Hannibal?"

"Yes, I'm sure," said Hannibal. "Do you see that star? My Uncle Bob
learned me how I was to watch that star when I wanted to keep going
straight."

There was another long interval of silence. Bit by bit the sky became
overcast. Vague, fleecy rifts of clouds appeared in the heavens. A wind
sprang up, murmuring about them, there came a distant roll of thunder,
while along the horizon the lightning rushed in broken, jagged lines of
fire. In the east there was a pale flush that showed the black, hurrying
clouds the winds had summoned out of space.

The booming thunder, first only the sullen menace of the approaching
storm, rolled nearer and nearer, and the fierce light came in blinding
sheets of flame. A ceaseless, pauseless murmur sprang up out of the
distance, and the trees rocked with a mighty crashing of branches, while
here and there a big drop of rain fell. Then the murmur swelled into a
roar as the low clouds disgorged themselves. Drenched to the skin on the
instant, the two men and the boy stumbled forward through the gray wake
of the storm.

"What's come of our trail now?" shouted the judge, but the sound of his
voice was lost in the rush of the hurrying winds and the roar of the
airy cascades that fell about them.

An hour passed. There was light under the trees, faint, impalpable
without visible cause, but they caught the first sparkle of the rain
drops on leaf and branch; they saw the silvery rivulets coursing down
the mossy trunks of old trees; last of all through a narrow rift in
the clouds, the sun showed them its golden rim, and day broke in the
steaming woods. With the sun, with a final rush of the hurrying wind, a
final torrent, the storm spent itself, and there was only the drip from
bough and leaf, or pearly opalescent points of moisture on the drenched
black trunks of maple and oak; a sapphire sky, high arched, remote
overhead; and the June day all about.

"What's come of they trail now?" cried the judge again. "He'll be a good
dog that follows it through, these woods!"

They had paused on a thickly wooded hillside.

"We've come eight or ten miles if we have come a rod, Price," said
Mahaffy, "and I am in favor of lying by for the day. When it comes dark
we can go on again."

The judge readily acquiesced in this, and they presently found a dense
thicket which they cautiously entered. Reaching the center of the
tangled growth, they beat down the briers and bushes, or cut them away
with their knives, until they had a little cleared space where they
could build a fire. Then from the pack which Mahaffy carried, the
rudiments of a simple but filling meal were produced.

"Your parents took no chances when they named you Solomon!" said the
judge approvingly.




CHAPTER XIV. BELLE PLAIN


"Now, Tom," said Betty, with a bustling little air of excitement as she
rose from the breakfast table that first morning at Belle Plain, "I am
ready if you are. I want you to show me everything!"

"I reckon you'll notice some changes," remarked Tom.

He went from the room and down the hall a step or two in advance of her.
On the wide porch Betty paused, breathing deep. The house stood on an
eminence; directly before it at the bottom of the slight descent was a
small bayou, beyond this the forest stretched away in one unbroken mass
to the Mississippi. Here and there, gleaming in the brilliant morning
light, some great bend of the river was visible through the trees, while
the Arkansas coast, blue and distant, piled up against the far horizon.

"What is it you want to see, anyhow, Betty?" Tom demanded, turning on
her.

"Everything--the place, Tom--Belle Plain! Oh, isn't it beautiful! I had
no idea how lovely it was!" cried Betty, as with her eyes still fixed on
the distant panorama of woods and water she went down the steps, Tom
at her heels--he bet she'd get sick of it all soon enough, that was one
comfort!

"Why, Tom! Why does the lawn look like this?"

"Like what?" inquired Tom.

"Why, this--all weeds and briers, and the paths overgrown?" and as Betty
surveyed the unkempt waste that had once been a lawn, a little frown
fixed itself on her smooth brow.

Mr. Ware rubbed his chin reflectively with the back of his hand.

"That sort of thing looked all right, Bet," he said, "but it kept five
or six of the best hands out of the fields right at the busiest time of
the year."

"Haven't I slaves enough?" she asked.

The dull color crept into Ware's cheeks. He hated her for that "I!" So
she was going to come that on him, was she? And he'd worked himself like
a horse to bring in more land. Why, he'd doubled the acreage in cotton
and corn in the last four years! He smothered his sense of hurt and
indignation.

"Don't you want to see the crops, Bet? Let me order a team and show you
about, you couldn't walk over the place in a week!" he urged.

The girl shook her head and moved swiftly down the path that led from
terrace to terrace to the margin of the bayou. At the first terrace she
paused. All below was a wilderness of tangled vines and brush. She faced
Tom rather piteously. What had been lost was more than he could possibly
understand. Her father had planned these grounds which he was allowing a
riotous second growth to swallow up.

"It's positively squalid!" cried Betty, with a little stamp of her foot.

Ware glanced about with dull eyes. The air of neglect and decay which
was everywhere visible, and which was such a shock to Betty, had not
been reached in a season, he was really convinced that the place looked
pretty much as it had always looked.

"I'll tell you, Betty, I'm busy this morning; you poke about and see
what you want done and we'll do it," he said, and made a hasty retreat
to his office, a little brick building at the other side of the house.

Betty returned to the porch and seating herself on the top step with her
elbows on her knees and her chin sunk in the palms of her hands, gazed
about her miserably enough. She was still seated there when half an hour
later Charley Norton galloped up the drive from the highroad. Catching
sight of her on the porch he sprang from the saddle, and, throwing his
reins to a black boy, hurried to her side.

"Inspecting your domain, Betty?" he asked, as he took his place near her
on the step.

"Why didn't you tell me, Charley--or at least prepare me for this?" she
asked, almost tearfully.

"How was I to know, Betty? I haven't been here since you went away,
dear--what was there to bring me? Old Tom would make a cow pasture out
of the Garden of Eden, wouldn't he--a beautiful, practical, sordid soul
he is!"

"What am I going to do, Charley?"

"Keep after him until you get what you want, it's the only way to manage
Tom that I know of."

"It's horrid to have to assert one's self!"

"You'll have to with Tom--you must, Betty--he won't understand anything
else." Then he added: "Let's look around and see what's needed, a season
or two of care will remedy the most of this neglect. Just make Tom put a
lot of hands in here with brush-hooks and axes and soon you'll not know
the place!"

Norton spent the day at Belle Plain; and though he was there on his good
behavior as the result of an agreement they had reached on board The
Naiad, he proposed twice.

"My intentions are all right, Betty," he assured her in extenuation.
"But I've the worst memory imaginable. Oh, yes, the lower terrace is
badly gullied, but it's no great matter, it can be fixed with a little
work."

It was soon plain to Betty that Tom's ideals, if he possessed any,
had not led him in the direction of what he termed display. His social
impulse had suffered atrophy. The house was utterly disorganized; there
was a dearth of suitable servants. Those she had known were gone--sold,
she learned. Tom explained that there had been no need for them since
he had lived pretty much in his office, what had been the use in keeping
darkies standing about doing nothing? He had got rid of those show
niggers and put their price in husky field hands, who could be made to
do a day's work and not feel they were abused.

But Tom was mistaken in his supposition that Betty would soon tire of
Belle Plain. She demanded men, and teams, and began on the lawns. This
interested and fascinated her. She was out at sun-up to direct her
laborers. She had the advantage of Charley Norton's presence and advice
for the greater part of each day in the week, and Sundays he came to
look over what had been accomplished, and, as Tom firmly believed, to
put that little fool up to fresh nonsense. He could have booted him!

As the grounds took shape before her delighted eyes, Betty found leisure
to institute a thorough reformation indoors. A number of house servants
were rescued from the quarters and she began to instruct them in their
new duties.

Tom was sick at heart. The little fool would cripple the place. It gave
him acute nausea to see the gangs at work about the lawns; it made him
sicker to pass through the house. There were five or six women in the
kitchen now--he was damned if he could see what they found to do--there
was a butler and a page. Betty had levied on the stables for one of the
best teams to draw the family carriage, which had not been in use since
her mother's death; there was a coachman for that, and another little
monkey to ride on the rumble and hop down and open gates. This came of
sending girls away to school--they only learned foolishness.

And those niggers about the house had to be dressed for their new
work; the butler, a cracking plow-hand he was, wore better clothes than
he--Tom--did. No wonder he was sick;--and waste! Tom knew all about that
when the bills began to come in from Memphis. Why, that pink-faced chit,
he always referred to her in his own mind now as a pink-faced chit, was
evolving a scheme of life that would cost eight or ten thousand dollars
a year to maintain, and she was talking of decorators for the house,
either from New Orleans or Philadelphia, and new furniture from top to
bottom.

Tom felt that he was being robbed. Then he realized with a sense of
shock that here was a fortune of over half a million in lands and slaves
which he had managed and manipulated all these years, but which was not
his. It was true that under the terms of his stepmother's will he would
inherit it in the event of Betty's death--well, she looked like dying,
a whole lot--she was as strong as a mule, those soft rounded curves
covered plenty of vigorous muscle; Tom hated the very sight of her. A
pink-faced chit bubbling over with life and useless energy, a perfect
curse she was, with all sorts of extravagant tastes and he was powerless
to check her, for, although he was still her guardian, there were
certain provisions of the will--he consulted the copy he kept locked up
in his desk in the office--that permitted her to do pretty much as
she pleased with her income. It was a hell of a will! She could spend
fifteen or twenty thousand dollars a year if she wanted to and he
couldn't prevent it. It was an iniquitous document!

Well, the place could go straight off to the devil, he wouldn't wear out
his life economizing for her to waste--he didn't get a thank-you--and he
knew that nobody took off the land bigger crops than he did, while bale
for bale his cotton outsold all other cotton raised in the county--that
was the kind of a manager he was. He wagged his head in self-approval.
And what did he get out of it? A lump sum each year with a further
lump sum of twenty thousand dollars when she came of age--soon now--or
married. Tom's eyes bulged from their sockets--she'd be doing that next,
to spite him!

Betty's sphere of influence rapidly extended itself. She soon began to
have her doubts concerning the treatment accorded the slaves, and was
not long in discovering that Hicks, the overseer, ran things with a
heavy hand. Matters reached a crisis one day when, happening to ride
through the quarters, she found him disciplining a refractory black.
She turned sick at the sight. Here was a slave actually being whipped
by another slave while Hicks stood looking on with his hands in his
pockets, and with a brutal satisfied air. When he caught sight of the
girl, he sang out,

"That'll do; he's had enough, I reckon, to learn him!" He added sullenly
to Betty, "Sorry you seen this, Miss!"

"How dare you order such a punishment without authority!" cried Betty
furiously.

Hicks gave her a black scowl.

"I don't need no authority to whip a shirker," he said insolently, as he
turned away.

"Stop!" commanded Betty, her eyes blazing. She strove to keep her voice
steady. "You shall not remain at Belle Plain another hour."

Hicks said nothing. He knew it would take more than her saying so to
get him off the place. Betty turned her horse and galloped back to the
house. She felt that she was in no condition to see Tom just at that
moment, and dismounting at the door ran up-stairs to her room.

Meantime the overseer sought out Ware in his office. His manner
of stating his grievance was singular. He began by swearing at his
employer. He had been insulted before all the quarter--his rage fairly
choked him, he could not speak.

Tom seized the opportunity to swear back. He wanted to know if he
hadn't troubles enough without the overseer's help? If he'd got himself
insulted it was his own affair and he could lump it, generally speaking,
and get out of that office! But Tom's fury quickly spent itself. He
wanted to know what the matter was.

"Sent you off the place, did she; well, you'll have to eat crow. I'll do
all I can. I don't know what girls were ever made for anyhow, damned if
I do!" he added plaintively, as a realization of a stupendous mistake on
the part of nature overwhelmed him.

Hicks consented to eat crow only after Mr. Ware had cursed and cajoled
him into a better and more forgiving frame of mind. Then Tom hurried off
to find Betty and put matters right; a more difficult task than he had
reckoned on, for Betty was obdurate and her indignation flared up at
mention of the incident; all his powers of argument and persuasion were
called into requisition before she would consent to Hicks remaining, and
then only on that most uncertain tenure, his good behavior.

"Now you come up to the house," said Tom, when he had won his point and
gone back to Hicks, "and get done with it. I reckon you talked when you
should have kept your blame familiar mouth shut! Come on, and get it
over with, and say you're sorry."

Later, after Hicks had made his apology, the two men smoked a friendly
pipe and discussed the situation. Tom pointed out that opposition was
useless, a losing game, you could get your way by less direct means. She
wouldn't stay long at Belle Plain, but while she did remain they must
avoid any more crises of the sort through which they had just passed,
and presently; she'd be sick of the place. Tom wagged his head. She was
sick of it already only she hadn't the sense to know it. It wasn't good
enough. Nothing suited-the house--the grounds--nothing!

In the midst of her activities Betty occasionally found time to think
of Bruce Carrington. She was sure she did not wish to see him again! But
when three weeks had passed she began to feel incensed that he had not
appeared. She thought of him with hot cheeks and a quickening beat of
the heart. It was anger. Naturally she was very indignant, as she had
every right to be! He was the first man who had dared--!

Then one day when she had decided for ever to banish all memory of
him from her mind, and never, under any circumstances, to think of him
again, he presented himself at Belle Plain.

She was in her room just putting the finishing touches to an especially
satisfying toilet when her maid tapped on the door and told her there
was a gentleman in the parlor who wished to see her.

"Is it Mr. Norton?" asked Betty.

"No, Miss--he didn't give no name, Miss."

When Betty entered the parlor a moment later she saw her caller standing
with his back turned toward her as he gazed from one of the windows, but
she instantly recognized those broad shoulders, and the fine poise of
the shapely head that surmounted them.

"Oh, Mr. Carrington--" and Betty stopped short, while her face grew
rather pale and then crimsoned. Then she advanced quite boldly and held
out a frigid hand, which he took carefully. "I didn't know--so you are
alive--you disappeared so suddenly that night--"

"Yes, I'm alive," he said, and then with a smile. "But I fear before you
get through with me we'll both wish I were not, Betty."

"Don't call me Betty."

"Who was that man who met you at New Madrid? He can't have you, whoever
he is!" His eyes dwelt on her tenderly, and the remembered spell of her
fresh youthful beauty deepened itself for him.

"Perhaps he doesn't want me--"

"Yes, he does. That was plain as day."

Betty surveyed him from under her lashes. What could she do with this
man? Nothing affected him. He seemed to have crossed some intangible
barrier and to stand closer to her than any other man had ever stood.

"Do you still hate me, Betty--Miss Malroy--is there anything I can say
or do that will make you forgive me?" He looked at her penitently.

But Betty hardened her heart against him and prepared to keep him in
place. Remembering that he was still holding her hand, she recovered it.

"Will you sit down?" she indicated a chair. He seated himself and Betty
put a safe distance between them. "Are you staying in the neighborhood,
Mr. Carrington?" she asked, rather unkindly. How did he dare come here
when she had forgotten him and her annoyance? And now the sight of him
brought back memories of that disagreeable night on that horrid boat--he
had deceived her about that boat, too--she would never forgive him for
that--she had trusted him and he had clearly shown that he was not to be
trusted; and Betty closed her pretty mouth until it was a thin red line
and looked away that she might not see his hateful face.

"No, I'm not staying in the neighborhood. When I left you, I made up my
mind I'd wait at New Madrid until I could come on down here and say I
was sorry."

"And it's taken you all this time?"

Carrington regarded her seriously.

"I reckon I must have come for more time, Betty--Miss Malroy." In spite
of herself, Betty glowed under the caressing humor of his tone.

"Really--you must have chosen poorly then when you selected New Madrid.
It couldn't have been a good place for your purpose."

"I think if I could have made up my mind to stay there long enough, it
would have answered," said Carrington. "But when a down-river boat tied
up 'there yesterday it was more than I could stand. You 'see there's
danger in a town like New Madrid of getting too sorry. I thought we'd
better discuss this point--"

"Mayn't I show you Belle Plain?" asked Betty quickly.

But Carrington shook his head.

"I don't care anything about that," he said. "I didn't come here to see
Belle Plain."

"You certainly are candid," said Betty.

"I intend to be honest with you always."

"Dear me--but I don't know that I shall particularly like it. Do
you think it was quite fair to select the boat you did, or was your
resolution to be always honest formed later?" demanded Betty severely.

He looked at her with great sweetness of expression.

"I didn't advise that boat for speed, only for safety. Betty, doesn't
it mean anything to you that I love you? I admit that I wish it had been
twice as slow!" he added reflectively, as an afterthought. He looked at
her steadily, and Betty's dark lashes drooped as the color mounted to
her face.

"I don't," she said quickly. She rose from her chair, and Carrington
followed her example with a lithe movement that bespoke muscles in good
training. She led the way through the wide hall and out to the porch.

"Now I am going to show you all over the place," she announced
resolutely. She stood on the top step, looking off into the flaming
west where the sun rode low in the heavens. "Isn't it lovely, Mr.
Carrington, isn't it beautiful?"

"Very beautiful!" Carrington's glance was fixed on her face.

"If you don't care to see Belle Plain," began Betty, rather indignantly.
"No, I don't, Betty. This is enough for me. I'll come for that some
other time if you'll be good enough to let me?"

"Then you expect to remain in the neighborhood?"

"I've given up the river, and I'm going to get hold of some land--"

"Land?" said Betty, with a rising inflection.

"Yes, land."

"I thought you were a river-man?"

"I'm a river-man no longer. I am going to be a planter now. But I'll
tell you why, and all about it some other day." Then he held out his
hand. "Goodby," he added.

"Are you going--good-by, Mr. Carrington," and Betty's fingers tingled
with his masterful clasp long after he had gone.

Carrington sauntered slowly down the path to the highroad.

"She didn't ask me to come back--an oversight," he told himself
cheerfully.

Just beyond the gates he met that same young fellow he had seen at
New Madrid. Norton nodded good-naturedly as he passed, and Carrington,
glancing back, saw that he turned in at Belle Plain. He shrugged his
shoulders, and went on his way not rejoicing.




CHAPTER XV. THE SHOOTING-MATCH AT BOGGS'


The judge's faith in the reasonableness of mankind having received a
staggering blow, there began a somewhat furtive existence for himself,
for Solomon Mahaffy, and for the boy. They kept to little frequented
byways, and usually it was the early hours of morning, or the cool of
late afternoons when they took the road.

The heat of silent middays found them lounging beside shady pools, where
the ripple of fretted waters filled the pauses in their talk. It was
then that the judge and Mahaffy exchanged views on literature and
politics, on religion and politics, on the public debt and politics, on
canals and national roads and more politics. They could and did honestly
differ at great length and with unflagging energy on these vital topics,
especially politics, for they were as far apart mentally as they were
close together morally.

Mahaffy, morose and embittered, regarded the life they were living as
an unmixed hardship. The judge entered upon it with infinite zest. He
displayed astonishing adaptability, while he brought all the resources
of a calm and modest knowledge to bear on the vexed problem of procuring
sustenance for himself and for his two companions.

"To an old campaigner like me, nothing could be more delightful than
this holiday, coming as it does on the heels of grinding professional
activity," he observed to Mahaffy. "This is the way our first parents
lived--close to nature, in touch with her gracious beneficence! Sir,
this experience is singularly refreshing after twenty years of slaving
at the desk. If any man can grasp the possibilities of a likely looking
truck-patch at a glance, I am that man, and as for getting around in the
dark and keeping the lay of the land--well, I suppose it's my military
training. Jackson always placed the highest value on such data as I
furnished him. He leaned on me more than any other man, Solomon--"

"I've heard he stood up pretty straight," said Mahaffy affably.
The judge's abandoned conduct distressed him not a little, but his
remonstrances had been in vain.

"I consider that when society subjected me to the indignity of arrest, I
was relieved of all responsibility. Injustice must bear its own fruit,"
the judge had answered him sternly.

His beginnings had been modest enough: a few ears of corn, a few hills
of potatoes, and the like, had satisfied him; then one night he appeared
in camp with two streaks of scarlet down the side of his face.

"Are you hurt, Price?" demanded Mahaffy, betraying an anxiety of which
he was instantly ashamed.

"Let me relieve your apprehension, Solomon; it's only a trickle of
stewed fruit. I folded a couple of pies and put them in the crown of my
hat," explained the judge.

"You mean you've been in somebody's springhouse?"

"It was unlocked, Solomon, This will be a warning to the owner. I
consider I have done him a kindness."

Thus launched on a career of plunder, the judge very speedily
accumulated a water bucket--useful when one wished to milk a cow--an ax
from a woodpile, a kettle from a summer kitchen, a tin of soft soap, and
an excellent blanket from a wash-line.

"For the boy, Solomon," he said gently, when he caught Mahaffy's steady
disapproving glance fixed upon him as he displayed this last trophy.

"What sort of an example are you setting him?"

"The world is full of examples I'd not recommend, Solomon. One must
learn to discriminate. A body can no more follow all the examples than
he can follow all the roads, and I submit that the ends of morality can
as well be served in showing a child what he should not do as in showing
him what he should. Indeed, I don't know but it's the finer educational
idea!"

Thereafter the judge went through the land with an eye out for
wash-lines.

"I'm looking for a change of linen for the boy, Solomon," he said. "Let
me bring you a garment or two. Eh--how few men you'll find of my build;
those last shirts I got were tight around the armholes and had no more
tail than a rabbit!"

Two nights later Mr. Mahaffy accepted a complete change of under linen,
but without visible sign of gratitude.

A night later the judge disappeared from camp, and after a prolonged
absence returned puffing and panting with three watermelons, which
proved to be green, since his activity had been much in advance of the
season.

"I don't suppose there is any greater tax on human ingenuity than to
carry three watermelons!" he remarked. "The human structure is ideally
adapted to the transportation of two--it can be done with comfort; but
when a body tackles three he finds that nature herself is opposed to the
proceeding! Well, I am going back for a bee-gum I saw in a fence corner.
Hannibal will enjoy that--a child is always wanting sweets!"

In this fashion they fared gaily across the state, but as they neared
the Mississippi the judge began to consider the future. His bright
and illuminating intelligence dealt with this problem in all its
many-sidedness.

"I wish you'd enter one of the learned professions, Solomon--have you
ever thought of medicine?" he inquired. Mr. Mahaffy laughed. "But why
not, Solomon? There is nothing like a degree or a title--that always
stamps a man, gives him standing--"

"What do I know about the human system?"

"I should certainly hope you know as much as the average doctor knows.
We could locate in one of these new towns where they have the river on
one side and the canal on the other, and where everybody has the ague--"

"What do I know about medicine?" inquired Mahaffy.

"As much as Aesculapius, no doubt--even he had to make a beginning. The
torch of science wasn't lit in a day--you must be willing to wait; but
you've got a good sick-room manner. Have you ever thought of opening an
undertaker's shop? If you couldn't cure them you might bury them."

A certain hot afternoon brought them into the shaded main street of a
straggling village. Near the door of the principal building, a frame
tavern, a man was seated, with his feet on the horse-rack. There was no
other sign of human occupancy.

"How do you do, sir?" said the judge, halting before this solitary
individual whom he conjectured to be the 'landlord. The man nodded,
thrusting his thumbs into the armholes of his vest. "What's the name of
this bustling metropolis?" continued the judge, cocking his head on one
side.

As he spoke, Bruce Carrington appeared in the tavern door; pausing
there, he glanced curiously at the shabby wayfarers.

"This is Raleigh, in Shelby County, Tennessee, one of the states of the
Union of which, no doubt, you've heard rumor in your wanderings," said
the landlord.

"Are you the voice from the tomb?" inquired the judge, in a tone of
playful sarcasm.

Carrington, amused, sauntered toward him.

"That's one for you, Mr. Pegloe!" he said.

"I am charmed to meet a gentleman whose spirit of appreciation shows his
familiarity with a literary allusion," said the judge, bowing.

"We ain't so dead as we look," said Pegloe. "Just you keep on to
Boggs' race-track, straight down the road, and you'll find that
out--everybody's there to the hoss-racing and shooting-match. I reckon
you've missed the hoss-racing, but you'll be in time for the shooting.
Why ain't you there, Mr. Carrington?"

"I'm going now, Mr. Pegloe," answered Carrington, as he followed the
judge, who, with Mahaffy and the boy, had moved off.

"Better stop at Boggs'!" Pegloe called after them.

But the judge had already formed his decision.

Horse-racing and shooting-matches were suggestive of that progressive
spirit, the absence of which he had so much lamented at the jail raising
at Pleasantville--Memphis was their objective point, but Boggs' became
a side issue of importance. They had gained the edge of the village when
Carrington overtook them. He stepped to Hannibal's side.

"Here, let me carry that long rifle, son!" he said. Hannibal looked up
into his face, and yielded the piece without a word. Carrington balanced
it on his big, muscular palm. "I reckon it can shoot--these old guns are
hard to beat!" he observed.

"She's the clostest shooting rifle I ever sighted," said Hannibal
promptly. "You had ought to see the judge shoot her--my! he never
misses!"

Carrington laughed.

"The clostest shooting rifle you ever sighted--eh?" he repeated. "Why,
aren't you afraid of it?"

"No," said Hannibal scornfully. "But she kicks you some if you don't
hold her right."

There was a rusty name-plate on the stock of the old sporting rifle;
this had caught Carrington's eye.

"What's the name here? Oh, Turberville."

The judge, a step or two in advance, wheeled in his tracks with a
startling suddenness.

"What?" he faltered, and his face was ashen.

"Nothing, I was reading the name here; it is yours; sir, I suppose?"
said Carrington.

The color crept slowly back into the judge's cheeks, but a tremulous
hand stole up to his throat.

"No, sir--no; my name is Price--Slocum Price!
Turberville--Turberville--" he muttered thickly, staring stupidly at
Carrington.

"It's not a common name; you seem to have heard it before?" said the
latter.

A spasm of pain passed over the judge's face.

"I--I've heard it. The name is on the rifle, you say?"

"Here on the stock, yes."

The judge took the gun and examined it in silence.

"Where did you get this rifle, Hannibal?" he at length asked brokenly.

"I fetched it away from the Barony, sir; Mr. Crenshaw said I might have
it."

The judge gave a great start, and a hoarse inarticulate murmur stole
from between his twitching lips.

"The Barony--the Barony--what Barony? The Quintard seat in North
Carolina, is that what you mean?"

"Yes," said the boy.

The judge, as though stunned, stared at Hannibal and stared at the
rifle, where the rusted name-plate danced before his eyes.

"What do you know of the Barony, Hannibal?" the words came slowly from
the judge's lips, and his face had gone gray again.

"I lived at the Barony once, until Uncle Bob took me to Scratch Hill to
be with him. It were Mr. Crenshaw said I was to have the old sp'otin'
rifle," said Hannibal.

"You--you lived at the Barony?" repeated the judge, and a dull stupid
wonder struck through his tone, he passed a shaking hand before his
eyes. "How long ago--when?" he continued.

"I don't know how long it were, but until Uncle Bob carried me away
after the old general died."

The judge slipped a hand under the child's chin and tilted his face
back so that he might look into it. For a long moment he studied closely
those small features, then with a shake of the head he handed the rifle
to Carrington, and without a word strode forward. Carrington had been
regarding Hannibal with a quickened interest.

"Hello!" he said, as the judge moved off. "You're the boy I saw at
Scratch Hill!"

Hannibal gave him a frightened glance, and edged to Mr. Mahaffy's side,
but did not answer him.

"What's become of Bob Yancy?" Carrington went on. He looked from Mahaffy
to the judge; externally neither of these gentlemen was calculated
to inspire confidence. Mahaffy, keenly alive to this fact, returned
Carrington's glance with a fixed and hostile stare. "Come--" said
Carrington good-naturedly, "you surely remember me?"

"Yes, sir; I reckon I do--"

"Can't you tell me about Mr. Yancy?"

"No, sir; I don't know exactly where he is--"

"But how did you get here?" persisted Carrington.

Suddenly Mahaffy turned on him.

"Don't you see he's with us?" he said truculently.

"Well, my dear sir, I certainly intended no offense!" rejoined
Carrington rather hotly.

Mahaffy was plainly disturbed, the debased currency of his affection was
in circulation where Hannibal was concerned, and he eyed the river-man
askance. He was prepared to give him the lie should he set up any claim
to the boy.

The judge plodded forward, his shoulders drooped, and his head bowed.
For once silence had fixed its seal upon his lips, no inspiring speech
fell from them. He had been suddenly swept back into a past he had
striven these twenty years and more to forget, and his memories shaped
themselves fantastically. Surely if ever a man had quitted the world
that knew him, he was that man! He had died and yet he lived--lived
horribly, without soul or heart, the empty shell of a man.

A turn in the road brought them within sight of Boggs' racetrack, a wide
level meadow. The judge paused irresolutely, and turned his bleared face
on his friend.

"We'll stop here, Solomon," he said rather wearily, for the spirit of
boast and jest was quite gone out of him. He glanced toward Carrington.
"Are you a resident of these parts, sir?" he asked.

"I've been in Raleigh three days altogether," answered Carrington,
falling into step at his side, and they continued on across the meadow
in silence.

"Do you observe the decorations of those refreshment booths?--the
tasteful disposition of our national colors, sir?" the judge presently
inquired.

Carrington smiled; he was able to follow his companion's train of
thought.

They were elbowing the crowd now. Here were men from the small clearings
in homespun and butternut or fringed hunting-shirts, with their women
folk trailing after them. Here, too, in lesser numbers, were the lords
of the soil, the men who counted their acres by the thousand and their
slaves by the score. There was the flutter of skirts among the moving
groups, the nodding of gay parasols that shaded fresh young faces, while
occasionally a comfortable family carriage with some planter's wife
or daughter rolled silently over the turf; for Boggs' race-track was a
famous meeting-place where families that saw one another not above once
or twice a year, friends who lived a day's hard drive apart even when
summer roads were at their best, came as to a common center.

The judge's dull eye kindled, the haggard lines that had streaked his
face erased themselves. This was life, opulent and full. These swift
rolling carriages with their handsome women, these well-dressed men on
foot, and splendidly mounted, all did their part toward lifting him out
of his gloom. He settled his hat on his head with a rakish slant and his
walk became a strut, he courted observation; he would have been grateful
for a word, even a jest at his expense.

A cry from Hannibal drew his attention. Turning, he was in time to see
the boy bound away. An instant later, to his astonishment, he saw a
young girl who was seated with two men in an open carriage, spring to
the ground, and dropping to her knees put her arms about the tattered
little figure.

"Why, Hannibal!" cried Betty Malroy.

"Miss Betty! Miss Betty!" and Hannibal buried his head on her shoulder.

"What is it, Hannibal; what is it, dear?"

"Nothing, only I'm so glad to find you!"

"I am glad to see you, too!" said Betty, as she wiped his tears away.
"When did you get here, dear?"

"We got here just to-day, Miss Betty," said Hannibal.

Mr. Ware, careless as to dress, with a wiry black beard of a week's
growth decorating his chin and giving an unkempt appearance which his
expression did not mitigate, it being of the sour and fretful sort;
scowled down on the child. He had favored Boggs' with his presence, not
because he felt the least interest in horse-racing, but because he had
no faith in girls, and especially had he profound mistrust of Betty. She
was so much easily portable wealth, a pink-faced chit ready to fall into
the arms of the first man who proposed to her. But Charley Norton had
not seemed disturbed by the planter's forbidding air. Between those
two there existed complete reciprocity of feeling, inasmuch as
Tom's presence was as distasteful to Norton as his own presence was
distressing to Ware.

"Where is your Uncle Bob, Hannibal?" Betty asked, glancing about, and
at her question a shadow crossed the child's face and the tears gathered
again in his eyes.

"Ain't you seen him, Miss Betty?" he whispered. He had been sustained by
the belief that when he found her he should find his Uncle Bob, too.

"Why, what do you mean, Hannibal--isn't your Uncle Bob with you?"
demanded Betty.

"He got hurt in a fight, and I got separated from him way back yonder
just after we came out of the mountains." He looked up piteously into
Betty's face. "But you think he'll find me, don't you?"

"Why, you poor little thing!" cried Betty compassionately, and again she
sank on her knees at Hannibal's side, and slipped her arms about him.
The child began to cry softly.

"What ragamuffin's this, Betty?" growled Ware disgustedly.

But Betty did not seem to hear.

"Did you come alone, Hannibal?" she asked.

"No, ma'am; the judge and Mr. Mahaffy, they fetched me."

The judge had drawn nearer as Betty and Hannibal spoke together, but
Mahaffy hung back. There were gulfs not to be crossed by him. It was
different with the judge; the native magnificence of his mind fitted him
for any occasion. He pulled up his stock, and coaxed a half-inch of limp
linen down about his wrists, then very splendidly he lifted his napless
hat from his shiny bald head and pressing it against his fat chest with
much fervor, elegantly inclined himself from the hips.

"Allow me the honor to present myself, ma'am--Price is my name--Judge
Slocum Price. May I be permitted to assume that this is the Miss
Betty of whom my young protege so often speaks?" The judge beamed
benevolently, and rested a ponderous hand on the boy's head.

Tom Ware gave him a glance of undisguised astonishment, while Norton
regarded him with an expression of stunned and resolute gravity. Mahaffy
seemed to be undergoing a terrible moment of uncertainty. He was divided
between two purposes: one was to seize Price by the coat tails and drag
him back into the crowd; the other was to kick him, and himself fly that
spot. This singular impulse sprang from the fact that he firmly believed
his friend's appearance was sufficient to blast the boy's chances in
every quarter; nor did he think any better of himself.

Betty looked at the judge rather inquiringly.

"I am glad he has found friends," she said slowly. She wanted to believe
that judge Slocum Price was somehow better than he looked, which should
have been easy, since it was incredible that he could have been worse.

"He has indeed found friends," said the judge with mellow unction, and
swelling visibly. These prosperous appearing people should be of use
to him, God willing--he made a sweeping gesture. "I have assumed the
responsibility of his future--he is my care."

Now Betty caught sight of Carrington and bowed. Occupied with Hannibal
and the judge, she had been unaware of his presence. Carrington stepped
forward.

"Have you met Mr. Norton, and my brother, Mr. Carrington?" she asked.

The two young men shook hands, and Ware improved the opportunity to
inspect the new-comer. But as his glance wandered over him, it took in
more than Carrington, for it included the fine figure and swarthy face
of Captain Murrell, who, with his eyes fixed on Betty, was thrusting his
eager way through the crowd.

Murrell had presented himself at Belle Plain the day before. For upward
of a year, Ware had enjoyed great peace of mind as a direct result of
his absence from west Tennessee, and when he thought of him at all he
had invariably put a period to his meditations with, "I hope to hell he
catches it wherever he is!" It had really seemed a pernicious thing to
him that no one had shown sufficient public spirit to knock the captain
on the head, and that this had not been done, utterly destroyed his
faith in the good intentions of Providence.

More than this, Betty had spoken of the captain in no uncertain terms.
He was not to repeat that visit. Tom must make that point clear to him.
Tom might entertain him if he liked at his office, but the doors of
Belle Plain were closed against Captain Murrell; he was not to set his
foot inside of them.

As Murrell approached, the hot color surged into Betty's face. As for
Hannibal, he had gone white to the lips, and his small hand clutched
hers desperately; he was remembering all the terror of that hot dawn at
Slosson's.

Murrell, with all his hardihood, realized that a too great confidence
had placed him in an awkward position, for Betty turned her back on him
and began an animated conversation with Carrington and Charley Norton;
only Hannibal and the judge continued to regard him; the boy with a
frightened, fascinated stare, the judge with a wide sweet smile.

Hicks, the Belle Plain overseer, pushed his way to Murrell's side.

"Here, John Murrell, ain't you going to show us a trick or two?" he
inquired.

Murrell turned quickly with a sense of relief.

"If you can spare me your rifle," he said, but his face wore a
bleak look. Glancing at Betty, he took up his station with the other
contestants, whereupon two or three young planters silently withdrew
from the firing-line.

"Don't you think you've seen about enough, Bet?" demanded Tom. "You
don't care for the shooting, do you?"

"That's the very thing I do care for; I think I'd rather see that
than the horse-racing," said Betty perversely. This had been her first
appearance in public since her home-coming, and she felt that it had
been most satisfactory. She had met everybody she had ever known, and
scores of new people; her progress had been quite triumphal in spite
of Tom, and in spite of Charley Norton, who was plainly not anxious to
share her with any one, his devotion being rather of the monopolizing
sort.

Betty now seated herself in the carriage, with Hannibal beside her,
quietly determined to miss nothing. The judge, feeling that he had come
into his own, leaned elegantly against the wheel, and explained the
merits of each shot as it was made.

"Our intruding friend, the Captain, ma'am, is certainly a master with
his weapon," he observed.

Betty was already aware of this. She turned to Norton.

"Charley, I can't bear to have him win!"

"I am afraid he will, for anything I can do, Betty," said Norton.

"Mr. Carrington, can't you shoot?--do take Hannibal's rifle and beat
him," she coaxed.

"Don't be too sure that I can!" said Carrington, laughing.

"But I know you can!" urged Betty.

"I hope you gentlemen are not going to let me walk off with the prize?"
said Murrell, approaching the group about the carriage.

"Mr. Norton, I am told you are clever with the rifle."

"I am not shooting to-day," responded Norton haughtily.

Murrell stalked back to the line.

"At forty paces I'd risk it myself, ma'am," said the judge. "But at a
hundred, offhand like this, I should most certainly fail--I've burnt too
much midnight oil. Eh--what--damn the dog, he's scored another center
shot!"

"It would be hard to beat that--" they heard Murrell say.

"At least it would be quite possible to equal it," said Carrington,
advancing with Hannibal's rifle in his hands. It was tossed to his
shoulder, and poured out its contents in a bright stream of flame. There
was a moment of silence.

"Center shot, ma'am!" cried the judge.

"I'll add twenty dollars to the purse!" Norton addressed himself to
Carrington. "And I shall hope, sir, to see it go in to your pocket."

"Our sentiments exactly, ma'am, are they not?" said the judge.

"Perhaps you'd like to bet a little of your money?" remarked Murrell.

"I'm ready to do that too, sir," responded Norton quietly.

"Five hundred dollars, then, that this gentleman in whose success you
take so great an interest, can neither equal nor better my next shot!"
Murrell had produced a roll of bills as he spoke. Norton colored with
embarrassment. Carrington took in the situation.

"Wait a minute--" he said, and passed his purse to Norton.

"Cover his money, sir," he added briefly.

"Thank you, my horses have run away with most of my cash," explained
Norton.

"Your shot!" said Carrington shortly, to the outlaw.

Murrell taking careful aim, fired, clipping the center.

As soon as the result was known, Carrington raised his rifle; his
bullet, truer than his opponent's, drove out the center. Murrell turned
on him with an oath.

"You shoot well, but a board stuck against a tree is no test for a man's
nerve," he said insolently.

Carrington was charging his piece.

"I only know of one other kind of target," he observed coolly.

"Yes--a living target!" cried Murrell.

The crowd opened from right to left. Betty's face grew white, and
uttering a smothered cry she started to descend from the carriage, but
the judge rested his hand on her arm.

"No, my dear young, lady, our friend is quite able to care for himself."

Carrington shook the priming into the pan of Hannibal's ancient weapon.

"I am ready for that, too," he said. There was a slow smile on his lips,
but his eyes, black and burning, looked the captain through and through.

"Another time--" said Murrell, scowling.

"Any time," answered Carrington indifferently.




CHAPTER XVI. THE PORTAL OF HOPE


"This--" the speaker was judge Price; "this is the place for me: They
are a warm-hearted people, sir; a prosperous people, and a patriotic
people with an unstinted love of country. A people full of rugged
virtues engaged in carving a great state out of the indulgent bosom of
Nature. I like the size of their whisky glasses; I like the stuff that
goes into them; I despise a section that separates its gallons into too
many glasses. Show me a community that does that, and I'll show you a
community rapidly tending toward a low scale of living. I'd like to hang
out my shingle here and practise law."

The judge and Mr. Mahaffy were camped in the woods between Boggs' and
Raleigh. Betty had carried Hannibal off to spend the night at Belle
Plain, Carrington had disappeared with Charley Norton; but the judge
and Mahaffy had lingered in the meadow until the last refreshment booth
struck its colors to the twilight, and they had not lingered in vain.
The judge threw himself at full length on the ground, and Mahaffy
dropped at his side. About them, in the ruddy glow of their camp-fire,
rose the dark wall of the forest.

"I crave opportunity, Solomon--the indorsement of my own class. I feel
that I shall have it here," resumed the judge pensively.

But Mahaffy was sad in his joy, sober in his incipientent drunkenness.
The same handsome treatment which the judge commended, had been as
freely tendered him, yet he saw the end of all such hospitality. This
was the worm in the bud. The judge, however, was an eager idealist;
he still dreamed of Utopia, he still believed in millenniums. Mahaffy
didn't and couldn't. Memory was the scarecrow in the garden of his
hopes--you could wear out your welcome anywhere. In the end the world
reckoned your cost, and unless you were prepared to make some sort of
return for its bounty, the cold shoulder came to be your portion instead
of the warm handclasp.

"Hannibal has found friends among people of the first importance. I
have made it my business to inquire into their standing, and I find
that young lady is heiress to a cool half million. Think of that,
Solomon--think of that! I never saw anything more beautiful than her
manifestation of regard for my protege--"

"And you made it your business, Mr. Price, to do your very damnedest to
ruin his chances," said Mahaffy, with sudden heat.

"I ruin his chances?--I, sir? I consider that I helped his chances
immeasurably."

"All right, then, you helped his chances--only you didn't, Price!"

"Am I to understand, Solomon, that you regard my interest in the boy as
harmful?" inquired the judge, in a tone of shocked surprise.

"I regard it as a calamity," said Mahaffy, with cruel candor.

"And how about you, Solomon?"

"Equally a calamity. Mr. Price, you don't seem able to grasp just what
we look like!"

"The mind's the only measure of the man, Solomon. If anybody can talk to
me and be unaware that they are conversing with a gentleman, all I can
say is their experience has been as pitiable as their intelligence is
meager. But it hurts me when you intimate that I stand in the way of the
boy's opportunity."

"Price, what do you; suppose we look like--you and I?"

"In a general way, Solomon, I am conscious that our appeal is to the
brain rather than the eye," answered the judge, with dignity.

"I reckon even you couldn't do a much lower trick than use the boy as a
stepping-stone," pursued Mahaffy.

"I don't see how you have the heart to charge me with such a purpose--I
don't indeed, Solomon." The judge spoke with deep feeling; he was really
hurt.

"Well, you let the boy have his chance, and don't you stick in your
broken oar," cried Mahaffy fiercely.

The judge rolled over on his back, and stared up at the heavens.

"This is a new aspect of your versatile nature, Solomon. Must I regard
you as a personally emancipated moral influence, not committed to the
straight and narrow path yourself, but still close enough to it to keep
my feet from straying?" he at length demanded.

Mahaffy having spoken his mind, preserved a stony silence.

The judge got up and replenished the camp-fire, which had burnt low,
then squatting before it, he peered into the flames.

"You'll not deny, Solomon, that Miss Malroy exhibited a real affection
for Hannibal?" he began.

"Now don't you try to borrow money of her, Price," said Mahaffy,
returning to the attack.

"Solomon--Solomon--how can you?"

"That'll be your next move. Now let her alone; let Hannibal have his
luck as it comes to him."

"You seem to forget, sir, that I still bear the name of gentleman!" said
the judge.

Mahaffy gave way to acid merriment.

"Well, see that you are not tempted to forget that," he observed.

"If I didn't know your sterling qualities, Solomon, and pay homage to
'em, I might be tempted to take offense," said the judge.

"It's like pouring water on a duck's back to talk to you, Price; nothing
strikes in."

"On the contrary, I am at all times ready to listen to reason from any
quarter, but I've studied this matter in its many-sided aspect. I won't
say we might not do better in Memphis, but we must consider the boy. No;
if I can find a vacant house in Raleigh, I wouldn't ask a finer spot in
which to spend the afternoon of my life."

"Afternoon?" snapped Mahaffy irritably.

"That's right--carp--! But you can't relegate me! You can't shove me
away from the portal of hope--metaphorically speaking, I'm on the
stoop; it may be God's pleasure that I enter; there's a place for gray
heads--and there's a respectable slice of life after the meridian is
passed."

"Humph!" said Mahaffy.

"I've made my impression; I've been thrown with cultivated minds quick
to recognize superiority; I've met with deference and consideration."

"Aren't you forgetting the boy?" inquired Mahaffy. "No, sir! I regard my
obligations where he is concerned as a sacred trust to be administered
in a lofty and impersonal manner. If his friends--if Miss Malroy, for
instance--cares to make me the instrument of her benefactions, I'll not
be disposed to stand on my dignity; but his education shall be my care.
I'll make such a lawyer of him as America has not seen before! I don't
ask you to accept my own opinion of my fitness to do this, but two
gentlemen with whom I talked this evening--one of them was the justice
of the peace--were pleased to say that they had never heard such
illuminating comments on the criminal law. I quoted the Greeks and
Romans to 'em, sir; I gave 'em the salient points on mediaeval law; and
they were dumfounded and speechless. I reckon they'd never heard such an
exposition of fundamental principles; I showed 'em the germ and I showed
'em fruition. Damn it, sir, they were overwhelmed by the array of facts
I marshaled for 'em. They said they'd never met with such erudition--no
more they had, for I boiled down thirty years of study into ten minutes
of talk! I flogged 'em with facts, and then we drank--" The judge
smacked his lips. "It is this free-handed hospitality I like; it's this
that gives life its gala aspect."

He forgot former experiences; but without this kindly refusal of memory
to perform its wonted functions, the world would have been a chill place
indeed for Slocum Price. But Mahaffy, keen and anxious, with doubt in
every glass he drained, a lurking devil to grin at him above the rim,
could see only the end of their brief hour of welcome. This made the
present moment as bitter as the last.

"I have a theory, Solomon, that I shall be handsomely supported by my
new friends. They'll snatch at the opportunity."

"I see 'em snatching, Mr. Price," said Mahaffy grimly.

"That's right--go on and plant doubt in my heart if you can! You're as
hopeless as the grave side!" cried the judge, a spasm of rage shaking
him.

"The thing for us to do--you and I, Price--is to clear out of here,"
said Mahaffy.

"But what of the boy?"

"Leave him with his friends."

"How do you know Miss Malroy would be willing to assume his care? It's
scandalous the way you leap at conclusions. No, Solomon, no--I won't
shirk a single irksome responsibility," and the judge's voice shook with
suppressed emotion. Mahaffy laughed. "There you go again, Solomon, with
that indecent mirth of yours! Friendship aside, you grow more offensive
every day." The judge paused and then resumed. "I understand there's a
federal judgeship vacant here. The president--" Mr. Mahaffy gave him
a furtive leer. "I tell you General Jackson was my friend--we were
brothers, sir--I stood at his side on the glorious blood-wet field of
New Orleans! You don't believe me--"

"Price, you've made more demands on my stock of credulity than any man
I've ever known!"

The judge became somber-faced.

"Unparalleled misfortune overtook me--I stepped aside, but the world
never waits; I was a cog discarded from the mechanism of society--" He
was so pleased with the metaphor that he repeated it.

"Look here, Price, you talk as though you were a modern job; what's the
matter anyhow?--have you got boils?"

The judge froze into stony silence. Well, Mahaffy could sneer--he would
show him! This was the last ditch and he proposed to descend into it,
it was something to be able to demand the final word of fate--but
he instantly recalled that he had been playing at hide-and-seek with
inevitable consequences for something like a quarter of a century; it
had been a triumph merely to exist. Mahaffy having eased his conscience,
rolled over and promptly went to sleep. Flat on his back, the judge
stared up at the wide blue arch of the heavens and rehearsed those
promises which in the last twenty years he had made and broken times
without number. He planned no sweeping reforms, his system of morality
being little more than a series of graceful compromises with himself.
He must not get hopelessly in debt; he must not get helplessly drunk.
Dealing candidly with his own soul in the silence, he presently came
to the belief that this might be done without special hardship. Then
suddenly the rusted name-plate on Hannibal's old rifle danced again
before his burning eyes, and a bitter sense of hurt and loss struck
through him. He saw himself as he was, a shabby outcast, a tavern
hanger-on, the utter travesty of all he should have been; he dropped his
arm across his face.


The first rift of light in the sky found the judge stirring; it found
him in his usual cheerful frame of mind. He disposed of his toilet and
breakfast with the greatest expedition.

"Will you stroll into town with me, Solomon?" he asked, when they had
eaten. Mahaffy shook his head, his air was still plainly hostile. "Then
let your prayers follow me, for I'm off!" said the judge.

Ten minutes' walk brought him to the door of the city tavern, where he
found Mr. Pegloe directing the activities of a small colored boy who was
mopping out his bar. To him the judge made known his needs.

"Goin' to locate, are you?" said Mr. Pegloe.

"My friends urge it, sir, and I have taken the matter under
consideration," answered the judge.

"Sho, do you know any folks hereabouts?" asked Mr. Pegloe.

"Not many," said the judge, with reserve.

"Well, the only empty house in town is right over yonder; it belongs to
young Charley Norton out at Thicket Point Plantation."

"Ah-h!" said the judge.

The house Mr. Pegloe had pointed out was a small frame building; it
stood directly on the street, with a narrow porch across the front, and
a shed addition at the back. The judge scuttled over to it. With his
hands clasped under the tails of his coat he walked twice about the
building, stopping to peer in at all the windows, then he paused and
took stock of his surroundings. Over the way was Pegloe's City Tavern;
farther up the street was the court-house, a square wooden box with a
crib that housed a cracked bell, rising from a gable end. The judge's
pulse quickened. What a location, and what a fortunate chance that Mr.
Norton was the owner of this most desirable tenement.

He must see him at once. As he turned away to recross the street and
learn from Mr. Pegloe by what road Thicket Point might be reached,
Norton himself galloped into the village. Catching sight of the judge,
he reined in his horse and swung himself from the saddle.

"I was hoping, sir, I might find you," he said, as they met before the
tavern.

"A wish I should have echoed had I been aware of it!" responded the
judge. "I was about to do myself the honor to wait upon you at your
plantation."

"Then I have saved you a long walk," said Norton. He surveyed the judge
rather dubiously, but listened with great civility and kindness as he
explained the business that would have taken him to Thicket Point.

"The house is quite at your service, sir," he said, at length.

"The rent--" began the judge. He had great natural delicacy always in
mentioning matters of a financial nature.

But Mr. Norton, with a delicacy equal to his own, entreated him not to
mention the rent. The house had come to him as boot in a trade. It
had been occupied by a doctor and a lawyer; these gentlemen had each
decamped between two days, heavily in debt at the stores and taverns,
especially the taverns.

"I can't honestly say they owed me, since I never expected to get
anything out of them; however, they both left some furniture, all that
was necessary for the kind of housekeeping they did, for they were
single gentlemen and drew the bulk of their nourishment from Pegloe's
bar. I'll turn the establishment over to you with the greatest
pleasure in the world, and wish you better luck than your predecessors
had--you'll offend me if you refer to the rent again!"

And thus handsomely did Charley Norton acquit himself of the mission he
had undertaken at Betty Malroy's request.

That same morning Tom Ware and Captain Murrell were seated in the small
detached building at Belle Plain, known as the office, where the former
spent most of his time when not in the saddle. Whatever the planter's
vices, and he was reputed to possess a fair working knowledge of good
and evil, no one had ever charged him with hypocrisy. His emotions
lay close to the surface and wrote themselves on his unprepossessing
exterior with an impartial touch. He had felt no pleasure when Murrell
rode into the yard, and he had welcomed him according to the dictates of
his mood, which was one of surly reticence.

"So your sister doesn't like me, Tom--that's on your mind this morning,
is it?" Murrell was saying, as he watched his friend out of the corner
of his eyes.

"She was mad enough, the way you pushed in on us at Boggs' yesterday.
What happened back in North Carolina, Murrell, anyhow?"

"Never you mind what happened."

"Well, it's none of my business, I reckon; she'll have to look out for
herself, she's nothing to me but a pest sand a nuisance--I've been more
bothered since she came back than I've been in years! I'd give a good
deal to be rid of her," said Ware, greatly depressed as he recalled the
extraordinary demands Betty had made.

"Make it worth my while and I'll take her off your hands," and Murrell
laughed.

Tom favored him with a sullen stare.

"You'd better get rid of that notion--of all fool nonsense, this love
business is the worst! I can't see the slightest damn difference between
one good looking girl and another. I wish every one was as sensible as
I am," he lamented. "I wouldn't miss a meal, or ten minutes' sleep, on
account of any woman in creation," and Ware shook his head.

"So your sister doesn't like me?"

"No, she doesn't," said Ware, with simple candor.

"Told you to put a stop to my coming here?"

"Not here--to the house, yes. She doesn't give a damn, so long as she
doesn't have to see you."

Murrell, somber-faced and thoughtful, examined a crack in the flooring.

"I'd like to know what happened back yonder in North Carolina to make
her so blazing mad?" continued Ware.

"Well, if you want to know, I told her I loved her."

"That's all right, that's the fool talk girls like to hear," said Ware.
He lighted a cigar with an air of wearied patience.

"Open the door, Tom," commanded Murrell.

"It is close in here," agreed the planter.

"It isn't that, but you smoke the meanest cigars I ever smelt, I always
think your shoes are on fire. Tom, do you want to get rid of her? Did
you mean that?"

"Oh, shut up," said Tom, dropping his voice to a surly whisper.

There was a brief silence, during which Murrell studied his friend's
face. When he spoke, it was to give the conversation a new direction.

"Did she bring the boy here last night? I saw you drive off with him in
the carriage."

"Yes, she makes a regular pet of the little ragamuffin--it's perfectly
sickening!"

"Who were the two men with him?"

"One of 'em calls himself judge Price; the other kept out of the way, I
didn't hear his name."

"Is the boy going to stay at Belle Plain?" inquired Murrell.

"That notion hasn't struck her yet, for I heard her say at breakfast
that she'd take him to Raleigh this afternoon."

"That's the boy I traveled all the way to North Carolina to get for
Fentress. I thought I had him once, but the little cuss gave me the
slip."

"Eh--you don't say?" cried Ware.

"Tom, what do you know about the Quintard lands; what do you know about
Quintard himself?" continued Murrell.

"He was a rich planter, lived in North Carolina. My father met him when
he was in congress and got him to invest in land here. They had some
colonization scheme on foot this was upward of twenty years ago--but
nothing came of it. Quintard lost interest."

"And the land?"

"Oh, he held on to that."

"Is there much of it?"

"A hundred thousand acres," said Ware.

Murrell whistled softly under his breath.

"What's it worth?"

"A pot of money, two or three dollars an acre anyhow," answered Ware.

"Quintard has been dead two years, Tom, and back yonder in North
Carolina they told me he left nothing but the home plantation. The boy
lived there up to the time of Quintard's death, but what relation he was
to the old man no one knew. What do you suppose Fentress wants with him?
He offered me five thousand dollars if I'd bring him West; and he still
wants him, only he's lying low now to see what comes of the two old
sots--he don't want to move in the dark. Offhand, Tom, I'd say that by
getting hold of the boy Fentress expects to get hold of the Quintard
land."

"That's likely," said Ware, then struck by a sudden idea, he added, "Are
you going to take all the risks and let him pocket the cash? If it's the
land he's after, the stake's big enough to divide."

"He can have the whole thing and welcome, I'm playing for a bigger
stake." His friend stared at him in astonishment. "I tell you, Tom, I'm
bent on getting even with the world! No silver spoon came in the way of
my mouth when I was a youngster; my father was too honest--and I think
the less of him for it!"

Mr. Ware seemed on the whole edified by the captain's unorthodox point
of view.

"My mother was the true grit though; she came of mountain stock, and
taught us children to steal by the time we could think! Whatever we
stole, she hid, and dared my father to touch us. I remember the first
thing of account was when I was ten years old. A Dutch peddler came to
our cabin one winter night and begged us to take him in. Of course, he
opened his pack before he left, and almost under his nose I got away
with a bolt of linen. The old man and woman fought about it, but if the
peddler discovered his loss he had the sense not to come back and tell
of it! When I was seventeen I left home with three good horses I'd
picked up; they brought me more money than I'd ever seen before and I
got my first taste of life--that was in Nashville where I made some
good friends with whose help I soon had as pretty a trade organized
in horseflesh as any one could wish." A somber tone had crept into
Murrell's voice, while his glance had become restless and uneasy. He
went on: "I'm licking a speculation into shape that will cause me to be
remembered while there's a white man alive in the Mississippi Valley!"
His wicked black eyes were blazing coals of fire in their deep sockets.
"Have you heard what the niggers did at Hayti?"

"My God, John--no, I won't talk to you--and don't you think about it!
That's wrong--wrong as hell itself!" cried Ware.

"There's no such thing as right and wrong for me. That'll do for those
who have something to lose. I was born with empty hands and I am going
to fill them where and how I can. I believe the time has come when the
niggers can be of use to me--look what Turner did back in Virginia three
years ago! If he'd had any real purpose he could have laid the country
waste, but he hadn't brains enough to engineer a general uprising."

Ware was probably as remote from any emotion that even vaguely
approximated right feeling as any man could well be, but Murrell's words
jarred his dull conscience, or his fear, into giving signs of life.

"Don't you talk of that business, we want nothing of that sort out here.
You let the niggers alone!" he said, but he could scarcely bring himself
to believe that Murrell had spoken in earnest. Yet even if he jested,
this was a forbidden subject.

"White brains will have to think for them, if it's to be more than a
flash in the pan," said Murrell unheeding him.

"You let the niggers alone, don't you tamper with them," said Ware.
He possessed a profound belief in Murrell's capacity. He knew how the
latter had shaped the uneasy population that foregathered on the edge of
civilization to his own ends, and that what he had christened the Clan
had become an elaborate organization, disciplined and flexible to his
ruthless will.

"Look here, what do you think I have been working for--to steal a few
niggers?"

"A few--you've been sending 'em south by the boatload! You ought to be a
rich man, Murrell. If you're not it's your own fault."

"That furnishes us with money, but you can push the trade too hard
and too far, and we've about done that. The planters are uneasy in the
sections we've worked over, there's talk of getting together to clean
out everybody who can't give a good account of himself. The Clan's got
to deal a counter blow or go out of business. It was so with the horse
trade; in the end it became mighty unhandy to move the stock we'd
collected. We've reached the same point now with the trade in niggers.
Between here and the gulf--" he made a wide sweeping gesture with his
arm. "I am spotting the country with my men; there are two thousand
active workers on the rolls of the Clan, and as many more like you,
Tom--and Fentress--on whose friendship I can rely." He leaned toward
Ware. "You'd be slow to tell me I couldn't count on you, Tom, and you'd
be slow to think I couldn't manage this thing when the time's ripe for
it!"

But no trace of this all-sufficient sense of confidence, of which he
seemed so certain, showed on Ware's hardened visage. He spat away the
stump of his cigar.

"Sure as God, John Murrell, you are overreaching yourself! Your white
men are all right, they've got to stick by you; if they don't they know
it's only a question of time until they get a knife driven into their
ribs--but niggers--there isn't any real fight in a nigger, if there was
they wouldn't be here."

"Yet you couldn't have made the whites in Hayti believe that," said
Murrell, with a sinister smile.

"Because they were no-account trash themselves!" returned Ware, shaking
his head. "We'll all go down in this muss you're fixing for!" he added.

"No, you won't, Tom. I'll look out for my friends. You'll be warned in
time."

"A hell of a lot of good a warning will do!" growled Ware.

"The business will be engineered so that you, and those like you, will
not be disturbed. Maybe the niggers will have control of the country
for a day or two in the thickly settled parts near the towns; longer,
of course, where the towns and plantations are scattering. The end will
come in the swamps and cane-brakes, and the members of the Clan who
don't get rich while the trouble is at its worst, will have to stay
poor. As for the niggers, I expect nothing else than that they will
be pretty well exterminated. But look what that will do for men like
yourself, Tom, who will have been able to hold on to their slaves!"

"I'd like to have some guarantee that I'd be able to; do that! No, sir,
the devils will all go whooping off to raise hell." Ware shivered at
the picture his mind had conjured up. "Well, thank God, they're not my
niggers!" he added.

"You'd better come with me, Tom," said Murrell.

"With you?"

"Yes, I'm going to keep New Orleans for myself; that's a plum I'm going
to pick with the help of a few friends, and I'd cheerfully hang for it
afterward if I could destroy the city Old Hickory saved--but I expect to
quit the country in good time; with a river full of ships I shan't lack
for means of escape." His manner was cool and decided. He possessed in
an eminent degree the egotism that makes possible great crimes and great
criminals, and his degenerate brain dealt with this colossal horror as
simply as if it had been a petty theft.

"There's no use in trying to talk you out of this, John, but I just want
to ask you one thing: you do all you say you are going to do, and then
where in hell's name will you be safe?"

"I'll take my chances. What have I been taking all my life but the
biggest sort of chances?--and for little enough!"

Ware, feeling the entire uselessness of argument, uttered a string of
imprecations, and then fell silent. His acquaintance with Murrell was
of long standing. It dated back to the time when he was growing into the
management of Belle Plain. A chance meeting with the outlaw in Memphis
had developed into the closest intimacy, and the plantation had become
one of the regular stations for the band of horse-thieves of which
Murrell had spoken. But time had wrought its changes. Tom was now in
full control of Belle Plain and its resources, and he had little heart
for such risks as he had once taken.

"Well, how about the girl, Tom?" asked Murrell at length, in a low even
tone.

"The girl? Oh, Betty, you mean?" said Ware, and shifted uneasily in his
seat. "Haven't you got enough on your hands without worrying about her?
She don't like you, haven't I told you that? Think of some one else for
a spell, and you'll find it answers," he urged.

"What do you think is going to happen here if I take your advice? She'll
marry one of these young bloods!" Ware's lips twitched. "And then, Tom,
you'll get your orders to move out, while her husband takes over the
management of her affairs. What have you put by anyhow?--enough to stock
another place?"

"Nothing, not a damn cent!" said Ware. Murrell laughed incredulously.
"It's so! I've turned it all over--more lands, more niggers, bigger
crops each year. Another man might have saved his little spec, but I
couldn't; I reckon I never believed it would go to her, and I've managed
Belle Plain as if I were running it for myself." He seemed to writhe as
if undergoing some acute bodily pain.

"And you are in a fair way to turn it all over to her husband when she
marries, and step out of here a beggar, unless--"

"It isn't right, John! I haven't had pay for my ability! Why, the place
would have gone down to nothing with any management but mine!"

"If she were to die, you'd inherit?"

Ware laughed harshly.

"She looks like dying, doesn't she?"

"Listen to me, Tom. I'll take her away, and Belle Plain is yours--land,
stock and niggers!" said Murrell quietly.

Ware shifted and twisted in his seat.

"It can't be done. I can advise and urge: but I can't command. She's got
her friends, those people back yonder in North Carolina, and if I made
things uncomfortable for her here she'd go to them and I couldn't
stop her. You don't seem to get it through your head that she's got no
earthly use for you!"

Murrell favored him with a contemptuous glance.

"You're like every one else! Certain things you'll do, and certain other
things you won't even try to do--your conscience or your fear gets in
your way."

"Call it what you like."

"I offer to take the girl off your hands; when I quit the country she
shall go with me--"

"And I'd be left here to explain what had become of her!" cried Ware, in
a panic.

"You won't have anything to explain. She'll have disappeared, that will
be all you'll know," said Murrell quietly.

"She'll never marry you."

"Don't you be too sure of that. She may be glad enough to in the end."

"Oh, you think you are a hell of a fellow with women! Well, maybe you
are with one sort--but what do you know about her kind?" jeered the
planter.

Murrell's brow darkened.

"I'll manage her," he said briefly.

"You were of some account until this took hold of you," complained Ware.

"What do you say? One would hardly think I was offering to make you a
present of the best plantation in west Tennessee!" said Murrell.

Ware seemed to suck in hope through his shut teeth.

"I don't want to know anything about this, you are going to swamp
yourself yet--you're fixing to get yourself strung up--yes, by thunder,
that'll be your finish!"

"Do you want the land and the niggers? I reckon you'll have to take them
whether you want them or not, for I'm going to have the girl."




CHAPTER XVII. BOB YANCY FINDS HIMSELF


Mr. Yancy awoke from a long dreamless sleep; heavy-lidded, his eyes slid
open. For a moment he struggled with the odds and ends of memory, then
he recalled the fight at the tavern, the sudden murderous attack, the
fierce blows Slosson had dealt him, the knife thrust which had ended
the struggle. Therefore, the bandages that now swathed his head and
shoulders; therefore, the need that he should be up and doing--for where
was Hannibal?

He sought to lift himself on his elbow, but the effort sent shafts of
pain through him; his head seemed of vast size and endowed with a weight
he could not support. He sank back groaning, and closed his eyes. After
a little interval he opened them again and stared about him. There
was the breath of dawn in the air; he heard a rooster crow, and the
contented grunting of a pig close at hand. He was resting under a rude
shelter of poles and bark. Presently he became aware of a slow gliding
movement, and the silvery ripple of water. Clearly he was no longer at
the tavern, and clearly some one had taken the trouble to bandage his
hurts.

At length his eyes rolling from side to side focused themselves on a low
opening near the foot of his shakedown bed. Beyond this opening, and
at some little distance, he saw a sunbonneted woman of a plump and
comfortable presence. She was leaning against a tub which rested on a
rude bench. At her back was another bark shanty similar to the one that
sheltered himself, while on either hand a shoreless expanse of water
danced and sparkled under the rays of the newly risen sun. As his
eyes slowly took in the scene, Yancy's astonishment mounted higher and
higher. The lady's sunbonnet quite hid her face, but he saw that she was
smoking a cob-pipe.

He was still staring at her, when the lank figure of a man emerged from
the other shanty. This man wore a cotton shirt and patched butternut
trousers; he way hatless and shoeless, and his hair stood out from his
head in a great flaming shock. He, too, was smoking a cob-pipe. Suddenly
the man put out a long arm which found its way about the lady's waist,
an attention that culminated in a vigorous embrace. Then releasing her,
he squared his shoulders, took a long breath, beat his chest with the
flat of his hands and uttered a cheerful whoop. The embrace, the deep
breath, and the whoop constituted Mr. Cavendish's morning devotions,
and were expressive of a spirit of thankfulness to the risen sun, his
general satisfaction with the course of Providence, and his homage to
the lady of his choice.

Swinging about on his heel, Cavendish passed beyond Yancy's range of
vision. Again the latter attempted to lift himself on his elbow, but
sky and water changed places before his eyes and he dropped down on his
pillow with a stifled sigh. He seemed to be slipping back into the black
night from which he had just emerged. Again he was at Scratch Hill,
again Dave Blount was seeking to steal his nevvy--incidents of the
trial and flight recurred to him--all was confused, feverish, without
sequence.

Suddenly a shadow fell obliquely across the foot of his narrow bed, and
Cavendish, bending his long body somewhat, thrust his head in at the
opening. He found himself looking into a pair of eyes that for the first
time in many a long day held the light of consciousness.

"How are you, stranger?" he demanded, in a soft drawl.

"Where am I?" the words were a whisper on Yancy's bearded lips.

"Well, sir, you are in the Tennessee River fo' certain; my wife will
make admiration when she hears you speak. Polly! you jest step here."

But Polly had heard Cavendish speak, and the murmur of Yancy's voice in
reply. Now her head appeared beside her husband's, and Yancy saw that
she was rosy and smiling, and that her claim to good looks was something
that could not well be denied.

"La, you are some better, ain't you, sir?" she cried, smiling down on
him.

"How did I get here, and where's my nevvy?" questioned Yancy anxiously.

"There now, you ain't in no condition fo' to pester yo'self with
worry. You was fished up out of the Elk River by Mr. Cavendish," Polly
explained, still smiling and dimpling at him.

"When, ma'am--last night?"

"You got another guess coming to you, stranger!" It was Cavendish who
spoke.

"Do you mean, sir, that I been unconscious for a spell?" suggested Yancy
rather fearfully, glancing from one to the other.

"It's been right smart of a spell, too; yes, sir, you've laid like you
was dead, and not fo' a matter of hours either--but days."

"How long?"

"Well, nigh on to three weeks."

They saw Yancy's eyes widen with a look of dumb horror.

"Three weeks!" he at length repeated, and groaned miserably. He was
thinking of Hannibal.

"You was mighty droll to look at when I fished you up out of the river,"
continued Mr. Cavendish. "You'd been cut and beat up scandalous!"

"And you don't know nothing about my nevvy?--you ain't seen or heard of
him, ma'am?" faltered Yancy, and glanced up into Polly's comely face.

Polly shook her head regretfully.

"How come you in the river?" asked Cavendish.

"I reckon I was throwed in. It was a man named Murrell and another
man named Slosson. They tried fo' to murder me--they wanted to get my
nevvy--I 'low they done it!" and Yancy groaned again.

"You'll get him back," said Polly soothingly.

"Could you-all put me asho'?" inquired Yancy, with sudden eagerness.

"We could, but we won't," said Cavendish, in no uncertain tone.

"Why, la!--you'd perish!" exclaimed Polly.

"Are we far from where you-all picked me up?"

Cavendish nodded. He did not like to tell Yancy the distance they had
traversed.

"Where are you-all taking me?" asked Yancy.

"Well, stranger, that's a question I can't answer offhand. The Tennessee
are a twister; mebby it will be Kentucky; mebby it will be Illinoy, and
mebby it will be down yonder on the Mississippi. My tribe like this way
of moving about, and it certainly favors a body's legs."

"How old was your nevvy?" inquired Polly, reading the troubled look in
Yancy's gray eyes.

"Ten or thereabouts, ma'am. He were a heap of comfort to me," and the
whisper on Yancy's lips was wonderfully tender and wistful.

"Just the age of my Richard," said Polly, her glance full of compassion
and pity.

Mr. Cavendish essayed to speak, but was forced to pause and clear his
throat. The allusion to Richard in this connection having been almost
more than he could endure with equanimity. When he was able to put his
thoughts into words, he said:

"I shore am distressed fo' you. I tried to leave you back yonder where
I found you, but no one knowed you and you looked so near dead folks
wouldn't have it. What parts do you come from?"

"No'th Carolina. Me and my nevvy was a-goin' into west Tennessee to
a place called Belle Plain, somewhere near Memphis. We have friends
there," explained Yancy.

"That settles it!" cried Cavendish. "It won't be Kentucky, and it won't
be Illinoy; I'll put you asho' at Memphis; mebby you'll find yo' nevvy
there after all."

"That's the best. You lay still and get yo' strength back as fast as
you can, and try not to worry--do now." Polly's voice was soft and
wheedling.

"I reckon I been a heap of bother to you-all," said Yancy.

"La, no," Polly assured him; "you ain't been."

And now the six little Cavendishes appeared on the scene. The pore
gentleman had come to--sho! He had got his senses back--sho! he wa'n't
goin' to die after all; he could talk. Sho! a body could hear him plain!
Excited beyond measure they scurried about in their fluttering rags of
nightgowns for a sight and hearing of the pore gentleman. They struggled
madly to climb over their parents, and failing this--under them. But the
opening that served as a door to the shanty being small, and being as it
was completely stoppered by their father and mother who were in no mood
to yield an inch, they distributed themselves in quest of convenient
holes in the bark edifice through which to peer at the pore gentleman.
And since the number of youthful Cavendishes exceeded the number of such
holes, the sound of lamentation and recrimination presently filled the
morning air.

"I kin see the soles of his feet!" shrieked Keppel with passionate
intensity, his small bleached eye glued to a crack.

He was instantly ravished of the sight by Henry.

"You mean hateful thing!--just because you're bigger than Kep!" and
Constance fell on the spoiler. As her mother's right-hand man she
had cuffed and slapped her way to a place of power among the little
brothers.

Mr. Cavendish appeared to allay hostilities.

"I 'low I'll skin you if you don't keep still! Dress!--the whole kit and
b'ilin' of you!" he roared, and his manner was quite as ferocious as his
words.

But the six little Cavendishes were impressed by neither. They instantly
fastened on him like so many leeches. What was the pore gentleman
saying?--why couldn't they hear, too? Then they'd keep still, sure they
would! Did he say he knowed who throwed him in the river?

"I wonder, Connie, you ain't able to do more with these here children.
Seems like you ought to--a great big girl like you," said Mr. Cavendish,
reduced to despair.

"It was Henry pickin' on Kep," cried Constance.

"I found a crack and he took it away from me! drug me off by the legs,
he did, and filled my stomach full of slivers!" wailed Keppel, suddenly
remembering he had a grievance. "You had ought to let me see the pore
gentleman!" he added ingratiatingly.

"Well, ain't you been seein' him every day fo' risin' two weeks and
upwards?--ain't you sat by him hours at a stretch?" demanded Mr.
Cavendish fiercely.

Sho--that didn't count, he only kept a mutterin'--sho!--arollin' his
head sideways, sho! And their six tow heads were rolled to illustrate
their meaning. And a-pluckin' at a body's hands!--and they plucked at
Mr. Cavendish's hands. Sho--did he say why he done that?

"If you-all will quit yo' noise and dress, you-all kin presently set by
the pore gentleman. If you don't, I'll have to speak to yo' mother; I
'low she'll trim you! I reckon you-all don't want me to call her? No, by
thunderation!--because you-all know she won't stand no nonsense! She'll
fan you; she'll take the flat of her hand to you-all and make you skip
some; I reckon I'd get into my pants befo' she starts on the warpath. I
wouldn't give her no such special opportunity as you're offerin'!"
Mr. Cavendish's voice and manner had become entirely confidential and
sympathetic, and though fear of their mother could not be said to bulk
high on their horizon, yet the small Cavendishes were persuaded by sheer
force of his logic to withdraw and dress. Their father hurried back to
Yancy.

"I was just thinkin', sir," he said, "that if it would be any comfort to
you, we'll tie up to the bank right here and wait until you can travel.
I'm powerfully annoyed at having fetched you all this way!"

But Yancy shook his head.

"I'll be glad to go on to Memphis with you. If my nevvy got away from
Murrell, that's where I'll find him. I reckon folks will be kind to him
and sort of help him along. Why, he ain't much mo' than knee high!"

"Shore they will! there's a lot of good in the world, so don't you fret
none about him!" cried Polly.

"I can't do much else, ma'am, than think of him bein' lonesome and
hungry, maybe--and terribly frightened. What do you-all suppose he
thought when he woke up and found me gone?" But neither Polly nor her
husband had any opinion to venture on this point. "If I don't find him
in Memphis I'll take the back track to No'th Carolina, stoppin' on the
way to see that man Slosson."

"Well, I 'low there's a fit comin' to him when he gets sight of you!"
and Cavendish's bleached blue eyes sparkled at the thought.

"There's a heap mo' than a fit. I don't bear malice, but I stay mad a
long time," answered Yancy grimly:

"You shouldn't talk no mo'," said Polly. "You must just lay quiet
and get yo' strength back. Now, I'm goin' to fix you a good meal of
vittles." She motioned Cavendish to follow her, and they both withdrew
from the shanty.

Yancy closed his eyes, and presently, lulled by the soft ripple that
bore them company, fell into a restful sleep.

"When he told us of his nevvy, Dick, and I got to thinkin' of his bein'
just the age of our Richard, I declare it seemed like something got in
my throat and I'd choke. Do you reckon he'll ever find him?" said Polly,
as she busied herself with preparations for their breakfast.

"I hope so, Polly!" said Cavendish, but her words were a powerful
assault on his feelings, which at all times lay close to the surface and
were easily stirred.

Under stress of his emotions, he now enjoined silence on his family,
fortifying the injunction with dire threats as to the consequences that
would descend with lightning--like suddenness on the head of the
unlucky sinner who forgot and raised his voice above a whisper. Then he
despatched a chicken; sure sign that he and Polly considered their guest
had reached the first stage of convalescence.




CHAPTER XVIII. AN ORPHAN MAN OF TITLE


The raft drifted on into the day's heat; and when at last Yancy awoke,
it was to find Henry and Keppel seated beside him, each solacing him
with a small moist hand, while they regarded him out of the serious
unblinking eyes of childhood.

"Howdy!" said he, smiling up at them.

"Howdy!" they answered, a sociable grin puckering their freckled faces.

"Do you find yo'self pretty well, sir?" inquired Keppel.

"I find myself pretty weak," replied Yancy.

"Me and Kep has been watching fo' to keep the flies from stinging you,"
explained Henry.

"We-all takes turns doin' that," Keppel added.

"Well, and how many of you-all are there?" asked Yancy.

"There's six of we-uns and the baby."

They covertly examined this big bearded man who had lost his nevvy, and
almost his life. They had overheard their father and mother discuss
his plans and knew when he was recovered from his wounds if he did not
speedily meet up with his nevvy at a place called Memphis, he was going
back to Lincoln County, which was near where they came from, to have the
hide off a gentleman of the name of Slosson. They imagined the gentleman
named Slosson would find the operation excessively disagreeable; and
that Yancy should be recuperating for so unique an enterprise invested
him with a romantic interest. Henry squirmed closer to the recumbent
figure on the bed.

"Me and Kep would like mighty well to know how you-all are goin' to
strip the hide offen to that gentleman's back," he observed.

Yancy instantly surmised that the reference was to Slosson.

"I reckon I'll feel obliged to just naturally skin him," he explained.

"Sho', will he let you do that?" they demanded.

"He won't be consulted none. And his hide will come off easy once I get
hold of him by the scruff of the neck." Yancy's speech was gentle and
his lips smiling, but he meant a fair share of what he said.

"Sho', is that the way you do it?" And round-eyed they gazed down on
this fascinating stranger.

"I may have to touch him up with a tickler," continued Yancy, who did
not wish to prove disappointing. "I reckon you-all know what a tickler
is?"

They nodded.

"What if Mr. Slosson totes a tickler, too?" asked Keppel insinuatingly.
This opened an inviting field for conjecture.

"That won't make no manner of difference. Why? Because it's a powerful
drawback fo' a man to know he's in the wrong, just as it's a heap in yo'
favor to know you're in the right."

"My father's got a tickler; I seen it often," vouchsafed Henry.

"It's a foot long, with a buck horn handle. Gee whiz!--he keeps it keen;
but he never uses it on no humans," said Keppel.

"Of course he don't; he's a high-spirited, right-actin' gentleman.
But what do you reckon he'd feel obliged to do if a body stole one of
you-all?" inquired Yancy.

"Whoop! He'd carve 'em deep!" cried Keppel.

At this moment Mrs. Cavendish appeared, bringing Yancy's breakfast. In
her wake came Connie with the baby, and the three little brothers who
were to be accorded the cherished privilege of seeing the poor gentleman
eat.

"You got a nice little family, ma'am," said Yancy.

"Well, I reckon nobody complains mo' about their children than me, but
I reckon nobody gets mo' comfort out of their children either. I hope
you-all are a-goin' to be able to eat, you ain't had much nourishment.
La, does yo' shoulder pain you like that? Want I should feed you?"

"I am sorry, ma'am, but I reckon you'll have to," Yancy spoke
regretfully. "I expect I been a passel of bother to you."

"No, you ain't. Here's Dick to see how you make out with the chicken,"
Polly added, as Cavendish presented himself at the opening that did duty
as a door.

"This looks like bein' alive, stranger," he commented genially. He
surveyed the group of which Yancy was the center. "If them children gets
too numerous, just throw 'em out."

"You-all ain't told me yo' name yet?" said Yancy.

"It's Cavendish. Richard Keppel Cavendish, to get it all off my mind at
a mouthful. And this lady's Mrs. Cavendish."

"My name's Yancy--Bob Yancy."

Mr. Cavendish exchanged glances with Mrs. Cavendish. By a nod of her
dimpled chin the lady seemed to urge some more extended confidence on
his part. Chills and Fever seated himself at the foot of Yancy's bed.

"Stranger, what I'm a-goin' to tell you, you'll take as bein' said man
to man," he began, with the impressive air of one who had a secret of
great moment to impart; and Yancy hastened to assure him that whatever
passed between them, his lips should be sealed. "It ain't really that,
but I don't wish to appear proud afo' no man's, eyes. First, I want to
ask you, did you ever hear tell of titles?"

Polly and the children hung breathlessly on Mr. Yancy's reply.

"I certainly have," he rejoined promptly. "Back in No'th Carolina we
went by the chimneys."

"Chimneys? What's chimneys got to do with titles, Mr. Yancy?" asked
Polly, while her husband appeared profoundly mystified.

"A whole lot, ma'am. If a man had two chimneys to his house we always
called him Colonel, if there was four chimneys we called him General."

"La!" cried Polly, smiling and showing a number of new dimples. "Dick
don't mean militia titles, Mr. Yancy."

"Them's the only ones I know anything of," confessed Yancy.

"Ever hear tell of lords?" inquired Chills and Fever, tilting his head
on one side.

"No." And Yancy was quick to notice the look of disappointment on the
faces of his new friends. He felt that for some reason, which was by no
means clear to him, he had lost caste.

"Are you ever heard of royalty?" and Cavendish fixed the invalid's
wandering glance.

"You mean kings?"

"I shore do."

Yancy regarded him reflectively and made a mighty mental effort.

"There's them Bible kings--" he ventured at length.

Mr. Cavendish shook his head.

"Them's sacred kings. Are you familiar with any of the profane kings,
Mr. Yancy?"

"Well, taking them as they come, them Bible kings seemed to average
pretty profane." Yancy was disposed to defend this point.

"You must a heard of the kings of England. Sho', wa'n't any of yo' folks
in the war agin' him?"

"I'd plumb forgot, why my daddy fit all through that war!" exclaimed
Yancy. The Cavendishes were immensely relieved. Polly beamed on the
invalid, and the children hunched closer. Six pairs of eager lips were
trembling on the verge of speech.

"Now you-all keep still," said Cavendish. "I want Mr. Yancy should get
the straight of this here! The various orders of royalty are kings,
dukes, earls and lords. Earls is the third from the top of the heap, but
lords ain't no slouch; it's a right neat little title, and them that has
it can turn round in most any company."

"Dick had ought to know, fo' he's an earl himself," cried Polly
exultantly, unable to restrain herself any longer, while a mutter came
from the six little Cavendishes who had been wonderfully silent for
them.

"Sho', Richard Keppel Cavendish, Earl of Lambeth! 'Sho', that was what
he was! Sho'!" and some transient feeling of awe stamped itself upon
their small faces as they viewed the long and limber figure of their
parent.

"Is that mo' than a Colonel?" Yancy risked the question hesitatingly,
but he felt that speech was expected from him.

"Yes," said the possessor of the title.

"Would a General lay it over you any?"

"No, sir, he wouldn't."

Yancy gazed respectfully but uncertainly at Chills and Fever.

"Then all I got to say is that I've traveled considerably, mostly
between Scratch Hill and Balaam's Cross Roads, meeting with all kinds of
folks; but I never seen an earl afo. I take it they are some scarce."

"They are. I don't reckon there's another one but me in the whole United
States."

"Think of that!" gasped Yancy.

"We ain't nothin' fo' style, it bein' my opinion that where a man's a
born gentleman he's got a heap of reason fo' to be grateful but none to
brag," said Cavendish.

"Dick's kind of titles are like having red hair and squint eyes. Once
they get into a family they stick," explained Polly.

"I've noticed that, 'specially about squint eyes." Yancy was glad to
plant his feet on familiar ground.

"These here titles go to the eldest son. He begins by bein' a viscount,"
continued Chills and Fever. He wished Yancy to know the full measure of
their splendor.

"And their wives are ladies-ain't they, Dick?"

Cavendish nodded.

"Anybody with half an eye would know you was a lady, ma'am," said Yancy.

"Kep here is an Honorable, same as a senator or a congressman,"
Cavendish went on.

"At his age, too!" commented Yancy.

"And my daughter's the Lady Constance," said Polly.

"Havin' such a mother she ain't no choice," observed Yancy, with an air
of gentle deference.

"Dick's got the family, Mr. Yancy. My folks, the Rhetts, was plain
people."

"Some of 'em ain't so noticeably plain, either," said Yancy.

"Sho', you've a heap of good sense, Mr. Yancy!" and Cavendish shook him
warmly by the hand. "The first time I ever seen her, I says, I'll marry
that lady if it takes an arm! Well, it did most of the time while I was
co'tin' her."

"La!" cried Polly, blushing furiously. "You shouldn't tell that, Dick.
Mr. Yancy ain't interested."

"Yes, sir, I'd been hearin' about old man Rhett's Polly fo' considerable
of a spell," said Cavendish, looking at Polly reflectively. "He lived up
at the head waters of the Elk River. Fellows who had been to his place,
when girls was mentioned would sort of shake their heads sad-like and
say, 'Yes, but you had ought to see old man Rhett's Polly, all the rest
is imitations!' Seemed like they couldn't get her off their minds. So
I just slung my kit to my back, shouldered my rifle, and hoofed it
up-stream. I says, I'll see for myself where this here paragon lays it
all over the rest of her sect, but sho--the closter I came to old man
Rhett the mo' I heard of Polly!"

"Dick, how you do run on," cried Polly protestingly, but Chills and
Fever's knightly soul dwelt in its illusions, and the years had not
made stale his romance. Also Polly was beaming on him with a wealth of
affection.

"I seen her fo' the first time as I was warmin' the trail within a mile
of old man Rhett's. She was carrying a grist of co'n down to the mill
in her father's ox cart. When I clapped eyes on her I says, 'I'll marry
that lady. I'll make her the Countess of Lambeth--she'll shore do fo'
the peerage any day!' That was yo' mommy, sneezic's!" Mr. Cavendish
paused to address himself to the baby whom Connie had relinquished to
him.

"You bet I made time the rest of the way. I says, 'She's sixteen if
she's a day, and all looks!' I broke into old man Rhett's clearin' on a
keen run. He was a settin' afo' his do' smokin' his pipe and he glanced
me over kind of weary-like and says, 'Howdy!' It wa'n't much of a
greetin' the way he said it either; but I figured it was some better
than bein' chased off the place. So I stepped indo's, stood my rifle in
a corner and hung up my cap. He was watchin' me and presently he drawled
out, 'Make yo'self perfectly at home, stranger.'

"I says, 'Squire'--he wa'n't a squire, but they called him that--I says,
'Squire, my name's Cavendish. Let's get acquainted quick. I'm here fo'
to co'te yo' Polly. I seen her on the road a spell back and I couldn't
be better suited.'

"He says, 'You had ought to be kivered up in salt, young man, else yo'll
spile in this climate.'

"I says, 'I'll keep in any climate.'

"He says, 'Polly ain't givin' her thoughts much to marryin', she's busy
keepin' house fo' her pore old father.'

"I says, 'I've come here special fo' to arouse them thoughts you
mention. If I seem slow.'

"He says, 'You don't. If this is yo' idea of bein' slow, I'd wish to
avoid you when you was in a hurry.'

"I says, 'Put in yo' spare moments thinkin' up a suitable blessin' fo'
us.'

"He says, 'You'll have yo' hands full. There's a number of young fellows
hereabouts that you don't lay it over none in p'int of freshness or
looks.'

"I says, 'Does she encourage any of 'em?'

"He says, 'Nope, she don't. Ain't I been tellin' you she's givin' her
mind to keepin' house fo' her pore old father?'

"I says, 'If she don't encourage 'em none, she shore must disencourage
'em. I 'low she gets my help in that.'

"He says, 'They'll run you so far into the mountings, Mr. Cavendish,
you'll never be heard tell of again in these parts.'

"I says, 'I'll bust the heads offen these here galoots if they try
that!'

"He asks, grinnin', 'Have you arranged how yo' remains are to be sent
back to yo' folks?'

"I says, 'I'm an orphan man of title, a peer of England, and you can
leave me lay if it cones to that.'

"'Well,'. he says, 'if them's yo' wishes, the buzzards as good as got
you."' Cavendish lapsed into a momentary silence. It was plain that
these were cherished memories.

"That's what I call co'tin!" remarked Mr. Yancy, with conviction.

The Earl of Lambeth resumed

"It was as bad as old man Rhett said it was. Sundays his do'yard looked
like a militia muster. They told it on him that he hadn't cut a stick
of wood since Polly was risin' twelve. I reckon, without exaggeration,
I fit every unmarried man in that end of the county, and two lookin'
widowers from Nashville. I served notice on to them that I'd attend to
that woodpile of old man Rhett's fo' the future; that I was qualifying
fo' to be his son-in-law, and seekin' his indorsement as a provider. I
took 'em on one at a time as they happened along, and lambasted 'em all
over the place. As fo' the Nashville widowers," said Cavendish with a
chuckle, and a nod to Polly, "I pretty nigh drownded one of 'em in the
Elk. We met in mid-stream and fit it out there; and the other quit the
county. That was fo'teen years ago; but, mind you, I'd do it all over
again to-morrow."

"But, Dick, you ain't telling Mr. Yancy nothin' about yo' title,"
expostulated Polly.

"I'd admire to hear mo' about that," said Yancy.

"I'm gettin' round to that. It was my great grandfather come over here
from England. His name was Richard Keppel Cavendish, same as mine is.
He lived back yonder on the Carolina coast and went to raisin' tobacco.
I've heard my grandfather tell how he'd heard folks say his father was
always hintin' in his licker that he was a heap better than he seemed,
and if people only knowed the truth about him they'd respect him mo',
and mebby treat him better. Well, sir, he married and riz a family;
there was my grandfather and a passel of girls--and that crop of
children was the only decent crop he ever riz. I've heard my grandfather
tell how, when he got old enough to notice such things, he seen that his
father had the look of a man with something mysterious hangin' over him,
but he couldn't make it out what it was, though he gave it a heap of
study. He seen, too, that let him get a taste of licker and he'd begin
to throw out them hints, how if folks only knowed the truth they'd be
just naturally fallin' over themselves fo' to do him a favor, instead of
pickin' on him and tryin' to down him.

"My grandfather said he never knowed a man, either, with the same
aversion agin labor as his father had. Folks put it down to laziness,
but they misjudged him, as come out later, yet he never let on. He just
went around sorrowful-like, and when there was a piece of work fo' him
to do he'd spend a heap of time studyin' it, or mebby he'd just set
and look at it until he was ready fo' to give it up. Appeared like he
couldn't bring himself down to toil.

"Then one day he got his hands on a paper that had come acrost in a ship
from England. He was readin' it, settin' in the shade; my grandfather
said he always noticed he was partial to the shade, and his wife was
pesterin' of him fo' to go and plow out his truck-patch, when, all at
once, he lit on something in the paper, and he started up and let out
a yell like he'd been shot. 'By gum, I'm the Earl of Lambeth!' he says,
and took out to the nearest tavern and got b'ilin' full. Afterward he
showed 'em the paper and they seen with their own eyes where Richard
Keppel Cavendish, Earl of Lambeth, had died in London. My great
grandfather told 'em that was his uncle; that when he left home there
was several cousins--which was printed in the paper, too--but they'd up
and died, so the title naturally come to him.

"Well, sir, that was the first the family ever knowed of it, and then
they seen what it was he'd meant when he throwed out them hints about
bein' a heap better than he seemed. He said perhaps he wouldn't never
have told, only he couldn't bear to be misjudged like he'd always been.

"He never done a lick of work after that. He said he couldn't bring
himself down to it; that it was demeanin' fo' a person of title fo' to
labor with his hands like a nigger or a common white man. He said he'd
leave it to his family to see he didn't come to want, it didn't so much
matter about them; and he lived true to his principles to the day of his
death, and never riz his hand except to feed himself."

Cavendish paused. Yancy was feeling that in his own person he had
experienced some of the best symptoms of a title.

"Then what?" he asked.

"Well, sir, he lived along like that, never complainin', my grandfather
said, but mighty sweet and gentlelike as long as there was plenty to eat
in the house. He lived to be nigh eighty, and when he seen he was
goin' to die he called my grandfather to him and says, 'She's yours,
Dick,'--meanin' the title--and then he says, 'There's one thing I've
kep' from you. You've been a viscount ever since I come into the title,
and then he went on and explained what he wanted cut on his tombstone,
and had my grandfather write it out, so there couldn't be any mistake.
When he'd passed away, my grandfather took the title. He said it made
him feel mighty solemn and grand-like, and it come over him all at once
why it was his father hadn't no heart fo' work."

"Does it always take 'em that way?" inquired Yancy.

"It takes the Earls of Lambeth that way. I reckon you might say it was
hereditary with 'em. Where was I at?"

"Your grandpap, the second earl," prompted Polly.

"Oh, yes--well, he 'lowed he'd emigrate back to England, but while
he was studying how he could do this, along come the war. He said he
couldn't afford to fight agin his king, so he pulled out and crossed the
mountings to avoid being drug into the army. He said he couldn't let it
get around that the Earls of Lambeth was shootin' English soldiers."

"Of course he couldn't," agreed Yancy.

"It's been my dream to take Polly and the children and go back to
England and see the king about my title. I 'low he'd be some surprised
to see us. I'd like to tell him, too, what the Earls of Lambeth done fo'
him--that they was always loyal, and thought a heap better of him than
their neighbors done, and mebby some better than he deserved. Don't you
reckon that not hearin' from us, he's got the notion the Cavendishes has
petered out?"

Mr. Yancy considered this likely, and said so.

"You might send him writin' in a letter," he suggested.

The furious shrieking of a steam-packet's whistle broke in upon them.

"It's another of them hawgs, wantin' all the river!" said Mr. Cavendish,
and fled in haste to the steering oar.

During all the long days that followed, Mr. Yancy was forced to own
that these titled friends of his were, despite their social position,
uncommon white in their treatment of him. The Earl of Lambeth consorted
with him in that fine spirit that recognizes the essential brotherhood
of man, while his Lady Countess was, as Yancy observed, on the whole, a
person of simple and uncorrupted tastes. She habitually went barefoot,
both as a matter of comfort and economy, and she smoked her cob-pipe as
did those other ladies of Lincoln County who had married into far less
exalted stations than her own. He put these simple survivals down to
her native goodness of heart, which would not allow of her succumbing
to mere pride and vainglory, for he no more doubted their narrative than
they, doubted it themselves, which was not at all.



CHAPTER XIX. THE JUDGE SEES A GHOST


Charley Norton's good offices did not end when he had furnished judge
Price with a house, for Betty required of him that he should supply
that gentleman with legal business as well. When she pointed out the
necessity of this, Norton demurred. He had no very urgent need of a
lawyer, and had the need existed, Slocum Price would not have been his
choice. Betty knit her brows.

"He must have a chance; perhaps if people knew you employed him it would
give them confidence--you must realize this, Charley; it isn't enough
that he has a house--he can't wear it nor eat it!"

"And fortunately he can't drink it, either. I don't want to discourage
you, but his looks are all against him, Betty. If you take too great
an interest in his concerns I am afraid you are going to have him
permanently on your hands."

"Haven't you some little scrap of business that really doesn't matter
much, Charley? You might try him--just to please me--" she persisted
coaxingly.

"Well, there's land I'm buying--I suppose I could get him to look up the
title, I know it's all right anyhow," said Norton, after a pause.

Thus it happened that judge Price, before he had been three days in
Raleigh, received a civil note from Mr. Norton asking him to search
the title to a certain timber tract held by one Joseph Quaid; a
communication the effect of which was out of all proportion to the size
of the fee involved. The judge, powerfully excited, told Mahaffy he
was being understood and appreciated; that the tide of prosperity was
clearly setting his way; that intelligent foresight, not chance, had
determined him when he selected Raleigh instead of Memphis. Thereafter
he spoke of Charley Norton only as "My client," and exalted him for his
breeding, wealth and position, refusing to admit that any man in the
county was held in quite the same esteem. All of which moved Mahaffy to
flashes of grim sarcasm.

The immediate result of Norton's communication had been to send the
judge up the street to the courthouse. He would show his client that he
could be punctual and painstaking. He should have his abstract of title
without delay; moreover, he had in mind a scholarly effort entirely
worthy of himself. The dull facts should be illuminated with an
occasional striking phrase. He considered that it would doubtless be of
interest to Mr. Norton, in this connection, to know something, too, of
mediaeval land tenure, ancient Roman and modern English. He proposed
artfully to pander to his client's literary tastes--assuming that he had
such tastes. But above all, this abstract must be entirely explanatory
of himself, since its final purpose was to remove whatever doubts his
mere appearance might have bred in Mr. Norton's mind.

"If my pocket could just be brought to stand the strain of new clothes
before the next sitting of court, I might reasonably hope for a share of
the pickings," thought the judge.

Entering the court-house, he found himself in a narrow hall. On his
right was the jury-room, and on his left the county clerk's office,
stuffy little holes, each lighted by a single window. Beyond, and
occupying the full width of the building, was the court-room, with its
hard, wooden benches and its staring white walls. Advancing to the door,
which stood open, the judge surveyed the room with the greatest possible
satisfaction. He could fancy it echoing to that eloquence of which he
felt himself to be the master. He would show the world, yet, what was
in him, and especially Solomon Mahaffy, who clearly had not taken his
measure.

Turning away from the agreeable picture his mind had conjured up,
he entered the county clerk's office. He was already known to this
official, whose name was Saul, and he now greeted him with a pleasant
air of patronage. Mr. Saul removed his feet from the top of his desk and
motioned his visitor to a chair; at the same time he hospitably thrust
forward a square box filled with sawdust. It was plain he labored under
the impression that the judge's call was of an unprofessional character.

"A little matter of business brings me here, sir," began the judge,
with a swelling chest and mellow accents. "No, sir, I'll not be
seated--another time I'll share your leisure if I may--now I am in some
haste to look up a title for my client, Mr. Norton."

"What Norton?" asked Mr. Saul, when he had somewhat recovered from the
effect of this announcement.

"Mr. Charles Norton, of Thicket Point," said the judge.

"I reckon you mean that timber tract of old Joe Quaid's." Mr. Saul
viewed the judge's ruinous exterior with a glance of respectful awe,
for clearly a man who could triumph over such a handicap must possess
uncommon merit of some sort. "So you're looking after Charley Norton's
business for him, are you?" he added.

"He's a client of mine. We have mutual friends, sir--I refer to Miss
Malroy," the judge vouchsafed to explain.

"You're naming our best people, sir, when you name the Malroys and the
Nortons; they are pretty much in a class by themselves," said Mr. Saul,
whose awe of the judge was momentarily increasing.

"I don't underestimate the value of a social endorsement, sir, but
I've never stood on that," observed the judge. "I've come amongst you
unheralded, but I expect you to find me out. Now, sir, if you'll be good
enough, I'll glance at the record."

Mr. Saul scrambled up out of the depths of his chair and exerted himself
in the judge's behalf.

"This is what you want, sir. Better take the ledger to the window, the
light in here ain't much." He drew forward a chair as he spoke, and
the judge, seating himself, began to polish his spectacles with great
deliberation. He felt that he had reached a crisis in his career, and
was disposed to linger over the hope that was springing up in his heart.

"How does the docket for the next term of court stand?" he inquired.

"Pretty fair, sir," said Mr. Saul.

"Any litigation of unusual interest in prospect?" The judge was fitting
his glasses to the generous arch of his nose, a feature which nicely
indexed its owner's habits.

"No, sir, just the ordinary run of cases."

"I hoped to hear you say different."

"You've set on the bench, sir?" suggested Mr. Saul.

"In one of the eastern counties, but my inclination has never been
toward the judiciary. My temperament, sir, is distinctly aggressive--and
each one according to the gifts with which God has been graciously
pleased to endow him! I am frank to say, however, that my decisions have
received their meed of praise from men thoroughly competent to speak
on such matters." He was turning the leaves of the ledger as he spoke.
Suddenly the movement of his hand was arrested.

"Found it?" asked Mr. Saul. But the judge gave him no answer; absorbed
and aloof he was staring down at the open pages of the book. "Found the
entry?" repeated Mr. Saul.

"Eh?--what's that? No--" he appeared to hesitate. "Who is this man
Quintard?" The question cost him an effort, that was plain.

"He's the owner of a hundred-thousand-acre tract in this and abutting
counties," said Mr. Saul.

The judge continued to stare down at the page.

"Is he a resident of the county?" he asked, at length.

"No, he lives back yonder in North Carolina."

"A hundred thousand acres!" the judge muttered thoughtfully.

"There or thereabouts--yes, sir."

"Who has charge of the land?"

"Colonel Fentress; he was old General Ware's law partner. I've heard it
was the general who got this man Quintard to make the investment, but
that was before my time in these parts."

The judge lapsed into a heavy, brooding silence.

A step sounded in the narrow hall. An instant later the door was pushed
open, and grateful for any interruption that would serve to take Mr.
Saul's attention from himself, the judge abruptly turned his back on the
clerk and began to examine the record before him. Engrossed in this, he
was at first scarcely aware of the conversation that was being carried
on within a few feet of him. Insensibly, however, the cold, level tones
of the voice that was addressing itself to Mr. Saul quickened the beat
of his pulse, the throb of his heart, and struck back through the years
to a day from which he reckoned time. The heavy, calf-bound volume in
his hand shook like a leaf in a gale. He turned slowly, as if in dread
of what he might see.

What he saw was a man verging on sixty, lean and dark, with thin, shaven
cheeks of a bluish cast above the jaw, and a strongly aquiline profile.
Long, black locks swept the collar of his coat, while his tall, spare
figure was habited in sleek broadcloth and spotless linen. For a moment
the judge seemed to struggle with doubt and uncertainty, then his face
went a ghastly white and the book slipped from his nerveless fingers to
the window ledge.

The stranger, his business concluded, swung about on his heel and
quitted the office. The judge, his eyes starting from their sockets,
stared after him; the very breath died on his lips; speechless and
motionless, he was still seeing that tall, spare figure as it had passed
before him, but his memories stripped a weight of thirty years from
those thin shoulders. At last, heavy-eyed and somber, he glanced about
him. Mr. Saul, bending above his desk, was making an entry in one of his
ledgers. The judge shuffled to his side.

"Who was that man?" he asked thickly, resting a shaking hand on the
clerk's arm.

"That?--Oh, that was Colonel Fentress I was just telling you about." He
looked up from his writing. "Hello! You look like you'd seen a ghost!"

"It's the heat in here--I reckon--" said the judge, and began to mop his
face.

"Ever seen the colonel before?" asked Mr. Saul curiously.

"Who is he?"

"Well, sir, he's one of our leading planters, and a mighty fine lawyer."

"Has he always lived here?"

"No, he came into the county about ten years ago, and bought a place
called The Oaks, over toward the river."

"Has he--has he a family?" The judge appeared to be having difficulty
with his speech.

"Not that anybody knows of. Some say he's a widower, others again say
he's an old bachelor; but he don't say nothing, for the colonel is as
close as wax about his own affairs. So it's pure conjecture, sir." There
was a brief silence. "The county has its conundrums, and the colonel's
one of them," resumed Mr. Saul.

"Yes?" said the judge.

"The colonel's got his friends, to be sure, but he don't mix much with
the real quality."

"Why not?" asked the judge.

"He's apparently as high-toned a gentleman as you'd meet with anywhere;
polished, sir, so smooth your fingers would slip if you tried to take
hold of him, but it's been commented on that when a horsethief or
counterfeiter gets into trouble the colonel's always first choice for
counsel."

"Get's 'em off, does he?" The judge spoke somewhat grimly.

"Mighty nigh always. But then he has most astonishing luck in the
matter of witnesses. That's been commented on too." The judge nodded
comprehendingly. "I reckon you'd call Tom Ware, out at Belle Plain,
one of Fentress' closest friends. He's another of your conundrums. I
wouldn't advise you to be too curious about the colonel."

"Why not?" The judge was frowning now.

"It will make you unpopular with a certain class. Those of us who've
been here long enough have learned that there are some of these
conundrums we'd best not ask an answer for."

The judge pondered this.

"Do you mean to tell me, sir, that freedom of speech is not allowed?" he
demanded, with some show of heat.

"Perfect freedom, if you pick and choose your topic," responded Mr.
Saul.

"Humph!" ejaculated the judge.

"Now you might talk to me with all the freedom you like, but I'd
recommend you were cautious with strangers. There have been those who've
talked freely that have been advised to keep still or harm would come of
it."

"And did harm come of it?" asked the judge.

"They always kept still."

"What do you mean by talking freely?"

"Like asking how so and so got the money to buy his last batch of
niggers," explained Mr. Saul rather vaguely.

"And Colonel Fentress is one of those about whose affairs it is best not
to show too much curiosity?"

"He is, decidedly. His friends appear to set a heap by him. Another of
his particular intimates is a gentleman by the name of Murrell."

The judge nodded.

"I've met him," he said briefly. "Does he belong hereabouts?"

"No, hardly; he seems to hold a sort of roving commission. His home is,
I believe, near Denmark, in Madison County."

"What's his antecedents?"

"He's as common a white man as ever came out of the hills, but he
appears to stand well with Colonel Fentress."

"Colonel Fentress!" The judge spat in sheer disgust.

"You don't appear to fancy the colonel--" said Mr. Saul.

"I don't fancy wearing a gag--and damned if I do!" cried the judge.

"Oh, it ain't that exactly; it's just minding your own business. I
reckon you'll find there's lot's to be said in favor of goin' ca'mly on
attending strictly to your own affairs, sir," concluded Mr. Saul.

Acting on a sudden impulse, the judge turned to the door. The business
and the hope that had brought him there were forgotten. He muttered
something about returning later, and hastily quitted the office.

"Well, I reckon he's a conundrum too!" reflected Mr. Saul, as the door
swung shut.

In the hall the judge's steps dragged and his head was bowed. He was
busy with his memories, memories that spanned the desolate waste of
years in which he had walked from shame to shame, each blacker than the
last. Then passion shook him.

"Damn him--may God-for ever damn him!" he cried under his breath, in
a fierce whisper. A burning mist before his eyes, he shuffled down the
hall, down the steps, and into the shaded, trampled space that was known
as the court-house yard. Here he paused irresolutely. Across the way was
the gun-maker's shop, the weather-beaten sign came within range of
his vision, and the dingy white letters on their black ground spelled
themselves out. The words seemed to carry some message, for the judge,
with his eyes fixed on the sign as on some beacon of hope, plunged
across the dusty road and entered the shop.


At supper that night it was plain to both Mr. Mahaffy and Hannibal
that the judge was in a state of mind best described as beatific. The
tenderest consideration, the gentlest courtesy flowed from him as from
an unfailing spring; not that he was ever, even in his darkest hours,
socially remiss, but there was now a special magnificence to his manner
that bred suspicion in Mahaffy's soul. When he noted that the judge's
shoes were extremely dusty, this suspicion shaped itself definitely. He
was convinced that on the strength of his prospective fee the judge had
gone to Belle Plain, for what purpose Mr. Mahaffy knew only too well.

"It took you some time to get up that abstract, didn't it, Price?" he
presently said, with artful indirection.

"I shall go on with that in the morning, Solomon; my interest was
dissipated this evening," rejoined the judge.

"Looks as though you had devoted a good part of your time to
pedestrianism," suggested Mahaffy.

"Quite right, so I did, Solomon."

"Were you at Belle Plain?" demanded Mahaffy harshly and with a black
scowl. The judge had agreed to keep away from Belle Plain.

"No, Solomon, you forget our pact."

"Well, I am glad you remembered it."

They finished supper, the dishes were cleared away and the candles
lighted, when the judge produced a mysterious leather-covered case. This
he placed upon the table and opened, and Mahaffy and Hannibal, who had
drawn near, saw with much astonishment that it held a handsome pair of
dueling pistols, together with all their necessary paraphernalia.

"Where did you get 'em, Judge?--Oh, ain't they beautiful!" cried
Hannibal, circling about the table in his excitement.

"My dear lad, they were purchased only a few hours ago," said the judge
quietly, as he began to load them.

"For Heaven's sake, Price, do be careful!" warned Mahaffy, who had a
horror of pistols that extended to no other species of firearm.

"I shall observe all proper caution, Solomon," the judge assured him
sweetly.

"Judge, may I try 'em some day?" asked Hannibal.

"Yes, my boy, that's part of a gentleman's education."

"Well, look out you don't shoot him before his education begins,"
snapped Mahaffy.

"Where did you buy 'em?" Hannibal was dodging about the judge, the
better to follow the operation of loading.

"At the gunsmith's, dear lad. It occurred to me that we required small
arms. If you'll stand quietly at my elbow and not hop around, you'll
relieve Mr. Mahaffy's apprehension."

"I declare, Price, you need a guardian, if ever a man did!" cried
Mahaffy, in a tone of utter exasperation.

"Why, Solomon?"

"Why?--they are absolutely useless. It was a waste of good money that
you'll be sorry about."

"Bless you, Solomon--they ain't paid for!" said the judge, with a thick
little chuckle.

"I didn't do you the injustice to suppose they were; but you haven't any
head for business; aren't you just that much nearer the time when not a
soul here will trust you? That's just like you, to plunge ahead and use
up your credit on gimcracks!" Mahaffy prided himself on his acquaintance
with the basic principles of economics.

"I can sell 'em again," observed the judge placidly.

"For less than half what they are worth!--I never knew so poor a
manager!"

The pistols were soon loaded, and the judge turned to Hannibal.
"I regretted that you were not with me out at Boggs' this evening,
Hannibal; you would have enjoyed seeing me try these weapons there. Now
carry a candle into the kitchen and place it on the table."

Mahaffy laughed contemptuously, but was relieved to know the purpose to
which the judge had devoted the afternoon.

"What aspersion is rankling for utterance within you now, Solomon?" said
the judge tolerantly. Assuming a position that gave him an unobstructed
view across the two rooms, he raised the pistol in his hand and
discharged it in that brief instant when he caught the candle's flame
between the notches of the sight, but he failed to snuff the candle, and
a look of bitter disappointment passed over his face. He picked up the
other pistol. "This time--" he muttered under his breath.

"Try blowing it out try the snuffers!" jeered Mahaffy.

"This time!" repeated the judge, unheeding him, and as the pistol-shot
rang out the light vanished. "By Heaven, I did it!" roared the judge,
giving way to an uncontrollable burst of feeling. "I did it--and I can
'do it again--light the candle, Hannibal!"

He began to load the pistols afresh with feverish haste, and Mahaffy,
staring at him in amazement, saw that of a sudden the sweat was dripping
from him. But the judge's excitement prevented his attempting another
shot at once, twice his hand was raised, twice it was lowered, the
third time the pistol cracked and the candle's flame was blown level,
fluttered for a brief instant, and went out.

"Did I nick the tallow, Hannibal?" The judge spoke anxiously.

"Yes, sir, both shots."

"We must remedy that," said the judge. Then, as rapidly as he could
load and fire, bullet after bullet was sent fairly through the flame,
extinguishing it each time. Mahaffy was too astonished at this display
of skill even to comment, while Hannibal's delight knew no bounds. "That
will do!" said the judge at last. He glanced down at the pistol in his
hand. "This is certainly a gentleman's weapon!" he murmured.




CHAPTER XX. THE WARNING


Norton had ridden down to Belle Plain ostensibly to view certain of
those improvements that went so far toward embittering Tom Ware's
existence. Gossip had it that he kept the road hot between the two
places, and this was an added strain on the planter. But Norton did not
go to Belle Plain to see Mr. Ware. If that gentleman had been the sole
attraction, he would have made just one visit suffice; had it preceded
his own, he would have attended Tom's funeral, and considered that he
had done a very decent thing. On the present occasion he and Betty were
strolling about the rehabilitated grounds, and Norton was exhibiting
that interest and enthusiasm which Betty always expected of him.

"You are certainly making the old place look up!" he said, as they
passed out upon the terrace. He had noted casually when he rode up the
lane half an hour before that a horse was tied near Ware's office; a man
now issued from the building and swung himself into the saddle. Norton
turned abruptly to Betty. "What's that fellow doing here?" he asked.

"I suppose he comes to see Tom," said Betty.

"Is he here often?"

"Every day or so." Betty's tone was indifferent. For reasons which had
seemed good and sufficient she had never discussed Captain Murrell with
Norton.

"Every day or so?" repeated Norton. "But you don't see him, Betty?"

"No, of course I don't."

"Tom has no business allowing that fellow around; if he don't know this
some one ought to tell him!" Norton was working himself up into a fine
rage.

"He doesn't bother me, Charley, if that's what you're thinking of. Let's
talk of something else."

"He'd better not, or I'll make it a quarrel with him."

"Oh, you mustn't think of that, Charley, indeed you mustn't!" cried
Betty in some alarm, for young Mr. Norton was both impulsive and
hot-headed.

"Well, just how often is Murrell here?" he demanded.

"I told you--every few days. He and Tom seem wonderfully congenial."

They were silent for a moment.

"Tom always sees him in his office," explained Betty. She might have
made her explanation fuller on this point had she cared to do so.

"That's the first decent thing I ever heard of Tom!" said Norton with
warmth. "But he ought to kick him off the place the first chance he
gets."

"Do you think Belle Plain is ever going to look as it did, Charley?--as
we remember it when we were children?" asked Betty, giving a new
direction to the conversation.

"Why, of course it is, dear, you are doing wonders!"

"I've really been ashamed of the place, the way it looked--and I can't
understand Tom!"

"Don't try to," advised Norton. "Look here, Betty, do you remember
it was right on this terrace I met you for the first time? My mother
brought me down, and I arrived with a strong prejudice against you,
young lady, because of the clothes I'd been put into--they were fine but
oppressive."

"How long did the prejudice last, Charley?"

"It didn't last at all, I thought you altogether the nicest little girl
I'd ever seen--just what I think now, I wish you could care for me,
Betty, just a little; just enough to marry me."

"But, Charley, I do care for you! I'm very, very fond of you."

"Well, don't make such a merit of it," he said, and they both laughed.
"I'm at an awful disadvantage, Betty, from having proposed so often.
That gives it a humorous touch which doesn't properly reflect the state
of my feeling at all--and you hear me without the least emotion; so long
as I keep my distance we might just as well be discussing the weather!"

"You are very good about that--"

"Keeping my distance, you mean?--Betty, if you knew how much resolution
that calls for! I wonder if that isn't my mistake--" And Norton came a
step nearer and took her in his arms.

With her hands on his shoulders Betty pushed him back, while the rich
color came into her cheeks. She was remembering Bruce Carrington, who
had not kept his distance.

"Please, Charley," she said half angrily, "I do like you tremendously,
but I simply can't bear you when you act like this--let me go!"

"Betty, I despair of you ever caring for me!" and as Norton turned
abruptly away he saw Tom Ware appear from about a corner of the house.
"Oh, hang it, there's Tom!"

"You are very nice, anyway, Charley--" said Betty hurriedly, fortified
by the planter's approach.

Ware stalked toward them. Having dined with Betty as recently as the day
before, he contented himself with a nod in her direction. His greeting
to Norton was a more ambitious undertaking; he said he was pleased to
see him; but in so far as facial expression might have indorsed the
statement this pleasure was well disguised, it did not get into his
features. Pausing on the terrace beside them, he indulged in certain
observations on the state of the crops and the weather.

"You've lost a couple of niggers, I hear?" he added with an oblique
glance.

"Yes," said Norton.

"Got on the track of them yet?" Norton shook his head. "I understand
you've a new overseer?" continued Ware, with another oblique glance.

"Then you understand wrong--Carrington's my guest," said Norton. "He's
talking of putting in a crop for himself next season, so he's willing to
help me make mine."

Betty turned quickly at the mention of Carrington's name. She had known
that he was still at Thicket Point, and having heard him spoken of
as Norton's new overseer, had meant to ask Charley if he were really
filling that position. An undefined sense of relief came to her with
Norton's reply to Tom's question.

"Going to turn farmer, is he?" asked Ware.

"So he says." Feeling that the only subjects in which he had ever known
Ware to take the slightest interest, namely, crops and slaves, were
exhausted, Norton was extremely disappointed when the planter manifested
a disposition to play the host and returned to the house with them,
where his mere presence, forbidding and sullen, was such a hardship that
Norton shortly took his leave.

"Well, hang Tom!" he said, as he rode away from Belle Plain. "If he
thinks he can freeze me out there's a long siege ahead of him!"

Issuing from the lane he turned his face in the direction of home, but
he did not urge his horse off a walk. To leave Belle Plain and Betty
demanded always his utmost resolution. His way took him into the solemn
twilight of untouched solitudes. A cool breath rippled through the
depths of the woods and shaped its own soft harmonies where it lifted
the great branches that arched the road. He crossed strips of bottom
land where the water stood in still pools about the gnarled and
moss-covered trunks of trees. At intervals down some sluggish inlet
he caught sight of the yellow flood that was pouring past, or saw the
Arkansas coast beyond, with its mighty sweep of unbroken forest that
rose out of the river mists and blended with the gray distance that lay
along the horizon.

He was within two miles of Thicket Point when, passing about a sudden
turn in the road, he found himself confronted by three men, and before
he could gather up his reins which he held loosely, one of them had
seized his horse by the bit. Norton was unarmed, he had not even a
riding-whip. This being the case he prepared to make the best of an
unpleasant situation which he felt he could not alter. He ran his eye
over the three men.

"I am sorry, gentlemen, but I reckon you have hold of the wrong
person--"

"Get down!" said one of the men briefly.

"I haven't any money, that's why I say you have hold of the wrong
person."

"We don't want your money." The unexpectedness of this reply somewhat
disturbed Norton.

"What do you want, then?" he asked.

"We got a word to say to you."

"I can hear it in the saddle."

"Get down!" repeated the man, a surly, bull-necked fellow. "Come--hurry
up!" he added.

Norton hesitated for an instant, then swung himself out of the saddle
and stood in the road confronting the spokesman of the party.

"Now, what do you wish to say to me?" he asked.

"Just this--you keep away from Belle Plain."

"You go to hell!" said Norton promptly. The man glowered heavily at hire
through the gathering gloom of twilight.

"We want your word that you'll keep away from Belle Plain," he said with
sullen insistence.

"Well, you won't get it!" responded Norton with quiet decision.

"We won't?"

"Certainly you won't!" Norton's eyes began to flash. He wondered
if these were Tom Ware's emissaries. He was both quick-tempered and
high-spirited. Falling back a step, he sprang forward and dealt the
bullnecked man a savage blow. The latter grunted heavily but kept his
feet. In the same instant one of the men who had never taken his eyes
off Norton from the moment he quitted the saddle, raised his fist and
struck the young planter in the back of the neck.

"You cur!" cried Norton, blind and dizzy, as he wheeled on him.

"Damn him--let him have it!" roared the bullnecked man.

Afterward Norton was able to remember that the three rushed on him,
that he was knocked down and kicked with merciless brutality, then
consciousness left him. He lay very still in the trampled dust of the
road. The bull-necked man regarded the limp figure in grim silence for a
moment.

"That'll do, he's had enough; we ain't to kill him this time," he said.
An instant later he, with his two companions, had vanished silently into
the woods.

Norton's horse trotted down the road. When it entered the yard at
Thicket Point half an hour later, Carrington was on the porch.

"Is that you, Norton?" he called, but there was no response, and he saw
the horse was riderless. "Jeff!" he cried, summoning Norton's servant
from the house.

"What's the matter, Mas'r?" asked the negro, as he appeared in the open
door.

"Why, here's Mr. Norton's horse come home without him. Do you know where
he went this afternoon?"

"I heard him say he reckoned he'd ride over to Belle Plain, Mas'r,"
answered Jeff, grinning. "I 'low the hoss done broke away and come home
by himself--he couldn't a-throwed Mas'r Charley!"

"We'll make sure of that. Get lanterns, and a couple of the boys!" said
Carrington.

It was mid-afternoon of the day following before Betty heard of the
attack on Charley Norton. Tom brought the news, and she at once ordered
her horse saddled and was soon out on the river road with a black groom
trailing along through the dust in her wake. Tom's version of the attack
was that Charley, had been robbed and all but murdered, and Betty never
drew rein until she reached Thicket Point. As she galloped into the yard
Bruce Carrington came from the house. At sight of the girl, with her
wind-blown halo of bright hair, he paused uncertainly. By a gesture
Betty called him to her side.

"How is Mr. Norton?" she asked, extending her hand.

"The doctor says he'll be up and about inside of a week, anyhow, Miss
Malroy," said Carrington.

Betty gave a great sigh of relief.

"Then his hurts are not serious?"

"No," said Carrington, "they are not in any sense serious."

"May I see him?"

"He's pretty well bandaged up, so he looks worse off than he is. If
you'll wait on the porch, I'll tell him you are here," for Betty had
dismounted.

"If you please."

Carrington passed on into the house. His face wore a look of somber
repression. Of course it was all right for her to come and see
Norton--they were old, old friends. He entered the room where Norton
lay.

"Miss Malroy is here," he said shortly.

"Betty?--bless her dear heart!" cried Charley rather weakly. "Just
toss my clothes into the closet and draw up a chair... There-thank
you, Bruce, that will do--let her come along in now." And as Carrington
quitted the room, Norton drew himself up on the pillows and faced the
door. "This is worth several beatings, Betty!" he exclaimed as she
appeared on the threshold. But much cotton and many bandages lent him
a rather fearful aspect, and Betty paused with a little gasp of dismay.
"I'm lots better than I look, I expect," said Norton. "Couldn't you
arrange to come a little closer?" he added, laughing.

He bent to kiss the hand she gave him, but groaned with the exertion.
Then he looked up into her face and saw her eyes swimming with tears.

"What--tears? Tears for me, Betty?" and he was much moved.

"It's a perfect outrage! Who did it, Charley?" she asked.

"You sit down and I'll tell you all about it," said Norton happily.

"Now tell me, Charley!" when she had seated herself.

"Who fetched you, Betty--old Tom?"

"No, I came alone."

"Well, it's mighty kind of you. I'll be all right in a day or so. What
did you hear?--that I'd been attacked and half-killed?"

"Yes--and robbed."

"There were three of the scoundrels. They made me climb out of the
saddle, and as I was unarmed they did as they pleased with me, which was
to stamp me flat in the road--"

"Charley!"

"I might almost be inclined to think they were friends of yours,
Betty--or at least friends of friends of yours."

"What do you mean, Charley--friends of mine?"

"Well, you see they started in by stipulating that I should keep away
from Belle Plain, and the terms they proposed being on the face of them
preposterous, trouble quickly ensued--trouble for me, you understand.
But never mind, dear, the next man who undertakes to grab my horse by
the bit won't get off quite so easy."

"Why should any one care whether you come to Belle Plain or not?"

"I wonder if my amiable friend, Tom, could have arranged this little
affair; it's sort of like old Tom to move in the dark, isn't it?"

"He couldn't--he wouldn't have done it, Charley!" but she looked
troubled, not too sure of this.

"Couldn't he? Well, maybe he couldn't--but he's afraid you'll marry
me--and I'm only afraid you won't. Betty, hasn't it ever seemed worth
your while to marry me just to give old Tom the scare of his life?"

"Please, Charley--" she began.

"I'm in a dreadful state of mind when I think of you alone at Belle
Plain--I wish you could love me, Betty!"

"I do love you. There is no one I care half so much for, Charley."

Norton shook his bandaged head and heaved a prodigious sigh.

"That's merely saying you don't love any one." He dropped back rather
wearily on his pillow. "Does Tom know about this?" he added.

"Yes."

"Was he able to show a proper amount of surprise?"

"He appeared really shocked, Charley."

"Well, then, it wasn't Tom. He never shows much emotion, but what he
does show he usually feels, I've noticed. I had rather hoped it was Tom,
I'd be glad to think that he was responsible; for if it wasn't Tom, who
was it?--who is it to whom it makes any difference how often I see you?"

"I don't know, Charley;" but her voice was uncertain.

"Look here, Betty; for the hundredth time, won't you marry me? I've
loved you ever since I was old enough to know what love meant. You've
been awfully sweet and patient with me, and I've tried to respect your
wishes and not speak of this except when it seemed necessary--" he
paused, and they both laughed a little, but he looked weak and helpless
with his bloodless face showing between the gaps in the bandages that
swathed him. Perhaps it was this sense of his helplessness that roused a
feeling in Betty that was new to her.

"You see, Charley, I fear--I am sure I don't love you the way I
should--to marry you--"

Charley, greatly excited, groaned and sat up, and groaned again.

"Oh, please, Charley-lie still!" she entreated.

"That's all right--and you needn't pull your hand away--you like me
better than any one else, you've told me so; well, don't you see that's
the beginning of really loving me?"

"But you wouldn't want to marry me at once?"

"Yes I would--right away--as soon as I am able to stir around!" said
Charley promptly. "Don't you see the immediate necessity there is of my
being in a position to care for you, Betty? I wasn't served this trick
for nothing."

"You must try not to worry, Charley."

"But I shall--I expect it's going to retard my recovery," said the young
man gloomily. "I couldn't be worse off! Here I am flat on my back;
I can't come to you or keep watch over you. Let me have some hope,
dear--let me believe that you will marry me!"

She looked at him pityingly, and with a certain latent tenderness in her
mood.

"Do you really care so much for me, Charley?"

"I love you, Betty!--I want you to say you will marry me as soon as I
can stand by your side--you're not going?--I won't speak of this again
if it annoys you, dear!" for she had risen.

"I must, Charley--"

"Oh, don't--well, then, if you will go, I want Carrington to ride back
with you."

"But I brought George with me--"

"Yes, I know, but I want you to take Carrington--the Lord knows what we
are coming to here in West Tennessee; I must have word that you reach
home safe."

"Very well, then, I'll ask Mr. Carrington. Good-by, Charley, dear!"

Norton seemed to summon all his fortitude.

"You couldn't have done a kinder thing than come here, Betty; I can't
begin to tell you how grateful I am--and as for my loving you--why, I'll
just keep on doing that to the end. I can see myself a bent, old man
still pestering you with my attentions, and you a sweet, old lady with
snow-white hair and pink cheeks, still obdurate--still saying no! Oh,
Lord, isn't it awful!" He had lifted himself on his elbow, and now sank
back on his pillow.

Betty paused irresolutely.

"Charley--"

"Yes, dear?"

"Can't you be happy without me?"

"No."

"But you don't try to be!"

"No use in my making any such foolish effort, I'd be doomed to failure."

"Good-by, Charley--I really must go--"

He looked up yearningly into her face, and yielding to a sudden impulse,
she stooped and kissed him on the forehead, then she fled from the room.

"Oh, come back--Betty--" cried Norton, and his voice rose to a wail of
entreaty, but she was gone. She had been quite as much surprised by her
act as Charley himself.

In the yard, Carrington was waiting for her. Jeff had just brought up
Norton's horse, and though he made no display of weapons, the Kentuckian
had fully armed himself.

"I am going to ride to Belle Plain with you, Miss Malroy," he said, as
he lifted her into her saddle.

"Do you think it necessary?" she asked, but she did not look at him.

"I hope not. I'll keep a bit in advance," he added, as he mounted his
horse, and all Betty saw of him during their ride of five miles was his
broad back. At the entrance to Belle Plain he reined in his horse.

"I reckon it's all right, now," he said briefly.

"You will return at once to Mr. Norton?" she asked. He nodded. "And you
will not leave him while he is helpless?"

"No, I'll not leave him," said Carrington, giving her a steady glance.

"I am so glad, I--his friends will feel so much safer with you there. I
will send over in the morning to learn how he passed the night. Good-by,
Mr. Carrington." And still refusing to meet his eyes, she gave him her
hand.

But Carrington did not quit the mouth of the lane until she had crossed
between the great fields of waving corn, and he had seen her pass up
the hillside beyond to the oak grove, where the four massive chimneys
of Belle Plain house showed their gray stone copings among the foliage.
With this last glimpse of her he turned away.



CHAPTER XXI. THICKET POINT


It WAS a point with Mr. Ware to see just as little as possible of Betty.
He had no taste for what he called female chatter. A sane interest in
the price of cotton or pork he considered the only rational test of
human intelligence, and Betty evinced entire indifference where those
great staples were concerned, hence it was agreeable to him to have most
of his meals served in his office.

At first Betty had sought to adapt herself to his somewhat peculiar
scheme of life, but Tom had begged her not to regard him, his movements
from hour to hour were cloaked in uncertainty. The man who had to
overlook the labor of eighty or ninety field hands was the worst sort of
a slave himself; the niggers knew when they could sit down to a meal; he
never did.

But for all his avoidance of Betty, he in reality kept the closest kind
of a watch on her movements, and when he learned that she had visited
Charley Norton--George, the groom, was the channel through which this
information reached him--he was both scandalized and disturbed. He felt
the situation demanded some sort of a protest.

"Isn't it just hell the way a woman can worry you?" he lamented, as
he hurried up the path from the barns to the house. He found Betty at
supper.

"I thought I'd have a cup of tea with you, Bet--what else have you
that's good?" he inquired genially, as he dropped into a chair.

"That was nice of you; we don't see very much of each other, do we,
Tom?" said Betty pleasantly.

Mr. Ware twisted his features, on which middle age had rested an
untender hand, into a smile.

"When a man undertakes to manage a place like Belle Plain his work's
laid out for him, Betty, and an old fellow like me is pretty apt to go
one of two ways; either he takes to hard living to keep himself in trim,
or he pampers himself soft."

"But you aren't old, Tom!"

"I wish I were sure of seeing forty-five or even forty-eight again--but
I'm not," said Tom.

"But that isn't really old," objected Betty.

"Well, that's old enough, Bet, as you'll discover for yourself one of
these days."

"Mercy, Tom!" cried Betty.

Mr. Ware consumed a cup of tea in silence.

"You were over to see Norton, weren't you, Bet? How did you find him?"
he asked abruptly.

"The doctor says he will soon be about again," answered Betty.

Tom stroked his chin and gazed at her reflectively.

"Betty, I wish you wouldn't go there again--that's a good girl!" he said
tactfully, and as he conceived it, affectionately, even, paving the way
for an exercise of whatever influence might be his, a point on which he
had no very clear idea. Betty glanced up quickly.

"Why, Tom, why shouldn't I go there?" she demanded.

"It might set people gossiping. I reckon there's been pretty near enough
talk about you and Charley Norton. A young girl can't be too careful."
The planter's tone was conciliatory in the extreme, he dared not risk a
break by any open show of authority.

"You needn't distress yourself, Tom. I don't know that I shall go there
again," said Betty indifferently.

"I wouldn't if I were you." He was charmed to find her so reasonable.
"You know it isn't the thing for a young girl to call on a man, you'll
get yourself talked about in a way you won't like--take my word for it!
If you want to be kind and neighborly send one of the boys over to ask
how he is--or bake a cake with your own hands, but you keep away. That's
the idea!--send him something to eat, something you've made yourself,
he'll appreciate that."

"I'm afraid he couldn't eat it if I did, Tom. It's plain you have no
acquaintance with my cooking," said Betty, laughing.

"Did Norton say if he had any idea as to the identity of the men who
robbed him?" inquired Tom casually.

"Their object wasn't robbery," said Betty.

"No?" Ware's glance was uneasy.

"It seems that some one objects to his coming here, Tom--here to
Belle Plain to see me, I suppose," added Betty. The planter moved
uncomfortably in his seat, refusing to meet her eyes.

"He shouldn't put out a yarn like that, Bet. It isn't just the thing for
a gentleman to do--"

"He isn't putting it out, as you call it! He has told no one, so far as
I know," said Betty quickly. Mr. Ware fell into a brooding silence.
"Of course, Charley wouldn't mention my name in any such connection!"
continued Betty.

"Who cares how often he comes here? You don't, and I don't. There's more
back of this than Charley would want you to know. I reckon he's got
his enemies; some one's had a grudge against him and taken this way
to settle it." The planter's tone and manner were charged with an
unpleasant significance.

"I don't like your hints, Tom," said Betty. Her heightened color and the
light in her eyes warned Tom that he had said enough. In some haste he
finished his second cup of tea, a beverage which he despised, and after
a desultory remark or two, withdrew to his office.

Betty went up-stairs to her own room, where she tried to finish a letter
she had begun the day before to Judith Ferris, but she was in no mood
for this. She was owning to a sense of utter depression and she had been
at home less than a month. Struggle as she might against the feeling,
it was borne in upon her that she was wretchedly lonely. She had seated
herself by an open window. Now, resting her elbows on the ledge and with
her chin between her palms, she gazed off into the still night. A mile
distant, on what was called "Shanty Hill," were the quarters of the
slaves. The only lights she saw were there, the only sounds she heard
reached her across the intervening fields. This was her world. A
half-savage world with its uncouth army of black dependents.

Tom's words still rankled. Betty's temper flared up belligerently as she
recalled them. He had evidently meant to insinuate that Charley had lied
outright when he told her the motive for the attack, and he had followed
it up by that covert slur on his character. Charley's devotion was the
thing that redeemed the dull monotony of existence. She became suddenly
humble and tenderly penitent in her mood toward him; he loved her much
better than she deserved, and she suspected that her own attitude had
been habitually ungenerous and selfish. She had accepted all and yielded
nothing. She wondered gravely why it was she did not love him; she was
fond of him--she was very, very fond of him; she wondered if after all,
as he said, this were not the beginning of love, the beginning of that
deeper feeling which she was not sure she understood, not sure she
should ever experience.

The thought of Charley's unwavering affection gave her a great sense of
peace; it was something to have inspired such devotion, she could
never be quite desperate while she had him. She must try to make him
understand how possible an ideal friendship was between them, how
utterly impossible anything else. She would like to have seen Charley
happily married to some nice girl--"I wonder whom!" thought Betty,
gazing deep into the night through her drooping lashes. She considered
possible candidates for the happiness she herself seemed so willing to
forego, but for one reason or another dismissed them all. "I am not sure
I should care to see him marry," she confessed under her breath. "It
would spoil everything. Men are much nicer than girls!" And Charley
possessed distinguished merits as a man; he was not to be too hastily
disposed of, even for his own good. She viewed him in his various
aspects, his character and disposition came under her critical survey.
Nature had given the young planter a handsome presence; wealth and
position had come to him as fortuitously. The first of these was no
great matter, perhaps; Betty herself was sometimes burdened with a sense
of possession, but family was indispensable.

In theory, at least, she was a thoroughgoing little aristocrat. A
gentleman was always a gentleman. There were exceptions, like Tom, to
be sure, but even Tom could have reached up and seized the title had he
coveted it. She rarely forgot that she was the mistress of Belle Plain
and a Malroy. Just wherein a Malroy differed from the rest of the sons
of men she had never paused to consider, it sufficed that there was a
hazy Malroy genealogy that went back to tidewater Virginia, and then
if one were not meanly curious, and would skip a generation or two that
could not be accounted for in ways any Malroy would accept, one might
triumphantly follow the family to a red-roofed Sussex manor house.
Altogether, it was a highly satisfactory genealogy and it had Betty's
entire faith. The Nortons were every bit as good as the Malroys, which
was saying a great deal. Their history was quite as pretentious, quite
as vague, and as hopelessly involved in the mists of tradition.

Inexplicably enough, Betty found that her thoughts had wandered to
Carrington; which was very singular, as she had long since formed
a resolution not to think of him at all. Yet she remembered with
satisfaction his manner that afternoon, it left nothing to be desired.
He was probably understanding the impassable gulf that separated
them--education, experience, feeling, everything that made up the
substance of life but deepened and widened this gulf. He belonged
to that shifting, adventurous population which was far beneath the
slave-holding aristocracy, at least he more nearly belonged to this
lower order than to any other. She fixed his status relentlessly as
something to be remembered when they should meet again. At last, with
a little puckering of the brows and a firm contraction of the lips, she
dismissed the Kentuckian from her thoughts.


Betty complied with Tom's expressed wish, for she did not again visit
Thicket Point, but then she had not intended doing so. However, the
planter was greatly shocked by the discovery he presently made that she
was engaged in a vigorous correspondence with Charley.

"I wish to blazes Murrell had told those fellows to kick the life clean
out of him while they were about it!" he commented savagely, and fell
to cursing impotently. Brute force was a factor to be introduced with
caution into the affairs of life, but if you were going to use it,
his belief was that you should use it to the limit. You couldn't
scare Norton, he was in love with that pink-faced little fool. Keep
away?--he'd never think of it, he'd stuff his pockets full of pistols
and the next man who stopped him on the road would better look out! It
made him sick--the utter lack of sense manifested by Murrell, and his
talk, whenever they met, was still of the girl. He couldn't see anything
so damn uncommon about that red-and-white chit. She wasn't worth running
your neck into a halter for--no woman that ever lived was worth that.

The correspondence, so far as Betty was responsible for it, bore just on
one point. She wanted Charley to promise that for a time, at least, he
would not attempt to see her. It seemed such a needless risk to take,
couldn't he be satisfied if he heard from her every day?

Charley was regretful, but firm. Just as soon as he could mount his
horse he would ride down to Belle Plain. She was not to distress herself
on his account; he had been surprised, but this should not happen again.

The calm manner in which he put aside her fears for his safety
exasperated Betty beyond measure. She scolded him vigorously. Charley
accepted the scolding with humility, but his resolution was unshaken;
he did not propose to vacate the public roads at any man's behest; that
would be an unwise precedent to establish.

Betty replied that this was not a matter in which silly vanity should
enter, even if his life was of no value to himself it did not follow
that she held it lightly. It required some eight closely written pages
for Charley to explain why existence would be an unsupportable burden if
he were denied the sight of her.

A week had intervened since the attack, and from Jeff, who always
brought Charley's letters, Betty learned more of Charley's condition
than Charley himself had seen fit to tell. According to Jeff his master
was now able to get around pretty tolerable well, though he had a
powerful keen misery in his side.

"That was whar' they done kicked him most, Miss," he added. Betty
shuddered.

"How much longer will he be confined to the house?" she asked.

"I heard him 'low to Mas'r Carrington, Miss, as how he reckoned he'd
take a hossback ride to-morrow evenin' if the black and blue was all
come out of his features--"

"Oh--" gasped Betty.

"Seems like they was mighty careless whar' they put their feet, don't
it, Miss?" said Jeff.

It was this information she gleaned from Jeff that led Betty to
desperate lengths, to the making of what her cooler judgment told her
was a desperate bargain.

At Thicket Point Charley Norton, greatly excited, hobbled into the
library in search of Carrington. He found him reading by the open
window.

"Look here, Bruce!" he cried. "It's settled; she's going to marry me!"

The book slipped unheeded from Carrington's hand to the floor. For a
moment he sat motionless, then he slowly pulled himself up out of his
chair.

"What's that?" he asked a trifle thickly.

"Betty Malroy is going to marry me," said Norton. Carrington gazed at
him in silence.

"It's settled, is it?" he asked at length. He saw his own hopes go down
in miserable wreck; they had been utterly futile from the first. He had
known all along that Norton loved her, the young planter had made no
secret of it. He had been less frank.

"I swear you take it quietly enough," said Norton.

"Do I?"

"Can't you wish me joy?"

Carrington held out his hand.

"You are not going to take any risks now, you have too much to live
for," he said haltingly.

"No, I'm to keep away from Belle Plain," said Norton happily. "She
insists on that; she says she won't even see me if I come there.
Everything is to be kept a secret; nothing's to be known until we are
actually married; it's her wish--"

"It's to be soon then?" Carrington asked, still haltingly.

"Very soon."

There was a brief silence. Carrington, with face averted, looked from
the window.

"I am going to stay here as long as you need me," he presently said.
"She--Miss Malroy asked me to, and then I am going back to the river
where I belong."

Norton turned on him quickly.

"You don't mean you've abandoned the notion of turning planter?" he
demanded in surprise.

"Well, yes. What's the use of my trying my hand at a business I don't
know the first thing about?"

"I wouldn't be in too big a hurry to decide finally on that point,"
urged Norton.

"It has decided itself," said Carrington quietly.

But Norton was conscious of a subtle change in their relation.
Carrington seemed a shade less frank than had been habitual with
him; all at once he had removed his private affairs from the field of
discussion. Afterward, when Norton considered the matter, he wondered
if it were not that the Kentuckian felt himself superfluous in this new
situation that had grown up.

Charley Norton's features recovered their accustomed hue, but he did not
go near Belle Plain; with resolute fortitude he confined himself to
his own acres. He was tolerably familiar with certain engaging little
peculiarities of Mr. Ware's; he knew, for instance, that the latter was
a gentleman of excessively regular habits; once each fortnight, making
an excuse of business, he spent a day in Memphis, neither more nor less.
Norton told himself with satisfaction that Tom was destined to return to
the surprise of his life from the next of these trips. This conviction
was the one thing which sustained Charley for some ten days. They were
altogether the longest ten days he had ever known, and he had about
reached the limit of his endurance when Betty's groom arrived with
a letter which threw him into a state of ecstatic happiness. The
sober-minded Tom would devote the morrow to Memphis and business.
This meant that he would leave Belle Plain at sun-up and return after
nightfall.

"You may not like Tom, but you can always count on him," said Norton.
Then he ordered his horse and rode off in the direction of Raleigh,
but before leaving the house, he scribbled a line or two to be handed
Carrington, who had gone down to the nearest river landing.

It was nightfall when the Kentuckian returned, Hearing his step in the
hall, Jeff came from the dining-room, where he was laying the cloth for
supper.

"Mas'r Charley has rid to Raleigh, Sah," said he; "but he done lef' this
fo' me to han' to yo"--extending the letter.

Carrington took it. He guessed its contents. Breaking the seal he read
the half dozen lines.

"To-morrow--" he muttered under his breath, and slowly tore the sheet of
note-paper into thin ribbons. He turned to Jeff. "Mr. Charley won't be
home until late," he said.

"Then I 'low yo' want yo' supper now, Sar?" But Carrington shook his
head.

"No, you needn't bother, Jeff," he said, as he turned toward the stairs.

Ten minutes later and he had got together his belongings and was ready
to quit Thicket Point. He retraced his steps to the floor below. In
the hall he paused and glanced about him. He seemed to feel her
presence--and very near--to-morrow she would enter there as Norton's
wife. With his pack under his arm he entered the dining-room in search
of Jeff.

"Tell your master I have gone to Memphis," he said briefly.

"Ain't yo' goin' to have a hoss, Mas'r Carrington?" demanded Jeff in
some surprise. He had come to regard the Kentuckian as a fixture.

"No," said Carrington. "Good-by, Jeff," he added, turning away.

But when he left Thicket Point he did not take the Memphis road, but
the road to Belle Plain. Walking rapidly, he reached the entrance to
the lane within the hour. Here he paused irresolutely, it was as if the
force of his purpose had already spent itself. Then he tossed his pack
into a fence corner and kept on toward the house.




CHAPTER XXII. AT THE CHURCH DOOR


There was the patter of small feet beyond Betty's door, and little
Steve, who looked more like a nice fat black Cupid than anything else,
rapped softly; at the same time he effected to squint through the
keyhole.

"Supper served, Missy," he announced, then he turned no less than seven
handsprings in the upper hall and slid down the balustrade to the floor
below. He was far from being a model house servant.

His descent was witnessed by the butler. Now in his own youth big Steve
with as fair a field had cut similar capers, yet he was impelled by his
sense of duty to do for his grandson what his own father had so often
done for him, and in no perfunctory manner. It was only the sound of
Betty's door opening and closing that stayed his hand as he was making
choice of a soft and vulnerable spot to which he should apply it. Little
Steve slid under the outstretched arm that menaced him and fled to the
dining-room.

Betty came slowly down the stairs. Four hours since Jeff had ridden away
with the letter. Already there had come to her moments when, she would
have given much could she have recalled it, when she knew with dread
certainty that whatever her feeling for Charley, it was not love;
moments when she realized that she had been cruelly driven by
circumstances into a situation that offered no escape.

"Mas'r Tom he say he won't come in to supper, Missy; he 'low he's
powerful busy, gittin' ready to go to Memphis in the mo'ning," explained
Steve, as he followed Betty into the dining-room.

His mistress nodded indifferently as she seated herself at the table;
she was glad to be alone just then; she was in no mood to carry on the
usual sluggish conversation with Tom; her own thoughts absorbed her more
and more they became terrifying things to her.

She ate her supper with big Steve standing behind her chair and little
Steve balancing himself first on one foot and then on the other near the
door. Little Steve's head was on a level with the chair rail and but
for the rolling whites of his eyes he was no more than a black shadow
against the walnut wainscoting; he formed the connecting link between
the dining-room and the remote kitchen. Betty suspected that most of the
platters journeyed down the long corridor deftly perched on top of his
woolly head. She frequently detected him with greasy or sticky fingers,
which while it argued a serious breach of trust also served to indicate
his favorite dishes. These two servitors were aware that their mistress
was laboring under some unusual stress of emotion. In its presence big
Steven, who, with the slightest encouragement, became a medium through
which the odds and ends of plantation gossip reached Betty's ears, held
himself to silence; while little Steve ceased to shift his weight from
foot to foot, the very dearth of speech fixed his attention.

The long French windows, their curtains drawn, stood open. All day a hot
September sun had beaten upon the earth, but with the fall of twilight
a soft wind had sprung up and the candles in their sconces flared at
its touch. It came out of wide solitudes laden with the familiar night
sounds. It gave Betty a sense of vast unused spaces, of Belle Plain
clinging on the edge of an engulfing wilderness, of her own loneliness.
She needed Charley as much as he seemed to think he needed her. The life
she had been living had become suddenly impossible of continuance; that
it had ever been possible was because of Charley; she knew this now as
she had never known it before.

Her thoughts dealt with the past. In her one great grief, her mother's
death, it had been Charley who had sustained and comforted her. She was
conscious of a choking sense of gratitude as she recalled his patient
tenderness at that time, the sympathy and understanding he had shown; it
was something never to be forgotten.

Unrest presently sent her from the house. She wandered down to the
terrace. Before her was the wide sweep of the swampy fore-shore, and
beyond just beginning to silver in the moonlight, the bend of the river
growing out of the black void. With her eyes on the river and her hands
clasped loosely she watched the distant line of the Arkansas coast
grow up against the sky; she realized that the moon was rising on Betty
Malroy for the last time.

She liked Charley; she needed some one to take care of her and her
belongings, and he needed her. It was best for them both that she should
marry him. True she might have gone back to Judith Ferris; that would
have been one solution of her difficulties. Why hadn't she thought of
doing this before? Of course, Charley would have followed her East.
Charley met the ordinary duties and responsibilities of his position
somewhat recklessly; it was only where she was concerned that he became
patiently determined.

"I suppose the end would have been the same there as here," thought
Betty.

A moment later she found herself wondering if Charley had told
Carrington yet; certainly the Kentuckian would not remain at Thicket
Point when he knew. She was sure she wished him to leave not Thicket
Point merely, but the neighborhood. She did not wish to see him
again--not see him again--not see him again--She found herself repeating
the words over and over; they shaped themselves into a dreadful refrain.
A nameless terror of the future swept in upon her. She was cold and
sick. It was as though an icy hand was laid upon her heart. The words
ran on in endless repetition--not see him again--they held the very soul
of tragedy for her, yet she was roused to passionate protest. She
must not think of him, he was nothing to her. She was to be married to
another man, even now she was almost a wife--but battle as she might the
struggle went on.

There was the sound of a step on the path. Betty turned, supposing it to
be Tom; but it was not Tom, it was Carrington himself who stood before
her, his face haggard and drawn. She uttered an involuntary exclamation
and shrank away from him. Without a word he stepped to her side and took
her hands rather roughly.

For a moment there was silence between them, Betty stared up into his
face with wide scared eyes, while he gazed down at her as if he would
fasten something on his mind that must never be forgotten. Suddenly
he lifted her soft cold hands to his lips and kissed them passionately
again and again; then he held them in his own against his cheek, his
glance still fixed intently upon her; it held something of bitterness
and reproach, but now she kept her eyes under their quivering lids from
him.

"What am I to do without you?"--his voice was almost a whisper. "What is
this thing you have done?" Betty's heart was beating with dull sickening
throbs, but she dared not trust herself to answer him. He took both her
hands in one of his, and, slipping the other under her chin, raised her
face so that he could look into her eyes; then he put his arm loosely
about her, holding her hands against his breast. "If I could have had
one moment out of all the years for my own--only one. I am glad you
don't care, dear; it hurts when you reach the end of something that has
been all your hope and filled all your days. I have come to say good-by,
Betty; this is the last time I shall see you. I am going away."

All in an instant Betty pressed close to him, hiding her face in his
arm; she clung to him in a panic of pain and horror. She felt something
stir within her that had never been there before, as a storm of
passionate longing swept through her. Her words, her promise to another
man, became as nothing. All her pride was forgotten. Without this man
the days stretched away before her a blank. His arm drew her closer
still, until she felt her heart throb against his.

"Do you care?" he said, and seemed to wonder that she should.

"Bruce, Bruce, I didn't know--and now--Oh, my dear, my dear--" He
pressed his lips against the bright little head that rested in such
miserable abandon against his shoulder.

"Do you love me?" he whispered. The blood ran riot in his veins.

"Why have you stayed away--why didn't you come to me? I have promised
him--" she gasped.

"I know," he said, and shut his lips. There was another silence while
she waited for him to speak. She felt that she was at his mercy, that
whether right or wrong, as he decided so it would be. At length he said.
"I thought it wasn't fair to him, and it seemed so hopeless after I came
here. I had nothing--and a man feels that--so I kept away." He spoke
awkwardly with something of the reserve that was habitual to him.

"If you had only come!" she moaned.

"I did--once," he muttered.

"You didn't understand; why did you believe anything I said to you? It
was only that I cared--that in my heart I knew I cared--I've cared
about you ever since that trip down the river, and now I am going to
be married to-morrow--to-morrow, Bruce--do you realize I have given my
promise? I am to meet him at the Spring Bank church at ten o'clock--and
it's tomorrow!" she cried, in a laboring choked voice. For answer he
drew her closer. "Bruce, what can I do?--tell me what I can do."

Carrington made an involuntary gesture of protest.

"I can't tell you that, dear--for I don't know." His voice was steady,
but it came from lips that quivered. He knew that he might have urged
the supreme claim of his love and in her present desperate mood she
would have listened, but the memory of Norton would have been between
them always a shame and reproach; as surely as he stood there with his
arms about her, as surely as she clung to him so warm and near, he would
have lived to see the shadow of that shame in her eyes.

"I can not do it--I can not, Bruce!" she panted.

"Dear--dear--don't tempt me!" He held himself in check.

"I am going to tell you--just this once, Bruce--I love you--you are my own
for this one moment out of my life!" and she abandoned herself to the
passionate caressing with which he answered her. "How can I give you
up?" he said, his voice hoarse with emotion. He put her from him almost
roughly, and leaning against the trunk of a tree buried his face in his
hands. Betty watched him for a moment in wretched silence.

"Don't feel so bad, Bruce," she said brokenly. "I am not worth it. I
tried not to love you--I didn't want to." She raised a white face to
his.

"I am going now, Betty. You--you shouldn't stay here any longer with
me." He spoke with sudden resolution.

"And I shall not see you again?" she asked, in a low, stifled voice.

"It's good-by--" he muttered.

"Not yet--oh, not yet, Bruce--" she implored. "I can not--"

"Yes--now, dear. I don't dare stay--I may forget--" but he turned again
to her in entreaty. "Give me something to remember in all the years
that are coming when I shall be alone--let me kiss you on the lips--let
me--just this once--it's good-by we're saying--it's good-by, Betty!"

She went to him, and, as he bent above her, slipped her arms about his
neck.

"Kiss me--" she breathed.

He kissed her hair, her soft cheek, then their lips met.

He helped her as she stumbled blindly along the path to the house,
and half lifted her up the steps to the door. They paused there for a
moment. At last he turned from her abruptly in silence. A step away he
halted.

"If you should ever need me--" "Never as now," she said.

She saw his tall figure pass down the path, and her straining eyes
followed until it was lost in the mild wide spaces of the night.


Another hot September sun was beating upon the earth as Betty galloped
down the lane and swung her horse's head in the direction of Raleigh.
Her grief had worn itself out and she carried a pale but resolute face.
Carrington was gone; she would keep her promise to Charley and he should
never know what his happiness had cost her. She nerved herself for their
meeting; somewhere between Belle Plain and Thicket Point Norton would be
waiting for her.

He joined her before she had covered a third of the distance that
separated the two plantations.

"Thank God, my darling!" he cried fervently, as he ranged up alongside
of her.

"Then you weren't sure of me, Charley?"

"No, I wasn't sure, Betty--but I hoped. I have been haunting the road
for more than an hour. You are making one poor unworthy devil happy,
unless--"

"Unless what, Charley?" she prompted.

"Unless you came here merely to tell me that after all you couldn't
marry me." He put out his hand and covered hers that held the reins.
"I'll never give you cause to regret it--you know how I love you, dear?"

"Yes, Charley--I know." She met his glance bravely.

"We are to go to the church. Mr. Bowen will be there; I arranged with
him last night; he will drive over with his wife and daughter, who will
be our witnesses, dear. We could have gone to his house, but I thought
it would seem more like a real wedding in a church, you know."

Betty did not answer him, her eyes were fixed straight ahead, the last
vestige of color had faded from her face and a deathly pallor was there.
This was the crowning horror. She felt the terrible injustice she was
doing the man at her side, the depth and sincerity of his devotion was
something for which she could make no return. Her lips trembled on the
verge of an avowal of her love for Carrington. Presently she saw the
church in its grove of oaks, in the shade of one of these stood Mr.
Bowen's horse and buggy.

"We won't have to wait on him!" said Norton.

"No--" Betty gasped out the monosyllable.

"Why--my darling--what's the matter?" he asked tenderly, his glance bent
in concern on the frightened face of the girl.

"Nothing--nothing, Charley."

They had reined in their horses. Norton sprang to the ground and lifted
her from the saddle.

"It will only take a moment, dear!" he whispered encouragingly in the
brief instant he held her in his arms.

"Oh, Charley, it isn't that--it's dreadfully serious--" she said, with a
wild little laugh that was almost hysterical.

"I wouldn't have it less than that," he said gravely.


Afterward Betty could remember standing before the church in the fierce
morning light; she heard Mr. Bowen's voice, she heard Charley's voice,
she heard another voice--her own, though she scarcely recognized it.
Then, like one aroused from a dream, she looked about her--she met
Charley's glance; his face was radiant and she smiled back at him
through a sudden mist that swam before her eyes.

Mr. Bowen led her toward the church door. As they neared it they caught
the clatter of hoofs, and Tom Ware on a hard-ridden horse dashed up; he
was covered with dust and inarticulate with rage. Then a cry came from
him that was like the roar of some mortally wounded animal.

"I forbid this marriage!" he shrieked, when he could command speech.

"You're too late to stop it, Tom, but you can attend it," said Norton
composedly.

"You--you--" Words failed the planter; he sat his horse the picture of a
grim and sordid despair.

Mr. Bowen divided a look of reproach between his wife and daughter; his
own conscience was clear; he had told no one of the purpose of Norton's
call the night before.

"I'll tie the horses, Betty," said Norton.

Ware turned fiercely to Bowen.

"You knew better than to be a party to this, and by God!--if you go on
with it you shall live to regret it!"

The minister made him no answer, he thoroughly disapproved of the
planter. It was well that Betty should have a proper protector, this
half-brother was hardly that measured by any standard.

Norton, leading the horses, had reached the edge of the oaks when from
the silent depths of the denser woods came the sharp report of a rifle.
The shock of the bullet sent the young fellow staggering back among the
mossy and myrtle-covered graves.

For a moment no one grasped what had happened, only there was Norton who
seemed to grope strangely among the graves. Black spots danced
before his eyes, the little group by the church merged into the
distance--always receding, always more remote, as he, stumbled
helplessly over the moss and the thick dank myrtle and among the round
graves that gave him a treacherous footing; and then he heard Betty's
agonized cry. He had fallen now, and his strength went from him, but he
kept his face turned on the group before the church in mute appeal, and
even as the shadows deepened he was aware that Betty was coming swiftly
toward him.

"I'm shot--" he said, speaking with difficulty.

"Charley--Charley--" she moaned, slipping her strong young arms about
him and gathering him to her breast.

He looked up into her face.

"It's all over--" he said, but as much in wonder as in fear. "But I knew
you would come to me--dear--" he added in a whisper. She felt a shudder
pass through him. He did not speak again. His lips opened once, and
closed on silence.




CHAPTER XXIII. THE JUDGE OFFERS A REWARD


The news of Charley Norton's murder spread quickly over the county. For
two or three days bands of armed men scoured the woods and roads, and
then this activity quite unproductive of any tangible results ceased,
matters were allowed to rest with the constituted authorities, namely
Mr. Betts the sheriff, and his deputies.

No private citizen had shown greater zeal than Judge Slocum Price, no
voice had clamored more eloquently for speedy justice than his. He had
sustained a loss that was in a peculiar sense personal, he explained.
Mr. Norton was his friend and client; they had much in common; their
political ideals were in the strictest accord and he had entertained a
most favorable opinion of the young man's abilities; he had urged him
to enter the national arena and carve out a career for himself; he had
promised him his support. The judge so worked upon his own feelings that
presently any mention of Norton's name utterly unmanned him. Well, this
was life. One could only claim time as it was doled out by clock ticks;
we planned for the years and could not be certain of the moments.

He spent two entire days at the church and in the surrounding woods, nor
did any one describe the murder with the vividness he achieved in his
description of it. The minister's narrative was pale and colorless by
comparison, and those who came from a distance went away convinced
that they had talked with an eyewitness to the tragedy and esteemed
themselves fortunate. In short, he imposed himself on the situation with
such brilliancy that in the end his account of the murder became
the accepted version from which all other versions differed to their
discredit.

In the same magnificent spirit of public service he would have assumed
the direction of the search for the murderer, but Mr. Betts' jealousy
proved an obstacle to his ambitious design. In view of this he was
regretful, but not surprised when the hard-ridden miles covered by dusty
men and reeking horses yielded only failure.

"If I had shot that poor boy, I wouldn't ask any surer guarantee of
safety than to have that fool Betts with his microscopic brain working
in unhampered asininity on the case," he told Mahaffy.

"Is it your idea that you are enlarging your circle of intimate friends
by the way you go about slamming into folks?" inquired Mahaffy, with
harsh sarcasm.

Later, the judge was shocked at what he characterized as official
apathy. It became a point on which he expressed himself with surpassing
candor.

"Do they think the murderer's going to come in and give himself up?--is
that the notion?" he demanded heatedly of Mr. Saul.

"The sheriff owns himself beat, Sir; the murderer's got safely away and
left no clue to his identity."

The judge waived this aside.

"Clues, sir? If you mean physical evidence the eye can apprehend, I
grant it; the murderer has got away; certainly he's been given all the
time he needed, but what about the motive that prompted the crime? An
intelligently conducted examination such as I am willing to undertake
might still bring it to light. Isn't it known that Norton was attacked a
fortnight ago as he was leaving Belle Plain? He recovers and is about
to be married to Miss Malroy when he is shot at the church door; I'll
hazard the opinion the attack was in the nature of a warning for him to
keep away from Belle Plain. Now, had he a rival? Clear up these points
and you get a clue!" The judge paused impressively.

"Tom Ware has acted in a straightforward manner. He's stated frankly
he was opposed to the match, that when he heard about it on his way to
Memphis he turned back and made every effort to get to the church in
time to stop it if he could," said Mr. Saul.

"Mr. Ware need not be considered," observed the judge.

"Well, there's been a heap of talk."

"If he'd inspired the firing of the fatal shot he'd have kept away from
the church. No, no, Mr. Saul, is there anybody hereabout who aspired to
Miss Malroy's hand--any rejected suitor?"

"Not that we know of."

"Under ordinary circumstances, sir, I am opposed to measures that
ignore the constituted authorities, but we find ourselves living under
extraordinary conditions, and the law--God save the name--has proved
itself abortive. It is time for the better element to join bands; we
must get together, sir. I am willing to take the initial steps and
issue the call for a mass meeting of our best citizens. I am prepared to
address such a meeting." The very splendor of his conception dazzled the
judge; this promised a gorgeous publicity with his name flying broadcast
over the county. He continued:

"I am ready to give my time gratuitously to directing the activities of
a body of picked men who shall rid the county of the lawless element.
God knows, sir, I desire the repose of a private career, yet I am
willing to sacrifice myself. Is it your opinion, Mr. Saul, that I should
move in this matter?"

"I advise you didn't," said Mr. Saul, with disappointing alacrity.

The judge looked at him fixedly.

"Am I wrong in supposing, Mr. Saul, that if I determine to act as I have
outlined I shall have your indorsement?" he demanded. Mr. Saul
looked extremely uncomfortable; he was finding the judge's effulgent
personality rather compelling. "There is no gentleman whose support
I should value in quite the same sense that I should value yours, Mr.
Saul; I should like to feel my course met with your full approval,"
pursued the judge, with charming deference.

"You'll get yourself shot full of holes," said Mr. Saul.

"What causes me to hesitate is this: my name is unfamiliar to your
citizens. You know their prejudices, Mr. Saul; how would they regard me
if I put myself forward?"

"Can't say how they would take it," rejoined Mr. Saul.

Again the judge gave him a fixed scrutiny. Then ha shook him warmly by
the hand.

"Think of what I have said; ponder it, sir, and let me have your
answer at another time." And he backed from Mr. Saul's presence with
spectacular politeness.

"A cheap mind!" thought the judge, as he hurried up the street.

He broached the subject to Mr. Wesley the postmaster, to Mr. Ellison
the gunsmith, to Mr. Pegloe, employing much the same formula he had used
with Mr. Saul, and with results almost identical. He imagined there must
be some conspiracy afoot to keep him out of the public eye, and in the
end he managed to lose his temper.

"Hasn't Norton any friends?" he demanded of Pegloe. "Who's going to
be safe at this rate? We want to let some law into west Tennessee, a
hanging or two would clear the air!" His emotions became a rage that
blew through him like a gale, shaking him to his center.

Two mornings later he found where it had been placed under his door
during the night a folded paper. It contained a single line of writing:


"You talk too much. Shut up, or you'll go where Norton went."


Now the judge was accessible to certain forms of fear. He was, for
instance, afraid of snakes--both kinds--and mobs he had dreaded
desperately since his Pleasantville experience; but beyond this, fear
remained an unexplored region to Slocum Price, and as he examined the
scrawl a smile betokening supreme satisfaction overspread his battered
features. He was agreeably affected by the situation; indeed he was
delighted. His activities were being recognized; he had made his
impression; the cutthroats had selected him to threaten. Well, the
damned rascals showed their good sense; he'd grant them that! Swelling
with pride, he carried the scrawl to Mahaffy.

"They are forming their estimate of me, Solomon; I shall have them on
the run yet!" he declared.

"You are going out of your way to hunt trouble--as if you hadn't enough
at the best of times, Price! Let these people manage their own affairs,
don't you mix up in them," advised the conservative Mahaffy.

The judge drew himself up with an air of lofty pride.

"Do you think I am going to be silenced, intimidated, by this sort of
thing? No, sir! No, Solomon, the stopper isn't made that will fit my
mouth."

A few moments later he burst in on Mr. Saul.

"Glance at that, my friend!" he cried, as he tossed the paper on the
clerk's desk. "Eh, what?--no joke about that, Mr. Saul. I found it under
my door this morning." Mr. Saul glanced at the penciled lines and drew
in his breath sharply. "What do you make of it, sir?" demanded the judge
anxiously.

"Well, of course, you'll do as you please, but I'd keep still."

"You mean you regard this as an authentic expression, sir, and not as
the joke of some irresponsible humorist?"

"It's authentic enough," said Mr. Saul impatiently.

The judge gave a sigh of relief; he could have hugged the little clerk
who had put to rest certain miserable doubts that had assailed him.

"Sir, I wish it known that I hold the writer and his threats in
contempt; if I have given offense it is to an element I shall never seek
to conciliate." Mr. Saul was clearly divided between his admiration for
the judge's courage and fear for his safety. "One thing is proven, sir,"
the judge went on; "the man who murdered that poor boy is in our midst;
that point can no longer be disputed. Now, where are their fine-spun
theories as to how he crossed to the Arkansas coast? What does their
mass of speculation and conjecture amount to in the face of this?" He
breathed deep. "My God, sir, the murderer may be the very next man you
pass the time of day with!" Mr. Saul shivered uncomfortably. "And the
case in the hands of that pin-headed fool, Betts!" The judge laughed
derisively as he bowed himself out. He left it with Mr. Saul to
disseminate the news. The judge strutted home with his hat cocked over
one eye, and his chest expanded to such limits that it menaced all
his waistcoat buttons. Perhaps he was under observation. Ah, let the
cutthroats look their full at him!

He established himself in his office. He had scarcely done so when Mr.
Betts knocked at the door. The sheriff came direct from Mr. Saul and
arrived out of breath, but the letter was not mentioned by the judge.
He spoke of the crops, the chance of rain, and the intricacies of county
politics. The sheriff withdrew mystified, wondering why it was he had
not felt at liberty to broach the subject which was uppermost in
his mind. His place was taken by Mr. Pegloe, and on the heels of
the tavern-keeper came Mr. Bowen. Judge Price received them with
condescension, but back of the condescension was an air of reserve
that did not invite questions. The judge discussed the extension of
the national roads with Mr. Pegloe, and the religion of the Persian
fire-worshipers with Mr. Bowen; he permitted never a pause and they
retired as the sheriff had done without sight of the letter.

The judge's office became a perfect Mecca for the idle and the curious,
and while he overflowed with high-bred courtesy he had never seemed so
unapproachable--never so remote from matters of local and contemporary
interest.

"Why don't you show 'em the letter?" demanded Mr. Mahaffy, when they
were alone. "Can't you see they are suffering for a sight of it?"

"All in good time, Solomon." He became thoughtful. "Solomon, I am
thinking of offering a reward for any information that will lead to the
discovery of my anonymous correspondent," he at length observed with a
finely casual air, as if the idea had just occurred to him, and had not
been seething in his brain all day.

"There you go, Price--" began Mahaffy.

"Solomon, this is no time for me to hang back. I shall offer a reward
of five thousand dollars for this information." The judge's tone was
resolute. "Yes, sir, I shall make the figure commensurate with the
poignant grief I feel. He was my friend and client--" The moisture
gathered in his eyes.

"I should think that fifty dollars was nearer to being your figure,"
suggested the cautious Mahaffy.

"Inadequate and most insulting," said the judge.

"Well, where do you expect to get five thousand dollars?" cried Mahaffy
in a tone of absolute exasperation.

"Where would I get fifty?" inquired the judge mildly.

For once Mahaffy frankly owned himself beaten. A gleam of admiration lit
up his glance.

"Price, you have a streak of real greatness!" he declared.

Before the day was over it was generally believed that the judge was
wearing his gag with humility; interest in him declined, still the
public would have been grateful for a sight of that letter.

"Shucks, he's nothing but an old windbag!" said Mr. Pegloe to a group of
loungers gathered before his tavern in the early evening.

As he spoke, the judge's door opened and that gentleman appeared on his
threshold with a lighted candle in each hand. Glancing neither to the
right nor the left he passed out and up the street. Not a breath of wind
was blowing and the flames of the two candles burnt clear and strong,
lighting up his stately advance.

At the corner of the court-house green stood a row of locust hitching
posts. Two of these the judge decorated with his candles, next he
measured off fifteen paces, strides as liberal as he could make them
without sacrifice to his dignity; he scored a deep line in the dust
with the heel of his boot, toed it squarely, and drew himself up to his
fullest height. His right hand was seen to disappear under the frayed
tails of his coat, it reappeared and was raised with a movement quicker
than the eye could follow and a pistol shot rang out. One of the candles
was neatly snuffed.

The judge allowed himself a covert glance in the direction of the
loungers before the tavern. He was aware that a larger audience was
assembling. A slight smile relaxed the firm set of his lips. The
remaining candle sputtered feebly. The judge walked to the post and
cleared the wick from tallow with his thumb-nail. There was no haste in
any of his movements; his was the deliberation of conscious efficiency.
Resuming his former station back of the line he had drawn in the dusty
road he permitted his eye to gauge the distance afresh, then his hand
was seen to pass deftly to his left hip pocket, the long barrel of the
rifle pistol was leveled, the piece cracked, and the candle's yellow
flame vanished.

The judge pocketed his pistol, walked down the street, and with never a
glance toward the tavern reentered his house.

The next morning it was discovered that sometime during the night the
judge had tacked his anonymous communication on the court-house door;
just below it was another sheet of paper covered with bold script:


"TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN: Judge Slocum Price assumes that the above was
intended for him since he found it under his office door on the morning
of the twenty-fifth inst.

"Judge Price begs leave to state it as his unqualified conviction that
the writer is a coward and a cur, and offers a reward of five thousand
dollars for any information that will lead to his identification.

"Judge Price has stated that he would conduct an intelligently directed
investigation of the Norton murder mystery without remuneration. He
has the honor to assure his friends that he is still willing to do so;
however, he takes this opportunity to warn the public that each day's
delay is a matter of the utmost gravity.

"Furthermore, judge Price avails himself on this occasion to say that
he has no wish to avoid personal conclusions with the murderers and
cutthroats who are terrorizing this community; on the contrary, he will
continue earnestly to seek such personal conclusions."




CHAPTER XXIV. THE CABIN ACROSS THE BAYOU


Tom Ware was seated alone over his breakfast. He had left his bed as
the pale morning light crept across the great fields that were alike his
pride and his despair--what was the use of trying to sleep when sleep
was an impossibility! The memory of that tragedy at the church door was
a black horror to him; it gave substance to his dreams, it brought him
awake with writhing lips that voiced his fear in the dead stillness of
the night. The days were scarcely less terrible. Steeled and resolute
as his will could make him, he was not able to speak of what he had seen
with composure. Being as he was in this terribly perturbed state he had
shirked his morning toilet and presented a proportionately haggard
and unkempt appearance. He was about to quit the table when big Steve
entered the room to say there was a white fellow at the door wished to
see him.

"Fetch him along in here," said Ware briefly, without lifting his
bloodshot eyes.

Brought into his presence the white fellow delivered a penciled note
which proved to be from Murrell, and then on Ware's invitation partook
of whisky. When he was gone, the planter ordered his horse, and while he
waited for it to be brought up from the stables, reread Murrell's
note. The expression of his unprepossessing features indicated what
was passing in his mind, his mood was one of sullen rebellion. He felt
Murrell was bent on committing him to an aggregate of crime he
would never have considered possible, and all for love of a girl--a
pink-cheeked, white-faced chit of a girl--disgust boiled up within him,
rage choked him; this was the rotten spot in Murrell's make-up, the man
was mad-stark mad!

As Ware rode away from Belle Plain he cursed him under his breath with
vindictive thoroughness. His own inclination toward evil was never very
robust; he could have connived and schemed over a long period of
years to despoil Betty of her property, he would have counted this a
legitimate field for enterprise; but murder and abduction was quite
another thing. He would wash his hands of all further connection with
Murrell, he had other things to lose besides Belle Plain, and the
present would be as good a time as any to let the outlaw know he could
be coerced and bullied no longer. But he had a saving recollection
of the way in which Murrell dealt with what he counted treachery; an
unguarded word, and he would not dare to travel those roads even at
broad noon-day, while to pass before a lighted window at night would be
to invite death; nowhere would he be safe.

Three miles from Belle Plain he entered a bridle path that led toward
the river; he was now traversing a part of the Quintard tract. Two miles
from the point where he had quitted the main road he came out upon the
shores of a wide bayou. Looking across this he saw at a distance of half
a mile what seemed to be a clearing of considerable extent, it was the
first sign of human occupation he had seen since leaving Belle Plain.

An impenetrable swamp defended the head of the bayou which he skirted.
Doubling back as though he were going to retrace his steps to Belle
Plain, finally he gained a position opposite the clearing which still
showed remotely across the wide reach of sluggish water. Here he
dismounted and tied his horse, then as one tolerably familiar with the
locality and its resources, he went down to the shore and launched a
dugout which he found concealed in some bushes; entering it he pointed
its blunt bow in the direction of the clearing opposite. A growth of
small timber was still standing along the water's edge, but as he drew
nearer, those betterments which the resident of that lonely spot had
seen fit to make for his own convenience, came under his scrutiny; these
consisted of a log cabin and several lesser sheds. Landing and securing
his dug-out by the simple expedient of dragging half its length out of
the water, he advanced toward the cabin. As he did so he saw two
women at work heckling flax under an open shed. They were the wife and
daughter of George Hicks, his overseer's brother.

"Morning, Mrs. Hicks," he said, addressing himself to the mother, a
hulking ruffian of a woman.

"Howdy, sir?" she answered. Her daughter glanced indifferently in Ware's
direction. She was a fine strapping girl, giving that sense of physical
abundance which the planter admired.

"They'd better keep her out of Murrell's way!" he thought; aloud he
said, "Anybody with the captain?"

"Colonel Fentress is."

"Humph!" muttered Ware. He moved to the door of the cabin and pushing
it open, entered the room where Murrell and Fentress were seated facing
each other across the breakfast table. The planter nodded curtly. He had
not seen Murrell since the murder, and the sight of him quickened the
spirit of antagonism which he had been nursing. "You roust a fellow out
early enough!" he grumbled, rubbing his unshaven chin with the back of
his hand.

"I was afraid you'd be gone somewhere. Sit down--here, between the
colonel and me," said Murrell.

"Well, what the devil do you want of me anyhow?" demanded the planter.

"How's your sister, Tom?" inquired Murrell.

"I reckon she's the way you'd expect her to be." Ware dropped his voice
to a whisper. Those women were just the other side of the logs, he could
hear them at their work.

"Who's at Belle Plain now?" continued Murrell.

"Bowen's wife and daughter have stayed," answered Ware, still in a
whisper.

"For how long, Tom? Do you know?"

"They were to go home after breakfast this morning; the daughter's to
come out again to-morrow and stay with Betty until she leaves."

"What's that you're saying?" cried Murrell.

"She's going back to North Carolina to those friends of hers; it's no
concern of mine, she does what she likes without consulting me." There
was a brief pause during which Murrell scowled at the planter.

"I reckon your heart's tender, too!" he presently said. Ware's dull
glance shifted to Fentress, but the colonel's cold and impassive
exterior forbade the thought that his sympathy had been roused.

"It isn't that," Ware muttered, moistening his lips. He felt the utter
futility of opposition. "I am for letting things rest just where they
are," again his voice slid into a husky whisper. "You'll be running all
our heads into a halter, the first thing you know--and this isn't any
place to talk over such matters, there are too many people about."

"There's only Bess and the old woman busy outside," said Murrell.

"What's to hinder them from sticking an ear to a chink in the logs?"

"Go on, and finish what you've got to say, and get it off your mind,"
said Murrell.

"Well, then, I want to tell you that I consider you didn't regard me at
all in the way you managed that business at the church! If I had known
what was due to happen there, do you think I'd have gone near the place?
But you let me go! I met you on the road and you told me you'd learned
Norton had been to see Bowen, you told me that much, but you didn't tell
me near all you might!" Ware was bitter and resentful; again he felt the
sweat of a mortal terror drip from him.

"It was the best thing for you that it happened the way it did,"
rejoined Murrell coolly. "No one will ever think you had a hand in it."

"It wasn't right! You placed me in the meanest kind of a situation,"
objected Ware sullenly, mopping his face.

"Did you think I was going to let the marriage take place? You knew
he had been warned to keep away from her," said Murrell. There was a
movement overhead in the loft, the loose clapboards with which it was
floored creaked under a heavy tread.

"Who's that? Hicks?" asked Ware.

"It isn't Hicks--never mind who it is, Tom," answered Murrell quietly.

"I thought you'd sent him out of the county?" muttered Ware, his face
livid.

"Look here, Tom, I don't ask your help, but I won't stand your
interference. I'm going to have the girl."

"John, you'll ruin yourself with your damned crazy infatuation!" It was
Fentress, no longer able to control himself, who spoke.

"No, I won't, Colonel, but I'm not going to discuss that. All I want is
for Tom to go to Memphis and stay there for a couple of days. When he
comes back Belle Plain and its niggers will be as good as his. I am
going to take the girl away from there to-night. I don't ask your
help and you needn't ask what comes of her afterward. That will be my
affair." Murrell's burning eyes shifted from one to the other.

"A beautiful and accomplished young lady--a great heiress--is to
disappear and no solution of the mystery demanded by the public
at large!" said Fentress with an acid smile. Murrell laughed
contemptuously.

"What's all this fuss over Norton's death amounted to?" he said.

"Are you sure you have come to the end of that, John?" inquired
Fentress, still smiling.

"I don't propose to debate this further," rejoined Murrell haughtily.
Instantly the colonel's jaw became rigid. The masterful airs of this
cutthroat out of the hills irked him beyond measure. Murrell turned to
Ware.

"How soon can you get away from here, Tom?" he asked abruptly.

"By God, I can't go too soon!" cried the planter, staggering to his
feet. He gave Fentress a hopeless beaten look. "You're my witness that
first and last I've no part in this!" he added.

The colonel merely shrugged his shoulders. Murrell reached out a
detaining hand and rested it on Ware's arm.

"Keep your wits about you, Tom, and within a week people will have
forgotten all about Norton and your sister. I am going to give them
something else to worry over."

Ware went from the cabin, and as the door swung shut Fentress faced
Murrell across the table.

"I've gone as far with you in this affair as I can go; after all, as you
say, it is a private matter. You reap the benefits--you and Tom between
you--I shall give you a wide berth until you come to your senses.
Frankly, if you think that in this late day in the world you can carry
off an unwilling girl, your judgment is faulty."

"Hold on, Colonel--how do you know she is going to prove unwilling?"
objected Murrell, grinning.

Fentress gave him a glance of undisguised contempt and rose from his
seat.

"I admit your past successes, John--that is, I take your word for
them--but Miss Malroy is a lady."

"I have heard enough!" said Murrell angrily.

"So have I, John," retorted the colonel in a tone that was unvexed but
final, "and I shall count it a favor if you will never refer to her in
my hearing." He moved in the direction of the door.

"Oh, you and I are not going to lose our tempers over this!" began
Murrell. "Come, sit down again, Colonel!" he concluded with great good
nature.

"We shall never agree, John--you have one idea and I another."

"We'll let the whole matter drop out of our talk. Look here, how about
the boy--are you ready for him if I can get my hands on him?"

Fentress considered. From the facts he had gathered he knew that the man
who called himself Judge Price must soon run his course in Raleigh, and
then as inevitably push out for fresh fields. Any morning might find him
gone and the boy with him.

"I can't take him to my place as I had intended doing; under the
circumstances that is out of the question," he said at length.

"Of course; but I'll send him either up or down the river and place him
in safe keeping where you can get him any time you want."

"This must be done without violence, John!" stipulated Fentress.

"Certainly, I understand that perfectly well. It wouldn't suit your
schemes to have that brace of old sots handled by the Clan. Which shall
it be--up or down river?"

"Could you take care of him for me below, at Natchez?" inquired
Fentress.

"As well there as anywhere, Colonel, and he'll pass into safe hands; he
won't give me the slip the second time!"

"Good!" said Fentress, and took his leave.

From the window Murrell watched him cross the clearing, followed by the
girl, Bess, who was to row him over to the opposite shore. He reflected
that these men--the Wares and Fentresses and their like--were keen
enough where they had schemes of their own they wished put through;
it was only when he reached out empty hands that they reckoned the
consequences.

Three-quarters of an hour slipped by, then, piercing the silence,
Murrell heard a shrill whistle; it was twice repeated; he saw Bess go
down to the landing again. A half-hour elapsed and a man issued from
the scattering growth of bushes that screened the shore. The new-comer
crossed the clearing and entered the cabin. He was a young fellow of
twenty-four or five, whose bronzed and sunburnt face wore a somewhat
reckless expression.

"Well, Captain, what's doing?" he asked, as he shook hands with Murrell.

"I've been waiting for you, Hues," said Murrell. He continued, "I reckon
the time's here when nothing will be gained by delay."

Hues dropped down on a three-legged stool and looked at the
outlaw fixedly and in silence for a moment. At length he nodded
understandingly.

"You mean?"

"If anything's to be done, now is the time. What have you to report?"

"Well, I've seen the council of each Clan division. They are ripe to
start this thing off."

Murrell gave him a moment of moody regard.

"Twice already I've named the day and hour, but now I'm going to put it
through!" He set his teeth and thrust out his jaw.

"Captain, you're the greatest fellow in America! Inside of a week men
who have never been within five hundred miles of you will be asking each
other who John Murrell is!"

Murrell had expected to part with Hues then and there and for all time,
but Hues possessed qualities which might still be of use to him.

"What do you expect to do for yourself?" he demanded. The other laughed
shortly.

"Captain, I'm going to get rich while I have the chance. Ain't that what
we are all after?"

"How?" inquired Murrell quietly. Hues shifted his seat.

"I'm sensitive about calling things by their short names;" he gave way
to easy laughter; "but if you've got anything special you're saving for
yourself, I'm free to say I'd rather take chances with you than with
another," he finished carelessly.

"Hues, you must start back across Tennessee. Make it Sunday at
midnight--that's three days off." Unconsciously his voice sank to a
whisper.

"Sunday at midnight," repeated Hues slowly.

"When you have passed the word into middle Tennessee, turn south and
make the best of your way to New Orleans. Don't stop for anything--push
through as fast as you can. You'll find me there. I've a notion you and
I will quit the country together."

"Quit the country! Why, Captain, who's talking of quitting the country?"

"You speak as though you were fool enough to think the niggers would
accomplish something!" said Murrell coolly. "There will be confusion at
first, but there are enough white men in the southwest to handle a
heap better organized insurrection than we'll be able to set going. Our
fellows will have to use their heads as well as their hands or they are
likely to help the nigger swallow his medicine. I look for nothing
else than considerable of a shake-up along the Mississippi... what with
lynchers and regulators a man will have to show a clean bill of health
to be allowed to live, no matter what his color--just being white won't
help him any!"

"No, you're right, it won't!" and again Hues gave way to easy laughter.

"When you've done your work you strike south as I tell you and join me.
I'm going to keep New Orleans for myself--it's my ambition to destroy
the city Old Hickory saved!"

"And then it's change your name and strike out for Texas with what
you've picked up!"

"No, it isn't! I'll have my choice of men--a river full of ships. Look
here, there's South America, or some of those islands in the gulf with
a black-and-tan population and a few white mongrels holding on to
civilization by their eye-teeth; what's to hinder our setting up shop
for ourselves? Two or three hundred Americans could walk off with an
island like Hayti, for instance--and it's black with niggers. What
we'd done here would be just so much capital down there. We'd make it a
stamping-ground for the Clan! In the next two years we could bring in a
couple of thousand Americans and then we'd be ready to take over their
government, whether they liked it or not, and run it at a profit. We'd
put the niggers back in slavery where they belong, and set them at work
raising sugar and tobacco for their new bosses. Man, it's the richest
land in the world, I tell you--and the mountains are full of gold!"

Hues had kindled with a ready enthusiasm while Murrell was speaking.

"That sounds right, Captain--we'd have a country and a flag of our
own--and I look at those free niggers as just so much boot!"

"I shall take only picked men with me--I can't give ship room to any
other--but I want you. You'll join me in New Orleans?" said Murrell.

"When do you start south?" asked Hues quickly.

"Inside of two days. I've got some private business to settle before I
leave. I'll hang round here until that's attended to."




CHAPTER XXV. THE JUDGE EXTENDS HIS CREDIT


That afternoon Judge Price walked out to Belle Plain. Solomon Mahaffy
had known that this was a civility Betty Malroy could by no means
escape. He had been conscious of the judge's purpose from the moment
it existed in the germ state, and he had striven to divert him, but
his striving had been in vain, for though the judge valued Mr. Mahaffy
because of certain sterling qualities which he professed to discern
beneath the hard crust that made up the external man, he was not
disposed to accept him as his mentor in nice matters of taste and
gentlemanly feeling. He owed it to himself personally to tender his
sympathy. Miss Malroy must have heard something of the honorable part
he had played; surely she could not be in ignorance of the fact that the
lawless element, dreading his further activities, had threatened
him. She must know, too, about that reward of five thousand dollars.
Certainly her grief could not blind her to the fact that he had met
the situation with a largeness of public spirit that was an impressive
lesson to the entire community.'

These were all points over which he and Mahaffy had wrangled, and he
felt that his friend, in seeking to keep him away from Belle Plain, was
standing squarely in his light. He really could not understand Solomon
or his objections. He pointed out that Norton had probably left a
will--no one knew yet--probably his estate would go to his intended
wife--what more likely? He understood Norton had cousins somewhere
in middle Tennessee--there was the attractive possibility of extended
litigation. Miss Malroy needed a strong, clear brain to guide her past
those difficulties his agile fancy assembled in her path. He beamed on
his friend with a wide sunny smile.

"You mean she needs a lawyer, Price?" insinuated Mahaffy.

"That slap at me, Solomon, is unworthy of you. Just name some one, will
you, who has shown an interest comparable to mine? I may say I have
devoted my entire energy to her affairs, and with disinterestedness. I
have made myself felt. Will you mention who else these cutthroats
have tried to browbeat and frighten? They know that my theories and
conclusions are a menace to them! I got 'em in a panic, sir--presently
some fellow will lose his nerve and light out for the tall timber--and
it will be just Judge Slocum Price who's done the trick--no one else!"

"Are you looking for some one to take a pot shot at you?" inquired
Mahaffy sourly.

"Your remark uncovers my fondest hope, Solomon--I'd give five years
of my life just to be shot at--that would round out the episode of the
letter nicely;" again the judge beamed on Mahaffy with that wide and
sunny smile of his.

"Why don't you let the boy go alone, Price?" suggested Mahaffy.
He lacked that sense of sublime confidence in the judge's tact and
discretion of which the judge, himself, entertained never a doubt.

"I shall not obtrude myself, Solomon; I shall merely walk out to Belle
Plain and leave a civil message. I know what's due Miss Malroy in her
bereaved state--she has sustained no ordinary loss, and in no ordinary
fashion. She has been the center of a striking and profoundly moving
tragedy! I would give a good deal to know if my late client left a
will--"

"You might ask her," said Mahaffy cynically. "Nothing like going to
headquarters for the news!"

"Solomon, Solomon, give me credit for common sense--go further, and give
me credit for common decency! Don't let us forget that ever since we
came here she has manifested a charmingly hospitable spirit where we are
concerned!"

"Wouldn't charity hit nearer the mark, Price?"

"I have never so regarded it, Solomon," said the judge mildly. "I have
read a different meaning in the beef and flour and potatoes she's sent
here. I expect if the truth could be known to us she is wondering in
the midst of her grief why I haven't called, but she'll appreciate the
considerate delicacy of a gentleman. I wish it were possible to get cut
flowers in this cussed wilderness!"

The judge had been occupied with a simple but ingenious toilet. He had
trimmed the frayed skirts of, his coat; then by turning his cuffs inside
out and upside down a fresh surface made its first public appearance.
Next his shoes had engaged his attention. They might have well
discouraged a less resolute and resourceful character, but with the
contents of his ink-well he artfully colored his white yarn socks where
they showed though the rifts in the leather. This the judge did gaily,
now humming a snatch of song, now listening civilly to Mahaffy, now
replying with undisturbed cheerfulness. Last of all he clapped his dingy
beaver on his head, giving it an indescribably jaunty slant, and stepped
to the door.

"Well, wish me luck, Solomon, I'm off--come, Hannibal!" he said. At
heart he cherished small hope of seeing Betty, advantageous as he
felt an interview might prove. However, on reaching Belle Plain he and
Hannibal were shown into the cool parlor by little Steve. It was more
years than the judge cared to remember since he had put his foot inside
such a house, but with true grandeur of soul he rose to the occasion;
a sublimated dignity shone from every battered feature, while he fixed
little Steve with so fierce a glance that the grin froze on his lips.

"You are to say that judge Slocum Price presents his compliments and
condolences to Miss Malroy--have you got that straight, you pinch
of soot?" he concluded affably. Little Steve, impressed alike by the
judge's air of condescension and his easy flow of words, signified that
he had. "You may also say that judge Price's ward, young Master Hazard,
presents his compliments and condolences--" What more the judge might
have said was interrupted by the entrance of Betty, herself.

"My dear young lady--" the judge bowed, then he advanced toward her
with the solemnity of carriage and countenance he deemed suitable to
the occasion, and her extended hand was engulfed between his two plump
palms. He rolled his eyes heavenward. "It's the Lord's to deal with
us as His own inscrutable wisdom dictates," he murmured with pious
resignation. "We are all poorer, ma'am, that he has died--just as we
were richer while he lived!" The rich cadence of the judge's speech fell
sonorously on the silence, and that look of horror which had never quite
left Betty's eyes since they saw Charley Norton fall, rose out of their
clear depths again. The judge, instantly stricken with a sense of
the inadequacy of his words, doubled on his spiritual tracks. "In a
round-about way, ma'am, we're bound to believe in the omnipresence of
Providence--we must think it--though a body might be disposed to hold
that west Tennessee had got out of the line of divine supervision
recently. Let me lead you to a chair, ma'am!"

Hannibal had slipped to Betty's side and placed his hand in hers. The
judge regarded the pair with great benevolence of expression. "He would
come, and I hadn't the heart to forbid it. If I can be of any service
to you, ma'am, either in the capacity of a friend--or professionally--I
trust you will not hesitate to command me--" The judge backed toward the
door.

"Did you walk out, Judge Price?" asked Betty kindly.

"Nothing more than a healthful exercise--but we will not detain you,
ma'am; the pleasure of seeing you is something we had not reckoned on!"
The judge's speech was thick and unctuous with good feeling. He wished
that Mahaffy might have been there to note the reserve and dignity of
his deportment.

"But you must let me order luncheon for you," said Betty. At least this
questionable old man was good to Hannibal.

"I couldn't think of it, ma'am--"

"You'll have a glass of wine, then," urged Betty hospitably. For the
moment she had lost sight of what was clearly the judge's besetting sin.

The judge paused abruptly. He endured a moment of agonizing
irresolution.

"On the advice of my physician I dare not touch wine--gout, ma'am,
and liver--but this restriction does not apply to corn whisky--in
moderation, and as a tonic--either before meals, immediately after meals
or at any time between meals--always keeping in mind the idea of its
tonic properties--" The judge seemed to mellow and ripen. This was
much better than having the dogs sicked on you! His manner toward Betty
became almost fatherly. Poor young thing, so lonely and desolate in the
midst of all this splendor--he surreptitiously wiped away a tear,
and when little Steve presented himself and was told to bring whisky,
audibly smacked his lips--a whole lot better, surely!

"I am sorry you think you must hurry away, Judge Price," said Betty. She
still retained the small brown hand Hannibal had thrust into hers.

"The eastern mail gets in to-day, ma'am, and I have reason to think
my share of it will be especially heavy, for it brings the bulk of my
professional correspondence." In ten years the judge had received just
one communication by mail--a bill which had followed him through four
states and seven counties. "I expect my secretary--" boldly fixing
Solomon Mahaffy's status, "is already dipping into it; an excellent
assistant, ma'am, but literary rather than legal."

Little Steve reappeared bearing a silver tray on which was a decanter
and glass.

"Since you insist, ma'am," the judge poured himself a drink, "my best
respects--" he bowed profoundly.

"If you are quite willing, judge, I think I will keep Hannibal. Miss
Bowen, who has been here--since--" her voice broke suddenly.

"I understand, ma'am," said the judge soothingly. He gave her a glance
of great concern and turned to Hannibal. "Dear lad, you'll be very quiet
and obedient, and do exactly as Miss Malroy says? When shall I come for
him, ma'am?"

"I'll send him to you when he is ready to go home. I am thinking of
visiting my friends in North Carolina, and I should like to have him
spend as much time as possible with me before I start for the East."

It had occurred to Betty that she had done little or nothing for the
child; probably this would be her last opportunity.

The state of the judge's feelings was such that with elaborate absence
of mind he poured himself a second drink of whisky; and that there
should be no doubt the act was one of inadvertence, said again, "My best
respects, ma'am," and bowed as before. Putting down the glass he backed
toward the door.

"I trust you will not hesitate to call upon me if I can be of any use to
you, ma'am--a message will bring me here without a moment's delay." He
was rather disappointed that no allusion had been made to his recent
activities. He reasoned correctly that Betty was as yet in ignorance of
the somewhat dangerous eminence he had achieved as the champion of law
and order. However, he reflected with satisfaction that Hannibal, in
remaining, would admirably serve his ends.

Betty insisted that he should be driven home, and after faintly
protesting, the judge gracefully yielded the point, and a few moments
later rolled away from Belle Plain behind a pair of sleek-coated bays,
with a negro in livery on the box. He was conscious of a great sense of
exaltation. He felt that he should paralyze Mahaffy. He even temporarily
forgot the blow his hopes had sustained when Betty spoke of returning to
North Carolina. This was life--broad acres and niggers--principally
to trot after you toting liquor--and such liquor!--he lolled back
luxuriantly with half-closed eyes.

"Twenty years in the wood if an hour!" he muttered. "I'd like to have
just such a taste in my mouth when I come to die--and probably she has
barrels of it!" he sighed deeply, and searched his soul for words with
which adequately to describe that whisky to Mahaffy.

But why not do more than paralyze Solomon--that would be pleasant but
not especially profitable. The judge came back quickly to the vexed
problem of his future. He desired to make some striking display of Miss
Malroy's courtesy. He knew that his credit was experiencing the pangs of
an early mortality; he was not sensitive, yet for some days he had
been sensible of the fact that what he called the commercial class was
viewing him with open disfavor, but he must hang on in Raleigh a little
longer--for him it had become the abode of hope. The judge considered
the matter. At least he could let people see something of that decent
respect with which Miss Malroy treated him.

They were entering Raleigh now, and he ordered the coachman to pull his
horses down to a walk. He had decided to make use of the Belle Plain
turnout in creating an atmosphere of confidence and trust--especially
trust. To this end he spent the best part of an hour interviewing
his creditors. It amounted almost to a mass-meeting of the adult male
population, for he had no favorites. When he invaded virgin territory
he believed in starting the largest possible number of accounts without
delay. The advantage of his system, as he explained its workings to
Mahaffy, was that it bred a noble spirit of emulation. He let it be
known in a general way that things were looking up with him; just in
what quarter he did not specify, but there he was, seated in the Belle
Plain carriage and the inference was unavoidable that Miss Malroy was to
recognize his activities in a substantial manner.

Mahaffy, loafing away the afternoon in the county clerk's office, heard
of the judge's return. He heard that Charley Norton had left a will;
that Thicket Point went to Miss Malroy; that the Norton cousins in
middle Tennessee were going to put up a fight; that Judge Price had been
retained as counsel by Miss Malroy; that he was authorized to begin an
independent search for Charley Norton's murderer, and was to spare no
expense; that Judge Price was going to pay his debts. Mahaffy grinned at
this and hurried home. He could believe all but the last, that was the
crowning touch of unreality.

The judge explained the situation.

"I wouldn't withhold hope from any man, Solomon; it's the cheapest thing
in the world and the one thing we are most miserly about extending
to our fellows. These people all feel better--and what did it cost
me?--just a little decent consideration; just the knowledge of what the
unavoidable associations of ideas in their own minds would do for them!"

What had seemed the corpse of credit breathed again, and the judge and
Mahaffy immediately embarked upon a characteristic celebration. Early
candlelight found them making a beginning; midnight came--the gray and
purple of dawn--and they were still at it, back of closed doors and
shuttered windows.




CHAPTER XXVI. BETTY LEAVES BELLE PLAIN


Hannibal had devoted himself loyally to the judge's glorification, and
Betty heard all about the letter, the snuffing of the candles and the
reward of five thousand dollars. It vastly increased the child's sense
of importance and satisfaction when he discovered she had known nothing
of these matters until he told her of them.

"Why, where would Judge Price get so much money, Hannibal?" she asked,
greatly astonished.

"He won't have to get it, Miss Betty; Mr. Mahaffy says he don't reckon
no one will ever tell who wrote the letter--he 'lows the man who done
that will keep pretty mum--he just dassent tell!" the boy explained.

"No, I suppose not--" and Betty saw that perhaps, after all, the judge
had not assumed any very great financial responsibility. "He can't be a
coward, though, Hannibal!" she added, for she understood that the risk
of personal violence which he ran was quite genuine. She had formed her
own unsympathetic estimate of him that day at Boggs' race-track; Mahaffy
in his blackest hour could have added nothing to it. Twice since then
she had met him in Raleigh, which had only served to fix that first
impression.

"Miss Betty, he's just like my Uncle Bob was--he ain't afraid of
nothing! He totes them pistols of his--loaded--if you notice good you
can see where they bulge out his coat!" Hannibal's eyes, very round and
big, looked up into hers.

"Is he as poor as he seems, Hannibal?" inquired Betty.

"He never has no money, Miss Betty, but I don't reckon he's what a body
would call pore."

It might have baffled a far more mature intelligence than Hannibal's to
comprehend those peculiar processes by which the judge sustained himself
and his intimate fellowship with adversity--that it was his magnificence
of mind which made the squalor of his daily life seem merely a passing
phase--but the boy had managed to point a delicate distinction, and
Betty grasped something of the hope and faith which never quite died out
in Slocum Price's indomitable breast.

"But you always have enough to eat, dear?" she questioned anxiously.
Hannibal promptly reassured her on this point. "You wouldn't let me
think anything that was not true, Hannibal--you are quite sure you have
never been hungry?"

"Never, Miss Betty; honest!"

Betty gave a sigh of relief. She had been reproaching herself for her
neglect of the child; she had meant to do so much for him and had done
nothing! Now it was too late for her personally to interest herself in
his behalf, yet before she left for the East she would provide for him.
If she had felt it was possible to trust the judge she would have
made him her agent, but even in his best aspect he seemed a dubious
dependence. Tom, for quite different reasons, was equally out of the
question. She thought of Mr. Mahaffy.

"What kind of a man is Mr. Mahaffy, Hannibal?"

"He's an awful nice man, Miss Betty, only he never lets on; a body's got
to find it out for his own self--he ain't like the judge."

"Does he--drink, too, Hannibal?" questioned Betty.

"Oh, yes; when he can get the licker, he does." It was evident that
Hannibal was cheerfully tolerant of this weakness on the part of the
austere Mahaffy. By this time Betty was ready to weep over the child,
with his knowledge of shabby vice, and his fresh young faith in those
old tatterdemalions.

"But, no matter what they do, they are very, very kind to you?" she
continued quite tremulously.

"Yes, ma'am--why, Miss Betty, they're lovely men!"

"And do you ever hear the things spoken of you learned about at Mrs.
Ferris' Sunday-school?"

"When the judge is drunk he talks a heap about 'em. It's beautiful
to hear him then; you'd love it, Miss Betty," and Hannibal smiled up
sweetly into her face.

"Does he have you go to Sunday-school in Raleigh?"

The boy shook his head.

"I ain't got no clothes that's fitten to wear, nor no pennies to give,
but the judge, he 'lows that as soon as he can make a raise I got to
go, and he's learning me my letters--but we ain't a book. Miss Betty, I
reckon it'd stump you some to guess how he's fixed it for me to learn?"

"He's drawn the letters for you, is that the way?" In spite of herself,
Betty was experiencing a certain revulsion of feeling where the judge
and Mahaffy were concerned. They were doubtless bad enough, but they
could have been worse.

"No, ma'am; he done soaked the label off one of Mr. Pegloe's whisky
bottles and pasted it on the wall just as high as my chin, so's I can
see it good, and he's learning me that-a-ways! Maybe you've seen the
kind of bottle I mean--Pegloe's Mississippi Pilot: Pure Corn Whisky?"
But Hannibal's bright little face fell. He was quick to see that the
educational system devised by the judge did not impress Betty at all
favorably. She drew him into her arms.

"You shall have my books--the books I learned to read out of when I was
a little girl, Hannibal!"

"I like learning from the label pretty well," said Hannibal loyally.

"But you'll like the books better, dear, when you see them. I know just
where they are, for I happened on them on a shelf in the library only
the other day."

After they had found and examined the books and Hannibal had grudgingly
admitted that they might possess certain points of advantage over the
label, he and Betty went out for a walk. It was now late afternoon and
the sun was sinking behind the wall of the forest that rose along the
Arkansas coast. Their steps had led them to the terrace where they stood
looking off into the west. It was here that Betty had said good-by to
Bruce Carrington--it might have been months ago, and it was only days.
She thought of Charley--Charley, with his youth and hope and high
courage--unwittingly enough she had led him on to his death! A sob rose
in her throat.

Hannibal looked up into her face. The memory of his own loss was never
very long absent from his mind, and Miss Betty had been the victim of
a similarly sinister tragedy. He recalled those first awful days
of loneliness through which he had lived, when there was no Uncle
Bob--soft-voiced, smiling and infinitely companionable.

"Why, Hannibal, you are crying--what about, dear?" asked Betty suddenly.

"No, ma'am; I ain't crying," said Hannibal stoutly, but his wet lashes
gave the lie to his words.

"Are you homesick--do you wish to go back to the judge and Mr. Mahaffy?"

"No, ma'am--it ain't that--I was just thinking--"

"Thinking about what, dear?"

"About my Uncle Bob." The small face was very wistful.

"Oh--and you still miss him so much, Hannibal?"

"I bet I do--I reckon anybody who knew Uncle Bob would never get over
missing him; they just couldn't, Miss Betty! The judge is mighty kind,
and so is Mr. Mahaffy--they're awful kind, Miss Betty, and it seems like
they get kinder all the time--but with Uncle Bob, when he liked you, he
just laid himself out to let you know it!"

"That does make a great difference, doesn't it?" agreed Betty sadly, and
two piteous tearful eyes were bent upon him.

"Don't you reckon if Uncle Bob is alive, like the judge says, and
he's ever going to find me, he had ought to be here by now?" continued
Hannibal anxiously.

"But it hasn't been such a great while, Hannibal; it's only that so much
has happened to you. If he was very badly hurt it may have been weeks
before he could travel; and then when he could, perhaps he went back to
that tavern to try to learn what had become of you. But we may be
quite certain he will never abandon his search until he has made every
possible effort to find you, dear! That means he will sooner or later
come to west Tennessee, for there will always be the hope that you have
found your way here."

"Sometimes I get mighty tired waiting, Miss Betty," confessed the boy.
"Seems like I just couldn't wait no longer." He sighed gently, and then
his face cleared. "You reckon he'll come most any time, don't you, Miss
Betty?"

"Yes, Hannibal; any day or hour!"

"Whoop!" muttered Hannibal softly under his breath. Presently he asked:
"Where does that branch take you to?" He nodded toward the bayou at the
foot of the terraced bluff.

"It empties into the river," answered Betty.

Hannibal saw a small skiff beached among the cottonwoods that grew along
the water's edge and his eyes lighted up instantly. He had a juvenile
passion for boats.

"Why, you got a boat, ain't you, Miss Betty?" This was a charming and an
important discovery.

"Would you like to go down to it?" inquired Betty.

"'Deed I would! Does she leak any, Miss Betty?"

"I don't know about that. Do boats usually leak, Hannibal?"

"Why, you ain't ever been out rowing in her, Miss Betty, have you?--and
there ain't no better fun than rowing a boat!" They had started down the
path.

"I used to think that, too, Hannibal; how do you suppose it is that when
people grow up they forget all about the really nice things they might
do?"

"What use is she if you don't go rowing in her?" persisted Hannibal.

"Oh, but it is used. Mr. Tom uses it in crossing to the other side where
they are clearing land for cotton. It saves him a long walk or ride
about the head of the bayou."

"Like I should take you out in her, Miss Betty?" demanded Hannibal with
palpitating anxiety.

They had entered the scattering timber when Betty paused suddenly with
a startled exclamation, and Hannibal felt her fingers close convulsively
about his. The sound she had heard might have been only the rustling
of the wind among the branches overhead in that shadowy silence, but
Betty's nerves, the placid nerves of youth and perfect health, were
shattered.

"Didn't you hear something, Hannibal?" she whispered fearfully.

For answer Hannibal pointed mysteriously, and glancing in the direction
he indicated, Betty saw a woman advancing along the path toward them.
The look of alarm slowly died out of his eyes.

"I think it's the overseer's niece," she told Hannibal, and they kept on
toward the boat.

The girl came rapidly up the path, which closely followed the irregular
line of the shore in its windings. Once she was seen to stop and glance
back over her shoulder, her attitude intent and listening, then she
hurried forward again. Just by the boat the three met.

"Good evening!" said Betty pleasantly.

The girl made no reply to this; she merely regarded Betty with a fixed
stare. At length she broke silence abruptly.

"I got something I want to say to you--you know who I am, I reckon?" She
was a girl of about Betty's own age, with a certain dark, sullen beauty
and that physical attraction which Tom, in spite of his vexed mood, had
taken note of earlier in the day.

"You are Bess Hicks," said Betty.

"Make the boy go back toward the house a spell--I got something I want
to say to you." Betty hesitated. She was offended by the girl's manner,
which was as rude as her speech. "I ain't going to hurt you--you needn't
be afraid of me, I got something important to say--send him off, I
tell you; there ain't no time to lose!" The girl stamped her foot
impatiently.

Betty made a sign to Hannibal and he passed slowly back along the path.
He went unwillingly, and he kept his head turned that he might see what
was done, even if he were not to hear what was said.

"That will do, Hannibal--wait there--don't go any farther!" Betty called
after him when he had reached a point sufficiently distant to be out of
hearing of a conversation carried on in an ordinary tone. "Now, what is
it? Speak quickly if you have anything to tell me!"

"I got a heap to say," answered the girl with a scowl. Her manner was
still fierce and repellent, and she gave Betty a certain jealous
regard out of her black eyes which the latter was at a loss to explain.
"Where's Mr. Tom?" she demanded.

"Tom? Why, about the place, I suppose--in his office, perhaps." So it
had to do with Tom.... Betty felt sudden disgust with the situation.

"No, he ain't about the place, either! He done struck out for Memphis
two hours after sun-up, and what's more, he ain't coming back here
to-night--" There was a moment of silence. The girl looked about
apprehensively. She continued, fixing her black eyes on Betty: "You're
here alone at Belle Plain--you know what happened when Mr. Tom started
for Memphis last time? I reckon you-all ain't forgot that!"

Betty felt a pallor steal over her face. She rested a hand that shook on
the trunk of a tree to steady herself. The girl laughed shortly.

"Don't be so scared; I reckon Belle Plain's as good as his if anything
happened to you?"

By a great effort Betty gained a measure of control over herself. She
took a step nearer and looked the girl steadily in the face.

"Perhaps you will stop this sort of talk, and tell me what is going to
happen to me--if you know?" she said quietly.

"Why do you reckon Mr. Norton was shot? I can tell you why--it was all
along of you--that was why!" The girl's furtive glance, which searched
and watched the gathering shadows, came back as it always did to Betty's
pale face. "You ain't no safer than he was, I tell you!" and she sucked
in her breath sharply between her full red lips.

"What do you mean?" faltered Betty.

"Do you reckon you're safe here in the big house alone? Why do you
reckon Mr. Tom cleared out for Memphis? It was because he couldn't be
around and have anything happen to you--that was why!" and the girl sank
her voice to a whisper. "You quit Belle Plain now--to-night--just as
soon as you can!"

"This is absurd--you are trying to frighten me!"

"Did they stop with trying to frighten Charley Norton?" demanded Bess
with harsh insistence.

Whatever the promptings that inspired this warning, they plainly had
nothing to do with either liking or sympathy. Her dominating emotion
seemed to be a sullen sort of resentment which lit up her glance with a
dull fire; yet her feelings were so clearly and so keenly personal that
Betty understood the motive that had brought her there. The explanation,
she found, left her wondering just where and how her own fate was linked
with that of this poor white.

"You have been waiting some time to see me?" she asked.

"Ever since along about noon."

"You were afraid to come to the house?"

"I didn't want to be seen there."

"And yet you knew I was alone."

"Alone--but how do you know who's watching the place?"

"Do you think there was reason to be afraid of that?" asked Betty.

Again the girl stamped her foot with angry impatience.

"You're just wastin' time--just foolin' it away--and you ain't got none
to spare!"

"You must tell me what I have to fear--I must know more or I shall stay
just where I am!"

"Well, then, stay!" The girl turned away, and then as quickly turned
back and faced Betty once more. "I reckon he'd kill me if he knew--I
reckon I've earned that already--"

"Of whom are you speaking?"

"He'll have you away from here to-night!"

"He?... who?... and what if I refuse to go?"

"Did they ask Charley Norton whether he wanted to live or die?" came the
sinister question.

A shiver passed through Betty. She was seeing it all again--Charley as
he groped among the graves with the hand of death heavy upon him.

A moment later she was alone. The girl had disappeared. There was only
the shifting shadows as the wind tossed the branches of the trees, and
the bands of golden light that slanted along the empty path. The fear of
the unknown leaped up afresh in Betty's soul, in an instant her flying
feet had borne her to the boy's side.

"Come--come quick, Hannibal!" she gasped out, and seized his hand.

"What is it, Miss Betty? What's the matter?" asked Hannibal as they fled
panting up the terraces.

"I don't know--only we must get away from here just as soon as we can!"
Then, seeing the look of alarm on the child's face, she added more
quietly, "Don't be frightened, dear, only we must go away from Belle
Plain at once." But where they were to go, she had not considered.

Reaching the house, they stole up to Betty's room. Her well-filled purse
was the important thing; that, together with some necessary clothing,
went into a small hand-bag.

"You must carry this, Hannibal; if any one sees us leave the house
they'll think it something you are taking away," she explained. Hannibal
nodded understandingly.

"Don't you trust your niggers, Miss Betty?" he whispered as they went
from the room.

"I only trust you, dear!"

"What makes you go? Was it something that woman told you? Are they
coming after us, Miss Betty? Is it Captain Murrell?"

"Captain Murrell?" There was less of mystery now, but more of terror,
and her hand stole up to her heart, and, white and slim, rested against
the black fabric of her dress.

"Don't you be scared, Miss Betty!" said Hannibal.

They went silently from the house and again crossed the lawn to the
terrace. Under the leafy arch which canopied them there was already the
deep purple of twilight.

"Do you reckon it were Captain Murrell shot Mr. Norton, Miss Betty?"
asked Hannibal in a shuddering whisper.

"Hush--Oh, hush, Hannibal! It is too awful to even speak of--" and,
sobbing and half hysterical, she covered her face with her hands.

"But where are we going, Miss Betty?" asked the boy.

"I don't know, dear!" she had an agonizing sense of the night's approach
and of her own utter helplessness.

"I'll tell you what, Miss Betty, let's go to the judge and Mr. Mahaffy!"
said Hannibal.

"Judge Price?" She had not thought of him as a possible protector.

"Why, Miss Betty, ain't I told you he ain't afraid of nothing? We could
walk to Raleigh easy if you don't want your niggers to hook up a team
for you."

Betty suddenly remembered the carriage which had taken the judge into
town; she was sure it had not yet returned.

"We will go to the judge, Hannibal! George, who drove him into Raleigh,
has not come back; if we hurry we may meet him on the road."

Screened by the thick shadows, they passed up the path that edged the
bayou; at the head of the inlet they entered a clearing, and crossing
this they came to the corn-field which lay between the house and the
highroad. Following one of the shock rows they hurried to the mouth of
the lane.

"Hannibal, I don't want to tell the judge why I am leaving Belle
Plain--about the woman, I mean," said Betty.

"You reckon they'd kill her, don't you, Miss Betty, if they knew what
she'd done?" speculated the boy. It occurred to him that an adequate
explanation of their flight would require preparation, since the judge
was at all times singularly alive to the slightest discrepancy of
statement. They had issued from the cornfield now and were going along
the road toward Raleigh. Suddenly Betty paused.

"Hark!" she whispered.

"It were nothing, Miss Betty," said Hannibal reassuringly, and they
hurried forward again. In the utter stillness through which they moved
Betty heard the beating of her own heart, and the soft, and all but
inaudible patter of the boy's bare feet on the warm dust of the road.
Vague forms that resolved themselves into trees and bushes seemed to
creep toward them out of the night's black uncertainty. Once more Betty
paused.

"It were nothing, Miss Betty," said Hannibal as before, and he
returned to his consideration of the judge. He sensed something of that
intellectual nimbleness which his patron's physical make-up in nowise
suggested, since his face was a mask that usually left one in doubt as
to just how much of what he heard succeeded in making its impression on
him; but the boy knew that Slocum Price's blind side was a shelterless
exposure.

"You don't think the carriage could have passed us while we were
crossing the corn-field?" said Betty.

"No, I reckon we couldn't a-missed hearing it," answered Hannibal. He
had scarcely spoken when they caught the rattle of wheels and the beat
of hoofs. These sounds swept nearer and nearer, and then the darkness
disgorged the Belle Plain team and carriage.

"George!" cried Betty, a world of relief in her tones.

"Whoa, you!" and George reined in his horses with a jerk. "Who's dar?"
he asked, bending forward on the box as he sought to pierce the darkness
with his glance.

"George--"

"Oh, it you, Missy?"

"Yes, I wish you to drive me into Raleigh," said Betty, and she and
Hannibal entered the carriage.

"All right, Missy. Yo'-all ready fo' me to go along out o' here?"

"Yes--drive fast, George!" urged Betty.

"It's right dark fo' fas' drivin' Missy, with the road jes' aimin' fo'
to bus' yo' springs with chuckholes!" He had turned his horses' heads in
the direction of Raleigh while he was speaking. "It's scandalous black
in these heah woods, Missy I 'clar' I never seen it no blacker!"

The carriage swung forward for perhaps a hundred yards, then suddenly
the horses came to a dead stop.

"Go along on, dar!" cried George, and struck them with his whip, but the
horses only reared and plunged.

"Hold on, nigger!" said a rough voice out of the darkness.

"What yo' doin'?" the coachman gasped. "Don' yo' know dis de Belle Plain
carriage? Take yo' han's offen to dem hosses' bits!"

Two men stepped to the side of the carriage.

"Show your light, Bunker," said the same rough voice that had spoken
before. Instantly a hooded lantern was uncovered, and Hannibal uttered
a cry of terror. He was looking into the face of Slosson, the
tavern-keeper.




CHAPTER XXVII. PRISONERS


In the face of Betty's indignant protest Slosson and the man named
Bunker climbed into the carriage.

"Don't you be scared, ma'am," said the tavernkeeper, who smelt strongly
of whisky. "I wouldn't lift my hand ag'in no good looking female except
in kindness."

"How dare you stop my carriage?" cried Betty, with a very genuine anger
which for the moment dominated all her other emotions. She struggled to
her feet, but Slosson put out a heavy hand and thrust her back.

"There now," he urged soothingly. "Why make a fuss? We ain't going to
harm you; we wouldn't for no sum of money. Drive on, Jim--drive like
hell!" This last was addressed to the man who had taken George's place
on the box, where a fourth member of Slosson's band had forced the
coachman down into the narrow space between the seat and dashboard, and
was holding a pistol to his head while he sternly enjoined silence.

With a word to the horses Jim swung about and the carriage rolled off
through the night at a breakneck' pace. Betty's shaking hands drew
Hannibal closer to her side as she felt the surge of her terrors rise
within her. Who were these men--where could they be taking her--and for
what purpose? The events of the past weeks linked themselves in tragic
sequence in her mind.

What was it she had to fear? Was it Tom who had inspired Norton's
murder? Was it Tom for whom these men were acting? Tom who would profit
greatly by her disappearance or death.

They swept past the entrance at Belle Plain, past a break in the wall of
the forest where the pale light of stars showed Betty the corn-field she
and Hannibal had but lately crossed, and then on into pitchy darkness
again. She clung to the desperate hope that they might meet some one on
the road, when she could cry out and give the alarm. She held herself
in readiness for this, but there was only the steady pounding of the big
bays as Jim with voice and whip urged them forward. At last he abruptly
checked them, and Bunker and Slosson sprang from their seats.

"Get down, ma'am!" said the latter.

"Where are you taking me?" asked Betty, in a voice that shook in spite
of her efforts to control it.

"You must hurry, ma'am," urged Slosson impatiently.

"I won't move until I know where you intend taking me!" said Betty, "If
I am to die--"

Mr. Slosson laughed loudly and indulgently.

"You ain't. If you don't want to walk, I'm man enough fo' to tote you.
We ain't far to go, and I've tackled jobs I'd a heap less heart fo' in
my time," he concluded gallantly. From the opposite side of the carriage
Bunker swore nervously. He desired to know if they were to stand there
talking all night. "Shut your filthy mouth, Bunker, and see you keep
tight hold of that young rip-staver," said Slosson. "He's a perfect
eel--I've had dealings with him afore!"

"You tried to kill my Uncle Bob--at the tavern, you and Captain Murrell.
I heard you, and I seen you drag him to the river!" cried Hannibal.

Slosson gave a start of astonishment at this.

"Why, ain't he hateful?" he exclaimed aghast. "See here, young feller,
that's no kind of a way fo' you to talk to a man who has riz his ten
children!"

Again Bunker swore, while Jim told Slosson to make haste. This popular
clamor served to recall the tavernkeeper to a sense of duty.

"Ma'am, like I should tote you, or will you walk?" he inquired, and
reaching out his hand took hold of Betty.

"I'll walk," said the girl quickly, shrinking from the contact.

"Keep close at my heels. Bunker, you tuck along after her with the boy."

"What about this nigger?" asked the fourth man.

"Fetch him along with us," said Slosson. They turned from the road
while he was speaking and entered a narrow path that led off through the
woods, apparently in the direction of the river. A moment later Betty
heard the carriage drive away. They went onward in silence for a little
time, then Slosson spoke over his shoulder.

"Yes, ma'am, I've riz ten children but none of 'em was like him--I
trained 'em up to the minute!" Mr. Slosson seemed to have passed
completely under the spell of his domestic recollections, for he
continued with just a touch of reminiscent sadness in his tone. "There
was all told four Mrs. Slossons: two of 'em was South Carolinians, one
was from Georgia, and the last was a widow lady out of east Tennessee.
She'd buried three husbands and I figured we could start perfectly
even."

The intrinsic fairness of this start made its strong appeal. Mr. Slosson
dwelt upon it with satisfaction. "She had three to her credit, I had
three to mine; neither could crow none over the other."

As they stumbled forward through the thick obscurity he continued his
personal revelations, the present enterprise having roused whatever
there was of sentiment slumbering in his soul. At last they came out on
a wide bayou; a white mist hung above it, and on the low shore leaf and
branch were dripping with the night dews. Keeping close to the water's
edge Slosson led the way to a point where a skiff was drawn up on the
bank.

"Step in, ma'am," he said, when he had launched it.

"I will go no farther!" said Betty in desperation. She felt an
overmastering fear, the full horror of the unknown lay hold of her, and
she gave a piercing cry for help. Slosson swung about on his heel and
seized her. For a moment she struggled to escape, but the man's big
hands pinioned her.

"No more of that!" he warned, then he recovered himself and laughed.
"You could yell till you was black in the face, ma'am, and there'd be no
one to hear you."

"Where are you taking me?" and Betty's voice faltered between the sudden
sobs that choked her.

"Just across to George Hicks's."

"For what purpose?"

"You'll know in plenty of time." And Slosson leered at her through the
darkness.

"Hannibal is to go with me?" asked Betty tremulously.

"Sure!" agreed Slosson affably. "Your nigger, too--quite a party."

Betty stepped into the skiff. She felt her hopes quicken--she was
thinking of Bess; whatever the girl's motives, she had wished her to
escape. She would wish it now more than ever since the very thing she
had striven to prevent had happened. Slosson seated himself and took up
the oars, Bunker followed with Hannibal and they pushed off. No word
was spoken until they disembarked on the opposite shore, when Slosson
addressed Bunker. "I reckon I can manage that young rip-staver, you go
back after Sherrod and the nigger," he said.

He conducted his captives up the bank and they entered a clearing.
Looking across this Betty saw where a cabin window framed a single
square of light. They advanced toward this and presently the dark
outline of the cabin itself became distinguishable. A moment later
Slosson paused, a door yielded to his hand, and Betty and the boy were
thrust into the room where Murrell had held his conference with Fentress
and Ware. The two women were now its only occupants and the mother,
gross and shapeless, turned an expressionless face on the intruders; but
the daughter shrank into the shadow, her burning glance fixed on Betty.

"Here's yo' guests, old lady!" said Mr. Slosson. Mrs. Hicks rose from
the three-legged stool on which she was sitting.

"Hand me the candle, Bess," she ordered.

At one side of the room was a steep flight of stairs which gave access
to the loft overhead. Mrs. Hicks, by a gesture, signified that Betty and
Hannibal were to ascend these stairs; they did so and found themselves
on a narrow landing inclosed by a partition of rough planks, this
partition was pierced by a low door. Mrs. Hicks, who had followed close
at their heels, handed the candle to Betty.

"In yonder!" she said briefly, nodding toward the door.

"Wait!" cried Betty in a whisper.

"No," said the woman with an almost masculine surliness of tone. "I got
nothing to say." She pushed them into the attic, and, closing the door,
fastened it with a stout wooden bar.

Beyond that door, which seemed to have closed on every hope, Betty held
the tallow dip aloft, and by its uncertain and flickering light surveyed
her prison. The briefest glance sufficed. The room contained two
shakedown beds and a stool, there was a window in the gable, but a piece
of heavy plank was spiked before it.

"Miss Betty, don't you be scared," whispered Hannibal. "When the judge
hears we're gone, him and Mr. Mahaffy will try to find us. They'll go
right off to Belle Plain--the judge is always wanting to do that, only
Mr. Mahaffy never lets him but now he won't be able to stop him."

"Oh, Hannibal, Hannibal, what can he do there--what can any one do
there?" And a dead pallor overspread the girl's face. To speak of the
blind groping of her friends but served to fix the horror of their
situation in her mind.

"I don't know, Miss Betty, but the judge is always thinking of things to
do; seems like they was mostly things no one else would ever think of."

Betty had placed the candle on the stool and seated herself on one of
the beds. There was the murmur of voices in the room below; she wondered
if her fate was under consideration and what that fate was to be.
Hannibal, who had been examining the window, returned to her side.

"Miss Betty, if we could just get out of this loft we could steal their
skiff and row down to the river; I reckon they got just the one boat;
the only way they could get to us would be to swim out, and if they done
that we could pound 'em over the head with the oars the least little
thing sinks you when you're in the water." But this murderous fancy of
his failed to interest Betty.

Presently they heard Sherrod and Bunker come up from the shore with
George. Slosson joined them and there was a brief discussion, then an
interval of silence, and the sound of voices again as the three white
men moved back across the field in the direction of the bayou. There
succeeded a period of utter stillness, both in the cabin and in the
clearing, a somber hush that plunged Betty yet deeper in despair. Wild
thoughts assailed her, thoughts against which she struggled with all the
strength of her will.

In that hour of stress Hannibal was sustained by his faith in the judge.
He saw his patron's powerful and picturesque intelligence applied to
solving the mystery of their disappearance from Belle Plain; it was
inconceivable that this could prove otherwise than disastrous to Mr.
Slosson and he endeavored to share the confidence he was feeling with
Betty, but there was something so forced and unnatural in the girl's
voice and manner when she discussed his conjectures that he quickly fell
into an awed silence. At last, and it must have been some time after
midnight, troubled slumbers claimed him. No moment of forgetfulness came
to Betty. She was waiting for what--she did not know! The candle burnt
lower and lower and finally went out and she was left in darkness, but
again she was conscious of sounds from the room below. At first it
was only a word or a sentence, then the guarded speech became a steady
monotone that ran deep into the night; eventually this ceased and Betty
fancied she heard sobs.

At length points of light began to show through chinks in the logs.
Hannibal roused and sat up, rubbing his eyes with the backs of his
hands.

"Wasn't you able to sleep none?" he inquired. Betty shook her head. He
looked at her with an expression of troubled concern. "How soon do you
reckon the judge will know?" he asked.

"Very soon now, dear." Hannibal was greatly consoled by this opinion.

"Miss Betty, he will love to find us--"

"Hark! What was that?" for Betty had caught the distant splash of
oars. Hannibal found a chink in the logs through which by dint of much
squinting he secured a partial view of the bayou. "They're fetching up
a keel boat to the shore, Miss Betty--it's a whooper!" he announced.
Betty's heart sank, she never doubted the purpose for which that boat
was brought into the bayou, or that it nearly concerned herself.

Half an hour later Mrs. Hicks appeared with their breakfast. It was
in vain that Betty attempted to engage her in conversation, either she
cherished some personal feeling of dislike for her prisoner, or else the
situation in which she herself was placed had little to recommend it,
even to her dull mind, and her dissatisfaction was expressed in her
attitude toward the girl.

Betty passed the long hours of morning in dreary speculation concerning
what was happening at Belle Plain. In the end she realized that the day
could go by and her absence occasion no alarm; Steve might reasonably
suppose George had driven her into Raleigh or to the Bowens' and that
she had kept the carriage. Finally all her hope centered on Judge Price.
He would expect Hannibal during the morning, perhaps when the boy did
not arrive he would be tempted to go out to Belle Plain to discover
the reason of his nonappearance. She wondered what theories would offer
themselves to his ingenious mind, for she sensed something of that
indomitable energy which in the face of rebuffs and laughter carried him
into the thick of every sensation.

At noon, Mrs. Hicks, as sullen as in the morning, brought them their
dinner. She had scarcely quitted the loft when a shrill whistle pierced
the silence that hung above the clearing. It was twice repeated, and the
two women were heard to go from the cabin. Perhaps half an hour elapsed,
then a step became audible on the packed earth of the dooryard; some
one entered the room below and began to ascend the narrow stairs, and
Betty's fingers closed convulsively about Hannibal's. This was neither
Mrs. Hicks nor her daughter, nor Slosson with his clumsy shuffle.
There was a brief pause when the landing was reached, but it was only
momentary; a hand lifted the bar, the door was thrown open, and its
space framed the figure of a man. It was John Murrell.

Standing there he regarded Betty in silence, but a deep-seated fire
glowed in his sunken eyes. The sense of possession was raging through
him, his temples throbbed, a fever stirred his blood. Love, such as it
was, he undoubtedly felt for her and even his giant project with all its
monstrous ramifications was lost sight of for the moment. She was the
inspiration for it all, the goal and reward toward which he struggled.

"Betty!" the single word fell softly from his lips. He stepped into the
room, closing the door as he did so.

The girl's eyes were dilating with a mute horror, for by some swift
intuitive process of the mind, which asked nothing of the logic of
events, but dealt only with conclusions, Murrell stood revealed as
Norton's murderer. Perhaps he read her thoughts, but he had lived in his
degenerate ambitions until the common judgments or the understanding
of them no longer existed for him. That Betty had loved Norton seemed
inconsequential even; it was a memory to be swept away by the force of
his greater passion. So he watched her smilingly, but back of the smile
was the menace of unleashed impulse.

"Can't you find some word of welcome for me, Betty?" he asked at length,
still softly, still with something of entreaty in his tone.

"Then it was you--not Tom--who had me brought here!" She could have
thanked God had it been Tom, whose hate was not to be feared as she
feared this man's love.

"Tom--no!" and Murrell laughed. "You didn't think I'd give you up? I am
standing with a halter, about my neck, and all for your sake--who'd risk
as much for love of you?" he seemed to expand with savage pride that
this was so, and took a step toward her.

"Don't come near me!" cried Betty. Her eyes blazed, and she looked at
him with' loathing.

"You'll learn to be kinder," he exulted. "You wouldn't see me at Belle
Plain; what was left for me but to have you brought here?" While Murrell
was speaking, the signal that had told of his own presence on the
opposite shore of the bayou was heard again. This served to arrest his
attention. A look of uncertainty passed over his face, then he made an
impatient gesture as if he dismissed some thought that had forced itself
upon him, and turned to Betty.

"You don't ask what my purpose is where you are concerned; have you
no curiosity on that score?" She endeavored to meet his glance with a
glance as resolute, then her eyes sought the boy's upturned face. "I
am going to send you down river, Betty. Later I shall join you in New
Orleans, and when I leave the country you shall go with me--"

"Never!" gasped Betty.

"As my wife, or however you choose to call it. I'll teach you what a
man's love is like," he boasted, and extended his hand. Betty shrank
from him, and his hand fell at his side. He looked at her steadily out
of his deep-sunk eyes in which blazed the fires of his passion, and as
he looked, her face paled and flushed by turns. "You may learn to be
kind to me, Betty," he said. "You may find it will be worth your while."
Betty made no answer, she only gathered Hannibal closer to her side. "Why
not accept what I have to offer, Betty?" again he went nearer her,
and again she shrank from him, but the madness of his mood was in the
ascendant. He seized her and drew her to him. She struggled to free
herself, but his fingers tightened about hers.

"Let me go!" she panted. He laughed his cool laugh of triumph.

"Let you go--ask me anything but that, Betty! Have you no reward
for patience such as mine? A whole summer has passed since I saw you
first--"

There was the noisy shuffling of feet on the stairs, and releasing
Betty, Murrell swung about on his heel and faced the door. It was pushed
open an inch at a time by a not too confident hand and Mr. Slosson thus
guardedly presented himself to the eye of his chief, whom he beckoned
from the room.

"Well?" said Murrell, when they stood together on the landing.

"Just come across to the keel boat!" and Slosson led the way down the
stairs and from the house.

"Damn you, Joe; you might have waited!" observed the outlaw. Slosson
gave him a hardened grin. They crossed the clearing and boarded the keel
boat which rested against the bank. As they did so, the cabin in the
stern gave up a shattered presence in the shape of Tom Ware. Murrell
started violently. "I thought you were hanging out in Memphis, Tom?"
he said, and his brow darkened as, sinister and forbidding, he stepped
closer to the planter. Ware did not answer at once, but looked at
Murrell out of heavy bloodshot eyes, his face pinched and ghastly. At
last he said, speaking with visible effort,

"I stayed in Memphis until five o'clock this morning."

"Damn your early hours!" roared Murrell. "What are you doing here?
I suppose you've been showing that dead face of yours about the
neighborhood--why didn't you stay at Belle Plain since you couldn't keep
away?"

"I haven't been near Belle Plain, I came here instead. How am I going
to meet people and answer questions?" His teeth were chattering. "Is it
known she's missing?" he added.

"Hicks raised the alarm the first thing this morning, according to the
instructions I'd given him."

"Yes?" gasped Ware. He was dripping from every pore and the sickly color
came and went on his unshaven cheeks. Murrell dropped a heavy hand on
his shoulder.

"You haven't been at Belle Plain, you say, but has any one seen you on
the road this morning?"

"No one, John," cried Ware, panting between each word. There was a
moment's pause and Ware spoke again. "What are they doing at Belle
Plain?" he demanded in a whisper. Murrell's lips curled.

"I understand there is talk of suicide," he said.

"Good!" cried Ware.

"They are dragging the bayou down below the house. It looks as though
you were going to reap the rewards of the excellent management you have
given her estate. They have been trying to find you in Memphis, so the
sooner you show yourself the better," he concluded significantly.

"You are sure you have her safe, John, no chance of discovery? For God's
sake, get her away from here as soon as you can, it's an awful risk you
run!"

"She'll be sent down river to-night," said Murrell.

"Captain," began Slosson who up to this had taken no part in the
conversation. "When are you going to cross to t'other side of the
bayou?"

"Soon," replied Murrell. Slosson laughed.

"I didn't know but you'd clean forgot the Clan's business. I want to ask
another question--but first I want to say that no one thinks higher or
more frequent of the ladies than just me, I'm genuinely fond of 'em and
I've never lifted my hand ag'in' 'em except in kindness." Mr. Slosson
looked at Ware with an exceedingly virtuous expression of countenance.
He continued. "Yo' orders are that we're to slip out of this a little
afore midnight, but suppose there's a hitch--here's the lady knowing
what she knows and here's the boy knowing what he knows."

"There can be no hitch," rasped out Murrell arrogantly.

"I never knew a speculation that couldn't go wrong; and by rights we
should have got away last night."

"Well, whose fault is it you didn't?" demanded Murrell.

"In a manner it were mine, but the ark got on a sandbank as we were
fetching it in and it took us the whole damn night to get clear."

"Well?" prompted Murrell, with a sullen frown.

"Suppose they get shut of that notion of theirs that the lady's done
drowned herself, suppose they take to watching the river? Or suppose the
whole damn bottom drops out of this deal? What then? Why, I'll tell you
what then--the lady, good looking as she is, knows enough to make west
Tennessee mighty onhealthy for some of us. I say suppose it's a flash in
the pan and you have to crowd the distance in between you and this
part of the world, you can't tell me you'll have any use for her then."
Slosson paused impressively. "And here's Mr. Ware feeling bad, feeling
like hell," he resumed. "Him and me don't want to be left in no trap
with you gone God only knows where."

"I'll send a man to take charge of the keel boat. I can't risk any more
of your bungling, Joe."

"That's all right, but you don't answer my question," persisted Slosson,
with admirable tenacity of purpose.

"What is your question, Joe?"

"A lot can happen between this and midnight--"

"If things go wrong with us there'll be a blaze at the head of the
bayou; does that satisfy you?"

"And what then?"

Murrell hesitated.

"What about the girl?" insisted Slosson, dragging him back to the point
at issue between them. "As a man I wouldn't lift my hand ag'in' no good
looking woman except like I said--in kindness, but she can't be turned
loose, she knows too much. What's the word, Captain--you say it!" he
urged. He made a gesture of appeal to Ware.

"Look for the light; better still, look for the man I'll send." And with
this Murrell would have turned away, but Slosson detained him.

"Who'll he be?"

"Some fellow who knows the river."

"And if it's the light?" asked the tavern-keeper in a hoarse undertone.
Again he looked toward Ware, who, dry-lipped and ashen, was regarding
him steadfastly. Glance met glance, for a brief instant they looked deep
into each other's eyes and then the hand Slosson had rested on Murrell's
shoulder dropped at his side.




CHAPTER XXVIII. THE JUDGE MEETS THE SITUATION


The judge's and Mr. Mahaffy's celebration of the former's rehabilitated
credit had occupied the shank of the evening, the small hours of the
night, and that part of the succeeding day which the southwest described
as soon in the morning; and as the stone jug, in which were garnered the
spoils of the highly confidential but entirely misleading conversation
which the judge had held with Mr. Pegloe after his return from Belle
Plain, lost in weight, it might have been observed that he and Mr.
Mahaffy seemed to gain in that nice sense of equity which should form
the basis of all human relations. The judge watched Mr. Mahaffy, and Mr.
Mahaffy watched the judge, each trustfully placing the regulation of his
private conduct in the hands of his friend, as the one most likely to be
affected by the rectitude of his acts.

Probably so extensive a consumption of Mr. Pegloe's corn whisky had
never been accomplished with greater highmindedness. They honorably
split the last glass, the judge scorning to set up any technical claim
to it as his exclusive property; then he stared at Mahaffy, while
Mahaffy, dark-visaged and forbidding, stared back at him.

The judge sighed deeply. He took up the jug and inverted it. A stray
drop or so fell languidly into his glass.

"Try squeezing it, Price," said Mahaffy.

The judge shook the jug, it gave forth an empty sound, and he sighed
again; he attempted to peer into it, closing one watery eye as he tilted
it toward the light.

"I wonder no Yankee has ever thought to invent a jug with a glass
bottom," he observed.

"What for?" asked Mahaffy.

"You astonish me, Solomon," exclaimed the judge. "Coming as you do from
that section which invented the wooden nutmeg, and an eight-day clock
that has been known to run as much as four or five hours at a stretch. I
am aware the Yankees are an ingenious people; I wonder none of 'em ever
thought of a jug with a glass bottom, so that when a body holds it up
to the light he can see at a glance whether it is empty or not. Do you
reckon Pegloe has sufficient confidence to fill the jug again for us?"

But Mahaffy's expression indicated no great confidence in Mr. Pegloe's
confidence.

"Credit," began the judge, "is proverbially shy; still it may sometimes
be increased, like the muscles of the body and the mental faculties,
by judicious use. I've always regarded Pegloe as a cheap mind. I hope
I have done him an injustice." He put on his hat, and tucking the jug
under his arm, went from the house.

Ten or fifteen minutes elapsed. Mahaffy considered this a good sign,
it didn't take long to say no, he reflected. Another ten or fifteen
elapsed. Mahaffy lost heart. Then there came a hasty step beyond the
door, it was thrown violently open, and the judge precipitated himself
into the room. A glance showed Mahaffy that he was laboring under
intense excitement.

"Solomon, I bring shocking news. God knows what the next few hours may
reveal!" cried the judge, mopping his brow. "Miss Malroy has disappeared
from Belle Plain, and Hannibal has gone with her!"

"Where have they gone?" asked Mahaffy, and his long jaw dropped.

"Would to God I had an answer ready for that question, Solomon!"
answered the judge, with a melancholy shake of the head. He gazed down
on his friend with an air of large tolerance. "I am going to Belle
Plain, but you are too drunk. Sleep it off, Solomon, and join me when
your brain is clear and your legs steady."

Mahaffy jerked out an oath, and lifting himself off his chair, stood
erect. He snatched up his hat.

"Stuff your pistols into your pockets, and come on, Price!" he said, and
stalked toward the door.

He flitted up the street, and the judge puffed and panted in his wake.
They gained the edge of the village without speech.

"There is mystery and rascality here!" said the judge.

"What do you know, Price, and where did you hear this?" Mahaffy shot the
question back over his shoulder.

"At Pegloe's, the Belle Plain overseer had just fetched the news into
town."

Again they were silent, all their energies being absorbed by the
physical exertion they were making. The road danced before their
burning eyes, it seemed to be uncoiling itself serpentwise with hideous
undulations. Mr. Mahaffy was conscious that the judge, of whom he caught
a blurred vision now at his right side, now at his left, was laboring
painfully in the heat and dust, the breath whistling from between his
parched lips.

"You're just ripe for apoplexy, Price!" he snarled, moderating his pace.

"Go on," said the judge, with stolid resolution.

Two miles out of the village they came to a roadside spring, here they
paused for an instant. Mahaffy scooped up handfuls of the clear water
and sucked it down greedily. The judge dropped on his stomach and buried
his face in the tiny pool, gulping up great thirsty swallows. After a
long breathless instant he stood erect, with drops of moisture clinging
to his nose and eyebrows. Mahaffy was a dozen paces down the road,
hurrying forward again with relentless vigor. The judge shuffled after
him. The tracks they left in the dust crossed and re-crossed the road,
but presently the slanting lines of their advance straightened, the
judge gained and held a fixed place at Mahaffy's right, a step or so in
the rear. His oppulent fancy began to deal with the situation.

"If anything happens to the child, the man responsible for it would
better never been born--I'll pursue him with undiminished energy from
this moment forth!" he panted.

"What could happen to him, Price?" asked Mahaffy.

"God knows, poor little lad!"

"Will you shut up!" cried Mahaffy savagely.

"Solomon!"

"Why do you go building on that idea? Why should any one harm him--what
earthly purpose--"

"I tell you, Solomon, we are the pivotal point in a vast circle of
crime. This is a blow at me--this is revenge, sir, neither more nor
less! They have struck at me through the boy, it is as plain as day."

"What did the overseer say?"

"Just that they found Miss Malroy gone from Belle Plain this morning,
and the boy with her."

"This is like you, Price! How do you know they haven't spent the night
at some neighbor's?"

"The nearest neighbor is five or six miles distant. Miss Malroy and
Hannibal were seen along about dusk in the grounds at Belle Plain, do
you mean to tell me you consider it likely that they set out on foot at
that hour, and without a word to any one, to make a visit?" inquired the
judge; but Mahaffy did not contend for this point.

"What are you going to do first, Price?"

"Have a look over the grounds, and talk with the slaves."

"Where's the brother--wasn't he at Belle Plain last night?"

"It seems he went to Memphis yesterday."

They plodded forward in silence; now and again they were passed by some
man on horseback whose destination was the same as their own, and then
at last they caught sight of Belle Plain in its grove of trees.

All work on the plantation had stopped, and the hundreds of slaves--men,
women and children--were gathered about the house. Among these moved the
members of the dominant race. The judge would have attached himself to
the first group, but he heard a whispered question, and the answer,

"Miss Malroy's lawyer."

Clearly it was not for him to mix with these outsiders, these curiosity
seekers. He crossed the lawn to the house, and mounted the steps. In the
doorway was big Steve, while groups of men stood about in the hall, the
hum of busy purposeless talk pervading the place. The judge frowned.
This was all wrong.

"Has Mr. Ware returned from Memphis?" he asked of Steve.

"No, Sah; not yet."

"Then show me into the library," said the judge with bland authority,
surrendering his hat to the butler. "Come along, Mahaffy!" he added.
They entered the library, and the judge motioned Steve to close the
door. "Now, boy, you'll kindly ask those people to withdraw--you may say
it is Judge Price's orders. Allow no one to enter the house unless they
have business with me, or as I send for them--you understand? After you
have cleared the house, you may bring me a decanter of corn whisky--stop
a bit--you may ask the sheriff to step here."

"Yes, Sah." And Steve withdrew.

The judge drew an easy-chair up to the flat-topped desk that stood in
the center of the room, and seated himself.

"Are you going to make this the excuse for another drunk, Price? If so,
I feel the greatest contempt for you," said Mahaffy sternly.

The judge winced at this.

"You have made a regrettable choice of words, Solomon," he urged gently.

"Where's your feeling for the boy?"

"Here!" said the judge, with an eloquent gesture, resting his hand on
his heart.

"If you let whisky alone, I'll believe you, otherwise what I have said
must stand."

The door opened, and the sheriff slouched into the room. He was chewing
a long wheat straw, and his whole appearance was one of troubled
weakness.

"Morning," he said briefly.

"Sit down, Sheriff," and the judge indicated a meek seat for the
official in a distant corner. "Have you learned anything?" he asked.

The sheriff shook his head.

"What you turning all these neighbors out of doors for?" he questioned.

"We don't want people tracking in and out the house, Sheriff. Important
evidence may be destroyed. I propose examining the slaves first--does
that meet with your approval?"

"Oh, I've talked with them, they don't know nothing," said the sheriff.
"No one don't know nothing."

"Please God, we may yet put our fingers on some villain who does," said
the judge.

Outside it was noised about that judge Price had taken matters in
hand--he was the old fellow who had been warned to keep his mouth shut,
and who had never stopped talking since. A crowd collected beyond the
library windows and feasted its eyes on the back of this hero's bald
head.

One by one the house servants were ushered into the judge's presence.
First he interrogated little Steve, who had gone to Miss Betty's door
that morning to rouse her, as was his custom. Next he examined Betty's
maid; then the cook, and various house servants, who had nothing
especial to tell, but told it at considerable length; and lastly big
Steve.

"Stop a bit," the judge suddenly interrupted the butler in the midst of
his narrative. "Does the overseer always come up to the house the first
thing in the morning?"

"Why, not exactly, Sah, but he come up this mo'ning, Sah. He was talking
to me at the back of the house, when the women run out with the word
that Missy was done gone away."

"He joined in the search?"

"Yes, Sah.''

"When was Miss Malroy seen last?" asked the judge.

"She and the young gemman you fotched heah were seen in the gyarden
along about sundown. I seen them myself."

"They had had supper?"

"Yes, Sah."

"Who sleeps here?"

"Just little Steve and three of the women, they sleeps at the back of
the house, Sah.''

"No sounds were heard during the night?"

"No, Sah."

"I'll see the overseer--what's his name?--Hicks? Suppose you go for
him!" said the judge, addressing the sheriff.

The sheriff was gone from the room only a few moments, and returned
with the information that Hicks was down at the bayou, which was to be
dragged.

"Why?" inquired the judge.

"Hicks says Miss Malroy's been acting mighty queer ever since Charley
Norton was shot--distracted like! He says he noticed it, and that Tom
Ware noticed it."

"How does he explain the boy's disappearance?"

"He reckons she throwed herself in, and the boy tried to drag her out,
like he naturally would, and got drawed in."

"Humph! I'll trouble Mr. Hicks to step here," said the judge quietly.

"There's Mr. Carrington and a couple of strangers outside who've been
asking about Miss Malroy and the boy, seems like the strangers knowed
her and him back yonder in No'th Carolina," said the sheriff as he
turned away.

"I'll see them." The sheriff went from the room and the judge dismissed
the servants.

"Well, what do you think, Price?" asked Mahaffy anxiously when they were
alone.

"Rubbish! Take my word for it, Solomon, this blow is leveled at me. I
have been too forward in my attempts to suppress the carnival of crime
that is raging through west Tennessee. You'll observe that Miss Malroy
disappeared at a moment when the public is disposed to think she has
retained me as her legal adviser, probably she will be set at liberty
when she agrees to drop the matter of Norton's murder. As for the boy,
they'll use him to compel my silence and inaction." The judge took a
long breath. "Yet there remains one point where the boy is concerned
that completely baffles me. If we knew just a little more of his
antecedents it might cause me to make a startling and radical move."

Mahaffy was clearly not impressed by the vague generalities in which the
judge was dealing.

"There you go, Price, as usual, trying to convince yourself that you
are the center of everything!" he said, in a tone of much exasperation.
"Let's get down to business! What does this man Hicks mean by hinting at
suicide? You saw Miss Malroy yesterday?"

"You have put your finger on a point of some significance," said the
judge. "She bore evidence of the shock and loss she had sustained; aside
from that she was quite as she has always been."

"Well, what do you want to see Hicks for? What do you expect to learn
from him?"

"I don't like his insistence on the idea that Miss Malroy is mentally
unbalanced. It's a question of some delicacy--the law, sir, fully
recognizes that. It seems to me he is overanxious to account for her
disappearance in a manner that can compromise no one."

Here they were interrupted by the opening of the door, and big Steve
admitted Carrington and the two men of whom the sheriff had spoken.

"A shocking condition of affairs, Mr. Carrington!" said the judge by way
of greeting.

"Yes," said Carrington shortly.

"You left these parts some time ago, I believe?" continued the judge.

"The day before Norton was shot. I had started home for Kentucky.
I heard of his death when I reached Randolph on the second bluff,"
explained Carrington, from whose cheeks the weather-beaten bloom had
faded. He rested his hand on the edge of the desk and turned to the men
who had followed him into the room. "This is the gentleman you wish
to see," he said, and stepped to one of the windows; it overlooked the
terraces where he had said good-by to Betty scarcely a week before.

The two men had paused by the door. They now advanced. One was gaunt
and haggard, his face disfigured by a great red scar, the other was a
shockheaded individual who moved with a shambling gait. Both carried
rifles and both were dressed in coarse homespun.

"Morning, sir," said the man with the scar. "Yancy's my name, and this
gentleman 'lows he'd rather be known now as Mr. Cavendish."

The judge started to his feet.

"Bob Yancy?" he cried.

"Yes, sir, that's me." The judge passed nimbly around the desk and shook
the Scratch Hiller warmly by the hand. "Where's my nevvy, sir--what's
all this about him and Miss Betty?" Yancy's soft drawl was suddenly
eager.

"Please God we'll recover him soon!" said the judge.

By the window Carrington moved impatiently. No harm could come to the
boy, but Betty--a shudder went through him.

"They've stolen him." Yancy spoke with conviction. "I reckon they've
started back to No'th Carolina with him--only that don't explain what's
come of Miss Betty, does it?" and he dropped rather helplessly into a
chair.

"Bob are just getting off a sick bed. He's been powerful porely in
consequence of having his head laid open and then being throwed into
the Elk River, where I fished him out," explained Cavendish, who still
continued to regard the judge with unmixed astonishment, first cocking
his shaggy head on one side and then on the other, his bleached eyes
narrowed to a slit. Now and then he favored the austere Mahaffy with a
fleeting glance. He seemed intuitively to understand the comradeship of
their degradation.

"Mr. Cavendish fetched me here on his raft. We tied up to the sho' this
morning. It was there we met Mr. Carrington--I'd knowed him slightly
back yonder in No'th Carolina," continued Yancy. "He said I'd find
Hannibal with you. I was counting a heap on seeing my nevvy."

Carrington, no longer able to control himself, swung about on his heel.

"What's been done?" he asked, with fierce repression. "What's going to
be done? Don't you know that every second is precious?"

"I am about to conclude my investigations, sir," said the judge with
dignity.

Carrington stepped to the door. After all, what was there to expect of
these men? Whatever their interest, it was plainly centered in the boy.
He passed out into the hall.

As the door closed on him the judge turned again to the Scratch Hiller.

"Mr. Yancy, Mr. Mahaffy and I hold your nephew in the tenderest regard,
he has been our constant companion ever since you were lost to him. In
this crisis you may rely upon us; we are committed to his recovery,
no matter what it involves." The judge's tone was one of unalterable
resolution.

"I reckon you-all have been mighty good and kind to him," said Yancy
huskily.

"We have endeavored to be, Mr. Yancy--indeed I had formed the resolution
legally to adopt him should you not come to claim him. I should have
given him my name, and made him my heir. His education has already
begun, under my supervision," and the judge, remembering the high use to
which he had dedicated one of Pegloe's trade labels, fairly glowed with
philanthropic fervor.

"Think of that!" murmured Yancy softly. He was deeply moved. So was Mr.
Cavendish, who was gifted with a wealth of ready sympathy. He thrust out
a hardened hand to the judge.

"Shake!" he said. "You're a heap better than you look." A thin ripple
of laughter escaped Mahaffy, but the judge accepted Chills and Fever's
proffered hand. He understood that here was a simple genuine soul.

"Price, isn't it important for us to know why Mr. Yancy thinks the boy
has been taken back to North Carolina?" said Mahaffy.

"Just what kin is Hannibal to you, Mr. Yancy?" asked the judge resuming
his seat.

"Strictly speaking, he ain't none. That he come to live with me is all
owing to Mr. Crenshaw, who's a good man when left to himself, but he's
got a wife, so a body may say he never is left to himself," began Yancy;
and then briefly he told the story of the woman and the child much as
he had told it to Bladen at the Barony the day of General Quintard's
funeral.

The judge, his back to the light and his face in shadow, rested his
left elbow on the desk and with his chin sunk in his palm, followed the
Scratch Hiller's narrative with the closest attention.

"And General Quintard never saw him--never manifested any interest in
him?" the words came slowly from the judge's lips, he seemed to gulp
down something that rose in his throat. "Poor little lad!" he muttered,
and again, "Poor little lad!"

"Never once, sir. He told the slaves to keep him out of his sight.
We-all wondered, fo' you know how niggers will talk. We thought maybe he
was some kin to the Quintards, but we couldn't figure out how. The old
general never had but one child and she had been dead fo' years. The
child couldn't have been hers no how." Yancy paused.

The judge drummed idly on the desk.

"What implacable hate--what iron pride!" he murmured, and swept his hand
across his eyes. Absorbed and aloof, he was busy with his thoughts
that spanned the waste of years, years that seemed to glide before him in
review, each bitter with its hideous memories of shame and defeat. Then
from the smoke of these lost battles emerged the lonely figure of the
child as he had seen him that June night. His ponderous arm stiffened
where it rested on the desk, he straightened up in his chair and his
face assumed its customary expression of battered dignity, while a smile
at once wistful and tender hovered about his lips.

"One other question," he said. "Until this man Murrell appeared you
had no trouble with Bladen? He was content that you should keep the
child--your right to Hannibal was never challenged?"

"Never, sir. All my troubles began about that time."

"Murrell belongs in these parts," said the judge.

"I'd admire fo' to meet him," said Yancy quietly.

The judge grinned.

"I place my professional services at your disposal," he said. "Yours is
a clear case of felonious assault."

"No, it ain't, sir--I look at it this-a-ways; it's a clear case of my
giving him the damnedest sort of a body beating!"

"Sir," said the judge, "I'll hold your hat while you are about it!"

Hicks had taken his time in responding to the judge's summons, but now
his step sounded in the hall and throwing open the door he entered
the room. Whether consciously or not he had acquired something of that
surly, forbidding manner which was characteristic of his employer. A
curt nod of the head was his only greeting.

"Will you sit down?" asked the judge. Hicks signified by another
movement of the head that he would not. "This is a very dreadful
business!" began the judge softly.

"Ain't it?" agreed Hicks. "What you got to say to me?" he added
petulantly.

"Have you started to drag the bayou?" asked the judge. Hicks nodded.
"That was your idea?" suggested the judge.

"No, it wa'n't," objected Hicks quickly. "But I said she had been actin'
like she was plumb distracted ever since Charley Norton got shot--"

"How?" inquired the judge, arching his eyebrows. Hicks was plainly
disturbed by the question.

"Sort of out of her head. Mr. Ware seen it, too--"

"He spoke of it?"

"Yes, sir; him and me discussed it together."

The judge regarded Hicks long and intently and in, silence. His
magnificent mind was at work. If Betty had been distraught he had not
observed any sign of it the previous day. If Ware were better informed
as to her true mental state why had he chosen this time to go to
Memphis?

"I suppose Mr. Ware asked you to keep an eye on Miss Malroy while he was
away from home?" said the judge. Hicks, suspicious of the drift of his
questioning, made no answer. "I suppose you told the house servants to
keep her under observation?" continued the judge.

"I don't talk to no niggers," replied Hicks, "except to give 'em my
orders."

"Well, did you give them that order?"

"No, I didn't."

The sudden and hurried entrance of big Steve brought the judge's
examination of Mr. Hicks to a standstill.

"Mas'r, you know dat 'ar coachman George--the big black fellow dat took
you into town las' evenin'? I jes' been down at Shanty Hill whar Milly,
his wife, is carryin' on something scandalous 'cause George ain't never
come home!" Steve was laboring under intense excitement, but he ignored
the presence of the overseer and addressed himself to Slocum Price.

"Well, what of that?" cried Hicks quickly.

"Thar warn't no George, mind you, Mas'r, but dar was his team in de
stable this mo'ning and lookin' mighty nigh done up with hard driving."

"Yes." interrupted Hicks uneasily; "put a pair of lines in a nigger's
hands and he'll run any team off its legs!"

"An' the kerriage all scratched up from bein' thrashed through the
bushes," added Steve.

"There's a nigger for you!" said Hicks. "She took the rascal out of the
field, dressed him like he was a gentleman and pampered him up, and now
first chance he gets he runs off!"

"Ah!" said the judge softly. "Then you knew this?"

"Of course I knew--wa'n't it my business to know? I reckon he was off
skylarking, and when he'd seen the mess he'd made, the trifling fool
took to the woods. Well, he catches it when I lay hands on him!"

"Do you know when and under what circumstances the team was stabled, Mr.
Hicks?" inquired the judge.

"No, I don't, but I reckon it must have been along after dark," said
Hicks unwillingly. "I seen to the feeding just after sundown like I
always do, then I went to supper," Hicks vouchsafed to explain.

"And no one saw or heard the team drive in?"

"Not as I know of," said Hicks.

"Mas'r Ca'ington's done gone off to get a pack of dawgs--he 'lows hit's
might' important to find what's come of George," said Steve.

Hicks started violently at this piece of news.

"I reckon he'll have to travel a right smart distance to find a pack of
dogs," he muttered. "I don't know of none this side of Colonel Bates'
down below Girard."

The judge was lost in thought. He permitted an interval of silence to
elapse in which Hicks' glance slid round in a furtive circle.

"When did Mr. Ware set out for Memphis?" asked the judge at length.

"Early yesterday. He goes there pretty often on business."

"You talked with Mr. Ware before he left?" Hicks nodded. "Did he speak
of Miss Malroy?" Hicks shook his head. "Did you see her during the
afternoon?"

"No--maybe you think these niggers ain't enough to keep a man stirring?"
said Hicks uneasily and with a scowl. The judge noticed both the
uneasiness and the scowl.

"I should imagine they would absorb every moment of your time, Mr.
Hicks," he agreed affably.

"A man's got to be a hog for work to hold a job like mine," said Hicks
sourly.

"But it came to your notice that Miss Malroy has been in a disturbed
mental state ever since Mr. Norton's murder? I am interested in this
point, Mr. Hicks, because your experience is so entirely at variance
with my own. It was my privilege to see and speak with her yesterday
afternoon; I was profoundly impressed by her naturalness and composure."
The judge smiled, then he leaned forward across the desk. "What were you
doing up here early this morning--hasn't a hog for work like you got
any business of his own at that hour?" The judge's tone was suddenly
offensive.

"Look here, what right have you got to try and pump me?" cried Hicks.

For no discernible reason Mr. Cavendish spat on his palms.

"Mr. Hicks," said the judge, urbane and gracious, "I believe in
frankness."

"Sure," agreed Hicks, mollified by the judge's altered tone.

"Therefore I do not hesitate to say that I consider you a damned
scoundrel!" concluded the judge.

Mr. Cavendish, accepting the judge's ultimatum as something which
must debar Hicks from all further consideration, and being, as he was,
exceedingly active and energetic by nature, if one passed over the
various forms of gainful industry, uttered a loud whoop and threw
himself on the overseer. There was a brief struggle and Hicks went down
with the Earl of Lambeth astride of him; then from his boot leg that
knightly soul flashed a horn-handled tickler of formidable dimensions.

The judge, Yancy, and Mahaffy, sprang from their chairs. Mr. Mahaffy was
plainly shocked at the spectacle of Mr. Cavendish's lawless violence.
Yancy was disturbed too, but not by the moral aspects of the case; he
was doubtful as to just how his friend's act would appeal to the judge.
He need not have been distressed on that score, since the judge's one
idea was to profit by it. With his hands on his knees he was now bending
above the two men.

"What do you want to know, judge?" cried Cavendish, panting from his
exertions. "I'll learn this parrot to talk up!"

"Hicks," said the judge, "it is in your power to tell us a few things we
are here to find out." Hicks looked up into the judge's face and closed
his lips grimly. "Mr. Cavendish, kindly let him have the point of that
large knife where he'll feel it most!" ordered the judge.

"Talk quick!" said Cavendish with a ferocious scowl. "Talk--or what's
to hinder me slicing open your woozen?" and he pressed the blade of his
knife against the overseer's throat.

"I don't know anything about Miss Betty," said Hicks in a sullen
whisper.

"Maybe you don't, but what do you know about the boy?" Hicks was silent,
but he was grateful for the judge's question. From Tom Ware he had
learned of Fentress' interest in the boy. Why should he shelter the
colonel at risk to himself? "If you please, Mr. Cavendish!" said the
judge quietly nodding toward the knife.

"You didn't ask me about him," said Hicks quickly.

"I do now," said the judge.

"He was here yesterday."

"Mr. Cavendish--" and again the judge glanced toward the knife.

"Wait!" cried Hicks. "You go to Colonel Fentress."

"Let him up, Mr. Cavendish; that's all we want to mow," said the judge.




CHAPTER XXIX. COLONEL FENTRESS


The judge had not forgotten his ghost, the ghost he had seen in Mr.
Saul's office that day he went to the court-house on business for
Charley Norton. Working or idling--principally the latter--drunk or
sober--principally the former--the ghost, otherwise Colonel Fentress,
had preserved a place in his thoughts, and now as he moved stolidly up
the drive toward Fentress' big white house on the hill with Mahaffy,
Cavendish, and Yancy trailing in his wake, memories of what had once
been living and vital crowded in upon him. Some sense of the wreck that
littered the long years, and the shame of the open shame that had swept
away pride and self-respect, came back to him out of the past.

He only paused when he stood on the portico before Fentress' open door.
He glanced about him at the wide fields, bounded by the distant timber
lands that hid gloomy bottoms, at the great log barns in the hollow to
his right; at the huddle of whitewashed cabins beyond; then with his
big fist he reached in and pounded on the door. The blows echoed loudly
through the silent house, and an instant later Fentress' tall, spare
figure was seen advancing from the far end of the hall.

"Who is it?" he asked.

"Judge Price--Colonel Fentress'' said the judge.

"Judge Price," uncertainly, and still advancing.

"I had flattered myself that you must have heard of me," said the judge.

"I think I have," said Fentress, pausing now.

"He thinks he has!" muttered the judge under his breath.

"Will you come in?" it was more a question than an invitation.

"If you are at liberty." The colonel bowed. "Allow me," the judge
continued. "Colonel Fentress--Mr. Mahaffy, Mr. Yancy and Mr. Cavendish."
Again the colonel bowed.

"Will you step into the library?"

"Very good," and the judge followed the colonel briskly down the hall.

When they entered the library Fentress turned and took stock of his
guests. Mahaffy he had seen before; Yancy and Cavendish were of course
strangers to him, but their appearance explained them; last of all his
glance shifted to the judge. He had heard something of those activities
by means of which Slocum Price had striven to distinguish himself,
and he had a certain curiosity respecting the man. It was immediately
satisfied. The judge had reached a degree of shabbiness seldom equaled,
and but for his mellow, effulgent personality might well have passed
for a common vagabond; and if his dress advertised the state of his
finances, his face explained his habits. No misconception was possible
about either.

"May I offer you a glass of liquor?" asked Fentress, breaking the
silence. He stepped to the walnut centertable where there was a decanter
and glasses. By a gesture the judge declined the invitation. Whereat
the colonel looked surprised, but not so surprised as Mahaffy. There was
another silence.

"I don't think we ever met before?" observed Fentress. There was
something in the fixed stare his visitor was bending upon him that he
found disquieting, just why, he could not have told.

But that fixed stare of the judge's continued. No, the man had
not changed--he had grown older certainly, but age had not come
ungracefully; he became the glossy broadcloth and spotless linen he
wore. Here was a man who could command the good things of life, using
them with a rational temperance. The room itself was in harmony with
his character; it was plain but rich in its appointments, at once his
library and his office, while the well-filled cases ranged about the
walls showed his tastes to be in the main scholarly and intellectual.

"How long have you lived here?" asked the judge abruptly. Fentress
seemed to hesitate; but the judge's glance, compelling and insistent,
demanded an answer.

"Ten years."

"You have known many men of all classes as a lawyer and a planter?" said
the judge. Fentress inclined his head. The judge took a step nearer
him. "People have a great trick of coming and going in these western
states--all sorts of damned riffraff drift in and out of these new
lands." A deadly earnestness lifted the judge's words above mere
rudeness. Fentress, cold and distant, made no reply. "For the
past twenty years I have been looking for a man by the name of
Gatewood--David Gatewood." Disciplined as he was, the colonel started
violently. "Ever heard of him, Fentress?" demanded the judge with a
savage scowl.

"What's all this to me?" The words came with a gasp from Fentress'
twitching lips. The judge looked at him moody and frowning.

"I have reason to think this man Gatewood came to west Tennessee," he
said.

"If so, I have never heard of him."

"Perhaps not under that name--at any rate you are going to hear of
him now. This man Gatewood, who between ourselves was a damned
scoundrel"--the colonel winced--"this man Gatewood had a friend who
threw money and business in his way--a planter he was, same as Gatewood.
A sort of partnership existed between the pair. It proved an expensive
enterprise for Gatewood's friend, since he came to trust the damned
scoundrel more and more as time passed--even large sums of his money
were in Gatewood's hands--" the judge paused. Fentress' countenance was
like stone, as expressionless and as rigid.

By the door stood Mahaffy with Yancy and Cavendish; they understood that
what was obscure and meaningless to them held a tragic significance
to these two men. The judge's heavy face, ordinarily battered and
debauched, but infinitely good-natured, bore now the markings of deep
passion, and the voice that rumbled forth from his capacious chest came
to their ears like distant thunder.

"This friend of Gatewood's had a wife--" The judge's voice broke,
emotion shook him like a leaf, he was tearing open his wounds. He
reached over and poured himself a drink, sucking it down with greedy
lips. "There was a wife--" he whirled about on his heel and faced
Fentress again. "There was a wife, Fentress--" he fixed Fentress with
his blazing eyes.

"A wife and child. Well, one day Gatewood and the wife were missing.
Under the circumstances Gatewood's friend was well rid of the pair--he
should have been grateful, but he wasn't, for his wife took his child,
a daughter; and Gatewood a trifle of thirty thousand dollars his friend
had intrusted to him!"

There was another silence.

"At a later day I met this man who had been betrayed by his wife and
robbed by his friend. He had fallen out of the race--drink had done for
him--there was just one thing he seemed to care about and that was the
fate of his child, but maybe he was only curious there. He wondered if
she had lived, and married--" Once more the judge paused.

"What's all this to me?" asked Fentress.

"Are you sure it's nothing to you?" demanded the judge hoarsely.
"Understand this, Fentress. Gatewood's treachery brought ruin to at
least two lives. It caused the woman's father to hide his face from the
world, it wasn't enough for him that his friends believed his daughter
dead; he knew differently and the shame of that knowledge ate into his
soul. It cost the husband his place in the world, too--in the end it
made of him a vagabond and a penniless wanderer."

"This is nothing to me," said Fentress.

"Wait!" cried the judge. "About six years ago the woman was seen at her
father's home in North Carolina. I reckon Gatewood had cast her off. She
didn't go back empty-handed. She had run away from her husband with a
child--a girl; after a lapse of twenty years she returned to her
father with a boy of two or three. There are two questions that must be
answered when I find Gatewood: what became of the woman and what became
of the child; are they living or dead; did the daughter grow up and
marry and have a son? When I get my answer it will be time enough to
think of Gatewood's punishment!" The judge leaned forward across the
table, bringing his face close to Fentress' face. "Look at me--do you
know me now?"

But Fentress' expression never altered. The judge fell back a step.

"Fentress, I want the boy," he said quietly.

"What boy?"

"My grandson."

"You are mad! What do I know of him--or you?" Fentress was gaining
courage from the sound of his own voice.

"You know who he is and where he is. Your business relations with
General Ware have put you on the track of the Quintard lands in this
state. You intend to use the boy to gather them in."

"You're mad!" repeated Fentress.

"Unless you bring him to me inside of twenty-four hours I'll smash
you!" roared the judge. "Your name isn't Fentress, it's Gatewood; you've
stolen the name of Fentress, just as you have stolen other things.
What's come of Turberville's wife and child? What's come of
Turberville's money? Damn your soul! I want my grandson! I'll pull you
down and leave you stripped and bare! I'll tell the world the false
friend you've been--the thief you are! I'll strip you and turn you out
of these doors as naked as when you entered the world!" The judge seemed
to tower above Fentress, the man had shot up out of his deep debasement.
"Choose! Choose!" he thundered, his shaggy brows bent in a menacing
frown.

"I know nothing about the boy," said Fentress slowly.

"By God, you lie!" stormed the judge.

"I know nothing about the boy," and Fentress took a step toward the
door.

"Stay where you are!" commanded the judge. "If you attempt to leave this
room to call your niggers I'll kill you on its threshold!"

But Yancy and Cavendish had stepped to the door with an intention that
was evident, and Fentress' thin face cast itself in haggard lines. He
was feeling the judge's terrible capacity, his unexpected ability to
deal with a supreme situation. Even Mahaffy gazed at his friend in
wonder. He had only seen him spend himself on trifles, with no further
object than the next meal or the next drink; he had believed that as
he knew him so he had always been, lax and loose of tongue and deed,
a noisy tavern hero, but now he saw that he was filling what must have
been the measure of his manhood.

"I tell you I had no hand in carrying off the boy," said Fentress with a
sardonic smile.

"I look to you to return him. Stir yourself, Gatewood, or by God, I'll
hold so fierce a reckoning with you--"

The sentence remained unfinished, for Fentress felt his overwrought
nerves snap, and giving way to a sudden blind fury struck at the judge.

"We are too old for rough and tumble," said the judge, who had displayed
astonishing agility in avoiding the blow. "Furthermore we were once
gentlemen. At present I am what I am, while you are a hound and a
blackguard! We'll settle this as becomes our breeding." He poured
himself a second glass of liquor from Fentress' decanter. "I wonder
if it is possible to insult you," and he tossed glass and contents in
Fentress' face. The colonel's thin features were convulsed. The judge
watched him with a scornful curling of the lips. "I am treating you
better than you deserve," he taunted.

"To-morrow morning at sun-up at Boggs' racetrack!" cried Fentress. The
judge bowed with splendid courtesy.

"Nothing could please me half so well," he declared. He turned to the
others. "Gentlemen, this is a private matter. When I have met Colonel
Fentress I shall make a public announcement of why this appeared
necessary to me; until then I trust this matter will not be given
publicity. May I ask your silence?" He bowed again, and abruptly passed
from the room.

His three friends followed in his steps, leaving Fentress standing by
the table, the ghost of a smile on his thin lips.

As if the very place were evil, the judge hurried down the drive toward
the road. At the gate he paused and turned on his companions, but his
features wore a look of dignity that forbade comment or question. He
held out his hand to Yancy.

"Sir," he said, "if I could command the riches of the Indies, it would
tax my resources to meet the fractional part of my obligations to you."

"Think of that!" said Yancy, as much overwhelmed by the judge's manner
as by his words.

"His Uncle Bob shall keep his place in my grandson's life! We'll watch
him grow into manhood together." The judge was visibly affected. A smile
of deep content parted Mr. Yancy's lips as his muscular fingers closed
about the judge's hand with crushing force.

"Whoop!" cried Cavendish, delighted at this recognition of Yancy's love
for the boy, and he gleefully smote the austere Mahaffy on the shoulder.
But Mahaffy was dumb in the presence of the decencies, he quite lacked
an interpreter. The judge looked back at the house.

"Mine!" he muttered. "The clothes he stands in, the food he eats--mine!
Mine!"




CHAPTER XXX. THE BUBBLE BURSTS


At about the same hour that the judge was hurling threats and insults at
Colonel Fentress, three men were waiting ten miles away at the head
of the bayou which served to isolate Hicks' cabin. Now no one of these
three had ever heard of Judge Slocum Price; the breath of his fame had
never blown, however gently, in their direction, yet they were preparing
to thrust opportunity upon him. To this end they were lounging about the
opening in the woods where the horses belonging to Ware and Murrell were
tied.

At length the dip of oars became audible in the silence and one of
the trio stole down the path, a matter of fifty yards, to a point that
overlooked the bayou. He was gone but a moment.

"It's Murrell all right!" he said in an eager whisper. "Him and another
fellow--the Hicks girl is rowing them." He glanced from one to the other
of his companions, who seemed to take firmer hold of themselves under
his eye. "It'll be all right," he protested lightly. "He's as good
as ours. Wait till I give you the word." And he led the way into an
adjacent thicket.

Meantime Ware and Murrell had landed and were coming along the path, the
outlaw a step or two in advance of his friend. They reached the horses
and were untying them when the thicket suddenly disgorged the three men;
each held a cocked pistol; two of these pistols covered Murrell and the
third was leveled at Ware.

"Hues!" cried Murrell in astonishment, for the man confronting him was
the Clan's messenger who should have been speeding across the state.

"Toss up your hands, Murrell," said Hues quietly.

One of the other men spoke.

"You are under arrest!"

"Arrest!"

"You are wanted for nigger-stealing," said the man. Still Murrell did
not seem to comprehend. He looked at Hues in dull wonder.

"What are you doing here?" he asked.

"Waiting to arrest you--ain't that plain?" said Hues, with a grim smile.

The outlaw's hands dropped at his side, limp and helpless. With some
idea that he might attempt to draw a weapon one of the men took hold of
him, but Murrell was nerveless to his touch; his face had gone a ghastly
white and was streaked with the markings of terror.

"Well, by thunder!" cried the man in utter amazement.

Murrell looked into Hues' face.

"You--you--" and the words thickened on his tongue becoming an
inarticulate murmur.

"It's all up, John," said Hues.

"No!" said Murrell, recovering himself. "You may as well turn me
loose--you can't arrest me!"

"I've done it," answered Hues, with a laugh. "I've been on your track
for six months."

"How about this fellow?" asked the man, whose pistol still covered Ware.
Hues glanced toward the planter and shook his head.

"Where are you going to take me?" asked Murrell quickly. Again Hues
laughed.

"You'll find that out in plenty of time, and then your friends can pass
the word around if they like; now you'll come with me!"

Ware neither moved nor spoke as Hues and his prisoner passed back along
the path, Hues with his hand on Murrell's shoulder, and one of his
companions close at his heels, while the third man led off the outlaw's
horse.

Presently the distant clatter of hoofs was borne to Ware's ears--only
that; the miracle of courage and daring he had half expected had not
happened. Murrell, for all his wild boasting, was like other men, like
himself. His bloodshot eyes slid around in their sockets. There across
the sunlit stretch of water was Betty--the thought of her brought him
to quick choking terrors. The whole fabric of crime by which he had been
benefited in the past or had expected to profit in the future seemed
toppling in upon him, but his mind clutched one important fact. Hues, if
he knew of Betty's disappearance, did not connect Murrell with it. Ware
sucked in comfort between his twitching lips. Stealing niggers! No one
would believe that he, a planter, had a hand in that, and for a brief
instant he considered signaling Bess to return. Slosson must be told
of Murrell's arrest; but he was sick with apprehension, some trap might
have been prepared for him, he could not know; and the impulse to act
forsook him.

He smote his hands together in a hopeless, beaten gesture. And Murrell
had gone weak--with his own eyes he had seen it--Murrell--whom he
believed without fear! He felt that he had been grievously betrayed in
his trust and a hot rage poured through him. At last he climbed into the
saddle, and swaying like a drunken man, galloped off.

When he reached the river road he paused and scanned its dusty surface.
Hues and his party had turned south when they issued from the wood path.
No doubt Murrell was being taken to Memphis. Ware laughed harshly. The
outlaw would be free before another dawn broke.

He had halted near where Jim had turned his team the previous night
after Betty and Hannibal had left the carriage; the marks of the wheels
were as plainly distinguishable as the more recent trail left by the
four men, and as he grasped the significance of that wide half circle
his sense of injury overwhelmed him again. He hoped to live to see
Murrell hanged!

He was so completely lost in his bitter reflections that he had been
unaware of a mounted man who was coming toward him at a swift gallop,
but now he heard the steady pounding of hoofs and, startled by the
sound, looked up. A moment later the horseman drew rein at his side.

"Ware!" he cried.

"How are you, Carrington?" said the planter.

"You are wanted at Belle Plain," began Carrington, and seemed to
hesitate.

"Yes--yes, I am going there at once--now--" stammered Ware, and gathered
up his reins with a shaking hand.

"You've heard, I take it?" said Carrington slowly.

"Yes," answered Ware, in a hoarse whisper. "My God, Carrington, I'm
heart sick; she has been like a daughter to me!" he fell silent mopping
his face.

"I think I understand your feeling," said Carrington, giving him a level
glance.

"Then you'll excuse me," and the planter clapped spurs to his horse.
Once he looked back over his shoulder; he saw that Carrington had not
moved from the spot where they had met.

At Belle Plain, Ware found his neighbors in possession of the place.
They greeted him quietly and spoke in subdued tones of their sympathy.
The planter listened with an air of such abject misery that those who
had neither liked nor respected him, were roused to a sudden generous
feeling where he was concerned, they could not question but that he was
deeply affected. After all the man might have a side to his nature with
which they had never come in contact.

When he could he shut himself in his room. He had experienced a day of
maddening anxiety, he had not slept at all the previous night, in mind
and body he was worn out; and now he was plunged into the thick of this
sensation. He must keep control of himself, for every word he said would
be remembered. In the present there was sympathy for him, but sooner or
later people would return to their sordid unemotional judgments.

He sought to forecast the happenings of the next few hours. Murrell's
friends would break jail for him, that was a foregone conclusion, but
the insurrection he had planned was at an end. Hues had dealt its death
blow. Moreover, though the law might be impotent to deal with Murrell,
he could not hope to escape the vengeance of the powerful class he had
plotted to destroy; he would have to quit the country. Ware gloated in
this idea of craven flight. Thank God, he had seen the last of him!

But as always his thoughts came back to Betty. Slosson would wait at
the Hicks' place for the man Murrell had promised him, and failing this
messenger, for the signal fire, but there would be neither; and Slosson
would be left to determine his own course of action. Ware felt certain
that he would wait through the night, but as sure as the morning broke,
if no word had reached him, he would send one of his men across the
bayou, who must learn of Murrell's arrest, escape, flight--for in Ware's
mind these three events were indissolubly associated. The planter's
teeth knocked together. He was having a terrible acquaintance with fear,
its very depths had swallowed him up; it was a black pit in which he
sank from horror to horror. He had lost all faith in the Clan which
had terrorized half a dozen states, which had robbed and murdered with
apparent impunity, which had marketed its hundreds of stolen slaves. He
had utterly collapsed at the first blow dealt the organization, but he
was still seeing Murrell, pallid and shaken.

A step sounded in the hall and an instant later Hicks entered the room
without the formality of knocking. Ware recognized his presence with
a glance of indifference, but did not speak. Hicks slouched to his
employer's side and handed him a note which proved to be from Fentress.
Ware read and tossed it aside.

"If he wants to see me why don't he come here?" he growled.

"I reckon that old fellow they call Judge Price has sprung something
sudden on the colonel," said Hicks.

"He was out here the first thing this morning; you'd have thought he
owned Belle Plain. There was a couple of strangers with him, and he had
me in and fired questions at me for half an hour, then he hiked off up
to The Oaks."

"Murrell's been arrested," said Ware in a dull level voice. Hicks gave
him a glance of unmixed astonishment.

"No!" he cried.

"Yes, by God!"

"Who'd risk it?"

"Risk it? Man, he almost fainted dead away--a damned coward. Hell!"

"How do you know this?" asked Hicks, appalled.

"I was with him when he was taken--it was Hues the man he trusted more
than any other!" Ware gave the overseer a ghastly grin and was silent,
but in that silence he heard the drumming of his own heart. He went on.
"I tell you to save himself John Murrell will implicate the rest of us;
we've got to get him free, and then, by hell--we ought to knock him in
the head; he isn't fit to live!"

"The jail ain't built that'll hold him!!" muttered Hicks.

"Of course, he can't be held," agreed Ware. "And 'he'll never be brought
to trial; no lawyer will dare appear against him, no jury will dare find
him guilty; but there's Hues, what about him?" He paused. The two men
looked at each other for a long moment.

"Where did they carry the captain?" inquired Hicks.

"I don't know."

"It looks like the Clan was in a hell-fired hole--but shucks! What
will be easier than to fix Hues?--and while they're fixing folks they'd
better not overlook that old fellow Price. He's got some notion about
Fentress and the boy." Mr. Hicks did not consider it necessary to
explain that he was himself largely responsible for this.

"How do you know that?" demanded Ware.

"He as good as said so." Hicks looked uneasily at the planter. He knew
himself to be compromised. The stranger named Cavendish had forced an
admission from him that Murrell would not condone if it came to his
knowledge. He had also acquired a very proper and wholesome fear of
Judge Slocum Price. He stepped close to Ware's side. "What'll come of
the girl, Tom? Can you figure that out?" he questioned, sinking his
voice almost to a whisper. But Ware was incapable of speech, again
his terrors completely overwhelmed him. "I reckon you'll have to find
another overseer. I'm going to strike out for Texas," said Hicks.

Ware's eyes met his for an instant. He had thought of flight, too, was
still thinking of it, but greed was as much a part of his nature as
fear; Belle Plain was a prize not to be lightly cast aside, and it was
almost his. He lurched across the room to the window. If he were going
to act, the sooner he did so the better, and gain a respite from his
fears. The road down the coast slid away before his heavy eyes, he
marked each turn; then a palsy of fear shook him, his heart beat against
his ribs, and he stood gnawing his lips while he gazed up at the sun.

"Do you get what I say, Tom? I am going to quit these parts," said
Hicks. Ware turned slowly from the window.

"All right, Hicks. You mean you want me to settle with you, is that it?"
he asked.

"Yes, I'm going to leave while I can, maybe I can't later on," said
Hicks stolidly. He added: "I am going to start down the coast as soon
as it turns dark, and before it's day again I'll have put the good miles
between me and these parts."

"You're going down the coast?" and Ware was again conscious of the
quickened beating of his heart. Hicks nodded. "See you don't meet up
with John Murrell," said Ware.

"I'll take that chance. It seems a heap better to me than staying here."

Ware looked from the window. The shadows were lengthening across the
lawn.

"Better start now, Hicks," he advised.

"I'll wait until it turns dark."

"You'll need a horse."

"I was going to help myself to one. This ain't no time to stand on
ceremony," said Hicks shortly.

"Slosson shouldn't be left in the lurch like this--or your brother's
folks--"

"They'll have to figure it out for themselves same as me," rejoined
Hicks.

"You can stop there as you go by."

"No," said Hicks; "I never did believe in this damn foolishness about
the girl, and I won't go near George's--"

"I don't ask you to go there, you can give them the signal from the
head of the bayou. All I want is for you to stop and light a fire on
the shore. They'll know what that means. I'll give you a horse and fifty
dollars for the job."

Hicks' eyes sparkled, but he only said

"Make it twice that and maybe we can deal."

Racked and tortured, Ware hesitated; but the sun was slipping into the
west, his windows blazed with the hot light.

"You swear you'll do your part?" he said thickly. He took his purse from
his pocket and counted out the amount due Hicks. He named the total, and
paused irresolutely.

"Don't you want the fire lighted?" asked Hicks. He was familiar with his
employer's vacillating moods.

"Yes," answered Ware, his lips quivering; and slowly, with shaking
fingers, he added to the pile of bills in Hicks' hand.

"Well, take care of yourself," said Hicks, when the count was complete.
He thrust the roll of bills into his pocket and moved to the door.

Alone again, the planter collapsed into his chair, breathing heavily,
but his terrors swept over him and left him with a savage sense of
triumph. This passed, he sprang up, intending to recall Hicks and unmake
his bargain. What had he been thinking of--safety lay only in flight!
Before he reached the door his greed was in the ascendant. He dropped
down on the edge of his bed, his eyes fixed on the window. The sun sank
lower. From where he sat he saw it through the upper half of the sash,
blood-red and livid in a mist of fleecy clouds.

It was in the tops of the old oaks now, which sent their shadows into
his room. Again maddened by his terrors he started up and backed toward
the door; but again his greed, the one dominating influence in his life,
vanquished him.

He watched the sun sink. He watched the red splendor fade over the
river; he saw the first stars appear. He told himself that Hicks would
soon be gone--if the fire was not to be lighted he must act at once!
He stole to the window. It was dusk now, yet he could distinguish the
distant wooded boundaries of the great fields framed by the darkening
sky. Then in the silence he heard the thud of hoofs.




CHAPTER XXXI. THE KEEL BOAT


"PRICE," began Mahaffy. They were back in Raleigh in the room the judge
called his office, and this was Mahaffy's first opportunity to ease his
mind on the subject of the duel, as they had only just parted from Yancy
and Cavendish, who had stopped at one of the stores to make certain
purchases for the raft.

"Not a word, Solomon--it had to come. I am going to kill him. I shall
feel better then."

"What if he kills you?" demanded Mahaffy harshly. The judge shrugged his
shoulders.

"That is as it may be."

"Have you forgotten your grandson?" Mahaffy's voice was still harsh and
rasping.

"I regard my meeting with Fentress as nothing less than a sacred duty to
him."

"We know no more than we did this morning," said Mahaffy. "You are
mixing up all sorts of side issues with what should be your real
purpose."

"Not at all, Solomon--not at all! I look upon my grandson's speedy
recovery as an assured fact. Fentress dare not hold him. He knows he is
run to earth at last."

"Price--"

"No, Solomon--no, my friend, we will not speak of it again. You will
go back to Belle Plain with Yancy and Cavendish; you must represent me
there. We have as good as found Hannibal, but we must be active in Miss
Malroy's behalf. For us that has an important bearing on the future, and
since I can not, you must be at Belle Plain when Carrington arrives
with his pack of dogs. Give him the advantage of your sound and
mature judgment, Solomon; don't let any false modesty keep you in the
background."

"Who's going to second you?" snapped Mahaffy.

The judge was the picture of indifference.

"It will be quite informal, the code is scarcely applicable; I merely
intend to remove him because he is not fit to live."

"At sun-up!" muttered Mahaffy.

"I intend to start one day right even if I never live to begin another,"
said the judge, a sudden fierce light flashing from his eyes. "I feel
that this is the turning point in my career, Solomon!" he went on. "The
beginning of great things! But I shall take no chances with the future,
I shall prepare for every possible contingency. I am going to make you
and Yancy my grandson's guardians. There's a hundred thousand acres of
land hereabout that must come to him. I shall outline in writing the
legal steps to be taken to substantiate his claims. Also he will inherit
largely from me at my death."

Something very like laughter escaped from Mahaffy's lips.

"There you go, Solomon, with your inopportune mirth! What in God's name
have I if I haven't hope? Take that from me and what would I be?
Why, the very fate I have been fighting off with tooth and nail would
overwhelm me. I'd sink into unimportance--my unparalleled misfortunes
would degrade me to a level with the commonest! No, sir, I've never been
without hope, and though I've fallen I've always got up. What Fentress
has is based on money he stole from me. By God, the days of his
profit-taking are at an end! I am going to strip him. And even if I
don't live to enjoy what's mine, my grandson shall! He shall wear
velvet and a lace collar and ride his pony yet, by God, as a gentleman's
grandson should!"

"It sounds well, Price, but where's the money coming from to push a
lawsuit?"

The judge waved this aside.

"The means will be found, Solomon. Our horizon is lifting--I can see it
lift! Don't drag me back from the portal of hope! We'll drink the stuff
that comes across the water; I'll warm the cockles of your heart with
imported brandy. I carry twenty years' hunger and thirst under my
wes-coat and I'll feed and drink like a gentleman yet!" The judge
smacked his lips in an ecstasy of enjoyment, and dropping down before
the table which served him as a desk, seized a pen.

"It's good enough to think about, Price," admitted Mahaffy grudgingly.

"It's better to do; and if anything happens to me the papers I am going
to leave will tell you how it's to be done. Man, there's a million of
money in sight, and we've got to get it and spend it and enjoy it! None
of your swinish thrift for me, but life on a big scale--company, and
feasting, and refined surroundings!"

"And you are going to meet Fentress in the morning?" asked Mahaffy. "I
suppose there's no way of avoiding that?"

"Avoiding it?" almost shouted the judge. "For what have I been living?
I shall meet him, let the consequences be what they may. To-night when
I have reduced certain facts to writing I shall join you at Belle Plain.
The strange and melancholy history of my life I shall place in your
hands for safe keeping. In the morning I can be driven back to Boggs'."

"And you will go there without a second?"

"If necessary; yes."

"I declare, Price, you are hardly fitted to be at large! Why, you act as
if you were tired of life. There's Yancy--there's Cavendish!"

The judge gave him an indulgent but superior smile.

"Two very worthy men, but I go to Boggs' attended by a gentleman or I go
there alone. I am aware of your prejudices, Solomon; otherwise I might
ask this favor of you."

Mr. Mahaffy snorted loudly and turned to the door, for Yancy and
Cavendish were now approaching the house, the latter with a meal sack
slung over his shoulder.

"Here, Solomon, take one of my pistols," urged the judge hastily. "You
may need it at Belle Plain. Goodby, and God bless you!"

Just where he had parted from Ware, Carrington sat his horse, his brows
knit and his eyes turned in the direction of the path. He was on his way
to a plantation below Girard, the owner of which had recently imported
a pack of bloodhounds; but this unexpected encounter with Ware had
affected him strangely. He still heard Tom's stammering speech, he was
still seeing his ghastly face, and he had come upon him with startling
suddenness. He had chanced to look back over his shoulder and when he
faced about there had been the planter within a hundred yards of him.

Presently Carrington's glance ceased to follow the windings of the path.
He stared down at the gray dust and saw the trail left by Hues and his
party. For a moment he hesitated; if the dogs were to be used with
any hope of success he had no time to spare, and this was the merest
suspicion, illogical conjecture, based on nothing beyond his distrust
of Ware. In the end he sprang from the saddle and leading his horse into
the woods, tied it to a sapling.

A hurried investigation told him that five men had ridden in and out of
that path. Of the five, all coming from the south, four had turned
south again, but the fifth man--Ware, in other words--had gone north. He
weighed the possible significance of these facts.

"I am only wasting time!" he confessed reluctantly, and was on the point
of turning away, when, on the very edge of the road and just where the
dust yielded to the hard clay of the path, his glance lighted on the
print of a small and daintily shod foot. The throbbing of his heart
quickened curiously.

"Betty!" The word leaped from his lips.

That small foot had left but the one impress. There were other signs,
however, that claimed his attention; namely, the bootprints of Slosson
and his men; and he made the inevitable discovery that these tracks
were all confined to the one spot. They began suddenly and as suddenly
ceased, yet there was no mystery about these; he had the marks of the
wheels to help him to a sure conclusion. A carriage had turned just
here, several men had alighted, they had with them a child or a woman.
Either they had reentered the carriage and driven back as they had come,
or they had gone toward the river. He felt the soul within him turn
sick.

He stole along the path; the terror of the river was ever in his
thoughts, and the specter of his fear seemed to flit before him and lure
him on. Presently he caught his first glimpse of the bayou and his legs
shook under him; but the path wound deeper still into what appeared to
be an untouched solitude, wound on between the crowding tree forms,
a little back from the shore, with an intervening tangle of vines
and bushes. He scanned this closely as he hurried forward, scarcely
conscious that he was searching for some trampled space at the water's
edge; but the verdant wall preserved its unbroken continuity, and twenty
minutes later he came within sight of the Hicks' clearing and the keel
boat, where it rested against the bank.

A little farther on he found the spot where Slosson had launched the
skiff the night before. The keel of his boat had cut deep into the
slippery clay; more than this, the impress of the small shoe was
repeated here, and just beside it was the print of a child's bare foot.

He no longer doubted that Betty and Hannibal had been taken across the
bayou to the cabin, and he ran back up the path the distance of a mile
and plunged into the woods on his right, his purpose being to pass
around the head of the expanse of sluggish water to a point from which
he could later approach the cabin. But the cabin proved to be better
defended than he had foreseen; and as he advanced, the difficulties of
the task he had set himself became almost insurmountable; yet sustained
as he was by his imperative need, he tore his way through the labyrinth
of trailing vines, or floundered across acre-wide patches of green slime
and black mud, which at each step threatened to engulf him in their
treacherous depths, until at the end of an hour he gained the southern
side of the clearing and a firmer footing within the shelter of the
woods.

Here he paused and took stock of his surroundings. The two or three
buildings Mr. Hicks had erected stood midway of the clearing and were
very modest improvements adapted to their owner's somewhat flippant
pursuit of agriculture. While Carrington was still staring about him,
the cabin door swung open and a woman stepped forth. It was the girl
Bess. She went to a corner of the building and called loudly:

"Joe! Oh, Joe!"

Carrington glanced in the direction of the keel boat and an instant
later saw Slosson clamber over its side. The tavern-keeper crossed to
the cabin, where he was met by Bess, who placed in his hands what
seemed to be a wooden bowl. With this he slouched off to one of the
outbuildings, which he entered. Ten or fifteen minutes slipped by,
then he came from the shed and after securing the door, returned to
the cabin. He was again met by Bess, who relieved him of the bowl; they
exchanged a few words and Slosson walked away and afterward disappeared
over the side of the keel boat.

This much was clear to the Kentuckian: food had been taken to some one
in the shed--to Betty and the boy!--more likely to George.

He waited now for the night to come, and to him the sun seemed fixed in
the heavens. At Belle Plain Tom Ware was watching it with a shuddering
sense of the swiftness of its flight. But at last the tops of the tall
trees obscured it; it sank quickly then and blazed a ball of fire beyond
the Arkansas coast, while its dying glory spread aslant the heavens,
turning the flanks of the gray clouds to violet and purple and gold.

With the first approach of darkness Carrington made his way to the shed.
Hidden in the shadow he paused to listen, and fancied he heard difficult
breathing from within. The door creaked hideously on its wooden hinges
when he pushed it open, but as it swung back the last remnant of the
day's light showed him some dark object lying prone on the dirt floor.
He reached down and his hand rested on a man's booted foot.

"George--" Carrington spoke softly, but the man on the floor gave no
sign that he heard, and Carrington's questioning touch stealing higher
he found that George--if it were George--was lying on his side with his
arms and legs securely bound. Thinking he slept, the Kentuckian shook
him gently to arouse him.

"George?" he repeated, still bending above him. This time an
inarticulate murmur answered him. At the same instant the woolly head
of the negro came under his fingers and he discovered the reason of his
silence. He was as securely gagged as he was bound.

"Listen, George--it's Carrington--I am going to take off this gag, but
don't speak above a whisper--they may hear us!" And he cut the cords
that held the gag in place.

"How yo' get here, Mas'r Ca'ington?" asked the negro guardedly, as the
gag fell away.

"Around the head of the bayou."

"Lawd!" exclaimed George, in a tone of wonder.

"Where's Miss Betty?"

"She's in the cabin yonder--fo' the love of God, cut these here
other ropes with yo' knife, Mas'r Ca'ington--I'm perishin' with 'em!"
Carrington did as he asked, and groaning, George sat erect. "I'm like I
was gone to sleep all over," he said.

"You'll feel better in a moment. Tell me about Miss Malroy?"

"They done fetched us here last night. I was drivin' Missy into
Raleigh--her and young Mas'r Hazard--when fo' men stop us in the road."

"Who were they, do you know?" asked Carrington.

"Lawd--what's that?"

Carrington, knife in hand swung about on his heel. A lantern's light
flashed suddenly in his face and Bess Hicks, with a low startled cry
breaking from her lips, paused in the doorway. Springing forward,
Carrington seized her by the wrist.

"Hush!" he grimly warned.

"What are you doin' here?" demanded the girl, as she endeavored to shake
off his hand, but Carrington drew her into the shed, and closing the
door, set his back against it. There was a brief silence during which
Bess regarded the Kentuckian with a kind of stolid fearlessness. She was
the first to speak. "I reckon you-all have come after Miss Malroy," she
observed quietly.

"Then you reckon right," answered Carrington. The girl studied him from
beneath her level brows.

"And you-all think you can take her away from here," she speculated. "I
ain't afraid of yo' knife--you-all might use it fast enough on a
man, but not on me. I'll help you," she added. Carrington gave her an
incredulous glance. "You don't believe me? What's to hinder my calling
for help? That would fetch our men up from the keel boat. No--yo'-all's
knife wouldn't stop me!"

"Don't be too sure of that," said Carrington sternly. The girl met the
menace of his words with soft, fullthroated laughter.

"Why, yo' hand's shakin' now, Mr. Carrington!"

"You know me?"

"Yes, I seen you once at Boggs'." She made an impatient movement. "You
can't do nothing against them fo' men unless I help you. Miss Malroy's
to go down river to-night; they're only waiting fo' a pilot--you-all's
got to act quick!"

Carrington hesitated.

"Why do you want Miss Malroy to escape?" he said.

The girl's mood changed abruptly. She scowled at him.

"I reckon that's a private matter. Ain't it enough fo' you-all to know
that I do? I'm showing how it can be done. Them four men on the keel
boat are strangers in these parts, they're waiting fo' a pilot, but they
don't know who he'll be. I've heard you-all was a riverman; what's to
hinder yo' taking the pilot's place? Looks like yo' was willing to risk
yo' life fo' Miss Malroy or you wouldn't be here."

"I'm ready," said Carrington, his hand on the door.

"No, you ain't--jest yet," interposed the girl hastily. "Listen to me
first. They's a dugout tied up 'bout a hundred yards above the keel
boat; you must get that to cross in to the other side of the bayou, then
when yo're ready to come back yo're to whistle three times--it's the
signal we're expecting--and I'll row across fo' you in one of the
skiffs."

"Can you see Miss Malroy in the meantime?"

"If I want to, they's nothin' to hinder me," responded Bess sullenly.

"Tell her then--" began Carrington, but Bess interrupted him.

"I know what yo' want. She ain't to cry out or nothin' when she sees
you-all. I got sense enough fo' that."

Carrington looked at her curiously.

"This may be a serious business for your people," he said significantly,
and watched her narrowly.

"And you-all may get killed. I reckin if yo' want to do a thing bad
enough you don't mind much what comes after," she answered with a hard
little laugh, as she went from the shed.

"Come!" said Carrington to the negro, when he had seen the cabin door
close on Bess and her lantern; and they stole across the clearing.
Reaching the bayou side they began a noiseless search for the dugout,
which they quickly found, and Carrington turned to George. "Can you
swim?" he asked.

"Yes, Mas'r."

"Then go down into the water and drag the canoe farther along the
shore--and for God's sake, no sound!" he cautioned.

They placed a second hundred yards between themselves and the keel boat
in this manner, then he had George bring the dug-out to the bank, and
they embarked. Keeping within the shadow of the trees that fringed the
shore, Carrington paddled silently about the head of the bayou.

"George," he at length said, bending toward the negro; "my horse is tied
in the woods on the right-hand side of the road just above where you
were taken from the carriage last night--you can be at Belle Plain
inside of an hour."

"Look here, Mas'r Ca'ington, those folks yonder is kin to Boss Hicks. If
he get his hand on me first don't you reckon he'll stop my mouth? I been
here heaps of times fotchin' letters fo' Mas'r Tom," added George.

"Who were the letters for?" asked the Kentuckian, greatly surprised.

"They was fo' that Captain Murrell; seems like him and Mas'r Tom was
mixed up in a sight of business."

"When was this--recently?" inquired Carrington. He was turning this
astonishing statement of the slave over in his mind.

"Well, no, Mas'r; seems like they ain't so thick here recently."

"I reckon you'd better keep away from the big house yet a while," said
Carrington. "Instead of going there, stop at the Belle Plain landing.
You'll find a raft tied up to the shore, it belongs to a man named
Cavendish. Tell him what you know. That I've found Miss Malroy and the
boy, tell him to cast off and drift down here. I'll run the keel boat
aground the first chance I get, so tell him to keep a sharp lookout."

A few minutes later they had separated, George to hurry away in search
of the horse, and Carrington to pass back along the shore until he
gained a point opposite the clearing. He whistled shrilly three times,
and after an interval of waiting heard the splash of oars and presently
saw a skiff steal out of the gloom.

"Who's there?" It was Bess who asked the question.

"Carrington," he answered.

"Lucky you ain't met the other man!" she said as she swept her skiff
alongside the bank.

"Lucky for him, you mean. I'll take the oars," added Carrington as he
entered the skiff.

Slowly the clearing lifted out of the darkness, then the keel boat
became distinguishable; and Carrington checked the skiff by a backward
stroke of the oars.

"Hello!" he called.

There was no immediate answer to his hail, and he called again as he
sent the skiff forward. He felt that he was risking all now.

"What do you want?" asked a surly voice.

"You want Slosson!" quickly prompted the girl in a whisper.

"I want to see Slosson!" said Carrington glibly and with confidence, and
once more he checked the skiff.

"Who be you?"

"Murrell sent you," prompted the girl again, in a hurried whisper.

"Murrell--" And in his astonishment Carrington spoke aloud.

"Murrell?" cried the voice sharply.

"--sent me!" said Carrington quickly, as though completing an unfinished
sentence. The girl laughed nervously under her breath.

"Row closter!" came the sullen command, and the Kentuckian did as he was
bidden. Four men stood in the bow of the keel boat, a lantern was
raised aloft and by its light they looked him over. There was a moment's
silence broken by Carrington, who asked:

"Which one of you is Slosson?" And he sprang lightly aboard the keel
boat.

"I'm Slosson," answered the man with the lantern. The previous night Mr.
Slosson had been somewhat under the enlivening and elevating influence
of corn whisky, but now he was his own cheerless self, and rather
jaded by the passing of the hours which he had sacrificed to an irksome
responsibility. "What word do you fetch from the Captain, brother?" he
demanded.

"Miss Malroy is to be taken down river," responded Carrington. Slosson
swore with surpassing fluency.

"Say, we're five able-bodied men risking our necks to oblige him!
You can get married a damn sight easier than this if you go about it
right--I've done it lots of times." Not understanding the significance
of Slosson's allusion to his own matrimonial career, Carrington held his
peace. The tavern-beeper swore again with unimpaired vigor. "You'll find
mighty few men with more experience than me," he asserted, shaking his
head. "But if you say the word--"

"I'm all for getting shut of this!" answered Carrington promptly, with
a sweep of his arm. "I call these pretty close quarters!" Still shaking
his head and muttering, the tavernkeeper sprang ashore and mounted the
bank, where his slouching figure quickly lost itself in the night.

Carrington took up his station on the flat roof of the cabin which
filled the stern of the boat. He was remembering that day in the sandy
Barony road--and during all the weeks and months that had intervened,
Murrell, working in secret, had moved steadily toward the fulfilment of
his desires! Unquestionably he had been back of the attack on Norton,
had inspired his subsequent murder, and the man's sinister and
mysterious power had never been suspected. Carrington knew that the
horse-thieves and slave stealers were supposed to maintain a loosely
knit association; he wondered if Murrell were not the moving spirit in
some such organization.

"If I'd only pushed my quarrel with him!" he thought bitterly.

He heard Slosson's shuffling step in the distance, a word or two when
he spoke gruffly to some one, and a moment later he saw Betty and the boy,
their forms darkly silhouetted against the lighter sky as they moved
along the top of the bank. Slosson, without any superfluous gallantry,
helped his captives down the slope and aboard the keel boat, where he
locked them in the cabin, the door of which fastened with a hasp and
wooden peg.

"You're boss now, pardner!" he said, joining Carrington at the steering
oar.

"We'll cast off then," answered Carrington.

Thus far nothing had occurred to mar his plans. If they could but quit
the bayou before the arrival of the man whose place he had taken, the
rest would be if not easy of accomplishment, at least within the realm
of the possible.

"I reckon you're a river-man?" observed Slosson.

"All my life."

The line had been cast off, and the crew with their setting poles were
forcing the boat away from the bank. All was quietly done; except for
an occasional order from Carrington no word was spoken, and soon the
unwieldy craft glided into the sluggish current and gathered way. Mr.
Slosson, who clearly regarded his relation to the adventure as being of
an official character, continued to stand at Carrington's elbow.

"What have we, between here and the river?" inquired the latter. It was
best, he felt, not to give Slosson an opportunity to ask questions.

"It narrows considerably, pardner, but it's a straight course," said
Slosson. "Black in yonder, ain't it?" he added, nodding ahead.

The shores drew rapidly together; they were leaving the lakelike expanse
behind. In the silence, above the rustling of the trees, Carrington
heard the first fret of 'the river against its bank. Slosson yawned
prodigiously.

"I reckon you ain't needing me?" he said.

"Better go up in the bow and get some sleep," advised Carrington, and
Slosson, nothing loath, clambered down from the roof of the cabin and
stumbled forward.

The ceaseless murmur of the rushing waters grew in the stillness as the
keel boat drew nearer the hurrying yellow flood, and the beat of the
Kentuckian's pulse quickened. Would he find the raft there? He glanced
back over the way they had come. The dark ranks of the forest walled off
the clearing, but across the water a dim point of light was visible. He
fixed its position as somewhere near the head of the bayou. Apparently
it was a lantern, but as he looked a ruddy glow crept up against the
sky-line.

From the bow Bunker had been observing this singular phenomenon.
Suddenly he bent and roused Slosson, who had fallen asleep. The
tavern-keeper sprang to his feet and Bunker pointed without speaking.

"Mebby you can tell me what that light back yonder means?" cried
Slosson, addressing himself to Carrington; as he spoke he snatched up
his rifle.

"That's what I'm trying to make out," answered Carrington.

"Hell!" cried Slosson, and tossed his gun to his shoulder.

What seemed to be a breath of wind lifted a stray lock of Carrington's
hair, but his pistol answered Slosson in the same second. He fired at
the huddle of men in the bow of the boat and one of them pitched forward
with his arms outspread.

"Keep back, you!" he said, and dropped off the cabin roof.

His promptness had bred a momentary panic, then Slosson's bull-like
voice began to roar commands; but in that brief instant of surprise and
shock Carrington had found and withdrawn the wooden peg that fastened
the cabin door. He had scarcely done this when Slosson came tramping aft
supported by the three men.

Calling to Betty and Hannibal to escape in the skiff which was towing
astern the Kentuckian rushed toward the bow. At his back he heard the
door creak on its hinges as it was pushed open by Betty and the boy, and
again he called to them to escape by the skiff. The fret of the current
had grown steadily and from beneath the wide-flung branches of the
trees which here met above his head, Carrington caught sight of the
starspecked arch of the heavens beyond. They were issuing from the
bayou. He felt the river snatch at the keel boat, the buffeting of some
swift eddy, and saw the blunt bow swing off to the south as they were
plunged into the black shore shadows.

But what he did not see was a big muscular hand which had thrust itself
out of the impenetrable gloom and clutched the side of the keel boat.
Coincident with this there arose a perfect babel of voices, high-pitched
and shrill.

"Sho--I bet it's him! Sho'--it's Uncle Bob's nevvy! Sho', you can hear
'em! Sho', they're shootin' guns! Sho'!"

Carrington cast a hurried glance in the direction of these sounds. There
between the boat and the shore the dim outline of a raft was taking
shape. It was now canopied by a wealth of pale gray smoke that faded
from before his eyes as the darkness lifted. Turning, he saw Slosson and
his men clearly. Surprise and consternation was depicted on each face.

The light increased. From the flat stone hearth of the raft ascended
a tall column of flame which rendered visible six pygmy figures,
tow-headed and wonderfully vocal, who were toiling like mad at the huge
sweeps. The light showed more than this. It showed a lady of plump and
pleasing presence smoking a cobpipe while she fed the fire from a tick
stuffed with straw. It showed two bark shanties, a line between them
decorated with the never-ending Cavendish wash. It showed a rooster
perched on the ridge-pole of one of these shanties in the very act of
crowing lustily.

Hannibal, who had climbed to the roof of the cabin, shrieked for help,
and Betty added her voice to his.

"All right, Nevvy!" came the cheerful reply, as Yancy threw himself over
the side of the boat and grappled with Slosson.

"Uncle Bob! Uncle Bob!" cried Hannibal.

Slosson uttered a cry of terror. He had a simple but sincere faith in
the supernatural, and even with the Scratch Hiller's big hands gripping
his throat, he could not rid himself of the belief that this was the
ghost of a murdered man.

"You'll take a dog's licking from me, neighbor?" said Yancy grimly. "I
been saving it fo' you!"

Meanwhile Mr. Cavendish, whose proud spirit never greatly inclined him
to the practice of peace, had prepared for battle; Springing aloft he
knocked his heels together.

"Whoop! I'm a man as can slide down a thorny locust and never get
scratched!" he shouted. This was equivalent to setting his triggers;
then he launched himself nimbly and with enthusiasm into the thick of
the fight. It was Mr. Bunker's unfortunate privilege to sustain the
onslaught of the Earl of Lambeth.

The light from the Cavendish hearth continued to brighten the scene,
for Polly was recklessly sacrificing her best straw tick. Indeed her
behavior was in every way worthy of the noble alliance she had formed.
Her cob-pipe was not suffered to go out and with Connie's help she kept
the six small Cavendishes from risking life and limb in the keel boat,
toward which they were powerfully drawn. Despite these activities she
found time to call to Betty and Hannibal on the cabin roof.

"Jump down here; that ain't no fittin' place for you-all to stop in with
them gentlemen fightin'!"

An instant later Betty and Hannibal stood on the raft with the little
Cavendishes flocking about them. Mr. Yancy's quest of his nevvy
had taken an enduring hold on their imagination. For weeks it had
constituted their one vital topic, and the fight became merely a
satisfying background for this interesting restoration.

"Sho', they'd got him! Sho'--he wa'n't no bigger than Richard! Sho'!"

"Oh!" cried Betty, with a fearful glance toward the keel boat. "Can't
you stop them?"

"What fo'?" asked Polly, opening her black eyes very wide.

"Bless yo' tender heart!-you don't need to worry none, we got them
strange gentlemen licked like they was a passel of children! Connie,
you-all mind that fire!"

She accurately judged the outcome of the fight. The boat was little
better than a shambles with the havoc that had been wrought there
when Yancy and Carrington dropped over its side to the raft. Cavendish
followed them, whooping his triumph as he came.




CHAPTER XXXII. THE RAFT AGAIN


Yancy and Cavendish threw themselves on the sweeps and worked the raft
clear of the keel boat, then the turbulent current seized the smaller
craft and whirled it away into the night; as its black bulk receded from
before his eyes the Earl of Lambeth spoke with the voice of authority
and experience.

"It was a good fight and them fellows done well, but not near well
enough." A conclusion that could not be gainsaid. He added, "No one
ain't hurt but them that had ought to have got hurt. Mr. Yancy's all
right, and so's Mr. Carrington--who's mighty welcome here." The earl's
shock of red hair was bristling like the mane of some angry animal
and his eyes still flashed with the light of battle, but he managed to
summon up an expression of winning friendliness.

"Mr. Carrington's kin to me, Polly," explained Yancy to Mrs. Cavendish.
His voice was far from steady, for Hannibal had been gathered into
his arms and had all but wrecked the stoic calm with which the Scratch
Hiller was seeking to guard his emotions.

Polly smiled and dimpled at the Kentuckian. Trained to a romantic point
of view she had a frank liking for handsome stalwart men. Cavendish was
neither, but none knew better than Polly that where he was most lacking
in appearance he was richest in substance. He carried scars honorably
earned in those differences he had been prone to cultivate with less
generous natures; for his scheme of life did not embrace the millennium.

"Thank God, you got here when you did!" said Carrington.

"We was some pushed fo' time, but we done it," responded the earl
modestly. He added, "What now?--do we make a landing?"

"No--unless it interferes with your plans not to. I 'want to get around
the next bend before we tie up. Later we'll all go back. Can I count on
you?"

"You shorely can. I consider this here as sociable a neighborhood as I
ever struck. It pleases me well. Folks are up and doing hereabout."

Carrington looked eagerly around in search of Betty. She was sitting
on an upturned tub, a pathetic enough figure as she drooped against the
wall of one of the shanties with all her courage quite gone from her. He
made his way quickly to her side.

"La!" whispered Polly in Chills and Fever's ear. "If that pore young
thing yonder keeps a widow it won't be because of any encouragement she
gets from Mr. Carrington. If I ever seen marriage in a man's eye I seen
it in his this minute!"

"Bruce!" cried Betty, starting up as Carrington approached. "Oh, Bruce,
I am so glad you have come--you are not hurt?" She accepted his presence
without question. She had needed him and he had not failed her.

"We are none of us hurt, Betty," he said gently, as he took her hand.

He saw that the suffering she had undergone during the preceding
twenty-four hours had left its record on her tired face and in her heavy
eyes. She retained a shuddering consciousness of the unchecked savagery
of those last moments on the keel boat; she was still hearing the oaths
of the men as they struggled together, the sound of blows, and the
dreadful silences that had followed them. She turned from him, and there
came the relief of tears.

"There, Betty, the danger is over now and you were so brave while it
lasted. I can't bear to have you cry!"

"I was wild with fear--all that time on the boat, Bruce--" she faltered
between her sobs. "I didn't know but they would find you out. I could
only wait and hope--and pray!"

"I was in no danger, dear. Didn't the girl tell you I was to take the
place of a man Slosson was expecting? He never doubted that I was that
man until a light--a signal it must have been--on the shore at the head
of the bayou betrayed me."

"Where are we going now, Bruce? Not the way they went--" and Betty
glanced out into the black void where the keel boat had merged into the
gloom.

"No, no--but we can't get the raft back up-stream against the current,
so the best thing is to land at the Bates' plantation below here; then
as soon as you are able we can return to Belle Plain," said Carrington.

There was an interval broken only by the occasional sweep of the great
steering oar as Cavendish coaxed the raft out toward the channel. The
thought of Charley Norton's murder rested on Carrington like a pall.
Scarcely a week had elapsed since he quitted Thicket Point and in that
week the hand of death had dealt with them impartially, and to what
end? Then the miles he had traversed in his hopeless journey up-river
translated themselves into a division of time as well as space. They
were just so much further removed from the past with its blight of
tragic terror. He turned and glanced at Betty. He saw that her eyes
held their steady look of wistful pity that was for the dead man; yet in
spite of this, and in spite of the bounds beyond which he would not
let his imagination carry him, the future enriched with sudden promise
unfolded itself. The deep sense of recovered hope stirred within him. He
knew there must come a day when he would dare to speak of his love, and
she would listen.

"It's best we should land at Bates' place--we can get teams there," he
went on to explain. "And, Betty, wherever we go we'll go together, dear.
Cavendish doesn't look as if he had any very urgent business of his own,
and I reckon the same is true of Yancy, so I am going to keep them
with us. There are some points to be cleared up when we reach Belle
Plain--some folks who'll have a lot to explain or else quit this part of
the state! And I intend to see that you are not left alone until--until
I have the right to take care of you for good and all--that's what
you want me to do one of these days, isn't it, darling?" and his eyes,
glowing and infinitely tender, dwelt on her upturned face.

But Betty shrank from him in involuntary agitation.

"Oh, not now, Bruce--not now--we mustn't speak of that--it's wrong--it's
wicked--you mustn't make me forget him!" she cried brokenly, in protest.

"Forgive me, Betty, I'll not speak of it again," he said.

"Wait, Bruce, and some time--Oh, don't make me say it," she gasped, "or
I shall hate myself!" for in his presence she was feeling the horror
of her past experience grow strangely remote, only the dull ache of
her memories remained, and to these she clung. They were silent for a
moment, then Carrington said:

"After I'm sure you'll be safe here perhaps I'll go south into the
Choctaw Purchase. I've been thinking of that recently; but I'll find my
way back here--don't misunderstand me--I'll not come too soon for even
you, Betty. I loved Norton. He was one of my best friends, too," he
continued gently. "But you know--and I know--dear, the day will come
when no matter where you are I shall find you again--find you and not
lose you!"

Betty made no answer in words, but a soft and eloquent little hand was
slipped into his and allowed to rest there.

Presently a light wind stirred the dead dense atmosphere, the mist
lifted and enveloped the shore, showing them the river between piled-up
masses of vapor. Apparently it ran for their raft alone. It was just
twenty-four hours since Carrington had looked upon such another night
but this was a different world the gray fog was unmasking--a world of
hopes, and dreams, and rich content. Then the thought of Norton--poor
Norton who had had his world, too, of hopes and dreams and rich
content--

The calm of a highly domestic existence had resumed its interrupted sway
on the raft. Mr. Cavendish, associated in Betty's memory with certain
earsplitting manifestations of ferocious rage, became in the bosom of
his family low-voiced and genial and hopelessly impotent to deal with
his five small sons; while Yancy was again the Bob Yancy of Scratch
Hill, violence of any sort apparently had no place in his nature. He was
deeply absorbed in Hannibal's account of those vicissitudes which had
befallen him during their separation. They were now seated before a
cheerful fire that blazed on the hearth, the boy very close to Yancy
with one hand clasped in the Scratch Hiller's, while about them were
ranged the six small Cavendishes sedately sharing in the reunion of
uncle and nevvy, toward which they felt they had honorably labored.

"And you wa'n't dead, Uncle Bob?" said Hannibal with a deep breath,
viewing Yancy unmistakably in the flesh.

"Never once. I been floating peacefully along with these here titled
friends of mine; but I was some anxious about you, son."

"And Mr. Slosson, Uncle Bob--did you smack him like you smacked Dave
Blount that day when he tried to steal me?" asked Hannibal, whose
childish sense of justice demanded reparation for the wrongs they had
suffered.

Mr. Yancy extended a big right hand, the knuckle of which was skinned
and bruised.

"He were the meanest man I ever felt obliged fo' to hit with my fist,
Nevvy; it appeared like he had teeth all over his face."

"Sho--where's his hide, Uncle Bob?" cried the little Cavendishes in
an excited chorus. "Sho--did you forget that?" They themselves had
forgotten the unique enterprise to which Mr. Yancy was committed, but
the allusion to Slosson had revived their memory of it.

"Well, he begged so piteous to be allowed fo' to keep his hide, I hadn't
the heart to strip it off," explained Mr. Yancy pleasantly. "And the
winter's comin' onat this moment I can feel a chill in the air--don't
you-all reckon he's goin' to need it fo' to keep the cold out,' Sho',
you mustn't be bloody-minded!"

"What was it about Mr. Slosson's hide, Uncle Bob?" demanded Hannibal.
"What was you a-goin' to do to that?"

"Why, Nevvy, after he beat me up and throwed me in the river, I was some
peevish fo' a spell in my feelings fo' him," said Yancy, in a tone of
gentle regret. He glanced at his bruised hand. "But I'm right pleased
to be able to say that I've got over all them oncharitable thoughts of
mine."

"And you seen the judge, Uncle Bob?" questioned Hannibal.

"Yes, I've seen the judge. We was together fo' part of a day. Me and him
gets on fine."

"Where is he now, Uncle Bob?"

"I reckon he's back at Belle Plain by this time. You see we left him
in Raleigh along after noon to 'tend to some business he had on hand. I
never seen a gentleman of his weight so truly spry on his legs--and all
about you, Nevvy; while as to mind! Sho--why, words flowed out of him as
naturally as water out of a branch."

Of Hannibal's relationship to the judge he said nothing. He felt that
was a secret to be revealed by the judge himself when he should see fit.

"Uncle Bob, who'm I going to live with now?" questioned Hannibal
anxiously.

"That p'int's already come up, Nevvy--him and me's decided that there
won't be no friction. You-all will just go on living with him."

"But what about you, Uncle Bob?" cried Hannibal, lifting a wistful
little face to Yancy's.

"Oh, me?--well, you-all will go right on living with me."

"And what will come of Mr. Mahaffy?"

"I reckon you-all will go right on living with him, too."

"Uncle Bob, you mean you reckon we are all going to live in one house?"

"I 'low it will have to be fixed that-a-ways," agreed Yancy.




CHAPTER XXXIII. THE JUDGE RECEIVES A LETTER


After he had parted with Solomon Mahaffy the judge applied himself
diligently to shaping that miracle-working document which he was
preparing as an offset to whatever risk he ran in meeting Fentress. As
sanguine as he was sanguinary he confidently expected to survive the
encounter, yet it was well to provide for a possible emergency--had he
not his grandson's future to consider? While thus occupied he saw the
afternoon stage arrive and depart from before the City Tavern.

Half an hour later Mr. Wesley, the postmaster, came sauntering up the
street. In his hand he carried a letter.

"Howdy," he drawled, from just beyond the judge's open door.

The judge glanced up, his quill pen poised aloft.

"Good evening, sir; won't you step inside and be seated?" he asked
graciously. His dealings with the United States mail service were of the
most insignificant description, and in personally delivering a letter,
if this was what had brought him there, he felt Mr. Wesley had reached
the limit of official courtesy and despatch.

"Well, sir; it looks like you'd never told us more than two-thirds of
the truth!" said the postmaster. He surveyed the judge curiously.

"I am complimented by your opinion of my veracity," responded that
gentleman promptly. "I consider two-thirds an enormously high per cent
to have achieved."

"There is something in that, too," agreed Mr. Wesley. "Who is Colonel
Slocum Price Turberville?"

The judge started up from his chair.

"I have that honor," said he, bowing.

"Well, here's a letter come in addressed like that, and as you've been
using part of the name I am willing to assume you're legally entitled
to the rest of it. It clears up a point that off and on has troubled me
considerable. I can only wonder I wa'n't smarter."

"What point, may I ask?"

"Why, about the time you hung out your shingle here, some one wrote a
letter to General Jackson. It was mailed after night, and when I seen it
in the morning I was clean beat. I couldn't locate the handwriting and
yet I kept that letter back a couple of days and give it all my spare
time. It ain't that I'm one of your spying sort--there's nothing of the
Yankee about me!"

"Certainly not," agreed the judge.

"Candid, Judge, I reckon you wrote that letter, seeing this one comes
under a frank from Washington. No, sir--I couldn't make out who was
corresponding with the president and it worried me, not knowing, more
than anything I've had to contend against since I came into office. I
calculate there ain't a postmaster in the United States takes a more
personal interest in the service than me. I've frequently set patrons
right when they was in doubt as to the date they had mailed such and
such a letter." As Mr. Wesley sometimes canceled as many as three or
four stamps in a single day he might have been pardoned his pride in a
brain which thus lightly dealt with the burden of official business. He
surrendered the letter with marked reluctance.

"Your surmise is correct," said the judge with dignity. "I had occasion
to write my friend, General Jackson, and unless I am greatly mistaken I
have my answer here." And with a fine air of indifference he tossed the
letter on the table.

"And do you know Old Hickory?" cried Mr. Wesley.

"Why not? Does it surprise you?" inquired the judge. It was only his
innate courtesy which restrained him from kicking the postmaster into
the street, so intense was his desire to be rid of him.

"No, I don't know as it does, judge. Naturally a public man like him is
in the way of meeting with all sorts. A politician can't afford to be
too blame particular. Well, next time you write you might just send
him my regards--G. W. M. de L. Wesley's regards--there was considerable
contention over my getting this office; I reckon he ain't forgot. There
was speeches made, I understand the lie was passed between two United
States senators, and that a quid of tobacco was throwed in anger."
Having thus clearly established the fact that he was a more or less
national character, Mr. Wesley took himself off.

When he had disappeared from sight down the street, the judge closed the
door. Then he picked up the letter. For along minute he held it in his
hand, uncertain, fearful, while his mind slipped back into the past
until his inward searching vision ferreted out a handsome soldierly
figure--his own.

"That's what Jackson remembers if he remembers anything!" he muttered,
as with trembling fingers he broke the seal. Almost instantly a smile
overspread his battered features. He hitched his chin higher and squared
his ponderous shoulders. "I am not forgotten--no, damn it--no!" he
exulted under his breath, "recalls me with sincere esteem and considers
my services to the country as well worthy of recognition--" the judge
breathed deep. What would Mahaffy find to say now! Certainly this was
well calculated to disturb the sour cynicism of his friend. His bleared
eyes brimmed. After all his groping he had touched hands with the
realities at last! Even a federal judgeship, though not an office of the
first repute in the south had its dignity--it signified something! He
would make Solomon his clerk! The judge reached for his hat. Mahaffy
must know at once that fortune had mended for them. Why, at that moment
he was actually in receipt of an income!

He sat down, the better to enjoy the unique sensation. Taxes were being
levied and collected with no other end in view than his stipend--his
ardent fancy saw the whole machinery of government in operation for his
benefit. It was a singular feeling he experienced. Then promptly his
spendthrift brain became active. He needed clothes--so did Mahaffy--so
did his grandson; they must take a larger house; he would buy himself a
man servant; these were pressing necessities as he now viewed them.

Once again he reached for his hat, the desire to rush off to Belle Plain
was overmastering.

"I reckon I'd be justified in hiring a conveyance from Pegloe," he
thought, but just here he had a saving memory of his unfinished task;
that claimed precedence and he resumed his pen.

An hour later Pegloe's black boy presented himself to the judge. He
came bearing a gift, and the gift appropriately enough was a square
case bottle of respectable size. The judge was greatly touched by
this attention, but he began by making a most temperate use of the
tavern-keeper's offering; then as the formidable document he was
preparing took shape under his hand he more and more lost that feeling
of Spartan fortitude which had at first sustained him in the presence of
temptation. He wrote and sipped in complete and quiet luxury, and when
at last he had exhausted the contents of the bottle it occurred to him
that it would be only proper personally to convey his thanks to Pegloe.
Perhaps he was not uninspired in this by ulterior hopes; if so, they
were richly rewarded. The resources of the City Tavern were suddenly
placed at his disposal. He attributed this to a variety of causes all
good and sufficient, but the real reason never suggested itself,
indeed it was of such a perfidious nature that the judge, open and
generous-minded, could not have grasped it.

By six o'clock he was undeniably drunk; at eight he was sounding
still deeper depths of inebriety with only the most confused memory of
impending events; at ten he collapsed and was borne up-stairs by Pegloe
and his black boy to a remote chamber in the kitchen wing. Here he was
undressed and put to bed, and the tavernkeeper, making a bundle of his
clothes, retired from the room, locking the door after him, and the
judge was doubly a prisoner.

Rousing at last from a heavy dreamless sleep the judge was aware of a
faint impalpable light in his room, the ashen light of a dull October
dawn. He was aware, too, of a feeling of profound depression. He knew
this was the aftermath of indulgence and that he might look forward
to forty-eight hours of utter misery of soul, and, groaning aloud, he
closed his eyes, Sleep was the thing if he could compass it. Instead,
his memory quickened. Something was to happen at sunup--he could not
recall what it was to be, though he distinctly remembered that Mahaffy
had spoken of this very matter--Mahaffy, the austere and implacable, the
disembodied conscience whose fealty to duty had somehow survived his own
spiritual ruin, so that he had become a sort of moral sign-post, ever
pointing the way yet never going it himself. The judge lay still and
thought deeply as the light intensified itself. What was it that Mahaffy
had said he was to do at sun-up? The very hour accented his suspicions.
Probably it was no more than some cheerless obligation to be met, or
Mahaffy would not have been so concerned about it. Eventually he decided
to refer everything to Mahaffy. He spoke his friend's name weakly and in
a shaking voice, but received no answer.

"Solomon!" he repeated, and shifting his position, looked in what should
have been the direction of the shake-down bed his friend occupied.
Neither the bed nor Mahaffy were there. The judge gasped he wondered if
this were not a premonition of certain hallucinations to which he was
not a stranger. Then all in a flash he remembered Fentress and the
meeting at Boggs', something of how the evening had been spent, and a
spasm of regret shook him.

"I had other things to think of. This must never happen again!" he told
himself remorsefully.

He was wide-awake now. Doubtless Pegloe had put him to bed. Well, that
had been thoughtful of Pegloe--he would not forget him--the City Tavern
should continue to enjoy his patronage. It would be something for Pegloe
to boast of that judge Slocum Price Turberville always made his place
headquarters when in Raleigh. Feeling that he had already conferred
wealth and distinction on the fortunate Pegloe the judge thrust his fat
legs over the side of his bed and stood erect. Stooping he reached for
his clothes. He confidently expected to find them on the floor, but
his hand merely swept an uncarpeted waste. The judge was profoundly
astonished.

"Maybe I've got 'em on, I don't recall taking them off!" he thought
hopefully. He moved uncertainly in the direction of the window where the
light showed him his own bare extremities. He reverted to his original
idea that his clothes were scattered about the floor.

He was beginning to experience a great sense of haste, it was two miles
to Boggs' and Fentress would be there at sun-up. Finally he abandoned
his quest of the missing garments and turned to the door. To say that
he was amazed when he found it locked would have most inadequately
described his emotions. Breathing deep, he fell back a step or two, and
then with all the vigor he could muster launched himself at the door.
But it resisted him. "It's bolted on the other side!" he muttered, the
full measure of Pegloe's perfidy revealing itself to his mind.

He was aghast. It was a plot to discredit him. Pegloe's hospitality had
been inspired by his enemy, for Pegloe was Fentress' tenant.

Again he attacked the door; he believed it might be possible to force it
from its hinges, but Pegloe had done his work too well for that, and at
last, spent and breathless, the judge dropped down on the edge of his
bed to consider the situation. He was without clothes and he was a
prisoner, yet his mind rose splendidly to meet the difficulties that
beset him. His greatest activities were reserved for what appeared to be
only a season of despair. He armed himself with a threelegged stool he
had found and turned once more to the door, but the stout planks stood
firm under his blows.

"Unless I get out of here in time I'm a ruined man!" thought the judge.
"After this Fentress will refuse to meet me!"

The window next engaged his attention. That, too, Pegloe had taken the
precaution to fasten, but a single savage blow of the stool shattered
glass and sash and left an empty space that framed the dawn's red glow.
The judge looked out and shook his head dubiously. It was twelve feet or
more to the ground, a risky drop for a gentleman of his years and build.
The judge considered making a rope of his bedding and lowering himself
to the ground by means of it, he remembered to have read of captives in
that interesting French prison, the Bastille, who did this. However, an
equally ingenious but much more simple use for his bedding occurred to
him; it would form a soft and yielding substance on which to alight.
He gathered it up into his arms, feather-tick and all, and pushed it
through the window, then he wriggled out across the ledge, feet first,
and lowering himself to the full length of his arms, dropped.

He landed squarely on the rolled-up bed with a jar that shook him to his
center. Almost gaily he snatched up a quilt, draping it about him after
the manner of a Roman, toga, and thus lightly habited, started across
Mr. Pegloe's truck-patch, his one thought Boggs' and the sun. It would
have served no purpose to have gone home, since his entire wardrobe,
except for the shirt on his back, was in the tavern-keeper's possession,
besides he had not a moment to lose, for the sun was peeping at him over
the horizon.

Unobserved he gained the edge of the town and the highroad that led past
Boggs' and stole a fearful glance over his shoulder. The sun was clear
of the treetops, he could even feel the lifeless dust grow warm beneath
his feet; and wrapping the quilt closer about him he broke into a
labored run.

Some twenty minutes later Boggs' came in sight. He experienced a moment
of doubt--suppose Fentress had been there and gone! It was a hideous
thought and the judge groaned. Then at the other end of the meadow near
the woods he distinguished several men, Fentress and his friends beyond
question. The judge laughed aloud. In spite of everything he was keeping
his engagement, he was plucking his triumph out of the very dregs of
failure. The judge threw himself over the fence, a corner of the quilt
caught on one of the rails; he turned to release it, and in that instant
two pistol shots rang out sharply in the morning air.




CHAPTER XXXIV. THE DUEL


It had been with no little reluctance that Solomon Mahaffy accompanied
Yancy and Cavendish to Belle Plain; he would have preferred to remain in
Raleigh in attendance upon judge Price. Intimately acquainted with the
judge's mental processes, he could follow all the devious workings of
that magnificent mind; he could fathom the simply hellish ingenuity
he was capable of putting forth to accomplish temporary benefits.
Permitting his thoughts to dwell upon the mingled strength and weakness
which was so curiously blended in Slocum Price's character, he had
horrid visions of that great soul, freed from the trammels of restraint,
confiding his melancholy history to Mr. Pegloe in the hope of bolstering
his fallen credit at the City Tavern.

Always where the judge was concerned he fluctuated between extremes of
doubt and confidence. He felt that under the urgent spur of occasion
his friend could rise to any emergency, while a sustained activity made
demands which he could not satisfy; then his efforts were discounted by
his insane desire to realize at once on his opportunities; in his haste
he was for ever plucking unripe fruit; and though he might keep one eye
on the main chance the other was fixed just as resolutely on the nearest
tavern.

With the great stake which fate had suddenly introduced into their
losing game, he wished earnestly to believe that the judge would stay
quietly in his office and complete the task he had set himself; that
with this off his hands the promise of excitement at Belle Plain
would compel his presence there, when he would pass somewhat under the
restraining influence which he was determined to exert; in short, to
Solomon, life embraced just the one vital consideration, which was to
maintain the judge in a state of sobriety until after his meeting with
Fentress.

The purple of twilight was stealing over the land when he and his two
companions reached Belle Plain. They learned that Tom Ware had returned
from Memphis, that the bayou had been dragged but without results, and
that as yet nothing had been heard from Carrington or the dogs he had
gone for.

Presently Cavendish and Yancy set off across the fields. They were going
on to the raft, to Polly and the six little Cavendishes, whom they had
not seen since early morning; but they promised to be back at Belle
Plain within an hour.

By very nature an alien, Mahaffy sought out a dark corner on the wide
porch that overlooked the river to await their return. The house had
been thrown open, and supper was being served to whoever cared to stay
and partake of it. The murmur of idle purposeless talk drifted out to
him; he was irritated and offended by it. There was something garish
in this indiscriminate hospitality in the very home of tragedy. As the
moments slipped by his sense of displeasure increased, with mankind
in general, with himself, and with the judge--principally with the
judge--who was to make a foolish target of himself in the morning. He
was going to give the man who had wrecked his life a chance to take
it as well. Mahaffy's cold logic dealt cynically with the preposterous
situation his friend had created.

In the midst of his angry meditations he heard a clock strike in the
hall and counted the strokes. It was nine o'clock. Surely Yancy and
Cavendish had been gone their hour! He quitted his seat and strolled
restlessly about the house. He felt deeply indignant with everybody and
everything. Human intelligence seemed but a pitiable advance on brute
instinct. A whole day had passed and what had been accomplished?
Carrington, the judge, Yancy, Cavendish--the four men who might have
worked together to some purpose had widely separated themselves; and
here was the duel, the very climax of absurdity. He resumed his dark
corner and waited another hour. Still no Carrington, and Yancy and
Cavendish had not come up from the raft.

"Fools!" thought Mahaffy bitterly. "All of them fools!"

At last he decided to go back to the judge; and a moment later was
hurrying down the lane in the direction of the highroad, but, jaded
as he was by the effort he had already put forth that day, the walk
to Raleigh made tremendous demands on him, and it was midnight when he
entered the little town.

It can not be said that he was altogether surprised when he found
their cottage dark and apparently deserted. He had half expected
this. Entering, and not stopping to secure a candle, he groped his way
up-stairs to the room on the second floor which he and the judge shared.

"Price!" he called, but this gained him no response, and he cursed
softly under his breath.

He hastily descended to the kitchen, lighted a candle, and stepped into
the adjoining room. On the table was a neat pile of papers, and
topping the pile was the president's letter. Being burdened by no
false scruples, and thinking it might afford some clue to the judge's
whereabouts, Mahaffy took it up and read it. Having mastered its
contents he instantly glanced in the direction of the City Tavern, but
it was wrapped in darkness.

"Price is drunk somewhere," was his definite conclusion. "But he'll be
at Boggs' the first thing in the morning--most likely so far gone he
can hardly stand!" The letter, with its striking news, made little or no
impression on him just then; it merely furnished the clue he had sought.
The judge was off somewhere marketing his prospects.

After a time Mahaffy went up-stairs, and, without removing his clothes,
threw himself on the bed. He was worn down to the point of exhaustion,
yet he could not sleep, though the deep silence warned him that day was
not far off. What if--but he would not let the thought shape itself in
his mind. He had witnessed the judge's skill with the pistol, and he had
even a certain irrational faith in that gentleman's destiny. He prayed
God that Fentress might die quickly and decently with the judge's bullet
through his brain. Over and over in savage supplication he muttered his
prayer that Fentress might die.

He began to watch for the coming of the dawn, but before the darkness
lifted he had risen from the bed and gone downstairs, where he made
himself a cup of wretched coffee. Then he blew out his candle and
watched the gray light spread. He was impatient now to be off, and fully
an hour before the sun, set out for Boggs', a tall, gaunt figure in the
shadowy uncertainty of that October morning. He was the first to reach
the place of meeting, but he had scarcely entered the meadow when
Fentress rode up, attended by Tom Ware. They dismounted, and the colonel
lifted his hat. Mahaffy barely acknowledged the salute; he was in no
mood for courtesies that meant nothing. Ware was clearly of the same
mind.

There was an awkward pause, then Fentress and Ware spoke together in
a low tone. The planter's speech was broken and hoarse, and his heavy,
bloodshot eyes were the eyes of a haunted man; this was all a part of
Fentress' scheme to face the world, and Ware still believed that the
fires Hicks had kindled had served his desperate need.

When the first long shadows stole out from the edge of the woods
Fentress turned to Mahaffy, whose glance was directed toward the distant
corner of the field, where he knew his friend must first appear.

"Why are we waiting, sir?" he demanded, his tone cold and formal.

"Something has occurred to detain Price," answered Mahaffy.

The colonel and Ware exchanged looks. Again they spoke together, while
Mahaffy watched the road. Ten minutes slipped by in this manner, and
once more Fentress addressed Mahaffy.

"Do you know what could have detained him?" he inquired, the ghost of a
smile curling his thin lips.

"I don't," said Mahaffy, and relapsed into a moody and anxious silence.
He held dueling in very proper abhorrence, and only his feeling of
intense but never-declared loyalty to his friend had brought him there.

Another interval of waiting succeeded.

"I have about reached the end of my patience; I shall wait just ten
minutes longer," said Fentress, and drew out his watch.

"Something has happened--" began Mahaffy.

"I have kept my engagement; he should have kept his," Fentress
continued, addressing Ware. "I am sorry to have brought you here for
nothing, Tom."

"Wait!" said Mahaffy, planting himself squarely before Fentress.

"I consider this comic episode at an end," and Fentress pocketed his
watch.

"Scarcely!" rejoined Mahaffy. His long arm shot out and the open palm of
his hand descended on the colonel's face. "I am here for my friend," he
said grimly.

The colonel's face paled and colored by turns.

"Have you a weapon?" he asked, when he could command his voice. Mahaffy
exhibited the pistol he had carried to Belle Plain the day before.

"Step off the ground, Tom." Fentress spoke quietly. When Ware had done
as he requested, the colonel spoke again. "You are my witness that I was
the victim of an unprovoked attack."

Mr. Ware accepted this statement with equanimity, not to say
indifference.

"Are you ready?" he asked; he glanced at Mahaffy, who by a slight
inclination of the head signified that he was. "I reckon you're a green
hand at this sort of thing?" commented Tom evilly.

"Yes," said Mahaffy tersely.

"Well, listen: I shall count, one, two, three; at the word three you
will fire. Now take your positions."

Mahaffy and the colonel stood facing each other, a distance of twelve
paces separating them. Mahaffy was pale but dogged, he eyed Fentress
unflinchingly. Quick on the word Fentress fired, an instant later
Mahaffy's pistol exploded; apparently neither bullet had taken effect,
the two men maintained the rigid attitude they had assumed; then Mahaffy
was seen to turn on his heels, next his arm dropped to his side and the
pistol slipped from his fingers, a look of astonishment passed over his
face and left it vacant and staring while his right hand stole up toward
his heart; he raised it slowly, with difficulty, as though it were held
down by some invisible weight.

A hush spread across the field. It was like one of nature's invisible
transitions. Along the edge of the woods the song of birds was stricken
into silence. Ware, heavy-eyed Fentress, his lips twisted by a tortured
smile, watched Mahaffy as he panted for breath, with his hand clenched
against his chest. That dead oppressive silence lasted but a moment,
from out of it came a cry that smote on the wounded man's ears and
reached his consciousness.

"It's Price--" he gasped, his words bathed in blood, and he pitched
forward on his face.

Ware and Fentress had heard the cry, too, and running to their horses
threw themselves into the saddle and galloped off. The judge midway of
the meadow roared out a furious protest but the mounted men turned into
the highroad and vanished from sight, and the judge's shaking legs bore
him swiftly in the direction of the gaunt figure on the ground.

Mahaffy struggled to rise, for he was hearing his friend's voice now,
the voice of utter anguish, calling his name. At last painful effort
brought him to his knees. He saw the judge, clothed principally in
a gaily colored bed-quilt, hatless and shoeless, his face sodden and
bleary from his night's debauch. Mahaffy stood erect and staggered
toward him, his hand over his wound, his features drawn and livid, then
with a cry he dropped at his friend's feet.

"Solomon! Solomon!" And the judge knelt beside him.

"It's all right, Price; I kept your appointment," whispered Mahaffy; a
bloody spume was gathering on his lips, and he stared up at his friend
with glassy eyes.

In very shame the judge hid his face in his hands, while sobs shook him.

"Solomon--Solomon, why did you do this?" he cried miserably.

The harsh lines on the dying man's face erased themselves.

"You're the only friend I've known in twenty years of loneliness, Price.
I've loved you like a brother," he panted, with a pause between each
word.

Again the judge buried his face in his hands.

"I know it, Solomon--I know it!" he moaned wretchedly.

"Price, you are still a man to be reckoned with. There's the boy; take
your place for his sake and keep it--you can."

"I will--by God, I will!" gasped the judge. "You hear me? You hear me,
Solomon? By God's good help, I will!"

"You have the president's letter--I saw it," said Mahaffy in a whisper.

"Yes!" cried the judge. "Solomon, the world is changing for us!"

"For me most of all," murmured Mahaffy, and there was a bleak instant
when the judge's ashen countenance held the full pathos of age and
failure. "Remember your oath, Price," gasped the dying man. A moment of
silence succeeded. Mahaffy's eyes closed, then the heavy lids slid back.
He looked up at the judge while the harsh lines of his sour old face
softened wonderfully. "Kiss me, Price," he whispered, and as the judge
bent to touch him on the brow, the softened lines fixed themselves in
death, while on his lips lingered a smile that was neither bitter nor
sneering.




CHAPTER XXXV. A CRISIS AT THE COURT-HOUSE


In that bare upper room they had shared, the judge, crushed and broken,
watched beside the bed on which the dead man lay; unconscious of the
flight of time he sat with his head bowed in his hands, having scarcely
altered his position since he begged those who carried Mahaffy up the
narrow stairs to leave him alone with his friend.

He was living over the past. He recalled his first meeting with Mahaffy
in the stuffy cabin of the small river packet from which they had later
gone ashore at Pleasantville; he thanked God that it had been given
him to see beneath Solomon's forbidding exterior and into that starved
heart! He reviewed each phase of the almost insensible growth of their
intimacy; he remembered Mahaffy's fine true loyalty at the time of his
arrest--he thought of Damon and Pythias--Mahaffy had reached the heights
of a sublime devotion; he could only feel enobled that he had inspired
it.

At last the dusk of twilight invaded the room. He lighted the candles
on the chimneypiece, then he resumed his seat and his former attitude.
Suddenly he became aware of a small hand that was resting on his arm and
glanced up; Hannibal had stolen quietly into the room. The boy pointed
to the still figure on the bed.

"Judge, what makes Mr. Mahaffy lie so quiet--is he dead?" he asked in a
whisper.

"Yes, dear lad," began the judge in a shaking voice as he drew Hannibal
toward him, "your friend and mine is dead--we have lost him." He lifted
the boy into his lap, and Hannibal pressed a tear-stained face against
the judge's shoulder. "How did you get here?" the judge questioned
gently.

"Uncle Bob fetched me," said Hannibal. "He's down-stairs, but he didn't
tell me Mr. Mahaffy was dead-"

"We have sustained a great loss, Hannibal, and we must never forget the
moral grandeur of the man. Some day, when you are older, and I can bring
myself to speak of it, I will tell you of his last moments." The judge's
voice broke, a thick sob rose chokingly in his throat. "Poor Solomon! A
man of such tender feeling that he hid it from the world, for his was a
rare nature which only revealed itself to the chosen few he honored with
his love." The judge lapsed into a momentary brooding silence, in which
his great arms drew the boy closer against his heart. "Dear lad, since I
left you at Belle Plain a very astonishing knowledge has come to me.
It was the Hand of Providence--I see it now--that first brought us
together. You must not call me judge any more; I am your grandfather
your mother was my daughter."

Hannibal instantly sat erect and looked up at the judge, his blue eyes
wide with amazement at this extraordinary statement.

"It is a very strange story, Hannibal, and its links are not all in my
hands, but I am sure because of what I already know. I, who thought that
not a drop of my blood flowed in any veins but my own, live again in
you. Do you understand what I am telling you? Your are my own dear
little grandson--" and the judge looked down with no uncertain love and
pride into the small face upturned to his.

"I am glad if you are my grandfather, judge," said Hannibal very
gravely. "I always liked you."

"Thank you, dear lad," responded the judge with equal gravity, and then
as Hannibal nestled back in his grandfather's arms a single big tear
dropped from the end of that gentleman's prominent nose.

"There will be many and great changes in store for us," continued the
judge. "But as we met adversity with dignity, I am sure we shall be able
to endure prosperity with equanimity, only unworthy natures are affected
by what is at best superficial and accidental. I mean that the blight of
poverty is about to be lifted from our lives."

"Do you mean we ain't going to be pore any longer, grandfather?" asked
Hannibal.

The judge regarded him with infinite tenderness of expression; he was
profoundly moved.

"Would you mind saying that again, dear lad?"

"Do you mean we ain't going to be pore any longer, grandfather?"
repeated Hannibal.

"I shall enjoy an adequate competency which I am about to recover. It
will be sufficient for the indulgence of those simple and intellectual
tastes I propose to cultivate for the future." In spite of himself the
judge sighed. This was hardly in line with his ideals, but the right to
choose was no longer his. "You will be very rich, Hannibal. The Quintard
lands--your grandmother was a Quintard--will be yours; they run up into
the hundred of thousand of acres here about; this land will all be yours
as soon as I can establish your identity."

"Will Uncle Bob be rich too?" inquired Hannibal.

"Certainly. How can he be poor when we possess wealth?" answered the
judge.

"You reckon he will always live with us, don't you, grandfather?"

"I would not have it otherwise. I admire Mr. Yancy--he is simple and
direct, and fit for any company under heaven except that of fools. His
treatment of you has placed me under everlasting obligations; he shall
share what we have. My one bitter, unavailing regret is that Solomon
Mahaffy will not be here to partake of our altered fortunes." And the
judge sighed deeply.

"Uncle Bob told me Mr. Mahaffy got hurt in a duel, grandfather?" said
Hannibal.

"He was as inexperienced as a child in the use of firearms, and he had
to deal with scoundrels who had neither mercy nor generous feeling--but
his courage was magnificent."

Presently Hannibal was deep in his account of those adventures he had
shared with Miss Betty.

"And Miss Malroy--where is she now?" asked the judge, in the first pause
of the boy's narrative.

"She's at Mr. Bowen's house. Mr. Carrington and Mr. Cavendish are
here too. Mrs. Cavendish stayed down yonder at the Bates' plantation.
Grandfather, it were Captain Murrell who had me stole--do you reckon he
was going to take me back to Mr. Bladen?"

"I will see Miss Malroy in the morning. We must combine--our interests
are identical. There should be hemp in this for more than one scoundrel!
I can see now how criminal my disinclination to push myself to the front
has been!" said the judge, with conviction. "Never again will I shrink
from what I know to be a public duty."

A little later they went down-stairs, where the judge had Yancy make up
a bed for himself and Hannibal on the floor. He would watch alone beside
Mahaffy, he was certain this would have been the dead man's wish; then
he said good night and mounted heavily to the floor above to resume his
vigil and his musings.

Just at daybreak Yancy was roused by the pressure of a hand on his
shoulder, and opening his eyes saw that the judge was bending over him.

"Dress!" he said briefly. "There's every prospect of trouble--get your
rifle and come with me!"

Yancy noted that this prospect of trouble seemed to afford the judge
a pleasurable sensation; indeed, he had quite lost his former air of
somber and suppressed melancholy.

"I let you sleep, thinking you needed the rest," the judge went on.
"But ever since midnight we've been on the verge of riot and possible
bloodshed. They've arrested John Murrell--it's claimed he's planned a
servile rebellion! A man named Hues, who had wormed his way into his
confidence, made the arrest. He carried Murrell into Memphis, but the
local magistrate, intimidated, most likely, declined to have anything to
do with holding him. In spite of this, Hues managed to get his prisoner
lodged in jail, but along about nightfall the situation began to look
serious. Folks were swarming into town armed to the teeth, and Hues
fetched Murrell across country to Raleigh--"

"Yes?" said Yancy.

"Well, the sheriff has refused to take Murrell into custody. Hues has
him down at the court-house, but whether or not he is going to be able
to hold him is another matter!"

Yancy and Hannibal had dressed by this time, and the judge led the way
from the house. The Scratch Hiller looked about him. Across the street
a group of men, the greater number of whom were armed, stood in front
of Pegloe's tavern. Glancing in the direction of the court-house, he
observed that the square before it held other groups. But what impressed
him more was the ominous silence that was everywhere. At his elbow the
judge was breathing deep.

"We are face to face with a very deplorable condition, Mr. Yancy. Court
was to sit here to-day, but judge Morrow and the public prosecutor have
left town, and as you see, Murrell's friends have gathered for a rescue.
There's a sprinkling of the better element--but only a sprinkling. I saw
judge Morrow this morning at four o'clock--I told him I would obligate
myself to present for his consideration evidence of a striking and
sensational character, evidence which would show conclusively that
Murrell should be held to await the action of the next grand jury--this
was after a conference with Hues--I guaranteed his safety. Sir, the man
refused to listen to me! He showed himself utterly devoid of any feeling
of public duty." The bitter sense of failure and futility was leaving
the judge. The situation made its demands on that basic faith in his own
powers which remained imbedded in his character.

They had entered the court-house square. 'On the steps of the building
Betts was arguing loudly with Hues, who stood in the doorway, rifle in
hand.

"Maybe you don't know this is county property?" the sheriff was saying.
"And that you have taken unlawful possession of it for an unlawful
purpose? I am going to open them doors-a passel of strangers can't keep
folks out of a building their own money has bought and paid for!" While
he was speaking, the judge had pushed his way through the crowd to the
foot of the steps.

"That was very nicely said, Mr. Betts," observed the judge. He smiled
widely and sweetly. The sheriff gave him a hostile glare. "Do you know
that Morrow has left town?" the judge went on.

"I ain't got nothing to do with judge Morrow. It's my duty to see that
this building is ready for him when he's a mind to open court in it."

"You are willing to assume the responsibility of throwing open these
doors?" inquired the judge affably.

"I shorely am," said Betts. "Why, some of these folks are our leading
people!"

The judge turned to the crowd, and spoke in a tone of excessive
civility. "Just a word, gentlemen!--the sheriff is right; it is your
court-house and you should not be kept out of it. No doubt there are
some of you whose presence in this building will sooner or later be
urgently desired. We are going to let all who wish to enter, but I beg
you to remember that there will be five men inside whose prejudices
are all in favor of law and order." He pushed past Hues and entered the
court-house, followed by Yancy and Hannibal. "We'll let 'em in where I
can talk to 'em," he said almost gaily. "Besides, they'll come in anyhow
when they get ready, so there's no sense in exciting them."

In the court-house, Murrell, bound hand and foot, was seated between
Carrington and the Earl of Lambeth in the little railed-off space below
the judge's bench. Fear and suffering had blanched his unshaven cheeks
and given a wild light to his deeply sunken eyes. At sight of Yancy a
smothered exclamation broke from his lips, he had supposed this man dead
these many months!

Hues had abandoned his post and the crowd, suddenly grown clamorous,
stormed the narrow entrance. One of the doors, borne from its hinges,
went down with a crash. The judge, a fierce light flashing from his
eyes, turned to Yancy.

"No matter what happens, this fellow Murrell is not to escape--if he
calls on his friends to rescue him he is to be shot!"

The hall was filling with swearing, struggling men, the floor shook
beneath their heavy tread; then they burst into the court-room and
saluted Murrell with a great shout. But Murrell, bound, in rags, and
silent, his lips frozen in a wolfish grin, was a depressing sight, and
the boldest felt something of his unrestrained lawlessness go from him.

Less noisy now, the crowd spread itself out among the benches or swarmed
up into the tiny gallery at the back of the building. Man after man had
hurried forward, intent on passing beyond the railing, but each lead
encountered the judge, formidable and forbidding, and had turned
aside. Gradually the many pairs of eyes roving over the little group
surrounding the outlaw focussed themselves on Slocum Price. It was in
unconscious recognition of that moral force which was his, a tribute to
the grim dignity of his unshaken courage; what he would do seemed worth
considering.

He was charmed to hear his name pass in a whisper from lip to lip. Well,
it was time they knew him! He squared his ponderous shoulders and made a
gesture commanding silence. Battered, shabby and debauched, he was
like some old war horse who sniffs the odor of battle that the wind
incontinently brings to his nostrils.

"Don't let him speak!" cried a voice, and a tumult succeeded.

Cool and indomitable the judge waited for it to subside. He saw that the
color was stealing back into Murrell's face. The outlaw was feeling that
he was a leader not overthrown, these were his friends and followers,
his safety was their safety too. In a lull in the storm of sound the
judge attempted to make himself heard, but his words were lost in the
angry roar that descended on him.

"Don't let him speak! Kill him! Kill him!"

A score of men sprang to their feet and from all sides came the click
of rifle and pistol hammers as they were drawn to the full cock. The
judge's fate seemed to rest on a breath. He swung about on his heel and
gave a curt nod to Yancy and Cavendish, who, falling back a step, tossed
their guns to their shoulders and covered Murrell. A sudden hush grew up
out of the tumult; the cries, angry and jeering, dwindled to a murmur,
and a dead pall of silence rested on the crowded room.

The very taste of triumph was in the judge's mouth. Then came a
commotion at the back of the building, a whispered ripple of comment,
and Colonel Fentress elbowed his way through the crowd. At sight of his
enemy the judge's face went from white to red, while his eyes blazed;
but for the moment the force of his emotions left him speechless. Here
and there, as he advanced, Fentress recognized a friend and bowed coolly
to the right and left.

"What does this ridiculous mockery mean?" he demanded harshly. "Mr.
Sheriff, as a member of the bar, I protest! Why don't you clear the
building?" He did not wait for Betts to answer him, but continued.
"Where is this man Hues?"

"Yonder, Colonel, by the captain," said Betts.

"I have a warrant for his arrest. You will take him into custody."

"Wait!" cried the judge. "I represent Mr. Hues. I desire to see that
warrant!"

But Fentress ignored him. He addressed the crowded benches.

"Gentlemen, it is a serious matter forcibly to seize a man without
authority from the courts and expose him to the danger of mob
violence--Mr. Hues will learn this before we have done with him."

Instantly there was a noisy demonstration that swelled into a burst
of applause, which quickly spent itself. The struggle seemed to have
narrowed to an individual, contest for supremacy between Fentress and
the judge. On the edge of the railed off space they confronted each
other: the colonel, a tall, well-cared-for presence; the judge shabby
and unkempt. For a moment their eyes met, while the judge's face purpled
and paled, and purpled again. The silence deepened. Fentress' thin lips
opened, twitched, but no sound came from them; then his glance wavered
and fell. He turned away.

"Mr. Sheriff!" he called sharply.

"All right, Colonel!"

"Take your man into custody," ordered Fentress. As he spoke he handed
the warrant to Betts, who looked at it, grinned, and stepped toward
Hues. He would have pushed the judge aside had not that gentleman,
bowing civilly, made way for him.

"In my profound respect for the law and properly constituted authority I
yield to no man, not even to Colonel Fentress," he said, with a gracious
gesture. "I would not place the slightest obstacle in the way of its
sanctioned manifestation. Colonel Fentress comes here with that high
sanction." He bowed again ceremoniously to the colonel. "I repeat, I
respect his dependence upon the law!" He whirled suddenly.

"Cavendish--Yancy--Carrington--I call upon you to arrest John Murrell! I
do this by virtue of the authority vested in me as a judge of the United
States Federal Court. His crime--a mere trifle, my friends--passing
counterfeit money! Colonel Fentress will inform you that this is a
violation of the law which falls within my jurisdiction," and he beamed
blandly on Fentress.

"It's a lie!" cried the colonel.

"You'll answer for that later!" said the judge, with abrupt austerity of
tone.

"For all we know you may be some fugitive from justice! Why, your name
isn't Price!"

"Are you sure of that?" asked the judge quickly.

"You're an impostor! Your name is Turberville!"

"Permit me to relieve your apprehensions. It is Turberville who has
received the appointment. Would you like to examine my credentials?--I
have them by me--no? I am obliged for your introduction. It could not
have come at a more timely moment!" The judge seemed to dismiss Fentress
contemptuously. Once more he faced the packed benches. "Put down your
weapons!" he commanded. "This man Murrell will not be released. At the
first effort at rescue he will be shot where he sits--we have sworn
it--his plotting is at an end." He stalked nearer the benches. "Not one
chance in a thousand remains to him. Either he dies here or he lives to
betaken before every judge in the state, if necessary, until we find one
with courage to try him! Make no mistake--it will best conserve the ends
of justice to allow the state court's jurisdiction in this case; and I
pledge myself to furnish evidence which will start him well on his road
to the gallows!" The judge, a tremendous presence, stalked still nearer
the benches. Outfacing the crowd, a sense of the splendor of the part
he was being called upon to play flowed through him like some elixir;
he felt that he was transcending himself, that his inspiration was drawn
from the hidden springs of the spirit, and that he could neither falter
nor go astray. "You don't know what you are meddling with! This man
has plotted to lay the South in ruins--he has been arming the
negroes--it--it is incredible that you should all know this--to such I
say, go home and thank God for your escape! For the others"--his shaggy
brows met in a menacing frown--"if they force our hand we will toss them
John Murrell's dead carcass--that's our answer to their challenge!"

He strode out among the gun muzzles which wavered where they still
covered him. He was thinking of Mahaffy--Mahaffy, who had said he was
still a man to be reckoned with. For the comfort of his own soul he was
proving it.

"Do you know what a servile insurrection means?--you men who have wives
and daughters, have you thought of their fate? Of the monstrous savagery
to which they would be exposed? Do you believe he could limit and
control it? Look at him! Why, he has never had a consideration outside
of his own safety, and yet he expects you to risk your necks to save
his! He would have left the state before the first blow was struck--his
business was all down river--but we are going to keep him here to answer
for his crimes! The law, as implacable as it is impartial, has put its
mark on him--the shadow in which he sits is the shadow of the gallows!"

The judge paused, but the only sound in that expectant silence was the
heavy breathing of men. He drew his unwieldy form erect, while his voice
rumbled on, aggressive and threatening in its every intonation.

"You are here to defend something that no longer exists. Your
organization is wrecked, your signals and passwords are known, your
secrets have become public property--I can even produce a list of your
members; there are none of you who do not stand in imminent peril--yet
understand, I have no wish to strike at those who have been misled or
coerced into joining Murrell's band!" The judge's sodden old face glowed
now with the magnanimity of his sentiments. "But I have no feeling
of mercy for your leaders, none for Murrell himself. Put down your
guns!--you can only kill us after we have killed Murrell--but you can't
kill the law! If the arch conspirator dies in this room and hour, on
whose head will the punishment fall?" He swung round his ponderous arm
in a sweeping gesture and shook a fat but expressive forefinger in the
faces of those nearest him. "On yours--and yours--and yours!"

Across the space that separated them the judge grinned his triumph at
his enemy. He had known when Fentress entered the room that a word or
a sign from him would precipitate a riot, but he knew now that neither
this word nor this sign would be given. Then quite suddenly he strode
down the aisle, and foot by foot Fentress yielded ground before his
advance. A murderous light flashed from the judge's bloodshot eyes and
his right hand was stealing toward the frayed tails of his coat.

"Look out--he's getting ready to shoot!" cried a frightened voice.

Instantly by doors and windows the crowd, seized with inexplicable
panic, emptied itself into the courthouse yard. Fentress was caught
up in the rush and borne from the room and from the building. When he
reached the graveled space below the steps he turned. The judge was in
the doorway, the center of a struggling group; Mr. Bowen, the minister,
Mr. Saul and Mr. Wesley were vainly seeking to pinion his arm.

"Draw--damn you!" he roared at Fentress, as he wrenched himself free,
and the crowd swayed to right and left as Fentress was seen to reach for
his pistol.

Mr. Saul made a last frantic effort to restrain his friend; he seized
the judge's arm just as the latter's finger pressed the trigger, and
an instant later Fentress staggered back with the judge's bullet in his
shoulder.




CHAPTER XXXVI. THE END AND THE BEGINNING


It was not strange that a number of gentlemen in and about Raleigh
yielded to an overmastering impulse to visit newer lands, nor was it
strange that the initial steps looking toward the indulgence of their
desires should have been taken in secrecy. Mr. Pegloe was one of the
first to leave; Mr. Saul had informed him of the judge's declared
purpose of shooting him on sight. Even without this useful hint the
tavern-keeper had known that he should experience intense embarrassment
in meeting the judge; this was now a dreary certainty.

"You reckon he means near all he says?" he had asked, his fat sides
shaking.

"I'd take his word a heap quicker than I would most folks," answered Mr.
Saul with conviction.

Pegloe promptly had a sinking spell. He recalled the snuffing of
the candles by the judge, an extremely depressing memory under the
circumstances, also the reckless and headlong disregard of consequences
which had characterized so many of that gentleman's acts, and his plans
shaped themselves accordingly, with this result: that when the judge
took occasion to call at the tavern, and the hostile nature of his visit
was emphasized by the cautious manner of his approach, he was greatly
shocked to discover that his intended victim had sold his business
overnight for a small lump sum to Mr. Saul's brother-in-law, who had
appeared most opportunely with an offer.

Pegloe's flight created something of a sensation, but it was dwarfed by
the sensation that developed a day or so later when it became known
that Tom Ware and Colonel Fentress had likewise fled the country. Still
later, Fentress' body, showing marks of violence, was washed ashore at a
wood-yard below Girard. It was conjectured that he and Ware had set
out from The Oaks to cross the river; there was reason to believe that
Fentress had in his possession at the time a considerable sum of money,
and it was supposed that his companion had murdered and robbed him. Of
Ware's subsequent career nothing was ever known.

These were, after all, only episodes in the collapse of the Clan,
sporific manifestations of the great work of disintegration that was
going forward and which the judge, more than any other, perhaps, had
brought about. This was something no one questioned, and he quickly
passed to the first phase of that unique and peculiar esteem in which he
was ever after held. His fame widened with the succeeding suns; he had
offers of help which impressed him as so entirely creditable to human
nature that he quite lacked the heart to refuse them, especially as he
felt that in the improvement of his own condition the world had bettered
itself and was moving nearer those sound and righteous ideals of
morality and patriotism which had never lacked his indorsement, no
matter how inexpedient it had seemed for him to put them into practice.
But he was not diverted from his ultimate purpose by the glamour of
a present popularity; he was able to keep his bleared eyes resolutely
fixed on the main chance, namely the Fentress estate and the Quintard
lands. It was highly important that he should go east to South Carolina
to secure documentary evidence that would establish his own and
Fentress' identity, to Kentucky, where Fentress had lived prior to his
coming to Tennessee.

Early in November the judge set out by stage on his journey east; he was
accompanied by Yancy and Hannibal, from neither of whom could he bring
himself to be separated; and as the woods, flaming now with the touch of
frost, engulfed the little town, he turned in his seat and looked back.
He had entered it by that very road, a beggar on foot and in rags;
he was leaving it in broadcloth and fine linen, visible tokens of his
altered fortunes. More than this, he could thrust his hands deep down
into his once empty pockets and hear the clink of gold and silver. The
judge slowly withdrew his eyes from the last gray roof that showed among
the trees, and faced the east and the future with a serenely confident
expression.

Betty Malroy and Carrington had ridden into Raleigh to take leave of
their friends. They had watched the stage from sight, had answered the
last majestic salute the judge had given them across the swaying top of
the coach before the first turn of the road hid it from sight, and then
they had turned their horses' heads in the direction of Belle Plain.

"Bruce, do you think judge Price will ever be able to accomplish all he
hopes to?" Betty asked when they had left the town behind. She drew
in her horse as she spoke, and they went forward at a walk under the
splendid arch of the forest and over a carpet of vivid leaves.

"I reckon he will, Betty," responded Carrington. Unfavorable as had
been his original estimate of the judge's character, events had greatly
modified it.

"He really seems quite sure, doesn't he?" said Betty.

"There's not a doubt in his mind," agreed Carrington.

He was still at Belle Plain, living in what had been Ware's office,
while the Cavendishes were domiciled at the big house. He had arranged
with the judge to crop a part of that hopeful gentleman's land the very
next season; the fact that a lawsuit intervened between the judge and
possession seemed a trifling matter, for Carrington had become infected
with the judge's point of view, which did not admit of the possibility
of failure; but he had not yet told Betty of his plans. Time enough for
that when he left Belle Plain.

His silence concerning the future had caused Betty much thought. She
wondered if he still intended going south into the Purchase; she was not
sure but it was the dignified thing for him to do. She was thinking of
this now as they went forward over the rustling leaves, and at length
she turned in the saddle and faced him.

"I am going to miss Hannibal dreadfully--yes, and the judge, and Mr.
Yancy!" she began.

"And when I leave--how about me, Betty?" Carrington asked unexpectedly,
but he only had in mind leaving Belle Plain.

A little sigh escaped Betty's red lips, for she was thinking of the
Purchase, which lay far down the river, many, many miles distant. The
sigh was ever so little, but Carrington had heard it.

"I am to be missed, too, am I, Betty?" he inquired, leaning toward her.

"You, Bruce?--Oh, I shall miss you, too--dreadfully--but then, perhaps
in five years, when you come back--"

"Five years!" cried Carrington, but he understood, something of what
was passing in her mind, and laughed shortly. "Five years, Betty?" he
repeated, dwelling on the numeral.

Betty hesitated and looked thoughtful. Presently she stole a
surreptitious glance at Carrington from under her long lashes, and went
on slowly, as though she were making careful choice of her words.

"When you come back in three years, Bruce--"

Carrington still regarded her fixedly. There was a light in his black
eyes that seemed to penetrate to the most secret recesses of her heart
and soul.

"Three years, Betty?" he repeated again.

Betty, her eyes cast down, twisted her rein nervously between her slim,
white fingers, but Carrington's steady glance never left her sweet face,
framed by its halo of bright hair. She stole another look at him from
beneath her dark lashes.

"Three years, Betty?" he prompted.

"Bruce, don't stare at me that way, it makes me forget what I was going
to say! When you come, back--next year--" and then she lifted her eyes
to his and he saw that they were full of sudden tears. "Bruce, don't go
away--don't go away at all--"

Carrington slipped from the saddle and stood at her side.

"Do you mean that, Betty?" he asked. He took her hands loosely in his
and relentlessly considered her crimsoned face. "I reckon it will always
be right hard to refuse you anything--here is one settler the Purchase
will never get!" and he laughed softly.

"It was the Purchase--you were going there!" she cried.

"No, I wasn't, Betty; that notion died its natural death long ago. When
we are sure you will be safe at Belle Plain with just the Cavendishes,
I am going into Raleigh to wait as best I can until spring." He spoke so
gravely, that she asked in quick alarm.

"And then, Bruce--what?"

"And then--Oh, Betty, I'm starving--" All in a moment he lifted her
slender figure in his arms, gathering her close to him. "And then,
this--and this--and this, sweetheart--and more--and--oh, Betty! Betty!"

When Murrell was brought to trial his lawyers were able to produce a
host of witnesses whose sworn testimony showed that so simple a thing as
perjury had no terrors for them. His fight for liberty was waged in and
out of court with incredible bitterness, and, as judge and jury were
only human, the outlaw escaped with the relatively light sentence of
twelve years' imprisonment; he died, however, before the expiration of
his term.

The judge, where he returned to Raleigh, resumed his own name of
Turberville, and he allowed it to be known that he would not be offended
by the prefix of General. During his absence he had accumulated a wealth
of evidence of undoubted authenticity, with the result that his claim
against the Fentress estate was sustained by the courts, and when
The Oaks with its stock and slaves was offered for sale, he, as the
principal creditor, was able to buy it in.

One of his first acts after taking possession of the property was to
have Mahaffy reinterred in the grove of oaks below his bedroom windows,
and he marked the spot with a great square of granite. The judge,
visibly shaken by his emotions, saw the massive boulder go into place.

"Harsh and rugged like the nature of him who lies beneath it--but
enduring, too, as he was," he murmured. He turned to Yancy and Hannibal,
and added,

"You will lay me beside him when I die."

Then when the bitter struggle came and he was wrenched and tortured by
longings, his strength was in remembering his promise to the dead man,
and it was his custom to go out under the oaks and pace to and fro
beside Mahaffy's grave until he had gained the mastery of himself. Only
Yancy and Hannibal knew how fierce the conflict was he waged, yet in the
end he won that best earned of all victories, the victory over himself.

"My salvation has been a costly thing; it was bought with the blood of
my friend," he told Yancy.

It was Hannibal's privilege to give Cavendish out of the vast Quintard
tract such a farm as the earl had never dreamed of owning even in his
most fervid moments of imagining; and he abandoned all idea of going to
England to claim his title. At the judge's suggestion he named the
place Earl's Court. He and Polly were entirely satisfied with their
surroundings, and never ceased to congratulate themselves that they had
left Lincoln County. They felt that their friends the Carringtons at
Belle Plain, though untitled people, were still of an equal rank with
themselves; while as for the judge, they doubted if royalty itself laid
it any over him.

Mr. Yancy accepted his changed fortunes with philosophic composure.
Technically he filled the position of overseer at The Oaks, but the
judge's activity was so great that this position was largely a sinecure.
The most arduous work he performed was spending his wages.

Certain trifling peculiarities survived with the judge even after he
had entered what he had once been prone to call the Portal of Hope; for
while his charity was very great and he lived with the splendid air of
plenty that belonged to an older order, it required tact, patience, and
persistence to transact business with him; and his creditors, of whom
there were always a respectable number, discovered that he esteemed them
as they were aggressive and determined. He explained to Yancy that too
great certainty detracted from the charm of living, for, after all, life
was a game--a gamble--he desired to be reminded of this. Yet he was
held in great respect for his wisdom and learning, which was no more
questioned that his courage.

Thus surrounded by his friends, who were devoted to him, he began
Hannibal's education and the preparation of his memoirs, intended
primarily for the instruction of his grandson, and which he modestly
decided to call The History of My Own Times, which clearly showed the
magnificence of his mind and its outlook.