I had not seen my friend Stokeman since we were at college together,
longer ago than it was pleasant to think of, and now naturally we fell
to talking of old times. I remembered him as a hard-headed man without
a particle of superstition, if such a thing be possible in a land where
we are brought up on superstition, from the bottle. He was at that time
full of life and of enjoyment of whatever it brought. I found now that
gravity had taken the place of the gayety for which he was then noted,
and that his wild and almost reckless spirits had been tempered by the
years which had passed as I should not have believed possible; for his
career had been an unbroken success, and he appeared to have proved in
his own case his old tenet, so arrogantly asserted, that no difficulty
could exist which a man's intellect could not overcome.
He used to maintain, I remember, that there was no apparition or
supernatural manifestation, or series of circumstances pointing to such a
manifestation, however strongly substantiated they appeared to be, that
could not be explained on purely natural grounds. And he was wont to
say that he regretted that he had not followed my profession: Medicine
instead of the Law, that he might study and explain all such phenomena,
and show the folly of all contrary theories.
During our stay at college a somewhat notable instance of what was by
many supposed to be a supernatural manifestation occurred in a deserted
house on a remote plantation in an adjoining county.
It baffled all investigation, and got into the newspapers, recalling the
Cock Lane ghost, and many more less celebrated apparitions. Parties were
organized to investigate it, but were baffled. Stokeman, on a bet of a
box of cigars, volunteered to go out alone and explode the fraud; and
did so, not only putting the restless spirit to flight, but capturing
it and dragging it into town as the physical and indisputable witness
both of the truth of his theory and of his personal courage. The exploit
gave him immense notoriety in our little world.
I was, therefore, now during my visit to him no little surprised to
hear him say seriously that he had come to understand how people saw
apparitions.
"I have seen them myself," he added, gravely.
"You do not mean it?" I sat bolt upright in my chair in my astonishment.
I had myself, largely through his influence, become a skeptic in matters
relating to the supernatural.
"Yes, I have seen ghosts. They not only have appeared to me, but were
as real to my ocular vision as any other external physical object which
I saw with my eyes."
"Of course it was an hallucination. Tell me; I can explain it."
"I explained it myself," he said, dryly. "But it left me with a little
less conceit and a little more sympathy with the hallucinations of others
not so gifted."
It was a fair hit.
"In the year ——," he went on, after a brief period of reflection, "I
was the State Attorney for my native county, to which office I had been
elected a few years after I left college, and the year we emancipated
ourselves from carpet-bag rule, and I so remained until I was appointed
to the bench. I had a personal acquaintance, pleasant or otherwise,
with every man in the county. The district was a close one, and I could
almost have given the census of the population. I knew every man who was
for me and almost every one who was against me. There were few neutrals.
In those times much hung on the elections. There was no borderland. Men
were either warmly for you or hotly against you.
"We thought we were getting into smooth water, where the sailing was
clear, when the storm suddenly appeared about to rise again. In the
canvass of that year the election was closer than ever and the contest
hotter.
"Among those who went over when the lines were thus sharply drawn was an
old darky named Joel Turnell, who had been a slave of one of my nearest
neighbors, Mr. Eaton, and whom I had known all my life as an easy-going,
palavering old fellow with not much principle, but with kindly manners
and a likable way. He had always claimed to be a supporter of mine,
being one of the two or three negroes in the county who professed to
vote with the whites.
"He had a besetting vice of pilfering, for which I had once or twice
defended and got him off, and he appeared to be grateful to me. I always
doubted him a little; for I believed he did not have force of character
enough to stand up against his people, and he was a great liar. Still,
he was always friendly with me, and used to claim the emoluments and
privileges of such a relation. Now, however, on a sudden, in this
campaign he became one of my bitterest opponents. I attributed it to
the influence of a son of his, named Absalom, who had gone off from the
county during the war when he was only a youth, and had stayed away for
many years without anything being known of him, and who had now returned
unexpectedly, and thrown himself into the fight. He claimed to have been
in the army, and he appeared to have a deep-seated animosity against the
whites, particularly against all those whom he had known in boyhood. He
was a vicious-looking fellow, broad-shouldered, and bow-legged, with
a swagger in his gait. He had an ugly scar on the side of his throat,
evidently made by a knife, though he told the negroes, I understood, that
he had got it in the war, and was ready to fight again if he but got the
chance. He had not been back long before he was in several rows, and as
he was of brutal strength, he began to be much feared by the negroes.
Whenever I heard of him it was in connection with some fight among his own
people, or some effort to excite race animosity. When the canvass began
he flung himself into it with fury, and I must say with marked effect.
His hostility appeared to be particularly directed against myself, and
I heard of him in all parts of the district declaiming against me. The
Negroes who, for one or two elections had appeared to have quieted down
and become indifferent as to politics were suddenly revivified and showed
more feeling than I personally had ever known them to show. It looked
as if the old scenes of the Reconstruction period, when the two sides
were like hostile armies, might be witnessed again. Night meetings, or
'camp-fires,' were held all through the district, and from all of them
came the report of Absalom Turnell's violent speeches stirring up the
blacks and arraying them against the whites. Our side was equally aroused
and the whole section was in a ferment. Our effort was to prevent any
outbreak and tide over the crisis.
"Among my friends was a farmer named John Halloway, one of the best
men in my county, and a neighbor and friend of mine from my boyhood.
His farm, a snug little homestead of fifty or sixty acres, adjoined our
plantation on one side; and on the other, that of the Eatons, to whom
Joel Turnell and his son Absalom had belonged, and I remember that as a
boy it was my greatest privilege and reward to go over on a Saturday and
be allowed by John Halloway to help him plough, or cut his hay. He was a
big, ruddy-faced, jolly boy, and even then used to tell me about being
in love with Fanny Peel, who was the daughter of another farmer in the
neighborhood, and a Sunday-school scholar of my mother's. I thought him
the greatest man in the world. He had a fight once with Absalom Turnell
when they were both youngsters, and, though Turnell was much the heavier,
whipped him completely. Halloway was a good soldier and a good son, and
when he came back from the war and won his wife, who was a belle among
the young farmers, and with her settled down on his little place and
proceeded to make it a bower of roses and fruit-trees, there was not a
man around who did not rejoice in his prosperity and wish him well. The
Halloways had no children and, as is often the case in such instances,
they appeared to be more to each other than most husbands and wives. He
always spoke of his wife as if the sun rose and set in her. No matter
where he might be in the county, when night came he always rode home,
saying that his wife would be expecting him. 'Don't keer whether she's
asleep or not,' he used to say, 'she knows I'm a-comin', and she always
hears my click on the gate-latch, and is waitin' for me.'
"It came to be well understood throughout the county.
"'I believe you are henpecked,' said a man to him one night.
"'I believe I am, George,' laughed Halloway, 'and by Jings! I like it too.'
"It was impossible to take offence at him, he was so good-natured. He
would get out of his bed in the middle of the night, hitch up his horse
and pull his bitterest enemy out of the mud. He had on an occasion ridden
all night through a blizzard to get a doctor for the wife of a negro
neighbor in a cabin near by who was suddenly taken ill. When someone
expressed admiration for it, especially as it was known that the man
had not long before been abusing Halloway to the provost-marshal, who
at that time was in supreme command, he said,
"'Well, what's that got to do with it? Wa'n't the man's wife sick? I
don't deserve no credit, though; if I hadn't gone, my wife wouldn' 'a'
let me come in her house.' He was an outspoken man, too, not afraid of
the devil, and when he believed a thing he spoke it, no matter whom it
hit. In this way John had been in trouble several times while we were
under 'gun-rule'; and this, together with his personal character, had
given him great influence in the county, and made him a power. He was
one of my most ardent friends and supporters, and to him, perhaps, more
than to any other two men in the county, I owed my position.
"Absalom Turnell's rancorous speeches had stirred all the county, and the
apprehension of the outbreak his violence was in danger of bringing might
have caused trouble but for John Halloway's coolness and level-headedness.
John offered to go around and follow Absalom up at his meetings. He
could 'spike his guns,' he said. Some of his friends wanted to go with
him. But he said no. The only condition on which he would go was that
he should go alone.
"'You'd better not try that,' they argued. 'That fellow, Ab. Turnell's
got it in for you.'
"'They ain't any of 'em going to trouble me,' said John. 'I know 'em all
and I git along with 'em first rate. I don't know as I know this fellow
Ab.; he's sort o' grown out o' my recollection; but I want to see. He
knows me, I know. I got my hand on him once when he was a boy—about my
age, and he ain't forgot that, I know. He was a blusterer; but he didn't
have real grit. He won't say nothin' to my face. But I must go alone.
You all are too flighty.'
"So Halloway went alone and followed Ab. up at his 'camp-fires,' and if
report was true his mere presence served to curb Ab.'s fury, and take the
fire out of his harangues. Even the negroes got to laughing and talking
about it. Ab. was just like a dog when a man faced him, they said; he
could not look him in the eye.
"The night before the election there was a meeting at one of the worst
places in the county, a country store at a point known as Burley's Fork,
and Halloway went there, alone—and for the first time in the canvass
thought it necessary to interfere. Absalom, stung by the taunts of
some of his friends, and having stimulated himself with mean whiskey,
launched out in a furious tirade against the whites generally, and me
in particular; and called on the negroes to go to the polls next day
prepared to 'wade in blood to their lips.' For himself, he said, he had
'drunk blood' before, both of white men and women, and he meant to drink
it again. He whipped out and flourished a pistol in one hand and a knife
in the other. His language exceeded belief, and the negroes, excited by
his violence, were showing the effect of his wild declamation on their
emotions, and were beginning to respond with shouts and cries, when
Halloway rose and walked forward. Absalom turned and started to meet
him, yelling his fury and threats, and the audience were rising to their
feet when they were stopped. It was described to me afterwards. Halloway
was in the midst of a powder magazine, absolutely alone, a single spark
would have blown him to atoms and might have caused a catastrophe which
would have brought untold evil. But he was as calm as a May morning.
He walked through them, the man who told me said, as if he did not know
there was a soul in a hundred miles of him, and as if Absalom were only
something to be swept aside.
"'He wa'n't exac'ly laughin', or even smilin,' he said, 'but he jest
looked easy in his mine.'
"They were all waiting, he said, expecting Absalom to tear him to pieces
on the spot; but as Halloway advanced, Absalom faltered and stopped. He
could not stand his calm eye. 'It was jest like a dog givin' way before
a man who ain't afraid of him,' my man said. 'He breshed Absalom aside
as if he had been a fly, and began to talk to us, and I never heard such
a Speech.'
* * * * *
"I got there just after it happened; for some report of what Absalom
intended to do had reached me that night and I rode over hastily,
fearing that I might arrive too late. When, however, I reached the
place everything was quiet, Absalom had disappeared. Unable to face
his downfall, he had gone off, taking old Joel with him. The tide of
excitement had changed and the negroes, relieved at the relaxing of the
tension, were laughing among themselves at their champion's defeat and
disavowing any sympathy with his violence. They were all friendly with
Halloway.
"'Dat man wa'n' nothin' but a' outside nigger, nohow,' they said. 'And
he always was more mouth than anything else,' etc.
"'Good L—d! He say he want to drink _blood_!' declared one man to
another, evidently for us to hear, as we mounted our horses.
"'Drink _whiskey_!' replied the other, dryly, and there was a laugh of
derision.
"I rode home with Halloway. I shall never forget his serenity. As we
passed along, the negroes were lining the roads on their way homeward,
and were shouting and laughing among themselves; and the greetings
they gave us as we passed were as civil and good-humored as if no
unpleasantness had ever existed. A little after we set out, one man, who
had been walking very fast just ahead of us, and had been keeping in
advance all the time, slackened his gait and, as we rode by him, came
close to Halloway's stirrup and said something to him in an undertone.
All I caught was that somebody was 'layin' up something against him.'
"'That's all right, Dick; let him lay it up, and keep it laid up,'
Halloway laughed.
"'Dat's a bad feller!' the negro insisted, uneasily, his voice kept in
an undertone. 'You got to watch him. I'se knowed him from a boy.' He
added something else in a whisper which I did not catch.
"'All right; certainly not! Much obliged to you, Dick. I'll keep my eyes
open. Good-night.'
"'Good-night, gent'men;' and the negro fell back and began to talk with
the nearest of his companions effusively.
"'Who is that?' I asked, for the man had kept his hat over his eyes.
"'That's Dick Winchester. You remember that old fellow 't used to belong
to old Mr. Eaton—lived down in the pines back o' me, on the creek 't
runs near my place. His wife died the year of the big snow.' It was not
necessary to explain further. I remembered the negro for whom Halloway
had ridden through the storm that night.
"I asked him, somewhat irrelevantly, if he carried a pistol. He said
no, he had never done so.
"'Fact is, I'm afraid of killin' somebody. And I don't want to do that, I
know. Never could bear to shoot my gun even durin' o' the war, though I
shot her 'bout as often as any of 'em, I reckon—always used to shut my
eyes right tight whenever I pulled the trigger. I reckon I was a mighty
pore soldier,' he laughed. (I had heard that he was one of the best in
the army.)
"'Besides, I always feel sort o' cowardly if I've got a pistol on. Looks
like I was afraid of somebody—an' I ain't. I've noticed if two fellows
has pistols on and git to fightin', mighty apt to one git hurt, maybe
both. Sort o' like two dogs growling—long as don't but one of 'em growl
it's all right. If don't but one have a pistol, t'other feller always has
the advantage and sort o' comes out top, while the man with the pistol
looks mean.'
"I remember how he looked in the dim moonlight as he drawled his quaint
philosophy.
"'I'm a man o' peace, Mr. Johnny, and I learnt that from your mother—I
learnt a heap o' things from her,' he added, presently, after a little
period of reflection. 'She was the lady as used always to have a kind
word for me when I was a boy. That's a heap to a boy. I used to think she
was an angel. You think it's _you_ I'm a fightin' for in this canvass?
'Tain't. I likes you well enough, but I ain't never forgot your mother,
and her kindness to my old people durin' the war when I was away. She
give me this handkerchief for a weddin' present when I was married after
the war—said 'twas all she had to give, and my wife thinks the world and
all of it; won't let me have it 'cept as a favor; but this mornin' she
told me to take it—said 'twould bring me luck.' He took a big bandanna
out of his pocket and held it up in the moonlight. I remembered it as
one of my father's.
"'She'll make me give it up to-morrow night when I git home,' he chuckled.
"We had turned into the road through the plantations, and had just come
to the fork where Halloway's road turned off toward his place.
"'I lays a heap to your mother's door—purty much all this, I reckon.'
His eye swept the moon-bathed scene before him. 'But for her I mightn't
'a got _her_. And ain't a man in the world got a happier home, or as
good a wife.' He waved his hand toward the little homestead that was
sleeping in the moonlight on the slope the other side of the stream, a
picture of peace.
"His path went down a little slope, and mine kept along the side of the
hill until it entered the woods. A great sycamore tree grew right in
the fork, with its long, hoary arms extending over both roads, making
a broad mass of shadow in the white moonlight.
"The next day was the day of the election. Halloway was at one poll and
I was at another; so I did not see him that day. But he sent me word
that evening that he had carried his poll, and I rode home knowing that
we should have peace.
* * * * *
"I was awakened next morning by the news that Halloway and his
wife had both been murdered the night before. I at once galloped over
to his place, and was one of the first to get there. It was a horrible
sight. Halloway had evidently been waylaid and killed by a blow of an
axe just as he was entering his yard gate, and then the door of the
house had been broken open and his wife had been killed, after which
Halloway's body had been dragged into the house, and the house had
been fired with the intention of making it appear that the house had
burned by accident. But the house had not burned down. By one of those
inexplicable fatalities, the fire, after catching and burning half of two
walls, had gone out. It was a terrible sight, and the room looked like
a shambles. Halloway had evidently been caught unawares while leaning
over his gate. The back of his head had been crushed in with the eye
of an axe, and he had died instantly. The pleasant thought which was
in his mind at the instant—perhaps of the greeting that always awaited
him on the click of his latch; perhaps of his success that day; perhaps
of my mother's kindness to him when he was a boy—was yet on his face,
stamped there indelibly by the blow that killed him. There he lay, face
upward, as the murderer had thrown him after bringing him in, stretched
out his full length on the floor, with his quiet face upturned, looking
in that throng of excited, awe-stricken men, just what he had said he
was: a man of peace. His wife, on the other hand, wore a terrified look
on her face. There had been a terrible struggle. She had lived to taste
the bitterness of death, before it took her." He put his hand over his
eyes as though to shut out the vision that recurred to him.
"In a short time there was a great crowd there, white and black. The
general mind flew at once to Absalom Turnell. The negroes present were
as earnest in their denunciation as the whites; perhaps more so, for
the whites were past threatening. I knew from the grimness that trouble
was brewing, and I felt that if Absalom were caught and any evidence
were found on him, no power on earth could save him. A party rode off
in search of him, and went to old Joel's house. Neither Absalom nor Joel
were there; they had not been home since the election, one of the women
said.
"As a law officer of the county I was to a certain extent in charge at
Halloway's, and in looking around for all the clews to be found, I came
on a small piece of 'light-wood,' as it is called, stuck in a crack in
the floor near the bed: a piece of a stick of 'fat-pine,' such as negroes
often carry about, and use as tapers—not as large or as long as one's
little finger. One end had been burned; but the other end was clean and
was jagged just as it had been broken off. There was a small scorched
place on the planks on either side, and it was evident that this was
one of the splinters that had been used in firing the house. I called a
couple of the coolest, most level-headed men present and quietly showed
them the spot, and they took the splinter out and preserved it.
"By one of those fortuitous chances which so often happen in every
lawyer's experience, and appear inexplicable, Old Joel Turnell came up
to the house just as we came out. He was as sympathetic as possible,
appeared outraged at the crime, and professed the highest regard for
Halloway, and the deepest sorrow at his death. The sentiment of the crowd
was rather one of sympathy with him, that he should have such a son as
Absalom.
"I took the old man aside to have a talk with him, to find out where his
son was and where he had been the night before. He was equally vehement
in his declarations of his son's innocence, and of professions of regard
for Halloway. He was indeed so profuse as to these that he aroused
my suspicion and I questioned him further; when to my astonishment he
declared that his son had spent the night with him and had gone away
after sunrise.
"Then happened one of those fatuous things that have led to the detection
of so many negroes and can almost be counted on in their prosecution.
Joel took a handkerchief out of his pocket and wiped his face, and
as he did so I recognized the very handkerchief Halloway had shown me
the night before. As he pulled out the handkerchief, Joel drew with it
several splinters of light-wood, one of which had been broken off from a
longer piece and looked exactly as if it might fit into the piece that
had been stuck in the crack in the floor. At first, I could scarcely
believe my own senses. But it was the same handkerchief. Of course, it
became my duty to have Joel arrested immediately. But I was afraid to
have it done there, the crowd was so deeply incensed. So I called the two
men to whom I had shown the light-wood splinter, told them the story,
and they promised to get him away and arrest him quietly and take him
safely to jail, which they did.
"Even then we did not exactly believe that the old man had any active
complicity in the crime, and I was blamed for arresting the innocent old
father and letting the guilty son escape. The son, however, was arrested
shortly afterward.
"The circumstances from which the crime arose gave the case something
of a political aspect, and the prisoners had the best counsel to be
procured, both at our local bar and in the capital. Thus the case became a
somewhat celebrated one. The evidence was almost entirely circumstantial,
and when I came to work it up, I found, as often occurs, that although
the case was plain enough on the outside, there were many difficulties
in the way of fitting all the circumstances to prove the guilt of the
accused and to make out every link in the chain. Particularly was this
so in the prosecution of the young man, who was supposed to be the chief
criminal, and in whose case there was a strong effort to prove an alibi.
"As I worked, I found to my surprise that the guilt of the old man,
though based wholly on circumstantial evidence, was established more
clearly than that of his son—not indeed, as to the murders, but as to
the arson, which served just as well to convict on. The handkerchief,
which Joel had not been able to resist the temptation to steal, and the
splinter of light-wood in his pocket, which fitted exactly into that
found in the house, together with other circumstances, proved his guilt
conclusively. But although there was an equal moral certainty of the
guilt of the young man, it was not so easy to establish it by law.
"Old Dick Winchester was found dead one morning and the alibi was almost
completely proved, and only failed by the incredibility of the witnesses
for the defence. Old Joel persistently declared that Absalom was innocent,
and but for a confession by Absalom of certain facts intended to shift
the suspicion from himself to his father, I do not know how his case
might have turned out.
"I believed him to be the instigator as well as the perpetrator of the
crime.
"I threw myself into the contest, and prosecuted with all the vigor
I was capable of. And I finally secured the conviction of both men.
But it was after a hard fight. They were the only instances in which,
representing the Commonwealth, I was ever conscious of strong personal
feeling, and of a sense of personal triumph. The memory of my last ride
with Halloway, and of the things he said to me; the circumstances under
which he and his wife were killed; the knowledge that in some sort it
was on my account; and the bitter attacks made on me personally (for
in some quarters I was depicted as a bloodthirsty ruffian, and it was
charged that I was for political reasons prosecuting men whom I personally
knew to be innocent), all combined to spur me to my utmost effort. And
when the verdicts were rendered, I was conscious of a sense of personal
triumph so fierce as to shock me.
"Not that I did not absolutely believe in the guilt of both prisoners;
for I considered that I had demonstrated it, and so did the jurors who
tried them.
"The day of execution was set. An appeal was at once taken in both cases
and a stay was granted, and I had to sustain the verdicts in the upper
court. The fact that the evidence was entirely circumstantial had aroused
great interest, and every lawyer in the State had his theory. The upper
court affirmed in both cases and appeals were taken to the next highest
court, and again stay of execution was granted.
"The prisoners' counsel had moved to have the prisoners transferred to
another county, which I opposed. I was sure that the people of my county
would observe the law. They had resisted the first fierce impulse, and
were now waiting patiently for Justice to take its course. Months passed,
and the stay of execution had to be renewed. The road to Halloway's grew
up and I understood that the house had fallen in, though I never went
that way again. Still the court hung fire as to its conclusion.
"The day set for the execution approached for the third time without the
court having rendered its decision. On the day before that set for the
execution, the court gave its decision. It refused to interfere in the
case of old Joel, but reversed, and set aside the verdict in that of the
younger man. Of a series of over one hundred bills of exception taken
by his counsel as a "drag-net," one held; and owing to the admission of
a single question by a juror, the judgment was set aside in Absalom's
case and a new trial ordered.
"The decision of the court was not as great a surprise to me as it was
to the people generally; still even I was somewhat surprised, for I had
supposed that both judgments would go together. The court came in for
a good deal of abuse, and it was declared by many that they had hanged
the wrong man.
"Being anxious lest the excitement might increase, I felt it my duty to
stay at the county-seat that night, and as I could not sleep I spent the
time going over the records of the two cases; which, like most causes,
developed new points every time they were read. I found myself fascinated
by them.
"Everything was perfectly quiet all night, though the village was filling
up with people from the country to see the execution, which at that
time was still public. I determined next morning to go to my home in
the country and get a good rest, of which I began to feel the need. I
was detained, however, and it was well along in the forenoon before I
mounted my horse and rode slowly out of town through a back street. The
lane kept away from the main road except at one point just outside of
town, where it crossed it at right angles.
"It was a beautiful spring day—a day in which it is a pleasure merely to
live, and as I rode along through the quiet lane under the leafy trees
I could not help my mind wandering and dwelling on the things that were
happening. I am not sure, indeed, that I was not dozing; for I reached
the highway without knowing just where I was.
"I was recalled to myself by a rush of boys up the street before me,
and a crowd behind them. And there at that moment, coming slowly along
before me, was the head of the procession, the sheriff and his men
riding, with set faces, in front and on both sides of a slowly moving
vehicle, and in a common horse-cart in the midst of his guards, dressed
in his Sunday clothes, with a clean white shirt on, seated on his pine
coffin, was old Joel. I unconsciously gazed at him, and at the instant
he looked up and saw me. Our eyes met as naturally as if he had expected
to find me there, and he gave me as natural and as friendly a bow, not
a particle reproachful; but a little timid, as though he did not quite
know whether I would speak to him.
"It gave me a tremendous shock. I had a sudden sinking of the heart, and
nearly fell from my horse. I turned and rode away; but I could not shake
off the feeling. I tried to reassure myself with the reflection that he
had committed a terrible crime. It did not compose me. What insisted on
coming to my mind was the eagerness with which I had prosecuted him and
the joy I had felt at my success.
"Of course, I know now it was simply that I was overworked and needed
rest; but at that time the trouble was serious.
"It haunted me all day, and that night I could not sleep; and for many
days after, it clung to me, and I found myself unable to forget it, or
to sleep as I had been used to do.
"The new trial of Absalom came on in time, and the fight was had all
over again. It was longer than before, as every man in our county had
an opinion, and a jury had to be brought from another county. But again
the verdict was the same. And again an appeal was taken; was refused by
the next higher court; and allowed by the highest; this time because
a talesman said he had expressed an opinion, but had not formed one.
And in time the appeal was heard once more, and after much delay, due
to the number of cases on the docket and the immense labor of studying
carefully so huge a record it was decided. It was again reversed, on
the technicality mentioned, and a new trial ordered.
"That same day the court adjourned for its term.
"Sentiment is a curious thing. The apparent injustice of the fact that
old Joel was sentenced to be hanged, while his son, who was universally
believed to be the instigator of the crime, was given another chance for
his life, affected many people, and a strong effort was made to get his
sentence commuted; some, even of those who had been most earnest in their
denunciation of him, turned, and petitions were got up recommending him
for executive clemency. One was brought to me, and every argument was
used to induce me to sign it. I was satisfied of his guilt, and refused.
"Having a bedroom adjoining my office, I spent that night in town. I
did not go to sleep until late, and had not been asleep long when I was
awakened by the continual repetition of a monotonous sound. At first I
thought I was dreaming, but as I aroused it came to me distinctly: the
sound of blows in the distance struck regularly. I awaked fully. The
noise was in the direction of the jail. I dressed hastily and went down
on the street. I stepped into the arms of a half-dozen masked men who
quietly laid me on my back, blindfolded me and bound me so that I could
not move. I threatened and struggled; but to no purpose, and finally
gave it up and tried expostulation. They told me that they intended no
harm to me; but that I was their prisoner and they meant to keep me.
They had come for their man, they said, and they meant to have him. They
were perfectly quiet and acted with the precision of old soldiers.
"All the time I could hear the blows at the jail as the mob pounded the
iron door with sledges, and now and then a shout or cry from within.
Then one great roar went up and the blows ceased suddenly, and then one
cry.
"The blows were on the inner door, for the mob had gained access to the
outer. They had come prepared and, stout as the door was, it could not
resist long.
"In a little while I heard the regular tramp of men, and in a few minutes
the column came up the street, marching like soldiers. There must have
been five hundred of them. The prisoner was in the midst, bare-headed
and walking between two mounted men, and was moaning and pleading and
cursing by turns.
"I asked my captors if I might speak, and they gave me ten minutes. I
stood up on the top step of the house, and for a quarter of an hour I
made what I consider to have been the best speech I ever made or shall
make. I told them in closing that I should use all my powers to find
out who they were, and if I could I should prosecute them, every one,
and try and have them hanged for murder.
"They heard me patiently, but without a word, and when I was through,
one of the leaders made a short reply. They agreed with me about the
law; but they felt that the way it was being used was such as to cause
a failure of justice. They had waited patiently, and were apparently no
nearer seeing justice executed than in the beginning. So they proposed
to take the law into their own hands. The remedy was, to do away with
all but proper defences and execute the law without unreasonable delay.
"It was the first mob I had ever seen, and I experienced a sensation of
utter powerlessness and insignificance; just as in a vast disturbance
of the elements—a storm at sea, a hurricane, a conflagration. The
individual disappeared before the irresistible force.
"An order was given and the column moved on silently.
"A question arose among my guards as to what should be done with me.
"They wished to pledge me to return to my rooms and take no steps until
morning, but I would give no pledges. So they took me along with them.
From the time they started there was not a word except the orders of the
leader and his lieutenants and the occasional outcry of the prisoner,
who prayed and cursed by turns.
"They went out of the village and turned in at Halloway's place.
"Here the prisoner made his last struggle. The idea of being taken to
Halloway's place appeared to terrify him to desperation. He might as
well have struggled against the powers of the Infinite. He said he would
confess everything if they would not take him there. They said they did
not want his confession. He gave up, and from this time was quiet; and
he soon began to croon a sort of hymn.
"The procession stopped at the big sycamore under which I had last parted
from Halloway.
"I asked leave to speak again; but they said no. They asked the prisoner
if he wanted to say anything. He said he wanted something to eat. The
leader said he should have it; that it should never be said that any
man—even he—had asked in vain for food in that county.
"Out of a haversack food was produced in plenty, and while the crowd
waited amidst profound silence, the prisoner squatted down and ate up
the entire plateful.
"Then the leader said he had just five minutes more to live, and he had
better pray.
"He began a wild sort of incoherent ramble; confessed that he had murdered
Halloway and his wife, but laid the chief blame on his father, and begged
them to tell his friends to meet him in Heaven.
"I asked leave to go, and it was given me on condition that I would
not return for twenty minutes. This I agreed to. I went to my home and
aroused someone, and we returned. It was not much more than a half hour
since I had left, but the place was deserted. It was all silent as the
grave. There was no living creature there. Only under the great sycamore,
from one of its long, pale branches that stretched across the road, hung
that dead thing just out of our reach, turning and swaying a little in
the night wind.
"We had to climb to the limb to cut the body down.
"The outside newspapers made a good deal of the affair. I was charged
with indifference, with cowardice, with venality. Some journals even
declared that I had instigated the lynching and participated in it, and
said that I ought to be hanged.
"I did not mind this much. It buoyed me up, and I went on with my work
without stopping for a rest, as I had intended to do.
"I kept my word and ransacked the county for evidence against the
lynchers. Many knew nothing about the matter; others pleaded their
privilege and refused to testify on the ground of self-crimination.
"The election came on again, and almost before I knew it I was in the
midst of the canvass.
"I held that election would be an indorsement of me, and defeat would
be a censure. After all, it is the endorsement of those about our own
home that we desire.
"The night before the election I spoke to a crowd at Burley's Fork. The
place had changed since Halloway checked Absalom Turnell there. A large
crowd was in attendance. I paid Halloway my personal tribute that night,
and it met with a deep response. I denounced the lynching. There was a
dead silence. I was sure that in my audience were many of the men who
had been in the mob that night.
"When I rode home quite a company started with me.
"The moon, which was on the wane, was, I remember, just rising as we
set out. It was a soft night, rather cloudy, but not dark, for the sad
moon shone a little now and then, looking wasted and red. The other
men dropped off from time to time as we came to the several roads that
led to their homes and at last I was riding alone. I was dead tired,
and after I was left by my companions sat loungingly on my horse, and
my mind ran on the last canvass and the strange tragedy that ended it,
with its train of consequences. I was not aware when my horse turned off
from the main road into the by-road that led through the Halloway place
to my own home. It was the same horse I had ridden that night. I waked
suddenly to a realization of where I was, and regretted for a second
that I had come by that road. The next moment I put the thought away
as a piece of cowardice and rode on, my mind perfectly easy. My horse
presently broke into a canter and I took a train of thought distinctly
pleasant. I mention this to account for my inability to explain what
followed. I was thinking of old times and of a holiday I had spent once
at Halloway's when old Joel came through on his way to his wife's house.
It was the first time I ever remembered seeing Joel. I was suddenly
conscious of something white moving on the road before me. At the same
second my horse suddenly wheeled with such violence as to break my
stirrup-leather and almost throw me over his neck. I pulled him up and
turned him back, and there before me, coming along the unused road up
the hill from Halloway's, was old Joel, sitting in a cart, looking at
me, and bowing to me politely just as he had done that morning on his
way to the gallows; while dangling from the white limb of the sycamore,
swaying softly in the wind, hung the corpse of Absalom. At first I
thought it was an illusion and I rubbed my eyes. But there they were.
Then I thought it was a delusion; and I reined in my horse and reasoned
about it. But it was not; for I saw both men as plainly as I saw my
stirrup-leather lying there in the middle of the road, and in the same
way. My horse saw them too, and was so terrified that I could not keep
him headed to them. Again and again I pulled him around and looked at
the men and tried to reason about them; but every time I looked there
they were, and my horse snorted and wheeled in terror. I could see the
clothes they wore; the clean, white shirt and neat Sunday suit old Joel
had on, and the striped, hickory shirt, torn on the shoulders, and the
gray trousers that the lynched man wore—I could see the white rope
wrapt around the limb and hanging down, and the knot at his throat; I
remembered them perfectly. I could not get near the cart, for the road
down to Halloway's, on which it moved steadily without ever approaching,
was stopped up. But I rode right under the limb on which the other man
hung, and there it was just above my head. I reasoned with myself, but
in vain. There it still hung silent and real, swinging gently in the
night wind and turning a little back and forth at the end of the white
rope.
"In sheer determination to fight it through I got off my horse and picked
up my stirrup. He was trembling like a leaf. I remounted and rode back
to the spot and looked again, confident that the spectres would now have
disappeared. But there they were, old Joel, sitting in his cart, bowing
to me civilly with timid, sad, friendly eyes, as much alive as I was,
and the dead man, with his limp head and arms, hanging in mid-air and
turning in the wind.
"I rode up under the dangling body and cut at it with my switch. At the
motion my horse bolted. He ran fully a mile before I could pull him in.
"The next morning I went to my stable to get my horse to ride to the
polls. The man at the stable said:
"'He ain't fit to take out, sir. You must 'a gin him a mighty hard ride
last night—he won't tetch a moufful; he's been in a cold sweat all
night.'
"Sure enough, he looked it.
"I took another horse and rode out by Halloway's to see the place by
daylight. It was quiet enough now.
"The sycamore shaded the grass-grown road, and a branch, twisted and
broken by some storm, hung by a strip of bark from the big bough that
stretched across the road above my head, swaying, with limp leaves, a
little in the wind; a dense dogwood bush in full bloom among the young
pines, filled a fence-corner down the disused road where old Joel had
bowed to me from his phantom cart the night before. But it was hard to
believe that these were the things which had created such impressions on
my mind—as hard to believe as that the quiet cottage peering out from
amid the mass of peach-bloom was one hour the home of such happiness,
and the next the scene of such a tragedy.
"Yes, I have seen apparitions," he said, thoughtfully, "but I have seen
what was worse."
[Illustration: Dressed in his Sunday clothes, with a clean white shirt
on, seated on his pine coffin, was old Joel.—Page 185.]
Once more he put his hands suddenly before his face as though to shut
out something from his vision.