THE STRUGGLE
JACK and Little Coffee had laid the dead turkey down upon the ground.
Without another word he ran away toward the house. He heard voices as
he approached; they ceased at the sound of his footsteps as he entered
the house. He found Mr. Parker standing in the middle of the hall with
his hat upon his head; Peggy Pitcher stood leaning over the lean,
rickety banister-rail, half-way up the stairs. “There he is now,” she
said as Jack entered. “And ’tis no use to bluster and swear at me any
more. I told you ’twas none of my doings that he went.”
Jack had never before seen Mr. Parker in one of his humors. He had
heard others about the Roost speak of those times when the master would
be in one of his fits of temper, but he himself had as yet never beheld
one of those dreadful moods. Now he saw that the master’s eyes were
bloodshot. Mr. Parker had not been drinking, but his face was congested
to a purple-red, and the veins in his neck and forehead stood out full
and round. He turned a dull, heavy, truculent look upon Jack as he came
in, and Jack, under that heavy and forbidding glare, stood still and
looked down upon the floor.
“Come hither,” said Mr. Parker at last, in a gloomy voice, and at his
bidding Jack advanced slowly and reluctantly. “Come hither, I say,”
he repeated, as Jack hesitated at a little distance, and again Jack
advanced. When he had come near enough Mr. Parker reached out and
caught him by the collar of his coat. Jack made no effort to resist
him; he stood perfectly quiet, his soul heavy with a dumb apprehension
as to what was about to happen to him.
“Mrs. Pitcher hath told me that she bade you not to go away from home,”
said Mr. Parker; “but that in spite of all she could say you did go,
leaving your work undone behind you. Well, then, I’ll lay my mark on
you, by——, and in such a way that you’ll not forget it soon, nor run
away again when you’re told to stay at home.”
He drew Jack across the room as he spoke, and Jack, fearing to resist,
yielded himself to be led as the master chose. It was not until Mr.
Parker had taken down the heavy riding-whip from the wall that he fully
understood what his master intended to do to him. His first instinct
was of defense, and as Mr. Parker raised his arm he too reached up,
hardly knowing what he did, and caught the other by the sleeve, holding
it tightly. “Your honor!” he cried, and he recognized that his voice
was hoarse and dry—“your honor, I’m mightily sorry for what I’ve done,
and I promise you I’ll never do the like again. I’ll never run away
again, your honor, indeed I won’t! Pray don’t strike me, your honor!”
“Let go my arm!” cried Mr. Parker, harshly. “What d’ye mean by holding
my sleeve like that?” He strove to break away from Jack’s hold, but
Jack clung to him more closely than ever.
“I promise you,” he cried panting, “I promise you—I’ll never go away
again. I promise you after this I’ll do just as you would have me,
but—but—don’t beat me. I’m mightily sorry for what I’ve done—I
am—but don’t try to beat me!”
“Let go my arm, I tell you!” cried Mr. Parker, and he tried to wrench
himself loose. But still Jack held him tightly. Then Jack felt that Mr.
Parker had let go his grasp upon his collar and was trying to pluck
away the hold of the fingers that clutched the sleeve. “Let me go, I
tell you!” he cried out again. “Are you mad to handle me thus?—What do
you mean?—Are you mad?—Let me go!” The next moment he had torn his
arm free. He struck at Jack with the whip, but Jack clung to him so
closely that the blow was without effect, and before he could strike
him again Jack had caught him once more.
He heard the rasping sound of ripping cloth, and he knew that he must
have torn some part of his master’s dress. “You sha’n’t beat me!” he
gasped. “You sha’n’t beat me!” Mr. Parker tried to thrust him away
with his elbow, but he clung all the more tightly. As Mr. Parker
pushed him partly away, he could see the other’s handsome face flaming
purple-red, but in the violence and excitement of the struggle he only
half knew what he was doing. He could feel the struggling movements
of his master’s body as he clutched him, and he was conscious of the
soft linen of his shirt and the fine smell of his person. Then he felt
that some one had caught him by the collar, and, in the turmoil of his
excitement, he knew that it was Mrs. Pitcher who held him, and he heard
her voice crying in his ear: “Let go, Jack! Are you clean gone crazy?
What are you doing? Let go, I say.”
“No, I won’t!” cried Jack, hoarsely, “he sha’n’t beat me!” He hardly
knew what he was doing; his only instinct was of self-defense. In
his struggles he felt himself strike against the edge of the table,
and then against a chair. Then he stumbled against another chair,
overturning it with a loud clatter. At the same instant, Mr. Parker
tripped over it and fell, rolling over and over on the floor. In the
fall his hat and wig were knocked off, but he still held the whip
clutched in his hand. Jack stood panting, and Peggy Pitcher still had
hold of him by the collar of his coat. In the sudden cessation of
the tumult of the struggle, Jack could hear the blood surging with a
ceaselessly beating “hum-hum-hum” in his ears.
Mr. Parker lay still for a second or two as though partly stunned by
his fall, then he scrambled up from the floor. He picked up his wig
and put it on his head. He did not seem to see his hat where it had
fallen under the table. He put his hand to his head and stood so for a
second or two. Then he flung the riding-whip down upon the table and
walked to the door without looking at Jack. Dennis, who was on his way
to his cabin, had heard the sound of the struggle and loud voices,
the scuffling of feet upon the bare floor, the clattering overturning
of the chair. He had stopped, and now stood with the musket over his
shoulder, Little Coffee carrying the turkey. He was still so standing
when Mr. Parker came to the door. “Dennis!” cried the master hoarsely,
“bring three or four men and come over here directly.” Then, without
waiting for a reply, he came back to the table and poured out a glass
of rum for himself, the bottle clinking and tinkling against the edge
of the glass with the nervous trembling of his hand.
Jack heard Mr. Parker’s words to Dennis, and then he realized for the
first time how utterly and helplessly powerless he was, and into what
a pit of trouble he had fallen. His heart sank away within him and he
stood without moving, numb with despair, the rapid pulse-beats still
thumping and surging in his ears. “Your honor—your honor,” he said
huskily, “I—I didn’t know what I was doing—I didn’t. I didn’t mean to
tear your dress. Pardon me, your honor, I didn’t mean it!” He almost
choked, swallowing upon a hard lump in his throat. Mr. Parker paid not
the slightest attention to him. “Won’t you listen to me, your honor?”
he cried despairingly. He heard the approaching footsteps of Dennis and
those whom he had brought with him, and the sound lent a still heavier
agony of despair to his apprehension. “I didn’t mean to do it, your
honor,” he cried, with a final effort to placate that implacable one,
and then the next moment Dennis and three negroes came into the house.
“I want you to take that boy,” said Mr. Parker, pointing to Jack,
“and lock him up in the cellar for the night. I’ll flay you alive
to-morrow,” said he, turning with a flash upon Jack and grinding his
white teeth together. “I’ll spare you for to-night, but to-morrow I’ll
murder you, I will,” and then he turned and went out of the room.
“What have you been doing, Jack?” said Dennis.
“Oh! I don’t know, Dennis,” Jack panted—almost sobbing. “He was going
to beat me and I tried to keep him from doing it, that was all.”
“He fought with his honor like a wild-cat,” said Mrs. Pitcher, “and he
threw him down over a chair onto the floor.”
“Why did you do that, Jack?” said Dennis. “You must have been clean
gone crazy to do such a thing as that.” Jack tried to reply, but he
could not do so for the choking in his throat. “Well,” said Dennis,
“there is nothing left now but to do as his honor said. You had better
come along now, and not make any more trouble.”
“Oh, I’m not going to make any more trouble,” said Jack, hoarsely.
Dennis and Mrs. Pitcher stood looking at him. “Well,” said Dennis, as
though giving himself a shake, “’tis a bad, bad piece of business. I
can’t do anything to help you. Come along, and I’ll make it as easy
for you as I can.”
“I’ll send you down something good to eat,” said Mrs. Pitcher.
“I don’t want anything to eat,” said Jack, despairingly.
The cellar was a vault-like dungeon of a place, built solidly of brick,
with only a narrow, barred window and the door from the kitchen opening
into it. Indeed, it had once been used as a place of confinement or
retention for the slaves in olden days, and there was a pair of rusty
unused shackles with chains yet hanging from a staple in the wall. Jack
could not tell how long it was he sat there, in the cold dampness of
the place, thinking and thinking, and yet with a mind inert and dull as
to any precision of consciousness. He could hear distant sounds through
the house, and now and then the echo of footsteps passing overhead. All
around him was a dead and muffled silence of darkness. It must have
been nightfall when Mrs. Pitcher came, bringing some food wrapped up in
a napkin. “Here,” she said, “you eat this, and you’ll feel the better
for it.” Jack shook his head. “Well, I’ll put it down here, and maybe
you’ll eat it after a while.” And then she went away, leaving him once
more to the darkness and the silence.
By little and little the sounds of moving in the house above were
stilled. Jack’s ears hummed and tingled and buzzed, and he sat there
thinking, thinking, thinking, and yet not thinking with any set purpose
of thought. What was to happen to him? Oh! if he had not resisted his
master! Why had he resisted? If there were only some way in which he
could set himself right with that master! If he could only beg and
obtain some pardon! And then he realized with despair that there was
no way in which he could undo what he had done; that there was no
possible pardon for him. He saw as in a mental picture his master
rolling over on the floor, and he knew that he would never be forgiven
such an insult. Now and then he thrilled almost as with an agony—if
he could only escape the inevitable to-morrow! But, no! There was
nothing for him to do but to sit there all night waiting for the day.
Oh! if he could only stop thinking about it. He might have sat there
thinking thus for an hour; he might have sat there ten hours; there
was no sequence of thought by which he might measure the length or
the shortness of time—nothing but a level stretch of dull and numb
despair. Then, suddenly, he felt that he was parched and dry with
thirst. He wondered if Peggy Pitcher had brought him anything to drink.
He reached over, fumbling in the darkness, and opened the cloth in
which was wrapped the food she had brought him. There was a bottle with
something in it. It was rum and water, and Jack, as he drank a long
draught of it, felt an almost animal gratitude in the quenching of his
parching thirst. Presently he began eating some of the food, and before
he knew it he had made a hearty meal.
For a while the eating distracted his mind, and his troubles lay big
and dumb, brooding within him; but after he had finished the food
and sat again in the humming silence, it all came back to him with
a renewed and overwhelming keenness. He bowed his head over on his
knees. Recollections of the warm, bright day that had just passed—a
recollection of the dead turkey as it lay in the grass—came vividly to
him. The trivial recollection seemed to make the terror of that which
afterward happened all the more tragic by contrast. He felt the hot
drops well bigger and bigger under his burning eyelids, and then one
fell upon his hand and trickled slowly down across it.