THE FIGHT FOR A STATE
Colonel Kenton and Harry avoided Louisville, which was now in the hands
of Northern sympathizers, and, travelling partly by rail and partly by
stage, reached Frankfort early in May to attend the special session of
the Legislature called by Governor Magoffin. Although the skirmishing
had taken place already along the edge of highland and lowland, the
state still sought to maintain its position of neutrality. There was
war within its borders, and yet no war. In feeling, it was Southern,
and yet its judgment was with the Union. Thousands of ardent young men
had drifted southward to join the armies forming there, and thousands of
others, equally ardent, had turned northward to join forces that would
oppose those below. Harry, young as he was, recognized that his own
state would be more fiercely divided than any other by the great strife.
But Federal and Confederate alike preserved the semblance of peace as
they gathered at Frankfort for the political struggle over the state.
Colonel Kenton and his son took the train at a point about forty miles
from the capital, and they found it crowded with public men going
from Louisville to Frankfort. It was the oldest railroad west of the
Alleghanies, and among the first ever built. The coaches swung around
curves, and dust and particles flew in at the windows, but the speed was
a relief after the crawling of the stage and Harry stretched himself
luxuriously on the plush seat.
A tall man in civilian attire, holding himself very stiffly, despite the
swinging and swaying of the train, rose from his seat, and came forward
to greet Colonel Kenton.
"George," he said, his voice quivering slightly, "you and I have fought
together in many battles in Mexico and the West, but it is likely now
that we shall fight other battles on this own soil of ours against each
other. But, George, let us be friends always, and let us pledge it here
and now."
The words might have seemed a little dramatic elsewhere, but not so
under the circumstances of time and place. Colonel Kenton's quick
response came from the depths of a generous soul.
"John," he said as their two hands met in the grip of brothers of the
camp and field, "you and I may be on opposing sides, but we can never be
enemies. John, this is my son, Harry. Harry, this is Major John Warren
of Mason County and the regular army of the United States; he does not
think as we do, but even at West Point he was a stubborn idiot. He and
I were continually arguing, and he would never admit that he was always
wrong. I never knew him to be right in anything except mathematics,
and then he was never wrong."
Major Warren smiled and sat down by his old comrade.
"You've a fine boy there, George," he said, "and I suppose he probably
takes his opinions from his father, which is a great mistake. I think
if I were to talk to him I could show him his, or rather your, error."
"Not by your system of mathematical reasoning, John. Your method is
well enough for the building of a fortress or calculating the range of
a gun. But it won't do for the actions of men. You allow nothing for
feeling, sentiment, association, propinquity, heredity, climate and,
and--"
"Get a dictionary or a book of synonyms, George."
"Perhaps I should. I understand how we happen to differ. But I can't
explain it well. Well, maybe it will all blow over. The worries of
today are often the jokes of tomorrow."
Major Warren shook his head.
"It may blow over," he said, "but it will be a mighty wind; it will blow
a long time, and many things for which you and I care, George, will be
blown away by it. When that great and terrible wind stops blowing,
our country will be changed forever."
"Don't be so downcast, John, you are not dead yet," said Colonel Kenton,
clapping his friend on the shoulder. "You've often seen big clouds go
by without either wind or rain."
"How about that attack upon your house and you and your friends?
The clouds had something in them then."
"Merely mountain outlaws taking advantage of unsettled conditions."
Harry had listened closely and he knew that his father was only giving
voice to his hopes, not to his beliefs. But as they ceased to talk of
the great question, his attention wandered to the country through which
they were passing. Spring was now deep and green in Kentucky. They
were running through a land of deep, rich soil, with an outcrop of
white limestone showing here and there above the heavy green grass. A
peaceful country and prosperous. It seemed impossible that it should
be torn by war, by war between those who lived upon it.
Then the train left the grass lands, cut through a narrow but rough
range of hills, entered a gorge and stopped in Frankfort, the little
capital, beside the deep and blue Kentucky.
Frankfort had only a few thousand inhabitants, but Harry found here much
of the feeling that he had seen in Nashville and Charleston, with an
important difference. There it was all Southern, or nearly so, but here
North struggled with South on terms that certainly were not worse than
equal.
Although the place was crowded, he and his father were lucky enough to
secure a room at the chief hotel, which was also the only one of any
importance. The hotel itself swarmed with the opposing factions.
Senator Culver and Judge Kendrick had a room together across the hall
from theirs, and next to them four red hot sympathizers with the Union
slept on cots in one apartment. Further down the hall Harvey Whitridge,
a state senator, huge of stature, much whiskered, and the proud
possessor of a voice that could be heard nearly a mile, occupied a room
with Samuel Fowler, a tall, thin, quiet member of the Lower House.
The two were staunch Unionists.
Everybody knew everybody else in this dissevered gathering. Nearly
everybody was kin by blood to everybody else. In a state affected
little by immigration families were more or less related. If there was
to be a war it would be, so far as they were concerned, a war of cousins
against cousins.
Colonel Kenton and Harry had scarcely bathed their faces and set their
clothing to rights, when there was a sharp knock at the door and the
Colonel admitted Raymond Bertrand, the South Carolinian, dark of
complexion, volatile and wonderfully neat in apparel. He seemed at once
to Harry to be a messenger from that Charleston which he had liked,
and in the life of which he had had a share. Bertrand shook hands with
both with great enthusiasm, but his eyes sparkled when he spoke to Harry.
"And you were there when they fired on Sumter!" he exclaimed. "And you
had a part in it! What a glorious day! What a glorious deed! And I
had to be here in your cold state, trying to make these descendants of
stubborn Scotch and English see the right, and follow gladly in the path
of our beautiful star, South Carolina!"
"How goes the cause here, Bertrand?" asked Colonel Kenton, breaking in
on his prose epic.
Bertrand shrugged his shoulders and his face expressed discontent.
"Not well," he replied, "not as well as I had hoped. There is still
something in the name of the Union that stirs the hearts of the
Kentuckians. They hesitate. I have worked, I have talked, I have used
all the arguments of our illustrious President, Mr. Davis, and of the
other great men who have charge of Southern fortunes, and they still
hesitate. Their blood is not hot enough. They do not have the vision.
They lack the fire and splendor of the South Carolinians!"
Harry felt a little heat, but Colonel Kenton was not disturbed at all by
the criticism.
"Perhaps you are right, Bertrand," he said thoughtfully. "We
Kentuckians have the reputation of being very quick on the trigger,
but we are conservative in big things. This is going to be a great war,
a mighty great war, and I suppose our people feel like taking a good
long look, and then another, equally as long, before they leap."
Bertrand, hot-blooded and impatient, bit his lip.
"It will not do! It will not do!" he exclaimed. "We must have this
state. Virginia has gone out! Kentucky is her daughter! Then why does
not she do the same?"
"You must give us time, Bertrand," said Colonel Kenton, still speaking
slowly and thoughtfully. "We are not starting upon any summer holiday,
and I can understand how the people here feel. I'm going with my people
and I'm going to fire on the old flag, under which I've fought so often,
but you needn't think it comes so easy. This thing of choosing between
the sections is the hardest task that was ever set for a man."
Harry had never heard his father speak with more solemnity. Bertrand
was silent, overawed by the older man, but to the boy the words were
extremely impressive. His youthful temperament was sensitive to
atmosphere. In Charleston he shared the fire, zeal and enthusiasm of
an impressionable people. They saw only one side and, for a while, he
saw only one side, too. Here in Frankfort the atmosphere was changed.
They saw two sides and he saw two sides with them.
"But you need have no fear about us, Bertrand," continued Colonel
Kenton. "My heart is with the South, and so is my boy's. I thought
that Kentucky would go out of the Union without a fight, but since there
is to be a struggle we'll go through with it, and win it. Don't be
afraid, the state will be with you yet."
They talked a little longer and then Bertrand left. Harry politely held
the door open for him, and, as he went down the hall, he saw him pass
Whitridge and Fowler. Contrary to the custom which still preserved the
amenities they did not speak. Bertrand gave them a look of defiance.
It seemed to Harry that he wanted to speak, but he pressed his lips
firmly together, and, looking straight ahead of him, walked to the
stairway, down which he disappeared. As Harry still stood in the open
doorway, Whitridge and Fowler approached.
"Can we come in?" Whitridge asked.
"Yes, Harvey," said Colonel Kenton over the boy's shoulder. "Both of
you are welcome here at any time."
The two men entered and Harry gave them chairs. Whitridge's creaked
beneath him with his mighty weight.
"George," said the Senator pointedly but without animosity, "you and
I have known each other a good many years, and we are eighth or tenth
cousins, which counts for something in this state. Now, you have come
here to Frankfort to pull Kentucky out of the Union, and I've come to
pull so hard against you that you can't. You know it and I know it.
All's square and above board, but why do you bring here that South
Carolina Frenchman to meddle in the affairs of the good old state of
Kentucky? Is it any business of his or of the other people down there?
Can't we decide it ourselves? We're a big family here in Kentucky,
and we oughtn't to bring strangers into the family council, even if
we do have a disagreement. Besides, he represents the Knights of the
Golden Circle, and what they are planning is plumb foolishness. Even if
you are bound to go out and split up the Union, I'd think you wouldn't
have anything to do with the wholesale grabbing of Spanish-speaking
territories to the southward."
"There's a lot in what you say, Harvey," replied Colonel Kenton,
speaking with the utmost good humor, "but I didn't bring Bertrand here;
he came of his own accord. Besides, while I'm strong for the South,
I think this Knights of the Golden Circle business is bad, just as you
do."
"I'm glad you've got that much sense left, George," said Whitridge.
"You army men never do know much about politics. It's easy to pull the
wool over your eyes."
"Have you and Fowler come here for that purpose?" asked the colonel,
smiling.
It was the preliminary to a long argument carried on without temper.
Harry listened attentively, but as soon as it was over and Whitridge and
Fowler had gone, he tumbled into his bed and went to sleep.
He rose early the next morning, before his father in fact, as he was
eager to see more of Frankfort, ate a solid breakfast almost alone,
and went into the streets, where the first person he met was his own
cousin and schoolmate, Dick Mason. The two boys started, looked first
at each other with hostile glances, which changed the next instant to
looks of pleasure and welcome, and then shook hands with power and
heartiness. They could not be enemies. They were boys together again.
"Why, Dick," exclaimed Harry, "I thought you had gone east to save the
Union."
"So I have," replied Dick Mason, "but not as far east as you thought.
We've got a big camp down in Garrard County, where the forces of the
Kentuckians who favor the Union are gathering. General Nelson commands
us. I suppose you've heard that you rebels are gathering on the other
side of Frankfort in Owen County under Humphrey Marshall?"
"Yes, Yank, I've heard it," replied Harry. "Now, what are you doing in
Frankfort? What business have you got here?"
"Since you ask me a plain question I'll give you a plain answer,"
replied Dick. "I'm here to scotch you rebels. You don't think you
can run away with a state like this, do you?"
"I don't know yet," replied Harry, "but we're going to try. Say, Dick,
let's not talk about such things any more for a while. I want to see
this town and we can take a look at it together."
"The plan suits me," said Dick promptly. "Come on. I've been here two
days and I guess I can be guide."
"We'll take in the Capitol first," said Harry.
Dick led the way and Harry approached with awe and some curiosity the
old building which was famous to him. Erected far back, when the state
was in its infancy, it still served well its purpose. He and Dick
walked together upon the lawns among the trees, but, as soon as the
doors were open, they went inside and entered with respect the room
in which the great men of their state, the Clays, the Marshalls, the
Breckinridges, the Crittendens, the Hardins, and so many others had
begun their careers. They were great men not to Kentucky alone, but to
the nation as well, and the hearts of the two boys throbbed with pride.
They sat down in two of the desks where the members were to meet the
next day and fight over the question whether Kentucky was Northern or
Southern.
It was very early. Besides themselves there was nobody about but the
caretaker. They were sitting in the House and the room was still warmed
in winter by great stoves, but they were not needed now, as the windows
were open and the fresh breeze of a grass-scented May morning blew in
and tumbled the hair of the two youths of the same blood who sat side by
side, close friends of their school days again, but who would soon be
facing each other across red fields.
The wind which blew so pleasantly on Harry's forehead reminded him of
that other wind which had blown so often upon his face at Charleston.
But it was not heavy and languorous here. It did not have the lazy
perfumes of the breezes that floated up from the warm shores of the
Gulf. It was sharp and penetrating. It whipped the blood like the
touch of frost. It stirred to action. His cousin's emotions were
evidently much like his own.
"Harry," said Dick, "I never thought that Kentucky would be fighting
against Kentucky, that Pendleton would be fighting against Pendleton."
Harry was about to reply when his attention was attracted by a heavy
footstep. A third person had entered the chamber of the House, and he
stood for a while in the aisle, looking curiously about him. Harry saw
the man before the stranger saw him and with an instinctive shudder
he recognized Bill Skelly. There he stood, huge, black, hairy, and
lowering, two heavy pistols shown openly in his belt.
The boys were sitting low in the desks and it was a little while before
Skelly noticed them. His attitude was that of triumph, that of one who
expects great spoils, like that of a buccaneer who finds his profit in
troubled times, preying upon friend and foe alike. Presently he caught
sight of the two boys. But his gaze fastened on Harry, and a savage
glint appeared in his eyes. Then he strode down the wide aisle and
stood near them. But he looked at Harry alone.
"You are Colonel Kenton's son?" he said.
"I am," replied Harry, meeting his fierce stare boldly, "the same whom
you tried to murder on the way to Winton, the same who helped to hold
our house against you and your gang of assassins."
Skelly's dark face grew darker as the black blood leaped to his very
eyes. But he choked down his passion. The mountaineer was not lacking
in cunning.
"Your father and his friends killed some of my men," he said. "I ain't
here now to argy with you about the rights an' wrongs of it, but I want
to tell you that all the people of the mountains are up for the Union.
With them from the lowlands that are the same way, we'll chase you
rebels, Jeff Davis and all, clean into the Gulf of Mexico."
Harry deliberately turned his head away, and stared out of a window
at the green of lawns and trees. Skelly filled him with abhorrence.
He felt as if he were in the presence of a creeping panther, and he
would have nothing more to say to him. Skelly looked at him for a few
minutes longer, drew himself together in the manner of a savage wild
beast about to spring, but relaxed the next moment, laughed softly,
and strode out of the chamber.
"That's one of your men," said Harry. "I hope you're proud of him."
"All the mountain people are for us," replied Dick judicially, "and we
can't help it if some of the rascals are on our side. You're likely to
have men just as bad on yours. I heard about the attack he made upon
Uncle George's house, but it was war, I suppose, and this which we have
here in Frankfort is only an armed truce. You can't do anything."
"I suppose not. Do you know how long he has been here?"
"He arrived at Camp Dick Robinson only two or three days ago, and I
suppose he has taken the first chance to come in and have a look at the
capital."
"With the idea of looting it later on."
Dick laughed.
"Don't be bitter, Harry," he said. "It's going to be a fair fight."
"Well, I hope so, here in this little town as well as on the greater
field of the country. Are you staying long in Frankfort, Dick?"
"Only today. I'm going back tomorrow to Camp Dick Robinson."
"Well, don't you make friends with that fellow Skelly, even if he is on
the same side you are."
"I won't, Harry, have no fear of that."
The two went together to the hotel, and found Colonel Kenton at
breakfast. He welcomed his nephew with great affection, and made him
sit by him until he had finished his breakfast. While he was drinking
his coffee Harry told him of Skelly's presence. The Colonel frowned,
but merely uttered three words about him.
"We'll watch him," he said.
Then the three went out and saw the little town grow into life and
seethe with the heat of the spirit. Although actual skirmishing had
taken place already in the state there was no violence here, except of
speech. All the members of the House and Senate were gathered, and
so far as Harry could observe the Southerners were in the majority.
Others thought so, too. Bertrand was sanguine. His eyes burned with
the fire of enthusiasm, lighting up his olive face.
"We'll win. We'll surely win!" he said. "This state which we need so
much will be out of the Union inside of two weeks."
But Senator Culver was more guarded in his opinion, or at least in the
expression of it.
"It's going to be a mighty hot fight," he said.
Harry and Dick together watched the convening of the Legislature,
having chosen seats in the upper lobby of the House. Harry looked for
Skelly, but not seeing him he inferred that the mountaineer's leave of
absence was short and that he had gone back to camp.
Dick himself left the next morning for Camp Dick Robinson, and Harry
shook his hand over and over again as he departed. The feeling between
the cousins was strong and it had been renewed by their meeting under
such circumstances.
"I may go east," said Dick, as he mounted his horse. "The big things
are going to happen there first."
Harry watched him as he rode away and he wondered when they would meet
again. Like Colonel Leonidas Talbot he felt now that this was going to
be a great war, wide in its sweep.
Harry returned to his hotel, very thoughtful. The second parting with
his cousin, who had been his playmate all his life, was painful, and
he realized that while he was wondering when and where they would meet
again it might never occur at all. He found his father and his friends
holding a close conference in his room at the hotel. Senator Culver,
Mr. Bracken, Gardner, the editor, and others yet higher in the councils
of the Confederacy, were there. Bertrand sat in a corner, saying little,
but watching everything with ardent, burning eyes.
Letters had come from the chief Southern leaders. There was one from
Jefferson Davis, himself, another from the astute Benjamin, another from
Toombs, bold and brusque as befitted his temperament, and yet more from
Stephens and Slidell and Yancey and others. Colonel Kenton read them
one by one to the twenty men who were crowded into the room. They were
appealing, insistent, urgent. Their tone might vary, but the tenor was
the same. They must take Kentucky out of the Union and take her out at
once. In the West the line of attack upon the South would lead through
Kentucky. But if the state threw in her fortunes with the South,
the advance of Lincoln's troops would be blocked. The force of example
would be immense, and a hundred thousand valiant Kentuckians could
easily turn the scale in favor of the Confederacy.
Harry listened to them a long time, but growing tired at last, went out
again into the fresh air. Young though he was, he realized that it was
one thing for the Southern leaders to ask, but it was another thing
for the Kentuckians to deliver. He saw all about him the signs of a
powerful opposition, and he saw, too, that these forces, scattered at
first, were consolidating fast, presenting a formidable front.
The struggle began and it was waged for days in the picturesque old
Capitol. There was no violence, but feeling deepened. Men put
restraint upon their words, but their hearts behind them were full of
bitterness, bitterness on one side because the Northern sympathizers
were so stubborn, and bitterness on the other, because the Southern
sympathizers showed the same stubbornness. Friends of a lifetime used
but cold words to each other and saw widening between then, a gulf which
none could cross. Supporters of either cause poured into the little
capital. Tremendous pressure was brought to bear upon House and Senate.
Members were compelled to strive with every kind of emotion or appeal,
love of the Union, cool judgment in the midst of alarms, state
patriotism, kinship, and all the conflicting ties which pull at those
who stand upon the border line on the eve of a great civil war. And
yet they could come to no decision. Day after day they fought back and
forth over points of order and resolutions and the result was always
the same. North and South were locked fast within the two rooms of one
little Capitol.
They were rimmed around meanwhile by a fiery horizon that steadily came
closer and closer. The guns reducing Sumter had been a sufficient
signal. North and South were sharply arrayed against each other.
The Southern volunteers, full of ardor and fire, continued to pour to
their standards. The North, larger and heavier, moved more slowly,
but it moved. The whole land swayed under an intense agitation.
The news of skirmishes along the border came, magnified and colored
in the telling. Men's minds were inflamed more every day.
When Harry had been in Frankfort about a week he received a letter from
St. Clair, written from Richmond, urging him, if he could, to get an
assignment to the East, and to come to that city, which was to be the
permanent capital of the South.
"We are here," he said, "looking the enemy in the face. Langdon and I
are in the same company and I see Colonel Talbot and Major St. Hilaire
every day. We are going to the front soon, and before the summer is out
there will be a big battle followed by our taking of Washington."
"But you must come, Harry, to Richmond and join us before we march.
This is a fine town and all the celebrities are crowding in. You never
saw such confidence and enthusiasm. Virginia was slow in joining us,
but, since she has joined, she is with us heart and soul. Troops are
pouring in all the time. Cannon and wagons loaded with ammunition and
supplies are hurrying to the front. The Yankees are not threatening
Richmond; we are threatening Washington. Be sure and get yourself
transferred to the East, Harry, where the great things are going to
happen. Friends are waiting for you here. Colonel Talbot and Major
St. Hilaire have a lot of power and they will use it for you."
Harry was walking on the hills that look down on the Capitol, when he
read the letter and its warm words made his pulses leap with pleasure.
He felt now the pull of opposing magnets. He wanted to remain in
Frankfort with his father and see the issue, and he also wanted to join
those South Carolina comrades of his in the East, where the battle
fronts now lowered so ominously.
He thought long over the letter, and, at last sat down by the monument
to the Kentucky volunteers who fell at the battle of Buena Vista.
The pull of the East was gradually growing the stronger. He did not
see what he could do at Frankfort, and he wanted to be off there on the
Virginia fields where the bayonets would soon meet.
The curious feeling that war could not come here in his own land
persisted in Harry. It was late in the afternoon with the lower tip of
the sun just hid behind the far hills and the landscape that he looked
upon was soft and beautiful. The green of spring was deep and tender.
Everything rough or ugly was smoothed away by the first mellow touch
of the advancing twilight. The hills were clothed in the same robe of
green that lay over the valleys, and through the center of the circle
flowed the deep Kentucky, serene and blue.
While Harry's thoughts at that moment were on war, he really had no
feeling against anybody. It was all general and impersonal. There
is something pure and noble about a boy who comes out of a good home,
something lofty to which the man later looks back with pride, not
because the boy was wise or powerful, but because his heart was good.
The twilight slowly darkened over green fields and blue river. But the
noble stone, with its sculptured lines, by the side of which Harry sat,
seemed to grow whiter, despite the veil of dusk that was drooping softly
over it. The houses in the town below began to sink out of sight and
lights appeared in their place.
Night came and found the boy still at his place. He could see only the
tint of the blue river now, and the far hills were lost in the darkness.
The chill of evening was coming on, and rising, he shook himself a
little. Then he followed a path down the steep hill and along the edge
of the river. But he paused, standing by the side of a great oak that
grew at the Water's margin, and looked up the Kentucky.
Harry could see from the point where he stood no sign of human life.
He heard only the murmur of deep waters as they flowed slowly and
peacefully by. The spirit of his great ancestor, the famous Henry Ware,
who had been the sword of the border, was strong upon him. The Kentucky
was to him the most romantic of all rivers, clustered thick with the
facts and legends of the great days, when the first of the pioneers
came and built homes along its banks. It flowed out of mountains still
mysterious, and, for a few moments, Harry's thoughts floated from the
strife of the present to a time far back when the slightest noise in the
canebrake might mean to the hunter the coming of his quarry.
A faint musical sound, not more than the sigh of a stray breeze, came
from a point far up the stream. He listened and the sound pleased him.
The lone, weird note was in full accord with the night and his mood,
and presently he knew it. It was some mountaineer on a raft singing a
plaintive song of his own distant hills. Huge rafts launched on the
headwaters of the stream in the mountains in the eastern part of the
state came in great numbers down the river, but oftenest at this time of
the year. Some stopped at Frankfort, and others went into the Ohio for
the cities down that stream.
Harry waited, while the song grew a little in volume, and, penned now
between high banks, gave back soft echoes. But the raft came very
slowly, only as fast as the current of the river. He thought he would
see a light as the men usually cooked and slept in a rude little hut
built in the center of the raft. But all was yet in darkness.
The singer, however rude and unlettered a mountaineer he may have been,
had a voice and ear, and Harry still listened with the keenest pleasure
to the melodious note that came floating down the river. The spell was
upon him. His imagination became so vivid that it was not a mountaineer
singing. He had gone back into another century. It was one of the
great borderers, perhaps Boone himself, who was paddling his canoe upon
the stream, the name of which was danger. And Kenton, and Logan and
Harrod and the others were abroad in the woods.
He was engrossed so deeply that he did not hear a heavy step behind him,
nor did he see a huge bewhiskered figure in the path, holding a clubbed
rifle. Yet he turned. It was perhaps the instinct inherited from his
great ancestor, who was said to have had a sixth sense. Whatever it may
have been, he faced suddenly about, and saw Bill Skelly aiming at him
a blow with the clubbed rifle, which would at once crush his skull and
send his body into the deep stream.
The same inherited instinct made him leap within the swing of the rifle
and clutch at the mountaineer's throat. The heavy butt swished through
the air, and the very force of the blow jerked the weapon from Skelly's
hands. The next instant he was struggling for his life. Harry was a
powerful youth, much stronger than many men, and, at that instant,
the spirit and strength of his great ancestor were pouring into his
veins. The treacherous attempt upon his life filled him with rage.
He was, in very truth, the forest runner of the earlier century, and he
strove with all his great might to slay his enemy.
Skelly, six feet two inches tall and two hundred pounds of muscle and
sinew, struck the boy fiercely on the side of the head, but the terrible
grasp was still at his throat. He was the larger and the stronger,
but the sudden leap upon him gave his younger and smaller antagonist an
advantage. He had a pistol in his belt, but with that throttling grip
upon his throat he forgot it. The hunter had suddenly become the
hunted. Filled with rage and venom he had expected an easy triumph, and,
instead, he was now fighting for his life.
Skelly struck again and again at the boy, but Harry, with instinctive
wisdom, pressed his head close to the man's chin, and Skelly's blows
at such short range lacked force behind them. All the while Harry's
youthful but powerful arms were pouring strength into the hands that
grasped the man's throat. The mountaineer choked and gasped, and,
changing his aim from the head, struck Harry again and again in the
chest. Then he remembered to draw his pistol, but Harry, raising his
knee, struck him violently on the wrist. The pistol dropped to the
ground, and Skelly, in the fierce struggle, was unable to regain it.
Neither had uttered a cry. There was not a single shout for help.
Skelly would not want to call attention, and Harry recalled afterward
that in the tremendous tension of the moment the thought of it never
occurred to him. He continued to press savagely upon Skelly's throat,
while the mountaineer rained blows upon his chest, blows that would
have killed him had Skelly been able to get full purchase for his arms.
He heard the heavy gasping breath of the man, and he saw the dark,
hideous face close to his own. It was so hairy that it was like the
face of some huge anthropoid, with the lips wrinkled back from strong
and cruel white teeth.
It seemed to Harry in very truth that he was fighting a great wild
beast. His own breath came in short gasps, and at every expansion of
the lungs a fierce pain shot through his whole body. A bloody foam rose
to his lips. The savage pounding upon his chest was telling. He still
retained his grasp upon Skelly's throat, where his fingers were sunk
into the flesh, but it was only the grimmest kind of resolution that
enabled him to hold on.
Harry saw the fierce light in Skelly's eye turn to joy. The man foresaw
his triumph, and he began to curse low, but fast and with savage
unction. Harry felt himself weakening, and he made another mighty
effort to retain his hold, but the fingers still slipped, and, as Skelly
struck him harder than ever in the chest, they flew loose entirely.
He knew that if Skelly had room for the full play of his arm that he
would be knocked senseless at the next blow, and to ward it off he
seized the man by his huge chest, tripping at the same time with all his
might. The two fell, rolled over in their struggling, and then Harry
felt himself dropping from a height. The next moment the deep waters of
the Kentucky closed over the two, still locked fast in a deadly combat,
and the waves circled away in diminishing height from the spot where
they had sunk.