THE DESERTED CABIN.
Three weeks after the events related in our last chapter, a horseman
rode slowly through the clearing before Daniel Hart’s cabin and
dismounted beneath the huge chestnut, which was yet standing with its
trunk cut through to the heart, and all the foliage on the upper
branches hanging withered and drooping in the morning sunshine. As the
man passed from under the tree his foot struck something upon the
ground. It was Daniel Hart’s axe, rusted and wet with dew, which had
been lying upon the same spot till the grass and strawberry vines had
crept over and tangled themselves around it so completely, that, but for
his accidental stumble, it might not have been discovered. The man
lifted the axe, examined it closely, and muttering—
“There is nothing here but rust—downright honest rust”—rested the
implement against the tree, and moved across the clearing.
Daniel Hart’s cabin stood desolate and uninhabited, like a forsaken
bird’s-nest, in the midst of its little vegetable garden—no wreath of
smoke went curling up from the stick-chimney in the quiet morning air,
and, though it was near the breakfast hour, no snowy napkin streaming
from the window proclaimed the waiting meal. The door was unlocked, and
our horseman had but to touch it with his foot to gain entrance into the
dwelling.
How lonesome and neglected it was! A few ashes lay upon the hearth,
caked together with the water that had rained down the open-mouthed
chimney. A bed stood in one corner, made up neatly, and covered with a
pretty patch-work quilt; but the pillows were spotted with mildew, and
the same damp mould had eaten its way in many a broad patch over the
glowing colors of the quilt. The back window, close by, was open, and a
mass of morning-glory vines, entangled with scarlet runners in full
flower, had forced their way through and crept along the wall. They had
twisted themselves around one of the bed-posts, and were creeping over
the head-board, where they hung in a light and graceful wreath,
rendering the decay and stillness around yet more melancholy by
contrast.
The man who gazed upon this scene was a backwoods constable, rough and
uncultivated; but even he was affected by this picture of home-comforts
so completely abandoned. He had come to search the house, but moved
about with a soft tread, and unlocked the cupboards and that large chest
with a bunch of keys which he took from his pocket stealthily, as if his
heart would not permit him to handle with a rude hand the household gods
of another man. He started up from his knees by the chest, and dropped
the garment he was examining, like a guilty one, when a noise at the
window disturbed him. It was only the house cat, gaunt and thin with
hunger, which had just come in from the woods, and stood staring at him
from the window-sill, with a flying-squirrel in her jaws. The poor
animal had attained a fierce and savage look, from solitude and the wild
raids she had been compelled to make for food; but she dropped her prey
and crept toward the man, purring mournfully, and rubbing herself
against his thick boots.
“Poor puss, poor puss,” murmured the man, stooping down to smooth her
rough coat with his hand.
But, as if she had not seen that he was a stranger before, the cat
snapped angrily at his hand, and darted away to the squirrel, which she
seized in her mouth and carried under the bed, where she remained,
growling fiercely, and peering at the stranger, from under the valance,
with her round, savage eyes, as she devoured her victim.
After he had examined every thing in the rooms below, the man went up a
ladder which led to the garret, where he continued his search among the
barrels and bunches of dried herbs which it contained, but evidently to
no effect, for he came down the ladder, muttering,
“There’s nothing here—nothing on ’arth that can tell ag’in him, and I’m
as glad of it as if I’d caught a bear in a coon-trap. Consarn me if can
believe the old chap’s guilty arter all.”
With these words the constable went out, closing the door carefully
after him, and mounting his horse, made the best of his way to The Bend.
Judge Church was walking up and down the veranda, in front of his
tavern, when the constable rode up.
“Well, neighbor, well!” exclaimed the kind-hearted man, “what news?—how
have you made out?”
“Just as I expected. There’s nothing in the cabin but the fixin’s that
belong there, and they’re nigh upon sp’iled; for my part, I never could
see the use of going out there ag’in.”
“Never mind, Johnson, never mind; that flinty lawyer would insist on it,
and you know it won’t do for me to interfere. They mistrust me, I can
see that; but they needn’t—they needn’t! I always liked Hart. It goes
ag’in my feelings to believe him guilty; but if they prove it—if he has
killed that noble fellow and then robbed him, I shall do my duty,
Johnson. I must do my duty!”
“And I must do mine, too,” replied the constable; and he added, bending
down nearer to the Judge: “but it will be a tough job to tie the halter
round that old man’s neck; between you and I, Judge, when you have done
your part of the business, and my turn comes, there may be a log missing
from the old jail there!”
A bright gleam shot to the Judge’s eye, but he shook his head
reprovingly.
“No, no Johnson that will never do; law is law; but hush, hush—don’t
think of any thing of the kind yet. We must do our duty—the laws must be
maintained, Mr. Johnson!”
The Judge spoke these last words in a raised voice, and accompanied with
a warning look, which the constable understood; for just then Michael
Hurst came sauntering round a corner of the house, and slowly approached
them. The appearance of this man had been much changed since the night
of the storm; his features had become sharp and thin; a restless,
anxious expression would constantly break over them, notwithstanding the
listless air which he always assumed. His figure had shrunk away till
the hunting-frock, which he always wore, hung loosely over it. All this
gave a neglected look to his whole person, combined, as it was, with
unusual disorder in the remainder of his dress.
“Halloa, Hurst!” said the constable, glancing at the young man’s dress,
which was even more roughly put on than it had been the day before, and
resting his eyes at last on the clumsy boots, which gave a still more
slovenly air to his person, “you are so much like one of us that I did
not know you at first. Glad to see you taking to the brush like a man,
at last. There was no living sociable with a chap who carried a white
handkerchief week-days, and had his calf-skin boots blacked every
morning. I tell you what, it makes us plain homespun fellows
mistrustful.”
Hurst approached them with the heavy, restless air of a man who had
known but little sleep for many nights; but when Johnson uttered the
last word he lifted his eyes, which seemed almost black from the dark
shadows around them, and cast a keen glance from the constable to the
Judge.
“Mistrustful,” he said, with a forced smile, “mistrustful of me?”
“Not now, that you dress like a man, and have given up pinching your
feet out of all shape,” replied the constable. “But what have you done
with the rights-and-lefts? Give them to old Brown; let him hang them up
at his door for a sign. Come, bring the things out, and I’ll leave them
as I go along!”
“You would only get one of them, at best,” said Hurst, with an unnatural
laugh. “The hostler got tired of blacking them, I suppose, though I paid
him well enough for the trouble.”
“So he rubbed them with tallow, and spoiled the polish,” cried the
constable, laughing.
“No; worse than that. He lost one boot altogether. So I was obliged to
patronize old Brown,” replied Hurst, with affected carelessness.
“A cunning fellow, that hostler of yours,” said Johnson, nodding to the
Judge, and taking up his bridle.
“I say, Hurst,” he added, turning again to the young man, “you wanted an
order to see Daniel Hart, one day last week; I am going down to the jail
now, you can walk along, and I will let you in.”
Hurst hesitated a moment. “Are his daughter and niece there now?” he
inquired.
“Oh yes, poor gals, they never leave the old man.”
“Well, wait a moment, and I will go with you,” replied Hurst, turning to
mount the tavern steps.
“Is he acquainted with Hart?” inquired the Judge, addressing Johnson the
moment Hurst was out of hearing.
“Not that I know of,” was the reply, “but he is hand-and-glove with the
prosecuting attorney, and it would not answer to refuse him.”
“Just so,” said the Judge, rather anxiously, “but give the prisoner a
hint before he goes in; the fellow is silky as an ear of green corn, but
I don’t like him. He may be put up to this by the attorney, and so take
advantage of any thing he can get out of poor Hart. Put the old man on
his guard—you understand!”
“Yes, yes; I will see to it,” replied Johnson hastily. “Come to think
now, I may as well ride on and leave orders for the jailer to let him
in. If we go together there will be no chance to caution the old man.”
“Ride on, then,” replied the Judge, “I will tell him how it is!” and,
with a friendly shake of the hand, the Judge and the constable
separated.
After a little time Hurst descended from the room, where he had been
arranging his dress, and walked hurriedly down the road toward the
county jail, which stood on the outskirts of the town.
The county jail was built of logs, and erected after the usual fashion
of such buildings, but the windows were heavily grated, and the huge
logs were bolted together with iron bars, which formed a massive wall
scarcely less vulnerable than granite itself. The doors, too, were
knobbed with great spike nails, and bolted with massive bars, just as
they came from the forge. Altogether, though rudely built, the jail was
not only strong but well guarded, and it must have been a desperate man
indeed who could hope for escape when once immured within its rugged
walls.
But the stout farmer, who was the only important prisoner in the
building, had little thought of escape. If the massive logs could have
crumbled to dust at his feet, Daniel Hart would not have fled one step
from the captivity in which his friends and neighbors had placed him.
Still imprisonment was a weary trial to an old man who had been all his
life an active tiller of the soil—a healthy, enterprising, cheerful
farmer. He felt restive, and sometimes almost sullen, cooped up—as he
expressed it—like a barn-door fowl, with its wings clipped; sometimes he
gave way to fits of childlike melancholy, for—innocent or guilty of his
brother-in-law’s death—the old man could not but feel the event deeply;
the more so as Bentley’s noble and suffering daughter was always near,
to remind him, by her sad and mournful attempts at cheerfulness, how
terribly she felt the event which had rendered her young heart desolate.
Sometimes Daniel Hart would give way to fits of sturdy indignation
against those who had placed him in confinement. Again he would admit,
with simple-hearted candor, that appearances were strong against him,
and he could not blame those who, on evidence so conclusive, had dragged
him from his quiet home, and shut him up, to undergo a disgraceful trial
for the murder of a man whom he had loved as a brother.
“I would not have cared,” said Daniel to his daughter, on the morning
after Constable Johnson had been at the jail to warn him of Hurst’s
visit, “I would not have cared a bean-stalk about being shut up here, if
I didn’t have to see every scoundrel that chooses to come in and ask me
impudent questions. It’s bad enough to know that your poor uncle is
gone—don’t turn pale, don’t cry so, Gillian—you did not think it was me,
if I did bring home the money with red hands! I know my own daughter
will never believe it!”
“No, no, my father! my dear, good father! never think it again,”
exclaimed Martha, winding her arms around the stout old man and kissing
his brown cheek, while she trembled and wept with agitation. “But he is
dead—dead and gone—and, oh father, how she did love him!”
“I know it, gal, I know it well enough,” said the prisoner, taking the
pale head of his niece between both his great hands and kissing her
forehead, while his stout form trembled, and tears ran down his cheeks.
“I know you loved him; he was as good a father as ever lived; but if he
is in heaven, Gillian—and why not? he was good enough to go there,
though he wasn’t a member in any church—if he can only look down from
heaven now, he knows that I didn’t do it. I! Gillian, I loved him a’most
as well as you did!”
Daniel Hart sunk down on a bench, that ran across his prison-room, and
covering his face with both hands, sobbed aloud, though he was ashamed
of his tears, and struggled hard against them. Gillian crept to his
side, and bending her fair head upon his breast, tried to comfort him.
“I didn’t do it, Gillian—the God of heaven knows I didn’t. I’m growing
thin. I look down-hearted sometimes, I know that; but it isn’t a guilty
conscience. They may hang me to-morrow, if they like, but I’ll cry out
‘not guilty’ with my last breath. They shan’t point you out, Martha,
arter I’m gone, and say, ‘There goes the gal whose father owned that he
had killed his own brother, just as they swung him off.’ They shan’t, I
say—they never shall do that, Martha!”
And pressing the poor weeping girls to his broad bosom with both his
arms, Daniel Hart swayed to and fro on his seat, protesting that he was
innocent, and striving to soothe their grief. But when Martha, who
lingered there last, moved on his bosom, and tried to murmur words of
confidence and hope through her tears, he burst forth again.
“Never mind, gal, never mind. They may do it if they like—my own
neighbors, too—let them hang me, let them! I will take you with me. We
will go together; for it would kill you to see them strangling your
father like a dog—wouldn’t it, child? That will be best; and we can be
buried all in one spot, down in the woods. Don’t take on so—don’t take
on, Martha—we shall find them in another world! Poor Bentley, Sarah and
your mother too. But you must go with me, Martha, for the first thing
that she will ask for will be the little gal she left behind for me to
take care of, and I shan’t dare to tell her that I’ve left you all alone
in a world where an honest fellow can be hung for nothing, by his own
neighbors!”
“Yes, father, we will go together. Neither of us have any thing to live
for, now,” said Martha Hart, rising from her father’s arms far enough to
wind her own around his neck, and laying her pale, wet cheek feebly down
on his shoulder. “I am glad, father, that you want me to go with you.
The world would be so lonesome—after that.”
Daniel Hart laid his cheek down to the pale face upon his shoulder, and
began rocking her in his arms again, without any other reply; for this
rush of passionate feeling had exhausted even his great strength. By
degrees they all became more calm, but Daniel was still holding the
strengthless girl in his arms, and Gillian sat with dreary face in a
corner of the room, when the prison-door opened, and Michael Hurst
entered.
Daniel Hart sprung to his feet, set Martha down, and dashing the tears
from his face with an impetuous motion of the hand, walked quickly to
the further end of his dungeon, where he turned, like a stag at bay, and
waited in stern silence for his visitor to speak.
Almost for the first time in his life Hurst was at a loss for words; he
turned pale, and then the color burned hotly up to his forehead, but
shaking off the fascination which the prisoner’s eye seemed to fix upon
him, he moved gently to the bench where Gillian was sitting, and placed
himself near her. Hart took a step forward, but before he could do more,
his niece had left her seat and stood by his side, pale and still
trembling, but with the tears quenched in her eyes.
“Well, sir, what do you want here? This roof belongs to the State. If I
were a free man, it could not cover us both half a minute longer.”
“I have come as a friend; pray hear me with patience,” said Hurst,
rising and moving toward the prisoner.
Hart flung one powerful arm around his niece, and motioned Hurst back
with the other.
“Stay where you are, Mike Hurst; I care nothing about what place you
stand in, but my niece, here, trembles as if a rattlesnake were crawling
this way; keep where you stand, I can hear you well enough.”
“Why do you treat me in this way?” said Hurst, soothingly. “You may
believe it or not, but I only came to see if I could help you. The trial
comes on to-morrow.”
“To-morrow!” exclaimed Martha, faintly, and drawing closer to the old
man.
“The evidence against you is enough to convict any man,” continued
Hurst, still drawing toward the unfortunate prisoner. “The people are
excited against you! There is but one way to save your life—for the
trial once over, they will hang you at once!”
“But how—how can he be saved?” cried Martha, in a voice of eager hope,
which overwhelmed ever other sound.
“By escape, Martha, by escape,” replied Hurst, drawing close to the
excited girl. “It will be easy to break jail if he has a friend on the
outside. I will be that friend—by to-morrow morning we can be safe in
spite of all the constables in the country. I have money enough for us
all—trust every thing to me!”
A flash of joy shot over the broad face of Daniel Hart as this prospect
of liberty was presented to him, but it passed away, and grasping his
niece’s hand very hard, as if to prevent her speaking, he gazed on
Hurst’s face earnestly a moment, then said, with cool composure,
“And what do you expect to gain by it, if I should break jail?”
“Nothing, nothing, but your own good will, the kind feelings of your
daughter, and some favor with this proud lady here,” replied Hurst,
stammering with embarrassment.
“And this is all you would be at?” continued Hart, still with great
coolness.
“Why, Gillian knows how well I love her. I will marry her the minute we
get to one of the river towns, in spite of all this odium.”
“Just so,” muttered Hart, grasping Gillian’s hand still more firmly, as
he felt her start and tremble. “But would you be kind to her?”
“She shall sleep on gold, if she wishes it,” replied the young man, with
flashing eyes, and, emboldened by the quiet way in which Hart seemed to
be dropping into his plans, he attempted to withdraw her from the
protecting arm of her uncle, but Hart put a hand against his breast and
pushed him back.
“Not yet—she is not yours just yet. Look here, do you think that I
murdered her father in cold blood?”
“What else can any one think? He has disappeared. His money was found in
your chest. What else can be thought?”
“You believe this, and yet will help the old murderer to break jail!”
“I would do a great deal more than that for her sake,” replied Hurst,
casting a look of revolting tenderness on the helpless girl.
“Well, then, let me tell you, Michael Hurst, if I were the cold-blooded
murderer that you think I am, I should consider my niece here disgraced
by marrying a man who would help me to escape; but I am no murderer nor
robber, either. I wouldn’t run away if these jail-doors were flung wide
open, and a troop of horses on the outside! If they want to try me for
my life, let the neighbors do it. If they want to hang me, let them do
that too. We are ready, Martha, we are ready,” and, wringing his
daughter’s hand with a sort of mournful exultation, the old man looked
firmly in the face of his anxious visitor. “My niece would sooner be
with her old uncle on the gallows than your wife. Wouldn’t you,
Gillian?” continued the firm old man, folding the poor girl to his side
with his disengaged arm.
Hurst began to expostulate again, but the prisoner cut him short.
“It’s of no use, I tell you, I am determined to stand trial. I’m not
guilty, and I won’t sneak away as if I was.”
“But they will hang you. Even Judge Church is turning against you now,”
persisted the young man, becoming more and more anxious.
“Well, let him,” cried Hart, in a broken voice and dashing a tear from
his rough cheek; “I shouldn’t have believed it of him, though!”
Hurst was about to urge his purpose still further, but that moment the
jail-door was swung open, and our old friend, the blacksmith, came in.
He cast a sharp glance at Hurst as he entered, and shook Hart warmly by
the hand.
“Well, I have just seen the Judge, and he says your trial will sartinly
come on to-morrow!” exclaimed the good man, with a degree of
cheerfulness which seemed remarkable under the circumstances. “They are
all ready. The attorney has got evidence enough to hang fifty men; the
whole would be complete as a nailed horse-shoe if they could only find
the body. It’s a pity they can’t find the body, though, isn’t it?”
Hart shook his head and muttered, “It is strange.”
“Got any lawyer feed yet?” inquired the smith.
“No,” replied Hart. “What could a lawyer do for me?”
“True enough, true enough,” rejoined the smith, folding his dusty arms
and laughing. “I will be your lawyer. What do you say, gals, shall I be
his lawyer?”
“You have always been a good friend,” said Martha, smiling faintly
through her tears; “you have brought us our meals, and tried to cheer
him up every day. No one has ever given us any hope but you.”
“Yes, yes, depend on it, the truth will come out at last—such things
always do one time or another.”
The blacksmith turned half-round as he uttered these words, and cast a
keen glance from under his heavy eyebrows at Hurst, who still lingered
in the room.
The young man turned a little pale, but he tried to smile, and muttered,
in the low, silky voice which he could so well assume,
“Certainly, the truth always makes itself known at last.”
“Well,” continued the smith, wiping his hand on the leather apron which
he always wore, and patting Gillian kindly on the head before he took
leave of Hart, “keep up your spirits, all of you: that is half the
battle. I have left some provisions with the jailer; don’t let the
thoughts of to-morrow spoil your appetite. Come, Mr. Hurst, are you
going my way?”
Hurst hesitated and looked anxiously from the prisoner to Gillian, but
meeting no encouragement to remain, he followed the smith out with
evident reluctance.