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ESPITE the news Pole Baker had brought to town regarding the disposition
of the mountaineers to let justice take its formal trend in the case
of the negro already arrested, as the day wore on towards its close
the whole town took on an air of vague excitement. Men who now lived at
Darley, but had been former residents of the country, and were supposed
to know the temper and character of the aggrieved people, shook their
heads and smiled grimly when the subject of Pete's coming trial was
mentioned. “Huh!” said one of these men, who kept a small grocery
store on the main street, “that nigger'll never see the door of the
court-house.”
And that opinion grew and seemed to saturate the very garment of
approaching night. The negroes at work in various ways about the
business portion of the town left their posts early, and with no comment
to the whites or even to their own kind, they betook themselves to their
homes--or elsewhere. The negroes who had held the interrupted meeting at
Neb Wynn's house had been all that day less in evidence than any of the
others. The attempt to stimulate law and order, to meet the white race
on common ground, had been crudely and yet sincerely made. They had done
all they could within their restricted limitations; it now behooved them
personally to avoid the probable overflow of the coming crisis.
Their meeting in secret, they feared, was not understood. The present
prisoner, in fact, had to all appearances, at least, been knowingly
harbored by them. To explain would be easy enough; convincing an
infuriated, race-mad mob of their friendly, helpful intentions would be
impossible. Hence it was that long-headed, now silent-tongued, Neb Wynn
locked up his domicile, and with his wife and children stole through the
darkest streets and alleys to the house of a citizen who had owned his
father.
“Marse George,” he said. “I want you ter take me 'n my folks in fer
ter-night.”
“All right, Neb,” the white man answered; “we've got plenty of room. Go
round to the kitchen and get your suppers. I didn't know it was as bad
as that, but it may be well to be on the safe side.”
Just after dark Carson went home to supper. As he drew near the front
gate he noticed that the Warren house was lighted both in the upper and
lower portions and that a group of persons were standing on the veranda.
He noticed the towering form of old Lewis and the bowed, bandanna-clad
head of Linda, and with them, evidently offering consolation, stood
Helen, the Major, Sanders, and Keith Gordon.
Carson was entering the gate when Keith through the twilight recognized
him and signalled him to wait. And leaving the others Keith came over to
him.
“I must see you, Carson,” he said, in a voice that had never sounded so
grave. “Can we go in? If Mam' Linda sees you she'll be after you. She's
terribly upset.”
“Come into the library,” Carson said. “I see it's lighted. We'll not be
disturbed there.”
Inside the big, square room, with its simple furnishings and drab tints,
Carson sank, weary from his nervous strain and loss of sleep, into an
easy-chair and motioned his friend to take another, but Keith, nervously
twirling his hat in his hands, continued to stand.
“It's awful, old man, simply awful!” he said. “I've been there since
sundown trying to pacify that old man and woman, but what was the use?”
“Then she's afraid--” Carson began.
“Afraid? Good God! how could she help it? The negro preacher and his
wife came to her and Lewis and frankly tried to prepare them for the
worst. Uncle Lewis is speechless, and Linda is past the tear-shedding
stage. Hand in hand the old pair simply pace the floor like goaded
brutes with human hearts and souls bound up in them. Then Helen--the
poor, dear girl! Isn't this a beautiful homecoming for her? I feel like
fighting, and yet there's nothing to hit but empty, heartless air. I
don't care if you know it, Carson.” Keith sank into a chair and leaned
forward, his eyes glistening with the condensed dew of tense emotion. “I
don't deny it. Helen is the only girl I ever cared for. She's treated
me very kindly ever since she discovered my feeling, and given me to
understand in the sweetest way the utter hopelessness of my case, but I
still feel the same. I thought I was growing out of it, but seeing her
sorrow to-day has shown me what she is to me--and what she always will
be. I'll love her all my life, Carson. She's suffering terribly over
this. She loves her old mammy as much as if they were the same flesh and
blood. Oh, it was pitiful, simply pitiful! Helen was trying to pacify
her just now, and the old woman suddenly laid her hand on her breast and
cried out: 'Don't talk ter me, honey child, I nursed bofe you en Pete on
dis here breast, an' dat boy's _me_--my own self, heart en soul, en ef
God let's dem men hang 'im ter-night, I'll curse 'Im ter my grave.'”
“Poor old woman!” Carson sighed. “If it has to come to her, it would be
better to have it over with. It would have been better if I had stood
back last night and let them have their way.”
“Oh no,” protested Keith; “that's Linda's sole comfort. She hardly draws
a breath that doesn't utter your name. She still believes that her only
hope rests in you. She says you'll yet think of something--that you'll
yet do something to prevent the thing. She cries that out every now
and then. Oh, Carson, I don't amount to anything, but before God I can
truthfully say that I'd give my life to have Linda talk that way about
me--before Helen.”
Carson groaned, his tense hands were locked like prongs of steel in
front of him, his face was deathly pale. “You wouldn't like any sort of
talk or idle compliments if you were bound hand and foot as I am,” he
said. “It's mockery. It's vinegar rubbed into my wounds. It's hell!”
He tore himself from his chair and began to stride about the room like
a restless tiger in a cage. His walk took him into the hall utterly
forgetful of the presence of his friend. There a colored maid came to
him and said, “Your mother wants you, sir.”
He stared at the girl blankly for a moment, then he seemed to pull
himself together. “Has my mother heard--?”
“No, sir, your father told us not to excite her.”
“All right, I'll go up,” Carson said. “Tell Mr. Gordon, in the library,
to wait for me.”
“I was wondering if you had come,” the invalid said, as he bent over her
bed, took her hand, and kissed her. “I presume you have been very busy
all day over Pete's case?”
“Yes, very busy, mother dear.”
“And is it all right now? Your father tells me the trial is set for
to-morrow. Oh, Carson, I'm very proud of you. I heard your speech last
night, and it seemed to lift me to the very throne of God. Oh, you are
right, you are right! It is our duty to love and sympathize with those
poor creatures. They are still children in the cradles of their past
slavery. They can't act for themselves. Their crimes are due chiefly to
the lack of the guiding hands they once had. Oh, my son, your father
is angry with you for spoiling your political chances by such a radical
stand, but even if you lose the race by it, I shall be all the prouder
of you, for you have shown that you won't sell yourself. I wish I could
go to the courthouse to-morrow, but the doctor won't let me. He says I
mustn't have another shock like that last night, when I heard that shot,
saw you reel, and thought you were killed. Son, are you listening?”
“Why, yes, mother. I--” His mind was really elsewhere. He had dropped
her hand, and was standing with furrowed brow and tightly drawn lips in
the shadow thrown by the lamp on a table near by and the high posts of
the old-fashioned bedstead.
“I thought you seemed to be thinking of something else,” said the
invalid, plaintively.
“I really was troubled about leaving Keith downstairs by himself,”
Carson said. “Perhaps I'd better run down now, mother.”
“Oh yes, I didn't know he was there. Ask him to supper.”
“All right, mother,” and he left the room with a slow step, finding
Gordon on the veranda below fitfully puffing at a cigar as he walked to
and fro.
“Helen called me to the fence just now,” Keith said. “She's all broken
to pieces. She is relying solely on you now. She sent you a message.”
“Me?”
“Yes, with the tears streaming down her cheeks she simply said, 'Tell
Carson that I am praying that he will think of some way to avert this
disaster.”
“She said that!” Carson turned and stared through the gathering shadows
towards the jail. There was a moment's pause, then he asked, in a tone
that was harsh, crisp, and rasping: “Keith, could you get together
to-night fifteen men who would stick to me through personal friendship
and help me arrive at some decision as to--to what is best?”
“Twenty, Carson--twenty who would risk their lives at a word from you.”
“They might have to sacrifice--”
“That wouldn't make a bit of difference; I know the ones you can depend
on. You've got genuine friends, the truest and bravest a man ever had.”
“Then have as many as you can get to meet me at Blackburn's store at
nine o'clock. We may accomplish nothing, but I want to talk to them.
God knows it is the only chance. No, I can't explain now. There is not
a moment to lose. Tell Blackburn to keep the doors shut and let them
assemble in the rear as secretly and quietly as possible.”
“All right, Carson. I'll have the men there.”