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HAT afternoon Keith Gordon went to Warren's to tell Helen of Carson's
plan for the removal of Pete. She received him in the big parlor, and he
found her seated at one of the wide windows which, in summer-time, was
used as a doorway to the veranda.
“I met the conquering hero, Mr. Sanders, on my way down,” he said,
lightly. “I presume he has been here as usual.”
“He only called to say good-bye,” Helen answered, a little coldly.
“Oh, that _is_ news,” Keith pursued, in the same tone. “Rather sudden,
isn't it?”
“No, his affairs would not permit a longer visit,” said Helen. “But you
didn't come to talk of him; it was something about Pete.”
She sat very still and rigid while he went into detail as to the whole
situation, and when he had finished she rested her chin in her white
hand, and he saw her breast rise and fall tremulously.
“There is danger attached to the trip,” she said, without looking at
him. “I know it, Keith, by the way you talk.”
He deliberated for an instant, then acknowledged: “Yes, there is, and
to my way of thinking, Helen, there is a great deal. Wade and I tried to
get him to consent to some other plan, but he wouldn't hear to it.
He's so anxious to put it through all right that he won't trust to any
substitute, and he won't let any one else go along, either. He thinks it
would attract too much attention.”
“In what particular way does the danger lie?” Helen faltered, and Keith
saw her pass her hand over her mouth as if to reprimand her lips for
their unsteadiness.
“I'd tell you there wasn't any at all, as Carson would have me do,”
Keith declared; “but when a fellow has the courage of an army of men, I
believe in his getting the full credit for it. You want to know and
I'm going to tell you. He's been through ticklish places enough in this
business, but going over that lonely road to-night, when a thousand
furious men may be on the lookout for him, is the worst thing he has
tackled. It wouldn't be so very dangerous to a man who would throw up
his hands if accosted, but, Helen, if you could have seen Carson's face
when he was telling us about it, you would know that he will actually
die rather than see Pete taken. He's reckless of late, anyway.”
“Reckless!” Helen echoed, and this time she gave Keith a full, almost
pleading stare.
“Oh yes, you know he's reckless. He's been so ever since Mr. Sanders
came. It looks to me like--well, I reckon a man can understand another
better than a woman can, but it looks to me like Carson is doing the
whole thing because you feel so worried about it.”
“You certainly wrong him there,” Helen declared.
“He is doing it simply because it is right.”
“Oh, of course he thinks it's _right,_” Keith returned, with a boyish
smile; “he thinks everything _you_ want is right.”
When Keith had gone Helen went at once to Linda's cottage to tell her
the news, putting it in as hopeful a light as possible, and not touching
upon the danger of the journey. But the old woman had a very penetrating
mind, and she stood in the doorway with a deeply furrowed brow for
several minutes without saying anything, then her observation only added
to Helen's burden of anxiety.
“Chile,” she said, “ol' Lindy don't like de way dat looks one bit.
You say young marster got ter steal off in de dead o' night, en dat he
cayn't even let me see my boy once 'fo' he go. Suppin up, honey--suppin
up! De danger ain't over yit. Honey, I know what it is,” Linda groaned;
“dem white folks is rising ergin.”
“Well, even if that is the reason”--Helen felt the chill hand of fear
grasp her heart at the admission--“even if that is it, Carson will
get him away safely.”
“Ef he _kin_, honey, ef he _kin!_” Linda moaned.
“'God been behind 'im all thoo so fur, but I seed de time when de Lawd
Hisse'f seem ter turn His back on folks tryin' ter do dey level best.”
Leaving Linda muttering and moaning in the cottage doorway, the girl
went with a despondent step back to the big empty house and wandered
aimlessly about the various rooms.
As night came on and her father returned from town, she met him on the
veranda and gave him a kiss of greeting, but she soon discovered that
he had heard nothing. In fact, he was one of the many who still believed
that Pete had been lynched, the vague whisperings to the contrary not
having reached his old ears. She sat with him at the tea-table, and then
went up to her room and lighted her lamp on her bureau. As she did so
she looked at her reflection in the mirror and started at the sight of
her grave features. Then a flash from her wrist caught her eye. It was
the big diamond of a beautiful bracelet which Sanders had given her,
and as she looked at it she shuddered. Was she superstitious? She hardly
knew, and yet a strange idea took possession of her brain. Would her
unspoken prayers for Carson Dwight's safety in his perilous expedition
be answered while she wore that gift from another man, after she had
spurned Carson's great and lasting love, and allowed the poor boy to
think that she had given herself heart and soul to this stranger? She
hesitated only a moment, and opening a jewel box she unclasped the
bracelet and put it away. Then with a certain lightness of heart she
went to the window overlooking the grounds of the Dwight homestead
and stood there staring out in the hope of seeing Carson. But he was
evidently not at home, for no lights were visible except a dim one in
the invalid's room and one in old Dwight's chamber adjoining.
At ten o'clock Helen disrobed herself still with that awful sense of
impending tragedy hovering over her. The oil in her lamp was almost out,
and for this reason only she extinguished the flame, else she would
have kept it burning through the night to dissipate the material shadows
which seemed to accentuate those of her spirit. She heard the old
grandfather clock on the stair-landing below solemnly strike ten, then
the monotonous tick-tack as the great pendulum swung to and fro. Sleep
was out of the question. A few minutes before eleven she heard a soft
foot-fall on the walk in the front garden, and going out on the veranda
she looked down.
The bowed form of a woman was moving restlessly back and forth from the
steps to the gate.
“Is that you, mammy?” Helen asked, softly.
The handkerchiefed head was lifted and Linda looked up.
“Yes, it's me, honey. I can't sleep. What de use? Kin er mother sleep
when her chile is comin' in de worl'? No, you know she can't; neither
kin she close 'er eyes when she's afeared dat same chile is gwine out of
it. I'm afeared, honey. I'm afeared ter-night wuss dan all. Seem lak
de evil sperits des been playin' wid us all erlong--makin' us think we
gwine ter come thoo, so't will hit us harder w'en it do strack de blow.
You go on back ter yo' baid, honey. You catch yo' death er cold. I'm
gwine home right now.”
Helen saw the old woman disappear round the corner of the house, but
she remained on the veranda. The clock was striking eleven, and she
was about to go in, when she heard the dull beat of hoofs on the
carriage-drive of the Dwight place, and through the half moonlight she
saw a pair of horses, Carson's best, harnessed to a buggy and driven
by their owner slowly and cautiously going towards the big gate. Dwight
himself got down to open it. She heard his low commands to the spirited
animals as he led them forward by the bit, and then he stepped back to
close and latch the gate. She had an overpowering impulse to call out to
him; but would it be wise? His evident precaution was to keep his mother
from knowing of his departure, and Helen's voice might attract the
attention of the invalid and seriously hamper him in his undertaking.
With her hands pressed to her breast she saw him get into the buggy,
heard his calm voice as he spoke to the horses, and then he was off--off
to do his duty--and _hers_. She went back to her room and laid down,
haunted by the weird thought that she would never see him again. Then,
all at once, she had a flash of memory which sent the hot blood of
shame from her heart to her brain, and she sat up, staring through the
darkness. _That_ was the man against whom she had steeled her heart for
his conduct, his youthful indiscretions with her unfortunate brother.
Was Carson Dwight to go forever unpardoned--unpardoned by such as _she_
while _that_ sort of soul held suffering sway within him?
The hours of the long night dragged by and another day began. Keith came
up after breakfast and related the particulars of Carson's departure.
Graphically he recounted how the gang had robed the ill-starred Pete in
grotesque woman's attire and seen him and Carson safely in the buggy,
but that was all that could be told or foretold. As for Keith, he and
all the rest were trying to look on the bright side, and they would
succeed better but for the long face Pole Baker had drawn when he came
into town early that morning and heard of the expedition.
“So he was uneasy?” Helen said, in perturbation.
Keith hesitated for a moment and then answered: “Yes, to tell you the
truth, Helen, it almost staggered him. He is a good-natured, long-headed
chap, and he lost his temper. He cursed us all out for a silly, stupid
set for allowing Carson to take such a risk. Finally we drew out of him
what he feared. He said the particular road Carson took to reach the
State line was actually alive with men, who had been keyed up to the
highest tension by Wiggin and his followers. Pole said they had their
eye on that road particularly because it was the most direct way to
Chattanooga, and that Carson wouldn't have one chance in five hundred
of passing unmolested. He said the idea of fooling men of that stamp by
putting Pete in a woman's dress in the company of Carson, of all human
beings, was the work of insane men.”
“It really was dangerous!” said Helen, pale to the lips.
“Well, we meant it for the best”--Keith defended himself and his
friends--“we didn't know the road was a particularly dangerous one. In
fact, Pole didn't learn it himself until several hours after Carson had
left. I really believe he'd have helped us do what we did if he had been
with us last night. We did the best we could; besides, Carson was going
to have his way. Every protest we made was swept off with that winning
laugh of his. In spite of the gravity of the thing, he kept us roaring.
I have never seen him in better spirits. He was bowing and scraping
before that veiled and hooded darky as if he were the grandest lady in
the land. He even insisted on handing Pete into the buggy and protecting
his long skirt from the dusty wheel. We never realized what we had done
till he was gone and we all gathered in the store and talked it over.
Blackburn, I reckon, being the oldest, was the bluest. He almost cried.
Helen, I've seen popular men in my life, but I never saw one with so
many friends as Carson. He's an odd combination. His friends love him
extravagantly and his enemies hate him to the limit.”
Late that afternoon, unable to wait longer for news of Carson, Helen
went down to his office. Garner was in, and she surprised a look of
firmly grounded uneasiness on his strong face. For a moment it was as if
he intended to make some equivocal reply to her inquiry, but threw aside
the impulse as unworthy of her courage and intelligence.
“To be candid,” he said, as he stood stroking his chin, which bristled
with open disregard for appearances under stress of more important
things--“to tell you the whole truth, Miss Helen, I don't like the lay
of the land.” Then he told her that the sheriff had just informed him
of the whispered rumor that a body of men had met Carson Dwight and his
charge near the State line about three o'clock in the morning. What had
taken place the sheriff didn't know, beyond the fact that the men had
disbanded and returned to their homes all gravely uncommunicative. What
it meant no one but the participants knew. To face the facts, it looked
very much as if harm had really come to one, if not to both, of the two.
The mob had evidently been wrought to a high pitch of resentment for
the trick Carson had played in stealing the prisoner from jail, and this
second attempt to get him away may have enraged his enemies to outright
violence against him, especially as Dwight was a fighting man and very
hot-headed when roused.
Unable to discuss the matter in her depressed frame of mind, Helen left
him and went home. The whole story being now out, she found her father
warmly excited and disposed to talk about it in all its phases, the
earliest as well as the latest, but she had no heart for it, and after
urging the Major not to speak of it to Linda she went supperless to her
room.
Two hours passed. The dusk had given way to the deeper darkness of
evening. The moon had not yet risen and the starlight from a partly
clouded sky was not sufficiently luminous to aid the vision in reaching
any considerable distance, and yet from one of the rear windows of her
room, where she stood morosely contemplative, she could see the vague
outlines of Linda's cottage. It was while she was looking at the doorway
of the little domicile, which stood out above the shrubbery of the rear
garden as if dimly lighted from a candle within, that she saw something
which caused her heart to suddenly bound. It was the live coal of a
cigar, and the smoker seemed to be leaving the cottage, passing through
the little gateway, and entering her father's grounds. What more natural
than for Carson, if he had returned safely, to go at once to the mother
of the boy with the news? Helen almost held her breath. She would soon
be reasonably sure, for if it were Carson he would take a diagonal
direction to reach the gateway to the Dwight homestead. Was it Carson,
or--could it be her father? Her heart sank over the last surmise, and
then it bounded again, for the coal of fire, fitfully flaring, was
moving in the direction prayed for. Down the stairs Helen glided
noiselessly, lest the Major hear her, and yet rapidly. When she reached
the front veranda and descended the steps to the grass of the lawn she
was just in time to see the red disk passing through the gateway
to Dwight's. No form was visible, and yet she called out firmly and
clearly: “Carson! Carson!” The coal of fire paused, described a curve,
and she bounded towards it.
“Did you call me?” Carson Dwight asked, in a voice so low from
hoarseness that it hardly reached her ears.
“Yes, wait!” she panted. “Oh, you've gotten back!”
They now stood face to face.
“Oh yes,” he laughed, with a gesture towards his throat of apology for
his hoarseness; “did you think I was off for good?”
“No, but I was afraid”--she was shocked by the pallor of his usually
ruddy face, the many evidences of fatigue upon him, the nervous way
he stood holding his hat and cigar--“I was afraid you had met with
disaster.”
“But why did you feel that way?” he asked, reassuringly.
“Oh, from what Keith said in general, and Mr. Garner, too. They declared
the road you took was full of desperadoes, and--”
“I might have known they would exaggerate the whole business,” Carson
said, with a smile. “Why, I've just come from Mam' Linda's. I went to
tell her that Pete is all right and as sound as a dollar. He's in the
charge of good, reliable friends of mine up there, and wholly out
of danger. In fact, he's as happy as a lark. When I left him he was
surrounded by a gang of as trifling scamps as himself bragging about his
numerous escapes and--he's generous--my importance in the community we
live in. Well, he's certainly been _important_ enough lately.”
“But did you not meet with--with any opposition at all?” Helen went on,
insistently.
“Oh, well”--he hesitated, struck a match, and applied it to his already
lighted cigar--“we lost our way, for one thing. You see, I was a little
afraid to carry a light, and it was hard to make out the different
sign-boards, and, all in all, it was a slow trip, but we got through all
right. And hungry! Gee whiz! We struck a restaurant in the outskirts of
Chattanooga about sunup, and while that fellow was cooking us some steak
and making coffee we could have eaten him alive. If Mam' Linda
could have seen her boy eat she would have no fears as to his bodily
condition.”
“But didn't you meet some men who stopped you?” Helen asked, staring
steadily into his eyes.
He blinked, flicked the ashes from his cigar, and said: “Yes, we did,
and they were really on the war-path, but they seemed very reasonable,
and when I had talked to them and explained the matter from our
stand-point--why, they--they let us go.”
They had gone into the grounds and were near the main walk when the gate
was opened and a man came striding towards them. It was Jeff Braider.
“Oh, I've been looking for you everywhere, Carson,” he cried, warmly,
shaking Dwight's hand. “I heard you'd got back, but I wanted to see you
with my own eyes. Lord, Lord, my boy, if I'd known the awful trouble I
was getting you into I'd never have let you take that road. I've just
heard the whole story. For genuine pluck and endurance you certainly
take the rag off the bush. Why, nine hundred and ninety-nine men out of
a thousand would have given up the game, but you, you young bull-dog--”
“Carson, Carson! are you down there?” It was a man's voice from an upper
window.
“Yes, father, what is it?”
“Your mother wants to see you right now. She's waked up and is worrying.
Come on in.”
“You'll both excuse me for just a moment, I know,” Carson said, as if
glad of the interruption. “I'll be back presently. I haven't seen my
mother since I returned, and she is very nervous and easily excited.”