_A SEARCH FOR THE MISSING._
The academy was situated in a retired spot, half a mile out of the
village. Stackridge and his party were soon pushing rapidly towards it
along the dark, unfrequented road. Carl ran on before, leading the way
to the scene of the lynching.
The place was deserted and silent. Only the cold wind swept the bleak
wood-side, making melancholy moans among the trees. Overhead shone the
stars, lighting dimly the desolation of the ground.
"Now, where's yer tar-and-feathering party?" said Stackridge. "See here,
Dutchy! ye hain't been foolin' us, have ye?"
"I vish it vas notting but fooling!" said Carl, full of distress,
fearing the worst. "We have come too late. The willains have took him
off."
"Feathers, men!" muttered Stackridge, picking up something from beneath
his feet. "The boy's right! Now, which way have they gone?--that's the
question."
"Hark!" said Carl. "I see a man!"
Indeed, just then a dim figure arose from the earth, and appeared slowly
and painfully moving away.
"Hold on there!" cried Stackridge. "Needn't be afeared of us. We're your
friends."
The figure stopped, uttering a deep groan.
"Is it you, Hapgood?"
"No," answered the most miserable voice in the world. "It's me."
"Who's _me_?"
"Pepperill--Dan Pepperill; ye know me, don't ye, Stackridge?"
"You? you scoundrel!" said the farmer. "What have ye been doing to the
schoolmaster? Answer me this minute, or I'll----"
"O, don't, don't!" implored the wretch. "I'll answer, I'll tell every
thing, only give me a chance!"
"Be quick, then, and tell no lies!"
The poor man looked around at his captors in the starlight, stooping
dejectedly, and rubbing his bent knees.
"I ain't to blame--I'll tell ye that to begin with. I've been jest
knocked about, from post to pillar, and from pillar to post, till I
don't know who's my friends and who ain't. I reckon more ain't than is!"
added he, dismally.
"That's neither here nor there!" said Stackridge. "Where's Hapgood?
that's what I want to know."
"Ye see," said Dan, endeavoring to collect his wits (you would have
thought they were in his kneepans, and he was industriously rubbing them
up), "Ropes sent me to tote the kittle home, and when I got back here, I
be durned if they wasn't all gone, schoolmaster and all."
"But what had they done to him?"
"I don't know, I'm shore! That's what I was a comin' back fur to see. He
let me down when I was hung up on the rail, and helped me home; and so I
says to myself, says I, 'Why shouldn't I do as much by him?' so I come
back, and found him gone."
"What was in the kittle?" Stackridge took him by the throat.
"O, don't go fur to layin' it to me, and I'll tell ye! Thar'd been tar
in the kittle! It had been used to give him a coat. That's the fact,
durn me if it ain't! They put it on with the broom--my broom--they made
me bring my own broom, that's the everlastin' truth! made me do it
myself, and spile my wife's best broom into the bargain!" And Pepperill
sobbed.
"You put on the tar?"
"Don't kill me, and I'll own up! I did put on some on't, that's a fact.
Ropes would a' killed me if I hadn't, and now you kill me fur doin' of
it. He did knock me down, 'cause he said I didn't rub it on hard enough;
and arter that he rubbed it himself."
"What next, you scoundrel?"
"Next, they rolled him in the feathers, and sent me, as I told ye, to
tote the kittle home. Now don't, don't go fur to hang me, Mr.
Stackridge! Help me, men! help me, Withers,--Devit! For he means to be
the death of me, I'm shore!"
Indeed, Stackridge was in a tremendous passion, and would, no doubt,
have done the man some serious injury but for the timely interposition
of Carl.
"O, you're a good boy, Carl!" cried Dan, in an exstasy of terror and
gratitude. "You know they druv me to it, don't ye? You know I wouldn't
have gone fur to do it no how, if 't hadn't been to save my life. And as
fur rubbing on the tar, I know'd they'd rub harder 'n I did; so I took
holt, if only to do it more soft and gentle-like."
Carl testified to Dan's apparent unwillingness to participate in the
outrage; and Stackridge, finding that nothing more could be got out of
the terror-stricken wretch, flung him off in great rage and disgust.
"We must find what they have done with Hapgood," he said. "We're losing
time here. We'll go to his boarding-place first."
As Pepperill fell backwards upon some stones, and lay there helplessly,
Carl ran to him to learn if he was hurt.
"Wal, I be hurt some," murmured Dan; "a good deal in my back, and a
durned sight more in my feelin's. As if I wan't sufferin' a'ready the
pangs of death--wus'n death!--a thinkin' about the master, and what's
been done to him, arter he'd been so kind to me--and thinkin' he'd think
I'm the ongratefulest cuss out of the bad place!--and then to have it
all laid on to me by Stackridge and the rest! that's the stun that hurts
me wust of any!"
Carl thought, if that was all, he could not assist him much; and he ran
on after the men, leaving Pepperill snivelling like a whipped schoolboy
on the stones.
Penn's landlady, the worthy Mrs. Sprowl, lived in a lonesome house that
stood far back in the fields, at least a dozen rods from the road. She
was a widow, whose daughters were either married or dead, and whose only
son was a rover, having been guilty of some crime that rendered it
unsafe for him to visit his bereaved parent. Penn had chosen her house
for his home, partly because she needed some such assistance in gaining
a living, but chiefly, I think, because she did not own slaves. The
other inmates of her solitary abode were two large, ferocious dogs,
which she kept for the sake of their company and protection.
But this night the house looked as if forsaken even by these. It was
utterly dark and silent. When Stackridge shook the door, however, the
illusion was dispelled by two fierce growls that resounded within.
"Hello! Mrs. Sprowl!" shouted the farmer, shaking the door again, and
knocking violently. "Let me in!"
At that the growling broke into savage barks, which made Stackridge lay
his hand on the revolver Carl had returned to him. A window was then
cautiously opened, and a bit of night-cap exposed.
"If it's you agin," said a shrill feminine voice, "I warn you to be
gone! If you think I can't set the dogs on to you, because you've slep'
in my house so long, you're very much mistaken. They'll tear you as they
would a pa'tridge! Go away, go away, I tell ye; you've been the ruin of
me, and I ain't a-going to resk my life a-harboring of you any longer."
"Mrs. Sprowl!" answered the stern voice of the farmer.
"Dear me! ain't it the schoolmaster?" cried the astonished lady. "I
thought it was him come back agin to force his way into my house, after
I've twice forbid him!"
"Why forbid him?"
"Is it you, Mr. Stackridge? Then I'll be free, and tell ye. I've been
informed he's a dangerous man. I've been warned to shet my doors agin'
him, if I wouldn't have my house pulled down on to my head."
"Who warned you?"
"Silas Ropes, this very night. He come to me, and says, says he, 'We've
gin your abolition boarder a coat, which you must charge to his
account;' for you see," added the head at the window, pathetically,
"they took the bed he has slep' on, right out of my house, and I don't
s'pose I shall see ary feather of that bed ever agin! live goose's
feathers they was too! and a poor lone widder that could ill afford it!"
"Where is the master?"
"Wal, after Ropes and his friends was gone, he comes too, an awful
lookin' object as ever you see! 'Mrs. Sprowl,' says he, 'don't be
scared; it's only me; won't ye let me in?' for ye see, I'd shet the
house agin' him in season, detarmined so dangerous a character should
never darken my doors agin."
"And he was naked!"
"I 'spose he was, all but the feathers, and suthin' or other he seemed
to have flung over him."
"Such a night as this!" exclaimed Stackridge. "You're a heartless jade,
Mrs. Sprowl!--I don't wonder the fellow hates slavery," he muttered to
himself, "when it makes ruffians of the men and monsters even of the
women!--Which way did he go?"
"That's more'n I can tell!" answered the lady, sharply. "It's none o' my
business where he goes, if he don't come here! That I won't have, call
me what names you please!" And she shut the window.
"Hang the critter! after all Hapgood has done for her!" said the
indignant Stackridge,--for it was well-known that she was indebted to
the gentle and generous Penn for many benefits. "But it's no use to
stand here. We'll go to my house, men,--may be he's there."