Why Mr. Blake should take a journey at all at this time, and why of
all places in the world he should choose such an insignificant town
as Putney for his destination, was of course the mystery upon which I
brooded during the entire distance. But when somewhere near five in the
afternoon I stepped from the cars on to the platform at Putney Station
only to hear Mr. Blake making inquiries in regard to a certain stage
running between that town and a still smaller village further east, I
own I was not only surprised but well-nigh nonplussed. Especially as
he seemed greatly disappointed to hear that it only ran once a day, and
then for an earlier train in the morning.
“You will have to wait till to-morrow I fear,” said the ticket agent,
“unless the landlord of the hotel down yonder, can harness you up a
team. There is a funeral out west to-day and--”
I did not wait to hear more but hurried down to the hotel he had pointed
out, and hunting up the landlord inquired if for love or money he could
get me any sort of a conveyance for Melville that afternoon. He assured
me it would be impossible, the livery stable as well as his own being
entirely empty.
“Such a thing don’t happen here once in five years,” said he to me. “But
the old codger who is dead, though a queer dick was a noted personage in
these parts, and not a man, woman or child, who could find a horse, mule
or donkey, but what availed himself of the privilege. Even the doctor’s
spavined mare was pressed into service, though she halts on one leg and
stops to get her breath half a dozen times in going up one short hill.
You will have to wait for the stage, sir.”
“But I am in a hurry,” said I as I saw Mr. Blake enter. “I have business
in Melville tonight, and I would pay anything in reason to get there.”
But the landlord only shook his head; and drawing back with the air of
an abused man, I took up my stand in the doorway where I could hear the
same colloquy entered into with Mr. Blake, with the same unsatisfactory
termination. He did not take it quite as calmly as I did, though he
was of too reserved a nature to display much emotion over anything.
The prospect of a long tedious evening spent in a country hotel seemed
almost unendurable to him, but he finally succumbed to the force of
circumstances, as indeed he seemed obliged to do, and partaking of such
refreshment as the rather poorly managed hotel afforded, retired without
ceremony to his room, from which he did not emerge again till next
morning. In all this he had somehow managed not to give his name; and by
means of some inquiries I succeeded in making that evening, I found his
person was unknown in the town.
By a little management I secured the next room to his, by which
arrangement I succeeded in passing a sleepless night, Mr. Blake spending
most of the wee sma’ hours in pacing the floor of his room, with an
unremitting regularity that had anything but a soothing effect upon my
nerves. Early the next morning we took the stage, he sitting on the back
seat, and I in front with the driver. There were other passengers, but
I noticed he never spoke to any of them, nor through all the long drive
did he once look up from the corner where he had ensconced himself. It
was twelve o’clock when we reached the end of the route, a small town
of somewhat less than the usual pretensions of mountain villages; so
insignificant indeed, that I found it more and more difficult to imagine
what the wealthy ex-Congressman could find in such a spot as this, to
make amends for a journey of such length and discomfort; when to my
increasing wonder I heard him give orders for a horse to be saddled and
brought round to the inn door directly after dinner. This was a move I
had not expected and it threw me a little aback, for although I had thus
far managed to hold myself so aloof from Mr. Blake, even while keeping
him under my eye, that no suspicion of my interest in his movements had
as yet been awakened, how could I thus for the third time follow his
order with one precisely similar, without attracting an attention that
would be fatal to my plans. Yet to let him ride off alone now, would be
to drop the trail at the very moment the scent became of importance.
The landlord, a bustling, wiry little man all nervousness and questions,
unwittingly helped me at this crisis.
“Are you going on to Perry, sir?” inquired he of that gentleman, “I have
been expecting a man along these three days bound for Perry.”
“I am that man,” I broke in, stepping forward with some appearance of
asperity, “and I hope you won’t keep me waiting. A horse as soon as
dinner is over, do you hear? I am two days late now, and won’t stand any
nonsense.”
And to escape the questions sure to follow, I strode into the
dining-room with a half-fierce, half-sullen countenance, that
effectually precluded all advances. During the meal I saw Mr. Blake’s
eye roam more than once towards my face; but I did not return his gaze,
or notice him in any way; hurrying through my dinner, and mounting the
first horse brought around, as if time were my only consideration. But
once on the road I took the first opportunity to draw rein and wait,
suddenly remembering that I had not heard Mr. Blake give any intimation
of the direction he intended taking. A few minutes revealed to me his
elegant form well mounted and showing to perfection in his closely
buttoned coat, slowly approaching up the road. Taking advantage of
a rise in the ground, I lingered till he was almost upon me, when I
cantered quickly on, fearing to arouse his apprehensions if I allowed
him to pass me on a road so solitary as that which now stretched out
before us: a move provocative of much embarassment to me, as I dared not
turn my head for the same reason, anxious as I was to keep him in sight.
The roads dividing before me, at length gave me my first opportunity
to pause and look back. He was some fifty paces behind. Waiting till he
came up, I bowed with the surly courtesy I thought in keeping with the
character I had assumed, and asked if he knew which road led towards
Perry, saying I had come off in such haste I had forgotten to inquire my
way. He returned my bow, pointed towards the left hand road and saying,
“I know this does not,” calmly took it.
Now here was a dilemma. If in face of this curt response I proceeded to
follow him, my hand was revealed at once; yet the circumstances
would admit of no other course. I determined to compromise matters by
pretending to take the right hand road till he was out of sight, when I
would return and follow him swiftly upon the left. Accordingly I reined
my horse to the right, and for some fifteen minutes galloped slowly
away towards the north; but another fifteen saw me facing the west, and
riding with a force and fury of which I had not thought the old mare
they had given me capable, till I put her to the test. It was not long
before I saw my fine gentleman trotting in front of me up a long but
gentle slope that rose in the distance; and slackening my own rein, I
withdrew into the forest at the side of the road, till he had passed its
summit and disappeared, when I again galloped forward.
And thus we went on for an hour, over the most uneven country I ever
traversed, he always one hill ahead; when suddenly, by what instinct I
cannot determine, I felt myself approaching the end, and hastening to
the top of the ascent up which I was then laboring, looked down into the
shallow valley spread out before me.
What a sight met my eyes if I had been intent on anything less practical
than the movements of the solitary horseman below! Hills on hills piled
about a verdant basin in whose depths nestled a scanty collection of
houses, in number so small they could be told upon the fingers of the
right hand, but which notwithstanding lent an indescribable aspect of
comfort to this remote region of hill and forest.
But the vision of Mr. Blake pausing half way down the slope before me,
examining, yes examining a pistol which he held in his hand, soon put
an end to all ideas of romance. Somewhat alarmed I reined back; but his
action had evidently no connection with me, for he did not once glance
behind him, but kept his eye on the road which I now observed took a
short turn towards a house of so weird and ominous an appearance that I
scarcely marvelled at his precaution.
Situated on a level track of land at the crossing of three roads, its
spacious front, rude and unpainted as it was, presented every appearance
of an inn, but from its moss-grown chimneys no smoke arose, nor could
I detect any sign of life in its shutterless windows and closed doors,
across which shivered the dark shadow of the one gaunt and aged pine,
that stood like a guard beside its tumbled-down porch.
Mr. Blake seemed to have been struck by the same fact concerning its
loneliness, for hurriedly replacing his pistol in his breast pocket, he
rode slowly forward. I instantly conceived the plan of striking across
the belt of underbrush that separated me from this old dwelling, and by
taking my stand opposite its front, intercept a view of Mr. Blake as
he approached. Hastily dismounting, therefore, I led my horse into the
bushes and tied her to a tree, proceeding to carry out my plan on foot.
I was so far successful as to arrive at the further edge of the wood,
which was thick enough to conceal my presence without being too dense to
obstruct my vision, just as Mr. Blake passed on his way to this solitary
dwelling. He was looking very anxious, but determined. Turning my eyes
from him, I took another glance at the house, which by this movement I
had brought directly before me. It was even more deserted-looking than
I had thought; its unpainted front with its double row of blank windows
meeting your gaze without a response, while the huge old pine with half
its limbs dismantled of foliage, rattled its old bones against its sides
and moaned in its aged fashion like the solitary retainer of a dead
race.
I own I felt the cold shivers creep down my back as that creaking sound
struck my ears, though as the day was chill with an east wind I dare say
it was more the effect of my sudden cessation from exercise, than of
any superstitious awe I felt. Mr. Blake seemed to labor under no such
impressions. Riding up to the front door he knocked without dismounting,
on its dismal panels with his riding whip. No response was heard.
Knitting his brows impatiently, he tried the latch: the door was locked.
Hastily running his eye over the face of the building, he drew rein and
proceeded to ride around the house, which he could easily do owing
to the absence of every obstruction in the way of fence or shrubbery.
Finding no means of entrance he returned again to the front door which
he shook with an impatient hand that however produced no impression
upon the trusty lock, and recognizing, doubtless, the futility of his
endeavors, he drew back, and merely pausing to give one other look at
its deserted front, turned his horse’s head, and to my great amazement,
proceeded with sombre mien and clouded brow to retake the road to
Melville.
This old inn or decayed homestead was then the object of his lengthened
and tedious journey; this ancient house rotting away among the bleak
hills of Vermont, the bourne towards which his steps had been tending
for these past two days. I could not understand it. Rapidly emerging
from the spot where I had secreted myself, I in my turn made a circuit
of the house, if happily I should discover some loophole of entrance
which had escaped his attention. But every door and window was securely
barred, and I was about to follow his example and leave the spot, when
I saw two or three children advancing towards me down the cross roads,
gaily swinging their school books. I noticed they hesitated and huddled
together as they approached and saw me, but not heeding this, I accosted
them with a pleasant word or so, then pointing over my shoulder to the
house behind, asked who lived there. Instantly their already pale faces
grew paler.
“Why,” cried one, a boy, “don’t you know? That is where the two wicked
men lived who stole the money out of the Rutland bank. They were put in
prison, but they got away and--”
Here, the other, a little girl, plucked him by the sleeve with such
affright, that he himself took alarm and just giving me one quick stare
out of his wide eyes, grasped his companion by the hand and took to his
heels. As for myself I stood rooted to the ground in my astonishment.
This blank, sleepy old house the home of the notorious Schoenmakers
after whom half of the detectives of the country were searching? I could
scarcely credit my own ears. True I now remembered they had come from
these parts, still--
Turning round I eyed the house once more. How altered it looked to me!
What a murderous aspect it wore, and how dismally secret were the tight
shut windows and closely fastened doors, on one of which a rude cross
scrawled in red chalk met the eye with a mysterious significance. Even
the old pine had acquired the villainous air of the uncanny repositor of
secrets too dreadful to reveal, as it groaned and murmured to itself in
the keen east wind. Dark deeds and foul wrong seemed written all over
the fearful place, from the long strings of black moss that clung to
the worm-eaten eaves, to the worn stone with its great blotch of
something,--could it have been blood?--that served as a threshold to
the door. Suddenly with the quickness of lightning the thought flashed
across me, what could Mr. Blake, the aristocratic representative of New
York’s oldest family, have wanted in this nest of infamy? What errand
of hope, fear, despair, avarice or revenge, could have brought this
superior gentleman with his refined tastes and proudly reticent manners,
so many miles from home, to the forsaken den of a brace of hardy
villains whose name for two years now, had stood as the type of all that
was bold, bad and lawless, and for whom during the last six weeks the
prison had yawned, and the gallows hungered. Contemplation brought
no reply, and shocked at my own thoughts, I put the question by for
steadier brains than mine; and instead of trying further to solve it,
cast about how I was to gain entrance into this deserted building; for
to enter it I was more than ever determined, now that I had heard to
whom it had once belonged.
Examining with a glance the several roads that branched off in every
direction from where I stood, I found them all equally deserted. Even
the school children had disappeared in some one of the four or five
houses scattered in the remote distance.
If I was willing to enter upon any daring exploit, there was no one to
observe or interrupt. I resolved to make the attempt with which my mind
was full. This was to climb the old tree, and from one of the two or
three branches that brushed against the house, gain entrance at an
open garret window that stared at me from amid the pine’s dark needles.
Taking off my coat with a sigh over the immaculate condition of my new
cassimere trousers, I bent my energies to the task. A difficult one you
will say for a city lad, but thanks to fortune I was not brought up in
New York, and know how to climb trees with the best. With little more
than a scratch or so, I reached the window of which I have spoken,
and after a moment spent in regaining my breath, gave one spring and
accomplished my purpose. I alighted upon a heap of broken glass in a
large bare room. An ominous chill at once struck to my heart. Though
I am anything but a sensitive man as far as physical impressions are
concerned, there was something in the hollow echo that arose from the
four blank walls about me as my feet alighted on that rough, uncarpeted
floor, that struck a vague chill through my blood, and I actually
hesitated for the moment whether to pursue the investigations I had
promised myself, or beat a hasty retreat. A glance at the huge distorted
limbs swaying across the square of the open window decided me. It
was easy to enter by means of that unsteady support, but it would be
extremely unsafe to venture forth in that way. If I prized life and limb
I must seek some other method of egress. I at once put my apprehensions
in my pocket and entered upon my self imposed task.
A single glance was sufficient to exhaust the resources of the empty
garret in which I found myself. Two or three old chairs piled in one
corner, a rusty stove or so, a heap of tattered and decaying clothing,
were all that met my gaze. Taking my way, then, at once to the ladder,
whose narrow ends projecting above a hole in the garret floor, seemed
to proffer the means of reaching the rooms below, I proceeded to descend
into what to my excited imagination looked like a gulf of darkness. It
proved, however, to be nothing more nor less than an unlighted hall of
small dimensions, with a stair-case at one end and a door at the other,
which, upon opening I found myself in a large, square room whose immense
four-post bedstead entirely denuded of its usual accompaniments of bed
and bolster at once struck my eye and for a moment held it enchained.
There were other articles in the room; a disused bureau, a rocking
chair, even a table, but nothing had such a ghostly look as that antique
bedstead with its curtains of calico tied back over its naked framework,
like rags draped from the bare bones of a skeleton. Passing hurriedly
by, I tried a closet door or so, finding little, however, to reward my
search; and eager to be done with what was every moment becoming more
and more drearisome, I hastened across the floor to the front of the
house where I found another hall and a row of rooms that, while not
entirely stripped of furniture, were yet sufficiently barren to
offer little encouragement to my curiosity. One only, a small but not
uncomfortable apartment, showed any signs of having been occupied within
a reasonable length of time; and as I paused before its hastily spread
bed, thrown together as only a man would do it, and wondering why the
room was so dark, looked up and saw that the window was entirely covered
by an old shawl and a couple of heavy coats that had been hastily nailed
across it, I own I felt my hand go to my breast pocket almost as if I
expected to see the wild faces of the dreaded Schoenmakers start up all
aglare from one of the dim corners before me. Rushing to the window, I
tore down with one sweep of my arm both coat and shawl, and with a start
discovered that the window still possessed its draperies in the shape of
a pair of discolored and tattered curtains tied with ribbons that must
once have been brilliant and cheery of color.
Nor was this the only sign in the room of a bygone presence that had
possessed a taste for something beyond the mere necessities of life.
On the grim coarsely papered wall hung more than one picture; cut from
pictorial newspapers to be sure, but each and every one, if I may be
called a judge of such matters, possessing some quality of expression to
commend it to a certain order of taste. They were all strong pictures.
Vivid faces of men and women in daring positions; a hunter holding back
a jaguar from his throat; a soldier protecting his comrade from the
stroke; and most striking of all, a woman lissome as she was powerful,
starting aghast and horror stricken from--what? I could not tell; a
rough hand had stripped the remainder of the picture from the wall.
A bit of candle and a half sheet of a newspaper lay on the floor. I
picked up the paper. It was a Rutland Herald and bore the date of two
days before. As I read I realized what I had done. If these daring
robbers were not at this very moment in the house, they had been there,
and that within two or three days. The broken panes of glass in the
garret above were now explained. I was not the first one who had climbed
that creaking pine tree this fall.
Something like a sensible dread of a very possible danger now seized
hold of me. If I had stumbled upon these strangely subtile, yet
devilishly bold creatures in their secret lair, the pistol I carried was
not going to save me. Shut in like a fox in a hole, I had little to hope
for, if they once made their appearance at the stairhead or came upon me
from any of the dim halls of the crazy old dwelling, which I now began
to find altogether too large for my comfort. Stealing cautiously forth
from the room in which I had found so much to disconcert me, I crept
towards the front staircase and listened. All was deathly quiet. The
old pine tree moaned and twisted without, and from time to time the wind
came sweeping down the chimney with an unearthly shrieking sound that
was weirdly in keeping with the place. But within and below all was
still as the tomb, and though in no ways reassured, I determined to
descend and have the suspense over at once. I did so, pistol in hand
and ears stretched to their utmost to catch the slightest rustle, but no
sound came to disturb me, nor did I meet on this lower floor the sign of
any other presence in the house but my own. Passing hastily through what
appeared to be a sort of rude parlor, I stepped into the kitchen and
tried one of the windows. Finding I could easily lift it from the
inside, I drew my breath with ease for the first time since I had
alighted among the broken glass above, and turning back, deliberately
opened the door of the kitchen stove, and looked in. As I half expected,
I found a pile of partly charred rags, showing where the wretches had
burned their prison clothing, and proceeding further, picked up from
the ashes a ring which whether or not they were conscious of having
attempted to destroy in this way I cannot say, but which I thankfully
put in my pocket against the day it might be required as proof.
Discerning nothing more in that quarter inviting interest, I asked
myself if I had nerve to descend into the cellar. Finally concluding
that that was more than could be expected from any man in my position, I
gave one look of farewell to the damp and desolate walls about me, then
with a breath of relief jumped from the kitchen window again into the
light and air of day. As I did so I could swear I heard a door within
that old house swing on its hinges and softly close. With a thrill I
recognized the fact that it came from the cellar.
* * * *
My thoughts on the road back to Melville were many and conflicting.
Chief above them all, however, rose the comfortable conclusion that in
the pursuit of one mysterious affair, I had stumbled, as is often the
case, upon the clue to another of yet greater importance, and by so
doing got a start that might yet redound greatly to my advantage. For
the reward offered for the recapture of the Schoenmakers was large, and
the possibility of my being the one to put the authorities upon their
track, certainly appeared after this day’s developements, open at least
to a very reasonable hope. At all events I determined not to let the
grass grow under my feet till I had informed the Superintendent of what
I had seen and heard that day in the old haunt of these two escaped
convicts.
Arrived at the public house in Melville, and learning that Mr. Blake had
safely returned there an hour before, I drew the landlord to one side
and asked what he could tell me about that old house of the two noted
robbers Schoenmaker, I had passed on my way back among the hills.
“Wa’al now,” replied he, “this is curious. Here I’ve just been answering
the gentleman up stairs a heap of questions concerning that self same
old place, and now you come along with another batch of them; just as
if that rickety old den was the only spot of interest we had in these
parts.”
“Perhaps that may be the truth,” I laughed. “Just now when the papers
are full of these rogues, anything concerning them must be of superior
interest of course.” And I pressed him again to give me a history of the
house and the two thieves who had inhabited it.
“Wa’al,” drawled he “‘taint much we know about them, yet after all it
may be a trifle too much for their necks some day. Time was when nobody
thought especial ill of them beyond a suspicion or so of their being
somewhat mean about money. That was when they kept an inn there, but
when the robbery of the Rutland bank was so clearly traced to them,
more than one man about here started up and said as how they had
always suspected them Shoenmakers of being villains, and even hinted at
something worse than robbery. But nothing beyond that one rascality has
yet been proved against them, and for that they were sent to jail for
twenty years as you know. Two months ago they escaped, and that is the
last known of them. A precious set, too, they are; the father being only
so much the greater rogue than the son as he is years older.”
“And the inn? When was that closed?”
“Just after their arrest.”
“Has’nt it been opened since?”
“Only once when a brace of detectives came up from Troy to investigate,
as they called it.”
“Who has the key?”
“Ah, that’s more than I can tell you.”
I dared not ask how my questions differed from those of Mr. Blake, nor
indeed touch upon that point in any way. I was chiefly anxious now
to return to New York without delay; so paying my bill I thanked the
landlord, and without waiting for the stage, remounted my horse and
proceeded at once to Putney where I was fortunate enough to catch the
evening train. By five o’clock next morning I was in New York where I
proceeded to carry out my programme by hastening at once to headquarters
and reporting my suspicions regarding the whereabouts of the
Schoenmakers. The information was received with interest and I had
the satisfaction of seeing two men despatched north that very day with
orders to procure the arrest of the two notable villains wherever found.