They found the wounded man lying in the front room upon a rudely
extemporized couch of bear-skins, he having sternly declined the
effeminacy of his wife's bedroom. In the possibility of a fatal
termination to his wound, and in obedience to a grim frontier tradition,
he had also refused to have his boots removed in order that he might
“die with them on,” as became his ancestral custom. Johnny was therefore
speedily made comfortable in the McKinstry bed, while Dr. Duchesne gave
his whole attention to his more serious patient. The master glanced
hurriedly around for Mrs. McKinstry. She was not only absent from the
room, but there seemed to be no suggestion of her presence in the house.
To his greater surprise the hurried inquiry that rose to his lips was
checked by a significant warning from the attendant. He sat down beside
the now sleeping boy, and awaited the doctor's return with his mind
wandering between the condition of the little sufferer and the singular
revelation that had momentarily escaped his childish lips. If Johnny had
actually seen Seth fire at McKinstry, the latter's mysterious wound
was accounted for--but not Seth's motive. The act was so utterly
incomprehensible and inconsistent with Seth's avowed hatred of the
master that the boy must have been delirious.
He was roused by the entrance of the surgeon. “It's not so bad as I
thought,” he said, with a reassuring nod. “It was a mighty close shave
between a shattered bone and a severed artery, but we've got the ball,
and he'll pull through in a week. By Jove! though--the old fire-eater
was more concerned about finding the ball than living or dying! Go in
there--he wants to see you. Don't let him talk too much. He's called
in a lot of his friends for some reason or other--and there's a regular
mass-meeting in there. Go in, and get rid of 'em. I'll look after baby
Filgee--though the little chap will be all right again after another
dressing.”
The master cast a hurried look of relief at the surgeon, and re-entered
the front room. It was filled with men whom the master instinctively
recognized as his former adversaries. But they gave way before him with
a certain rude respect and half abashed sympathy as McKinstry called him
to his side. The wounded man grasped his hand. “Lift me up a bit,” he
whispered. The master assisted him with difficulty to his elbow.
“Gentlemen!” said McKinstry, with a characteristic wave of his crippled
hand towards the crowd as he laid the other on the master's shoulder.
“Ye heerd me talkin' a minit ago; ye heer me now. This yer young man as
we've slipped up on and meskalkilated has told the truth--every time!
Ye ken tie to him whenever and wherever ye want to. Ye ain't expected to
feel ez I feel, in course, but the man ez goes back on HIM--quo'lls with
me. That's all--and thanks for inquiring friends. Ye'll git now, boys,
and leave him a minit with me.”
The men filed slowly out, a few lingering long enough to shake the
master's hand with grave earnestness, or half smiling, half abashed
embarrassment. The master received the proffered reconciliation of
these men, who but a few hours before would have lynched him with equal
sincerity, with cold bewilderment. As the door closed on the last of the
party he turned to McKinstry. The wounded man had sunk down again, but
was regarding with drowsy satisfaction a leaden bullet he was holding
between his finger and thumb.
“This yer shot, Mr. Ford,” he said in a slow voice, whose weakness was
only indicated by its extreme deliberation, “never kem from the gun I
gave ye--and was never fired by you.” He paused and then added with his
old dull abstraction, “It's a long time since I've run agin anythin'
that makes me feel more--kam.”
In Mr. McKinstry's weak condition the master did not dare to make
Johnny's revelation known to him, and contented himself by simply
pressing his hand, but the next moment the wounded man resumed,--
“That ball jest fits Seth's navy revolver--and the hound hes made tracks
outer the country.”
“But what motive could he have in attacking YOU at such a time?” asked
the master.
“He reckoned that either I'd kill you and so he'd got shut of us both in
that way, without it being noticed; or if I missed you, the others would
hang YOU--ez they kalkilated to--for killing ME! The idea kem to him
when he overheard you hintin' you wouldn't return my fire.”
A shuddering conviction that McKinstry had divined the real truth
passed over the master. In the impulse of the moment he again would have
corroborated it by revealing Johnny's story, but a glance at the growing
feverishness of the wounded man checked his utterance. “Don't talk of it
now,” he said hurriedly. “Enough for me to know that you acquit ME. I
am here now only to beg you to compose yourself until the doctor comes
back--as you seemed to be alone, and Mrs. McKinstry”--he stopped in
awkward embarrassment.
A singular confusion overspread the invalid's face. “She hed steppt out
afore this happened, owin' to contrairy opinions betwixt me and her. Ye
mout hev noticed, Mr. Ford, that gin'rally she didn't 'pear to cotton to
ye! Thar ain't a woman a goin' ez is the ekal of Blair Rawlins' darter
in nussin' a man and keeping him in fightin' order, but in matters like
things that consarn herself and Cress, I begin to think, Mr. Ford,
that somehow, she ain't exakly--kam! Bein' kam yourself, ye'll put any
unpleasantness down to that. Wotever you hear from HER, and, for
the matter o' that, from her own darter too--for I'm takin' back
the foolishness I said to ye over yon about your runnin' off with
Cress--you'll remember, Mr. Ford, it warn't from no ill feeling to YOU,
in her or Cress--but on'y a want of kam! I mout hev had MY idees about
Cress, you mout hev had YOURS, and that fool Dabney mout hev had HIS;
but it warn't the old woman's--nor Cressy's--it warn't Blair Rawlins'
darter's idea--nor yet HER darter's! And why? For want o' kam! Times
I reckon it was left out o' woman's nater. And bein' kam yourself, you
understand it, and take it all in.”
The old look of drowsy pain had settled so strongly in his red eyes
again that the master was fain to put his hand gently over them, and
with a faint smile beg him to compose himself to sleep. This he finally
did after a whispered suggestion that he himself was feeling “more kam.”
The master sat for some moments with his hand upon the sleeping man's
eyes, and a vague and undefinable sense of loneliness seemed to fall
upon him from the empty rafters of the silent and deserted house. The
rising wind moaned fitfully around its bleak shell with the despairing
sound of far and forever receding voices. So strong was the impression
that when the doctor and McKinstry's attending brother re-entered the
room, the master still lingered beside the bed with a dazed sensation
of abandonment that the doctor's practical reassuring smile could hardly
dispel.
“He's doing splendidly now,” he said, listening to the sleeper's more
regular respiration: “and I'd advise you to go now, Mr. Ford, before
he wakes, lest he might be tempted to excite himself by talking to you
again. He's really quite out of danger now. Good-night! I'll drop in on
you at the hotel when I return.”
The master, albeit still confused and bewildered, felt his way to
the door and out into the open night. The wind was still despairingly
wrestling with the tree-tops, but the far receding voices seemed to be
growing fainter in the distance, until, as he passed on, they too seemed
to pass away forever.
*****
Monday morning had come again, and the master was at his desk in the
school house early, with a still damp and inky copy of the Star fresh
from the press before him. The free breath of the pines was blowing in
the window, and bringing to his ears the distant voices of his slowly
gathering flock, as he read as follows:--
“The perpetrator of the dastardly outrage at the Indian Spring Academy
on Thursday last--which, through unfortunate misrepresentation of
the facts, led to a premature calling out of several of our most
public-spirited citizens, and culminated in a most regrettable encounter
between Mr. McKinstry and the accomplished and estimable principal of
the school--has, we regret to say, escaped condign punishment by leaving
the country with his relations. If, as is seriously whispered, he was
also guilty of an unparalleled offence against a chivalrous code which
will exclude him in the future from ever seeking redress at the Court
of Honor, our citizens will be only too glad to get rid of the
contamination of being obliged to arrest him. Those of our readers who
know the high character of the two gentlemen who were thus forced into
a hostile meeting, will not be surprised to know that the most ample
apologies were tendered on both sides, and that the entente cordiale has
been thoroughly restored. The bullet--which it is said played a highly
important part in the subsequent explanation, proving to have come
from a REVOLVER fired by some outsider--has been extracted from Mr.
McKinstry's thigh, and he is doing well, with every prospect of a speedy
recovery.”
Smiling, albeit not uncomplacently, at this valuable contribution to
history from an unfettered press, his eye fell upon the next paragraph,
perhaps not so complacently:--
“Benjamin Daubigny, Esq., who left town for Sacramento on important
business, not entirely unconnected with his new interests in Indian
Springs, will, it is rumored, be shortly joined by his wife, who has
been enabled by his recent good fortune to leave her old home in
the States, and take her proper proud position at his side. Although
personally unknown to Indian Springs, Mrs. Daubigny is spoken of as a
beautiful and singularly accomplished woman, and it is to be regretted
that her husband's interests will compel them to abandon Indian Springs
for Sacramento as a future residence. Mr. Daubigny was accompanied by
his private secretary Rupert, the eldest son of H. G. Filgee, Esq., who
has been a promising graduate of the Indian Spring Academy, and offers a
bright example to the youth of this district. We are happy to learn
that his younger brother is recovering rapidly from a slight accident
received last week through the incautious handling of firearms.”
The master, with his eyes upon the paper, remained so long plunged in a
reverie that the school-room was quite filled and his little flock was
wonderingly regarding him before he recalled himself. He was hurriedly
reaching his hand towards the bell when he was attracted by the rising
figure of Octavia Dean.
“Please, sir, you didn't ask if we had any news!”
“True--I forgot,” said the master smiling. “Well, have you anything to
tell us?”
“Yes, sir. Cressy McKinstry has left school.”
“Indeed!”
“Yes, sir; she's married.”
“Married,” repeated the master with an effort, yet conscious of the eyes
concentrated upon his colorless face. “Married--and to whom?”
“To Joe Masters, sir, at the Baptist Chapel at Big Bluff, Sunday, an'
Marm McKinstry was thar with her.”
There was a momentary and breathless pause. Then the voices of his
little pupils--those sage and sweet truants from tradition, those gentle
but relentless historians of the future--rose around him in shrill
chorus--“WHY, WE KNOWED IT ALL ALONG, SIR!”