It was a very dark night. The wind freshened; leaves were set adrift in
the black void spaces; the jarring of bare boughs, continually clashing
together, pervaded the gloom: the water was ruffled, and the reflection
of the stars was distorted or annulled amongst the vacillating ripples as
the faint beams fell. No other sound near Keedon Bluffs, no other stir.
By the fireside of Hiram Guyther’s house one could hardly be unconscious
of the tumult of the mountain forest, or of the swirl of the wind in the
funnel-like depths of the Cove, however deep the reverie, however the
fire might crackle as the big blazes sprang up the chimney, however the
little Rosamondy might laugh or might sing.
“How the wind blows!” the blind man said from time to time, lifting his
gray head and his young face. And aunt Jemima would remark on “the
powerful clatter” of the orchard boughs and the rustling swish of the
Indian corn standing dead and stark in the fields.
As the trumpeting blast came down the chimney once more Ab roused himself
anew and exclaimed, “’Minds me o’ the night Rosamondy kem.”
“Did the wind blow me hyar?” cried Rosamondy, as she sat in her little
chair.
“The bes’ wind that ever blew!” declared aunt Jemima, her gleaming
spectacles intercepting her caressing glance.
Jerry Binwell turned a trifle aside in his chair to hide the scornful
curve of his lips. There was no need to shift his posture. Aunt Jemima’s
eyes were bent once more upon her knitting, and Abner was blind alike to
sneers and smiles. Rosamond’s attention was fixed upon a big red apple
roasting and sputtering between two stones that served as fire-dogs.
Now and then, with the aid of a stick, she turned the other side of the
apple to the heat. Only the blinking cat saw the jeer on his face, and
this animal was too frequently ridiculed to care to cultivate any fine
distinctions in the nature of laughs. Curiously enough, the cat wore a
queer gown of blue-checked homespun and a ruffled cap that was often
awry, for she sometimes put up a disaffected paw to scrape it off, or it
became disarranged in hasty or too energetic washings of her face. She
had been thus accoutered by aunt Jemima to appease Rosamondy’s craving
for a live doll. The cat was very much alive, and seated before the fire
she had an antique and dame-like look, which was highly appreciated by
her owner, but which was totally destroyed when she walked on all-fours.
The live doll was eminently satisfactory to Rosamond, and except for the
tyranny of her garments was in danger of being killed by kindness.
The laugh on Jerry Binwell’s face was only a transient gleam. He relapsed
into brooding gravity and meditatively eyed the fire.
“Ab,” he said suddenly, when aunt Jemima had left the room to join Mrs.
Guyther, who was “sizin’” yarn in the shed-room, and he could hear their
voices in animated controversy as to the best methods. “Ab, I’ll tell ye
what this windy night in the fall of the year ’minds me of.”
His voice had the most agreeable inflections of which it was capable,
but it elicited no response, for Abner had not relented toward his old
comrade, and seldom would seem aware of his existence. Binwell’s face
contorted into a disagreeable grimace. This secret taunt the blind man
was spared. Then Binwell’s smooth tones went on as if he had not expected
a rejoinder.
“’Minds me o’ that night in the old War time whenst me an’ you-uns holped
old Squair Torbett ter hide his plunder from g’rillas an’ sech—ye ’member
how the wind blowed?”
Abner’s fire-lit face glowed with more than the reflection of the flames.
His lip curled; the reminiscence seemed to afford him some occult
amusement.
“I ’member! I ’member!” he said slowly; then he chuckled softly to
himself.
Binwell’s eyes were fixed upon him with an antagonistic intentness, as
if he would fain seize upon his withheld thought in some unconscious
betrayal of face. But the blind man could only hear his voice, languid
and reminiscent, drawling on, aimlessly, it seemed. “Waal, I ’members
it too, mighty well. How flustry the old man war! Wonder if we’ll be
that-a-way when we-uns git ez old ez him? He gin us the box, an’ we-uns
kerried it ter the top o’ the Bluffs, an’ ye clomb down whilst I watched.
An’ wunst in a while the old man would nudge me,” then with a quick
change of voice—“‘Ain’t that a horse a-lopin’, Jerry? hear it? hear it?’
An’ I’d say, ‘It’s the wind, Squair—the wind, a-wallopin’ up the gorge.’
An’ then he’d rest fur a minit an’ say, ‘Air sign o’ Ab? That thar boy’ll
break his neck, I’m ’feared.’ An’ I’d say, ‘I hear the clods in the
niches a-fallin’ whilst he climbs, Squair; he’s a-goin’ it.’ An’ then
he’d clutch me by the arm, an’ say, whispery an’ husky, ‘Jerry! Jerry!
what’s that down the road—the jingle o’ spurs, the clank o’ a sabre?’ An’
I’d say—‘It’s jes’ the dead leaves, Squair, a-rustlin’ as they fly in the
wind.’ An’ he warn’t easy one minit till ye clomb up the Bluffs ag’in,
empty-handed an’ the box hid.”
As he talked, Rosamond’s hands had fallen still in her lap while she
listened with the wide-eyed wonder of childhood. Her curling yellow hair,
ruddily gleaming in the firelight, hung down over her shoulders, her
cheek was flushed, her great gray eyes, full of starry lights and yet
pensively shadowed by her long black lashes, were fixed upon his face.
When the tension slackened she sighed deeply and stirred, and then lapsed
into intent interest again.
The blind man had bent forward, his elbows on his knees. “I ’members,” he
said again.
“I never did know, Ab, whether ye fund them hollows in the Bluffs a
toler’ble tight fit, nor how fur back they run in them rocks; but ye war
a mighty slim boy in them days.”
“Warn’t slim enough ter git inter the fust nor the second,” spoke up the
blind soldier briskly, with awakened interest.
“So ye put it inter the thurd?” demanded Jerry.
If he could have seen himself how well he would have thought it that his
old comrade could not see him! His head was thrust forward till all the
ligaments in his long thin neck were visible, strained and stretched. His
eyes were starting. His breath was quick, and his under jaw had dropped.
Rosamond had a half affrighted look as she sat in her chair on the hearth
beside the sleeping dogs and the grotesquely attired cat that was gravely
washing its face.
The blind man nodded. “Yes,” he said simply, “I put it in the thurd, an’
pritty far back, too.”
The chimney was resounding with the burden of the blast as it sang
without; its tumultuous staves echoed far up the mountain slopes. Abner
lifted his head to listen, hearing perhaps the faint din of the winds of
memory blowing as they listed about Keedon Bluffs. The next instant his
attention was recalled. In the momentary absorption the sharpened hearing
of the blind had failed him. He subtly knew that there was a change in
the room, but what it was he could not say. He stretched out his hand
with a groping gesture. “Jerry,” he called out in a friendly voice. There
was no answer.
The puzzled expression deepened on his face. He heard the stirring of the
child. “Rosamondy,” he said, “who’s hyar?”
“Nobody,” the vibrant, sweet voice answered, “nobody but me—an’ Mis’ Cat.”
“Whar’s Jerry?” he demanded.
“Gone out,” she said promptly. “Sech walkin’ on tiptoes I never see.”
There sounded instantly a queer thumping on the puncheon floor, a
tumble, a great gush of treble laughter; then the eccentric thumping was
renewed and Abner knew that Rosamondy was imitating the deft celerity of
Binwell’s exit on tiptoes. He did not laugh. He leaned back in his chair
with doubt and perplexity corrugating his brow.
A step was upon the ladder, descending from the roof-room—not Ike’s usual
light step, but he it was, slowly appearing from the shadows. Even after
he had emerged into the genial firelight their gloom seemed still to
rest upon his face, and his eyes were at once anxious and mournful. He
withstood as well as he could the shock of welcome with which Rosamond
rushed upon him, seizing him round the knees till he almost toppled
over, and was constrained to wildly wave his arms in order to regain his
equilibrium. She fell into ecstasies of delight because of the awkward
insecurity he exhibited, and as with outstretched arms, and flying hair,
and tangled feet, and rippling, gurgling cries, she mimicked him, he
found himself at liberty to sink into a chair. And then while Rosamond,
always long in exhausting her jokes, still toppled about the floor, he
silently brooded over the fire.
Once or twice he raised his eyes and looked toward his uncle who seemed
too lost in reverie. Sometimes Abner lifted his head to listen to the
rioting winds and again bent it to his dreams. The white firelight
flickered, and now the brown shadow wavered. He was presently subtly
aware of a new presence by the hearth, unseen by others as all must be by
him.
“Ye hev got trouble alongside o’ ye, Ike,” he remarked. “Ye’re mighty
foolish. It’s a great thing ter be young, an’ strong, an’ hev all yer
senses. The beastises hev got mo’ gumption than ye. Ever see a young
strong critter, free an’ fat, that war mournful? Naw; an’ ye ain’t goin’
ter. Ye hev got the worl’ in a sling. An’ ye set an’ mope.”
Ike made an effort to rouse himself. “I know I oughtn’t,” he said in a
strained voice, “but I be mighty—mighty troubled.”
“Jes’ so,” said the blind man.
Ike looked at the flickering white flames for a moment, at the pulsing
red coals, at the vacillating brown shadows. Rosamondy had rushed into
the shed-room to exhibit her imitation of Ike to his mother and aunt
Jemima. He listened to the chorus of voices for a moment, then he said,
“I dunno but what I’m foolish, uncle Ab, but I hearn what ye tole Jerry
Binwell jes’ now ’bout whar ye hid the Squair’s money-box, an’—an’ I
wisht ye hedn’t done it.”
“What fur?” the blind man lifted his face lighted with sudden interest,
“ye be ’feared ez he mought ’low it’s thar yit an’ go arter it an’ git
his neck bruk.”
Ike moved uneasily.
“That’s jes’ the reason he tried to keep me an’ Skimpy Sawyer from
climbin’ down thar one evenin’—fust time I ever seen him; tried ter skeer
we-uns with witches an’ sech. The Squair’s money-box air what he war
arter, I be bound, the night o’ the coon hunt whenst I cotch him thar.
I’m feared he’ll git it. I dunno what to do! I s’picioned suthin’, but I
never ’lowed ’twar money. He’ll git arrested ef he don’t mind.”
“I wisht he would,” said Abner; he chuckled fiercely and fell to
revolving his old grudges.
“Waal, I’d hate that mightily,” said Ike dolorously, “arrested out’n
we-uns’s house. I war goin’ ter tell dad nex’ day, but he war gone ’fore
I got home. I wisht Jerry Binwell bed never kem hyar!”
“Why, Ike,” Abner retorted cogently, “then leetle Rosamondy would never
hev kem!”
“I seen old Corbin an’ the constable with thar heads mighty close
tergether ter-day,” Ike went on drearily, “an’ arterward I passed down
the river-bank on the opposite side ter Keedon Bluffs, an’ I see the
constable a-hidin’ hisself in a clump o’ sour-wood. I dunno what ter
do. I feel ’sponsible, somehows. I don’t want him ter git the money—a
thievin’ scamp—and yit I don’t want him ter git arrested.” He paused in
astonishment.
Abner Guyther was laughing in sardonic delight. “He ain’t goin’ ter git
the money!” he cried. “An’ I dunno nobody ez needs arrestin’ ez bad ez he
do—somebody oughter scotch his wheel, sartain! G’long, Ike; g’long ter
bed. An’ quit addlin’ yer brains ’bout’n yer elders.”
Ike was not reassured by the reception of his disclosure. And he had not
told the worst of his troubles. More than once of late he had seen Skimpy
and Binwell together. He had felt no resentment that his friend had
been forbidden association with him, to avoid contact with this elderly
villain. It seemed wise in Skimpy’s father, and he only wished that his
own had been sufficiently uninfluenced and firm to have determined upon
a similar course. Noting the constable in the clump of sour-wood, and
with his own recollection of Binwell climbing down Keedon Bluffs, he had
been smitten with terror for Skimpy’s sake. He knew that Binwell had some
reason of his own for affecting the lad’s society. In cudgeling his mind
for the man’s motive he had brought to light the true one which might not
have been so readily presented were not Keedon Bluffs so continually in
his thoughts of late. He was sure that Binwell wished Skimpy, being light
and slim, to explore the hollows of the Bluffs—with what end in view he
had not definitely known until to-night. Nevertheless the conviction that
his simple-hearted friend had become involved in serious danger had been
strong enough that afternoon to induce him to go to Skimpy’s home. Old
man Sawyer sat on the porch morosely smoking his pipe, and Ike paused at
the fence and whistled for Skimpy—a shrill, preconcerted signal; it was
in the deepest confidence that he was about to impart his suspicions and
his warnings and he did not feel justified in including the elder Sawyer
in the colloquy. It might be a slander on Jerry Binwell, after all. “An’
I don’t wanter be a backbiter like him,” said Ike to himself.
The whistle brought Skimpy promptly out from the barn. To Ike’s surprise,
however, he did not approach the fence, which was at some distance from
the house. He simply stood near the porch with his old hat on the back of
his red head, his long arms crooked, his hands thrust into his pockets,
and upon his face a sardonic grin that seemed broader than anything in
his whole physical economy.
“Kem down hyar. I hev a word ter say ter ye,” called Ike.
He felt as if he were dreaming when instead of replying Skimpy swayed
himself grotesquely and mockingly about, and began to sing with
outrageous fluctuations from the key “Oh-aw-e-Mister Coon! Oh-aw-i-Mister
Ky-une.”
It seemed a frenzied imitation of himself, and Ike was about to speak
when Skimpy, putting his fingers in his ears that he might not hear Ike,
although to the casual observer it might well seem that he had good
reasons for not wanting to hear himself, bellowed and piped mockingly,
“Oh-aw-i-Mister Kyune! That’s the way he ’lows I sing,” he observed in
an aside to his father, who might have been carved from a corn-cob, for
all the animation he showed, except to silently smoke his corn-cob pipe.
“I never!” cried Ike indignantly; “somebody hev been settin’ ye ag’in
me—a backbitin’ scamp! An’ I’ll be bound I know who ’twar.”
But Skimpy’s fingers were in his ears, and he was still swaying back and
forth and making the air shudder with his mock vocalizations. At last Ike
turned away in sheer futility, angered and smarting, but as anxious and
troubled as before.
Now he was sorry he had not persisted for he had not realized how
immediate and terrible was the danger to Skimpy. He sat still for a
moment, afraid to say aught of the perplexities that racked him, lest
being mistaken he might needlessly implicate Skimpy in any crime that
Binwell might commit. Presently he rose with a look of determination
on his face. The sound of the lifting latch, the cold in-rushing of
the air, the light touch of the flakes of ashes set a-flying from the
hearth, notified Abner that he was solitary by the fire. He heard the
cat purring, the low murmuring of the flames in the chimney, the wind
outside, the voices of the two women busy in the shed-room.
Another stir of a latch and a presence entered bright even to the blind
man. “All alone-y by hisself-y!” Rosamondy cried as she pattered across
the floor and flung herself into his arms. He shared much baby talk with
Mrs. Cat, but he was not jealous of that esteemed friend, for he was
Rosamondy’s preferred crony. Through her, life had come to mean for him
a present as well as a past, and to hold for him a future and a vista.
He planned for her with the two old women. He had let it be known to all
his relatives that all he had in the world—his horse, his cows, his share
of the cabin, his gun, a captured sabre—was to be hers at his death.
Always in his simple dreams for enriching her, and for her fair fate,
Jerry Binwell’s image would be intruded like some ugly blight upon it
all. He had heretofore thrust away the thought of him, and dreamed on
resolutely. Somehow he could not do this to-night. As he patted her on
the head and heard the silken rustle of her hair beneath his hand, he
could but remember that it was her father risking his life on the rocks,
his liberty, the lurking officer and everlasting ignominy, which must
surely rebound upon her.
“She wouldn’t know nuthin’ ’bout it now, ef he war branded ez a thief,
but she air a-goin’ ter be a gal ez will keer mightily fur a good name
an’ sech. Jerry Binwell hain’t never hed a good name wuth talkin’ ’bout,
but he ain’t never yit been branded ez a thief.”
Mrs. Cat was brought and perched upon his knee, and he was required to
shake hands and inquire after her health and that of her family, which
ceremony both he and the poor animal performed lugubriously enough,
although with a certain dexterity, having been trained to it by frequent
repetitions. Rosamondy, however, found herself a better improvisor than
he of conversation for Mrs. Cat, and as she prattled on his anxious
thoughts reverted to the subject.
“He air her dad, an’ he’ll be disgraced fur life, an’ I could hev
purvented it. Too late! Too late!” he groaned aloud.
He felt like a traitor as she passed her soft little arm around his neck
and kissed his cheek—pale now, although it had never blanched for shot or
shell. He had both her and Mrs. Cat to hold, and although both were of
squirming tendencies his mind could still steadily pursue its troublous
regrets.
“But I oughtn’t ter hev done it jes’ fur Rosamondy, nuther. I oughter
hev done it fur the sake of—_folks_! A man oughter keep another man
from doing wrong, ef he kin, same ez ter keep his own score clear—them
ez kin stan’ ter thar guns oughter keer ter keep the whole line from
waverin’, stiddier a-pridin’ tharse’fs on the aim o’ thar one battery.
Laws-a-massy; I wish I hed tole him. I wish I hed gin him a word. He mus’
be nigh thar now. Ef I jes’ could ketch him! Ef I jes’ could find my way!
I ain’t been nigh thar fur twenty year. Fur one hour o’ sight ter save a
man from crime! Fur one hour o’ sight to hold the battle-line! Fur one
hour o’ sight to do the Lord’s kind will!”
He was speaking aloud. He had risen from his chair, the little girl and
her cat slipping softly down upon the floor. He took a step forward, both
groping hands outstretched. “Fur one hour o’ sight!”
“I’ll lead ye, unky Ab,” the child compassionately exclaimed, putting up
her soft, warm hand to his cold trembling fingers.
“Lead me! yes! Lead me ter Keedon Bluffs,” he cried eagerly. “She kin do
it! She kin save him! Stop,” he caught himself. “Look out, Rosamondy. Air
the night dark?”
She opened the door; a mild current of air flowed in above her yellow
head, for the wind now was laid. She saw the dark woods gloom around;
the stars glimmer in the vast spaces of the sky; but about the mountain
summit shone an aureola of burnished gold.
“The moon’s a-risin’,” she said.
He placed his hand in hers; she stepped sturdily upon the ground. The
door closed, and the hearth was vacant behind them but for the flicker of
the flames, the drowsing dogs, and the purring Mrs. Cat.