"And is he conscious of his danger?"
"I reckon."
Gideon did not speak again. But as the onus of that silence seemed to
rest upon the other two, the last speaker, after a few moments' silent
and rapid riding, continued abruptly, "You don't seem curious?"
"Of what?" said Gideon, lifting his soft eyes to the speaker. "You
tell me of a brother at the point of death, who seeks the Lord through
an humble vessel like myself. HE will tell me the rest."
A silence still more constrained on the part of the two strangers
followed, which they endeavored to escape from by furious riding; so
that in half an hour the party had reached a point where the tules
began to sap the arid plain, while beyond them broadened the lagoons of
the distant river. In the foreground, near a clump of dwarfed willows,
a camp-fire was burning, around which fifteen or twenty armed men were
collected, their horses picketed in an outer circle guarded by two
mounted sentries. A blasted cotton-wood with a single black arm
extended over the tules stood ominously against the dark sky.
The circle opened to receive them and closed again. The elder man
dismounted and leading Gideon to the blasted cotton-wood, pointed to a
pinioned man seated at its foot with an armed guard over him. He looked
up at Gideon with an amused smile.
"You said it was a dying man," said Gideon, recoiling.
"He will be a dead man in half an hour," returned the stranger.
"And you?"
"We are the Vigilantes from Alamo. This man," pointing to the
prisoner, "is a gambler who killed a man yesterday. We hunted him
here, tried him an hour ago, and found him guilty. The last man we
hung here, three years ago, asked for a parson. We brought him the man
who used to live where we found you. So we thought we'd give this man
the same show, and brought you."
"And if I refuse?" said Gideon.
The leader shrugged his shoulders.
"That's HIS lookout, not ours. We've given him the chance. Drive
ahead, boys," he added, turning to the others; "the parson allows he
won't take a hand."
"One moment," said Gideon, in desperation, "one moment, for the sake of
that God you have brought me here to invoke in behalf of this wretched
man. One moment, for the sake of Him in whose presence you must stand
one day as he does now." With passionate earnestness he pointed out
the vindictive impulse they were mistaking for Divine justice; with
pathetic fervency he fell upon his knees and implored their mercy for
the culprit. But in vain. As at the camp-meeting of the day before, he
was chilled to find his words seemed to fall on unheeding and
unsympathetic ears. He looked around on their abstracted faces; in
their gloomy savage enthusiasm for expiatory sacrifice, he was
horrified to find the same unreasoning exaltation that had checked his
exhortations then. Only one face looked upon his, half mischievously,
half compassionately. It was the prisoner's.
"Yer wastin' time on us," said the leader, dryly; "wastin' HIS time.
Hadn't you better talk to him?"
Gideon rose to his feet, pale and cold. "He may have something to
confess. May I speak with him alone?" he said gently.
The leader motioned to the sentry to fall back. Gideon placed himself
before the prisoner so that in the faint light of the camp-fire the
man's figure was partly hidden by his own. "You meant well with your
little bluff, pardner," said the prisoner, not unkindly, "but they've
got the cards to win."
"Kneel down with your back to me," said Gideon, in a low voice. The
prisoner fell on his knees. At the same time he felt Gideon's hand and
the gliding of steel behind his back, and the severed cords hung
loosely on his arms and legs.
"When I lift my voice to God, brother," said Gideon, softly, "drop on
your face and crawl as far as you can in a straight line in my shadow,
then break for the tules. I will stand between you and their first
fire."
"Are you mad?" said the prisoner. "Do you think they won't fire lest
they should hurt you? Man! they'll kill YOU, the first thing."
"So be it--if your chance is better."
Still on his knees, the man grasped Gideon's two hands in his own and
devoured him with his eyes.
"You mean it?"
"I do."
"Then," said the prisoner, quietly, "I reckon I'll stop and hear what
you've got to say about God until they're ready."
"You refuse to fly?"
"I reckon I was never better fitted to die than now," said the
prisoner, still grasping his hand. After a pause he added in a lower
tone, "I can't pray--but--I think," he hesitated, "I think I could
manage to ring in a hymn."
"Will you try, brother?"
"Yes."
With their hands tightly clasped together, Gideon lifted his gentle
voice. The air was a common one, familiar in the local religious
gatherings, and after the first verse one or two of the sullen
lookers-on joined unkindly in the refrain. But, as he went on, the air
and words seemed to offer a vague expression to the dull lowering
animal emotion of the savage concourse, and at the end of the second
verse the refrain, augmented in volume and swelled by every voice in
the camp, swept out over the hollow plain.
It was met in the distance by a far-off cry. With an oath taking the
place of his supplication, the leader sprang to his feet. But too
late! The cry was repeated as a nearer slogan of defiance--the plain
shook--there was the tempestuous onset of furious hoofs--a dozen
shots--the scattering of the embers of the camp-fire into a thousand
vanishing sparks even as the lurid gathering of savage humanity was
dispersed and dissipated over the plain, and Gideon and the prisoner
stood alone. But as the sheriff of Contra Costa with his rescuing
posse swept by, the man they had come to save fell forward in Gideon's
arms with a bullet in his breast--the Parthian shot of the flying
Vigilante leader.
The eager crowd that surged around him with outstretched helping hands
would have hustled Gideon aside. But the wounded man roused himself,
and throwing an arm around the young preacher's neck, warned them back
with the other. "Stand back!" he gasped. "He risked his life for
mine! Look at him, boys! Wanted ter stand up 'twixt them hounds and
me and draw their fire on himself! Ain't he just hell?" he stopped; an
apologetic smile crossed his lips. "I clean forgot, pardner; but it's
all right. I said I was ready to go; and I am." His arm slipped from
Gideon's neck; he slid to the ground; he had fainted.
A dark, military-looking man pushed his way through the crowd--the
surgeon, one of the posse, accompanied by a younger man fastidiously
dressed. The former bent over the unconscious prisoner, and tore open
his shirt; the latter followed his movements with a flush of anxious
inquiry in his handsome, careless face. After a moment's pause the
surgeon, without looking up, answered the young man's mute questioning.
"Better send the sheriff here at once, Jack."
"He is here," responded the official, joining the group.
The surgeon looked up at him. "I am afraid they've put the case out of
your jurisdiction, Sheriff," he said grimly. "It's only a matter of a
day or two at best--perhaps only a few hours. But he won't live to be
taken back to jail."
"Will he live to go as far as Martinez?" asked the young man addressed
as Jack.
"With care, perhaps."
"Will you be responsible for him, Jack Hamlin?" said the sheriff,
suddenly.
"I will."
"Then take him. Stay, he's coming to."
The wounded man slowly opened his eyes. They fell upon Jack Hamlin
with a pleased look of recognition, but almost instantly and anxiously
glanced around as if seeking another. Leaning over him, Jack said
gayly, "They've passed you over to me, old man; are you willing?"
The wounded man's eyes assented, but still moved restlessly from side
to side.
"Is there any one you want to go with you?"
"Yes," said the eyes.
"The doctor, of course?"
The eyes did not answer. Gideon dropped on his knees beside him. A ray
of light flashed in the helpless man's eyes and transfigured his whole
face.
"You want HIM?" said Jack incredulously.
"Yes," said the eyes.
"What--the preacher?"
The lips struggled to speak. Everybody bent down to hear his reply.
"You bet," he said faintly.