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SPECIAL MESSENGER
* * * * * *
WORKS OF ROBERT W. CHAMBERS
Special Messenger Iole
The Firing Line The Reckoning
The Younger Set The Maid-at-Arms
The Fighting Chance Cardigan
Some Ladies in Haste The Haunts of Men
The Tree of Heaven The Mystery of Choice
The Tracer of Lost Persons The Cambric Mask
A Young Man in a Hurry A Maker of Moons
Lorraine The King in Yellow
Maids of Paradise In Search of the Unknown
Ashes of Empire The Conspirators
The Red Republic A King and a Few Dukes
Outsiders In the Quarter
FOR CHILDREN
Garden-Land Mountain-Land
Forest-Land Orchard-Land
River-Land Outdoorland
* * * * * *
SPECIAL MESSENGER
by
ROBERT W. CHAMBERS
[Illustration: "Daintily her handsome horse set foot in the water."
Page 131.]
D. Appleton and Company
New York--MCMIX
Copyright, 1909, by
Robert W. Chambers
Copyright, 1904, 1905, by Harper and Brothers
Copyright, 1908, by P F Collier & Son
Copyright, 1908, by The Curtis Publishing Company
Published, March, 1909
TO
GEORGE F. D. TRASK
IN MEMORY OF
OUR FIRST MARTIAL EXPLOITS
IN THE NURSERY
Thou hast given a banner to them that fear Thee, that
it may be displayed because of the truth.--PSALM lx, 4.
PREFACE
In the personality and exploits of the "Special Messenger,"
the author has been assured that a celebrated historical
character is recognizable--Miss Boyd, the famous Confederate
scout and spy.
It is not uncommon that the readers of a book know more
about that book than the author.
R. W. C.
CONTENTS
PART ONE
WHAT SHE WAS
Page
I. Noncombatants 3
PART TWO
WHAT SHE BECAME
II. Special Messenger 39
III. Absolution 67
IV. Romance 99
V. Red Ferry 127
VI. An Air Line 157
VII. The Pass 192
VIII. Ever After 223
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
FACING PAGE
"Daintily her handsome horse set foot in the water" Frontispiece
"'They seem to be allfired sure of us'" 78
"Then, like a flash his hand fell to his holster, and it was empty" 90
"'Turn around,' said the Special Messenger" 176
"She dropped her sunbonnet--stooped to recover it" 216
"White-faced, desperate, she clung to him with the tenacity
of a lynx" 220
"'We was there--I know that; yes, an' we had a fight'" 238
"'Yes,' she gasped, 'the Special Messenger--noncombatant!'" 258
PART ONE
WHAT SHE WAS
I
NONCOMBATANTS
About five o'clock that evening a Rhode Island battery clanked through
the village and parked six dusty guns in a pasture occupied by some
astonished cows.
A little later the cavalry arrived, riding slowly up the tree-shaded
street, escorted by every darky and every dog in the country-side.
The clothing of this regiment was a little out of the ordinary. Instead
of the usual campaign head gear the troopers wore forage caps strapped
under their chins, heavy visors turned down, and their officers were
conspicuous in fur-trimmed hussar tunics slung from the shoulders of
dark-blue shell jackets; but most unusual and most interesting of all, a
mounted cavalry band rode ahead, led by a bandmaster who sat his horse
like a colonel of regulars--a slim young man with considerable yellow
and gold on his faded blue sleeves, and an easy manner of swinging
forward his heavy cut-and-thrust sabre as he guided the column through
the metropolitan labyrinths of Sandy River.
Sandy River had seen and scowled at Yankee cavalry before, but never
before had the inhabitants had an opportunity to ignore a mounted band
and bandmaster. There was, of course, no cheering; a handkerchief
fluttered from a gallery here and there, but Sandy River was loyal only
in spots, and the cavalry pressed past groups of silent people,
encountering the averted heads or scornful eyes of young girls and the
cold hatred in the faces of gray-haired gentlewomen, who turned their
backs as the ragged guidons bobbed past and the village street rang with
the clink-clank of scabbards and rattle of Spencer carbines.
But there was a small boy on a pony who sat entranced as the
weather-ravaged squadrons trampled by. Cap in hand, straight in his
saddle, he saluted the passing flag; a sunburnt trooper called out:
"That's right, son! Bully for you!"
The boy turned his pony and raced along the column under a running fire
of approving chaff from the men, until he came abreast of the bandmaster
once more, at whom he stared with fascinated and uncloyed satisfaction.
Into a broad common wheeled the cavalry; the boy followed on his pony,
guiding the little beast in among the mounted men, edging as close as
possible to the bandmaster, who had drawn bridle and wheeled his showy
horse abreast of a group of officers. When the boy had crowded up as
close as possible to the bandmaster he sat in silence, blissfully
drinking in the splendors of that warrior's dusty apparel.
"I'm right glad you-all have come," ventured the boy.
The bandmaster swung round in his saddle and saw a small sun-tanned face
and two wide eyes intently fixed on his.
"I reckon you don't know how glad my sister and I are to see you down
here," said the boy politely. "When are you going to have a battle?"
"A battle!" repeated the bandmaster.
"Yes, sir. You're going to fight, of course, aren't you?"
"Not if people leave us alone--and leave that railroad alone," replied
the officer, backing his restive horse to the side of the fence as the
troopers trotted past into the meadow, fours crowding closely on fours.
"Not fight?" exclaimed the boy, astonished. "Isn't there going to be a
battle?"
"I'll let you know when there's going to be one," said the bandmaster
absently.
"You won't forget, will you?" inquired the boy. "My name is William
Stuart Westcote, and I live in that house." He pointed with his riding
whip up the hill. "You won't forget, will you?"
"No, child, I won't forget."
"My sister Celia calls me Billy; perhaps you had better just ask her for
Billy if I'm not there when you gallop up to tell me--that is, if you're
coming yourself. Are you?" he ended wistfully.
"Do you want me to come?" inquired the bandmaster, amused.
"Would you really come?" cried the boy. "Would you really come to visit
me?"
"I'll consider it," said the bandmaster gravely.
"Do you think you could come to-night?" asked the boy. "We'd certainly
be glad to see you--my sister and I. Folks around here like the Malletts
and the Colvins and the Garnetts don't visit us any more, and it's
lonesome sometimes."
"I think that you should ask your sister first," suggested the
bandmaster.
"Why? She's loyal!" exclaimed the boy earnestly. "Besides, you're coming
to visit _me_, I reckon. Aren't you?"
"Certainly," said the bandmaster hastily.
"To-night?"
"I'll do my best, Billy."
The boy held out a shy hand; the officer bent from his saddle and took
it in his soiled buckskin gauntlet.
"Good night, my son," he said, without a smile, and rode off into the
meadow among a crowd of troopers escorting the regimental wagons.
A few moments later a child on a pony tore into the weed-grown drive
leading to the great mansion on the hill, scaring a lone darky who had
been dawdling among the roses.
"'Clar' tu goodness, Mars Will'm, I done tuk you foh de Black Hoss
Cav'ly!" said the ancient negro reproachfully. "Hi! Hi! Wha' foh you mek
all dat fuss an' a-gwine-on?"
"Oh, Mose!" cried the boy, "I've seen the Yankee cavalry, and they have
a horse band, and I rode with them, and I asked a general when they were
going to have a battle, and the general said he'd let me know!"
"Gin'ral?" demanded the old darky suspiciously; "who dat gin'ral dat
gwine tell you 'bout de battle? Was he drivin' de six-mule team, or was
he dess a-totin' a sack o' co'n? Kin you splain dat, Mars Will'm?"
"Don't you think I know a general when I see one?" exclaimed the boy
scornfully. "He had yellow and gilt on his sleeves, and he carried a
sabre, and he rode first of all. And--oh, Mose! He's coming here to pay
me a visit! Perhaps he'll come to-night; he said he would if he could."
"Dat gin'ral 'low he gwine come here?" muttered the darky. "Spec' you
better see Miss Celia 'fo' you ax dis here gin'ral."
"I'm going to ask her now," said the boy. "She certainly will be glad to
see one of our own men. Who cares if all the niggers have run off? We're
not ashamed--and, anyhow, you're here to bring in the decanters for the
general."
"Shoo, honey, you might talk dat-a-way ef yo' pa wuz in de house,"
grumbled the old man. "Ef hit's done fix, nobody kin onfix it. But dess
yo' leave dem gin'rals whar dey is nex' time, Mars Will'm. Hit wuz a
gin'ral dat done tuk de Dominiker hen las' time de blueco'ts come to
San' River."
The boy, sitting entranced in reverie, scarcely heard him; and it was
only when a far trumpet blew from the camp in the valley that he started
in his saddle and raised his rapt eyes to the windows. Somebody had hung
out a Union flag over the jasmine-covered portico.
"There it is! There it is, Mose!" he cried excitedly, scrambling from
his saddle. "Here--take the bridle! And the very minute you hear the
general dashing into the drive, let me know!"
He ran jingling up the resounding veranda--he wore his father's
spurs--and mounted the stairs, two at a jump, calling: "Celia! Celia!
You'll be glad to know that a general who is a friend of mine----"
"Hush, Billy," said his sister, checking him on the landing and leading
him out to the gallery from which the flag hung; "can't you remember
that grandfather is asleep by sundown? Now--what is it, dear, you wish
to tell me?"
"Oh, I forgot; truly I did, Celia--but a general is coming to visit me
to-night, if you can possibly manage it, and I'm so glad you hung out
the flag--and Moses can serve the Madeira, can't he?"
"What general?" inquired his sister uneasily. And her brother's
explanations made matters no clearer. "You remember what the Yankee
cavalry did before," she said anxiously. "You must be careful, Billy,
now that the quarters are empty and there's not a soul in the place
except Mose."
"But, Celia! the general is a gentleman. I shook hands with him!"
"Very well, dear," she said, passing one arm around his neck and leaning
forward over the flag. The sun was dipping between a cleft in the
hills, flinging out long rosy beams across the misty valley. The mocking
birds had ceased, but a thrasher was singing in a tangle of Cherokee
roses under the western windows.
While they stood there the sun dipped so low that nothing remained
except a glowing scarlet rim.
"Hark!" whispered the boy. Far away an evening gunshot set soft echoes
tumbling from hill to hill, distant, more distant. Strains of the
cavalry band rose in the evening silence, "The Star Spangled Banner"
floating from the darkening valley. Then silence; and presently a low,
sweet thrush note from the dusky garden.
It was after supper, when the old darky had lighted the dips--there
being no longer any oil or candles to be had--that the thrush, who had
been going into interminable ecstasies of fluty trills, suddenly became
mute. A jingle of metal sounded from the garden, a step on the porch, a
voice inquiring for Mr. Westcote; and old Mose replying with reproachful
dignity: "Mars Wes'cote, suh? Mars Wes'cote daid, suh."
"That's my friend, the general!" exclaimed Billy, leaping from his
chair. "Mose, you fool nigger, why don't you ask the general to come
in?" he whispered fiercely; then, as befitted the master of the house,
he walked straight out into the hall, small hand outstretched, welcoming
his guest as he had seen his father receive a stranger of distinction.
"I am so glad you came," he said, crimson with pleasure. "Moses will
take your cap and cloak-- Mose!"
The old servant shuffled forward, much impressed by the uniform revealed
as the long blue mantle fell across his own ragged sleeve.
"Do you know why I came, Billy?" asked the bandmaster, smiling.
"I reckon it was because you promised to, wasn't it?" inquired the
child.
"Certainly," said the bandmaster hastily. "And I promised to come
because I have a brother about your age--'way up in New York. Shall we
sit here on the veranda and talk about him?"
"First," said the boy gravely, "my sister Celia will receive you."
He turned, leading the way to the parlor with inherited
self-possession; and there, through the wavering light of a tallow dip,
the bandmaster saw a young girl in black rising from a chair by the
center table; and he brought his spurred heels together and bowed his
very best bow.
"My brother," she said, "has been so anxious to bring one of our
officers here. Two weeks ago the Yan--the Federal cavalry passed
through, chasing Carrington's Horse out of Oxley Court House, but there
was no halt here." She resumed her seat with a gesture toward a chair
opposite; the bandmaster bowed again and seated himself, placing his
sabre between his knees.
"Our cavalry advance did not behave very well in Oxley," he said.
"They took a few chickens _en passant_," she said, smiling; "but had
they asked for them we would have been glad to give. We are loyal, you
know."
"Those gay jayhawkers were well disciplined for that business when
Stannard took them over," said the bandmaster grimly. "Had they behaved
themselves, we should have had ten friends here where we have one now."
The boy listened earnestly. "Would you please tell me," he asked,
"whether you have decided to have a battle pretty soon?"
"I don't decide such matters," said the bandmaster, laughing.
"Why, I thought a general could always have a battle when he wanted to!"
insisted the boy, surprised.
"But I'm not a general, Billy," replied the young fellow, coloring. "Did
you think I was?"
"My brother's ideas are very vague," said his sister quickly; "any
officer who fights is a general to him."
"I'm sorry," said the bandmaster, looking at the child, "but do you
know, I am not even a fighting officer? I am only the regimental
bandmaster, Billy--a noncombatant."
For an instant the boy's astonished disappointment crushed out his
inbred courtesy as host. His sister, mortified but self-possessed, broke
the strained silence with a quiet question or two concerning the newly
arrived troops; and the bandmaster replied, looking at the boy.
Billy, silent, immersed in reflection, sat with curly head bent and
hands folded on his knees. His sister glanced at him, looked furtively
at the bandmaster, and their eyes met. He smiled, and she returned the
smile; and he looked at Billy and smiled again.
"Billy," he said, "I've been sailing under false colors, it seems--but
you hoisted them. I think I ought to go."
The boy looked up at him, startled.
"Good night," said the bandmaster gravely, rising to his lean height
from the chair beside the table. The boy flushed to his hair.
"Don't go," he said; "I like you even if you don't fight!"
Then the bandmaster began to laugh, and the boy's sister bit her lip and
looked at her brother.
"Billy! Billy!" she said, catching his hands in hers, "do you think the
only brave men are those who gallop into battle?"
Hands imprisoned in his sister's, he looked up at the bandmaster.
"If you were ordered to fight, you'd fight, wouldn't you?" he asked.
"Under those improbable circumstances I think I might," admitted the
young fellow, solemnly reseating himself.
"Celia! Do you hear what he says?" cried the boy.
"I hear," said his sister gently. "Now sit very still while Moses serves
the Madeira; only half a glass for Mr. William, Moses--no, not one drop
more!"
Moses served the wine with pomp and circumstance; the lean young
bandmaster looked straight at the boy's sister and rose, bowing with a
grace that instantly entranced the aged servant.
"Celia," said the boy, "we must drink to the flag, you know;" and the
young girl rose from her chair, and, looking at the bandmaster, touched
her lips to the glass.
"I wish they could see us," said the boy, "--the Colvins and the
Malletts. I've heard their 'Bonnie Blue Flag' and their stirrup toasts
until I'm sick----"
"Billy!" said his sister quietly. And reseating herself and turning to
the bandmaster, "Our neighbors differ with us," she said, "and my
brother cannot understand it. I have to remind him that if they were not
brave men our army would have been victorious, and there would have been
no more war after Bull Run."
The bandmaster assented thoughtfully. Once or twice his worn eyes swept
the room--a room that made him homesick for his own. It had been a long
time since he had sat in a chair in a room like this--a long time since
he had talked with women and children. Perhaps the boy's sister divined
something of his thoughts--he was not much older than she--for, as he
rose, hooking up his sabre, and stepped forward to take his leave, she
stood up, too, offering her hand.
"Our house is always open to Union soldiers," she said simply. "Will you
come again?"
"Thank you," he said. "You don't know, I think, how much you have
already done for me."
They stood a moment looking at one another; then he bowed and turned to
the boy, who caught his hand impulsively.
"I knew my sister would like you!" he exclaimed.
"Everybody is very kind," said the young bandmaster, looking steadily at
the boy.
Again he bowed to the boy's sister, not raising his eyes this time; and,
holding the child's hand tightly in his, he walked out to the porch.
Moses was there to assist him with his long blue mantle; the boy clung
to his gloved hand a moment, then stepped back into the doorway, where
the old servant shuffled about, muttering half aloud: "Yaas, suh. Done
tole you so. He bow lak de quality, he drink lak de Garnetts--what I
tole yo'? Mars Will'm, ef dat ossifer ain' er gin'ral, he gwine be
mighty quick!"
"I don't care," said the boy, "I just love him."
The negro shuffled out across the moonlit veranda, peered around through
the fragrant gloom, wrinkled hands linked behind his back. Then he
descended the steps stiffly, and teetered about through the shrubbery
with the instinct of a watchdog worn out in service.
"Nuff'n to scare nobody, scusin' de hoot owls," he muttered. "Spec'
hit's time Miss Celia bolt de do', 'long o' de sodgers an' all de
gwines-on. Shoo! Hear dat fool chickum crow!" He shook his head, bent
rheumatically, and seated himself on the veranda step, full in the
moonlight. "All de fightin's an' de gwines-on 'long o' dis here wah!" he
soliloquized, joining his shriveled thumbs reflectively. "Whar de use?
Spound dat! Whar all de fool niggers dat done skedaddle 'long o' de
Linkum troopers? Splain dat!" He chuckled; a whip-poor-will answered
breathlessly.
"Dar dat scan'lous widder bird a-hollerin'!" exclaimed the old man,
listening. "'Pears lak we's gwine have moh wah, moh daid men, moh
widders. Dar de ha'nt! Dar de sign an' de warnin'. G'way, widder bird."
He crossed his withered fingers and began rocking to and fro, crooning
softly to himself:
"Butterfly a-flyin' in de Chinaberry tree
(Butterfly, flutter by!),
Kitty gull a-cryin' on the sunset sea
(Fly, li'l gull, fly high!),
Bully bat a-follerin' de moon in de sky,
Widder bird a-hollerin', 'Hi, dar! Hi!'
Tree toad a-trillin'
(Sleep, li'l honey!
De moon cost a shillin'
But we ain't got money!),
Sleep, li'l honey,
While de firefly fly,
An' Chuck-Will's Widder holler,
'Hi, dar! Hi!'"
Before dawn the intense stillness was broken by the rushing music of the
birds--a careless, cheery torrent of song poured forth from bramble and
woodland. Distant and nearer cockcrows rang out above the melodious
tumult, through which a low, confused undertone, scarcely apparent at
first, was growing louder--the dull sound of the stirring of many men.
Men? The valley was suddenly alive with them, choking the roads in heavy
silent lines; they were in the lanes, they plodded through the orchards,
they swarmed across the hills, column on column, until the entire
country seemed flowing forward in steady streams. Sandy River awoke,
restlessly listening; lights glimmered behind darkened windows; a
heavier, vaguer rumor grew, hanging along the hills. It increased to a
shaking, throbbing monotone, like the far dissonance of summer thunder!
And now artillery was coming, bumping down the dim street with clatter
of chain and harness jingling.
Up at the great house on the hill they heard it--the boy in his white
nightdress leaning from the open window, and his sleepy sister kneeling
beside him, pushing back her thick hair to peer out into the morning
mist. On came the battery, thudding and clanking, horses on a long
swinging trot, gun, caisson, forge, mounted artillerymen succeeding each
other, faster, faster under the windows. A guidon danced by; more guns,
more caissons, then a trampling, plunging gallop, a rattle of
sabres--and the battery had passed.
"What is that heavy sound behind the hills?" whispered the boy.
"The river rushing over the shallows--perhaps a train on the trestle at
Oxley Court House--" She listened, resting her rounded chin on her
hands. "It is thunder, I think. Go to bed now for a while----"
"Hark!" said the boy, laying his small hand on hers.
"It is thunder," she said again. "How white the dawn is growing. Listen
to the birds--is it not sweet?"
"Celia," whispered the boy, "that is not thunder. It is too hushed, too
steady--it hums and hums and hums. Where was that battery galloping? I
am going to dress."
She looked at him, turned to the east and stared at the coming day. The
air of dawn was full of sounds, ominous, sustained vibrations.
She rose, went back to her room, and lighted a dip. Then, shading the
pallid smoky flame with her hand, she opened a door and peered into the
next bedroom. "Grandfather!" she whispered, smiling, seeing that he was
already awake. And as she leaned over him, searching the dim and
wrinkled eyes, she read something in their unwonted luster that struck
her silent. It was only when she heard her brother's step on the stairs
that she roused herself, bent, and kissed the aged head lying there
inert among the pillows.
"It is cannon," she breathed softly--"you know that sound, don't you,
grandfather? Does it make you happy? Why are you smiling? Look at me--I
understand; you want something. Shall I open the curtains? And raise the
window? Ah, you wish to hear. Hark! Horsemen are passing at a gallop.
What is it you wish--to see them? But they are gone, dear. If any of our
soldiers come, you shall see them. That makes you happy?--_that_ is what
you desire?--to see one of our own soldiers? If they pass, I shall go
out and bring one here to you--truly, I will." She paused, marveling at
the strange light that glimmered across the ravaged visage. Then she
blew out the dip and stole into the hall.
"Billy!" she called, hearing him fumbling at the front door.
"Oh, Celia! The cavalry trumpets! Do you hear? I'm going out. Perhaps
_he_ may pass the house."
"Wait for me," she said; "I am not dressed. Run to the cabin and wake
Moses, dear!"
She heard him open the door; the deadened thunder of the cannonade
filled the house for an instant, shut out by the closing door, only to
swell again to an immense unbroken volume of solemn harmony. The
bird-music had ceased; distant hilltops grew brighter.
Down in the village lights faded from window and cabin; a cavalryman,
signaling from the church tower, whirled his flaming torch aside and
picked up a signal flag. Suddenly the crash of a rifled cannon saluted
the rising sun; a shell soared skyward through the misty glory, towered,
curved, and fell, exploding among the cavalrymen, completely ruining the
breakfasts of chief-trumpeter O'Halloran and kettle-drummer Pillsbury.
For a moment a geyser of ashes, coffee, and bacon rained among the men.
"Hell!" said Pillsbury, furiously wiping his face with his dripping
sleeve and spitting out ashes.
"Young kettle-drums, he don't love his vittles," observed a trooper,
picking up the cap that had been jerked from his head by a whirring
fragment.
"Rich feedin' is the sp'ilin' o' this here hoss band," added the
farrier, stanching the flow of blood from his scalp; "quit quar'lin'
with your rations, kettle-drums!"
"Y'orter swaller them cinders," insisted another; "they don't cost
nothin'!"
The band, accustomed to chaffing, prepared to retire to the ambulance,
where heretofore their fate had always left them among luggage,
surgeons, and scared camp niggers during an engagement.
The Rhode Island battery, placed just north of the church, had opened;
the cavalry in the meadow could see them--see the whirl of smoke, the
cannoneers moving with quick precision amidst obscurity--the flash, the
recoil as gun after gun jumped back, buried in smoke.
It lasted only a few minutes; no more shells came whistling down among
the cavalry; and presently the battery grew silent, and the steaming
hill, belted with vapor, cleared slowly in the breezy sunshine.
The cavalry had mounted and leisurely filed off to the shelter of a
grassy hollow; the band, dismounted, were drawn up to be told off in
squads as stretcher-bearers; the bandmaster was sauntering past, buried
in meditation, his sabre trailing a furrow through the dust, when a
clatter of hoofs broke out along the village street, and a general
officer, followed by a plunging knot of horsemen, tore up and drew
bridle.
The colonel of the cavalry regiment, followed by the chief trumpeter,
trotted out to meet them, saluting sharply; there was a quick exchange
of words; the general officer waved his hand toward the south, wheeled
his horse, hesitated, and pointed at the band.
"How many sabres?" he asked.
"Twenty-seven," replied the colonel--"no carbines."
"Better have them play you in--_if you go_," said the officer.
The colonel saluted and backed his horse as the cavalcade swept past
him; then he beckoned to the bandmaster.
"Here's your chance," he said. "Orders are to charge anything that
appears on that road. You'll play us in this time. Mount your men."
Ten minutes later the regiment, band ahead, marched out of Sandy River
and climbed the hill, halting in the road that passed the great white
mansion. As the outposts moved forward they encountered a small boy on a
pony, who swung his cap at them gayly as he rode. Squads, dismounted,
engaged in tearing away the rail fences bordering the highway, looked
around, shouting a cheery answer to his excited greeting; the colonel on
a ridge to the east lowered his field glasses to watch him; the
bandmaster saw him coming and smiled as the boy drew bridle beside him,
saluting.
"If you're not going to fight, why are you here?" asked the boy
breathlessly.
"It really looks," said the bandmaster, "as though we might fight, after
all."
"_You, too?_"
"Perhaps."
"Then--could you come into the house--just a moment? My sister asked me
to find you."
A bright blush crept over the bandmaster's sun-tanned cheeks.
"With pleasure," he said, dismounting, and leading his horse through the
gateway and across the shrubbery to the trees.
"Celia! Celia!" called the boy, running up the veranda steps. "_He_ is
here! Please hurry, because he's going to have a battle!"
She came slowly, pale and lovely in her black gown, and held out her
hand.
"There is a battle going on all around us, isn't there?" she asked.
"That is what all this dreadful uproar means?"
"Yes," he said; "there is trouble on the other side of those hills."
"Do you think there will be fighting here?"
"I don't know," he said.
She motioned him to a veranda chair, then seated herself. "What shall we
do?" she asked calmly. "I am not alarmed--but my grandfather is
bedridden, and my brother is a child. Is it safe to stay?"
The bandmaster looked at her helplessly.
"I don't know," he repeated--"I don't know what to say. Nobody seems to
understand what is happening; we in the regiment are never told
anything; we know nothing except what passes under our eyes." He broke
off suddenly; the situation, her loneliness, the impending danger,
appalled him.
"May I ask a little favor?" she said, rising. "Would you mind coming in
a moment to see my grandfather?"
He stood up obediently, sheathed sabre in his left hand; she led the way
across the hall and up the stairs, opened the door, and motioned toward
the bed. At first he saw nothing save the pillows and snowy spread.
"Will you speak to him?" she whispered.
He approached the bed, cap in hand.
"He is very old," she said; "he was a soldier of Washington. He desires
to see a soldier of the Union."
And now the bandmaster perceived the occupant of the bed, a palsied,
bloodless phantom of the past--an inert, bedridden, bony thing that
looked dead until its deep eyes opened and fixed themselves on him.
"This is a Union soldier, grandfather," she said, kneeling on the floor
beside him. And to the bandmaster she said in a low voice: "Would you
mind taking his hand? He cannot move."
The bandmaster bent stiffly above the bed and took the old man's hand in
his.
The sunlit room trembled in the cannonade.
"That is all," said the girl simply. She took the fleshless hand, kissed
it, and laid it on the bedspread. "A soldier of Washington," she said
dreamily. "I am glad he has seen you--I think he understands: but he is
very, very old."
She lingered a moment to touch the white hair with her hand; the
bandmaster stepped back to let her pass, then put on his cap, hooked his
sabre, turned squarely toward the bed and saluted.
The phantom watched him as a dying eagle watches; then the slim hand of
the granddaughter fell on the bandmaster's arm, and he turned and
clanked out into the open air.
The boy stood waiting for them, and as they appeared, he caught their
hands in each of his, talking all the while and walking with them to the
gateway, where pony and charger stood, nose to nose under the trees.
"If you need anybody to dash about carrying dispatches," the boy ran on,
"why, I'll do it for you. My father was a soldier, and I'm going to be
one, and I----"
"Billy," said the bandmaster abruptly, "when we charge, go up on that
hill and watch us. If we don't come back, you must be ready to act a
man's part. Your sister counts on you."
They stood a moment there together, saying nothing. Presently some
mounted officers on the hill wheeled their horses and came spurring
toward the column drawn up along the road. A trumpet spoke briskly; the
bandmaster turned to the boy's sister, looked straight into her eyes,
and took her hand.
"I think we're going," he said; "I am trying to thank you--I don't know
how. Good-by."
"Is it a charge?" cried the boy.
"Good-by," said the bandmaster, smiling, holding the boy's hand tightly.
Then he mounted, touched his cap, wheeled, and trotted off, freeing his
sabre with his right hand.
The colonel had already drawn his sabre, the chief bugler sat his
saddle, bugle lifted, waiting. A loud order, repeated from squadron to
squadron, ran down the line; the restive horses wheeled, trampled
forward, and halted.
"Draw--sabres!"
The air shrilled with the swish of steel.
Far down the road horsemen were galloping in--the returning pickets.
"Forward!"
They were moving.
"Steady--right dress!" taken up in turn by the company
officers--"steady--right dress!"
The bandmaster swung his sabre forward; the mounted band followed.
Far away across the level fields something was stirring; the colonel saw
it and turned in his saddle, scanning the column that moved forward on a
walk.
Half a mile, and, passing a hill, an infantry regiment rose in the
shallow trenches to cheer them. Instantly the mounted band burst out
into "The Girl I Left Behind Me"; an electric thrill passed along the
column.
"Steady! Steady! Right dress!" rang the calm orders as a wood, almost
behind them, was suddenly fringed with white smoke and a long, rolling
crackle broke out.
"By fours--right-about--wheel!"
The band swung out to the right; the squadrons passed on; and--"Steady!
Trot! Steady--right dress--gallop!" came the orders.
The wild music of "Garryowen" set the horses frantic--and the men, too.
The band, still advancing at a walk, was dropping rapidly behind. A
bullet hit kettle-drummer Pillsbury, and he fell with a grunt, doubling
up across his nigh kettle-drum. A moment later Peters struck his cymbals
wildly together and fell clean out of his saddle, crashing to the sod.
Schwarz, his trombone pierced by a ball, swore aloud and dragged his
frantic horse into line.
"Right dress!" said the bandmaster blandly, mastering his own splendid
mount as a bullet grazed its shoulder.
They were in the smoke now, they heard the yelling charge ahead, the
rifle fire raging, swelling to a terrific roar; and they marched
forward, playing "Garryowen"--not very well, for Connor's jaw was half
gone, and Bradley's horse was down; and the bandmaster, reeling in the
saddle, parried blow on blow from a clubbed rifle, until a stunning
crack alongside of the head laid him flat across his horse's neck. And
there he clung till he tumbled off, a limp, loose-limbed mass, lying in
the trampled grass under the heavy pall of smoke.
Long before sunset the echoing thunder in the hills had ceased; the edge
of the great battle that had skirted Sandy River, with a volley or two
and an obscure cavalry charge, was ended. Beyond the hills, far away on
the horizon, the men of the North were tramping forward through the
Confederacy. The immense exodus had begun again; the invasion was
developing; and as the tremendous red spectre receded, the hem of its
smoky robe brushed Sandy River and was gone, leaving a scorched regiment
or two along the railroad, and a hospital at Oxley Court House
overcrowded.
In the sunset light the cavalry returned passing the white mansion on
the hill. They brought in their dead and wounded on hay wagons; and the
boy, pale as a spectre, looked on, while the creaking wagons passed by
under the trees.
But it was his sister whose eyes caught the glitter of a gilt and yellow
sleeve lying across the hay; and she dropped her brother's hand and ran
out into the road.
"Is he dead?" she asked the trooper who was driving.
"No, miss. Will you take him in?"
"Yes," she said. "Bring him."
The driver drew rein, wheeled his team, and drove into the great
gateway. "Hospital's plum full, ma'am," he said. "Wait; I'll carry him
up. Head's bust a leetle--that's all. A day's nussin' will bring him
into camp again."
The trooper staggered upstairs with his burden, leaving a trail of dark,
wet spots along the stairs, even up to the girl's bed, where he placed
the wounded man.
The bandmaster became conscious when they laid him on the bed, but the
concussion troubled his eyes so that he was not certain that she was
there until she bent close over him, looking down at him in silence.
"I thought of you--when _I_ was falling," he explained vaguely--"only of
you."
The color came into her face; but her eyes were steady. She set the
flaring dip on the bureau and came back to the bed. "We thought of you,
too," she said.
His restless hand, fumbling the quilt, closed on hers; his eyes were
shut, but his lips moved, and she bent nearer to catch his words:
"We noncombatants get into heaps of trouble--don't we?"
"Yes," she whispered, smiling; "but the worst is over now."
"There is worse coming."
"What?"
"We march--to-morrow. I shall never see you again."
After a silence she strove gently to release her hand; but his held it;
and after a long while, as he seemed to be asleep, she sat down on the
bed's edge, moving very softly lest he awaken. All the tenderness of
innocence was in her gaze, as she laid her other hand over his and left
it there, even after he stirred and his unclosing eyes met hers.
"Celia!" called the boy, from the darkened stairway, "there's a medical
officer here."
"Bring him," she said. She rose, her lingering fingers still in his,
looking down at him all the while; their hands parted, and she moved
backward slowly, her young eyes always on his.
The medical officer passed her, stepping quickly to the bedside, stopped
short, hesitated, and bending, opened the clotted shirt, placing a
steady hand over the heart.
The next moment he straightened up, pulled the sheet over the
bandmaster's face, and turned on his heel, nodding curtly to the girl
as he passed out.
When he had gone, she walked slowly to the bed and drew the sheet from
the bandmaster's face.
And as she stood there, dry-eyed, mute, from the dusky garden came the
whispering cry of the widow bird, calling, calling to the dead that
answer never more.
PART TWO
WHAT SHE BECAME
II
SPECIAL MESSENGER
On the third day the pursuit had become so hot, so unerring, that she
dared no longer follow the rutty cart road. Toward sundown she wheeled
her big bony roan into a cow path which twisted through alders for a
mile or two, emerging at length on a vast stretch of rolling country,
where rounded hills glimmered golden in the rays of the declining sun.
Tall underbrush flanked the slopes; little streams ran darkling through
the thickets; the ground was moist, even on the ridges; and she could
not hope to cover the deep imprint of her horse's feet.
She drew bridle, listening, her dark eyes fixed on the setting sun.
There was no sound save the breathing of her horse, the far sweet
trailing song of a spotted sparrow, the undertones of some hidden rill
welling up through matted tangles of vine and fern and long wild
grasses.
Sitting her worn saddle, sensitive face partly turned, she listened, her
eyes sweeping the bit of open ground behind her. Nothing moved there.
Presently she slipped off one gauntlet, fumbled in her corsage, drew out
a crumpled paper, and spread it flat. It was a map. With one finger she
traced her road, bending in her saddle, eyebrows gathering in
perplexity. Back and forth moved the finger, now hovering here and there
in hesitation, now lifted to her lips in silent uncertainty. Twice she
turned her head, intensely alert, but there was no sound save the cawing
of crows winging across the deepening crimson in the west.
At last she folded the map and thrust it into the bosom of her
mud-splashed habit; then, looping up the skirt of her kirtle, she
dismounted, leading her horse straight into the oak scrub and on through
a dim mile of woodland, always descending, until the clear rushing music
of a stream warned her, and she came out along the thicket's edge into a
grassy vale among the hills.
A cabin stood there, blue smoke lazily rising from the chimney; a hen or
two sat huddled on the shafts of an ancient buckboard standing by the
door. In the clear, saffron-tinted evening light some ducks sailed and
steered about the surface of a muddy puddle by the barn, sousing their
heads, wriggling their tails contentedly.
As she walked toward the shanty, leading her horse, an old man appeared
at the open doorway, milking stool under one gaunt arm, tin pail
dangling from the other. Astonished, he regarded the girl steadily,
answering her low, quick greeting with a nod of his unkempt gray head.
"How far is the pike?" she asked.
"It might be six mile," he said, staring.
"Is there a wood road?"
He nodded.
"Where does it lead?"
"It leads just now," he replied grimly, "into a hell's mint o' rebels.
What's your business in these parts, ma'am?"
Her business was to trust no one, yet there had been occasions when she
had been forced to such a risk. This was one. She looked around at the
house, the dismantled buckboard tenanted by roosting chickens, the ducks
in the puddle, the narrow strip of pasture fringing the darkening woods.
She looked into his weather-ravaged visage, searching the small eyes
that twinkled at her intently out of a mass of wrinkles.
"Are you a Union man?" she asked.
His face hardened; a slow color crept into the skin above his sharp
cheek bones. "What's that to you?" he demanded.
"Here in Pennsylvania we expect to find Union sentiments. Besides, you
just now spoke of rebels----"
"Yes, an' I'll say it again," he repeated doggedly; "the Pennsylvany
line is crawlin' with rebels, an' they'll butt into our cavalry before
morning."
She laughed, stepping nearer, the muddy skirt of her habit lifted.
"I must get to Reynolds's corps to-night," she said confidingly. "I came
through the lines three days ago; their cavalry have followed me ever
since. I can't shake them off; they'll be here by morning--as soon as
there's light enough to trace my horse."
She looked back at the blue woods thoughtfully, patting her horse's
sleek neck.
He followed her glance, then his narrowing eyes focused on her as she
turned her head toward him again.
"What name?" he asked harshly, hand to his large ear.
She smiled, raising her riding whip in quaint salute; and in a low voice
she named herself demurely.
There was a long silence.
"Gosh!" he muttered, fascinated gaze never leaving her; "to think that
you are that there gal! I heard tell you was young, an' then I heard
tell you was old an' fat, ma'am. I guess there ain't many has seen you
to take notice. I guess you must be hard run to even tell me who ye be?"
She said quietly: "I think they mean to get me this time. Is there a
clear road anywhere? Even if I leave my horse and travel afoot?"
"Is it a hangin' matter?" he asked.
She shrugged her shoulders.
Presently he said: "The hull blame country's crawlin' with rebel
cavalry. I was to Mink Creek, an' they was passin' on the pike, wagons
an' guns as fur as I could see. They levied on Swamp Holler at sunup;
they was on every road along the State line. There ain't no road nor cow
path clear that way."
"And none the other way," she said. "Can't you help me?"
He looked at her gravely, then his small eyes swept the limited
landscape.
"A hangin' matter," he mused, scratching his gray head reflectively.
"An' if they ketch you here, I guess I'll go to Libby, too. Hey?"
He passed his labor-worn hand over his eyes, pressing the lids, and
stood so, minute after minute, buried in thought.
"Waal," he said, dropping his hand and blinking in the ruddy glow from
the west, "I guess I ain't done nothin' fur the Union yet, but I'm
a-goin' to now, miss."
He looked around once more, his eyes resting on familiar scenery, then
he set down milking stool and pail and shuffled out to where her horse
stood.
"Guess I'll hev to hitch your hoss up to that there buckboard," he
drawled. "My old nag is dead two year since. You go in, miss, an' dress
in them clothes a-hangin' onto that peg by the bed," he added, with an
effort. "Use 'em easy; they was _hers_."
She entered the single room of the cabin, where stove, table, chair, and
bed were the only furniture. A single cheap print gown and a sunbonnet
hung from a nail at the bed's foot, and she reached up and unhooked the
garment. It was ragged but clean, and the bonnet freshly ironed.
Through the window she saw the old man unsaddling her horse and fitting
him with rusty harness. She closed the cabin door, drew the curtain at
the window, and began to unbutton her riding jacket. As her clothing
fell from her, garment after garment, that desperate look came into her
pale young face again, and she drew from her pocket a heavy army
revolver and laid it on the chair beside her. There was scarce light
enough left to see by in the room. She sat down, dragging off her
spurred boots, stripping the fine silk stockings from her feet, then
rose and drew on the faded print gown.
Now she needed more light, so she opened the door wide and pushed aside
the curtain. A fragment of cracked mirror was nailed to the door. She
faced it, rapidly undoing the glossy masses of her hair; then lifting
her gown, she buckled the army belt underneath, slipped the revolver
into it, smoothed out the calico, and crossed the floor to the bed
again, at the foot of which a pair of woman's coarse, low shoes stood on
the carpetless floor. Into these she slipped her naked feet.
He was waiting for her when she came out into the yellow evening light,
squatting there in his buckboard, reins sagging.
"There's kindlin' to last a week," he said, "the ax is in the barn, an'
ye'll find a bin full o' corn meal there an' a side o' bacon in the
cellar. Them hens," he added wistfully "is Dominickers. _She_ was fond
o' them--an' the Chiny ducks, too."
"I'll be kind to them," she said.
He rested his lean jaw in one huge hand, musing, dim-eyed, silent. Far
away a cow bell tinkled, and he turned his head, peering out across the
tangled pasture lot.
"We called our caow Jinny," he said. "She's saucy and likes to plague
folks. But I don't never chase her; no, ma'am. You jest set there by
them pasture bars, kinder foxin' that you ain't thinkin' o' nothin',
and Jinny she'll come along purty soon."
The girl nodded.
"Waal," he muttered, rousing up, "I guess it's time to go." He looked at
her, his eyes resting upon the clothing of his dead wife.
"You see," he said, "I've give all I've got to the Union. Now, ma'am,
what shall I tell our boys if I git through?"
In a low, clear voice she gave him the message to Reynolds, repeating it
slowly until he nodded his comprehension.
"If they turn you back," she said, "and if they follow you here,
remember I'm your daughter."
He nodded again. "My Cynthy."
"Cynthia?"
"Yaas, 'm. Cynthy was _her_ name, you see; James is mine, endin' in
Gray. I'll come back when I can. I guess there's vittles to spare an'
garden sass----"
He passed his great cracked knuckles over his face again, digging
hastily into the corners of his eyes, then leaned forward and shook the
rusty reins.
"Git up!" he said thoughtfully, and the ancient buckboard creaked away
into the thickening twilight.
She watched him from the door, lingering there, listening to the creak
of the wheels long after he had disappeared. She was deadly tired--too
tired to eat, too tired to think--yet there was more to be done before
she closed her eyes. The blanket on the bed she spread upon the floor,
laid in it her saddle and bridle, boots, papers, map, and clothing, and
made a bundle; then slinging it on her slender back, she carried it up
the ladder to the loft under the roof.
Ten minutes later she lay on the bed below, the back of one hand across
her closed eyes, breathing deeply as a sleeping child--the most
notorious spy in all America, the famous "Special Messenger," carrying
locked under her smooth young breast a secret the consequence of which
no man could dare to dream of.
* * * * *
Dawn silvering the east aroused her. Cockcrow, ducks quacking, the
lowing of the cow, the swelling melody of wild birds--these were the
sounds that filled her waking ears.
Motionless there on the bed in the dim room, delicate bare arms
outstretched, hair tumbled over brow and shoulder, she lay, lost in
fearless retrospection--absolutely fearless, for courage was hers
without effort; peril exhilarated like wine, without reaction; every
nerve and contour of her body was instinct with daring, and only the
languor of her dark eyes misled the judgment of those she had to deal
with.
Presently she sat up in bed, yawned lightly, tapping her red lips with
the tips of her fingers; then, drawing her revolver from beneath the
pillow, she examined the cylinder, replaced the weapon, and sprang out
of bed, stretching her arms, a faint smile hovering on her face.
The water in the stream was cold, but not too cold for her, nor were the
coarse towels too rough, sending the blood racing through her from head
to foot.
Her toilet made, she lighted the fire in the cracked stove, set a pot of
water boiling, and went out to the doorstep, calling the feathered flock
around her, stirring their meal in a great pan the while her eyes roamed
about the open spaces of meadow and pasture for a sign of those who
surely must trace her here.
Her breakfast was soon over--an ash cake, a new egg from the barn, a
bowl of last night's creamy milk. She ate slowly, seated by the window,
raising her head at intervals to watch the forest's edge.
Nobody came; the first pink sunbeams fell level over the pasture; dew
sparkled on grass and foliage; birds flitted across her line of vision;
the stream sang steadily, flashing in the morning radiance.
One by one the ducks stretched, flapped their snowy wings, wiggled their
fat tails, and waddled solemnly down to the water; hens wandered
pensively here and there, pecking at morsels that attracted them; the
tinkle of the cow bell sounded pleasantly from a near willow thicket.