them from this morbid brooding. He strove so strenuously that he
presently was able to fix his attention on the matters of merely human
law and justice which began to come before him, as soon as he had taken
his place upon the bench. Thorough training and long practice helped him
so that he was gradually able to bring his eminently legal mind to bear
upon the wearying routine of the docket with the unerring precision of
some marvellous machine.
His fine face was still pale, but there was nothing unusual in its
paleness, and it now grew calm and collected under the very intensity of
his spirit's stress. For the farthest spiritual extremity lies cold and
still beyond all human passion, as the supreme summit of perpetual ice
rises cold and still above all human life. There was, therefore, no
change in his attitude of mind or body when he suddenly saw the dark,
threatening visage and the wild, bloodshot eyes of the Spaniard
confronting him through the crowded gloom of the heated court-room. He
was accustomed to the sight; it had faced him at every term of his
court. There was consequently no disturbance, not the slightest
uneasiness in the abrupt turning away of his eyes. His sole feeling was
one of unutterable weariness of the struggle of living, of utter
sickness of mind and heart and soul. He was so weary that he did not
even fear himself, so utterly weary that he was--for the moment--no
longer afraid even of the unexpected escape of his own fierce temper,
always so hardly held in leash. He no longer dreaded the sudden breaking
of the steel bars of his own stern self-control, the greatest danger
that he had ever found to fear.
When the case against the estate of Major John Bramwell came to trial in
its due turn, during the dragging hours of the long, hot afternoon, the
judge weighed that also, as he had weighed all which had come before,
and as he intended weighing all which were to come after--coolly,
calmly, scrupulously--according to the letter of the law. Having so
weighed it, and found it wanting, he dismissed the complaint on account
of time limitation, and assigned the costs to the plaintiff, as he would
have done in any similar case under like circumstances. Then he passed
composedly to the deliberate consideration of further business, and the
hot, heavy hours droned on.
Through it all he had scarcely glanced at Alvarado; in truth he had
scarcely thought of him save as a party to one of the many suits before
the court. He had had no opportunity to learn that the Spaniard had
refused to accept the money, offered early in the day, in payment of the
note. He did not observe Alvarado's leaving the court-room after the
decision. He did not know that the man was waiting on the steps when he
himself hastened out after the adjournment of court.
Thus it was that the long-coming crisis found him at last wholly
unprepared. Thus it was that the blow from the heavy handle of the
Spaniard's riding-whip struck him without warning. It sent him, stunned
and reeling, down the steps. His hand went out, through blind instinct,
and caught one of the portico pillars, so that he did not fall quite to
the earth; and he was on his feet instantly, springing to his great
height, to his tremendous power--towering above the surrounding crowd.
As he arose, he made one furious leap, like the magnificent bound of a
wounded lion, straight at the Spaniard, who stood--still as a
statue--braced for the encounter.
A cry of terror had gone up from the crowd when the blow had been
struck. Many restraining arms were now raised, as the white fury flashed
over the judge's pale face, as rare and deadly lightning glares from the
paleness of a winter sky. And then this appalling danger-signal faded
even as it flashed forth. The cry of the crowd was suddenly hushed, its
swaying was suddenly stilled. There now followed a strange pause of
strained waiting!
Every man's eyes were on the judge. No man gave a glance to the
Spaniard; every man knew what he meant to do. But the judge--it was on
his noble figure and on his fine face that every man's eyes were
riveted. Every man knew his horror of violence of any description, and
his abhorrence of the taking of human life under any provocation. Yet
every man, thus looking on, held it to be impossible for any man to
suffer the degradation which this man had just suffered, without
resistance. For in every man's eyes this was, with but one exception,
_the most binding of all the many traditions for the shedding of blood_.
No man might suffer it, and ever hope to hold up his head among his
fellow-men, without killing, or at least trying to kill, the man who had
so degraded him. Breathless, indeed, was this instant's terrible
waiting! The bloodthirsty wild beast, which lurks forgotten in most
men's hearts, now leaped up in its secret lair, scenting blood, and
stared fiercely out of the fierce eyes fixed on the judge. And not one
of all these men--all so feeling, all so believing--could credit the
evidence of his own senses when he saw this man, who stood so high above
other men in body, in mind, and in reputation, now stand still, making
no farther advance. Even less could they believe what their own eyes
beheld, when they then saw him draw back, slowly and silently, from the
nearness to the Spaniard to which that single uncontrollable bound had
carried him. And so the crowd stood--stricken dumb and motionless-for a
breath's space! Then--suddenly--every upraised arm came down as the
judge's powerful arms fell at his side. Calmly, almost gently, he
turned, and, raising his majestic form to its fullest height, and
lifting his noble head to its highest level, he rested his calm, clear
gaze on the murderous passion of the Spaniard's eyes. It was a long,
strange look. It was a look which filled every man who saw it with a
feeling of awe; even though not one, of all those who were looking on,
could comprehend its meaning. It was a look such as not many are
permitted to try to comprehend: it was a look such as no mortal men can
ever have seen, save it may have been the few who stood close to the
foot of the Cross.
In his own room at the tavern, late on that afternoon, the judge felt
more alone than ever before through all his lonely life. He had already
begun to suffer the mental reaction which nearly always follows great
spiritual exaltation. He was even now thinking of what he had done--what
he had _not_ done--as if he were another person. He most distinctly saw
its inevitable, far-reaching, and never-ending consequences. He realized
that he, no more--perhaps even less--than any other man, could expect to
evade them or hope to live them down. The very fact of his prominence
could but make the matter more widely known and more disastrous in its
results. The high office which he held--though it personified the
law--would only make his breaking of this unwritten law all the more
unpardonable. Suddenly he felt completely overwhelmed by the weariness
of life, which had so weighed upon him through the day. In terrifying
fear of himself he sprang to the open window and hurriedly leaned out,
finding a measure of safety in the mere presence of the people passing
on their way home from court. But some of them looked up, and stared at
him curiously, so that he drew back. He had not closed the door of his
room, and he was glad to hear footsteps in the passage, although he
merely turned his head without speaking when the man, to whom he had
given the money for the payment of the note, came in quietly, and laid
it on the table within reach of his hand. Nor did the man speak,--there
was nothing for any one to say,--but he stood for a moment hesitatingly,
irresolutely; and then, still without speaking, he drew a pistol from
his pocket, and laid it on the table beside the money.
When he was gone the judge got up and closed the door, and took the
pistol in his hands, which were beginning to tremble now as they had
never trembled before. Hastily he put the temptation down, and walked to
the door and opened it again: taking swift, aimless turns up and down
the room. At the sound of footsteps again passing along the passage, he
called to a servant and asked for some water. The presence of any one
would protect him against himself. Turning this way and that, aimlessly,
he turned once more to the window, and threw it higher and pushed the
curtain further back--as far this time as it would go. He then leaned
out again, caring nothing now for the curious gaze of the passers-by,
caring only that he might escape this overpowering, horrifying,
paralyzing fear of himself.
The highway was heavily overhung with clouds of dust as the huge wagons
with their mighty teams, which had passed in the morning, now rumbled
homeward, returning from the journey to the river. Through the dark haze
the judge could see only the proud face of his wife, and it seemed to
his fevered fancy that her cool smile was cooler than ever with
something very like scorn. It seemed to his sick imagination that he
could see again the half-contemptuous shrug of her graceful shoulders,
the half-scornful lift of her handsome brows, with which she always
greeted any disregard of the established order. Above the rude sounds of
the iron-bound wheels, the clanking chains, and the beating hoofs, he
heard the music of the light laugh with which she had always mocked his
own deviations. She had called him an idealist, a dreamer--even a
fanatic--half in jest, half in earnest. But this was different. She
would not laugh at this, which must alter her position in the world as
well as his own. And then, as he thought of this, a doubt for the first
time assailed him, piercing his breast like a poisoned spear. Had he the
right--toward her? She had married a man who stood fair before all men.
Again, in the anguish of this last thought, this new dread, this worst
doubt, the deadly fear of himself rushed over him. Weakened and sickened
in body by the anguish of mind which was rending him, he dared not turn
his head toward the table where the temptation lay within such easy
reach of his shaking hand.
Leaning as far as possible the other way, he caught sight of the old
Frenchman, toiling along the big road on crutches, threading a passage
through its unusual turmoil with difficulty and pain. Then the wind
tossed the deep dust and sent it swirling upward in thick, dark clouds,
shutting the highway from the judge's unseeing sight. He had hardly been
conscious of seeing Monsieur Beauchamp; everything was passing in a
fearful dream. He scarcely heard a new, strange roar which now suddenly
arose above the voices of the passing people, above the rumble, the
rattle, and clash of the passing wagons and the heavy beating of many
great hoofs. But he heard more consciously as this came nearer and
louder, like the rapid, roaring approach of a sudden terrible storm. He
saw clearly enough when the cause of the violent sounds burst over the
highest hilltop, and dashed down its side--as a gigantic wave is driven
by a hurricane,--a huge wagon thundering behind six mighty, maddened,
runaway horses. Like some monster missile it was hurled this way and
that, crashing terrifically from side to side of the big road; and
threatening the whole highway with destruction. Like death-dealing
thunder-bolts the flying iron hoofs gave little time to flee for safety,
but the danger appeared to give wings to every living creature, brute
and human alike. The old Frenchman alone stood still, paralyzed by
fright and unable to move. His crutches dropped from his powerless
grasp, so that he could no longer even stand, and--tottering and
shrieking for help--he fell helpless, prone upon the highway straight in
the track of that huge, blurred, black bulk of Force which was being
whirled toward him with the speed of a cyclone by the storm-flight of
those frenzied horses.
And then the judge's vision magically cleared, and he saw the little
Frenchman--his weakness, his utter helplessness--as if by a lightning
flash. The judge, starting up with a leap, was down the stairs and
running along the big road almost as soon as he realized what it was
that he was going to meet. He was such a powerful man, so quick and
strong of mind and body, so prompt, so able, so fearless in the doing of
everything that he thought right! Ah, the pity of it all!
He could not see the old man upon first reaching the highway. Blinding
dust-clouds hung more heavily than ever over the wild, furious confusion
of the big road. The people, terror-mad, were fleeing, each one thinking
only of his own peril. The drivers, panic-stricken, whirled the clashing
wagons hither and thither, utterly bewildered. The horses, helpless and
terrified, plunged amid the clanking of the entangled trace-chains. The
dense clouds of smothering dust hung like a blinding pall. But the judge
knew where the little Frenchman was lying and sprang straight toward him
and found him in time,--barely in time to bend down, to lift him in his
mighty arms and toss him like a feather far beyond danger. But there was
no more time,--not an instant,--and then the judge himself went down as
a church spire falls before a tempest,--down into the dust of the earth
under the awful, crushing hoofs of the maddened horses, down under the
cruel, cutting tires of those merciless wheels,--down to death, giving
his life for the humblest of his fellow-creatures.
XXVII
THE LAST ARTFULNESS OF MISS JUDY
To Lynn Gordon, as to most of the Oldfield people, it seemed as if this
sleepless night--the saddest ever known to the village--never would end.
And yet, when he arose at last, with the first faint glimmer of the
day's gray, and looked out through the dew-wet dimness of the green
boughs at the softly whitening east, a sudden feeling of peace fell upon
his deeply troubled spirit.
The sorrow and terror of the darkness fled away, like evil birds of the
night, so peaceful did the world appear, so free from all pain and wrong
and cruelty and death, now that the soft white dawn-light--cool, sweet,
calm, pure as ever--was coming for the perpetual refreshment of the
earth. Under this fresh whiteness from heaven all living creatures
looked to be resting untroubled, completely in harmony with one another.
Three little screech-owls sat as a single bunch of gray feathers,
motionless among the shadows which still lingered in the nearest tree.
Three little brownish heads merely turned slowly as he appeared at the
window, and six big eyes regarded him calmly, as though all belonged to
the one small bunch of dark gray feathers, still huddled sleepily
together almost within reach of his hand.
From the darker and more distant trees gradually swelled the twitter of
many bird voices, rising into a rapturous chorus as the east became
rifted with rose and seamed with silver. Every member of this divine
choir was singing his softest and sweetest in celebration of the dawn's
eternal renewal of creation. And then, as the rose brightened into royal
red, and the silver melted into molten gold, at the nearer approach of
sunrise, the oriole--already wearing the sun's golden livery--sent forth
his ringing welcome to the king, a greeting so brilliant and so ancient
as to make the trumpeter's mediaeval salute to the emperor seem but a
poor dull thing of yesterday.
With this heavenly music in his ears and this seeming peace and
happiness before his eyes, Lynn Gordon could hear no sound of the sorrow
of living, nor could he see any sign of the pain of the world. An
unconscious smile even lifted for a moment the weight from his heart as
he idly watched a merry couple of nuthatches, those gay "clowns of the
green tent of the woods," tumbling up and down a giant elm. He did not
see the solitary butcher bird, nature's most cruel executioner, sitting
in motionless, sinister silence in the dark depths of a great thorn
tree, nature's cruelest scaffold.
As the light grew brighter the young man's eyes followed the wood smoke
arising from the tall chimney of the tavern in slender, thin spirals of
pale blue, and going straight up to the bluer blue of the warm, windless
sky. With the sight, the deep sadness of the night came back suddenly
and overwhelmingly. It was not a terrible dream; it was a more terrible
reality. Under that old mossy roof, so simple, so peaceful-seeming, lay
all that was mortal of the noblest presence, the noblest mind, the
noblest heart that this isolated corner of the earth had ever given to
the greater world.
Before a tragedy so overwhelming every earnest soul striving in Oldfield
stood awed, although it was not given to many to comprehend that the
greatest awe which even the simplest felt was for the awful Mystery of
Life. Never in the history of the village had its simple people been so
slow in taking up the petty burden of daily struggle and strife. It
seemed as if the least imaginative must be feeling the littleness of all
earthly things.
Even old lady Gordon's look and manner were almost gentle, certainly
more gentle than her grandson had ever seen them. Scarcely a word passed
between the two after bidding each other good morning on meeting at the
breakfast table; and she saw him go in silence when the uneaten meal was
over. He hastened straight up the road, looking neither to the right nor
the left. Doris was with Miss Judy; he knew that she was, because he had
haunted the house through the greater part of the terrible night, and,
although he had not been able to speak to her, he had seen her shadow on
the white curtain of Miss Judy's room. The sight had comforted him
somewhat at the moment, but he now was longing more than ever to see
her, to speak to her--longing with the unspeakably softened tenderness
that comes to love through grief.
And he saw her through the window from Miss Judy's gate. The poor old
white curtain, with its quaint border of little snowballs, had been
pushed back as far as it would go, much farther than it ever had been
before when Miss Judy was lying in the high old bed. There was too
desperate need for every wandering breeze, for every straying breath of
air, for appearances to be remembered. Miss Judy herself could no longer
guard the sacred privacy of that spotless chamber. She could no longer
even blush faintly when the doctor laid his shaggy head against her
hard-laboring little heart, listening for its weak fluttering, and
hearing the soft knell of the pericardial murmur. For even this, which
rings so harshly from sterner breasts, rang softly from Miss Judy's
gentle breast. Yet it rang unmistakably, nevertheless, and there was
nothing more that the doctor could do--nothing save to grieve, and he
never stood idle for futile grieving when the suffering needed him
elsewhere. After the doctor was gone to other duties, only Miss Sophia
sat at the bedside, striving piteously to realize what was happening;
and Doris alone hovered silently over it and flitted softly around it;
doing the little that she found to do, and holding back her tears for
Miss Judy's sake. But many others who loved Miss Judy were already
gathering, and waited in the passage, looking out at the passers-by and
shaking their heads speechlessly and sadly at those who paused at the
gate to make anxious inquiry.
Lynn Gordon did not enter the house, and he quickly turned his eyes away
from the uncurtained window. Even his reverend gaze seemed a profanation
of the holiness of that quiet, shadowed old room, whence the soul of a
saint was so near taking its flight from the earth. He crossed the
narrow strip of front yard with noiseless steps and sat down on a broken
bench under the window. He could hear Miss Sophia's heavy breathing as
the little sister tried to understand; and he caught the soft rustle of
Doris's skirts as the girl moved now and then in her loving
ministrations; he could almost hear the swaying of the fan in her hand.
Presently he became conscious of a familiar scent--faint, pure,
delicate, like the spirit of perfume. He did not know at first what it
was, but it seemed to float out through the open window; and after a
little while he knew it to be the old-fashioned, natural, wholesome
sweetness of dried rose leaves, the fragrance which had always clung
round Miss Judy's life, the fragrance which would forever cling round
her memory.
As he sat there waiting,--as so many were now waiting,--others came and
went. Anne Watson crossed the big road before sitting down to the
card-table, and stood for a moment at the door, talking in a low tone to
some one whom Lynn could not see. But her husband's wistful, restless,
compelling gaze followed her, drawing her back, and she did not linger.
Nothing, not even her grateful affection for Miss Judy, could hold her
long away from her post; nothing, save death alone, could ever free her
from it. And even after death--! What then? Always, Anne Watson was
asking herself that question; never was she able so to answer it that
her soul was set at rest. She now went slowly and sadly to her place at
the card-table, and she did not leave it again that day. But Lynn
Gordon, keeping his vigil, saw her strange, mystical gaze wander many
times from the burning stake to which she was bound,--a hopeless,
tortured captive for life,--to the shadowed peace of the window behind
his head. Ah, the inscrutableness of those strange eyes. The eyes of
Anne Watson were the eyes of a fanatic, yet none the less the eyes of a
martyr.
He glanced now and then at the people who were coming and going so
stilly and so sadly through the little broken gate. All gave him a
friendly nod in passing, no matter whether they knew him or not, for
that was the kind custom of the country. But no one stopped to speak to
him; all appeared to be too deeply absorbed in their own sad thoughts.
Only Kitty Mills smiled at him, and she did not know that she smiled,
for her light heart was heavy enough that day. But she never had known
what it was to have her eyes meet other eyes without smiling; and her
merry brown ones smiled now of themselves without her knowledge, through
mere force of habit. They had been sad indeed an instant before, and her
round ruddy cheeks were drawn and pale, and bore traces of tears. She
had been tirelessly running back and forth between her own house and
Miss Judy's, coming and going more often than any one else, as often, in
truth, as she found herself momentarily released from her
father-in-law's ceaseless clamor for attention, and as his querulous
summons recalled her to her perpetual bondage. His shrill, imperious cry
now suddenly made itself distinctly heard through the reigning
stillness; through that awesome stillness which reigns wherever death is
expected; that stillness which awes all, save the very young, who feel
too far away to be afraid, and the very old, who are come too near to
heed the awe.
In response to the call Kitty Mills started to run across the big road
as she had sped many times that day, and in so doing she encountered
Miss Pettus, who had gone home and was now returning in great haste,
bearing a small covered dish with the greatest care. At the sight of her
the sadness instantly flitted from poor Kitty Mills's face--which was
newly wet with tears--and the old quizzical, bantering challenge flashed
into it without her dreaming that it was there. But Miss Pettus saw it
as quickly as it came, and her fiery temper flared up forthwith, like a
flame in a sudden gust of wind. Her sharp little black eyes snapped with
all the old fire, although they were red and swollen with weeping and
watching the whole night through. Her homely, hard, faithful features
stiffened at once with all the old scornful wrath as she caught Kitty
Mills looking at the dish.
"_Yes_, it's a chicken for Miss Judy! And no bigger than a bird
either--and tenderer too. There's no law--that I know of--against my
having late chickens, even if that stubborn old dorminica _won't_ set,"
she said, as fiercely defiant as ever.
She gave the usual contemptuous toss of her head in its gingham
sunbonnet, and the accustomed excited swish of her starched calico
skirt, as she passed Kitty Mills. And then she turned for the parting
shot, which she could not even then bring herself to forego:--
"What if I _have_ cooked this chicken for Miss Judy with my own hands?
Don't _I_ know as well as you do that she can't eat it--nor anything
else--ever again in this world? And what's that got to do with my
cooking this chicken, and thinking that--maybe Miss Judy might feel a
little better--if"--with a burst of angry sobbing, "--if she could see
Miss Sophia eat it. She always liked that better than anything for
herself. You know as well as _I_ do, Kitty Mills, that she always was
just that silly and soft!"