she did not say a word. She neither accepted nor refused his embrace.
Hiram felt a powerful impulse to say more, but he suddenly remembered
that Barbara's grief had no relation to him, and it seemed hateful that
he should intrude his own feelings and hopes upon her in her
all-engrossing sorrow, and he feared to offend again a pride so
sensitive as he knew hers to be. But he allowed himself once more to
draw the silent Barbara toward him with a gentle pressure; then, with a
resolute effort at self-control, he climbed into the mow to pitch down
some hay for old Blaze. This duty he performed as quickly as possible,
blindly intent on returning to Barbara once more. But when he came down
again Barbara had gone, and he sat down on the draw-horse where she had
been, and remained there long, all alone but for the swallows flitting
in and out through the openings between the lower ends of the rafters,
and gossiping from one mud-built nest to another. In this time he asked
himself questions about his conduct in the difficult days yet to come,
and tried to reproach himself for the partial surrender he had made to
his feelings; though now he had given so much expression to his
affection, he could not for the life of him repent of it.
If he had known how much strength this little outbreak of sympathy on
his part had given to Barbara, his conscience would have been quite at
ease. Even Mrs. Grayson was sustained by the girl's accession of
courage. In the darkest days that followed, Barbara liked to recall
Hiram's voice soothing her, and begging her not to weep; and with
blushes she remembered the pressure of his gentle embrace about her
shoulders. This memory was a check to the bitterness of her grief. But
Hiram had lost confidence in himself. There were yet two more weeks to
be passed, and unless he should desert Barbara in her trouble, he would
have to spend these weeks in unceasing conflict.
The next day was the last of the school-term, and according to
immemorial usage, the last Friday afternoon of a school-term was spent
in a grand spelling-match, in which others than the regular pupils of
the school were free to engage. It was while this orthographical
scrimmage was going on that the county clerk, Magill, sprucely dressed,
and ruddy-faced as ever, rode up to the school-house. He spent many of
his days in riding about the county, palavering the farmers and
flattering their wives and daughters, and, by his genial Irish manners,
making friends against the time of need. Who could tell whether it might
not also be worth while to make friends with the grown-up and growing-up
pupils of the Timber Creek school; there would be elections after these
boys came to vote. Besides, he remembered that Rachel Albaugh was one of
Mason's postgraduate scholars, and it was not in such a connoisseur of
fine women to miss an opportunity of seeing the finest in the county. So
he went in and sat for an hour on the hard bench with his back against
the stone jamb of the great empty fire-place, and smilingly listened to
the scholars wrestling with the supreme difficulties of Webster's
Elementary; such, for example, as "incomprehensibility," and other
"words of eight syllables accented on the sixth." By the time the
spelling-match was over and the school was ready to be dismissed he had
evolved a new plan relating to his own affairs. In making friends and
electioneering no one could excel Magill; but for attending to the
proper work of his office he had neither liking nor aptitude, and the
youth he kept there, though good enough at building fires and collecting
fees, was not competent to transcribe a document. The records were
behind, and he needed some one to write them up. He was too prudent to
take into the office any man who in after years could use the experience
that might be gained and the knowledge of his own dilatory habits that
might be acquired there to supplant him. It occurred to him now that it
would be a good stroke to engage Mason, who was not likely ever to be a
resident of the county, and who could therefore never become a rival.
While these thoughts were in Magill's mind, Hiram was indulging in a few
words of that sort of sentiment to which schoolmasters are prone when
the parting time comes. When the children were dismissed they formed
themselves into two rows on the outside of the school-house door,
according to an antique and, no doubt, Old-World custom still lingering
in some rural places at that time. When the master made his exit the
boys were on his right and the girls were on his left,--probably because
of Eve's indiscretion in the garden of Eden. Between the two rows Hiram
marched slowly, with a quizzical look on his face, as the boys, to the
best of their knowledge and ability, bowed to him, and the girls, with
an attempt at simultaneousness, dropped "curcheys" of respect. Magill
stood in the door and smiled to see some of the boys bend themselves to
stiff right angles on their middle hinges, while others grinned
foolishly and bobbed their heads forward or sidewise, according to the
string they chanced to pull. The performances of the other row were
equally various; some of the girls bent their knees and recovered
themselves all in one little jerk, while others dropped so low as to
"make tubs" of their dress-skirts. When these last honors had been paid,
the scholars broke ranks and started for their homes.
As Magill put one foot into the stirrup he said: "Mason, how would yeh
like to come down to Moscow an' help me write up me books? I'm a good
dale behoind; an' ef you like to come for a wake or two an' help me to
ketch up, I'll give yeh four bits a day an' yer board at the tavern."
Hiram's finances were so straitened that this offer of fifty cents a day
was very welcome to him. How could he serve the Graysons better than to
be where he could see Tom every day, and look after his interest in any
contingency that might arise? This and the recollection of his
embarrassing situation in the Grayson household quickly decided him; and
as the condition of Magill's office was distressing, he promised to come
to town in time to begin by 9 o'clock the next morning.
That evening he explained the matter to Barbara and her mother at the
supper table; and before bed-time he had arranged with Bob McCord to
look after the "critters," as Bob called them. The next morning Hiram
was off by daybreak. Bob McCord took him half-way with old Blaze,--for
the rest, he "rode shank's mare," as the people say,--and by 9 o'clock
he was trying to thread the labyrinth of confusion in Magill's office.
To Barbara it seemed the greatest good fortune to have Mason near to
Tom, but the table was intolerably lonely when only two sorrow-smitten
women sat down together.
XXII
THE FIRST DAY OF COURT
The eventful morning at the opening of the "fall term" of the court of
Moscow came at length. Mrs. Grayson again put her house into the care of
her neighbor Mely McCord, and she arranged that Bob McCord should stay
at home so as to feed the cattle that night and the next morning. It was
thought that Tom's trial would take place on the second day. Mrs.
Grayson and Barbara drove into Moscow early on the first day of court,
that they might give Tom all the sympathy and assistance possible.
On that very first forenoon the grand jury heard such fragments of
evidence as the public prosecutor thought necessary to bring before
them, and found an indictment against Thomas Grayson, Junior, for murder
in the first degree. In the prevailing state of public opinion a true
bill would almost have been found if no evidence had been before them.
Delay in such cases was not to be thought of in that time of summary
justice; dilatory postponements were certainly not to be expected in a
court presided over, as this one was, by Judge Watkins. He was a man
approaching sixty years of age, with a sallow, withered face; a victim
to hot biscuit and dyspepsia; arbitrary and petulant, but with deep-set,
intelligent black eyes. Though his temper was infirm, his voice crabbed,
and his administration of justice austere and unrelenting, he was
eminently just, and full of the honorable if somewhat irascible pride of
a Virginian with a superstitious reverence for his "family." Judge
Watkins came of an ancestry who were famous only for courageously
holding up their heads and doing nothing that they considered unworthy
of gentlemen. Their greatest pride was that they had always been proud.
The judge's coat hung loosely on his frame, and his trousers were
generally drawn up in wrinkles so as to show the half of his boot-legs.
His garments were, moreover, well worn and rather coarse; like his
planter ancestors, he never fancied that dress could add anything to the
dignity of a gentleman. The substantial distinction of a gentleman, in
his estimation, consisted in being of a "good family," and in preferring
to lose one's life rather than to lie, and to take another man's life
rather than to suffer the reproach of falsehood or cowardice. It was
characteristic of a Virginian of this type to have something like a
detestation for clothes, except in so far as they served for decency and
warmth; all the great difference which separated a respected gentleman
from a despised fop lay in this fierce contempt for appearances. Judge
Watkins left fine coats and gold watches for those who needed such
decorations; he clothed himself in homespun and family pride.
When the indictment was read, the judge, looking from under his
overhanging, grizzled eyebrows, said, "When can we try this case?" The
counsel on both sides knew that he intended to dispatch this
disagreeable business promptly. As he put the question, Judge Watkins
looked first at Allen, the prosecuting attorney, and then at Lincoln.
"We are ready, your Honor," said the prosecuting attorney, a little man
with a freckled face and a fidgety desire to score a point on every
occasion. "I hope there'll be no delay, your Honor. The defense knew six
weeks ago that a true bill would be found. They've had time enough to
prepare, and I hope we shall be able to go on."
The judge listened impatiently to this, with the air of a man who has
heard so much clap-trap that it has become nauseous to him. Indeed,
before Allen had completed his little speech Judge Watkins had turned
quite away from him and fastened his deep-set eyes on young Lincoln, who
rose to his feet without succeeding in getting himself quite
straight,--this was always a matter of time with him,--and said in a
grave, half-despondent way:
"Your Honor, we are ready."
"I'll set the case for to-morrow, then," said the judge, and added in a
sharper key, "Sheriff, command silence!" This last injunction was
prompted by an incontinent rustle of interest in the court-room when the
time for the murder trial was fixed for the next day. The judge's
high-strung, irascible nerves, and his sense of the sacred dignity of
his court, made him take offense at the slightest symptom of popular
feeling.
The sheriff, who sat at the judge's left a little lower than the judge,
now stood up and rapped with a mallet on the plank desk in front of him,
and cried lustily, "Si--lence in court!"
And all was still again.
The judge's dignity would not admit of his addressing the commonalty,
who, since they were neither members of the bar, court officers,
witnesses, nor criminals, were beyond official recognition, but he said
to the sheriff in a severe tone:
"Sheriff, you will arrest any person who makes any kind of disturbance
in the court."
Then the business of the court went on. One after another of the
spectators, whose interest was centered in the next day's session, rose
and tip-toed softly out of the room. They did not all go at once, nor
did any one of them go noisily. The judge had been known to fine a man
for treading heavily, and those who wore squeaking boots were in misery
until they were quite clear of the door.
XXIII
BROAD RUN IN ARMS
The popular imagination had made Tom into something monstrous. Visitors
to the village went to the jail window to look at him, as one might go
to look at a wild beast. Confinement, solicitude, and uncertainty had
worn upon him. He shrank nervously into the darker corners of the jail
to avoid observation. His mind was a very shuttlecock between the
battledores of hope and fear. He knew no more than the public of the
purposes or expectations of his lawyer. All that Lincoln would say to
Tom or his friends was that the case was a difficult one, and that it
was better to leave the line of defense wholly to himself. But in
proportion as Tom's counsel was uncommunicative about his plans rumor
was outspoken and confident, though not always consistent in its account
of them. It was reported that Tom was to plead guilty to manslaughter;
that Lincoln would try to clear him on the ground of justifiable
homicide in self-defense; and that the lawyer had found a man willing to
swear that he was in company with Tom on another part of the ground at
the very time of the shooting. In any case, it was decided that Lincoln
would move for a change of venue, for it was well understood that in
Moscow the accused did not stand "a ghost of a chance."
As the time of the court session drew on, a new and more exciting report
had got abroad. It was everywhere said that Dave Sovine had been bought
off, and that he was to get his money and leave the country in time to
avoid testifying. How the story was set a-going, or who was responsible
for it, no one could tell. Dave Sovine's conferences with Bob McCord may
have raised surmises, for as the time of the trial approached, Dave grew
more and more solicitous to get the hundred dollars and be off. He even
hinted to Bob that he might refuse to accept it, if it did not come
soon. Bob McCord had his own notions about the report. He thought that
either Sovine had incontinently let the matter out, which was hardly
probable, or that Abe Lincoln for some reason wanted such a belief to be
spread abroad. Secretive and tricky as Bob was, there was a finesse
about Lincoln's plans which he could not penetrate, and which led him
more than once to remark that Abe was "powerful deep for a young
feller." Whether the rumor was launched for a purpose or not, it had had
the effect of waking up Allen, the public prosecutor, who put a watch on
Sovine's movements, and gave his chief witness to understand that any
attempt of his to leave the country, by night or day, would bring about
his immediate arrest.
The story that Sovine had been bought off produced another result which
could not have been desired by either of the lawyers: it fanned to a
blaze the slumbering embers of Broad Run. Jake Hogan's abortive
expedition to Perrysburg had left resentment rankling in his manly
bosom. He had reluctantly given over the attempt to redeem himself by
making a raid on Moscow the Sunday night following, when Deputy Sheriff
Markham had pretended to look up a hypothetical wall-eyed, red-whiskered
man, who was believed to have had some reason for killing George
Lockwood. It was, indeed, only by degrees that Broad Run came to
understand that its dignity had been again trifled with. The first
result of its indignation was that the Broad Run clan, attributing to
Sheriff Plunkett all the humiliation put upon it, had unanimously
resolved to compass his defeat at the next election. Plunkett, having
heard of this, promptly took measures to avert the defection of his good
friends on the Run. Markham, as the principal author of the difficulty,
was dismissed from his place of deputy on some trifling pretext. It did
not cost Sheriff Plunkett serious pain to let him go; Markham was
becoming too conspicuous a figure. It is the way of shrewd small men to
cut down in time an apprentice who is likely to overtop the master. Then
Plunkett told his brother-in-law to go out to Broad Run and explain
things. Greater diplomatists than he have prepared to make use of
irresponsible ambassadors when they had that to say which it might be
necessary to repudiate. The brother-in-law was one of those men who like
to take a hand in local politics, not for the sake of holding office
themselves, but for the pleasure of intrigue for its own sake. He first
sought Jake Hogan at his cabin, and sat and whittled with him on the
wood-pile in the most friendly way, laughing at Jake's lank jokes,
flattering his enormous self-love, and by every means in his power
seeking to appease Hogan's wrath against the sheriff. The sheriff hadn't
anything to do with running Tom off after the inquest, said the
envoy,--Markham had done that. It was Markham who had peddled around the
story of the man with red whiskers. Markham had got too big-feeling for
his place. The sheriff saw that Markham was against the Broad Run boys,
and so he put him out--dropped him like a hot potato, you know.
"Just consider," the brother-in-law urged, "how much Plunkett's done for
the boys. He's refused tee-totally to let Tom go to Perrysburg. Plunkett
ain't going to be dictated to by rich men like ole Tom Grayson. He knows
who elected him. And he don't feel obliged to protect a murderer after
the coroner's jury say's he's guilty."
"They's been talk of his shootin' if any reg'laters come around," said
Jake.
"_Him_ shoot?" answered the brother-in-law. "He's done everything he
could not to put out the boys, and what 'u'd 'e shoot for? He ain't
anxious to have the job of hangin' Tom Grayson. He's heard tell of
sheriffs, 'fore now, that's felt themselves ha'nted as long's they
lived, because they'd hanged a man. He ain't goin' to fight for the
privilege of hangin' Tom, and he ain't the kind to do anythin' brash,
and he ain't ag'inst good citizens like the boys on the Run--depend on
that. Of course,"--here the brother-in-law picked up a new splinter and
whittled it cautiously as he spoke,--"of course you know't the sheriff's
give bonds. He's got to make a show of defending his prisoner. He's took
'n oath, you see, 'n' people expect him to resist. But if a lot of men
comes, what can one man do? S'posin' they was to tie his hands, and then
s'pose they was to say if he moved they'd shoot. What _could_ he do?"
The envoy stopped whittling and looked at Jake, giving the slightest
possible wink with one eye. Jake nodded his head with the air of a man
who is confident that he is not such a fool as to be unable to take a
hint enforced by half a wink.
"What does 'n oath amount to with a pistol at your head?" the
brother-in-law inquired; "an' what's the use of bonds if your hands are
tied? You can _talk_ strong; that don't hurt anybody."
Jake nodded again, and said, "In course."
"If you was to hear about the sheriff's sayin' he'd ruther die than give
up his prisoner, you can just remember that he's _got_ to talk that way;
he's under bonds, and he's swore in, and the people expect him to talk
about doin' his dooty. But you're too old a hand to set much store by
talk?"
"Well, I 'low I am," said Hogan, greatly pleased that his experience and
astuteness were at length coming in for due recognition.
Then when Jake was pretty well mollified, the brother-in-law adjourned
himself and Jake to the grocery, where he treated the crowd, and in much
more vague and non-committal terms let all the citizens that resorted
thither understand that Sheriff Plunkett was their friend, and that Pete
Markham was the friend of the rich men and the lawyers. But he took
pains to leave the impression that Tom would certainly meet his deserts
at the hands of the court, for the sheriff desired to avoid the
embarrassment of a mob if he could.
The sweetness of Jake Hogan's spirit had been curdled by his
disappointment and reverses, but these overtures from the sheriff to him
as a high-contracting power were very flattering and assuring. When, a
little later, the startling intelligence reached that center of social
and intellectual activity, the Broad Run grocery, that Dave Sovine had
been bought off, Broad Run was aroused, and Jake Hogan left off sulking
in his tent and resumed his activity in public affairs.
"Didn't I tell you," he asked, leaning his back against the counter and
supporting himself on his two elbows thrust behind him, while one of his
legs, ending in a stogy boot, was braced out in front of him, "you can't
hang the nephew 'v a rich man in such a dodrotted country as this yer
Eelenoys? Dave Sovine's bought off, they say, by an ornery young lawyer
un that air Bob McCord." Jake was too prudent to apply any degrading
adjectives to a man of Bob's size and renown. "Dave'll light out the day
afore the trial with rocks in his pockets, un that air young coward'll
git clean off. Where's yer spunk, I'd like to know? 'F you're go'n' to
be hornswoggled by lawyers like that air long-legged Abe Lincoln, un
skin-flints like ole Seven-percent Tom Grayson, w'y, you _kin_, that's
all."
Jake, with his head thrown forward, looked sternly around on the group
about him, and they seemed to feel the reproach of his superior
aggressiveness. Bijy Grimes was rendered so uneasy by Jake's regard that
he shut his mouth; and then, not knowing what better to do, he ventured
to ask humbly, "What kin we do about it, Jake?" letting his mouth drop
open again in token that he waited for a reply.
"Do?" said Jake contemptuously. "W'y, chain-lightnin', Bijy, what a
thing, now, to ax! Show me two dozen, ur even _one_ dozen, men that'll
stan' at my back tell the blood runs, un I'll show 'em 't folks can't
take a change of venoo out-uh the k-younty that knows all about the
rascality into one that don't. I'll show 'em how to buy off witnesses,
un I'll l'arn these yer dodrotted lawyers un rich men how to fool wreth
the very bone un sinoo uv the land."
Notwithstanding the natural love of these men for a little excitement,
they had been rendered somewhat unresponsive by Jake's failures. The
most of them thought it best to go to town on the day of the trial and
see how it would come out. But at 6 o'clock in the evening of the first
day of court, Lew Baker, a farmer from the river valley beyond the Run,
rode past the door of the grocery on his way home, and said a
collective "Howdy" to the three or four who stood outside. Bijy Grimes,
who was one of them, came out toward the middle of the road heading off
the traveler.
"Hello, Lew! Any nooze about the trial?" he said, dropping his lower jaw
from between his fat infantile cheeks and waiting for a reply, while the
rest of the group moved up to hearing distance.
"Well, yes," said Baker, pulling up his horse and swinging himself round
in the saddle so as to bring the most of his weight on the right
stirrup, while he rested his left elbow on his left knee and his right
hand on the horse's mane. "I heern tell, jest as I come away, that Dave
what-ye-may-call-'im, the witness, had sloped, liker'n not. He hain't
been seed aroun' for a right smart while, un they say he's gone off to
New Ur_leans_ ur the Injun country. Moscow's stirred up about it."
"Tu-lah!" said Bijy. "They 'low he'll be got off, don't they!"
"They're shore sumpin's fixed, fer the young feller's lawyer hain't
soopeenied a derned witness."
"Tu-lah!" said Bijy. "Is that a fack?"
"Shore 's shootin', they say. He's to be got off somehow, I s'pose."
"Tu-laws-a-massy!" broke out Bijy; and turning to his fellow-loafers he
said, "That'll rile Jake purty consid'able, now won't it?"
It did stir up Jake when he heard of it. He promptly set to work to form
a company to descend at once on Moscow and take the case out of the
hands of the dodrotted lawyers. He could not at so late an hour get
together more than twenty or twenty-five men from Broad Run and the
regions within warning distance. Some of these joined him only because
they could not endure to have anything very exciting take place in their
absence: it would entail the necessity of their hearing for the rest of
their lives the account given of the affair by the participators, who
would always value themselves on it. Some of the larger boys, whose aid
had been rejected in the previous excursion because they were not
accounted mature enough for such public responsibilities, were now
admitted: the company would be small, and a boy is better than nobody in
a pinch. S'manthy's oldest son, a tow-headed fellow of fifteen, was one
of these, and he was sent over the hill to warn Zeke Tucker, who was
still at Britton's, a mile away from the borders of what was
distinctively called "the Run Neighborhood."
The September twilight was already fading when the lad presented himself
in front of Zeke Tucker, who sat perched on top of a rail fence for rest
and observation after his day's work. Mrs. Britton was making the house
over-warm, and Zeke preferred the fresh air.
"I say, Zeke," said the breathless boy, "it's to come off to-night, un
I'm a-goin', by hokey!"
"What's to come off to-night?"
"W'y, the hangin'--the hangin' of that young chap Tom down't Moscow; un
I'm goin' to take grandad's ole flint-lock."
"Your grandad's ole flint-lock! You might as well take a stick," said
Zeke.
"Oh! it'll go off ef you tech it off weth a coal of fire, but I don't
'low I kin find any coal to tech it off weth down thar," and S'manthy's
son scratched his head thoughtfully. "But, anyways, it'll look like a
gun in the night."