are talking about." He shook his head and waved his hand nervously.
"Oh, I remember now; your case was purely hypothetical," said Mr.
Tidwell. "Well, your _Blackwood_ was wrong about it."
"That's what I thought," Silas assented with a grunt; and with that, he
turned abruptly away, and went in the direction of his house.
"I'll tell you what's the fact," remarked Mr. Sanders, as he watched the
shabby and shrunken figure retreat; "I'm about to change my mind about
Silas. I used to think he was mean all through; but he's got a nice warm
place in his heart for that son of his'n. I declare I feel right sorry
for the man."
Before Cephas went away, he was not too busy learning the lessons Mr.
Sanders had set for him to forget to hunt up Nan Dorrington and tell her
the wonderful news; to-wit, that he was about to go on a journey, and
that while he was gone he would most likely see Gabriel.
"Well," said Nan, drawing herself up a little stiffly, "what is that to
me?" Unfortunately, Cephas had come upon the girl when she was talking
with Eugenia Claiborne, who had sought her out at the Lumsden Place.
Cephas looked at her hard a moment, and then his freckled face turned
red. He was properly angry. "Well, whatever it may be to you, it's a
heap to me," he said. "I hope it's nothing to you."
"Cephas, will you see Paul Tomlin?" asked Eugenia. "If you do, tell him
that one of his friends sent him her love."
"Is it sure enough love?" inquired Cephas.
"Yes, Cephas, it is," replied Eugenia simply and seriously--but her face
was very red. "Tell him that Eugenia Claiborne sent him her love."
"All right," said Cephas, and turned away without looking at Nan. She
had hurt his feelings.
This turn of affairs didn't suit Nan at all. She ran after Cephas, and
caught him by the arm. "Aren't you ashamed of yourself, Cephas, to treat
me so? How could I tell you anything before others? If you see Gabriel,
tell him--oh, I don't know what to say. If I was to tell you what I want
to, you'd say that Nan Dorrington had lost her mind. No, I'll not send
any word, Cephas. It wouldn't be proper in a young lady. If he asks
about me, just tell him that I am well and happy."
She turned away, in response to a call from Eugenia Claiborne, but she
kept her eyes on Cephas for some time. Evidently she wished to send a
message, but was afraid to. "Don't be angry with me, Cephas," she said,
before the youngster got out of hearing. Cephas made no reply, but
trudged on stolidly. He was at the age when a boy is easily disgusted
with girls and young women. You may call them sweet creatures if you
want to, but a twelve-year-old boy is not to be deceived by fine words.
The sweet creatures are under no restraints when dealing with small
boys, and the small boys are well acquainted with all their worst
traits. What is most strange is that this intimate knowledge is of no
service to them when they grow a little older. They forget all about it
and fall into the first trap that love sets for them.
Cephas was angry without knowing why. He felt that both Gabriel and
himself had been insulted, though he couldn't have explained the nature
of the insult; and he was all the angrier because he was fond of Nan.
She had been very kind to the little boy--kinder, perhaps, than he
deserved, for he had made the impulsive young lady the victim of many a
practical joke.
As Cephas went along, it suddenly occurred to him that he had done wrong
to say anything about his proposed journey, and the thought took away
all his resentment. He whirled in his tracks, and ran back to where he
had left the girls. He saw Eugenia Claiborne sauntering along the
street, but Nan was nowhere in sight. He had no trouble in pledging Miss
Claiborne to secrecy, for she was very fond of all sorts of secrets, and
could keep them as well as another girl.
Nan, she informed Cephas, had expressed a determination to visit him at
his own home, and, in fact, Cephas found her there. She was as sweet as
sugar, and was not at all the same Nan who had drawn herself up proudly
and as good as told Cephas that it was nothing to her that he was going
to see Gabriel. No; this was another Nan, and she had a troubled look in
her eyes that Cephas had never seen there before.
"I came to see if you were still angry, Cephas," she said by way of
explanation. "I wasn't very nice to you, was I?"
"Well, I hope you don't mind Cephas," said the lad's mother. "If you do,
he'll keep you guessing. Has he been rude to you, Nan?"
And it was then that Cephas heard praise poured on his name in a steady
stream. Cephas rude! Cephas saucy! A thousand times no! Why, he was the
best, the kindest, and the brightest child in the town. Nan was so much
in earnest that Cephas had to blush.
"I didn't know," said his mother. "He has been going with those large
boys so much that I was afraid he was getting too big for his breeches."
She loved her son, but she had no illusions about the nature of boys;
she knew them well.
"Are you still angry, Cephas?" Nan asked. She appeared very anxious to
be sure on that score.
"N-o-o," replied Cephas, somewhat doubtfully; he hesitated to surrender
the advantage that he saw he had.
"Yes, you are," said Nan, "and I think it is very unkind of you. I am
sorry you misunderstood me; if you only knew how I really feel, and how
much trouble I have, you would be sorry instead of angry."
"I'm the one to blame," said Cephas penitently. "Gabriel says you
dislike him, and I thought he was only guessing. But he knew better than
I did. I had no business to bother you."
Nan caught her breath. "Did Gabriel say I disliked him?"
"He didn't say that word," replied Cephas. "I think he said you detested
him, and I told him he didn't know what he was talking about. But he
did; he knew a great deal better than I did, because I didn't really
know until just now."
"But, Cephas!" cried Nan; "what could have put such an idea in his
head?" Cephas's mother was now busy about the house.
"I didn't know then, but I know now," remarked the boy stolidly.
"Don't be unkind, Cephas. If you knew me better, you'd be sorry for me.
You and Gabriel are terribly mistaken. I'm very fond of both of you."
"Oh, _I_ don't count in this game," Cephas declared.
"Oh, yes, you do," said Nan. "You are one of my dearest friends, and so
is Gabriel."
"All right," said Cephas. "If you treat all your dearest friends as you
do Gabriel, I'm very sorry for them."
"Cephas, if you tell Gabriel what I said while Eugenia Claiborne was
standing there, all ears, I'll never forgive you." Nan was at her wit's
end.
"Tell him that!" cried Cephas; "why, I wouldn't tell him that, not for
all the world. I'll tell him nothing."
"Please, Cephas," said Nan. "Tell him"--she paused, and threw her hair
away from her pale face--"tell him that if he doesn't come home soon, I
shall die!" Then her face turned from pale to red, and she laughed
loudly.
"Well, I certainly sha'n't tell him that," said Cephas.
"I didn't think you would," said Nan. "You are a nice little boy, and I
am going to kiss you good-bye. If you don't have something sweet to tell
me when you come back, I'll think you detest me--wasn't that Gabriel's
word? Poor Gabriel! he's in prison, and here we are joking about him."
"I'm not joking about him!" exclaimed Cephas.
"Just as much as I am," said Nan; and then she leaned over and kissed
Cephas's freckled face, leaving it very red after the operation.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
_Mr. Sanders Visits Some of His Old Friends_
It will be observed by those who are accustomed to make note of trifles,
that the chronicler, after packing Cephas off in a barouche with the
handsome Captain Falconer, still manages to retain him in Shady Dale.
For the sake of those who may be puzzled over the matter, let us say
that it is a mistake of the reporter. That is the way our public men
dispose of their unimportant inconsistencies--and the reporter, for his
part, can say that the trouble is due to a typographical error. The
truth is, however, that when a cornfield chronicler finds himself
entangled in a rush of events, even if they are minor ones, he feels
compelled to resort to that pattern of the "P. S." which is so
comforting to the lady writers, and so captivating to their readers.
Mr. Sanders is supposed to be on his way to Savannah on the same train
with Cephas and Captain Falconer, supposing the train to be on time.
Nevertheless, it is necessary to give a further account of his movements
before he started on the journey that was to prove to be such an
important event in Gabriel's career.
On the third morning after the arrest of the young men, Mrs. Lumsden
expressed a desire to see Mr. Sanders, but he was nowhere to be found.
Many sympathetic persons, including Nan Dorrington, joined in the
search, but it proved to be a fruitless one. As a matter of fact, Mr.
Sanders had gone to bed early the night before, but a little after
midnight he awoke with a start. This was such an unusual experience that
he permitted it to worry him. He had had no dream, he had heard no
noise; yet he had suddenly come out of a sound and refreshing sleep with
every faculty alert. He struck a match, and looked at his watch. It was
a quarter to one.
"I wish, plague take 'em!" he said with a snort, "that somebody would
whirl in an' make a match that wouldn't smifflicate the whole house an'
lot."
He lit the candle, and then proceeded to draw on his clothes. In the
course of this proceeding, he lay back on the bed with his hands under
his head. He lay thus for some minutes, and then suddenly jumped to his
feet with an exclamation. He put on his clothes in a hurry, and went out
to the stables, where he gave his horse a good feed--seventeen ears of
corn and two bundles of fodder.
Then he returned to the house, and rummaged around until he found a
pitcher of buttermilk and a pone of corn-bread, which he disposed of
deliberately, and with great relish. This done, he changed his clothes,
substituting for those he wore every day the suit he wore on Sundays and
holidays. When all these preparations were complete, the hands of his
watch stood at quarter past three. He had delayed and dillydallied in
order to give his horse time to eat. The animal had taken advantage of
the opportunity, for when Mr. Sanders went to the stables, the Racking
Roan was playfully tossing the bare cobs about in the trough with his
flexible upper lip.
"Be jigged ef your appetite ain't mighty nigh as good as mine," he
remarked, whereupon the roan playfully bit at him. "Don't do that, my
son," protested Mr. Sanders. "Can't you see I've got on my Sunday duds?"
To bridle and saddle the horse was a matter of a few moments only, and
when Mr. Sanders mounted, the spirited horse was so evidently in for a
frolic that he was going at a three-minute gait by the time the rider
had thrown a leg over the saddle.
A horseback ride, when the weather is fine and the sun is shining, is a
very pleasing experience, but it is not to be compared to a ride in the
dark, provided you are on good terms with your horse, and are familiar
with the country. You surrender yourself entirely to the creature's
movements, and if he is a horse equipped with courage, common-sense and
energy, you are lifted entirely out of your everyday life into the
regions of romance and derring-do--whatever that may be. There is no
other feeling like it, no other pleasure to be compared to it; all the
rest smell of the earth.
"I'm sorter glad I lit that match," Mr. Sanders remarked to the horse.
"It's like gittin' a whiff of the Bad Place, an' then breathin' the
fresh air of heav'n." The reply of the roan was a sharp affirmative
snort.
The sun was just rising when Mr. Sanders rode into Halcyondale.
Coincident with his arrival, the train from Atlanta came in with a
tremendous clatter. There was much creaking and clanking as it slowed up
at the modest station. It paused just long enough for the mail-bag and a
trunk to be thrown off with a bang, and then it went puffing away. Short
as the pause had been, one of the passengers, in the person of Colonel
Bolivar Blasengame, had managed to escape from it. The Colonel, with his
valise in his hand, paused to watch the train out of sight, and then
leisurely made his way toward his home. To reach that point, he was
compelled to cross the public square, and as he emerged from the side
street leading to the station, he met Mr. Sanders, who had also been
watching the train.
"Hello, Colonel, how are you? We belong apparently to the early bird
society."
"Good-morning, Mr. Sanders," replied the Colonel, with a smile of
friendly welcome. "What wind has blown you over here?"
"Why, I want to see Major Perdue. You know we have had trouble in our
settlement."
"And you want to see Tomlin because you have had trouble; but why is it,
Mr. Sanders, that your people never think of me when you have trouble?
Am I losing caste in your community?"
"Well, you know, Colonel, you haven't been over sence the year one; an'
then the Major is kinder kin to one of the chaps that's been took off."
"Exactly; but did it ever occur to you that whoever is kin to Tomlin is
a little kin to me," remarked the Colonel. "Tomlin is my
brother-in-law--But where are you going now?"
"Well, I thought I would go to the tavern, have my hoss put up an' fed,
git a snack of somethin' to eat, an' then call on the Major."
"You hadn't heard, I reckon, that the tavern is closed, and the
livery-stable broke up," said the Colonel, by way of giving the visitor
some useful information.
At that moment a negro came out on the veranda of the hotel--only the
older people called it a tavern--and rang the bell that meant breakfast
in half an hour.
"What's that?" inquired Mr. Sanders, though he knew well enough.
"It's pure habit," replied the Colonel. "That nigger has been ringing
the bell so long that he can't quit it. Anyhow, you can't go to the
tavern, and you can't go to Tomlin's. He's got a mighty big family to
support, Tomlin has. He's fixin' up to have a son-in-law, and he's
already got a daughter, and old Minervy Ann, who brags that she can eat
as much as she can cook. No, you can't impose on Tomlin."
"Then, what in the world will I do?" Mr. Sanders asked with a laugh. He
was perfectly familiar with the tactics of the Colonel.
"Well, there wasn't any small-pox or measles at my house when I left day
before yesterday. Suppose we go there, and see if there's anything the
matter. If the stable hasn't blown away or burned down, maybe you'll
find a place for your horse, and then we can scuffle around maybe, and
find something to eat. That's a fine animal you're on. He's the one, I
reckon, that walked the stringer, after the bridge had been washed away.
I never could swallow that tale, Mr. Sanders."
"Nor me nuther," replied Mr. Sanders. "All I know is that he took me
across the river one dark night after a fresh, an' some folks on t'other
side wouldn't believe I had come across. They got to the place whar the
bridge ought to 'a' been long before dark, and they found it all gone
except one stringer. I seed the stringer arterwards, but I never could
make up my mind that my hoss walked it wi' me a-straddle of his back."
"Still, if he was my horse," Colonel Blasengame remarked, "I wouldn't
take a thousand dollars for him, and I reckon you've heard it rumoured
around that I haven't got any more money than two good steers could
pull."
Mr. Sanders turned his horse's head in the direction that Colonel
Blasengame was going, and when they arrived at his home, he stopped at
the gate. "Mr. Sanders," he said, taking out his watch, "I'll bet you
two dollars and a half to a horn button that breakfast will be ready in
ten minutes, and that everything will be fixed as if company was
expected."
And it was true. By the time the horse had been put in the stable and
fed, breakfast was ready, and when Mr. Sanders was ushered into the
room, Mrs. Blasengame was sitting in her place at the table pouring out
coffee. She was a frail little woman, but her eyes were bright with
energy, and she greeted the unexpected guest as cordially as if he had
come on her express invitation. She had little to say at any time, but
when she spoke her words were always to the purpose.
"What did you accomplish?" she asked her husband, after Mr. Sanders, as
in duty bound, had praised the coffee and the biscuit, and the meal was
well under way.
"Nothing, honey; not a thing in the world. I thought the boys had been
carried to Atlanta, but they are at Fort Pulaski."
Mrs. Blasengame said nothing more, and the Colonel was for talking about
something else, but the curiosity of Mr. Sanders was aroused.
"What boys was you referrin' to, Colonel?" he asked.
"I don't like to tell you, Mr. Sanders," replied Colonel Blasengame,
"but if you'll take no offence, I'll say that the boys are from a little
one-horse country settlement called Shady Dale, a place where the people
are asleep day and night. A parcel of Yankees went over there the other
night, snatched four boys out of their beds, and walked off with them."
"That's so," Mr. Sanders assented.
"Yes, it's so," cried the Colonel hotly. "And it's a----" He caught the
eye of his wife and subsided. "Excuse me, honey; I'm rather wrought up
over this thing. What worries me," he went on, "is that the boys were
yerked out of bed, and carried off, and then their own families went to
sleep again. But suppose they didn't turn over and go back to sleep:
doesn't that make matters worse? I can't understand it to save my life.
Why, if it had happened here, the whole town would have been wide awake
in ten minutes, and the boys would never have been carried across the
corporation line. Tomlin is mighty near wild about it. If I hadn't gone
to Atlanta, he would have gone; and you know how he is, honey. Somebody
would have got hurt."
Yet, strange to say, Major Tomlin Perdue was far cooler and more
deliberate than his brother-in-law, Colonel Blasengame. It was the
peculiarity of each that he was anxious to assume all the dangerous
responsibilities with which the other might be confronted; and the only
serious dispute between the two men was in the shape of a hot
controversy as to which should call to account the writer of a card in
which Major Perdue was criticised somewhat more freely than politeness
warranted.
"You are correct in your statement about the four boys bein' took away,"
said Mr. Sanders, "but you'll have to remember that the woods ain't so
full of Blasengames an' Perdues as they used to be; an' you ain't got in
this town a big, heavy balance-wheel the size an' shape of Meriwether
Clopton."
"Yes, dear, you were about to be too hasty in your remarks," suggested
Mrs. Blasengame. Her soft voice had a strangely soothing effect on her
husband. "If some of our young men had been seized, all of us, including
you, my dear, would have been in a state of paralysis, just as our
friends in Shady Dale were."
"The only man in town that know'd it," Mr. Sanders explained, "was Silas
Tomlin. He was sleepin' in the same room wi' Paul, an' they rousted him
out, an' took him along. They carried him four or five mile. He had to
walk back, an' by the time he got home, the sun was up."
"That puts a new light on it," said the Colonel, "and Tomlin will be as
glad to hear it as I am. But I wonder what the rest of the State will
think of us."
"My dear, didn't these young men, and the Yankees who arrested them,
take the train here?" inquired Mrs. Blasengame. She nodded to Mr.
Sanders, and a peculiar smile began to play over that worthy's features.
"By George! I believe they did, honey!" exclaimed the Colonel.
"And in broad daylight?" persisted the lady.
To this the Colonel made no reply, and Mr. Sanders became the
complainant. "I dunner what we're comin' to," he declared, "when a
passel of Yankees can yerk four of our best young men on a train in this
town in broad daylight, an' all the folks a-stanin' aroun' gapin' at
'em, an' wonderin' what they're gwine to do next."
"Say no more, Mr. Sanders; say no more--the mule is yours." This in the
slang of the day meant that the point at issue had been surrendered.
"I suppose Lucy Lumsden is utterly crushed on Gabriel's account,"
remarked Mrs. Blasengame.
"Crushed!" exclaimed Mr. Sanders; "no, ma'am! not much, if any. She's
fightin' mad."
"I know well how she feels," said the pale, bright-eyed little woman.
"It is a pity the men can't have the same feeling."
"Why, honey, what good would it do?" the Colonel asked, somewhat
querulously.
"It would do no good; it would do harm--to some people."
"And yet," said the Colonel, turning to Mr. Sanders with a protesting
frown on his face, "when I want to show some fellow that I'm still on
top of the ground, or when Tomlin takes down his gun and goes after some
rascal, she makes such a racket that you'd think the world was coming to
an end."
"A racket! I make a racket? Why, Mr. Blasengame, I'm ashamed of you! the
idea!"
"Well, racket ain't the word, I reckon; but you look so sorry, honey,
that to me it's the same as making a racket. It takes all the grit out
of me when I know that you are sitting here, wondering what minute I'll
be brought home cut into jiblets, or shot full of holes."
Mrs. Blasengame laughed, as she rose from the table. She stood tiptoe to
pin a flower in her husband's button-hole.
"You've missed a good deal, Mr. Sanders," said the Colonel, stooping to
kiss his wife. "You don't know what a comfort it is to have a little bit
of a woman to boss you, and cuss you out with her eyes when you git on
the wrong track."
"Yes," said Mr. Sanders, "I allers feel like a widower when I see a man
reely in love wi' his wife. It's a sight that ain't as common as it used
to be. We'll go now, if you're ready, an' see the Major. I ain't got
much time to tarry."
"Oh, you want me to go too?" said the Colonel eagerly. "Well, I'm your
man; you can just count on me, no matter what scheme you've got on
hand."
They went to Major Perdue's, and were ushered in by Minervy Ann. "I'm
mighty glad you come," said she; "kaze 'taint been ten minnits sence
Marse Tomlin wuz talkin' 'bout gwine over dar whar you live at; an' he
ain't got no mo' business in de hot sun dan a rabbit is got in a blazin'
brushpile. Miss Vallie done tole 'im so, an' I done tole 'im so. He went
ter bed wid de headache, an' he got up wid it; an' what you call dat, ef
'taint bein' sick? But, sick er well, he'll be mighty glad ter see you."
Aunt Minervy Ann made haste to inform the Major that he had visitors. "I
tuck 'em in de settin'-room," she said, "kaze dat parlour look ez cold
ez a funer'l. It give me de shivers eve'y time I go in dar. De cheers
set dar like dey waitin' fer ter make somebody feel like dey ain't
welcome, an' dat ar sofy look like a coolin'-board."
Mr. Sanders was very much at home in the Major's house; he had dandled
Vallie on his knee when she was a baby; and he had made the Major's
troubles his own as far as he could. Consequently the greeting he
received was as cordial as he could have desired. "Major," he said, when
he found opportunity to state the nature of his business, "do you know
young Gabe Tolliver?"
"Mighty well--mighty well," responded Major Perdue, "and a fine boy he
is. He'll make his mark some day."
"Not onless we do somethin' to help him out. They ain't no way in the
world he can prove that he didn't kill that feller Hotchkiss. Ike Varner
done the killin', but he's gone, an' I think his wife is fixin' to go to
Atlanta. They've got the dead wood on Gabriel. They ain't no case at all
ag'in the rest; but you know how Gabriel is--he goes moonin' about in
the fields both day an' night, an' it's mighty hard for to put your
finger on him when you want him. An' to make it wuss, Hotchkiss called
his name more'n once before he died. It looks black for Gabriel, an' we
must do somethin' for him."
Major Perdue leaned forward a little, a frown on his face, and stretched
forth his left hand, in the palm of which he placed the forefinger of
his right. "I'll tell you what, Mr. Sanders, I'm just as much obliged to
you for coming to me as if you had saved me from drowning. I have come
to the point where I can't hold in much longer, and maybe you'll keep me
from making a fool of myself. I'll say beforehand, I don't care what
your plan is; I don't care to know it--just count on me."
"And where do I come in?" Colonel Blasengame inquired.
"Right by my side," responded Major Perdue.