speak to me here; no one will interrupt you--unless I call them,” she
added with a little feminine caution.
“And I reckon ye won't do that,” he said with a grim smile. “You are the
widow o' Pulaski Wade, late o' Heavy Tree Hill, I reckon?”
“I am,” said Mrs. Wade.
“And your husband's buried up thar in the graveyard, with a monument
over him setting forth his virtues ez a Christian and a square man and a
high-minded citizen? And that he was foully murdered by highwaymen?”
“Yes,” said Mrs. Wade, “that is the inscription.”
“Well, ma'am, a bigger pack o' lies never was cut on stone!”
Mrs. Wade rose, half in indignation, half in terror.
“Keep your sittin',” said the stranger, with a warning wave of his
hand. “Wait till I'm through, and then you call in the hull State o'
Californy, ef ye want.”
The stranger's manner was so doggedly confident that Mrs. Wade sank
back tremblingly in her chair. The man put his slouch hat on his knee,
twirled it round once or twice, and then said with the same stubborn
deliberation:--
“The highwayman in that business was your husband--Pulaski Wade--and his
gang, and he was killed by one o' the men he was robbin'. Ye see,
ma'am, it used to be your husband's little game to rope in three or four
strangers in a poker deal at Spanish Jim's saloon--I see you've heard o'
the place,” he interpolated as Mrs. Wade drew back suddenly--“and when
he couldn't clean 'em out in that way, or they showed a little more
money than they played, he'd lay for 'em with his gang in a lone part of
the trail, and go through them like any road agent. That's what he did
that night--and that's how he got killed.”
“How do you know this?” said Mrs. Wade, with quivering lips.
“I was one o' the men he went through before he was killed. And I'd hev
got my money back, but the rest o' the gang came up, and I got away jest
in time to save my life and nothin' else. Ye might remember thar was one
man got away and giv' the alarm, but he was goin' on to the States by
the overland coach that night and couldn't stay to be a witness. I was
that man. I had paid my passage through, and I couldn't lose THAT too
with my other money, so I went.”
Mrs. Wade sat stunned. She remembered the missing witness, and how she
had longed to see the man who was last with her husband; she
remembered Spanish Jim's saloon--his well-known haunt; his frequent and
unaccountable absences, the sudden influx of money which he always said
he had won at cards; the diamond ring he had given her as the result of
“a bet;” the forgotten recurrence of other robberies by a secret masked
gang; a hundred other things that had worried her, instinctively,
vaguely. She knew now, too, the meaning of the unrest that had driven
her from Heavy Tree Hill--the strange unformulated fears that had
haunted her even here. Yet with all this she felt, too, her present
weakness--knew that this man had taken her at a disadvantage, that she
ought to indignantly assert herself, deny everything, demand proof, and
brand him a slanderer!
“How did--you--know it was my husband?” she stammered.
“His mask fell off in the fight; you know another mask was found--it
was HIS. I saw him as plainly as I see him there!” he pointed to a
daguerreotype of her husband which stood upon her desk.
Mrs. Wade could only stare vacantly, hopelessly. After a pause the man
continued in a less aggressive manner and more confidential tone, which,
however, only increased her terror. “I ain't sayin' that YOU knowed
anything about this, ma'am, and whatever other folks might say when THEY
know of it, I'll allers say that you didn't.”
“What, then, did you come here for?” said the widow desperately.
“What do I come here for?” repeated the man grimly, looking around the
room; “what did I come to this yer comfortable home--this yer big ranch
and to a rich woman like yourself for? Well, Mrs. Wade, I come to get
the six hundred dollars your husband robbed me of, that's all! I ain't
askin' more! I ain't askin' interest! I ain't askin' compensation for
havin' to run for my life--and,” again looking grimly round the walls,
“I ain't askin' more than you will give--or is my rights.”
“But this house never was his; it was my father's,” gasped Mrs. Wade;
“you have no right”--
“Mebbe 'yes' and mebbe 'no,' Mrs. Wade,” interrupted the man, with
a wave of his hat; “but how about them two checks to bearer for two
hundred dollars each found among your husband's effects, and collected
by your lawyer for you--MY CHECKS, Mrs. Wade?”
A wave of dreadful recollection overwhelmed her. She remembered the
checks found upon her husband's body, known only to her and her lawyer,
believed to be gambling gains, and collected at once under his legal
advice. Yet she made one more desperate effort in spite of the instinct
that told her he was speaking the truth.
“But you shall have to prove it--before witnesses.”
“Do you WANT me to prove it before witnesses?” said the man, coming
nearer her. “Do you want to take my word and keep it between ourselves,
or do you want to call in your superintendent and his men, and all
Santy Any, to hear me prove your husband was a highwayman, thief, and
murderer? Do you want to knock over that monument on Heavy Tree Hill,
and upset your standing here among the deacons and elders? Do you want
to do all this and be forced, even by your neighbors, to pay me in the
end, as you will? Ef you do, call in your witnesses now and let's have
it over. Mebbe it would look better ef I got the money out of YOUR
FRIENDS than ye--a woman! P'raps you're right!”
He made a step towards the door, but she stopped him.
“No! no! wait! It's a large sum--I haven't it with me,” she stammered,
thoroughly beaten.
“Ye kin get it.”
“Give me time!” she implored. “Look! I'll give you a hundred down
now,--all I have here,--the rest another time!” She nervously opened a
drawer of her desk and taking out a buckskin bag of gold thrust it in
his hand. “There! go away now!” She lifted her thin hands despairingly
to her head. “Go! do!”
The man seemed struck by her manner. “I don't want to be hard on
a woman,” he said slowly. “I'll go now and come back again at nine
to-night. You can git the money, or what's as good, a check to bearer,
by then. And ef ye'll take my advice, you won't ask no advice from
others, ef you want to keep your secret. Just now it's safe with me; I'm
a square man, ef I seem to be a hard one.” He made a gesture as if to
take her hand, but as she drew shrinkingly away, he changed it to an
awkward bow, and the next moment was gone.
She started to her feet, but the unwonted strain upon her nerves and
frail body had been greater than she knew. She made a step forward, felt
the room whirl round her and then seem to collapse beneath her feet,
and, clutching at her chair, sank back into it, fainting.
How long she lay there she never knew. She was at last conscious of some
one bending over her, and a voice--the voice of Mr. Brooks--in her ear,
saying, “I beg your pardon; you seem ill. Shall I call some one?”
“No!” she gasped, quickly recovering herself with an effort, and staring
round her. “Where is--when did you come in?”
“Only this moment. I was leaving tonight, sooner than I expected, and
thought I'd say good-by. They told me that you had been engaged with a
stranger, but he had just gone. I beg your pardon--I see you are ill. I
won't detain you any longer.”
“No! no! don't go! I am better--better,” she said feverishly. As she
glanced at his strong and sympathetic face a wild idea seized her. He
was a stranger here, an alien to these people, like herself. The advice
that she dare not seek from others, from her half-estranged religious
friends, from even her superintendent and his wife, dare she ask from
him? Perhaps he saw this frightened doubt, this imploring appeal, in her
eyes, for he said gently, “Is it anything I can do for you?”
“Yes,” she said, with the sudden desperation of weakness; “I want you to
keep a secret.”
“Yours?--yes!” he said promptly.
Whereat poor Mrs. Wade instantly burst into tears. Then, amidst her
sobs, she told him of the stranger's visit, of his terrible accusations,
of his demands, his expected return, and her own utter helplessness. To
her terror, as she went on she saw a singular change in his kind face;
he was following her with hard, eager intensity. She had half hoped,
even through her fateful instincts, that he might have laughed, manlike,
at her fears, or pooh-poohed the whole thing. But he did not. “You say
he positively recognized your husband?” he repeated quickly.
“Yes, yes!” sobbed the widow, “and knew that daguerreotype!” she pointed
to the desk.
Brooks turned quickly in that direction. Luckily his back was towards
her, and she could not see his face, and the quick, startled look that
came into his eyes. But when they again met hers, it was gone, and even
their eager intensity had changed to a gentle commiseration. “You have
only his word for it, Mrs. Wade,” he said gently, “and in telling your
secret to another, you have shorn the rascal of half his power over you.
And he knew it. Now, dismiss the matter from your mind and leave it all
to me. I will be here a few minutes before nine--AND ALONE IN THIS ROOM.
Let your visitor be shown in here, and don't let us be disturbed. Don't
be alarmed,” he added with a faint twinkle in his eye, “there will be no
fuss and no exposure!”
It lacked a few minutes of nine when Mr. Brooks was ushered into the
sitting-room. As soon as he was alone he quietly examined the door and
the windows, and having satisfied himself, took his seat in a chair
casually placed behind the door. Presently he heard the sound of voices
and a heavy footstep in the passage. He lightly felt his waistcoat
pocket--it contained a pretty little weapon of power and precision, with
a barrel scarcely two inches long.
The door opened, and the person outside entered the room. In an instant
Brooks had shut the door and locked it behind him. The man turned
fiercely, but was faced by Brooks quietly, with one finger calmly hooked
in his waistcoat pocket. The man slightly recoiled from him--not as much
from fear as from some vague stupefaction. “What's that for? What's your
little game?” he said half contemptuously.
“No game at all,” returned Brooks coolly. “You came here to sell a
secret. I don't propose to have it given away first to any listener.”
“YOU don't--who are YOU?”
“That's a queer question to ask of the man you are trying to
personate--but I don't wonder! You're doing it d----d badly.”
“Personate--YOU?” said the stranger, with staring eyes.
“Yes, ME,” said Brooks quietly. “I am the only man who escaped from the
robbery that night at Heavy Tree Hill and who went home by the Overland
Coach.”
The stranger stared, but recovered himself with a coarse laugh. “Oh,
well! we're on the same lay, it appears! Both after the widow--afore we
show up her husband.”
“Not exactly,” said Brooks, with his eyes fixed intently on the
stranger. “You are here to denounce a highwayman who is DEAD and escaped
justice. I am here to denounce one who is LIVING!--Stop! drop your hand;
it's no use. You thought you had to deal only with a woman to-night, and
your revolver isn't quite handy enough. There! down!--down! So! That'll
do.”
“You can't prove it,” said the man hoarsely.
“Fool! In your story to that woman you have given yourself away. There
were but two travelers attacked by the highwaymen. One was killed--I am
the other. Where do YOU come in? What witness can you be--except as
the highwayman that you are? Who is left to identify Wade but--his
accomplice!”
The man's suddenly whitened face made his unshaven beard seem to bristle
over his face like some wild animal's. “Well, ef you kalkilate to blow
me, you've got to blow Wade and his widder too. Jest you remember that,”
he said whiningly.
“I've thought of that,” said Brooks coolly, “and I calculate that to
prevent it is worth about that hundred dollars you got from that
poor woman--and no more! Now, sit down at that table, and write as I
dictate.”
The man looked at him in wonder, but obeyed.
“Write,” said Brooks, “'I hereby certify that my accusations against the
late Pulaski Wade of Heavy Tree Hill are erroneous and groundless, and
the result of mistaken identity, especially in regard to any complicity
of his in the robbery of John Stubbs, deceased, and Henry Brooks, at
Heavy Tree Hill, on the night of the 13th August, 1854.'”
The man looked up with a repulsive smile. “Who's the fool now, Cap'n?
What's become of your hold on the widder, now?”
“Write!” said Brooks fiercely.
The sound of a pen hurriedly scratching paper followed this first
outburst of the quiet Brooks.
“Sign it,” said Brooks.
The man signed it.
“Now go,” said Brooks, unlocking the door, “but remember, if you should
ever be inclined to revisit Santa Ana, you will find ME living here
also.”
The man slunk out of the door and into the passage like a wild animal
returning to the night and darkness. Brooks took up the paper, rejoined
Mrs. Wade in the parlor, and laid it before her.
“But,” said the widow, trembling even in her joy, “do you--do you think
he was REALLY mistaken?”
“Positive,” said Brooks coolly. “It's true, it's a mistake that has cost
you a hundred dollars, but there are some mistakes that are worth that
to be kept quiet.”
*****
They were married a year later; but there is no record that in after
years of conjugal relations with a weak, charming, but sometimes trying
woman, Henry Brooks was ever tempted to tell her the whole truth of the
robbery of Heavy Tree Hill.
THE MERMAID OF LIGHTHOUSE POINT
Some forty years ago, on the northern coast of California, near the
Golden Gate, stood a lighthouse. Of a primitive class, since superseded
by a building more in keeping with the growing magnitude of the adjacent
port, it attracted little attention from the desolate shore, and, it was
alleged, still less from the desolate sea beyond. A gray structure of
timber, stone, and glass, it was buffeted and harried by the constant
trade winds, baked by the unclouded six months' sun, lost for a few
hours in the afternoon sea-fog, and laughed over by circling guillemots
from the Farallones. It was kept by a recluse--a preoccupied man of
scientific tastes, who, in shameless contrast to his fellow immigrants,
had applied to the government for this scarcely lucrative position as a
means of securing the seclusion he valued more than gold. Some believed
that he was the victim of an early disappointment in love--a view
charitably taken by those who also believed that the government would
not have appointed “a crank” to a position of responsibility. Howbeit,
he fulfilled his duties, and, with the assistance of an Indian, even
cultivated a small patch of ground beside the lighthouse. His isolation
was complete! There was little to attract wanderers here: the nearest
mines were fifty miles away; the virgin forest on the mountains inland
were penetrated only by sawmills and woodmen from the Bay settlements,
equally remote. Although by the shore-line the lights of the great port
were sometimes plainly visible, yet the solitude around him was
peopled only by Indians,--a branch of the great northern tribe of
“root-diggers,”--peaceful and simple in their habits, as yet
undisturbed by the white man, nor stirred into antagonism by aggression.
Civilization only touched him at stated intervals, and then by the more
expeditious sea from the government boat that brought him supplies. But
for his contiguity to the perpetual turmoil of wind and sea, he might
have passed a restful Arcadian life in his surroundings; for even his
solitude was sometimes haunted by this faint reminder of the great port
hard by that pulsated with an equal unrest. Nevertheless, the sands
before his door and the rocks behind him seemed to have been untrodden
by any other white man's foot since their upheaval from the ocean. It
was true that the little bay beside him was marked on the map as “Sir
Francis Drake's Bay,” tradition having located it as the spot where
that ingenious pirate and empire-maker had once landed his vessels and
scraped the barnacles from his adventurous keels. But of this Edgar
Pomfrey--or “Captain Pomfrey,” as he was called by virtue of his
half-nautical office--had thought little.
For the first six months he had thoroughly enjoyed his seclusion. In
the company of his books, of which he had brought such a fair store
that their shelves lined his snug corners to the exclusion of more
comfortable furniture, he found his principal recreation. Even his
unwonted manual labor, the trimming of his lamp and cleaning of his
reflectors, and his personal housekeeping, in which his Indian help at
times assisted, he found a novel and interesting occupation. For outdoor
exercise, a ramble on the sands, a climb to the rocky upland, or a pull
in the lighthouse boat, amply sufficed him. “Crank” as he was supposed
to be, he was sane enough to guard against any of those early lapses
into barbarism which marked the lives of some solitary gold-miners.
His own taste, as well as the duty of his office, kept his person and
habitation sweet and clean, and his habits regular. Even the little
cultivated patch of ground on the lee side of the tower was symmetrical
and well ordered. Thus the outward light of Captain Pomfrey shone forth
over the wilderness of shore and wave, even like his beacon, whatever
his inward illumination may have been.
It was a bright summer morning, remarkable even in the monotonous
excellence of the season, with a slight touch of warmth which the
invincible Northwest Trades had not yet chilled. There was still a faint
haze off the coast, as if last night's fog had been caught in the quick
sunshine, and the shining sands were hot, but without the usual dazzling
glare. A faint perfume from a quaint lilac-colored beach-flower, whose
clustering heads dotted the sand like bits of blown spume, took the
place of that smell of the sea which the odorless Pacific lacked. A few
rocks, half a mile away, lifted themselves above the ebb tide at varying
heights as they lay on the trough of the swell, were crested with foam
by a striking surge, or cleanly erased in the full sweep of the sea.
Beside, and partly upon one of the higher rocks, a singular object was
moving.
Pomfrey was interested but not startled. He had once or twice seen seals
disporting on these rocks, and on one occasion a sea-lion,--an estray
from the familiar rocks on the other side of the Golden Gate. But he
ceased work in his garden patch, and coming to his house, exchanged
his hoe for a telescope. When he got the mystery in focus he suddenly
stopped and rubbed the object-glass with his handkerchief. But even when
he applied the glass to his eye for a second time, he could scarcely
believe his eyesight. For the object seemed to be a WOMAN, the lower
part of her figure submerged in the sea, her long hair depending over
her shoulders and waist. There was nothing in her attitude to suggest
terror or that she was the victim of some accident. She moved slowly
and complacently with the sea, and even--a more staggering
suggestion--appeared to be combing out the strands of her long hair with
her fingers. With her body half concealed she might have been a mermaid!
He swept the foreshore and horizon with his glass; there was neither
boat nor ship--nor anything that moved, except the long swell of the
Pacific. She could have come only from the sea; for to reach the rocks
by land she would have had to pass before the lighthouse, while the
narrow strip of shore which curved northward beyond his range of view he
knew was inhabited only by Indians. But the woman was unhesitatingly
and appallingly WHITE, and her hair light even to a golden gleam in the
sunshine.
Pomfrey was a gentleman, and as such was amazed, dismayed, and cruelly
embarrassed. If she was a simple bather from some vicinity hitherto
unknown and unsuspected by him, it was clearly his business to shut up
his glass and go back to his garden patch--although the propinquity of
himself and the lighthouse must have been as plainly visible to her as
she was to him. On the other hand, if she was the survivor of some wreck
and in distress--or, as he even fancied from her reckless manner, bereft
of her senses, his duty to rescue her was equally clear. In his dilemma
he determined upon a compromise and ran to his boat. He would pull out
to sea, pass between the rocks and the curving sand-spit, and examine
the sands and sea more closely for signs of wreckage, or some overlooked
waiting boat near the shore. He would be within hail if she needed him,
or she could escape to her boat if she had one.
In another moment his boat was lifting on the swell towards the rocks.
He pulled quickly, occasionally turning to note that the strange figure,
whose movements were quite discernible to the naked eye, was still
there, but gazing more earnestly towards the nearest shore for any sign
of life or occupation. In ten minutes he had reached the curve where the
trend opened northward, and the long line of shore stretched before him.
He swept it eagerly with a single searching glance. Sea and shore were
empty. He turned quickly to the rock, scarcely a hundred yards on his
beam. It was empty too! Forgetting his previous scruples, he pulled
directly for it until his keel grated on its submerged base. There was
nothing there but the rock, slippery with the yellow-green slime of
seaweed and kelp--neither trace nor sign of the figure that had
occupied it a moment ago. He pulled around it; there was no cleft or
hiding-place. For an instant his heart leaped at the sight of something
white, caught in a jagged tooth of the outlying reef, but it was only
the bleached fragment of a bamboo orange-crate, cast from the deck of
some South Sea trader, such as often strewed the beach. He lay off the
rock, keeping way in the swell, and scrutinizing the glittering sea. At
last he pulled back to the lighthouse, perplexed and discomfited.
Was it simply a sporting seal, transformed by some trick of his vision?
But he had seen it through his glass, and now remembered such details
as the face and features framed in their contour of golden hair, and
believed he could even have identified them. He examined the rock again
with his glass, and was surprised to see how clearly it was outlined now
in its barren loneliness. Yet he must have been mistaken. His scientific
and accurate mind allowed of no errant fancy, and he had always sneered
at the marvelous as the result of hasty or superficial observation. He
was a little worried at this lapse of his healthy accuracy,--fearing
that it might be the result of his seclusion and loneliness,--akin to
the visions of the recluse and solitary. It was strange, too, that it
should take the shape of a woman; for Edgar Pomfrey had a story--the
usual old and foolish one.
Then his thoughts took a lighter phase, and he turned to the memory of
his books, and finally to the books themselves. From a shelf he picked
out a volume of old voyages, and turned to a remembered passage: “In
other seas doe abound marvells soche as Sea Spyders of the bigness of a
pinnace, the wich they have been known to attack and destroy; Sea Vypers
which reach to the top of a goodly maste, whereby they are able to draw
marinners from the rigging by the suction of their breathes; and
Devill Fyshe, which vomit fire by night which makyth the sea to shine
prodigiously, and mermaydes. They are half fyshe and half mayde of grate
Beauty, and have been seen of divers godly and creditable witnesses
swymming beside rocks, hidden to their waist in the sea, combing of
their hayres, to the help of whych they carry a small mirrore of the
bigness of their fingers.” Pomfrey laid the book aside with a faint
smile. To even this credulity he might come!