THE ROCK CASTLE OF THE ROBBERS.
But the preparations of Bunce had been foreseen and provided for by
those most deeply interested in his progress; and scarcely had the
worthy tradesman effected his entrance fairly into the forbidden
territory, when he felt himself grappled from behind. He struggled with
an energy, due as much to the sudden terror as to any exercise of the
free will; but he struggled in vain. The arms that were fastened about
his own bound them down with a grasp of steel; and after a few moments
of desperate effort, accompanied with one or two exclamations,
half-surprise, half-expostulation, of "Hello, friend, what do you mean?"
and "I say, now, friend, you'd better have done--" the struggle ceased,
and he lay supine in the hold of the unseen persons who had secured him.
These persons he could not then discern; the passage was cavernously
dark, and had evidently been as much the work of nature as of art. A
handkerchief was fastened about his eyes, and he felt himself carried on
the shoulders of those who made nothing of the burden. After the
progress of several minutes, in which the anxiety natural to his
situation led Bunce into frequent exclamations and entreaties, he was
set down, the bandage was removed from his eyes, and he was once more
permitted their free exercise.
To his great wonder, however, nothing but women, of all sizes and ages,
met his sight. In vain did he look around for the men who brought him.
They were no longer to be seen, and so silent had been their passage
out, that the unfortunate pedler was compelled to satisfy himself with
the belief that persons of the gentler sex had been in truth his
captors.
Had he, indeed, given up the struggle so easily? The thought was
mortifying enough; and yet, when he looked around him, he grew more
satisfied with his own efforts at resistance. He had never seen such
strongly-built women in his life: scarcely one of them but could easily
have overthrown him, without stratagem, in single combat. The faces of
many of them were familiar to him; but where had he seen them before?
His memory failed him utterly, and he gave himself up to his
bewilderment.
He looked around, and the scene was well calculated to affect a nervous
mind. It was a fit scene for the painter of the supernatural. The small
apartment in which they were, was formed in great part from the natural
rock; where a fissure presented itself, a huge pine-tree, overthrown so
as to fill the vacuity, completed what nature had left undone; and,
bating the one or two rude cavities left here and there in the
sides--themselves so covered as to lie hidden from all without--there
was all the compactness of a regularly-constructed dwelling. A single
and small lamp, pendent from a beam that hung over the room, gave a
feeble light, which, taken in connection with that borrowed from
without, served only to make visible the dark indistinct of the place.
With something dramatic in their taste, the old women had dressed
themselves in sombre habiliments, according to the general aspect of all
things around them; and, as the unfortunate pedler continued to gaze in
wonderment, his fear grew with every progressive step in his
observation. One by one, however, the old women commenced stirring, and,
as they moved, now before and now behind him--his eyes following them on
every side--he at length discovered, amid the group, the small and
delicate form of the very being for whom he sought.
There, indeed, were Lucy Munro and her aunt, holding a passive character
in the strange assembly. This was encouraging; and Bunce, forgetting his
wonder in the satisfaction which such a prospect afforded him,
endeavored to force his way forward to them, when a salutary twitch of
the arm from one of the beldam troop, by tumbling him backward upon the
floor of the cavern, brought him again to a consideration of his
predicament. He could not be restrained from speech, however--though, as
he spoke, the old women saluted his face on all hands with strokes from
brushes of fern, which occasioned him no small inconvenience. But he had
gone too far now to recede; and, in a broken manner--broken as much by
his own hurry and vehemence as by the interruptions to which he was
subjected--he contrived to say enough to Lucy of the situation of
Colleton, to revive in her an interest of the most painful character.
She rushed forward, and was about to ask more from the beleaguered
pedler; but it was not the policy of those having both of them in charge
to permit such a proceeding. One of the stoutest of the old women now
came prominently upon the scene, and, with a rough voice, which it is
not difficult to recognise as that of Munro, commanded the young girl
away, and gave her in charge to two attendants. But she struggled still
to hear, and Bunce all the while speaking, she was enabled to gather
most of the particulars in his narration before her removal was
effected.
The mummery now ceased, and Bunce having been carried elsewhere, the
maskers resumed their native apparel, having thrown aside that which had
been put on for a distinct purpose. The pedler, in another and more
secure department of the robbers' hiding-place, was solaced with the
prospect of a long and dark imprisonment.
In the meantime, our little friend Chub Williams had been made to
undergo his own distinct punishment for his share in the adventure. No
sooner had Bunce been laid by the heels, than Rivers, who had directed
the whole, advanced from the shelter of the cave, in company with his
lieutenant, Dillon, both armed with rifles, and, without saying a word,
singling out the tree on which Chub had perched himself, took deliberate
aim at the head of the unfortunate urchin. He saw the danger in an
instant, and his first words were characteristic: "Now don't--don't,
now, I tell you, Mr. Guy--you may hit Chub!"
"Come down, then, you rascal!" was the reply, as, with a laugh, lowering
the weapon, he awaited the descent of the spy. "And now, Bur, what have
you to say that I shouldn't wear out a hickory or two upon you?"
"My name ain't Bur, Mr. Guy; my name is Chub, and I don't like to be
called out of my name. Mother always called me Chub."
"Well, Chub--since you like it best, though at best a bur--what were you
doing in that tree? How dare you spy into my dwelling, and send other
people there? Speak, or I'll skin you alive!"
"Now, don't, Mr. Guy! Don't, I beg you! 'Taint right to talk so, and I
don't like it!--But is that your dwelling, Mr. Guy, in truth?--you
really live in it, all the year round? Now, you don't, do you?"
The outlaw had no fierceness when contemplating the object before him.
Strange nature! He seemed to regard the deformities of mind and body, in
the outcast under his eyes, as something kindred. Was there anything
like sympathy in such a feeling? or was it rather that perversity of
temper which sometimes seems to cast an ennobling feature over violence,
and to afford here and there, a touch of that moral sunshine which can
now and then give an almost redeeming expression to the countenance of
vice itself? He contemplated the idiot for a few moments with a close
eye, and a mind evidently busied in thought. Laying his hand, at length,
on his shoulder, he was about to speak, when the deformed started back
from the touch as if in horror--a feeling, indeed, fully visible in
every feature of his face.
"Now, don't touch Chub, Mr. Guy! Mother said you were a dark man, and
told me to keep clear of you. Don't touch me agin, Mr. Guy; I don't like
it."
The outlaw, musingly, spoke to his lieutenant: "And this is education.
Who shall doubt its importance? who shall say that it does not overthrow
and altogether destroy the original nature? The selfish mother of this
miserable outcast, fearing that he might be won away from his service to
her, taught him to avoid all other persons, and even those who had
treated her with kindness were thus described to this poor dependant. To
him the sympathies of others would have been the greatest blessing; yet
she so tutored him, that, at her death, he was left desolate. You hear
his account of me, gathered, as he says, and as I doubt not, from her
own lips. That account is true, so far as my other relationships with
mankind are concerned; but not true as regards my connection with her. I
furnished that old creature with food when she was starving, and when
this boy, sick and impotent, could do little for her service. I never
uttered a harsh word in her ears, or treated her unkindly; yet this is
the character she gives of me--and this, indeed, the character which she
has given of all others. A feeling of the narrowest selfishness has led
her deliberately to misrepresent all mankind, and has been productive of
a more ungracious result, in driving one from his species, who, more
than any other, stands in need of their sympathy and association."
While Rivers spoke thus, the idiot listened with an air of the most
stupid attention. His head fell on one shoulder, and one hand partially
sustained it. As the former concluded his remarks, Chub recovered a
posture as nearly erect as possible, and remarked, with as much
significance as could comport with his general expression--
"Chub's mother was good to Chub, and Mr. Guy mustn't say nothing agin
her."
"But, Chub, will you not come and live with me? I will give you a good
rifle--one like this, and you shall travel everywhere with me."
"You will beat Chub when you are angry, and make him shoot people with
the rifle. I don't want it. If folks say harm to Chub, he can lick 'em
with his fists. Chub don't want to live with you."
"Well, as you please. But come in and look at my house and see where I
live."
"And shall I see the strannger agin? I can lick _him_, and I told him
so. But he called me Chub, and I made friends with him."
"Yes, you shall see him, and--"
"And Miss Lucy, too--I want to see Miss Lucy--Chub saw her, and she
spoke to Chub yesterday."
The outlaw promised him all, and after this there was no further
difficulty. The unconscious idiot scrupled no longer, and followed his
conductors into--prison. It was necessary, for the further safety of the
outlaws in their present abode, that such should be the case. The secret
of their hiding-place was in the possession of quite too many; and the
subject of deliberation among the leaders was now as to the propriety of
its continued tenure. The country, they felt assured, would soon be
overrun with the state troops. They had no fears of discovery from this
source, prior to the affair of the massacre of the guard, which rendered
necessary the secretion of many in their retreat, who, before that time,
were perfectly unconscious of its existence. In addition to this, it was
now known to the pedler and the idiot, neither of whom had any reason
for secrecy on the subject in the event of their being able to make it
public. The difficulty, with regard to the two latter, subjected them to
no small risk of suffering from the ultimate necessities of the rogues,
and there was a sharp and secret consultation as to the mode of
disposing of the two captives; but so much blood had been already
spilled, that the sense of the majority revolted at the further resort
to that degree of violence--particularly, too, when it was recollected
that they could only hold their citadel for a certain and short period
of time. It was determined, therefore, that so long as they themselves
continued in their hiding-place, Bunce and Chub should, perforce,
continue prisoners. Having so determined, and made their arrangements
accordingly, the two last-made captives were assigned a cell, chosen
with reference to its greater security than the other portions of their
hold--one sufficiently tenacious of its trust, it would seem, to answer
well its purpose.
In the meantime, the sufferings of Lucy Munro were such as may well be
understood from the character of her feelings, as we have heretofore
beheld their expression. In her own apartment--her cell, we may style
it, for she was in a sort of honorable bondage--she brooded with deep
melancholy over the narrative given by the pedler. She had no reason to
doubt its correctness, and, the more she meditated upon it, the more
acute became her misery. But a day intervened, and the trial of Ralph
Colleton must take place; and, without her evidence, she was well aware
there could be no hope of his escape from the doom of felony--from the
death of shame and physical agony. The whole picture grew up before her
excited fancy. She beheld the assembled crowd--she saw him borne to
execution--and her senses reeled beneath the terrible conjurations of
her fancy. She threw herself prostrate upon her couch, and strove not to
think, but in vain. Her mind, growing hourly more and more intensely
excited, at length almost maddened, and she grew conscious herself--the
worst of all kinds of consciousness--that her reason was no longer
secure in its sovereignty. It was with a strong effort of the still-firm
will that she strove to meditate the best mode of rescuing the victim
from the death suspended above him; and she succeeded, while
deliberating on this object, in quieting the more subtle workings of her
imagination.
Many were the thoughts which came into her brain in this examination. At
one time she thought it not impossible to convey a letter, in which her
testimony should be carefully set down; but the difficulty of procuring
a messenger, and the doubt that such a statement would prove of any
avail, decided her to seek for other means. An ordinary mind, and a
moderate degree of interest in the fate of the individual, would have
contented itself with some such step; but such a mind and such
affections were not those of the high-souled and spirited Lucy. She
dreaded not personal danger; and to rescue the youth, whom she so much
idolized, from the doom that threatened him, she would have willingly
dared to encounter that doom itself, in its darkest forms. She
determined, therefore, to rely chiefly upon herself in all efforts which
she should make for the purpose in view; and her object, therefore, was
to effect a return to the village in time to appear at the trial.
Yet how should this be done? She felt herself to be a captive; she knew
the restraints upon her--and did not doubt that all her motions were
sedulously observed. How then should she proceed? An agent was
necessary; and, while deliberating with herself upon the difficulty thus
assailing her at the outset, her ears were drawn to the distinct
utterance of sounds, as of persons engaged in conversation, from the
adjoining section of the rock.
One of the voices appeared familiar, and at length she distinctly made
out her own name in various parts of the dialogue. She soon
distinguished the nasal tones of the pedler, whose prison adjoined her
own, separated only by a huge wall of earth and rock, the rude and
jagged sides of which had been made complete, where naturally imperfect,
for the purposes of a wall, by the free use of clay, which, plastered in
huge masses into the crevices and every fissure, was no inconsiderable
apology for the more perfect structures of civilization.
Satisfied, at length, from what she heard, that the two so confined were
friendly, she contrived to make them understand her contiguity, by
speaking in tones sufficiently low as to be unheard beyond the apartment
in which they were. In this way she was enabled to converse with the
pedler, to whom all her difficulties were suggested, and to whom she did
not hesitate to say that she knew that which would not fail to save the
life of Colleton.
Bunce was not slow to devise various measures for the further promotion
of the scheme, none of which, however, served the purpose of showing to
either party how they should get out, and, but for the idiot, it is more
than probable, despairing of success, they would at length have thrown
aside the hope of doing anything for the youth as perfectly illusory.
But Chub came in as a prime auxiliar. From the first moment in which he
heard the gentle tones of Lucy's voice, he had busied himself with his
long nails and fingers in removing the various masses of clay which had
been made to fill up sundry crevices of the intervening wall, and had so
far succeeded as to detach a large square of the rock itself, which,
with all possible pains and caution, he lifted from the embrasure. This
done, he could distinguish objects, though dimly, from one apartment in
the other, and thus introduced the parties to a somewhat nearer
acquaintance with one another. Having done so much, he reposed from his
labors, content with a sight of Lucy, on whom he continued to gaze with
a fixed and stupid admiration.
He had pursued this work so noiselessly, and the maiden and Bunce had
been so busily employed in discussing their several plans, that they had
not observed the vast progress which Chub had made toward furnishing
them with a better solution of their difficulties than any of their own
previous cogitations. When Bunce saw how much had been done in one
quarter, he applied himself resolutely to similar experiments on the
opposite wall: and had the satisfaction of discovering that, as a
dungeon, the dwelling in which they were required to remain was sadly
deficient in some few of the requisites of security. With the aid of a
small pick of iron, which Lucy handed him from her cell, he pierced the
outer wall in several places, in which the clay had been required to do
the offices of the rock, and had the satisfaction of perceiving, from
the sudden influx of light in the apartment, succeeding his application
of the instrument, that, with a small labor and in little time, they
should be enabled to effect their escape, at least into the free air,
and under the more genial vault of heaven.
Having made this discovery, it was determined that nothing more should
be done until night, and having filled up the apertures which they had
made, with one thing or another, they proceeded to consult, with more
deliberate composure, on the future progress. It was arranged that the
night should be permitted to set in fairly--that Lucy should retire
early, having first taken care that Munro and her aunt, with whom she
more exclusively consorted--Rivers having kept very much out of sight
since her removal--should see her at the evening meal, without any
departure from her usual habits. Bunce undertook to officiate as guide,
and as Chub expressed himself willing to do whatever Miss Lucy should
tell him, it was arranged that he should remain, occasionally making
himself heard in his cell, as if in conversation, for as long a period
after their departure as might be thought necessary to put them
sufficiently in advance of pursuit--a requisition to which Chub readily
gave his consent. He was the only one of the party who appeared to
regard the whole matter with comparative indifference. He knew that a
man was in danger of his life--he felt that he himself was in prison,
and he said he would rather be out among the pine-trees--but there was
no rush of feeling, such as troubled the heart of the young girl, whose
spirit, clothing itself in all the noblest habiliments of humanity,
lifted her up into the choicest superiority of character--nor had the
dwarf that anxiety to do a service to his fellow, which made the pedler
throw aside some of his more worldly characteristics--he did simply as
he was bid, and had no further care.
Miss Lucy, he said, talked sweetly, like his mother, and Chub would do
for Miss Lucy anything that she asked him. The principle of his
government was simple, and having chosen a sovereign, he did not
withhold his obedience. Thus stood the preparations of the three
prisoners, when darkness--long-looked-for, and hailed with trembling
emotions--at length came down over the silent homestead of the outlaws.