They knew the fellowship of man and wife only in so much as was absolutely essential to the keeping up of appearances to the public eye—a matter necessary to maintaining her lord in the possession of his dignity; which, as it conferred honor and profit, through him, upon her also, it was of necessity a part of her policy to continue.
There had been a brush—a small gust had passed over that fair region of domestic harmony—on the very morning upon which the outlaw and his party rode up the untrimmed and half-overgrown avenue, which led to the house of the writ-server. There had been an amiable discussion between the two, as to which of them, with propriety, belonged the duty of putting on the breeches of their son Tommy, preparatory to his making his appearance at the breakfast-table. Some extraneous influence had that morning prompted the sheriff to resist the performance of a task which had now for some time been imposed upon him, and for which, therefore, there was the sanction of prescription and usage. It was an unlucky moment for the assertion of his manhood: for, a series of circumstances operating just about that time unfavorably upon the mind of his wife, she was in the worst possible humor upon which to try experiments.
She heard the refusal of her liege to do the required duty, therefore, with an astonishment, not unmingled with a degree of pleasure, as it gave a full excuse for the venting forth upon him of those splenetic humors, which, for some time, had been growing and gathering in her system. The little sheriff, from long attendance on courts and camps, had acquired something more, perhaps, of the desire and disposition, than the capacity, to make long speeches and longer sermons, in the performance of both of which labors, however, he was admirably fortified by the technicals of the law, and the Bible phraseology. The quarrel had been waged for some time, and poor Tommy, the bone of contention, sitting all the while between the contending parties in a state of utter nudity, kept up a fine running accompaniment to the full tones of the wranglers, by crying bitterly for his breeches.
For the first time for a long period of years, the lady found her powers of tongue fail in the proposed effect upon the understanding of her loving and legal lord; and knowing but of one other way to assail it, her hand at length grappling with the stool, from which she tumbled the breechless babe without scruple, seized upon an argument to which her adversary could oppose neither text nor technical; when, fortunately for him, the loud rapping of their early visiters at the outer door of the dwelling interposed between her wrath and its object, and spared the life of the devout sheriff for other occurrences. Bundling the naked child out of sight, the mother rushed into an inner apartment, shaking the stool in the pale countenance of her lord as she retreated, in a manner and with a look which said, as plainly as words could say, that this temporary delay would only sharpen her appetite for vengeance, and exaggerate its terrors when the hour did arrive. It was with a hesitating step and wobegone countenance, therefore, that the officer proceeded to his parlor, where a no less troublesome, but less awkward trial awaited him.
[TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE: A chapter number was skipped in the original book.]
CHAPTER XXIX.
ARREST.
The high-sheriff made his appearance before his early and well-known visiters with a desperate air of composure and unconcern, the effort to attain which was readily perceptible to his companions. He could not, in the first place, well get rid of those terrors of the domestic world from which their interruption had timely shielded him; nor, on the other hand, could he feel altogether assured that the visit now paid him would not result in the exaction of some usurious interest. He had recently, as we have said, as much through motives of worldly as spiritual policy, become an active religionist, in a small way, in and about the section of country in which he resided; and knowing that his professions were in some sort regarded with no small degree of doubt and suspicion by some of his brethren holding the same faith, he felt the necessity of playing a close and cautious game in all his practices. He might well be apprehensive, therefore, of the visits of those who never came but as so many omens of evil, and whose claims upon, and perfect knowledge of, his true character, were such, that he felt himself, in many respects, most completely at their mercy.
Rivers did not give much time to preliminaries, but, after a few phrases of commonplace, coming directly to the point, he stated the business in hand, and demanded the assistance of the officer of justice for the arrest of one of its fugitives. There were some difficulties of form in the matter, which saved the sheriff in part, and which the outlaw had in great part over looked. A warrant of arrest was necessary from some officer properly empowered to issue one, and a new difficulty was thus presented in the way of Colleton's pursuit. The sheriff had not the slightest objections to making deputies of the persons recommended by the outlaw, provided they were fully empowered to execute the commands of some judicial officer; beyond this, the scrupulous executioner of justice was unwilling to go; and having stood out so long in the previous controversy with his spouse, it was wonderful what a vast stock of audacious courage he now felt himself entitled, and ventured, to manifest.
"I can not do it, Master Guy—it's impossible—seeing, in the first place, that I ha'n't any right by the laws to issue any warrant, though it's true, I has to serve them. Then, agin, in the next place, 'twont do for another reason that's jist as good, you see. It's only the other day, Master Guy, that the fear of the Lord come upon me, and I got religion; and now I've set myself up as a worker in other courts, you see, than those of man; and there be eyes around me that would see, and hearts to rejoice at the backslidings of the poor laborer. Howbeit, Master Guy, I am not the man to forget old sarvice; and if it be true that this man has been put to death in this manner, though I myself can do nothing at this time, I may put you in the way—for the sake of old time, and for the sake of justice, which requires that the slayer of his brother should also be slain—of having your wish."
Though something irritated still at the reluctance of his former creature to lend himself without scruple to his purposes, the outlaw did not hesitate to accept the overture, and to press for its immediate accomplishment. He had expostulated with the sheriff for some time on the point, and, baffled and denied, he was very glad, at the conclusion of the dialogue with that worthy, to find that there was even so much of a prospect of concert, though falling far short of his original anticipations, from that quarter. He was too well aware, also, of the difficulty in the way of any proceeding without something savoring of authority in the matter; for, from a previous and rather correct estimate of Colleton's character, he well foresaw that, knowing his enemy, he would fight to the last against an arrest; which, under the forms of law and with the sanction of a known officer, he would otherwise readily recognise and submit to. Seizing, therefore, upon the speech of the sheriff, Rivers eagerly availed himself of its opening to obtain those advantages in the affair, of which, from the canting spirit and newly-awakened morality of his late coadjutor, he had utterly begun to despair. He proceeded to reply to the suggestion as follows:—
"I suppose, I must content myself, Maxson, with doing in this thing as you say, though really I see not why you should now be so particular, for there are not ten men in the county who are able to determine upon any of your powers, or who would venture to measure their extent. Let us hear your plan, and I suppose it will be effectual in our object, and this is all I want. All I desire is, that our people, you know, should not be murdered by strangers without rhyme or reason."
The sheriff knew well the hypocrisy of the sentiment with which Rivers concluded, but made no remark. A single smile testified his knowledge of the nature of his colleague, and indicated his suspicion of a deeper and different motive for this new activity. Approaching the outlaw closely, he asked, in a half whisper:—
"Who was the witness of the murder—who could swear for the magistrate? You must get somebody to do that."
This was another point which Rivers, in his impatience, had not thought to consider. But fruitful in expedient, his fertile mind suggested that ground of suspicion was all that the law required for apprehension at least, and having already arranged that the body of the murdered man should be found under certain circumstances, he contented himself with procuring commissions, as deputies, for his two officers, and posted away to the village.
Here, as he anticipated, the intelligence had already been received—the body of Forrester had been found, and sufficient ground for suspicion to authorize a warrant was recognised in the dirk of the youth, which, smeared with blood as it had been left by Rivers, had been found upon the body. Rivers had but little to do. He contrived, however, to do nothing himself. The warrant of Pippin, as magistrate, was procured, and the two officers commissioned by the sheriff went off in pursuit of the supposed murderer, against whom the indignation of all the village was sufficiently heightened by the recollection of the close intimacy existing between Ralph and Forrester, and the nobly characteristic manner in which the latter had volunteered to do his fighting with Rivers. The murdered man had, independent of this, no small popularity of his own, which brought out for him a warm and active sympathy highly creditable to his memory. Old Allen, too, suffered deeply, not less on his own than his daughter's account. She, poor girl, had few words, and her sorrow, silent, if not tearless, was confined to the solitude of her own chamber.
In the prosecution of the affair against Ralph, there was but one person whose testimony could have availed him, and that person was Lucy Munro. As the chief particular in evidence, and that which established the strong leading presumption against him, consisted in the discovery of his dagger alongside the body of the murdered man, and covered with his blood; it was evident that she who could prove the loss of the dagger by the youth, and its finding by Munro, prior to the event, and unaccompanied by any tokens of crime, would not only be able to free the person suspected, at least from this point of suspicion, but would be enabled to place its burden elsewhere, and with the most conclusive distinctness.
This was a dilemma which Rivers and Munro did not fail to consider. The private deliberation, for an hour, of the two conspirators, determined upon the course which for mutual safety they were required to pursue; and Munro gave his niece due notice to prepare for an immediate departure with her aunt and himself, on some plausible pretence, to another portion of the country.
To such a suggestion, as Lucy knew not the object, she offered no objection; and a secret departure was effected of the three, who, after a lonely ride of several hours through a route circuitously chosen to mislead, were safely brought to the sheltered and rocky abiding-place of the robbers, as we have already described it. Marks of its offensive features, however, had been so modified as not to occasion much alarm. The weapons of war had been studiously put out of sight, and apartments, distinct from those we have seen, partly the work of nature, and partly of man, were assigned for the accommodation of the new-comers. The outlaws had their instructions, and did not appear, though lurking and watching around in close and constant neighborhood.
Nor, in this particular alone, had the guilty parties made due provision for their future safety. The affair of the guard had made more stir than had been anticipated in the rash moment which had seen its consummation; and their advices warned them of the approach of a much larger force of state troops, obedient to the direction of the district-attorney, than they could well contend with. They determined, therefore, prudently for themselves, to keep as much out of the way of detection as they could; and to avoid those risks upon which a previous conference had partially persuaded them to adventure. They were also apprized of the greater excitement attending the fate of Forrester, than could possibly have followed the death, in his place, of the contemplated victim; and, adopting a habit of caution, heretofore but little considered in that region, they prepared for all hazards, and, at the same time, tacitly determined upon the suspension of their numerous atrocities—at least, while a controlling force was in the neighborhood. Previous impunity had led them so far, that at length the neighboring country was aroused, and all the better classes, taking advantage of the excitement, grew bolder in the expression of their anger against those who had beset them so long. The sheriff, Maxson, had been something tutored by these influences, or, it had been fair to surmise that his scruples would have been less difficult to overcome.
In the meantime, the pursuit of Ralph Colleton, as the murderer of Forrester, had been hotly urged by the officers. The pursuers knew the route, and having the control of new horses as they proceeded, at frequent intervals, gained of course at every step upon the unconscious travellers. We have seen the latter retiring to repose at a late hour of the night. Under the several fatigues which all parties had undergone, it is not strange that the sun should have arisen some little time before those who had not retired quite so early as himself. At a moderately late hour they breakfasted together—the family of the wagoner, and Ralph, and our old friend the pedler. Pursuing the same route, the two latter, after the repast, separated, with many acknowledgments on both sides, from the emigrating party, and pursued their way together.
On their road, Bunce gave the youth a long and particular account of all those circumstances at the village-inn by which he had been deprived of his chattels, and congratulated himself not a little on the adroit thought which had determined him to retain the good steed of the Lawyer Pippin in lieu of his losses. He spoke of it as quite a clever and creditable performance, and one as fully deserving the golden honors of the medal as many of those doings which are so rewarded.
On this point his companion said little; and though he could not altogether comprehend the propriety of the pedler's morals, he certainly did not see but that the necessity and pressing danger of his situation somewhat sanctioned the deceit. He suggested this idea to Bunce, but when he came to talk of the propriety of returning the animal the moment he was fairly in safety, the speculator failed entirely to perceive the moral of his philosophy.
The sheriff's officers came upon the wagoner a few hours after the two had separated from him. The intelligence received from him quickened their pace, and toward noon they descried our travellers ascending a hill a few hundred yards in advance of them. A repeated application of the spur brought them together, and, as had been anticipated by Rivers, Ralph offered not the slightest objection, when once satisfied of the legality of his arrest, to becoming their prisoner. But the consternation of Bunce was inexpressible. He endeavored to shelter himself in the adjoining woods, and was quietly edging his steed into the covert for that purpose, on the first alarm, but was not permitted by the sharp eyes and ready unscrupulosity of the robber representatives of the law. They had no warrant, it is true, for the arrest of any other person than "the said Ralph Colleton"—but the unlucky color of Pippin's horse, and their perfect knowledge of the animal, readily identifying him, did the business for the pedler.
Under the custody of the laws, therefore, we behold the youth retracing his ground, horror-stricken at the death of Forrester—indignant at the suspicions entertained of himself as the murderer, but sanguine of the result, and firm and fearless as ever. Not so Bunce: there were cruel visions in his sight of seven-sided pine-rails—fierce regulators—Lynch's law, and all that rude and terrible sort of punishment, which is studiously put in force in those regions for the enjoyment of evil-doers. The next day found them both securely locked up in the common jail of Chestatee.
CHAPTER XXX.
CHUB WILLIAMS.
The young mind of Colleton, excursive as it was, could scarcely realize to itself the strange and rapidly-succeeding changes of the last few days. Self-exiled from the dwelling in which so much of his heart and hope had been stored up—a wanderer among the wandering—assaulted by ruffians—the witness of their crimes—pursued by the officers of justice, and finally the tenant of a prison, as a criminal himself! After the first emotions of astonishment and vexation had subsided—ignorant of the result of this last adventure, and preparing for the worst—he called for pen and paper, and briefly, to his uncle, recounted his adventures, as we have already related them, partially acknowledging his precipitance in departing from his house, but substantially insisting upon the propriety of those grounds which had made him do so.
To Edith, what could he say? Nothing—everything. His letter to her, enclosed in that to her uncle, was just such as might be expected from one with a character such as we have endeavored to describe—that of the genuine aristocrat of Carolina—gentle, but firm—soothing, but manly—truly, but loftily affectionate—the rock touched, if not softened by the sunbeam; warm and impetuous, but generally just in his emotions—liberal in his usual estimate of mankind, and generous, to a fault, in all his associations;—ignorant of any value in money, unless for high purposes—as subservient to taste and civilization—a graceful humanity and an honorable affection.
With a tenderness the most respectful, Ralph reiterated his love—prayed for her prayers—frankly admitted his error in his abrupt flight, and freely promised atonement as soon as he should be freed from his difficulties; an event which, in speaking to her, he doubted not. This duty over, his mind grew somewhat relieved, and, despatching a note by the jailer's deputy to the lawyer Pippin, he desired immediately to see him.
Pippin had looked for such an invitation, and was already in attendance. His regrets were prodigious, but his gratification not less, as it would give him an opportunity, for some time desired, for serving so excellent a gentleman. But the lawyer shook his head with most professional uncertainty at every step of his own narration of the case, and soon convinced Ralph that he really stood in a very awkward predicament. He described the situation of the body of Forrester when found; the bloody dirk which lay beside it, having the initials of his name plainly carved upon it; his midnight flight; his close companionship with Forrester on the evening of the night in which he had been murdered—a fact proved by old Allen and his family; the intimate freedom with which Forrester had been known to confide his purposes to the youth, deducible from the joint call which they had made upon the sweetheart of the former; and many other smaller details, unimportant in themselves, but linked together with the rest of the particulars, strengthening the chain of circumstances against him to a degree which rendered it improbable that he should escape conviction.
Pippin sought, however, to console his client, and, after the first development of particulars, the natural buoyancy of the youth returned. He was not disposed readily to despair, and his courage and confidence rose with the pressure of events. He entered into a plain story of all the particulars of his flight—the instrumentality of Miss Munro in that transaction, and which she could explain, in such a manner as to do away with any unfavorable impression which that circumstance, of itself, might create. Touching the dagger, he could say nothing. He had discovered its loss, but knew not at what time he had lost it. The manner in which it had been found was, of course, fatal, unless the fact which he alleged of its loss could be established; and of this the consulting parties saw no hope. Still, they did not despair, but proceeded to the task of preparing the defence for the day of trial, which was at hand. The technical portions of the case were managed by the lawyer, who issued his subpoenas—made voluminous notes—wrote out the exordium of his speech—and sat up all night committing it to memory.
Having done all that the occasion called for in his interview with Ralph, the lawyer proceeded to visit, uncalled-for, one whom he considered a far greater criminal than his client. The cell to which the luckless pedler, Bunce, had been carried, was not far from that of the former, and the rapid step of the lawyer soon overcame the distance between.
Never was man seemingly so glad to see his neighbor as was Bunce, on this occasion, to look upon Pippin. His joy found words of the most honeyed description for his visiter, and his delight was truly infectious. The lawyer was delighted too, but his satisfaction was of a far different origin. He had now some prospect of getting back his favorite steed—that fine animal, described by him elsewhere to the pedler, as docile as the dog, and fleet as the deer. He had heard of the safety of his horse, and his anger with the pedler had undergone some abatement; but, with the consciousness of power common to inferior minds, came a strong desire for its use. He knew that the pedler had been guilty in a legal sense of no crime, and could only be liable in a civil action for his breach of trust. But he suspected that the dealer in wares was ignorant of the advantageous distinctions in morals which the law had made, and consequently amused himself with playing upon the fears of the offender. He put on a countenance of much commiseration, and, drawing a long sigh, regretted the necessity which had brought him to prepare the mind of his old friend for the last terrors of justice.
But Bunce was not a man easily frightened. As he phrased it himself, he had been quite too long knocking about among men to be scared by shadows, and replied stoutly—though really with some internal misgivings—to the lachrymalities of the learned counsel. He gave him to understand that, if he got into difficulty, he knew some other persons whom his confessions would make uncomfortable; and hinted pretty directly at certain practices of a certain professional gentleman, which, though the pedler knew nothing of the technical significant might yet come under the head of barratry, and so forth.
The lawyer was the more timid man of the two, and found it necessary to pare down his potency. He soon found it profitable to let the matter rest, and having made arrangements with the pedler for bringing suit for damages against two of the neighboring farmers concerned in the demolition of his wares—who, happening to be less guilty than their accessaries, had ventured to remain in the country—Bunce found no difficulty in making his way out of the prison. There had been no right originally to detain him; but the consciousness of guilt, and some other ugly misgivings, had so relaxed the nerves of the tradesman, that he had never thought to inquire if his name were included in the warrant of arrest. It is probable that his courage and confidence would have been far less than they appear at present, had not Pippin assured him that the regulators were no longer to be feared; that the judge had arrived; that the grand-jury had found bills against several of the offenders, and were still engaged in their labors; that a detachment of the state military had been ordered to the station; and that things looked as civil as it was altogether possible for such warlike exhibition to allow. It is surprising to think how fearlessly uncompromising was the conduct of Bunce under this new condition of affairs.
But the pedler, in his own release from custody, was not forgetful of his less-fortunate companion. He was a frequent visiter in the dungeon of Ralph Colleton; bore all messages between the prisoner and his counsel; and contributed, by his shrewd knowledge of human kind, not a little to the material out of which his defence was to be made.
He suggested the suspicion, never before entertained by the youth, or entertained for a moment only, that his present arrest was the result of a scheme purposely laid with a reference to this end; and did not scruple to charge upon Rivers the entire management of the matter.
Ralph could only narrate what he knew of the malignant hatred of the outlaw to himself—another fact which none but Lucy Munro could establish. Her evidence, however, would only prove Rivers to have meditated one crime; it would not free him from the imputation of having committed another. Still, so much was important, and casualties were to be relied upon for the rest.
But what was the horror of all parties when it was known that neither Lucy nor any of the landlord's family were to be found! The process of subpoena was returned, and the general opinion was, that alarmed at the approach of the military in such force, and confident that his agency in the late transactions could not long remain concealed in the possession of so many, though guilty like himself, Munro had fled to the west.
The mental agony of the youth, when thus informed, can not well he conceived. He was, for a time, utterly prostrate, and gave himself up to despair. The entreaties of the pedler, and the counsels and exhortings of the lawyer, failed equally to enliven him; and they had almost come to adopt his gloomy resignation, when, as he sat on his low bench, with head drooping on his hand, a solitary glance of sunshine fell through the barred window—the only one assigned to his cell.
The smile of God himself that solitary ray appeared to the diseased spirit of the youth, and he grew strong in an instant. Talk of the lessons of the learned, and the reasonings of the sage!—a vagrant breeze, a rippling water, a glance of the sweet sunlight, have more of consolation in them for the sad heart than all the pleadings of philosophy. They bring the missives of a higher teacher.
Bunce was an active coadjutor with the lawyer in this melancholy case. He made all inquiries—he went everywhere. He searched in all places, and spared no labor; but at length despaired. Nothing could be elicited by his inquiries, and he ceased to hope himself, and ceased to persuade Ralph into hope. The lawyer shook his head in reply to all questions, and put on a look of mystery which is the safety-valve to all swollen pretenders.
In this state of affairs, taking the horse of the youth, with a last effort at discoveries, Bunce rode forth into the surrounding country. He had heretofore taken all the common routes, to which, in his previous intercourse with the people, he had been accustomed; he now determined to strike into a path scarcely perceptible, and one which he never remembered to have seen before. He followed, mile after mile, its sinuosities. It was a wild, and, seemingly, an untrodden region. The hills shot up jaggedly from the plain around him—the fissures were rude and steep—more like embrasures, blown out by sudden power from the solid rock. Where the forest appeared, it was dense and intricate—abounding in brush and underwood; where it was deficient, the blasted heath chosen by the witches in Macbeth would have been no unfit similitude.
Hopeless of human presence in this dreary region, the pedler yet rode on, as if to dissipate the unpleasant thoughts, following upon his frequent disappointment. Suddenly, however, a turn in the winding path brought him in contact with a strange-looking figure, not more than five feet in height, neither boy nor man, uncouthly habited, and seemingly one to whom all converse but that of the trees and rocks, during his whole life, had been unfamiliar.
The reader has already heard something of the Cherokee pony—it was upon one of these animals he rode. They are a small, but compactly made and hardy creature—of great fortitude, stubborn endurance, and an activity, which, in the travel of day after day, will seldom subside from the gallop. It was the increasing demand for these animals that had originally brought into existence and exercise a company, which, by a transition far from uncommon, passed readily from the plundering of horses to the cutting of throats and purses; scarcely discriminating in their reckless rapacity between the several degrees of crime in which such a practice involved them.
Though somewhat uncouth in appearance, the new-comer seemed decidedly harmless—nay, almost idiotic in appearance. His smile was pleasant, though illuminating features of the ruggedest description, and the tones of his voice were even musical in the ears of the pedler, to whom any voice would probably have seemed so in that gloomy region. He very sociably addressed Bunce in the patois of that section; and the ceremonial of introduction, without delay or difficulty, was overcome duly on both sides. In the southern wilderness, indeed, it does not call for much formality, nor does a strict adherence to the received rules of etiquette become at all necessary, to make the traveller "hail fellow, well met." Anything in that quarter, savoring of reserve or stiffness, is punished with decided hostility or openly-avowed contempt; and, in the more rude regions, the refusal to partake in the very social employments of wrestling or whiskey-drinking, has brought the scrupulous personage to the more questionable enjoyments of a regular gouging match and fight. A demure habit is the most unpopular among all classes. Freedom of manner, on the other hand, obtains confidence readily, and the heart is won, at once, by an off-handed familiarity of demeanor, which fails to recognise any inequalities in human condition. The society and the continued presence of Nature, as it were, in her own peculiar abode, put aside all merely conventional distinctions, and men meet upon a common footing. Thus, even when perfect strangers to one another, after the usual preliminaries of "how are you, friend," or "strannger?"—"whar from?"—"whar going?"—"fair" or "foul weather"—as the case may be—the acquaintance is established, and familiarity well begun. Such was the case in the present instance. Bunce knew the people well, and exhibited his most unreluctant manner. The horses of the two, in like manner with their masters, made similar overtures; and in a little while, their necks were drawn in parallel lines together.
Bunce was less communicative, however, than the stranger. Still his head and heart, alike, were full, and he talked more freely than was altogether consistent with his Yankee character. He told of Ralph's predicament, and the clown sympathized; he narrated the quest which had brought him forth, and of his heretofore unrewarded labors; concluded with naming the ensuing Monday as the day of the youth's trial, when, if nothing in the meantime could be discovered of the true criminal—for the pedler never for a moment doubted that Ralph was innocent—he "mortally feared things would go agin him."
"That will be hard, too—a mighty tough difficulty, now, strannger—to be hanged for other folks' doings. But, I reckon, he'll have to make up his mind to it."
"Oh, no! don't say so, now, my friend, I beg you. What makes you think so?" said the anxious pedler.
"Why, only from what I heer'd you say. You said so yourself, and I believed it as if I had seed it," was the reply of the simple countryman.
"Oh, yes. It's but a poor chance with him now, I guess. I'd a notion that I could find out some little particular, you see—"
"To be sure you don't, but that's my say. Everybody has a say, you know."
"No, I don't know."
"To be sure, of course you don't know, but that's what I tell you. Now you must know—"
"Don't say must to me, strannger, if you want that we shall keep hands off. I don't let any man say must to me."
"No harm, my friend—I didn't mean no harm," said the worried pedler, not knowing what to make of his acquaintance, who spoke shrewdly at times, but occasionally in a speech, which awakened the doubts of the pedler as to the safety of his wits. Avoiding all circumlocution of phrase, and dropping the "you sees," and "you knows" from his narration, he proceeded to state his agency in procuring testimony for the youth, and of the ill-success which had hitherto attended him. At length, in the course of his story, which he contrived to tell with as much caution as came within the scope of his education, he happened to speak of Lucy Munro; but had scarcely mentioned her name when his queer companion interrupted him:—
"Look you, strannger, I'll lick you now, off-hand, if you don't put Miss for a handle to the gal's name. She's Miss Lucy. Don't I know her, and han't I seen her, and isn't it I, Chub Williams, as they calls me, that loves the very airth she treads?"
"You know Miss Lucy?" inquired the pedler, enraptured even at this moderate discovery, though carefully coupling the prefix to her name while giving it utterance—"now, do you know Miss Lucy, friend, and will you tell me where I can find her?"
"Do you think I will, and you may be looking arter her too? 'Drot my old hat, strannger, but I do itch to git at you."
"Oh, now, Mr. Williams—"
"I won't answer to that name. Call me Chub Williams, if you wants to be perlite. Mother always calls me Chub, and that's the reason I like it."
"Well, Chub,"—said the other, quite paternally—"I assure you I don't love Miss Munro—and—"
"What! you don't love Miss Lucy. Why, everybody ought to love her. Now, if you don't love her, I'll hammer you, strannger, off hand."
The poor pedler professed a proper sort of love for the young lady—not exactly such as would seek her for a wife, however, and succeeded in satisfying, after a while, the scruples of one who, in addition to deformity, he also discovered to labor under the more serious curse of partial idiocy. Having done this, and flattered, in sundry other ways, the peculiarities of his companion, he pursued his other point with laudable pertinacity.
He at length got from Chub his own history: how he had run into the woods with his mother, who had suffered from the ill-treatment of her husband: how, with his own industry, he had sustained her wants, and supplied her with all the comforts which a long period had required; and how, dying at length, she had left him—the forest boy—alone, to pursue those toils which heretofore had an object, while she yielded him in return for them society and sympathy. These particulars, got from him in a manner the most desultory, were made to preface the more important parts of the narrative.
It appears that his harmlessness had kept him undisturbed, even by the wild marauders of that region, and that he still continued to procure a narrow livelihood by his woodland labors, and sought no association with that humanity which, though among fellow-creatures, would still have lacked of fellowship for him. In the transfer of Lucy from the village to the shelter of the outlaws, he had obtained a glimpse of her person and form, and had ever since been prying in the neighborhood for a second and similar enjoyment. He now made known to the pedler her place of concealment, which he had, some time before this event, himself discovered; but which, through dread of Rivers, for whom he seemed to entertain an habitual fear, he had never ventured to penetrate.
"Well, I must see her," exclaimed Bunce. "I a'n't afraid, 'cause you see, Mr. Williams—Chub, I mean, it's only justice, and to save the poor young gentleman's life. I'm sure I oughtn't to be afraid, and no more I a'n't. Won't you go there with me, Chub?"
"Can't think of it, strannger. Guy is a dark man, and mother said I must keep away when he rode in the woods. Guy don't talk—he shoots."
The pedler made sundry efforts to procure a companion for his adventure; but finding it vain, and determined to do right, he grew more resolute with the necessity, and, contenting himself with claiming the guidance of Chub, he went boldly on the path. Having reached a certain point in the woods, after a very circuitous departure from the main track, the guide pointed out to the pedler a long and rude ledge of rocks, so rude, so wild, that none could have ever conjectured to find them the abode of anything but the serpent and the wolf. But there, according to the idiot, was Lucy Munro concealed. Chub gave the pedler his directions, then alighting from his nag, which he concealed in a clump of neighboring brush, hastily and with the agility of a monkey ran up a neighboring tree which overhung the prospect.
Bunce, left alone, grew somewhat staggered with his fears. He now half-repented of the self-imposed adventure; wondered at his own rash humanity, and might perhaps have utterly forborne the trial, but for a single consideration. His pride was concerned, that the deformed Chub should not have occasion to laugh at his weakness. Descending, therefore, from his horse, he fastened him to the hanging branch of a neighboring tree, and with something of desperate defiance in his manner, resolutely advanced to the silent and forbidding mass of rocks, which rose up so sullenly around him. In another moment, and he was lost to sight in the gloomy shadow of the entrance-passage pointed out to him by the half-witted, but not altogether ignorant dwarf.
CHAPTER XXXI.
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.
CHAPTER XXXII.
ESCAPE.
The night gathered apace, and the usual hour of repose had come. Lucy retired to her apartment with a trembling heart but a courageous spirit, full of a noble determination to persevere in her project. Though full of fear, she never for a moment thought of retreat from the decision which she had made. Her character afforded an admirable model for the not unfrequent union that we find in woman, of shrinking delicacy with manly and efficient firmness.
Munro and Rivers, having first been assured that all was quiet, by a ramble which they took around their hiding-place, returned to the little chamber of the latter, such as we have described it in a previous portion of our narrative, and proceeded to the further discussion of their plans. The mind of the landlord was very ill at ease. He had arrived at that time of life when repose and a fixed habitation became necessary; and when, whatever may have been the habits of earlier manhood, the mind ceases to crave the excitements of adventure, and foregoes, or would fain forego, all its roving characteristics. To this state of feeling had he come, and the circumstances which now denied him the fruition of that prospect of repose which he had been promising himself so long, were regarded with no little restlessness and impatience. At the moment, the colleagues could make no positive arrangements for the future. Munro was both to give up the property which, in one way or other, he had acquired in the neighborhood, and which it was impossible for him to remove to any other region; and, strange to say, a strong feeling of inhabitiveness—the love of home—if home he could be thought to have anywhere—might almost be considered a passion with his less scrupulous companion.
Thus situated, they lingered on in the hope that the military would soon be withdrawn from the neighborhood, as it could only be maintained at great expense by the state; and then, as the country was but nominally settled, and so sparsely as to scarcely merit any consideration, they felt assured that they might readily return to their old, or any practices, and without any further apprehension. The necessity, however, which made them thus deliberate, had the effect, at the same time, of impressing them with a gloomy spirit, not common to either of them.
"Let us see, Munro," said the more desperate ruffian; "there is, after all, less to apprehend than we first thought. In a week, and the court will be over; in another week, and the guard will be withdrawn; and for this period only will it be necessary that we should keep dark. I think we are now perfectly safe where we are. The only persons who know of our retreat, and might be troublesome, are safe in our possession. They will hardly escape until we let them, and before we do so we shall first see that they can give us no further necessity for caution. Of our own party, none are permitted to know the secrets of our hiding-place, but those in whom we may trust confidently. I have taken care to provide for the doubtful at some distance in the adjoining woods, exaggerating so greatly the danger of exposure, that they will hardly venture to be seen under any circumstances by anybody. Once let these two weeks go over, and I have no fears; we shall have no difficulties then."
"And what's to be done with the pedler and the fool? I say, Guy, there must be no more blood—I will not agree to it. The fact is, I feel more and more dismal every day since that poor fellow's death; and now that the youngster's taken, the thought is like fire in my brain, which tells me he may suffer for our crime."
"Why, you are grown parson. Would you go and save him, by giving up the true criminal? I shall look for it after this, and consider myself no longer in safety. If you go on in this manner, I shall begin to meditate an off-hand journey to the Mississippi."
"Ay, and the sooner we all go the better—though, to be plain, Guy, let this affair once blow over and I care not to go with you any longer. We must then cut loose for ever. I am not a good man, I know—anything but that; but you have carried me on, step by step, until I am what I am afraid to name to myself. You found me a rogue—you have made me a—"
"Why do you hesitate? Speak it out, Munro; it is a large step gained toward reform when we learn to name truly our offences to ourselves."
"I dare not. The thought is sufficiently horrible without the thing. I hear some devil whispering it too frequently in my ears, to venture upon its utterance myself. But you—how you can live without feeling it, after your experience, which has been so much more dreadful than mine, I know not."
"I do feel it, Munro, but have long since ceased to fear it. The reiteration takes away the terror which is due rather to the novelty than to the offence. But when I began, I felt it. The first sleep I had after the affair of Jessup was full of tortures. The old man, I thought, lay beside me in my bed; his blood ran under me, and clotted around me, and fastened me there, while his gashed face kept peering into mine, and his eyes danced over me with the fierce light of a threatening comet. The dream nearly drove me mad, and mad I should have been had I gone to my prayers. I knew that, and chose a different course for relief."
"What was that?"
"I sought for another victim as soon after as I conveniently could. The one spectre superseded the other, until all vanished. They never trouble me now, though sometimes, in my waking moments, I have met them on the roadside, glaring at me from bush or tree, until I shouted at them fiercely, and then they were gone. These are my terrors, and they do sometimes unman me."
"They would do more with me; they would destroy me on the spot. But, let us have no more of this. Let us rather see if we can not do something towards making our visions more agreeable. Do you persevere in the sacrifice of this youngster? Must he die?"
"Am I a child, Walter Munro, that you ask me such a question? Must I again tell over the accursed story of my defeat and of his success? Must I speak of my thousand defeats—of my overthrown pretensions—my blasted hopes, where I had set my affections—upon which every feeling of my heart had been placed? Must I go over a story so full of pain and humiliation—must I describe my loss, in again placing before your eyes a portraiture like this? Look, man, look—and read my answer in the smile, which, denying me, teaches me, in this case, to arm myself with a denial as immutable as hers."
He placed before his companion the miniature of Edith, which he took from his bosom, where he seemed carefully to treasure it. He was again the envenomed and the excited savage which we have elsewhere seen him, and in which mood Munro knew well that nothing could be done with him in the shape of argument or entreaty. He went on:—
"Ask me no questions, Munro, so idle, so perfectly unnecessary as this. Fortune has done handsomely here. He falls through me, yet falls by the common hangman. What a double blow is this to both of them. I have been striving to imagine their feelings, and such a repast as that effort has procured me—I would not exchange it—no—not for worlds—for nothing less, Munro, than my restoration back to that society—to that place in society, from which my fierce passions, and your cruel promptings, and the wrongs of society itself, have for ever exiled me."
"And would you return, if you could do so?"
"To-morrow—to-night—this instant. I am sanguinary, Munro—revengeful—fierce—all that is bad, because I am not permitted to be better. My pride, my strong feelings and deeply absorbing mood—these have no other field for exercise. The love of home, the high ambition, which, had society done me common justice, and had not, in enslaving itself, dishonored and defrauded me—would, under other circumstances, have made me a patriot. My pride is even now to command the admiration of men—I never sought their love. Their approbation would have made me fearless and powerful in their defence and for their rights—their injustice makes me their enemy. My passions, unprovoked and unexaggerated by mortifying repulses, would have only been a warm and stimulating influence, perpetually working in their service—but, pressed upon and irritated as they have been they grew into so many wild beasts, and preyed upon the cruel or the careless keepers, whose gentle treatment and constant attention had tamed them into obedient servants. Yet, would I could, even now, return to that condition in which there might be hope. The true spectre of the criminal—such as I am—the criminal chiefly from the crimes and injustice of society, not forgetting the education of my boyhood, which grew out of the same crimes, and whose most dreadful lesson is selfishness—is despair! The black waters once past, the blacker hills rise between, and there is no return to those regions of hope, which, once lost, are lost for ever. This is the true punishment—the worst punishment which man inflicts upon his fellow—the felony of public opinion. The curse of society is no unfit illustration of that ban which its faith holds forth as the penal doom of the future. There is no return!"
The dialogue, mixed up thus, throughout, with the utterance of opinions on the part of the outlaw, many of which were true or founded in truth, yet coupled with many false deductions—was devoted, for some little while longer, to the discussion of their various necessities and plans for the future. The night had considerably advanced in this way, when, of a sudden, their ears were assailed with an eldritch screech, like that of the owl, issuing from one of the several cells around them.
The quick sense of Rivers immediately discerned the voice of the idiot, and without hesitation he proceeded to that division of the rock which contained the two prisoners. To each of these apartments had been assigned a sentinel, or watch, whose own place of abode—while covered completely and from sight, and in all respects furnishing a dwelling, though rather a confined one for himself—enabled him to attend to the duty assigned him without himself being seen. The night had been fairly set in, when Bunce, with the aid of Chub Williams, with all due caution proceeded to his task, and with so much success, that, in the course of a couple of hours, they had succeeded, not only in making a fair outlet for themselves, but for Lucy Munro too.
The watchman, in the meantime, holding his duty as merely nominal, gave himself as little trouble as possible; and believing all things quiet, had, after a little while, insinuated himself into the good graces of as attractive a slumber as may usually be won in the warm summer season in the south, by one to whom a nightwatch is a peculiarly ungracious exercise. Before this conclusion, however, he looked forth every now and then, and deceived by the natural stillness of earth and sky, he committed the further care of the hours, somewhat in anticipation of the time, to the successor who was to relieve him on the watch.
Without being conscious of this decision in their favor, and ignorant entirely of the sentinel himself, the pedler fortunately chose this period for his own departure with the young lady whom he was to escort; and who, with probably far less fear than her gallant, did not scruple, for a single instant, to go forth under his guidance. Chub took his instructions from the lips of Lucy, and promised the most implicit obedience.
They had scarcely been well gone when the sentinels were changed, and one something more tenacious of discipline, or something less drowsy than his predecessor, took his place. After muttering at intervals, as directed, for the space of an hour, probably, from the time at which his companion had departed, Chub thought it only prudent to sally forth too. Accordingly, ascending to the break in the wall, through which his companion had made his way, the urchin emerged from the cavern at the unlucky moment, when, at some ten or fifteen paces in front of him, the sentinel came forth from his niche to inspect the order of his watch. Chub saw his adversary first, and his first impulse originated the scream which drew the attention of Rivers, as already narrated. The outlaw rushed quickly to the scene of difficulty, and before the sentinel had well recovered from the astonishment occasioned by the singularly sudden appearance and wild screech of the urchin.
"Why, what is this, Briggs; what see you?" was the hasty inquiry of Rivers.
"There, sir, there," exclaimed the watch, still half bewildered, and pointing to the edge of the hill, where, in a condition seemingly of equal incertitude with himself, stood the imbecile.
"Seize upon him—take him at once—let him not escape you!" were the hasty orders of the outlaw. Briggs set forward, but his approach had the effect of giving determination also to Chub; who, just as the pursuer thought himself sure of his captive, and was indeed indirectly upon him, doubled himself up, as it were into a complete ball, and without effort rolled headlong down the hill; gathering upon his feet as he attained the level, seemingly unhurt, and with all the agility of the monkey.
"Shall I shoot, sir?" was the inquiry of Briggs, as the urchin stood off, laughing wildly at his good fortune.
"Now, don't"—was the cry—"Now, don't"—was the exclamation of Chub himself, who, however, trusting nothing to the effect of his entreaty, ran vigorously on his way.
"Yes, shoot him down," was the sudden exclamation of Munro; but Rivers struck the poised weapon upward in the hands of the sentinel, to the astonishment, not less of him than of the landlord.