Her husband's breathing was deep and regular. His perfect rest and the sense of strength in his warm body restored her poise. She felt the slender forms of her little girls in the trundle bed and tried to go back to sleep.
It was useless. In spite of every effort her eyes refused to close. Again she was sure she had heard the dog's cry in the night. She believed that it was an ugly dream. The dawn of a beautiful Sunday morning would find all well in the little home and her faithful dog again wagging his tail at the door asking for breakfast.
She listened to the beating of her foolish heart. Wide awake, she began to murmur a prayer of thanks to God for all His goodness and mercy in the new home He had given.
As Owen's hands slowly relaxed from the throat of the lifeless body he seized a handful of leaves and wiped the blood from the blade and replaced it in the scabbard.
He rose quickly and gave the signal to advance. Again crouching low, moving with the soft tread of beasts of prey, the hunters closed in on the settler's home.
The keen ears of the mother, still wide awake, caught the crunch of feet on the gravel of the walk. With a heart pounding again in alarm she raised her head and listened. From the other side of the house came the rustle of leaves stirred by another swiftly approaching footstep. It was so still she could hear her own heart beat again. There could be no mistake about it this time.
She gripped her husband's arm:
"John!"
He moaned drowsily.
"John—John—"
"What's matter?" he murmured without lifting his head from the pillow.
"Get up quick!"
"What for?" he groaned.
"There's somebody around the house."
"Na."
"I tell you—yes!"
"Hit's the dawgs."
"I heard a man's step on the path, I tell you."
"Yer dreamin', ole woman—"
"I'm not, I tell ye."
"Go back to sleep."
The man settled again and breathed deeply.
The woman remained on her elbow, listening with every nerve strained in agony.
Again she heard a step on the gravel. This time another footfall joined the first. She gripped her husband's shoulders and shook him violently.
"John, John!" she whispered.
He had half roused himself this time, shocked into consciousness by her trembling grip on his shoulders. But above all by the tremor in her whispered call.
"What is it, Mahala?"
"For God's sake, get up quick and call the boys down outen the loft."
"No!" he growled.
"I tell you, there's somebody outside—"
They were both sitting on the edge of the bed now, speaking in whispers.
"You're dreamin', ole 'oman," he persisted.
"I heard 'em. There's more'n one. I heard some on the other side of the house. I heard two in front. Call the boys down—"
"Don't wake the boys up fer nothin—"
"Is yer gun loaded?"
"No."
"Oh, my God."
"I ain't got no powder. I don't kill game in the springtime."
They both listened. All was still. They could hear the breathing of the little girls in the trundle bed.
The crunch of feet suddenly came to the doorstep. The woman's hand gripped her husband's arm in terror. He heard it now.
"That's funny," he mused.
"Call the boys!" the mother pleaded.
"Wait till we find out what it is—"
A firm knock on the door echoed through the darkened room.
"God save us!" the woman breathed.
Doyle rose and quietly walked to the door.
"What is it?" he called in friendly tones.
"We're lost in the woods," a voice answered.
His wife had followed and gripped his arm.
"Don't open that door."
"Wait, Mother—"
"We're trying to find the way to Mr. Wilkinson's—can you tell us?"
"Sure I can."
He moved to open the door. Again his wife held him.
"Don't do it!"
Doyle brushed her aside.
"Don't be foolish, Mahala," he protested indignantly. "I'm a poor sort o' man if I can't tell a lost traveler the way out of the woods."
"They're lyin'!"
"We'll see."
He raised the latch and six men crashed their way through the door. John Brown led the assault. He held a dim lantern in his hand which he lifted above his head, as he surveyed the room. He kept his own face in shadow.
With a smothered cry, the mother backed against the trundle bed instinctively covering the sleeping figures of the girls.
Brown pointed a cocked revolver at Doyle's breast and said in cold tones:
"Call those three boys down."
Doyle hesitated.
Brown's eye glanced down the barrel of his revolver:
"Quick!"
The man saw he had no chance.
He mounted the ladder, the revolver following him. The mother's terror-stricken eyes saw that each man was armed with two revolvers, a bowie knife and cutlass.
"Don't you scare 'em," Brown warned.
"I won't."
"Tell 'em to come down and show us the way to Wilkinson's."
"Boys!" the father called.
There was no answer at first, and the father wondered if they had heard and gotten weapons of some kind. He hoped not. It would be a useless horror to try to defend themselves before a mother's eyes, and those little girls screaming beside her.
He hastened to call a second time and reassure their fears.
"Boys!"
William, the older one, answered drowsily:
"Yessir—"
"Come down, all of you. Some travelers are here who've lost the way.
They want you to help them get to Mr. Wilkinson's."
"All right, sir."
The boys hastily slipped on their trousers and shoes.
"Tell 'em to hurry," Brown ordered.
"Jest slip on yer shoes and britches," Doyle called.
The Surveyor held the lantern behind his body until the three sons had come down the ladder and he saw that they were unarmed.
He stepped to the fireplace, took the shotgun from the rack and handed it to Weiner.
The boys, startled at the group of stern armed men, instinctively moved toward their father, dazed by the assault.
Brown faced the group.
"You four men are my prisoners."
The mother left the trundle bed and faced the leader.
"Who are you?"
Brown dropped his lantern, fixed her with his eyes.
"I am the leader of the Northern Army."
"What are you doing here to-night?"
"I have come on a divine mission."
"Who sent you?"
"The Lord of Hosts in a Vision—"
"What are you going to do?"
"The will of God."
"What are you going to do?" she fairly screamed in his face.
"That is not for your ears, woman," was the stern answer. "I have important business with Southern settlers on the Pottawattomie to-night."
The woman's intuition saw in a flash the hideous tragedy. With a cry of anguish she threw her arms around her husband's neck, sobbing.
"Oh, John, John, my man, I told ye not to talk—but ye would tell folks what ye believed. Why couldn't ye be still? Oh, my God, my God, it's come to this!"
The man soothed her with tender touch.
"Hush, Mother, hush. You mustn't take on."
"I can't help it—I just can't. God have mercy on my poor lost soul—"
She paused and looked at her boys.
With a scream she threw herself first on one and then on the other.
"Oh, my big fine boy! I can't let you go! Where is God to-night? Is He dead? Has He forgotten me?"
The father drew her away and shook her sternly.
"Hush, Mother, hush! Yer can't show the white feather like this!"
"I can't help it. I can't give up my boys!"
She paused and looked at Doyle.
"And I can't give you up, my man—I just can't!"
"Don't, don't—" the husband commanded. "We've got to be men now."
She fought hard to control her tears. The little girls began to sob. She rushed to the trundle bed and soothed them.
"Keep still, babies. They won't hurt you. Keep still!"
The children choked into silence and she leaped toward Brown and tried to seize his hand. He repulsed her and she went on frantically.
"Please, for God's sake, man, have mercy on a wife and mother, if you ain't got no pity in your heart for my men! Surely you have women home. Their hearts can break like mine. My man's only been talkin' as politicians talk. It was nothing. Surely it's no crime."
Brown drew a notebook from his pocket and held it up.
"I have the record in this book of your husband's words against the men of our party, Madame. He stands convicted of murder in his heart. His sons are not of age. Their opinions are his."
For a moment the mother forgot her pleading and shrieked her defiance into the stern face before her.
"And who made you a judge o' life and death for my man and my sons? I bore these boys of the pains of my body. God gave them to me. They are mine, not yours!"
Brown brushed her aside.
"That's enough from you. Those men are my prisoners. Bring them on!"
He moved toward the door and the guards with drawn swords closed in on the group.
The mother leaped forward and barred the way to the door. She faced Brown with blanched face. Her breath came in short gasps. She fought desperately for control of her voice, failed to make a sound, staggered to the old man, grasped blindly his body and sank to her knees at his feet.
At last she managed to gasp:
"Just one of my boys—then—my baby boy! He's a big boy—but look at his smooth face—he ain't but fourteen years old. Hit don't seem but yistiday that he wuz just a laughin' baby in my arms! And I've always been that proud of him. He's smart. He's always been smart—and God forgive me—I've loved him better'n all the others—hit—wuzn't—right— fer—a—mother—to—love one of her—children—more—than—the—others— but I couldn't help it! If ye'll just spare him—hit's all I'll ask ye now"—her voice sank into a sob as her face touched the floor.
The dark figure above her did not move and she lifted her head with desperate courage.
"I'll be all alone here—a broken-hearted woman with two little gals and nobody to help me—or work fer me—ef you'll just spare my baby boy—"
She sprang to her feet and threw her arms around the youngest boy's neck.
"Oh, my baby, my baby, I can't let ye go—I can't—I can't!"
She lifted her tear-streaming eyes to the dark face again.
"Please, please, for the love of
God—you—say—you—believe—in—God—leave me this one!"
Brown moved his head in a moment's uncertainty. He turned to Owen.
"Leave him and come on with the others."
With a desperate cry, the mother closed her eyes and clung to the boy.
She dared not lift them in prayer for the others as they passed out into the night.
The armed men had seized her husband and her two older sons, William and Drury, and hustled them through the door. The mother drew the boy back on the trundle bed and held him in her arms. The little girls crouched close and began to sob.
"Hush—don't make a noise. They won't hurt you. I want to hear what they do—maybe—"
The mother stopped short, fascinated by the horror of the tragedy she knew would take place outside her door. The darkness gave no token of its progress. A cricket was chirping in the chimney just awakened by the noise.
She held her breath and listened. Not a sound. The silence was unbearable. She sprang to her feet in a moment's fierce rebellion against the crime of such an infamous attack. A roused lioness, she leaped to the mantel to seize the shotgun.
John followed and caught her.
"The gun's gone, Ma," he cried.
"Yes, yes, I forgot," she gasped. "They took it, the damned fiends!"
"Ma, Ma, be still!" the boy pleaded. He was horror-stricken at the oath from her lips. In all his life he had never heard her use a vulgar word.
"Yes, of course," she faltered. "I mustn't try to do anything. They might come back and kill you—my baby boy!"
She pressed him again to her heart and held him. She strained her ears for the first signal of the deed the darkness shrouded.
The huntsmen dragged the father and two sons but a hundred and fifty yards from the door and halted beside the road. Brown faced the father in the dim starlight.
"You are a Southern white man?"
"I am, sir."
"You are pro-Slavery?"
"I hate the sight and sound of a slave."
"But you believe in the institution?"
"I hate it, I tell you."
Brown paused as if his brain had received a shock. The answer had been utterly unexpected. The man was in earnest. He meant what he said. And he was conscious of the solemnity of the trial on which his life hung.
Brown came back to his cross examination, determined to convict him on the grounds he had fixed beforehand.
"What do you mean when you say that you hate the institution of
Slavery?"
"Exactly what I say."
"You do not believe in owning slaves?"
"I do not."
"Did you ever own one?"
"No!"
"And you never expect to own one?"
"Never."
"Why did you rush into this Territory among the first to cross the border?"
"I come West to get away from niggers, and bring my children up in a white man's country."
Quick as a flash came the crucial question from lips that had never smiled. It was the triumphant scream of an eagle poised to strike. He had him at last.
"Then you don't believe the negro to be your brother and your equal—do you?"
The poor white man's body suddenly stiffened and his chin rose:
"No, by God, I don't believe that!"
John Brown lifted his hand in a quick signal and Owen stepped stealthily behind Doyle. The sharpened cutlass whistled through the air and crashed into Doyle's skull. His helpless hands were lifted instinctively as he staggered. The swift descending blade split the right hand open and severed the left from the body before he crumpled in a heap on the ground. The assassin placed his knee on the prostrate figure and plunged his knife three times in the breast,—once through the heart and once through each lung. He had learned the art in butchering cattle.
Fifty yards away the mangled bodies of William and Drury Doyle lay on the ground with the dim figure of the assassin bending low to make sure that no sign of life remained.
John Brown raised the wick of his lantern and walked coolly up to the body of the elder Doyle. He flashed the lantern on the distorted features. A look of religious ecstasy swept the stern face of the Puritan and his eyes glittered with an unearthly glare.
He uttered a sound that was half a laugh and half a religious shout, snatched his pistol from his belt, placed the muzzle within an inch of the dead skull and fired. The brains of the corpse splashed the muzzle of the revolver.
The trembling mother inside the cabin uttered a low cry of horror and crumpled in the arms of her son.
The boy dragged her to the bed and rushed to the kitchen for a cup of water. He dashed it in her face and cried for joy when she breathed again. He didn't mind the moans and sobs. The thought that she, too, might be dead had stopped his very heartbeat.
He soothed her at last and sat holding her hand in the dark. The girls nestled against her side. The mother gave no sign that she was conscious of their presence.
Her spirit was outside the cabin now, hovering in the darkness mourning her dead. Through the dread hours of the night she sat motionless, listening, dreaming.
No sounds came from the darkness. The coyote had ceased to call. The cricket in the chimney slept at last.
CHAPTER XIX
The dark figures secured the horses, bridles and saddles and moved to the next appointed crime.
The stolen horses were put in charge of the two sons, who had refused to take part in the events of the night. They were ordered to follow the huntsmen carefully.
Again they crept through the night and approached the home of Wilkinson, the member of the Legislature from the County. Brown had carefully surveyed his place and felt sure of a successful attack unless the house should be alarmed by a surly dog which no member of his surveying party had been able to approach.
When they arrived within two hundred yards of the gate, it was one o'clock. Brown carefully watched the house for ten minutes to see that no light gleamed through a window or a chink. The wife had been sick with the measles when the survey was made. There was no sign of a light.
Salmon and Owen Brown were sent by the men on a protest to Brown.
Salmon was spokesman.
"We've got something to say to you, Father, before we take out
Wilkinson—"
"Well?" the old man growled.
"You gave every man strict orders to fire no guns or revolver unless necessary—didn't you?"
"I did."
"You fired the only shot heard to-night."
"I'll not do it again. I didn't intend to. I don't know why I did it.
Stick to my order."
"See that you stick to it," the boy persisted.
"I will. Use only your knives and cutlasses. The cutlass first always."
The men began to move slowly forward.
Brown called softly.
"Just a minute. This dog of Wilkinson's is sure to bark. Don't stop to try to kill him. Rush the house double quick and pay no attention to his barking—"
"If he bites?" Owen asked.
"Take a chance, don't try to kill him—Wilkinson might wake. Now, all together—rush the house!"
They rushed the house at two hundred yards. They had taken but ten steps when the dog barked so furiously Brown called a halt. They waited.
Then, minutes later the dog raged, approaching the house and retreating. His wild cry of alarm rang with sinister echo through the woods. The faithful brute was calling his master and mistress to arms.
Still the man inside slept. The Territory of Kansas to this time had been as free from crime as any state on its border. The lawmaker had never felt a moment's uneasiness.
Footsteps approached the door. The sick woman saw the shadow of a man pass the window. The starlight sharply silhouetted his face against the black background.
Some one knocked on the door.
The woman asked:
"Who's that?"
No one answered.
"Henry, Henry!" she called tensely.
"Well?" the husband answered.
"There's somebody knocking at the door."
Wilkinson half raised in bed.
"Who is that?"
A voice replied:
"We've lost the road. We want you to tell us the way to Dutch Henry's."
Wilkinson began to call the directions.
"We can't understand—"
"You can't miss the way."
"Come out and show us!"
The request was given in tones so sharp there could be no mistake. It was a command not a plea.
"I'll have to go and tell them," he said to his wife.
"For God's sake, don't open that door," she whispered.
"It's best."
She seized and held him.
"You shall not go!"
Wilkinson sought to temporize.
"I'm not dressed," he called. "I can tell you the way as well without going outdoors."
The men stepped back from the door and held a consultation. John Brown at once returned and began his catechism:
"You are Wilkinson, the Member of the Legislature?"
"I am, sir."
"You are opposed to the Free Soil Party?"
"I am."
The answers were sharp to the point of curtness and his daring roused the wrath of Brown to instant action.
"You're my prisoner, sir."
He waited an instant for an answer and, getting none, asked:
"Do you surrender?"
"Gentlemen, I do."
"Open the door!"
"In just a minute."
"Open it—"
"When I've made a light."
"We've got a light. Open that door or we'll smash it!"
Again the sick woman caught his arm.
"Don't do it!"
"It's better not to resist," he answered, opening the door.
Brown held the lantern in his face.
"Put on your clothes."
Wilkinson began to dress.
The men covered him with drawn revolvers. The sick woman sank limply on the edge of the bed.
"Are there any more men in this house?" Brown asked sharply.
"No."
"Have you any arms?"
"Only a quail gun."
"Search the place."
The guard searched the rooms, ransacking drawers and chests. They took everything of value they could find, including the shotgun and powder flask.
The sick woman at length recovered her power of speech and turned to
Brown.
"If you've arrested my husband for anything, he's a law-abiding man. You can let him stay here with me until morning."
"No!" Brown growled.
"I'm sick and helpless. I can't stay here by myself."
"Let me stay with my wife, gentlemen," Wilkinson pleaded, "until I can get some one to wait on her and I'll remain on parole until you return or I'll meet you anywhere you say."
Brown looked at the woman and at the little children trembling by her side and curtly answered:
"You have neighbors."
"So I have," Wilkinson agreed, "but they are not here and I cannot go for them unless you allow me."
"It matters not," Brown snapped. "Get ready, sir."
Wilkinson took up his boots to pull them on when Brown signaled his men to drag him out.
Without further words they seized him and hurried into the darkness.
They dragged him a few yards from the house into a clump of dead brush.
Weiner was the chosen headsman. He swung his big savage figure before
Wilkinson and his cutlass flashed in the starlight.
The woman inside the darkened house heard the crash of the blade against the skull and the dying groan from the lips of the father of her babies.
When the body crumpled, Weiner knelt, plunged his knife into the throat, turned it and severed the jugular vein.
Standing over the body John Brown spoke to one of his men.
"The horses, saddles and bridles from the stable—quick!"
The huntsman hurried to the stable and took Wilkinson's horse.
It was two o'clock before they reached the home of James Harris on the other side of the Pottawattomie. Harris lived on the highway and kept a rude frontier boarding place where travelers stopped for the night.
With him lived Dutch Henry Sherman and his brother, William.
Brown had no difficulty in entering this humble one-room house. It was never locked. The latch string was outside.
Without knocking Brown lifted the latch and sprang into the room with his son, Owen, and another armed huntsman.
He surveyed the room. In one bed lay Harris, his wife and child. In two other beds were three men, William Sherman, John Whitman and a stranger who had stopped for the night and had given no name.
"You are our prisoners," Brown announced. "It is useless for you to resist."
The old man stood by one bed with drawn saber and Owen stood by the other while Weiner searched the room. He found two rifles and a bowie knife which he passed through the door to the guard outside.
Brown ordered the stranger out first. He kept him but a few minutes and brought him back. He next ordered Harris to follow him.
Brown confronted his prisoner in the yard. A swordsman stood close by his side to catch his nod.
"Where is Dutch Henry Sherman?"
"On the plains hunting for lost cattle."
"You are telling me the truth?" Brown asked, boring him through with his terrible eyes.
"The truth, sir!"
He studied Harris by the light of his lantern.
"Have you ever helped a Southern settler to enter the Territory of
Kansas?"
"No."
"Did you take any hand in the troubles at Lawrence?"
"I've never been to Lawrence."
"Have you ever done the Free State Party any harm?"
"No. I don't take no part in politics."
"Have you ever intended to do that party any harm?"
"I don't know nothin' about politics or parties."
"What are you doing living here among these Southern settlers?"
"Because I can get better wages."
"Any horses, bridles, or saddles?"
"I've one horse."
"Saddle him and bring him here."
A swordsman walked by his side while he caught and saddled his horse and delivered him to his captors.
Brown went back into the house and brought out William Sherman. Harris was ordered back to bed, and a new guard was placed inside until the ceremony with Sherman should be ended.
It was brief.
Brown had no questions to ask this man. He was the brother of Henry Sherman, the most hated member of the settlement. Brown called Thompson and Weiner and spoke in tones of quick command.
"Take him down to the Pottawattomie Creek. I want this man's blood to mingle with its waters and flow to the sea!"
The doomed man did not hear the sentence of his judge. The two huntsmen caught his arms and rushed him to the banks of the creek. He stood for a moment trembling and dazed. Not a word had passed his lips. Not one had passed his guards.
They loosed their grip on his arms, stepped back and two cutlasses whistled through the air in a single stroke. The double blow was so swiftly and evenly delivered that the body stood erect until the second stroke of the sharpened blades had cut off one hand and split open the breast.
When the body fell at the feet of the huntsmen they seized the quivering limbs and hurled them into the creek.
They reported at once to their Captain. He stood in front of the house with his restless gaze sweeping the highway for any possible, belated traveler. The one hope uppermost in his mind was that Dutch Henry Sherman might return with his lost cattle in time.
He raised his lantern and looked at his watch. The men who had butchered
William Sherman stood with red swords for orders.
Brown had not yet uttered a word. He knew that the work on the bank of the Pottawattomie was done. The attitude of his swordsmen was sufficient.
He asked but one question.
"You threw him into the water?"
"Yes."
"Good."
He closed his silver watch with a snap.
"It's nearly four o'clock. We have no more time for work to-night. Back to camp."
The men turned to repeat his orders.
"Wait!"
His order rang like vibrant metal.
The men stopped.
"We'll mount the horses we have taken, and march single file. I'll ride the horse taken here. Bring him to the door."
With quick springing step Brown entered the house where the husband and wife and the two lodgers were still shivering under the eye of the guard with drawn sword.
The leader's voice rang with a note of triumph.
"You people whose lives have been spared will stay in this house until sunrise. And the less you say about what's happened to-night the longer you'll live."
He turned to his guard.
"Come on."
Brown had just mounted his horse to lead the procession back to the camp in the ravine, when the first peal of thunder in a spring shower crashed overhead.
He glanced up and saw that the sky was being rapidly overcast by swiftly moving clouds. A few stars still glimmered directly above.
The storm without was an incident of slight importance. The rain would give him a chance to test the men inside. He ordered his followers to take refuge in the long shed under which Harris stabled the horses and vehicles of travelers.
He stationed a sentinel at the door of the house.
His orders were clear.
"Cut down in his tracks without a word, the man who dares to come out."
The swordsman threw a saddle blanket around his shoulders and took his place at the doorway.
The storm broke in fury. In five minutes the heavens were a sea of flame. The thunder rolled over the ravine, the hills, the plains in deafening peals. Flash after flash, roar after roar, an endless throb of earth and air from the titanic bombardment from the skies. The flaming sky was sublime—a changing, flashing, trembling splendor.
Townsley was the only coward in the group of stolid figures standing under the shed. He watched by the lightning the expression of Brown's face with awe. There was something terrible in the joy that flamed in his eyes. Never had he seen such a look on human face. He forgot the storm and forgot his fears of cyclones and lightning strokes in the fascination with which he watched the seamed, weather-beaten features of the man who had just committed the foulest deed in the annals of American frontier life. There was in his shifting eyes no shadow of doubt, of fear, of uncertainty. There was only the look of satisfaction, of supreme triumph. The coward caught the spark of red that flashed from his soul.
For a moment he regretted that he had not joined the bloody work with his own hand. He was ashamed of his pity for the stark masses of flesh that still lay on the deluged earth. In spite of the contagion of Brown's mind which he felt pulling him with resistless power, his own weaker intellect kept playing pranks with his memory.
He recalled the position of the bodies which they had left in the darkness. He had seen them by the light of the lantern which Brown had flashed each time before leaving. He remembered with a shiver that the two Doyle boys had died with their big soft blue eyes wide open, staring upward at the starlit skies. He wondered if the rain had beaten their eyelids down.
A blinding flash filled the sky and lighted every nook and corner of the woods and fields. He shook at its glare and put his hand over his eyes. For a moment he could see nothing but the wide staring gaze upward of those stalwart young bodies. He shivered and turned away from the leader.
The next moment found him again watching the look of victory on the terrible face.
As the lightning played about Brown's form he wondered at the impression of age he gave with his face turned away and his figure motionless. He was barely fifty-seven and yet he looked seventy-five, until he moved.
The moment his wiry body moved there was something uncanny in the impression he gave of a wild animal caught in human form.
Brown had tired waiting for the shower to pass and had begun to pace back and forth with his swinging, springy step. When he passed, Townsley instinctively drew aside. He knew that he was a coward and yet he couldn't feel the consciousness of cowardice in giving this man room. It was common sense.
The storm passed as swiftly as it came.
Without a word the leader gave the signal. His men mounted the stolen horses. With Townsley's grays and Weiner's pony the huntsmen returned to the camp in the ravine, a procession of cavalry.
The eastern sky was whitening with the first touch of the coming sun when they dismounted.
The leader ordered the fire built and a hearty breakfast cooked for each man. As was his custom he wandered from the camp alone, his arms gripped behind his stooped back. He climbed the hill, stood on its crest and watched the prairie.
The storm had passed from west to east. On the eastern horizon a low fringe of clouds was still slowly moving. They lay in long ribbons of dazzling light. The sun's rays flashed through them every color of the rainbow. Now they were a deep purple, growing brighter with each moment, until every flower in the waving fields was touched with its glory. The purple melted into orange; the waving fields were set with dazzling buttercups; the buttercups became poppies. And then the mounting sun kissed the clouds again. They blushed scarlet, and the fields were red.
The grim face gave no sign that he saw the glory and beauty of a wonderful Sabbath morning. His figure was rigid. His eyes set. A sweet odor seemed to come from the scarlet rays of the sun. The man lifted his head in surprise to find the direction from which the perfume came.
He looked at the ground and saw that he was standing in a bed of ripening wild strawberries.
He turned from the sunrise, stooped and ate the fruit. He was ravenously hungry. His hunger satisfied, he walked deliberately back to camp as the white light of day flooded the clean fields and woods.
He called his men about the fire and searched for marks of the night's work. As the full rim of the sun crept over the eastern hills and its first rays quivered on the surface of the water, the huntsmen knelt by the bank of the Pottawattomie and washed the stains from their swords, hands and clothes.
Breakfast finished, the leader divided among his headsmen the goods stolen from his victims and called his men to Sunday prayers.
With folded hands and head erect in the attitude of victory he read from memory a passage from the old Hebrew prophet, singing in triumph over the enemies of the Lord. From the scripture recitation, given in tones so cold and impersonal that they made Townsley shiver, his voice drifted into prayer:
"We thank thee, oh, Lord, God of Hosts, for the glorious victory Thou hast given us this night over Thy enemies. We have heard Thy voice. We have obeyed Thy commands. The wicked have been laid low. And Thy glory shines throughout the world on this beautiful Sabbath morning. Make strong, oh, God, the arms of Thy children for the work that is yet before them. Thou art a jealous God. Thou dost rejoice always in blood offerings on Thy altars. We have this night brought to Thee and laid before Thy face the five offerings which the sins of man have demanded. May this blood seem good in Thy sight, oh, God, as it is glorious in the eyes of Thy servant whom Thou hast anointed to do Thy will. May it be as seed sown in good ground. May it bring forth a harvest whose red glory shall cover the earth, even as the rays of the sun have baptized our skies this morning. We wait the coming of Thy Kingdom, oh, Lord, God of Hosts. Speed the day we humbly pray. Amen."
Townsley's eyes had gradually opened at the tones of weird, religious ecstasy with which the last sentences of the prayer were spoken. He was staring at Brown's face. It was radiant with a strange joy. He had not smiled; but he was happy for a moment. His happiness was so unusual, so sharply in contrast with his habitual mood, the sight of it chilled Townsley's soul.
CHAPTER XX
Stuart succeeded in securing from Colonel Sumner a leave of absence of two weeks to visit Fort Riley. The Colonel suspected the truth and teased the gallant youngster until he confessed.
He handed Stuart the order with a hearty laugh.
"It's all right, my boy. I've been young myself. Good luck."
Stuart's laughter rang clear and hearty.
"Thank you, Colonel. You had me scared."
He had just turned to leave the room when a messenger handed Sumner a telegram.
Stuart paused to hear the message.
"Bad news, Lieutenant."
"What, sir?"
"An attack has been made on the Southern settlement on the
Pottawattomie."
"A drunken fight—"
"No. Wilkinson, the member of the Legislature from Miami County, was taken from his house in the night and murdered."
"The story's a fake," Stuart ventured.
"The man who sent this message doesn't make such mistakes."
He paused and studied the telegram.
"No. This means the beginning of a blood feud. The time's ripe for it."
"We'll have better news to-morrow," Stuart hoped.
"We'll have worse. I've been looking for something like this since the day I heard old Brown harangue a mob at Lawrence."
He stopped short.
"You'll have to give me back that order, my boy."
Stuart's face fell.
"Colonel, I've just got to see that girl, if it's only for a day—"
He slowly handed the order back to the Commandant. Sumner watched the red blood mount to Stuart's face with a look of sympathy.
"Is it as bad as that, boy?"
"It couldn't be worse, sir," Stuart admitted in low tones. "I'm a goner."
"All right. You've no time to lose, I'll give you three days—"
"Thank you!"
"This regiment will be on the march before a week has passed or I miss my guess."
"I'll be here, sir!" was the quick response.
Stuart grasped the leave of absence and hurried out before another messenger could arrive.
He reached Fort Riley the following day and had but twenty-four hours in which to crowd the most important event of his life.
He paced the floor in Colonel Cooke's reception room awaiting Flora's appearance with eager impatience. What on earth could be keeping her? He asked himself the question fifty times and looked at his watch a dozen times before he heard the rustle of organdy on the stairs.
A vision of radiant youth! She had taken time to make her beauty still more radiant with the daintiest touches to her blonde hair.
The simple dress she wore was a poem. The young cavalier was stunned anew. There was no doubt about the welcome in her smile and voice. It thrilled him to his fingertips. He held her hand until she drew it away with a little self-conscious laugh that was confusing to Stuart's plan of direct action.
There was a touch of the Southern girl's conscious poise and coquetry in the laugh. There was something aloof in it that meant trouble. He felt it with positive terror. He didn't have time to fence for position. He was in no mood for a flirtation. He had come to speak the deep things.
She led him to a seat with an air of dignity and reserve that alarmed him still more. He had taken too much for granted perhaps. There might be another man. Conceited fool! He hadn't thought it possible. Her manner had been so frank, so utterly sincere.
She sat by his side smiling at him in the bewitching way so many pretty girls had done before, when they merely wished to play with love.
He spoke in commonplaces and studied her with increasing panic. Her tactics baffled him. Until at last he believed he had solved the riddle! She had suddenly waked to the fact, as he had, that she had met her fate. She was drawing back for a moment in fright at the seriousness of surrender.
"Yes, that's it!" he murmured half aloud.
"What did you say?" she asked archly.
And his heart sank again. She asked the question with a tone of teasing that made him blush in spite of himself.
With sudden resolution he decided to make the plunge. He seized her hand and spoke with a queer hitch of awkwardness in his voice.
"Miss Flora, I've just twenty-four hours to be here. Every one of them is precious. I want to make them count. Don't you know that I love you?"
The little mouth twitched with a smile.
"I've heard that you're very fickle, Mr. Jeb Stuart. Isn't this all very, very sudden, to be so serious?"
She was still smiling and her eyes were twinkling, but her hand was not trembling. She was complete mistress of her emotions.
Stuart felt his heart pounding. He couldn't keep his hand from trembling, nor his voice from quivering slightly.
"I know I've been a little quick on the trigger, Miss Flora. But it came to me in a flash, the moment I saw you. I've had a good time with pretty girls—yes. But I never felt that way when I met one of the others. And now I'm stammering and trembling and I don't know how to talk to you. I can't rattle on like I've done so many times. You—you've got me, dear honey girl, for life, if you want me—please—be good to me."
She laughed a joyous, girlish peal that disconcerted him completely.
"My daddy's been warning me against you, sir!"
Stuart suddenly caught a note in her laughter that gave him courage.
She was not laughing at him but with him.
"He did not," he protested solemnly. "Colonel Cooke was just as nice to me as he could be—"
"Certainly. He's an Old Virginia gentleman. Behind your back he told me confidentially what he thought of you."
"All right. I dare you to cross your heart and tell me what he said."
"Dare me?"
"Dee double dare you."
"He said that you're a sad product of Sir Walter Scott's novels, a singing, rollicking, flirting, lazy young cavalier."
"Didn't say lazy."
"No."
"I thought not."
"I added that for good measure."
"I thought so."
"And he warned me that there might be a streak of the old Stuart purple blood in your veins that might make you silly for life—"
"Didn't say silly."
"No, I added that, too."
Stuart again seized the hand she had deftly withdrawn. He pressed it tenderly and sought the depths of her blue eyes.
"Ah, honey girl," he cried passionately, "don't tease me any more, please! I've got to leave you in a few hours. My regiment is going to march. It may be a serious business. You're a brave soldier's daughter and you're going to be a soldier's bride."
The girl's lips quivered for the first time and her voice trembled the slightest bit as she fought for self-control.
"I'll never marry a soldier."
"You will!"
"My daddy's never at home. I promised my mother never to look at a soldier."
"You're looking at me, dear heart!"
She turned quickly.
"I won't—"
Stuart drew her suddenly into his arms and kissed her.
"I love you, Flora! And you're mine."
She looked into his eyes, smiled, slipped both arms around his neck and kissed him.
"And I love you, my foolish, singing, laughing boy!"
"Always?"
"Always."
"And you'll marry me?"
"You couldn't get away from me if you tried."
She drew him down and kissed him again.
"The shadow will always be in my heart, dear soldier man. The shadow of the day I shall lose you! But it's life. I'll face it with a smile."
Through the long, sweet hours of the day and deep into the night they held each other's hand, and talked and laughed and dreamed and planned.
What mattered the shadow that was slowly moving across the sunlit earth?
It was the morning of life!
CHAPTER XXI
The eight men engaged in the remarkable enterprise on the Pottawattomie, led by their indomitable Captain, mounted their stolen horses and boldly rode to the camp of the military company commanded by John Brown, Jr. The father planned to make his stand behind these guns if pursued by formidable foes.
Brown reached the camp of the Rifles near Ottawa Jones' farm at midnight. The fires still burned brightly. To his surprise he found that the news of the murders had traveled faster than the stolen horses.
The camp was demoralized.
John Brown, Jr., had been forced to resign as Captain and H. H. Williams had been elected in his stead.
The reception which the County was giving his inspired deed stunned the leader. He had expected a reign of terror. But the terror had seized his own people. He was compelled to lie and deny his guilt except to his own flesh and blood. Even before his sons he was arraigned with fierce condemnation.
On the outer edge of the panic-stricken camp his sons, Jason and John,
Jr., faced him with trembling and horror in their voices.
Jason had denounced the first hint of the plan when the surveyor's scheme was broached. John, Jr. had refused to move a step on the expedition. The two sons confronted their father with determined questions. He shifted and evaded the issue.
Jason squared himself and demanded:
"Did you kill those men?"
"I did not," was the sharp answer.
The son held his shifting eye by the glare of the camp fire.
"Did you have anything to do with the killing of those men?"
To his own he would not lie longer. It wasn't necessary. His reply was quick and unequivocal.
"I did not do it. But I approved it."
"It was the work of a beast."
"You cannot speak to me like that, sir!" the old man growled.
"And why not?"
"I am your father, sir!"
"That's why I tell you to your face that you have disgraced every child who bears your name—now—and for all time. What right had you to put this curse upon me? The devils in hell would blush to do what you have done!"
The father lifted his hand as if to ward a blow and bored his son through with a steady stare.
"God is my judge—not you, sir!"
John Brown, Jr., sided with his brother in the attack but with less violence. His feebler mind was already trembling on the verge of collapse.
"It cuts me to the quick," the old man finally answered, "that my own people should not understand that I had to make an example of these men—"
Jason finally shrieked into his ears:
"Who gave you the authority of Almighty God to sit in judgment upon your fellow man, condemn him without trial and slay without mercy?"
The father threw up both hands in a gesture of disgust and walked from the scene. He spent the night without sleep, wandering through the woods and fields.
Three days later while Brown and his huntsmen were still hiding in the timber, the people of his own settlement at Osawatomie held a public meeting which was attended by the entire male population. They unanimously adopted resolutions condemning in the bitterest terms the deed.
When the old man heard of these resolutions he ground his teeth in rage. He had thought to sweep the Territory with a Holy War in a Sacred Cause. He expected the men who hated Slavery to applaud his Blood Offering to the God of Freedom. Instead they had hastened to array themselves with his foes.
Something had gone wrong in the execution of his divine vision. His mind was stunned for the moment. But he was wrestling again with God in prayer, while the avengers were riding to demand an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.
When the true history of man is written it will be the record of mind not the story of the physical acts which follow the mental process.
The dangers of society are psychological, not physical. The crucial moments of human history are not found in the hours in which armies charge. They are found in the still small voices that whisper in the silence of the night to a lone watcher by the fireside. They are found in the words of will that follow hours of silent thought behind locked doors or under the stars.
The story of man's progress, his relapses to barbarism, his victories, his failures, his years of savage cruelties, his eras of happiness and sorrow, must be written at last in terms of mental states.
John Brown's mind had conceived and executed the series of murders that shocked even a Western frontier. His mind enacted the tragedy days before the actual happening.
And it was the state of mind created by the deed that upset all his calculations. The reaction was overwhelming. He was correct in his faith that a blood feud once raised, all appeal to reason and common sense, all appeal to law, order, tradition, religion would be vain babble. But he had failed to gauge the moral sense of his own party. They had not yet accepted the theory which he held with such passionate conviction.
Brown's moral code was summed up in one passage from the Bible which he quoted and brooded over daily:
"WITHOUT THE SHEDDING OF BLOOD THERE IS NO REMISSION OF SINS."
But he had made a mistake in the spot chosen for rousing the Blood Feud. Men had instantly seen red. They sprang to their arms. They leaped as tigers leap on their prey. But his own people were the prey. He had miscalculated the conditions of frontier life, though he had not yet realized it. His stubborn, restless mind clung to the idea that the stark horror of the crimes which he had committed in the name of Liberty would call at last all men who stood for Freedom.
He held his armed band in camp under the sternest discipline to await this call of the blood.
The Southern avengers who swarmed across the Missouri border into the region of Osawatomie accepted Brown's standards of justice and mercy without question. A few men of education among them were the only restraining influence.
Through these exciting days the old man would show himself at daylight in different places removed from his camp in the woods. While squadrons of avengers were scouring the ravines, the river bottoms and the tangled underbrush, he was lying quietly on his arms. Sometimes his pursuers camped within hearing and got their water from the same spring.
With all his indomitable courage he was unable to rally sufficient men to afford protection to his people. He was a fugitive from justice with a price on his head. Yet, armed and surrounded by a small band of faithful followers, he led a charmed life.
His deed on the Pottawattomie made murder the chief sport of the unhappy Territory. The life of the frontier was reduced to anarchy. Outrages became so common it was impossible to record them. Murder was a daily incident. Many of them passed in secret. Many were not revealed for days and weeks after they had been committed—then, only by the discovery of the moldering remains of the dead. Two men were found hanging on a tree near Westport. They were ill-fated Free State partisans who had fallen by the hand of the avengers. The troops buried them in a grave so shallow that the prairie wolves had half devoured them before they were again found and re-buried.
The Free Soil men organized guerrilla bands for retaliation. John E. Cook, a daring young adventurer, the brother-in-law of Governor Willard of Indiana, early distinguished himself in this work. He put himself at the head of a group of twenty young "Cavalry Scouts" who ranged the country, asking no quarter and giving none.
A squadron of avengers invaded Brown's settlement at Osawatomie, sacked and partly destroyed it, and killed his son, Frederick, whose mind had been in a state of collapse since the night of the murders on the Pottawattomie.
John Brown rallied a group of sympathizers and fought a pitched battle with the invaders but was defeated with bloody losses and compelled to retreat.
He was followed by Deputy United States Marshal, Henry C. Pate. Brown turned and boldly attacked Pate's camp and another battle ensued. The Deputy Marshal, wishing to avoid useless bloodshed, sent out a flag of truce and asked an interview with the guerrilla commander. Brown answered promptly, advanced and sent for Pate.
Pate, trusting the flag of truce, approached the old man.
"I am addressing the Captain in command?" Pate asked.
"You are, sir."
"Then let me announce that I am a Deputy United States Marshal."
"And why are you fighting us?"
"I have no desire for bloodshed, sir. I am acting under the orders of the Marshal of the Territory."
"And what does the Marshal demand?"
"The arrest of the men for whom I have warrants."
Pate had never seen John Brown and had no idea that he was talking to the old man himself.
"I have a proposition to make," he went on.
"I'll have no proposals from you, sir," Brown announced shortly. "I demand your surrender."
"I am an officer of the law. I cannot surrender to armed outlaws."
Brown's metallic voice quivered.
"I demand your immediate and unconditional surrender!"
"I have the right to retire under a flag of truce and consider your proposition with my men—"
Pate started to go and Brown stood in front of him.
"You're not going."
"You will violate a flag of truce?"
Brown signaled his men to advance and surround Pate.
"You're not going, sir," he repeated.
"I claim my rights under a flag of truce accepted by you for this parley. An Indian respects that flag."
Brown pointed to his men who were standing within the sound of their voices.
"Order those men to surrender."
Pate folded his arms and remained silent.
Brown placed his revolver at the Deputy Marshal's breast and shouted.
"Tell your men to lay down their arms!"
Pate refused to speak. There was a moment's deadly silence and the Marshal's posse, to save the life of their Captain, threw down their guns and the whole party were made prisoners.
The United States Cavalry at Fort Leavenworth were ordered to the scene to rescue the Deputy Marshal and his men.