The Quest of the Silver Fleece Part 76

"I wish I could see a n.i.g.g.e.r."

_"Hark!"_

Stealthy steps were approaching, a glint of steel flashed behind the fire lights. Each band mistook the other for the armed Negroes, and the leaders yelled in vain; human power can not stay the das.h.i.+ng torrent of fear-inspired human panic. Whirling, the mob fled till it struck the road in two confused, surging ma.s.ses. Then in quick frenzy, shots flew; three men threw up their hands and tumbled limply in the dust, while the main body rushed pellmell toward town.

At early dawn, when the men relaxed from the strain of the night's vigil, Alwyn briefly counselled them: "Hide your guns."

"Why?" bl.u.s.tered Rob. "Haven't I a right to have a gun?"

"Yes, you have, Rob; but don't be foolish--hide it. We've not heard the last of this."

But Rob tossed his head belligerently.

In town, rumor spread like wildfire. A body of peaceful whites pa.s.sing through the black settlement had been fired on from ambush, and six killed--no, three killed--no, one killed and two severely wounded.

"The thing mustn't stop here," shouted Sheriff Colton; "these n.i.g.g.e.rs must have a lesson." And before nine next morning fully half the grown members of the same mob, now sworn in as deputies, rode with him to search the settlement. They tramped insolently through the school grounds, but there was no shred of evidence until they came to Rob's cabin and found his gun. They tied his hands behind him and marched him toward town.

But before the mob arrived the night before, Johnson feeling that his safety lay in informing the white folks, had crawled with his gun into the swamp. In the morning he peered out as the cavalcade approached, and not knowing what had happened, he recognized Colton, the sheriff, and signalled to him cautiously. In a moment a dozen men were on him, and he appealed and explained in vain--the gun was d.a.m.ning evidence. The voices of Rob's wife and children could be heard behind the two men as they were hurried along at a dog trot.

The town poured out to greet them--"The murderers! the murderers! Kill the n.i.g.g.e.rs!" and they came on with a rush. The sheriff turned and disappeared in the rear. There was a great cloud of dust, a cry and a wild scramble, as the white and angry faces of men and boys gleamed a moment and faded.

A hundred or more shots rang out; then slowly and silently, the ma.s.s of women and men were sucked into the streets of the town, leaving but black eddies on the corners to throw backward glances toward the bare, towering pine where swung two red and awful things. The pale boy-face of one, with soft brown eyes glared up sightless to the sun; the dead, leathered bronze of the other was carved in piteous terror.

_Thirty-eight_

ATONEMENT

Three months had flown. It was Spring again, and Zora sat in the transformed swamp--now a swamp in name only--beneath the great oak, dreaming. And what she dreamed there in the golden day she dared not formulate even to her own soul. She rose with a start, for there was work to do. Aunt Rachel was ill, and Emma went daily to attend her; today, as she came back, she brought news that Colonel Cresswell, who had been unwell for several days, was worse. She must send Emma up to help, and as she started toward the school she glanced toward the Cresswell Oaks and saw the arm-chair of its master on the pillared porch.

Colonel Cresswell sat in his chair on the porch, alone. As far as he could see, there was no human soul. His eyes were blood-shot, his cheeks sunken, and his breath came in painful gasps. A sort of terror shook him until he heard the distant songs of black folk in the fields. He sighed, and lying back, closed his eyes and the breath came easier. When he opened them again a white figure was coming up the avenue of the Oaks. He watched it greedily. It was Mary Cresswell, and she started when she saw him.

"You are worse, father?" she asked.

"Worse and better," he replied, smiling cynically. Then suddenly he announced: "I've made my will."

"Why--why--" she stammered.

"Why?" sharply. "Because I'm going to die."

She said nothing. He smiled and continued:

"I've got it all fixed. Harry was in a tight place--gambling as usual--and I gave him a lump sum in lieu of all claims. Then I gave John Taylor--you needn't look. I sent for him. He's a d.a.m.ned scoundrel; but he won't lie, and I needed him. I willed his children all the rest except two or three legacies. One was one hundred thousand dollars for you--"

"Oh, father!" she cried. "I don't deserve it."

"I reckon two years with Harry was worth about that much," he returned grimly. "Then there's another gift of two hundred thousand dollars and this house and plantation. Whom do you think that's for?"

"Helen?"

"Helen!" he raised his hand in threatening anger. "I might rot here for all she cares. No--no--but then--I'll not tell you--I--ah--" A spasm of pain shot across his face, and he lay back white and still. Abruptly he sat up again and peered down the oaks. "Hus.h.!.+" he gasped. "Who's that?"

"I don't know--it's a girl--I--"

He gripped her till she winced.

"My G.o.d--it walks--like my wife--I tell you--she held her head so--who is it?" He half rose.

"Oh, father, it's n.o.body but Emma--little Emma--Bertie's child--the mulatto girl. She's a nurse now, and I asked to have her come and attend you."

"Oh," he said, "oh--" He looked at the girl curiously. "Come here." He peered into her white young face. "Do you know me?"

The girl shrank away from him.

"Yes, sir."

"What do you do?"

"I teach and nurse at the school."

"Good! Well, I'm going to give you some money--do you know why?"

A flash of self-consciousness pa.s.sed over the girl's face; she looked at him with her wide blue eyes.

"Yes, Grandfather," she faltered.

Mrs. Cresswell rose to her feet; but the old man slowly dropped the girl's hand and lay back in his chair, with lips half smiling.

"Grandfather," he repeated softly. He closed his eyes a s.p.a.ce and then opened them. A tremor s.h.i.+vered in his limbs as he stared darkly at the swamp.

"Hark!" he cried harshly. "Do you hear the bodies creaking on the limbs?

It's Rob and Johnson. I did it--I--"

Suddenly he rose and stood erect and his wild eyes stricken with death stared full upon Emma. Slowly and thickly he spoke, working his trembling hands.

"Nell--Nell! Is it you, little wife, come back to accuse me? Ah, Nell, don't shrink! I know--I have sinned against the light and the blood of your poor black people is red on these old hands. No, don't put your clean white hands upon me, Nell, till I wash mine. I'll do it, Nell; I'll atone. I'm a Cresswell yet, Nell, a Cresswell and a gen--" He swayed. Vainly he struggled for the word. The shudder of death shook his soul, and he pa.s.sed.

A week after the funeral of Colonel Cresswell, John Taylor drove out to the school and was closeted with Miss Smith. His sister, installed once again for a few days in her old room at the school, understood that he was conferring about Emma's legacy, and she was glad. She was more and more convinced that the marriage of Emma and Bles was the best possible solution of many difficulties. She had asked Emma once if she liked Bles, and Emma had replied in her innocent way,

"Oh, so much."

As for Bles, he was often saying what a dear child Emma was. Neither perhaps realized yet that this was love, but it needed, Mrs. Cresswell was sure, only the lightning-flash, and they would know. And who could furnish that illumination better than Zora, the calm, methodical Zora, who knew them so well?

As for herself, once she had accomplished the marriage and paid the mortgage on the school out of her legacy, she would go abroad and in travel seek forgetfulness and healing. There had been no formal divorce, and so far as she was concerned there never would be; but the separation from her husband and America would be forever.

Her brother came out of the office, nodded casually, for they had little intercourse these days, and rode away. She rushed in to Miss Smith and found her sitting there--straight, upright, composed in all save that the tears were streaming down her face and she was making no effort to stop them.