Books: The Law of the Land
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Emerson Hough >> The Law of the Land
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Now, as to this young man, Henry Decherd, thought Miss Lady, why
should he trouble her by being continually about when she did not
care for him? Why had he been so eager, even from the first day when
he met her at the Big House? What had he to do with her coming to the
Big House? Why did her mother now leave her with him, and, then
again, capriciously call her away from him? And why should she
herself avoid him, dismiss him, and then wonder whither he had gone?
Miss Lady, with one vague thought or another in her mind, wandered
idly back to the great drawing-room where but an hour ago she had
last seen Henry Decherd. He was not there as she peered in at the
door; wherefore she needed no excuse, but stepped in and dropped into
a chair which offered invitation in the depths of the half-darkened
room.
A beautiful girl was Miss Lady, round of throat and arm, already
stately, quite past the days of flat immaturity. A veritable young
goddess one might have called her, with her high, short mouth and
upright head, and her shoulders carried back with a certain
haughtiness. Yet only a gracious, pensive goddess might have had this
wistfulness in the deep eyes, this little pensive droop of the mouth
corners, this piteous quality of the eye which left one saying that
here, after all, was a maiden most like to the wild deer of the
forest, strong, beautiful, yet timid; ready to flee, yet anxious to
confide.
As she sat thus, the idle gaze of Miss Lady chanced upon an object
lying on the floor, fallen apparently by accident from the near-by
table. She stooped to pick it up, examining it at first carelessly
and then with greater interest. It was a book, a little old-fashioned
book, in the French language, the covers now broken and faded, though
once of brave red morocco. The type was old and quaint, and the paper
yellow with age. Miss Lady had never seen this book before, and now,
failing better occupation, fell to reading in it. Presently she
became so absorbed that once more she was surprised by the quiet
approach of Mrs. Ellison. The latter paused at the door, looked in
and coughed a second time. Miss Lady started in surprise.
"You frightened me, mamma," said she, "coming up so close. You are
always frightening me that way. Do you think I need watching all the
time?"
"Well, you know, my child, we must not keep Colonel Blount waiting
for his dinner."
"But tell me, what book is this, mamma?" said Miss Lady to her. "It's
French. See, I can read some of it. It is about people in St. Louis
years and years ago. It tells about a Louise Loisson--isn't that a
pretty name!--who was a captive among the Indians, or something of
that sort. She was an heiress, like enough, too, I can't make out
just what, but certainly well-born. I think her father was a count,
or something. Mamma, you should have insisted upon my taking up
French more thoroughly when I was at the Sisters'. Now, this is the
strangest thing."
"Nonsense, child. Can't you spend your time better than fooling with
such trash?"
"It isn't trash, mamma. The girl went to France, to Paris, and she
danced--she was famous."
Mrs. Ellison shifted uneasily. "You are old enough to begin reading
books of proper sort. I don't know how you pick up such notions as
this," said she.
"Is not the book yours, mamma?"
"Why, no, of course not. I don't know whose it is."
How much it might have saved Mrs. Ellison later had she now simply
picked up this book, admitted its ownership and so concealed it for
ever! How much, too, that had meant in the life of Miss Lady, its
chance finder! Yet this was not to be. Fate sometimes teaches a woman
to say the thing which at the instant relieves, though it later
damns. It was Mrs. Ellison's fate to deny all knowledge of this
little volume.
"Come, we must hurry, my child," she repeated. Miss Lady resolved to
come back after dinner and look further into this interesting book.
Mrs. Ellison resolved the same. Her interest in the little volume was
far greater than she cared to evince. She hesitated. Her eyes turned
to it again and again, her hands longed to clutch it. Once more in
her possession, she resolved that never in the future should it be
left lying carelessly about, to fall into precisely the wrong hands.
She hurried Miss Lady away from the place.
"Go and get ready for dinner," she commanded, "and try to look your
best to-night; you know we've Mr. Decherd, and perhaps other company.
That girl Delphine has run away, and I had to look after things
myself; I don't want you to disgrace me--"
"I'll try not," said Miss Lady, coolly, and swept her a mocking
courtesy.
Mrs. Ellison gazed after her with ill-veiled hostility, but turned
away presently, quite as anxious as she was angry. This girl was a
problem, and a dangerous one as well.
Things were not going smoothly at the Big House. Sam, the curly-
headed, embryonic butler, who gazed out over Colonel Blount's dinner-
table each evening in solemn dignity, knew that something was wrong
with his people that evening, though he could not tell what. Some of
them talked too much. Miss Lady laughed too much. The boss was too
thoughtful, and young Massa Decherd--whom Sam had never learned to
like--was too scowling. Little Sam was almost relieved when a knock
summoned him without, and he betook his ten years of dignity from
Colonel Blount's right hand, to learn what might be wanted at the
door.
"What is it, Sam?" asked Colonel Blount.
"M-m-m-m-man outside, sah, h-h-h-he wants to see you, sah."
"Well, Sam, if there is a gentleman outside, why don't you ask him to
come in and eat with us? Don't you know your manners, Sam? Why do I
give you this place to run if you can't ask a gentleman to come in
and sit at your table when we are having dinner?"
"D-d-did as-s-s-sk him, sah," said Sam, "b-b-but he wouldn't c-c-c-
_come_ in; n-n-n-no, sah, wouldn't c-c-c-_come_ in."
"What, wouldn't come in, eh?"
"No, sah, s-s-s-says you must come out, sah. W-w-w-wants to see you,
sah. H-h-h-he won't wait."
It was the claim agent of the Y. V. railroad who stood on the gallery
awaiting the appearance of Colonel Blount. The latter looked at him
quietly for a moment, and held out his hand.
"Come in," said he, "you are just in time for dinner. I'm glad to see
you back."
"Colonel Blount," said Eddring, in spite of himself grown again
swiftly choleric, "damn your dinner! I have come back because as a
white man I've got to tell you what you ought to know." There was an
eagerness in his tone whose import was recognized by Blount.
"What's up?" said he, shortly. "Niggers?"
"Yes, down below there."
"Down towards the Sands' place?"
"Yes, they've been holding a meeting all the afternoon; they've got a
regular church over there in the cane. They've got a leader this
time, of some sort; I can't find out who it is, but it all means
trouble. There has been a plot going on for a long time. They think
you have been too rough with them, and, in fact, I reckon they are
just generally right desperate and dangerous. They've heard a lot of
this political and educational talk from up North, and it's done what
might have been expected all along. The niggers are up. They are
going to march on your house to-night. Why, haven't you heard their
infernal drum going all the evening! This is insurrection, I tell
you!"
"Come in," said Blount, simply. "I thank you."
"I don't want any thanks," said Eddring, "I am telling you this
because you are a white man and so am I. It is my duty."
Blount reached out his hand again. "Not necessary," said Eddring; but
the older man threw a long arm over his shoulders, so that for an
instant they looked into each other's eyes; then quickly Eddring
turned and caught Blount by the hand.
"I can't come in," said he, "until you take back this infernal
voucher we were wrangling over."
"Oh, well," said Blount, "I will take it, if that will please you, or
you may keep it, if that will please you better. There's no time for
that sort of thing now. Come in and sit down at my table--and now
you, Sam, run and tell Mollie to ring the big plantation bell, and
keep it ringing until I tell her to stop."
John Eddring thus came back to the Big House which lately he had left
in anger; and as he entered the great dining-room he saw once more
his coveted picture, the image of the morning, the tall young girl
with the brown ruff of hair rolling back from the smooth brow, above
the clear-seeing dark eyes. Here again, by miracle, had come his
friend, to meet him in the smother of the grimy way of life! Yet he
thought the girl looked at him but coldly as he stood wearily apart.
He felt himself unaccredited, a man of no station. Again there swept
over him the feeling of his own insufficiency, his own failure of all
life's things worth having. It seemed to him that in this young
girl's gaze there called out to him the cool, insolent tone of
pitiless youth, saying: "I know you not; you are not my friend."
Himself simple and direct in good masculine sort, he knew little of
such thing as coquetry, nor knew that the soul feminine might hide
much curiosity, if not interest, behind a glance indifferently
turned, a word calmly or coolly spoken. And so he raged, unhappy in
his own ignorance, and most of all unhappy for that, now disobedient
to all his mandates, there surged up in his heart a great and
dangerous longing, the mutiny of a soul too long crushed down by the
iron hand of the commonplace,--the iron hand of this thing called
Duty.
Out of this sudden conflict, and out of this sudden misery, he could
formulate no better course of action to set him straight; and in the
uneasy silence, tense, overstrung, he almost longed for that physical
action which he knew must presently follow.
But now there pealed out suddenly upon the air of evening the mighty
clangor of the great bell, the one used only in time of stress at the
Big House, which soon sent all else silent. High and clear arose the
note, ringing out for a moment and then silent, only to resume. The
dinner in the great hall passed with few explanations vouchsafed, and
presently Mrs. Ellison hurried Miss Lady away. Eddring, dimly aware
that now in spite of himself he was established on some sort of
footing in the Big House, none the less reflected that the occasion
counted for but little from a social standpoint. He caught himself
looking at the door where the tall young woman had disappeared. For
the time he forgot his own station, and his own errand in that place.
He forgot no more than an instant, for there came to him the swift
feeling that a grave peril impended for this girl, for all the white
women of the house. From that moment his problems became savagely
impersonal. He was simply one of a few men called upon to defend a
home, and the women of that home. He asked his soul as to his fitness
for the task, and rejoiced grimly that he found himself calm and
ready for this thing which was now his duty.
Colonel Calvin Blount scarcely spoke, yet he gladly welcomed his
neighbor, the storekeeper, Ben Buckner, who now came strolling up to
the gallery steps; and he smiled with yet greater pleasure when he
peered out of the window into the twilight and saw riding up to the
gate his other neighbor, Jim Bowles, who carried across the saddle in
front of him a long rifle. Behind Bowles, on the family mule, sat his
wife, Sarah Ann, dipping snuff vigorously.
"Good even', Cunnel," said Bowles, alighting, "I heah you-all got a
b'ah this mawnin'. I just brung my own gun 'long heah, 'lowin' I
might see somethin' 'long the road, even if it is gittin' a little
dark." Blount smiled grimly. No mention was made of the ringing of
the bell until Blount himself explained.
"You-all know something is up," said he.
"Yas, sah," said Buckner, evincing no great curiosity.
"Well, there's trouble enough on hand right now. We need every white
man we can get. Bowles, take your wife inside to get something to
eat, and you, Ben, go back and get your women-folks; and don't forget
your Winchester."
The bell spoke on. The plantation paths now began to blacken with
slowly moving figures, but within the Big House there was no
confusion. Colonel Blount paced slowly up and down the gallery.
Hearing footfalls, he turned.
"Oh, it's you, Decherd, is it? I'm right glad you're going home to-
morrow morning, and not to-night. We need men who can shoot. I will
give you something for every black head you can make a hole in to-
night. What would you like? Say about two dollars?" Decherd gulped
and reddened, and made such shamefaced defense as he could. There was
an ugly look of ill temper on his face, but he found Calvin Blount a
hard man to approach with any masculine asperities.
"The next time," said Blount to him, quietly, "if I were you, Mr.
Decherd, and I heard the Blount pack going out, I don't believe I
would ride along." He was away before Decherd could frame reply. At
that instant Eddring appeared on the gallery calling out to him.
"Listen, listen to it," cried Eddring, "don't you hear it? That's
their drum; it's coming closer."
The little party of white men faced toward the sound.
"Here, Bill," cried Blount. "Call the ladies here to me at once." He
turned to them, as presently they appeared, questioning him.
"Never mind," he said, "there's going to be a little trouble, but we
can handle it. It's out of the difficulty with that Sands nigger that
I was telling you about, Mrs. Ellison. Now, here, you and Miss Lady
take these two pistols, and go into Miss Lady's room. No matter what
happens, you stay there until you are called. If any one tries to get
into the room, wait until he gets almost in, then shoot, and shoot
straight. Don't be scared, and keep quiet; well take care of you,
these gentlemen and myself. I must tell you that it was my friend Mr.
Eddring here who brought the news and warned us. You ought to thank
him, but not now; get on into that room."
The women took the weapons, and Eddring noticed that of the two Mrs.
Ellison seemed the more frightened. The younger one was pale, but her
eye did not flicker or falter. She looked straight at each man, at
Bowles and Buckner, both impassive, at Calvin Blount, now beginning
to flush under his fighting choler; yes, and at last at him, John
Eddring, pale and serious, but steady as the door-jamb against which
he leaned.
"It was fortunate for us, sir, that you came," she said in a voice
that did not tremble as much as did his in stammering a reply. So she
passed on within, and the eyes of those silent men followed her.
"Now then, Bill," cried Calvin Blount, sharply, "get the hands into
line so we can count them. Here, into the kitchen there, all you
people, every one of you. If I see a head out of the window this
night it will get a hole put through it. Do you hear? Get under cover
and stay there. Ring that bell, Bill, louder, louder! Keep it going!
We'll show these people what we think, and what we'll do."
So, high over the droning sounds of sleeping evening-tide, there
arose the challenge of the white man's bell, calling out to the
savage drum its answer and its defiance.
CHAPTER VIII
THE VOLCANO
At length the sound of bell and drum alike ceased. The great house
went grim and silent. The sound of the flying night-jars died away,
and the chorus of crickets and katydids began as the dusk settled
down. Inside the kitchen, a detached building in which the plantation
forces were now practically confined, there arose occasional sounds
of half-hysterical laughter, snatches of excited talk, now and then
the quavering of a hymn. In the kennel yards a hound, prescient,
raised his voice, and was joined by another, until the whole pack,
stirred by some tense feeling in the air, lifted up in tremulous
unison a far-reaching wail.
After a time even the mingled calling of the pack droned away, and
silence came once more, a silence hard to endure, since now each
occupant of the Big House knew that the assailants must be close
about. Each man had a window assigned to his care, and so all settled
for the task ahead. An hour passed that seemed a score of hours.
Then, over toward the railroad track, there came a confused sound of
muffled footfalls in ragged unison, and presently a sort of chant,
broken now and then by shoutings. Suddenly there boomed out once
more, full and unmistakable, the voice of the great drum of Africa.
The beating was now rapid and sonorous, and the sound of the drum was
accompanied by a savage volume of cries. A mass of shadow appeared at
the end of the lane, soon lapping over into the yard in front of the
Big House.
There arose near at hand answering calls, containing a scarcely
concealed note of encouragement. At a window in the kitchen there
appeared a head and arm thrust out. Eddring saw it and pointed. "Why
don't you shoot, man?" said the slow voice of Bowles at his elbow.
"I can't; it's murder!" said Eddring, drawing away. Yet even as he
did so he saw the long brown barrel of the squirrel rifle rise level
and hang motionless. There came a sharp, thin, inadequate report, and
at the kitchen window the shoulders of the unfortunate flung upward
and fell hanging. Eddring felt sick with horror, but Bowles lowered
his rifle calmly, as if this were but target practice. Not a hand in
the kitchen dared pull back into the room the body of the dead negro.
And now there came a sudden rush of feet; a medley of deep-throated
callings came almost from the gallery edge. The assault, savage,
useless, almost hopeless, had begun. Eddring remembered always that
it seemed to him that this young gentleman, Henry Decherd, was a
trifle pale; that Bowles was at least a dozen feet tall; that Colonel
Calvin Blount was quite turned to stone; and that he himself was not
there personally, but merely witnessing some fierce and fearful
nightmare in which others were concerned. Once he heard Mrs. Ellison
call repeatedly to Delphine, and was dimly conscious that there was
no answer. Once, too, he saw, standing at the door, the tall figure
of the young girl, Miss Lady--the white girl, the prototype of
civilization; woman, sweet, to be shielded, to be cared for, to be
protected--yea, though it were with a man's heart-blood. And after
this spectacle John Eddring looked about him no more, but cherished
his rifle and used it.
About him were vague and confused sounds of a conflict of which he
saw little save that directly in front of his own window. He was
conscious of a second insignificant rifle-crack at his right, and
heard other shots from Blount's window at the left. His own work he
did methodically, feeling that his duty was plain to him. He was a
rifleman. His firing was not aimless, but exact, careful, pitilessly
unagitated.
The black mass in front broke and scattered, and drew together again
and came on. The assailants reached every portion of the front yard,
hiding behind buildings, trees, anything they could find. At the rear
of the house, among the barns, there arose the yelping of dogs cut
down at the kennels, and screams rang out where the maddened blacks,
no longer human, were stabbing horses and cattle and leaving them
half dead. Then there arose a sudden flicker of flame. Some voice
cried out that they had fired the cotton-gin. From other buildings
closer at hand there also arose flames. From the kitchen came cries
and lamentations. Here and there over the ground, plain in the
moonlight, or huddled blackly in the shadows, there lay long blurs
where the rifles had done their work. Yet from a point not far from
the corner of the gallery there came continual firing.
"That's from behind that board-pile out there," cried Blount,
stepping back from his window. "We've got to get them out." Eddring,
not pausing for speech, plunged out of the window, rushed across the
gallery and over the narrow space to the shelter whence was coming
this close firing. His weapon spoke once and was lowered. Then he
fled back as swiftly as he had gone.
"Get back in here, you fool!" cried Blount, pulling him in at the
window as he returned. "How many were there?"
"Two," said Eddring, breathless. "One was a woman."
"Woman!" cried Blount; "what woman?"
There was no time to ponder as to this, for now shouts sounded behind
them. The crashing of glass and cries of fear came from the room
where the women had been left. The men hurried thither, and as they
gained the door, a black face appeared at the broken pane. Once more
Eddring felt hesitation at what seemed simple murder, yet still his
rifle was rising when he felt a sudden dizziness assail him. A long
arm pushed him away. He saw the brown barrel of the squirrel rifle
rising into line once more. The black at the window fell back, shot
through the forehead. Sarah Ann handed Jim Bowles another bullet. "I
always did love you, ol' man," said Sarah Ann, as he blew the smoke
from the long barrel of his rifle before reloading.
Eddring saw and heard thus much, but presently he sank half-
unconscious, not knowing the puzzle of the shot which had struck him
here so far toward the interior of the house. After a time the horror
of it all drew to its climax and passed on. Buckner, the storekeeper,
slipped down to the railroad station and set going an imperative
clicking on the wire. Two hours later there came a special train,
whose appearance put an end to the conflict. Dawn found the engine
fuming at the station-house, and dawn saw the Big House still
standing, charred a little at one corner, near which lay the body of
the unfortunate who had sought to apply the brand. Eddring, still
faint and dizzy, but not seriously hurt, sat at a little table
opposite Colonel Blount, who, himself gray and gaunt, had paused for
a time in his uneasy walk about the premises. A mocking-bird on the
trellis without the door trilled its song high and sweet, as though
the coming sunshine could reveal nothing of that which had been
there.
CHAPTER IX
ON ITS MAJESTY'S SERVICE
John Eddring, one morning, a month, or so after the Big House
battle, sat in the offices devoted to the use of the division claim
agent of the Y. Y. lines, whose headquarters were situated in a squat
building around which went on the scattered industries of the city
known as the industrial capital of a certain region of the South.
Beyond these dingy confines might have been seen other structures yet
more squat and dreary, from which issued the lines of iron rails
which led out into the South, rails which even here paralleled the
shores of the great river, as though dependent upon it for
maintenance and guidance. The mighty flood, unmindful, swept toward
the South, its tawny mane far out in midstream wrinkled by the breath
of an up-stream air.
Beyond the nearest bend there arose, above the cover of the gray
forest, the dense smoke of a steamer, and near at hand there came now
and again the coughing roar of the whistles of yet other river boats.
Slow smoke issued also from steamers tied up at the levee, where,
under low wooden canopies, lay piles and rows of brown-cased cotton
bales, continually increased in number by other bales brought up in
long drays, each drawn by a single mule. Above the hot wharves rose
the slope of close stone riprapping, fence against Father Messasebe,
who now and then, in spirit of sport or of forgetfulness, reached out
for his immemorial tribute of the soil. The sun was reflected from
this wall down on the depot building and the wharf floor beyond.
Across the water came the strumming of a banjo, and the low note of
singing also arose from the rooms where workmen shuffled about with
truck and hook, shifting the cotton bales. An inspector, almost the
only white man at the wharf, moved slowly from bale to bale, ripping
the covers with his knife and probing with his cotton auger into the
middle of each bale to test its quality. Mules dozed about with
lopping ears. Nowhere was there haste; neither here nor on the
street; nor in the railway offices beyond, where sat John Eddring,
agent of the personal injury department of this southern railway.
The room was not attractive, with its few chairs, its rows of letter
files, its desks and copying presses. The table at which Eddring sat
was worn and lacking in polish. Upon the wall hung a map showing the
divers lines of the Y. V. railroad; a chart depicting the street
crossings in the city of New Orleans; an engineer's elevation of a
bridge somewhere on the line. Severely professional were these
surroundings; as was indeed the central figure in the room, who now
sat at his desk opening the morning mail. He looked up presently as
there came a knock at the door, and soon was on his feet, hat in
hand; for the first caller of the day proved to be a lady. Apparently
she was an acquaintance of the claim agent, who addressed her by
name.
"Come in, Mrs. Wilson," he said pleasantly.
Mrs. Wilson, just arrived from a small town down the railroad, had
brought with her her sister, her mother and four children, not to
mention a neighbor who had come along to do a little shopping.
Eddring employed himself in getting a sufficient number of chairs for
this little body of visitors. Inquiries as to the health of himself
and his family ensued, reciprocated politely by Eddring, who asked
after Mrs. Wilson's kith and kin and the leading citizens of her
town. These preliminaries were long, but the claim agent was
apparently well acquainted with them and regarded them as necessary.
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