Blacksheep! Blacksheep! Part 29

"Well, I'd say you're out of it easy. Of course you didn't kill him or he wouldn't have been able to wound you. I congratulate you on your escape!"

"Thanks, Comly; but you see he didn't die immediately, but crawled off and breathed his life out in some lonely place. It's horrible! Of course he was a thief and had no business in the house; but as I sit here on this park bench I'm a murderer! I never got beyond the headlines in the Portland papers; simply couldn't bear it and haven't dared look at a newspaper since. I shot a poor devil who had quite as much right to live as I have. The thing will hang over me till I die! I don't know just why I am confiding in you, but something tells me that you can look at the thing straight. If you say I ought to go to Maine and surrender myself and tell what I know about the shooting of that man I'll do it."

"Most certainly not!" cried Archie with mournful recollection of his own speculations on the same point in the hours when he believed that he himself was responsible for Hoky's death. The emotional strain of the talk was telling on him. He had never expected to hear from Congdon's lips the story of their duel at Bailey Harbor. Congdon had no idea that he had fired not at a man but at a reflection in a mirror; and it was a question whether common decency didn't demand that he set Congdon straight. Congdon in all likelihood wouldn't believe him. n.o.body would believe such a story! And certainly if he should tell all he knew of the Congdons and Isabel, and wind up by acknowledging that it was he who had been in the Bailey Harbor house on the night of the shooting, Congdon would probably be so frightened that he would run away in terror to seek police protection.

Congdon, unaware of his companion's perturbation, rose and suggested a walk to freshen them up before train time.

"I thank G.o.d I fell in with you," he said with feeling. "Just talking to you has helped me a whole lot!"

Archie, his guilt heavy upon him, walked up Michigan Avenue beside the man he had shot.

CHAPTER SIX

I

They breathed deep of the tonic air of the North as they left the sleeper. Huddleston was a forlorn village with one street that displayed a single line of buildings against a background of saw mill and sawdust.

An unpainted structure bearing the inscription, "Grand Hotel; Fishermen's Resort" presented a picture of complete desolation to the travelers. The further arm of the bay was a strip of green in the distance.

A fisherman posed in monumental majesty on a weatherbeaten pile of lumber on the wharf was the only human being in sight on the water side of the town. Just as the train pulled out he jerked up his pole, flinging a perch high in air and catching it with a yell of delight.

Archie sighed with relief as the fisherman, now standing erect to unhook the perch, turned toward them. It was the Governor, rakishly trigged out in knickerbockers, with a cap smartly tilted over one ear and a scarf snapping about his face in the lively wind.

"This looks like the end of the world," Congdon remarked dejectedly as they walked toward the hotel. "I was a fool to come here and drag you along."

"Don't worry about me," said Archie cheerfully. "We'll make a lark of it. Your daughter's probably around here somewhere. We'll lay low and see what turns up."

A man emerged from the hotel and crossed the street. Archie identified him at once as Red Leary, to whom the Governor had delivered the stolen money at Walker's farm. Leary made no sign of ever having seen Archie before but picked up the luggage and led the way to the hotel. Archie's admiration for the Governor soared to new heights at this manifestation of the thoroughness of his preparations. Something had been said at Walker's about Leary's retirement to northern Michigan, but at that time Huddleston had not, he was sure, figured in the Governor's plans. Leary walked round the counter and turned the register for their signatures.

"We jes' opened the house last week; she's been shet up quite a spell but they're goin' t' open the mill ag'in. Jest now there ain't a soul in town. Those houses and the store are boarded up tight. The railroad agent stays here to run the water tank and sleeps in the station. Yep; one other gent's registered." He placed his finger on "Reginald Heber Saulsbury" in the Governor's flowing autograph. "All the way from New York. I guess you'll find him all right. Blew in a couple of days ago; says he come out here seekin' peace for his soul; them's his very words."

"I judge there's a large surplus of soul stuff hereabouts," remarked Congdon. "By the way, you haven't seen anything of a little girl about here, have you--a child of eleven?"

"Not one of 'em but a whole pa.s.sel," replied Leary lifting his head after scrawling the numbers of the rooms against their names. "They's a camp o' city girls across the bay. The day I got here a whole trainload of 'em was hauled up from Chicago. Y' never saw such a lively bunch. And yestiddy I was over that way lookin' up fis.h.i.+n' places to recommend to our guests and saw the whole outfit swimmin'. A cute lot o' youngsters.

Mos' likely th' camp'll bring considerable business to the hotel; folks comin' up to visit their kids."

"Well, I suppose that's the trick," said Congdon as Leary started upstairs with their bags. "Edith has been put in a camp; her mother's work, of course. Not a bad idea. All I want to be sure of is that the child's in good hands. This is a beastly hole but I guess we can make out for a day or two and I'll see if I can get a glimpse of Edith."

"Oh, we'll have to study the situation a little," Archie answered. "I don't question your daughter's all right. We can make out here for a few days anyhow."

The house had been renovated and their rooms were better than the grim exterior promised.

"There'll be dinner at twelve," said Leary; "and if you want to try your hand at trollin' for pickerel I'll fix you up later in the afternoon.

Mr. Saulsbury's been s.n.a.t.c.hin' up perch all mornin'. I'm tired out jest from settin' on the porch and watchin' 'im."

Mrs. Leary, in spite of the fact disclosed by the Governor at Walker's, that she had conducted a fence in Chicago and was p.r.o.ne to view precious stones with a covetous eye, bore all the marks of respectability. She entered the dining-room briskly, her motherly face heated from the range, and placed a large platter of fried chicken on the table.

"Jes' help yerselves, gents. We've hardly got goin' yet but I got a waitress on the way from Chicago and she'll spare me some steps."

"Ah!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the Governor, pausing dramatically in the door and eyeing the newly arrived guests as though their presence filled him with astonishment. He bowed to them and remarked upon the fineness of the day.

"I guess you folks'll get acquainted without bein' introduced," observed Mrs. Leary. "It's always nicer in a summer resort when folks get together sociable-like. You wanted radishes, Mr. Saulsbury, and you'll notice I got 'em fer you."

"Madam," said the Governor in his most elaborate manner, "I knew you at once for a woman of kind heart! I am not in the least surprised to find myself in the presence of the n.o.blest radishes I have ever seen."

In a moment more he had introduced himself to Archie and Congdon. He had spent a jolly morning, he announced. Not in years had he enjoyed himself so hugely. He delivered a lecture on fish only to celebrate in sonorous periods the humble perch, scorned by epicures. It was the most delectable of all the finny genus, superior even to the pompano.

Congdon, first irritated by the Governor's volubility, was soon laughing at his whimsical speeches and by the time they moved to the narrow veranda to smoke he was both puzzled and amused. Archie had been with the Governor so constantly and was so familiar with his tangential mental processes that he was glad of an opportunity to watch the effect of his patter upon a man of his own world. It was clear that the Governor was at pains to make himself agreeable to Congdon. He touched upon public affairs, sensibly and convincingly, then turned handsprings through the arts and sciences.

"Rather odd my being here," he rippled on; "and I need hardly say that it's a pleasure to meet on this bleak sh.o.r.e two gentlemen of your caliber. I told a friend of mine in Chicago that I was enormously fed up with cities and the general human pressure and wanted to go to the most G.o.d-forsaken spot in America. And he answered without a moment's hesitation that Huddleston, Michigan, would satisfy my loftiest ideal of G.o.dforsakenness. He had been here straightening up some land t.i.tles and camped out for a week with a surveyor and ate out of a skillet. He's one of these fussy fellows who sends an order of chops back to a club kitchen a dozen times before he's satisfied,--you know the type. He's probably laughing himself to death right now thinking how miserable I am. But I refuse to be bored; never in my life have I been bored! Even the sawdust pyramids and the stumps are magnificent in their desolation.

I feel it in my bones that something extraordinary is going to happen.

Something's got to happen or the lake will rise in one vast wave and destroy Huddleston. I hope you gentlemen share my feeling that our meeting has been ordered by the G.o.ds and that we shall stand or fall together."

"If we've got to put the responsibility somewhere the G.o.ds may have it,"

laughed Congdon. "I'm a cripple, as you see, but as Comly and I haven't a thing to do we'll give you a day or two to kick up some excitement. It may entertain you to know that my coming here was due to an anonymous telegram."

"Excellent! I'm delighted to know that there's some of the old romantic spirit left in the world! It pleases me clear through to meet a man who will act on an anonymous telegram and not ring up the police to ask their stupid advice."

With a wave of the hand he left them, declaring it to be his purpose to spend the afternoon in the woods.

"What do you make of that chap?" Congdon asked as the Governor strolled away, swinging a stick, and disappeared at the end of the street.

"He talks like a nonsense book," Archie replied. "I hope he won't become a nuisance!"

"A cheerful soul, I should call him. He's likely to make the place more tolerable."

When Congdon pleaded weariness Archie put him to bed and then sauntered away, following a dirt road that wound through the timber. In a little while he came upon the Governor lying with his back against a tree, reading Horace.

"You arrive most opportunely!" he said, without lifting his eyes from the book. "I was pining for some one to read this ode to."

He not only read the ode but expounded it, dwelling upon felicities that had eluded him before. With countless questions crying for answer Archie was obliged to feign interest in the poem until the Governor thrust the book into his pocket with a sigh and led the way to the beach.

"Well, you landed him here!" he remarked, seating himself on a log and producing his pipe. "Or did he bring you? One would think you were old chums to see you together. Not a bad fellow, I should say."

"He's really a good sort," said Archie; "but I'll tell you the whole story."

The Governor listened placidly, interrupting only when Archie repeated what Congdon had said of Isabel.

"A wonderful girl!" he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed. "Makes it her business to tease the world along. Laughing in her sleeve all the time. I must say it's odd that both you and Congdon should be the victims of her wiles. My burdens are heavier than I knew, for I've got to get you both out of your sc.r.a.pes."

"You don't seem to appreciate how horrible I felt when I found myself liking that fellow. To say I was embarra.s.sed doesn't express it! And I nearly gave myself away when he told me he'd killed a man, your friend Hoky, you know. I nearly confessed all I knew of that business just to ease the poor chap's mind."

"But you didn't, Archie! You couldn't have done anything so foolish. My tutoring hasn't been wholly wasted on you, after all. You managed the trip admirably; I haven't a point to criticize; but now to get down to bra.s.s tacks. What you learned of old Eliphalet Congdon's meddlesomeness jibes exactly with what I know of his character. Let me show you something, Archie."

He walked out upon the gravelly sh.o.r.e and pointed through the wide-flung arms of the bay.

"Do you see a little blur of smoke out yonder in the open lake? That's the _Arthur B. Grover_ proceeding under her own steam, with all the dignity of a transatlantic liner. I took up my option and the bloomin'