Gabriel Tolliver Part 25

Beyond the valley, still farther away from the town, was the negro church, of which the Rev. Jeremiah Tomlin was the admired pastor.

Ordinarily, there were services in this church three times a week, unless one of the constantly recurring revivals was in progress, and then there were services every night in the week, and sometimes all night long. The Rev. Jeremiah was a preacher who had lung-power to spare, and his voice was well calculated to shatter our old friend the welkin, so dear to poets and romancers. But if there was no revival in progress, the nights devoted to prayer-meetings were mainly musical, and the songs, subdued by the distance, floated across the valley to Gabriel with entrancing sweetness.

One Wednesday night, when the political conditions were at their worst, Gabriel observed that while the lights were lit in the church, there was less singing than usual. This attracted his attention and then excited his curiosity. Listening more intently, he failed to hear the sound of a single voice lifted in prayer, in song or in preaching. The time was after nine o'clock, and this silence was so unusual that Gabriel concluded to investigate.

He made his way across the valley, and was soon within ear-shot of the church. The pulpit was unoccupied, but Gabriel could see that a white man was standing in front of it. The inference to be drawn from his movements and gestures was that he was delivering an address to the negroes. Hotchkiss was standing near the speaker, leaning in a familiar way on one of the side projections of the pulpit. Gabriel knew Hotchkiss, but the man who was speaking was a stranger. He was flushed as with wine, and appeared to have no control of his hands, for he flung them about wildly.

Gabriel crept closer, and climbed a small tree, in the hope that he might hear what the stranger was saying, but listen as he might, no sound of the stranger's voice came to Gabriel. The church was full of negroes, and a strange silence had fallen on them. He marvelled somewhat at this, for the night was pleasant, and every window was open. The impression made upon the young fellow was very peculiar. Here was a man flinging his arms about in the heat and ardour of argument or exhortation, and yet not a sound came through the windows.

Suddenly, while Gabriel was leaning forward trying in vain to hear the words of the speaker, a tall, white figure, mounted on a tall white horse, emerged from the copse at the rear of the church. At the first glance, Gabriel found it difficult to discover what the figures were, but as horse and rider swerved in the direction of the church, he saw that both were clad in white and flowing raiment. While he was gazing with all his eyes, another figure emerged from the copse, then another, and another, until thirteen white riders, including the leader, had come into view. Following one another at intervals, they marched around the church, observing the most profound silence. The hoofs of their horses made no sound. Three times this ghostly procession marched around the church. Finally they paused, each horseman at a window, save the leader, who, being taller than the rest, had stationed himself at the door.

He was the first to break the silence. "Brothers, is all well with you?"

his voice was strong and sonorous.

"All is not well," replied twelve voices in chorus.

"What do you see?" the impressive voice of the leader asked.

"Trouble, misery, blood!" came the answering chorus.

"Blood?" cried the leader.

"Yes, blood!" was the reply.

"Then all is well!"

"So mote it be! All is well!" answered twelve voices in chorus.

Once more the ghostly procession rode round and round the church, and then suddenly disappeared in the darkness. Gabriel rubbed his eyes. For an instant he believed that he had been dreaming. If ever there were goblins, these were they. The figures on horseback were so closely draped in white that they had no shape but height, and their heads and hands were not in view.

It may well be believed that the sudden appearance and disappearance of these apparitions produced consternation in the Rev. Jeremiah's congregation. The stranger who had been addressing them was left in a state of collapse. The only person in the building who appeared to be cool and sane was the man Hotchkiss. The negroes sat paralysed for an instant after the white riders had disappeared--but only for an instant, for, before you could breathe twice, those in the rear seats made a rush for the door. This movement precipitated a panic, and the entire congregation joined in a mad effort to escape from the building. The Rev. Jeremiah forgot the dignity of his position, and, umbrella in hand, emerged from a window, bringing the upper sash with him. Benches were overturned, and wild shrieks came from the women. The climax came when five pistol-shots rang out on the air.

Gabriel, in his tree, could hear the negroes running, their feet sounding on the hard clay like the furious scamper of a drove of wild horses. Years afterward, he could afford to laugh at the events of that night, but, at the moment, the terror of the negroes was contagious, and he had a mild attack of it.

The pistol-shots occurred as the Rev. Jeremiah emerged from the window, and were evidently in the nature of a signal, for before the echoes of the reports had died away, the white hors.e.m.e.n came into view again, and rode after the fleeing negroes. Gabriel did not witness the effect of this movement, but it came near driving the fleeing negroes into a frenzy. The white riders paid little attention to the mob itself, but selected the Rev. Jeremiah as the object of their solicitude.

He had bethought him of his dignity when he had gone a few hundred steps, and found he was not pursued, and, instead of taking to the woods, as most of his congregation did, he kept to the public road.

Before he knew it, or at least before he could leave the road, he found himself escorted by the entire band. Six rode on each side, and the leader rode behind him. Once he started to run, but the white riders easily kept pace with him, their horses going in a comfortable canter.

When he found that escape was impossible, he ceased to run. He would have stopped, but when he tried to do so he felt the hot breath of the leader's horse on the back of his neck, and the sensation was so unexpected and so peculiar, that the frightened negro actually thought that a chunk of fire, as he described it afterward, had been applied to his head. So vivid was the impression made on his mind that he declared that he had actually seen the flame, as it circled around his head; and he maintained that the back of his head would have been burned off if "de fier had been our kind er fier."

Finding that he could not escape by running, he began to walk, and as he was a man of great fluency of speech, he made an effort to open a conversation with his ghostly escort. He was perspiring at every pore, and this fact called for a frequent use of his red pocket-handkerchief.

"Blood!" cried the leader, and twelve voices repeated the word.

"Bosses--Marsters! What is I ever done to you?" To this there was no reply. "I ain't never hurted none er you-all; I ain't never had de idee er harmin' you. All I been doin' for dis long time, is ter try ter fetch sinners ter de mercy-seat. Dat's all I been doin', an' dat's all I wanter do--I tell you dat right now." Still there was no response, and the Rev. Jeremiah made bold to take a closer look at the riders who were within range of his vision. He nearly sunk in his tracks when he saw that each one appeared to be carrying his head under his arm. "Name er de Lord!" he cried; "who is you-all anyhow? an' what you gwineter do wid me?"

Silence was the only answer he received, and the silence of the riders was more terrifying than their talk would have been. "Ef you wanter know who been tryin' fer ter 'casion trouble, I kin tell you, an' dat mighty quick." But apparently the white riders were not seeking for information. They asked no questions, and the perspiration flowed more freely than ever from the Rev. Jeremiah's pores. Again his red handkerchief came out of his pocket, and again the rider behind him cried out "Blood!" and the others repeated the word.

The Rev. Jeremiah, in despair, caught at what he thought was the last straw. "Ef you-all think dey's blood on dat hankcher, you mighty much mistooken. 'Twuz red in de sto', long 'fo' I bought it, an' ef dey's any blood on it, I ain't put it dar--I'll tell you dat right now."

But there was no answer to his protest, and the ghostly cortege continued to escort him along the road. The white riders went with him through town and to the Tomlin Place. Once there, each one filed between him and the gate he was about to enter, and the last word of each was "Beware!"

CHAPTER NINETEEN

_Major Tomlin Perdue Arrives_

Gabriel was struck by the fact that Hotchkiss seemed to be undisturbed by the events that had startled and stampeded the negroes and the white stranger. He remained in the church for some time after the others were gone, and he showed no uneasiness whatever. He had seated himself on one of the deacons' chairs near the pulpit, and, with his head leaning on his hand, appeared to be lost in thought. After awhile--it seemed to be a very long time to Gabriel--he rose, put on his hat, blew out one by one the lamps that rested in sconces along the wall, and went out into the darkness.

Gabriel had remained in the tree, and with good reason. He knew that whoever fired the pistol, the reports of which added so largely to the panic among the negroes, was very close to the tree where he had hid himself, and so he waited, not patiently, perhaps, but with a very good grace. When Hotchkiss was out of sight, and presumably out of hearing, Gabriel heard some one calling his name. He made no answer at first, but the call was repeated in a tone sufficiently loud to leave no room for mistake.

"Tolliver, where are you? If you're asleep, wake up and show me a near-cut to town."

"Who are you?" Gabriel asked.

"One," replied the other.

"I don't know your voice," said Gabriel; "how did you know me?"

"That is a secret that belongs to the Knights of the White Camellia,"

answered the unknown. "If you don't come down, I'm afraid I'll have to shake you out of that tree. Can't you slide down without hurting your feelings?"

Gabriel slid down the trunk of the small tree as quickly as he could, and found that the owner of the voice was no other than Major Tomlin Perdue, of Halcyondale.

"You didn't expect to find me roosting around out here, did you?" the irrepressible Major asked, as he shook Gabriel warmly by the hand.

"Well, I fully expected to find you. Your grandmother told me an hour ago that I'd find you mooning about on the hills back there. I didn't find you because I didn't care to go about bawling your name; so I came around by the road. I was loafing around here when you came up, and I knew it was you, as soon as I heard you slipping up that tree. But that hill business, and the mooning--how about them? You're in love, I reckon. Well, I don't blame you. She's a fine gal, ain't she?"

"Who?" inquired Gabriel.

"Who!" cried Major Perdue, mockingly. "Why, there's but one gal in the Dale. You know that as well as I do. She never has had her match, and she'll never have one. And it's funny, too; no matter which way you spell her first name, backwards or forwards, it spells the same. Did you ever think of that, Tolliver? But for Vallic--you know my daughter, don't you?--I never would have found it out in the world."

Gabriel laughed somewhat sheepishly, wondering all the time how Major Perdue could think and talk of such trivial matters, in the face of the spectacle they had just witnessed.

"Well, you deserve good luck, my boy," the Major went on. "Everybody that knows you is singing your praises--some for your book-learning, some for your modesty, and some for the way you ferreted out the designs of that fellow who was last to leave the church."

"I'm sure I don't deserve any praise," protested Gabriel.

"Continue to feel that way, and you'll get all the more," observed the Major, sententiously. "But for you these dirty thieves might have got the best of us. Why, we didn't know, even at Halcyondale, what was up till we got word of your discovery. Well, sir, as soon as we found out what was going on, we got together, and wiped 'em up. Why, you've got the pokiest crowd over here I ever heard of. They just sit and sun themselves, and let these white devils do as they please. When they do wake up, the white rascals will be gone, and then they'll take their spite out of the n.i.g.g.e.rs--and the n.i.g.g.e.rs ain't no more to blame for all this trouble than a parcel of two-year-old children. You mark my words: the n.i.g.g.e.rs will suffer, and these white rascals will go scot-free. Why don't the folks here wake up? They can't be afraid of the Yankee soldiers, can they? Why the Captain here is a rank Democrat in politics, and a right down clever fellow."

"He is a clever gentleman," Gabriel a.s.sented. "I have met him walking about in the woods, and I like him very much. He is a Kentuckian, and he's not fond of these carpet-baggers and scalawags at all. But I never told anybody before that he is a good friend of mine. You know how they are, especially the women--they hate everything that's clothed in blue."

"Well, by George! you are the only person in the place that keeps his eyes open, and finds out things. You saw that rascal talking to the n.i.g.g.e.rs awhile ago, didn't you? Well, he's the worst of the lot. He has been preaching his social equality doctrine over in our town, but I happened to run across him t'other day, and I laid the law down to him.

I told him I'd give him twenty-four hours to get out of town. He stayed the limit; but when he saw me walk downtown with my shot-gun, he took a notion that I really meant business, and he lit out. Minervy Ann found out where he was headed for, and I've followed him over here. He's the worst of the lot, and they're all rank poison."

Major Perdue paused a moment in his talk, as if reflecting. "Can you keep a secret, Tolliver?" he asked after awhile.