Rodman the Keeper Part 39

Allison was the belle of the ball. He danced charmingly, and murmured the most delightful things to all his partners in rapid succession. He was the only man in full evening-dress present, and the pink flush on his cheeks, and his tall, slender figure swaying around in the waltz, were long remembered in Ellerby. Honor was there in a white muslin which had been several times washed and repaired; there was no flow to her drapery, and she looked awkward. She was pale and silent. Mrs.

Kellinger, clothed to the chin and wrists, with no p.r.o.nounced color about her, was the one noticeable woman present. Royce did not dance. He found the rooms hot and the people tiresome; he was in a fever to be off. Stephen sat on the piazza, and looked in through the window. At one o'clock it was over. Allison had danced every dance. He went back to the inn with his pockets stuffed with gloves, withered rose-buds, knots of ribbon, and even, it was whispered, a lock of golden hair. The next hour, in the deep darkness, the troops started.

At five minutes before eleven the next morning, Stephen was bringing his algebra-lesson to a close, when a distant clatter in the gorge was heard, a tramping sound; men were running out of the mill opposite and gazing curiously up the road. Honor was at the window in a flash, Stephen beside her. The troops were returning. They had laid hands upon a mountain-wagon and marched upon each side of it like a guard of honor.

Royce sat in the wagon, his face hidden in his hands.

"Where is Mr. Allison?" said Honor, and her voice was but a whisper. She stood back of the curtain, trembling violently.

Royce did not look up as the procession pa.s.sed the library; without a word Wainwright and Honor went out, locked the door behind them, and followed the wagon toward the village. Everybody did the same; the houses were emptied of their dwellers. The whole village came together to see the body of the boy-officer lifted out and carried into the inn.

Allison was dead.

The b.u.t.tons on his uniform gleamed as they bore him in, and his white hands hung lifelessly down. He had fought like a tiger, they said, and had led his men on with the most intrepid, daring courage to the very last. It seemed that they had fallen into an ambuscade, and had accomplished nothing. Singularly enough, the young lieutenant was the only one killed; Royce was sure that he had seen one of the outlaws deliberately single him out and fire--a dark, haggard-looking fellow.

Stephen took Honor up to Adelaide's parlor. Adelaide was there wringing her hands. She had fastened the boy's collar for him at two o'clock the night before, when he had rather absurdly pretended that he could not make it stay b.u.t.toned; and she had tapped him on the cheek reprovingly for his sentimental looks. "This ball has spoiled you, foolish boy," she had said; "march off into the mountains and get rid of this nonsense."

Ah, well, he was well rid of it now!

Honor stood as if transfixed, listening. Presently the door opened, and Royce came in. "Let me get somewhere where I am not ashamed to cry," he said; and, sinking down, he laid his head upon his arms on the table and cried like a child. Honor went out of the room hastily; she hardly noticed that Stephen was with her. When she reached the ravine, she, too, sank down on the gra.s.s, out of sight of the house, and sobbed as though her heart would break. Stephen looked at her irresolutely, then moved away some paces, and, sitting down on a stump, waited. Honor had danced with Allison: could it be--but no; it was only the sudden horror of the thing.

Allison was buried in the little village churchyard; the whole country-side came to the funeral. The old Episcopal rector read the burial-service, and his voice shook a little as the young head was laid low in the deep grave. Brother Bethuel had come down from the mountains on Marcher, and had asked permission to lead the singing; he stood by the grave, and, with uncovered head and uplifted eyes, sang with marvelous sweetness and power an old Methodist hymn, in which all the throng soon joined. The young girls who had danced at the ball sobbed aloud. Honor alone stood tearless; but she had brought her choicest roses to lay over the dead boy's feet, where no one could see them, and she had stooped and kissed his icy forehead in the darkened room before he was carried out: Stephen saw her do it. After the funeral, Brother Bethuel and Honor went away together; Stephen returned to the inn.

Adelaide had taken upon herself the task of answering the letters.

Allison had no father or mother, but his other relatives and friends were writing. Royce, his one young burst of grief over, went about sternly, his whole soul set on revenge. Now troops came: an officer of the United States army had been killed, and the Department was aroused at last. There were several officers at Ellerby now, older men than Allison and more experienced; a new expedition was to be sent into the mountains to route these banditti and make an end of them. Royce was going as guide; he knew where the former attack had been made, and he knew, also, the detective's reasons for suspecting Eagle k.n.o.b, the detective himself being now out of the field, owing to brain-fever: the United States authorities had ordered him out of jail, and he was at the inn, having his fever comfortably on the ground-floor. Honor was with Adelaide almost constantly now. The elder woman, who always received her caressingly, seemed puzzled by the girl's peculiar manner. She said little, but sat and listened to every word, turning her dark eyes slowly from one speaker to the next. Royce came and went, brought in his maps, talked, and every now and then made the vases on the table ring as he brought down his strong hand with an emphasis of defiance.

"I can not study," Honor had said to Stephen when he made some allusion to their morning hours. She said it simply, without excuse or disguise; he did not ask her again.

The expedition was to start on Monday night. The whole village, in the mean time, had been carefully intrusted with the secret that it was to go on Tuesday. But on Sunday evening Honor discovered that before midnight the hounds were to be let slip. The very soldiers themselves did not know it. How did the girl learn it, then? She divined it from some indefinable signs in Royce. Even Adelaide did not suspect it; and Stephen saw only the girl's own restlessness. She slipped away like a ghost--so like one that Stephen himself did not see her go. He followed her, however, almost immediately; it was too late for her to go through the village alone. He was some distance behind her. To his surprise, she did not go homeward, but walked rapidly down toward the river-road.

There was fickle moonlight now and then; he dropped still farther behind, and followed her, full of conjecture, which was not so much curiosity as pain. It was still early in the evening, yet too late for her to be out there on the river-road alone. This innocent young girl--this child--where, where was she going? He let her walk on for a mile, and then he made up his mind that he must stop her. They were far beyond the houses now, and the road was lonely and wild; the roar of the river over its broad, rock-dotted, uneven bed, hid the sound of his footsteps as he climbed up the steep bank, ran forward, and came down into the road in advance of her.

"Where are you going, Miss Honor?" he said, showing himself, and speaking quietly.

She started back, and gasped out his name.

"Yes, it is I," he answered, "Stephen Wainwright. I am alone; you need not be frightened."

She came close up to him and took his hand.

"Do not stop me," she said entreatingly. "I am on an errand of life and death!"

"I will go in your place, Honor."

"You can not."

"Yes, I can. But _you_ shall not."

"Will you betray me, then?" she said, in an agonized tone.

"No; but you will tell me what it is, and I will go for you."

"I tell you, you can not go."

"Why?"

"You do not know; and, besides--you would not."

"I will do anything you ask me to do," said Stephen.

"Anything?"

"Anything."

She hesitated, looking at him.

"Do you give me your word?"

"I do."

"But--but it is an enormous thing you are doing for me."

"I know it is."

"Oh, let me go--let me go myself!" she cried suddenly, with a half sob; "it is so much better."

"I will never let you go," said Stephen. His voice was inflexible. She surveyed him tremulously, hopelessly; then sank down upon her knees, praying, but not to him. Stephen took off his hat, and waited, bareheaded. It was but a moment; then she rose. "My cousin, Richard Eliot, my uncle's eldest son, has been with these men, at one of their hiding-places, for some months. My uncle knows nothing of it; but Brother Bethuel is in the secret, and keeps watch of him."

"Your cousin is Masters, then?"

"He is. Ask no more questions, but hasten on; take the first broad trail which leaves the road on the right, follow it until you come to Brother Bethuel's house; you can not miss it; it is the only one. He will guide you to the place where Richard is, and you must warn him that the troops are coming."

"Only one question, Honor. Come out into the moonlight; give me both your hands. Do you love this man?"

He looked at her fixedly. She gave a quick, strong start, as though she must break away from him at all hazards, and turned darkly red, the deep, almost painful, blush of the brunette. Her hands shook in his grasp, tears of shame rose in her eyes; it was as though some one had struck her in the face.

"Do you love this Eliot?" repeated Stephen, compelling her still to meet his eyes.

She drew in her breath suddenly, and answered, with a rush of quick words: "No, no, no! Not in the way you mean. But he is my cousin. Go!"

He went. Nearly two miles farther down the road the trail turned off; it climbed directly up a glen by the side of a brook which ran downward to the river in a series of little waterfalls. It was wide enough for a horse, and showed the track of Marcher's hoofs. It came out on a flank of the mountain and turned westward, then northward, then straight up again through the thick woods to a house whose light shone down like a beacon, and guided him.

Wainwright knocked; Brother Bethuel opened, started slightly, then recovered himself, and welcomed his guest effusively.

"Is there any one in the house besides ourselves?" said Stephen, ignorant as to whether there was or was not a Mrs. Head. There was; but she had gone, with her five offspring, to visit her mother in Tennessee.

"Then," said Stephen, "take me immediately to Richard Eliot."

The little minister stared innocently at his guest.

"Take you where?" he repeated, with surprised face.

"Come," said Stephen, "you need not conceal. Miss Dooris herself sent me. I am to warn this Eliot that the troops are on the way--have probably already left Ellerby."

The little man, convinced, sprang for his lantern, lighted it, and hurried out, followed by Wainwright. He ran more than he walked; he climbed over the rocks; he galloped down the gullies and up the other side; he said not a word, but hurried, closely followed by Stephen, who was beginning to feel spent, until he reached the foot of a wall of rock, the highest ledge of Eagle k.n.o.b. Here he stood still and whistled.