The Graysons: A Story of Illinois

XVIII

ZEKE

Two things lay heavy on Zeke Tucker's mind as he hastened toward Britton's. For the life of him he could not tell whether Perrysburg was the destination to which Bob wished to send Jake, or whether Jake might not be right in supposing that Bob had incautiously betrayed his own secret. But this was Bob's affair; what troubled him most was to devise a way by which he could get possession of a piece of candle. Mrs. Britton would not allow a hired man to have a light. "Any man that could n' feel 'is way into bed mus' be simple," she said.

Zeke found the old people out of bed later than usual. Mrs. Britton had been churning, and the butter "took a contrary streak," as she expressed it, and refused to come until she and the old man had churned alternately for two hours. She was working the butter when Zeke came in and sat down. Watching his chance, he managed to snatch a tiny bit of candle-end that had been carefully laid up on the mantel-piece. But when Mrs. Britton's lighted candle flickered in its socket, she went to get the piece that was already in Zeke's pocket.

"I declare to goodness," she said, as she fumbled among the bits of string and other trumpery on the shelf, "where's that piece of candle gone to? Do you know, Cyrus?"

This question was addressed to her husband, who never did know where anything she wanted "had gone to." But she always gave vent to her feelings by asking him, and he always answered, as he did now, with an impassive "No."

"Zeke, d' you see that short piece of candle that was here on the shelf?"

Zeke rose and affected to look for it.

"I don't see nothin' uv it," he said at length.

"Well, if the rats ain't a-gittin' no better fast. Who'd a' believed they'd 'a' got up on the shelf?" So saying, she reluctantly lighted a fresh candle to take her butter to the spring.

By the time she was well out of the back door, Zeke, with one eye on the lethargic Britton, who was now a-doze in his chair, raked a hot coal from the ashes, and blowing it to a flame lighted his bit of candle with it. Then he quickly climbed to the loft, and opening the window-shutter put the candle in the glassless window on the side of the chimney toward Perrysburg. He was shivering for fear the old woman would see the light, though she was at the other end of the house, and he was yet more afraid that Bob would not see it before it should burn out. Hearing, at length, the crack of Bob's rifle, he extinguished the expiring wick and slipped down the ladder without arousing the slumbering old man.

"I expect they's another man shot," said Mrs. Britton, when she came back. If she had ever been a planter's wife her pronunciation had probably degenerated, though her archaic speech was perhaps a shade better than the "low down" language of Broad Run.

"Why?" asked Zeke.

"Oh! I heerd a gun go off, un guns ain't common at 9 o'clock at night. An' I thought I saw a flicker uv light in our loft jus' now, but it went out as soon as the gun went off. It made me feel creepy, like the house was ha'nted." And she again began to look on the mantel-piece for the lost bit of candle which she was loath to give up.

"I'm a-goin' to bed," said Zeke, "ghos's ur no ghos's"; and he again mounted the ladder. After he had lain on the bed with his clothes on for an hour, keeping himself awake with difficulty, he felt sure that the old couple below stairs must be sound asleep. He softly opened the square window, the wooden shutter of which made no sound, as it swung on hinges of leather cut from an ancient boot-top. Then he climbed out on the projecting ends of the sticks which composed the chimney, and cautiously descended to the ground.

"Cyrus!" said Mrs. Britton to her husband; "didn't you hear that noise?"

"What noise?"

"That scratchin' kind-uh noise inside of the chimbley."

"No, I don't hear nothin'"; and the old man made haste to resume his sleep where he had left off.

"I do believe this house is ha'nted," sighed Mrs. Britton to herself.

The next morning when she woke up she called out, according to her wont, to the hired man in the loft: "Zeke! Zeke! O Zeke!"

She got no reply. Vexed of all things that a hired man should lose a minute of time, she called again in vain. A minute later she was about to get up and go to the ladder so as to be better heard, when there came to her the sound of Zeke chopping wood at the back door.

"Well, ef the world ain't a-comin' to 'n end, when Zeke Tucker gits up an' goes to choppin' of 'is own accord!"

When Zeke came in to breakfast, she said: "You're out bright and airly this mornin."

"Yes; I could n' sleep."

"D' you hear that scratchin' in the chimbley?"

"Ya-as," said Zeke, with hesitation. He was relieved that the conversation should be broken at this point by the entrance of the old man from the stable.

"Zeke," said Britton, as he drew his chair to the table, "what's the matter with ole Gray?"

"I never noticed nothin' when I gin him 'is oats. But 't wuzn't fa'rly light then."

"He's been rode. They's sweat marks onto him, un the saddle's wet yet."

The old woman put down her knife and fork. "That's witch-work," she said. "First, the butter wouldn't come, then I lost that piece of candle; un it's tee-totally gone too. Now rats don't never git up onto that shelf. Then I see a flicker of light in the loft while I was puttin' away the butter, an' you 'n' Zeke a-settin' h-yer by the fire. Then I wuz waked up by that scritch-scratchin' soun' in the chimbley, fer all the world like somebody a-climbin' down into the room, though they wa'n't nobody clum down, fer I listened. It kep' Zeke awake all night an roused 'im out airly this mornin'. Th' ain't nothin' short of witch-work gits Zeke up an' sets him to choppin' wood 'thout callin'. An' it's been a-ridin' ole Gray. Maybe the ghost of that feller that wuz shot over 't the camp-meetin' 's a-ha'ntin' roun' the country, like. I don' b'lieve it'll ever be quiet tell the feller that shot 'im's hung."

The old man was very taciturn, and Zeke could not divine whether he was impressed by his wife's mysterious "it," or whether, suspecting the truth about old Gray, he thought best to say nothing. For if anything should set Mrs. Britton going she would not stop scolding for days, and Britton knew well that Zeke would not be the chief sufferer in such a tempest.

As soon as he had eaten his breakfast Zeke went out to dig early potatoes in Britton's farther field. About 9 o'clock a clod of earth came flying past his legs and broke upon his hoe. He turned to look, and saw another one thrown from the corn-field near by ascending in a hyperbolic curve and then coming down so near to his head that he moved out of the way. He laid down his hoe and climbed the fence into the corn-field, which at this time of the year was a dense forest of green stalks higher than a man's head. Bob McCord was here awaiting Zeke. He had left Lazar Brown's horse tied in a neighboring papaw patch.

"Did you go to Perrysburg?" began Bob.

"Yes," said Zeke. "You played it onto 'em good. I wuz ruther more 'n half fooled myself. I 'lowed sometimes ut maybe S'manthy had come it over you."

Bob laughed all through his large frame.

"When we got to Perrysburg un come to wake up the shurruff he wuz skeered, un ast what 't wuz we wuz arter.

"'That murderer,' says Jake Hogan, like a ghos' fum behin' his false-face.

"'What murderer?' says the shurruff. 'They hain't no murderer in the jail.'

"'They hain't, sonny?' says Jake, weth sech a swing. 'You ketch us with yer dodrotted foolin',' says he; 'we hain't the kind to be fooled. We know what we're about afore we begin, we do. We hain't the sort to be tuck in by lawyers nur nobody else,' says he.

"'I tell you they hain't no murderer h-yer,' says the shurruff, says he.

"'Tie 's han's, boys,' says Jake, in Jake's way, yeh know, like as if he wuz king uv all creation."

"Weth Eelenoys throwed in like a spool uv thread, to make the bargain good," suggested Bob, losing all prudence and giving way to a long, unrestrained peal of laughter.

"Jes' so," said Zeke. "When we come to the jail un got the door open they wuzn't nobody thar but Sam Byfiel', the half-crazy feller that wuz through h-yer last ye'r a-playin' his fool tricks, un a man name' Simmons, as had stole half a cord uh wood. Simmons was that skeered when we come in, 't 'e got down on 'is knees un begged, un whined, un sniffled, un says, 'Boys,' says he, 'I hain't noways purpared to die. Don't hang me, un I won't never steal nothin' ag'in,' says he."

"I'll bet Byfiel' wuzn't skeered," said Bob.

"Not him. He'd been a-playin' the angel Gaberl about Perrysburg weth a long tin horn, blowin' it into people's winders at midnight, just to skeer 'em un hear 'em howl, un the watchman had jugged him. Jake says, says he, 'Sam Byfiel', tell us whar that air murderer is.' Jake put 'is voice away down in 'is boots, – it sounded like a mad bull a-bellerin'. But Sam jest lif's Jake's false-face, this away, un peeps under, un says, 'Jake Hogan,' says 'e, 'I knowed it mus' be you by yer big-feelin' ways. It's mighty hard fer a man that's a nateral born to make a fool uv hisself; but, Jake, I'll be derned ef you hain't gone un done it this time.'

"'Hain't Tom Grayson h-yer?' says Jake.

"'No,' says Byfiel'. 'Somebody's been a-greenin' on you, Jake; Tom hain't never been h-yer,' says he.

"'Aw, you're a lunatic, Sam,' says Jake.

"'Ditto, brother,' says Byfiel'.

"The shurruff's folks had run out, un 'bout this time they'd began to raise the neighbors, un somebody run to the Prisbaterian church un commenced to pull away on the new church bell, 't a man Down East sent 'em. We thought we'd better be a-lightin' out mighty soon. But time we wuz in our saddles crack went a gun fum behin' the court-house. I s'pose 't wuz shot into the air to skeer us; but Jake, like a fool, out weth his pistol un shot back. The Perrysburg people wuz like a bee-gum that's been upsot. The people was now a-runnin', some one way un some t'other, un more guns wuz fired off fum summers, – we never stopped to eenquire fum whar, tell we'd got safe acrost the county line. One uv them guns must 'a' been a rifle, un it must 'a' been shot in bloody yarnest, fer I heerd the bullet whiz."

"You never stopped to say good-bye!" said Bob.

"Not me! Ole Gray wuz the very fust hoss that pulled hisself acrost the corporation line. I didn' seem to feel no interest in stayin', noways."

"What's Jake goin' to do nex' thing?" asked Bob, not yet recovered from his merriment.

"Wal, about half the fellers rode straight on home un wouldn't talk to Jake at all, 'cept maybe to cuss 'im now un then fer a fool, on'y fit to hole a snipe-bag fer Bob McCord. They swore they wuz done go'n' under sech as him. But Jake ain't the kind to gin it up; he says 'f 'e kin get a dozen he's boun' to go a Sunday night when they'll be lots of fellers about the camp-meetin', un some uh them'll go too, maybe."

"We'll have to see about that," said Bob, getting up. "But you stick to Jake, closte ez a cuckle-burr."

"All right," said Zeke, remembering his potato patch and looking ruefully at the ascending sun as he hurried back to his work.

Bob went on his way and returned the horse to Lazar Brown's house; but Uncle Lazar was nowhere to be seen, and S'manthy was evidently out of humor.

"S'manthy, yer 's yer hoss," said Bob.

"Wal, you thes let 'im loose thar; I hain't got no time to bauther."

"How'd the boys come out las' night down 't Moscow?"

"Aw, I don' know, un I don' keer, neither. You're a low-lived passel uh loafers, all uh yeh, big an' leetle."

"W'y, S'manthy! You wuz that sweet las' night."

S'manthy was in a hurry about something, but she showed her irregular teeth as she disappeared around a corner of the cabin, looking back over her shoulder to say:

"You'e a purty one, hainch yeh, now?"

Bob's face shone with delight as he went on up the run to look for the bear's cubs. He succeeded in killing one of them and capturing the other alive, but he had to take them and his wounded dog home afoot. It seemed too great a venture to ask S'manthy to lend the horse a second time.

XIX

THE MYTH

Jake's leadership had received a severe blow, and Bob could hardly believe that he would be able to muster a company again. But Hogan's vindictiveness and persistence rendered it probable that he would not rest in his present ridiculous position without making an effort to redeem himself, even if he had to act with a small party.

"You see," Bob explained to Mason that Saturday night, "Jake's got the most p'ison kind uv hold-on you ever seed. He's shore to try't over, fust or last."

"He won't let you fool him again," said Mason.

Bob smiled and picked up a chip, which he began to whittle as an aid to reflection.

"It would be a juberous thing to try again. But I'm goin' to see Pete Markham in the mornin'. He'll go apast h-yer to the camp-meetin', fer he's a Methodis' by marriage, – that is, his wife's a member, un that makes Pete feel 'z if he wuz a kind-uv a member-in-law. Un Pete knows mighty well 't when the time comes roun' fer him to run fer office, it'll be worth while to know pussidin' elders, un circus-riders, un locus' preachers, un exhausters, un all sorts uv camp-meetin' people. Pete's jes' as shore to go to camp-meetin' a Sunday mornin' 'z a bear is to eat honey when he comes acrost a tumble-down bee-tree."

The next morning Bob stood in his shirt-sleeves leaning over Mrs. Grayson's gate and watching the people that rode to the great Sunday assembly at the Union camp-ground. Many a staid plow-horse, with collar-marks on his shoulders, had been diligently curried and brushed to transform him into a stylish saddle-nag; and many a young man, with hands calloused by ax-helve and plow-handle, rode to-day in his Sunday best with a blooming girl by his side, or behind him, and with the gay heart of a troubadour in his breast. Fresh calico dresses, in which the dominant tint was either a bright pink or a positive blue, were flaunted with more pride than a princess feels in her lace and pearls. The woman who has worked and schemed and skimped to achieve her attire knows the real pleasure and victory of self-adornment.

The early comers of this Sunday-morning procession are, in the main, Methodists going to eat bread and water with the brethren in the 9 o'clock love-feast assembly, to sing together the touching songs of fellowship, and to tell, and to hear told, the stories of personal trials and sorrows, – to taste the pleasure of being one of a great company wrought to ecstasy by a common religious passion. But as the summer sun mounts higher, the road is more and more thronged with a miscellaneous company. For at 11 o'clock the presiding elder, a great man of all the country round, will preach one of his favorite sermons, and all the world – believers and scoffers, doctors and lawyers, and judges and politicians – will be there to hear him marshal in new forms the oft-repeated arguments in favor of the divine origin of Christianity, or the truth of the Arminian system of Wesley, and to admire the dramatic effect of his well-told anecdotes and the masterly pathos of his peroration. The people no longer go in couples; there are six and even ten in a group. And how well they sit their saddles! There is no "rising to the trot," in the ungraceful fashion of New York and Boston gentlemen and ladies who have put away the tradition of ancestors of unrivaled horsemanship, to adopt from England an ugly custom excusable only in a land of fox-hunting. You might find girls in their teens in this company who ride with grace and dash over difficult roads, and who could learn nothing worth their while from a riding-master, – for to ride perfectly consists chiefly in riding as naturally and unconsciously as one walks, and that is rarely given to any but those that are to the saddle born. But besides saddle-horses there are wagons, for wherever there is a prairie, wheels come early. One or two families not yet out of a pioneer state of existence go creaking painfully along in ox-carts; and there are barefoot boys skurrying afoot across fields to save distance. Everybody feels bound to go. The attraction of a crowd is proportioned to its greatness, like all other gravitation, and this one will drain the country dry of people. Scarcely any one stays at home, as you see. There are little children in the wagons and on the croups of the saddle-horses, while some supernumerary ones are held in place on the withers; it is in this way that the babies get their first lessons in horsemanship. At half-past 10 o'clock the roads are beclouded with dust that drifts to leeward, turning the green blades of the corn-field to gray and grizzling the foliage of the trees. All along the road there is the sound of voices in many keys – but all with a touch of holiday buoyancy in them. There is that universal interchange of good feeling which is only found in communities that have no lines of social cleavage. Everybody is talking to everybody, – about the weather, the crops, the latest weddings, the most recent deaths, and, above all, the murder at the camp-meeting. To this topic every party drifts when the Grayson farm-house comes in sight, if not before. Wild stories are repeated of Tom's profligacy, and of the causes that led to the feud between him and Lockwood. As the people come nearer to the house their voices fall into a lower tone, and they ride by the front gate in almost entire silence, scanning the house with eager curiosity, as though trying to penetrate the chagrin of those within. They all nod to Bob; it is the common and indispensable civility of the country. Bob nods to all in turn and grunts in a friendly way at those with whom he is acquainted; but to his best friends he gives a cheerful "Howdy!"

At length the deputy sheriff, Markham, appears, riding alongside of his wife. She is also escorted on the other side by Magill, the county clerk, who is saying the pleasantest things he can think of to her. When Markham arrives at a point nearly opposite the gate, Bob does not nod, but gives his head a significant jerk backward and to the left, – a laconic invitation to stop a moment, rendered the more explicit by the utterance in a low tone of a single word, "Pete!" Markham draws rein and stops to hear what Bob has to say; and Mason, who has come out on the porch at that moment, descends to the gate to talk with Magill and Mrs. Markham, who have also pulled up. The whole five are presently engaged in conversation in one group, while the horses amuse themselves by thrusting their dusty noses through the cracks of the fence to nibble at such blades of grass as are within their reach. The sight of the deputy sheriff and the county clerk in front of the Grayson house piques yet more the curiosity of the passers-by, who wonder what those privileged folks can be talking about.

"You cannot do that," Markham said presently, in reply to a suggestion that came from Mason. "It's no use talking to the sheriff about moving Tom to Perrysburg. He's made up his mind not to move him; and if he did move him, Perrysburg wouldn't be a safe place."

"The shairiff seems to have one eye on Broad Run, ainh Pate?" said Magill chaffingly.

But Pete Markham neither smiled nor said anything in reply.

"It's a shame something can't be done for Tom," said Mason. "He's got a right to a fair trial; and we think he's innocent."

"I'll do anything I can," said Markham, whose memory had been haunted by the appealing face of Mrs. Grayson ever since his domiciliary visit in search of Tom's pistol.

"I'm not caring much whether he's innocent or not, meself," said Magill. "May be Lockwood aggravated 'im an' naded puttin' out of the way. All I say is, Tom faced that crowd the other day like a man, an' he's a born gintleman in me own istimation; an' I'd niver let a gintleman be hung by a gang of blackguards, if I could help it."

"Broad Run don't vote for you, Magill," said Markham.

"You wouldn't ixpict it to vote for a man with a clane shirt on, now would ye?"

"Well," said Bob, "I've been a-thinkin' that ef Pete could make people b'lieve that they wuz another man wanted fer the shootin', it would sort uh muddle Jake's plans fer a while, un by that time liker'n not Abe Lincoln'll find out who the rale murderer is."

"Tell me what's the color of his hair, Pate?" said Magill. "Then I'll help you foind him."

"Well," drawled Markham, turning a little sidewise in the saddle to rest himself, and looking perfectly serious and secretive, "I haven't found out about his hair, – he wore a straw hat, you know. But he was a youngish fellow, with foxy whiskers under his chin."

"Middlin' small?" suggested Magill, with a faint pucker of drollery about the corner of his mouth.

"Yes," said Markham, biting the butt of his beech switch meditatively. "Ruther under the average, I should say, without being small."

"One eye a leetle crossed?" Bob McCord inquired, laughing.

"Right eye a little out," said Markham, waving his hand outwardly. "He had quarreled with Lockwood a good while ago and owed him a grudge. That's the man."

"Know his name?" put in Magill.

"N-o. That's one thing we're trying to find out. He come from off East where Lockwood used to live. We've got to try to find if anybody knows which way he went when he left the camp-meetin' that night, and if anybody can tell just where he come from."

"Oh! I understand now what you're after," said Magill. "There'll be a plinty will remimber the man when you come to spake about him. Don't you say what you want him fer. L'ave all explinations to me. I'm not responsible, an' I'll let out the saycrits of the shairiff's office."

The passers-by had grown visibly fewer in the last few minutes, and now the belated ones rode for the most part in a rapid trot or a gallop. Mrs. Markham began to warn her husband that there would not be a seat left; so the horses' heads were drawn up, and the trio set forward with a nod of good-bye to Bob and the schoolmaster.

Markham went to work in all seriousness to get information about the imaginary young man with red whiskers under his chin and an outward cast in one eye who had been seen on the ground the night of the murder. Magill took occasion to remark that if the praycher 'd only 'a' known what Markham was looking for, and all about the rale facts of the murder, he mightn't have held Tom up for an awful warnin' to the young that mornin'. But he supposed it did not matter whether you had the roight fellow or the wrong one, if you were only praychin'. Some of those who heard the clerk describe the smallish man with the red goatee and one eye out a little, thought they could remember having seen a man answering to this description; but as they could not give any information tending to secure his arrest, Magill did not think it worth while communicating their knowledge to Markham. But he quoted their sayings and surmises to the next persons he spoke to; so that, without ever straining his conscience to the point of positively asserting the substantive existence of such a red-whiskered young man with a squint, he had almost come to believe in him by the time the day was over.