She quickly closed the door behind her and sped off down the line of now lightless cabins. A man stepped out of the black shadow beyond the second cabin and stood in her path. She did not pause, but walked swiftly, fearlessly up to him, her heart quickening under the thrill of exultation. He was waiting for her! He had been waiting for her all the long evening. The time had come!
The night was dark now; a strong wind had sprung up to drive the black and storm-laden clouds across the moonlit sky. She held out her hands with a little moan of ecstasy,—and then she was in his strong, crushing arms, pressed fiercely to his breast.
“God, can I believe,—is it true? You have come,—you have come of your own free will,—you are here in my arms!” His hot lips found hers in a wild, passionate kiss. “Speak to me! Tell me it is all real,—that I am not dreaming. Oh, Ruth, Ruth,—darling!”
Her body stiffened. A convulsive shudder raced over her, and then, for an instant, she was limp and heavy in his embrace. Then suddenly she threw her arms about his neck and kissed him furiously, savagely, again and again,—breaking away at last with a low, suffocating laugh.
“Now,—now,-” she cried, “now, what are you going to do with me?”
He lifted his head with a jerk, peering into her face, slow to realize the incredible mistake he had made. He was still under the spell of the riotous passion that her lustful response had aroused. It had rushed over him like a great, resistless wave,—hot, delicious, tingling. He had been amazed, bewildered by the unbelievable craving,—furious and uncontrolled,—which she revealed in her momentary surrender to the elemental. The truth began to dawn upon him even before she spoke. Could this be Ruth,—could this unbridled, voluptuous wanton who clung to him and smothered him with kisses be the pure, high-minded girl he had grown to love and revere? She spoke, and then he knew that the consuming fire in his blood was unholy,—as unholy as the spark that set it ablaze.
“Damn you!” he whispered hoarsely,—but he did not put her away from him. The lure of the flesh was upon him. It was stronger than his will, stronger than his love.
For months this woman had beguiled him. There had been times when he was compelled to fight himself,—times when he asked: “Why not?”
She was alluring, she was frankly a sensualist; but she was patient, she was crafty. She knew that he was honourably in love with another, but she was not deterred by that nor by the conviction that her conquest, if she prevailed, would be transitory. She had a code of her own. It included an uncertain element of honour, fixed rather rigidly upon what she would have called constancy. Singleness of purpose was her notion of morality. She would not have believed herself to be a bad woman any more than she would have looked upon her lover as a bad man. To her, morality in its accepted sense signified no more than the suppression of human emotions and human sensations. As a matter of fact, she considered herself a good woman if for no other reason than that she steadfastly had repelled the munificent appeals of countless infatuated men. Treasure had been laid at her feet, only to be kicked aside. She calmly spoke of herself as a pearl without price. She was content to possess, but not to be possessed. That was what she called self-respect. She was a pagan, but she was her own idol. She worshipped herself. She would never permit her idol to be desecrated.
All this Percival knew,—or rather sensed. He was not above feeling a queer sort of respect and admiration for her. She was not without integrity.
He had reached the pinnacle of happiness in believing that the girl he loved was in his arms. He was blind and deaf with ecstasy. The awakening was a shock. His senses reeled for an instant,—and then Ruth Clinton went out of his thoughts entirely!
“Damn you!” he cried again, and drew her close. “She hates me,—she will always hate me,” he was mumbling. “Why should I care? Why should I refuse to take—” Her lips were on his again, warm, firm, voluptuous, drawing his heart's blood with the resistless power of a magnet.
They did not hear the rapid approach of footsteps—heavy, swift as of one running. A dark, panting figure raced past them, and then another but a few paces behind.
Percival's senses were released. They cast off the bewitching bonds. His head went up again. In a flash his brain was clear. His arms were still about her, she was still lying close against him,—but the current of passion that consumed both of them was checked.
“What was that?” she gasped, as if coming out of a dream.
He released her, and sprang out into the path to peer fruitlessly after the unseen runners. The sound of footsteps was rapidly diminishing.
They were suddenly aware of women's voices far away to the right. They were indistinct but there was a sinister significance in the ever-increasing volume.
“There's trouble out there,” said Percival. “Something wrong. Come,—come along! You must get indoors at once.” He grasped her arm and started rapidly off in the direction of her cabin. She stumbled at first, but quickly fell into stride with him. Men's shouts were now added to the clamour.
“I know,—I know,” she cried in his ear. “It has happened, just as I said it would. Some of these men are beasts.”
“Then, there's hell to pay,” he grated.
They reached her cabin just as the door was thrown open. The three startled coryphees filled the entrance. Recognition was followed by a clatter of agitated voices. Olga was fairly dragged into the cabin.
“Bolt your door,” was Percival's command as he turned away.
She stood in the door for a moment, looking after him. He passed out of the radius of light. The chorus of voices grew louder down the way,—like the make-believe mob in the theatre.
Then she closed the door slowly, reluctantly. The three girls watched her in silence as she stood for many seconds with her hand on the knob, her eyes tightly shut.
She turned and faced them. There was a wry smile on her lips as she shrugged her shoulders and spread out her hands in a gesture of resignation.
“Yes,—bolt the door,” she said. As Alma hesitated, her eyes grew hard, her voice imperative. “Do you know of any reason why you should not do as both Mr. Percivail and I have commanded?”
“No,—no, Madame,” cried Alma hastily.
As the heavy wooden bolt fell into place, Olga again shrugged her shoulders and threw herself into a chair in front of the fireplace.
“Put on your clothes,” she ordered.
“What is happening, Madame? What is all the noise about?” questioned one of the girls.
But there was no answer. Olga was staring into the fire.
Percival's blood was still in a tumult as he ran down the line of cabins. From every doorway men were now stumbling, half-dressed, half-asleep. Behind them, in many cabins, alarmed, agitated women appeared. Farther on there were lanterns and a chaotic mass of moving objects. Above the increasing clamour rose the horrible, uncanny wail of a woman. Percival's blood cooled, his brain cleared. Men shouted questions as he passed, and obeyed his command to follow.
The ugly story is soon told. Philippa, the fifteen-year-old daughter of Pedro, the head-farmer, had gone out from her father's cabin at dusk to fetch water from the little reservoir that had been constructed alongside Leap Frog River a short distance above the cabins. The pool was a scant two hundred yards from her home. It was a five minutes' walk there and back. Half-an-hour passed, and she had not returned. Her mother became uneasy. Pedro reassured her. He laughed at her fears.
“She could not have fallen into the pool,” he said. “You forget the fence we have built around it.”
“I am not thinking of the pool, Pedro,” she argued. “Go you at once and search for her. She is no laggard. She has not stopped in to see one of the girls.”
And Pedro went grumpily forth to search for his daughter. An hour later he came staggering down from the woods above the pool to meet the dozen or more friends and neighbours who had set out some-time earlier to look for the two of them, father and daughter.
He bore in his arms the limp, apparently lifeless form of Philippa. He was covered with blood, he was chattering like a madman. Out of his incoherent babble the horrified searchers were able to put together the cruel story. It seems he had heard a faint cry far back in the dense wood,—another and yet another. Then utter silence. Even the night-birds were still. Swift, paralysing fear choked him. He tried to call out as he rushed blindly up from the pool into the forest, but only hoarse, unnatural gasps left his lips. He fell often, he crashed into the trunks of trees, but always he went onward, gasping out his futile cries. He knew not how long he beat through the forest. He was not even sure that it was Philippa's cry he had heard, but his soul was filled with a great, convincing dread. He knew that his beloved Philippa, the idol of his heart, the sunshine of his life, was up there in the woods. Frequently he stopped to listen. He could hear nothing save the pounding of his own heart, and the wheezing of his breath, thick and laboured.
Then, at last, during one of those silences, he heard something moving in the darkness near at hand. Something—some one was coming toward him through the underbrush. He called out hoarsely: “Philippa!” The sound ceased instantly, and then he heard a whispered execration. Wild rage possessed him. He plunged forward into the brush. Something crashed down upon his head, and he felt himself falling forward. The next he knew, he was trying vainly to rise to his feet. Something hot was running into his eyes,—hot and sticky. He lifted his hand to his head; it came away wet. He put his fingers into his mouth,-and tasted blood! It was enough. His strength came back. He sprang to his feet and rushed onward, shouting, cursing, calling upon God! He had no recollection of finding his girl. Apparently everything was a blank to him until long afterwards he saw lights moving among the trees, and voices were calling his name.
Percival and other cool-headed men were hard put to check the fury of the mob. Men and women, bent on vengeance, made the night hideous with their curses, howls and shrieks. In their senseless fury they prepared to kill. They had heard the stories about Manuel Crust and his disciples. Only the determined stand taken by the small group that rallied to Percival's support kept the maddened crowd from seeking out these men and rending them limb from limb. The sailors from the Doraine were the first to listen to the pleas of the level-headed,—just as they had been the first to demand the lives of Manuel Crust and his gang. Individually they were rough men and lawless, collectively they were the slaves of discipline. It was to their vanity that Percival and the others appealed,—only they called it honour instead of vanity. The mob spirit was—quelled for the time being, at least. No one was so foolish as to believe that it was dead, however. Unless the man guilty of the shocking crime was found and delivered up for punishment, the inevitable would happen.
“We'll get the right man,” said the voice of universal fury, “if we have to cut the heart out of every one of Manuel Crust's gang.”
The women were the worst. They fought like wildcats to reach the cabins occupied by the known followers of Manuel Crust. With knives and axes and burn-ing faggots they tried again and again to force their way through the stubborn wall of men that had been raised against them.
As for Manuel Crust and his little group of radicals, they had vanished. They had mingled with the mob at the outset. There were many who recalled seeing this one and that one, remembered speaking to him, remembered hearing him curse the ravisher. But as their own names began to run from lip to lip, they silently, swiftly disappeared.
Dawn found the camp awake, but grimly silent. No one had gone to bed. With the first streak of day, the man-hunt began in earnest. All night long the camp had been patrolled. Every cabin had been searched, even those occupied solely by women. This search had been conducted in an orderly, business-like way under the supervision of men chosen by Percival. The folly of beating the woods during the night was recognized even by the most impatient; there was time enough for that when the blackness of night had lifted.
Throughout the long night, the restless crowd, with but one thought in mind, hung about the cabin of Pedro the farmer. The doctors and several of the nurses were in there. Down at the meeting-house a bonfire had been started, and here were grouped the men to whom the leaders had intrusted firearms and other weapons,—men of the gun crew, under officers from the Doraine, the committee of ten and others.
It was accepted as a fact that two men were involved in the heinous deed. Percival's account of the mysterious runners seemed definitely to establish this. He called upon Olga Obosky to verify his statement. If she was surprised by his admission that he was in her company when the men rushed past them in the darkness, she did not betray the fact. She indulged in a derisive smile when he went on to explain that it was so dark he had failed to recognize her until she spoke to him. She agreed with him that the two men must have come into the open a very short distance above them, having sneaked out between the cabins before suddenly breaking into a run. Avoiding the beaten roadway, they had laid their course twenty or thirty feet to the right of it, keeping to the soft, springy turf.
Percival had issued orders for the entire camp to congregate on the Green at the first sign of day. The cold grey light of dawn fell upon vague, unreal forms moving across the open spaces from all directions. There was no shouting, no turmoil, scarcely the sound of a voice. The silent, ghostly figures merged into a compact, motionless mass in front of the meetinghouse. It was not necessary for Percival to call for order when he appeared on the steps and began to speak. The only sounds were the shuffling of feet, the rustling of garments, the deep, restrained breathing of the mass.
He spoke partly in English and partly in Spanish, and he was brief.
“You know what we are here for and what is ahead of us. I don't have to tell you the story of last night. You know it as well as I. You will be glad to hear the latest word from Dr. Cullen. Philippa is conscious. He thinks she will recover. She is having the best of care and attention. I will explain why we are all here now. The first thing for us to do is to count noses. We will go about it as rapidly as possible. After that, we will get down to business. Mr. Landover and Mr. Malone will check off the name of every man, woman and child. As your names are called, come forward, answer, and then move over beyond the corner of the building. We've got to find out just who is missing,—if any one is missing at all.”
He raised his voice. “I want you all to keep cool. Don't forget that we are after the men who committed this crime. We have no right to say that Manuel Crust or any of his crowd did this thing until we have positive proof of the fact. It may not have been any of Manuel's gang, don't forget that, people. We must make no mistakes. I am saying this to you now because I see Manuel Crust and some of his friends standing over there at the edge of the clearing. Stop! Don't make a move in their direction. We've all had time to think,—we've all had time to get ourselves in hand. There is a right and a wrong way to handle this thing,—and we've got to be sure we're right. The guilty cannot escape. They haven't a chance, and you know it. So, let's be sure,—let's be dead sure before we accuse any man. We have no right to charge Manuel's gang with this crime. The guilty men may be here among us,—absolutely unsuspected. Chizler! You and Soapy Shay go over and tell those men that we are taking a count of all the people in this camp. Tell them to come and answer to their names. They will be safe.”
The count was never completed. Manuel Crust did not wait for his name to be called. He pushed his way through the crowd, leaving his followers behind. Advancing to the foot of the steps he cried out hoarsely to Percival:
“If you want your men, I—I, Manuel Crust, will lead you to one of them. He is up there in the wood. Three men are guarding him. He is Sancho Mendez, the blacksmith. Listen, I will tell you. It is the God's truth I tell. There were seven of us hiding out there in the wood. We were scared. We heard our names called out. We had heard the threats to burn us alive. We ran away. We were not cowards,—but still we ran away. We would wait till the crowd cooled off. That was my advice. Then we would return,—then we would help to find the men who did it,—and we would help to burn them alive. An hour ago Sancho Mendez crawled out of the brush up there above the landing and begged us to protect him. His leg was broken. He had fallen over a log. You all know Sancho Mendez. He was a good boy. He was the friend of Boss Percival. He was no friend to me. But he swears he will be my slave for ever if I will save him. Then he tells us everything. When I ask him why the hell he run away, he says he lose his mind or something. He just go crazy, he says. He say everybody was chasing him,—he could hear them in the bushes, he could hear that girl screaming out his name,—and all that. He was going to jump in the water and drown, because he say people tell him always it is the easy way to die. But he falls down and breaks his leg,—here below the knee. He cannot run no more. It is all up. He is afraid to breathe. People are all around him with knives and axes and clubs. He can hear them in the brush. Then the daylight comes, and he sees us down below in the wood, and he says he thanks God. I will be his friend,—I will save him because I am an angel from heaven! Bah! I spit in his face. We tie him to a tree with our belts, and then I come down to tell Boss Percival we have his man,—his good and loyal friend.”
“Stop!” yelled Percival, as the crowd began to show symptoms of breaking away. “Listen to me! I give you fair warning. I don't want to do it, but, by God, I'll order these men to shoot the first who tries to start anything. We're going to have law and order here. This man Sancho is going to have a fair trial. What's more, he had a companion. What does he say of the other man, Manuel Crust?”
“Sancho Mendez says he was alone. There was no other man.”
Percival looked hard into Manuel Crust's bloodshot eyes. An appalling thought had suddenly flashed into his mind. Many seconds passed before he dared to open his lips. As if by divine revelation the situation lay bare before him,—the whole Machiavelian scheme as conceived by Manuel. Sancho Mendez was to be sacrificed!
Even as he stood there speechless, the plan began to work toward its well-calculated end. Manuel's friends started to harangue the crowd. They were growling hoarse invectives, shaking their fists in the direction of the wood, fanning the pent-up fury of the mob into a whirlwind that would sweep everything before it. Once the tide turned there would be no stopping it until Sancho Mendez was torn to pieces. He would shriek his innocence into deaf ears. And that was Manuel's game.
Percival's heart leaped with joy as he saw the armed force under Lieutenant Platt move swiftly into a position barring the way to the woods. He thrilled with a mighty pride in the shrewd intelligence and resourcefulness of this trained fighting-man from the far-off homeland.
Manuel Crust was turning away to mingle with the crowd. Quick as a flash, Percival was down from the steps and at the “Portugee's” side. He grasped the man's arm.
“I've got a gun against your back,” he cried in fierce suppressed tones. “Stand still and keep your mouth shut, or I'll drill a hole through you. You're safe if you do as I tell you, Crust. I'm onto your little game. I'm not saying you are the guilty man, but you know who he is,—and it won't work.”
Manuel Crust was as rigid as a block of stone. He did not even turn his head to look into the face of the man who held him.
Michael Malone and Landover were at Percival's side in an instant. From their position on the steps they could see what was not visible to the crowd beyond,—the revolver that was pressed against the small of Crust's back.
“Cover this man,” whispered Percival to Malone. “Shoot if he opens his mouth.”
Malone's revolver was jammed against the “Portugee's” back, and Percival sprang back up the steps.
Manuel Crust shot a look of surprise at Abel Landover.
“What the hell—” he began, but choked off the words at a command from Malone. While Percival was rapidly calling out orders from above, he broke out recklessly again, addressing the stern-faced banker.
“Are you my friend or not?” he snarled. “What kind of a man are you? Speak up! Tell them I'm all right.”
“Keep quiet,” warned Malone.
Landover's eyes met the searching, questioning gaze of the Portuguese. Manuel Crust apparently was satisfied with what he read in them, for a quick gleam of confidence leaped into his own. His chest swelled with a tremendous intake of breath.
The remarkable personality,—or perhaps the magnetism,—of the “boss,” again asserted itself. He made no allusion to the thing uppermost in his mind as he spoke hurriedly, emphatically to the tense throng. When he directed Randolph Fitts to take a few picked men with him up into the woods to bring down the captive, there were mutterings but no move on the part of the crowd either to anticipate or to follow the detachment. A few terse words to Buck Chizler sent that active young man after Fitts, the bearer of instructions. Sancho Mendez was to be brought in alive. His guards were not to be given a chance to kill him when they realized that the scheme had failed and he would be allowed to tell his own story.
With the departure of Fitts and his men, Percival ordered the people to return to their cabins. He promised them that Sancho Mendez should have his just deserts. Slowly, reluctantly the crowd broke up and shuffled away in small groups across the dewy Green. Manuel Crust was free to go. The few words that passed between Landover and Percival, although unheard by the man, sufficed to put courage back into his heart. He had come to look upon the banker as his “pal”! And his “pal” had not failed him!
This is what Landover said to Percival:
“Whatever may be in your mind, Percival, I want to say this to you. I was in Manuel Crust's cabin when the thing happened. There were eight of us there. I can point out to you the other six. I must beg you to overlook the fact that we are not friends, and believe what I am saying. It is the absolute truth.”
“I will take your word for it, Mr. Landover,” said Percival, after a moment. “I am aware of your dealings with Crust and his crowd. I don't know what the game is, but I do know that you have been fostering discontent,—it may even amount to revolt,—among; these men. If you say you were with Crust and that he was not out of your sight all evening, I will believe you. You may be a misguided, domineering fool, Mr. Landover, but you are honest. You have failed to appreciate what you were stirring up,—what you were letting yourself and all the rest of us in for, that's all.”
Landover flushed. He compressed his lips for a second or two before speaking.
“My opposition to you as a dictator, Percival, hardly warrants the implication that I am in a sense responsible for the devilish thing that happened last night.”
“I grant you that,” said Percival. “Nevertheless, it is your purpose to down me, no matter what it costs,—isn't that true?”
“No, it is not true. There is an honest, sincere belief on the part of some of us that you are not the man to rule this camp. You may call it politics, if you like,—or revolt, if you prefer.”
“We'll call it politics, Mr. Landover. It was not politics that made me the superintendent of construction here, however. I've looked after the job to the best of my ability. I am ready to retire whenever the people decide they've found a better man. You may be right in supposing that Manuel Crust is the right man for the job,—but I don't agree with you.”
Landover started. “Nothing is farther from my thoughts than to turn the affairs of this camp over to Crust,” he said.
“Once more I agree with you. But that is what you will be doing, just the same. If you think that Manuel Crust is going to play second fiddle to you, Mr. Landover, you'll suddenly wake up to find yourself mistaken. You know what Crust is advocating, don't you? Well, I guess there's nothing more to be said on the subject.”
“We will drop it, then,” said Landover curtly. “I merely want you to understand that Crust had no hand in last night's affair. I can vouch for that.”
“Can you vouch for each and every member of his gang?”
“I know nothing about his gang, as you call it. If I am not mistaken, this fellow Mendez is one of your pet supporters. He may be double-crossing you.”
“We'll see. For the present, your friend Crust is safe. As long as he lives within the law, he is all right. We're going to have law and order here, Mr. Landover. I want you to understand that. The best evidence that most of us want law and order is the incredible manner in which these people have curbed their natural instincts.”
“No one wants law and order more than I,” said Landover.
“And I suppose Manuel Crust is of the same mind, eh?”
“So far as I know, he is,” replied the other firmly.
Percival looked at him in blank astonishment. “Well, I'm damned!” he said, after a moment. “Do you really believe that?”
“It does not follow that he is an advocate of lawlessness and disorder because he happens to be opposed to some of your pet schemes, does it, Mr. Percival?” inquired Landover ironically.
“One of my pet schemes happens to conflict seriously with Manuel's pet scheme, if that will strengthen your argument any, Mr. Landover.”
“I don't believe Crust ever had any such thought,” said the other flatly.
“We're not getting anywhere by arguing the point,” said Percival. He turned to walk away.
“Just a moment,” called out Landover, after the younger man had taken a few steps. “See here, Percival, I don't want you to misunderstand me. If there is anything in this talk about Crust,—you know what I mean,—and if it should come to the point where stern measures are required, I will be with you, heart and soul. You know that, don't you?”
Percival studied the banker's face for a moment. “I've never doubted it for an instant, Landover. We may yet shake hands and be friends in spite of ourselves.”
Landover turned on his heel and walked away, and Percival, with a shrug of his shoulders, set about making preparations to safe-guard Sancho Mendez when he was brought in from the wood. He posted a number of reliable, cool-headed men around the “meetinghouse,” many of them being armed. Arrangements were made for barricading the door and the few windows. The prisoner was to be confined in the building, a long, low structure, and there he was to tell his story and stand trial. There was to be no delay in the matter of a trial.
“You will sit as judge, Mike,” said the “boss,” addressing Malone. “There will not be any legal technicalities, old man, and there won't be any appeal,—so all you've got to do is to act like a judge and not like a lawyer. We've got to do this thing in the regular way. Try to forget that you have practiced in the New York City courts. Remember that there is such a thing as justice and pay absolutely no attention to what you are in the habit of calling the law. The law is a beautiful thing if you don't take it too seriously. Ninety-nine out of every hundred judges in the courts of the U. S. A. sit through a trial worrying their heads off trying to remember the law so that they can keep out of the record things that might make them look like jackasses when the case is carried up to a higher court,—and while they are thinking so hard about the law they forget all about the poor little trifle called justice. I guess you know that as well as I do, so there's no use talking about it.”
“I guess I do,” said Michael Malone. “I live on technicalities when I'm in New York. If it were not for technicalities, I'd starve to death. And, my God, man, if we had to stop and think about justice every time we go into court, we'd be a disgrace to the profession.”
Percival, Peter Snipe, Flattner and several others strode out from the meeting-house and swept the long line of huts with serious, apprehensive eyes. They had expected to find the people congregated at some nearby point, ready to swoop down upon the prisoner the instant he appeared with his captors at the edge of the wood. To their amazement and relief, the people had taken Percival's command literally. They had retired to their huts, and but few of them were to be seen, even on their doorsteps.
“Can you beat it?” cried Snipe. “By golly, boys, they've put it squarely up to us. It's the greatest exhibition of restraint and confidence I've ever known. This couldn't have happened at home. Hello!”
The gaze of all was centred upon two persons who walked rapidly in the direction taken by Fitts and his party. No one spoke for a few seconds. Flattner, after a quick look at Percival's set, scowling face, was the first to speak. To a certain degree, he understood the situation. It was out of pure consideration for his friend's feelings that he said:
“I'll go and head 'em off, A. A.”
“Thanks, old chap,—but there's no sense in getting yourself disliked. I'll do it. I'm in bad already,—and besides I'm the one who gave the order.”
Near the end of the row of huts, he drew alongside of Ruth Clinton and Landover.
“The order was meant for every one, Miss Clinton,” he said levelly. “Am I to understand that you have decided to ignore it?”
She stopped short and drew herself up haughtily. Their eyes met. There was defiance in hers. She did not speak. Landover confronted Percival, white with fury.
“I am capable of looking after Miss Clinton,” he exclaimed. “Your beastly officiousness—”
“You will go back to your cabin at once, Miss Clinton,” said Percival, ignoring Landover.
She did not move.
“Miss Clinton came out here at my suggestion,” said Landover. “If you have any more bullying to do, confine yourself to me, Percival.”
“I am not doing this because I enjoy it, Miss Clinton,” went on the young man, still looking into her unwavering eyes. “I am sorry it is necessary to remind you that there are no privileged classes here. You will have to obey orders the same as every one else.”
“Very well,” she said, suddenly lowering her eyes. “Take me back to the cabin, Mr. Landover. There is nothing more to say.”
Percival stood aside. They walked past him without so much as a glance at his set, unsmiling face. Landover slipped an arm through hers. She did not resist when he drew her up close to his side. Percival saw him lean over and speak to her after they had gone a few paces. His lips were close to her ear, but though his voice was low and repressed, the words were distinctly audible to the young man.
“Ruth darling, I am sorry,—I can't tell you how sorry I am for having subjected you to this insult. God, if I could only help matters by resenting it, I—”
She broke in, her voice as clear as a bell.
“Oh, if I were only a man,—if I were only a man!”
They were well out of hearing before Percival looked despairingly up at the pink and grey sky and muttered with heartfelt earnestness:
“I wish to God you were. I'd like nothing better than to be soundly threshed by you.”
Just before sunset that evening, Sancho Mendez was publicly hanged. Confessing the crime, he was carried to the rude gibbet at the far edge of the wheat field and paid the price in full. He had been tried by a jury of twelve; and there was absolutely no question as to his guilt. His companion, a lad named Dominic, callously betrayed by the older man, fled to the forest and it was not until the second day after the hanging that he was found by a party of man-hunters, half-starved and half-demented. He was hanged at sunrise on the following day.
Manuel Crust considered himself glorified. After a fashion, he posed as a martyr. Some sort of cunning, as insidious as it was unexpected, caused him to assume an air of humility. He went about shaking his head sorrowfully, as if cut to the quick by the unjust suspicions that had been heaped upon him by the ignorant, easily-persuaded populace.
Sentiment began to swing toward him. He and his so-called followers were vindicated. It was his gloomy, dejected contention that if Providence had not intervened he and his honest fellows undoubtedly would have been placed in the most direful position, so strong and so bitter was the prejudice that conspired against him. He was constantly thanking Providence. And presently other people undertook to thank Providence too. They began to regard Manuel as a much-abused man.
The burly “Portugee” haunted the cabin of Pedro the farmer. He was the most solicitous and the most active of all who strove to befriend and encourage the unhappy father, and no one was more devoted than he to the slowly-recovering girl. He carried flowers to Pedro's hut; he did many chores for Pedro's wife; he went out into the woods and killed the plumpest birds he could find and cooked them himself for Pedro's daughter.
Presently he began to assert a more or less proprietary interest in the family. It was no uncommon thing for him to issue orders to the nurses; he hectored the Doctor; and on several occasions he went so far as to offend such well-meaning ladies as Mrs. Spofford, Madame Careni-Amori, Mrs. Block and others when they appeared at Pedro's cabin with delicacies for the girl. And finally the people in that end of the camp began to speak of Manuel Crust as a good fellow and a gentleman!
On Easter Sunday he stood guard over Pedro's cabin while that worthy and his family went to the “Tabernacle” to attend the special services. Two of the nurses were inside with the girl, but outside sat Manuel, a grim watch-dog that growled when any one approached.
The horror of that black night and the days that witnessed the wiping out of Sancho Mendez and Dominic hung like a pall over the camp. Both executions had been witnessed by practically all of the inhabitants. Captain Trigger came ashore.
With set, relentless faces the people watched two men go to their doom. The women were as stony-faced, as repressed, as the men. Save for the involuntary groans, and the queer hissing sound of long-pent breath as the black-capped figures swung off into space, the tremulous hush of intense restraint rested upon the staring crowd.
Twice they came out to see men they had known and respected “hanged by the neck until dead,” and on neither occasion was there the slightest manifestation of pity, nor was there a single word of gloating. They watched and then they went away, leaving the victims to be disposed of by the men selected for the purpose. No shouts, no execrations, no hysterical cries or sobs,—nothing save the grim silence of awe. For these people, even to the tiniest child, had ceased to live in the light of other days.
Peter Snipe, in his journal, wrote of that silent, subdued throng as other historians have written of the rock-hearted people of Salem, and of the soulful Puritans who grew heartless in the service of the Lord.
They stood afar-off and watched the small detachment of sailors carry the bodies down to the basin, and every one knew that Sancho Mendez and Dominic, heavily weighted, were rowed out to the middle and dumped into a bottomless grave. Some there were who declared that their bodies would sink for ages before reaching the bottom,—and no one thought of Sancho Mendez and Dominic without picturing them as gliding deeper and deeper into the endless abyss of water.
Michael Malone's speech to the multitude on the shorn edge of the wheat field was brief. He spoke from the scaffold on which Sancho Mendez, the blacksmith, sat with a noose around his neck.
“This man has been fairly tried and he is being fairly punished. There is no way to circumvent the laws of God or the laws of man on this island, my friends. The guilty cannot escape. If we transgress the law, we must pay in proportion to our transgression. This man is to die. The laws of our homeland would not have demanded the life of such as he,—but they should, my friends, they should. This island is small. It will be easy for us to keep it clean,—and we must keep it clean. We must not live in fear of each other. The lion and the lamb lie down together here; the thief and the honest man walk hand in hand. Our sins will find us out. We cannot hide them. Remember that. In this little land of ours there is nothing to stand in the way of the soundest principle ever laid down for man. 'Do unto others as ye would have others do unto you.' That is the Golden Rule. All we have to do is to observe that rule and there will be no use for the Ten Commandments, nor the laws of Moses, nor all the laws that man has made. We don't even have to be Christians. 'Do unto others as ye would have others do unto you.' That, my friends, is the law of laws. It is the religion of religions.”
“Soapy” Shay, sitting before the fire in his cabin a few nights after the executions, held forth at some length and with peculiar emphasis on what he called an exploded theory.
“As I said before, and as I've always said,—not being a drinking man myself,—it's all bunk about booze being responsible for all the crimes that are committed. Now here were these two guys, Sancho and Dominic. Look at what they did,—and they hadn't touched a drop for months. I'm not saying that licker is a soothin' syrup for a man's morals, but what I am saying is that if a feller has got it in him to be ornery, he'll be ornery, drunk or sober. I was tellin' Parson Mackenzie only this morning that him and me both have good reason for not touchin' the stuff,—for different reasons, of course,—but I didn't see why other people oughtn't to have it if they want it.
“With me, in my former profession, it would have been criminal to touch the stuff. The worst crime a burglar can commit is to get drunk. No decent, bang-up burglar ever does it. I don't suppose there is a more self-respectin' sort of man in the world than a high-grade burglar. And it's the same with a preacher. He can't any more preach a good sermon when he is lit up than a burglar can crack a safe or jimmy a window if he tanks up beforehand. The parson seemed surprised when I put it right up to him like that. He said he'd never thought of it in that light before. Of course, says he, a minister of the gospel ain't even supposed to know what licker tastes like, and I says to him that's where we have the advantage of him. We know what it tastes like, and we like it, and we leave it alone because it cramps our style. He leaves it alone because it's the style for preachers to leave it alone, and because they'd go to hell if they drank like ordinary men. The only place a burglar goes to if he boozes is jail.
“Well, as I was sayin', this here Sancho wasn't soused when he committed that crime, and it all goes to prove that these temperance cranks are off their base. Most of the crime that's committed in this world is committed because the feller wants to commit it. When I was up in Sing Sing once,—sort of by accident, you might say,—there was a lot of talk about prison reform, and pattin' the crooks on the back, and tellin' them they could be just as good as anybody else if they had a chance. The only chance them guys want, and keep lookin' for night and day, is a chance to lift something when nobody's lookin'. That's all they're thinkin' about while they're in the pen, and God knows they're as sober as judges all the time they're there. Crime is crime and you can't always lay it to booze. It's human nature with some people. I'm not sayin' the world wouldn't be better off if there wasn't any licker to drink. It stands to reason that there wouldn't be half so much bunglin' if people kept sober, 'specially when it comes to crime. Now, if this guy Sancho had had a couple of pints in him, everybody would be going around preachin' about the horrible effects of booze, and—What say?”
“I said you make me tired,” said Buck Chizler, repeating his remark. “I never did anything wrong in my life except when I was half-soused.”
“Sure,” agreed Soapy. “But you'd have done it right if you'd been sober, my boy. That's the principal trouble with booze. It never gives a feeler a chance to do anything right.” Whereupon, with a slow wink for the other members of the group, he arose and passed out into the night.
“I can't make that feller out,” grumbled Buck, uncomfortably.
Easter Sunday was bright and clear, following a fortnight of cold, penetrating winds and rain. The sun smiled, but it was a cold smile that mocked rather than cheered. The sky was the colour of thin, transparent ice; the vast white dome was unspotted by a single cloud; the rose tints of early morn, frightened away at birth by the chill, unfeeling glare, took with them every promise of tenderness that dawned with the new day. But, though the sky was hard, the air was soft; the tang of the salt-sea spice lay over everything.
Percival had no active part in the exercises arranged by Ruth. The song service was held in the open. A platform had been erected in front of the “tabernacle” (the meeting-house on occasion) for the choir and musicians. There were no seats for the congregation. Every one stood, bareheaded, in a wide semi-circle facing the platform. The “boss” took his place inconspicuously among those who formed the outer fringe of the assemblage. His gaze seldom left the face of the girl he loved. Once her eyes met his. She was on the platform discussing arrangements with the two clergymen when her roving, unsettled gaze chanced to fall upon him. For many seconds she stared at him fixedly,—so fixedly, in fact, that Father Francisco, after a moment, shot a look in the same direction. Even from his far-off post, Percival saw the colour mount to her cheeks as she hastily turned away to resume the conversation that had been so incontinently broken off. She was bare-headed. He had been watching the sun at play among the coils of her soft, dark hair,—a glint here as of bronze, a gleam there as of gold, ever changing under the caresses of that flaming lover a hundred million miles away.
The affable Mr. Nicklestick was standing beside Percival, carrying on a more or less one-sided conversation.
“You see, it's this way,” he was saying, contriving to reduce his far-reaching voice to a moderate undertone; “I'm not in the habit of attending Easter services. I'm not opposed to them, believe me, A. A.,—not in the slightest. Now at home in New York, I make it a habit to walk from the Metropolitan Museum down to the Waldorf-Astoria regularly every Easter. Between eleven and twelve-thirty. You get them going into certain churches and you get them coming out of others, don't you see? Oh, vat would I give to be on Fif' Avenue at this minute, A. A.! A hundred thousand dollars,—gladly, villingly,—yes, two hundred thousand! I vonder vat things are like on Fif Avenue now,—at this minute, I mean. I vonder what the vimmin are wearing this season. My God, don't you vish you were on Fif Avenue, A. A.?”
“What?”
“I say don't you vish you were on Fif Avenue now?”
“No, I don't,” gruffly.
“You—you don't?” gasped Nicklestick. “My God, where do you wish you were?”
“Over in France,—or better still, in Germany,—that's where I'd like to be. Keep still! Can't you see Careni-Amori is singing?”
Nicklestick was silent for two minutes. Then he volunteered: “Do you know what that song vould cost if she vas to give it in the Metropolitan Opera House, A. A.? A thousand dollars, von thousand simoleons. And we get it for nothing. It ain't possible to realize that you can get something for nothing in these days, is it? I vas saying to Morrie Shine only this morning that—”
“Sh!” hissed an exasperated Brazilian in front of them.
“I guess we better not talk any more, A. A.,” said Nicklestick, deprecatingly. Presently he leaned close to Percival's ear and whispered: “Miss Clinton is looking very fine today, isn't she?” Receiving no reply, he waited a moment and then went on: “Landover is a very lucky dog, eh?” Failing again, he was silent for some time. His next effort was along a totally different line. “I've been feeling some of the people out in regard to the election next week. I think it's a great idea. You got a cinch, A. A. Nobody vants anybody but you for governor. What seems to be—”
“Sh!”
“Oh, you go to the devil!” addressed the exasperated Mr. Nicklestick to the Brazilian. “Ain't we got freedom of speech here on this island? Veil, then! What seems to be troubling most every one, A. A., is who is the best man for clerk. Nobody vants to be treasurer, for why? Because there ain't anything to be treasurer about. Say, where are you going?”
“Nowhere,” replied Percival, as he strode away.
Over against the line of trees on the opposite side of the wheat field still loomed the gibbet from which Sancho Mendez and Dominic had stepped blindfolded into another and darker world. While Pastor Mackenzie, leading up to the glorious resurrection, was repeating the story of the Crucifixion, Ruth Clinton, sitting behind him on the platform, stared wide-eyed at this gaunt object, and she saw not Christ on the Cross but the spectre of Sancho Mendez falling off into darkness. Percival's gaze followed hers, and his heart smote him,—for it was he who had demanded that the gruesome reminder be left standing as a warning to carrion. And he had laughed when Peter Snipe christened it “the scarecrow!”
“Leave it standing, A. A.,” Peter had said, “and you can bet your boots no jailbird will ever roost on it if he thinks twice. And it's just that sort of thing that makes a man think twice.”
But the look of dread in the eyes of this girl who could do no wrong, and yet was to be everlastingly tortured by the sight of the thing that stood as a silent accuser of all who looked, was more than Percival could stand. Easter Sunday,—and that gibbet pointing its long arm toward the little flock in the shadow of sanctuary,—mocking the good as it beckoned to the bad,—Easter Sunday and that!
He stole quietly away, circling the edge of the crowd, his head bent, his teeth set. Just as he was about to pass from view around the corner of the “tabernacle,” he cast a quick glance at the girl on the platform. Their eyes met again. She turned her head quickly, but he was certain that she had followed his movements from the beginning.