 | CHAPTER X
SHADOWS OF COMING EVENTS. The kinsmen, or, The black riders of Congaree |  |
10. CHAPTER X
SHADOWS OF COMING EVENTS.
“Hold, comrades, you have done enough. Leave the
prisoner to me! Colonel Conway, you demanded to
look upon the chief of the Black Riders. He is before
you. He answers, at last, to your defiance.”
And with these words, with a form rising into dignity
and height, in becoming correspondence, as it were, with
the novel boldness of his attitude, Edward Conway stood
erect and confronted his kinsman. In the bosom of the
latter a thousand feelings were at conflict. Vexation at the
gross imposition which had been practised upon him—
scorn at the baseness of the various forms of subterfuge
which the other had employed in his serpent-like progress;
but, more than all, the keen anguish which followed a discovery
so humiliating, in the bosom of one so sensible to
the purity of the family name and honour—all combined
to confound equally his feelings and his judgment. But
his reply was not the less prompt for all this.
“And him, thus known, I doubly scorn, defy and spit
upon!”
He had not time for more. Other passions were in
exercise beside his own; and Edward Conway was
taught to know, by what ensued, if the truth were unknown
to him before, that it is always a far less difficult
task to provoke, than to quiet, frenzy—to stimulate, than
to subdue, the ferocity of human passions, when at the
flood. A fool may set the wisest by the ears, but it is
not the wisest always who can restore them to their
former condition of sanity and repose. The congratulations
of Muggs, the landlord, which, by the way, spoke
sufficient reason. The captain of the Black Riders
met with unexpected resistance among his troop. The
murdered man had been a favourite, and they were not
apt to be scrupulous about avenging the death of such
among their comrades as were. Even at a time when a
moderate degree of reason prevailed among them, it was
not easy to subdue them to placability and forbearance in
regard to a prisoner; the very name of whom, according
to their usual practice, was synonymous with victim.
How much less so, at this juncture, when, with their
blood roused to tiger rage, they had been suffered to proceed
to the very verge of indulgence, before any effort,
worthy of the name, on the part of an acknowledged
superior, had been made to arrest them! Edward Morton
felt his error, in delaying his interposition so long.
If his purpose had been to save, his effort should have
been sooner made, and then it might have been effected
without the more serious risk which now threatened
himself, in the probable diminution of his authority. He
estimated his power too highly, and flattered himself that
he could at any moment interpose with effect. He made
no allowance for that momentum of the blood, which, in
the man aroused by passion and goaded to fury, resists
even the desires of the mind accustomed to control it;
even as the wild beast, after he has lashed himself into
rage, forgets the keeper by whom he is fed and disciplined,
and rends him with the rest. Edward Morton
stood erect and frowning among those whom he was
accustomed to command—and their obedience was withheld!
His orders were received with murmurs by some
—with sullenness by all. They still maintained their
position—their hands and weapons uplifted—their eyes
glaring with savage determination;—now fixed on their
threatened victim, and now on their commander; and
without much difference in their expression when surveying
either.
“Do ye murmur—are ye mutinous? Ha! will ye
have me strike, men; that ye fall not back? Is it you,
Barton, and you, Fisher.—You, of all, that stand up in
you to give me your prompt obedience. I have
not forgotten your connexion with Lieutenant Stockton.
Fall back, sir—do not provoke me to anger: do not any
of you provoke me too far!”
The man addressed as Barton—a huge fellow who
made himself conspicuous by his clamours from the first
—replied in a style which revealed to Morton the full
difficulties of his position.
“Look you, Captain Morton, I'm one that is always
for obedience when the thing's reasonable; but here's
a case where it's onreasonable quite. We aint used to
see one of us shot down without so much as drawing
blood for it. Ben Williams was my friend; and, for
that matter, he was a friend with every fellow of the
troop. I, for one, can't stand looking at his blood, right
afore me, and see his enemy standing t'other side,
without so much as a scratch. As for the obedience,
Captain, why there's time enough for that when we've
done hanging the rebel.”
“It must be now, Mr. Barton. Muggs, that pistol!
Stand by me with your weapon. Men, I make you one
appeal! I am your Captain! All who are still willing
that I should be so, will follow Muggs. Muggs—behind
me. March! By the God of Heaven, Mr. Barton, this
moment tries our strength. You or I must yield. There
is but a straw between us. There is but a moment of
time for either! Lower your weapon, sir, or one of
us, in another instant, lies with Ben Williams.”
The huge horseman's pistol which Muggs handed to
his leader at his requisition, had been already cocked
by the landlord. It was lifted while Morton was speaking—deliberately
lifted—and the broad muzzle was
made to rest full against the face of the refractory subordinate.
The instant was full of doubt and peril, and
Clarence Conway forgot for the time his own danger
in the contemplation of the issue. But the courage of
the moral man prevailed over the instinct of blood.
Edward Morton saw that he was about to triumph.
The eye of the fierce mutineer sunk beneath his own,
still gleamed with defiance and rage, but no longer with
resolution. The fellow looked round upon his comrades.
They had shrunk back—they were no longer at his
side, and no small number had followed the landlord
and were now ranged on either side of their Captain.
Of those who had not taken this decided movement, he
saw the irresoluteness, and his own necessarily increased.
It is this dependence upon sympathy and
association which constitutes one of the essential differences
between the vulgar and the educated mind.
Brutal and bold as he was, Barton was not willing to
be left alone. The chief of the Black Riders saw that
the trial was fairly over—the strife had passed. The
evil spirit was laid for the present, and there was no
longer any thing to fear.
“Enough!” he exclaimed, lowering his weapon, and
acting with a better policy than had altogether governed
his previous movements. “Enough! You know me,
Barton, and I think I know you. You are a good fellow
at certain seasons, but you have your blasts and
your hurricanes, and do not always know when to leave
off the uproar. You will grow wiser, I trust, but meanwhile
you must make some effort to keep your passions
in order. This rough treatment of your friends, as if
they were foes, won't answer. Beware. You have
your warning.”
“Yes,” growled the ruffian, doggedly, still unwilling
altogether to submit; “but when our friends stand up
for our foes, and take sides against us, I think its reasonable
enough to think there's not much difference
between 'em, as you say. I'm done, but I think it's
mighty hard now-a-days that we can't hang a rebel and
a spy, without being in danger of swallowing a bullet
ourselves. And then, too, poor Ben Williams. Is he
to lie there in his blood, and nothing to be done to his
enemy?”
“I say not that, Mr. Barton. The prisoner shall
have a trial; and if you find him guilty of connexion
with the man who shot Williams, you may then do as
your victim; but know from me, that, while I command
you, you shall obey me—ay, without asking the why
and wherefore! I should be a sorry captain—nay, you
would be a sorry troop—if I suffered your insubordination
for an instant. Away, now, and make the circuit
—all of you but Shumway and Irby. See to your
powder, that it be kept dry; and let your horses be in
readiness for a start at dawn. This country is too hot
for you already; and with such management as you
have had in my absence, it would become seven times
hotter. Away.”
They disappeared, all but the two who were excepted
by name. To these he delivered the prisoner.
“Shumway, do you and Irby take charge of the rebel.
Lodge him in the block, and let him be safely kept till I
relieve you. Your lives shall answer for his safety.
Spare none who seek to thwart you. Were he the best
man in the troop who approached you suspiciously,
shoot him down like a dog.”
In silence the two led Clarence Conway out of the
house. He followed them in silence. He looked once
toward his kinsman, but Edward Morton was not yet
prepared to meet his glance. His head was averted as
the former was followed by his guards to the entrance.
Clarence was conducted to an out-house—a simple, but
close, block-house, of squared logs—small, and of little
use as a prison, except as it was secluded from the
highway. Its value, as a place of safe keeping, consisted
simply in its obscurity. Into this he was thrust headlong,
and the door fastened from without upon him.
There let us leave him for a while, to meditate upon the
strange and sorrowful scene which he had witnessed,
and of which he had been a part. His reflections were
not of a nature to permit him to pay much attention to
the accommodations which were afforded him. He found
himself in utter darkness, and the inability to employ
his eyes led necessarily to the greater exercise of his
thoughts. He threw himself upon the floor of his dungeon,
which was covered with pine straw, and brooded
through an ordeal so narrow. Let us now return to
his kinsman.
Edward Morton had now resumed all the duties of
his station as chief of the Black Riders. In this capacity,
and just at this time, his tasks, as the reader will readily
imagine, were neither few in number nor easy of performance.
It required no small amount of firmness,
forethought and adroitness, to keep in subjection, and
govern to advantage, such unruly spirits. But the skill
of their captain was not inconsiderable, and such were
the very spirits whom he could most successfully command.
The coarser desires of the mind, and the wilder
passions of the man, he could better comprehend than
any other. With these he was at home. But with
these his capacity was at an end. Beyond these, and
with finer spirits, he was usually at fault. To be the
successful leader of ruffians is, perhaps, a small merit.
It requires cunning rather than wisdom to be able simply
to discover the passion which it seeks to use, and
this was the chief secret of Edward Morton. He knew
how to make hate, and jealousy, and lust, and fear,
subservient to his purposes, already roused into action.
It is doubtful even whether he possessed the cold-blooded
talent of Iago, to awaken them from their slumbers,
breathe into them the breath of life, and send them forward,
commissioned like so many furies, for the destruction
of their wretched victim. A sample has been given
already of the sort of trial which awaited him in the
control of his comrades. But there were other difficulties
which tasked his powers to the utmost. The difficulties
which environed the whole British army were
such as necessarily troubled, in a far greater degree, its
subordinate commands. The duties of these were more
constant, more arduous, and liable to more various risk
and exposure. The unwonted successes of the American
arms had awakened all the slumbering patriotism
of the people; while the excesses, of which such parties
as that which Morton commanded, had been guilty, in
the hey-day of their reckless career, had roused passions
equally violent, and far less likely, once awakened, to
relapse into slumber. Revenge was busy with all her
train in search of himself and the gloomily caparisoned
troop which he led. It was her array from which he
so narrowly escaped when he received the timely succour
of his kinsman in the swamp. An hundred small
bodies like his own had suddenly started into existence
and activity around him, some of which had almost
specially devoted themselves to the destruction of his
troop. The wrongs of lust, and murder, and spoliation,
were about to be redressed; and by night as by day
was he required to keep his troop in motion, if for no
other object than his own safety; though, by this necessity,
he was compelled to traverse a country which had
been devastated by the wanton hands of those whom
he commanded. On the same track, and because of
the same provocation, were scattered hundreds of enemies,
as active in pursuit and search as he was in evasion.
He well knew the fate which awaited him if
caught, and involuntarily shuddered as he thought of it:
—death in its most painful form—torture fashioned by
the most capricious exercise of ingenuity—scorn, ignominy
and contumely, the most bitter and degrading,
which stops not even at the gallows, and, as far as it
may, stamps the sign of infamy upon the grave. These
were, in part, the subject of the gloomy meditations of
the outlawed chief when left alone in the wigwam of
Muggs, the landlord. True, he was not without his
resources—his disguises—his genius! He had been so
far wonderfully favoured by fortune, and his hope was
an active, inherent principle in his organization. But
the resources of genius avail not always, and even the
sanguine temperament of Edward Morton was disposed
to reserve, while listening to the promises of fortune.
He knew the characteristic caprices in which she was
accustomed to indulge. He was no blind believer in
her books. He was too selfish a man to trust her implicitly;
though, hitherto, she had fulfilled every promise
that she had ever made him. The signs of a change
he was not without audacity—he could dare
with the boldest; but his daring had usually been shown
at periods, when to dare was to be cautious. He meditated
even now to distrust the smiles of fortune in season—to
leave the field of adventure while it was still
possible and safe to do so. His meditations were interrupted
at this moment, and, perhaps, assisted, by no
less a person than Muggs, the landlord. He made his
appearance, after a brief visit to an inner shanty—a
place of peculiar privity—the sanctum sanctorum, in
which the landlord wisely put away from sight such
stores as he wished to preserve from that maelstrom,
the common stock. The landlord was one of the few
who knew the secret history of the two Conways; and
though he knew not all, he knew enough to form a
tolerably just idea of the feelings with which the elder
regarded the younger kinsman. He could form a notion,
also, of the sentiments by which they were requited.
In Muggs, Edward Morton had reason to believe
that he had a sure friend—one before whom he might
safely venture to unbosom some of his reserves. Still
he was especially careful to show not all, nor the most
important—none, in fact, the revelation of which could
possibly be productive of any very serious injury or
inconvenience. He, perhaps, did little more than stimulate
the communicative disposition of “mine host,”
who, like most persons of his craft, was garrulous by
profession, and fancied that he never ministered perfectly
to the palates of his guests, unless when he accompanied
the service by a free exercise of his own
tongue.
“Well, cappin, the game of fox and goose is finished
now, I reckon. There's no chance to play possum with
your brother any longer. It's lion and tiger now, if
any thing.”
“I suppose so,” replied the other, with something of
a sigh. The landlord continued:
“The question now, I reckon—now, that you've go
him in your clutches—is what you're to do with him
the man when he shook hands with the black
bear round the tree. It was a starve to hold on and a
squeeze to let go, and danger to the mortal ribs which
ever way he took it.”
“You have described the difficulty, Muggs,” said
the other, musingly,—“what to do with him is the
question.”
“There's no keeping him here, that's cl'ar.”
“No. That's impossible!”
“His friends, I reckon, are nigh enough to get him
out of the logbox, and it's cl'ar they know where to
find him. That shot that tumbled poor Williams was
mighty nigh and mighty sudden, and was sent by a
bold fellow. I'm onsatisfied but there was more than
one.”
“No,—but one,” said Morton,—“but one!”
“Well, cappin, how do you count? There wa'n't
no track to show a body where to look for him. The
wash made the airth smooth again in five shakes after
the foot left the print.”
“It's guesswork with me only, Muggs.”
“And who do you guess t'was, cappin?”
“Supple Jack!”
“Well, I reckon you're on the right trail. It's reasonable
enough. I didn't once think of him. But it's
cl'ar enough to every body that knows the man, that
Supple Jack's jest the lad to take any risk for a person
he loves so well. But, you don't think he come alone?
I'm dub'ous the whole troop aint mighty fur off.”
“But him, Muggs! He probably came alone. We
left him, only an hour before I came, on the edge of the
Wateree—a few miles above this. He and Clarence
gave me shelter in the swamp when I was chased by
Butler's men, and when that skulking scoundrel, Stockton,
left me to perish. Clarence rode on with me, and
left Supple Jack to return to the swamp, where they
have a first rate hiding place. I suspect he did not
return, but followed us. But of this we may speak
hereafter. The question is, what to do with the prisoner
equally dangerous to keep and to let go.”
“Well, that's what I call a tight truth; but it's a sort
of satisfaction, cappin, that you've still got the tree
a-tween you; and so you may stop a while to consider.
Now, I aint altogether the person to say what's what,
and how it's to be done; but if so be I can say any
thing to make your mind easy, cappin, you know I'm
ready.”
“Do, Muggs: let us hear you,” was the reply of the
outlaw, with the musing manner of one who listens
with his ears only, and is content to hear every thing,
if not challenged to find answer.
“Well, cappin, I'm thinking jest now we're besot all
round with troubles; and there's no telling which is
biggest, closest, and ugliest—they're all big, and close,
and ugly. As for hiding Clarence Conway here, now,
or for a day more, that's unpossible. It's cl'ar he's
got his friends on the track, one, or mout-be, a hundred;
and they can soon muster enough to work him
out of the timbers, if it's only by gnawing through with
their teeth. Well, how are you to do then? Send him
under guard to Camden? Why, it's a chance if all
your troop can carry themselves there, without losing
their best buttons by the way. It's a long road, and
the rebels watch it as close as hawks do the farm-yard
in chicken season. That, now, is about the worst sign
for the king's side that I've seed for a long spell of
summers. It shows pretty cl'ar that we aint so strong
as we was a-thinking. The wonder is, where these
troopers come from; and the worst wonder is, where
they get their boldness. Once on a time, when Tarleton
first begun to ride among us, it was more like a
driving of deer than a fighting of men; but it seems to
me that the rebels have got to be the drivers, and o'
late days they scamper us mightily. I see these things
better than you, cappin, and, perhaps, better than the
rebels themselves; for I aint in the thick, I'm jest like
one that's a-standing on a high hill and looking down
at the fighting when it's a-going on below. I tell you,
They're a-losing ground—these men's getting fewer
and fewer every day, and jest so fast I hear of a new
gathering among the whigs. I tell you agen, cappin,
you're besot with troubles.”
“I know it, Muggs. Your account of the case is an
accurate one. We are in a bad way.”
“By jingo, you may say so, cappin. You are, as I
may say, in a mighty bad way—a sort of conflustration,
that it puzzles my old head more than I can tell rightly,
to onbefluster. Then, as for the prisoner—”
“Ay, that, Muggs. Speak to that. What of him?
—let me hear your advice about the prisoner. How is
he to be disposed of?”
“Well now, cappin—there's a-many ways for doing
that, but which is the right and proper one—and when
it's done, will it sarve the purpose? I'm afeard not—
I'm not knowing to any way how to fix it so as to
please you. It's pretty sartain he's your enemy in
war and your enemy in peace; and if all things that's
said be true, about him and Miss Flora, it don't seem
to me that you'd ha' been any worse off—if so be your
father had never given you this brother for a companion.”
The outlaw chief looked up for the first time during
the interview, and his eye full of significance encountered
that of the landlord.
“Ay, Muggs, the gift was a fatal one to me. Better
—far better—for me had he never seen the light; or,
seeing it, that some friendly foe had closed it from his
eyes, while he—while we were both—in a state of
innocence.”
“Gad, captain, I was thinking at one time to-night
that black Barton would have done you a service like
that; and I was a-thinking jest then, that you wa'nt
unwilling. You kept so long quiet, that I was afeard
you'd have forgotten the bloodkin, and let the boys had
the game their own way.”
“You were afraid of it, were you?” said Morton, his
brow darkening as he spoke.
“Ay, that I was, mightily. When I thought of the
temptations, you know;—Miss Flora and her property,
—and then the fine estates he got by his mother's side
and all that was like to fall to you, if once he was out
of the way—I begun to tremble—for I thought you
couldn't stand the temptation. `He's only to keep
quiet now and say nothing, and see what he'll get for
only looking on.' That was the thought that troubled
me. I was afeard, as I tell you, that you'd forget blood-kin
and every thing when you come to consider these
temptations.”
The outlaw rose and strode the floor impatiently.
“No, no, Muggs, you had little cause to fear. He
had just saved my life—sheltered me from my enemies
—nay, would have yielded me his own commission as
a protection, which he supposed would be effectual for
his own or my safety. No, no! I could not suffer it.
Yet, as you say, great, indeed, would have been the
gain—great was the temptation.”
“True, cappin, but what's the gain that a man gits
by bloodying his hands agin natur'? Now, it's not onreasonable
or onnatural, when you have tumbled an
open enemy in a fair scratch, to see after his consarns,
and empty his fob and pockets. But I don't think any
good could go with the gain that's spotted with the
blood of one's own brother—”
“He's but a half-brother, Muggs,” said Morton,
hastily. “Different mothers, you recollect.”
“Well, I don't see that there's a-much difference,
cappin. He's a full brother by your father's side.”
“Yes, yes!—but Muggs, had he been slain by Barton
and the rest, the deed would have been none of
mine. It was a chance of war, and he's a soldier.”
“Well, cappin, I'm not so certain about that. There's
a difference I know, but—”
“It matters not! He lives! He is spared, Muggs—
spared, perhaps, for the destruction of his preserver. I
have saved his life; but he knows my secret. That
secret!—That fatal secret! Would to God!—”
He broke off the exclamation abruptly, while he
struck his head with his open palm.
“My brain is sadly addled, Muggs. Give me something—something
which will settle it and compose my
nerves. You are happy, old fellow—you are happy,
and—safe! The rebels have forgiven you—have they
not?”
“Well, we have forgiven each other, cappin, and I
have found them better fellows nigh, than they were at
a distance;” replied the landlord, while he concocted
for the outlaw a strong draught of punch, the favourite
beverage of the time and country. “If I aint happy,
cappin, it's nobody's fault but my own. I only wish
you were as safe with all your gettings as I think myself
with mine; and you might be—”
A look of much significance concluded the sentence.
“How,—what would you say, Muggs?” demanded
the outlaw, with some increase of anxiety in his manner.
The reply of the landlord was whispered in his ears.
“Would to heaven I could!—but how?—How,
Muggs, is this to be done?”
The answer was again whispered.
“No, no!” replied the other, with a heavy shake of
the head. “I would not, and I dare not. They have
stood by me without fear or faithlessness, and I will not
now desert them. But enough of this for the present.
Get me your lantern, while I seek this brother of mine
in private. There must be some more last words between
us.”
| CHAPTER X
SHADOWS OF COMING EVENTS. The kinsmen, or, The black riders of Congaree | |