 | CHAPTER XXI.
ON THE TRACK OF CRIME. Haunted hearts |  |
21. CHAPTER XXI.
ON THE TRACK OF CRIME.
The morning sun at Stein's Plains came up like a
great red ball rising from a bed of snow. The storm
was past, the wind lulled, but the cold was intense, the
earth seemed shrinking and crouching under its snowy
coverlet, the doors and windows of the farm-houses were
sealed up with strips of white cement; traces of man's
ownership, his industry, his prerogative, — all had been
obliterated in a night. Winter had taken possession, and
no one had yet risen to dispute her claim.
But she was about to be defied. The challenge was
already coming down the cross-road; it was heralded by
the jingling of bells; it appeared over the crest of a little
hill, in the form of a blue pung, drawn by a white horse,
and containing three individuals. It seemed as if the
“great red eye of heaven” had started up in surprise
to stare at this plebeian object, the only moving thing for
miles around, and now coming on at a round trot, breaking
at every step the chaste uniformity with which Nature
had decked herself. It ought to have been Youth on a
elated at the prospect, who were thus out as pioneers,
breaking the first track on that pure, untrodden pathway.
Could it be that it was Experience, Revenge, and Fear,
all on the track of crime?
It was no other than these last, for Van Hausen, Hannah
Rawle, and Angie were already on their way to New York.
They travelled in silence. It was cold enough to
stiffen their jaws; had they been a pleasure-party they
would not have thawed into merriment so early; as it
was, they preserved a silence as stern as that of the still
December morning which they were so boldly confronting.
Hannah, dressed in a scant cloak of black camlet,
a fur cape of yellowish sable (that ugly, old-fashioned
sable which our grandmothers sported fifty years ago),
and a pumpkin hood of huge dimensions, was, by her
height, her erect posture, and her determined air, the
most conspicuous figure in the pung. Probably she felt
the eold, the hard seat, the absence of any thing to lean
against less than either of her fellow-travellers. Angie,
clad in the close-fitting mandarin, and the little pink hood
(faded pink it was now), looked like a child beside her
Amazonian companion. She shivered perceptibly; her
face wore the expression of one who is dragged forward
against her will; she had withdrawn instinctively from
Hannah's vicinity to the extremity of the plank which
constituted the back seat of the pung, and, leaning over
the side of the vehicle, watched the runner cut its track
in the snow with as intense a gaze as if they were
might at any moment sink.
Van Hausen had lately got a stoop in the shoulders,
which was more than ever perceptible as he sat leaning
over the reins in a brooding attitude, his head crowned
with a seal-skin cap, and sunk as far as the ears within
the upright collar of a green and black plaid cloak,
fastened at the throat with a great steel hook and chain.
Once in a while he roused himself, and half turned round
to draw up a well-worn buffalo-robe, apparently to save
it from dragging in the snow, in reality to tuck it more
effectually around the feet of his female passengers. This
act, repeated at intervals, and now and then a slapping
of the reins, and a “go 'long!” to his horse, were the
only exceptions to his otherwise stoical deportment.
They journeyed for two hours without meeting or
passing any one on the road, though as they advanced
there were increasing signs of animation in the farm-houses
and barnyards, showing that the population was
astir. The snow had been drifted in some places by the
last night's wind; but on the whole the roads were practicable,
and travelling facilitated rather than impeded by
the storm; so that, although they had the disadvantage
of being the first to break track, our party made good
speed. As they approached the neighborhood of the
city, and gained roads well trodden by the passage of
other sleighs, they progressed even more rapidly, and it
was not yet nine o'clock when they reached the ferry at
Hoboken. The ferry-boats then were not the floating
and inconvenient in comparison was that in which our
travellers crossed, that it barely furnished accommodation
for Van Hausen's pung, and two other clumsy vehicles
which crossed on the same trip. A covered passage,
unwarmed, and open at both extremities, offered the only
protection for foot passengers. This was better, perhaps,
than utter exposure to the blast that swept across the
bay; but Hannah did not think it any inducement, as
she said, for “bundlin' out an' in agin;” so she and
Angie kept their seats, and got chilled to the last degree
short of freezing, while Van Hausen walked up and down
in a contracted space, and thrashed his arms across his
chest, by way of keeping up the circulation.
Arrived at New York, Van Hausen, without consulting
his companions, made at once for their destination,
the jail. Their course lay through the chief business
thoroughfares of the city, which, though insignificant in
comparison with its present size, was a busy, thriving
metropolis, more great and imposing, no doubt, in the
eyes of the rustic then than the New York of the present
day is to the dweller in the most remote corner which
New Jersey now affords.
Angie shrank from the city crowd, that aggregate of
humanity, — the world. The neighborhood of Stein's
Plains constituted the immediate orbit of her life; but
there was an outside world beyond that; a wider sphere,
a vaster public, destined to ring with the history of a
great crime come to light. And this was that world.
already questioning the inmates of the blue pung as to
their errand hither; these eager ears were awaiting the
startling revelations of to-day; these tongues seemed
freshly sharpened for the universal hiss; this sea of
human faces was a sea just about to be lashed into fury
by the tempest; Angie felt herself launched upon it, and
shuddered.
Not so with Hannah. She was in sympathy with the
coming storm. Law, justice, the people's voice, — all
were on her side; she could ride on the crest of the
billow; she had nothing to fear. So she met the stare
of the city throng (and they did stare perhaps, as city
folks often do at a country equipage) with the confidence
of an equal if not a master spirit. Destiny was befriending
Hannah; so she and the world were on good terms.
But though Hannah's spirit was equal to the present
emergency, the flesh quivered under it. If Angie shook
with dread, Hannah shook no less with the cold. Young
blood can defy the weather, even when the heart is faint,
but the current runs thin and slow in old veins, and courage
cannot keep a chill out of aged bones. If Hannah
sat upright now it was partly because she was benumbed.
The expression of her face might well be rigid, for her
features were stiffened, her lips compressed and blue; her
whole frame vibrated with an unconscious shiver; otherwise,
she was almost paralyzed. The noises of the street,
too, reached her half-deafened ears in an indistinct rattle,
which so bewildered her brain that by the time the travellers
notice of surrounding objects, and her stare was that of
stupefaction. After all, Angie, trembling though she was,
had to support the old woman as she tottered from the
vehicle, and followed Van Hausen through the entrance
gate and up the steps leading to an iron-barred door, at
which he had already knocked loudly. The granite surface
of the building, the grated window-frames from
which icicles hung in pendants; the hollow reverberation
of Van Hausen's knock as it went echoing through the
stone corridors, all the sights and sounds which serve
to make up the grim uniformity of a prison, acted upon
Angie's senses with scarcely less of chill and horror than
if she were a criminal under sentence for life. This was
the spot to which human society banished its lost and degraded
members; it was one of the instruments of its
retaliation against crime; it was the giant coadjutor of
Angie's companions in the business on which they had
come. It almost annihilated poor Angie with its voice
and frown.
One of the jailer's assistants opened the door; he was
a stranger to Van Hausen, but the old carpenter, having
bluntly announced the object of his visit, the party were
conducted through a stone passage-way, and thence into
a little ante-room, a sort of lounging-place for turnkeys
and constables, as might be judged from the attitude of
an individual of the latter class, who was leaning idly
against the solitary window which overlooked the prison-yard.
It was a plastered room, bare, unfurnished, and
There was no fireplace, and the only seat which the room
afforded was a wooden bench, on which Hannah suffered
herself to be placed, Angie standing beside her, while
Van Hausen unclasped the fastening of his cloak, raised
his seal-skin cap from his forehead, set his whip up
against the wall, and then looked about him.
“That you, Mr. Van Hausen? Wal, how are you to-day,
old feller?” said the constable, who had been
stationed at the window, but who, now that Dick had
divested himself of his wrappings, came forward and
claimed acquaintance, offering his hand, too, in quite a
patronizing way.
This man was one of the city detectives employed five
years ago for the discovery of Baultie Rawle's murderer,
and as near an approach to a police officer as this or any
other municipality could boast fifty years ago. Van
Hausen recognized him, and shook hands cordially
enough, but scarcely bestowing a look on his old acquaintance.
His eye was wandering round the room.
“Pooty cold reception yer give folks here!” was the
result of his survey.
The constable laughed heartily at this good joke, as it
seemed to him.
“People mustn't calkerlate on getting any great comfort
or happiness in these quarters,” he answered jocosely.
“Hain't yer got a fire any where about here?” persisted
Dick, gruffly.
“I'm afraid we hain't. We have to depend on our
drop inside? You must be een-a-most friz with your
long ride.”
“My women folks is, I reckon,” said Dick, looking
anxiously in the direction of his fellow-passengers.
“Cold mornin', mum!” said the constable, addressing
Hannah doubtless, but eying Angie.
Hannah neither noticed nor heard. Angie answered
for both, — “Very cold, sir.”
“Sorry we hain't got no fire in this place. Howsomever,
Tracy there's gone to speak to the boss. He's
got a snug corner at t'other end o' the building. I guess
we'll get you warmed up somehow 'fore long. Ah, here's
the boss himself!” he exclaimed, as steps were heard approaching.
“Get on the right side o' him now, and you'll
do. I'll speak a good word for you, mum,” and “mum”
this time meant Angie herself. Her troubled face had
conciliated this man, perhaps, or her modest manner, or
some remnant of her beauty not quite overcast by pain.
At any rate he went to meet the chief jailer, and probably
made a benevolent suggestion to him, for immediately
after bidding Van Hausen, whose visit he had expected,
a matter-of-course sort of good morning, the
jailer, who seemed a well-disposed man, though not much
accustomed to practise courtesy, and so a little awkward
at it, bowed to Hannah with an “Obedient servant,
ma'am! Hope I see you well, ma'am!” This salutation
eliciting no reply, except “The old ooman's deaf!”
from Van Hausen, the jailer said, “Ah?” and then,
comfortably to Van Hausen.
“You've had a long ride this morning, I hear, sir,”
he said. “It's a sharp morning. We ought to have a
warmer place than this to receive visitors in at this time
o' year, ladies especially; but we haven't — that's a fact.
Our inspectors don't seem to see the necessity of it. If
I'd only known about the ladies now —”
“Wal,” interrupted Dick, “she would come, so I
fetched her. It's my sister, you see, the old 'ooman is —
the widder — Rawle's widder.”
O! ah! indeed!” ejaculated the jailer, turning short
round and surveying Hannah with the interest and curiosity
which this announcement excited. The constable
took a similar survey, so did the assistant jailer, Tracy.
From an obscure old woman, Hannah was suddenly
elevated into a notoriety. Not only was she the widow
of a man mysteriously murdered, she was a party concerned
in the detection of the crime. She was one of
themselves. So they instinctively took the measure of
her calibre.
“She's naterally had her heart sot for years on siftin'
out this 'ere thing,” continued Dick, by way of explaining
Hannah's presence. “She'd like to have a hand in 't,
I s'pose. She's got a bit of evidence that she holds on
to as she does to her life.”
“She has, has she?” said the jailer. “Well, it may
come in play. Anyhow, it's no harm for her to be on
the spot when we come to take the testimony. I don't
out first. Let me see! We've got a fire in the inspector's
office, haven't we, Tracy?”
Tracy nodded in assent.
“I'm expecting the district attorney and his clerk
there presently on this very business. If your folks
wouldn't mind, now,” glancing doubtfully at the two
women, — and here the jailer hesitated, held a moment's
conference aside with Tracy, then added something in a
low tone to Van Hausen.
Apparently Van Hausen assured him that his companions
wouldn't mind this something, whatever it might
be, which the jailer hinted at, for he immediately replied,
“This way, then!” and was starting off, motioning to the
visitors to follow him.
“Look here, mister! I've got to go and see to my
hoss,” said Van Hausen. “S'posin' I leave my folks
with you a spell, an' jine 'em in half an hour or so?
The lawyers won't be here 'fore that time, will they?”
The jailer looked at his watch. “Quarter past nine!
They won't be here till ten,” he soliloquized. “No;
you've got time enough,” he added, addressing Van
Hausen.
“Then I'll be off,” concluded Dick, taking up his
whip, and proceeding to reclasp his cloak.
“I'll do the best I can for you, ma'am, if you'll come
with me,” said the jailer, accosting Angie, in default
of hearing on Hannah's part, just as the constable had
done.
Angie signified to Hannah that they were to follow
this individual. The old woman rose with effort, and
moving as if on stilts, so numb and stiffened had her
limbs become, tottered away, leaning heavily on Angie's
shoulder.
“You're all right now, miss,” whispered the constable,
in his patronizing way, to Angie, as he was bowing them
out of the room. Angie thanked him humbly for the
assurance, adding that they should be very glad to go
where there was a fire. “She 's a spunky old woman,”
he found time to add, as they moved slowly through the
door-way, while Van Hausen and the jailer exchanged
a word or two more in the passage outside. “Any
relation o' yours?”
Angie shuddered and shook her head.
“A right spunky old woman. I've a great respect for
her. She'll be quite relieved now in her mind, if it all
comes out as we expect. Won't she?”
“Perhaps she will,” replied Angie, hesitatingly, and
turning her face away so as to avoid as much as possible
the keen eye of the detective.
“Of course she will,” responded the man confidently.
“Anyhow she has my best wishes. Good morning,
miss,” and hurrying to overtake Van Hausen, for whom
Tracy was unbarring the front entrance, he accompanied
him out of the building, while Hannah and Angie followed
the lead of the jailer in the opposite direction.
They proceeded through several narrow, dark corridors,
with iron doors, like oven-doors let into the stone
and down another, and passed through an iron gate in
one of the passage-ways, which the jailer unlocked for
their admittance, and locked behind them. A heavy
door of oak, cross-barred with iron, led them at last
into the inspector's office, which was their destination.
This room was scarcely more habitable than that from
which they had come, except for the presence of a
clumsy pile of green wood in the fireplace which had
been coaxed into a fitful blaze just in the centre, but was
dripping its cold juices on to the hearth in either corner,
and was altogether as little suggestive of cheerfulness or
comfort as a fire could be. It had not long been kindled,
and the air of the apartment was chilly. The windows,
situated on that side of the prison which had been
exposed to last night's storm, were obscured by the
snow which had beaten against the panes and frozen
there. No sun reached this side of the building in the
short winter days, and the moderate share of light which
the windows usually afforded was now so far excluded
by the coating of sleet, that but for the faint glow which
the fire imparted, the room would have been wrapped in
a murky twilight. The walls were of rough plaster; a
plan of the prison was the only thing that relieved their
bareness; a plank-floor well sanded; a high desk and
three-legged stool; a shallow box, filled with ashes, beneath
the desk, intended, and evidently much used, as a
spittoon; a few rush-bottomed chairs, painted red; and
in the darkest corner a wide settle, on which an old rug,
a greasy hat, seemed to be carelessly huddled together,
— these things completed the picture of the room
into which Hannah Rawle and Angie were ushered by
special privilege and favor.
But the fire was attraction enough for these trembling,
half-frozen women. The jailer pushed a chair in front of
it for each of them; and while they sat warming themselves,
he turned his back and busied himself at the high
desk, looking over a file of papers, selecting some foolscap,
probably for the district attorney's use, and hunting
up a few quill-pens, inky and worn, which, after he had
tested them by a few rapid and satisfactory experiments,
he stuck upright in a raw turnip, that answered the
double purposes of pen-wiper and pen-holder.
| CHAPTER XXI.
ON THE TRACK OF CRIME. Haunted hearts | |