University of Virginia Library

10. CHAPTER X.

When she had disappeared the father spoke.

“Now, Bud Halsey, what is all this?”

“It seems to me plain enough. Have I not
told you? This fellow is a spy upon us—a traitor.
He has lied—his whole story is a lie!”

The old man looked at me with stern but sorrowful
glance.

“It is false! I am no traitor.” I had uttered
this assurance before—had spoken several times,
particularly when the rude assault was made upon
Helen by her brutal uncle;—but, in my excitement,
though I very well heard and understood
what was said by everybody else, I knew

not well what I said myself. My asseveration
now seemed to have very little effect,—upon Bud
Halsey at least.

“Oh, my good fellow, we expect your denials.
We look for no admissions from you,—no truth,
as long as a lie will serve your purposes.”

“A lie!” I exclaimed writhing furiously in my
ropes.

“Ay, a lie! Look not so indignant at the
charge, my lad,—we have made the discovery,
that a lie comes easy to you. Your invention is
good. But you will pay for it. You hang, by
all that's powerful, to-morrow morning!”

“Hang!” said Bush Halsey.

“Even so!”

“Pshaw, Bud!—you cannot mean it. You are
not serious?”

“As a judge! as a judge—the supreme judge,
without appeal, in all this region,—I have doomed
him. He dies by sunrise.”

The affair was looking serious. The ruffian
continued,—interrupting the expostulations of his
brother.

“The long and short of the matter is this. I
have discovered that this lad, for his own purposes,
has come among us with a lie in his mouth.
Suspecting him at first, I dispatched Monks to
Tennessee, to make inquiry as to the truth of the
story which he told us. He has been all through
Franklin County, and finds that the Sheriff has no
process against any person named Henry Coleman,
that nobody of the name of Backus has been

murdered there, and the whole affair is a mere
invention of this chap to find his way among us.
Now what can be his object but treachery. He
is a creature of the Sheriff. He would betray
us. Well! he probably understands the conditions
of his venture. He must abide them. You
know our laws. He too shall know them.”

“I cannot think the youth an enemy, Bud Halsey,—and
you recollect he is my guest.”

“And you are mine. You have no right to
harbor a spy. Our safety makes this necessary.
As for his being no enemy, that is possible, but I
think him otherwise. Besides, as your guest, he
has proved himself unworthy of trust, since he
seeks the first opportunity to dishonor your
daughter.”

“You are a foul-mouthed liar!”—I exclaimed,
“I love Helen Halsey. Never was mortal love
less free from taint than mine. This, indeed,
brought me here. I met her for the first time at
Yannaker's—was pleased with her, and set out to
find her. Circumstances helped me in the pursuit,
and prompted the story which I told. It is
true I am no murderer—no outlaw. But motive
beyond what I have told you, I had none. Nothing
but an honorable passion has prompted me
in what I have done. This alone has brought
me here.”

“An honorable passion prompt a lie!” said the
outlaw, with a sneer. “But,” he resumed, “if this
be true, you are ready to marry Helen Halsey?”

His keen eye seemed bent to search me through.
The eye of the father also seemed on a sudden
to watch me with a new interest. At that moment
the idea struck me that the whole affair was
a piece of practice—a conspiracy among them—
to force me into marriage; and, with this conjecture,
indignant that I should be thus hampered,
and forced into an engagement of the sort, I forgot
the claims of poor Helen—nay, connected
her with the scheme—suppressed my own strong
yearnings for the prize thus proffered me, and replied
doggedly:—

“I would not be compelled to marry an angel.”

“Nor shall my child be forced on any one, Bud
Halsey.”

“Pshaw, Bush, you are a child yourself. How
know you, man, that the measure is not necessary
for her safety. Ay—look not so black and scowling—do
you not suppose I feel like yourself?—
but I say it again—to save her—to save her from
shame!”

The frame of the old man was violently agitated.
His lips were blanched to perfect whiteness;—for
an instant his eyes glared on me with
an expression akin to that tiger-look which his
brother habitually wore,—and he exclaimed:—

“Speak not of this to me, Bud Halsey. I will
not hear it even from your lips. Could I think
it true, I should do murder myself. But it is not
true—it cannot be true. Helen is as pure as
any angel!”

“She is!” I exclaimed, fervently.

“Very well! I am glad to hear it—I am willing
to believe it. You surely cannot be unwilling
to marry an angel?”

The old man interrupted the outlaw.

“I tell you, Bud Halsey, that my child must
not be named again in this business.”

“And I tell you, Bush Halsey, that unless this
traitor weds with Helen Halsey by sunrise tomorrow,
he sees the last sunrise of his life. He
dies an hour after. Take him away, men, and
keep him safe in the new den!”