University of Virginia Library

5. CHAPTER V.

About midday we were surprised by a visit
from Mr. Shaler, who called on his way home to
say, that he could not leave the county without
doing himself the pleasure of offering his respects
to Mr. Balcombe. He was desirous, too, he said,
to obtain the assurance of what his experience of
Mr. Balcombe's candour would hardly permit him
to doubt, that the manner in which he had been
constrained, on the preceding day, to perform a
disgusting and painful duty, had not been taken
amiss. To this Balcombe replied, by assuring him
that he had perfectly understood his situation, and
added some remarks, showing that he had well
weighed all the considerations, which are regarded
in ascertaining the duty of the lawyer to his
client.

“I am perfectly aware,” said he, “that the

nature of the human mind disqualifies any man
for investigating both sides of any question at
once. Yet no decision can be properly made, until
all that can be said on both sides (right or wrong)
is duly considered; and the wisdom of the law is
in nothing more manifest, than in the designation
of a set of men, qualified by nature, education, and
experience, for such investigations, to seek out and
lay before the judge or jury, everything worthy to
be taken into view. To do this, the counsel on
each side must have a single object, and to the
pursuit of this object he must be stimulated by interest,
without being withheld by any consideration
of the rights or interests of the other party, which
are committed to the guardianship of his adversary.
I say this, my dear sir,” continued he, “not
by way of showing that I do or do not understand
what I am talking about, but that you may see that
I speak advisedly, and not mere words of course,
when I assure you that all you have done has been
taken in good part.”

We found Mr. Shaler the same pleasant, intelligent
gentleman that he had shown himself in our
ride together, with a vein of mingled humour and
sarcasm. He seemed to take the highest pleasure
in his profession, and exulted with the spirit of a
keen sportsman, in the exercise of the talents appropriate
to it. With these he was eminently
gifted, and possessed, moreover, some literature, a
good taste, and the manners of a gentleman. He
seemed to be a man of kind feelings, somewhat

blunted by professional exercise. He spoke of
Montague with playful scorn, and promised himself
a full feast of revenge should he ever return
to Missouri, for the trick he had played him in
drawing him in to aid in such a scheme of
iniquity.

“I would gladly,” he said, “ride from St. Louis
to prosecute him for the conspiracy, and as accessory
to the robbery of Mr. Balcombe and Scott.”

After sitting an hour he rose to take his departure.
He was pressed to remain, but said that
Whitehead, who had refused to call, was waiting
for him at the next house. Balcombe then took
him aside, and spoke a few words to him in private.
In answer, he said aloud,

“I will hand it to you, sir, as you pass through
St. Louis so authenticated as to pass unquestioned
anywhere. And I hope,” added he, “that I shall
then not only have the pleasure of seeing more of
you and Mrs. Balcombe, and Mr. Napier, but that
you will also permit me to communicate to my
friends there a part of the satisfaction I have enjoyed
in your acquaintance.”

Having said this, he took his leave. About dinner
time poor John came limping along on foot,
completely broken down in everything but mind
and spirits. He brought the pistol and picture,
which in our hurry we had left behind. James
took the latter, and gazed on it with tearful eyes,
and kissing it, was about to return it to his bosom,
when Mrs. Balcombe begged leave to look at it.

She took it, expressed her admiration of its surpassing
beauty, and stepping out, returned with a
riband, with which she tied it about James's neck.
It was delightful to look upon the grateful expression
of the poor boy's countenance as he looked up at
her while performing this office of delicate respect
fr his poor sister. I have never seen anything
like his affectionate devotion to her. It was not
merely love to her as a sister, nor gratitude to the
instructress of his youth, nor compassion for a
friendless and unfortunate woman. It amounted
to absolute idolatry to one who seemed to him a
perfectly faultless being. The interest in her
manifested by Balcombe had bound the gentle
youth to him. His gratitude, admiration, and
confidence appeared to have no bounds. It was
plain he knew nothing of Montague, and had no
idea of the cause or nature of the cloud that rested
upon her. Indeed, after the manifestations I had
seen of his quick feelings, delicate sense of honour,
and high spirit, I had no doubt that the least intimation
of her wrongs would be fatal to her betrayer.
The propriety and gentleness of his demeanour
had endeared him to us all, and the
utmost caution was uniformly observed to save
his feelings, and to say nothing from which he
could possibly suspect the truth. Balcombe now
asked John how he had been so fortunate as to fall
in with Todd.

“I God, colonel!” said he, “I went after him,
and that's the way I fell in with him.”

“But,” said Balcombe, “what put it into your
head to go after him?”

“Why,” said he, “it's a long story, colonel; but
I reckon you'd like to know all about it, so I'd as
well begin at once and tell you. You see, the day
before I went away I happened to be at a warrant
trying, and who should be there but that same fellow
Perkins, that wanted to put in his jaw that day
before the justice. A nasty, tallow-faced, greasy,
bloated, long-legged, water-jointed rascal, that looks
for all the world like a hound puppy, that's got fat
by stealing pot liquor out of the kitchen. Well, he
was there, and I heard him say, `I God,' says he,
`'twas pretty cunning in Balcombe to make no objection
to hearsay testimony, when all he wanted
was to get in all that long rigmarole about what
Montague should have said to that fellow Napier,
and then tell the story his own way besides. But
I guess,' says he, `he'll find the difference when
Lawyer Shaler gets him before the judge; for when
all that loose jaw comes to be left out, his case will
look d—d slim, I can tell him. And then,' says
he, `I guess he'll be glad enough to get a lawyer
to plead for him—a pettifogger, as he calls it. But
I'll see him d—d before I say a word for him,
unless he pays me, and that well too,' says he.

“So you see that sets me to considering, colonel;
and I sees plain enough that it was just as
he said. So the next day I starts a way to tell you,
and when I got there you wasn't at home, and when
you come in, the madam, she was there, and I did

not want to say nothing before her. So then the
talk riz about the pistol, and thinks I, I'll just go
and try to see that woman, and tell the colonel
about it another time. So I starts after her the
way she went, and I remembered how she was
dressed, and I sort o' guessed who she was. So
after a while I comes up with her, and she had a
sort of sun bonnet on, so that I could not see her
face; and I speaks to her, and she answers me,
and looked up, I seed it was a woman that lives
with Sam Todd when he's at home—or rather Sam
lives with her, for he aint got no home of his own
rightly; and you see, gentlemen, if she aint his
wife, she ought to be, anyhow. So says I,

“`Why, is that you, Jenny? Why, I met you
a while ago, and I did not know you no more than
if I never had seed you! And,' says I, `did Sam
Todd send that pistol to Colonel Balcombe that
you carried there a while ago?'

“Says she, `I don't know nothing about no
pistol.'

“`Well,' says I, `maybe you don't; but you
carried a box there, anyhow.'

“`Well,' says she, `and what if I did?'

“`'Cause,' says I, `I want to know if Sam Todd
sent it. 'Cause,' says I, `the colonel takes it mighty
friendly-like of Sam.'

“`Ay, ay, John,' says she, `you aint a going to
come over me that way.”

“`Well,' says I, `but, Jenny, I don't mean you
no harm in the 'versal world, nor Sam neither,'

says I; `'cause you know Sam and I was always
good friends; and you know he and I is going out
hunting together this fall.'

“`I reckon,' said she, `you won't hunt much
with him this fall, 'cause he's gone out already.'

“`Gone!' says I; `how come he to go without
me, after he and I agreed to go together?'

“You see, gentlemen, I sort o' suspicioned as
much as that Sam was gone to get out of the way.
'Cause you know, colonel, there was four of them
villains, and Ramsay was one of them, and Johnson
was one; and then I remembered I had heard
old Jones tell Montague about Sam Todd and his
brother; so I made sure partly Sam and Jim were
the other two; and I knew where to find Sam,
and I thought if he was anyways friendly, I could
not do better than to go right after him. So I just
talked so with the woman to try to find out how
that was. So when I axed her how come Sam to
go away and leave me, says she,

“`He did not think it worth while,' says she,
`to wait for you after you were tooken up about
that scrape of Ramsay's.'

“`When did he go?' says I.

“`Sunday morning,' says she.

“`Why,' says I, `that was before I was tooken
up.'

“`Well,' says she, `if you wasn't tooken up then,
Sam could give a right good guess you would be.'

“So by that, gentlemen, I made sure Sam was
in the scrape, and 'twas he that sent the pistol, and

I did not much doubt but he was friendly. So I
speaks right up, and says I, `Well, I don't want
so much to know who sent the pistol, but I just
want to know whether Sam is friendly to the colonel
or not. 'Cause,' says I, `the colonel is in a
sort o' ticklish fix just now, and he wants friends,
and I know,' says I, `that if Sam is a friend anyhow,
he is a good friend.' And with that says she,

“`I won't tell you nothing at all, John, about
the pistol nor the box, nor who sent it; but you
may be sure of one thing,' says she, `Sam Todd
don't mean no harm by Colonel Balcombe nor
you neither. 'Cause,' says she, `the colonel is a
brave soldier and a good man, for all Sam knows
he don't like him.'

“`Well,' says I, `Jenny, where's Sam now?'

“`I shan't tell you that neither,' says she; `and
I'm not sure as I know; but I reckon you know
where you and he was to hunt.'

“So, gentlemen, I had got all I wanted, and I
considered a while; and it was a desperate long
way to the head of Sac River, where I expected
to find Sam; and I had my rifle with me, and it
wasn't no use saying nothing about it to the colonel,
nohow, so I starts right off.

“Well, I went out upon Sac River, and I hunts
a long time before I could light upon Sam's trail.
At last I falls in with him, and from that we camped
together. So that night, setting by the fire, says
I, `Colonel Balcombe was mightily obliged to you,
Sam,' says I, `for sending him that pistol, 'cause

it looked friendly-like; and besides, though you
and I is a couple of sort o' ruffianlike fellows, and
likes to make money by taking the part of them
that has not got the pluck to take their own part,
yet as to taking what don't belong to us, or robbing,
or anything in that way, it's what we don't
hold with. So I suppose while them other fellows,
Ramsay and Johnson, was a robbing the colonel,
you just took your share to keep for him, and sent
it back like an honest man.'

“`Did not Squire Montague make him pay nothing
for it?' says he.

“And the minute Todd said that, I begun to
think of something I had not thought of before,
and says I, `I never suspicioned it came from him,
and how was Squire Montague to know anything
about it?'

“`Why, he knowed where I left it,' says he.

“`And where was that?' said I.

“`At the Rockhouse,' says he.

“`And the picture too?' says I.

“`Yes,' says he.

“And with that he ups and tells me all about it,
just the same as he did yesterday, how he managed
to save what the colonel and Mr. Scott would hate
to lose the most. And when he was done telling,
says I,

“`Well, I am mighty sorry to tell you, Sam,'
says I, `that that pistol is a going to get the colonel
into a sight of trouble.'

“`Oh,' says he, `it cannot be of no great force

nohow, 'cause,' says he, `there wasn't nothing there
but the blood, and nobody knows whose blood it
was; and as to Ramsay, the catfish have done
eating him long ago, and he won't be missed.'

“`There's where you are mistaken,' says I, `for
Ramsay's body washed up on a sand bar right by;
and when Squire Montague and old man Jones
went there and found the picture and the pistol,
by the time they could say, `Eh, what's this?' there
was the corpse to tell them all about it, as plain as
a live man could talk.'

“When Sam heard this he studied and looked
mighty uneasy-like, and then says he, `Squire
Montague had not ought to have carried old man
Jones there right away. He'd ought to have gone
there by himself first,' says he, `and seen how the
land lay; 'cause,' says he, `that wasn't doing the
right thing by me; 'cause you see, John, when he
give me the hundred dollars for the things, to make
my mind easy, he tells me the men should get
their things again; and he'd just fix so as to fling
a running noose, like, over the colonel in the start
of the race, and so sort o' trip him, and then he'd
get to Virginia first. And,' says he, `I tell'd him
right straight that he should not have the things
nohow, if the colonel was to be brought into any
serious trouble about the business.'

“`Well,' says I, `it's a slim chance to depend
upon what almost anybody says; but as to such a
natural born devil as that Montague, you could
not look for anything from him. Do you think,'

says I, `he didn't carry Mr. Jones down there Sunday
evening, and then a Monday morning he was
off by crack of day? and he puts that fellow Johnson
up to tell it all just right to hang the colonel;
and then when he gets to St. Louis, he employs a
first-rate lawyer there, (one Shaler, I think they
call his name,) that they say is a right roarer, to
come up to prosecute the colonel, right or wrong.'

“And while I was a saying this, gentlemen, Jim,
he looks straight at me right through the fire, and
if he did not look like the devil in his own ilement,
I don't know. And with that he jumps right up,
and such a cursing as Montague got, it did not do
his soul no good, now mind I tell you. So after a
while, when his steam was pretty well blowed off,
he just said he'd start off next day, and come right
in and tell all about it. And you see, gentlemen,
all the time I never said a word about myself,
'cause that was part of the story he did not know
nothing about; and more than that, 'twasn't no use;
for you see, for all Sam know'd the colonel didn't
like him, 'cause he was a hardheaded devil out
upon the Spanish frontier, that wouldn't neither
lead nor drive, and he and I was right good friends,
yet I know'd he would not so much mind my
coming to a bad end, as such a man as the colonel.
'Cause you see,” added John, with a knowing
look, “maybe he thought if I did not deserve it
now, I did another time, and maybe he wasn't so
mighty far wrong either; though as to taking
life,” (and here he spoke with great gravity,) “except

of an Indian, or them that wasn't no better,
and that in the way of fair manhood, it's what I
never did do, and never will. And besides, if such
a poor fellow as I was put out of the way, there's
plenty more just like me; leastways, maybe Sam
thinks so; and I aint so sure but what he thinks
he'd do just as well in my place, for all the good
I'll ever do, or harm either. But then, if Colonel
Balcombe was gone, where would we find anybody
to pay a poor fellow sometimes for doing
what an't agin his conscience? For a man may
be pretty well up to all sorts of devilment, and yet
maybe he won't like to be always at it. So you
see, gentlemen, Sam never know'd a word about
my part in the scrape more than he know'd before
till he got in the courthouse, and I an't so mighty
sure he know'd it then. So, gentlemen, to make
a long story short, the next day we cached our
skins, and started in, and a tough time we had of
it to save our distance.”

“And where did Billy John come from?” said
Balcombe; “and what brought him?”

“I had not a chance to ask him,” said John.
“I suppose he just staid long enough to see that
you was out of the scrape, and then slipped away
to his hunting ground again. You see, that day
they took me at the camp meeting he and Snake
was there, and the minute they seed me in trouble,
they came up and waited for orders. And so I
tells them to be off if they did not want to be
hanged: so they put right off. How they got the

news of your being in trouble, the Lord knows.
But as to his coming in after he heard that! Bless
your soul, colonel! why, that fellow, before he'd let
you come to any harm, especially for what he had
done, he'd let 'em roast him before a slow fire, and
cut slices off, and eat 'em before his face.”

“And did Todd know nothing about the other
pistol?” said Balcombe. “Because I should like
to get the dirk that was in company with it. It's
an old friend that I should not like to lose.”

“I reckon so, sir,” said John, “and so did Sam;
for we both seed it stand your friend once, when
nothing else could have helped you. But he could
not tell rightly about that. Only just when I told
him how it come, he seemed pleased, and said it
must be Jim's work. And he said he was mighty
glad Jim sent it. `'Cause,' says he, `I'm sorter
jubus Jim an't so mighty partickler about holding
fast what he gets.' And then he axed me about
the dirk, and he said Jim ought to have sent that
too; but maybe he had just carried it out with him
for a hunting-knife, and would give it back to the
colonel when he come in. And, anyhow, he said
it should be forthcoming.”

“I am afraid,” said Balcombe, “it will come too
late; for I must be off to Virginia immediately.”

“Do you still propose going?” said I, delighted.

“Yes,” said he, “and I shall take my wife with
me. We shall lose no time by taking her. She
has relations in Fauquier whom she wishes to see.
We take the steamboat to Wheeling, the stage to

Baltimore, Washington, and Fredericksburg, which
last will pass near her destination; and after leaving
her, to touch at your mother's in King and
Queen, and fall down into Essex to Raby Hall.
How would you like the trip, John?”

“Of all things in the world, if you'd any use for
me.”

“Well, John, Colonel Robinson says whenever
there are such men as Montague there's use for
such as you. So here's my hand. We must go
to the tailor, and have ourselves made decent, and
be off.”

“I God,” said John, laughing, and looking at his
tattered buckskins, “I don't think a set of new rigging
would do me any harm; but don't you think,
colonel, that a new suit of leather would answer
me best?”

“That will never do, John, where we are going.
You must shed that dress, or the boys will all run
after you in the streets.”

“Why, colonel,” said John, “in the part of Virginia
where I was raised, nobody hardly wears
nothing else; and I should think a man wasn't such
a strange sight where you come from. But maybe
it's away down towards Norfolk you are going,
and then I know it won't do. So I must try and
learn to wear breeches and shoes.”

He went out, and Balcombe, looking after him
with a good-humoured smile, turned to me and
said,

“Well, William, what do you think of my man
John?”

“The fellow's worth his weight in gold,” said I.

“He's an extraordinary animal,” continued Balcombe;
“and I hardly know a more curious study
than to follow him in such a detail as he has just
given us, and note the process of his mind in `putting
that and that together,' as he sometimes says.
His quickness in tracing actions to their motives,
and determining the influence which the motive
thus ascertained will have on other actions, is even
less remarkable than his accuracy in defining the
extent to which they may be depended on. Did
you observe, that though he had no doubt that that
sort of attachment, which, in spite of individual
grievances, men will form for those who have led
them safely through danger, would dispose Todd
to save me, he was careful not to tell him too much.
He was not so very sure of the wisdom of letting
the fellow know, that by holding his tongue he
might get him out of his way, and so establish himself
in that pre-eminence among the rogues and
ruffians of the region, to which John's title is incontestible;
though, after him, no man has a better
claim to it than Todd. John's place among such
fellows is something like that of Bamfylde Moore
Carew among the beggars. Indeed he often reminds
me of the gipsies and suchlike sapient vagabonds
that we meet with in modern romances. I
don't mean to speak of such marvellous creatures
as Edie Ochiltree or Meg Merrilies. I allude to

the innumerable paltry imitations which the popularity
of these characters has produced. But Scott
himself might have profited by a personal knowledge
of such a man as John Keizer. He would
have seen that it was not necessary to endow these
creatures of his fancy with powers bordering on
the supernatural, so that they sometimes seem to
have the faculty of ubiquity, and sometimes preternatural
means of knowledge. The spell which this
`wizard of the north' casts on us, disqualifies us for
observing this while we read. We are ourselves
bewitched, and magic seems nature. But there is
no witchcraft about John. We know whence and
how he comes; he does nothing that other people
cannot do, and as to his information of all that concerns
him, we know he comes by it by what he
would call `a knack of knowing by a little what a
great deal means.' He makes no mystery of the
matter, and is always ready to explain his means
of knowledge. It is impossible to tell the fellow
any three facts, from which he will not instantly
infer a fourth; and this, with courage, address, and
activity, makes up the sum total of his efficiency.

“His manner of telling his story,” continued
Balcombe, “characterizes the operations of his
mind. You may perceive that his language is not
now that which you first heard from him. You
were then a stranger, and he was on his p's and q's
before you, and trying to talk `high larnt' as he
would call it. He now talks to you as he would
to me, in the dialect of his native mountains. It

is one which we often see put into the mouths of
men who are made to spin out their narratives
with digressions and wanderings, and `says he's'
and `says I's' innumerable. But John's narratives
are not spun out. If you have caught the run of
his slang, amuse yourself with writing down what
he has just told us in his own words; and then try
whether you can by any means express the same
facts and ideas in good gentlemanly English, as
perspicuously or in the same compass. It will be
an amusing exercise.”

I thought so, and tried it. The reader has the
result of the first part of the experiment. What I
have given as John's narrative is a copy from what
I then wrote down. I shall be excused from giving
my paraphrase. It turned out to be such an
improvement as paraphrases of the Bible generally
are. If, instead of telling John's story for him, I
could have gotten him to tell mine for me, we
should have been through it long ago, and much
more agreeably. Different as they were, John
and Balcombe had much in common. In describing
the operations of John's mind, Balcombe had
described his own. Their principles and modes
of action made the difference. It was the possession
of these faculties that had enabled them to
extricate themselves from the deep-laid schemes
of the most artful villain under the sun. That Balcombe
would have ultimately achieved his deliverance
without the aid of Keizer was rendered probable
by what Roberts had said. Indeed John may

have anticipated his commands by his journey into
the wilderness, for they had both interpreted the
appearance of the pistol in the same way. It is
possible that a part of Balcombe's astonishing composure,
under the very eye of danger, may have
proceeded from his confidence in the other's sagacity
and activity. The two together certainly
constituted a league of offence and defence, the
most efficient imaginable. They called to my
mind a remark I had seen, that his alliance with
the dog had given to man his mastery over other
animals. John, in Balcombe's hands, was the
wild dog, retaining his courage, his rapacity, and
his hardihood, but fitted to the uses of his master
by having his ferocity subdued, his sagacity trained,
and his courage directed against the denizens of
his native forest.