CHAPTER XXVIII.
THE WORLD WENT VERY ILL THEN.
Acredale was not the sleepy, sylvan scene we first saw it, when Mrs. Sprague and Merry drove through the wide main street from the station, four months after they had quitted it in search of their soldier boys. The stately elms still arched the highway to Warchester, but here and there rough gaps were seen in the trim hedge-rows. Staring new edifices jutted through these breaks upon the grassy walks, and building material lay heaped in confusion all along the graveled walks. Merry railed at these evidences of commercial invasion, wondering who had come to the village to transform it into city hideousness. Mrs. Sprague did not give much heed to her companion's speculations. Her mind was far away on the James, wondering where her boy was. It was very hard to settle down to the commonplaces of home life; but, even in all her distraction, Mrs. Sprague saw that a change had come upon the people as well as the place. With the war and its desolating sights fresh in her memory, she saw, with sorrow and aversion, that social life was gayer than it had ever been, that the rush for wealth had become a fever, and that the simple ways and homely joys of the past were now remitted to the very elderly. The story of Dick's mad pursuit of Jack and the Caribees, after the disaster at Bull Run, was soon known in every home in the county. Friends came from far and near to hear the exciting adventure; and the younger boys, who had been the lad's classmates in the academy, at once made up a company of youngsters, adorned by the name of the "Perley Rangers," to be in readiness for the hero's command when he should return.
The feud between the adherents of the houses of Sprague and Boone had become acrimoniously embittered by the point of view from which each side saw the conduct of Jack. Among the Boone feudatories he was set down as a traitor, a spy, a murderer. The first malignant rumors that reached the village after the battle were still maintained stoutly by the Boone lictors. Jack had ingloriously shirked his part in the battle with the Caribees; he had skulked in the bushes until the issue was decided, and then had followed the sympathies of his secession family; he had gone to the Atterburys, well known for their hatred to the North. It was to prove his sincerity in the Southern cause that he had wormed himself into the confidence of Wesley Boone's comrades, and in order that he might be chief agent in the frustration of the plan of escape.
He had won high regard in the Confederacy by saving Davis from capture. He had, with his own hand, shot Wesley Boone when the plan of capture was on the verge of success. Could anything be clearer than his odious treason? Hadn't he, of all the unfortunates of the battle, found favor and luxurious quarters in Richmond? Hadn't he cunningly cajoled the Boones into the visit to the rebel household, in order to wrest the secrets of the Union rescue from them? It was in vain that the Perleys and others set forth the real case. "Very likely, indeed," the Boone side cried, "that rebels like the Atterburys would receive true Unionists into their house, and treat them as friends! A real Unionist would have refused hospitality from the enemies of his country." There was talk among the more zealous patriots of having the Sprague family expelled from Acredale. Loyal zealots looked up the law on expatriation and attainder, and complained bitterly that no applicable provisions were found in the statutes. Stirring addresses were sent to the member from Warchester, imploring him to have laws enacted that would enable the patriots to deal summarily with covert treason. It was true that the Spragues had contributed many thousand dollars toward the equipment of the Caribees, had endowed twenty beds in one of the city hospitals for the wounded—but this was when Jack expected high command in the regiment. Failing in that ignoble self-seeking, he had gone where his heart was, while the family, to retain their property, remained among the loyal, to insult their woe and gloat over their misfortunes.
At a great "war meeting" in the town-hall, over which Boone presided, one thrilling orator hinted that fire, if not the law, could "relieve a loyal community of the Copperhead's nest!" "It was an insult, as well as a menace, to have the patrician palace of disloyalty flaunting its grandeurs among a people loyal and devoted, whose sons and brothers were battling for the Union. Every rebel sympathizer driven from the North would strengthen the Union cause; ashes and salt sowed on the ground their insolent homes had desecrated, would be a holy reminder to the loyal, a warning to the secret foes of the Union."
There were loud expressions of approval, and a solemn "Amen" to this intrepid plan of campaign. Lawyer Brodie, who was present, arose under a thunder of discordant notes—"Copperhead!" "Traitor!" "Dough-face!" "We don't want to hear from rebel sympathizers! Out with him!" and other more opprobrious taunts. Now, Brodie was Boone's counsel, and had been identified with him in some very difficult litigation. It would not do to have him discredited. The chairman rapped loudly for order.
"I can vouch, my friends, for Mr. Brodie's patriotism. He is a Democrat, it is true; but he loves the Union. I know that to be a fact. You can do the Union no better service than listening to what he has to say."
Brodie, who had held his place, calmly smiled as Boone sat down, and, surveying the audience from side to side, began:
"Free speech was one of the cries that aroused the North in the late campaign, I believe in free speech. I have done my share toward securing it, but I never was refused it before. I look among the men here and see among you neighbors whom I have known since boyhood, neighbors who have known me since boyhood, and when I arise here to take a citizen's part, in a meeting called to aid and comfort the cause of the Union, I am permitted to speak only by the personal request of one man. If that is your idea of free speech, if that is your notion of aiding the Union cause, and strengthening the hands of the Administration, I don't need to be in the confidence of the rebel authorities to tell you that they could ask no more powerful allies than you! [Sensation.]
"There are three hundred men in this hall. The light is good, and my eyesight is not impaired; but I can not see a man among you who was not a Democrat a year or two ago. There are not fifty men among you that voted for Abraham Lincoln. [Murmurs.] Are the two hundred and fifty, then, traitors? Are they rebel sympathizers? Are they Copperheads? One thousand men marched under the Caribee flag; not a man of them voted for Lincoln. Are they Copperheads? This township, by its vote at the last election, was five to one Democratic. Is this a Copperhead community? Nearly a half million dollars have been subscribed for bounties and war measures; the tax-payers, almost to a man, are Democrats. Is it possible, then, that the Copperheads are supplying the money to carry on the war? You propose to burn the mansion of my old partner, Senator Sprague! Why? Because his estate has given more to the Union cause than any other family in the township?"
"The son has gone over to the rebels," a voice cried.
"Thank you. There—I'm glad you have given me the chance to crush that cowardly calumny—the invention of some envious malefactor. Jack Sprague has gone over to the rebels, just as Anderson and his men went over at Sumter; just as fifteen hundred of his comrades went over at Bull Run; just as some of our sons and brothers here in Acredale went over; just as my friend, Boone's son, went over—because he was surrounded and wounded."
"Stop a moment, if you please, friend Brodie; I protest against your making anything in common between my son and this young man. The matter is to be investigated, and then we can tell better."
Boone spoke in great excitement, and the audience, now feverishly wrought up, urged the lawyer to say his say out. He continued in the trained, impassive tones of the advocate:
"Every one in this room knows the two young men. It would be waste of time for me to strive to make anything in common between John Sprague and Wesley Boone. Here, where they both grew up, that is quite unnecessary."
"I—I—referred to their conduct as soldiers," Boone cried, hoarsely. "My son lost his life in the service of his country. I can't have his name coupled with a—murderer's—with a traitor's."
"Ah, my friend, when hate draws your portrait it is bound to be black. When prejudice holds the pen, your virtues stand in the shade of vice. I will tell John Sprague's story from the day he quit Acredale to the unhappy hour his comrade was killed in the dark, in the sleeping-room of the mother and daughter who had nursed him from the very jaws of death. He was in that house by his father's urgent request, though it would have needed none to open its doors to any one in want of succor. Nor," he added, significantly, "can it be told who killed Wesley Boone until all the shots fired in Mrs. Atterbury's chamber are accounted for."
Then he narrated rapidly, but tellingly, the substance of what has been already set down in this history—the facts taken from Jack's letters and attested by the corroboration of Barney, Dick, and the company's officers. There was a visible revulsion in the larger part of the audience as the tale went on; and when the lawyer wound up with the story of Mrs. Sprague's baffled efforts in Washington to have her boy brought North, there was an outburst of applause and a faint cheer from the younger men for "glorious old Jack."
The factions shifted a good deal after this official rendering of the affair. There was no longer any talk of burning the Sprague property, and opinion was about evenly divided as to Jack's conduct. December had come, and the township was busy packing boxes to send to the army. No news had come North from Richmond. Active movements were looked for every day, and in the momentous expectation such lesser incidents as exchange were forgotten or ignored. The daily journals were filled with details of contemplated expeditions, and one morning Mrs. Sprague read with beating heart this paragraph in the Herald:
"A score or more of the men who escaped from the Richmond prison a few weeks ago, arrived at Washington to-day from Fort Monroe. The party endured untold privations in the swamps between Williamsburg and our line on the Warwick, but all came in safely, except two men who died from the results of their wounds. The expedition was planned and carried out by an agent of General Butler, who has been in Virginia since the unfortunate attempt to rescue Captain Boone of the 'Caribee' regiment. At the moment the party reached the Union outpost, one of the most daring of the Union men, Sergeant Jacques of the Caribees, was, it is thought, mortally wounded."
Merry, too, had seen the story, and came over to show it to Mrs.
Sprague.
"I have seen it, I have seen it. Who of the Caribees can these be? Who is Jacques? I never heard that name here."
"Ah! he must be one of the town recruits. It's a French name."
"Yes, it is part of a rather famous French name," Mrs. Sprague replied, half smiling at Merry's innocence. "Something must be done to get into communication with these escaped men. Some of them must have seen Jack. If there are Caribees among them, you may be sure they have messages from our boys. I think I shall set out for Washington, or ask Mr. Brodie to go."
"That's better. Mr. Brodie can get at the men and you couldn't. I shall be in a fever until we have heard from them."
Brodie agreed with the ladies when, later, they discussed the matter with him, and that evening he set out for Washington. Mrs. Sprague at the tea-table with Merry, who made it a point to give the lonely mother as much of her time as she could spare, was still pondering the paragraph when the sound of carriage-wheels came in through the closed curtains. Then the front door opened without knocking, and there was a rustle in the hallway, and then, with a simultaneous scream, three agitated females, to wit, Mrs. Sprague, Merry, and Olympia, in a confused mass.
"O my child! my child!"
"Mamma!"
"Dearest, dearest Olympia," Merry splutters, wildly embracing both.
"Oh, how delightful to be here, to see you, mamma as peaceful and serene as in the old days! I thought I should never get home. I left Richmond three weeks ago. I was held at Fredericksburg for ten days. Then I had to turn back when we got to Manassas, through some red tape lacking there. But here I am. Here I am at home—ugh!—I shall never quit it again—never."
"But, my child. Tell us—Jack!"
"Jack? Haven't you heard from him? He escaped three weeks ago. It was he who got the men out of the prison. Dick was with him. Surely you have heard of that?" and Olympia sank into the nearest chair, all the gayety gone from her face, her eyes questioning the two wretched women. Neither could for the moment control her agitation; neither was capable of thinking. All that was in their minds was this dire specter of a month's silence. Alive, Jack or Dick would have found means to relieve their anxiety.
"Surely you heard that a party had escaped from Libby and made their way to Fort Monroe?" Olympia cried, desperately.
"Fort Monroe?" Mrs. Sprague echoed mechanically. "Yes, ah, yes. Merry, where's the paper?"
Olympia devoured the meager scrap and then dropped the journal on her knees. Her mind was in a whirl. In Richmond the escape had been announced, then the news that the party had been surrounded in the swamp, then day by day details of the taking of straggling negroes and one or two soldiers, but no name that even resembled Jack's. The Atterburys, after the first painful sensation, had given their approval of Jack's going, and used all means in their power to get such facts as would comfort Olympia. They assured her that Jack had reached the Union lines, and then she had set out northward, expecting to find him at home or in communication with his family. No word from Dick? No word from Jack? They were dead, and she—she had urged them to the mad adventure! She had given Jack no peace, had fired Dick to the fatal enterprise. She dared not look in the tearless eyes of her mother. She dared not face the ghastly questioning in Merry's meek eye. Brodie had gone down to see the escaped men. Perhaps he would discover something. This was the small comfort left the three when, near midnight, they ended the woful conference.
The next day Olympia was visited by a representative of the Crossbow, the chief journal of Warchester, and urged to write a narrative of her adventures in the rebel capital. Until her friends made her see how much effect it would have in clearing Jack's reputation she shrank from the publicity, but with that end in view—Jack's honor—she wrote, and wrote with strength and clearness, the moving incidents of her brother's capture, captivity, and escape—or his bold effort to escape. This she told so simply, so directly, so vividly, that the truth of it at once, struck the most prejudiced reader, who had no cause to continue in his prepossession. After the publication in the Warchester paper scores who had sided with the Boone faction either called or wrote to confess their error. Even the Acredale Monitor, a weekly sheet notoriously in the interest of Boone, felt constrained to copy parts of the account and publish with it a shambling retraction of previous criticism, based on imperfect knowledge, that it had printed concerning Sergeant Sprague. "Death," it declared, "has obliterated all feeling that existed against our young townsman, whose conduct, though open to grievous doubt in the early part of his military career has been amply atoned for in the intrepid enterprise in which he seems to have lost his life."