CHAPTER XVIII
Brown lay flat on his belly the last hour of the day catching moments of fitful sleep. At sunset he lifted his small head above the grass and scanned the horizon. There might be the curling smoke of a camp in sight. A relief party might be on his trail.
He breathed a sigh of satisfaction. All was well. The sun was fast sinking beneath the hills, the prey was in sight and no hand could be lifted to help.
The moment the shadows closed over the ravine he rose, stretched his cramped body and turned to Thompson.
"Build your fire for supper."
Thompson nodded.
"And give our men all they can eat."
"Yes, sir."
"They'll need their strength to-night."
"I understand."
The supper ready, Brown gathered his band around the camp fire and offered thanks to his God. The meal was eaten in silence. The tension of an imperious mind had gripped the souls of his men. They moved as if stalking game at close quarters.
And they were doing this exactly.
The last pot and pan had been cleaned and packed. The fire was extinguished. Brown issued his first order of the deed.
"Lie down flat in the grass now."
The men dropped one by one. Brown was the last.
"When I give the word, see that your arms are in trim and march single file fifty yards apart and beat the brush as you go. If you come on a cabin in our path not marked in our survey, it is important. Do not pass it. Report to me immediately."
There was no response. He had expected none. The order was final.
The first move in the man hunt was carefully planned.
The instinct to kill is the elemental force, beneath our culture, which makes the hunter. The strongest personalities of our world-conquering race of Nordic freemen are always hunters. If they do not practice the chase the fact is due to an accident of position in life. The opportunity has not been given.
Beneath the skin of the man of the College, the Council Table, the Forum, the Sacred Altar, of Home, and the Church slumbers this elemental beast.
Culture at best is but a few hundred years old and it has probably skipped several generations in its growth. The Archaic instinct in man to kill reaches back millions of years into the past. The only power on earth to restrain that force is Law. The rules of life, embodied in law are the painful results of experience in killing and the dire effects which follow, both to the individual and the race. Law is a force only so long as reverence for law is made the first principle of man's social training. The moment he lifts his individual will against the embodied experience of humanity, he is once more the elemental beast of the prehistoric jungle—the Hunter.
And when the game is human and the hunter is a man of prayer, we have the supreme form of the beast, the ancient Witch Hunter. It is a fact that the pleasure of killing is universal in man. Our savage ancestors for millions of years had to kill to live. We have long ago outgrown this necessity in the development of civilization. But the instinct remains.
We are human as we restrain this instinct and bring it under the dominion of Law. We still hunt the most delicate and beautiful animals, stalk and kill them, driven by the passionate secret pleasure of the act of murder. With bated breath and glittering eyes we press our advantage until the broken wing ceases to flutter and the splintered bone to crawl.
This imperious atavism the best of us cannot or will not control in the pursuit of animals. When man has lifted his arm in defiance of Tradition and Law, this impulse is the dominant force which sweeps all else as chaff before it.
John Brown was the apostle of the sternest faith ever developed in the agonies of our history. To him life had always been a horror.
There was no hesitation, no halting, no quiver of maudlin pity, when he slowly rose from his grass-covered lair in the darkness and called his men at ten o'clock:
"Ready!"
Single file, moving silently and swiftly they crept through the night, only the sharpened swords clanking occasionally broke the silence. Their tread was soft as the claws of panthers. The leader's spirit gripped mind and body of his followers.
They moved northward from the camp in the ravine and crossed the Mosquito Creek just above the home of the Doyles. Once over the creek, the hunters again spread out single file fifty yards apart.
They had gone but two hundred yards when the signal to halt was whispered along the line. Owen Brown reported to his father:
"There's a cabin just ahead."
"We haven't charted it in our survey?"
"No."
"It will not do to pass it," said Brown.
"They might give the alarm."
"Surround it and do your duty," was the stern command.
Owen called three men, cautiously approached the door and knocked.
Something moved inside and a gun was suddenly rammed through a chink in the walls. The muzzle line could be seen in the flash of a star's light.
The four men broke and scattered in the brush. They reported to the leader.
"We want no fight with this fool. No gun play if we can avoid it. We'll take our chances and let him alone. He'll think we're a bunch of sneak thieves. I don't see how we missed this man's place. It can't be five hundred yards from the Doyles'. Back to your places and swing round his cabin."
Owen quickly gave the order and the hunters passed on. The first one of the marked prey had shown teeth and claws and the hunters slipped on under the cover of the darkness to easier game.
The Doyles were not armed.
At least the chances were the old shotgun was not loaded, as it was used only for hunting.
The hunters crouched low and circled the Doyle house, crawling through the timber and the brush.
A hundred yards from the stable, a dog barked. Owen had carefully marked this dog on the day of the survey. He was merely a faithful yellow cur which Doyle had brought from Virginia. He looked about seven years old. If crossed he might put up a nasty fight. If approached with friendly word by a voice he had once heard, the rest would be easy.
The signal was given to halt. The hunters paused and stood still in their tracks. Owen had taken pains to be friendly with this dog on the day of the survey. He had called him a number of times and had given him a piece of bread from his pocket. He was sure he could manage him.
In a low tone he whistled and called the dog by name. He had carefully recalled it.
"Jack!"
He listened intently and heard the soft step of a paw rustling the leaves. The plan was working.
The dog pushed his way into an open space in the brush and stopped.
The hunter called softly:
"Jack, old boy!"
The dog wagged his tail. The man could see the movement of kindly greeting in the starlight, and ventured close. He bent low and called again:
"Come on, boy!"
The dog answered with a whine, wagged his tail, came close and thrust his nose against the man's arm in a welcome greeting. With his left hand the man stroked the warm, furry head, while his right slowly slipped the ugly sharpened cutlass from its scabbard.
Still stroking the dog's head and softly murmuring words of endearment, he straightened his body:
"Bully old dog! Fine old doggie—"
The dog's eyes followed the rising form with confidence, wagging his tail in protest against his going.
The hand gripped the brass hilt of the cutlass, the polished steel whizzed through the air and crashed into the yellow mass of flesh and bones.
His aim was bad in the dark. He missed the dog's head and the sword split the body lengthwise. To the man's amazement a piercing howl of agony rang through the woods.
He dropped his sword and gripped the quivering throat and held it in a vise of steel until the writhing body was still at last.
Inside the darkened cabin, the mother stirred from an uneasy sleep. She shook her husband and listened intently. The only sound that came from without was the chirp of crickets and the distant call of a coyote from the hill across the creek.
She held her breath and listened again. The man by her side slept soundly. She couldn't understand why her heart persisted in pounding. There wasn't the rustle of a leaf outside. The wind had died down with the falling night. It couldn't be more than eleven o'clock.
Her husband's breathing was deep and regular. His perfect rest and the sense of strength in his warm body restored her poise. She felt the slender forms of her little girls in the trundle bed and tried to go back to sleep.
It was useless. In spite of every effort her eyes refused to close. Again she was sure she had heard the dog's cry in the night. She believed that it was an ugly dream. The dawn of a beautiful Sunday morning would find all well in the little home and her faithful dog again wagging his tail at the door asking for breakfast.
She listened to the beating of her foolish heart. Wide awake, she began to murmur a prayer of thanks to God for all His goodness and mercy in the new home He had given.
As Owen's hands slowly relaxed from the throat of the lifeless body he seized a handful of leaves and wiped the blood from the blade and replaced it in the scabbard.
He rose quickly and gave the signal to advance. Again crouching low, moving with the soft tread of beasts of prey, the hunters closed in on the settler's home.
The keen ears of the mother, still wide awake, caught the crunch of feet on the gravel of the walk. With a heart pounding again in alarm she raised her head and listened. From the other side of the house came the rustle of leaves stirred by another swiftly approaching footstep. It was so still she could hear her own heart beat again. There could be no mistake about it this time.
She gripped her husband's arm:
"John!"
He moaned drowsily.
"John—John—"
"What's matter?" he murmured without lifting his head from the pillow.
"Get up quick!"
"What for?" he groaned.
"There's somebody around the house."
"Na."
"I tell you—yes!"
"Hit's the dawgs."
"I heard a man's step on the path, I tell you."
"Yer dreamin', ole woman—"
"I'm not, I tell ye."
"Go back to sleep."
The man settled again and breathed deeply.
The woman remained on her elbow, listening with every nerve strained in agony.
Again she heard a step on the gravel. This time another footfall joined the first. She gripped her husband's shoulders and shook him violently.
"John, John!" she whispered.
He had half roused himself this time, shocked into consciousness by her trembling grip on his shoulders. But above all by the tremor in her whispered call.
"What is it, Mahala?"
"For God's sake, get up quick and call the boys down outen the loft."
"No!" he growled.
"I tell you, there's somebody outside—"
They were both sitting on the edge of the bed now, speaking in whispers.
"You're dreamin', ole 'oman," he persisted.
"I heard 'em. There's more'n one. I heard some on the other side of the house. I heard two in front. Call the boys down—"
"Don't wake the boys up fer nothin—"
"Is yer gun loaded?"
"No."
"Oh, my God."
"I ain't got no powder. I don't kill game in the springtime."
They both listened. All was still. They could hear the breathing of the little girls in the trundle bed.
The crunch of feet suddenly came to the doorstep. The woman's hand gripped her husband's arm in terror. He heard it now.
"That's funny," he mused.
"Call the boys!" the mother pleaded.
"Wait till we find out what it is—"
A firm knock on the door echoed through the darkened room.
"God save us!" the woman breathed.
Doyle rose and quietly walked to the door.
"What is it?" he called in friendly tones.
"We're lost in the woods," a voice answered.
His wife had followed and gripped his arm.
"Don't open that door."
"Wait, Mother—"
"We're trying to find the way to Mr. Wilkinson's—can you tell us?"
"Sure I can."
He moved to open the door. Again his wife held him.
"Don't do it!"
Doyle brushed her aside.
"Don't be foolish, Mahala," he protested indignantly. "I'm a poor sort o' man if I can't tell a lost traveler the way out of the woods."
"They're lyin'!"
"We'll see."
He raised the latch and six men crashed their way through the door. John Brown led the assault. He held a dim lantern in his hand which he lifted above his head, as he surveyed the room. He kept his own face in shadow.
With a smothered cry, the mother backed against the trundle bed instinctively covering the sleeping figures of the girls.
Brown pointed a cocked revolver at Doyle's breast and said in cold tones:
"Call those three boys down."
Doyle hesitated.
Brown's eye glanced down the barrel of his revolver:
"Quick!"
The man saw he had no chance.
He mounted the ladder, the revolver following him. The mother's terror-stricken eyes saw that each man was armed with two revolvers, a bowie knife and cutlass.
"Don't you scare 'em," Brown warned.
"I won't."
"Tell 'em to come down and show us the way to Wilkinson's."
"Boys!" the father called.
There was no answer at first, and the father wondered if they had heard and gotten weapons of some kind. He hoped not. It would be a useless horror to try to defend themselves before a mother's eyes, and those little girls screaming beside her.
He hastened to call a second time and reassure their fears.
"Boys!"
William, the older one, answered drowsily:
"Yessir—"
"Come down, all of you. Some travelers are here who've lost the way.
They want you to help them get to Mr. Wilkinson's."
"All right, sir."
The boys hastily slipped on their trousers and shoes.
"Tell 'em to hurry," Brown ordered.
"Jest slip on yer shoes and britches," Doyle called.
The Surveyor held the lantern behind his body until the three sons had come down the ladder and he saw that they were unarmed.
He stepped to the fireplace, took the shotgun from the rack and handed it to Weiner.
The boys, startled at the group of stern armed men, instinctively moved toward their father, dazed by the assault.
Brown faced the group.
"You four men are my prisoners."
The mother left the trundle bed and faced the leader.
"Who are you?"
Brown dropped his lantern, fixed her with his eyes.
"I am the leader of the Northern Army."
"What are you doing here to-night?"
"I have come on a divine mission."
"Who sent you?"
"The Lord of Hosts in a Vision—"
"What are you going to do?"
"The will of God."
"What are you going to do?" she fairly screamed in his face.
"That is not for your ears, woman," was the stern answer. "I have important business with Southern settlers on the Pottawattomie to-night."
The woman's intuition saw in a flash the hideous tragedy. With a cry of anguish she threw her arms around her husband's neck, sobbing.
"Oh, John, John, my man, I told ye not to talk—but ye would tell folks what ye believed. Why couldn't ye be still? Oh, my God, my God, it's come to this!"
The man soothed her with tender touch.
"Hush, Mother, hush. You mustn't take on."
"I can't help it—I just can't. God have mercy on my poor lost soul—"
She paused and looked at her boys.
With a scream she threw herself first on one and then on the other.
"Oh, my big fine boy! I can't let you go! Where is God to-night? Is He dead? Has He forgotten me?"
The father drew her away and shook her sternly.
"Hush, Mother, hush! Yer can't show the white feather like this!"
"I can't help it. I can't give up my boys!"
She paused and looked at Doyle.
"And I can't give you up, my man—I just can't!"
"Don't, don't—" the husband commanded. "We've got to be men now."
She fought hard to control her tears. The little girls began to sob. She rushed to the trundle bed and soothed them.
"Keep still, babies. They won't hurt you. Keep still!"
The children choked into silence and she leaped toward Brown and tried to seize his hand. He repulsed her and she went on frantically.
"Please, for God's sake, man, have mercy on a wife and mother, if you ain't got no pity in your heart for my men! Surely you have women home. Their hearts can break like mine. My man's only been talkin' as politicians talk. It was nothing. Surely it's no crime."
Brown drew a notebook from his pocket and held it up.
"I have the record in this book of your husband's words against the men of our party, Madame. He stands convicted of murder in his heart. His sons are not of age. Their opinions are his."
For a moment the mother forgot her pleading and shrieked her defiance into the stern face before her.
"And who made you a judge o' life and death for my man and my sons? I bore these boys of the pains of my body. God gave them to me. They are mine, not yours!"
Brown brushed her aside.
"That's enough from you. Those men are my prisoners. Bring them on!"
He moved toward the door and the guards with drawn swords closed in on the group.
The mother leaped forward and barred the way to the door. She faced Brown with blanched face. Her breath came in short gasps. She fought desperately for control of her voice, failed to make a sound, staggered to the old man, grasped blindly his body and sank to her knees at his feet.
At last she managed to gasp:
"Just one of my boys—then—my baby boy! He's a big boy—but look at his smooth face—he ain't but fourteen years old. Hit don't seem but yistiday that he wuz just a laughin' baby in my arms! And I've always been that proud of him. He's smart. He's always been smart—and God forgive me—I've loved him better'n all the others—hit—wuzn't—right— fer—a—mother—to—love one of her—children—more—than—the—others— but I couldn't help it! If ye'll just spare him—hit's all I'll ask ye now"—her voice sank into a sob as her face touched the floor.
The dark figure above her did not move and she lifted her head with desperate courage.
"I'll be all alone here—a broken-hearted woman with two little gals and nobody to help me—or work fer me—ef you'll just spare my baby boy—"
She sprang to her feet and threw her arms around the youngest boy's neck.
"Oh, my baby, my baby, I can't let ye go—I can't—I can't!"
She lifted her tear-streaming eyes to the dark face again.
"Please, please, for the love of
God—you—say—you—believe—in—God—leave me this one!"
Brown moved his head in a moment's uncertainty. He turned to Owen.
"Leave him and come on with the others."
With a desperate cry, the mother closed her eyes and clung to the boy.
She dared not lift them in prayer for the others as they passed out into the night.
The armed men had seized her husband and her two older sons, William and Drury, and hustled them through the door. The mother drew the boy back on the trundle bed and held him in her arms. The little girls crouched close and began to sob.
"Hush—don't make a noise. They won't hurt you. I want to hear what they do—maybe—"
The mother stopped short, fascinated by the horror of the tragedy she knew would take place outside her door. The darkness gave no token of its progress. A cricket was chirping in the chimney just awakened by the noise.
She held her breath and listened. Not a sound. The silence was unbearable. She sprang to her feet in a moment's fierce rebellion against the crime of such an infamous attack. A roused lioness, she leaped to the mantel to seize the shotgun.
John followed and caught her.
"The gun's gone, Ma," he cried.
"Yes, yes, I forgot," she gasped. "They took it, the damned fiends!"
"Ma, Ma, be still!" the boy pleaded. He was horror-stricken at the oath from her lips. In all his life he had never heard her use a vulgar word.
"Yes, of course," she faltered. "I mustn't try to do anything. They might come back and kill you—my baby boy!"
She pressed him again to her heart and held him. She strained her ears for the first signal of the deed the darkness shrouded.
The huntsmen dragged the father and two sons but a hundred and fifty yards from the door and halted beside the road. Brown faced the father in the dim starlight.
"You are a Southern white man?"
"I am, sir."
"You are pro-Slavery?"
"I hate the sight and sound of a slave."
"But you believe in the institution?"
"I hate it, I tell you."
Brown paused as if his brain had received a shock. The answer had been utterly unexpected. The man was in earnest. He meant what he said. And he was conscious of the solemnity of the trial on which his life hung.
Brown came back to his cross examination, determined to convict him on the grounds he had fixed beforehand.
"What do you mean when you say that you hate the institution of
Slavery?"
"Exactly what I say."
"You do not believe in owning slaves?"
"I do not."
"Did you ever own one?"
"No!"
"And you never expect to own one?"
"Never."
"Why did you rush into this Territory among the first to cross the border?"
"I come West to get away from niggers, and bring my children up in a white man's country."
Quick as a flash came the crucial question from lips that had never smiled. It was the triumphant scream of an eagle poised to strike. He had him at last.
"Then you don't believe the negro to be your brother and your equal—do you?"
The poor white man's body suddenly stiffened and his chin rose:
"No, by God, I don't believe that!"
John Brown lifted his hand in a quick signal and Owen stepped stealthily behind Doyle. The sharpened cutlass whistled through the air and crashed into Doyle's skull. His helpless hands were lifted instinctively as he staggered. The swift descending blade split the right hand open and severed the left from the body before he crumpled in a heap on the ground. The assassin placed his knee on the prostrate figure and plunged his knife three times in the breast,—once through the heart and once through each lung. He had learned the art in butchering cattle.
Fifty yards away the mangled bodies of William and Drury Doyle lay on the ground with the dim figure of the assassin bending low to make sure that no sign of life remained.
John Brown raised the wick of his lantern and walked coolly up to the body of the elder Doyle. He flashed the lantern on the distorted features. A look of religious ecstasy swept the stern face of the Puritan and his eyes glittered with an unearthly glare.
He uttered a sound that was half a laugh and half a religious shout, snatched his pistol from his belt, placed the muzzle within an inch of the dead skull and fired. The brains of the corpse splashed the muzzle of the revolver.
The trembling mother inside the cabin uttered a low cry of horror and crumpled in the arms of her son.
The boy dragged her to the bed and rushed to the kitchen for a cup of water. He dashed it in her face and cried for joy when she breathed again. He didn't mind the moans and sobs. The thought that she, too, might be dead had stopped his very heartbeat.
He soothed her at last and sat holding her hand in the dark. The girls nestled against her side. The mother gave no sign that she was conscious of their presence.
Her spirit was outside the cabin now, hovering in the darkness mourning her dead. Through the dread hours of the night she sat motionless, listening, dreaming.
No sounds came from the darkness. The coyote had ceased to call. The cricket in the chimney slept at last.