THE MINER’S PARTNER.
IN FOUR CHAPTERS.—CONCLUSION.
Never before had Ben from mental excitement passed a sleepless night; his seasoned, iron nerves had borne him through a multitude of perils—from hostile Indians, from white enemies; from the bear, the wolf, the snake; from fire and flood; and when the time had come for him to sleep, he slept soundly; when his rough meals were prepared, he ate well. But it was different now. The recollection of the face which confronted his own at the restaurant, haunted him, broke his sleep into fitful dozing, and filled these unrefreshing snatches with terrible dreams. Yet, when the bright morning came, he persuaded himself that he must have been mistaken—that he had exaggerated some chance resemblance into the identity of his dead partner.
Ben’s reflections touched upon what was growing into another dreadful form of mental excitement. He began to fear that he had not seen the man at all, that it was merely a delusion, a vision of the brain. And that such a delusion should take the form of Rube Steele was not surprising, bearing in mind the fact, which was never long absent from his thoughts, that he had given this man a blow which, if it had not, as he formerly supposed, caused the man’s death, must have very nearly done so. No doubt the blow was struck in self-defence; but even murder in self-defence is not a thing which a man can in his calmer moments recall without some sense of remorse.
He was early at the hotel, and taking his regular seat, waited with a nervous anxiety, such as he had rarely experienced before, the appearance of the stranger. He had not long to wait. Almost as soon as he was seated, a figure entered the saloon which there was no mistaking, and all Ben’s consolatory theories as to a casual resemblance deceiving him, fled on the instant. The stoop of the long body and neck, the crafty glance the man threw around on entering, his very step—these were all Rube Steele’s; and to the dismay of Ben, the new-comer evidently glanced round the saloon in search of him, for the moment he saw him, his face lighted up with a smile, and he came to the table.
‘Glad to see you again!’ said he, extending a hand which a horrible fascination compelled Ben to seize and shake; but the familiarity of the touch was more horrible still. He felt—he knew for a certainty, he had touched that hand a thousand times.
‘I thought mebbe you made this your regular dining location,’ continued the other; ‘and I have kinder taken a fancy to you.’
‘In-deed!’ gasped Ben, wondering as to what would come next.
‘Yes, I have; that is so,’ replied the stranger. ‘I reckon you have not been located in this city very long?’
‘Not very long,’ said Ben, who had not once removed his eyes from the other’s face. ‘I came from the West—from the mining country.’
‘Possible!’ ejaculated the stranger. ‘Wal, now, I take a great interest in the mining countries, and like to hear tell of them. Were you from Californy, or Nevady, or’——
‘From Colorado,’ gasped Ben, who almost began to fancy that he was losing his senses, so certain was he that the man was Rube, and yet so inconsistent with this belief was the whole of his conversation, especially his liking for Ben, and his anxiety to hear of the mines.
When they separated, it was with another shake of the hand, and a strongly expressed hope on the part of the stranger that they might meet again the next day. ‘Either the critter is a ghost,’ thought Ben—‘and in that case there are ghosts—or I am going crazy; or he is Rube Steele; and I know that is impossible. I won’t go to this hotel any more; and soon as we get married, Ruth and I will live out of the city, and that is a comfort.’
Fortified by this reflection, he was able to bear up somewhat better on this day, and to accept Mr Showle’s invitation with a calmer mind. He arrived early at the merchant’s house. Ruth came in soon afterwards, and he was pleased to see that she, too, looked more cheerful. Ruth had relieved her mind, as she confessed to Ben, by telling him her trouble; and now he knew it, she felt that the worst was over. It was to avoid her half-brother, she owned, that she had wished Ben to live so far from town, and as he had now really arrived, he was glad they had agreed upon this precaution.
They were conversing cheerfully enough, when a knock was heard at the outer door, and Mr Showle, rising, exclaimed: ‘There is Morede! I know his knock. Indeed, he takes care we shall hear him.—I am sure you will like him, Creelock, and he is very anxious to see you.—Ah! Mr Morede! you are punctual, then! Come in, and let me introduce you to our friend Creelock.’ Saying this, he shook hands with the new arrival, and led him to where Ben was standing.
‘I think,’ said Mr Morede, as he took Ben’s hand with a smile, ‘I am not entirely a stranger to Mr Creelock. I have had the pleasure of dining with him more than once at the Ocean House.’
Yes, he had; of course he had. Of course he was not a stranger to Ben—far from it, and Ben knew it well; for here was his mysterious companion at dinner, the new partner in Showle and Bynnes, and Ruth’s half-brother, all turning out to be not only one and the same person, but were also each and every one Rube Steele, his treacherous partner, whom he had left for dead in Colorado! And why did he not recognise Ben, as Ben had recognised him? Of all the strange features in this bewildering matter, this was the strangest.
Ben shook hands, as an automaton might have done, and spoke as though in a trance; the odd tone and character of his replies, and his fixed stare, evidently attracting the notice of Ruth and Mr Showle.
‘Come, Creelock!’ cried the latter presently; ‘you are not yourself to-night. Where are your mining stories and your prairie adventures? I have been praising you all the time to our friend Morede here, as a sort of live volume of entertainment on these matters, and you are not saying a word about them.’
‘Mr Showle is entirely right; he is so,’ said Morede; ‘and I reckon I shall be quite pleased to sit around and hear somethin’ about the western mines. I always do like to hear tell of them.’
‘Do you?’ exclaimed Ben, rousing himself in a species of desperation, and resolving to bring this horrible torture to a finish. ‘Shall I tell you an adventure of my own?’
‘Just so,’ returned Morede, with a pleased smile. ‘I should like it above all things.’
‘Then,’ said Ben—and his answering smile was of a somewhat grimmer character, in spite of himself, than Morede’s had been—‘then I will tell you how my pardner at the mines introduced a stranger, who robbed me of fifteen hundred dollars. This stranger came, I should tell you, with information about Indians, on the war-path who were likely to be around our camp. But it was an arranged plot. He was a mean cuss, this stranger; he or his friends robbed the placers and broke the stamp-mill. It was either him or my pardner that shot at me from a gully; and the bullet went through my hat and cut away some of my hair. That was not the only time my pardner got his desperadoes to shoot at me; so I will tell you about him.’
Thereupon, stimulated by the desperate impulse we have alluded to, Ben proceeded to relate a part of the plot which had been devised for his ruin by his crafty partner; the incidents attendant on which greatly excited, and sometimes almost appalled his hearers, none among whom listened with more palpable interest than did Mr Morede. Ben told all, up to the action of the Vigilantes, but could not bring himself to speak of the final scene at the pool; there was something too horrible in the idea of describing that to his listeners. When Ben had finished, which he did by saying, ‘What do you think of that, Mr Morede?’ and looking his new partner straight in the face, the latter exclaimed, in what seemed the most genuine manner possible: ‘First-rate, Mr Creelock! I admire you. I see you have the real grit; and I wish I had been there to help you in such a fix. But, to my thinking, your partner was the worse of the two.’
‘He was,’ said Ben drily.
‘And he ought to have had his reward,’ continued Morede.
‘He had it,’ said Ben, with increased dryness.
‘Good! Good!’ cried Morede; and other comments being made, the conversation became general.
Morede bore his part all through the evening without a single allusion which could induce Ben to suppose he had the slightest remembrance of him, or had ever before heard a syllable relating to the dangerous stranger or the robberies. When they parted for the night, too, he was particularly demonstrative in his friendliness to Creelock, making quite a ‘smart oration,’ as Mr Showle afterwards remarked, on the agreeable evening he had passed, and the pleasure it would give him to be associated in business, and as he hoped, in still closer relationship with a man whom he admired and liked so much at first sight as he did Mr Creelock. Ben went home after this speech in doubt as to whether it was himself or every one around him that was going mad.
Day after day passed, and the new partners in the firm met frequently, with no diminution in the friendship which Mr Morede had from the first professed for Ben. They did not meet at the hotel, however; the strain on Ben’s nerves was bad enough when they met as part of a group. A tête-à-tête was more than he could stand with a man whom he believed to have killed, but who was now walking about as unconcernedly as though he had never been stretched by the side of that Colorado pool.
So confounded had Ben been by the apparition, that he had never thought of asking the Christian name of Mr Morede, and it came upon him as a new shock when he received a note from the warehouse on some business matters signed ‘Reuben Morede,’ while he could have sworn to the handwriting in a court of justice. This did not increase his certainty, for it could admit of no increase; he was certain, and could not go beyond that; but it seemed to make the position more dreadful and complicated. Now and then, too, he would find, if he turned quickly round, Mr Morede gazing fixedly upon him—an earnest gaze, as though he were striving to recall something to his memory; and this was not agreeable to Creelock.
He asked Ruth, as guardedly as possible, about her brother’s past career; but she knew nothing of it since he had left home. He had gone West, she knew; but he would not now utter a syllable in explanation, or even say how he had been employed. Ben could not press her very much upon the subject, as it was evidently a painful one. His departure from home had been caused by some disgraceful, possibly fatal broil—that was clear; so Ben forbore to question her.
The day of his wedding drew nigh. Ruth had left her school; their home was so far advanced in its improvements that it would be quite ready by the time they returned from their trip; and then—to add still greater pleasure and éclat to the festivities—the gallant energetic old gentleman Mr Bynnes paid a short visit to Cincinnati. Like the restless Yankee he was, he had already sold his new estate at a very considerable profit; so was now, at seventy years of age, looking out for some fresh investment for his dollars, and employment for his time. He had seen Ben before leaving Cincinnati, and appeared to like him then; and seeing him a little more at leisure now, he liked him more. The bluff, straightforward, perhaps rough manner, which Creelock could never shake off, seemed to please the old man mightily, and he was never so happy as when in his company. Ben, with his nightmare always oppressing him, had asked a little about Reuben Morede, who he knew was a connection of Mr Bynnes. But the latter was not communicative about the new partner, although there was a tantalising hesitation in his manner, which made Ben think he could a tale unfold, did he choose.
Well, the wedding-day came; and the simple ceremony performed in Mr Showle’s drawing-room, made Ben and Ruth man and wife. Then came what answers to the wedding-breakfast of the Britisher, and this was on a scale, for variety and display, to put the old country on its mettle, although it was only given by an American storekeeper. After the first part of the feast was over, Mr Bynnes got Ben by himself and insisted upon having a final glass of champagne with him. ‘I know you have got just the best wife in the States,’ said the old gentleman; ‘and you are the kind of man to make a good husband, I can see. I feel as glad to see little Ruth Alken happily settled, as if she was a gal of my own—I do. After all these years, too, to think her brother is going to clear up and quit his tricks! I always liked the boy; but he has had some real bad ways. You asked me about him, you know.’
‘Yes, I did,’ said Ben.
‘Wal, I did not like to let out agen him,’ pursued Mr Bynnes; ‘but it can’t do harm now anyway, that I can see. He has been mining in Colorado, and has been up to some queer tricks there. He was nigh killed by his partner—he was; that is so.’
‘Nearly killed!’ echoed Ben.
‘Ah! most oncommon nigh,’ said Mr Bynnes. ‘Also he was nigh upon lynched by the Vigilantes. His partner found out that he was—Rube was, I mean—playing him false, planning to rob and perhaps murder him; so it is supposed from the mark on his head that he hit him down with some blunt instrument, possibly a club, and left him for dead at the mine. He was found lying by some of the miners, who carried him to Flume City, and I heard all about it from the doctor who attended him. It is a real extraordinary case. He recovered, as you see; but his memory from a certain time has entirely gone. His boyish days he remembers quite well; but does not appear to have the least idea that he ever went to the mines or was ever injured. We have tried him in every way; but his mind is a perfect blank. Strange, is it not?’
‘Very strange,’ assented Ben, who, we need hardly say, was listening with breathless interest.
‘His brain is injured, no doubt,’ continued the elder; ‘for his skull was fractured. The doctor says it is to be hoped that he will never recover his memory; for if he does, he will probably go mad, and do some more mischief before he dies. It is a strange case.—Here we are! just having a friendly drink at parting.’ This was in reply to one or two of the party who came to interrupt the lengthened gossip, and the conference was broken up.
Often, during his eastern trip, did Ben recur to the strange story he had heard, and often did he debate with himself whether or not he should tell his wife what he had learned; but he thought it better on the whole to be silent. It was with a great feeling of relief, however, that he found, upon his return to Cincinnati, that Morede was absent, having just left to accompany Mr Bynnes in his inspection of a property in Colorado.
In about a week after this time, Mr Showle received a letter from Mr Bynnes announcing the almost sudden death of Morede! ‘And we had a bad time with him,’ said the writer. ‘Perhaps it was because we came to Colorado that he all at once got back his mind; but whatever it was, he woke one morning like a fiend or a wild Indian. He raved about the mines, talked of horrible things he had done; said the fellows here would tremble even now at Rube Steele’s name; and we have found out that he, or some one like him, was known in these parts as Rube Steele, a year or two back. Tell Mr Creelock that he was frantic against him. He was sensible enough in other things; but he was always calling for his pistol, and vowed that he would shoot Ben Creelock on sight! Told me that Ben was the man who had broken his skull and had set the Vigilantes on his friends. I tell you, Abel Showle, it was real frightful, and we were all glad when he died; though my heart ached for him, when I recollected the bright, clever boy he was; his mother’s only son, too. But he is gone now; and bad as he may have been, I don’t think we will tell Ruth of his later life, as he had caused her a deal of misery, and she don’t need to think any worse of him.’[1]
The kindly, shrewd old merchant’s advice was followed; and Ruth Creelock, although she did not feign passionate grief for the half-brother who had so injured all who ought to have been dear to him, yet spoke of him with a softened feeling, which must have been changed had she known of the deadly enmity which once existed between the dead man and her husband.