“I have already given you the information necessary to make you quit this house, and that is all you have a right to know,” returned Clarence with folded arms.
“But I can answer for him,” said Mrs. Brant, rising, with a quivering voice and curling lip. “There IS no sympathy between us. We are as far apart as the poles. We have nothing in common but this house and his name.”
“But you are husband and wife, bound together by a sacred compact.”
“A compact!” echoed Mrs. Brant, with a bitter laugh. “Yes, the compact that binds South Carolina to the nigger-worshipping Massachusetts. The compact that links together white and black, the gentleman and the trader, the planter and the poor white—the compact of those UNITED States. Bah! THAT has been broken, and so can this.”
Clarence's face paled. But before he could speak there was a rapid clattering at the gate and a dismounted vaquero entered excitedly. Turning to Mrs. Brant he said hurriedly, “Mother of God! the casa is surrounded by a rabble of mounted men, and there is one among them even now who demands admittance in the name of the Law.”
“This is your work,” said Brooks, facing Clarence furiously. “You have brought them with you, but, by God, they shall not save you!” He would have clutched Clarence, but the powerful arm of Judge Beeswinger intervened. Nevertheless, he still struggled to reach Clarence, appealing to the others: “Are you fools to stand there and let him triumph! Don't you see the cowardly Yankee trick he's played upon us?”
“He has not,” said Mrs. Brant haughtily. “I have no reason to love him or his friends; but I know he does not lie.”
“Gentlemen!—gentlemen!” implored Colonel Starbottle with beaming and unctuous persuasion, “may I—er—remark—that all this is far from the question? Are we to be alarmed because an unknown rabble, no matter whence they come, demand entrance here in the name of the Law? I am not aware of any law of the State of California that we are infringing. By all means admit them.”
The gate was thrown open. A single thick-set man, apparently unarmed and dressed like an ordinary traveler, followed by half a dozen other equally unpretentious-looking men, entered. The leader turned to the balcony.
“I am the Chief of Police of San Francisco. I have warrants for the arrest of Colonel Culpepper Starbottle, Joshua Brooks, Captain Pinckney, Clarence Brant and Alice his wife, and others charged with inciting to riot and unlawful practice calculated to disturb the peace of the State of California and its relations with the Federal government,” said the leader, in a dry official voice.