"Get hence, girl! You have been the ruin of me and mine. We have never seen you, spoken to you, thought of you, I do believe, without some evil happening to us. Touch me not! Your very name has been a plague to us."
"And well it might, Billy Thornton," said a bluff old gentleman, who had come with the sheriff, "for you would never let any who bore it alone. You began all the mischief, and your son continued it. Who egged on the quarrel between poor Davenport, her father, and Richard Conway, when Conway wanted no quarrel at all? Who stopped the letter of explanation, and got Davenport killed, and was, more or less, the cause of Conway being drowned?"
"Hush! hush!" said the sheriff. "This is no time or place for recriminations. We must do the best we can to stop the bleeding ourselves, as he refuses the kind aid of hands that would do it better. Sir Richard, you had better take Miss Bessy away out of the cabin, and get her some water; she looks faint. Send off one of the men to the Thornton old place, and bid them bring down a mattress and a cart. You had better let Mr. Henry Thornton and Billy Byles know you are here, and then ride away with them to my house; it is the nearest, and, though but an old bachelor's residence, you will find a dear old maid there--my sister--who will make it comfortable to you, and cheer this young lady. Come, Miss Bessy, do not look so sad. All will go well, yet; and we who stand here living this day, without having lost our nearest and dearest, have much to thank God for."
"We have, indeed!" said Bessy; "and from my heart I do thank God." I led her quietly out, and turning away from the spot where several of the party were still gathered round the dead body of Robert Thornton, I seated her on a little rise at the other end of the cottage, and then proceeded to express the sheriff's wishes to some people before the hut. I hardly liked to leave her, even for a moment, for I had a sort of superstitious feeling upon me, after all that had occurred, that if I lost sight of her again I should never behold her more. Two men on horseback set out at once for the old place, as it was called, and, returning to Bessy's side, I strove to cheer her, and to lead her mind away from all the terrible and distressing events which had been crowded into so marvellously short a space of time. Indeed it was extraordinary how three days, in the midst of one year, could have crowded into themselves in the midst of a peaceful and happy country so many and terrible facts as occurred during the three principal days of the Southampton massacre. We were allowed but very little time for anything like tranquil conversation, however. First, came back one of the men who had gone in pursuit of Nat Turner and his companions, and then another. Dismounting from his horse, the first sauntered up to us, interrupting my conversation with Bessy, by saying,--
"There's no use trying to catch him. That man has got the devil in him, I do believe, and has got away into places where I wouldn't take my horse Maggie, for all the niggers that ever run. Isn't she a pretty creature? Have you got any horses like that in England? I guess not." The next who came up was the poor fellow who got hurt in the pursuit, and he gave me and Bessy occupation for some time in bandaging his wound, though it did not seem a very severe one. This operation was not quite over, when the sheriff came out of the cabin and joined us. He was looking stern, and somewhat irritated.
"That old man," he said, "seems to have been taken possession of by Satan. He abuses everybody and everything, and will make his wound prove mortal, if he doesn't mind, by his own bitter irritability. What changes circumstances do produce in men! I remember him, not many years ago, one of the most jovial and good-humoured sort of persons I ever saw--always cunning and ready to take advantage, it is true, but still he did it all so good-humouredly, that one was inclined to laugh rather than be angry."
"Don't you think," I asked, "that circumstances may have brought out the real character of the man, which cunning had concealed? We have a saying that the devil is good-humoured when he is pleased. I have seen more than once a man who carried on very artful schemes under an appearance, of careless jollity, turn out fierce, malicious, and vindictive, when those schemes were finally frustrated."
"Perhaps you are right," answered the sheriff. "I have heard that he would occasionally do a malevolent thing in former years. But here comes our friend Henry Thornton, I think--this man's very opposite in every respect. That is his head approaching at such a rate over the bushes of the swamp, isn't it? Well, my dear young lady, how do you feel now?"
"Somewhat calmer," answered Bessy, quietly; "but I shall not be better, my good friend, till I have had two good things."
"And what are those?" asked the sheriff.