But the Bishop was already running for the steps of his departing train.
At Lowville he left the train and hurried to Father Brady’s house. Finding the priest out on a call, he begged a hasty lunch from the housekeeper, and, commandeering some riding clothes and Father Brady’s saddle horse, he was soon on the road to French Village and the hills.
It was before the days of the rural telephone and there was no telegraph up the hill road. A messenger had come down from the hills a half hour ago to the telegraph office. But there was no alarm among the people of Lowville, for there lay twenty miles of well cultivated country between them and the hills. If they noticed Father Brady’s clothes riding furiously out toward the hill road, they gave the matter no more than a mild wonder.
For twenty-two miles the Bishop rode steadily up the hard dirt road over which he and Arsene LaComb had struggled in the beginning of the winter before. He thought of Tom Lansing, who had died that night. He thought of the many things that had in some way had their beginning on that night, all leading up, more or less, to this present moment. But more than all he thought of Jeffrey Lansing and other desperate men up there in the hills fighting for their lives and their little all.
He did not know who had started this fire. It might well have started accidentally. He did not know that the railroad people had sent men into 154 the hills to start it. But if they had, and if those men were caught by the men of the hills, then there would be swift and bloody justice done. The Bishop thought of this and he rode Father Brady’s horse as that good animal had never been ridden in the course of his well fed life.
Nearing Corben’s, he saw that the horse could go but little farther. Registering a remonstrance to Father Brady, anent the matter of keeping his horse too fat, he rode up to bargain with Corben for a fresh horse. Corben looked at the horse from which the Bishop had just slid swiftly down. He demanded to know the Bishop’s destination in the hills––which was vague, and his business––which was still more vague. He looked at the Bishop. He closed one eye and reviewed the whole matter critically. Finally he guessed that the Bishop could have the fresh horse if he bought and paid for it on the spot.
The Bishop explained that he did not have the money about him. Corben believed that. The Bishop explained that he was the bishop of the diocese. Corben did not believe that.
In the end the Bishop, chafing at the delay, persuaded the man to believe him and to accept his surety for the horse. And taking food in his pockets he pressed on into the high hills.
Already he had met wagons loaded with women and children on the road. But he knew that they would be of those who lived nearest the fringe of 155 the hills. They would know little more than he did himself of the origin of the fire or of what was going on up there under and beyond that pall of smoke. So he did not stop to question them.