The silence that swallowed up this clear-cut assertion was deeper than the one which had followed Trundle’s other remark. Seeing that no one was ready to reply, he went on, “I did come down heer, though, to see ef I couldn’t git you-uns to do me a sorter favor, ef you-uns jest would.”
“Ah!” Wade Sims was feeling better. “I must say I was puzzled about yore conduct in sa ‘nterin’ out to meet us. Well, what do you want?”
“I’m ready fer my whippin’,” said Trundle, “becase I think I deserve it. I’ve been so lazy an’ careless that I never once noticed till I got yore letter that my wife was a sick woman. I did let her go to the field in the hot sun when I was a-fishin’ on the creek-bank in the shade. I thought her an’ all of us would like some fresh fish, an’ I forgot that our corn-patch was sufferin’ fer the hoe. But she didn’t. She ‘tended to it. An’—now I come to the favor I want to ask. She hain’t done a speck o’ harm to you-uns, an’, as foolish as it may seem, it would go hard with her in her weakly condition to heer about me a-goin’ through what I ’ll have to submit to. She has got a mighty sight of pride, an’ it’s my honest conviction that she would jest pine away an’ die ef she knowed about it. I ain’t a-beggin’ off from nothin’, understand; it’s only a word fer her an’ the childern. You kin all take a turn an’ whip me jest as long as you want to, but when it’s over an’ done with I ‘lowed you mought consent to say nothin’ to nobody about it. Besides, I’ve made up my mind to lead a different sort of a life, friends, God bein’ my helper, an’ it would be easier to do it if I knowed Martha had respect fer me; an’, neighbors, I am actu’ly afeered she won’t have it if she diskivers what takes place to-night. I—I think you-uns mought agree to that much.”
Masks turned upon masks. Some of them fell from strangely set visages into hands that quivered and failed to replace them. It was plain to the crowd that they had not elected a leader who could possibly do justice to the infinite delicacy of the situation. In fact, something was struggling in Wade Sims that was humiliating him in his own eyes, making him feel decidedly unmanly.
“I think yore proposition is—is purty reasonable,” he managed to blurt out, after an awkward hesitation. “We hain’t none of us got nothin’ ag’in yore wife; an’ ef she is sick, an’ hearin’ about this—”
But his inability to continue was evident to his most sincere admirers. Trundle sighed in relief. He knew that not one in the gang could possibly be harder of heart than their blustering leader. “I wish, then, gentlemen,” he said, calmly, “that you’d git it over with. I don’t know how long it’s a-goin’ to take—that’s with you-uns; but Martha thinks I’ve gone over to Rawlston’s to set till bedtime, an’ it ’ll soon be time I was back.”
“That’s a fact,” admitted Wade Sims, slowly, as if his mind were on something besides the business in hand, and he looked round him. The band stood like rugged, white-capped posts.
Then it was proved that Sid Wombley, the wag of the valley, had more courage of his convictions than had ever been accredited to him. It sounded strange to hear him speak without joking. His seriousness struck a sort of terror to the hearts of some of the most backward. There was a suspicion of a whimper in the tone he manfully tried to straighten as he spoke.
“Looky’ heer, Jim,” he said, and he stepped forward and tore off his mask, I’ve got a sorter feelin’ that I want you to see my face an’ know who I am. Sence I heard yore proposal, blame me ef I hain’t got more downright respect fer you than fer any man in this cove, an’ I want to kick myself. You’ve got the sort o’ meat in you that ain’t in me, I’m afeered, an’ I take off my hat to it. I’m a member o’ this gang, an’ have agreed to abide by the vote of the majority, but they ’ll have to git a mighty move on theirselves an’ reverse the’r decision in yore case, ur I ’ll be a deserter. I’d every bit as soon whip my mammy as a body feelin’ like you do.”
“That’s the talk.” It was the voice of Alf Carden. All at once he remembered that Jim Trundle, after all that had been said against him, did not owe him a cent, while nearly every other man present had to be dunned systematically once a week. “Boys, let ’im go,” he said; “I’m a-thinkin’ we hain’t fully understood Jim Trundle.”