The Bondboy

  CHAPTER VII

  DELIVERANCE

  Joe, stunned by the sudden tragedy, stood for a moment as he had stoppedwhen he laid his hand on Isom's shoulder. Ollie, on the other side ofthe fallen man, leaned over and peered into his face.

  In that moment a wild turmoil of hopes and fears leaped in her hotbrain. Was it deliverance, freedom? Or was it only another complicationof shame and disgrace? Was he dead, slain by his own hand in thebaseness of his own heart? Or was he only hurt, to rise up againpresently with revilings and accusations, to make the future moreterrible than the past. Did this end it; did this come in answer to herprayers for a bolt to fall on him and wither him in his tracks?

  Even in that turgid moment, when she turned these speculations, guiltyhopes, wild fears, in her mind, Isom's eyelids quivered, dropped; andthe sounding breath in his nostrils ceased.

  Isom Chase lay dead upon the floor. In the crook of his elbow rested alittle time-fingered canvas bag, one corner of which had broken open inhis fall, out of which poured the golden gleanings of his hard andbitter years.

  On the planks beneath his shoulder-blades, where his feet had come andgone for forty years, all leached and whitened by the strong lye ofcountless scrubbings at the hands of the old wife and the new, his bloodran down in a little stream. It gathered in a cupped and hollowed plank,and stood there in a little pool, glistening, black. His wife saw herwhite face reflected in it as she raised up from peering into his blank,dead eyes.

  "Look at his blood!" said she, hoarsely whispering. "Look at it--look atit!"

  "Isom! Isom!" called Joe softly, a long pause between his words, as ifsummoning a sleeper. He stooped over, touching Isom's shoulder.

  There was a trickle of blood on Isom's beard, where the rifle ball hadstruck him in the throat; back of his head that vital stream waswasting, enlarging the pool in the hollowed plank near Ollie's foot.

  "He's dead!" she whispered.

  Again, in a flash, that quick feeling of lightness, almost joyfulliberty, lifted her. Isom was dead, dead! What she had prayed for hadfallen. Cruel, hard-palmed Isom, who had gripped her tender throat, wasdead there on the floor at her feet! Dead by his own act, in the angerof his loveless heart.

  "I'm afraid he is," said Joe, dazed and aghast.

  The night wind came in through the open door and vexed the lamp withharassing breath. Its flame darted like a serpent's tongue, and Joe,fearful that it might go out and leave them in the dark with thatbleeding corpse, crossed over softly and closed the door.

  Ollie stood there, her hands clenched at her sides, no stirring of pityin her heart for her husband with the stain of blood upon his harsh,gray beard. In that moment she was supremely selfish. The possibility ofaccusation or suspicion in connection with his death did not occur toher. She was too shallow to look ahead to that unpleasant contingency.The bright lure of liberty was in her eyes; it was dancing in her brain.As she looked at Joe's back the moment he stood with hand on the door,her one thought was:

  "Will he tell?"

  Joe came back and stood beside the lifeless form of Isom, looking downat him for a moment, pity and sorrow in his face. Then he tiptoed fararound the body and took up his hat from the floor where it had fallenin Isom's scramble for the sack of gold.

  "What are we going to do?" asked Ollie, suddenly afraid.

  "I'll go after the doctor, but he can't help him any," said Joe. "I'llwake up the Greenings as I go by and send some of them over to stay withyou."

  "Don't leave me here with it--don't leave me!" begged Ollie. "I can'tstay here in the house with it alone!"

  She shrank away from her husband's body, unlovely in death as he hadbeen unloved in life, and clung to Joe's arm.

  But a little while had passed since Isom fell--perhaps not yet fiveminutes--but someone had heard the shot, someone was coming, running,along the hard path between gate and kitchen door. Ollie started.

  "Listen!" she said. "They're coming! What will you say?"

  "Go upstairs," he commanded, pushing her toward the door, harshness inhis manner and words. "It'll not do for you to be found here all dressedup that way."

  "What will you tell them--what will you say?" she insisted, whispering.

  "Go upstairs; let me do the talking," he answered, waving her away.

  A heavy foot struck the porch, a heavy hand beat a summons on the door.Ollie's white dress gleamed a moment in the dark passage leading to thestairs, the flying end of her veil glimmered.

  "Come in," called Joe.

  Sol Greening, their neighbor, whose gate was almost opposite Isom's,whose barn was not eighty rods from the kitchen door, stood panting inthe lamplight, his heavy beard lifting and falling on his chest.

  "What--what's happened--who was that shootin'--Isom! God A'mighty, is hehurt?"

  "Dead," said Joe dully, standing hat in hand. He looked dazedly at theexcited man in the door, whose mouth was open as he stared fearfully atthe corpse.

  "How? Who done it?" asked Greening, coming in on tiptoe, his voicelowered to a whisper, in the cautious fashion of people who move in thevicinity of the sound-sleeping dead. The tread of living man never morewould disturb old Isom Chase, but Sol Greening moved as silently as ablowing leaf.

  "Who done it?" he repeated.

  "He did," answered Joe.

  "_He_ done it!" repeated Greening, looking from the rifle, stillclutched in Isom's hand, to the gold in the crook of his arm, and fromthat to Joe's blanched face. "_He_ done it!"

  "Jerking down the gun," explained Joe, pointing to the broken rack.

  "Jerkin' down the gun! What'd he want--look--look at all that money! Thesack's busted--it's spillin' all over him!"

  "He's dead," said Joe weakly, "and I was going after the doctor."

  "Stone dead," said Greening, bending over the body; "they ain't a puffof breath left in him. The doctor couldn't do him no good, Joe, but Ireckon----"

  Greening straightened up and faced Joe, sternly.

  "Where's Missis Chase?" he asked.

  "Upstairs," said Joe, pointing.

  "Does _she_ know? Who was here when it happened?"

  "Isom and I," said Joe.

  "God A'mighty!" said Greening, looking at Joe fearfully, "just you andhim?"

  "We were alone," said Joe, meeting Greening's eyes unfalteringly. "Wehad some words, and Isom lost his temper. He jumped for the gun and Itried to stop him, but he jerked it by the barrel and the hammercaught."

  "Broke his neck," said Greening, mouth and eyes wide open; "broke itclean! Where'd that money come from?"

  "I don't know," said Joe; "I didn't see it till he fell."

  "Words!" said Greening, catching at it suddenly, as if what Joe had saidhad only then penetrated his understanding. "You and him had somewords!"

  "Yes, we had some words," said Joe.

  "Where's Missis Chase?" demanded Greening again, turning his eyessuspiciously around the room.

  "Upstairs, I told you Sol," replied Joe. "She went to bed early."

  "Hush!" cautioned Greening, holding up his hand, listening intently. "Ihear her movin' around. Let me talk to her."

  He tiptoed to the door at the foot of the stairs, and listened again;tiptoed back to the outer portal, which he had left swinging behind him,and closed it gently. There was no sound from above now to indicate thatOllie was awake. Sol stood near Isom's body, straining and listening,his hand to his ear.

  "She must 'a' been turnin' over in bed," said he. "Well, I guess I'llhave to call her. I hate to do it, but she's got to be told."

  "Yes, she must be told," said Joe.

  Sol stood as if reflecting on it a little while. Joe was on the otherside of Isom's body, near the table. Both of them looked down into hisbloodless face.

  "You had words!" said Greening, looking sternly at Joe. "What about?"

  "It was a matter between him and me, Sol, it don't concern anybodyelse," said Joe in a manner of dignity and reserve that was blunter thanhis words. Sol was not impressed by this implied r
ebuke, and hint tomind his own business.

  "That ain't no answer," said he.

  "Well, it will have to do for you, Sol," said Joe.

  "I don't know about that," declared Sol. "If you can't give me thestraight of it, in plain words, I'll have to take you up."

  Joe stood thoughtfully silent a little while. Then he raised his headand looked at Sol steadily.

  "If there's any arresting to be done--" he began, but checked himselfabruptly there, as if he had reconsidered what he started to say."Hadn't we better pick Isom up off the floor?" he suggested.

  "No, no; don't touch him," Greening interposed hurriedly. "Leave him layfor the coroner; that's the law."

  "All right."

  "I'll have to tell Missis Chase before we go," said Sol.

  "Yes, you must tell her," Joe agreed.

  Sol rapped on the woodwork of the wall at the bottom of the stairs withhis big knuckles. The sound rose sudden and echoing in the house. Olliewas heard opening her door.

  "Missis Chase--oh, Missis Chase!" called Greening.

  "Who's that, who's that?" came Ollie's voice, tremulous and frightened,little above a whisper, from above.

  "It's Sol Greening. Don't come down here, don't come down!"

  "What was that noise? It sounded like a gun," said Ollie, a bit nearerthe head of the stairs, her words broken and disjointed.

  "Something's happened, something mighty bad," said Sol. "You stay rightwhere you are till I send the old woman over to you--do you hearme?--stay right there!"

  "Oh, what is it, what is it?" moaned Ollie. "Joe--where's Joe? Call him,Mr. Greening, call Joe!"

  "He's here," Sol assured her, his voice full of portent "he's goin' awaywith me for a little while. I tell you it's terrible, you must stayright up there."

  "Oh, I'm so afraid--I'm so afraid!" said Ollie, coming nearer.

  "Go back! Go back!" commanded Greening.

  "If you'll only stick to it that way," thought Joe as Ollie's moanssounded in his ears.

  "Was it robbers--is somebody hurt?" she asked.

  "Yes, somebody's hurt, and hurt bad," said Greening, "but you can't dono good by comin' down here. You stay right there till the old womancomes over; it'll only be a minute."

  "Let me go with you. Oh, Mr. Greening, don't leave me here alone!" sheimplored.

  "There's nothing to hurt you, Ollie," said Joe. "You do as Sol tells youand stay here. Go to your room and shut the door, and wait till Mrs.Greening comes."

  Sol leaned into the staircase and listened until he heard her doorclose. Then he turned and shut the kitchen window and the door leadinginto the body of the house, leaving the burning lamp on the table tokeep watch over Isom and his money.

  "We'll go out the front way," said Sol to Joe. "Nothing must be touchedin that room till the coroner orders it. Now, don't you try to dodge me,Joe."

  "I've got no reason to want to dodge any man," said Joe.

  "Well, for your own sake, as well as your old mother's, I hope to Godyou ain't!" said Sol. "But this here thing looks mighty bad forsomebody, Joe. I'm goin' to take you over to Bill Frost's and turn youover to the law."

  Joe made no comment, but led the way around the house. At the kitchenwindow Greening laid a restraining hand on Joe's shoulder and stoppedhim, while he looked in at the corpse of Isom Chase.

  "Him and me, we served on the same jury this afternoon," said Sol,nodding toward the window as he turned away. "I rode to overtake him onthe way home, but he had the start of me; and I was just goin' in thegate when I heard that shot. I poled right over here. On the same jury,and now he's dead!"

  As they approached the gate Joe looked back, the events of the past fewminutes and the shock of the tragedy, which had fallen as swift as alightning stroke, stunning him out of his usual cool reasoning.

  There lay the house, its roof white in the moonlight, a little stream ofyellow coming through the kitchen window, striking the lilac-bushes andfalling brokenly on the grass beyond. There was reality in that; but inthis whirl of events which crowded his mind there was no tangible thingto lay hold upon.

  That Isom was dead on the kitchen floor seemed impossible and unreal,like an event in a dream which one struggles against the terror of,consoling himself, yet not convincingly, as he fights its sad illusions,with the argument that it is nothing but a vision, and that with wakingit will pass away.

  What was this awful thing with which Sol Greening had charged him, overwhich the whole neighborhood soon must talk and conjecture?

  Murder!

  There was no kinder word. Yet the full terror of its meaning was notover him, for his senses still swirled and felt numb in the suddennessof the blow. He had not meant that this accusation should fasten uponhim when he sent Ollie from the room; he had not thought that far ahead.His one concern was that she should not be found there, dressed andready to go, and the story of her weakness and folly given heartlesslyto the world.

  And Curtis Morgan--where was he, the man to blame for all this thing?Not far away, thought Joe, driving that white road in security, perhaps,even that very hour, while he, who had stood between him and his unholydesires, was being led away by Sol Greening like a calf in a rope. Theywere going to charge him with the murder of Isom Chase and take him awayto jail.

  How far would Morgan permit them to go? Would he come forward to bearhis share of it, or would he skulk away like a coward and leave him, thebondman, to defend the name of his dead master's wife at the cost of hisown honor and liberty, perhaps his life?

  All that had gone before Isom threw his life away in that moment ofblind anger, must be laid bare if he was to free himself of the shadowof suspicion. It was not the part of an honorable man to seek his owncomfort and safety at the cost of a woman's name, no matter how unworthyhe knew her to be, while that name and fame still stood flawless beforethe world. In the absence of some other avenue to vindication, agentleman must suffer in silence, even to death. It would be cruel,unjust, and hard to bear, but that was the only way. He wondered ifOllie understood.

  But there were certain humiliations and indignities which a gentlemancould not bend his neck to; and being led away by an inferior man likeSol Greening to be delivered up, just as if he thought that he mighthave run away if given an opening, was one of them. Sol had passed onthrough the open gate, which he had not stopped to close when he ran in,before he noticed that Joe was not following. He looked back. Joe wasstanding inside the fence, his arms folded across his chest.

  "Come on here!" ordered Sol.

  "No, I'm not going any farther with you, Sol," said Joe quietly. "Ifthere's any arresting to be done, I guess I can do it myself."

  Greening was a self-important man in his small-bore way, who saw in thisnight's tragedy fine material for increasing his consequence, at leasttemporarily, in that community. The first man on the bloody scene, theman to shut up the room for the coroner, the man to make the arrest anddeliver the murderer to the constable--all within half an hour. It was adistinction which Greening did not feel like yielding.

  "Come on here, I tell you!" he commanded again.

  "If you want to get on your horse and go after Bill, I'll wait righthere till he comes," said Joe; "but I'll not go any farther with you. Ididn't shoot Isom, Sol, and you know it. If you don't want to go afterBill, then I'll go on over there alone and tell him what's happened. Ifhe wants to arrest me then, he can do it."

  Seeing that by this arrangement much of his glory would get away fromhim, Greening stepped forward and reached out his hand, as if to compelsubmission. Joe lifted his own hand to intercept it with warninggesture.

  "No, don't you touch me, Sol!" he cautioned.

  Greening let his hand fall. He stepped back a pace, Joe's subdued, calmwarning penetrating his senses like the sound of a blow on an anvil.Last week this gangling strip of a youngster was nothing but a boy,fetching and carrying in Isom Chase's barn-yard. Tonight, big and bonyand broad-shouldered, he was a man, with the same outward gentlenessover the iron inside of
him as old Peter Newbolt before him; the samesoft word in his mouth as his Kentucky father, who had, without oath ormalediction, shot dead a Kansas Redleg, in the old days of borderstrife, for spitting on his boot.

  "Will you go, or shall I?" asked Joe.

  Greening made a show of considering it a minute.

  "Well, Joe, you go on over and tell him yourself," said he, putting onthe front of generosity and confidence, "I know you won't run off."

  "If I had anything to run off for, I'd go as quick as anybody, I guess,"said Joe.

  "I'll go and fetch the old lady over to keep company with Mrs. Chase,"said Sol, hurriedly striking across the road.

  Joe remained standing there a little while. The growing wind, whichmarked the high tide of night, lifted his hat-brim and let the moonlightfall upon his troubled face. Around him was the peace of the sleepingearth, with its ripe harvest in its hand; the scents of ripe leaves andfruit came out of the orchard; the breath of curing clover from thefields.

  Joe brought a horse from the barn and leaped on its bare back. He turnedinto the highroad, lashing the animal with the halter, and galloped awayto summon Constable Bill Frost.

  Past hedges he rode, where cricket drummers beat the long roll for themuster of winter days; past gates letting into fields, clamped andchained to their posts as if jealous of the plenty which they guarded;past farmsteads set in dark forests of orchard trees and tall windbreaksof tapering poplar, where never a light gleamed from a pane, where sonsand daughters, worn husbandmen and weary wives, lay soothed in honestslumber; past barn-yards, where cattle sighed as they lay in themoonshine champing upon their cuds; down into swales, where the air wasdamp and cold, like a wet hand on the face; up to hill-crests, overwhich the perfumes of autumn were blowing--the spices of goldenrod andragweed, the elusive scent of hedge orange, the sweet of curing fodderin the shock; past peace and contentment, and the ripe reward of men'ssummer toil.

  Isom Chase was dead; stark, white, with blood upon his beard.

  There a dog barked, far away, raising a ripple on the placid night;there a cock crowed, and there another caught his cry; it passed on, on,fading away eastward, traveling like an alarm, like a spreading wave,until it spent itself against the margin of breaking day.

  Isom Chase was dead, with an armful of gold upon his breast.

  Aye, Isom Chase was dead. Back there in the still house his limbswere stiffening upon his kitchen floor. Isom Chase was dead on theeve of the most bountiful harvest his lands had yielded him in allhis toil-freighted years. Dead, with his fields around him; dead,with the maize dangling heavy ears in the white moonlight; dead, withthe gold of pumpkin lurking like unminted treasure in the margin of hisfield. Dead, with fat cattle in his pastures, fat swine in hisconfines, sleek horses in his barn-stalls, fat cockerels on hisperch; dead, with a young wife shrinking among the shadows above hiscold forehead, her eyes unclouded by a tear, her panting breastundisturbed by a sigh of pity or of pain.