Chapter 8

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_ Chapter VIII

Something like joy came into Madelon's face. "Then we will save him, you and I!" she cried out. "We will save him together! He shall not be hung! He shall be set free! They shall let him out of jail to-day, and put me there instead. We will save him! He would not own that I was guilty and he innocent; Lot would not own it, nor my brother Richard, but now--we will save him--now!"

"How?" asked Dorothy, feebly.

"He will own it to you. Burr will own it to you if you go and plead with him. He can't help owning it to you. And then you shall go to Lot, and when you ask him for your sake, that you may marry Burr, if he knows Burr has told you, and does not care about me, he will speak. He will be sure to speak for you. Come!"

Dorothy raised herself on one elbow and stared at Madelon, her yellow hair falling about her fair startled face. "Where?" said she.

"With me to New Salem."

"To New Salem?"

"Yes, to New Salem--to see Burr."

"But I am ill, and the doctor has bid me stay in bed. I have been ill ever since the ball with a headache and fever."

"You talk about headache and fever when Burr is there in prison! I tell you if my two feet were cut off I would walk to him on the stumps to set him free!"

"How can I go?" said Dorothy. Her blue eyes kindled a little under Madelon's fiery zeal.

"We will take your father's horse and sleigh."

"But the horse is gone lame, and has not been used for a month."

"I will get one from Dexter Beers at the tavern," said Madelon, promptly. "I will lead him over here and harness him into the sleigh."

"My father will not let me go," said Dorothy.

"He is a minister of the gospel--he will let his daughter go to save a life."

"I tell you he will not," said Dorothy. "I know my father better than you. He will not let me go out when I am ill. It is freezing cold, too. If I go I must go without his knowledge and consent."

"I am going without my father's," said Madelon, shortly, "and I go at a greater cost than that, too."

"It's the second time I have deceived and disobeyed my father in a week's time," Dorothy said.

"You talk about your father when it is Burr--Burr--that's at stake!" Madelon cried out. "What is your father to Burr if you love him? That ought to go before anything else. It says so in your Bible--it says so in your Bible, Dorothy Fair!"

Dorothy, with her innocent, frightened eyes fixed upon the other girl's passionate face, as if she were being led by her into unknown paths, put back the coverlet and thrust one little white foot out of bed. Then swiftly the black woman, who had entered the room, backed against the door as stiffly as a sentinel, darted forward, and would have thrust her mistress into bed again, making uncouth protests the while, had not Dorothy motioned her away with a gentle dignity, which was hers for use when she chose.

"Go down-stairs, if you please," said she, "and see if my father is in his study. If he is in there, and busy over his sermon, go to the barn, and drag out the sleigh for us."

Dorothy, white and fair as an angel, in her straight linen nightgown, stood out on the floor, in front of her great black guardian, who made again as though she would seize her and force her back, and pleaded with her in a thick drone, like an anxious bee, not to go.

"Do as I bid you!" said Dorothy, and glided past her to her dimity dressing-table, and began combing out her yellow hair.

The black woman went out, muttering.

"If my father is in his study on the north side of the house, and busy over his sermon, we can get away; otherwise we cannot," said Dorothy, combing the thick tress over her shoulder.

Madelon went to a south window of the room and looked out. She could see the barn, and across the road, farther down, the tavern. She watched while Dorothy bound up her hair, and soon she saw the black woman run, with a low crouch of her great body like a stealthy animal, across the yard.

"Your father is in his study," Madelon said, quickly. "I will go over to the tavern for a horse if yours is too lame."

"He can scarce stand," said Dorothy. Her soft voice trembled; she trembled all over--then was still with nervous rigors. Bright pink spots were on her cheeks. A certain girlish daring was there in this gentle maiden for youthful love and pleasure, else she had not stolen away that night to the ball, but very little for tragic enterprise. And, moreover, her fine sense of decorum and womanly pride had always served her mainly in the place of courage, which she lacked.

Sorely afraid was Dorothy Fair, if the truth were told, to go with this passionate girl, who had declared to her face she had done murder, to visit a man who she still half believed, with her helpless tenacity of thought, was a murderer also. The love she had hitherto felt for him was eclipsed by terror at the new image of him which her fearful fancy had conjured up and could not yet dismiss, in spite of Madelon's assurances. She was, too, really ill, and her delicate nerves were still awry from the shock they had received the night of the ball. Parson Fair had been sternly indignant, and his daughter had quailed before him, and then had come the news concerning Burr. Sage tea, and hot foot-baths, and the doctor's nostrums had not cured her yet. Her very spirit trembled and fluttered at this undertaking; but she could not withstand this fierce and ardent girl who upbraided her with the cowardice and distrust of her love. Instinctively she tried to raise her sentiment to the standard of the other's and believe in Burr.

Madelon paused a second as she went out, and gave a strange, scrutinizing glance at her.

"Why do you not wear your blue-silk quilted hood with the swan's-down trimming?" said she. "It becomes you, and it is warm over your ears."

"Yes, I will," said Dorothy, looking at her wonderingly.

Madelon went softly out of the house, and ran across and down the road to the tavern. Dexter Beers, the landlord, was just going around the wide sweep of drive to the stable with a meal-sack over his shoulder. No one else was in sight; it was so cold there were no loafers about. Madelon ran after him, and overtook him before he reached the stable door.

"Can you let me take a horse?" said she, abruptly.

Dexter Beers looked slowly around at her with a quick roll of a black eye in a massive face. He had an enormous bulk, which he moved about with painful sidewise motions. His voice was husky.

"What d'ye want a horse for?" said he.

"I want it to put in Parson Fair's sleigh."

"What for?"

"To take Dorothy to ride."

"Parson's horse lame yet?"

Madelon nodded.

"Where's yours?"

"I can't have him."

Dexter Beers still moved on with curious lateral twirls of his shoulders and heaves of his great chest, with its row of shining waistcoat buttons.

"Pooty cold day for a sleigh-ride," he observed, with a great steam of breath.

"I'll pay you well for the horse," said Madelon, in a hard voice. She followed him into the stable. He heaved the meal-sack from his shoulder to the floor with a grunt. Another man came forward with a peck measure in his hand. He was young, with a frosty yellow mustache. He had gone to school with Madelon and knew her well, but he looked at her with uncouth shyness without speaking. Then he began unfastening the mouth of the sack.

Madelon stepped forward impatiently towards the horse-stalls. There were the relay of coach-horses, great grays and bays, champing their feed, getting ready for their sure-footed rushes over the mountain roads when the coaches came in. She passed them by with sharp glances.

A man whose face was purplish red with cold was out in the rear of the stable, rubbing down a restive bay with loud "whoas," and now and then a stronger word and a hard twitch at the halter. He looked curiously at Madelon as she walked up to one of the stalls.

"Better look out for them heels!" he called out, as she drew nearer. She paid no heed, but went straight into the stall, untied the horse, and began to back him out. "Hi, there!" the man shouted, and Dexter Beers and the young man came hurrying up. "Better look out for that gal--I believe she's gone crazy!" he called out. "I can't leave this darned beast--she'll get kicked to death if she don't look out. That old white won't stan' a woman in the stall. Whoa, there! whoa, darn ye! Stan' still!"

"Hullo, what ye doin' of?" demanded Dexter Beers, coming up.

Madelon calmly backed the horse out of his stall. "I want to hire this horse," said she, holding his halter with a firm hand.

"That horse?"

"Yes. I'll pay you whatever you ask."

Dexter Beers stared at her and the horse dubiously. "Jest as soon set a woman to drivin' the devil as that old white," volunteered the man who was cleaning the bay. The young man stood gaping with wonder.

"Can I have this horse or not?" demanded Madelon. Her black eyes flashed imperiously at Dexter Beers. Her small brown hand held the halter of the old white with a grasp like steel.

"Dunno 'bout your drivin' that horse," said Dexter Beers. "'Fraid you'll get run away with. Better take another."

"Isn't this horse the fastest you've got on a short stretch?"

"S'pose he is, but I dunno 'bout a woman's drivin' of him."

Madelon looked as if she were half minded to spring upon the back of the old white and settle the matter summarily. She fairly quivered with impatience.

"A woman who can drive David Hautville's roan can drive this horse, and you know it," said she. She moved forward as she spoke, leading the high-stepping old white, and Dexter Beers stood aside.

"Well, David Hautville's roan is nigh a match for this one," he grunted, hesitatingly, "but then ye know your own better. Hadn't ye better--"

But the old white was out of the stable at a trot, with Madelon running alongside.

"Don't ye want a man to hitch him up?" Dexter Beers called after her; but she was out of hearing.

"If the gal's ekal to drivin' that horse, she's ekal to hitchin' of him up," said the man who was cleaning the bay. "If a gal wants to drive, let her hitch. Ye'd better let a woman go the whole figger when she gits started, just as ye'd better give an ugly cuss of a horse his head up hill an' down. It takes the mischief out of 'em quicker'n anything. Let her go it, Dexter--don't ye fret."

"I don't want her breakin' any of the parson's daughter's bones with none of my horses," said Dexter Beers, uneasily. "Wonder where the parson is?"

"Let 'em go it! They won't git smashed up, I guess," said the other. "I've seen that gal of Hautville's with that mare of his'n. She kin drive most anythin' short of the devil, an' old white's got sense enough to know when he's well driv, ugly's he is. He wa'n't on the track for nothin'. He ain't no wuss, if he's as bad, as that roan mare. Let 'em _go_ it!"

"Wonder what's to pay?" said the young man, who had not spoken before.

"Dunno," said Dexter Beers. "Somethin's to pay--that girl acted queer."

"S'pose she takes it hard 'bout Burr Gordon. He used to fool 'round her, I've heerd, afore he went courtin' the parson's gal."

"Dunno--queer she's so thick with the parson's gal all of a sudden."

"Lord, I wouldn't tech a gal that could git the upperhand of a horse like that roan mare with a ten-foot pole," half soliloquized the man at work over the bay. "Wouldn't have her if she owned half the township, an' went down on her knees to me--darned if I would. Don't want no woman that kin make horse-flesh like that knuckle under. Guess a man wouldn't have much show; hev to take his porridge 'bout the way she wanted to make it. Whoa, there! stan' still, can't ye? Darned if I want nothin' to do with sech woman folks or sech horses as ye be."

Dexter Beers moved laboriously out to the stable door and peered after Madelon, but she had disappeared in Parson Fair's yard. The white horse had gone up the road at a brisk trot, but she had easily kept pace with him. She also harnessed him into the sleigh with no difficulty. The animal seemed docile, and as if he were to belie his hard reputation. There was, however, a proud and nervous cant to his old white head, and he set his jaw stiffly against his bit.

Dorothy came out in her quilted silk pelisse and her blue hood edged with swan's-down, and got into the sleigh. The black woman was keeping watch at the parson's study door the while, but he never swerved from his hard application of the doctrines. The sleigh slipped noiselessly out of the yard and up the road, for Madelon had not put on the bells. The old white went rather stiffly and steadily for the first quarter-mile; then he made a leap forward with a great lift of his lean white flanks, and they flew.

Dorothy gave a terrified gasp. "Don't be frightened," Madelon said. "It's the horse that used to beat everything in the county. He's old now, but when he gets warmed up he's the fastest horse around for a short stretch. He can't hold out long, but while he does he goes; and I want to get a good start. I want to strike the New Salem road as soon as I can."

Madelon had a growing fear lest Eugene might have freed himself, and might ride the roan across by a shorter cut, and so intercept her at the turn into the New Salem road. He might easily suspect her of attempting to see Burr again. If she passed the turn first she could probably escape him if her horse held out; and, indeed, he might not think she had gone that way if he did not see her.

Dorothy held fast to the side of the sleigh, which seemed to rise from the track as they sped on. "Don't be frightened," Madelon said again. "This is the only horse in town that can beat my father's on a short stretch, and I don't know that he can always, but I don't think he has been used, and father's was ridden hard yesterday. I can manage this one in harness better than I can father's. Don't be frightened." But Dorothy's face grew pale as the swan's-down around it, and her great blue eyes were fixed fearfully upon the bounding heels and flanks of the old white race-horse.

Madelon strained her eyes ahead as they neared the turn of the New Salem road. There was nobody in sight. Then she glanced across the fields at the right. Suddenly she swung out the reins over the back of the old white, and hallooed, and stood up in the sleigh.

Dorothy screamed faintly. "Sit still and hold on!" Madelon shouted. Dorothy shut her eyes. It seemed to her she was being hurled through space. Her slender body swung to and fro against the sleigh as she clung frantically to it.

Eugene Hautville, on the roan, was coming at a mad run across the open field on the right towards the turn of the road. It seemed for a second as if Madelon would reach it before he did; but they met there, and the roan reared to a stop in the narrow road directly in front of the old white, who plunged furiously.

"Look out there!" shouted Eugene, as the sleigh tilted on the snow-crust. The old white's temper was up at this sudden check, but the woman behind him had a stronger will than he. She brought him to a straining halt, and then she spoke to her brother.

"You let us pass!" she said, sternly.

"Where are you going?" he demanded. He looked uneasily at Dorothy as he spoke. It was easy enough to see that she was a restraint upon him, and that fair, timid face in its blue hood held his indignation well in check.

"We are going to New Salem," replied Madelon. "Let us pass."

"I want to know what you are going for," said Eugene; and he tried to speak with fire, but he still looked furtively at Dorothy.

Nobody had ever suspected how that lovely face of hers had been in his dreams, unless it had been for a time Dorothy herself. Nobody had noticed in meeting, of a Sabbath day long since, when Dorothy had first returned from her Boston school, sundry glances which had passed between a pair of soft blue eyes in the parson's pew and a pair of fiery black ones in the singing-seats.

Dorothy, half guiltily in those days, had arranged her curls and tied on her Sunday bonnets with a view to Eugene Hautville's eyes; and always, when she returned from meeting, had gone straight to her looking-glass, to be sure that she had looked fair in them. But nobody had ever known, and scarcely she herself.

She had come to think later that she had perhaps been mistaken, for never had Eugene made other advances to her than by those ardent glances; and Burr had come, and she had turned to him, and thought of Eugene Hautville only when he crossed her way, and then with a mixture of pique and shame. Never by any chance did her eyes meet his nowadays of a Sabbath day, and she listened coldly to his sweet tenor in the hymns. Now, suddenly, she looked straight up in his face and met his eyes, and a pink flush came into her white cheeks.

"Please to let us pass," she said, in her gentle tone, which had yet a tincture of command in it. Any woman as fair as she, who has a right understanding of her looking-glass, has, however soft she may be, the instincts of a queen within her. She felt a proud resentment for her own old folly and for Eugene's old slighting of her, and indignation at his present attitude as she looked up at him with sudden daring.

Eugene threw back his head haughtily. "She wants to see Burr Gordon," he thought, and would have died rather than let her think he would stand in the way of it. He jerked the roan aside, and seemed as if he would have been flung into the way-side bushes with her curving plunge.

"Pass, if you wish," he said, with a graceful bend in his saddle, and was past them, riding the other way towards the village. _

Read next: Chapter 9

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