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Prisoners of Hope: A Tale of Colonial Virginia, a novel by Mary Johnston |
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Chapter 12. A Dark Deed |
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_ CHAPTER XII. A DARK DEED Three weeks passed, weeks in which Landless saw the mender of nets some eight times in all, making each visit at night, stealthily and under constant danger of detection. Thrice he had assisted at conferences of the Oliverians from the neighboring plantations, who now, by virtue of his descent, his intimacy with Godwyn, and his very apparent powers, accepted him as a leader. Upon the first of these occasions he had set his case before them in a few plain, straightforward words, and they believed him as Godwyn had done, and he became in their eyes, not a convict, but, as he in truth was, an Oliverian like themselves, and a sufferer for the same cause. The remaining interviews had been between him and Godwyn alone. In the lonely hut on the marsh, beneath starlight or moonlight, the two had held much converse, and had grown to love each other. The mender of nets, though possessed of a calm and high serenity of nature that defied trials beneath which a weaker soul had sunk, was a man of many sorrows; he had the wisdom, too, of years and experience, and he sympathized with, soothed, and counseled his younger yoke-fellow with a parental tenderness that was very grateful to the other's more ardent, undisciplined, and deeply wounded spirit. Upon the night of their eighth meeting they held a long and serious consultation. Affairs were in such train that little remained to be done, but to set the day for the rising, and to send notice by many devious and underground ways to the Oliverian captains scattered throughout the Colony. Landless counseled immediate action, the firing of the fuse at once by starting the secret intelligence which would spread like wildfire from plantation to plantation. Then would the mine be sprung within the week. There was nothing so dangerous as delay, when any hour, any moment might bring discovery and ruin. Godwyn was of a different opinion. It was then August, the busiest and most unhealthy season of the year, when the servants and slaves, weakened by unremitting toil, were succumbing by scores to the fever. It was the time when the masters looked for disaffection, when the overseers were most alert, when a general watchfulness pervaded the Colony. The planters stayed at home and attended to their business, the trainbands were vigilant, the servant and slave laws were construed with a harshness unknown at other seasons of the year. There were few ships in harbor compared with the number which would assemble for their fall lading a month later, and Godwyn counted largely upon the seizure of the ships. In a month's time the tobacco would be largely in,--a weighty consideration, for tobacco was money, and the infant republic must have funds. The ships would be in harbor, and their sailors ready for anything that would rid them of their captains; the heat and sickness of the summer would be abated; the work slackened, and discipline relaxed. The danger of discovery was no greater now than it had been all along, and the good to be won by biding their time might be inestimable. The danger was there, but they would face it, and wait,--say until the second week in September. Landless acquiesced, scarcely convinced, but willing to believe that the other knew whereof he spoke, and conscious, too, that his own impatience of the yoke which galled his spirit almost past endurance might incline him to a reckless and disastrous haste. It was past midnight when he rose to leave the hut on the marsh. Godwyn took up his stick. "I will walk with you to the banks of the creek," he said. "'Tis a feverish night, and I have an aching head. The air will do me good, and I will then sleep." The young man gave him his arm with a quiet, protecting tenderness that was very dear to the mender of nets, and leaning upon it, he limped through the fifty feet of long grass to the border of the creek. "Shall I not wait to help you back?" asked Landless. "No," said the other, with his peculiarly sweet and touching smile. "I will sit here awhile beneath the stars and say my hymn of praise to the Creator of Night. You need not fear for me; my trusty stick will carry me safely back. Go, lad, thou lookest weary enough thyself, and should be sleeping after thy long day of toil." "I am loth to leave you to-night," said Landless. Godwyn smiled. "And I am always loth to see you go, but it were selfish to keep you listening to a garrulous, wakeful old man, when your young frame is in sore need of rest. Good-night, dear lad." Landless gave him his hands. "Good-night," he said. He stood below the other at the foot of the low bank to which was moored his stolen boat. Godwyn stooped and kissed him upon the forehead. "My heart is tender to-night, lad," he said. "I see in thee my Robert. Last night I dreamed of him and of his mother, my dearly loved and long-lost Eunice, and ah! I sorrowed to awake!" Landless pressed his hand in silence, and in a moment the water widened between them as Landless bent to his oars and the crazy little bark shot out into the middle of the stream. At the entrance of the first labyrinthine winding he turned and looked back to see Godwyn standing upon the bank, the moonlight silvering his thin hair and high serene brow. In the mystic white light, against the expanse of solemn heaven, he looked a vision, a seer or prophet risen from beneath the sighing grass. He waved his hand to Landless, saying in his quiet voice, "Until to-morrow!" The boat made the turn, and the lonely figure and the hut beyond it vanished, leaving only the moonlight, the wash and lap of water, and the desolate sighing of the marsh grass. There were many little channels and threadlike streams debouching from the main creek, and separated from it by clumps and lines of partially submerged grass, growing in places to the height of reeds. While passing one of these clumps it occurred to Landless that the grass quivered and rustled in an unusual fashion. He rested upon his oars and gazed at it curiously, then stood up, and parting the reeds, looked through into the tiny channel upon the other side. There was nothing to be seen, and the rustling had ceased. "A heron has its nest there, or a turtle plunged, shaking the reeds," said Landless to himself, and went his way. Some three hours later he was roused from the heavy sleep of utter fatigue by the voice of the overseer. Bewildered, he raised himself upon his elbow to stare at Woodson's grim face, framed in the doorway and lit by the torch held by Win-Grace Porringer, who stood behind him. "You there, you Landless!" cried the overseer, impatiently. "You sleep like the dead. Tumble out! You and Porringer are to go to Godwyn's after that new sail for the Nancy. Sir Charles Carew has taken it into his head to run over to Accomac, and he's got to have a spick and span white rag to sail under. Hurry up, now! He wants to start by sun up, and I clean forgot to send for it last night. You're to be back within the hour, d' ye hear? Take the four-oared shallop. There's the key," and the overseer strode away, muttering something about patched sails being good enough for Accomac folk. Landless and the Muggletonian stumbled through the darkness to the wharf behind the quarters, where they loosed the shallop, and in it shot across the inlet towards the mouth of the creek. "I will row," said the Muggletonian with grim kindness; "you look worn out. I suppose you were out last night?" Landless nodded, and the other bent to the oars with a will that sent them rapidly across the sheet of water. A cold and uncertain light began to stream from the ashen east, and the air was dank and heavy with the thick mist that wrapped earth and water like a shroud. It swallowed up the land behind them, and through it the nearer marshes gloomed indistinctly, dark patches upon the gray surface of the water. The narrow creek was hard to find amidst the universal dimness. The Muggletonian rowed slowly, peering about him with small, keen eyes. At length with a grunt of satisfaction he pointed to a pale streak dividing two masses of gray, and had turned the boat's head towards it, when through the stillness they caught the sound of oars. The next moment a boat glided from the creek and began to skirt the shores of the inlet, hugging the banks and moving slowly and stealthily. It was still so dark that they could tell nothing more than that it held one man. "Now, who is that?" said the Muggletonian. "And what has he been doing up that creek?" "Hail him," Landless replied. Porringer sent a low halloo across the water, but if the man heard he made no sign. The boat, one of the crazy dugouts of which every plantation had store, held on its stealthy way, but being over close to the bank presently ran upon a sand bar. Its occupant was forced to rise to his feet in order to shove it off. He stood upright but a moment, but in that moment, and despite the partial darkness, Landless recognized the misshapen figure. "It is the convict, Roach!" he exclaimed. "Ay," said the Muggletonian, "and an ill-omened night bird he is! May he be cursed from the sole of his foot to the crown of his head! May there be no soundness in him! May--What are you about, friend?" he cried, interrupting himself. "There's no need of two pair of oars. We have plenty of time." Landless bent to the second pair of oars. "He came down the creek," he said in a voice that sounded strained and unnatural. The other stared at him. "What do you mean?" he demanded. "Nothing: but let us hasten." Porringer stared, but fell in with the humor of his companion, and the shallop, impelled by strong arms, shot into the creek and along its mazy windings with the swiftness of a bird. Landless rowed with compressed lips and stony face, a great fear tugging at his heart. Porringer too was silent. The vapor hung so heavily upon the plains of marsh level with their heads that they seemed to be piercing a dense, low cloud. The light was growing stronger, but the earth still lay like a corpse, livid, dumb, cold and still. There was a chill stagnant smell in the air. Arriving at the stake in the bank below the hut, they fastened the boat to it, and stepping out, moved through the dense mist to where the hut loomed indistinctly before them, looking in the blank and awful stillness like a forlorn wreck drifting upon an infinite sea of soundless foam. "The door is open," said Landless. "Ay, I see," answered Porringer. "Does he wish to die before his time of the fever, that he lets this graveyard mist and stench creep in upon him in his sleep?" They spoke in low tones as though they feared to waken the sleeper whom they had come to waken. When they reached the hut, they knocked upon the lintel of the door and called Godwyn by name, once, twice, thrice. There was no answer. "Come on!" said Landless hoarsely, and entered the hut, followed by the other. The cold twilight, filtering through the low and narrow doorway, was powerless to dispel the darkness within. Landless groped his way to the pallet and stooped down. "He is not here," he said. The Muggletonian stumbled over a sheaf of oars, sending them to the floor with a noise that in the utter stillness, and to their strained ears, sounded appalling. "It's the darkness of Tophet," muttered Porringer. "If I could find his flint and steel; there are pine knots, I know, in the corner--God in Heaven!" "What is it? What is the matter?" cried Landless, as he staggered against him. "It's his face!" gasped the other. "There upon the table! I put my hand upon it. It's cold!" Landless rushed to the fireplace where he knew the tinder-box to be kept, and then groped for and found the heap of pine knots. A moment more and the fat wood was burning brightly, casting its red light throughout the hut, and choking back the pale daylight. The familiar room with its familiar furnishing of chest and settle and pallet, of hanging nets and piles of dingy sail, sprung into sight, but with it sprung into sight something unfamiliar, strange, and dreadful. It was the body of the mender of nets, flung face upwards across the rude table, the head hanging over the edge, and the face, which but a few short hours before had looked upon Landless with such a bright and patient serenity, blackened and distorted. Upon the throat were dark marks, the print of ten murderous fingers. With a bitter cry Landless fell upon his knees beside the table, and pressed his face against the cold hand flung backwards over the head of the murdered man. Porringer began to curse. With white lips and burning eyes he hurled anathemas at the murderer. He cursed him by the powers of light and darkness, by the earth, the sea, and the air; by all the plagues of the two Testaments. Landless broke the torrent of his maledictions. "Silence!" he said sternly. "He would have forgiven." Presently he rose from the ground, and taking the body in his arms, placed it upon the pallet, and reverently composed the limbs. Then he turned to the fireplace. It was easy to see that the hiding place had been visited. The spring was broken, and the lid had been struck and jammed into place by a powerful and hasty hand. Landless wrenched it off. Before him lay the pistols; but the gold and papers were gone. He turned to the Muggletonian, standing beside him with staring eyes. "Listen!" he said. "There was gold here. The wretch whom we passed but now knew of it--never mind how--and for it he has murdered the only friend I had on earth. There will come a day when I will avenge him. There were papers here, lists with the signatures of Oliverians, Redemptioners, sailors,--of all classes concerned in this undertaking, save only the slaves and the convicts. There were letters from Maryland and New England, and a correspondence which would provide whipping-post and pillory for other Nonconformists than the Quakers. All these, the actual proofs of this conspiracy, are in his--that murderer's--hands,--where they must not stay." "What wilt thou do, friend?" said the Muggletonian eagerly. "Wilt thou take the murderer aside in the gate to speak with him quietly, and smite him under the fifth rib, as did Joab to Abner the son of Ner, who slew his brother Asahel?" "God forbid," said Landless. "But I will take them from him before he knows their contents. One moment, and we will go." He crossed to the pallet and stood beside it, looking down on the shell that lay upon it with a stern and quiet grief. One of the cold white hands was clenched upon something. He stooped, and with difficulty unclasped the rigid fingers. The something was a ragged lock of coarse red hair. "You see," he said. "Ay," said the Muggletonian grimly. "It's evidence enough. There's but one man in this county with hair like that. Leave that lock where it is, and that dead man holds the rope that will hang his murderer." "It shall be left where it is," said Landless, and reclosed the fingers upon it. He took a piece of sail-cloth from the floor, and with it covered the dead man from sight. Next he turned to the hollow above the fireplace, and took from it the pistols, concealing them in his bosom. "I may need them," he said. "Come." They left the hut and its dead guardian, and rowed back through the summer dawn. The sky was barred with crimson and gold, the fiery rim of the sun just lifting above the eastern waters, the mist, a bridal veil of silver and pearl drawn across the face of a virgin earth. They rowed in silence until they neared the wharf, when Porringer said, "You are leader now." The other raised his haggard eyes. "It is a trust. I will go through with it, God helping me. But I would I were lying dead beside him in yonder hut." They left the boat at the wharf, and went towards the quarters. Meeting one of the blowzed and slatternly female servants, Landless asked where they might find the overseer. He had gone to the three-mile field half an hour ago, after bestowing upon the two dilatory servants a hearty cursing, and promising to reckon with them at dinner-time. "Where was the master?" He had gone to the mouth of the inlet with Sir Charles Carew, who had grown impatient, and had sailed away under the Nancy's patched sail. The under overseer was in the far corn-field, two miles off. "Are all the men in the fields, Barb?" asked Landless. Barb informed him that they were, "as he might very well know, seeing that the sun was half an hour high." "Have you seen the man called Roach?" No: Barb had not seen him; but she had heard the overseer tell Luiz Sebastian to take two men and go to the strip of Orenoko between the inlet and the third tobacco house, and Luiz Sebastian had been calling for Roach and Trail. Landless thanked her, and moved away without offering to bestow upon her that which Barb probably thought her information merited. "Do you find Woodson," he said to the Muggletonian, "and report this murder, saying nothing, however, of what we know. I myself will go to the tobacco house." "Had I not best come with thee to hold up thy hands?" said Porringer. "I would take up my text from the thirty-fifth of Numbers, and from Revelation, twenty-second, thirteen, and deal mightily with the murderer." "No," answered Landless. "Woodson must be seen at once, or we ourselves will fall under suspicion. And, friend, ask that thou and I may be the ones to bury him." _ |
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