CHAPTER XX
THE ESCAPE
The little county seat awoke in the morning to a strange sight. Thestorm had not abated. The wind was still blowing at blizzard rate offthe northwest hills, and fine, icy snow was swirling so thickly throughthe cold air that vision was obstructed. Buildings were distinguishableonly as shadows showing faintly through a heavy white veil. Thethermometer had gone many degrees below the zero mark. It was steadilygrowing colder. The older inhabitants said it would surely break therecord the coming night.
An immense fire had been built in the sitting-room. Thither Mary andLouise repaired. Here they were joined by Dale, Langford, and Gordon.
"You should be out at the ranch looking after your poor cattle, Mr.Langford," said Mary, smilingly. She could be light-hearted now,--since alittle secret had been whispered to her last night at a tea party whereno tea had been drunk. Langford had gravitated toward her as naturallyas steel to a magnet. He shrugged his big shoulders and laughed alittle.
"The Scribe will do everything that can be done. Honest, now, did youthink this trial could be pulled off without me?"
"But there can be no trial to-day."
"Why not?"
"Did I dream the court-house burned last night?"
"If you did, we are all dreamers alike."
"Then how can you hold court?"
"We have gone back to the time when Church and State were one andinseparable, and court convenes at ten o'clock sharp in themeeting-house," he said.
Louise was looking white and miserable.
"You are not contemplating running away, are you?" asked Gordon. "Thisis unusual weather--really."
She looked at him with a pitiful smile.
"I should like to be strong and brave and enduring and capable--likeMary. You don't believe it, do you? It's true, though. But I can't. I'mweak and homesick and cold. I ought not to have come. I am not the kind.You said it, too, you know. I am going home just as soon as this courtis over. I mean it."
There was no mistaking that. Gordon bowed his head. His face was white.It had come sooner than he had thought.
All the records of the work of yesterday had been burned. There wasnothing to do but begin at the beginning again. It was discouraging,uninteresting. But it had to be done. Dale refused positively toadjourn. The jurymen were all here. So the little frame church wasbargained for. If the fire-bugs had thought to postpone events--to gaintime--by last night's work, they would find themselves very greatlymistaken. The church was long and narrow like a country schoolhouse, andrather roomy considering the size of the town. It had precisewindows--also like a country schoolhouse,--four on the west side, throughwhich the fine snow was drifting, four opposite. The storm kept few athome with the exception of the people from across the river. There wereenough staying in the town to fill the room to its utmost limits.Standing room was at a premium. The entry was crowded. Men not able toget in ploughed back through the cutting wind and snow only to returnpresently to see if the situation had changed any during their briefabsence. So all the work of yesterday was gone over again.
Mingled with the howl and bluster of the wind, and the swirl and swishof the snow drifting outside during the small hours of last night,sometimes had been distinguishable the solemn sound of heavy stepsrunning--likened somewhat to the tramp of troops marching on thedouble-quick. To some to whom this sound was borne its meaning wasclear, but others wondered, until daylight made it clear to all. Thesorry day predicted for the cattle had come. The town was full ofcattle. They hugged the south side of the buildings--standing in stolidpatience with drooping heads. Never a structure in the whole town--houseor store or barn or saloon--but was wind-break for some forlorn bunchhuddled together, their faces always turned to the southeast, for thewind went that way. It was an odd sight. It was also a pitiful one.Hundreds had run with the wind from the higher range altitude, seekingthe protection of the bluffs. The river only stopped the blind, onwardimpetus. The flat where the camps had been might have been a closecorral, so thickly were the animals crowded together, their faces turneduncompromisingly with the wind.
But the most pathetic part of the situation made itself felt later inthe day when the crying need of food for this vast herd began to be aserious menace. Starvation stared these hundreds of cattle in the face.Men felt this grimly. But it was out of the question to attempt to drivethem back to the grass lands in the teeth of the storm. Nothing could bedone that day at least. But during the second night the wind fell away,the snow ceased. Morning dawned clear, still, and stingingly cold, andthe sun came up with a goodly following of sun-dogs. Then such a sightgreeted the inhabitants of the little town as perhaps they had neverseen before--and yet they had seen many things having to do with cattle.There was little grass in the town for them, but every little dead spearthat had lived and died in the protection of the sidewalk or inout-of-the-way corners had been ravenously nipped. Where snow haddrifted over a likely place, it had been pawed aside. Where there hadbeen some grass, south of town and east, the ground was as naked now asthough it had been peeled. Every bit of straw had been eaten from manurepiles, so that only pawed-over mounds of pulverized dust remained.Garbage heaps looked as if there had been a general Spring cleaning-up.And there was nothing more now. Every heap of refuse, every grass plothad been ransacked--there was nothing left for those hundreds of starvingbrutes. Many jurors, held in waiting, begged permission to leave, todrive their cattle home. Whenever practicable, these requests weregranted. The aggregate loss to the county would be enormous if thecattle were allowed to remain here many more days. Individual loss wouldgo hard with many of the small owners. The cattle stupidly made no moveto return to the grass lands of their own volition.
Later in the day, the numbers were somewhat thinned, but things werehappening in the little church room that made men forget--so concentratedwas the interest within those four walls. So close was the pack ofpeople that the fire roaring in the big stove in the middle of the roomwas allowed to sink in smouldering quiet. The heavy air had beenunbearable else. The snow that had been brought in on tramping feet layin little melted pools on the rough flooring. Men forgot to eat peanutsand women forgot to chew their gum--except one or two extremely nervousones whose jaws moved the faster under the stimulus of hysteria. JesseBlack was telling his story.
"Along toward the first of last July, I took a hike out into the Indiancountry to buy a few head o' cattle. I trade considerable with thehalf-breeds around Crow Creek and Lower Brule. They're always forsellin' and if it comes to a show-down never haggle much about thelucre--it all goes for snake-juice anyway. Well, I landed at John YellowWolf's shanty along about noon and found there was others ahead o' me.Yellow Wolf always was a popular cuss. There was Charlie Nightbird, PeteMonroe, Jesse Big Cloud, and two or three others whose mugs I did nothappen to be onto. After our feed, we all strolled out to the corral.Yellow Wolf said he had bought a likely little bunch from some Englishfeller who was skipping the country--starved out and homesick--and hadn'tput 'em on the range yet. He said J R was the English feller's brand. Ididn't suspicion no underhand dealin's. Yellow Wolf's always treated mewhite before, so I bargained for this here chap and three or four othersand then pulled out for home driving the bunch. They fed at home for aspell and then I decided to put 'em on the range. On the way I fell inwith Billy Brown here. He was dead set on havin' the lot to fill in thechinks of the two carloads he was shippin', so I up and lets him have'em. I showed him this here bill-o'-sale from Yellow Wolf and made himout one from me, and that was all there was to it. He rode on to Velpen,and I turned on my trail."
It was a straight story, and apparently damaging for the prosecution. Itcorroborated the attestations of other witnesses--many others. It had aplausible ring to it. Two bills of sale radiated atmospheric legality.If there had been dirty work, it must have originated with that renegadehalf-breed, Yellow Wolf. And Yellow Wolf was dead. He had died whileserving a term in the penitentiary for cattle-rustling. Uncle Samhimself had set the sea
l upon him--and now he was dead. This insinuatedcharge he could not answer. The finality of it seemed to set its stampupon the people gathered there--upon the twelve good men and true, aswell as upon others. Yellow Wolf was dead. George Williston was dead.Their secrets had died with them. An inscrutable fate had lowered theveil. Who could pierce it? One might believe, but who could know? Andthe law required knowledge.
"We will call Charlie Nightbird," said Small, complacently.
There was a little waiting silence--a breathless, palpitating silence.
"Is Charlie Nightbird present?" asked Small, casting rather anxious eyesover the packed, intent faces. Charlie Nightbird was not present. Atleast he made no sign of coming forward. The face of the young counselfor the State was immobile during the brief time they waited for CharlieNightbird--whose dark, frozen face was at that moment turned toward thecold, sparkling sky, and who would never come, not if they waited forhim till the last dread trump of the last dread day.
There was some mistake. Counsel had been misinformed. Nightbird was animportant witness. He had been reported present. Never mind. He wasprobably unavoidably detained by the storm. They would call Jesse BigCloud and others to corroborate the defendant's statements--which theydid, and the story was sustained in all its parts, major and minor. Thenthe defence rested.
Richard Gordon arose from his chair. His face was white. His lean jawswere set. His eyes were steel. He was anything but a lover now, this manGordon. Yet the slim little court reporter with dark circles ofhomesickness under her eyes had never loved him half so well as at thismoment. His voice was clear and deliberate.
"Your honor, I ask permission of the Court to call a witness in directtestimony. I assure your honor that the State had used all efforts inits power to obtain the presence of this witness before resting itscase, but had failed and believed at the time that he could not beproduced. The witness is now here and I consider his testimony of theutmost importance in this case."
Counsel for the defendant objected strenuously, but the Court grantedthe petition. He wanted to hear everything that might throw some lighton the dark places in the evidence.
"I call Mr. George Williston," said Gordon.
Had the strain crazed him? Louise covered her eyes with her hands. Mensat as if dazed. And thus, the cynosure of all eyes--stupefiedeyes--Williston of the ravaged Lazy S, thin and worn but calm, naturaland scholarly-looking as of old--walked from the little ante-room at theside into the light and knowledge of men once more and raised his handfor the oath. Not until this was taken and he had sat quietly down inthe witness chair did the tension snap. Even then men found it difficultto focus their attention on the enormous difference this new witnessmust make in the case that a few moments before had seemed settled.
Mary sat with shining eyes in the front row of wooden chairs. It was nowonder she had laughed and been so gay all the dreary yesterday and allthe worse to-day. Louise shot her a look of pure gladness.
Small's face was ludicrous in its drop-jawed astonishment. The littlelawyer's face was a study. A look of defiance had crept into thedefendant's countenance.
The preliminary questions were asked and answered.
"Mr. Williston, you may state where you were and what you saw on thefourteenth day of July last."
Williston, the unfortunate gentleman and scholar, the vanquished cowman,for a brief while the most important man in the cow country, perhaps,was about to uncover to men's understanding the dark secret hithertoobscured by a cloud of supposition and hearsay. He told the story of hisvisit to the island, and he told it well. It was enough. Gordon asked nofurther questions regarding that event.
"And now, Mr. Williston, you may tell what happened to you on the nightof the thirtieth of last August."
Williston began to tell the story of the night attack upon the Lazy S,when the galvanic Small jumped to his feet. The little lawyer touchedhim with a light hand.
"Your honor," he said, smoothly, "I object to that as incompetent,irrelevant, and immaterial, and not binding on the defendant."
"Your honor," interrupted Gordon, with great calmness, "we intend toshow you before we get through that this testimony is competent, andthat it is binding upon the defendant."
"Was the defendant there?"
"The defendant was there."
The objection was overruled.
So Williston told briefly but to the point the story of the night attackupon his home, of the defence by himself and his daughter, and of theburning of his house and sheds. Then he proceeded:
"Suddenly, some one caught me from behind, my arms were pinioned to mysides, something was clapped over my mouth. I was flung over a horse andstrapped to the saddle all in less time than it takes to tell it, andwas borne away in company with the man who had overpowered me."
He paused a moment in his recital. Faces strained with expectancydevoured him--his every look and word and action. Mary was very pale,carried thus back to the dread realities of that night in August, andshuddered, remembering that ghastly galloping. Langford could scarcerestrain himself. He wanted to rip out a blood curdling Sioux war-whoopon the spot.
"Who was this man, Mr. Williston?" asked Gordon.
"Jesse Black."
Small was on his feet again, gesticulating wildly. "I object! This isall a fabrication, put in here to prejudice the minds of the juryagainst this defendant. It is a pack of lies, and I move that it bestricken from the record."
The little lawyer bowed his head to the storm and shrugged up hisshoulders. Perhaps he wished that he, or his associate--one of the unholyalliance at least--was where the wicked cease from troubling, on the faraway islands of the deep seas, possibly, or home on the farm. But hisexpression told nothing.
"Gentlemen! gentlemen!" expostulated Judge Dale. "Gentlemen! I insist.This is all out of order." Only one gentleman was out of order, but thatwas the Judge's way. Gordon had remained provokingly cool under thetirade.
Again the soft touch. Small fell into his chair. He poured himself aglass of water from the pitcher standing on the attorneys' table anddrank a little of it nervously.
"I move," said the little lawyer, "that all this touching upon thepersonal matter of this witness and having to do with his privatequarrels be stricken out of the evidence as not bearing on the case inquestion."
All in vain. The Judge ruled that it did bear on the case, and Willistonpicked up the thread of his story.
"We rode and rode hard--it must have been hours; daylight was comingbefore we stopped. Our horses were spent I had no idea where we were.From the formation of the land, I judged we were not far from the river.We were surrounded by bluffs. I can hardly make you see how cleverlythis little retreat had been planned. It was in a valley--one of ahundred similar in all essential respects. The gulch at the bottom ofthe valley was heavily wooded with scrub-oak, cottonwood, woodbine, andplum-trees, and this tangle of foliage extended for some distance up thesides of the hills. In the midst of this underbrush--a most excellentscreen--was a tiny cabin. In this tiny cabin I have lived, a closelywatched prisoner, from that day until I escaped."
The defendant stirred a little uneasily. Was he thinking of Nightbirdwith the dark, frozen face--who had not answered to his call?
"Black left me soon after. He did not unbind me, rather bound me thetighter. There was no one then to watch me. He deigned to inform me thathe had found it rather inconvenient to kill me after the relief partyrode up, as then there was no absolute surety of his making a cleanget-away, and being caught in the act would be bound to be unpleasant,very unpleasant just then, so he had altered his plans a little--for thepresent. He gave me no hint either that time, nor either of the twotimes I saw him subsequently, as to what was to be his ultimate disposalof me. I could only suppose that after this trial was well over in hisfavor, and fear of indictment for arson and murder had blown over--ifblow over it did,--he would then quietly put an end to me. Dead men tellno tales. The shanty in the gulch did not seem to be much of arendezvous for secret me
etings. I led a lonely existence. My jailerswere mostly half-breeds--usually Charlie Nightbird. Two or three timesJake Sanderson was my guard."
Then from the doorway came a loud, clear, resonant voice, a joyfulvoice, a voice whose tones fairly oozed rapture.
"Hellity damn! The Three Bars's a gettin' busy, Mouse-hair!"
Judge Dale started. He glared angrily in that direction.
"Remove that man!" he ordered, curtly. He liked Jim, but he could notbrook this crying contempt of court. Jim was removed. He went quietly,but shaking his head reproachfully.
"I never would 'a' thought it o' the Jedge," he murmured,disconsolately. "I never would 'a' thought it."
There was a movement in the back of the room. A man was making his wayout, slipping along, cat-like, trying to evade attention. Quietly Gordonmotioned to the sheriff and slipped a paper into his hand.
"Look sharp," he whispered, his steady eyes on the shifty ones of thesheriff. "If you let him get away, just remember the handwriting on thewall. It's our turn now."
Presently, there was a slight scuffle by the door and two men quietlyleft the improvised court-room.
"Day before yesterday, in the afternoon," continued Williston, "Imanaged to knock Nightbird down at the threshold as he was about toenter. I had secretly worked a cross-beam from the low, unfinishedceiling. There was nothing else in the room I might use for a weapon.They were very careful. I think I killed him, your honor and gentlemenof the jury. I am not sorry. There was no other way. But I would ratherit had been the maker, not the tool. By the time I had made my way backto the Lazy S, I was too exhausted to go further; so I crawled over tomy neighbors, the Whites, and Mother White made me a shake down. I laythere, nearly dead, until this morning."
He leaned back wearily.
Black stood up. He was not lank nor lazy now, nor shuffling. His bodywas drawn to its full height. In the instant before the spring, Mary,who was sitting close to the attorneys' table, met his glance squarely.She read there what he was about to do. Only a moment their eyes heldeach other's, but it was time enough for a swift message ofunderstanding, of utter dislike, and of a determined will to defeat theman's purpose, to pass from the accusing brown eyes to the cruel ones ofthe defendant.
Quick as a flash, Black seized the chair upon which he had been sitting,sprang clear of the table and his lawyers, and landed close to Mary'sside. With his chair as a weapon, he meant to force his way to thenearest window. Mary's eyes dilated. Unhesitatingly she seized thehalf-emptied glass on the table and dashed the contents of it full intothe prisoner's face. Blinded, he halted a moment in his mad rush. Mary'squick manoeuvre made Langford's opportunity. He grappled with Black. Thecrowd went mad with excitement.
The prisoner still retained his chair. When Langford grappled with him,he attempted to bring it down upon the fair head of his antagonist. Marygasped with dread, but Langford grasped the chair with one muscularhand, wrested it from the desperado's hold, and threw it to the floor.The two men locked in a close embrace. Langford's great strength wasmore than sufficient to hold the outlaw until the dazed officers coulddo their duty--had he been let alone; but two men, who had been standingnear the door when the prisoner made his unexpected leap for liberty,had succeeded in worming their way through the excited crowd, and nowsuddenly threw themselves upon the ranchman, dragging him back.
"Stand aside or I'll shoot!"
It was a girl's voice, clear and firm. Mary had been the first torealize that Black's friends, not Langford's, had joined in thestruggle. She snatched her revolver from her cowboy belt--she had notbeen without either since the Lazy S was burned--and cried out herchallenge. Glancing quickly from the gleaming barrel to the determinedface of the young girl, the men let go their hold of Langford and fellback precipitately.
Instantly, Langford sprang forward, but Black had made good use of hismoment of grace. Swinging his arms to the right and left, he had beatenhis way to the window, when Langford again seized him, but he had theadvantage this time and he tore himself loose, throwing Langfordviolently against the window-casing. With his bare, clinched fist, heshivered the glass and leaped out--into the arms of Jim Munson.
The officers made gallant plunges through the stampeded crowd in theirefforts to get clear of the room to follow the fugitive. But certain menmanaged to keep themselves clumsily, but with marvellous adroitnessnevertheless, between the deputies and the doors and windows; so thatseveral moments elapsed before the outside was finally gained.
Meanwhile, Jim struggled heroically with the outlaw. Black was farsuperior to him in weight and strength of limb, but Jim was quick andtough and daring. Expelled from the court room, he had been watchingthrough the window. He had seen Mary's quick action and his Boss'ssplendid attack. He had also seen the little "gun play" and his eyesglowed in admiration of "Williston's little girl," though his generousheart ached for love of the woman who was not for him. He saw Blackcoming. He was ready for him. He grappled with him at once. If the Bossor the officers would only come now!
When they did come, they found Jim stretched at length on the frozenground. He sat up slowly.
"You're too late, boys," he said; "the hoss thief was too much for me.He's gone."
It was true. The little street stretched before them still--deserted.Early twilight was coming on. The biting cold struck them broadside. Thedeputies scattered in vain pursuit.