{"collection":"myth-cosmogony","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_23630/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_23630","id":"gutenberg_23630","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/23630","summary":null,"tags":["Category: American Literature","Category: Mythology, Legends & Folklore","Category: Novels","Fiction"],"text":"Produced by David Widger\n\n\n\n\n\n\nTHE PHANTOMS OF THE FOOT-BRIDGE\n\nBy Charles Egbert Craddock\n\n1895\n\n\nAcross the narrow gorge the little foot-bridge stretched-a brace of\nlogs, the upper surface hewn, and a slight hand-rail formed of a cedar\npole. A flimsy structure, one might think, looking down at the dark and\nrocky depths beneath, through which flowed the mountain stream, swift\nand strong, but it was doubtless substantial enough for all ordinary\nusage, and certainly sufficient for the imponderable and elusive\ntravellers who by common report frequented it.\n\n\u201cWe ain\u2019t likely ter meet nobody. Few folks kem this way nowadays,\n\u2018thout it air jes\u2019 ter ford the creek down along hyar a piece, sence\nharnts an\u2019 sech onlikely critters hev been viewed a-crossin\u2019 the\nfoot-bredge. An\u2019 it hev got the name o\u2019 bein\u2019 toler\u2019ble onlucky, too,\u201d\n said Roxby.\n\nHis interlocutor drew back slightly. He had his own reasons to recoil\nfrom the subject of death. For him it was invested with a more immediate\nterror than is usual to many of the living, with that flattering\npersuasion of immortality in every strong pulsation repudiating all\npossibility of cessation. Then, lifting his gloomy, long-lashed eyes to\nthe bridge far up the stream, he asked, \u201cWhose \u2018harms?\u201d\n\nHis voice had a low, repressed cadence, as of one who speaks seldom,\ngrave, even melancholy, and little indicative of the averse interest\nthat had kindled in his sombre eyes. In comparison the drawl of the\nmountaineer, who had found him heavy company by the way, seemed imbued\nwith an abnormal vivacity, and keyed a tone or two higher than was its\nwont.\n\n\u201cThar ain\u2019t a few,\u201d he replied, with a sudden glow of the pride of the\ncicerone. \u201cThar\u2019s a graveyard t\u2019other side o\u2019 the gorge, an\u2019 not more\nthan a haffen-mile off, an\u2019 a cornsider\u2019ble passel o\u2019 folks hev\nbeen buried thar off an\u2019 on, an\u2019 the foot-bredge ain\u2019t in nowise\nill-convenient ter them.\u201d\n\nThus demonstrating the spectral resources of the locality, he rode his\nhorse well into the stream as he spoke, and dropped the reins that the\nanimal\u2019s impatient lips might reach the water. He sat fac-, ing the\nfoot-bridge, flecked with the alternate shifting of the sunshine and the\nshadows of the tremulous firs that grew on either side of the high\nbanks on the ever-ascending slope, thus arching both above and below\nthe haunted bridge. His companion had joined him in the centre of\nthe stream; but while the horses drank, the stranger\u2019s eyes were\npersistently bent on the concentric circles of the water that the\nmovement of the animals had set astir in the current, as if he feared\nthat too close or curious a gaze might discern some pilgrim, whom he\ncared not to see, traversing that shadowy quivering foot-bridge. He\nwas mounted on a strong, handsome chestnut, as marked a contrast to his\nguide\u2019s lank and trace-galled sorrel as were the two riders. A slender\ngloved hand had fallen with the reins to the pommel of the saddle. His\nsoft felt hat, like a sombrero, shadowed his clear-cut face. He was\ncarefully shaven, save for a long drooping dark mustache and imperial.\nHis suit of dark cloth was much concealed by a black cloak, one end of\nwhich thrown back across his shoulder showed a bright blue lining, the\ncolor giving a sudden heightening touch to his attire, as if he were \u201cin\ncostume.\u201d It was a fleeting fashion of the day, but it added a certain\npicturesqueness to a horseman, and seemed far enough from the times\nthat produced the square-tailed frock-coat which the mountaineer wore,\nconstructed of brown jeans, the skirts of which stood stiffly out on\neach side of the saddle, and gave him, with his broad-brimmed hat, a\ncertain Quakerish aspect.\n\n\u201cI dun\u2019no\u2019 why folks be so \u2018feared of \u2018em,\u201d Rox-by remarked,\nspeculatively. \u201cThe dead ain\u2019t so oncommon, nohow. Them ez hev been\nin the war, like you an\u2019 me done, oughter be in an\u2019 \u2018bout used ter\ncorpses-though I never seen none o\u2019 \u2018em afoot agin. Lookin\u2019 at a smit\nfield o\u2019 battle, arter the rage is jes\u2019 passed, oughter gin a body a\nrealizin\u2019 sense how easy the sperit kin flee, an\u2019 what pore vessels fur\nholdin\u2019 the spark o\u2019 life human clay be.\u201d\n\nSimeon Roxby had a keen, not unkindly face, and he had that look of\nextreme intelligence which is entirely distinct from intellectuality,\nand which one sometimes sees in a minor degree in a very clever dog or a\nfine horse. One might rely on him to understand instinctively everything\none might say to him, even in its subtler aesthetic values, although he\nhad consciously learned little. He was of the endowed natures to whom\nmuch is given, rather than of those who are set to acquire. He had\nmany lines in his face-even his simple life had gone hard with him, its\nsorrows un assuaged by its simplicity. His hair was grizzled, and hung\nlong and straight on his collar. He wore a grizzled beard cut broad and\nshort. His boots had big spurs, although the lank old sorrel had never\nfelt them. He sat his horse like the cavalryman he had been for four\nyears of hard riding and raiding, but his face had a certain gentleness\nthat accented the Quaker-like suggestion of his garb, a look of\ncommuning with the higher things.\n\n\u201cI never blamed \u2018em,\u2019\u201d he went on, evidently reverting to the spectres\nof the bridge-\u201cI never blamed \u2018em for comin\u2019 back wunst in a while. It\n\u2018pears ter me \u2018twould take me a long time ter git familiar with heaven,\nan\u2019 sociable with them ez hev gone before. An\u2019, my Lord, jes\u2019 think what\nthe good green yearth is! Leastwise the mountings. I ain\u2019t settin\u2019 store\non the valley lands I seen whenst I went ter the wars. I kin remember\nyit what them streets in the valley towns smelt like.\u201d\n\nHe lifted his head, drawing a long breath to inhale the exquisite\nfragrance of the fir, the freshness of the pellucid water, the aroma of\nthe autumn wind, blowing through the sere leaves still clinging red and\nyellow to the boughs of the forest.\n\n\u201cNaw, I ain\u2019t blamin\u2019 \u2018em, though I don\u2019t hanker ter view \u2018em,\u201d he\nresumed. \u201cOne of \u2018em I wouldn\u2019t be afeard of, though. I feel mighty\nsorry fur her. The old folks used ter tell about her. A young \u2018oman she\nwar, a-crossin\u2019 this bredge with her child in her arms. She war young,\nan\u2019 mus\u2019 have been keerless, I reckon; though ez \u2018twar her fust baby,\nshe moightn\u2019t hev been practised in holdin\u2019 it an\u2019 sech, an\u2019 somehows\nit slipped through her arms an\u2019 fell inter the ruver, an\u2019 war killed in\na minit, dashin\u2019 agin the rocks. She jes\u2019 stood fur a second a-screamin\u2019\nlike a wild painter, an\u2019 jumped off\u2019n the bredge arter it. She got it\nagin; for when they dragged her body out\u2019n the ruver she hed it in her\narms too tight fur even death ter onloose. An\u2019 thar they air together in\nthe buryin\u2019-ground.\u201d\n\nHe gave a nod toward the slope of the mountain that intercepted the\nmelancholy view of the graveyard.\n\n\u201cGot it yit!\u201d he continued; \u201cbekase\u201d (he lowered his voice) \u201con windy\nnights, whenst the moon is on the wane, she is viewed kerryin\u2019 the baby\nalong the bredge--kerryin\u2019 it clear over, _safe an\u2019 sound_, like she\nthought she oughter done, I reckon, in that one minute, whilst she stood\nan\u2019 screamed an\u2019 surveyed what she hed done. That child would hev been\nnigh ter my age ef he hed lived.\u201d\n\nOnly the sunbeams wavered athwart the bridge now as the firs swayed\nabove, giving glimpses of the sky, and their fibrous shadows flickered\nback and forth. The wild mountain stream flashed white between the brown\nbowlders, and plunged down the gorge in a succession of cascades, each\nseeming more transparently green and amber and brown than the other. The\nchestnut horse gazed meditatively at these limpid out-gushings, having\ndrunk his fill; then thought better of his moderation, and once more\nthrust his head down to the water. The hand of his rider, which had\nmade a motion to gather up the reins, dropped leniently on his neck, as\nSimeon Roxby spoke again:\n\n\u201cSeveral--several others hev been viewed, actin\u2019 accordin\u2019 ter thar\nmotions in life. Now thar war a peddler--some say he slipped one icy\nevenin\u2019, \u2018bout dusk in winter--some say evil ones waylaid him fur his\ngear an\u2019 his goods in his pack, but the settlemint mostly believes\nhe war alone whenst he fell. His pack \u2018pears ter be full still, they\nsay--but ye air \u2018bleeged ter know he hev hed ter set that pack down fur\ngood \u2018fore this time. We kin take nuthin\u2019 out\u2019n this world, no matter\nwhat kind o\u2019 a line o\u2019 goods we kerry in life. Heaven\u2019s no place fur\ntradin\u2019, I understan\u2019, an\u2019 I _do_ wonder sometimes how in the worl\u2019 them\nmerchants an\u2019 sech in the valley towns air goin\u2019 ter entertain tharse\u2019fs\nin the happy land o\u2019 Canaan. It\u2019s goin\u2019 ter be sorter bleak fur them,\nsure\u2019s ye air born.\u201d\n\nWith a look of freshened recollection, he suddenly drew a plug of\ntobacco from his pocket, and he talked on even as he gnawed a piece from\nit.\n\n\u201cDurin\u2019 the war a cavalry-man got shot out hyar whilst runnin\u2019 \u2018crost\nthat thar foot-bredge. Thar hed been a scrimmage an\u2019 his horse war kilt,\nan\u2019 he tuk ter the bresh on foot, hopin\u2019 ter hide in the laurel. But ez\nhe war crossin\u2019 the foot-bredge some o\u2019 the pursuin\u2019 party war fordin\u2019\nthe ruver over thar, an\u2019 thinkin\u2019 he\u2019d make out ter escape they fired\non him, jes\u2019 ez the feller tried ter surrender. He turned this way an\u2019\nflung up both arms--but thar\u2019s mighty leetle truce in a pistol-ball.\nThat minute it tuk him right through the brain. Seems toler\u2019ble long\nrange fur a pistol, don\u2019t it? He kin be viewed now most enny moonlight\nnight out hyar on the foot-bredge, throwin\u2019 up both hands in sign of\nsurrender.\u201d\n\nThe wild-geese were a-wing on the way southward. Looking up to that\nnarrow section of the blue sky which the incision of the gorge into\nthe very depths of the woods made visible, he could see the tiny files\ndeploying along the azure or the flecking cirrus, and hear the vague\nclangor of their leader\u2019s cry. He lifted his head to mechanically follow\ntheir flight. Then, as his eyes came back to earth, they rested again on\nthe old bridge.\n\n\u201cStrange enough,\u201d he said, suddenly, \u201cthe sker-riest tale I hev ever\nhearn \u2018bout that thar old bredge is one that my niece set a-goin\u2019. She\n_seen_ the harnt _herself_, an\u2019 it shakes me wuss \u2018n the idee o\u2019 all the\nrest.\u201d\n\nHis companion\u2019s gloomy gaze was lifted for a moment with an expression\nof inquiry from the slowly widening circles of the water about the\nhorse\u2019s head as he drank. But Roxby\u2019s eyes, with a certain gleam of\nexcitement, a superstitious dilation, still dwelt upon the bridge at\nthe end of the upward vista. He went on merely from the impetus of the\nsubject. \u201cYes, sir--she _seen_ it a-pacin\u2019 of its sorrowful way acrost\nthat bredge, same ez the t\u2019others of the percession o\u2019 harnts. \u2018Twar\nmy niece, Mill\u2019cent--brother\u2019s darter--by name, Mill\u2019cent Roxby. Waal,\nMill\u2019cent an\u2019 a lot o\u2019 young fools o\u2019 her age--little over fryin\u2019\nsize--they \u2018tended camp-meetin\u2019 down hyar on Tomahawk Creek--\u2018tain\u2019t\nso long ago--along with the old folks. An\u2019 \u2018bout twenty went huddled up\ntergether in a road-wagin. An\u2019, lo! the wagin it bruk down on the way\nhome, an\u2019 what with proppin\u2019 it up on a crotch, they made out ter reach\nthe cross-roads over yander at the Notch, an\u2019 thar the sober old folks\ncalled a halt, an\u2019 hed the wagin mended at the blacksmith-shop. Waal, it\ntuk some two hours, fur Pete Rodd ain\u2019t a-goin\u2019 ter hurry hisself--in my\nopinion the angel Gabriel will hev ter blow his bugle oftener\u2019n wunst\nat the last day \u2018fore Pete Rodd makes up his mind ter rise from the\ndead an\u2019 answer the roll-call--an\u2019 this hyar young lot sorter found it\ntiresome waitin\u2019 on thar elders\u2019 solemn company. The old folks, whilst\nwaitin\u2019, set outside on the porches of the houses at the settlemint,\nan\u2019 repeated some o\u2019 the sermons they hed hearn at camp, an\u2019 more\u2019n one\nraised a hyme chune. An\u2019 the young fry--they hed hed a steady diet o\u2019\nsermons an\u2019 hyme chunes fur fower days--they tuk ter stragglin\u2019 off\ndown the road, two an\u2019 two, like the same sorter id jits the world over,\nleavin\u2019 word with the old folks that the wagin would overtake \u2018em an\u2019\npick \u2018em up on the road when it passed. Waal, they walked several mile,\nan\u2019 time they got ter the crest o\u2019 the hill over yander the moon hed\nriz, an\u2019 they could look down an\u2019 see the mist in the valley. The\nmoon war bright in the buryin\u2019-groun\u2019 when they passed it, an\u2019 the\nhead-boards stood up white an\u2019 stiff, an\u2019 a light frost hed fell on the\nmounds, an\u2019 they showed plain, an\u2019 shone sorter lonesome an\u2019 cold.\nThe young folks begun ter look behind em\u2019 fur the wagin. Some said--I\nb\u2019lieve \u2018twar Em\u2019ry Keen an--they could read the names on the boards\nplain, \u2018twar so light, the moon bein\u2019 nigh the full: but Em\u2019ry never\nread nuthin\u2019 at night by the moon in his life; he ain\u2019t enny too capable\no\u2019 wrastlin\u2019 with the alphabet with a strong daytime on his book ter\nlight him ter knowledge. An\u2019 the shadows war black an\u2019 still, an\u2019 all\nthe yearth looked ez ef nuthin\u2019 lived nor ever would agin, an\u2019 they\nhearn a wolf howl. Waal, that disaccommodated the gals mightily, an\u2019\nthey hed a heap more interes\u2019 in that old wagin, all smellin\u2019 rank with\nwagin-grease an\u2019 tar, than they did in thar lovyers; an\u2019 they hed ruther\nhev hearn that old botch of a wheel that Pete Rodd hed set onto it com\nin\u2019 a-creakin\u2019 an\u2019 a-com-plainin\u2019 along the road than the sweetest words\nthem boys war able ter make up or remember. So they stood thar in the\nroad--a-stare-gazin\u2019 them head-boards, like they expected every grave\nter open an\u2019 the reveilly ter sound--a-waitin\u2019 ter be overtook by the\nwagin, a-listenin\u2019, but hearin\u2019 nuthin\u2019 in the silence o\u2019 the frost--not\na dead leaf a-twirlin\u2019, nor a frozen blade o\u2019 grass astir. An\u2019 then\ntwo or three o\u2019 the gals \u2018lowed they hed ruther walk back ter meet the\nwagin, an\u2019 whenst the boys \u2018lowed ter go on--nuthin\u2019 war likely ter\nketch \u2018em--one of \u2018em bust out a-cryin\u2019. Waal, thar war the eend o\u2019 that\nmuch! So the gay party set out on the back track, a-keepin\u2019 step\nter sobs an\u2019 sniffles, an\u2019 that\u2019s how kem _they_ seen no harnt. But\nMill\u2019-cent an\u2019 three or four o\u2019 the t\u2019others \u2018lowed they\u2019d go on. They\nwarn\u2019t two mile from home, an\u2019 full five from the cross-roads. So Em\u2019ry\nKeenan--he hev been waitin\u2019 on her sence the year one--so he put his\nskeer in his pocket an\u2019 kem along with her, a-shakin\u2019 in his shoes, I\u2019ll\nbe bound! So down the hill in the frosty moonlight them few kem--purty\nnigh beat out, I reckon, Mill\u2019cent war, what with the sermonizin\u2019 an\u2019\nthe hyme-singin\u2019 an\u2019 hevin\u2019 ter look continual at the sheep\u2019s-eyes o\u2019\nEm\u2019ry Keenan--he wears my patience ter the bone! So she concluded ter\ntake the short-cut. An\u2019 Em\u2019ry he agreed. So they tuk the lead, the rest\na following an\u2019 kem down thar through all that black growth\u201d--he lifted\nhis arm and pointed at the great slope, dense with fir and pine and the\nheavy underbrush--\u201ckeepin\u2019 the bridle-path--easy enough even at night,\nfur the bresh is so thick they couldn\u2019t lose thar way. But the moonlight\nwar mightily slivered up, fallin\u2019 through the needles of the pines an\u2019\nthe skeins of dead vines, an\u2019 looked bleached and onnatural, an\u2019 holped\nthe dark mighty leetle. An\u2019 they seen the water a-shinin\u2019 an\u2019 a-plungin\u2019\ndown the gorge, an\u2019 the glistenin\u2019 of the frost on the floor o\u2019 the\nbredge. Thar war a few icicles on the hand-rail, an\u2019 the branches o\u2019 the\nfirs hung ez still ez death; only that cold, racin\u2019, shoutin\u2019, jouncin\u2019\nwater moved. Jes ez they got toler\u2019ble nigh the foot-bredge a sudden\ncloud kem over the face o\u2019 the sky. Thar warn\u2019t no wind on the yearth,\nbut up above the air war a-stirrin\u2019. An\u2019 Em\u2019ry he \u2018lowed Mill\u2019cent\nshouldn\u2019t cross the foot-bredge whilst the light warn\u2019t clar--I wonder\nthe critter hed that much sense! An\u2019 she jes\u2019 drapped down on that rock\nthar ter rest\u201d--he pointed up the slope to a great fragment that had\nbroken off from the ledges and lay near the bank: the bulk of the mass\nwas overgrown with moss and lichen, but the jagged edges of the recent\nfracture gleamed white and crystalline among the brown and olive-green\nshadows about it. A tree was close beside it. \u201cAgin that thar pine trunk\nEm\u2019ry he stood an\u2019 leaned. The rest war behind, a-comin\u2019 down the\nhill. An\u2019 all of a suddenty a light fell on the furder eend o\u2019\nthe foot-bredge--a waverin\u2019 light, mighty white an\u2019 misty in the\ndarksomeness. Mill\u2019cent \u2018lowed ez fust she thunk it war the moon. An\u2019\nlookin\u2019 up, she seen the cloud; it held the moon close kivered. An\u2019\nlookin\u2019 down, she seen the light war movin\u2019--movin\u2019 from the furder eend\no\u2019 the bredge, straight acrost it. Sometimes a hand war held afore it,\nez ef ter shield it from the draught, an\u2019 then Mill\u2019cent \u2018seen twar a\ncandle, an\u2019 the white in the mistiness war a \u2018oman wearin\u2019 white an\u2019\ncarryn\u2019 it.\n\n[Illustration: The Phantom of the Foot-bridge 025]\n\nLookin\u2019 ter right an\u2019 then ter lef the \u2018oman kem, with now her right\nhand shieldin\u2019 the candle she held, an\u2019 now layin\u2019 it on the hand-rail.\nThe candle shone on the water, fur it didn\u2019t flare, an\u2019 when the \u2018oman\nheld her hand before it the light made a bright spot on the foot-bredge\nan\u2019 in the dark air about her, an\u2019 on the fir branches over her head.\nAn\u2019 a thin mist seemed to hang about her white frock, but not over her\nface, fur when she reached the middle o\u2019 the foot-bredge she laid her\nhand agin on the rail, an\u2019 in the clear light o\u2019 the candle Mill\u2019cent\nseen the harnt\u2019s face. An\u2019 thar she beheld her own face; _her own\nface_ she looked upon ez she waited thar under the tree watchin\u2019 the\nfoot-bredge; _her own face_ pale an\u2019 troubled; her own self dressed in\nwhite, crossin\u2019 the foot-bredge, an\u2019 lightin\u2019 her steps with a corpse\u2019s\ncandle.\u201d He drew up the reins abruptly. He seemed in sudden haste to go.\nHis companion looked with deepening interest at the bridge, although he\nfollowed his guide\u2019s surging pathway to the opposite bank. As the two\ndripping horses struggled up the steep incline he asked, \u201cDid the man\nwith her see the manifestation also?\u201d\n\n\u201cHe _\u2018lows_ he did,\u201d responded Roxby, equivocally. \u201cBut when Mill\u2019cent\nfust got so she could tell it, \u2018peared ter me ez Em\u2019ry Keen an fund it\nez much news ez the rest o\u2019 we-uns. Mill\u2019cent jes\u2019 drapped stone-dead,\naccordin\u2019 ter all accounts, an\u2019 he an\u2019 the t\u2019other young folks flung\nwater in her face till she kem out\u2019n her faint; an\u2019 jes\u2019 then they hearn\nthe wagin a-rattlin\u2019 along the road, an\u2019 they stopped it an\u2019 fetched her\nhome in it. She never told the tale till she war home, an\u2019 it skeered\nme an\u2019 my mother powerful, fur Mill\u2019cent is all the kin we hev got.\nMill\u2019cent is gran\u2019daddy an\u2019 gran\u2019mam-my, sons an\u2019 daughters, uncles an\u2019\naunts, cousins, nieces, an\u2019 nephews, all in one. The only thing I ain\u2019t\npervided with is a nephew-in-law, an\u2019 I don\u2019t need him. Leastwise I\nain\u2019t lookin\u2019 fur Em\u2019ry Keenan jes\u2019 at present.\u201d\n\nThe pace was brisker when the two horses, bending their strength\nsturdily to the task, had pressed up the massive slope from the deep\ncleft of the gorge. As the road curved about the outer verge of the\nmountain, the valley far beneath came into view, with intersecting\nvalleys and transverse ranges, dense with the growths of primeval\nwildernesses, and rugged with the tilted strata of great upheavals, and\nwith chasms cut in the solid rock by centuries of erosion, traces\nof some remote cataclysmal period, registering thus its throes and\nturmoils. The blue sky, seen beyond a gaunt profile of one of the\nfarther summits that defined its craggy serrated edge against the\nultimate distances of the western heavens, seemed of a singularly suave\ntint, incongruous with the savagery of the scene, which clouds and\nportents of storm might better have befitted. The little graveyard,\nwhich John Dundas discerned with recognizing eyes, albeit they had never\nbefore rested upon it, was revealed suddenly, lying high on the opposite\nside of the gorge. No frost glimmered now on the lowly mounds; the\nflickering autumnal sunshine loitered unafraid among them, according\nto its languid wont for many a year. Shadows of the gray un-painted\nhead-boards lay on the withered grass, brown and crisp, with never\na cicada left to break the deathlike silence. A tuft of red leaves,\nvagrant in the wind, had been caught on one of the primitive monuments,\nand swayed there with a decorative effect. The enclosure seemed, to\nunaccustomed eyes, of small compass, and few the denizens who had found\nshelter here and a resting-place, but it numbered all the dead of the\ncountry-side for many a mile and many a year, and somehow the loneliness\nwas assuaged to a degree by the reflection that they had known each\nother in life, unlike the great herds of cities, and that it was a\ncommon fate which the neighbors, huddled together, encountered in\ncompany.\n\nIt had no discordant effect in the pervasive sense of gloom, of mighty\nantagonistic forces with which the scene was replete; it fostered a\nrealization of the pitiable minuteness and helplessness of human nature\nin the midst of the vastness of inanimate nature and the evidences of\ninfinite lengths of forgotten time, of the long reaches of unimagined\nhistory, eventful, fateful, which the landscape at once suggested and\nrevealed and concealed.\n\nLike the sudden flippant clatter of castanets in the pause of some\nsolemn funeral music was the impression given by the first glimpse along\nthe winding woodland way of a great flimsy white building, with its\nmany pillars, its piazzas, its \u201cobservatory,\u201d its band-stand, its garish\nintimations of the giddy, gay world of a summer hotel. But, alack! it,\ntoo, had its surfeit of woe.\n\n\u201cThe guerrillas an\u2019 bushwhackers tuk it out on the old hotel, sure!\u201d\n observed Sim Roxby, by way of introduction. \u201cThar warn\u2019t much fightin\u2019\nhyar-abouts, an\u2019 few sure-enough soldiers ever kem along. But wunst in a\nwhile a band o\u2019 guerrillas went through like a suddint wind-storm, an\u2019\nI tell ye they made things whurl while they war about it. They made a\nsorter barracks o\u2019 the old place. Looks some like lightning hed struck\nit.\u201d\n\nHe had reined up his horse about one hundred yards in front of the\nedifice, where the weed-grown gravelled drive--carefully tended ten\nyears agone--had diverged from the straight avenue of poplars, sweeping\nin a circle around to the broad flight of steps.\n\n\u201cThough,\u201d he qualified abruptly, as if a sudden thought had struck\nhim, \u201cef ye air countin\u2019 on buyin\u2019 it, a leetle money spent ter keerful\npurpose will go a long way toward makin\u2019 it ez good ez new.\u201d\n\nHis companion did not reply, and for the first time Roxby cast upon him\na covert glance charged with the curiosity which would have been earlier\nand more easily aroused in another man by the manner of the stranger. A\nletter--infrequent missive in his experience--had come from an ancient\ncompanion-in-arms, his former colonel, requesting him in behalf of a\nfriend of the old commander to repair to the railway station, thirty\nmiles distant, to meet and guide this prospective purchaser of the old\nhotel to the site of the property. And now as Roxby looked at him the\nsuspicion which his kind heart had not been quick to entertain was\nseized upon by his alert brain.\n\n\u201cThe cunnel\u2019s been fooled somehows,\u201d he said to himself.\n\nFor the look with which John Dundas contemplated the place was not the\ngaze of him concerned with possible investment--with the problems of\nrepair, the details of the glazier and the painter and the plasterer.\nThe mind was evidently neither braced for resistance nor resigned to\ndespair, as behooves one smitten by the foreknowledge of the certainty\nof the excess of the expenditures over the estimates. Only with pensive,\nlistless melancholy, void of any intention, his eyes traversed the\nlong rows of open doors, riven by rude hands from their locks, swinging\nhelplessly to and fro in the wind, and giving to the deserted and\ndesolate old place a spurious air of motion and life. Many of the\nshutters had been wrenched from their hinges, and lay rotting on the\nfloors. The ball-room windows caught on their shattered glass the\nreflection of the clouds, and it seemed as if here and there a wan face\nlooked through at the riders wending along the weed-grown path. Where so\nmany faces had been what wonder that a similitude should linger in the\nloneliness! The pallid face seemed to draw back as they glanced up while\nslowly pacing around the drive. A rabbit sitting motionless on the front\npiazza did not draw back, although observing them with sedate eyes as\nhe poised himself upright on his haunches, with his listless fore-paws\nsuspended in the air, and it occurred to Dundas that he was probably\nunfamiliar with the presence of human beings, and had never heard the\ncrack of a gun. A great swirl of swallows came soaring out of the big\nkitchen chimneys and circled in the sky, darting down again and again\nupward. Through an open passage was a glimpse of a quadrangle, with its\nweed-grown spaces and litter of yellow leaves. A tawny streak, a red\nfox, sped through it as Dundas looked. A half-moon, all a-tilt, hung\nabove it. He saw the glimmer through the bare boughs of the leafless\nlocust-trees here and there still standing, although outside on the lawn\nmany a stump bore token how ruthlessly the bushwhackers had furnished\ntheir fires.\n\n\u201cThat thar moon\u2019s a-hangin\u2019 fur rain,\u201d said the mountaineer, commenting\nupon the aspect of the luminary, which he, too, had noticed as they\npassed. \u201cI ain\u2019t s\u2019prised none ef we hev fallin\u2019 weather agin \u2018fore\nday, an\u2019 the man--by name Morgan Holden--that hev charge o\u2019 the hotel\nproperty can\u2019t git back fur a week an\u2019 better.\u201d\n\nA vague wonder to find himself so suspicious flitted through his mind,\nwith the thought that perhaps the colonel might have reckoned on this\ndelay. \u201cSurely the ruvers down yander at Knoxville mus\u2019 be a-boomin\u2019,\nwith all this wet weather,\u201d he said to himself.\n\nThen aloud: \u201cMorgan Holden he went ter Col-bury ter \u2018tend ter some\nbusiness in court, an\u2019 the ruvers hev riz so that, what with the bredges\nbein\u2019 washed away an\u2019 the fords so onsartain an\u2019 tricky, he\u2019ll stay till\nthe ruver falls. He don\u2019t know ye war kemin\u2019, ye see. The mail-rider hev\nquit, \u2018count o\u2019 the rise in the ruver, an\u2019 thar\u2019s no way ter git word\nter him. Still, ef ye air minded ter wait, I\u2019ll be powerful obligated\nfur yer comp\u2019ny down ter my house till the ruver falls an\u2019 Holden he\ngits back.\u201d\n\nThe stranger murmured his obligations, but his eyes dwelt lingeringly\nupon the old hotel, with its flapping doors and its shattered windows.\nThrough the recurrent vistas of these, placed opposite in the rooms,\ncame again broken glimpses of the grassy space within the quadrangle,\nwith its leafless locust-trees, first of all to yield their foliage to\nthe autumn wind, where a tiny owl was shrilling stridulously under the\nlonely red sky and the melancholy moon.\n\n\u201cHed ye \u2018lowed ter, put up at the old hotel?\u201d asked Roxby, some inherent\nquickness supplying the lack of a definite answer.\n\nFor the first time the stranger turned upon him a look more expressive\nthan the casual fragmentary attention with which he had half heeded,\nhalf ignored his talk since their first encounter at the railway\nstation.\n\n\u201cA simple fellow, but good as gold,\u201d was the phrase with which Simeon\nRoxby had been commended as guide and in some sort guard.\n\n\u201cNot so simple, perhaps,\u201d the sophisticated man thought as their eyes\nmet. Not so simple but that the truth must serve. \u201cThe colonel suggested\nthat it might be best,\u201d he replied, more alert to the present moment\nthan his languid preoccupation had heretofore permitted.\n\nThe answer was good as far as it went. A few days spent in the old\nhostelry certainly would serve well to acquaint the prospective\npurchaser with its actual condition and the measures and means needed\nfor its repair; but as Sim Roxby stood there, with the cry of the owl\nshrilling in the desert air, the lonely red sky, the ominous tilted\nmoon, the doors drearily flapping to and fro as the wind stole into the\nforlorn and empty place and sped back affrighted, he marvelled at the\nrefuge contemplated.\n\n\u201cI believe there is some of the furniture here yet. We could contrive to\nset up a bed from what is left. The colonel could make it all right with\nHolden, and I could stay a day or two, as we originally planned.\u201d\n\n\u201cYe-es. I don\u2019t mind Holden: a man ain\u2019t much in charge of a place ez\nain\u2019t got a lock or a key ter bless itself with, an\u2019 takes the owel an\u2019\nthe fox an\u2019 the gopher fur boarders; but, ennyhow, kem with me home ter\nsupper. Mill\u2019cent will hev it ready by now ennyhows, an\u2019 ye need suthin\u2019\nhearty an\u2019 hot ter stiffen ye up ter move inter sech quarters ez these.\u201d\n Dundas hesitated, but the mountaineer had already taken assent for\ngranted, and pushed his horse into a sharp trot. Evidently a refusal was\nnot in order. Dundas pressed forward, and they rode together along the\nwinding way past the ten-pin alley, its long low roof half hidden in the\nencroaching undergrowth springing up apace beneath the great trees; past\nthe stables; past a line of summer cottages, strangely staring of aspect\nout of the yawning doors and windows, giving, instead of an impression\nof vacancy, a sense of covert watching, of secret occupancy. If one\u2019s\nglances were only quick enough, were there not faces pressed to those\nshattered panes--scarcely seen--swiftly withdrawn?\n\nHe was in a desert; he had hardly been so utterly alone in all his life;\nyet he bore through the empty place a feeling of espionage, and ever\nand anon he glanced keenly at the overgrown lawns, with their deepening\ndrifts of autumn leaves, at the staring windows and flaring doors, which\nemitted sometimes sudden creaking wails in the silence, as if he sought\nto assure himself of the vacancy of which his mind took cognizance and\nyet all his senses denied.\n\nLittle of his sentiment, although sedulously cloaked, was lost on Sim\nRoxby; and he was aware, too, in some subtle way, of the relief his\nguest experienced when they plunged into the darkening forest and left\nthe forlorn place behind them. The clearing in which it was situated\nseemed an oasis of light in the desert of night in which the rest of\nthe world lay. From the obscurity of the forest Dundas saw, through the\nvistas of the giant trees, the clustering cottages, the great hotel,\ngables and chimneys and tower, stark and distinct as in some weird\ndream-light in the midst of the encircling gloom. The after-glow of\nsunset was still aflare on the western windows; the whole empty place\nwas alight with a reminiscence of its old aspect--its old gay life. Who\nknows what memories were a-stalk there--what semblance of former times?\nWhat might not the darkness foster, the impunity of desertion, the\nassociations that inhabited the place with almost the strength of human\noccupancy itself? Who knows--who knows?\n\nHe remembered the scene afterward, the impression he received. And from\nthis, he thought, arose his regret for his decision to take up here his\nabiding-place.\n\nThe forest shut out the illumined landscape, and the night seemed indeed\nat hand; the gigantic boles of the trees loomed through the encompassing\ngloom, that was yet a semi-transparent medium, like some dark but clear\nfluid through which objects were dimly visible, albeit tinged with its\nown sombre hue. The lank, rawboned sorrel had set a sharp pace, to\nwhich the chestnut, after momentary lagging, as if weary with the day\u2019s\ntravel, responded briskly. He had received in some way intimations that\nhis companion\u2019s corn-crib was near at hand, and if he had not deduced\nfrom these premises the probability of sharing his fare, his mental\nprocesses served him quite as well as reason, and brought him to the\nsame result. On and on they sped, neck and neck, through the darkening\nwoods; fire flashed now and again from their iron-shod hoofs; often\na splash and a shower of drops told of a swift dashing through the\nmud-holes that recent rains had fostered in the shallows. The dank odor\nof dripping boughs came on the clear air. Once the chestnut shied from a\nsudden strange shining point springing up in the darkness close at\nhand, which the country-bred horse discriminated as fox-fire, and\nkept steadily on, unmindful of the rotting log where it glowed. Far in\nadvance, in the dank depths of the woods, a Will-o\u2019-the-wisp danced and\nflickered and lured the traveller\u2019s eye. The stranger was not sure of\nthe different quality of another light, appearing down a vista as the\nroad turned, until the sorrel, making a tremendous spurt, headed for it,\nuttering a joyous neigh at the sight.\n\nThe deep-voiced barking of hounds rose melodiously on the silence,\nand as the horses burst out of the woods into a small clearing, Dundas\nbeheld in the brighter light a half-dozen of the animals nimbly afoot in\nthe road, one springing over the fence, another in the act of climbing,\nhis fore-paws on the topmost rail, his long neck stretched, and his head\nturning about in attitudes of observation. He evidently wished to assure\nhimself whether the excitement of his friends was warranted by the facts\nbefore he troubled himself to vault over the fence. Three or four still\nlingered near the door of a log-cabin, fawning about a girl who stood on\nthe porch. Her pose was alert, expectant; a fire in the dooryard, where\nthe domestic manufacture of soap had been in progress, cast a red flare\non the house, its appurtenances, the great dark forest looming all\naround, and, more than the glow of the hearth within, lighted up the\ncentral figure of the scene. She was tall, straight, and strong; a\nwealth of fair hair was clustered in a knot at the back of her head, and\nfleecy tendrils fell over her brow; on it was perched a soldier\u2019s-cap;\nand certainly more gallant and fearless eyes had never looked out from\nunder the straight, stiff brim. Her chin, firm, round, dimpled, was\nuplifted as she raised her head, descrying the horsemen\u2019s approach. She\nwore a full dark-red skirt, a dark brown waist, and around her neck\nwas twisted a gray cotton kerchief, faded to a pale ashen hue, the\nneutrality of which somehow aided the delicate brilliancy of the\nblended roseate and pearly tints of her face. Was this the seer of\nghosts--Dundas marvelled--this the Millicent whose pallid and troubled\nphantom already-paced the foot-bridge?\n\nHe did not realize that he had drawn up his horse suddenly at the sight\nof her, nor did he notice that his host had dismounted, until Roxby was\nat the chestnut\u2019s head, ready to lead the animal to supper in the barn.\nHis evident surprise, his preoccupation, were not lost upon Roxby,\nhowever. His hand hesitated on the girth of the chestnut\u2019s saddle when\nhe stood between the two horses in the barn. He had half intended to\ndisregard the stranger\u2019s declination of his invitation, and stable the\ncreature. Then he shook his head slowly; the mystery that hung about the\nnew-comer was not reassuring. \u201cA heap o\u2019 wuthless cattle \u2018mongst them\nvalley men,\u201d he said; for the war had been in some sort an education to\nhis simplicity. \u201cLet him stay whar the cunnel expected him ter stay. I\nain\u2019t wantin\u2019 no stranger a-hangin\u2019 round about Mill\u2019cent, nohow. Em\u2019ry\nKeenan ain\u2019t a pattern o\u2019 perfection, but I be toler\u2019ble well acquainted\nwith the cut o\u2019 his foolishness, an\u2019 I know his daddy an\u2019 mammy, an\u2019\nboth sets o\u2019 gran\u2019daddies an\u2019 gran\u2019mammies, an\u2019 I could tell ye exac\u2019ly\nwhich one the critter got his nose an\u2019 his mouth from, an\u2019 them lean\nsheep\u2019s-eyes o\u2019 his\u2019n, an\u2019 nigh every tone o\u2019 his voice. Em\u2019ry never\nthunk afore ez I set store on bein\u2019 acquainted with him. He \u2018lowed I\nknowed him _too_ well.\u201d\n\nHe laughed as he glanced through the open door into the darkening\nlandscape. Horizontal gray clouds were slipping fast across the pearly\nspaces of the sky. The yellow stubble gleamed among the brown earth\nof the farther field, still striped with its furrows. The black forest\nencircled the little cleared space, and a wind was astir among the\ntree-tops. A white star gleamed through the broken clapboards of the\nroof, the fire still flared under the soap-kettle in the dooryard, and\nthe silence was suddenly smitten by a high cracked old voice, which told\nhim that his mother had perceived the dismounted stranger at the gate,\nand was graciously welcoming him.\n\nShe had come to the door, where the girl still stood, but half withdrawn\nin the shadow. Dundas silently bowed as he passed her, following his\naged hostess into the low room, all bedight with the firelight of a huge\nchimney-place, and comfortable with the realization of a journey\u2019s end.\nThe wilderness might stretch its weary miles around, the weird wind\nwander in the solitudes, the star look coldly on unmoved by aught it\nbeheld, the moon show sad portents, but at the door they all failed,\nfor here waited rest and peace and human companionship and the sense of\nhome.\n\n\u201cTake a cheer, stranger, an\u2019 make yerself at home. Powerful glad ter\nsee ye---war \u2018feard night would overtake ye. Ye fund the water toler\u2019ble\nhigh in all the creeks an\u2019 sech, I reckon, an\u2019 fords shifty an\u2019\nonsartain. Yes, sir. Fall rains kem on earlier\u2019n common, an\u2019 more\u2019n\nwe need. Wisht we could divide it with that thar drought we had in the\nsummer. Craps war cut toler\u2019ble short, sir--toler\u2019ble short.\u201d\n\nMrs. Roxby\u2019s spectacles beamed upon him with an expression of the utmost\nbenignity as the firelight played on the lenses, but her eyes peering\nover them seemed endowed in some sort with independence of outlook. It\nwas as if from behind some bland mask a critical observation was poised\nfor unbiased judgment. He felt in some degree under surveillance. But\nwhen a light step heralded an approach he looked up, regardless of\nthe betrayal of interest, and bent a steady gaze upon Millicent as she\npaused in the doorway.\n\nAnd as she stood there, distinct in the firelight and outlined against\nthe black background of the night, she seemed some modern half-military\nideal of Diana, with her two gaunt hounds beside her, the rest of the\npack vaguely glimpsed at her heels outside, the perfect outline and\nchiselling of her features, her fine, strong, supple figure, the look of\nsteady courage in her eyes, and the soldier\u2019s cap on her fair hair. Her\nface so impressed itself upon his mind that he seemed to have seen her\noften. It was some resemblance to a picture of a vivandi\u00e8re, doubtless,\nin a foreign gallery--he could not say when or where; a remnant of a\ntourist\u2019s overcrowded impressions; a half-realized reminiscence, he\nthought, with an uneasy sense of recognition.\n\n\u201cHello, Mill\u2019cent! home agin!\u201d Roxby cried, in cheery greeting as he\nentered at the back door opposite. \u201cWhat sorter topknot is that ye got\non?\u201d he demanded, looking jocosely at her head-gear.\n\nThe girl put up her hand with an expression of horror. A deep red\nflush dyed her cheek as she touched the cap. \u201cI forgot \u2018twar thar,\u201d she\nmurmured, contritely. Then, with a sudden rush of anger as she tore it\noff: \u201c\u2018Twar granny\u2019s fault. She axed me ter put it on, so ez ter see\nwhich one I looked most like.\u201d\n\n\u201cStranger,\u201d quavered the old woman, with a painful break in her voice,\n\u201cI los\u2019 fower sons in the war, an\u2019 Mill\u2019cent hev got the fambly favor.\u201d\n\n\u201cYe _mought_ hev let me know ez I war a-perlitin\u2019 round in this hyar\nmen\u2019s gear yit,\u201d the girl muttered, as she hung the cap on a prong of\nthe deer antlers on which rested the rifle of the master of the house.\n\nRoxby\u2019s face had clouded at the mention of the four sons who had gone\nout from the mountains never to return, leaving to their mother\u2019s aching\nheart only the vague comfort of an elusive resemblance in a girl\u2019s\nface; but as he noted Millicent\u2019s pettish manner, and divined her\nmortification because of her unseemly head-gear in the stranger\u2019s\npresence, he addressed her again in that jocose tone without which he\nseldom spoke to her.\n\n[Illustration: Warn\u2019t you-uns apologizin\u2019 ter me 006]\n\n\u201cWarn\u2019t you-uns apologizin\u2019 ter me t\u2019other day fur not bein\u2019 a nephew\n\u2018stiddier a niece? Looked sorter like a nephew ter-night.\u201d\n\nShe shook her head, covered now only with its own charming tresses\nwaving in thick undulations to the coil at the nape of her neck--a\ntrifle dishevelled from the rude haste with which the cap had been torn\noff.\n\nRoxby had seated himself, and with his elbows on his knees he looked\nup at her with a teasing jocularity, such as one might assume toward a\nchild.\n\n\u201c_Ye war_,\u201d he declared, with affected solemnity--\u201cye war \u2018pologizin\u2019\nfur not bein\u2019 a nephew, an\u2019 \u2018lowed ef ye war a nephew we could go\na-huntin\u2019 tergether, an\u2019 ye could holp me in all my quar\u2019ls an\u2019 fights.\nI been aging some lately, an\u2019 ef I war ter go ter the settlemint an\u2019 git\ninter a fight I mought not be able ter hold my own. Think what \u2018twould\nbe ter a pore old man ter hev a dutiful nephew step up an\u2019\u201d--he doubled\nhis fists and squared off--\u201cjes\u2019 let daylight through some o\u2019 them\ncusses. An\u2019 didn\u2019t _ye say_\u201d--he dropped his belligerent attitude and\npointed an insistent finger at her, as if to fix the matter in her\nrecollection--\u201cef ye war a nephew \u2018stiddier a niece ye could fire a gun\n\u2018thout shettin\u2019 yer eyes? An\u2019 I told ye then ez that would mend yer aim\nmightily. I told ye that I\u2019d be powerful mortified ef I hed a nephew ez\nhed ter shet his eyes ter keep the noise out\u2019n his ears whenst he fired\na rifle. The tale would go mighty hard with me at the settlemint.\u201d\n\nThe girl\u2019s eyes glowed upon him with the fixity and the lustre of those\nof a child who is entertained and absorbed by an elder\u2019s jovial wiles.\nA flash of laughter broke over her face, and the low, gurgling,\nhalf-dreamy sound was pleasant to hear. She was evidently no more than\na child to these bereft old people, and by them cherished as naught else\non earth.\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 didn\u2019t _I tell you-uns,_\u201d he went on, affecting to warm to the\ndiscussion, and in reality oblivious of the presence of the\nguest\u2019--\u201cdidn\u2019t I tell ye ez how ef ye war a nephew \u2018stiddier a niece ye\nwouldn\u2019t hev sech cattle ez Em\u2019ry Keenan a-dan-glin\u2019 round underfoot,\nlike a puppy ye can\u2019t gin away, an\u2019 that _won\u2019t_ git lost, an\u2019 ye ain\u2019t\ngot the heart ter kill?\u201d\n\nThe girl\u2019s lip suddenly curled with scorn. \u201cYer nephew would be\nobligated ter make a ch\u2019ice fur marryin\u2019 \u2018mongst these hyar mounting\ngals--Par-mely Lepstone, or Belindy M\u2019ria Matthews, or one o\u2019 the\nWindrow gals. Waal, sir, I\u2019d ruther be yer niece--even ef Em\u2019ry Keenan\n_air_ like a puppy underfoot, that ye can\u2019t gin away, an\u2019 won\u2019t git\nlost, an\u2019 ye ain\u2019t got the heart ter kill.\u201d She laughed again,\nshowing her white teeth. She evidently relished the description of the\npersistent adherence of poor Emory Keenan. \u201cBut which one o\u2019 these hyar\ngals would ye recommend ter yer nephew ter marry--ef ye hed a nephew?\u201d\n\nShe looked at him with flashing eyes, conscious of having propounded a\nposer.\n\nHe hesitated for a moment. Then--\u201cI\u2019m surrounded,\u201d he said, with a\nlaugh. \u201cEz I couldn\u2019t find a wife fur myself, I can\u2019t undertake\nter recommend one ter my nephew. Mighty fine boy he\u2019d hev been, an\u2019\nsaaft-spoken an\u2019 perlite ter aged men--not sassy an\u2019 makin\u2019 game o\u2019 old\nuncles like a niece. Mighty fine boy!\u201d\n\n\u201cYe air welcome ter him,\u201d she said, with a simulation of scorn, as she\nturned away to the table.\n\nWhether it were the military cap she had worn, or the fancied\nresemblance to the young soldiers, never to grow old, who had gone forth\nfrom this humble abode to return no more, there was still to the guest\u2019s\nmind the suggestion of the vivandi\u00e8re about her as she set the table\nand spread upon it the simple fare. To and from the fireplace she was\nfollowed by two or three of the younger dogs, their callowness expressed\nin their lack of manners and perfervid interest in the approaching meal.\nThis induced their brief journeys back and forth, albeit embarrassed\nby their physical conformation, short turns on four legs not being\napparently the easy thing it would seem from so much youthful\nsuppleness. The dignity of the elder hounds did not suffer them to move,\nbut they looked on from erect postures about the hearth with glistening\neyes and slobbering jaws.\n\nEver and anon the deep blue eyes of Millicent were lifted to the outer\ngloom, as if she took note of its sinister aspect. She showed scant\ninterest in the stranger, whose gaze seldom left her as he sat beside\nthe fire. He was a handsome man, his face and figure illumined by the\nfirelight, and it might have been that he felt a certain pique, an\nunaccustomed slight, in that his presence was so indifferent an element\nin the estimation of any young and comely specimen of the feminine sex.\nCertainly he had rarely encountered such absolute preoccupation as her\nsmiling far-away look betokened as she went back and forth with her\nyoung canine friends at her heels, or stood at the table deftly slicing\nthe salt-rising bread, the dogs poised skilfully upon their hind-legs\nto better view the appetizing performance; whenever she turned her face\ntoward them they laid their heads languish-ingly askew, as if to remind\nher that supper could not be more fitly bestowed than on them. One, to\nsteady himself, placed unobserved his fore-paw on the edge of the table,\nhis well-padded toes leaving a vague imprint as of fingers upon the\ncoarse white cloth; but John Dundas was a sportsman, and could the\nbetter relax an exacting nicety where so pleasant-featured and affable\na beggar was concerned. He forgot the turmoils of his own troubles as\nhe gazed at Millicent, the dreary aspect of the solitudes without, the\nexile from his accustomed sphere of culture and comfort, the poverty\nand coarseness of her surroundings. He was sorry that he had declined\na longer lease of Roxby\u2019s hospitality, and it was in his mind to\nreconsider when it should be again proffered. Her attitude, her gesture,\nher face, her environment, all appealed to his sense of beauty, his\ninterest, his curiosity, as little ever had done heretofore. Slice after\nslice of the firm fragrant bread was deftly cut and laid on the plate,\nas again and again she lifted her eyes with a look that might seem to\nexpect to rest on summer in the full flush of a June noontide without,\nrather than on the wan, wintry night sky and the plundered, quaking\nwoods, while the robber wind sped on his raids hither and thither so\nswiftly that none might follow, so stealthily that none might hinder. A\nsudden radiance broke upon her face, a sudden shadow fell on the\nfirelit floor, and there was entering at the doorway a tall, lithe young\nmountaineer, whose first glance, animated with a responsive brightness,\nwas for the girl, but whose punctilious greeting was addressed to the\nold woman.\n\n\u201cHowdy, Mis\u2019 Roxby--howdy? Air yer rheumatics mendin\u2019 enny?\u201d he\ndemanded, with the condolent suavity of the would-be son-in-law, or\ngrand-son-in-law, as the case may be. And he hung with a transfixed\ninterest upon her reply, prolix and discursive according to the wont of\nthose who cultivate \u201crheumatics,\u201d as if each separate twinge racked his\nown sympathetic and filial sensibilities. Not until the tale was ended\ndid he set his gun against the wall and advance to the seat which Roxby\nhad indicated with the end of the stick he was whittling. He observed\nthe stranger with only slight interest, till Dundas drew up his chair\nopposite at the table. There the light from the tallow dip, guttering in\nthe centre, fell upon his handsome face and eyes, his carefully tended\nbeard and hair, his immaculate cuffs and delicate hand, the seal-ring on\nhis taper finger.\n\n\u201cLike a gal, by gum!\u201d thought Emory Keenan. \u201cRings on his fingers--yit\nsix feet high!\u201d\n\nHe looked at his elders, marvelling that they so hospitably repressed\nthe disgust which this effeminate adornment must occasion, forgetting\nthat it was possible that they did not even observe it. In the gala-days\nof the old hotel, before the war, they had seen much \u201cfinicking finery\u201d\n in garb and equipage and habits affected by the _jeunesse dor\u00e9e_ who\nfrequented the place in those halcyon times, and were accustomed to\nsuch details. It might be that they and Millicent approved such flimsy\ndaintiness. He began to fume inwardly with a sense of inferiority in her\nestimation. One of his fingers had been frosted last winter, and with\nthe first twinge of cold weather it was beginning to look very red and\nsad and clumsy, as if it had just remembered its ancient woe; he glanced\nfrom it once more at the delicate ringed hand of the stranger.\n\nDundas was looking up with a slow, deferential, decorous smile that\nnevertheless lightened and transfigured his expression. It seemed\nsomehow communicated to Millicent\u2019s face as she looked down at him from\nbeneath her white eyelids and long, thick, dark lashes, for she was\nstanding beside him, handing him the plate of bread. Then, still\nsmiling, she passed noiselessly on to the others.\n\nEmory was indeed clumsy, for he had stretched his hand downward to\noffer a morsel to a friend of his under the table--he was on terms of\nexceeding amity with the four-footed members of the household--and in\nhis absorption not withdrawing it as swiftly as one accustomed to canine\nmanners should do, he had his frosted finger well mumbled before he\ncould, as it were, repossess himself of it.\n\n\u201cI wonder what they charge fur iron over yander at the settlemint,\nEm\u2019ry?\u201d observed Sim Roxby presently.\n\n\u201cDun\u2019no\u2019, sir,\u201d responded Emory, glumly, his sullen black eyes full of\nsmouldering fire--\u201chevin\u2019 no call ter know, ez I ain\u2019t no blacksmith.\u201d\n\n\u201cI war jes\u2019 wonderin\u2019 ef tenpenny nails didn\u2019t cost toler\u2019ble high ez\nreg\u2019lar feed,\u201d observed Roxby, gravely.\n\nBut his mother laughed out with a gleeful cracked treble, always a ready\nsequence of her son\u2019s rustic sallies. \u201cHe got ye that time, Em\u2019ry,\u201d she\ncried.\n\nA forced smile crossed Emory\u2019s face. He tossed back his tangled dark\nhair with a gasp that was like the snort of an unruly horse submitting\nto the inevitable, but with restive projects in his brain. \u201cI let the\ndog hyar ketch my finger whilst feedin\u2019 him,\u201d he said. His plausible\nexcuse for the ten-penny expression was complete; but he added, his\ndarker mood recurring instantly, \u201cAn\u2019, Mis\u2019 Roxby, I hev put a stop ter\nthem ez hev tuk ter callin\u2019 me Em\u2019ly, I hev.\u201d\n\nThe old woman looked up, her small wrinkled mouth round and amazed.\n\u201c_I_ never called ye Emily,\u201d she declared.\n\nSwift repentance seized him.\n\n\u201cNaw, \u2018m,\u201d he said, with hurried propitiation. \u201cI \u2018lowed ye did.\u201d\n\n\u201cI didn\u2019t,\u201d said the old woman. \u201cBut ef I warter find it toothsome ter\ncall ye \u2018Emily,\u2019 I dun\u2019no\u2019 how ye air goin\u2019 ter pervent it. Ye can\u2019t go\ngun-nin\u2019 fur me, like ye done fur the men at the mill, fur callin\u2019 ye\n\u2018Emily.\u2019\u201d\n\n\u201cLaw, Mis\u2019 Roxby!\u201d he could only exclaim, in his horror and contrition\nat this picture he had thus conjured up. \u201cYe air welcome ter call me\nennything ye air a mind ter,\u201d he protested.\n\nAnd then he gasped once more. The eyes of the guest, contemptuous,\namused, seeing through him, were fixed upon him. And he himself had\nfurnished the lily-handed stranger with the information that he had been\nstigmatized \u201cEm\u2019ly\u201d in the banter of his associates, until he had taken\nup arms, as it were, to repress this derision.\n\n\u201cIt takes powerful little ter put ye down, Em\u2019ry,\u201d said Roxby, with\nrallying laughter. \u201cMam hev sent ye skedaddlin\u2019 in no time at all. I\ndon\u2019t b\u2019lieve the Lord made woman out\u2019n the man\u2019s rib. He made her out\u2019n\nthe man\u2019s backbone; fur the man ain\u2019t hed none ter speak of sence.\u201d\n\nMillicent, with a low gurgle of laughter, sat down beside Emory at the\ntable, and fixed her eyes, softly lighted with mirth, upon him. The\nothers too had laughed, the stranger with a flattering intonation, but\nyoung Keenan looked at her with a dumb appealing humility that did not\naltogether fail of its effect, for she busied herself to help his plate\nwith an air of proprietorship as if he were a child, and returned\nit with a smile very radiant and sufficient at close range. She then\naddressed herself to her own meal. The young dogs under the table ceased\nto beg, and gambolled and gnawed and tugged at her stout little shoes,\nthe sound of their callow mirthful growls rising occasionally above\nthe talk. Sometimes she rose again to wait on the table, when they came\nleaping out after her, jumping and catching at her skirts, now and then\ncasting themselves on the ground prone before her feet, and rolling over\nand over in the sheer joy of existence.\n\nThe stranger took little part in the talk at the table. Never a question\nwas asked him as to his mission in the mountains, or the length of\nhis stay, his vocation, or his home. That extreme courtesy of the\nmountaineers, exemplified in their singular abstinence from any\nexpressions of curiosity, accepted such account of himself as he had\nvolunteered, and asked for no more. In the face of this standard of\nmanners any inquisitiveness on his part, such as might have elicited\npoints of interest for his merely momentary entertainment, was tabooed.\nNevertheless, silent though he was for the most part, the relish with\nwhich he listened, his half-covert interest in the girl, his quick\nobservation of the others, the sudden very apparent enlivening of his\nmental atmosphere, betokened that his quarters were not displeasing\nto him. It seemed only a short time before the meal was ended and the\ncircle all, save Millicent, with pipes alight before the fire again. The\ndogs, well fed, had ranged themselves on the glowing hearth, lying prone\non the hot stones; one old hound, however, who conserved the air of\nlistening to the conversation, sat upright and nodded from time to time,\nnow and again losing his balance and tipping forward in a truly human\nfashion, then gazing round on the circle with an open luminous eye, as\nwho should say he had not slept.\n\nIt was all very cheerful within, but outside the wind still blared\nmournfully. Once more Dundas was sorry that he had declined the\ninvitation to remain, and it was with a somewhat tentative intention\nthat he made a motion to return to the hotel. But his host seemed\nto regard his resolution as final, and rose with a regret, not an\ninsistence. The two women stared in silent amazement at the mere idea\nof his camping out, as it were, in the old hotel. The ascendency of\nmasculine government here, notwithstanding Roxby\u2019s assertion that\nEve was made of Adam\u2019s backbone, was very apparent in their mute\nacquiescence and the alacrity with which they began to collect various\narticles, according to his directions, to make the stranger\u2019s stay more\ncomfortable.\n\n\u201cEm\u2019ry kin go along an\u2019 holp,\u201d he said, heartlessly; for poor Emory\u2019s\njoy in perceiving that the guest was not a fixture, and that his\npresence was not to be an embargo on any word between himself and\nMillicent during the entire evening, was pitiably manifest. But the\nsituation was still not without its comforts, since Dundas was to go\ntoo. Hence he was not poor company when once in the saddle, and was\ncivil to a degree of which his former dismayed surliness had given no\npromise.\n\nNight had become a definite element. The twilight had fled. Above their\nheads, as they galloped through the dank woods, the bare boughs of the\ntrees clashed together--so high above their heads that to the town\nman, unaccustomed to these great growths, the sound seemed not of the\nvicinage, but unfamiliar, uncanny, and more than once he checked his\nhorse to listen. As they approached the mountain\u2019s verge and overlooked\nthe valley and beheld the sky, the sense of the predominance of darkness\nwas redoubled. The ranges gloomed against the clearer spaces, but a\ncloud, deep gray with curling white edges, was coming up from the\nwest, with an invisible convoy of vague films, beneath which the stars,\nglimmering white points, disappeared one by one. The swift motion of\nthis aerial fleet sailing with the wind might be inferred from the\nseemingly hurried pace of the moon making hard for the west. Still\nbright was the illumined segment, but despite its glitter the shadowy\nspace of the full disk was distinctly visible, its dusky field spangled\nwith myriads of minute, dully golden points. Down, down it took its\nway in haste--in disordered fright, it seemed, as if it had no heart\nto witness the storm which the wind and the clouds foreboded--to fairer\nskies somewhere behind those western mountains. Soon even its vague\nlight would encroach no more upon the darkness. The great hotel would be\ninvisible, annihilated as it were in the gloom, and not even thus dimly\nexist, glimmering, alone, forlorn, so incongruous to the wilderness that\nit seemed even now some mere figment of the brain, as the two horsemen\ncame with a freshened burst of speed along the deserted avenue and\nreined up beside a small gate at the side.\n\n\u201cNo use ter ride all the way around,\u201d observed Emory Keenan. \u201cMought jes\nez well \u2018light an\u2019 hitch hyar.\u201d\n\nThe moon gave him the escort of a great grotesque shadow as he\nthrew himself from his horse and passed the reins over a decrepit\nhitching-post near at hand. Then he essayed the latch of the small gate.\nHe glanced up at Dundas, the moonlight in his dark eyes, with a smile as\nit resisted his strength.\n\nHe was a fairly good-looking fellow when rid of the self-consciousness\nof jealousy. His eyes, mouth, chin, and nose, acquired from reliable\nand recognizable sources, were good features, and statuesque in their\nimmobility beneath the drooping curves of his broad soft hat. He was\ntall, with the slenderness of youth, despite his evident weight and\nstrength. He was long-waisted and lithe and small of girth, with broad\nsquare shoulders, whose play of muscles as he strove with the gate was\nnot altogether concealed by the butternut jeans coat belted in with his\npistols by a broad leathern belt. His boots reached high on his long\nlegs, and jingled with a pair of huge cavalry spurs. His stalwart\nstrength seemed as if it must break the obdurate gate rather than open\nit, but finally, with a rasping creak, dismally loud in the silence, it\nswung slowly back.\n\nThe young mountaineer stood gazing for a moment at the red rust on the\nhinges. \u201cHow long sence this gate must hev been opened afore?\u201d he said,\nagain looking up at Dundas with a smile.\n\nSomehow the words struck a chill to the stranger\u2019s heart. The sense of\nthe loneliness of the place, of isolation, filled him with a sort of\nawe. The night-bound wilderness itself was not more daunting than these\nsolitary tiers of piazzas, these vacant series of rooms and corridors,\nall instinct with vanished human presence, all alert with echoes of\nhuman voices. A step, a laugh, a rustle of garments--he could have sworn\nhe heard them at any open doorway as he followed his guide along the dim\nmoonlit piazza, with its pillars duplicated at regular intervals by the\nshadows on the floor. How their tread echoed down these lonely ways!\nFrom the opposite side of the house he heard Kee-nan\u2019s spurs jangling,\nhis soldierly stride sounding back as if their entrance had roused\nbarracks. He winced once to see his own shadow with its stealthier\nmovement. It seemed painfully furtive. For the first time during the\nevening his jaded mind, that had instinctively sought the solace of\ncontemplating trifles, reverted to its own tormented processes. \u201cAm\nI not hiding?\u201d he said to himself, in a sort of sarcastic pity of his\nplight.\n\nThe idea seemed never to enter the mind of the transparent Keenan. He\nlaughed out gayly as they turned into the weed-grown quadrangle, and\nthe red fox that Dundas had earlier observed slipped past him with\naffrighted speed and dashed among the shadows of the dense shrubbery of\nthe old lawn without. Again and again the sound rang back from wall to\nwall, first with the jollity of seeming imitation, then with an appalled\neffect sinking to silence, and suddenly rising again in a grewsome\n_staccato_ that suggested some terrible unearthly laughter, and bore but\nscant resemblance to the hearty mirth which had evoked it Keenan paused\nand looked back with friendly gleaming eyes. \u201cOughter been a leetle\nhandier with these hyar consarns,\u201d he said, touching the pistols in his\nbelt.\n\nIt vaguely occurred to Dundas that the young man went strangely heavily\narmed for an evening visit at a neighbor\u2019s house. But it was a lawless\ncountry and lawless times, and the sub-current of suggestion did not\ndefinitely fix itself in his mind until he remembered it later. He\nwas looking into each vacant open doorway, seeing the still moonlight\nstarkly white upon the floor; the cobwebbed and broken window-panes,\nthrough which a section of leafless trees beyond was visible; bits of\nfurniture here and there, broken by the vandalism of the guerillas. Now\nand then a scurrying movement told of a gopher, hiding too, and on one\nmantel-piece, the black fireplace yawning below, sat a tiny tawny-tinted\nowl, whose motionless beadlike eyes met his with a stare of stolid\nsurprise. After he had passed, its sudden ill-omened cry set the silence\nto shuddering.\n\nKeenan, leading the way, paused in displeasure. \u201cI wisht I hed viewed\nthat critter,\u201d he said, glumly. \u201cI\u2019d hev purvented that screechin\u2019 ter\ncall the devil, sure. It\u2019s jes a certain sign o\u2019 death.\u201d\n\nHe was about to turn, to wreak his vengeance, perchance. But the bird,\nsufficiently fortunate itself, whatever woe it presaged for others,\nsuddenly took its awkward flight through sheen and shadow across the\nquadrangle, and when they heard its cry again it came from some remote\nsection of the building, with a doleful echo as a refrain.\n\nThe circumstance was soon forgotten by Keenan. He seemed a happy,\nmercurial, lucid nature, and he began presently to dwell with interest\non the availability of the old music-stand in the centre of the square\nas a manger. \u201cHyar,\u201d he said, striking the rotten old structure with\na heavy hand, which sent a quiver and a thrill through all the\ntimbers--\u201chyar\u2019s whar the guerillas always hitched thar beastises. Thar\nfeed an\u2019 forage war piled up thar on the fiddlers\u2019 seats. Ye can\u2019t do no\nbetter\u2019n ter pattern arter them, till ye git ready ter hev fiddlers an\u2019\nsech a-sawin\u2019 away in hyar agin.\u201d\n\nAnd he sauntered away from the little pavilion, followed by Dundas, who\nhad not accepted his suggestion of a room on the first floor as being\nless liable to leakage, but finally made choice of an inner apartment in\nthe second story. He looked hard at Keenan, when he stood in the doorway\nsurveying the selection. The room opened into a cross-hall which gave\nupon a broad piazza that was latticed; tiny squares of moonlight were\nall sharply drawn on the floor, and, seen through a vista of gray\nshadow, seemed truly of a gilded lustre. From the windows of this room\non a court-yard no light Could be visible to any passer-by without.\nAnother door gave on an inner gallery, and through its floor a staircase\ncame up from the quadrangle close to the threshold. Dundas wondered if\nthese features were of possible significance in Keenan\u2019s estimation. The\nyoung mountaineer turned suddenly, and snatching up a handful of slats\nbroken from the shutters, remarked:\n\n\u201cLet\u2019s see how the chimbly draws--that\u2019s the main p\u2019int.\u201d\n\nThere was no defect in the chimney\u2019s constitution. It drew admirably,\nand with the white and red flames dancing in the fireplace, two or\nthree chairs, more or less disabled, a table, and an upholstered lounge\ngathered at random from the rooms near at hand, the possibility of\nsojourning comfortably for a few days in the deserted hostelry seemed\namply assured.\n\nOnce more Dundas gazed fixedly at the face of the young mountaineer,\nwho still bent on one knee on the hearth, watching with smiling eyes\nthe triumphs of his fire-making. It seemed to him afterwards that his\njudgment was strangely at fault; he perceived naught of import in the\nshallow brightness of the young man\u2019s eyes, like the polished surface of\njet; in the instability of his jealousy, his anger; in his hap-hazard,\nmercurial temperament. Once he might have noted how flat were the\nspaces beneath the eyes, how few were the lines that defined the lid,\nthe socket, the curve of the cheekbone, the bridge of the nose, and how\nexpressionless. It was doubtless the warmth and glow of the fire,\nthe clinging desire of companionship, the earnest determination to be\ncontent, pathetic in one who had but little reason for optimism, that\ncaused him to ignore the vacillating glancing moods that successively\nswayed Keenan, strong while they lasted, but with scanty augury because\nof their evanescence. He was like some newly discovered property in\nphysics of untried potentialities, of which nothing is ascertained but\nits uncertainties.\n\nAnd yet he seemed to Dundas a simple country fellow, good-natured in the\nmain, unsuspicious, and helpful. So, giving a long sigh of relief and\nfatigue, Dundas sank down in one of the large arm-chairs that had once\ndone duty for the summer loungers on the piazza.\n\nIn the light of the fire Emory was once more looking at him. A certain\nair of distinction, a grace and ease of movement, an indescribable\nquality of bearing which he could not discriminate, yet which he\ninstinctively recognized as superior, offended him in some sort. He\nnoticed again the ring on the stranger\u2019s hand as he drew off his glove.\nGloves! Emory Keen an would as soon have thought of wearing a petticoat.\nOnce more the fear that these effeminate graces found favor in\nMillicent\u2019s estimation smote upon his heart. It made the surface of his\nopaque eyes glisten as Dundas rose and took up a pipe and tobacco-pouch\nwhich he had laid on the mantelpiece, his full height and fine figure\nshown in the changed posture.\n\n\u201cEz tall ez me, ef not taller, an\u2019, by gum! a good thirty pound\nheavier,\u201d Emory reflected, with, a growing dismay that he had not those\nstalwart claims to precedence in height and weight as an offset to the\nsmoother fascinations of the stranger\u2019s polish.\n\nHe had risen hastily to his feet. He would not linger to smoke\nfraternally over the fire, and thus cement friendly relations.\n\n\u201cI guided him hyar, like old Sim Roxby axed me ter do, an\u2019 that\u2019s all. I\nain\u2019t keerin\u2019 ef I never lay eyes on him again,\u201d he said to himself.\n\n\u201cGoing?\u201d said Dundas, pleasantly, noticing the motion. \u201cYou\u2019ll look in\nagain, won\u2019t you?\u201d\n\n\u201cWunst in a while, I reckon,\u201d drawled Keenan, a trifle thrown off his\nbalance by this courtesy.\n\nHe paused at the door, looking back over his shoulder for a moment at\nthe illumined room, then stepped out into the night, leaving the tenant\nof the lonely old house filling his pipe by the fire.\n\nHis tread rang along the deserted gallery, and sudden echoes came\ntramping down the vacant halls as if many a denizen of the once populous\nplace was once more astir within its walls. Long after Dundas had heard\nhim spring from the lower piazza to the ground, and the rusty gate clang\nbehind him, vague footfalls were audible far away, and were still again,\nand once more a pattering tread in some gaunt and empty apartment near\nat hand, faint and fainter yet, till he hardly knew whether it were the\nreverberations of sound or fancy that held his senses in thrall.\n\nAnd when all was still and silent at last he felt less solitary than\nwhen these elusive tokens of human presence were astir.\n\nLate, late he sat over the dwindling embers. His mind, no longer\ndiverted by the events of the day, recurred with melancholy persistence\nto a theme which even they, although fraught with novelty and presage\nof danger, had not altogether crowded out. And as the sense of peril\ndulled, the craft of sophistry grew clumsy. Remorse laid hold upon him\nin these dim watches of the night. Self-reproach had found him out here,\ndefenceless so far from the specious wiles and ways of men. All the line\nof provocations seemed slight, seemed naught, as he reviewed them and\nbalanced them against a human life. True, it was not in some mad quarrel\nthat his skill had taken it and had served to keep his own--a duel, a\nfair fight, strictly regular according to the code of \u201chonorable men\u201d\n for ages past--and he sought to argue that it was doubtless but the\nmorbid sense of the wild fastnesses without, the illimitable vastness\nof the black night, the unutterable indurability of nature to the\ninfluences of civilization, which made it taste like murder. He had\nbrought away even from the scene of action, to which he had gone with\ndecorous deliberation--his worldly affairs arranged for the possibility\nof death, his will made, his volition surrendered, and his sacred honor\nin the hands of his seconds--a humiliating recollection of the sudden\nrevulsion of the aspect of all things; the criminal sense of haste with\nwhich he was hurried away after that first straight shot; the agitation,\nnay, the fright of his seconds; their eagerness to be swiftly rid of\nhim, their insistence that he should go away for a time, get out of the\ncountry, out of the embarrassing purview of the law, which was prone to\nregard the matter as he himself saw it now, and which had an ugly trick\nof calling things by their right names in the sincere phraseology of an\nindictment. And thus it was that he was here, remote from all the usual\nlines of flight, with his affectation of being a possible purchaser for\nthe old hotel, far from the railroad, the telegraph, even the postal\nservice. Some time--soon, indeed, it might be, when the first flush\nof excitement and indignation should be overpast, and the law, like a\nbarking dog that will not bite, should have noisily exhausted the gamut\nof its devoirs--he would go back and live according to his habit in his\nwonted place, as did other men whom he had known to be \u201ccalled out,\u201d and\nwho had survived their opponents. Meantime he heard the ash crumble; he\nsaw the lighted room wane from glancing yellow to a dull steady red,\nand so to dusky brown; he marked the wind rise, and die away, and come\nagain, banging the doors of the empty rooms, and setting timbers all\nstrangely to creaking as under sudden trampling feet; then lift into the\nair with a rustling sound like the stir of garments and the flutter of\nwings, calling out weirdly in the great voids of the upper atmosphere.\n\nHe had welcomed the sense of fatigue earlier in the evening, for it\npromised sleep. Now it had slipped away from him. He was strong and\nyoung, and the burning sensation that the frosty air had left on his\nface was the only token of the long journey. It seemed as if he\nwould never sleep again as he lay on the lounge watching the gray ash\ngradually overgrow the embers, till presently only a vague dull glow\ngave intimation of the position of the hearth in the room. And then,\nbereft of this dim sense of companionship, he stared wide-eyed in the\ndarkness, feeling the only creature alive and awake in all the world.\nNo; the fox was suddenly barking within the quadrangle--a strangely wild\nand alien tone. And presently he heard the animal trot past his door\non the piazza, the cushioned footfalls like those of a swift dog. He\nthought with a certain anxiety of the tawny tiny owl that had sat like\na stuffed ornament on the mantel-piece of a neighboring room, and he\nlistened with a quaking vicarious presentiment of woe for the sounds of\ncapture and despair. He was sensible of waiting and hoping for the fox\u2019s\nbootless return, when he suddenly lost consciousness.\n\nHow long he slept he did not know, but it seemed only a momentary\nrespite from the torture of memory, when, still in the darkness,\nthousands of tremulous penetrating sounds were astir, and with a great\nstart he recognized the rain on the roof. It was coming down in steady\ntorrents that made the house rock before the tumult of his plunging\nheart was still, and he was longing again for the forgetfulness of\nsleep. In vain. The hours dragged by; the windows slowly, slowly denned\ntheir dull gray squares against the dull gray day dawning without.\nThe walls that had been left with only the first dark coat of plaster,\nawaiting another season for the final decoration, showed their drapings\nof cobweb, and the names and pencilled scribblings with which the fancy\nof transient bushwhackers had chosen to deface them. The locust-trees\nwithin the quadrangle drearily tossed their branches to and fro in the\nwind, the bark very black and distinct against the persistent gray lines\nof rain and the white walls of the galleried buildings opposite; the\ngutters were brimming, roaring along like miniature torrents; nowhere\nwas the fox or the owl to be seen. Somehow their presence would have\nbeen a relief--the sight of any living thing reassuring. As he walked\nslowly along the deserted piazzas, in turning sudden corners, again and\nagain he paused, expecting that something, some one, was approaching to\nmeet him. When at last he mounted his horse, that had neighed gleefully\nto see him, and rode away through the avenue and along the empty ways\namong the untenanted summer cottages, all the drearier and more forlorn\nbecause of the rain, he felt as if he had left an aberration, some\nhideous dream, behind, instead of the stark reality of the gaunt and\nvacant and dilapidated old house.\n\nThe transition to the glow and cheer of Sim Roxby\u2019s fireside was like\na rescue, a restoration. The smiling welcome in the women\u2019s eyes, their\nsoft drawling voices, with mellifluous intonations that gave a value to\neach commonplace simple word, braced his nerves like a tonic. It might\nhave been only the contrast with the recollections of the night, with\nthe prospect visible through the open door--the serried lines of rain\ndropping aslant from the gray sky and elusively outlined against the\ndark masses of leafless woods that encircled the clearing; the dooryard\nhalf submerged with puddles of a clay-brown tint, embossed always with\nmyriads of protruding drops of rain, for however they melted away the\ndownpour renewed them, and to the eye they were stationary, albeit\npervaded with a continual tremor--but somehow he was cognizant of a\ncertain coddling tenderness in the old woman\u2019s manner that might have\nbeen relished by a petted child, an unaffected friendliness in the\ngirl\u2019s clear eyes. They made him sit close to the great wood fire; the\nblue and yellow flames gushed out from the piles of hickory logs, and\nthe bed of coals gleamed at red and white heat beneath. They took his\nhat to carefully dry it, and they spread out his cloak on two chairs\nat one side of the room, where it dismally dripped. When he ventured to\nsneeze, Mrs. Roxby compounded and administered a \u201cyerb tea,\u201d a sovereign\nremedy against colds, which he tasted on compulsion and in great doubt,\nand swallowed with alacrity and confidence, finding its basis the easily\nrecognizable \u201ctoddy.\u201d He had little knowledge how white and troubled\nhis face had looked as he came in from the gray day, how strongly marked\nwere those lines of sharp mental distress, how piteously apparent was\nhis mute appeal for sympathy and comfort.\n\n\u201cMill\u2019cent,\u201d said the old woman in the shed-room, as they washed and\nwiped the dishes after the cozy breakfast of venison and corn-dodgers\nand honey and milk, \u201cthat thar man hev run agin the law, sure\u2019s ye air\nborn.\u201d\n\nMillicent turned her reflective fair face, that seemed whiter and\nmore delicate in the damp dark day, and looked doubtfully out over the\nfields, where the water ran in steely lines in the furrows.\n\n\u201cMus\u2019 hev been by accident or suthin\u2019. _He_ ain\u2019t no hardened sinner.\u201d\n\n\u201cShucks!\u201d the old woman commented upon her reluctant acquiescence. \u201cI\nain\u2019t keerin\u2019 for the law! \u2018Tain\u2019t none o\u2019 my job. The tomfool men make\nan\u2019 break it. Ennybody ez hev seen this war air obleeged to take note\no\u2019 the wickedness o\u2019 men in gineral. This hyer man air a sorter pitiful\nsinner, an\u2019 he hev got a look in his eyes that plumb teches my heart.\nI \u2018ain\u2019t got no call ter know nuthin\u2019 \u2018bout the law, bein\u2019 a \u2018oman an\u2019\nnaterally ignorant. I dun\u2019no\u2019 ez he hev run agin it.\u201d\n\n\u201cMus\u2019 hev been by accident,\u201d said Millicent, dreamily, still gazing over\nthe sodden fields.\n\nThe suspicion did nothing to diminish his comfort or their cordiality.\nThe morning dragged by without change in the outer aspects. The noontide\ndinner came and went without Roxby\u2019s return, for the report of the\nwashing away of a bridge some miles distant down the river had early\ncalled him out to the scene of the disaster, to verify in his own\ninterests the rumor, since he had expected to haul his wheat to the\nsettlement the ensuing day. The afternoon found the desultory talk still\nin progress about the fire, the old woman alternately carding cotton\nand nodding in her chair in the corner; the dogs eying the stranger,\nlistening much of the time with the air of children taking instruction,\nonly occasionally wandering out-of-doors, the floor here and there\nbearing the damp imprint of their feet; and Millicent on her knees in\nthe other corner, the firelight on her bright hair, her delicate cheek,\nher quickly glancing eyes, as she deftly moulded bullets.\n\n\u201cUncle Sim hed ter s\u2019render his shootin\u2019-irons,\u201d she explained, \u201can\u2019 he\n\u2018ain\u2019t got no ca\u2019tridge-loadin\u2019 ones lef. So he makes out with his old\nmuzzle-loadin\u2019 rifle that he hed afore the war, an\u2019 I moulds his bullets\nfor him rainy days.\u201d\n\nAs she held up a moulded ball and dexterously clipped off the surplus\nlead, the gesture was so culinary in its delicacy that one of the dogs\nin front of the fire extended his head, making a long neck, with a\ntentative sniff and a glistening gluttonous eye.\n\n\u201cEf I swallered enny mo\u2019 lead, I wouldn\u2019t take it hot, Towse,\u201d she said,\nholding out the bullet for canine inspection. \u201c\u2018Tain\u2019t healthy!\u201d\n\nBut the dog, perceiving the nature of the commodity, drew back with a\nlook of deep reproach, rose precipitately, and with a drooping tail went\nout skulkingly into the wet gray day.\n\n\u201cTowse can\u2019t abide a bullet,\u201d she observed, \u201cnor nuthin\u2019 \u2018bout a gun.\nHe got shot wunst a-huntin\u2019, an\u2019 he never furgot it. Jes show him a gun\nan\u2019 he ain\u2019t nowhar ter be seen--like he war cotch up in the clouds.\u201d\n\n\u201cGood watch-dog, I suppose,\u201d suggested Dundas, striving to enter into\nthe spirit of her talk.\n\n\u201cNaw; too sp\u2019ilt for a gyard-dog--granny coddled him so whenst he\ngot shot. He\u2019s jest vally\u2019ble fur his conversation, I reckon,\u201d she\ncontinued, with a smile in her eyes. \u201cI dun\u2019no\u2019 what else, but he _is_\ntoler\u2019ble good company.\u201d\n\nThe other dogs pressed about her, the heads of the great hounds as high\nas her own as she sat among them on the floor. With bright eyes and\nknitted brows they followed the motions of pouring in the melted metal,\nthe lifting of the bullets from the mould, the clipping off of the\nsurplus lead, and the flash of the keen knife.\n\nOutside the sad light waned; the wind sighed and sighed; the dreary\nrain fell; the trees clashed their boughs dolorously together, and their\nturbulence deadened the sound of galloping horses. As Dundas sat and\ngazed at the girl\u2019s intent head, with its fleecy tendrils and its\nmassive coil, the great hounds beside her, all emblazoned by the\nfirelight upon the brown wall near by, with the vast fireplace at hand,\nthe whole less like reality than some artist\u2019s pictured fancy, he knew\nnaught of a sudden entrance, until she moved, breaking the spell, and\nlooked up to meet the displeasure in Roxby\u2019s eyes and the dark scowl on\nEmory Keenan\u2019s face.\n\n*****\n\nThat night the wind shifted to the north. Morning found the chilled\nworld still, ice where the water had lodged, all the trees incased in\nglittering garb that followed the symmetry alike of every bough and\nthe tiniest twig, and made splendid the splintered remnants of the\nlightning-riven. The fields were laced across from furrow to furrow, in\nwhich the frozen water still stood gleaming, with white arabesques which\nhad known a more humble identity as stubble and crab-grass; the sky was\nslate-colored, and from its sad tint this white splendor gained added\nvalues of contrast. When the sun should shine abroad much of the effect\nwould be lost in the too dazzling glister; but the sun did not shine.\n\nAll day the gray mood held unchanged. Night was imperceptibly sifting\ndown upon all this whiteness, that seemed as if it would not be\nobscured, as if it held within itself some property of luminosity, when\nMillicent, a white apron tied over her golden head, improvising a hood,\nits superfluous fulness gathered in many folds and pleats around her\nneck, fichu-wise, stood beside the ice-draped fodder-stack and essayed\nwith half-numbed hands to insert a tallow dip into the socket of a\nlantern, all incrusted and clumsy with previous drippings.\n\n\u201cI dun\u2019no\u2019 whether I be a-goin\u2019 ter need this hyar consarn whilst\nmilkin\u2019 or no,\u201d she observed, half to herself, half to Emory, who,\nchewing a straw, somewhat surlily had followed her out for a word apart.\n\u201cThe dusk \u2018pears slow ter-night, but Spot\u2019s mighty late comin\u2019 home, an\u2019\nold Sue air fractious an\u2019 contrairy-minded, and feels mighty anxious\nan\u2019 oneasy \u2018boutn her calf, that\u2019s ez tall ez she is nowadays, an\u2019 don\u2019t\nkeer no mo\u2019 \u2018bout her mammy \u2018n a half-grown human does. I tell her she\noughtn\u2019t ter be mad with me, but with the way she brung up her chile, ez\nwon\u2019t notice her now.\u201d\n\nShe looked up with a laugh, her eyes and teeth gleaming; her golden hair\nstill showed its color beneath the spotless whiteness of her voluminous\nheadgear, and the clear tints of her complexion seemed all the more\ndelicate and fresh in the snowy pallor of the surroundings and the\ngrayness of the evening.\n\n\u201cI reckon I\u2019d better take it along,\u201d and once more she addressed herself\nto the effort to insert the dip into the lantern.\n\nEmory hardly heard. His pulse was quick. His eye glittered. He breathed\nhard as, with both hands in his pockets, he came close to her.\n\n\u201cMill\u2019cent,\u201d he said, \u201cI told ye the t\u2019other day ez ye thunk a heap too\nmuch o\u2019 that thar stran-ger-\u201d\n\n\u201cAn\u2019 I tole ye, bubby, that I didn\u2019t think nuthin\u2019 o\u2019 nobody but\nyou-uns,\u201d she interrupted, with an effort to placate his jealousy. The\nlittle jocularity which she affected dwindled and died before the steady\nglow of his gaze, and she falteringly looked at him, her unguided hands\nfutilely fumbling with the lantern.\n\n\u201cYe can\u2019t fool me,\u201d he stoutly asseverated. \u201cYe think mo\u2019 o\u2019 him \u2018n o\u2019\nme, kase ye \u2018low he air rich, an\u2019 book-larned, an\u2019 smooth-fingered, an\u2019\nfini-fied ez a gal, an\u2019 goin\u2019 ter buy the hotel. I say, _hotel!_ Now\n_I\u2019ll_ tell ye what he is--I\u2019ll tell ye! He\u2019s a criminal. He\u2019s runnin\u2019\nfrom the law. He\u2019s hidin\u2019 in the old hotel that he\u2019s purtendin\u2019 ter\nbuy.\u201d\n\nShe stared wide-eyed and pallid, breathless and waiting.\n\nHe interpreted her expression as doubt, denial.\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s gospel sure,\u201d he cried. \u201cFur this very evenin\u2019 I met a gang o\u2019\nmen an\u2019 the sheriff\u2019s deputy down yander by the sulphur spring \u2018bout\nsundown, an\u2019 he \u2018lowed ez they war a-sarchin\u2019 fur a criminal ez war\nskulkin\u2019 round hyarabout lately--ez they wanted a man fur hevin\u2019\nc\u2019mitted murder.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut ye didn\u2019t accuse _him_, surely; ye hed no right ter s\u2019picion _him_.\nUncle Sim! Oh, my Lord! Ye surely wouldn\u2019t! Oh, Uncle Sim!\u201d\n\nHer tremulous words broke into a quavering cry as she caught his arm\nconvulsively, for his face confirmed her fears. She thrust him wildly\naway, and started toward the house.\n\n\u201cYe needn\u2019t go tattlin\u2019 on me,\u201d he said, roughly pushing her aside.\n\u201cI\u2019ll tell Mr. Roxby myself. I ain\u2019t \u2018shamed o\u2019 what I done. I\u2019ll\ntell him. I\u2019ll tell him myself.\u201d And animated with this intention to\nforestall her disclosure, his long strides bore him swiftly past and\ninto the house.\n\nIt seemed to him that he lingered there only a moment or two, for Roxby\nwas not at the cabin, and he said nothing of the quarrel to the old\nwoman. Already his heart had revolted against his treachery, and then\nthere came to him the further reflection that he did not know enough\nto justify suspicion. Was not the stranger furnished with the fullest\ncredentials--a letter to Roxby from the Colonel? Perhaps he had allowed\nhis jealousy to endanger the man, to place him in jeopardy even of his\nlife should he resist arrest.\n\nKeenan tarried at the house merely long enough to devise a plausible\nexcuse for his sudden excited entrance, and then took his way back to\nthe barnyard.\n\nIt was vacant. The cows still stood lowing at the bars; the sheep\ncowered together in their shed; the great whitened cone of the\nfodder-stack gleamed icily in the purple air; beside it lay the lantern\nwhere Millicent had cast it aside. She was gone! He would not believe\nit till he had run to the barn, calling her name in the shadowy place,\nwhile the horse at his manger left his corn to look over the walls of\nhis stall with inquisitive surprised eyes, luminous in the dusk. He\nsearched the hen-house, where the fowls on their perches crowded close\nbecause of the chill of the evening. He even ran to the bars and looked\ndown across the narrow ravine to which the clearing sloped. Beyond the\nchasm-like gorge he saw presently on the high ascent opposite footprints\nthat had broken the light frostlike coating of ice on the dead leaves\nand moss--climbing footprints, swift, disordered. He looked back again\nat the lantern where Millicent had flung it in her haste. Her mission\nwas plain now. She had gone to warn Dundas. She had taken a direct line\nthrough the woods. She hoped to forestall the deputy sheriff and his\nposse, following the circuitous mountain road.\n\nKeenan\u2019s lip curled in triumph. His heart burned hot with scornful anger\nand contempt of the futility of her effort. \u201cThey\u2019re there afore she\nstarted!\u201d he said, looking up at the aspects of the hour shown by the\nsky, and judging of the interval since the encounter by the spring.\nThrough a rift in the gray cloud a star looked down with an icy\nscintillation and disappeared again. He heard a branch in the woods snap\nbeneath the weight of ice. A light sprang into the window of the cabin\nhard by, and came in a great gush of orange-tinted glow out into the\nsnowy bleak wintry space. He suddenly leaped over the fence and ran like\na deer through the woods.\n\nMillicent too had been swift. He had thought to overtake her before he\nemerged from the woods into the more open space where the hotel stood.\nIn this quarter the cloud-break had been greater. Toward the west a\nfading amber glow still lingered in long horizontal bars upon the opaque\ngray sky. The white mountains opposite were hung with purple shadows\nborrowed from a glimpse of sunset somewhere far away over the valley\nof East Tennessee; one distant lofty range was drawn in elusive snowy\nsuggestions, rather than lines, against a green space of intense yet\npale tint. The moon, now nearing the full, hung over the wooded valley,\nand aided the ice and the crust of snow to show its bleak, wan, wintry\naspect; a tiny spark glowed in its depths from some open door of an\nisolated home. Over it all a mist was rising from the east, drawing its\nfleecy but opaque curtain. Already it had climbed the mountain-side and\nadvanced, windless, soundless, overwhelming, annihilating all before and\nbeneath it. The old hotel had disappeared, save that here and there a\ngaunt gable protruded and was withdrawn, showed once more, and once more\nwas submerged.\n\nA horse\u2019s head suddenly looking out of the enveloping mist close to his\nshoulder gave him the first intimation of the arrival, the secret silent\nwaiting, of those whom he had directed hither. That the saddles were\nempty he saw a moment later. The animals stood together in a row,\nhitched to the rack. No disturbance sounded from the silent building.\nThe event was in abeyance. The fugitive in hiding was doubtless at\nease, unsuspecting, while the noiseless search of the officers for his\nquarters was under way.\n\nWith a thrill of excitement Keenan crept stealthily through an open\npassage and into the old grass-grown spaces of the quadrangle. Night\npossessed the place, but the cloud seemed denser than the darkness. He\nwas somehow sensible of its convolutions as he stood against the wall\nand strained his eyes into the dusk. Suddenly it was penetrated by a\nmilky-white glimmer, a glimmer duplicated at equidistant points, each\nfading as its successor sprang into brilliance. The next moment he\nunderstood its significance. It had come from the blurred windows of the\nold ball-room. Milli-cent had lighted her candle as she searched for the\nfugitive\u2019s quarters; she was passing down the length of the old house\non the second story, and suddenly she emerged upon the gallery. She\nshielded the feeble flicker with her Hand; her white-hooded head gleamed\nas with an aureola as the divergent rays rested on the opaque mist; and\nnow and again she clutched the baluster and walked with tremulous care,\nfor the flooring was rotten here and there, and ready to crumble away.\nHer face was pallid, troubled; and Dundas, who had been warned by the\ntramp of horses and the tread of men, and who had descended the stairs,\nrevolver in hand, ready to slip away if he might under cover of\nthe mist, paused appalled, gazing across the quadrangle as on an\napparition--the sight so familiar to his senses, so strange to his\nexperience. He saw in an abrupt shifting of the mist that there were\nother figures skulking in doorways, watching her progress. The next\nmoment she leaned forward to clutch the baluster, and the light of the\ncandle fell full on Emory Keenan, lurking in the open passage. A sudden\nsharp cry of \u201cSurrender!\u201d The young mountaineer, confused, swiftly drew\nhis pistol. Others were swifter still. A sharp report rang out into\nthe chill crisp air, rousing all the affrighted echoes--a few faltering\nsteps, a heavy fall, and for a long time Emory Keenan\u2019s life-blood\nstained the floor of the promenade. Even when it had faded, the rustic\ngossips came often and gazed at the spot with morbid interest, until, a\ndecade later, an enterprising proprietor removed the floor and altered\nthe shape of that section of the building out of recognition.\n\nThe escape of Dundas was easily effected. The deputy sheriff, confronted\nwith the problem of satisfactorily accounting for the death of a man\nwho had committed no offence against public polity, was no longer\nformidable. His errand had been the arrest of a horse-thief, well-known\nto him, and he had no interest in pursuing a fugitive, however obnoxious\nto the law, whose personal description was so different from that of the\nobject of his search.\n\nTime restored to Dundas his former place in life and the esteem of his\nfellow-citizens. His stay in the mountains was an episode which he will\nnot often recall, but sometimes volition fails, and he marvels at the\nstrange fulfilment of the girl\u2019s vision; he winces to think that her\nsolicitude for his safety should have cost her her lover; he wonders\nwhether she yet lives, and whether that tender troubled phantom, on\nnights when the wind is still and the moon is low and the mists rise,\nagain joins the strange, elusive, woful company crossing the quaking\nfoot-bridge.","title":"The phantoms of the foot-bridge: 1895","tradition":"myth-cosmogony","translated_text":null,"word_count":15860}