Gabriel Tolliver Part 45

There was a tremendous uproar in the station, caused by the soldiers trying to run over the firemen and the efforts of the firemen to prevent them. In a short time, however, a squad of soldiers had forced themselves through the crowd, and as they made their appearance, Mr.

Sanders gave the word to old Beck, saying as he moved off, "Ef you gents will excuse me, I'll mosey along, an' the next time I have a c.r.a.p of cotton to sell, I'll waggin it to some place or other wher' w'arhouses ain't depots, an' wher' jugglers don't jump on you an' make the'r disappearance in broad daylight. This is my fust trip to this great town, an' it'll be my last ef I know myself, an' I ruther reckon I do."

As he spoke, his team Was moving slowly off, and the soldiers who were in pursuit of Gabriel had no idea that it was worth their while to give the countryman and his superannuated equipment more than a pa.s.sing glance. It was providential that Captain Falconer, who was to have conveyed the prisoners to Atlanta, should have been confined to his bed with an attack of malarial fever when the order for their removal came.

The Captain would surely have recognised the countryman as Mr. Sanders, and the probability is that Gabriel would have been recaptured, though Captain Buck Sanford, who was sitting in an upper window of the hotel, with his Winchester across his lap, says not.

The officer in charge did all that he could have been expected to do under the circ.u.mstances. By a stroke of good-luck, as he supposed, he found the Chief of Police near the entrance of the station and interested that official in his effort to recapture the prisoner who had escaped. By order of the military commander in Atlanta, the train was held a couple of hours while the search for Gabriel proceeded. The whole town was searched and researched, but all to no purpose. Gabriel had disappeared, and was not to be found by any person hostile to his interests.

Mr. Sanders drove his team around to the warehouse of Vardeman & Stark, where he was met by Colonel Tom Vardeman, who, besides being a cotton factor, was one of the political leaders of the day, and as popular a man as there was in the State.

"I heard a terrible fusillade in the direction of the depot," he said to Mr. Sanders, as the latter drove up. "I hope n.o.body's hurt."

"Well, they ain't much damage done, I reckon. Gus Tidwell an' Major Perdue took a notion to play a game of tag wi' pistols. They're doin' it jest for fun, I reckon. They want to show you city fellers that all the public sperrit an' enterprise ain't knocked out'n the country chaps."

"Well, they're almost certain to get in the lock-up," remarked Colonel Tom Vardeman.

"It reely looks that away," said Mr. Sanders, drily; "the Chief of Police was standin' in front of the depot, an' ev'ry time a gun'd go off he'd wink at me."

Colonel Tom laughed, and then turned to Mr. Sanders with a serious air.

"What did I tell you about that wild plan of yours to rescue one of the prisoners? You've had all your trouble for nothing, and the probability is that you are out considerable cash first and last. You don't catch grown men asleep any more. Why, if the officer in charge of those poor boys were to permit one of them to escape, he'd be court-martialled, and it would serve him right."

"So it would," replied Mr. Sanders, "an' I'm mighty glad it wa'n't Captain Falconer. This feller that had the boys in tow is a stranger to me, an' I'm glad of it. He'll never know who lost him his job. He's a right nice-lookin' feller, too, but when he run out'n the depot awhile ago, his face kinder spoke up an' said he had had a dram too much some time endyorin' of the night; or his colour mought 'a' been high bekaze he was flurried or skeered. Now, then, Colonel Tom, ef you've done what you laid off to do, an' I don't mis...o...b.. it in the least, you've got a safe place wher' I kin store a bale of long-staple cotton, ag'in a rise in prices. Ef you've got it fixed, I'll drive right in, bekaze the kind of cotton I'm dealin' in will spile ef it lays in the sun too long."

"Do you mean to tell me----"

"I'm mean enough for anything, Colonel Tom; but right now, I want to git wher' I can drench a long-sufferin' friend of mine wi' a big gourdful of cold water."

"But, Mr. Sanders----"

"Ef you'd 'a' stuck in the William H., you'd 'a' purty nigh had my whole name," remarked Mr. Sanders with a solemn air.

"Why, dash it, man! you've taken my breath away. Drive right in there.

John! Henry! come here, you lazy rascals, and take this team out! I told you," said Colonel Tom to Mr. Sanders as the negroes came forward, "that you couldn't get any better prices for your cotton than I offered you.

We treat everybody right over here, and that's the way we keep our trade."

The two negroes were detailed to convey the mule and the oxen to the stable where Mr. Sanders had arranged for their "keep," as he termed it, and as soon as they were out of sight, Mr. Sanders went to the rear of the waggon, and said playfully, "Peep eye, Gabriel!" Receiving no answer, he was suddenly seized with the idea that the young man had suffocated behind the loose cotton which was intended to conceal him.

But no such thing had happened. Gabriel had plenty of breathing-room, and the practical and unromantic rascal was sound asleep. His quarters were warm, but the sweat-boxes at Fort Pulaski were hotter. It was very fortunate for Gabriel that the reaction from the strain under which he had been, took the blessed shape of sleep.

Gabriel's place of concealment was simplicity itself. With his own hands Mr. Sanders had constructed a stout box of oak boards, and around this he had packed cotton until the affair, when complete, had the appearance of an extra large bale of cotton, covered with bagging, and roped as the majority of cotton-bales were in those days. The only way to discover the sham was to pull out the cotton that concealed the opening in the end of the box. In delivering his message to Cephas, Mr.

Sanders had called this loose cotton a plug, and the fact that the word was new to the vocabulary of the school-children gave great trouble to Gabriel, causing him to lose considerable sleep in the effort to translate it satisfactorily to himself. The meaning dawned on him one night when he had practically abandoned all hope of discovering it, and then the whole scheme became so clear to him that he could have shouted for joy.

It was thought that a search would be made for Gabriel in the neighbourhood of Shady Dale, and it was decided that it would be best for him to remain in the city until all noise of the pursuit had died away. But no pursuit was ever made, and it soon became apparent to the public at large that radicalism was burning itself out at last, after a weary time. When rage has nothing to feed upon it consumes itself, especially when various chronic maladies common to mankind take a hand in the game.

Not only was no pursuit made of Gabriel, but the detachment of Federal troops which had been stationed at Shady Dale was withdrawn. The young men who had been arrested with Gabriel were placed on trial before a military court, but with the connivance of counsel for the prosecution, the trial dragged along until the military commander issued a proclamation announcing that civil government had been restored in the State, and the prisoners were turned over to the State courts. And as there was not the shadow of a case against them, they were never brought to trial, a fact which caused some one to suggest to Mr. Sanders that all his work in behalf of Gabriel had been useless.

"Well, it didn't do Gabriel no good, maybe," remarked the veteran, "but it holp me up mightily. It gi' me somethin' to think about, an' it holp me acrosst some mighty rough places. You have to pa.s.s the time away anyhow, an' what better way is they than workin' for them you like? Why, I knowed a gal, an' a mighty fine one she was, who knit socks for a feller she had took a fancy to. The feller died, but she went right ahead wi' her knittin' just the same. Now, that didn't do the feller a mite of good, but it holp the gal up might'ly."

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

_Gabriel as an Orator_

The _Malvern Recorder_ was very kind to Gabriel, and said nothing in regard to his escape. This was due to a timely suggestion on the part of Colonel Tom Vardeman, who rightly guessed that the Government authorities would be more willing to permit the affair to blow over, provided the details were not made notorious in the newspapers. As the result of the Colonel's discretion, there was not a hint in the public press that one of the prisoners had eluded the vigilance of those who had charge of him. There was a paragraph or two in the _Recorder_, stating that the Shady Dale prisoners--"the victims of Federal tyranny"--had pa.s.sed through the city on their way to Atlanta, and a long account was given of their sufferings in Fort Pulaski. The facts were supplied by Gabriel, but the printed account went far beyond anything he had said. "They are not the first martyrs that have suffered in the cause of liberty," said the editor of the _Recorder_, in commenting on the account in the local columns, "and they will not be the last. Let the radicals do their worst; on the old red hills of Georgia, the camp-fires of Democracy have been kindled, and they will continue to burn and blaze long after the tyrants and corruptionists have been driven from power."

Gabriel read this eloquent declaration somewhat uneasily. There was something in it, and something in the exaggeration of the facts that he had given to the representative of the paper that jarred upon him. He had already in his own mind separated the Government and its real interests from the selfish aims and desires of those who were temporarily clothed with authority, and he had begun to suspect that there might also be something selfish behind the utterances of those who made such vigorous protests against tyranny. The matter is hardly worth referring to in these days when shams and humbugs appear before the public in all their nakedness; but it was worth a great deal to Gabriel to be able to suspect that the champions of const.i.tutional liberty, and the defenders of popular rights, in the great majority of instances had their eyes on the flesh-pots. The suspicions he entertained put him on his guard at a time when he was in danger of falling a victim to the rhetoric of orators and editors, and they preserved him from many a mistaken belief.

During the period that intervened between his escape and the announcement of the restoration of civil government in Georgia, Gabriel settled down to a course of reading in the law office of Judge Vardeman, Colonel Tom's brother. He did this on the advice of those who were old enough to know that idleness does not agree with a healthy youngster, especially in a large city. His experience in Judge Vardeman's office decided his career. He was fascinated from the very beginning. He found the dullest law-book interesting; and he became so absorbed in his reading that the genial Judge was obliged to warn him that too much study was sometimes as bad as none.

Yet the lad's appet.i.te grew by what it fed on. A new field had been opened up to him, and he entered it with delight. Here was what he had been longing for, and there were moments when he felt sure that he had heard delivered from the bench, or had dreamed, the grave and sober maxims and precepts that confronted him on the printed page. He pursued his studies in a state of exaltation that caused the days to fly by unnoted. He thought of home, and of his grandmother, and a vision of Nan sometimes disturbed his slumbers; but for the time being there was nothing real but the grim commentators and expounders of the common law.

When Mr. Sanders returned home, bearing the news of Gabriel's escape, Nan Dorrington laid siege to his patience, and insisted that he go over every detail of the event, not once but a dozen times. To her it was a remarkable adventure, which fitted in well with the romances which she had been weaving all her life. How did Gabriel look when he ran from the depot at Malvern? Was he frightened? And how in the world did he manage to get in the waggon, and crawl on the inside of the sham bale of cotton and hide so that n.o.body could see him? And what did he say and how did he look when Mr. Sanders found him asleep in the cotton-bale box, or the cotton-box bale, whichever you might call it?

"Why, honey, I've told you all I know an' a whole lot more," protested Mr. Sanders. "Ef ever'body was name Nan, I'd be the most populous man in the whole county."

"Well, tell me this," Nan insisted; "what did he talk about when he woke up? Did he ask about any of the home-folks?"

"Lemme see," said Mr. Sanders, pretending to reflect; "he turned over in his box, an' got his ha'r ketched in a rough plank, an' then he bust out cryin' jest like you use to do when you got hurt. I kinder muched him up, an' then he up an' tol' me a whole lot of stuff about a young lady: how he was gwine to win her ef he had to stop chawin' tobacco, an'

cussin'. I'll name no names, bekaze I promised him I wouldn't."

"I think that is disgusting," Nan declared. "Do you mean to tell me he never asked about his grandmother?"

"Fiddlesticks, Nan! he looked at me like he was hungry, an' I told him all about his grandmother, an' he kep' on a-lookin' hungry, an' I told him all about her neighbours. What he said I couldn't tell you no more than the man in the moon. He done jest like any other healthy boy would 'a' done, an' that's all I know about it."

"That's what I thought," said Nan wearily; "boys are so tiresome!"

"Well, Gabriel didn't look much like a boy when I seed him last. He hadn't shaved in a month of Sundays, and his beard was purty nigh as long as my little finger. He couldn't go to a barber-shop in Malvern for fear some of the n.i.g.g.e.rs might know him an' report him to the commander of the post there. I begged him not to shave the beard off. He looks mighty well wi' it."

"His beard!" cried Nan. "If he comes home with a beard I'll never speak to him again. Gabriel with a beard! It is too ridiculous!"

"Don't worry," Mr. Sanders remarked soothingly. "Ef I git word of his comin' I'll git me a pa'r of shears, an' meet him outside the corporation line, an' lop his whiskers off for him; but I tell you now, it won't make him look a bit purtier--not a bit."

"You needn't trouble yourself," said Nan, with considerable dignity. "I have no interest in the matter at all."

"Well, I thought maybe you'd be glad to git Gabriel's beard an' make it in a sofy pillow."

"Why, whoever heard of such a thing?" cried Nan. In common with many others, she was not always sure when Mr. Sanders was to be taken seriously.

"I knowed a man once," replied Mr. Sanders, by way of making a practical application of his suggestion, "that vowed he'd never shave his beard off till Henry Clay was elected President. Well, it growed an' growed, an' bimeby it got so long that he had to wrop it around his body a time or two for to keep it from draggin' the ground. It went on that away for a considerbul spell, till one day, whilst he was takin' a nap, his wife took her scissors an' whacked it off. The reason she give was that she wanted to make four or five sofy pillows; but I heard afterwards that she changed her mind, an' made a good big mattress."

Nan looked hard at the solemn countenance of Mr. Sanders, trying to discover whether he was in earnest, but older and wiser eyes than hers had often failed to penetrate behind the veil of child-like serenity that sometimes clothed his features.

One day while Gabriel was deep in a law-book, Colonel Tom Vardeman came in smiling. He had a telegram in his hand, which he tossed to Gabriel.

It was from Major Tomlin Perdue, and contained an urgent request for Gabriel to take the next train for Halcyondale, where he would meet the prisoners who had been released pending their trial by the State courts, an event that never came off. Gabriel had seen in the morning paper that the prisoners were to be released in a day or two; but undoubtedly Major Perdue had the latest information, for he was in communication with Meriwether Clopton and other friends of the prisoners who were in Atlanta watching the progress of the case.

Gabriel lost no time in making his arrangements to leave, and he was in Halcyondale some hours before the Atlanta train was due. When all had arrived, they were for going home at once; but the citizens of Halcyondale, led by Major Perdue and Colonel Blasengame, would not hear of such a thing.