Port O' Gold Part 41

"Big duel ... Broderick and Terry!" shrieked the "newsies." Benito stopped the horse and bought a paper, perusing the headlines feverishly.

Alice leaned over his shoulder, her face white. Presently Benito faced her. "Terry's forced a fight on Dave," he said huskily. "They're to meet on Monday at the upper end of Lake Merced."

CHAPTER LIV

THE "FIELD OF HONOR"

Chief of Police Burke lingered late in his office that Sat.u.r.day afternoon. Twilight had pa.s.sed into dusk, through which the street lamps were beginning to glimmer, leaping here and there into sudden luminance as the lamp-lighter made his rounds. Deep in the complexities of police reports Burke had scarcely noted the entrance of a police clerk who lighted the swinging lamp overhead. And he was only dimly aware of faint knocking at his door. It came a second, a third time before he roused himself. "Come in," he called, none too graciously.

The door opened with an inrush of wind which caused his lamp to flicker.

Before him stood a slight and well-gowned woman, heavily veiled. She was trembling. He looked at her expectantly, but she did not speak.

"Please be seated, madam," said the chief of police.

But she continued to stand. Presently words came to her. "Can you stop a duel? Will you?" Her hands went out in a gesture of supplication, involuntary, unstudiedly dramatic.

"What do you mean?" he asked. "What duel?"

"Senator Broderick ... Justice Terry," a wealth of hate was in her utterance of the second name. "They fight at sunrise Monday morning."

"It's not our custom to--interfere in such cases," Burke said slowly.

"What would you have me do? Arrest them?"

"Anything," she cried. "Oh--ANYTHING!"

He looked at her searchingly. "If you will raise your veil, madam, I will talk with you further. Otherwise I must bid you goodnight."

For a moment she stood motionless. Then her hand went upward, stripped the covering from her features. "Now," she asked him, in a half-shamed whisper, "will you help me?"

"Yes ... Mrs. Windham," said Burke.

At daybreak on a raw, cold Monday morning, Broderick, with his seconds, Joe McKibben and Dave Colton, arrived at the upper end of Lake Merced.

Terry and his seconds were already waiting. The princ.i.p.als, clad in long overcoats, did not salute each other. Broderick looked toward the sea.

Terry stood implacable and silent, turning now and then to spit into the sun dried gra.s.s. The seconds conferred with each other. All seemed ready to begin when an officer, springing from a foam-flecked horse, rushed up to Broderick and shouted, "You are under arrest."

Broderick turned half-bewildered. He was very tired, for he had not slept the night before. "Arrest?" he said blankly.

"You and Justice Terry," said the officer; "I've warrants for ye both.

Come along and no nonsense. This duel is stopped."

Terry began an angry denunciation of the officer, but his seconds, Calhoun Benham and Colonel Thomas Hayes, persuaded him at length into a bl.u.s.tering submission. Princ.i.p.als and seconds, feeling like the actors in an ill-considered farce, rode off together. Later they were summoned to appear before Judge c.o.o.n.

"The whole thing was a farce," Benito told his wife. "The case was dismissed. Our prosecuting counsel asked the judge to put them under bonds to keep the peace. But he refused."

"Then the fight will go on?" asked Alice. Her face was white.

"Doubtless," said Benito gloomily. "They say that Terry's been practicing with a pair of French pistols during the past two months and hopes to use them at the meeting. Old 'Natchez,' the gunsmith, tells me one's a tricky weapon ... discharges now and then before the trigger's pressed."

"Why--that would be murder," Alice spoke aghast. "You must find David's seconds and warn them."

"I've tried all afternoon to locate them ... they're hidden ... afraid of arrest."

Despite the secrecy with which the second meeting was arranged, some three score spectators were already a.s.sembled at the duelling ground when Broderick and Terry arrived. It was not far from where they had met on the previous morning, but no officer appeared to interrupt their combat. Both men looked nervous and worn, especially Broderick, who had spent the night in a flea-infested hut on the ocean sh.o.r.e at the suggestion of his seconds who feared further interference. Terry had fared better, being quartered at the farm house of a friend who provided breakfast and a flask of rum.

The seconds tossed for position and those of Broderick won. The choice of pistols, too, was left to chance, which favored Terry. Joe McKibben thought he saw a smile light the faces of Benham and Hayes, a smile of secret understanding. The French pistols were produced and Hayes, with seeming care, selected one of them. McKibben took the other. He saw Benham whisper something to Terry as the latter grasped his weapon, saw the judge's eyes light with a sudden satisfaction.

"You will fire between the words 'one' and 'two'," Colton announced crisply. "Are you ready, gentlemen?"

Terry answered "Yes" immediately. Broderick, who was endeavoring to adjust the unfamiliar stock of the foreign pistol to his grasp, did not hear. McKibben repeated, "Are you ready, Dave?" in an undertone.

Broderick looked up with nervous and apologetic haste, "Yes, yes, quite ready," he replied.

"One," called Colton. Broderick's pistol spoke. Discharged apparently before aim could be taken; his bullet struck the ground at Terry's feet.

Broderick, now defenseless, waited quietly. "Two," the word came. Terry, who had taken careful aim, now fired. Broderick staggered, recovered himself. His face was distorted with pain. Slowly he sank to one knee; sidewise upon his elbow, then lay p.r.o.ne.

It was Sunday, September 18th. In the plaza a catafalque had been erected, draped in black. Upon it stood a casket covered with flowers.

An immense crowd was about it, strangely silent. Across the platform a constant stream of people filed, each stopping a moment to gaze at a face that lay still and peaceful, seemingly composed in sleep. It was a keen and striking face; the forehead bespoke intellect and high resolve; the jaw and chin indomitable; aggressive bravery. Over all there was a stamp of sadness and of loneliness that caught one's heart. Friends, political compatriots and erstwhile enemies paid David Broderick a final tribute as they pa.s.sed; few without a twitching of the lips. Tears ran down the faces of both men and women. The crowd murmured. Then the splendid moving voice of Colonel Baker poured forth an oration like Mark Anthony above the bier of Caesar:

"Citizens of California: A Senator lies dead.... It is not fit that such a man should pa.s.s into the tomb unheralded; that such a life should steal, unnoticed, to its close. It is not fit that such a death should call forth no rebuke...."

His majestic voice rolled on, telling of Broderick's work, his character, devotion to the people. He a.s.sailed the practice of duelling, the bitter hatreds of a slave-impa.s.sioned South. His voice shook with emotion as he ended:

"Thus, O brave heart! we bear thee to thy rest. As in life no other voice so rung its trumpet blast upon the ear of freemen, so in death its echoes will reverberate amid our valleys and mountains until truth and valor cease to appeal to the human heart.

"Good friend! True hero! Hail and farewell."

[Ill.u.s.tration: Terry, who had taken careful aim, now fired. Broderick staggered, recovered himself. Slowly he sank to one knee.]

CHAPTER LV

THE SOUTHERN PLOT

America stood on war's threshold. Even in the West one felt its imminence. The Republican victory had been like a slap in the face to slave-holding democracy. Its strongholds were secretly arming, mobilizing, drilling. And though Lincoln wisely held his peace--warned all the States which hummed with wild secession talk that their aggression alone could disrupt the Union--the wily Stanton, through the machinery of the War Department, prepared with quiet grimness for the coming struggle.

Herbert Waters, after Broderick's death, returned to Windham's office.

He was a full-fledged lawyer now, more of a partner than an employee.

Waters was of Southern antecedents, a native of Kentucky, a friend, almost a protege, of General Albert Sydney Johnson, commanding the military district of the Pacific.

One evening in January, 1861, he dined with the Windhams. Early in the evening Benito was called out to the bedside of an ailing client, who desired him to write a will. After he was gone, young Waters turned to Alice.