When 'Bear Cat' Went Dry Part 48

"When ther time comes," he said shortly, "I'll be ready. I wants thet ye should hev hit give out in Marlin Town, thet ye sought ter persuade me, but that I wouldn't hev nuthin' more ter do with aidin' state co'tes then I would with revenuers." And that was the message that percolated through the hills.

When Turner returned home he went first to Blossom's cabin, his heart full of thoughts of her and sympathy for her loneliness. Old days there swarmed into memory, and just to see her, even now that he counted for so little, meant a great deal to him. But in the road, at first sight of the house, he halted in astonishment--for the chimney was smokeless--and when he hurried forward his dismay grew into something like panic as he found the windows blankly shuttered and the door nailed up.

Hastening to his own house, he demanded in a strained voice of fright.

"Whar air she, maw? Whar's Blossom at?"

The old woman rose and took from the mantel-shelf a folded sheet of paper which she handed him without a word of explanation, and with shaking fingers he opened and read it.

"Dear Turney," she said, and her round chirography had run wild as weeds with the disturbed mood of that composition, "I can't bear it here any longer. I'm going away--for always. Jerry left a little money and the lawyers have paid it to me. It's not much, but it's enough.

These mountains are beautiful--but they are full of misery--and memories that haunt me day and night. You have been more than good to me and I'll always pray for you. I don't know yet where I'll go. With love, Blossom."

Turner sagged into a chair by the hearth-stone and the paper dropped from his inert fingers. His face became very drawn and he silently licked lips which burned with a dry feverishness.

The special session of court convened in Marlin Town with a quiet that lacked any tang of genuine interest. These fiascos had come before and pa.s.sed without result. Since Bear Cat Stacy had permitted it to be understood that he would hold aloof, no strength would challenge the sway of Kinnard Towers, save a "fotched on" judge and a few white-faced lawyers who wore stiff collars. They had not even brought tin soldiers this time nor dignified the occasion with a Gatling gun.

Towers himself remained comfortably at the Quarterhouse, and if he had about him a small army of men its protection of rifle-muzzles pointed toward Little Slippery rather than Marlin Town. A posse would come, of course, since even his own courts must follow the forms and pretenses of the statutes made and provided, but their coming, too, would be a formality.

Outside a late winter storm had turned into a blizzard and though he did not often spend his evenings at the bar, Kinnard was to-night leaning with his elbow on its high counter. His blond face was suave and his manner full of friendliness, because men who were anxious to display their solicitude were coming in to denounce the farce of the trial inagurated by "furriners" and to proclaim their sympathy. It was all incense to his undiminished dominance, thought Towers, and it pleased him to meet such amenities with graciousness.

"Any time now--any time at all," he laughed, "them turrible deputy sheriffs air liable ter come bustin' through thet door, and drag me off ter ther jail-house." As he uttered this pleasantry, the a.s.sembled cohorts shouted their laughter. It was as diverting as to hear a battle-scarred tom-cat express panic over a mouse. "Howsoever, I hain't a shettin' no doors. They all stands open," added Kinnard.

Then, even as he spoke, the telephone jangled. It was a neighborhood wire which connected only a few houses in a narrow radius, but the voice that sounded through the receiver was excited. The proprietor of the lawless stronghold listened and made some unruffled reply, then turned to his audience a smiling face on which was written amus.e.m.e.nt.

"Well, boys," he genially inquired, "what did I tell ye? Thar's a scant handful of deputy sheriffs a-ridin' over hyar right now. They're within a measured mile of this place at ther present minute."

A low hum of voices rose in apprehensive notes, but Kinnard lifted his hand.

"You men needn't feel no oneasiness, I don't reckon," he a.s.sured them.

"They hain't got nothin' erginst ther balance of ye. Hit's jest me they aims ter drag off ter ther calaboose--an' es I said afore, I'm leavin'

my doors wide open."

As an indication of his confidence he ordered his bartender to fill all gla.s.ses, and beamed benignly on the recipients of his hospitality, while he awaited the minions of the law.

"They hed ought ter be hyar by now, them turrible fellers," he suggested at length, and as if in answer to his speech a sound of heavy steps sounded just outside the door.

A small posse stamped into the room, and the excellent jest of the entire situation became more pointed as men noted with what a shamefaced bearing they presented themselves.

"Kinnard," began the chief-deputy in an embarra.s.sment which almost choked him, "I've got ter put ye under arrest. You an' Tom Carmichael thar, both. Ye're charged with murder."

The crowd wanted to laugh again, but because of their curiosity they desisted. Towers himself stepped back two paces.

"Gentlemen," he said blandly, "ye'll hev ter git papers fust from ther governor of Virginny." He swept his hand toward the white line on the floor. "Ye hain't hardly got no license ter foller me outen old Kaintuck. Thar's ther leetle matter of a state line lyin' atween us."

They had all known that Towers would handle the situation with a triumph of resource, and a subdued murmur of applause and adulation rose from many bewhiskered lips, as the posse withdrew slowly to the threshold over which it had entered.

Then they became deadly quiet, for a voice had spoken from the Virginia door. "Hold on!"

They wheeled and saw a single figure there, unarmed, and hands began going to holsters.

"Virginny and Kaintuck looks right-smart alike ter me," said Bear Cat Stacy with the level voice of one who has long waited his moment and finds it at hand. "Will ye all lay down yore arms, and surrender ther men we wants--or will ye stand siege an' have this pest-house burnt down over yore heads? I'll wait outside for an answer."

The amazement of the moment had held them gripped in tableau as he spoke, but when he stepped swiftly back, a dozen pistols spat and barked at him, and then, louder than the firing, they heard a circle of song--compa.s.sing the stockaded building on all sides--a giant chorus that swelled in the frosty air: "Mine Eyes have seen the Glory of the Coming of the Lord."

Kinnard Towers' self-a.s.surance fell away from him. His hand was unsteady as he raised it and said huskily; "Boys, we needs must fight."

CHAPTER XXVII

The volume of the singing out there and the flare of the ruddy torches, left no doubt as to the substantial strength of the force which had swept aside such legal technicalities as state jurisdiction.

When Bear Cat had trusted himself so recklessly on the threshold while the opposite door still stood open, the spectral figures with masked faces could have streamed in, wave on wave, to smother out any up-flaming spirit of resistance, but in doing that there would have been hand-to-hand conflict, in which the innocent must pay as heavy and ultimate a penalty as the guilty.

So Turner had withdrawn, and permitted the barring of the doors--though he knew that the structure had the solid strength of square-sawed oak and that the besieged scores were fully armed. Now from the outside he hammered on the ma.s.sive panels with a rifle b.u.t.t.

"Ef ye wants ter send a man out hyar ter parley with me," he shouted through the heavy barrier, "I gives ye my pledge that he kin go back safe. Ef ye don't see fit ter do thet, we've got ter believe thet ye're all one stripe, resistin' arrest, and we aims ter set this h.e.l.l-house ter ther torch."

"Let me have five minutes ter study erbout hit," Towers gave answer, then he turned to the men inside. "Go upsta'rs, Tom," he directed swiftly, "an' look out. Let me know how many thar seems ter be of 'em."

Carmichael, peering out of dark windows above, saw against the snow, innumerable sable figures bulking formidably in the red flare of blazing pine f.a.gots. Other torches burned with a menacing a.s.surance of power beyond them along the road, and far up the distant slopes glittered reinforcements of scattered tongues of flame.

The figures nearest at hand stood steady with an ominous and spectral stillness, and their ghostliness was enhanced by the fitful torch-light in which the whole picture leaped and subsided with a phantom uncertainty of line and ma.s.s.

Black Tom came back and shook his head. "Hit hain't no manner of use,"

he announced. "We mout es well give up. I reckon we kin still come cl'ar in co'te."

But the old lion, whose jaws and fangs had always proved strong enough to crush, was of no mind to be caged now.

"Come cl'ar! h.e.l.l's blazes!" he roared with a livid face. "Don't ye see what's done come ter pa.s.s? He'll take these d.a.m.n' outlaws over thar an'

no jury won't dast ter cl'ar us. If we quits now we're done."

Towers leaped, with an astonishing agility to the counter of the bar and raised his clenched fists high above his head.

"Men!" he thundered, "hearken ter me! Don't make no mistake in thinkin'

thet ef ye goes out thar, ye'll hev any mercy showed ye. This is ther finish fight betwixt all ther customs of yore blood--an' this d.a.m.n'

outlaw's new-fangled tyranny! He don't aim jest ter jail me an' Tom--he aims ter wipe out every mother's son thet's ever been a friend ter me.

"We've got solid walls around us now--but any man thet goes out thar, goes straight ter murder. Es fer me I don't aim ter be took alive--air ye of ther same mind? Will ye fight?"

His flaming utterance found credence in their befuddled minds. They could not conceive of merciful treatment from the man they had hounded and sought for months to murder from ambush. Inside at least they could die fighting, and nods of grim a.s.sent gave their answer.

"Ther stockade hain't no good now," Towers reminded them. "They're already inside hit, but from them upsta'r winders we kin still rake 'em severe an' plentiful whilst they're waitin' fer our answer. Let them winders be filled with men, but don't let no man shoot till he heers my pistol--then all tergether--an' give 'em unshirted h.e.l.l."

So, answering the reprieve with deceit, the block house, which had, for a generation, been an infamous seat of power, remained silent until a pistol snapped out and then from every window leaped spiteful jets of powder lightning and the solid roar of a united volley. That was the answer and as a light clatter of sliding breech bolts followed the crescendo, its defenders went on shooting, more raggedly now, as fast as each man could work his repeater. A chorused bellow of defiance was hurled outward as they fired.