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Will N. Harben - Westerfelt

W >> Will N. Harben >> Westerfelt




"'Liz Lithicum dared to say my child made a fool o' herse'f about John
Westerfelt. That's exactly what Liz an' other folks sez about yore
wife. I don't see what right you have to ax me sech a question.'
Well, sir, Clem was so much set back 'at he couldn't hardly speak, an'
he spilled a scoop o' coffee on the counter 'fore he could get it into
the old woman's poke. After she had gone out, laughin' in her sneakin'
way, Clem come back whar I wus at by the stove an' set down an' spit
about two dozen times. Arter 'while he axed me ef I'd ever heerd the
talk about his wife, an' I eased him all I could, but, lawsy me, you
ort ter see 'im hop up an' bow an' scrape when old Sue comes in the
store now. Clem ain't a jealous man--I reckon he's been married too
long for that. In my courtin' days I used to be jealous actually of
Clariss's own daddy, but now I make a habit o' invitin' the preacher to
our house every third Sunday so I kin git a decent meal an' set an'
smoke in the kitchen. John, you don't seem to be any nigher marryin'
now than you wus awhile back."

Westerfelt smiled, but made no reply.

"Well, you'd better keep on a-thinkin' it over," counselled Slogan, as
he took the saddle and blanket from his horse and examined a rubbed
spot on the animal's back; "thar's a heap more fun marryin' in a body's
mind than before a preacher; the law don't allow a feller but one sort
of a wife, but a single man kin live alone, an' fancy he's got any kind
he wants, an' then she won't be eternally a-yellin' to 'im to fetch in
fire-wood. A young feller kin make a woman a sight more perfect than
the Creator ever did, an' He's had a sight o' practice. I reckon the
Lord made 'em like they are to keep men humble and contrite an' to show
up to advantage His best work on t'other shore. But so long, John, I
must be goin'."




Chapter XI

It was a dark night two weeks later. Westerfelt, quite recovered from
his illness, was returning from a long ride through the mountains,
where he had been in search of a horse that had strayed from the stable.

The road along the mountain-side was narrow and difficult to follow.
At times he was obliged to ascend places so steep that he had to hold
to the mane of his horse to keep from falling off.

At the foot of a mountain about two miles from Cartwright, he heard
voices ahead of him. He stopped, peered through the foliage, and, a
few paces farther on, saw a wagon containing a couple of barrels. Near
it stood two men in slouched hats and jeans clothing.

"Thought shore I heerd some'n," said one of them.

"Which away?" asked the other.

"Sounded to me like a hoss up on the mount'in."

There was a silence for a moment, then the first voice said:

"No, not that away. Listen! It's somebody comin' up the road on foot.
I reckon it's a friend, but I don't take no resks."

The two men stepped quickly to the wagon and took out a couple of
rifles. Then they stood motionless behind the wagon and horse.
Westerfelt heard the regular step of some one coming up the road.

"Hello thar!" cried one of the men at the wagon.

"Hello!" was the answer.

"Stand in yore tracks! What's the password?"

"Joe Dill's good 'nough pass-word fer me; I don't try to keep up with
all the pop-doodle you fellers git up."

"Joe Dill will do in this case, bein' as yore a good liquor customer.
What'll you have, Joseph?"

"A gallon o' mash--this jug jest holds that amount up to the neck.
Gi'me a swallow in a cup, I'm as dry as powder. What do you-uns mean
by bein' in the business ef you cayn't send out a load oftener'n this?
I'll start to 'stillin' myse'f. I know how the dang truck's made;
nothin' but corn-meal an' water left standin' till it rots, an'--"

"Revenue men's as thick through heer as flies in summer-time," broke in
the man at the faucet. "Sh! what's that?"

Westerfelt's horse had stepped on a dry twig. There was silence for a
moment, then Dill laughed softly.

"Nothin' but a acorn drappin'. You fellers is afeerd o' yore shadders;
what does the gang mean by sendin' out sech white-livered chaps?" The
only sound for a moment was the gurgling of the whiskey as it ran into
the jug. "How's Toot like his isolation?" concluded Dill, grunting as
he lifted the jug down from the wagon.

"It's made a wuss devil 'n ever out'n 'im," was the answer. "He don't
do a blessed thing now but plot an' plan fer revenge. He's beginnin'
to think that hotel gal's gone back on 'im an' tuk to likin' the feller
he fit that day. My Lord, that man'll see the day he'll wish he'd
never laid eyes on Wambush."

"I hain't in entire sympathy with Toot." It was Dill's voice. "That
is to say, not entire!"

"Well, don't say so, ef you know what's good fer you."

"Oh, it's a free country, I reckon."

"Don't you believe it!"

"What's Toot gwine to do?"

"I don't know, but he'll hatch out some'n."

Westerfelt's horse had been standing on the side of a little slope, and
the soft earth suddenly gave way beneath his hind feet, and in
regaining a firm footing he made a considerable noise. There was
nothing now for Westerfelt to do but to put a bold face on the matter.

"Get up," he said, guiding his horse down towards the men.

"Halt!" commanded one of the moonshiners. All three of them were now
huddled behind the wagon.

"Hello!" answered Westerfelt, drawing rein; "I'm lookin' for an iron
gray, flea-bitten horse that strayed away from the livery-stable this
morning; have you fellows seen anything of him?"

"No, I hain't." This in a dogged tone from a slouched hat just above a
whiskey barrel.

There was a pause.

"I don't think anybody could have taken him," continued Westerfelt,
pleasantly.

"Hain't seed 'im." The speaker struck the wagon-bed with his rifle as
he was trying to put it down behind the barrels without being seen.

"The left hand road leads to town, I believe?" said Westerfelt, riding
away.

"Yes, but take the right at the next fork."

About half a mile farther on he saw two horsemen, approaching. When
quite near they stopped.

"Howdy' do?" said one, eying Westerfelt suspiciously.

"How are you?" answered Westerfelt.

"We are revenue men; we're after a couple o' men and a wagon loaded
with whiskey. Seen anything of them?"

Westerfelt was silent. The revenue officer who had spoken rested his
elbow on his thigh and leaned towards him.

"Looky' here," he said, deliberately; "we don't know one another, but
there may be no harm in tellin' you if you try to throw us off the
track you lay yoreself liable to complicity. We've had about as much
o' that sort o' treatment round heer as we are going to put up with."

"I'm not on the witness-stand," said Westerfelt, pleasantly; "I'm only
looking for a stray horse."

"Let's go on," said the other Officer to his companion. "We are on the
right road; he's seed 'em ur he'd a-denied it. Let's not lose time."

"I'm with you," was the reply; then to Westerfelt: "You are right, you
hain't on the witness-stand, but ef we wanted to we could mighty easy
arrest you on suspicion and march you back to jail to be questioned by
the inspectors."

Westerfelt smiled, "You'd have to feed me at the expense of the
government, and I'm as hungry as a bear; I've been out all day, and
haven't had a bite since breakfast."

The revenue men laughed. "We know who you are," said the one that had
spoken first, "an' we know our business, too; so long!"

Two hours later, as Westerfelt was about to go to bed in his room over
the stable, he heard a voice calling down-stairs. He went to the
window and looked out. Below he saw four men, two saddle horses, and a
horse and wagon. He heard Washburn open the office door and ask:

"What do you folks want?"

"Want to put up our beasts an' this hoss an' wagon," was the reply.
"We've got some gentlemen heer we're gwine to jail till mornin'."

"All right. I'll slide open the doors as soon as I git my shoes on. I
wus in bed."

"We'll have to leave these barrels o' rotgut with you."

"All right. Plenty o' room." Westerfelt came down-stairs just as
Washburn opened the big doors.

"Hello!" said the revenue officer who had addressed him on the
mountain; "you see we made quick time; we found 'em right whar you left
'em."

"I see."

Washburn, who was under the skirt of a saddle unbuckling a girth,
glanced at Westerfelt in surprise as he lifted the saddle from the
horse and carried it into the stable. The two moonshiners exchanged
quick glances and sullenly muttered something to each other.
Westerfelt, intent on getting the business over that he might go to
bed, failed to observe these proceedings. When the officers had taken
their prisoners on towards the jail, Washburn, who, with a lantern, was
putting the horses into stalls, turned to Westerfelt.

"My Lord! Mr. Westerfelt," he said, "I hope you didn't give them
fellers away."

"Never dreamt of such a thing. What do you mean?"

"I 'lowed you had by what that feller said just now."

"What did he say?"

"Why, he said they'd ketched the men right whar you left 'em, an'--"

"Well, what of that?" Westerfelt spoke impatiently. "I did pass the
whiskey wagon. The revenue men asked me if I'd seen them, and I simply
refused to answer. They didn't get anything out of me."

"That's just what I'd 'a' done, but I wish you'd 'a' set yorese'f right
jest now, fer them fellers certainly think you give 'em away, an'
they'll tell the gang about it."

"Well, I didn't, so what does it matter?"

Washburn took out the bowl of his lantern and extinguished the light as
they entered the office.

"It makes a man mighty unpopular in the Cohutta Valley to interfere
with the moonshiners," he answered. "Whiskey-makin' is agin the law,
but many a family gits its livin' out o' the stuff, an' a few good
citizens keep the'r eyes shet to it. You see, Mr. Westerfelt, the gang
may be a little down on you anyway sence your difficulty with Wambush.
Did you know that he wus a sort of a ring-leader amongst 'em?"

"Yes."

"Well, you mark my word, that feller'd swear his chances of heaven away
to turn them mount'in men agin you."

"Most of them are good-hearted fellows" replied Westerfelt. "They
won't harm me."

Washburn sat down on his bed, pulled off his shoes, and dropped them on
the puncheon floor.

"But he's got the'r ear, an' you hain't, Mr. Westerfelt. He'd grab at
a chance like this an' you'd never be able to disprove anything.
Toot's got some unprincipled friends that 'ud go any length to help him
in rascality."

The next morning before the revenue men had left with their prisoners
and the confiscated whiskey for the town where the trial before an
inspector was to take place, a number of mountaineers had gathered in
the village. They stood about the streets in mysterious groups and
spoke in undertones, and now and then a man would go to the jail window
and confer with the prisoners through the bars. Several men had been
summoned to attend the trial as witnesses, and others went out of
curiosity or friendship for the accused.

That evening, as John Westerfelt was passing through the hall of the
hotel to the dining-room, he met Harriet Floyd. She started when she
saw him, and he thought she acted as if she wanted to speak to him, but
just then some other boarders entered, and she turned from him
abruptly. She sat opposite him at the table a few moments later, but
she did not look in his direction.

On his return to the stable after supper, Washburn gave him a letter.
He recognized Sue Dawson's handwriting on the envelope.

"Is it a order?" asked Washburn, thinking it concerned the business.

"No, no; from a--a friend." Westerfelt lighted a candle at the wick of
Washburn's lantern and went up to his room. He put the candle on a
little table and sat down by it.

"I'll never read another line from that woman," he said. "I can't.
She'll run me crazy! I've suffered enough."

He threw the letter unopened on the table, and clasped his hands over
his knee and sat motionless for several minutes. Then he picked up the
letter and held one corner of it in the candle-flame. It ignited, and
the blue blaze began to spread over the envelope. Suddenly he blew it
out and tore the letter open. The margin of the paper was charred, but
the contents were intact. It ran:


"JOHN WESTERFELT,--I heard you Come Nigh meeting yore Death. The Lord
let you live to make you Suffer. The worst pain is not in the body But
in the Soul. You will likely live a long time and never git over yore
guilty suffering. The Report has gone out that some gal over thar tuk
care of you while you wus down in Bed. Well, it would be jest like you
to try yore skill on her. God Help her. I dont know her, nor nothin
about her, but she ort ter be warned. Ef she loved you with all Her
soul you would pick a Flaw somehow. Mark my words. You will live to
See Awful Shapes when nobody else does. Yore Hell Has begun. It will
Go on for everlastin and everlastin.

"SUE DAWSON."


He put the letter into his pocket and went to the window and drew down
the shade. Then he locked the door and placed the candle on the
mantel-piece and stood an open book before it, so that his bed was in
the shadow. He listened to hear if Washburn was moving below, then
knelt by the bed and covered his face with his hands. He tried to
pray, but could think of no words to express his desires. He had never
been so sorely tried. Even if he could school himself to forgetting
Harriet's old love and the act of deceitfulness into which her love had
drawn her, could he ever escape Mrs. Dawson's persecutions? Would she
not, even if he won and married Harriet, pursue and taunt him with the
girl's old love, as she had Clem Dill? And how could he stand
that--he, whose ideal of woman and woman's constancy had always been so
high?

He rose, sat on the edge of the bed, and clasped his hands between his
knees. The room was in darkness except the spot of light on the wall
behind the book. Below he heard the horses crunching their corn and
hay. He took from his pocket Sue Dawson's letters and the one from
Sally and wrapped them in a piece of paper. Then he looked about for a
place to hide them. In a corner overhead he saw a jutting rafter, and
behind it a dark niche where the shingles sloped to the wall. It was
too high for him to reach from the floor, so he placed the table
beneath the spot, and, mounting it, pushed the packet tightly into the
corner. Then he stepped down and removed the table, cautiously, that
Washburn might not hear him, and sat on the bed again. He remained
there motionless for twenty minutes. Suddenly a rat ran across the
floor with a scrap of paper in its mouth. He stared at the place where
the rat had disappeared as if bewildered, then rose, placed the table
back against the wall, secured the packet, and put it into his pocket.




Chapter XII

Westerfelt knew he could not sleep, and, seeing the moonlight shining
through his window, he decided to take a walk. He went below.
Washburn sat in a little circle of candle-light mending a piece of
harness.

"Has the hack come in yet?" asked Westerfelt, remembering that he had
paid little attention to business that day.

"Yes," answered Washburn; "it's down at the store unloadin' the mail."

"I thought I heard it turn the corner. Any passengers?"

"No; Buck said a family, one woman and five children, wus ready to
start by the Cohutta road to Royleston, but the report about the
Whitecaps t'other night skeerd 'em out of it, so they went by train to
Wilks, an' through that way. This outlawin' will ruin the country ef
it hain't stopped; nobody'll want to settle heer."

"I'll be back soon," said Westerfelt, and he went out.

The November air was dry and keen as he walked briskly towards the
mountains. The road ran through groves of stunted persimmon and
sassafras bushes, across swift-bounding mountain streams, and under
natural arbors of wild grapes and muscadine vines. In a few minutes
Westerfelt reached the meeting-house on a little rise near the roadside.

It had never been painted, but age and the weather had given it the
usual grayish color. Behind it, enclosed by a rail fence, was the
graveyard. The mounds had sunk, the stones leaned earthward, and the
decaying trellises had been pulled down by the vines which clambered
over them.

It was a strange thing for Westerfelt to do, but, seeing the door open,
he went into the church. Two windows on each side let in the
moonlight. The benches were unpainted, and many of them had no backs.

Westerfelt stood before the little pulpit for a moment and then turned
away. Outside, the road gleamed in the moonlight as it stretched on to
the village. A glimpse of the graveyard through the window made him
shudder. It reminded him of a grave he had never seen save in his
mind. It was past midnight. He would go back to his bed, though he
felt no inclination to sleep.

As he approached the stable, walking in the shadow of the trees on the
side of the street, he saw a woman come out of the blacksmith's shop
opposite the stable. For a moment she paused, her face raised towards
the window of his room, and then retreated into the shop.

It was Harriet Floyd. He stepped behind a tree and watched the door of
the shop. In a moment she reappeared and looked up towards his window
again. He thought she might be waiting to see him, so he moved out
into the moonlight and advanced towards her.

"Oh, it's you!" she exclaimed, excitedly. "I've been waiting to see
you. I--I must tell you something, but it won't do to stand here;
somebody will see us. Can't we?--come in the shop a minute."

Without speaking, and full of wonder, he followed her into the dark
building. She led him past piles of old iron, wagon-tires,
ploughshares, tubs of black water, anvils, and sledges to the forge and
bellows at the back of the shop. She waited for a moment for him to
speak, but he only looked at her questioningly, having almost steeled
his heart against her.

"I come to warn you," she began, awkwardly, her eyes raised to his.
"Toot Wambush has prejudiced the Whitecaps against you. He has
convinced them that you reported the moonshiners. They are coming
to-night to take you out. The others don't mean to kill you; they say
it's just to whip you, and tar and feather you, and drive you out of
the place, but he--Toot Wambush--will kill you if he can. He would not
let you get away alive. He has promised the others not to use
violence, but he will; he hates you, and he wants revenge. He'll do it
and make the others share the responsibility with him--that's his plan."

He put his hand on the bellows-pole; the great leather bag rattled and
gasped, and a puff of ashes rose from the forge.

"How do you happen to know this?" he asked, coldly. She shrank from
him, and stared at him in silence.

"How do you know it?" he repeated, his tone growing fierce.

She drew the shawl with which she had covered her head more closely
about her shoulders.

"Toot hinted at it himself," she said, slowly.

"When?"

"About an hour ago."

"You met him?"

"Yes."

"Are you a member of his gang?"

"Mr. Westerfelt," shrinking from him, "do--do you mean to insult me?"

"Would he have told you if he had thought you would give him away?"

"I reckon not--why, no."

"Then he considers you in sympathy with his murderous plans."

"I don't know, but I want you to keep out of his way. You must--oh,
Mr. Westerfelt, you must go! Don't stand here; they are coming down
the Hawkbill road directly. You could ride off towards Dartsmouth and
easily get away, if you will hurry."

"I see," he answered, with a steady stare of condemnation; "you want to
keep him from committing another crime--a more serious one."

She looked at him an instant as if puzzled, and then said:

"I want to keep him from killing you."

"Do you think he would take advantage of a helpless man?"

"I know it, Mr. Westerfelt; oh, I know he would!"

"Then you acknowledge he is a coward, and yet you--my God, what sort of
a creature _are_ you?"

She continued to stare at him wonderingly, as if half afraid. She
moved suddenly into a moonbeam that streamed through a broken shingle
in the roof. Her face was like white marble. In its terrified lines
and angles he read nothing but the imprint of past weakness where he
should have seen only pleading purity--the purity of a child cowed and
awed by the object of a love so powerful, so self-sacrificing that she
made no attempt to understand it. She had always felt her inferiority
to others, and now that she loved her ideal of superiority she seemed
to expect ill-treatment--even contempt--at his hands.

He looked away from her. The begrimed handle of the bellows creaked
and swung as he leaned on it. He turned suddenly and impulsively
grasped her hands.

"You are a good girl," he cried; "you have been the best friend I ever
had. If I don't treat you better, it is on account of my awful nature.
I can't control it when I think of that villain."

"He _has_ treated you very badly," she said, slowly, in a voice that
faltered.

"Where did you meet him and when?" he asked, under his breath. "God
knows I thought you were done with him."

"He came right to the house just after dark," returned Harriet.
"Mother let him come in; she wanted to talk to him."

"Did he come to get you to go away with him, Harriet?"

"Yes, Mr. Westerfelt."

"And why didn't you go?"

"Oh, how _can_ you ask such a question," she asked, "when you _know_--"
She broke off suddenly, and then, seeing that he was silent, she added:
"Mr. Westerfelt, sometimes I am afraid, really afraid, your sickness
has affected your mind, you speak so strange and harsh to me. Surely I
do not deserve such cruelty. I am just a woman, and a weak one at
that; a woman driven nearly crazy through troubling about you." She
raised a corner of her shawl to her eyes.

He saw her shoulders rise with a sob, then he caught her hands.
"Don't--don't cry, little girl. I'd give my life to help you. Oh yes,
_do_ let me hold your hands, just this once; it won't make any
difference."

She did not attempt to withdraw her hands from his passionate, reckless
clasp, and, now more trustingly, raised her eyes to his.

"Sometimes I think you really love me," she faltered. "You have made
me think so several times."

"I'm not ashamed of it," he said. "I've had fancies for women, but I
have never felt this way before. It seems to me if I was to live a
thousand years I'd never, never feel that you was like other women.
Maybe you love me real deep, and maybe you just fancy me, but I'll
never want any other human being like I want you. I have been a bad
man--a careless, thoughtless man. Ever since I was a boy I have played
with love. I was playing with fire--the fire of hell, Harriet--and I
got burnt. In consequence of what I've done I suffer as no mortal ever
suffered. Repentance brings contentment to some men, but they are not
built like me. I don't do anything from morning to night but brood and
brood over my past life."

"I thought you had had some trouble," she returned, sympathetically.

"Why did you think so?" he asked.

"You talked when you were out of your head. That's why I first took
pity on you. I never saw a man suffer in mind as you did. You rolled
and tumbled the first two or three nights and begged for forgiveness;
often you spoke so loud I was afraid others in the house would hear."

He opened his palms before her. "These hands are soaked in human
blood--innocent human blood," he said, tragically. "I don't deny it;
if it would do a particle of good I'd tell every soul on earth. I won
a good girl's love, and when I got tired of her and left her she killed
herself to escape the misery I put her in. I was unworthy of her, but
she didn't know it, or want to know it. Nobody knows she took her own
life except me and her mother, and it has ruined her life--taken away
her only comfort in old age and made her my mortal enemy. She never
gives me a minute's rest--she reminds me constantly that I'll never get
forgiveness and never be happily married, and she is right--I never
shall. My wicked nature demands too much of a woman. I can love, and
do love, with all my soul, but my pride cannot be subdued. I--"

"I understand, Mr. Westerfelt" she broke in, quickly. "Don't bring up
that subject again. What you said when I last saw you was enough. It
almost kept me from coming to-night, but it was my duty; but you do not
have to say any more about that." She took a step backward and stood
staring at him in mute misery. She had never felt that she was worthy
of him, in a way, but his cold reference--as she understood it--to her
misfortune released a spring of resentment she hardly knew was wound in
her breast.

"Forgive me," he pleaded, trying to regain her hands. "I'll never
mention it again. I promise you that--never again."

"It's all right," she answered, softening under his passionate gaze.
"But it would be kind of you to avoid mentioning what I cannot help."

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