The Red Mist. Randall Parrish

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СКАЧАТЬ find plenty o' deviltry going on in Green Briar, if ye ever git out that away. Wal, thet's all thar is fer us ter eat, an' I'm goin' ter take a snooze."

      He closed the door, fastening it securely with a wooden bar, and stretched himself out on the floor. The room was dark as the only window was tightly boarded up, and, using my bundle for a pillow, I lay down also. For a short time I remained staring up through the dim light, thinking, and endeavoring to plan some feasible course of action, but there was no reason to remain awake, nothing to fear immediately, for his heavy breathing was evidence enough that Taylor slept. Slowly my heavy eyes closed, and I lost consciousness.

      The sun was below the mountain ridge, when the heavy hand of the old mountaineer shook me into sudden wakefulness. I had aroused once during ​the day, and lay listening to the sound of heavy wagons passing along the pike—a strongly guarded train to judge by the voices of men, and the thud of steadily marching feet. Ammunition, no doubt, destined for the Army of the Valley, in preparation for the coming campaign. Then my eyes had closed again in dreamless sleep. With nothing left to eat we were not long in preparing for departure, I endeavoring vainly to get my silent companion to converse, being rewarded merely by grumbled and evasive answers. Finally I desisted in the attempt, content to follow his lead. Taylor, astride his sorrel, with gun resting grimly across his knees, rode straight through the brush, away from the pike, down the valley of a small stream. In crossing, the horses drank their fill.

      "How about the valley road?" I asked as we climbed the opposite bank.

      The leader glanced back at me.

      "This yere way is nigher, an' a darn sight mor' quiet," he answered gruffly. "Soldiers been marching over the pike all day. Mout be all right fer yer, if yer've got a pass—but I ain't got none. We'll hev' good 'nough ridin' in 'bout a mile mor'."

      "You are aiming for the cut-off?"

      "I be—yer do kno' sumthin' of this yere kintry, I reckon, but yer've got more eddication than eny ​Cowan I ever hooked up with afore. Yer don't talk none like mountin' folks."

      I drew a quick breath, sensing the return of suspicion.

      "That's true," I admitted readily. "You see I went to school at Covington; they were going to make a preacher out of me."

      "The hell they wus!" and he chuckled to himself. "A blue-bellied Presbyterian I'll bet a hog. Their the ol' stock—them Cowans—hell fire, infant damnation. So you wus goin' fer ter be a preacher—hey?"

      "That was the program."

      Taylor stared into my face, his vague suspicion seemingly gone.

      "Well, I'll de damned—a preacher."

      He rode on into the dusk, chuckling, and I followed, smiling to myself, glad that the man's good humor had been so easily restored.

      We were fed at a hut far back in the foot-hills, where an old couple, the man lame, were glad enough to exchange their poor food for late news from the army, in which they had a son. Then we rode on steadily to the south along a deserted, weed-bordered road, meeting no one to obstruct our progress. Earlier in the war the Army of the Kanawa had passed along this way on forced march, ​and the ruts left by battery wheels were still in evidence, the frozen ridges making fast riding impossible. There were no villages, and only a few scattered houses, but the night was not so dark as to prevent fairly rapid progress. When dawn came we were to the west of Waynesboro, in broken country, and all through those long night hours scarcely a word had been exchanged between us. We camped finally in the bend of a small stream, where high banks concealed us from observation. There was little to eat in our haversacks, but we munched what we had, and Taylor, his eyes on the horses, broke the silence.

      "I reckon the critters don't need mor'n a couple hours' rest," he said. "They ain't been rid noways hard, an' I'm fer gittin' through the gap durin' daylight—the road ain't overly good just now."

      "Across the mountains? Is there a gap here?"

      "Ther road ter Hot Springs is 'bout two miles below yer. I cum over it ten days ago an' I reckon I kin find my way back. It's 'bout forty miles frum thar ter Lewisburg, mostly hills, but a good trail. I know folks et Hot Springs who will take good keer o' us, onct we git thar."

      We rested dozing, but neither sound asleep, for nearly three hours. Whatever might be in Taylor's mind, the lonely night had brought to me a new ​thought relative to my companion. The fellow was evasive, and once he had frankly lied in seeking to explain his presence in the valley, and the reason for his secrecy of movement. By now we were decidedly at cross-purposes, each vigilantly watching the other—Taylor in doubt as to what the bundle contained, which I never permitted out of my grasp, and myself as deeply interested in gaining possession of a packet of papers, a glimpse of which I had caught in an inside pocket of the mountaineer's coat. The belief that the fellow was either a Yankee spy, or a messenger between some Union emissary in the Confederate camp, and the Federal commander in western Virginia, became clear and distinct. His explanation that he had been seeking payment for losses occasioned by Confederate troops, was far from convincing. Had this been true he would certainly have been provided with a pass, and there would be no necessity for riding these back roads at night to avoid being challenged. His mission, whatever it might be, was secret and dangerous. Of this his ceaseless vigilance was proof.

      We rode on side by side through the rocky gap in the chain of mountains, and along the rough hills beyond, through gloomy stretches of wood, and over wind-swept ridges. It was cold and blustery, the clouds hanging low, and threatening storm. We ​were silent, suspicious of each other, never relaxing our vigilance. We encountered few travelers, and with these scarcely exchanged a word. Not a soldier was seen, although there was a Confederate garrison at Covington a few miles to the south. The light of a dying day still clung to the western sky when our wearied horses bore us into the village of Hot Springs. It was like a deserted hamlet, few houses appearing inhabited, and the shop windows boarded up. Occasionally a face peered at us cautiously through closed windows, and a man, tramping across the square, paused to stare curiously in our direction; but these were the only signs of life visible. Over a stone building—possibly the post-office—flapped a small Confederate flag, ragged and disreputable. Taylor, glancing neither to right or left, apparently indifferent to all this desolation, rode straight down the main street, and turned onto a pike road, leading to the left. A mile beyond, a frame house, painted white, barely visible through the deepening dusk, stood in a grove of oaks. The fence surrounding it had been broken down, and the gate stood wide open. The mountaineer turned up the broad driveway, and dismounted before the closed door. Almost at the same moment the portal opened slightly and a black face peered out.

      ​

      CHAPTER III THE BODY ON THE FLOOR

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      TAYLOR stood at the foot of the steps, pausing in uncertainty.

      "Is that you, Sam?"

      "Yas, sah, but I don't just make out who you gentl'men am, sah."

      "Well, never mind thet now. Is Mister Harwood, yere?"

      I insensibly straightened in my saddle. Harwood? What Harwood, I wondered—surely not Major Harwood of Lewisburg, my father's old friend! What was it I had heard about him a few months ago? Wasn't it a rumor that he was on General Ramsay's staff? And the daughter—Noreen—whatever had become of СКАЧАТЬ