The Prophet of the Great Smoky Mountains. Mary Noailles Murfree

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СКАЧАТЬ for the question which he had asked at every habitation along the road. It suddenly occurred to him as polite to include Dorinda in the conversation.

      'Ye hain't seen nor hearn of him, I s'pose, hev ye?' inquired the sheriff, directly addressing her.

      As he turned toward her he marked her expression. His own face changed suddenly. He rose at once.

      'Don't trifle with the law, I warn ye,' he said sternly. 'Ye hev seen that man.'

      Dorinda was standing beside her spinning-wheel, one hand holding the thread, the other raised to guide the motion. She looked at him pale and breathless.

      'I hev seen him. I ain't onwillin' ter own it. Ye never axed me afore.'

      The other members of the party had crowded in from the porch, where they had been sitting since dinner, smoking their pipes. The officer, realizing his lapse of vigilance and the loss of his opportunity, was sharply conscious, too, of their appreciation of his fatuity.

      'Whar did ye see him?' he asked.

      'I seen him hyar—this mornin'.' There was a stir of excitement in the group. 'He kem by on his beastis whilst I war a-ploughin', an' we talked a passel. An' then he tuk Pete's plough, ez war idle in the turn-row, an' helped along some; he run a few furrows.'

      'Which way did he go?' asked the sheriff breathlessly.

      'I dunno,' faltered the girl.

      'Look-a-hyar!' he thundered, in rising wrath. 'Ye'll find yerself under lock an' key in the jail at Shaftesville, if ye undertake ter fool with me. Which way did he go?'

      A flush sprang into the girl's excited face. Her eyes flashed.

      'Ef ye kin jail me fur tellin' all I know, I can't holp it,' she said, with spirit. 'I kin tell no more.'

      He saw the justice of her position. It did not make the situation easier for him. Here he had sat eating and drinking and idly talking, while the fugitive, who had escaped by a hair's-breadth, was counting miles and miles between himself and his lax pursuer. This would be heard of in Shaftesville—and he a candidate for re-election! He beheld already an exchange of significant glances among his posse. Had he asked that simple question earlier he might now be on his way back to Shaftesville, his prisoner braceleted with the idle handcuffs that jingled in his pocket as he moved.

      He caught at every illusive vagary that might promise to retrieve his error. He declared that she could not say which way Rick Tyler had taken because he was not gone.

      'He's in this house right now!' he exclaimed. He ordered a search, and the guests, a little while ago so friendly, began exploring every nook and cranny.

      'No, no!' cried the old woman shrilly, as they tried the door of the shed-room, which was bolted and barred. 'Ye can't tech that thar door. It can't be opened—not ef the Gov'nor o' Tennessee war hyar himself, a-moanin' an' a-honin' ter git in.'

      The sheriff's eyes dilated. 'Open the door—I summon ye!' he proclaimed, with his imperative official manner.

      'No!—I done tole ye,' she said indignantly. 'The word o' the men folks hev been gin ter keep that thar door shet, an shet it's going ter be kep'.'

      The officer laid his hand upon it.

      'Ye mustn't bust it open!' shrilled the old woman. 'Laws-a-massy! ef thar be many sech ez you-uns in Shaftesville, I ain't s'prised none that the Bible gits ter mournin' over the low kentry, an' calls it a vale o' tears an' the valley o' the shadder o' death!'

      The sheriff had placed his powerful shoulder against the frail batten door.

      'Hyar goes!' he said.

      There was a crash; the door lay in splinters on the floor; the men rushed precipitately over it.

      They came back laughing sheepishly. The officer's face was angry and scarlet.

      'Don't take the bar'l—don't take the bar'l!' the old woman besought of him, as she fairly hung upon his arm. 'I dunno how the boys would cavort ef they kem back an' fund the bar'l gone.'

      He gave her no heed. 'Whyn't ye tell me that man warn't thar?' he asked of the girl.

      'Ye didn't ax me that word,' said Dorinda.

      'No, 'Cajah Green, ye didn't,' said one of the men, who, since the abortive result of their leader's suspicion, were ashamed of their mission, and prone to self-exoneration. 'I'll stand up ter it ez she answered full an' true every word ez ye axed her.'

      'Lor'-a'mighty! Ef I jes' knowed aforehand how it will tech the boys when they view the door down onto the floor!' exclaimed the old woman. 'They mought jounce round hyar ez ef they war bereft o' reason, an' all thar hope o' salvation hed hung on the hinges. An' then agin they mought 'low ez they hed ruther hev no door than be at the trouble o' shettin' it an' barrin' it up ez they come an' go. They air mighty onsartin in thar temper, an' I hev never hankered ter see 'em crost. But fur the glory's sake, don't tech the bar'l. It's been sot thar ter age some, ef the Lord will spare it.'

      In the girl's lucent eyes the officer detected a gleam of triumph. How far away in the tangled labyrinths of the mountain wilderness, among the deer-paths and the cataracts and the cliffs, had these long hours led Rick Tyler?

      He spoke on his angry impulse: 'An' I ain't goin' ter furgit in a hurry how I hev fund out ez ye air a-consortin' with criminals, an' aidin' an' abettin' men ez air fleein' from jestice an' wanted fur murder. Ye look out; ye'll find yerself in Shaftesville jail 'fore long, I'm a-thinkin'.'

      'He stopped an' talked ez other folks stop an' talk,' Dorinda retorted. 'I couldn't hender, an' I hed no mind ter hender. He took no bite nor sup ez others hez done. 'Pears like ter me ez we hev gin aid an' comfort ter the off'cer o' the law ez well ez we could.'

      And this was the story that went down to Shaftesville.

      The man, his wrath rebounding upon himself, hung his head, and went down to the trough, and mounted his horse without another word.

      The others hardly knew what to say to Dorinda. But they were more deliberate in their departure, and hung around apologizing in their rude way to the old woman, who convulsively besought each to spare the barrel, which had been set in the shed-room to 'age some, ef it could be lef alone.'

      Dorinda stood under the jack-bean vines, blossoming purple and white, and watched the men as they silently rode away. All the pride within her was stirred. Every sensitive fibre flinched from the officer's coarse threat. She followed him out of sight with vengeful eyes.

      'I wish I war a man!' she cried passionately.

      'A-law, D'rindy!' exclaimed her grandmother, aghast at the idea. 'That ain't manners!'

      The shadows were beginning to creep slowly up the slopes of the Great Smoky Mountains, as if they came from the depths of the earth. A roseate suffusion idealised range and peak to the east. The delicate skyey background of opaline tints and lustre made distinct and definite their majestic symmetry of outline. Ah! and the air was so clear! What infinite lengths of elastic distances stretched between that quivering trumpet-flower by the fence and the azure heights which its scarlet horn might almost seem to cover! The sun, its yellow blaze burned out, and now a sphere of smouldering fire, was dropping СКАЧАТЬ