Calhoun Conly, knowing nothing, but suspecting a great deal, and full of anxiety, repaired to Ion directly after breakfast. Blood-stains on the ground without and within the gate, and here and there along the avenue as he rode up to the house, confirmed his surmise that his friends had been attacked by the Ku Klux the previous night. He found them all in the library talking the matter over.
"Ah, sir! like a brave man and a true friend, you come when the fight is over," was his grandfather"s sarcastic greeting.
"It was my misfortune, sir, to be unable in this instance, to follow my inclination," returned the young man, coloring to the very roots of his hair with mortification. "But"--glancing around the circle--"heaven be thanked that I find you all unhurt," he added with a sigh that told that a great load had been taken from his heart. "May I hear the story? I see the men are tearing down a breastwork and I suppose the attacking party must have been a large one."
"Not too large, however, for us to beat back and defeat without your a.s.sistance," growled his grandfather.
"Ah, grandpa, he would have helped if he could," said Mrs. Travilla.
"Sit down, Cal, we are very glad to see you."
His uncle and Travilla joined in the a.s.surance, but Horace and Arthur regarded him rather coldly, and "Cousin Ronald" thought he deserved some slight punishment.
As he attempted to take the offered seat, "Squeal! squeal! squeal!" came from his coat pocket, causing him to start and redden again, with renewed embarra.s.sment.
"O Cousin Cal! _has_ you dot a wee little piggie in your pocket? Let me see him," cried Harold, running up and trying to get a peep at it; then starting back with a cry of alarm, at a sudden loud barking, as of an infuriated dog, at Calhoun"s heels.
Bruno came bounding in with an answering bark; Calhoun thrusting his hand into his pocket with purpose to summarily eject the pig, and at the same time wheeling about to confront his canine antagonist, looked utterly confounded at finding none there, while to add to his confusion and perplexity, a bee seemed to be circling round his head, now buzzing at one ear, now at the other.
He tried to dodge it, he put up his hand to drive it away, then wheeled about a second time, as the furious bark was renewed in his rear but turned pale and looked absolutely frightened at the discovery that the dog was still invisible; then reddened again at perceiving that everybody was laughing.
His cousin Elsie was trying to explain, but could not make herself heard above the furious barking. She looked imploringly at Mr. Lilburn, and it ceased on the instant.
Calhoun dropped into a chair and glanced inquiringly from one to another.
His uncle answered him in a single word, "Ventriloquism."
"Sold!" exclaimed the youth, joining faintly in the mirth. "Strange I did not think of that, though how could I suppose there was a ventriloquist here?"
"An excellent one, is he not? You must hear what good service he did last night," said Mr. Travilla, and went on to tell the story of the attack and defense.
Elsie and Eddie listened to the account with keen interest. Vi, who had been devoting herself in motherly fashion to a favorite doll, laid it aside to hear what was said; but Harold was playing with Bruno, who seemed hardly yet to have recovered from his wonder at not finding the strange canine intruder who had so roused his ire.
Harold had climbed upon his back, and with his arms around his neck, was talking to him in an undertone. "Now you"s my horse, Bruno; let"s go ridin" like papa and Beppo."
The dog started toward the door. "With all my heart, little master; which way shall we go?"
"Why, Bruno, you s"prise me! can you talk?" cried the little fellow in great delight. "Why didn"t you begin sooner? Mamma, oh mamma, did you hear Bruno talk?"
Mamma smiled, and said gently, "Be quiet, son, while papa and the rest are talking: or else take Bruno out to the veranda."
Cousin Ronald was amusing himself with the children. Vi"s doll presently began to cry and call upon her to be taken up, and she ran to it in surprised delight, till she remembered that it was "only Cousin Ronald and not dolly at all."
But Cousin Ronald had a higher object than his own or the children"s amus.e.m.e.nt: he was trying to divert their thoughts from the doings of the Ku Klux, lest they should grow timid and fearful.
Chapter Nineteenth.
"Revenge at first though sweet, Bitter ere long, back on itself recoils."
--MILTON.
George Boyd, who was of most vindictive temper, had laid his plans for the night of the raid upon Ion, to wreak his vengeance not upon Travilla only, but also upon the woman on whose clothing he had left the impress of his b.l.o.o.d.y hand.
With this in view, he went first to the kitchen department where, as he had learned through the gossip of the servants, she now pa.s.sed the night, intending afterward to have a hand in the brutal flogging to be meted out to Mr. Travilla. He headed the attacking party there, and it was he who received upon his person the full broadside from Aunt Dicey"s battery of soap ladles.
The pain was horrible, the scorching ma.s.s clinging to the flesh and burning deeper and deeper as he was borne shrieking away in the arms of his comrades.
"Oh take it off! take it off! I"m burning up, I tell you!" he yelled as they carried him swiftly down the avenue; but they hurried on, seemingly unmindful of his cries, mingled though they were with oaths and imprecations, nor paused till they had reached the shelter of the woods at some little distance on the opposite side of the road.
"Curse you!" he said between his clenched teeth, as they laid him down at the foot of a tree, "curse you! for keeping me in this agony. Help me off with these--duds. Unb.u.t.ton it, quick! quick! I"m burning up, I tell you; and my hands are nearly as bad as my face. Oh! oh! you fiends! do you want to murder me outright? you"re bringing all the skin with it!"
he roared, writhing in unendurable torture, as they dragged off the disguise. "Oh kill me! Bill, shoot me through the head and put me out of this torment, will you?"
"No, no, I daren"t. Come, come, pluck up courage and bear it like a man."
"Bear it indeed! I only wish you had it to bear. I tell you it can"t be borne! Water, water, for the love of heaven! carry me to the river and throw me in. My eyes are put out; they burn like b.a.l.l.s of fire."
"Stop that yelling, will you!" cried a voice from a little distance, "you"ll betray us. We"re whipped, and there"s troops coming up too."
"Sure, Smith?"
"Yes, heard their tramp, tramp distinctly ramble of artillery too.
Can"t be more"n a mile off, if that. Hurry, boys, no time to lose! Who"s this groaning at such an awful rate? What"s the matter?"
"Scalded; horribly scalded."
"He ain"t the only one, though maybe he"s the worst. And Blake"s killed outright; two or three more, I believe; some with pretty bad pistol-shot wounds. Tell you they made warm work for us. There"s been a traitor among us; betrayed our plans and put "em on their guard."
He concluded with a torrent of oaths and fearful imprecations upon the traitor, whoever he might be.
"Hist!" cried the one Boyd had addressed as Bill, "hist boys! the bugle call! they"re on us. Stop your noise, Boyd, can"t you!" as the latter, seized, and borne onward again, not too gently, yelled and roared with redoubled vigor: "Be quiet or you"ll have "em after us in no time."
"Shoot me through the head then: it"s the only thing that"ll help me to stop it."
Mr. Lilburn, keeping well in the shadow of the trees, had hurried after the retreating foe, and concealing himself behind a clump of bushes close to the gate, caused his bugle note to sound in their ears as if coming from a point some half a mile distant.
Convinced that a detachment of United States troops were almost upon them, those carrying the dead and wounded dashed into the wood with their burdens, while in hot haste the others mounted and away, never drawing rein until they had put several miles between them and the scene of their attempted outrage.
Meantime those in the wood, moving as rapidly as possible under the circ.u.mstances, were plunging deeper and deeper into its recesses.
There was an occasional groan or half suppressed shriek from others of the wounded, but Boyd"s cries were incessant and heart-rending, till a handkerchief was suddenly thrust into his mouth with a muttered exclamation, "Necessity knows no law! it"s to save your own life and liberty as well as ours."
At length, well nigh spent with their exertions, the bearers paused, resting their burdens for a moment upon the ground, while they listened intently for the sounds of pursuit.
"We"ve baffled "em, I think," panted Bill, "I don"t hear no more of that--tramp, tramp, and the bugle"s stopped too."
"That"s so and I reckon we"re pretty safe now," returned another voice.