The youth beheld him at this moment, and shouted aloud his own situation and safety. In a voice indicative of restored confidence in himself, no less than in his fate, the landlord, by a similar shout, recognised him, and was bending forward to the spot where he stood, when the sharp and joint report of three rifles from the opposite banks, attested the discovery of his person; and, in the same instant, the rider tottered forward in his saddle, his grasp was relaxed upon the rein, and, without a word, he toppled from his seat, and was borne for a few paces by his horse, dragged forward by one of his feet, which had not been released from the stirrup.
He fell, at length, and the youth came up with him. He heard the groans of the wounded man, and, though exposing himself to the same chance, he could not determine upon flight. He might possibly have saved himself by taking the now freed animal which the, landlord had ridden, and at once burying himself in the nation. But the n.o.ble weakness of pity determined him otherwise; and, without scruple or fear, he resolutely advanced to the spot wh.o.r.e Munro lay, though full in the sight of the pursuers, and prepared to render him what a.s.sistance he could. One of the troopers, in the meantime, had swum the river; and, freeing the flat from its chains, had directed it across the stream for the pa.s.sage of his companions. It was not long before they had surrounded the fugitives, and Ralph Colleton was again a prisoner, and once more made conscious of the dreadful doom from which he had, at one moment, almost conceived himself to have escaped.
Munro had been shockingly wounded. One ball had pierced his thigh, inflicting a severe, though probably not a fatal wound. Another, and this had been enough, had penetrated directly behind the eyes, keeping its course so truly across, as to tear and turn the b.l.o.o.d.y orbs completely out upon the cheek beneath. The first words of the dying man were--
"Is the moon gone down--lights--bring lights!"
"No, Munro; the moon is still shining without a cloud, and as brightly as if it were day" was the reply of Ralph.
"Who speaks--speak again, that I may know how to believe him."
"It is I, Munro--I, Ralph Colleton."
"Then it is true--and I am a dead man. It is all over, and he came not to me for nothing. Yet, can I have no lights--no lights?--Ah!" and the half-reluctant reason grew more terribly conscious of his situation, as he thrust his fingers into the bleeding sockets from which the fine and delicate conductor of light had been so suddenly driven. He howled aloud for several moments in his agony--in the first agony which came with that consciousness--but, recovering, at length, he spoke with something of calm and coherence.
"Well, Mr. Colleton, what I said was true. I knew it would be so. I had warning enough to prepare, and I did try, but it"s come over soon and nothing is done. I have my wages, and the text spoke nothing but the truth. I can not stand this pain long--it is too much--and--"
The pause in his speech, from extreme agony, was filled up by a shriek that rung fearfully amid the silence of such a scene, but it lasted not long. The mind of the landlord was not enfeebled by his weakness, even at such a moment. He recovered and proceeded:--
"Yes, Mr. Colleton, I am a dead man. I have my wages--but my death is your life! Let me tell the story--and save you, and save Lucy--and thus--(oh, could I believe it for an instant)--save myself! But, no matter--we must talk of other things. Is that Brooks--is that Brooks beside me?"
"No, it is I--Colleton."
"I know--I know," impatiently--"who else?"
"Mr. Brooks, the jailer, is here--Ensign Martin and Brincle, of the Georgia guard," was the reply of the jailer.
"Enough, then, for your safety, Mr. Colleton. They can prove it all, and then remember Lucy--poor Lucy! You will be in time--save her from Guy Rivers--Guy Rivers--the wretch--not Guy Rivers--no--there"s a secret--there"s a secret for you, my men, shall bring you a handsome reward. Stoop--stoop, you three--where are you?--stoop, and hear what I have to say! It is my dying word!-and I swear it by all things, all powers, all terrors, that can make an oath solemn with a wretch whose life is a long crime! Stoop--hear me--heed all--lose not a word--not a word--not a word! Where are you?"
"We are here, beside you--we hear all that you say. Go on!"
"Guy Rivers is not his name--he is not Guy Rivers--hear now--Guy Rivers is the outlaw for whom the governor"s proclamation gives a high reward--a thousand dollars--the man who murdered Judge Jessup. Edward Creighton, of Gwinnett courthouse--he is the murderer of Jessup--he is the murderer of Forrester, for whose death the life of Mr. Colleton here is forfeit! I saw him kill them both!--I saw more than that, but that is enough to save the innocent man and punish the guilty! Take down all that I have said. I, too, am guilty! would make amends, but it is almost too late--the night is very dark, and the earth swings about like a cradle. Ah!--have you taken down on paper what I said? I will tell you nothing more till all is written--write it down--on-paper--every word--write that before I say any more!"
They complied with his requisition. One of the troopers, on a sheet of paper furnished by the jailer, and placed upon the saddle of his horse, standing by in the pale light of the moon, recorded word after word, with scrupulous exactness, of the dying man"s confession. He proceeded duly to the narration of every particular of all past occurrences, as we ourselves have already detailed them to the reader, together with many more, unnecessary to our narrative, of which we had heretofore no cognizance. When this was done, the landlord required it to be read, commenting, during its perusal, and dwelling, with more circ.u.mstantial minuteness, upon many of its parts.
"That will do--that will do! Now swear me, Brooks!--you are in the commission--lift my hand and swear me, so that nothing be wanting to the truth! What if there is no bible?" he exclaimed, suddenly, as some one of the individuals present suggested a difficulty on this subject.
"What!--because there is no bible, shall there be no truth? I swear--though I have had no communion with G.o.d--I swear to the truth--by him! Write down my oath--he is present--they say he is always present! I believe it now--I only wish I had always believed it! I swear by him--he will not falsify the truth!--write down my oath, while I lift my hand to him! Would it were a prayer--but I can not pray--I am more used to oaths than prayers, and I can not pray! Is it written--is it written? Look, Mr. Colleton, look--you know the law. If you are satisfied, I am. Will it do?"
Colleton replied quickly in the affirmative, and the dying man went on:--
"Remember Lucy--the poor Lucy! You will take care of her. Say no harsh words in her ears--but, why should I ask this of you, whom--Ah!--it goes round--round--round--swimming--swimming. Very dark--very dark night, and the trees dance--Lucy--"
The voice sunk into a faint whisper whose sounds were unsyllabled--an occasional murmur escaped them once after, in which the name of his niece was again heard; exhibiting, at the last, the affection, however latent, which he entertained in reality for the orphan trust of his brother. In a few moments, and the form stiffened before them in all the rigid sullenness of death.
CHAPTER XL.
WOLF"S NECK--CAPTURE.
The cupidity of his captors had been considerably stimulated by the dying words of Munro. They were all of them familiar with the atrocious murder which, putting a price upon his head, had driven Creighton, then a distinguished member of the bar in one of the more civilized portions of the state, from the pale and consideration of society; and their anxieties were now entirely addressed to the new object which the recital they had just heard had suggested to them. They had gathered from the narrative of the dying man some idea of the place in which they would most probably find the outlaw; and, though without a guide to the spot, and altogether ignorant of its localities, they determined--without reference to others, who might only subtract from their own share of the promised reward, without contributing much, if any, aid, which they might not easily dispense with--at once to attempt his capture. This was the joint understanding of the whole party, Ralph Colleton excepted.
In substance, the youth was now free. The evidence furnished by Munro only needed the recognition of the proper authorities to make him so; yet, until this had been effected, he remained in a sort of understood restraint, but without any actual limitations. Pledging himself that they should suffer nothing from the indulgence given him, he mounted the horse of Munro, whose body was cared for, and took his course back to the village; while, following the directions given them, the guard and jailer pursued their way to the Wolf"s Neck in their search after Guy Rivers.
The outlaw had been deserted by nearly all his followers. The note of preparation and pursuit, sounded by the state authorities, had inspired the depredators with a degree of terror, which the near approximation of the guard, in strong numbers, to their most secluded places, had not a little tended to increase; and accordingly, at the period of which we now speak, the outlaw, deserted by all but one or two of the most daring of his followers--who were, however, careful enough of themselves to keep in no one place long, and cautiously to avoid their accustomed haunts--remained in his rock, in a state of gloomy despondency, not usually his characteristic. Had he been less stubborn, less ready to defy all chances and all persons, it is not improbable that Rivers would have taken counsel by their flight, and removed himself, for a time at least, from the scene of danger. But his native obstinacy, and that madness of heart which, as we are told, seizes first upon him whom G.o.d seeks to destroy, determined him, against the judgment of others, and in part against his own, to remain where he was; probably in the fallacious hope that the storm would pa.s.s over, as on so many previous occasions it had already done, and leave him again free to his old practices in the same region. A feeling of pride, which made him unwilling to take a suggestion of fear and flight from the course of others, had some share in this decision; and, if we add the vague hungering of his heart toward the lovely Edith, and possibly the influence of other pledges, and the imposing consideration of other duties, we shall not be greatly at a loss in understanding the injudicious indifference to the threatening dangers which appears to have distinguished the conduct of the otherwise politic and circ.u.mspect ruffian.
That night, after his return from the village, and the brief dialogue with Chub Williams, as we have already narrated it he retired to the deepest cell of his den, and, throwing himself into a seat, covering his face with his hands, he gave himself up to a meditation as true in its philosophy as it was humiliating throughout in its application to himself. Dillon, his lieutenant--if such a t.i.tle may be permitted in such a place, and for such a person--came to him shortly after his arrival, and in brief terms, with a blunt readiness--which, coming directly to the point, did not offend the person to whom it was addressed--demanded to know what he meant to do with himself.
"We can"t stay here any longer," said he; "the troops are gathering all round us. The country"s alive with them, and in a few days we shouldn"t be able to stir from the hollow of a tree without popping into the gripe of some of our hunters. In the Wolf"s Neck they will surely seek us; for, though a very fine place for us while the country"s thin, yet even its old owners, the wolves, would fly from it when the horn of the hunter rings through the wood. It won"t be very long before they pierce to the very "nation," and then we should have but small chance of a long grace. Jack Ketch would make mighty small work of our necks, in his hurry to go to dinner."
"And what of all this--what is all this to me?" was the strange and rather phlegmatic response of the outlaw, who did not seem to take in the full meaning of his officer"s speech, and whose mind, indeed, was at that moment wandering to far other considerations. Dillon seemed not a little surprised by this reply, and looked inquiringly into the face of the speaker, doubting for a moment his accustomed sanity. The stern look which his glance encountered directed its expression elsewhere, and, after a moment"s pause, he replied--
"Why, captain, you can"t have thought of what I"ve been saying, or you wouldn"t speak as you do. I think it"s a great deal to both you and me, what I"ve been telling you; and the sooner you come to think so too, the better. It"s only yesterday afternoon that I narrowly missed being seen at the forks by two of the guard, well mounted, and with rifles. I had but the crook of the fork in my favor, and the hollow of the creek at the old ford where it"s been washed away. They"re all round us, and I don"t think we"re safe here another day. Indeed, I only come to see if you wouldn"t be off with me, at once, into the "nation.""
"You are considerate, but must go alone. I have no apprehensions where I am, and shall not stir for the present. For yourself, you must determine as you think proper. I have no further hold on your service. I release you from the oath. Make the best of your way into the "nation"--ay, go yet farther; and, hear me, Dillon, go where you are unknown--go where you can enter society; seek for the fireside, where you can have those who, in the dark hour, will have no wish to desert you. I have no claim now upon you, and the sooner you "take the range" the better."
"And why not go along with me, captain? I hate to go alone, and hate to leave you where you are. I shan"t think you out of danger while you stay here, and don"t see any reason for you to do so."
"Perhaps not, Dillon; but there is reason, or I should not stay. We may not go together, even if I were to fly--our paths lie asunder. They may never more be one. Go you, therefore, and heed me not; and think of me no more. Make yourself a home in the Mississippi, or on the Red river, and get yourself a fireside and family of your own. These are the things that will keep your heart warm within you, cheering you in hours that are dark, like this."
"And why, captain," replied the lieutenant, much affected--"why should you not take the course which you advise for me? Why not, in the Arkansas, make yourself a home, and with a wife--"
"Silence, sir!--not a word of that! Why come you to chafe me here in my den? Am I to be haunted for ever with such as you, and with words like these?" and the brow of the outlaw blackened as he spoke, and his white teeth knit together, fiercely gnashing for an instant, while the foam worked its way through the occasional aperture between them. The ebullition of pa.s.sion, however, lasted not long, and the outlaw himself, a moment after, seemed conscious of its injustice.
"I do you wrong, Dillon; but on this subject I will have no one speak. I can not be the man you would have me; I have been schooled otherwise. My mother has taught me a different lesson; her teachings have doomed me, and these enjoyments are now all beyond my hope."
"Your mother?" was the response of Dillon, in unaffected astonishment.
"Ay, man--my mother! Is there anything wonderful in that? She taught me the love of evil with her milk--she sang it in lullabies over my cradle--she gave it me in the playthings of my boyhood; her schoolings have made me the morbid, the fierce criminal, the wilful, vexing spirit, from whose a.s.sociation all the gentler virtues must always desire to fly. If, in the doom which may finish my life of doom, I have any one person to accuse of all, that person is--my mother!"
"Is this possible? Can it be true? It is strange--very strange!"
"It is not strange; we see it every day--in almost every family. She, did not _tell_ me to lie, or to swindle, or to stab--no! oh, no! she would have told me that all these things were bad; but she _taught_ me to perform them all. She roused my pa.s.sions, and not my _principles_, into activity. She provoked the one, and suppressed the other. Did my father reprove my improprieties, she petted me, and denounced him. She crossed his better purposes, and defeated all his designs, until, at last, she made my pa.s.sions too strong for my government, not less than hers; and left me, knowing the true, yet the victim of the false. Thus it was that, while my intellect, in its calmer hours, taught me that virtue is the only source of true felicity, my ungovernable pa.s.sions set the otherwise sovereign reason at defiance, and trampled it under foot.
Yes, in that last hour of eternal retribution, if called upon to denounce or to accuse, I can point but to one as the author of all--the weakly-fond, misjudging, misguiding woman who gave me birth!
"Within the last hour I have been thinking over all these things. I have been thinking how I had been cursed in childhood by one who surely loved me beyond all other things besides. I can remember how sedulously she encouraged and prompted my infant pa.s.sions, uncontrolled by her authority and reason, and since utterly unrestrainable by my own. How she stimulated me to artifices, and set me the example herself, by frequently deceiving my father, and teaching me to disobey and deceive him! She told me not to lie; and she lied all day to him, on my account, and to screen me from his anger. She taught me the catechism, to say on Sunday, while during the week she schooled me in almost every possible form of ingenuity to violate all its precepts. She bribed me to do my duty, and hence my duty could only be done under the stimulating promise of a reward; and, without the reward, I went counter to the duty. She taught me that G.o.d was superior to all, and that he required obedience to certain laws; yet, as she hourly violated those laws herself in my behalf, I was taught to regard myself as far superior to him! Had she not done all this, I had not been here and thus: I had been what now I dare not think on. It is all her work. The greatest enemy my life has ever known has been my mother!"
"This is a horrible thought, captain; yet I can not but think it true."
"It is true! I have a.n.a.lyzed my own history, and the causes of my character and fortunes now, and I charge it all upon her. From one influence I have traced another, and another, until I have the sweeping amount of twenty years of crime and sorrow, and a life of hate, and probably a death of ignominy--all owing to the first ten years of my infant education, where the only teacher that I knew was the woman who gave me birth!--But this concerns not you. In my calm mood, Dillon, you have the fruit of my reason: to abide its dictate, I should fly with you; but I suffer from my mother"s teachings even in this. My pa.s.sions, my pride, my fierce hope--the creature of a maddening pa.s.sion--will not let me fly; and I stay, though I stay alone, with a throat bare for the knife of the butcher, or the halter of the hangman. I will not fly!"
"And I will stay with you. I can dare something, too, captain; and you shall not say, when the worst comes to the worst, that Tom Dillon was the man to back out. I will not go either, and, whatever is the chance, you shall not be alone."
Rivers, for a moment, seemed touched by the devotion, of his follower, and was silent for a brief interval; but suddenly the expression of his eye was changed, and he spoke briefly and sternly:--