At any other time these pious sentiments would have brought a volley of laughter from Blatchley, but this evening Judith judged from the sounds that he clapped the fat man on the shoulder as he said heartily:
"Mighty right you air, James Calhoun. Unc" Jep is one of the finest men that ever ate bread, but his day is pretty well over. Ef we went by him and old man Broyles and Hawk and Chantry, we"d find ourselves in trouble mighty shortly. They"s but one way to toll Bonbright out to whar we want him. We"ve got to send word that Unc" Jep will meet him at moonrise and talk to him. The fool is plumb crazy about talkin" to folks, and looks like he cain"t get it through his head that Unc" Jep ain"t his best friend. It"ll fetch him whar nothin" else will."
"And we"ve got to hunt up something else for you to ride, Blatch, ef Jim Cal an" me takes the mules," Jeff remarked. "Jude mighty nigh tore up the ground when she found we"d had Selim last night. She give it out to each and every that n.o.body is to lay a hand on him day or night from this on."
The girl outside heard Blatch"s hateful laugh, and knew with a great throb of rage who had ridden her horse the night before.
There was a stir among the men seated, Judith conjectured, on the grain-room floor, and a little clinking, as the jug of corn whiskey was once more brought into play by Blatch. Presently,
"All right," said Buck Shalliday. "I"ll bring Lige"s mule. And I"ll have a message got to Bonbright that Jephthah Turrentine wants to see and talk with him out at Todd"s corner at moonrise a-Monday night. Will that suit ye?"
"Hit"ll answer," returned Blatch. "Let"s see," he calculated; "that"ll be about two o"clock. Ef he comes up to the scratch we"ll git Mr. Man as he goes by the big rock in the holler acrosst from the spring. That rock and the bushes by it gives plenty of cover. They"s bound to be light enough to see him by, with the moon jest coming up, and I want to hear from every man present that he"ll shoot at the word. I don"t want any feller in the crowd that"ll say he didn"t pull trigger on Bonbright. Ef we all aim and shoot, nary a one of us can say who killed him--and killed he"s got to be."
The listening girl hoped for some demur, but Blatch Turrentine and his potent counsellor, the jug, dominated the a.s.sembly, and there came a striking of hands on this, a hoa.r.s.e murmuring growl of agreement. She doubled low to avoid being seen against the sky and hurried back toward the cabin as she heard the men preparing to leave the grain-room.
Brave as any one of them there, enterprising and full of the spirit of leadership, Judith addressed herself promptly to saving Creed Bonbright.
She went straight to her uncle"s cabin. No mountaineer ever raps on a door. Judith shook the latch, at first gently, then, getting no response, more and more imperatively, at length opening and walking in, with a questioning, "Uncle Jep?"
There was no answer, no sound or movement. With hasty fingers she raked together the brands of the fire; they flickered up and showed her an untenanted room. The bed was untouched, the old man"s hat and coat were gone. The pegs above the door where Old Sister always rested were empty.
Instantly there flashed upon Judith the intuition that her uncle, heartsick and ill-affected toward the quarrel, had silently withdrawn until it should have been settled one way or another. Well, she must work alone.
Chapter XVI
A Message
When Judith stole noiselessly into the house and up to her room, she could hear the boys preparing for bed in their own quarters, with unwonted jesting and laughter, and even some occasional stamping about which suggested horse-play; and her lip curled angrily as she recalled Blatch"s jug of corn whiskey.
She lay thinking, thinking; and at length there evolved itself in her mind a plan for getting Creed safely out of the mountains by way of an ancient Cherokee trail that ran down the gulch through a distant corner of the old Turrentine place. By this route they would reach the railroad town of Garyville, quite around the flank of Big Turkey Track from Hepzibah. She could do that. She knew every step of the way. The trail was a disused, forgotten route of travel, long fenced across in several places, and scoured out of existence at certain points by mountain streams; but she had known every foot of it in years past; she could travel it the darkest night; and Selim was her own horse; she need ask n.o.body.
When she got so far, came the pressing question of how to send word to Creed. She must see and warn him before the men put their plan into practice. But she was well aware that she herself was under fairly close espionage, and that her first move in the direction of Nancy Card"s cabin would bring the vague suspicions of her household to a certainty. Where to find a messenger? How to so word a message that Creed would answer it?
These were the questions that drove sleep from her pillow till almost morning.
She rose and faced the dawn with haggard eyes. Unless she could do something this was the last day of Creed"s life. In a tremor of apprehension she got through her morning duties, cooking and serving a breakfast to the three boys, who made no comment on their father"s absence, and whose curious looks she was aware of upon her averted face, her down-dropped eyelids. She felt alone indeed, with her uncle gone, and the boys who had been as brothers to her almost since babyhood suddenly become strangers, their interests and hers hostile, destructive to each other.
Woman will go to woman in a pinch like this, and in spite of her repugnance at the thought of Huldah, Judith late in the afternoon made her way over to the Jim Cal cabin and asked concerning its mistress"
toothache.
"Hit"s better," said Iley briefly. Her head was tied up in a medley of cloths and smelled loud of turpentine, camphor, and a lingering bouquet of a.s.safoetida. She was not a hopeful individual to enlist in a chivalrous enterprise.
"Huldy git back yet?" Judith asked finally.
"No, an" she needn"t never git back," snapped Iley. "Her and Creed Bonbright kin make out best they may. I don"t know as I mind her bein"
broke off with Wade. One Turrentine in the fambly"s enough fer me."
"Air her and Creed Bonbright goin" to be wedded?" inquired Judith scarcely above her breath.
"_Air_ they?" echoed Xantippe, settling her hands on her hips and surveying Judith with an angry stare, the dignity of which was sadly impaired by a yellow flannel cloth-end which persisted in dabbling in her eye. "Well, I should hope so! I don"t know what gals is comin" to in this day an" time--follerin" "round after the young men like you do. Ef I"d a"
done so when I was a gal my mammy"d have took a hickory to me. That"s what she would. Here"s Jim Cal be"n rarin" around here like a chicken with its head off "caze Huldy run away with Creed Bonbright, and here _you_ air askin" me do I think Creed and Huldy is apt to marry. What kind of women do ye "low the Spiller gals is, anyhow?"
Judith turned away from so unpromising an ally. She was accused of running after Creed Bonbright. When he got her message it would be with Huldah Spiller beside him to help him read it. The thought was bitter. It gave that pa.s.sionate heart of hers a deadly qualm; but she put it down and rose above it. Huldah or no Huldah, she could not let him die and make no effort.
Leaving Jim Cal"s cabin she walked out into the woods, and only as she turned at the edge of the clearing and looked back to find Iley furtively peering after her from the corner of the house did she realise that the woman"s words had been dictated because she had been taken into the confidence of the men and set to keep an eye on Judith.
At the conviction a feeling of terror began to gain ground. She was like a creature enmeshed in a net weak in its cordage, but many-stranded and hampering; turn whichever way she would some petty restriction met her.
She moved aimlessly forward, reasonably sure that she was not followed or observed, since she was going away from rather than toward the Card place. About a mile from the cabin of old Hannah Updegrove, a weaver of rag carpet, she suddenly came upon two little creatures sitting at a tree-foot playing about one of those druidical-looking structures that the childhood of the man and the childhood of the race alike produce. It was Little Buck and Beezy come to spend the day with old Hannah who, on their father"s side, was kin of theirs, and making rock play-houses in the tree-roots to put over the time. Judith ran to the children, gathered them close, and hugged them to her with whispered endearments in which some tears mingled.
Then for half an hour followed the schooling of Little Buck for the message which he was to carry, and which Beezy must be so diverted that she would not even hear.
Judith plaited gra.s.s bracelets for the fat little wrists, fashioned bonnets of oak leaves, pinning them together with gra.s.s stems, and then sending Beezy far afield to gather flowers for their tr.i.m.m.i.n.g. On long journeys the little feet trudged, to where the beautiful, frail, white meadow lilies rose in clumps from the lush gra.s.s of the lowlands. She fetched cardinal flowers from the mud and shallow water beyond them, or brought black-eyed Susans from the sun of open s.p.a.ces. And during these expeditions Judith"s catechism of the boy went on.
"How you goin" to git home, Little Buck?"
"Pappy"s a-comin" by to fetch us."
"When?"
"A little befo" sundown?"
"You goin" straight home?"
"Yes, Jude, we" goin" straight home to Granny, why?"
"Never mind, honey. Is Creed there at yo" house?"
A silent nod.
"Is--honey, tell Jude the truth--is it true that he ain"t bad hurt? Could he ride a nag?"
Little Buck looked all around him, drew close to his big sweetheart, and pulled her down that he might whisper in her ear.
"I know somethin" that Granny and Creed don"t know I know, but I mus"n"t tell it to anybody--only thest you. Creed--no, he ain"t so awful bad hurt--he walks everywheres most--he"s a-goin" to take the old nag and go over to Todd"s corner to see yo" Unc" Jep, about moonrise to-night. They said that--Granny an" Creed. An" they fussed. Granny, she don"t want him to go; but Creed, he thest will--he"s bull-headed, Creed is."
Judith caught her breath. They had got the message to him then, and he was going. Well, her appointment with him must be first.
"Little Buck, honey, ef you love me don"t you forget one word I say to you now," she whispered chokingly, holding the child by both hands.
He rounded eyes of solemn adoration and acquiescence upon her.
"You say to Creed Bonbright that Judith Barrier says he must come to her at the foot of Foeman"s Bluff--on yon side--as soon after dark as he can git there. Tell him to come straight through by the short cut; hit"ll be safe; n.o.body"ll ever study about him comin" in this direction. As soon after hit"s plumb dark as he can git there--will ye say that? Will ye sh.o.r.e tell Creed an" never tell n.o.body but Creed?"
"But he won"t go," said Little Buck wisely. "Granny"s scared to have him go to talk to yo" Unc" Jep, but she"d be a heap scareder to have him come to you, "caze you" one o" the Turrentines too--ain"t ye, Judith?"
Judith"s face whitened at the weakness of her position.