Kitabı oku: «Campaigning with Crook, and Stories of Army Life», sayfa 14
CHAPTER IV
A week passed, and with no tidings of him. Detectives had been scouring the country in every direction. A man answering his description was arrested in Chicago, and turned out to be somebody else. A dozen times it was reported that now the sleuth-hounds of the law had run down their victim, but the entire month of July passed away, and the community had gradually settled down to the belief that Graham had made good his escape and taken with him some five hundred dollars of his murdered master's money.
Old Morrow had been duly and reverently buried. A younger brother from a distant state came to the scene as executor of the will, in conjunction with Mr. Lowrie, and under his management the mill resumed its functions for the benefit of the estate. Except some legacies to this brother and to the sister who had taken charge of Nellie and his household, old Morrow had left his property, valued at over forty thousand dollars, to be divided equally between his two children should Sam reappear; but if proof of his death were obtained, his share was to go to Nellie.
A week after the funeral, acting on the advice of the minister and the village doctor, Nellie's relatives sent her to Chicago. She had suffered greatly in health, and was in a condition of nervous depression. Whenever Dick's crime was mentioned in her presence, she would vehemently assert her belief in his innocence, and then shudderingly accuse herself, with piteous crying, of being the cause of all his trouble, and perhaps of her father's death. Another thing. She who had plainly shown herself fascinated by Mr. Frost's many graces and attractions during the preceding winter, now refused to see him. He hung around the house, full of respectful sympathy and lover-like interest, but was visibly chagrined at her persistent avoidance. To the minister she confessed that she had been greatly interested in Frost – perhaps a little in love with him; he flattered and delighted her, and it made Dick jealous. She didn't know how or why she so encouraged him, but she had, and now she shrank from seeing him at all. Her deep affliction would excuse it.
A week after she left for Chicago Mr. Frost concluded that he would go thither himself. The new master needed no bookkeeper, he said, and Frost was too fine a gentleman to do Dick's work around the mill. He was neither invited to go nor to stay. He was allowed to go and come without apparent let or hindrance, yet, before the train which bore him away was well out of sight, a new farm-hand, who worked at odd jobs around a neighboring place on the lake, suddenly entered the railway station, wrote ten hurried words on a telegraph-blank, and handed it to the operator, whereupon the operator gazed at him in quick surprise, then whistled softly to himself, nodded appreciatively, and clicked away the message, with the addition of a cabalistic "Rush," and Mr. Frost's train was boarded at Milwaukee by a number of people who took no special note of him, and by one man who never lost sight of him from that moment until he locked his bedroom door behind him at night.
Then the minister received a call from the new farm-hand, who brought with him a young man who worked on a place over near Eagle Prairie, a railway station some distance off to the southwest. This young man had spent Sunday calling on a sweetheart in 'Mahbin, and had started about 7.30 p.m. to walk to the large town seven miles away, where he would take the cars homeward. He saw Nellie, her aunt, and a young man driving into town, and by eight o'clock he himself was passing the mill. It was just growing dark, so that he could not distinguish faces, but he saw two men standing by the office – one short, stout, and elderly, the other tall and slender and straight. The older man was talking furiously and angrily; heard him say, "I told you an hour ago to keep away from me. You have lied to me right along. You are a thief and a scoundrel, I believe, and you are a damned coward and deserter – a deserter, by God! and I've got the papers to prove it!"
What the tall man said he could not hear. He spoke low – seemed to be arguing with the old man, begging him to be quiet, and they went into the office. Then the young man walked on a few hundred yards, when it came on to rain very hard, and he stopped and took shelter under a little fishing-shed there was right at the edge of the lake. The rain held up in fifteen minutes, and he started on again over the causeway, "and hadn't more'n got a rod" when he heard what sounded like a pistol-shot back at the mill. He stopped short and listened two minutes, but heard nothing more, so went on and thought no more of it until he heard of the murder – but that was not until a week after it happened, when he came up from the farm to Eagle village and heard people talking about it.
But with the first week in August came exciting news. Far to the northwest across the Missouri, Dick Graham had been traced and followed by a Wisconsin detective, who found him in the uniform of the regular army, just marching off with his comrades to join General Terry's forces, then in the field up the Yellowstone. In his possession was the Avenger revolver and over one hundred dollars in greenbacks. On two five-dollar bills there was a broad and ugly stain, which microscopic examination proved to be blood. Graham appeared utterly stunned at the arrest; expressed the greatest grief and horror at hearing of the murder of Mr. Morrow, and professed his entire willingness to go back and stand trial. The story of his "escape" to that distance was now easily told. The detectives had speedily satisfied themselves he had got away on none of the regular trains that week, but one bright fellow had learned that four cars full of troops had passed west late that Sunday night, and followed the clue. They had gone through to Bismarck – a tedious journey in '76 – and thither he followed. Thence the troops had gone by boat up the Missouri, and he took the first opportunity that came – and the next boat going up. At Fort Buford he "sighted" his man, told his story to the commanding officer of the post, who sent for the officers of the troops with whom poor Dick was serving. They promptly asserted that their first knowledge of him was on the Monday they reached St. Paul, when a sergeant brought him to them, saying he begged to be allowed to enlist and go with them. He told a perfectly straight story; said he was an orphan, unmarried, had been a miller, but was tired of small wages, hard work, and no hopes of getting ahead, and had made up his mind to get into the regulars. Was at the railway station at midnight when the train was side-tracked to allow another to pass, and appealed to the sergeant of the guard to take him along; said he would pay his way until they could enlist him, and as he was a likely fellow they were glad to have him. He had won everybody's respect in the short time he was with them, and the whole command seemed thunderstruck to hear of the allegations against him.
The detective and his prisoner were put on a boat going back to Bismarck, and on that same boat, returning, wounded and furloughed, was a sergeant of the Seventh Cavalry – a gallant fellow who had fought under Benteen and McDougall on the bluffs of the Little Horn, after Custer's command had been surrounded and slaughtered four miles farther down stream. The sergeant kept to his room and bunk until they got to Bismarck, but the detectives had a chance to see and talk with him – and so had Graham.
It was an eventful day when the detective and his prisoner reached Nemahbin. The minister was there to meet him, as was Mr. Lowrie, and the entire male population of the neighborhood. There was no disorder or turbulence. Dick was quietly escorted to a room in the constable's house – they had no jail – and there that night he had a long conference with the minister and other prominent citizens. The minister drove home quite late – but very much later, along towards two in the morning, in fact, he was at the railway station and received in his buggy the single passenger who alighted from the night express.
Next day there was a gathering at the mayor's office – an apartment in the municipal residence devoted to dining-room duty three times a day, and opening into the kitchen on the one hand, into the hallway on another, and into the village post-office on the third. Here sat Mr. Lowrie, the doctor, the constable, other local celebrities, and one or two distinguished importations from Milwaukee. Here was the minister, looking singularly wide-awake, lively, and brisk for a man who had been up all night; here, too, sat the farm-hand who sent the cabalistic despatch when Frost went to Chicago, and the young man who heard the conversation down at the mill that Sunday night; here, too, sat Dick, looking pale but tranquil, and hither, too, presently came Mr. Frost, looking ghastly pale and very far from tranquil. Dick looked squarely at him as he entered, but Frost glanced rapidly about the room, eagerly nodding to one man after another, but avoiding Dick entirely. Then followed an impressive silence.
Outside, the August sun was streaming hotly down upon the heads of an intensely curious and interested throng; inside there was for the moment no sound but the humming of a thousand flies, or the nervous scraping of a boot over the uncarpeted floor. Then the mayor whispered a few words to the minister, who nodded to Mr. Morrow, the surviving brother, and then Mr. Morrow stepped into the hallway leading to the mayor's parlor, and presently reappeared at the doorway, and quietly said, "All right."
All eyes turned to glance at him at this moment, but, beyond his square, squat figure, nothing in the darkened hallway was visible. Then the mayor cleared his throat and began:
"By the consent of the proper authorities the prisoner, accused of the murder of the late Samuel Morrow, has been brought here instead of to the county town, for reasons that will appear hereafter. Graham, you have desired to hear the evidence of Mr. Frost, one of the principal witnesses against you at the time of the discovery of the murder. The clerk will now read it."
And read it the clerk did, in monotonous singsong. Graham sat clinching his fists and his teeth, and looking straight at Frost as the reading was finished. The latter, uneasily shifting in his chair, still looked anywhere else around the room.
"Do you wish to say anything, Graham?" asked the mayor, in answer to the appeal in Dick's eyes.
"I do, sir. That statement is a lie almost from beginning to end. I had no quarrel, no words with Mr. Morrow that Sunday evening – never spoke to him at all. It was Frost himself who was with him at the mill before supper. As to the rest of the evening I know nothing of what happened. When I got home, and put up the horse and buggy, it must have been long after ten. Then I found the east door of the mill was open, and went in and found everything dark and quiet; came out and locked the door (but never went into the office), and took the key up to the mill-house, and hung it up on the hook in the hall. I supposed Mr. Morrow was asleep in bed. Then I went home and burned some old letters and papers and packed some things in my bag. I was going away for good – I've told the doctor and the minister why – they know well enough – and I called Frost; he owed me twenty dollars, and I needed it, and woke him up, if he was asleep, and asked him for it, and the very money he gave me was in those five-dollar bills. I never burned my overalls. I did lose my handkerchief somewhere about the house that night, and never missed it until I was gone; and I never had my revolver until just before I took my bag and started, and never knew until days afterwards – way up the Northern Pacific – that one of the chambers was emptied. As for the murder, I never heard of it until I was arrested."
"Mr. Frost," said the mayor, "you made no mention in your evidence of paying money to the prisoner."
"Certainly not," said Frost, promptly, but his eyes glittered, and his face was white as a sheet. "Nothing of the kind happened. That money came direct from the mill safe."
"How do you know?"
"Well – of course – I don't know that; but it is my belief."
"Mr. Frost, there was no mention in your testimony of a violent altercation between yourself and the late Mr. Morrow at the mill that evening after Graham came in town with the ladies. Why did you omit that?"
He was livid now, and the strong, white hands were twitching nervously. All eyes were fastened upon him as he stood confronting the mayor, his back towards the hallway, where, in grim silence, stood Mr. Morrow.
"I know of no such altercation," he stammered.
"Were you ever accused of being a deserter from the army?"
Every one saw the nervous start he gave, but, though haggard and wild, he stuck to his false colors.
"Never, sir."
"That's a lie," said a deep voice out in the hall, and at the unconventional interruption there was a general stir. Men leaned forward and craned their necks to peer behind Mr. Morrow, who stood there immovable.
"Order, gentlemen, if you please," said Mr. Lowrie.
"Then how and where did you know Sam Morrow, as you convinced his father you did?"
"I? – out in Arizona, where I was mining."
"Why did you not fulfil your promise, as you said you could and would?"
"I couldn't. That was what made the old man down on me. I did believe last winter I could find Sam and get him home, but I could not bear to tell the old man he was killed with General Custer."
"That's another lie!" came from the hallway, and, brushing past Mr. Morrow's squat figure, there strode into the room a tall, bronzed-faced, soldierly fellow in the undress uniform of a sergeant of cavalry.
Men sprang to their feet and fairly shouted. Old Doctor Green threw his arms about the soldier's neck in the excess of his joy. There was a rush forward from the post-office doorway to greet him, a cry of "Sam Morrow!" and then another cry – a yell – a scurry and crash at the kitchen entrance. "Quick! Head him off! Catch him!" were the cries, and then came a dash into the open air.
With a spring like that of a panther Frost had leaped into the unguarded kitchen, thence to the fence beyond, and now was running like a deer through the quiet village street towards the railway. A hundred men were in pursuit in a moment, and in that open country there was no shelter for skulking criminal, no lair in which he could hide till night. In half an hour, exhausted, half dead with terror and despair, the wretched man was dragged back, and now, limp and dejected, cowered in the presence of his accusers.
CHAPTER V
Sam Morrow told his story in a few words. He had served in the Seventh Cavalry for five years under the name of Samuel Moore, and two years before, while with his troop on the Yellowstone, the man calling himself Frost was a sergeant in another company. He was only a short time in the regiment, but his fine appearance, intelligence, and education led to his speedy appointment as sergeant, and as Sergeant Farrand he had been for a few months a popular and respected man; but as soon as they got back to winter-quarters he turned out to be a gambler, then a swindler and card-sharper. He lost the respect of both officers and men, got into a gambling-scrape with some teamsters in Bismarck, was locked up by the civil authorities, and, after a series of troubles of that description, deserted the service in the Black Hills the summer of '75, taking three horses with him, and that was the last seen of him until now. Sam had been shot in the arm in the fight of the 25th of June, after the Indians had butchered Custer's part of the regiment, and now, having served out his time, was once more home, with an honorable discharge and a certificate of high character from his officers.
In substantiation of Sam's story, Mr. Morrow exhibited two letters which he had found among his brother's papers. They were from the adjutant of the Seventh Cavalry, in reply, evidently, to inquiries which old Morrow had instituted in May, and the second one contained a description of Frost as the soldier Farrand, which tallied exactly.
"And now, Frost, what have you to say as to the murder?" was the next question; and, cowering and abject, the wretch sat with bowed head and trembling limbs, gasping, "I did not do it, I did not do it." But this Nemahbin would believe no longer. There was a wild cry of "Hang him!" from the excited crowd in the street, and then came a scene. Peaceful and law-abiding as had been the community, it turned in almost savage fury upon the scoundrel who had sought to charge his own crime upon an innocent and long-respected citizen. A dozen resolute men leaped through the post-office to the doorway of the inner room, but there they halted. Between them and the cowering form of Frost stood the tall figure of Sam Morrow, his eyes ablaze, his mouth set and stern, his left arm in a sling, but in his right hand a levelled revolver.
"Back, every man of you!" he said. "He killed my father, but, by God, it has got to be a fair trial!" Lowrie, the doctor, and the detective were at his back, and Nemahbin hesitated, thought better of its mad impulse, and retired. That night Frost lay behind the prison bars, accused of an array of crimes, with cold-blooded murder as the climax, and Sam Morrow, Dick Graham, and Nellie met once more at the old home.
In less than a month Frost's last hope had gone. Whether his pluck and nerve had given out entirely, whether the rapid accumulation of damaging evidence had made him fearful that even hanging would be too good for him if all his past were "ferreted out," as now seemed likely, or whether he hoped, by confession, to gain mercy, is not known; but, before his trial, he made full admission of his guilt. He had come to Nemahbin hoping to get such a hold on the old man by telling him he could find Sam that he would be welcomed, and allowed to prosecute his suit with Nellie, who was plainly fascinated. If he could gain her love and her hand, he might settle down, be respectable on old Morrow's money, and then, even if Sam did come home, he would not be apt to expose the man his sister loved and married. But his efforts to convince the old man that he was trying to find Sam, while all the time he was doing all he knew how to keep him on the wrong track, were at constant cross-purposes. The old man soon became suspicious of him, would advance him no money, paid him a nominal sum for keeping books, etc., the first three months he was there, then relieved him of that duty, and kept up incessant cross-questioning. At last Frost found out that Graham suspected him of being a deserter, and that the old man had got that idea and also that his own boy was somewhere in the army. Then came the news of the Custer massacre, and by that time he felt sure he could win Nellie's hand if her father's consent could be gained; but Morrow was all suspicion and eagerness, and Frost knew by his manner that he was on the trail of his lost boy by means of letters – and these letters would plainly betray him, who had deserted from Sam's own regiment. He hurried to Chicago, and there – there he came upon that list of killed in the battle of the Little Big Horn, and among the names was the one he wanted to see, Sergeant Sam Moore. It decided him at once. He went to his uncle, claiming that he was about to marry Nellie Morrow, got from him a small supply of money, and came back determined to win her at once. She was the old man's only child and sole heir. That very day Morrow had told him that he had found him out, that in his absence he had received letters proving him to be a scoundrel, and, giving him just one chance to tell him where his lost boy was or to leave. Frost feared to tell then, as he knew the miller would insist on proofs, and in some way his own connection with the regiment would be known. That evening, before tea, Morrow, in an angry interview, which Schaffer partially overheard, told him he had proofs of his rascality – letters to settle his case for good and all. Then he became desperate. Soon as Dick had gone to town with the ladies he went to Graham's room, got the revolver, and once more went to the mill, and found Morrow at the office door. It was then almost dark. Then came the accusation of desertion, and, once in the office, Morrow had called him by his soldier name, and Frost knew "all was up." He must have those papers. He drew the revolver to frighten the old man, and it went off, killing him instantly. He was horror-stricken, but strove to collect himself. Flight would betray him at once as the murderer. Why not make it a case of suicide – leave the pistol by him? No – that would not do. It was Graham's – Ha! why not make Graham the guilty one? Quickly he got the safe key from the old man's pocket, unlocked and obtained the cash-drawer, with its five hundred dollars in green-backs – opened the desk, and rummaged through the letters till he found one from the headquarters of the Seventh Cavalry, which gave a description of several men almost his height and general appearance who had deserted. Among them he recognized his own and his soldier name. With these he went to the cottage, leaving all dark at the mill, burned the letter, hid portions of the money in Graham's mattress, and was thinking, in terror, what to do next, when he heard voices on the road. He dare not go out, and so wasted some time in the house. When he heard Graham drive back with the buggy he hurriedly undressed and went to bed. Then Schaffer came home and he called him in, that the boy might say that he was in bed and undressed; but when Graham entered he shammed sleep. Roused, at last, by Graham's demand for his money and the news that he was going away, an idea occurred to him. Cutting a slit in his finger with a razor, he let the blood fall on a couple of five-dollar bills – smeared and quickly dried it – gave them to Graham before he started, and as soon as he was gone went busily to work. Going down to the mill as soon as satisfied that all was safe – Schaffer asleep and Dick far on his way to the railroad – he found the east door locked. Then he knew that Graham had been there; had locked the door and taken the key to the hall of the mill-house, and of course had seen nothing of the body. He got the key, obtained Graham's overalls from the mill, burned them in the stove at the cottage – as he argued Dick could have done had he bloodied them in the affray – and then in Graham's room had found his cambric handkerchief. Once more he went down to the ghostly mill, and dipped this into the blood of his victim; then locked the mill door (he had locked the office door, leaving the key inside), put the key back in the house, returned to the cottage, and to bed. He had woven a chain for Graham that, added to the poor fellow's flight and his previous disagreements, would fasten all suspicion on him as the murderer. Then he thought of the money. He rose, bundled it loosely in an old oyster-can, stole out in the gray light of approaching dawn, and buried it in the loose sand down on the shore of the mill-pond, just where all the cattle would go for water, and trample out all traces within an hour; then once more he went back to bed, and to the counterfeited sleep from which Schaffer had such difficulty in rousing him. It was well planned – and when he heard the boy declare he had seen Graham coming from the mill at 11 o'clock he thought it perfect.
But he had failed to cross one track – the bloody print of a slender, city-made, shapely boot on the flour-dusted floor under the peg where Graham's overalls generally hung. It was the only footprint in that corner of the old mill, and Frost's was the only boot in all Nemahbin that would fit it. Keen eyes had noted this even while the wiseacres of the law were urging the pursuit of Graham; and then came the inexorable watch on every move that Frost might make. Even without his confession, the relentless search of the detectives would have run him down. And now Dick Graham was free.
It wasn't such a mystery, after all. A greater one was being enacted right here in the old mill-house, whither Nellie had hurriedly returned on the telegraphic news of Sam's home-coming. She had sent Dick Graham sorrowing to his fate only a month ago. She never wished to see him or speak to him again. She had twined her girlish hero-worship around the tall beauty of Mr. Frost, and seen it shrivel with aversion in a single day. And now, surrounded by the halo of his sufferings, his self-imposed exile, his years of patient, uncomplaining, unswerving devotion, here was her brother's best friend, sharing with that brother the admiration and homage of their little village circle; here was her true lover, Dick, loving, forgiving, unreproaching, and yet unseeking, and one sweet August night, calm and still and starlit, she stood at the very gate where he had seen her parting with Frost that dread Sunday morning. And now her little hand was trembling on his arm as he would have closed the gate behind him. He felt the detaining pressure, and turned, gently as ever:
"What is it, Nellie?"
"Dick, will you never forgive me for what I said – that night?"
One instant he could hardly speak – hardly breathe; but then, slowly, with swimming eyes and quivering lips, soft and tremulous, she looked up into his radiant face.
And now – eight years after – 'Mahbin Mill hums and whirs more merrily than ever. Dick Graham is master and manager, for Sam, with a well-earned strap of gold-lace on each broad shoulder, has gone back to the frontier life he learned to love in the old regiment. Frost languished but a few months in his prison before death mercifully took him away, and Nellie – Nellie is the happiest little woman around Nemahbin for miles; only those two scamps, Sam and Dick, seven and five years old respectively, keep her in a fidget and their father in a chuckle with their pranks. They are always in mischief or the mill-pond.
