In Old Kentucky Part 12

But, though it angered him, the tense activity of the construction camp was fascinating, too. Especially was his attention held spellbound by the ruthless work of the advancing blasting gangs. What power lay hidden in those tiny sticks of dynamite! How lightly one of them had tossed that poor unfortunate in air and left him lying mangled, broken, helpless on the ground when it had spent its fury! _What a weapon one of them would make, upon occasion_!

This thought grew rapidly in his depressed and agitated mind. What a weapon, what a weapon! Presently the blasting gangs and what they did absorbed his whole attention. He no longer paid the slightest heed to the puffing locomotives, busy with their dump-cars, to the mysterious steam-shovel, to the hand cars with their pumping, flying pa.s.sengers.

The dynamite was greater than the greatest of them. One stick of it, if properly applied, would blow a locomotive into junk, would tear a dump-car, with its ma.s.sive iron-work and grinding wheels, apart and leave mere splinters!

His thoughts roamed back to his home mountains and pondered on the probable effect of this incursion on his personal affairs. Not satisfied with tearing up the placid valley, these foreigners would, presently, invade the very mountains in their turn. He saw the doom of that small, hidden still which had been his father's secret, years ago, was now his secret from the prying eyes of law and progress. That the "revenuers,"

soon or late, would get it, now that their allies were building steel highways to swarm on, was inevitable. His heart beat fast with a new anger, antic.i.p.atory of their coming to his fastness.

Lying not six feet from him as he sat there thinking bitterly of all these things, the foreman of the blasting gang had gingerly deposited a dozen sticks of dynamite upon a soft cus.h.i.+on of grey blankets. Joe looked at them as they lay there, innocent and unimpressive. If he had some of them in the hills and the revenuers came to raid his still--

The thought sprang into being in his mind with lightning quickness and grew there with mushroom growth. Never in his life had Lorey stolen anything, although the government would have cla.s.sed him as a criminal because he owned that hidden still. His standards, in some things, were different from yours and mine, but he had never stolen anything and scorned as low beyond the power of words to tell a man who would. But now temptation came to him. He wanted some of that explosive. Should he buy it, its purchase by a mountaineer would certainly attract attention and might thus precipitate the very thing he wished to ward away--a watch of him, and, through that espionage, discovery of his secret place among the hills. And were not the railroad and the men who owned it robbing him by their progression into his own country? They were robbing him of peace and quiet, of the possibility of living on the life he had been born to and had learned to love! One of the cla.s.s which fostered him was robbing him, he feared with a great fear, of the sweet girl whom he loved better than he loved his life. Surely it would be no sin, no act of real dishonesty for him to slip down from his stump when none was looking and secure a stick or two of the explosive!

Speciously he argued this out in his mind and reached the wrong conclusion which he wished to reach.

If he could but get one of those sticks of dynamite! When progress came, as, now, he felt convinced it would, to drive him from his mountains and the still which made life possible to him, he could meet it, at the start, with one of its own weapons. That, even though he had a hundred such, he could fight the fight successfully, could, in the end, find triumph, he did not for an instant think. The might of the encroaching army had impressed him, and he knew that, soon or late, he would be forced to yield to it; but he coveted those sticks of dynamite. One of them would give him some slight power, at least. He acknowledged to himself that he would steal one if he got the chance, despite his innate hatred of all pilferers. Such theft would merely be the taking of an unimportant tribute from the power which would, eventually, claim much, indeed, from him.

From the distance came the screaming whistle of a locomotive pulling in along the newly built roadway to eastward. It was followed by a flurry of excitement among all the men at work around about him.

"There comes the mail," he heard one handsome young chap shout.

He wore a suit like that which Joe had learned to hate because Frank Layson wore it.

This youth started running down the track, bright-eyed, expectant, and a dozen others ran to follow him, leaving blue-prints, their surveyors'

instruments and other tokens of their mysterious might of education, lying unheeded on the ground behind them. There was much excitement.

Even the rough laborers stopped delving at their tasks for a few minutes, to straighten from their work and stand, with curious eyes agaze down-track.

In the distance Joe saw smoke arise above the tops of the invaded forest-trees. Then he heard the growing clangor of a locomotive's bell, then other whistling and the approaching rumble of steel wheels upon steel rails, the groan of brake shoes gripping, the rattle of contracted couplings, the impact of car-b.u.mpers.

The excitement grew among the working gangs. Even the laborers left their tasks and started down the rough surface of the new embankment toward the place, a quarter-of-a-mile away, where the train would stop at the end of the crude ballasting.

Lorey sat there on his stump, apparently impa.s.sive, watching all this flurry with resentful, discontented eyes. He himself was infinitely curious about the coming train; but he could not bring himself to go to see it. He had never seen a railway train, but it somehow seemed to him that if he hurried with the rest to meet this one it would mean a certain sacrifice of dignity in the face of the invading conqueror. He sat there, grimly wondering what it might be like, what the people whom it brought were like, until, suddenly, he discovered that he was alone.

The last workman yielding to temptation, free from supervision for the moment, had run down the bank to meet the train, get mail, see who had come. Lying not a dozen feet away from Joe on their grey blanket were the sticks of dynamite.

Lithe, quick and silent as one of the mountain wild-cats he had so often trailed through his domain, he slipped down from his stump, caught up a stick of the explosive, tucked it carefully into his game-bag, took his place again upon the stump, impa.s.sive, calm, apparently quite unexcited.

When the men came trooping back, opening letters, tearing wrappers from their newspapers, gossipping, he still sat on the stump as they had left him. Not one of them suspected that he once had left it.

"Bright and lively as a cigar-store Indian," he heard one care-free youth exclaim as he went by him.

He did not know what the man meant; he had never seen a cigar-store Indian; but he knew a jibe was meant. It did not anger him, as it would have done, a few moments earlier. Now he had exacted his small tribute.

They could stare at him and jibe, if they were so inclined. Hidden carefully there in his game-bag was one of their own weapons for their fight against the wilderness, which, in course of time, might be a weapon of the wilderness in fighting against some of them.

Presently he climbed down from the stump and strolled back along the raw embankment toward the little group still standing near the train which had arrived.

CHAPTER VII

The young moons.h.i.+ner stiffened instantly as he neared the group of newly arrived travellers, for the first word he heard from them was the name of him whom, among all foreigners, he hated with most bitterness. An old darky, plainly the servant of the party, and such a darky as the mountain country had never seen before, was inquiring of a bystander where he could find "Ma.r.s.e" Frank Layson.

The man of whom he asked the question had not the least idea, nor had anyone about the railroad working. Most of the men had never heard of Layson, and the few who had become acquainted with him through chance meetings since he had been stopping in his cabin in the mountains, knew most indefinitely where the place was located. Lorey could have quickly given the information, but had no thought of doing so. He stood, instead, staring at the party with wondering but not good-natured eyes, and said no word. He certainly was not the one to do a favor to his rival or his rival's friends.

The group of strangers were thrown into confusion by the difficulty of getting news of him they sought, and, while they discussed the matter, Lorey had a chance to study them. He stood upon the rough plank platform, leaning on his rifle, with the game-bag and its burden of purloined explosive hanging slouchily beneath one arm, his c.o.o.n-skin cap down well upon his eyes, those eyes, half closed, gazing at the newcomers with all the curiosity which they would have shown at sight of savages from some far foreign sh.o.r.e.

He was not the only one about the temporary railroad station who eyed the group with curiosity and interest. Two of the travellers were ladies from the bluegra.s.s and scarcely one of all the natives lingering about the workings had ever seen a lady from the bluegra.s.s, while, to the young surveyors and the group of civil engineers who had, for months, been exiled by their work among the mountains from all a.s.sociation with such lovely creatures, it was a joy to stand apart and covertly gaze at them. Many a young fellow, months away from home, who had grasped the newspapers and letters which had come in with the other mail with eager fingers, anxious to devour their contents, had, after the two ladies had descended from the train, almost forgotten his anxiety to get the news from home, and stood there, now, with opened letters in his hands, unread.

The ladies were very worthy of attention, too. Miss Alathea Layson, the elder of the two, was slight, beautifully groomed despite the long and dirty trip on rough cars over the crude road-bed of a newly graded railway. A woman whose thirtieth birthday had been left behind some years before, she still had all the brightness and vivacity of the twenties in her carriage and her manner. Her voice, as it drifted to the young moons.h.i.+ner, was a new experience to him--soft, well modulated, cultivated, it was of a sort which he had never heard before, and, while it seemed to him affected, nevertheless thrilled him with an unacknowledged admiration.

It was she who showed the greatest disappointment about the general ignorance concerning Layson's whereabouts, and that voice made instantaneous and irresistible appeal to the older men among the party of engineers and surveyors, who, finding an excuse in her discomfiture, flocked about her, hats off, backs bent in humble bows, proffering a.s.sistance, three deep in the circle.

The other lady traveller, whom Miss Alathea called Miss Barbara, more especially attracted the attention of the younger men, and, as they stood aloof to gaze at her, held such mountain dwellers as were near, paralyzed with wonder and admiration. Nothing so brilliantly beautiful as she in form, carriage, face, coloring or dress had ever been seen there in the little valley.

She was a florid girl of twenty, or, perhaps, of twenty-one or two. Her eyes were the obtrusive feature of her face, and she used them with a freedom which held callow youth spellbound. Her gown was more pretentious than that of her more elderly companion. This, of course, was justified by the difference between their ages; but there seemed to be, beyond this, a flaunting gayety about it and her manner which were not, in the eyes of the older and wiser men among the group who watched, justified by anything. It would have been a hard thing for the most critical of them to have definitely mentioned just what forced this strong impression on their minds, but it was forced upon them very quickly. One of them, a cute and keen observer as he was, of many years experience, decided the moot point, though, and whispered his decision to a grizzled man (the engineer in charge of the whole enterprise upon that section of construction) who stood next him.

"The elder one is of the old-time Southern aristocracy," he said. "The younger one is one of the newcomers--her father has made money and she is breaking in by means of it."

His companion nodded, realizing that the guess was shrewd and justified, even if it might, conceivably, be inaccurate.

"She certainly is very striking," he said, nodding, "but the elder one is the aristocrat."

The other member of the party was a big man, nearing fifty, with a broad face on which geniality was written in its every line, wearing the wide-brimmed Southern hat, typical long frock-coat with flaring skirts, black trousers, somewhat pegged, and boots of an immaculate brilliance.

His voice was loud, hearty and attractive, as he made inquiries, here and there, about the young man whom they had hoped to find in waiting for them at the station, although they had arrived, owing to the exigencies of travel by a new road, not yet officially opened to traffic, a day before they had expected to.

"I suh," said this gentleman, "am Cunnel Doolittle--Cunnel Sandusky Doolittle, and am looking for this lady's nephew, Mr. Layson, suh. If you can tell me where the youngster is likely to be runnin', now, you will put me under obligations, suh."

None, however, knew just how Layson could be reached. Most of them knew him or had heard of him, but they were not certain just where his camp in the mountains was located.

"I regret, Miss 'Lethe," said the Colonel, turning to the disappointed lady at his side, after having completed his inquiries, "that there is no good hotel heah. If there were a good hotel heah, I would take you to it, ma'am, and make you comfortable. Then, ma'am, I would search this country and I'd find him in short order. He probably did not receive my letter saying that we would arrive to-day and not to-morrow."

One of the engineers proffered to the ladies the use of his own canvas quarters till some course of action should have been decided on, an offer which was gratefully accepted.

Soon afterward inquiries by the Colonel brought out definite information as to the exact location of Frank's camp. A railway teamster, also, it appeared, was starting in that direction after ties and offered to transport a messenger as far as he was going, directing him, then, so that he could not lose his way. Old Neb, the darky, thereupon, was started on the search.

He was a different sort of negro from any which the mountain folk had ever seen, and wore more airs than his "white folks." Dressed in a black frock-coat as ornate as the Colonel's, although its bagging shoulders showed that it had been a gift and not made for him, his hat was a silk tile, a bit too large, and in one hand was a gold-headed cane on which he leaned as his old legs limped under him. Among the mountaineers about he was an object of the keenest curiosity, although down in the bluegra.s.s, where old family negroes frequently were let to grow into a childish dignity of manner after years of faithful service and were not disturbed in their ideas of their own importance, he would have been regarded as merely an amusing infant of great age, reaping a reward for by-gone merits in the careful consideration and indulgence now extended to him. His inordinate vanity of his personal appearance and his dignity might have given rise to smiles, down there; here there were those upon the platform who laughed loudly as he walked away, boasting vaingloriously, although he evidently feared the trip with the rough teamster, that he would find "young Ma.r.s.e Frank" in a jiffy and have him there in no time.

It was while the aged negro was climbing somewhat difficultly to the side of the good-natured railroad teamster who had promised to give him a lift upon his way and then supply directions for his further progress, that Joe Lorey, who had been an interested spectator of the affair, contemptuous, amused by the old darky, saw, coming through the crowd behind him and well beyond the range of the newly arrived strangers, the roughly dressed, mysterious old man whom he had seen, once or twice, up in the mountains, whom Madge had seen, tapping with his little hammer at the rocks. Lorey looked toward him with a face which scowled instinctively. He disliked the man, as he disliked all foreigners who dared invasion of his wilderness; he would have feared him, too, had he known that it had really been him and not young Layson and Madge Brierly who had made the noise there in the thicket which had disturbed him, that day, when, armed to meet a raid of revenuers, he had rushed out from his still to find the girl and the young bluegra.s.s gentleman in a close company which worried him almost as much as the appearance of the officers, in fact, could have done.

He was a "foreigner," this old man with the manner of the mountains, and, sometimes, their speech, for he wore bluegra.s.s clothes; therefore he was one to be cla.s.sed with the others in his bitter hatred. He was standing almost in his path, and, by stepping to one side, could have saved him a small detour round a pile of boxed supplies; but he did not move an inch, stiffening, instead, delighted at obstructing him.

The old man, as he went around, looked sharply at him, and then smiled, almost as if he recognized him and could read his thoughts; almost as if he realized the man's instinctive hate; almost as if he felt a certainty, deep in his soul, that so great was the disaster hovering above the mountaineer that it would be scarcely worth his own while, now, even to think resentfully of this small insult.

A moment later, though, and the expression of his face had changed completely. The first glimpse of the new come party standing, now, deep in discussion of the railway work, before the engineer's white, hospitable tent, made him start back in amazement.

For an instant he stood wavering, as if he were considering the plan of trying to depart without approaching them or being seen by them, but then he shrugged his shoulders and advanced, trying to show upon his face surprised good-nature.

"Wall, Colonel Doolittle!" he cried. "And you, Miss Layson, and--why, there's Barbara!"