Miss Ravenel's conversion from secession to loyalty Part 33

"Are you going, papa?" asked Mrs. Carter, who somehow was not much alarmed.

"My dear, I must stay here till the last moment. We have so much property here! You will have to go without me."

"Then I won't go," she answered; and so that was settled.

"_You_ ought to be off," said the Doctor to Colburne. "As a United States officer you are sure to be kept a prisoner, if taken. I certainly think that you ought to go."

Colburne thought so too, but would not desert his friends; he shrugged his shoulders in spirit and resolved to endure what might come. The negroes were in a state of exquisite alarm. The entire black population of the Lafourche Interior was making for the swamps or other places of shelter; and only the love of the Ravenel gang for their good ma.s.sa and beautiful missus kept them from being swept away by the contagious current. The horror with which they regarded the possibility of being returned into slavery delighted the Doctor, who, even in those circ.u.mstances, dilated enthusiastically upon it as a proof that the race was capable of high aspirations.

"They have already acquired the love of individual liberty," said this amiable optimist. "The cognate love of liberty in the abstract, the liberty of all men, is not far ahead of them. How superior they already are to the white wretches who are fighting to send them back to slavery!--Shedding blood, their own and their brothers', for slavery! Is it not utterly amazing? Risking life and taking life to restore slavery!

It is the foolishest, wickedest, most demoniacal infatuation that ever possessed humanity. The Inquisition, the Ma.s.sacre of St. Bartholomew, were common sense and evangelical mercy compared to this pro-slavery rebellion. And yet these imps of atrocity pretend to be Christians. They are the most orthodox creatures that ever served the devil. They rant and roar in the Methodist camp-meetings; they dogmatize on the doctrines in the Presbyterian church; they make the responses in the Episcopal liturgy. There is only one pinnacle of hypocrisy that they never have had the audacity to mount. They have not yet brought themselves to make the continuance and spread of slavery an object of prayer. It would be logical, you know; it would be just like their impudence. I have expected that they would come to it. I have looked forward to the time when their hypocritical priesthood would put up b.l.o.o.d.y hands in the face of an indignant Heaven, and say, 'O G.o.d of Justice! O Jesus, lover of the oppressed! bless, extend and perpetuate slavery; prosper us in selling the wife away from the husband, and the child away from the parent; enable us to convert the blood and tears of our fellow creatures into filthy lucre; help us to degrade man, who was made in Thine image; and to Father, Son and Spirit be all the Glory!'--Can you imagine anything more astoundingly wicked than such a pet.i.tion? And yet I am positively astonished that they have not got up monthly concerts of prayer, and fabricated a liturgy, all pregnant with just such or similar blasphemies. But G.o.d would not wait for them to reach this acme of iniquity. His patience is exhausted, and He is even now bringing them to punishment."

"They have some power left yet, as we feel to-night," said Colburne.

"Yes. I have seen an adder's head flatten and snap ten minutes after the creature was cut in two. I dare say it might have inflicted a poisonous wound."

"I think you had better send the hands to the fort."

"Do you antic.i.p.ate such immediate danger?" inquired the Doctor, his very spectacles expressing surprise.

"I feel uneasy every time I think of those Texans. They are fast boys.

They outmarch their own shadows sometimes, and have to wait for them to come in after nightfall."

"I really ought to send the hands off," admitted the Doctor after a minute of reflection. "I never could forgive myself if through my means they should be returned to bondage."

"It would be a poor result of a freedman's labor experiment."

The Doctor went to the back door and shouted for Major Scott.

"Major," said he, "you must take all the people down to the fort as soon as they can get ready."

"They's all ready, Marsr. They's only a waitin' for the word."

"Very well, bring them along. I'll write a note to the commandant, asking him to take you in for the night. You can come back in the morning if all is quiet."

"What's a gwine to come of you an' Miss Lillie?"

"Never mind that now. I will see to that presently. Bring the people along."

In five minutes fifteen men, six women and four pickaninnies, the whole laboring force of the plantation, were in the road before the house, each loaded with a portion of his or her property, such as blankets, food, and cooking utensils. The men looked anxious; the women cried loudly with fright and grief; the pickaninnies cried because their mothers did.

"Oh, Mars Ravenel! you'll be cotched suah," sobbed the old mamma who did the family cooking. "Miss Lillie, do come 'long with us."

"We'se gwine to tote some o' your fixin's 'long," observed Major Scott.

"Better let him do it," said Colburne. "It may be your only chance to save necessaries."

So the negroes added to their loads whatever seemed most valuable and essential of the Ravenel baggage. Then Scott received the note to the commandant of the fort, handed it to Julius, the second boss, and remarked with dignity, "I stays with Marsr." The Major was undisguisedly alarmed, but he had a character to sustain, and a military t.i.tle to justify. He was immediately joined in his forlorn hope by Jim the "no 'count n.i.g.g.e.r," who, being a sly and limber darkey, fleet of foot, and familiar with swamp life, had a faith that he could wriggle out of any danger or captivity.

"Keep them," said Colburne to Ravenel. "We shall want them as look-outs during the night."

There was an evident hesitation in the whole gang as to whether they should go or stay; but Colburne settled the question by p.r.o.nouncing in a tone of military command, "Forward, march!"

"Ah! they knows how to mind that sort o' talk," said Major Scott, highly gratified with the spectacular nature of the scene. "I'se a been eddycatin' 'em to millingtary ways. They knows a heap a'ready, they doos."

He smiled with a simple and transitory joy, although he could hear the voice of his wife (commonly called Mamma Major) rising in loud lament amid the chorus of sorrow with which the women and children moved away.

The poor creature kept no grudge against her husband for his infidelity of a month previous.

In the lonely and imperilled little household Colburne now took command.

"Since you will fight," he said smiling, "you must fight under my orders. I am the military power, and I proclaim martial law."

He forbade the Ravenels to undress; they must be prepared to run at a moment's notice. He laughed at the Doctor's proposition to barricade the doors and windows, and, instead thereof, opened two or three trunks and scattered articles of little value about the rooms. The property would be a bait, he said, which might amuse the raiders while the family escaped. To gratify Major Scott's tremulous enthusiasm he loaded his own revolver and the Doctor's doubled-barreled fowling-piece, smiling sadly to himself to think how absurd was the idea of fighting off a band of Texans with such a feeble artillery. He posted the two negroes as a vidette a quarter of a mile down the road, with strict orders not to build a fire, not to sleep, not to make a noise, but in case of the approach of a party to hasten to the house and give information. The Major begged hard for the fowling-piece, but Colburne would not let him have it.

"He would be worse than a Nine Months' man," he said to the Doctor. "He would be banging away at stumps and shadows all night. There wouldn't be a living field mouse on the plantation by morning."

The Doctor's imagination was seriously affected by these business-like preparations, and he silently regretted that he had not gone to the fort, or at least sent his daughter thither. Lillie, though quiet, was very pale, and wished herself in the trenches of Port Hudson, safe under the protection of her invincible husband. Colburne urged and finally ordered them to lie down and try to sleep. Two mules were standing in the yard, saddled and ready to do their part in the hegira when it should be necessary. He examined their harness, then returned into the house, buckled on his sword and revolver, extinguished every light, took his seat at an open window looking towards the danger, waited and listened. The youthful veteran was perfectly calm; notwithstanding that he had taken more precautions than a greenhorn, however timorous, would have thought of. Once in each hour he visited the negroes to see if they were awake; then mounted the levee to listen for tramp of men or horses across the bayou; then went to the sugar-house and listened towards the woods which backed the plantation; then resumed his silent watch at the open window. At two o'clock the moon still poured a pale light over the flat landscape. Colburne, feverish with fatigue, want of sleep, and the small remainder of irritation in his wound, was just saying to himself, "We _must_ go to-morrow," when he saw two dark forms glide rapidly towards the house under cover of a fence, and rush crouching across the door-yard. Without waiting to hear what the negroes had to say, he stepped into the parlor and awoke the two sleepers on the sofas.

"What is the matter?" gasped the Doctor, with the wild air common to people startled out of an anxious slumber.

"Perhaps nothing," answered Colburne. "Only be ready."

By this time the two videttes were in the house, breathless with running and alarm.

"Oh, Cap'm! they's a comin'," whispered Scott. "They's a comin' right smart. We heerd the hosses. They's a quarter mile off, mebbe; but they's a comin' right smart. Oh Cap'm, please give me the double-barril gun. I wants to fight for my liberty an' for Mars Ravenel an' for Miss Lillie."

"Take it," said Colburne. "Now then, Doctor, you and Jim will hurry Mrs.

Carter directly down the road to the fort. Jim can keep up on foot. The Major and I will go to the woods, fire from there, and draw the enemy in that direction."

Every one obeyed him without a word. The approaching tramp of horses was distinctly audible at the house when the Ravenels mounted the mules and set off at a lumbering trot, the animals being urged forward by resounding whacks from Jim's bludgeon. Colburne scowled and grated his teeth with impatience and vexation.

"I ought to have sent them away last evening," he muttered with a throb of self-reproach.

"Scott, you and I will have to fight," he said aloud. "They never can escape unless we keep the rascals here. We must fire once from the house; then run to the woods and fire again there. We must show ourselves men now."

"Yes, Mars Cap'm," replied the Major. His voice was tremulous, and his whole frame shook, but he was nevertheless ready to die, if need be, for his liberty and his benefactors. Of physical courage the poor fellow had little; but in moral courage he was at this moment sublime.

Colburne posted himself and his comrade at a back corner of the house, where they could obtain a view of the road which led toward Thibodeaux.

"Now, Scott," he said, "you must not fire until I have fired. You must not fire until you have taken aim at somebody. You must fire only one barrel. Then you must make for the woods along the line of this fence.

If they follow us on horseback we can bother them by dodging over the fence now and then. If they catch us, we must fight as long as we can.

Cheer up, old fellow. It's all right. It's not bad business as soon as you're used to it."

"Cap'm, I'se ready," answered Scott solemnly. "I'se not gwine for ter be cotched alive."

Then he prayed for some minutes in a low whisper, while Colburne stood at the corner and watched. "Watch and pray," the latter repeated to himself, smiling inwardly at the odd compliance with the double injunction, so strangely does the mind work on such occasions. It was not a deliberate process of intellection with him; it was an instinctive flash of ideas, not traceable to any feeling which was in him at the time; on the contrary, his prevailing emotion was one of extreme anxiety. The tramp which fled toward the fort gently diminished in the distance, while the tramp which approached from the opposite side grew nearer and louder. When the advancing hors.e.m.e.n got within a hundred yards of the house, they slackened their pace to a walk, and finally halted, probably to listen. Some of them must have dismounted at this time, for Colburne suddenly beheld four footmen at the front gate. He scowled at this sign of experienced caution, and gave a hasty glance toward the garden in his rear, to see if others were not cutting off his retreat. He could not discover the features of any of the four, but he could see that they were of the tall and lank Texan type, dressed in brownish clothing, and provided with short guns, no doubt double-barreled fowling-pieces. Inside of the gate they halted and seemed to hearken, while one of them pointed up the road toward the fort, and whispered to his comrades. Colburne had hoped that they would get into the house, and fall to plundering; but they had evidently overheard the fugitives, for there was a simultaneous backward movement in the group--they were going to remount and pursue. Now was his time, if ever, to effect the proposed diversion. Aiming his six-inch revolver at the tallest, he fired a single barrel. The man yelled a curse, staggered, dropped his gun, and leaned against the fence. Two of his comrades sprang across the road, and threw themselves behind the levee as a breast-work, while the fourth, all grit, turned short and brought his fowling-piece to a level as Colburne drew behind his cover. In that same moment, Major Scott, wild with a sudden madness of conflict, shouted like a lion, bounded beyond the angle of the house, planting himself on two feet set wide apart, his mad black face set toward the enemy, and his gun aimed. Both fired at the same instant, and both fell together, probably alike lifeless. The last prayer of the negro was, "My G.o.d!" and the last curse of the rebel was "d.a.m.nation!"

By the light of the moon Colburne looked at his comrade, and saw the brains following the blood from a hole in the centre of his forehead. He cast a glance at the levee, fired one more barrel at a broad-brimmed hat which rose above it, listened for a second to an advancing rush of hoofs in order to decide whether it came by the road or by the fields, turned, crossed the garden on a noiseless run, placed himself on the further side of a high and close plantation-fence, and followed its cover rapidly toward the forest. The distance was less than a quarter of a mile, but he was quite breathless and faint before he had traversed it, so weak was he still, and so little accustomed to exercise. In the edge of the wood he sat down on a fallen and mouldering trunk to listen. If the cavalry were pursuing their course up the road, they were doing it very prudently and slowly, for he could hear no more trampling of horses. Tolerably satisfied as to the safety of the Ravenels, he reloaded his two empty barrels, settled his course in his mind, and pushed as straight as he could for Taylorsville without quitting the cover of the forest. Although the fort was not four miles away in a direct line, it was daybreak when he came in sight of a low flattened outline, as of a truncated mound, which showed dimly through the yellowish morning mist. He had still to cross a dead level of four or five hundred yards, with no points of shelter but three small wooden houses. At this moment, when safety seemed so near and sure, he saw on the bayou road, two hundred yards to his right, half a dozen black and indistinct bunches moving in a direction parallel to his own. They were unquestionably hors.e.m.e.n going toward the fort, and nearer to it than he.