Part 6

chimed in the trembling voice of the sick man. Then, by an effort that evidently taxed his fading powers to the last degree, he fixed his eyes firmly on those of the young woman. Here was a martyr of the divine sort, true and unchangeable in the flame of the torture.

"Rose, little Rose," he said, glancing uneasily at the 'Squire, "I've got something private like to say to you."

The young woman trembled. Memory was at work.

"'Squire, go out a minute, will ye?" continued Zach.

The sick man's request was promptly obeyed, and Rose sat, drooping, alone beside the bed, while the widow snored away.

Zach now more nervously clasped the hand of the young woman. A spot of faint sunshine glimmered on the pillow close by the man's head. The out-door sounds of the wind in the young grass, and the rustle of the new soft leaves of the trees, crept into the room gently, as if not to drown the low voice of the dying man.

"It's been on my mind ever since we parted, Rose, and I ort 'a' said it then, but I choked an' couldn't; but I kin say it now and I will." He paused a moment and Rose looked pitifully at him. His chin was thrust out firmly and his lips had a determined set. He looked just as he did when about to knock the poor old horse on the head over in the dell that day. How vividly the tragic situation was recalled in Rose's mind!

"Yes, I will say it now, so I will," he resumed. "Since things turned out jist as they have, Rose, I do wish I'd 'a' paid no 'tention to ye an' jist gone on and knocked that derned ole fistleoed hoss so dead 'at he'd 'a' never kicked--I do--I do, 'i hokey! I don't want to make ye feel bad, but I'm goin' away now, an' it 'pears to me like as if I'd go easy if I know'd you'd----." He turned away his face and drew just one little fluttering breath. When, after only a few minutes' absence, the 'Squire came in, the widow still slept, the sweet air still rippled through the room, but Rose held a dead hand; Zach was at rest! The 'Squire placed his hand on the bright hair of Rose and gazed mournfully down into the pinched, pallid face of the dead. How awfully calm a dead face is!

The widow stirred in her chair, groaned, and awoke. For a moment she bent her eyes wonderingly, inquiringly on the young woman; then, rising, she clasped her in her great bony arms.

"You are the Rose, the little Rose he's been goin' on so about. O, honey, I'm orful glad you've come. You ort jist to 'a' heerd him talk about ye when he got flighty like----but O--O--my! O Lor'! Zach--Zachy, dear! O, Miss, O, he's dead--he's dead!"

"Dead, yes, dead!" echoed the 'Squire, his words dropping with the weight of lead.

Across the fields of young green wheat ran waves of the spring wind, murmuring and sighing, while the dust of blossoms wheeled, and rose and fell in the last soft rays of the going sun. A big yellow butterfly flitted through the room.

Presently Sammy entered. He came in like a gust of wind, making things rattle with his impetuous motion.

"O, mammy! O, Zach! I's got s'thin' to tell ye, an' I'll bet a biscuit you can't guess what 't is!" he cried breathlessly.

"O, Sammy, honey, O, dear!" groaned the widow.

"S-s-h!" said the 'Squire solemnly.

"Well, I jist wanted 'm to guess," replied Sammy, "for it's awful doggone cur'u's 'at----"

"S-s-h!"

"The fistleo is broke out on Zach's ole hoss ten times as wuss as ever!"

"S-s-s-s-h!"

"It's so, for I seed it. It's layin' down over in the hollow by 'tater creek, where the ole clay root is, an' its jist about to d----."

"S-s-h!"

The child caught a glimpse of the face and was struck mute. And darkness stole athwart the earth, but the morrow's sun drove it away. Never, however, did any sun or any season chase from the heart of little Rose the shadow that was the memory of the man who died in that cabin.

STEALING A CONDUCTOR.

He shambled into the bar-room of the hotel at Thorntown, a Boone County village, and, with a bow and a hearty "how-de do to you all," took the only vacant chair. He scratched a match and lighted his pipe. "Now we'll be bored with some sort of a long-winded story," whispered some to others of the loungers present. "Never knowed him to fail," said a lank fellow, almost loud enough for the subject to hear. "He's our travelled man," added a youth, who winked as if he were extremely intelligent and didn't mind letting folks know it.

The man himself whiffed away carelessly at his pipe, now and then raising one eye higher than the other, to take a sort of side survey of the persons present. That eye was not long in settling upon me, and after a short, searching look, gleamed in a well pleased way. He was a stout formed man of about fifty years, dressed rather seedily, and wearing a plug hat of enormous height, the crown of which was battered into the last degree of grotesqueness. He got right up, and, dragging his chair behind him, came over and settled close down in front of me.

"Stranger here, a'n't you?"

"Yes, sir."

"Your name's Fuller, a'n't it?"

"No, sir."

"Well, mebbe I'm mistaken, but you're just the picter o' Fuller. Never was a conductor on a railroad, was you?"

"Never, sir."

"Never was down in the swamps o' South-Eastern Georgy, was you?"

"Never, sir."

"Well, that beats four aces! I could 'a' bet on your bein' Fuller." He paused a moment, and then added in a very insinuating tone: "If you _are_ Fuller you needn't be afeard to say so, for I don't hold any grudge 'gin you about that little matter. Now, sure enough, a'n't your name Fuller, in fact?"

I glared at the man a moment, hesitating about whether or not I should plant my fist in his eye. But something of almost child-like simplicity and sincerity beaming from his face restrained me. Surely the fellow did not wish to be as impudent as his words would imply.

"Well, stranger, I see I've got to explain, but the story's not overly long," said he, hitching up a little closer to me and settling himself comfortably.

I was about to get up and walk out of the room, when some one of the by-sitters filliped a little roll of paper to me. Unrolling it I read--

"Let him go on, he'll give you a lively one. He's a brick."

So, concluding that possibly I might be entertained, I lounged back in my seat.

"You see," said he, "I thought you was Fuller, an' Fuller was the only conductor I ever stole."

"Stole a conductor," whispered somebody, "that's a new one!"

"I've stole a good many things in my time, but I'm here to bet that no other living Hoosier ever stole a railroad conductor, an' Fuller was the only one I ever stole. I stole him slicker 'n a eel. I had him 'fore he knowed it, and you jist better bet he was one clean beat conductor fore I was done wi' 'im.

"I kin tell you the whole affair in a few minutes, and I da' say you'll laugh a good deal 'fore I'm through. You see I went down to Floridy for my health, and when I had about recivered I got onto a bum in Jacksonville and spent all my money and everything else but my very oldest suit o' clothes and my pistol, a Colt's repeater, ten inch barrel. None o' you can't tell how a feller feels in a predicament o' that sort. Somethin' got into my throat 'bout as big as a egg, and I felt kinder moist about the eyes when I had to stare the fact in the face that I was nigh onto, or possibly quite a thousand miles from home without ary a dime in my pocket. But if there's one thing I do have more 'n another in my nater it's common sense grit. Well, what you s'pose I done? W'y I jest lit out for home afoot. Well, sir, the derndest swamps is them Floridy and Georgy swamps. It's ra'lly all one swamp--the Okeefenokee. I follered the railroad that goes up to Savanny, and it led me deeper and deeper into the outlying fringes of that terrible old bog. When I had travelled a considerable distance into Georgy, and had pretty well wore my feet off up to my ankle j'ints, and was about as close onto starvation as a 'tater failure in Ireland, and when my under lip had got to hanging down like the skirt o' a wore out saddle, and when every step seemed like it'd be my last, I jest got clean despairing like and concluded to pray a little. So I got down upon my knee j'ints and put up a most extra-ornary supplication. I felt every word o' it, too, in all the marrer of my bones. The place where I was a prayin' was a sort o' hummock spot in a mighty bad part o' the swamp. Some awful tall pines towered stupenjisly above me. Well, jest as I was finished, and was a saying amen, the lordy mercy what a yowl something did give right over me in a tree! I think I jumped as high as your head, stranger, and come down flat-footed onto a railroad cross tie. Whillikins, how I was scared! It was one o' them whooping owls they have down there. It was while I was a running from that 'ere owl a thinkin' it was a panther, that the thought struck me somewhere in the back o' the head that I might steal a ride to Savanny on the first train 'at might pass. 'I'll try it!' says I, and so I sot right down there in the swamp and calmly waited for a train. In about a hour here come one, like the de'il a braking hemp, jist more'n a roaring through the swamp. I forgot to tell you 'at it was after dark, but the moon was dimly a shining through the fog that covers everything there o' nights. Well, here come the train, and as she passed I made a lunge at the hind platform of the last car and some how or another got onto it and away I went. It was mighty much softer 'n walking, I tell you, and I was pleased as a monkey with a red cap on. My, how fast that train did go! I could hardly hold onto where I wus. You may jist bet I clung on though, and finally I got myself setting down on the steps and then I was all hunkey. But I didn't have much time to enjoy myself there, though, for all of a sudden the light of a lantern shined on me and then somebody touched me and said--

'Ticket!'

"Mebbe you don't know how onery a feller'll feel sometimes when he hears that 'ere word ticket--'specially when he a'n't got no ticket nor no money to pay his fare, and too, when he does want to ride a little of the derndest! That was my fix! I'd 'a' give a thousand dollars for a half dollar!

'Ticket!'

"He shook me a little this time and held his lantern down low, so's to see into my face. I know I must 'a' looked like the de'il.

'Ticket here, quick!'

'I've done paid,' said I.

'Show your check then.'

'Lost it,' says I.

'Money, then, quick!'

'Got none,' says I.

'What the ---- did you git onto my train for without ticket or money? How do you expect to travel without paying, you ---- lousy vagabond! You can't steal from me; out with your ---- wallet and gi' me the money! Hurry up!'

'A'n't got no wallet nor no money,' says I.

'Well, I'll dump you off right here, then,' said he, reaching for the bell-rope to stop the train.

'For the Lord's sake let me ride to Savanny!' says I.

'A dam Northerner, I know from your voice!' said he, pulling the rope. The train began to slack and soon stopped.

'Get off!' said the conductor.

'Please l'me ride!' says I.

'Off with you!'

'Jist a few miles here on the steps!'

'Off, quick!'

'Please----'

'Here you go!' and as he said the words he tried to kick me off.

"In a second I was like a Bengal tiger. I jumped up and gethered him and we went at it. I'm as good as ever fluttered, and pretty soon I give him one flat on the nose, and we both went off 'n the platform together. As I started off I happened to think of it, so I grabbed up and pulled the bell-rope to signal the engineer to drive on. 'Hoot-toot!' says the whistle, and away lick-to-split went the train, and slashy-to-splashy, rattle-o-bangle, kewoppyty-whop, bump, thud! down me and that 'ere conductor come onto a pile o' wore out cross ties in the side ditch, and there we laid a fightin'!

"But you jest bet it didn't take me long to settle _him_. He soon began to sing out ''nuff! 'nuff! take 'm off!' and so I took him by the hair and dragged him off 'n the cross ties, shot him one or two more under the ear with my fist, and then dropped him. He crawled up and stood looking at me as if I was the awfulest thing in the world. I s'pect I did look scary, for I was terrible mad. His face was bruised up mightily, but he wasn't a bleeding much. He was mostly swelled.

'Where's my train?' says he, in a sort o' blank, hollow way.

'Don't ye hear it?' I answered him, 'It's gone on to Savanny!'

'Gone! Who told 'm to go on? What'd they go leave me for?'

'I pulled the bell rope,' says I.

'_You?_'

'Yes, _me_!'

'What in the world did you do _that_ for, man?'

''Cause you wouldn't let me ride to Savanny!'

'What'll I do! What'll I do!' he cried, beginning to waltz 'round like one possessed.

"I laughed--I couldn't help it--and at the same time I pulled out my old pistol.

'Yah-hoo-a!' yelled another owl.

'For the sake o' humanity don't kill me!' said the conductor.

'I'm jest a going to shoot you a little bit for the fun o' the thing,' says I.

'Mercy, man!' he prayed.

'Ticket!' says I.

"He groaned the awfulest kind, and, by the moonlight, I saw 'at the big tears was running down his face. I felt sorry for him, but I kinder thought 'at after what he'd done he'd better pray a little, so I mentioned it to him.

'I guess it mought be best if you'd pray a little,' says I, cocking the pistol. My voice had a decided sepulchreal sound. The pistol clicked very sharp.

'O, kind sir,' says he, 'O, dear sir, I never did pray, I don't know how to pray!'

'Ticket or check!' says I, and he knowed I was talking kind o' sarcasm. 'Pray quick!'

"He got down and prayed like a Methodist preacher at his very best licks. He must 'a' prayed afore.

"About the time his prayer was ended I heard a train coming in the distance. He jumped up and listened.

'Glory! Heaven be praised!' says he, capering around like a mad monkey, 'They've missed me and are backing down to hunt me! Where's my lantern? Have you a match? Gi'me your handkerchief!'

'Not so fast,' says I; 'you jest be moderate now, will you? I've no notion o' you getting on that train any more. You jest walk along wi' me, will you?'

'Where?' says he.

'Into the swamp,' says I; 'step off lively, too, d'you hear me?'

'O mercy, mercy, man!' says he.

'Ticket!' says I, and then he walked along wi' me into the swamp some two or three hundred yards from the railroad.

"I took him into a very thickety place, and made him back up agin a tree and put back his arms around it. Then I took one o' his suspenders and tied him hard and fast. Then I gagged him with my handkerchief. So far, so good.

"Here come the train slowly backing down, the brakesman a swinging lanterns, and the passengers all swarming onto the platforms. Poorty soon they stopped right opposite us. The conductor began to struggle. I poked the pistol in his face and jammed the gag furder into his mouth. He saw I meant work and got quiet.

"The passengers was swarming off 'n the train and I saw 'at I must git about poorty fast if I was to do anything. I soon hit on a plan. I jist stepped back a piece out o' sight o' the conductor and turned my coat, which was one o' these two-sided affairs, one side white, t'other brown. I turned the white side out. Then I flung away my greasy skull cap and took a soft hat out 'n my pocket and put it on. Then I watched my chance and mixed in with the passengers who was a hunting for the conductor.

'Strange what's become o' him,' says I to a fat man, who was puffing along.

'Dim strange, dim strange,' says the big fellow, in a keen, wheezing voice.

"Well, you never saw jist sich hunting as was done for that conductor. Everybody slopped around in the swamp till their clothes was as wet and muddy as mine. I was monstrous active in the search. I hunted everywhere 'cepting where the conductor was. Finally he got the gag spit out and lordy how he did squeal for help. Everybody rushed to him and soon had him free.

"It tickled me awful to hear that conductor explaining the matter. He told it something like this:

'Devil of a great big ruffian on hind platform. Asked him for ticket. Refused. Tried to put him off. Grabbed me. Smashed my nose. Flung me off. Pulled the bell-rope, then lit out on me. Mauled ---- out o' me. Had a pistol two feet long. Made me pray. Heard train a coming. Took me to swamp. Tied me and sloped. Lord but I'm glad to see you all!'

"We all went aboard o' the train and I rode to Savanny onmolested. The conductor didn't mistrust me. He asked me for my check and I told him 'at I'd lost it a thrashing round in the bushes a hunting him. That was all right.

"When we got to Savanny I couldn't help letting the conductor know me, so as I passed down the steps of the car I whispered savagely in his ear:

'Ticket! dod blast you!'

"He tried to grab me as I shambled off into the crowd, but I knowed the ropes. I heard him a shoutin'--

'There he goes! Ketch him, dern him, ketch him!' But they didn't.

"That conductor's name was Fuller, and I swear, stranger, 'at you look jest like him! Gi' me a match, will you, my pipe's out. Thanky. Hope I ha'n't bored you. Good bye all."

He shambled out and I never saw him again.

HOIDEN.

The house was known as Rackenshack throughout the neighborhood for miles around. It was a frame structure, originally of sorry workmanship, at least thirty years old, and upon which not a cent's worth of repairing had been done since first erected, wherefore the name was peculiarly appropriate. It was not only old, rickety, paintless, half rotten and sadly sunken at one end, but the fencing around the place was broken, grown over with weeds, and slanted in as many ways as there were panels. The lawn or yard in front of the house had some old cherry trees, gnarled and decaying, growing in what had once been straight rows, but storms and more insidious vicissitudes had twisted and curled them about till they looked as though they had been thrown end foremost at the ground hap-hazard. Under and all round these trees young sprouts, from the scattered cherry seeds of many years of fruiting, had grown so thick that one could with difficulty get through them. A narrow, well-beaten path led from the gate, which lazily lolled on one hinge, up to the decayed and sunken porch, in front of which was the well, with its lop-eared windlass and dilapidated curb and shed.

A country thoroughfare, one of the old State roads leading westward to a ferry on the Wabash river near the village of Attica and eastward to either Crawfordsville, Indianapolis or Lafayette. This road was in the direct line of emigration, and in the proper seasons long lines of covered wagons rolled past, the drivers, a jolly set, hallooing to each other and bandying sharp wit and rude sarcasm at the expense of Rackenshack. Poor old house, it leered at the passers, with its windows askew, and clattered its loose boards and battered shutters in utter and complacent defiance of all their jeers!

Rackenshack belonged to Luke Plunkett and Betsy, his sister; the latter an old maid beyond all cavil, the former a bachelor of about thirty. The lands of the estate were pretty broad, comprising some two thousand acres of rich prairie and "river bottom" land, which had been kept in a much better state of improvement than the house had. In fact, Luke was considered a careful, industrious, frugal farmer. He had large, well regulated barns and stock sheds and stables--plenty of fine horses, cattle, hogs, sheep and mules, all well fed and cared for, and it was generally understood that he had a pretty round deposit in a bank.

Perhaps 'Squire Rube Fink, sometimes called "the Rev. Major Fink" and sometimes "Talking Rube," gives the best description of Luke's condition, habits and surroundings, that I can offer. It is truthful and singularly graphic. He says:

"Luke Plunkett's no fool if he does live at Rack-a-me-shack and 'spect the ole rotten tabernacle to fall down on him every time a rooster crows close by. That feller's long-headed, he is. To be sure, sartinly, his barn's a dern sight better 'n his house, but his head's level, for, d'ye see, that's the way to make money. A house don't never make no money for a feller--it's nothin' but dead capital to put money into a fine dwellin'. Luke's pilin' his money in the bank. He's been doin' a sharp thing in wheat and live stock at Cincinnati, and I guess he knows what he's about. He don't keer about what sort o' house he lives in. But I tell you that red haired sister o' his'n is lightning. She's what bosses the job all round that ole shanty; but she can't red-hair it over Luke in the farm matters. He has his own way. He's so quiet and peculiar; a still, say nothin', bull-dog sort o' man he is."

Indeed, Luke was one of that quiet sort of men who, without ever once loudly asserting a right or disputing any word you say, invariably go ahead on their own judgment and carry their point in everything. Nevertheless, he was a man of fine, generous nature at bottom, a good brother and a worthy friend.

But it was with Luke just as it is, more or less, with us all. He absorbed into his life the spirit of his surroundings. He grew somewhat to resemble Rackenshack in outward appearance. He became slovenly in his dress and let his hair and beard grow wild. His naturally handsome face gradually took on a sort of good humored ugliness, and his heavy shoulders slanted over like the uneven gables of his house. He became an inveterate chewer and smoker of tobacco. What time a quid of the weed was not in his mouth, the short thick stem of a dark, nicotine-coated briar-root pipe took its place there.

Luke was an early riser; therefore it happens that our story properly begins on a fine June morning, just before sunrise. The birds seemed to suspect that a story was to date from that hour, for they were up earlier than usual and made a great rustle of wings and a sweet Babel of voices in the old cherry trees. There were the oriole, the cat bird, the yellow throat, the brown thrush and the red bird, all putting forth at once their charmingest efforts. The old cherry trees, knee deep in the foliage of their under growing seedlings, gleamed dusky green in the early light, as Luke, bareheaded, barefooted and in his "shirt sleeves," as the phrase goes, issued from the front door of Rackenshack, and walked down the path across the yard to the gate at the road. Of late he had been in the habit of "taking a smoke" the first thing after getting up in the morning, and somehow the gate, though off one hinge and having doubtful tenure of the other, was his favorite thing to lean upon while watching the whiffs of blue smoke slowly float away.