Chapter 24

Up to this day Casey had been very content with his situation. His quarters were the best the place afforded, and they had been made more comfortable. Scores of friends had visited him, hailing him as their champion. He had been made to feel quite a hero. To be sure it was a nuisance to be so confined; but when he shot King, he had anticipated undergoing some inconvenience. It was a price to pay. He understood that there was some public excitement, and that it was well to lie low for a little until that had died down. The momentary annoyance would be more than offset by later prestige. Casey did not in the least fear the courts. He had before his eyes too many reassuring examples. His friends were rallying nobly to his defence. Over the wines and cigars, with which he was liberally supplied, they boasted of their strength and their dispositions--the whole police force of the city, the militia companies sworn, to act in just such emergencies, hundreds of volunteers, if necessary the whole power of the State of California called to put down this affronting of duly constituted law!

But this Sunday morning Casey was uneasy. There seemed to be much whispering in corners, much bustling to and fro. He paced back and forth, fretting, interrogating those about him. But they could or would tell him little--there was trouble;--and they fussed away, leaving Casey alone. As a matter of fact, the withdrawal of the committee's guard of ten, and the formal notice that the truce was thus promptly ended, had caught the Law and Order party unprepared. With five hours' notice--or indeed by next day, even were no notice given--the jail would have been impregnably defended. The sudden move of the committee won; as prompt, decisive moves will.

The bustling of the people in the jail suddenly died. Casey heard no shuffle of feet, no whisper of conversation. The building might have been empty save for himself. But he did hear outside the steady rhythmic tramp of feet.

Sheriff Scannell stood before him, the Vigilantes' written communication in his hand. Casey, looking up from the bed on which he had fallen in sudden shrinking, saw on his face an expression that made him cower. For the first time realization came to him of the straits he was in. His vivid Irish imagination leaped instantaneously from the complacence of absolute safety to the depths of terror. He sprang to his feet.

"You aren't going to betray me! You aren't going to give me up!" he cried, wringing his hands.

"James," replied' Scannell solemnly, "there are three thousand armed men coming for you, and I have not now thirty supporters around the jail."

"Not thirty!" cried. Casey, astonished. For a moment he appeared crushed; then leaped to his feet flourishing a long knife he had drawn from his boot. "I'll not be taken from this place alive!" he shrieked, beside himself with hysteria. "Where are all you brave fellows who were going to see me through this?"

Scannell looked at him sadly. In the pause came a sharp knocking at the door of the jail. The sheriff turned away. A moment later Casey, listening intently, heard the door open and close, heard the sound of talking. He fairly darted to his table, scrawled a paper, and called to attract attention. Marshal North, answered the summons.

"Give this to them--to the Vigilantes," urged Casey, thrusting the paper into his hands. North glanced through the note.

TO THE VIGILANT COMMITTEE. Gentlemen: I am willing to go before you if you will let me speak but ten minutes. I do not wish the blood of any man upon my head.

JAS. CASEY

But after North had gone to deliver this, Casey again sprang to his feet, again flourished his bowie knife, again ramped up and down, again swore he would never be taken alive. A deputy passed the door. Casey's demeanour collapsed again.

"Tell them," he begged this man earnestly; "tell them if two respectable citizens will promise me gentlemanly treatment, I'll go peaceably! I will not be dragged through the streets like a dog! If they will give me a fair trial and allow me to summon my witnesses, I'll yield!"

And the deputy left him pacing up and down, waving his knife, muttering wildly to, himself.

On entering the jail door Coleman and his companions bowed formally to the sheriff.

"We have come for the prisoner, Casey," said Coleman. "We ask that he be peaceably delivered us handcuffed, at the door, immediately."

"Under existing circumstances," replied Scannell, "I shall make no resistance. The prison and its contents are yours."

But Truett interrupted pointedly:

"We want only the man Casey, at present," he said. "For the rest we hold you strictly accountable."

Scannell bowed without reply. North and the deputy came in succession to deliver Casey's messages, and to report his apparent determination. The committee offered no comment. They penetrated to the ulterior of the jail. Many men, apparently unarmed, idling about as though merely spectators, looked at them curiously as they passed. Casey heard them, coming and sprang back from the door, holding his long knife dramatically poised. Coleman walked directly to the door, where he stopped, looking Casey coldly in the eye. The seconds, passed. Neither man stirred. At the end of a full minute Coleman said sharply:

"Lay down that knife!"

As though his incisive tones had broken the spell, Casey moved. He looked wildly to right and to left; then flung the knife from him and buried his face in his hands.

"Your requests are granted," said Coleman shortly; then to Marshal North: "Open the door and bring him out."

LXI

On the veranda of the unoccupied house above the jail Nan Keith stood rigid, her hand upon her heart. During the period of the committee's absence inside the jail she did not alter her position by a hair's breadth. She was in the hypnosis of a portentous waiting. Time fell into the abyss of eternity: whether it were ten minutes or ten hours did not matter in the least.

For this was to Nan in the nature of a revelation so sudden and so complete that it filled her whole soul. Had she known what Mrs. Sherwood was taking her to see, she would have pre-visualized a drunken, disorderly, howling, bloodthirsty mob; a huge composite of brawling antagonisms, of blind fury, of vulgar irrationalisms. Here were men filled with purpose; This was what caught at her breath--the grim silent purpose of it! The orderly progression of events, moving with the certainty of a fate, was like the steady crescendo of solemn music. And this crescendo rose in her as a tide of emotion that overflowed and drowned her. The right and wrong--as she had examined them intellectually or through, the darkened glasses of her caste prejudices--were quite lost. This was merely something primitive, wonderful, beautiful. The spectacle was at the moment of suspense, yet she felt so impatience--the wheel must turn in its own majestic circle--but only an intense expectation. And in this she felt, subconsciously, that she was one with the multitude.

The jail door swung open. The committee came out. In the middle of their compact group walked a stranger.

"Casey!" breathed a vast voice from the crowd.

An indescribable burst of grateful relief fluttered across the upturned faces as a breeze across water. It was almost timid at first, but gathered strength as it spread. It rolled up the hillside. A great, deep breath seemed to fill the lungs of the throng. The murmur swelled suddenly, was on the point of bursting into the frantic cheering of twenty thousand men.

But Coleman, his hat removed, raised his hand. In obedience to the simple gesture the cheer was stifled. In an instant all was still. The little group entered the carriages, which immediately wheeled and drove away.

Nan, standing bolt upright, her attitude still unchanged, caught her breath at the inhibition of the cheer. She did not even try to wink away the tears that rolled down her cheeks. Through them she saw the troops wheel with the precision of veterans, and march away after the carriages. The crowd melted slowly. Soon were left only the inscrutable jail, the gun still pointed at its door, the rigid ranks of Olney's Sixty, who had evidently been left on guard, and a few stragglers.

Suddenly she turned and walked away. Mrs. Sherwood followed her as rapidly as she could, but did not succeed in catching up with her. At the corner below the Keiths' house she stopped, watched until Nan had gained her own dooryard, then turned toward home, a smile sketching her lips, a light in her eyes.

Nan flung open her door and went directly to the parlour. She stood in the doorway contemplating the scene. It was very cozy. The afternoon sun slanted through the high-narrow windows of the period, gilding the dust motes floating lazily to and fro. The tea table, set with a snowy doth, glittered invitingly, its silver and porcelain, its plates of dainty sandwiches and thin waferlike cookies--Wing Sam's specialty--enticingly displayed. Two easy chairs had been drawn close, and, before the unoccupied one a low footstool had been placed. Ben Sansome sat in the other. He was, as usual, exquisitely dressed. All his little appointments were not only correct but worn easily. The varicoloured waistcoat, the sparkling studs and cravat pins, the bright, soft silk tie, were all subdued from their ordinary too-vivid effect by the grace with which they were carried. Nan saw all this, and appreciated it dispassionately, appraising him anew through clarified vision. Especially she noticed the waxed ends of his small moustache. He had, at the sound of her entrance, lighted the tea kettle; and as she came in he smiled up at her brightly.

"You see," he cried gayly, "I am doing your task for you! I have the lamp all lit!"

She paid no attention to this, but advanced two steps into the room.

"Which side are you on, anyway?" she asked abruptly and a little harshly.

Sansome raised his eyebrows in faint and fastidious surprise.

"Dear lady, what do you mean?"

"The only thing I can mean in these times: are you with the Law and Order, or with the Committee of Vigilance?"

Sansome shrugged his shoulders whimsically and sank back into his chair.

"How can you ask that, dear lady?" he begged pathetically. "You would not class me with the rabble, I hope."

But Nan did not in the slightest degree respond to the lightness of his tone. Her own was cold and detached.

"I do not know how to class you," she said. "But I asked you a question."

Sansome arose to his feet again. His manner now became sympathetic, but into it had crept the least hint of resentment.

"I don't understand your mood" he told her. "You are overwrought."

Nan's self-control slipped by ever so little. She did not actually stamp her foot, but her delivery of her next speech achieved that for her.

"Will you answer me?" she demanded. "Which side, are you on?"

"I am on the side every gentleman is on," replied Sansome, a trifle stung. "The side of the law."

"Then," she cried, with a sudden intensity, "why weren't you there--on your side--defending the jail?' Why are you here?"

Ben Sansome's knowledge of women was wide, and he therefore imagined it profound. Here he recognized the symptoms of hysteria; cause unknown. He adopted the lightly soothing.

"I thought I was asked here!" he cried with quizzical mock pathos.

She stared at him a contemplative instant so steadily that he coloured. She was not seeing him, however; she was seeing Keith, standing with his fellows in the open, under the walls of the jail and its hidden guns. With a short laugh she turned away.

"You were," said she. "Help yourself to tea. As you say, I am overwrought. I am going to lie down."

Her one compelling instinct now was to get away from him before something in her brain snapped. He became soothing.

"Won't you have a cup of tea first?" he urged. "It will do you good."

"A cup of tea!" she repeated with deadly calm. It seemed such an ending to such a day! She tried to laugh, but strangled in her throat; and she bolted wildly from the room, leaving Ben Sansome staring.

LXII

Nan's high exaltation of spirit, which still soared at the altitude to which the events of the afternoon had lifted it, next expressed itself in a characteristically feminine manner: she picked flowers in the garden, arranged them, placed them effectively, set the table herself, lighted the lamps, touched a match to the wood fire always comfortable in San Francisco evenings, slightly altered the position of the chairs, visited Wing Sam with fresh instructions. Gringo, who looked on all this as for his especial benefit, took his place luxuriously before the grate. It was a cozy, homelike scene. Then she dressed slowly and carefully in her most becoming gown--the only gown Keith had ever definitely singled out for individual praise--took especial pains with her hair, and finally descended to join Gringo. The latter, as a greeting intended to show his entire confidence, promptly rolled over to expose his vitals to her should it be her pleasure to hurt a poor defenceless dog. He was a ridiculous sight, upside down, his tongue lolling out, his eye rolled up at her adoringly. She laughed at him a little, then leaned swiftly over to confide something in his ear.

But that evening Keith was late. The clock on the mantel chimed clearly the hour, then the quarter and the half. Wing Sam came to protest aggreivedly that "him glub catchum cold--you no wait!" Nan was severe with Wing Sam and his suggestion--so unwontedly severe that Wing Sam returned to the kitchen muttering darkly. He had caught the atmosphere of celebration, somehow, and on his own-initiative had frosted with wonderful white a cake not yet cut, and on the cake had carefully traced pink legends in Chinese and English characters. The former was one of those conventional mottoes seen on every laundry, club, and temple which would have translated "Health, long life, and happiness"; the other Wing Sam had copied from a lithograph he much admired. It read "Use Rising Sun Stove Polish." Glowering with resentment, Wing Sam scraped the frosting from the cake.

At eight o'clock a small boy delivered a note at the door and scuttled back to the centre of excitement. It was a scrawl from Keith, saying that he was detained, would not be home to dinner, might not be in at all. Nan sat down to a cold, belated meal served by a loftily disapproving Chinaman. She tried to think of her pride in Keith, and the work he, in company with his fellows, was doing for the city; to recall some of her exaltation of the afternoon; but it was very difficult. Her little preparations were so much nearer. The table, the flowers, the shaded lamps, the fire on the hearth, her gown, the twist of her hair, all mocked her anticipations. In spite of herself her spirits went down to zero. She could not eat, she could not even sit at the table through the service of the various courses. Midway in the meal she threw aside her napkin and returned abruptly to the drawing-room. The fire was snapping merrily on the hearth. Gringo opened his eyes at her entrance, recognized his beloved mistress, and rolled over as usual, all four legs in the air, his tender stomach confidingly exposed, for Who could be so brutal as to hurt a poor, defenceless dog? Nan kicked him pettishly in the ribs. Gringo stopped panting, and drew in his tongue, but otherwise did not shift his posture. This was, of course, a mistake. Nan kicked him again. Gringo rose deliberately and retired with dignity to the coldest, darkest, most cheerless corner he could find, where he sat and looked dejected.

"You look such a silly fool!" Nan told him relentlessly.

Thus passed the moment of exaltation and expansion. If Keith had come home to dine, it is probable that the barrier between them--of which he was only dimly conscious--would have been broken. But by midnight Nan had, as she imagined, "thought out" the situation. She was able to see him now through eyes purged of self-pity or self-thought. She came to full realization, which she formulated to herself, that she was not now the central point of his interest--that she was "no longer" the central point, as she expressed it. She was right also in her conclusion that all day long he hardly gave her more than a perfunctory thought. So far, her facts were absolutely correct. But Nan was, in spite of her natural good mind and married experience, too ignorant of man psychology to draw the true conclusion. Indeed, very few women ever realize man's possibilities of single-minded purpose and concentration to the temporary exclusion of other things. Keith's whole being was carried by this moral movement in which he was involved. He simply took Nan for granted; and that is something a woman never gets used to, and always misinterprets.

"He no longer loves me!" she said to herself, in this hour of plain thinking. She faced it squarely; and her heart sank to the depths; for she still loved him, and the sight of him that afternoon amid the guns had told her how much.

But her next thought was not of herself, but of him, and the situation in which, he was working out his destiny. "How can I best help?" she asked herself, which showed that the spirit aroused in her that afternoon had not in reality died. And her intellect relentlessly pointed out to her that her only aid would come from her self-effacement, her standing one side. When the great work was done, then, perhaps--

So affairs in the Keith household went on exactly as before. Nobody but Gringo knew that anything had happened; and he only realized that the universe had suffered an upheaval, so that now mistresses might kick their poor defenceless dogs in the stomach.

LXIII

Casey was safely in custody. Cora also had been taken on a second trip to the jail. They had been escorted into the headquarters, the doors of which had closed behind them and behind the armed men who guarded them. The streets were filled with an orderly crowd. They waited with that same absence of excitement, impatience, or tumult so characteristic of all the popular gatherings of that earnest time, save when the upholders of the law were gathered. After a long interval one of the committeemen, Dows by name, appeared at an upper window. He did not have to appeal for attention, and had barely to raise his voice.

"It is not the intention of the committee to be hasty," he announced. "Nothing more will be done to-day."

Silence greeted this statement. At last some one spoke up:

"Where are Casey and Cora?" he asked.

"The committee holds possession of the jail; all are safe," replied Dows.

With this assurance the crowd was completely satisfied, as it proved by dispersing quietly and at once.

Of the three thousand enrolled men, three hundred were retained under arms at headquarters; a hundred surrounded and watched the jail; the rest were dismissed. About midnight a dense fog descended on the city. The streets were deserted. But on the roofs of the jail and the adjacent buildings indistinct figures stalked to and fro in the misty moonlight.

All next day, which was Monday, headquarters remained inscrutable. Small activities went forward. Guards and patrols were changed. The cannon was brought from before the jail. Early in the day a huge crowd gathered, packing the adjacent streets, watching patiently far into the night to see what would happen. Nothing happened.

But about the city at large patrols of armed men moved on mysterious business. Gun shops were picketed, and their owners forbidden to sell weapons. Evidently the committee was carrying out a considered plan.

Toward evening the weather thickened and a rain came on. It turned colder. Still the crowd did not disperse. It stood in its sodden shoes, hugging its sodden cloaks to its shoulders, humped over, waiting. About eight o'clock several companies in rigid marching formation appeared. A stir of interest, shivered through the crowd, but died as it became evident that this was only a general relief for those on duty during the day. At midnight, or thereabouts, the crowd went home; but again by first daylight the streets for blocks were jammed full. Still it rained with a sullen, persistence. Still nothing happened.

And all over the city business was practically at a stand. Knots of men stood conferring on every corner. Conversation in mixed company was very wary indeed. No man dared express himself too openly. The courts were empty. Some actually closed, on one excuse or another, but most went through a form of business. Some judges took the occasion to go to White Sulphur Springs on vacations, long contemplated, they said. These things occasioned lively comment. It was generally known that the Sacramento steamer of the evening before had carried several hundred passengers, all with pressing business at the capitol, or somewhere else. As our chronicler tells it: "A good many who had things on their minds left for the country." Still it rained; still the crowd waited; still the headquarters of the Committee of Vigilance remained closed and inscrutable.

LXIV

During all this time the Executive Committee sat in continuous session, for it had been agreed that no recess of more than thirty minutes should be taken until a decision had been reached. The room in which they sat was a large one, lighted by windows on one side only. Coleman sat behind a raised desk at one end. Below it stood a small table accommodating two. On either side six small tables completed three sides of a hollow square. No ornament, no especial comforts--the desk, the thirteen pine tables, the twenty-eight pine chairs, the wooden walls, the oil lamps, the four long windows--that was all.

The prisoners, who, when they had seen the thousands before the jail, had expected nothing less than instant execution by lynch law, began to take heart. After a man has faced what he thinks is the prospect of immediate and unavoidable death, such treatment as this arouses real hope. The prisoners were strictly guarded and closely confined, it is true, but they understood they were to have a fair trial "according to law." That last phrase cheered them immensely. They knew the law. Nor were they entirely cut off from the outside. Casey was allowed to see several men in regard to certain pressing business matters, and was permitted to talk to them freely, although always in the presence of a member of the committee. Cora received visits from Belle. She had spent thousands in his legal defence; now she came to see him faithfully, and tried to cheer him, but was plainly cowed. Her self-control had vanished. She clung to him passionately, weeping. He was forced to what should have been her rôle; and in cheering her he managed to gain a modicum of self-confidence for himself. She left him at midnight, much reassured.

But on Monday morning Cora's cell door was thrown open, and he was motioned forth by a grave man, who conducted him through echoing gloomy corridors to the committee room, where he was left facing the tables and the men who sat behind them. Cora's natural buoyancy vanished. The men before him met his gaze with rigid, unbending solemnity. The rain beat mournfully against the windows, blurring the glass, casting the high apartment in a half gloom. Nobody moved or spoke. All looked at him. The echo of his footsteps died, and the room was cast in stillness except for the soft dashing of the storm.

"Charles Cora," at last pronounced Coleman in measured tones, "you are here on trial for your life, accused with the murder of United States Marshal Richardson."

Cora, who was a plucky man, had recovered his wits. He must have realized that he was in a tight place, but he kept his head admirably. His demeanour took on alertness, his manner throughout was respectful, and his voice low.

"Do I get no counsel?" he inquired.

"Counsel will be given you."