Miss Ravenel's conversion from secession to loyalty

by John William De Forest

  CHAPTER XXII.

  CAPTAIN COLBURNE REINFORCES THE RAVENELS IN TIME TO AID THEM IN RUNNINGAWAY.

  Colburne had been two or three weeks in the hospital when he wasstartled by seeing Doctor Ravenel advancing eagerly upon him with a facefull of trouble. The Doctor had heard of the young man's hurt, and ashis sensitive sympathy invariably exaggerated danger and suffering,especially if they concerned any one whom he loved, he had imagined theworst, and taken the first boat for New Orleans. On the other hand,Colburne surmised from that concerned countenance that the Doctorbrought evil tidings of his daughter. Was she unhappy in her marriage,or widowed, or dead? He laughed outright, with a sense of reliefequivalent to positive pleasure, when he learned that he alone was thecause of Ravenel's worry.

  "I am getting along famously," said he. "Ask Doctor Jackson here. I amnot sick at all above my left elbow. Below the elbow the arm seems tobelong to some other man."

  The Doctor shook his head with the resolute incredulity of a man who istoo anxious not to expect the worst.

  "But you can't continue to do well here. This air is infected. Thisgreat mass of inflammation, suppuration, mortification and death, haspoisoned the atmosphere of the hospital. I scented it the moment Ientered the door. Am I not right, Dr. Jackson?"

  "Just so. Can't help it. Horrid weather for cases," replied the chiefsurgeon, wiping the perspiration from his forehead. "Air _is_ poisoned.Wish to God I could get a fresh building. My patients would do better inshanties than they will here."

  "I knew it," said Ravenel. "Now then, I am a country doctor. I can takethis young man to a plantation, and give him pure air."

  "That's what you want," observed Jackson, turning to Colburne. "Your armdon't need ice now. Water will do. Better go, I think. I'll see that youhave a month's leave of absence. Come, you can go to Taylorsville, andstill not miss a chance for fighting. Tried to send him north," headded, addressing Ravenel. "But he's foolish about it. Wants to see PortHudson out--what you call a knight-errant."

  Colburne was in a tremble, body and soul, at the thought of meeting Mrs.Carter; he had never been so profoundly shaken by even the actuality ofencountering Miss Ravenel. Most of us have been in love enough tounderstand all about it without explanation, and to feel no wonder athim because, after reeling mentally this way and that, he finally said,"I will go." Now and then there is a woman who cannot bear to look uponthe man whom she has loved and lost, and who will turn quick corners andrun down side streets to escape him, haunting him spiritually perhaps,but bodily keeping afar from him all her life. But stronger natures, whocan endure the trial, frequently go to meet it, and seem to find somedolorous comfort in it. As regards Colburne, it may be that he would nothave gone to Taylorsville had he not been weak and feverish, and felt acraving for that petting kindness which seems to be a necessity ofinvalids.

  I doubt whether the life in Ravenel's house contributed much to advancehis convalescence. His emotions were played upon too constantly andpowerfully for the highest good of the temporarily shattered instrument.He had supposed that he would undergo one great shock on meeting Mrs.Carter, and that then his trouble would be over. The first thrill wasnot so potent as he expected; but it was succeeded by a constant unrest,like the burning of a slow fever; he was uneasy all day and slept badlyat night. In the house he could not talk freely and gaily, because ofLillie's presence; and out of it he could not feel with calmness,because he was perpetually thinking of her. After all, it may have beenthe splinters of bone in the arm, quite as much as the arrow in theheart, which worried him. Of Mrs. Carter I must admit that she was notmerciful; she made the doubly-wounded Captain talk a great deal of hisColonel. He might recite Carter's martial deeds and qualities aslengthily as he pleased, and recommence _da capo_ to recite them overagain, not only without fatiguing her, but without exciting in her minda thought that he was doing any thing remarkable. She was very muchpleased, but she was not a bit grateful. Why should she be! It wasperfectly natural to her mind that people should admire the Colonel, andtalk much of his glory. Colburne performed this ill-paid task withinfinite patience, sympathy, and self-sacrificing love; and no warriorwas ever better sung in conversational epics than was Carter thesuccessful by Colburne the disappointed. Under the rude oppression ofthis subject the bruised shrub exhaled daily sweetness. It is almostpainful to contemplate these two loving hearts: the one sending itsanxious sympathies a hundred miles away into the deadly trenches ofPort Hudson; the other pouring out its sympathies for a present object,but covertly and without a thought of reward. If the passionateaffection of the woman is charming, the unrequited, unhoping love of theman is sublime.

  The Doctor perhaps saw what Lillie could not or would not see.

  "My dear," he observed, "you must remember that Colonel Carter is notthe husband of Captain Colburne."

  "Oh papa!" she answered. "Do you suppose that he doesn't like to talkabout Colonel Carter? Of course he does. He admires him, and likes himimmensely."

  "I dare say--I dare say. But nevertheless you give him very large dosesof your husband."

  "No, papa; not too large. He is such a good friend that I am sure hedoesn't object. Just think how unkind it would be not to want to talkabout my husband. You don't understand him if you think he is soshabby."

  Nevertheless the Doctor was partially right, and shabby as it may havebeen, Colburne was no better for the conversation which so muchgratified Mrs. Carter. His arm discharged its slivers of bone and healedsteadily, but he was thin and pale, slept badly, and had a slow fever.It must not be supposed that he wilfully brooded over hisdisappointment; much less that he was angry about it or felt any desireto avenge it. He was too sensible not to struggle against uselesspinings; too gentle-hearted and honorable to be even tempted of base orcruel spirits. Not that he was a moral miracle; not that he was even amarvellously bright exception to the general run of humanity; on thecontrary he was like many of us, especially when we are under theinfluence of elevating emotion. Some by me forgotten author has remarkedthat no earthly being is purer, more like the souls in paradise, than ayoung man during his first earnest love.

  At one time Colburne entirely forgot himself in his sympathy for Mrs.Carter. When the news came of the unsuccessful and murderous assault ofthe fourteenth of June, she was nearly crazy for three days because ofher uncertainty concerning the fate of her husband. She must hearconstantly from her comforters the assurance that all was undoubtedlywell; that, if the Colonel had been engaged in the fighting, he wouldcertainly have been named in the official report; that, if he hadreceived any harm, he would have been all the more sure of beingmentioned, etc., etc. Clinging as if for life to these two men, shedemanded all their strength to keep her out of the depths of despair.Every day they went two or three times to the fort, one or other ofthem, to gather information from passing boats concerning the newtragedy. Very honestly and earnestly gratified was Colburne when he wasable to bring to Mrs. Carter a letter from her husband, written the dayafter the struggle, and saying that no harm had befallen him. How thatletter was wept over, prayed over, held to a beating heart, and then toloving lips! The house was solemn all day with that immense andunspeakable joy.

  Circumstances soon occurred which caused this lonely and anxious familyto be troubled about its own safety. To carry on the siege of PortHudson, Banks had been obliged to reduce the garrison of New Orleans andof its vast exterior line of defences (a hundred miles from the city onevery side) to the lowest point consistent with safety. Meantime Taylorreorganized the remnant of his beaten army, raised new levies byconscription, procured reinforcements from Texas, and resumed theoffensive. Brashear City on the Atchafalaya, with its immense mass ofcommissary stores, and garrison of raw Nine Months' men, was captured bysurprise. A smart little battle was fought at Lafourche Crossing, nearThibodeaux, in which Greene's Texans charged with their usual brilliantimpetuosity, but were repulsed by our men with fearful slaughter after ahand-to-hand struggle over the contested cannon. Nevertheless the Uniontroops
soon retired before superior numbers, and Greene's wild mountedrangers were at liberty to patrol the Lafourche Interior.

  "We can't stay here long," said Colburne, in the council of war in whichthe family talked these matters over. "Greene will come this way sooneror later. If he can take Fort Winthrop, he will thereby blockade theMississippi, cut off Banks' supplies, and force him to raise the siegeof Port Hudson. He is sure to try it sooner or later."

  "Must we leave our plantation, then?" asked Ravenel in real anguish. Tolose his home, his invested capital, pigs, chickens, prospective crop ofvegetables, and, worse yet, of enlightened and ennobled negroes, wasindeed a torturing calamity. Had he known on the afternoon of that day,that before morning the shaggy ponies and long, lank, dirty mosstroopersof Greene's brigade would be upon him, he would not have paused toexamine the situation from so many different points of view. Colburneknew by experience the celerity of Texan rangers; he had chased them inforced marches from Brashear City to Alexandria without ever seeing atail of their horses; and yet even he indulged in a false security.

  "I think we have twelve hours before us," he observed. "To-morrowmorning we shall have to get up and get, as the natives say. Still it'smy opinion--I don't believe Mrs. Carter had better stay here; she oughtto go to the fort to-night."

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

  "My dear, I must stay here till the last moment. We have so muchproperty 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 UnitedStates officer you are sure to be kept a prisoner, if taken. I certainlythink that you ought to go."

  Colburne thought so too, but would not desert his friends; he shruggedhis shoulders in spirit and resolved to endure what might come. Thenegroes were in a state of exquisite alarm. The entire black populationof the Lafourche Interior was making for the swamps or other places ofshelter; and only the love of the Ravenel gang for their good massa andbeautiful missus kept them from being swept away by the contagiouscurrent. The horror with which they regarded the possibility of beingreturned into slavery delighted the Doctor, who, even in thosecircumstances, dilated enthusiastically upon it as a proof that the racewas capable of high aspirations.

  "They have already acquired the love of individual liberty," said thisamiable optimist. "The cognate love of liberty in the abstract, theliberty of all men, is not far ahead of them. How superior they alreadyare to the white wretches who are fighting to send them back toslavery!--Shedding blood, their own and their brothers', for slavery! Isit not utterly amazing? Risking life and taking life to restore slavery!It is the foolishest, wickedest, most demoniacal infatuation that everpossessed humanity. The Inquisition, the Massacre of St. Bartholomew,were common sense and evangelical mercy compared to this pro-slaveryrebellion. And yet these imps of atrocity pretend to be Christians. Theyare the most orthodox creatures that ever served the devil. They rantand roar in the Methodist camp-meetings; they dogmatize on the doctrinesin the Presbyterian church; they make the responses in the Episcopalliturgy. There is only one pinnacle of hypocrisy that they never havehad the audacity to mount. They have not yet brought themselves to makethe continuance and spread of slavery an object of prayer. It would belogical, you know; it would be just like their impudence. I haveexpected that they would come to it. I have looked forward to the timewhen their hypocritical priesthood would put up bloody hands in the faceof an indignant Heaven, and say, 'O God of Justice! O Jesus, lover ofthe oppressed! bless, extend and perpetuate slavery; prosper us inselling the wife away from the husband, and the child away from theparent; enable us to convert the blood and tears of our fellow creaturesinto 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 imagineanything more astoundingly wicked than such a petition? And yet I ampositively astonished that they have not got up monthly concerts ofprayer, and fabricated a liturgy, all pregnant with just such or similarblasphemies. But God would not wait for them to reach this acme ofiniquity. His patience is exhausted, and He is even now bringing them topunishment."

  "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 thecreature was cut in two. I dare say it might have inflicted a poisonouswound."

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

  "Do you anticipate such immediate danger?" inquired the Doctor, his veryspectacles 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 tocome in after nightfall."

  "I really ought to send the hands off," admitted the Doctor after aminute of reflection. "I never could forgive myself if through my meansthey 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 soonas 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 themorning 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 peoplealong."

  In five minutes fifteen men, six women and four pickaninnies, the wholelaboring 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 criedloudly with fright and grief; the pickaninnies cried because theirmothers did.

  "Oh, Mars Ravenel! you'll be cotched suah," sobbed the old mamma who didthe 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 tosave necessaries."

  So the negroes added to their loads whatever seemed most valuable andessential of the Ravenel baggage. Then Scott received the note to thecommandant of the fort, handed it to Julius, the second boss, andremarked with dignity, "I stays with Marsr." The Major was undisguisedlyalarmed, but he had a character to sustain, and a military title tojustify. He was immediately joined in his forlorn hope by Jim the "no'count nigger," who, being a sly and limber darkey, fleet of foot, andfamiliar with swamp life, had a faith that he could wriggle out of anydanger or captivity.

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

  There was an evident hesitation in the whole gang as to whether theyshould go or stay; but Colburne settled the question by pronouncing in atone 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 beeneddycatin' 'em to millingtary ways. They knows a heap a'ready, theydoos."

  He smiled with a simple and transitory joy, although he could hear thevoice of his wife (commonly called Mamma Major) rising in loud lamentamid the chorus of sorrow with which the women and children moved away.The poor creature kept no grudge against her husband for his infidelityof 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 myorders. I am the military power, and I proclaim martial law."

  He forbade the Ravenels to undress; they must be prepared to run at amoment's notice. He laughed at the Doctor's proposition to barricade thedoors and windows, and, instead thereof, opened two or three trunks andscattered articles of little value about the rooms. The property wouldbe a bait, he said, which might amuse the raid
ers while the familyescaped. To gratify Major Scott's tremulous enthusiasm he loaded his ownrevolver and the Doctor's doubled-barreled fowling-piece, smiling sadlyto himself to think how absurd was the idea of fighting off a band ofTexans with such a feeble artillery. He posted the two negroes as avidette a quarter of a mile down the road, with strict orders not tobuild a fire, not to sleep, not to make a noise, but in case of theapproach of a party to hasten to the house and give information. TheMajor begged hard for the fowling-piece, but Colburne would not let himhave it.

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

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

  "What is the matter?" gasped the Doctor, with the wild air common topeople 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 runningand alarm.

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

  "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. TheMajor and I will go to the woods, fire from there, and draw the enemy inthat direction."

  Every one obeyed him without a word. The approaching tramp of horses wasdistinctly audible at the house when the Ravenels mounted the mules andset off at a lumbering trot, the animals being urged forward byresounding whacks from Jim's bludgeon. Colburne scowled and grated histeeth with impatience and vexation.

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

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

  "Yes, Mars Cap'm," replied the Major. His voice was tremulous, and hiswhole frame shook, but he was nevertheless ready to die, if need be, forhis liberty and his benefactors. Of physical courage the poor fellow hadlittle; 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 mustnot fire until you have taken aim at somebody. You must fire only onebarrel. 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 thefence 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 asyou're used to it."

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

  Then he prayed for some minutes in a low whisper, while Colburne stoodat the corner and watched. "Watch and pray," the latter repeated tohimself, smiling inwardly at the odd compliance with the doubleinjunction, so strangely does the mind work on such occasions. It wasnot a deliberate process of intellection with him; it was an instinctiveflash of ideas, not traceable to any feeling which was in him at thetime; on the contrary, his prevailing emotion was one of extremeanxiety. The tramp which fled toward the fort gently diminished in thedistance, while the tramp which approached from the opposite side grewnearer and louder. When the advancing horsemen got within a hundredyards of the house, they slackened their pace to a walk, and finallyhalted, probably to listen. Some of them must have dismounted at thistime, for Colburne suddenly beheld four footmen at the front gate. Hescowled at this sign of experienced caution, and gave a hasty glancetoward the garden in his rear, to see if others were not cutting off hisretreat. He could not discover the features of any of the four, but hecould see that they were of the tall and lank Texan type, dressed inbrownish clothing, and provided with short guns, no doubtdouble-barreled fowling-pieces. Inside of the gate they halted andseemed to hearken, while one of them pointed up the road toward thefort, and whispered to his comrades. Colburne had hoped that they wouldget into the house, and fall to plundering; but they had evidentlyoverheard the fugitives, for there was a simultaneous backward movementin the group--they were going to remount and pursue. Now was his time,if ever, to effect the proposed diversion. Aiming his six-inch revolverat the tallest, he fired a single barrel. The man yelled a curse,staggered, dropped his gun, and leaned against the fence. Two of hiscomrades sprang across the road, and threw themselves behind the leveeas a breast-work, while the fourth, all grit, turned short and broughthis fowling-piece to a level as Colburne drew behind his cover. In thatsame moment, Major Scott, wild with a sudden madness of conflict,shouted like a lion, bounded beyond the angle of the house, plantinghimself on two feet set wide apart, his mad black face set toward theenemy, and his gun aimed. Both fired at the same instant, and both felltogether, probably alike lifeless. The last prayer of the negro was, "MyGod!" and the last curse of the rebel was "Damnation!"

  By the light of the moon Colburne looked at his comrade, and saw thebrains following the blood from a hole in the centre of his forehead. Hecast a glance at the levee, fired one more barrel at a broad-brimmed hatwhich rose above it, listened for a second to an advancing rush of hoofsin 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 furtherside of a high and close plantation-fence, and followed its coverrapidly toward the forest. The distance was less than a quarter of amile, 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 edgeof the wood he sat down on a fallen and mouldering trunk to listen. Ifthe cavalry were pursuing their course up the road, they were doing itvery prudently and slowly, for he could hear no more trampling ofhorses. Tolerably satisfied as to the safety of the Ravenels, hereloaded his two empty barrels, settled his course in his mind, andpushed as straight as he could for Taylorsville without quitting thecover of the forest. Although the fort was not four miles away in adirect line, it was daybreak when he came in sight of a low flattenedoutline, as of a truncated mound, which showed dimly through theyellowish morning mist. He had still to cross a dead level of four orfive hundred yards, with no points of shelter but three small woodenhouses. At this moment, when safety seemed so near and sure, he saw onthe bayou road, two hundred yards to hi
s right, half a dozen black andindistinct bunches moving in a direction parallel to his own. They wereunquestionably horsemen going toward the fort, and nearer to it than he.Changing his direction, he made straight for the river, struck it abovethe fortification, and got behind the levee, thus securing both acovered way to hide his course, and an earthwork from behind which hecould fight. He lost no time in peeping over the top of the mound, butpushed ahead at his best speed, supposing that no cavalry scouts woulddare approach very near to a garrison supplied with artillery. He couldsee a sentry pacing the ramparts, the dark uniform showing clear againstthe grey sky beyond. He even thought that the man perceived him, andsupposed that his dangers were over for the present. He was full ofexhilaration, and glanced back at the events of the night with a senseof satisfaction, taking it all for granted with a resolute faith ofsatisfaction, that the Ravenels had escaped. Major Scott was dead; hewas really quite sorry for that; but then two Texans had been killed, orat least disabled; the war was so much nearer its close. In a small wayhe felt much as a general does who has effected a masterly retreat, andinflicted severe loss upon the pursuing enemy.

  Presently a break in the bank forced him to mount the levee. As hereached the top he stared in astonishment and some dismay at a man inbutternut-colored clothing, mounted on a rough pony, with thedouble-barreled gun of Greene's mosstroopers across his saddle-bow, whowas posted on the road not forty feet distant. The Butternut immediatelysaid, in the pleasant way current in armies, "Halt, you son of a bitch!"

  He fired, but missed, as Colburne skirted the break on a run, and sprangagain behind the levee. The Captain then fired in return, with no othereffect than to make the Butternut gallop beyond revolver range. Fromthis distance he called out, ironically, "I say, Yank, have you heardfrom Brashear City?"

  Colburne made no reply, but continued his retreat unmolested. When thesentinel challenged, "Halt! who comes there?" he thought he had neverheard a pleasanter welcome.

  "Friend," he answered.

  "Halt, friend! Corporal of the guard, number five," shouted the sentry.

  The corporal appeared, recognized Colburne, and let him in through thegate in a palisade which connected one angle of the fort with the river.The garrison was already under arms, and the men were lying down behindthe low works, with their equipments on and their muskets by theirsides. The first person from the plantation whom Colburne saw was MaumaMajor.

  "Where is Mrs. Carter, aunty?" he asked.

  "They's all here, bress the Lord! And now you's come!" shouted the goodfat creature, clapping her hands with delight. "Whar my ole man?"

  "In heaven," said Colburne, with a solemn tenderness which carriedinstant conviction. The woman screamed, and went down upon her kneeswith an air and face of such anguish as might cast shame upon thosephilosophers as have asserted that the negro is not a man.

  "Oh! the Lord gave! The Lord gave!" she repeated, wildly.

  Perhaps she had forgotten, perhaps she never knew, the remainder of thetext; but its piteous sense of bereavement, and of more than humanconsolation, was evidently clear in some manner to her soul.