The Trail of the Lonesome Pine

by John Fox

  XVI

  The in-sweep of the outside world was broadening its current now. Theimprovement company had been formed to encourage the growth of the town.A safe was put in the back part of a furniture store behind a woodenpartition and a bank was started. Up through the Gap and towardKentucky, more entries were driven into the coal, and on the Virginiaside were signs of stripping for iron ore. A furnace was coming in justas soon as the railroad could bring it in, and the railroad was pushingahead with genuine vigor. Speculators were trooping in and the town hadbeen divided off into lots--a few of which had already changed hands.One agent had brought in a big steel safe and a tent and was buying coallands right and left. More young men drifted in from all points of thecompass. A tent-hotel was put at the foot of Imboden Hill, and of nightsthere were under it much poker and song. The lilt of a definite optimismwas in every man's step and the light of hope was in every man's eye.

  And the Guard went to its work in earnest. Every man now had hisWinchester, his revolver, his billy and his whistle. Drilling andtarget-shooting became a daily practice. Bob, who had been a year in amilitary school, was drill-master for the recruits, and very gravelyhe performed his duties and put them through the skirmishers'drill--advancing in rushes, throwing themselves in the new grass, andvery gravely he commended one enthusiast--none other than the Hon.Samuel Budd--who, rather than lose his position in line, threw himselfinto a pool of water: all to the surprise, scorn and anger of themountain onlookers, who dwelled about the town. Many were the commentsthe members of the Guard heard from them, even while they were at drill.

  "I'd like to see one o' them fellers hit me with one of them locustposts."

  "Huh! I could take two good men an' run the whole batch out o' thecounty."

  "Look at them dudes and furriners. They come into our country and airtryin' to larn us how to run it."

  "Our boys air only tryin' to have their little fun. They don't meannothin', but someday some fool young guard'll hurt somebody and thenthar'll be hell to pay."

  Hale could not help feeling considerable sympathy for their point ofview--particularly when he saw the mountaineers watching the Guard attarget-practice--each volunteer policeman with his back to the target,and at the word of command wheeling and firing six shots in rapidsuccession--and he did not wonder at their snorts of scorn at such badshooting and their open anger that the Guard was practising for THEM.But sometimes he got an unexpected recruit. One bully, who had beenconspicuous in the brickyard trouble, after watching a drill went up tohim with a grin:

  "Hell," he said cheerily, "I believe you fellers air goin' to have morefun than we air, an' danged if I don't jine you, if you'll let me."

  "Sure," said Hale. And others, who might have been bad men, becamemembers and, thus getting a vent for their energies, were asenthusiastic for the law as they might have been against it.

  Of course, the antagonistic element in the town lost no opportunity toplague and harass the Guard, and after the destruction of the "blindtigers," mischief was naturally concentrated in the high-licensesaloons--particularly in the one run by Jack Woods, whose local powerfor evil and cackling laugh seemed to mean nothing else than closepersonal communion with old Nick himself. Passing the door of his saloonone day, Bob saw one of Jack's customers trying to play pool with aWinchester in one hand and an open knife between his teeth, and the boystepped in and halted. The man had no weapon concealed and was making nodisturbance, and Bob did not know whether or not he had the legal rightto arrest him, so he turned, and, while he was standing in the door,Jack winked at his customer, who, with a grin, put the back of hisknife-blade between Bob's shoulders and, pushing, closed it. The boylooked over his shoulder without moving a muscle, but the Hon. SamuelBudd, who came in at that moment, pinioned the fellow's arms from behindand Bob took his weapon away.

  "Hell," said the mountaineer, "I didn't aim to hurt the little feller. Ijes' wanted to see if I could skeer him."

  "Well, brother, 'tis scarce a merry jest," quoth the Hon. Sam, and helooked sharply at Jack through his big spectacles as the two led the manoff to the calaboose: for he suspected that the saloon-keeper was at thebottom of the trick. Jack's time came only the next day. He had regardedit as the limit of indignity when an ordinance was up that nobody shouldblow a whistle except a member of the Guard, and it was great fun forhim to have some drunken customer blow a whistle and then stand in hisdoor and laugh at the policemen running in from all directions. That dayJack tried the whistle himself and Hale ran down.

  "Who did that?" he asked. Jack felt bold that morning.

  "I blowed it."

  Hale thought for a moment. The ordinance against blowing a whistlehad not yet been passed, but he made up his mind that, under thecircumstances, Jack's blowing was a breach of the peace, since the Guardhad adopted that signal. So he said:

  "You mustn't do that again."

  Jack had doubtless been going through precisely the same mental process,and, on the nice legal point involved, he seemed to differ.

  "I'll blow it when I damn please," he said.

  "Blow it again and I'll arrest you," said Hale.

  Jack blew. He had his right shoulder against the corner of his door atthe time, and, when he raised the whistle to his lips, Hale drew andcovered him before he could make another move. Woods backed slowlyinto his saloon to get behind his counter. Hale saw his purpose, and heclosed in, taking great risk, as he always did, to avoid bloodshed,and there was a struggle. Jack managed to get his pistol out; but Halecaught him by the wrist and held the weapon away so that it was harmlessas far as he was concerned; but a crowd was gathering at the doortoward which the saloon-keeper's pistol was pointed, and he feared thatsomebody out there might be shot; so he called out:

  "Drop that pistol!"

  The order was not obeyed, and Hale raised his right hand high aboveJack's head and dropped the butt of his weapon on Jack's skull--hard.Jack's head dropped back between his shoulders, his eyes closed and hispistol clicked on the floor.

  Hale knew how serious a thing a blow was in that part of the world, andwhat excitement it would create, and he was uneasy at Jack's trial, forfear that the saloon-keeper's friends would take the matter up; but theydidn't, and, to the surprise of everybody, Jack quietly paid his fine,and thereafter the Guard had little active trouble from the town itself,for it was quite plain there, at least, that the Guard meant business.

  Across Black Mountain old Dave Tolliver and old Buck Falin had got wellof their wounds by this time, and though each swore to have vengeanceagainst the other as soon as he was able to handle a Winchester, bothfactions seemed waiting for that time to come. Moreover, the Falins,because of a rumour that Bad Rufe Tolliver might come back, and becauseof Devil Judd's anger at their attempt to capture young Dave, grew waryand rather pacificatory: and so, beyond a little quarrelling, a littlethreatening and the exchange of a harmless shot or two, sometimes inbanter, sometimes in earnest, nothing had been done. Sternly, however,though the Falins did not know the fact, Devil Judd continued to holdaloof in spite of the pleadings of young Dave, and so confident was theold man in the balance of power that lay with him that he sent June wordthat he was coming to take her home. And, in truth, with Hale going awayagain on a business trip and Bob, too, gone back home to the Bluegrass,and school closed, the little girl was glad to go, and she waited forher father's coming eagerly. Miss Anne was still there, to be sure,and if she, too, had gone, June would have been more content. The quietsmile of that astute young woman had told Hale plainly, and somewhat tohis embarrassment, that she knew something had happened between the two,but that smile she never gave to June. Indeed, she never encounteredaught else than the same silent searching gaze from the strangely maturelittle creature's eyes, and when those eyes met the teacher's, alwaysJune's hand would wander unconsciously to the little cross at her throatas though to invoke its aid against anything that could come between herand its giver.

  The purple rhododendrons on Bee Rock had come and gone and thepi
nk-flecked laurels were in bloom when June fared forth one sunnymorning of her own birth-month behind old Judd Tolliver--home. Back upthrough the wild Gap they rode in silence, past Bee Rock, out of thechasm and up the little valley toward the Trail of the Lonesome Pine,into which the father's old sorrel nag, with a switch of her sunburnttail, turned leftward. June leaned forward a little, and there was thecrest of the big tree motionless in the blue high above, and shelteredby one big white cloud. It was the first time she had seen the pinesince she had first left it, and little tremblings went through her fromher bare feet to her bonneted head. Thus was she unclad, for Hale hadtold her that, to avoid criticism, she must go home clothed just as shewas when she left Lonesome Cove. She did not quite understand that, andshe carried her new clothes in a bundle in her lap, but she took Hale'sword unquestioned. So she wore her crimson homespun and her bonnet, withher bronze-gold hair gathered under it in the same old Psyche knot.She must wear her shoes, she told Hale, until she got out of town, elsesomeone might see her, but Hale had said she would be leaving too earlyfor that: and so she had gone from the Gap as she had come into it, withunmittened hands and bare feet. The soft wind was very good to thosedangling feet, and she itched to have them on the green grass or in thecool waters through which the old horse splashed. Yes, she was goinghome again, the same June as far as mountain eyes could see, though shehad grown perceptibly, and her little face had blossomed from her heartalmost into a woman's, but she knew that while her clothes were thesame, they covered quite another girl. Time wings slowly for the young,and when the sensations are many and the experiences are new, slowlyeven for all--and thus there was a double reason why it seemed an age toJune since her eyes had last rested on the big Pine.

  Here was the place where Hale had put his big black horse into a deadrun, and as vivid a thrill of it came back to her now as had been thethrill of the race. Then they began to climb laboriously up the rockycreek--the water singing a joyous welcome to her along the path, fernsand flowers nodding to her from dead leaves and rich mould and peepingat her from crevices between the rocks on the creek-banks as high up asthe level of her eyes--up under bending branches full-leafed, with thewarm sunshine darting down through them upon her as she passed, andmaking a playfellow of her sunny hair. Here was the place where she hadgot angry with Hale, had slid from his horse and stormed with tears.What a little fool she had been when Hale had meant only to be kind! Hewas never anything but kind--Jack was--dear, dear Jack! That wouldn'thappen NO more, she thought, and straightway she corrected that thought.

  "It won't happen ANY more," she said aloud.

  "Whut'd you say, June?"

  The old man lifted his bushy beard from his chest and turned his head.

  "Nothin', dad," she said, and old Judd, himself in a deep study, droppedback into it again. How often she had said that to herself--that itwould happen no more--she had stopped saying it to Hale, because helaughed and forgave her, and seemed to love her mood, whether she criedfrom joy or anger--and yet she kept on doing both just the same.

  Several times Devil Judd stopped to let his horse rest, and each time,of course, the wooded slopes of the mountains stretched downward inlonger sweeps of summer green, and across the widening valley the topsof the mountains beyond dropped nearer to the straight level of hereyes, while beyond them vaster blue bulks became visible and ran on andon, as they always seemed, to the farthest limits of the world. Evenout there, Hale had told her, she would go some day. The last curvingup-sweep came finally, and there stood the big Pine, majestic, unchangedand murmuring in the wind like the undertone of a far-off sea. As theypassed the base of it, she reached out her hand and let the tips of herfingers brush caressingly across its trunk, turned quickly for a lastlook at the sunlit valley and the hills of the outer world and then thetwo passed into a green gloom of shadow and thick leaves that shut herheart in as suddenly as though some human hand had clutched it. She wasgoing home--to see Bub and Loretta and Uncle Billy and "old Hon" and herstep-mother and Dave, and yet she felt vaguely troubled. The valley onthe other side was in dazzling sunshine--she had seen that. The sun muststill be shining over there--it must be shining above her over here, forhere and there shot a sunbeam message from that outer world down throughthe leaves, and yet it seemed that black night had suddenly fallen abouther, and helplessly she wondered about it all, with her hands grippedtight and her eyes wide. But the mood was gone when they emerged at the"deadening" on the last spur and she saw Lonesome Cove and the roofof her little home peacefully asleep in the same sun that shone on thevalley over the mountain. Colour came to her face and her heart beatfaster. At the foot of the spur the road had been widened and showedsigns of heavy hauling. There was sawdust in the mouth of the creek and,from coal-dust, the water was black. The ring of axes and the shouts ofox-drivers came from the mountain side. Up the creek above her father'scabin three or four houses were being built of fresh boards, and therein front of her was a new store. To a fence one side of it two horseswere hitched and on one horse was a side-saddle. Before the door stoodthe Red Fox and Uncle Billy, the miller, who peered at her for a momentthrough his big spectacles and gave her a wondering shout of welcomethat brought her cousin Loretta to the door, where she stopped a moment,anchored with surprise. Over her shoulder peered her cousin Dave, andJune saw his face darken while she looked.

  "Why, Honey," said the old miller, "have ye really come home agin?"While Loretta simply said:

  "My Lord!" and came out and stood with her hands on her hips looking atJune.

  "Why, ye ain't a bit changed! I knowed ye wasn't goin' to put on noairs like Dave thar said "--she turned on Dave, who, with a surly shrug,wheeled and went back into the store. Uncle Billy was going home.

  "Come down to see us right away now," he called back. "Ole Hon's mightnigh crazy to git her eyes on ye."

  "All right, Uncle Billy," said June, "early termorrer." The Red Foxdid not open his lips, but his pale eyes searched the girl from head tofoot.

  "Git down, June," said Loretta, "and I'll walk up to the house with ye."

  June slid down, Devil Judd started the old horse, and as the two girls,with their arms about each other's waists, followed, the wolfish side ofthe Red Fox's face lifted in an ironical snarl. Bub was standing at thegate, and when he saw his father riding home alone, his wistful eyesfilled and his cry of disappointment brought the step-mother to thedoor.

  "Whar's June?" he cried, and June heard him, and loosening herselffrom Loretta, she ran round the horse and had Bub in her arms. Then shelooked up into the eyes of her step-mother. The old woman's face lookedkind--so kind that for the first time in her life June did what herfather could never get her to do: she called her "Mammy," and then shegave that old woman the surprise of her life--she kissed her. Right awayshe must see everything, and Bub, in ecstasy, wanted to pilot her aroundto see the new calf and the new pigs and the new chickens, but dumblyJune looked to a miracle that had come to pass to the left of thecabin--a flower-garden, the like of which she had seen only in herdreams.