by Bret Harte
CHAPTER VIII.
IN TENEBRIS SERVARE FIDEM.
Although a large man, Gabriel was lithe and active, and dropped theintervening distance where the rope was scant, lightly, and withoutinjury. Happily the falling of the statue was looked upon as the resultof another earthquake shock, and its disastrous effect upon the stormingparty for awhile checked the attack. Gabriel lifted his half-faintingally in his arms, and gaining the friendly shelter of the ditch, in tenminutes was beyond the confines of One Horse Gulch, and in the shadow ofthe pines of Conroy's Hill. There were several tunnel openings onlyknown to him. Luckily the first was partly screened by a fall of rockloosened by the earthquake from the hill above, and satisfied that itwould be unrecognised by any eye less keen than his own, Gabriel turnedinto it with his fainting burden. And it was high time. For theh[ae]morrhage from Jack Hamlin's wound was so great that that gentleman,after a faint attempt to wave his battered hat above his dishevelledcurls, suddenly succumbed, and lay as cold and senseless and beautifulas a carven Apollo.
Then Gabriel stripped him, and found an ugly hole in his thigh that hadnarrowly escaped traversing the femoral artery, and set himself aboutthat rude surgery which he had acquired by experience, and that moredelicate nursing which was instinctive with him. He was shocked at therevelation of a degree of emaciation in the figure of this young fellowthat he had not before suspected. Gabriel had nursed many sick men, andhere was one who clearly ought to be under the doctor's hands,economising his vitality as a sedentary invalid, who had shown himselfto him hitherto only as a man of superabundant activity and animalspirits. Whence came the power that had animated this fragile shell?Gabriel was perplexed; he looked down upon his own huge frame with a newand sudden sense of apology and depreciation, as if it were an offenceto this spare and bloodless Adonis.
And then with an infinite gentleness, as of a young mother over hernewborn babe, he stanched the blood and bound up the wounds of his newfriend, so skilfully that he never winced, and with a peculiar purringaccompaniment that lulled him to repose. Once only, as he held him inhis arms, did he change his expression, and that was when a shadow and atread--perhaps of a passing hare or squirrel--crossed the mouth of hiscave, when he suddenly caught the body to his breast with the fiercenessof a lioness interrupted with her cubs. In his own rough experience hewas much awed by the purple and fine linen of this fine gentleman'sunderclothing--not knowing the prevailing habits of his class--and whenhe had occasion to open his bosom to listen to the faint beatings of hisheart, he put aside with great delicacy and instinctive honour a finegold chain from which depended some few relics and keepsakes which thisscamp wore. But one was a photograph, set in an open locket, that hecould not fail to see, and that at once held him breathless above it. Itwas the exact outline and features of his sister Grace, but with astrange shadow over that complexion which he remembered well asbeautiful, that struck him with superstitious awe. He scanned it againeagerly. "Maybe it was a dark day when she sot!" he murmured softly tohimself; "maybe it's the light in this yer tunnel; maybe the heat o'this poor chap's buzzum hez kinder turned it. It ain't measles, fur shehed 'em along o' Olly." He paused and looked at the unconscious manbefore him, as if trying to connect him with the past. "No," he saidsimply, with a resigned sigh, "it's agin reason! She never knowed him!It's only my foolishness, and my thinkin' and thinkin' o' her so much!It's another gal, and none o' your business, Gabe, and you a' pryinginter another man's secrets, and takin' advantage of him when he'sdown." He hurriedly replaced it in his companion's bosom, and closed thecollar of his shirt, as Jack's lips moved. "Pete!" he called, feebly.
"It's his pardner, maybe, he's callin' on," said Gabriel to himself;then aloud, with the usual, comforting professional assent, "In course,Pete, surely! He's coming, right off--he'll be yer afore you know it."
"Pete," continued Jack, forcibly, "take the mare off my leg, she'sbreaking it! Don't you see? She's stumbled! D--n it, quick! I'll belate. They'll string him up before I get there!"
In a moment Gabriel's stout heart sank. If fever should set in--if heshould become delirious, they would be lost. Providentially, however,Jack's aberration was only for a moment; he presently opened his blackeyes and stared at Gabriel. Gabriel smiled assuringly. "Am I dead andburied," said Jack, gravely, looking around the dark vault, "or have Igot 'em again?"
"Ye wuz took bad fur a minit--that's all," said Gabriel, reassuringly,much relieved himself, "yer all right now!"
Hamlin tried to rise but could not. "That's a lie," he said, cheerfully."What's to be done?"
"Ef you'd let me hev my say, without gettin' riled," said Gabriel,apologetically, "I'd tell ye. Look yer," he continued, persuasively, "yeought to hev a doctor afore thet wound gets inflamed; and ye ain't goin'to get one, bein' packed round by me. Now don't ye flare up, but harkin!Allowin' I goes out to them chaps ez is huntin' us, and sez, 'look yer,you kin take me, provided ye don't bear no malice agin my friend, andyou sends a doctor to fetch him outer the tunnel.' Don't yer see, theycan't prove anythin' agin ye, anyway," continued Gabriel, with a look ofthe intensest cunning, "I'll swear I took you pris'ner, and Joe won't goback on his shot."
In spite of his pain and danger this proposition afforded Jack Hamlinapparently the largest enjoyment. "Thank ye," he said, with a smile,"but as there's a warrant, by this time, out against me forhorse-stealing, I reckon I won't put myself in the way of their nursing.They might forgive you for killing a Mexican of no great market value,but they ain't goin' to extend the right hand of fellowship to me afterrunning off with their ringleader's mustang! Particularly when thatanimal's foundered and knee-sprung. No, sir!"
Gabriel stared at his companion without speaking.
"I was late coming back with Olly to Wingdam. I had to swap the horseand buggy for the mare without having time to arrange particulars withthe owner. I don't wonder you're shocked," continued Jack,mischievously, affecting to misunderstand Gabriel's silence, "but thet'sme. Thet's the kind of company you've got into. Procrastination and wantof punctuality has brought me to this. Never procrastinate, Gabriel.Always make it a point to make it a rule, never to be late at theSabbath school!"
"Ef I hed owt to give ye," said Gabriel, ruefully, "a drop o' whisky, orsuthin' to keep up your stren'th!"
"I never touch intoxicating liquors without the consent of myphysician," said Jack, gravely, "they're too exciting! I must be keptfree from all excitement. Something soothing, or sedentary like this,"he added, striking his leg. But even through his mischievous smile hisface paled, and a spasm of pain crossed it.
"I reckon we'll hev to stick yer ontil dark," said Gabriel, "and thenstrike acrost the gully to the woods on Conroy's Hill. Ye'll be easierthar, and we're safe ontil sun-up, when we kin hunt another tunnel. Tharain't no choice," added Gabriel, apologetically.
Jack made a grimace, and cast a glance around the walls of the tunnel.The luxurious scamp missed his usual comfortable surroundings. "Well,"he assented, with a sigh, "I suppose the game's made anyway! and we'vegot to stick here like snails on a rock for an hour yet. Well," hecontinued, impatiently, as Gabriel, after improvising a rude couch forhim with some withered pine tassels gathered at the mouth of the tunnel,sat down beside him, "are you goin' to bore me to death, now that you'vegot me here--sittin' there like an owl? Why don't you say something?"
"Say what?" asked Gabriel, simply.
"Anything! Lie if you want to; only talk!"
"I'd like to put a question to ye, Mr. Hamlin," said Gabriel, with greatgentleness,--"allowin' in course, ye'll answer or no jest ez as isagree'ble to ye--reckonin' it's no business o' mine nor pryin' intosecrets, ony jess to pass away the time ontil sundown. When you was tukbad a spell ago, unloosin' yer shirt thar, I got to see a pictur that yehev around yer neck. I ain't askin' who nor which it is--but onythis--ez thet--thet--thet young woman dark complected ez that picterallows her to be?"
Jack's face had recovered its colour by the time that Gabriel hadfinished, and he answered promptly, "A d--d si
ght more so! Why, thatpicture's fair alongside of her!"
Gabriel looked a little disappointed, Hamlin was instantly up in arms."Yes, sir--and when I say that," he returned, "I mean, by thunder, thatthe whitest faced woman in the world don't begin to be as handsome. Tharain't an angel that she couldn't give points to and beat! That's _her_style! It don't," continued Mr. Hamlin, taking the picture from hisbreast, and wiping its face with his handkerchief--"it don't begin todo her justice. What," he asked suddenly and aggressively, "have _you_got to say about it, anyway?"
"I reckoned it kinder favoured my sister Grace," said Gabriel,submissively. "Ye didn't know her, Mr. Hamlin? She was lost sence'49--thet's all!"
Mr. Hamlin measured Gabriel with a contempt that was delicious in itssublime audacity and unconsciousness. "Your sister?" he repeated,"that's a healthy lookin' _sister_ of such a man as you--ain't it? Why,look at it," roared Jack, thrusting the picture under Gabriel's nose."Why, it's--it's a _lady_!"
"Ye musn't jedge Gracey by me, nor even Olly," interposed Gabriel,gently, evading Mr. Hamlin's contempt.
But Jack was not to be appeased, "Does your sister sing like an angel,and talk Spanish like Governor Alvarado: is she connected with one ofthe oldest Spanish families in the state; does she run a rancho andthirty square leagues of land, and is Dolores Salvatierra her nickname?Is her complexion like the young bark of the madro[~n]o--the most beautifulthing ever seen--did every other woman look chalky beside her, eh?"
"No!" said Gabriel, with a sigh--"it was just my foolishness, Mr.Hamlin. But seein' that picter, kinder"----
"I stole it," interrupted Jack, with the same frankness. "I saw it inher parlour, on the table, and I froze to it when no one was looking.Lord, _she_ wouldn't have given it to _me_. I reckon those relatives ofhers would have made it very lively for me if they'd suspected it. Hossstealing ain't a circumstance to this, Gabriel," said Jack, with areckless laugh. Then with equal frankness, and a picturesque freedom ofdescription, he related his first and only interview with Donna Dolores.I am glad to say that this scamp exaggerated, if anything, thehopelessness of his case, dwelt but slightly on his own services, andconcealed the fact that Donna Dolores had even thanked him. "You canreckon from this the extent of my affection for that Johnny Ramirez, andwhy I just froze to you when I heard you'd dropped him. But come now,it's your deal; tell us all about it. The boys put it up that he washangin' round your wife,--and you went for him for all he was worth. Goon--I'm waiting--and," added Jack, as a spasm of pain passed across hisface, "and aching to that degree that I'll yell if you don't take mymind off it."
But Gabriel's face was grave and his lips silent as he bent over Mr.Hamlin to adjust the bandages. "Go on," said Jack, darkly, "or I'll tearoff these rags and bleed to death before your eyes. What are you afraidof? I know all about your wife--you can't tell me anything about her.Didn't I spot her in Sacramento--before she married you--when she hadthis same Chilino, Ramirez, on a string. Why, she's fooled him as shehas you. You ain't such a blasted fool as to be stuck after her still,are you?" and Jack raised himself on his elbow the more intently toregard this possible transcendent idiot.
"You was speakin' o' this Mexican, Ramirez," said Gabriel, after apause, fixing his now clear and untroubled eyes on his interlocutor.
"Of course," roared out Jack, impatiently, "did you think I was talkingof----?" Here Mr. Hamlin offered a name that suggested the most completeand perfect antithesis known to modern reason.
"I didn't kill him!" said Gabriel, quietly.
"Of course not," said Jack, promptly. "He sorter stumbled and fell overon your bowie-knife as you were pickin' your teeth with it. But goon--how did you do it? Where did you spot him? Did he make any fight?Has he got any sand in him?"
"I tell ye I didn't kill him!"
"Who did, then?" screamed Jack, furious with pain and impatience.
"I don't know--I reckon--that is----" and Gabriel stopped short with awistful perplexed look at his companion.
"Perhaps, Mr. Gabriel Conroy," said Jack, with sudden coolness anddeliberation of speech, and a baleful light in his dark eyes, "perhapsyou'll be good enough to tell me what this means--what _is_ your littlegame? Perhaps you'll kindly inform me what I'm lying here crippled for?What you were doing up in the Court House, when you were driving thosepeople crazy with excitement? What you're hiding here in this blankfamily vault for? And maybe, if you've got time, you'll tell me what wasthe reason I made that pleasant little trip to Sacramento? I know Irequired the exercise, and then there was the honour of being introducedto your little sister--but perhaps you'll tell me WHAT IT WAS FOR!"
"Jack," said Gabriel, leaning forward, with a sudden return of his oldtrouble and perplexity, "I thought _she_ did it! and thinkin' that--whenthey asked me--I took it upon _myself_! I didn't know to ring _you_ intothis, Jack! I thought--I thought--thet--it 'ud all be one--thet they'dhang me up afore this--I did, Jack, honest!"
"And you didn't kill Ramirez?"
"No."
"And you reckoned your wife did?"
"Yes."
"And you took the thing on yourself?"
"I did."
"_You_ did!"
"I did!"
"You DID?"
"I did!"
Mr. Hamlin rolled over on his back, and began to whistle "When thespring time comes, gentle Annie!" as the only way of expressing hisinordinate contempt for the whole proceeding.
Gabriel slowly slid his hand under Mr. Hamlin's helpless back, and underpretext of arranging his bandages, lifted him in his arms like atruculent babe. "Jack," he said, softly, "ef thet picter of yours--thatcoloured woman"----
"Which?" said Jack, fiercely.
"I mean--thet purty creature--ef she and you hed been married, and you'dfound out accidental like that she'd fooled ye--more belike, Jack," headded, hastily, "o' your own foolishness--than her little game--and"----
"_That_ woman was a lady," interrupted Jack, savagely, "and your wife'sa"----But he paused, looking into Gabriel's face, and then added, "Ohgit! will you! Leave me alone! 'I want to be an angel and with theangels stand.'"
"And thet woman hez a secret," continued Gabriel, unmindful of theinterruption, "and bein' hounded by the man az knows it, up and killshim, ye wouldn't let thet woman--that poor pooty creeture--suffer forit! No, Jack! Ye would rather pint your own toes up to the sky than doit. It ain't in ye, Jack, and it ain't in me, so help me, God!"
"This is all very touching, Mr. Conroy, and does credit, sir, to yourhead and heart, and I kin feel it drawing Hall's ball out of my legwhile you're talkin'," said Jack, with his black eyes evading Gabriel'sand wandering to the entrance of the tunnel. "What time is it, you d--dold fool, ain't it dark enough yet to git outer this hole?" He groaned,and after a pause added fiercely, "How do you know your wife did it?"
Gabriel swiftly, and for him even concisely, related the events of theday from his meeting with Ramirez in the morning, to the time that hehad stumbled upon the body of Victor Ramirez on his return to keep theappointment at his wife's written request.
Jack only interrupted him once to inquire why, after discovering themurder, he had not gone on to keep his appointment.
"I thought it wa'n't of no use," said Gabriel, simply; "I didn't want tolet her see I knowed it."
Hamlin groaned, "If you had you would have found her in the company ofthe man who _did_ do it, you daddering old idiot!"
"What man?" asked Gabriel.
"The first man you saw your wife with that morning; the man I ought tobe helping now, instead of lyin' here."
"You don't mean to allow, Jack, ez you reckon she _didn't_ do it?" askedGabriel, in alarm.
"I do," said Hamlin, coolly.
"Then what did she reckon to let on by that note?" said Gabriel, with asudden look of cunning.
"Don't know," returned Jack, "like as not, being a d--d fool, you didn'tread it right! hand it over and let me see it."
Gabriel (hesitatingly): "I can't."
Hamlin: "You can't?"
Gabriel (apologetically): "I tore it up!"
Hamlin (with frightful deliberation): "you DID?"'
"I did."
Jack (after a long crushing silence): "Were you ever under medicaltreatment for these spells?"
Gabriel (with great simplicity and submission): "They allers used toallow I waz queer."
Hamlin (after another pause): "Has Pete Dumphy got anything agin you?"
Gabriel (surprisedly): "No."
Hamlin (languidly): "It was his right hand man, his agent at Wingdamthat started up the Vigilantes! I heard him, and saw him in the crowdhounding 'em on."
Gabriel (simply): "I reckon you're out thar, Jack, Dumphy's my friend.It was him that first gin me the money to open this yer mine. And I'mhis superintendent!"
Jack: "Oh!" (after another pause). "Is there any first-class LunaticAsylum in this county where they would take in two men, one anincurable, and the other sufferin' from a gunshot wound brought on byplayin' with firearms?"
Gabriel (with a deep sigh): "Ye mus'n't talk, Jack, ye must be quiettill dark."
Jack, dragged down by pain, and exhausted in the intervals of eachparoxysm was quiescent.
Gradually, the faint light that had filtered through the brush andd['e]bris before the tunnel faded quite away, and a damp charnel-housechill struck through the limbs of the two refugees, and made themshiver; the flow of water from the dripping walls seemed to haveincreased; Gabriel's experienced eye had already noted that theearthquake had apparently opened seams in the gully and closed up one ofthe leads. He carefully laid his burden down again, and crept to theopening. The distant hum of voices and occupation had ceased, the sunwas setting; in a few moments, calculating on the brief twilight of theMountain region, it would be dark, and they might with safety leavetheir hiding-place. As he was returning, he noticed a slant beam oflight, hitherto unobserved, crossing the tunnel from an old drift.Examining it more closely, Gabriel was amazed to find that during theearthquake a "cave" had taken place in the drift, possibly precipitatedby the shock, disclosing the more surprising fact that there had been aprevious slight but positive excavation on the hill side, above thetunnel, that antedated any record of One Horse Gulch known to Gabriel.He was perfectly familiar with every foot of the hill side, and theexistence of this ancient prospecting "hole" had never been evensuspected by him. While he was still gazing at the opening, his footstruck against some glittering metallic substance. He stooped and pickedup a small tin can, not larger than a sardine box, hermetically sealedand soldered, in which some inscription had been traced, but which thedarkness of the tunnel prevented his deciphering. In the faint hope thatit might contain something of benefit to his companion, Gabriel returnedto the opening, and even ventured to step beyond its shadow. But allattempts to read the inscription were in vain. He opened the box with asharp stone; it contained, to his great disappointment, only amemorandum book and some papers. He swept them into the pocket of hisblouse, and re-entered the tunnel. He had not been absent altogethermore than five minutes, but when he reached the place where he had leftJack, he was gone!