The Clansman Read online

  “Apologies to the dogs——”

  “And why does your master honour the kennel with his presence to-day?”

  “He hit a nigger on the head so hard that he strained the nigger’s ankle, and he’s restin’ from his labours.”

  “That’s right, Towser. If I had you and Tige a few hours every day I could make good squirrel-dogs out of you.”

  There was a pause. Phil looked up and smiled.

  “What does it sound like?” asked the Captain, with a shade of doubt in his voice.

  “Sounds to me like a Sunday-school teacher taking his class through a new catechism.”

  The Captain fumbled hurriedly for his keys.

  “There’s something wrong in there.”

  He opened the door and sprang in.

  Ben Cameron was sitting on top of the two toughs, knocking their heads together as they repeated each chorus.

  “Walk in, gentlemen. The show is going on now—the animals are doing beautifully,” said Ben.

  The Captain muttered an oath. Phil suddenly grasped him by the throat, hurled him against the wall, and snatched the keys from his hand.

  “Now open your mouth, you white-livered cur, and inside of twenty-four hours I’ll have you behind the bars. I have all the evidence I need. I’m an ex-officer of the United States Army, of the fighting corps—not the vulture division. This is my friend. Accompany us to the street and strike your charges from the record.”

  The coward did as he was ordered, and Ben hurried back to Piedmont with a friend toward whom he began to feel closer than a brother.

  When Elsie heard the full story of the outrage, she bore herself toward Ben with unusual tenderness, and yet he knew that the event had driven their lives farther apart. He felt instinctively the cold silent eye of her father, and his pride stiffened under it. The girl had never considered the possibility of a marriage without her father’s blessing. Ben Cameron was too proud to ask it. He began to fear that the differences between her father and his people reached to the deepest sources of life.

  Phil found himself a hero at the Cameron House. Margaret said little, but her bearing spoke in deeper language than words. He felt it would be mean to take advantage of her gratitude.

  But he was quick to respond to the motherly tenderness of Mrs. Cameron. In the groups of neighbours who gathered in the evenings to discuss with the doctor the hopes, fears, and sorrows of the people, Phil was a charmed listener to the most brilliant conversations he had ever heard. It seemed the normal expression of their lives. He had never before seen people come together to talk to one another after this fashion. More and more the simplicity, dignity, patience, courtesy, and sympathy of these people in their bearing toward one another impressed him. More and more he grew to like them.

  Marion went out of her way to express her open admiration for Phil and tease him about Margaret. The Rev. Hugh McAlpin was monopolizing her on the Wednesday following his return from Columbia and Phil sought Marion for sympathy.

  “What will you give me if I tease you about Margaret right before her?” she asked.

  He blushed furiously.

  “Don’t you dare such a thing on peril of your life!”

  “You know you like to be teased about her,” she cried, her blue eyes dancing with fun.

  “With such a pretty little friend to do the teasing all by ourselves, perhaps——”

  “You’ll never get her unless you have more spunk.”

  “Then I’ll find consolation with you.”

  “No, I mean to marry young.”

  “And your ideal of life?”

  “To fill the world with flowers, laughter, and music—especially my own home—and never do a thing I can make my husband do for me! How do you like it?”

  “I think it very sweet,” Phil answered soberly.

  At noon on the following Friday, the Piedmont Eagle appeared with an editorial signed by Dr. Cameron, denouncing in the fine language of the old school the arrest of Ben as “despotism and the usurpation of authority.”

  At three o’clock, Captain Gilbert, in command of the troops stationed in the village, marched a squad of soldiers to the newspaper office. One of them carried a sledge-hammer. In ten minutes he demolished the office, heaped the type and their splintered cases on top of the battered press in the middle of the street, and set fire to the pile.

  On the courthouse door he nailed this proclamation:

  To the People of Ulster County:

  The censures of the press, directed against the servants of the people, may be endured; but the military force in command of this district are not the servants of the people of South Carolina. We are your masters. The impertinence of newspaper comment on the military will not be brooked under any circumstances whatever.

  G. C. Gilbert,

  Captain in Command.

  Not content with this display of power, he determined to make an example of Dr. Cameron, as the leader of public opinion in the county.

  He ordered a squad of his negro troops to arrest him immediately and take him to Columbia for obstructing the execution of the Reconstruction Acts. He placed the squad under command of Gus, whom he promoted to be a corporal, with instructions to wait until the doctor was inside his house, boldly enter it and arrest him.

  When Gus marched his black janizaries into the house, no one was in the office. Margaret had gone for a ride with Phil, and Ben had strolled with Elsie to Lover’s Leap, unconscious of the excitement in town.

  Dr. Cameron himself had heard nothing of it, having just reached home from a visit to a country patient.

  Gus stationed his men at each door, and with another trooper walked straight into Mrs. Cameron’s bedroom, where the doctor was resting on a lounge.

  Had an imp of perdition suddenly sprung through the floor, the master of the house of Cameron would not have been more enraged or surprised.

  A sudden leap, as the spring of a panther, and he stood before his former slave, his slender frame erect, his face a livid spot in its snow-white hair, his brilliant eyes flashing with fury.

  Gus suddenly lost control of his knees.

  His old master transfixed him with his eyes, and in a voice, whose tones gripped him by the throat, said:

  “How dare you?”

  The gun fell from the negro’s hand, and he dropped to the floor on his face.

  His companion uttered a yell and sprang through the door, rallying the men as he went:

  “Fall back! Fall back! He’s killed Gus! Shot him dead wid his eye. He’s conjured him! Git de whole army quick.”

  They fled to the Commandant.

  Gilbert ordered the negroes to their tents and led his whole company of white regulars to the hotel, arrested Dr. Cameron, and rescued his fainting trooper, who had been revived and placed under a tree on the lawn.

  The little Captain had a wicked look on his face. He refused to allow the doctor a moment’s delay to leave instructions for his wife, who had gone to visit a neighbour. He was placed in the guard-house, and a detail of twenty soldiers stationed around it.

  The arrest was made so quickly, not a dozen people in town had heard of it. As fast as it was known, people poured into the house, one by one, to express their sympathy. But a greater surprise awaited them.

  Within thirty minutes after he had been placed in prison, a Lieutenant entered, accompanied by a soldier and a negro blacksmith who carried in his hand two big chains with shackles on each end.

  The doctor gazed at the intruders a moment with incredulity, and then, as the enormity of the outrage dawned on him, he flushed and drew himself erect, his face livid and rigid.

  He clutched his throat with his slender fingers, slowly recovered himself, glanced at the shackles in the black hands and then at the young Lieutenant’s face, and said slowly, with heaving breast:

  “My God! Have you been sent to place these irons on me?”

  “Such are my orders, sir,” replied the officer, motioning to the negro smith to app
roach. He stepped forward, unlocked the padlock, and prepared the fetters to be placed on his arms and legs. These fetters were of enormous weight, made of iron rods three quarters of an inch thick and connected together by chains of like weight.

  “This is monstrous!” groaned the doctor, with choking agony, glancing helplessly about the bare cell for some weapon with which to defend himself.

  Suddenly looking the Lieutenant in the face, he said:

  “I demand, sir, to see your commanding officer. He cannot pretend that these shackles are needed to hold a weak unarmed man in prison, guarded by two hundred soldiers?”

  “It is useless. I have his orders direct.”

  “But I must see him. No such outrage has ever been recorded in the history of the American people. I appeal to the Magna Charta rights of every man who speaks the English tongue—no man shall be arrested or imprisoned or deprived of his own household, or of his liberties, unless by the legal judgment of his peers or by the law of the land!”

  “The bayonet is your only law. My orders admit of no delay. For your own sake, I advise you to submit. As a soldier, Dr. Cameron, you know I must execute orders.”

  “These are not the orders of a soldier!” shouted the prisoner, enraged beyond all control. “They are orders for a jailer, a hangman, a scullion—no soldier who wears the sword of a civilized nation can take such orders. The war is over; the South is conquered; I have no country save America. For the honour of the flag, for which I once poured out my blood on the heights of Buena Vista, I protest against this shame!”

  The Lieutenant fell back a moment before the burst of his anger.

  “Kill me! Kill me!” he went on passionately, throwing his arms wide open and exposing his breast. “Kill—I am in your power. I have no desire to live under such conditions. Kill, but you must not inflict on me and on my people this insult worse than death!”

  “Do your duty, blacksmith,” said the officer, turning his back and walking toward the door.

  The negro advanced with the chains cautiously, and attempted to snap one of the shackles on the doctor’s right arm.

  With sudden maniac frenzy, Dr. Cameron seized the negro by the throat, hurled him to the floor, and backed against the wall.

  The Lieutenant approached and remonstrated:

  “Why compel me to add the indignity of personal violence? You must submit.”

  “I am your prisoner,” fiercely retorted the doctor. “I have been a soldier in the armies of America, and I know how to die. Kill me, and my last breath will be a blessing. But while I have life to resist, for myself and for my people, this thing shall not be done!”

  The Lieutenant called a sergeant and a file of soldiers, and the sergeant stepped forward to seize the prisoner.

  Dr. Cameron sprang on him with the ferocity of a tiger, seized his musket, and attempted to wrench it from his grasp.

  The men closed in on him. A short passionate fight and the slender, proud, gray-haired man lay panting on the floor.

  Four powerful assailants held his hands and feet, and the negro smith, with a grin, secured the rivet on the right ankle and turned the key in the padlock on the left.

  As he drove the rivet into the shackle on his left arm, a spurt of bruised blood from the old Mexican War wound stained the iron.

  Dr. Cameron lay for a moment in a stupor. At length he slowly rose. The clank of the heavy chains seemed to choke him with horror. He sank on the floor, covering his face with his hands and groaned:

  “The shame! The shame! O God, that I might have died! My poor, poor wife!”

  Captain Gilbert entered and said with a sneer:

  “I will take you now to see your wife and friends if you would like to call before setting out for Columbia.”

  The doctor paid no attention to him.

  “Will you follow me while I lead you through this town, to show them their chief has fallen, or will you force me to drag you?”

  Receiving no answer, he roughly drew the doctor to his feet, held him by the arm, and led him thus in half-unconscious stupor through the principal street, followed by a drove of negroes. He ordered a squad of troops to meet him at the depot. Not a white man appeared on the streets. When one saw the sight and heard the clank of those chains, there was a sudden tightening of the lip, a clinched fist, and an averted face.

  When they approached the hotel, Mrs. Cameron ran to meet him, her face white as death.

  In silence she kissed his lips, kissed each shackle on his wrists, took her handkerchief and wiped the bruised blood from the old wound on his arm the iron had opened afresh, and then with a look, beneath which the Captain shrank, she said in low tones:

  “Do your work quickly. You have but a few moments to get out of this town with your prisoner. I have sent a friend to hold my son. If he comes before you go, he will kill you on sight as he would a mad dog.”

  With a sneer, the Captain passed the hotel and led the doctor, still in half-unconscious stupor, toward the depot down past his old slave quarters. He had given his negroes who remained faithful each a cabin and a lot.

  They looked on in awed silence as the Captain proclaimed:

  “Fellow citizens, you are the equal of any white man who walks the ground. The white man’s day is done. Your turn has come.”

  As he passed Jake’s cabin, the doctor’s faithful man stepped suddenly in front of him, looking at the Captain out of the corners of his eyes, and asked:

  “Is I yo’ equal?”

  “Yes.”

  “Des lak any white man?”

  “Exactly.”

  The negro’s fist suddenly shot into Gilbert’s nose with the crack of a sledge-hammer, laying him stunned on the pavement.

  “Den take dat f’um yo’ equal, d—n you!” he cried, bending over his prostrate figure. “I’ll show you how to treat my ole marster, you low-down slue-footed devil!”

  The stirring little drama roused the doctor and he turned to his servant with his old-time courtesy, and said:

  “Thank you, Jake.”

  “Come in here, Marse Richard; I knock dem things off’n you in er minute, ’en I get you outen dis town in er jiffy.”

  “No, Jake, that is not my way; bring this gentleman some water, and then my horse and buggy. You can take me to the depot. This officer can follow with his men.” And he did.

  * * *

  CHAPTER V

  Forty Acres and a Mule

  When Phil returned with Margaret, he drove at Mrs. Cameron’s request to find Ben, brought him with all speed to the hotel, took him to his room, and locked the door before he told him the news. After an hour’s blind rage, he agreed to obey his father’s positive orders to keep away from the Captain until his return, and to attempt no violence against the authorities.

  Phil undertook to manage the case in Columbia, and spent three days collecting his evidence before leaving.

  Swifter feet had anticipated him. Two days after the arrival of Dr. Cameron at the fort in Colombia, a dust-stained, tired negro was ushered into the presence of General Howle.

  He looked about timidly and laughed loudly.

  “Well, my man, what’s the trouble? You seem to have walked all the way, and laugh as if you were glad of it.”

  “I ‘spec’ I is, sah,” said Jake, sidling up confidentially.

  “Well?” said Howle good-humouredly.

  Jake’s voice dropped to a whisper.

  “I hears you got my ole marster, Dr. Cameron, in dis place.”

  “Yes. What do you know against him?”

  “Nuttin’, sah. I des hurry ’long down ter take his place, so’s you can sen’ him back home. He’s erbleeged ter go. Dey’s er pow’ful lot er sick folks up dar in de country cain’t git ’long widout him, an er pow’ful lot er well ones gwiner be raisin’ de debbel ’bout dis. You can hol’ me, sah. Des tell my ole marster when ter be yere, en he sho’ come.”

  Jake paused and bowed low.

  “Yessah, hit’s des lak I tell you. F
uddermo’, I ’spec’ I’se de man what done de damages. I ’spec’ I bus’ de Capt’n’s nose so ’tain gwine be no mo’ good to ’im.”

  Howle questioned Jake as to the whole affair, asked him a hundred questions about the condition of the county, the position of Dr. Cameron, and the possible effect of this event on the temper of the people.

  The affair had already given him a bad hour. The news of this shackling of one of the most prominent men in the State had spread like wildfire, and had caused the first deep growl of anger from the people. He saw that it was a senseless piece of stupidity. The election was rapidly approaching. He was master of the State, and the less friction the better. His mind was made up instantly. He released Dr. Cameron with an apology, and returned with him and Jake for a personal inspection of the affairs of Ulster county.

  In a thirty-minutes’ interview with Captain Gilbert, Howle gave him more pain than his broken nose.

  “And why did you nail up the doors of that Presbyterian church?” he asked suavely.

  “Because McAlpin, the young cub who preaches there, dared come to this camp and insult me about the arrest of old Cameron.”

  “I suppose you issued an order silencing him from the ministry?”

  “I did, and told him I’d shackle him if he opened his mouth again.”

  “Good. The throne of Russia needn’t worry about a worthy successor. Any further ecclesiastical orders?”

  “None, except the oaths I’ve prescribed for them before they shall preach again.”

  “Fine! These Scotch Covenanters will feel at home with you.”

  “Well, I’ve made them bite the dust—and they know who’s runnin’ this town, and don’t you forget it.”

  “No doubt. Yet we may have too much of even a good thing. The League is here to run this country. The business of the military is to keep still and back them when they need it.”

  “We’ve the strongest council here to be found in any county in this section,” said Gilbert with pride.

  “Just so. The League meets once a week. We have promised them the land of their masters and equal social and political rights. Their members go armed to these meetings and drill on Saturdays in the public square. The white man is afraid to interfere lest his house or barn take fire. A negro prisoner in the dock needs only to make the sign to be acquitted. Not a negro will dare to vote against us. Their women are formed into societies, sworn to leave their husbands and refuse to marry any man who dares our anger. The negro churches have pledged themselves to expel him from their membership. What more do you want?”