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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 12388 ***
+
+[Illustration: "I am going to take you from the island!"]
+
+
+The COURAGE of CAPTAIN PLUM
+
+BY
+JAMES OLIVER CURWOOD
+1912
+
+WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY
+FRANK E. SCHOONOVER
+
+
+
+
+
+
+THE COURAGE OF CAPTAIN PLUM
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+THE TWO OATHS
+
+
+On an afternoon in the early summer of 1856 Captain Nathaniel Plum,
+master and owner of the sloop _Typhoon_ was engaged in nothing more
+important than the smoking of an enormous pipe. Clouds of strongly
+odored smoke, tinted with the lights of the setting sun, had risen above
+his head in unremitting volumes for the last half hour. There was
+infinite contentment in his face, notwithstanding the fact that he had
+been meditating on a subject that was not altogether pleasant. But
+Captain Plum was, in a way, a philosopher, though one would not have
+guessed this fact from his appearance. He was, in the first place, a
+young man, not more than eight or nine and twenty, and his strong,
+rather thin face, tanned by exposure to the sea, was just now lighted up
+by eyes that shone with an unbounded good humor which any instant might
+take the form of laughter.
+
+At the present time Captain Plum's vision was confined to one direction,
+which carried his gaze out over Lake Michigan. Earlier in the day he had
+been able to discern the hazy outline of the Michigan wilderness twenty
+miles to the eastward. Straight ahead, shooting up rugged and sharp in
+the red light of the day's end, were two islands. Between these, three
+miles away, the sloop _Typhoon_ was strongly silhouetted in the fading
+glow. Beyond the islands and the sloop there were no other objects for
+Captain Plum's eyes to rest upon. So far as he could see there was no
+other sail. At his back he was shut in by a dense growth of trees and
+creeping vines, and unless a small boat edged close in around the end
+of Beaver Island his place of concealment must remain undiscovered. At
+least this seemed an assured fact to Captain Plum.
+
+In the security of his position he began to whistle softly as he beat
+the bowl of his pipe on his boot-heel to empty it of ashes. Then he drew
+a long-barreled revolver from under a coat that he had thrown aside and
+examined it carefully to see that the powder and ball were in solid and
+that none of the caps was missing. From the same place he brought forth
+a belt, buckled it round his waist, shoved the revolver into its
+holster, and dragging the coat to him, fished out a letter from an
+inside pocket. It was a dirty, much worn letter. Perhaps he had read it
+a score of times. He read it again now, and then, refilling his pipe,
+settled back against the rock that formed a rest for his shoulders and
+turned his eyes in the direction of the sloop.
+
+The last rim of the sun had fallen below the Michigan wilderness and in
+the rapidly increasing gloom the sloop was becoming indistinguishable.
+Captain Plum looked at his watch. He must still wait a little longer
+before setting out upon the adventure that had brought him to this
+isolated spot. He rested his head against the rock, and thought. He had
+been thinking for hours. Back in the thicket he heard the prowling of
+some small animal. There came the sleepy chirp of a bird and the
+rustling of tired wings settling for the night. A strange stillness
+hovered about him, and with it there came over him a loneliness that was
+chilling, a loneliness that made him homesick. It was a new and
+unpleasant sensation to Captain Plum. He could not remember just when he
+had experienced it before; that is, if he dated the present from two
+weeks ago to-night. It was then that the letter had been handed to him
+in Chicago, and it had been a weight upon his soul and a prick to his
+conscience ever since. Once or twice he had made up his mind to destroy
+it, but each time he had repented at the last moment. In a sudden
+revulsion at his weakness he pulled himself together, crumpled the
+dirty missive into a ball, and flung it out upon the white rim of beach.
+
+At this action there came a quick movement in the dense wall of verdure
+behind him. Noiselessly the tangle of vines separated and a head thrust
+itself out in time to see the bit of paper fall short of the water's
+edge. Then the head shot back as swiftly and as silently as a serpent's.
+Perhaps Captain Plum heard the gloating chuckle that followed the
+movement. If so he thought it only some night bird in the brush.
+
+"Heigh-ho!" he exclaimed with some return of his old cheer, "it's about
+time we were starting!" He jumped to his feet and began brushing the
+sand from his clothes. When he had done, he walked out upon the rim of
+beach and stretched himself until his arm-bones cracked.
+
+Again the hidden head shot forth from its concealment. A sudden turn and
+Captain Plum would certainly have been startled. For it was a weird
+object, this spying head; its face dead-white against the dense green of
+the verdure, with shocks of long white hair hanging down on each side,
+framing between them a pair of eyes that gleamed from cavernous sockets,
+like black glowing beads. There was unmistakable fear, a tense anxiety
+in those glittering eyes as Captain Plum walked toward the paper, but
+when he paused and stretched himself, the sole of his boot carelessly
+trampling the discarded letter, the head disappeared again and there
+came another satisfied bird-like chuckle from the gloom of the thicket.
+
+Captain Plum now put on his coat, buttoned it close to conceal the
+weapons in his belt, and walked along the narrow water-run that crept
+like a white ribbon between the lake and the island wilderness. No
+sooner had he disappeared than the bushes and vines behind the rock were
+torn asunder and a man wormed his way through them. For an instant he
+paused, listening for returning footsteps, and then with startling
+agility darted to the beach and seized the crumpled letter.
+
+The person who for the greater part of the afternoon had been spying
+upon Captain Plum from the security of the thicket was to all
+appearances a very small and a very old man, though there was something
+about him that seemed to belie a first guess at his age. His face was
+emaciated; his hair was white and hung in straggling masses on his
+shoulders; his hooked nose bore apparently the infallible stamp of
+extreme age. Yet there was a strange and uncanny strength and quickness
+in his movements. There was no stoop to his shoulders. His head was set
+squarely. His eyes were as keen as steel. It would have been impossible
+to have told whether he was fifty or seventy. Eagerly he smoothed out
+the abused missive and evidently succeeded even in the failing light, in
+deciphering much of it, for the glimmer of a smile flashed over his thin
+features as he thrust the paper into his pocket.
+
+Without a moment's hesitation he set out on the trail of Captain Plum. A
+quarter of a mile down the path he overtook the object of his pursuit.
+
+"Ah, how do you do, sir?" he greeted as the younger man turned about
+upon hearing his approach. "A mighty fast pace you're setting for an old
+man, sir!" He broke into a laugh that was not altogether unpleasant, and
+boldly held out a hand. "We've been expecting you, but--not in this way.
+I hope there's nothing wrong?"
+
+Captain Plum had accepted the proffered hand. Its coldness and the
+singular appearance of the old man who had come like an apparition
+chilled him. In a moment, however, it occurred to him that he was a
+victim of mistaken identity. As far as he knew there was no one on
+Beaver Island who was expecting him. To the best of his knowledge he was
+a fool for being there. His crew aboard the sloop had agreed upon that
+point with extreme vehemence and, to a man, had attempted to dissuade
+him from the mad project upon which he was launching himself among the
+Mormons in their island stronghold. All this came to him while the
+little old man was looking up into his face, chuckling, and shaking his
+hand as if he were one of the most important and most greatly to be
+desired personages in the world.
+
+"Hope there's nothing wrong, Cap'n?" he repeated.
+
+"Right as a trivet here, Dad," replied the young man, dropping the cold
+hand that still persisted in clinging to his own. "But I guess you've
+got the wrong party. Who's expecting me?"
+
+The old man's face wrinkled itself in a grimace and one gleaming eye
+opened and closed in an understanding wink.
+
+"Ho, ho, ho!--of course you're not expected. Anyway, you're not
+_expected_ to be expected! Cautious--a born general--mighty clever thing
+to do. Strang should appreciate it." The old man gave vent to his own
+approbation in a series of inimitable chuckles. "Is that your sloop out
+there?" he inquired interestedly.
+
+Something in the strangeness of the situation began to interest Captain
+Plum. He had planned a little adventure of his own, but here was one
+that promised to develop into something more exciting. He nodded his
+head.
+
+"That's her."
+
+"Splendid cargo," went on the old man. "Splendid cargo, eh?"
+
+"Pretty fair."
+
+"Powder in good shape, eh?"
+
+"Dry as tinder."
+
+"And balls--lots of balls, and a few guns, eh?"
+
+"Yes, we _have_ a few guns," said Captain Plum. The old man noted the
+emphasis, but the darkness that had fast settled about them hid the
+added meaning that passed in a curious look over the other's face.
+
+"Odd way to come in, though--very odd!" continued the old man, gurgling
+and shaking as if the thought of it occasioned him great merriment.
+"Very cautious. Level business head. Want to know that things are on
+the square, eh?"
+
+"That's it!" exclaimed Captain Plum, catching at the proffered straw.
+Inwardly he was wondering when his feet would touch bottom. Thus far he
+had succeeded in getting but a single grip on the situation. Somebody
+was expected at Beaver Island with powder and balls and guns. Well, he
+had a certain quantity of these materials aboard his sloop, and if he
+could make an agreeable bargain--
+
+The old man interrupted the plan that was slowly forming itself in
+Captain Plum's puzzled brain.
+
+"It's the price, eh?" He laughed shrewdly. "You want to see the color of
+the gold before you land the goods. I'll show it to you. I'll pay you
+the whole sum to-night. Then you'll take the stuff where I tell you to.
+Eh? Isn't that so?" He darted ahead of Captain Plum with a quick alert
+movement. "Will you please follow me, sir?"
+
+For an instant Captain Plum's impulse was to hold back. In that instant
+it suddenly occurred to him that he was lending himself to a rank
+imposition. At the same time he was filled with a desire to go deeper
+into the adventure, and his blood thrilled with the thought of what it
+might hold for him.
+
+"Are you coming, sir?"
+
+The little old man had stopped a dozen paces away and turned
+expectantly.
+
+"I tell you again that you've got the wrong man, Dad!"
+
+"Will you follow me, sir?"
+
+"Well, if you'll have it so--damned if I won't!" cried Captain Plum. He
+felt that he had relieved his conscience, anyway. If things should
+develop badly for him during the next few hours no one could say that he
+had lied. So he followed light-heartedly after the old man, his eyes and
+ears alert, and his right hand, by force of habit, reaching under his
+coat to the butt of his pistol. His guide said not another word until
+they had traveled for half an hour along a twisting path and stood at
+last on the bald summit of a knoll from which they could look down upon
+a number of lights twinkling dimly a quarter of a mile away. One of
+these lights gleamed above all the others, like a beacon set among
+fireflies.
+
+"That's St. James," said the old man. His voice had changed. It was low
+and soft, as though he feared to speak above a whisper.
+
+"St. James!"
+
+The young man at his side gazed down silently upon the scattered lights,
+his heart throbbing in a sudden tumult of excitement. He had set out
+that day with the idea of resting his eyes on St. James. In its silent
+mystery the town now lay at his feet.
+
+"And that light--" spoke the old man. He pointed a trembling arm toward
+the glare that shone more powerfully than the others. "That light marks
+the sacred home of the king!" His voice had again changed. A metallic
+hardness came into it, his words were vibrant with a strange excitement
+which he strove hard to conceal. It was still light enough for Captain
+Plum to see that the old man's black, beady eyes were startlingly alive
+with newly aroused emotion.
+
+"You mean--"
+
+"Strang!"
+
+He started rapidly down the knoll and there floated back to Captain Plum
+the soft notes of his meaningless chuckle. A dozen rods farther on his
+mysterious guide turned into a by-path which led them to another knoll,
+capped by a good-sized building made of logs. There sounded the grating
+of a key in a lock, the shooting of a bolt, and a door opened to admit
+them.
+
+"You will pardon me if I don't light up," apologized the old man as he
+led the way in. "A candle will be sufficient. You know there must be
+privacy in these matters--always. Eh? Isn't that so?"
+
+Captain Plum followed without reply. He guessed that the cabin was made
+up of one large room, and that at the present time, at least, it
+possessed no other occupant than the singular creature who had guided
+him to it.
+
+"It is just as well, on this particular night, that no light is seen at
+the window," continued the old man as he rummaged about a table for a
+match and a candle. "I have a little corner back here that a candle will
+brighten up nicely and no one in the world will know it. Ho, ho,
+ho!--how nice it is to have a quiet little corner sometimes! Eh, Captain
+Plum?"
+
+At the sound of his name Captain Plum started as though an unexpected
+hand had suddenly been laid upon him. So he _was_ expected, after all,
+and his name was known! For a moment his surprise robbed him of the
+power of speech. The little old man had lighted his candle, and,
+grinning back over his shoulder, passed through a narrow cut in the
+wall that could hardly be called a door and planted his light on a table
+that stood in the center of a small room, or closet, not more than five
+feet square. Then he coolly pulled Captain Plum's old letter from his
+pocket and smoothed it out in the dim light.
+
+"Be seated, Captain Plum; right over there--opposite me. So!"
+
+He continued for a moment to smooth out the creases in the letter and
+then proceeded to read it with as much assurance as though its owner
+were a thousand miles away instead of within arm's reach of him. Captain
+Plum was dumfounded. He felt the hot blood rushing to his face and his
+first impulse was to recover the crumpled paper and demand something
+more than an explanation. In the next instant it occurred to him that
+this action would probably spoil whatever possibilities his night's
+adventure might have for him. So he held his peace. The old man was so
+intent in his perusal of the letter that the end of his hooked nose
+almost scraped the table. He went over the dim, partly obliterated words
+line by line, chuckling now and then, and apparently utterly oblivious
+of the other's presence. When he had come to the end he looked up, his
+eyes glittering with unbounded satisfaction, carefully folded the
+letter, and handed it to Captain Plum.
+
+"That's the best introduction in the world, Captain Plum--the very best!
+Ho, ho!--it couldn't be better. I'm glad I found it." He chuckled
+gleefully, and rested his ogreish head in the palms of his skeleton-like
+hands, his elbows on the table. "So you're going back home--soon?"
+
+"I haven't made up my mind yet, Dad," responded Captain Plum, pulling
+out his pipe and tobacco. "You've read the letter pretty carefully, I
+guess. What would you do?"
+
+"Vermont?" questioned the old man shortly.
+
+"That's it."
+
+"Well, I'd go, and very soon, Captain Plum, _very_ soon, indeed. Yes,
+I'd hurry!" The old man jumped up with the quickness of a cat. So sudden
+was his movement that it startled Captain Plum, and he dropped his
+tobacco pouch. By the time he had recovered this article his strange
+companion was back in his seat again holding a leather bag in his hand.
+Quickly he untied the knot at its top and poured a torrent of glittering
+gold pieces out upon the table.
+
+"Business--business and gold," he gurgled happily, rubbing his thin
+hands and twisting his fingers until they cracked. "A pretty sight, eh,
+Captain Plum? Now, to our account! A hundred carbines, eh? And a
+thousand of powder and a ton of balls. Or is it in lead? It doesn't make
+any difference--not a bit. It's three thousand, that's the account, eh?"
+He fell to counting rapidly.
+
+For a full minute Captain Plum remained in stupefied bewilderment,
+silenced by the sudden and unexpected turn his adventure had taken.
+Fascinated, he watched the skeleton fingers as they clinked the gold
+pieces. What was the mysterious plot into which he had allowed himself
+to be drawn? Why were a hundred guns and a ton and a half of powder and
+balls wanted by the Mormons of Beaver Island? Instinctively he reached
+out and closed his hand over the counting fingers of the old man. Their
+eyes met. And there was a shrewd, half-understanding gleam in the black
+orbs that fixed Captain Plum in an unflinching challenge. For a little
+space there was silence. It was Captain Plum who broke it.
+
+"Dad, I'm going to tell you for the third and last time that you've made
+a mistake. I've got eight of the best rifles in America aboard my sloop
+out there. But there's a man for every gun. And I've got something
+hidden away underdeck that would blow up St. James in half an hour. And
+there is powder and ball for the whole outfit. But that's all. I'll sell
+you what I've got--for a good price. Beyond that you've got the wrong
+man!"
+
+He settled back and blew a volume of smoke from his pipe. For another
+half minute the old man continued to look at him, his eyes twinkling,
+and then he fell to counting again.
+
+Captain Plum was not given over to the habit of cursing. But now he
+jumped to his feet with an oath that jarred the table. The old man
+chuckled. The gold pieces clinked between his fingers. Coolly he shoved
+two glittering piles alongside the candle-stick, tumbled the rest back
+into the leather bag, deliberately tied the end, and smiled up into the
+face of the exasperated captain.
+
+"To be sure you're not the man," he said, nodding his head until his
+elf-locks danced around his face. "Of course you're not the man. I know
+it--ho, ho! you can wager that I know it! A little ruse of mine, Captain
+Plum. Pardonable--excusable, eh? I wanted to know if you were a liar. I
+wanted to see if you were honest."
+
+[Illustration: Captain Plum]
+
+With a gasp of astonishment Captain Plum sank back into the chair. His
+jaw dropped and his pipe was held fireless in his hand.
+
+"The devil you say!"
+
+"Oh, certainly, certainly, if you wish it," chuckled the little man, in
+high humor. "I would have visited your sloop to-day, Captain Plum, if
+you hadn't come ashore so opportunely this morning. Ho, ho, ho! a good
+joke, eh? A mighty good joke!"
+
+Captain Plum regained his composure by relighting his pipe. He heard the
+chink of gold pieces and when he looked again the two piles of money
+were close to the edge of his side of the table.
+
+"That's for you, Captain Plum. There's just a thousand dollars in those
+two piles." There was tense earnestness now in the old man's face and
+voice. "I've imposed on you," he continued, speaking as one who had
+suddenly thrown off a disguise. "If it had been any other man it would
+have been the same. I want help. I want an honest man. I want a man whom
+I can trust. I will give you a thousand dollars if you will take a
+package back to your vessel with you and will promise to deliver it as
+quickly as you can."
+
+"I'll do it!" cried Captain Plum. He jumped to his feet and held out his
+hand. But the old man slipped from his chair and darted swiftly out into
+the blackness of the adjoining room. As he came back Captain Plum could
+hear his insane chuckling.
+
+"Business--business--business--" he gurgled. "Eh, Captain Plum? Did you
+ever take an oath?" He tossed a book on the table. It was the Bible.
+
+Captain Plum understood. He reached for the book and held it under his
+left hand. His right he lifted above his head, while a smile played
+about his lips.
+
+"I suppose you want to place me under oath to deliver that package," he
+said.
+
+The old man nodded. His eyes gleamed with a feverish glare. A sudden
+hectic flush had gathered in his death-like cheeks. He trembled. His
+voice rose barely above a whisper.
+
+"Repeat," he commanded. "I, Captain Nathaniel Plum, do solemnly swear
+before God--"
+
+A thrilling inspiration shot into Captain Plum's brain.
+
+"Hold!" he cried. He lowered his hand. With something that was almost a
+snarl the old man sprang back, his hands clenched. "I will take this
+oath upon one other consideration," continued Captain Plum. "I came to
+Beaver Island to see something of the life and something of the people
+of St. James. If you, in turn, will swear to show me as much as you can
+to-night I will take the oath."
+
+The old man was beside the table again in an instant.
+
+"I will show it to you--all--all--" he exclaimed excitedly. "I will show
+it to you--yes, and swear to it upon the body of Christ!"
+
+Captain Plum lifted his hand again and word by word repeated the oath.
+When it was done the other took his place.
+
+"Your name?" asked Captain Plum.
+
+A change scarcely perceptible swept over the old man's face.
+
+"Obadiah Price."
+
+"But you are a Mormon. You have the Bible there?"
+
+Again the old man disappeared into the adjoining room. When he returned
+he placed two books side by side and stood them on edge so that he might
+clasp both between his bony fingers. One was the Bible, the other the
+Book of the Mormons. In a cracked, excited voice he repeated the
+strenuous oath improvised by Captain Plum.
+
+"Now," said Captain Plum, distributing the gold pieces among his
+pockets, "I'll take that package."
+
+This time the old man was gone for several minutes. When he returned he
+placed a small package tightly bound and sealed into his companion's
+hand.
+
+"More precious than your life, more priceless than gold," he whispered
+tensely, "yet worthless to all but the one to whom it is to be
+delivered."
+
+There were no marks on the package.
+
+"And who is that?" asked Captain Plum.
+
+The old man came so close that his breath fell hot upon the young man's
+cheek. He lifted a hand as though to ward sound from the very walls that
+closed them in.
+
+"Franklin Pierce, President of the United States of America!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+THE SEVEN WIVES
+
+
+Hardly had the words fallen from the lips of Obadiah Price than the old
+man straightened himself and stood as rigid as a gargoyle, his gaze
+penetrating into the darkness of the room beyond Captain Plum, his head
+inclined slightly, every nerve in him strained to a tension of
+expectancy. His companion involuntarily gripped the butt of his pistol
+and faced the narrow entrance through which they had come. In the moment
+of absolute silence that followed there came to him, faintly, a sound,
+unintelligible at first, but growing in volume until he knew that it was
+the last echo of a tolling bell. There was no movement, no sound of
+breath or whisper from the old man at his back. But when it came again,
+floating to him as if from a vast distance, he turned quickly to find
+Obadiah Price with his face lifted, his thin arms flung wide above his
+head and his lips moving as if in prayer. His eyes burned with a dull
+glow as though he had been suddenly thrown into a trance. He seemed not
+to breathe, no vibration of life stirred him except in the movement of
+his lips. With the third toll of the distant bell he spoke, and to
+Captain Plum it was as if the passion and fire in his voice came from
+another being.
+
+"Our Christ, Master of hosts, we call upon Thy chosen people the three
+blessings of the universe--peace, prosperity and plenty, and upon
+Strang, priest, king and prophet, the bounty of Thy power!"
+
+Three times more the distant bell tolled forth its mysterious message
+and when the last echoes had died away the old man's arms dropped beside
+him and he turned again to Captain Plum.
+
+"Franklin Pierce, President of the United States of America," he
+repeated, as though there had been no interruption since his companion's
+question. "The package is to be delivered to him. Now you must excuse
+me. An important matter calls me out for a short time. But I will be
+back soon--oh, yes, very soon. And you will wait for me. You will wait
+for me here, and then I will take you to St. James."
+
+He was gone in a quick hopping way, like a cricket, and the last that
+Captain Plum saw of him was his ghostly face turned back for an instant
+in the darkness of the next room, and after that the soft patter of his
+feet and the strange chuckle in his throat traveled to the outer door
+and died away as he passed out into the night. Nathaniel Plum was not a
+man to be easily startled, but there was something so unusual about the
+proceedings in which he was as yet playing a blind part that he forgot
+to smoke, which was saying much. Who was the old man? Was he mad? His
+eyes scanned the little room and an exclamation of astonishment fell
+from his lips when he saw the leather bag, partly filled with gold,
+lying where his mysterious acquaintance had dropped it. Surely this was
+madness or else another ruse to test his honesty. The discovery thrilled
+him. It was wonderfully quiet out in that next room and very dark. Were
+hidden eyes guarding that bag? Well, if so, he would give their owner to
+understand that he was not a thief. He rose from his chair and moved
+toward the bag, lifted it in his hand, and tossed it back again so that
+the gold in it chinked loudly. Then he went to the narrow aperture and
+blocked it with his body and listened until he knew that if there had
+been human life in the room he would have heard it.
+
+The outer door was open and through it there came to him the soft breath
+of the night air and the sweetness of balsam and wild flowers. It struck
+him that it would be pleasanter waiting outside than in, and it would
+undoubtedly make no difference to Obadiah Price. In front of the cabin
+he found the stump of a log and seating himself on it where the clear
+light of the stars fell full upon him he once more began his
+interrupted smoke. It seemed to him that he had waited a long time when
+he heard the sound of footsteps. They came rapidly as if the person was
+half running. Hardly had he located the direction of the sound when a
+figure appeared in the opening and hurried toward the door of the cabin.
+A dozen yards from him it paused for a moment and turned partly about,
+as if inspecting the path over which it had come. With a greeting
+whistle Captain Plum jumped to his feet. He heard a little throat note,
+which was not the chuckling of Obadiah Price, and the figure ran almost
+into his arms. A sudden knowledge of having made a mistake drew Captain
+Plum a pace backward. For scarcely more than five seconds he found
+himself staring into the white terrified face of a girl. Eyes wide and
+glowing with sudden fright met his own. Instinctively he lifted his hand
+to his hat, but before he could speak the girl sprang back with a low
+cry and ran swiftly down the path that led into the gloom of the woods.
+
+
+For several minutes Captain Plum stood as if the sudden apparition had
+petrified him. He listened long after the sound of retreating footsteps
+had died away. There remained behind a faint sweet odor of lilac which
+stirred his soul and set his blood tingling. It was a beautiful face
+that he had seen. He was sure of that and yet he could have given no
+good verbal proof of it. Only the eyes and the odor of lilac remained
+with him and after a little the lilac drifted away. Then he went back to
+the log and sat down. He smiled as he thought of the joke that he had
+unwittingly played on Obadiah. From his knowledge of the Beaver Island
+Mormons he was satisfied that the old man who displayed gold in such
+reckless profusion was anything but a bachelor. In all probability this
+was one of his wives and the cabin behind him, he concluded, was for
+some reason isolated from the harem. "Evidently that little Saintess is
+not a flirt," he concluded, "or she would have given me time to speak to
+her."
+
+The continued absence of Obadiah Price began to fill Captain Plum with
+impatience. After an hour's wait he reentered the cabin and made his way
+to the little room, where the candle was still burning dimly. To his
+astonishment he beheld the old man sitting beside the table. His thin
+face was propped between his hands and his eyes were closed as if he was
+asleep. They shot open instantly on Captain Plum's appearance.
+
+"I've been waiting for you, Nat," he cried, straightening himself with
+spring-like quickness. "Waiting for you a long time, Nat!" He rubbed his
+hands and chuckled at his own familiarity. "I saw you out there enjoying
+yourself. What did you think of her, Nat?" He winked with such audacious
+glee that, despite his own astonishment, Captain Plum burst into a
+laugh. Obadiah Price held up a warning hand. "Tut, tut, not so loud!" he
+admonished. His face was a map of wrinkles. His little black eyes shone
+with silent laughter. There was no doubt but that he was immensely
+pleased over something. "Tell me, Nat--why did you come to St. James?"
+
+He leaned forward over the table, his odd white head almost resting on
+it, and twiddled his thumbs with wonderful rapidity. "Eh, Nat?" he
+urged. "Why did you come?"
+
+"Because it was too hot and uninteresting lying out there in a calm,
+Dad," replied the master of the _Typhoon_. "We've been roasting for
+thirty-six hours without a breath to fill our sails. I came over to see
+what you people are like. Any harm done?"
+
+"Not a bit, not a bit--yet," chuckled the old man. "And what's your
+business, Nat?"
+
+"Sailing--mostly."
+
+"Ho, ho, ho! of course, I might have known it! Sailing--_mostly_. Why,
+certainly you sail! And why do you carry a pistol on one side of you and
+a knife on the other, Nat?"
+
+"Troublous times, Dad. Some of the fisher-folk along the Northern End
+aren't very scrupulous. They took a cargo of canned stuffs from me a
+year back."
+
+"And what use do you make of the four-pounder that's wrapped up in
+tarpaulin under your deck, Nat? And what in the world are you going to
+do with five barrels of gunpowder?"
+
+"How in blazes--" began Captain Plum.
+
+"O, to be sure, to be sure--they're for the fisher-folk," interrupted
+Obadiah Price. "Blow 'em up, eh, Nat? And you seem to be a young man of
+education, Nat. How did you happen to make a mistake in your count?
+Haven't you twelve men aboard your sloop instead of eight, Nat? Aren't
+there twelve, instead of eight? Eh, Nat?"
+
+"The devil take you!" cried Captain Plum, leaping suddenly to his feet,
+his face flaming red. "Yes, I have got twelve men and I've got a gun in
+tarpaulin and I've got five barrels of gunpowder! But how in the name of
+Kingdom-Come did you find it out?"
+
+Obadiah Price came around the end of the table and stood so close to
+Captain Plum that a person ten feet away could not have heard him when
+he spoke.
+
+"I know more than that, Nat," he whispered. "Listen! A little while
+ago--say two weeks back--you were becalmed off the head of Beaver
+Island, and one dark night you were boarded by two boat-loads of men who
+made you and your crew prisoners, robbed you of everything you had,--and
+the next day you went back to Chicago. Eh?"
+
+Nathaniel stood speechless.
+
+"And you made up your mind the pirates were Mormons, enlisted some of
+your friends, armed your ship--and you're back here to make us settle.
+Isn't it so, Nat?"
+
+The little old man was rubbing his hands eagerly, excitedly.
+
+"You tried to get the revenue cutter _Michigan_ to come down with you,
+but they wouldn't--ho, ho, they wouldn't! One of our friends in Chicago
+sent quick word ahead of you to tell me all about it, and--Strang, the
+king, doesn't know!"
+
+He spoke the last words in intense earnestness.
+
+Then, suddenly, he held out his hand.
+
+"Young man, will you shake hands with me? Will you shake hands?--and
+then we will go to St. James!"
+
+Captain Plum thrust out a hand and the old man gripped it. The thin
+fingers tightened like cold clamps of steel. For a moment the face of
+Obadiah Price underwent a strange change. The hardness and glitter went
+out of his eyes and in place there came a questioning, almost an
+appealing, look. His tense mouth relaxed. It was as if he was on the
+point of surrendering to some emotion which he was struggling to stifle.
+And Nathaniel, meeting those eyes, felt that somewhere within him had
+been struck a strange chord of sympathy, something that made this little
+old man more than a half-mad stranger to him, and involuntarily the
+grip of his fingers tightened around those of his companion.
+
+"Now we will go to St. James, Captain Plum!"
+
+He attempted to withdraw his hand but Captain Plum held to it.
+
+"Not yet!" he exclaimed. "There are two or three things which your
+friend didn't tell you, Obadiah Price!"
+
+Nathaniel's eyes glittered dangerously.
+
+"When I left ship this morning I gave explicit orders to Casey, my
+mate."
+
+He gazed steadily into the old man's unflinching eyes.
+
+"I said something like this: 'Casey, I'm going to see Strang before I
+come back. If he's willing to settle for five thousand, we'll call it
+off. And if he isn't--why, we'll stand out there a mile and blow St.
+James into hell! And if I don't come back by to-morrow at sundown,
+Casey, you take command and blow it to hell without me!' So, Obadiah
+Price, if there's treachery--"
+
+The old man clutched at his hands with insane fierceness.
+
+"There will be no treachery, Nat, I swear to God there will be no
+treachery! Come, we will go--"
+
+Still Captain Plum hesitated.
+
+"Who are you? Whom am I to follow?"
+
+"A member of our holy Council of Twelve, Nat, and lord high treasurer of
+His Majesty, King Strang!"
+
+Before Captain Plum could recover from the surprise of this whispered
+announcement the little old man had freed himself and was pattering
+swiftly through the darkness of the next room. The master of the
+_Typhoon_ followed close behind him. Outside the councilor hesitated for
+a moment, as if debating which route to take, and then with a prodigious
+wink at Captain Plum and a throatful of his inimitable chuckles, chose
+the path down which his startled visitor of a short time before had
+fled. For fifteen minutes this path led between thick black walls of
+forest verdure. Obadiah Price kept always a few paces ahead of his
+companion and spoke not a word. At the end of perhaps half a mile the
+path entered into a large clearing on the farther side of which
+Nathaniel caught the glimmer of a light. They passed close to this
+light, which came from the window of a large square house built of logs,
+and Captain Plum became suddenly conscious that the air was filled with
+the redolent perfume of lilac. With half a dozen quick strides he
+overtook the councilor and caught him by the arm.
+
+"I smell lilac!" he exclaimed.
+
+"Certainly, so do I," replied Obadiah Price. "We have very fine lilacs
+on the island."
+
+"And I smelled lilac back there," continued Nathaniel, still holding to
+the old man's arm, and pointing a thumb over his shoulder. "I smelled
+'em back there, when--"
+
+"Ho, ho, ho!" chuckled the councilor softly. "I don't doubt it, Nat, I
+don't doubt it. She is very fond of lilacs. She wears the flowers very
+often."
+
+He pulled himself away and Captain Plum could hear his queer chuckling
+for some time after. Soon they entered the gloom of the woods again and
+a little later came out into another clearing and Nathaniel knew that it
+was St. James that lay at his feet. The lights of a few fishing boats
+were twinkling in the harbor, but for the most part the town was dark.
+Here and there a window shone like a spot of phosphorescent yellow in
+the dismal gloom and the great beacon still burned steadily over the
+home of the prophet.
+
+"Ah, it is not time," whispered Obadiah. "It is still too early." He
+drew his companion out of the path which they had followed and sat
+himself down on a hummock a dozen yards away from it, inviting Nathaniel
+by a pull of the sleeve to do the same. There were three of these
+hummocks, side by side, and Captain Plum chose the one nearest the old
+man and waited for him to speak. But the councilor did not open his
+lips. Doubled over until his chin rested almost upon the sharp points of
+his knees, he gazed steadily at the beacon, and as he looked it
+shuddered and grew dark, like a firefly that suddenly closes its wings.
+With a quick spring the councilor straightened himself and turned to the
+master of the _Typhoon_.
+
+"You have a good nose, Nat," he said, "but your ears are not so good.
+Sh-h-h-h!" He lifted a hand warningly and nodded sidewise toward the
+path. Captain Plum listened. He heard low voices and then
+footsteps--voices that were approaching rapidly, and were those of
+women, and footsteps that were almost running. The old man caught him by
+the arm and as the sounds came nearer his grip tightened.
+
+"Don't frighten them, Nat. Get down!"
+
+He crouched until he was only a part of the shadows of the ground and
+following his example Nathaniel slipped between two of the knolls. A
+few yards away the sound of the voices ceased and there was a hesitancy
+in the soft tread of the approaching steps. Slowly, and now in awesome
+silence, two figures came down the path and when they reached a point
+opposite the hummocks Nathaniel could see that they turned their faces
+toward them and that for a brief space there was something of terror in
+the gleam he caught of their eyes. In a moment they had passed. Then he
+heard them running.
+
+"They saw us!" Captain Plum exclaimed.
+
+Obadiah hopped to his feet and rubbed his hands with great glee. "What a
+temptation, Nat!" he whispered. "What a temptation to frighten them out
+of their wits! No, they didn't see us, Nat--they didn't see us. The
+girls are always frightened when they pass these graves. Some day--"
+
+"Graves!" almost shouted the master of the _Typhoon_. "Graves--and we
+sitting on 'em!"
+
+"That's all right, Nat--that's all right. They're my graves, so we're
+welcome to sit on them. I often come here and sit for hours at a time.
+They like to have me, especially little Jean--the middle one. Perhaps
+I'll tell you about Jean before you go away."
+
+If Captain Plum had been watching him he would have seen that soft
+mysterious light again shining in the old councilor's eyes. But now
+Nathaniel stood erect, his nostrils sniffing the air, catching once more
+the sweet scent of lilac. He hurried out into the opening, with the old
+man close behind him, and peered down into the starlit gloom into which
+the two girls had disappeared. The lovely face that had appeared to him
+for an instant at Obadiah's cabin began to haunt him. He was sure now
+that his sudden appearance had not been the only cause of its terror,
+and he felt that he should have called out to her or followed until he
+had overtaken her. He could easily have excused his boldness, even if
+the councilor had been watching him from the cabin door. He was certain
+that she had passed very near to him again and that the fright which
+Obadiah had attempted to explain was not because of the graves. He swung
+about upon his companion, determined to ask for an explanation. The
+latter seemed to divine his thought.
+
+"Don't let a little scent of lilac disturb you so, young man," he said
+with singular coldness. "It may cause you great unpleasantness." He went
+ahead and Nathaniel followed him, assured that the old man's words and
+the way in which he had spoken them no longer left a doubt as to the
+identity of his night visitor. She was one of the councilor's wives, so
+he thought, and his own interest in her was beginning to have an
+irritating effect. In other words Obadiah was becoming jealous.
+
+For some time there was silence between the two. Obadiah Price now
+walked with extreme slowness and along paths which seemed to bring him
+no nearer to the town below. Nathaniel could see that he was absorbed in
+thoughts of his own, and held his peace. Was it possible that he had
+spoiled his chances with the councilor because of a pretty face and a
+bunch of lilacs? The thought tickled Captain Plum despite the delicacy
+of his situation and he broke into an involuntary laugh. The laugh
+brought Obadiah to a halt as suddenly as though some one had thrust a
+bayonet against his breast.
+
+"Nat, you've got good red blood in you," he cried, whirling about. "D'ye
+suppose you can hate as well as love?"
+
+"Lord deliver us!" exclaimed the astonished Captain Plum.
+"Hate--love--what the--"
+
+"Yes, _hate_," repeated the old man with fierce emphasis, so close that
+his breath struck Nathaniel's face. "You can love a pretty face--and you
+can _hate_. I know you can. If you couldn't I would send you back to
+your sloop with the package to-night. But as it is I am going to relieve
+you of your oath. Yes, Nat, I give you back your oath--for a time."
+
+Nathaniel stepped a pace back and put his hands on his pockets as if to
+protect the gold there.
+
+"You mean that you want to call off our bargain?" he asked.
+
+The councilor rubbed his hands until the friction of them sent a shiver
+up Nathaniel's back. "Not that, Nat--O, no, not that! The bargain is
+good. The gold is yours. You must deliver the package. But you need not
+do it immediately. Understand? I am lonely back there in my shack. I
+want company. You must stay with me a week. Eh? Lilacs and pretty faces,
+Nat! Ho, ho!--You will stay a week, won't you, Nat?"
+
+He spoke so rapidly and his face underwent so many changes, now
+betraying the keenest excitement, now wrinkled in an ogreish, bantering
+grin, now almost pleading in its earnestness, that Nathaniel knew not
+what to make of him. He looked into the beady eyes, sparkling with
+passion, and the cat-like glitter of them set his blood tingling. What
+strange adventure was this old man dragging him into? What were the
+motives, the reasoning, the plot that lay behind this mysterious
+creature's apparent faith in him? He tried to answer these things in the
+passing of a moment before he replied. The councilor saw his hesitancy
+and smiled.
+
+"I will show you many things of interest, Nat," he said. "I will show
+you just one to-night. Then you will make up your mind, eh? You need not
+tell me until then."
+
+He took the lead again and this time struck straight down for the town.
+They passed a number of houses built of logs and Nathaniel caught narrow
+gleams of light from between close-drawn curtains. In one of these
+houses he heard the crying of children, and with a return of his grisly
+humor Obadiah Price prodded him in the ribs and said,
+
+"Good old Israel Laeng lives there--two wives, one old, one
+young--eleven children. The Kingdom of Heaven is open to him!" And from
+a second he heard the sound of an organ, and from still a third there
+came the laughter and chatter of several feminine voices, and again
+Obadiah reached out and prodded Nathaniel in the ribs. There was one
+great, gloomy, long-built place which they passed, without a ray of
+light to give it life, and the councilor said, "Three widows there,
+Nat,--fight like cats and dogs. Poor Job killed himself." They avoided
+the more thickly populated part of the settlement and encountered few
+people, which seemed to please the councilor. Once they overtook and
+passed a group of women clad in short skirts and loose waists and with
+their hair hanging in braids down their backs. For a third time Obadiah
+nudged Captain Plum.
+
+"It is the king's pleasure that all women wear skirts that come just
+below the knees," he whispered. "Some of them won't do it and he's
+wondering how to punish them. To-morrow there's going to be two public
+whippings. One of the victims is a man who said that if he was a woman
+he'd die before he put on knee skirts. After he's whipped he is going
+to be made to wear 'em. By Urim and Thummin, isn't that choice, Nat?"
+
+He shivered with quiet laughter and dived into a great block of darkness
+where there seemed to be no houses, keeping close beside Nathaniel. Soon
+they came to the edge of a grove and deep among the trees Captain Plum
+caught a glimpse of a lighted window. Obadiah Price now began to exhibit
+unusual caution. He approached the light slowly, pausing every few steps
+to peer guardedly about him, and when they had come very near to the
+window he pulled his companion behind a thick clump of shrubbery.
+Nathaniel could hear the old man's subdued chuckle and he bent his head
+to catch what he was about to whisper to him.
+
+"You must make no noise, Nat," he warned. "This is the castle of our
+priest, king and prophet--James Jesse Strang. I am going to show you
+what you have never seen before and what you will never look upon again.
+I have sworn upon the Two Books and I will keep my oath. And then--you
+will answer the question I asked you back there."
+
+He crept out into the darkness of the trees and Nathaniel followed, his
+heart throbbing with excitement, every sense alert, and one hand resting
+on the butt of his pistol. He felt that he was nearing the climax of his
+day's adventure and now, in the last moment of it, his old caution
+reasserted itself. He knew that he was among a dangerous people, men
+who, according to the laws of his country, were criminals in more ways
+than one. He had seen much of their work along the coasts and he had
+heard of more of it. He knew that this gloom and sullen quiet of St.
+James hid cut-throats and pirates and thieves. Still there was nothing
+ahead to alarm him. The old man dodged the gleams of the lighted window
+and slunk around to the end of the great house. Here, several feet above
+his head, was another window, small and veiled with the foliage wall.
+With the assurance of one who had been there before the councilor
+mounted some object under the window, lifted himself until his chin was
+on a level with the glass, and peered within. He was there but an
+instant and then fell back, chuckling and rubbing his hands.
+
+"Come, Nat!"
+
+He stood a little to one side and bowed with mock politeness. For a
+moment Captain Plum hesitated. Under ordinary circumstances this spying
+through a window would have been repugnant to him. But at present
+something seemed to tell him that it was not to satisfy his curiosity
+alone that Obadiah Price had given him this opportunity. Would a look
+through that little window explain some of the mysteries of the night?
+
+There came a low whisper in his ear.
+
+"Do you smell lilac, Nat? Eh?"
+
+The councilor was grinning at him. There was a suggestive gleam in his
+eyes. He rubbed his hands almost fiercely.
+
+In another instant Captain Plum had stepped upon the object beneath the
+window and parted the leaves. Breathlessly he looked in. A strange scene
+met his eyes. He was looking into a vast room, illuminated by a huge
+hanging lamp suspended almost on a level with his head. Under this lamp
+there was a long table and at the table sat seven women and one man. The
+man was at the end nearest the window and all that Nat could see was the
+back of his head and shoulders. But the women were in full view, three
+on each side of the table and one at the far end. He guessed the man to
+be Strang; but he stared at the women and as his eyes traveled back to
+the one facing him at the end of the table he could scarcely repress the
+exclamation of surprise that rose to his lips. It was the girl whom he
+had encountered at the councilor's cabin. She was leaning forward as if
+in an agony of suspense, her eyes on the king, her lips parted, her
+hands clutching at a great book which lay open before her. Her cheeks
+were flushed with excitement. And even as he looked Captain Plum saw
+her head fall suddenly forward upon the table, encircled by her arms.
+The heavy braid of her hair, partly undone, glistened like red gold in
+the lamplight. Her slender body was convulsed with sobs. The woman
+nearest her reached over and laid a caressing hand on the bowed head,
+but drew it quickly away as if at a sharp command.
+
+In his eagerness Nathaniel thrust his face through the foliage until his
+nose touched the glass. When the girl lifted her head she straightened
+back in her chair--and saw him. There came a sudden white fear in her
+face, a parting of the lips as if she were on the point of crying out,
+and then, before the others had seen, she looked again at Strang. She
+had discovered him and yet she had not revealed her discovery! Nathaniel
+could have shouted for joy. She had seen him, had recognized him! And
+because she had not cried out she wanted him! He drew his pistol from
+its holster and waited. If she signaled for him, if she called him, he
+would burst the window. The girl was talking now and as she talked she
+lifted her eyes. Nathaniel pressed his face close against the window,
+and smiled. That would let her know he was a friend. She seemed to
+answer him with a little nod and he fancied that her eyes glowed with a
+mute appeal for his assistance. But only for an instant, and then they
+turned again to the king. Not until that moment did Nathaniel notice
+upon her bosom a bunch of crumpled lilacs.
+
+From below the iron grip of the councilor dragged him down.
+
+"That's enough," he whispered. "That's enough--for to-night." He saw the
+pistol in Nathaniel's hand and gave a sudden breathless cry.
+
+"Nat--Nat--"
+
+He caught Captain Plum's free hand in his.
+
+"Tell me this, Obadiah Price," whispered the master of the _Typhoon_,
+"who is she?"
+
+The councilor stood on tiptoe to answer.
+
+"They are the six wives of Strang, Nat!"
+
+"But the other?" demanded Nathaniel. "The other--"
+
+"O, to be sure, to be sure," chuckled Obadiah. "The girl of the lilacs,
+eh? Why, she's the seventh wife, Nat--that's all, the seventh wife!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+THE WARNING
+
+
+So quickly that Obadiah Price might not have counted ten before it had
+come and gone the significance of his new situation flashed upon Captain
+Plum as he stood under the king's window. His plans had changed since
+leaving ship but now he realized that they had become hopelessly
+involved. He had intended that Obadiah should show him where Strang was
+to be found, and that later, when ostensibly returning to his vessel, he
+would visit the prophet in his home. Whatever the interview brought
+forth he would still be in a position to deliver the councilor's
+package. Even an hour's bombardment of St. James would not interfere
+with the fulfilment of his oath. But those few minutes at the king's
+window had been fatal to the scheme he had built. The girl had seen
+him. She had not betrayed his presence. She had called to him with her
+eyes--he would have staked his life on that. What did it all mean? He
+turned to Obadiah. The old man was grimacing and twisting his hands
+nervously. He seemed half afraid, cringing, as if fearing a blow. The
+sight of him set Nathaniel's blood afire. His white face seemed to
+verify the terrible thought that had leaped into his brain. Suddenly he
+heard a faint cry--a woman's voice--and in an instant he was back at the
+window. The girl had risen to her feet and stood facing him. This time,
+as her eyes met his own, he saw in them a flashing warning, and he
+obeyed it as if she had spoken to him. As he dropped silently back to
+the ground the councilor came close to his side.
+
+"That's enough for to-night, Nat," he whispered.
+
+He made as if to slip away but Nathaniel detained him with an emphatic
+hand.
+
+"Not yet, Dad! I'd like to have a word with--this--"
+
+"With Strang's wife," chuckled Obadiah. "Ho, ho, ho, Nat, you're a
+rascal!" The old man's face was mapped with wrinkles, his eyes glowed
+with joyous approbation. "You shall, Nat, you shall! You love a pretty
+face, eh? You shall meet Mrs. Strang, Nat, and you shall make love to
+her if you wish. I swear that, too. But not to-night, Nat--not
+to-night."
+
+He stood a pace away and rubbed his hands.
+
+"There will be no chance to-night, Nat--but to-morrow night, or the
+next. O, I promise you shall meet her, and make love to her, Nat! Ho, if
+Strang knew, if Strang _only_ knew!"
+
+There was something so fiendishly gloating in the councilor's attitude,
+in his face, in the hot glow of his eyes, that for a moment Nathaniel's
+involuntary liking for the little old man before him turned to
+abhorrence. The passion, the triumph of the man, convinced him where
+words had failed. The girl was Strang's wife. His last doubt was
+dispelled. And because she was Strang's wife Obadiah hated the Mormon
+prophet. The councilor had spoken with fateful assurance--that he should
+meet her, that he should make love to her. It was an assurance that made
+him shudder. As he followed in silence up out of the gloom of the town
+he strove, but in vain, to find whether sin had lurked in the sweet face
+that had appealed to him in its misery--whether there had been a flash
+of something besides terror, besides prayerful entreaty, in the lovely
+eyes that had met his own. Obadiah spoke no word to break in on his
+thoughts. Now and then the old man's insane chucklings floated softly to
+Nathaniel's ears, and when at last they came to the cabin in the forest
+he broke into a low laugh that echoed weirdly in the great black room
+which they entered. He lighted another candle and approached a ladder
+which led through a trap in the ceiling. Without a word he mounted this
+ladder, and Nathaniel followed him, finding himself a moment later in a
+small low room furnished with a bed. The councilor placed his candle on
+a table close beside it and rubbed his hands until it seemed they must
+burn.
+
+"You will stay--eh, Nat?" he cried, bobbing his head. "Yes, you will
+stay, and you will give me back the package for a day or two." He
+retreated to the trap and slid down it as quickly as a rat. "Pleasant
+dreams to you, Nat, and--O, wait a minute!" Captain Plum could hear him
+pattering quickly over the floor below. In a moment he was back,
+thrusting his white grimacing face through the trap and tossed something
+upon the bed. "She left them last night, Nat. Pleasant dreams, pleasant
+dreams," and he was gone.
+
+Nathaniel turned to the bed and picked up a faded bunch of lilacs. Then
+he sat down, loaded his pipe, and smoked until he could hardly see the
+walls of his little room. From the moment of his landing on the island
+he turned the events of the day over in his mind. Yet when he arrived at
+the end of them he was no less mystified than when he began. Who was
+Obadiah Price? Who was the girl that fate had so mysteriously associated
+with his movements thus far? What was the plot in which he had
+accidentally become involved? With tireless tenacity he hung to these
+questions for hours. That there was a plot of some kind he had not the
+least doubt. The councilor's strange actions, the oath, the package, and
+above all the scene in the king's house convinced him of that. And he
+was sure that Obadiah's night visitor--the girl with the lilacs--was
+playing a vital part in it.
+
+He plucked at the withered flowers which the old man had thrown him. He
+could detect their sweet scent above the pungent fumes of tobacco and as
+Obadiah's triumphant chuckle recurred to him, the gloating joy in his
+eyes, the passionate tremble of his voice, a grim smile passed over his
+face. The mystery was easy of solution--if he was willing to reason
+along certain lines. But he was not willing. He had formed his own
+picture of Strang's wife and it pleased him to keep it. At moments he
+half conceded himself a fool, but that did not trouble him. The longer
+he smoked the more his old confidence and his old recklessness returned
+to him. He had enjoyed his adventure. The next day he would end it. He
+would go openly into St. James and have done his business with Strang.
+Then he would return to his ship. What had he, Captain Plum, to do with
+Strang's wife?
+
+But even after he had determined on these things his brain refused to
+rest. He paced back and forth across the narrow room, thinking of the
+man whom he was to meet to-morrow--of Strang, the one-time schoolmaster
+and temperance lecturer who had made himself a king, who for seven years
+had defied the state and nation, and who had made of his island
+stronghold a hot-bed of polygamy, of licentiousness, of dissolute power.
+His blood grew hot as he thought again of the beautiful girl who had
+appealed to him. Obadiah had said that she was the king's wife. Still--
+
+Thoughts flashed into his head which for a time made him forget his
+mission on the island. In spite of his resolution to keep to his own
+scheme he found himself, after a little, thinking only of the Mormon
+king, and the lovely face he had seen through the castle window. He knew
+much about the man with whom he was to deal to-morrow. He knew that he
+had been a rival of Brigham Young and that when the exodus of the
+Mormons to the deserts of the west came he had led his own followers
+into the North, and that each July, amid barbaric festivities, he was
+recrowned with a circlet of gold. But the girl! If she was the king's
+wife why had her eyes called to him for help?
+
+The question crowded Nathaniel's brain with a hundred thrilling
+pictures. With a shudder he thought of the terrible power the Mormon
+king held not only over his own people but over the Gentiles of the
+mainlands as well. With these mainlanders, he regarded Beaver Island as
+a nest of pirates and murderers. He knew of the depredations of Strang
+and his people among the fishermen and settlers, of the piratical
+expeditions of his armed boats, of the dreaded raids of his sheriffs,
+and of the crimes that made the women of the shores tremble and turn
+white at the mere mention of his name.
+
+Was it possible that this girl--
+
+Captain Plum did not let himself finish the thought. With a powerful
+effort he brought himself back to his own business on the island, smoked
+another pipe, and undressed. He went to bed with the withered lilacs on
+the table close beside him. He fell asleep with their scent in his
+nostrils. When he awoke they were gone. He started up in astonishment
+when he saw what had taken their place. Obadiah had visited him while he
+slept. The table was spread with a white cloth and upon it was his
+breakfast, a pot of coffee still steaming, and the whole of a cold baked
+fowl. Near-by, upon a chair, was a basin of water, soap and a towel.
+Nathaniel rolled from his bed with a healthy laugh of pleasure. The
+councilor was at least a courteous host, and his liking for the curious
+old man promptly increased. There was a sheet of paper on his plate upon
+which Obadiah had scribbled the following words:
+
+"My dear Nat:--Make yourself at home. I will be away to-day but will see
+you again to-night. Don't be surprised if somebody makes you a visit."
+
+The "somebody" was heavily underscored and Nathaniel's pulse quickened
+and a sudden flush of excitement surged into his face as he read the
+meaning of it. The "somebody" was Strang's wife. There could be no other
+interpretation. He went to the trap and called down for Obadiah but
+there was no answer. The councilor had already gone. Quickly eating his
+breakfast the master of the _Typhoon_ climbed down the ladder into the
+room below. The remains of the councilor's breakfast were on a table
+near the door, and the door was open. Through it came a glory of
+sunshine and the fresh breath of the forest laden with the perfume of
+wild flowers and balsam. A thousand birds seemed caroling and twittering
+in the sunlit solitude about the cabin. Beyond this there was no other
+sound or sign of life. For many minutes Nathaniel stood in the open, his
+eyes on the path along which he knew that Strang's wife would come--if
+she came at all. Suddenly he began to examine the ground where the girl
+had stood the previous night. The dainty imprints of her feet were
+plainly discernible in the soft earth. Then he went to the path--and
+with a laugh so loud that it startled the birds into silence he set off
+with long strides in the direction of St. James. From the footprints in
+that path it was quite evident that Strang's wife was a frequent visitor
+at Obadiah's.
+
+At the edge of the forest, from where he could see the log house
+situated across the opening, Nathaniel paused. He had made up his mind
+that the girl whom he had seen through the king's window was in some way
+associated with it. Obadiah had hinted as much and she had come from
+there on her way to Strang's. But as the prophet's wives lived in his
+castle at St. James this surely could not be her home. More than ever he
+was puzzled. As he looked he saw a figure suddenly appear from among the
+mass of lilac bushes that almost concealed the cabin. An involuntary
+exclamation of satisfaction escaped him and he drew back deeper among
+the trees. It was the councilor who had shown himself. For a few moments
+the old man stood gazing in the direction of St. James as if watching
+for the approach of other persons. Then he dodged cautiously along the
+edge of the bushes, keeping half within their cover, and moved swiftly
+in the opposite direction toward the center of the island. Nathaniel's
+blood leaped with a desire to follow. The night before he had guessed
+that Obadiah with his gold and his smoldering passion was not a man to
+isolate himself in the heart of the forest. Here--across the open--was
+evidence of another side of his life. In that great square-built
+domicile of logs, screened so perfectly by flowering lilac, lived
+Obadiah's wives. Captain Plum laughed aloud and beat the bowl of his
+pipe on the tree beside him. And the _girl_ lived there--or came from
+there to the woodland cabin so frequently that her feet had beaten a
+well-worn path. Had the councilor lied to him? Was the girl he had seen
+through the King's window one of the seven wives of Strang--or was she
+the wife of Obadiah Price?
+
+The thought was one that thrilled him. If the girl was the councilor's
+wife what was the motive of Obadiah's falsehood? And if she was Strang's
+wife why had her feet--and hers alone with the exception of the old
+man's--worn this path from the lilac smothered house to the cabin in the
+woods? The captain of the _Typhoon_ regretted now that he had given such
+explicit orders to Casey. Otherwise he would have followed the figure
+that was already disappearing into the forest on the opposite side of
+the clearing. But now he must see Strang. There might be delay,
+necessary delay, and if it so happened that his own blundering curiosity
+kept him on the island until sundown--well, he smiled as he thought of
+what Casey would do.
+
+Refilling his pipe and leaving a trail of smoke behind him he set out
+boldly for St. James. When he came to the three graves he stopped,
+remembering that Obadiah had said they were his graves. A sort of grim
+horror began to stir at his soul as he gazed on the grass-grown
+mounds--proofs that the old councilor would inherit a place in the
+Mormon Heaven having obeyed the injunctions of his prophet on earth.
+Nathaniel now understood the meaning of his words of the night before.
+This was the family burying ground of the old councilor.
+
+He walked on, trying in vain to concentrate his mind solely upon the
+business that was ahead of him. A few days before he would have counted
+this walk to St. James one of the events of his life. Now it had lost
+its fascination. Despite his efforts to destroy the vision of the
+beautiful face that had looked at him through the king's window its
+memory still haunted him. The eyes, soft with appeal; the red mouth,
+quivering, and with lips parted as if about to speak to him; the bowed
+head with its tumbled glory of hair--all had burned themselves upon his
+soul in a picture too deep to be eradicated. If St. James was
+interesting now it was because that face was a part of it, because the
+secret of its life, of the misery that it had confessed to him, was
+hidden somewhere down there among its scattered log homes.
+
+Slowly he made his way down the slope in the direction of Strang's
+castle, the tower of which, surmounted by its great beacon, glistened in
+the morning sun. He would find Strang there. And there would be one
+chance in a thousand of seeing the girl--if Obadiah had spoken the
+truth. As he passed down he met men and boys coming up the slope and
+others moving along at the bottom of it, all going toward the interior
+of the island. They had shovels or rakes or hoes upon their shoulders
+and he guessed that the Mormon fields were in that direction; others
+bore axes; and now and then wagons, many of them drawn by oxen, left the
+town over the road that ran near the shore of the lake. Those whom he
+met stared at him curiously, much interested evidently in the appearance
+of a stranger. Nathaniel paid but small heed to them. As he entered the
+grove through which the councilor had guided him the night before his
+eagerness became almost excitement. He approached the great log house
+swiftly but cautiously, keeping as much from view as possible. As he
+came under the window through which he had looked upon the king and his
+wives his heart leaped with anticipation, with hope that was strangely
+mingled with fear. For only a moment he paused to listen, and
+notwithstanding the seriousness of his position he could not repress a
+smile as there came to his ears the crying of children and the high
+angry voice of a woman. He passed around to the front of the house. The
+door of Strang's castle was wide open and unguarded. No one had seen his
+approach; no one accosted him as he mounted the low steps; there was no
+one in the room into which he gazed a moment later. It was the great
+hall into which he had spied a few hours previous. There was the long
+table with the big book on it, the lamp whose light had bathed the
+girl's head in a halo of glory, the very chair in which he had found her
+sitting! He was conscious of a throbbing in his breast, a longing to
+call out--if he only knew her name.
+
+In the room there were four closed doors and it was from beyond these
+that there came to him the wailing of children. A fifth door was open
+and through it he saw a cradle gently rocking. Here at last was visible
+life, or motion at least, and he knocked loudly. Very gradually the
+cradle ceased its movement. Then it stopped, and a woman came out into
+the larger room. In a moment Nathaniel recognized her as the one who had
+placed a caressing hand upon the bowed head of the sobbing girl the
+night before. Her face was of pathetic beauty. Its whiteness was
+startling. Her eyes shone with an unhealthy luster, and her dark hair,
+falling in heavy curls over her shoulder, added to the wonderful pallor
+of her cheeks.
+
+Nathaniel bowed. "I beg your pardon, madam; I came to see Mr. Strang,"
+he said.
+
+"You will find the king at his office," she replied.
+
+The woman's voice was low, but so sweet that it was like music to the
+ear. As she spoke she came nearer and a faint flush appeared in the
+transparency of her cheek.
+
+"Why do you wish to see the king?" she asked.
+
+Was there a tremble of fear in her voice? Even as he looked Nathaniel
+saw the flush deepen in her cheeks and her eyes light with nervous
+eagerness.
+
+"I am sent by Obadiah Price," he hazarded.
+
+A flash of relief shot into the woman's face.
+
+"The king is at his office," she repeated. "His office is near the
+temple."
+
+Nathaniel retired with another bow.
+
+"By thunder, Strang, old boy, you've certainly got an eye for beauty!"
+he laughed as he hurried through the grove.
+
+"And Obadiah Price must be somebody, after all!"
+
+The Mormon temple was the largest structure in St. James, a huge square
+building of hewn logs, and Nathaniel did not need to make inquiry to
+find it. On one side was a two-story building with an outside stairway
+leading to the upper floor, and a painted sign announced that on this
+second floor was situated the office of James Jesse Strang, priest, king
+and prophet of the Mormons. It was still very early and the general
+merchandise store below was not open. Congratulating himself on this
+fact, and with the fingers of his right hand reaching instinctively for
+his pistol butt, Captain Plum mounted the stair. When half way up he
+heard voices. As he reached the landing at the top he caught the quick
+swish of a skirt. Another step and he was in the open door. He was not
+soon enough to see the person who had just disappeared through an
+opposite door but he knew that it was a woman. Directly in front of him
+as if she had been expecting his arrival was a young girl, and no sooner
+had he put a foot over the threshold than she hurried toward him, the
+most acute anxiety and fear written in her face.
+
+"You are Captain Plum?" she asked breathlessly.
+
+Nathaniel stopped in astonishment.
+
+"Yes, I'm--"
+
+"Then you must hurry--hurry!" cried the girl excitedly. "You have not a
+moment to lose! Go back to your ship before it is too late! She says
+they will kill you--"
+
+"Who says so?" thundered Captain Plum. He sprang to the girl's side and
+caught her by the arm. "Who says that I will be killed? Tell me--who
+gave you this warning for me?"
+
+"I--I--tell you so!" stammered the young girl. "I--I--heard the
+king--they will kill you--" Her lips trembled. Nathaniel saw that her
+eyes were already red from crying. "You will go?" she pleaded.
+
+Nathaniel had taken her hand and now he held it tightly in his own. His
+head was thrown back, his eyes were upon the door across the room. When
+he looked again into the girlish face there was flashing joyous defiance
+in his eyes, and in his voice there was confession of the truth that had
+suddenly come to overwhelm whatever law of self preservation he might
+have held unto himself.
+
+"No, my dear, I am not going back to my ship," he spoke softly. "Not
+unless she who is in that room comes out and bids me go herself!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+THE WHIPPING
+
+
+Scarce had the words fallen from his lips when there sounded a slow,
+heavy step on the stair outside. The young girl snatched her hand free
+and caught Nathaniel by the wrist.
+
+"It is the king!" she whispered excitedly. "It is the king! Quick--you
+still have time! You must go--you must go--"
+
+She strove to pull him across the room.
+
+"There--through that door!" she urged.
+
+The slowly ascending steps were half way up the stairs. Nathaniel
+hesitated. He knew that a moment before there had passed through that
+door one who carried with her the odor of lilac and his heart leaped to
+its own conclusion who that person was. He had heard the rustle of the
+girl's skirt. He had seen the last inch of the door close as Strang's
+wife pulled it after her. And now he was implored to follow! He sprang
+forward as the heavy steps neared the landing. His hand was upon the
+latch--when he paused. Then he turned and bent his head close down to
+the girl.
+
+"No, I won't do it, my dear," he whispered. "Just now it might make
+trouble for--her."
+
+He lifted his eyes and saw a man looking at him from the doorway. He
+needed no further proof to assure him that this was Strang the king of
+the Mormons, for the Beaver Island prophet was painted well in that
+region which knew the grip and terror of his power. He was a massive
+man, with the slow slumbering strength of a beast. He was not much under
+fifty; but his thick beard, reddish and crinkling, his shaggy hair, and
+the full-fed ruddiness of his face, with its foundation of heavy jaw,
+gave him a more youthful appearance. There was in his eyes, set deep and
+so light that they shone like pale blue glass, the staring assurance
+that is frequently born of power. In his hand he carried a huge
+metal-knobbed stick.
+
+In an instant Nathaniel had recovered himself. He advanced a step,
+bowing coolly.
+
+"I am Captain Plum, of the sloop _Typhoon_," he said. "I called at your
+home a short time ago and was directed to your office. As a stranger on
+the island I did not know that you had an office or I would have come
+here first."
+
+"Ah!"
+
+The king drew his right foot back half a pace and bowed so low that
+Nathaniel saw only the crown of his hat. When he raised his head the
+aggressive stare had gone out of his eyes and a welcoming smile lighted
+up his face as he advanced with extended hand.
+
+"I am glad to see you, Captain Plum."
+
+His voice was deep and rich, filled with that wonderful vibratory power
+which seems to strike and attune the hidden chords of one's soul. The
+man's appearance had not prepossessed Nathaniel, but at the sound of his
+voice he recognized that which had made him the prophet of men. As the
+warm hand of the king clasped his own Captain Plum knew that he was in
+the presence of a master of human destinies, a man whose ponderous
+red-visaged body was simply the crude instrument through which spoke the
+marvelous spirit that had enslaved thousands to him, that had enthralled
+a state legislature and that had hypnotized a federal jury into giving
+him back his freedom when evidence smothered him in crime. He felt
+himself sinking in the presence of this man and struggled fiercely to
+regain himself. He withdrew his hand and straightened himself like a
+soldier.
+
+"I have come to you with a grievance, Mr. Strang," he began. "A
+grievance which I feel sure you will do your best to right. Perhaps you
+are aware that some little time ago--about two weeks back--your people
+boarded my ship in force and robbed me of several thousand dollars'
+worth of merchandise."
+
+Strang had drawn a step back.
+
+"Aware of it!" he exclaimed in a voice that shook the room. "Aware of
+it!" The red of his face turned purple and he clenched his free hand in
+sudden passion. "Aware of it!" He repeated the words, this time so
+gently that Nathaniel could scarcely hear them, and tapped his heavy
+stick upon the floor. "No, Captain Plum, I was not aware of it. If I
+_had_ been--" He shrugged his thick shoulders. The movement, and a
+sudden gleam of his teeth through his beard, were expressive enough for
+Nathaniel to understand.
+
+Then the king smiled.
+
+"Are you sure--are you _quite_ sure, Captain Plum, that it was my people
+who attacked your ship? If so, of course you must have some proof?"
+
+"We were very near to Beaver Island and many miles from the mainland,"
+said Nathaniel. "It could only have been your people."
+
+"Ah!"
+
+Strang led the way to a table at the farther end of the room and
+motioned Nathaniel to a seat opposite him.
+
+"We are a much persecuted people, Captain Plum, very much persecuted
+indeed." His wonderful voice trembled with a subdued pathos. "We have
+answered for many sins that have never been ours, Captain Plum, and
+among them are robbery, piracy and even murder. The people along the
+coasts are deadly enemies to us--who would be their friends; they commit
+crimes in our name and we do not retaliate. It was not my people who
+waylaid your vessel. They were fishermen, probably, who came from the
+Michigan shore and awaited their opportunity off Beaver Island. But I
+shall investigate this; believe me, I shall investigate this fully,
+Captain Plum!"
+
+Nathaniel felt something like a great choking fist shoot up into his
+throat. It was not a sensation of fear but of humiliation--the
+humiliation of defeat, the knowledge of his own weakness in the hands of
+this man who had so quickly and so surely blocked his claim. His quick
+brain saw the futility of argument. He possessed no absolute proof and
+he had thought that he needed none. Strang saw the flash of doubt in his
+face, the hesitancy in his answer; he divined the working of the other's
+brain and in his soft voice, purring with friendship, he followed up his
+triumph.
+
+"I sympathize with you," he spoke gently, "and my sympathy and word
+shall help you. We do not welcome strangers among us, for strangers have
+usually proved themselves our enemies and have done us wrong. But to you
+I give the freedom of our kingdom. Search where you will, at what hours
+you will, and when you have found a single proof that your stolen
+property is among my people--when you have seen a face that you
+recognize as one of the robbers, return to me and I shall make
+restitution and punish the evil-doers."
+
+So intensely he spoke, so filled with reason and truth were his words,
+that Nathaniel thrust out his hand in token of acceptance of the king's
+terms. And as Strang gripped that hand Captain Plum saw the young girl's
+face over the prophet's shoulder--a face, white as death in its terror,
+that told him all he had heard was a lie.
+
+"And when you have done with my people," continued the king, "you will
+go among that other race, along the mainland, where men have thrown off
+the restraints of society to give loose reign to lust and avarice; where
+the Indian is brutified that his wife may be intoxicated by compulsion
+and prostituted by violence before his eyes; where the forest cabins and
+the streets of towns are filled with half-breeds; where there stalk
+wretches with withered and tearless eyes, who are in nowise troubled by
+recollection of robbery, rape and murder. And _there_ you will find whom
+you are looking for!"
+
+Strang had risen to his feet. His eyes blazed with the fire of smothered
+hatred and passion and his great voice rolled through his beard,
+tremulous with excitement, but still deep and rich, like the booming of
+some melodious instrument. He flung aside his hat as he paced back and
+forth; his shaggy hair fell upon his shoulders; huge veins stood out
+upon his forehead--and Nathaniel sat mute as he watched this lion of a
+man whose great throat quivered with the power that might have stirred a
+nation--that might have made him president instead of king. He waited
+for the thunder of that throat and his nerves keyed themselves to meet
+its bursting passion. But when Strang spoke again it was in a voice as
+soft and as gentle as a woman's.
+
+"Those are the men who have vilified us, Captain Plum; who have covered
+us with crimes that we have never committed; who have driven our people
+into groups that they may be free from depredation; who watch like
+vultures to despoil our women; wild wifeless men, Captain Plum, who have
+left families and character behind them and who have sought the
+wilderness to escape the penalties of law and order. It is they who
+would destroy us. Go among my own people first, Captain Plum, and find
+your lost property if you can; and if you can not discover it where in
+seven years not one child has been born out of wedlock, seek among the
+Lamanites--and my sheriffs shall follow where you place the crime!"
+
+He had stretched out his arms like one whose plea was of life and death;
+his face shone with earnestness; his low words throbbed as if his heart
+were borne upon them for the inspection of its truth and honor. He was
+Strang the tragedian, the orator, the conqueror of a legislature, a
+governor, a dozen juries--and of human souls. And as he stood silent for
+a moment in this attitude Nathaniel rose to his feet, subservient, and
+believing as others had believed in the fitness of this man. But as his
+eyes traveled a dozen paces beyond, he saw the young girl gesturing to
+him in that same terror, and holding up for him to see a slip of paper
+upon which she had written. And when she had caught his eyes she
+crumpled the paper into a shapeless ball and tossed it just over the
+landing to the ground below the stair.
+
+"I thank you for the privileges of the island which you have offered
+me," said Nathaniel, putting on his hat, "and I shall certainly take
+advantage of your kindness for a few hours, as I want very much to
+witness one of your ceremonies which I understand is to take place
+to-day. Then, if I have discovered nothing, I shall return to my ship."
+
+"Ah, you wish to see the whipping?" The king smiled his approval. "That
+is one way we have of punishing slight misdemeanors in our kingdom,
+Captain Plum. It is an illustration of our intolerance of evil-doers."
+He turned suddenly toward the girl. "Winnsome, my dear, have you copied
+the paper I was at work on? I wish to show it to Captain Plum."
+
+He walked slowly toward her and for the first time since her warning
+Nathaniel had an opportunity of observing the girl without fear of
+being perceived by the prophet. She was very young, hardly more than a
+child he would have guessed at first; and yet at a second and more
+careful glance he knew that she could not be under fifteen--perhaps
+sixteen. Her whole attire was one to add to her childish appearance. Her
+hair, which was rather short, fell in lustrous dark curls about her face
+and upon her neck. She wore a fitted coat-like blouse, and knee skirts
+which disclosed a pretty pair of legs and ankles. As Strang was
+returning with the paper which she handed to him the girl turned her
+face to Captain Plum. Her mouth was formed into a round red O and she
+pointed anxiously to where she had thrown the note. The king's eyes were
+on his paper and Nathaniel nodded to assure her that he understood.
+
+"I am like a gardener who compels every passing neighbor to go into his
+back yard and admire his first sprouts," laughed the prophet jovially.
+"In other words, I do a little writing, and I take a kind of childish
+joy in making other people read it. But I see this is not in proper
+shape, so you have escaped. It is a brief history of Beaver Island
+written at the request of the Smithsonian Institute, which has already
+published an article of mine. If you happen to be on the island
+to-morrow and should you return to this office I shall certainly have
+you read it if I have to call all of my sheriffs into service!"
+
+He laughed with such open good-humor that Nathaniel found himself
+smiling despite the varied unpleasant sensations within him. "Do you
+write much?" he asked.
+
+"I get out a daily paper," said the king rather proudly, "and of course,
+as prophet, I am the translator of what word may be handed down to us
+from Heaven for the direction and commandment of my people. I hold the
+secret of the Urim and Thummin, which was first delivered by angels into
+the hands of Joseph, and with it have revealed the word of God as it
+appears in a book which I have written. Ah--I had forgotten this!" From
+among a mass of papers and books on the table he drew forth a
+blue-covered pamphlet and passed it to his companion. "I have only a few
+copies left but you may have this one, Captain Plum. It will surely
+interest you. In it I have set forth the troubles existing between my
+own people and the cyprian-rotted criminals that infest Mackinac and the
+mainland and have described our struggle for chastity and honor against
+these human vultures. It was published two years ago. But conditions are
+different to-day. Now--now I am king, and the oppressors in the filth of
+their crime have become the oppressed!"
+
+The last words boomed from him in a slogan of triumph and as if in
+echoing mockery there came from the open door the chuckling, mirthless
+laugh of Obadiah Price.
+
+"Yea--yea--even into the land of the Lamanites are you king!"
+
+At the sound of his voice Strang turned toward him and the sonorous
+triumph that rumbled in his throat faded to a low greeting. And
+Nathaniel saw that the little old councilor's eyes glittered boldly as
+they met the prophet's and that in their glance was neither fear nor
+servitude but rather a light as of master meeting master. The two
+advanced and clasped hands and a few low words passed between them while
+Nathaniel went to the door.
+
+"I will go with you, Captain Nathaniel Plum," called Obadiah. "I will go
+with you and show you the town."
+
+"The councilor will be your friend," added Strang. "To-day he carries
+with him that authority from the king."
+
+He bowed and Nathaniel passed through the door. Looking back he caught a
+last warning flash from the girl's eyes. As he hurried down the stair he
+heard the councilor pause for an instant upon the landing and taking
+advantage of this opportunity he picked up the bit of crumpled paper,
+and read these lines:
+
+"Hurry to your ship. In another hour men will be watching for an
+opportunity to kill you. You will never leave the island alive--_unless
+you go now_. The girl you saw through the window sends you this
+warning."
+
+He thrust the paper into his coat pocket as Obadiah came up behind him.
+
+"Ho, ho, Nat, my boy, I have come fast to catch you--I have come fast!"
+he whispered. He caught his companion by the arm and Nathaniel felt his
+hand trembling violently. "Come this way, Nat--beyond the temple. I have
+things to say to you." His voice was strangely unnatural and when
+Captain Plum looked down into his face the look in the bead-like eyes
+startled him. "Nat, you must hurry away with the package!"
+
+"So I understand--if I save my skin. Obadiah Price, I have a notion to
+kill you!"
+
+They had passed beyond the huge edifice of logs, and as he stopped,
+hidden from the view of the king's office, Nathaniel caught the
+councilor's arm in a grip that crushed to the bone.
+
+"I have a notion to kill you!" he repeated.
+
+The old man stood unflinching. Not a muscle of his face quivered as the
+captain's fingers sank into his flesh.
+
+"At the first sign of treachery, at the first sign of danger to myself,
+I shall shoot you dead!" he finished.
+
+"You may, Nat, you may. From this moment until you leave the island I
+shall be at your side and no harm shall come to you. But if there
+should, Nat, or if there should come a moment when you believe that I am
+your enemy--shoot me!" There was sincerity in his voice that carried
+conviction to Nathaniel's heart and he released his hold upon the
+councilor's arm. Regardless of the mystery that surrounded him he
+believed in Obadiah. But there rose in his breast a mad desire to choke
+this old man into telling him the truth, to force him to reveal the
+secrets of this strange plot into which he had been drawn and of which
+he knew as little as when he first set foot in Strang's kingdom. Yet he
+realized even as the desire formed itself in his brain that such an
+effort would be useless.
+
+"If you had remained at the cabin, Nat, you would have known that I was
+your friend," continued Obadiah. "She would have come to you, but
+now--it is impossible. You know. You have been warned?"
+
+Nathaniel drew Winnsome's note from his pocket and read it aloud.
+Obadiah smiled gleefully when he noticed how carefully he kept the
+handwriting from his eyes.
+
+"Ah, Nat, you are a noble fellow!" he cried, rubbing his hands in his
+old tireless way. "You would not betray pretty little Winn, eh? And who
+do you suppose told Winnsome to give you this note?"
+
+"Strang's wife."
+
+"Yea, even so. And it was she who set my old legs a-running for you, my
+boy. Come, let us move!"
+
+The little councilor was his old self again, chuckling and grimacing and
+rubbing his hands, and his eyes danced as he spoke of the girl.
+
+"Casey is not a cautious man," he gurgled with a sudden upward leer.
+"Casey is a fool!"
+
+"Casey!" almost shouted Captain Plum. "What the devil do you mean?"
+
+"Ho, ho, ho--haven't you guessed the truth yet, Nat? While you and I
+were getting acquainted last night a couple of fishermen from the
+mainland dropped alongside your sloop. They had been robbed by the
+Mormon pirates! They cursed Strang. They swore vengeance. And your
+cautious Casey cursed with 'em, and fed 'em, and drank with 'em--and he
+would have had them stay until morning only they were anxious to hurry
+with their report to Strang. Understand, Nat? Eh? Do you understand?"
+
+"What did Casey tell them?" gasped Nathaniel.
+
+Obadiah hunched his shoulders.
+
+"Enough to warrant a bullet through your head, Nat. Cheerful, isn't it?
+But we'll fool them, Nat, we'll fool them! You shall board your ship and
+hurry away with the package, and then you shall make love to Strang's
+wife--_for she will go with you!_"
+
+He stopped to enjoy the amazement that was written in every lineament of
+the other's face. The red blood surged into Nathaniel's neck and
+deepened on his bronze cheeks. Slowly the reaction came. When he spoke
+there was an uneasy gleam in his eyes and his voice was as hard as
+steel.
+
+"She will go with me, Councilor! And why?"
+
+Obadiah had laughed softly as he watched the change. Suddenly he jerked
+himself erect.
+
+"Sh-h-h!" he whispered. "Keep cool, Nat! Don't show any excitement or
+fear. Here comes the man who is to kill you!"
+
+He made no move save with his eyes.
+
+"He is coming to speak with me and to get a good look at you," he added
+in excited haste. "Appear friendly. Agree with what I say. He is the
+chief of sheriffs, the king's murderer--Arbor Croche!"
+
+He turned as if he had just seen the approaching figure. And he
+whispered softly, "Winnsome's father!"
+
+Arbor Croche! Nathaniel gave an involuntary shudder as he turned with
+Obadiah. Croche, chief of sheriffs, scourge of the mainland--the Attila
+of the Mormon kingdom, whose very name caused the women of the shores to
+turn white and on whose head the men had secretly set a price in gold!
+Without knowing it his hand went under his coat. Obadiah saw the
+movement and as he advanced to meet the officer of the king he jerked
+the arm back fiercely. Half a dozen paces away the chief of sheriffs
+paused and bowed low. But the councilor stood erect, as he had stood
+before the king, smiling and nodding his head.
+
+"Ah, Croche," he greeted, "good morning!"
+
+"Good morning, Councilor!"
+
+"Sheriff, I would have you meet Captain Nathaniel Plum, master of the
+sloop _Typhoon_. Captain Plum this is His Majesty's officer, Arbor
+Croche!"
+
+The two men advanced and shook hands. Nathaniel stood half a head above
+the sheriff, who, like his master, the king, was short and of massive
+build, though a much younger man. He was a dark lowering hulk of a
+creature, with black eyes, black hair, and a hand-clasp that showed him
+possessed of great strength.
+
+"You are a stranger, Captain Plum?"
+
+The councilor replied quickly.
+
+"He has never been at St. James before, sheriff. I have invited him to
+stay over to see the whipping. By the way--" he shot a suggestive look
+at the Officer. "By the way, Croche, I want you to see him safely aboard
+his sloop to-night. His ship is at the lower end of the island, and if
+you will detail a couple of men just before dusk--an escort, you know--"
+
+Nathaniel felt a curious thrill creep up his spine at the satisfaction
+which betrayed itself in the officer's black face.
+
+"It will give me great pleasure, Councilor," he interrupted. "I shall
+escort you myself if you will allow me, Captain Plum!"
+
+"Thank you," said Nathaniel.
+
+"Captain Plum is to remain with me throughout the day," added Obadiah.
+"Come at seven--to my place. Ah, I see that people are assembling near
+the jail!"
+
+"We have changed our plans somewhat, Councilor." The officer turned to
+Nathaniel. "You will see the whipping within half an hour, Captain
+Plum." He turned away with another bow to the councilor and hastened in
+the direction of Strang's office.
+
+"So that is the gentleman who thinks he is going to put a bullet through
+me!" exclaimed Nathaniel when the officer had gone beyond hearing. He
+laughed, and there was a kind of wild expectant joy in his voice.
+"Obadiah, can you not make arrangements for him to go with me alone?"
+
+"He will not go with you at all, Nat," gloated the old man. "Ho, ho, we
+are playing at his own game--treachery. When he calls at my place you
+will be aboard ship."
+
+"But I should like to have a talk with him--alone, and in the woods.
+God--I know a man at Grand Traverse Bay whose wife and daughter--"
+
+"Sh-h-h-h!" interrupted the councilor. "Would you kill little Winnsome's
+father?"
+
+"Her father? That animal! That murderer! Is it true?"
+
+"But you should have seen her mother, Nat, you should have seen her
+mother!" The old man twisted his hands, like a miser ravished by the
+sight of gold. "She was beautiful--as beautiful as a wild flower, and
+she killed herself three years ago to save the birth of another child
+into this hell. Little Winn is like her mother, Nat."
+
+"And she lives with him?"
+
+"Er, yes--and guarded, oh, so carefully guarded by Strang, Nat! Yes, I
+guess that some day she will be a queen."
+
+"Great God!" cried the young man. "And you--you live in this cesspool of
+sin and still believe in a Heaven?"
+
+"Yes, I believe in a Heaven. And my reward there shall be great. Ho, ho,
+I am taking no middle road, Nat!"
+
+They had passed in a semicircle beyond the temple and now approached a
+squat building constructed of logs, which Obadiah had pointed out as the
+jail. A glance satisfied Nathaniel that it was so situated that an
+admirable view of the proceedings could be obtained from the rear of the
+structure in which Strang had his office. Several score of people had
+already assembled about the prison and stood chatting with that tense
+interest and anticipation with which the mob always awaits public
+infliction of the law's penalties. A third of them were women. As
+Nathaniel had previously noted, the feminine part of the Mormon
+population wore their hair either in braids down their backs or in thick
+curls flowing over their shoulders and with the exception of three or
+four were attired in skirts that just concealed their knees. Obadiah
+halted his companion close to a group of half a dozen of these women and
+nudged him slyly.
+
+"Pretty sight, eh, Nat?" he chuckled. "Ah, the king has a wonderful eye
+for beauty, Nat--wonderful eye! He orders that no skirt shall fall below
+the female knee. Ho, ho, if he dared, if he _quite_ dared, Nat!"
+
+He nudged Nathaniel again with such enthusiasm that the latter jumped as
+though a knife had been thrust between his ribs.
+
+"By George, I admire his taste!" he laughed. The women caught him
+staring at them, and one, who was the youngest and prettiest of the lot,
+smiled invitingly.
+
+"Tush--the Jezebel!" snapped Obadiah, catching the look. "That's her
+child playing just beyond."
+
+The young woman tossed her head and her white teeth gleamed in a laugh,
+as though she had overheard the old councilor's words.
+
+"See her twist her hair," he snarled venomously as the young woman,
+still boldly eying Nathaniel, played with the luxuriant curls that
+glistened in the sun upon her breast. "Ezra Wilton is so fond of her
+that he will take no other wife. Ugh, Strang is a fool!"
+
+Nathaniel turned away from the smiling eyes with a shrug.
+
+"Why?"
+
+"To tell our women that it helps to save their souls to wear short
+skirts and let their hair hang down. For every soul of a woman that it
+saves it sends two men on the road to hell!"
+
+So intense was the old man's displeasure and so ludicrous the twisting
+contortions of his face that Nathaniel could hardly restrain himself
+from bursting into a roar of laughter. Obadiah perceived his inclination
+and with an angry bob of his head led the way through to the inner edge
+of the waiting circle of men. Within this circle, in a small open space,
+was a short post with straps attached to an arm nailed across it, and
+leaning upon this post in an attitude of one who possesses a most
+distinguished office was a young man with a three thonged whip in his
+hand. An ominous silence pervaded the circle, with the exception of the
+hushed whispering of a number of women who had forced themselves into
+the line of spectators, bent upon witnessing the sight of blood as well
+as hearing the sound of lashes. Nathaniel noticed that most of the women
+hung in frightened curiosity beyond the men.
+
+"That is MacDougall with the lash--official whipper and caretaker of the
+slave hounds," explained Obadiah in a whisper.
+
+Nathaniel gave a start of horror.
+
+"Slave hounds!" he breathed.
+
+The councilor grinned and twisted his hands, in enjoyment of his
+companion's surprise.
+
+"We have the finest pack of bloodhounds north of Louisiana," he
+continued, so low that only Nathaniel could hear. "See! Isn't the earth
+worn smooth and hard about that post?"
+
+Nathaniel looked and his blood grew hot.
+
+"I have seen such things in the South," he said. "But not--for white
+men!"
+
+The councilor caught him by the arm.
+
+"They are coming!"
+
+In the direction of the jail the crowd was separating. Men crushed back
+on each side, forming a narrow aisle, even the whispering of the women
+ceased. A moment later three men appeared in the opening between the
+spectators. One of these, who walked between the other two, was stripped
+to the waist. About each of his naked wrists was tied a leather thong
+and these thongs were held by the man's guards. The prisoner's face was
+livid; his hands were red with blood that dripped from his lacerated
+wrists; his eyes glared malignantly and his heaving chest showed that
+he had not been brought from the log prison without a struggle.
+
+"Ah, it's Wittle first!" breathed the councilor. "It's he who said his
+wife should not wear short skirts."
+
+At the edge of the circle the prisoner hesitated and the muscles in his
+arms and chest grew rigid. Those of the crowd nearest to him drew back.
+Then a sudden change swept over the man's features and he walked quickly
+to the stake and kneeled before it. The thongs about his wrists were
+tied to the straps of the cross-piece and the whipper took his position.
+As the first lash fell, a cry burst from the lips of the victim. When
+the whip descended again he was silent. A curious sensation of sickness
+crept over Nathaniel as he saw the red gashes thicken on the white
+flesh. Five times--six times--seven times the whip rose and fell and he
+could see the blood starting. In horror he turned his eyes away. Behind
+him a man grinned at the whiteness of his face and the involuntary
+trembling of his lips. Again and again he heard the lash fall upon the
+naked back. From near him there came the sobbing moan of a woman. A
+subdued movement, a sound as of murmuring wordless voices swept through
+the throng. A steady glitter filled the eyes of the man who had laughed
+at him--and he turned again to the stake. The man's back was dripping
+blood. Great red seams lay upon his shoulders and a single lash had cut
+his bowed neck. Another stroke, more fierce than the others, and
+MacDougall turned away from the figure at the post, breathing hard. The
+guards unfastened the victim's wrist-thongs and the man staggered to his
+feet. As he swayed down through the path that opened for him his crimson
+back shone in the sun.
+
+"Great God!" gasped Nathaniel.
+
+He turned to Obadiah and was startled by the appearance of the old man.
+The councilor's face was ghastly. His mouth twitched and his body
+trembled. Nathaniel took his arm sympathetically.
+
+"Hadn't we better go, Dad?" he whispered.
+
+"No--no--no--not yet, Nat. It's--it's--Neil now and I must see how the
+boy--stands it!"
+
+It was but a short time before the guards returned. This time their
+prisoner walked free and erect. The thongs dangled from his wrists and
+he was a pace ahead of the two men who accompanied him. He was a young
+man. Nathaniel judged his age at twenty-five. He was a striking contrast
+to the man who had suffered first at the post. His face instead of
+betraying the former's pallor was flushed with excitement; his head was
+held high; not a sign of fear or hesitation shone in his eyes. As he
+glanced quickly around the circle of faces the flush grew deeper in his
+cheeks. He nodded and smiled at MacDougall and in that nod and smile
+there was a meaning that sent a shiver to the whip-master's heart. Then
+his eyes fell upon Obadiah and Nathaniel. He saw the councilor's hand
+resting upon the young captain's arm and a flash of understanding passed
+over his face. For an instant the eyes of the two young men met. The man
+at the post took half a step forward. His lips moved as if he was on the
+point of speaking, the defiant smile went out of his face, the flush
+faded in his cheeks. Then he turned quickly and held out his hands to
+the guards.
+
+As the young man kneeled before the post Nathaniel heard a smothered sob
+at his side which he knew came from Obadiah.
+
+"Come, Dad," he said softly. "I can't stand this. Let's get away!"
+
+He shoved the councilor back. The lash whistled through the air behind
+him. As it fell there came a piercing cry. It was a woman's voice, and
+with a snarl like that of a tortured animal the old man struck down
+Nathaniel's arm and clawed his way back to the edge of the line. On the
+opposite side there was a surging in the crowd and as MacDougall raised
+his whip a woman burst through.
+
+"My God!" cried Nathaniel, "it's--"
+
+He left the rest of the words unspoken. His veins leaped with fire. A
+single sweep of his powerful arms and he had forced himself through the
+innermost line of spectators. Within a dozen feet of him stood Strang's
+wife, her beautiful hair disheveled, her face deadly white, her bosom
+heaving as if she had been running. In a moment her eyes had taken in
+the situation--the man at the stake, the upraised lash--and Nathaniel.
+With a sobbing, breathless cry, she flung herself in front of MacDougall
+and threw her arms around the kneeling man, her hair covering him in a
+glistening veil. For an instant her eyes were raised to Nathaniel and he
+saw in them that same agonized appeal that had called to him through the
+king's window. The striking muscles of his arms tightened like steel.
+One of the guards sprang forward and caught the girl roughly by the arm
+and attempted to drag her away. In his excitement he pulled her head
+back and her hair trailed in the dirt. The sight was maddening. From
+Nathaniel's throat there came a fierce cry and in a single leap he had
+cleared the distance to the guard and had driven his fist against the
+officer's head with the sickening force of a sledge-hammer. The man fell
+without a groan. In another flash he had drawn his knife and severed the
+thongs that held the man at the stake. For a moment his face was very
+near the girl's and he saw her lips form the glad cry which he did not
+wait to hear.
+
+He turned like an enraged beast toward the circle of dumfounded
+spectators and launched himself at the second guard. From behind him
+there sounded a shout and he caught the gleam of naked shoulders as the
+man who had been at the stake rushed to his side. Together they tore
+through the narrow rim of the crowd, striking at the faces which
+appeared before them, their terrific blows driving men right and left.
+
+"This way, Neil!" shouted Nathaniel. "This way--to the ship!"
+
+They raced up the slope that led from the town to the forest. Even the
+king's officer, palsied by the suddenness of the attack, had not
+followed. From a screened window in the king's building two men had
+witnessed the exciting scene near the jail. One of these men was Strang.
+The other was Arbor Croche. At another window a few feet away, hidden
+from their eyes by a high desk and masses of papers and books, Winnsome
+Croche was crumpled up on the floor hardly daring to breathe through
+fear of betraying her presence. From these windows they had seen the
+girl run from behind the jail; they had watched her struggle through the
+line of spectators, saw Nathaniel leap forward--saw the quick blow, the
+gleaming knife, and the escape. So suddenly had it all occurred that not
+a sound escaped the two astonished men. But as Nathaniel and Neil burst
+through the crowd and sped toward the forest Strang's great voice
+boomed forth like the rumble of a gun.
+
+"Arbor Croche, overtake those men--and kill them!"
+
+With a wild curse the chief of sheriffs dashed down the stairway and as
+she heard him go the terror of Winnsome's heart seemed to turn her blood
+cold. She knew what that command meant. She knew that her father would
+obey it. As the daughter of the chief of sheriffs more than one burning
+secret was hidden in her breast, more than one of those frightful
+daggers that had pricked at the soul of her mother until they had
+murdered her. And the chief of them all was this: that to Arbor Croche
+the words of Strang were the words of God and that if the prophet said
+kill, he would kill. For a full minute she crouched in her concealment,
+stunned by the horror that had so quickly taken the place of the joy
+with which she had witnessed the escape. She heard Strang leave the
+window, heard his heavy steps in the outer room, heard the door close,
+and knew that he, too, was gone. She sprang to her feet and ran to the
+window at which the two men had stood. The chief of sheriffs was already
+at the jail. The crowd had begun to disperse. Men were swarming like
+ants up the long slope reaching to the forest. Three or four of the
+leaders were running and she knew that they were hot in pursuit of the
+fugitives. Others were following more slowly and among these she saw
+that there were women. As she looked there came a sound from the stair.
+She recognized the step. She recognized the voice that called her name a
+moment later and with a despairing cry she turned with outstretched arms
+to greet the girl for whom Nathaniel had interrupted the king's
+whipping.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+THE MYSTERY
+
+
+Hardly had Nathaniel fought his way through the thin crowd of startled
+spectators about the whipping-post before the enormity of his offense in
+interrupting the king's justice dawned upon him. He was not sorry that
+he had responded to the mute appeal of the girl who had entered so
+strangely into his life. He rejoiced at the spirit that had moved him to
+action, that had fired his blood and put the strength of a giant in his
+arms; and his nerves tingled with an unreasoning joy that he had leaped
+all barriers which in cooler moments would have restrained him, and
+which fixed in his excited brain only the memory of the beautiful face
+that had sought his own in those crucial moments of its suffering. The
+girl had turned to him and to him alone among all those men. He had
+heard her voice, he had felt the soft sweep of her hair as he severed
+the prisoner's thongs, he had caught the flash of her eyes and the
+movement of her lips as he dashed himself into the crowd. And as he sped
+swiftly up the slope he considered himself amply repaid for all that he
+had done. His blood was stirred as if by the fire of sharp wines; he was
+still in a tension of fighting excitement. Yet no sooner had he fought
+himself clear of the mob than his better judgment leaped into the
+ascendency. If danger had been lurking for him before it was doubly
+threatening now and he was sufficiently possessed of the common spirit
+of self-preservation to exult at the speed with which he was enabled to
+leave pursuit behind. A single glance over his shoulder assured him that
+the man whom he had saved from the prophet's wrath was close at his
+heels. His first impulse was to direct his flight toward Obadiah's
+cabin; his second to follow the path that led to his ship. At this hour
+some of his men would surely be awaiting him in a small boat and once
+aboard the _Typhoon_ he could continue his campaign against the Mormon
+king with better chances of success than as a lone fugitive on the
+island. Besides, he knew what Casey would do at sundown.
+
+At the top of the slope he stopped and waited for the other to come up
+to him.
+
+"I've got a ship off there," he called, pointing inland. "Take a short
+cut for the point at the head of the island. There's a boat waiting for
+us!"
+
+Neil came up panting. He was breathing so hard that for a moment he
+found it impossible to speak but in his eyes there was a look that told
+his unbounded gratitude. They were clear, fearless eyes, with the blue
+glint of steel in them and, as he held out his hands to Nathaniel, they
+were luminous with the joy of his deliverance.
+
+"Thank you, Captain Plum!"
+
+He spoke his companion's name with the assurance of one who had known
+it for a long time. "If they loose the dogs there will be no time for
+the ship," he added, with a suggestive hunch of his naked shoulders.
+"Follow me!"
+
+There was no alarm in his voice and Nathaniel caught the flashing gleam
+of white teeth as Neil smiled grimly back at him, running in the lead.
+From the man's eyes the master of the _Typhoon_ had sized up his
+companion as a fighter. The smile--daring, confident, and yet signaling
+their danger--assured him that he was right, and he followed close
+behind without question. A dozen rods up the path Neil turned into a
+dense thicket of briars and underbrush and for ten minutes they plunged
+through the pathless jungle. Now and then Nathaniel saw the three red
+stripes of the whipper's lash upon the bare shoulders of the man ahead
+and to these every step seemed to add new wounds made by the thorns. As
+they came out upon an old roadway the captain stripped off his coat and
+Neil thrust himself into it as they ran.
+
+Even in these first minutes of their flight Nathaniel was thrilled by
+another thought than that of the peril behind them. Whom had he saved?
+Who was this clear-eyed young fellow for whom the girl had so openly
+sacrificed herself at the whipping-post, about whom she had thrown her
+arms and covered with the protection of her glorious hair? With his joy
+at having served her there was mingled a chilling doubt as these
+questions formed themselves in his mind. Obadiah's vague suggestions,
+the scene in the king's room, the night visits of the girl to the
+councilor's cabin--and last of all this incident at the jail flashed
+upon him now with another meaning, with a significance that slowly
+cooled the enthusiasm in his veins. He was sure that he was near the
+solution of the mysterious events in which he had become involved, and
+yet this knowledge brought with it something of apprehension, something
+which made him anticipate and yet dread the moment when the fugitive
+ahead would stop in his flight, and he might ask him those questions
+which would at least relieve him of his burden of doubt. They had
+traveled a mile through forest unbroken by path or road when Neil halted
+on the edge of a little stream that ran into a swamp. Pointing into the
+tangled fen with a confident smile he plunged to his waist in the water
+and waded slowly through the slough into the gloom of the densest alder.
+A few minutes later he turned in to the shore and the soft bog gave
+place to firm ground. Before Nathaniel had cleared the stream he saw his
+companion drop to his knees beside a fallen log and when he came up to
+him he was unwrapping a piece of canvas from about a gun. With a warning
+gesture he rose to his feet and for twenty seconds the men stood and
+listened. No sound came to them but the chirp of a startled squirrel and
+the barking of a dog in the direction of St. James.
+
+"They haven't turned out the dogs yet," said Neil, holding a hand
+against his heaving chest. "If they do they can't reach us through that
+slough." He leaned his rifle against the log and again thrusting an arm
+into the place where it had been concealed drew forth a small box.
+
+"Powder and ball--and grub!" he laughed. "You see I am a sort of
+revolutionist and have my hiding-places. To-morrow--I will be a martyr."
+He spoke as quietly as though his words but carried a careless jest.
+
+"A martyr?" laughed Nathaniel, looking down into the smiling, sweating
+face.
+
+"Yes, to-morrow I shall kill Strang."
+
+There was no excitement in Neil's voice as he stood erect. The smile did
+not leave his lips. But in his eyes there shone that which neither words
+nor smiling lips revealed, a reckless, blazing fury hidden deep in
+them--so deep that Nathaniel stared to assure himself what it was. The
+other saw the doubt in his face.
+
+"To-morrow I shall kill Strang," he repeated. "I shall kill him with
+this gun from under the window of his house through which you saw
+Marion."
+
+"Marion!" exclaimed Nathaniel. "Marion--" He leaned forward eagerly,
+questioning. "Tell me--"
+
+"My sister, Captain Plum!"
+
+It seemed to Nathaniel that every fiber in his body was stretched to the
+breaking point. He reached out, dazed by what he had heard and with both
+hands seized Neil's arm.
+
+"Your sister--who came to you at the whipping-post?"
+
+"That was Marion."
+
+"And--Strang's wife?"
+
+"No!" cried Neil. "No--not his wife!" He drew back from Nathaniel's
+touch as if the question had stabbed him to the heart. The passion that
+had slumbered in his eyes burst into savage flame and his face became
+suddenly terrible to look upon. There was hatred there such as Nathaniel
+had never seen; a ferocious, pitiless hatred that sent a shuddering
+thrill through him as he stood before it. After a moment the clenched
+fist that had risen above Neil's head dropped to his side. Half
+apologetically he held out his hand to his companion.
+
+"Captain Plum, we've got a lot to thank you for, Marion and I," he said,
+a tremble of the passing emotion in his voice. "Obadiah told Marion that
+help might come to us through you and Marion brought the word to me at
+the jail late last night--after she had seen you at the window. The old
+councilor kept his word! You have saved her!"
+
+"Saved her!" gasped Nathaniel. "From what? How?" A hundred questions
+seemed leaping from his heart to his lips.
+
+"From Strang. Good God, don't you understand? I tell you that I am going
+to kill Strang!"
+
+Neil stood as though appalled by his companion's incomprehension. "I am
+going to kill Strang, I tell you!" he cried again, the fire burning
+deeper through the sweat of his cheeks.
+
+Nathaniel's bewilderment still shone in his face.
+
+"She is not Strang's wife," he spoke softly, as if to himself. "And she
+is not--" His face flushed as he nearly spoke the words. "Obadiah lied!"
+He looked squarely into Neil's eyes. "No, I don't understand you. The
+councilor said that she--that Marion was Strang's wife. He told me
+nothing more than that, nothing of her trouble, nothing about you. Until
+this moment I have been completely mystified. Only her eyes led me to
+do--what I did at the jail."
+
+Neil gazed at him in astonishment.
+
+"Obadiah told--you--nothing?" he asked incredulously.
+
+"Not a word about you or Marion except that Marion was the king's
+seventh wife. But he hinted at many things and kept me on the trail,
+always expecting, always watching, and yet every hour was one of
+mystery. I am in the darkest of it at this instant. What does it all
+mean? Why are you going to kill Strang? Why--"
+
+Neil interrupted him with a cry so poignant in its wretchedness that
+the last question died upon his lips.
+
+"I thought that the councilor had told you all," he said. "I thought you
+knew." The disappointment in his voice was almost despair. "Then--it was
+only accidentally--you helped us?"
+
+"Only accidentally that I helped _you_--yes! But Marion--" Nathaniel
+crushed Neil's hand in both his own and his eyes betrayed more than he
+would have said. "I've got an armed ship and a dozen men out there and
+if I can help Marion by blowing up St. James--I'll do it!"
+
+For a time only the tense breathing of the two broke the silence of
+their lips. They looked into each other's face, Nathaniel with all the
+eagerness of the passion with which Marion had stirred his soul, Neil
+half doubting, as if he were trying to find in this man's eyes the
+friendship which he had not questioned a few minutes before.
+
+"Obadiah told you nothing?" he asked again, as if still unbelieving.
+
+"Nothing."
+
+"And you have not seen Marion--to talk with her?"
+
+"No."
+
+Nathaniel had dropped his companion's hand, and now Neil walked to the
+log and sat down with his face turned in the direction from which their
+pursuers must come if they entered the swamp.
+
+Suddenly the memory of Obadiah's note shot into Nathaniel's head, the
+councilor's admonition, his allusion to a visitor. With this memory
+there recurred to him Obadiah's words at the temple, "If you had
+remained at the cabin, Nat, you would have known that I was your friend.
+She would have come to you, but now--it is impossible." For the first
+time the truth began to dawn upon him. He went and sat down beside Neil.
+
+"I am beginning to understand--a little," he said. "Obadiah had planned
+that I should meet Marion, but I was a fool and spoiled his scheme. If I
+had done as he told me I should have seen her this morning."
+
+In a few words he reviewed the events of the preceding evening and of
+that morning--of his coming to the island, his meeting with Obadiah, and
+of the singular way in which he had become interested in Marion. He
+omitted the oaths but told of Winnsome's warning and of his interview
+with the Mormon king. When he spoke of the girl as he had seen her
+through the king's window, and of her appealing face turned to him at
+the jail, his voice trembled with an excitement that deepened the flush
+in Neil's cheeks.
+
+"Captain Plum, I thank God that you like Marion," he said simply. "After
+I kill Strang will you help her?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"You are willing to risk--"
+
+"My life--my men--my ship!"
+
+Nathaniel spoke like one to whom there had been suddenly opened the
+portals to a great joy. He sprang to his feet and stood before Neil, his
+whole being throbbing with the emotions which had been awakened within
+him.
+
+"Good God, why don't you tell me what her peril is?" he cried, no longer
+restraining himself. "Why are you going to kill Strang? Has he--has
+he--" His face flamed with the question which he dared not finish.
+
+"No--not that!" interrupted Neil. "He has never laid a hand on Marion.
+She hates him as she hates the snakes in this swamp. And yet--next
+Sunday she is to become his seventh wife!"
+
+Nathaniel started as if he had been threatened by a blow.
+
+"You mean--he is forcing her into his harem?" he asked.
+
+"No, he can not do that!" exclaimed Neil, the hatred bursting out anew
+in his face. "He can not force her into marrying him, and yet--" He
+flung his arms above his head in sudden passionate despair. "As there
+is a God in Heaven I would give ten years of my life for the secret of
+the prophet's power over Marion!" he groaned. "Three months ago her
+hatred of him was terrible. She loathed the sight of him. I have seen
+her shiver at the sound of his voice. When he asked her to become his
+wife she refused him in words that I had believed no person in the
+kingdom would dared to have used. Then--less than a month ago--the
+change came, and one day she told me that she had made up her mind to
+become Strang's wife. From that day her heart was broken. I was
+dumfounded. I raged and cursed and even threatened. Once I accused her
+of a shameful thing and though I implored her forgiveness a thousand
+times I know that she weeps over my brutal words still. But nothing
+could change her. On my knees I have pleaded with her, and once she
+flung her arms round my shoulders and said, 'Neil, I can not tell you
+why I am marrying Strang. But I must.' I went to Strang and demanded an
+explanation; I told him that my sister hated him, that the sight of his
+face and the sound of his voice filled her with abhorrence, but he only
+laughed at me and asked why I objected to becoming the brother-in-law of
+a prophet. Day by day I have seen Marion's soul dying within her. Some
+terrible secret is gnawing at her heart, robbing her of the very life
+which a few weeks ago made her the most beautiful thing on this island;
+some dreadful influence is shadowing her every step, and as the day
+draws near when she is to join the king's harem I see in her eyes at
+times a look that frightens me. There is only one salvation. To-morrow I
+shall kill Strang!"
+
+"And then?"
+
+Neil shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"I will shoot him through the abdomen so that he will live to tell his
+wives who did the deed. After that I will try to make my escape to the
+mainland."
+
+"And Marion--"
+
+"Will not marry Strang! Isn't that plain?"
+
+"You have guessed nothing--no cause for the prophet's power over your
+sister?" asked Nathaniel.
+
+"Absolutely nothing. And yet that influence is such that at times the
+thought of it freezes the blood in my veins. It is so great that Strang
+did not hesitate to throw me into jail on the pretext that I had
+threatened his life. Marion implored him to spare me the disgrace of a
+public whipping and he replied by reading to her the commandments of the
+kingdom. That was last night--when you saw her through the window.
+Strang is madly infatuated with her beauty and yet he dares to go to any
+length without fear of losing her. She has become his slave. She is as
+completely in his power as though bound in iron chains. And the most
+terrible thing about it all is that she has constantly urged me to leave
+the island--to go, and never return. Great God, what does it all mean? I
+love her more than anything else on earth, we have been inseparable
+since the day she was old enough to toddle alone--and yet she would have
+me leave her! No power on earth can reveal the secret that is torturing
+her. No power can make Strang divulge it."
+
+"And Obadiah Price!" cried Nathaniel, sudden excitement flashing in his
+eyes. "Does he not know?"
+
+"I believe that he does!" replied Neil, pacing back and forth in his
+agitation. "Captain Plum, if there is a man on this island who loves
+Marion with all of a father's devotion it is Obadiah Price, and yet he
+swears that he knows nothing of the terrible influence which has so
+suddenly enslaved her to the prophet! He suggests that it may be
+mesmerism, but I--" He interrupted himself with a harsh, mirthless
+laugh. "Mesmerism be damned! It's not that!"
+
+"Your sister--is--a Mormon," ventured Nathaniel, remembering what the
+prophet had said to him that morning. "Could it be her faith?--a
+message revealed through Strang from--"
+
+Neil stopped him almost fiercely.
+
+"Marion is not a Mormon!" he said. "She hates Mormonism as she hates
+Strang. I have tried to get her to leave the island with me but she
+insists on staying because of the old folk. They are very old, Captain
+Plum, and they believe in the prophet and his Heaven as you and I
+believe in that blue sky up there. The day before I was arrested I
+begged my sister to flee to the mainland with me but she refused with
+the words that she had said to me a hundred times before--'Neil, I must
+marry the prophet!' Don't you see there is nothing to do--but to kill
+Strang?"
+
+Nathaniel thrust his hand into a pocket of the coat he had loaned to
+Neil and drew forth his pipe and tobacco pouch. As he loaded the pipe he
+looked squarely into the other's eyes and smiled.
+
+"Neil," he said softly. "Do you know that you would have made an awful
+fool of yourself if I hadn't hove in sight just when I did?"
+
+He lighted his pipe with exasperating coolness, still smiling over its
+bowl.
+
+"You are not going to kill Strang to-morrow," he added, throwing away
+the match and placing both hands on Neil's shoulders. His eyes were
+laughing with the joy that shone in them. "Neil, I am ashamed of you!
+You have worried a devilish lot over a very simple matter. See here--"
+He blew a cloud of smoke over the other's head. "I've learned to demand
+some sort of pay for my services since I landed on this island. Will you
+promise to be--a sort of brother--to me--if I steal Marion and sail away
+with her to-night?"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+MARION
+
+
+At Nathaniel's astonishing words Neil stood as though struck suddenly
+dumb.
+
+"Don't you see what a very simple case it is?" he continued, enjoying
+the other's surprised silence. "You plan to kill Strang to keep Marion
+from marrying him. Well, I will hunt up Marion, put her in a bag if
+necessary, and carry her to my ship. Isn't that better and safer and
+just as sure as murder?"
+
+The excitement had gone out of Neil's face. The flush slowly faded from
+his cheeks and in his eyes there gleamed something besides the
+malevolence of a few moments before. As Nathaniel stepped back from him
+half laughing and puffing clouds of smoke from his pipe Marion's brother
+thrust his hands into his pockets with an exclamation that forcefully
+expressed his appreciation of Captain Plum's scheme.
+
+"I never thought of that," he added, after a moment. "By Heaven, it will
+be easy--"
+
+"So easy that I tell you again I am ashamed of you for not having
+thought of it!" cried Nathaniel. "The first thing is to get safely
+aboard my ship."
+
+"We can do that within an hour."
+
+"And to-night--where will we find Marion?"
+
+"At home," said Neil. "We live near Obadiah. You must have seen the
+house as you came out into the clearing this morning from the forest."
+
+Nathaniel smiled as he thought of his suspicions of the old councilor.
+
+"It couldn't be better situated for our work," he said. "Does the forest
+run down to the lake on Obadiah's side of the island?"
+
+"Clear to the beach."
+
+Neil's face betrayed a sudden flash of doubt.
+
+"I believe that our place has been watched for some time," he explained.
+"I am sure that it is especially guarded at night and that no person
+leaves or enters it without the knowledge of Strang. I am certain that
+Marion is aware of this surveillance although she professes to be wholly
+ignorant of it. It may cause us trouble."
+
+"Can you reach the house without being observed?"
+
+"After midnight--yes."
+
+"Then there is no cause for alarm," declared Nathaniel. "If necessary I
+can bring ten men into the edge of the woods. Two can approach the house
+as quietly as one and I will go with you. Once there you can tell Marion
+that your life depends on her accompanying you to Obadiah's. I believe
+she will go. If she won't--" He stretched out his arms as if in
+anticipation of the burden they might hold. "If she won't--I'll help you
+carry her!"
+
+"And meanwhile," said Neil, "Arbor Croche's men--"
+
+"Will be as dead as herring floaters if they show up!" he cried, leaping
+two feet off the ground in his enthusiasm. "I've got twelve of the
+damnedest fighters aboard my ship that ever lived and ten of them will
+be in the edge of the woods!"
+
+Neil's eyes were shining with something that made Nathaniel turn his own
+to the loading of his pipe.
+
+"Captain Plum, I hope I will be able to repay you for this," he said.
+There was a trembling break in his voice and for a moment Nathaniel did
+not look up. His own heart was near bursting with the new life that
+throbbed within it. When he raised his eyes to his companion's face
+again there was a light in them that spoke almost as plainly as words.
+
+"You haven't accepted my price, yet, Neil," he replied quietly. "I asked
+you if you'd--be--a sort of brother--"
+
+Neil sprang to his side with a fervor that knocked the pipe out of his
+hand.
+
+"I swear that! And if Marion doesn't--"
+
+Suddenly he jerked himself into a listening attitude.
+
+"Hark!"
+
+For a moment the two ceased to breathe. The sound had come to them both,
+low, distant. After it there fell a brief hush. Then again, as they
+stared questioningly into each other's eyes, it rolled faintly into the
+swamp--the deep, far baying of a hound.
+
+"Ah!" exclaimed Neil, drawing back with a deep breath. "I thought they
+would do it!"
+
+"The bloodhounds!"
+
+Horror, not fear, sent an involuntary shiver through Nathaniel.
+
+"They can't reach us!" assured Neil. There was the glitter of triumph in
+his eyes. "This was to have been my way of escape after I killed Strang.
+A quarter of a mile deeper in the swamp I have a canoe." He picked up
+the gun and box and began forcing his way through the dense alder along
+the edge of the stream. "I'd like to stay and murder those dogs," he
+called back, "but it wouldn't be policy."
+
+For a time the crashing of their bodies through the dense growth of the
+swamp drowned all other sound. Five minutes later Neil stopped on the
+edge of a wide bog. The hounds were giving fierce tongue in the forest
+on their left and their nearness sent Nathaniel's hand to his pistol.
+Neil saw the movement and laughed.
+
+"Don't like the sound, eh?" he said. "We get used to it on Beaver
+Island. They're just about at the place where they tore little Jim
+Schredder to pieces a few weeks back. Schredder tried to kill one of the
+elders for stealing his wife while he was away on a night's fishing
+trip."
+
+He plunged to his knees in the bog.
+
+"They caught him just before he reached the swamp," he flung back over
+his shoulder. "Two minutes more and he would have been safe."
+
+Nathaniel, sinking to his knees in the mire, forged up beside him.
+
+"Lord!" he exclaimed, as a breath of air brought a sudden burst of
+blood-curdling cries to them. "If they'd loosed them on us sooner--"
+
+He shivered at the terrible grimace Neil turned on him.
+
+"Had they slipped the leashes when we escaped, we would have been with
+poor Schredder now, Captain Plum. By the way--" he stopped a moment to
+wipe the water and mud from his face, "--three days after they covered
+Schredder's bones with muck out there, the elder took Schredder's wife!
+She was too pretty for a fisherman." He started on, but halted suddenly
+with uplifted hand. No longer could they hear the baying of the dogs.
+"They've struck the creek!" said Neil. "Listen!"
+
+After an interval of silence there came a long mournful howl.
+
+"Treed--treed or in the water, that's what the howling means. How
+Croche and his devils are hustling now!"
+
+A curse was mingled with Neil's breath as he forced his way through the
+bog. Twenty rods farther on they came to a slime covered bit of water on
+which was floating a dugout canoe. Immense relief replaced the anxiety
+in Nathaniel's face as he climbed into it. At that moment he was willing
+to fight a hundred men for Marion's sake, but snakes and bogs and
+bloodhounds were entirely outside his pale of argument and he exhibited
+no hesitation in betraying this fact to his companion. For a quarter of
+a mile Neil forced the dugout through water viscid with slime and rotted
+substance before the clearer channel of the creek was reached. As they
+progressed the stream constantly became deeper and more navigable until
+it finally began to show signs of a current and a little later, under
+the powerful impetus of Neil's paddle, the canoe shot from between the
+dense shores into the open lake. A mile away Nathaniel discerned the
+point of forest beyond which the _Typhoon_ was hidden. He pointed out
+the location of the ship to his companion.
+
+"You are sure there is a small boat waiting for you on the point?" asked
+Neil.
+
+"Yes, since early morning."
+
+Neil was absorbed in thought for some time as he drove the canoe through
+the tall rice grass that grew thick along the edge of the shore.
+
+"How would it be if I landed you on the point and met you to-night at
+Obadiah's?" he asked suddenly. "It is probable that after we get Marion
+aboard your ship I will not return to the island again, and it is quite
+necessary that I run down the coast for a couple of miles--for--" He did
+not finish his reason, but added: "I can make the whole distance in this
+rice so there is no danger of being seen. Or you might lie off the point
+yonder and I would join you early this evening."
+
+"That would be a better plan if we must separate," said Nathaniel, whose
+voice betrayed the reluctance with which he assented to the project. He
+had guessed shrewdly at Neil's motive. "Is it possible that we may have
+another young lady passenger?" he asked banteringly.
+
+There was no answering humor to this in Neil's eyes.
+
+"I wish we might!" he said quietly.
+
+"We can!" exclaimed Nathaniel. "My ship--"
+
+"It is impossible. I am speaking of Winnsome. Arbor Croche's house is in
+the heart of the town and guarded by dogs. I doubt if she would go,
+anyway. She has always been like a little sister to Marion and me and
+she has come to believe--something--as we do. I hate to leave her."
+
+"Obadiah told me about her mother," ventured Nathaniel. "He said that
+some day Winnsome will be a queen."
+
+"I knew her mother," replied Neil, as though he had not heard
+Nathaniel's last words. He looked frankly into the other's face. "I
+worshipped her!"
+
+"Oh-h-h!"
+
+"From a distance," he hastened. "She was as pure as Winnsome is now.
+Little Winn looks like her. Some day she will be as beautiful."
+
+"She is beautiful now."
+
+"But she is a mere child. Why, it seems only a year ago that I was
+toting her about on my shoulders! And--by George, that was a year before
+her mother died! She is sixteen now."
+
+Nathaniel laughed softly.
+
+"To-morrow she will be making love, Neil, and before you know it she
+will be married and have a family of her own. I tell you she is a
+woman--and if you are not a fool you will take her away with Marion."
+
+With a powerful stroke of his paddle Neil brought the canoe in to the
+shore.
+
+"There!" he whispered. "You have only to cross this point to reach your
+boat." He stretched out his long arm and in the silence the two shook
+hands. "If you should happen to think of a way--that we might get
+Winnsome--" he added, coloring.
+
+The sudden grip of his companion's fingers made him flinch.
+
+"We must!" said Nathaniel.
+
+He climbed ashore and watched Neil until he had disappeared in the wild
+rice. Then he turned into the woods. He looked at his watch and saw that
+it was only two o'clock. He was conscious of no fatigue; he was not
+conscious of hunger. To him the whole world had suddenly opened with
+glorious promise and in the still depths of the forest he felt like
+singing out his rejoicing. He had never stopped to ask himself what
+might be the end of this passion that had overwhelmed him; he lived only
+in the present, in the knowledge that Marion was not a wife, and that it
+was he whom fate had chosen for her deliverance. He reasoned nothing
+beyond the sweet eyes that had called upon him, that had burned their
+gratitude, their hope and their despair upon his soul; nothing beyond
+the thought that she would soon be free from the mysterious influence of
+the Mormon king and that for days and nights after that she would be on
+the same ship with him. He had emptied the pockets of the coat he had
+given Neil and now he brought forth the old letter which Obadiah had
+rescued from the sands. He read it over again as he sat for a few
+moments in the cool of the forest and there was no trouble in his face
+now. It was from a girl. He had known that girl, years ago, as Neil knew
+Winnsome; in years of wandering he had almost forgotten her--until this
+letter came. It had brought many memories back to him with shocking
+clearness. The old folk were still in the little home under the hill;
+they received his letters; they received the money he sent them each
+month--but they wanted _him_. The girl wrote with merciless candor. He
+had been away four years and it was time for him to return. She told
+him why. She wrote what they, in their loving fear of inflicting pain,
+would never have dared to say. At the end, in a postscript, she had
+asked for his congratulations on her approaching marriage.
+
+To Nathaniel this letter had been a torment. He saw the truth as he had
+never seen it before--that his place was back there in Vermont, with his
+father and mother; and that there was something unpleasant in thinking
+of the girl as belonging to another. But now matters had changed. The
+letter was a hope and inspiration to him and he smoothed it out with
+tender care. What a refuge that little home among the Vermont hills
+would make for Marion! He trembled at the thought and his heart sang
+with the promise of it as he went his way again through the thick growth
+of the woods.
+
+It was half an hour before he came out upon the beach. Eagerly he
+scanned the sea. The _Typhoon_ was nowhere in sight and for an instant
+the gladness that had been in his heart gave place to a chilling fear.
+But the direction of the wind reassured him. Casey had probably moved
+beyond the jutting promontory, that swung in the form of a cart wheel
+from the base of the point, that he might have sea room in case of
+something worse than a stiff breeze. But where was the small boat? With
+every step adding to his anxiety Nathaniel hurried along the narrow rim
+of beach. He went to the very tip of the point which reached out like
+the white forefinger of, a lady's hand into the sea; he passed the spot
+where he had lain concealed the preceding day; his breath came faster
+and faster; he ran, and called softly, and at last halted in the arch of
+the cart wheel with the fear full-flaming in his breast. Over all those
+miles of sea there was no sign of the sloop. From end to end of the
+point there was no boat. What did it mean? Breathlessly he tore his way
+through the strip of forest on the promontory until all Lake Michigan
+to the south lay before his eyes. The _Typhoon_ was gone! Was it
+possible that Casey had abandoned hope of Nathaniel's return and was
+already lying off St. James with shotted gun? The thought sent a shiver
+of despair through him. He passed to the opposite side of the point and
+followed it foot by foot, but there was no sign of life, no distant
+flash of white that might have been the canvas of the sloop _Typhoon_.
+
+There was only one thing for him to do--wait. So he went to his
+hiding-place of the day before and watched the sea with staring eyes. An
+hour passed and his still aching vision saw no sign of sail; two
+hours--and the sun was falling in a blinding glare over the Wisconsin
+wilderness. At last he sprang to his feet with a hopeless cry and stood
+for a few moments undecided. Should he wait until night with the hope of
+attracting the attention of Neil and joining him in his canoe or should
+he hasten in the direction of St. James? In the darkness he might miss
+Neil, unless he kept up a constant shouting, which would probably bring
+the Mormons down upon him; if he went to St. James there was a
+possibility of reaching Casey. He still had faith in Obadiah and he was
+sure that the old man would help him to reach his ship; he might even
+assist him in his scheme of getting Marion from the island.
+
+He would go to the councilor's. Having once decided, Nathaniel turned in
+the direction of the town, avoiding the use of the path which he and
+Obadiah had taken, but following in the forest near enough to use it as
+a guide. He was confident that Arbor Croche and his sheriffs were
+confining their man-hunt to the swamp, but in spite of this belief he
+exercised extreme caution, stopping to listen now and then, with one
+hand always near his pistol. A quiet gloom filled the forest and by the
+tree-tops he marked the going down of the sun. Nathaniel's ears ached
+with their strain of listening for the rumbling roar that would tell of
+Casey's attack on St. James.
+
+Suddenly he heard a crackling in the underbrush ahead of him, a sound
+that came not from the strain of listening for the rumbling roar and in
+a moment he had dodged into the concealment of the huge roots of an
+overturned tree, drawn pistol in hand. Whatever object was approaching
+came slowly, as if hesitating at each step--a cautious, stealthy
+advance, it struck Nathaniel, and he cocked his weapon. Directly in
+front of him, half a stone's throw away, was a dense growth of hazel and
+he could see the tops of the slender bushes swaying. Twice this movement
+ceased and the second time there came a crashing of brush and a faint
+cry. For many minutes after that there was absolute silence. Was it the
+cry of an animal that he had heard--or of a man? In either case the
+creature who made it had fallen in the thicket and was lying there as
+still as if dead. For a quarter of an hour Nathaniel waited and
+listened. He could no longer have seen the movement of bushes in the
+gathering night-gloom of the forest but his ears were strained to catch
+the slightest sound from the direction of the mysterious thing that lay
+within less than a dozen rods of him. Slowly he drew himself out from
+the shelter of the roots and advanced step by step. Half way to the
+thicket a stick cracked loudly under his foot and as the sound startled
+the dead quiet of the forest with pistol-shot clearness there came
+another cry from the dense hazel, a cry which was neither that of man
+nor animal but of a woman; and with an answering shout Nathaniel sprang
+forward to meet there in the edge of the thicket the white face and
+outstretched arms of Marion. The girl was swaying on her feet. In her
+face there was a pallor that even in his instant's glance sent a chill
+of horror through the man and as she staggered toward him, half falling,
+her lips weakly forming his name Nathaniel leaped to her and caught her
+close in his arms. In that moment something seemed to burst within him
+and flood his veins with fire. Closer he held the girl, and heavier he
+knew that she was becoming in his arms. Her head was upon his breast,
+his face was crushed in her hair, he felt her throbbing and breathing
+against him and his lips quivered with the words that were bursting for
+freedom in his soul. But first there came the girl's own whispered
+breath--"Neil--where is Neil?"
+
+"He is gone--gone from the island!"
+
+She had become a dead weight now and so he knelt on the ground with her,
+her head still upon his breast, her eyes closed, her arms fallen to her
+side. And as Nathaniel looked into the face from which all life seemed
+to have fled he forgot everything but the joy of this moment--forgot all
+in life but this woman against his breast. He kissed her soft mouth and
+the closed eyes until the eyes themselves opened again and gazed at him
+in a startled, half understanding way, until he drew his head far back
+with the shame of what he had dared to do flaming in his face.
+
+And as for another moment he held her thus, feeling the quivering life
+returning in her, there came to him through that vast forest stillness
+the distant deep-toned thunder of a great gun.
+
+"That's Casey!" he whispered close down to the girl's face. His voice
+was almost sobbing in its happiness. "That's Casey--firing on St.
+James!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+THE HOUR OF VENGEANCE
+
+
+For perhaps twenty seconds after the last echoes of the gun had rolled
+through the forest the girl lay passive in Nathaniel's arms, so close
+that he could feel her heart beating against his own and her breath
+sweeping his face. Then there came a pressure against his breast, a
+gentle resistance of Marion's half conscious form, and when she had
+awakened from her partial swoon he was holding her in the crook of his
+arm. It had all passed quickly, the girl had rested against him only so
+long as he might have held half a dozen breaths and yet there had been
+all of a lifetime in it for Nathaniel Plum, a cycle of joy that he knew
+would remain with him for ever. But there was something bitter-sweet in
+the thought that she was conscious of what he had done, something of
+humiliation as well as gladness, and still not enough of the first to
+make him regret that he had kissed her, that he had kissed her mouth and
+her eyes. He loved her, and he was glad that in those passing moments he
+had betrayed himself. For the first time he noticed that her face was
+scratched and that the sleeves of her thin waist were torn to shreds;
+and as she drew away from him, steadying herself with a hand on his arm,
+his lips were parched of words, and yet he leaned to her eagerly,
+everything that he would have said burning in the love of his eyes.
+Still irresolute in her faintness the girl smiled at him, and in that
+smile there was gentle accusation, the sweetness of forgiveness, and
+measureless gratitude, and it was yet light enough for him to see that
+with these there had come also a flush into her cheeks and a dazzling
+glow into her eyes.
+
+"Neil has escaped!" she breathed. "And you--"
+
+"I was going back to you, Marion!" He spoke the words hardly above a
+whisper. The beautiful eyes so close to him drew his secret from him
+before he had thought. "I am going to take you from the island!"
+
+With his words there came again that sound of a great gun rolling from
+the direction of St. James. With a frightened cry the girl staggered to
+her feet, and as she stood swaying unsteadily, her arms half reached to
+him, Nathaniel saw only mortal dread in the whiteness of her face.
+
+"Why didn't you go? Why didn't you go with Neil?" she moaned. Her breath
+was coming in sobbing excitement. "Your ship is--at--St. James!"
+
+"Yes, my ship is at St. James, Marion!" His voice was tremulous with
+triumph, with gladness, with a tenderness which he could not control. He
+put an arm half round her waist to support her trembling form and to his
+joy she did not move away from him. His hand was buried in the richness
+of her loose hair. He bent until his lips touched her silken tresses.
+"Neil has told me everything--about you," he added softly. "My ship is
+bombarding St. James, and I am going to take you from the island!"
+
+Not until then did Marion free herself from his arm and then so gently
+that when she stood facing him he felt no reproof. No longer did shame
+send a flush into his face. He had spoken his love, though not in words,
+and he knew that the girl understood him. It did not occur to him in
+these moments that he had known this girl for only a few hours, that
+until now a word had never passed between them. He was conscious only
+that he had loved her from the time he saw her through the king's
+window, that he had risked his life for her, and that she knew why he
+had leaped into the arena at the whipping-post.
+
+The words she spoke now came like a dash of cold water in his face.
+
+"Your ship is not bombarding St. James, Captain Plum!" she exclaimed.
+Darkness hid the terror in her face but he could hear the tremble of it
+in her voice. "The _Typhoon_ has been captured by the Mormons and those
+guns are--guns of triumph--and not--" She caught her breath in a
+convulsive sob. "I want you to go--I want you to go--with Neil!" she
+pleaded.
+
+"So Casey is taken!"
+
+He spoke slowly, as if he had not heard her last words. For a moment he
+stood silent, and as silently the girl stood and watched him. She
+guessed the despair that was raging in his heart but when he spoke to
+her she could detect none of it in his voice.
+
+"Casey is a fool," he said, unconsciously repeating Obadiah's words.
+"Marion, will you come with me? Will you leave the island--and join your
+brother?"
+
+The hope that had risen in his heart was crushed as Marion drew farther
+away from him.
+
+"You must go alone," she replied. With a powerful effort she steadied
+her voice. "Tell Neil that he has been condemned to death. Tell him
+that--if he loves me--he will not return to the island."
+
+"And I?"
+
+From her distance she saw his arms stretched like shadows toward her.
+
+"And you--"
+
+Her voice was low, so low that he could hardly hear the words she spoke,
+but its sweetness thrilled him.
+
+"And you--if you love me--will do this thing for me. Go to Neil. Save
+his life for me!"
+
+She had come to him through the gloom, and in the luster of the eyes
+that were turned up to him Nathaniel saw again the power that swayed his
+soul.
+
+"You will go?"
+
+"I will save your brother--if I can!"
+
+"You can--you can--" she breathed. In an ecstasy of gratitude she seized
+one of his hands in both her own. "You can save him!"
+
+"For you--I will try."
+
+"For me--"
+
+She was so close that he could feel the throbbing of her bosom. Suddenly
+he lifted his free hand and brushed back the thick hair from her brow
+and turned her face until what dim light there still remained of the day
+glowed in the beauty of her eyes. "I will keep him from the island if I
+can," he said, looking deep into them, "and as there is a God in Heaven
+I swear that you--"
+
+"What?" she urged, as he hesitated.
+
+"That you shall not marry Strang!" he finished.
+
+A cry welled up in the girl's throat. Was it of gladness? Was it of
+hope? She sprang back a pace from Nathaniel and with clenched hands
+waited breathlessly, as if she expected him to say more.
+
+"No--no--you can not save me from Strang! Now--you must go!"
+
+She retreated slowly in the direction of the path. In an instant
+Nathaniel was at her side.
+
+"I am going to see you safely back in St. James," he declared. "Then I
+will go to your brother."
+
+She barred his way defiantly.
+
+"You can not go!"
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Because--" He caught the frightened flutter of her voice again.
+"Because--they will kill you!"
+
+The low laugh that he breathed in her hair was more of joy than fear.
+
+"I am glad you care--Marion." He spoke her name with faltering
+tenderness, and led her out into the path.
+
+"You must go," she still persisted.
+
+"With you--yes," he answered.
+
+She surrendered to the determination in his voice and they moved slowly
+along the path, listening for any sound that might come from ahead of
+them. Nathaniel had already formed his plan of action. From Marion's
+words and the voice in which she had uttered them he knew that it would
+be useless for him as it had been for Neil to urge her to flee from the
+island. There remained but one thing for him to do, so he fell back upon
+the scheme which he had proposed to Marion's brother. He realized now
+that he might be compelled to play the game single-handed unless he
+could secure assistance from Obadiah. His ship and men were in the hands
+of the Mormons; Neil, in his search for the captured vessel, stood a
+large chance, of missing him that night, and in that event Marion's fate
+would depend on him alone. If he could locate a small boat on the beach
+back of Obadiah's; if he could in some way lure Marion to it--He gave an
+involuntary shudder at the thought of using force upon the girl at his
+side, at the thought of her terror of those first few moments, her
+struggles, her broken confidence. She believed in him now. She believed
+that he loved her. She trusted him. The warm soft pressure of her hand
+as it clung to his arm in the blackening gloom of the forest was
+evidence of that trust. She looked into his face anxiously, inquiringly
+when they stopped to listen, like a child who was sure of a stronger
+spirit at her side. She held her breath when he held his, she listened
+when he listened, her feet fell with velvet stillness when he stepped
+with caution. Her confidence in him was like a beautiful dream to
+Nathaniel and he trembled when he pictured the destruction of it. After
+a little he reached over and as if by accident touched the hand that was
+lying on his arm; he dared more after a moment, and drew the warm little
+fingers into his great strong palm and held them there, his soul
+thrilled by their gentle submissiveness. And then in another breath
+there came to still his joy a thought of the terrible power that chained
+this girl to the Mormon king. He longed to speak words of encouragement
+to her, to instil hope in her bosom, to ask her to confide in him the
+secret of the shadow which hung over her, but the memory of what Neil
+had said to him held his lips closed.
+
+They had walked in silence for many minutes when the girl stopped.
+
+"It is not very far now," she whispered. "You must go!"
+
+"Only a little farther," he begged.
+
+She surrendered again, hesitatingly, and they went on, more slowly than
+before, until they came to where the path met the footway that led to
+Obadiah's.
+
+"Now--now you _must_ go," whispered Marion again.
+
+In this last moment Nathaniel crushed her hand against his breast, his
+body throbbing with a wild tumult, and a half of what he had meant not
+to say fell passionately from his lips.
+
+"Forgive me for--that--back there--Marion," he whispered. "It was
+because I love you--love you--" He freed her hand and stood back,
+choking the words that would have revealed his secret. He lied now for
+the love of this girl. "Neil is out there waiting for me in a small
+boat," he continued, pointing beyond Obadiah's to the lake. "I will see
+him soon, and then I will return to Obadiah's to tell you if he has left
+for the mainland. Will you promise to meet me there--to-night?"
+
+"I will promise."
+
+"At midnight--"
+
+"Yes, at twelve o'clock."
+
+This time it was Marion who came to him. Her eyes shone like stars.
+
+"And if you make Neil go to the mainland," she said softly, "when I meet
+you I will--will tell you--something."
+
+The last word came in a breathless sob. As she slipped into the path
+that led to St. James she paused for a moment and called back, in a low
+voice, "Tell Neil that he must go for Winnsome's sake. Tell him that her
+fate is shortly to be as cruel as mine--tell him that Winnsome loves
+him, and that she will escape and come to him on the mainland. Tell him
+to go--go!"
+
+She turned again, and Nathaniel stood like a statue, hardly breathing,
+until the sound of her feet had died away. Then he walked swiftly up
+the foot-path that led to Obadiah's. He forgot his own danger in the
+excitement that pulsated with every fiber of his being, forgot his old
+caution and the fears that gave birth to it--forgot everything in those
+moments but Marion and his own great happiness. Neil's absence meant
+nothing to him now. He had held Marion in his arms, he had told her of
+his love, and though she had accepted it with gentle unresponsiveness he
+was thrilled by the memory of that last look in her eyes, which had
+spoken faith, confidence, and perhaps even more. What was that
+_something_ she would tell him if he got Neil safely away? It was to be
+a reward for his own loyalty--he knew that, by the half fearing tremble
+of her voice, the sobbing catch of her breath, the strange glow in her
+eyes. With her brother away would she confide in him? Would she tell him
+the secret of her slavedom to Strang? Nathaniel was conscious of no
+madness in the wild hope that filled him; nothing seemed impossible to
+him now. Marion would meet him at midnight. She would go with him to the
+boat, and then--ah, he had solved the problem! He would use no force. He
+would tell her that Neil was in his canoe half a mile out from the shore
+and that he had promised to leave the island for good if she would go
+out to bid him good-by. And once there, a half a mile or a mile away, he
+would tell her that he had lied to her; and he would give her his heart
+to trample upon to prove the love that had made him do this thing, and
+then he would row her to the mainland.
+
+It was the sight of Obadiah's cabin that brought his caution back. He
+came upon it so suddenly that an exclamation of surprise fell unguarded
+from his lips. There was no light to betray life within. He tried the
+door and found it locked. He peered in at the windows, listened, and
+knocked, and at last concealed himself near the path, confident that the
+little old councilor was still at St. James. For an hour he waited. From
+the rear of Obadiah's home a narrow footway led toward the lake and
+Nathaniel followed it, now as warily as an animal in search of prey. For
+half a mile it took him through the forest and ended at the white sands
+of the beach. In neither direction could Nathaniel see a light, and
+keeping close in the shadows of the trees he made his way slowly toward
+St. James. He had gone but a short distance when he saw a house directly
+ahead of him, a single gleam of light from a small window telling him
+that it was inhabited and that its tenants were at home. He circled down
+close to the water looking for a boat. His heart leaped with sudden
+exultation when he saw a small skiff drawn upon the beach and his joy
+was doubled at finding the oars still in the locks. It took him but a
+moment to shove the light craft into the sea and a minute later he was
+rowing swiftly away from the land.
+
+Nathaniel was certain that by this time Neil had abandoned his search
+for the captured _Typhoon_ and was probably paddling in the direction
+of St. James. With the hope of intercepting him he pulled an eighth of a
+mile from the shore and rowed slowly toward the head of the island.
+There was no moon, but countless stars glowed in a clear sky and upon
+the open lake Nathaniel could see for a considerable distance about him.
+For another hour he rowed back and forth and then beached his boat
+within a dozen rods of the path that came down from Obadiah's.
+
+It was ten o'clock. Two more hours! He had tried to suppress his
+excitement, his apprehensions, his eagerness, but now as he went back
+into the darkness of the forest they burst out anew. What if Marion
+should not keep the tryst? He thought of the spies whom Neil had said
+guarded the girl's home--and of Obadiah. Could he trust the old
+councilor? Should he confide his plot to him and ask his assistance? As
+the minutes passed and these thoughts recurred again and again in his
+brain he could not keep the nervousness from growing within him. He was
+sure now that he would have to fight his battle without Neil. He saw
+the necessity of coolness, of judgment, and he began to demand these
+things of himself, struggling sternly against those symptoms of weakness
+which had replaced his confidence of a short time before. Gradually he
+fought himself back into his old faith. He would save Marion--without
+Neil, without Obadiah. If Marion did not come to him by midnight it
+would be because of the guards against whom Neil had warned him, and he
+would go to her. In some way he would get her to the boat, even if he
+had to fight his way through Arbor Croche's men.
+
+With this return of confidence Nathaniel's thoughts reverted to his
+present greatest need, which was food. Since early morning he had eaten
+nothing and he began to feel the physical want in a craving that was
+becoming acutely uncomfortable. If Obadiah had not returned to his home
+he made up his mind that he would find entrance to the cabin and help
+himself. A sudden turn in the path which he was following, however,
+revealed one of the councilor's windows aglow with light, and as he
+pressed quietly around the end of the building the sound of a low voice
+came to him through the open door. Cautiously he approached and peered
+in. A large oil lamp, the light of which he had seen in the window, was
+burning on a table in the big room but the voice came from the little
+closet into which Obadiah had taken him the preceding night. For several
+minutes he crouched and listened. He heard the chuckling laugh of the
+old councilor--and then an incoherent raving that set his blood
+tingling. There is a horror in the sound of madness, a horror that
+creeps to the very pit of one's soul, that sends shivering dread from
+every nerve center, that causes one who is alone with it to sweat with a
+nameless fear. It was the voice of madness that came from that little
+room. Before it Nathaniel quailed as if a clammy hand had reached out
+from the darkness and gripped him by the throat. He drew back shivering
+in every limb, and the voice followed him, shrieking now in a sudden
+burst of insane mirth and dying away a moment later in a hollow cackling
+laugh that seemed to curdle the blood in his veins. Mad! Obadiah Price
+was mad! Step by step Nathaniel fell back from the door. He felt himself
+trembling from head to foot. His heart thumped within his breast like
+the beating of a hammer. For an instant there was silence--a silence in
+which strange dread held him breathless while he watched the glow in the
+door and listened. And after that quiet there came suddenly a cry that
+ended in the exultant chattering of a name.
+
+At the sound of that name Nathaniel sprang forward again. It was
+Marion's name and he strained his ears to catch the words that might
+follow it. As he listened, his head thrust half in at the door,
+Obadiah's voice became lower and lower, until at last it ceased
+entirely. Not a step, not a deep breath, not the movement of a hand
+disturbed the stillness of the little room. By inches Nathaniel drew
+himself inside the door. His heavy boot caught in a sliver on the step
+but the rending of wood brought no response. It was the quiet of death
+that pervaded the cabin, it was a strange, growing fear of death that
+entered Nathaniel as he now hurried across the room and peered through
+the narrow aperture. The old councilor was half stretched upon the
+table, his arms reaching out, his long, thin fingers gripping its edges,
+his face buried under his shoulders. It looked as if death had come
+suddenly to him during some terrible convulsion, but after a moment
+Nathaniel saw that he was breathing. He went over and placed a hand on
+the old man's twisted back.
+
+"Hello, Obadiah! Hello--hello!" he called cheerfully.
+
+A shudder ran through the councilor's frame, as if the voice had
+startled him, his arms and body stiffened and slowly he lifted his head.
+Nathaniel tried to stifle the cry on his lips, tried to smile--to
+speak, but the terrible face that stared up into his own held him
+silent, motionless. He had heard the voice of madness, now he looked
+upon madness in the eyes that glared at him. In them was no sign of
+recognition, no passing flash of sanity. The white face was lined with
+purplish veins, the mouth was distorted and the lips bleeding.
+Involuntarily he stepped back to the end of the table.
+
+At his movement the councilor stretched out his arms with a sobbing
+moan.
+
+"Nat--Nat--don't--go--"
+
+He fell again upon his face, clutching the table in a sudden convulsion.
+In the next room Nathaniel had noticed a pail of water and he brought
+this and wet the old man's head. For a long time Obadiah did not move,
+and when he did it was to reach out with a groping hand to find
+Nathaniel. A change had come into his face when he lifted it again, the
+mad fire had partly burned itself out of his eyes, the old chuckling
+laugh came from between his lips.
+
+"A little weakness, Nat--a little weakness," he gasped faintly. "I have
+it now and then. Excitement--great excitement--" He straightened himself
+for a moment and stood, swaying free from the table, then collapsed into
+a chair his head dropping upon his breast.
+
+Without arousing him from the stupor into which he had fallen, Nathaniel
+again concealed himself in the shadows outside the cabin where he could
+better guard himself against the possible approach of Mormon visitors.
+But he did not remain long. He struck a match and saw that it was nearly
+eleven and a sudden resolution turned him back to the cabin door. He
+believed that Obadiah would not easily arouse himself from the strange
+stupor into which he had fallen. Meanwhile he would find food and then
+conceal himself near the path to intercept Marion.
+
+As he mounted the step he heard for the second time since landing upon
+the island the solemn tolling of the great bell at St. James, and as he
+paused for an instant to listen, peal upon peal followed the first until
+its brazen thunder rolled in one long booming echo through the forests
+of the Mormon kingdom. There came a shrill cry at his back and he
+whirled about to see the councilor standing in the center of the big
+room, his arms outstretched, his face lifted as it had been raised in
+prayer at the tolling of that same bell the night before--but this time
+it was not prayer that fell from his lips.
+
+"Nat, ye have returned in the hour of vengeance! The hand of God is
+descending upon the Mormon kingdom!"
+
+His words came in a gasping, but triumphant cry.
+
+"And to-morrow--to-morrow--" He stepped forward, his voice crooning a
+wild joy, "To-morrow--I--shall--be--king!"
+
+As he spoke the cabin trembled, a tremor passed under them, and the
+tolling of the bell was lost in a sudden tumult that came like the
+bursting crash of low thunder.
+
+"What is it?" cried Nathaniel. He leaped into the room and caught
+Obadiah by the arm. "What is it?"
+
+"The hand of God!" whispered the old man again. "Nat--Nat--" It was his
+old self that stood grimacing and twisting his hands before Nathaniel
+now. "Nat--a thousand armed men are off the coast! The Lamanites of the
+mainland are descending upon the Mormon kingdom as the hosts of Israel
+upon Canaan! Strang is doomed--doomed--doomed--and to-morrow I shall be
+king!" His voice rose in a wailing shriek. He darted to the door and his
+cackling laugh rang with the old madness as he pointed into the north
+where a lurid glow had mounted high into the sky.
+
+"The signal fire--the bell!" he gurgled chokingly. "They are calling the
+Mormons to arms--but it is too late--too late! Ho, ho, it is too late,
+Nat--too late!" He staggered back, gripping his throat, and fell upon
+the floor. "Too late--too late," he moaned, groveling weakly, as if
+struggling for breath. "Too late--Nat--Marion--"
+
+A shiver passed through his body and he lay quite still.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+THE SIX CASTLE CHAMBERS
+
+
+In an instant Nathaniel was upon his knees beside the prostrate form of
+the old councilor.
+
+Obadiah's eyes were open, but unseeing; his face was blanched to the
+whiteness of paper; an almost imperceptible movement of his chest showed
+that he still breathed. Nathaniel lifted one of the limp hands and its
+clammy chill struck horror to his heart. Tenderly he lifted the old man
+and carried him to the cot at the end of the room. He loosened his
+clothes, tore off the low collar about his throat, and felt with his
+hand to measure the faint beating of life in the councilor's breast. For
+a few moments it seemed to grow fainter and fainter, and a choking lump
+rose in his throat as he watched the pallor of death fixing itself on
+the councilor's shriveled face. What strange chord of sympathy was it
+that bound him to this old man? Was it the same mysterious influence
+that had attracted Marion to him? He dropped upon his knees and called
+the girl's name softly but it awakened no response in the sightless
+eyes, no tremor in the parted, unquivering lips. Very slowly as the
+minutes passed there came a reaction. The pulsations of the weakened
+heart became a little stronger, he could catch faintly the sound of
+breath coming from between the old man's lips.
+
+With a gasp of relief Nathaniel rose to his feet. Through the door he
+saw the red glare growing in the northern sky and heard the great bell
+at St. James ring a wilder and more excited alarm. For a few moments he
+stood in silent, listening inaction, his nerves tingling with a strange
+sensation of impending peril. Obadiah's madness, the mysterious
+trembling of the earth beneath his feet, the volcano of fire, the
+clanging of the bell and the councilor's insane rejoicing had all come
+so suddenly that he was dazed. What great calamity, what fearful
+vengeance, was about to come upon the Mormon kingdom? Was it possible
+that the fishermen and settlers of the mainland had risen, as Obadiah
+had said, and were already at hand to destroy Strang and his people? The
+thought spurred him to the door. The blood rushed like fire through his
+veins. What would it mean to Marion--to Neil?
+
+In his excitement he started down the path that led to the lilac hidden
+home beyond the forest. Then he thought again of Obadiah and his last
+choking utterance of Marion's name. He had tried to speak of her, even
+with that death-like rattling of the breath in his throat; and the
+memory of the old councilor's frantic struggle for words brought
+Nathaniel quickly back to the cabin. He bent over Obadiah's shriveled
+form and spoke the girl's name again and again in his ears. There came
+no response, no quiver of life to show that the old man was conscious
+of his presence. As he worked over him, bathing his face and chest in
+cool water, the feeling became strong in him that he was fighting death
+in this gloomy room for Marion's sake. It was like the whispering of an
+invisible spirit in his ears--something more than presentiment,
+something that made his own heart grow faint when death seemed winning
+in the struggle. His watchfulness was acute, intense, desperate. When,
+after a time, he straightened himself again, rewarded by Obadiah's more
+regular breathing, the sweat stood in beads upon his face. He knew that
+he had triumphed. Obadiah would live, and Marion--
+
+He placed his mouth close to the councilor's ear.
+
+"Tell me about Marion," he said again. "Marion--Marion--Marion--"
+
+He waited, stilling his own breath to catch the sound of a whisper. None
+came. As he bent over him he saw through the open door that the red
+glare of fire had faded to a burnt out glow in the sky. In the deep
+silence the sullen beating of the bell seemed nearer, and he could hear
+the excited barking of dogs in St. James. Slowly the hope that Obadiah
+might speak to him died away and he returned to the door. It still
+lacked an hour of midnight, when Marion, had promised to come to him. He
+was wildly impatient and to his impatience was added the fear that had
+filled him as he hovered over Obadiah, a nameless, intangible
+fear--something which he could not have analyzed and which clutched at
+his heart and urged him to follow the path that led to Marion's. For a
+time he resisted the impulse. What if she should come by another path
+while he was gone? He waited nervously in the edge of the forest,
+watching, and listening for footsteps. Each minute seemed like an hour
+marked into seconds by the solemn steady tolling of the bell, and after
+a little he found himself unconsciously measuring time by counting the
+strokes. Then he went out into the path. He followed it, step by step,
+until he could no longer see the light in the cabin; his pulse beat a
+little faster; he stared ahead into the deep gloom between the walls of
+forest--and quickened his pace. If Marion was coming to him he would
+meet her. If she was not coming--
+
+In his old fearless way he promptly made up his mind. He would go boldly
+to the cabin and tell her that Neil was waiting. He felt sure that the
+alarm sounding from St. James had drawn away the guards and that there
+would be nothing to interfere with his plan. If she had already left the
+cabin he would return quickly to Obadiah's. In his eagerness he began to
+run. Once a sound stopped him--the distant beating of galloping hoofs.
+He heard the shout of a man, a reply farther away, the quick, excited
+yelping of a dog. His blood danced as he thought of the gathering of the
+Mormon fighters, the men and boys racing down the black trails from the
+inland forests, the excitement in St. James. As he ran on again he
+thought of Arbor Croche mustering the panting, vengeful defenders; of
+Strang, his great voice booming encouragement and promise, above the
+brazen thunder of the bell; he saw in fancy the frightened huddling
+groups of women and children and beyond and above all the coming of the
+"vengeance of God"--a hundred beats, a thousand men--and there went out
+from his soul if not from his lips a great cry of joy. At the edge of
+the forest he stopped for a moment. Over beyond the clearing a light
+burned dimly through the lilacs. The sweet odor of the flowers came to
+him gently, persuasively, and nerved him into the open. He passed across
+the open space swiftly and plunged into a tangle of bushes close to the
+lighted window.
+
+He heard a man's voice within, and then a woman's. Was it Marion?
+Cautiously Nathaniel crept close to the log wall of the cabin. He
+reached out, and hesitated. Should he look--as he had done at the king's
+window? The man's voice came to him again, harsh and angry, and this
+time it was not a woman's words that he heard but a woman's sobbing cry.
+He parted the bushes and a glare of light fell on his face. The lamp was
+on a table and beside the table there sat a woman, her white head turned
+from him, her face buried in her hands. She was an old woman and he knew
+that it was Marion's mother. He could not see the man.
+
+Where was Marion? He wormed himself back out of the bushes and walked
+quickly around the house. There was no other light, no other sign of
+life except in that one room. With sudden resolution he stepped to the
+door and knocked loudly.
+
+For a full half minute there was silence, and he knocked again. He heard
+the approach of a shuffling step, the thump, thump, thump of a cane, and
+the door swung back. It was the man who opened it, a tall giant of an
+old man, doubled as if with rheumatism, and close behind him was the
+frightened face of the woman. An involuntary shudder passed through
+Nathaniel as he looked at them. They were old--so old that the man's
+shrivelled hands were like those of a skeleton; his giant frame seemed
+about to totter into ruin, his eyes were sunken until his face gave the
+horror of a death mask. Was it possible that these people were the
+father and mother of Marion--and of Neil? As he stepped to the threshold
+they timidly drew back from him. In a single glance Nathaniel swept the
+room and what he saw thrilled him, for everywhere were signs of Marion;
+in the pictures on the walls, the snowy curtains, the cushions in the
+window-seat--and the huge vase of lilacs on the mantle.
+
+"I am a messenger of the king," he said, advancing and closing the door
+behind him. "I want to speak with Marion."
+
+"Strang--the king!" cried the old man, clutching the knob of his cane
+with both hands. "She has gone!"
+
+"Gone!" exclaimed Nathaniel. For an instant his heart bounded with
+delight. Marion was on her way to the tryst! He sprang back to the
+door. "When? When did she go?"
+
+The woman had come forward, her hands trembling, her lips quivering.
+Something in the terror of her face sent the hot blood from Nathaniel's
+cheeks.
+
+"They sent for her an hour ago," she said. "The king sent Obadiah Price
+for her! O, my God!" she shrieked suddenly, clutching at her breast,
+"Tell me--what are they doing with Marion--"
+
+"Shut up!" snarled the old man. "That is Strang's business. She has gone
+to Strang." With an effort he straightened himself until his towering
+form rose half a head above Nathaniel. "She has gone to the king," he
+repeated. "Tell Strang that she will wive him to-night, as she has
+promised!"
+
+In spite of his effort to control himself a terrible cry burst from
+Nathaniel's lips. He flung open the door and stood for an instant with
+his white face turned back.
+
+"She went to the castle--an hour ago?" he cried.
+
+"Yes, to the castle--with Obadiah Price--" The last words followed him
+as he sped out into the night. As swiftly as a wolf he raced across the
+clearing to the trail that led down to St. James. Something seemed to
+have burst in his brain; something that was not blood, but fire, seemed
+to burn in his veins--a mad desire to reach Strang, to grip him by the
+throat, to mete out to him the vengeance of a fiend instead of that of a
+man. He was too late to save Marion! His brain reeled with the thought.
+Too late--too late--too late. He panted the words. They came with every
+gasp for breath. Too late! Too late! His heart pumped like an engine as
+he strained to keep up his speed. He passed a man and a boy hurrying
+with their rifles to St. James and made no answer to their shout; a
+galloping horse forged ahead of him and he tried to keep up with it; and
+then, at the top of the long hill that sloped down to the stronghold of
+the Mormon kingdom something seemed to sweep his legs from under him,
+and he fell panting on the ground. For a few moments he lay there
+looking down upon the city. The great bell at the temple was now silent.
+He saw huge fires burning for a mile along the coast, hundreds of lights
+were twinkling in the harbor, there came up to him softly, subdued by
+distance, the sound of commotion and excitement far below.
+
+His eyes rested on the beacon above the prophet's home, burning like a
+ball of fire over the black canopy of tree-tops. Marion was there! He
+rose to his feet again and went on, reason and judgment returning to
+him--telling him that he was about to play against odds; that his work
+was to be one of strength and generalship and not of madness. As he
+picked his way more slowly and cautiously down the slope a new hope
+flashed upon him. Was it possible that the discovery of the approach of
+the mainlanders had served to save Marion? In the excitement that
+followed the calling of the Mormons to arms and the preparations for the
+defense would Strang, the master of the kingdom, the bulwark of his
+people, waste priceless time in carrying out the purpose for which he
+had sent for Marion? Hardly did hope burn anew in his breast when there
+came another thought to quench it. Why had the king sent for Marion on
+this particular night and at this late hour? Why, unless at the approach
+of his enemies he had feared that he might lose his beautiful victim,
+and in his overmastering passion had called her to him even as his
+people assembled in defense of his kingdom.
+
+There was desperate coolness in Nathaniel's approach now. Whatever had
+happened he would do what Neil had threatened to do--kill Strang. And
+whatever had happened he would take Marion away with him if it was only
+her dead body that he carried in his arms. To do these things he needed
+strength. He advanced more slowly and drew deeper and deeper drafts of
+air into his exhausted lungs. At the edge of the grove surrounding the
+castle he paused to listen. For the first time it occurred to Nathaniel
+that the prophet might have assembled some of his fighters to the
+defense of his harem, which he knew would be one of the first places to
+feel the vengeance of the outraged men of the mainland. But he heard no
+voices ahead of him. There were no fires to betray the approach of the
+enemy. Not even the barking of a dog gave warning of his stealthy
+advance. Soon he could make out a light in the king's house. A few steps
+more and he saw that the door was open, as it had been on his first
+visit to the castle. He dodged swiftly from bush to bush, darted under
+the window through which he had seen Marion, leaped lightly up the broad
+steps and sprang into the great room, his pistol cocked in his hand.
+
+The room was empty. He listened, but not a sound came to his ears except
+the rustling of a curtain in the breeze. The huge lamp over the table
+was burning dimly. The five doors leading from the room were tightly
+closed. Nathaniel held his breath, tried to still the tumultuous
+pounding of his heart as he waited for a sound of life--a step beyond
+those doors, a woman's voice, a child's cry. But none came. The
+stillness of desertion hovered about him. He went to one of the five
+doors. It was not locked. He opened it silently, with the caution of a
+thief, and there loomed before him a chaos of gloom.
+
+"Hello!" he called gently. "Hello--Hello--"
+
+There was no answer. He struck a match and advanced step by step,
+holding the yellow bit of flame above his head. It disclosed the narrow
+walls of a hall and an open door leading into another room. The match
+sputtered and went out and he lighted another. On a little table just
+outside the door was a half burned candle and he replaced his match with
+this. Then he went in.
+
+At a glance he knew that he had entered a woman's room, redolent with
+the perfume of flowers. On one side was a bed and close beside it a
+cradle with a child's toys scattered about it. The tumbled coverlets
+showed that both had been recently used. About the room were thrown
+articles of wearing apparel; a trunk had been dragged from a closet and
+was half packed; everywhere was the disorder of hurried flight. For a
+few moments the depth of his despair held Nathaniel motionless. The
+castle was deserted--Marion was gone! He ran back into the great room,
+no longer trying to still the sound of his footsteps, and opened a
+second door. The same silence greeted him, the same disorder, the same
+evidence that the wives and children of the Mormon king had fled. He
+went into a third room--and then a fourth.
+
+For an instant he paused at the threshold of this fourth chamber. A
+light was burning in the room at the end of the hall. The door was
+closed with the exception of an inch or two.
+
+"Marion!" he called softly, and listened intently.
+
+He went on when there was no reply, and pushed open the door.
+
+A candle was burning on a stand in front of a mirror. The room was as
+empty as the others. But there was no disorder here. The bed was unused,
+the garments in the open closet had not been disarranged. On the floor
+beside the bed was a pair of shoes and as Nathaniel saw them his heart
+seemed to leap to his throat and stifled the cry that was on his lips.
+He took one of them in his hand, his whole being throbbing with
+excitement. It was Marion's shoe--encrusted with mud and torn as he had
+seen it in the forest. With her name falling from his lips in a pleading
+cry he now searched the room and on the stand in front of the mirror he
+found a lilac colored ribbon, soiled and crumpled. It was Marion's
+ribbon--the one he had seen last in her hair, and he crushed it to his
+lips as he ran back into the great room, calling out her name again and
+again in the torture of helplessness that now possessed him.
+
+Mechanically, rather than with reason, he went to the fifth and last
+door. His candle had become extinguished in his haste and after he had
+opened the door he stopped at the threshold of the black hall to light
+it again. There was a moment's pause as he searched his pockets for a
+match, a silence in which he listened as he searched, and suddenly as he
+was about to strike the sulphur tipped splint there came to his ears a
+sound that held him chained to the spot. It was the sobbing of a woman;
+or was it a child? In a moment he knew that it was a woman; and then the
+sobbing ceased.
+
+There was nothing but darkness ahead of him; no ray of light shone under
+the door; the chamber itself was in utter gloom. As quietly as possible
+he relighted his candle. A glance assured him that this hall was
+different from the others; it was deeper, and there were two doors at
+the end of it instead of one. Through which of these doors had come the
+sound of sobbing he had heard?
+
+He approached and listened. Each moment added to his excitement, his
+fears, his hopes, but at last he opened the door on the left. The room
+was empty; there was the same disorder as before; the same signs of
+hurried flight. It was the room on the right! His heart almost stopped
+its beating as he placed his hand on the latch, lifted it, and pushed
+the door in. Kneeling beside the bed he saw a woman. She had turned
+toward the light and in the dim illumination of the room Nathaniel
+recognized the beautiful face he had seen at the king's castle the
+preceding day--the face of the woman who had sent him to find the
+prophet, who had placed her gentle hand on Marion's head as he had
+looked through the window. There was no fear in her eyes as she saw
+Nathaniel. Something more terrible than that shone in their glorious
+depths as she rose to her feet and stood before him, her face lined with
+grief, her mouth twitching in agony. She stood with clenched hands, her
+bosom rising and falling in the passion of the storm within her; and she
+sobbed even as Nathaniel paused there, unmanned in this sudden presence
+of a distress greater than his own; sobbed in a choking, tearless way,
+waiting for him to speak.
+
+"Forgive me," he spoke gently. "I have come--for--Marion." He felt that
+he had no reason to lie to this woman. His face betrayed his own anguish
+as he came nearer to her. "I want Marion," he repeated. "My God, won't
+you tell me--?"
+
+She struggled to calm herself as he spoke the girl's name.
+
+"Marion is not here," she said. She crushed his hands against her bosom
+and a softer look came into her eyes; her voice was low and sweet, as it
+had been the morning he asked for Strang. As she saw the despair
+deepening in the man's face a great pity swept over her and she
+stretched out her arms to him with an aching cry, "Marion is
+gone--gone--gone," she moaned, "and you must go, too! O, I know you love
+her--she told me that you loved her, as I love Strang, my king! We have
+both lost--lost--and you must go--as--I--shall--go!" She turned away
+from him with a cry so heart-breaking in its pain that Nathaniel felt
+himself trembling to the soul. In another instant she had faced him
+again, fighting back a strange calm into her face.
+
+"I love Marion," she breathed softly. "I would help you--I would help
+her--if I could." For a moment her pale beautiful face was filled with a
+light that might have shone from the face of an angel, "Don't you
+understand?" she continued, scarcely above a whisper. "I have been
+Strang's one great love--his life--until Marion came into his heart. I
+have lost--you have lost--but mine is the more bitter because Marion
+loves you, and Strang--"
+
+With a cry Nathaniel sprang to her side. The candle fell from his hand,
+sputtered on the floor, and left them in darkness.
+
+"Marion loves me! You say that Marion loves me?"
+
+The woman's voice came to him in a whisper filled with the sweetness of
+sympathy.
+
+"She said so to-night--in this room. She told me that she loved you as
+she never thought that she could love a man in this world. O, my God, is
+that not a balm for your heart, if it is broken? And Strang--my
+Strang--has forgotten his love for me!"
+
+Nathaniel reached out his arms. They found the woman and for a time he
+held her hands in his, while a great silence fell upon them. He could
+hear the sobbing of her breath and as her fingers tightened about his
+own his heart seemed bursting with its hatred of this man who called
+himself a prophet of God; a hatred that burned furiously even as his
+being throbbed with the wild joy of the words he had just heard.
+
+"Where is Marion?" he pleaded.
+
+"I don't know," replied the woman. "They took her away alone. The
+others have gone to the temple."
+
+"Do you think she is at the temple?" he inquired insistently.
+
+"No. One of the others came back a little while ago. She said that
+Marion was not there."
+
+"Where is Strang?"
+
+This time he felt the woman tremble.
+
+"Strang--"
+
+She drew her hands away from him. There was a strange quiver in her
+voice.
+
+"Yes--where is Strang?"
+
+There came no reply.
+
+"Tell me--where is he?"
+
+"I don't know."
+
+"Is he at the temple?"
+
+"I don't know."
+
+He could hear her stifled breath; he could almost feel her trembling, an
+arm's reach out there in the darkness. What a woman was this whose
+heart the Mormon king had broken for a new love!
+
+"Listen," he said gently. "I am going to find Marion. I am going to take
+her away. To-morrow you shall have Strang again--if he is alive!"
+
+There was no answer and he moved slowly back to the door. He closed it
+after him as he entered the hall. Once in the big room he paused for a
+moment under the hanging lamp to examine his pistol and then went
+outside. The grove in which the castle stood was absolutely deserted. So
+far as he could see not even a guard watched over the property of the
+king. Nathaniel had become too accustomed to the surprises of Beaver
+Island to wonder at this. He could see by the lights flaring along the
+harbor that the castle was in an isolated position and easy of attack.
+From what Strang's wife had told him and the evidences of panic in the
+chambers of the harem he believed that the Mormon king had abandoned the
+castle to its fate and that the approaching conflict would center about
+the temple.
+
+Was Marion at the temple? If so he realized that she was beyond his
+reach. But the woman had said that she was not there. Where could she
+have gone? Why had not Strang taken her with his wives? In a flash
+Nathaniel thought of Arbor Croche and Obadiah--the two men who always
+knew what the king was doing. If he could find the sheriff alone--if he
+could only nurse Obadiah back into sane life again! He thrust his pistol
+into its holster. There was but one thing for him to do and that was to
+return to the old councilor. It would be madness for him to go down to
+St. James. He had lost--Strang had won. But his love for Marion was
+undying. If he found her Strang's wife it would make no difference to
+him. It would all be evened up when he killed the king. For Marion loved
+him--loved him--
+
+He turned his face toward Obadiah's, his heart singing the glad words
+which the woman had spoken to him back there in the sixth chamber.
+
+And as he was about to take the first step in that long race back to the
+mad councilor's he heard behind him the approach of quick feet. He
+crouched behind a clump of bushes and waited. A shadowy form was
+hurrying through the grove. It passed close to him, mounted the castle
+steps, and in the doorway turned and looked back for an instant in the
+direction of St. James.
+
+Nathaniel's lips quivered; the pounding of his heart half choked him; a
+shriek of mad, terrible joy was ready to leap from his lips.
+
+There in the dim glow of the great lamp stood Strang, the Mormon king.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+THE HAND OF FATE
+
+
+Like a panther Nathaniel crouched and watched the man on the steps. His
+muscles jerked, his hands were clenched; each instant he seemed about to
+spring. But he held himself back until Strang had passed through the
+door. Then he slipped along the log wall of the castle, hugging the
+shadows, fearing that the king might reappear and see him in time to
+close the door. What an opportunity fate had made for him! His fingers
+itched to get at Strang's thick bull-like throat. He felt no fear, no
+hesitation about the outcome of the struggle with this giant prophet of
+God. He did not plan to shoot, for a shot would destroy the secret of
+Marion's fate. He would choke the truth from Strang; rob him of life
+slowly, gasp by gasp, until in the horror of death the king would reveal
+her hiding-place--would tell what he had done with her.
+
+Then he would kill him!
+
+There was the strength of tempered steel in his arms; his body, slender
+as an athlete's, quivered to hurl itself into action. Up the steps he
+crept so cautiously that he made no sound. In the intensity of his
+purpose Nathaniel looked only ahead of him--to the door. He did not see
+that another figure was stealing through the gloom behind him as
+cautiously, as quietly as himself. He passed through the door and stood
+erect. Strang had not seen him. He had not heard him. He was standing
+with his huge back toward him, facing the hall that led to the sixth
+chamber--and the woman. Nathaniel drew his pistol. He would not shoot,
+but Strang might be made to tell the truth with death leveling itself at
+his heart. He groped behind him, found the door, and slammed it shut.
+There would be no retreat for the king!
+
+And the man who turned toward him at the slamming of that door, turned
+slowly, coolly, and gazed into the black muzzle of his pistol looked,
+indeed, every inch of him a king. The muscles of his face betrayed no
+surprise, no fear. His splendid nerve was unshaken, his eyes unfaltering
+as they rose above the pistol to the face behind it. For fifteen seconds
+there was a strange terrible silence as the eyes of the two men met. In
+that quarter of a minute Nathaniel knew that he had not guessed rightly.
+Strang was not afraid. He would not tell him where Marion was. The
+insuperable courage of this man maddened Captain Plum and unconsciously
+his finger fell upon the trigger of his pistol. He almost shrieked the
+words that he meant to speak calmly:
+
+"Where is Marion?"
+
+"She is safe, Captain Plum. She is where the friends who are invading us
+from the mainland will have no chance of finding her."
+
+Strang spoke as quietly as though in his own office beside the temple.
+Suddenly he raised his voice.
+
+"She is safe, Captain Plum--safe!"
+
+His eyes wavered, and traveled beyond. As accurately as a striking
+serpent Nathaniel measured that glance. It had gone to the door. He
+heard a movement, felt a draft of air, and in an instant he whirled
+about with his pistol pointed to the door. In another instant he had
+fired and the huge form of Arbor Croche toppled headlong into the room.
+A roar like that of a beast came from behind him and before he could
+turn again Strang was upon him. In that moment he felt that all was
+lost. Under the weight of the Mormon king he was crushed to the floor;
+his pistol slipped from his grasp; two great hands choked a despairing
+cry from his throat. He saw the prophet's face over him, distorted with
+passion, his huge neck bulging, his eyes flaming like angry garnets. He
+struggled to free his pinioned arms, to wrench off the death grip at his
+throat, but his efforts were like those of a child against a giant. In a
+last terrible attempt he drew up his knees inch by inch under the
+weight of his enemy; it was his only chance--his only hope. Even as he
+felt the fingers about his throat sinking like hot iron into his flesh
+and the breath slipping from his body he remembered this murderous
+knee-punch of the rough fighters of the inland seas and with all the
+life that remained in him he sent it crushing into the abdomen of the
+Mormon king. It was a moment before he knew that it had been successful,
+before the film cleared from his eyes and he saw Strang groveling at his
+feet; another moment and he had hurled himself on the prophet. His fist
+shot out like a hammer against Strang's jaw. Again and again he struck
+until the great shaggy head fell back limp. Then his fingers twined
+themselves like the links of a chain about the purplish throat and he
+choked until Strang's eyes opened wide and lifeless and his convulsions
+ceased. He would have held on until there was no doubt of the end, had
+not the king's wife--the woman whose misery he had shared that
+night--suddenly flung herself with a piercing cry, between him and the
+blackened face, clutching at his hands with all her fragile strength.
+
+[Illustration: His fingers twined about the purplish throat.]
+
+"My God, you are killing him--killing him!" she moaned.
+
+Her eyes blazed as she tore at his fingers.
+
+"You are killing him--killing him!" she shrieked. "He has not destroyed
+Marion! You said you would take her and leave him--for me--" She struck
+her head against his breast, tearing the flesh of his wrists with her
+nails.
+
+Nathaniel loosened his grip and staggered to his feet.
+
+"For you!" he panted. "If you had only come--a little sooner--" He
+stumbled to his pistol and picked it up. "I am afraid he is--dead!"
+
+He did not look back.
+
+Arbor Croche barred the door. He had not moved since he had fallen. His
+head was twisted so that his face was turned to the glow of the lamp
+and Nathaniel shuddered as he saw where his shot had struck. He had
+apparently died with that last cry on his lips.
+
+There was no longer a fear of the Mormons in Nathaniel. He believed the
+king and Arbor Croche dead, and that in the gloom and excitement of the
+night he could go among the people of St. James undiscovered. A great
+load was lifted from his soul, for if he had not been in time to save
+Marion he had at least delivered her after a short bondage. He had now
+only to find Marion and she would go with him, for she loved him--and
+Strang was no more.
+
+He hurried through the grove toward the temple. Even before he had come
+near to it he could see that a great crowd had congregated there. The
+street which he passed was deserted. No lights shone in the houses. Even
+the dogs were gone. For the first time he understood what it meant. The
+whole town had fled to that huge log stronghold for protection.
+Buildings and trees shut out his view seaward but he could see the
+flare of great fires mounting into the sky and he knew that those who
+were not at the temple were guarding the shore.
+
+Suddenly he almost fell over a figure in his path. It was an old woman
+mumbling and sobbing incoherently as she stumbled weakly in the
+direction of the temple. Like an inspiration the thought came to him
+that here was his opportunity of gaining admittance to that multitude of
+women and children. He seized the old woman by the arm and spoke words
+of courage to her as he half carried her on her way. A few minutes more
+and a blaze of light burst upon them and the great square in which the
+temple was situated lay open before them. Half a hundred yards ahead a
+fire was burning; oil and pine sent their lurid flame high up into the
+night, and in the thick gloom behind it, intensified by the blinding
+glare, Nathaniel saw the shadows of men. He caught the old woman in his
+arms and went on boldly. He passed close to a thin line of waiting men,
+saw the faint glint of firelight on their rifles, and staggering past
+them unchallenged with his weight he stopped for a moment to look back.
+The effect was startling. Beyond the three great fires that blazed
+around the temple the clearing was bathed in a sea of light; in its
+concealment of giant trees the temple was buried in gloom. From the
+gloom a hundred cool men might slaughter five times their number
+charging across that illumined death-square!
+
+Nathaniel could not repress a shudder as he looked. Screened behind each
+of the three fires was a cannon. He figured that there were more than a
+hundred rifles in that silent cordon of men. What was there on the
+opposite side of the temple?
+
+He turned with the old woman and joined the throng that was seething
+about the temple doors. There were women, children and old men, crushing
+and crowding, fighting with panic-stricken fierceness for admittance to
+the thick log walls. Through the doors there came the low thunder of
+countless voices pierced by the shrill cries of little children. Foot by
+foot Nathaniel fought his way up the steps. At the top were drawn a
+dozen men forming barriers with their rifles. One of them shoved him
+back.
+
+"Not you!" he shouted. "This is for the women!"
+
+Nathaniel fell back, filled with horror. A glance had shown him the vast
+dimly lighted interior of the temple packed to suffocation. What sins
+had this people wrought that it thus feared the vengeance of the men
+from the mainland! He felt the sweat break out upon his face as he
+thought of Marion being in that mob, tired and fainting with her
+terrible day's experience--perhaps dying under the panic-stricken feet
+of those stronger than herself. He hoped now for that which at first had
+filled him with despair--that Strang had hidden Marion away from the
+terror and suffocation of this multitude that fought for its breath
+within the temple. Freeing himself of the crowd he ran to the farther
+side of the building. A fourth fire blazed in his face. But on this side
+there was no cannon; scarcely a score of men were guarding the rear of
+the temple.
+
+For a full minute he stood concealed in the gloom. He realized now that
+it would be useless to return to Obadiah. The old councilor could
+probably have told him all that he had discovered for himself; that
+Marion had gone to the castle--that Strang intended to make her his
+bride that night. But did Obadiah know that the castle had been
+abandoned? Did he know that the king's wives had sought refuge in the
+temple, and did he know where Marion was hidden? Nathaniel could assure
+himself but one answer; Obadiah, struck down by his strange madness, was
+more ignorant than he himself of what had occurred at St. James.
+
+While he paused a heavy noise arose that quickened his heart-beats and
+sent the blood through his veins in wild excitement. From far down by
+the shore there came the roar of a cannon. It was closely followed by a
+second and a third, and hardly was the night shaken by their thunder
+than a mighty cheering of men swept up from the fire-rimmed coast. The
+battle had begun! Nathaniel leaped out into the glow of the great
+blazing fire beyond the temple; he heard a warning shout as he darted
+past the men; for an instant he saw their white faces staring at him
+from the firelight--heard a second shout, which he knew was a
+command--and was gone. Half a dozen rifles cracked behind him and a yell
+of joyful defiance burst from his throat as the bullets hissed over his
+head. The battle had begun! Another hour and the Mormon kingdom would be
+at the mercy of the avenging host from the mainland--and Marion would be
+his own for ever! He heard again the deep rumble of a heavy gun and from
+its sullen detonation he knew that it was fired from a ship at sea. A
+nearer crash of returning fire turned him into a deserted street down
+which he ran wildly, on past the last houses of the town, until he came
+to the foot of a hill up which he climbed more slowly, panting like a
+winded animal.
+
+From its top he could look down upon the scene of battle. To the
+eastward stretched the harbor line with its rim of fires. A glance
+showed him that the fight was not to center about these. They had served
+their purpose, had forced the mainlanders to seek a landing farther down
+the coast. The light of dawn had already begun to disperse the thick
+gloom of night and an eighth of a mile below Nathaniel the Mormon forces
+were creeping slowly along the shore. The pale ghostly mistiness of the
+sea hung like a curtain between him and what was beyond, and even as he
+strained his eyes to catch a glimpse of the avenging fleet a vivid light
+leaped out of the white distance, followed by the thunder of a cannon.
+He saw the head of the Mormon line falter. In an instant it had been
+thrown into confusion. A second shot from the sea--a storm of cheering
+voices from out of that white chaos of mist--and the Mormons fell back
+from the shore in a panic-stricken, fleeing mob. Were those frightened
+cowards the fierce fighters of whom he had heard so much? Were they the
+men who had made themselves masters of a kingdom in the land of their
+enemies--whose mere name carried terror for a hundred miles along the
+coast? He was stupefied, bewildered. He made no effort to conceal
+himself as they approached the hill, but drew his pistol, ready to fire
+down upon them as they came. Suddenly there was a change. So quickly
+that he could scarcely believe his eyes the flying Mormons had
+disappeared. Not a man was visible upon that narrow plain between the
+hill and the sea. Like a huge covey of quail they had dropped to the
+ground, their rifles lost in that ghostly gloom through which the voices
+of the mainlanders came in fierce cries of triumph. It was magnificent!
+Even as the crushing truth of what it all meant came to him, the
+fighting blood in his veins leaped at the sight of it--the pretended
+effect of the shots from sea, the sham confusion, the disorderly
+flight, the wonderful quickness and precision with which the rabble of
+armed men had thrown itself into ambush!
+
+Would the mainlanders rush into the trap? Had some keen eye seen those
+shadowy forms dropping through the mist? Each instant the ghostly pall
+that shut out vision seaward seemed drifting away. Nathaniel's staring
+eyes saw a vague shape appear in it, an indistinct dirt-gray blotch, and
+he knew that it was a boat. Another followed, and then another; he heard
+the sound of oars, the grinding of keels upon the sand, and where the
+Mormons had been a few moments before the beach was now alive with
+mainlanders. In the growing light he could make out the king's men below
+him, inanimate spots in the middle of the narrow plain. Helpless he
+stood clutching his pistol, the horror in him growing with each breath.
+Could he give no warning? Could he do nothing--nothing--At least he
+could join in the fight! He ran down the hill, swinging to the left of
+the Mormons. Half way, and he stopped as a thundering cheer swept up
+from the shore. The mainlanders had started toward the hill! Without
+rank, without order--shouting their triumph as they came they were
+rushing blindly into the arms of the ambush! A shriek of warning left
+Nathaniel's lips. It was drowned in a crash of rifle fire. Volley after
+volley burst from that shadowy stretch of plain. Before the furious fire
+the van of the mainlanders crumpled into ruin. Like chaff before a wind
+those behind were swept back. Apparently they were flying without
+waiting to fire a shot! Nathaniel dashed down into the plain. Ahead of
+him the Mormons were charging in a solid line, and in another moment the
+shore had become a mass of fighting men. Far to the left he saw a group
+of the mainlanders running along the beach toward the conflict. If he
+could only intercept them--and bring them into the rear! Like the wind
+he sped to cut them off, shouting and firing his pistol.
+
+He won by a hundred yards and stood panting as they came toward him.
+Dawn had dispelled the mist-gloom and as the mainlanders drew nearer he
+discerned in their lead a figure that brought a cry of joy from his
+lips.
+
+"Neil!" he shouted. "Neil--"
+
+He turned as Marion's brother darted to his side.
+
+"This way--from behind!"
+
+The two led the way, side by side, followed by a dozen men. A glance
+told Nathaniel that nothing much less than a miracle could turn the tide
+of battle. Half of the mainlanders were fighting in the water. Others
+were struggling desperately to get away in the boats. Foot by foot the
+Mormons were crushing them back, their battle cries now turned into
+demoniac yells of victory. Into the rear of the struggling mass, firing
+as they ran, charged the handful of men behind Captain Plum and Neil.
+For a little space the king's men gave way before them and with wild
+cheers the powerful fishermen from the coast fought their way toward
+their comrades. Many of them were armed with long knives; some had
+pistols; others used their empty rifles as clubs. A dozen more men and
+they would have split like a wedge through the Mormon mass. Above the
+din of battle Nathaniel's voice rose in thundering shouts to the men in
+the sea, and close beside him he heard Neil shrieking out a name between
+his blows. Like demons they fought straight ahead, slashing with their
+knives. The Mormon line was thinning. The mainlanders had turned and
+were fighting their way back, gaining foot by foot what they had lost.
+Suddenly there came a terrific cheer from the plain and the hope that
+had flamed in Nathaniel's breast died out as he heard it. He knew what
+it meant--that the Mormons at St. James had come to reinforce their
+comrades. He fought now to reach the boats, calling to Neil, whom he
+could no longer see. Even in that moment he thought of Marion. His only
+chance was to escape with the others, his only hope of wresting her from
+the kingdom lay in his own freedom. He had waited too long. A crushing
+blow fell upon him from behind and with a last cry to Neil he sank under
+the trampling feet. Indistinctly there came to him the surging shock of
+the fresh body of Mormons. The din about him became fainter and fainter
+as though he was being carried rapidly away from it; shouting voices
+came to him in whispers, and deadened sounds, like the quick tapping of
+a finger on his forehead, were all that he heard of the steady rifle
+fire that pursued the defeated mainlanders in their flight.
+
+After a little he began struggling back into consciousness. There was a
+splitting pain somewhere in his head and he tried to reach his hand to
+it.
+
+"You won't have to carry him," he heard a voice say. "Give him a little
+water and he'll walk."
+
+He felt the dash of the water in his face and it put new life into him.
+Somebody had raised him to a sitting posture and was supporting him
+there while a second person bound a cloth about his head. He opened his
+eyes and the light of day shot into them like a stinging, burning charge
+of needle-points, and he closed them again with a sharp cry of pain.
+That second's glance had shown him that it was a woman who was binding
+his head. He had not seen her face. Beyond her he had caught a half
+formed vision of many people and the glistening edge of the sea, and as
+he lay with closed eyes the murmur of voices came to him. The support at
+his back was taken away, slowly, as if the person who held him feared
+that he would fall. Nathaniel stiffened himself to show his returning
+strength and opened his eyes again. This time the pain was not so great.
+A few yards away he saw a group of people and among them were women;
+still farther away, so far that his brain grew dizzy as he looked, there
+was a black moving crowd. He was among the wounded. The Mormon women
+were here. Down there along the shore--among the dead--had assembled the
+population of St. James.
+
+A strange sickness overpowered him and he sank back against his
+supporter. A cool hand passed over his face. It was a soothing, gentle
+touch--the hand of the woman. He felt the sweep of soft hair against his
+cheek--a breath whispering in his ear.
+
+"You will be better soon."
+
+His heart stood still.
+
+"You will be better--"
+
+Against his rough cheek there fell the soft pressure of a woman's lips.
+
+Nathaniel pulled himself erect, every drop of blood in him striving for
+the mastery of his body, his vision, his strength. He tried to turn, but
+strong arms seized him from behind. A man's voice spoke to him, a man's
+strength held him. In an agony of appeal Marion's name burst from his
+lips.
+
+"Sh-h-!" warned the voice behind him. "Are you crazy?"
+
+The arms relaxed their hold and Nathaniel dragged himself to his knees.
+The woman was gone. As far as he could see there were people--scores of
+them, hundreds of them--multiplied into thousands and millions as he
+looked, until there was only a black cloud about him. He staggered to
+his feet and a strong hand kept him from falling while his brain slowly
+cleared. The millions and thousands and hundreds of people dissolved
+themselves into the day until only a handful was left where he had seen
+multitudes. He turned his face weakly to the man beside him.
+
+"Where did she go?" he asked.
+
+It was a boyish face into which his pleading eyes gazed, a face white
+with the strain of battle, reddened a little on one cheek with a smear
+of blood, and there was a startled, frightened look in it that did not
+come of the strife that had passed.
+
+"Who? What are you talking about?"
+
+"The woman," whispered Nathaniel. "The woman--Marion--who kissed--me--"
+
+The young fellow's hand gripped his arm in a sudden fierce clutch.
+
+"You've been dreaming!" he exclaimed in a threatening voice. "Shut up!"
+He spoke the words loudly. Then quickly dropping his voice to a whisper
+he added, "For God's sake don't betray her! They saw her with
+us--everybody knows that it was the king's wife with you!"
+
+The king's wife! Nathaniel was too weak to analyze the words beyond the
+fact that they carried the dread truth of his fears deep into his soul.
+Who would have come to him but Marion? Who else would have kissed him?
+It was her voice that had whispered in his ear--the thrill of her hand
+that had passed over his face. And this man had said that she was the
+wife of the king! He heard the voices of other men near him but did not
+understand what they were saying. He knew that after a moment there was
+a man on each side of him holding him by the arms, and mechanically he
+moved his legs, knowing that they wanted him to walk. They did not guess
+how weak he was--how he struggled to keep from becoming too great a
+weight on their hands. Once or twice they stopped in their agonizing
+climb up the hill. On its top the cool sea air swept into Nathaniel's
+face and it was like water to a parched throat.
+
+After a time--it seemed a day of terrible work and pain to him--they
+came to the streets of the town, and in a half conscious sort of way he
+cursed at the rabble trailing at their heels. They passed close to the
+temple, dirt and blood and a burning torment shutting the vision of it
+from his eyes, and beyond this there was another crowd. An aisle opened
+for them, as it had opened for others ahead of them. In front of the
+jail they stopped. Nathaniel's head hung heavily upon his breast and he
+made no effort to raise it. All ambition and desire had left him, all
+desire but one, and that was to drop upon the ground and lie there for
+endless, restful years. What consciousness was left in him was ebbing
+swiftly; he saw black, fathomless night about him and the earth seemed
+slipping from under his feet.
+
+A voice dragged him back into life--a voice that boomed in his ears like
+rolling thunder and set every fiber in him quivering with emotion. He
+drew himself erect with the involuntary strength of one mastering the
+last spasm of death and as they dragged him through the door he saw
+there within an arm's reach of him the great, living face of Strang,
+gloating at him as if from out of a mist--red eyed, white fanged, filled
+with the vengefulness of a beast.
+
+The great voice rumbled in his ears again.
+
+"Take that man to the dungeon!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+WINNSOME'S VERDICT OF DEATH
+
+
+The voice--the condemning words--followed Nathaniel as he staggered on
+between his two guards; it haunted him still as the cold chill of the
+rotting dungeon walls struck in his face; it remained with him as he
+stood swaying alone in the thick gloom--the voice rumbling in his ears,
+the words beating against his brain until the shock of them sickened
+him, until he stretched out his arms and there fell from him such a cry
+as had never tortured his lips before.
+
+Strang was alive! He had left the spark of life in him, and the woman
+who loved him had fanned it back into full flame.
+
+Strang was alive! And Marion--Marion was his wife!
+
+The voice of the king taunted him from the black chaos that hid the
+dungeon walls. The words struck at him, filling his head with shooting
+pain, and he tottered back and sank to the ground to get away from them.
+They followed, and that vengeful leer of the king was behind them,
+urging them on, until they beat his face into the sticky earth, and
+smothered him into what he thought was death.
+
+There came rest after that, a long silent rest. When Nathaniel slowly
+climbed up out of the ebon shadows again the first consciousness that
+came to him was that the word-demons had stopped their beating against
+his brain and that he no longer heard the voice of the king. His relief
+was so great that he breathed a restful sigh. Something touched him
+then. Great God! were they coming back? Were they still
+there--waiting--waiting--
+
+It was a wonderfully familiar voice that spoke to him.
+
+"Hello there, Nat! Want a drink?"
+
+He gulped eagerly at the cool liquid that touched his lips.
+
+"Neil," he whispered.
+
+"It's me, Nat. They chucked me in with you. Hell's hole, isn't it?"
+
+Nathaniel sat up, Neil's strong arm at his back. There was a light in
+the room now and he could see his companion's face, smiling at him
+encouragingly. The sight of it was like an elixir to him. He drank again
+and new life coursed through him.
+
+"Yes--hell of a hole!" he repeated drowsily. "Sorry for you--Neil--" and
+he seemed to sleep again.
+
+Neil laughed as he wiped his companion's face with a wet cloth.
+
+"I'm used to it, Nat. Been here before," he said. "Can you get up?
+There's a bench over here--not long enough to stretch you out on or I
+would have made you a bed of it, but it's better than this mud to sit
+on."
+
+He put his arms about Nathaniel and helped him to his feet. For a few
+moments the wounded man stood without moving.
+
+"I'm not very bad, I guess," he said, taking a slow step. "Where is the
+seat, Neil? I'm going to walk to it. What sort of a bump have I got on
+the head?"
+
+"Nothing much," assured Neil. "Suspicious, though," he grinned
+cheerfully. "Looks as though you were running and somebody came up and
+tapped you from behind!"
+
+Nathaniel's strength returned to him quickly. The pain had gone from his
+head and his eyes no longer hurt him. In the dim candle-light he could
+distinguish the four walls of the dungeon, glistening with the water and
+mold that reeked from between their rotting logs. The floor was of wet,
+sticky earth which clung to his boots, and the air that he breathed
+filled his nostrils and throat with the uncomfortable thickness of a
+night fog at sea. Through it the candle burned in a misty halo. Near the
+candle, which stood on a shelf-like table against one of the walls, was
+a big dish which caught Nathaniel's eyes.
+
+"What's that?" he asked pointing toward it.
+
+"Grub," replied Neil. "Hungry?"
+
+He went to the table and got the plate of food. There were chunks of
+boiled meat, unbuttered bread, and cold potatoes. For several minutes
+they ate in silence. Now that Nathaniel was himself again Neil could no
+longer keep up his forced spirits. Both realized that they had played
+their game and that it had ended in defeat. And each believed that it
+was in his individual power to alleviate to some extent the other's
+misery. To Neil what was ahead of them held no mystery. A few hours more
+and then--death. It was only the form in which it would come that
+troubled him, that made him think. Usually the victims of this dungeon
+cell were shot. Sometimes they were hanged. But why tell Nathaniel? So
+he ate his meat and bread without words, waiting for the other to speak,
+as the other waited for him. And Nathaniel, on his part, kept to himself
+the secret of Marion's fate. After they had done with the meat and the
+bread and the cold potatoes he pulled out his beloved pipe and filled it
+with the last scraps of his tobacco, and as the fumes of it clouded
+round his head, soothing him in its old friendship, he told of his fight
+with Strang and his killing of Arbor Croche.
+
+"I'm glad for Winnsome's sake," said Neil, after a moment. "Oh, if you'd
+only killed Strang!"
+
+Nathaniel thought of what Marion had said to him in the forest.
+
+"Neil," he said quietly, "do you know that Winnsome loves you--not as
+the little girl whom you toted about on your shoulders--but as a woman?
+Do you know that?" In the other's silence he added, "When I last saw
+Marion she sent this message to you--'Tell Neil that he must go, for
+Winnsome's sake. Tell him that her fate is shortly to be as cruel as
+mine--tell him that Winnsome loves him and that she will escape and come
+to him on the mainland.'" Like words of fire they had burned themselves
+in his brain and as Nathaniel repeated them he thought of that other
+broken heart that had sobbed out its anguish to him in the castle
+chamber. "Neil, a man can die easier when he knows that a woman loves
+him!"
+
+He had risen to his feet and was walking back and forth through the
+thick gloom.
+
+"I'm glad!" Neil's voice came to him softly, as though he scarcely dared
+to speak the words aloud. After a moment he added, "Have you got a
+pencil, Nat? I would like to leave a little note for Winnsome."
+
+Nathaniel found both pencil and paper in one of his pockets and Neil
+dropped upon his knees in the mud beside the table. Ten minutes later he
+turned to Nathaniel and a great change had come into his face.
+
+"She always seemed like such a little child to me that I never
+dared--to--tell her," he faltered. "I've done it in this."
+
+"How will you get the note to her?"
+
+"I know the jailer. Perhaps when he comes to bring us our dinner I can
+persuade him to send it to her."
+
+Nathaniel thrust his hands into his pockets. His fingers dug into
+Obadiah's gold.
+
+"Would this help?" he asked.
+
+He brought out a shimmering handful of it and counted the pieces upon
+the table.
+
+"Two hundred dollars--if he will deliver that note," he said.
+
+Neil stared at him in amazement.
+
+"If he won't take it for that--I've got more. I'll go a thousand!"
+
+Neil stood silent, wondering if his companion was mad. Nathaniel saw the
+look in his face and his own flushed with sudden excitement.
+
+"Don't you understand?" he cried. "That note means Heaven or hell for
+Winnsome--it means life--her whole future! And you know what this cell
+means for us," he said more calmly. "It means that we're at the end of
+our rope, that the game is up, that neither of us will ever see Marion
+or Winnsome again. That note is the last word in life from us--from you.
+It's a dying prayer. Tell Winnsome your love, tell her that it is your
+last wish that she go out into the big, free world--away from this
+hell-hole, away from Strang, away from the Mormons, and live as other
+women live! And commanded by your love--she will go!"
+
+"I've told her that!" breathed Neil.
+
+"I knew you would!"
+
+Nathaniel threw another handful of gold on the table.
+
+"Five hundred!" he exclaimed. "It's cheap enough for a woman's soul!"
+
+He motioned for Neil to put the money in his pocket. The pain was coming
+back into his head, he grew dizzy, and hastened to the bench. Neil came
+and sat beside him.
+
+"So you think it's the end?" he asked. He was glad that his companion
+had guessed the truth.
+
+"Don't you?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+There was a minute's dark silence. The ticking of Nathaniel's watch
+sounded like the tapping of a stick.
+
+"What will happen?"
+
+"I don't know. But whatever it may be it will come to us soon. Usually
+it happens at night."
+
+"There is no hope?"
+
+"Absolutely none. The whole mainland is at the mercy of Strang. He fears
+no retribution now, no punishment for his crimes, no hand stronger than
+his own. He will not even give us the pretense of a hearing. I am a
+traitor, a revolutionist--you have attempted the life of the king. We
+are both condemned--both doomed."
+
+Neil spoke calmly and his companion strove to master the terrible pain
+at his heart as he thought of Marion. If Neil could go to the end like a
+martyr he would at least make an attempt to do as much. Yet he could not
+help from saying:
+
+"What will become of Marion?"
+
+He felt the tremor that passed through his companion's body.
+
+"I have implored Winnsome to do all that she can to get her away,"
+replied Neil. "If Marion won't go--" He clenched his hands with a
+moaning curse and sprang to his feet, again pacing back and forth
+through the gloomy dungeon. "If she won't go I swear that Strang's
+triumph will be short!" he cried suddenly. "I can not guess the terrible
+power that the king possesses over her, but I know that once his wife
+she will not endure it long. The moment she becomes that, her bondage is
+broken. I know it. I have seen it in her eyes. She will kill herself!"
+
+Nathaniel rose slowly from the bench and came to his side.
+
+"She won't do that!" he groaned. "My God--she won't do that!"
+
+Neil's face was blanched to the whiteness of paper.
+
+"She will," he repeated quietly. "Her terrible pact with Strang will
+have been fulfilled. And I--I am glad--glad--"
+
+He raised his arms to the dripping blackness of the dungeon ceiling, his
+voice shaking with a cold, stifled anguish. Nathaniel drew back from
+that tall, straight figure, step by step, as though to hide beyond the
+flickering candle glow the betrayal that had come into his face, the
+blazing fire that seemed burning out his eyes. If what Neil had said was
+true--
+
+Something choked him as he dropped alone upon the bench.
+
+If it was true--Marion was dead!
+
+He dropped his head in his hands and sat for a long time in silence,
+listening to Neil as he walked tirelessly over the muddy earth. Not
+until there came a rattling of the chain at the cell door and a creaking
+of the rusty hinges did he lift his face. It was the jailer with a huge
+armful of straw. He saw Neil approach him after he had thrown it down.
+Their low voices came to him in an indistinct murmur. After a little he
+caught the sound of the chinking gold pieces.
+
+Neil came and sat down beside him as the heavy door closed upon them
+again.
+
+"He took it," he whispered exultantly. "He will deliver it this morning.
+If possible he will bring us an answer. I kept out a hundred and told
+him that a reply would be worth that to him."
+
+Nathaniel did not speak, and after a moment's silence Neil continued.
+
+"The jury is assembling. We will know our fate very soon."
+
+He rose to his feet, his words quivering with nervous excitement, and
+Nathaniel heard him kicking about in the straw. In another breath his
+voice hissed through the gloom in a sharp, startled command:
+
+"Good God, Nat, come here!"
+
+Something in the strange fierceness of Neil's words startled Nathaniel,
+like the thrilling twinges of an electric shock. He darted across the
+cell and found Marion's brother with his shoulder against the door.
+
+"It's open!" he whispered. "The door--is--open!"
+
+The hinges creaked under his weight. A current of air struck them in the
+face. Another instant and they stood in the corridor, listening,
+crushing back the breath in their lungs, not daring to speak. Only the
+drip of water came to their ears. Gently Neil drew his companion back
+into the cell.
+
+"There's a chance--one chance in ten thousand!" he whispered. "At the
+end of this corridor there is a door--the jailer's door. If that's not
+locked, we can make a run for it! I'd rather die fighting--than here!"
+
+He slipped out again, pressing Nathaniel back.
+
+"Wait for me!"
+
+Nathaniel heard him stealing slowly through the blackness. A minute
+later he returned.
+
+"Locked!" he exclaimed.
+
+In the opposite direction a ray of light caught Nathaniel's eye.
+
+"Where does that light come from?" he asked.
+
+"Through a hole about as big as your two hands. It was made for a stove
+pipe. If we were up there we could see into the jury room."
+
+They moved quietly down the corridor until they stood under the
+aperture, which was four or five feet above their heads. Through it they
+could hear the sound of voices but could not distinguish the words that
+were being spoken.
+
+"The jury," explained Neil. "They're in a devil of a hurry! I wonder
+why?"
+
+Nathaniel could feel his companion shrug himself in the darkness.
+
+"Lord--for my revolver!" he whispered excitedly. "One shot through that
+hole would be worth a thousand notes to the girls!" He caught Marion's
+brother by the arm as a voice louder than the others came to them.
+
+"Strang!"
+
+"Yes--the--king!" affirmed Neil laying an expostulating hand on him.
+"Hush!"
+
+"I would like to see--"
+
+Even in these last hours of failure and defeat the fire of adventure
+flamed up in Nathaniel's blood. He felt his nerves leaping again to
+action, his arms grew tense with new ambition--almost he forgot that
+death had him cornered and was already preparing to strike him down.
+Another thought replaced all fear of this. A few feet beyond that log
+wall were gathered the men whose bloodthirsty deeds had written for them
+one of the reddest pages in history--men who had burned their souls out
+in the destruction of human lives, whose passions and loves and hatreds
+carried with them life and death; men who had bathed themselves in blood
+and lived in blood until the people of the mainland called them "the
+leeches."
+
+"The Mormon jury!" Nathaniel spoke the words scarcely above his breath.
+
+"I'd like to take a look through that hole, Neil," he added.
+
+"Easy enough--if you keep quiet. Here!" He doubled himself against the
+wall. "Climb up on my shoulders."
+
+No sooner had Nathaniel's face come to a level with the hole than a soft
+cry of astonishment escaped him. Neil whispered hoarsely but he did not
+reply. He was looking into a room twice as large as the dungeon cell and
+lighted by narrow windows whose lower panes were on a level with the
+ground outside. At the farther end of the room, in full view, was a
+platform raised several feet from the main floor. On this platform were
+seated ten men, immovable as statues, every face gazing straight ahead.
+Directly in front of them, on the lower floor, stood the Mormon king,
+and at his side, partly held in the embrace of one of his arms was
+Winnsome!
+
+Strang's voice came to him in a low, solemn monotone, its rumbling
+depth drowning the words he was speaking, and as Nathaniel saw him lift
+his arm from about the girl's shoulders and place his great hand upon
+her head he dug his own fingers fiercely into the rotting logs and an
+imprecation burned in his breath. He did not need to hear what the king
+was saying. It was a pantomime in which every gesture was
+understandable. But even Neil, huddled against the wall, heard the last
+words of the prophet as they thundered forth in sudden passion.
+
+"Winnsome Croche demands the death of her father's murderer!"
+
+Nathaniel felt his companion's shoulders sinking under his weight and he
+leaped quickly to the floor.
+
+"Winnsome is there!" he panted desperately. "Do you want to see her?"
+
+Neil hesitated.
+
+"No. Your boots gouge my shoulder. Take them off."
+
+The scene had changed when Nathaniel took his position again. The jury
+had left its platform and was filing through a small door. Winnsome and
+the king were along.
+
+The girl had turned from him. She was deathly pale and yet she was
+wondrously beautiful, so beautiful that Nathaniel's breath came in quick
+dread as the king approached her. He could see the triumph in his eyes,
+a terrible eagerness in his face. He seized Winnsome's hand and spoke to
+her in a soft, low voice, so low that it came to Nathaniel only in a
+murmur. Then, in a moment, he began stroking the shimmering glory of her
+hair, caressing the silken curls between his fingers until the blood
+seemed as if it must burst, like hot sweat from Nathaniel's face.
+Suddenly Winnsome drew back from him, the pallor gone from her face, her
+eyes blazing like angry stars. She had retreated but a step when the
+prophet sprang to her and caught her in his arms, straining her to him
+until the scream on her lips was choked to a gasping cry. In answer to
+that cry a yell of rage hurled itself from Nathaniel's throat.
+
+"Stop, you hell-hound!" he cried threateningly. "Stop!"
+
+He shrieked the words again and again, maddened beyond control, and the
+Mormon king, whose self-possession was more that of devil than man,
+still held the struggling girl in his arms as he turned his head toward
+the voice and saw Nathaniel's long arm and knotted fist threatening him
+through the hole in the wall. Then Neil's name in a piercing scream
+resounded through the dungeon corridor and in response to it the man
+under Nathaniel straightened himself so quickly that his companion fell
+back to the floor.
+
+"Great God! what is the matter, Nat? Quick! let me up!"
+
+Nathaniel staggered to his feet, the breath half gone out of his body,
+and in another instant Neil was at the opening. The great room into
+which he looked was empty.
+
+"What was it?" he cried, leaping down. "What were they doing with
+Winnsome?"
+
+"It was the king," said Nathaniel, struggling to master himself. "The
+king put his arms around Winnsome and--she struck him!"
+
+"That was all?"
+
+"He kissed her as she fought--and I yelled."
+
+"She struck him!" Neil cried. "God bless little Winnsome, Nat! and--God
+bless her!"
+
+Neil's breath came fast as he caught the other's hand.
+
+"I'd give my life if I could help you--and Marion!"
+
+"We'll give them together," said Nathaniel coolly, turning down the
+corridor. "Here's our chance. They'll come through that door to relock
+us in our cell. Shall we die fighting?"
+
+He was groping about in the mud of the floor for some object.
+
+"If we had a couple of stones--"
+
+"It would be madness--worse than madness!" interposed Neil, steadying
+himself. "There will be a dozen rifles at that door when they open it.
+We must return to the cell. It is worth dying a harder death to hear
+from Marion and Winnsome. And we will hear from them before night!"
+
+They retreated into the dungeon. A few minutes later the door opened
+cautiously at the head of the corridor. A light blazed through the
+blackness and after an interval of silence the jailer made his
+appearance in front of the cell, a pistol in his hand.
+
+"Don't be afraid, Jeekum," said Neil reassuringly. "You forgot the door
+and we've been having a little fun with the jury. That's all!"
+
+The nervous whiteness left Jeekum's face at this cheerful report and he
+was about to close the door when Nathaniel exhibited a handful of gold
+pieces in the candle-light and frantically beckoned the man to come in.
+The jailer's eyes glittered understandingly and with a backward glance
+down the lighted corridor he thrust his head and shoulders inside.
+
+"Five hundred dollars for that note!" he whispered. "Five hundred beside
+the four you've got!"
+
+"Jeekum's a fool!" said Neil, as the door closed on them. "I feel sorry
+for him."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Because he is accepting the money. Don't you suppose that you have been
+searched? Of course you have--probably before I came, while you were
+half dead on the floor. Somebody knows that you have the gold."
+
+"Why hasn't it been taken?"
+
+For a full minute Neil made no answer. And his answer, when it did come,
+first of all was a laugh.
+
+"By George, that's good!" he cried exultingly. "Of course you were
+searched--and by Jeekum! He knows, but he hasn't made a report of it to
+Strang because he believes that in some way he will get hold of the
+money. He is taking a big risk--but he's winning! I wonder what his
+first scheme was?"
+
+"Thought I'd bury it, perhaps," vouchsafed Nathaniel, throwing himself
+upon the straw. "There's room for two here, Neil."
+
+A long silence fell between them. The action during the last few minutes
+had been too great an effort for Nathaniel and his wound troubled him
+again. As the pain and his terrible thoughts of Marion's fate returned
+to him he regretted that they had not ended it all in one last fight at
+the door. There, at least, they might have died like men instead of
+waiting to be shot down like dogs, their hands bound behind them, their
+breasts naked to the Mormon rifles. He did not fear death. In more than
+one game he had played against its hand, more often for love of the
+sport than not, but there was a horror in being penned up and tortured
+by it. He had come to look upon it as a fair enemy, filled of course
+with subterfuge and treachery, which were the laws of the game; but he
+had never dreamed of it as anything but merciful in its quickness. It
+was as if his adversary had broken an inviolable pact with him and he
+sweated and tossed on his bed of straw while Neil sat cool and silent on
+the bench against the dungeon wall. Sheer exhaustion brought him relief,
+and after a time he fell asleep.
+
+He was awakened by Neil. The white face of Marion's brother was over him
+when he opened his eyes and he was shaking him roughly by the shoulder.
+
+"Wake up, Nat!" he cried. "For Heaven's sake--wake up!"
+
+He drew back as Nathaniel sleepily roused himself.
+
+"I couldn't help it, Nat," he apologized, laughing nervously. "You've
+lain there like a dead man for hours. My head is splitting with this
+damned silence. Come--smoke up! I got some tobacco from our jailer and
+he loaned me his pipe."
+
+Nathaniel jumped to his feet. A fresh candle was burning on the table
+and in its light he saw that a startling change had come into Neil's
+face during the hours he had slept. It looked to him thinner and whiter,
+its lines had deepened, and the young man's eyes were filled with gloomy
+dejection.
+
+"Why didn't you awaken me sooner?" he exclaimed. "I deserve a good
+drubbing for leaving you alone here!" He saw fresh food on the table.
+"It's late--" he began.
+
+"That is our dinner and supper," interrupted Neil. He held his watch
+close to the candle. "Half past eight!"
+
+"And no word--from--"
+
+"No."
+
+The two men looked deeply into each other's eyes.
+
+"Jeekum delivered my note to her at noon when he was relieved," said
+Neil. "He did not carry it personally but swears that he saw her receive
+it. He sent her word that he would call at a certain place for a reply
+when he was relieved again at five. There was no reply for him--not a
+word from Winnsome."
+
+Their silence was painful. It was Nathaniel who spoke first,
+hesitatingly, as though afraid to say what was passing in his mind.
+
+"I killed Winnsome's father, Neil," he said, "and Winnsome has demanded
+my death. I know that I am condemned to die. But you--" His eyes flashed
+sudden fire. "How do you know that my fate is to be yours? I begin to
+see the truth. Winnsome has not answered your note because she knows
+that you are to live and that she will see you soon. Between Winnsome
+and--Marion you will be saved!"
+
+Neil had taken a piece of meat and was eating it as though he had not
+heard his companion's words.
+
+"Help yourself, Nat. It's our last opportunity."
+
+"You don't believe--"
+
+"No. Lord, man, do you suppose that Strang is going to let me live to
+kill him?"
+
+Somebody was fumbling with the chain at the dungeon door.
+
+The two men stared as it opened slowly and Jeekum appeared. The jailer
+was highly excited.
+
+"I've got word--but no note!" he whispered hoarsely. "Quick! Is it
+worth--"
+
+"Yes! Yes!"
+
+Nathaniel dug the gold pieces out of his pockets and dropped them into
+the jailer's outstretched hand.
+
+"I've had my boy watching Winnsome Croche's house," continued the
+sheriff, white with the knowledge of the risk he was taking. "An hour
+ago Winnsome came out of the house and went into the woods. My boy
+followed. She ran to the lake, got into a skiff, and rowed straight out
+to sea. She is following your instructions!"
+
+In his excitement he betrayed himself. He had read the note.
+
+There came a sound up the corridor, the opening of a door, the echo of
+voices, and Jeekum leaped back. Nathaniel's foot held the cell door
+from closing.
+
+"Where is Marion?" he cried softly, his heart standing still with dread.
+"Great God--what about Marion?"
+
+For an instant the sheriff's ghastly face was pressed against the
+opening.
+
+"Marion has not been seen since morning. The king's officers are
+searching for her."
+
+The door slammed, the chains clanked loudly, and above the sound of
+Jeekum's departure Neil's voice rose in a muffled cry of joy.
+
+"They are gone! They are leaving the island!"
+
+Nathaniel stood like one turned into stone. His heart grew cold within
+him. When he spoke his words were passionless echoes of what had been.
+
+"You are sure that Marion would kill herself as soon as she became the
+wife of Strang?" he asked.
+
+"Yes--before his vile hands touched more than the dress she wore!"
+shouted Neil.
+
+"Then Marion is dead," replied Nathaniel, as coldly as though he were
+talking to the walls about him. "For last night Marion was forced into
+the harem of the king."
+
+As he revealed the secret whose torture he meant to keep imprisoned in
+his own breast he dropped upon the pallet of straw and buried his face
+between his arms, cursing himself that he had weakened in these last
+hours of their comradeship.
+
+He dared not look to see the effect of his words on Neil. His companion
+uttered no sound. Instead there was a silence that was terrifying.
+
+At the end of it Neil spoke in a voice so strangely calm that Nathaniel
+sat up and stared at him through the gloom.
+
+"I believe they are coming after us, Nat. Listen!"
+
+The tread of many feet came to them faintly from beyond the corridor
+wall.
+
+Nathaniel had risen. They drew close together, and their hands clasped.
+
+"Whatever it may be," whispered Neil, "may God have mercy on our souls!"
+
+"Amen!" breathed Captain Plum.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+"THE STRAIGHT DEATH"
+
+
+Hands were fumbling with the chain at the dungeon door.
+
+It opened and Jeekum's ashen face shone in the candle-light. For a
+moment his frightened eyes rested on the two men still standing in their
+last embrace of friendship. A word of betrayal from them and he knew
+that his own doom was sealed.
+
+He came in, followed by four men. One of them was MacDougall, the king's
+whipper. In the corridor were other faces, like ghostly shadows in the
+darkness. Only MacDougall's face was uncovered. The others were hidden
+behind white masks. The men uttered no sound but ranged themselves like
+specters in front of the door, their cocked rifles swung into the crooks
+of their arms. There was a triumphant leer on MacDougall's lips as he
+and the jailer approached. As the whipper bound Neil's hands behind his
+back he hissed in his ear.
+
+"This will be a better job than the whipping, damn you!"
+
+Neil laughed.
+
+"Hear that, Nat?" he asked, loud enough for all in the cell to hear.
+"MacDougall says this will be a better job than the whipping. He
+remembers how I thrashed him once when he said something to Marion one
+day."
+
+Neil was as cool as though acting his part in a play. His face was
+flushed, his eyes gleamed fearlessly defiant. And Nathaniel, looking
+upon the courage of this man, from under whose feet had been swept all
+hope of life, felt a twinge of shame at his own nervousness. MacDougall
+grew black with passion at the taunting reminder of his humiliation and
+tightened the thongs about Neil's wrists until they cut into the flesh.
+
+"That's enough, you coward!" exclaimed
+
+Nathaniel, as he saw the blood start. "Here--take this!"
+
+Like lightning he struck out and his fist fell with crushing force
+against the side of the man's head. MacDougall toppled back with a
+hollow groan, blood spurting from his mouth and nose. Nathaniel turned
+coolly to the four rifles leveled at his breast.
+
+"A pretty puppet to do the king's commands!" he cried. "If there's a man
+among you let him finish the work!"
+
+Jeekum had fallen upon his knees beside the whipper.
+
+"Great God!" he shrieked. "You've killed, him! You've stove in the side
+of his head!"
+
+There was a sudden commotion in the corridor. A terrible voice boomed
+forth in a roar.
+
+"Let me in!"
+
+Strang stood in the door. He gave a single glance at the man gasping and
+bleeding in the mud. Then he looked at Nathaniel. The eyes of the two
+men met unflinching. There was no hatred now in the prophet's face.
+
+"Captain Plum, I would give a tenth of my kingdom for a brother like
+you!" he said calmly. "Here--I will finish the work." He went boldly to
+the task, and as he tied Nathaniel's arms behind him he added, "The
+vicissitudes of war, Captain Plum. You are a man--and can appreciate
+what they sometimes mean!"
+
+A few minutes later, gagged and bound, the prisoners fell behind two of
+the armed guards and at a command from the king, given in a low tone to
+Jeekum, marched through the corridor and up the short flight of steps
+that led out of the jail. To Nathaniel's astonishment there was no light
+to guide them. Candles and lights had been extinguished. What words he
+heard were spoken in whispers. In the deep shadow of the prison wall a
+third guard joined the two ahead and like automatons they strode through
+the gloom with slow, measured step, their rifles held with soldierly
+precision. Nathaniel glanced over his shoulder and saw three other white
+masked faces a dozen feet away. The king had remained behind.
+
+He shuddered and looked at Neil. His companion's appearance was almost
+startling. He seemed half a head taller than himself, yet he knew that
+he was shorter by an inch or two; his shoulders were thrown back, his
+chin held high, he kept step with the guards ahead. He was marching to
+his death as coolly as though on parade.
+
+Nathaniel's heart beat excitedly as they came to where the scrub of the
+forest met the plain. They were taking the path that led to Marion's!
+Again he looked at Neil. There was no change in the fearless attitude of
+Marion's brother, no lowering of his head, no faltering in his step.
+They passed the graves and entered the opening in the forest where lay
+Marion's home, and as once more the sweet odor of lilac came to him,
+awakening within his soul all those things that he had tried to stifle
+that he might meet death like a man, he felt himself weakening, until
+only the cloth about his mouth restrained the moaning cry that forced
+itself to his lips. If he had possessed a life to give he would have
+sacrificed it gladly then for a word with the Mormon king, a last prayer
+that death might be meted to him here, where eternity would come to him
+with his glazing eyes fixed to the end upon the home of his beloved, and
+where the sweetness of the flower that had become a part of Marion
+herself might soothe the pain of his final moment on earth.
+
+His heart leaped with hope as a sharp voice from the rear commanded a
+halt. It was Jeekum. He came up out of the darkness from behind the rear
+guard, his face still unmasked, and for a few moments was in whispered
+consultation with the guards ahead. Had Strang, in the virulence of that
+hatred which he concealed so well, conceived of this spot to give added
+torment to death? It was the poetry of vengeance! For the first time
+Neil turned toward his companion. Each read what the other had guessed.
+Neil, who was nearest to the whispering four, turned suddenly toward
+them and listened. When he looked at Nathaniel again it was with a slow
+negative shake of his head.
+
+Jeekum returned quickly and placed himself between them, seizing each by
+an arm, and the forward guards, pivoting to the left, set off at their
+steady pace across the clearing. As they entered the denser gloom of the
+forest on the farther side Nathaniel felt the jailer's fingers tighten
+about his arm, then relax--and tighten again. A gentle pressure held him
+back and the guards in front gained half a dozen feet. In a low voice
+Jeekum called for those behind to fall a few paces to the rear.
+
+Then came again the mysterious working of the man's fingers on
+Nathaniel's arm.
+
+Was Jeekum signaling to him?
+
+He could see Neil's white face still turned stoically to the front.
+Evidently nothing had occurred to arouse his suspicions. If the
+maneuvering of Jeekum's fingers meant anything it was intended for him
+alone. Action had been the manna of his life. The possibility of new
+adventure, even in the face of death, thrilled him. He waited,
+breathless--and the strange pressure came again, so hard that it hurt
+his flesh.
+
+There was no longer a doubt in his mind. The king's sheriff wanted to
+speak to him.
+
+And he was afraid of the eyes and ears behind.
+
+The fingers were cautioning him to be ready--when the opportunity came.
+
+The path widened and through the thin tree-tops above their heads the
+starlight filtered down upon them. The leading guards were twenty feet
+away. How far behind were the others?
+
+A moment more and they plunged into deep night again. The figures ahead
+were mere shadows. Again the fingers dug into Nathaniel's arm, and
+pressing close to the sheriff he bent down his head.
+
+A low, quick whisper fell in his ear.
+
+"Don't give up hope! Marion--Winnsome--"
+
+The sheriff jerked himself erect without finishing. Hurried footsteps
+had come close to their heels. The rear guards were so near that they
+could have touched them with their guns. Had some spot of lesser gloom
+ahead betrayed the prisoner's bowed head and Jeekum's white face turned
+to it? There was a steady pressure on Nathaniel's arm now, a warning,
+frightened pressure, and the hand that made it trembled. Jeekum feared
+the worst--but his fear was not greater than the chill of disappointment
+that came to smother the excited beating of Nathaniel's heart. What had
+the jailer meant to say? What did he know about Marion and Winnsome, and
+why had he given birth to new hope in the same breath that he mentioned
+their names?
+
+His words carried at least one conviction. Marion was alive despite her
+brother's somber prophesies. If she had killed herself the sheriff would
+not have coupled her name with Winnsome's in the way he had.
+
+Nathaniel's nerves were breaking with suspense. He stifled his breath to
+listen, to catch the faintest whisper that might come to him from the
+white faced man at his side. Each passing moment of silence added to his
+desperation. He squeezed the sheriff's hand with his arm, but there was
+no responding signal; in a patch of thick gloom that almost concealed
+the figures ahead he pressed near to him and lowered his head again--and
+Jeekum pushed him back fiercely, with a low curse.
+
+They emerged from the forest and the clear starlight shone down upon
+them. A little distance off lay the lake in shimmering stillness.
+Nathaniel looked boldly at the sheriff now, and as his glance passed
+beyond him he was amazed at the change that had come over Neil. The
+young man's head was bowed heavily upon his breast, his shoulders were
+hunched forward, and he walked with a listless, uneven step. Was it
+possible that his magnificent courage had at last given way?
+
+A hundred steps farther they came to the beach and Nathaniel saw a boat
+at the water's edge with a single figure guarding it. Straight to this
+Jeekum led his prisoners. For the first time he spoke to them aloud.
+
+"One in front, the other in back," he said.
+
+For an instant Nathaniel found himself close beside Neil and he prodded
+him sharply with his knee. His companion did not lift his head. He made
+no sign, gave no last flashing comradeship with his eyes, but climbed
+into the bow of the boat and sat down with his chin still on his chest,
+like a man lost in stupor.
+
+Nathaniel followed him, scarcely believing his eyes, and sat himself in
+the stern, leaning comfortably against the knees of the man who took the
+tiller. He felt a curious thrill pass through him when he discovered a
+moment later that this man was Jeekum. Two men seized the oars
+amidships. A fourth, with his rifle across his knees sat facing Neil.
+
+For the first time Nathaniel found himself wondering what this voyage
+meant. Were they to be rowed far down the shore to some secret fastness
+where no other ears would hear the sound of the avenging rifles, and
+where, a few inches under the forest mold, their bodies would never be
+discovered? Each stroke of the oars added to the remoteness of this
+possibility. The boat was heading straight out to sea. Perhaps they were
+to meet a less terrible death by drowning, an end which, though
+altogether unpleasant, held something comforting in it for Captain Plum.
+Two hours passed without pause in the steady labor of the men at the
+oars. In those hours not a word was spoken. The two men amidships held
+no communication. The guard in the bow moved a little now and then only
+to relieve his cramped limbs. Neil was absolutely motionless, as though
+he had ceased to breathe. Jeekum uttered not a whisper.
+
+It was his whisper that Nathaniel waited for, the signaling clutch of
+his fingers, the sound of his breath close to his ears. Again and again
+he pressed himself against the sheriff's knees. He knew that he was
+understood, and yet there came no answer. At last he looked up, and
+Jeekum's face was far above him, staring straight and unseeing into the
+darkness ahead. His last spark of hope went out.
+
+After a time a dark rim loomed slowly up out of the sea. It was land,
+half a mile or so away. Nathaniel sat up with fresh interest, and as
+they drew nearer Jeekum rose to his feet and gazed long and steadily in
+both directions along the coast. When he returned to his seat the boat's
+course was changed. A few minutes later the bow grated upon sand. Still
+voiceless as specters the guards leaped ashore and Neil roused himself
+to follow them, climbing over the gunwale like a sick man. Nathaniel was
+close at his heels. With a growing sense of horror he saw two ghostly
+stakes thrusting themselves out of the beach a dozen paces away. He
+looked beyond them. As far as he could see there was sand--nothing but
+sand, as white as paper, scintillating in a billion flashing
+needle-points in the starlight. Instinctively he guessed what the stakes
+were for, and walked toward them with the blood turning cold in his
+veins. Neil was before him and stopped at the first stake, making no
+effort to lift his eyes as Nathaniel strode past him. At the second, a
+dozen feet beyond, Nathaniel's two guards halted, and placed him with
+his back to the post. Two minutes later, bound hand and foot to the
+stake, he shifted his head so that he could look at his companion.
+
+Neil was similarly fastened, with his face turned partly toward him.
+There was no change in his attitude. His head hung weakly upon his
+chest, as if he had fainted.
+
+What did it mean?
+
+Suddenly every nerve in Nathaniel's body leaped into excited action.
+
+The guards were entering their boat! The last man was shoving it
+off--they were rowing away! His throbbing muscles seemed ready to burst
+their bonds. The boat became indistinct in the starry gloom--a mere
+shadow--and faded in the distance. The sound of oars became fainter and
+fainter. Then, after a little, there was wafted back to him from far out
+in the lake a man's voice--the wild snatch of a song. The Mormons were
+gone! They were not to be shot! They were not--
+
+A voice spoke to him, startling him so that he would have cried out if
+it had not been for the cloth that gagged him. It was Neil, speaking
+coolly, laughingly.
+
+"How are you, Nat?"
+
+Nathaniel's staring eyes revealed his astonishment. He could see Neil
+laughing at him as though it was an unusually humorous joke in which
+they were playing a part.
+
+"Lord, but this is a funny mess!" he chuckled. "Here am I, able and
+willing to talk--and there you are, as dumb as a mummy, and looking for
+all the world as if you'd seen a ghost! What's the matter? Aren't you
+glad we're not going to be shot?"
+
+Nathaniel nodded.
+
+The other's voice became suddenly sober.
+
+"This is worse than the other, Nat. It's what we call the 'Straight
+Death.' Unless something turns up between now and to-morrow morning, or
+a little later, we'll be as dead as though they had filled us with
+bullets. Our only hope rests in the fact that I can use my lungs. That's
+why I didn't let them know when my gag became loose. I had the devil's
+own time keeping it from falling with my chin; pretty near broke my neck
+doing it. A little later, when we're sure Jeekum and his men are out of
+hearing, I'll begin calling for help. Perhaps some fisherman or
+hunter--"
+
+He stopped, and a chill ran up Nathaniel's back as he listened to a
+weird howl that came from far behind them. It was a blood-curdling
+sound and his face turned a more ghastly pallor as he gazed inquiringly
+at Neil. His companion saw the terrible question in his face.
+
+"Wolves," he said. "They're away back in the forest. They won't come
+down to us." For a moment he was silent, his eyes turned to the sea.
+Then he added, "Do you notice anything queer about the way you're bound
+to that stake, Nat?"
+
+There was a thrilling emphasis in Nathaniel's answer. He nodded his head
+affirmatively, again and again.
+
+"Your hands are tied to the post very loosely, with a slack of say six
+inches," continued Neil with an appalling precision. "There is a rawhide
+thong about your neck, wet, and so tight that it chafes your skin when
+you move your head. But the very uncomfortable thing just at this moment
+is the way your feet are fastened. Isn't that so? Your legs are drawn
+back, so that you are half resting on your toes, and I'm pretty sure
+your knees are aching right now. Eh? Well, it won't be very long before
+your legs will give way under you and the slack about your wrists will
+keep you from helping yourself. Do you know what will happen then?"
+
+He paused and Nathaniel stared at him, partly understanding, yet giving
+no sign.
+
+"You will hang upon the thong about your neck until you choke to death,"
+finished Neil. "That's the 'Straight Death.' If the end doesn't come by
+morning the sun will finish the job. It will dry out the wet rawhide
+until it grips your throat like a hand. Poetically we call it the hand
+of Strang. Pleasant, isn't it?"
+
+The grim definiteness with which he described the manner of their end
+added to those sensations which had already become acutely discomforting
+to Nathaniel. Had he possessed the use of his voice when the Mormons
+were leaving he would have called upon them to return and lengthen the
+thongs about his ankles by an inch or two. Now, with almost brutal
+frankness, Neil had explained to him the meaning of his strange
+posture. His knees began to ache. An occasional sharp pain shot up from
+them to his hips, and the thong about his neck, which at first he had
+used as a support for his chin, began to irritate him. At times he found
+himself resting upon it so heavily that it shortened his breath, and he
+was compelled to straighten himself, putting his whole weight on his
+twisted feet. It seemed an hour before Neil broke the terrible silence
+again. Perhaps it was ten minutes.
+
+"I'm going to begin," he said. "Listen. If you hear an answer nod your
+head."
+
+He drew a deep breath, turned his face as far as he could toward the
+shore, and shouted.
+
+"Help--help--help!"
+
+Again and again the thrilling words burst from his throat, and as their
+echoes floated back to them from the forest, like a thousand mocking
+voices, Nathaniel grew hot with the sweat of horror. If he could only
+have added his own voice to those cries, shrieked out the words with
+Neil--joined even unavailingly in this last fight for life, it would not
+have been so bad. But he was helpless. He watched the desperation grow
+in his companion's face as there came no response save the taunting
+echoes; even in the light of the stars he saw that face darken with its
+effort, the eyes fill with a mad light, and the throat strain against
+its choking thong. Gradually Neil's voice became weaker. When he stopped
+to rest and listen his panting breath came to Nathaniel like the hissing
+of steam. Soon the echoes failed to come back from the forest, and
+Nathaniel fought like a crazed man to free himself, jerking at the
+thongs that held him until his wrists were bleeding and the rawhide
+about his neck choked him.
+
+"No use!" he heard Neil say. "Better take it easy for a while, Nat!"
+
+Marion's brother had turned toward him, his head thrown back against the
+stake, his face lifted to the sky. Nathaniel raised his own head, and
+found that he could breath easier. For a long time his companion did not
+break the silence. Mentally he began counting off the seconds. It was
+past midnight--probably one o'clock. Dawn came at half past two, the sun
+rose an hour later. Three hours to live! Nathaniel lowered his head, and
+the rawhide tightened perceptibly at the movement. Neil was watching
+him. His face shone as white as the starlit sand. His mouth was partly
+open.
+
+"I'm devilish sorry--for you--Nat--" he said.
+
+His words came with painful slowness. There was a grating huskiness in
+his voice.
+
+"This damned rawhide--is pinching--my Adam's apple--"
+
+He smiled. His white teeth gleamed, his eyes laughed, and with a heart
+bursting with grief Nathaniel looked away from him. He had seen courage,
+but never like this, and deep down in his soul he prayed--prayed that
+death might come to him first, so that he might not have to look upon
+the agonies of this other, whose end would be ghastly in its fearless
+resignation. His own suffering had become excruciating. Sharp pains
+darted like red-hot needles through his limbs, his back tortured him,
+and his head ached as though a knife had cloven the base of his skull.
+Still--he could breathe. By pressing his head against the post it was
+not difficult for him to fill his lungs with air. But the strength of
+his limbs was leaving him. He no longer felt any sensation in his
+cramped feet. His knees were numb. He measured the paralysis of death
+creeping up his legs inch by inch, driving the sharp pains before it,
+until suddenly his weight tottered under him and he hung heavily upon
+the thong about his throat. For a full half minute he ceased to breathe,
+and a feeling of ineffable relief swept over him, for during those few
+seconds his body was at rest. He found that by a backward contortion he
+could bring himself erect again, and that for a few minutes after each
+respite it was not so difficult for him to stand.
+
+After a third effort he turned again toward Neil. A groan of horror rose
+to his imprisoned lips. His companion's face was full upon him, ghastly
+white; his eyes were wide and staring, like balls of shimmering glass in
+the starlight, and his throat was straining at the fatal rawhide!
+Nathaniel heard no sound, saw no stir of life in the inanimate figure.
+
+A moaning, wordless cry broke through the cloth that gagged him.
+
+At the sound of that cry, faint, terrifying, with all the horror that
+might fill a human soul in its inarticulate note, a shudder of life
+passed into Neil's body. Weakly he flung himself back, stood poised for
+an instant against the stake, then fell again upon the deadly thong.
+Twice--three times he made the effort, and failed. And to Nathaniel,
+staring wild eyed and silent now, the spectacle was one that seemed to
+blast the very soul within him and send his blood in rushing torrents of
+fire to his sickened brain. Neil was dying! A fourth time he struggled
+back. A fifth--and he held his ground. Even in that passing instant
+something like a flash of his buoyant smile flickered in his face and
+there came to Nathaniel's ears like a throttled whisper--his name.
+
+"Nat--"
+
+And no more.
+
+The head fell forward again. And Nathaniel, turning his face away, saw
+something come up out of the shimmering sea, like a shadow before his
+blistering eyes, and as his own limbs went out from under him and he
+felt the strangling death at his throat there came from that shadow a
+cry that seemed to snap his very heartstrings--a piercing cry and (even
+in his half consciousness he recognized it) a woman's cry! He flung
+himself back, and for a moment he saw Neil struggling, the last spark of
+life in him stirred by that same cry; and then across the white sand two
+figures flew madly toward them and even as the hot film in his eyes grew
+thicker he knew that one of them was Marion, and that the other was
+Winnsome Croche.
+
+His heart seemed to stop beating. He strove to pull himself together,
+but his head fell forward. Faintly, as on a battlefield, voices came to
+him, and when with a superhuman effort he straightened himself for an
+instant he saw that Neil was no longer at the stake but was stretched on
+the sand, and of the two figures beside him one suddenly sprang to her
+feet and ran to him. And then Marion's terror-filled face was close to
+his own, and Marion's lips were moaning his name, and Marion's hands
+were slashing at the thongs that bound him. When with a great sigh of
+joy he crumpled down upon the earth he knew that he was slipping off
+into oblivion with Marion's arms about his neck, and with her lips
+pressing to his the sweet elixir of her love.
+
+Darkness enshrouded him but a few moments, when a dash of cool water
+brought him back into light. He felt himself lowered upon the sand and
+after a breath or two he twisted himself on his elbow and saw that
+Neil's white face was held on Winnsome's breast and that Marion was
+running up from the shore with more water. For a space she knelt beside
+her brother, and then she hurried to him. Joy shone in her face. She
+fell upon her knees and drew his head in the hollow of her arm, crooning
+mad senseless words to him, and bathing his face with water, her eyes
+shining down upon him gloriously. Nathaniel reached up and touched her
+face, and she bowed her head until her hair smothered him in sweet
+gloom, and kissed him. He drew her lips to his own, and then she lowered
+him gently and stood up in the starlight, looking first at Neil and next
+down at him; and then she turned quickly back to the sea.
+
+From down near the shore she called back some word, and with a shrill
+cry Winnsome followed her. Nathaniel struggled to his elbow, to his
+knees--staggered to his feet. He saw the boat drifting out into the
+night, and Winnsome standing alone at the water-edge, her sobbing cries
+of entreaty, of terror, following it unanswered. He tottered down toward
+her, gaining new strength at each step, but when he reached her the boat
+was no longer to be seen and Winnsome's face was whiter than the sands
+under her feet.
+
+"She is gone--gone--" she moaned, stretching out her arms to him. "She
+is going--back to Strang!"
+
+And then, from far out in the white glory of the night, there came back
+to him the voice of the girl he loved.
+
+"Good-by--Good-by--"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+MARION FREED FROM BONDAGE
+
+
+"Gone!" moaned Winnsome again. "She has gone--back--to--Strang!"
+
+Neil was crawling to them like a wounded animal across the sand.
+
+She started toward him but Nathaniel stopped her.
+
+"She is the king's--wife--"
+
+His throat was swollen so that he could hardly speak.
+
+"No. They are to be married to-night. Oh, I thought she was going to
+stay!" She tore herself away from him to go to Neil, who had fallen upon
+his face exhausted, a dozen yards away.
+
+In the wet sand, where the incoming waves lapped his hands and feet,
+Nathaniel sank down, his eyes staring out into the shimmering distance
+where Marion had gone. His brain was in a daze, and he wondered if he
+had been stricken by some strange madness--if this all was but some
+passing phantasm that would soon leave him again to his misery and his
+despair. But the dash of the cold water against him cleared away his
+doubt. Marion had come to him. She had saved him from death. And now she
+was gone.
+
+And she was not the king's wife!
+
+He staggered to his feet again and plunged into the lake until the water
+reached to his waist, calling her name, entreating her in weak, half
+choked cries to come back to him. The water soaked through to his hot,
+numb body, restoring his reason and strength, and he buried his face in
+it and drank like one who had been near to dying of thirst. Then he
+returned to Neil. Winnsome was holding his head in her arms.
+
+He dropped upon his knees beside them and saw that life was returning
+full and strong in Neil's face.
+
+"You will be able to walk in a few minutes," he said. "You and Winnsome
+must leave here. We are on the mainland and if you follow the shore
+northward you will come to the settlements. I am going back for Marion."
+
+Neil made an effort to follow him as he rose to his feet.
+
+"Nat--Nat--wait--"
+
+Winnsome held him back, frightened, tightening her arms about him.
+
+"You must go with Winnsome," urged Nathaniel, seizing the hand that Neil
+stretched up to him. "You must take her to the first settlement up the
+coast. I will come back to you with Marion."
+
+He spoke confidently, as a man who sees his way open clearly before him,
+and yet as he turned, half running, to the low black shadow of the
+distant forest he knew that he was beginning a blind fight against fate.
+If he could find a hunter's cabin, a fisherman's shanty--a boat!
+
+Barely had he disappeared when a voice called to him. It was Winnsome.
+The girl ran up to him holding something in her hand. It was a pistol.
+"You may need it!" she exclaimed. "We brought two!"
+
+Nathaniel reached out hesitatingly, but not to take the weapon. Gently,
+as though his touch was about to fall upon some fragile flower, he drew
+the girl to him, took her beautiful face between his two strong hands
+and gazed steadily and silently for a moment into her eyes.
+
+"God bless you, little Winnsome!" he whispered. "I hope that someday you
+will--forgive me."
+
+The girl understood him.
+
+"If I have anything to forgive--you are forgiven."
+
+The pistol dropped upon the sand, her hands stole to his shoulders.
+
+"I want you to take something to Marion for me," she whispered softly.
+"This!"
+
+And she kissed him.
+
+Her eyes shone upon him like a benediction.
+
+"You have given me a new life, you have given me--Neil! My prayers are
+with you."
+
+And kissing him again, she slipped away from under his hands before he
+could speak.
+
+And Nathaniel, following her with his eyes until he could no longer see
+her, picked up the pistol and set off again toward the forest, the touch
+of her lips and the prayers of this girl whose father he had slain
+filling him with something that was more than strength, more than hope.
+Life had been given to him again, strong, fighting life, and with it and
+Winnsome's words there returned his old confidence, his old daring.
+There was everything for him to win now. His doubts and his fears had
+been swept away. Marion was not dead, she was not the king's wife--and
+it was not of another that he had accepted proof of her love for him,
+for he had felt the pressure of her arms about his neck and the warmth
+of her lips upon his face. He had until night--and the dawn was just
+beginning to break. Ten or fifteen miles to the north there were
+settlements, and between there were scores of settlers' homes and
+fishermen's shanties. Surely within an hour or two he would find a boat.
+
+He turned where the edge of the forest came down to meet the white
+water-run of the sea, and set off at a slow, steady trot into the north.
+If he could reach a boat soon he might overtake Marion in mid-lake. The
+thought thrilled him, and urged him to greater speed. As the stars faded
+away in the dawn he saw the dark barrier of the forest drifting away,
+and later, when the light broke more clearly, there stretched out ahead
+of him mile upon mile of desert dunes. As far as he could see there was
+no hope of life. He slowed his steps now, for he would need to preserve
+his strength. Yet he experienced no fear, no loss of confidence. Each
+moment added to his faith in himself. Before noon he would be on his
+way to the Mormon kingdom, by nightfall he would be upon its shores.
+After that--
+
+He examined the pistol that Winnsome had given him. There were five
+shots in it and he smiled joyously as he saw that it had been loaded by
+an experienced hand. It would be easy enough for him to find Strang. He
+would not consider the woman--his wife. The king's wife! Like a flash
+there occurred to him the incident of the battlefield. Was it this
+woman--the woman who had begged him to spare the life of the prophet,
+who had knelt beside him, and whispered in his ear, and kissed him? Had
+that been her reward for the sacrifice she believed he had made for her
+in the castle chamber? The thought of this woman, whose beauty and love
+breathed the sweet purity of a flower and whose faith to her king and
+master was still unbroken even in her hour of repudiation fell upon him
+heavily. For there was no choice, no shadow of alternative. There was
+but one way for him to break the bondage of the girl he loved.
+
+For hours he trod steadily through the sand. The sun rose above him, hot
+and blistering, and the dunes still stretched out ahead of him, like
+winnows and hills and mountains of glittering glass. Gradually the
+desert became narrower. Far ahead he could see where the forest came
+down to the shore and his heart grew lighter. Half an hour later he
+entered the margin of trees. Almost immediately he found signs of life.
+A tree had been felled and cut into wood. A short distance beyond he
+came suddenly upon a narrow path, beaten hard by the passing of feet,
+and leading toward the lake. He had meant to rest under the shade of
+these trees but now he forgot his fatigue. For a moment he hesitated.
+Far back in the forest he heard the barking of a dog--but he turned in
+the opposite direction. If there was a boat the path would take him to
+it. Through a break in the trees he caught the green sweep of marsh rice
+and his heart beat excitedly with hope. Where there was rice there were
+wild-fowl, and surely where there were wild-fowl, there would be a punt
+or a canoe! In his eagerness he ran, and where the path ended, the flags
+and rice beaten into the mud and water, he stopped with an exultant cry.
+At his feet was a canoe. It was wet, as though just drawn out of the
+water, and a freshly used paddle was lying across the bow. Pausing but
+to take a quick and cautious glance about him he shoved the frail craft
+into the lake and with a few quiet strokes buried himself in the rice
+grass. When he emerged from it he was half a mile from the shore.
+
+For a long time he sat motionless, looking out over the shimmering sea.
+Far to the south and west he could make out the dim outline of Beaver
+Island, while over the trail he had come, mile upon mile, lay the
+glistening dunes. Somewhere between the white desert sand and that
+distant coast of the Mormon kingdom Marion was making her way back to
+bondage. Nathaniel had given up all hope of overtaking her now. Long
+before he could intercept her she would have reached the island. When he
+started again he paddled slowly, and laid out for himself the plan that
+he was to follow. There must be no mistake this time, no error in
+judgment, no rashness in his daring. He would lie in hiding until dusk,
+and then under cover of darkness he would hunt down Strang and kill him.
+After that he would fly to his canoe and escape. A little later, perhaps
+that very night if fate played the game well for him, he would return
+for Marion. And yet, as he went over and over his scheme, whipping
+himself into caution--into cool deliberation--there burned in his blood
+a fire that once or twice made him set his teeth hard, a fire that
+defied extinction, that smoldered only to await the breath that would
+fan it into a fierce blaze. It was the fire that had urged him into the
+rescue at the whipping-post, that had sent him single-handed to invade
+the king's castle, that had hurled him into the hopeless battle upon the
+shore. He swore at himself softly, laughingly, as he paddled steadily
+toward Beaver Island.
+
+The sun mounted straight and hot over his head; he paddled more slowly,
+and rested more frequently, as it descended into the west, but it still
+lacked two hours of sinking behind the island forest when the white
+water-run of the shore came within his vision. He had meant to hold off
+the coast until the approach of evening but changed his mind and landed,
+concealing his canoe in a spot which he marked well, for he knew it
+would soon be useful to him again. Deep shadows were already gathering
+in the forest and through these Nathaniel made his way slowly in the
+direction of St. James. Between him and the town lay Marion's home and
+the path that led to Obadiah's. Once more the spirit of impatience, of
+action, stirred within him. Would Marion go first to her home?
+Involuntarily he changed his course so that it would bring him to the
+clearing. He assured himself that it would do no harm, that he still
+would take no chances.
+
+He came out in the strip of dense forest between the clearing and St.
+James, worming his way cautiously through the underbrush until he could
+look out into the opening. A single glance and he drew back in
+astonishment. He looked again, and his face turned suddenly white, and
+an almost inaudible cry fell from his lips. There was no longer a cabin
+in the clearing! Where it had been there was gathered a crowd of men and
+boys. Above their heads he saw a thin film of smoke and he knew what had
+happened. Marion's home had burned! But what was the crowd doing? It
+hung close in about the smoldering ruins as if every person in it were
+striving to reach a common center. Surely a mere fire would not gather
+and hold a throng like this.
+
+Nathaniel rose to his feet and thrust his head and shoulders from his
+hiding-place. He heard a loud shout near him and drew back quickly as a
+boy rushed madly across the opening toward the crowd, crying out at the
+top of his voice. He had come out of the path that led to St. James. No
+sooner had he reached the group about the burned cabin than there came a
+change that added to Nathaniel's bewilderment. He heard loud voices, the
+excited shouting of men and the shrill cries of boys, and the crowd
+suddenly began to move, thinning itself out until it was racing in a
+black stream toward the Mormon city. In his excitement Nathaniel hurried
+toward the path. From the concealment of a clump of bushes he watched
+the people as they rushed past him a dozen paces away. Behind all the
+others there came a figure that drew a sharp cry from him as he leaped
+from his hiding-place. It was Obadiah Price.
+
+"Obadiah!" he called. "Obadiah Price!"
+
+The old man turned. His face was livid. He was chattering to himself,
+and he chattered still as he ran up to Nathaniel. He betrayed no
+surprise at seeing him, and yet there was the insane grip of steel in
+the two hands that clutched fiercely at Nathaniel's.
+
+"You have come in time, Nat!" he panted joyfully. "You have come in
+time! Hurry--hurry--hurry--"
+
+He ran back into the clearing, with Nathaniel close at his side, and
+pointed to the smoking ruins of the cabin among the lilacs.
+
+"They were killed last night!" he cried shrilly. "Somebody murdered
+them--and burned them with the house! They are dead--dead!"
+
+"Who?" shouted Nathaniel.
+
+Obadiah had stopped and was rubbing and twisting his hands in his old,
+mad way.
+
+"The old folks. Ho, ho, the old folks, of course! They are
+dead--dead--dead--"
+
+He fairly shrieked the words. Then, for a moment, he stood tightly
+clutching his thin hands over his chest in a powerful effort to control
+himself.
+
+"They are dead!" he repeated.
+
+He spoke more calmly, and yet there was something so terrible in his
+eyes, something so harshly vibrant of elation in the quivering passion
+of his voice that Nathaniel felt himself filled with a strange horror.
+He caught him by the arm, shaking him as he would have shaken a child.
+
+"Where is Marion?" he asked. "Tell me, Obadiah--where is Marion?"
+
+The councilor seemed not to have heard him. A singular change came into
+his face and his eyes traveled beyond Nathaniel. Following his glance
+the young man saw that three men had appeared from the scorched
+shrubbery about the burned house and were hurrying toward them. Without
+shifting his eyes Obadiah spoke to him quickly.
+
+"Those are king's sheriffs, Nat," he said. "They know me. In a moment
+they will recognize you. The United States warship _Michigan_ has just
+arrived in the harbor to arrest Strang. If you can reach the cabin and
+hold it for an hour you will be saved. Quick--you must run--"
+
+"Where is Marion?"
+
+"At the cabin! She is at--"
+
+Nathaniel waited to hear no more, but sped toward the breach in the
+forest that marked the beginning of the path to Obadiah's. The shouts of
+the king's men came to him unheeded. At the edge of the woods he glanced
+back and saw that they had overtaken the councilor. As he ran he drew
+his pistol and in his wild joy he flung back a shout of defiance to the
+men who were pursuing him. Marion was at the cabin--and a government
+ship had come to put an end to the reign of the Mormon king! He shouted
+Marion's name as he came in sight of the cabin; he cried it aloud as he
+bounded up the low steps.
+
+"Marion--Marion--"
+
+In front of the door that led to the tiny chamber in which he had taken
+Obadiah's gold he saw a figure. For a moment he was blinded by his
+sudden dash from the light of day into the gloom of the cabin, and he
+saw only that a figure was standing there, as still as death. His
+pistol dropped to the floor. He stretched out his arms, and his voice
+sobbed in its entreaty as he whispered the girl's name. In response to
+that whisper came a low, glad cry, and Marion lay trembling on his
+breast.
+
+"I have come back for you!" he breathed.
+
+He felt her heart beating against him. He pressed her closer, and her
+arms slipped about his neck.
+
+"I have come back for you!"
+
+He was almost crying, like a boy, in his happiness.
+
+"I love you, I love you--"
+
+He felt the warm touch of her lips.
+
+"You will go with me?"
+
+"If you want me," she whispered. "If you want me--after you know--what I
+am--"
+
+She shuddered against his breast, and he raised her face between his two
+hands and kissed her until she drew away from him, crying softly.
+
+[Illustration: Marion]
+
+"You must wait--you must wait!"
+
+He saw now in her face an agony that appalled him. He would have gone to
+her again, but there came loud voices from the forest, and recovering
+his pistol he sprang to the door. Half a hundred paces away were Obadiah
+and the king's sheriffs. They had stopped and the councilor was
+expostulating excitedly with the men, evidently trying to keep them from
+the cabin. Suddenly one of the three broke past him and ran swiftly
+toward the open door, and with a shriek of warning to Nathaniel the old
+councilor drew a pistol and fired point blank in the sheriff's back. In
+another instant the two men behind had fired and Obadiah fell forward
+upon his face.
+
+With a yell of rage Nathaniel leaped from the door. He heard Marion cry
+out his name, but his fighting blood was stirred and he did not stop.
+Obadiah had given up his life for him, for Marion, and he was mad with a
+desire to wreak vengeance upon the murderers. The first man lay where he
+had fallen, with Obadiah's bullet through his back. The other two fired
+again as Nathaniel rushed down upon them. He heard the zip of one of the
+balls, which came so close that it stung his cheek.
+
+"Take that!" he cried.
+
+He fired, still running--once, twice, three times and one of the two men
+crumpled down as though a powerful blow had broken his legs under him.
+
+The other turned into the path and ran. Nathaniel caught a glimpse of a
+frightened, boyish face, and something of mercy prompted him to hold the
+shot he was about to send through his lungs.
+
+"Stop!" he shouted. "Stop!"
+
+He aimed at the fugitive's legs and fired.
+
+"Stop!"
+
+The boyish sheriff was lengthening the distance between them and
+Nathaniel halted to make sure of his last ball. He was about to shoot
+when there came a sharp command from down the path and a file of men
+burst into view, running at double-quick. He saw the flash of a saber,
+the gleam of brass buttons, the blue glare of the setting sun on leveled
+carbines, and he stopped, shoulder to shoulder with the man he had been
+pursuing. For a moment he stared as the man with the naked saber
+approached. Then he sprang toward him with a joyful cry of recognition.
+
+"My God, Sherly--Sherly--"
+
+He stood with his arms stretched out, his naked chest heaving.
+
+"Sherly--Lieutenant Sherly--don't you know me?"
+
+The lieutenant had dropped the point of his saber. He advanced a step,
+his face filled with astonishment.
+
+"Plum!" he cried incredulously. "Is it you?"
+
+For the moment Nathaniel could only wring the other's hand. He tried to
+speak but his breath choked him.
+
+"I told you in Chicago that I was going to blow up this damned
+island--if you wouldn't do it for me--", he gasped at last. "I've had--a
+hell of a time--"
+
+"You look it!" laughed the lieutenant. "We got our orders the second day
+after you left to 'Arrest Strang, and break up the Mormon kingdom!'
+We've got Strang aboard the _Michigan_. But he's dead."
+
+"Dead!"
+
+"He was shot in the back by one of his own men as we were bringing him
+up the gang-way. The fellow who killed him has given himself up, and
+says that he did it because Strang had him publicly whipped day before
+yesterday. I'm up here hunting for a man named Obadiah Price. Do you
+know--"
+
+Nathaniel interrupted him excitedly.
+
+"What do you want with Obadiah Price?"
+
+"The president of the United States wants him. That's all I know. Where
+is he?"
+
+"Back there--dead or very badly wounded! We've just had a fight with the
+king's men--"
+
+The lieutenant broke in with a sharp command to his men.
+
+"Quick, lead us to him. Captain Plum! If he's not dead--"
+
+He started off at a half run beside Nathaniel.
+
+"Lord, it's a pretty mess if he is!" he added breathlessly. Without
+pausing he called back over his shoulder, "Regan, fall out and return to
+the ship. Tell the captain that Obadiah Price is badly wounded and that
+we want the surgeon on the run!"
+
+A turn in the path brought them to the opening where the fight had
+occurred. Marion was on her knees beside the old councilor.
+
+Nathaniel hurried ahead of the lieutenant and his men. The girl glanced
+up at him and his heart filled with dread at the terror in her eyes.
+
+"Is he dead?"
+
+"No--but--" Her voice trembled with tears.
+
+Nathaniel did not let her finish. Gently he raised her to her feet as
+the lieutenant came up.
+
+"You must go to the cabin, sweetheart," he whispered.
+
+Even in this moment of excitement and death his great love drove all
+else from his eyes, and the blood surged into Marion's pale cheeks as
+she tremblingly gave him her hand. He led her to the door, and held her
+for a moment in his arms.
+
+"Strang is dead," he said softly. In a few words he told her what had
+happened and turned back to the door, leaving her speechless.
+
+"If he is dying--you will tell me--" she called after him.
+
+"Yes, yes, I will tell you."
+
+He ran back into the opening.
+
+The lieutenant had doubled his coat under Obadiah's head and his face
+was pale as he looked up at Nathaniel. The latter saw in his eyes what
+his lips kept silent. The officer held something in his hand. It was the
+mysterious package which Captain Plum had taken his oath to deliver to
+the president of the United States.
+
+"I don't dare move until the surgeon comes," said the lieutenant. "He
+wants to speak to you. I believe, if he has anything to say you had
+better hear it now."
+
+His last words were in a whisper so low that Nathaniel scarcely heard
+them. As the lieutenant rose to his feet, he whispered again.
+
+"He is dying!"
+
+Obadiah's eyes opened as Nathaniel knelt beside him and from between his
+thin lips there came faintly the old, gurgling chuckle.
+
+"Nat!" he breathed. His thin hand sought his companion's and clung to it
+tightly. "We have won. The vengeance of God--has come!"
+
+In these last moments all madness had left the eyes of Obadiah Price.
+
+"I want to tell you--" he whispered, and Nathaniel bent low. "I have
+given him the package. It is evidence I have gathered--all these
+years--to destroy the Mormon kingdom."
+
+He tried to turn his head.
+
+"Marion--" he whispered wistfully.
+
+"She will come," said Nathaniel. "I will call her."
+
+"No--not yet."
+
+Obadiah's fingers tightened about Captain Plum's.
+
+"I want to tell--you."
+
+For a few moments he seemed struggling to command all his strength.
+
+"A good many years ago," he said, as if speaking to himself, "I loved a
+girl--like Marion, and she loved me--as Marion loves you. Her people
+were Mormons, and they went to Kirtland--and I followed them. We planned
+to escape and go east, for my Jean was good and beautiful, and hated the
+Mormons as I hated them. But they caught us and--thought--they--killed--"
+
+The old man's lips twitched and a convulsive shudder shook his body.
+
+"When everything came back to me I was older--much older," he went on.
+"My hair was white. I was like an old man. My people had found me and
+they told me that I had been mad for three years, Nat--mad--mad--mad!
+and that a great surgeon had operated on my head, where they struck
+me--and brought me back to reason. Nat--Nat--" He strained to raise
+himself, gasping excitedly. "God, I was like you then, Nat! I went back
+to fight for my Jean. She was gone. Nobody knew me, for I was an old
+man. I hunted from settlement to settlement. In my madness I became a
+Mormon, for vengeance--in hope of finding her. I was rich, and I became
+powerful. I was made an elder because of my gold. Then I found--"
+
+A moan trembled on the old man's lips.
+
+"--they had forced her to marry--the son of a Mormon--"
+
+He stopped, and for a moment his eyes seemed filling with the glazed
+shadows of death. He roused himself almost fiercely.
+
+"But he loved my Jean, Nat--he loved her as I loved her--and he was a
+good man!", he whispered shrilly. "Quick--quick--I must tell you--they
+had tried to escape from Missouri and the Danites killed him,--and
+Joseph Smith wanted Jean and at the last moment she killed herself to
+save her honor as Marion was going to do, and she left two children--"
+
+He coughed and blood flecked his lips.
+
+"She left--Marion and Neil!"
+
+He sank back, ashen white and still, and with a cry Nathaniel turned to
+the lieutenant. The officer ran forward with a flask in his hand.
+
+"Give him this!"
+
+The touch of liquor to Obadiah's lips revived him. He whispered weakly.
+
+"The children, Nat--I tried to find them--and years after--I did--in
+Nauvoo. The man and woman who had killed the father in their own house
+had taken them and were raising them as their own. I went mad!
+Vengeance--vengeance--I lived for it, year after year. I wanted the
+children--but if I took them all would be lost. I followed them,
+watched them, loved them--and they loved me. I would wait--wait--until
+my vengeance would fall like the hand of God, and then I would free
+them, and tell them how beautiful their mother was. When Joseph Smith
+was killed and the split came the old folks followed Strang--and I--I
+too--"
+
+He rested a moment, breathing heavily.
+
+"I brought my Jean with me and buried her up there on the hill--the
+middle grave, Nat, the middle grave--Marion's mother."
+
+Nathaniel pressed the liquor to the old man's lips again.
+
+"My vengeance was at hand--I was almost ready--when Strang learned a
+part of the secret," he continued with an effort. "He found the old
+people were murderers. When Marion would not become his wife he told her
+what they had done. He showed her the evidence! He threatened them with
+death unless Marion became his wife. His sheriffs watched them night
+and day. He named the hour of their doom--unless Marion yielded to him.
+And to save them, her supposed parents--to keep the terrible knowledge of
+their crime from Neil--Marion--was--going--to--sacrifice--herself--when--"
+
+Again he stopped. His breath was coming more faintly.
+
+"I understand," whispered Nathaniel. "I understand--"
+
+Obadiah's dimming eyes gazed at him steadily.
+
+"I thought my vengeance would come--in time--to save her, Nat. But--it
+failed. I knew of one other way and when all seemed lost--I took it. I
+killed the old people--the murderers of her father--of my Jean! I knew
+that would destroy Strang's power--"
+
+In a sudden spasm of strength he lifted his head. His voice came in a
+hoarse, excited whisper.
+
+"You won't tell Marion--you won't tell Marion that I killed them--"
+
+"No--never."
+
+Obadiah fell back with a relieved sigh. After a moment he added.
+
+"In a chest in the cabin there is a letter for Marion. It tells her
+about her mother--and the gold there--is for her--and Neil--"
+
+His eyes closed. A shudder passed through his form.
+
+"Marion--" he breathed. "Marion!"
+
+Nathaniel rose to his feet and ran to the cabin door.
+
+"Marion!" he called.
+
+Blinding tears shut out the vision of the girl from his eyes. He
+pointed, looking from her, and she, knowing what he meant, sped past him
+to the old councilor.
+
+In the great low room in which Obadiah Price had spent so many years
+planning his vengeance Captain Plum waited.
+
+After a time, the girl came back.
+
+There was great pain in her voice as she stretched out her arms to him
+blindly, sobbing his name.
+
+"Gone--gone--they're all gone now--but Neil!"
+
+Nathaniel held out his arms.
+
+"Only Neil,"--he cried, "only Neil--Marion--?"
+
+"And you--you--you--"
+
+Her arms were around his neck, he held her throbbing against his breast.
+
+"And you--"
+
+She raised her face, glorious in its love.
+
+"If you want me--still."
+
+And he whispered:
+
+"For ever and for ever!"
+
+
+THE END
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Courage of Captain Plum
+by James Oliver Curwood
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 12388 ***