The Courage of Captain Plum - James Oliver Curwood (the best novels to read .TXT) 📗

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