A few days later Grace welcomed her husband with a long, close embrace, but with streaming eyes; while he bowed his head upon her shoulder and groaned in the bitterness of his spirit.
"Next to losing you, Grace," he said, "this is the heaviest blow I could receive; and to think that he gave his life for me! How can I ever face Mrs. Mayburn?"
But his wife comforted him as only she knew how to soothe and bless; and Mrs. Mayburn saw that he was as sincere a mourner as herself. Moreover they would not despair of Graham, for although he had been seen to fall, he might only have been wounded and made a prisoner. Thus the bitterness of their grief was mitigated by hope.
This hope was fulfilled in a most unexpected way, by a cheerful letter from Graham himself; and the explanation of this fact requires that the story should return to him.
He thought that the sentence of death which he had passed upon himself had been carried into effect. He had felt himself falling, and then there had been sudden darkness. Like a dim taper flickering in the night, the spark of life began to kindle again. At first he was conscious of but one truth-that he was not dead. Where he now was, in this world or some other, what he now was, he did not know; but the essential
ego, Alford Graham, had not ceased to exist. The fact filled him with a dull, wondering awe. Memory slowly revived, and its last impression was that he was to die and had died, and yet he was not dead.
As a man's characteristic traits will first assert themselves, he lay still and feebly tried to comprehend it all. Suddenly a strange, horrid sound smote upon his senses and froze his blood with dread. It must be life after death, for only his mind appeared to have any existence. He could not move. Again the unearthly sound, which could not be a human shriek, was repeated; and by half-involuntary and desperate effort he started up and looked around. The scene at first was obscure, confused, and awful. His eye could not explain it, and he instinctively stretched out his hands; and through the sense of touch all that had happened came back to his confused brain. He first felt of himself, passed his hand over his forehead, his body, his limbs: he certainly was in the flesh, and that to his awakening intelligence meant much, since it accorded with his belief that life and the body were inseparable. Then he felt around him in the darkness, and his hands touched the grassy field. This fact righted him speedily. As in the old fable, when he touched the earth he was strong. He next noted that his head rested on a smooth rock that rose but little above the plain, and that he must have fallen upon it. He sat up and looked around; and as the brain gradually resumed its action after its terrible shock, the situation became intelligible. The awful sounds that he had heard came from a wounded horse that was struggling feebly in the light of the rising moon, now in her last quarter. He was upon the scene of last evening's conflict, and the obscure objects that lay about him were the bodies of the dead. Yes, there before him were the two men he had killed; and their presence brought such a strong sense of repugnance and horror that he sprang to his feet and recoiled away.
He looked around. There was not a living object in sight except the dying horse. The night wind moaned about him, and soughed and sighed as if it were a living creature mourning over the scene.
It became clear to him that he had been left as dead. Yes, and he had been robbed, too; for he shivered, and found that his coat and vest were gone, also his hat, his money, his watch, and his boots. He walked unsteadily to the little bridge, and where he had left his line of faithful men, all was dark and silent. With a great throb of joy he remembered that Hilland must have sped across that bridge to safety, while he had expiated his evil thought.
He then returned and circled around the place. He was evidently alone; but the surmise occurred to him that the Confederates would return in the morning to bury their dead, and if he would escape he must act promptly. And yet he could not travel in his present condition. He must at least have hat, coat, and boots. His only resource was to take them from the dead; but the thought of doing so was horrible to him. Reason about it as he might, he drew near their silent forms with an uncontrollable repugnance. He almost gave up his purpose, and took a few hasty steps away, but a thorn pierced his foot and taught him his folly. Then his imperious will asserted itself, and with an imprecation on his weakness he returned to the nearest silent form, and took from it a limp felt hat, a coat, and a pair of boots, all much the worse for wear; and having arrayed himself in these, started on the trail of the Union force.
He had not gone over a mile when, on surmounting an eminence, he saw by dying fires in a grove beneath him that he was near the bivouac of a body of soldiers. He hardly hoped they could be a detachment of Union men; and yet the thought that it was possible led him to approach stealthily within earshot. At last he heard one patrol speak to another in unmistakable Southern accent, and he found that the enemy was in his path.
Silently as a ghost he stole away, and sought to make a wide detour to the left, but soon lost himself hopelessly in a thick wood. At last, wearied beyond mortal endurance, he crawled into what seemed the obscurest place he could find, and lay down and slept.
The sun was above the horizon when he awoke, stiff, sore, and hungry, but refreshed, rested. A red squirrel was barking at him derisively from a bough near, but no other evidences of life were to be seen. Sitting up, he tried to collect his thoughts and decide upon his course. It at once occurred to him that he would be missed, and that pursuit might be made with hounds. At once he sprang to his feet and made his way toward a valley, which he hoped would be drained by a running stream. The welcome sound of water soon guided him, and pushing through the underbrush he drank long and deeply, bathed the ugly bruise on his head, and then waded up the current.
He had not gone much over half a mile before he saw through an opening a negro gazing wonderingly at him. "Come here, my good fellow," he cried.
The man approached slowly, cautiously.
"I won't hurt you," Graham resumed; "indeed you can see that I'm in your power. Won't you help me?"
"Dunno, mas'r," was the non-committal reply.
"Are you in favor of Lincoln's men or the Confederates?" "Dunno, mas'r. It 'pends."
"It depends upon what?"
"On whedder you'se a Linkum man or 'Federate."
"Well, then, here's the truth. The Lincoln men are your best friends, if you've sense enough to know it; and I'm one of them. I was in the fight off there yesterday, and am trying to escape."
"Oh golly! I'se sense enough;" and the genial gleam of the man's ivory was an omen of good to Graham. "But," queried the negro, "how you wear 'Federate coat and hat?"
"Because I was left for dead, and mine were stolen. I had to wear something. The Confederates don't wear blue trousers like these."
"Dat's so; an' I knows yer by yer talk and look. I knows a 'Federate well as I does a coon. But dese yere's mighty ticklish times; an' a nigger hab no show ef he's foun' meddlin'. What's yer gwine ter do?"
"Perhaps you can advise me. I'm afraid they'll put hounds on my trail"
"Dat dey will, if dey misses yer."
"Well, that's the reason I'm here in the stream. But I can't keep this up long. I'm tired and hungry. I've heard that you people befriended Lincoln's men. We are going to win, and now's the time for you to make friends with those who will soon own this country."
"Ob corse, you'se a-gwine ter win. Linkum is de Moses we're all a- lookin' ter. At all our meetin's we'se a-prayin' for him and to him. He's de Lord's right han' to lead we alls out ob bondage."
"Well, I swear to you I'm one of his men."
"I knows you is, and I'se a-gwine to help you, houn's or no houn's. Keep up de run a right smart ways, and you'se'll come ter a big flat stun'. Stan' dar in de water, an I'll be dar wid help." And the man disappeared in a long swinging run,
Graham did as he was directed, and finally reached a flat rock, from which through the thick bordering growth something like a path led away. He waited until his patience was wellnigh exhausted, and then heard far back upon his trail the faint bay of a hound. He was about to push his way on up the stream, when there was a sound of hasty steps, and his late acquaintance with another stalwart fellow appeared.
"Dere's no time ter lose, mas'r. Stan' whar you is," and in a moment he splashed in beside him. "Now get on my back. Jake dar will spell me when I wants him; fer yer feet mustn't touch de groun';" and away they went up the obscure path.
This was a familiar mode of locomotion to Graham, for he had been carried thus by the hour over the mountain passes of Asia. They had not gone far before they met two or three colored women with a basket of clothes.
"Dat's right," said Graham's conveyance; "wash away right smart, and dunno nothin'. Yer see," he continued, "dis yer is Sunday, and we'se not in de fields, an de women folks can help us;" and Graham though that the old superstition of a Sabbath has served him well for once.
They soon left the path and entered some very heavy timber, through an opening of which he saw the negro quarters and plantation dwellings in the distance.
At last they stopped before an immense tree. Some brush was pushed aside, revealing an aperture through which Graham was directed to crawl, and he found himself within a heart of oak.
"Dar's room enough in dar ter sit down," said his sable friend. "An' you'se 'll find a jug ob milk an' a pone ob corn meal. Luck ter yer. Don't git lonesome like and come out. We'se a-gwine ter look ater yer;" and the opening was hidden by brush again, and Graham was left alone.
From a small aperture above his head a pencil of sunlight traversed the gloom, to which his eyes soon grew accustomed, and he saw a rude seat and the food mentioned. By extending his feet slightly through the opening by which he had entered, he found the seat really comfortable; and the coarse fare was ambrosial to his ravenous appetite. Indeed, he began to enjoy the adventure. His place of concealment was so unexpected and ingenious that it gave him a sense of security. He had ever had a great love for trees, and now it seemed as if one had opened its very heart to hide him.
Then his hosts and defenders interested him exceedingly. By reason of residence in New England and his life abroad, he was not familiar with the negro, especially his Southern type. Their innocent guile and preposterous religious belief amused him. He both smiled and wondered at their faith in "Linkum," whom at that time he regarded as a long headed, uncouth Western politician, who had done not a little mischief of interfering with the army.
"It is ever so with all kinds of superstition and sentimental belief," he soliloquized. "Some conception of the mind is embodied, or some object is idealized and magnified until the original is lost sight of, and men come to worship a mere fancy of their own. Then some mind, stronger and more imaginative than the average, gives shape and form to this confused image; and so there grows in time a belief, a theology, or rather a mythology. To think that this Lincoln, whom I've seen in attitudes anything but divine, and telling broad, coarse stories--to think that he should be a demigod, antitype of the venerated Hebrew! In truth it leads one to suspect, according to analogy, that Moses was a money-making Jew, and his effort to lead his people to Palestine an extensive land speculation."
Graham lived to see the day when he acknowledged that the poor negroes of the most remote plantations had a truer conception of the grand proportions of Lincoln's character at that time than the majority of his most cultivated countrymen.
His abstract speculations were speedily brought to a close by the nearer baying of hounds as they surmounted an eminence over which lay his trail. On came the hunt, with its echoes rising and falling with the wind or the inequalities of the ground, until it burst deep- mouthed and hoarse over the brow of the hill that sloped to the stream. Then there were confused sounds, both of the dogs and of men's voices, which gradually approached until there was a pause, caused undoubtedly by a colloquy with Aunt Sheba and her associate washerwomen. It did not last very long; and then, to Graham's dismay, the threatening sounds were renewed, and seemed coming directly toward him. He soon gave up all hope, and felt that he had merely to congratulate himself that, from the nature of his hiding-place, he could not be torn by the dogs, when he perceived that the hunt was coming no nearer--in brief, that it was passing. He then understood that his refuge must be near the bed of the stream, from which his pursuers were seeking on either side his diverging trail. This fact relieved him at once, and quietly he listened to the sounds, dying away as they had come.
As the sun rose higher the ray of light sloped downward until it disappeared; and in the profound gloom and quiet he fell asleep. He was awaked by hearing a voice call, "Mas'r."
Looking down, he saw that the brush had been removed, and that the opening was partially obstructed by a goblin-like head with little horns rising all over it.
"Mas'r," said the apparition, "Aunt Sheba sends you dis, and sez de Lord be wid you."
"Thanks for Aunt Sheba, and you, too, whatever you are," cried Graham; and to gratify his curiosity he sprang down on his knees and peered out in time to see a little negro girl replacing the brush, while what he had mistaken for horns was evidently the child's manner of wearing her hair. He then gave his attention to the material portion of Aunt Sheba's offering, and found a rude sort of platter, or low basket, made of corn husks, and in this another jug of milk, corn bread, and a delicious broiled chicken done to that turn of perfection of which only the colored aunties of the South are capable.
"Well!" ejaculated Graham. "From this day I'm an abolitionist, a Republican of the blackest dye." A little later he added, "Any race that can produce a woman capable of such cookery as this has a future before it."
Indeed, the whole affair was taking such an agreeable turn that he was inclined to be jocular.
After another long sleep in the afternoon, he was much refreshed, and eager to rejoin his command. But Issachar, or Iss, as his associates called him, the negro who had befriended him in the first instance, came and explained that the whole country was full of Confederates; and that it might be several days before it would be safe to seek the Union lines.
"We'se all lookin' out fer yer, mas'r," he continued; "you won't want for nothin'. An' we won't kep yer in dis woodchuck hole arter nine ob de ev'nin'. Don't try ter come out. I'm lookin' t'oder way while I'se a-talkin. Mean niggers an' 'Federates may be spyin' aroun'. But I reckon not; I'se laid in de woods all day, a-watchin'.
"Now I tell yer what 'tis, mas'r, I'se made up my mine to put out ob heah. I'se gwine ter jine de Linkum men fust chance I gits. An' if yer'll wait an' trus' me, I'll take yer slick and clean; fer I know dis yer country and ebery hole whar ter hide well as a fox. If I gits safe ter de Linkum folks, yer'll say a good word fer Iss, I reckon."
"Indeed, I will. If you wish, I'll take you into my own service, and pay you good wages."
"Done, by golly; and when dey cotch us, dey'll cotch a weasel asleep."
"But haven't you a wife and children?"
"Oh, yah. I'se got a wife, an' I'se got a lot ob chillen somewhar in de 'Fed'racy; but I'll come wid you uns bime by, an' gedder up all I can fine. I'se 'll come 'long in de shank ob de ev'nin', mas'r, and guv yer a shakedown in my cabin, an' I'll watch while yer sleeps. Den I'll bring yer back heah befo' light in de mawnin'."
The presence of Confederate forces required these precautions for several days, and Iss won Graham's whole heart by his unwearied patience and vigilance. But the young man soon prevailed on the faithful fellow to sleep nights while he watched; for after the long inaction of the day he was almost wild for exercise. Cautious Iss would have been nearly crazed with anxiety had he known of the
reconnaissances in which his charge indulged while he slept. Graham succeeded in making himself fully master of the disposition of the Rebel forces in the vicinity, and eventually learned that the greater part of them had been withdrawn. When he had communicated this intelligence to Iss, they prepared to start for the Union lines on the following night, which proved dark and stormy.
Iss, prudent man, kept the secret of his flight from even his wife, and satisfied his marital compunctions by chucking her under the chin and calling her "honey" once or twice while she got supper for him. At eight in the evening he summoned Graham from his hiding-place, and led him, with almost the unerring instinct of some wild creature of the night, due northeast, the direction in which the Union forces were said to be at that time. It was a long, desolate tramp, and the dawn found them drenched and weary. But the glorious sun rose warm and bright, and in a hidden glade of the forest they dried their clothes, rested, and refreshed themselves. After a long sleep in a dense thicket they were ready to resume their journey at nightfall. Iss proved an invaluable guide, for, concealing Graham, he would steal away, communicate with the negroes, and bring fresh provisions.
On the second night he learned that there was a Union force not very far distant to the north of their line of march. Graham had good cause to wonder at the sort of freemasonry that existed among the negroes, and the facility with which they obtained and transmitted secret intelligence. Still more had he reason to bless their almost universal fidelity to the Union cause.
Another negro joined them as guide, and in the gray of the morning they approached the Union pickets. Graham deemed it wise to wait till they could advance openly and boldly; and by nine o'clock he was received with acclamations by his own regiment as one risen from the dead.
After congratulations and brief explanations were over, his first task was to despatch the two brief letters mentioned, to his aunt and Hilland, in time to catch the daily mail that left their advanced position. Then he saw his brigade commander, and made it clear to him that with a force of about two regiments he could strike a heavy blow against the Confederates whom he had been reconnoitring; and he offered to act as guide. His proposition was accepted, and the attacking force started that very night. By forced marches they succeeded in surprising the Confederate encampment and in capturing a large number of prisoners. Iss also surprised his wife and Aunt Sheba even more profoundly, and before their exclamations ceased he had bundled them and their meagre belongings into a mule cart, with such of the "chillen" as had been left to him, and was following triumphantly in the wake of the victorious Union column; and not a few of their sable companions kept them company.
The whole affair was regarded as one of the most brilliant episodes of the campaign and Graham received much credit, not only in the official reports, but in the press. Indeed, the latter, although with no aid from the chief actor, obtained an outline of the whole story, from the rescue of his friend to his guidance of the successful expedition, and it was repeated with many variations and exaggerations. He cared little for these brief echoes of fame; but the letters of his aunt, Hilland, and even the old major, were valued indeed, while a note from the grateful wife became his treasure of treasures.
They had returned some time before to the St. John cottage, and she had at last written him a letter "straight from her heart," on the quaint secretary in the library, as he had dreamed possible on the first evening of their acquaintance.