But what did it all mean? It was some kind of a celebration, of course, but why then did the Malvern Recorder, one of the most enterprising newspapers in the State, as its editors and proprietors were willing to admit, why, then, did the Recorder fail to have an appropriate announcement of an event so interesting and important? Was our public press, the palladium of our liberties, losing its prestige and influence? Certainly it seemed so, when such an affair as this could be devised and carried out without an adequate announcement in the organ of public opinion.
After awhile there was a lull in the display. The Chief, who was stationed near the depot, received authoritative information that the train from Savannah was approaching. He waved his trumpet, and the firemen formed themselves into a procession, and passed twice in review before their Chief, and then halted, with their hose reels, and their hook and ladder waggons almost completely blocking up the entrance to the station. The crowd had followed them, but the police managed to keep the street clear, so that vehicles might effect a passage.
It was well that the officers of the law had been thus thoughtful in the matter, otherwise a countryman who chanced to be coming along just then would have found it difficult to drive his team even half way through the jam. He was a typical Georgia farmer in his appearance. He wore a wide straw hat to preserve his complexion, a homespun shirt and jeans trousers, the latter being held in place by a dirty pair of home-made suspenders. He drove what is called a spike-team, two oxen at the wheels, and a mule in the lead. The day was warm, but he was warmer. The crowd had flurried him, and he was perspiring more profusely than usual. He was also inclined to use heated language, as those nearest him had no difficulty in discovering. In fact, he was willing to make a speech, as the crowd into which he was wedging his team grew denser and denser. It was observed that when the crowd really impeded the movements of his team, he had a way of touching the mule in the flank with the long whip he carried. This was invariably the signal for such gyrations on the part of the mule as were calculated to make the spectators pay due respect to the animal's heels.
"I don't see," said the countryman, "why you fellers don't get out some'rs an' go to work. They's enough men in this crowd to make a crop big enough to feed a whole county, ef they'd git out in the field an' buckle down to it stidder loafin' roun' watchin' 'em spurt water at nothin'. It's a dad-blamed shame that the courts don't take a han' in the matter. Ef you lived in my county, you'd have to work or go to the poor-house. Whoa, Beck! Gee, Buck! Why don't you gee, contrive your hide!"
At a touch from the whip, the rearing, plunging, and kicking of the mule were renewed, and the team managed to fight its way to a point opposite where the chief officials of the Police and Fire Department were standing. The waggon to which the team was attached was a ramshackle affair apparently, but was strong enough, nevertheless, to sustain the weight of three bales of cotton, one of the bales being somewhat larger than the others.
"My friend," said the Chief of Police, elevating his voice so that the countryman could hear him distinctly, "this is not a warehouse. If you want to sell your cotton, carry it around the corner yonder, and there you'll find the warehouse of Vardeman & Stark."
"If I want to sell my cotton? Well, you don't reckon I want to give it away, do you? Way over yander in the fur eend of town, they told me that the cotton warehouse was down here some'rs, an' that it was made of brick. This shebang is down yander, an' it's made of brick. How fur is t'other place?"
"Right around the corner," said one in the crowd.
"Humph—yes; that's the way wi' ever'thing in this blamed town; it's uther down yander, or right around the corner. But ef it was right here, how could I git to it? Deliver me from places whar they celebrate Christmas in the hottest part of June! Ef I ever git out'n the town you'll never ketch me here ag'in—I'll promise you that."
"Oh, Mister, please don't say that!" wailed some humourist in the crowd. "There's hundreds of us that couldn't live without you."
"Oh, is that you?" cried the countryman. "Tell your sister Molly that I'll be down as soon as I sell my cotton." This set the crowd in a roar, for though the humourist had no sister Molly, the retort was accepted as a very neat method of putting an end to impertinence.
Inside the station another scene was in the full swing of action. Certain well-known citizens of Halcyondale had been pacing up and down the planked floor of the station apparently awaiting with some impatience for the moment to come when the train for Atlanta would be ready to leave. But the train itself seemed to be in no particular hurry. The locomotive was not panting and snorting with suppressed energy, as the moguls do in our day, but stood in its place with the blue smoke curling peacefully from its black chimney. Presently an access of energy among the employees of the station gave notice to those who were familiar with their movements that the train from Savannah was crossing the "Y."
Mr. Tidwell, of Shady Dale, who was also among those who were apparently anxious to take the train for Atlanta, ceased his restless walking, and stood leaning against one of the brick pillars supporting the rear end of the structure. Major Tomlin Perdue, on the other hand, leaned confidently on the counter of the little restaurant, where a weary traveller could get a cup of hasty and very nasty coffee for a dime. The Major was acquainted with the vendor of these luxuries, and he informed the man confidentially that he was simply waiting a fair opportunity to put a few lead plugs into the carcass of the person at the far end of the station, who was no other than Mr. Tidwell.
"Is that so?" asked the clerk breathlessly. "Well, I don't mind telling you that he has been having some of the same kind of talk about you, and you'd better keep your eye on him. They say he's 'most as handy with his pistol as Buck Sanford."
Slowly the Savannah train backed in, and slowly and carelessly Major Perdue sauntered along the raised floor. They had decided that the prisoners would most likely be in the second-class coach, and they purposed to make that coach the scene of their sham duel. It was a very delicate matter to decide just when to begin operations. A moment too soon or too late would be decisive. When this point was referred to Mr. Sanders, he settled it at once. "What's your mouth for, Gus? Shoot wi' that tell the time comes to use your gun. And the Major has got about as much mouth as you. Talk over the rough places, an' talk loud. Don't whisper; rip out a few damns an' then cut your caper. This is about the only chance you'll have to cuss the Major out wi'out gittin' hurt. I wisht I was in your shoes; I'd rake him up one side an' down the other. You can stand to be cussed out in a good cause, I reckon, Major."
"Yes—oh, yes! It'll make my flesh crawl, but I'll stand it like a baby."
"Don't narry one on you try to be too polite," said Mr. Sanders, and this was his parting injunction.
The two men were the length of the car apart when the Savannah train came to a standstill. "Perdue! they tell me that you have been hunting for me all over the city," said Mr. Tidwell. He was a trained speaker, and his voice had great carrying power. The firemen of both trains heard it distinctly, caught the note of passion in it and looked curiously out of their cabs.
"Yes, I've been hunting you, and now that I've found you you'll not get away until you apologise to me for the language you have used about me," cried Major Perdue. He was not as loud a talker as Mr. Tidwell, but his voice penetrated to every part of the building.
"What I've said I'll stand to," declared Mr. Tidwell, "and if you think I have been trying to keep out of your way, you will find out differently, you blustering blackguard!" (The Major insisted afterward that Tidwell took advantage of the occasion to give his real views.)
"Are you ready, you cowardly hellian?" cried the Major, apparently in a rage.
"As ready as you will ever be," replied Tidwell hotly. He was the better actor of the two.
And then just as the prisoners were coming out of the coach—as soon as Gabriel, lean and haggard, had reached the floor of the station, Major Perdue whipped out his pistol and a shot rang out, clear and distinct, and it was immediately reproduced from the further end of the car by Mr. Tidwell, and then the shooting became a regular fusillade. There was a wild scattering on the part of the crowd assembled in the station, a scuffling, scurrying panic, and in the midst of it all Gabriel ducked his head, and made a rush with the rest. He had been handcuffed, but his wrist was nearly as large as his hand, and he had found early in his experience with these bracelets that by placing his thumb in the palm of his hand, he would have no difficulty in freeing himself from the irons. This he had accomplished without much trouble, as soon as he started out of the car, and when he ducked his head and ran, he had nothing to impede his movements.
And Gabriel was always swift of foot, as Cephas will tell you. On the present occasion, he brought all his strength, and energy, and will to bear on his efforts to escape. Running half-bent, he was afraid the crowd which he saw all about him, pushing and shoving, and apparently making frantic efforts to escape, would give him some trouble. But strangely enough, this struggling crowd seemed to help him along. He saw men all around him with uniforms on, and wearing queerly shaped hats. They opened a way before him and closed in behind him. He heard a sharp cry, "Prisoner escaped!" and he heard the energetic commands of the officer in charge, but still the crowd opened a way in front of him, and closed up behind him. This pathway, formed of struggling firemen, led Gabriel away from the main entrance, and conducted him to the side, where there was an opening between the pillars. Not twenty feet away was the countryman with his queer-looking team. He was still complaining of the way he had been taken in by the town fellers who had told him that the station was a cotton warehouse.
Gabriel recognised the voice and ran toward it, jumped into the waggon, and crawled under the cover. "Now here—now here!" cried the countryman, "you kin rob me of my money, an' make a fool out'n me about your cotton warehouses, but be jigged ef I'll let you take my waggin an' team. I dunner what you're up to, but you'll have to git out'n my waggin." With that he stripped the cover from the top, and, lo! there was no one there!
He turned to the astonished crowd with open mouth. "Wher' in the nation did he go?" he cried. There was no answer to this, for the spectators were as much astonished as Mr. Sanders professed to be. The man who had crawled under the waggon-cover had disappeared.
He turned to the astonished crowd with a face on which amazement was depicted, crying out, "Now, you see, gentlemen, what honest men have to endyore when they come to your blame town. Whoever he is, an' wharsoever he may be, that chap ain't up to no good." Then he looked under the waggon and between the bales of cotton, and, finally, took the cover and shook it out, as if it might be possible for one of the "slick city fellers" to hide in any impossible place.
There was a tremendous uproar in the station, caused by the soldiers trying to run over the firemen and the efforts of the firemen to prevent them. In a short time, however, a squad of soldiers had forced themselves through the crowd, and as they made their appearance, Mr. Sanders gave the word to old Beck, saying as he moved off, "Ef you gents will excuse me, I'll mosey along, an' the next time I have a crap of cotton to sell, I'll waggin it to some place or other wher' w'arhouses ain't depots, an' wher' jugglers don't jump on you an' make the'r disappearance in broad daylight. This is my fust trip to this great town, an' it'll be my last ef I know myself, an' I ruther reckon I do."
As he spoke, his team Was moving slowly off, and the soldiers who were in pursuit of Gabriel had no idea that it was worth their while to give the countryman and his superannuated equipment more than a passing glance. It was providential that Captain Falconer, who was to have conveyed the prisoners to Atlanta, should have been confined to his bed with an attack of malarial fever when the order for their removal came. The Captain would surely have recognised the countryman as Mr. Sanders, and the probability is that Gabriel would have been recaptured, though Captain Buck Sanford, who was sitting in an upper window of the hotel, with his Winchester across his lap, says not.
The officer in charge did all that he could have been expected to do under the circumstances. By a stroke of good-luck, as he supposed, he found the Chief of Police near the entrance of the station and interested that official in his effort to recapture the prisoner who had escaped. By order of the military commander in Atlanta, the train was held a couple of hours while the search for Gabriel proceeded. The whole town was searched and researched, but all to no purpose. Gabriel had disappeared, and was not to be found by any person hostile to his interests.
Mr. Sanders drove his team around to the warehouse of Vardeman & Stark, where he was met by Colonel Tom Vardeman, who, besides being a cotton factor, was one of the political leaders of the day, and as popular a man as there was in the State.
"I heard a terrible fusillade in the direction of the depot," he said to Mr. Sanders, as the latter drove up. "I hope nobody's hurt."
"Well, they ain't much damage done, I reckon. Gus Tidwell an' Major Perdue took a notion to play a game of tag wi' pistols. They're doin' it jest for fun, I reckon. They want to show you city fellers that all the public sperrit an' enterprise ain't knocked out'n the country chaps."
"Well, they're almost certain to get in the lock-up," remarked Colonel Tom Vardeman.
"It reely looks that away," said Mr. Sanders, drily; "the Chief of Police was standin' in front of the depot, an' ev'ry time a gun'd go off he'd wink at me."
Colonel Tom laughed, and then turned to Mr. Sanders with a serious air. "What did I tell you about that wild plan of yours to rescue one of the prisoners? You've had all your trouble for nothing, and the probability is that you are out considerable cash first and last. You don't catch grown men asleep any more. Why, if the officer in charge of those poor boys were to permit one of them to escape, he'd be court-martialled, and it would serve him right."
"So it would," replied Mr. Sanders, "an' I'm mighty glad it wa'n't Captain Falconer. This feller that had the boys in tow is a stranger to me, an' I'm glad of it. He'll never know who lost him his job. He's a right nice-lookin' feller, too, but when he run out'n the depot awhile ago, his face kinder spoke up an' said he had had a dram too much some time endyorin' of the night; or his colour mought 'a' been high bekaze he was flurried or skeered. Now, then, Colonel Tom, ef you've done what you laid off to do, an' I don't misdoubt it in the least, you've got a safe place wher' I kin store a bale of long-staple cotton, ag'in a rise in prices. Ef you've got it fixed, I'll drive right in, bekaze the kind of cotton I'm dealin' in will spile ef it lays in the sun too long."
"Do you mean to tell me——"
"I'm mean enough for anything, Colonel Tom; but right now, I want to git wher' I can drench a long-sufferin' friend of mine wi' a big gourdful of cold water."
"But, Mr. Sanders——"
"Ef you'd 'a' stuck in the William H., you'd 'a' purty nigh had my whole name," remarked Mr. Sanders with a solemn air.
"Why, dash it, man! you've taken my breath away. Drive right in there. John! Henry! come here, you lazy rascals, and take this team out! I told you," said Colonel Tom to Mr. Sanders as the negroes came forward, "that you couldn't get any better prices for your cotton than I offered you. We treat everybody right over here, and that's the way we keep our trade."
The two negroes were detailed to convey the mule and the oxen to the stable where Mr. Sanders had arranged for their "keep," as he termed it, and as soon as they were out of sight, Mr. Sanders went to the rear of the waggon, and said playfully, "Peep eye, Gabriel!" Receiving no answer, he was suddenly seized with the idea that the young man had suffocated behind the loose cotton which was intended to conceal him. But no such thing had happened. Gabriel had plenty of breathing-room, and the practical and unromantic rascal was sound asleep. His quarters were warm, but the sweat-boxes at Fort Pulaski were hotter. It was very fortunate for Gabriel that the reaction from the strain under which he had been, took the blessed shape of sleep.
Gabriel's place of concealment was simplicity itself. With his own hands Mr. Sanders had constructed a stout box of oak boards, and around this he had packed cotton until the affair, when complete, had the appearance of an extra large bale of cotton, covered with bagging, and roped as the majority of cotton-bales were in those days. The only way to discover the sham was to pull out the cotton that concealed the opening in the end of the box. In delivering his message to Cephas, Mr. Sanders had called this loose cotton a plug, and the fact that the word was new to the vocabulary of the school-children gave great trouble to Gabriel, causing him to lose considerable sleep in the effort to translate it satisfactorily to himself. The meaning dawned on him one night when he had practically abandoned all hope of discovering it, and then the whole scheme became so clear to him that he could have shouted for joy.
It was thought that a search would be made for Gabriel in the neighbourhood of Shady Dale, and it was decided that it would be best for him to remain in the city until all noise of the pursuit had died away. But no pursuit was ever made, and it soon became apparent to the public at large that radicalism was burning itself out at last, after a weary time. When rage has nothing to feed upon it consumes itself, especially when various chronic maladies common to mankind take a hand in the game.
Not only was no pursuit made of Gabriel, but the detachment of Federal troops which had been stationed at Shady Dale was withdrawn. The young men who had been arrested with Gabriel were placed on trial before a military court, but with the connivance of counsel for the prosecution, the trial dragged along until the military commander issued a proclamation announcing that civil government had been restored in the State, and the prisoners were turned over to the State courts. And as there was not the shadow of a case against them, they were never brought to trial, a fact which caused some one to suggest to Mr. Sanders that all his work in behalf of Gabriel had been useless.
"Well, it didn't do Gabriel no good, maybe," remarked the veteran, "but it holp me up mightily. It gi' me somethin' to think about, an' it holp me acrosst some mighty rough places. You have to pass the time away anyhow, an' what better way is they than workin' for them you like? Why, I knowed a gal, an' a mighty fine one she was, who knit socks for a feller she had took a fancy to. The feller died, but she went right ahead wi' her knittin' just the same. Now, that didn't do the feller a mite of good, but it holp the gal up might'ly."