The Redemption of David Corson by Charles Frederic Goss

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"Halt," he screamed, in a voice that cut the silent air like a knife.

A face appeared above the top of the buggy, and looked back. It was his
foe.

With a howl of rage, he snatched a pistol from the holster and fired.
The bullet went wide of the mark and the next instant he saw the
whip-lash cut the air and descend on the flank of the startled mare. The
buggy lurched forward, and for an instant drew rapidly away. Overwhelmed
by the fear that he might be baffled in his vengeance, he drew the other
pistol and fired again more wide of the mark than before.

With a wild oath he flung the smoking weapons into the road, and again
drove the spurs into the steaming sides of his horse. There could be no
doubt as to the result of the chase after that. The half-maddened
animal was overhauling the fugitives perceptibly at every enormous
stride, and in a few moments more shot by the buggy and up to the head
of the terrified mare. As he did so, his rider reached out his left hand
and caught the mare by her bridle, reined up his own horse and threw
both of the animals back upon their haunches.

In another instant the two men stood confronting each other on the road,
the quack black and terrible, the Quaker white and calm. Not a word was
spoken, and like two wild beasts emerging from a jungle they sprang at
each other's throats. They were oddly, but not unequally, matched, for
while the doctor was short, thick-set and muscular, but clumsy and
awkward like a bear, David was tall and slim, but lithe and sinewy as a
panther. Locked in each other's arms, they seemed like a single hideous
monster in some sort of convulsion.

As it was impossible for them in this deadly embrace to strike, they
wrestled rather than fought, and bit with teeth and tore with hands with
equal ferocity.

At the instant when the two infuriated men seized each other in this
deadly grip, Pepeeta fainted, while the terrified mare backed the buggy
into the bushes by the roadside. Romeo, snorting and pawing the ground,
approached the combatants, snuffed at them a moment as if profoundly
concerned at their strange maneuvers, then, turning away, began to crop
the rich blue grass in entire indifference to the results of this mad
quarrel between two foolish men.

The combatants surged and swayed back and forth along the dusty road,
tripping and stumbling in vain efforts to throw each other to the
ground. Their danger lent them strength, and their hatred skill. At
last, after protracted efforts, they fell and rolled over and over, now
one on top, now the other. Suddenly and as if by a single impulse
changing their tactics, their right hands unclasped and began to feel
each for the other's throat. A sudden slip of David's hold permitted the
doctor to turn him over, and sprawling across his breast he pinioned him
to the earth. His great hand stole toward the throat of his prostrate
foe and fastened upon it with the grip of an iron vise.

The beautiful face turned pale, then grew purple. This would have been
the last moment in the life of the Quaker had not his right hand,
convulsively clawing the road, touched a piece of broken rock. It was as
if a life-line had swung up against the hand of a drowning man.

Through the body which had seemed to be emptied of all its resources, a
tide of reserve energy swelled, under the impulse of which the exhausted
youth untwisted the grip of the iron hand, flung off the heavy body,
mounted upon it, crowded the great head with its matted hair and staring
eyes down into the dust, seized the stone with his right hand, raised
it, and struck.

The effect of the blow was twofold--paralyzing the brain of the smitten
and the arm of the smiter. Across the low forehead of the quack it left
a great gaping wound like a bloody mouth. A death-like pallor spread
itself over his countenance, the lids dropped back and left the eyes
staring hideously up into the face above them.

David's arm, spasmodically uplifted for a second blow, was suspended in
air. He did not move for a long time; and when at length his scattered
senses began to return he threw down the stone, rose to his feet and
exclaimed in accents of terror, "My God! I have killed him."

He could not overcome the fascination of the lifeless face and
wide-staring eyes. They drew him towards them; he stooped down and felt
for the pulse, which was imperceptible; laid his hand upon the heart,
but could not feel it beat; he raised an arm, and it fell back limp and
lifeless.

Suddenly one elemental passion gave place to another. Horror had
displaced anger, and now in its turn gave way to the instinct of
self-preservation. He looked toward the carriage and saw that Pepeeta
had fallen into a swoon. "Perhaps she has not seen what has happened,"
he said to himself, and a cunning smile lit up his pale face.

Stooping down, he seized the loathsome object lying there in the dust of
the road and dragged it off into the thick shrubbery. Stumbling along,
he came to a hollow made by the roots of an upturned tree. Into this he
flung the thing, hastily; covered it with moss and leaves, and stood
staring stupidly at the rude sepulchre. He experienced a momentary
feeling of relief that the hideous object was out of sight; but the
consciousness of his guilt and his danger soon surged back upon him like
a flood. In such moments the mind works wildly, like a clock with a
broken spring, but sometimes with an astonishing accuracy and wisdom.

It occurred to him that if he left the body where it was and it should
be eventually discovered, it would afford the gravest suspicions of foul
play; but that if he dragged it back again to the road and laid it with
its face in the dust, against the rock with which the deed was done, it
might pass for an accident.

Once more that hideous smile of cunning lit up the face which in these
few moments had undergone a mysterious deterioration. He hastily removed
the heap of rubbish, shuddered as he saw the loathsome thing once more
exposed to view, but seized it, dragged it back, and placed it with
consummate art in the position which his criminal prescience had
suggested.

As it lay there in the road nothing could have seemed more natural than
that it had fallen from the horse; he felt another momentary relief from
terror, in which he cunningly conceived a still more sagacious plan, on
noticing Romeo. They were the best of friends; it was easy to catch him.
He did so, removed the saddle, broke the girth and placed it near the
prostrate figure of the quack. Nothing could have more perfectly
resembled an accident. An adept in crime could not have performed this
task with finer skill, and he was free now to turn to the rest of the
work that he must do to conceal this ghastly deed.

Approaching the buggy, he found to his immense relief that Pepeeta was
still unconscious. With swift and silent movements he freed the mare,
led her out into the road and drove hurriedly away.

The wood through which they were passing was wide and somber. The
shadows of the evening had already begun to creep up the tree-trunks and
lurk gloomily among the branches. Plaintive bird songs were heard from
the treetops, and among them those of the mourning dove, whose solemn,
funereal note sent shudders through the heart of the trembling fugitive.

But all had gone successfully so far, and he actually began to cherish
hope that he would escape detection. There still remained, however, the
uneasy fear that Pepeeta herself had been a witness of the deed.
Horrible as was his own consciousness of his crime, he dared to hope
that he could stand it, if only she did not know! He dreaded to have her
waken, and yet it seemed as if he could not endure the suspense until he
found whether she had seen the deed or not.

Without trying to rouse her, he drove rapidly forward, and just as he
emerged from the wood came to another brook, so similar to the one by
the side of which the struggle had occurred, that he conceived the idea
of stopping by its side and awakening Pepeeta from her stupor there.
"She will not notice the difference," he said to himself; "and if she
did not witness the fatal blow I can persuade her that I overpowered the
doctor and forced him to return while she was in her swoon."

Stopping the horse, he lifted her inanimate form from the carriage, bore
it to the side of the brook, laid it gently upon the bank and dashed a
handful of the cold water into her white face. She gasped, opened her
eyes, and, sitting up, looked about her with an expression of terror.

"Where am I?" she asked.

"Do you not remember? You are here in the wood where the doctor overtook
us," he replied.

"And where is he?"

"He has returned."

"Has something dreadful happened?"

"Nothing."

"But I saw you clench with each other, and it was awful! What happened
then? I must have fainted. Did I?"

"Yes, you fainted. Were you so frightened?"

"Oh, terribly! I thought that you would kill each other! It was
horrible, horrible! But where is he now?"

"He has returned."

"Returned? Do you mean that he has gone back without me? How did you
persuade him to do that?"

"How did I persuade him? Ha! ha! I persuaded him with my fists. You
should have seen me, Pepeeta! Are you quite sure that you did not see
me? I should like you to know what a coward he was at last, and how he
went home like a whipped puppy."

"But did he acknowledge that he had deceived me?"

"He did indeed, upon his knees."

"And do you think he has gone, never to return?"

"Yes, he has gone, never to return," he answered, shuddering at the
double meaning of his words. "He made his confession and relinquished
his claim, and I made him swear that he would renounce you forever. And
so we have nothing to do but forget him and be happy. Are you feeling
better now?"

"Yes, I am better; but I am not well; I cannot shake it off. It seems
too dreadful to have been real. And yet how much better it is than if
one of you had been killed! Oh! I wish I could stop seeing it" (putting
her hands over her eyes). "Let us go! Let us leave this gloomy wood. Let
us get out into the sunshine. See! It is getting dark. We must not stay
here any longer."

"Yes, let us go," he said, rising, lifting her gently from the ground
and leading her back to the buggy in which they took their seats and
drove rapidly forward.

In a few moments they emerged from the forest. The sun was still a
little way above the horizon; its cheerful beams partially restored
Pepeeta's spirits, and David felt a momentary pleasure as he saw a
slight smile upon her pale countenance.

"Do you feel happier now?" he said.

"Yes, a little," she answered, looking into his face with eyes suffused
with tears. "And I am so thankful that you are safe!"

"And so you fainted before we fell?" he asked, compelled to reassure
himself.

"Did you fall?" she said, trembling again and laying her hand upon his
arm.

"There, there," he answered gently; "I ought not to have asked you. We
must never allude to it again. We must forget it. Will you try?"

"Yes, I will try, but it is hard. It belongs to the past, and we must
live in the present and in the future. I will try. I love you so, and I
am so thankful that you are safe." As she said this, she took his hand
in both of hers and pressed it to her breast.

This tender caress produced a revulsion in his heart and he shuddered.
Pepeeta observed it. "What makes you tremble so?" she asked.

"Nothing," he answered, regaining his self-control. "It is only that I
have been very angry, and I cannot recover from it at once."

"No wonder," she said, taking his hand again and kissing it.

In the distance they saw the steeple of a church. "Look," said David,
"there must be a village near. We will top and rest here to-night, and
in the morning we will push on toward New Orleans and forget the past."

They rode in silence. Pepeeta's thoughts were full of gladness; and
David's full of agony--they rushed tumultuously back and forth through
his mind like contrary winds through a forest.

"Was it not enough that I should be an Adam, and fall? Must I also
become a Cain and go forth with the brand of a murderer on my forehead?"
he kept saying to himself.

His life seemed destined to reproduce that whole series of archetypal
experiences, whose records make the Hebrew Scriptures the inspired
mirror of human life.

CHAPTER XVIII.

A FUGITIVE AND A VAGABOND

"That is the bitterest of all,--to wear the yoke of our own
wrong-doing!"--Daniel Deronda.

The morning after the fight David and Pepeeta hurried on to Louisville,
and from there took a steamer to New Orleans.

However hard it is to find stepping-stones when one wishes to rise,
those by which he can descend have been skilfully planted at every stage
of life's journey, and Satanic ingenuity could not have devised an
instrument better fitted to complete the destruction of the young
mystic's moral nature than a Mississippi steamboat, such as he found
lying at the wharf. He had been subjected to the fascination of love,
now he was to be tried by that of money. It is by a series of such
consecutive assaults upon every avenue of approach to the soul that it
is at last reduced to ruin.

Pepeeta was radiant with joy as they embarked. "How happy I am!" she
cried. "It seems as if I had left my old life and the old world behind
me!"

"And I am happy to see you glad," answered the wretched youth, whose
heart lay in his bosom like lead and whose conscience was writhing with
a torture of whose like he had never even dreamed. They embarked
unknown and unobserved; but as soon as the first confusion had passed,
their singular beauty and unusual appearance made them the cynosure of
every eye.

"Who is that splendid fellow?" women asked each other, as David passed
with Pepeeta on his arm, while under their breaths men swore that his
companion was the loveliest woman who had ever set foot on a Mississippi
steamer.

The pilot forgot to turn his wheel and the stevedores to put out the
gang plank when she stood looking at them. Love, and her freedom, had
transfigured her. She was radiant with health, happiness and hope, and
entered into the novelty and excitement of this floating world with the
ardor of a child.

All was gaiety and animation oh board the vessel. People from countries
widely separated mingled with each other and chatted with the greatest
freedom on every subject of human interest. Acquaintances were made
without the formality of an introduction, and it was not long before the
two adventurers were drawn into conversation.

"I have traveled all over the world," said a gentleman of foreign air,
"but I have never seen anything so picturesque as this boat. Look at the
variegated colors and styles of these costumes, at the manifold types of
countenance, at the blending of races--black and white and red! Listen
to the discordant but altogether charming sounds, the ringing of the
great bell, the roar of the whistle, the splash of the paddlewheels,
the songs of the negroes, and the clatter of dishes in the cabins! It is
a hurly-burly of noise! Then what varied scenery, what constant
excitement at the landing, what a hodge-podge, a pot-pourri of
merchandise! There is nothing like it in the world."

"Wait until you see a race with another steamer," said an officious
Yankee, who rejoiced in a knowledge which frequent trips had given him.

"Are they exciting?" asked the foreigner.

"Well I should say! I have seen horse races and prize fights in my day,
but I never ran against anything that shook up my nerves like a race
between two of these river boats! Every pound of steam is crowded on,
the engines groan like imprisoned devils, a darkey sits on the safety
valve, the stokers jam the furnaces, the passengers crowd the gunwales,
everybody yells at the top of his voice until pandemonium is mere
silence compared to it! And then the betting! Lord, you never saw
betting if you never saw a river race."

"They bet, do they?"

"Bet? They don't do anything else! Just got on at Louisville? Oh! well,
you'll see sights in the cabin to-night that will open your eyes. Isn't
that so?" he asked, turning to a southern planter who had been edging
his way toward Pepeeta.

"Reckon the gentleman'll see a little gambling, sah, if that's what you
refeh to. I've heard those that ought to know say that a Mississippi
river boat is the toughest spot on top of earth for little games of
pokah and that soht of thing, sah. 'Spect the gentleman can be
accommodated if he likes a lively game of chance."

"I don't expect to be surprised in that line," the foreigner said, with
the air of one who knew a thing or two; "for I have been in Monte Carlo,
Carlsbad and every famous gambling place in Europe."

"Well, sah, I don't know; I have never been in those places myself, but
I have heard those who have say that what they play there is mere 'penny
ante' to what goes on in one of these yere Mississippi boats. Like a
little game now and then myself, sah. Glad to have you join me."

While these men and others pretended to address their remarks to David
or to each other, their free glances were more and more directed to
Pepeeta who began to be embarrassed by them and gently drew David away
to more retired places. He went with her reluctantly, for he was in need
of excitement. The thought of his crime was constantly agitating his
heart, the prostrate form of the doctor with the bloody wound on his
forehead was never absent from his mind, and through all the ceaseless
rumble around him he could hear the dull thud of the stone upon the hard
skull. The efforts which he made to throw off these horrible weights
that crushed him were like those of a man awakening from a nightmare. He
scarcely dared to speak for fear of uttering words which would betray
him and which seemed to tremble on his lips. Had he been on shore he
would have fled to the solitude of a forest; but here he was
resistlessly impelled to that other solitude--a crowd. The necessity of
being gay with his beautiful bride and of concealing every trace of his
terror and remorse taxed his resources to their utmost limit, and in his
nervousness he kept Pepeeta moving with him all day long. At its close
she was completely exhausted, and retired early to her stateroom. Freed
from her company and craving relief from thought, David made his way
straight to the gambling tables where the nightly games were in full
swing.

The claim of the southerner that the excitement at those tables, when
the river traffic was at its height, had never been surpassed in the
history of games of chance, was no exaggeration. Not a semblance of
restraint was put upon the players, and experts from all over the world
gathered to pluck the exhaustless supply of victims, as buzzards
assemble to feed on carrion. Fortunes were made and lost in a night. Men
sat down to play worth thousands of dollars, and rose paupers! They
staked and lost their money, their slaves, their business and their
homes. In the wild frenzy which such misfortunes kindle the most
shocking crimes were committed, but the criminals were never called to
account, for the law was powerless.

What the fugitive sought was diversion, and he found it! Tragedies
became commonplace in those cabins. Men crowded into single hours the
experience and excitement of months. It was this very night that an
encounter occurred which is still a tradition on the river.

An old planter approached a table where his son, who did not know of his
father's presence on the boat, was playing. He stood in the background
and watched a gambler strip the boy of his last penny, and when the
young fellow rose from his chair, white as a sheet, he turned to look
into the whiter face of his father. The enraged parent did not speak a
word, but took the seat left vacant by the boy and commenced playing.
Rage at the financial loss, mortification at the boy's defeat, and old
scores to be settled with this very gambler, conspired to rouse him to a
frenzy. His terrible earnestness paralyzed the dealer, who seemed to
form some premonition of a tragic termination and lost his nerve. In a
little while, in the presence of a crowd of excited spectators, the
father won back the exact amount his son had lost, and then rising from
his chair sprang at the gambler, seized him, dragged him from the cabin
and flung him into the river.

Terrible as was the furor which this tragedy aroused, it subsided almost
as soon as the ripples of the water which closed over the drowning man,
and the players returned to their games as if nothing had happened.

In the months which they had spent together the quack had indoctrinated
David into all the best-known secrets of this vice, and besides this,
had familiarized him with the use of a certain "hold out" of his own
invention, with which he had achieved incredible results and which was
new to the fraternity of the river. Having watched the players for a
long time, David convinced himself that he could employ this trick
successfully, and took his place at the table.

The young man's nerves were tested by the circumstances in which he
found himself, if nerves are tested to tension anywhere, for he faced
the most experienced masters of the craft who could be found anywhere in
the world, and staked not only his little fortune, but his existence,
for, as he had just seen, these determined and reckless men thought no
more of taking life than of taking money.

David felt his way along with a coolness that astonished himself, and
his very first experiment with the delicate apparatus concealed in his
sleeve was such a brilliant triumph that he saw it was undetected. With
a strengthened confidence, he made the stakes larger and larger, and his
winnings increased so rapidly as to make him the center of attention.
The crowd swarmed round the table. The spectators became breathless. The
gamblers were first astonished, then bewildered. As their nerve failed
them, David's assurance increased, and when day broke ten thousand
dollars lay upon the table before him as the result of his skilful and
desperate efforts.

Their loss astonished and enraged the gamblers to such a degree that
with a preconcerted signal they sprang at their opponent, determined to
regain their money by violence. The move was not unexpected, nor was he
unprepared. He fought as he had played, and so won the sympathies of the
bystanders that in an instant there was a general melee in which he was
helped to escape with the winnings.

He was the hero of the trip, and a career had opened before him.
Satellites began to circle around him and to solicit his friendship and
patronage.

When he disembarked at New Orleans he had already entered into a
partnership with one of the most notable members of the gambling
fraternity, and purchased an interest in one of those "palaces" where
games of chance attracted and destroyed their thousands.

The newspapers made the gay throngs of that gayest of all cities
familiar with the incidents of David's advent. He and Pepeeta became the
talk of the town. They rented a fashionable house, and swung out into
the current of the mad life of the metropolis of the South.

For a little while this excitement and glory softened the pain in the
heart of the man who believed himself to be a murderer and encouraged
him to hope that it might eventually pass away. He played recklessly but
successfully, for he was a transient favorite of the fickle goddess.
When gambling lost its power to drown the voice of conscience, there
was the race, the play and the wine cup! To each of them appealing in
turn, he went whirling madly around the outer circles of the great
maelstrom in which so many brilliant youths were swallowed in those
ante-bellum days.

CHAPTER XIX.

ALIENATION

"There can never be deep peace between two spirits, never mutual
respect, until, in their dialogue, each stands for the whole
world."--Emerson.

For two years David and Pepeeta lived together in New Orleans. They were
years full of import, and of trouble. A baby came to them, lingered a
few weeks, and then died.

David pursued the occupation he had chosen, with the vicissitudes of
fortune usually attending the votaries of games of chance, and the moral
and spiritual deterioration which they invariably develop.

Pepeeta altered strangely. Her bloom disappeared and an expression of
sadness became habitual on her face. She was surrounded by luxuries of
every kind, but they did not give her peace. With an ambition which
never flagged she sought self improvement, and attained it to a
remarkable degree. Endowed with an inherited aptitude for culture, she
read and studied books, observed and imitated elegant manners, and
rapidly absorbed the best elements of such higher life as she had access
to, until her natural beauty and charm were wonderfully enhanced. Yet
she was not happy, for her life with David had brought her nothing but
surprise and disappointment; something had come between them, she knew
not what.

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