The Quest of the Silver Fleece by W. E. B. Du Bois

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"Well," she said quietly, "we must prepare."

He looked at her, his face aglow with admiration.

"You wonder-woman!" he exclaimed softly.

A moment they regarded each other. She saw the love in his eyes, and he
saw rising in hers something that made his heart bound. But she turned
quickly away.

"You must hurry, Bles; lives are at stake." And in another moment he
thundered out of the barn on the black mare.

Along the pike he flew and up the plantation roads. Across broad fields
and back again, over to the Barton pike and along the swamp. At every
cabin he whispered a word, and left behind him grey faces and whispering
children.

His horse was reeking with sweat as he staggered again into the
school-yard; but already the people were gathering, with frightened,
anxious, desperate faces. Women with bundles and children, men with
guns, tottering old folks, wide-eyed boys and girls. Up from the swamp
land came the children crying and moaning. The sun was setting. The
women and children hurried into the school building, closing the doors
and windows. A moment Alwyn stood without and looked back. The world was
peaceful. He could hear the whistle of birds and the sobbing of the
breeze in the shadowing oaks. The sky was flashing to dull and purplish
blue, and over all lay the twilight hush as though God did not care.

He threw back his head and clenched his hands. His soul groaned within
him. "Heavenly Father, was man ever before set to such a task?" Fight?
God! if he could but fight! If he could but let go the elemental
passions that were leaping and gathering and burning in the eyes of
yonder caged and desperate black men. But his hands were tied--manacled.
One desperate struggle, a whirl of blood, and the whole world would rise
to crush him and his people. The white operatore in yonder town had but
to flash the news, "Negroes killing whites," to bring all the country,
all the State, all the nation, to red vengeance. It mattered not what
the provocation, what the desperate cause.

The door suddenly opened behind him and he wheeled around.

"Zora!" he whispered.

"Bles," she answered softly, and they went silently in to their people.

All at once, from floor to roof, the whole school-house was lighted up,
save a dark window here and there. Then some one slipped out into the
darkness and soon watch-fire after watch-fire flickered and flamed in
the night, and then burned vividly, sending up sparks and black smoke.
Thus ringed with flaming silence, the school lay at the edge of the
great, black swamp and waited. Owls hooted in the forest. Afar the
shriek of the Montgomery train was heard across the night, mingling with
the wail of a wakeful babe; and then redoubled silence. The men became
restless, and Johnson began to edge away toward the lower hall. Alwyn
was watching him when a faint noise came to him on the eastern breeze--a
low, rumbling murmur. It died away, and rose again; then a distant
gun-shot woke the echoes.

"They're coming!" he cried. Standing back in the shadow of a front
window, he waited. Slowly, intermittently, the murmuring swelled, till
it grew distinguishable as yelling, cursing, and singing, intermingled
with the crash of pistol-shots. Far away a flame, as of a burning cabin,
arose, and a wilder, louder yell greeted it. Now the tramp of footsteps
could be heard, and clearer and thicker the grating and booming of
voices, until suddenly, far up the pike, a black moving mass, with
glitter and shout, swept into view. They came headlong, guided by
pine-torches, which threw their white and haggard faces into wild
distortion. Then as bonfire after bonfire met their gaze, they moved
slowly and more slowly, and at last sent a volley of bullets at the
fires. One bullet flew high and sang through a lighted window. Without a
word, Uncle Isaac sank upon the floor and lay still. Silence and renewed
murmuring ensued, and the sound of high voices in dispute. Then the mass
divided into two wings and slowly encircled the fence of fire; starting
noisily and confidently, and then going more slowly, quietly, warily, as
the silence of the flame began to tell on their heated nerves.

Strained whispers arose.

"Careful there!"

"Go on, damn ye!"

"There's some one by yon fire."

"No, there ain't."

"See the bushes move."

_Bang! bang! bang!_

"Who's that?"

"It's me."

"Let's rush through and fire the house."

"And leave a pa'cel of niggers behind to shoot your lights out? Not me."

"What the hell are you going to do?"

"I don't know yet."

"I wish I could see a nigger."

_"Hark!"_

Stealthy steps were approaching, a glint of steel flashed behind the
fire lights. Each band mistook the other for the armed Negroes, and the
leaders yelled in vain; human power can not stay the dashing torrent of
fear-inspired human panic. Whirling, the mob fled till it struck the
road in two confused, surging masses. Then in quick frenzy, shots flew;
three men threw up their hands and tumbled limply in the dust, while the
main body rushed pellmell toward town.

At early dawn, when the men relaxed from the strain of the night's
vigil, Alwyn briefly counselled them: "Hide your guns."

"Why?" blustered Rob. "Haven't I a right to have a gun?"

"Yes, you have, Rob; but don't be foolish--hide it. We've not heard the
last of this."

But Rob tossed his head belligerently.

In town, rumor spread like wildfire. A body of peaceful whites passing
through the black settlement had been fired on from ambush, and six
killed--no, three killed--no, one killed and two severely wounded.

"The thing mustn't stop here," shouted Sheriff Colton; "these niggers
must have a lesson." And before nine next morning fully half the grown
members of the same mob, now sworn in as deputies, rode with him to
search the settlement. They tramped insolently through the school
grounds, but there was no shred of evidence until they came to Rob's
cabin and found his gun. They tied his hands behind him and marched him
toward town.

But before the mob arrived the night before, Johnson feeling that his
safety lay in informing the white folks, had crawled with his gun into
the swamp. In the morning he peered out as the cavalcade approached, and
not knowing what had happened, he recognized Colton, the sheriff, and
signalled to him cautiously. In a moment a dozen men were on him, and he
appealed and explained in vain--the gun was damning evidence. The voices
of Rob's wife and children could be heard behind the two men as they
were hurried along at a dog trot.

The town poured out to greet them--"The murderers! the murderers! Kill
the niggers!" and they came on with a rush. The sheriff turned and
disappeared in the rear. There was a great cloud of dust, a cry and a
wild scramble, as the white and angry faces of men and boys gleamed a
moment and faded.

A hundred or more shots rang out; then slowly and silently, the mass of
women and men were sucked into the streets of the town, leaving but
black eddies on the corners to throw backward glances toward the bare,
towering pine where swung two red and awful things. The pale boy-face of
one, with soft brown eyes glared up sightless to the sun; the dead,
leathered bronze of the other was carved in piteous terror.

_Thirty-eight_

ATONEMENT

Three months had flown. It was Spring again, and Zora sat in the
transformed swamp--now a swamp in name only--beneath the great oak,
dreaming. And what she dreamed there in the golden day she dared not
formulate even to her own soul. She rose with a start, for there was
work to do. Aunt Rachel was ill, and Emma went daily to attend her;
today, as she came back, she brought news that Colonel Cresswell, who
had been unwell for several days, was worse. She must send Emma up to
help, and as she started toward the school she glanced toward the
Cresswell Oaks and saw the arm-chair of its master on the pillared
porch.

Colonel Cresswell sat in his chair on the porch, alone. As far as he
could see, there was no human soul. His eyes were blood-shot, his cheeks
sunken, and his breath came in painful gasps. A sort of terror shook
him until he heard the distant songs of black folk in the fields. He
sighed, and lying back, closed his eyes and the breath came easier. When
he opened them again a white figure was coming up the avenue of the
Oaks. He watched it greedily. It was Mary Cresswell, and she started
when she saw him.

"You are worse, father?" she asked.

"Worse and better," he replied, smiling cynically. Then suddenly he
announced: "I've made my will."

"Why--why--" she stammered.

"Why?" sharply. "Because I'm going to die."

She said nothing. He smiled and continued:

"I've got it all fixed. Harry was in a tight place--gambling as
usual--and I gave him a lump sum in lieu of all claims. Then I gave John
Taylor--you needn't look. I sent for him. He's a damned scoundrel; but
he won't lie, and I needed him. I willed his children all the rest
except two or three legacies. One was one hundred thousand dollars for
you--"

"Oh, father!" she cried. "I don't deserve it."

"I reckon two years with Harry was worth about that much," he returned
grimly. "Then there's another gift of two hundred thousand dollars and
this house and plantation. Whom do you think that's for?"

"Helen?"

"Helen!" he raised his hand in threatening anger. "I might rot here for
all she cares. No--no--but then--I'll not tell you--I--ah--" A spasm of
pain shot across his face, and he lay back white and still. Abruptly he
sat up again and peered down the oaks. "Hush!" he gasped. "Who's that?"

"I don't know--it's a girl--I--"

He gripped her till she winced.

"My God--it walks--like my wife--I tell you--she held her head so--who
is it?" He half rose.

"Oh, father, it's nobody but Emma--little Emma--Bertie's child--the
mulatto girl. She's a nurse now, and I asked to have her come and attend
you."

"Oh," he said, "oh--" He looked at the girl curiously. "Come here." He
peered into her white young face. "Do you know me?"

The girl shrank away from him.

"Yes, sir."

"What do you do?"

"I teach and nurse at the school."

"Good! Well, I'm going to give you some money--do you know why?"

A flash of self-consciousness passed over the girl's face; she looked at
him with her wide blue eyes.

"Yes, Grandfather," she faltered.

Mrs. Cresswell rose to her feet; but the old man slowly dropped the
girl's hand and lay back in his chair, with lips half smiling.
"Grandfather," he repeated softly. He closed his eyes a space and then
opened them. A tremor shivered in his limbs as he stared darkly at the
swamp.

"Hark!" he cried harshly. "Do you hear the bodies creaking on the limbs?
It's Rob and Johnson. I did it--I--"

Suddenly he rose and stood erect and his wild eyes stricken with death
stared full upon Emma. Slowly and thickly he spoke, working his
trembling hands.

"Nell--Nell! Is it you, little wife, come back to accuse me? Ah, Nell,
don't shrink! I know--I have sinned against the light and the blood of
your poor black people is red on these old hands. No, don't put your
clean white hands upon me, Nell, till I wash mine. I'll do it, Nell;
I'll atone. I'm a Cresswell yet, Nell, a Cresswell and a gen--" He
swayed. Vainly he struggled for the word. The shudder of death shook his
soul, and he passed.

A week after the funeral of Colonel Cresswell, John Taylor drove out to
the school and was closeted with Miss Smith. His sister, installed once
again for a few days in her old room at the school, understood that he
was conferring about Emma's legacy, and she was glad. She was more and
more convinced that the marriage of Emma and Bles was the best possible
solution of many difficulties. She had asked Emma once if she liked
Bles, and Emma had replied in her innocent way,

"Oh, so much."

As for Bles, he was often saying what a dear child Emma was. Neither
perhaps realized yet that this was love, but it needed, Mrs. Cresswell
was sure, only the lightning-flash, and they would know. And who could
furnish that illumination better than Zora, the calm, methodical Zora,
who knew them so well?

As for herself, once she had accomplished the marriage and paid the
mortgage on the school out of her legacy, she would go abroad and in
travel seek forgetfulness and healing. There had been no formal divorce,
and so far as she was concerned there never would be; but the separation
from her husband and America would be forever.

Her brother came out of the office, nodded casually, for they had little
intercourse these days, and rode away. She rushed in to Miss Smith and
found her sitting there--straight, upright, composed in all save that
the tears were streaming down her face and she was making no effort to
stop them.

"Why--Miss Smith!" she faltered.

Miss Smith pointed to a paper. Mrs. Cresswell picked it up curiously. It
was an official notification to the trustees of the Smith School of a
legacy of two hundred thousand dollars together with the Cresswell house
and plantation. Mrs. Gresswell sat down in open-mouthed astonishment.
Twice she tried to speak, but there were so many things to say that she
could not choose.

"Tell Zora," Miss Smith at last managed to say.

Zora was dreaming again. Somehow, the old dream-life, with its glorious
phantasies, had come silently back, richer and sweeter than ever. There
was no tangible reason why, and yet today she had shut herself in her
den. Searching down in the depths of her trunk, she drew forth that
filmy cloud of white--silk-bordered and half finished to a gown. Why
were her eyes wet today and her mind on the Silver Fleece? It was an
anniversary, and perhaps she still remembered that moment, that supreme
moment before the mob. She half slipped on, half wound about her, the
white cloud of cloth, standing with parted lips, looking into the long
mirror and gleaming in the fading day like midnight gowned in mists and
stars. Abruptly there came a peremptory knocking at the door.

"Zora! Zora!" sounded Mrs. Cresswell's voice. Forgetting her informal
attire, she opened the door, fearing some mishap. Mrs. Cresswell poured
out the news. Zora received it in such motionless silence that Mary
wondered at her want of feeling. At last, however, she said happily to
Zora:

"Well, the battle's over, isn't it?"

"No, it's just begun."

"Just begun?" echoed Mary in amazement.

"Think of the servile black folk, the half awakened restless whites, the
fat land waiting for the harvest, the masses panting to know--why, the
battle is scarcely even begun."

"Yes, I guess that's so," Mary began to comprehend. "We'll thank God it
has begun, though."

"Thank God!" Zora reverently repeated.

"Come, let's go back to poor, dear Miss Smith," suggested Mary.

"I can't come just now--but pretty soon."

"Why? Oh, I see; you're trying on something--how pretty and becoming!
Well, hurry."

As they stood together, the white woman deemed the moment opportune; she
slipped her arm about the black woman's waist and began:

"Zora, I've had something on my mind for a long time, and I shouldn't
wonder if you had thought of the same thing."

"What is it?"

"Bles and Emma."

"What of them?"

"Their liking for each other."

Zora bent a moment and caught up the folds of the Fleece.

"I hadn't noticed it," she said in a low voice.

"Well, you're busy, you see. They've been very much together--his taking
her to her charges, bringing her back, and all that. I know they love
each other; yet something holds them apart, afraid to show their love.
Do you know--I've wondered if--quite unconciously, it is you? You know
Bles used to imagine himself in love with you, just as he did afterward
with Miss Wynn."

"Miss--Wynn?"

"Yes, the Washington girl. But he got over that and you straightened him
out finally. Still, Emma probably thinks yours is the prior claim,
knowing, of course, nothing of facts. And Bles knows she thinks of him
and you, and I'm convinced if you say the word, they'd love and marry."

Zora walked silently with her to the door, where, looking out, she saw
Bles and Emma coming from Aunt Rachel's. He was helping her from the
carriage with smiling eyes, and her innocent blue eyes were fastened on
him.

Zora looked long and searchingly.

"Please run and tell them of the legacy," she begged. "I--I will
come--in a moment." And Mrs. Cresswell hurried out.

Zora turned back steadily to her room, and locked herself in. After all,
why shouldn't it be? Why had it not occurred to her before in her
blindness? If she had wanted him--and ah, God! was not all her life
simply the want of him?--why had she not bound him to her when he had
offered himself? Why had she not bound him to her? She knew as she
asked--because she had wanted all, not a part--everything, love, respect
and perfect faith--not one thing could she spare then--not one thing.
And now, oh, God! she had dreamed that it was all hers, since that night
of death and circling flame when they looked at each other soul to soul.
But he had not meant anything. It was pity she had seen there, not love;
and she rose and walked the room slowly, fast and faster.

With trembling hands she drew the Silver Fleece round her. Her head swam
again and the blood flashed in her eyes. She heard a calling in the
swamp, and the shadow of Elspeth seemed to hover over her, claiming her
for her own, dragging her down, down.... She rushed through the swamp.
The lagoon lay there before her presently, gleaming in the
darkness--cold and still, and in it swam an awful shape.

She held her burning head--was not everything plain? Was not everything
clear? This was Sacrifice! This was the Atonement for the unforgiven
sin. Emma's was the pure soul which she must offer up to God; for it was
God, a cold and mighty God, who had given it to Bles--her Bles. It was
well; God willed it. But could she live? Must she live? Did God ask
that, too?

All at once she stood straight; her whole body grew tense, alert. She
heard no sound behind her, but knew he was there, and braced herself.
She must be true. She must be just. She must pay the uttermost farthing.

"Bles," she called faintly, but did not turn her head.

"Zora!"

"Bles," she choked, but her voice came stronger, "I know--all. Emma is a
good girl. I helped bring her up myself and did all I could for her and
she--she is pure; marry her."

His voice came slow and firm:

"Emma? But I don't love Emma. I love--some one else."

Her heart bounded and again was still. It was that Washington girl then.
She answered dully, groping for words, for she was tired:

"Who is it?"

"The best woman in all the world, Zora."

"And is"--she struggled at the word madly--"is she pure?"

"She is more than pure."

"Then you must marry her, Bles."

"I am not worthy of her," he answered, sinking before her.

Then at last illumination dawned upon her blindness. She stood very
still and lifted up her eyes. The swamp was living, vibrant, tremulous.
There where the first long note of night lay shot with burning crimson,
burst in sudden radiance the wide beauty of the moon. There pulsed a
glory in the air. Her little hands groped and wandered over his
close-curled hair, and she sobbed, deep voiced:

"Will you--marry me, Bles?"

L'ENVOI

Lend me thine ears, O God the Reader, whose Fathers aforetime sent
mine down into the land of Egypt, into this House of Bondage. Lay
not these words aside for a moment's phantasy, but lift up thine
eyes upon the Horror in this land;--the maiming and mocking and
murdering of my people, and the prisonment of their souls. Let my
people go, O Infinite One, lest the world shudder at

The End

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