"Tell him," she said, "that he must n't take any further risk. He can't save the house or barn "And you would have him save himself?" interrupted Barnaby. "He must save himself," she answered. Just when Barnaby reached the door into the kitchen, there came a lull in the babel of shouting, and above the crackle of the flames, he heard Ashgrave's voice in what seemed a final appeal to the mob to save the house. Barnaby lifted the latch, but the door was fastened, and he paused a moment lest his entrance at this instant should mar the effect of Ashgrave's appeal. The mob seemed to be listening, with something of the instinct that gives the condemned the privilege of speech on the gallows. "Come, boys," Ashgrave was saying, "this is getting a little too serious. You'll burn the house if you let it go further." "The Canuck! Turn out the Canuck, an' we 'll stop the fire!" The cry of the few was reëchoed through the throng. "The Canuck! turn out the Canuck!" A sudden expedient seemed to occur to Ashgrave. "The boy is n't here, he 's gone," he said. "You 're a liar!" the crowd yelled. "He is here, an' you know it!" "I tell you he is 'nt," Ashgrave reiterated, anger at the failure of his device and at the insult making his voice hard. 66 'Where is he, then?" crowd took up the yell. get him?" Ashgrave was silent and the "Where is he? Where c'n we One of the mob apparently stepped forward, for his voice came more distinctly. "Joe," he said, "we 've got nothin' agin you, but we 're goin' to hev that thar bloody Papist. If he hain't in the house, we don't want to burn it, but ef he is, we 'll smoke him out, ef we hev to burn you with it. Whar is he?” "Yep, whar is he?" the crowd yelled. "This is my house," Ashgrave shouted, "and I know every one of you. If there's a law in the land, you'll smart for this." "Dead men tell no tales!" some one called, and the crowd laughed. "Come, Joe," the man's voice came clear again, "tell us whar he is, an' stop this thing, while thar 's time." "I'll see the house burn and you in hell before I 'll do it!" he shouted. A yell of resentment and disappointment went up from the crowd, and a volley of stones rattled against the house. Above this tumult, Barnaby heard a sound as if a heavy body had fallen, and then came a low groan. The crowd gave a yell that sounded like a cry of triumph, and the fire seemed to redouble its force. Barnaby understood, from the shoutings of the mob, that the heavy fall which shook the floor must be Ashgrave. He stepped back to give force to his blow, and threw himself against the door. At the second thrust it gave way, and he was precipitated headlong into the kitchen. He gathered himself up, dazzled with the sudden burst of light after the darkness of the cellar. The roar of the fire had grown markedly greater, and across the windows darted serpents of flame that thrust, as it were, tongues into the room, seeking to seize and devour its contents. Already the house was beyond saving. Before the window lay Ashgrave, and one tongue of flame almost caught him, as it darted through the broken sash. Then it drew back as if for a second spring. Barnaby stooped and found Ashgrave breathing, but unconscious. He raised himself to determine how best to save him, and some one, catching sight of his face, and mistaking him for the Canadian, raised the cry: "Thar he is! thar's the Papist! Now we've got him! Now fur the Canuck!" There was a rush through the smoke and flame, which on a lesser cause would have daunted the men, and it seemed to Barnaby as if his effort was lost. Groping blindly for something with which to defend himself, his hand fell on the musket. With the instinct of selfpreservation, he thrust it through the window and fired. It was loaded with bird shot that scattered and stung, producing panic far in excess of the execution it did. 'The foremost of the mob fell back, cursing and frightened, and encountering the crush of those behind, came in confusion on the ground, where the others fell and sprawled over them, doubling the confusion and fright. Barnaby dropped the musket and seized Ashgrave. He lifted the great body as if it were that of a child. By some rare presence of mind, he closed the cellar door behind him, and so staggering and dragging the inert mass, traversed the passage and gained the barn. The fire had already caught its roof, and sparks were ready to drop at any moment into the mows. Behind him was the yell of the mob that was already scrambling through the windows into the burning farmhouse. All this was as a spur to his fagged muscles. He carried Ashgrave through the rear door, which he closed carefully to cover for the time his retreat. Then he lifted and carried him along the shadows and across the pastures, and finally laid him, still unconscious, behind the sheltershed in the second pasture. Amanda was nowhere in sight. Behind him, the barn was already sending its column of flame heavenward. As a point of concealment, the shelter-shed could be relied on for but a few moments at best. He crept out into the pasture, where the cattle and horses were growing restless and wild under the excitement of the fire, and caught the halter of one of the horses. Behind the shed he succeeded, with almost superhuman effort, in lifting Ashgrave astride the horse, to which he fastened him with a rope he had found in the shed. He had determined on an effort to reach the saphouse in the sugar grove, as the least dangerous shelter he could think of. He led the horse to the bars, where the old wood road that led to the camp opened from the pasture, and stooping to let them down, was startled to see another hand reaching out from the other side for the same purpose. Before he could recover, Amanda spoke: "Is he alive or dead?” "Alive so far; but a stone hit him behind the ear and he is badly hurt." "I have seen my father," she said. "He will not let us come there. Where can we go?" "I was going to take him to the sugar camp," said Barnaby. She put up the bars, slowly and mechanically, recognising their utility in blinding pursuit. Then she followed behind the horse, slow-moving, with her eyes fixed on the great shapeless mass fastened to his back, which sometimes, lighted by the flames of their burning home, took on a grotesque resemblance to a man. Did it mean that God had put the seal of his condemnation on their union, as her father said there in the sunken path where she met him, coming at the call of the fire, and begged him to save their all from the mob? He had come with neighbourly promptness when he saw the banner of flame, but when she told him, he turned back without lifting a finger against the cruelty and wrong of the mob! And when she pleaded, he told her it was God's hand, punishing her husband and condemning their marriage. What if it were true? No, that was not the sting. She would be honest with herself. God could but condemn Ashgrave's shelter of a Catholic, his wrong to religion in bringing a Papist into the town. It was no use shutting one's eyes to that. But it was not God, it was her own father, who had said to her that she should always have a home and protection under his roof, let who would condemn; but that he would not give shelter to Ashgrave, not if he saw him dying by the roadside; not if a crust of bread or a dipper of water would save him. And who knew but he was dying; dying there with no shelter at hand but the old sugar camp, with no one to help but she and There was the sting of the night's work! trudged on behind the trembling horse as he climbed, with his wabbling, swaying load, up the rough wood road to the shelter of the sugar camp. Barnaby? |