The Gray Dawn

S >> Stewart Edward White >> The Gray Dawn

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Sansome sipped at his drink; sighed sentimentally.

"Cold--yes--but if the right man could awaken her--" he murmured.

"Look here, Sansome, do you want that woman?"

Sansome looked at his companion haughtily; his eye fell; he drew circles
with the bottom of his glass.

"By gad!" he cried with a sudden queer burst of fire; "I've got to have
her!"

And then he turned slowly red, actually started to wriggle, concealed his
embarrassment under cover of his cigar.

"H'm," observed Morrell speculatively, without looking across at Sansome.
"Tell me, Ben, does she still care for her husband?"

"No; that I'll swear!" replied Sansome eagerly.

"If you're sure of that one essential little fact, and you really want her,
why don't you take her?"

"Damn it, ain't I telling you? She won't see me."

"Tell me about it," urged Morrell, settling back, and again motioning for
fresh drinks.

Sansome, whose soul was ripe for sympathy, needed little more urging. He
poured out his tale, sometimes rushingly and passionately, again, as his
submerged but still conventional self-consciousness straggled to the
surface, with shamefaced bravado. "By Gad!" he finished. "You know, I feel
like a raw schoolboy, talkin' like this!"

Morrell leaned forward, his reserve of manner laid aside, his whole being
radiating sympathetic charm.

"My dear chap, don't," he begged, laying his hand on Sansome's forearm. "A
genuine passion is the most glorious thing on earth even in callow youth!
But when we old men of the world--" The pause was eloquent. "She's a
headstrong filly," he went on in a more matter-of-fact tone, after a
moment, "takes a bit of handling. You'll pardon me, old chap, if I suggest
that you've gone about things a bit wrong."

"How is that?" asked Sansome. Under the influence of drinks, confession,
and sympathy, he was in a glow of fellow-feeling.

"Believe me, I know women and horses! You've ridden this one too much on
the snaffle. Try the curb. That high-spirited sort takes a bit of handling.
They like to feel themselves dominated. You've been too gentle, too
refined. She's gentle and refined for two. What she wants is the brute--
'Rape of the Sabines' principle. Savage her a bit, and she'll come to heel
like a dog. Not at once, perhaps. Give her a week."

"That's all very well," objected Sansome, whose eyes were shining, "but how
about that week? She'll run to that beast of a husband with her story--"

"And be sorry for it afterward--"

"Too late."

Morrell appeared to think.

"There's something in that. But suppose we arranged to get the husband out
of the way, where she couldn't run to him at once--" he suggested.

They had more drinks. At first Morrell was only sardonically amused; but as
his imagination got to working and the creative power awoke, his interest
became more genuine. It was all too wildly improbable for words--and yet,
was anything improbable in this impossible place? At least it was amusing,
the whole thing was amusing--this super-refined exquisite awakened, to an
emotion so genuine that what judgment he had was now obscured by the
eagerness of his passion; the situation apparently so easily malleable; the
beautiful safety of it all for himself. And it did not really matter if the
whole fantastic plot failed!

"I tell you, no," he broke his thoughts to reply to some ill-considered
suggestion, "The good old simple methods are the best--they're all laid out
for us by the Drury Lane melodramas. You leave it to me to get rid of him.
Then we'll send the usual message to her that he is lying wounded
somewhere--say at Jake's road house--"

"Won't that get her to thinking too much of him?" interrupted Sansome
anxiously.

Morrell, momentarily taken aback, gained time for a reply by pouring
Sansome another drink, "He's more sense left than I thought," he said to
himself; and aloud: "All you want is to get her out to Jake's. She'll go
simply as a matter of wifely duty, and all that. Don't worry. Once she's
there, it's your affair; and unless I mistake my man, I believe you'll know
how to manage the situation"--he winked slyly--"she's really mad about you,
but, like most women, she's hemmed in by convention. Boldly break through
the convention, and she'll come around."

Sansome was plainly fascinated by the idea, but in a trepidation of doubt,
nevertheless.

"But suppose she doesn't come around?" he objected vaguely.

Morrell threw aside his cigarette and arose with an air of decision.

"I thought you were so crazy mad about her?" he said in tones that cut.
"What are you wasting my time for?"

"No, no! Hold on!" cried Sansome, at once all fire again. "I'll do it--hold
on!"

"As a matter of fact," observed Morrell, reseating himself, and speaking as
though there had been no interruption, "I imagine you have little to fear
from that."

He went into the street a little later, his vision somewhat blurred, but
his mind clear. Sansome, by now very pot-valiant, swaggered alongside.

"By the way, Ben," said Morrell suddenly, "I hope you go armed--these are
bad times."

"I have always carried a derringer--and I can use it, too!" boasted
Sansome, swinging his cane.

Morrell, left alone, stood on the corner for some time diligently engaged
in getting control of himself. He laughed a little.

"Regular bally melodrama, conspiracy and all, right off the blood-and-
thunder stage," said he. "Wonder if it works in real life? We'll see."

After his head had cleared, he set to work methodically to find Keith, but
when he finally met that individual it was most casually. Morrell was
apparently in a hurry, but as he saw Keith he appeared to hesitate, then,
making up his mind, he approached the young lawyer.

"Look here, Keith, a word with you," he said. "I have stumbled on some
information which may be important. I was on my way to the committee with
it, but I'm in a hurry. The governor is shipping arms into the city to-
morrow night from Benicia, by a small sloop."

"Are you sure of this?" asked Keith.

"Certain."

"Where did you get the information?"

"That I cannot tell you."

Keith still hesitated; Morrell turned on his heel.

"Well, I've told you. You can do as you please, but you'd better let the
committee decide whether to take the tip or not." He walked away without
once looking back, certain that Keith would end by reporting the
information,

"Chances are he'll go with the capturing party," ran the trend of his
thoughts, "and so he'll be out of reach of this little abduction. But I
don't care much. If he follows them out to Jake's by any chance, Sansome
will shoot him--or he'll shoot Sansome. Doesn't matter which. Shootin's
none too healthy these days _for either side!_ Oh, Lord, most amusin'!"

He thought a while, then turned up the hill toward his own house. A new
refinement of the plot had occurred to the artist's soul too much drink had
released in him.

Mrs. Morrell was vastly surprised to see him. She was clad in a formless
pink silk wrapper, was reclining on a sofa, and was settling down to
relaxation of mind and body by means of French novels and cigarettes,

"Well, what are you doing here at this time of day?" was her greeting.

"Came to bask in the light of your smiles, my dear," he replied with
elephantine irony.

"Nonsense!" she rejoined sharply, "You've been drinking again!"

"To be sure; but not enough to hurt." His manner suddenly became
businesslike, "Look here," he asked her, "are you game to make a tidy bit
of money?"

"Always!" she replied promptly, also becoming businesslike.

He explained in detail. She listened in silence at first with a slight
smile of contempt on her lips. As he progressed, however, the smile faded.

"Where do I come in?" she asked finally.

"You must be there when the message comes to her. She might not go out to
Jake's alone--probably wouldn't. I don't know her well enough to judge.
Hurry her into it."

"I see." She laughed suddenly. "Lord, she'll be surprised when I call on
her! Take some doing, that!" She thought a few moments. "My appearance will
connect us with it. Won't do."

"If the thing goes through we won't be here," he pointed out. "If it
doesn't go through all right, we'll arrange a little comedy. Have you bound
and gagged--before her eyes--or something like that."

"Thanks," she replied to this.

Morrell was not entirely open. He did not tell her that money or no money,
plot or no plot, he had resolved to flee the city, at least for a time.
Investigations were getting too close to some of his past activities. He
did not offer in words what he nevertheless knew to be the most potent of
his arguments--namely, the implacable hate Mrs. Morrell bore Keith.
Morrell's knowledge of this hate was accurate, though his analysis of its
cause was faulty. He thought his wife to be Keith's discarded mistress, and
did not greatly care. Nor did he mention the possibility which, however,
Mrs. Morrell now voiced.

"Suppose Keith follows them out to Jake's?" she suggested.

"One of them will kill, and the Stranglers will hang the other," he said
briefly.

She looked up.

"I don't care for that!"

"In that event, you will not be present. Your job will be to duck out." He
paused, then went on slowly: "Would you grieve at the demise of either--or
all three?"

Her face hardened.

"But," he went on slowly, "the chances of it are very remote. If there is
any killing, it will come later. Keith will be kept out of the way."

"And after?"

"You hint of an assignation. I will arrange for witnesses."

"Where does the money come in?" she demanded. Morrell floundered for a
moment. He had lost sight of the money.

"It comes from certain parties who want Keith put out of the way," he said.

"And suppose Keith is not put out of the way?" she began, her facile mind
pouncing on the weakness of this statement. "Never mind," she interrupted
herself. "I'll do it!" Her face had hardened again, "Can you depend on
Sansome to go through with it?"

"Only if he's fairly drunk."

"Yes?"

"I'll attend to that. That is my job. You may not see me to-morrow; but go
in the evening to call on her."

"It looks absolutely preposterous," she said at last, "but it may work.
And, if any part of it works, that'll be enough."

"Yes," said he.

They had both forgotten the money.

LXIX

As Morrell had surmised, Keith decided to pass on the news for what it was
worth. The committee believed it, and was filled with consternation at the
incredible folly of the projected show of armed force.

"This is not peace, but war," said Coleman, "which we are trying to avert!"

The Executive Committee went into immediate session. It was now evident
that the disbanding would have to be indefinitely postponed. An
extraordinary program to meet the emergency was discussed piecemeal. One of
its details had to do with the shipment of arms from Benicia. The committee
here fell neatly into the trap prepared for it. In all probability no one
clearly realized the legal status of the muskets, but all supposed them
already to belong to the State that was threatening to use them. Charles
Doane, instructed to take the steps necessary to their capture, called to
him the chief of the harbour police.

"Have you a small vessel ready for immediate service?" he asked this man.

"Yes, a sloop, at the foot of this street."

"Be ready to sail in half an hour."

Doane then turned the job over to a trustworthy, quick-witted man named
John Durkee. The latter selected twelve to assist him, among whom was
Keith, at the latter's especial request. Morrell, loitering near, saw this
band depart for the water front, and followed them far enough to watch them
embark, to witness the hoisting of the sloop's sails, and to see the craft
heel to the evening breeze and slip away around the point. All things were
going well. The committee suspected nothing of the plot to fasten the crime
of piracy on it; Keith was out of the way. Morrell turned on his heel and
walked rapidly to his rendezvous with Sansome.

Durkee and his sloop beat for some hours against wind and tide; but
finally, so strong were both, he was forced to anchor in San Pablo Bay
until conditions had somewhat modified. Finally, he was able to get under
way again, A number of craft were sailing about, and one by one these were
overhauled, commanded to lay to, and boarded in true piratical style. It
was fun for everybody. The breeze blew in strongly from the Golden Gate,
the waves chopped and danced merrily, the little sloop dipped her rail and
flew along at a speed that justified her reputation as a racer, gulls
followed curiously. But there were no practical results. Every sailing
craft they overhauled proved innocent, and either indignant or sarcastic.
The sun dipped, and the short twilight of this latitude was almost
immediately succeeded by a brilliant night. Slowly the breeze died, until
the little sloop could just crawl along. It grew chilly, and there was no
food aboard. A less persistent man than John Durkee would have felt
justified in giving it up and heading for home; but John had been
instructed to cruise until he captured the arms; and he profanely announced
his intention of so doing.

In this he was more faithful to his superiors than the notorious Rube
Maloney to his employers. It was to the interest of the Law and Order party
that Rube and his precious crew should be promptly and easily captured.
They had been instructed to carry boldly and flagrantly, in full daylight,
down the middle of the bay. But Terry's permission, to lay in
"refreshments" at cost of the conspirators had been liberally interpreted.
By six o'clock Rube had just sense enough left to drop anchor off Pueblo
Point. There the three jolly mariners proceeded to celebrate; and there
they would probably have lain undiscovered had less of a bulldog than
Durkee been sent after them.

As it was, midnight had passed before Durkee's keen eyes caught the loom of
some object in the black mist close under the point. Quietly he eased off
the sheet and bore down on it. As soon as he ascertained definitely that
the object was indeed a boat, he ran alongside. The twelve men boarded with
a rush: they found themselves in possession of an empty deck. From the
hatch came the reek of alcohol and the sound of hearty snoring. The capture
was made.

In a half hour the transfer of the muskets and the three prisoners was
accomplished. The latter offered no resistance, but seemed cross at being
awakened. Leaving the vessel anchored off the point, the little sloop stood
away again for San Francisco, reaching the California Street wharf shortly
after daylight. Here she was moored, and one of the crew was dispatched to
the committee for further instructions and grub. He returned after an hour,
but was preceded somewhat by the grub.

"They say to deliver the muskets at headquarters," he reported, "but to
turn the prisoners loose."

"Turn them loose!" cried Durkee, astonished.

"That's what they said," repeated the messenger. "And here's written
orders," and he displayed a paper signed by the well-known "33, Secretary,"
and bearing the Vigilante seal of the open eye.

"All right," acquiesced Durkee. "Now, you mangy hounds, you've got just
about twenty-eight seconds to make yourselves as scarce as your virtues.
Scat!"

Rube and his two companions had several of the twenty-eight seconds to
spare; but once they had lost sight of their captors, they moderated their
pace. They had been much depressed, but now they cheered up and swaggered.
A few drinks restored them to normal, and they were able to put a good face
on the report they now made to their employers, all of whom, including
Terry, had gathered thus early to receive them. After all, things had gone
well: they had been actually captured, which was the essential thing, and
it did not seem necessary to go into extraneous details.

"Good!" cried Terry, who had come down from Sacramento personally to
superintend the working out of this latest ruse.

He was illegally absent from his court, meddling illegally with matters not
in his jurisdiction. "Now we must get a warrant for piracy into the hands
of the United States Marshal. Send him alone, with no deputies. When he
makes his deposition of resistance, then we shall see!"

The marshal found Durkee still at the wharf, seated on an upturned cask.

"I have this warrant for your arrest!" he proclaimed in a voice purposely
loud.

"Yes? Let's see it," rejoined Durkee, lazily reaching out his hand.

He read the document through leisurely. His features betrayed no hint of
his thoughts, but nevertheless his brain was very active. He read that he
was accused of piracy against the might and majesty of the United States
Government; and as his eyes slowly followed the involved and redundant
legal phraseology, he reviewed the situation. The nature, of the trap
became to him, partly evident. There was no doubt that technically he was a
pirate, if these arms--as it seemed--belonged to the Government and not to
the State. The punishment of piracy was death. Without appreciation of the
fact, the committee had made him liable to the death penalty. And he had no
doubt that the Federal Courts of California, as then constituted, would
visit that penalty on him. He raised his head and looked about him. Within
call were lounging a dozen resolute men belonging to the Committee of
Vigilance. He had but to raise his voice to bring them to his assistance.
Once inside Fort Gunnybags he knew that the committee would stand behind
him to the last man.

But John Durkee had imagination as well as bulldog persistency. His mind
flashed ahead into the future, envisaging the remoter consequences. He saw
the majesty of the law's forces invoked to back this warrant which the
tremendous power of the disciplined Vigilantes would repulse; he saw
reinforcements, summoned. What reinforcements? A smile flitted across his
lips, and he glanced up at the warship _John Adams_ riding at anchor
outside, her guns, their tampons in place, staring blackly at the city. He
saw the whole plot.

"That's all right," he told the waiting marshal, folding the warrant and
returning it to him. "Put your paper in your pocket. I'll go with you."

By this quietly courageous and intelligent deed John Durkee completely
frustrated the fourth and most dangerous effort of the Law and Order party.
There was no legal excuse for calling on Federal forces to take one man--
who peaceably surrendered!

Undoubtedly, had not matters taken the decided and critical turn soon to be
detailed, Durkee would have been immediately brought to trial, and perhaps
executed. As it was, even the most rabid of the Law and Order party agreed
it was inexpedient to press matters. The case was postponed again and
again, and did not come to trial until several months, by which time the
Vigilantes had practically finished their work. The law finally saved its
face by charging the jury that "if they believed the prisoners took the
arms with the intention of appropriating them to their own use and
permanently depriving the owner of them, then they were guilty. But if they
took them only for the purpose of preventing their being used against
themselves and their associates, then they were not guilty." Under which
hair-splitting and convenient interpretation the "pirates" went free, and
everybody was satisfied!

LXX

After leaving the office where they had made their report to their
employers, Rube Maloney and his two friends visited all the saloons. There
they found sympathetic and admiring audiences. They reviled the committee
collectively and singly; bragged that they would shoot Coleman, Truett,
Durkee, and some others at sight; flourished weapons, and otherwise became
so publicly and noisily obstreperous that the committee decided they needed
a lesson. Accordingly they instructed Sterling Hopkins, with four others,
to rearrest the lot and bring them in. Hopkins was a bulldog, pertinacious,
rough, a faithful creature.

News of these orders ran ahead of their performance. Rube and his
satellites dropped everything and fled to their masters like threatened
dogs. Their masters, who included Terry, Bowie, Major Marmaduke Miles, and
a few others, happened to be discussing the situation in the office of
Richard Ashe, a Texan, and an active member of "the chivalry." The three
redoubtables burst in on this gathering, wild-eyed, scared, with, the
statement that a thousand stranglers were at their heels.

"Better hide 'em," suggested Bowie.

But hot-headed Terry, seconded by equally hot-headed Ashe, would have none
of this.

"By gad, let them try it!" cried the judge. "I've been aching for this
chance!"

Therefore when Hopkins, having left his small _posse_ at the foot of the
stairs, knocked and entered, he was faced by the muzzles of half a dozen
pistols, and profanely told to get out of there. He was no fool, so he
obeyed. If Terry had possessed the sense of a rooster, or a single quality
of leadership, he would have seen that this was not the moment to
precipitate a crisis. The forces of his own party were neither armed nor
ready. But here, as in all other important actions of his career, he was
governed by the haughty and headstrong passions of the moment--as when
later he justified himself in attempting to shoot down an old and unarmed
man. Hopkins left his men at the foot of the stairs, borrowed a horse from
Dr. Beverly Cole, who was passing, and galloped to headquarters. There he
was instructed to return, to keep watch, that reinforcements would follow.
He arrived at the building in which Ashe's office was located, in time to
see Maloney, Terry, Ashe, McNabb, Bowie, and Rowe all armed with shotguns,
just turning the far corner. He dismounted and called on his men to follow.
The little _posse_ dogged the judge's party for some distance. For a time
no attention was paid to them, but as they pressed closer Terry, Ashe, and
Maloney whirled and presented their shotguns. The movement was probably
intended only as a threat; but Hopkins, always bold to the point of
rashness, made a sudden rush at Maloney. Judge Terry thrust his gun at the
Vigilante officer who seized it by the barrel. At the same instant Ashe
pressed the muzzle of his weapon against one Bovee's breast, but hesitated
to pull the trigger. It was getting to be unhealthy to shoot men in the
open street.

"Are you a friend?" he faltered.

"Yes," replied Bovee, and by a rapid motion struck the barrel aside.

Another of the Vigilantes named Barry covered Rowe with a pistol. Rowe's
"chivalry" oozed. He dropped his gun and fled toward the armoury. The
others struggled for possession of weapons, but nobody fired. Suddenly
Terry whipped out a knife and plunged it into Hopkins's neck. Hopkins
relaxed his hold on Terry's shotgun and staggered back.

"I am stabbed! Take them, Vigilantes!" he cried.

He sank to the pavement. Terry and his friends dropped everything and ran
toward the armoury. Of the Vigilante _posse_ only Bovee and Barry remained,
but these two pursued the fleeing Law and Order men to the very portals of
the armoury itself. When the door was slammed in their faces, they took up
their stand outside, they two holding within several hundred men! At the
end of ten minutes a pompous, portly individual came up under full sail,
cast a detached and haughty glance at the two quiet men lounging
unwarrantedly in his path, and attempted to pass inside.

"You cannot enter here," said Bovee grimly, as they barred his way.

The pompous man turned purple.

"Do you know who I am?" he demanded.

"I don't give a damn who you are," replied Bovee, still quietly.

"I am Major-General Volney E. Howard!"

"You cannot enter here," repeated Bovee, and this time he said it in a tone
of voice that sent the major-general scurrying away.

After a short interval another man dashed up very much in a hurry.
Mistaking Bovee and Barry for sentinels, he cried as he ran up:

"I am a lieutenant in Calhoun Bennett's company, and I have been sent here
to--"

"I am a member of the Committee of Vigilance," interrupted Barry, "and you
cannot enter."

"What!" cried the officer, in astonishment. "Have the Vigilance Committee
possession of this building?"

"They have," was the reply of the dauntless two.

The lieutenant rolled up his eyes and darted away faster than he had come.
A few moments later, doubtless to the vast relief of the "outside garrison"
of the armoury within which five or six hundred men were held close by this
magnificent bluff, the great Vigilante bell boomed out: _one, two, three_,
rest; then _one, two, three_, rest; and repeat.

Immediately the streets were alive with men. Merchants left their
customers, clerks their books, mechanics their tools. Dray-men stripped
their horses of harness, abandoned their wagons where they stood, and rode
away to their cavalry. Clancey Dempster's office was only four blocks from
headquarters. At the first stroke of the bell he leaped from his desk, ran
down the stairs, and jumped into his buggy. Yet he could drive only three
of the four blocks, so dense already was the crowd. He abandoned his rig in
the middle of the street and forced his way through afoot. Two days later
he recovered his rig. In the building he found the companies, silently,
without confusion, falling into line.

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