The Complete Works of Stephen Crane (173 page)

But who would understand? Who would understand? And here the boy turned his mental glance in every direction, and found nothing but what was to him the black of cruel ignorance. Very well; some day they would —

From somewhere out in the street he heard a peculiar whistle of two notes. It was the common signal of the boys in the neighborhood, and judging from the direction of the sound, it was apparently intended to summon him. He moved immediately to one of the windows of the sitting-room. It opened upon a part of the grounds remote from the stables and cut off from the veranda by a wing. He perceived Willie Dalzel loitering in the street. Jimmie whistled the signal after having pushed up the window-sash some inches. He saw the Dalzel boy turn and regard him, and then call several other boys. They stood in a group and gestured. These gestures plainly said: “Come out. We’ve got something on hand.” Jimmie sadly shook his head.

But they did not go away. They held a long consultation. Presently Jimmie saw the intrepid Dalzel boy climb the fence and begin to creep among the shrubbery, in elaborate imitation of an Indian scout. In time he arrived under Jimmie’s window, and raised his face to whisper: “Come on out! We’re going on a bear-hunt.”

A bear-hunt! Of course Jimmie knew that it would not be a real bear-hunt, but would be a sort of carouse of pretension and big talking and preposterous lying and valor, wherein each boy would strive to have himself called Kit Carson by the others. He was profoundly affected. However, the parental word was upon him, and he could not move. “No,” he answered, “I can’t. I’ve got to stay in.”

“Are you a prisoner?” demanded the Dalzel boy, eagerly.

“No-o — yes — I s’pose I am.”

The other lad became much excited, but he did not lose his wariness. “Don’t you want to be rescued?”

“Why — no — I dun’no’,” replied Jimmie, dubiously.

Willie Dalzel was indignant. “Why, of course you want to be rescued! We’ll rescue you. I’ll go and get my men.” And thinking this a good sentence, he repeated, pompously, “I’ll go and get my men.” He began to crawl away, but when he was distant some ten paces he turned to say: “Keep up a stout heart. Remember that you have friends who will be faithful unto death. The time is not now far off when you will again view the blessed sunlight.”

The poetry of these remarks filled Jimmie with ecstasy, and he watched eagerly for the coming of the friends who would be faithful unto death. They delayed some time, for the reason that Willie Dalzel was making a speech.

“Now, men,” he said, “our comrade is a prisoner in yon — in yond — in that there fortress. We must to the rescue. Who volunteers to go with me?” He fixed them with a stern eye.

There was a silence, and then one of the smaller boys remarked,

“If Doc Trescott ketches us trackin’ over his lawn—”

Willie Dalzel pounced upon the speaker and took him by the throat. The two presented a sort of a burlesque of the wood-cut on the cover of a dime novel which Willie had just been reading —
The Red Captain: A Tale of the Pirates of the Spanish Main
.

“You are a coward!” said Willie, through his clinched teeth.

“No, I ain’t, Willie,” piped the other, as best he could.

“I say you are,” cried the great chieftain, indignantly. “Don’t tell
me
I’m a liar.” He relinquished his hold upon the coward and resumed his speech. “You know me, men. Many of you have been my followers for long years. You saw me slay Six-handed Dick with my own hand. You know I never falter. Our comrade is a prisoner in the cruel hands of our enemies. Aw, Pete Washington? He dassent. My pa says if Pete ever troubles me he’ll brain ‘im. Come on! To the rescue! Who will go with me to the rescue? Aw, come on! What are you afraid of?”

“HE TURNED TO SAY: ‘KEEP UP A STOUT HEART’”

It was another instance of the power of eloquence upon the human mind. There was only one boy who was not thrilled by this oration, and he was a boy whose favorite reading had been of the road-agents and gun-fighters of the great West, and he thought the whole thing should be conducted in the Deadwood Dick manner. This talk of a “comrade” was silly; “pard” was the proper word. He resolved that he would make a show of being a pirate, and keep secret the fact that he really was Hold-up Harry, the Terror of the Sierras.

But the others were knit close in piratical bonds. One by one they climbed the fence at a point hidden from the house by tall shrubs. With many a low-breathed caution they went upon their perilous adventure.

Jimmie was grown tired of waiting for his friends who would be faithful unto death. Finally he decided that he would rescue himself. It would be a gross breach of rule, but he couldn’t sit there all the rest of the day waiting for his faithful-unto-death friends. The window was only five feet from the ground. He softly raised the sash and threw one leg over the sill. But at the same time he perceived his friends snaking among the bushes. He withdrew his leg and waited, seeing that he was now to be rescued in an orthodox way. The brave pirates came nearer and nearer.

Jimmie heard a noise of a closing door, and turning, he saw his father in the room looking at him and the open window in angry surprise. Boys never faint, but Jimmie probably came as near to it as may the average boy.

“What’s all this?” asked the doctor, staring. Involuntarily Jimmie glanced over his shoulder through the window. His father saw the creeping figures. “What are those boys doing?” he said, sharply, and he knit his brows.

“Nothin’.”

“Nothing! Don’t tell me that. Are they coming here to the window?”

“Y-e-s, sir.”

“What for?”

“To — to see me.”

“What about?”

“About — about nothin’.”

“What about?”

Jimmie knew that he could conceal nothing.

“THE BOY TURNED AGAIN TO HIS FRIEND”

He said, “They’re comin’ to — to — to rescue me.” He began to whimper.

The doctor sat down heavily.

“What? To rescue you?” he gasped.

“Y-yes, sir.”

The doctor’s eyes began to twinkle. “Very well,” he said presently. “I will sit here and observe this rescue. And on no account do you warn them that I am here. Understand?”

Of course Jimmie understood. He had been mad to warn his friends, but his father’s mere presence had frightened him from doing it. He stood trembling at the window, while the doctor stretched in an easy-chair near at hand. They waited. The doctor could tell by his son’s increasing agitation that the great moment was near. Suddenly he heard Willie Dalzel’s voice hiss out a word: “S-s-silence!” Then the same voice addressed Jimmie at the window: “Good cheer, my comrade. The time is now at hand. I have come. Never did the Red Captain turn his back on a friend. One minute more and you will be free. Once aboard my gallant craft and you can bid defiance to your haughty enemies. Why don’t you hurry up? What are you standin’ there lookin’ like a cow for?”

“I — er — now — you—” stammered Jimmie.

Here Hold-up Harry, the Terror of the Sierras, evidently concluded that Willie Dalzel had had enough of the premier part, so he said:

“Brace up, pard. Don’t ye turn white-livered now, fer ye know that Hold-up Harry, the Terrar of the Sarahs, ain’t the man ter—”

“Oh, stop it!” said Willie Dalzel. “He won’t understand that, you know. He’s a pirate. Now, Jimmie, come on. Be of light heart, my comrade. Soon you—”

“I ‘low arter all this here long time in jail ye thought ye had no friends mebbe, but I tell ye Hold-up Harry, the Terrar of the Sarahs—”

“A boat is waitin’—”

“I have ready a trusty horse—”

Willie Dalzel could endure his rival no longer.

“Look here, Henry, you’re spoilin’ the whole thing. We’re all pirates, don’t you see, and you’re a pirate too.”

“I ain’t a pirate. I’m Hold-up Harry, the Terrar of the Sarahs.”

“You ain’t, I say,” said Willie, in despair. “You’re spoilin’ everything, you are. All right, now. You wait. I’ll fix you for this, see if I don’t! Oh, come on, Jimmie. A boat awaits us at the foot of the rocks. In one short hour you’ll be free forever from your ex — exewable enemies, and their vile plots. Hasten, for the dawn approaches.”

“THEY WHIRLED AND SCAMPERED AWAY LIKE DEER”

The suffering Jimmie looked at his father, and was surprised at what he saw. The doctor was doubled up like a man with the colic. He was breathing heavily. The boy turned again to his friends. “I — now — look here,” he began, stumbling among the words. “You — I — I don’t think I’ll be rescued to-day.”

The pirates were scandalized. “What?” they whispered, angrily. “Ain’t you goin’ to be rescued? Well, all right for you, Jimmie Trescott. That’s a nice way to act, that is!” Their upturned eyes glowered at Jimmie.

Suddenly Doctor Trescott appeared at the window with Jimmie. “Oh, go home, boys!” he gasped, but they did not hear him. Upon the instant they had whirled and scampered away like deer. The first lad to reach the fence was the Red Captain, but Hold-up Harry, the Terror of the Sierras, was so close that there was little to choose between them.

Doctor Trescott lowered the window, and then spoke to his son in his usual quiet way. “Jimmie, I wish you would go and tell Peter to have the buggy ready at seven o’clock.”

“Yes, sir,” said Jimmie, and he swaggered
out to the stables. “Pete, father wants the buggy ready at seven o’clock.”

Peter paid no heed to this order, but with the tender sympathy of a true friend he inquired, “Hu’t?”

“Hurt? Did what hurt?”

“Yer trouncin’.”

“Trouncin’!” said Jimmie, contemptuously. “I didn’t get any trouncin’.”

“No?” said Peter. He gave Jimmie a quick shrewd glance, and saw that he was telling the truth. He began to mutter and mumble over his work. “Ump! Ump! Dese yer white folks act like they think er boy’s made er glass. No trouncin’! Ump!” He was consumed with curiosity to learn why Jimmie had not felt a heavy parental hand, but he did not care to lower his dignity by asking questions about it. At last, however, he reached the limits of his endurance, and in a voice pretentiously careless he asked, “Didn’ yer pop take on like mad er-bout dese yer cay’ge-lamps?”