Moosemeadows/Chapter 15

HERE were several things in Stack Glashner's story of that night which failed to make a hit with me.

"Tell Miss Jeanbard not to worry," I said. "Nobody was killed that night. The old fellow was only nicked that time. I am responsible for his death, as far as I can make out. He died of blood-poisoning from the wound in his left hand."

We heard shouting ahead, far up the road, and supposed that Young Bill had again tried to show speed and again come to grief. We quickened our hard stride to a jog-trot. The shouting was repeated a few minutes later.

"We ain't gained on him," said Stack. "He's still travelin'."

We broke from the jog into a run; and still the wild shouts continued to recede before us until silenced by distance.

"The high hoss must sure be goin' some," gasped Stack.

We came to Deblore clearings, and a point on the road from which a view of the ancient homestead was obtainable, half a mile away and half-right, across stump pastures and old meadows and patches of young grain. Half a mile is a long way to see an object in the dark, unless that object happens, to be illuminated, as in this case. The old mansion of Moosemeadows Park was illuminated. Lights shone at the windows, and above some of the windows—wavering lights, swelling and dwindling and swelling again.

Stack and I halted and stared, breathing hard. I blinked, mistrusting my eyes.

"Jumpin' Joshyfat!" exclaimed Stack. "Another house a-fire! What the hell?"

I believed it then; and I grasped the truth.

"Hell's right!" I said. "You had better collar your ripe old Uncle Ruben before he sets the whole countryside on fire. Two houses already tonight—and the woods at his mercy!"

We took the short-cut across the pastures and meadows and patches of young grain. Tom was there, and had burned off the remainder of his whiskers in rescuing heirlooms. Sol and Amy were safe, thanks to the dogs. Duster and Spud had given Lion the alarm from outside, and Lion had clawed Sol and Amy awake. The house was past help. All its dry old woodwork was aflame, inside and outside. The barns were not on fire; and that is another thing we had to thank the dogs for, as we afterward learned. There was not any wind; but, to be on the safe side, we turned out all the animals. Stack said nothing and worked hard. Old Tom Deblore worked hard and said, again and again, what he wished to heaven he'd done to Ruben Glashner when he had the chance. I happened on a queer thing just inside the door of one of the cow-stables. I nosed it out, after releasing the cows, and called Stack Glashner over and showed it to him. It was a splash of kerosene on the floor of tinder-dry old planks; and just outside the door, on a spot of damp muck, lay a scrap of birch-bark, charred and curled.

"It looks as if he had been interrupted here," I said. "Looks as if he'd been yanked back and out, just in the nick of time—the oil ready poured and the burning bark in his hand. There's no mistaking his touch, the old sinner! A coward even when insane and delirious—trying to burn humans and cattle in their sleep! By God, I prefer the kind of murderer who has courage to pull a trigger!"

Stack did not make an articulate reply, but groaned and cursed.

We watched the old house burn. There was nothing else to do, as the sparks continued to go straight up in the windless air. Now and then a floor broke and larger clouds of smoke and sparks gulched out and up. The old roof fell in at dawn with a crash and kicked up such a storm of blazing fragments that we were busy stamping out little flames for the next few minutes. Soon after that, Stack Glashner harnessed the dependable pair, hitched them to a dependable wagon and drove off toward the settlement, without so much as by-your-leave to Tom or me. The day grew and brightened. Within the old walls of stone the fire continued to roar and crack. We drove the livestock back to their stalls and pens—with the exception of one pig that could not be found just then. Every now and again a stone would explode with a loud report and a piece of wall would fall into the fiery pit; and Tom would turn from whatever he was doing and gaze at the wreck with smouldering eyes. The massive chimneys stood unmarred,

"If I ever find that unspeakable old slithering beast alive I'll forget he's sick and insane and kill him like a scorpion," said Tom.

The cows were milked and driven to pasture. I wandered off toward the woods to look for the lost porker, having nothing better to do just then. I was thinking of Rose Jeanbard. I could not keep my mind off that girl. Having saved her life, I had a right to think of her. When I closed my eyes for a moment I could feel her in my arms again, almost as I had felt her when carrying her out through the blistering heat and choking smoke. I kept my eyes closed a second too long and walked slap into a stump. That reminded me of my accident beside the trail that night when Stack Glashner and I had gone out to spy on the treasure-hunters and Stack had behaved so strangely. This started me wondering again why Rose and her father had followed close behind us for all those miles of the way out, after the shot at the lantern, without making their presence known to me. Stack had known, and had kept it from me. What was his game? Was he jealous? That goodnatured clodhopper? To the devil with his game!

But why had Rose Jeanbard kept herself hidden from me? Didn't she know I was her friend, and a friend to be trusted all the way? Well, she must know it now. I had proved it last night; and again I closed my eyes for a moment, the more easily to imagine her in my arms again. Just then Lion joined me. After jumping mightily against me once, as if he thought I needed arousing, he took the lead. I followed his lead. I had great faith in that big dog. If anyone could lead me to the pig, he would be the one. We changed direction and reached an edge of the forest at a point several hundred yards away from the spot toward which I had been casually heading. And there at the edge of the woodland we came upon the thing that Lion wanted to show me. It was not the pig.

It was the body of old Ruben Glashner. It lay on its back, its eyes staring blankly and its mouth frozen in a grimace of terror. Beside it lay a two-gallon can, empty but still smelling strongly of kerosene oil. A broken box of matches was held tight in the left hand, and in the right were gripped a dozen or more long, tawny hairs. I looked at Lion enquiringly, and he met my glance full-eyed and answered it with an affirmative gesture of the tail. He knew all about this. He had been in at the death. I stooped and looked closely at the dead man's leathery throat. It was unmarked; so I understood that the big dog had not been forced to use his teeth. Terror had put the swift finishing stroke to the thing which fever and exposure and strain had worn down to a mere mad flicker of life. I picked the tawny hairs from the grip of the stiff, hooked fingers.

We left the body on its back, with the oilcan beside it and the matches crushed in the right hand. I saw a glint of wheels on the road; and as we drew near the smoking shell of the old house I saw Amos Trim drive up in a light wagon. He was within a few yards of old Tom Deblore when he drew rein. He got down heavily, went forward slowly, then slowly but surely extended his hand, Tom accepted the hand. They stood talking, with an occasional gesture toward the smoking walls of the old house. When I came up, Trim turned to me and shook hands,

"I started the minute I heared about it from Stack Glashner," he said. "An' thar's more follerin'. Proud to meet you, Mr. Swayton. Trust we'll be good friends an' helpful neighbors."

"Go as far as you like," I replied. "Tom and I will meet you halfway, you may be sure; but if you had called sooner you would have been more hospitably entertained."

"It was a mansion of a house," returned Amos Trim. "It was built regardless of cost, of the best, by a high an' proud man—but a just man, so I've heared tell. But—but maybe thar's more gain nor loss in the loss of it. Thar'll never be sich another mansion on Wicklow Crick, I reckon, but yer new house won't cost you a red cent, Mr. Deblore."

"How's that?" asked Tom. "We are not paupers, the captain and I."

"That ain't the point. We've been in the wrong, the settlement an' the village these ten years back an' more; as surely in the wrong as we was surely in the right before—before you yerself come home, Tom Deblore, It ain't a matter of money, nor of lumber an' carpentry, it's—it's—well, if it weren't that I'm a deacon, I'd say I'm damned if I can put a name to it!"

Tom's blistered face twisted into the lines of a painful but genuine smile.

"By the lord, Trim, you're human!" he exclaimed. We looked toward the road, attracted by sounds of wheels and hoofs. "And here come more of them, more humans," he continued. "Smiths and Watsons, men and women, and Stack Glashner back with our team. No, it's not a matter of money, I guess, nor of lumber and carpentry. There'll never be such another house on my ancestral acres as the old mansion, but if you folks like the new house better, I'll be satisfied. Go to it, Amos. I promise to live happily in the new house of Moosemeadows Park, whatever it looks like—but make it big enough for plenty of company."

The people brought baskets of food and rolls of bedding. They were embarrassed, men and women alike. They regarded the smoking husk of the old house with awe, whispering and pointing. But an elderly woman insisted on attending to Tom's face and hands and my hands. She slithered [sic] us with cold cream and bandaged us with more will than skill. That elderly woman, who was no beauty, affectionately tended the hurts which I had received while rescuing Rose Jeanbard from death. I thanked her, but there was bitterness in my heart. With the bitterness still in evidence, I walked over to Stack Glashner, who was arguing with another man about cement and lumber, and requested him to come with me. He came; and it seemed to me that there was a suggestion in his compliance of the air of a busy man humoring a fatherless child. I took him to the spot at the edge of the woods to which the big dog had guided me.

"What are you going to do with it?" I asked.

He did not say. He looked at the oil-can, the matches, the crowded underbrush and innumerable big trees.

"What killed him?" he asked.

"That's exactly how I found him," I said. "He looks as if something had scared him to death."

Stack turned the body over.

"Look at that," he said, pointing. There were unmistakable tooth-marks on the backs of the legs.

"That's where the dogs grabbed him to pull him out of the barn," I said. "So he sneaked over here, to use the last of his oil for setting the whole country on fire—but death overtook him before the match was struck. His third fire would have been his masterpiece. You recognize the oil-can, I suppose?"

I had once noticed it, or one just like it, in the doorway of the Jeanbard woodshed. Stack nodded.

"You and Lion and I are the only people who have seen this," I said.

Again Stack nodded thoughtfully. "I'll drag it in a ways now, out of sight, an' dig a hole tonight," he said. "No call for a funeral I reckon. No need for publicity, I guess."