Golden Face: A Tale of the Wild West

“Put in the faggot. Don’t give any of the skunks a further show,” yelled the frantic mob, exasperated by this reverse. And a rush was made for the further end of the building.

Chapter Fifteen

Judge Lynch takes a Back Seat

It is not wonderful, all things considered, that the citizens of Henniker, together with its fortuitous and floating population, should have been moved to such lengths as to resolve upon lynching Vipan. Indeed, it would have been surprising had matters turned out otherwise. Here was a man they very much more than suspected of being in league with their barbarous and dreaded foes, at a time when the frontier was almost in a state of war. A man of known daring and unscrupulousness, and whom they knew to have been present – the only white man – at an important council, involving issues of peace or war; to have taken part in its deliberations, going even so far as to advise the chiefs, and that, if report were to be believed, by no means in the direction of peaceful results. Several of their friends and neighbours had been murdered and scalped, those who had escaped a similar fate being obliged to carry on their mining or other operations rifle in hand, even if not forced to quit altogether. Meanwhile, this man, it was well known, could move about the country perfectly unmolested, visiting the Indian encampments at will – indeed, in one instance he was known to have witnessed a scalp-dance, wherein the prime attraction of the entertainment lay in the exhibition of the scalps recently torn from the heads of two of their murdered comrades.

And then he was an alien, which was the crowning point of the whole offence; and the good citizens of Henniker were virtuously stirred that a foreigner – an Englishman – should, while dwelling on their free and sacred soil, presume to be on friendly terms with its dispossessed and original owners; even as here and there in Great Britain may still be found a misguided and hard-headed Tory moved to honest indignation at the prospect of Fenians and Invincibles and National Leaguers stirred up to dynamite and murder by Irish-American agents and American dollars.

But how came it that so much should be known of Vipan’s movements, seeing that he himself was almost the only white man who could safely penetrate the semi-hostile country or venture among the roving bands who even then were raiding and murdering at their own sweet will? Well, human nature is rather alike all the world over. Gossip on that wild Western frontier was circulated through very much the same channels as, say, at Lant with Lant-Hanger in the county of Brackenshire – through the agency of the squaws to wit. Some of the miners owned red spouses, others, again, were not above open admiration for the savage beauties – and, presto! – sooner or later the gossip of the Indian villages leaked out.

Peering through the chinks, the besieged could descry a sea of threatening faces, savagely hideous in the red torchlight. Prominent among these was a man who held a noosed cord. Hither and thither he moved, stirring up the crowd, his sinister features distorted with malicious rage. Hatred, envy, disappointed greed, all were depicted there, as with blood-curdling threats the mob clamoured for the object of its resentment.

Suddenly a clatter of approaching hoofs became audible alike to besiegers and besieged. The crowd paused aghast, the first thought being that of an Indian attack. Then a score of horsemen darted into the light, and a ringing voice was heard inquiring —

“Say, boys, what in thunder’s all this muss?”

“That’s the sheriff,” said Smokestack Bill, coolly, lowering his revolver. “We’re out of this fix, anyhow.”

A roar was the answer.

“The white Injun! The pizen white Injun! We’re going to lynch him.”

“I guess not,” was the reply. “Not while Nat Hardroper’s sheriff of Henniker City. When it comes to reckoning with that invaluable officer, Judge Lynch’ll have to take a back seat. Eh, boys?” turning to his well-armed followers, a score of cowboys and well-disposed citizens, whom he had prudently collected in haste on receiving the first intimation of a riot.

“That’s so, sheriff,” was the prompt reply.

“Say, Dan Harper,” called out the sheriff, “Judge Lynch’s sittin’ in the State you’ve just left. Why not go and talk to him there?”

The face of the fellow named blanched at this allusion.

Meanwhile the crowd, composed mainly as it was of ruffians and bullies, began to show a disposition to slink off, in the presence of these well-armed and determined representatives of law and order.

“Never mind, boys,” shouted someone. “We’ll plant him full of lead yet. Now let’s git.”

“How do, sheriff?” said the scout, calmly stepping forth with extended hand. “Guess you’ve raised the siege on us right slick in the nick of time.”

“How do, Bill? How do, colonel?” to Vipan. “Now you come right along to my log and we’ll talk.”

“Hold hard, friends,” objected Vipan. “We’ve got to drink first. Murphy, bring out the juice.”

“Whurroo, sheriff darlint,” chuckled the saloon-keeper. “Whurroo! but it’s purty shootin’ there’s bin around here afure you came. Be jabers! and thur’ll be a big inquist to-morrow, and the power of the ‘crame’ ’ll be on hand for the jewry, I reckon. Bedad! and whur’s that shuck-faced omadhaun?” he added, gazing at the corner. For Bitter Rube, having recovered his confused senses, had profited by the confusion to steal away unperceived.

“Now, boys, mind me,” said Nat Hardroper to Vipan and the scout, after a substantial supper a few hours later. “This same Henniker City’s a powerful survigerous place. I’ve got you out of one fix, but I can’t go on getting you out of fixes. It’s too big a contract on one man’s hands, I want you to see. Now, a power of those chirruping roarers’ll be on your trail first thing you show your noses out of this shebang. If I warn’t sheriff this’d be my advice – to take your hosses this very night and git. But it ain’t my advice, because, you see, I am sheriff, and you’re under my charge. No, no; it ain’t my advice.”

Save for the faintest possible wink, he looked them straight in the face, as solemn as an owl. Vipan burst into a roar of laughter.

“Right you are, Nat. It’s not your advice – we’ll remember that.”

“Well, good-night, boys; good-night.”

They shook hands heartily. But our two friends did not go to bed; they went to the stable. By daybreak they had put a considerable number of miles between Henniker City and themselves.

Chapter Sixteen

A Conjugal Debate and its Sequel

With all his failings, the Rev. Dudley Vallance had one redeeming point – he was excessively fond of his children; but it is probable that he loved his only son more than all the rest put together. To him he could refuse nothing. Indeed, so loth was he to part with him even for a time that he could not bring himself to allow Geoffry to enter any profession. He must remain at home. There was no need for him to earn his living, since he would one day succeed to the Lant property, and meanwhile he could be learning to look after it.

Fortunately, Geoffry was something of a bookworm, and studious of temperament, or the bringing-up he had received, and the aimless life which it entailed upon him, would have sent the boy straight to the dogs. As it was, he was cut out by Nature for a college don rather than for a country squire, and during his University career he was known essentially as a reading man.

It may be imagined, then, that when he returned home at the end of the summer term, after taking a brilliant double first, the pride and delight of his reverend parent knew no bounds, and by a series of festivities, unparalleled since the distinguished youth’s coming of age, was Lant-Hanger at large, and particularly its “County Society,” bidden to share the parental joy.

But, alas! that the latter should be so short-lived. The object of all this fun and frolic seemed in no way to relish it at all. Instead of returning home cheerful, overflowing with spirits, thoroughly enjoying life with the zest of the average young Englishman who has just scored a signal success, and sees a congenial and rose-bestrewn future before him, poor Geoffry seemed to have parted with all capacity for enjoyment. He was pale and listless, absent, bored, and – shall we own it? – at times excessively irritable, not to say peevish. His father was deeply concerned, and his mother, who read off the symptoms as briefly as the village doctor would diagnose a case of incipient scarlet fever, felt more of anger than concern.

“I really don’t know what to do about the boy,” said the Rev. Dudley, dejectedly, coming into his wife’s morning-room the day after the last of their house party had dispersed. “It’s dreadful to see the poor fellow in such low spirits. He must have been working too hard, whatever he may say to the contrary. It’s hard to part with him so soon, the dear fellow, but we positively must send him abroad to travel for the summer. Nothing like travel.”

“Try him, and see if he’ll go,” was the short reply.

“We must insist upon it. We must get medical advice – a doctor’s opinion to back us up. The boy will be ill – ill, mark me. He eats nothing. He doesn’t sleep, for I hear him moving in his rooms far into the small hours. He looks pale and pulled down, and doesn’t even care for his books. Then, when all the people were here, he would steal away from everybody, and wander about and mope by himself all day. We had some nice people, too; and pleasant, good-looking girls. Come, hadn’t we?”

“Oh, yes; a most complete party. Only one ingredient left out.”

“And that?”

“Yseulte Santorex.” And Mrs Vallance shut down the envelope she was closing with a vicious bang.

“God bless my soul! you don’t say so? Surely it hasn’t gone so far as that?”

“It has gone just as far as that abominable girl could carry it,” was the uncompromising reply. “Surely you are not simple enough to imagine that the daughter of that hybrid Spanish atheist would neglect such an opportunity? The girl has simply made a fool of him.”

“You dislike her to that extent?” said Mr Vallance, vacantly, his mind full of the woeful plight into which his son was plunged. “I don’t know. Sometimes I think her not a bad sort of girl considering the fallow in which her mind has been allowed to lie. And Geoffry might do worse.”

“Oh, yes. He might, but not much. A forward, bold, masculine minx, tramping the countryside, fishing and shooting. And she is utterly devoid of respect for her elders, and as for principle or religion – faugh! I beg leave to think, Dudley, that he hardly could do worse.”

This spitefulness on the lady’s part was not wholly devoid of excuse. For her elders, as represented by Mrs Dudley Vallance, Yseulte certainly had scant respect. And then, if she became their son’s wife, the day might come when Mrs Vallance would have to abdicate Lant Hall in her favour, whereas no such calamity could in the nature of things ever befall its reverend squire. Of course Geoffry must marry somebody or other one day; but Geoffry’s mother could contemplate such a contingency with far more equanimity than that of being dispossessed by a girl whom she detested, and whom she knew despised her.

“Well, well! we won’t say that; we won’t say quite that,” rejoined Mr Vallance. “Perhaps you are a little hard on poor Yseulte. She is young, remember, and at a thoughtless age. But she is thoroughbred in the matter of birth, and will be well off. We must not expect everything at once. And the girl is very pretty, with all her faults. I am not surprised at Geoffry’s infatuation.”

“No more am I,” was the short reply.

“Oh, but you must look at a question of this kind apart from prejudice. And then I can’t bear to see poor Geoffry simply eating his heart out like this. I am becoming seriously alarmed about him; and I tell you what it is, my dear, as he really has staked his happiness on this girl, he shall have her. I’ll see Santorex about it this very day.”

“Oh, well, if you have quite made up your mind, the sooner you do so the better,” answered his spouse, resignedly.

“Very well, then, that’s settled,” said the Rev. Dudley, with a sigh of relief.

There was just one thing they forgot, this worthy couple, namely, that before settling a matter of the kind so comfortably and out of hand, it might be necessary to obtain the concurrence of the party most concerned, to wit Yseulte Santorex herself. But that Yseulte might unhesitatingly decline the honour of the projected alliance never occurred to them for one moment, and any suggestion of the bare idea of such a contingency would have thrown them into a state of wild amazement.