Part 22 (1/2)
The grand jury sat upon the Whittaker case and returned a true bill against Emerson Mead, indicting him for the murder of Will Whittaker.
Mead was confined in the jail at Las Plumas to await his trial, which would not take place until the following autumn. The finding of Will Whittaker's body convinced many who had formerly believed in his innocence that Mead was guilty. Everybody knew that his usual practice in shooting was to fire three quick shots, so rapidly that the three explosions were almost a continuous sound, pause an instant, and then, if necessary, fire three more in the same way. The three bullets were pretty sure to go where he meant they should, and if he wished he could put them so close together that the ragged edges of the holes touched one another, as did those in the back of Whittaker's corpse.
It was the number and character of those bullet holes that made many of Mead's friends believe that he was guilty of the murder. ”n.o.body but Emerson could have put those bullets in like that,” they said to themselves, although publicly the Democrats all loudly and persistently insisted that he was innocent.
In the constant debate over the matter which followed the finding of the body the Democrats contended that the two men who had held Thomson Tuttle captive all night near the White Sands must have been the murderers. And it was on them and their mysterious conduct that Judge Harlin rested his only hope for his client. The lawyer did not believe they had Whittaker's body in their wagon, although he intended to try to make the jury think so. Privately he believed that Mead was guilty, but he admitted this to no one, and in his talks with Mead he constantly a.s.sumed that his client was innocent. He had never asked Mead to tell him whether or not he had committed the murder.
Nick Ellhorn and Tom Tuttle lingered about Las Plumas for a short time, sending their gold to the mint, and trying to contrive some scheme by which Emerson Mead could be forced into liberty. Each of them felt it a keen personal injury that their friend was in jail, and they were ready to forego everything else if they could induce him to break his promise and with them make a wild dash for freedom. But he would listen to none of their plans and told them, over and over, that he had given his word and proposed to keep it.
”Of course,” he said, ”when I made that promise to Wellesly I didn't suppose they would find Will's body. But they did, and I mean to keep my promise. I gave my word for you-all too, and I don't want you to make any fool breaks that will cause people to think I'm trying to skip.”
Finally they gave up their plans and Tom returned to his duties with Marshal Black at Santa Fe and Nick went out to Mead's ranch to keep things in order there.
Ellhorn returned to Las Plumas for his own trial, the result of which was that he was found guilty of a.s.sault and battery upon the Chinese and fined five hundred dollars. The moment sentence was p.r.o.nounced upon him he strode to the judge's desk and laid down his check for the amount of his fine. Then he straightened up, thrust his hands in his pockets, and exclaimed:
”Now, I want that pig tail!”
”You are fined five dollars for contempt of court,” said the judge, frowning at the tall Texan, who looked very much in earnest.
”All right, Judge! Here you are!” said Nick cheerfully, as he put a gold piece down beside the check. ”Now, I want that Chiny pig tail!
It's mine! I've paid big for it! It's cost me five hundred and five dollars, and no end of trouble, and it belongs to me.”
”You are fined ten dollars for contempt of court,” the judge said severely, biting his lips behind his whiskers.
”Here you are, Judge!” and Nick spun a ten-dollar gold piece on the desk. ”I want that scalp as a memento of this affair, and to remind me not to mix my drinks again. I've paid for it, a whole heap more'n it's worth, and I demand my property!” And Nick brought his fist down on the judge's desk with a bang that made the gold coins rattle.
”Mr. Sheriff, remove this man!” ordered the Judge, and John Daniels stepped forward to seize his arm. Ellhorn leaped to one side, exclaiming, ”I'll not go till I get my property!” He thrust his hand into the accustomed place for his revolver, and with a look of surprise and chagrin on his face stood meekly before the sheriff.
”A man can't get his rights unless he has a gun, even in a court,” he growled, as he submitted to be led out. At the door he looked back and called to the judge:
”That scalp's mine, and I mean to have what I've paid for, if I have to sue your blamed old court till the day o' judgment!” And he went at once and filed a suit against the district attorney for the recovery of the queue.
Marguerite Delarue kept on with her quiet life through the summer, caring for little Paul and attending to her father's house. She did not see Emerson Mead again after the day when, with her little white sunbonnet pulled over her disordered hair, she helped her baby brother to mount his horse. Long before the summer was over she decided that he cared nothing for her and that she must no longer feel more interest in him than she did in any other casual acquaintance. But sometimes she wakened suddenly, or started at her work, seeming to feel the intent gaze of a pair of brown eyes. Then she would blush, cry a little, and scold herself severely.
It was late in the summer when Albert Wellesly made his next visit to Las Plumas. He had decided to buy a partly abandoned gold mine in the Hermosa mountains, and he explained to Marguerite Delarue, as he sat on her veranda the afternoon of his arrival, that he was making a hurried visit to Las Plumas in order to give it a thorough examination. And then he added in a lower tone and with a meaning look in his eyes, that that was not the only reason for the trip. She blushed with pleasure at this, and he felt well enough satisfied not to go any farther just then.
He came to see her again after he returned from the mine. It was Sunday afternoon, and they sat together on the veranda, behind the rose and honeysuckle vines, with Marguerite's tea table between them.
He told her about his trip to the mine and what he thought of its condition and deferentially asked her advice in some small matters that had an ethical as well as a commercial bearing. She listened with much pleasure and her blue eyes shone with the gratification that filled her heart, for never before had a man, fighting his battles with the world, turned aside to ask her whether or not he was doing right. Then he told her how much he valued her judgment upon such matters and how much he admired and reverenced the pure, high standard of her life. His tones grew more lover-like as he said it would mean far more to him than he could express if he might hope that her sweet influence would some day come intimately into his own life.
Then he paused and looked at her lowered eyelids, bent head and burning cheeks. But she said nothing, sitting as still as one dead, save for her heaving breast. After a moment he went on, saying that he cared more for her than for any other woman he had ever known, and that if she did not love him then, he would be willing to wait many years to win her love, and make her his wife. Still she did not speak, and he laid one hand on hers, where it rested on the table, and whispered softly, ”Marguerite, do you love me?” With that she lifted her head, and the troubled, appealing look in her eyes smote his heart into a brighter flame. He pressed her hand in a closer grasp and exclaimed, ”Marguerite, dearest, say that you love me!”
The innocent, fluttering, maiden heart of her, glad and proud to feel that she had been chosen above all others, but doubtful of itself, and ignorant of everything else, leaped toward him then and a wistful little smile brightened her face. She opened her lips to speak, but suddenly she seemed to see, beside the gate, a tall and comely figure bending toward her with eyes that burned her cheeks and cast her own to the ground. She s.n.a.t.c.hed her hand from Wellesly's grasp and buried her face in her palms.
”I do not know,” she panted. ”I must think about it.”
”Yes, certainly, dear--you will let me call you dear, won't you--take time to think it over. I will wait for your answer until your heart is quite sure. I hope it will be what I want, and don't make me wait very long, dear. Good-bye, sweetheart.”
He lifted her hand to his lips and went away. She sat quite still beside the table, her burning face in her hands, her breast a turmoil of blind doubts, and longings, and keen disappointments with, she knew not what, and over all an imperious, sudden-born wish to be loved.
Wellesly walked down the street smiling to himself in serene a.s.surance of an easy victory. He was accustomed to having women show him much favor, and more than one had let him know that he might marry her if he wished. Moreover, he thought himself a very desirable match, and he did not doubt for an instant that any woman, who liked him as well as he was sure Marguerite did, would accept his offer.
”It was evidently her first proposal,” he thought, ”and she did not know exactly what to do with it. She is as shy and as sweet as a little wood-violet. Some girls, after my undemonstrative manner this afternoon, would write me a sarcastic note with a 'no' in it as big as a house. But nothing else would have done with Marguerite. She isn't one of the sort that wants every man she knows to begin kissing her at the first opportunity. And that is one of the reasons I mean to marry her. The other sort are all very well, but a man doesn't want to marry one of them. I want my wife to have such dignity and modesty that I can feel sure no other man ever has, or ever will, kiss her but me.