Part 5

Oh, those teamsters of the plains! No jollier crowd of brave, enduring, accommodating men ever cracked cruel whips over the backs of long-enduring oxen, or plodded more patiently than they beside the slowly moving wagons, as, wading often over shoe-tops through the muck and mire of the Missouri roads of early springtime, they jollied one another and cracked their whips and sang. Each misfit nickname was accepted as a joke, and none of the men inquired as to the origin of his peculiar cognomen. But Hal, being more inquisitive than they, asked troublesome questions of his sisters, who were in the secret.

“Better tell him, girls,” said their mother. “He’ll be in honor bound to keep the secret then. Won’t you, dear?”

“Jean did it,” said Marjorie.

“Then suppose you confess,” said Hal.

“It was this way,” she explained after a pause of mock seriousness. “The first night we were in camp, after we had washed the dishes, it occurred to me to write each teamster’s name and paste it to the bottom of his plate. I didn’t know the real name of one of ’em from Adam’s, so I wrote them down as Scotty, Limpy, Yank, Shorty, Sawed-off, and so on. We didn’t intend to perpetrate a misfit, but a joke, and we struck both. Scotty got the correct title, though it merely happened so. But you just watch ’em! Limpy’s as straight as an Indian; Sawed-off stands six feet two in his socks; Lengthy is no taller when he stands up than when he lies down; Yank is a characteristic slave-owner; and Sambo is an ingrained abolitionist!”

“We couldn’t have made such a lot o’ misfits if we had tried a week,” said Mary. “But the men all think Hal did it; so the suspicion doesn’t fall on us; and you get the credit for being somewhat of a wag, Mr. Hal.”

“It’s nothing new for men or boys to take the credit for what their sisters do,” said Jean, as Hal strode away, satisfied that in protecting his sisters from a piece of folly, by accepting it as his own, he was acting the part of a man. “Adam set the example; and where would Herschel have been if he hadn’t had a sister?”

“Adam might have been in a box if he couldn’t have had Eve,” laughed Marjorie; “for there would then have been nobody to raise Cain.”

“Or the Ranger family,” added Jean.

* * * * *

Several days of tedious, laborious travel brought the wanderers into an open, sparsely timbered, almost unsettled part of the State of Missouri. The snow and sleet gave way to brighter skies, the roads and sloughs were drying up, and the higher grounds were gradually arraying themselves in robes of green and gold.

“Here is vacant land, and lots of it,” said Mary, as she viewed the virgin prospect of a mighty settlement in undisguised admiration. “This is a beautiful world!” and she sighed deeply, her face toward the rising sun.

“Don’t look backward,” cried Jean. “Remember Lot’s wife.”

“There’s no use in trying to look backward,” urged Hal. “Dad will never halt till he lands us on the western shore of the continent, on the eastern hem of the Pacific Ocean. He says this country’s too old for him. The wild turkeys are all killed off, or scared out o’ sight; the deer and elk are gone for good; and the country’s played out.”

“Wait a few years, and there’ll be railroads gridironing this whole great valley of the Mississippi,” said Jean. “There’ll be towns and cities springing up in a hundred places. Farms and orchards and handsome country homes will cover these rolling prairies. The native groves will be more than quadrupled by cultivation, and schoolhouses and churches will spring into existence everywhere.”

“I wish you’d talk like this to your father! Won’t you, Jean?” asked Mrs. Ranger.

“You couldn’t hire him to live in a slave State!” cried Jean.

“The Reverend Thomas Rogers might manage to get this far on the way toward the setting sun without much money,” smiled Mrs. Ranger, meaningly. “The children favor our stopping here, on Missouri soil,” she added, as her husband joined the group. “Don’t you think the idea a good one, John?”

“What! And let the word go back among our people at home that we’d flunked? No! I’d die first, and then I wouldn’t do it,” exclaimed her husband, petulantly.

Mrs. Ranger burst into tears.

“There, there, Annie! Don’t worry. But don’t ask me to settle, with my children, in a slave State. Father left Kentucky when I was a boy to get away from slavery and its inevitable accompaniment of poor white trash. There is an irrepressible conflict between freedom and every form of involuntary servitude that exists under the sun. This nigger business will lead to a bloody war long before Uncle Sam is done with it, and I doubt if even war will settle it.”

“But Oregon may come into the Union as a slave State, John. You know that the extension of slavery is the chief theme that is agitating Congress now.”

“I’ll have a chance to fight the curse in Oregon, Annie. But it is a settled condition here. I’ll fight it to the bitter end, if I get a chance!” He strode away to look after the cattle and men.

“Dear, patient mother!” cried Jean, stroking her mother’s cheek tenderly. “Your head is as clear as a bell. But there’s a whole lot o’ common-sense in what daddie says, too. We’ll soon have settled weather; then you won’t mind travelling. We all think you’ll be well and strong as soon as we get settled in Oregon.”

“Maybe so, if I could only live to get there,” faltered the feeble woman. “But—”

“But what, mother?”

“Nothing. I was only thinking.”

Jean’s heart sank. “You must get to bed, mother dear,” she said lovingly.

The Ranger children, tired out with the fatigue and excitement of the day, were soon locked in the deep sleep of healthy youth and vigor. Not so Mrs. Ranger. The regular breathing of her sleeping loved ones soothed her nerves, but she seemed preternaturally awake.

A gentle breeze stirred the white wagon-hood overhead. Sukie, who was tethered near, neighed gently as Mrs. Ranger spoke her name, and came closer to be stroked.

“Is de Cap’n heah?” asked a dusky figure with a child on its hip, as it edged its way between the mare and the wagon-wheel.

“He’s out with the cattle at present. Is there anything I can do for you?”

“Hide me, quick! De houn’s is aftah me, honey. I’ve jes’ waded de crick, and dey’ve lost de trail. Quick, missus; an’ I’ll sarve ye forever!”

The low baying of the bloodhounds proclaimed that they were again on the trail.

“Climb in here! Be quick!” exclaimed Mrs. Ranger, making room for the quaking fugitive. “I’ve never tried to sleep with a nigger and her baby, but I can stand it if I have to,” she said to herself, as the refugee took the place assigned to her.

* * * * *

“What in thunder are you up to now?” asked her husband when he looked in upon his wife and children in the morning and discovered the dusky intruder.

“Trying to help you to circumvent the institution you are so ready to fight, which, as you say, is wrong, and no contingency can make right,” replied his wife, her cheeks and eyes aglow with mingled satisfaction and excitement.

IX

_THE CAPTAIN DEFENDS THE LAW_

“Don’t you know it’s against the laws of your country to harbor a runaway nigger?” asked the Captain, in genuine alarm. “We’ll never get off o’ Missouri soil in this world if we’re caught hiding this wench and her pickaninny among our traps. She’s got to get away from here in a hurry.”

“So far as the laws go, I don’t care a rap, John. I, nor no other woman, ever took a hand in making any of ’em. And as for Missouri soil, it’s good enough for anybody. I’m quite enamored of it; and I feel perfectly willing to stay here as long as I live.”

“I don’t want to make no trouble for nobody, massa,” sobbed the fugitive, peeping from her covert like a beast at bay. “De missus done tuk keep o’ me ’dout ’siderin’ any consikenses. Didn’t ye, honey?”

“There was nothing else I could do,” said Mrs. Ranger, firmly, though her cheeks blanched with an unspoken fear.

“Dey was goin’ to sell me down Souf, an’ keep my coon for a body-servant for his own pappy’s new bride dat’s a-comin’ to de plantation nex’ week. Wusn’t dey, dawlin’?” holding aloft her mulatto offspring, who blinked at the rising sun. “’Fo’ God, massa, I won’t make a speck o’ trouble. I’ll jest keep a hidin’ till we git across de Missouri Ribbah. Take me ’long to Oregon, an’ ye won’t nebbah be sorry.”

“I’ve already agreed to take along one widow and her babies,” said the Captain, exchanging glances with Jean. “It doesn’t seem possible to add to the number.”

“Jes’ le’ me ride a hidin’ in a wagon till I get across de Missouri Ribbah, massa! I kin take keer o’ myself an’ my pickaninny too, if you’ll turn me loose among de Injuns.”

“It is the slaveholding, free American white man that the poor creature’s afraid of,” said Mrs. Ranger, with a bitter smile.

Again the deep baying of the bloodhounds betokened the finding of the trail.

“Climb back into the wagon, quick,” cried the Captain, “and take care that you keep out o’ sight! Deluge the wagon-wheel and all around it with water, gals. Don’t let the wench put her nose out, Annie. Hang the luck! When it comes to such a pass that a runaway wench would rather trust herself and her brat among the red savages of the plains than among her white owners in a free country, I get ashamed of a white man’s government. What’s the wench’s name?”

“She said it was Dugs.”

“The devil!”

“Don’t swear, John. She didn’t name herself.”

“And the name of the coon?”

“Geo’ge Washin’t’n, sah. I named him for de faddah o’ de kentry. He’s as han’some a coon as ebber had a white daddy. Ain’t ye, honey?” And the mother held him close. “Yo’s a flower o’ slavery, ain’t ye, dawlin’?” a hidden meaning in her voice.

Again the deep baying of the bloodhounds was heard. But they were taking the back trail. The fugitive laughed.

“De way we larn ’em dat trick is a niggah’s secret,” she said, as she again hid herself and child.

“My massa didn’t use to b’lieve in slavery, missus,” she said, as the baying of the dogs grew faint and distant. “When massa first ’herited his slaves, he used to tell us he’d set us free. But he got a habit o’ holdin’ on to us, an’ it jist growed on him. It was like de whiskey habit. It got fastened on him good an’ ha’d, and he didn’t talk ’bout manumittin’ us no mo’. He didn’t want to sell me, he said, but I was prope’ty, an’ times got bad, an’ he was ’bleeged to have money to pay his debts. His new wife’s ’spensive, awful, an’ he had to sell some o’ de niggahs. If he’d sol’ me an’ Geo’dy Wah too, I wouldn’t ’a’ runned away. But when he said he’d sell me, an’ keep my coon to be his new wife’s niggah, I couldn’t stan’ it nohow, so I scooted!” and the negress laughed heartily.

“Do you think you can hide her for a week, Annie? We’ll be across the Missouri River, by that time.”

“I’ll do my best, John. We’re running a terrible risk, though. Sometimes, when I think of the sins of this so-called free government, all committed in the name of Liberty, I long to turn rebel, and do my best to destroy it, root and branch.”

“I had a husban’ once, suh. But massa tuk a liken’ to me, so he sol’ him down Souf,” said the fugitive.

“And this baby?”

“Is my massa’s own coon. Massa wouldn’t ’a’ sol’ him nohow.”

“Be quick!” cried Jean, her breath hot with indignation. “Hide yourself! You mustn’t let the teamsters see you here. They’re coming in with the cattle now.”

“Gimme some quilts an’ blankets, honey. Dah! Hol’ ’em up, so! Now lemme make an Injun wickiup in one end o’ dis yah wagon. Geo’ge Washin’t’n ’ll be still as a lamb. Won’t ye, my putty ’ittle yallow coon?”

The baby, with its tawny skin, blue eyes, and blackish-brown, tangled curls, looked elfish as he nestled close to his mother’s breast and gazed affrighted into her turban-shaded eyes.

“Sh-sh-sh!” cried Jean; “the men are almost here. Keep close to your den and be very quiet.”

* * * * *

Day after day passed wearily along; but if the teamsters suspected aught, they made no sign. And day after day the teams wended their way westward without betraying the commission of this crime against the commonwealth of the great new State of Missouri and the free government of the United States of America, which it would have been base flattery to call a misdemeanor; as its perpetrators would have learned to their cost if they had been caught in the act.

* * * * *

“You don’t seem as happy as formerly,” said Captain Ranger to his wife at the close of a long and trying day. “If the risk we’re running by harboring that runaway nigger is making you uneasy, we can turn her out. A man’s first duty is to his own flesh and blood.”

“It isn’t that, John. The woman is no trouble; and her baby’s so afraid of bloodhounds that she keeps him as quiet as a mouse. I’m willing to risk my life to get them both away from their white owners and out into the Indians’ country, where they may have at least comparative freedom. I am not afraid.”

“Then what is the matter, dear?”

She toyed caressingly with his hair and beard, but said nothing. They were seated on a log by the roadside, and a laughing rivulet sprawled at their feet.

“Speak, Annie; don’t hesitate. I can hear your heart beat. What’s the matter?”

“You remember my little farm, John? It’s only ten acres, you know.”

“Yes; what of it?”

“You won’t be angry, John?”

“Of course not. What about it?”

“I want to deed the place over to my mother before we leave the State o’ Missouri.”

His manner changed instantly.

“I thought that matter was settled,” he said tersely. “Can’t you let me have a little peace?”

“I have held my peace as long as my conscience will let me, dear. You didn’t settle anything about it. You merely put me off, you know.”

“Well?”

A man can put a world of meaning into a monosyllable sometimes.

“I want you to let me deed that piece of property to my mother. If the deed were made to my father, and she should outlive him, she’d be only allowed to occupy it free from rent for one year after his death; but if it is made hers absolutely, and he should outlive her, he’ll be allowed to have a home and get his living off it as long as he lives. You see, it makes a difference whether it is a cow or an ox that is gored,” and she smiled grimly.

“The women are all getting their heads turned over the question of property,” said Captain Ranger to himself as he watched the rivulet playing at his feet.

“Jean’s been putting this into your head, Annie,” he said after a painful silence.

“The child has a strong sense of justice, inherited from you, John. You know she is wonderfully like you.”

“Yes, yes, Annie. I wish she had been a boy instead o’ Hal. She’d have made a rackin’ good lawyer.”

“I’ll admit that she advised me to urge you to make the deed, John.”

“Very well; we’ll see about it sometime, Annie” and he arose to go.

Mrs. Ranger’s heart sank.

“Why is it that men who are proverbially just and upright in their dealings with their fellow-men are so often derelict in duty where women, especially their own wives, are concerned?” she asked herself as she tottered by his side in silence.

The next morning found her unable to rise. A racking cough, which had disturbed her all through the night, was followed at daybreak by a burning fever. Her husband, who had slept like a top in an adjoining tent, was startled when he saw the ravages the night had left upon her pinched, white face.

“You caught cold last night, darling,” he said, as he prescribed a simple remedy. “You ought not to have been sitting out in the night air.”

“That didn’t hurt me, John.”

“Then it is the apprehension you suffer on account o’ that wench that is making you sick.”

“No, John; it isn’t that at all.”

“Then what is it?”

“Ask Jean. I have nothing more to say.”

But there was no time for further parleying. The breakfast was ready, and the hurry of preparation for departure was the theme of the hour.

* * * * *

“We reached camp in a pouring rain last night and pitched our tents, amid much discomfort, on the outskirts of the little town of St. Joseph,” wrote Jean on the morning of the fifth of May. “But I haven’t much time for you, my journal, for there are other things to claim attention,” and she shut the book with the usual impatient bang.

“Got any blank deeds along with you, daddie?” she asked, after it was announced that they were to be ready to break camp the next morning.

“Yes; why?”

“Because we must have that deed of Grandma Robinson’s all ready for mother to acknowledge before a notary in the morning, as we go through town on our way to the ferry.”

“Your mother isn’t able to attend to any business.”

“She isn’t able to put it off, daddie dear.”

“Very well; I’ll see about it.”

“But I want the blank form now, so I can have it all ready when we go through town. Mother has the original deed, and I can easily duplicate it. I’ll search for a blank among your papers, if you don’t object.”

“You have no idea how this little act of justice will help mother to regain her health,” said Mary. “She’s been haunted by a fear that you’d put it off till it would be too late.”

Captain Ranger did not reply; but his silence was considered as consent, and Jean hurried away to prepare the deed.

“I’ve been dreaming about an island somewhere in mid-ocean,” said Marjorie, “where women could hold their own earnings, just as men do in the United States; where they had full liberty to help the men to make the laws, for which they paid their full quota of taxes, just as the women do in Missouri and Illinois and, for aught I know, in Oregon.”

“I’ve paid the taxes on that ten-acre farm for a dozen years,” said her father.

“Yes, out of mother’s income from it,” retorted Marjorie. “It has always been rented, you know.”

The subject was dropped for the nonce, though John Ranger did not feel wholly at ease, he hardly realized why. But the next day, as the train was moving through the principal street on its way to the river-front, he stopped his team hard by a notary’s office and tenderly assisted his wife to alight. Here, with her thin and trembling fingers, Annie Ranger affixed her signature to her last earthly deed of conveyance, her eyes beaming with joy.

“Are you satisfied now?” asked her husband, as he lifted her to her seat in the wagon, where she watched Harry rushing away to the post-office with a big envelope containing the precious deed.

“Yes, dear; and I am so glad I didn’t have to make my mark! When I get to Oregon, I’ll manage somehow to earn the money to pay you what I owe on my taxes, John.”

“Don’t speak of that,” her husband exclaimed, feeling half ashamed of himself, for a reason he did not divine.

“Then you’ll never try to hold those old tax receipts as a lien on the property?”

“Nonsense, Annie! Do you think I’m a brute beast?”

“No, darling. I would to God all men were as good as you are, my own dear, precious husband.”

* * * * *

They were nearing the Missouri River now, and in the rush that ensued, the family had no opportunity for further exchange of confidences for many hours.

“Look!” cried Marjorie, after the last loaded wagon had been crowded on to the big ferry-boat, and they had started to a point several miles up the river to make a landing on the opposite bank. “There’s a posse of officers. They’re after Dugs, I know they are, ’cause they’ve got bloodhounds with ’em, and they’re signalling the boat to stop and come back.”

“She can’t do it,” said the captain of the ferry, after a hurried conference with the captain of the train, as he suspiciously thrust his closed hand into the breeches pocket over his hip.

“You can come out of hiding now, Sally O’Dowd,” exclaimed Captain Ranger, as soon as the last team was safely up the opposite bank.

“I thought it was Dugs they were after,” said Mary.

“So ’twas; and me too,” cried the grass widow, as she jumped to the ground, surrounded by her three children. “Sam O’Dowd was one o’ the posse. I saw him. He couldn’t have taken me; but he was after my babies.” She hugged her children, as she laughed and wept by turns in a transport of joy.

“Don’t cry, Sally,” said the Captain, coaxingly. “You’re in the Indian country, safe and sound.”

“Before Sam can get a requisition from the Governor of Illinois to reclaim your babies, and before the Governor o’ Missouri can give that party o’ slave-catchers the power to arrest Dugs and her coon, we’ll have you out under the protection of the Indians!” said Mrs. Ranger, with a meaning smile.

X

_THE CAPTAIN MAKES A DISTINCTION_

“I thought it was arranged that Sally was to join us at Quincy, on the Mississippi,” said Captain Ranger, after they were safely landed in the Indians’ territory.

“That was the agreement between Jean and myself,” interposed the frightened fugitive, still holding her babies close; “but I overheard a conversation at St. Louis that changed my plans. I was in hiding, down among the wharf-rats and niggers on the river-bank, in a cheap hash-house, half scow and half log cabin. The walls were thin, and I couldn’t sleep much, so I heard most everything that was going on, out o’ doors and in. And one night by the help of the good Lord I overheard a voice that I knew was Sam’s. He was telling a pal that he was hunting his runaway wife. He said she had stolen his babies, and he meant to get ’em, dead or alive.”

“I thought you’d led him off on an altogether different scent,” exclaimed Jean.

“So did I. But it appears that his mother got on the scent somehow, and betrayed me. I don’t know why she did it, for she was over-anxious to be rid of the children. But I suppose she was moved by an impulse of spite or revenge. I heard Sam say he’d overhaul us at Quincy, so I had good reason to change my route.”