“You lie!” I cried. “You lie, you damned spy!”
And then Peter Johansen went white and, suddenly whipping a knife from his clothes, he leaped at me, striking wildly for any part of me that the blade might reach. At first he almost got me, so unexpected and so venomous was the attack; but though I was struck twice on the arm and cut a little I managed to ward the point from any vital part, and in a moment I had seized his knife wrist. That was the end-I just twisted it a little-I did not mean to twist hard-and something snapped inside his wrist.
Peter let out an awful scream, his knife dropped from his fingers, and I pushed him from me and gave him a good kick as he was leaving-a kick that I think he will remember for some time. Then I picked up his knife and hurled it as far as I could in the direction of the river, where I think it landed, and went on my way toward home-whistling.
When I entered the house mother came out of her room and, putting her arms about my neck, she clung closely to me.
“Dear boy,” she murmured, “I am so happy, because you are happy. She is a dear girl, and I love her as much as you do.”
“What is the matter?” I asked. “What are you talking about?”
“I heard you whistling,” she said, “and I knew what it meant-grown men whistle but once in their lives.”
I picked her up in my arms.
“Oh, mother, dear!” I cried. “I wish it were true and maybe it will be some day-if I am not too much of a coward; but not yet.”
“Then why were you whistling?” she asked, surprised and a bit skeptical, too, I imagine.
“I whistled,” I explained, “because I just broke the wrist of a spy and kicked him across the road.”
“Peter?” she asked, trembling.
“Yes, mother, Peter. I called him a spy and he tried to knife me.”
“Oh, my son!” she cried. “You did not know. It is my fault, I should have told you. Now he will fight no more in the dark; but will come out in the open and when he does that I am lost.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“I do not mind dying,” she said; “but they will take your father first, because of me.”
“What do you mean? I can understand nothing of what you are driving at.”
“Then listen,” she said. “Peter wants me. That is the reason he is spying on your father. If he can prove something against him and father is taken to the mines or killed, Peter will claim me.”
“How do you know this?” I asked.
“Peter himself has told me that he wants me. He tried to make me leave your dear father and go with him, and when I refused he bragged that he was in the favor of the Kalkars and that he would get me in the end. He has tried to buy my honor with your father’s life. That is why I have been so afraid and so unhappy; but I knew that you and father would rather die than have me do that thing, and so I have withstood him.”
“Did you tell father?” I asked.
“I dared not. He would have killed Peter and that would have been the end of us, for Peter stands high in the graces of the authorities.”
“I will kill him!” I said.
She tried to dissuade me, and finally I had to promise her that I would wait until I had provocation that the authorities might recognize. God knows I had provocation enough, though.
After breakfast the next day we set out singly and in different directions, as was always our custom on the first Sunday in each month. I went to Jim’s first to get Juana as she did not know the way, having never been with us. I found her ready and waiting and alone, as Jim and Mollie had started a few minutes before, and seemingly very glad to see me.
I told her nothing of Peter, as there is enough trouble in the world without burdening people with any that does not directly threaten them. I led her up the river for a mile and all the while we watched to see if we were followed. Then we found a skiff, where I had hidden it, and crossed the river. After hiding it again we continued on up for half a mile. Here was a raft that I had made myself, and on this we poled again to the other shore-if any followed us they must have swum, for there were no other boats on this part of the river.
I had come this way for several years-in fact, ever since I was fifteen years old-and no one had ever suspected or followed me, yet I never relaxed my vigilance, which may account for the fact that I was not apprehended. No one ever saw me take to either the skiff or the raft and no one could even have guessed my destination, so circuitous was the way.
A mile west of the river is a thick forest of very old trees and toward this I led Juana. At its verge we sat down, ostensibly to rest; but really to see if any one was near who might have followed us or who could accidentally discover our next move. There was no one in sight, and so, with light hearts, we arose and entered the forest.
For a quarter of a mile we made our way along a winding path and then I turned to the left at a right angle and entered thick brush here there was no trail. Always we did this, never covering the last quarter of a mile over the same route, lest we make a path that might be marked and followed.
Presently we came to a pile of brush wood, beneath one edge of which was an opening into which, by stooping low, one might enter. It was screened from view by a fallen tree, over which had been heaped broken branches. Even in winter time and early spring the opening in the brush beyond was invisible to the passers-by, if there had been any passers-by. A man trailing lost stock might come this way; but no others, for it was a lonely and unfrequented spot. During the summer, the season of the year when there was the greatest danger of discovery, the entire brush pile and its tangled screen were hidden completely beneath a mass of wild vines, so that it was with difficulty that we found it ourselves.
Into this opening I led Juana-taking her by the hand as one might a blind person, although it was not so dark within that she could not see perfectly every step she took. However, I took her by the hand, a poor excuse being better than none. The winding tunnel beneath the brush was a hundred yards long, perhaps-I wished then that it had been a hundred miles. It ended abruptly before a rough stone wall in which was a heavy door. Its oaken panels were black with age and streaked with green from the massive hinges that ran across its entire width in three places, while from the great lag screws that fastened them to the door brownish streaks of rust ran down to mingle with the green and the black. In patches moss grew upon it, so that all in all it had the appearance of great antiquity, though even the oldest among those who knew of it at all could only guess at its age. Above the door, carved in the stone, was a shepherd’s crook and the words, Dieu et man droit.
Halting before this massive portal I struck the panels once with my knuckles, counted five and struck again, once; then I counted three and, in the same cadence, struck three times. It was the signal for the day-never twice was it the same. Should one come with the wrong signal and later force the door he would find only an empty room beyond.
Now the door opened a crack and an eye peered forth, then it swung outward and we entered a long, low room lighted by burning wicks floating in oil. Across the width of the room were rough wooden benches and at the far end a raised platform upon which stood Orrin Colby, the blacksmith, behind an altar which was the sawn off trunk of a tree, the roots of which, legend has it, still run down into the ground beneath the church, which is supposed to have been built around it.
7
Betrayed
There were twelve people sitting on the benches when we entered, so that with Orrin Colby, ourselves and the man at the door we were sixteen in all. Colby is the head of our church; his great grandfather was a Methodist minister. Father and mother were there, sitting next to Jim and Mollie, and there were Samuels the Jew, Betty Worth, who was Dennis Corrigan’s woman, and all the other familiar faces.