The Sugar Creek Highwayman

BY

ADELA E. ORPEN

When Mrs. Boyd returned from Arkansas, I, having myself spent a very uneventful summer at home, with only the slight excitement of a month at Margate, was most anxious to hear an account of her adventures. That she had had adventures out there on those wild plains of course I felt certain. It would be manifestly preposterous to go to Arkansas for three months, and come back without an adventure.

So, on the first day when Mrs. Boyd was to be 'at home' after her return, I went to see her; and I found, already assembled in her cosy drawing-room, several other friends, impelled there, like myself, by curiosity to hear what she had to say, as well as by a desire to welcome her back.

'I was just asking Mrs. Boyd what she thought the most singular thing in America,' said Miss Bascombe, by way of putting me _au courant_ with the conversation after my greeting was over with our hostess.

'And I,' replied Mrs. Boyd, 'was just going to say I really did not know what was the one most curious thing in America, where most things seem curious, being different from here, you know. I suppose it is their strange whining speech which most strikes one at the outset. It is strong in New York, certainly, but when you get out West it is simply amazing. But then they thought my speech as curious as I did theirs. A good woman in Arkansas said I talked 'mighty crabbed like.' But a man who travelled in the next seat to me, across Southern Illinois, after talking with me for a long time, said, 'Wal, now, you dew talk purty tol'eble square for an Englishwoman. You h'aint said 'Hingland' nor 'Hameriky' onst since you sot there as I knows on!''

Mrs. Boyd put on so droll a twang, and gave her words such a curious, downward jerk in speaking, that we all laughed, and felt we had a pretty fair idea of how the Illinois people talk at all events.

'Everybody is very friendly,' continued Mrs. Boyd, 'no matter what may be their station in life, nor what you may suppose to be yours. I remember in Cincinnati, where I stopped for a couple of days, the porter who got out my box for me saw it had some London and Liverpool labels on it, whereupon he said, with a pleasant smile, 'Wal, how's Europe gettin' on, anyhow?' Fancy a Cannon Street porter making such a remark to a passenger! But it was quite simply said, without the faintest idea of impertinence. In fact, it is almost impossible to say that anybody is impertinent where you are all so absolutely on an equality.'

Now all this was interesting enough, no doubt, but what I wanted to hear about was something more startling. I could not really give up all at once the idea of an adventure in the West, so I said, 'But didn't anything wonderful happen to you, Mrs. Boyd?'

'No, I can't say there did,' replied the lady, slightly surprised, I could see, by my question.

Then, rallying my geography with an effort, I asked, 'Weren't you carried off by the Indians, or swept away by a flood?'

'No, I was many hundred miles away from the Indian Reservation, and did not see a single Red man,' replied Mrs. Boyd; 'and as for floods--well, my dear, I could tell you the ridiculous straits we were put to for want of water, but I can't even imagine a flood on those parched and dried-up plains.'

An Adventure
 

'Well,' said I, in an aggrieved voice, 'I think you might have come back with at least one adventure after being away for three months.'

'An adventure!' exclaimed Mrs. Boyd, in astonishment, and then a flash of recollection passed over her countenance, and she continued, 'Oh, yes, I did have one; I had an adventure with an highwayman.'

'Oh!' cried all the ladies, in a delighted chorus.

'See there, now!' said Miss Bascombe, as if appropriating to herself the credit of the impending narrative.

'I knew it!' said I, with triumph, conscious that to me was due the glory of unearthing the tale.

'I'll tell it to you, if you like,' said Mrs. Boyd.

'Oh, pray do; we are dying to hear about it!' said Miss Bascombe. 'A highwayman above all! How delicious!'

'Was he handsome?' asked one of the ladies, foolishly, as if that had anything to say to it.

'Wait,' said Mrs. Boyd, who assumed a grave expression of countenance, which we felt to be due to the recollection of the danger she had run. We also looked serious, as in politeness bound, and sat in eager expectation of her story.

'One day we were all invited to spend the whole afternoon at a neighbour's house. We were to go early for dinner at half-past twelve, stay until tea at five, and then drive home in the evening. The neighbour lived twelve miles away, but as there was to be a moon we anticipated no difficulty in driving home over the prairie. You see, as a rule, people are not out after dark in those wild regions; they get up very early, work hard all day, and are quite ready to go to bed soon after sunset. Anyway, there is no twilight; the sun sets, and it is dark almost immediately. When the day came, Emily (my sister, you know, with whom I was staying) wasn't able to go because the baby was not at all well, and she could not leave him for so long a time. So my brother-in-law and I set off alone, promising to come home early. I enjoyed the drive over the prairie very much, and we got to our destination about midday. Then we had dinner, a regular out-West dinner, all on the table together, everything very good and very plentiful. We dined in the kitchen, of course, and after dinner I helped Mrs. Hewstead to wash up the dishes, and then we went out and sat on the north side of the house in the shade and gossiped, while the men went and inspected some steam-ploughs and corn-planters, and what not. Then at five o'clock we had supper. Dear me! when I think of that square meal, and then look at this table, I certainly realise there is a world of difference between England and Arkansas.'

'Why,' said Miss Bascombe, 'don't they have tea in America?'

'Oh, yes,' replied Mrs. Boyd, 'we had tea and coffee, any number of cakes and pies, and the coloured man brought up a wheelbarrowful of water-melons and piled them on the floor, and we ate them all!'

'Dear me,' I remarked, 'what a very extraordinary repast! I think you must have felt rather uncomfortable after such a gorge.'

'Oh dear, no,' returned Mrs. Boyd, smiling; 'one can eat simply an unlimited quantity of water-melons on those thirsty plains. The water is always sickeningly warm in the summer-time, so that any substitute for it is eagerly welcomed.'

Mrs. Boyd, lost in the recollections of the appetising water-melons, was clearly forgetting the great point of her story, so I ventured to suggest it by remarking: 'And the highwayman?'

'I am coming to that directly,' said Mrs. Boyd.

'Well, we started home just before sundown; and as it was very hot, we could not drive fast. Indeed, the horses were in a sheet of lather almost immediately, and the air seemed fairly thick with the heat-rays, and absolutely breathless. Just as we got to the bluff overlooking the Big Sugar Creek, the sun set.
 

A Dangerous District

''I wish we were on the other side of the creek, I know,' said my brother-in-law.

''Why so?' said I; 'this part of the country is perfectly safe, is it not?'

''Yes,' he replied, 'it is pretty safe now, but there are always some rough customers about the bush, and there have been one or two shootings on the Big Sugar. Orlando Morse saw a man on horseback one night just after he had crossed the ford, waiting for him by the side of the road under the trees. But Orlando is an old frontier-man, so he is pretty quick with his trigger. He fired twice at the man, after challenging; whereupon the scoundrel vanished rapidly, and Orlando got safe home.'

'I felt very uncomfortable at this, as you may imagine; still, as I knew my brother-in-law had a very poor opinion of the nerves of Englishwomen, I made an effort to say, as lightly as I could: 'What a very extraordinary country, to be sure! And do you always shoot anybody you may happen to see standing by the roadside of a summer's evening?'

''Oh no,' laughed Louis; 'we're not quite so savage as that. But you may fire at any suspicious body or thing, after due challenge, if the answer is not satisfactory. That's the rule of the road.'

'After that I began to peer about in the gloom, rather anxiously trying to see if I could discover any suspicious body or thing, but I could make out nothing on account of the gloom, made more complete by the surrounding trees. Besides, we were going down hill very fast; we were, in fact, descending the steep bank of the first creek; then there was a bit of level in the wooded valley, then another stream, the South Fork it was called, then another steep climb, and we would once more be on the high and open prairie.

''Now, then, hold on tight!' said my brother-in-law, as he clutched the reins in both hands, braced his feet against the dashboard, and leaned far back in his seat. The horses seemed literally to disappear beneath our feet; the wagon went down head foremost with a lunge, there was a sudden jerk and great splashing and snorting, followed by a complete cessation of noise from the wheels, and a gentle swaying to and fro of the wagon. We were crossing the ford with the water breast high on the horses.

''I'm always glad when that ford is behind me,' said Louis to me, when we were again driving on quietly through the valley.

''Why?' said I; 'for there's another ford in front of us still.'

''Oh, the South Fork is nothing, but the Big Sugar is treacherous. I've known it rise twenty feet in two hours, and once I was water-bound on the other side for eleven days, unable to ford it. Emily would have gone out of her mind with anxiety, for the country was very disturbed at the time, only one of our neighbours, who saw me camping there, rode down to the house, and told her where I was, but, all the same----Hold! what's that?'

'I didn't scream; I couldn't, for my heart almost stopped beating with terror.

''Take the reins,' said Louis, in a quick whisper.

'I took hold of them as firmly as I could, but a pair of kittens could have run away with us, my hands trembled so. Louis got out his revolver; I heard click, click, click, in his hand, and then in the faint light I saw the gleam of steel.

''Halt! Who goes there?' called Louis, in a voice of thunder. I never heard his soldier-voice before, for ordinarily he speaks in a melodious baritone; and I then quite understood what Emily meant when she told me how his voice was heard above the din of battle, cheering his men on for the last charge at Gettysburg. I strained my eyes to see what it was, and there in front of us, not fifteen yards away, on the side of the road, I saw a man seated on horseback standing motionless, his right arm stretching forward, aiming straight towards us.
 

Two Pistol-shots
 

'Two livid tongues of flame darted from beside me--two quick reports of pistol-shots rang on the night air, then all was still. I felt the horses quiver, for the motion was communicated to me by the reins I held in my hands, but they were admirably trained animals, and did not move to the right or the left, only the younger one, a bay filly, snorted loudly. Louis sat silent and motionless, his revolver still pointing at the highwayman.

'I scarcely breathed, but in all my life I never thought with such lightning rapidity. My whole household over here was distinct before me, with my husband and the children, and what they would do on getting the cablegram saying 'waylaid and murdered.'

'I thought of a myriad things. I remember, amongst others, that it worried me to think that an over-charge of five shillings from Perkins for fowl, which my husband had just written to ask about, would now be paid because I could never explain that the pair of chickens had been returned. All this time--only a moment or two, you know--I was expecting instant death, while Louis and the horses remained motionless.

'The smoke from the revolver slowly cleared away; a bat, startled by the noise, flapped against my face, and we saw the highwayman seated on his horse, standing immovable where he was, his right arm stretching out towards us with the same deadly aim.

''If that man is mortal, he should have dropped,' said Louis softly. 'Both bullets struck him.'

'We waited a moment longer. The figure remained as before.

''I must reconnoitre,' said Louis; 'I don't understand his tactics.' And, to my dismay, he prepared to get out of the wagon.

''Are you going away?' I asked breathlessly.

''Yes; sit still--the horses won't stir. I'm going to open fire at close quarters.'

'I thought Louis's attempt at jocularity most ill-timed, but I said nothing. It seemed to me an immense time that he was gone, but he declares that it was not more than a minute and a quarter. Then I heard him laugh quietly to himself.

''All right, come on,' he said to me. 'Gee, whoa, haw, get up, girlies,' he said to the horses, and those sagacious beasts immediately walked straight towards the spot whence his voice came, without paying the least attention to me, who was holding the reins so tight, as I thought.

''Well, Milly, I suppose you'll never stop laughing,' was the first thing he said to me when the horses came to a standstill, with their noses almost in his beard.

''I never felt less like laughing,' I replied, hardly daring to believe that the peril was past and that I was still alive.

''Our highwayman is an old stump, don't you see?' exclaimed Louis. I looked again and saw that what he said was true; a gnarled tree stump, some twisted branches, a deceiving white vapour, and perhaps, too, our own vivid imaginations, these were the elements which had given birth to our highwayman.

''I never was more taken in,' said Louis, as he resumed his seat beside me. 'It was the dead image of a man on horseback holding out a pistol. I'll come down here to-morrow and examine the place, to find out how I could have been so silly, but in the daylight, of course, it will look quite different. I shan't ever dare to tell the story, however, for they'll laugh at me from the Red River to the Mississippi, and say I'm getting to be an old fool, and ought to have somebody to look after me!'

'I saw that Louis was ashamed of the mistake he had made, but I was so thankful to be safe that I paid little heed to what he said. The next day he rode down to the Big Sugar Creek, sure enough, to identify the slain, as he said. When he came back, a couple of hours later, he was in high good-humour.

''I shall not be afraid to tell the story against myself now,' he said. 'What do you think I found in the stump?'

''What did you find?' asked I, full of interest in this, the only highwayman I ever met.

The Last Laugh
 

''_Sixteen bullet-holes!_ You see, there have been other fools as great as myself, but they were ashamed of their folly and kept it dark. I shall tell mine abroad and have the last laugh at all events.''