“I believe that is plain enough,” he said. “How many of you are with me?”
There were nine in the group who rode out from the village. Four were from the local company of militia, and even old Mister Dean, armed with a tremendous double-barreled shotgun, had come along.
“Will there be time to reach the cabin?” Hutchins asked, turning in his saddle to look at Rob.
“No, sir. I don’t think so. And with so many men there would be noise.”
Walker spoke up angrily. “By the Lord, Captain, if they’ve killed that boy …
!”
“Hsst!”
They drew up sharply at the signal, stopping in the black shadow of a roadside tree. They heard a murmur of voices and an oath as somebody stumbled. Men were coming through the brush.
Hutchins swung to the ground, very cool, very businesslike. Rob’s father tossed his reins to Rob and dismounted. “Hold the horses, Rob,” he said, “and don’t be frightened.”
Breathless with excitement, Rob watched his father. He carried a rifle, and from somewhere he had gotten a large pistol which was thrust into his waistband. Moreover, he seemed completely at home with both weapons. Rob had noticed with pride the businesslike way in which his father loaded them. The four militiamen disappeared into the trees opposite the noise in the brush. Hutchins stood his ground, in the middle of the moonlit road. Some twenty feet farther along, standing partly in the shadow, was Walker. The other men had scattered themselves, two slipping into the brush, planning to come in behind the Carters and cut off any attempted escape.
Fud was the first Carter to reach the road. “Right across here there’s a rock,” he was saying. “We can wait there until Hutchins …” His voice broke off sharply as he saw the slim, erect figure standing in the light of the sinking moon.
The others emerged from the woods, Ring pausing on the edge of the brush, warned by the sudden breaking off of Fud’s speech.
“Stand where you are, men,” Hutchins spoke clearly. “You’re well taken.”
A rustle of movement in the brush behind him made Sam start, then relax slowly. Fud was weaving uncertainly as his slow brain attempted to cope with the situation, a situation already beyond him. The shock of the trap was too much for Fud.
“You’ll drop your weapons!” Walker’s voice was crisp. “If you do not comply at once, we shall shoot to kill!”
Fud found his voice. “What’s this?” he blustered. “Can’t a man travel the high road ‘thout bein’ held up?”
“Our point exactly,” Hutchins replied cheerfully. “I’m Hutchins, if you’d like to know. I understand you planned to meet me later. Now tell us: where’s the boy?”
“What boy?” Fud tried to seem surprised.
“Don’t pretend, man.” Hutchins walked up to him. “You have been found out so you’d best tell us. If that boy has been harmed I shall personally attend to your hanging.”
Rob’s attention had been riveted upon the tense scene in the road’s center. All at once his eyes swung to the edge of the road. Sam was still there, a man behind him with a gun at his back, but the third man was gone. “Father!” he called sharply. “The other man’s gone!” Before anyone could speak, Sam lifted his voice. “Hutchins, you’d better get to the cabin and save that boy. Ring’s got away and he hates the lot of you. He’ll kill that lad. I know Ring. He’ll kill him certain sure.” Fud turned his heavy head to glare at Sam. “Why don’t you keep shet?” he demanded.
Sam shrugged, smiling wryly. “You heard the man. If anything happens to that boy, we hang. Do you want to hang, Fud?”
“Did you say Ring?” Walker crossed the road to Sam. “I thought we’d killed the lot of them.”
“This here’s Bob Ring. You killed his father and brother. They were the first of the Carters.”
Walker turned to his son. “Rob, can you take us to the cabin? I don’t like to ask you. I know you’re tired, but …”
“I want to go!” Rob slid from his horse. “I know the way.” Four men took Sam and Fud, their hands tied behind them, and started for the village. The others followed Captain Hutchins and Walker into the woods, and Rob led the way. Out there in the stone house Jean LaBarge waited for help, and he was bringing it.
The light outside the knothole slowly turned gray. Unless Rob had reached them in time Captain Hutchins would now be approaching the place where the Carters lay in wait for him on Mill Creek Road.
What if Rob was not believed? But he would be, for Rob was a serious boy, not given to pranks, and he had a way of making people listen to him. He knew how to talk, and had the words for it. That was because he read books. Jean made a mental resolution to read more … if he got out of this. He got to his feet and went to the door. The cabin smelled of dirty clothes and stale tobacco smoke. He tried to get his fingers into the crack between the door and the jamb but there was no space for them, nor could he budge the heavy planks at the window.
Somewhere out in the woods there was a sound, and he went to the knothole, peering out. The grass of the clearing beyond the hemlocks was gray with morning dew; with the rising sun it would turn to silver. A bird came out of a tree and sat on a stump, preening his feathers. There was no sound, there was no other movement.
Yet there was … a stirring of leaves, a branch that moved, and a man peering furtively out. The bird, frightened, took off in a low swoop for the trees, and the man named Ring came from the forest and started toward the house. Jean’s throat tightened with fear. Ring was back and he was alone. He had been running: his breath came in ragged gasps and he walked with swift, jerky steps. That meant something had happened—
Ring hesitated, staring back at the forest and listening. His lank black hair hung around his ears, his eyes were wild and staring. There was a pistol tucked in his waistband. He ran on to the stone house and Jean heard him fumbling with the hasp on the door.
Frightened, his mouth dry, Jean hid where the opening door would conceal him until the last moment. They would be coming. Rob must have gotten help; Ring was being chased. If only he could…
The door slammed open and Ring stepped into the room, glaring about like a wild animal, looking for Jean. Gasping hoarsely from his run, the man was beyond reason, beyond thought, filled with murderous rage. He stepped on into the room, and instantly Jean ducked around the door and ran. Wheeling with amazing swiftness, the black-haired man grabbed for him. Jean felt the fingers clutch at his arm, slide off. Then he was out of the door and around the corner of the house. The man was like a cat. He sprang after him, but Jean ducked behind a hemlock and froze in place, eyes wide, fear choking him. Ring stood in the clearing before the house and looked around him slowly. When he spoke it was in an amazingly cool, almost conversational voice. “You surely needn’t try to get away. I know these here woods better’n anybody. My name is Ring and I growed up here.”
Jean looked toward the brush, judging the distance. The black-haired man would not want to use his gun and draw the pursuers to him. The brush was only fifteen feet away, yet for the time it took to cover that distance he would be in full view.
“I’m surely goin’ to kill you, boy. They done kilt my daddy, an’ I’m a-goin’ to kill you.”
Jean sprang out and leaped for the brush.
Ring swore, a shrill, whining scream, then lifted his pistol. Realization of what it might bring made him lower it again. He raced after the boy, but Jean LaBarge was already into the woods and once more in his own element. He ducked, dodged, then plunged out into an unexpected little clearing. Behind him Ring yelped a cry of triumph. And then out of the bushes ahead of them stepped Captain Hutchins. “It’s all right boy,” Hutchins said quietly. “Let him come.”
5
The hardest part had been saying goodbye to Walker, for they had always planned to go west together, and now he was going and Rob was staying behind. The next hardest part was to leave the swamp.
Before he left he walked alone to the Honey Tree, and he sat down there where he and Rob had sat so many times together, and where he had sat so many times alone. Around the towering tree millions of bees hummed unceasingly, and he watched them, a lump in his throat.