Doctor Tom: The Coroner of Brett

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Contents

L

n. m.

IV.

Chapter I

« Why do you say that, Uncle Jeflf ? " « 'Cause every Mac in the mountins has camped on my trail for more'n thirty year. The McCalls, McCandlesses, McMahons, McBrides, and every other Scotch-Irish gang, and all their kin by blood, marriage, or 'doption, have been dead set agin we-uns ever since the wah. My uncle had a company of moimtin Bucktails on the Union side when most of the mountins were on the other side. The Thompson kin and the Reardon kin, and the Joyces, and the Clays, made the company, and we-uns got through the wah all right, but the other side made the mountins scaldin' hot when we-all got back."

« Was there a personal feud before the war ? " "Not that I ever heard tell of. To be certain, there was a little shootin' once in a while ; but it was all regular and friendly-like, and no hard feelin'."

" What started this vendetta. Uncle Jeff ? " " If you mean this wah between the Macs and

B 1 we-all, I s'pose it was the sudden goin' off of Brother George's gun. Your Uncle George was the peacef uUest man I ever saw — just like a girL He was that soft and easy anybody could make him jump over a house to git outer the way of trouble ; but it was always a mistake to comer George; for if he couldn't slip outer trouble, some one else would slip into it, shore pop. George hated to draw a gim, but if you drove him to it, he was the lightest hand on trigger that ever I see.

" It was this way : George was over to Brettville to pay taxes. After he had done his business, he went into Abe McCalPs place to get a taste o' moimtin dew and hear what was goin' on. Phil Sheridan was in New Orleans, and the news of his < Banditti Order' had just reached the mountins. Talk was loud in McCall's, and George slipped in behind a table, at the corner of the bah, where there was a window with a lot of sun at his back — he was always retirin' and quiet-like. The room was half full of chaps that hadn't been reconstructed, and the talk was wild and hot. George nodded and spoke to three or four men, and then, leanin' his right arm on the bah, he threw open his double-breasted jacket so his left arm was covered, and said : —

"«Come, boys, who'll wet a whistle along o' me?'

"Not a man nodded. Your Uncle George wasn't much to look at. He was small and pale.

and he hadn't more beard than a girl ; and when he was mad he smilAi sweet-like with his mouth, but I never seed no one that saw him smile with his eyes at sech times, and them what know'd him best didn't set much store on that smile.

" ^ Good and strong for one,' said George, ^ and I'll toast a friend o' mine. Here's luck to that great little soldier and that bully little man, Phil Sheridan,' says your Uncle George, smilin' and drinkin'.

"Hell wasn't more'n a minute's walk from that place. They cursed your Uncle George till his smile spread all over his face; they swore they'd kill him, and Joe McCall and Tom McCandless drew guns on him. They shouldn't 'a' done that with George standin' with his right arm on the bah and his back to the light. But how did they know he was left-handed with his gun? They didn't know it then, and two of them never knowed it. The others caught on when they saw his coat on fire and heard six shots from his gim, in about three seconds, and saw five of their gang on the floor. That's over thirty year ago, but I reckon that's how this wah commenced. Two killed and three wounded in the first gun fight was big odds in George's favor, and it took the Macs nigh on twenty year to get even. They trailed him more'n nineteen year afore they hung his pelt on the fence, and then his score was fourteen plugged and eight winged. For sech a peaceful man, your Uncle George saw considerable trouble. He's takin' his rest now, but this wah's goin' on jes' as if he was here ; only we miss his smile and his cheerful way with a gun.

« They got your Uncle Hughey and one of the Reardons and Tom Bristow two year afore they got your Uncle George — the time when we-all went over the range to wipe out old Joe McCall and his gang ; and they got your Uncle John two year ago, when the McMahons jined the revenue men to break up our still over yander. I'm the only one of the old Thompsons left ; and they'll not let me die in my bed if they can help it — there's too much a-comin' to me for that. Some galoot'U pop me — Fore Gawd, he's done it now 1 "

Two rifle shots rang sharp and clear, and two puffs of smoke showed above a pine log that lay across the path fifty yards down the mountain side. The two men fell as if stricken by the same blow, — the old man heavily on his side, with his rifle under him and a ragged hole in his left breast, while the young man pitched forward on his face, and his Winchester clattered on the stones a dozen feet farther down the trail.

There was a sound in Doctor Tom's ear, as of an angry bee, and a stinging feeling over the ear, as if the bee had not been idle ; but that was all. Tom Hendricks was all alive and all alert. In his headlong fall he had thrown himself behind a pine stump, half smothered with new growth that made a sheltering fringe through which he could see without being seen, while the solid stump was a safe defence against the bullets of his enemies.

With his long-barrelled Smith & Wesson in his hand, his eyes on the log, above which the faint smoke still curied, he lay motionless, as if dead. He heard a gasping groan that sounded like the last effort of Uncle Jeff ; and then there was absolute silence, except for the harsh cry of a blue jay which had alighted in the bushes above his head. Tom was certain that the enemy had not left cover, though they gave no sign, but he grew impatient as the moments passed, for his instincts, personal and professional, were calling him to give aid to the wounded man who lay near him.

Five, eight, and perhaps ten, slow minutes passed before the men in ambush were willing to accept the evidence of their good luck. There seemed to be no reason for doubting, however, for their victims lay as they had fallen, their Winchesters out of reach, and a sly blue jay perched close to the head of one of them. Two brown slouched hats rose over the log, two brown faces, bearded and fierce-eyed, showed above it for a short second, two sharp reports from a self-cocking revolver, and two heads disappeared behind the log.

There was no uncertainty in Doctor Tom's mind or movements. Springing to his feet, he tamed his back toward the fateful ambush as he reached the side of his prostrate uncle. Quickly relieviiig the long frame from its uncomfortable position, he placed it flat on its back, opened the homespun coat and shirt, and saw the gaping wound in the left chest which the big .45 had made.

Doctor Tom was too modem a surgeon to finger or probe this wound. There was evidence of severe hemorrhage, but this had almost ceased since the patient had fainted. With dexterous fingers the surgeon searched the posterior region of the left chest, and, much to his joy, foimd a hard nodule in the muscles of the back just beyond the point of the scapula. Accepting this as hopeful evidence that the bullet had been deflected by one of the sturdy ribs and thus had failed to penetrate the well-guarded chest, Tom took a clean handkerchief from his jacket and, with strips torn from the old man's shirt, bound it tightly over the wound. The wounded man was quite unconscious, though the heart was beating slowly, and the doctor was not anxious to change this condition until he knew more of the case and until he was in position to control the hemorrhage, which might again become active when the heart resumed full duty. The important matter, for the moment, was to get the patient to the house in the easiest and quickest manner possible.

It was a good half mile to the cabin, and no help was to be found nearer ; but Doctor Tom was equal to the task. Modern surgical training includes " first aid to the injured " ; and this contemplates not only medical and surgical aid, but also the lifting and carrying of those who need such attentions.

Jeff Thompson was not a light load for a mule, but Hendricks' shoulders and Hendricks' skill were equal to the burden. Kneeling on one knee by the side of the wounded mountaineer, he lifted him gently, and, in the most approved fashion, balanced him across his broad shoulders and bore him safely down the trail. A half mile is a long way with such a load, and it taxed even Doctor Tom, trained athlete though he was. The sweat stood in great drops on his face, his breath came fast, and his sturdy legs shook at the knees as he stepped on to the floored and covered passage which joined the two halves of the Thompson cabin. Mrs. Thompson entered the passage from the opposite side at the same moment.

" For Gawd's sake ! What's the matter with Jeff ? He ain't been shot ? Nobody hain't shot Jeff, has they, Tom? Why don't you-all say somethin', Tom Hendricks ? "

"Uncle Jeff's shot all right. Aunt Hat, and we'd better get him on to a bed," said Tom, as he stumbled into the sleeping-part and dropped his burden on the nearest bed.

Tom sat on a stiff chair and watched his mother's sister while he caught his breath. Tom's mother died yovmg, but he could remember her as a slight, blond, delicate woman with dainty ways and a soft voice. How could she be sister to this plain woman with iron-gray hair, heavy features, and gaunt, angular outlines, accentuated by a scant gown of calico much the worse for time and wear ? Aunt Hat's face was distorted by grief and passion, and her voice was as harsh as a soft voice can be, as she said : —

"That's Bill McCandless' work! May his soul roast in hell for it I But Jeff won't die, will he, Tom ? Jeff Thompson's too good a man to be done to death by a scum of a McCandless. He won't die, will he ? "

" I hope he'll not die. Aunt Hat ; but he's had a close call, and we must get to work."

Aunt Hat went into the open, and, with hands to her mouth like a megaphone, shouted, " Sis 1 Oh, Sis ! Sis Thompson I "

" What yo' want, maw ? " came back in a soft, musical, and carrying voice.

" Come here quick."

" What is it, maw ? " asked the same voice, when halfway from the spring house.

" That McCandless has tried to get your paw. Run for the boys; they're in the cohn high up the branch."

Without a word, and fleet as a deer, the girl was off. When Aunt Hat returned to the sleeping-part, Jeff was more than half undressed. The wife and the doctor soon had him in bed, and then Tom ran up a ladder to the sleeping loft and returned with a small case of instruments.

« I'll boil these while you get water from the spring and some whiskey; we must wake him up.''

They bathed his face, neck, and chest with cold water, and poured fiery mountain whiskey down his throat. In a few minutes his breathing became deeper, and, with a long-drawn sigh, he opened his eyes, looked vacantly around, and then closed them.

" That'll do for the present," said Doctor Tom. " I'll see what I can find in this ugly hole."

With a well-boiled silver probe, he traced the bullet to the seventh rib, and proved that it had not penetrated that ivory-hard substance, but had followed its curved line until it reached its greatest convexity. Thence, taking its original direction, it had passed through the deep muscles of the back and had lodged under the skin near the lower angle of the shoulder blade. With two strokes of a scalpel the bullet was exposed and removed. Simple water dressings and a mountaineer's constitution would bring speedy recovery.

Chapter II

Sis returned from her mile-and-a-half run before the simple surgery was finished. She showed the same evidences of exertion that a three-yearold thoroughbred would have shown: deep breathing, expanded nostrils, a trace of moisture in the hair which touched her forehead or clung to her ears, and some tiny half drops on her short upper lip. She stood at the foot of the bed, her brown hands clutching the rail and her great eyes flashing under the storm-cloud of her gathered brows.

Sis Thompson was seventeen years old, and she looked like an unkempt and uncombed filly, with all the latent possibilities, as well as the wilfulness and uncertainties, of the thoroughbred. She was tall and gaunt, like her race, with long arms and legs, which were covered, though not hidden, by a dingy calico dress. When new, the dress must have been fitted to a shorter and narrower girl, for four inches of brown, bare, and sinewy ankles showed above the tops of the shoes, which were much too large for her slender feet. The outlines of her straight limbs were exaggerated by the clinging scantiness of her gown, and the spines and crests of her hip-bones were thrown into high relief by the strained calico that covered them. Her back was straight and flat, and so, indeed, was her chest. Her face was in that transitional and imformed stage which gives much to hope for as well as much to fear. Her skin was smooth, but so brown that it looked harsh, and there was an archipelago of freckles athwart the bridge of her straight nose. Her mouth was wide, with a short upper lip, armed with a perfect Cupid's bow, and a lower one which looked as though " some gentle bee had stung it." Her teeth were perfect and well shown, but badly stained by "dipping." Her eyes were large, brown, wide apart, and full of fires which were often beyond control ; and dark brown hair grew luxuriantly in waving masses on her small head and crept down upon her forehead. It was rebellious hair, and the great knob, placed where head and neck join, held but part of it : wandering locks found pleasure in hiding her little ears or sought companionship with her heavy eyebrows, which were now contracting ominously.

"What was yo'-all doin' when that nasty skunk tried to get paw? Yo'-all was there, wasn't yo' ? Yo' had a gun, hadn't yo' ? "

" Yes, I had a gun until I fell and dropped it," said Tom, rising as he finished his work.

" What did yo' fall for ? Was yo' skeered ? "

The short lip curled and the brown eyes flashed.

" I reckon that's about the size of it, Sis."

"I wish paw'd had a mam, with him; no Thompson don't fall jes' 'cause he's skeered. It takes an ounce of lead to trip we-uns, if we-uns ain't got store clothes," said the scornful girl.

" There, Sis, don't sass your cousin ; your paw's comin' to," said her mother.

«0h, Dad I Tell me yo'-^U's not hurted! Why didn't yo' take me with yo'?" and Sis flung herself on the floor at the side of the bed.

The big brothers came rushing in hot from the run, and eager to help or for revenge.

« Bill McCandless tried to pot your paw, but Tom says he'll pull through. Take the guns and dogs and trail the skunk 'fore he gits outer the Cove." The mother's face was fierce with rage as she urged her sons to prompt reprisal.

The four men were quickly armed ; they had only to take four loaded Winchesters from the buckhorns and they were ready.

" Where's the old man's gun ? " asked Jake.

" I dunno," said the mother.

"Bill McCandless's got it by this time, and yours, too, I suppose, Tom Hendricks," said Sis, in high scorn.

" No, I think not. I had to leave them on the trail, for Uncle Jeff is no featherweight, but I reckon they're safe," answered Tom.

"Guns is mostly safe when dolly kids gits skeered and leaves 'em," snapped the brown wildcat from the bedside.

Tom followed the men into the open, and said : " You don't need all of those guns ; you'll find four up the trail by the north spring — two behind a pine log. Take a couple of spades and a mattock, — you'll want to hide something."

The men started for the trail with two guns and the tools which Tom had recommended. They said little: talking was not looked upon as an accomplishment by these tall, straight, solemn-faced young men. They were all young : Jake twenty-three, George twenty-one, Zeb nineteen, and John (known as " Bud ") a sapling of fifteen; but their faces were prematurely old. There was little promise of levity or even lighthear tedness in walk or conversation. Life offered serious propositions to these young men, and they accepted them seriously. The daily struggle for food and shelter was met with courage and a willingness to face homely and uninteresting employments ; their environment made but scant demands upon their energies, and they had grown up with hardly an ambition beyond the live-andlet-live principle which their isolation favored. As they swiftly followed the trail in single file, they showed all the alertness and the dogged scantiness of speech of the Indian ; they were tall and slender, too, like the best type of the redman, and their long limbs moved with catlike celerity and lack of effort. They were loose- join ted and slouching in gait, but underneath this careless manner were muscular possibilities as quick, strong, and fierce as a panther's, and spirits no more easily tamed.

The three dogs that beat the bush for fifty yards on each side of the trail were as unusual as their owners. They were cross-bred dogs, but not mongrels, for on each side was royal canine blood. Their mother was a heavy-boned bloodhound, red in color, with flapping, pendant ears, fiery haws that made her eyes look bloodshot, and apparently twice as much skin as was needed to cover her muscular frame. As a sick puppy, she had been given to Jeff Thompson by a travelling showman, and she had developed into a wonderful specimen of canine strength, fidelity, and intelligence. She had taken for her husband the only well-bred dog-gentleman in the mountains — a large, white bull terrier from the county town — and the result of this marriage was three red-and-white puppies, which the proud mother nourished and educated in most exemplary manner. They now surpassed their mother in stature and equalled her in intelligence and woodcraft. They were built close to the lines of a heavy pointer — large, capable nose and jaws, abundant room for brain development, pendulous, silky ears, strong neck set into massive shoulders, muscular back and quarters, and legs and tail which cast no discredit on the gentleman bull terrier, their father.

They looked fierce and dangerous on first impression, but they were gentle to a degree on better acquaintance, and they were always wise. This canine wisdom was phenomenal and uncanny, for it was unaccountable when predicated on any means of acquiring wisdom known to man. The something which, for want of better information, we call "instinct" must be capable of varying degrees of development, — else, why the clairvoyance which some large-brained dogs possess ? That the mother could and did warn these young dogs against personal dangers and enemies was only natural ; but that she could teach them who were the enemies of their human friends borders on debatable ground. That this, however, was true, no one who had the privilege of studying these remarkable animals could doubt. By sight, hearing, smell, instinct, or by all combined, they became conscious of an enemy long before a mere human intelligence suspected its presence. Every Mac in the mountains was reckoned an enemy, and not only every Mac, but every man, woman, or child who claimed friendship with them. The accident of the afternoon could not have occurred had the dogs been with the men, for no enemy could get within even long range without the warning growls, bristling spines, and eager questings of these faithful, vigilant animals.

They now beat the thickets in front and on both sides of the trail until within two hundred yards of the north spring, when one gave a whining growl, threw his head high, and made straight for a fallen pine one hundred and fifty yards away. The others joined him, and, like hounds with breast-high scent, ran swiftly, leaped the log, and, with fierce growls, began tearing and worrying something which lay beyond it. The young men hastened forward with guns alert ; but when they reached the fallen tree they dropped their guns and called the dogs ofF, with words of commendation.

" To heel, Shem ! Good boy, Japhet 1 Let go, Ham, you bully dog ! "

Jake turned the men over. "Bill McCandless, — plum in the middle of his forward ! Black Jack McCall, in the middle of his forward ! Well, I'll be damned ! "

George went up the trail to where the guns lay. He saw the pool of blood where his father fell, the impress in the loose leaves and mould beyond the stump where Tom had thrown himself, and the powder-burn on the low leaves of the bush whereon the blue jay sat and cried his shrill call. It was all clear to George, and he slowly paced the distance from stump to log. " Forty-six 1 Well, I'll be damned ! "

With the trenching tools a shallow grave was made; and when it was filled in and covered with leaves and brush, Zeb spoke : —

" He said we'd wanter hide so'thin' 1 Well, I'll be damned 1 "

The young men picked up the tools and the six guns and marched in single file down the trail. When halfway to the cabin, Bud spoke : —

"Sis said he was skeered ! Well, I'll be damned ! "

While the young men were busy on the mountain side, Doctor Tom did what he could for the comfort of his uncle. When there was nothing further to occupy him, he went into the open, tilted a split-bottomed chair against the cabin logs, threw one long leg over the other so that his left toe was in the same latitude as his chin, filled his brier-root, and blew clouds and rings of smoke, through which he watched the glories of the setting sun. Sunset and sunrise are regarded as perfunctory phenomena in Brett County. They occur, but they are not observed, or, if observed, it is in such a matter-of-fact, everyday sort of way as is not at all complimentary to the ever varying panorama. But Tom was a man who saw visions and dreamed dreams, and it did not require the full glories of a mountain sunset to arouse his fancies. Through the smoke-bedimmed yellow of the setting sun he began to see the vision of a peaceful valley overflowing with golden corn, which would nourish and fatten the regenerated swine with which he crowded its hillsides. He had fairly started the first herd to market when Aunt Hat's voice stampeded the whole bunch.

" Sis, I want yo' to stop gawkin' at the trail and get the pone made. They-all 'uU be hungry 'fore we-uns is ready."

« I can't, maw. If I hear a dog or a gun I'm goin' up the mountin. /ain't afeared to move outer the shadder of the cabin 1 "

Tom half turned, and saw Sis at the other side of the opening, intently watching the windings of the trail. Her back was toward him. She held the muzzle of a Winchester in her hand, while the stock rested on the ground beside her impatient foot. Her muscles were rigid, and she looked the embodiment of youth, alertness, and intensity.

" Don't worry. Sis ; the boys'll be here before the pone's baked."

«I ain't a-worryin', Tom Hendricks, but I makes no pone till I sees the boys."

Sis had hardly finished speaking before her tense muscles relaxed and she went quickly to the sleeping-part, hung the rifle on its buckhorn, crossed the opening in front of Tom, and disappeared in the detached kitchen. She did not speak to her cousin, or even look at him, but her high head and tilted nose expressed her scorn.

The boys soon appeared in single file. They marched to the rifle rack and hung up their weapons ; then, with solemnity, they approached Doctor Tom, and, in the order of primogeniture, shook his hand with such vigor as to bring his chair on to all fours and to rattle the pipe from his teeth. When this function was over, Jake, as spokesman for the quartette, said : —

"Cousin Tom, you-all ain't no slouch 1" and they filed off to the kitchen. Tom picked up his pipe, tipped his chair against the logs, and tried again to court his visions ; but he had no chance, for Sis came with a rush.

«Yo' slap my mouth, Tom Hendricks! I want yo' to slap it hard 1 "

She was close to him, her flushed face and stormy eyes looking down into his and her lips shaking and quivering.

" Slap my mouth quick — quick, I tell yo' 1 Don't you hear. Cousin Tom ? "

« Yes, Sis, I hear ; but men don't slap pretty girls' mouths where I came from. They find other uses for them, sometimes even more cruel, but they don't slap them."

"Yo' slap mine now, or I'll die of shame. Cousin Tom."

« I'll kiss your mouth. Sis, on half that provocation. But I'll not let you off easy, my young lady; I'm going to ask you to do something that'll be hard."

« What is it, Tom ? Cut off my hair, marry yo', stop swearin' ? I'll do it shore ! "

"Nothing so hard. Sis; but mind, it's a promise, and I'll hold you to it."

" I promise yo' shore. Cousin Tom."

" Put up your right hand and say after me the words which I say : < I'll never again put a dip stick into my mouth.' "

Down went the hand.

« Cousin Tom, my teeth would get nigger white, jes' like yoxirs 1 "

"Yes, I expect they would; but that's the punishment, Sis, and I hold you to your promise."

« I don't tell no lies," said the girl, and her hand went up.

" Pone's made and you-uns better hurry up," said Aunt Hat. Tom knocked the ashes from his pipe, dropped the bowl into his pocket, and followed Sis to the table. The supper, spread on bare boards, was eaten rapidly and in silence.

Pone, cracklings, sour milk, wild honey, foxgrape jelly, and whiskey were in abundant measure, but they were unattended save by a crock of sweet milk, cool from the spring house, which Sis placed near Tom's plate.

" It'll make yo' sick shore," said the girl, with a warning smile, as she placed the crock beside him.

" I'll risk it. Sis," said Tom, as he drew the dish to him and commenced breaking a large triangle of fresh pone into the cool, delicious fluid.

No further word was spoken until the meal was ended. Then Jake, in his drawling monotone, said : —

"Bill McCandless and Black Jack McCall! In the middle of the forward 1 Well, I'll be damned 1 "

And the boys marched out.

CHAPTER III BUTH BAYMOlffD

The Raymond mansion is substantial and commodious, and stands four square to all the world in a large lot on Walnut Hills, out from Cincinnati. It was built by the first John Raymond, who came to the valley of the Ohio to establish a fortune, and, incidentally, to found a city. It is of such massive and honest construction that the flight of a hundred years has touched it only to soften ; and it stands to-day as solid and stately, although somewhat old-fashioned, as it did when Jefferson was President and Blennerhassett listened to the wily tongue of Aaron Burr on the island which can almost be seen from its high-peaked roof.