Jr. Thomas Dixon

“ Billy seized both her hands and drew her under the shadow of a tree.
“A strong manly breast on which to lean—Susie, my Darling, I love you! Will you be my wife?”
Susie burst into a fit of laughter and Billy dropped her hands in rage.
“You treat the offer of my heart as a senseless joke, young woman?”
“No, Billy dear, I don’t. I appreciate it more than words can express. You have paid me the highest tribute a girl can receive, but the idea of marrying a boy of your age is ridiculous!”
“Ridiculous! Ridiculous! How dare you insult me? I’m as old as you are!” thundered Billy. ”

“ The tall form again towered in rage above the shrinking figure.
“Wait! I must tell you all, Susie. You know but half the truth. Listen dear, I did try to avenge my father’s death. I believed John Graham guilty. I did lure him on to love me only to find that I loved him! I tried to hate him and couldn’t. I’ve betrayed only his name to Ackerman. I could tear my tongue out for it. If he learns of it, he will turn from me and hate me! Susie darling, I’ve been proud and vain and wilful. Now I’m a poor little girl alone, friendless and lost. You’re stronger than I am. ”

“ The mother dead, his father a hopeless mental invalid, Billy had grown up with no hand to guide his wayward fancy. It was not to be wondered at that he soon recognised no authority save that of his own will.
Stella’s request had brought John face to face with the problems of his father and Billy. He must know the truth before he could answer that letter. Better to strangle the love that was fast swelling in his heart than wait until the hour when the call of love might drown the voice of honour. ”

“ Every secret of my life shall be laid bare before I’d dare claim you as my wife. I only beg to-night one word of love from your dear lips. You believe me when I swear to you, on my honour, my life, my love that I am innocent?”
“Yes, I believe and trust you!”
He bowed and kissed her fingers reverently.
“And now you must show that you trust me before I speak,” she went on dreamily—“you are in reality the Chief of the Klan in North Carolina, are you not?”
John’s hand trembled, his lips quivered, and a look of mortal anguish overspread his face. ”

“ Never had he seen a human being so transformed by anger—eyes that a moment before had held him enraptured with their tender light had flashed cold points of steel. Hands, soft and warm and full of velvet feeling, had closed in rage as the claws of a tigress!
Suppose she refused to see him again? It was unthinkable. He seemed to have lived a century within the weeks since she had called him to her side. The life which had gone before grew dim. Four years of war and two years of daring secret revolution as a leader of the Invisible Empire faded from his consciousness. ”

“ Yet no traitor had appeared among its ranks. The deepest curses of a race were reserved for the white lip that should betray its members. Whatever the leaders of public opinion might say, the masses of the people knew the necessity which had called this dreaded order into existence—the black threat of Negro dominion. Thousands of women and children knew its secrets and held them inviolate.
On Stella Butler the death of her father had wrought a deep and remarkable change. The fun-loving, imperious, self-willed, spoiled child had suddenly become a serious woman. ”

“ She heard them with contempt and proceeded to shock her critics still worse by establishing herself permanently in the great lonely house with only Aunt Julie Ann as her guardian.
Her whole being was fused into a single deathless purpose—to take the life of the man who had killed her father. She would stop at no means to accomplish this end, and she would treat with scorn every convention of society which might interfere.
She slowly descended the winding stairs to-night before Steve’s enraptured gaze, dressed in pure white with full train. A single deep red rose was set in her black hair. ”

“ You’re in my way; get out of it,” sneered the Judge.
“You contemptible cur!” cried Larkin. “I could strangle you!”
“No doubt,” sneered Butler. “If you dared!”
“Take care, you cowardly dog!” leaped the threat from the lips of the Carpetbagger, with a sudden flash of incontrollable rage; and again his massive figure towered over the Judge’s slouching form. Butler’s shifting eyes blinked in terror as he spluttered:
“I’ll keep your secret on one condition!”
“What is it?” snapped Larkin.
“You’re a man of genius. Use your talents for me, and we’ll be friends.” ”

“ They entered the immense kitchen whose walls had once echoed with the voices of swarms of indolent well-fed slaves.
Stella looked about her in amazement, asking with a slight tremor in her voice:
“Why have you brought me here?”
“To place my life in your hands, joyously, without a single reservation,” he said with deep earnestness. “You are in the council chamber of the Invisible Empire. Here its High Court of Life and Death was held.”
Stella’s breath quickened and she glanced at John with furtive eyes. ”

“ Five minutes more of that Convention and you’ll be a memory as a politician. You never had a principle in your life. A professed leader of the Republican party in the South composed of Negroes, you loathe the very sight of a Negro. You profess to be a Southerner, yet your ear is always to the ground to hear the slightest whisper from the lowest breed of Yankee demagogues in the North. You lie to the Negro, you lie to the Southern white man, you lie to the Yankee. You’re a pusillanimous, office-seeking turncoat beneath the contempt of a man. ”

“ The ivy which had grown on the sides of the stone steps had climbed in unbridled riot over one of them and hung in graceful festoons from the top.
To Stella’s fancy they seemed grim white sentinels guarding the entrance to some vast empire of the dead.
“How still and death-like everything is,” she said, with a timid glance about her. “We seem a thousand miles from life.” ”

“ Behind her stood the rich old mahogany sideboard of Colonial pattern, the Graham silver flashing in the quaint gold mirror which hung above it. In the mirror her own image was clearly reflected. The man opposite could look into her face and at the same time see in the shining silvery picture above the sideboard the black ringlets of curling hair at the back of her neck, as well as the exquisite lines of her figure.
John gazed at her in silent wonder. Never had he seen a picture so appealing in its beauty to every sense of his being. ”

“ John found her in a mood of elusive girlishness. When he begged her to remember her parting words, the half-pledged promise of a message for which he waited, she only laughed and fenced.
She allowed him to call each afternoon and evening for a week until he was drunk with the joy of her presence—until the sense of personal intimacy and the growing consciousness of comradeship had made his will obedient to her slightest whim. It amused her to watch the growth of his powers of intuition, born of this daily life, which enabled him to anticipate her wishes. ”

“ When they reached the first corridor, he sprang to a grated door and seized his brother’s hand. As she passed on Stella heard him say joyously:
“It’ll be all right, Jim, don’t worry. She’s a goin’ to help us. She told me so. She’s rich—she’ll get us a lawyer.”
Stella climbed the stairs to John’s door with a great voiceless fear in her soul. The thought of his discovery of her betrayal stopped the very beat of her heart.
To her surprise she found him strangely calm.
“It’s sweet of you to come so early,” he said with a smile.
“Love makes one’s feet swift, doesn’t it?” ”

“ Ackerman could have nothing to do with Stella—they were not even passing acquaintances.
From every point of view he tested the problem of her possible design to use this knowledge and found it preposterous. There was but one reasonable explanation. She had found with her keen woman’s intuition the one weak spot in his mental attitude toward her. Yes, it was true. He loved her with passionate devotion, but he had not fully trusted her. She had discovered it. Had she not thus revealed the true state of her own heart? She must love him. ”

“ Steve Hoyle knows that he can beat me for Congress with this new wildcat Klan at his back. He hasn’t sense enough to see that the spell of authority once broken, he wields a power no human hand can control. It will be faction against faction, neighbour against neighbour, man against man—the end martial law, prison bars and the shadow of the gallows. I can save the lives of thousands of men, and my state from crime and disgrace by killing this fool as I’d kill a mad dog, and I’m going to do it! ”

“ When the deep-muttered curses against Steve Hoyle for the betrayal of his men reached John’s ears, he sent through Stella his sternest orders and his tenderest entreaties to Dan Wiley to prevent violence. Dan had successfully eluded every effort to arrest him. John knew that he was hiding in the mountains with the men he had commanded armed to the teeth, and he lived in constant dread of the news of Steve’s assassination, even under the noses of the United States troops. ”

“ John looked at her curiously, bowed and kissed her hand.
“Thanks, Miss Susie! I appreciate, more than I can tell, your coming alone after me here to-night—a very rash and daring thing for a girl to do in these troublesome times. Such things make a fellow ashamed that he ever took a drink, make him feel that life is always worth the fight—and I’m going to make it to-night—and I’m going to win!”
“Then don’t give old Butler the chance to ruin you,” pleaded the gentle voice. ”

“ The Clansman leader lifted his hand, and the shrill scream of his whistle rang three times, and each white figure answered with a long piercing cry.
The police cordon broke into scurrying fragments and melted into the throngs on the sidewalks, while the procession of white and scarlet horsemen, without a pause, passed slowly on amid shouts of laughter from the people who had witnessed the fiasco.
“Well, I’ll be d———! excuse me, Miss Stella!” ”

“ Stella was fairly intoxicated with her social victory. Steve led in the devoted circle of her admirers, each day pressing his suit with humble and dogged persistence. She smiled in triumph at his abject surrender but continued to keep him at arm’s length, showering her favours on all who were worth while.
She determined to crown her social leadership with a unique fancy dress ball by inviting the Klan masqueraders to dance with a select group of her girl friends at her home. ”

“ Stella ignored his question and said in even tones as though talking to herself:
“I had intended to have the United States marshals arrest him dressed in the Klan costume at their meeting place.”
“And now?” Steve broke in eagerly.
“I don’t know what to do. I’ll be frank with you, Steve—I never expected to keep my promise to marry you—I never really expected to face such a choice. There are times when I like you. There’s evil in me, as there is in you—cruelty, pride, selfishness—I feel our kinship. But I don’t love you, and the closer I get to you the less I love you.” ”

“ Old Larkin, who came from the Capitol to assist the prosecution, sat constantly by Steve’s side.
John Graham watched Steve with cold deadly hate, but he had warned his men under no conceivable circumstances to lift a hand in resistance either to constituted authority, or to give the traitor his deserts. A pall of helpless grief and fear hung over every decent white man who witnessed the High Court of Justice of the Anglo-Saxon race suddenly transformed into a Negro minstrel farce on which hung their liberty and life.
The star witness of the prosecution was Uncle Isaac A. Postle. ”

“ In another moment he would have made his motion for a solid Negro delegation and stampeded the Convention had it not been for the single burst of eloquence with which he closed his speech. Just at the moment when he held every heart in the dusky host in the hollow of his hand, he thundered:
“Against the white traitor of the South who has perpetrated these wrongs on your defenseless heads I hurl the everlasting curse of God! Only a race of dastards and cowards would thus sneak under the cover of night to strike their foes!” ”

“ We have rescued our state from Negro rule. We dissolve this powerful secret order in time to save you from persecution, exile, imprisonment and death. The National Government is getting ready to strike. When the blow falls it will be on the vanished shadow of a ghost. There’s a time to fight, and a time to retreat. ”

“ She touched her horse with the whip, and he bounded forward in a swift gallop, and in a few minutes she passed into the old lawn and saw the flash of the white ghost-like columns among the dark firs.
Again she found herself recalling the silly extravagances of his talk as they entered the grounds two days before.
“What was it he said about angels?” she mused with a smile. “Yes, I remember. Somehow I seem to remember them all!—‘When I stand by your side, in every silent space I hear the beating of the wings of angels’—and I liked it! what a fool a woman is! ”