Buckley

“ One morning in September it was hot inland, but cool on the point of land reaching out into the sea where the Buckley house stood. The son, Ichabod, had gone to sea in a whaling-vessel; the father was at home, working in the little slanting shed behind the house. One could hear the grating slide of his chisel down the boughs of a weeping-willow on a new gravestone. A very old woman of the village had died that week.
At the left of the house there was a bright unexpected glint from a great brass kettle which the eastern sun struck. ”

“ Poor Persis Buckley sometimes felt herself turn fairly cold with dread at the thought of entering that splendid coach and driving away forever out of her old life at that strange gentleman's side. He became to her as cold and formless as a moving column of mist on the marsh, and even the dreams which sprang of themselves in her girlish heart could not invest him with love and life again. ”

“ Even the folk of this old New England village, who had in their stern doctrines no value for a fair face, turned for a second, as if by some compelling gleam of light under their eyelids, when this little Buckley maid entered the meeting-house; and her mother and sisters, although they saw her every day, would stop sometimes their work or speech when her face came suddenly before their eyes.
Persis had her little looking-glass. She looked in it when she had washed her face to see if it were clean, and when she braided her hair to see if it were smooth. ”

“ Marvellous tales were told of this gentleman and his lady mother, who had come in the coach with him. Persis, when she was wedded, would dwell in marble halls, wear satin and velvet of a week-day, and eat off gold and silver dishes. No wonder that Ichabod Buckley and his wife Sarah were doing their poor best to fit their daughter for such a high estate! No wonder that they kept her all day in the best room embroidering and reading poetry and playing music! No wonder that they never let her walk abroad without morocco shoes and a veil over her face! ”

“ A multitude of small lads, with here and there a little petticoat among them, collected rapidly, and pelted along in the wake of this grand equipage. They followed it quite through the town to the road that led through the woods, past the graveyard, to the Buckley house, then up the road, panting but eager, the smaller children dragging at the hands of their elder brothers. ”

“ Then Mistress Tabitha Hopkins, holding her Sabbath gown high above her hooped satin petticoat as she stepped along, unfolded to her nephew Darius Hopkins the strange romance of Persis Buckley's life.
“'Tis a shame!” cried the young man, indignantly, when she had finished — “a shame, to keep her a prisoner in this fashion!”
“'Tis only a prince with a coach and four can set her free. A prince from over seas, with a black gentleman a-driving,” said his aunt.
Darius turned, and stared back across the flat meadow-land at Ichabod Buckley's house. ”

“ A neighbor ripe in years and good works had died. The funeral was over and the man of God had stopped to rest in the pleasant shade of Mrs. Buckley's trees and in the pleasant sound of Mrs. Buckley's voice. Mary, the gocart, and Theodora completed the group, and the minister spoke.
"A good man," he repeated, "Ah, Mrs. Buckley, he will be sadly missed! But the Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away. ”

“ Oh, madness, beyond all question!
"Here, wake up!" Buckley cried, in a voice that was strangely strong and natural. "I've found it. And it's been there all the time. We've been marching side by side with it for two or three days. Come along!"
"What is it?" Macardie gasped. "You are wet."
"Of course I am!" Buckley shouted. "It's water down there—a stream of beautiful clear, cold water, but so smothered with leaves that you can't see it. What we thought was flat rock was nothing in the world but thick leaves floating on the stream. ”

“ Ichabod Buckley's wife had her dye-kettle out there on forked sticks over a fire. She was dyeing some cloth an indigo-blue, and her two elder daughters were helping her. The two daughters Submit and Rebecca looked like their mother. The three, from their figures, seemed about of an age — all tall and meagre and long-limbed, moving in their scanty petticoats around the kettle with a certain dry pliability, like three tall brown weeds on the windy marsh.
Persis came up from the shore at the front of the house with her arms full of drift-wood. ”

“ The husbands--with that intelligence which is the privilege of the male sex--saw the state of the case at a glance. A great warrior had been buried at the mound. Great warriors, as all the world knows, change into white men after death. Buckley was a white man; and, moreover, he had in his hand the very spear that had been stuck into the tomb. Nothing could be more satisfactory, and saluting the half-starved convict by the name of Murrangurk, they bore him off to their huts, with much shouting and demonstrations of joy. ”

“ With an uneasy glance at the window Buckley offered such sorry comfort as he could. “The wind plays damn queer tricks, Sam. You buck up an’ get a bottle out. We’ll play seven up for a spell.”
A high mocking laugh, thin and sinister, trembled out of the night as though in answer to Buckley’s suggestion. The two men looked at each other. Each read fear in the eyes facing his.
“It—that sounded like—like Al Morford the day I shot him,” gasped Dutch, clutching at his companion’s sleeve. ”

“ Nobody knew how the Buckley Lady, sitting in her window watching, had seen Darius Hopkins pass by, with never a coach and four, but striding bravely along on his own stalwart young legs, and how her heart had gone out to him and followed him, whether she would or not.
Darius Hopkins was Mistress Tabitha Hopkins's nephew, and he had come from Boston to pay his aunt a visit. People whispered that he had expectations, and had come with a purpose. Mistress Tabitha had received within two years a legacy, nobody knew how large, by the death of a relative. ”

“ But the baronet proved a perfect William Rufus for variegated and versatile blackguardism. Lady Buckley’s life was made impossible by his abominable conduct. At this juncture my heroine chanced to be obliged to lunch at a railway refreshment-room. My last chapter had described the poor lady lunching lonely in the bleak and gritty waiting room of Swilby Junction, lonely except for the company of her little boy. I showed how she fell into a strange and morbid vein of reflection suggested by the qualities of the local sherry. If she was to live, her lord and master, Sir W. Buckley, must die! ”

“ Her mother caught her arm with a jerk. “Who be they?” she hissed in her ear.
“I — don't know — such — grand folks, and — the coach and the four, and the black man — oh, mother!”
“Go bid your father come quick.”
Sarah Buckley gave her daughter a push, and Persis flew on towards the shed where her father kept his stock of gravestones and worked. But Rebecca had already given him the alarm, and he was at the well washing the slate dust from his hands.
“Go quick, father; they want you!” panted Persis.
“Who be they?” queried Ichabod Buckley. ”

“ I said. "Major Buckley."
The Major came forward, and held out his hand to George Hawker. "You are now," he said, "like a dead man to me. You die to-morrow; and you know it; and face it like a man. I come to ask you to forgive me anything you may have to forgive. I have been your enemy since I first saw you: but I have been an honest and open enemy ”

“ Macardie shook his fist feebly.
"Ah, you devils," he said, "you're waiting for us, are you? Well, you'll not have long to wait now. But you'll not have that brandy, Buckley. You've got to be like a man, so you can just make the best of it." ”

“ Buckley's horse, and ride him till he drops, and you'll get another at the Parson's. If you have any snow, it will be on Broadsaddle; but it won't signify. You go round the low side of Tambo, and sight the lake, and you'll be there before him."
"How far?"
"Sixty miles, or thereabouts, plain sailing. It ain't eleven o'clock yet."
"Good; I'll remember you for this. Buckley, I want your horse. Is the lad dead?"
"No; but he is very bad. I'll try to get him home. Take the horse; he is not so good a one as Widderin, but he'll carry you to the Parson's. God speed you." ”

“ The other meaning is that Buckley never goes into a fight without giving away weight. He seems to dread taking the slightest advantage. That's quite close to foolhardiness when you are dealing with horse-thieves and fence-cutters who would ambush you any night, and shoot you in the back if they could. ”

“ I used to say to myself when I first knew him, what a pity that a man with such a noble intellect should be buried in a country village, a pastor to a lot of ignorant hinds. And yet he is fit for nothing else, with all his intelligence, and all his learning. He has no go in him,—no back to his head. Contrast him with Buckley, and see the difference. Now Buckley, without being a particularly clever man, sees the right thing, and goes at it through fire and water. But our old Vicar sees the right, and leaves it to take care of itself. He can't manage his own family even. ”

“ The measure of freedom is always in proportion to the measure of previous restraint. Persis Buckley had been under a restraint which no maiden in this New England village had ever suffered, and she had gotten from it an impetus for a deed which they would have blushed to think of. ”

“ That he had not openly committed himself to any of Buckley's schemes, had signed no papers and written no letters that would betray the conspiracy he had entered into against Steve, filled him with joy. He had intended to be generous, and even, if necessary, confess to Clara his indiscretion in talking of a possible marriage, but when he got to the farm house and had taken Clara into the parlor and had closed the door, he changed his mind. He told her of Buckley's arrest, and then started tramping excitedly up and down in the room. Her coolness infuriated him. ”

“ Ever hit the trail?"
"Not on those plains. In the woods many times."
"We ain't takin' but damn few," went on Buckley dissertatively, "and them that goes has to be right on to their job. No women; good cattle. That's our motto. Reckon you-all fills the bill. Cyan't tell. Got to ask the others."
Lafond knew that this, from a man of Buckley's stamp, was distinct encouragement. At the moment, the other two members came up. Buckley, in a few words, told them of the newcomer's desires and qualifications.
Billy looked him over briefly.
"Yo're a breed, ain't yo'?" ”

“ Every one thought he would be too late; when some one ran out of the square (men said it was Buckley) , and, throwing the wounded lad over his shoulder, ran with him into safety; and a cheer ran along the line from those who saw him do it. Small time for cheering then; for neither could recover his breath before there came a volley of musketry, and all around them, outside the bayonets, was a wild sea of fierce men's faces, horses' heads, gleaming steel, and French blasphemy. ”

“ The insult cost him his audience. When he realized this he lost all his self-possession, and, as the Buffalo Courier put it the next day, "went up and down the platform raving like a Billingsgate fishwife." He lost the debate, and the supply of yellow ribbon left in the surrounding counties was purchased that night to be used in the suffrage celebration that followed. My friends still refer to the occasion as "the day we wiped up the earth with Dr. Buckley"; but I do not deserve the implied tribute, for Dr. Buckley would have lost his case without a word from me. ”

“ Buckley would never speak at random, if she once promised to give her real opinion."
"No, I don't think she would, Auntie, but she is not very particular in her own dress."
"She always looks like a thorough lady, my dear: Mrs. Buckley is a woman whom I could set before you as a model for imitation far sooner than myself."
"She is a duck, at all events," said Mary; "and her husband is a darling."
Miss Thornton was too much shocked to say anything. To hear a young lady speak of a handsome military man as a "darling," went quite beyond her experience. ”

“ Thirdly, it was equally inconceivable that Captain Shillington should have appointed to see Buckley at that hour of the night, however pressed the latter might have been for money. Why should he? The next morning would have done just as well, whether he meant to help him or whether he did not, and, according to the testimony of the night-watchman, William Rugger, when he was accosted by Buckley, he exclaimed in tones of great surprise, 'Good Lord, Henry, what are you doing here?' These are not words which a man would say to a friend whom he had appointed to meet at this very hour. ”

“ Quixotic, perhaps, but it was Bob Buckley's way. Another man—and a braver one—might have raised a posse to accompany him. It was Buckley's rule to discard all preliminary advantage.
The Mexican had left behind him a wake of closed doors and an empty street, but now people were beginning to emerge from their places of refuge with assumed unconsciousness of anything having happened. Many citizens who knew the ranger pointed out to him with alacrity the course of Garcia's retreat. ”

“ Popular theology is accustomed to cry out for "more props."
At last, after thirty-two years of savage life, Buckley met two natives, one of whom carried a flag over his shoulders. He had long given up all hope of meeting with white men; he had forgotten his language and almost his name, but the sight of the flag gave him a strange shock. The natives told him that they had seen a vessel at anchor in Port Phillip Bay, near the Indented Heads, and, all hands having left her on a boat expedition up the river, they had climbed on board and helped themselves. ”