Crandall

“ RAXENFELD waited. Presently Crandall told his story, and the American listened as a man listens to the speech of those who speak in awful dreams.
“It was the Dyak girl who was the beginning of it all—the witch-doctor,” said Crandall, in that slow, blurred, husky voice. “She was very pretty. She was not really a witch-doctor, either—only she was going to marry one of the real witch-doctors. She liked me better and followed me into the woods one day and told me so. And I always was a fool with women.” ”

“ But Raxenfeld was no god. He was a man—human. Was he to throw everything away for that monster?
“Throw nothing!” he muttered scornfully. “Crandall’s down and out,—poor brute,—and I don’t intend to allow Katherine to blast her life for him.” He glared out across the camp, his chin thrust forward like a block of steel. He went back a little—what sort of man was Crandall in the first place to cause even a debased native to be jealous of him? What were Dyak girls to a man for whom Katherine Renny waited? ”

“ Raxenfeld rose and crossed over to him.
“You'd better sleep,” he said. “We'll get back to the bungalow at the plantation to-morrow and see Van Handen. He knows the country—perhaps there is something he can do. We'll see.”
HE helped the wreck that had been Crandall into the little tent, wrapped him in rugs and blankets and left him. He sat long by the fire, smoking and thinking. But think as he would, he could see no hope for Crandall. As he had said himself, Crandall was “done for.” ”

“ Raxenfeld set the porters to burying the witch-doctor and the woman, who had also been disfigured.
But Crandall he buried himself.
CHAPTER VII
The Return
THEN he cut the bonds of L’yan.
“We will return now to the bungalow,” he said to the men. Then, pointing to Crandall’s grave, he said to L’yan: “Let this not be spoken of—tell these men that. There lies the body of a white man who, made mad by the evil deeds of others, would have done evil deeds himself. You have seen a little—no more than a little—of the might of the white man. ”

“ There, with Crandall’s mother, Raxenfeld left her. Of his own love he spoke no more then—for it was not fitting. But the months are passing smoothly, and from her letters, Raxenfeld knows that the first shock of grief has given way to regret less poignant. And he waits patiently, with the calm patience that only a big-souled and strong man possesses—until the time comes for him to go to her and take her. It will come; he knows it, and Katherine Renny is slowly, slowly beginning to realize it also. Soon she will see that she can love Raxenfeld without disloyalty to the dead Crandall. ”

“ You don't know my name. My clumsiness. Captain Woodhouse." The man bridged the dangerous gap hurriedly. Lady Crandall acknowledged the introduction with a gracious smile.
"Your husband is Sir George——" he began.
"Yes, Sir George Crandall, Governor-general of the Rock. And you——"
"Quite a recent comer. Transferred from the Nile country here. Report to-morrow."
"All of the new officers have to report to the governor's wife as well," Lady Crandall rallied, with a glance at Jane. "You must come and see me—and Miss Gerson, who will be with me until her boat sails." ”

“ Jane's heart stopped. Crandall sat frozen in his seat. Jaimihr turned the key in the lock, and the doors opened. In stepped Captain Woodhouse, helmeted, armed with sword and revolver at waist. He stood facing the trio, his swift eye taking in the situation at once. Crandall half rose from his seat, his face apoplectic.
"Spy! Secret killer of men!" ”

“ But the Dutchman was not encouraging. He explained that it was unlikely to the last degree that either the man whom he believed had killed Crandall, or the girl for whose sake he suspected Crandall had been killed, would be in the village now.
“Dey will haf disappeared into der woods,” he said, “chust as a snake creeps away into the undergrowd and disappears. Moreofer, dere is the liddle lady dot awaits at Wahlen’s—so pale and with such great wis’ful eyes and so full of belief in the love and faith of dis young man Crandall. ”

“ Crandall's speech about the two spies and the arrest of one of them—Louisa, he meant—and now this summary order that he wait the arrival of Bishop—would the second arrest be here in this room? The man who carried a number from the Wilhelmstrasse felt the walls of the library slowly closing in to crush him; he could almost hear the whisper and mutter of the inexorable machine moving them closer—closer. Be alone with the man whose word could send bullets into his heart!
"A very pleasant dinner—Lady Crandall's," Woodhouse began, eager to lighten the tenseness of the situation. ”

“ Somewhere aboud dot village is a man dot knows what was the end of Crandall. And if dot man was foundt and was made to speak, den we also should know. Only dot is an impossibility. And now let us go and eat dinner.”
Throughout the meal which followed, Raxenfeld said little. When he spoke, it was to put quiet questions to the blunt old plantation-manager, which, for all their quietness, were nevertheless directed always to one end—the Dyak girl of whom Van Handen had hinted, and the chances of finding her. ”

“ Lady Crandall's attention could not be long away from the gowns, however. She turned back to them eagerly. With Jane Gerson as her aid, she passed them in rapturous review, Mrs. Sherman and Kitty playing an enthusiastic chorus.
A pursy little man with an air of supreme importance—Henry Reynolds he was, United States Consul at Gibraltar—catapulted in from the street while the gown chatter was at its noisiest. He threw his hands above his head in a mock attitude of submissiveness before a highwayman. ”

“ She! Somehow, he had not expected a woman.
Raxenfeld saw his surprise and added quietly: “The lady is Miss Renny.” Ware flushed a little, and a certain distress shadowed his eyes. He stepped a few paces back from the litter, beckoning Raxenfeld.
The lady who was to have married that poor chap Crandall—the orchid-hunter?” he asked softly. “Van Handen, the manager here, wrote to her.”
Raxenfeld nodded.
“Mr. Crandall went into the forest alone,” Ware continued. “He was difficult to advise—overconfident, you know. I’m afraid he will never come back—this Dyak country is a queer place. ”

“ He knows the woods inch by inch by instinct, and Van says that if one could only make him talk, he could probably put you on the track of what happened to Crandall. But it depends a good deal on whether L’yan ‘takes’ to you. They are rather like children,—even the more murderous of them,—these little Dyaks. You'll see how you get on.”
Raxenfeld understood, for he had dealt with natives before. He arranged that L’yan should present himself at the bungalow at dawn on the following morning and accompany him first to the house of the missionary. ”

“ He would come unwarned, unsuspecting. He might leave that room under guard and with guns at his back—guns soon to be leveled at his heart. Yet she, Jane Gerson, possessed the power to save him—as the warning of the cigarette surely would be saving, once a clever man were put on his guard by it.
Would she speak—and betray General Crandall, her kindly host? Would she lock her lips and see a man walk blindfolded to his death?
A few minutes before five o'clock, Major Bishop was announced at Government House and received by General Crandall in the library. ”

“ If the fugitive resisted, he would have to stand the consequence of resistance. It was nothing to him. He could hear the footfall of the approaching horses in the snow, and he cocked his rifle so as to be ready. The setting sun shone full in the man’s face, but Crandall forgot to look for the scar that the notice had said was on the right cheek, although he had resolved to do so particularly. When he first discovered the fugitive, he scanned the road behind him to discover Lansing, but the nearer the man approached, the less Crandall cared whether Lansing came or not. ”

“ There are things which a white man should not do—Crandall had done them. There are things which no man, white or black, must do—the half-man was on the verge of doing them. So Raxenfeld killed him. Whether it was right or wrong, let no man judge who has not faced the problem that Raxenfeld faced out there in those grim forests where ethics loom less large than here in the heart of a civilization as merciless in its way as the savagery of the land of the head-hunters.
The End ”

“ The Lord could testify that Temperance Crandall had the disposition of an angel and the patience of a saint, but even she could be driven only so far and not one inch farther.
"He throws his dirty socks and underwear all over the room," she told her image in the mirror. "He misses the porcelain spittoon a foot."
She yanked the kid curlers out of her hair with a viciousness which added a tenth of an inch to the diameter of the bald spot which was starting on her crown, twisted her hair into a hard knot at the nape of her neck and punched in hairpins with fury. ”

“ You haf come to make inquiry for dot unlucky Misder Crandall?”
He sat down as Raxenfeld answered that he had.
The Dutchman shook his head gravely.
“We too haf made much inquiry afder him, but we haf learned noding. He wend into the forest, and he did not come out dere from. Dot is all we know, and all dot we can discover. The forest swallowed him up.” He looked keenly at Raxenfeld through half-closed lids.
“He was an expert in his line—an orchid-hunter; he knew the ordinary dangers of his business,” said Raxenfeld.
“Dere is plenty dangers,” threw in Van Handen. ”

“ I'll have something prepared for Miss Renny to eat and drink while she rests, and then go on to Wahlen’s with you. But I hope you'll stop here; we can manage a shakedown for a man.”
Raxenfeld accepted gladly. He fancied that he detected in Ware’s manner something queer, as though, for instance, he had not yet told all he knew of Crandall’s disappearance.
Thus it was that toward nightfall the big American found himself sitting on the veranda of the bungalow, smoking and talking with Ware, content in the knowledge that Katherine Renny was in kind and capable hands. ”

“ Now, as to our plan for Woodhouse's reception—this affair of Craigen's wife; we might as well agree on points, so that——" He heard his wife's voice in the room off the library, and broke off abruptly. "Confound it; the women are coming! Just step into my room with me, and we'll go over this little matter, Major."
General Crandall held open a small door at the left of his desk and followed Bishop through. Lady Crandall and Jane entered the library almost at the same time.
"This tea of George's is preposterous," the lady of Government House was grumbling. ”

“ It is not possible to tell who blows a poisoned arrow out of the darkness and the silence of the night and creeps and crawls away, leaving a dead man.
“But in a preddy short time, I go to the Dyak village the foreman had spoken about. But dere was noding to be gained derefrom—dey can be secret as the grave, dose people, when dey choose. Dey said dey had nefer seen nor heard of a white man for years; dey: knew noding, dey said. Dey oferdid it, mine friendt, for the foreman had told me dot Misder Crandall had camped near dot village. ”

“ It's yours, Lady Crandall. I'd give another to the general if he'd wear it. Now one fitting and——"
Her voice was drowned by Lady Crandall's: "You dear!"
"Be at the dock at five a. m. Friday to see you and the others off, Miss Gerson," Reynolds called after her. "Must go now—morning crowd of busted citizens waiting at the consulate to be fed. Ta-ta!" Reynolds collided with Jaimihr Khan at the double doors.
"A young man who wishes to see you. General Sahib. ”

“ And John Crandall stood beside me and pounded his big hands together until the rest of the delegates forgot their fear and joined in. When I finished there was nothing to do for us but to file out of the courthouse.
Then they turned on me in sorrow and anger. Everyone [232] would now be a marked man. They never could get any office from Jake Spaulding. Even Henry, the candidate, felt I had injured his chances, for if he kept quiet perhaps he might make a deal to get to be deputy clerk. But John Crandall stood by me.
“Good,” he said; “I’m a fighter. ”

“ The box was sent round by water, but he brought the trunk when he came on the second time. He did not carry it to the house when he arrived at night, but it was sent over in the morning. Crandall was immediately taken sick, and witness frequently went to the trunk for various purposes, and saw a package nicely done up, which she supposed to be books. The package remained just as it was tied up at the bookstore, till six or eight days before the prisoner's arrest, when she had curiosity to know what it contained, and he consented that she might open it. ”

“ I replied, “and you may prevent this if you please.”
“O,” they cried, “we are not her friends; we are not in favor of her school; we don’t want any more —— niggers coming among us. It is your place to stand by Miss Crandall and help her now. You and your —— abolition brethren have encouraged her to bring this nuisance into Canterbury, and it is —— mean in you to desert her now.”
I rejoined: “She knows we have not deserted her,56 and do not intend to desert her. The law which her persecutors have persuaded our legislators to enact is an infamous one, worthy of the Dark Ages. ”

“ Sewall testified that the traverser came to him some time in the spring to get a license to practice in the District, and showed him two letters of high recommendation. He had some conversation with Crandall upon subjects of science and upon his knowledge of medicine and surgery, and formed a high opinion of his talents and acquirements. He advised the defendant by no means to abandon the practice of his profession for entering upon botany or chemistry, but if he could do that without interfering with practice, it might do; he thought him too well qualified in the profession to give it up. ”