furnished him with many victims, till, at length, he made a final settlement in the state of Arkansas, at that time only a territory, and, as such, the safest refuge for all characters of a similar kind. The town of Helena became his head-quarters.
In this grand emporium of scamps and speculators there was nothing in Dick Tarleton’s profession to make him conspicuous. Had he confined himself to card-playing, he might have passed muster among the most respectable citizens of the place or its proximity, many of whom, like himself, were professed “sportsmen.” But, Dick was not long in Helena until he began to be suspected of certain specialities of sport, among others, that of nigger-running. Long absences unaccounted for, strange company in which he was seen in strange places – both the company and the places already suspected – with, at times, a plentiful supply of money drawn from unknown sources, at length fixed upon Dick Tarleton a stigma of a still darker kind than that of card-playing or even sharping. It became the belief that he was a negro-stealer, a crime unpardonable in all parts of planter-land – Arkansas not excepted.
Along with this belief, every other stigma that might become connected with his name was deemed credible, and no one would have doubted Dick Tarleton’s capability of committing whatever atrocity might be charged to him.
Bad as he was, he was not so bad as represented and believed. A professed “sportsman,” of wild and reckless habits, he knew no limits to dissipation and common indulgence. Immoral to an extreme degree, it was never proved that he was guilty of those dark crimes with which he stood charged or suspected; and the suspicions, when probed to the bottom, were generally found to be baseless.
There were few, however, who took this trouble, for from the first Dick Tarleton was far from being a favourite among the fellows who surrounded him. He was of haughty habits, presuming on the superiority of birth and education, and – something still less easily tolerated – a handsome personal appearance. One of the finest looking men to be seen among the settlements, he was, it need hardly be said, popular among the fair sex – such of them as might be expected to turn their eyes upon a sportsman.
One of this class – a young girl of exceeding attraction, but, alas! with tarnished reputation – was at the time an inhabitant of Helena. Among her admirers, secret and open, were many young men of the place and of the adjacent plantations. She could count a long list of conquests, numbering names far above her own rank and station in life. Among those were Planter Brandon, the lawyer Randall, and, of lesser note, the horse-dealer, Buck. None of these, however, appeared to have been successful in obtaining her smiles, which, according to general belief, were showered on the dissolute but handsome Dick Tarleton.
However it might have gratified the gambler’s vanity, it did not add to his popularity. On the contrary, it increased the spite felt for him, and caused the dark suspicions to be oftener repeated.
Such were the circumstances preceding a terrible tragedy that one day startled Helena out of its ordinary tranquillity. The young girl in question was found in the woods, at no great distance from the town, in the condition already stated by Dick Tarleton, murdered, and Dick himself was charged with being the murderer.
He was at once arrested and arraigned, not before a regular court of justice, but one constituted under a tree, and under the presidency of Judge Lynch. It was done in all haste, both the arrest and the trial, and equally quick was the condemnation. The case was so clear. His pistol, the very weapon that had sent the fatal bullet, in the hurry and confusion of escape, was let fall upon the ground close by the side of the victim. His relation with the unfortunate girl – some speech he had been heard boastingly to utter – a suspected disagreement arising from it – all pointed to Dick Tarleton as the assassin; and by a unanimous verdict of his excited judges, prompted by extreme vindictiveness, he was sentenced to hanging upon a tree.
In five minutes more he would have been consigned to this improvised gallows, but for the negligence of his executioners. In their blind fury they had but slightly fastened his hands, while they had forgotten to strip him of his coat. In the pocket of this there chanced to be another pistol – the fellow of that found. Its owner remembered it, and, in the hour of his despair, determined upon an attempt to escape. Wresting his wrists free from their fastening, he drew the pistol, discharged it in the face of the man who stood most in his way, and then clearing a track, sprang off into the woods!
The sudden surprise, the dismay caused by the death of the man shot at – for he fell dead in his track – held the others for some time as if spell-bound. When the pursuit commenced Dick Tarleton was out of sight, and neither Judge Lynch nor his jury ever set eyes upon him again.
The woods were scoured all round, and the roads travelled for days by parties sent in search of him. But all returned without reporting Dick Tarleton, or any traces of him.
It was thought that some one must have assisted him in his escape, and suspicion was directed upon a hunter named Rook, who squatted near White River – the Jerry Rook of our tale. But no proof could be obtained of this, and the hunter was left unmolested, though with some additional stain on a character before not reputed very clean.
Such is a brief sketch of the life of Richard Tarleton – that portion of it spent on the north-eastern corner of Arkansas. No wonder, with such a record, he felt constrained to do his travelling by night.
Since that fearful episode, now a long time ago, he had not appeared at Helena or the settlements around – at least not to the eyes of those who would care to betray him. Gone to Texas was the general belief – Texas or some other lawless land, where such crimes are easily condoned. So spoke the “Puritans” of Arkansas, blind to their own especial blemish.
Even Jerry Rook knew not the whereabouts of his old acquaintance, until some six years before, when he had come to his cabin under the shadows of the night, bringing with him a boy whom he hinted at as being his son, the youth who had that day afforded such fatal sport for his atrocious tormentors.
The link between the two men could not have been strong, for the hunter, in taking charge of the boy had stipulated for his “keep,” and once or twice, during the long absence of his father, had shown a disposition to turn him out of doors. Still more so of late; and doubly more when Lena showed signs of interference in his favour. Ever, while regarding his daughter, he seemed to dread the presence of Pierre Robideau, as if the youth stood between him and some favourite scheme he had formed for her future.
There need be nothing to fear now – surely not; if Dick Tarleton would but discharge the debt.
Ah! to suppose this would be to make the grandest of mistakes. The brain of Jerry Rook was at that moment busy revolving more schemes than one. But there was one, grand as it was, dire and deadly.
Let our next chapter reveal it.
Story 1-Chapter XII.
A Traitor’s Epistle
As already chronicled, Dick Tarleton has started along the forest path, leaving Jerry Rook under the cottonwood tree.
For some time he remains there, motionless as the trunk beside him.
The exclamation of chagrin that escaped him, as the other passed beyond earshot, is followed by words of a more definite shape and meaning. It was Dick Tarleton who drew from him the former. It is to him the latter are addressed, though without the intention of their being heard.
“Ye durned fool! ye’d speil my plan, wud ye? An’ I ’spose all the same if I war to tell ye o’t? But I ain’t gwine to do that, nor to hev it speiled neyther by sich a obs’nate eedyut as you. Six hundred dollars pre annul air too much o’ a good pull to be let go agin slack as that. An’ doggoned if I do let it go, cost what it may to keep holt o’t. Yes, cost what it may!”
