HtK THE BLIND BROTHER. THE BLIND BROTHER & Storg of THE PENNSYLVANIA COAL MINES. BY HOMER GREENE. The author received for this story the First Prize, Fifteen Hundred Dollars, offered by the YOUTH'S COMPANION in i88b, for the Best Serial Story. NEW YORK: THOMAS Y. CROWELL & CO., 13 ASTOR PLACE. COPYRIGHT, 1887, BY THOMAS Y. CROWELL & CO. RAND AVERY COMPANY, ELECTROTYPERS AND PRINTERS, BOSTON. TO MY MOTHER, WHOSE TENDER CARE AND UNSELFISH DEVOTION MADE HAPPY THE DAYS OF MY OWN BOYHOOD, fa Book far Bogs IS AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED, BY THE AUTHOR. HONESDALE, PENN., April 6, 1887. 2034546 CONTENTS. CHAPTER PAGE I. LOST IN THE MINE 1 1 II. THE BURNED BREAKER 30 III. THE UNQUIET CONSCIENCE 54 IV. THE TRIAL 77 V. THE VERDICT 101 VI. THE FALL 123 VII. THE SHADOW OF DEATH 146 VIII. OUT OF DARKNESS . . 168 DICK, THE DOOR-BOY 191 THE BLIND BROTHER CHAPTER I. LOST IN THE MINE. THE Dryden Mine, in the Susquehanna coal-fields of Pennsylvania, was worked out and abandoned long ago. To-day its headings and airways and chambers echo only to the occasional fall of loosened slate, or to the drip of water from the roof. Its pillars, robbed by retreating workmen, are crumbling and rusty, and those of its props which are still standing have become mouldy and rotten. The rats that once scampered through its galleries deserted it along with human kind, and its very name, from long disuse, has acquired an unaccus- tomed sound. But twenty years ago there was no 12 THE BLIND BROTHER. busier mine than the Dryden from Carbon- dale to Nanticoke. Two hundred and thirty men and boys went by the slope into it every morning, and came out from it every night. They were simple and un- learned, these men and boys, rugged and rude, rough and reckless at times, but manly, heroic, and kindhearted. Up in the Lackawanna region a strike had been in progress for nearly two weeks. Efforts had been made by the strikers to persuade the miners down the valley to join them, but at first without success. Then a committee of one hundred came down to appeal and to intimidate. In squads of ten or more they visited the mines in the region, and, in the course of their journeyings, had come to the Dryden Slope. They had induced the miners to go out at all the workings they had thus far entered, and were no less successful here. It required persuasion, sometimes threats, sometimes, indeed, even blows, for the miners in Dryden Slope had no cause of complaint against their employers ; they earned good wages, and were content. THE BLIND BROTHER. 13 But, twenty years ago, miners who kept at work against the wishes of their fellows while a strike was in progress, were called " black-legs," were treated with contempt, waylaid and beaten, and sometimes killed. So the men in the Dryden Mine yielded ; and soon, down the chambers and along the headings, toward the foot of the slope, came little groups, with dinner-pails and tools, discussing earnestly, often bitterly, the situation and the prospect. The members of a party of fifteen or twenty, that came down the airway from the tier of chambers on the new north heading, were holding an especially animated con- versation. Fully one-half of the men were visiting strikers. They were all walking, in single file, along the route by which the mine-cars went. For some distance from the new cham- bers the car-track was laid in the airway ; then it turned down through an entrance into the heading, and from that point fol- lowed the heading to the foot of the slope. Where the route crossed from the airway to the heading, the space between the 14 THE BLIND BROTHER. pillars had been carefully boarded across, so that the air current should not be turned aside ; and a door had been placed in the boarding, to be opened whenever the cars approached, and shut as soon as they had passed by. That door was attended by a boy. To this point the party had now come, and one by one filed through the opening, while Bennie, the door-boy, stood holding back the door to let them pass. " Ho, Jack, tak' the door-boy wi' ye ! " shouted some one in the rear. The great, broad-shouldered, rough- bearded man who led the procession turned back to where Bennie, apparently lost in astonishment at this unusual occurrence, still stood, with his hand on the door. " Come along, lad ! " he said ; " come along ! Ye'll have a gret play-spell noo." " I can't leave the door, sir," answered Bennie. " The cars'll be comin' soon." " Ye need na min' the cars. Come along wi' ye, I say ! " " But I can't go till Tom comes, anyway, you know." THE BLIND BROTHER. I 5 The man came a step closer. He had the frame of a giant. The others who passed by were like children beside him. Then one of the men who worked in the mine, and who knew Bennie, came through the doorway, the last in the group, and said, " Don't hurt the boy ; let him alone. His brother'll take him out ; he always does." All this time Bennie stood quite still, with his hand on the door, never turning his head. It was a strange thing for a boy to stand motionless like that, and look neither to the right nor the left, while an excited group of men passed by, one of whom had stopped and approached him, as if he meant him harm. It roused the curiosity of " Jack the Giant," as the miners called him, and, plucking his lamp from his cap, he flashed the light of it up into Bennie's face. The boy did not stir ; no muscle of his face moved ; even his eyes remained open and fixed. 1 6 THE BLIND BROTHER. " Why, lad ! lad ! What's the matter wi' ye ? " There was tenderness in the giant's voice as he spoke, and tenderness in his bearded face as Bennie answered, " Don't you know ? I'm blind." " Blind ! An' a-workin' i' the mines ? " " Oh, a body don't have to see to 'tend door, you know. All I've to do is to open it when I hear the cars a-comin', an' to shut it when they get by." " Aye, that's true ; but ye did na get here alone. Who helpit ye ? " Bennie's face lighted up with pleasure, as he answered, " Oh, that's Tom ! He helps me. I couldn't get along without him ; I couldn't do any thing without Tom." The man's interest and compassion had grown, as the conversation lengthened, and he was charmed by the voice of the child. It had in it that touch of pathos that often lingers in the voices of the blind. He would hear more of it. " Sit ye, lad," he said ; " sit ye, an' tell me aboot Tom, an' aboot yoursel', an' a' ye can remember." THE BLIND BROTHER. I'J Then they sat down on the rude bench together, with the roughly hewn pillar of coal at their backs, blind Bennie and Jack Rennie, the giant, and while one told the story of his blindness, and his blessings, and his hopes, the other listened with tender earnestness, almost with tears. Bennie told first about Tom, his brother, who was fourteen years old, two years older than himself. Tom was so good to him ; and Tom could see, could see as well as anybody. "Why," he exclaimed, "Tom can see every thing ! " Then he told about his blindness ; how he had been blind ever since he could remember. But there w r as a doctor, he said, who came up once from Philadelphia to visit Major Dryden, before the major died ; and he had chanced to see Tom and Bennie up by the mines, and had looked at Bennie's eyes, and said he thought, if the boy could go to Philadelphia and have treatment, that sight might be restored. Tom asked how much it would cost, and the doctor said, " Oh, maybe a hundred dollars ; " and then some one came and 1 8 THE BUND BROTHER. called the doctor away, and they had never seen him since. But Tom resolved that Bennie should go to Philadelphia, if ever he could save money enough to send him. Tom was a driver-boy in Dryden Slope, and his meagre earnings went mostly to buy food and clothing for the little family. But the dollar or two that he had been accustomed to spend each month for him- self he began now to lay aside for Bennie. Bennie knew about it, of course, and rejoiced greatly at the prospect in store for him, but expressed much discontent be- cause he, himself, could not help to obtain the fund which was to cure him. Then Tom, with the aid of the kindhearted mine superintendent, found employment for his brother as a door-boy in Dryden Slope, and Bennie was happy. It wasn't absolutely necessary that a door-boy should see ; if he had good hearing he could get along very well. So every morning Bennie went down the slope with Tom, and climbed into an empty mine-car, and Tom's mule drew them, rat- THE BLIND BROTHER. 19 tling along the heading, till they reached, almost a mile from the foot of the slope, the doorway where Bennie staid. Then Tom went on, with the empty cars, up to the new tier of chambers, and brought the loaded cars back. Every day he passed through Bennie's doorway on three round trips in the forenoon, and three round trips in the afternoon ; and every day, when the noon-hour came, he stopped on the down- trip, and sat with Bennie on the bench by the door, and both ate from one pail the dinner prepared for them by their mother. When quitting time came, and Tom went down to the foot of the slope with his last trip for the day, Bennie climbed to the top of a load, and rode out, or else, with his hands on the last car of the trip, walked safely along behind. " And Tom and me together have a'most twenty dollars saved now ! " said the boy exultingly. " An' we've only got to get eighty dollars more, an' then I can go an' buy back the sight into my eyes ; an' then Tom an' me we're goin' to work together all our lives. Tom, he's goin' to get a 20 THE BLIND BROTHER. chamber an' be a miner, an' I'm goin' to be Tom's laborer till I learn how to mine, an' then we're goin' to take a contract together, an' hire laborers, an' get rich, an' then why, then Mommie won't have to work any more ! " It was like a glimpse of a better world to hear this boy talk. The most favored child of wealth that ever revelled seeing in the sunlight has had no hope, no courage, no sublimity of faith, that could compare with those of this blind son of poverty and toil. He had his high ambition, and that was to work. He had his sweet hope to be fulfilled, and that was to see. He had his earthly shrine, and that was where his mother sat. And he had his hero of heroes, and that was Tom. There was no quality of human good- ness, or bravery, or excellence of any kind, that he did not ascribe to Tom. He would sooner have disbelieved all of his four re- maining senses than have believed that Tom would say an unkind word to Mommie or to him, or be guilty of a mean act towards any one. THE BLIND BROTHER. 21 Bennie's faith in Tom was fully justified. No nineteenth century boy could have been more manly, no knight of old could have been more true and tender, than was Tom to the two beings whom he loved best upon all the earth. " But the father, laddie," said Jack, still charmed and curious ; " whaur's the father ? " " Dead," answered Bennie. " He came from the old country first, an' then he sent for Mommie an' us, an' w'en we got here he was dead." " Ah, but that was awfu' sad for the mither ! Took wi' the fever, was he ? " " No ; killed in the mine. Top coal fell an' struck him. That's the way they found him. We didn't see him, you know. That was two weeks before me an' Tom an' Mommie got here. I wasn't but four years old then, but I can remember how Mom- mie cried. She didn't have much time to cry, though, 'cause she had to work so hard. Mommie's al'ays had to work so hard," added Bennie, reflectively. The man began to move, nervously, on 22 THE BLIND BROTHER. the bench. It was apparent that some strong emotion was taking hold of him. He lifted the lamp from his cap again and held it up close to Bennie's face. " Killed, said ye i' the mine top coal fell?" " Yes, an* struck him on the head ; they said he didn't ever know what killed him." The brawny hand trembled so that the flame from the spout of the little lamp went up in tiny waves. "Whaur whaur happenit it i' what place i' what mine ?" " Up in Carbondale. No. 6 shaft, I think it was ; yes, No. 6." Bennie spoke somewhat hesitatingly. His quick ear had caught the change in the man's voice, and he did not know what it could mean. " His name, lad ! gi' me the father's name ! " The giant's huge hand dropped upon Bennie's little one, and held it in a painful grasp. The boy started to his feet in fear. " You won't hurt me, sir! Please don't hurt me ; I can't see ! " THE BLIND BROTHER. 2$ " Not for the warld, lad ; not for the whole warld. But I must ha' the father's name ; tell me the father's name, quick ! " " Thomas Taylor, sir," said Bennie, as he sank back, trembling, on the bench. The lamp dropped from Jack Rennie's hand, and lay smoking at his feet. His hugh frame seemed to have shrunk by at least a quarter of its size ; and for many minutes he sat, silent and motionless, see- ing as little of the objects around him as did the blind boy at his side. At last he roused himself, picked up his lamp, and rose to his feet. " Well, lad, Bennie, I mus' be a-goin' ; good-by till ye. Will the brither come for ye?" "Oh, yes!" answered Bennie, "Tom al'ays stops for me ; he aint come up from the foot yet, but he'll come." Rennie turned away, then turned back again. " Whaur's the lamp ? " he asked ; " have ye no licht?" " No ; I don't ever have any. It wouldn't be any good to me, you know." 24 THE BLIND BROTHER. Once more the man started down the heading, but, after he had gone a short dis- tance, a thought seemed to strike him, and he came back to where Bennie was still sitting. " Lad, I thocht to tell ye ; ye s'all go to the city wi' your eyes. I ha' money to sen' ye, an' ye s'all go. I I knew the father, lad." Before Bennie could express his surprise and gratitude, he felt a strong hand laid gently on his shoulder, and a rough, bearded face pressed for a moment against his own, and then his strange visitor was gone. Down the heading the retreating foot- steps echoed, their sound swallowed up at last in the distance ; and up at Bennie's doorway silence reigned. For a long time the boy sat, pondering the meaning of the strange man's words and conduct. But the more he thought about it the less able was he to understand it. Perhaps Tom could explain it, though ; yes, he would tell Tom about it. Then it occurred to him that it was long past time THE BLIND BROTHER, 2$ for Tom to come up from the foot with his last trip for the day. It was strange, too, that the men should all go out together that way ; he didn't understand it. But if Tom would only come He rose and walked down the heading a little way ; then he turned and went up through the door and along the airway ; then he came back to his bench again, and sat down. He was sure Tom would come ; Tom had never disappointed him yet, and he knew he would not disappoint him for the world if he could help it. He knew, too, that it was long after quitting-time, and there hadn't been a sound, that he could hear, in the mine for an hour, though he had listened carefully. After a while he began to grow nervous ; the stillness became oppressive ; he could not endure it. He determined to try to find the way out by himself. He had walked to the foot of the slope alone once, the day Tom was sick, and he thought he could do it again. So he made sure that his door was 26 THE BLIND BROTHER. tightly closed, then he took his dinner-pail, and started bravely down the heading, striking the rails of the mine car-track on each side with his cane as he went along, to guide him. Sometimes he would stop and listen, for a moment, if, perchance, he might hear Tom coming to meet him, or, possibly, some belated laborer going out from an- other part of the mine ; then, hearing nothing, he would trudge on again. After a long time spent thus, he thought he must be near the foot of the slope ; he knew he had walked far enough to be there. He was tired, too, and sat down on the rail to rest. But he did not sit there long ; he could not bear the silence, it was too depressing, and after a very little while he arose and walked on. The caps in the track grew higher ; once he stumbled over one of them and fell, striking his side on the rail. He was in much pain for a few minutes ; then he recovered and went on more carefully, lifting his feet high with every step, and reaching ahead with his cane. But his progress was vry slow. THE BLIND BROTHER. 2 7 Then there came upon him the sensation of being in a strange place. It did not seem like the heading along which he went to and from his daily work. He reached out with his cane upon each side, and touched nothing. Surely, there was no place in the heading so wide as that. But he kept on. By-and-by he became aware that he was going down a steep incline. The echoes of his footsteps had a hollow sound, as though he were in some wide, open space, and his cane struck one, two, three, props in succession. Then he knew he was somewhere in a chamber ; and knew, too, that he was lost. He sat down, feeling weak and faint, and tried to think. He remembered that, at a point in the heading about two-thirds of the way to the foot, a passage branched off to the right, crossed under the slope, and ran out into the southern part of the mine, where he had never been. He thought he must have turned into this cross-heading, and followed it, and if he had, it would be hard indeed to tell where 28 THE BLIND BROTHER. he now was. He did not know whether to go on or to turn back. Perhaps it would be better, after all, to sit still until help should come, though it might be hours, or even days, before any one would find him. Then came a new thought. What would Tom do ? Tom would not know where he had gone ; he would never think of look- ing for him away off here ; he would go up the heading to the door, and not finding him there, would think that his brother had already gone home. But when he knew that Bennie was not at home, he would surely come back to the mine to search for him ; he would come down the slope ; maybe he was, at that very moment, at the foot ; maybe Tom would hear him if he should call, " Tom ! O Tom ! " The loudest thunder-burst could not have been more deafening to the fright- ened child than the sound of his own voice, as it rang out through the solemn stillness of the mine, and was hurled back to his ears by the solid masses of rock and coal that closed in around him. THE BLIND BROTHER. 29 A thousand echoes went rattling down the wide chambers and along the narrow galleries, and sent back their ghosts to play upon the nervous fancy of the frightened child. He would not have shouted like that again if his life had depended on it. Then silence fell upon him ; silence like a pall oppressive, mysterious and awful silence, in which he could almost hear the beating of his own heart. He could not endure that. He grasped his cane again and started on, searching for a path, stum- bling over caps, falling sometimes, but on and on, though never so slowly ; on and on until, faint and exhausted, he sank down upon the damp floor of the mine, with his face in his hands, and wept, in silent agony, like the lost child that he was. Lost, indeed, with those miles and miles of black galleries opening and winding and crossing all around him, and he, lying pros- trate and powerless, alone in the midst of that desolation. 30 THE BLIND BROTHER. CHAPTER II. THE BURNED BREAKER. FOR a long time Bennie lay there, piti- fully weeping. Then, away off somewhere in the mine, he heard a noise. He lifted his head. By degrees the noise grew louder; then it sounded almost like foot- steps. Suppose it were some one com- ing ; suppose it were Tom ! The light of hope flashed up in Bennie's breast with the thought. But the sound ceased, the stillness set- tled down more profoundly than before, and about the boy's heart the fear and loneliness came creeping back. Was it possible that the noise was purely imagin- ary ? Suddenly, tripping down the passages, bounding from the walls, echoing through the chambers, striking faintly, but, oh, how THE BLIND BROTHER. 31 sweetly, upon Bennie's ears, came the well- known call, " Ben-nie-e-e-e ! " The sound died away in a faint succes- sion of echoing ^'s. Bennie sprang to his feet with a cry. " Tom ! Tom ! Tom, here I am." Before the echoes of his voice came back to him they were broken by the sound of running feet, and down the winding galler- ies came Tom, as fast as his lamp and his legs would take him, never stopping till he and Bennie were in one another's arms. " Bennie, it was my fault ! " exclaimed Tom. " Patsy Donnelly told me you went out with Sandy McCulloch while I was up at the stables ; an' I went way home, an' Mommie said you hadn't been there, an' I came back to find you, an' I went up to your door an' you wasn't there, an' I called an' called, an' couldn't hear no answer ; an' then I thought maybe you'd tried to come out alone, an' got off in the cross headin' an' got lost, an' " Tom stopped from sheer lack of breath, and Bennie sobbed out, 32 THE BLIND BROTHER. " I did, I did get lost an' scared, an' an' O Tom, it was awful ! " The thought of 'what he had experi- enced unnerved Bennie again, and, still holding Tom's hand, he sat down on the floor of the mine and wept aloud. "There, Bennie, don't cry!" said Tom, soothingly ; " don't cry ! You're found now. Come, jump up an' le's go home ; Mommie'll be half-crazy." It was touching to see the motherly way in which this boy of fourteen consoled and comforted his weaker brother, and helped him again to his feet. With his arm around the blind boy's waist, Tom led him down, through the chambers, out into the south heading, and so to the foot of the slope. It was not a great distance; Bennie's progress had been so slow that, although he had, as he feared, wandered off by the cross heading into the southern part of the mine, he had not been able to get very far away. At the foot of the slope they stopped to rest, and Bennie told about the strange man who had talked with him at the door- THE BLIND BROTHER. 33 way. Tom could give no explanation of the matter, except that the man must have been one of the strikers. The meaning of his strange conduct he could no more understand than could Bennie. It was a long way up the slope, and for more than half the distance it was very steep ; like climbing up a ladder. Many times on the upward way the boys stopped to rest. Always when he heard Bennie's breathing grow hard and laborious, Tom would complain of being himself tired, and they would turn about and sit for a few moments on a tie, facing down the slope. Out at last into the quiet autumn night! Bennie breathed a long sigh of relief when he felt the yielding soil under his feet and the fresh air in his face. Ah ! could he but have seen the village lights below him, the glory of the sky and the jewelry of stars above him, and the half moon slipping up into the heavens from its hiding-place beyond the heights of Campbell's Ledge, he would, indeed, have known how sweet and beautiful the upper earth is, even with the veil of night across 34 THE BLIND BROTHER. it, compared with the black recesses of the mine. It was fully a mile to the boys' home ; but, with light hearts and willing feet, they soon left the distance behind them, and reached the low-roofed cottage, where the anxious mother waited in hope and fear for the coming of her children. " Here we are, Mommie ! " shouted Tom, as he came around the corner and saw her standing on the doorstep in the moonlight watching. Out into the road she ran then, and gathered her two boys into her arms, kissed their grimy, coal- blackened faces, and listened to their oft- interrupted story, with smiles and with tears, as she led them to her house. But Tom stopped at the door and turned back. " I promised Sandy McCulloch," he said, " to go over an' tell him if I found Bennie. He said he'd wait up for me, an' go an* help me hunt him up if I came back with- out him. It's only just over beyond the breaker; it won't take twenty minutes, an' Sandy'll be expcctin* me." THE BLIND BROTHER. 35 And without waiting for more words, the boy started off on a run. It was already past ten o'clock, and he had not had a mouthful of supper, but that was nothing in consideration of the fact that Sandy had been good to him, and would have helped him, and was, even now, waiting for him. So, with a light and grateful heart, he hurried on. He passed beyond the little row of cot- tages, of which his mother's was one, over the hill by a foot-path, and then along the mine car-track to the breaker. Before him the great building loomed up, like some huge castle of old, cutting its out- lines sharply against the moon-illumined sky, and throwing a broad black shadow for hundreds of feet to the west. Through the shadow went Tom, around by the engine-room; where the watchman's light was glimmering faintly through the grimy window ; out again into the moon- light, up, by a foot-path, to the summit of another hill, along by another row of dark- ened dwellings, to a cottage where a light was still burning, and there he stopped. 36 THE BLIND BROTHER. The door opened before he reached it, and a man in shirt-sleeves stepped out and hailed him : "Is that you, Tom? An' did ye find Bennie ? " " Yes, Sandy. I came to tell you we just got home. Found him down in the south chambers ; he tried to come out alone, an' got lost. So I'll not need you, Sandy, with the same thanks as if I did, an' good- night to you ! " " Good-nicht till ye, Tom ! I'm glad the lad's safe wi' the mither. Tom," as the boy turned away, " ye'll not be afeard to be goin' home alone ? " Tom laughed. "Do I looked scared, Sandy? Give yourself no fear for me ; I'm afraid o' naught." Before Sandy turned in at his door, Tom had disappeared below the brow of the hill. The loose gravel rolled under his feet as he hurried down, and once, near the bottom, he slipped and fell. As he rose, he was astonished to see the figure of a man steal carefully along in THE BLIND BROTHER. 37 the shadow of the breaker, and disappear around the corner by the engine-room. Tom went down cautiously into the shadow, and stopped for a moment in the track by the loading-place to listen. He thought he heard a noise in there ; some- thing that sounded like the snapping of dry twigs. The next moment a man came out from under that portion of the breaker, with his head turned back over his shoulder, mut- tering, as he advanced toward Tom, " There, Mike, that's the last job o' that kind I'll do for all the secret orders i' the waiT. They put it on to me because I've got no wife nor chilcler, nor ither body to cry their eyes oot, an' I get i' the prison for it. But I've had the hert o' me touched the day, Mike, an' I canna do the like o' this again ; it's the las' time, min' ye, the las' time I Mike! why, that's no' Mike ! Don't ye speak, lad ! don't ye whusper ! don't ye stir ! " The man stepped forward, a very giant in size, with a great beard floating on his breast, and laid his brawny hands on 38 THE BLIND BROTHER. Tom's shoulders with a grip that made the lad wince. Tom did not stir ; he was too much frightened for one thing, too much aston- ished for another. For, before the man had finished speaking, there appeared un- der the loading-place in the breaker a lit- tle flickering light, and the light grew into a flame, and the flame curled around the coal-black timbers, and sent up little red tongues to lick the cornice of the long, low roof. Tom was so astounded that he could not speak, even if he had dared. But this giant was standing over him, gripping his shoulders in a painful clutch, and saying to him, in a voice of emphasis and determination, " Do ye see me, lad ? Do ye hear me ? Then I say to ye, tell a single soul what ye've seen here the night, an' the life o' ye's not worth the dust i' the road. Whusper a single word o' it, an' the Molly Maguires '11 tak' terrible revenge o' ye'! Noo, then, to your home ! Rin ! an' gin ye turn your head or speak, ye s'all wish ye'd 'a' been i' the midst o' the fire instead." THE BLIND BROTHER. 4! With a vigorous push, he sent Tom from him at full speed down the track. But the boy had not gone far before the curiosity that overtook Lot's wife came upon him, and he turned and looked. He was just in time to see and hear the sleepy watchman open the door of the engine- room, run out, give one startled look at the flames as they went creeping up the long slant of roof, and then make the still night echo with his cry of " Fire ! " Before twenty minutes had passed, the surrounding hills were alive with people who had come to look upon the burning breaker. The spectacle was a grand one. For many minutes the fire played about in the lower part of the building, among the pockets and the screens, and dashed up against the base of the shaft-tower like lapping waves. Then the small square windows, dotting the black surface of the breaker here and there up its seventy feet of height, began to redden and to glow with the mounting flames behind them ; a column of white smoke broke from the 42 THE BUND BROTHER. topmost cornice, little red tongues \vent creeping up to the very pinnacle of the tower, and then from the highest point of all a great column of fire shot far up to- ward the onlooking stars, and the whole gigantic building was a single body of roaring, wavering flame. It burned rapidly and brilliantly, and soon after midnight there was but a mass of charred ruins covering the ground where once the breaker stood. There was little that could be saved; the cars in the loading-place, the tools in the engine-room, some loose lumber, and the household effects from a small dwelling-house nearby; that was all. But among the many men who helped to save this little, none labored with such energetic effort, such daring zeal, such superhuman strength, as the huge-framed, big-bearded man they called Jack Rennie. The strike had become general. The streets of the mining towns were filled with idle, loitering men and boys. The drink- THE BLIND BROTHER. 43 ing saloons drove a brisk business, and the merchants feared disaster. Tom had not told any one as yet of his adventure at the breaker on the night of the fire. He knew that he ought to disclose his secret ; in- deed, he felt a pressing duty upon him to do so in order that the crime might be duly punished. But the secret order of Molly Maguires was a terror in the coal regions in those days; the torch, the pistol, and the knife were the insruments with which it carried out its desperate decrees, and Tom was absolutely afraid to whisper a word of what he knew, even to his mother or to Bennie. But one day the news went out that Jack Rennie had been arrested, charged with setting fire to the Valley Breaker ; and soon afterward a messenger came to the house of the Widow Taylor, saying that Tom was wanted immediately in Wilkes- barre at the office of Lawyer Pleadwell. Tom answered this summons gladly, as it might possibly afford a means by which he would be compelled to tell what he knew about the fire, with the least respon- 44 THE BUND BROTHER. sibility resting on him for the disclosure. But he resolved that, in no event, would he speak any thing but the truth. After he was dressed and brushed to the satisfaction of his careful mother, Tom went with the messenger to the railroad station, and the fast train soon brought them into the city of Wilkesbarre, the county town of Luzerne County. On one of the streets radiating from the court-house square, they stopped be- fore a dingy-looking door on which was fastened a sign reading: "James G. Plead- well, Attorney-at-Law." Tom was taken, first, into the outer room of the law-offices, where a man sat at a table writing, and two or three other men, evidently miners, were talking to- gether in a corner; and then, after a few moments, the door into an inner apart- ment was opened and he was called in there. This room was more completely furnished than the outer one ; there was a carpet on the floor, and there were pic- tures on the walls ; also there were long shelves full of books, all bound alike in THE BLIND BROTHER. 45 leather, all with red labels near the tops and black labels near the bottoms of their backs. At the farther side of the room sat a short, slim, beardless man, with pale face and restless eyes, whom Tom recognized as having been in the mine with the visit- ing strikers the day Bennie was lost ; and by a round centre table sat Lawyer Plead- well, short and stout, with bristly mus- tache and a stubby nose on which rested a pair of gold-rimmed eye-glasses. As Tom entered the room, the lawyer regarded him closely, and waving his hand towards an easy chair, he said, "Be seated, my lad. Your name is a' let me see" "Tom Thomas Taylor, sir," answered the boy. " Well, Tom, you saw the fire at the Valley Breaker ? " " Yes, sir," said Tom ; " I guess I was the first one 'at saw it." " So I have heard," said the lawyer, slowly ; then, after a pause, " Tom have you told to any one what 46 THE BLIND BROTHER. you saw, or whom you saw at the mo- ment of the breaking out of that fire ? " " I have not, sir," answered Tom, won- dering how the lawyer knew he had seen any one. " Do you expect, or desire, to disclose your knowledge ?" "I do," said Tom; "I ought to a' told before ; I meant to a' told, but I didn't dare. I'd like to tell now." Tom was growing bold ; he felt that he had kept the secret long enough and that, now, it must out. Lawyer Pleadwell twirled his glasses thoughtfully for a few moments, then placed them deliberately on his nose, and turned straight to Tom. " Well, Tom," he said, " we may as well be plain with you. I represent Jack Rennie, who is charged with firing this breaker, and Mr. Carolan here is officially connected with the order of Molly Ma- guires, in pursuance of whose decree the deed is supposed to have been done. We have known, for some time, that a boy was present when the breaker was fired. Last THE BLIND BROTHER. 49 night we learned that you were that boy. Now, what we want of you is simply this : to keep your knowledge to yourself. This will be to your own advantage as well as for the benefit of others. Will you do it?" To Tom, the case had taken on a new aspect. Instead of being, as he had sup- posed, in communication with those who desired to punish the perpetrators of the crime, he found himself in the hands of the prisoner's friends. But his Scotch stubbornness came to the rescue, and he replied, "I can't do it, sir; it wasn't right to burn the breaker, an' the man 'at done it ought to go to jail for it." Lawyer Pleadwell inserted a thumb into the arm-hole of his vest, and poised his glasses carefully in his free hand. He was preparing to argue the case with Tom. " Suppose," said he, " you were a miner, as you hope to be, as your father was be- fore you ; and a brutal and soulless cor- poration, having reduced your wages to the starvation-point, while its vaults were 5O THE BLIND BROTHER. gorged with money, should kick you, like a dog, out of their employ, when you humbly asked them for enough to keep body and soul together. Suppose you knew that the laws were made for the rich and against the poor, as they are, and that your only redress, and a speedy one, would be to spoil the property of your persecu- tors till they came to treat you like a human being, with rights to be respected, as they surely would, for they fear nothing so much as the torch ; would you think it right for a fellow- workman to deliver you up to their vengeance and fury for having taught them such a lesson ? " The lawyer placed his glasses on his nose, and leaned forward, eagerly, towards Tom. The argument was not without its effect. Tom had long been led to believe that cor- porations were tyrannical monsters. But the boy's inherent sense of right and wrong was proof against even this specious plea. " All the same," he said, " I can't make out 'at it's right to burn a breaker. Why," THE BLIND BROTHER. 51 he continued, " you might say the same thing if it'd 'a been murder." Pleadwell saw that he was on the wrong track with this clear-headed boy. " Well," he said, settling back in his chair, " if peaceful persuasion will not avail, I trust you are prepared, in case of disclosure, to meet whatever the Molly Maguires have in store for you ? " " Yes," answered Tom, boldly, " I am. I've been afraid of 'em, an' that's what's kept me from tellin' ; but I won't be a coward any more ; they can do what they're a mind to with me." The lawyer was in a quandary, and Car- olan shot angry glances at Tom. Here was a lad who held Jack Rennie's fate in his hands, and whom neither fear nor per- suasion could move. What was to be done? Pleadwell motioned to Carolan, and they rose and left the room together ; while Tom sat, with tumultuously beating heart, but with constantly increasing reso- lution. The men were gone but a few moments, 52 THE BLIND BROTHER. and came back with satisfied looks on their faces. " I have learned," said the lawyer, ad- dressing Tom, in a voice laden with appar- ent sympathy, " that you have a younger brother who is blind. That is a sad afflic- tion." " Yes, indeed it is," replied Tom ; " yes, indeed ! " " I have learned, also, that there is a possibility of cure, if the eyes are subjected to proper and timely treatment." " Yes, that's what a doctor told us." " What a blessing it would be if sight could be restored to him ! what a delight ! What rejoicing there would be in your little household, would there not ? " " Oh, indeed there would ! " cried Tom, "oh, indeed! It's what we're a-thinkin' of al'ays ; it's what I pray for every night, sir. We've been a-tryin' to save money enough to do it, but it's slow a-gettin' it, it's awful slow." "A how much " Lawyer Plead well paused, and twirled his eye-glasses thought- fully " how much would it cost, Tom ? " THE BLIA?D BROTHER, 53 " Only a hundred dollars, sir ; that's what the doctor said." Another pause ; then, with great deliber- ation, " Tom, suppose my friend here should see fit to place in your hands, to-day, the sum of one hundred dollars, to be used in your brother's behalf; could you return the favor by keeping to yourself the knowledge you possess concerning the origin of the fire at the breaker ? " The hot blood surged up into Tom's face, his heart pounded like a hammer against his breast, his head was in a whirl. o A hundred dollars ! and sight for Ben- nie ! No lies to be told only to keep quiet and sight for Bennie! Would it be very wrong ? But, oh, to think of Ben- nie in the joy of seeing ! The temptation was terrible. Stronger, less affectionate natures than Tom's might well have yielded. 54 THE BLIND BROTHER. CHAPTER III. THE UNQUIET CONSCIENCE. AND Tom yielded. The whisperings of conscience were drowned in the anticipation of Bennie's joy. The fear of personal violence would not have conquered him ; neither would the fallacious argument of compensation by destruction have done so. But that vision of Bennie, with eyes that could look into his eyes, with eyes that could see the houses and the breakers, the trees and the birds and the flowers, that could even see the far-off stars in the sky at night, that was the vision that crowded out from Tom's mind the sharp distinction between right and wrong, and delivered him over wholly to the tempter. But he felt the shame of it, neverthe- less, as he answered, in a choking voice, at last, THE BLIND BROTHER. 55 " Yes, I could. A hundred dollars 'd give sight to Bennie. I wouldn't lie for it, but I'll keep still for it." Lawyer Pleadwell doubluj- i$p his glasses, slipped them into a morocco case, and slipped the case into his vest-pocket. His object was accomplished. "Tom," he said, " you're a wise lad. If you keep on in this way, you'll make a lawyer ; and a lawyer, with so evenly balanced a conscience as yours, will be a credit to the profession." Tom was not quite sure whether this was intended for a compliment or not, so he simply said, " Yes, sir." Pleadwell reached across the table for his high silk hat, motioned to Carolan to follow him, and went out, saying to Tom as he went, "You stay here and amuse yourself; we'll be back shortly." Tom sat there alone quite still. His mind was in a tumult. Is it right? Is it right ? Some unseen presence kept crowding the question in upon him. What would Bennie say to it ? 56 THE BLIND BROTHER. What would Mommie say to it ? Yet there were no lies to be told ; he was simply to hold his tongue. But was it not shielding a criminal from just punishment? Was it not virtually selling his honor for money? Would it not be better, after all, to take back his promise, to do his duty fearlessly, and to work and wait, patiently and with a clear conscience, for means to accomplish the desire of his heart for Bennie ? He was just getting into a state of pain- ful indecision when Carolan came in alone, and closed the door carefully behind him. Without saying a word, he handed to Tom, one by one, ten crisp, new ten-dollar bills. The boy had never in his life before seen so much money at one time. To hold it was like a scene in a fairy story ; to own it was to be rich beyond belief. The whis- pers of conscience were again stilled in the novelty of possessing wealth with which such blessings might be bought. Tom took the money, folded it awk- wardly, and placed it in the inside pocket of his vest. Carolan looked on with ap- THE BLIND BROTHER. 59 parent satisfaction ; then went and seated himself in the chair he had formerly occu- pied, without having uttered a word. This man was a marked character in the anthracite coal region twenty years ago. He was known among the miners as " Silent Mike," was credited with much native ability and sharpness, and was gen- erally believed to be at the head, in the anthracite region, of the secret order of Molly Maguires. He was always shrewd enough not to implicate himself in any lawlessness. The fact that he so controlled the organization as to meet his personal ends caused it, eventually, to be split with internal dissensions. Then, as a new reign of law and order came in, and as organized labor began to base itself on higher princi- ples, and to work out its problem with less of vengeance and more of justice, the order gradually passed out of existence. Thinking there was nothing more to be said or done, Tom rose to go ; but just then Pleadwell entered, laid his silk hat carefully on the table, and motioned to him to be seated. Having taken his eye-glasses 60 THE BLIND BROTHER, from their case and adjusted them care- fully on his nose, he said to Tom, " It will not be wise for you to make any large expenditures of money for any purpose until after the trial ; and in the mean time it will be absolutely unsafe for you to disclose to any one the fact of your having money or the means by which it was obtained. Your own discretion will teach you this. You understand me, do you not?" Tom nodded, and Pleadwell continued : "There is one thing more that I desire to speak of: I have heard that when you reached the foot of the hill on the night the breaker was burned, you saw a man come from near the point where the fire broke out, pass by you in the shadow of the building, and disappear around the corner by the engine-room. Is this true ? " " Yes, sir." " What kind of a looking man was this ? Describe him." " He was a short man," Tom replied, " kind o' slim, an' he didn't have any whiskers " a sudden thought seemed THE BLIND BROTHER. 6 1 to strike the boy, and looking for a moment earnestly at Carolan, and then pointing his finger at him, he exclaimed, "Why, he looked just like just like him ! " Carolan smiled grimly, but Pleadwell laughed aloud. " Well, Tom," he said, " we shall not ask you to tell whom he looks like, but if I should require your presence at the trial, and should call you to the witness-stand, you would have no objection, I presume, to giving a description of the man you saw pass by you in the shadow of the breaker, just as you have described him to me ? " " No," replied Tom, " not so long as it's true." " Oh, I should expect you to say noth- ing that is not strictly true," said Pleadwell. " I would not allow a witness of mine to tell a lie. Well, then, you are to be in the court-room here a week from next Tuesday morning at nine o'clock. Do you under- stand ? " " Yes, sir." " Carolan, put Thomas Taylor's name on 62 THE BLIND BROTHER. that subpoena. You will consider yourself subpoenaed, Tom. Now," taking a heavy gold watch from his fob-pocket and glan- cing at it, " you will have just time to' catch the train north." Then stepping to the door between the two rooms, and throwing it open, he said, " Harris, go to the station with this boy, buy his ticket, and see that he gets the right train." Harris was the young man who came down with Tom, and he and the boy were soon on the street together, walking briskly toward the station. An hour earlier, when they were coming in, Tom had been very talkative and in- quiring, but now his companion was able to get from him no more than a simple " yes" or " no," and that only in answer to questions. Conversation was impossible to the boy, with his mind so crowded with perplexing doubts. He could not even take notice of the shop-windows, or of the life in the streets, but followed blindly along by the side of Harris. Somehow he felt as though he were walking under a heavy THE BLIND BROTHER. 63 weight, and that roll of money in his pocket seemed to be burning him where it rested against his breast. He imagined that the people he met looked at him sus- piciously, as if they knew he had been bribed bribed ! The word came into his mind so sud- denly, and with such startling force, that he stopped still in the street, and only recov- ered himself when Harris turned and called to him. They were just in time for the train. Tom found a place in the corner of the car where he would be alone, and sat there thinking over what he had done, and try- ing to reason himself into justification of his conduct. The conductor came along and punched his ticket, and looked at him so sharply that Tom wondered if he knew. But of course that was absurd. Then he tried to dismiss the matter from his mind alto- gether, and give his attention to what he could see from the car-window. Outside a drizzling rain was beginning to fall on the brown fields and leafless trees, 64 THE ELIA'D BROTHER. and the autumn early twilight was fast deepening into darkness. It was very dismal and cheerless, and not at all the kind of outlook that could serve to draw Tom's mind from its task of self-contem- plation. It was but a few minutes, there- fore, before this controversy with him- self was going on again, harder than before. Somehow that strange word "bribed" kept haunting him. It sounded constantly in his ears. He imagined that the people in the cars were speaking it ; that even the rhythmic rattle of the wheels upon the rails kept singing it to him with monotonous reiteration, "Bribed! bribed!" Tom thought, as he hurried down the street in the gathering darkness, out upon the plank walk, and up the long hill toward home, that he had never been so unhappy in all his life before. It was strange, loo, for he had so often dreamed of the great joy he should feel when the coveted hun- dred dollars had been saved. Well, he had it now, every cent of it, rolled up and tucked safely away in the THE BLIND BROTHER. 65 pocket of his vest ; but instead of happi- ness, it had brought misery. For the first time within his memory, the thought of meeting his mother and his brother gave him no pleasure. He would not tell them about the money that night at any rate ; he had decided upon that. Indeed, he had almost concluded that it would be better that they should not know about it until after the trial. And then suppose they should not approve ! He was aghast at the very thought. But Tom was a brave lad, and he put on a bright face before these two, and told them of his trip to Wilkesbarre, and about what he had seen and heard, about the law-office, about Pleadwell and Carolan, about every thing, indeed, but the bargain and the money. He tried to eat his supper as if he en- joyed it, though every mouthful seemed about to choke him, and on the plea of being very tired, he went early to bed. There he lay half the night debating with his conscience, trying to make himself be- lieve that he had done right, yet feeling 66 THE BLIND BROTHER. all the time that he had stooped to dis- honor. He went over in his mind the way in which he should break the news to Mommie and Bennie, and wondered how they would receive it ; and always beating upon his brain, with a regular cadence that followed the pulsation of his heart, and with a mo- notonous rhythm that haunted him even after he had fallen into a troubled sleep, went that terrible word, Bribed ! The autumn days went by, and still the strike continued. There were no signs of resumption, no signs of compromise. On the contrary, the breach between the miners and the operators was growing daily wider. The burning of the Valley breaker and the arrest of Jack Rennie had given rise to a bitterness of feeling between the two classes that hindered greatly an amicable settlement of their differences. Acts of lawlessness were common, and it was apparent that but little provocation would be needed to bring on deeds of THE BLIND BROTHER. 67 violence of a desperate nature. The cry of want began to be heard, and, as the winter season was drawing near, suffering became more frequent among the improvi- dent and the unfortunate. The Taylor family saw coming the time when the pittance of twenty dollars that the boys had saved for Bennie must be drawn upon to furnish food and clothing for them all. Tom had tried to get work outside of the mines, but had failed ; there were so many idle men and boys, and there was so little work to be done at that season of the year. But the district school was open, not far from his home, and Tom went there instead. He was fond of books, and had studied much by himself. He could read very well indeed. He used to read aloud to Bennie a great deal, and during these days of enforced idleness the boys occupied much of their time in that way ; finding their literature in copies of old newspapers which had been given to them, and in a few old books which had belonged to their father. 68 THE BLIND BROTHER. Indian Summer came late that year, but it was very fair. It lingered day after day, with its still air, its far-sounding echoes, its hazy light and its smoky distances ; and the brooding spirit of nature's quiet rested down, for a brief but beautiful season, about the unquiet spirits of men. On the afternoon of one of its most charming days, Tom and Bennie sauntered out, hand in hand, as they always went, to where the hill, south of their little mining village, rose like a huge, upturned bowl, sloping downward from its summit to every point of the compass. Over in the little valley to the south lay the ruins of the burned breaker, still untouched ; and off upon the other side, one could see the sparkling Susquehanna far up into the nar- row valley where its waters sweep around the base of Campbell's Ledge ; across to the blue mountains on the west ; and down the famous valley of Wyoming, with its gray stone monument in the middle dis- tance, until the eastern hills crept in to intercept the view. It was a dreamy day, and a day fit for THE BLIND KROTHER. 69 dreams, and when the boys reached the summit of the hill, Tom lay down upon the warm sod, and silently looked away to the haze-wrapped mountains, while Bennie sat by his side, and pictured to his mind the view before him, as Tom had described it to him many times, sitting in that very spot. Poor Tom ! These beautiful clays had brought to him much perplexity of mind, much futile reasoning with his conscience, and much, very much, of silent suf- fering. Lying there now, in the sunlight, with open eyes, he saw, in reality, no more of the beautiful scene before him than did blind Bennie at his side. He was thinking of the trial, now only three days distant, of what he should be called upon to do and to say, and of how, after it was all over, he must tell Mommie and Bennie about the hundred dollars. Ah, there was the trouble! he could see his way clearly enough until it should come to that ; but how should he ever be able to tell to these two a thine of which he tried 70 THE BLIND BROTHER. to be proud, but of which, after all, he felt guilty and ashamed ? Then, what would they say to him ? Would they praise him for his devotion to Bennie, and for his cleverness in having .grasped an opportunity? Or would they grieve over his lack of manly firmness and his loss of boyish honor ? Alas ! the more he thought of it, the more he feared that they would sorrow rather than rejoice. But an idea came to Tom, as he lay there, thinking the matter over ; the idea that perhaps he could learn what Bennie's mind would be on the subject, without exciting any suspicion therein of what had actually occurred. He resolved to try. He hardly knew how best to approach the matter, but, after some consideration, he turned to Bennie and said, " Bennie, do you s'pose Jack Rennie act'ally set fire to that breaker ? " " I shouldn't wonder a bit, Tom," replied Bennie ; " those 'at know him says he's dreadful bad. 'Taint so much worse to burn a breaker than 'tis to burn a shaft- house, an' they say he act'ally did burn a THE BLIND BROTHER, f\ shaft-house up at Hyde Park, only they couldn't prove it on him." " Well, s'pose you'd 'a' seen s'pose you could see, you know, Bennie an' s'pose you'd 'a' seen Jack Rennie set fire to that breaker ; would you tell on him ? " "Yes, I would," said Bennie, resolutely, " if I thought he'd never get punished for it 'less I did tell on him." " Well, don't you think," continued Tom, reflectively, " 'at that'd be sidin' with the wealthy clapitulist, against the poor laborer, who ain't got no other way to get even justice for himself, except to make the rich corpurations afraid of him, that way?" Tom was using Pleadwell's argument, not because he believed in it himself, but simply to see how Bennie would meet it. Bennie met it by saying, " Well, I don't care ; I don't b'lieve it's ever right to burn up any thing 'at belongs to anybody else ; an' if I saw any one a-doin' it, I'd tell on him if" Bennie hesitated a moment, and Tom looked up eagerly "if I wasn't afraid o' the Molly 72 THE BLIND BKOTHER. Maguires. Jack Rennie's a Molly, you know." " But wouldn't you be afraid of 'em ? s'pose one of 'em should come to you an' say, ' Ben Taylor, if you tell on Jack, we'll put out your ' I mean ' cut off your tongue.' What'd you do ? " Bennie thought a moment. " Well, I b'lieve I'd tell on him, anyway ; an* then I'd get a pistol, an' I wouldn't let no Molly get nearer to me'n the muzzle of it." In spite of his great anxiety, Tom laughed at the picture of weak, blind little Bennie holding a crowd of outlaws at bay, with a cocked revolver in his hand. But he felt that he was not getting at the real question very fast, so he tried again. " Well, Bennie, s'pose you'd 'a' seen him start that fire, an' he'd 'a' knowed it, an' he'd 'a' said to you, ' Ben Taylor, if you ever tell on me, I'll burn your Mommie's house down, an' I'll most kill your brother Tom ! ' t/ien what'd you do ? " Bennie hesitated. This was more of a poser. THE BLIND BROTHER. 73 " Well," he answered, at last, " if I'd 'a' b'lieved he'd 'a' done what he said I don't know I guess I'd well, maybe, if I didn't have to tell any lie, I just wouldn't say any thing." Tom's spirits rose ; he felt that a great point was gained. Here was a matter in which Bennie would have been even less firm than he himself had been. Now was the time to come directly to the issue, to ask the final question. Tom braced himself to the task. He tried to speak naturally and carelessly, but there was a strange shortness of breath, and a huskiness in his voice which he could not control ; he could only hope that Bennie would not notice it. "Well, then, s'pose just s'pose, you know that Pd seen Jack Rennie set fire to the breaker, an' 'at he knew I was goin' to tell on him, an' 'at he'd 'a' said to me, ' Tom, you got a blind brother Bennie, ain't you ? ' an' I'd 'a' said, ' Yes,' an' he'd 'a' said, ' What'll it cost to get Bennie's sight for him ? ' an' I'd 'a' said, ' Oh, maybe a hun- dred dollars,' an' he'd 'a' said, ' Here, Tom, 74 THE BLIND BROTHER. here's a hundred dollars ; you go an' get Bennie's eyes cured ; an' don't you say any thin' about my settin' that fire.' What what'd you 'a' done if you'd 'a' been me?" Tom raised himself to a sitting posture, and leaned toward Bennie, with flushed face and painful expectancy in his eyes. He knew that for him Bennie's answer meant either a return to a measure of the old happiness, or a plunging into deeper misery. The blind boy rose to his feet and stood for a moment as if lost in thought. Then he turned his sightless eyes to Tom, and said, very slowly and distinctly, " If you'd 'a' took it, Tom, an' if you'd 'a' used it to cure me with, an' I'd 'a' known it, an' I'd 'a' got my sight, I don't believe I don't believe I should ever 'a' wanted to look at you, Tom, or wanted you to see me ; I'd 'a' been so 'shamed o' both of us." THE BLIND BROTHER. 77 CHAPTER IV. THE TRIAL. TOM turned his head away, and covered his face with his hands. This was cruel. For the first time in his life, he was glad Bennie could not see him. But he felt that it was necessary for him to say some- thing, so he stammered out, " Well, I was only just s'posin', you know. Course, no honest fellow'd do that ; but if they'll only get to work again, we won't ask anybody for any hunderd dollars. We'll earn it." The beauty of the autumn day died slowly out, and the narrow crescent of the new moon, hanging over the tops of the far western hills, shone dimly through the purple haze. Sadly and with few words the two boys went their homeward way. A great burden of regret and remorse 78 THE BLIND BROTHER. rested upon Tom's heart, and the shadow of it fell upon the heart of his blind brother. Poor, poor Tom ! He knew not what to do. He could never use the money now for Bennie, and he would not use it for him- self. It had occurred to him once to take the money back to Plead well, and seek to be released from his agreement. But a little thought had convinced him that this would be useless ; that the money would not be received ; that, having accepted a bribe, he had placed himself in the power of those who had given it to him, and that any wavering on his part, much more any violation of his agreement, would bring down vengeance and punishment on him- self, and trouble and disgrace on those who were dear to him. "Oh, why," he asked himself, in bitter thought, "why did I ever take the money?" Tom's mother attributed his melancholy to lack of work and loss of earnings. She knew how his heart was set on laying up money to send Bennie away, and how im- patient he became at any delay in the prog- THE BLIND BROTHER. 8 1 ress of his scheme. So she talked to him very cheerfully, and made delicate little dishes to tempt his appetite, and when the morning for the trial came, and Tom started for the train to go to Wilkesbarre, dressed in his best clothes, and with the hated hundred dollars burning in his pocket, she kissed him good-by with a smile on her face. She bade him many times to be very careful about the cars, and said to him, at parting, " Whatever tha says to thee, lad, tell the truth ; whatever tha does to thee, tell the truth ; fear to look no man i' the eye ; be good an' honest wi' yoursel', an' coom back to Mommie an' Bennie, when it's ower, hearty an' weel." Sandy McCulloch went down with Tom on the train, and together they walked from the station to the Court House. There were many people standing about in the Court-House Square, and in the corridors of the building, and the court-room itself was nearly full when Tom and Sandy en- tered it. They found vacant places on one of the rear benches, but, as the seats were all graded down on a sloping floor to 82 THE BLIND BROTHER. the bar, they could see without difficulty all that was being done. Tom had never been in a court-room before, and he looked with much interest at the judges on the bench, at the lawyers chatting pleasantly in the bar, at the entry and departure of the grand jury, and at the officious constables, each with his staff of office, who kept order in the court-room. There were some motions and argu- ments which Tom could not understand, being made by the attorneys; the clerk read some lists in a weak voice, and the time of the court was thus occupied until toward noon. By and by there was a slight bustle at the side door, to the right of the judges' bench, and the sheriff and his deputy en- tered with Jack Rennie. Head and shoulders above those who accompanied him, his heavily bearded face somewhat pale from confinement, and stooping rather more than usual, he moved slowly across the crowded bar, in full view of all the people in the room, to a seat by the side of his counsel. THE BLIND BROTHER. 83 The instant Tom's eyes rested on him he recognized him as the man who had threatened him at the breaker on the night of the fire. The buzz of excitement, oc- casioned by the entrance of the prisoner, subsided, and the voice of the presiding judge sounded distinctly through the room: " Commonwealth against Jack Rennie. Arson. Are you ready for trial ? " " We are, your Honor," replied the district attorney, rising to his feet and advancing to the clerk's desk. " Very well," said the judge. " Arraign the prisoner." Rennie was directed to stand up, and the district attorney read, in a clear voice, the indictment, which charged that the defendant " did, on the eighteenth day of November last passed, feloniously, wil- fully and maliciously set fire to, burn and consume, a certain building, to wit: a coal- breaker, the same being the property of a certain body corporate known by the style and title of ' The Valley Coal Company ; ' by reason of which setting fire to, burning 84 THE BLIND BROTHER. and consuming, a certain dwelling-house, also the property of the said Valley Coal Company, and being within the curtilage of said coal-breaker, was also burned and consumed ; contrary to the form of the act of the General Assembly, in such case made and provided, and against the peace and dignity of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania." Rennie stood, listening intently to the reading of the indictment. When the question was put : " What say you, guilty, or not guilty ? " he replied, in a deep, chest voice, " If I be guilty, ye ha' but to prove it." " Make your plea, sir ! " said the judge severely. " Guilty, or not guilty ? " " Then I'll plead no' guilty. No mon's guilty till he's proved guilty." Rennie resumed his seat, and the court was soon afterward adjourned for the noon recess. In the afternoon the selecting of jurors in the case against Rennie began. The first one called was a miner. One could tell that by the blue powder-marks THE BLIND BROTHER. 87 on his face, and that he was of Irish nativ- ity could be detected by the rich brogue that escaped his lips. He was " passed " by the Commonwealth, and the clerk of the court recited the formula : " Juror, look upon the prisoner. Pris- oner, look upon the juror. What say you, challenge, or no challenge ? " " Swear the juror to ' true answers make,' " said Attorney Pleadwell. The man was sworn. "Where do you live?" inquired the lawyer. " Up on Shanty Hill, sorr." " That's definite. Anywhere near this breaker that was burned ? " " Oh, the matther of a mile belike, bar- rin' the time it'd take ye to walk to the track beyant." 14 What's your occupation ? " "Occupation, is it? Yis, sorr; as good a charr^ter as anny " " Oh, I mean what do you work at ? " " I'm a miner, sorr." " Where do you work ? " " Faith, I worked for the Valley Breaker 88 THE BLIND BROTHER. Coal Company this tin years come next St. Patrick's day, may it plase the coort, an' bad 'cess to the man that burnt it, I say, an' " " Challenge ! " interrupted Attorney Plead well, sharply. A tipstaff hurried the challenged man from the witness-box, in a state of helpless bewilderment as to what it all meant, and another juror was called, a small, wiry man, chewing on a mouthful of tobacco. He was sworn on his voir dire, and the dis- trict attorney asked him, " Do you belong to an organization known as the Molly Maguires ? " 44 No, sir ! " quickly responded the man, before Pleadwell could interpose an objec- tion to the question. The district attorney looked at the wit- ness sharply for a moment, then consulted with Attorney Summons, who sat by his side as private counsel for the prosecution. They believed that the man had sworn falsely, in order to get on the jury in behalf of the defendant, and he was directed to stand aside. THE BLIND BROTHER. 89 The next juror called was a farmer from a remote part of the county, who had heard nothing about the fire until he arrived in town, and who displayed no prejudices. He was accepted by both sides as the first juror in the case. So the selection went on, slowly and tediously, enlivened at times by an amusing candidate for the jury-box, or a tilt between counsel ; and long before the " twelve good men and true " had all been selected and sworn, the early autumn night had fallen, and the flaring gas-jets lighted up the space about the bench and bar, leaving the remote corners of the court-room in uncertain shadow. At six o'clock court was adjourned until the following morning, and Tom went, with Sandy McCulloch, to a small hotel on the outskirts of the city, where arrangements had been made to accommodate wit- nesses for the defence. Notwithstanding his anxiety of mind, Tom was hungry, and he ate a hearty supper and went early to bed. But he could not sleep. The excitement QO THE BLIND BROTHER. of the day had left his brain in a whirl, and he tossed restlessly about, going over in his mind what had already occurred, and thinking with grave apprehension of what to-morrow might bring forth. Through it all he still repeated one resolve : that what- ever came he would not lie. With this unsatisfactory compromise with his conscience on his mind, he fell at last into a troubled sleep. When court was opened on the follow- ing morning, the court-room was more densely crowded with idle men than it had been on the previous day. The case against Rennie was taken up without delay. The district attorney made the opening address on behalf of the Commonwealth, doing little more than to outline the evidence to be presented by the prosecution. The first witness called was a civil engi- neer, who presented a map showing the plan, location and surroundings of the burned breaker. Following him came two witnesses who detailed the progress of the fire as they had seen it, one of them being the watchman at the breaker, and the other THE BLIND. BROTHER. 91 the occupant of the dwelling-house which had been burned. A third witness testified to having seen Rennie at the fire shortly after it broke out, but did not know how long he had been there, nor where he came from ; and still another swore that he had seen the defend- ant in a drinking-saloon in town, about half an hour before he heard the alarm of fire, and had noticed that he went away, in the direction of the breaker, in company with " Silent Mike." Then came a witness who gave his name as Lewis G. Travers ; a slightly built, but muscular man, of middle age, with sharp eyes and quiet manner. "What is your occupation?" inquired the district attorney, after the man had been sworn. " I am a detective."