



Produced by Donald Lainson





SALLY DOWS


By Bret Harte




CONTENTS


SALLY DOWS

THE CONSPIRACY OF MRS. BUNKER

THE TRANSFORMATION OF BUCKEYE CAMP

THEIR UNCLE FROM CALIFORNIA




SALLY DOWS.


PROLOGUE.

THE LAST GUN AT SNAKE RIVER.


What had been in the cool gray of that summer morning a dewy country
lane, marked only by a few wagon tracks that never encroached upon its
grassy border, and indented only by the faint footprints of a crossing
fox or <DW53>, was now, before high noon, already crushed, beaten down,
and trampled out of all semblance of its former graciousness. The heavy
springless jolt of gun-carriage and caisson had cut deeply through the
middle track; the hoofs of crowding cavalry had struck down and shredded
the wayside vines and bushes to bury them under a cloud of following
dust, and the short, plunging double-quick of infantry had trodden out
this hideous ruin into one dusty level chaos. Along that rudely widened
highway useless muskets, torn accoutrements, knapsacks, caps, and
articles of clothing were scattered, with here and there the larger
wrecks of broken-down wagons, roughly thrown aside into the ditch to
make way for the living current. For two hours the greater part of
an army corps had passed and repassed that way, but, coming or going,
always with faces turned eagerly towards an open <DW72> on the right
which ran parallel to the lane. And yet nothing was to be seen there.
For two hours a gray and bluish cloud, rent and shaken with explosion
after explosion, but always closing and thickening after each discharge,
was all that had met their eyes. Nevertheless, into this ominous cloud
solid moving masses of men in gray or blue had that morning melted away,
or emerged from it only as scattered fragments that crept, crawled,
ran, or clung together in groups, to be followed, and overtaken in the
rolling vapor.

But for the last half hour the desolated track had stretched empty and
deserted. While there was no cessation of the rattling, crackling, and
detonations on the fateful <DW72> beyond, it had still been silent. Once
or twice it had been crossed by timid, hurrying wings, and frightened
and hesitating little feet, or later by skulkers and stragglers from
the main column who were tempted to enter it from the hedges and bushes
where they had been creeping and hiding. Suddenly a prolonged yell from
the hidden <DW72> beyond--the nearest sound that had yet been heard from
that ominous distance--sent them to cover again. It was followed by
the furious galloping of horses in the lane, and a handsome, red-capped
officer, accompanied by an orderly, dashed down the track, wheeled,
leaped the hedge, rode out on the <DW72> and halted. In another instant a
cloud of dust came whirling down the lane after him. Out of it strained
the heavy shoulders and tightened chain-traces of six frantic horses
dragging the swaying gun that in this tempest of motion alone seemed
passive and helpless with an awful foreknowledge of its power. As in
obedience to a signal from the officer they crashed through the hedge
after him, a sudden jolt threw an artilleryman from the limber before
the wheel. A driver glanced back on the tense chain and hesitated. "Go
on!" yelled the prostrate man, and the wheel went over him. Another and
another gun followed out of the dust cloud, until the whole battery had
deployed on the <DW72>. Before the drifting dust had fairly settled, the
falling back of the panting horses with their drivers gave a momentary
glimpse of the nearest gun already in position and of the four erect
figures beside it. The yell that seemed to have evoked this sudden
apparition again sounded nearer; a blinding flash broke from the
gun, which was instantly hidden by the closing group around it, and
a deafening crash with the high ringing of metal ran down the lane. A
column of white, woolly smoke arose as another flash broke beside it.
This was quickly followed by another and another, with a response from
the gun first fired, until the whole <DW72> shook and thundered. And the
smoke, no longer white and woolly, but darkening and thickening as with
unburnt grains of gunpowder, mingled into the one ominous vapor, and
driving along the lane hid even the <DW72> from view.

The yelling had ceased, but the grinding and rattling heard through the
detonation of cannon came nearer still, and suddenly there was a shower
of leaves and twigs from the lower branches of a chestnut-tree near the
broken hedge. As the smoke thinned again a rising and falling medley of
flapping hats, tossing horses' heads and shining steel appeared for an
instant, advancing tumultuously up the <DW72>. But the apparition was as
instantly cloven by flame from the two nearest guns, and went down in a
gush of smoke and roar of sound. So level was the delivery and so close
the impact that a space seemed suddenly cleared between, in which
the whirling of the shattered remnants of the charging cavalry was
distinctly seen, and the shouts and oaths of the inextricably struggling
mass became plain and articulate. Then a gunner serving the nearest
piece suddenly dropped his swab and seized a carbine, for out of
the whirling confusion before them a single rider was seen galloping
furiously towards the gun.

The red-capped young officer rode forward and knocked up the gunner's
weapon with his sword. For in that rapid glance he had seen that the
rider's reins were hanging loosely on the neck of his horse, who was
still dashing forwards with the