Hindered Hand or, The Reign of the Repressionist

Elbert Griggs Sutton

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pubOne.info thank you for your continued support and wish to present you this new edition. To a devoted father, of rugged strength of character, and, withal, pre-eminently a man of peace, and to a loving mother, ever tender and serene of soul - To these twin moulders of the hearthside, who have ever been anxious that their children should contribute naught but what is good to the world, this volume is most affectionately dedicated by their son

Sujets

• Adventure (Guyana)
• Adventure

Informations

• Publié par: Pub One Info
• Date de parution: 23 octobre 2010
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9782819913597
• Langue: English

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DEDICATION.
To a devoted father, of rugged strength ofcharacter, and, withal, pre-eminently a man of peace, and to aloving mother, ever tender and serene of soul – To these twinmoulders of the hearthside, who have ever been anxious that theirchildren should contribute naught but what is good to the world,this volume is most affectionately dedicated by theirson,
THE AUTHOR.
SOLEMNLY ATTESTED.
Upon a matter of such tremendous importance to theAmerican people as is the subject herein treated, it is perhaps dueour readers to let them know how much of fact disports itselfthrough these pages in the garb of fiction.
We beg to say that in no part of the book has theauthor consciously done violence to conditions as he has beenpermitted to view them, amid which conditions he has spent hiswhole life, up to the present hour, as an intensely absorbedobserver.
If in any of these pages the reader comes acrossthat which puts him in a mood to chide, may the author not hopethat the wrath aroused be not wasted upon the inconsequentialpainter, but directed toward the landscape that forced the brushinto his hand, stretched the canvas, and shouted in irresistibletones: "Write!" Very respectfully, SUTTON E. GRIGGS.
Nashville, Tenn., May, 1905.
TUNING THE LYRE.
In the long ago when the earth was in process offormation, it must have been that those forces of nature mostexpert in the fashioning of the beautiful were ordered to cometogether as collaborators and give to the world Almaville!
Journeying toward the designated spot, they haltedon the outskirts of the site of the contemplated city, and tossedup a series of engirdling hills, whose slopes and crests coveredwith verdure might afford in the days to come a beautiful sight tothe inhabitants when riding forth to get a whiff of country air.These same forces of nature, evidently in love with their work,arranged, it seems, for all the beautiful clouds with their varyinghues to pass in daily review over the head of the city to beborn.
In all that appertains to physical excellenceAlmaville was made attractive, and somewhere, perhaps behind yonhills, the forces rested until man set his foot upon the soil andprepared to build. They so charged the air and all the environmentswith the spirit of the beautiful, that the men who later wrought inbuilding the city found themselves the surprised and happy creatorsof a lovely habitation.
On an eminence crowning the center of the areawhereon the city is planted, the State has builded its capitol, andfrom the tower thereof one can see the engaging network of streets,contemplate the splendid architecture of the buildings, and gazeupon the noble trees that boldly line the sidewalks, and thustestify that they are not afraid of civilization.
Even in the matter of climate Almaville is highlyfavored, it would seem. Her summers are not too hot nor her winterstoo cold, and many a fevered brow finds solace in her balmybreezes.
The war gods saw and admired her, and decreed thatone of the famous battles of the Civil War should be fought withinher environs, that their memory might ever be cherished here.
Philanthropy, it seems, singled out Almaville forspecial attention, granting unto her opportunities for learningthat well might cause proud Athens to touch her crown to see thatit was still there and had not been lifted by her modern rival.
A murky river runs through Almaville and a darkstream flows through the lives of all of us who dwell upon itsbanks. But yonder! yonder! is the ocean! Where? THE AUTHOR.
THE HINDERED HAND.
CHAPTER I.
Occurrences That Puzzle.
To the pagan yet remaining in man it would seem thatyon railroad train plunging toward the Southland is somehowconscious of the fact that it is playing a part in events oftremendous import, for observe how it pierces the darkness with itsone wild eye, cleaves the air with its steely front and causes warsand thunders to creep into the dreams of the people by whose homesit makes its midnight rush.
Well, this train now moving toward Almaville, queencity of the South, measured by the results that developed from thatnight's journey, is fully entitled to all its fretting and fuming,brag and bluster of steam and smoke, and to its wearisome jangle ofclanging bell and shrieking whistle and rumbling wheel.
It was summer time. A Negro porter passing through acoach set apart for white passengers noted the fixedness with whicha young woman with a pretty face and a pair of beautiful blue eyeswas regarding him. Her head was inclined to one side, her hand sosupporting her face that a prettily shaped ear peeped out frombetween her fingers. In the look of her eye there was a slightsuggestion of immaturity, which, however, was contradicted by thefirm outlines of her face. As the porter drew near her seat shesignificantly directed her look to a certain spot on the car floor,thence to the eyes of the porter.
Having in mind the well understood dictum of thewhite man of the South that the Negro man and the white woman areto be utterly oblivious of the existence of each other, this Negroporter was loth to believe that the young woman was tryingsurreptitiously to attract his attention, and he passed out of thecoach hurriedly. In a short while he returned and again noted howintently the young woman regarded him. This time he observed thatshe had evidently been weeping and that there was a look ofhopeless sorrow in her eyes. Again the young woman looked at him,then upon the floor and up at him once more. The porter looked downupon the spot indicated by her look, saw a note, stooped and pickedit up. He returned to the coach or rather to the end of a coach,set apart for Negroes, took a rear seat and surveyed the carpreparatory to reading the note which the young woman plainlyindicated was for him. "I don't want white girls passing me notes,"thought the Negro, clutching the note tightly and continuing toglance about the coach in a half-frightened manner. He arose tohoist the window by which he sat, intending to utilize it to be ridof the note in case the occasion should demand it. His fears hadbegun to suggest to him that perhaps some white man had noticed histaking cognizance of the young woman's efforts to attract hisattention.
As the Negro section of the coach was the forwardsection and next to the baggage car, any person coming from thesection set apart for the whites would be to the back of the Negropassengers. The porter therefore changed his seat, going forwardand taking a position where he would be facing any one coming fromthe coach for whites. He raised the window by which he sat and hiseye wandered out into the darkness amid the sombre trees that wentspeeding along, and there arose to haunt him mental visions of asea of angry white faces closing around some one dark face, perhapsguilty and perhaps innocent; and as he thought thereon heshuddered. He felt sorely tempted to toss the note out of thewindow unread, but remembering the pleading look on the face of theyoung woman he did not follow the promptings of his fear. "In caseof trouble, this crew in here couldn't help a fellow much," saidthe porter, moving his eyes about slowly again, taking note one byone of those in the section with him. There was the conductor, whothough a white man, seemed always to prefer to sit in the sectionset apart for the Negroes. There was the newsboy, also white,taking up two seats with his wares. "As well as they know me theywould go with the other gang. A white man is a white man, and don'tyou forget it," mused the porter.
There were two male passengers sitting together,Negroes, one of whom was so light of complexion that he couldeasily have passed for white, while the other was of a dark brownhue. "A fine looking fellow," thought the porter concerning thedark young man.
Across the aisle from the two young men mentioned,and a seat or so in advance of them, sat a young woman whose facewas covered with a very thick veil. The perfect mould of hershoulders, the attractiveness of her wealth of black hair massed atthe back of her head – these things were demanding, the porternoticed, many an admiring glance from the darker of the two youngmen.
The porter seemed about to forget his note inobserving with what regularity the young man's eyes would wanderoff and straightway return to rest upon the beautiful form of theyoung woman, but an incident occurred that brought his mind backvery forcibly to the note. The door from the section for the whitesopened and two white men entered.
The porter's hand in which the note was heldcautiously crept toward the open window, while he eyed the twowhite men whom he feared had come to accuse him of an attemptedflirtation with a young white woman. One of the men reached behindto his hip pocket and the porter half arose in his seat, throwingup his hands in alarm, expecting a pistol to appear to cover him.The white man was simply drawing out a flask of whiskey to offerhis companion a drink.
Ensal Ellwood, the dark young man, looking around tosee if the parties who had entered had closed the door behind them(for the adjoining section was the white people's smokingapartment, and care had to be exercised to keep smoke and tobaccofumes out), saw the two white men about to take a drink. He arosequickly and advancing to the two men, said quietly, urbanely andyet with an air of firmness, "Gentlemen, the law prescribes thatthis coach shall be used exclusively by Negro passengers and wemust ask that you do not make our first-class apartment a drinkingroom for the whites."
The two men stared at Ensal and he looked themfrankly in the face that they might see that in a dignified mannerhe would insist to the last upon the rights of the Negropassengers. The justness of Ensal's request, his unostentatious,manly bearing had the desired effect. The two men quietly turnedabout and left the car.
The porter who had been standing during this littlescene now sat down, opened the note and