The Bell-Ringer of Angel's Page #7

"The Bell-Ringer of Angel's" is a short story by Bret Harte that revolves around the life of a mysterious bell-ringer in the mining town of Angel's Camp. Set against the backdrop of the California Gold Rush, the story explores themes of love, identity, and community. The protagonist, whose bell-ringing serves as a harbinger of events, becomes intertwined with the lives of the townspeople, revealing their dreams and struggles. Harte's vivid storytelling captures the spirit of the West while delving into the complexities of human relationships in a rapidly changing environment.

• Short story

								

since Arthur had revolted and openly absented himself from his religious
devotions for lighter diversions of the Bar. Keenly as Madison felt his
defection, he was too much preoccupied with other things to lay much
stress upon it, and the sting of Arthur's relapse to worldliness and
folly lay in his own consciousness that it was partly his fault. He
could not chide his brother when he felt that his own heart was absorbed
in his neighbor's wife, and although he had rigidly adhered to his own
crude ideas of self-effacement and loyalty to McGee, he had been again
and again a visitor at his house. It was true that Mrs. McGee had
made this easier by tacitly accepting his conditions of their
acquaintanceship, by seeming more natural, by exhibiting a gayety, and
at times even a certain gentleness and thoughtfulness of conduct that
delighted her husband and astonished her lover. Whether this wonderful
change had really been effected by the latter's gloomy theology and
still more hopeless ethics, he could not say. She certainly showed no
disposition to imitate their formalities, nor seemed to be impressed by
them on the rare occasions when he now offered them. Yet she appeared to
link the two men together--even physically--as on these occasions when,
taking an arm of each, she walked affectionately between them along the
river bank promenade, to the great marveling and admiration of the Bar.
It was said, however, that Mr. Jack Hamlin, a gambler, at that moment
professionally visiting Wayne's Bar, and a great connoisseur of feminine
charms and weaknesses, had glanced at them under his handsome lashes,
and asked a single question, evidently so amusing to the younger members
of the Bar that Madison Wayne knit his brow and Arthur Wayne blushed.
Mr. Hamlin took no heed of the elder brother's frown, but paid some
slight attention to the color of the younger brother, and even more to
a slightly coquettish glance from the pretty Mrs. McGee. Whether or
not--as has been ingeniously alleged by some moralists--the light
and trifling of either sex are prone to recognize each other by some
mysterious instinct, is not a necessary consideration of this chronicle;
enough that the fact is recorded.

And yet Madison Wayne should have been satisfied with his work! His
sacrifice was accepted; his happy issue from a dangerous situation, and
his happy triumph over a more dangerous temptation, was complete and
perfect, and even achieved according to his own gloomy theories of
redemption and regeneration. Yet he was not happy. The human heart is
at times strangely unappeasable. And as he sat that evening in the
gathering shadows, the Book which should have yielded him balm and
comfort lay unopened in his lap.

A step upon the gravel outside had become too familiar to startle him.
It was Mr. McGee lounging into the cabin like a gaunt shadow. It must be
admitted that the friendship of these strangely contrasted men, however
sincere and sympathetic, was not cheerful. A belief in the thorough
wickedness of humanity, kept under only through fear of extreme penalty
and punishment, material and spiritual, was not conducive to light and
amusing conversation. Their talk was mainly a gloomy chronicle of life
at the Bar, which was in itself half an indictment. To-night, Mr. McGee
spoke of the advent of Mr. Jack Hamlin, and together they deplored the
diversion of the hard-earned gains and valuable time of the Bar through
the efforts of that ingenious gentleman. "Not," added McGee cautiously,
"but what he can shoot straight enough, and I've heard tell that he
don't LIE. That mout and it moutn't be good for your brother who goes
around with him considerable, there's different ways of lookin' at
that; you understand what I mean? You follow me?" For all that, the
conversation seemed to languish this evening, partly through some
abstraction on the part of Wayne and partly some hesitation in McGee,
who appeared to have a greater fear than usual of not expressing himself
plainly. It was quite dark in the cabin when at last, detaching himself
from his usual lounging place, the door-post, he walked to the window
and leaned, more shadowy than ever, over Wayne's chair. "I want to
tell you suthin'," he said slowly, "that I don't want you to
misunderstand--you follow me? and that ain't no ways carpin' or
criticisin' nor reflectin' on YOU--you understand what I mean? Ever sens
you and me had that talk here about you and Safie, and ever sens I got
the hang of your ways and your style o' thinkin', I've been as sure
of you and her as if I'd been myself trottin' round with you and
a revolver. And I'm as sure of you now--you sabe what I mean? you
understand? You've done me and her a heap o' good; she's almost another
woman sens you took hold of her, and ef you ever want me to stand up
and 'testify,' as you call it, in church, Sandy McGee is ready. What
I'm tryin' to say to ye is this. Tho' I understand you and your work and
your ways--there's other folks ez moutn't--you follow? You understand
what I mean? And it's just that I'm coming to. Now las' night, when you
and Safie was meanderin' along the lower path by the water, and I kem
across you"--

"But," interrupted Madison quickly, "you're mistaken. I wasn't"--

"Hol' on," said McGee, quietly; "I know you got out o' the way without
you seein' me or me you, because you didn't know it was me, don't you
see? don't you follow? and that's just it! It mout have bin some one
from the Bar as seed you instead o' ME. See? That's why you lit out
before I could recognize you, and that's why poor Safie was so mighty
flustered at first and was for runnin' away until she kem to herself
agin. When, of course, she laughed, and agreed you must have mistook
me."

"But," gasped Madison quickly, "I WASN'T THERE AT ALL LAST NIGHT."

"What?"

The two men had risen simultaneously and were facing each other. McGee,
with a good-natured, half-critical expression, laid his hand on Wayne's
shoulder and slightly turned him towards the window, that he might see
his face. It seemed to him white and dazed.

"You--wasn't there--last night?" he repeated, with a slow tolerance.

Scarcely a moment elapsed, but the agony of an hour may have thrilled
through Wayne's consciousness before he spoke. Then all the blood of his
body rushed to his face with his first lie as he stammered, "No! Yes! Of
course. I have made a mistake--it WAS I."

"I see--you thought I was riled?" said McGee quietly.

"No; I was thinking it was NIGHT BEFORE LAST! Of course it was last
night. I must be getting silly." He essayed a laugh--rare at any
time with him--and so forced now that it affected McGee more than his
embarrassment. He looked at Wayne thoughtfully, and then said slowly: "I
reckon I did come upon you a little too sudden last night, but, you see,
I was thinkin' of suthin' else and disremembered you might be there. But
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