Having murdered his brother-in-law, Orrin Brower of Kentucky was a
fugitive from justice. From the county jail where he had been
confined to await his trial he had escaped by knocking down his
jailer with an iron bar, robbing him of his keys and, opening the
outer door, walking out into the night. The jailer being unarmed,
Brower got no weapon with which to defend his recovered liberty. As
soon as he was out of the town he had the folly to enter a forest;
this was many years ago, when that region was wilder than it is now.
The night was pretty dark, with neither moon nor stars visible, and
as Brower had never dwelt thereabout, and knew nothing of the lay of
the land, he was, naturally, not long in losing himself. He could
not have said if he were getting farther away from the town or going
back to it--a most important matter to Orrin Brower. He knew that
in either case a posse of citizens with a pack of bloodhounds would
soon be on his track and his chance of escape was very slender; but
he did not wish to assist in his own pursuit. Even an added hour of
freedom was worth having.
Suddenly he emerged from the forest into an old road, and there
before him saw, indistinctly, the figure of a man, motionless in the
gloom. It was too late to retreat: the fugitive felt that at the
first movement back toward the wood he would be, as he afterward
explained, "filled with buckshot." So the two stood there like
trees, Brower nearly suffocated by the activity of his own heart;
the other--the emotions of the other are not recorded.
A moment later--it may have been an hour--the moon sailed into a
patch of unclouded sky and the hunted man saw that visible
embodiment of Law lift an arm and point significantly toward and
beyond him. He understood. Turning his back to his captor, he
walked submissively away in the direction indicated, looking to
neither the right nor the left; hardly daring to breathe, his head
and back actually aching with a prophecy of buckshot.
Brower was as courageous a criminal as ever lived to be hanged; that
was shown by the conditions of awful personal peril in which he had
coolly killed his brother-in-law. It is needless to relate them
here; they came out at his trial, and the revelation of his calmness
in confronting them came near to saving his neck. But what would
you have?--when a brave man is beaten, he submits.
So they pursued their journey jailward along the old road through
the woods. Only once did Brower venture a turn of the head: just
once, when he was in deep shadow and he knew that the other was in
moonlight, he looked backward. His captor was Burton Duff, the
jailer, as white as death and bearing upon his brow the livid mark
of the iron bar. Orrin Brower had no further curiosity.
Eventually they entered the town, which was all alight, but
deserted; only the women and children remained, and they were off
the streets. Straight toward the jail the criminal held his way.
Straight up to the main entrance he walked, laid his hand upon the
knob of the heavy iron door, pushed it open without command, entered
and found himself in the presence of a half-dozen armed men. Then
he turned. Nobody else entered.
On a table in the corridor lay the dead body of Burton Duff.
Here is the queer story of David William Duck, related by himself.
Duck is an old man living in Aurora, Illinois, where he is
universally respected. He is commonly known, however, as "Dead
Duck."
"In the autumn of 1866 I was a private soldier of the Eighteenth
Infantry. My company was one of those stationed at Fort Phil
Kearney, commanded by Colonel Carrington. The country is more or
less familiar with the history of that garrison, particularly with
the slaughter by the Sioux of a detachment of eighty-one men and
officers--not one escaping--through disobedience of orders by its
commander, the brave but reckless Captain Fetterman. When that
occurred, I was trying to make my way with important dispatches to
Fort C. F. Smith, on the Big Horn. As the country swarmed with
hostile Indians, I traveled by night and concealed myself as best I
could before daybreak. The better to do so, I went afoot, armed
with a Henry rifle and carrying three days' rations in my haversack.
"For my second place of concealment I chose what seemed in the
darkness a narrow canon leading through a range of rocky hills. It
contained many large bowlders, detached from the slopes of the
hills. Behind one of these, in a clump of sage-brush, I made my bed
for the day, and soon fell asleep. It seemed as if I had hardly
closed my eyes, though in fact it was near midday, when I was
awakened by the report of a rifle, the bullet striking the bowlder
just above my body. A band of Indians had trailed me and had me
nearly surrounded; the shot had been fired with an execrable aim by
a fellow who had caught sight of me from the hillside above. The
smoke of his rifle betrayed him, and I was no sooner on my feet than
he was off his and rolling down the declivity. Then I ran in a
stooping posture, dodging among the clumps of sage-brush in a storm
of bullets from invisible enemies. The rascals did not rise and
pursue, which I thought rather queer, for they must have known by my
trail that they had to deal with only one man. The reason for their
inaction was soon made clear. I had not gone a hundred yards before
I reached the limit of my run--the head of the gulch which I had
mistaken for a canon. It terminated in a concave breast of rock,
nearly vertical and destitute of vegetation. In that cul-de-sac I
was caught like a bear in a pen. Pursuit was needless; they had
only to wait.
"They waited. For two days and nights, crouching behind a rock
topped with a growth of mesquite, and with the cliff at my back,
suffering agonies of thirst and absolutely hopeless of deliverance,
I fought the fellows at long range, firing occasionally at the smoke
of their rifles, as they did at that of mine. Of course, I did not
dare to close my eyes at night, and lack of sleep was a keen
torture.
"I remember the morning of the third day, which I knew was to be my
last. I remember, rather indistinctly, that in my desperation and
delirium I sprang out into the open and began firing my repeating
rifle without seeing anybody to fire at. And I remember no more of
that fight.
"The next thing that I recollect was my pulling myself out of a
river just at nightfall. I had not a rag of clothing and knew
nothing of my whereabouts, but all that night I traveled, cold and
footsore, toward the north. At daybreak I found myself at Fort C.
F. Smith, my destination, but without my dispatches. The first man
that I met was a sergeant named William Briscoe, whom I knew very
well. You can fancy his astonishment at seeing me in that
condition, and my own at his asking who the devil I was.
"'Dave Duck,' I answered; 'who should I be?'
"He stared like an owl.
"'You do look it,' he said, and I observed that he drew a little
away from me. 'What's up?' he added.
"I told him what had happened to me the day before. He heard me
through, still staring; then he said:
"'My dear fellow, if you are Dave Duck I ought to inform you that I
buried you two months ago. I was out with a small scouting party
and found your body, full of bullet-holes and newly scalped--
somewhat mutilated otherwise, too, I am sorry to say--right where
you say you made your fight. Come to my tent and I'll show you your
clothing and some letters that I took from your person; the
commandant has your dispatches.'
"He performed that promise. He showed me the clothing, which I
resolutely put on; the letters, which I put into my pocket. He made
no objection, then took me to the commandant, who heard my story and
coldly ordered Briscoe to take me to the guardhouse. On the way I
said:
"'Bill Briscoe, did you really and truly bury the dead body that you
found in these togs?'
"'Sure,' he answered--'just as I told you. It was Dave Duck, all
right; most of us knew him. And now, you damned impostor, you'd
better tell me who you are.'
"'I'd give something to know,' I said.
"A week later, I escaped from the guardhouse and got out of the
country as fast as I could. Twice I have been back, seeking for
that fateful spot in the hills, but unable to find it."