Rensselaer Standard, Volume 1, Number 19, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 October 1879 — ROSS'S MIDNIGHT RIDE. [ARTICLE]

ROSS'S MIDNIGHT RIDE.

We were on the up-grade, and the six hones were slowly pulling their best. We were in a forest of mountains, and spiked over its top by a row of pines standing straight and stiff against the horizon. 1 Exceptionally fine weather it was, the stage-driver said, for this time of year. I was out on the box, you will understand, because it made me sick to ride inside, and for this onee I was glad of it Suddenly, as we were crawling on the up-grade road, round a projection ahead of us appeared a woman on horseback. Our driver tightened his slack reins, and gave a low peculiar whistle to his horses. Six pair of ears straightened briskly, the lagging hoofs picked themselves up and quickened their pace, and every horse began to Kso that we fell into a smart trot horsewoman ahead shook her bridle, and, without warning, her pony stretched into a sharp gallop, and os its flying feet struck the ground she rose in the saddle like a bird with a light, easy, graceful motion of the shoulder and a careless pose of the head. So we passed one another in fine style, and as she dashed along the road she was quite an excitement to me.

I saw the corners of the driver’s mouth jerking in a half-smile. He clicked to his horses, hemmed a bit, arranged his coat-collar, then fixed his gaze between the ears of the offwheeler, and said he: “That’s Rosie Maguire I” “Indeed?” T said, my eye-brows twisting into an interrogation point. “Yes’m; Tim Magufee’s daughter over into ihe town, and as soon as we get up this mount and strike the Bunker grade we II be In there in less than an hour.” Rose Maguire came into these parts alone with her father when he opened the “hotel.” Being without a mother, she had no bringing up, and early took to horses. There wasn’t a young man thereabouts but had his eye on Rosie Maguire for a wife by and by, if she’d have him. But Rosie she tossed her head at each and all, though she threw a glance at them from under her lashes. Among these admirers was a homely fellow who’d have given hand and foot for little Rose—one John Winstanley by name, but called, for short, Johnny Win. If ever there was one man at whom she snuffled up her little nose it was Johnny. She ordered him to her stirrup, and never noticed him when he came; she cut him dead without a look, and again speared Him through with a glance; she smiled upon the veriest good-for-nothings when he was near, and at times he wished he had been a dog that he might shrink into a corner by himself, so hurt and small he felt.

It was rain, rain, rain, and the roads became so unsafe it was thought risky to run the soft spots in the track, down which the water had soaked, leaving the surface clear and smooth. It came so bad that one morning the paid driver made it his business to beg off on account of the worry the trips gave his wife. “Then I’ll go myself, for the mail must be brought,” said Johnny Win. “But if you Dreak a neck there’s no oue to cry for you.” It was Rose said it, having overheard him. i “All the same, Miss Rosier I’ll go, and perhaps the neck’ll break easier because the breaking grieve no one.” Carefully he drove, and wearily he watched the road, and it rained* aud rained. Drops fell as big as an egg, aud broke upon branches and stones. Five o’clock, was stage time, but no stage came. Supper came and went, people droped in for the mail and went home; the clock struck 7 and still no stage. “He’s probably waited over, finding the roads too bad to get in by daylight,” said one. “No,” answered Tim Maguire; “Johnny’s got too much git up and git an’ reglar grit to be beat by a road. Depend upon it, boys, he’s in trouble somewheres with that stage and horses. It ’ud be worth a man’s life to find out, though.” It wasgood eight when certain assurance was brought that the stage was of a surety really on the road, on Its back trip, by a horseman who had met and passed it struggling along off among the hills. Many were the hands raised, palm outward, in dismay then; but when the men took a look out of the window into the dead darkness, and heard the roar of the stream, and the swish of the falling rain, they shook their heads, and coming back, spit at the stove once more. And when the clock was on the stroke of nine, a small form, a tiptoe and a-tremble, stole out the back doorway. Out to the stables Rosie flew straight as a sent arrow; and her own little bay mare whinnied as the small hand had slid rapidly down her flanks, as the bridle went over her neck, and saddle across back. She gathered herself together, and with a bound like a rabbit she was off and away in the dark.

And then began the wild ride of ffiosie Maguire! As they touched the top of the mountain the rain had ceased, but a dull and sullen silence fell from the heavens, and a watery, blear-eyed moon looked out and the clouds had jugged its edges till it seemed like a torn tear. “Oh! where are you, Johunj Win, and how shall I find you at all?” Despairing eyes peered through tha dark, and its daraer imaginings and fancy pictured a dead man far down the hillside. Such sobs broke through her lips that they came to be agony just of themselves.

But like a hero fighting in battle, she struck them down, hovering upon her saddle out of very fear, ana shrinking first to one side, then to the other, uncertain as to where danger lay. But, hurrah! my brave': little rose, my brave bay mare! What is that really down in the gulch this time, its fore wheels in a rut, and the water playing like a mill race through them? As you live, six horses, weary and worn, stand patiently in harness, and, lo! a man on the ground with abroken leg, aud the reinsln his hands, waiting the painlul night thrbugh till day and help shall come. Nay, never scream, my girl, nor jump from your saddle so. You’ve found him, Rose, you’ve found him, spite of road, ana rain,and night, and your two slender wet arms frantically clinging round his neck are like angel touches to him. Now, chirrup to your horses Johnny Win, and get your stage out of the rut as you lie on the ground; then up, man,

over the wheel, dragging your leg after you. Slowly aud cautiously along the road they went, the tired mare following behind. Through the meadows and the hills, and the voices of the night, robbed of their terriors now, went Rose and Johnny, and the stage and pretty mare, across the treacherous streams and the thousand ravines, and the stones that lay by the way. and the shadows that had sprung like wolves to the dainty stirrup. The breaking of the day brought them to the highest peak of all, and the fair down grade was all that lay between them and rest. Then tile horses picked up there ears, the wheels spun, and down they whirled, with Rose’s own little foot helping on the brake. Well, well, but it was glad they were to see the houses, though not a soul was ’ stirring; what Johnny’s broken-limb, and Rosie’s cheeks feverish with excitement, the night she had spent, the deed she had done, which must go to the world, and the blushes of her shame and confessed love! r

Astonished the hostler was when he came running, half asleep, and there was Tim Maguire staring aghast from an upper window, and a dozen others round by the lumbering stage. But Rosie’s ride was ended, and down she stepped aud slipped away to hide her face in her own-pillow. It was ended, but the no<se of it went abroad through tbe mountains, and though that was a year come the 19th day of January, the folks have never done talking about the ride she took in the night over the roads.