The next day he came again to see her, bringing with him his wife, a little woman in Quaker bonnet and gown, with a strong face and a sweet smile. Mary Ellen, they told her, had been safely started on her way again at midnight. Chaddle Wallace had taken her in his peddler’s wagon. Their news well-nigh dissipated Rhoda’s anxiety. For, of all the many fugitives he had hauled part or all the way to the northern boundary she knew that not one had failed to reach Canada in safety. CHAPTER XXII In the depths of humiliation Rhoda mourned over the fiasco of her attempt to guide Mary Ellen to freedom. But she soon found that the fiasco itself was bearing a rich crop of results. She was indicted for aiding and abetting the escape of a runaway slave and a dozen men of the rescuing party for obstructing the United States marshal in the performance of his duties and preventing him from rendering back the fugitive. The anti-slavery side retorted by arresting Gordon, the slave trader’s agent, and the slave catcher accompanying him, under the state’s personal liberty law, for kidnaping, and several members of the marshal’s posse, who had used fire-arms, for assault with intent to kill. As the news spread, meeting after meeting was held all through the central and eastern part of the state and up into the Western Reserve, denouncing the law, expressing sympathy with its victims and declaring the righteousness of setting at naught its provisions. Through the southern portion of the state and wherever there was sufficient pro-slavery feeling to crystallize into such action, counter-meetings were held, which reprobated the unfairness to the South, characterized in contemptuous terms the actions and principles of believers in the “higher law,” declared them to be traitors and called upon the Federal Government to use stern measures in upholding the Fugitive Slave Act. On the advice of Horace Hardaker, who was to conduct her case, and that of the counsel for her fellow prisoners, both Rhoda and they refused to enter recognizance that they would appear in court when wanted, and therefore were compelled to remain in jail. “It’s an unrighteous law in every respect,” said Hardaker, “and our contention will be that it is unconstitutional and void. To consent to return for trial under it would make tacit recognition of its validity. And that we won’t do. Besides, staying in jail will make martyrdom out of it, and the effect will be all the more potent.”