The Reckoning
Page 12
CHAPTER IX
INTO THE NORTH
Head winds, which began with a fresh breeze off King's Ferry andculminated in a three days' hurricane, knocked us about the Tappan Zee,driving us from point to cove; and for forty-eight hours I saw ourgunboats, under bare poles, tossing on the gray fury of the Hudson, anda sloop of war, sprit on the rocks, buried under the sprouting spraybelow Dobbs Ferry. Safer had we been in the open ocean off the Narrows,where the great winds drive bellowing from the Indies to the Pole; butthese yelling gales that burst from the Highlands struck us like thesuccessive discharges of cannon, and the _Wind-Flower_ staggered andheeled, reeling through the Tappan Zee as a great water-fowl, crippledand stung to terror, drives blindly into the spindrift, while shot onshot strikes, yet ends not the frantic struggle.
Once we were beaten back so far that, in the dark whirlwind of dawn, Isaw a fire-ball go whirring aloft and spatter the eastern horizon. Then,through the shrilling of the tempest, a gun roared to starboard, and atthe flash a gun to port boomed, shaking our decks. We had beaten backwithin range of the British lines, and the batteries on Cock Hill openedon us, and a guard-ship to the west had joined in. Southeast a red glareleaped, and died out as Fort Tryon fired a mortar, while the _Wind-Flower_,bulwarks awash, heeled and heeled, staggering to the shelter of Tetard'sHill. Southward we saw the beacons ablaze, marking the _chevaux defrise_ below Fort Lee, and on the Jersey shore the patrol's torchesflashing along the fort road. But we had set a bit o' rag under Tetard'sHill, and slowly we crept north again past Yonkers, strugglingdesperately at Phillips, but making Boar's Hill and Dobbs Ferry bymid-afternoon. And that night the wind shifted so suddenly that fromTappan to Tarrytown was but a jack-snipe's twist, and we lay snug inHaverstraw Bay, under the lee of the Heights of North Castle, scarce anhour's canoe-paddle from the wharf where we had embarked four daysbefore.
And now delay followed delay, a gunboat holding us twenty-four hours atDobbs Ferry--why, I never knew--and, at the Chain, two days' delay wererequired before they let us pass.
When at last we signaled West Point, at the close of one long, calmAugust afternoon, through the flaming mountain sunset, the blackfortress beckoned us to anchor, nor had we any choice but to obey thesilent summons from those grim heights, looming like a thunder-cloudagainst the cinders of the dying sun.
That night a barge put out, and an officer boarded us, subjecting us toa most rigid scrutiny. Since the great treason a savage suspicion hadsucceeded routine vigilance; the very guns among the rocks seemedalive, alert, listening, black jaws parted to launch a thunderouswarning. A guard was placed on deck; we were not allowed to send a boatashore; not even permitted to communicate with the fishing-smack androwboats that hovered around us, curious as gulls around a floatingplank.
And all this time--from the very instant of departure, through threedays and a night of screaming winds and cataracts of water, through thedelays where we rode at anchor below the Chain and Dobbs Ferry, under avertical sun that started the pitch in every seam--Elsin Grey, radiant,transfigured, drenched to the skin, faced storm and calm in an ecstasyof reckless happiness.
Wild winds from the north, shouting among the mountains, winds of theforests, that tore the cries of exultation from our lips and scatteredsound into space, winds of my own northland that poured through ourveins, cleansing us of sordid care and sad regret and doubt, these werethe sorcerers that changed us back to children while the dull roaringof their incantations filled the world. We two alone on earth, and thevast, veiled world spread round, outstretching to the limits ofeternity, all ours to conquer, ours for our pleasure, ours to reign intill the moon cracked and the stars faded, and the sun went downforever and a day, and all was chaos save for the blazing trail ofblessed souls, soaring to glory through the majesty of endless night.
In the sunlit calms, riding at our moorings, much we discussed eternityand creation. Doctrines once terrible seemed now harmless and withoutmenace, dogmas dissolved into thinnest air, blown to the nothingnessfrom whence they came; for, strangely, all teachings and creeds andlaws of faith narrowed to the oldest of precepts; and, ponder andquestion as we might, citing prophet and saint and holy men inspired,all came to the same at last, expressed in that cardinal precept sosafe in its simplicity--the one law embodied in one word governingheaven and commanding earth.
"Aye," said she, "but how interpret it? For a misstep means certaindamnation, Carus. Once when I spelled out 'Love' for you, I stumbledand should have fallen had you not held me up."
"You held _me_ up, sweetheart! I was closer to the brink than you."
She looked thoughtfully at the fortress; the shore was so near that,through the calm darkness, we could hear the sentinels calling frompost to post and the ripple of the Hudson at the base of the rocks.
But these conferences concerning the philosophy of ethics overweightedtwo hearts as young as ours; and while our new love and the happinessof it at times reacted in solemn argument and the naive searching ofour souls, mostly a reckless delight in one another and in our freedomdominated; and we lived for the moment only, chary and shy of stirringslumbering embers that must one day die out or flash to a flame asfierce as that blaze that bars the gates of heaven from lost souls.
Knowing the need of haste, and having in my pocket instructions which Ibelieved overweighed even the voiceless orders of the West Pointcannon, I argued with the officer of the guard on deck, day after day,to let us go; but it was only after fifteen days' detention there atanchor that I found out that it was an order from his Excellencyhimself which held us there.
Then, one morning in early September, boats from the fortress put offloaded with provisions for the _Wind-Flower_; the guard disembarked intheir barge, and an officer, in a cockle-shell, shouted: "Good luck toyou! The Mouse-trap's sprung, and the Mouse is squeaking!" And with thathe tossed a letter on deck. It was addressed to me:
"HEADQUARTERS, PHILADELPHIA, "September 2d, '81.
"CARUS RENALT, ESQ'RE:
"_Sir_--On receipt of this order you will immediately proceed from your anchorage off West Point to Albany, disembark, and travel by way of Schenectady to Johnstown, and from there to Butlersbury, where you will establish yourself in the manor-house, making it your headquarters, unless force of circumstances prevent. Fifty Tryon County Rangers, to be employed as one scout or several, are placed under your authority; the militia, and such companies of Continental troops as are now or may later be apportioned to Tryon County, will continue under the orders of Colonel Marinus Willett. Your duties you are already familiar with; your policy must emanate from your own nature and deliberate judgment concerning the situation as it is or as it threatens. Close and cordial cooperation with Colonel Willett, and with the various civil and military authorities in Tryon County, should eventually accomplish the object of your mission, which is, first, to prevent surprise from all invasion; second, to prevent a massacre of the Oneida Nation.
"Authority is herewith given you to open and read the sealed orders delivered to you by myself on your departure."
The letter was signed by Colonel Hamilton. I stared at his signature, thenat the name of the city from whence the letter was dated--_Philadelphia_.What in Heaven's name were "Headquarters" doing in Philadelphia? Was hisExcellency there? Was the army there? Impossible--the army which formonths had been preparing to storm New York?--impossible!
I thrust my hand into the breast-pocket of my coat, drew out the sealedorders, tore them open, and read:
"Until further notice such reports as you are required to render to his Excellency, the Commander-in-Chief, should be sent to headquarters, near Yorktown, Virginia----"
Virginia! The army that I had seen at Dobbs Ferry, at White Plains, atNorth Castle, was that army on its way to Virginia? What! hurl anentire army a thousand miles southward? And had Sir Henry Clintonpermitted it?
In a sort of stupor I read and reread the astonishing words: "Virginia?The
re was a British army in Virginia. Yorktown? Yes, that British armywas at Yorktown, practically at bay, with a youth of twenty-three--myown age--harassing it--the young General Lafayette! Greene, too, wasthere, his chivalry cutting up the light troops of General LordCornwallis----"
"By Heaven!" I cried, springing to my feet, "his Excellency never meantto storm New York! The French fleet has sailed for the Chesapeake!Lafayette is there, Greene is there, Morgan, Sumter, Lee, Pickens, allare there! His Excellency has gone to catch Cornwallis in a mouse-trap,and Sir Henry is duped!"
Mad with excitement and delight, I looked up at the great fortress onthe river, and knew that it was safe in its magnificent isolation--safewith its guns and ramparts and its four thousand men--knew that the keyto the Hudson was ours, and would remain ours, although the army, likea gigantic dragon, had lifted its great wings and soared southward, sosilently that none, not even the British spies, had dreamed itsdestination was other than the city of New York.
And, as I looked, the signals on the fortress changed; the guard-boatshailed us, the harmless river-craft gave us right of way, and we spreadour white sails once more, drawing slowly northward, under the rockypulpits of the heights, past shore forests yet unbroken, edged withacres of reeds and marshes, from which the water-fowl arose in clouds;past pine-crowned capes and mountains, whose bases were bathed in thegreat river; past lonely little islands, on, on, into the purplemystery of the silent north.
Now there remained no high sky-bastion to halt us with voiceless signaland dumb cannon, nothing beyond but Albany; and, beyond Albany, thefrontier; and beyond the frontier a hellish war of murder and thetorch, a ceaseless conflict of dreadful reprisals, sterile triumphs,terrible vengeance, a saturnalia of private feuds, which spared neitherthe infirm nor the infant--nay, the very watch-dog at the door receivedno quarter in the holocaust.
Elsin had begged and begged that she should not be left there at WestPoint, saying that Albany was safer, though I doubted the question ofsafety weighed in her choice; but she pleaded so reasonably, sosweetly, arms around my neck, and her lips whispering so that my cheekfelt their soft flutter, that I consented. There I was foolish, for nosooner were we in sight of the Albany hills than arms and lips werepersuading again, guilelessly explaining how simple it would be for herto live at Johnstown, while I, at Butlersbury, busied myself with myown affairs.
And so we stood in earnest conference, while nearer and nearer loomedthe hills, with the Dutch town atop, brick houses, tiled roofs, steepstreets, becoming plainer and plainer to the eye.
There seemed to be an unusual amount of shipping at the Albany wharvesas we glided in, and a great number of wagons and people scurryingabout. In fact, I had never before observed such a bustle in Albanystreets, but thought nothing of it at the moment, for I had not seenthe town since war began. As the schooner dropped anchor at the wharfwe were still arguing; as, arm in arm, we followed our two horses andour sea-chests which the men bore shoreward and up the steep hill tothe Half-Moon Tavern, we argued every step; at the tavern we argued,she in her chamber, I in mine, the door open between; argued andargued, finally rising in our earnestness and meeting on the commonthreshold to continue a discussion in which tears, lips, and arms soonsupplanted logic and reason.
Had she remained at West Point, although that fortress could not havebeen taken except by a regular siege, still she might have beensubjected to all the horrors of blockade and bombardment, for since hisExcellency had abandoned the Hudson with his army and was alreadyhalf-way to Virginia, nothing now stood between West Point and theheavy British garrison of New York.
It was my knowledge of that more than her pleading that reconciled meto leave her in Albany.
But I was soon to learn that she was by no means secure in the choice Ihad made for her; for presently she retired to her own chamber and laydown on her bed to rest for an hour or so before supper, in order torecover from the fatigue and the constant motion of the long voyage;and I went out into the town to inquire where Colonel Willett might befound.
The sluggish Dutch burghers of Albany appeared to be active enough thatlovely September afternoon; hurrying hither and thither through thestreets, and not one among them sufficiently civil to stop and give mean answer to my question concerning Colonel Willett. At first I couldmake nothing of this amazing bustle and hurry; wagons, loaded withhousehold furniture, clattered through the streets or toiled up and downthe hills, discharging bedding, pots and pans, chairs, tables, thefamily clock, and Heaven knows what, on to the wharves, where a greatmany sloops and other craft were moored, the _Wind-Flower_ among them.
In the streets, too, wagons were standing before fine residences andshops; servants and black slaves piled them high with all manner ofgoods. I even saw a green parrot in a cage, perched atop of a pile ofcorded bedding, and the bird cocked his head and called outcontinually: "Gad-a-mercy! Gad-a-mercy! Gad-a-mercy!"
An invalid soldier of Colonel Livingston's regiment, his right armbandaged in splints, was standing across the street, apparently vastlyamused by the bird in the wagon; and I crossed over to him and askedwhat all this exodus might signify.
"Why, the town is in a monstrous fright, friend," he drawled, cradlinghis shattered arm and puffing away at his cob-pipe. "Since April, whenthem red-devils of Brant's struck Cherry Valley for the second time,and cleaned up some score and odd women and children, these herethrifty Dutchmen in Albany have been ready to pack up and pull foot atthe first breath o' foul news."
"But," said I, "what news has alarmed them now?"
"Hey? Scairt 'em? Waal, rumors is thicker than spotted flies in thesugar-bush. Some say the enemy are a-scalping at Torlock, some sayLittle Falls. We heard last week that Schenectady was threatened. Itmay be true, for there's a pest o' Tories loose in the outlying county,and them there bloody Iroquois skulk around the farms and shoot littlechildren in their own dooryards."
"Do you believe there is any danger in Albany?" I asked incredulously.
He shrugged his shoulders, nursing his bandaged arm.
Then, troubled and apprehensive, I asked him where I might find ColonelWillett, and he said that a scout was now out toward Johnstown, andthat Willett led it. This was all he knew, all the information I couldget from him. Returning along the dusty, steep streets to the Half-MoonTavern, I called in the stolid Dutch landlord, requesting information;but he knew nothing at all except that a number of timid people werepacking up because an express had come in the night before with newsthat a body of Tories and Indians had attacked Cobleskill, taken a Mr.Warner, and murdered the entire family of a Captain Dietz--father,mother, wife, four little children, and a Scotch servant-girl, JessieDean.
Observing the horror with which I received the news he shook his head,pulled at his long pipe for a few moments in thoughtful silence, andsaid:
"What shall we do, sir? They kill us everywhere. Better die at homethan in the bush. I think a man's as safe here in Albany as in anyplace, unless he quits all and leaves affairs to go to ruin to skulk inone o' the valley forts. But they've even burned Stanwix now, and theblockhouses are poor defense against Iroquois fire-arrows. If I had awife I'd take her to Johnstown Fort; it's built of stone, they say.Besides, Marinus Willett is there. I wish to God he were here!"
We lingered in the empty tap-room for a while, talking in low voices ofthe peril; and I was certainly amazed, so utterly unprepared was I tofind such a town as Albany in danger from the roaming scalping partiesinfesting the frontier.
Still, had my own headquarters been in Albany, I should have consideredit the proper place for Elsin; but under these ominous, unlooked-forconditions I dared not leave her here, even domiciled with some familyof my acquaintance, as I had intended. Indeed, I learned that the youngpatroon himself had gone to Heldeberg to arm his tenantry, and I knewthat when Stephen Van Rensselaer took alarm it was not at the idlewhistling of a kill-deer plover.
As far as I could see there was now nothing for Elsin but to go forwardwith me--strange irony of fate!--to Jo
hnstown, perhaps to Butlersbury,the late residence of that mortal enemy of mine, who had brought uponher this dreadful trouble. How great a trouble it might prove to be Idared not yet consider, for the faint hope was ever in me that thisunholy marriage might not stand the search of Tryon County's parishrecords--that the poor creature he had cast off might not have been hismistress after all, but his wife. Yes, I dared hope that he had lied,remembering what Mount and the Weasel told me. At any rate, I had longsince determined to search what parish records might remain undestroyedin a land where destruction had reigned for four terrible years. That,and the chance that I might slay him if he appeared as he hadthreatened, were the two fixed ideas that persisted. There was littlecertainty, however, in either case, for, as I say, the records, ifextant, might only confirm his pledged word, and, on the other hand, Iwas engaged by all laws of honor not to permit a private enmity toswerve me from my public duty. Therefore, I could neither abandon allelse to hunt him down if he appeared as he promised to appear, nor taketime in record-searching, unless the documents were close at hand.
Perplexed, more than anxious, I went up-stairs and entered my chamber.The door between our rooms still swung open, and, as I stepped forwardto close it, I saw Elsin there, asleep on her bed, fingers doubled upin her rosy palms. So young, so pitifully alone she seemed, lying theresleep-flushed, face upturned, that my eyes dimmed as I gazed. Bitterdoubts assailed me. I knew that I should have asked a flag and sent hernorth to Sir Frederick Haldimand--even though it meant a finalseparation for us--rather than risk the chances of my living throughthe armed encounter, the intrigues, the violence which were so surelyapproaching. I could do so still; it was not too late. Colonel Willettwould give me a flag!
Miserable, undecided, overwhelmed with self-reproach, I stood therelooking upon the unconscious sleeper. Sunlight faded from the patternedwall; that violet tint, which lingers with us in the north after thesun has set, deepened to a sadder color, then slowly thickened toobscurity; and from the window I saw the new moon hanging throughtangled branches, dull as a silver-poplar leaf in November.
What if I die here on the frontier? The question persisted, repeatingitself again and again. And my thoughts ran on in somber disorder: If Idie--then we shall never know wedded happiness--never know the sweetestof intimacies. Our lives, uncompleted, what meaning is there in suchlives? As for me, were my life to end all incomplete, why was I born?To live on, year after year, escaping the perils all are heir to, andthen, when for the first instant life's true meaning is disclosed, todie, sterile, blighting, desolating another life, too? And must we putaway offered happiness to wait on custom at our peril?--to sit cowedbefore convention, juggling with death and passion?
Darkness around me, darkness in my soul, I stood staring at her whereshe lay, arms bent back and small hands doubled up; and an overwhelmingrush of tenderness and apprehension drew me forward to bend above her,hovering there, awed by the beauty of her--the pure lids, the lashesresting on the cheeks, the red mouth so exquisitely tranquil, curledlike a scarlet petal of a flower fallen on snow.
Her love and mine! What cared we for laws that barred it?--whatmattered any law that dared attempt to link her destiny with that manwho might, perhaps, wear a title as her husband--and might not. Whojoined them? No God that I feared or worshiped. Then, why should I notsunder a pact inspired by hell itself; and if the law of the land madeby men of the land permitted us no sanctuary in wedlock, then why didwe not seek that shelter in a happiness the law forbids, inspired by apassion no law could forbid?
I had but to reach forward, to bend and touch her, and where wasDeath's triumph if I fell at last? What vague and terrible justicecould rob us of these hours? Never, never had I loved her as I didthen. She breathed so quietly, lying there, that I could not see herbody stir; her stillness awed me, fascinated me; so still, so inert, somarvelously motionless, that her very soul seemed asleep within her.Should I awake her, this child whose calm, closed lids, whose softlashes and tinted skin, whose young soul and body were in my keepinghere under a strange roof, in a strange land?
Slowly, very slowly, a fear grew in me that took the shape of horror.My reasoning was the reasoning of Walter Butler!--my argument hisdamning creed! Dazed, shaken, I sank to my knees, overwhelmed by my ownperfidy; and she stirred in her slumber and stretched out one littlehand. All the chivalry, all the manhood in me responded to that appealin a passion of loyalty which swept my somber heart clean ofselfishness.
And there in the darkness I learned the lesson that she believed I hadtaught to her--a lesson so easily forgotten when the heart's loud clamordrowns all else, and every pulse throbs reckless response. And it wascold reasoning and chill logic for cooling hot young blood--but it wasneither reason nor logic which prevailed, I think, but something--I knownot what--something inborn that conquered spite of myself, and a guiltyand rebellious heart that, after all, had only asked for love, at anyprice--only love, but _all_ of it, its sweetness unbridled, its mysteryunfathomed--lest the body die, and the soul, unsatisfied, wing upward toeternal ignorance.
As I crouched there beside her, in the darkness below the tallhall-clock fell a-striking; and she moved, sighed, and satup--languid-eyed and pink from slumber.
"Carus," she murmured, "how long have I slept? How long have you beenhere, my darling? Heigho! Why did you wake me? I was in paradise withyou but now. Where are you? I am minded to drowse, and go find you inparadise again."
She pushed her hair aside and turned, resting her chin on one hand,regarding me with sweet, sleepy, humorous eyes that glimmered likeamethysts in the moonlight.
"Were ever two lovers so happy?" she asked. "Is there anything on earththat we lack?--possessing each other so completely. Tell me, Carus."
"Nothing," I said.
"Nothing," she echoed, leaning toward me and resting in my arms for amoment, then laid her hands on my shoulders, and, raising herself to asitting posture, fell a-laughing to herself.
"While you were gone this afternoon," she said, "and I was lying here,eyes wide open, seeming to feel the bed sway like the ship, I fell tocounting the ticking of the stair-clock below, and thinking how eachsecond was recording the eternity of my love for you. And as I laya-listening and thinking, came one by the window singing 'John O'Bail',and I heard voices in the tap-room and the clatter of pewter flagons.On a settle outside the tap-room window, full in the sun, sat thesongster and his companions, drinking new ale and singing 'JohnO'Bail'--a song I never chanced to hear before, and I shall not soonforget it for lack of schooling"--and she sang softly, sitting there,clasping her knees, and swaying with the quaint rhythm:
"'Where do you wend your way, John O'Bail, Where do you wend your way?' 'I follow the spotted trail Till a maiden bids me stay,' 'Beware of the trail, John O'Bail, Beware of the trail, I say!'
"Thus it runs, Carus, the legend of this John O'Bail, how he sought thewilderness, shunning his kind, and traveled and trapped and slew thedeer, until one day at sunrise a maid of the People of the Morninghailed him, bidding him stay:
"'Turn to the fire of dawn, John O'Bail, Turn to the fire of dawn; The doe that waits in the vale Was a fawn in the year that's gone!' And John O'Bail he heeds the hail And follows her on and on.
"Oh, Carus, they sang it and sang it, hammering their pewters together,and roaring the chorus, and that last dreadful verse:
"'Where is the soul of you, John O'Bail, Where is the soul you slew? There's Painted Death on the trail, And the moccasins point to you. Shame on the name of John O'Bail----'"
She hesitated, peering through the shadows at me: "Who _was_ JohnO'Bail, Carus? What is the Painted Death, and who are the People of theMorning?"
"John O'Bail was a wandering fellow who went a-gipsying into theDelaware country. The Delawares call themselves 'People of theMorning.' This John O'Bail had a son by an Indian girl--and that's whatthey made the ballad about, because this son is that mongrel demon,Cornplanter, and he's s
truck the frontier like a catamount gone ravingmad. He is the 'Painted Death.'"
"Oh," she said thoughtfully, "so that is why they curse the name ofJohn O'Bail."
After a moment she went on again: "Well, you'll never guess who it wassinging away down there! I crept to my windows and peeped out, andthere, Carus, were those two queer forest-running fellows who stoppedus on the hill that morning----"
"Jack Mount!" I exclaimed.
"Yes, dear, and the other--the little wrinkled fellow, who had suchstrangely fine manners for a Coureur-de-Bois----"
"The Weasel!"
"Yes, Carus, but very drunk, and boisterous, and cutting most amazingcapers. They went off, finally, arm in arm, shuffling, reeling, andanon breaking into a solemn sort of dance; and everybody gave them wideberth on the street, and people paused to look after them, marking themwith sour visages and wagging heads--" She stopped short, finger onlips, listening.
Far up the street I heard laughter, then a plaintive, sustainedhowling, then more laughter, drawing nearer and nearer.
Elsin nodded in silence. I sprang up and descended the stairs. Thetap-room was lighted with candles, and the sober burghers who satwithin, savoring the early ale, scarce noted my entrance, so intentwere they listening to the approaching tumult.
The peculiar howling had recommenced. Stepping to the open door Ilooked out, and beheld a half-dozen forest-runners, in all the glory ofdeep-fringed buckskin and bright wampum, slowly hopping round and roundin a circle, the center of which was occupied by an angry townwatchman, lanthorn lighted, pike in hand. As they hopped, lifting theirmoccasined feet as majestically as turkeys walking in a muddy road,fetching a yelp at every step, I perceived in their grotesqueevolutions a parody upon a Wyandotte scalp-dance, the while they yappedand yowled, chanting:
"Ha-wa-sa-say Ha! Ha! Ha-wa-sa-say!"
"Dance, watchman, dance!" shouted one of the rangers, whom I knew to beJack Mount, poking the enraged officer in the short ribs with themuzzle of his rifle; and the watchman, with a snarl, picked up his feetand began to tread a reluctant measure, calling out that he did notdesire to dance, and that they were great villains and rogues andshould pay for it yet.
I saw some shopkeepers putting up the shutters before their lightedwindows, while the townspeople stood about in groups, agape, to seesuch doings in the public streets.
"Silence!" shouted Mount, raising his hand. "People of Albany, we haveshown you the famous Wyandotte dance; we will now exhibit a dancingbear! Houp! Houp! Weasel, take thy tin cup and collect shillings! Ow!Ow!" And he dropped his great paws so that they dangled at the wrist,laid his head on one side, and began sidling around in a circle withthe grave, measured tread of a bear, while the Weasel, drinking-cup inhand, industriously trotted in and out among the groups of scandalizedburghers, thrusting the tin receptacle at them, and talking all thewhile: "Something for the bear, gentlemen--a trifle, if you please.Everybody is permitted to contribute--you, sir, with your bones sonicely wadded over with fat--a shilling from you. What? How dare yourefuse? Stop him, Tim!"
A huge ranger strode after the amazed burgher, blocking his way; thethrifty had taken alarm, but the rangers herded them back withpersuasive playfulness, while the little Weasel made the rounds,talking cheerfully all the time, and Mount, great fists dangling,minced round and round, with a huge simper on his countenance, asthough shyly aware of his own grace.
"Tim Murphy should go into the shops," he called out. "There are adozen fat Dutchmen a-peeking through the shutters at me, and I dancebefore no man for less than a shilling. Houp! Houp! How much is in thycup, Cade? Lord, what a thirst is mine! Yet I dance--villains, do youmark me? Oh, Cade, yonder pretty maid who laughs and shows her teeth iswelcome to the show and naught to pay--unless she likes. Tim, I candance no more! Elerson, bring the watchman!"
The Weasel trotted up, rattling the coins so unwillingly contributed bythe economical; the runner addressed as Elerson tucked his armaffectionately into the arm of the distracted watchman and strolled up,followed by Tim Murphy, the most redoubtably notorious shot in NorthAmerica.
Laughing, disputing, shouting, they came surging toward the Half-MoonTavern, dragging the watchman, on whom they lavished many endearments.The crowd parted with alacrity as Mount, thumbs in his armpits,silver-moleskin cap pushed back on his clustering curls, swaggeredahead, bowing right and left as though an applauding throng heraldedthe progress of an emperor and his suite.
Here and there a woman laughed at the handsome, graceless fellows; hereand there a burgher managed to pull a grin, spite of the toll exacted.
"Now that our means permit us, we are going to drink your healths, goodpeople," said Mount affably, shaking the tin cup; "and the health ofthat pretty maid who showed her teeth at me. Ladies of Albany, if youbut knew the wealth of harmless frolic caged in the heart that beatsbeneath a humble rifle-frock! Eh, Tim? Off with thy coonskin, and sweepthe populace with thy courtly bow!"
Murphy lifted his coonskin cap, flourishing it till the ringed fur-tailbecame a blur. Elerson, in a spasm of courtesy, removed the watchman'stricorn as well as his own; the little Weasel backed off, bowing stepby step, until he backed past me into the tap-room, followed by thebuckskinned crew.
"Now, watchman, have at thee!" roared Mount, as the sloppy pewters werebrought.
And the watchman, resigned, pulled away at his mug, furtive eyes on thelandlord, who, with true delicacy, looked the other way. At that momentMount espied me and rose, pewter in hand, with a shout that brought allto their feet.
"Death to the Iroquois!" he thundered, "and a health to Captain Renaultof the Rangers!"
Every eye was on me; the pewters were lifted, reversed, and emptied.The next instant I was in the midst of a trampling, buckskinned mob;they put me up on their shoulders and marched around the tap-room,singing "Morgan's Men"; they set me on their table amid the pools ofspilled ale, and, joining hands, danced round and round, singing "TheNew Yorker" and "John O'Bail," until more ale was fetched and a cuphanded up to me.
"Silence! The Captain speaks!" cried Mount.
"Captain?" said I, laughing. "I am no officer."
There was a mighty roar of laughter, amid which I caught cries of "Hedoesn't know." "Where's the 'Gazette'?" "Show him the 'Gazette'!"
The stolid landlord picked up a newspaper from a table, spread itdeliberately, drew his horn spectacles from his pocket, wiped them,adjusted them, and read aloud a notice of my commission from GovernorClinton to be a senior captain in the Tryon County Rangers. Utterlyunprepared, dumb with astonishment, I stared at him through theswelling din. Somebody thrust the paper at me. I read the item, mug inone hand, paper in t'other.
"Death to the Iroquois!" they yelled. "Hurrah for Captain Renault!"
"Silence!" bawled Mount. "Listen to the Captain!"
"Rangers of Tryon," I said, hesitating, "this great honor which ourGovernor has done me is incomprehensible to me. What experience have Ito lead such veterans?--men of Morgan's, men of Hand's, men ofSaratoga, of Oriska, of Stillwater?--I who have never laid rifle inanger--I who have never seen a man die by violence?"
The hush was absolute.
"It must be," said I, "that such service as I have had the honor torender has made me worthy, else this commission had been an affront tothe Rangers of Tryon County. And so, my brothers, that I may not shameyou, I ask two things: obedience to orders; respect for my rank; and ifyou render not respect to my character, that will be my fault, not yourown."
I raised my pewter: "The sentiment I give you is: 'The Rangers! Myhonor in their hands; theirs in mine!' Pewters aloft! Drink!"
Then the storm broke loose; they surged about the table, cheering,shaking their rifles and pewters above their heads, crying out for meto have no fear, that they would aid me, that they would be obedientand good--a mob of uproarious, overgrown children, swayed by sentimententirely. And I even saw the watchman, maudlin already, dancing all byhimself in a corner, and waving pike and lanthorn in martial fervor.
There was a dead silence.
"That is all," I said, smiling; and, laying my hand on the table,leaped lightly to the floor.
"Are we to drink no more?" asked Jack Mount, coming up, with round blueeyes widening.
"I did not say so. I said that we march at day-break. You veterans ofthe pewter know best how much ale to carry with you to bed. All Irequire are some dozen steady legs in the morning."
A roar of laughter broke out.
"You may trust us, Captain! Good night, Captain! A health to you, sir!We will remember!"
Instead of returning to my chamber to secure a few hours' rest, I wentout into the dimly lighted street, and, striking a smart pace, arrivedin a few moments at the house of my old friend, Peter Van Schaick, nowColonel in command of the garrison. The house was pitch-dark, and itwas only after repeated rapping that the racket of the big bronzeknocker aroused an ancient negro servant, who poked his woolly patefrom the barred side-lights and informed me, in a quavering voice, thatColonel Van Schaick was not at home, refusing all further informationconcerning him.
"Joshua! Joshua!" I said gently; "don't you know me?"
There was a silence, then a trembling: "Mars' Renault, suh, is datyou?"
"It is I, Joshua, back again after four years. Tell me where I may findyour master?"
"Mars' Carus, suh, de Kunnel done gone to de Foht, suh--Foht Orange onde hill."
The old slave used the ancient name of the fort, but I understood.
"Does anybody live here now except the Colonel, Joshua?"
"No, suh, nobody 'cep' de Kunnel--'scusin' me, Mars' Carus."
"Joshua," I said, under my breath, "you know all the gossip of thecountry. Tell me, do you remember a young gentleman who used to comehere before the war--a handsome, dark-eyed gentleman--Lieutenant WalterN. Butler?"
There was an interval of silence.
"Wuz de ossifer a-sparkin' de young misses at Gin'ral Schuyler's?"
"Yes, Joshua."
"A-co'tin' Miss Betty, suh?"
"Yes, yes. Colonel Hamilton married her. That is the man, Joshua. Tellme, did you ever hear of Mr. Butler's marriage in Butlersbury?"
A longer silence, then: "No, suh. Hit wuz de talk ob de town dat SuhJohn Johnsing done tuk Miss Polly Watts foh his lady-wife, an' all detime po'l'l Miss Claire wuz a-settin' in Foht Johnsing, dess a-cryin'her eyes out. But Mars' Butler he done tuk an' run off 'long o' dathalf-caste lady de ossifers call Carolyn Montour----"
"What!"
"Yaas, suh. Dat de way Mars' Butler done carry on, suh. He doneskedaddle 'long o' M'ss Carolyn. Hit wuz a Mohawk weddin', Mars'Carus."
"He never married her?"
"Mars' Butler he ain' gwine ma'hy nobody ef he ain' 'bleeged, suh. Hedess lak all de young gentry, suh--'scusin' you'se'f, Mars' Carus."
I nodded in grim silence. After a moment I asked him to open the doorfor me, but he shook his aged head, saying: "Ef a ossifer done tell youwhat de Kunnel done tell me, what you gwine do, Mars' Carus, suh?"
"Obey," I said briefly. "You're a good servant, Joshua. When ColonelVan Schaick returns, say to him that Captain Renault of the Rangersmarches to Butlersbury at sunup, and that if Colonel Van Schaick canspare six bat-horses and an army transport-wagon, to be at theHalf-Moon at dawn, Captain Renault will be vastly obliged to him, andwill certainly render a strict accounting to the proper authorities."
Then I turned, descended the brick stoop, and walked slowly back to myquarters, a prey to apprehension and bitter melancholy. For if it weretrue that Walter Butler had done this thing, the law of the land was onhis side; and if the war ended with him still alive, the courts mustsustain him in this monstrous claim on Elsin Grey. Thought halted. Wasit possible that Walter Butler had dared invade the tiger-brood ofCatrine Montour to satisfy his unslaked lust?
Was it possible that he dared affront the she-demon of Catherinestownby ignoring an alliance with her fiercely beautiful child?--an alliancethat Catrine Montour must have considered legal and binding, howeverirregular it might appear to jurists.
I was astounded. Where passion led this libertine, nothing barred hisway--neither fear nor pity. And he had even dared to reckon with thisfrightful hag, Catrine Montour--this devil's spawn of Frontenac--andher tawny offspring.
I had seen the girl, Carolyn, at Guy Park--a splendid young animal, ofsixteen then, darkly beautiful, wild as a forest-cat. No wonder thebeast in him had bristled at view of her; no wonder the fierce passionin her had leaped responsive to his forest courtship. By heaven, aproper mating in the shaggy hills of Danascara! Yes, but when the malebeast emerges, yellow eyes fixed on the dead line that should bar himfrom the haunts of men, then, _then_ it is time that a man shall ariseand stand against him--stand for honor and right and light, and drivehim back to the darkness of his lair again, or slay him at the sunlitgates of that civilization he dared to challenge.