The Reckoning

by Robert W. Chambers

  CHAPTER XI

  THE TEST

  I was awakened by somebody shaking me. Bewildered, not recognizing mylandlord, but confusing him with the sinister visions that had hauntedmy sleep, I grappled with him until, senses returning, I found myselfsitting bolt upright in a shaky trundle-bed, clutching Jimmy Burke bythe collar.

  "Lave go me shirrt, sorr," he pleaded--"f'r the saints' sake, MistherRenault! I've the wan shirrt to me back----"

  "Confound you, Jimmy!" I yawned, dropping back on my pillow; "what doyou mean by choking me?"

  "Chocken', is it, sorr!" exclaimed the indignant Irishman; "'tis meshcalp ye're afther liftin' wid a whoop an' a yell, glory be! I'llthrouble ye, Captain Renault, f'r to projooce me wig, sorr!"

  Clutched in my left hand I discovered the unfortunate landlord's wig,and I lay there amused and astonished while he haughtily adjusted itbefore the tiny triangle of glass nailed on the wall.

  "Shame on you, Jimmy Burke, to wear a wig to cheat some honest Mohawkout of his eight dollars!" I yawned, rubbing my eyes.

  "Mohawks, is it? Now, God be good to the haythen whin James Burrketakes the Currietown thrail----"

  "You're exempt, you fat rascal!" I said, laughing; and the dumpy littleIrishman gave me a sly grin as he retied his stock and stood smoothingdown his rumpled wig before the glass.

  "Och! divil a hair has he left on the wig o' me!" he grumbled. "Will yeget up, sorr? 'Tis ten o'clock, lackin' some contrairy minutes, an' theofficers from the foort do be ragin' f'r lack o' soupaan----"

  "Are they here?" I cried, leaping out of bed. "Why didn't you say so?Where's my tub of water? Don't stand there grinning, I tell you. Say toColonel Willett I'll join him in a second."

  The fat little landlord retreated crab-wise. I soused my clipped headin the tub, took a spatter-bath like a wild duck in a hurry, clothed mein my gay forest-dress, making no noise lest I wake Elsin, and ran downthe rough wooden stairs to the coffee-room, plump into a crowd ofstrange officers, all blue and buff and gilt.

  "Well, Carus!" came a cool, drawling voice from the company; and I sawthe tall, gaunt figure of Colonel Marinus Willett sauntering toward me,his hawk's nose wrinkled into a whimsical smile.

  "Colonel," I stammered, saluting, then sprang forward and grasped theveteran's outstretched hand, asking his pardon for my tardiness.

  "What a great big boy!" he commented, holding my hand in both of his,and inspecting me from crown to heel. "Is this the lad I've heardof--below--" His nose wrinkled again, and his grimly humorous mouthtwitched. "Carus, you've grown since I last saw you at the patroon's,romping a reel with those rosy Dutch lassies from Vrooman's--eh? That'swell, my son; the best dancers were ever the best fighters! Look at TimMurphy! As for me, I never could learn to dance with you Valleyaristocrats. Carus, you should know my officers." And he mentionednames with a kindly, informal precision characteristic of a gentlemantoo great to follow conventions, too highly bred to ignore them. Theconsequent compromise was, as I say, a delightfully formal informalitywhich reigned among his entourage, but never included himself, althoughhe apparently invited it. In this, I imagine, he resembled hisExcellency, and have heard others say so; but I do not know, for Inever saw his Excellency.

  "Now, gentlemen," said Colonel Willett casually, as he seated himselfat the head of the table. And we sat down at the signal, I next to theColonel at his nod of invitation.

  The fat little landlord, Burke, notorious for the speed with which hefled from Sir John Johnson when that warrior-baronet raided Johnstown,came bustling into the coffee-room like a fresh breeze from the Irishcoast, asking our pleasure in a brogue thick enough to season thebubbling, steaming bowl of hasty-pudding he set before us a momentlater.

  "Jimmy," said an officer, glancing up at him where he stood, thick legsapart, hands clasped behind him, and jolly head laid on one side, "isthere any news of Sir John Johnson in these parts?"

  "Faith," said Burke, with a toss of his head, "'tis little I bothermeself along wid the likes o' Sir John. Lave him poke his nose into theSacandagy an' dhrown there, bad cess to him! We've a thrick to matchhis, an' wan f'r the pig!"

  "I'm glad to know that, Jimmy," said another officer earnestly. "And ifthat's the case. Captain Renault's Rangers might as well pack up andmove back to Albany."

  "Sure, Captain dear," he said, turning to me, "'tis not f'r the likeso' Jimmy Burke to say it, but there do be a fri'nd o' mine in theRangers, a blatherin', blarneyin', bog-runnin' lad they call TimMurphy. 'Tis f'r his sake I'd be glad to see the Rangers here--an'ye'll not misjudge me, sorr, that Jimmy Burke is afeared o' Sir Johnan' his red whippets!"

  "Oh, no," I said gravely; "I'm quite ready to leave Johnstown to yourprotection, Jimmy, and march my men back to-night--with ColonelWillett's permission----"

  "Sorra the day! Och, listen to him, Colonel dear!" exclaimed thelandlord, with an appealing glance at Willett. "Wud ye lave us now, width' ould women an' childer huddled like catthle in the foort, an'Walther Butler at Niagary an' Sir John on the Sacandagy! Sure, 'tisfoolin' ye arre, Captain dear--wid the foine ale I have below, an'divil a customer--the town's that crazy wid fear o' Sir John! 'Tis notf'r meself I shpake, sorr," he added airily, "but 'tis the jooty o' themilitary f'r to projooce thraffic an' thrade an' the blessing ofprosperity at the p'int o' the bagnet, sorr."

  "In that case," observed Willett, "you ought to stay, Carus. Burkecan't attend to his tavern and take time to chase Sir John back to thelakes."

  "Thrue f'r ye, sorr!" exclaimed Burke, with a twinkle in his gray eye."Where wud th' b'ys find a dhram, sorr, wid Jimmy Burke on a scout,sorr, thrimmin' the Tories o' Mayfield, an' runnin' the Scotch loonsout o' Perth an' the Galways, glory be!"

  He bustled out to fetch us a dish of pink clingstone peaches, grown inthe gardens planted by the great Sir William. Truly, Sir John had lostmuch when he lost Johnson Hall; and now, like a restless ghost drawnback to familiar places, he haunted the spot that his great father hadmade to bloom like a rose in the wilderness. He was out there now, inthe sunshine and morning haze, somewhere, beyond the blue autumn mistin the north--out there, disgraced, disinherited, shelterless, sullenlybrooding, and plotting murder with his motley mob of Cayugas andpainted renegades.

  Colonel Willett rose and we all stood up, but he signaled those who hadnot finished eating to resume their places, and laying a familiar handon my arm led me to the sunny bench outside the door where, at his nod,I seated myself beside him. He drew a map from his breast-pocket andstudied in silence; I waited his pleasure.

  The veteran seemed to have grown no older since I had last seen himfour years since--indeed, he had changed little as I remembered himfirst, sipping his toddy at my father's house, and smiling his shrewd,kindly, whimsical smile while I teased him to tell me of the Frenchwar, and how he had captured Frontenac.

  I was but seventeen years old when he headed that revolt in New YorkCity, and, single-handed, halted the British troops on Broad Street andtook away their baggage. I was nineteen when he led the sortie fromStanwix. I had already taken my post in New York when he was servingwith his Excellency in the Jerseys and with Sullivan in the west.

  Of all the officers who served on the frontier, Marinus Willett was theonly man who had ever held the enemy at check. Even Sullivan, returningfrom his annihilation of Indian civilization, was followed by a cloudof maddened savages and renegades that settled in his tracks,enveloping the very frontier which, by his famous campaign, he hadproperly expected to leave unharassed.

  And now Marinus Willett was in command, with meager resources, indeed,yet his personal presence on the Tryon frontier restored something ofconfidence to those who still clung to the devastated region, sowing,growing, garnering, and grinding the grain that the half-starved armyof the United States required to keep life within the gaunt rank andfile. West Point, Albany, Saratoga called for bread; and the men ofTryon plowed and sowed and reaped, leaving their dead in everyfurrow--swung their scythes under the Iroquois bullets, cut theirblood-wet hay in the face of
ambush after ambush, stacked theirscorched corn and defended it from barn, shack, and window. With torchand hatchet renegade and Iroquois decimated them; their houses kindledinto flame; their women and children, scalped and throats cut, werehung over fences like dead game; twelve thousand farms lay tenantless;by thousands the widows and orphans gathered at the blockhouses, naked,bewildered, penniless. There remained in all Tryon County but eighthundred militia capable of responding to a summons--eight hundreddesperate men to leave scythe and flail and grist-mill for their riflesat the dread call to arms. Two dozen or more blockhouses, holding fromten to half a hundred families each, were strung out between StanwixFort and Schenectady; these, except for a few forts, formed the outerline of the United States' bulwarks in the north; and this line Willettwas here to hold with the scattered handful of farmers and Rangers.

  Yet, with these handfuls, before our arrival he had already cleaned outTorlock; he had already charged through the flames of Currietown, androuted the renegades at Sharon--leading the charge, cocked-hat in hand,remarking to his Rangers that he could catch in his hat all the ballsthat the renegades could fire. Bob McKean, the scout, fell that day;nine men, bound to saplings, were found scalped; yet the handful underWillett turned on Torlock and seized a hundred head of cattle for thefamishing garrison of Herkimer. Wawarsing, Cobleskill, and Little Fallswere ablaze; Willett's trail lay through their smoking cinders, hishatchets hung in the renegades' rear, his bullets drove the raidersheadlong from Tekakwitha Spring to the Kennyetto, and his Oneidas clungto the edges of invasion, watching, waiting, listening in the stillplaces for the first faint sound of that advance that meant the finaldeath-grapple. It was coming, surely coming: Sir John already harryingthe Sacandaga; Haldimand reported on the eastern lakes; Ross and theButlers expected from Niagara, and nothing now to prevent Clinton fromadvancing up the Hudson from New York, skirting West Point, and givingthe entire north to the torch. This was what confronted Tryon County;but the army needed grain, and we were there to glean what we mightbetween fitful storms, watching that solid, thunderous tempestdarkening the north from east to west, far as the eye could see.

  Colonel Willett had lighted his clay pipe, and now, map spread acrosshis knees and mine, he leaned over, arms folded, smoking, and examiningthe discolored and wrinkled paper.

  "Where is Adriutha, Carus?" he drawled.

  I pointed out the watercourse, traced in blue, showing him the ancientsite and the falls near by.

  "And Carenay?"

  Again I pointed.

  "Oswaya?"

  "Only tradition remains of that lost village," I said. "Even in theGreat Rite those who pronounce the name know nothing more than that itonce existed. It is so with Kayaderos and Danascara; nobody now knowsexactly where they were."

  "And Thendara?"

  "Thendara _was_, and _will be_, but is not. In the Great Rite of theIroquois that place where the first ceremony, which is called 'At thewood's edge,' begins is called Thendara, to commemorate the ancientplace where first the Holder of Heaven talked face to face with theLeague's founder, Hiawatha."

  The hawk-faced veteran smoked and studied the map for a while; then heremoved the pipe from his mouth, and, in silence, traced with thesmoking stem a path. I watched him; he went back to the beginning andtraced the path again and yet again, never uttering a word; andpresently I began to comprehend him.

  "Yes, sir," I said; "thus will the Long House strike the Oneidas--whenthey strike."

  "I have sent belts--as you suggested," observed Willett carelessly.

  I was delighted, but made no comment; and presently he went on in hisdrawling, easy manner: "I can account for Sir John, and I can hold himon the Sacandaga; I can account for Haldimand only through thecowardice or treachery of Vermont; but I can hold him, too, if he everdares to leave the lakes. For Sir Henry Clinton I do not care a damn;like a headless chicken he tumbles about New York, seeing, hearingnothing, and no mouth left to squawk with. His head is off; one of hislegs still kicks at Connecticut, t'other paddles aimlessly in theAtlantic Ocean. But he's done for, Carus. Let his own blood cleanse himfor the plucking!"

  The gaunt Colonel replaced his pipe between his teeth and gazedmeditatively into the north:

  "But where's Walter Butler?" he mused.

  "Is he not at Niagara, sir?" I asked.

  Willett folded his map and shoved it into his breast-pocket. "That," hesaid, "is what I want you to find out for me, Carus."

  He wheeled around, facing me, his kindly face very serious:

  "I have relieved you of your command, Carus, and have attached you tomy personal staff. There are officers a-plenty to take your Rangerswhere I send them; but I know of only one man in Tryon County who cando what is to be done at Thendara. Send on your belt to Sachems of theLong House. Carus, you are a spy once more."

  I had not expected it, now that the Oneidas had been warned. Chilled,sickened at the thought of playing my loathsome role once more, bitterdisappointment left me speechless. I hung my head, feeling his keeneyes upon me; I braced myself sullenly against the overwhelming rush ofrepulsion surging up within me. My every nerve, every fiber quiveredfor freedom to strike that blow denied me for four miserable years. HadI not earned the right to face my enemies in the open? Had I not earnedthe right to strike? Had I not waited--God! had I not waited?

  Appalled, almost unmanned, I bowed my head still lower as the quicktears of rage wet my lashes. They dried, unshed.

  "Is there no chance for me?" I asked--"no chance for one honest blow?"

  His kind eyes alone answered; and, like a school-boy, I sat thererubbing my face, teeth clenched, to choke back the rebellious cryswelling my hot throat.

  "Give me an Oneida, then," I muttered. "I'll go."

  "You are a good lad, Carus," he said gently. "I know how you feel."

  I could not answer.

  "You know," he said, "how many are called, how few chosen. You knowthat in these times a man must sink self and stand ready for anysacrifice, even the supreme and best."

  He laid his hand on my shoulder: "Carus, I felt as you do now when hisExcellency asked me to leave the line and the five splendid New Yorkregiments just consolidated and given me to lead. But I obeyed; I gaveup legitimate ambition; I renounced hope of that advancement allofficers rightly desire; I left my New York regiments to come here totake command of a few farmers and forest-runners. God and hisExcellency know best!"

  I nodded, unable to speak.

  "There is glory and preferment to be had in Virginia," he said; "thereare stars to be won at Yorktown, Carus. But those stars will neverglitter on this faded uniform of mine. So be it. Let us do our best,lad. It's all one in the end."

  I nodded.

  "And so," he continued pleasantly, "I send you to Thendara. None knowsyou for a partizan in this war. For four years you have been lost tosight; and if any Iroquois has heard of your living in New York, hemust believe you to be a King's man. Your one danger is in answeringthe Iroquois summons as an ensign of a nation marked for punishment.How great that danger may be, you can judge better than I."

  I thought for a while. The Canienga who had summoned me by belt couldnot prove I was a partizan of the riflemen who escorted me. I mighthave been absolutely non-partizan, traveling under escort of eitherside that promised protection from those ghostly rovers who scalpedfirst and asked questions afterward.

  The danger I ran as clan-ensign of a nation marked for punishment wasan unknown quantity to me. From the Canienga belt-bearer I had gatheredthat there was no sanctuary for an Oneida envoy at Thendara; but whatprotection an ensign of the Wolf Clan might expect, I could not becertain of.

  But there was one more danger. Suppose Walter Butler should appear tosit in council as ensign of his mongrel clan?

  "Colonel," I said, "there is one thing to be done, and, as there isnobody else to accomplish this dog's work, I must perform it. I amtrying not to be selfish--not to envy those whose lines are fallen inpleasant places--not to regret the happiness of battle
which I havenever known--not to desire those chances for advancement and for glorythat--that all young men--crave----"

  My voice broke, but I steadied it instantly.

  "I had hoped one day to do a service which his Excellency could openlyacknowledge--a service which might, one day, permit him to receive me.I have never seen him. I think, now, I never shall. But, as you say,sir, ambitions like these are selfish, therefore they are petty andunworthy. He does know best."

  The Colonel nodded gravely, watching me, his unlighted pipe drooping inhis hand.

  "There is one thing--before I go," I said. "My betrothed wife is withme. May I leave her in your care, sir?"

  "Yes, Carus."

  "She is asleep in that room above--" I looked up at the closedshutters, scarcely seeing them for the blinding rush of tears; yetstared steadily till my eyes were dry and hot again, and my choked andtense throat relaxed.

  "I think," said the Colonel, "that she is safer in Johnstown Fort thananywhere else just now. I promise you, Carus, to guard and cherish heras though she were my own child. I may be called away--you understandthat!--but I mean to hold Johnstown Fort, and shall never be too farfrom Johnstown to relieve it in event of siege. What can be done I willdo on my honor as a soldier. Are you content?"

  "Yes."

  He lowered his voice: "Is it best to see her before you start?"

  I shook my head.

  "Then pick your Oneida," he muttered. "Which one?"

  "Little Otter. Send for him."

  The Colonel leaned back on the bench and tapped at the outside of thetavern window. An aide came clanking out, and presently hurried awaywith a message to Little Otter to meet me at Butlersbury within thehour, carrying parched corn and salt for three days' rations.

  For a while we sat there, going over personal matters. Our sea-chestswere to be taken to the fort; my financial affairs I explained, tellinghim where he might find my papers in case of accident to me. Then Iturned over to him my watch, what money I had of Elsin's, and my own.

  "If I do not return," I said, "and if this frontier can not hold out,send Miss Grey with a flag to New York. Sir Peter Coleville is kin toher; and when he understands what danger menaces her he will defend herto the last ditch o' the law. Do you understand, Colonel?"

  "No, Carus, but I can obey."

  "Then remember this: She must never be at the mercy of Walter Butler."

  "Oh, I can remember that," he said drily.

  For a few moments I sat brooding, head between my hands; then, of asudden impulse, I swung around and laid my heart bare to him--told himeverything in a breath--trembling, as a thousand new-born fears seizedme, chilling my blood.

  "Good God!" I stammered, "it is not for myself I care now, Colonel! Butthe thought of him--of her--together--I can not endure. I tell you, thedread of this man has entered my very soul; there is terror at a hintof him. Can I not stay, Colonel? Is there no way for me to stay? She isso young, so alone----"

  Hope died as I met his eye. I set my teeth and crushed speech intosilence.

  "The welfare of a nation comes first," he said slowly.

  "I know--I know--but----"

  "All must sacrifice to that principle, Carus. Have not the men of NewYork stood for it? Have not the men of Tryon given their all? I tellyou, the army shall eat, but the bread they munch is made fromblood-wet grain; and for every loaf they bake a life has been offered.Where is the New Yorker who has not faced what you are facing? At thecrack of the ambushed rifle our people drop at the plow, and theirdying eyes look upon wife and children falling under knife and hatchet.It must be so if the army is to eat and liberty live in this country wedare call our own. And when the call sounds, we New Yorkers must go,Carus. Our women know it, even our toddling children know it, God blessthem!--and they proudly take their chances--nay, they demand thechances of a war that spares neither the aged nor the weak, neithermother nor cradled babe, nor the hound at the door, nor the cattle, norany living thing in this red fury of destruction!"

  He had risen, eyes glittering, face hardened into stone. "Go to yourbetrothed and say good-by. You do not know her yet, I think."

  "She is Canadienne," I said.

  "She is what the man she loves is--if she honors him. His cause ishers, his country hers, his God is her God!"

  "Her heart is with neither side----"

  "Her heart is with you! Shame to doubt her--if I read her eyes! Readthem, Carus!"

  I wheeled, speechless; Elsin Grey stood before me, deadly pale.

  After a moment she moved forward, laying her hand on my shoulder andfacing Colonel Willett with a smile. All color had fled from her face,but neither lip nor voice quivered as she spoke:

  "I think you do understand, sir. We Canadiennes yield nothing indevotion to the women of New York. Where we love, we honor. Whatmatters it where the alarm sounds? We understand our lovers; we cangive them to the cause of freedom as well here in Tryon County as onthe plains of Abraham--can we not, my betrothed?" she said, lookinginto my face; but her smile was heart-breaking.

  "Child, child," said Willett, taking her free hand in both of his, "youspeak a silent language with your eyes that no man can fail tounderstand."

  "I failed," I said bitterly, as Willett kissed her hand, placed it inmine, and, turning, entered the open door.

  "And what blame, Carus?" she whispered. "What have I been to you but asymbol of unbridled selfishness, asking all, giving nothing? How couldyou know I loved you so dearly that I could stand aside to let youpass? First I loved you selfishly, shamelessly; then I begged yourguilty love, offering mine in the passion of my ignorance andbewilderment."

  Her arm fell from my shoulder and nestled in mine, and we turned awaytogether under the brilliant autumn glory of the trees.

  "That storm that tore me--ah, Carus--I had been wrecked without yourstrong arm to bear me up!"

  "It was you who bore me up, Elsin. How can I leave you now!"

  "Why, Carus, our honor is involved."

  "_Our_ honor!"

  "Yes, dear, ours."

  "You--you bid me go, Elsin?"

  "If I bid you stay, what would avail except to prove me faithless toyou? How could I truly love you and counsel dishonor?"

  White as a flower, the fixed smile never left her lips, nor did hersteady pace beside me falter, or knee tremble, or a finger quiver ofthe little hand that lay within my own.

  And then we fell silent, walking to and fro under the paintedmaple-trees in Johnstown streets, seeing no one, heeding no one, untilthe bell at the fort struck the hour. It meant the end.

  We kissed each other once. I could not speak. My horse, led by JackMount, appeared from the tavern stables; and we walked back to the inntogether.

  Once more I took her in my arms; then she gently drew away and enteredthe open door, hands outstretched as though blinded, feeling herway--that was the last I saw of her, feeling her dark way alone intothe house.

  Senses swimming, dumb, deafened by the raging, beating pulses hammeringin my brain, I reeled at a gallop into the sunny street, north, thenwest, then north once more, tearing out into the Butlersbury road. Agate halted me; I dismounted and dragged it open, then to horse again,then another gate, then on again, hailed and halted by riflemen at thecross-roads, which necessitated the summoning of my wits at last beforethey would let me go.

  Now riding through the grassy cart-road, my shoulders swept by thefringing willows, I came at length to the Danascara, shining in thesunlight, and followed its banks--the same banks from which so often inhappier days I had fished. At times I traveled the Tribes Hill road, attimes used shorter cuts, knowing every forest-trail as I did, andpresently entered the wood-road that leads from Caughnawaga church toJohnstown. I was in Butlersbury; there was the slope, there the TribesHill trail, there the stony road leading to that accursed house fromwhich the Butlers, father and son, some five years since, had goneforth to eternal infamy.

  And now, set in a circle of cleared land and ringed by the ancientforests of the
north, I saw the gray, weather-beaten walls of thehouse. The lawns were overgrown; the great well-sweep shattered; thelocust-trees covered with grapevines--the cherry- and apple-trees tothe south broken and neglected. Weeds smothered the flower-gardens,where here and there a dull-red poppy peered at me through witheringtangles; lilac and locust had already shed foliage too early blighted,but the huge and forbidding maples were all aflame in their blood-redautumn robes. Here the year had already begun to die; in the clear aira faint whiff of decay came from the rotting heaps of leaves--decay,ruin, and the taint of death; and, in the sad autumn stillness,something ominous, something secret and sly--something of malice.

  Seeing no sign of my Oneida, I walked my horse across the lawn and upto the desolate row of windows. The shutters had been ripped off theirhinges; all within was bare and dark; dimly I made out the shadowywalls of a hallway which divided the house into halves. By the lightwhich filtered through the soiled windows I examined room after roomfrom the outside, then, noiselessly, tried the door, but found itbolted from within as well as locked from without. Either the Butlersor the commissioners of sequestration must have crawled through awindow to do this. I prowled on, looking for the window they had usedas exit, examining the old house with a fascinated repugnance. Theclapboards were a foot wide, evidently fashioned with care and beadedon the edges. The outside doors all opened outward; and I noted, with ashudder of contempt, the "witch's half-moon," or lunette, in the bottomof each door, which betrays the cowardly superstition of the man wholived there. Such cat-holes are fashioned for haunted houses; thespecter is believed to crawl out through these openings, and then to bekept out with a tarred rag stuffed into the hole--ghosts being unableto endure tar. Faugh! If specters walk, the accursed house must bealive with them--ghosts of the victims of old John Butler, wraithsdripping red from Cherry Valley--children with throats cut; women withbleeding heads and butchered bodies, stabbed through and through--andperhaps the awful specter of Lieutenant Boyd, with eyes and nailsplucked out, and tongue cut off, bound to the stake and slowly roastingto death, while Walter Butler watched the agony curiously, interestedand surprised to see a disemboweled man live so long!

  Oh, yes, there might well be phantoms in this ghastly mansion; but theyhad nothing to do with me; only the absent master of the house was anyconcern of mine; and, finding at last the window I sought for, I shovedit open and climbed to the sill, landing upon the floor inside, mymoccasined feet making no more sound than the padded toes of atree-cat.

  Then to prowl and mouse, stepping cautiously, stooping warily toexamine dusty scraps lying on the bare boards--a dirty newspaper, anold shoe with buckle missing, a broken pewter spoon--all the sordidtrifles that accent desolation. Once or twice I thought to make outmoccasin tracks in the dust, as though some furtive prowler hadanticipated me here, but the light filtering through the crusted paneswas meager and uncertain, and, after all, it mattered nothing to me.

  The house was divided by a hallway; there were two rooms on eitherside, all bare and empty save for scraps here and there, and in oneroom the collapsed and dusty carcass of a rat. On the walls there wasnothing except a nail driven into the clay, which was crumbling betweenthe facing of whitewashed brick. From the heavy oaken timbers of thewooden ceilings hung smutty banners of ancient cobwebs, stirring aboveme as I moved. It was the very abomination of sinister desolation.

  Some vague idea of finding something that might aid me--some scrap ofevidence I might chance on to kindle hope with--some neglected trifleto damn him and proclaim this monstrous marriage void--it was thisinstinct that led me into a house abhorred. Nothing I found, save, onone foul window-pane, names, diamond-cut, scrawled again and again:"Lyn," and "Cherry-Maid," repeated a score of times.

  And long I lingered, pondering who had written it, and what it mightmean, and who was "Lyn." As for "Cherry-Maid," the name was used in theFalse Faces rites; and at that terrific orgy held on the Kennyettobefore the battle of Oriskany, where the first split came in the wallsof the Long House, and where that hag-sorceress, Catrine Montour, hadfailed to pledge the Oneidas to the war-post, the Cherry-Maid had takenpart. Indeed, some said that she was a daughter of the Huron witch; butJack Mount, who saw the rite, swore that the Cherry-Maid was but abeautiful child, painted from brow to ankle----

  Suddenly I thought of the hag's daughter as Carolyn. Carolyn? Lyn! Byheaven, the Cherry-Maid was Carolyn Montour, mistress of Walter Butler!Here in bygone days she had scrawled her name--here her title. AndWalter Butler had been present at that frantic debauch where the FalseFaces cringed to their prophetess, Magdalen Brant. Perhaps it was therethat this man had met his match in the lithe young animal whelped bythe Toad-Woman--this slim, lawless, depraved child, who had led theFalse Faces in their gruesome rites and sacrifice!

  I stared at the diamond scrawl; and before my eyes I seemed to see thethree fires burning, the clattering rows of wooden masks, the whiteblankets of the sachems, the tawny, naked form of the Cherry-Maid,seated between samphire and hazel, her pointed fingers on her hips, herheavy hair veiling a laughing face, over which the infernal fire shadowplayed.

  Ah, it was well! Beast linked to beast--what need of priest in thefierce mating of such creatures of the dusk? He was hers, and she hisby all laws of nature, and in the eternal fitness of things vast andsavage. They must live and breed in the half-light of forests; theymust perish as the sun follows the falling trees, creeping everinexorably westward.

  Somberly brooding, I turned and descended into the cellar. There waslittle light here, and I cared not to strike flint. Groping about Itouched with my foot remains of bottles of earthenware, then made myway to the door again and began to ascend.

  The stairway seemed steeper and more tortuous to me. As I climbed Ibecame uneasy at its length. Then, in a second, it flashed on me that Ihad blundered upon a secret stairway[1] leading upward from the cellar.At this same instant my head brushed the ceiling; I gave a gentle push,and a trap-door lifted, admitting me to another flight of stairs, upwhich I warily felt my way. This must end in another trap-door on thesecond floor--I understood that--and began to reach upward, feelingabout blindly until my hands fell on a bolt. This I drew; it was notrusty, and did not creak, and, as I slid it back, to my astonishment myfingers grew wet and greasy. The bolt had been _recently oiled_!

  [1] Evidences of this stairway still exist in the ancient house of Walter Butler.

  Now all alert as a gray wolf sniffing a strange trail that cuts hisown, I warily lifted the trap to a finger's breadth. The crack of lightdazzled me; gradually my blurred sight grew clearer; I saw a low,oblong window under the eaves of the steep, pointed roof; and, throughit, the sunlight falling on the bare floor of a room all littered withpapers, torn letters, and tape-bound documents of every description.Could these be the Butler papers? I had heard that all documents hadbeen seized by the commissioners after the father and son had fled. Butthe honorable commissioners of sequestration had evidently neversuspected this stairway.

  In spite of myself I started! _How_ had I, then, entered it? Somebodymust have mounted it before me, leaving the secret door open in thecellar, and I, groping about, had chanced upon it. But whoever left itopen must have been acquainted with the house--an intimate here, if notone of the family!

  When had this unknown entered? Was any one here _now_? At the thought myskin roughened as a dog bristles. Was I alone in this house?

  Listening, motionless, nostrils dilated, every sense concentrated onthat narrow crack of light, I crouched there. Then, very gradually, Iraised the trap, higher, higher, laying it back against the upright ofwhite oak.

  I was in a tiny room--a closet, lighted by a slit of a window.Everywhere around me in the dust were small moccasin prints, pointing inevery direction. I could see no door in the wooden walls of the closet,but I stepped out of the stair-well and leaned over, examining themoccasin tracks, tracing them, until I found a spot where they ledstraight up to the wall; and there were no returning tracks to be seen.A chill cre
pt over me; only a specter could pass through a solid wall.The next moment I had bent, ear flattened to the wooden wainscot. _Therewas something moving in the next room!_