Acquainted with all the passes of the hills, and indefatigable in the discharge of his duty, the trooper had, with much trouble and toil, succeeded in effecting his object. The party had halted at a farm house for the purposes of refreshment, and the prisoner was placed in a room by himself, but under the keeping of the two men before mentioned—all that was known subsequently is, that a woman was seen busily engaged in the employments of the household near the sentinels, and was particularly attentive to the wants of the captain, until he was deeply engaged in the employments of the supper table.
Afterwards, neither woman nor pedlar was to be found. The pack, indeed, was discovered, open, and nearly empty, and a small door communicating with a room adjoining to the one in which the pedlar had been secured, was ajar.
Captain Lawton never could forgive the deception; his antipathies to his enemies were not very moderate, but this was adding an insult to his penetration that rankled deeply. He sat in portentous silence, brooding over the exploit of his prisoner, yet mechanically pursuing the business before him, until after sufficient time had past to make a very comfortable meal, a trumpet suddenly broke on the ears of the party, sending its martial tones up the valley, in startling melody. The trooper rose instantly from the table, exclaiming—
“Quick, gentlemen, to your horses—there comes Dunwoodie;” and, followed by his officers, he precipitately left the room.
With the exception of the sentinels left to guard Captain Wharton, the dragoons mounted, and marched out to meet their comrades.
None of the watchfulness, necessary in a war, in which similarity of language, appearance and customs, rendered prudence doubly necessary, was omitted by the cautious leader. On getting sufficiently near, however, to a body of horse of more than double his own number, to distinguish countenances, Lawton plunged his rowels into his charger, and in a moment he was by the side of his commander.
The ground in front of the cottage was again occupied by the horse; and, observing the same precautions as before, the newly arrived troops hastened to participate in the cheer prepared for their comrades.
Chapter VI
“and, let conquerors boast
Their fields of fame—he who in virtue arms
A young, warm spirit against beauty’s charms,
Who feels her brightness, yet defies her thrall,
Is the best, bravest, conqueror of them all.”
Moore.
* * *
THE LADIES of the Wharton family had collected about a window, deeply interested in the scene we have related.
Sarah viewed the approach of her countrymen with a smile of contemptuous indifference for she even undervalued the personal appearance of men, whom she thought arrayed in the unholy cause of rebellion. Miss Peyton looked on the gallant show with an exulting pride which arose in the reflection, that the warriors before her were the chosen troops of her native colony, while Frances gazed with a singleness of interest that absorbed all other considerations.
The two parties had not yet joined, before her quick eye distinguished one horseman in particular from those around him. To her it appeared that even the steed of this youthful soldier seemed to be conscious that he sustained the weight of no common man—his hoofs but lightly touched the earth, and his airy tread was the curbed motion of a blooded charger.
The dragoon sat in the saddle, with a firmness and ease that showed him master of himself and horse—his figure uniting the just proportions of strength and activity, being tall, round, and muscular. To this officer Lawton made his report, and side by side, they rode into the field opposite to the cottage.
The heart of Frances beat with a pulsation nearly stifling, as he paused for a moment and took a survey of the building with an eye whose dark and sparkling glance could be seen, notwithstanding the distance—her colour changed, and for an instant, as she saw the youth throw himself from the saddle, she was compelled to seek relief for her trembling limbs in a chair.
The officer gave a few hasty orders to his second in command, walked rapidly into the lawn, and approached the cottage.—Frances rose from her seat, and vanished from the apartment.—The dragoon ascended the steps of the piazza, and had barely time to touch the outer door when it opened to his admission.
The youth of Frances, when she left the city, had prevented her sacrificing, in conformity to the customs of that day, all her native beauties on the altar of fashion. Her hair, which was of a golden richness of colour, was left untortured to fall in the natural ringlets of infancy, and it shaded a face which was glowing with the united charms of health, youth, and artlessness—her eyes spake volumes, but her tongue was silent—her hands were interlocked before her, and aided by her taper form, bending forward in an attitude of expectation, gave a loveliness and interest to her appearance that for a moment chained her lover in silence to the spot.
Frances silently led the way into a vacant parlour opposite to the one in which the family were assembled, and turning to the soldier frankly, placing both her hands in his own, exclaimed—
“Ah! Dunwoodie! how happy, on many accounts, I am to see you; I have brought you in here to prepare you to meet an unexpected friend in the opposite room.”
“To whatever cause it may be owing,” cried the youth, pressing her hands to his lips, “I, too, am happy in being able to see you alone.—Frances, the probation you have decreed is cruel—war and distance may shortly separate us forever.”
“We must submit to the necessity which governs us. But it is not love speeches I would hear now: I have other and more important matter for your attention.”
“What can be of more importance than to make you mine by a tie that will be indissoluble! Frances, you are cold to me—me—from whose mind days of service and nights of alarm have never been able to banish your image for a single moment.”
“Dear Dunwoodie,” said Frances, softening nearly to tears, and again extending her hand to him, as the richness of her colour gradually returned, “you know my sentiments—this war once ended, and you may take that hand for ever—but I can never consent to tie myself to you by any closer union than already exists, so long as you are arrayed in arms against my only brother—even now, that brother is awaiting your decision to restore him to liberty, or to conduct him to probable death.”
“Your brother!” cried Dunwoodie, starting and turning pale; “your brother! explain yourself—what dreadful meaning is concealed in your words?”
“Has not Captain Lawton told you of the arrest of Henry, by himself this very morning?” continued Frances, in a voice barely audible, and fixing on her lover a look of the deepest concern.
“He told me of arresting a captain of the 60th in disguise, but without mentioning where or whom,” replied the major in a similar tone, and dropping his head between his hands, he endeavoured to conceal his feelings from his companion.
“Dunwoodie! Dunwoodie!” exclaimed Frances, losing all her former confidence in the most fearful apprehensions, “what means this agitation?” As the major slowly raised his face, in which was pictured the most expressive concern, she continued, “surely—surely—you will not betray your friend—my brother—your brother—to an ignominious death.”
“Frances!” exclaimed the young man in agony, “what can I do?”
“Do!” she repeated, gazing at him wildly; “would Major Dunwoodie yield his friend to his enemies—the brother of his betrothed wife?”
“Oh! speak not so unkindly to me—dearest Miss Wharton—my own Frances. I would this moment die for you—for Henry—but I cannot forget my duty—cannot forfeit my honor—you yourself would be the first to despise me if I did.”
“Peyton Dunwoodie!” said Frances solemnly, and with a face of ashy paleness, “you have told me—you have sworn, that you loved me.”
“I do”—interrupted the soldier with fervor;—but motioning for silence, she continued, in a v
oice that trembled with her fears,
“Do you think I can throw myself into the arms of a man, whose hands are stained with the blood of my only brother!”
“Frances! you wring my very heart;” then pausing to struggle with his feelings, he endeavoured to force a smile, as he added, “but, after all, we may be torturing ourselves with unnecessary fears, and Henry, when I know the circumstances, may be nothing more than a prisoner of war; in which case I can liberate him on parole.”
There is no more delusive passion than hope; and it seems to be the happy privilege of youth to cull all the pleasures that can be gathered from its indulgence. It is when we are most worthy of confidence ourselves, that we are least apt to distrust others, and what we think ought to be, we are fond to think will be.
The half-formed expectations of the young soldier were communicated to the desponding sister more by the eye than the voice, and the blood rushed again to her cheek, as she cried—
“Oh! there can be no just grounds to doubt it: I knew—I knew—Dunwoodie, you would never desert us in the hour of our greatest need!” The violence of her feelings prevailed, and the agitated girl found relief in a flood of tears.
The office of consoling those we love is one of the dearest prerogatives of affection; and Major Dunwoodie, although but little encouraged by his own momentary suggestion of relief, could not undeceive the lovely girl who leaned on his shoulder, as he wiped the traces of her feeling from her face, with a trembling, but reviving confidence in the safety of her brother and the protection of her lover.
Frances having sufficiently recovered her recollection to command herself, now eagerly led the way into the opposite room, to communicate to her family the pleasing intelligence which she already conceived so certain.
Dunwoodie followed her reluctantly, and with forebodings of the result: but, a few moments brought him into the presence of his relatives, and he summoned all his resolution to meet the trial with firmness.
The salutations of the young men were cordial and frank, and on the part of Henry Wharton as collected as if nothing had occurred to disturb his self-possession.
The abhorrence of being, in any manner, auxiliary to the arrest of his friend, the danger to the life of Captain Wharton, and the heart-breaking declarations of Frances had, however, created an uneasiness in the bosom of Major Dunwoodie, which all his efforts could not conceal. His reception by the rest of the family was kind and sincere, both from old regard, and a remembrance of former obligations, heightened by the anticipations they could not fail to read in the expressive eyes of the blushing girl by his side. After exchanging greetings with every member of the family, Major Dunwoodie beckoned to the sentinel, whom the wary prudence of Captain Lawton had left in charge of the prisoner, to leave the room. Turning to Captain Wharton, he inquired mildly—
“Tell me, Henry, the circumstances of this disguise, in which Captain Lawton reports you to have been found, and remember—remember—Captain Wharton—your answers are entirely voluntary.”
“The disguise was used by me, Major Dunwoodie,” replied the English officer, gravely, “to enable me to visit my friends, without incurring the danger of becoming a prisoner of war.”
“But you did not wear it until you saw the troop of Lawton approaching?”
“Oh! no,” interrupted Frances, eagerly, forgetting all the circumstances in her anxiety for her brother; “Sarah and myself placed them on him when the dragoons appeared—it was our awkwardness that led to his discovery.”
The countenance of Dunwoodie brightened, as, turning his eyes in fondness on the speaker, he listened to her explanation.
“Probably some articles of your own,” he continued, “which were at hand, and were used on the spur of the moment.”
“No,” said Wharton, with dignity; “the clothes were worn by me from the city—they were procured for the purpose to which they were applied, and I intended to use them in my return this very day.”
The appalled Frances shrunk back from between her brother and lover, where her ardent feelings had carried her, as the whole truth glanced over her mind, and she sunk into a seat, gazing wildly on the young men.
“But the picquets—the party at the Plains?”—added Dunwoodie, turning pale.
“I passed them too in disguise. I made use of this pass for which I paid; and, as it bears the name of Washington, I presume it is forged.”
Dunwoodie caught the paper from his hand, eagerly, and stood gazing on the signature for some time in silence, during which the soldier gradually prevailed over the man; when he turned to the prisoner, with a searching look, as he asked—
“Captain Wharton, whence did you procure this paper?”
“That is a question, I conceive, Major Dunwoodie has no right to ask.”
“Your pardon, sir, my feelings may have led me into an impropriety.”
Mr. Wharton, who had been a deeply interested auditor, now so far conquered his feelings as to say, “Surely, Major Dunwoodie, the paper cannot be material—such artifices are used daily in war.”
“This name is no counterfeit,” said the dragoon, studying the characters, and speaking in a low voice; “is treason yet among us undiscovered?—The confidence of Washington has been abused, for the fictitious name is in a different hand from the pass. Captain Wharton, my duty will not suffer me to grant you a parole: you must accompany me to the Highlands.”
“I did not expect otherwise, Major Dunwoodie.”
Dunwoodie turned slowly towards the sisters, when the figure of Frances once more arrested his gaze; she had risen from her seat, and stood again with her hands clasped before him in an attitude of petition: feeling himself unable to contend longer with his feelings, he made a hurried excuse for a temporary absence, and left the room. Frances followed him, and, obedient to the direction of her eye, the soldier re-entered the apartment in which had been their first interview.
“Major Dunwoodie,” said Frances, in a voice barely audible, as she beckoned to him to be seated; her cheek, which had been of a chilling whiteness, was flushed with a suffusion that crimsoned her whole countenance; she struggled with herself for a moment, and continued; “I have already acknowledged to you my esteem—even now, when you most painfully distress me, I wish not to conceal it. Believe me, Henry is innocent of every thing but imprudence. Our country can sustain no wrong;” again she paused, and almost gasped for breath; her colour changed rapidly from red to white, until the blood rushed into her face, covering her features with the brightest vermilion; and she added hastily, in an under tone, “I have promised, Dunwoodie, when peace shall be restored to our country, to become your wife—give to my brother his liberty on parole, and I will this day go with you to the altar, follow you to the camp—and, in becoming a soldier’s bride, learn to endure a soldier’s privations.”
Dunwoodie seized the hand which the blushing girl in her ardour had extended towards him, and pressed it for a moment to his bosom; then rising from his seat, he paced the room in excessive agitation—
“Frances—say no more—I conjure you, unless you wish to break my heart.”
“You then reject my offered hand?” she said rising with dignity, though her pale cheek and quivering lip plainly showed the conflicting passions within.
“Reject it! have I not sought it with entreaties—with tears? Has it not been the goal of all my earthly wishes? But to take it under such conditions would be to dishonour both. We will hope for better things. Henry must be acquitted—perhaps not tried. No intercession of mine shall be wanting, you must well know; and believe me, Frances, I am not without favour with Washington.”
“That very paper, that abuse of his confidence, to which you alluded, will steel him to my brother’s case. If threats or entreaties could move his stern sense of justice, would André have suffered?” As Frances uttered these words, she flew from the room in despair.
Dunwoodie remained for a minute nearly stupified, and then he followed with a view to vindicate himself and to relieve her apprehensions. On entering the hall that divided the two parlours, he was met by a small ragged boy, who looked one moment at his dress; and placing a piece of paper in his hands, immediately vanished through the outer door of the building. The bewildered state of his mind, and the suddenness of the occurrence, gave the major barely time to observe the messenger to be a country lad, meanly attired, and that he held in his hand one of those toys which are to be bought in cities, and which he now apparently contemplated with the conscious pleasure of having fairly purchased, by the performance of the service required. The soldier turned his eyes to the subject of the note. It was written on a piece of torn and soiled paper, and in a hand barely legible; but, after some little labour, he was able to make out as follows:—
“The rig’lars are at hand, horse and foot.”*
Dunwoodie started; and forgetting every thing but the duties of a soldier, he precipitately left the house. While walking rapidly towards the troops, he noticed on a distant hill a vidette riding with speed; several pistols were fired in quick succession, and the next instant the trumpets of the corps, rung in his ears with the enlivening strain of “to arms.” By the time he had reached the ground occupied by his squadron, the major saw that every man was in active motion. Lawton was already in the saddle, eyeing the opposite extremity of the valley with the eagerness of expectation, and crying to the musicians, in tones but little lower than their own—
“Sound away my lads, and let these Englishmen know, that the Virginia horse are between them and the end of their journey.”
The videttes and patroles now came pouring in, each making in succession his hasty report to the commanding officer, who gave his orders coolly, and with a promptitude that made obedience certain. Once only, as he wheeled his horse to ride over the ground in front, did Dunwoodie trust himself with a look at the cottage, and his heart beat with an unusual rapidity as he saw a female figure standing, with clasped hands, at a window of the room in which he had met Frances. The distance was too great to distinguish her features; but the soldier could not doubt that it was his mistress. The paleness of his cheek and the languor of his eye endured but for a moment longer. As he rode towards the intended battleground, a flush of ardour began to show itself on his sun-burnt features; and his dragoons, who studied the face of their leader, as the best index to their own fate, saw again the wonted flashing of the eyes, and the cheerful animation, which they had so often witnessed on the eve of battle. By the additions of the videttes and parties that had been out, and which now had all joined, the whole number of the horse was increased to nearly two hundred. There was also a small body of mounted men, whose ordinary duties were those of guides, but who, in cases of emergency, were embodied and did duty as foot soldiers: these were dismounted, and proceeded, by the order of Dunwoodie, to level the few fences which might interfere with the intended movements of the cavalry. The neglect of husbandry, which had been occasioned by the war, left this task comparatively easy. Those long lines of heavy and durable walls, which now sweep through every part of the county, forty years ago were unknown. The slight and tottering fences of stone were then used more to clear the land for the purposes of cultivation, than as permanent barriers, and required the constant attention of the husbandman, to preserve them against the fury of the tempests and the frosts of winter. Some few of them had been built with more care immediately around the dwelling of Mr. Wharton; but those which had intersected the vale below were now generally a pile of ruins, over which the horses of the Virginians would bound with the fleetness of the wind. Occasionally a short line yet preserved its erect appearance, but as none of these crossed the ground on which Dunwoodie intended to act, there remained only the slighter fences of rails to be thrown down. Their duty was hastily, but effectually, performed; and the guides withdrew to the post assigned to them for the approaching fight.
James Fenimore Cooper's Five Novels Page 11
