The Macabre Megapack: 25 Lost Tales from the Golden Age

by John Galt

  “And what we heerd, was sent to tell us on’t!” replied another.

  “Past doubt it was,” said Dirk, “and we’ll hear more of it, if we don’t stir ourselves, and search out this unnat’ral murder. The task’s fell upon us, boys; and have got jest to keep mighty straight, and obey orders! Who’ll go along with me—you, Asa, and you, Enoch, I count upon—you’ll stick to old Dirk’s tracks, I know—who else?”

  “I will,”—“and I,”—“and I,” responded several voices of the rough borderers, who had again assembled at this new cause of excitement, and who were, perhaps, less alarmed at the prospect of a tramp through the woods, and even a skirmish with mortal enemies, than of passing the remainder of the night in that haunted homestead. Rifles were hunted up and loaded; pouches and horns and wood-knives slung or belted; horses were saddled; and in less than half an hour, eight hardy woodmen were in their stirrups, ready to follow old Dirk Ericson, wherever he might guide them.

  “Well, Dirk, what’s the fix now? how’ll we set to, to find him?”

  “Why, he set out from here, you see, with black Cornelius,” answered the veteran, “and no one else has travelled up since they two quit, so we can take their track to where they parted; and so see, if it be, as Cornelius quit at his own turn; and if he did, two on us can jest ride up and see if he’s in bed, and tell him how it’s chanced; and the rest on us follow up the stranger’s track to where the mischief has fell out. We’ll hunt it out, I reckon—leastwise, if I lose the trail on’t, there must be e’en a most plaguy snarl in’t.”

  No more was said—the plan was evidently good—two or three lanthorns were provided; and having ascertained the tracks of the two horses—the noble charger of the stranger, and the mean gasson of the farmer—easily visible in the deep mud which lay in every hollow of the route, the little band got under way in silence. Their progress, was, of course, slow and guarded, for it was absolutely necessary to pause from time to time, and survey the ground; so to make sure that they had not o’errun the scent—but still at every halt, their caution was rewarded, for, in each muddy spot, the double trail was clearly visible. They reached the well-known turning, and, much to the relief of all concerned, in the night search, the farmer’s hoof-track diverged from that of his companion, wheeling directly homeward; they could even see where the horses of the two had pawed and poached the ground, while they had held brief parley ere they parted.

  “Now, then,” said Dirk, ‘so far, our course is clear! but now comes all the snarl on’t. Well ,we must see to’t how e can best. Asa and Enoch, hear to me, boys—follow up Heyer’s track clear to the end on’t—and take note of every stop and turn on’t; and if he has gone home, creep up quiet to the windows, and see if he’s in bed, or how. But don’t you rouse him, no how—and when he’s fairly lodged, the one on you set right down where you can watch the door, and let t’other come down to the road by the back track, past Lupton’s branch, and so keep up the main road till he overtakes us. Take a light with you, boys, and keep a bright look out! The rest come on with me.”

  So perfect was the confidence of the whole party in the old hunter’s sagacity that not a question was asked, much less an opinion given in opposition to his orders. Away rode the detachment, and on moved the main body—their work becoming, at every step, more difficult and intricate, since, having now no clue at all, they were compelled to ascertain the trail, foot by foot. Much time had been spent, therefore, before they reached the second turning of the road close to the bridge, under which Lupton’s branch fell into the main river. Here, as we know already, the hapless rider had quitted the true path; and here our company, for the first time, overshot the scent—for, nothing doubting that the trail lay onward from the road, from the fork upward to the bridge, being so hard, and of a soil so rocky as to give no note of any footmarks—they galloped forward to the next muddy bottom, when, pausing to look for the guiding track, they found, at once, that it had not passed further.

  “Here’s the snarl, boys! here’s the snarl,” shouted Dirk. “Down, every one of you; we must e’en hunt it out by inches. You, Audrey Hewson, hold all the horses—Spencer and Young get forward with all the lights, and hold them low down to the earth, I tell you!”

  His orders were obeyed implicitly; and in a short time the result was the discovery of the horse-track turning away from the other side of the bridge, into the blind and unused bye-path.

  “There’s deviltry in this,” muttered the crafty veteran. “Dark as it was, there still was light enough to show the main track—and neither horse nor man would turn off into this devil’s hole unless they had been told to. It’s no use mounting, boys, I tell you—the trouble’s hard by here, now I tell you!”

  They made the trail good to the branch, the last tracks being of the hind feet on the very marge of the turbulent stream—they crossed it, but no footprint had deranged one pebble on the verge! “Try back, once more,” cried Dirk, “try back—this is the very spot!” and in a few more moments the sod spurned up, where the startled charger had wheeled round in terror as his master fell, revealed another secret of the dark mystery. Every stone was now turned, every leaf or branch removed that might have been disposed to cover the assassin’s tracks, but all in vain! A little dam of stones was now run out into the stream, under old Ericson’s direction, so as to turn the waters into a channel somewhat different from their wonted course; a narrow stripe of mud was thus exposed to sight, which had, of late, been covered by the foamy ripples, and there, the very spot whereon the traveller’s corpse had fallen, with a large foot-print by the side of it, was rendered clear to every eye! Beyond this, and one splash of blood close to the water’s edge, all clue was lost. The morning dawned while they were yet busy with the search, and the broad sun came out, banishing every shadow, and revealing every secret of sweet nature, but no light does his radiance cast on this dread mystery. The woods were searched for miles around—the waters of the wild Ashuelot were dragged for leagues of distance—all to no purpose! No spot of soil had been disturbed—the pools and shallows gave up no dead.

  While they were yet employed about the ford, one of the young allies returned with the tidings that Heyer’s trail ran straight home—that his horse had been turned out into its wonted pasture—that the door was unlocked, and a light burning in the chamber, which showed the man calmly reclining on his bed in the undisturbed slumbers of apparent innocence.

  With this all clue was lost; and, save that night after night the same hellish disturbances resounded through the chambers of the tavern, till the inhabitants, fairly unable to endure the terrors of this nightly uproar, abandoned it to solitude and ruin, the very story of the hapless traveller might well have been forgotten even on the very scene of his murder.

  THE REVELATION

  Days, weeks, and months rolled on—and still, as we have said, night after night the fearful din, the crash succeeded by those fiendish yells and that appalling laughter, rang through the chambers of the Hawknest Tavern. For a brief space the inmates strove to maintain their dwelling despite these awful visitations—but brief indeed was that space! For guest by guest, the old familiar customers fell off, deserting their accustomed stations by the glowing hearth in winter, or on the cool and shadowy stoop in the warm summer evenings. So widely did the terrors spread of the mysterious and unearthly sounds, which now clothed with a novel-horror the dark pass of the Ashuelot, that travellers began to shun the route entirely, preferring a circuitous and more fatiguing road to one whereon the Spirits of the Dead held, as it was almost universally believed, nocturnally their hellish orgies. The few and humble wayfarers who still held to the wonted path, hurried along, as the Spanish tourist has it, with beard on shoulder, stealing at every turn a fearful glance around them, making no halt nor tarrying on their journey, and shunning the pass altogether, save when the sun rode high in heaven.

  The consequences of this change were sad in the extreme to Hartley—his occupation gone, his customers departed, his o
ld friends gazing on him with doubtful and suspicious eyes, poverty staring him in his face, driven forth from his home at last by the overwhelming awe of those dread noises—he and his family were suddenly reduced from moderate affluence and comfort to the extremity of sordid want. A little cabin framed of rude lofs received them, a miserable hut, which had been raised for temporary occupation only, within a gunshot of the fatal bridge whereby the hapless traveller had fallen, involving in his ruin the innocent family of him who warned and would have succored him.

  Game at this time abounded in the wild woods around, and by his rifle only did the unhappy landlord now support his once rich and respected household.

  It is the way of the world to judge by result—and before long men who had known him from his cradle, and known his probity and worth, began to shrink from him, as one on whom the judgement of an offended Providence had weighed too visibly—whom punishment divine had marked out as a sinner of no small degree! They shrank from him at market, they drew aside from his contaminating touch even in the house of prayer—all shunned him, all with the exception of one man believed him guilty—guilty of that, too, which by no possibility, he could have committed—the murder of that youth who died at two miles distance, while Hartley was employed before the eyes of many in his own crowded bar-room. The man—the only man who drew yet closer to his side, who to the limit of his own scanty means assisted him, was Dirk, the hunter, while he who spoke the loudest in suspicious hints, and dark insinuations—who was he but the murderer?

  Two years had passed, and now inseparable friends, Hartley and Dirk roved over the rude mountains side by side—there was no rock-ribbed summit which their adventurous feet had not mounted; no glen so deep but had resounded to the crack of their true rifles. Not a beast of the hills, nor a fowl of the air, but ministered to their support; and, though avoided by the neighbors as a spot, guilt-stricken and accursed, the little hut of Hartley was once again the scene of humble comfort, and of content at least, if not of happiness. The peltry, conveyed by old Dirk to the nearest market, sold or exchanged, yielded the foreign luxuries of clothing, groceries and liquor—the flesh of the deer, the hare, or the ruffled grouse simmered as temptingly on gridiron or stewpan, and tasted full as well, as veal or mutton. The little garden plot tended by Hartley’s eldest, a fine lad now rising toward manhood, was rich with many a succulent root and savory herb. All prospered—poorly indeed, but hopefully and humbly!—all prospered save the man! No soothing of his anxious wife, no sparkling merriment of his loved children, no consolation cheery and bold of his bluff fellow could chase the now habitual gloom from Hartley’s honest brow. To be suspected had sank, like the iron of the psalmist, into his very soul. To be condemned of men, no error ever proved against him—to be shunned like the haggard wolf—pointed by every finger in execration and contempt.

  Two years had passed—and the same time, which had cast down the innocent from the good will of men, from the communion of his fellows, from wealth and happiness and comfort, had raised the real murderer to affluence and respect and honor. For many months after the perpetuation of his crime, he had pursued his ordinary avocations of the hard-working occupant of a small mountain farm; but when he found that suspicion had cast glimpse toward him but had on the contrary fixed steadfastly upon another, he gave out that a rich uncle had died suddenly in far-off Massachusetts, had journeyed thitherward, been absent several weeks, and returned rich in cattle, moveables and money, his wealthy kinsman’s heir. The mountain farm, which had been heavily mortgaged, was cleared from all encumbrance. A new and handsome dwelling-house erected on a knoll o’erlooking proudly what was now called the Bridge of Blood, and Hartley’s low-browed cabin. Gardens stretched down in pretty terraced slopes to the brink of the arrowy stream; orchards were planted in the rear; fine barns and out-houses were erected, among which stood now desolate and fast decaying the former homestead—the very hovel through the unshuttered lattices of which the Allens’ had looked for and witnessed the feigned slumbers of the foul assassin.

  Two years, as has been said, had passed; when one tempestuous evening old Dirk who still, as he would boast at times, feared neither man nor devil—set forth on his return from Fitzwilliam, wither he had come in the morning with a large pack of beaver. In driving a hard bargain with a peddler for his peltry, hour of daylight after hour had slipped away unheeded, and supper was announced, before the terms of sale were finally concluded—despite his wish to get home early, the veteran hunter could not refuse the invitation to “sit by,” and it was eight o’clock before he started homeward—his pack supplied him with broadcloth and fifty things beside, in lieu of its furred peltry, his trusty rifle balanced on his shoulder, and his heart fortified, had that been needful, by a good stirrup cup of right Jamaica. Then as will often happen when men are in haste, accident after accident befell him; none indeed very serious, or even troublesome, but still sufficient to delay him on his route, so that his practiced eye read clearly from the position of the stars which blinked forth now and then from their dim canopy of storm that midnight was at hand ere he reached the old Hawknest.

  “Well, well,” he muttered to himself as he approached its lonely and decaying walls—“well! well, I’ve heern it afore now, and I guess it won’t be the death of me, if I should hear it once again!”

  Just then the winds rose high and swept the storm-clouds clear athwart the skies, and left them bright and sparkling with their ten thousand lamps of living fire. “Ha!” he exclaimed as he looked up—“I reckon its full time for’t now,” and as he spoke he stood and gazed with a strange sense of curiosity and wonder not altogether mixed, it is true, with a sort of half-pleasing apprehension. The windows, where the glass was yet entire, reflected back the quiet radiance of the moon—the door-way, wide open—for the door fallen inwards hung by one rusted hinge—showed cavernous and dark in the calm gleamy night—a bright wind whispered in the branches of the huge cluster, and a small thread of water from the horse-trough gurgled along its pebbly channel with a sweet peaceful murmur. The hunter’s wonderment increased as he stood gazing at the tranquil scene, and he determined after a little hesitation to sit down by the streamlet’s edge and wait to satisfy himself whether the fearful sounds still haunted the old tavern, or whether they indeed as he now half surmised had ceased for ever. No sooner was his resolution taken than he began to act on it—a moment’s search sufficed to find a moss-grown seat of rock, another and his huge limbs were outstretched by the marge of the tinkling runnel, while with an eye as tranquil and as serene a brow, as though he were anticipating some long promised pleasure, he waited the repetition of the mysterious sounds which had so long driven from those mouldering walls all human occupants. In vain however did he wait, for the moon set, and the stars twinkled and went out, and amber clouds clothed the eastern firmament and day burst forth in its glory and no more fearful noise than the air murmuring in the branches, and the rill gurgling down to meet the noisier river, and the shrill accent of the katydid and cricket, the melancholy wailing of the whip-poor-will, or the far whooping of the answered owl fell on the hunter’s ear. Cheery of heart he started up as the day dawned and hurried homeward with glad tidings—the Hawknest was no longer haunted!

  On the next night at about nine o’clock a light was shining from the casement of the old bar-room, whence no light had flashed gladness on the traveller’s eyes for many a weary month. Two men sat by the old round table on which lay, ready to each hand, two ponderous rifles, a watch, some food and liquor, and last not least a copy of the Testament! They were old Dirk, the hunter, and his comrade Hartley, who had returned to pass the night in that spot, and satisfy themselves fully that the disturbance was at rest for ever. It needs not to rehearse what passed that night—suffice it that no sound nor sight occurred, save the accustomed rural noises of the neighborhood; and that some two hours before daylight, they left the place convinced and joyfully on their route homeward.

  Homeward they walked in glad and
joyous converse, ‘till on a sudden as they reached a little height commanding from a distance a view of ——’s new house and farm buildings, their eyes were suddenly attracted by an appearance of bright dancing lights—as of the aurora borealis—flashing and streaming heavenward from a focus situated as it seemed in the rear of the new-planted orchards. Strange were the sights indeed, flashes of vivid flame upleaping suddenly from earth and then a long dark interval and then a glimmering glow pervading the whole circuit of the homestead. Believing that a fire had burst out suddenly among the out buildings the veterans dashed forward with the wind and nerve that hunters alone can possess. They scaled the rocky height, dashed through the muddy hollow, reached the spot and there from the old house, now desolate and quite deserted, they saw these fearful flashes bursting at every instant. Through every chink and cranny of the door, the walls, the shutters, streamed the deep crimson glare, along the roof tree danced meteoric balls, of an unearthly pallid lustre on either gable that permanently fixed a globe or lurid fire.

  “Fire! fire!” shouted Dirk—“Fire! halloa! halloa! Hans! the old house is on fire!” And with the words he rushed against the door and striking it with the sole of his foot broke every bar and fastening and drove it inwards, but within all was dark!—deep—solid—pitchy blackness.