Works of Robert W Chambers

by Robert W. Chambers

  A stump-field, sadly overgrown with choke-cherry, sumach, and rabbit-brier, warned me that I was within rifle-hail of the Rangers’ post at Broadalbin. I swung to the west, then south, then west again, passing the ruins of the little settlement — a charred beam here, an empty cellar there, yonder a broken well-sweep, until I came to the ridge above the swamp, where I must turn east and ford the stream, under the rifles of the post.

  There stood the chimney of what had once been my father’s house — the new one, “burned by mistake,” ere it had been completed.

  I gave it one sullen glance; looked around me, saw but heaps of brick, mortar, and ashes, where barns, smoke-houses, granaries, and stables had stood. The cellar of my old home was almost choked with weeds; slender young saplings had already sprouted among the foundation-stones.

  Passing the orchard, I saw the trees under which I had played as a child, now all shaggy and unpruned, tufted thick with suckers, and ringed with heaps of small rotting apples, lying in the grass as they had fallen. With a whirring, thunderous roar, a brood of crested grouse rose from the orchard as I ran on, startling me, almost unnerving me. The next moment I was at the shallow water’s edge, shouting across at a blockhouse of logs; and a Ranger rose up and waved his furry cap at me, beckoning me to cross, and calling to me by name.

  “Is that you, Dave Elerson?” I shouted.

  “Yes, sir. Is there bad news?”

  “Butler is in the Valley!” I answered, and waded into the cold, brown current, ankle-deep in golden bottom-sands. Breathless, dripping thrums trailing streams of water after me, I toiled up the bank and stood panting, leaning against the log hut.

  “Where is the post?” I breathed.

  “Out, sir, since last night.”

  “Which way?” I groaned.

  “Johnstown way, Mr. Renault. The Weasel, Tim Murphy, and Nick Stoner was a-smellin’ after moccasin-prints on the Mayfield trail. About sunup they made smoke-signals at me that they was movin’ Kingsboro way on a raw trail.”

  He brought me his tin cup full of rum and water. I drank a small portion of it, then rinsed throat and mouth, still standing.

  “Butler and Ross, with a thousand rifles and baggage-wagons, are making for the Tribes Hill ford,” I said. “A hundred Cayugas, Mohawks, and Tories burned Oswaya just after sunrise, and are this moment pushing on to Johnstown. We’ve got to get there before them, Elerson.”

  “Yes, sir,” he said simply, glancing at the flint in his rifle.

  “Is there any chance of our picking up the scout?”

  “If we don’t, it’s a dead scout for sure,” he returned gravely. “Tim Murphy wasn’t lookin’ for scalpin’ parties from the north.”

  I handed him his cup, tightened belt and breast-straps, trailed rifle, and struck the trail at a jog; and behind me trotted David Elerson, famed in ballad and story, which he could not read — nor could Tim Murphy, either, for that matter, whose learning lay in things unwritten, and whose eloquence flashed from the steel lips of a rifle that never spoke in vain.

  Like ice-chilled wine the sweet, keen mountain air blew in our faces, filtering throat and nostrils as we moved; the rain that the frost had promised was still far away — perhaps not rain at all, but snow.

  On we pressed, first breath gone, second breath steady; and only for the sickening foreboding that almost unnerved me when I thought of Elsin, I should not have suffered from the strain.

  Somewhere to the west, hastening on parallel to our path, was strung out that pack of raiding bloodhounds; farther south, perhaps at this very instant entering Johnstown, moved the marauders from the north. A groan burst from my dry lips.

  Slowing to a walk we began to climb, shoulder to shoulder, ascending the dry bed of a torrent fairly alive with partridges.

  “Winter’s comin’ almighty fast; them birds is a-packin’ and a-buddin’ already. Down to the Bush I see them peckin’ the windfall apples in your old orchard.”

  I scarcely heard him, but, as he calmly gossiped on, hour after hour, a feeling of dull surprise grew in me that at such a time a man could note and discuss such trifles. Ah, but he had no sweetheart there in the threatened town, menaced by death in its most dreadful shape.

  “Are the women in the jail?” I asked, my voice broken by spasmodic breathing as we toiled onward.

  “I guess they are, sir — leastways Jack Mount was detailed there to handle the milishy.” And, after a pause, gravely and gently: “Is your lady there, sir?”

  “Yes — God help her!”

  He said nothing; there was nothing of comfort for any man to say. I looked up at the sun.

  “It’s close to noontide, sir,” said Elerson. “We’ll make Johnstown within the half-hour. Shall we swing round by the Hall and keep cover, or chance it by the road to Jimmy Burke’s?”

  “What about the scout?” I asked miserably.

  He shook his head, and over his solemn eyes a shadow passed.

  “Mayhap,” he muttered, “Tim Murphy’s luck will hold, sir. He’s been fired at by a hundred of their best marksmen; he’s been in every bloody scrape, assault, ambush, retreat, ‘twixt Edward and Cherry Valley, and never a single bullet-scratch. We may find him in Johnstown yet.”

  He swerved to the right: “With your leave, Captain Renault, we’ll fringe the timber here. Look, sir! Yonder stands the Hall against the sky!”

  We were in Johnstown. There, across Sir William’s tree-bordered pastures and rolling stubble-fields, stood the baronial hall. Sunlight sparkled on the windows. I saw the lilacs, the bare-limbed locusts, the orchards, still brilliant with scarlet and yellow fruit, the long stone wall and hedge fence, the lawns intensely green.

  “It is deserted,” I said in a low voice.

  “Hark!” breathed Elerson, ear to the wind. After a moment I heard a deadened report from the direction of the village, then another and another; and, spite of the adverse breeze, a quavering, gentle, sustained sound, scarce more than a vibration, that hung persistently in the air.

  “By God!” gasped Elerson, “it’s the bell at the jail! The enemy are here! Pull foot, sir! Our time has come!”

  Down the slope we ran, headed straight for the village. Gunshots now sounded distinctly from the direction of the Court-House; and around us, throughout the whole country, guns popped at intervals, sometimes a single distant report, then a quick succession of shots, like hunters shooting partridges; but we heard as yet no volley-firing.

  “Tories and scalpers harrying the outlying farms,” breathed Elerson. “Look sharp, sir! We’re close to the village, and it’s full o’ Tories.”

  Right ahead of us stood a white house; and, as we crossed the hay-field behind it, a man came to the back door, leveled a musket, and deliberately shot at us. Instantly, and before he could spring back, Elerson threw up his rifle and fired, knocking the man headlong through the doorway.

  “The impudent son of a slut!” he muttered to himself, coolly reloading. “Count one more Tory in hell, Davy, lad!”

  Priming, his restless eyes searched the road-hedge ahead, then, ready once more, we broke into a trot, scrambled through the fence, and started down the road, which had already become a village street. It was fairly swarming with men running and dodging about.

  The first thing I saw clearly was a dead woman lying across a horse-block. Then I saw a constable named Hugh McMonts running down the street, chased closely by two Indians and a soldier wearing a green uniform. They caught him as we fired, and murdered him in a doorway with hatchet and gun-stock, spattering everything with the poor wretch’s brains.

  Our impulsive and useless shots had instantly drawn the fire of three red-coated soldiers; and, as the big bullets whistled around us, Elerson grasped my arm, pulled me back, and darted behind a barn. Through a garden we ran, not stopping to load, through another barnyard, scattering the chickens into frantic flight, then out along a stony way, our ears ringing with the harsh din of the jail bell.

  “There’s the jail; run f
or it!” panted Elerson, as we came in sight of the solid stone structure, rising behind its palisades on the high ground.

  I sprang across the road and up the slope, battering at the barricaded palings with my rifle-stock, while Elerson ran around the defenses bawling for admittance.

  “Hurry, Elerson!” I cried, hammering madly for entrance; “here come the enemy’s baggage-wagons up the street!”

  “Jack Mount! Jack Mount! Let us in, ye crazy loon!” shouted Elerson.

  Somebody began to unbolt the heavy slab gate; it creaked and swung just wide enough for a man to squeeze through. I shoved Elerson inside and followed, pushing into a mob of scared militia and panic-stricken citizens toward a huge buckskinned figure at a stockade loophole on the left.

  “Jack Mount!” I called, “where are the women? Are they safe?”

  He looked around at me, nodded in a dazed and hesitating manner, then wheeled quick as a flash, and fired through the slit in the logs.

  I crawled up to the epaulment and peered down into the dusty street. It was choked with the enemy’s baggage-wagons, now thrown into terrible confusion by the shot from Mount’s rifle. Horses reared, backed, swerved, swung around, and broke into a terrified gallop; teamsters swore and lashed at their maddened animals, and some batmen, carrying a dead or wounded teamster, flung their limp burden into a wagon, and, seizing the horses’ bits, urged them up the hill in a torrent of dust.

  I fumbled for my ranger’s whistle, set it to my lips, and blew the “Cease firing!”

  “Let them alone!” I shouted angrily at Mount. “Have you no better work than to waste powder on a parcel of frightened clodhoppers? Send those militiamen to their posts! Two to a loop, yonder! Lively, lads; and see that you fire at nothing except Indians and soldiers. Jack, come up here!”

  The big rifleman mounted the ladder and leaped to the rifle-platform, which quivered beneath his weight.

  “I thought I’d best sting them once,” he muttered. “Their main force has circled the town westward toward the Hall. Lord, sir, it was a bad surprise they gave us, for we understood that Willett held them at Tribes Hill!”

  I caught his arm in a grip of iron, striving to speak, shaking him to silence.

  “Where — where is Miss Grey?” I said hoarsely. “You say the women are safe, do you not?”

  “Mr. Renault — sir—” he stammered, “I have just arrived at the jail — I have not seen your wife.”

  My hand fell from his arm; his appalled face whitened.

  “Last night, sir,” he muttered, “she was at the Hall, watching the flames in the sky where Butler was burning the Valley. I saw her there in a crowd of townsfolk, women, children — the whole town was on the lawn there — —”

  He wiped his clammy face and moistened his lips; above us, in the wooden tower, the clamor of the bell never ceased.

  “She spoke to me, asking for news of you. I — I had no news of you to tell her. Then an officer — Captain Little — fell a-bawling for the Rangers to fall in, and Billy Laird, Jack Shew, Sammons, and me — we had to go. So I fell in, sir; and the last I saw she was standing there and looking at the reddening sky — —”

  Blindly, almost staggering, I pushed past him, stumbling down the ladder, across the yard, and into the lower corridor of the jail. There were women a-plenty there; some clung to my arm, imploring news; some called out to me, asking for husband or son. I looked blankly into face after face, all strangers; I mounted the stairs, pressing through the trembling throng, searching every whitewashed corridor, every room; then to the cellar, where the frightened children huddled, then out again, breaking into a run, hastening from blockhouse to blockhouse, the iron voice of the bell maddening me!

  “Captain Renault! Captain Renault!” called out a militiaman, as I turned from the log rampart.

  The man came hastening toward me, firelock trailing, pack and sack bouncing and flopping.

  “My wife has news of your lady,” he said, pointing to a slim, pale young woman who stood in the doorway, a shawl over her wind-blown hair.

  I turned as she advanced, looking me earnestly in the face.

  “Your lady was in the fort late last night, sir,” she began. A fit of coughing choked her; overhead the dreadful clangor of the bell dinned and dinned.

  Dumb, stunned, I waited while she fumbled in her soiled apron, and at last drew out a crumpled letter.

  “I’ll tell you what I know,” she said weakly. “We had been to the Hall; the sky was all afire. My little boy grew frightened, and she — your sweet lady — she lifted him and carried him for me — I was that sick and weak from fright, sir — —”

  A fit of coughing shook her. She handed me the letter, unable to continue.

  And there, brain reeling, ears stunned by the iron din of the bell which had never ceased, I read her last words to me:

  “Carus, my darling, I don’t know where you are. Please God, you are not at Oswaya, where they tell me the Indians have appeared above Varicks. Dearest lad, your Oneida came with your letter. I could not reply, for there were no expresses to go to you. Colonel Willett had news of the enemy toward Fort Hunter, and marched the next day. We hoped he might head them, but last night there was an alarm, and we all went out into the street. People were hastening to the Hall, and I went, too, being anxious, now that you are out there alone somewhere in the darkness.

  “Oh, Carus, the sky was all red and fiery behind Tribes Hill; and women were crying and children sobbing all around me. I asked the Ranger, Mount, if he had news of you, and he was gentle and kind, and strove to comfort me, but he went away with his company on a run, and I saw the militia assembling where the drummers stood beating their drums in the torchlight.

  “Somebody — a woman — said: ‘It’s hatchet and scalping again, and we women will catch it now.’

  “And then a child screamed, and its mother was too weak to carry it, so I took it back for her to the jail.

  “I sat in the jailer’s room, thinking and thinking. Outside the barred window I heard a woman telling how Butler’s men had already slain a whole family at Caughnawaga — an express having arrived with news of horrors unspeakable.

  “Dearest, it came to me like a flash of light what I must do — what God meant me to do. Can you not understand, my darling? We are utterly helpless here. I must go back to this man — to this man who is riding hither with death on his right hand, and on his left hand, death!

  “Oh, Carus! Carus! my sin has found me out! It is written that man should not put asunder those joined together. I have defied Him! Yet He repays, mercifully, offering me my last chance.

  “Sweetheart, I must take it. Can you not understand? This man is my lawful husband; and as his wife, I dare resist him; I have the right to demand that his Indians and soldiers spare the aged and helpless. I must go to him, meet him, and confront him, and insist that mercy be shown to these poor, terrified people. And I must pay the price!

  “Oh, Carus! Carus! I love you so! Pray for me. God keep you! I must go ere it is too late. My horse is at Burke’s. I leave this for you. Dear, I am striving to mend a shattered life with sacrifice of self — the sacrifice you taught me. I can not help loving you as I do; but I can strive to be worthy of the man I love. This is the only way!

  “Elsin Grey.”

  The woman had begun to speak again. I raised my eyes.

  “Your sweet lady gave me the letter — I waited while she wrote it in the warden’s room — and she was crying, sir. God knows what she has written you! — but she kissed me and my little one, and went out into the yard. I have not seen her since, Mr. Renault.”

  Would the din of that hellish bell never cease its torture? Would sound never again give my aching brain a moment’s respite? The tumult, men’s sharp voices, the coughing of the sick woman, the dull, stupid blows of sound were driving me mad! And now more noises broke out — the measured crash of volleys; cheers from the militia on the parapet; an uproar swelling all around me. I heard some one shout
, “Willett has entered the town!” and the next instant the smashing roll of drums broke out in the street, echoing back from façade and palisade, and I heard the fifes and hunting-horns playing “Soldiers’ Joy!” and the long double-shuffling of infantry on the run.

  The icy current of desperation flowed back into every vein. My mind cleared; I passed a steady hand over my eyes, looked around me, and, drawing the ranger’s whistle from my belt, set it to my lips.

  The clear, mellow call dominated the tumult. A man in deerskin dropped from the rifle-platform, another descended the ladder, others came running from the log bastions, all flocking around me like brown deer herding to the leader’s call.

  “Fall in!” I scarce knew my own voice.

  The eager throng of riflemen fell away into a long rank, stringing out across the jail yard.

  “Shoulder arms! Right dress! Right face! Call off!”

  The quick responses ran along the ranks: “Right! left! right! left! — —”

  “Right double!” I called. Then, as order followed order, the left platoon stepped forward, halted, and dressed.

  “Take care to form column by platoons right, right front. To the right — face! March!”

  The gates were flung wide as we passed through, and, wheeling, swung straight into the streets of Johnstown with a solid hurrah!

  A battalion of Massachusetts infantry was passing St. John’s Church, filling William Street with the racket of their drums. White cross-belts and rifles shining, the black-gaitered column plodded past, mounted officers leading. Then a field-piece, harness and chains clanking, came by, breasting the hill at a gallop, amid a tempest of cheers from my riflemen. And now the Tryon County men were passing in dusty ranks, and more riflemen came running up, falling in behind my company.

  “There’s Tim Murphy!” cried Elerson joyously. “He has your horse, Captain!”

  Down the hill from Burke’s Inn came Murphy on a run, leading my horse; behind him sped the Weasel and a rifleman named Sammons, and Burke himself, flourishing a rifle, all greeted lustily by the brown ranks behind me, amid shouts of laughter as Jimmy Burke, in cap and fluttering forest-dress, fell in with the others.