“It ‘s me Tina, – I ‘ve come back, – be very still. I ‘m going to stay in the barn till everybody ‘s asleep, and then I ‘ll come and wake you, and you get out of the window and come with me.”
“To be sure I will, Harry. Let me come now, and sleep with you in the barn.”
“No, Tina, that would n’t do; lie still. They ‘d see us. Wait till everybody ‘s asleep. You just lie down and go to sleep. I ‘ll get in at your window and waken you when it ‘s time.”
At this moment the door of the child’s room was opened; the boy’s face was gone in an instant from the window. The child’s heart was beating like a trip-hammer; there was a tingling in her ears; but she kept her little eyes tightly shut.
“O, here ‘s that brown towel I gin her to hem,’ said Miss Asphyxia peacefully. “She ‘s done her stent this arternoon. That ‘ere whipping did some good.”
“You ‘ll never whip me again,” thought the defiant little heart under the bedclothes.
* * * * *
Old Crab came home that night thoroughly drunk, – a thing that did not very often occur in his experience. He commonly took only just enough to keep himself in a hyena’s state of temper, but not enough to dull the edge of his cautious, grasping, money-saving faculties. But to-night he had had a experience that had frightened him, and driven him to deeper excess as a refuge from thought.
When the boy, upon whom he was meaning to wreak his diabolic passions, so suddenly turned upon him in the electric fury of enkindled passion, there was a sort of jar or vibration of the nervous element in the man’s nature, that brought about a result not uncommon to men of his habits. As he was looking in a sort of stunned, stupid wonder at the boy, where he stood braced against the manger, he afterwards declared that he saw suddenly in the dark space above it, hovering in the air, the exact figure and form of the dead woman whom they had buried in the graveyard only a few weeks before. “Her eyes was looking right at me, like live coals,” he said; “and she had up her hand as if she ‘d ‘a’ struck me; and I grew all over cold as a stone.”
“What do you suppose ‘t was?” said his auditor.
“How should I know,” said Old Crab. “But there I was; and that very night the young ‘un ran off. I would n’t have tried to get him back, not for my right hand, I tell you. Tell you what,” he added, rolling a quid of tobacco reflectively in his mouth, “I don’t like dead folks. Ef dead folks ‘ll let me alone I ‘ll let them alone. That ‘ere fair, ain’t it?”
CHAPTER XIII.
THE EMPTY BIRD’S NEST.
THE next morning showed as brilliant a getting up of gold and purple as ever belonged to the toilet of a morning. There was to be seen from Miss Asphyxia’s bedroom window a brave sight, if there had been any eyes to enjoy it, – a range of rocky cliffs with little pin-feathers of black pine upon them, and behind them the sky all aflame with bars of massy light, – orange and crimson and burning gold, – and long, bright rays, darting hither and thither, touched now the window of a farm-house, which seemed to kindle and flash back a morning salutation; now they hit a tall scarlet maple, and now they pierced between clumps of pine, making their black edges flame with gold; and over all, in the brightening sky, stood the morning star, like a great, tremulous tear of light, just ready to fall on a darkened world.
Not a bit of all this saw Miss Asphyxia, though she had looked straight out at it. Her eyes and the eyes of the cow, who, with her horned front, was serenely gazing out of the barn window on the same prospect, were equally unreceptive.
She looked at all this solemn pomp of gold and purple, and the mysterious star, and only said: “Good day for killin’ the hog, and I must be up gettin’ on the brass kettle. I should like to know why Sol ain’t been a stirrin’ an hour ago. I ‘d really like to know how long folks would sleep ef I ‘d let ‘em.”
Here an indistinct vision came into Miss Asphyxia’s mind of what the world would be without her to keep it in order. She called aloud to her prime minster, who slept in the loft above, “Sol! Sol! You awake?”
“Guess I be,” said Sol; and a thundering sound of cowhide boots on the stairs announced that Sol’s matutinal toilet was complete.
“We ‘re late this morning,” said Miss Asphyxia, in a tone of virtuous indignation.
“Never knowed the time when we wa’ n’t late,” said Sol, composedly.
“You thump on that ‘ere child’s door, and tell her to be lively,” said Miss Asphyxia.
“Yaas ‘m I will,” said Sol, while secretly he was indulging in a long and low chuckle, for Sol had been party to the fact that the nest of that young bird had been for many hours forsaken. He had instructed the boy what road to take, and bade him “walk spry and he would be out of the parish of Needmore afore daybreak. Walk on, then, and follow the road along the river,” said Sol, “and it ‘ll bring you to Oldtown, where our folks be. You can’t miss your victuals and drink any day in Oldtown, call at what house you may; and ef you ‘s to get into Deacon Badger’s, why, your fortin ‘s made. The Deacon he ‘s a soft-spoken man to everybody, – white folks, niggers, and Indians, – and Ma’am Badger keeps regular poor-man’s tavern, and won’t turn even a dog away that behaves himself. Ye could n’t light on wus than ye have lit on, – for Old Crab’s possessed of a devil, everybody knows; and as for Miss Asphyxia, she ‘s one of the kind of sperits that goes walkin’ through dry places seekin’ rest and findin’ none. Lordy massy, an old gal like her ain’t nobody to bring up a child. It takes a woman that ‘s got juice in her to do that. Why, that ‘ere crittur ‘s drier ‘n a two-year-old mullen-stalk. There ain’t no sap ris in her these ‘ere thirty years. She means well; but, lordy, you might jest as well give young turkey chicks to the old gobbler, and let hem stram off in the mowin’ grass with ‘em, as give a delicate little gal like your sister to her to raise; so you jest go long and keep up your courage, like a brave boy as ye be, and you ‘ll come to somethin’ by daylight”; – and Sol added to these remarks a minced pie, with a rye crust of a peculiarly solid texture, adapted to resist any of the incidents of time and travel, which pie had been set out as part of his own last night’s supper.
When, therefore, he was exhorted to rap on the little girl’s door, he gave sundry noisy, gleeful thumps, – pounding with both fists, and alternating with a rhythmical kick of the cowhide boots, calling out in stentorian tones: “Come, little un, – time you ‘s up. Miss Sphyxy’s comin’ down on ye. Better be lively! Bless me, how the gal sleeps!”
“Don’t take the door off the hinges,” said Miss Asphyxia, sweeping down stairs. “Let me come; I ‘ll wake her, I guess!” and with a dipper of cold water in her hand, Miss Asphyxia burst into the little room. “What! – what! – where!” she said, looking under the bed, and over and around with a dazed expression. “What ‘s this mean? Do tell if the child ‘s really for once got up of herself afore I called her. Sol, see if she ‘s out pickin’ up chips!”
Sol opened the door and gazed out with well-affected stolidity at the wood-pile, which, garnished with a goodly show of large chips, was now being touched up and brightened by the first rays of the morning sun.
“Ain’t here,” he said.
“Ain’t here? Why, where can she be then? There ain’t nobody swallowed her, I s’pose; and if anybody ‘s run off with her in the night, I guess they ‘d bring her back by daylight.”
“She must ‘a’ run off,” said Sol.
“Run! Where could she ‘a’ run to?”
“Mebbe she ‘s gone to her brother ‘s.”
“I bet you,” said Miss Asphyxia, “it ‘s that ‘ere boy that ‘s the bottom of it all. You may always know that there ‘s a boy at the bottom, when there ‘s any deviltry up. He was here yesterday, – now wa’ n’t he?”
“Wal, I reckon he was,” said Sol. “But, massy, Miss Sphyxy, ef the pigs is to be killed to-day, we can’t stan’ a talkin’ about what you nor me can’t help. Ef the child ‘s gone, why she ‘s somewhere in the Lord’s worl
d, and it ‘s likely she ‘ll keep, – she won’t melt away like the manna in the wilderness; and when the pigs is killed, and the pork salted down and got out o’ the way, it ‘ll be time enough to think o’ lookin’ on her up. She wa’ n’t no gret actual use, – and with kettles o’ hot water round, it ‘s jest as well not to have a child under yer feet. Ef she got scalded, why, there ‘s your time a taking care on her, and mebbe a doctor to pay; so it ‘s jest as well that things be as they be. I call it kind o’ providential,” said Sol, giving a hoist to his breeches by means of a tug at his suspenders, which gesture was his usual indication that he was girding up the loins of his mind for an immediate piece of work; and, turning forthwith, he brought in a mighty armful of wood, with massive back-log and fore-stick, well grizzled and bearded with the moss that showed that they were but yesterday living children of the forest.
The fire soon leaped and crackled and roared, being well fed with choice split hickory sticks of last year, of which Sol kept ample store; and very soon the big brass kettle was swung over, upon the old iron crane, and the sacrificial water was beginning to simmer briskly, while Miss Asphyxia prepared breakfast, not only for herself and Sol, but for Primus King, a vigorous old negro, famed as a sort of high-priest in all manner of butchering operations for miles around. Primus lived in the debatable land between Oldtown and Needmore, and so was at the call of all who needed an extra hand in both parishes.
The appearance of Primus at the gate in his butcher’s frock, knife in hand, in fact put an end, in Miss Asphyxia’s mind, to all thoughts apart from the present eventful crisis; and she hastened to place upon the table the steaming sausages which, with her usual despatch, had been put down for their morning meal. A mighty pitcher of cider flanked this savory dish, to which Primus rolled delighted eyes at the moment of sitting down. The time had not yet dawned, in those simple, old New England days, when the black skin of the African was held to disqualify him from a seat at the social board with the men whom he joined in daily labor. The strength of the arm, and the skill of the hand, and the willingness of the mind of the workman, in those days, were his passport to equal social rights; and old Primus took rank, in the butchering season, as in fact a sort of leader and commander. His word was law upon all steps and stages of those operations which should transform the plethoric, obese inhabitants of the sty into barrels of pink-hued salt-pork or savory hams and tenderloins and spareribs, or immense messes of sausage-meat.
Concerning all these matters, Primus was an oracle. His fervid Ethiopian nature glowed with a broad and visible delight, his black face waxed luminous with the oil of gladness, while he dwelt on the savory subject, whereon, sitting at breakfast, he dilated with an unctuous satisfaction that soothed the raven down of darkness in Miss Asphyxia’s perturbed mind, till something bearing a distant analogy to a smile played over her rugged features.
CHAPTER XIV.
THE DAY IN FAIRY-LAND.
OUR little travellers, meanwhile, had had a prosperous journey along the rocky road between Needmore and Oldtown, in which Sol had planted their feet. There was a great, round-orbed, sober-eyed October moon in the sky, that made everything as light as day; and the children were alive in every nerve with the keen interest of their escape.
“We are going just as Hensel and Grettel did,” said the little girl. “You are Hensel, and I am Grettel, and Miss Asphyxia is the old witch. I wish only we could have burnt her up in her old oven before we came away!”
“Now Tina, you must n’t wish such things really,” said the boy, somewhat shocked at such very extreme measures. “You see, what happens in stories would n’t do really to happen.”
“O, but Harry, you don’t know how I hate – how I h-ate – Miss Sphyxy! I hate her – most as much as I love you!”
“But Tina, mother always told us it was wicked to hate anybody. We must love our enemies.”
“You don’t love Old Crab Smith, do you?”
“No, I don’t; but I try not to hate him,” said the boy. “I won’t think anything about him.”
“I can’t help thinking,” said Tina; “and when I think, I am so angry! I feel such a burning in here!” she said, striking her little breast; “it ‘s just like fire!”
“Then don’t think about her at all,” said the boy; “it is n’t pleasant to feel that way. Think about the whippoorwills singing in the woods over there, – how plain they say it, don’t they? – and the frogs, all singing, with their little, round, yellow eyes looking up out of the water; and the moon looking down on us so pleasantly! she seems just like mother!”
“O Harry, I ‘m so glad,” said the girl, suddenly throwing herself on his neck and hugging him, – “I ‘m so glad we ‘re together again! Was n’t it wicked to keep us apart, – we poor children?”
“Yes, Tina, I am glad,” said the boy, with a steady, quiet, inward sort of light in his eyes; “but, baby, we can’t stop to say so much, because we must walk fast and get way, way, way off before daylight; and you know Miss Sphyxy always gets up early, – don’t she?”
“O dear, yes! She always poked me out of bed before it was light, – hateful old thing! Let ‘s run as fast as we can, and get away!”
And with that she sprang forward, with a brisk and onward race, over the pebbly road, down a long hill, laughing as she went, and catching now at a branch of sweetbrier that overhung the road, and now at the tags of sweet-fern, both laden and hoary with heavy autumnal dews, till finally, her little foot tripping over a stone, she fell and grazed her arm sadly. Her brother lifted her up, and wiped the tears from her great, soft eyes with her blue check apron, and talked to her in that grandfatherly way that older children take such delight in when they feel the care of younger ones.
“Now, Tina, darling, you should n’t run so wild. We ‘d better go pretty fast steadily, than run and fall down. But I ‘ll kiss the place, as mother used to.”
“I don’t mind it, Hensel, – I don’t mind it,” she said, controlling the quivering of her little resolute mouth. “That scratch came for liberty; but this,” she said, showing a long welt on her other arm, – “this was slavery. She struck me there with her great ugly stick. O, I never can forgive her!”
“Don’t let ‘s talk any more, baby; let ‘s hurry on. She never shall get you again; I ‘ll fight for you till I die, first!”
“You ‘d kill ’em all, would n’t you? You would have knocked her down, would n’t you?” said Tina, kindling up with that inconsiderate exultation in the powers of an elder brother which belongs to childhood. “I knew you would get me away from here, Harry, – I knew you would.”
“But now,” said Harry, “you just keep hold of my hand, and let ‘s run together, and I ‘ll hold you up. We must run fast, after all, because maybe they will harness up the wagon when daylight comes, and come out to look for us.”
“Well, if it ‘s only Sol comes,” said the little girl, “I sha’ n’t care; for he would only carry us on farther.”
“Ay, but you may be sure Miss Asphyxia would come herself.”
The suggestion seemed too probable, and the two little pairs of heels seemed winged by it as they flew along, their long shadows dancing before them on the moonlit road, like spiritual conductors. They made such good headway that the hour which we have already recorded, when Miss Asphyxia’s slumbers were broken, found the pair of tiny pilgrims five miles away on the road to Oldtown.
“Now, Tina,” said the boy, as he stopped to watch the long bars of crimson and gold that seemed to be drawing back and opening in the eastern sky, where the sun was flaring upward an expectant blaze of glory, “only look there! Is n’t it so wonderful? It ‘s worth being out here only to see it. There! there! there! the sun is coming! Look! Only see that bright-eyed maple – it seems all on fire! – now that yellow chestnut, and that old pine-tree! O, see, see those red leaves! They are like the story papa used to tell of the trees that bore rubies and emeralds. Are n’t they beautiful?”
“Set me on the
fence, so as I can see,” said Tina. “O Harry, it ‘s beautiful! And to think that we can see it together!”
Just at this moment they caught the distant sound of wheels.
“Hurry, Tina! Let me lift you over the fence,” said the boy; “they are coming!”
How the little hearts beat, as both children jumped down into a thicket of sweet-fern, heavy and wet with morning dew! The lot was one of those confused jungles which one often sees hedging the course of rivers in New England. Groups of pine and hemhock grew here and there, intermixed with low patches of swampy land, which were waving with late wild-flowers and molding swamp-grasses. The children tore their way through goldenrods, asters, and cat-tails to a little elevated spot where a great, flat rock was surrounded by a hedge of white-pine. This was precisely the shelter they wanted; for the pines grew so thickly around it as completely to screen it from sight from the road, while it was open to the warm beams of the morning sun.
“Cuddle down here, Tina,” said Harry, in a whispering voice, as if he feared the driver in the rattling farm-wagon might hear them.
“O, what a nice little house the trees make here!” said Tina. “We are as snug here and as warm as can be; and only see what a nice white-and-green carpet there is all over the rock!”
Complete Works of Harriet Beecher Stowe Page 252
