The Lost Hunter

by John Turvill Adams

  CHAPTER XVI.

  _Dogberry_.--You are thought here to be the most senseless and fit man for the constable of the watch; therefore, bear you the lantern. This is your charge; you shall comprehend all vagrom men.

  MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING.

  It may well be supposed that the misadventures on the ice were illcalculated to soothe the excited mind of the constable. He bore agrudge towards the Solitary before, for his failure and the beatinghe had received at the island, and now to be made the object of suchabuse in the presence of his townsmen, and that on account of a personwhom he looked down upon as a sort of vagrant, was more than hisphilosophy could bear. For Basset, with that kind of logic which is socommon with a certain class of people, could not avoid regarding theRecluse as the culpable cause of his misfortune in both instances. "Ifhe hadn't gone agin the law," he said to himself, "I shouldn't havetried to take him; and if I hadn't tried to take him, I shouldn't havebeen treated so." Whatever Hedge or Mills may think of such logic, itwas satisfactory to Basset.

  His lucubrations, moreover, were very different in the daytime fromthose in the solemn shades of night. As ghosts are said to disappearwhen they scent the morning air, so the constable's apprehensions ofthem fled at the rising of the sun. When in the dark at the island hereceived the blow that prostrated him on the earth, he was unableto determine in his confusion, whether it had been inflicted by thefisherman's ghost or by Holden. It never crossed his mind that itmight have come from any one else. On this subject he had mused duringthe whole time of his return from his nocturnal disaster, withoutbeing able to arrive at any conclusion. If in those witching hours,when the stars gleamed mysteriously through the drifting clouds,and the wind moaned among the bare branches, he was inclined to oneopinion rather than to another, it was to that which would attributethe blow to the ghost. But with the light of returning day the currentof his thoughts changed. Things assumed an altered aspect. Fearsof inhabitants of an unseen world vanished, and Basset was angry athimself for entertaining such silly imaginations. It was now evidentthat Holden by some means had obtained a knowledge of the design tocapture him, or had suspected it, or had noticed the approach of theboat and laid in wait to take a most unjustifiable revenge. "I wishI could prove it," thought Basset; "if I wouldn't make him smart forstriking an officer!"

  We shall not be surprised to find that the constable feeling thus,provided himself with another warrant. Smarting under a sense ofinjury, both as a man and a baffled administrator of the law, he hadimmediately sought the Justice, revealed the loss of the instrument,and procured another. Upon returning to the river, where he hoped totriumph in the presence of those who had witnessed his disgrace,over one whom he now regarded as an enemy, he found to his infinitemortification that the bird had flown. He dared not follow alone, andmeditating vengeance, he kept the fatal document safely depositedin his pocket-book, where "in grim repose" it waited for a favorableopportunity and its prey.

  On the following Monday morning, the constable met Gladding in thestreet, whom he had not seen since the latter assisted him on the ice.

  "How are you?" cried Tom, seizing him by the hand, and affecting thegreatest pleasure at the meeting; "how do you feel after your row,friend Basset?"

  "Oh, pretty well," answered the constable; "how is it with you?

  "Alive and kicking," said Tom. "But, Basset, you hain't got the dentsout o' your hat, I see."

  "No, and I don't expect they ever will come out. It's good as twodollars damage to me," he added, taking off the hat and looking at itwith a woeful face. "You're a little to blame for it, too, Tom."

  "Me! You ongrateful critter," exclaimed Gladding, indignantly. "Youwant me to give you a new hat, don't ye?"

  "What made you ask if I'd got the warrant?"

  "I never said no such a thing. I only said sort o' promiscuously, youhadn't showed your document."

  "Well, what was the use o' that? If you'd kept still there wouldn'tbeen no fuss."

  "Who'd ha' thought you'd ha' gone to take a man without being ableto show your authority? Now I call that plaguy green, Basset. But whostood by you when everybody else desarted you, and got you out fromunder them rough boys, and helped you clean out o' the scrape? Darn itall, Basset, you're the ongratefullest varmint I ever did see, when,in a manner, I saved your life. Really, I did think, instead o'blowing a fellow up in this way, you'd a stood treat."

  "So I will," said Basset, who began to fancy he had found too muchfault, and was unwilling to lose his ally; "so come along intoJenkins', and we'll take it on the spot. But you must give in, Tom,your observation was unfortunate"

  "Unfortunate for you," returned Tom; "but I guess Holden thought'twasn't unfortunate for him. Howsomever, you'll let the old fellowslip now, won't you?"

  "Let him slip!" almost screamed the exasperated Basset, whom Tom'smanner of treating the subject was not calculated to mollify. "Lethim slip, you say. I'll see him, I'll see him"--but in vain he soughtwords to express the direful purpose; language broke down under theeffort.

  "Poh, poh," said Tom, "don't take on so, man--forget andforgive--luck's been on his side, that's all."

  "I tell you what," said Basset, "who do you think struck me the othernight?"

  "Why, what could it be but Lanfear's ghost?"

  "Don't talk to me about sperits; whose afraid o' them? But tell us onething, did you see Holden when you looked into the window!"

  "What makes you ask?" said the cautious Tom, "supposing I did, orsupposing I didn't?"

  "'Cause I know you didn't. Now it's my opinion," said Basset, loweringhis voice and looking round suspiciously as if he were afraid of anaction for slander should he be overheard, "that Holden himself madethe assault."

  "That ain't possible," said Gladding, confidently. "You and Primestood by the door and would ha' seen him if he'd come out there, and Iknow he didn't jump out o' the window, for I should ha' seen him."

  "But, perhaps he wasn't in the house at all," persisted Basset;"it was plaguy dark, and perhaps he heard us coming and hid himselfoutside on purpose to play the trick and take an unfair advantage onus."

  "You'll never make me believe that story," said Gladding, shaking hishead. "I'd as soon believe it was me as the old man. Prime and me areof the same opinion, and we should both be witnesses agin you."

  The two, at this stage of the conversation, reached the door ofthe grocer's shop, into which we will not follow them, but turn ourattention elsewhere.

  Meanwhile, the cause of all this excitement was quietly pursuingthe ordinary tenor of his life. It will have been observed that whenBasset attempted to arrest him, Holden did not even inquire with whatoffence he was charged, unless demanding the production of the warrantmay be considered so, and that upon the constable relinquishinghis purpose, he turned away without giving any attention to theobservations addressed to him. It is not probable that his designwas to avoid the service of process, all unconscious as he was of anyviolation of the laws of the State; and certain it is he made notthe slightest difference in his habits. As before, he pursued hisoccupation of basket-making at his hut and his recreations offishing and strolling through the woods, as though no such formidablecharacter as Basset was in existence. If he did not appear in thevillage it was an accidental circumstance, it being only at irregularintervals that he ever made his appearance there. Thus, then, passeda week longer; the petulant constable on the watch, and the steadymalignity of Davenport gradually becoming impatient for gratification.But the little drama had a course of its own to run.

  One morning Primus saw the tall figure of Holden passing his cabin.The veteran was at the window smoking his pipe when the Recluse firstcame in sight. A secret must have been very closely kept, indeed, inthe village, not to come to his ears, and the warlike equipment andintentions of Basset were well known to him. "Dere he come," said thenegro to himself, "jist like a fly flying into de spider-web. I guessI gib him warning." With this benevolent intention, Primus went to thedoor, and as Holden app
roached, addressed him with the salutationof the morning. It was courteously acknowledged, and the Generalcommenced as if he wished to engage in a conversation.

  "Beautiful wedder dis marning, Missa Holden."

  "Old man, thy days are too short to be wasted in chattering about theweather," said Holden. "Speak, if thou hast aught to say."

  The General's attempt at familiarity was effectually checked, and hefelt somewhat chagrined at the reply; but for all that he would notgive up his friendly purpose.

  "Dey say," he said, with military precision, "dat de Constable Bassethab a warrant agin Missa Holden."

  "Thanks, Primus," said Holden, resuming his walk, "but I fear the faceof no man."

  "De obstinate pusson!" exclaimed the negro. "And den to talk about myshort day! Dat is bery onpleasaut. Short day, Missa Holden, eh? Not asyou knows on. I can tell you dis child born somewhere about de twentyob June (at any rate de wedder was warm), and mean to lib accordingly.Oh, you git out, Missa Holden! Poor parwarse pusson! What a pity hehab no suspect for de voice ob de charmer! I always hear," he added,chuckling, in that curious, mirth-inspiring way so peculiar to theblacks, "dat de black snake know how to charm best, but all sign failin dry wedder, and de pan flash in de powder dis time."

  Holden paid not the least regard to the information. According to hissystem of fatalism he would have considered it beyond his power toalter the predetermined course of things, but it is not probable thathis mind dwelt upon the thought of personal security. He went straightforward to the village, calling at places where he thought he wouldmost likely find customers for his wares, and in no respect avoidingpublic observation. He had sold his baskets, and was on his return tothe river, over whose frozen surface lay his road home, when he behelda scene that solicited his attention and arrested his steps.

  It was an Indian burial. Holden in his round had strolled as faras the piece of table land, of which mention was made in the firstchapter, to a distance of nearly a mile from the head of the Severn,and was at the moment opposite a spot reserved by the tribe, of whicha small number were lingering in the neighborhood, as the reveredresting-place of the bones of their ancestors, whence they themselveshoped to start for the happy hunting grounds. It was a place ofsingular beauty, selected apparently with a delicate appreciation ofthe loveliness of the scenery, for nowhere else in the vicinity wasthere so attractive a combination of hill and dale, and wood andwater, to compose a landscape.

  The little burying-ground, shorn of its original dimensions bythe encroachments of the fatal race that came from the rising sun,contained less than half an acre, and was situated at the top of aravine, running down from the level land, on which the gravestoneswere erected, to the Yaupaae, where that river expands itself intoa lake. The sides of the ravine, along its whole sweep upwards, wascovered quite to the top with immense oaks and chestnuts, the growthof centuries, interspersed with ash trees, while in the colder andmoister part in the centre, the smooth-barked birch threw out itsgnarled branches. There was no undergrowth, and under and between thelimbs of the trees, the eye caught a view towards the south of thewidened Yaupaae and of the islands that dotted its surface, with hillssweeping round in a curve, and presenting an irregular outline likethat made by the backs of a school of porpoises. Towards the threeother quarters of the compass, a level plain extended for a shortdistance, and then was broken up into an undulating surface which roseinto eminences covered with woods that hemmed in the whole. The fallsof the Yaupaae were at a distance of only a few rods, but invisible,being hidden by the plain that occupied the intervening space, at anelevation of some forty feet higher than the point where the river,rushing down its rocky bed, made its presence known by a ceaselessroar, and seemed to chant a dirge over the vanished greatness of thetribe.

  Here were assembled some sixty or seventy Indians to perform therights of sepulture to one of their number. No vestige of theiroriginal wildness was to be traced among them. They were clothed inthe garments of civilization, but of a coarse and mean quality, andappeared broken down and dispirited. One half, at least, were women,and at the moment of which we are speaking they were collectingtogether from among the blue slate gravestones, where they had beendispersed, around a newly dug grave. The rites were of a Christiancharacter, and performed by an elder of one of the neighboringchurches, who offered up a prayer, on the conclusion of which heretired. The grave was immediately filled, and then commenced aceremony of a singular character.

  At a given signal the assembled company began with slow and measuredsteps, and in silence, to encircle the grave. It must have been acustom peculiar to the tribe, at least we do not recollect seeingit alluded to by any traveller or describer of Indian manners, andconsisted in walking one after the other around the grave, in themanner called Indian file, and recounting the good qualities of thedeparted; nor was it considered permissible to leave until somethinghad been said in his praise. The Indians walked round and round inunbroken silence, each one modestly waiting, as it seemed at first,for another to speak. But no one begun, and it soon became evidentthat some other cause than modesty restrained their speech. Thus,with downcast eyes, or casting side long glances at each other, as inexpectation of the wished-for eulogy, and with the deepest gravity,they followed round and round, but still with sealed lips. The defunctmust have been a strange being to deserve no commendation. Couldit be? Did he possess no one good quality by which he could beremembered? Had he never done a kind act? Could he not hunt, or fish,or make baskets, or plant corn, or beans, or potatoes? Surely he musthave been able to do something. Had it never happened that he did somegood by mistake? Perhaps that would answer the purpose. Or had hebeen the mere shape and appearance of a man, and nothing more? Hehad vanished like a shadow; was he as unsubstantial? Were they notmistaken in supposing he had lived among them! Had he been a dream?

  Confused thoughts like these passed through the simple minds of therude race, as with tired steps they followed one another in that wearyround. But was there to be no cessation of those perpetual gyrations?Yet no gesture, no devious step betrayed impatience. On they went, asif destined to move thus for ever. Looks long and earnest began now tobe cast upon the new-made hillock, as if striving to draw inspirationthence, or reproaching its tenant with his unworthiness. Noinspiration came, and gradually the steps became slower and morelanguid, yet still the measured tread went on. A darker and darkercloud settled on their weary faces, but they could not stop; the dutywas too sacred to remain unfulfilled. They could not leave without aword to cheer their friend upon his way, and yet the word came not.When would some one speak? Who would relieve them from the difficulty?At length the countenance of an old squaw lighted up, and in lowtones she said, "He was a bery good smoker." The welcome words wereinstantly caught up by all, and with renewed strength each one movedon, and rejoicing at the solution of the dilemma, exclaimed, "He wasa bery good smoker." The charm had taken effect; the word ofaffectionate remembrance was spoken; the duty performed; and each withan approving conscience could now return home.

  What thin partitions divide the mirthful from the mournful, thesublime from the ridiculous! At the wedding we weep, and at thefuneral we can smile.

  Holden who had been standing with folded arms leaning against the railfence that enclosed the yard, and contemplating the ceremonies tillthe last Indian departed, now turned to leave, when the constable witha paper in one hand approached, and touching Holden with the other,told him he was his prisoner. The Solitary asked no questions, butwaving his hand to the constable to advance, followed him in silence.