TRAILING THE FOX.
This dialogue was broken by a summons to the breakfast-table. We have
already intimated that while the hateful person of Stevens was an inmate
of his own house, William Hinkley remained, the better portion of his
time, at that of his cousin. It was not merely that Stevens was hateful
to his sight, but such was the devotion of his father and mother to that
adventurer, that the young man passed with little notice from either,
or if he incurred their attention at all, it was only to receive their
rebuke. He had not been able to disguise from them his dislike to
Stevens. This dislike showed itself in many ways--in coldness, distance,
silence--a reluctance to accord the necessary civilities, and in very
unequivocal glances of hostility from the eyes of the jealous young
villager.
Such offences against good-breeding were considered by them as so many
offences against God himself, shown to one who was about to profess
his ministry; and being prepared to see in Brother Stevens an object of
worth and veneration only, they lacked necessarily all that keenness
of discrimination which might have helped somewhat to qualify the
improprieties of which they believed their son to be guilty. Of his
causes of jealousy they had no suspicion, and they shared none of his
antipathies. He was subject to the daily lecture from the old man, and
the nightly exhortation and expostulation of the old woman. The latter
did her spiriting gently. The former roared and thundered. The mother
implored and kissed--the father denounced and threatened. The one,
amidst the faults of her you which she reproved, could see his virtues;
she could also see that he was suffering--she knew not why--as well as
sinning; the other could only see an insolent, disobedient boy who was
taking airs upon himself, flying in the face of his parents, and doomed
to perish like the sons of Eli, unless by proving himself a better
manager than Eli, he addressed himself in time to the breaking in of
the unruly spirit whose offences promised to be so heinous. It was
not merely from the hateful sight of his rival, or the monotonous
expostulation of his mother, that the poor youth fled; it was sometimes
to escape the heavily chastening hand of his bigoted father.
These things worked keenly and constantly in the mind of William
Hinkley. They acquired additional powers of ferment from the coldness of
Margaret Cooper, and from the goadings of his cousin. Naturally one of
the gentlest of creatures, the young man was not deficient in spirit.
What seemed to his more rude and elastic relative a token of imbecility,
was nothing more than the softening influence of his reflective and
mental over his physical powers. These, under the excitement of his
blood were necessarily made subject to his animal impulses, and when he
left the house that morning, with his Blackstone under his arm, on
his way to the peaceful cottage of old Calvert, where he pursued his
studies, his mind was in a perfect state of chaos. Of the chapter which
he had striven to compass the previous night, in which the rights of
persons are discussed with the usual clearness of style, but the usual
one-sidedness of judgment of that smooth old monarchist, William Hinkley
scarcely remembered a solitary syllable. He had read only with his eyes.
His mind had kept no pace with his proceedings, and though he strove as
he went along to recall the heads of topics, the points and principles
of what he had been reading, his efforts at reflection, by insensible
but sudden transitions, invariably concluded with some image of strife
and commotion, in which he was one of the parties and Alfred Stevens
another; the beautiful, proud face of Margaret Cooper being always
unaccountably present, and seeming to countenance, with its scornful
smiles, the spirit of strife which operated upon the combatants.
This mood had the most decided effect upon his appearance; and the
good old man, Calvert, whose attention had been already drawn to the
condition of distress and suffering which he manifested, was now more
than ever struck with the seemingly sudden increase of this expression
upon his face. It was Saturday--the saturnalia of schoolboys--and a day
of rest to the venerable teacher. He was seated before his door, under
the shadows of his paternal oak, once more forgetting the baffled aims
and profitless toils of his own youthful ambition, in the fascinating
pages of that historical romancer the stout Abbe Vertot. But a glance at
the youth soon withdrew his mind from this contemplation, and the sombre
pages of the present opened upon his eye, and the doubtful ones of the
future became, on the instant, those which he most desired to peruse.
The study of the young is always a study of the past with the old. They
seem, in such a contemplation, to live over the records of memory. They
feel as one just returning from a long and weary journey, who encounters
another, freshly starting to traverse the same weary but inviting track.
Something in the character of William Hinkley, which seemed to resemble
his own, made this feeling yet more active in the mind of Mr. Calvert;
and his earnest desire was to help the youth forward on the path which,
he soon perceived, it was destined that the other should finally take.
He was not satisfied with the indecision of character which the youth
displayed. But how could he blame it harshly? It was in this very
respect that his own character had failed, and though he felt that all
his counsels were to be addressed to this point, yet he knew not where;
or in what manner, to begin. The volume of Blackstone which the youth
carried suggested to him a course, however. He bade the young man bring
out a chair, and taking the book in his hand, he proceeded to examine
him upon parts of the volume which he professed to have been reading.
This examination, as it had the effect of compelling the mind of the
student to contract itself to a single subject of thought, necessarily
had the further effect of clearing it somewhat from the chaos of clouds
which had been brooding over it, obscuring the light, and defeating
the warmth of the intellectual sun behind them; and if the examination
proved the youth to have been very little of a student, or one who had
been reading with a vacant mind, it also proved that the original powers
of his intellect were vigorous and various--that he had an analytical
capacity of considerable compass; was bold in opinion, ingenious in
solution, and with a tendency to metaphysical speculation, which,
modified by the active wants and duties of a large city-practice, would
have made him a subtle lawyer, and a very logical debater. But the blush
kept heightening on the youth's cheeks as the examination proceeded. He
had answered, but he felt all the while how much his answer had sprung
from his own conjectures and how little from his authorities. The
examination convinced him that the book had been so much waste-paper
under his thumb. When it was ended the old man closed the volume, laid
it on the sward beside him, and looked, with a mingled expression of
interest and commiseration, on his face. William Hinkley noted this
expression, and spoke, with a degree of mortification in look and
accent, which he did not attempt to hide:--
“I am afraid, sir, you will make nothing of me. I can make nothing of
myself. I am almost inclined to give up in despair. I will be nothing--I
can be nothing. I feared as much from the beginning, sir. You only waste
your time on me.”
“You speak too fast, William--you let your blood mingle too much with
your thoughts. Let me ask you one question. How long will you be content
to live as you do now--seeking nothing--performing nothing--being
nothing?”
The youth was silent.
“I, you see, am nothing,” continued the old man--“nay, do not interrupt
me. You will tell me, as you have already told me, that I am much, and
have done much, here in Charlemont. But, for all that I am, and have
done here, I need not have gone beyond my accidence. My time has been
wasted; my labors, considered as means to ends, were unnecessary; I have
toiled without the expected profits of toil; I have drawn water in a
sieve. It is not pleasant for me to recall these things, much less to
speak of them; but it is for your good that I told you my story. You
have, as I had, certain defects of character--not the same exactly, but
of the same family complexion. To be something, you must be resolved.
You must devote yourself, heart and mind, with all your soul and with
all your strength, to the business you have undertaken. Shut your
windows against the sunshine, your ears to the song of birds, your heart
against the fascinations of beauty; and if you never think of the last
until you are thirty, you will be then a better judge of beauty, a truer
lover, a better husband, a more certain candidate for happiness. Let
me assure you that, of the hundred men that take wives before they are
thirty, there is scarcely one who, in his secret soul, does not repent
it--scarcely one who does not look back with yearning to the days when
he was free.”
There was a pause. The young man became very much agitated. He rose from
his chair, walked apart for a few moments, and then, returning, resumed
his seat by the old man.
“I believe you are right, sir--nay, I know you are; but I can not be
at once--I can not promise--to be all that you wish. If Margaret Cooper
would consent, I would marry her to-morrow.”
The old man shook his head, but remained silent. The young one
proceeded:--
“One thing I will say, however: I will take to my studies after this
week, whatever befalls, with the hearty resolution which you recommend.
I will try to shut out the sunshine and the song. I will endeavor to
devote soul and strength, and heart and mind, to the task before me. I
KNOW that I can master these studies--I think I can”--he continued,
more modestly, modifying the positive assertion--“and I know that it is
equally my interest and duty to do so. I thank you sir, very much for
what you have told me. Believe me, it has not fallen upon heedless or
disrespectful ears.”
The old man pressed his hand.
“I know THAT, my son, and I rejoice to think that, having given me these
assurances, you will strive hard to make them good.”
“I will, sir!” replied William, taking up his cap to depart.
“But whither are you going now?”
The youth blushed as he replied frankly:--
“To the widow Cooper's. I'm going to see Margaret.”
“Well, well!” said the old man, as the youth disappeared, “if it must be
done, the sooner it's over the better. But there's another moth to the
flame. Fortunately, he will be singed only; but she!--what is left
for her--so proud, yet so confiding--so confident of strength, yet so
artless? But it is useless to look beyond, and very dismal.”
And the speaker once more took up Vertot, and was soon lost amid the
glories of the knights of St. John. His studies were interrupted by the
sudden and boisterous salutation of Ned Hinkley:--
“Well, gran'pa, hard at the big book as usual? No end to the fun of
fighting, eh? I confess, if ever I get to love reading, it'll be in some
such book as that. But reading's not natural to me, though you made me
do enough of it while you had me. Bill was the boy for the books, and
I for the hooks. By-the-way, talking of hooks, how did those trout eat?
Fine, eh? I haven't seen you since the day of our ducking.”
“No, Ned, and I've been looking for you. Where have you been?”
“Working, working! Everything's been going wrong. Lines snapped,
fiddle-strings cracked, hooks missing, gun rusty, and Bill Hinkley so
sulky, that his frown made a shadow on the wall as large and ugly as a
buffalo's. But where is he? I came to find him here.”
While he was speaking, the lively youth squatted down, and deliberately
took his seat on the favorite volume which Mr. Calvert had laid upon the
sward at his approach.
“Take the chair, Ned,” said the old man, with a smaller degree of
kindness in his tone than was habitual with him. “Take the chair.
Books are sacred things--to be worshipped and studied, not employed as
footstools.”
“Why, what's the hurt, gran'pa?” demanded the young man, though he rose
and did as he was bidden. “If 'twas a fiddle, now, there would be some
danger of a crash, but a big book like that seems naturally made to sit
upon.”
The old man answered him mildly:--
“I have learned to venerate books, Ned, and can no more bear to see
them abused than I could bear to be abused myself. It seems to me like
treating their writers and their subjects with scorn. If you were to
contemplate the venerable heads of the old knights with my eyes and
feelings, you would see why I wish to guard them from everything like
disrespect.”
“Well, I beg their pardon--a thousand pardons! I meant no offence,
gran'pa--and can't help thinking that it's all a notion of yours, your
reverencing such old Turks and Spaniards that have been dead a thousand
years. They were very good people, no doubt, but I'm thinking they've
served their turn; and I see no more harm in squatting upon their
histories than in walking over their graves, which, if I were in their
country of Jericho--that was where they lived, gran'pa, wa'n't it?--I
should be very apt to do without asking leave, I tell you.”
Ned Hinkley purposely perverted his geography and history. There was a
spice of mischief in his composition, and he grinned good-naturedly as
he watched the increasing gravity upon the old man's face.
“Come, come, gran'pa, don't be angry. You know my fun is a sort of
fizz--there's nothing but a flash--nothing to hurt--no shotting. But
where's Bill Hinkley, gran'pa?”
“Gone to the widow Cooper's, to see Margaret.”
“Ah! well, I'm glad he's made a beginning. But I'd much rather he'd have
seen the other first.”
“What other do you mean?” demanded the old man; but the speaker, though
sufficiently random and reckless in what he said, saw the impolicy
of allowing the purpose of his cousin in regard to Stevens to be
understood. He contrived to throw the inquirer off.
“Gran'pa, do you know there's something in this fellow Stevens that
don't altogether please me? I'm not satisfied with him.”
“Ah, indeed! what do you see to find fault with?”
“Well, you see, he comes here pretending to study. Now, in the first
place, why should he come here to study? why didn't he stay at home with
his friends and parents?”
“Perhaps he had neither. Perhaps he had no home. You might as well ask
me why I came here, and settled down, where I was not born--where I had
neither friends nor parents.”
“Oh, no, but you told us why,” said the other. “You gave us a reason for
what you did.”
“And why may not the stranger give a reason too?”
“He don't, though.”
“Perhaps he will when you get intimate with him. I see nothing in
this to be dissatisfied with. I had not thought you so suspicious, Ned
Hinkley--so little charitable.”
“Charity begins at home, gran'pa. But there's more in this matter.
This man comes here to study to be a parson. How does he study? Can you
guess?”
“I really can not.”
“By dressing spruce as a buck--curling his hair backward over his ears
something like a girl's, and going out, morning, noon, and night, to see
Margaret Cooper.”
“As there is no good reason to suppose that a student of divinity
is entirely without the affections of humanity, I still see nothing
inconsistent with his profession in this conduct.”
“But how can he study?”
“Ah! it may be inconsistent with his studies though not with his
profession. It is human without being altogether proper. You see that
your cousin neglects his studies in the same manner. I presume that the
stranger also loves Miss Cooper.”
“But he has no such right as Bill Hinkley.”
“Why not?”
“Why not? Why, Bill is a native here, has been loving her for the last
year or more. His right certainly ought to be much greater than that of
a man whom nobody knows--who may be the man in the moon for anything we
know to the contrary--just dropped in upon us, nobody knows how, to do
nobody knows what.”
“All that may be very true, Ned, and yet his right to seek Miss Cooper
may be just as good as that of yourself or mine. You forget that it all
depends upon the young lady herself whether either of them is to have a
right at all in her concerns.”
“Well, that's a subject we needn't dispute about, gran'pa, when there's
other things. Now, isn't it strange that this stranger should ride off
once a week with his valise on his saddle, just as if he was starting on
a journey--should be gone half a day--then come back with his nag all
in a foam, and after that you should see him in some new cravat, or
waistcoat, or pantaloons, just as if he had gone home and got a change?”
“And does he do that?” inquired Mr. Calvert, with some show of
curiosity.
“That he does, and he always takes the same direction; and it seems--so
Aunt Sarah herself says, though she thinks him a small sort of divinity
on earth--that the day before, he's busy writing letters, and, according
to her account, pretty long letters too. Well, nobody sees that he ever
gets any letters in return. He never asks at the post-office, so Jacob
Zandts himself tells me, and that's strange enough, too, if so be he has
any friends or relations anywhere else.”
Mr. Calvert listened with interest to these and other particulars which
his young companion had gathered respecting the habits of the stranger;
and he concurred with his informant in the opinion that there was
something in his proceedings which was curious and perhaps mysterious.
Still, he did not think it advisable to encourage the prying and
suspicious disposition of the youth, and spoke to this effect in the
reply which finally dismissed the subject. Ned Hinkley was silenced not
satisfied.
“There's something wrong about it,” he muttered to himself on leaving
the old man, “and, by dickens! I'll get to the bottom of it, or there's
no taste in Salt-river. The fellow's a rascal; I feel it if I don't know
it, and if Bill Hinkley don't pay him off, I must. One or t'other must
do it, that's certain.”
With these reflections, which seemed to him to be no less moral than
social, the young man took his way back to the village, laboring with
all the incoherence of unaccustomed thought, to strike out some process
by which to find a solution for those mysteries which were supposed to
characterize the conduct of the stranger. He had just turned out of
the gorge leading from Calvert's house into the settlement, when he
encountered the person to whom his meditations were given, on horseback;
and going at a moderate gallop along the high-road to the country.
Stevens bowed to him and drew up for speech as he drew nigh. At first
Ned Hinkley appeared disposed to avoid him, but moved by a sudden
notion, he stopped and suffered himself to speak with something more of
civility than he had hitherto shown to the same suspected personage.
“Why, you're not going to travel, Parson Stevens,” said he--“you're not
going to leave us, are you?”
“No, sir--I only wish to give myself and horse a stretch of a few miles
for the sake of health. Too much stable, they say, makes a saucy nag.”
“So it does, and I may say, a saucy man too. But seeing you with your
valise, I thought you were off for good.”
Stevens said something about his being so accustomed to ride with the
valise that he carried it without thinking.
“I scarcely knew I had it on!”
“That's a lie all round,” said Ned Hinkley to himself as the other rode
off. “Now, if I was mounted, I'd ride after him and see where he goes
and what he's after. What's to hinder? It's but a step to the stable,
and but five minutes to the saddle. Dang it, but I'll take trail this
time if I never did before.”