THE LODGE IN THE HILLS.
Sitting by the crackling twigs which drove away the cool airs of the
autumn night with their inspiring warmth, the young man, whose early
fortunes we have thus far endeavored to narrate, leaned his head upon
his hand, and mused and dreamed.
Overhead the shadows played upon the rafters; around him, the
firelight lit up the wild and uncouth interior, with its sleeping
hounds, and guns, and fishing-rods, and chests; on the opposite side
of the fire-place, the old Indian woman was indulging, like Verty, in
a reverie.
From time to time, Longears or Wolf would stir in their sleep, and
growl, engaged in dreaming of some forest adventure which concerned
itself with deer or other game; or the far cry of the whip-poor-will
would echo through the forest; or the laughter of the owl suddenly
come floating on, borne on the chill autumn wind.
This, with the crackle of the twigs, was all which disturbed the
silence of the solitary lodge.
The silence lasted for half an hour, at the end of which time Verty
changed his position, and sighed. Then looking at the old woman with
great affection, the young man said:
"I was thinking who I was; and I wanted to ask you, _ma mere_--tell
me."
The old woman looked startled at this address, but concealing her
emotion with the marvellous skill of her people, replied in her
guttural accent--
"My son wants to know something?"
"Yes, _ma mere_, that is it. I want to know if I really am your son."
The old woman turned her eyes from Verty.
"The fawn knows the deer, and the bear's cub knows his fellows,"
continued Verty, gazing into the fire; "but they laugh at me. I don't
know my tribe."
"Our tribe is the Delaware," said the old Indian woman evasively--"
they came from the great woods like a river."
"Like a river? Yes, they know their source. But where did I spring
from, _ma mere_?"
"Where was my son born?"
"Yes, tell me everything," said Verty; "tell me if I am your son.
Do not tell me that you love me as a son, or that I love you as my
mother. I know that--but am I a Delaware?"
"Why does my son ask?"
"Because a bird of the air whispered to me--'You are not a Delaware,
nor a Tuscarora, nor a Dacotah; you are a pale face.' Did the bird
lie!"
The old woman did not answer.
"_Ma mere_," said Verty, tenderly taking the old woman's hand and
sitting at her feet, "the Great Spirit has made me honest and open--I
cannot conceal anything. I cannot pry and search. I might find out
this from some other person--who knows? But I will not try. Come!
speak with a straight tongue. Am I the son of a brave; am I a
Delaware; or am I what my face makes me out--a Long-knife?"
"Ough! ough! ough!" groaned the old woman; "he wants to go, away from
the nest where he was warmed, and nursed, and brought up. The Great
Spirit has put evil into his heart--it is cold."
"No, no," said Verty, earnestly--"my heart is red, not white; every
drop of my life-blood is yours, _ma mere_; you have loved me,
cherished me: when my muscles were soft and hot with fever, you laid
my head upon your bosom, and rocked me to sleep as softly as the
topmost bough of the oak rocks the oriole; you loved me always. My
heart shall run out of my breast and soak the ground, before it turns
white; yet, I love you, and you love me. But, _ma mere_, I have grown
well nigh to manhood; the bird's song is changed, and the dove has
flown to me--the dove yonder at Apple Orchard--"
"Ough!" groaned the old woman, rocking to and fro; "she is black! She
has made you bad!"
"No, no! she is white--she is good. She told me about the Great
Spirit, and makes me pure."
"Ough! ough!"
"She is as pure as the bow in the cloud," continued Verty; "and I
did not mean that the dove was the bird who whispered, that I was no
Delaware. No--my own heart says, 'know--find out.'"
"And why should the heart say 'know?'" said the old woman, still
rocking about, and looking at Verty with anxious affection. "Why
should my son seek to find?"
"Because the winds are changed and sing new songs; the leaves whisper,
as I pass, with a new voice; and even the clouds are not what they
were to me when I ran after the shadows floating along the hills, and
across the hollows. I have changed, _ma mere_, and the streams talk no
more with the same tongue. I hear the flags and water-lilies muttering
as I pass, and the world opens on me with a new, strange light. They
talked to me once; now they laugh at me as I pass. Hear the trees,
yonder! Don't you hear them? They are saying, 'The Delaware paleface!
look at him! look at him!'"
And crouching, with dreamy eyes, Verty for a moment listened to the
strange sob of the pines, swaying in the chill winds of the autumn
night.
"I am not what I was!" he continued; the world is open now, and I must
be a part of it. The bear and deer speak to me with tongues I do not
understand. _Ma mere! ma mere_! I must know whether I am a Delaware or
pale face!--whether one or the other, I am still yours--yours always!
Speak! speak with a straight tongue to your child!"
"Ough! ough! ough!" groaned the old woman, looking at him wistfully,
and plainly struggling with herself--hesitating between two courses.
"Speak!" said Verty, with a glow in his eye, which made him resemble
a young leopard of the wild--"speak, _ma mere_!--I am no longer a
child! I go into a new land now, and how shall it be? As a red face,
or a long knife--which am I? Speak, _ma mere_--say if I am a Delaware,
whose place is the woods, or a white, whose life must take him from
the deer forever!"
The struggle was ended; Verty could not have uttered words more fatal
to his discovering anything. He raised an insuperable barrier to
any revelations--if, indeed, there existed any mystery--by his
alternative. Was he a Delaware, and thus doomed to live in the forest
with his old Indian mother--or was he a white, in which case, he would
leave her? Pride, cunning, above all, deep and pure affection, sealed
the old woman's lips, if she had thought of opening them. She looked
for sometime at Verty, then, taking his head between her hands, she
said, with eyes full of tears:
"You are my own dear son--my young, beautiful hawk of the woods--who
said you were not a true Delaware!"
And the old woman bent down, and with a look of profound affection,
pressed her lips to Verty's forehead.
The young man's face assumed an expression of mingled gloom and doubt,
and he sighed. Then he was an Indian--a Delaware--the son of the
Indian woman--he was not a paleface. All the talk about it was thrown
away; he was born in the woods--would live and die in the woods!
For a moment the image of Redbud rose before him, and he sighed. He
knew not why, but he wished that he was not an Indian--he wished that
his blood had been that of the whites.
His sad face drooped; then his eyes ware raised, and he saw the old
woman weeping.
The sight removed from Verty's mind all personal considerations, and
he leaned his head upon her knee, and pressed her hand to his lips.
"Did the child make his mother weep," he said; "did his idle words
bring rain to her eyes, and make her heart heavy? But he is her child
still, and all the world is nothing to him."
Verty rose, and taking the old, withered hand, placed it respectfully
on his breast.
"Never again, _ma mere_" he said, "will the wind talk to me, or the
birds whisper. I will not listen. Have I made your eyes dark? Let it
pass away--I am your son--I love you--more than all the whole wide
world."
And Verty sat down, and gazed tenderly at the old woman, whose face
had assumed an expression of extraordinary delight.
"Listen," said Verty, taking down his old violin, with a smile,
"I will play one of the old tunes, which blow like a wind from my
childhood--happy childhood."
And the young man gazed for a moment, silent and motionless, into the
fire. Then he raised his old, battered instrument, and began to play
one of the wild madrigals of the border.
The music aroused Longears, who sat up, so to speak, upon his
forepaws, and with his head bent upon one side, gazed with dignified
and solemn interest at his master.
The young man smiled, and continued playing; and as the rude border
music floated from the instrument, the Verty of old days came back,
and he was once again the forest hunter.
The old woman gazed at him with thoughtful affection, and returned his
smile. He went on playing, and the long hours of the autumn night went
by like birds into the cloudland of the past.
When the forest boy ceased playing, it was nearly midnight, and the
brands were flickering and dying.
Waked by the silence, Longears, who had gone to sleep again, rose up,
and came and licked his master's hand, and whined. Verty caressed his
head, and laying down his violin, looked at the old Indian woman with
affectionate smiles, and murmured:
"We are happy still, _ma mere_!"