A TERRIBLE NIGHT.
As Standish entered his own house the four men to whom he had spoken
passed on around the base of the hill, and reaching a tract of swampy
land covered with reeds and rushes suitable for thatching, they set to
work cutting them and binding in bundles ready for use. For some hours
they wrought industriously, until Peter Browne, commander of the
expedition, straightened his back, stretched his cramped arms, and
gazing at the sun announced,--
"Noontime, men. We'll e'en rest and eat our snack."
"Art thou o' mind to come and show me the pond where thou sawest wild
fowl t' other day?" asked John Goodman, townsman and friend of Browne's.
"Ay, will I. Take thy meat in thy hand and come along," replied Browne.
"And we may as well finish our day there, sith this spot is well nigh
stripped. Margeson and Britteridge, when you have fed, you can bind the
rushes that are cut, and then come after us as far as a little pond
behind that hill, due west from here I should say. You'll find it easily
enough."
"Oh, ay, we'll find it," replied Margeson, a rough companion, but a good
worker. "Go on mates, and take your dogs with you, for they're smelling
at the victuals enough to turn a man's stomach. Get out you beast!" and
raising his foot he offered to kick Nero, who growled menacingly and
showed a formidable set of teeth.
"Have a care, man!" cried Browne angrily. "Meddle with that dog and
he'll make victual of thee before thou knowest what ails thee. 'T is
ever a poor sign when a man cannot abear dogs or children."
And the two friends, followed by the mastiff and spaniel, walked rapidly
away. Two hours passed while Margeson and Britteredge, not greatly in
haste, finished their lunch and tied and stacked the reeds already cut.
Then shouldering their sickles they leisurely skirted the hill in front
of them, and after a little search came upon the pretty sheet of water
now called Murdoch's Pond.
"This will be the place," said Margeson looking about him; "but where is
pepperpot Browne?"
"Or his dog?" suggested Britteridge slyly.
"Whistle and the beasts will hear us if the men do not," said Margeson
suiting the action to the word. No answer followed, and both men
together raised a yet shriller note, followed by shouts, halloos, and
various noises supposed to carry sound to the farthest limits of space.
But each effort died away in dim and distant echoes among the hills, and
after a while the men looked at each other in half angry discouragement.
"They've played us a trick," said Margeson; "they're hiding to mock at
us, or they've gone back to the village some other way."
"Nay," replied Britteridge pacifically; "they're not such babes as to
play tricks like that. See, here are goodly reeds; let us cut and bind
some while we tarry, and Browne will be back anon."
Grumbling and unconvinced Margeson still complied, and for a while
longer the two worked fitfully, pausing now and again to look about
them, to listen, or to shout.
At last, by tacit consent, both threw down their tools, and with slow,
half-fearful gaze surveyed the scene. It was a dismal one. The sun had
reached the tops of the pines, and already the water lay in black shadow
at their feet, rippled by the small, bitter breeze creeping in from
seaward, and stirring the sedge into faint whisperings and moanings;
night birds, awaking in the depths of the forest, uttered querulous
cries, and strange, vague sounds within the covert suggested prowling
beast or savage creeping near and nearer.
"Ugh! 't is a grewsome spot as ever I saw," said Margeson as softly as
if he feared to be overheard. "Certes the men have gone home some other
way, and the sun is setting. Let us be after them, say I."
"And say I," replied Britteridge readily, and without more words the two
men hurried away, and in a brief half hour presented themselves before
the governor with news that their comrades were not to be found, either
in the field or the town, and doubtless were lost in the forest or
captured by the Indians.
Carver, ever as ready to act as to command, armed himself at once, and
summoning such men as were on shore led them to the wood, where by
calling, firing their pieces, and kindling torches they protracted the
search far into the night, and when forced to give it up until daylight
returned to the Common house for united and fervent prayers and
supplications.
Early in the morning another search party, headed by Stephen Hopkins,
with Billington as scout, entered the woods, but having traversed a
radius of seven or eight miles returned at night weary, footsore, and
with no tidings.
News of the loss was carried on board the Mayflower, and a heavy sense
of misfortune and danger settled upon the little community already
depressed by disease and want.
The men thus mourned were meantime in nearly as evil case as was feared.
Just before arriving at the pond, while munching their frugal lunch and
discussing the prospect of game, they espied a splendid stag who had
evidently been disturbed while drinking, and stood with head erect and
dilated eyes gazing upon the first white men he had ever seen, and
perhaps foreboding the war of extermination they had come to wage on him
and his.
"Oh for a piece!" cried Browne raising an imaginary gun to his shoulder.
"Seize him, Nero! Take him, good dog! Hi! Away, away!"
Nero needing no second invitation uttered a deep bay and set off,
followed by the spaniel, yelping to the extent of her powers, while the
two men, reckless of the fact that they were unarmed save with sickles,
and could never hope to overtake the deer on foot, bounded after as fast
as they could lay legs to the ground, nor paused until utterly blown and
exhausted and the chase out of sight and hearing.
"Hah!" panted Browne flinging himself upon the ground; "I haven't been
breathed like that since I ran in the foot-race at home in Yorkshire
five year agone. Phew!"
Goodman only replied by inarticulate groans and wheezes, and while he
yet struggled for breath Nero came trotting back through the woods with
a mortified and contrite expression pervading his body from eloquent
eyes to abject tail, while Pike, as the spaniel was called, followed at
some distance with an affected carelessness of demeanor as if she would
have it clearly understood that she had been running solely for her own
pleasure, with no idea of chasing the deer. The men laughed, and patting
their favorites allowed them to lie and rest for some moments; then as
the air grew chill they rose and strolled in the direction, as they
supposed, of the clearing where they had left their comrades. But the
wood was thick, and several swampy hollows induced detours; the sun was
obscured by the gathering snow clouds, and neither man was skilled in
woodcraft; while the dogs, roaming at pleasure, were more intent upon
tracing various scents of game than of finding the way home. Thus it
came that as darkness began to gather visibly among the crowding
evergreens, and the last tinge of sunlight was buried in thickening
clouds, the two men stopped and looked each other squarely in the face.
"Yes, John," said Browne reading the frightened eyes of his younger and
less courageous companion. "Yes, lad, we're lost, and I doubt me must
pass the night in the woods."
"And we lack not only food but cloaks and weapons!" exclaimed Goodman
looking forlornly about him, and stooping to pat Pike, who scenting
disaster in the air had returned whimpering to her master's side.
"If we could but find some deserted hut of the salvages, or some of
their stored grain, or even the venison we disdained the other day,"
suggested Browne.
"We've seen no trace of such a thing to-day," replied Goodman
disconsolately.
"Come on, then, and let us look while daylight lingers. Mayhap the dogs
will lead us out if we put them to it. Hi, Nero! Home boy, home! Seek!"
Nero whimpered intelligently and trotted on for a mile or so, but with
none of that appearance of conviction which sometimes gives to an
animal's proceedings the force of an inspiration. Browne, who knew his
dog well, felt the discouragement of his movement, and finally stopped
abruptly.
"Nay, he knows no home in this wilderness and feels no call to one place
more than another. 'T is past praying for, John; we must e'en make up
our minds to sleep here. Suppose that we lie down in the lee of these
nut-bushes, call the dogs to curl up beside us, and try to keep life
going till morning; no doubt we shall find the way out then, or at least
somewhat to eat."
"My blood is like ice already," murmured Goodman burying his hands in
the spaniel's curly hair.
"If we had but flint and steel to make a fire it were something!"
exclaimed Browne. "What Jack-o'-Bedlams we were to set off thus
unprovided. Catch me so again!"
"But we came out to cut thatch, not to chase deer and get lost in the
woods," suggested Goodman trying to laugh, though his teeth chattered
like castanets.
"It will never do for thee to lie down as chilled as thou art,"
exclaimed Browne anxiously. "I promised thy old mother I'd have an eye
to thee, and lo it is I that have led thee into this mischance! What
shall I do for thee? I have it, lad! Sith it is too dark and rough to
walk farther I'll try a fall with thee; there's naught warms a man's
blood like a good wrestling match. Come on, then!"
"I'm no match for thee, Peter, but here goes!" replied Goodman
struggling to his feet, and the two men joined there in the darkness and
the wilderness in what might truly be called a "joust of courtesy,"
moved only by mutual love and good will, for the event proved Goodman's
modesty well founded, and it was only a few moments before Browne,
raising his slender opponent in his arms, set him down sharply two or
three times upon his feet, saying,--
"I'll not throw thee, for that might prove small kindness. Art warmer?"
But before Goodman could answer a snarling cry broke from the thicket
close at hand, and was answered by another and another voice until the
air seemed filled with the cries of howling fiends.
Nero started to his feet, his eyes glowing, the hair bristling stiffly
upon his neck, and with a fierce growl of defiance would have sprung
forward had not his master seized him by the collar exclaiming,--
"Nay, fool! wouldst rush on thy destruction!"
"'T is the salvages!" stammered Goodman staring about him in the
darkness.
"Nay, 't is lions," replied Browne. "Hopkins saith they swarm about
here. We must climb a tree, John. Here is a stout one; up with thee,
man, as fast as may be!"
"But thou, Peter?" asked John clambering into the oak his friend pointed
out.
"I cannot leave Nero. He'll be gone to the lion so soon as I quit my
hold of his collar, and I'll not lose him but in sorer need than this.
Here, take thou the spaniel and hold her to thee for warmth."
"Nay, I'll not be safe and thou in danger," replied the young man
springing down; "and, moreover, it is deadly cold perching in a tree."
"Well, then, we'll both stand on our guard here, and if the lions come
we'll e'en up in the tree hand over hand and leave the poor beasts to
their fate. Stamp thy feet on the ground and walk a few paces up and
down, John. I fear me thou 'lt swound with the cold like poor Tilley."
"I could not well be colder and live," replied Goodman faintly, as he
tried to follow his friend's injunction.
The night crept on, with frost and snow and icy rain and heavy darkness,
and still the wolves prowled howling around their prey, and the good dog
held them at bay with savage growls and deep-throated yelps of defiance,
and his master, caring more for the humble friend he had reared and
brought over seas from his English home than for his own safety, held
him all night by the collar, and the spaniel whimpered with cold and
terror in her master's arms, and he, poor lad, suffered all the anguish
of death as his feet and legs chilled and stiffened and froze like ice.
A night not to be numbered in those men's lives by hours but years, a
night of exhaustion, terror, and agony, a night hopeless of morning save
through the exceeding mercy of God.
The gray light broke at last, however, and with it the wolves grew mute
and slunk away, Nero quieted into obedience, and Browne carefully
straightening his own stiffened joints and rising to his feet looked
into his comrade's face and shook his head.
"John, hearken to me, lad! We're in a sore strait but we're not dead,
and daylight hath broken. Hold up thy face to the sky, man, and say 'I
WILL win through this, so help me God!' and having said it, stick to it,
even as Nero would have stuck to yon lion's throat until he was clawed
away in shreds. Come, try it, my lad, try it!"
Catching something of his friend's heroic spirit the poor fellow did as
he was bidden, but followed the brave resolve with a piteous look into
the other's face while he said,--
"My feet are froze, Peter; there is no feeling nor power in them. But
lead on, and I will follow if I must crawl."
"Tarry a bit till I see"--
And not pausing to finish his sentence Browne set himself to climb the
tree beneath which they had passed the night. His cramped limbs and
benumbed fingers made this no easy task and more than once he was near
losing his grasp and finishing the story by a headlong fall to the
frozen earth, but this danger was passed also, and presently hastening
down he said,--
"Well, heavy though the clouds be I can see that east is that-a-way, and
not far from us rises a high hill. Come, then, lean on me; pass thy arm
around my shoulders this fashion and I will help thee on. Then I will
leave thee at the foot of the hill and myself climb it, and if need be
some tree upon its summit. From that I shall surely catch sight of the
sea, and knowing that we know all we need."
Goodman silently laid his arm around the stalwart shoulders presented to
him, but found himself too weak and spent for other reply, and Browne,
passing an arm around his waist, looked anxiously into his face,
saying,--
"Courage, lad, courage!"
"Ay, I WILL, by God's help!" murmured the poor lad as with agony
inexpressible he forced his stiffened limbs to follow one after the
other.
The hill, more distant than Browne had supposed, was only reached after
two hours of agonizing effort, and at the foot Goodman sank speechless
and exhausted, his eyes closed, his parted lips white and drawn. Browne
looked at him despairingly, and calling the dogs made one crouch at
either side close to the heart and lungs of the prostrate body, and then
hastened on up the hill muttering,--
"'T is best kindness to leave him." Half an hour later he came crashing
down again through underbrush and fallen branches shouting,--
"Courage, John; courage, man! From the top of the biggest tree on this
hill I've seen not only the sea, but our own harbor, and the old brig
rocking away as peacefully as may be. Think of the good friends and the
good Hollands gin and the good fires aboard of her. Come, rouse up, lad!
Once more pluck up thy courage and remember thy resolve! 'T is but
another hour or so and we are there!"
And yet the good fellow knew that not one but many hours lay before
them, and that it was for him to find strength and endurance for both.
Once more his cheery voice and assured courage conveyed power for
another effort to the half-dead lad he almost carried in his arms, and
so, with frequent pauses for rest and encouragement, the day wore past,
until at last on the brow of Watson's Hill, Browne, his own strength all
but spent, cried tremulously,--
"Now God be praised! here is the harbor at our feet, yonder is the
Mayflower, below is the village, and but a few moments more will bring
thee, John, to a bed and Surgeon Fuller's care, and me to a fire and
some boiling schnapps."
"God indeed be praised!" murmured Goodman rousing himself for the final
effort; and so it came to pass that just at sunset the two crossed the
brook and came hobbling down The Street amid a clamorous and joyful
crowd of friends who lifted Goodman from his feet, nor paused until they
brought them both into the house where abode Carver and also Fuller, the
shrewd and crabbed physician and philanthropist. Here Goodman was laid
upon a bed, his shoes cut from his feet, and in a few moments the
governor on one side and the doctor on the other were vigorously rubbing
the frozen limbs with alcohol.
"Shall I lose my feet, Doctor?" asked the patient feebly.
"Lose them!" cried the doctor indignantly. "Nay! what use would a
footless man be to the Adventurers who sent thee out? 'T were but a
knave's trick for thee to shed thy feet first thing, and I'll see to it
thou dost not."
"And that's a comfortable saying, Master Fuller," said Browne standing
anxiously by.
"Thou here, Peter Browne!" exclaimed the doctor glancing up under his
shaggy brows. "What art doing here, blockhead? Get thee into bed beside
a good fire, and bid Hopkins mix thee a posset such as he would have for
himself. Be off, I say!"