To Fonda's Bush it is a good ten miles. I rode Sir William's great
horse, Warlock, who plunged and danced at the slap of my
sword-scabbard on his flanks, and wellnigh shook me from my boots.
"Spare spur, lad! Let him sniff the pistols!" called Sir William,
standing up in the broad hay-wagon to observe me. "He will quiet when
he smells the priming, Michael."
I drew one of my pistols from the holster and allowed Warlock to sniff
it, which he did, arching his neck and pricking forward two wise ears.
After this the horse and I understood each other, he being satisfied
that it was a real officer he bore and no lout pranked out to shame
him before other horses.
The broad flat hay-wagon, well bedded and deep in rye-straw, was
filled with the company on fishing bent; Peter and Esk already
disputing over their lines, red quills, and bob-floats; Silver Heels,
in flowered cotton damask and hair rolled up under a small hat of
straw, always observing me with lowered, uncertain eyes; Mr. Duncan,
in fustian coat and leggings, counting out fish-hooks; Sir William, in
yellow-and-brown buckskin and scarlet-flowered waistcoat, singing
lustily:
"A-Maying!
A-Maying!
Oh, the blackthorn and the broom
And the primrose are in bloom!"
Behind the wagon, with punch-jugs swinging on his saddle-bags, like
John Gilpin rode young Bareshanks the Scot, all a-grin; while upon
either side of the wagon two mounted soldiers trotted, rifles slung
and hangers sheathed.
Thus we set out for Fonda's Bush, which is a vast woods, cut into a
hundred arabesques by the Kennyetto, a stream well named, for in the
Indian language it means "Snake-with-its-tail-in-its-mouth," and,
although it flows for forty miles, the source of it is scarce half a
mile from the mouth, where it empties into the great Vlaie near to Sir
William's hunting-lodge.
In the wagon Sir William turned to the windows and waved his hat at
Mistress Molly, who stood behind the nursery curtains and kissed her
fingers to him. And, as the wagon with its escort rolled off with slow
wheels creaking, Mr. Duncan struck up:
"Who hunts, doth oft in danger ride;
Who hawks, lures oft both far and wide;
Who uses games, may often prove
A loser; but who falls in love,
Is fettered in fond Cupid's snare;
My angle breeds me no such care."
And Sir William and Mr. Duncan ended the song:
"The first men that our Saviour dear
Did choose to wait upon him here,
Blest Fishers were,--"
The shrill voices of Esk and Peter joined in, then were hushed as
Silver Heels's dainty song grew from the silence like a fresh breeze:
"For Courts are full of flattery
As hath too oft been tried;
The City full of wantonness,
And both be full of Pride:
Then care away,
And wend along with me!"
So singing on their rye-straw couches, the swaying wagon bore them
over the hilly road, now up, now rattling down-hill among the stones
to ford some ice-clear brook, and away again across the rolling
country, followed by Gillie Bareshanks, stone bottles flopping, and
the trotting soldiers holding their three-cornered hats on with one
hand, bridle-rein in t'other.
I galloped ahead, pistol poised, frowning at woodlands where I
pretended to myself danger might hide, examining all wayfarers with
impartial severity; and I doubt not that, seeing me in full uniform
and armed, my countenance filled them with misgivings; indeed, some
called out to know if the news from Boston was bad, if the Indians
meant mischief hereabouts, or if the highwayman, Jack Mount, was
abroad.
"Plague on your pistols!" shouted Sir William, as I waited at a ford
for the wagon. "Gad! Michael, your desperate deportment is scaring my
tenants along the way! Smile as you gallop, in Heaven's name! else
they'll take you for Jack Mount himself!"
Somewhat mortified by Sir William's roar of laughter, I trotted on in
silence, returning my pistol to its holster, and buckling the flap.
We now entered the slashings of the forest which is called Fonda's
Bush, "bush" meaning land not yet cleared of woods. The sweet, moist
shadow of the forest cooled me; I made Warlock stop, for I love to
listen and linger in a woodland's quiet.
Here the field-birds which had sung everywhere by the roadside were
silent, as they always are on the borders of deep forests. Slow hawks
sailed along the edge of the woods; out in the clearing a few finches
twittered timidly in the sunshine, but here among the hushed ranks of
giant trees nothing stirred save green leaves.
But the solitude of forest depths is no solitude to those who know
when and where to watch and listen. Faint sounds came to savant ears:
the velvet rustle of a snake brushing its belly over soft mosses; the
padded patter of the fox-hare; the husky quhit! quhit! of that ashy
partridge whose eye is surmounted by a scarlet patch, and whose flesh
is bitter as hemlock. Solitude! Nay, for the quick furry creatures
that haunt water-ways live here, slipping among bowlders, creeping
through crevices; here a mink with eyes like jet beads; here a
whiskered otter peering from a cleft; now a musk-rat squatting to wash
his face; now a red martin thrashing about in the thick tree-top like
a mammoth squirrel at frolic.
If this be solitude, with the stream softly talking in that silly
babble which is a language, too; if this be solitude, with the shy
deer staring and the tiny wood-mouse in the windfall scraping busily;
if this be solitude, then imprison me here, and not in the cities,
where solitude is in men's hearts!
Five miles still lay before us over the moist, springy forest road, an
excellent and carefully constructed thoroughfare which had been begun
by Sir William and designed for a short and direct route to those
healing springs of Saratoga which he loved, twenty-eight miles
northeast of us. But this route had never been continued east of
Fonda's Bush, partly because the winding Kennyetto interfered too
often, demanding to be bridged a dozen times in a mile, partly because
an easier though longer route had been surveyed by the engineer
officers from Albany, and was already roughly marked as far as the
Diamond Hill, from which, in clear weather, the Saratoga lake may be
seen.
The road we travelled, therefore, came to an abrupt end on the banks
of the Kennyetto; and here, in a sunny clearing which was a sugar-bush
lately in use, the wagon and its passengers halted, and I dismounted,
flinging my bridle to one of the soldiers.
"Souse the stone jugs in the stream!" called out Sir William to young
Bareshanks, who came bumping up with his bottles a-knocking and his
hat crammed on his ears.
Peter and Esk wriggled out of the straw, fighting over a red and blue
bob-float, and fell with a thump upon the moss, locked in conflict.
Whereupon Sir William fetched them a clip with his ivory cane across
their buttocks, which brought them up snivelling, but reconciled.
Meanwhile Mr. Duncan had gone to the bank of the stream with six sharp
pegs, all numbered; and presently Sir William joined him, where they
consulted seriously concerning the proper ground, and took snuff and
hummed and hawed with much wagging of heads and many eye-squints at
the sky and water.
At last, the question being settled, Mr. Duncan set the six pegs ten
yards apart and pushed them noiselessly down into the bank, while Sir
William removed his hat and placed in the crown six bits of birch-bark
with numbers written on each.
"Now, then, young wild-cats," he said, frowning at Esk and Peter,
"and you, Felicity, you, too, Mr. Duncan, and Michael, also, come and
draw lots for pegs. Zounds! Peter! Ladies first, sir! Now, Felicity!"
Silver Heels placed one hand over her eyes and groped in the hat until
her fingers clutched a square of bark. Then she drew it out.
"Number six!" she said, shyly.
"Last peg to the left," announced Sir William. "Who next? Draw, Mr.
Duncan!"
"Me! Me!" shouted Peter and Esk, charging at the hat and tearing their
numbers from it.
Then Mr. Duncan drew, and then I drew number five.
"Get ready!" commanded Sir William, fumbling with his fish-rod.
"Michael, take care of Felicity!"
Now the rules for a peg-down fishing match are few and simple. Each
contestant must fish from the position which his peg indicates, and he
must not leave his peg to fish elsewhere until the match is ended.
Furthermore, he must fish courteously and with due regard for his
neighbour's rights, employing no unfair means to attract fish to his
own bait or to drive them from his neighbour's. The contestant
securing the largest number of fish is the winner; he who bags the
largest single fish is adjudged worthy of a second prize; he who
secures the choicest individual fish receives a crown of young oak
leaves.
At the words, "Take your stations!" we trooped to our pegs. Silver
Heels was on the extreme left, I next, then Sir William, then Mr.
Duncan, then Peter, and, last of all, Esk.
"Fish!" cried Sir William, and swung his rod from the wrist, sending a
green and gray and scarlet feather-fly out into the water.
Silver Heels held her hook out to me and I garnished it with a bit of
eel's skin and red flannel. My own line I baited with angle-worm, and
together we cast out into the slow, deep current.
Farther along I heard Esk and Peter cast out with some heedless
splashing, which was the occasion of mutual recrimination until Sir
William silenced them.
Yet almost immediately fat Peter caught a fish, which is like all
Indians. However, it was but a spiny sun-fish with blue and scarlet
and yellow gills. Still it made Peter's score one.
"Does that count?" asked Silver Heels, turning up her nose. "See!
Peter hath another one--a sun-fish, too! Pooh! Anybody can catch
sun-fish."
"Better catch 'em then," said Sir William, laughing, and drawing his
fly over the water to recover it for another cast.
Splash!--and Peter had a third sun-fish; and in another moment Esk
jerked a fourth from the water, secured his prize with a scowl at
Peter, and hurriedly rebaited, muttering and breathing thickly.
Then Mr. Duncan's yellow float bobbed under, once, twice, then bobbed
so fast that the water dimpled all around and the little rings,
spreading, succeeded each other so quickly that the wavelets covered
the yellow float.
"A barbel-pout," quoth Mr. Duncan, coolly, and sure enough up came the
bluish-black fish and flapped and squeaked, now on its white belly,
now on its back, grinning with its gummy, whiskered maw agape and its
three dagger fins ready to stab and poison him who rashly grasped it.
"Silver Heels," said I, politely; "you are having a nibble."
"Oh, so I am!" she cried, and drew a lovely blue and silver frost-fish
to the surface, only to lose it by over-haste, and cry out in her
vexation.
I explained to her how to strike the hook before pulling in, and she
thanked me very modestly. There was a new and humble tone in her
voice, delicate and grateful flattery to me, due, as I knew perfectly
well, to my uniform. Nor did the tribute savour of any after-sting of
jealousy or resentment for my new honours.
She recognized that I had climbed high in a single day, leaving the
rounds of childhood behind forever; and she knew, too, which I did
not, that she also was climbing the ladder very swiftly, a little
behind me now, yet confident, and meaning to rejoin and pass me ere I
dreamed of such a thing.
About this time Sir William hooked and landed a great pink and white
Mohawk chub, which had risen silently from a black pool and had sucked
in his feather-fly.
"Tush!" said Sir William. "I'll not count that!" And with a slack and
a snip! he unhooked the fish, which at once slowly sank back into the
black channel. Whereupon Sir William smoothed out his fly, and took
snuff, singing merrily:
"A-Maying!
A-Maying!"
"You bade _us_ make no noise, sir," spoke up Esk, reproachfully.
"So I did, lad! So I did! But not with thy mouth. Shout all day, and
never a trout budges. Stamp thy feet--ay, brush but a stone in
passing, and it's farewell, master troutling! Ho! What was that?"
A spattering and splashing arose from Peter's peg, and all turned to
see the fat little Mohawk dragging a trout from the water and up the
bank, where he fell upon the bouncing fish, whooping like the savage
he was.
"Clearly," mused Sir William, "my eye has lost its cunning, and my arm
its strength. So passes the generation that was born with me!
Heigh-ho! Well done, Peter boy!"
Silver Heels was doomed to ill-fortune. She lost a second frost-fish,
and was ready to weep. So I laid my rod on the bank, leaving the
baited hook in the water, and went over to her, for she seemed
discouraged, having broken her hook and quill.
"Fen dubs!" shouted Peter, from the other end of the line. "You can't
do that, Michael! I'm ahead of you all, and it is not fair!"
"Mind your business," said I, sitting down beside Silver Heels; and
truly enough he did, for, before I was seated, Peter jumped up,
struggling with a fat white perch, which he landed, yelling and
dancing in his vanity.
"Never you mind, Silver Heels," said I, tying a plated hook on her
line, and covering it with a long silvery strip of skin and
pin-feathers from a pullet's neck. "Now do as I say; toss the bait
down stream, so! Now draw it slowly till it spins like a top."
Ere I could end my instructions I saw the nose of a great gold-green
pike close after her bait.
"Slack!" I whispered. "He has it!"
She held the rod still. There came a twitch, more twitches, but so
gentle you would have vowed 'twas a tender-mouthed minnow lipping the
line.
"He gorged it," I muttered; "strike hard!"
"A log!" wailed Silver Heels, as she felt the rod stagger when the
hook, deeply struck, embedded barb and shank.
But it was no log, for instantly the great fish shot into the air, and
lay a-wallowing and thrashing in mid-stream.
"A chain-pike!" cried Sir William, briskly. "Do you net him, Michael,
else Felicity will take a swim she has not bargained for!"
I ran to Sir William, who thrust the net at me, and back again as fast
as my legs could move to Silver Heels, who had dropped the rod and
now, sprawling on the moss, lay a-pulling at the line which was
cutting her tender fingers.
"No fair!" bellowed fat Peter, jealously. "Let her bag her own game as
I do! Hi-yi! Another trout!"
But spite of Peter's clamour and Esk's injured howls, I netted the
floundering pike and flung it among the bushes, where young Bareshanks
gaffed it and held it aloft.
There it hung, all spray and green and gold, marked with the devil's
chain pattern; and its wolf-jaws gaping, lined with teeth.
"Oh, Michael," quavered Silver Heels, staring at her captive. She
moved a little nearer to the fish, plucking up her skirts with her
fingers, and bending forward, alarmed, amazed at the fierce, dripping
creature.
"Ugh! There's blood on it!" she whispered, taking fast hold of my arm.
"Is it not a noble prize!" I urged, eagerly. But she shook her head
and turned away, holding me tightly by the sleeve.
"Are you not proud?" I persisted, irritably. "It is the biggest fish
any have yet caught. You will gain second prize, silly! What's the
matter with you, anyhow!" I added, in a temper.
"I can't help it," she said, tremulously; "I'm not a man, and it
frightens me to kill. I shall fish no more. Ugh--the blood!--and how
it quivered when the gillie gaffed it! I could cry my eyes out for the
life I took so lightly!"
I was disgusted and hurt, too, for I had thought to please her. I
drew my sleeve from her fingers, but she only stood there like a
simpleton harping on one string:
"Oh, the brave fish! Oh, the poor brave fish! I hurt it!--I saw blood
on it, Michael."
"Ninny," said I; "there is blood on your fingers, too, where the line
cut, and you've wiped it on my sleeve!"
She looked at her bleeding fingers in a silly, startled fashion, then
held them out to me so pitifully that I could do no less than wipe
them clean and bind them in my handkerchief, though it was my best,
and flowered and laced at that.
"I don't care," she said, a-pouting at the water; "you told me that
when you shot wild things it saddened you, too."
I pretended not to hear, yet it was true. And in sooth, to this day I
never draw trigger on beast or bird that I do not thrill with pity.
I know not what fierce, resistless passion it may be that sets my
nostrils quivering like a pointer's when I chase wild things--what
savage craving drives me on, on, on! till the flash of the gun and the
innocent death leave me standing sad and staring.
Could I but keep from the woods--but I cannot. And it were vainer to
argue with a hound on a runway, or with the west wind in October, than
with me.
I went to my rod, which I saw nodding its tip in the water, and found
an eel fast to the bait, yet not hooked, so summoned Bareshanks to rid
me of the snaky thing and strolled sulkily over to Sir William.
The Baronet had enticed and prettily netted a plump lake salmon, by
far the choicest fish taken; so, the match being ended, and luncheon
served under the pines, Silver Heels plaited a wreath of red-oak, and
crowned Sir William for his third prize.
Peter with his motley string of fish, some two dozen brace in all, and
mostly trout at that, clamoured for the first prize, which was a
Barlow-knife like the one Silver Heels had gained in the foot-race a
year ago; and he clutched his prize and straightway fell a-hacking the
wagon till Sir William collared him.
Silver Heels received the other reward, a gold guinea; and she placed
it in her bosom, and kissed Sir William heartily.
"Faith," said the Baronet, "you had best kiss your cousin yonder, who
saved you from a bath in the brook with your pike!"
Silver Heels came up to me, laying both hands on my shoulders, and
held up her lips. I kissed her maliciously and praised her skill,
vowing that she was a very Huron for slaughter, which boorish jest set
her face a sorrowful red.
Meanwhile young Bareshanks had laid a clean cloth upon the moss, and
there was pot-pie and roast capon, and a dish of apples and
gingerbread. Ale, too, and punch chilled in the brook, and small-beer
for the children, with a few drops of wine to drink Sir William's
health.
With a cup of ale in one hand and a slice of cold capon on a trencher
of bread, I munched and drank and rallied Silver Heels because of her
pity for the pike; but she did not like it, yet ventured no retort,
such as was formerly her custom.
Presently, Sir William having done scant justice to pot-pie and ale,
called for his rod and flies, and he and Mr. Duncan lighted their
pipes and strolled off along the stream to lure those small plump
salmon which abound in the Kennyetto's swiftest reaches.
Peter lay on the moss, a-stuffing himself Indian fashion until it hurt
him to eat more, and he howled and licked his gingercake, lamenting
because he could not contain it. So I grasped his heels and dragged
him to the wagon, tossing him up in the straw to lie like a sucking
pig and squeal his fill.
Bareshanks and the soldiers now fell upon the feast, and Silver Heels
and I withdrew to play at stick-knife and watch Esk that he tumbled
not into the water while turning flat rocks for cray-fish.
Seated there on the deep moss at stick-knife with the cold song of the
stream in our ears, we conducted politely as became our quality, I
asking pardon for plaguing her concerning the pike, she granting
pardon and praising my skill in taking such a monster fish. That glow
of amiability which suffuses man when he has fed, warmed me into a
most friendly state of mind, and I permitted Silver Heels to win at
stick-knife, and I drew the peg without protest.
Fat Peter had fallen asleep; Esk, nipped by a cray-fish, waddled to
the wagon, and rolling himself into a ball like a raccoon, joined
Peter in dreams of surfeit.
In a distant glade the soldiers and young Bareshanks played at cards;
the horses, tethered near, snorted in their feed-bags, and whisked
their tails at the gnats and forest flies.
A hush fell upon the woods, stiller for the gossip of the stream.
Ringed pigeons in the trees overhead made low, melodious love; far in
the forest dusk the hermit-bird sang, but so faint, so distant, that
the whisper of leaves stirring effaced the hymn of the gray recluse.
"I had not thought that you were so nearly a man to be appointed
cornet of horse," said Silver Heels, digging into the moss with her
knife.
"And you," said I, magnanimously, "are almost a woman." But I said it
from courtesy, not because I believed it.
"Yes," she replied, indifferently, "maids may wed at sixteen years."
"Wed!" I repeated, laughing outright.
"Ay. Mother was a bride at sixteen."
I was silent in my effort to digest such an absurd idea. Silver Heels
marry in another year! I looked at the frail yet full arm, half bared,
the slender neck, the round, clear hazel eyes, the faintly smiling
mouth, which was the mouth of a child. Silver Heels wed? The idea was
grotesque. It was also displeasing.
Not to rebuff her with scorn, I said: "Indeed, you are quite a woman.
Perhaps in a year you will be one! Who knows?--for a year is such a
long, long time, Silver Heels."
"It is a very long time," she admitted.
"And to love, one must be quite old," said I.
"Yes, that is true," she conceded, reluctantly; "but not always."
After a silence she said, "Michael, I have a secret."
The mere idea that Silver Heels possessed a secret which she had not
at once revealed to me produced a complicated sensation in my breast.
I was conscious of a sudden and wholly involuntary respect for Silver
Heels, a hearty resentment, and a gnawing curiosity to learn the
secret.
"Will you promise never, never to tell?" she asked, raising her eager
eyes to me.
Again resentment and hurt pride stung me, but curiosity prevailed, and
I promised, with pretended indifference, to soothe my weak loss of
self-respect.
"Well, then," she said, lowering her voice, "I am sure that Mr. Butler
is in love with me."
"Mr. Butler!" I cried out, in angry derision. "Why, he's an old man!
Why, he's nearly thirty!"
Angry incredulity choked me, and I sat scowling at Silver Heels and
striving to reconcile her serious mien with such a tomfool speech.
"If you shout my secret aloud," she said, "I shall tell you no more,
Micky."
Again, troubled and astonished at her sincerity, I expressed my
disbelief in a growl.
"He keeps me after school hours," she said; "once he would caress my
hand, but I will have none of it. He sometimes speaks of the future,
and certainly does conduct in most romantic manners, vowing he will
wait for me, declaring that I must love him one day, that I am no
longer a child, that he has adored me since I was but twelve."
"How long has this gone on?" I said, my face cold and twitching with
rage.
"These three months," said Silver Heels, without embarrassment.
"And--and you never told me!"
She shook her head frankly.
"No, you were but a lad, and you could not understand such things."
For a moment I felt so small that I could have yelled aloud my
vexation. What! I too young to be told the secrets of this chit of a
child with her ridiculous airs and pretensions!
"But now that you are become a man," she continued, serenely, "I
thought to tell you of this, because it tries my patience, yet pleases
me, too, sometimes."
Boiling with fury and humiliation, I gave her a piece of my mind. I
said that Mr. Butler was a sneak, a bully, and an old fool in his
dotage to make love to a baby. I told her it did sicken me to hear of
it; that there was no truth in it but vain imaginings, and that she
had best confess to Sir William how this gentleman school-teacher did
teach her his knowledge withal!
She listened, frowning and digging up moss with her knife.
"He is not old," she said, firmly; "thirty years is but a youth's
prime, which you will one day comprehend."
Such condescension wellnigh finished me. I could find neither tongue
nor words to speak my passion.
"He is a gentleman of rank and station," she said, primly. "If he
chooses to protest his solicitous regard for me, I can but courteously
discourage him."
"You little prig!" I exclaimed, grinding my teeth. "I will teach this
fellow Butler to abuse Sir William's confidence!"
"I have your promise not to reveal this," said Silver Heels, coolly.
I groaned, then remembering that Mr. Butler had partly promised me a
meeting, I caught Silver Heels by both hands and looked at her
earnestly.
"I also have a secret," said I. "Promise me silence, and you shall
share it."
"Truly?" she asked, a little pale.
"Truly, a secret. Promise. Silver Heels."
"I promise," she whispered.
Then I told her of my defiance, of the meeting which Mr. Butler had
half pledged me, and I swore to her that I would kill him, eye to eye
and hilt to hilt; not alone for his contempt and insults to me, but
for Sir William's honour and for the honour of my kinswoman. Felicity
Warren.
"The beast!" I snarled. "That he should come a-suing you without a
word to Sir William! Do gentlemen conduct in such a manner towards
gentlewomen? Now hear me! Do you swear to me upon your oath and honour
never to stay again after school, never to listen to another word from
this sneaking fellow until you are sixteen, never to receive his
addresses until Sir William speaks to you of him? Swear it! Or I will
go straight to Mr. Butler and strike him in the face!"
"Micky, what are you saying? Sir William knows all this."
Taken aback, I dropped her hands, but in a moment seized them again.
"Swear!" I repeated, crushing her hands. "I don't care what Sir
William says! Swear it!"
"I swear," she said, faintly. "You are hurting my fingers!"
She drew her hands from mine. Where the fishing-line had cut a single
drop of blood had been squeezed out again.
"First you bind my hand, then you tear it," she said, without
resentment. "It is like all men--to hurt, to heal, then wound again."
I scarcely heard her, being occupied with my anger and my designs
against Mr. Butler. Such hatred as I now felt for him I never had
conceived could be cherished towards any living thing. My right hand
itched for a sword-hilt; I longed to see him facing me as I never had
craved for anything in this world or the next. And to think that Sir
William approved it!
Unconsciously we had both risen, and now, side by side, we were moving
slowly along the stream, saying nothing, yet in closer communion than
we had ever been.
Little by little the hot anger cooled in my veins, leaving a
refreshing confidence that all would come right. Such passions are too
powerful for young hearts. Anger and grief heal their own wounds
quickly when life is yet new.
With my sudden, astonished respect for Silver Heels came another
sentiment, a recognition of her rights as an equal, and a strangely
solicitous desire to control and direct her enjoyment of these rights.
It is the instinct of chivalry, latent in the roughest of us, and
which, in extreme youth, first manifests as patronage. Thus, walking
with Silver Heels I unburdened my heart, telling her that I too had
been in love, that the object of my respectful passion was one Marie
Livingston, who would undoubtedly be mine at some distant date. I
revealed my desire to see Silver Heels suitably plighted, drawing a
pleasing portrait of an imaginary suitor who should fill all
requirements.
To this she replied that she, too, had desired a suitor resembling the
highly attractive portrait I had painted for her; that she found a
likeness between that portrait and her secret ideal, and that she
should be very glad to encounter the portrait in the flesh.
It hurt me a little that she had not recognized in me many of the
traits I had painted for her so carefully, and presently I disclosed
myself as the mysterious original of the portrait.
"You!" she exclaimed, in amazement. Then, not to hurt me, she said it
was quite true that I did resemble her ideal, and only lacked years
and titles and wealth and reputation to make me desirable for her.
"I believe, also," she said, "that Aunt Molly means that we marry.
Betty says so, and she is wiser than a black cat."
"Well," said I, "we can't marry, can we, Silver Heels?"
"Why, no," she said, simply; "there's all those things you lack."
"And all those things which you lack," said I, sharply. "Now, Marie
Livingston--"
"She is older than I!" cried Silver Heels.
"And those things I lack come with years!" I retorted.
"That is true," she answered; "you are suitable for me excepting your
years, which includes all you ought to be."
"Suppose you wait for me?" I proposed. "If I wed not Marie Livingston,
I will wed you, Silver Heels."
I meant to be generous, but she grew very angry and vowed she would
rather wed young Bareshanks than me.
"I don't care a fig," said I; "I only meant you to be suitably wed one
day, and was even willing to do so myself to save you from Captain
Butler. Anyway I'll kill him next year, so I don't care whether you
marry me or not."
"A sorry match, pardieu!" she snapped, and fell a-laughing. "Michael,
I will warn you now that I mean to wed a gentleman of rank and wealth,
and wear jewels which will blind you! And I shall wed a gallant
gentleman of years, Michael, and scarred with battles--not so to
disfigure a pleasing countenance, but under his clothes where none can
see--and I shall be 'my lady!'--mark me! Michael, and shall be well
patched and powdered as befits my rank! I shall strive to be very kind
to you, Michael."
Her cheeks were aflame, her eyes daring and bright. She picked up her
skirt and mocked me in a curtsey, then marched off, nose in the wind,
to join Sir William and Mr. Duncan, who were returning along the bank
with a few brace of fish.
The sun had dropped low behind the trees ere we were prepared to
depart. Bareshanks brought around my horse, and I mounted without
difficulty this time.
As the wagon moved off Mr. Duncan started a hymn of Watts, which all
joined, the soldiers and young Bareshanks also singing lustily, it
being permitted for servants to aid in holy song.
So among the woods and out into the still country, with the sun a red
ball sinking through saffron mist and the new moon aslant and dim
overhead.
As I rode, the whippoorwill called after me from the darkening woods;
the crickets began from every tuft, and far away I heard the solitary
hermit at vespers in the still pines.
It was night ere the lights of Johnstown glimmered out against the
hill-side where, on the hillock called Mount Johnson, the candles in
our windows spun little rings of fire in the evening haze.
As we passed through the village, the good people turned to smile and
to doff their hats to Sir William, thinking not less of him for riding
with his flock in the straw-lined wagon, and on they went; I pulling
rein at the blacksmith's, as Warlock had cast a shoe on the stony way
below.
While the smith was at his forge I dismounted and stood in the
fire-glow, stroking Warlock's velvet nose, and watching the fiery
flakes falling from the beaten metal.
And as I stood, musing now on Silver Heels, now on Mr. Butler, came
one a-swaggering by the shop, and bawling loudly a most foolish lilt:
"Diddle diddle dumpling,
My son John
Went to bed with one shoe on;
One shoe off and one shoe on;
Diddle diddle dumpling,
My son John!"
Perceiving me in full uniform the songster halted and saluted so
cheerfully that I rendered his salute with a smile. He was drunk but
polite; a great fellow, six feet two at least, all buckskin and
swagger and raccoon cap, with tail bobbing to his neck, a true
coureur-de-bois, which is the term for those roaming free-rifles whose
business and conduct will not always bear investigation, and who live
by their wits as well as by their rifles.
"A fine horse, captain," quoth he, with good-natured, drunken freedom,
which is not possible for gentlemen to either ignore or resent. "A
fine horse, sir, and, by your leave, worthy of his master!" And he
stood swaying there heel and toe, with such a jolly laugh that I
laughed too, and asked the news from Canada.
"Canada!" he roared, in his voice of a giant. "I've not sniffed priest
or Jesuit these six months! Do you take me for a Frenchy, captain?"
At that moment another man who had been pushing his nose against the
window of a bake-shop crossed the street and joined the giant in
buckskin, saluting me carelessly as he came up.
He was short and meagre and weasel-eyed, sharp-muzzled, and dingy as a
summer fox. He was also drunk, yet his mouth was honest, and I judge
not from such things, nor yet by the eye, but by men's lips and how
they rest one upon the other, and how they laugh.
Waiting there for my horse, I paced up and down the doorway, sometimes
glancing at the motley pair in their fringed buckskins, who were
fondly embracing one another, sometimes watching the towns-people,
passing before the lighted windows. There were soldiers strolling, two
by two, lingering at bake-shops to sniff the ovens; there were
traders, come to town to solicit permits from Sir William for the
Canadas. At times the tall, blanketed form of a Mohawk passed like a
spectre with the red forge light running along his rifle barrel,
followed by his squaw, loaded with bags of flour, or a haunch of
salted beef, or a bale of pelts crackling on her back.
My pair of buckskin birds, loitering before the tavern, had been
observed and mistaken for French trappers by half a dozen soldiers of
the Royal Americans, who were squatting in a row on the tavern porch,
and a volley of chaff was fired at short range.
"Mossoo! Oh, Mossoo! I say, Mossoo! How's Mrs. Parleyvoo and the
little Parleyvoos? What's the price of cat-stew in Canada? Take that
cat-tail off your cap, Mossoo!"
The big ranger gave them a drunken stare, then burst into a laugh.
"Why, it's some of those lobster-backs. Hello! Old red-bellies!
They're going to give another tea-party in Boston, I hear. Didn't they
invite you?"
"Come across the street and we'll give you a tea-party, you damned
Yankee!" cried the soldiers, unbuckling their leather belts and
swinging them.
"Come over here and we'll drum the rogue's march on you!" shouted the
little ranger, planting his legs wide apart and drawing the ramrod
from his long rifle.
A watchman with rattle, pike, and lanthorn came hobbling up,
threatening to sound his call. A group of towns-people gathered behind
him, protesting against the disturbance.
But the two rangers flourished their ramrods and taunted the soldiers
with inquiries which I did not understand at the time, such as: "How's
Bully Tryon and his blood-pudding?" "I learn that Tommy Gage has the
gout; too much Port-Bill; he needs bleeding, does Tommy Gage!"
Then the big ranger, addressing soldiers, watchman, and towns-people
as "bloody-backs," "cow-rumps," and "scratch-wigs," advised them all
to pickle their heads and sell them in Albany, where cabbage was much
esteemed among the Dutchmen.
"Come up to the barracks and we'll show you what pickling is," shouted
the soldiers, wrathfully.
"Come out in the woods and I'll show you something to beat pickled
pig!" replied the little ranger, cheerfully.
Behind me I heard the trample of hoofs; the smith was backing Warlock
out into the street. I paid him; he held my stirrup, and I mounted,
walking my horse out between the soldiers, the people, and the two
rangers.
"Come, boys," said I, pleasantly, "this town is no place for brawls.
Let it end here--do you understand?--or Sir William shall learn of
it!"
The soldiers had stepped forward to salute, the two rangers laughed
scornfully, flung their rifles over their shoulders, and passed on
into the darkness with noiseless, moccasined stride.
Waiting to see that the crowd dispersed without disorder, far down the
dim street I heard the two rangers break out into a foolish catch:
"Who comes here?
A grenadier!
What d'ye lack?
A pot o' beer!
Where's your penny?
I forgot--
Get you gone, you red-coat sot!"
A most uncomfortable sensation came over me, although I did not fully
understand that "red-coat" was a reproach. But the loose laughter, the
disrespectful tone, the devil-may-care swagger of these fellows
disturbed me. What had they meant by "lobster-back" and "Tommy Gage"
and "Bully Tryon?" Surely they could not have referred to General Gage
of Boston or to our Governor! Did they mean Sir William's son, John,
by their "diddle dumpling?" What quarrel had they with the King's
soldiers? They had been courteous enough to me, unless they intended
their song as an insult.
The blood stung my face; I put Warlock to a gallop and overtook the
pair. They were arm in arm, swaggering along, ogling the towns-people,
jostling the crowd, sometimes mocking the bare shanks of a Highlander,
sometimes hustling an Indian, or tweaking the beard of a Jew peddler,
now doffing their caps to some pretty maid, now digging the ribs of a
sober Quaker, and ever singing of "diddle diddle dumpling" or of the
grenadier and his pot of beer.
Such license and freedom displeased me. I had never before observed it
in our town or among those who came to the Hall. However, I now saw
that I could not with dignity notice either their boorish gallantry,
their mischief, or the songs they were pleased to bawl out in the
street.
I therefore passed them in silence, and, loosening bridle, set Warlock
at a gallop for home.
I did not comprehend it at the time; indeed, the whole matter passed
from my mind ere the lights of the Hall broke out in the blue night.
Yet the scene I had witnessed was my first view of the unrest which
tormented the whole land, the first symptom of that new fever for
which no remedy had yet been found.