BEFORE THE STORM
Johnny Silver had ridden my mare to Varick's to be shod, the evening
previous, and was to remain the night and return by noon to Fonda's
Bush.
It was the first sunny May day of the year, murmurous with bees, and a
sweet, warm smell from woods and cleared lands.
Already bluebirds were drifting from stump to stump, and robins, which
had arrived in April before the snow melted, chirped in the furrows of
last autumn's plowing.
Also were flying those frail little grass-green moths, earliest
harbingers of vernal weather, so that observing folk, versed in the
pretty signals which nature displays to acquaint us of her designs,
might safely prophesy soft skies.
I was standing in my glebe just after sunrise, gazing across my great
cleared field--I had but one then, all else being woods--and I was
thinking about my crops, how that here should be sown buckwheat to break
and mellow last year's sod; and here I should plant corn and Indian
squashes, and yonder, God willing, potatoes and beans.
And I remember, now, that I presently fell to whistling the air of "The
Little Red Foot," while I considered my future harvest; and was even
planning to hire of Andrew Bowman his fine span of white oxen for my
spring plowing; when, of a sudden, through the May woods there grew upon
the air a trembling sound, distant and sad. Now it sounded louder as the
breeze stirred; now fainter when it shifted, so that a mournful echo
only throbbed in my ears.
It was the sound of the iron bell ringing on the new Block House at
Mayfield.
The carelessly whistled tune died upon my lips; my heart almost ceased
for a moment, then violently beat the alarm.
I ran to a hemlock stump in the field, where my loaded rifle rested, and
took it up and looked at the priming powder, finding it dry and bright.
A strange stillness had fallen upon the forest; there was no sound save
that creeping and melancholy quaver of the bell. The birds had become
quiet; the breeze, too, died away; and it was as though each huge tree
stood listening, and that no leaf dared stir.
As a dark cloud gliding between earth and sun quenches the sky's calm
brightness, so the bell's tolling seemed to transform the scene about me
to a sunless waste, through which the dread sound surged in waves, like
the complaint of trees before a storm.
Standing where my potatoes had been hoed the year before, I listened a
moment longer to the dreary mourning of the bell, my eyes roving along
the edges of the forest which, like a high, green rampart, enclosed my
cleared land on every side.
Then I turned and went swiftly to my house, snatched blanket from bed,
spread it on the puncheon floor, laid upon it a sack of new bullets, a
new canister of powder, a heap of buckskin scraps for wadding, a bag of
salt, another of parched corn, a dozen strips of smoked venison.
Separately on the blanket beside these I placed two pair of woollen
hose, two pair of new ankle moccasins, an extra pair of deer-skin
leggins, two cotton shirts, a hunting shirt of doe-skin, and a fishing
line and hooks. These things I rolled within my blanket, making of
everything a strapped pack.
Then I pulled on my District Militia regimentals, which same was a
hunting shirt of tow-cloth, spatter-dashes of the same, and a felt hat,
cocked.
Across the breast of my tow-cloth hunting-shirt I slung a bullet-pouch,
a powder-horn and a leather haversack; seized my light hatchet and hung
it to my belt, hoisted the blanket pack to my shoulders and strapped it
there; and, picking up rifle and hunting knife, I passed swiftly out of
the house, fastening the heavy oaken door behind me and wondering
whether I should ever return to open it again.
The trodden forest trail, wide enough for a team to pass, lay straight
before me due west, through heavy woods, to Andrew Bowman's farm.
When I came into the cleared land, I perceived Mrs. Bowman washing
clothing in a spring near the door of her log house, and the wash
a-bleaching in the early sun. When she saw me she called to me across
the clearing:
"Have you news for me, John Drogue?"
"None," said I. "Where is your man, Martha?"
"Gone away to Stoner's with pack and rifle. He is but just departed. Is
it only a drill call, or are the Indians out at the Lower Castle?"
"I know nothing," said I. "Are you alone in the house?"
"A young kinswoman, Penelope Grant, servant to old Douw Fonda, arrived
late last night with my man from Caughnawaga, and is still asleep in the
loft."
As she spoke a girl, clothed only in her shift, came to the open door of
the log house. Her naked feet were snow-white; her hair, yellow as
October-corn, seemed very thick and tangled.
She stood blinking as though dazzled, the glory of the rising sun in her
face; then the tolling of the tocsin swam to her sleepy ears, and she
started like a wild thing when a shot is fired very far away.
And, "What is that sound?" she exclaimed, staring about her; and I had
never seen a woman's eyes so brown under such yellow hair.
She stepped out into the fresh grass and stood in the dew listening, now
gazing at the woods, now at Martha Bowman, and now upon me.
Speech came to me with an odd sort of anger. I said to Mrs. Bowman, who
stood gaping in the sunshine:
"Where are your wits? Take that child into the house and bar your
shutters and draw water for your tubs. And keep your door bolted until
some of the militia can return from Stoner's."
"Oh, my God," said she, and fell to snatching her wash from the bushes
and grass.
At that, the girl Penelope turned and looked at me. And I thought she
was badly frightened until she spoke.
"Young soldier," said she, "do you know if Sir John has fled?"
"I know nothing," said I, "and am like to learn less if you women do not
instantly go in and bar your house."
"Are the Mohawks out?" she asked.
"Have I not said I do not know?"
"Yes, sir.... But I should have escort by the shortest route to
Cayadutta----"
"You talk like a child," said I, sharply. "And you seem scarcely more,"
I added, turning away. But I lingered still to see them safely bolted in
before I departed.
"Soldier," she began timidly; but I interrupted:
"Go fill your tubs against fire-arrows," said I. "Why do you loiter?"
"Because I have great need to return to Caughnawaga. Will you guide me
the shortest way by the woods?"
"Do you not hear that bell?" I demanded angrily.
"Yes, sir, I hear it. But I should go to Cayadutta----"
"And I should answer that militia call," said I impatiently. "Go in and
lock the house, I tell you!"
Mrs. Bowman, her arms full of wet linen, ran into the house. The girl,
Penelope, gazed at the woods.
"I am servant to a very old man," she said, twisting her linked fingers.
"I can not abandon him! I can not let him remain all alone at Cayadutta
Lodge. Will you take me to him?"
"And if I were free of duty," said I, "I would not take you or any other
woman into those accursed woods!"
"Why not, sir?"
"Because I do not yet comprehend what that bell is telling me. And if it
means that there is a painted war-party out between the Sacandaga and
the Mohawk, I shall not take you to Caughnawaga when I return from
Stoner's, and that's flat!"
"I am not afraid to go," said she. But I think I saw her shudder; and
her face seemed very still and white. Then Mrs. Bowman ran out of the
house and caught the girl by her homespun shift.
"Come indoors!" she cried shrilly, "or will you have us all pulling war
arrows out of our bodies while you stand blinking at the woods and
gossiping with Jack Drogue?"
The girl shook herself free, and asked me again to take her to Cayadutta
Lodge.
But I had no more time to argue, and I flung my rifle to my shoulder and
started out across the cleared land.
Once I looked back. And I saw her still standing there, the rising sun
bright on her tangled hair, and her naked feet shining like silver in
the dew-wet grass.
By a spring path I hastened to the house of John Putman, and found him
already gone and his family drawing water and fastening shutters.
His wife, Deborah, called to me saying that the Salisburys should be
warned, and I told her that I had already spoken to the Bowmans.
"Your labour for your pains, John Drogue!" cried she. "The Bowmans are
King's people and need fear neither Tory nor Indian!"
"It is unjust to say so, Deborah," I retorted warmly. "Dries Bowman is
already on his way to answer the militia call!"
"Watch him!" she said, slamming the shutters; and fell to scolding her
children, who, poor things, were striving at the well with dripping
bucket too heavy for their strength.
So I drew the water they might need if, indeed, it should prove true
that Little Abe's Mohawks at the Lower Castle had painted themselves and
were broken loose; and then I ran back along the spring path to the
Salisbury's, and found them already well bolted in, and their man gone
to Stoner's with rifle and pack.
And now comes Johnny Silver, who had ridden my mare from Varick's, but
had no news, all being tranquil along Frenchman's Creek, and nobody able
to say what the Block House bell was telling us.
"Did you stable Kaya?" I asked.
"Oui, mon garce! I have bolt her in tight!"
"Good heavens," said I, "she can not remain bolted in to starve if I am
sent on to Canada! Get you forward to Stoner's house and say that I
delay only to fetch my horse!"
The stout little French trapper flung his piece to his shoulder and
broke into a dog-trot toward the west.
"Follow quickly, Sieur Jean!" he called gaily. "By gar, I have smell
Iroquois war paint since ver' long time already, and now I smell him
strong as old dog fox!"
I turned and started back through the woods as swiftly as I could
stride.
As I came in sight of my log house, I was astounded to see my mare out
and saddled, and a woman setting foot to stirrup. As I sprang out of the
edge of the woods and ran toward her, she wheeled Kaya, and I saw that
it was the Caughnawaga wench in _my_ saddle and upon _my_ horse--her
yellow hair twisted up and shining like a Turk's gold turban above her
bloodless face.
"What do you mean!" I cried in a fury. "Dismount instantly from that
mare! Do you hear me?"
"I must ride to Caughnawaga!" she called out, and struck my mare with
both heels so that the horse bounded away beyond my reach.
Exasperated, I knew not what to do, for I could not hope to overtake the
mad wench afoot; and so could only shout after her.
However, she drew bridle and looked back; but I dared not advance from
where I stood, lest she gallop out of hearing at the first step.
"This is madness!" I called to her across the field. "You do not know
why that bell is ringing at Mayfield. A week since the Mohawks were
talking to one another with fires on all these hills! There may be a
war party in yonder woods! There may be more than one betwixt here and
Caughnawaga!"
"I cannot desert Mr. Fonda at such a time," said she with that same pale
and frightened obstinacy I had encountered at Bowman's.
"Do you wish to steal my horse!" I demanded.
"No, sir.... It is not meant so. If some one would guide me afoot I
would be glad to return to you your horse."
"Oh. And if not, then you mean to ride there in spite o' the devil. Is
that the situation?"
"Yes, sir."
Had it been any man I would have put a bullet in him; and could have
easily marked him where I pleased. Never had I been in colder rage;
never had I felt so helpless. And every moment I was afeard the crazy
girl would ride on.
"Will you parley?" I shouted.
"Parley?" she repeated. "How so, young soldier?"
"In this manner, then: I engage my honour not to seize your bridle or
touch you or my horse if you will sit still till I come up with you."
She sat looking at me across the fallow field in silence.
"I shall not use violence," said I. "I shall try only to find some way
to serve you, and yet to do my own duty, too."
"Soldier," she replied in a troubled voice, "is this the very truth you
speak?"
"Have I not engaged my honour?" I retorted sharply.
She made no reply, but she did not stir as I advanced, though her brown
eyes watched my every step.
When I stood at her stirrup she looked down at me intently, and I saw
she was younger even than I had thought, and was made more like a
smooth, slim boy than a woman.
"You are Penelope Grant, of Caughnawaga," I said.
"Yes, sir."
"Do you know who I am?"
"No, sir."
I named myself, saying with a smile that none of my name had ever broken
faith in word or deed.
"Now," I continued, "that bell calls me to duty as surely as drum or
trumpet ever summoned soldier since there were wars on earth. I must go
to Stoner's; I can not guide you to Caughnawaga through the woods or
take you thither by road or trail. And yet, if I do not, you mean to
take my horse."
"I must."
"And risk a Mohawk war party on the way?"
"I--must."
"That is very brave," said I, curbing my impatience, "but not wise.
There are others of his kin to care for old Douw Fonda if war has truly
come upon us here in Tryon County."
"Soldier," said she in her still voice, which I once thought had been
made strange by fear, but now knew otherwise--"my honour, too, is
engaged. Mr. Fonda, whom I serve, has made of me more than a servant. He
uses me as a daughter; offers to adopt me; trusts his age and feebleness
to me; looks to me for every need, every ministration....
"Soldier, I came to Dries Bowman's last night with his consent, and gave
him my word to return within a week. I came to Fonda's Bush because Mr.
Fonda desired me to visit the only family in America with whom I have
the slightest tie of kinship--the Bowmans.
"But if war has come to us here in County Tryon, then instantly my duty
is to this brave old gentleman who lives all alone in his house at
Caughnawaga, and nobody except servants and black slaves to protect him
if danger comes to the door."
What the girl said touched me; nor could I discern in her anything of
the coquetry which Nick Stoner's story of her knitting and her ring of
gallants had pictured for me.
Surely here was no rustic coquette to be flattered and courted and
bedeviled by her betters--no country suck-thumb to sit a-giggling at her
knitting, surfeited with honeyed words that meant destruction;--no wench
to hang her head and twiddle apron while some pup of quality whispered
in her ear temptations.
I said: "This is the better way. Listen. Ride my mare to Mayfield by the
highway. If you learn there that the Lower Castle Indians have painted
for war, there is no hope of winning through to Cayadutta Lodge. And of
what use to Mr. Fonda would be a dead girl?"
"That is true," she whispered.
"Very well. And if the Mohawks are loose along the river, then you shall
remain at the Block House until it becomes possible to go on. There is
no other way. Do you understand?"
"Yes, sir."
"Do you engage to do this thing? And to place my horse in safety at the
Mayfield fort?"
"Yes, sir."
"Then," said I, "in my turn I promise to send aid to you at Mayfield, or
come myself and take you to Cayadutta Lodge as soon as that proves
possible. And I promise more; I shall endeavour to get word through to
Mr. Fonda concerning your situation."
She thanked me in that odd, still voice of hers. Her eyes had the starry
look of a child's--or of unshed tears.
"My mare will carry two," said I cheerfully. "Let me mount behind you
and set you on the Mayfield road."
She made no reply. I mounted behind her, took the bridle from her
chilled fingers, and spoke to Kaya very gaily. And so we rode across my
sunlit glebe and across the sugar-bush, where the moist trail, full of
ferns, stretched away toward Mayfield as straight as the bee flies.
I do not know whether it was because the wench was now fulfilling her
duty, as she deemed it, and therefore had become contented in a measure,
but when I dismounted she took the bridle with a glance that seemed near
to a faint smile. But maybe it was her mouth that I thought fashioned in
pleasant lines.
"Will you remember, soldier?" she asked, looking down at me from the
saddle. "I shall wait some news of you at the Mayfield fort."
"I shall not let you remain there long abandoned," said I cheerily. "Be
kind to Kaya. She has a tender mouth and an ear more sensitive still to
a harsh word."
The girl laid a hand flat on my mare's neck and looked at me, the shy
caress in her gesture and in her eyes.
Both were meant for my horse; and a quick kindness for this Scotch girl
came into my heart.
"Take shelter at the Mayfield fort," said I, "and be very certain I
shall not forget you. You may gallop all the way on this soft wood-road.
Will you care for Kaya at the fort when she is unsaddled?"
A smile suddenly curved her lips.
"Yes, John Drogue," she answered, looking me in the eyes. And the next
moment she was off at a gallop, her yellow hair loosened with the first
bound of the horse, and flying all about her face and shoulders now,
like sunshine flashing across windblown golden-rod.
Then, in her saddle, the girl turned and looked back at me, and sat so,
still galloping, until she was out of sight.
And, as I stood there alone in the woodland road, I began to understand
what Nick Stoner meant when he called this Scotch girl a disturber of
men's minds and a mistress--all unconscious, perhaps--of a very deadly
art.