Playful she turn'd that he might see
The passing smile her cheek put on;
But when she marked how mournfully
His eyes met hers, that smile was gone.
_Lalla Rookh._
The occurrences of the last few days had been too exciting, and had made
too many demands on the fortitude of our heroine, to leave her in the
helplessness of grief. She mourned for her father, and she occasionally
shuddered as she recalled the sudden death of Jennie, and all the
horrible scenes she had witnessed; but on the whole she had aroused
herself, and was no longer in the deep depression which usually
accompanies grief. Perhaps the overwhelming, almost stupefying sorrow
that crushed poor June, and left her for nearly twenty-four hours in a
state of stupor, assisted Mabel in conquering her own feelings, for she
had felt called on to administer consolation to the young Indian woman.
This she had done in the quiet, soothing, insinuating way in which her
sex usually exerts its influence on such occasions.
The morning of the third day was set for that on which the _Scud_ was to
sail. Jasper had made all his preparations; the different effects were
embarked, and Mabel had taken leave of June, a painful and affectionate
parting. In a word, all was ready, and every soul had left the island
but the Indian woman, Pathfinder, Jasper, and our heroine. The former
had gone into a thicket to weep, and the three last were approaching the
spot where three canoes lay, one of which was the property of June, and
the other two were in waiting to carry the others off to the _Scud_.
Pathfinder led the way, but, when he drew near the shore, instead of
taking the direction to the boats, he motioned to his companions to
follow, and proceeded to a fallen tree which lay on the margin of the
glade and out of view of those in the cutter. Seating himself on the
trunk, he signed to Mabel to take her place on one side of him and to
Jasper to occupy the other.
“Sit down here Mabel; sit down there, Eau-douce,” he commenced, as soon
as he had taken his own seat. “I've something that lies heavy on my
mind, and now is the time to take it off, if it's ever to be done. Sit
down, Mabel, and let me lighten my heart, if not my conscience, while
I've the strength to do it.”
The pause that succeeded lasted two or three minutes, and both the young
people wondered what was to come next; the idea that Pathfinder could
have any weight on his conscience seeming equally improbable to each.
“Mabel,” our hero at length resumed, “we must talk plainly to each other
afore we join your uncle in the cutter, where the Saltwater has slept
every night since the last rally, for he says it's the only place in
which a man can be sure of keeping the hair on his head, he does. Ah's
me! What have I to do with these follies and sayings now? I try to be
pleasant, and to feel light-hearted, but the power of man can't make
water run up stream. Mabel, you know that the Sergeant, afore he left
us, had settled it 'atween us two that we were to become man and wife,
and that we were to live together and to love one another as long as the
Lord was pleased to keep us both on 'arth; yes, and afterwards too?”
Mabel's cheeks had regained a little of their ancient bloom in the
fresh air of the morning; but at this unlooked-for address they blanched
again, nearly to the pallid hue which grief had imprinted there. Still,
she looked kindly, though seriously, at Pathfinder and even endeavored
to force a smile.
“Very true, my excellent friend,” she answered; “this was my poor
father's wish, and I feel certain that a whole life devoted to your
welfare and comforts could scarcely repay you for all you have done for
us.”
“I fear me, Mabel, that man and wife needs be bound together by a
stronger tie than such feelings, I do. You have done nothing for me,
or nothing of any account, and yet my very heart yearns towards you,
it does; and therefore it seems likely that these feelings come from
something besides saving scalps and guiding through woods.”
Mabel's cheek had begun to glow again; and though she struggled hard to
smile, her voice trembled a little as she answered.
“Had we not better postpone this conversation, Pathfinder?” she said;
“we are not alone; and nothing is so unpleasant to a listener, they say,
as family matters in which he feels no interest.”
“It's because we are not alone, Mabel, or rather because Jasper is with
us, that I wish to talk of this matter. The Sergeant believed I might
make a suitable companion for you, and, though I had misgivings about
it,--yes, I had many misgivings,--he finally persuaded me into the idee,
and things came round 'atween us, as you know. But, when you promised
your father to marry me, Mabel, and gave me your hand so modestly, but
so prettily, there was one circumstance, as your uncle called it, that
you didn't know; and I've thought it right to tell you what it is,
before matters are finally settled. I've often taken a poor deer for my
dinner when good venison was not to be found; but it's as nat'ral not to
take up with the worst when the best may be had.”
“You speak in a way, Pathfinder, that is difficult to be understood. If
this conversation is really necessary, I trust you will be more plain.”
“Well then, Mabel, I've been thinking it was quite likely, when you gave
in to the Sergeant's wishes, that you did not know the natur' of Jasper
Western's feelings towards you?”
“Pathfinder!” and Mabel's cheek now paled to the livid hue of death;
then it flushed to the tint of crimson; and her whole frame shuddered.
Pathfinder, however, was too intent on his own object to notice this
agitation; and Eau-douce had hidden his face in his hands in time to
shut out its view.
“I've been talking with the lad; and, on comparing his dreams with my
dreams, his feelings with my feelings, and his wishes with my wishes,
I fear we think too much alike consarning you for both of us to be very
happy.”
“Pathfinder, you forget; you should remember that we are betrothed!”
said Mabel hastily, and in a voice so low that it required acute
attention in the listeners to catch the syllables. Indeed the last word
was not quite intelligible to the guide, and he confessed his ignorance
by the usual,--
“Anan?”
“You forget that we are to be married; and such allusions are improper
as well as painful.”
“Everything is proper that is right, Mabel; and everything is right that
leads to justice and fair dealing; though it _is painful_ enough, as you
say, as I find on trial, I do. Now, Mabel, had you known that Eau-douce
thinks of you in this way, maybe you never would have consented to be
married to one as old and as uncomely as I am.”
“Why this cruel trial, Pathfinder? To what can all this lead? Jasper
Western thinks no such thing: he says nothing, he feels nothing.”
“Mabel!” burst from out of the young man's lips, in a way to betray the
uncontrollable nature of his emotions, though he uttered not another
syllable.
Mabel buried her face in both her hands; and the two sat like a pair of
guilty beings, suddenly detected in the commission of some crime which
involved the happiness of a common patron. At that instant, perhaps,
Jasper himself was inclined to deny his passion, through an extreme
unwillingness to grieve his friend; while Mabel, on whom this positive
announcement of a fact that she had rather unconsciously hoped than
believed, came so unexpectedly, felt her mind momentarily bewildered;
and she scarcely knew whether to weep or to rejoice. Still she was
the first to speak; since Eau-douce could utter naught that would be
disingenuous, or that would pain his friend.
“Pathfinder,” said she, “you talk wildly. Why mention this at all?”
“Well, Mabel, if I talk wildly, I _am_ half wild, you know, by natur',
I fear, as well as by habit.” As he said this, he endeavored to laugh
in his usual noiseless way, but the effect produced a strange and
discordant sound; and it appeared nearly to choke him. “Yes, I _must_ be
wild; I'll not attempt to deny it.”
“Dearest Pathfinder! my best, almost my only friend! You _cannot, do
not_ think I intended to say that!” interrupted Mabel, almost breathless
in her haste to relieve his mortification. “If courage, truth, nobleness
of soul and conduct, unyielding principles, and a hundred other
excellent qualities can render any man respectable, esteemed, or
beloved, your claims are inferior to those of no other human being.”
“What tender and bewitching voices they have, Jasper!” resumed the
guide, now laughing freely and naturally. “Yes, natur' seems to have
made them on purpose to sing in our ears, when the music of the woods
is silent. But we must come to a right understanding, we must. I ask you
again, Mabel, if you had known that Jasper Western loves you as well as
I do, or better perhaps, though that is scarcely possible; that in his
dreams he sees your face in the water of the lake; that he talks to
you, and of you, in his sleep; fancies all that is beautiful like Mabel
Dunham, and all that is good and virtuous; believes he never knowed
happiness until he knowed you; could kiss the ground on which you have
trod, and forgets all the joys of his calling to think of you and the
delight of gazing at your beauty and in listening to your voice, would
you then have consented to marry me?”
Mabel could not have answered this question if she would; but, though
her face was buried in her hands, the tint of the rushing blood was
visible between the openings, and the suffusion seemed to impart itself
to her very fingers. Still nature asserted her power, for there was a
single instant when the astonished, almost terrified girl stole a glance
at Jasper, as if distrusting Pathfinder's history of his feelings, read
the truth of all he said in that furtive look, and instantly concealed
her face again, as if she would hide it from observation for ever.
“Take time to think, Mabel,” the guide continued, “for it is a solemn
thing to accept one man for a husband while the thoughts and wishes lead
to another. Jasper and I have talked this matter over, freely and like
old friends, and, though I always knowed that we viewed most things
pretty much alike, I couldn't have thought that we regarded any
particular object with the very same eyes, as it might be, until we
opened our minds to each other about you. Now Jasper owns that the very
first time he beheld you, he thought you the sweetest and winningestest
creatur' he had ever met; that your voice sounded like murmuring water
in his ears; that he fancied his sails were your garments fluttering in
the wind; that your laugh haunted him in his sleep; and that ag'in and
ag'in has he started up affrighted, because he has fancied some one
wanted to force you out of the _Scud_, where he imagined you had taken
up your abode. Nay, the lad has even acknowledged that he often weeps at
the thought that you are likely to spend your days with another, and not
with him.”
“Jasper!”
“It's solemn truth, Mabel, and it's right you should know it. Now stand
up, and choose 'atween us. I do believe Eau-douce loves you as well as
I do myself; he has tried to persuade me that he loves you better, but
that I will not allow, for I do not think it possible; but I will own
the boy loves you, heart and soul, and he has a good right to be heard.
The Sergeant left me your protector, and not your tyrant. I told him
that I would be a father to you as well as a husband, and it seems to me
no feeling father would deny his child this small privilege. Stand up,
Mabel, therefore, and speak your thoughts as freely as if I were the
Sergeant himself, seeking your good, and nothing else.”
Mabel dropped her hands, arose, and stood face to face with her two
suitors, though the flush that was on her cheeks was feverish, the
evidence of excitement rather than of shame.
“What would you have, Pathfinder?” she asked; “Have I not already
promised my poor father to do all you desire?”
“Then I desire this. Here I stand, a man of the forest and of little
larning, though I fear with an ambition beyond my desarts, and I'll
do my endivors to do justice to both sides. In the first place, it is
allowed that, so far as feelings in your behalf are consarned, we love
you just the same; Jasper thinks his feelings _must_ be the strongest,
but this I cannot say in honesty, for it doesn't seem to me that it
_can_ be true, else I would frankly and freely confess it, I would. So
in this particular, Mabel, we are here before you on equal tarms. As for
myself, being the oldest, I'll first say what little can be produced in
my favor, as well as ag'in it. As a hunter, I do think there is no man
near the lines that can outdo me. If venison, or bear's meat, or even
birds and fish, should ever be scarce in our cabin, it would be more
likely to be owing to natur' and Providence than to any fault of mine.
In short, it does seem to me that the woman who depended on me would
never be likely to want for food. But I'm fearful ignorant! It's true
I speak several tongues, such as they be, while I'm very far from being
expart at my own. Then, my years are greater than your own, Mabel; and
the circumstance that I was so long the Sergeant's comrade can be no
great merit in your eyes. I wish, too, I was more comely, I do; but
we are all as natur' made us, and the last thing that a man ought to
lament, except on very special occasions, is his looks. When all is
remembered, age, looks, learning, and habits, Mabel, conscience tells me
I ought to confess that I'm altogether unfit for you, if not downright
unworthy; and I would give up the hope this minute, I would, if I didn't
feel something pulling at my heart-strings which seems hard to undo.”
“Pathfinder! Noble, generous Pathfinder!” cried our heroine, seizing his
hand and kissing it with a species of holy reverence; “You do yourself
injustice--you forget my poor father and your promise--you do not know
_me_!”
“Now, here's Jasper,” continued the guide, without allowing the girl's
caresses to win him from his purpose, “with _him_ the case is different.
In the way of providing, as in that of loving, there's not much to
choose 'atween us; for the lad is frugal, industrious, and careful. Then
he is quite a scholar, knows the tongue of the Frenchers, reads many
books, and some, I know, that you like to read yourself, can understand
you at all times, which, perhaps, is more than I can say for myself.”
“What of all this?” interrupted Mabel impatiently; “Why speak of it
now--why speak of it at all?”
“Then the lad has a manner of letting his thoughts be known, that I
fear I can never equal. If there's anything on 'arth that would make my
tongue bold and persuading, Mabel, I do think it's yourself; and yet in
our late conversations Jasper has outdone me, even on this point, in a
way to make me ashamed of myself. He has told me how simple you were,
and how true-hearted, and kind-hearted; and how you looked down upon
vanities, for though you might be the wife of more than one officer,
as he thinks, that you cling to feeling, and would rather be true to
yourself and natur' than a colonel's lady. He fairly made my blood warm,
he did, when he spoke of your having beauty without seeming ever to have
looked upon it, and the manner in which you moved about like a young
fa'n, so nat'ral and graceful like, without knowing it; and the truth
and justice of your idees, and the warmth and generosity of your
heart--”
“Jasper!” interrupted Mabel, giving way to feelings that had gathered
an ungovernable force by being so long pent, and falling into the
young man's willing arms, weeping like a child, and almost as helpless.
“Jasper! Jasper! Why have you kept this from me?”
The answer of Eau-douce was not very intelligible, nor was the murmured
dialogue that followed remarkable for coherency. But the language of
affection is easily understood. The hour that succeeded passed like a
very few minutes of ordinary life, so far as a computation of time was
concerned; and when Mabel recollected herself, and bethought her of the
existence of others, her uncle was pacing the cutter's deck in great
impatience, and wondering why Jasper should be losing so much of a
favorable wind. Her first thought was of him, who was so likely to feel
the recent betrayal of her real emotions.
“Oh, Jasper,” she exclaimed, like one suddenly self-convicted, “the
Pathfinder!”
Eau-douce fairly trembled, not with unmanly apprehension, but with the
painful conviction of the pang he had given his friend; and he looked in
all directions in the expectation of seeing his person. But Pathfinder
had withdrawn, with a tact and a delicacy that might have done credit to
the sensibility and breeding of a courtier. For several minutes the
two lovers sat, silently waiting his return, uncertain what propriety
required of them under circumstances so marked and so peculiar. At
length they beheld their friend advancing slowly towards them, with a
thoughtful and even pensive air.
“I now understand what you meant, Jasper, by speaking without a tongue
and hearing without an ear,” he said when close enough to the tree to
be heard. “Yes, I understand it now, I do; and a very pleasant sort of
discourse it is, when one can hold it with Mabel Dunham. Ah's me! I told
the Sergeant I wasn't fit for her; that I was too old, too ignorant, and
too wild like; but he _would_ have it otherwise.”
Jasper and Mabel sat, resembling Milton's picture of our first parents,
when the consciousness of sin first laid its leaden weight on their
souls. Neither spoke, neither even moved; though both at that moment
fancied they could part with their new-found happiness in order to
restore their friend to his peace of mind. Jasper was pale as death,
but, in Mabel, maiden modesty had caused the blood to mantle on her
cheeks, until their bloom was heightened to a richness that was scarcely
equalled in her hours of light-hearted buoyancy and joy. As the feeling
which, in her sex, always accompanies the security of love returned,
threw its softness and tenderness over her countenance, she was
singularly beautiful. Pathfinder gazed at her with an intentness he did
not endeavor to conceal, and then he fairly laughed in his own way, and
with a sort of wild exultation, as men that are untutored are wont to
express their delight. This momentary indulgence, however, was expiated
by the pang which followed the sudden consciousness that this glorious
young creature was lost to him for ever. It required a full minute for
this simple-minded being to recover from the shock of this conviction;
and then he recovered his dignity of manner, speaking with gravity,
almost with solemnity.
“I have always known, Mabel Dunham, that men have their gifts,” said he;
“but I'd forgotten that it did not belong to mine to please the young,
the beautiful, and l'arned. I hope the mistake has been no very heavy
sin; and if it was, I've been heavily punished for it, I have. Nay,
Mabel, I know what you'd say, but it's unnecessary; I _feel_ it all, and
that is as good as if I _heard_ it all. I've had a bitter hour, Mabel.
I've had a very bitter hour, lad.”
“Hour!” echoed Mabel, as the other first used the word; the tell-tale
blood, which had begun to ebb towards her heart, rushing again
tumultuously to her very temples; “surely not an hour, Pathfinder?”
“Hour!” exclaimed Jasper at the same instant; “No, no, my worthy friend,
it is not ten minutes since you left us!”
“Well, it may be so; though to me it has seemed to be a day. I begin to
think, however, that the happy count time by minutes, and the miserable
count it by months. But we will talk no more of this; it is all over
now, and many words about it will make you no happier, while they will
only tell me what I've lost; and quite likely how much I desarved to
lose her. No, no, Mabel, 'tis useless to interrupt me; I admit it all,
and your gainsaying it, though it be so well meant, cannot change my
mind. Well, Jasper, she is yours; and, though it's hard to think it,
I do believe you'll make her happier than I could, for your gifts are
better suited to do so, though I would have strived hard to do as much,
if I know myself, I would. I ought to have known better than to believe
the Sergeant; and I ought to have put faith in what Mabel told me at the
head of the lake, for reason and judgment might have shown me its truth;
but it is so pleasant to think what we wish, and mankind so easily
over-persuade us, when we over-persuade ourselves. But what's the use
in talking of it, as I said afore? It's true, Mabel seemed to be
consenting, though it all came from a wish to please her father, and
from being skeary about the savages--”
“Pathfinder!”
“I understand you, Mabel, and have no hard feelings, I haven't. I
sometimes think I should like to live in your neighborhood, that I might
look at your happiness; but, on the whole, it's better I should quit the
55th altogether, and go back to the 60th, which is my natyve rigiment,
as it might be. It would have been better, perhaps, had I never left it,
though my sarvices were much wanted in this quarter, and I'd been with
some of the 55th years agone; Sergeant Dunham, for instance, when he was
in another corps. Still, Jasper, I do not regret that I've known you--”
“And me, Pathfinder!” impetuously interrupted Mabel; “do you regret
having known _me_? Could I think so, I should never be at peace with
myself.”
“You, Mabel!” returned the guide, taking the hand of our heroine and
looking up into her countenance with guileless simplicity, but earnest
affection; “How could I be sorry that a ray of the sun came across the
gloom of a cheerless day--that light has broken in upon darkness, though
it remained so short a time? I do not flatter myself with being able
to march quite so light-hearted as I once used to could, or to sleep as
sound, for some time to come; but I shall always remember how near I was
to being undeservedly happy, I shall. So far from blaming you, Mabel,
I only blame myself for being so vain as to think it possible I could
please such a creatur'; for sartainly you told me how it was, when we
talked it over on the mountain, and I ought to have believed you then;
for I do suppose it's nat'ral that young women should know their own
minds better than their fathers. Ah's me! It's settled now, and nothing
remains but for me to take leave of you, that you may depart; I feel
that Master Cap must be impatient, and there is danger of his coming on
shore to look for us all.”
“To take leave!” exclaimed Mabel.
“Leave!” echoed Jasper; “You do not mean to quit us, my friend?”
“'Tis best, Mabel, 'tis altogether best, Eau-douce; and it's wisest. I
could live and die in your company, if I only followed feeling; but, if
I follow reason, I shall quit you here. You will go back to Oswego, and
become man and wife as soon as you arrive,--for all that is determined
with Master Cap, who hankers after the sea again, and who knows what is
to happen,--while I shall return to the wilderness and my Maker. Come,
Mabel,” continued Pathfinder, rising and drawing nearer to our heroine,
with grave decorum, “kiss me; Jasper will not grudge me one kiss; then
we'll part.”
“Oh, Pathfinder!” exclaimed Mabel, falling into the arms of the guide,
and kissing his cheeks again and again, with a freedom and warmth she
had been far from manifesting while held to the bosom of Jasper; “God
bless you, dearest Pathfinder! You'll come to us hereafter. We shall
see you again. When old, you will come to our dwelling, and let me be a
daughter to you?”
“Yes, that's it,” returned the guide, almost gasping for breath; “I'll
try to think of it in that way. You're more befitting to be my daughter
than to be my wife, you are. Farewell, Jasper. Now we'll go to the
canoe; it's time you were on board.”
The manner in which Pathfinder led the way to the shore was solemn and
calm. As soon as he reached the canoe, he again took Mabel by the hands,
held her at the length of his own arms, and gazed wistfully into her
face, until the unbidden tears rolled out of the fountains of feeling
and trickled down his rugged cheeks in streams.
“Bless me, Pathfinder,” said Mabel, kneeling reverently at his feet.
“Oh, at least bless me before we part!”
That untutored but noble-minded being did as she desired; and, aiding
her to enter the canoe, seemed to tear himself away as one snaps a
strong and obstinate cord. Before he retired, however, he took Jasper by
the arm and led him a little aside, when he spoke as follows:--
“You're kind of heart and gentle by natur', Jasper; but we are both
rough and wild in comparison with that dear creatur'. Be careful of her,
and never show the roughness of man's natur' to her soft disposition.
You'll get to understand her in time; and the Lord, who governs the lake
and the forest alike, who looks upon virtue with a smile and upon vice
with a frown, keep you happy and worthy to be so!”
Pathfinder made a sign for his friend to depart, and he stood leaning on
his rifle until the canoe had reached the side of the _Scud_. Mabel wept
as if her heart would break; nor did her eyes once turn from the open
spot in the glade, where the form of the Pathfinder was to be seen,
until the cutter had passed a point that completely shut out the island.
When last in view, the sinewy frame of this extraordinary man was as
motionless as if it were a statue set up in that solitary place to
commemorate the scenes of which it had so lately been the witness.