INTO THE NORTH
Head winds, which began with a fresh breeze off King's Ferry and
culminated in a three days' hurricane, knocked us about the Tappan Zee,
driving us from point to cove; and for forty-eight hours I saw our
gunboats, under bare poles, tossing on the gray fury of the Hudson, and
a sloop of war, sprit on the rocks, buried under the sprouting spray
below Dobbs Ferry. Safer had we been in the open ocean off the Narrows,
where the great winds drive bellowing from the Indies to the Pole; but
these yelling gales that burst from the Highlands struck us like the
successive discharges of cannon, and the _Wind-Flower_ staggered and
heeled, reeling through the Tappan Zee as a great water-fowl, crippled
and stung to terror, drives blindly into the spindrift, while shot on
shot strikes, yet ends not the frantic struggle.
Once we were beaten back so far that, in the dark whirlwind of dawn, I
saw a fire-ball go whirring aloft and spatter the eastern horizon. Then,
through the shrilling of the tempest, a gun roared to starboard, and at
the flash a gun to port boomed, shaking our decks. We had beaten back
within range of the British lines, and the batteries on Cock Hill opened
on us, and a guard-ship to the west had joined in. Southeast a red glare
leaped, and died out as Fort Tryon fired a mortar, while the _Wind-Flower_,
bulwarks awash, heeled and heeled, staggering to the shelter of Tetard's
Hill. Southward we saw the beacons ablaze, marking the _chevaux de
frise_ below Fort Lee, and on the Jersey shore the patrol's torches
flashing along the fort road. But we had set a bit o' rag under Tetard's
Hill, and slowly we crept north again past Yonkers, struggling
desperately at Phillips, but making Boar's Hill and Dobbs Ferry by
mid-afternoon. And that night the wind shifted so suddenly that from
Tappan to Tarrytown was but a jack-snipe's twist, and we lay snug in
Haverstraw Bay, under the lee of the Heights of North Castle, scarce an
hour's canoe-paddle from the wharf where we had embarked four days
before.
And now delay followed delay, a gunboat holding us twenty-four hours at
Dobbs Ferry--why, I never knew--and, at the Chain, two days' delay were
required before they let us pass.
When at last we signaled West Point, at the close of one long, calm
August afternoon, through the flaming mountain sunset, the black
fortress beckoned us to anchor, nor had we any choice but to obey the
silent summons from those grim heights, looming like a thunder-cloud
against the cinders of the dying sun.
That night a barge put out, and an officer boarded us, subjecting us to
a most rigid scrutiny. Since the great treason a savage suspicion had
succeeded routine vigilance; the very guns among the rocks seemed
alive, alert, listening, black jaws parted to launch a thunderous
warning. A guard was placed on deck; we were not allowed to send a boat
ashore; not even permitted to communicate with the fishing-smack and
rowboats that hovered around us, curious as gulls around a floating
plank.
And all this time--from the very instant of departure, through three
days and a night of screaming winds and cataracts of water, through the
delays where we rode at anchor below the Chain and Dobbs Ferry, under a
vertical sun that started the pitch in every seam--Elsin Grey, radiant,
transfigured, drenched to the skin, faced storm and calm in an ecstasy
of reckless happiness.
Wild winds from the north, shouting among the mountains, winds of the
forests, that tore the cries of exultation from our lips and scattered
sound into space, winds of my own northland that poured through our
veins, cleansing us of sordid care and sad regret and doubt, these were
the sorcerers that changed us back to children while the dull roaring
of their incantations filled the world. We two alone on earth, and the
vast, veiled world spread round, outstretching to the limits of
eternity, all ours to conquer, ours for our pleasure, ours to reign in
till the moon cracked and the stars faded, and the sun went down
forever and a day, and all was chaos save for the blazing trail of
blessed souls, soaring to glory through the majesty of endless night.
In the sunlit calms, riding at our moorings, much we discussed eternity
and creation. Doctrines once terrible seemed now harmless and without
menace, dogmas dissolved into thinnest air, blown to the nothingness
from whence they came; for, strangely, all teachings and creeds and
laws of faith narrowed to the oldest of precepts; and, ponder and
question as we might, citing prophet and saint and holy men inspired,
all came to the same at last, expressed in that cardinal precept so
safe in its simplicity--the one law embodied in one word governing
heaven and commanding earth.
"Aye," said she, "but how interpret it? For a misstep means certain
damnation, Carus. Once when I spelled out 'Love' for you, I stumbled
and should have fallen had you not held me up."
"You held _me_ up, sweetheart! I was closer to the brink than you."
She looked thoughtfully at the fortress; the shore was so near that,
through the calm darkness, we could hear the sentinels calling from
post to post and the ripple of the Hudson at the base of the rocks.
But these conferences concerning the philosophy of ethics overweighted
two hearts as young as ours; and while our new love and the happiness
of it at times reacted in solemn argument and the naive searching of
our souls, mostly a reckless delight in one another and in our freedom
dominated; and we lived for the moment only, chary and shy of stirring
slumbering embers that must one day die out or flash to a flame as
fierce as that blaze that bars the gates of heaven from lost souls.
Knowing the need of haste, and having in my pocket instructions which I
believed overweighed even the voiceless orders of the West Point
cannon, I argued with the officer of the guard on deck, day after day,
to let us go; but it was only after fifteen days' detention there at
anchor that I found out that it was an order from his Excellency
himself which held us there.
Then, one morning in early September, boats from the fortress put off
loaded with provisions for the _Wind-Flower_; the guard disembarked in
their barge, and an officer, in a cockle-shell, shouted: "Good luck to
you! The Mouse-trap's sprung, and the Mouse is squeaking!" And with that
he tossed a letter on deck. It was addressed to me:
"HEADQUARTERS, PHILADELPHIA,
"September 2d, '81.
"CARUS RENALT, ESQ'RE:
"_Sir_--On receipt of this order you will immediately proceed from
your anchorage off West Point to Albany, disembark, and travel by
way of Schenectady to Johnstown, and from there to Butlersbury,
where you will establish yourself in the manor-house, making it your
headquarters, unless force of circumstances prevent. Fifty Tryon
County Rangers, to be employed as one scout or several, are placed
under your authority; the militia, and such companies of Continental
troops as are now or may later be apportioned to Tryon County, will
continue under the orders of Colonel Marinus Willett. Your duties
you are already familiar with; your policy must emanate from your
own nature and deliberate judgment concerning the situation as it is
or as it threatens. Close and cordial cooperation with Colonel
Willett, and with the various civil and military authorities in
Tryon County, should eventually accomplish the object of your
mission, which is, first, to prevent surprise from all invasion;
second, to prevent a massacre of the Oneida Nation.
"Authority is herewith given you to open and read the sealed orders
delivered to you by myself on your departure."
The letter was signed by Colonel Hamilton. I stared at his signature, then
at the name of the city from whence the letter was dated--_Philadelphia_.
What in Heaven's name were "Headquarters" doing in Philadelphia? Was his
Excellency there? Was the army there? Impossible--the army which for
months had been preparing to storm New York?--impossible!
I thrust my hand into the breast-pocket of my coat, drew out the sealed
orders, tore them open, and read:
"Until further notice such reports as you are required to render to
his Excellency, the Commander-in-Chief, should be sent to
headquarters, near Yorktown, Virginia----"
Virginia! The army that I had seen at Dobbs Ferry, at White Plains, at
North Castle, was that army on its way to Virginia? What! hurl an
entire army a thousand miles southward? And had Sir Henry Clinton
permitted it?
In a sort of stupor I read and reread the astonishing words: "Virginia?
There was a British army in Virginia. Yorktown? Yes, that British army
was at Yorktown, practically at bay, with a youth of twenty-three--my
own age--harassing it--the young General Lafayette! Greene, too, was
there, his chivalry cutting up the light troops of General Lord
Cornwallis----"
"By Heaven!" I cried, springing to my feet, "his Excellency never meant
to storm New York! The French fleet has sailed for the Chesapeake!
Lafayette is there, Greene is there, Morgan, Sumter, Lee, Pickens, all
are there! His Excellency has gone to catch Cornwallis in a mouse-trap,
and Sir Henry is duped!"
Mad with excitement and delight, I looked up at the great fortress on
the river, and knew that it was safe in its magnificent isolation--safe
with its guns and ramparts and its four thousand men--knew that the key
to the Hudson was ours, and would remain ours, although the army, like
a gigantic dragon, had lifted its great wings and soared southward, so
silently that none, not even the British spies, had dreamed its
destination was other than the city of New York.
And, as I looked, the signals on the fortress changed; the guard-boats
hailed us, the harmless river-craft gave us right of way, and we spread
our white sails once more, drawing slowly northward, under the rocky
pulpits of the heights, past shore forests yet unbroken, edged with
acres of reeds and marshes, from which the water-fowl arose in clouds;
past pine-crowned capes and mountains, whose bases were bathed in the
great river; past lonely little islands, on, on, into the purple
mystery of the silent north.
Now there remained no high sky-bastion to halt us with voiceless signal
and dumb cannon, nothing beyond but Albany; and, beyond Albany, the
frontier; and beyond the frontier a hellish war of murder and the
torch, a ceaseless conflict of dreadful reprisals, sterile triumphs,
terrible vengeance, a saturnalia of private feuds, which spared neither
the infirm nor the infant--nay, the very watch-dog at the door received
no quarter in the holocaust.
Elsin had begged and begged that she should not be left there at West
Point, saying that Albany was safer, though I doubted the question of
safety weighed in her choice; but she pleaded so reasonably, so
sweetly, arms around my neck, and her lips whispering so that my cheek
felt their soft flutter, that I consented. There I was foolish, for no
sooner were we in sight of the Albany hills than arms and lips were
persuading again, guilelessly explaining how simple it would be for her
to live at Johnstown, while I, at Butlersbury, busied myself with my
own affairs.
And so we stood in earnest conference, while nearer and nearer loomed
the hills, with the Dutch town atop, brick houses, tiled roofs, steep
streets, becoming plainer and plainer to the eye.
There seemed to be an unusual amount of shipping at the Albany wharves
as we glided in, and a great number of wagons and people scurrying
about. In fact, I had never before observed such a bustle in Albany
streets, but thought nothing of it at the moment, for I had not seen
the town since war began. As the schooner dropped anchor at the wharf
we were still arguing; as, arm in arm, we followed our two horses and
our sea-chests which the men bore shoreward and up the steep hill to
the Half-Moon Tavern, we argued every step; at the tavern we argued,
she in her chamber, I in mine, the door open between; argued and
argued, finally rising in our earnestness and meeting on the common
threshold to continue a discussion in which tears, lips, and arms soon
supplanted logic and reason.
Had she remained at West Point, although that fortress could not have
been taken except by a regular siege, still she might have been
subjected to all the horrors of blockade and bombardment, for since his
Excellency had abandoned the Hudson with his army and was already
half-way to Virginia, nothing now stood between West Point and the
heavy British garrison of New York.
It was my knowledge of that more than her pleading that reconciled me
to leave her in Albany.
But I was soon to learn that she was by no means secure in the choice I
had made for her; for presently she retired to her own chamber and lay
down on her bed to rest for an hour or so before supper, in order to
recover from the fatigue and the constant motion of the long voyage;
and I went out into the town to inquire where Colonel Willett might be
found.
The sluggish Dutch burghers of Albany appeared to be active enough that
lovely September afternoon; hurrying hither and thither through the
streets, and not one among them sufficiently civil to stop and give me
an answer to my question concerning Colonel Willett. At first I could
make nothing of this amazing bustle and hurry; wagons, loaded with
household furniture, clattered through the streets or toiled up and down
the hills, discharging bedding, pots and pans, chairs, tables, the
family clock, and Heaven knows what, on to the wharves, where a great
many sloops and other craft were moored, the _Wind-Flower_ among them.
In the streets, too, wagons were standing before fine residences and
shops; servants and black slaves piled them high with all manner of
goods. I even saw a green parrot in a cage, perched atop of a pile of
corded bedding, and the bird cocked his head and called out
continually: "Gad-a-mercy! Gad-a-mercy! Gad-a-mercy!"
An invalid soldier of Colonel Livingston's regiment, his right arm
bandaged in splints, was standing across the street, apparently vastly
amused by the bird in the wagon; and I crossed over to him and asked
what all this exodus might signify.
"Why, the town is in a monstrous fright, friend," he drawled, cradling
his shattered arm and puffing away at his cob-pipe. "Since April, when
them red-devils of Brant's struck Cherry Valley for the second time,
and cleaned up some score and odd women and children, these here
thrifty Dutchmen in Albany have been ready to pack up and pull foot at
the first breath o' foul news."
"But," said I, "what news has alarmed them now?"
"Hey? Scairt 'em? Waal, rumors is thicker than spotted flies in the
sugar-bush. Some say the enemy are a-scalping at Torlock, some say
Little Falls. We heard last week that Schenectady was threatened. It
may be true, for there's a pest o' Tories loose in the outlying county,
and them there bloody Iroquois skulk around the farms and shoot little
children in their own dooryards."
"Do you believe there is any danger in Albany?" I asked incredulously.
He shrugged his shoulders, nursing his bandaged arm.
Then, troubled and apprehensive, I asked him where I might find Colonel
Willett, and he said that a scout was now out toward Johnstown, and
that Willett led it. This was all he knew, all the information I could
get from him. Returning along the dusty, steep streets to the Half-Moon
Tavern, I called in the stolid Dutch landlord, requesting information;
but he knew nothing at all except that a number of timid people were
packing up because an express had come in the night before with news
that a body of Tories and Indians had attacked Cobleskill, taken a Mr.
Warner, and murdered the entire family of a Captain Dietz--father,
mother, wife, four little children, and a Scotch servant-girl, Jessie
Dean.
Observing the horror with which I received the news he shook his head,
pulled at his long pipe for a few moments in thoughtful silence, and
said:
"What shall we do, sir? They kill us everywhere. Better die at home
than in the bush. I think a man's as safe here in Albany as in any
place, unless he quits all and leaves affairs to go to ruin to skulk in
one o' the valley forts. But they've even burned Stanwix now, and the
blockhouses are poor defense against Iroquois fire-arrows. If I had a
wife I'd take her to Johnstown Fort; it's built of stone, they say.
Besides, Marinus Willett is there. I wish to God he were here!"
We lingered in the empty tap-room for a while, talking in low voices of
the peril; and I was certainly amazed, so utterly unprepared was I to
find such a town as Albany in danger from the roaming scalping parties
infesting the frontier.
Still, had my own headquarters been in Albany, I should have considered
it the proper place for Elsin; but under these ominous, unlooked-for
conditions I dared not leave her here, even domiciled with some family
of my acquaintance, as I had intended. Indeed, I learned that the young
patroon himself had gone to Heldeberg to arm his tenantry, and I knew
that when Stephen Van Rensselaer took alarm it was not at the idle
whistling of a kill-deer plover.
As far as I could see there was now nothing for Elsin but to go forward
with me--strange irony of fate!--to Johnstown, perhaps to Butlersbury,
the late residence of that mortal enemy of mine, who had brought upon
her this dreadful trouble. How great a trouble it might prove to be I
dared not yet consider, for the faint hope was ever in me that this
unholy marriage might not stand the search of Tryon County's parish
records--that the poor creature he had cast off might not have been his
mistress after all, but his wife. Yes, I dared hope that he had lied,
remembering what Mount and the Weasel told me. At any rate, I had long
since determined to search what parish records might remain undestroyed
in a land where destruction had reigned for four terrible years. That,
and the chance that I might slay him if he appeared as he had
threatened, were the two fixed ideas that persisted. There was little
certainty, however, in either case, for, as I say, the records, if
extant, might only confirm his pledged word, and, on the other hand, I
was engaged by all laws of honor not to permit a private enmity to
swerve me from my public duty. Therefore, I could neither abandon all
else to hunt him down if he appeared as he promised to appear, nor take
time in record-searching, unless the documents were close at hand.
Perplexed, more than anxious, I went up-stairs and entered my chamber.
The door between our rooms still swung open, and, as I stepped forward
to close it, I saw Elsin there, asleep on her bed, fingers doubled up
in her rosy palms. So young, so pitifully alone she seemed, lying there
sleep-flushed, face upturned, that my eyes dimmed as I gazed. Bitter
doubts assailed me. I knew that I should have asked a flag and sent her
north to Sir Frederick Haldimand--even though it meant a final
separation for us--rather than risk the chances of my living through
the armed encounter, the intrigues, the violence which were so surely
approaching. I could do so still; it was not too late. Colonel Willett
would give me a flag!
Miserable, undecided, overwhelmed with self-reproach, I stood there
looking upon the unconscious sleeper. Sunlight faded from the patterned
wall; that violet tint, which lingers with us in the north after the
sun has set, deepened to a sadder color, then slowly thickened to
obscurity; and from the window I saw the new moon hanging through
tangled branches, dull as a silver-poplar leaf in November.
What if I die here on the frontier? The question persisted, repeating
itself again and again. And my thoughts ran on in somber disorder: If I
die--then we shall never know wedded happiness--never know the sweetest
of intimacies. Our lives, uncompleted, what meaning is there in such
lives? As for me, were my life to end all incomplete, why was I born?
To live on, year after year, escaping the perils all are heir to, and
then, when for the first instant life's true meaning is disclosed, to
die, sterile, blighting, desolating another life, too? And must we put
away offered happiness to wait on custom at our peril?--to sit cowed
before convention, juggling with death and passion?
Darkness around me, darkness in my soul, I stood staring at her where
she lay, arms bent back and small hands doubled up; and an overwhelming
rush of tenderness and apprehension drew me forward to bend above her,
hovering there, awed by the beauty of her--the pure lids, the lashes
resting on the cheeks, the red mouth so exquisitely tranquil, curled
like a scarlet petal of a flower fallen on snow.
Her love and mine! What cared we for laws that barred it?--what
mattered any law that dared attempt to link her destiny with that man
who might, perhaps, wear a title as her husband--and might not. Who
joined them? No God that I feared or worshiped. Then, why should I not
sunder a pact inspired by hell itself; and if the law of the land made
by men of the land permitted us no sanctuary in wedlock, then why did
we not seek that shelter in a happiness the law forbids, inspired by a
passion no law could forbid?
I had but to reach forward, to bend and touch her, and where was
Death's triumph if I fell at last? What vague and terrible justice
could rob us of these hours? Never, never had I loved her as I did
then. She breathed so quietly, lying there, that I could not see her
body stir; her stillness awed me, fascinated me; so still, so inert, so
marvelously motionless, that her very soul seemed asleep within her.
Should I awake her, this child whose calm, closed lids, whose soft
lashes and tinted skin, whose young soul and body were in my keeping
here under a strange roof, in a strange land?
Slowly, very slowly, a fear grew in me that took the shape of horror.
My reasoning was the reasoning of Walter Butler!--my argument his
damning creed! Dazed, shaken, I sank to my knees, overwhelmed by my own
perfidy; and she stirred in her slumber and stretched out one little
hand. All the chivalry, all the manhood in me responded to that appeal
in a passion of loyalty which swept my somber heart clean of
selfishness.
And there in the darkness I learned the lesson that she believed I had
taught to her--a lesson so easily forgotten when the heart's loud clamor
drowns all else, and every pulse throbs reckless response. And it was
cold reasoning and chill logic for cooling hot young blood--but it was
neither reason nor logic which prevailed, I think, but something--I know
not what--something inborn that conquered spite of myself, and a guilty
and rebellious heart that, after all, had only asked for love, at any
price--only love, but _all_ of it, its sweetness unbridled, its mystery
unfathomed--lest the body die, and the soul, unsatisfied, wing upward to
eternal ignorance.
As I crouched there beside her, in the darkness below the tall
hall-clock fell a-striking; and she moved, sighed, and sat
up--languid-eyed and pink from slumber.
"Carus," she murmured, "how long have I slept? How long have you been
here, my darling? Heigho! Why did you wake me? I was in paradise with
you but now. Where are you? I am minded to drowse, and go find you in
paradise again."
She pushed her hair aside and turned, resting her chin on one hand,
regarding me with sweet, sleepy, humorous eyes that glimmered like
amethysts in the moonlight.
"Were ever two lovers so happy?" she asked. "Is there anything on earth
that we lack?--possessing each other so completely. Tell me, Carus."
"Nothing," I said.
"Nothing," she echoed, leaning toward me and resting in my arms for a
moment, then laid her hands on my shoulders, and, raising herself to a
sitting posture, fell a-laughing to herself.
"While you were gone this afternoon," she said, "and I was lying here,
eyes wide open, seeming to feel the bed sway like the ship, I fell to
counting the ticking of the stair-clock below, and thinking how each
second was recording the eternity of my love for you. And as I lay
a-listening and thinking, came one by the window singing 'John O'Bail',
and I heard voices in the tap-room and the clatter of pewter flagons.
On a settle outside the tap-room window, full in the sun, sat the
songster and his companions, drinking new ale and singing 'John
O'Bail'--a song I never chanced to hear before, and I shall not soon
forget it for lack of schooling"--and she sang softly, sitting there,
clasping her knees, and swaying with the quaint rhythm:
"'Where do you wend your way, John O'Bail,
Where do you wend your way?'
'I follow the spotted trail
Till a maiden bids me stay,'
'Beware of the trail, John O'Bail,
Beware of the trail, I say!'
"Thus it runs, Carus, the legend of this John O'Bail, how he sought the
wilderness, shunning his kind, and traveled and trapped and slew the
deer, until one day at sunrise a maid of the People of the Morning
hailed him, bidding him stay:
"'Turn to the fire of dawn, John O'Bail,
Turn to the fire of dawn;
The doe that waits in the vale
Was a fawn in the year that's gone!'
And John O'Bail he heeds the hail
And follows her on and on.
"Oh, Carus, they sang it and sang it, hammering their pewters together,
and roaring the chorus, and that last dreadful verse:
"'Where is the soul of you, John O'Bail,
Where is the soul you slew?
There's Painted Death on the trail,
And the moccasins point to you.
Shame on the name of John O'Bail----'"
She hesitated, peering through the shadows at me: "Who _was_ John
O'Bail, Carus? What is the Painted Death, and who are the People of the
Morning?"
"John O'Bail was a wandering fellow who went a-gipsying into the
Delaware country. The Delawares call themselves 'People of the
Morning.' This John O'Bail had a son by an Indian girl--and that's what
they made the ballad about, because this son is that mongrel demon,
Cornplanter, and he's struck the frontier like a catamount gone raving
mad. He is the 'Painted Death.'"
"Oh," she said thoughtfully, "so that is why they curse the name of
John O'Bail."
After a moment she went on again: "Well, you'll never guess who it was
singing away down there! I crept to my windows and peeped out, and
there, Carus, were those two queer forest-running fellows who stopped
us on the hill that morning----"
"Jack Mount!" I exclaimed.
"Yes, dear, and the other--the little wrinkled fellow, who had such
strangely fine manners for a Coureur-de-Bois----"
"The Weasel!"
"Yes, Carus, but very drunk, and boisterous, and cutting most amazing
capers. They went off, finally, arm in arm, shuffling, reeling, and
anon breaking into a solemn sort of dance; and everybody gave them wide
berth on the street, and people paused to look after them, marking them
with sour visages and wagging heads--" She stopped short, finger on
lips, listening.
Far up the street I heard laughter, then a plaintive, sustained
howling, then more laughter, drawing nearer and nearer.
Elsin nodded in silence. I sprang up and descended the stairs. The
tap-room was lighted with candles, and the sober burghers who sat
within, savoring the early ale, scarce noted my entrance, so intent
were they listening to the approaching tumult.
The peculiar howling had recommenced. Stepping to the open door I
looked out, and beheld a half-dozen forest-runners, in all the glory of
deep-fringed buckskin and bright wampum, slowly hopping round and round
in a circle, the center of which was occupied by an angry town
watchman, lanthorn lighted, pike in hand. As they hopped, lifting their
moccasined feet as majestically as turkeys walking in a muddy road,
fetching a yelp at every step, I perceived in their grotesque
evolutions a parody upon a Wyandotte scalp-dance, the while they yapped
and yowled, chanting:
"Ha-wa-sa-say
Ha! Ha!
Ha-wa-sa-say!"
"Dance, watchman, dance!" shouted one of the rangers, whom I knew to be
Jack Mount, poking the enraged officer in the short ribs with the
muzzle of his rifle; and the watchman, with a snarl, picked up his feet
and began to tread a reluctant measure, calling out that he did not
desire to dance, and that they were great villains and rogues and
should pay for it yet.
I saw some shopkeepers putting up the shutters before their lighted
windows, while the townspeople stood about in groups, agape, to see
such doings in the public streets.
"Silence!" shouted Mount, raising his hand. "People of Albany, we have
shown you the famous Wyandotte dance; we will now exhibit a dancing
bear! Houp! Houp! Weasel, take thy tin cup and collect shillings! Ow!
Ow!" And he dropped his great paws so that they dangled at the wrist,
laid his head on one side, and began sidling around in a circle with
the grave, measured tread of a bear, while the Weasel, drinking-cup in
hand, industriously trotted in and out among the groups of scandalized
burghers, thrusting the tin receptacle at them, and talking all the
while: "Something for the bear, gentlemen--a trifle, if you please.
Everybody is permitted to contribute--you, sir, with your bones so
nicely wadded over with fat--a shilling from you. What? How dare you
refuse? Stop him, Tim!"
A huge ranger strode after the amazed burgher, blocking his way; the
thrifty had taken alarm, but the rangers herded them back with
persuasive playfulness, while the little Weasel made the rounds,
talking cheerfully all the time, and Mount, great fists dangling,
minced round and round, with a huge simper on his countenance, as
though shyly aware of his own grace.
"Tim Murphy should go into the shops," he called out. "There are a
dozen fat Dutchmen a-peeking through the shutters at me, and I dance
before no man for less than a shilling. Houp! Houp! How much is in thy
cup, Cade? Lord, what a thirst is mine! Yet I dance--villains, do you
mark me? Oh, Cade, yonder pretty maid who laughs and shows her teeth is
welcome to the show and naught to pay--unless she likes. Tim, I can
dance no more! Elerson, bring the watchman!"
The Weasel trotted up, rattling the coins so unwillingly contributed by
the economical; the runner addressed as Elerson tucked his arm
affectionately into the arm of the distracted watchman and strolled up,
followed by Tim Murphy, the most redoubtably notorious shot in North
America.
Laughing, disputing, shouting, they came surging toward the Half-Moon
Tavern, dragging the watchman, on whom they lavished many endearments.
The crowd parted with alacrity as Mount, thumbs in his armpits,
silver-moleskin cap pushed back on his clustering curls, swaggered
ahead, bowing right and left as though an applauding throng heralded
the progress of an emperor and his suite.
Here and there a woman laughed at the handsome, graceless fellows; here
and there a burgher managed to pull a grin, spite of the toll exacted.
"Now that our means permit us, we are going to drink your healths, good
people," said Mount affably, shaking the tin cup; "and the health of
that pretty maid who showed her teeth at me. Ladies of Albany, if you
but knew the wealth of harmless frolic caged in the heart that beats
beneath a humble rifle-frock! Eh, Tim? Off with thy coonskin, and sweep
the populace with thy courtly bow!"
Murphy lifted his coonskin cap, flourishing it till the ringed fur-tail
became a blur. Elerson, in a spasm of courtesy, removed the watchman's
tricorn as well as his own; the little Weasel backed off, bowing step
by step, until he backed past me into the tap-room, followed by the
buckskinned crew.
"Now, watchman, have at thee!" roared Mount, as the sloppy pewters were
brought.
And the watchman, resigned, pulled away at his mug, furtive eyes on the
landlord, who, with true delicacy, looked the other way. At that moment
Mount espied me and rose, pewter in hand, with a shout that brought all
to their feet.
"Death to the Iroquois!" he thundered, "and a health to Captain Renault
of the Rangers!"
Every eye was on me; the pewters were lifted, reversed, and emptied.
The next instant I was in the midst of a trampling, buckskinned mob;
they put me up on their shoulders and marched around the tap-room,
singing "Morgan's Men"; they set me on their table amid the pools of
spilled ale, and, joining hands, danced round and round, singing "The
New Yorker" and "John O'Bail," until more ale was fetched and a cup
handed up to me.
"Silence! The Captain speaks!" cried Mount.
"Captain?" said I, laughing. "I am no officer."
There was a mighty roar of laughter, amid which I caught cries of "He
doesn't know." "Where's the 'Gazette'?" "Show him the 'Gazette'!"
The stolid landlord picked up a newspaper from a table, spread it
deliberately, drew his horn spectacles from his pocket, wiped them,
adjusted them, and read aloud a notice of my commission from Governor
Clinton to be a senior captain in the Tryon County Rangers. Utterly
unprepared, dumb with astonishment, I stared at him through the
swelling din. Somebody thrust the paper at me. I read the item, mug in
one hand, paper in t'other.
"Death to the Iroquois!" they yelled. "Hurrah for Captain Renault!"
"Silence!" bawled Mount. "Listen to the Captain!"
"Rangers of Tryon," I said, hesitating, "this great honor which our
Governor has done me is incomprehensible to me. What experience have I
to lead such veterans?--men of Morgan's, men of Hand's, men of
Saratoga, of Oriska, of Stillwater?--I who have never laid rifle in
anger--I who have never seen a man die by violence?"
The hush was absolute.
"It must be," said I, "that such service as I have had the honor to
render has made me worthy, else this commission had been an affront to
the Rangers of Tryon County. And so, my brothers, that I may not shame
you, I ask two things: obedience to orders; respect for my rank; and if
you render not respect to my character, that will be my fault, not your
own."
I raised my pewter: "The sentiment I give you is: 'The Rangers! My
honor in their hands; theirs in mine!' Pewters aloft! Drink!"
Then the storm broke loose; they surged about the table, cheering,
shaking their rifles and pewters above their heads, crying out for me
to have no fear, that they would aid me, that they would be obedient
and good--a mob of uproarious, overgrown children, swayed by sentiment
entirely. And I even saw the watchman, maudlin already, dancing all by
himself in a corner, and waving pike and lanthorn in martial fervor.
"Lads," I said, raising my hand for silence, "there is ale here for the
asking, and nothing to pay. But we leave at daybreak for Butlersbury."
There was a dead silence.
"That is all," I said, smiling; and, laying my hand on the table,
leaped lightly to the floor.
"Are we to drink no more?" asked Jack Mount, coming up, with round blue
eyes widening.
"I did not say so. I said that we march at day-break. You veterans of
the pewter know best how much ale to carry with you to bed. All I
require are some dozen steady legs in the morning."
A roar of laughter broke out.
"You may trust us, Captain! Good night, Captain! A health to you, sir!
We will remember!"
Instead of returning to my chamber to secure a few hours' rest, I went
out into the dimly lighted street, and, striking a smart pace, arrived
in a few moments at the house of my old friend, Peter Van Schaick, now
Colonel in command of the garrison. The house was pitch-dark, and it
was only after repeated rapping that the racket of the big bronze
knocker aroused an ancient negro servant, who poked his woolly pate
from the barred side-lights and informed me, in a quavering voice, that
Colonel Van Schaick was not at home, refusing all further information
concerning him.
"Joshua! Joshua!" I said gently; "don't you know me?"
There was a silence, then a trembling: "Mars' Renault, suh, is dat
you?"
"It is I, Joshua, back again after four years. Tell me where I may find
your master?"
"Mars' Carus, suh, de Kunnel done gone to de Foht, suh--Foht Orange on
de hill."
The old slave used the ancient name of the fort, but I understood.
"Does anybody live here now except the Colonel, Joshua?"
"No, suh, nobody 'cep' de Kunnel--'scusin' me, Mars' Carus."
"Joshua," I said, under my breath, "you know all the gossip of the
country. Tell me, do you remember a young gentleman who used to come
here before the war--a handsome, dark-eyed gentleman--Lieutenant Walter
N. Butler?"
There was an interval of silence.
"Wuz de ossifer a-sparkin' de young misses at Gin'ral Schuyler's?"
"Yes, Joshua."
"A-co'tin' Miss Betty, suh?"
"Yes, yes. Colonel Hamilton married her. That is the man, Joshua. Tell
me, did you ever hear of Mr. Butler's marriage in Butlersbury?"
A longer silence, then: "No, suh. Hit wuz de talk ob de town dat Suh
John Johnsing done tuk Miss Polly Watts foh his lady-wife, an' all de
time po'l'l Miss Claire wuz a-settin' in Foht Johnsing, dess a-cryin'
her eyes out. But Mars' Butler he done tuk an' run off 'long o' dat
half-caste lady de ossifers call Carolyn Montour----"
"What!"
"Yaas, suh. Dat de way Mars' Butler done carry on, suh. He done
skedaddle 'long o' M'ss Carolyn. Hit wuz a Mohawk weddin', Mars'
Carus."
"He never married her?"
"Mars' Butler he ain' gwine ma'hy nobody ef he ain' 'bleeged, suh. He
dess lak all de young gentry, suh--'scusin' you'se'f, Mars' Carus."
I nodded in grim silence. After a moment I asked him to open the door
for me, but he shook his aged head, saying: "Ef a ossifer done tell you
what de Kunnel done tell me, what you gwine do, Mars' Carus, suh?"
"Obey," I said briefly. "You're a good servant, Joshua. When Colonel
Van Schaick returns, say to him that Captain Renault of the Rangers
marches to Butlersbury at sunup, and that if Colonel Van Schaick can
spare six bat-horses and an army transport-wagon, to be at the
Half-Moon at dawn, Captain Renault will be vastly obliged to him, and
will certainly render a strict accounting to the proper authorities."
Then I turned, descended the brick stoop, and walked slowly back to my
quarters, a prey to apprehension and bitter melancholy. For if it were
true that Walter Butler had done this thing, the law of the land was on
his side; and if the war ended with him still alive, the courts must
sustain him in this monstrous claim on Elsin Grey. Thought halted. Was
it possible that Walter Butler had dared invade the tiger-brood of
Catrine Montour to satisfy his unslaked lust?
Was it possible that he dared affront the she-demon of Catherinestown
by ignoring an alliance with her fiercely beautiful child?--an alliance
that Catrine Montour must have considered legal and binding, however
irregular it might appear to jurists.
I was astounded. Where passion led this libertine, nothing barred his
way--neither fear nor pity. And he had even dared to reckon with this
frightful hag, Catrine Montour--this devil's spawn of Frontenac--and
her tawny offspring.
I had seen the girl, Carolyn, at Guy Park--a splendid young animal, of
sixteen then, darkly beautiful, wild as a forest-cat. No wonder the
beast in him had bristled at view of her; no wonder the fierce passion
in her had leaped responsive to his forest courtship. By heaven, a
proper mating in the shaggy hills of Danascara! Yes, but when the male
beast emerges, yellow eyes fixed on the dead line that should bar him
from the haunts of men, then, _then_ it is time that a man shall arise
and stand against him--stand for honor and right and light, and drive
him back to the darkness of his lair again, or slay him at the sunlit
gates of that civilization he dared to challenge.