THE RETURN.
“Oh! if indeed to _part_
With the soul’s loved ones be a bitter thing,
When we go forth in buoyancy of heart,
And bearing all the glories of our spring,
Is it less so to _meet_
When these are withered? Who shall call it sweet?”
HEMANS.
The 20th of March, 182-, was a day to be remembered for the terrible
storm of wind, snow, and hail that visited the earth, and raged through
these latitudes all that tremendous day and night!
It was in the height of this furious tempest, that a packet might _not_
have been seen as it toiled against wind and tide, on its way down
Chesapeake Bay,—might _not_ have been seen, for it was as difficult to
_see_ through the dense fall of snow, as it was to _breathe_ against the
driving, piercing sleet that struck into every pore of the skin and
thorax like millions of needle points.
Could you have discerned that packet boat through the shrouds of falling
snow, you would have looked upon a bark apparently carved in ice. The
deck was blocked up with drifting snow, freezing as it fell, and still
increasing against all the efforts of the crew. The masts struck up like
shafts of ice, between which the crossing ropes formed a crystal
lattice-work. The sails were stiff, stark, and glittering with sleet.
And all—ropes, masts, and sails, grew thicker every instant,—losing
their distinctness of form as the snow fell fast, congealing on them,
until the bark seemed the nucleus of an avalanche, or the skeleton upon
which the body of an iceberg was being formed.
The cabin of that little packet was small, deep, and dark, and lighted
even in the day by a tiny lamp nailed against the wall. In this low
cabin, by the side of the narrow coffin-like berth, sat a pale and
ghastly little woman, clothed in a black dress and simple cap, whom you
would never recognise to be Hagar. Upon the berth lay two sleeping
infants, of nearly twelve months old. She leans heavily with both elbows
upon the side of the berth, and supports her drooping head upon her
hands. She has sat thus for hours, while the tempest has raged above and
around her. She will probably sit there for hours longer unless the
children wake, or some one enters to rouse her from her dreamy trance.
She does not hear the howling wind, though it beats among the ice-bound
and rattling sails and ropes, a thundering accompaniment to its fierce
song. She does not see the snow, though it has nearly blocked up the
narrow gangway leading down into her cabin. She does not feel the
penetrating and piercing cold, though her hands are purple, stiff, and
numb. Towards the evening, Gusty May entered the cabin.
“How are you now, Hagar, and how are the children?” inquired he, coming
up to her side.
She did not seem to see or hear him. He repeated his question earnestly.
She raised her pallid brow and straining glance, and answered,
mechanically,—
“Well—we are well.”
“Do the children fatigue you, Hagar? You look so weary; why do you not
call me to help to take care of them when they tire you?”
“They never tire me,” replied Hagar.
“Have they brought you any dinner, Hagar? I really do not believe they
have. No!—and your fire has been suffered to go out, while I have been
on deck all day helping to work the vessel or clear the deck. What a
thing it is to see a poor, dear sick girl, with two children, on the
water in such a scuttled tub as this bark, without even a female
attendant!”
So lamenting, Gusty bustled about, replenished the fire, and going to a
locker, brought out a glass of cordial and a cracker, which he compelled
her to swallow, saying,
“It is a ‘round, unvarnished’ truth that, if I were not here to kindle
your fire and to hold a morsel to your lips, you would starve to death,
Hagar! I wonder how long this dreadful apathy is going to last!”
Then setting away the glass and plate, he went to shovelling away the
snow from the gangway.
“Passengers for Heath Hall!” sang out a voice from above.
Gusty dropped the shovel and rushed up on deck. Hagar, her children, and
himself, were certainly the only passengers for Heath Hall. After an
absence of five minutes he returned.
“Hagar! rouse yourself, now, dear Hagar, and answer me; we are nearly
opposite to _Heath Hall_!”
The sound of that name was sufficient to arouse her.
“Speak on, Gusty, I am neither dead, deaf, asleep, nor crazy, Gusty,
though I must often seem to you to be one or the other. Well, what were
you saying about Heath Hall?”
“We are nearly opposite to the promontory, Hagar, and we must now go
ashore, or keep on down the bay to the Capes.”
“Oh, go on shore by all means! What suggested the other alternative?”
“What? Poor thing, you know nothing! It is a frightful night to go on
shore, Hagar. We stand out a mile from the land, and cannot even see the
shore through thick and driving hail and sleet. Then, the beach must be
covered knee-deep with snow, and the ascent to the promontory nearly
impracticable from ice—that is to say, for _you_, Hagar.”
“For _me_—you forget, Gusty, overwhelmed, as you see me, by mental
troubles, you know that I am nearly invincible before physical ills and
obstacles. I can see my way through the darkest night that ever shrouded
earth—keep my footing firm in the ascent of the most slippery and
dangerous precipice in the world. Thank God! my physical powers are not
destroyed yet.”
“You are feeling better—your spirits are rising, Hagar.”
“Oh, they are, they are, to be under the shadow of my old Hall again! I
think that I shall no sooner step upon my native heath, than I shall
feel life and spirits strike up through my feet, filling my whole frame
with strength and power.”
“Passengers for Heath Hall, get ready,” yelled a voice from the deck.
“Come, Hagar, get the children and yourself ready quickly, while I see
the trunks lowered to the skiff.”
“But, oh! these children! these children! after all, perhaps we had
better stay here, than expose _them_ to the storm.”
“They shall not suffer from exposure to the storm; _I_ will carry the
babies, and take care of that—so if you think that you can get along and
keep your footing ascending the cliff, we had better go ashore
notwithstanding all I have said; for it threatens to be a horrible
night, and God Almighty only knows what may be the fate of the packet
before day.”
Hagar said no more, and Gusty left the cabin. Hagar wrapped her children
up in their little warm light blankets and long cloaks, and then put on
her own close travelling dress, and had scarcely completed her
preparations when Gusty came down again, and assisted her with the
children by taking charge of one while she insisted on keeping the other
on deck. And what a deck it was! She toiled up the gangway knee-deep in
snow, while the sharp and driving sleet cut into her face, nearly
blinding and smothering her; it was almost impossible to see a foot in
advance; in an instant her whole dress was covered white and stiff with
snow, that froze as it fell. It was only her warm breath that kept mouth
and nostrils free for breathing, and saved her from a freezing
suffocation. Gusty kept hold of one hand; drawing her through the
snow-drifts beneath, and the falling avalanche of sleet around, he
guided her to the edge of the vessel, lowered the two children half
smothered in their wrappings, to the oarsmen in the skiff, handed Hagar
down, and descended after her; while the sleet whirling thick around
them threatened to convert the little boat with its freight into a huge
snowball. The two oarsmen pulled swiftly through the white tempest for
the shore—providentially wind and tide were in their favor; they soon
reached the beach—but, oh! what a howling wilderness of a shore it was
upon this tremendous night! On their left the promontory, like some huge
ice-peak of the arctic regions, loomed horribly through storm and
darkness; while towards the right the white shore stretched away in a
dim horizontal line—a half-guessed vague terror like the shores of the
frozen ocean seen through the night. Using their oars as poles they
pushed the boat through the rushing water and crusted ice, and landed it
upon the beach immediately under the promontory. Pausing a moment to
gather breath after their great exertions, the two men took each of them
a child, and Gusty drew Hagar’s frost-crusted arm within his own, and
they stepped from the boat, and struggled on through the deep snow and
against the driving storm to the little fishing-house against the side
of the promontory. The wind and sleet were in their face, blowing from
behind the other side of the promontory. As they toiled on towards it
they found the snow less and less deep, until coming under its cover
they trod upon bare though frozen ground, and reaching the fishing-house
found it perfectly dry, as the ground was for many yards around it; a
better protected place than was the cabin of the ship they had left.
Taking away the prop that fastened the door, they entered. The men stood
holding the children. Hagar dropped upon an upturned fishing-tub; while
Gusty, taking a small wax candle and tinder-box from the pocket of his
great coat, struck a light, and holding it about surveyed the premises,
as the men, giving the children to Hagar, returned to the boat to fetch
the trunks. It was a small but tight and well-finished, weather-proof
little place, built against the side of the promontory of rocks cut from
its bosom; the walls were plastered, the floor paved, and an ample
fire-place on the right of the entrance, faced a large window on the
left. It had been built as a place of deposit for fishing tackle, and as
a kitchen for dressing the freshly caught fish, crabs, and oysters, when
the Churchills varied their hospitality by an improvised fish feast upon
the beach.
Gusty surveyed the capabilities of the place, poked the candle and his
nose into holes and corners, among broken fishing-rods, old
flag-baskets, staves of fallen down tubs, footless pots, and topless
kettles, &c., and then sticking the candle against the side of the
chimney, he collected some of the old flag-baskets, and breaking them
up, piled them in the fire-place and set fire to them—they blazed and
roared delightfully up the chimney, diffusing agreeable light and
warmth. Then drawing a rude stool to the chimney-corner, and going up to
Hagar, he took the two children from her arms, and told her to pull off
her snow-covered riding habit and sit there. She did so, and held out
her arms to receive the children back. He set them in her lap, and going
to the pile of staves, brought and threw them on the burning embers of
the flag-baskets, making a great fire, whose light glowed all over the
small room, heating it pleasantly. Then he hung up her riding habit to
dry, and digging out an old tea-kettle from the pile of rubbish, he
clapped his hat upon his head and went out to fill it at a spring that
bubbled from the rock by the side of the house; returning he set it on
the fire, just as the voices of the men were heard approaching the
cabin. They came in, each with a large trunk upon his shoulder, and
bearing another by the handles between them. They came in and setting
down their burdens prepared to depart and return to the packet—but
Gusty, with a gesture, detained them, as he knelt at the side of one of
the trunks, and opening it, took out a bottle of brandy, some spices,
and a mug, and gave “something to protect them against suffering through
the inclemency of the weather.”
They then departed, leaving Gusty, Hagar, and the children, sole
occupants of the cabin.
“It is vain to think of trying to reach the Hall to-night, Hagar,” said
Gusty, as he pulled off his greatcoat and hung it near the fire to thaw
and dry. “And we must just stay here till morning,” he continued, and
turning a tub bottom upwards he drew it up to the fire and seated
himself, watching and tending the kettle as it progressed towards
boiling. “If the men could possibly have stopped and lent us their
assistance in carrying the children, I might have helped you, and—but,
no! even then it would have been impossible on this frightful night! We
should have got lost, and floundered about in snow-drifts until morning,
if we had not perished before then; the snow is so much deeper than I
had any idea of before leaving the packet,” and Gusty, taking a stick,
and passing it through the handle, lifted the boiling kettle from the
fire, and set it on the hearth, saying, “I am going to make you some
spice tea, Hagar, to restore your circulation and send out a
perspiration; you are chilled to death, your hands are livid,” and
putting some cloves into the mug, he poured some of the boiling water
upon it and set it down to steep.
All this time, Hagar had heard his remarks without replying to them—seen
his efforts for her comfort without acknowledging them; because, after
her sudden rise of spirits, she had again sunk into apathy. Soon he took
a little rude table—once used in cooking operations—and turning it
bottom upwards, and gathering all their outside coverings that were now
dried, he made a little warm bed for the babies, and begged Hagar to lay
them in it. She did so, covered them up snugly, and resumed her seat.
“I wish, Hagar,” said he, as he handed her the mug of spice tea, “I _do_
wish that there was a place where you could lie down and take some
sleep.”
She smiled sadly and shook her head faintly.
“I know _now_ what to do,” he said, receiving the empty mug from her
hand and setting it on the hearth; “yes, I know what to do now,” and
taking her riding habit, he hung it from the corner of the mantel-piece
down against the wall behind her, and said, “Now, adjust your stool
comfortably, Hagar, and lean upon that; you will rest better, and
perhaps you will sleep. I shall sit here in front of the hearth, and
watch to keep the fire going.”
And so the party remained through all that stormy night. _But!_ Hagar
had better have braved the fearful ascent of the precipice through that
terrible storm—had better have perished in the snow—on that horrible
night, than have lived to defy the more fatal tempest of calumny raised
by her lodging in the fishing-house, and that soon roared and raved
around her, striking thunderbolts upon her devoted head.