THE TRAIL ON THE SUNLIT HILLS.
When Young Matt first knew that Sammy had sent Ollie back to the city
with no promise to follow, he took to the woods, and returned only
after miles of tramping over the wildest, roughest part of the country.
The big fellow said no word, but on his face was a look that his father
understood, and the old mountaineer felt his own blood move more
quickly at the sight.
But when Sammy with her books was fully established in the Matthews
home, and Young Matt seemed always, as the weeks went by, to find her
reading things that he could not understand, he was made to realize
more fully what her studies with the shepherd meant. He came to feel
that she had already crossed the threshold into that world where Mr.
Howitt lived. And, thinking that he himself could never enter, he grew
lonely and afraid.
With the quickness that was so marked in her character, Sammy grasped
the meaning of his trouble almost before Young Matt himself knew fully
what it was. Then the girl, with much care and tact, set about helping
him to see the truths which the shepherd had revealed to her.
All through the summer and fall, when the day’s work was done, or on a
Sunday afternoon, they were together, and gradually the woods and the
hills, with all the wild life that is in them, began to have for the
young man a new meaning; or, rather, he learned little by little to
read the message that lay on the open pages; first a word here and
there, then sentences, then paragraphs, and soon he was reading alone,
as he tramped the hills for stray stock, or worked in the mountain
field. The idle days of winter and the long evenings were spent in
reading aloud from the books that had come to mean most to her.
So she led him on slowly, along the way that her teacher had pointed
out to her, but always as they went, he saw her going before, far
ahead, and he knew that in the things that men call education, he could
never hope to stand by her side. But he was beginning to ask, are there
not after all things that lie still deeper in life than even these?
Often he would go to his old friend in the Hollow with some thought,
and the shepherd, seeing how it was, would smile as he helped the lad
on his way. The scholar looked forward with confidence to the time when
young Matt would discover for himself, as Sammy had found for herself,
that the only common ground whereon men and women may meet in safety is
the ground of their manhood and womanhood.
And so it was, on that spring morning when the young giant felt the red
life throbbing strongly in his great limbs, as he followed his team to
and fro across the field. And in his voice, as he shouted to his horses
at the end of the furrow, there was something under the words,
something of a longing, something also of a challenge.
Sammy was going to spend the day with her friends on Jake Creek. She
had not been to see Mandy since the night of her father’s death. As she
went, she stopped at the lower end of the field to shout a merry word
to the man with the plow, and it was sometime later when the big fellow
again started his team. The challenge in his tone had grown bolder.
Sammy returned that afternoon in time for the evening meal, and Aunt
Mollie thought, as the girl came up the walk, that the young woman had
never looked so beautiful. “Why, honey,” she said, “you’re just a
bubblin’ over with life. Your cheeks are as rosy; your eyes are as
sparklin’, you’re fairly shinin’ all over. Your ride sure done you
good.”
The young woman replied with a hug that made her admirer gasp. “Law,
child; you’re strong as a young panther. You walk like one too; so kind
of strong, easy like.”
The girl laughed. “I hope I don’t impress everybody that way, Aunt
Mollie. I don’t believe I want to be like a panther. I’d rather be
like—like—”
“Like what, child?”
“Like you, just like you; the best, the very best woman in the whole
world, because you’ve got the best and biggest heart.” She looked back
over her shoulder laughing, as she ran into the house.
When Young Matt came in from the field, Sammy went out to the barn,
while he unharnessed his team. “Are you very tired to-night?” she
asked.
The big fellow smiled, “Tired? Me tired? Where do you want to go?
Haven’t you ridden enough to-day? I should think you’d be tired
yourself.”
“Tired? Me tired?” said the girl. “I don’t want to ride. I want to
walk. It’s such a lovely evening, and there’s going to be a moon. I
have been thinking all day that I would like to walk over home after
supper, if you cared to go.”
That night the work within the house and the chores about the barn were
finished in a remarkably short time. The young man and woman started
down the Old Trail like two school children, while the father and
mother sat on the porch and heard their voices die away on the mountain
side below.
The girl went first along the little path, moving with that light, sure
step that belongs only to perfect health, the health of the woods and
hills. The man followed, walking with the same sure, easy step;
strength and power revealed in every movement of his body. Two splendid
creatures they were—masterpieces of the Creator’s handiwork; made by
Him who created man, male and female, and bade them have dominion “over
every living thing that moveth upon the earth;” kings by divine right.
In the belt of timber, where the trail to the ranch branches off, they
met the shepherd on his way to the house for an evening visit. The old
man paused only long enough to greet them, and pushed on up the hill,
for he saw by their faces that the time was come.
Sammy had grown very quiet when they rounded the shoulder of Dewey, and
they went in silence down to the cabin on the southern slope of the
mountain. The girl asked Young Matt to wait for her at the gate, and,
going to the house, she entered alone.
A short time she remained in the familiar rooms, then, slipping out
through the rear door, ran through the woods to the little glen back of
the house. Dropping beside the mound she buried her face in the cool
grass, as she whispered, “Oh, Daddy, Daddy Jim! I wish you were here
to-night; this night that means so much to me. Do you know how happy I
am, Daddy? Do you know, I wonder?” The twilight deepened, “I must go
now, Daddy; I must go to him. You told me you would trust me anywhere
with him. He is waiting for me, now; but I wish—oh, I wish that you
were here to-night, Daddy Jim!”
Quickly she made her way back to the cabin, passed through the house,
and rejoined Young Matt. The two returned silently up the mountain
side, to the higher levels, where the light still lingered, though the
sun was down. At the Lookout they stopped.
“We’ll wait for the moon, here,” she said; and so seated on a big rock,
they watched the last of the evening go out from the west. From forest
depth and mountain side came the myriad voices of Nature’s chorus,
blending softly in the evening hymn; and, rising clear above the low
breathed tones, yet in perfect harmony, came a whip-poor-will’s
plaintive call floating up from the darkness below; the sweet cooing of
a wood-dove in a tree on the ridge, and the chirping of a cricket in a
nearby crevice of the ledge. Like shadowy spirits, the bats flitted
here and there in the gathering gloom. The two on the mountain’s
shoulder felt themselves alone above it all; above it all, yet still a
part of all.
Then the moon looked over the mountain behind them turning Mutton
Hollow into a wondrous sea of misty light out of which the higher hills
lifted their heads like fairy islands. The girl spoke, “Come, Matt; we
must go now. Help me down.”
He slipped from his seat and stood beside the rock with uplifted arms.
Sammy leaned forward and placed her hands upon his shoulders. He felt
her breath upon his forehead. The next instant he held her close.
So they went home along the trail that is nobody knows how old, and the
narrow path that was made by those who walked one before the other,
they found wide enough for two.
Dad Howitt, returning to the ranch, saw them coming so in the
moonlight, and slipped aside from the path into the deeper shadows. As
they passed, the old shepherd, scholar and poet stood with bowed,
uncovered head. When they were gone and their low voices were no longer
heard, he said aloud, “What God hath joined; what God hath joined.”
And this way runs the trail that lies along the higher, sunlit hills
where those who journey see afar and the light lingers even when the
day is done.