"If, hitherto, Clara de Haldimar, I have been minute in the detail of
all that attended my connection with your mother, it has been with a
view to prove to you how deeply I have been injured; but I have now
arrived at a part of my history, when to linger on the past would goad
me into madness, and render me unfit for the purpose to which I have
devoted myself. Brief must be the probing of wounds, that nearly five
lustres have been insufficient to heal; brief the tale that reveals the
infamy of those who have given you birth, and the utter blighting of
the fairest hopes of one whose only fault was that of loving, "not too
wisely, but too well."
"Will you credit the monstrous truth," he added, in a fierce but
composed whisper, while he bent eagerly over the form of the trembling
yet attentive girl, "when I tell you that, on my return from that fatal
expedition, during my continuance on which her image had never once
been absent from my mind, I found Clara Beverley the wife of De
Haldimar? Yes," continued Wacousta, his wounded feeling and mortified
pride chafing, by the bitter recollection, into increasing fury, while
his countenance paled in its swarthiness, "the wife, the wedded wife of
yon false and traitorous governor! Well may you look surprised, Clara
de Haldimar: such damnable treachery as this may startle his own blood
in the veins of another, nor find its justification even in the
devotedness of woman's filial piety. To what satanic arts so
calculating a villain could have had recourse to effect his object I
know not; but it is not the less true, that she, from whom my previous
history must have taught you to expect the purity of intention and
conduct of an angel, became his wife,--and I a being accursed among
men. Even as our common mother is said to have fallen in the garden of
Eden, tempted by the wily beauty of the devil, so did your mother fall,
seduced by that of the cold, false, traitorous De Haldimar." Here the
agitation of Wacousta became terrific. The labouring of his chest was
like that of one convulsed with some racking agony and the swollen
veins and arteries of his head seemed to threaten the extinction of
life in some fearful paroxysm. At length he burst into a violent fit of
tears, more appalling, in one of his iron nature, than the fury which
had preceded it,--and it was many minutes before he could so far
compose himself as to resume.
"Think not, Clara de Haldimar, I speak without the proof. Her own words
confessed, her own lips avowed it, and yet I neither slew her, nor her
paramour, nor myself. On my return to the regiment I had flown to the
cottage, on the wings of the most impatient and tender love that ever
filled the bosom of man for woman. To my enquiries the landlady
replied, that my cousin had been married two days previously, by the
military chaplain, to a handsome young officer, who had visited her
soon after my departure, and was constantly with her from that moment;
and that immediately after the ceremony they had left, but she knew not
whither. Wild, desperate, almost bereft of reason, and with a heart
bounding against my bosom, as if each agonising throb were to be its
last, I ran like a maniac back into the town, nor paused till I found
myself in the presence of your father. My mind was a volcano, but still
I attempted to be calm, even while I charged him, in the most
outrageous terms, with his villainy. Deny it he could not; but, far
from excusing it, he boldly avowed and justified the step he had taken,
intimating, with a smile full of meaning, there was nothing in a
connection with the family of De Haldimar to reflect disgrace on the
cousin of Sir Reginald Morton; and that; the highest compliment he
could pay his friend was to attach himself to one whom that friend had
declared to be so near a relative of his own. There was a coldness of
taunt in these remarks, that implied his sense of the deception I had
practised on him, in regard to the true nature of the relationship; and
for a moment, while my hand firmly grasped the hilt of my sword, I
hesitated whether I should not cut him down at my feet: I had
self-command, however, to abstain from the outrage, and I have often
since regretted I had. My own blood could have been but spilt in
atonement for my just revenge; and as for the obloquy attached to the
memory of the assassin, it could not have been more bitter than that
which has followed me through life. But what do I say?" fiercely
continued the warrior, an exulting ferocity sparkling in his eye, and
animating his countenance; "had he fallen, then my vengeance were but
half complete. No; it is now he shall feel the deadly venom in his
heart, that has so long banqueted on mine.
"Determined to know from her own lips," he pursued, to the shuddering
Clara, whose hopes, hitherto strongly excited, now, began again to fade
beneath the new aspect given to the strange history of this terrible
man;--"determined to satisfy myself from her own acknowledgment,
whether all I had heard was not an imposition, I summoned calmness
enough to desire that your mother might confirm in person the
alienation of her affection, as nothing short of that could convince me
of the truth. He left the room, and presently re-appeared, conducting
her in from another: I thought she looked more beautiful than ever,
but, alas! I had the inexpressible horror to discover, before a word
was uttered, that all the fondness of her nature was indeed transferred
to your father. How I endured the humiliation of that scene has often
been a source of utter astonishment to myself; but I did endure it. To
my wild demand, how she could so soon have forgotten her vows, and
falsified her plighted engagements, she replied, timidly and
confusedly, she had not yet known her own heart; but if she had pained
me by her conduct, she was sorry for it, and hoped I would forgive her.
She would always be happy to esteem me as a friend, but she loved her
Charles far, far better than she had ever loved me. This damning
admission, couched in the same language of simplicity that had first
touched and won my affection, was like boiling lead upon my brain. In a
transport of madness I sprang towards her, caught her in my arms, and
swore she should accompany me back to the oasis--when I had taken her
there, to be regained by my detested rival, if he could; but that he
should not eat the fruit I had plucked at so much peril to myself. She
struggled to disengage herself, calling on your father by the most
endearing epithets to free her from my embrace. He attempted it, and I
struck him senseless to the floor at a single blow with the flat of my
sabre, which in my extreme fury I had unsheathed. Instead, however, of
profiting by the opportunity thus afforded to execute my threat, a
feeling of disgust and contempt came over me, for the woman, whose
inconstancy had been the cause of my committing myself in this
ungentlemanly manner; and bestowing deep but silent curses on her head,
I rushed from the house in a state of frenzy. How often since have I
regretted that I had not pursued my first impulse, and borne her to
some wild, where, forgetting one by whose beauty of person her eye
alone had been seduced, her heart might have returned to its allegiance
to him who had first awakened the sympathies of her soul, and would
have loved her with a love blending the fiercest fires of the eagle
with the gentlest devotedness of the dove. But destiny had differently
ordained.
"Did my injuries end here?" pursued the dark warrior, as his eye
kindled with rage. "No: for weeks I was insensible to any thing but the
dreadful shock my soul had sustained. A heavy stupor weighed me down,
and for a period it was supposed my reason was overthrown: no such
mercy was reserved for me. The regiment had quitted the Highlands, and
were now stationary in ----, whither I had accompanied it in arrest.
The restoration of my faculties was the signal for new persecutions.
Scarcely had the medical officers reported me fit to sustain the
ordeal, when a court-martial was assembled to try me on a variety of
charges. Who was my prosecutor? Listen, Clara," and he shook her
violently by the arm. "He who had robbed me of all that gave value to
life, and incentive to honour,--he who, under the guise of friendship,
had stolen into the Eden of my love, and left it barren of affection.
In a word, yon detested governor, to whose inhuman cruelty even the son
of my brother has, by some strange fatality of coincidence, so recently
fallen a second sacrifice. Curses, curses on him," he pursued, with
frightful vehemence, half rising as he spoke, and holding forth his
right arm in a menacing attitude; "but the hour of retribution is at
hand, and revenge, the exclusive passion of the gods, shall at length
be mine. In no other country in the world--under no other circumstances
than the present--could I have so secured it.
"What were the charges preferred against me?" he continued, with a
violence that almost petrified the unhappy girl. "Hear them, and judge
whether I have not cause for the inextinguishable hate that rankles at
my heart. Every trifling disobedience of orders--every partial neglect
of duty that could be raked up--was tortured into a specific charge;
and, as I have already admitted I had latterly transgressed not a
little in this respect, these were numerous enough. Yet they were but
preparatory to others of greater magnitude. Next succeeded one that
referred to the message I had given, and countermanded, to the sergeant
of my company, when in the impatience of my disappointment I had
desired him to tell the colonel I would see the service d--d rather
than inconvenience myself at that moment for it. This was unsupported
by other evidence, however, and therefore failed in the proof. But the
web was too closely woven around to admit of my escaping.--Will you,
can you believe any thing half so atrocious, as that your father should
have called on this same man not only to prove the violent and
insubordinate language I had used in reference to the commanding
officer in my own rooms, but also to substantiate a charge of
cowardice, grounded on the unwillingness I had expressed to accompany
the expedition, and the extraordinary trepidation I had evinced, while
preparing for the duty, manifested, as it was stated to be, by the
various errors he had rectified in my equipment with his own hand? Yes,
even this pitiful charge was one of the many preferred; but the
severest was that which he had the unblushing effrontery to make the
subject of public investigation, rather than of private redress--the
blow I had struck him in his own apartments. And who was his witness in
this monstrous charge?--your mother, Clara. Yea, I stood as a criminal
in her presence; and yet she came forward to tender an evidence that
was to consign me to a disgraceful sentence. My vile prosecutor had,
moreover, the encouragement, the sanction of his colonel throughout,
and by him he was upheld in every contemptible charge his ingenuity
could devise. Do you not anticipate the result?--I was found guilty,
and dismissed the service.
"How acted my brother officers, when, previously to the trial, I
alluded to the damnable treachery of your father? Did they condemn his
conduct, or sympathise with me in my misfortune?--No; they shrugged
their shoulders, and coldly observed, I ought to have known better than
to trust one against whom they had so often cautioned me; but that as I
had selected him for my friend, I should have bestowed a whole, and not
a half confidence upon him. He had had the hypocrisy to pretend to them
he had violated no trust, since he had honourably espoused a lady whom
I had introduced to him as a cousin, and in whom I appeared to have no
other interest than that of relationship. Not, they said, that they
believed he actually did entertain that impression; but still the
excuse was too plausible, and had been too well studied by my cunning
rival, to be openly refuted. As for the mere fact of his supplanting
me, they thought it an excellent thing,--a ruse d'amour for which they
never would have given him credit; and although they admitted it was
provoking enough to be ousted out of one's mistress in that cool sort
of way, still I should not so far have forgotten myself as to have
struck him while he was unarmed, when it was so easy to have otherwise
fastened an insult on him. Such," bitterly pursued Wacousta, "was the
consolation I received from men, who, a few short weeks before, had
been sedulous to gain and cultivate my friendship,--but even this was
only vouchsafed antecedent to my trial. When the sentence was
promulgated, announcing my dismissal from the service, every back was
turned upon me, as though I had been found guilty of some dishonourable
action or some disgraceful crime; and, on the evening of the same day,
when I threw from me for ever an uniform that I now loathed from my
inmost soul, there was not one among those who had often banqueted at
my expense, who had the humanity to come to me and say, 'Sir Reginald
Morton, farewell.'
"What agonies of mind I endured,--what burning tears I nightly shed
upon a pillow I was destined to press in freezing loneliness,--what
hours of solitude I passed, far from the haunts of my fellow-men, and
forming plans of vengeance,--it would take much longer time to relate
than I have actually bestowed on my unhappy history. To comprehend
their extent and force, you must understand the heart of fire in which
the deep sense of injury had taken root; but the night wears away, and
briefly told must be the remainder of my tale. The rebellion of
forty-five saw me in arms in the Scottish ranks; and, in one instance,
opposed to the regiment from which I had been so ignominiously
expelled. Never did revenge glow like a living fire in the heart of man
as it did in mine; for the effect of my long brooding in solitude had
been to inspire me with a detestation, not merely for those who had
been most rancorous in their enmity, but for every thing that wore the
uniform, from the commanding officer down to the meanest private. Every
blow that I dealt, every life that I sacrificed, was an insult washed
away from my attainted honour; but him whom I most sought in the melee
I never could reach. At length the corps to which I had attached myself
was repulsed; and I saw, with rage in my heart, that my enemy still
lived to triumph in the fruit of his villainy.
"Although I was grown considerably in stature at this period, and was
otherwise greatly altered in appearance, I had been recognised in the
action by numbers of the regiment; and, indeed, more than once I had,
in the intoxication of my rage, accompanied the blow that slew or
maimed one of my former associates with a declaration of the name of
him who inflicted it. The consequence was, I was denounced as a rebel
and an outlaw, and a price was put upon my head. Accustomed, however,
as I had ever been, to rocks and fastnesses, I had no difficulty in
eluding the vigilance of those who were sent in pursuit of me; and thus
compelled to live wholly apart from my species, I at length learned to
hate them, and to know that man is the only enemy of man upon earth.
"A change now came ever the spirit of my vengeance; for about this
period your mother died. I had never ceased to love, even while I
despised her; and notwithstanding, had she, after her flagrant
inconstancy, thrown herself into my arms, I should have rejected her
with scorn, still I was sensible no other woman could ever supply her
place in my affection. She was, in truth, the only being I had ever
looked upon with fondness; and deeply even as I had been injured by
her, I wept her memory with many a scalding tear. This, however, only
increased my hatred for him who had rioted in her beauty, and
supplanted me in her devotedness. I had the means of learning,
occasionally, all that passed in the regiment; and the same account
that brought me the news of your mother's death also gave me the
intelligence that three children had been the fruit of her union with
De Haldimar. How," pursued Wacousta, with bitter energy, "shall I
express the deep loathing I felt for those children? It seemed to me as
if their existence had stamped a seal of infamy on my own brow; and I
hated them, even in their childhood, as the offspring of an abhorred,
and, as it appeared to me, an unnatural union. I heard, moreover (and
this gave me pleasure), that their father doated on them; and from that
moment I resolved to turn his cup of joy into bitterness, even as he
had turned mine. I no longer sought his life; for the jealousy that had
half impelled that thirst existed no longer: but, deeming his cold
nature at least accessible through his parental affection, I was
resolved that in his children he should suffer a portion of the agonies
he had inflicted on me. I waited, however, until they should be grown
up to an age when the heart of the parent would be more likely to mourn
their loss; and then I was determined my vengeance should be complete.
"Circumstances singularly favoured my design. Many years afterwards,
the regiment formed one of the expedition against Quebec under General
Wolfe. They were commanded by your father, who, in the course of
promotion, had obtained the lieutenant-colonelcy; and I observed by the
army list, that a subaltern of the same name, whom I presumed to be his
eldest son, was in the corps. Here was a field for my vengeance beyond
any I could have hoped for. I contrived to pass over into Cornwall, the
ban of outlawry being still unrepealed; and having procured from my
brother a sum sufficient for my necessities, and bade him an eternal
farewell, embarked in a fishing-boat for the coast of France, whence I
subsequently took a passage to this country. At Montreal I found the
French general, who gladly received my allegiance as a subject of
France, and gave me a commission in one of the provincial corps that
usually served in concert with our Indian allies. With the general I
soon became a favourite; and, as a mark of his confidence at the attack
on Quebec, he entrusted me with the command of a detached irregular
force, consisting partly of Canadians and partly of Indians, intended
to harass the flanks of the British army. This gave me an opportunity
of being at whatever point of the field I might think most favourable
to my design; and I was too familiar with the detested uniform of the
regiment not to be able to distinguish it from afar. In a word, Clara,
for I am weary of my own tale, in that engagement I had an opportunity
of recognising your brother. He struck me by his martial appearance as
he encouraged his grenadiers to the attack of the French columns; and,
as I turned my eye upon him in admiration, I was stung to the soul by
his resemblance to his father. Vengeance thrilled throughout every
fibre of my frame at that moment. The opportunity I had long sought was
at length arrived; and already, in anticipation, I enjoyed the conquest
his fall would occasion to my enemy. I rushed within a few feet of my
victim; but the bullet aimed at his heart was received in the breast of
a faithful soldier, who had flown to intercept it. How I cursed the
meddler for his officiousness!"
"Oh, that soldier was your nephew," eagerly interrupted Clara, pointing
towards her companion, who had fallen into a profound slumber, "the
husband of this unfortunate woman. Frank Halloway (for by that name was
he alone known in the regiment) loved my brother as though he had been
of the same blood. He it was who flew to receive the ball that was
destined for another. But I nursed him on his couch of suffering, and
with my own hands prepared his food and dressed his wound. Oh, if pity
can touch your heart (and I will not believe that a heart that once
felt as you say yours has felt can be inaccessible to pity), let the
recollection of your nephew's devotedness to my mother's child disarm
you of vengeance, and induce you to restore us!"
"Never!" thundered Wacousta,--"never! The very circumstance you have
now named is an additional incentive to my vengeance. My nephew saved
the life of your brother at the hazard of his own; and how has he been
rewarded for the generous deed? By an ignominious death, inflicted,
perhaps, for some offence not more dishonouring than those which have
thrown me an outcast upon these wilds; and that at the command and in
the presence of the father of him whose life he was fool enough to
preserve. Yet, what but ingratitude of the grossest nature could a
Morton expect at the hands of the false family of De Haldimar! They
were destined to be our bane, and well have they fulfilled the end for
which they were created."
"Almighty Providence!" aspirated the sinking Clara, as she turned her
streaming eyes to heaven; "can it be that the human heart can undergo
such change? Can this be the being who once loved my mother with a
purity and tenderness of affection that angels themselves might hallow
with approval; or is all that I have heard but a bewildering dream?"
"No, Clara," calmly and even solemnly returned the warrior; "it is no
dream, but a reality--a sad, dreadful, heart-rending reality; yet, if I
am that altered being, to whom is the change to be ascribed? Who turned
the generous current of my blood into a river of overflowing gall? Who,
when my cup was mantling with the only bliss I coveted upon earth,
traitorously emptied it, and substituted a heart-corroding poison in
its stead? Who blighted my fair name, and cast me forth an alien in the
land of my forefathers? Who, in a word, cut me off from every joy that
existence can impart to man? Who did all this? Your father! But these
are idle words. What I have been, you know; what I now am, and through
what agency I have been rendered what I now am, you know also. Not more
fixed is fate than my purpose. Your brother dies even on the spot on
which my nephew died; and you, Clara, shall be my bride; and the first
thing your children shall be taught to lisp shall be curses on the vile
name of De Haldimar!"
"Once more, in the name of my sainted mother, I implore you to have
mercy," shrieked the unhappy Clara. "Oh!" she continued, with vehement
supplication, "let the days of your early love be brought back to' your
memory, that your heart may be softened; and cut yourself not wholly
off from your God, by the commission of such dreadful outrages. Again I
conjure you, restore us to my father."
"Never!" savagely repeated Wacousta. "I have passed years of torture in
the hope of such an hour as this; and now that fruition is within my
grasp, may I perish if I forego it! Ha, sir!" turning from the almost
fainting Clara to Sir Everard, who had listened with deep attention to
the history of this extraordinary man;--"for this," and he thrust aside
the breast of his hunting coat, exhibiting the scar of a long but
superficial wound,--"for this do you owe me a severe reckoning. I would
recommend you, however,"--and he spoke in mockery,--"when next you
drive a weapon into the chest of an unresisting enemy, to be more
certain of your aim. Had that been as true as the blow from the butt of
your rifle, I should not have lived to triumph in this hour. I little
deemed," he pursued, still addressing the nearly heart-broken officer
in the same insolent strain, "that my intrigue with that dark-eyed
daughter of the old Canadian would have been the means of throwing your
companion so speedily into my power, after his first narrow escape.
Your disguise was well managed, I confess; and but that there is an
instinct about me, enabling me to discover a De Haldimar, as a hound
does the deer, by scent, you might have succeeded in passing for what
you appeared. But" (and his tone suddenly changed its irony for
fierceness) "to the point, sir. That you are the lover of this girl I
clearly perceive, and death were preferable to a life embittered by the
recollection that she whom we love reposes in the arms of another. No
such kindness is meant you, however. To-morrow you shall return to the
fort; and, when there, you may tell your colonel, that, in exchange for
a certain miniature and letters, which, in the hurry of departure, I
dropped in his apartment, some ten days since, Sir Reginald Morton, the
outlaw, has taken his daughter Clara to wife, but without the
solemnisation of those tedious forms that bound himself in accursed
union with her mother. Oh! what would I not give," he continued,
bitterly, "to witness the pang inflicted on his false heart, when first
the damning truth arrests his ear. Never did I know the triumph of my
power until now; for what revenge can be half so sweet as that which
attains a loathed enemy through the dishonour of his child? But, hark!
what mean those sounds?"
A loud yelling was now heard at some distance in rear of the tent.
Presently the bounding of many feet on the turf was distinguishable;
and then, at intervals, the peculiar cry that announces the escape of a
prisoner. Wacousta started to his feet, and fiercely grasping his
tomahawk, advanced to the front of the tent, where he seemed to listen
for a moment attentively, as if endeavouring to catch the direction of
the pursuit.
"Ha! by Heaven!" he exclaimed, "there must be treachery in this, or yon
slippery captain would not so soon be at his flight again, bound as I
had bound him." Then uttering a deafening yell, and rushing past Sir
Everard, near whom he paused an instant, as if undecided whether he
should not first dispose of him, as a precautionary measure, he flew
with the speed of an antelope in the direction in which he was guided
by the gradually receding sounds.
"The knife, Miss de Haldimar," exclaimed Sir Everard, after a few
moments of breathless and intense anxiety. "See, there is one in the
belt that Ellen Halloway has girt around her loins. Quick, for Heaven's
sake, quick; our only chance of safety is in this."
With an activity arising from her despair, the unhappy Clara sprang
from the rude couch on which she had been left by Wacousta, and,
stooping over the form of the maniac, extended her hand to remove the
weapon from her side; but Ellen, who had been awakened from her long
slumber by the yells just uttered, seemed resolute to prevent it. A
struggle for its possession now ensued between these frail and delicate
beings; in which Clara, however, had the advantage, not only from the
recumbent position of her opponent, but from the greater security of
her grasp. At length, with a violent effort, she contrived to disengage
it from the sheath, around which Ellen had closely clasped both her
hands; but, with the quickness of thought, the latter were again
clenched round the naked blade, and without any other evident motive
than what originated in the obstinacy of her madness, the unfortunate
woman fiercely attempted to wrest it away. In the act of doing so, her
hands were dreadfully cut; and Clara, shocked at the sight of the blood
she had been the means of shedding, lost all the energy she had
summoned, and sunk senseless at the feet of the maniac, who now began
to utter the most piteous cries.
"Oh, God! we are lost," exclaimed Sir Everard; "the voice of that
wretched woman has alarmed our enemy, and even now I hear him
approaching. Quick, Clara, give me the knife. But no, it is now too
late; he is here."
At that instant, the dark form of a warrior rushed noiselessly to the
spot on which he stood. The officer turned his eyes in desperation on
his enemy, but a single glance was sufficient to assure him it was not
Wacousta. The Indian paused not in his course, but passing close round
the tree to which the baronet was attached, made a circular movement,
that brought him in a line with the direction that had been taken by
his enemy; and again they were left alone.
A new fear now oppressed the heart of the unfortunate Valletort, even
to agony: Clara still lay senseless, speechless, before him; and his
impression was, that, in the struggle, Ellen Halloway had murdered her.
The latter yet continued her cries; and, as she held up her hands, he
could see by the fire-light they were covered with blood. An
instinctive impulse caused him to bound forward to the assistance of
the motionless Clara; when, to his infinite surprise and joy, he
discovered the cord, which had bound him to the tree, to be severed.
The Indian who had just passed had evidently been his deliverer; and a
sudden flash of recollection recalled the figure of the young warrior
that had escaped from the schooner and was supposed to have leaped into
the canoe of Oucanasta at the moment when Madeline de Haldimar was
removed into that of the Canadian.
In a transport of conflicting feelings, Sir Everard now raised the
insensible Clara from the ground; and, having satisfied himself she had
sustained no serious injury, prepared for a flight which he felt to be
desperate, if not altogether hopeless. There was not a moment to be
lost, for the cries of the wretched Ellen increased in violence, as she
seemed sensible she was about to be left utterly alone; and ever and
anon, although afar off, yet evidently drawing nearer, was to be heard
the fierce denouncing yell of Wacousta. The spot on which the officer
stood, was not far from that whence his unfortunate friend had
commenced his flight on the first memorable occasion; and as the moon
shone brightly in the cloudless heavens, there could be no mistake in
the course he was to pursue. Dashing down the steep, therefore, with
all the speed his beloved burden would enable him to attain, he made
immediately for the bridge, over which his only chance of safety lay.
It unfortunately happened, however, that, induced either by the malice
of her insanity, or really terrified at the loneliness of her position,
the wretched Ellen Halloway had likewise quitted the tent, and now
followed close in the rear of the fugitives, still uttering the same
piercing cries of anguish. The voice of Wacousta was also again heard
in the distance; and Sir Everard had the inexpressible horror to find
that, guided by the shrieks of the maniac woman, he was now shaping his
course, not to the tent where he had left his prisoners, but in an
oblique direction towards the bridge; where he evidently hoped to
intercept them. Aware of the extreme disadvantages under which he
laboured in a competition of speed with his active enemy, the unhappy
officer would have here terminated the struggle, had he not been
partially sustained by the hope that the detachment prayed for by De
Haldimar, through the friendly young chief, to whom he owed his own
liberation, might be about this time on its way to attempt their
rescue. This thought supported his faltering resolution, although
nearly exhausted with his efforts--compelled, as he was, to sustain the
motionless form of the slowly reviving Clara; and he again braced
himself to the unequal flight The moon still shone beautifully bright,
and he could now distinctly see the bridge over which he was to pass;
but notwithstanding he strained his eyes as he advanced, no vestige of
a British uniform was to be seen in the open space that lay beyond.
Once he turned to regard his pursuers. Ellen was a few yards only in
his rear; and considerably beyond her rose, in tall relief against the
heavens, the gigantic form of the warrior. The pursuit of the latter
was now conducted with a silence that terrified even more than the
yells he had previously uttered; and he gained so rapidly on his
victims, that the tread of his large feet was now distinctly audible.
Again the officer, with despair in his heart, made the most incredible
exertions to reach the bridge, without seeming to reflect that, even
when there, no security was offered him against his enemy. Once, as he
drew nearer, he fancied he saw the dark heads of human beings peering
from under that part of the arch which had afforded cover to De
Haldimar and himself oh the memorable occasion of their departure with
the Canadian; and, convinced that the warriors of Wacousta had been
sent there to lie in ambuscade and intercept his retreat, his hopes
were utterly paralysed; and although he stopped not, his flight was
rather mechanical than the fruit of any systematic plan of escape.
He had now gained the extremity of the bridge, with Ellen Halloway and
Wacousta close in his rear, when suddenly the heads of many men were
once more distinguishable, even in the shadow of the arch that overhung
the sands of the river. Three individuals detached themselves from the
group and leaping upon the further extremity of the bridge, moved
rapidly to meet him. Meanwhile the baronet had stopped suddenly, as if
in doubt whether to advance or to recede. His suspense was but
momentary. Although the persons of these men were disguised as Indian
warriors, the broad moonlight that beamed full on their countenances,
disclosed the well-remembered features of Blessington, Erskine, and
Charles de Haldimar. The latter sprang before his companions, and,
uttering a cry of joy, sank in speechless agony on the neck of his
still unconscious sister.
"For God's sake, free me, De Haldimar!" exclaimed the excited baronet,
disengaging his charge from the embrace of his friend. "This is no
moment for congratulation. Erskine, Blessington, see you not who is
behind me? Be upon your guard; defend your lives!" And as he spoke, he
rushed forward with feint and tottering steps to place his companions
between the unhappy girl and the danger that threatened her.
The swords of the officers were drawn; but instead of advancing upon
the formidable being, who stood as if paralysed at this unexpected
rencontre, the two seniors contented themselves with assuming a
defensive attitude,--retiring slowly and gradually towards the other
extremity of the bridge.
Overcome by his emotion, Charles de Haldimar had not noticed this
action of his companions, and stood apparently riveted to the spot. The
voice of Blessington calling on him by name to retire, seemed to arouse
the dormant consciousness of the unhappy maniac. She uttered a piercing
shriek, and, springing forward, sank on her knees at his feet,
exclaiming, as she forcibly detained him by his dress,--
"Almighty Heaven! where am I? surely that was Captain Blessington's
kind voice I heard; and you--you are Charles de Haldimar. Oh! save my
husband; plead for him with your father!----but no," she continued
wildly,--"he is dead--he is murdered! Behold these hands all covered
with his blood! Oh!----"
"Ha! another De Haldimar!" exclaimed Wacousta, recovering his
slumbering energies, "this spot seems indeed fated for our meeting.
More than thrice have I been balked of my just revenge, but now will I
secure it. Thus, Ellen, do I avenge your husband's and my nephew's
death. My own wrongs demand another sacrifice. But, ha! where is she?
where is Clara? where is my bride?"
Bounding over the ill-fated De Haldimar, who lay, even in death, firmly
clasped in the embrace of the wretched Ellen, the fierce man dashed
furiously forward to renew his pursuit of the fugitives. But suddenly
the extremity of the bridge was filled with a column of armed men, that
kept issuing from the arch beneath. Sensible of his danger, he sought
to make good his retreat; but when he turned for the purpose, the same
formidable array met his view at the opposite extremity; and both
parties now rapidly advanced in double quick time, evidently with a
view of closing upon and taking him prisoner. In this dilemma, his only
hope was in the assistance that might be rendered him by his warriors.
A yell, so terrific as to be distinctly heard in the fort itself, burst
from his vast chest, and rolled in prolonged echoes through the forest.
It was faintly answered from the encampment, and met by deep but
noiseless curses from the exasperated soldiery, whom the sight of their
murdered officer was momentarily working into frenzy.
"Kill him not, for your lives!--I command you, men, kill him not!"
muttered Captain Blessington with suppressed passion, as his troops
were preparing to immolate him on their clustering bayonets. "Such a
death were, indeed, mercy to such a villain."
"Ha! ha!" laughed Wacousta in bitter scorn; "who is there of all your
accursed regiment who will dare to take him alive?" Then brandishing
his tomahawk around him, to prevent their finally closing, he dealt his
blows with such astonishing velocity, that no unguarded point was left
about his person; and more than one soldier was brought to the earth in
the course of the unequal struggle.
"By G--d!" said Captain Erskine, "are the two best companies of the
regiment to be kept at bay by a single desperado? Shame on ye, fellows!
If his hands are too many for you, lay him by the heels."
This ruse was practised with success. In attempting to defend himself
from the attack of those who sought to throw him down, the warrior
necessarily left his upper person exposed; when advantage was taken to
close with him and deprive him of the play of his arms. It was not,
however, without considerable difficulty, that they succeeded in
disarming and binding his hands; after which a strong cord being
fastened round his waist, he was tightly lashed to a gun, which,
contrary to the original intention of the governor, had been sent out
with the expedition. The retreat of the detachment then commenced
rapidly; but it was not without being hotly pursued by the band of
warriors the yell of Wacousta had summoned in pursuit, that they
finally gained the fort: under what feelings of sorrow for the fate of
an officer so beloved, we leave it to our readers to imagine.