The episode of the mad cat had given a severer shock to Nell's nerves
than she was at all aware of at the time. The joy and the new-born
hope that sprang to life within her in meeting that look of ineffable
tenderness in Kenneth's eyes buoyed her up at first, but the news of
his sudden departure, leaving neither note nor message for her, was a
heavy blow, and brought on the natural reaction from the excitement
of her struggle with the rabid animal.
For days her prostration was so great that she could do little but
lie on her bed, and when alone often bemoaned herself with bitter
sighing and weeping, although in Clare's presence she constantly
assumed a cheerfulness she was far from feeling, yet that deceived
even that keen-eyed individual.
At length her woman's pride helped her to rally her failing energies.
She rose from her bed and went about her accustomed duties and
pleasures with a determined will to seem her old self; hiding her
well-nigh breaking heart behind a smiling countenance.
She learned from Dale that Kenneth's summons had been to the dying
bed of his father, and that though he could not hope to traverse the
intervening distance in season to witness the closing scene, he yet
felt it imperative upon him to make all haste to give his widowed
mother the comfort and support of his presence at the earliest
possible moment.
"Ah, he had no time to write before leaving!" thought Nell; and hope
whispered that he would perhaps do so from some station on the way,
or from Glen Forest immediately on his arrival there.
She waited and watched, now hopefully, now with feverish longing, and
anon in almost utter despair, as weeks dragged on their weary round,
bringing no word from him, no evidence that she was not completely
forgotten.
She grew absent-minded, and would catch herself sitting in listless
attitude, silent and abstracted, while others chatted and laughed
gaily at her side; or moving about with a languor that attracted
Clare's attention, and brought upon her vexatious questions and
remarks.
"What was the matter? She was certainly not well, for it was not like
her to be so dull. She was losing her appetite too. She should take
more out-door exercise. Why did she stay in the house so constantly
of late? Where would she like to go? What was there that she could
eat? Really she must try to keep up, if only till Dr. Clendenin
returned, for he was the only physician in the place in whom the
major felt any confidence."
Nell answered, not always in the most amiable of tones, that she
was perfectly well and did not know why people should persist in
believing otherwise. She was in no haste for Dr. Clendenin's return,
and hoped he would stay six months or a year if he felt inclined to
do so.
Still, spite of her protestations, she continued to grow pale and
thin, ate less and less, and at last was forced to take to her bed
with a low, nervous fever.
It was now far on in October, but Kenneth had not returned, and Dr.
Buell was called in by the major, much against the patient's will.
"I don't want him or his medicines," she said. "I'm not sick."
"Why, what nonsense!" said Clare; "why do you lie here if you are not
ill?"
"Because I'm tired, tired!" sighed the girl, turning away her head.
"I only need rest, and all I want is to be let alone."
"The fact is, you don't know what ails you or what you need;
and you're not going to be let alone," remarked Clare, with
the assumption of authority always so distasteful to her young
sister-in-law.
The words, but especially the tone, brought the color to Nell's
cheeks and an indignant light into her eyes.
She opened her lips to reply, but Clare had already left the room,
and the next moment re-entered it, bringing Dr. Buell with her.
His remedies had no good effect. Nell drooped more and more. Major
Lamar became extremely anxious and uneasy.
"I wish," he said to his wife again and again, "that Clendenin would
come home. It is very unfortunate that he should be absent just now."
"Doesn't any body hear from him?" she asked, hearing the remark for
perhaps the fiftieth time.
"I don't know. I'll go and ask Dale," he answered, taking up his hat
and hurrying from the house.
He had not gone a hundred yards when he espied--welcome
sight!--Kenneth himself walking briskly toward him.
They met with a hearty handshaking and words of cordial greeting.
"Come at last," said the major, "and just when you are sorely needed.
I believe in my heart Nell's in a dangerous condition, and Buell's
doing her no good. I must take you home with me at once."
"But--"
"No but about it," interrupted the major bluntly. "He was called in
with the distinct understanding that the moment you returned the case
would be put into your hands, you being the family physician."
Kenneth made no further objection, but went with his friend, asking
a few hurried questions by the way in regard to the nature of the
malady and the length of time that had elapsed since the patient's
seizure.
Nell, lying alone on her bed, heard the well-known step and voice
in the outer room. What a thrill the sounds sent through her whole
frame, making every nerve tingle with excitement!
She half started up, flushing and trembling, then as step and voice
drew nearer, fell back again, closed her eyes and hid her face in the
bed clothes.
"Nell, are you ready to see the doctor?" asked Clare's voice at the
door.
"No, nor ever shall be. I should think that you and Percy might
be convinced by this time that his visits are doing me no good,"
answered the girl, in a tone of irritation.
"But it's Dr. Clendenin this time, Nell," said Clare, stepping aside
and motioning him to enter.
Nell lay perfectly still and kept her eyes shut, resolved to appear
utterly indifferent to his presence; but hers was a tell-tale face
to him; he saw that the indifference was only assumed, yet failed to
fully understand it.
"I grieve to find you so ill," he said, bending over her, and
speaking in the tone of extreme gentleness and compassion that ever
touched her heart to its inmost core.
She resented it, she did not want to have any kindly feeling toward
him; she was determined she would not, so averting her face,
answered, almost rudely, that she was not very ill, and would do well
enough if she could only be left alone; then unable through weakness
to maintain her self-control, burst into a fit of hysterical weeping.
"You see she's dreadfully nervous, doctor," remarked Clare, a little
maliciously, for she knew that Nell could not endure the imputation.
"Tears will bring some relief; I will be in again in the course of an
hour," said Kenneth, and was gone almost before he had finished his
sentence.
When he came again he found his patient more composed, but the pale,
sunken cheeks, and the great, hollow eyes filled him with remorse and
anxiety; he could scarcely command his voice for a moment.
"Excuse my rudeness, doctor," she said, holding out a thin white
hand. "I believe I'm just sick enough to be very cross."
She had resolved not to look at him, but, as she spoke, involuntarily
raised her eyes to his and read there such yearning affection, such
tender compassion as caused her to drop them instantly, while the hot
blood dyed cheek and brow, but only to vanish again, leaving them
paler than before.
And he? A wild impulse, scarcely to be restrained, seized him to
catch her in his arms, fold her to his heart, and pour out the story
of his love.
The desire was so overpowering that it may be he would have yielded
to it had not the major's entrance at that instant prevented.
But Nell had read the look, and the sweet story it told was as a
cordial to her fainting spirit.
She rallied from that moment, the next day he found her sitting up,
and in a week she was able to drive out.
After that his visits, which had been but few and brief from the
first, were rarer and shorter still, and soon they ceased entirely.
She seldom saw him now, except at church or on the street, when they
would exchange a passing bow and smile, and yet he had not told the
story of his love, save with his eloquent eyes.
But she blamed herself for that; for with the strange inconsistency
of human nature, she had shrunk from being left alone with him,
studiously avoiding giving him an opportunity to speak the words for
which her very soul was hungering and thirsting.
During all this time Wawillaway had been a frequent visitor at the
house of Major Lamar, coming often to Chillicothe with baskets of his
own weaving for sale, and never failing to call upon these friends
who had made much of him ever since his signal service to Nell.
When he remained over night in the town it was usually as their
guest, sleeping on the kitchen floor, wrapped in his blanket, and
with his feet to the fire.
He was an especial favorite with Nell, and the liking was mutual, he
having a great admiration for the "white squaw" whom he had saved
from the panther's teeth and claws, while she felt that she owed him
a debt of lasting gratitude; a debt that was doubled by an occurrence
that took place some months subsequent to her recovery from her late
illness.
Mounting Fairy one bright spring morning, she sallied forth with the
intention of paying a visit to her friend Mrs. Nash.
Wild animals were now seldom seen in the vicinity of the town, and
she felt secure in taking a short ride without escort; but on the way
found herself confronted by danger of another kind which she had not
taken into account.
She was passing through a bit of woods, when a man suddenly sprang
from behind a tree, seized her bridle, bringing her pony to an
abrupt halt that had nearly thrown her from the saddle, and with a
lecherous, impudent stare into her face, and a demoniacal grin, said:
"I'm powerful glad o' this meetin'; ben a wantin' to scrape
acquaintance this long while; fur you're a mighty purty gal."
Nell's cheek blanched and an involuntary shiver of fear crept over
her.
The man was a tall, broad shouldered, powerfully built fellow, of the
border ruffian class, whom she had seen about the streets and in the
stores of the town a number of times in the last few months.
She knew little of him except his name, which seemed to her strangely
appropriate, such was the ferocious and animal expression of his
bronzed and bearded face.
She had felt instinctive loathing of the man from the first casual
glance at him, had seen his evil eyes more than once following her
furtively with a look that filled her with a nameless terror; and it
may well be imagined that she was now filled with affright at this
unexpected encounter in the lonely wood.
A conciliatory course seemed wisest, and with a heroic effort to hide
her alarm, she addressed him politely.
"I am in haste, Mr. Wolf; please be good enough not to detain me."
"Not yet, my beauty, can't let you go just yet; we'll have a little
chat first. Come, I'll help you to 'light, and we'll go and sit
together a spell on that log yonder," he said, taking hold of her
left arm.
"Unhand me! how dare you?" she cried, her cheeks crimson, her eyes
flashing with indignation, and bringing her riding whip down on his
hand with all the force she could muster.
The stinging blow made him release her for an instant, but he kept
his hold on the bridle, and an attempt on her part to urge her pony
forward only made the creature rear and plunge in a dangerous manner.
"No, you don't!" cried the ruffian with a derisive laugh; and
uttering a fearful oath, he threw his arm about her waist and had
nearly lifted her from the saddle.
"Help! help!" she shrieked wildly till the woods rang again with the
sound, and striking madly at him with the whip.
She was answered instantly by the Indian warwhoop close at hand, and
half a dozen savages, armed with rifles and tomahawks, sprang out
from the wood, not a hundred yards away.
Wolf, having left his gun leaning up against a tree at some little
distance, was unarmed except the hunting knife in his belt, and
seeing himself about to be overpowered by numbers, fled with the
utmost precipitation, plunging into the forest and instantly
disappearing in its depths.
Nell, not knowing whether to look upon the red men as friends or
foes, felt her heart leap into her mouth, expecting to be tomahawked
and scalped on the spot; but the next moment, recognizing in the
foremost warrior her friend Wawillaway, she uttered a cry of joy.
"Very bad white man," he said coming up to her, "want killee you."
"No, I hope not," she said carefully steadying her voice, "but I am
so glad, so glad you came and drove him away, Wawillaway. Oh, you
have done me a greater service to-day than even the killing of the
panther!" she added with an irrepressible shudder.
It was long before Nell ventured again beyond the limits of the town
without a protector; but fearing Wolf's vengeance upon her brother,
should he bring the ruffian to punishment, as he undoubtedly would
should he hear of this day's peril to her, she carefully concealed
the occurrence, exacting a promise from her Indian friend to do the
same.