On the 14th the army lay supine. There was no news from Otsego. One man fell dead in camp of heart disease. The cattle-guard was fired on. On the 15th a corporal and four privates, while herding our cattle, were fired on, the Senecas killing and scalping one and wounding another. On the 16th came a runner from Clinton with news that the Otsego army was on the march and not very far distant from the Ouleout; and a detachment of eight hundred men, under Brigadier General Poor, was sent forward to meet our Right Wing and escort it back to this camp.
By one of the escort, a drummer lad, I sent a letter directed to Lois, hoping it might be relayed to Otsego and from thence by batteau to Albany. The Oneida runner had brought no letters, much to the disgust of the army, and no despatches except the brief line to our General commanding. The Brigadiers were furious. So also was I that no letters came for me.
On the 17th our soldier-herdsmen were again fired on, and, as before, one poor fellow was killed and partly scalped, and one wounded. The Yellow Moth, Tahoontowhee, and the Grey-Feather went out at night on retaliation bent, but returned with neither trophies nor news, save what we all knew, that the Seneca scouts were now swarming like hornets all around us ready to sting to death anyone who strayed out of bounds.
On the 18th the entire camp lay dull, patiently expectant of Clinton. He did not come. It rained all night.
On Thursday, the 19th, it still rained steadily, but with no violence--a fine, sweet, refreshing summer shower, made golden and beautiful at intervals by the momentary prophecy of the sun; yet he did not wholly reveal himself, though he smiled through the mist at us in friendly fashion.
I had been out fishing for trouts very early, the rain making it favourable for such pleasant sport, and my Indians and I had finished a breakfast of corn porridge and the sweet-fleshed fishes that I took from the brook where it falls into the Susquehanna.
It was still very early--near to five o'clock, I think--for the morning gun had not yet bellowed, and the camp lay very still in the gentle and fragrant rain.
A few moments before five I saw a company of Jersey troops march silently down to the river, hang their cartouche-boxes on their bayonets, and ford the stream, one holding to another, and belly deep in the swollen flood.
Thinks I to myself, they are going to protect our cattle-guards; and I turned and walked down to the ford to watch the crossing.
Then I saw why they had crossed: there were some people come down to the landing place on the other bank in two batteaux and an Oneida canoe--soldiers, boatmen, and two women; and our men were fording the river to protect the crossing of this small flotilla.
I seated myself, wondering what foolhardy people these might be, and trying to see more plainly the women in the two batteaux. As the boatmen poled nearer, it seemed to me that some of the people looked marvelously like the riflemen of my own corps; and a few moments later I sprang to my feet astounded, for of the two women in the nearest batteau one was Lois de Contrecoeur and the other Lana Helmer.
Suddenly the Oneida canoe shot out from the farther shore, passed both batteaux, paddles flashing, and came darting toward the landing where I stood. Two riflemen were in it; one rose as the canoe's nose grated on the gravel, cast aside the bow-paddle, balanced himself toward the bow with both hands, and leaped ashore, waving at me a gay greeting.
"My God!" said I excitedly, as Boyd ran lightly up the slope. "Are you stark mad to bring ladies into this damnable place?"
"There are other women, too. Why, even that pretty jade, Dolly Glenn, is coming! What could I do? The General himself permitted it. Miss de Contrecoeur and Lana heard that a number of women were already here, and so come for a frolic they must."
"Who accompanies them? I see no older woman yonder."
"Mrs. Sabin, the lady of Captain Sabin, Staff Commissary of Issues."
"Where is she, then?"
"We left her with the army at the Ouleout."
"Where do you propose to quarter these ladies?"
"We understand that you have four block-forts mounting cannon. That would argue barracks. Therefore, I don't think the danger is very considerable. Do you?"
"There is danger, of course," I said. "The entire Seneca nation is here with Indian Butler and Brant."
"Well, then, we'll turn your Butler into a turn-spit, and make of your wild Brant a domestic gander!"
He spoke coolly, a slight smile on his eager, handsome features. And I wondered how he could make a jest of this business, and how he could have permitted so mad a prank if he truly entertained any very deep regard for Lana Helmer.
"Danger," I repeated coldly. "Yes, there is a-plenty of that hereabouts, what with the Seneca scalping parties combing the woods around us, and the cattle-guard fired upon in plain sight of headquarters."
"Well, there were and still are some few scalping parties hanging around Otsego. I myself see no real reason why the ladies should not pay us a visit here, have their frolic, and later return with the heavier artillery down the river to Easton. Or, if they choose, they shall await our return from Catharines-town."
"And if we do not return? Have you thought of that, Boyd?"
"You shall not conjure me with any such forebodings!" he laughed. "This raid of ours will be no very great or fearsome affair. They'll run--your Brants and Butlers--I warrant you. And we'll follow and burn their towns. Then, like the French king of old, down hill we'll all go strutting, you and I and the army, Loskiel; and no great harm done to anybody or anything, save to the Senecas' squash harvest, and the sensitive feelings of Walter Butler!"
While he was speaking, I kept my eye on the slow batteau which led. Three boatmen poled it; Lois and Lana sat in the middle; behind them crouched two riflemen, long weapons ready, the ringed coon-tail floating in the breeze.
Neither of the ladies had yet recognized me; Lana leaned lightly against Lois, her cheek resting on her companion's shoulder.
A black rage against Boyd rose suddenly in my breast; and so savage and abrupt was the emotion that I could scarce stifle and subdue it.
"It is wrong for them to come," I said with an effort to speak calmly, "----utterly and wickedly wrong. Our block-forts are not finished. And when they are they will be more or less vulnerable. I can not understand why you did not make every effort to prevent their coming here."
"I made every proper effort," he said carelessly. "What man is vain enough to believe he can influence a determined woman?"
I did not like what he said, and so made him no answer.
"Is your camp still asleep?" he asked, yawning.
"Yes. The morning gun is usually fired at six."
"Can you lodge us and bait us until I make my report?"
"I can lodge the ladies and give breakfast to you all. How near is our main army?"
"Between twenty and thirty miles above--one can scarce tell the way this accursed river winds about. Our men are exhausted. They'll not arrive tonight. General Poor's men from this camp met us last night. Clinton desired me to take a few riflemen and push forward; and the ladies--except the fat one--begged so prettily to go with us that he consented. So we took two empty batteaux and a canoe and came on in advance, with no effort whatever."
"That was a rash business!" I said, controlling my anger. "The river woods along the Ouleout swarm with Seneca scouts. Didn't you understand that?"
"So I told 'em," he said, laughing, "but do you know, Loskiel, between you and me I believe that your pretty inamorata really loves the thrill of danger. And I know damned well that Lana Helmer loves it. For when we came through without so much as sighting a muskrat, 'What!' says she, 'Not a savage to be seen and not a shot fired! Lord,' says she, 'I had as lief take the air on Bowling Green--there being some real peril of beaux and macaronis!'"
Everything this man said now conspired to enrage me; and it was a struggle for me to restrain the bitter affront ever twitching at my lips for utterance. Perhaps I might not have restrained it any longer had I not seen Lois lean suddenly forward in her seat, shade her eyes with her hands, then stand up beside one of the boatmen. And I knew she recognized me.
Instantly within me all anger, rancour, and even dread melted in the warmer and more generous emotion which nigh overwhelmed me, so that for an instant I could scarce see her for the glimmering of my eyes.
But that passed; I went down to the shore and stood there while the clumsy boat swung inshore, the misty waves slapping at the bow and side. The landing planks lay on the gravel. Boyd and I laid them. Lana, wrapped in her camblet, crossed them first, giving me her hand with a pale smile. I laid my lips to it; she passed, Boyd moving forward beside her.
Then came Lois in her scarlet capuchin, eager and shy at the same time, smiling, yet with fearfulness and tenderness so strangely blended that ever her laughing eyes seemed close to tears and the lips that smiled were tremulous.
"I came--you see.... Are you angry?" she asked as I bent low over her little hand. "You will not chide me--will you, Euan?"
"No. What is done is done. Are you well, Lois?"
"Perfect in health, my friend. And if you truly are glad to see me, then I am content. But I am also very wet, Euan, spite of my capuchin. Lana and I have a common box. It belongs to her. May our boatmen carry it ashore?"
I gave brief directions to the men, returned the smiling salute of my wet riflemen from the other boat now drawing heavily inshore, and climbed the grassy bank with Lois to where Lana and Boyd stood under the trees awaiting us.
"I have but one bush-hut to offer you at present," I said. "Proper provision in barracks will be made, no doubt, as soon as the General learns who it is who has honoured him so unexpectedly with a visit."
"That's why we came, Euan--to honour General Sullivan," said Lois demurely. "Did we not, Lanette?"
Then again I noticed that the old fire, the old gaiety in Lana Helmer had been almost quenched. For instead of a saucy reply she only smiled; and even her eyes seemed spiritless as they rested on me a moment, then turned wearily elsewhere.
"You are much fatigued," I said to Lois.
"I? No. But my poor Lana slept very badly in the boat. Before dawn we went ashore for an hour's rest. That seemed sufficient for me, but Lana, poor dove, did not profit, I fear. Did you, dearest?"
"Very little," said Lana, forcing a gaiety she surely did not inspire in others with her haunted eyes that looked at everything, yet saw nothing--or so it seemed to me.
As we came to our bush-huts, Lois caught sight of the Sagamore for the first time, and held out both hands with a pretty cry of recognition:
"Nai, Mayaro!"
The Sagamore turned in silent astonishment; though when he saw Boyd there also his features became smooth and blank again. But he came forward with stately grace to welcome her; and, bending his crested head, took her hands and laid them lightly over his heart.
"Nai, Lois!" he exclaimed emphatically.
"Itoh, Mayaro!" she replied gaily, pressing his hands in hers. "I am that contented to see you! Are you not amazed to see me here?" she insisted, mischievously amused at his unaltered features.
The Sagamore said smilingly:
"When she wills it, who can follow the Rosy-throated Pigeon in her swift flight? Not the Enchantress in the moon. Tharon alone, O Rosy-throated One!"
"The wild pigeon has outwitted you all, has she not, Mayaro, my friend?"
"Nakwah! Let my brother Loskiel deny it, then. I, a Sagamore, know better than to deny a fire its ashes, or a wild pigeon its magic flight."
Boyd now spoke to the Mohican, who returned his greeting courteously, but very gravely. I then made the Mohican known to Lana, who gave him a lifeless hand from the green folds of her camblet. My Oneidas, who had finished their somewhat ominous painting, came from the other hut in company with the Yellow Moth, the latter now painted for the first time in a brilliant and poisonous yellow. All these people I made acquainted one with another. Lois was very gracious to them all, using what Indian words she knew in her winning greetings--and using them quite wrongly--God bless her!
Then the Yellow Moth hung my new blue blanket, which I had lately drawn from our Commissary of Issues, across the door of my hut; two huge boatmen came up with Lana's box, swung between them, and deposited it within the hut.
"By the time you are ready," said I, "we will have a breakfast for you such as only the streams of this country can afford."
The six o'clock gun awoke the camp and found me already at the General's tent, awaiting permission to see him.
He seemed surprised that Clinton had allowed any ladies to accompany the Otsego army, but it was evident that the happiness and relief he experienced at learning that Clinton was on the Ouleout had put him into a most excellent humour. And he straightway sent an officer with orders to remove Lana's box to Block-Fort No. 2 in the new fort, where were already domiciled the wives of two sergeants and a corporal, and gave me an order assigning to Lois and Lana a rough loft there.
But the General's chief concern and curiosity was for Boyd and the eight riflemen who had come through from the Ouleout as the first advanced guard of that impatiently awaited Otsego army; and I heard Boyd telling him very gaily that they were bringing more than two hundred batteaux, loaded with provisions. And, this, I think, was the best news any man could have brought to our Commander at that moment. One thing I do know; from that time Boyd was an indulged favourite of our General, who admired his many admirable qualities, his gay spirits, his dashing enterprise, his utter fearlessness; and who overlooked his military failings, which were rashness to the point of folly, and a tendency to obey orders in a manner which best suited his own ideas. Captain Cummings was a far safer man.
I say this with nothing in my heart but kindness for Boyd. God knows I desire to do him justice--would wish it for him even more than for myself. And I not only was not envious of his good fortune in so pleasing our General, but was glad of it, hoping that this honour might carry with it a new and graver responsibility sufficiently heavy to curb in him what was least admirable and bring out in him those nobler qualities so desirable in officer and man.
When I returned to my hut there were many fish smoking hot on their bark plates, and Lana and Lois in dry woollen dresses, worsted stockings, and stout, buckled shoon, already at porridge.
So I sat down with them and ate, and it was, or seemed to be, a happy company there before our little hut, with officers and troops passing to and fro and glancing curiously at us, and our Indians squatted behind us all a-row, and shining up knife and hatchet and rifle; and the bugle-horns of the various regiments sounding prettily at intervals, and the fifers and drummers down by the river at distant morning practice.
"You love best the bellowing conch-horn of the rifles," observed Lana to Lois, with a touch of her old-time impudence.
"I?" exclaimed Lois.
"You once told me that every blast of it sets you a-trembling," insisted Lana. "Naturally I take it that you quiver with delight--having some friend in that corps----"
"Lana! Have done, you little baggage!"
"Lord!" said Lana. "'Twas Major Parr I meant. What does an infant Ensign concern such aged dames as you and I?"
Lois, lovely under her mounting colour, continued busy with her porridge. Lana said in my ear:
"She is a wild thing, Euan, and endures neither plaguing nor wooing easily. How I have gained her I do not know.... Perhaps because I am aging very fast these days, and she hath a heart as tender as a forest dove's."
Lois looked up, seeing us whispering together.
"Uncouth manners!" said she. "I am greatly ashamed of you both."
I thought to myself, wondering, how utter a change had come over the characters of these two in twice as many weeks! Lois had now something of that quick and mischievous gaiety that once was Lana's; and the troubled eyes that once belonged to Lois now were hers no longer, but Lana's. It seemed very strange and sad to me.
"Had I a dozen beaux," quoth Lois airily, "I might ask of one o' them another bit of trout." And, "Oh!" she exclaimed, in affected surprise, as I aided her. "It would seem that I have at least one young man who aspires to that ridiculous title. Do you covet it, Euan? And humbly?"
"Do I merit it?" I asked, laughing.
"Upon my honour," she exclaimed, turning to Lana, "I believe the poor young gentleman thinks he does merit the title. Did you ever hear of such insufferable conceit? And merely because he offers me a bit of trout."
"I caught them, too," said I. "That should secure me in my title."
"Oh! You caught them too, did you! And so you deem yourself entitled to be a beau of mine? Lana, do you very kindly explain to the unfortunate Ensign that you and I were accustomed at Otsego to a popularity and an adulation of which he has no conception. Colonels and majors were at our feet. Inform him very gently, Lana."
"Yes," said Lana, "you behaved very indiscreetly at Otsego Camp, dear one--sitting alone for hours and hours over this young gentleman's letters----"
"Traitor!" exclaimed Lois, blushing. "It was a letter from his solicitor, Mr. Hake, that you found me doting on!"
"Did you then hear from Mr. Hake?" I asked, laughing and very happy.
"Indeed I did, by every post! That respectable Albany gentleman seemed to feel it his duty to write me by every batteau and inquire concerning my health, happiness, and pleasure, and if I lacked anything on earth to please me. Was it not most extraordinary behaviour, Euan?"
She was laughing when she spoke, and for a moment her eyes grew strangely tender, but they brightened immediately and she tossed her head.
"Oh, Lana!" said she. "I think I may seriously consider Mr. Hake and his very evident intentions. So I shall require no more beaux, Euan, and thank you kindly for volunteering. Besides, if I want 'em, this camp seems moderately furnished with handsome and gallant young officers," she added airily, glancing around her. "Lana! Do you please observe that tall captain with the red facings! And the other staff-major yonder in blue and buff! Is he not beautiful as Apollo? And I make no doubt that this agreeable young Ensign of ours will presently make them known to us for our proper diversion."
Somehow, now, with the prospect of all these officers besetting her with their civilities and polite assiduities, nothing of the old and silly jealousy seemed to stir within me. Perhaps because, although for days I had not seen her, I knew her better. And also I had begun to know myself. Even though she loved not me in the manner I desired, yet the lesser, cruder, and more unworthy solicitude which at first seemed to have possessed me in her regard was now gone. And if inexperience and youth had inspired me with unworthy jealousies I do not know; but I do know that I now felt myself older--years older than when first I knew Lois; and perhaps my being so honestly in love with her wrought the respectable change in me. For real love ages the mind, even when it makes more youthful the body, and so controls both body and mind. And I think it was something that way with me.
Presently, as we sat chattering there, came men to take away Lana's box to Block-House No. 2 on the peninsula. So Lana went into the bush-hut and refilled and locked the box, and then we all walked together to the military works which were being erected on a cleared knoll overlooking both rivers, and upon which artillerymen were now mounting the three-pounder and the cohorn, or "grasshopper," as our men had named it, because our artillery officers had taken it from its wooden carriage and had mounted it on a tripod. And at every discharge it jumped into the air and kicked over backward.
This miniature fortress, now called Fort Sullivan, was about three hundred feet square, with strong block-forts at the four corners, so situated as to command both rivers; and these fortifications were now so nearly completed that the men of the invalid corps who were to garrison the place had already marched into their barracks, and were now paraded for inspection.
The forts had been very solidly constructed of great logs, the serrated palisade, deeply and solidly embedded, rose twelve feet high. A rifle platform ran inside this, connecting the rough barracks and stables, which also were built of logs, the crevices stuffed with moss and smeared and plastered with blue clay from the creek.
These, with the curtain, block-forts, and a deep ditch over which was a log bridge, composed the military works at Tioga; and this was the place into which we now walked, a sentry directing us to Block-House No. 2, which overlooked the Chemung.
And no sooner had we entered and climbed the ladder to the women's quarters overhead, than:
"What luxury!" exclaimed Lois, looking down at her bed of fresh-cut balsam, over which their blankets had been cast. "Could any reasonable woman demand more? With a full view of the pretty river in the rain, and a real puncheon floor, and a bed of perfume to dream on, and a brave loop to shoot from! What more could a vain maid ask?" She glanced at me with sweet and humorous eyes, saying: "Fort Orange is no safer than this log bastion, so scowl on me no more, Euan, but presently take Lanette and me to the parapet where other and lovelier wonders are doubtless to be seen."
"What further wonders?" asked Lana indifferently.
"Why, sky and earth and river, dear, and the little dicky birds all a-preening under this sweet, sunny veil of rain. Is not all this mystery of nature wonderful enough to lure us to the rifle-platform?"
Said Lana listlessly: "I had liefer court a deeper mystery."
"Which, dear one?"
"Sleep," said Lana briefly; and I saw how pale she was, kneeling there beside the opened box and sorting out the simple clothing they had brought with them.
For a few minutes longer we conversed, talking of Otsego and of our friends there; and I learned how Colonel Gansevoort had left with his regiment and Lieutenant-Colonel Willet, and was marching hither with Clinton after all.
A soldier brought a wooden bowl, an iron sap-kettle full of sweet water, a hewn bench, and nailed up a blanket cutting the room in two. Their quarters were now furnished.
I pushed aside the blanket, walked to the inner loop, and gazed down on the miniature parade where the invalids were now being inspected by Colonel Shreve. When I returned, Lana had changed to a levete and was lying on her balsam couch, cheek on hand, looking up at Lois, who knelt beside her on the puncheon floor, smoothing back her thick, bright hair. And in the eyes of these two was an expression the like of which I had never before seen, and I stepped back instinctively, like a man who intrudes on privacy unawares.
"Come in, Euan!" cried Lois, with a gaiety which seemed slightly forced; and I came, awkwardly, not meeting their eyes, and made for the ladder to get myself below.
Whereat both laughed. Lois rose and went behind the blanket to the loop, and Lana said, with a trace of her former levity:
"Broad-brim! Do you fly blushing from my levete? The Queen of France receives in scanter attire, I hear. Sit you on yonder bench and play courtier amiably for once."
She seemed so frail and white and young, lying there, her fair hair unpowdered and tumbled about her face--so childlike and helpless--that a strange and inexplicable apprehension filled me; and, scarce thinking what I did, I went over to her and knelt down beside her, putting one arm around her shoulders.
Her expression, which had been smiling and vaguely audacious, changed subtly. She lay looking up at me very wistfully for a moment, then lifted her hands a little way. I laid them to my lips, looking over them down into her altered eyes.
"Always," she said under her breath, "always you have been kind and true, Euan, even when I have used you with scant courtesy."
"You have never used me ill."
"No--only to plague you as a girl torments what she truly loves.... Lois and I have spoken much of you together----" She turned her head. "Where are you, sweeting?"
Lois came from behind the blanket and knelt down so close to me that the fragrance of her freshened the air; and once again, as it happened at the first day's meeting in Westchester, the same thrill invaded me. And I thought of the wild rose that starlight night, and how fitly was it her symbol and her flower.
Lana looked at us both, unsmiling; then drew her hands from mine and crook'd her arms behind her neck, cradling her head on them, looking at us both all the while. Presently her lids drooped on her white cheeks.
When we rose on tiptoe, I thought she was asleep, but Lois was not certain; and as we crept out onto the rifle-platform and seated ourselves in a sheltered corner under the parapet, she said uneasily:
"Lanette is a strange maid, Euan. At first I knew she disliked me. Then, of a sudden, one day she came to me and clung like a child afraid. And we loved from that minute.... It is strange."
"Is she ill?"
"In mind, I think."
"Why?"
"I do not know, Euan."
"Is it love, think you--her disorder?"
"I do not know, I tell you. Once I thought it was--that. But knew not how to be certain."
"Does Boyd still court her?"
"No--I do not know," she said with a troubled look.
"Is it that affair which makes her unhappy?"
"I thought so once. They were ever together. Then she avoided him--or seemed to. It was Betty Bleecker who interfered between them. For Mrs. Bleecker was very wrathful, Euan, and Lana's indiscretions madded her.... There was a scene.... So Boyd came no more, save when other officers came, which was every day. Somehow I have never been certain that he and Lana did not meet in secret when none suspected."
"Have you proof?" I asked, cold with rage.
She shook her head, and her gaze grew vague and remote. After a while she seemed to put away her apprehensions, and, smiling, she turned to me, challenging me with her clear, sunny eyes:
"Come, Euan, you shall do me reason, now that my curly pate is innocent of powder, no French red to tint my lips and hide my freckles, and but a linsey-woolsey gown instead of chintz and silk to cover me! So tell me honestly, does not the enchantment break that for a little while seemed to hold you near me?"
"Do you forget," said I, "that I first saw my enchantress in rags and tattered shoon?"
"Oh!" she said, tossing her pretty head. "Extremes attract all men. But now in this sober and common guise of every day, I am neither Cinderella nor yet the Princess--merely a frowsy, rustic, freckled maid with a mouth somewhat too large for beauty, and the clipped and curly poll of a careless boy. And I desire to know, once for all, how I now suit you, Euan."
"You are perfection--once for all."
"I? What obstinate foolishness you utter! In all seriousness--"
"You are--more beautiful than ever--in all seriousness!"
"What folly!" She began to laugh nervously, then shrugged her shoulders, adding: "This young man is plainly partizan and deaf to reason."
"Being in love."
"You! In love! What nonsense!"
"Do you doubt it?"
"Oh!" she said carelessly. "You are in love with love--as all men are--and not particularly in love with me. Men, my dear Euan, are gamblers. When first you saw me in tatters, you laid a wager with yourself that I'd please you in silks. A gay hazard! A sporting wager! And straight you dressed me up to suit you; and being a man, and therefore conceited, you could scarcely admit that you had lost your wager to your better senses. Could you? But now you shall admit that in this frowsy, woollen gown the magic of both Cinderella and the Princess vanishes with yesterday's enchantment, and, instead of Chloe, pink and simpering, only a sturdy comrade stands revealed who now, as guerdon for the future, strikes hands with you--like this! Koue!" And with the clear and joyous cry on her lips she struck my palm violently with hers, nor winced under my quick-closing grip.
"Is all now clear and plain between us, Euan?" she inquired. And it seemed to me that her eagerness and fervour rang false.
"You can not love me, then?" I asked in a low voice.
"I? What has love to do with us--here in the woods--and I without knowledge and experience----"
"You do not love me, then?"
"I can not."
"Why?"
She made no answer, but bit her lip.
"You need not reply," said I. "Yet--that night I left Otsego--and when I passed you in the dark--I thought----"
"My heart was full that night! What comrade could feel less and still possess a human heart?" she said almost sullenly.
"Your letter--and mine--encouraged me to believe----"
"I know," she said, with the curt and almost breathless impatience of haste, "but have I ever denied our bond of intimacy, Euan? Closer bond have I with no man. But it must be a comrade's bond between us.... I meant to make that plain to you--and doubtless, my heart being full--and I but a girl--conveyed to you--by what I said--and did----"
"Lois! Is it not in you to love me as a woman loves a man?"
"I told you that when the time arrived I would doubtless be what you wish me to be----"
"You can love me, then?"
"How do I know? You perplex and vex me. Who else would I love but you? Who else is there in the world--except my mother?"
There was a silence; then I said:
"Has this passionate quest of her so wholly absorbed and controlled you that all else counts as nothing?"
"Yes, yes! You know it. You knew it at Otsego! Nothing else matters. I will not permit anything else to matter! And, lest you deem me cold, thankless, inhuman, ask of yourself, Euan, why such a lonely girl as I should close her eyes and stop her ears and lock her heart and--and turn her face away when the man--to whom she owes all--to whom she is--utterly devoted--urges her toward emotions--toward matters strange to her--and too profound as yet. So I ask you, for a time, to let what sleeps within us both lie sleeping, undisturbed. There is a love more natural, more imperious, more passionate still; and--it has led me here! And I will not confuse it with any other sentiment; nor share it with any man--not even with you--dear as you have become to me--lonely as I am,--no, not even with you will I share it! For I have vowed that I shall never slake my thirst with love save first in her dear embrace.... After these wistful, stark, and barren years--loveless, weary, naked, and unkind----" Suddenly she covered her face with her hands, bowing her head to her knees.
"Yet you bid me hope, Lois?" I asked under my breath.
She nodded.
"You make me happy beyond words," I whispered.
She looked up from her hands:
"Is that all you required to make you happy?"
"Can I ask more?"
"I--I thought men were more ruthless--more imperious and hotly impatient with the mistress of their hearts--if truly I am mistress of yours, as you tell me."
"I am impatient only for your happiness; ruthless only to secure it."
"For my happiness? Not for your own?"
"How can that come to me save when yours comes to you?"
"Oh!... I did not understand. I had not thought it mattered very greatly to men, so that they found their happiness--so that they found contentment in their sweethearts' yielding.... Then my surrender would mean nothing to you unless I yielded happily?"
"Nothing. Good God! In what school have you learned of love!"
She nodded thoughtfully, looking me in the eyes.
"What you tell me, Euan, is pleasant to think on. It reassures and comforts; nay, it is the sweetest thing you ever said to me--that you could find no happiness in my yielding unless I yield happily.... Why, Euan, that alone would win me--were it time. It clears up much that I have never understood concerning you.... Men have not used me gently.... And then you came.... And I thought you must be like the others, being a man, except that you are the only one to whom I was at all inclined--perhaps because you were from the beginning gentler and more honest with me.... What a way to win a woman's heart! To seek her happiness first of all!... Could you give me to another--if my happiness required it?"
"What else could I do, Lois?"
"Would you do that!" she demanded hotly.
"Have I any choice?"
"Not if your strange creed be sincere. Is it sincere?"
"There is no other creed for those who really love."
"You are wrong," she said angrily, looking at me with tightened lips.
"How wrong?"
"Because--I would not give you to another woman, though you cried out for her till the heavens fell!"
I began to laugh, but her eyes still harboured lightning.
"You should not go to her, whether or not you loved her!" she repeated. "I would not have it. I would not endure it!"
"Yet--if I loved another----"
"No! That is treason! Your happiness should be in me. And if you wavered I would hold you prisoner against your treacherous and very self!"
"How could you hold me?"
"What? Why--why--I----" She sat biting her scarlet lips and thinking, with straight brows deeply knitted, her greyish-purple eyes fixed hard on me. Then a slight colour stained her cheeks, and she looked elsewhere, murmuring: "I do not know how I would hold you prisoner. But I know I should do it, somehow."
"I know it, too," said I, looking at my ring she wore.
She blushed hotly: "It is well that you do, Euan. Death is the dire penalty if my prisoner escapes!" She hesitated, bit her lip, then added faintly: "Death for me, I mean." After a moment she slowly lifted her eyes to mine, and so still and clear were they that it seemed my regard plunged to the very depths of her.
"You do love me then," I said, taking her hand in mine.
Her face paled, and she caught her breath.
"Will you not wait--a little while--before you court me?" she faltered. "Will you not wait because I ask it of you?"
"Yes, I will wait."
"Nor speak of love--until----"
"Nor speak of love until you bid me speak."
"Nor--caress me--nor touch me--nor look in my eyes--this way----" Her hand had melted somehow closely into mine. We both were trembling now; and she withdrew her hand and slowly pressed it close against her heart, gazing at me in a white and childish wonder, as though dumb and reproachful of some wound that I had dealt her. And as I saw her there, so hurt and white and sweet, all quivering under the first swift consciousness of love, I trembled, too, with the fierce desire to take her in my arms and whisper what was raging in my heart of passionate assurance and devotion.
And I said nothing, nor did she. But presently the wild-rose tint crept back into her pale cheeks, and her head dropped, and she sat with eyes remote and vaguely sweet, her hands listless in her lap.
And I, my heart in furious protest, condemned to batter at its walls in a vain summons to the silent lips that should have voiced its every beat, remained mute in futile and impotent adoration of the miracle love had wrought under my very eyes.
Consigned to silence, condemned to patience super-human, I scarce knew how to conduct. And so cruelly the restraint cut and checked me that what with my perplexity, my happiness, and my wretchedness, I was in a plight.
No doubt the spectacle that my features presented--a very playground for my varying emotions--was somewhat startling to a maid so new at love. For, glancing with veiled eyes at me, presently her own eyes flew open wide. And:
"Euan!" she faltered. "Is aught amiss with you? Are you ill, dear lad? And have not told me?"
Whereat I was confused and hot and vexed; and I told her very plainly what it was that ailed me. And now mark! In place of an understanding and sympathy and a nice appreciation of my honourable discomfort, she laughed; and as her cheeks cooled she laughed the more, tossing back her pretty head while her mirth, now uncontrolled, rippled forth till the wild birds, excited, joined in with restless chirping, and a squirrel sprung his elfin rattle overhead.
"And that," said I, furious, "is what I get for deferring to your wishes! I've a mind to kiss you now!"
Breathless, her hands pressed to her breast, she looked at me, and made as though to speak, but laughter seized her and she surrendered to it helplessly.
Whereat I sprang to my feet and marched to the parapet, and she after me, laying her hand on my arm.
"Dear lad--I do not mean unkindness.... But it is all so new to me--and you are so tall a man to pull such funny faces--as though love was a stomach pain----" She swayed, helpless again with laughter, still clinging to my arm.
"If you truly find my features ridiculous----" I began, but her hand instantly closed my lips. I kissed it, however, with angry satisfaction, and she took it away hurriedly.
"Are you ashamed--you great, sulky and hulking boy--to take my harmless pleasantry so uncouthly? And how is this?" says she, stamping her foot. "May I not laugh a little at my lover if I choose? I will have you know, Euan, that I do what pleases me with mine own, and am not to sit in dread of your displeasure if I have a mind to laugh."
"It hurt me that you should make a mockery----"
"I made no mockery! I laughed. And you shall know that one day, please God, I shall laugh at you, plague you, torment you, and----" She looked at me smilingly, hesitating; then in a low voice: "All my caprices you shall endure as in duty bound.... Because your reward shall be--the adoration of one who is at heart--your slave already.... And your desires will ever be her own--are hers already, Euan.... Have I made amends?"
"More fully than----"
"Then be content," she said hastily, "and pull me no more lugubrious faces to fright me. Lord! What a vexing paradox is this young man who sits and glowers and gnaws his lips in the very moment of his victory, while I, his victim, tranquil and happy in defeat, sit calmly telling my thoughts like holy beads to salve my new-born soul. Ai-me! There are many things yet to be learned in this mad world of men."
We leaned over the parapet, shoulder to shoulder, looking down upon the river. The rain had ceased, but the sun gleamed only at intervals, and briefly.
After a moment she turned and looked at me with her beautiful and candid eyes--the most honest eyes I ever looked upon.
"Euan," she said in a quiet voice, "I know how hard it is for us to remain silent in the first flush of what has so sweetly happened to us both. I know how natural it is for you to speak of it and for me to listen. But if I were to listen, now, and when one dear word of yours had followed another, and the next another still; and when our hands had met, and then our lips--alas, dear lad, I had become so wholly yours, and you had so wholly filled my mind and heart that--I do not know, but I deeply fear--something of my virgin resolution might relax. The inflexible will--the undeviating obstinacy with which I have pursued my quest as far as this forest place, might falter, be swerved, perhaps, by this new and other passion--for I am as yet ignorant of its force and possibilities. I would not have it master me until I am free to yield. And that freedom can come happily and honourably to me only when I set my foot in Catharines-town. Do you understand me, Euan?"
"Yes."
"Then--we will not speak of love. Or even let the language of our eyes trouble each other with all we may not say and venture.... You will not kiss me, will you? Before I ask it of you?"
"No."
"Under no provocation? Will you--even if I should ask it?"
"No."
"I will tell you why, Euan. I have promised myself--it is odd, too, for I first thought of it the day I first laid eyes on you. I said to myself that, as God had kept me pure in spite of all--I should wish that the first one ever to touch my lips should be my mother. And I made that vow--having no doubt of keeping it--until I saw you again----"
"When?"
"When you came to me in Westchester before the storm."
"Then!" I exclaimed, amazed.
"Is it not strange, Euan? I know not how it was with me or why, all suddenly, I seemed to know--seemed to catch a sudden glimmer of my destiny--a brief, confusing gleam. And only seemed to fear and hate you--yet, it was not hate or fear, either.... And when I came to you in the rain--there at the stable shed--and when you followed, and gave your ring--such hell and heaven as awakened in my heart you could not fathom--nor could I--nor can I yet understand.... Do you think I loved you even then? Not knowing that I loved you?"
"How could you love me then?"
"God knows.... And afterward, on the rock in the moonlight--as you lay there asleep--oh, I knew not what so moved me to leave you my message and a wild-rose lying there.... It was my destiny--my destiny! I seemed to fathom it.... For when you spoke to me on the parade at the Middle Fort, such a thrill of happiness possessed me----"
"You rebuked and rebuked me, sweeting!"
"Because all my solicitude was for you, and how it might disgrace you."
"I could have knelt there at your ragged feet, in sight of all the fort!"
"Could you truly, Euan?"
"As willingly as I kneel at prayer!"
"How dear and gallant and sweet you are to me----" She broke off in dismay. "Ai-me! Heaven pity us both, for we are saying what should wait to be said, and have talked of love only while vowing not to do so!... Let loose my hand, Euan--that somehow has stolen into yours. Ai-me! This is a very maze I seem to travel in, with every pitfall hiding all I would avoid, and everywhere ambush laid for me.... Listen, dear lad, I am more pitifully at your mercy than I dreamed of. Be faithful to my faithless self that falters. Point out the path from your own strength and compassion.... I--I must find my way to Catharines-town before I can give myself to thoughts of you--to dreams of all that you inspire in me."
"Listen, Lois. This fort is as far as you may go."
"What!"
"Truly, dear maid. It is not alone the perils of an unknown country that must check you here. There is a danger that you know not of--that you never even heard of."
"A danger?"
"Worse. A threat of terrors hellish, inconceivable, terrible beyond words."
"What do you mean? The hatchet? The stake? Dear lad, may I not then venture what you soldiers brave so lightly?"
"It is not what we brave that threatens you!"
"What then?" she asked, startled.
"Dear did you ever learn that you are a 'Hidden Child'?"
"What is that, Euan?"
"Then you do not know?"
She shook her head.
And so I told her; told her also all that we had guessed concerning her; how that her captive mother, terrified by Amochol and his red acolytes, had concealed her, consecrated her, and, somehow, had found a runner to carry her beyond the doors of the Long House to safety.
This runner must have written the Iroquois message which I had read amid the corn-husks of her garret. It was all utterly plain and horrible now, to her and to myself.
As for the moccasins, the same faithful runner must have carried them to her, year after year, and taken back with him to the desolate mother the assurance that her child was living and still undiscovered and unharmed by Amochol.
All this I made plain to her; and I also told her that I, too, was of the Hidden Ones; and made it most clear to her who I really was. And I told her of the Cat-People, and of the Erie, and how the Sorcerer had defied us and boasted that the Hidden Child should yet die strangled upon the altar of Red Amochol.
She was quiet and very pale while I was speaking, and at moments her grey eyes widened with the unearthly horror of the thing; but never a tremour touched her, nor did lid or lips quiver or her gaze falter.
And when I had done she remained silent, looking out over the river at our feet, which was now all crinkling with the sun's bright network through the tracery of leaves.
"There is a danger to you," I said, "which will not cease until this army has left the Red Priest dead amid the sacrilegious ashes of his own vile altar. My Indians have made a vow to leave no Erie, no blasphemous and perverted priest alive. Amochol, the Wyoming Witch, the Toad-Woman--all that accursed spawn of Frontenac must die.
"Major Parr is of the same opinion; Clinton sees the importance of this, having had the sense to learn of Amherst how to stop the Seneca demons with a stout hempen rope. Two Sachems he hung, and the whole nation cowed down in terror of him while his authority remained.
"But Amherst left us; and the yelps of the Toad-Woman aroused the Sorcerers from their torpor. But I swear to you by St. Catharine, who is the saint of the Iroquois also, that the sway of Amochol shall end, and that he shall lie on his own bloody altar, nor die there before he sees the flames of Catharines-town touch the very heaven of an affronted God!"
"Can you do this?"
"With God's help and General Sullivan's," I said cheerfully. "For I daily pray to the One, and I have the promise of the other that before our marching army alarms Catharines-town, I and my Indians and Boyd and his riflemen shall strike the Red Priest there at the Onon-hou-aroria."
"What is that, Euan?"
"Their devil-rites--an honest feast which they have perverted. It was the Dream Feast, Lois, but Amochol has made of it an orgy unspeakable, where human sacrifices are offered to the Moon Witch, Atensi, and to Leshi and the Stone-Throwers, and the Little People--many of which were not goblins and ghouls until Amochol so decreed them."
"When is this feast to be held in Catharines-town?"
"On the last day of this month. Until then you must not leave this camp; and after the army marches you must not go outside this fort. Amochol's arm is long. His acolytes are watching. And now I think you understand at last."
She nodded. Presently she rested her pale cheek on her arms and looked at the reddening edges of the woods. Northwest lay Catharines-town, so Mayaro said. And into the northwest her grey eyes now gazed, calmly and steadily, while the sun went out behind the forest and the high heavens were plumed with fire.
Under us the river ran, all pink and primrose, save where deep, glassy shadows bounded it under either bank. The tips of the trees glowed with rosy flame, faded to ashes, then, burnt out, stood once more dark and serrated against the evening sky.
Suddenly an unearthly cry rang out from somewhere close to the river bank up stream. Instantly a sentry on the parapet near us fired his piece.
"Oh, God! What is it!" faltered Lois, grasping my arm. But I sprang for the ladder and ran down it; and the scattered soldiers and officers below on the parade were already running some grasping their muskets, others drawing pistols and hangers.
We could hear musketry firing ahead, and drums beating to arms in our camp behind us.
"The cattle-guard!" panted an officer at my elbow as we ran up stream along the river-bank. "The Senecas have made their kill again, God curse them!"
It was so. Out of the woods came running our frightened cattle, with the guard plodding heavily on their flanks; and in the rear two of our soldiers urged them on with kicks and blow; two more retreated backward, facing the dusky forest with levelled muskets, and a third staggered beside them, half carrying, half trailing a man whose head hung down crimsoning the leaves as it dragged over them.
He had been smoking a cob pipe when the silent assassin's hatchet struck him, and the pipe now remained clenched between his set teeth. At first, for the dead leaves stuck to him, we could not see that he had been scalped, but when we turned him over the loose and horrible features, all wrinkled where the severed brow-muscles had released the skin, left us in no doubt.
"This man never uttered that abominable cry," I said, shuddering. "Is there yet another missing from the guard?"
"Oh, no, sir," said the soldier who had dragged him. "That there was a heifer bawling when them devils cut her throat."
He stood scratching his head and gazing blankly down at his dead comrade.
"Jesus," he drawled. "What be I a-goin' for to tell his woman now?"
