CHAPTER XVIII
I knew afterwards--long, long afterwards--that I had been stabbedrepeatedly; how many times is now of little consequence, although Ihave sometimes counted the white cicatrices on my body, tracing eachwith wonder that I had not long ago done with this life.
For that matter, I was regarded as already ended when they tore myassailant from my body and shattered him to death with their hatchetsand knives, pistoling him again and again while he still quivered inthe long grass.
As for me, I appeared to be quite dead, and whether to bury me thereor in some kinder spot, none could determine, while the dear maid Iloved lay senseless in Black Betty's arms.
As it was afterwards told to me in the saddest days of my life, so Itell what now befell the rescued, the rescuers, and that scarcelypalpitating body o' mine, the soul of which floated on the darkborderland of Death. For it came to happen that dawn, lurking behindthe eastern hills, set dull signals of fire on every western peak,warning Mount and Renard that day was on their trail to bare it forall who chose to follow.
My senseless sweetheart they bore to the waiting chaise, and, my bodystill retaining some warmth, they bore that, too, because they darednot bury me before she had seen me dead with her own eyes.
All that day they rode west by north, climbing the vast divide,halting to lie perdu when their keen ears heard movements all unseen,pushing on to tear the path free while their axes rang out among thewindfalls. Then, when the western sun sank beyond the Ohio into thesea of trees, the winds of the east filled their nostrils and the longdivide had been passed at last.
That night my dear love opened her eyes, and the darkness thatenchained her fell, so that she crept to my feet as I lay in a cornerof the chaise and laid her head on my knees.
Whether she thought me alive or dead none knew. Betty had bared mybody to the waist and washed it. For a corpse they do as much. Later,without hope, Mount brought a pannikinful of blue-balsam gum, prickedfrom the globules on the trunk, and when Betty had once more washedme, they filled the long gashes with the balsam and closed themdecently, strip on strip, with the fine cambric shift which mysweetheart tore from her own body.
Later, when the moon was coming up, they carried me lying in ablanket, my sweetheart walking beside me, and her silken shoon intatters till her feet bled at every step, but refused to go back tothe chaise. That night they thought me surely dead and watched withoutsleep lest the rigidity of dissolution surprise me ere my limbs hadbeen laid straight. But the morning found me as I was, and the firstshadow of night revealed no change, nor was I dead on the nextmorning, nor on the next, nor yet the next.
A still Sabbath in the forest, passed amid the sad twilight of thetrees, gave them hope; for I had opened my eyes, though I saw nothing.But that night Death sat at my right hand, and the next night Deathcradled my head; and my dear love lay at my feet and looked Deathsteadily in the eyes.
The fever which loosened every muscle burned fiercely all night long,and my voice broke out from my body like a demon mocking within me. Afew of the Lenape, roaming near, followed and shot at us towards dawn,driving us north into the forest, where the chaise was abandoned, thetraces cut, and the horses loaded with corn.
North and south the runways of the Long House pierced the wilderness,and these were the trails they followed, the men on foot, bearing meon their litter of blankets and balsam-boughs, the women crouching onthe sack-laden horses.
As for me, I lived on through cold and heat, storm and stress, seeingnothing, hearing nothing, dumb, save when the demon hidden in my bodymocked and laughed between my blackened lips. That demon was alwayswatching things which I could not see, peeping out through my eyesinto hell. Hours came when there was no water, and the demon knew itand mouthed and cursed between my shrinking lips. Then he would turnon me and tear at my throat and gnaw me and thrust his claws into mybrain. Sometimes I heard his low laughter, for though I could neithersee nor hear aught in the world, I could hear the demon sometimes, andfeel him in my body, setting fire to the blood till it boiled like thewater he craved.
At night he often stole my body and carried it where the darknessburnt and charred. There he would take out my bones, one by one, andbreak them for the marrow to dry hard.
These things no one has told me. I remember them in sleep sometimes,sometimes waking.
What I have heard from others is vague, and to me unreal as a paintedscene in a picture where a film has settled under cobwebs. I hear thatI breathed through days which I never saw, that I opened my eyes onlands which are strange to me, that my babble broke primeval silenceswhich God himself had sealed. Nay, not I, but the demon mocked throughthose voiceless voids and lost ravines, through the still twilight ofthe noonday forest, through midnight summits muffled in the clouds.But only I know that, or dream it sometimes when I ponder on my endand on that fair salvation which my father finds lately in Christ.
Now, my dark soul, to hidden realms addressed, returned to me onenight, and, listening, heard the demon scratching at my bones. Then,weary and perplexed, inside my body crept my soul and drew the lids ofboth eyes down, so that we might sleep together before the busy demonknew.
Yet I, having my soul again, opened my eyes to find a star waswatching me; then, content, lay closer to my soul and slept. And thusthe demon found us, and so fled back to the sleepless hell from whencehe came.
Sleeping, I smelled lavender in the forest, and I thought the wood hadwindows where a sweet wind blew. Truly, there was a window somewherenear me, for I found my eyes had opened and could see it where thecurtains swayed in the sun.
Hours later I looked again; the window was still there, and the moonbeyond, low among pines whose shapes I knew.
Hours came and faded into sunshine; days brought bright spots on thecurtains; night brought the moon and the tall pines. Sweet-fern, too,I smelled sometimes, and I heard a soothing monotone of familiar soundbelow me.
One day a cock crew and I fell a-trembling all alone, I knew not why.That night a new sound woke me, and I felt the presence of anotherperson. Moonlight silvered the window of a room which I knew; but Iwas very quiet and waited for the sun, lest the phantoms I divinedshould trick me.
Then came a morning--perhaps the next, but I am not sure--when I knewI was in a bed and very tired, too tired to see aught but the sheetsand the sunlit curtains beyond. That night, however, I heard rainfalling on a roof and fell asleep, watching the window for the hiddenmoon.
When I first recognized the room, my memory served me a trick, and Ithought of the school-room below where the others were imprisoned--Silver Heels, Peter, and Esk. Slyly content to doze abed here in SirWilliam's room, I understood that I must have been lying sick a long,long time, but could not remember when I had fallen ill. One thingsure: I did not mean they should know that I was better; I closed myeyes when I felt a presence near, lying still as a mouse until aloneagain.
Sometimes my thoughts wandered to the others in the school-room withMr. Yost, for I did not remember he had been scalped by the Lenape,and I pitied Silver Heels and Esk and fat Peter a-thumbing theircopy-books and breathing chalk-dust. Faith, I was well off in thegreat white bed, here in Sir William's room.
I could see his fish-rods on the wall, looped with silk lines andscarlet feather-flies; his hunting-horn, too, and his whip and spurshanging from hooks beneath a fox's-mask and brush. There hung hisfowling-pieces above the mantel, pouch and horn dangling from crossedramrods; there rose his book-case with the eared-owl atop and theChinese jar full o' pipes, long as my arm and twice as strong--aconceit which sent a weak wave of mirth through my body I could notmove.
Soft! They are coming to watch me now. So I slyly close my eyes tillthey go away or give me the drinks they brew to make me sleep. I knowthem; were I minded I might gather strength to spit out theirsense-stealing stuffs. But I swallow and dream and wake to a new sunor to mark the waxing moon, now near its full.
Our Doctor Pierson was here to-day and caught me watching him. They'llsoon have me
in the school-room now, though I do still play possum allI can, eating my gruel, which a strange servant brings, and pretendingnot to see her. Yet I am wondering why the maid is so silent and thather gown is so dark and stiff.
Later that day I saw Colonel Guy Johnson come into the room and lookat me, but I did not mean he should think me awake, and so closed myeyes and lay quiet. When Sir William should come, however, I wouldopen my eyes, for I had been desiring to see him since I saw his rodsand guns. It fretted me at times that he neglected me, knowing my lovefor him.
Once, as I lay dozing, Peter crept into the room and stared at me. Hehad grown tall and gross and heavy-eyed, so that I scarce knew him,nor had he a trace of Sir William in his slinking carriage, which wasall Mohawk, and the worst Mohawk at that. I was glad when he ceasedthumbing the bedposts and left me.
The next day I saw Doctor Pierson beside me and asked for Sir William.He said that Sir William was away and that I was doing well. We oftenspoke after that, and he was ever busy with my head, which no longerached save when he fingered it.
Then one night I awoke with a cry of terror and found myself sittingupright, bathed in chilly sweat, shouting that the Cayugas were abroadand that I must hold them back by the throat till Sir William couldarrive and restrain them.
Lights soon moved into the room; I saw Doctor Pierson and Guy Johnson,but the dammed-up floods of memory had broken loose like an old wound,and the past came crowding upon me till I fell back on the pillows,convulsed and gasping, while the strong hands of the doctor begantheir silent work, tapping head and body, till somebody gave me adraught and I drowsed perdu.
Day broke--the bitterest day of life I was to know. I felt it,listening to the rain; I felt it, in the footsteps that passed mydoor--footsteps I did not know. Why was the house so silent? Why didall go about so quietly, dressed in black? Was there some one dead inthe house below? Where was Silver Heels? Why had she never come to me?How came I here? Where was Jack Mount and Cade Renard? And SirWilliam, where was he that he came not near me--me who had lain sickunto death in his service and for his sake?
Dread numbed me; I strove to call, but my dumb lips froze; I strove torise, and found my body wrecked in bed without power, without sense, ahelpless, inert thing between two sheets.
Why was I here? Why was I alive if aught had harmed Silver Heels? God!And I safe here in bed? Where was she? _Where was she?_ Dead? Why dothey not tell me? Why do they not kill me as I lie here if I havereturned without her?
I must have cried aloud in my agony, for the doctor came running andleaned over me.
"Tell me! Tell me!" I stammered. "Why don't you tell me?" and stroveto strike him, but could not use my arms.
"Quiet, quiet," he said, watching me; "I will tell you what you wishto know. What is it then, my poor boy?"
"I--want--Felicity," I blurted out.
"Felicity?" he repeated, blankly. "Oh--Miss--ahem!--Miss Warren?"
I glared at him.
"Miss Warren has gone with Sir John Johnson to Boston," he said,dryly.
My eyes never left him.
"Is that why you cried out?" he asked, curiously. "Miss Warren left usa week ago. Had you only known her she would have been happy, for shehas slept for weeks on the couch yonder."
"Why--why did she go?"
"I cannot tell you the reasons," he said, gravely.
"When will she return?"
"I do not know."
With a strength that came from God knows where, I dragged myselfupright and caught him by the hand.
"She is dead!" I whispered. "She is dead, and all in this house knowit save I who love her!"
A strange light passed over the doctor's face; he took both my handsand looked at me carefully. Then he smiled and gently forced me backto the pillows.
"She is alive and well," he said. "On my honour as a man, lad, I setyour heart at rest. She is in Boston, and I do know why, but I may notmeddle with what concerns this family, save in sickness--or death."
I watched his lips. They were solemn as the solemn word he uttered. Iknew death had been in the house; I had felt that for days. I waited,watching him.
"Poor lad," he said, holding my hands.
My eyes never left his.
"Ay," he said, softly, "his last word was your name. He loved youdearly, lad."
And so I knew that Sir William was dead.