“By thine infinite of woe,
All we know not, all we know;
If there be what dieth not,
Thine, affection, is its lot.”
Deep in the wilderness of woods and waters encircling the mouth of a small inlet, at the extreme northwestern end of the picturesque Maguntic, there lay encamped, at the point of a low headland, on one of the first nights of May, the three trappers, whose expedition had been the subject of so many gloomy speculations, and whose unexpectedly prolonged absence had caused, as we have seen, so much anxiety in the settlement to which they belonged. They had extended their outward journey more than double the distance contemplated by the Elwoods, at least when they left home; the mover of the expedition, Gaut Gurley, having proposed to make the shores of the Maguntic, and its feeding streams only, the range of their operations. But when they arrived there, as they did, on the ice, which was still firm and solid on the lakes, Gaut pretended to believe that the rich beaver-haunts, to which he had promised to lead them, could not be identified, much less reached, until the ice had broken up in the streams and lake. He, therefore, now proposed that they should first proceed over to the chief inlet of the Oquossak, stay one night in the camp, which was left in the great snow-storm of the fall before, dig out the steel-traps buried there, and, the next day, slide over the boats, also left there, on the glare ice,—as all agreed could easily be done on some light and simple contrivance,—and land them on the west shore of the Maguntic, where they could be concealed, and found ready for use when the lake opened. He would then, he said, lead them to a place among the head-water streams of the Magalloway, only a day’s journey distant, where he once “trapped it” himself, and where, as the rivers there broke up early, he could promise them immediate success.
All this had been done; and the party, having spent nearly three weeks among the lakelets and interweaving streams going to make up the sources of the Magalloway and Connecticut rivers, with occasional recourse to the nearest habitations on the upper Magalloway, for provisions, but with very indifferent success in taking furs, had now, on the urging of young Elwood, returned to the Maguntic,—which, after a hard day’s journey, they had reached, at the point where we have introduced them, about sunset the day but one preceding, thrown up a temporary shanty, and encamped for the night. On rising the next morning, Gaut had proposed that Claud remain at camp that day, to build a better shanty, and hunt in the near vicinity; while he and Mark Elwood should explore the stream, to a pond some miles above, where his previously discovered beaver-haunts, he said, were mostly to be found, and where, the snow and ice having wholly disappeared, they could now operate to good advantage. With this arrangement, however, the young man, whose secret suspicions had been aroused by one or two previous attempts made by Gaut to separate him from his father, plausibly refused to comply; and the consequence was, that they had all made the proposed explorations together, returned to camp without discovering any indications of the promised beaver, and laid down for the night, with the understanding, reluctantly agreed to by the moody and morose Gaut, that they should proceed down the lake to their boats the next morning, and embark for an immediate return to their homes, where the Elwoods felt conscious they must, by this time, be anxiously expected.
Such were the circumstances under which we have brought this singularly-assorted party of trappers to the notice of the reader, as they lay sleeping in their bough-constructed tents,—Gaut and Mark Elwood under one cover, and Claud under another, which he had fixed up for himself on the opposite side of their fire,—on the ominous night which was destined to prelude the most tragic and melancholy scene of our variously eventful story.
It was the hour of nature’s deepest repose, and the bright midnight moon, stealing through the gently-swaying boughs of the dark pines that rose heavenward, like pinnacles, along the silent shores around, was throwing her broken beams fitfully down upon the faces of the unconscious sleepers, faintly revealing the impress which the thoughts and purposes of the last waking hours had left on the countenance of each. And these impresses were as variant as the characters of those on whose features they rested: that lingering on the sternly-compressed lips and dark, beetling brows of Gaut Gurley, ever sinister, was doubly so now; that on the face of Mark Elwood, whose vacillations of thought and feeling, through life, had exempted his features from any stamp betokening fixed peculiarity of character, was one of fatuous security; and that resting on the intellectual and guileless face of Claud Elwood was one of simple care and inquietude.
But what is that light, shadowy form, hovering near the sylvan couch of Claud, like some unsubstantial being of the air; now advancing, now shrinking away, and now again flitting forward to the head of the youthful sleeper, and there pausing and preventing the light from longer revealing his features? Yes, what is it? would ask a doubting spectator of this singular night-scene. A passing cloud come over the moon? No, there is none in the heavens. But why the useless speculation? for it is gone now, leaving the sleeper’s face again visible, and wearing a more unquiet and disturbed air than before. His features twitch nervously, and expressions of terror and surprise flit over them. He dreams, and his dream is a troubled one. Let the novelist’s license be invoked to interpret it.
He was alone with his father on a boundless plain, when suddenly a dark, whirlwind tempest-cloud fell upon the earth around them, and soon separated him from the object of his care. As he was anxiously pressing on through the thickly-enveloping vapors, in the direction in which the latter had disappeared, he was suddenly confronted by a monstrous, black, and fearful living apparition, who stood before him in all the horrid paraphernalia ascribed to the prince of darkness, apparently ready to crush him to the earth, when a bright angel form swiftly interposed. Starting back, with the rapidly-chasing sensations of terror and surprise, he looked again, and the fiend stood stript of his infernal guise, and suddenly transformed into the person of Gaut Gurley, who, with a howl of dismay, quickly turned and fled in confusion. The amazed dreamer then turned to his deliverer, who had been transformed into the beauteous Fluella, whose image, he was conscious, was no longer a stranger among the lurking inmates of his heart. A sweet, benignant smile was breaking over her lovely features; and, under the sudden impulse of the grateful surprise, he eagerly stretched out his arms towards her, and, in the effort, awoke.
“Where, where is she?” he exclaimed, springing to his feet, and glaring wildly around him. “Why!” he continued, after a pause, in which he appeared to be rallying his bewildered senses,—“why! what is this? a dream, nothing but a dream? It must be so. But what a strange one! and what could have caused it? Was there not some one standing over me, just now, darkening my face like a shadow? I feel a dim consciousness of something like it. But that, probably, was part of the same dream. Yes, yes, all a mere dream; all nothing; so, begone with you, miserable phantoms! I will not suffer——”
But, as if not satisfied with his own reasoning, he stopped short, and, for many minutes, stood motionless, with his head dropped in deep thought; when, arousing himself, he returned to his rude resting-place, and laid down again, but only to toss and turn, in the restless excitement which he obviously found himself unable to allay. After a while spent in this tantalizing unrest, he rose and slowly made his way down to the edge of the lake, a few rods distant, where, scooping up water with his hands, he first drank eagerly, then bathed his fevered brow, and then, rising, he stood some time silent on the shore,—now pensively gazing out on the darkly-bright expanse of the moon-lit lake; and now listening to the mysterious voices of night in the wilderness, which, in low, soft, whispering undulations of sound, came, at varied intervals, gently murmuring along the wooded shores, to die away into silence in the remote recesses of the forest. These phenomena of the wilds he had once or twice before noted, and tried to account for, without, however, attaching much consequence to them. But now they became invested with a strange significance, and seemed to him, in his present excited and apprehensive state of mind, portentous of impending evil. While his thoughts were taking this channel, the possibility of what might be done in his absence suddenly appeared to occur to him; and he hastened back to camp, where he slightly replenished the fire, and, taking a recumbent position, with his loaded rifle within reach, kept awake, and on the watch, till morning.
After daylight Claud arose, as if nothing unusual had occurred to disturb him, bustled about, built a good fire, and began to prepare a morning meal from the fine string of trout he had taken during yesterday’s excursion. The noise of these preparations soon awoke the two sleepers; who, complimenting him on his early rising, also arose, and soon joined him in partaking the repast, which, by this time, he had in readiness.
As soon as they had finished their meal, which was enlivened by no other than an occasional brief, commonplace remark, the thoughts of each of them being evidently engrossed by his own peculiar schemes and anxieties, the trappers, by common consent, set about their preparations to depart; and, having completed them, leisurely took their way down the western shore of the lake towards the spot at which they had hauled up and concealed their canoe, and which, if they followed the deep indentures of the shore in this part of the lake, must be four or five miles distant.
For the first mile or two of their progress nothing noticeable to an indifferent observer occurred to vary the monotony of their walk, as they tramped steadily and silently forward, in the usual, and, indeed, almost the only practicable mode of travelling in the forest, appropriately denominated Indian file. But young Elwood, whose feelings had been deeply stirred by the fancies of the night, which, to say the least, had the effect to make him more keenly apprehensive and vigilant, had noted several little circumstances, that, to him, wore a questionable appearance. Gaut, who at first led the way, soon manœuvred to get Mark Elwood, the next in the order of their march, in front; and then urged him forward at a much faster pace than before, at the same time often casting furtive glances behind him, as if to see whether Claud, who seemed inclined to walk more slowly than the rest, would not fall behind, and soon be out of sight. And, when the latter quickened his pace, he showed signs of vexation, which had not passed unnoticed. All this Claud had noted, together with the singular expression which Gaut’s countenance assumed, and which filled him with an undefinable dread, and a lively suspicion that the man was on the eve of attempting the execution of foul purposes. Consequently he resolved to follow up closely, having no fears for himself, and believing his presence would prevent any attempt that might be meditated against his father. This precaution, for some time, the young man was careful to observe; but, as he was passing over a small brook that crossed his path, his eye caught the appearance of a slight trail, a few rods up the stream, and curiosity prompted him to turn aside to examine it. When he reached the place, he soon detected indications which convinced him that some person had recently been there; and, forgetful of his resolution, in the interest the circumstance excited, he commenced a closer inspection, which resulted in discovering a fresh imprint, in the soft mud on one side of the brook, of a small moccasined foot. This curious and unexpected discovery, uncertain as were its indications of any identity of the person, or even of the age or sex of the person, by whom that delicate footprint was made, at once diverted his attention from the particular care by which it had been engrossed, and started that other of the two trains of thought, which, for the last month, but especially since his singular awakening the past night, had constituted the chief burden of his mind,—his increasing apprehensions for his father’s safety, and his lurking but irrepressible regard for the chief’s beautiful daughter, whose image, since his dream, had haunted him with a pertinacity for which a resort to reason alone would fail to account.
“If music be the food of love,”
dreams, we apprehend, whatever the immortal bard might have thought of the matter, have often proved the more exciting stimulus of the tender passion; many of whose happiest consummations might be traced back to an origin in some peopled scene of a dreaming fancy, whose peculiar effect on the sympathies has frequently been felt by the sternest and most sceptical, though never very clearly explained in any of our written systems of the philosophy of the soul and its affections.
In the pleasing indulgence of the feelings and fancies which had been thus freshly kindled, Claud stood, for some minutes, quite unconscious of the lapse of time, though it had been long enough to place his companions far out of sight and hearing. From this reverie he was suddenly aroused by the sharp report of a rifle, bursting on his ear from the woods, about a quarter of a mile off, in the direction just taken by his companions. Starting at the sound, which sent a boding chill through his heart, and bitterly taxing himself for his inadvertent loitering, he sprang back to the trail he had left, and made his way along over it towards the place indicated by the firing, with all the speed which excited nerves and agonizing anxiety could bring to his aid. But, before reaching the spot at which he was aiming, and just as he was beginning to slacken his pace, to look around for it, Gaut Gurley burst through the bushes, a few rods ahead, and, running towards him with all the manifestations of a man in hasty retreat before a pursuing foe, eagerly exclaimed:
“Run, Claud! run for your life! We have just been beset by hostile Indians, who fired on us, and, I fear, have killed your father. I have misled them a little; but they will soon be on our trail. Run! run!” he added, seizing the other by the arm to start him into instant flight.
“What!” exclaimed the astonished young man, hanging back, and by degrees recovering from the surprise with which he was at first overwhelmed by the strange and startling announcement. “What! hostile Indians?—hostile to whom, to my father, or to me, that I should run from them? Gaut Gurley, what, O what does this mean?”
“Why, it means,” said the other, keeping up all the motions and flourishes naturally used by one urging another to flee,—“it means, as I say, our lives are in danger. Let us escape while we can. Come, come, there’s not a moment to lose!”
“I will know,” said Claud, with a quick, searching glance at the face of the other,—“yes, I will know for myself what has happened,” he sternly added, suddenly breaking from the grasp on his arm, and bounding forward to execute his purpose with a quickness and rapidity that made pursuit useless.
“Hold!” cried Gaut, in an increasingly fierce and angry tone, “hold, instantly,—on your life, hold! I warn you, sir, to stop, instantly to stop!”
But, heeding neither the entreaties nor the threats which, his ear told him, were strangely mingled in the tones of the words thus thundered after him, Claud, in his agony of apprehension, eagerly rushed on towards the forbidden scene, which could not now be thirty rods distant, and had proceeded, perhaps, forty yards; when, just as he was straightening up, after stooping to pass under an obstructing limb of a tree, extending across his path, he became conscious of the sound of the sudden hitting of the limb, and partly so of the concussion of a shot, still farther in his rear. But he neither heard nor knew more; and, the next moment, lay stretched senseless on the ground.
When he awoke to consciousness, after, he knew not what lapse of time, he found himself in a different place; lying, as he felt conscious, badly wounded, on a soft, elastic bed of boughs, within a dense thicket of low evergreens, through which his opening eye caught the gleams of widely-surrounding waters. A ministering angel, in the shape of the peerless daughter of the wilds, who had lately so much occupied his thoughts, was wistfully bending over him, with a countenance in which commiseration and woe had found an impersonation which no artist’s pencil could have equalled.
“Fluella!” he feebly murmured,—“how came you here, Fluella?”
She saw that the effort to speak caused him a pang, and, without replying to the question, motioned him to silence; when, being no longer able to master her emotions, she sat down by his side, and, covering her face with both hands, began to grieve and sob like a child. Poor girl! who could measure the depth of her heart’s anguish? She could not answer, had she deemed it best. We must answer the question for her. But, to do so, to the full understanding of the reader, we must again recur to the events of the past,—her troubled past, at least,—during the three or four days preceding the time of her appearance as an actor in the sad scene before us.
She had learned from Mrs. Elwood that Claud had pledged himself to her that he would return from his expedition within the month of April; and to Fluella, with her undoubting confidence in his word, a failure to redeem that pledge would be but little less than certain intelligence that some evil had befallen either him or his father, in their unknown place of sojourn in the wilderness. Consequently her solicitude—growing out of her secretly nourished but overmastering love for him—became, as the time approached which was to relieve or realize her fears for the result of an expedition undertaken under such dreadful auspices, each day more deep and absorbing. And, the last morning but one of the expiring month, she went out early on to the rock-bound shore of the lake, on which her father’s cabin was situated, and commenced her watch from the most commanding points, for the appearance of the expected party, on their way homeward from the upper lakes. And during that anxious day, and the still more anxious one that followed, she kept up her vigils, with no other cessation than what her brief absences for her hastily-snatched meals at the house required; sometimes standing, for an hour at a time, in one spot, intently gazing out into the lake, and sometimes moving restlessly about, and hurrying from cliff to cliff, along the beetling shore, to obtain a better observation. But, no appearance or indications of their coming rewarding her vigils during all that time, she retired from the shore, at the approach of night, on the last day of April, sad and sick at heart from disappointment, and painfully oppressed with apprehension for the fate of one for whose safety she felt she would have given her own worthless life as a willing sacrifice. But, her feelings still allowing her neither peace nor quietude, she left the house after supper; and, in the light of the nearly full moon, that was now throwing its mellow beams over the wild landscape, unconsciously took her way to the lake-shore, where she had already spent so many weary hours in her fruitless vigils. Here, climbing a tall rock on the bluff shore, she resumed her watch, and long stood, straining both eye and ear to catch sight of some moving thing, or the sound of some plashing oar, out on the lake, that might indicate the coming, even at this late hour, of the objects of her solicitude. But no such sight or sound came up from the sleeping waters, to greet and gladden her aching senses. All there was as motionless and silent as the plains of the dead.
“The time is past!” she at length despairingly muttered, slowly withdrawing her gaze, and standing as if to collect her thoughts and ponder. “Yes, passed by, now. He will not come!”
And her ideas immediately reverted to the other alternative for which she had before made up her mind, in case the party did not return within the month; but which, having been kept in the background of her thoughts, by her hope of their coming, now occurred to her with startling effect. She fancied Claud the victim of outrage or misfortune,—perhaps wounded and dying, by the same hand that might have previously struck down his father,—perhaps taken sick on his way home alone, and now lying helpless in the woods, where none could witness his sufferings or hear his cries for assistance. The thought sent a pang through her bosom, the more painful because, being something like a legitimate conclusion of her previous reasoning, she could not divest herself of it. She stood bewildered in the woes of her thick-coming fancies. The images thus conjured up from her distracting anxieties and excited brain, all heightened by the natural inspirations of the place and the hour, soon became to her vivid realities. And her burning thoughts at once insensibly ran into the form and spirit of one of the many beautiful plaints of England’s gifted poetess:
“I heard a song upon the wandering wind,
A song of many tones, though one full soul
Breathed through them all imploringly; and made
All nature, as they pass’d,—all quivering leaves,
And low responsive reeds and waters,—thrill,
As with the consciousness of human prayer.
——the tones
Were of a suppliant. ‘Leave me not’ was still
The burden of their music.”
“I will not leave you!” she exclaimed, startling the silent glens and grottos around by the wild energy of her tones, and eagerly stretching out her hands towards the imagined scene, and the suppliant for her ministering services. “O Claud, I will come to you. My love, my life, my more than life, I will soon be with you! Go after him?” she resumed, after a sudden pause, to which she seemed to be brought by recalling her thoughts to their wonted channel, and being startled at the sober import of her own words. “Go in search of him in the woods! Yes,” she added, after another long and thoughtful pause,—“yes, why not? I cannot, O, I cannot stay here another day, with these but too prophetic words, I fear, ringing in my ears. To be in the same wilderness with him were a pleasure, to the insupportable suspense I must suffer here. If I discover all to be well, I need not show myself; but, if it be as I fear, O, what happiness to be near him! Yes, it is decided; I will start in the morning.”
And, hastily descending from her stand, with the firm, quick step and decisive air of one whose purpose is fixed, she struck off directly for the house; where, after a few hasty preparations, she retired to her bed, and, happily, after the exhausting cares of the day, was soon quieted into sound and refreshing slumber.
In accordance with her still unaltered resolution, she rose early the next morning; and with an indefinite intimation to her family of her intention to be absent among friends a day or two, swung to her side a small square basket of nutritious provisions, took a thick shawl to protect her from the damps of the night, proceeded directly to her canoe at the landing, embarked, and struck out vigorously along the winding shore, on her way to the next upper lake. A steady but quiet row of a couple of hours took her out of the great lake on which she had embarked, up the principal inlet, and into the Maguntic, whose western shores, she had understood, were to be the base of the operations of the absent party. Here she turned short to the left, and, drawing in close to land, rowed slowly and cautiously along the western shore, following round all the numerous indentations, and continually sending her searching glances up its wooded shores, that no appearance of the trail of human beings might escape her observation.
After rowing two or three miles in this manner, and without noticing any thing that particularly attracted her attention, she reached the first of the three headlands, making out from this side a considerable distance into the lake, beyond the average line of the shore. As she was rounding this point, her eye fell on a dark protuberance, in a dense thicket a few rods in-shore, which appeared of a more oblong and regular form than is usual in such places. And, scanning the appearance more closely, she soon discerned a small piece of wrought wood, resembling a part of the blade of an oar, slightly projecting from one side of the apparent brush-heap. Starting at the sight, she immediately ran her canoe ashore, and proceeded at once to the spot; when, closely peering under the brush-wood, she discovered three canoes, with their oars, concealed beneath a deep covering of boughs, surmounted by a scraggy treetop lying carelessly over them, as if blown from some neighboring tree.
This, to her, was an important discovery; for it told her—after she had carefully examined the place, and found that no one had been to the boats since they were concealed, which she thought must have been done several weeks before—it told her, at once, that the trappers had gone to some distant locality among the streams and mountains, to the west or north, from which they had not yet returned to the lake; but doubtless would so return before proceeding homeward, provided the Elwoods had not both been slain or disabled by their suspected companion. The discovery, notwithstanding the light it had thrown on the first movements of the trappers, and much as it narrowed the range of her search for them, but little relieved her harrowing apprehensions; and she resolved to proceed up the lake with her observations, which might now as well be confined to this side of it, and the larger streams which should here be found entering it, and down some of which the company, if they came at all, would probably now soon come, on their way to the canoes. And, accordingly, she again set forth on her solitary journey. But, being conscious that the trappers might now at any time suddenly make their appearance, she proceeded more cautiously, keeping as far as possible out of the views that might be taken from distant points of the lake, and from time to time turning a watchful eye and ear on the shores around and before her. Thus, slowly and timidly advancing, she at length reached and rounded the second headland in her course, where another and still more interesting discovery was in store for her. As she came out from the overhanging trees beneath which she had shot along the point, she unexpectedly gained a clear view of the extreme end of the lake, with what appeared to be the mouth of a considerable stream, and suddenly backed her oar, to pause and reconnoitre; when she soon noticed one spot, near the supposed inlet, which wore a different hue from the rest, and which, a closer inspection told her, must be imparted by the lingering of undissipated smoke, from a fire kindled there as late, at least, as that morning. Her heart beat violently at the discovery; for she felt assured that the trappers had reached the lake, had encamped there the night before, and could not now be many miles distant. Fearing she should be seen, if she remained longer on the water, she at once resolved to conceal her canoe in some place near by, and proceed by land through the woods to the spot of the supposed encampment, or near enough to ascertain how far her conjectures were true, and how far her new-lit hopes were to be realized. All this—after many a misgiving and many an alarm, from the sudden movements of the smaller animals of the forest, started out from their coverts by her stealthy advance—had been by her, at length, successfully accomplished; the camp detected from a neighboring thicket; cautiously approached, finally entered, and the joyful discovery made that three persons had slept there the night before. Hieing back, like a frighted bird, into the screening forest, she selected a covert in a dense thicket on an elevation about an hundred yards distant, where, unseen by the most searching eye, she could look down into the camp; and there she lay down and anxiously awaited the approach of night, and, with it, the expected return of the party, who, she felt confident, could be no others than those of whom she was in search. And it was not all a dream with Claud, when he fancied some one standing by his couch of repose. A flitting form had, that night, indeed, for a moment hovered over him, looking down, with the sleepless eye of love, on his broken slumbers, and trying to divine, perhaps, the very dreams which, through some mysterious agency of the mental sympathies, her presence was inciting.
Although the maiden had now the unspeakable satisfaction of knowing that none of her fears had thus far been realized, yet she felt keenly sensible that the danger was not over; and she therefore determined that she would not lose sight of the objects of her vigilance and anxiety, at least until she had seen them embarked for home on the open lake, where deeds of darkness would be less likely to be attempted than in the screening forest. She had, therefore, started from her uneasy slumbers, the next morning, at daybreak; watched from her covert, with lively concern, the movements in the camp; and no sooner seen them packed up for a start, and headed towards their boats, then she shrank noiselessly away from her concealment, which was situated so as to give her considerably the start of them; and fled rapidly down the lake, in a line parallel to the one along the shore which the trappers would naturally take, and so near it that, from chosen stands, she could see them as they came along. And thus, for miles, like the timid antelope, she hovered on their flank,—now pausing to get a glance of them through the trees as they came in sight, and now fleeing forward again, for a new position, to repeat the observation. Up to this time she had kept considerably in advance of the moving party; but now, suddenly missing Claud, she sought a covert, and stood watching for him, till Mark Elwood, followed by Gaut Gurley, came abreast of the spot she occupied; when, suddenly, the forest shook and trembled from the report of a gun, bursting from the bushes, seemingly, almost beneath her feet. A single wild glance revealed to her appalled senses Gaut Gurley, clenching his smoking rifle, and, with the look of an exulting fiend, glaring out from behind a tree, towards his prostrate, convulsed, and dying victim. On recovering from the deeply paralyzing effect of the horrid spectacle, her first thought was for Claud; and, with the distracting thought, her eye involuntarily sought for the murderer of his father, who had shrunk back from his position, but whom she soon detected hastily reloading his rifle, and then starting, with a quick step, along back the path in which he had just come,—in search, as her alarmed heart suggested, of another victim for his infernal malice. With a sharp, smothered cry of anguish, she bounded out from her covert, and flew back, in a line parallel with that of the retreating murderer, till she saw him meet the alarmed young man hurrying forward to the rescue; when she suddenly paused, and listened with breathless interest to the dialogue we have already related as occurring between them. She heard—and her heart bounded with pride as she did so—she heard the manly and determined language of the young man; she saw him rush by the wretch who was trying to mislead him, to conceal his own crime. But she saw, also, the next moment, with a dismay that transfixed her to the spot, the murderous rifle raised, and the retreating, unconscious object of its aim stumble forward to the ground; then the monster, as if uncertain of the execution of his bullet, rush forward, with gleaming knife, apparently to finish his work; and then disappear in the direction of the concealed canoes, now less than a half-mile beyond. All this she had witnessed, with an agony which no pen can describe; and then, with the last glimpse of the retiring assassin, flown to the side of his second victim, badly but not fatally wounded; staunched, as she best could, the blood pouring from his wounds; hurried off for her canoe, luckily hid near by; brought it up to the shore, within a few yards of the spot where he had fallen; drawn him gently down to it, and got him into it, she knew not how; and then, after obliterating the trail, entered herself, and rowed off to the thickly wooded little island, a furlong to the northeast, but hid by an intervening point from the view of the foe, now supposed to be on his way to the boats. Here she had contrived to draw Claud up, in the light canoe, on the farthest shore, and, by degrees, got both him and the boat on the dry, mossy ground, safely within a thicket wholly impervious to outward view. Still fearful of Gaut’s return, she crept to the south end of the island, which she had scarcely reached when she saw him come round the point, land, drag down the body of Mark Elwood, take it out some distance from the shore, and sink it, by steel-traps and stones tied to it, deep in the lake. She then, with lively concern, saw him return and proceed towards the spot where Claud had fallen, but soon reäppear, evidently much disturbed at not finding the body, yet not seeming to suspect how it had been disposed of, though several times coming down to the edge of the water and peering anxiously up and down the lake; but she was soon relieved from her fears by seeing him take to his boat, row rapidly round the point, there take in tow two other canoes,—which, it appeared, he had brought up and left there,—and then row down the lake, in the direction of the great outlet; under the belief, doubtless, that Claud had revived, struck down through the woods for the upper end of the lake below, where, if he had not before sunk down and died of his wounds, he might be waylaid and finished. Thus relieved of this pressing apprehension, she hurried back to her charge, and carefully examined his wounds; when she found that the bullet, whose greatest force had been broken by the obstructing limb, had struck near the top of his head, and ploughed over the skull without breaking it; that, of the two stabs inflicted, one had been turned by the collar-bone, making only a long, surface wound, the other had passed through the fleshy part of the arm and terminated on a rib beneath, producing a flow of blood, which, but for the timely and plentiful application of beaver-fur, pulled from a skin which she saw protruding from his pack, must have soon terminated his life. With the drinking-cup she found slung to his side, she brought water, washed the wounds, laid the ruptured parts in place, and, with plasters of cloth cut from her handkerchief, and made adhesive by balsam taken from a tree at hand, covered and protected them; and thus, by the application of a skill she learned from her father, placed them in a situation where nature, with proper care, would, of herself, complete the sanatory operation. She then resumed the process of bathing his head and face, and, within another hour, was thrilled with joy in witnessing his return to consciousness, in the manner we described before leaving him for this long, but necessary, digression.
After giving vent to her painfully laboring emotions a while, the maiden softly arose, and, creeping down under the overhanging boughs to the edge of the water, sat down on a stone and bathed her throbbing brow, for some time, in the limpid wave; after which, having in a good measure regained her usual firmness and tranquillity, she returned to the side of her wounded friend, whom she found wrapt in the deep slumber generally produced by exhaustion from loss of blood. After gazing a while on his face, with the sad and yearning look of a mother on a disease-smitten child, a new thought seemed suddenly to occur to her, and she noiselessly stole away to her former lookout, at the south end of the island, where, with a brightening eye, she caught sight of the loathed and dreaded homicide, just entering the distant outlet. Waiting no longer than to feel assured that he had disappeared with the real intention of descending the stream, she returned to her still sleeping charge, slowly and carefully slid the canoe down into the water, headed it round with her hands, gained her seat in the stern, and pushed out into the lake, shaping her course obliquely down it towards the mouth of a small river entering from the eastern side, at the lower end of the lake, but still nearly a mile distant from the outlet in which the murderer had disappeared. Softly and smoothly as a gently-rocking cradle, the light canoe, under the skillfully plied oar of the careful maiden, glided through the waveless waters on her destined course, and, for more than an hour, steadily kept on its noiseless way, without once appearing to disturb the repose of the slumbering invalid. But, as the hitherto low-looking forest bordering the eastern shore began to loom up, and thus apprise the fair rower that she was now nearing the point to which she had been directing her course, she noticed, with concern, that the lake was beginning to be agitated, even where she then was, from a gathering breeze; while a long, light, advancing line, extending across the lake in the distance behind her, plainly told of the rapid approach of wind, which must soon greatly increase the disturbance of the waters, and the consequent rocking of the canoe. Knowing how injuriously such motion of the boat might affect the invalid, she put forth her utmost strength in propelling the canoe forward to reach the quiet haven before her, in season to escape the threatened roughness of the water. But her best exertions could secure only a partial immunity from the trouble she thus sought to avoid. The wind struck her long before gaining the place; when, in spite of all her endeavors to steady it, the canoe began to lurch and toss among the gathering waves; while the almost immediate awakening of the disturbed invalid, his twinges of pain and suppressed groans, told her, as they sent responsive thrills of anguish through her bosom, how much he was suffering from the motion. To her great relief, however, she now soon reached and shot into the still waters of the stream, and this trouble, at least, was over. Here, after passing in out of sight of the lake, she drew up her oar, and paused to reflect and conclude what should be her next movement; when Claud, whose head was pillowed in the bow of the boat, and whose eye was resting tenderly on her downcast countenance, soon read her perplexity, and again asked to be informed of all that had happened, and the object of her present movement. She told him,—with such reservations as maidenly modesty and pride suggested,—she told him all she had seen, and in conclusion proposed, as their enemy might ambush them, and as it was now drawing towards night, and the lake would not be quiet enough for some hours, at least, to permit them to proceed, that they should row up the river till they found an eligible spot, and encamp for the night. To this Claud readily assented; and they again set forth up the gentle stream, that, as before intimated, here came in from the southeast; and, after proceeding some distance, the anxious eye of the maiden fell on a place on the left bank, where a temporary shelter could easily be rigged up, under the wide-spreading and low-set limbs of a thick-topped evergreen, which, of itself, would be ample protection against the dews of heaven. Drawing up the canoe on land near the tree, in the same manner as at the island, she proceeded to gather large quantities of fine hemlock boughs, and dry, elastic mosses, arrange them under the tree, in the form of bed and pillow, and over the whole to spread Claud’s blanket; thus making a couch as safe and comfortable as ever received the limbs of a suffering invalid. Upon this, partly by his own exertions and partly by her assistance, he was then, without much difficulty, soon transferred from the canoe; when, with his light hatchet (she having brought all his implements along with him in the boat), she soon erected neat, closely-woven wicker walls of boughs, from the ground to the limbs above, on both sides, providing within one of them a space for herself. She then brought fuel, kindled a small fire in front, and took her position at his side, to be ready for such ministering offices as his case might seem to require. She found that he had again fallen into a profound slumber, which she at first regarded as a favorable omen; and, in the conscious security of the spot, in the belief that he had received none of the injuries she had apprehended from the motion of the boat, and, above all, in the indulgence of that overweening pride of affection which covets all pains and sacrifices for the loved one, she felt a satisfaction which was almost happiness, in her situation. But it was not destined to be of very long duration. She at length began to perceive a gradual reddening of his cheeks, and then, soon after, an increasing shortness of respiration, and a general restlessness of the system. Alarmed at these symptoms, she felt his pulse, and at once discovered that he was in a high fever, supervening from his wounds, and caused, or much aggravated, doubtless, by the jostling of the boat on his way hither. Starting back, as if some unexpected calamity had suddenly fallen upon her, she stood some minutes absorbed in earnest self-consultation. What should she do? She could not, dare not, even were it daytime, leave him to go miles away for her father, or others, for aid or advice. No; she must stay by him. And, having seen the alleviating effects of cold water in fevers and inflammations, and knowing that there were no other remedies within reach, she at once decided on its application. Accordingly, with her cup of water at her side, and a piece of soft, clean moss in her hand, she began sponging his face, neck, and the flesh around his wounds; and repeating this process at short intervals, she continued the tender assiduities, with only occasional snatches of repose, till the welcome morning light broke over the forest. She then rose, and, with a miniature camp-kettle found among her patient’s effects, prepared some gruel from the pounded parched corn which she had brought with her. This he mechanically took from her hand, when aroused for the purpose, but immediately relapsed again into the same state of unconsciousness and stupor in which he had lain through the night. Through the day and night that followed, but little variation was discernible in his condition, and as little was made in his treatment, by his fair, anxious nurse. Through the next day and night it was still the same; but towards night, on the third day after his attack, he began to show signs of amendment, and before dark his fever had entirely subsided. Perceiving this, the rejoiced maiden prepared him some more stimulating nourishment, in the shape of broth made from jerked venison. Having partaken freely of this, he then, with a whispered “I am much better, Fluella,” sank back on his couch, and was soon buried in a sweet and tranquil slumber. Having carefully adjusted his blanket around him, and added her own shawl to the covering, and being now once more relieved of her most pressing fears for his fate, the exhausted girl laid down on her own rude couch, and, before she was aware, fell into a slumber so deep and absorbing that she never once awoke till the sun was peering over the eastern mountains the next morning. Her first waking glance was directed to the couch of the invalid. It was empty. Starting to her feet, with a countenance almost wild with concern, she hurriedly ran her eye through the forest around her; when, with a suppressed exclamation of joyful surprise, she soon caught sight of his form, slowly making his way back from a short walk, which he had, on awakening, an hour before, found himself able to take, along a smooth and level path on the bank of the river.
But we have not the space, nor even the ability, to portray adequately the restrained but lively emotions of joy and the charming embarrassment that thrilled the tumultuously-beating bosom of the one, and the deep gratitude and silent admiration that took possession of the other, of this singularly situated young couple, during the succeeding scenes of Claud’s now rapid convalescence. Suffice it to say, that, on the afternoon of the second day but one from this auspicious morning, they were on their happy way down through the lakes and the connecting river, to the chief’s residence, where they safely arrived some hours before night, and where they were greeted with demonstrations of delight which told what anxieties had been suffered on their account. Here, for the first time, they learned that the murderer had been taken and carried to the village for his preliminary trial; that the examination had been postponed, to allow the prisoner time to send for his counsel; and that the hearing was to commence that very evening, though the hunter, who had that day made a hurried journey to the chief’s, to see if Fluella had returned or Claud been heard from, had expressed great fears that the evidence yet discovered might not be deemed sufficient to convict him of murder, and perhaps not to imprison him for a final trial. Claud, perceiving at once the importance of Fluella’s testimony, as well as of his own, proposed that they should immediately proceed that evening down the lakes to the place of trial. But neither the chief nor his daughter would suffer him to undertake the journey that night. At her earnest suggestion, however, it was at length arranged that she, accompanied by her half-brother, a lad of fifteen, should go down that evening, and that the chief, with Claud, should follow early the next morning.
In pursuance of this arrangement, the resolute girl and her attendant, as soon as she had changed her dress and refreshed herself with a meal, embarked on the lake, and, at the end of the next hour, they reached the Great Rapids, leading, as before described, down into the Umbagog. Here her brother, whose eye and ear, ever since they started, had often been turned suspiciously to a dark, heavy cloud, which, seeming to hang over the upper portions of the Magalloway, had been continually sending forth peals of heavy thunder, hesitated about proceeding any farther, and warned his unheeding sister of their liability of being overtaken by the thunder-storm. But, finding her determined to proceed, if she was compelled to do so alone, he yielded, and, landing their canoe at the usual carrying places, they shot rapidly down the stream, and in less than another hour came out on the broad Umbagog, just as darkness was beginning to enshroud its waters, and cut off their view of the distant shores for which they were destined. But for the light of day they found an ample substitute in the electric displays, which, lighting up the lake to the blaze of noonday, were every instant leaping from the black, angry clouds, now evidently passing off, with one almost continued roar of reverberating thunders, but a few miles to the north of them. A rapid row of about three miles now brought them to the foot of the lake, where the maiden had proposed to enter the river, and row down it to the swift water, a short distance above the village, and then proceed by land. Here, however, her course was unexpectedly impeded by one of those paradoxical occurrences which is peculiar to the spot, and which often happens on great and sudden rises of the Magalloway, that, though entering the Androscoggin a mile down its course, thus becomes higher than the level of the Umbagog, and pours its surplus waters along up its stream in the channel of the river last named, with a strong, rushing current into the lake. And our adventurers now found that masses of tangled trees, mill-logs, and all sorts of flood-wood, were driving so strongly and thickly up this channel that it would be in vain for them to attempt to proceed in that direction. But the purpose of the heroic girl to reach the village, by some means or other, was not to be thus shaken. She directed the boat to be rowed back to the Elwood Landing, where, leaving it, she with her attendant took the path to the cottage; and reaching this, and finding all dark within, she boldly led the way down the long road to the bridge, miles below, with no other light than the still lingering flashes of lightning afforded to her hurrying footsteps. But it was not till after an exhausting walk, and some time past midnight, that she reached the bridge leading over the river to the tavern, where the trial was proceeding; and then only to encounter another great obstacle to her progress. On coming up to the bridge, she perceived, with astonishment and dismay, that one-half of the structure, with the exception of a single string-piece, the only connection now remaining between the two sides of the river, had been swept away by the sudden flood, or the revolving trees it bore on its rushing surface. She also ascertained, from a woman still up, watching with a sick child, in a house near by, that every boat on that side the river had been either carried off by the unexpected freshet, or taken since the bridge went off, by persons still coming in, to get over to the exciting trial, which, it was understood, would occupy the whole night. After pausing a moment, the still unshaken maiden borrowed and lighted a lantern, when, without disclosing her purpose, she left the house and proceeded directly to the end of the string-piece. She first examined it carefully, and finding it broad, level, and fixed in its bed, she then mounted the dizzy beam, and stood for a moment glancing down on the wild rush of roaring waters beneath. Her movements, to which the light she carried had attracted attention, were by this time seen and comprehended by the crowd around the tavern, on the opposite side, who now came rushing to the other end of the bridge, to deter her from the bold attempt. But she heeded them not; and in a moment more was seen, with a quick, firm step, gliding over the awful chasm; in another, she had reached the end, and stood in safety on the planks beyond,—where she was greeted by the throng, who had witnessed with amazement the perilous passage, in a shout of exultation at her escape, that rose loud and wild above the roar of the waters around them.