CHAPTER XII
Leaving Edith to pursue her way toward the Oneida territory, and Mr.Prevost, after parting with Lord H---- at the distance of some threemiles from his own house, to ride on to Johnson Castle, let us followthe young nobleman to Albany, where he arrived somewhat afternightfall. His first duty, as he conceived it, led him to the quartersof the commander-in-chief, where he made a brief but clear report ofall that had occurred in his transactions with the Indians.
"I found," he said, "from information communicated by Sir WilliamJohnson, that there was no need of any concealment; but that, on thecontrary, it would be rather advantageous to appear at the meetingwith the Five Nations in my proper character. The results were what Ihave told you. There is one other point, however, which I think itnecessary to mention, and which, if imprudently treated, might lead toserious results."
He then went on to state generally the facts in regard to the death ofthe Indian by the hands of Woodchuck, and the supposed capture ofWalter Prevost by a party of the Oneidas. It would be uninteresting tothe reader to hear the particulars of the conversation which followed.Suffice it to say, that the government of the colony in all itsdepartments was very well disposed to inactivity at that time, and notat all inclined to exert itself for the protection of individuals, oreven of greater interests, unless strongly pressed to do so. This LordH---- was not at all inclined to do, as he was well aware from all hehad heard that no action on the part of the government short of thesudden march of a large body of troops would effect the liberation ofWalter Prevost, and that to expect such a movement, which itself mightbe unsuccessful, was quite out of the question with the officers whowere in command at the time.
His conference with the commander-in-chief ended, he declined aninvitation to supper, and went out on his search for the small innwhere he had been told he would find the man whose act, howeverjustifiable, had brought so much wretchedness upon Mr. Prevost'sfamily.
The city of Albany, in those days, as we have reason to know from verygood authority, though not numbering by many thousands as great apopulation as it contains at present, occupied a space nearly as largeas the present city. One long street ran by the river, to the veryverge of which beautiful and well cultivated gardens extended; andfrom the top of the hill down to this lower street ran another, verynearly, if not exactly, of the same position and extent as the presentState street. On the top of the hill was the fort; and built in thecenter of the large, descending street which swept round them oneither side, were two or three churches, a handsome market place, anda guard-house. A few other streets ran down the hill in a parallelline with this principal one; and other small streets, lanes, andalleys connected them all together. Nevertheless, the population, as Ihave said, was comparatively very small, for between house and house,and street and street, throughout the whole town, were large andbeautiful gardens filling up spaces now occupied by buildings andthronged with human beings. A great part of the population was at thattime Dutch, and all the neatness and cleanliness of true Dutch housesand Dutch streets was to be seen in Albany in those days--would wecould say as much at present. No pigs then ran in the streets, to thehorror of the eye and the annoyance of the passenger; no cabbageleaves or stalks disgraced the gutter; and the only place in whichanything like filth or uncleanliness was to be seen was at theextremity of the littoral street, where, naturally, the houses of theboatmen and others connected with the shipping were placed for thesake of approximating to the water. There, certainly, some degree ofdirt existed, and the air was perfumed with the high savor of tar andtobacco.
It was toward this part of the town that Lord H---- directed hissteps, inquiring for the inn called "The Three Boatmen." Severaltimes, however, was he frustrated in his attempt to obtain informationby the ignorance of a great portion of the inhabitants of the Englishlanguage; and the pipe was removed from the mouth only to reply inDutch, "I do not understand."
At length, however, he was directed aright, and found a small andsomewhat mean-looking house, in which an adventurous Englishman fromthe purlieus of Clare Market had established a tavern for the benefitof boatmen. It had in former times belonged to a Dutch settler, andstill retained many of the characteristic features of its origin,while four trees stood in line before the door, with benchesunderneath them for the convenience of those who chose to sit andpoison the sweet air of the summer evening with the fumes of tobacco.
Entering through a swing door into the narrow, sandy passage, whichdescended one step from the street, Lord H---- encountered a negrotapster with a white apron, of whom he inquired if Captain Brooks wasstill there.
"Oh, yes, Massa Officer," said the man, with a grin. "You mean MassaWoodchuck," he continued, showing that the good man's Indian nicknamewas very extensively known. "You find him in dere, in de coffee room,"and he pointed to a door, once white, now yellow and brown with smoke,age, and dirty fingers.
Lord H---- opened the door and went in amongst as strange andunprepossessing an assemblage of human beings as it had ever been hischance to light upon. The air was rendered obscure by smoke, so thatthe candles looked dim and red; and it was literally difficult todistinguish the objects around. What the odor was it is impossible tosay, for it was as complicated as the antidote of Mithridates; but thepredominant smells were certainly those of beer, rum, and Holland gin.Some ten or twelve little tables of exceedingly highly polishedmahogany, but stained here and there by the contaminating marks of wetglasses, divided the room amongst them, leaving just space betweeneach to place two chairs, back to back; and in this small den not lessthan five or six and twenty people were congregated, almost alldrinking, almost all smoking, some talking very loud, some sitting inprofound silence, as the quantity of liquor imbibed or the nationalcharacteristics of the individual might prompt. Gazing through thehaze upon this scene, which, besides the sturdy and coarse, but activeEnglishman, and the heavy, phlegmatic Dutchman, contained one or twovoluble Frenchmen, deserters from the Canadas, none of them showingthemselves in a very favorable light, Lord H---- could not helpcomparing the people before him with the free, wild Indians he hadlately left, and asking himself: "Which are the savages?"
At length his eye, however, fell upon a man sitting at the table inthe corner of the room next to the window. He was quite alone, withhis back turned to the rest of the people in the place, his headleaning on his hand, and a short pipe laid down upon the table besidehim. He had no light before him, as most of the others had, and hemight have seemed asleep, so still was his whole figure, had it notbeen that the fingers of his right hand, which rested on the table,beat time to an imaginary tune. Approaching close to him, LordH---- drew a seat to the table and laid a hand upon his arm. Woodchucklooked round, and a momentary expression of pleasure, slight, andpassing away rapidly, crossed his rugged features.
The next moment his face was all cold and stern again.
"Very kind of you to come and see me, my lord," he said, in a dull,sad tone. "What do you want with me? Have you got anything for me todo?"
"I am sorry to see you looking so melancholy, Captain," said LordH----, evading his question. "I hope nothing else has gone amiss."
"Haven't I cause enough to be melancholy," said the other, lookinground at the people in the room, "cooped up with a penful of swine?Come out--come out to the door. It's cold enough out, but the coldestwind that ever blew is better than the filthy air of these pigs."
As he spoke he rose, and a little, pert-looking Frenchman, who hadoverheard him, exclaimed in a bantering tone: "Why you call us pigsmore nor yourself de great hog?"
"Get out of my way, for fear I break your back," said Woodchuck, in alow, stern voice. "If your neck had been broken long ago, it wouldhave been better for your country and for mine;" and taking up thelittle Frenchman by the nape of the neck with one arm, he set him uponthe table from which he had just arisen.
A roar of laughter burst from a number of the assembled throats; thelittle Frenchman sputtered with wrath, without daring to carry theexpress
ion of his indignation farther; and Woodchuck strode quietlyout of the room, followed by his military visitor.
"Here--let us sit down here," he said, placing himself on a benchunder a leafless tree, and leaving room for Lord H---- by his side. "Iam gloomy enough, my lord, and haven't I reason to be so? Here I amfor life. This is to be my condition with the swine that gather up inthese sties of cities, suffocating in such dens as these. I guess Ishall drown myself some day, when I am driven quite mad. I know a manhas no right to lay hands upon himself. I larnt my Bible when I wasyoung, and know what's God's will, so I sha'n't do anything desperateso long as I be right here," and he laid his finger on his forehead."No! no! I'll just take as much care of my life," he continued, "asthough it were a baby I was nursing; but unless them Ingians catchsome other white man and kill him--which God forbid--I've got to stayhere for life; and even if they do, it's more nor a chance they'd killme, too, if they got me; and when I think of them beautiful woods andpleasant lakes, with the pictures of everything round painted sobeautiful on them when they are still, and the streams that go dancingand splashing along over the big black stones and the small whitepebbles, seeming for all the world to sing as if for pleasure at theirfreedom, and the open, friendly air of the hillside, and the cloudsskimming along, and the birds glancing through the branches, and thesquirrels skipping and chattering as if they were mocking everythingnot so nimble as themselves, I do often believe I shall go crazed tothink I shall never see those things again."
Lord H---- felt for him much, for he had in his own heart a sufficientportion of love for the wilder things of nature to sympathize in somedegree with one who loved them so earnestly.
"I trust, Woodchuck," he said, "that we shall be able to find someemployment for you with the army--if not with my own corps with someother, which may give you glimpses at least of the scenes you love sowell, and of the unconfined life you have lived so long; but I havecome to consult you upon a subject of much and immediate importance,and we must talk of that the first thing."
"What is that?" asked Brooks, in an indifferent tone, fixing his eyesupon the stones of the street, faintly lighted by the glare fromwithin the house.
Lord H---- began his account of what had happened between the Mohawkand the Hudson with some circumlocution, for he did not feel at allsure of the effect it would produce upon his companion's mind, and theWoodchuck seemed to fall into one of those deep reveries in which onemay be said to hear without hearing. He took not the slightest noticeof what his noble visitor said regarding the burning of the wood, orthe danger of Mr. Prevost and Edith. It seemed to produce no moredistinct effect than would the wind whistling in his ears. He sat calmand silent, without an observation, but he grew more attentive, thoughonly in a slight degree, when the narrator came to mention the anxietyof the family at the protracted absence of Walter; and when at lastLord H---- described the finding of the knife and the knapsack, andtold of the conclusions to which the whole family had come, he startedup, exclaiming: "What's that! What's that!" and then, after a moment'spause, he sank down upon his seat again, saying, with a groan: "Theyhave got him--they have got him, and they will tomahawk him--thebloody, barbarous critters! Couldn't they have chosen some moreworthless thing than that!"
Pressing his hand tight upon his forehead, as if he fancied theturbulent thoughts within would burst it, he remained for a moment ortwo in silence, till Lord H---- asked if he imagined they wouldexecute their bloody purposes speedily.
"No! no!" cried the man. "No fear of that; they'll take time enough;that's the worst of the savages. It's no quick rage, no angry heatwith them--no word and a blow. It's cold, bitter, long-premeditatedhatred. They wouldn't have half the pleasure if they didn't draw outtheir revenge by the week and the month--but what's to be donenow--gracious God! what's to be done now?"
"That is precisely what I came to consult you upon," said LordH----; "but let us talk over the matter calmly, my good friend. Thisis a case where grief, anger, and indignation can do nothing, butwhere deliberate thought, reason, and policy, even cunning, such astheir own--for, if we could arrive at it, we should be quite justifiedin using it--may, perhaps, do something to save this poor boy!"
"How the devil would you have me calm!" exclaimed the man, vehemently;but then, suddenly checking himself, he said: "You're right, you'reright. I am forgetting my old habits in these smoky holes; thought,cunning, those are the only things to do with an Indian. It'starnation hard to outwit them, but it may be done when one knows histracks well. I can't get my brain to hold steady tonight; this storyhas upset all my thoughts, and I've got no consideration in me. Youmust give me a night and a day to think over the matter, and then I'llsee what's to be done. By the Lord, Walter sha'n't die! Poor fellow!What should he die for? However, I guess it's no use talking in thatsort of manner. I must think of what's to be done; that's the businessin hand. I'll think as soon as I can, my lord; only you just now tellme all you have done, if you've done anything. As for Prevost, I don'tsuppose he's had time to do much, for though he's always right in theend, and no man's opinion is worth more, yet if you touch his heartand his feelings, as you call them, his wits get all in a work, justlike mine at this minute. More fool he, and I, too!"
"We have done something," said Lord H---- in reply. "Mr. Prevost setout this morning to see Sir William Johnson----"
"He's no good!" growled Woodchuck, impatiently.
"I came hither to consult with you," continued Lord H----, "and wehave commissioned the boatman, whom they call Robert, a tall, stoutman----"
"I know him! I know him!" said Woodchuck. "Passably honest--the bestof them."
"Well, we have commissioned him," resumed the young nobleman, "to seekfor some Indian runner, or half-breed, to carry news of this event toOtaitsa, whom Edith believes the tribe will keep in the dark in regardto the capture of Walter."
"Likely, likely," said the Woodchuck. "Miss Prevost understands them.They'll not tell the women anything, for fear they should meddle.They've a poor opinion of squaws. But the girl may do a great deal ofgood, too, if you can get the tidings to her. She's not as cunning asthe rest of them, but she has more heart and soul, and resolution,too, than a whole tribe of Indian women--that comes of her motherbeing a white woman."
"Her mother a white woman!" exclaimed Lord H----.
"Aye; didn't you know that?" said Woodchuck. "Just as white as MissPrevost, and quite a lady, too, she was, to look at, or to speakto--though she was not fond of speaking with white men, and would drawback into the lodge whenever she saw one. I did speak to her once,though, when she was in a great fright about Black Eagle, who had goneto battle against the French; and I, happening to come that way, gaveher some news of him. But we are getting astray from what's of morematter than that. The girl will save him, take my word for it, ifthere's strength enough in that little body to do it. But let mesee--you talk of Indian runners; where is one to be found who can betrusted? They're generally a bad set, the scum of the tribes; no realwarrior would take up on such a trade. However, what's to be done? Nowhite person can go; for they'd scalp him to a certainty, and he wouldgive his life for Walter's, that's all. On my life, it would be aswell to give the dangerous errand to some felon, as I have heard saythey do in despotic countries--give criminals some dangerous task toperform; and they, if they succeed and escape, so much the better forthem; if they die, so much the better for the community. But I'mgetting wandering again," he continued, rising. "Now, my lord, this isno use. Give me a few hours to think--tomorrow, at noon, if youwill--and then I'll come and tell you what my opinion is."
As he spoke, he turned abruptly toward the house, without anyceremonious leave-taking, and only looked round to put one morequestion:
"At the fort, I suppose?" he said.
Lord H---- assented, and Brooks entered the house and at once soughthis own chamber.
Ticonderoga: A Story of Early Frontier Life in the Mohawk Valley Page 12