Wyandotte; or, the Hutted Knoll . . . Volume 2

by James Fenimore Cooper

  “Attention! men” -- cried the serjeant -- “By platoons, to the right--”

  “No matter, Joyce,” interrupted the captain, waving his hand--“Let the men remain. You have held communications with our visiters, I know, Strides?”

  “We have, captain Willoughby, and a desperate sort of visiters be they! A more ugly set of Mohawks and Onondagas I never laid eyes on.”

  “As for their appearance, it is matter of indifference to me--what is the object of their visit?”

  “I mean ugly behaved, and they deserve all I say of’em. Their ar’nd, according to their own tell, is to seize the captain, and his family, in behalf of the colonies.”

  As Joel uttered this, he cast a glance along the line of faces paraded before him, in order to read the effect it might produce. That it was not lost on some, was as evident as that it was on others. The captain, however, appeared unmoved, and there was a slight air of incredulity in the smile that curled his lip.

  “This, then, you report as being the business of the party, in coming to this place!” he said, quietly.

  “I do, sir; and an ugly ar’nd it is, in times like these.”

  “Is there any person in authority in a party that pretends to move about the colony, with such high duties?”

  “There’s one or two white men among ’em, if that’s what the captain means; they pretend to be duly authorised and app’inted to act in behalf of the people.”

  At each allusion to the people, Joel invariably looked towards his particular partisans, in order to note the effect the use of the word might produce. On the present occasion, he even ventured to wink at the miller.

  “If acting on authority, why do they keep aloof?--I have no such character for resisting the laws, that any who come clothed with its mantle need fear resistance.”

  “Why, I s’pose they reason in some such manner as this. There’s two laws in operation at this time; the king’s law, and the people’s law. I take it, this party comes in virtue of the people’s law, whereas it is likely the law the captain means is the king’s law. The difference is so great, that one or t’other carries the day, just as the king’s friends or the people’s friends happen to be the strongest. These men don’t like to trust to their law, when the captain may think it safest to trust a little to his’n.”

  “And all this was told you, Strides, in order to be repeated to me?”

  “Not a word on’t; it’s all my own consait about the matter. Little passed between us.”

  “And, now,” said the captain, relieving his breast by a long sigh, “I presume I may inquire about your companion. You probably have ascertained who he is?”

  “Lord, captain Willoughby, I was altogether dumbfounded, when the truth came upon me of a sudden! I never should have known the major in that dress, in the world, or out of the world either; but he walks so like the captain, that as I followed a’ter him, I said to myself, who can it be? -- and then the walk came over me, as it might be; and then I remembered last night, and the stranger that was out with the captain, and how he occupied the room next to the library, and them things; and so, when I come to look in his face, there was the major sure enough!”

  Joel lied famously in this account; but he believed himself safe, as no one could very well contradict him.

  “Now, you have explained the manner in which you recognised my son, Strides,” added the captain, “I will thank you to let me know what has become of him?”

  “He’s with the savages. Having come so far to seize the father, it wasn’t in natur’ to let the son go free, when he walked right into the lion’s den, like.”

  “And how could the savages know he was my son? Did they, too, recognise the family walk?”

  Strides was taken aback at this question, and he even had the grace to colour a little. He saw that he was critically placed; for, in addition to the suggestions of conscience, he understood the captain sufficiently to know he was a man who would not trifle, in the event of his suspicions becoming active. He knew he deserved the gallows, and Joyce was a man who would execute him in an instant, did his commander order it. The idea fairly made the traitor tremble in his shoes.

  “Ah! I’ve got a little ahead of my story,” he said, hastily. “But, perhaps I had best tell everything as it happened--”

  “That will be the simplest and clearest course. In order that there be no interruption, we will go into my room, where Joyce will follow us, as soon as he has dismissed his men.”

  This was done, and in a minute or two the captain and Joel were seated in the library, Joyce respectfully standing; the old soldier always declining to assume any familiarity with his superior. We shall give the substance of most of Joel’s report in our own language; preferring it, defective as it is, to that of the overseer’s, which was no bad representative of his cunning, treacherous and low mind.

  It seems, then, that the bearers of the flag were amicably received by the Indians. The men towards whom they were led on the rocks, were the chiefs of the party, who treated them with proper respect. The sudden movement was explained to them, as connected with their meal; and the chiefs, accompanied by the major and Strides, proceeded to the house of the miller. Here, by means of a white man for an interpreter, the major had demanded the motive of the strangers in coming into the settlement. The answer was a frank demand for the surrender of the Hut, and all it contained, to the authorities of the continental congress. The major had endeavoured to persuade a white man, who professed to hold the legal authority for what was doing, of the perfectly neutral disposition of his father, when, according to Joel’s account, to his own great astonishment, the argument was met by the announcement of Robert Willoughby’s true character, and a sneering demand if it were likely man who had a son in the royal army, and who had kept that son secreted in his own house, would be very indifferent to the success of the royal cause.

  “They’ve got a wonderful smart man there for a magistrate, I can tell you,” added Joel, with emphasis, “and he ra’ally bore as hard on the major as a lawyer before a court. How he found out that the major was at the Hut is a little strange, seein’ that none of us know’d of it; but they’ve got extraor’nary means, now-a-days.”

  “And, did major Willoughby admit his true character, when charged with being in the king’s service?”

  “He did--and like a gentleman. He only insisted that his sole ar’nd out here was to see his folks, and that he intended to go back to York the moment he had paid his visit.”

  “How did the person you mention receive his explanations?”

  “Waal, to own the truth, he laugh’d at it, like all natur’. I don’t believe they put any great weight on a syllable the major told ’em. I never see critturs with such onbelievin’ faces! After talking as long as suited themselves, they ordered the major to be shut up in a buttery, with a warrior at the door for a sentinel; a’ter which they took to examining me.”

  Joel then proceeded with an account -- his own account, always, be it remembered--of what passed between himself and the strangers. They had questioned him closely touching the nature of the defences of the Hut, the strength of the garrison, its disposition, the number and quality of the arms, and the amount of the ammunition.

  “You may depend on’t, I gave a good account,” continued the overseer, in a self-satisfied way. “In the first place, I told’em, the captain had a lieutenant with him that had sarved out the whull French war; then I put the men up to fifty at once, seein’ it was just as easy to say that, as thirty or thirty-three. As to the arms, I told’em more than half the pieces were double-barrelled; and that the captain, in particular, carried a rifle that had killed nine savages in one fight.”

  “You were much mistaken in that, Joel. It is true, that celebrated chief once fell by this rifle; even that is not a matter for boasting.”

  “Waal, them that told me on’t, said that two had fallen before it, and I put it up to nine at once, to make a good story better. Nine men had a more despera
te sound than two; and when you do begin to brag, a man shouldn’t be backward. I thought, howsever, that they was most nonplussed, when I told’em of the field-piece.”

  “The field-piece, Strides!--Why did you venture on an exaggeration that any forward movement of theirs must expose?”

  “We’ll see to that, captain -- we’ll see to that. Field-pieces are desperate dampers to Indian courage, so I thought I’d just let’em have a six-pounder, by way of tryin’ their natur’s. They look’d like men goin’ to execution, when I told’em of the cannon, and what a history it had gone through.”

  “And what may have been this history, pray?”

  “I just told’em it was the very gun the captain had took from the French, about which we’ve all heern tell; and that, as everybody knows, was a desperate piece, havin’ killed more than a hundred reg’lars, before the captain charged baggonet on it, and carried it off.”

  This was a very artful speech, since it alluded to the most distinguished exploit of captain Willoughby’s military life; one of which it would have been more than human, had he not been a little proud. All who knew him, had heard of this adventure, and Joel cunningly turned it to account, in the manner seen. The allusion served to put to sleep, for the moment at least, certain very unpleasant suspicions that were getting to be active in his superior’s mind.

  “There was no necessity, Strides, for saying anything about that affair”--the captain, modestly, interposed. “It happened a long time since, and might well be forgotten. Then, you know we have no gun to support your account; when our deficiency is ascertained, it will all be set down to the true cause--a wish to conceal our real weakness.”

  “I beg your honour’s pardon,” put in Joyce--“I think Strides has acted in a military manner in this affair. It is according to the art of war for the besieged to pretend to be stronger than they are; and even besiegers sometimes put a better face than the truth will warrant, on their strength. Military accounts, as your honour well knows, never pass exactly for gospel, unless it be with the raw hands.”

  “Then,” added Joel, “I know’d what I was about, seein’ that we had a cannon ready for use, as soon as it could be mounted.”

  “I think I understand Strides, your honour,” resumed the serjeant. “I have carved a ‘quaker,’ as an ornament for the gateway, intending to saw it in two, in the middle, and place the pieces, crosswise, over the entrance, as your honour has often seen such things in garrisons -- like the brass ornaments on the artillery caps, I mean, your honour. Well, this gun is finished and painted, and I intended to split it, and have it up this very week. I suppose Joel has had it in his mind, quaker fashion.”

  “The serjeant’s right. That piece looks as much like a real cannon as one of our cathechisms is like another. The muzzle is more than a foot deep, and has a plaguy gunpowder look!”

  “But this gun is not mounted; even if it were, it could only be set up for show,” observed the captain.

  “Put that cannon up once, and I’ll answer for it that no Injin faces it. ’Twill be as good as a dozen sentinels,” answered Joel. “As for mountin’, I thought of that before I said a syllable about the crittur. There’s the new truck-wheels in the court, all ready to hold it, and the carpenters can put the hinder part to the whull, in an hour or two, and that in a way no Injin could tell the difference between it and a ra’al cannon, at ten yards.”

  “This is plausible, your honour,” said Joyce, respectfully, “and it shows that corporal Strides”--Joel insisted he was a serjeant, but the real Simon Pure never gave him a title higher than that of corporal--“and it shows that corporal Strides has an idea of war. By mounting that piece, and using it with discretion -- refusing it, at the right moment, and showing it at another -- a great deal might be done with it, either in a siege or an assault. If your honour will excuse the liberty, I would respectfully suggest that it might be well to set the quaker on his legs, and plant him at the gate, as an exhorter.”

  The captain reflected a moment, and then desired the overseer to proceed in his account. The rest of Joel’s story was soon told. He had mystified the strangers, according to his own account of the matter, so thoroughly, by affecting to withhold nothing, that they considered him as a sort of ally, and did not put him in confinement at all. It is true, he was placed en surveillance; but the duty was so carelessly performed, that, at the right moment, he had passed down the ravine, a direction in which a movement was not expected, and buried himself in the woods, so very effectually that it would have baffled pursuit, had any been attempted. After making a very long détour, that consumed hours, he turned the entire valley, and actually reached the Hut, under the cover of the rivulet and its bushes, or precisely by the route in which he and Mike had gone forth, in quest of Maud, the evening of the major’s arrival. This latter fact, however, Joel had reasons of his own for concealing.

  “You have told us nothing of Mr. Woods, Strides,” the captain observed, when Joel’s account was ended.

  “Mr. Woods! I can tell the captain nothing of that gentleman; I supposed he was here.”

  The manner in which the chaplain had left the Hut, and his disappearance in the ravine, were then explained to the overseer, who evidently had quitted the mill, on his return, before the divine performed his exploit. There was a sinister expression in Joel’s eyes, as he heard the account, that might have given the alarm to men more suspicious than the two old soldiers; but he had the address to conceal all he felt or thought.

  “If Mr. Woods has gone into the hands of the Injins, in his church shirt,” rejoined the overseer, “his case is hopeless, so far as captivity is consarned. One of the charges ag’in the captain is, that the chaplain he keeps prays as regulairly for the king as he used to do when it was lawful, and agreeable to public feelin’.”

  “This you heard, while under examination before the magistrate you have named?” demanded the captain.

  “As good as that, and something more to the same p’int. The ’squire complained awfully of a minister’s prayin’ for the king and r’yal family, when the country was fightin’ ’em.”

  “In that, the Rev. Mr. Woods only obeys orders,” said the serjeant.

  “But they say not. The orders is gone out, now, they pretend, for no man to pray for any on’em.”

  “Ay -- orders from the magistrates, perhaps. But the Rev. Mr. Woods is a divine, and has his own superiors in the church, and they must issue the commands that he obeys. I dare to say, your honour, if the archbishop of Canterbury, or the commander-in-chief of the church, whoever he may be, should issue a general order directing all the parsons not to pray for King George, the Rev. Mr. Woods would have no scruple about obeying. But, it’s a different thing when a justice of the peace undertakes to stand fugleman for the clergy. It’s like a navy captain undertaking to wheel a regiment.”

  “Poor Woods!” exclaimed the captain -- “Had he been ruled by me, he would have dropped those prayers, and it would have been better for us both. But, he is of your opinion, serjeant, and thinks that a layman can have no authority over a gownsman.”

  “And isn’t he right, your honour! Think what a mess of it the militia officers make, when they undertake to meddle with a regular corps. Some of our greatest difficulties in the last war came from such awkward hands attempting to manage machines of which they had no just notions. As for praying, your honour, I’m no wise particular who I pray for, or what I pray for, so long as it be all set down in general orders that come from the right head-quarters; and I think the Rev. Mr. Woods ought to be judged by the same rule.”

  As the captain saw no use in prolonging the dialogue, he dismissed his companions. He then sought his wife, in order to make her acquainted with the actual state of things. This last was a painful duty, though Mrs. Willoughby and her daughters heard the truth with less of apprehension than the husband and father had anticipated. They had suffered so much from uncertainty, that there was a relief in learning the truth. The mother did not think the
authorities of the colony would hurt her son, whom she fancied all men must, in a degree, love as she loved. Beulah thought of her own husband as Bob’s safeguard; while Maud felt it to be comparative happiness to know he was unharmed, and still so near her.

  This unpleasant duty discharged, the captain began to bethink him seriously of his military trust. After some reflection, and listening to a few more suggestions from Joyce, he consented to let the “quaker” be put on wheels. The carpenters were immediately set at work to achieve this job, which the serjeant volunteered to superintend, in person. As for Joel, his wife and children, with the miller, occupied most of the morning; the day turning, and even drawing towards its close, ere he became visible, as had formerly been his wont, among the men of the settlement.

  All this time, everything without the palisades lay in the silence of nature. The sun cast its glories athwart the lovely scene, as in one of the Sabbaths of the woods; but man was nowhere visible. Not a hostile Indian, or white, exhibited himself; and the captain began to suspect that, satisfied with their captures, the party had commenced its return towards the river, postponing his own arrest for some other occasion. So strong did this impression become towards the close of the day, that he was actually engaged in writing to some friends of influence in Albany and on the Mohawk to interpose their names and characters in his son’s behalf, when the serjeant, about nine o’clock, the hour when he had been ordered to parade the guard for the first half of the night, presented himself at the door of his room, to make an important report.

  “What now, Joyce?” demanded the captain. “Are any of our fellows sleepy, and plead illness?”

  “Worse than that, your honour, I greatly fear,” was the answer. Of the ten men your honour commanded me to detail for the guard, five are missing. I set them down as deserters.”