Edgar Huntly; or, Memoirs of a Sleep-Walker

by Charles Brockden Brown

  Chapter XXIII.

  The road was intricate and long. It seemed designed to pervade theforest in every possible direction. I frequently noticed cut wood piledin heaps upon either side, and rejoiced in these tokens that theresidence of man was near. At length I reached a second fence, whichproved to be the boundary of a road still more frequented. I pursuedthis, and presently beheld before me the river and its oppositebarriers.

  This object afforded me some knowledge of my situation. There was a fordover which travellers used to pass, and in which the road that I was nowpursuing terminated. The stream was rapid and tumultuous, but in thisplace did not rise higher than the shoulders. On the opposite side was ahighway, passable by horses and men, though not by carriages, and whichled into the midst of Solesbury. Should I not rush into the stream, andstill aim at reaching my uncle's house before morning? Why should Idelay?

  Thirty hours of incessant watchfulness and toil, of enormous efforts andperils, preceded and accompanied by abstinence and wounds, were enoughto annihilate the strength and courage of ordinary men. In the course ofthem, I had frequently believed myself to have reached the verge beyondwhich my force would not carry me; but experience as frequentlydemonstrated my error. Though many miles were yet to be traversed,though my clothes were once more to be drenched and loaded withmoisture, though every hour seemed to add somewhat to the keenness ofthe blast, yet how should I know, but by trial, whether my stock ofenergy was not sufficient for this last exploit?

  My resolution to proceed was nearly formed, when the figure of a manmoving slowly across the road at some distance before me was observed.Hard by this ford lived a man by name Bisset, of whom I had slightknowledge. He tended his two hundred acres with a plodding andmoney-doting spirit, while his son overlooked a grist-mill on the river.He was a creature of gain, coarse and harmless. The man whom I saw beforeme might be he, or some one belonging to his family. Being armed fordefence, I less scrupled at meeting with any thing in the shape of man.I therefore called. The figure stopped and answered me without surlinessor anger. The voice was unlike that of Bisset, but this person'sinformation I believed would be of some service.

  Coming up to him, he proved to be a clown belonging to Bisset'shabitation. His panic and surprise on seeing me made him aghast. In mypresent garb I should not have easily been recognised by my nearestkinsman, and much less easily by one who had seldom met me.

  It may be easily conceived that my thoughts, when allowed to wander fromthe objects before me, were tormented with forebodings and inquietudeson account of the ills which I had so much reason to believe hadbefallen my family. I had no doubt that some evil had happened, but thefull extent of it was still uncertain. I desired and dreaded to discoverthe truth, and was unable to interrogate this person in a direct manner.I could deal only in circuities and hints. I shuddered while I waitedfor an answer to my inquiries.

  Had not Indians, I asked, been lately seen in this neighbourhood? Werethey not suspected of hostile designs? Had they not already committedsome mischief? Some passenger, perhaps, had been attacked, or fire hadbeen set to some house? On which side of the river had their steps beenobserved or any devastation been committed? Above the ford or below it?At what distance from the river?

  When his attention could be withdrawn from my person and bestowed uponmy questions, he answered that some alarm had indeed been spread aboutIndians, and that parties from Solesbury and Chetasco were out inpursuit of them, that many persons had been killed by them, and that onehouse in Solesbury had been rifled and burnt on the night before thelast.

  These tidings were a dreadful confirmation of my fears. There scarcelyremained a doubt; but still my expiring hope prompted me to inquire, "Towhom did the house belong?"

  He answered that he had not heard the name of the owner. He was astranger to the people on the other side of the river.

  Were any of the inhabitants murdered?

  Yes; all that were at home, except a girl whom they carried off. Somesaid that the girl had been retaken.

  What was the name? Was it Huntly?

  Huntly? Yes. No. He did not know. He had forgotten.

  I fixed my eyes upon the ground. An interval of gloomy meditationsucceeded. All was lost! All for whose sake I had desired to live hadperished by the hands of these assassins! That dear home, the scene ofmy sportive childhood, of my studies, labours, and recreations, wasravaged by fire and the sword,--was reduced to a frightful ruin!

  Not only all that embellished and endeared existence was destroyed, butthe means of subsistence itself. Thou knowest that my sisters and I weredependants on the bounty of our uncle. His death would make way for thesuccession of his son, a man fraught with envy and malignity, who alwaystestified a mortal hatred to us, merely because we enjoyed theprotection of his father. The ground which furnished me with bread wasnow become the property of one who, if he could have done it withsecurity, would gladly have mingled poison with my food.

  All that my imagination or my heart regarded as of value had likewiseperished. Whatever my chamber, my closets, my cabinets contained, myfurniture, my books, the records of my own skill, the monuments of theirexistence whom I loved, my very clothing, were involved inindiscriminate and irretrievable destruction. Why should I survive thiscalamity?

  But did not he say that one had escaped? The only females in the familywere my sisters. One of these had been reserved for a fate worse thandeath; to gratify the innate and insatiable cruelty of savages, bysuffering all the torments their invention can suggest, or to linger outyears of weary bondage and unintermitted hardship in the bosom of thewilderness. To restore her to liberty, to cherish this last survivor ofmy unfortunate race, was a sufficient motive to life and to activity.

  But soft! Had not rumour whispered that the captive was retaken? Oh! whowas her angel of deliverance? Where did she now abide? Weeping over theuntimely fall of her protector and her friend? Lamenting and upbraidingthe absence of her brother? Why should I not haste to find her?--tomingle my tears with hers, to assure her of my safety, and expatiate theinvoluntary crime of my desertion by devoting all futurity to the taskof her consolation and improvement?

  The path was open and direct. My new motives would have trampled uponevery impediment and made me reckless of all dangers and all toils. Ibroke from my reverie, and, without taking leave or expressing gratitudeto my informant, I ran with frantic expedition towards the river, and,plunging into it, gained the opposite side in a moment.

  I was sufficiently acquainted with the road. Some twelve or fifteenmiles remained to be traversed. I did not fear that my strength wouldfail in the performance of my journey. It was not my uncle's habitationto which I directed my steps. Inglefield was my friend. If my sister hadexistence, or was snatched from captivity, it was here that an asylumhad been afforded to her, and here was I to seek the knowledge of mydestiny. For this reason, having reached a spot where the road dividedinto two branches, one of which led to Inglefield's and the other toHuntly's, I struck into the former.

  Scarcely had I passed the angle when I noticed a building on the righthand, at some distance from the road. In the present state of mythoughts, it would not have attracted my attention, had not a lightgleamed from an upper window and told me that all within were not atrest.

  I was acquainted with the owner of this mansion. He merited esteem andconfidence, and could not fail to be acquainted with recent events. Fromhim I should obtain all the information that I needed, and I should bedelivered from some part of the agonies of my suspense. I should reachhis door in a few minutes, and the window-light was a proof that myentrance at this hour would not disturb the family, some of whom werestirring.

  Through a gate I entered an avenue of tall oaks, that led to the house.I could not but reflect on the effect which my appearance would produceupon the family. The sleek locks, neat apparel, pacific guise, sobrietyand gentleness of aspect by which I was customarily distinguished, wouldin vain be sought in the apparition which would now present itselfbefore them. M
y legs, neck, and bosom were bare, and their native huewas exchanged for the livid marks of bruises and scarifications. Ahorrid scar upon my cheek, and my uncombed locks; hollow eyes, madeghastly by abstinence and cold, and the ruthless passions of which mymind had been the theatre, added to the musket which I carried in myhand, would prepossess them with the notion of a maniac or ruffian.

  Some inconveniences might hence arise, which, however, could not beavoided. I must trust to the speed with which my voice and my wordsshould disclose my true character and rectify their mistake.

  I now reached the principal door of the house. It was open, and Iunceremoniously entered. In the midst of the room stood a German stove,well heated. To thaw my half-frozen limbs was my first care. Meanwhile Igazed around me, and marked the appearances of things.

  Two lighted candles stood upon the table. Beside them were cider-bottlesand pipes of tobacco. The furniture and room was in that state whichdenoted it to have been lately filled with drinkers and smokers; yetneither voice, nor visage, nor motion, were anywhere observable. Ilistened; but neither above nor below, within nor without, could anytokens of a human being be perceived.

  This vacancy and silence must have been lately preceded by noise, andconcourse, and bustle. The contrast was mysterious and ambiguous. Noadequate cause of so quick and absolute a transition occurred to me.Having gained some warmth and lingered some ten or twenty minutes inthis uncertainty, I determined to explore the other apartments of thebuilding. I knew not what might betide in my absence, or what I mightencounter in my search to justify precaution, and, therefore, kept thegun in my hand. I snatched a candle from the table and proceeded intotwo other apartments on the first floor and the kitchen. Neither wasinhabited, though chairs and tables were arranged in their usual order,and no traces of violence or hurry were apparent.

  Having gained the foot of the staircase, I knocked, but my knocking waswholly disregarded. A light had appeared in an upper chamber. It wasnot, indeed, in one of those apartments which the family permanentlyoccupied, but in that which, according to rural custom, was reserved forguests; but it indubitably betokened the presence of some being by whommy doubts might be solved. These doubts were too tormenting to allow ofscruples and delay. I mounted the stairs.

  At each chamber-door I knocked, but I knocked in vain. I tried to open,but found them to be locked. I at length reached the entrance of that inwhich a light had been discovered. Here it was certain that some onewould be found; but here, as well as elsewhere, my knocking wasunnoticed.

  To enter this chamber was audacious, but no other expedient was affordedme to determine whether the house had any inhabitants. I thereforeentered, though with caution and reluctance. No one was within, butthere were sufficient traces of some person who had lately been here. Onthe table stood a travelling-escritoire, open, with pens and inkstand. Achair was placed before it, and a candle on the right hand. Thisapparatus was rarely seen in this country. Some traveller, it seemed,occupied this room, though the rest of the mansion was deserted. Thepilgrim, as these appearances testified, was of no vulgar order, andbelonged not to the class of periodical and every-day guests.

  It now occurred to me that the occupant of this apartment could not befar off, and that some danger and embarrassment could not fail to accruefrom being found, thus accoutred and garbed, in a place sacred to thestudy and repose of another. It was proper, therefore, to withdraw, andeither to resume my journey, or wait for the stranger's return, whomperhaps some temporary engagement had called away, in the lower andpublic room. The former now appeared to be the best expedient, as thereturn of this unknown person was uncertain, as well as his power tocommunicate the information which I wanted.

  Had paper, as well as the implements of writing, lain upon the desk,perhaps my lawless curiosity would not have scrupled to have pried intoit. On the first glance nothing of that kind appeared; but now, as Iturned towards the door, somewhat, lying beside the desk, on the sideopposite the candle, caught my attention. The impulse was instantaneousand mechanical that made me leap to the spot and lay my hand upon it.Till I felt it between my fingers, till I brought it near my eyes andread frequently the inscriptions that appeared upon it, I was doubtfulwhether my senses had deceived me.

  Few, perhaps, among mankind, have undergone vicissitudes of peril andwonder equal to mine. The miracles of poetry, the transitions ofenchantment, are beggarly and mean compared with those which I hadexperienced. Passage into new forms, overleaping the bars of time andspace, reversal of the laws of inanimate and intelligent existence, hadbeen mine to perform and to witness.

  No event had been more fertile of sorrow and perplexity than the loss ofthy brother's letters. They went by means invisible, and disappeared ata moment when foresight would have least predicted their disappearance.They now placed themselves before me, in a manner equally abrupt, in aplace and by means no less contrary to expectation. The papers which Inow seized were those letters. The parchment cover, the string that tiedand the wax that sealed them, appeared not to have been opened orviolated.

  The power that removed them, from my cabinet, and dropped them in thishouse,--a house which I rarely visited, which I had not entered duringthe last year, with whose inhabitants I maintained no cordialintercourse, and to whom my occupations and amusements, my joys and mysorrows, were unknown,--was no object even of conjecture. But they werenot possessed by any of the family. Some stranger was here, by whom theyhad been stolen, or into whose possession they had, by someincomprehensible chance, fallen.

  That stranger was near. He had left this apartment for a moment. Hewould speedily return. To go hence might possibly occasion me to misshim. Here, then, I would wait, till he should grant me an interview. Thepapers were mine, and were recovered. I would never part with them. Butto know by whose force or by whose stratagems I had been bereaved ofthem thus long, was now the supreme passion of my soul. I seated myselfnear a table and anxiously waited for an interview, on which I wasirresistibly persuaded to believe that much of my happiness depended.

  Meanwhile, I could not but connect this incident with the destruction ofmy family. The loss of these papers had excited transports of grief; andyet to have lost them thus was perhaps the sole expedient by which theirfinal preservation could be rendered possible. Had they, remained in mycabinet, they could not have escaped the destiny which overtook thehouse and its furniture. Savages are not accustomed to leave theirexterminating work unfinished. The house which they have plundered theyare careful to level with the ground. This not only their revenge, buttheir caution, prescribes. Fire may originate by accident as well as bydesign, and the traces of pillage and murder are totally obliterated bythe flames.

  These thoughts were interrupted by the shutting of a door below, and byfootsteps ascending the stairs. My heart throbbed at the sound. My seatbecame uneasy and I started on my feet. I even advanced half-way to theentrance of the room. My eyes were intensely fixed upon the door. Myimpatience would have made me guess at the person of this visitant bymeasuring his shadow, if his shadow were first seen; but this wasprecluded by the position of the light. It was only when the figureentered, and the whole person was seen, that my curiosity was gratified.He who stood before me was the parent and fosterer of my mind, thecompanion and instructor of my youth, from whom I had been parted foryears, from whom I believed myself to be forever separated,--Sarsefieldhimself!