Works of Robert W Chambers

by Robert W. Chambers

  After a moment I said, “Miss Warren, you say, cared for me while I lay ill?”

  “Like a mother — or fond sister.”

  I closed my eyes partly.

  He looked down at me and pressed my hand.

  “I have tired you,” he said, gently.

  “No, you have given me life,” I answered, smiling.

  CHAPTER XX

  Long before Sir John returned, or, indeed, long before we had any word from him, I was dressed and making hourly essays at walking, first in the house, then through the door-yard to the guard-house, where I would sit in the hot sun and breathe the full-throated October winds. Keen and sweet as apple-wine, the air I drank warmed and excited me; my eyes grew clear and strong, my lean cheeks filled, my wasted limbs once more began to bear me with the old-time lightness and delight.

  Too, I found myself at times nosing the wind with half-closed eyes, like a young hound too long kennelled, or sometimes listening, yet lost in reverie, as hounds listen on winter nights, drowsing by the dull fire.

  A hundred little zephyrs that knew me whispered to me through open windows. At night I caught the faint echo of the breezes’ laughter under the eaves; sometimes I heard the big wind stirring the dark pines, so far away that none but I could hear it playing with the baby breezes.

  They were little friendly breezes, the spirits of spirits, with dainty, familiar voices, too delicate to frighten the birds they sometimes gossiped with. Even the slate-gray deer-mouse, with his white belly, feared not my little friends, the winds; for oft I heard him, in the creamy October moonlight, tuning his tiny elfin song to the night wind’s fluting.

  On warm, spicy days Mr. Duncan and I would seek the stone church, sitting silent for hours in the purple and crimson rays of the stained window, watching the golden dust-bands slanting on the tomb.

  The resentment of bitter grief had died out in my heart; sorrow had been purged of selfishness; I felt the calm presence of the dead at my elbow where’er I went. Strength and quiet came to me in voiceless communion; high resolve, 336 patience, and hope were bred within me under the serene glow of those jewelled panes. On the gray-stone slab at my feet, dreaming, I read the story of a noble life, “Keep faith with all men,” and here, in silence, I sought to read and understand the changeless laws which shelter souls and mark the mile-stones of a blameless life.

  When the southwest sun hung gilding the clover, over miles of upland I passed, as I had roamed with him, twisting the bronzing sweet-fern from its woody stem, touching the silken milk-weed to set free its floss, halting, breast-deep in crimsoning sumach, to mark the headlong, whirling covey drive through the thorns into the purple dusk.

  His hounds bayed from their kennels; there was no one to cast them free; and the red fox throttled the fowls by moonlight; and the lynx squalled in the swamp. His horses trampled the stables till the oak floors, reverberating, hummed thunder; there was no one to bit and bridle them; the moorland clover swayed untrodden in the wind, and the dun stag stamped the crag.

  Night and day the river rushed to the sea; night and day the brooks prattled to their pebbles, the slim salmon lay in the pools, the lithe trout stemmed the gravel-rifts; but never a line whistled in the silence, and never a scarlet feather-fly sailed on the waters among the autumn leaves.

  Yet, though land and water were lonely without him, I was not lonely, for he walked with me always over the land he had known, and his voice was in the soft, mild winds he loved so well.

  With the memory of Silver Heels it was different. Every scented stem of sweet-fern was redolent of her; every grass-blade quivered for her; the winds called her all day long; the brooks whispered, “Where is Silver Heels?”

  Through our old play-grounds, in the orchard, on the stairs, through the darkened school-room I followed, haunting the vanished footsteps — gay, light, flying feet of the child I had loved so long, unknowing.

  Her stocks stood outside the nursery door; the brass key was on the nail. In her dim chamber hung the scent of lavender, while through the half-closed shutters a faint freshness crept, stirring the ghostly curtains of her bed.

  Wistfulness, doubt, tenderness, and sadness came and went like sun-spots on an April day. I waited with delicious dread for her return; I fretted, doubted, hoped, all in the same quick heart-beat, which was not all pain. Only that ghost of happiness which men call hope I knew in those long autumn days alone among the haunts of varied yesterdays.

  When the golden month drew near its end, amid the dropping glory of the maple-leaves, one sun-drenched morning I awoke to hear the drums and pipes skirling the march of “Tryon County Men”:

  “Hark to the horn in the dawn o’ the morn!

  Rally, whoever ye be;

  For it’s down Derry Down, and it’s over the lea,

  And it’s saddle and bridle as sure as you’re born!

  Scattered and trampled and torn is the corn

  As we ride to the war in the morning;

  Down Derry Down!

  Down Derry Down!

  For we ride to the war in the morning!”

  “Officer o’ the guard! Turn out the guard!” bawled the sentry under my window. As I looked out the drums came crashing past, and behind them tramped the Highlanders, kilts and sporrans swinging, firelocks aslant and claymore blades shining in the sun.

  It was the new regiment organized by Sir John, picked men all, and fierce partisans of the King, weeded from the militia regiment lately disbanded at Johnstown by order of Governor Tryon.

  Behind them, fifes squealing the “Huron,” came the reorganized battalion of yeomanry, now stripped clean of rebel suspects, and rechristened “Johnson’s Greens;” stout, brawny yokels with hats askew and the green cockade veiled in crape, their hunting-shirts caped triple and fringed deep in green wool, their powder-horns tasselled and chased in silver gilt.

  I watched them swinging north into the purple hills for their month’s training, the new order having arrived some eight days since from Governor Tryon.

  Leaning there in the casement, wrapped in my dressing-gown, I saw Colonel Guy Johnson ride up to the block-house, 338 dismount, and call out Mr. Duncan. Then began a great bustle among the soldiers, for what reason I did not understand, until a knocking at my door brought a gillie with Colonel Guy Johnson’s compliments, and would I dress in my uniform to receive Sir John, who was expected for breakfast.

  My heart began to beat madly; could it be possible that Sir John had brought Silver Heels, after all? Doctor Pierson had said that she would remain for the present in Boston; but perhaps Doctor Pierson did not know everything that went on in the world.

  To crush back hope from sheer dread of disappointment was a thankless task and too much for me. I dressed in my red uniform, tied my silver gorget, hung my sword, and drew on my spurred boots. Standing by the mirror, pensive, I thought of my delight in these same clothes when first I wore them for Sir William. Alas! alas! The gilt lace dulled under my eyes as I looked; the gorget tarnished; the spurs rang sadly in the silence. I twisted a strip of crape in my hilt, shook out the black badge on my sleeve, and went down-stairs, very soberly, in the livery of the King I must one day desert. Perhaps I was now wearing it for the last time. Well, such things matter nothing now; true hearts can beat as freely under a buckskin shirt as beneath the jewelled sashes of the great.

  As I reached the porch Mr. Duncan came hurrying past, buttoning his gloves.

  “Sir John is in the village,” he said, returning my salute, “and he has an escort of your regiment at his back. My varlets yonder need pipe-clay, but I dare not risk delay.”

  “Where is Colonel Guy?” I asked, but at that moment he came out of the stable in full uniform, and Mr. Duncan and I joined him at salute. He barely noticed me, as usual, but gave his orders to Mr. Duncan and then looked across the fields towards the village.

  “Is Felicity with Sir John?” I inquired.

  “No,” he answered, without turning.

  My throat swel
led and my mouth quivered. Where was she, then? What did all this mean?

  “By-the-by,” observed Colonel Guy, carelessly, “Sir John 339 has chosen another aide-de-camp in your place. You, of course, will join your regiment at Albany.”

  I looked at him calmly, but he was again gazing out across the fields. So Sir John, who had never cared about me, had rid himself of me. This brought matters to a climax. Truly enough, I was now wearing my red uniform for the last time.

  I looked across the yellowing fields where, on the highway, a troop of horse had come up over the hill and were now galloping hither in a veil of sparkling dust. I watched them indifferently; the drums at the guard-house were sounding, beating the major-general’s salute of two ruffles; the horsemen swept up past the ranks of presented firelocks and halted before the Hall.

  And now I saw Sir John in full uniform of his rank, badged with mourning, yet all a-glitter with medals and orders, slowly dismount, while gillie Bareshanks held his stirrup. Alas! alas! that he must be known by men as the son of his great father! — this cold, slow man, with distrustful eyes and a mouth which to see was to watch. His very voice seemed to sound a warning in its emotionless monotony; his lips said, “On guard, lest we trick you unawares.”

  Sir John greeted Colonel Guy, holding his hand and dropping into low conversation for a few moments. Then, as I gave him the officers’ salute, he rendered it and offered his hand, asking me how I did.

  I had the honour to report myself quite recovered, and in turn inquired concerning his own health, the health of Aunt Molly, and of Silver Heels; to which he replied that Mistress Molly with Esk and Peter was in Quebec; that Felicity was well; that he himself suffered somewhat from indigestion, but was otherwise in possession of perfect health.

  He then presented me to several officers of my own regiment, among them a very young cornet, who smiled at me in such friendly fashion that my lonely heart was warm towards him. His name was Rodman Girdwood, and he swaggered when he walked; but so frankly did he ruffle it that I could not choose but like him and smile indulgence on his guileless self-satisfaction.

  “They don’t like me,” he said, confidentially, as I took him to my own chamber so that he might remove the stains 340 of travel. “They don’t like me because I talk too much at mess. I say what I think, and I say it loud, sir.”

  “What do you say — loud?” I asked, smiling.

  “Oh, everything. I say it’s a damned shame to send British troops into Boston; I say it’s a doubly damned shame to close the port and starve the poor; I say that Tommy Gage is in a dirty business, and I, for one, hope the Boston people will hold on until the British Parliament find their senses. Oh, I don’t care who hears me!” he said, throwing off his coat and sword and plunging into the water-basin.

  His servant came to the door for orders, but Girdwood bade him let him alone and seek a pot o’ beer in the kitchen.

  “I trust I have not shocked your loyalty, Mr. Cardigan,” he said, using a towel vigorously.

  “Oh no,” I laughed.

  “I don’t mean to be discourteous,” he added, smoothing his ruffled lace; “but sometimes I feel as though I must stand up on a hill and shout across the ocean to Parliament, ‘Don’t make fools of yourselves’!”

  I was laughing so heartily that he turned around in humorous surprise.

  “I’m afraid you are one of those disrespectful patriots,” he said. “I never heard a Tory laugh at anything I said. Come, sir, pray repeat ‘God save the King’!”

  “God save” — we began together, then ended— “our country!”

  I looked at him gravely. He, too, had grown serious. Presently he held out his hand. I took it in silence.

  “Well, well,” he said, “I had little thought of finding a comrade in our new cornet.”

  “Nor I in the Border Horse,” said I, quietly.

  He turned to the mirror and began retying his queue ribbon. After a twist or two the smile came back to his lips and the jauntiness to his carriage.

  “It’s all in a lifetime,” he said. “Lord, but I’m hungry, Cardigan! Honest Abraham, I haven’t broken a crust since we left Schenectady!”

  “Come on, then,” I said; “we subalterns must not keep our superiors, you know.”

  “They wouldn’t wait for us, anyway,” he said, following 341 me down-stairs to the breakfast-room, into which already Sir John and his suite were crowding.

  The breakfast was short and dreary. Sir John’s unsympathetic presence had never yet warmed even his familiars to gayety. Those who were under his orders found him severe and unbending; his equals, I think, distrusted him; but his superiors saw in him a latent energy which they believed might be worth their control some day, and so studied him carefully, prepared for anything from fidelity to indifference, and even, perhaps, treachery.

  Benning, major in the Border Horse, strove indeed to liven the breakfast with liberal libations and jests, neither of which were particularly encouraged by Sir John. As for Colonel Guy Johnson, he brooded in his dish, a strange, dark, silent man who had never, to my knowledge, shown a single human impulse for either good or evil. He was a faultless executor of duty intrusted, obeying to the letter, yet never offering suggestions; a scrupulously clean man in speech and habit; a blameless husband, and an inoffensive neighbour. But that was all, and I had sooner had a stone idol as neighbour than Colonel Guy Johnson.

  The living Johnsons seemed to be alike in nature. I do not even now understand why I thought so, but I sometimes believed that they had, deep in them, something of that sombre ferocity which burned in the Butlers. Yet to me they had exhibited nothing but the most passionless reserve.

  When the gloomy breakfast was ended, Colonel Guy Johnson conducted his guests to the porch, where they made ready for the inspection of our two stone block-houses and the new artillery in the barracks, sent recently by Governor Tryon at Sir John’s request.

  Supposing I was to follow, as I no longer remained aide-de-camp to the major-general, I started off with Rodman Girdwood, but was recalled by a soldier, who reported that Sir John awaited me in the library.

  Sir John was sitting at the great oak table as I entered, and he motioned me to a seat opposite. He held in his hands a bundle of papers, which he slowly turned over and over in his fingers.

  He first informed me that he had selected another aide-de camp, 342 not because he expected to find me unsatisfactory, but because it was most desirable that young, inexperienced officers should join the colours as soon as possible. He said that the times were troublous and uncertain; that sedition was abroad in the land; that young men needed the counsel of loyal authority, and the example and discipline of military life. He expected me, he said, to return to Albany with the squadron which had served him as escort.

  To which I made no reply.

  He then spoke of the death of his father, of the responsibilities of his own position, and of his claim on me for obedience. He spoke of my mission to Cresap and the Cayugas as a mistake in policy; and I burned to hear him criticise Sir William’s acts. He asked me for my report, and I gave it to him, relating every circumstance of my meeting with the Cayugas, my peril, my rescue, the fight at Cresap’s fort, the treachery of Dunmore, Greathouse, Connolly, and the others.

  He frowned, listening with lowered eyes.

  I told him of the insult offered our family by Dunmore; I told how Silver Heels escaped. Then I related every circumstance in my relations with Walter Butler, from my first open quarrel with him here at the Hall to his deadly assault on me while in discharge of my mission, and finally how he had fallen under my fury in Dunmore’s presence.

  Sir John’s face was expressionless. He deplored the matters mentioned, saying that loyal men must stand together and not exterminate each other. He pointed out that Dunmore was the royal Governor of Virginia; that an alliance with Felicity was an honour we were most unwise to refuse; he regretted the quarrel between such a zealous loyalist as Walter Butler and myself, but coolly
informed me that he had heard from Butler, and that he was recovering slowly from the breaking of an arm, collar-bone, and many ribs.

  This calm acknowledgment that Sir John and my deadly enemy were in such intimacy set my blood boiling. His amazing complacency towards these men after the insults offered his own kin took my breath.

  He said that his policy in regard to the Cayuga rising was not the policy of Sir William. His efforts were directed 343 towards the solid assembling of all men, so that the loyal might in the hour of danger present an unbroken front to rebellion and discontent. It was, he said, my duty to lay aside all rancour against Lord Dunmore and Captain Butler. This was not the time to settle personal differences. Later, he could see no objection to my calling out Walter Butler or demanding reparation from Lord Dunmore, if I found it necessary.

  I was slowly beginning to hate Sir John.

  I therefore told him how we had done to death the wretch Greathouse; how I had shot the driver of the coach, who was the unknown man who had tasted his own hatchet in the forest.

  Sir John informed me that I and my party had also slain Wraxall and Toby Tice, and that Captain Murdy alone had escaped our fury.

  I was contented to hear it; contented to hear, too, that Walter Butler lived; for, though no man on earth deserved death more than he, I had not wished to slay any man in such a manner. I could wait, for I never doubted that he must one day die by my hand, though not the kind of death that he had escaped so narrowly.

  Sir John now spoke of the will left by Sir William. He held a copy in his hand and opened it.

  “You know,” he said, “that your fortune is not considerable, though my father has invested it most fortunately. The income is ample for a young man, and on the decease of your uncle, Sir Terence, you will come into his title and estate in Ireland. This should make you wealthy. However, Sir William saw fit to provide for you further.”

  He turned the pages of the document slowly, frowning.