"Does he know that it was me he loved so deeply in his madness?" asked Silver Heels, gently.
"I think he does," whispered Mount.
Silver Heels turned her sorrowful eyes on poor Cade Renard.
Riding that afternoon near sunset, at the False Faces" Carrying-Place upon the Mohawk, we spoke of Johnson Hall and the old life, sadly, for never again could we hope to enter its beloved portals.
Naught that belonged to us remained in the Hall, save only the memories none might rob us of.
"If only I might have Betty," said Silver Heels, wistfully.
"Betty? Did she not attend you to Boston with Sir John?" I asked.
"Yes, but she was slave to Sir John. I could not buy her; you know how poor I awoke to find myself in Boston town."
"Would not that brute allow you Betty?" I asked, angrily.
"No; I think he feared her. Poor, blubbering Betty, how she wept and roared her grief when Sir John bade her pack up, and called her "hussy.""
That night we lay at Schenectady, where also was camped a body of Sir William"s Mohawks, a sullen, watchful band, daubed in hunting-paint, yet their quivers hung heavy with triple-feathered war-arrows, and their knives and hatchets and their rifles were over-bright and clean to please me.
Some of them knew me, and came to talk with me over a birch-fire. I gave them tobacco, and we tarried by the birch-fire till the stars waned in the sky and the dawn-stillness fell on land and river; but from them I could learn nothing, save that Sir John and Colonel Guy had vowed to scalp their own neighbours should they as much as cry, "G.o.d save our country!" Evil news, truly, yet only set me firmer in my design to battle till the end for the freedom that G.o.d had given and kings would take away.
Silver Heels, quitting the inn with Mount, came to warn me that I must sleep if we set out at sunrise. Graciously she greeted the Mohawks who had risen to withdraw; they all knew her, and watched her like tame panthers with red coals in their eyes.
"But they are panthers yet; forget it not," muttered Jack Mount.
At sunrise we rode out into the blue hills. Homeless, yet nearing home at last, my heart lifted like a singing bird. Dew on the sweet-fern exhaling, dew on the ghost-flower, dew on the scented brake!--and the whistle of feathered wings, and the endless ringing chorus of the birds of Tryon! Hills of pure sapphire, streams of gems, limpid necklaces festooned to drip diamonds from crags into some frothing pool! Pendent pearls on vines starred white with bloom; a dun deer at gaze, knee-deep in feathering willow-gra.s.s; a hermit-bird his morning hymn, cloistered in the vaulted monastery where the great organ stirs among the pines!
Hills! Hills of Tryon, unploughed, unharrowed, save by the galloping deer; hills, sweet islands in the dark pine ocean, over whose waste the wild hawk"s mewing answers the cry of its high-wheeling mate; hills of the morning, aromatic with spiced fern, and perfumed of the gum of spruce and balsam; hills of Tryon; my hills! my hills!
"The spring is with us," said Jack Mount, stooping to pluck a frail flower.
"Ka-nah-wah-hawks, the cowslip!" murmured Silver Heels.
"Savour the wind; what is it?" I asked, sniffing.
"O-neh-tah, the pine!" she cried.
"O-ne-tah, the spruce!" I corrected.
"The pine, silly!"
"The spruce!"
"No, no, the pine!"
"So be it, sweet."
"No, I am wrong!"
And we laughed, and she stretched out her slender hand to me from her saddle.
Then we galloped forward together, calling out greeting to our old friends as we pa.s.sed; and thus we saluted Jis-kah-kah, the robin, and Kivi-yeh, the little owl, and we whistled at Koo-koo-e, the quail, and mocked at old Kah-kah, the watchful crow.
Han-nah-wen, the b.u.t.terfly, came flitting along the roadside, ragged with his long winter"s sleep.
"He should not have slept in his velvet robe for a night-shift," said Silver Heels; "he is a summer spendthrift, and Nah-wan-hon-tah, the speckled trout, lies watching him under the water."
Which set me thinking of my feather-flies; and then the dear old river flashed in sight.
"I see--I see--there, very far away on that hill--" whispered Silver Heels.
"I see," I muttered, choking.
Presently the sunlight glimmered on a window of the distant Hall.
"We are on our own land now, dear heart," I said, choking back the sob in my throat.
I called out to Jack Mount and unslung my woodaxe. He drew his hatchet, and together we cut down a fair young maple, trimmed it, and drove a heavy post into the soil.
"Here we will build one day," said I to Silver Heels. She smiled faintly, but her eyes were fixed on the distant Hall.
I had leased, from my lawyer, Peter Weaver, a large stone mansion in Johnstown, which stood next to the church where Sir William lay; this until such time as I might return from the war and find leisure to build on my own land the house which Silver Heels and I had planned to stand on a hill, in full view of the river and of the old Hall where our childhood had been pa.s.sed.
It was night when we rode into Johnstown. I could discover no changes in the darkness, save that a few new signs swung before lighted shops, and every fifth house hung out a lanthorn and a whole candle-light.
Our stone house was vast, damp, and scantily furnished, but Jack Mount lighted a fire in the hallway, and Silver Heels went about with a song on her lips, and Cade Renard sent servants from the nearest inn with cloth and tableware, and meats smoking hot, not forgetting a great bowl of punch and a cask of ale, which the scullions rolled into the great hall and hoisted on the skids.
So we were merry, and silent, too, at moments, when our eyes met in faint smiles or wistful sympathy.
Shemuel, with his peddling panniers, had strangely disappeared, nor could we find him high or low when Mount and Cade had set their own table by the fire and the room smelled sweet with steaming toddy.
"Thrift! Thrift!" muttered Mount, rattling his toddy-stick impatiently; "now who could have thought that little Jew would have cut away to make up time in trade this night!"
But Shemuel had traded in another manner, for, ere Mount had set his strong, white teeth in the breast-bone of a roasted fowl, I heard Silver Heels cry out: "Betty! Betty! Oh dear, dear Betty!" And the blubbering black woman came rolling in, scarlet turban erect, ear-rings jingling.
"Mah li"l dove! Mah li"l pigeon-dove! Oh Gord, mah li"l Miss Honey-bee!"
"You must keep her, lad," muttered Mount.
"I think Sir John will sell," I said, grimly.
And so he did, or would have, had not his new wife, poor Lady Johnson, whom I had never seen, writing from the Hall, begged me to accept Betty as a gift from her. And I, having no quarrel with the unhappy lady, accepted Betty as a gift, permitting Lady Johnson to secure from the incident what comfort she might.
All through the sweet May-tide, Jack Mount and Cade Renard sunned themselves under the trees in our garden, or sprawled on the warm porch like great, amiable wolf-hounds, dozing and dreaming of mighty deeds.