Cross never knew of the hopes and joys he had unwittingly crushed. The two young men became friends, intimates, brothers, serving in half the lands of Europe side by side. The maiden, an orphan now, and of substance and degree, came over at last to France, and Lynch stood by, calm-faced, and saw her married to his friend. She only pleasantly remembered him; he never forgot her till his death.
Finally, in 1745, when both men were nearing middle age, the time for striking the great blow was thought to have arrived. The memory of Lynch"s lineage was much stronger with the romantic young Pretender of his generation than had been the rightfully closer tie between their more selfish fathers, and princely favor gave him a prominent position among those who arranged that brilliant melodrama of Glenfinnan and Edinburgh and Preston Pans, which was to be so swiftly succeeded by the tragedy of Culloden. The two friends were together through it all--in its triumph, its disaster, its rout--but they became separated afterward in the Highlands, when they were hiding for their lives. Cross, it seems, was able to lie secure until his wife"s relatives, through some Whig influence, I know not what, obtained for him amnesty first, then leave to live in England, and finally a commission under the very sovereign he had fought. His comrade, less fortunate, at least contrived to make way to Ireland and then to France. There, angered and chagrined at unjust and peevish rebukes offered him, he renounced the bad cause, took the name of Stewart, and set sail to the New World.
This was my patron"s story, as I gathered it in later years, and which perhaps I have erred in bringing forward here among my childish recollections. But, it seems to belong in truth much more to this day on which, for the first and last time I beheld Major Cross, than to the succeeding period when his son became an actor in the drama of my life.
The sun was now well up in the sky, and the snow was melting. While I still moodily eyed my young enemy and wondered how I should go about to acquit myself of the task laid upon me--to play with him--he solved the question by kicking into the moist snow with his boots and calling out:
"Aha! we can build a fort with this, and have a fine attack. Bob, make me a fort!"
Seeing that he bore no malice, my temper softened toward him a little, and I set to helping the negro in his work. There was a great pile of logs in the clearing close to the house, and on the sunny side near this the little girl was placed, in a warm, dry spot; and here we two, with sticks and b.a.l.l.s of snow, soon reared a mock block-house. The English boy did no work, but stood by and directed us with enthusiasm. When the structure was to his mind, he said:
"Now we will make up some s...o...b..a.l.l.s, and have an attack I will be the Englishman and defend the fort; you must be the Frenchman and come to drive me out. You can have Bob with you for a savage, if you like; only he must throw no b.a.l.l.s, but stop back in the woods and whoop. But first we must have some hard b.a.l.l.s made, so that I may hit you good when you come up.--Bob, help this boy make some b.a.l.l.s for me!"
Thus outlined, the game did not attract me. I did not so much mind doing his work for him, since he was company, so to speak, but it did go against my grain to have to manufacture the missiles for my own hurt.
"Why should I be the Frenchman?" I said, grumblingly. "I am no more a Frenchman than you are yourself."
"You"re a Dutchman, then, and it"s quite the same," he replied. "All foreigners are the same."
"It is you who are the foreigner," I retorted with heat. "How can I be a foreigner in my own country, here where I was born?"
He did not take umbrage at this, but replied with argument: "Why, of course you"re a foreigner. You wear an ap.r.o.n, and you are not able to even speak English properly."
This reflection upon my speech pained even more than it nettled me. Mr.
Stewart had been at great pains to teach me English, and I had begun to hope that he felt rewarded by my proficiency. Years afterward he was wont to laughingly tell me that I never would live long enough to use English correctly, and that as a boy I spoke it abominably, which I dare say was true enough. But just then my childish pride was grievously piqued by Philip"s criticism.
"Very well, I"ll be on the outside, then," I said. "I won"t be a Frenchman, but I"ll come all the same, and do you look out for yourself when I _do_ come," or words to that purport.
We had a good, long contest over the snow wall. I seem to remember it all better than I remember any other struggle of my life, although there were some to come in which existence itself was at stake, but boys" mimic fights are not subjects upon which a writer may profitably dwell. It is enough to say that he defended himself very stoutly, hurling the b.a.l.l.s which Bob had made for him with great swiftness and accuracy, so that my head was sore for a week. But my blood was up, and at last over the wall I forced my way, pushing a good deal of it down as I went, and, grappling him by the waist, wrestled with and finally threw him. We were both down, with our faces in the snow, and I held him tight. I expected that he would be angry, and hot to turn the play into a real fight; but he said instead, mumbling with his mouth full of snow:
"Now you must pretend to scalp me, you know."
My aunt called us at this, and we all trooped into the house again. The little girl had crowed and clapped her hands during our struggle, all unconscious of the dreadful event of which it was a juvenile travesty. We two boys admired her as she was borne in on the negro"s shoulder, and Philip said:
"I am going to take her to England, for a playmate. Papa has said I may.
My brother Digby has no sport in him, and he is much bigger than me, besides. So I shall have her all for my own. Only I wish she weren"t Dutch."
When we entered the house the two gentlemen were seated at the table, eating their dinner, and my aunt had spread for us, in the chimney-corner, a like repast. She took the little girl off to her own room, the kitchen, and we fell like famished wolves upon the smoking venison and onions.
The talk of our elders was mainly about a personage of whom I could not know anything then, but whom I now see to have been the Young Pretender.
They spoke of him as "he," and as leading a painfully worthless and disreputable life. This Mr. Stewart, who was twelve years the Chevalier"s senior, and, as I learned later, had been greatly attached to his person, deplored with affectionate regret. But Major Cross, who related incidents of debauchery and selfishness which, being in Europe, had come to his knowledge about the prince, did not seem particularly cast down.
"It"s but what might have been looked for," he said, lightly, in answer to some sad words of my patron"s. "Five generations of honest men have trusted to their sorrow in the breed, and given their heads or their estates or their peace for not so much as a single promise kept, or a single smile without speculation in it. Let them rot out, I say, and be d.a.m.ned to them!"
"But he was such a goodly lad, Tony. Think of him as we knew him--and now!"
"No, I"ll _not_ think, Tom," broke in the officer, "for, when I do, then I too get soft-hearted. And I"ll waste no more feeling or faith on any of "em--on any of "em, save the only true man of the lot, who"s had the wit to put the ocean "twixt him and them. And you"re content here, Tom?"
"Oh, ay! Why not?" said Mr. Stewart. "It is a rude life in some ways, no doubt, but it"s free and it"s honest. I have my own roof, such as it is, and no one to gainsay me under it. I hunt, I fish, I work, I study, I dream--precisely what pleases me best."
"Ay, but the loneliness of it!"
"Why, no! I see much of Johnson, and there are others round about to talk with, when I"m driven to it. And then there"s my young Dutchman--Douw, yonder--who bears me company, and fits me so well that he"s like a second self."
The Major looked over toward my corner with a benevolent glance, but without comment. Presently he said, while he took more meat upon his plate:
"You"ve no thought of marrying, I suppose?"
"None!" said my patron, gravely and with emphasis.
The Major nodded his handsome head meditatively. "Well, there"s a deal to be said on that side," he remarked. "Still, children about the hearth help one to grow old pleasantly. And you always had a weakness for brats."
Mr. Stewart said again: "I have my young Dutchman."
Once more the soldier looked at me, and, I"ll be bound, saw me blushing furiously. He smiled and said:
"He seems an honest chap. He has something of your mouth, methinks."
My patron pushed his dish back with a gesture of vexation.
"No!" he said, sharply. "There"s none of that. His father was a dominie over the river; his mother, a good, hard-working lady, left a widow, struggles to put bread in a dozen mouths by teaching a little home-school for infants. I have the boy here because I like him--because I want him.
We shall live together--he and I. As he gets older this hut will doubtless grow into a house fit for gentlemen. Indeed, already I have the logs cut out in part for an addition, on the other side of the chimney."
The Major rose at this, smiling again, and frankly put out his hand.
"I meant no harm, you know, Tom, by my barracks jest. Faith! I envy the lad the privilege of living here with you. The happiest days of my life, dear friend, were those we spent together while I was waiting for my bride."
Mr. Stewart returned his smile rather sadly, and took his hand.
The time for parting had come. The two men stood hand in hand, with moistened eyes and slow-coming words, meeting for perhaps the last time in this life; for the Major was to stop but an hour at Fort Johnson, and thence hasten on to New York and to England, bearing with him weighty despatches.
While they still stood, and the negro was tying Master Philip"s hat over his ears, my aunt entered the room, bearing in her arms the poor little waif from the ma.s.sacre. The child had been washed and warmed, and wore over her dress and feet a sort of mantle, which the good woman had hastily and somewhat rudely fashioned meantime.
"Oh, we came near forgetting her!" cried Philip. "Wrap her snug and warm, Bob, for the journey."
The Major looked blank at sight of the child, who nestled in my aunt"s arms. "What am I to do with her?" he said to my patron.
"Why, papa, you know she is going to England with us," said the boy.
"Tut, lad!" spoke the Major, peremptorily; then, to Mr. Stewart: "Could Sir William place her, think you, or does that half-breed swarm of his fill the house? It seemed right enough to bring her out from the Palatine country, but now that she"s out, damme! I almost wish she was back again.
What a fool not to leave her at Herkimer"s!"
I do not know if I had any clear idea of what was springing up in Mr.
Stewart"s mind, but it seems to me that I must have looked at him pleadingly and with great hope in my eyes, during the moment of silence which followed. Mr. Stewart in turn regarded the child attentively.
"Would it please you to keep her here, Dame Kronk?" he asked at last.