"A fine boy," she said, at length, "and my own boy"s good friend!" Then she smiled tenderly and kissed him on the forehead. Jeremy was then and there won over. All women were angels of light to him from that moment.
That night, alone in the white wilderness of his first four-poster, the poor New England boy missed his mother very hard, more perhaps than he had ever missed her before. He fell asleep on a pillow that was wet in spots--and he was not ashamed.
In the days that followed nothing in Delaware Colony was too good for the young heroes. Jeremy could never understand just _why_ they were heroes, but was forced to give up trying to explain the matter to an admiring populace. As for Bob, he gleefully accepted all the glory that was offered and at last persuaded Jeremy to take the affair as philosophically as himself. They were in a fair way to be spoiled, but fortunately there was enough sense of humor between them to bring them off safe from the head-patting gentlemen and tearfully rapturous ladies who gathered at the brick house of afternoons.
Perhaps the thing that really saved them from the effects of too much petting was the trip up the Brandywine to the Curtis plantation. It was a fine ride of thirty miles and the trail led through woods just turning red and yellow with the autumn frosts. Jeremy, though he had been on a horse only half a dozen times in his life, was a natural athlete and without fear. He was quick to learn and imitated Bob"s erect carriage and easy seat so well that long before they had reached their journey"s end he backed his tall roan like an old-timer. With Job it was a different matter. He was all sailor, and though the times demanded that every man who travelled cross-country must do it in the saddle, the lank New Englander would have ridden a gale any day in preference to a steed.
Even Jeremy could afford to laugh at the sorry figure his big friend made.
The trail they followed was no more than a rough cutting, eight or ten feet wide, running through the forest. Here and there paths branched off to right or left and up one of these Bob turned at noon. It led them over a wooded hill, then down a long slope into the valley of a stream.
"John Cantwell"s plantation. We"ll stop here for a bite to eat,"
explained the boy. By the water side, in a wide clearing, was a group of log huts and farther along, a square house built of rough gray stone.
They rode up to the wide door which looked down upon the river. In answer to Bob"s hail a colored boy in a red jacket ran out to take the horses" heads and four black and white fox terriers tore round the corner barking a chorus of welcome. Bob jumped down with a laughing, "Ah there, Rufus!" to the horse-boy, and proceeded to roll the excited little dogs on their backs. As Jeremy and Job dismounted, a big man in sober gray came to the doorway. His strong, kindly face broke into a smile as he caught sight of his visitors. "Well, Bob, I"m mightily glad to see thee back, lad! We got news from the town only yesterday." He strode down the steps and took the boy"s hand in a hearty grip, then greeted the others, as Bob introduced them. Jeremy marvelled much at the cut of the man"s coat, which was without a collar, and at his continual use of the plain _thee_ and _thy_. But there was a direct simplicity about all his ways, and a gentleness in his eyes that won the boy to him instantly.
One moment only he wandered at John Cantwell. In the next he had forgotten everything about him and stood open-mouthed, gazing at the square doorway. In the sun-lit frame of it had appeared a little girl of twelve. She was dressed demurely in gray, set off with a bit of white kerchief. Her long skirt hid her toes and her hands were folded most properly. But above this sober stalk bloomed the fairest face that Jeremy had ever seen. She had merry hazel eyes, a straight little nose and a firm little chin. Her plain bonnet had fallen back from her head and the brown curls that strayed recklessly about her cheeks seemed to catch all the sunbeams in Delaware.
For a very little time she stood, and then the pursed red mouth could be controlled no longer. She opened it in a whoop of joy and catching up her skirts ran to smother Bob in a great hug. Next moment Jeremy, still in a daze, was bowing over her hand, as he had learned to do at New Castle. She dropped him a little curtsey and turned to meet Job.
Betty Cantwell and her father were Quakers from the Penn Colony to the north, Bob had time to tell Jeremy as they entered. That accounted for the staid simplicity of their dress and their quaint form of speech--the plain language, as it was called. Jeremy had heard of the Quakers, though in New England they were much persecuted for their beliefs by the Puritans. Here, apparently, people not only allowed them to live, but liked and honored them as well. He prayed fervently that Betty might never chance to visit Boston town. Yet already he half hoped that she would. Of course, he would have grown bigger by then, and would carry a sword and how he would p.r.i.c.k the thin legs of the first grim deacon who dared so much as to speak to her! These imaginings were put to rout at the dining-room door by the delicious savor of roast turkey. One of the black farmhands had shot the great bird the day before, and the three travellers had arrived just at the fortunate moment when it was to be carved.
It was a dinner never to be forgotten. The twenty miles they had ridden through the crisp air would have given them an appet.i.te, even had they not been normally good trenchermen, and there were fine white potatoes and yams that accompanied the turkey, not to mention some jelly which Betty admitted having made herself, "with cook"s help." Bob joyfully attacked his heaped-up plate and ate with relish every minute that he was not talking. Jeremy could say not a word, for opposite him was Betty and in her presence he felt very large and awkward. His hands troubled him. Indeed, had it been a possibility, he would have eaten his turkey without raising them above the table edge. As it was, he felt himself blush every time a vast red fist came in evidence. Yet he succeeded in making a good meal and would not have been elsewhere for all Solomon Brig"s gold. Perhaps Job, who was neither talkative nor under the spell of a lady"s eyes, wielded the best knife and fork of the three.
Dinner over, and Bob"s story finished, they were taken to see the stable and the broad tilled fields by the river bank, where corn stood shocked among the stubble. Afternoon came and soon it was time for them to start. There were laughing farewells and a promise that they would stop on the return trip, and before Jeremy could come back to earth the gloom of the forest shut in above their heads once more. They put the horses to a canter as soon as the ridge was cleared, for there were still ten miles to go and the light was waning. Jeremy was very much at home in the woods, but the chill, sombre depths that appeared and reappeared on either hand seemed to warn him to be prepared. He reached to the saddlebow, undid the flap of the pistol holster, and made sure that his weapon was loaded, then put it back, rea.s.sured. The footing was bad, and they had to go more slowly for a while. Then Bob, in the lead, came to a more open s.p.a.ce where light and ground alike favored better speed. He spurred his horse to a gallop and had turned to call to the others, when suddenly the animal he rode gave a snort of fear and stopped with braced forefeet. Bob, caught off his guard, went over the horse"s head with a lurch and fell sprawling on the ground in front. Then he gave a scream, for not two feet away he saw the short, cruel head of a coiled rattlesnake.
Jeremy, riding close behind, pulled up beside the other horse and threw himself off. Even as he touched the ground a sharp whirr met his ear and he saw the fat, still body and vibrating tail of the snake. He wrenched the pistol from the holster, took the quickest aim of his life and pulled the trigger. After the shot apparently nothing had changed.
The whirr of the rattle went on for a second or two, then gradually subsided. Bob lay white-faced, and still as death. Jeremy drew a step closer and then gave a choked cry of relief. The snake"s smooth, diamond-marked body remained coiled for the spring. Its lithe forepart was thrust forward from the top coil and the venemous, blunt head--but the head was no more. Jeremy"s ball had taken it short off.
Bob was unhurt, but badly shaken and frightened, and they followed the trail slowly through the dusk. Then just as the shadows that obscured their way were turning to the deep dark of night a small light became visible straight ahead. They pushed on and soon were luxuriously stretched before a log fire in the Curtis plantation house, while Mrs.
Robbins, the overseer"s wife, poured them a cup of hot tea.
When bedtime came, Bob came over to Jeremy and gave him a long grip of the hand, but said never a word. There was no need of words, for the New England boy knew that his chum would never be quite happy till he could repay his act in kind. Yet he could not tell Bob that the shooting of a snake was but a small return for the gift of a vision of one of heaven"s angels. Each felt himself the other"s debtor as they got into the great feather bed side by side.
CHAPTER XXIV
Two boys turned loose on a present-day farm can find enough interesting things to do to fill a book much larger than this. For me to go into the details of that week"s visit to Avon Dale would preclude any possible chance of your hearing the end of this story. And there are still many things that need telling.
But though no great or grave adventure befell the two boys while they stayed at the plantation, you may imagine the days they spent together.
Back of the farm buildings lay the fields, all up and down the river bank for miles. And back of the fields, crowding close to the edge of the plowed ground, the big trees of an age-old forest rose. The great wild woods ran straight back from the plantation for five hundred miles, broken only by rivers and the steep slopes of the Alleghanies, as yet hardly heard of by white men. Giant oaks, ashes and tulip trees mingled with the pine and hemlock growth. The hillsides where the sun shone through were thick with rhododendron and laurel. And all through this sylvan paradise the upper branches and the underbrush teemed with wild life. Squirrels, partridges and occasional turkeys offered frequent marks for the long muzzle-loading rifles, while a thousand little song birds flitted constantly through the leaves. Jeremy had never seen such hunting in his colder northern country. The game was bigger and more dangerous in New England, but never had he found it so plentiful. As the boys were both good marksmen, a great rivalry sprang up between them.
They scorned any but the hardest shots--the bright eye of a squirrel above a hickory limb fifty yards off or the downy form of a wood pigeon preening in a tree top. Though a good deal of powder and lead was spent in the process, they were shooting like old leather-stocking hunters by the end of the week.
The last two days had to be spent indoors, for a heavy autumn rain that came one night held over persistently and drenched the valley with a sullen, steady pour. Little muddy rivulets swept down across the fields and joined the already swollen current of the Brandywine. On the morning when they started back, the river was running high and fast and yellow along the low banks, but a bright sun shone, and a fresh breeze out of the west promised fair weather.
The horses were left at the plantation. They took their guns and a day"s provisions and carried a long, narrow-beamed canoe down to the sh.o.r.e. It was a dugout, quite unlike the graceful birch affairs that Jeremy had seen among the Pen.o.bscots, but serviceable and seaworthy enough.
Job, happy to be on the water once more, took the stern paddle, Bob knelt in the bow, and Jeremy squatted amidships with the blankets and guns. With a cry of farewell to the kindly folk on the bank, they shoved out and shot away down the swift river.
It was exciting work. The stream had overflowed its banks for many yards and the brown water swirled in eddies among the trees. To keep the canoe in the main channel required judgment and good steering. Job proved equal to the occasion and though with their paddling the swiftness of the current gave the craft a speed of over ten miles an hour, he brought her down without mishap into a wide-spreading cove. They rested, drifting slowly across the slack water. "This can"t be far from Cantwell"s," Bob was saying, when Jeremy gave a startled exclamation, and pointed toward the sh.o.r.e, some fifty yards away. A little girl in a gray frock stood on the bank, her arms full of golden rod and asters.
She had not seen the canoe, for she was looking behind her up the bank.
At that instant there was a crashing in the brush and a big buck deer stepped out upon the sh.o.r.e, tossing his gleaming antlers to which a few shreds of summer "velvet" still clung. He was not twenty feet from the girl, who faced him, perfectly still, the flowers dropping one by one from her ap.r.o.n.
It was the rutting season and the buck was in a fighting mood. But he was puzzled by this small motionless antagonist. He hesitated a bare second before launching his wicked charge. Then as he bellowed his defiance there came a loud report. The buck"s haunches wavered, then straightened with a jerk, as he made a great leap up the bank and fell dead. From Jeremy"s long-barrelled gun a wisp of smoke floated away.
Betty Cantwell sat down very suddenly and seemed about to cry, but as the canoe shot up to the sh.o.r.e she was smiling once more. They took her aboard and started down stream again. A few hundred yards brought them to the edge of the Cantwell clearing, where Bob hailed the negroes working in the field and gave them orders for bringing down the dead buck.
At the landing John Cantwell was waiting in some anxiety, for the sound of Jeremy"s shot had reached him at the house. Bob told the story, somewhat to Jeremy"s embarra.s.sment, for nothing was spared in the telling. The Quaker thanked him with great earnestness and reproved his daughter gently for straying beyond the plantation.
After another of those famous dinners Job and the boys returned to their craft, for there were many miles to make before night. As Jeremy took up the bow paddle he waved to Betty on the bank, and thrilled with happiness at the shy smile she gave him. Once again they were in the current, shooting downstream toward tidewater.
It was mid-afternoon when they crossed the Brandywine bar and paddled past the docks of Wilmington. Outside in the Delaware there was a choppy sea that made their progress slower, and the sun had set when the slim little craft ran in for the beach above New Castle. The voyagers shouldered their packs and made their way up the High Street to the brick house.
When the greetings were over and the boys were changing their clothes before coming down for supper, Clarke Curtis entered their room. "Lads,"
he said, "I"d advise you to go early to bed tonight. You"ll need a long rest, for in the morning you start overland for New York." At Bob"s exclamation of surprise he went on to explain that the _Indian Queen_ had weighed anchor two days before for that port, and as there was no other ship leaving the Delaware soon, he wished the boys to board her at New York for the voyage to New England. Both youngsters were overjoyed at the prospect of an early start. Bob, who had been promised that he could accompany his chum, was hilarious over the news, while Jeremy was too happy to speak.
Later, as they were packing their belongings for the trip, Job Howland came in. He, too, looked excited. "Jeremy, boy," he said, "I"d have liked to go north with you, but something else has come my way. Mr.
Curtis bought a new schooner, the _Tiger_, last week, and she"s being fitted out now for a coast trader. He offered me the chance to command her!"
"Three cheers!" shouted Bob. "Then New Castle will be your home port, and I"ll see you after every voyage!"
The three comrades chatted of their prospects a while and shortly went to bed.
CHAPTER XXV
The boys and their luggage were on their way to Wilmington in the family chaise before dawn, and it was scarce seven o"clock when they bade farewell to the old colored serving-man and clambered aboard the four-horse coach that connected in Philadelphia with the mail coach for New York.
The coaches of that day were c.u.mbersome affairs, huge of wheel, and with ridiculously small bodies slung on wide strips of bull"s hide which served for springs. The driver"s box was high above the forward running gear. There were as yet no "seats on top," such as were developed in the later days of fast stage-coach service.
In one of these rumbling, swaying conveyances the boys rode the thirty miles to Philadelphia, crossing the Schuylkill at Gray"s Ferry about noon. They had barely time for a bite of lunch in the White Horse Tavern before the horn was blown outside and they hurried to take their places in the north-bound coach. Along the cobbled streets of the bustling, red-brick town they rumbled for a few moments, then out upon the smooth dirt surface of the York Road, where the four good horses were put to a gallop.
The Delaware, opposite Trenton, was reached by six o"clock, and there the half-dozen pa.s.sengers left the coach and were carried across on a little ferry boat, rowed by an old man and his two sons. They spent the night at an Inn and next morning early boarded another coach bound northeast over the spa.r.s.ely settled hills of New Jersey. The road was narrow and bad in places, slackening their speed. Twice the horses were changed, in little hamlets along the way. In the late afternoon they crossed the marshy flats beyond Newark and just after dusk emerged on the Jersey side of the Hudson. A few lights glimmered from the low Manhattan sh.o.r.e. The quaint Dutch-English village which was destined to grow in two hundred years to be the greatest city in the world, lay quiet in the gathering dark.
The ferry was just pulling out from sh.o.r.e, but at the sound of the coach horn it swung back into its slip and waited for the pa.s.sengers to board.
A gruff Hollander by the name of Peter Houter was the ferryman. He stood at the clumsy steering-beam, while four stout rowers manned the oars of his wide, flat-bottomed craft. Approaching the steersman, Bob asked where in the town he would be likely to find the Captain of a merchantman then taking cargo in the port. The Dutchman named two taverns at which visiting seafaring men could commonly be found. One was the "Three Whales" and the other the "Bull and Fish."
Landing on the Manhattan sh.o.r.e, the boys shouldered their luggage and trudged by ill-lighted lanes across the island to the East River. As they advanced along the dock-side, Jeremy distinguished among the low-roofed houses a small inn before which a great sign swung in the wind. By the light which flickered through the windows they could make out three dark monsters painted upon the board, a white tree apparently growing from the head of each. "The Three Whales," laughed Jeremy, "and every one a-blowing! Let"s go in!"
It was an ill-smelling and dingy room that they entered. A score of men in rough sailor clothes lounged at the tables or lolled at the bar. Two pierced tin lanterns shed a faint smoky light over the scene. Bob waited by their baggage at the door, while Jeremy made his way from one group to another, inquiring for Captain Ghent of the _Indian Queen_. Several of the mariners nodded at mention of the ship, but none could give him word of the skipper"s whereabouts.
As he was turning to go out he noticed a man drinking alone at a table in the darkest corner. His eyes were fixed moodily on his gla.s.s and he did not look up. Jeremy shivered, took a step nearer, and almost cried out, for he had caught a glimpse of a livid, diagonal scar cutting across the nose from eyebrow to chin. It was such a scar as could belong to only one man on earth. Jeremy retreated to a darker part of the room and watched till the man lifted his head. It was Pharaoh Daggs and none other.
A moment later the boy had hurried to Bob outside and told him his news.
"If we can find Ghent," said Bob, "he will be able to summon soldiers and have him placed under arrest."