Murphy came jauntily up the hill, saluted me with easy respect, and drew from his pouch a small packet of papers which he handed me, nodding carelessly at Elerson and staring hard at Mount as though he did not recognize him.
"Phwat"s this?" he inquired of Elerson--"a Frinch cooroor, or maybe a Sac shquaw in a buck"s shirrt?"
"Don"t introduce him to me," said Mount to Elerson; "he"ll try to kiss my hand, and I hate ceremony."
"Quit foolin"," said Elerson, as the two big, over-grown boys seized each other and began a rough-and-tumble frolic. "You"re just cuttin"
capers, Tim, becuz you"ve heard that we"re takin" the war-path--quit pullin" me, you big Irish elephant! Is it true we"re takin" the war-path?"
"How do I know?" cried Murphy; but the twinkle in his blue eyes betrayed him; "bedad, "tis home to the purty la.s.ses we go this blessed day, f"r the crool war is over, an" the King"s got the pip, an--"
"Murphy!" I said.
"Sorr," he replied, letting go of Mount and standing at a respectful slouch.
"Did you get Beacraft there in safety?"
"I did, sorr."
"Any trouble?"
"None, sorr--f"r me."
I opened the first despatch, looking at him keenly.
"Do we take the war-path?" I asked.
"We do, sorr," he said, blandly. "McDonald"s in the hills wid the McCraw an"ten score renegades. Wan o" their scouts struck old man Sch.e.l.l"s farm an" he put buckshot into sivinteen o" them, or I"m a liar where I shtand!"
"I knew it," muttered Elerson to Mount. "Where you see smoke, there"s fire; where you see Murphy, there"s trouble. Look at the grin on him--and his hatchet shined up like a Cayuga"s war-axe!"
I opened the despatch; it was from Schuyler, countermanding his instructions for me to go to Stanwix, and directing me to warn every settlement in the Kingsland district that McDonald and some three hundred Indians and renegades were loose on the Schoharie, and that their outlying scouts had struck Broadalbin.
I broke the wax of the second despatch; it was from Harrow, briefly thanking me for the capture of Beacraft, adding that the man had been sent to Albany to await court-martial.
That meant that Beacraft must hang; a most disagreeable feeling came over me, and I tore open the third and last paper, a bulky doc.u.ment, and read it:
"VARICK MANOR, "June the 2d.
"An hour to dawn.
"In my bedroom I am writing to you the adieu I should have said the night you left. Murphy, a rifleman, goes to you with despatches in an hour: he will take this to you, ...
wherever you are.
"I saw the man you sent in. Father says he must surely hang.
He was so pale and silent, he looked so dreadfully tired--and I have been crying a little--I don"t know why, because all say he is a great villain.
"I wonder whether you are well and whether you remember me."
("me" was crossed out and "us" written very carefully.) "The house is so strange without you. I go into your room sometimes. Cato has pressed all your fine clothes. I go into your room to read. The light is very good there. I am reading the Poems of Pansard. You left a fern between the pages to mark the poem called "Our Deaths"; did you know it? Do you admire that verse? It seems sad to me. And it is not true, either. Lovers seldom die together." (This was crossed out, and the letter went on.) "Two people who love--" ("love" was crossed out heavily and the line continued)--"two friends seldom die at the same instant. Otherwise there would be no terror in death.
"I forgot to say that Isene, your mare, is very well. Papa and the children are well, and Ruyven a-pestering General Schuyler to make him a cornet in the legion of horse, and Cecile, all airs, goes about with six officers to carry her shawl and fan.
"For me--I sit with Lady Schuyler when I have the opportunity. I love her; she is so quiet and gentle and lets me sit by her for hours, perfectly silent. Yesterday she came into your room, where I was sitting, and she looked at me for a long time--so strangely--and I asked her why, and she shook her head. And after she had gone I arranged your linen and sprinkled lavender among it.
"You see there is so little to tell you, except that in the afternoon some Senecas and Tories shot at one of our distant tenants, a poor man, one Christian Sch.e.l.l; and he beat them off and killed eleven, which was very brave, and one of the soldiers made a rude song about it, and they have been singing it all night in their quarters. I heard them from your room--where I sometimes sleep--the air being good there; and this is what they sang:
""A story, a story Unto you I will tell, Concerning a brave hero, One Christian Sch.e.l.l.
""Who was attacked by the savages.
And Tories, it is said; But for this attack Most freely they bled.
""He fled unto his house For to save his life.
Where he had left his arms In care of his wife.
""They advanced upon him And began to fire, But Christian with his blunderbuss Soon made them retire.
""He wounded Donald McDonald And drew him in the door, Who gave an account Their strength was sixty-four.
""Six there was wounded And eleven there was killed Of this said party, Before they quit the field."
"And I think there are a hundred other verses, which I will spare you; not that I forget them, for the soldiers sang them over and over, and I had nothing better to do than to lie awake and listen.
"So that is all. I hear my messenger moving about below; I am to drop this letter down to him, as all are asleep, and to open the big door might wake them.
"Good-bye.
"It was not my rifleman, only the sentry. They keep double watch since the news came about Sch.e.l.l. "Good-bye. I am thinking of you.
"DOROTHY.
"Postscript.--Please make my compliments and adieux to Sir George Covert.
"Postscript.--The rifleman is here; he is whistling like a whippoorwill. I must say good-bye. I am mad to go with him.
Do not forget me!
"My memories are so keen, so pitilessly real, I can scarce endure them, yet cling to them the more desperately.
"I did not mean to write this--truly I did not! But here, in the dusk, I can see your face just as it looked when you said good-bye!--so close that I could take it in my arms despite my vows and yours!
"Help me to reason; for even G.o.d cannot, or will not, help me; knowing, perhaps, the dreadful after-life He has doomed me to for all eternity. If it is true that marriages are made in heaven, where was mine made? Can you answer? I cannot.
(The whimper of the whippoorwill again!) Dearest, good-bye.
Where my body lies matters nothing so that you hold my soul a little while. Yet, even of that they must rob you one day.
Oh, if even in dying there is no happiness, where, where does it abide? Three places only have I heard of: the world, heaven, and h.e.l.l. G.o.d forgive me, but I think the last could cover all.
"Say that you love me! Say it to the forest, to the wind.
Perhaps my soul, which follows you, may hear if you only say it. (Once more the ghost-call of the whippoorwill!) Dear lad, good-bye!"