At this instant the Lad dropped the bow upon the strings. Strong and round, mellow and sweet, the note swelled forth. Starting with the least filament of sound, it wove itself into a compact chord of sonorous resonance; filled the great parlors; passed through the doorway into the receptive stillness outside; charged it with throbbings—thus held the air a moment; reigned in it—then, calling its powers back to itself, drew in its vibrating tones; checked its undulating force; and leaving the air by easy retirement, came back like a bird to its nest and died away within the recesses of the dark, melodious shell from whence it started.
When the bow first began its course across the strings the old Trapper's eyes were on it; and as the note grew and swelled he seemed to grow with it. His great fingers shut into their palms as if an unseen power was pulling at the chords. His breast heaved. His mouth actually opened. It was as if the rising, swelling, pulsating sounds actually lifted him from off the floor on which he stood, and when the magnificent note ebbed and finally died away within the violin, not only he, but all the company stood breathless: charmed, surprised, astonished into silence at the wondrous note they had heard.
The old Trapper was the first to move. He brought his brawny hand down heavily upon Herbert's shoulder, and, with a face actually on fire with the fervor stirred within him, exclaimed:
"Lord-a-massy! Henry, did ye ever hear a noise like that? I say, boy, did ye ever hear a noise like that? Where on arth did it all come from? Why, boy, 'twas as long and as solemn as a funeral, as arnest as the cry of a panther, and roared like a nest of hornets when ye poke 'em with a stick. If that's a fiddle, I wonder what the other things be that I have heerd the half-breeds and the Frenchers play in the clearin's."
Well might the old Trapper be astonished. The violin of unknown age and make was one among ten thousand. It was a concert to hear the Lad tune it; which he did with a bold and skilful touch, and the exactness of an ear which nature had made exquisitely true to time and chord. His bashfulness was gone. His timidity had departed. His awkwardness, even, went out of body and arm and fingers, with the initial note. His soul had found its life with his mother's gift; and he who was so weak and hesitating in ordinary moments, found courage and strength, and the dignity of a master, when he touched the strings. At last the instrument was ready. And with a flourish bold and free he struck into the measures of a waltz that filled the parlor with circling noise, and made the air throb and beat—swing and swell, as if it were liquid, and unseen hands were moving it with measured undulations.
There was no resisting an influence so sweet, subtle, and pervasive, as flowed from that easy-going bow, as it came and went over the resounding strings. Couple after couple swung off into the open space, until the entire company were swinging and floating through the dreamy and bewitching measures. The god of music was actually in the room, and his strong, passionate touch was on the souls of those who were floated hither and thither as if blown by his invisible breath. The music took possession of the dancers. It banished the mortal heaviness from their frames, and made them buoyant, so that their feet scarce touched the floor. Up and down and across from side to side and end to end they whirled and floated. They moved as if a power which took the place of wings was in them. They did not seem to know that they were dancing. They did not dance; they floated, flowing like a current moved by easy undulations. Their hands were clasped. Their faces nearly touched. Their eyes were closed or glowing. And still the long bow came and went, and still the music rose and sank, swelled and ebbed, as easy waves advance, retreat and flood again, breaking in white and lazy murmurs at twilight on the dusky beach.
Herbert stood still; his eyes were lifted, the gaze in them far away, and one foot beat the measure. Beside him stood the Trapper. His arms were crossed; his eyes were on the bow that the Lad was drawing, and his body swayed, lifted and sank in perfect harmony with the motions and the accompanying sound, with a grace which nature only reaches when the will is utterly surrendered to a power that has charmed the stiffness and tension out of the frame and made it yielding and responsive.
At last the music stopped; and with it stopped each form. Each foot was arrested at the point to which the sound had carried it when it paused. Each couple stood in perfect pose. The motive power which moved them was withdrawn, and the limbs stood motionless as if the soul that gave them animation had retired. They had been lifted to another world—a world of impulse and movement more airy and spirit-like than the gross earth,—and it took a moment for them to struggle back to ordinary life. But in a moment thought recalled them to themselves, and they realized the mastery of the power that had held them at its will and the applause broke out in showers of happy tumult. They crowded around the Lad—strong men and beautiful women,—gazing at him in wonder; then broke up into knots talking and marvelling. To the old Trapper's face, as he gazed at the Lad, a strange look came,—the look of a man to whose soul has come a revelation so pure and sweet that he is unable at first to compass it with his understanding. He came close to the Lad, and, sitting down on the edge of the platform, put his hand on the knee of the youth, and said:
"I have heerd most of the sweet and terrible noises that natur' makes, boy: I have heered the thunder among the hills, when the Lord was knockin' ag'in the 'arth until it jarred; and I have heered the wind in the pines and the waves on the beaches when the darkness of night was on the woods, and Natur' was singin' her evenin' psalm; and there be no bird or beast the Lord has made whose cry, be it lively or solemn, I have not heerd; and I have said that man had never made an instrument that could make so sweet a noise as Natur' makes when the Sperit of the universe speaks through her stillness: but ye have made sounds to-night, Lad, sweeter than my ears have ever heerd on hill or lake-shore, at noon or in the night season, and I sartinly believe that the Sperit of the Lord has been with ye, boy, and gi'n ye the power to bring out sech music as the Book says the angels make in their happiness in the world above. I trust ye be grateful, Lad, for the gift the Lord has gi'n ye; for, though yer tongue knows leetle of speech, yit yer fingers can bring sech sounds out of that fiddle as a man might wish to have in his ears when his body lies stiffenin' in his cabin, and his sperit is standin' on the edge of the Great Clearin'. Yis, Lad, ye must sartinly play for me when my eyes grow dim, and my feet strike the trail that no man strikes but once, nor travels both ways."
At this point the announcement of supper was made; and the company streamed towards the tables. The repast was of that bounteous character customary to the houses located in the woods, in which the hearty provisions of the forest were brought into conjunction with and re-enforced by the more light and fanciful cuisine of the cities. Among the substantiate, fish and venison predominated. There was venison roast, and venison spitted, and venison broiled; venison steak and venison pie; trout broiled, and baked, and boiled; pancakes and rolls; ices and cream; pies and puddings; pickles and sauces of every conceivable character and make; ducks and partridges; coffee and tea whose nature, I regret to say, was discernible only to the eye of faith. In the midst of this abundance, the Old Trapper was entirely at home. He ate with the relish and heartiness of a man whose appetite was of the highest order, and whose courage mounted to the occasion.
"I tell ye, Henry," said the old man, as he transferred a duck to his plate and proceeded to carve it with the aptness of one who had practical knowledge of its anatomy, "I tell ye, Henry, the birds be gittin' fat; and I sartinly hope the flight this fall will be a good un. Don't be bashful, Lad, in yer eatin'," he continued, as he transferred half of the bird to his companion's plate, "ye haven't got the size of some about the waist, but yer length is in yer favor, and if ye will only straighten up, and Henry don't gin' out, there'll be leetle left on this eend of the table when we have satisfied our hunger. I don't know when the cravin' of natur' has been stronger within me then it is this minit; and if nothin' happens, and ye stand by me, the Saranacers will remember our visit for days after we be gone. It isn't often that I feed in the settlements, or get a taste of their cookin', but the man who basted these birds knowed what he was doin', and the fire has given them jest the right tech; and the morsels actilly melt in yer mouth."
The Trapper's feelings were evidently not peculiar to himself. And the spirit of feasting was abroad. The eating was such as would astonish the dwellers in cities. Wit flashed across the table in answer to wit. Mirth rippled from end to end of the room. Laughter roared and rollicked adown the hall. Jokes were cracked. Fun exploded. Plates rattled. Cups and glasses touched and rang. Even the waiters, as they came and went in their happy service, caught the infection of the surrounding happiness, and their laughter mingled with that of the guests.
The great pine branches and the evergreens nailed against the corner posts and wreathed into festoons along the walls shook and trembled in the uproar as to the passage of winds along their native hills. And the huge buck's heads, whose antlers were tied with rosettes and streaming ribbons, lost the staring look of their great artificial eyes and seemed as they gazed out through the interlacing boughs of cedar and balsam as if life had returned to them, and they once more were animate.
In about an hour the company streamed back into the parlor, with a mood even livelier than that which had characterized the early hours of the occasion. Their minds were in the state of highest action, and their bodies needed but the opportunity for rapid motion. Even the Lad had caught the infection of the surrounding liveliness, for his eyes and face glowed with the light of quickened animation.
"Have ye got any jigs in that fiddle, Lad?" said the Trapper; "Can ye twist any thing out of yer instrument that will set the feet travellin'? It seems to me that the young folks here want shakin' up a leetle; and a leetle of the old-fashioned dancin' will help 'em settle the vittles. Can ye liven up, Lad, and give 'em a tune that will set 'em whirlin'?"
The only reply of the Lad was a motion of the bow; but the motion was effective, for it sent a torrent of notes into the air, which thrilled through the body and tingled along the nerves like successive electric shocks. The old Trapper fairly bounded into the air; and when he struck the floor his feet were flying. Nor was he alone; the jig had started a dozen on the instant; and the floor rattled and rang with the tap of toe and heel.
"Henry," said the old Trapper, "hold on to me or I shall sartinly make a fool of myself. The Lad is ticklin' me from head to foot, and my toes are snappin' inside of the moccasins. Lord, who'd a thought that the blood in the veins of a man whose head is whitenin' could be sot leapin' as mine is doin' at this minit by the scrapin' of a fiddle!"
The Lad was a picture to see. His bow flew like lightning. His long fingers drummed and slid along the strings of the violin with bewildering swiftness. The little instrument jetted and effervesced its melody. The continuous and resounding noise poured out of it in tuneful bubbles. The air was filled with tinkling fragments of sound. The Lad's body swayed to and fro. His face glowed. His eyes flashed. The sweat stood in drops on his forehead, but still the bow snapped and crinkled, and the instrument continued to burst in musical explosions, while the floor shook, the windows rattled, and the lamps flared and fluttered, as the dancers chased the music on.
"Heavens and arth!" said the Trapper. "I can't stand this," and breaking from the hold that Herbert had on him, whirled himself out to the centre of the floor and, with his face aflame with excitement and his white hair flying abroad, led the jig men off with a lightness of foot and quickness of stroke that forced the music by half a beat. The effect was electric. The room burst into applause, and the Lad fetched a stroke that seemed to rip the violin asunder. It was now a race between the violin and the dancers. One after another fell out of the circle as the moments passed, until the Trapper was left alone and was cutting it down in a fashion that both astonished and convulsed the company. More than one of the spectators went on to the floor in paroxysms of laughter. Herbert, bent over with his hands on his knees, was watching the Trapper with mouth stretched to its utmost and streaming eyes.
It is impossible to say which would have triumphed, had not an accident decided the contest and brought the jig to an abrupt termination. For even while the Lad was in the midst of the swiftest execution, the hind legs of the chair in which he was sitting were whipped from their fastenings, his heels went into the air, he turned half a somersault backward and the music stopped with a snap.
It was minutes before a word could be heard. Roars and shrieks and screams of irrepressible and uncontrollable merriment shook the house from foundation to garret. The Lad picked himself up and for the first time since they met Herbert saw his placid countenance wrinkled and seamed with the contortions of uproarious mirth. The sluggishness of his temperament for once was thoroughly agitated and the manhood which never before had come to the surface found in hilarity a visible and adequate expression. The Trapper had spun to his side and the two had joined their hands and, looking into each other's faces, were laughing with a boisterousness that fairly shook their frames and exploded in resounding peals.
Gradually the uproar subsided and the company settled by easy transition to a quieter mood. The hours of the night were passing and the moment drawing nigh when those who had mingled their merriment must part. The old Trapper had regained his gravity and his countenance had settled to its customary repose. It seemed the general wish that the Lad would favor them with a farewell piece, and in compliance with the request of many, the old man turned to him and said:
"The hours be drawing on, Lad, and it's reasonable that we should break up; but afore we go the folks wish to hear ye play a quiet sort of a piece that may be cheerful and pleasant like for them to remember ye by when we be gone. So, Lad, if ye have got anything in yer head that's soft and teching, somethin' that will sort o' stay in the heart as the seasons come and go, I sartinly hope ye will play it for them. And as ye say ye was born by the sea, and as ye say the instrument ye hold in yer hand was gin ye by yer mother, it may be ye can play us something out of yer memory that shall tell us of her goodness to ye. Something I mean, that shall tell us of the shore where ye was born and the love that ye had afore ye laid her to rest and came to the woods seekin' me. Can ye play us somethin' like that, Lad?"
"I can play you anything that has mother in it," said he, and a wistful, yearning, hungry look came into his eyes and the edges of his lips quivered.
The company seated themselves and the boy drew his bow across the instrument. The brush of a painter could not have made the picture more perfect than the vision the Lad brought forth as the bow played on the strings. The picture of a sea, sunlighted and level, stretching far out; the picture of a curved shore: the shore of a quiet bay, rimmed with its beach of shining sand and noisy with the gurgle and splash of lapsing waves; the picture of a home quiet and orderly and filled with the tenderness of a gentle spirit; and then a heavier chord told of the coming of a darker hour when the mother lay dying. The violin fairly sobbed and groaned and wailed, as if the spirit of unconsolable grief were tugging heavily at the strings. Anon, a bell tolled solemnly out of it and its heavy knell clanged through the room. And then the music rested for a minute; and in the silence it seemed as if the grave came into sight as plainly as if the eyes of all were actually looking at its open mouth. Again the music sounded, and the sods, one after another, fell on the coffin, dull and heavy, changing to a gravelly, smothered sound as the grave filled. Once more it paused, and then a clear, sweet strain arose, sad, but pure and fine and hopeful, as voice of angels could have sung it, trustful and resigned. The bow stopped again; for a moment the violin was silent. And then the Lad lifted his face and, laying the bow softly upon the strings, began to play what all instinctively felt was a hymn to the spirit of his mother. Slowly, softly, sweetly, as the strains which the dying sometimes hear, the pure, clear, smooth notes stole out into the hushed air. It was playing, not such as mortal plays to mortal, but such as spirit plays to spirit and soul to soul, to-night, across the street of heaven. The Lad still used an earthly instrument and touched its strings with mortal fingers; but never, while they live, will those who heard that hymn believe that anything less than the spirit of the boy drew from the instrument the notes that filled the room with their divine sweetness. Indeed, the Lad did not act as if he were conscious of his body or of bodily presences around him. His face was lifted and his eyes, from which the tears were streaming, were gazing upward, not as if into vacancy, but as if they saw the bright being that had passed within the veil, standing in all the beauty of her transfiguration before them. For a smile was on the boy's lips, even while the tears were rolling down his cheeks. And when, at last, the arm suspended its motion; when the sweet notes ceased to sound and the last chord had died away, the Lad still kept his uplifted posture and his features held the same rapt expression.
The company sat motionless, their gaze fastened on the Lad. Not an eye was without its tear. The cheeks of the old Trapper were wet; and Herbert, touched by some memory or overcome by the pathos of the music, was actually sobbing. The old man, with a tread as light as a moccasined foot could make, stepped softly to the side of the Lad and taking him by the arm—while the company rose as one man—motioned to Henry with his hand, and then, without a word, the Trapper and Herbert and "The Man Who Didn't Know Much" passed out of the room, and taking boat, shoved off and glided from sight in the blue darkness of the overhanging night, amid whose eastern gloom the great, luminous, mellow-hearted stars of the morning were already aflame.
the head of a stretch of swiftly running water the river widened into a broad and deep pool. From the western bank a huge ledge of rock sloped downward and outward into the water. On it stood the trapper, John Norton, with a look of both expectation and anxiety on his face. For a moment he lifted his troubled eyes and gazed steadily through the tree-tops; and as his eyes fell to the level of the river, while the look of anxiety deepened on his countenance, he said:
"Yis, the wind has changed and the fire be comin' this way; and ef it gits into the balsam thickets this side of the mountain and the wind holds where it is, a buck in full jump could hardly outrun it. Yis, the smoke thickens; ef I didn't know that the boy would act with jedgment, and that he's onusually sarcumspect, I would sartinly feel worried about him. I hope he won't do anything resky for the sake of the pups. Ef he can't git 'em, he can't; and I trust he won't resk the life of a man for a couple of dogs."
With these words the trapper relapsed into silence. But every minute added to his anxiety, for the smoke thickened in the air and even a few cinders began to pass him as they were blown onward with the smoke by the wind.
"The fire is comin' down the river," he said, "and the boy has it behind him. Lord-a-massy! hear it roar! I know the boy is comin', for I never knowed him to do a foolish thing in the woods; and it would be downright madness for him to stay in the shanty, or even go to the shanty, ef the fire had struck the balsam thicket afore he made the landin'. Lord, ef an oar-blade should break,—but it won't break. The Lord of marcy won't let an oar that the boy is handlin' break, when the fire is racin' behind him, and he's comin' back from an arrand of marcy. I never seed a man desarted in a time like"—
A report of a rifle rang out quick and sharp through the smoke.
"God be praised!" said the trapper, "it's the boy's own piece, and he let it off as he shot the rift the fourth bend above. Yis, the boy knows his danger and he took the vantage of the rift to signal me with his piece, for oars couldn't help him in the rift and the missin' of a single stroke wouldn't count. I trust the boy got the pups, arter all," added the old trapper, his mind instantly reverting to his loved companions the moment it was relieved from anxiety touching his comrade.
It couldn't have been over five minutes after the report of a rifle had sounded, before a boat swept suddenly around the bend above the rock and shot like an arrow through the haze toward the trapper. Herbert was at the oars and the two hounds were sitting on their haunches at the stern. The stroke the oarsman was pulling was such as a man pulls when, in answer to some emergency, he is putting forth his whole strength. But though the stroke was an earnest one, there was no apparent hurry in it; for it was long and evenly pulled, from dip to finish, and the recovery seemed a trifle leisurely done. The face of the trapper fairly shone with delight as he saw the boat and the occupants. Indeed, his happiness was too great to be enjoyed silently, and, in accordance with his habit when greatly interested, he broke into speech.
"Look at that now!" he exclaimed, as if speaking to some one at his side; "look at that now! There's a stroke that's worth notin', and is a kind of edication in itself. Ye might almost think that there wasn't quite enough snap in it; but the boy knows that he's pullin' for his life and the life of another man somewhere below him—not to speak of the pups—and he knows it's good seven miles to the rapids, and he's pullin' every ounce that's in him to pull, and keep his stroke. Now, he's come five miles, ef he's come a rod, and I warrant he hasn't missed a stroke, save when in shootin' the rift he let off his piece. And he knows he's got seven miles more to pull and he's set himself a twelve-mile stroke; and there aint many men that could do it, with the roar of the fire a leetle way behind him. Yis, the boy has acted with jedgment and is sartinly comin' along like a buck in full jump. I guess I'd better let him know where I be."
"Hillow there, boy! Hi, hi, pups! Here I be on the p'int of the rock, as fresh as a buck arter a mornin' drink. Ease away a leetle, Herbert, in yer stroke and move the pups forad a leetle and make room for a man and a paddle, for the fire is arter ye and the time has come to jine works."
The young man did as the trapper requested. He intermitted a stroke and the hounds, at a word, moved into the middle of the boat and crouched obediently in the bottom, but whimpering in their gladness at hearing their master's voice again. The boat was under good headway when it passed the point of the ledge on which the trapper was standing, but as it glanced by, the old man leaped with practised agility to his place in the stern and had given a full and strong stroke to his paddle before he had fairly settled to his seat.
"Now, Herbert," he began, "ease yerself a bit, for ye have had a tough pull and it's good seven miles to the rapids. The fire is sartinly comin' in arnest, but the river runs nigh onto straight till ye git within sight of 'em, and I think we will beat it. I didn't feel sartin that ye had got the pups, Herbert, for I could see by the signs that ye wouldn't have any time to spare. Was it a tech and a go, boy?"
"The fire was in the pines west of the shanty when I entered it," answered the young man, "and the smoke was so thick that I couldn't see it from the river as I landed."
"I conceited as much," replied the trapper, "I conceited as much. Yis, I knowed 'twould be a close shave ef ye got 'em, and I feared ye would run a resk that ye oughtn't to run, in yer love for the dogs."
"I didn't propose to leave the dogs to die," responded the young man; "I think I should have heard their cries in my ears for a year, had they been burned to death in the shanty where we left them."
"Ye speak with right feelin', Herbert," replied the trapper. "No, a hunter has no right to desart his dog when danger be nigh; for the Creator has made 'em in their loves and their dangers, alike. Did ye save the powder and the bullits, boy?"
"I did not," responded Herbert; "the sparks were all around me and the shanty was smoking while I was feeling around for the dogs' leash. I heard the canister explode before I reached the first bend."
"'Twas a narrer rub, boy," rejoined the trapper. "Yis, I can see 'twas a narrer rub ye had of it, and the holes in yer shirt show that the sparks was fallin' pritty thick and pritty hot, too, when ye come out of the shanty. How does the stroke tell on ye, boy?" continued the old man, interrogatively. "Ye be pullin' a slashin' stroke, ye see, and there's five mile more of it, ef there's a rod."
"The stroke begins to tell on my left side," answered Herbert; "but if you were sitting where you could see what's coming down upon us as I can, you would see it wasn't any time for us to take things leisurely."
"Lord, boy," rejoined the trapper, "do ye think I haven't any ears? The fire's at the fourth bend above us and the pines on the ridge we passed five minutes ago ought to be blazin' by this time. Ah me, boy, this isn't the fust time I've run a race with a fire of the devil's own kindlin', alone and in company, both. And my ears have measured the roar and the cracklin' ontil I can tell to a rod, eenamost, how fur the red line be behind me."
"What do you think of our chances?" queried his companion; "shall we get over the carry in time? for I suppose we are making for the big pool, are we not?"
"Yis, we be makin' for the pool," replied the trapper, "for it's the only safe spot on the river; and as for the chances, I sartinly doubt ef we can fetch the carry in time. Ef the fire isn't there ahead of us, it will be on us afore we could git to the pool at the other eend."
"Why can't we run the rapids?" asked Herbert promptly.
"The rapids can be run, as you and me know," responded the old man, "for we have both did it, although they be onusually swift, and there be spots where good jedgment and a quick paddle is needed."
"Why," exclaimed Herbert, "the last time we went down we never took in a drop of water."
"It's true, as ye say, boy," responded the trapper; "yis, we sartinly did as ye say, though few be the men that know the waters that would believe it."
"Why, then," exclaimed the young man, "can't we do it again?"
"The smoke, boy, the smoke," was the answer. "The smoke will be there ahead of us. And who can run a stretch of water like the one ahead yender, with his eyes blinded? No, boy, we must git there ahead of the fire, for we can't run the rapids in the smoke. Here," he added, "ye be pullin' a murderin' stroke, and it's best that I spell ye. Down with ye, pups, down with ye, and lie still as a frozen otter while the boy comes over ye."
With the celerity of long practice in boating, the two men changed places, and with such quickness was the change in position effected, that the onrushing shell scarcely lessened its headway. The trapper seized the oars on the instant, while Herbert supported him with equal swiftness with the paddle and the light craft raced along like a feather blown by the gale.
For several moments the trapper, who, by the change in his position was brought face to face with the pursuing fire, said not a word. His stroke was long and sweeping and pulled with an energy which only perfect skill and tremendous strength can put into action. He looked at the rolling flames with a face undisturbed in its calmness and with eyes that noted knowingly every sign of its progress.
"The fire is a hot un," he said at length, "and it runs three feet to our two. We may git there ahead of it, for there isn't more than a mile furder to go; but—Lord!" exclaimed the trapper, "how it roars! and it makes its own wind as it comes on. Don't break yer paddle shaft, boy; but the shaft is a good un and ye may put all the strength into it that ye think it will stand."
The spectacle on which the trapper was gazing was, indeed, a terrible one; and the peril of the two men was getting to be extreme. The valley, through the centre of which the river ran, was perhaps a mile in width, at which distance a range of lofty hills on either side walled it in. Down this enclosed stretch the fire was being driven by a wind which sent the blazing evidences of its approach in advance of its terrible progress. The spectacle was indescribable. The dreadful line of flame moved onward like a line of battle, when it moves at a charge against a flying enemy. The hungry flames ate up the woods as a monster might eat food when starving. Grasses, shrubs, bushes, thickets of undergrowth and the great trees, which stood in groves over the level plain on either side of the stream, disappeared at its touch as if swallowed up. The evergreens crackled and flamed fiery hot. The smoke eddied up in rushing volumes. Overhead, and far in advance of the on-rolling line of fire, the air was darkened with black cinders, amid whose sombre masses fiery sparks and blazing brands shone and flashed like falling stars.
A deer suddenly sprang from the bank into the river ahead of the boat and, frenzied with fear, swam boldly athwart its course. He was followed by another and another. Birds flew shrieking through the air. Even the river animals swam uneasily along the banks, or peered out of their holes, as if nature had communicated to them, also, the terrible alarm; while, like the roar of a cataract,—dull, heavy, portentous,—the wrath of the flames rolled ominously through the air.
Amid the sickening smoke which was already rolling in volumes over the boat and the terrible uproar and confusion of nature, Herbert and the trapper kept steadily to their task. But every moment the line of fire gained on them. The smoke was already at intervals stifling and the heat of the coming conflagration getting unbearable. Brands began to fall hissing into the water. Twice had Herbert flung a blazing fragment out of the boat. And so, in a race literally for life, with the flames chasing them and their lives in jeopardy, they turned the last bend above the carry which began at the head of the rapids. But it was too late; the fiery fragments blown ahead by the high wind had fallen in front of them, and the landing at the carry itself was actually enveloped in smoke and flame.
"The fire be ahead of us, boy!" exclaimed the trapper, "and death is sartinly comin' behind. The odds be agin us to start with, for the smoke is thick and the fire will be in the bends at least half the way down, but it's our only chance; we must run the rapids."
"What about the dogs?"
"The pups must shirk for themselves," answered the old man. "I'm sorry, but the rapids be swift and the waters shaller on the first half of the stretch. And the pups settle the boat half an inch, ef they settle it a hair. Yis, overboard with ye, pups! overboard with ye!" commanded the trapper. "Ye must use the gifts the Lord has gin ye now, or git singed. I advise ye to keep with the current and come down trailin' the boat; for man's reason is better than dogs' reason, techin' currents and eddies, not to speak of falls. But take yer own way; for yer lives be in jeopardy with yer master's, and ye ought, for sartin, to have the chance of dyin' as ye like to. But yer best chance is to foller the boat, as I jedge."
The trapper had continued to talk as if addressing members of the human and not the canine species; and long before he had finished his remarks, the hounds had taken to the water and were swimming with all their power directly in the wake of the boat, as if they had actually understood their master's injunction, and were, indeed, determined to shoot the rapids in his wake.
The conflagration was now at its fiercest heat. The smoke whirled upward in mighty eddies or rolled along in huge convolutions. Through the fleecy rolls here and there tongues of flame shot fiercely. The river steamed. The roar of the rushing flames was deafening. The tops of the huge pines that stood along the banks would wave and toss as the fiery line reached them, and then burst into blaze, as if they were but the mighty torches that lighted the path of the passing destruction. In all his long and eventful life, passed amid peril, it is doubtful if the trapper had ever been in a wilder scene. The rapids were ahead and the fire behind and on either side. The great mass of flame had not yet rolled abreast the boat, but the blazing brands were already falling in advance. It was not a moment to hesitate; nor was he a man to falter when action was called for.
By this time the boat had come nigh the upper rift of the rapids, and the motion of the downward suction was beginning to tell on its progress. The trapper shipped his oars and, lifting his paddle, placed himself in a kneeling posture, gazing down stream. The fire was almost upon them, and the smoke too dense for sight. But pressing as was the emergency, neither man touched his paddle to the water, but let the boat go down with the quickening current to the verge of the rapids, where the sharp dip of the decline would send it flying.
"This be an onsartin ventur', Henry," cried the trapper, shouting to his comrade from the smoke that now made it impossible for the young man, even at only the boat's length, to see his person. "This be an onsartin ventur', and the Lord only knows how it will eend. Ye know the waters as well as I do; and ye know the p'ints where things must be did right. We'll beat the smoke arter we make the fust dip and git out of the thickest of it in the fust half of the distance, onless somethin' happens. Let her go with the current, boy, ontil yer sight comes to ye, for the current knows where it's goin', and that's more than a mortal can tell in this infarnal smoke. Here we go, boy!" shouted the old man, as the boat balanced in its perilous flight on the sharp edge of the uppermost rift. "Here we go, boy!" he shouted out of the smoke and the rush of waters, "it's hotter than Tophet where we be and it matters mighty leetle what meets us below."
To those who have had no experience in running rapids, no adequate conception can be given touching what can with truth be called one of the most exciting experiences that man can pass through. The very velocity with which the flight is made is enough of itself to make the sensation startling. The skill which is required on the part of the boatman is of the finest order. Eye and hand and readiest wit must work in swift connection. Some who read these lines perhaps have—shall we say—enjoyed the sensation which we have always found impossible to describe in words? These, at least, will appreciate the difficulty of our task, and also the peril which surrounded the trapper and his companion.
The first flight down which the boat glanced was a long one. The river bed sloped away in a straight direction for nigh on to fifty rods, and at an angle so steep that the water, although the bottom was rough, fairly flattened itself as it ran; and the channel where the current was the deepest gave forth a serpentine sound as it whizzed downward. The smoke, which hung heavily over the stretch from shore to shore, was too dense for the eye to penetrate a yard. Amid the smoke sparks floated, and brands, crackling as they fell, plunged through it into the steaming water. Guidance of the frail craft was, as the trapper had predicted, out of the question; the two men could only keep their position as they went streaming downward. They kept their seats like statues, knowing well that their safety lay in allowing their light shell to follow, without the least interruption, the pressure of the swift current.
Half down the flight the volume of smoke was parted, by some freak of the wind, from shore to shore, and for a couple of rods they saw the water, the blazing banks, the fiery tree-tops and each other. The trapper turned his face, blackened and stained by the grimy cinders, toward his companion and gave one glance, in which humor and excitement were equally mingled. His mouth was open, but the words were lost in the roar of the flame and the rush of the water. He had barely time to toss a hand upward, as if by gesture he would make good the impossibility of speech, before face and hand alike faded from Herbert's eyes as the boat plunged again into the smoke.
The next instant the boat launched down the final pitch of the declivity and shot far out into the smooth water that eddied in a huge circle in the pool below. The smoke was at this point less compact, for through it the blazing pines on either flamed partially into view.
"It's the devil's own work, boy, for sartin," cried the trapper, "and the fool or the knave that started the fire oughter be toasted. I trust the pups will be reasonable and come down with the current. Has the fire touched ye anywhere?"
"Not much," answered Herbert. "A brand struck me on the shoulder and opened a hole in my shirt,—that's all. How do you feel?"
"Fried, boy; yis, actally fried. Ef this infarnal heat lasts, I'll be ready to turn afore we reach the second bend."
"How goes the stream below?" asked Herbert.
"All clear for a while," answered the trapper, "all clear for a while. Put yer strength into the paddle till we come to the varge below, for the fire be runnin' fast, and it's agin reason for a mortal to stand this heat long."
"Shall we run out of the smoke at the next flight?" asked Herbert.
"I think so, boy; I think so," answered the trapper. "The maples grow to the bank at the foot of the next dip, and it isn't in the natur' of hard wood to make smoke like a balsam."
He would have said more, but his companion had nodded to him as he had ended the sentence, for they had come to the last flight of the rapids, and the great pool lay glimmering through the branches of the trees below.
The old man knew what was meant and said: "I know it, boy, I know it. Take the east run, for the water be deeper that way, and the boat sets deep. I won't trouble ye, for ye know the way. Lord! how the water biles! Now's yer time, boy,—to the right with ye! to the right! Sweep her round and let her go!"
Away and downward swept the boat. The strong eddies caught it, but the controlling paddle was stronger than the eddies and kept it to the line of its safest descent. Past rocks that stood in mid current, against which the swift-going water beat and dashed—past mossy banks and shadowed curves where the great eddies whirled—down over miniature falls into bubbles and froth the light craft swept, and with a final plunge and leap jumped the last cascade, and, darting out into the great basin, ran shoreward.
It touched the beach, and the trapper and Herbert rose to their feet; but for a moment neither stirred, for in front of them, not thirty feet away, at the line where the sand and the green mosses met, and looking directly at them, stood a man and a girl!
WHO WAS HE? The two men asked this question a thousand times mentally in the next two months, and once afterward they asked it aloud, as they looked into each other's eyes across a grave. But to the question, whether spoken or silent, no answer ever came.
The world has its enigmas, and he was one.
Amid the jabbering crowd we chaff and chatter with, we meet occasionally a man who never chaffs nor chatters,—a man who sees all things; perhaps because of this, suffers all things, but says nothing at all. The sphinxes are still extant. The old time ones were of stone and bronze; the modern ones are of flesh and blood; that's all the difference. Nay, not quite all; for the secrets that the ancients held smothered within the folds of their stony silence were only such as nature revealed to them from her desert posts,—the secrets of sunrises and starry nights and simoons that swept the sandy plain and of civilizations, the murmurs of whose rising and the crash of whose sudden overthrow, they needs must hear. But the secrets that men hear today, and by hearing of which are made silent, are the secrets of lives being lived, of hearts being broken, of intentions so noble and failures so bitter as to make men sceptical whether God keeps watch over the passing events on the earth.
Was he young? No. Was he old? No, again. How old was he? Forty, perhaps; it may be fifty. The two men who stood looking at him never thought of his age, neither then nor afterward; never thought whether he was old or young. There are people who have no age to those who know them. Is it because their bodies so little represent them? A friend has been away—for years. He returns; enters your room; you shake his hand heartily in welcome. And then you stand off and look at him. You look at his hair and note the gray in it—at the wrinkles in his face—the dozen and one marks that denote change—and say, "you've grown old, old boy;" and so we judge most men, and so they should be judged. Why? Because they are not great and strong and soul-large enough to dwarf their bodies out of sight and dwindle them into insignificance.
But now and then you meet one whose mind represents him, whose soul is so gloriously finished that, as in the case of a great painting, you do not think of the frame around it, nor take notice of it at all. He is so strong vitally; so great in living force—in vital energies—in moving and persuading power—that he is to you like an immense, endless, all-conquering Life, wholly independent of his embodiment, who might exist in any form,—angel, archangel, spirit, winged or wingless, supernal or infernal, and still, in all forms, in all places, in all moral states would remain true to himself and be the same. There are some, I say, who are like this,—who are not of the earth, earthy, nor of the body, but of the spirit, whether good or bad, spiritual: angel or demon, always.
Do you know one such? No? Perhaps not, for they are rare, very rare. But some such there are, and if you do not know one, or one like to such a one, I ask you if you do not think of him as I have said? Body! what is body to such a man? what is a formation of clay deftly mingled in its chemistry round about such an indomitable indwelling spirit? Does the old rain-sodden nest photograph the bird, the swiftness and glory of whose wings lived in it once? What is age to such a one? What has he to do with the passing of years? Such a one is young and old both, from the beginning of his career forever onward. He has the freshness of youth, the strength of manhood, and the sagacity of age, fixed permanently in his structure, as nature fixes her colors in the fibre of the ash and the oak. Such have no age. How silly to ask how old he is. If you ask me, I should answer, Who can tell? Their earthly parents say they were born on such and such dates. Were they? Or had they lived as Mary's Son had, ages before they took—for God's wise purpose—flesh? Who can tell?
"Heresy?" I'm not writing a sermon, I am writing a story, and I seek to make my readers think. That would not be essential if I were sermonizing. Good people don't want that kind of preaching.
But to return. Was he young? Was he old? Neither then nor ever after did Herbert and the trapper think of him as having age; and yet he was with them, and his body had all the marks which reveal to the noticing eye the measure of man's days. This is the young man's description of him:
"Tall, straight, and well-formed; large in size, but shapely, hair brown with gray in it; in all the face a look of great power, reserved, but ready to act; eyes of changeable color, that took the shade of the emotion that chanced to come and look out of them; when unoccupied, cold, gray, and meaningless as a window-pane behind which no face is; and over all the countenance the look of great gravity, divided by but the slightest line from sadness."
So Herbert described him; but he always used to add: "Remember, this was only his body, and therefore no description at all."
The girl? Why, certainly, you shall know of her, and from the same authority:
"The girl that was with this strange man was not a girl merely, but both girl and woman; for she was at that age when the sweet simplicity of the one, and the full charm of the other, come into union, and a time, at least, stand in attractive alliance. She was of medium height, and perfectly formed. Her hair was brown, as were her eyes, that were large and mild of look; and over all her face was such an expression of gentleness and peace as I never saw on any other woman's face, and she loved the man with so great a love that it made her life and took it both."
For a moment Herbert and the trapper stood looking at the man and girl, who were standing on the edge of the beach, looking silently at them; and then the trapper said, still standing in the boat:
"We would not run agin ye so sudden-like had we seed ye, friend; and ef our company be not pleasant to ye, we will move on, and camp on some clump furder down," and the old man placed his paddle against the beach as if he would breast the boat out into the pool.
"I beg you not to do so," answered the man on the beach; "you have as good a right to this camp-ground as we, and I dare say a better one, as we are but strangers to the woods; while you, old man, look as if you had made them your home for years."
"Ye speak the truth, friend," replied the trapper. "Yis, the woods be my home; and ef livin' in 'em gives man a right, few would gainsay my claim. Yis, it's thirty years agone sence I hefted the fust trout from this pool, and br'iled him on the bank there,—and a toothsome supper he made for me, too. Lord-a-massy, boy," exclaimed the old man, half turning toward his companion, "what a thing memory be! Thirty year!—and I've seed some wanderin' sence then,—but I remember as though I'd eat him last night jest how that trout tasted. You're sartin, friend, that we won't distarb ye ef we come ashore?"
"No, no, old man," answered the other, "come ashore, you and your companion. Our camp is the other side of the balsam thicket there, and after you have built your own, we will come down and pass an hour with you, unless we should disturb you in your occupation or your pleasure."