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The Wept of Wish-Ton-Wish: A Tale, a novel by James Fenimore Cooper |
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Chapter 31 |
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_ Chapter XXXI "Therefore, lay bare your bosom." Merchant of Venice.
The lights however still shone through many of the windows of the "Heathcote house," as, in the language of the country, the dwelling of the Puritan was termed. There was the usual stirring industry in and about the offices, and the ordinary calm was reigning in the superior parts of the habitation. A solitary man was to be seen on its piazza. It was young Mark Heathcote, who paced the long and narrow gallery, as if impatient of some interruption to his wishes. The uneasiness of the young man was of short continuance; for, ere he had been many minutes at his post, a door opened, and two light and timid forms glided out of the house. "Thou hast not come alone, Martha," said the youth, half-displeased. "I told thee that the matter I had to say was for thine own ear." "It is our Ruth. Thou knowest, Mark, that she may not be left alone, for we fear her return to the forest. She is like some ill-tamed fawn, that would be apt to leap away at the first well-known sound from the woods. Even now, I fear that we are too much asunder. "Fear nothing; my sister fondles her infant, and she thinketh not of flight; thou seest I am here to intercept her, were such her intention. Now speak with candor, Martha, and say if thou meanest in sincerity that the visits of the Hartford gallant, were less to thy liking than most of thy friends have believed?" "What I have said cannot be recalled." "Still it may be repented of." "I do not number the dislike I may feel for the young man among my failings. I am too happy, here, in this family, to wish to quit it. And now that our sister----there is one speaking to her at this moment, Mark!" "Tis only the innocent," returned the young man, glancing his eye to the other end of the piazza. "They confer often together. Whittal hath just come in from the woods, whither he is much inclined to pass an hour or two, each evening. Thou wast saying that now we have our sister--?" "I feel less desire to change my abode." "Then why not stay with us for ever, Martha?" "Hist!" interrupted his companion, who, though conscious of what she was about to listen to, shrunk, with the waywardness of human nature, from the very declaration she most wished to hear, "hist--there was a movement. Ah! our Ruth and Whittal are fled!" "They seek some amusement for the babe--they are near the out-buildings. Then why not accept a right to remain for ever----" "It may not be, Mark," cried the girl wresting her hand from his grasp; "they are fled!" Mark reluctantly released his hold, and followed to the spot where his sister had been sitting. She was, in truth, gone; though, some minutes passed before even Martha seriously believed that she had disappeared without an intention of returning. The agitation of both rendered the search ill-directed and uncertain, and there was perhaps a secret satisfaction in prolonging their interview even in this vague manner, that prevented them for some time from giving the alarm. When that moment did come, it was too late. The fields were examined, the orchards and out-houses thoroughly searched, without any traces of the fugitives. It would have been useless to enter the forest in the darkness, and all that could be done in reason, was to set a watch during the night, and to prepare for a more active and intelligent pursuit in the morning. But, long before the sun arose, the small and melancholy party of the fugitives threaded the woods at such a distance from the valley, as would have rendered the plan of the family entirely nugatory. Conanchet had led the way over a thousand forest knolls, across water-courses, and through dark glens, followed by his silent partner, with an industry that would have baffled the zeal of even those from whom they fled. Whittal Ring, bearing the infant on his back, trudged with unwearied step in the rear. Hours had passed in this manner, and not a syllable had been uttered by either of the three. Once or twice, they had stopped at some spot where water, limpid as the air, gushed from the rocks; and, drinking from the hollows of their hands, the march had been resumed with the same speechless industry as before. At length Conanchet paused He studied the position of the sun, gravely, and took a long and anxious look at the signs of the forest, in order that he might not be deceived in its quarter. To an unpractised eye, the arches of the trees, the leaf-covered path, and the mouldering logs, would have seemed everywhere the same. But it was not easy to deceive one so trained in the woods. Satisfied equally with the progress he had made, and with the hour the chief signed to his two companions to place themselves at his side, and took a seat on a low shelf of rock, that thrust its naked head out of the side of a hill. For many minutes, after all were seated, no one broke the silence. The eye of Narra-mattah sought the countenance of her husband, as the eye of woman seeks instruction from the expression of features that she has been taught to revere; but still she spoke not. The innocent laid the patient babe at the feet of its mother, and imitated her reserve. "Is the air of the woods pleasant to the Honey-suckle, after living in the wigwam of her people?" asked Conanchet, breaking the long silence. "Can a flower, which blossomed in the sun, like the shade?" "A woman of the Narragansetts is happiest in the lodge of her husband." The eye of the chief met her confiding look with affection, and then it fell, mild and full of kindness, on the features of the infant that lay at their feet. There was a minute, during which an expression of utter melancholy gathered about his brow. "The Spirit that made the earth," he continued, "is very cunning. He has known where to put the hemlock, and where the oak should grow. He has left the moose and the deer to the Indian hunter, and he has given the horse and the ox to a Pale-face. Each tribe hath its hunting-grounds, and its game. The Narragansetts know the taste of a clam, while the Mohawks eat the berries of the mountains. Thou hast seen the bright bow which shines in the skies, Narra-mattah, and knowest how one color is mixed with another, like paint on a warrior's face. The leaf of the hemlock is like the leaf of the sumach; the ash, the chestnut; the chestnut, the linden; and the linden, the broad-leaved tree which bears the red fruit, in the clearing of the Yengeese; but the tree of the red fruit is little like the hemlock! Conanchet is a tall and straight hemlock, and the father of Narra-mattah is a tree of the clearing, that bears the red fruit. The Great Spirit was angry when they grew together." The sensitive wife understood but too well the current of the chief's thoughts. Suppressing the pain she felt, however, she answered with the readiness of a woman whose imagination was quickened by her affections. "What Conanchet hath said is true. But the Yengeese have put the apple of their own land on the thorn of our woods, and the fruit is good!" "It is like that boy," said the chief, pointing to his son; "neither red nor pale. No, Narra-mattah; what the Great Spirit hath commanded, even a Sachem must do." "And doth Conanchet say this fruit is not good?" asked his wife, lifting the smiling boy with a mother's joy before his eyes. The heart of the warrior was touched. Bending his head, he kissed the babe, with such fondness as parents less stern are wont to exhibit. For a moment, he appeared to have satisfaction in gazing at the promise of the child. But, as he raised his head, his eye caught a glimpse of the sun, and the whole expression of his countenance changed. Motioning to his wife to replace the infant on the earth, he turned to her with solemnity, and continued-- "Let the tongue of Narra-mattah speak without fear. She hath been in the lodges of her father, and hath tasted of their plenty. Is her heart glad?" The young wife paused. The question brought with it a sudden recollection of all those reviving sensations, of that tender solicitude, and of those soothing sympathies, of which she had so lately been the subject. But these feelings soon vanished; for, without daring to lift her eyes to meet the attentive and anxious gaze of the chief, she said firmly, though with a voice that was subdued by diffidence-- "Narra-mattah is a wife." "Then will she listen to the words of her husband. Conanchet is a chief no longer. He is a prisoner of the Mohicans. Uncas waits for him in the woods!" Notwithstanding the recent declaration of the young wife, she heard of this calamity with little of the calmness of an Indian woman. At first, it seemed as if her senses refused to comprehend the meaning of the words. Wonder, doubt, horror, and fearful certainty, each in its turn prevailed; for she was too well schooled in all the usages and opinions of the people with whom she dwelt, not to understand the jeopardy in which her husband was placed. "The Sachem of the Narragansetts a prisoner, of Mohican Uncas!" she repeated in a low tone, as if the sound of her voice were necessary to dispel some horrible illusion. "No! Uncas is not a warrior to strike Conanchet!" "Hear my words," said the chief, touching the shoulder of his wife, as one arouses a friend from his slumbers. "There is a Pale-face in these woods who is a burrowing fox. He hides his head from the Yengeese. When his people were on the trail, barking like hungry wolves, this man trusted to a Sagamore. It was a swift chase, and my father is getting very old. He went up a young hickory, like a bear, and Conanchet led off the lying tribe. But he is not a moose. His legs cannot go like running water, for ever!" "And why did the great Narragansett give his life for a stranger?" "The man is a brave;" returned the Sachem, proudly: "he took the scalp of a Sagamore!" Again Narra-mattah was silent. She brooded, in nearly stupid amazement, on the frightful truth. "The Great Spirit sees that the man and his wife are of different tribes," she at length ventured to rejoin. "He wishes them to become the same people. Let Conanchet quit the woods, and go into the clearings with the mother of his boy. Her white father will be glad, and Mohican Uncas will not dare to follow." "Woman, I am a Sachem and a warrior among my people!" There was a severe and cold displeasure in the voice of Conanchet, that his companion had never before heard. He spoke in the manner of a chief to his woman, rather than with that manly softness with which he had been accustomed to address the scion of the Pale-faces. The words came over her heart like a withering chill, and affliction kept her mute. The chief himself sate a moment longer in a stern calmness, and then rising in displeasure, he pointed to the sun, and beckoned to his companions to proceed. In a time that appeared to the throbbing heart of her who followed his swift footsteps, but a moment, they had turned a little eminence, and, in another minute, they stood in the presence of a party that evidently awaited their coming. This grave group consisted only of Uncas, two of his fiercest-looking and most athletic warriors, the divine, and Eben Dudley. Advancing rapidly to the spot where his enemy stood, Conanchet took his post at the foot of the fatal tree. Pointing to the shadow, which had not yet turned towards the east, he folded his arms on his naked bosom, and assumed an air of haughty unconcern. These movements were made in the midst of a profound stillness. Disappointment, unwilling admiration, and distrust, all struggled through the mask of practised composure, in the dark countenance of Uncas. He regarded his long-hated and terrible foe, with an eye that seemed willing to detect some lurking signs of weakness. It would not have been easy to say whether he most felt respect, or regret, at the faith of the Narragansett. Accompanied by his two grim warriors, the chief examined the position of the shadow with critical minuteness, and when there no longer existed a pretext for affecting to doubt the punctuality of their captive, a deep ejaculation of assent issued from the chest of each. Like some wary judge, whose justice is fettered by legal precedents, as if satisfied there was no flaw in the proceedings, the Mohegan then signed to the white men to draw near. "Man of a wild and unreclaimed nature!" commenced Meek Wolfe, in his usual admonitory and ascetic tones, "the hour of thy existence draws to its end! Judgment hath had rule; thou hast been weighed in the balances, and art found wanting. But Christian charity is never weary. We may not resist the ordinances of Providence, but we may temper the blow to the offender. That thou art here to die, is a mandate decreed in equity, and rendered awful by mystery; but further, submission to the will of Heaven doth not exact. Heathen, thou hast a soul, and it is about to leave its earthly tenement for the unknown world----" Until now, the captive had listened with the courtesy of a savage when unexcited. He had even gazed at the quiet enthusiasm, and singularly contradictory passions, that shone in the deep lines of the speaker's face, with some such reverence as he might have manifested at an exhibition of one of the pretended revelations of a prophet of his tribe. But when the divine came to touch upon his condition after death, his mind received a clear, and to him an unerring, clue to the truth. Laying a finger suddenly on the shoulder of Meek, he interrupted him, by saying-- "My father forgets that the skin of his son is red. The path to the happy hunting-grounds of just Indians lies before him." "Heathen, in thy words hath the Master Spirit of Delusion and Sin uttered his blasphemies!" "Hist!--Did my father see that which stirred the bush?" "It was the viewless wind, idolatrous and idle-minded infant, in the form of adult man!" "And yet my father speaks to it," returned the Indian, with the grave but cutting sarcasm of his people. "See," he added, haughtily, and even with ferocity; "the shadow hath passed the root of the tree. Let the cunning man of the Pale-faces stand aside; a Sachem is ready to die!" Meek groaned audibly, and in real sorrow; for, notwithstanding the veil which exalted theories and doctrinal subtleties had drawn before his judgment, the charities of the man were grounded in truth. Bowing to what he believed to be a mysterious dispensation of the will of Heaven, he withdrew to a short distance, and, kneeling on a rock, his voice was heard, during the remainder of the ceremonies lifting its tones in fervent prayer for the soul of the condemned. The divine had no sooner quitted the place, than Uncas motioned to Dudley to approach. Though the nature of the borderer was essentially honest and kind, he was, in opinions and prejudices, but a creature of the times. If he had assented to the judgment which committed the captive to the mercy of his implacable enemies, he had the merit of having suggested the expedient that was to protect the sufferer from those refinements in cruelty which the savages were known to be too ready to inflict. He had even volunteered to be one of the agents to enforce his own expedient, though, in so doing, he had committed no little violence to his natural inclinations. The reader will therefore judge of his conduct, in this particular, with the degree of lenity that a right consideration of the condition of the country and of the usages of the age may require There was even a relenting and a yielding of purpose in the countenance of this witness of the scene, that was favorable to the safety of the captive, as he now spoke. His address was first to Uncas. "A happy fortune, Mohegan, something aided by the power of the white men, hath put this Narragansett into thy hands," he said. "It is certain that the Commissioners of the Colony have consented that thou shouldst exercise thy will on his life; but there is a voice in the breast of every human being, which should be stronger than the voice of revenge, and that is the voice of mercy. It is not yet too late to hearken to it Take the promise of the Narragansett for his faith--take more, take a hostage in this child, which with its mother shall be guarded among the English, and let the prisoner go." "My brother asketh with a big mind!" said Uncas, drily. "I know not how nor why it is I ask with this earnestness," resumed Dudley, "but there are old recollections and former kindnesses, in the face and manner of this Indian! And here, too, is one, in the woman, that I know is tied to some of our settlements, with a bond nearer than that of common charity--Mohegan, I will add a goodly gift of powder and of muskets, if thou wilt listen to mercy, and take the faith of the Narragansett." Uncas pointed with ironical coldness to his captive, as he said-- "Let Conanchet speak!" "Thou nearest, Narragansett. If the man I begin to suspect thee to be, thou knowest something of the usages of the whites. Speak; wilt swear to keep peace with the Mohegans, and to bury the hatchet in the path between your villages?" "The fire that burnt the lodges of my people turned the heart of Conanchet to stone," was the steady answer. "Then can I do no more than see the treaty respected," returned Dudley, in disappointment. "Thou hast thy nature, and it will have way. The Lord have mercy on thee, Indian, and render thee such judgment as is meet for one of savage opportunities." He made a gesture to Uncas that he had done, and fell back a few paces from the tree, his honest features expressing all his concern, while his eye did not refuse to do its duty by closely watching each movement of the adverse parties. At the same instant, the grim attendants of the Mohegan chief, in obedience to a sign, took their stations on each side of the captive. They evidently waited for the last and fatal signal, to complete their unrelenting purpose. At this grave moment there was a pause, as if each of the principal actors pondered serious matter in his inmost mind. "The Narragansett hath not spoken to his woman," said Uncas, secretly hoping that his enemy might yet betray some unmanly weakness, in a moment of so severe trial. "She is near." "I said my heart was stone;" coldly returned the Narragansett. "See--the girl creepeth like a frightened fowl among the leaves. If my brother Conanchet will look, he will see his beloved." The countenance of Conanchet grew dark, but it did not waver. "We will go among the bushes, if the Sachem is afraid to speak to his woman with the eyes of a Mohican on him. A warrior is not a curious girl, that he wishes to see the sorrow of a chief!" Conanchet felt, hurriedly, for some weapon that might strike his enemy to the earth, and then a low murmuring sound at his elbow stole so softly on his ear, as suddenly to divert the tempest of passion. "Will not a Sachem look at his boy?" demanded the suppliant. "It is the son of a great warrior: why is the face of his father so dark on him?" Narrah-mattah had drawn near enough to her husband, to be within reach of his hand. With extended arms she held the pledge of their former happiness towards the chief, as if to beseech a last and kindly look of recognition and love. "Will not the great Narragansett look at his boy?" she repeated, in a voice that sounded like the lowest notes of some touching melody. "Why is his face so dark, on a woman of his tribe?" Even the stern features of the Mohegan Sagamore showed that he was touched. Beckoning to his grim attendants to move behind the tree, he turned and walked aside, with the noble air of a savage, when influenced by his better feelings. Then light shot into the clouded countenance of Conanchet. His eyes sought the face of his stricken and grieved consort, who mourned less for his danger than she grieved for his displeasure. He received the boy from her hands, and studied his features long and intently. Beckoning to Dudley, who alone gazed on the scene, he placed the infant in his arms. "See!" he said, pointing to the child; "it is a blossom of the clearings. It will not live in the shade." He then fastened a look on his trembling partner There was a husband's love in the glance. "Flower of the open land!" he said; "the Manitou of thy race will place thee in the fields of thy fathers. The sun will shine upon thee, and the winds from beyond the salt lake will blow the clouds into the woods. A Just and Great Chief cannot shut his ear to the Good Spirit of his people. Mine calls his son to hunt among the braves that have gone on the long path; thine points another way. Go, hear his voice, and obey. Let thy mind be like a wide clearing; let all its shadows be next the woods; let it forget the dream it dreamt among the trees. 'Tis the will of the Manitou." "Conanchet asketh much of his wife; her son is only the soul of a woman!" "A woman of the Pale-faces; now let her seek her tribe. Narra-mattah, thy people speak strange traditions. They say that one just man died for all colors. I know not. Conanchet is a child among the cunning, and a man with the warriors. If this be true, he will look for his woman and boy in the happy hunting-grounds, and they will come to him. There is no hunter of the Yengeese that can kill so many deer. Let Narra-mattah forget her chief till that time, and then, when she calls him by name, let her speak strong, for he will be very glad to hear her voice again. Go; a Sagamore is about to start on a long journey. He takes leave of his wife with a heavy spirit. She will put a little flower of two colors before her eyes, and be happy in its growth. Now let her go. A Sagamore is about to die." The attentive woman caught each slow and measured syllable, as one trained in superstitious legends would listen to the words of an oracle. But, accustomed to obedience and bewildered with her grief, she hesitated no longer. The head of Narra-mattah sunk on her bosom, as she left him, and her face was buried in her robe. The step with which she passed Uncas was so light as to be inaudible; but when he saw her tottering form, turning swiftly, he stretched an arm high in the air. The terrible mutes just showed themselves from behind the tree, and vanished. Conanchet started, and it seemed as if he were about to plunge forward; but, recovering himself by a desperate effort, his body sunk back against the tree, and he fell in the attitude of a chief seated in council. There was a smile of fierce triumph on his face, and his lips evidently moved. Uncas did not breathe, as he bent forward to listen:-- "Mohican, I die before my heart is soft!" uttered firmly, but with a struggle, reached his ears. Then came two long and heavy respirations. One was the returning breath of Uncas, and the other the dying sigh of the last Sachem of the broken and dispersed tribe of the Narragansetts. _ |
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