“Motherdear, mother dear! Did you hear what Kashaqua says: that she will take me to Aunt Prissy’s to-morrow?” said Faith.
The Indian woman had turned quickly, and her sharp little eyes were fixed on Mrs. Carew’s face.
“You ’fraid let leettle girl go with Kashaqua?” she said, a little accusing note in her voice.
“No, indeed. Kashaqua would take good care of Faith. I know that. But to-morrow——” Mrs. Carew spoke bravely, but both Faith’s father and mother were sadly troubled. To offend the Indian woman would mean to make enemies of the tribe to which she belonged; and then neither their lives nor their property would be safe; and she would never forgive them if they doubted her by refusing to let Faith make the journey to Ticonderoga in her care.
It was Faith who came to the rescue by declaring:“Oh, I’d rather go with Kashaqua than anybody. Mother dear, you said Aunt Prissy would see about my shoes and dresses. I don’t have to wait to get ready,” and Faith ran to her mother eager for her consent, thinking it would be a fine thing to go on a day’s journey through the woods with the Indian woman, and quite forgetting for the moment that it meant a long absence from home.
Nothing could have pleased Kashaqua more than Faith’s pleading. The half-angry expression faded from her face, and she nodded and smiled, grunting her satisfaction, and taking from one of her baskets a pair of fine doeskin moccasins, which she gave to Faith. “Present,” she said briefly.
“They are the prettiest pair I ever had!” said Faith, looking admiringly at their fringed tops, and the pattern of a vine that ran from the toes to insteps, stitched in with thread-like crimson and blue thongs.
“It is a fine chance for Faith to go to her Aunt Priscilla,” said Mr. Carew. “Do you know where Philip Scott lives, across Champlain?”
“Me know. Not great ways from Fort,” responded Kashaqua. “Me take leettle girl safe to Scott’s wigwam.”
“That’s right, Kashaqua,” said Mr. Carew.
“Then me come back to mill and get meal an’ get pie,” said Kashaqua.
“Of course. I will make you the finest pie you ever tasted,” said Mrs. Carew, with a little sigh of relief. For she had wondered how long it would be before they could get news that Kashaqua had kept her promise, and that Faith had reached her aunt’s house in safety.
In the surprise and excitement of this new decision neither Faith nor her parents had much time to think about their separation. Although Aunt Priscilla was to see that Faith was well provided with suitable dresses, shoes, hat, and all that a little girl would need to wear to school and to church, there was, nevertheless, a good deal to do to prepare and put in order such things as she would take with her. Beside that Mrs. Carew meant to give the squaw a well-filled luncheon basket; so the remainder of the day went very quickly. Faith helped her mother, and talked gaily with Kashaqua of the good time they would have on the journey; while Kashaqua smoked and nodded, evidently quite satisfied and happy.
When night came the Indian woman madeher preparations to sleep before the kitchen fire, and the Carews went up-stairs to bed. The mother and father lay long awake that night. While they assured each other that Faith would be perfectly safe, and that the Indian woman would defend the little girl from all danger, they could not but feel an uncertainty. “We can trust the strength and love that has protected us always to go with our little maid,” said Mr. Carew; “perhaps Kashaqua is the safest person we could find.”
“We must hope so; but I shall not draw a good breath until she is here again, and tells me Faithie is safe with Priscilla,” responded Mrs. Carew.
The little household was awake at an early hour the next morning. Faith was to wear the new moccasins. She wore her usual dress of brown homespun linen. Faith had never had a hat, or a pair of leather shoes, and only the simplest of linen and wool dresses. She had never before been away from home, except for a day’s visit at the house of some neighboring settler. She knew that when she got to Aunt Prissy’s she would have a hat, probably like the one Esther Eldridge had worn, ribbons to tieback her yellow curls, shining leather shoes, and many things that she had never before seen. She had thought a good deal about these things when planning for the journey, but now that the time was so near when she must say good-bye to her mother and father she forgot all about the good times in store, and wished with all her heart that she were not going.
“Don’t let Kashaqua see you cry, child,” her father whispered, seeing Faith’s sad face; so she resolutely kept back her tears.
Breakfast was soon over. Kashaqua had stowed Faith’s bundle of clothing in one of her baskets and swung it over her shoulder. The basket of luncheon also was secured by stout thongs and hung across her back, and they were ready to start.
“Be a good child, Faithie, dear,” whispered Mrs. Carew.
“I’ll fetch you home when it is April’s turn to stir the fire,” said her father smilingly, and Faith managed to smile back, and to say good-bye bravely, as she trudged down the path holding tight to Kashaqua’s brown hand.
“I be back to-morrow night,” Kashaqua called back, knowing that would be a word ofcomfort to the white woman who was letting her only child go from home.
Neither Faith nor Kashaqua spoke for some little time. At last Faith stopped suddenly and stood still, evidently listening. “I can’t hear the brook,” she said.
Kashaqua nodded, and the two walked on through the autumn woods. But now Kashaqua began to talk. She told Faith stories of the wild animals of the woods; of the traps she set along the streams to catch the martens and otters; and of a bear cub that the children of her village had tamed. But it had disappeared during the summer.
“The papooses catch birds and feed them,” she continued, “tame birds so they know their name, and come right to wigwam.” Faith listened eagerly, and began to think that an Indian village must be a very pleasant place to live.
“Where is your village, Kashaqua?” she asked.
“You not know my village? Way back ’cross Mooselamoo,” answered Kashaqua.
“Perhaps I can go there some time,” suggested Faith. But Kashaqua shook her head.
For several hours they walked steadily onthrough the autumn woods. They climbed several rocky ridges, crossed brooks, and carefully made their way over a swampy stretch of ground. Faith was very tired when Kashaqua finally swung the baskets and bundles from her shoulders and declared that it was time to eat.
The trail had led them up a hill, and as Faith, with a little tired sigh, seated herself on a moss-covered rock, she looked about with a little exclamation of wonder. Close beside the trail was a rough shelter made of the boughs of spruce and fir trees, and near at hand was piled a quantity of wood ready for a fire. There was a clearing, and the rough shelter was shaded by two fine oak trees.
“Does somebody live here?” asked Faith.
“Traveler’s wigwam,” explained Kashaqua, who was unpacking the lunch basket with many grunts of satisfaction. “White men going down the trail to big road to Shoreham sleep here,” she added, holding up a fine round molasses cake in one hand and a roasted chicken in the other.
Faith was hungry as well as tired, and the two friends ate with good appetite. Kashaqua repacked the basket with what remained of the food, and with a pleasant nod to Faith declaredshe would “sleep a little,” and curled herself up near the shelter.
Faith looked about the rough camp, and peered down the trail. She decided she too would sleep a little, and stretched herself out close beside Kashaqua, thinking that it was a wonderful thing to be so far from home,—nearly in sight of Lake Champlain, Kashaqua had told her, with an Indian woman for her guide and protector; and then her eyes closed and she was sound asleep.
It seemed to Faith that she had not slept a minute before she awakened suddenly, and found that Kashaqua had disappeared. But she heard a queer scrambling sound behind her and sat up and looked around. For a moment she was too frightened to speak, for a brown bear was clawing the remainder of their luncheon from the basket, grunting and sniffing, as if well pleased with what he found.
As Faith looked at him she was sure that this creature had dragged Kashaqua off into the woods, and that he might turn and seize her as soon as he had finished with the basket.
“Kashaqua! Kashaqua!” she called hopelessly. “What shall I do? What shall I do?”
There was a rustle of leaves close behind her and the Indian woman darted into the clearing. Without a word to Faith she ran straight to where the bear was crouched over the basket. Faith could hardly believe what she saw, for Kashaqua had seized the basket and pushed it out of the bear’s reach, and was now belaboring him with a stout piece of wood that she had seized from the pile by the shelter. As she hit the bear she called out strange words in the Indian tongue, whose meaning Faith could not imagine, but which the bear seemed to understand. The creature accepted the blows with a queer little whimper which made Faith laugh in spite of her fear. And when Kashaqua had quite finished with him he crept along beside her, looking up as if pleading for forgiveness.
“Oh, Kashaqua! Is it the bear that your papooses tamed?” exclaimed Faith, remembering the story told her on the way.
Kashaqua nodded, at the same time muttering words of reproach to the bear.
“He like bad Indian, steal from friends,” she explained to Faith. “His name Nooski,” she added.
Nooski was quite ready to make friends withFaith, but she was not yet sure of his good-nature. It seemed to the little girl that the bear understood every word Kashaqua uttered; and when they went on their way down the trail Nooski followed, or kept close beside them.
It was still early in the afternoon when they reached level ground and Faith had her first glimpse of the blue waters of Lake Champlain and saw the heights of Ticonderoga on the opposite shore. For a moment she forgot Nooski and Kashaqua, and stood looking at the sparkling waters and listening to the same sound of “Chiming Waters” that had made the early French settlers call the place “Carillon.” She wondered if she should ever see the inside of the fort of which she had heard so much, and then heard Kashaqua calling her name.
“Canoe all ready, Faith.” The Indian woman had drawn the birch-bark canoe from its hiding-place in the underbrush, and the light craft now rested on the waters of the lake. The baskets and bundles were in the canoe, and Kashaqua, paddle in hand, stood waiting for her little companion.
“Where’s Nooski?” asked Faith, looking about for the young bear.
Kashaqua pointed toward the distant range of mountains which they had left behind them. “He gone home,” she said.
Kashaqua told her how to step into the canoe, and how to sit, and cautioned her not to move. Faith felt as if the day had been a wonderful dream. As Kashaqua with swift strokes of her paddle sent the canoe over the water Faith sat silent, with eyes fixed on the looming battlements of the fort, on the high mountain behind it, and thought to herself that no other little girl had ever taken such a journey.
Kashaqua landed some distance below the fort; the canoe was again safely hidden, and after a short walk across a field they reached a broad, well-traveled road. “’Most to Philip Scott’s house,” grunted Kashaqua. “You be glad?” and she looked down at the little girl with a friendly smile.
“AnIndian woman and a little girl with yellow hair are coming across the road, mother,” declared Donald Scott, rushing into the sitting-room, where his mother was busy with her sewing.
Mrs. Scott hastened to the front door. “Oh, Aunt Prissy,” called Faith, running as fast as her tired feet could carry her, and hardly seeing the brown-haired little cousin standing by his mother’s side.
Aunt Prissy welcomed her little niece, whom she had not expected to see for weeks to come, and then turned to thank Kashaqua. But the Indian woman had disappeared. The bundle containing Faith’s clothing lay on the door-step, but there was no trace of her companion. Long afterward they discovered that Kashaqua had started directly back over the trail, and had reached the Carews’ cabin, with her message ofFaith’s safe arrival at her aunt’s house, early the next morning.
“Come in, dear child. You are indeed welcome. Your father’s letter reached me but yesterday,” said Aunt Prissy, putting her arm about Faith and leading her into the house. “I know you are tired, and you shall lie down on the settle for a little, and then have your supper and go straight to bed.”
Faith was quite ready to agree. As she curled up on the broad sofa her three little cousins came into the room. They came on tiptoe, very quietly, Donald leading the two younger boys. Their mother had told them that Cousin Faith was tired after her long journey, and that they must just kiss her and run away.
Faith smiled up at the friendly little faces as they bent over to welcome her. “I know I shan’t be lonesome with such dear cousins,” she said, and the boys ran away to their play, quite sure that it was a fine thing to have a girl cousin come from the Wilderness to visit them.
Faith slept late the next morning, and awoke to hear the sound of rain against the windows. It was a lonesome sound to a little girl so far from her mother and father, and Faith was alreadythinking to herself that this big house, with its shining yellow floors, its white window curtains, and its nearness to a well-traveled road, was a very dreary place compared to her cabin home, when her chamber door opened and in came her Aunt Prissy, smiling and happy as if a rainy day was just what she had been hoping for.
“We shall have a fine time to-day, Faithie dear,” she declared, as she filled the big blue wash-basin with warm water. “There is nothing like a rainy day for a real good time. Your Uncle Philip and the boys are waiting to eat breakfast with you, and I have a great deal to talk over with you; so make haste and come down,” and Aunt Prissy, with a gay little nod, was gone, leaving Faith greatly cheered and wondering what the “good time” would be.
Uncle Philip Scott was waiting at the foot of the stairs. “So here is our little maid from the Wilderness! Well, it is a fine thing to have a girl in the house,” he declared, leading Faith into the dining-room and giving her a seat at the table beside his own. “Did you have any adventures coming over the trail?” he asked, after Faith had greeted her little cousins.
Faith told them of “Nooski’s” appearance, greatly to the delight of her boy cousins, who asked if the Indian woman had told Faith the best way to catch bear cubs and tame them.
“Come out to the shop, boys,” said Mr. Scott as they finished breakfast, “and help me repair the cart, and fix ‘Ginger’s’ harness. Perhaps Cousin Faith will come, too, later on in the morning.”
“We’ll see. Faithie and I have a good deal to do,” responded Mrs. Scott.
The boys ran off with their father, chattering gaily, but at the door Donald turned and called back: “You’ll come out to the shop, won’t you, Cousin Faith?”
“If Aunt Prissy says I may,” answered Faith.
“Yes; she will come,” added Aunt Prissy, with her ready smile.
It seemed to Faith that Aunt Prissy was always smiling. “I don’t believe she could be cross,” thought the little girl.
She helped her aunt clear the table and wash the dishes, just as she had helped her mother at home; and as they went back and forth in the pleasant kitchen, with the dancing flames from the fireplace brightening the walls and makingthe tins shine like silver, Faith quite forgot that the rain was pouring down and that she was far from home.
“I am going to begin a dress for you this very day. It is some material I have in the house; a fine blue thibet, and I shall put ruffles on the skirt. That will be your Sunday dress,” said Aunt Priscilla, “and your father wrote me you were to have the best shoes that the shoemaker can make for you. We’ll see about the shoes to-morrow. Did you bring your blue beads, Faithie? But of course you did. They will be nice to wear with your blue frock. And I mean you to have a warm hood of quilted silk for Sunday wear.”
Faith drew a long breath as her aunt finished. She wondered what Aunt Prissy would say if she told her about giving the blue beads to Esther Eldridge. But in the exciting prospect of so many new and beautiful things she almost forgot the lost beads. She had brought “Lady Amy,” carefully packed in the stout bundle, and Aunt Prissy declared that the doll should have a dress and hood of the fine blue thibet.
“When shall I go to school, Aunt Prissy?” asked Faith.
“I think the school begins next week, and you shall be all ready. I mean to make you a good dress of gray and scarlet homespun for school wear,” replied her aunt. “The schoolhouse is but a half-mile walk from here; a fine new cabin, and you and Donald may go together. I declare, the rain has stopped. ‘Rain before seven, clear before eleven’ is a true saying.”
Faith ran to the window and looked out. “Yes, indeed. The sky is blue again,” she said.
“You’d best run out to the shop a while now, Faithie. I’ll call you when ’tis time,” said her aunt.
Faith opened the kitchen door to step out, but closed it quickly, and looked around at her aunt with a startled face. “There’s a little bear right on the door-step,” she whispered.
“A bear! Oh, I forgot. You have not seen ‘Scotchie,’ our dog,” said Aunt Prissy. “No wonder you thought he was a bear. But he is a fine fellow, and a good friend. I often wish your dear father had just such a dog,” and she opened the door and called “Scotchie! Scotchie!”
The big black Newfoundland dog came slowly into the room.
“Put your hand on his head, Faith,” said Aunt Prissy, “and I’ll tell him who you are, and that he is to take care of you. He went to school with Donald all last spring, and we knew he would take care of him. Here, ‘Scotchie,’ go to the shop with Faith,” she concluded.
Faith started for the square building on the further side of the yard, and the big dog marched along beside her. Donald and little Philip came running to meet her.
“I’m going to make you a bow and some arrows, Cousin Faith,” said Donald, pushing open the shop door. “I have a fine piece of ash, just right for a bow, and some deerskin thongs to string it with. I made bows for Hugh and Philip.”
The workshop seemed a very wonderful place to Faith, and she looked at the forge, with its glowing coals, over which her Uncle Philip was holding a bar of iron, at the long work-bench with its tools, and at the small bench, evidently made for the use of her little cousins.
The boys were eager to show her all their treasures. They had a box full of bright feathers, with which to tip their arrows.
“We’ll show you how to make an arrow, Cousin Faith,” said Donald. “First of all, you must be sure the piece of wood is straight, and has no knots,” and Donald selected a narrow strip of wood and held it on a level with his eyes, squinting at its length, just as he had seen his father do. “This is a good straight piece. Here, you use my knife, and whittle it down until it’s about as big as your finger. And then I’ll show you how to finish it.”
But before Faith had whittled the wood to the required size, they heard the sound of a gaily whistled tune, and Donald ran toward the door and called out: “Hallo, Nathan,” and a tall, pleasant-faced boy of about fifteen years appeared in the doorway. He took off his coonskin cap as he entered.
“Good-morning, Mr. Scott,” he said, and then turned smilingly to speak to the boys.
“Faith, this is Nathan Beaman,” said Donald, and the tall boy bowed again, and Faith smiled and nodded.
“I’ve been up to the fort to sell a basket of eggs,” explained Nathan, turning again to Mr. Scott.
“You are a great friend of the English soldiers, are you not, Nathan?” responded Mr. Scott.
“No, sir!” the boy answered quickly. “I go to the fort when my errands take me. But I know well enough what those English soldiers are there for; all the Shoreham folk know that. I wish the Green Mountain Boys held Ticonderoga,” he concluded.
Mr. Scott rested a friendly hand on the boy’s shoulder.
“Best not say that aloud, my boy; but I am glad the redcoats have not made you forget that American settlers have a right to defend their homes.”
“I hear there’s a reward offered for the capture of Ethan Allen,” said the boy.
Mr. Scott laughed. “Yes, but he’s in small danger. Colonel Allen may capture the fort instead of being taken a prisoner,” he answered.
Nathan now turned toward the children, and Donald showed him the bow he was making for his cousin. “I’ll string it for you,” offered Nathan; and Donald was delighted to have the older boy finish his work, for he was quite sure that anything Nathan Beaman did was a little better than the work of any other boy.
“Who wants to capture Colonel Allen?” Faith asked.
“The ‘Yorkers.’ The English,” responded the boy carelessly; “but it can’t be done,” he added. “Why, every man who holds a New Hampshire Grant would defend him. And Colonel Allen isn’t afraid of the whole English army.”
“I know him. He was at my father’s house just a few weeks ago,” said Faith.
“Don’t tell anybody,” said Nathan. “Some of the people at the fort may question you, but you mustn’t let them know that you have ever seen Colonel Allen.”
Donald had been busy sorting out feathers for the new arrows, and now showed Nathan a number of bright yellow tips, which the elder boy declared would be just what were needed.
Nathan asked Faith many questions about her father’s mill, and about Ethan Allen’s visit. And Faith told him of the big bear that had entered their kitchen and eaten the syrup. When Mrs. Scott called them to dinner she felt that she was well acquainted with the good-natured boy, whom Mrs. Scott welcomed warmly.
“I believe Nathan knows as much about Fort Ticonderoga as the men who built it,” shesaid laughingly, “for the soldiers have let him play about there since he was a little boy.”
“And Nathan made his own boat, too. The boat he comes over from Shoreham in,” said Donald. For Nathan Beaman lived on the further side of the strip of water which separated Ticonderoga from the New Hampshire Grants.
That afternoon Faith and her aunt worked on the fine new blue dress. The next day Mrs. Scott took her little niece to the shoemaker, who measured her feet and promised to have the shoes ready at the end of a week.
As they started for the shoemaker’s Mrs. Scott said:
“The man who will make your shoes is a great friend of the English soldiers. Your uncle thinks that he gathers up information about the American settlers and tells the English officers. Do not let him question you as to what your father thinks of American or English rule. For I must leave you there a little while to do an errand at the next house.”
Faith began to think that it was rather a serious thing to live near an English fort.
Theshoemaker was the smallest man Faith had ever seen. She thought to herself that she was glad he was not an American. When he stood up to speak to Mrs. Scott Faith remembered a picture in one of her mother’s books of an orang-outang. For the shoemaker’s hair was coarse and black, and seemed to stand up all over his small head, and his face was nearly covered by a stubbly black beard. His arms were long, and he did not stand erect. His eyes were small and did not seem to see the person to whom he was speaking.
But he greeted his customers pleasantly, and as Faith sat on a little stool near his bench waiting for her aunt’s return, he told her that he had a little daughter about her own age, but that she was not very well.
“Perhaps your aunt will let you come and see her some day?” he said.
“I’ll ask her,” replied Faith, and before theyhad time for any further conversation the door opened and a tall man in a scarlet coat, deerskin trousers and high boots entered the shop.
“Any news?” he asked sharply.
“No, captain. Nothing at all,” replied the shoemaker.
“You’re not worth your salt, Andy,” declared the officer. “I’ll wager this small maid here would have quicker ears for news.”
Faith wished that she could run away, but did not dare to move.
“Well, another summer we’ll put the old fort in order and have a garrison that will be worth while. Now, what about my riding boots?” he added, and after a little talk the officer departed.
It was not long before Mrs. Scott called for her little niece and the two started for home.
Faith told her aunt what the shoemaker had said about his little girl, and noticed that Aunt Prissy’s face was rather grave and troubled.
“Do I have to go, Aunt Prissy?” she asked.
“We’ll see, my dear. But now we must hurry home, and sew on the new dresses,” replied Aunt Prissy, and for a few moments they walked on in silence.
Faith could hear the musical sound of the falls, and was reminded of the dancing mill-stream, of the silver fox and of her own dear “Bounce.” Every hour since her arrival at Aunt Prissy’s had been so filled with new and strange happenings that the little girl had not had time to be lonely.
“What is the name of the shoemaker’s little girl, Aunt Prissy?” she asked, as they came in sight of home, with Donald and Philip, closely followed by “Scotchie,” coming to meet them.
“Her name is Louise Trent, and she is lame. She is older than you, several years older,” answered Aunt Prissy, “and I fear she is a mischievous child. But the poor girl has not had a mother to care for her for several years. She and her father live alone.”
“Does she look like her father?” questioned Faith, resolving that if such were the case she would not want Louise for a playmate.
“Oh, no. Louise would be pretty if she were a neat and well-behaved child. She has soft black hair, black eyes, and is slenderly built. Too slender, I fear, for health,” replied Mrs. Scott, who often thought of the shoemaker’smotherless little girl, whose father seemed to resent any effort to befriend her.
“Why, that sounds just the way Esther Eldridge looks. Only Esther isn’t lame,” responded Faith; and, in answer to her aunt’s questions, Faith described Esther’s visit to the cabin, omitting, however, the fact that she had given Esther the blue beads.
Faith did not think to speak of the red-coated soldier until the family were gathered about the supper-table that night. Then she suddenly remembered what he had said, and repeated it to her uncle, who was asking her about her visit to Mr. Trent’s shop.
“So that’s their plan. More soldiers to come another summer! ’Twas a careless thing for an officer to repeat. But they are so sure that none of us dare lift a hand to protect ourselves that they care not who knows their plans. I’ll see to it that Ethan Allen and the men at Bennington get word of this,” said Mr. Scott, and then asked Faith to repeat again exactly what the officer had said.
In a few days both of Faith’s new dresses were finished; and, greatly to her delight, Aunt Prissy had made her a pretty cap of blue velvet,with a partridge’s wing on one side. She was trying on the cap before the mirror in the sitting-room one afternoon when she heard a queer noise on the porch and then in the front entry. Aunt Prissy was up-stairs, and the boys were playing outdoors.
“I wonder what it is?” thought Faith, running toward the door. As she opened it she nearly exclaimed in surprise, for there, leaning on a crutch, was the queerest little figure she had ever imagined. A little girl whose black hair straggled over her forehead, and whose big dark eyes had a half-frightened expression, stood staring in at the pleasant room. An old ragged shawl was pinned about her shoulders, and beneath it Faith could see the frayed worn skirt of gray homespun. But on her feet were a pair of fine leather shoes, well fitting and highly polished.
“I brought your shoes,” said this untidy visitor, swinging herself a step forward nearer to Faith, and holding out a bundle. “Father doesn’t know I’ve come,” she added, with a little smile of satisfaction. “But I wanted to see you.”
“Won’t you sit down?” said Faith politely, pulling forward a big cushioned chair.
Louise Trent sat down as if hardly knowing if she dared trust the chair or not.
“Your aunt didn’t let you come to see me, did she? I knew she wouldn’t,” continued Louise. “What you got?” she questioned, looking at the pretty cap with admiring eyes.
“It’s new. And I never had one before,” answered Faith.
“Well, I’ve never had one, and I never shall have. You wouldn’t let me try that one on, would you?” said Louise, looking at Faith with such a longing expression in her dark eyes that Faith did not hesitate for a moment.
“Of course I will,” she answered quickly, and taking off the cap placed it carefully on Louise’s untidy black hair.
“If your hair was brushed back it would look nice on you,” declared Faith. “You wait, and I’ll get my brush and fix your hair,” and before Louise could reply Faith was running up the stairs. She was back in a moment with brush and comb, and Louise submitted to having her hair put in order, and tied back with one of the new hair ribbons that Aunt Prissy had given Faith. While Faith was thus occupiedLouise looked about the sitting-room, and asked questions.
“There,” said Faith. “Now it looks nice on you. But what makes you wear that old shawl?”
Louise’s face clouded, and she raised her crutch as if to strike Faith. “Don’t you make fun of me. I have to wear it. I don’t have nothing like other girls,” she exclaimed, and dropping the crutch, she turned her face against the arm of the chair and began to sob bitterly.
For a moment Faith looked at her in amazement, and then she knelt down beside the big chair and began patting the shoulder under the ragged shawl.
“Don’t cry, Louise. Don’t cry. Listen, I’ll ask my aunt to make you a cap just like mine. I know she will.”
“No. She wouldn’t want me to have a cap like yours,” declared Louise.
“Isn’t your father good to you?” questioned Faith. And this question made Louise sit up straight and wipe her eyes on the corner of the old shawl.
“Good to me! Of course he is. Didn’t he make me these fine shoes?” she answered, pointingto her feet. “But how could he make me a pretty cap or a dress? And he doesn’t want to ask anybody. But you needn’t think he ain’t good to me!” she concluded, reaching after the crutch.
“Don’t go yet, Louise. See, that’s my doll over on the sofa. Her name is ‘Lady Amy,’” and Faith ran to the sofa and brought back her beloved doll and set it down in Louise’s lap.
“I never touched a doll before,” said Louise, almost in a whisper. “You’re real good to let me hold her. Are you going to live here?”
“I’m going to school,” replied Faith. “I’ve never been to school.”
“Neither have I,” said Louise. “I s’pose you know your letters, don’t you?”
“Oh, yes. Of course I do. I can read and write, and do fractions,” answered Faith.
“I can’t read,” declared Louise.
Just then Mrs. Scott entered the room. If she was surprised to see the shoemaker’s daughter seated in her easy chair, wearing Faith’s new cap and holding “Lady Amy,” she did not let the little girls know it, but greeted Louise cordially, took Faith’s new shoes from their wrapping and said they were indeed a fine pair ofshoes. Then she turned to Louise, with the pleasant little smile that Faith so admired, and said: “You are the first little girl who has come to see my little niece, so I think it would be pleasant if you two girls had a taste of my fruit cake that I make just for company,” and she started toward the dining-room and soon returned with a tray.
“Just bring the little table from the corner, Faithie, and set it in front of Louise and ‘Lady Amy,’” she said, and Faith hastened to obey.
Aunt Prissy set the tray on the table. “I’ll come back in a little while,” she said, and left the girls to themselves.
The tray was very well filled. There was a plate of the rich dark cake, and beside it two dainty china plates and two fringed napkins. There was a plate of thin slices of bread and butter, a plate of cookies, and two glasses filled with creamy milk.
“Isn’t this lovely?” exclaimed Faith, drawing a chair near the table. “It’s just like a party, isn’t it? I’m just as glad as I can be that you brought my shoes home, Louise. We’ll be real friends now, shan’t we?”
“I mustgo home,” said Louise, with a little sigh at having to end the most pleasant visit she ever remembered. The two little girls had finished the lunch, and had played happily with “Lady Amy.” Mrs. Scott had left them quite by themselves, and not even the small cousins had come near the sitting-room.
As Louise spoke she took off the blue velvet cap, which she had worn all the afternoon, and began to untie the hair ribbon.
“Oh, Louise! Don’t take off that hair ribbon. I gave it to you. It’s a present,” exclaimed Faith.
Louise shook her head. “Father won’t let me keep it,” she answered. “He wouldn’t like it if he knew that I had eaten anything in this house. He is always telling me that if people offer to give me anything I must never, never take it.”
Before Faith could speak Aunt Prissy came into the room.
“Tell your father I will come in and pay him for Faith’s shoes to-morrow, Louise,” she said pleasantly, “and you must come and see Faith again.”
“Yes’m. Thank you,” responded Louise shyly, and nodding to Faith with a look of smiling understanding, the crippled child made her way quickly from the room.
“Aunt Prissy, I like Louise Trent. I don’t believe she is a mischievous girl. Just think, she never had a doll in her life! And her father won’t let her take presents!” Faith had so much to say that she talked very rapidly.
“I see,” responded her aunt, taking up the rumpled hair ribbon which Louise had refused. “I am glad you were so kind to the poor child,” she added, smiling down at her little niece. “Tell me all you can about Louise. Perhaps there will be some way to make her life happier.”
So Faith told her aunt that Louise could not read. That she had never before tasted fruit cake, and that she had no playmates, and had never had a present.“Why do you suppose she came to see me, Aunt Prissy?” she concluded.
“I cannot imagine. Unless it was because you are a stranger,” replied Aunt Prissy. “I have an idea that I can arrange with Mr. Trent so that he will be willing for me to make Louise a dress, and get for her the things she ought to have. For the shoemaker is no poorer than most of his neighbors. How would you like to teach Louise to read?”
“I’d like to! Oh, Aunt Prissy, tell me your plan!” responded Faith eagerly.
“Wait until I am sure it is a good plan, Faithie dear,” her aunt replied. “I’ll go down and see Mr. Trent to-morrow. I blame myself that I have not tried to be of use to that child.”
“May I go with you?” urged Faith.
“Why, yes. You can visit Louise while I talk with her father, since he asked you to come.”
“Has the Witch gone?” called Donald, running into the room. “Didn’t you know that all the children call the Trent girl a witch?” he asked his mother.
“No, Donald. But if they do they ought to be ashamed. She is a little girl without any mother to care for her. And now she is your cousin’s friend, and we hope to see her here often. And you must always be polite and kind to her,” replied Mrs. Scott.
Donald looked a little doubtful and puzzled.
“You ought to be more kind to her than to any other child, because she is lame,” said Faith.
“All right. But what is a ‘witch,’ anyway?” responded Donald.
“It is a wicked word,” answered his mother briefly. “See that you do not use it again.”
Faith’s thoughts were now so filled with Louise that she nearly lost her interest in the new dresses and shoes, and was eager for the next day to come so that she could again see her new friend.
Faith had been taught to sew neatly, and she wondered if she could not help make Louise a dress. “And perhaps Aunt Prissy will teach her how to make cake,” she thought; for never to taste of cake seemed to Faith to be a real misfortune. For the first night since her arrival at her aunt’s home Faith went to sleep without a homesick longing for the cabin in the Wilderness, and awoke the next morning thinking about all that could be done for the friendless little girl who could not accept a present.
“We will go to Mr. Trent’s as soon as our morning work is finished,” said Aunt Prissy, “and you shall wear your new shoes and cap. And I have a blue cape which I made for you before you came. The morning is chilly. You had best wear that.”
“I don’t look like Faith Carew, I am so fine,” laughed the little girl, looking down at her shoes, and touching the soft cloth of the pretty blue cape.
As they walked along Faith told Aunt Prissy of her plans to teach Louise to sew, as well as to read. “And perhaps you’ll show her how to make cake! Will you, Aunt Prissy?”
“Of course I will, if I can get the chance,” replied her aunt.
The shoemaker greeted them pleasantly. Before Mrs. Scott could say anything of her errand he began to apologize for his daughter’s visit.
“She slipped off without my knowing it. It shan’t happen again,” he said.
“But Faith will be very sorry if it doesn’t happen again,” replied Aunt Prissy. “Can she not run in and see Louise while I settle with you for the shoes?”
The shoemaker looked at her sharply for amoment, and then motioned Faith to follow him, leading the way across the shop toward a door on the further side of the room. The shop occupied the front room of the shoemaker’s house. The two back rooms, with the chambers above, was where Louise and her father made their home.
Mr. Trent opened the door and said: “You’ll find her in there,” and Faith stepped into the queerest room that she had ever seen, and the door closed behind her. Louise was standing, half-hidden by a clumsy wooden chair. The shawl was still pinned about her shoulders.
“This ain’t much like your aunt’s house, is it? I guess you won’t ever want to come again. And my father says I can’t ever go to see you again. He says I don’t look fit,” said Louise.
But Faith’s eyes had brightened, and she was looking at the further side of the room and smiling with delight. “Oh, Louise! Why didn’t you tell me that you had a gray kitten? And it looks just like ‘Bounce,’” and in a moment she had picked up the pretty kitten, and was sitting beside Louise on a roughly made wooden seat, telling her of her own kitten,while Louise eagerly described the cleverness of her own pet.
“What’s its name?” asked Faith.
“Just ‘kitten,’” answered Louise, as if surprised at the question.
“But it must have a real name,” insisted Faith, and it was finally decided that it should be named “Jump,” the nearest approach to the name of Faith’s kitten that they could imagine.
The floor of the room was rough and uneven, and not very clean. There was a table, the big chair and the wooden seat. Although the morning was chilly there was no fire in the fireplace, although there was a pile of wood in one corner. There was but one window, which looked toward the lake.
“Come out in the kitchen, where it’s warm,” suggested Louise, after a few moments, and Faith was glad to follow her.
“Don’t you want to try on my new cape?” asked Faith, as they reached the kitchen, a much pleasanter room than the one they had left.
Louise shook her head. “I daresn’t,” she replied. “Father may come in. And he’d take my head off.”
“You are coming to see me, Louise. Aunt Prissy is talking to your father about it now,” said Faith; but Louise was not to be convinced.
“He won’t let me. You’ll see,” she answered mournfully. “Iknow. He’ll think your aunt is ‘Charity.’ Why, he won’t make shoes any more for the minister because his wife brought me a dress; and I didn’t wear the dress, either.”
But there was a surprise in store for Louise, for when Mrs. Scott and Mr. Trent entered the kitchen the shoemaker was smiling; and it seemed to Faith that he stood more erect, and did not look so much like the picture of the orang-outang.
“Louise, Mrs. Scott and I have been making a bargain,” he said. “I am going to make shoes for her boys, and she is going to make dresses for my girl. Exchange work; I believe that’s right, isn’t it, ma’am?” and he turned to Mrs. Scott with a little bow.
“Yes, it is quite right. And I’ll send you the bill for materials,” said Aunt Prissy.
“Of course. Well, Louise, I warrant you’re old enough to have proper dresses. And Mrs. Scott will take you home to stay with her until you are all fixed up as fine as this little maid,” and the shoemaker nodded to Faith.
“Do you mean I’m to stay up there?” asked Louise, pointing in the direction of the Scotts’ house. “I can’t. Who’d take care of you, father?”
Mr. Trent seemed to stand very straight indeed as Louise spoke, and Faith was ashamed that she had ever thought he resembled the ugly picture in her mother’s book.
“She’s a good child,” he said as if whispering to himself; but he easily convinced Louise that, for a few days, he could manage to take care of himself; and at last Louise, happy and excited over this change in her fortunes, hobbled off beside Mrs. Scott and Faith, while her father stood in the shop doorway looking after them.
It was a very differently dressed little daughter who returned to him at the end of the following week. She wore a neat brown wool dress, with a collar and cuffs of scarlet cloth, a cape of brown, and a cap of brown with a scarlet wing on one side. These, with her well-made, well-fitting shoes, made Louise a very trim little figure in spite of her lameness. Her hair,well brushed and neatly braided, was tied back with a scarlet ribbon. A bundle containing underwear, aprons, handkerchiefs, and hair ribbons of various colors, as well as a stout cotton dress for Louise to wear indoors, arrived at the shoemaker’s house with the little girl.
Her father looked at her in amazement. “Why, Flibbertigibbet, you are a pretty girl,” he declared, and was even more amazed at the gay laugh with which Louise answered him.
“I’ve learned a lot of things, father! I can make a cake, truly I can. And I’m learning to read. I’m so glad Faith Carew is going to live in Ticonderoga. Aren’t you, father?”
Mr. Trent looked at his daughter again, and answered slowly: “Why, yes, Flibbertigibbet, I believe I am.”
Theday that school began Faith returned home to find that a letter from her mother and father had arrived. It was a long letter, telling the little girl of all the happenings since her departure at the pleasant cabin in the Wilderness. Her father had shot a deer, which meant a good supply of fresh meat. Kashaqua had brought the good news of Faith’s arrival at her aunt’s house; and, best of all, her father wrote that before the heavy snows and severe winter cold began he should make the trip to Ticonderoga to be sure that his little daughter was well and happy.
But there was one sentence in her mother’s letter that puzzled Faith. “Your father will bring your blue beads,” her mother had written, and Faith could not understand it, for she was sure Esther had the beads. She had looked in the box in the sitting-room closet after Esther’sdeparture, hoping that Esther might have put them back before starting for home, but the box had been empty.
“Who brought my letter, Uncle Phil?” she questioned, but her uncle did not seem to hear.
“Father got it from a man in a canoe when we were down at the shore. The man hid——”
“Never mind, Hugh. You must not repeat what you see, even at home,” said Mr. Scott.
So Faith asked no more questions. She knew that the Green Mountain Boys sent messengers through the Wilderness; and that Americans all through the Colonies were kept notified of what the English soldiers stationed in those northern posts were doing or planning. She was sure that some such messenger had brought her letter; and, while she wondered if it might have been her friend Ethan Allen, she had learned since her stay in her uncle’s house that he did not like to be questioned in regard to his visitors from across the lake.
“I’ll begin a letter to mother dear this very night, so it will be all ready when father comes,” she said, thinking of all she longed to tell her mother about Louise, the school and her pretty new dresses.
“So you did not bring your beads,” said Aunt Prissy, as she read Mrs. Carew’s letter. “Did you forget them?”
Faith could feel her face flush as she replied: “No, Aunt Prissy.” She wished that she could tell her aunt just why she had felt obliged to give them to Esther Eldridge, and how puzzled she was at her mother’s reference to the beads. Faith was already discovering that a secret may be a very unpleasant possession.
As she thought of Esther, she recalled that her aunt had spoken of Louise as “mischievous,” and Faith was quite sure that Louise would never have accepted the beads or have done any of the troublesome things that had made the first days of Esther’s visit so difficult.
“Louise isn’t mischievous,” she declared suddenly. “What made you think she was, Aunt Prissy?”
Aunt Prissy was evidently surprised at this sudden change of subject, but she replied pleasantly:
“I ought not to have said such a thing; but Louise has improved every day since you became her friend. How does she get on in her learning to read?”
For Faith stopped at the shoemaker’s house every day on her way home from school to teach Louise; and “Flibbertigibbet,” as her father generally called her, was making good progress.
“She learns so quickly,” replied Faith, “and she is learning to write. I do wish she would go to school, Aunt Prissy,” for Louise had become almost sullen at the suggestion.
Faith did not know that Louise had appeared at the schoolhouse several years before, and had been so laughed at by some of the rough children of the village that she had turned on them violently and they had not dared come near her since. They had vented their spite, however, in calling, “Witch! Witch! Fly home on your broomstick,” as Louise hobbled off toward home, vowing that never again would she go near a school, and sobbing herself to sleep that night.
Aunt Prissy had heard something of the unfortunate affair, and was glad that Louise, when next she appeared at school, would have some little knowledge to start with and a friend to help her.
“Perhaps she will go next term, now that she has a girl friend to go with her,” responded Mrs. Scott.
Faith was making friends with two girls whose seats in the schoolroom were next her own. Their names were Caroline and Catherine Young. Faith was quite sure that they were two of the prettiest girls in the world, and wondered how it was possible for any one to make such beautiful dresses and such dainty white ruffled aprons as these two little girls wore to school. The sisters were very nearly of an age, and with their soft black curls and bright brown eyes, their flounced and embroidered dresses with dainty collars of lace, they looked very different from the more suitably dressed village children.
Caroline was eleven, and Catherine nine years old. But they were far in advance of the other children of the school.
They lost no time in telling Faith that their father was an English officer, stationed at Fort Ticonderoga; and this made Faith look at them with even more interest. Both the sisters were rather scornful in their manner toward the other school children. As Faith was a newcomer, and a stranger, they were more cordial to her.
“You must come to the fort with us some day,” Caroline suggested, when the little girls had known each other for several weeks; andFaith accepted the invitation with such eagerness that the sisters looked at her approvingly. Their invitations to some of the other children had been rudely refused, and the whispered “Tories” had not failed to reach their ears.
“We like you,” Caroline had continued in rather a condescending manner, “and we have told our mother about you. Could you go to the fort with us to-morrow? It’s Saturday.”
“Oh, yes; I’m sure I may. I have wanted to go to the fort ever since I came. You are real good to ask me,” Faith had responded gratefully, to the evident satisfaction of the English girls who felt that this new little girl knew the proper way to receive an invitation.
It was settled that they would call for Faith early on Saturday afternoon.
“I may go, mayn’t I, Aunt Prissy?” Faith asked, as she told her aunt of the invitation, and was rather puzzled to find that Aunt Prissy seemed a little doubtful as to the wisdom of permitting Faith visiting the fort with her new friends.
“It is a mile distant, and while that is not too long a walk, I do not like you to go so far from home with strangers,” she said; but onFaith’s declaring that the sisters were the best behaved girls in school, and that she had promised to go, Mrs. Scott gave her consent; and Faith was ready and waiting when Caroline and Catherine arrived, soon after dinner on Saturday.
“Is your father an officer?” asked Caroline, as the little girls started off.
Faith walked between her new friends, and looked from one to the other with admiring eyes.
“No, my father is a miller. And he owns a fine lot of land, too,” she answered smilingly.
“Our father is a major. He will go back to Albany in the spring, and that is a much better place to live than this old frontier town,” said Catherine. “We shan’t have to play with common children there.”
Faith did not quite know what Catherine meant, so she made no response, but began telling them of her own journey through the wilderness and across the lake. But her companions did not seem much interested.
“Your uncle is just a farmer, isn’t he?” said Caroline.
“Yes, he is a farmer,” Faith replied. She knew it was a fine thing to be a good farmer, so she answered smilingly. But before the fortwas reached she began to feel that she did not like the sisters as well as when they set out together. They kept asking her questions. Did her mother have a silver service? and why did her aunt not have servants? As they neared the fort Catherine ran to her sister’s side and whispered in her ear. After that they kept close together, walking a little way ahead of Faith. At the entrance to the fort Faith was somewhat alarmed to find a tall soldier, musket in hand. But he saluted the little girls, and Faith followed her companions along the narrow passageway. She wondered to herself what she had done to offend them, for they responded very stiffly to whatever she had to say. The narrow passage led into a large open square, surrounded by high walls. Faith looked about with wondering eyes. There were big cannons, stacks of musketry, and many strange things whose name or use she could not imagine. There were little groups of soldiers in red coats strolling about.
“Where is your father, Catherine?” she asked, and then looked about half fearfully; for both her companions had vanished.
None of the soldiers seemed to notice FaithFor a moment she looked about with anxious eyes, and then decided that her friends must have turned back to the entrance for some reason.
“And they probably think that I am right behind them,” she thought, running toward an arched passageway which she believed was the one by which she had entered the fort. But it seemed much longer than when she came in a moment before. She began running, expecting to see the sisters at every step. Suddenly she found that she was facing a heavy door at the end of the passage, and realized that she had mistaken her way. But Faith was not frightened. “All I have to do is to run back,” she thought, and turned to retrace her steps. But there were two passageways opening behind her at right angles. For an instant she hesitated, and then ran along the one to the right.
“I’m sure this is the way I came,” she said aloud. But as she went on the passageway seemed to curve and twist, and to go on and on in an unfamiliar way. It grew more shadowy too. Faith found that she could not see very far ahead of her, and looking back it seemed even darker. She began to feel very tired.
“I’m sure Caroline and Catherine will come and find me,” she thought, leaning against the damp wall of the passage. “I’ll just rest a minute, and then I’ll call so they will know which way to turn to find me.”