"I feel much rested now, sir; and perhaps we shall find something to kill before many miles."
She spoke cheerfully, and, for a while, felt so; but as the sun came slowly up, and rose higher and higher in the heavens—as the sand grew hot under her blistered feet, and the sky hot on heraching head—as hour after hour rolled away and no stream met her feverish gaze—as her lips began to parch with thirst and her frame to faint with hunger—then she could no longer conceal from her companion how terribly exhausted she was. Several times he took her in his arms and carried her a long ways, for he did not dare to pause to give her the needed rest—every moment which kept them from the expected stream and possible succor took away from their faint hopes of relief.
Nat Wolfe's own powerful frame was severely tried; he had staggered more than once, for it will be remembered that he had but scanty fare for a day or two before his rescue of Elizabeth, and the torture of thirst was upon him too.
"Go on—oh, do go on and leave me here, I can not take another step, and you must not kill yourself by staying to see me die. If you were not hindered by me you could go so much faster," pleaded the young girl, sinking at last under the meridian heat.
"Leave you, Elizabeth?" said Nat, for the first time using her name in addressing her; and once more he swung her into his arms, though her light form seemed made of iron, so weak was he growing. "Look ahead! don't you see trees? don't you see the glimmer of water? I'm sure we're not a mile from the spot."
"Yes!" she cried, in a strange, excited voice, "I see trees and water—a lovely lake—oh, so beautiful! like those of my childhood, and apples on the trees! cool, delicious apples and peaches. Walk faster, Nat, to the cool, cool water—" her voice sunk to a whisper, her head drooped—she had fainted even while longing for the beautiful mirage which reached her strained and feverish vision.
Filled with anguish, almost cursing fate, Nat staggered on. He threw away his rifle—his precious rifle, next in rank to his lost Kit Carson in his affections—for he could no longer be burdened by it. On—on—feeling that water, at least, could not be far away—until, finally, he, too, was compelled to rest. He knew very well that the rest might be fatal to both—but nature refused to be longer overtasked. Sinking upon the ground, he gazed in despair upon the fair face drooping back over his arm, the long tresses of dark hair sweeping about it, the breath scarcely fluttering over the parched, parted lips. To think that he had not even a drop of water with which to stay that departing soul! He was almost mad with the bitterness of the truth. He chafed the limp hands, he fanned the pale brow.
"At least we will die together," he murmured, fixing his lips upon hers with the first, last kiss of love and despair, of life and death. As if it called back her fluttering senses, she opened her eyes and smiled upon him—a dreamy smile, yet a smile, he was sure of it, full of love such as filled his own heart.
How long he sat holding her thus, his eyes bent upon hers, half closed and quiet, but full of passionate devotion, he knew not. The clatter of horses' hoofs roused them from their dying dream, and thus it was that Buckskin Joe had his full share in the rescue of the little girl, after all. It was the contents of his canteen and wallet which brought life back to the perishing.
As soon as the rescued were sufficiently revived, Dr. Carollyn took the girl before him on his horse, supporting her firmly in one arm. Joe gave up his animal to Nat, and trudged along on foot, with that long, loping step which takes these guides over the ground with such ease and rapidity. He was not wrong in his conjecture as to the vicinity of water; a few miles brought them to a stream which was one of those depended upon by emigrants for a supply. Here it was thought best to recruit the strength of all parties by tarrying in the shade of some sickly cottonwoods until the sun was down, and pursue their journey as far as possible during the cooler night. No sooner were the horses secured and the others comfortably seated, after bathing feet and hands in the refreshing water, than Joe crept away with his rifle down the stream in the hopes of meeting something eatable. In the course of half an hour they heard the crack of the rifle, followed in due course of time by the reappearance of the little old guide, tugging a young antelope after him.
"Thar' now, Miss 'Lizabeth, don't say I never did nothin' for you," he remarked, casting his treasure at her feet.
"You do nothing but kind deeds to me and every one, Joe," she said, with something of the accustomed arch smile sparkling about her eyes and mouth.
"A piece of broiled antelope will be the best thing possible for the young lady," said Dr. Carollyn, with almost a glow of admiration on his dark face, as he assisted at gathering stray branches and leaves under the trees, and kindled a fire, while Joe dressed the game.
"'Young lady!'" muttered Joe, to himself; "'young lady' be danged! If that ain't cool to his own daughter, after bein' in such a fidget as he was a spell ago. The circumstances is ruther curious, anyhow; and if I don't see that ring back on Miss 'Lizabeth's finger I shall have to tell her what I know about it."
"Joe," said Dr. Carollyn, a little while later, as he came close to the guide to help him in cutting some steaks from the antelope, speaking in a low voice, "of course I can trust in your discretion for the present. It would be dangerous, in the exhausted state of my daughter, to speak to her on any exciting subject. She knows nothing whatever of the relationship between her and myself—I dare not reveal it yet. Wait until she is restored to those who seem now to have the best right to her, and she and they and yourself shall hear the story."
"I reckon you can manage your own business—Ishan't presume to meddle," responded the guide, mollified immediately by this evidence of regard for his favorite's interest, and confidence in himself; "to be sure, any thin' startlin' would finish her up jes' now. It's dreadful lucky we didn't turn back when we was goin' to. I'm right glad you held out as you did. Nat Wolfe hasn't told us yet how it all come about."
"Wait till we have supped on fresh meat, and we shall have all the particulars, no doubt."
In the mean time, the two most exhausted of the little party reclined beneath the cottonwoods, quiet and silent. It was delight enough to see the water glittering before them, to hear the parched leaves rustle, to inhale the delicious odor of the venison broiling over the coals—their frames were in that state of weakness and languor when soul and sense are both most easily stirred. It was such a joy to feel safe, to be cared for, to wait for the feast which kind hands were preparing. The hour to both was one of strange, new happiness, as of souls taking their first repose in Paradise. Although neither of them tried to analyze their own emotions, the consciousness of what they had thought and felt and read in each other's eyes during those perilous hours just past was secretly thrilling the heart of each. Nat's eyes dwelt almost constantly upon the young girl's face, who scarcely raised her own, so conscious was she of that ardent gaze—a slight red spot in either pale cheek telling the story of her own feelings.
While this little tableau was being silently enacted, the brow of Dr. Carollyn was growing dark as a thunder-cloud, while his eyes flashed covert lightning from beneath. He was troubled, discontented, angry. He had found a child, a daughter, whose want of accomplishments suited to the rank he should soon confer upon her was fully counterbalanced by her exceeding beauty, grace and natural refinement. He had already felt more pleasure than had filled his breast in seventeen years, in dreaming of how he should develop that fine mind and cultivate those unconscious charms. That she still retained all the innocence of childhood his keen observation had convinced him, the first hour of their meeting—that strange chance meeting, which had told him in that wild place and in that unexpected way that he had a child!—a truth he had often dreamed over, doubting and wondering. When he first went, in the camp of the emigrants, to do a kindness to women and children, he had been moved in a mysterious manner at the first sight of that young face—he had felt thrilled by an electric shock, before he perceived the ring.Thatwas the key unlocking the marvel. He knew in an instant, more certainly than as if it had been sworn to, that he saw his child—the child of his Annie. He knew as certainly that Annie was dead—else, never would his daughter have been here under such circumstances.He had no need to question any party now—indeed, he could not at first, the shock was so sudden. That night he had crept to the side of the slumbering girl—he had sat and watched that sweet face bathed in the lustrous moonlight, while great, hot tears rolled over his cheeks. Her face was not Annie's—it was very lovely, but it was not Annie's—so fair, so angelic, with golden ringlets and deep-blue eyes. No, this washis ownlikeness softened by youth and sex, but his own. The dark, curling lashes, the raven hair, the clear brunette skin, the passionate mouth, the proud brows were the softer type of himself. This was his child, indeed, only that the pride of his own expression in hers was a calm melancholy, telling, ah, how piteously, of the heart-broken musings of the desolate mother who bore her.
With tears such as men seldom have such occasion to weep, he had kept watch, in the repose of midnight, by his daughter's slumber; then, softly slipping the ring from her hand, he had stolen back to his own camp-wagon, to waste the rest of the night in the recollections of bliss and agony which the sight of that wedding-ring had brought back almost as vividly as if the events of those long-vanished years had happened yesterday.
It was not surprising that the next day should find him too much shaken in spirit to feel like unraveling the thread of mystery connected with his wife and child. He would linger by her side another day, observe her, and the people who had her in charge, and, as soon as he was calm enough to hear what there might be for them to tell, he would make himself known to them.
The devastation of the tornado the following night had interrupted his plans and plunged him into new distress. But, through all his fears for the fate of Elizabeth, sweet hopes had whispered to him that he should find her, that he should take her with him to the home which nature had fitted her to adorn, and he had exulted in the thought that she was still but a child—"in maiden meditation, fancy free"—whom he could guide, develop, sway. She was pure and beautiful—this was enough for him.
This was the cause of the thunder-cloud now gathering over the heaven of his anticipations. In these two days that his child had been snatched from him, had come a change. He saw the blush in her cheek, the new luster in her drooping eyes. He saw the man who had found and cherished her would be loth ever to resign the treasure he had, as it were, secured a right to.
Nat Wolfe little suspected the searching jealousy that was reading his every thought and action. He did, indeed, although he had scarcelythoughtat all about it, feel as if Elizabeth was his own—as if he never more could leave this child to thedangers of the rude life she was compelled to live—as if he must take her in his strong arms, shield her against his strong breast, and keep, hereafter, the winds of heaven from blowing upon her too roughly.
But if hehadbeen conscious that the haughty gentleman who had taken so deep an interest in her rescue, had claims stronger than his, and would bitterly denyhisright to advance his own, it would not have changed his resolves.
Nat Wolfe was not a man to yield the mastery to any one. His will was not to be ruled. His pride was as stubborn in its way as Dr. Carollyn's. He despised the effeminacy of city civilization more thoroughly than anyone despised the rudeness of his handsome, courageous manhood.
If he could win the shy maiden to love the tangles of unshorn hair, the tried strength of his protecting arm, the sincere passion of his untutored heart, she should be his by the right of affinity.
The lion of his nature lay, however, for the present, unaroused. He only dreamed of the young form that he had held through the chill watches of the preceding night, and of the soft eyes that had answered his own with mute promises of deathless love in moments they had thought their last of earth—of the long, wild kiss with which he had sought to hold the sinking soul of the girl on his breast. And now they were safe and well again, almost strong, drinking delicious draughts of life, free to love, to live, to be happy!
The welcome supper was prepared. Dr. Carollyn himself attended to the quantity and quality of Elizabeth's share of the feast. Every morsel was ambrosial. The whole party were renovated by the needed refreshment. Nat told the story of his rescue of the kidnapped girl, his voice quivering slightly over the mention of Kit Carson's death.
The faithful horses who had borne Joe and the Doctor on their long, sultry ride, received their share of attention, being carefully watered, and fed on the short, coarse grass along the bank of the stream. Then, as the sunset hour approached, with wallets well filled with cooked antelope, and canteens overflowing with water, the quartette set out in good spirits, along the trail, hoping by traveling nearly all night, and making good speed next day, to overtake their company. To Buckskin Joe it was reserved to walk, he generously resigning his animal to Nat, while Elizabeth, as before, rode with Dr. Carollyn.
Without further accidents, and with only such events as were common to the journey, the party reached the encamped emigrants at the time they expected. A great shout of joy rung over the plain as the lost ones were welcomed back to the anxious company.
CHAPTER VII.
THE REVELATION.
I shrink from the embittered closeOf my own melancholy tale;'Tis long since I have waked my woes—And nerve and voice together fail.—Willis.How may this little tablet feignThe features of a face,Which o'erinforms with loveliness,Its proper share of space.—Pinckney.
"Itwas right kind of you, stranger, to put yourself out so much to help find our Lizzie," remarked Mrs. Wright, after the first excitement of the morning was over.
Dr. Carollyn had just returned from a visit to the wagon, where lay the man with the broken leg, who was doing as well as possible. The camping-ground where they had been so long detained was, fortunately, pretty well supplied with grass and water, so that the cattle were rather enjoying their holiday. The men had been kept busy repairing the damages done by the tornado, and now were in unusually good spirits, both on account of the safe return of the lost ones, as also in the prospect that another day's successful march would bring them into the belt of comparatively fertile prairie at the foot of the mountains. The dreaded part of the journey was over; to-morrow there would be wood and grass and water in plenty—in three days at furthermost they would be at the scene of their anticipation—their El Dorado; to realize something of their feverish dreams or to be overwhelmed with bitter disappointment—which?—there was plenty reason to fear the latter; but the human heart is more elastic than any other earthly substance—it will hope, itmusthope—it does hope always; and these men talked as if seas of gold were rolling at their feet.
"We shall never forget it, sir, so long as we live," added Mr. Wright, looking affectionately over at the maiden, who was sitting on a buffalo-skin under a canopy made of a wagon-cover stretched upon some poles.
She looked wearied out with exposure and excitement, but her smile was one of the most brilliant content; and she had not refused little Mary a place in her lap, fatigued as she was. The child had missed her so much as to fairly pine, and was now close in the shelter of her arms, sleeping, and laughing in her sleep. The two boys hung about, looking at their cousin as at some new and wonderful creature, their pleasure being testified by bashful smiles and giggles.
"Perhaps I have been more selfish in the matter than any ofyou dream," replied the gentleman, with a peculiar look at the young girl. "Elizabeth, you are not strong enough to hold that little one; let me give it to its mother. And now, I'm going to sit here, and tell you something strange."
He sat down on the robe beside her, and lifted one of her small, brown hands in his; there was something in his manner which arrested the attention of all. Mrs. Wright leaned forward, her husband took his tobacco-pipe from his mouth, leaning his elbows on his knees; Buckskin Joe, who was on the alert for this little episode, strolled alongside, standing, with a great quid in one cheek, and whittling away with his hunting-knife at a green switch; while Golden Arrow, who was also lounging on the grass, and near enough to hear every uttered word, straightened himself up, with eyes that began to flash as he saw the way in which Elizabeth's hand was taken possession of. His first thought was that this proud, reserved gentleman was about to make a declaration of love to the young girl, and the maddening jealousy which fired his veins taught him the full strength of the feeling she had awakened. The words which followed, however, gave a new direction to his fears.
"What do you say, friends—do you see any resemblance between this maiden and myself?" and the speaker drew the soft, oval face up beside his older and sallower countenance.
"La me! if they don't look enough alike to be father and child! don't they, Tim?" exclaimed Mrs. Wright.
"They sartainly do look alike, wife."
"Since we look so much like parent and daughter, and since this maiden has neither father nor mother, why not give her up to me, and let me have her for my child? This life you are bringing her up to is too hard and rough for her."
"So 'tis—so 'tis, stranger!" said Timothy, "but it's the best we can do for her—and we couldn't spare Lizzie. No! no!"
"You have others to provide for—I have no one. I am rich; I could give her all she wishes and ought to have."
"Wal, in the first place, stranger, if you're in earnest, you'd have to give purty satisfactory proofs of who and what you was, before you get our Lizzie. As for the rest, we love her too much to want to be selfish—and she can speak for herself."
"What do you say, Elizabeth? Will you be my daughter?"
She made no reply; she was looking at him with a startled, wistful gaze—something was stirring in her blood and brain which moved her mysteriously—her subtle sense was half conscious of the affinity between this stranger and herself.
"You never knew your father, Elizabeth?"
"Never."
"Or your mother?"—how his voice trembled.
"She has been dead many years—since I was three years old—but I remember her," and the tears rushed into voice and eyes.
The cautious prudence with which Dr. Carollyn meant to approach the avowal was swept away by a sudden torrent of emotion—tears blinded him, his lips quivered, he endeavored in vain to speak, to compose himself—until finally he caught the surprised girl to his breast, held her closely, exclaiming:
"Oh, my lost Annie! you are her child, yes, you are her child and mine. You are indeed my own flesh and blood—I am your father, my darling!"
"Wal, if that don't beat all," was Mrs. Wright's comment amid the silence of the rest of the group. "I always told you, husband, this very thing would turn up some time."
"How do I know he's speakin' truth?" growled Timothy.
"Did you know Elizabeth's mother?" asked Mr. Carollyn.
"I reckon we did, when she lived with us full four years—she was with us before this child was born, and stayed with us till she went to a better place—to the heaven where she belonged," and the woman put her apron up to her eyes.
"I will show you the likeness of my wife," said Dr. Carollyn, putting Elizabeth gently aside, and drawing a miniature case from an inner vest-pocket over his heart.
Wright and his wife sprung forward to look at it.
"It's her!" they both cried, lingering as if they could not look enough—another was also hanging tranced above it, the maiden gazing at the picture of her mother, whose girlish face was scarcely older than her own—gazing, breathless and tearless, upon the delicate, lovely vision whose blue eyes looked out of ripples of golden hair like an angel's out of a cloud.
"It is my mother," she said, "I have never forgotten her."
"And I am your father—oh, say that your heart no longer denies me the title."
The young girl looked into his face, full of the most yearning love and anguish; her own soul was deeply stirred. The dreams with which her melancholy childhood had been haunted, had ever pictured to her something different from the commonplace, narrow, poverty-enthralled life about her. Her vague memories of a mother, beautiful and refined, together with long musings over the few jewels and fine articles of clothing she had left, had helped her to build up a world as different from the coarse scenes of her daily experience as Paradise from common earth. It was in this world of dreams she moved when those dark eyes floated with those far-away, lustrous looks which made those about her feel that she was different from them, and leave her undisturbed to her reveries. Kind and gentle as she had ever been to her friends, winning their warmest love, she was conscious of affections and aspirations which their companionship never called forth.
"Speak—let me hear you call me father!"
The deep, musical tones, whose singular power seldom failed to move those whom he addressed with earnestness, and nowquivering with untold pathos, pierced to her heart; her bosom fluttered like a frightened bird's—her eyes turned to each one of the group, those true, affectionate friends of hers, and lastly, lingered an instant on those of Nat Wolfe, who had risen and was standing motionless, regarding her with a keen look—then her hand slipped into Dr. Carollyn's, she kissed his cheek and called him—
"Father."
When she thought of him again, Nat had disappeared; he had turned abruptly from the scene, and was walking off the pain and anger which tormented him, out of sight of the camp. He was more wordly-wise than Elizabeth; when he saw her yield to the claim of this courtly father, he knew that all her old associations were to be shaken off like a worn-out garment. For hours he strode back and forth along the outskirts of the camp, like a sentinel doing duty most conscientiously, his mind in such a tumult as had not shaken it for years.
"It is my fate," he muttered. "The soft blessings of a woman's love are never to warm this rough experience of mine. I was mad—a fool, to dream that it could be! I will not suffer the whole accursed thing over again," he continued. "It is enough to have had life blighted once, as mine was blighted. Why have I allowed this flower to spring again on the withered stalk? I should have known some frost would blacken it. The Fates should have made me more heartless or her less pure and lovely. What man could have cherished that innocent girl through days and nights, seeing her so confiding, so entirely a child in heart yet a woman in beauty, and not have felt the hard suspicion and dislike within him melt away? I wish I had never met her? I wish that confounded dark-skinned Doctor had chanced in some other company. I'm a fool to believe in woman! Two days ago she told me with her dying eyes, that she loved me—to-morrow she will tell me that she has changed her mind. The prospect of a little worldly splendor and flattery will turn any woman's head—or heart!"
Poor Nat! it was no wonder he spoke bitterly—that he stamped and stalked about in a manner quite different from his usual careless dignity. Far back in the past of his early manhood, when his fresh, boyish soul trusted all, and adored every woman as something to be revered and idolized, he had loved a girl of his own age. He was not a hunter of bison and Indians in those days—he was a handsome, proud, well-educated youth, the son of an esteemed clergyman, who, though poor, as is the wont of village ministers, managed to send his oldest son to college, and was glad, as even a minister has a right to be, to see him so bright, so graceful, so brilliant in intellect—the peer of any of the young men with whom he associated.
The Rev. Mr. Wolfe had never been so unwise as to plan thathis son should follow his own profession; for that Nathaniel was never made for the quiet, severely-disciplined life of his father was self-evident. Reckless, gay, full of wit and courage, it was yet impossible for the surliest deacon in his father's church to find fault with any action of his life. His morals were pure, his impulses good and generous—the deficiency in his character was that those impulses were not under the control of his judgment, and that his feelings were allowed too rash a rule.
He was just the young man to make the most devoted and winning lover. The maidens were all pleased with his attentions; and, of course, before he was fairly out of college, he was desperately enamored of the belle and beauty of the village, the 'Judge's' daughter. She liked him, too; she could not resist his handsome face and delicious devotion; she allowed herself to be engaged to him—and then, of course, he had to think of marriage, and the future. He had nothing, and she would be quite an heiress; he was too proud to live off her family, who wouldn't have permitted it, if he had been willing; he decided to study law, an offer having been made him by a friend of his father's in the city of New York—bade his darling betrothed a two years' passionate farewell, and set out, full of hope and ambition, to begin the struggle for the anticipated reward. Before his probation was much more than half over, he received news of the marriage of his affianced, to a wealthy widower, a squire of a neighboring town, who had seen and admired her beauty.
His friends thought that the rudeness of the shock would produce a reaction which would enable him to despise and forget her, while the disappointment would strengthen his character and subdue his too-romantic ideal. But they did not know how peculiarly the blow would fall upon his proud, dreamy, sensitive feelings. Having been offered the transaction of some rather unpleasant but profitable business in the far West, by the lawyer in whose office he was, and who did not wish to attend to the matter himself, he accepted the offer, with the secret resolution to never return to the mockery and falsehood of civilized society.
Upon reaching the wild settlements for which he was destined, the rude freedom of life in these places was a balm to his wounded and outraged spirit. Naturally fond of adventure, and brave as reckless, his present contempt for life added to his courage. He made friends with the sturdy trappers and guides; he learned their modes of living, joined eagerly in their pursuits, and soon outdid them in their own peculiar accomplishments. An incident which occurred quite early in his western experience, where a whole family of helpless women and children were savagely murdered by a prowling band of Indians, turned his dislike upon them. These barbarous bands were then the terrorof the white settlers—the only too well-founded dread of them lying like a dark and stealthy shadow at every isolated cabin-door, making children shriek in their sleep, and the faces of mothers to grow pale as they rocked the rude cradles wherein their innocent infants slumbered.
Those who have had an opportunity of observing how speedily men change when going to some new country where the firm restraints of law and public opinion are taken away—a change which affects morals and actions, manners and dispositions as quickly as it does their dress and conversation—will not be surprised that ten years of border-life had changed the ardent youth into the 'Nat Wolfe' of hunter fame, whose name was the admiration of his associates and the terror of all cowardly savages.
Yet, beneath all the roughness of his hunter's frock and neglected locks, he was always the superior man in every company. There was a reserve and dignity about him which added to the respect paid to his remarkable skill and courage; his deeds were always honest and manly, his language free from real coarseness, his person neat, with a little touch of elegance even about his wild costume. While he was social and friendly on all the topics of their common life and adventure, he never betrayed his past history or his private feelings to any one. The grace of his manners, the beauty of his countenance, the superiority of his intellect, gave him great influence with men who, sincerely as they admired these traits in him, would yet have despised him had he not proved himself fully their equal in coolness, daring, and the expert wisdom required by his pursuits. Thus Nat Wolfe had become the pride and model of the hunters and guides of a vast region of prairie and forest; while the Indians, as we have said, gave him the name of "Golden Arrow," both on account of the brightness of his hair, and the preternatural swiftness and sureness they believed his darts, spears, knives and rifles to possess.
Curiously enough, right in the pathway of this hunter-skeptic, this man who had fled from the refinements of life because he believed them to gild only deceit and selfishness, the Fates had thrown this young girl, Elizabeth, a being so innocent of all worldly guile, so ignorant of life, so untempted, artless and pure, yet so lovely in spirit and form as to be fit for any sphere. They had thrown her in his pathway, left her in his protection as if purposely, that he might be made to know what truth and beauty there still could be in some women's characters; they had shaken the fixed resolves of years, melted away his stoicism like ice in tropic sunlight—until he was warmed, thrilled, entranced—made over again in all the delicious trust and poetry of his boyhood—ready to give this maiden a love as sweet and hopeful as the first enthusiastic dream—Fate, or circumstance, had done this—what for? To drive him back again into adesolation more dreary than before! Ere he could fashion his hopes into words, ere he could ask the maiden to share with him the life of mingled luxury and wildness which he had painted as best fitted for both their natures, this specious tempter must come, in the shape of a haughty and wealthy father, to snatch away his Eve and feed her on the apples of knowledge. It was no wonder his thoughts were bitter as he tramped to and fro beneath the large, bright stars of the prairie-sky, which here seemed to come almost close enough to earth to be reached by his weary longing.
In the mean time, Dr. Carollyn was deeply engaged with the Wrights, listening, the most of the time with his face bowed and hidden in his hands, to the particulars of his wife's residence with this family. They were no relatives of hers; although they had taught Elizabeth to regard them as such, for the sake of making the orphan feel at home, as if she had a claim on them.
"They were a new-married couple themselves," Mrs. Wright said, and "had just sot up for themselves in a little house her father had built for them on a part of his own farm, in O— county, York State. They hadn't been to housekeeping but a few days when the lady came along, and wanted to board with them for the summer. She had no family then, nothin' much to do, and was right glad to take such a nice boarder, who paid them enough and well for all they did for her. Their place was small, but it was pleasant—looked out over an orchard and wheat-fields, off to Lake Ontary, lying as blue as the sky ag'in it. The lady had a neat chamber to herself, where she could look at the lake night and day, if she wanted to, which she mostly did. They knew of course there was something queer about her comin' there alone; she give her name as Mrs. St. John—but they didn't like to ask her questions; and they couldn't have been made to believe any thing bad about her. Some of the neighbors did talk and make remarks; but she and Tim set more store by the lady than they did by their own relatives; nobody that knew her, but would see, to oncet, she was a perfect angel—(ah, jealous man, how bitterly that unmeant dart stung thee!)—she was always so sad and quiet, but so gentle, and didn't make any fuss about any thing. When it became plain she was going to be a mother before long, she took me to her room oncet, when Tim was gone, and showed me her marriage-certificate, only she covered up her husband's name; and she told me there had been a difficulty; but if she should die and her baby should live, she would leave a letter for me to open, so I could give the child to its father, that he should do by it as he ought.
"Wal, she was very sick, but she didn't die; she got 'round again, but was never well—she took the consumption—sort of faded away like. She stayed with us all the time. We hadn'tno children of our own yet, and we sot our hearts on our little girl—the prettiest, sweetest, cunningest little thing that ever was! She saw how we loved little Lizzie, and she finally told me, a few weeks 'fore she died, that we might keep the child, and do by it as our own—that she believed the poor little creature would be heart-broken to be sent off to cold and cruel strangers—'we loved her,' she said, and we cried and said we did, and would do far more for that baby than as if it was our own. So she put away the ring, and what little things she had, and a couple o' hundred dollars in gold, in a box to be kept till the child was growed up, with a letter to her, to be read when she was eighteen; she saved out money to buy herself a shroud and coffin; and so she went at last, as quiet as a lamb."
"And left no word for me at the very last," cried her listener.
"Maybe she would have said somethin' at the last, but she went before anybody knew it. She was about her room the day before she died; that night we heard her speak, and got right up and went into her chamber, but she was dead when we reached her. Since then we've kept our promise as well as we could, haven't we, Lizzie?—which is poor enough at the best, for Timothy has been unlucky, and we've seen hard times, and so poor Lizzie has had rough times."
"Yes, we've had bad luck," said Mr. Wright, "we mostly have had all kind of misfortunes; but the Lord has blessed that little girl to us, for all."
That firmness of will, that selfishness of purpose, which is apt to accompany the intense pride and jealousy of a disposition like Dr. Carollyn's, was already working out the problem in his mind of how he was to separate his child from these associations in which she had grown up. This very evening, while moved to agony and remorse keen as that he felt the first day of his desolation, and amid the very gratitude the recital of these kind-hearted people awakened, he was conscious of regret that the ties between them and his should be so strong, and of a resolve that they must be severed. Yet he was far too generous and noble to wish to wrong the feelings of any; he did not intend to hint at any abrupt or long-continued separation; he wished to reward, as far as money could, the care and expense his child had been to these adopted relatives, to lighten the burden of their poverty, while into the heart of his daughter he thought to win his way gradually, and when he once had her to himself, he feared not but that the awakening of dormant tastes, the bewitching influences of ease and refinement, would complete the work of alienation. The proud love of his passionate nature, so long doomed to suspense and solitude, fixed now upon his child, as it had once fixed on the orphan Annie St. John, with the wish to absorb and possess its object utterly. Could he then brook a rival at the very onset?—that rival a lover, and a man of the stamp of Nat Wolfe? He had otherdreams for this beautiful girl—"sole daughter of his house and heart"—and the hunter, walking his impatient beat a mile away, knew it as well as himself—knew it better, for Dr. Carollyn had not yet realized the actualities of the case. If he took Elizabeth away with him to his eastern home, that, of course, would be the end of any incipient fancy which might be growing in her mind for her dashing preserver.
Every glance of Dr. Carollyn's at the ungainly calico frock which his daughter wore, every illiterate expression of her friends, grated upon his feelings. It was to him the most powerful evidence of the deadly nature of the blow he had struck into the heart of his sensitive, confiding wife, that she had sternly resolved to leave her little one with such people, rather than send her tohim—"cruel and cold strangers," she had said, but she had meant him, or, at least when she felt that her own protection could no longer be exercised over their babe, she would have consigned it to him. He dared not linger upon the history of that past time—but now, if his wife could look from the heaven where she was sheltered from the cruelties of earth, she should see that the tenderness in which he should wrap their child from every breath of any chilling care or sorrow, would satisfy her yet.
As for Elizabeth, she was absorbed in conjecturing what the difficulty could have been which alienated such a mother from such a father in the very honeymoon of their wedded youth—of this she was thinking far more than of the change in her own prospects.
CHAPTER VIII.
FIRE IN THE FOREST.
What is that which I should turn to, lighting upon days like these?Every door is barred with gold, and opens but to golden keys.Locksley Hall.
Too much horrified to speak,They can only shriek, shriek,In a clamorous appealing to the mercy of the fire,In a mad expostulation with the deaf and frantic fire!The Bells.
Nat Wolfeand Buckskin Joe were traversing a wild pine forest on the eastern slope of the Rocky Mountains. As they came out on a projecting ledge of rock from which they had a view of the mountain and plain beneath them, they turned to look back over the ground they had passed. Through the clear, bracing September air they distinctly saw where the little cluster of cabins was gathered about Pike's Peak, twenty miles away, by the smoke of the chimneys hovering over the settlement.
"We're purty nigh onto the spot now, if I recollect right," said Joe; "it's over a year sence I was here. Let's eat our grub—here's a basin of water in this rock a purpose for us to drink out of; after we've rested a spell we'll push on and find the exact locality. Cur'us, isn't it?—I didn't dream, when I traveled over this mountain the last time, that so many thousand fools would have sot foot on it in less'n a year. We made up our minds, then, me and Jim did, thar' was gold in this region—and I ain't sartain but we're responsible for givin' the fever to a good many," added the little old fellow, with a quiet chuckle. "It's a mighty catchin' disease—took more easily than the small-pox. The wust of it is, I'm afraid it'll prove fatal to a good many of them poor, white-livered chaps as have come expecting to crowd their pockets with rocks as big as goose-eggs, all ready picked up. I reckon Wright's one of the wust-up of any. He ain't naterally got any pluck, and he's out o' money and vittals, and instid of workin' for hisself and makin' thirty or forty dollars a day, he's had to hire out for a dollar a day and keepin.' I'm sorry for his wife, poor critter. But she's got more sperit than he has, and 'll make more money. She's takin' in washin' and cookin' for the men, and airns a good lot, I'll be bound. I shouldn't wonder ifshegot along and laid up money—which he'll be sure to borrow and have 'the luck' to lose. Have some o' this dried buffalo, Wolfe?—it's better'n your cold bacon.
"I don't wonder that saller-faced Doctor is anxious to get Miss 'Lizabeth away from such a hole as Pike's Peak," continued Joe, who grew talkative over his dried meat and whisky and water, giving a keen side-look at his companion as he spoke. "'Tain't no place for the likes of her—eh, Nat, what do you think? They say he'll leave with the first company that starts back, and take her along. I've a mind to hire out as guide, and see 'em safely back as far as Nebraska City."
"I wish you would," was the hunter's brief reply.
"Why don'tyouundertake the job, Wolfe?"
"I'm afraid my company wouldn't be agreeable," with a bitter laugh.
"Sho! it's the first time I ever knowed ofyouplayin' the sneak, Nat Wolfe."
"What do you mean?" rather fiercely.
"You needn't turn on me like a trod nettle, Nat. I wouldn't like to make you mad—cos we're alone out here in the woods and you're the biggest, and nobody'd ever know what had become of Buckskin Joe if you should chaw me up. But say, now, r'ally, I'll bet a thousand dollars, to be paid the day after wefind our lead, that you hain't never asked that young lady whether she liked your comp'ny or not. Come, now, own up the corn."
"I'm not so humble as to put myself in the way of being walked over," was the haughty reply.
"Oh—oh, jest as I 'spected. I ain't a ladies' man—that is, not lately," said the little guide, running his fingers through his short hair as if moved by ancient reminiscences, "but I allers thought it didn't disgrace a feller if a purty woman did put her foot on his neck. How in thunder do you expeck to know for sartain whether she likes you or not, if you're too mean to ask her. P'raps you wantherto do the courtin'! Mighty generous you be, ain't you. All I can say is, if you let her go off without findin' out precisely her sentiments, you deserve to lose her—and ought to be thrashed besides for breaking her purty heart, Nat Wolfe!"
"Breaking her heart!" echoed Nat, in a softer voice, his eyes bent wistfully upon the blue smoke wreathing the distant settlement. "There's no danger of that—her heart's already mended, and stuffed full of silk dresses and diamonds, young men and flattery, elegant houses and rich friends."
"A woman wouldn't be a woman, if she didn't have a hankerin' after silk and satin and other fixin's—specially if she's young and handsome. I don't see any thing to prevent your supplyin' her with a fair share of sech—particularly if we're lucky in findin' what we're after on this tramp. As for that pesky father of hers, he'd no business poking along here jest at this time—though he's a perfect gentleman, and we hain't no reason to hate him as I knows on. 'Lizabeth's known you as long as she hashim—and unless Buckskin Joe misses his guess more'n usual, she thinks a good deal more of the youngest one of the two. I should like to know if you think it's fair not to give her a chance to speak for herself?"
Nat smiled, rather sadly however, at the indignant, remonstrating tone of the guide; he felt cheered by his words, though, and brightened visibly, as he put away the remainder of his dinner in his wallet, and sprung to his feet, saying:
"Come on, then, my friend. Let's try for the gold, first, seeing we've come this far in search of it."
For a while they strode along in silence. The bracing air was fragrant with resinous odors, the dead tassels of the pines made a soft carpet under their feet; with rifles ready loaded to repel any wild animal who might see fit to resent their intrusion into his solitudes, eager, athletic, accustomed to the forest, they pressed onward with as little hesitation as if following some well-known highway.
It was a wild and glittering hope which danced before these sober men, leading them into the depths of mountain solitudes, hitherto trodden by white men seldom or never. Gold, the all-fascinating siren, allured them. Their hearts bounded, their pulses beat to the music of that whisper; the winds breathed it through the tall pines murmuring above them; the sunlightsparkled only to remind them of its glitter. Fond master-passion of the universal heart! the love of gold, dearer even than the love of woman, for it holds the key to that love, and to every other earthly delight.
The little, quaint, withered guide was enough of a philosopher to pause all of a sudden in their journey, and say, with that peculiar quirk of the mouth:
"What in creation amIchasing off here after a gold mine for? S'posin' I should stumble on a few hundred thousands or millions, what on airth would I do with my share? When I've plenty of tobaccy in my box, meat in my wallet and powder in my flask, I'm happy. I couldn't live without trampin' and huntin'. Yit here I am as crazy as the rest of 'em. Fact is, we're all a set of fools.
"Tell you what I will do," he continued, a little later, having evidently been dwelling on the subject: "if we strike a rich lead I'll give my share to Miss 'Lizabeth. She'd know how to make it fly, I reckon! As for me, I've neither wife nor child, and all I want is enough to keep me in tobaccy."
Buckskin Joe had no need of riches; but when, an hour later, they emerged from the woods into a wild and rock ravine, down the center of which a little stream came dashing and roaring, leaping from rock to rock, broken into foam one moment, and mended with silver bands the next—when they emerged into this secluded place, over which great masses of mountain hung threateningly, dark with frowning pines, rough with water-washed rocks, he threw up his cap, and shouted aloud:
"Here's the spot, Wolfe! Unless I'm more mistaken than ever I war' in my life, thar's gold enough in this ravine to pave the ground a mile square for Miss 'Lizabeth to walk over. I'll show you my reasons in less'n half an hour."
The hot blood rushed into the hunter's cheeks; a bright light danced in his eye; his breath came more quick with the excitement of the hour. Was he about to lay his hand on untold treasures? He believed so.
The circumstances which had brought the two adventurers to this remote and unsuspected locality were these: Upon the previous year, Buckskin Joe, crossing the mountains with a brother trapper, all alone, with no other object but game, furs and "the fun of the thing," happened upon this wild, romantic and picturesque spot. Resolved to follow the ravine up the mountain side, they commenced the difficult work of making their way from rock to rock, hight to hight, charmed with the noisy play of the stream. Coming into a little dell where the water was gathered into a basin worn in the rock, from which it overflowed and tumbled down a moss-grown steep, Joe stooped to drink, when his eyes caught the glitter of a large pebble lying in the bottom of the basin. He plunged in his arm and brought up a lump of pure, soft gold, nearly uncontaminatedwith other substances, and weighing nearly a pound. They lingered around the spot several days, finding half a dozen smaller specimens; then, having no way to bring off much treasure, and Joe's companion here injuring himself by an accident with his rifle, they were obliged to leave the mountains. They took their gold with them, and their story spread like wild-fire; but they betrayed to no one the exact locality of their discovery.
Another company made some discoveries in the same region that autumn. The news traveled through the winter and spring, and the summer saw people from all parts of the United States on their way to the new El Dorado.
So tardy and indifferent had Buckskin Joe been about profiting further by his good luck, that this was the first trip to the mountains since the time of his fortunate visit; the companion of his former trip was dead; he was sole possessor of the knowledge of a "lead" which, he was convinced, after a few days' observation of the "diggins" about Pike's Peak, was richer than any of them. He had come to the mature resolve to take Nat Wolfe into confidence and partnership—especially since he had observed the threatening clouds lowering about the two young people since the advent of the father into the interests of the group.
The result of a talk he had held with the moody hunter, a fortnight after the arrival of the company at their destination, was this private expedition, upon which the two set off, unsuspected by others.
With his present increased knowledge of mining, Joe "calkilated" to pick up enough stray nuggets in the quiet basins and gullies of the stream to make the two men rich beyond their wishes, before it would be necessary to take any trouble of machinery. He was sure that the accumulated washings of centuries were lying ready to their hands.
With eager, watchful eyes and glowing veins the gold hunters pushed forward up the difficult ravine. The stream was now dwindled to about its slenderest proportions; it was an excellent season in which to attempt their plans; but the brief September afternoon began to darken before they had laid their hands upon any tangible evidence to give substance to their brilliant dreams. The sun, sinking early behind the mountains, threw their deep shadows over the way, often slippery and uncertain.
"Wal, we're here, and all ready for work in the mornin' bright and 'arly," said Buckskin Joe, as the night drew closer. "Our best way is to climb back into the woods ag'in; we can have a comfortable bed of boughs and pine-tossels, and begin to-morrer. Thar's no hurry—nobody's goin' to carry our fortins off in the night. So let's make ourselves cosy. By this time to-morrer we'll be independent."
Clinging to roots of trees, washed bare by spring freshets, and to ledges of dark and chilly rock, they swung themselves up out of the cool ravine into the pleasant forest.
"We won't kindle a fire here in the midst of this pitchy stuff," remarked Joe; "the woods is jest like a match, ready to go off at the least rub, at this season of the year. Otherwise we might kill a brace of bird, and brile them for supper. As it is, we'll make out on a cold smack."
By the time the repast was taken, evening had shut them in. The guide, healthily fatigued after their long tramp, with a look to his knife and rifle in case of a stray bear, composed himself soon upon his primeval couch, and was breathing the deep and regular breath of a good sleeper long before Nat could close his excited eyes. Dreams of the expected successes of this search, mingled with softer dreams of the fair girl from whom he seemed so far separated—as if she never had been near his heart, and never could be—thronged upon his brain, as he looked up at the great silver stars peering here and there through rifts of the pine branches far overhead.
The wind, according to its nightly habit, began to rise, and to rush roaring down the mountain side, kissing the dark boughs of the pines till they wailed in unison. It was a solemn, sweet and mighty music, pleasant to the soul and sense of the hunter as he lay there dreaming of the woman he loved. But as the hours crept on to midnight, he, too, slept.
Buckskin Joe, as he stirred uneasily in his sleep, had a strange, disagreeable dream. He thought the water in the ravine began to rise with an awful roar—to rise until it overflowed gully and wood—till his ears were stunned by its tumult—till it reached and overflowed him where he lay—he was drowning! and in the spasmodic efforts he made to buffet the horrible stream, he finally awakened. Yes, he was awake; but where he was, or what was the matter, he could not recall. He felt as if a thousand pounds lay upon his chest, pressing him in the earth—he heard a dull, curious, continuous roar, like the incessant discharge of cannon, through which pierced sharp reports, as of volleys of musketry; there was a lurid glare around him that was not the light of moon or sun—for an instant the rough hunter thought of hell! A flake of burning pine-cone falling upon his face revealed the truth. Great God, the forest was on fire!
As the appalling conviction rushed upon him, he raised upon his elbows and looked about. A sea of fire spread around him in every direction—they were already ringed in that awful circle. High overhead flew great sheets and banners of flame, snatched up by the wind and flung from tree-top to tree-top, while a fiery shower fell constantly, drifting down through thelower foliage, which here was not fully kindled. Dense masses of hot and suffocating smoke now shut him in, and were again lifted for a moment by the howling wind. His first thought was of his companion.
He shouted, he felt about him, but obtained no response. Nat had gone to sleep about five yards from him, to the left. He rolled himself over and over until he reached what ought to be the spot, and here he groped about in the blinding smoke, calling sharply upon his friend, who, he was afraid, might be already overpowered. While he was making these efforts he choked, his brain reeled—he felt consciousness slipping from him as the dense vapor hung thicker and hotter about him. But before he entirely lost himself in that deadly struggle, a fierce gush of wind came rushing under the ocean of flame which roared far above. It caught up and whirled away the smoke; he breathed comparatively free again; and in that instant of salvation an instinct whispered to him of the cool ravine, of the delicious waters only such a little distance away. Better to fling himself down and be dashed to pieces on the rocks than to die by this torturing element which threatened him.
He crept along the ground with his face close to the earth. Once or twice the smoke grappled with him—as often a blessed breath of air came creeping after. Suddenly a cold draft struck him on the brow: he knew that it came up from the ravine. Gasping, exhausted, he made yet another effort, reached the edge of the rock, dragged himself over, hanging by his hands, and dropped, in the darkness, knowing nothing of the distance beneath him, nor what cruel reception he might meet from objects below.
For a short time after the fall he lay stunned by the shock, gradually reviving to a sense of safety—that he was alive and whole. He could hear the blessed music of the running stream; all was deep darkness where he was, but he crept along until he could dip his hand in the water, and cool his scorched face and parched tongue. Lifting up his head, he could see the glare of the burning forest against the sky, and the huge showers of sparks floating off into space. Men pray instinctively in times of peril and preservation; Buckskin Joe, albeit unused to prayer, uttered a fervent exclamation of thankfulness for his escape. The next instant he buried his face in his hands with a groan. He had thanked God for his own welfare, but he shuddered as the fate of his companion rushed over him.
It seemed a long time to him before the break of day enabled him to do any thing; it was hard work for him to remain idle while a chance remained in favor of Nat's escape. The glorious September morning was dull with hovering smoke in this vicinity; Joe discovered, by its light, that he had dropped somethirty feet down a precipice and lodged upon a shelf of rock so well cushioned with earth and moss that he had escaped without broken bones.
As he stood up and essayed to walk, he found himself stiff with bruises. Following the ledge upon which he was until he came around the precipice to a now broken and uneven fork, which promised sufficient foothold, he began to climb back to the forest. When he reached the surface of the wood, he found the fire still burning; the tops of the trees were consumed, but the trunks were standing like pillars of fire, and the ground—covered inches thick with dry pine-tassels, cones and other tinder-like combustibles—was now one mass of smoldering fire, upon which it was impossible to set foot.
The smoke was suffocating, coming as it did from the green wood of the trunks and branches, which were slowly charring without being consumed. If Nat Wolfe had not escaped by such an almost miraculous chance as had occurred to the guide, then he had indeed met a terrible death—nothing but his ashes could now remain upon that vast bed of fire.
There was life nowhere but in the deep ravine; back to that Buckskin Joe descended, with a heart of lead. Nearly all day he wandered up and down its intricacies, calling aloud, and getting only mocking echoes for answer.
He thought little of gold that day—he would have given a pound of gold for a pound of bread; and he would have given all the treasures he ever expected to find in the Rocky Mountains for a sight of his friend, alive and well before him. His acquaintance with Nat Wolfe had not been of long duration; but there was that in the stuff which Nat was made of which had secured the old guide's warmest friendship and admiration.
As the day wore away he gradually abandoned the faint hope to which, against reason, he had clung. Forlornly he set his face homeward. He would starve to death if he did not make his way out of that barren gully; there was no game, and if there had been, his rifle had been left to destruction. It being impossible to attempt the forest, all he could do was to follow the water course until he could reach some track which was clear of the fire, through which he might strike for the settlement. That night he lay on the damp rock; the next day, hungry, rheumatic and low-spirited, he continued on a few miles, came out upon the open mountain side, and, guided by the sun and his general knowledge of the country, pushed forward for Pike's Peak. He could see the forest-fires still raging to the south of him; but the wind had carried them from his present vicinity. A few prickly pears from a tree which he found on his way gave him a welcome though insufficient dinner.
About sunset he entered Pike's Peak settlement, which he startled with the news of the fate of Nat Wolfe.
CHAPTER IX.
FATHER AND DAUGHTER.
My steps are turned away;Yet my eyes linger stillOn their beloved hill,In one long, last survey;Gazing, through tears that multiply the view,Their passionate adieu.—Mrs. Barrett.
"Thereis a train starts homeward to-morrow, Elizabeth. We can not have a better opportunity for going East under good protection. It will be no easier for you to part from your friends a month or a year from now—so I think best to warn you of my decision. You'll be happy with your father, will you not? I am sure you will. This is no place for you. I can surround you with circumstances which will make you as glad and gay as the birds; and you will be my darling, my life, my all, my daughter!"
The deep feeling with which Dr. Carollyn spoke made his voice tremble and stirred the heart of the young girl strangely. She raised her wistful eyes to his; she pressed his hand to assure him of her gratitude and affection—but what little light and color still remained in her pale face faded out, leaving it as white and fixed as death. First she glanced into the little log-cabin where Mrs. Wright was too busy over the wash-tub to hear what had been said, then out in the sunshine where the children were playing, and then her gaze wandered to the pine-forests far away. Wreaths of blue smoke still curled from the charred trunks of millions of trees and floated like a thin haze in the west and south. The settlement had been excited for many days, by melancholy reports of the loss of life occasioned by that disastrous fire.
The charred remains of a company of four persons had been found in one spot, whose names and history must forever remain unknown—strangers in a strange land—so perishing as to leave no link by which to connect them with their friends, whoever these might be. Wild rumors, setting the loss of life from thirty to a hundred, as already known, floated about, growing from day to day.
The fate of Nat Wolfe had made a profound impression, and still cast a shadow upon the thoughts of his former friends. Buckskin Joe had himself undertaken to communicate the tidings to the Wrights, feeling more than any other person that the news would harrow one young heart most cruelly. He had watched, with sagacious quiet, the progress of affairsbetween the young people—had secretly chafed at the cold repulsion of Dr. Carollyn's manner toward the haughty hunter who would not make a single concession in advance—had thought he saw that Elizabeth was the deepest sufferer by this state of things—and had been making up his mind to tell Nat that he was a great fool not to take the young girl, in despite of her father—when the events of the last chapter so tragically cut short his plans for the two lovers.
"I'll be danged if I hadn't rather face the fire ag'in than to tell her," said the guide to himself, feeling wretchedly, "but thar's no one will break it so easy, mebbe—and I've got to out with it—that's all!"
He went straight to the log-cabin, in which the Wrights were established, more through the energy of Dr. Carollyn than any exertion of their own. The sunset streamed pleasantly into the little room, whose entrance-way was unopposed by other door than a piece of wagon-cover, which was let down at night.
Elizabeth was spreading a cloth on the grass outside, and Mrs. Wright was coming out with a tin plate heaped with biscuits and another with fried pork. Timothy was putting away his pipe, preparatory to supper.
"You're just in time, Joe," said the matron; "set by, and have somethin' to eat. You haven't been to supper, I hope."
The maiden had colored rose-red when she saw him coming; in her thoughts he was associated with Nat; she knew they had gone off on some kind of an expedition together, and she half expected to see the hunter in his wake. Joe saw the blush and groaned inwardly. Famished as he was, for he had stopped for no refreshment except a glass of whisky, he felt as if he could swallow nothing for the great lump that came up in his tough old throat. But so absolutely faint was he from exhaustion that he sunk down by the cloth, and stretching out his hand for a biscuit, began to eat it before the others were helped, or before he had made any answer to the hostess. Accustomed to the free-and-easy manners of his class, Mrs. Wright pushed the plate near him with a smile, called her husband and the children, and was pouring out the black coffee into tin cups, before she addressed her guest further:
"How's our friend, Nat Wolfe? He went 'long with you, didn't he?"
Joe swallowed his cup of scalding coffee, got up, and went into the cabin to light his pipe.
"I wish you'd eat your supper, Miss 'Lizabeth," he said, coming out and looking at her moodily.
She raised her eyes to his with a bright smile, but when she met his look, she startled, and grew anxious; the biscuit and bacon grew distasteful to her—she sipped her coffee, but not as if she cared for it.
"Did you have any luck, or wasn't you looking for a lead?" asked Mr. Wright, as the guide smoked in silence.
"Had some awful bad luck," answered Joe, letting his pipe fall and break to pieces. "We got caught in that fire, ye see. I got out of the scrape by hard scratching," here he paused entirely and stared at Elizabeth, who had set down her cup and was also staring at him.
"But what?" cried Mr. Wright. "My God! you don't mean to say that—that Nat Wolfe is lost!"
"Look out for that girl," called Joe, to Mrs. Wright, who turned and found Elizabeth fallen upon her face.
"I s'pose I've killed her, after all," muttered the guide, "it's my luck with that gal. Yes, Wright, Wolfe's gone, no mistake. I don't believe she's comin' to, right away; I guess I'll go for the Doctor."
"Yes, do—her father'll know just what to do. She's in a dead faint. It come on her so sudden."
"I hain't got sense to break any thing softly," muttered the old fellow, starting off in the direction of a cluster of tents, in one of which he had seen Dr. Carollyn as he passed by it. When he returned with that gentleman, the maiden was still unconscious; and it required time and skill to revive her from the deathly stupor into which she had been stricken.
Dr. Carollyn was shocked when he learned the cause of his daughter's illness; he had admired the hunter's brave and chivalric character, and felt grateful to him for the priceless service he had rendered in the rescue of his child—while he could not make up his mind to receive him as a son and a rival in the affections of that child. His awful and tragic fate affected him deeply; while he was pained to see the evidence of Elizabeth's interest in the lost one.
He hoped that a great part of the effect of the news upon her was owing to the weakened, excited state of her nerves, her mind and body having been overwrought by the occurrences of the past few weeks. That it was more a shock to her nerves than a fatal blow to her heart, he allowed himself to believe. He himself felt appalled by the sudden and terrible nature of the catastrophe.
With the utmost gentleness and tenderness he won her back to consciousness, and soothed and strengthened her through the two or three days' prostration which followed. During these days he made up his mind to wait no longer, before urging the necessary step of a parting from her old friends, than until she should be strong enough to undertake the return journey.
It was now a week since the news of the accident. Elizabeth was about her little duties, pale and quiet; and her father was making all needful preparations for a speedy departure. Having learned of a train that was about to start eastward, he had taken this time to give her warning of his intentions. Hadsuch a dazzling change in her prospects occurred a month ago, she would have welcomed it with all the delight and eagerness of her age. When oppressed with the dreariness of that long journey, tired of the homely fare, the rough company, if she had been told that such a father as this—a man to whom she could cling with all the fondness of her wild young heart—would come to her and offer all those splendors after which she had vaguely pined, her fancy would have reveled in happy enchantments—her dull life would have opened into a magic land, out of that monotonous desert.
Now her eyes fixed themselves upon the blackened forest with a gaze that could not be torn away; they seemed to say in that expression of mute longing and despair, that it would be sweeter to her to go there and throw herself, like the Hindoo widow, on that smoldering pyre, than to take her father's hand and go with him where every thing that makes life beautiful to the young awaited her. Such a depth of feeling in the breast of one who had been but a child a little while ago, proved that the character written in those mobile features and singularly expressive eyes was one of no ordinary power. She was one that, loving once, like her mother, would love so purely and deeply that to jar or rudely to doubt or destroy, would be death; and with this fondness was blended much of the passionate tenacity of her father's nature.
When Nat Wolfe, holding her, dying, in his arms, in the burning, solitary desert, sealed her soul with the impress of his own, that impress was eternal.
Finally, with a long, gasping sigh she withdrew her gaze, and trying to smile, said in a low voice:
"You are right, father. It is well to go at once, since we must go. It will not take much time to completemypreparations;" and truly, the gathering up of two calico frocks, and the precious box of mementoes left by her mother, constituted the whole of Elizabeth's trouble in the matter.
When Mrs. Wright heard the decision in favor of immediate departure, she left off wringing her clothes, and took to wringing her hands and crying in her demonstrative way.
"Don't, auntie, don't—it will make me more unhappy," said the maiden, so pitifully, that she made a great effort to restrain herself.
Timothy Wright didn't weep or wring his hands, but he walked about in a meaningless way, did every thing wrong that he tried to do, and made himself as useless and forlorn as usual.
Grieved as the couple were to part with their adopted niece, they never thought of opposing the step; they loved her too sincerely to oppose their claims against the prospect of her being placed as they had always felt she needed and deserved. Lizzie had been a rare and misplaced exotic in their homelygarden, and they had no wish to withhold her from the warmth and light and beauty necessary to her. They rejoiced heartily in her good fortune, trying to put their own loss out of sight.
Feeling how much he was taking from them, Dr. Carollyn did not prepare to leave them, without substantial tokens of his esteem and gratitude. He told Mr. Wright that farming was his legitimate business, not mining, and that there was a hundred-fold more gold to be found in carrots and corn and potatoes, than in the quarter of the ravines. The rich character of the land immediately at the foot of the mountain, and the fabulous prices which fruits and vegetables would bring for years to come, would insure a fortune to any farmer who would give his attention to the cultivation of articles needed in the market. Getting Wright's consent to the wisdom of the plan, he selected a suitable farm, bought cattle and utensils to enable him to work it, gave him money enough to live on for the winter, providing him fully with the ways and means for doing well.