boy running in woods"The breath came gripingly in his throat."
"The breath came gripingly in his throat."
"I've been in woods before now," cried the boy, indignantly. "But—but if I go, what will you do?"
"Sit here and take tobacco," Ned answered, in his swaggering tone, and, with his hand a little unsteady, drew his pipe from his pocket. "Give me the fowling piece near to me, and now run your briskest, d'ye hear? Off with you, heavy-heels, unless you be afraid!"
The taunt more than all else sent Miles plunging headlong down the hill. The needles slipped beneath his shoes, and his knees jarred with the steepness of the descent. Once he tripped, and, falling, rolled over and over, and rose up in fear lest he had hurt himself like Ned. But he could run well enough, he found, as he stumbled into the more level part of the trail. His briskest, and warn the Plymouth folk, Ned bade, and suddenly Miles's heart gave a great leap that he was to do so soldierly a part in the Captain's sight. He drew a big breath, and, bending his head, dashed down the trail.
The dry twigs snapped beneath his feet; a frightenedquail, with a startling whir, flew across his path; the branches, as he rushed by them, wavered and shook. Below him the ground reeled and the sky above was shot with black; the breath came gripingly in his throat, and a pain like that of a piercing iron bored into his side.
Downhill, where the ground seemed not to be beneath him, and in the hollow splashed a brook. He felt the chill of the water over his ankle as he thrust his foot into it, and, stopping a moment, he plunged his head, that ached to bursting, into the icy ripples, then, gasping, staggered up the opposite slope.
He was running heavily now, so it scarcely could be called running, swaying from side to side of the trail, but more than half, than three quarters, of the way was out. The trees dwindled about him; yonder were cleared fields; yonder the smoke rose from cottage chimneys. Now the stubble of corn was stiff beneath his feet; now he crashed through a little patch of brambles; and at last, thrusting his hands gropingly before him, he pitched up against the door of Captain Standish's cottage. "Open!" he called, but his voice came in a mere whisper.
Within, they heard him, however. The door was flung open; he fell against Master Winslow; and yonder by the table he had sight of the Governor and the Elder and Master Hopkins and the Captainhimself, starting up from the conference he had interrupted. Miles reeled forward a step or two and caught Standish's arm. "Captain Standish," he gasped, "the ship—the French—we saw it from the hill—the French are in the offing."
Then his knees gave way and the room whirled round. A blackness was about him in which he heard faintly the questions and re-questions of the men, the clatter of the house-door, a calling in the street. Then thunderously, subduing all other sound, he heard the crash of the great gun upon the Fort Hill that called home from labor the men who should defend their settlement.
LYING upon his own bed, whither Master Hopkins had carried him, Miles harked to the rattle of eager drumsticks in the street, the hurried rush of footsteps, the shrill calls of boys. Nearer, in the living room, he could hear Mistress Hopkins's frightened tones, and the clatter of swords as Master Hopkins and Dotey armed themselves.
Presently heavy footsteps came toward him, and Master Hopkins, with his buff-jacket half fastened, opened the door of the chamber to question him further of Ned. "He's hurt, and he made me to leave him," panted Miles. "And the Frenchmen will find him, and can you not send some one to help him, sir?"
"Unless Edward Lister's neck is broke, I'll trust him to shift for himself till we have space to look to him," Master Hopkins answered with a grim sort of chuckle, and just there the house-door banged open and upon it Miles heard Giles's eager voice, "Father, may I not carry Ned's musket, since he is not here?Bart Allerton has one; the Captain himself said all who could fight should get under arms."
Miles struggled up, with head still dizzy. "I can fight too," he murmured, but the older folk, without heeding him, tramped forth with their weapons and left him to Constance and her stepmother. But the women had terrified thoughts to keep them busy, so busy they took no note when presently Miles, quite recovered from his run, slipped off the bed and darted from the house.
Out-of-doors the men were rallying in haste to the shore, among them John Alden, whom Miles hailed shrilly from the house-yard: "John Alden, O John! May I have your fowling piece to fight with?"
"Ay, take it," Alden called, without looking round, and Miles, forgetting he was weary, scudded his fastest up the hill.
He was to have a gun and fight, even if it was no more than a fowling piece, he told himself, and, in a happy flutter that set at naught the Frenchmen, he clambered on the table in the Captain's living room and dragged down the fowling piece from the wall. He longed to take also the rapier from the chimneypiece, but he had no right, so, contenting himself with the gun, he hurried forth to do his part.
A gray day and a strange day; high noon, yetnot dinner time, for the whole order of life was broken, and beyond lay—no one knew what. But Miles thought on the fighting, and, with his pulses leaping, clambered to the gun platform, where a squad was stationed, and, ready as the best of them, gazed out upon the ocean. There, sure enough, loomed larger and larger a speck of white.
Captain Standish had gone down to the other men on the bluff by the landing, so presently Miles ran after him. He carried his fowling piece over his shoulder valiantly, and he stopped at the Elder's cottage to call to Dolly not to be afraid, and he wondered at Mistress Brewster's alarmed face.
The men on the bluff, too, looked grave and anxious, and the Captain's voice was sharp and stern. But the boys who were allowed muskets, albeit their faces were decorously sober, looked very happy, and handled their weapons with such pride that Miles grew ashamed of his paltry fowling piece.
"You might letmehave the musket a little time, Giles," he murmured to young Hopkins, who stood beside him on the northern slope of the bluff, where they were watching the horizon. "Surely, I could manage it, and 'tis Ned's, anyway, and he is my friend."
Giles preserved an elderly, careworn silence, and puckered his brows upon the ominous east, when suddenly from behind them shrilled a whistle.Miles guessed who it was before he turned, so, though Giles and some of the others cried out in surprise, he thought it quite a matter of course when he saw Ned Lister coming across the fields to the bluff.
Ned walked at a leisurely limp, with his fowling piece over his shoulder, and his cap on one side; it was not till he came nearer that Miles saw, too, that his clothes were muddied and stuck with briers and leaves, and his face was white to his lips, that were set in a hard line. "Well," he greeted his fellow-colonists civilly, "did you think I meant to sit there in the bushes till you chose to come seek me?"
There he staggered a little, so Dotey caught hold of him, and just then Standish, striding through the thin ranks of his company, came up. "How did you get hither, Lister?" he asked, with whatever surprise may have been his well in check.
"I walked," Ned answered, and then, as he saw the Captain's eyes upon his muddied jacket, he began to laugh oddly. "That is, sir, sometimes I rolled and otherwhiles I crawled. For I did not wish to be gulled of the fight. And—Giles Hopkins, you thief! give me my musket."
"My father said I might—" Giles began, unruly for once, but there a sudden sound of cheering on the hilltop cut short the dispute. A man—GilbertWinslow, they saw—came running break-neck down the steep street, and, so far as he could be heard, called to them, "English, an English ship!" and then those on the bluff, too, took up the cheering.
It was the sailor Trevor, who, from the Fort Hill, had watched the ship grow larger till he vowed that he could make out that she was rigged in the English fashion. Still the Captain held his force together on the bluff till the stranger's nationality should be assured past doubt, and, meantime, he bade Dotey and Giles help Ned Lister to the house. "And see that he stays there," the Captain added dryly.
So Ned, turned limp and unresisting of a sudden, staggered away between the two, and Miles, though he would fain have watched till the ship should loom up round the beach point, thought friendship required that he should follow after with the musket.
When he returned to the landing place, many minutes later, there was no longer a doubt or a fear, for the flag of England fluttered from the vessel's mast. The shipFortune, with the reënforcements for the colony, that was not expected for a month more, was casting anchor in Plymouth Harbor.
That afternoon seemed all a hazy dream. With a feeling that he must be some one else, Mileswatched the men make ready the shallop, saw it go dipping across the gray harbor, and lie to beside the great ship. He saw the first boatload of the newcomers pull in to the landing rock, and he gazed shyly and yet gladly at the faces of the men and women who were to be his townsfolk. Elder Brewster's grown up son came with them, and there were many other young men, and a few older, and several women, but there were very few children among them.
At last, however, Miles and Jack found among the newcomers a boy but little older than themselves, so at once they made up to him and found that his name was Thomas Cushman. And because he had looked on ships and sea till he was weary of them, they led him away from the harbor, and showed him the spring and the Fort Hill, and laughed at him because he was so certain he should see an Indian at each turning, and Miles bragged to him mightily of his experiences among the savages of the Cape.
It was near dusk when they came down again through the village, where the last boatload from the ship had just landed. The street seemed fairly thronged with folk, and out to sea a light sparkled on the quarter-deck of theFortune, just as it used to shine upon theMayflower.
Feeling secure and happy, Miles bade his new friend Thomas good night, and walked home to hissupper. "Bring firewood; we've many people to eat with us to-night," Constance called to him from the doorway, so he trudged on to the woodpile, where he picked out a good armful of the piny logs, to make a brave blaze for the friends who had come from England.
His face, as he worked, was toward the west, where showed a smear of red, which the sun, struggling forth just ere his setting, had left behind. Miles gazed on the gay fleck, that yet was lonely in the wide sky, till a step near at hand startled him, and, turning, he faced Master Hopkins.
"Lay aside that wood, Miles; I have to speak with you," his guardian greeted him; and Miles dropped the wood and wondered what he had done wrong. "Pray you, sir, John Alden told me I might take that fowling piece," he offered his excuses.
"Am I always so severe that you look for naught but chiding from me, Miles?" Master Hopkins said sternly, yet with something half wistful in his tone. "I would but say to you that Captain Standish has long urged me to let you be one of his household, and I have as long withstood him. For all he is a brave gentleman, he is not of the faith in which your father lived. But he has urged me strongly this day, and you, too, Miles, you bore yourself fairly this morning; you have tried to bearyourself well these last weeks, I can see. 'Tis possible that you will not suffer Miles Standish to spoil you with lax discipline, and in matters of faith you cannot go very far astray in this colony. So I think it safe now to leave this matter to your own decision. You may stay in my house, or go unto the Captain."
Miles breathed quickly and cracked a bit of bark between his fingers. "Am I to decide now, sir?" he asked.
"Yes, now. There is a kinsman of Mistress Hopkins's come on theFortunewho will take your place in my household if you go. But you need not go for that. As long as I have a house, there is a place for you therein, if you elect to stay."
It seemed an easy thing to say, he knew what he desired, yet when Master Hopkins stood looking gravely down at him and waiting for his answer, Miles found it hard to give. "I—I— You've been good to me, after all, sir," he faltered. "I'm sorry I've vexed you so many times. I—"
"In short, you wish to go to the Captain," Master Hopkins interrupted. "Very well, Miles Rigdale. Be it as you wish."
Then he walked away, and Miles, gathering up his armful of wood for the last time, wondered that, now he had his desire, he felt a half sorrow that it was granted him.
But when he entered the house, different thoughtscame to him. All was stir and bustle within, for Mistress Hopkins was cooking supper for the men with sea-appetites, who were to eat there that night, and suddenly Miles felt it quite a part of the day's upheaval that he should leave his old home. All afire with the pleasure of it, he went into the chamber, where he tied up his few clothes in his cloak.
Ned Lister, who was stretched upon his bed, pulled himself up on his elbow to watch him. "So you're going to live with the Captain, Miley," he repeated the boy's news. "Well, it's far better that you should; there'll be no one in his house to lead you into mischief." Ned's face grew serious and he was silent a moment, then broke out, "On my soul, I have liked you, lad, and I shall miss you."
"I shall see you every day," Miles answered, setting himself down on the edge of the bed.
"Hm!" Lister retorted. "Your Captain doesn't like me, Miles. Though he did trouble himself to see how I was faring, when he came to speak with Hopkins this afternoon; after all, he's a good fellow, though I've no liking for the punishments he gives. But that'll change now. There's a pack of jolly good fellows come in theFortune, they say, will keep him busy. Plague of this ankle! I might 'a' gone out and made friends with them, and I'm sick to have speech again with an ungodly rascal like myself."
Just there Constance pushed open the door and came in to bring Ned his supper, so Miles gathered up his bundle to go forth. But Constance had to kiss him good-bye, right before Ned, and tell him to come back often. "I will," Miles promised soberly. "You've been good to me, Constance, and—and if 'twill help you, I'll come tend Damaris—once in a while."
"No, you shan't, dear, ever again," Constance said, laughing, and pushed him out of the room.
He took the Bible that had been his father's from the chimneypiece, and, while Mistress Hopkins was busy talking to her kinsman, a grave young man who found no opportunity to answer her, thought to slip quietly out of the house. But Elizabeth Hopkins spied him. "Where are your manners, child, that you cannot say 'God be wi' you'?" she assailed him. "After what I've borne from your carelessness, Miles, and I'm sure your clothes never will be tidily mended now, and—"
But there Miles got the door open and scampered away. Trug came leaping at his heels, and, fast as if Mistress Hopkins were likely to pursue him, he ran till he reached the Captain's very dooryard, and was quite breathless when he opened the door.
Inside, the candles were lit, the meat was on the table, and the Captain and Alden and four of the newcomers were making their supper and talkingheartily the while. At the noise of the opening door they all faced about, and Miles felt shy and abashed. "If it like you, Captain Standish," he stammered, "Master Hopkins said I could come, so I came."
"And you are right welcome, Miles," Standish said quickly. "We looked for you to-night. Put down your bundle and come to the table. Let your dog come in, too."
Miles slipped into a cranny on the form between Alden and a black-haired young man named De la Noye. It was a roast duck they had for supper, and the men fed Trug right at table, and they talked a deal, of Indians and of hunting and of planting, and then, as the Captain and Alden guided the conversation, of the Parliament and of the Spanish influence and the war in the Palatinate, till, spite of the excitement of the evening, Miles's head nodded, and at heart he was glad when at length, long after the sober bedtime hour of Plymouth, the men cleared the table hastily and went to their rest.
The newcomers were bidden lie that night in the bedroom, since two of them still were weak with seasickness, but Alden and the Captain were to sleep in the living room, so Miles silently elected to stay with them, and he was glad when the chamber door closed behind the strangers.
"So you've a mind to share the floor with us,Miles?" the Captain asked, as he threw off his doublet.
"'Tis like a soldier to sleep where 'tis hard," Miles confessed shyly.
Standish smiled a little. "We'll surely make a fighting man of you, Miles, or you'll make one of yourself. 'Twas a pretty race you ran alone this morning, your friend Lister told me."
"Lister made a stout march of it, too," put in Alden, who had already rolled himself in his blanket and settled down on the floor.
"There's more mettle in that rapscallion than I judged," Standish answered thoughtfully, and then: "Lie you down, Miles. Eh? No blanket? Here, take my cloak; 'tis ample enough for you."
Indeed, it was, and very brave and martial, too. Miles curled himself up in it, and liked the manly hardness of the floor beneath his shoulders. He closed his eyes and half dozed, then, hearing Alden's voice, roused up a little.
"Captain," the young man was speaking softly, "there's not an ounce of extra provisions in theFortune."
From the neighboring corner where Standish had stretched himself came a non-committal "Um."
"And half these young fellows are equipped with nothing but the clothes they stand in; they gambled away their very cloaks, when the ship touched atPlymouth in Devonshire." There was silence in the living room for a time, before Alden resumed, "We had enough to do in the colony before, sir; now what shall we do with these?"
"Why, some we'll set to ploughing and some we'll set to fight the Indians," said Standish. "And those that will neither plough nor fight, we'll pack home to England. We've no use for idlers here."
Then again there was silence in the living room, and the embers in the fireplace gleamed red, and once, leaping into flame, set black shadows fluttering on the wall. "We've no use for idlers," Miles repeated to himself. "But I'll work as mother would wish me to, now I am in the Captain's house."
He drew the Captain's cloak closer about him, and thought to amuse himself with pretending he was a true soldier, like the Captain, sleeping in his military cloak out under the stars, but the reality pleased him better than the fancy. He lay with his eyes wide open, smiling at the embers. "The Captain's house," he repeated. "And I shall stay here always."
Transcriber's Notes:Obvious punctuation errors repaired. Author spells "rendezvous" as the archaic "randevous".
Transcriber's Notes:
Obvious punctuation errors repaired. Author spells "rendezvous" as the archaic "randevous".