A Soldier of Virginia Part 32

"They have found one of the negroes," I answered, as calmly as I could.

"They ran away, and must have hidden somewhere in the house."

We sat listening, the women pale and horror-stricken, and even Brightson and I no little moved. The yells and the single shrill cry were repeated a second time and then a third, and finally all was still again save for the negro women wailing softly, as they rocked themselves to and fro behind the gable, their arms about their knees. I crept back to my station by the trap and waited feverishly for what should happen next.

We could hear steps in the hall below, a short consultation and a clanking of arms, and then all was still.

"Here they come," said Brightson, between his teeth, and even as he spoke, the trap was thrown outward by a great force from below, and the savage swarm poured forth upon the roof. I struck madly at the first man, and saw another fall, pierced by a bullet from Brightson's gun, and then he was down and I heard the sough of a knife thrust into him.

"They are coming! They are coming!" screamed a shrill voice behind me, and I turned to see Dorothy upright on the roof, pointing away to the southward. And there, sure enough, at the edge of the clearing, was a troop of Virginians, galloping like mad. Ah, how welcome were those blue uniforms! We could hear them cheering, and, with a leaping heart, I saw it was Colonel Washington himself who led them.

For an instant the Indians stood transfixed, and then, with a yell, turned back toward the trap. All save one. I saw him raise his musket to his shoulder and take deliberate aim at Dorothy as she stood there outlined in white against the purple sky. I sprang at him with a cry of rage, and dragged his gun toward me as he pulled the trigger. There was a burst of flame in my face, a ringing in my ears, I felt the earth slipping from me, and knew no more.

CHAPTER XXVII

I COME INTO MY OWN

It was long before I realized that that white, bandaged thing lying on the bed before me was my hand. I gazed at it curiously for a while and stirred it slightly to make sure,--what a mighty effort that little motion cost me!--and then I became aware that a breeze was pa.s.sing across my face, and a peculiar thing about it was that it came and went regularly like the swinging of a pendulum. And when I raised my eyes to see what this might mean, I found myself looking straight into the astonished face of Sam, my boy.

He stared at me for a moment, his eyes starting from his head, and then with a loud cry he dropped the fan he had been wielding and ran from the room, clapping his hands together as he went, as I had heard negroes do under stress of great excitement. What could it mean? Again my eyes fell upon the queer, bandaged thing which must be my hand. Had there been an accident? I could not remember, and while my mind was still wrestling with the question in a helpless, flabby way, I heard the swish of skirts at the door, and there entered who but Dorothy!

"Why, Dorothy!" I cried, and then stopped, astonished at the sound of my own voice. It was not my voice at all,--I had never heard it before,--and it seemed to come from a great way off. And what astonished me more than anything else was that Dorothy did not seem in the least surprised by it.

"Yes, Tom," she said, and she came to the bedside and laid her hand upon my head. Such a cool, soft little hand it was. "Why, the fever is quite gone! You will soon be well again."

I tried to raise my hand to take hers, but it lay there like a great dead weight, and I could scarcely move it. I know not what it was, but at the sight of her standing there so strong and brave and sweet, and the thought of myself so weak and helpless, the tears started from my eyes and rolled down my cheeks in two tiny rivulets. She seemed to understand my thought, for she placed one of her hands in mine, and with the other wiped my tears away. I love to think of her always as I saw her then, bending over me with infinite pity in her face and wiping my tears away. The moment of weakness pa.s.sed, and my brain seemed clearer than it had been.

"Have I been ill?" I asked.

"Very ill, Tom," she said. "But now you will get well very quickly."

"What was the matter with me, Dorothy?"

She looked at me a moment and seemed hesitating for an answer.

"I think you would better go to sleep now, Tom," she said at last, "and when you wake again, I will tell you all about it."

"Very well," I answered submissively, and indeed, at the time, my brain seemed so weary that I had no wish to know more.

She gently took her hand from mine and went to a table, where she poured something from a bottle into a gla.s.s. I followed her with my eyes, noting how strong and confident and beautiful she was.

"Drink this, Tom," she said, bringing the gla.s.s back to the bed and holding it to my lips. I gulped it down obediently, and then watched her again as she went to the window and drew the blind. She came back in a moment and sat down in the chair from which I had startled Sam.

She picked up the fan which he had dropped, and waved it softly to and fro above me, smiling gently down into my face. And as I lay there watching her, the present seemed to slip away and leave me floating in a land of clouds.

But when I opened my eyes again, it all came back to me in an instant, and I called aloud for Dorothy. She was bending over me almost before the sound of my voice had died away.

"Oh, thank G.o.d!" I cried. "It was only a dream, then! You are safe, Dorothy,--there were no Indians,--tell me it was only a dream."

"Yes, I am quite safe, Tom," she answered, and took my hand in both of hers.

"And the Indians?" I asked.

"Were frightened away by Colonel Washington and his men, who killed many of them."

I closed my eyes for a moment, and tried to reconstruct the drama of that dreadful night.

"Dorothy," I asked suddenly, "was Brightson killed?"

"Yes, Tom," she answered softly.

I sighed.

"He was a brave man," I said. "No man could have been braver."

"Only one, I think," and she smiled down at me tremulously, her eyes full of tears.

"Yes, Colonel Washington," I said, after a moment's thought. "Perhaps he is braver."

"I was not thinking of Colonel Washington, Tom," and her lips began to tremble.

I gazed at her a moment in amazement.

"You do not mean me, Dorothy?" I cried. "Oh, no; I am not brave. You do not know how frightened I grow when the bullets whistle around me."

She laid her fingers on my lips with the prettiest motion in the world.

"Hush," she said. "I will not listen to such blasphemy."

"At least," I protested, "I am not so brave as you,--no, nor as your mother, Dorothy. I had no thought that she was such a gallant woman."

"Ah, you do not know my mother!" she cried. "But you shall know her some day, Tom. Nor has she known you, though I think she is beginning to know you better, now."

There were many things I wished to hear,--many questions that I asked,--and I learned how Sam had galloped on until he reached the fort, how he had given the alarm, how Colonel Washington himself had ridden forth twenty minutes later at the head of fifty men,--all who could be spared,--and had spurred on through the night, losing the road more than once and searching for it with hearts trembling with fear lest they should be too late, and how they had not been too late, but had saved us,--saved Dorothy.

"And I think you are dearer to the commander's heart than any other man,"

she added. "Indeed, he told me so. For he stayed here with you for three days, watching at your bedside, until he found that he could stay no longer, and then he tore himself away as a father leaves his child. I had never seen him moved so deeply, for you know he rarely shows emotion."

Ah, Dorothy, you did not know him as did I! You had not been with him at Great Meadows, nor beside the Monongahela, nor when we buried Braddock there in the road in the early morning. You had not been with him at Winchester when wives cried to him for their husbands, and children for their parents, nor beside the desolated hearths of a hundred frontier families. And of a sudden it came over me as a wave rolls up the beach, how much of sorrow and how little of joy had been this man's portion.

Small wonder that his face seemed always sad and that he rarely smiled.

Dorothy had left me alone a moment with my thoughts, and when she came back, she brought her mother with her. I had never seen her look at me as she looked now, and for the first time perceived that it was from her Dorothy got her eyes. She stood in the doorway for a moment, gazing down at me, and then, before I knew what she was doing, had fallen on her knees beside my bed and was kissing my bandaged hand.

"Why, aunt!" I cried, and would have drawn it from her.

"Oh, Tom," she sobbed, and clung to it, "can you forgive me?"

"Forgive you, aunt?" I cried again, yet more amazed. "What have you done that you should stand in need of my forgiveness?"