Keineth Part 7

"And the funniest toys--a doll that belonged to her grandmother and is made of wood and painted, with a queer silk dress, all ruffles! She always lets me play with it."

"And her great-great-grandmother, when she was a little girl, held an arch with some other children, at Trenton, for Washington to pa.s.s through when he went by horse to New York for his first inauguration.

They all wore white and the arch was covered with roses. Grandma Sparks loves to tell of it and how Washington patted her great-great-grandmother on the head! If you ask her to tell you the story she will be very happy, Keineth."

"I like her guns best--" cried Billy. "She's got all kinds of guns and things they used way back in the Revolution!"

"And she has a roomful of books and letters from great people that her ancestors collected. Why, Father says that she would be very rich if she'd sell the papers she has, but she will not part with a thing!

Mother says she just lives in the past and she'd rather starve than to take money for one of her relics!"

"I'd rather have the money, you bet," muttered Billy.

"I wouldn't--I think it must be wonderful to have a letter that was really written and signed by President Lincoln himself," Barbara declared.

"I'm awfully glad we're going there," said Keineth eagerly.

"Let's ask her to tell us about how her brother dug his way out of Andersonville Prison! She'll show us the broken knife, Ken!"

"Why, Billy, she's told us that story dozens of times--let's ask for a new one!" To Keineth: "After she gives us gingerbread and milk and little tarts she tells us a story while we all sit under the apple tree!"

"And say, she can make the best tarts!" interrupted Billy. "Oh, I wish the Fourth would hurry and come!" echoed Keineth. It did come--a glorious sunny morning! Billy's bugle wakened them at a very early hour. Before breakfast the children, with Mr. and Mrs. Lee, circled about the flag pole on the lawn, and, while Billy slowly pulled the Stars and Stripes to the top, in chorus they repeated the oath of allegiance to their flag. Keineth--her eyes turned upward, suddenly felt a rush of loneliness for her father. A little prayer formed on her lips to the flag she was honoring. "Please take care of him wherever he is!"

At noon, in Genevieve, they started merrily off for Grandma Sparks! In her mind Keineth had drawn a picture of a stately Colonial house, with great pillars, such as she had sometimes seen while driving with Aunt Josephine. Great was her surprise when Billy turned into a gra.s.s-grown driveway which led past a broken-down gate and stopped at the door of a weather-gray house; its walls almost concealed by the vines growing from ground to gable and even rambling over the patched roof. At the door of the house stood a n.o.ble apple tree, spreading its branches in loving protection over the old stone steps which led to the threshold.

Through the small-paned window Grandma Sparks had been watching for them. She came out quickly; a tiny figure in a dress as gray and weather-beaten as the house itself, a cap covering her white head. Her hands were stretched out in eager welcome and her smile seemed to embrace them all at once.

"Well--well--well," was all she could say.

Keineth felt suddenly as though this quaint little lady had indeed stepped out of one of her own dusty old books--she could not be a part, possibly, of their busy world! And while the others talked she examined, with unconcealed interest, the queer heavy furniture, the colored prints on the walls and the old spinnet in the corner. Billy was already taking down the guns and Alice sat rocking the doll.

Keineth was shown the picture of the great-great-grandmother who had held the arch and was told the story; she saw the plates and the cup and the broken knife. They unfolded the flags that had been in the family for generations and reread the letters that Mrs. Sparks kept in a heavy mahogany box. One of them--most treasured of all--had been written to her mother in praise of her brother's bravery on the battlefield under action, and was signed "A. Lincoln."

"My greatest grief in life," the little old lady said, holding the letter close to her heart, "is that I have no son who may for his generation serve his country, if they need him!"

Afterwards Barbara told Keineth that Mrs. Sparks had once had a little boy who had been born a cripple and died when he was twelve years old.

While Barbara and Peggy were busy spreading a picnic--table under the apple tree, Keineth told Grandma Sparks of her own father and how he had gone away to serve his country, too; but that it was a secret and no one knew he was a soldier because he wore no uniform.

"The truest hearts aren't always under a uniform, my dear," and the old lady patted Keineth's hand. "The service that is done quietly and with no beating of drums is the hardest service to do!" After the picnic--and the picnic _had_ included the gingerbread and tarts and patties that Barbara had described and which the dear old lady had spent hours in preparing--they grouped themselves under the apple tree; Grandma in the old rocker Billy had brought from the house.

"Not about Andersonville, please," begged Peggy. "Why, I know that by heart! A new one!"

"Something about the war," Billy urged.

Barbara interrupted, shuddering. "No--no! I can't bear to think there is a war right now--"

"Child--I had thought that never again in my lifetime would this world know a war! We have much to learn, yet--we are not ready for a lasting peace. But it will come!"

"That's what my father says--we must all learn to live like families in a nice street," added Keineth gravely.

"Oh, well--if the girls can't stand a story about the war, tell us something about the early settlers! I like adventure--if I'd lived in those days you bet I'd have discovered something!" "I remember," mused the old lady, "a story my father used to tell! We have the papers about it somewhere. Let me think--it was about a trading post on the Ohio and a captive maiden brought there by the Indians!"

Billy threw his cap in the air.

"Indians! Hooray!"

CHAPTER IX

THE CAPTIVE MAIDEN

Grandma Sparks folded her hands contentedly in her lap and fastened her eyes upon the distant tree-tops.

"Years and years ago, when this land was a vast forest, a band of Canadian and French soldiers and traders made their way through the wilderness to the banks of the Ohio where they built a small fort and started a trading post. The land was rich about them and they were soon carrying on a prosperous trade with the Indians who came to the fort.

Though these Indians were friendly the soldiers had made the fort as strong as possible, for they knew that no one could tell at what moment they might be attacked! Sometimes weeks and months would pa.s.s when no Indian would come their way; then some of the traders would journey back along the trail with their wealth, leaving the others at the fort to guard it.

"In their number was a soldier who had once escaped from England; had gone into France and from there to Canada, all because he had made the King angry! Everyone in England thought he was dead. After years of lonely wandering he had joined the little band of adventurers when they started for the West--as they called it in those days! He was a queer man, for he seldom talked to his fellows, but they knew he was brave and would give up his life for any one of them! They called him Robert--no one knew his other name, nor ever asked.

"It was the custom at the trading post to treat the Indians with great politeness. Sometimes great chiefs came to the fort and then the soldiers and traders acted as though they were entertaining the King of England.

"One early morning a sentry called out to his fellows that Indians were approaching. The soldiers quickly made all preparations for their reception. The commanding officer went forward with some of his men to meet them. The Indian band was led by a chief--a, great, tall fellow with a kingly bearing, and behind him another Indian carried in his arms the limp form of a white girl.

"Briefly the chief explained that the girl was hurt; that they, the white men, must care for her! Where they had found her--what horrible things might have happened before they made her captive no one could know, for an Indian never tells and the white men knew better than to ask! The girl was carried into shelter and laid upon a rough wooden bed. It was Robert, the outlaw, who helped unwind the covers that bound her.

"In astonishment the soldiers beheld the face of a beautiful girl--waxen white in her unconsciousness. Silently the Indians let the white medicine-man care for their captive. She had been so terribly hurt that for days she lay as though dead! While the soldiers entertained the Indians, the medicine-man and Robert worked night and day to save the young life.

"Having finished trading with the white men the Indians prepared to return to their village, which, they told the white men, was far away toward the setting sun. The girl was too ill to be moved; so, with a few words, the Indian Chief told the officer of the fort that soon they would return for the girl--whom he claimed as his squaw--and that if ill befell her, or, on their return, she was gone--a dozen scalps he would take in turn! The officer could do no more than promise that the Indian's captive would be well guarded.

"And every white man of them knew that as surely as the sun sets the Indian would return for the girl whom he claimed as his squaw, and that if she was not there for him to take, twelve of them would pay with their lives!

"The weeks went on and the girl grew well and strong, but, because of her horrible accident, could remember nothing of her past. She was like an angel to the rough traders and soldiers; going about among them in the simple robe they had fashioned for her of skins and sacking, with her fair hair lying over her shoulders and her eyes as blue as the very sky. And because she could not tell them her name they called her Angele.

"One day a message was brought to their fort telling of war in the Colonies--that the English were fighting the French and that all Canada would be swept with flame and blood! Almost to a man they said they would go back to fight. One among them did not speak--it was Robert!

Though he had fled from England never to return, he could not lift his hand against her. And someone must stay with Angele!

"By the camp fire they talked it over. It was decided that four of them would remain at the fort until the chieftain came to claim his captive.

One of these would be Robert; the other three would be chosen by lot.

"So while the others went home along the trail over which they had come, the four guarded the little fort for Angele's sake. Three of them gave little thought to that time when the Indian chief would come for the girl--to them, it simply meant that their guard would be ended and that they, too, might return--but Robert went about with a heavy heart, for, as the days pa.s.sed, it seemed to him more and more impossible to give the girl into a life of bondage! Under the stars he vowed that before he would do that he would run his knife deep into her heart, and pay with his own life.

"Angele's contentment was terribly shattered one evening when, at sundown, three Indians came to the fort. At the sight of them she uttered a terrible scream and fled into hiding. They said they had been wandering over the country and had come to the fort quite by chance and only sought a friendly shelter for the night, but the sight of their brown bodies and dark faces had shocked the girl's mind in such a way as to bring back the memory of everything that had happened to her and hers at the hands of these red men. Robert found her crouched in a corner weeping in terror. To him she told her story; how the little band of people, once happy families in the land of Acadia, roaming in search of a home, had been surprised by an attack of Indians; how before her very eyes every soul of them had been killed and she alone had been spared because the chief wanted her for his squaw! They had carried her away with them; for days they had travelled through strange forests, for hours at a time she was scarcely conscious. Then, attempting escape, she had received the blow from a tomahawk that had hurt her so cruelly. It was a terrible story. Robert listened to the end and then, taking her two hands and holding them close to his heart, told her solemnly that never would she be given again to the Indians!

"But he did not tell her of his vow, for suddenly he knew that life would be very, very happy if he could escape from the fort with her and go back to the Colonies!

"The three Indians, before departing, had told of an entire tribe they had overtaken only a little way off, decked out as if for a great ceremony and led by a chieftain! Robert well knew who they were. If they were to escape it must be before the dawn of another day!

"That night--quietly, that Angele might not be frightened--the men talked together over the fire. Robert unfolded a plan. The others must start eastward immediately along the river trail. Then as soon as the moon had gone down, he and Angele would go in the bark canoe the men had built--paddle as far eastward as they could, then make for the shelter of the forests.