Mothering on Perilous Part 14

Truly my Thanksgiving pride in their beautiful manners and aristocratic appearance has received a severe shock!

XIX

CHRISTMAS AND DANGER

_Wednesday Afternoon, Christmas Day._

No time to catch one's breath for ten days. Now the festivities are over. First came the tree last night. It was an exciting time as all of us, teachers, children, and parents from miles around, dressed in our best, sat waiting, the sole blot on my happiness being that just as the curtain was drawn back, revealing the splendid "spruce-pine" (hemlock) with its gleaming candles, strings of popcorn and hollyberries, and mysterious packages tied and banked around, my Philip, having successfully eluded me beforehand, stepped out on the platform, with a dirty face, tousled hair, soiled shirt, gallusses fastened by one nail, and a large hole in the seat of his breeches, to hand the gifts to Santa Claus for distribution.

Then, before daylight this morning, came the boys' carols, sung through halls and stairways of the big house, and down through the village street, awakening the valley with the glad tidings; and, finally, the great moment after breakfast, when our resident children were turned into the library, where, on a "fireboard" extended for the occasion across two sides of the room, hung seventy gay stockings. Great was the joy of little and big girls, many of whom had never beheld a doll before, over the pretty "poppets" in the tops of their stockings; great, though quieter, the pleasure of the boys in "store" marbles, b.a.l.l.s and knives, not to mention candy and "orange-apples"; but greatest was the happiness of little Iry, the "pure scholar," as, after gazing long and wonderingly at the large picture beneath his stocking, he at last clasped it rapturously to his heart, crying, "Me'n my maw! I got my maw back ag'in!" I knew he would recognize it!

My own stocking, too, held its treasures,--ten sticks of candy from Nucky, a little poke of brown-sugar and crackers (greatest luxury known to mountain children) from Killis, a walnut penholder from Philip, a fine apple, all the way from Rakeshin, and treasured for weeks for the purpose, from Iry, a red-flannel pincushion from Jason.

Then came the painful moment when I saw my boys scatter to their homes,--even Jason, who has no home, went for a week with Keats and Hen.

Again I begged Killis not to get the boys drunk when they visit him Sat.u.r.day, but he would make no promise. Last of all, and most reluctantly, I bade Nucky goodbye. I fear and dread the events that this Christmas season may bring to pa.s.s on Trigger,--with one accord, the boys prophesy "b.l.o.o.d.y doings" there. I would keep him back if I could; but nothing can prevent his going.

And now I shall have a much needed rest, and a chance to catch up on magazines and books laid away for five months.

_Bed-time._

The day has been ages long,--I cannot read or rest,--the old loneliness is all back upon me again. Why did I let all the boys go? And how am I to face the ten days of their absence? The silence is awful. I would give the world to hear the dozen pairs of shoes come thundering across the little bridge and into the cottage, the shrill voices raised in play or song or even a fight!

_Thursday Night._

My joy may be imagined when, as I started to breakfast this morning, I saw Jason come climbing over the big gate. To my pleased inquiries as to the cause of his return, he finally murmured with pretty bashfulness, "I were homesick for you!" "My darling child!" I cried, hugging him very hard. Then we went to the village and bought all the goodies he felt able to eat; and all day I have sat on the floor playing marbles with him. If I did not have Killis's party, and Nucky's danger to worry over, I should be quite happy. As it is, a sense of foreboding oppresses me.

When this evening I saw a splendid moon, almost full, hang over the wooded mountain to the East, my fears were quickened.

_Sat.u.r.day Morning._

All Thursday, yesterday and last night, I worried and could not sleep; and my anxiety has now reached a pitch where I must do, and no longer think. Something terrible hangs over me,--I know not whether it is some casualty to-day at Killis's, consequent upon the drinking and shooting, or something still more dreadful on Trigger Branch. At any rate, there is nothing to prevent my riding over to Clinch, and then, if I find all well there, going the eight miles farther to Nucky's, and persuading him to return with me if possible. I am just about to set off with Jason.

_Sunday Morning, Killis's Home on Clinch._

We came by way of Nancy's Perilous, pa.s.sing the Salyer home. Keats was out chopping wood in the snow, and greeted me joyfully. I accepted his invitation to alight for dinner; but before I could get off the nag, he remarked, "I see you got your little pet up behind you,--did he tell you how come him to leave a-Thursday?"

"Yes," I replied, proudly; "he was homesick for me."

Keats measured Jason with his eye. "He's the lyin'est little devil ever I seed," he said; "I'll tell you what made him go. Him and Hiram fit from the time he stepped in the door, and all through supper, and off'n on all night, and got up before day to start in ag'in; and Hiram he got him down and rid him, and Jason he pult his Christmas knife out of his pocket and jobbed it in Hiram's wrist, and maw she tuck atter him with a hickory, and he run away."

I slid off Mandy, called for another hickory, sternly dragged down my "darling child," and gave him, not only the punishment he escaped on Thursday, but another on my own account; the bitterness of it being doubled for him when all the Salyers, including Hiram, came out to see it well done.

After a hasty dinner, we started on again,--I could not be satisfied to tarry. Dark pictures rose before me all the way,--my dear boys drinking, shooting, maybe killing one another--and I urged Mandy on, scarcely feeling the cold wind that blew down from the snowy mountains.

It was past three when I reached the Blair home. Behind it rose a great hollow, filled with dark hemlocks. I gazed up into it with a shudder, remembering it was here that Killis's father died.

Mrs. Blair met me at the door, and in answer to my inquiries for the boys, said, "They've been in and out all day; now they're up the branch shooting."

"Have they been drinking much?" I asked.

"A sight!" she answered; then she continued smiling, "but what they've drank won't hurt 'em much, I reckon. When Killis come home a-Wednesday, he called for several jugs of liquor for the boys a-Sat.u.r.day; and I told him all right, for I don't never deny him nothing. But next day 'peared like he was thoughtful in his mind, and come evening, he said if he had something that weren't pure liquor, but would just sort of cheer the boys, he would give 'em that, to please you. And I recollected there was a barrel of cider left. So this morning, before they come, he drawed off a kag of that, and being as it was pretty hard, poured in a couple of gallon of water, so's they wouldn't get _too_ cheered; and all day they been eating and drinking fit to burst, and then running out to shoot a while, and then filling up ag'in."

"Anybody wounded?" I asked.

"None so far."

Relieved beyond expression, I sank into a chair and gave thanks to G.o.d.

A little later, Killis ran in the front door. "I never give them boys nary drap but cider," he said; "I done it to please you!"

I threw my arms around him; yes, I even wept.

"And I watered the cider, too," he continued; "them boys thinks they are drunk, and seeing a right Christmas, but they haint, but it does 'em just as much good!"

The other boys followed;--all mine but Nucky, the Salyers and the Atkinses were there, and some neighbor boys--piling up guns and pistols on the beds, and taking another round of pies and cider. Finding they were not at all abashed to see me, I accepted pressing invitations to spend the night, and we had a cheerful evening, with picking and singing, until Philip, who has been visiting a boy friend on Powderhorn, roused all my premonitions again by saying,

"I went up Trigger to fetch Trojan; but he couldn't come. He said Todd and Dalt had give it out they would certainly take the fence and grease their boots with Blant's brains before Christmas was over; and him and Rich was a-keeping lookout every minute."

All my fears leaped into being again instantly. If I could, I would have started for Trigger then and there. I cannot say how sinister the bright moonlight appeared to me as it streamed in through c.h.i.n.ks in the logs during the night. This morning my panic seems excessive; still I am going to Trigger at once with Philip to guide me.

XX

WAR AND WORSE ON TRIGGER

_Monday Noon._

Let me try to tell, if I can do so, the tale of these dreadful twenty-four hours. We crossed over a high gap and down into the head-waters of Powderhorn, and thence to the mouth of Trigger. Just as we reached it, a man riding down looked intently at me. "You are one of them school-women, haint you?" he inquired. I recognized him as Saxby, Blant's neighbor who brought Nucky word of the election fight, and replied, "Yes."

"I seed you when I was over," he continued. "I allow by your being here you have heared the news from Trigger."

"What news?" I asked.

"Another engagement last night,--I hate to tell you the rest."

"What is it?" I demanded.

"Ever sence Blant defeated them at the fence a month gone, the Cheever boys has been d.o.g.g.i.ng his footsteps in secret, trying to git him unbeknownst and unexpected. Though he haint seed hair nor hide of 'em, two or three times bullets has whizzed by him when he was doing ch.o.r.es round the house, or feeding the property. Of course he haint let the little chap, Nucky, know nothing about it, and has stayed in and laid low all he could, letting Rich tend to outside things for him. As Christmas come on, Todd and Dalt got so deep in liquor they couldn't keep their tongues from wagging, and they have bragged far and nigh that they would both take the fence and grease their boots with Blant's brains, before Christmas was over. So a' extry watch has been kept at both house and fence, and the little chap, Nucky, he has been hard at it. Last night when the full moon riz about seven, he was in the clump of spruce-pine on the p'int with his great-grandpaw's gun he allus packs around, when the whole b'iling of Cheevers, nine or ten, marched out to the fence. Just what happened, we haint got no means of knowing; but instid of obeying orders, and running to the house to tell Blant and Rich, like he ought, the boy he committed plumb suicide by opening fire on 'em from the tree. Of course before he could drap to the ground, seven or eight of 'em had blazed away in his direction; and when Blant and Rich heared the shots and come a-running, the little chap was a-laying limp and dead, and the Cheevers running round confused-like, carrying off one wounded. Blant he rushed on 'em like a robbed she-bear, routing 'em in no time,--Rich said such shooting never was seed on earth. I heared the noise acrost the branch where I live at, and come a-running. When we turnt the little chap over, we found he was bleeding from several flesh wounds, which we tied up; but then we also seed his skull was broke and stove in by another bullet, and knowed there wa'n't no hope. We tuck him to the house, and sot there all night keeping the death-watch, and looking for every breath to be his last."

[Ill.u.s.tration: "'Blant he rushed on 'em like a robbed she-bear, routing 'em in no time.'"]