The Canadian Brothers; Or, The Prophecy Fulfilled Part 30

"Oh, ho! my old c.o.c.k, that's the ticket, is it? but you'll see whether an old stager, like me, is to be turned out of any man's house such a night as this. I hav'nt served two campaigns against the Ingins and the British for nothing; and here I rest for the night."

So saying, the determined Jackson coolly dismounted from his horse, and unbuckling the girth, proceeded to deposit the saddle, with the valise attached to it, within the hut the door of which still stood open.

The woodsman, perceiving his object, made a movement, as if to bar the pa.s.sage; but Jackson, with great activity, seized him by the wrist of the left hand, and, all powerful as the ruffian was, sent him dancing some few yards in front of the threshold before he was aware of his intention, or could resist the peculiar knack with which it was accomplished. The Aid-de-Camp, meanwhile, had deposited his saddle in a corner near the fire, and on his return to the door, met the inhospitable woodsman advancing as if to court a personal encounter.

"Now, I'll tell you what it is, friend," he said calmly, throwing hack at the same time the blanket that concealed his uniform, and--what was more imposing--a brace of large pistols stuck in his belt. "you'd better have no nonsense with me, I promise you, or--" and he tapped with the fore finger of his right hand upon the b.u.t.t of one of them, with an expression that could not be misunderstood.

The woodsman seemed little awed by this demonstration.

He was evidently one on whom it might have been dangerous for one man, however well armed, to have forced his presence, so far away from every other human habitation; and it is probable that his forbearance then arose from the feet of their being two opposed to him, for he glanced rapidly from one to the other, nor was it until he seemed to have mentally decided that the odds of two to one were somewhat unequal, that he at length withdrew himself out of the door-way, as if in pa.s.sive a.s.sent to the stay he could not well prevent.

"Just so, my old c.o.c.k," continued Jackson, finding that he had gained his point, "and when you speak of this again, don't forget to say it was a true Tennessee man, bred and born, that gave you a lesson in what no American ever wanted--hospitality to a stranger. Suppose you begin and make yourself useful, by tethering and foddering old spare bones."

"I reckon as how you've hands as well as me," rejoined the surly woodsman, "and every man knows the ways of his own beast best. As for fodder, they'll find it on the skirt of the wood, and where natur' planted it."

Gerald meanwhile, finding victory declare itself in favor of his companion, had followed his example and entered the hut with his saddle. As he again quitted it, a sudden flash of light from the fire, which Jackson was then in the act of stirring, fell upon the countenance of the woodsman who stood without, his arms folded and his brow scowling, as if planning some revenge for the humiliation to which he had been subjected. In the indistinct dusk of the evening Grantham had not been able to remark more than the outline of the figure; but the voice struck him as one not unknown to him, although somewhat harsher in its tones than that which his faint recollection of the past supplied. The glance he had now obtained, momentary as it was, put every doubt to rest. What his feelings were in recognizing in the woodsman the traitor settler of the Canadas, Jeremiah Desborough, we leave to our readers to infer.

CHAPTER X.

There was a time when to have met his father's enemy thus, would have been to have called into activity all the dormant fierceness of Gerald's nature; but since they had last parted, a new channel had been opened to his feelings, and the deep and mysterious grief in which we have seen him shrouded, had been of so absorbing and selfish a nature, as to leave him little consideration for sorrows not his own. The rash impetuosity of his former character, which had often led him to act even before he thought, and to resent an injury before it could well be said to have been offered, had moreover given place to a self-command, the fruit of the reflective habits and desire of concealment which had made him latterly almost a stranger to himself.

Whatever his motives for outwardly avoiding all recognition of the settler, certain it is that, so far from this, he sought sedulously to conceal his own ident.i.ty, by drawing the slouched hat, which formed a portion of his new equipment, lower over his eyes. Left to do the duties of the rude hostelry, Captain Jackson and he now quitted the hut, and leading their jaded, smoking, steeds a few rods off to the verge of the plain they had so recently traversed, prepared to dispose of them for the night, Gerald had by this time become too experienced in the mode of travelling through an American wilderness, not to understand that he who expects to find a companion in his horse in the morning, must duly secure him with the tether at night. Following, therefore, the example of the Aid-de-Camp, he applied himself, amid the still pelting rain, to the not very cleanly task of binding round the fetlock joints of his steed several yards of untanned hide strips, with which they were severally provided for the purpose. Each gave his steed a parting slap on the b.u.t.tock with the hard bridle, Jackson exclaiming, "go ye luxurious beasts, ye have a whole prairie of wet gra.s.s to revel in for the night," and then left them to make the best of their dainty food.

While returning, Grantham took occasion to observe, that he had reason to think he knew the surly and inhospitable woodsman, by whom however he was not desirous of being recognized, and therefore begged as a favor that Captain Jackson would not, in the course of the night, mention his name, or even allude to him in any way that could lead to an inference that he was any other than he seemed, a companion and brother officer of his own; promising, in conclusion, to give him, in the course of the next day's journey, some little history of the man which would fully explain his motives. With this request Jackson unhesitatingly promised compliance, adding, good humouredly, that he was not sorry to pledge himself to any thing that would thaw his companion's tongue into sociability, and render himself, for the first time since their departure, a listener. Before entering the hut Gerald further observed in a whisper, that the better to escape recognition, he would, as much as possible, avoid joining in any conversation which might ensue, and therefore hoped his companion would not think it rude if he suffered him to bear the tax. Jackson again promised to keep the attention of the woodsman directed as much as possible to himself, observing, that he thought Gerald had already, to his cost, discovered he was not one easily tired out by conversation, should their host be that way inclined.

On opening the door of the cabin, they found that the woodsman, or more properly the settler as we shall again term him, making a virtue of necessity, had somewhat cheered its interior. A number of fine logs, sufficient to last throughout the night had been heaped upon the hearth, and these, crackling and fizzing, and emitting sparks in all the burly of a hickory wood-fire, gave promise of a night of comparative comfort. Ensconced in the farther corner of the chimney, the settler had already taken his seat, and, regardless of the entrance of the strangers, (with his elbows resting on his knees, and his face buried in his large palms), kept his eyes fixed upon the fire, as if with a sullen determination neither to speak nor suffer himself to be questioned. But the Aid-de-Camp was by no means disposed to humour him in his fancy. The idea of pa.s.sing some eight or ten consecutive hours in company with two fellow beings, without calling into full play the b.u.mp of loquacity, with which nature had largely endowed him, was, in his view, little better than the evil from which his perseverance had just enabled him to escape. Making himself perfectly at home, he unbuckled the wet blanket from his loins, and spreading it, with that of Gerald, to dry upon the rude floor before the fire, drew forward a heavy uncouth looking table, (which, with two or three equally unpolished chairs, formed the whole of the furniture), and deposited thereon the wallet or haversack in which remained a portion of provision. He then secured the last vacant chair, and taking up a position on the right of the table which lay between himself and Gerald, let it fall upon the dry clay hearth, with a violence that caused the settler to quit his att.i.tude of abstraction for one of anger and surprise.

"Sorry to disturb you, friend," he said; "but these chairs of yours are so curst heavy, there's no handling them decently; specially with cold fingers."

"Beggars, I reckon, have no right to be choosers," returned the settler; "the chairs is quite good enough for me--and no one axed you to sit on em."

"I'll tell you what it is, old c.o.c.k," continued the Aid-de-Camp, edging his seat closer, and giving his host a smart friendly slap upon the thigh, "this dull life of yours don't much improve your temper. Why, as I am a true Tennessee man, bred and born, I never set eyes upon such a crab apple in all my life--you'd turn a whole dairy of the sweetest milk that ever came from prairie gra.s.s sour in less than no time. I take it, you must be crossed in love old boy, eh?"

"Crossed in h.e.l.l," returned the settler, savagely. "I reckon as how it don't consarn you whether I look sour or sweet--what you want is a night's lodgin', and you've got it, so don't trouble me no more."

"Very sorry, but I shall," said Jackson, secretly congratulating himself that, now he had got the tongue of his host in motion, he had a fair chance of keeping it so. "I must trouble you for some bread, and whatever else your larder may afford. I'll pay you honestly for it, friend."

"I should guess," said the settler, his stern features brightening for the first time into a smile of irony, "as how a man who had served a campaign agin the Ingins and another agin the British, might contrive to do without sich a luxury as bread. You'll find no bread here I reckon."

"What, not even a bit of corn bread! Try, my old c.o.c.k, and rummage up a crust or two, for hung beef is devilish tight work for the teeth, without a little bread of some sort for a relish."

"If you'd ha' used your eyes you'd ha' seen nothin' like a corn patch for twenty mile round about this. Bread never entered this hut since I been here. I don't eat it."

"More's the pity," replied Jackson, with infinite drollery; but though you may not like it yourself, your friends may."

"I HAVE no friends--I WISH to have no friends," was the sullen reply.

"More's the pity still," pursued the Aid-de-Camp, "but what do you live on then, old c.o.c.k, if you don't eat bread?"

"Human flesh. Take that as a relish to your hung beef."

Scarcely had the strange confession escaped the settler's lips, when Jackson, active as a deer, was at the farther end of the hut, one hand holding the heavy chair as a shield before him, the other placed upon the b.u.t.t of one of his pistols. The settler at the same moment quitted his seat, and stretching his tall and muscular form to its utmost height, burst into a laugh that sounded more like that of some wild beast than a human being. The involuntary terror produced in his guest was evidently a source of exultation to him, and he seemed gratified to think he had at length discovered the means of making himself looked upon with something like fear.

On entering the hut, Gerald had taken his seat at the opposite corner of the fire, yet in such a manner as to admit of his features being shaded by the projection of the chimney. The customs of the wilderness moreover rendering it neither offensive, nor even worthy of remark, that he should retain his hat, he had, as in the first instance, drawn it as much over his eyes as he conceived suited to his purpose of concealment, without exciting a suspicion of his design; and, as the alteration in his dress was calculated to deceive into a belief of his being an American, he had been enabled to observe the settler without much fear of recognition in return. A great change had taken place in the manner of Desborough.

Ferocious he still was, but it was a ferocity, wholly unmixed with the cunning of his former years, that he now exhibited. He had evidently suffered much, and there was a stamp of thought on the heavy countenance that Gerald had never remarked there before. There was also this anomaly in the man, that while ten years appeared to have been added to his age--his strength was increased in the same proportion--a change that made itself evident by the att.i.tude in which he stood.

"Why now I take it you must be jesting" at length exclaimed the Aid-de-Camp doubtingly, dropping at the same time the chair upon the floor, yet keeping it before him as though not quite safe in the presence of this self-confessed anthropophagos; "you surely don't mean to say you kill and pickle every unfortunate traveller that comes by here. If so I most apprehend you in the name of the United States Government."

"I rather calculate not Mister," sneered the settler.

"Besides I don't eat the United States subjects; consequently they've no claim to interfere."

"Who the devil do you eat then," asked Jackson, gathering courage with his curiosity, and advancing a pace or two nearer the fire, "or is it all a hum?"

The settler approached the fire, stooped a little, and applying his shoulder to the top of the opening, thrust his right hand and arm up the chimney.

"I reckon that's no hum," he said, producing and throwing upon the table a piece of dark dry flesh, that resembled in appearance the upper part of a human arm. "If you're fond of a relish," he pursued with a fierce laugh; "you'll find that mighty well suited to the palate--quite as sweet as a bit of smok'd venison."

"Why you don't really mean to say that's part of a man?"

demanded Jackson, advancing cautiously to the table, and turning over the shrivelled ma.s.s with the point of his dagger. "Why, I declare, its just the color of my dried beef."

"But I do though--and what's more, of my own killin' and dryin'. Purty naturist you must be not to see that's off an Ingin's arm."

"Oh an Ingin's only, is it?" returned the Aid-de-Camp, whose apprehension began rapidly to subside, now that he had obtained the conviction that it was not the flesh of a white man. "Well, I'm sure! who'd have thought it. I take it, old c.o.c.k, you've been in the wars as well as myself."

"A little or so I reckon, and I expect to be in them agin shortly--as soon as my stock of food's out. I've only a thigh bone to pick after this, and then I'm off. But why don't you take your seat at the fire. There's nothin' so out of the way in the sight of a naked arm, is there? I reckon if you're a soger, you must have seen many a one lopped off in the wars."

"Yes, friend," said Jackson, altering the position of the table and placing it between the settler and himself; "a good many lopped off, as you say, and in a devil of a stew, but not exactly eaten. However be so good as to return this to the chimney, and when I've eaten something from my bag I'll listen to what you have to say about it."

"Jist so, and go without my own supper I suppose, to please you. But tarnation, while you're eatin' a bit of your hung beef I'll try a snack of mine."

So saying he deliberately took from the table the dried arm he had previously flung there, and, removing a large clasp knife from a pocket beneath his coa.r.s.e hunting frock, proceeded to help himself to several thin slices, corresponding precisely in appearance with those which the Aid-de-Camp divided in the same manner.

Jackson had managed to swallow three or four pieces of his favorite hung beef with all the avidity of an appet.i.te, rendered keen by the absence of every other stimulant than hunger; but no sooner did he perceive his host fastening with a degree of fury on his unnatural food, than, sick and full of loathing, his stomach rejected further aliment, and he was compelled to desist. During all this time Grantham, who, although he had a.s.sumed the manner and att.i.tude of a sleeping man, was a watchful observer of all that pa.s.sed, neither moved nor uttered a syllable, except on one occasion to put away from him the food Jackson had offered.

"Sorry to see your ride has given you so poor an appet.i.te,"

said the settler, with a look expressive of the savage delight he felt in annoying his visitor. "I reckon that's rather unsavory stuff you've got there, that you can't eat it without bread. I say young man"--addressing Grantham, "can't you find no appet.i.te neither, that you sit there snorin', as if you never meant to wake agin."

Gerald's head sunk lower on his chest, and his affectation of slumber became more profound.

"Try a drop of this," said Jackson, offering his canteen, after having drank himself, and with a view to distract attention from his companion. "You seem to have no liquor in the house, and I take it you require something hot as h-ll, and strong as d--n----n, after that ogre like repast of yours."

The settler seized the can, and raised it to his lips.

It contained some of the fiery whiskey we have already described as the common beverage in most parts of America.

This, all powerful as it was, he drained off as though it had been water, and with the greedy avidity of one who finds himself suddenly restored to the possession of a favorite and long absent drink.

"Hollo, my friend," exclaimed the angry Aid-de-Camp, who had watched the rapid disappearance of his "travellers best companion," as he quaintly enough termed it, down the capacious gullet of the settler--and s.n.a.t.c.hing at the same moment the nearly emptied canteen from his hands.