The Knight of the Golden Melice Part 11

"A message brought by Philip doth constrain my departure."

"A sweet constraint," said the knight, smiling. "Fear not, Master Arundel, that Lady Geraldine will blame thee for obeying an impulse as natural as the love of a bee for a flower. The diamond eyes of Mistress Eveline would furnish apology for a deeper crime."

"I trust all is well with sweet Mistress Eveline," said the lady.

"All well, may it please you, madam, save for the injurious durance which, in despite of his promise, and regardless of all honor as a man, the villain Spikeman, who calls himself her guardian, imposes on her."

"He will relent," said the lady. "It may be he desires only to try the strength of thy devotion. The flame of thy love will burn the brighter for the trial."

"I have no hope of such result, Arundel. He is so wedded to evil, that to do a good action would be to him a pain."

"Nay," said the lady, "it cannot be there is a creature who loves evil for its own sake. That were quite to extinguish the heavenly spark.

Judge not unhappy Master Spikeman so harshly. Commend me to the love of Mistress Eveline," she added, rising, "when you see her, and say that I wear her sweet image in my heart."

So saying, she bowed and left the apartment, preceded by the little girl, the others rising, and remaining standing as long as she was in sight.

CHAPTER VII.

Thinkest thou that I could bear to part From thee and learn to halve my heart?

Years have not seen, time shall not see, The hour that tears my soul from thee.

BRIDE OF ABYDOS.

It was early on the morning of the next day when Arundel started on his way to Boston, whither the message delivered by the soldier had somewhat hastened his return. There was, indeed, to one not in love, nothing in it to require such haste, and the explanation of his departure is to be found only in the natural desire of a lover to be near his mistress. Something might happen; he would seek an occasion to see her; perhaps a plan might be devised; at least, his wishes could not be promoted by keeping himself at a distance. While the young man, musing on sweet hopes and vague unformed designs, is threading his way through the forest, we will take advantage of the opportunity to explain in a few words what the reader, as yet, only imperfectly suspects.

Two years previous to the time when our story commences, Edmund Dunning, a landholder and gentleman of consideration, in the county of Devon, in England, having recently adopted the creed and practice of the Puritans, (as a sect dissenting from the Church of England, somewhat in doctrine, and wholly in outward observances, was called; from a.s.serting, as it was thought, pretentions to superior purity of belief and strictness of living,) left the sh.o.r.es of his native island with an only child, a daughter, then between seventeen and eighteen years of age, to seek that freedom for his faith in the new world, which, as he conceived, was denied him in the old. His whole family consisted of this daughter, Eveline, his wife having deceased several years previously. His departure was hastened by a circ.u.mstance which had for some time occasioned him no little uneasiness, and the evil consequences of which he could think of no other means so effectually to avoid. This circ.u.mstance was an intimacy between the beautiful Eveline and a young gentleman in the neighboring town more tender than the father approved, who looked upon the hopes of the suitor as presumptuous, and was, besides, opposed to an union, on account of a diversity of religious sentiment betwixt himself and the aspirant.

This young man was Miles Arundel. A year before Master Dunning and his daughter left England, he had come to the town of Exeter, near to which the Dunnings lived on their estate, and opened a studio as a landscape painter. It was not, however, until a month after his arrival, that he seemed at all decided as to his intentions, the time being spent in wandering over the beautiful country, and making occasionally a sketch; nor after he had offered his services to the public in a professional capacity did he work very diligently. Yet was it remarked that he was never in want of money; and the citizens of Exeter thought that he must get high prices for his pictures in London to warrant his expenditure.

Among the families to which he was introduced as an artist, was that of Edmund Dunning. Eveline was no indifferent sketcher herself, and accompanied her father one day on a visit to the rooms of Master Arundel. It is said that the young people blushed at the meeting, but however that may be, the blush was un.o.bserved by Master Dunning.

So agreeable did the young artist make himself, that one visit led on to another, and he was invited to the house of Dunning, and soon found himself, he hardly knew how, on a familiar footing in his family, and giving lessons in painting to his daughter. Edmund Dunning had no intentions that any other lessons should be given, and it accordingly grieved him when he discovered the terms on which the young people stood to one another, and which their ingenuousness could not conceal.

With this relation he had made himself acquainted as soon as he suspected it, by inquiring of Eveline, who frankly told him the whole truth. Arundel loved her, but dared not, on account of the distance that separated him from her father, make known his feelings. The father demanded of his child why she did not, at the beginning, check such aspiring thoughts, and whether it was proper to allow of the continuance of such a state of things. Poor Eveline could only reply with tears, and that she could not prevent Miles loving her, but confessed that she had done wrong, and promised to break off the intimacy.

"I am unacquainted with his family, which is probably obscure," said Edmund Dunning; "but were the blood of Alfred in his veins, he should have no daughter of mine so long as he favors the persecuting Church of England, which I know he does, notwithstanding his constant attendance at the meetings of the congregation, the reason whereof I now understand."

The promise which Eveline made to her father she kept, nor from that moment would she consent to see Arundel. He pleaded hard for a single interview, if only to take leave, and though her heart strongly took his part, she replied that she would not increase the reproaches of her conscience by advancing a step further in an intimacy which she had wrongly concealed from her father, and was disapproved by him. All intercourse between the lovers ceased from this time, and shortly after Arundel disappeared from the neighborhood.

But it was at the risk of her health that Eveline obeyed her parent.

The rounded form began to become thin; the cheeks, in which red roses were accustomed to bloom, faded, and the lovely blue eyes lost their l.u.s.tre. The anxious father noticed these signs with apprehension, and in the hope that new scenes and a change of climate might improve his daughter's health, hastened their departure.

Almost immediately on his arrival in the new world he formed an acquaintance with Spikeman, who used every effort to ingratiate himself into his confidence. So successful was Spikeman, that he persuaded Master Dunning to embark a considerable portion of his property in the business wherein Spikeman was engaged, and on the death of Dunning, which happened only six months thereafter, to appoint him the guardian of Eveline. But as the shadows of this world were settling on the eyelids of the dying man, the light of another and a better dawned upon his mind. The differences of opinion which had separated him from the friends of his youth and manhood, and the distinctions of rank, a.s.sumed less and less importance. He regarded with pity the sadness of his daughter, and determined that he would be no obstacle in the way of her happiness. He called her and his friend to his bed-side, and after kissing her pale cheek, gave his full consent to her union with Arundel, and made Spikeman promise to favor her wishes in all things. Having thus settled his worldly affairs, Edmund Dunning turned his face to the wall and gave up the ghost.

The tears of Eveline, left an orphan far away from the only spot which she considered her home, flowed bitterly at the loss of her father. He had been a gentle and sweet-tempered man, and an indulgent parent, and she thought of him with a grief and yearning affection, the pain of which the removal of the interdiction to her marriage with one whom she loved, served at first, but in a slight degree, to mitigate. But time had its usual effect. The swollen eyes of poor Eveline at last resumed their brightness; the color returned to her cheeks; her step became lighter, and she looked forward wish pleasure to the time when she should give her hand to one who already had her heart.

But Spikeman was far from sympathizing with her views, nor had he any intention to keep his promise. At the time when he inveigled Edmund Dunning into entrusting property to his hands, his affairs were in an embarra.s.sed condition, and he needed then and now the funds to save him from ruin. And again, hypocrite though he was in some respects, he was not altogether so. A man of violent pa.s.sions, and unscrupulous in their gratification, deluding himself with the idea that having once tasted the sweets of justification, (as he fancied,) his condition was one of safety, and that the sins which reigned in the members of his body could not reach his soul, he was yet zealous for the faith which he had adopted, and devoted to the interests of the colony. It was to this devotion mainly that he owed his dignity of a.s.sistant. As a Puritan, he was, or at least believed himself to be, opposed to a marriage between Eveline and Arundel on the same principle which had at first influenced her father, and been corrected only by the dawning light of eternity. Shortly before the decease of his friend, Spikeman had frequently, though never in the presence of Eveline, combated Dunning's resolution with which he had been made acquainted, but in vain. Had he dared, he would have resorted to one or more of the elders to exert their potent influence, but this would have been to betray the secret, and in case of their failure, might have placed himself in an unpleasant predicament. He concluded it was better to lock it up in his own breast, and so remain master of his actions and of her destiny, at least till her majority, which lacked two years before attainment. During that time, his circ.u.mstances might change--she might decease--no one knew what was in the future.

It is not, therefore, surprising that the a.s.sistant did not write to England to inform Edmund Dunning's relatives of his death; much less that he did not inform Arundel of the fact. Months slowly dragged by, and yet the expecting girl received no word from home. At first Spikeman accounted for it by the length of time required to make the pa.s.sage between the countries; afterwards by the supposition that the letters might have failed, or intimating that Arundel had probably changed his mind. A cold pang, as if she had been stabbed by an icicle, pierced the bosom of Eveline at this cruel suggestion, and she felt utterly desolute. What, however, frightened and depressed her spirit, only roused the indignation of Prudence Rix, her attendant from England, who even then had a sharper insight into the character of the a.s.sistant than her mistress.

"Hey-day!" she exclaimed; "to think that Master Miles, the handsomest and darlingest young gentleman in Devonshire, and who, if he was only a painter, looked grander and gave away more gold pieces than many a lord she'd known, and who worshipped Mistress Eveline like some pagans she'd heard of did the sun, should think of forgetting her! It was precious nonsense. For her part, if she was Mistress Eveline, she would write to him herself, without letting old vinegar-face know anything about it."

The advice was not thrown away on the young lady, though with an instinctive delicacy she did not follow it literally. Instead of addressing Arundel directly, she wrote to a female friend, and communicated the change in her circ.u.mstances, and the relenting of her deceased father, rightly judging that the information would not long remain unknown to her lover. She did this without the knowledge of Spikeman, else it is probable that the letter would never have reached its destination. The event answered her expectations, and with the arrival of the first ship after her epistle was received, she had the gratification of greeting Arundel. But what was her astonishment, when, upon the demand of the young man that her guardian should carry into effect the wishes of his deceased friend, Spikeman denied that any obligation was imposed upon him. He would not admit that there had been any change of opinion in the dying man, but insisted, on the contrary, that he had remained steadfast in his purpose to the last.

He affected surprise at the declarations of Eveline, and while not pretending to say what might have taken place in his absence, persisted in a.s.serting that nothing of the kind had occurred in his presence. The young lady was surely in error. The bewilderment occasioned by excessive grief on account of her father's condition, and partiality for her lover, had caused her to mistake the meaning of the former. He could not, however much desirous to please his ward, violate the instructions of his deceased friend.

The remonstrances of Arundel, and gentle expostulations and entreaties of Eveline, were without effect; and when once the young man, in a moment of anger, threatened Spikeman with an appeal to justice and punishment by the government in England, the latter grimly sneered at his threats, and bade him beware lest he himself might be sent, as a malcontent, out of the country. It was, indeed, far more probable that such would be the result of Arundel's persistency, than that he should succeed in carrying off his mistress; and, blinded as he was by love, he could not conceal from himself the danger. To this was to be added another peril, which the a.s.sistant, in one of their conversations, had hinted at, and of which we have also made mention, viz: that he might incur the punishment provided for those who paid court to maidens without the consent of the guardian or magistrate.

But the young couple had, besides Prudence, a powerful friend, Whose kind heart pitied their misfortunes, and by whose means, a.s.sisted by the faithful serving-maid, they had many stolen meetings, unknown to their persecutor, and this was no other than dame Spikeman herself.

Dest.i.tute of children, she had been early attracted by the beautiful orphan, for whom she soon learned to feel the affection of a mother.

Into her tender bosom the unprotected girl poured her griefs, and always met with sympathy and good counsel. At first, the good dame attempted to alter the determination of her husband, but finding her efforts in vain, she finally abandoned them, and contented herself with favoring the lovers by every means in her power, without his knowledge, trusting to the chapter of accidents for the result.

Perhaps a few pieces of coin, distributed by Arundel now and then among the servants, contributed to preserve the knowledge of their meetings from the a.s.sistant, who, whatever he might suspect, found it difficult, engaged in his business, to detect them.

While we have been making this tedious but necessary explanation, the young man has had time to reach the thickest part of the forest, lying midway betwixt the residence of the knight and his place of destination. He followed a narrow path made originally by the Indians, as they traversed the woods in the manner peculiar to themselves, known by the name of Indian file, now skirting the edge of a mora.s.s, now penetrating through a thick undergrowth, and now walking in more open s.p.a.ces and under the shade of enormous trees.

Arundel, as he walked along with his piece in his hand, had kept watchfully looking round to discern any game within range, when, as he reached one of these open s.p.a.ces, his eyes fell upon a dark object crouched upon a lower limb of a tree immediately over the path before him, and he instantly recognised the animal as the cougar or American panther. It is the habit of the creature thus to conceal itself in trees, waiting till its prey pa.s.ses along, when, with one bound, it springs upon its back, and quickly succeeds, by its own weight, and by tearing the veins and arteries of the neck, in bringing it to the ground.

The youth stopped, and gazed upon the motionless beast, whose half-shut eyes he could see winking at him. He lay extended upon the limb, his forward feet spread out at full length, on which rested his small round head, with little ears falling back almost flat, his hind legs drawn up under his body, and his flexible tail hanging a short distance beneath the bough. The dark reddish color of the hair of his skin, dashed with blackish tints, harmonized and blended well with the hue of the bark, so that at a distance, to an unpracticed eye, he appeared like a huge excrescence on the tree, or a large b.u.t.t of a branch that had lodged in its fall.

The young man did not hesitate what to do. He had come prepared for meeting with wild animals, and felt too much confidence in himself to fear the encounter. He approached so as to be just without reach of the spring of the creature, and levelling his piece, while he could see the cougar shut its eyes and cling closer to the limb, fired. The sound of the gun rang through the ancient forest, and in an instant the beast, jumping from the limb, fell at his feet. So sudden was this, that Arundel had hardly time to withdraw the weapon from his shoulder, before the animal had made the spring. The first impulse of the youth on finding the ferocious brute thus near, was to club his gun and strike it on the head; and now he discovered that it was wounded in one of the forward legs, which hung helplessly down. But the wound, instead of disabling or intimidating, only inflamed the ferocity of the creature. It made repeated attempts to jump upon its foe, which, in spite of the crippled condition of its leg and the loss of blood, Arundel found it difficult to elude. Active as he was, and though he succeeded occasionally in inflicting with his hunting-knife a wound upon the beast, he soon began to suspect that, notwithstanding he had thus far escaped with some inconsiderable scratches, the powers of endurance of the formidable forest denizen were likely to exceed his own. The combat had lasted some time, when, as the young man endeavored to avoid the leap of the panther by jumping to one side, his feet struck against some obstacle and he fell upon his back. In an instant the enraged beast, bleeding from its many wounds, was upon his prostrate person, and his destruction appeared inevitable. With a desperate effort, he struck with the hunting-knife at the panther, who caught it in its mouth, the blade pa.s.sing between its jaws and inflicting a slight wound at the sides, so slight as not to be felt, and stood with its unhurt paw upon his breast, powerless to do mischief with the other, and glaring with eyes of flame upon its victim. At the instant when the panther, shaking the knife out of its mouth, was about to gripe, with open jaws, the throat of the young man, it suddenly bounded with a cry into the air, almost crushing the breath out of the body of its antagonist, and giving him an opportunity to rise. When Arundel stood upon his feet, he beheld the panther in the agonies of death--an arrow sticking in one eye and an Indian striking it with a tomahawk upon the head, for which great agility and quickness were necessary in order to avoid the paw and teeth of the creature in its dying struggles. These soon became less violent, until, with a shudder, the limbs relaxed, and it lay motionless and harmless,

Arundel now advanced to thank for his timely succor the Indian, who stood quite still looking at him. He was apparently less than thirty years of age, tall and well formed, with a countenance expressive of n.o.bleness and generosity. His attire consisted only of breech-cloth and leggins, with no covering for the upper part of his person--a garb offering fewest obstructions to his movements through the forest. In his hand he held a bow; a quiver full of arrows was slung across his back; the tomahawk was returned to the girdle around his loins, and a knife hung by a deer-sinew from his neck.

"The arrow was well aimed," said Arundel, "that saved my life. How can I thank my brother?" "Waqua is satisfied," replied the Indian, in very imperfect English, which we shall not attempt to imitate.

"You are my preserver," said Arundel, "and shall not find the white man ungrateful."

"Enough," answered the Indian. "Let wild beasts find some other food than men."

"It was a strong hand as well as true aim that sent this arrow," said the young man, drawing the shaft out of the animal's brain, in which the barbed point, coming off, remained behind, "and I must furnish you at least another arrow."

"Waqua has plenty of arrows in his quiver, and can get more."

"Thou art an independent fellow," exclaimed Arundel; "but there is one thing I have to offer thee which thou must accept--that is, my hand, and it is a sign that I will be thy brother."

There was something in the action and expression of Arundel's face that was irresistibly attractive to the Indian. He took the offered hand into both of his and replied, "Waqua gives his two hands to the white man. He loves the white man, and the Great Spirit sent Waqua to protect his brother."

"Thou hast established a claim to, my friendship stronger than often exists. Be sure we will be friends. My brother is on a hunting path.

What success has he?"

"A deer," replied Waqua, stepping into a bush, returning with the carca.s.s on his shoulder, and throwing it upon the ground.

"Is my brother's lodge distant?"

"It would not tire a new born fawn to run the distance. My white brother shall see the wigwam of Waqua, and rest his limbs, and then Waqua will go with him to the lodges of the white men at Shawmut."

It was yet early in the day. There was no need of hurry, and the wish of the Indian of itself was enough. It would have been indeed ungracious to deny acquiescence to one who had just saved his life, and Arundel therefore at once signified his a.s.sent. But before they started, the Indian with the knife which he took from his neck, despoiled the panther of its skin. Throwing it then across his shoulders on top of the deer's carca.s.s, he led the way out of the path in a direction different from that in which Arundel had been travelling.