Wyandotte Or The Hutted Knoll Part 7

"But, Bob _cannot_ have it, father," exclaimed Maud--"No one _can_ have it but _you_; and it's a pity it should be lost."

"Let him wait, then, until I am out of the way; when he may claim his own."

"_Can_ that be done?" inquired the mother, to whom nothing was without interest that affected her children. "How is it, Mr. Woods?-- may a t.i.tle be dropped, and then picked up again?--how is this, Robert?"

"I believe it may, my dear mother--it will always exist, so long as there is an heir, and my father's disrelish for it will not be binding on me."

"Oh! in that case, then, all will come right in the end--though, as your father does not want it, I wish you could have it, now."

This was said with the most satisfied air in the world, as if the speaker had no possible interest in the matter herself, and it closed the conversation, for that time. It was not easy to keep up an interest in anything that related to the family, where Mrs. Willoughby was concerned, in which heart did not predominate. A baronetcy was a considerable dignity in the colony of New York in the year of our Lord, 1775, and it gave its possessor far more importance than it would have done in England. In the whole colony there was but one, though a good many were to be found further south; and he was known as "Sir John,"

as, in England, Lord Rockingham, or, in America, at a later day, La Fayette, was known as "_The_ Marquis." Under such circ.u.mstances, then, it would have been no trifling sacrifice to an ordinary woman to forego the pleasure of being called "my lady." But the sacrifice cost our matron no pain, no regrets, no thought even: The same attachments which made her happy, away from the world, in the wilderness where she dwelt, supplanted all other feelings, and left her no room, or leisure, to think of such vanities. When the discourse changed, it was understood that "Sir Hugh" was not to be "Sir Hugh," and that "Sir Robert" must bide his time.

"Where did you fall in with the Tuscarora, Bob?" suddenly asked the captain, as much to bring up another subject, as through curiosity.

"The fellow had been so long away, I began to think we should never see him again.

"He tells me, sir, he has been on a war path, somewhere out among the western savages. It seems these Indians fight among themselves, from time to time, and Nick has been trying to keep his hand in. I found him down at Canajoharie, and took him for a guide, though he had the honesty to own he was on the point of coming over here, had I not engaged him."

"I'll answer for it he didn't tell you _that_, until you had paid him for the job."

"Why, to own the truth, he did not, sir. He pretended something about owing money in the village, and got his pay in advance. I learned his intentions only when we were within a few miles of the Hut."

"I'm glad to find, Bob, that you give the place its proper name. How gloriously Sir Hugh Willoughby, Bart., of The _Hut_, Tryon county, New York, would sound, Woods!--Did Nick boast of the scalps he has taken from the Carthaginians?"

"He lays claim to three, I believe, though I have seen none of his trophies."

"The Roman hero!--Yet, I have known Nick rather a dangerous warrior. He was out against us, in some of my earliest service, and our acquaintance was made by my saving his life from the bayonet of one of my own grenadiers. I thought the fellow remembered the act for some years; but, in the end, I believe I flogged all the grat.i.tude out of him. His motives, now, are concentrated in the little island of Santa Cruz."

"Here he is, father," said Maud, stretching her light, flexible form out of a window. "Mike and the Indian are seated at the lower spring, with a jug between them, and appear to be in a deep conversation."

"Ay, I remember on their first acquaintance, that Mike mistook _Saucy_ Nick, for _Old_ Nick. The Indian was indignant for a while, at being mistaken for the Evil Spirit, but the worthies soon found a bond of union between them, and, before six months, he and the Irishman became sworn friends. It is said whenever two human beings love a common principle, that it never fails to make them firm allies."

"And what was the principle, in this case, captain Willoughby?"

inquired the chaplain, with curiosity.

"Santa Cruz. Mike renounced whiskey altogether, after he came to America, and took to rum. As for Nick, he was never so vulgar as to find pleasure in the former liquor."

The whole party had gathered to the windows, while the discourse was proceeding, and looking out, each individual saw Mike and his friend, in the situation described by Maud. The two _amateurs_-- _connoisseurs_ would not be misapplied, either--had seated themselves at the brink of a spring of delicious water, and removing the corn-cob that Pliny the younger had felt it to be cla.s.sical to affix to the nozzle of a quart jug, had, some time before, commenced the delightful recreation of sounding the depth, not of the spring, but of the vessel.

As respects the former, Mike, who was a wag in his way, had taken a hint from a practice said to be common in Ireland, called "potatoe and point," which means to eat the potatoe and point at the b.u.t.ter; declaring that "rum and p'int" was every bit as entertaining as a "p'int of rum." On this principle, then, with a broad grin on a face that opened from ear to ear whenever he laughed, the county Leitrim-man would gravely point his finger at the water, in a sort of mock-homage, and follow up the movement with such a suck at the nozzle, as, aided by the efforts of Nick, soon a.n.a.lyzed the upper half of the liquor that had entered by that very pa.s.sage. All this time, conversation did not flag, and, as the parties grew warm, confidence increased, though reason sensibly diminished. As a part of this discourse will have some bearing on what is to follow, it may be in place to relate it, here.

"Ye're a jewel, ye be, _ould_ Nick, or _young_ Nick!" cried Mike, in an ecstasy of friendship, just after he had completed his first half-pint. "Ye're as wilcome at the Huts, as if ye owned thim, and I love ye as I did my own brother, before I left the county Leitrim--paice to his sowl!"

"He dead?" asked Nick, sententiously; for he had lived enough among the pale-faces to have some notions of then theory about the soul.

"That's more than I know--but, living or dead, the man must have a sowl, ye understand, Nicholas. A human crathure widout a sowl, is what I call a heretick; and none of the O'Hearns ever came to _that_."

Nick was tolerably drunk, but by no means so far gone, that he had not manners enough to make a grave, and somewhat dignified gesture; which was as much as to say he was familiar with the subject.

"All go ole fashion here?" he asked, avoiding every appearance of curiosity, however.

"That does it--that it does, Nicholas. All goes ould enough. The captain begins to get ould; and the missus is oulder than she used to be; and Joel's wife looks a hundred, though she isn't t'irty; and Joel, himself, the spalpeen--he looks--" a gulp at the jug stopped the communication.

"Dirty, too?" added the sententious Tuscarora, who did not comprehend more than half his friend said.

"Ay, dir-r-ty--he's always _that_. He's a dirthy fellow, that thinks his yankee charactur is above all other things."

Nick's countenance became illuminated with an expression nowise akin to that produced by rum, and he fastened on his companion one of his fiery gazes, which occasionally seemed to penetrate to the centre of the object looked at.

"Why pale-face hate one anoder? Why Irishman don't love yankee?"

"Och! love the crathure, is it? You'd betther ask me to love a to'd"-- for so Michael would p.r.o.nounce the word 'toad.' "What is there to love about him, but skin and bone! I'd as soon love a skiliten. Yes--an immortal skiliten."

Nick made another gesture, and then he endeavoured to reflect, like one who had a grave business in contemplation. The Santa Cruz confused his brain, but the Indian never entirely lost his presence of mind; or never, at least, so long as he could either see or walk.

"Don't like him"--rejoined Nick. "Like anybody?"

"To be sure I does--I like the capt'in--och, _he_'s a jontleman-- and I likes the missus; she's a laddy--and I likes Miss Beuly, who's a swate young woman--and then there's Miss Maud, who's the delight of my eyes. Fegs, but isn't _she_ a crathure to relish!"

Mike spoke like a good honest fellow, as he was at the bottom, with all his heart and soul. The Indian did not seem pleased, but he made no answer.

"You've been in the wars then, Nick!" asked the Irishman, after a short pause.

"Yes--Nick been chief ag'in--take scalps."

"Ach! That's a mighty ugly thrade! If you'd tell 'em that in Ireland, they'd not think it a possibility."

"No like fight in Ireland, hah?"

"I'll not say that--no, I'll not say that; for many's the jollification at which the fighting is the chafe amus.e.m.e.nt. But we likes _thumping_ on the head--not _skinning_ it."

"That your fashion--my fashion take scalp. You thump; I skin--which best?"

"Augh! skinnin' is a dreadthful operation; but shillaleh-work comes nately and nat'rally. How many of these said scalps, now, may ye have picked up, Nick, in yer last journey?"

"T'ree--all man and woman--no pappoose. One big enough make _two_; so call him _four_."

"Oh! Divil burn ye, Nick; but there's a spice of your namesake in ye, afther all. T'ree human crathures skinned, and you not satisfied, and so ye'll chait a bit to make 'em four! D'ye never think, now, of yer latther ind? D'ye never confess?"

"T'ink every day of _dat_. Hope to find more, before last day come. Plenty scalp _here_; ha, Mike?"

This was said a little incautiously, perhaps, but it was said under a strong native impulse. The Irishman, however, was never very logical or clear-headed; and three gills of rum had, by no means, helped to purify his brain. He heard the word "plenty," knew he was well fed and warmly clad, and just now, that Santa Cruz so much abounded, the term seemed peculiarly applicable.

"It's a plinthiful place it is, is this very manor. There's all sorts of things in it that's wanted. There's food and raiment, and cattle, and grain, and porkers, and praiching--yes, divil burn it, Nick, but there's what _goes_ for praiching, though it's no more like what _we_ calls praiching than yer'e like Miss Maud in comeliness, and ye'll own, yourself, Nick, yer'e no beauty."

"Got handsome hair," said Nick, surlily--"How she look widout scalp?"

"The likes of her, is it! Who ever saw one of her beauthy without the finest hair that ever was! What do you get for your scalps?--are they of any use when you find 'em?"

"Bring plenty bye'm-by. Whole country glad to see him before long--den beavers get pond ag'in."