 | CHAPTER XVI.
THE MYSTERIOUS STRANGER. The border rover |  |
16. CHAPTER XVI.
THE MYSTERIOUS STRANGER.
“I give you good morning, gentlemen!” said the
white man, making a slight inclination of his head,
and speaking with a foreign accent. “You see my
boy[1]
and myself are making ourselves as comfortable
as we can in the rain.”
“You've got the nigger to a tighter fit nor I'd like
on a juicy day like this hyer,” returned Sam, bluntly.
“Howsomever, every body to his likes, and this hyer
old one-eyed hoss has his notions. Augh!”
As Botter spoke, the negro darted upon him a sharp,
the countenance of the white man slightly changed,
as if he considered the remark injudicious and ill-timed.
Perceiving all this, I hastened to say:
“You are certainly comfortably fixed; and let my
plain-spoken friend here say what he may, I for one
should feel myself the gainer by an exchange of situations.
If I had had forethought enough to have
provided myself with such water-proof garments as
yours, I should not at this moment be such a miserable
victim of Dame Nature's hydropathic treatment;
but I am young—my friend Sam, here, thinks me
green—and so, doubtless, with age and seasoning, I
shall get wisdom.”
The stranger smiled, and rejoined, with pleasant
irony:
“But your friend here, with all his experience—
and it is quite evident, from his damaged figure-head,
he has been over rough places—with all his experience,
I say, it seems he has not learned the mode of
keeping a dry skin any more than yourself.”
“Augh!” grunted Sam, contemptuously—“what's
a little water to a old beaver as has seed snakes in his
time?”
“Why, water is everything to a beaver,” pursued
the stranger, good-humoredly; “and if you are a
beaver, it is quite reasonable you should like to soak
in your favorite element.”
“What's the sign?” said Sam, a little testily.
“One sign of the beaver is a dam,” replied the
other, quietly, his dark eye twinkling with humor.
“Wall, then, d—n beavers, and you too, ef you
can't answer a civil question!” rejoined the old trapper.
“I suppose,” pursued the other, taking a strong
pull at his nearly extinguished meerschaum, and puffing
out quite a volume of smoke—“I suppose I ought
not to take any offence at your coupling beavers and
myself in your malediction—because, by your own
showing, you are one of the broad-tailed quadrupeds
—and I do not think any one can curse himself and
seriously mean what he says.”
“Wall, as I'm a living nigger—” resumed Botter;
when the other interrupted him with a loud laugh,
and the exclamation:
“A nigger? Why what, in the name of all the
saints, will you be next? First a horse, then a beaver,
and now a nigger! Good sooth! you will turn out
to be a whole menagerie if you keep on! Cato,
(turning to the black,) he claims to be of your race
now!”
“Well, I's doesn't own him,” replied Cato, with a
malicious chuckle.
Sam looked puzzled, and was evidently at a stand
whether to get up a fight, or laugh the whole matter
off as a joke. I was determined there should be no
quarrel, if I could prevent it; and I hastened to turn
the conversation into another channel.
“Badinage aside,” said I, addressing the stranger,
“Nothing personal to relate, sir; but on my way
up here from the South, I met a company of Santa Fe
traders, who said they had been attacked, and had
lost five men killed, and two females taken prisoners.”
“Alas! I know that tragical story too well!” said
I; “the news reached me at Council Grove the day
following the sad event, and was brought by four
young men who were in the fight. But did you hear
any mention of the names of those who were captured
and killed?”
“I did not—or if I did, I have forgotten them.
Being all strangers, I felt no interest in names.”
“And was there no talk of trying to rescue the
prisoners?”
“No mention was made to me of such a design.”
“Would to Heaven,” returned I, “that I could collect
together a dozen, or even half that number, of
brave, determined, experienced men! I would make
the venture.”
“Are the female prisoners related to you?” inquired
the stranger.
“No! but one of them is a beautiful girl, of seventeen,
in whom I am deeply interested.”
“Seventeen!” repeated the stranger; “young and
beautiful! what a horrible fate is hers!”
“And of your country, too, if I mistake not!”
said I.
“How, sir?”
“Pardon me! are you not a Spaniard?”
“I am, sir! And is this girl, you speak of, Spanish?”
“I cannot say positively—for she herself knows not
what country gave her birth; but, from her earliest
recollection, she spoke the Spanish language.”
“Indeed! you interest me!” returned the stranger,
earnestly. “Pray tell me all you know of her? But,
I beg your pardon! I have kept you standing in the
rain, when I might have had the courtesy to provide
you with a dry covering, to say the least. Cato, get
my other sombrero and sarape from the mule-pack,
and let the gentleman take your place! I have just
let my morning fire go out; but you seem to be chilly,
and I will have another kindled. Here—step in
here!” he continued, throwing back the oil-cloth covering
around his feet, as the negro hastened to obey his
orders.
I did as directed, and squatted down by his side,
when he continued:
“Doubtless you are surprised to find me provided
with an extra sombrero; but the truth is, on one of
my jaunts through Mexico, I lost the one I had on,
in a river; and was obliged to go a long distance,
through a heavy rain, before I could get another;
and since then I have always taken care to be prepared
against accidents. But how shall I provide
for your friend here? although he says he does not
mind water. I have an extra oil-cloth baggage cover,
you wrap yourself in that, and smoke a pipe
with me!”
“You git this hyer old one-eyed”—Sam stopped,
with a look of some perplexity, and then added—
“white gintleman, a heap, when you talk about 'bacca
—for I haint had a smell for two days—but cuss the
kivering! for my old hide is as tough as bufflers is,
and water won't spile it, you kin gamble on to that.
No! jest you gin me some 'bacca, I've got a pipe, and
you and Freshwater kin spread yourselves fur a big
talk, while I go to make buffler kim. Augh!”
“You shall have a pound, my worthy friend, and
no hard thoughts between us!” rejoined the Spaniard,
with a laugh. “Cato, give the white gentleman—for
he is no longer a horse, beaver, or `nigger'—a pound
of the best tobacco; and then (he added this in
an under-tone) the menagerie will depart on a buffalo
hunt.”
In a few minutes I found myself very comfortably
situated indeed—that is to say, comparatively speaking.
Although with wet garments next to my
skin, I was now protected against the falling rain,
and my outside coverings brought warmth to my
body, which for many long hours had been shivering
with cold.
“You will, of course, join me in a smoke?” said
my new acquaintance, producing another meerschaum,
as he prepared to refill the one in his mouth.
“Thank you! I never use tobacco in any shape,”
I replied.
“Ah! sir, you know not how much pleasure you
lose!” he rejoined. “It may seem incredible to you
—but, sir, I have actually found more real enjoyment
in a pipe of tobacco, smoked in the wilderness, alone
with my thoughts, than I have, at other times, surrounded
by a circle of friends. It calms the nerves
—it soothes the mind—it gives the imagination a
dreamy play; and you live over the past, or go into
the future, and pictures of happiness, with well known
forms and faces, float around you in the gently curling
vapor.”
“But all end in smoke,” said I, laughing.
“As what does not, sir!” he quickly rejoined. “It
is happiness for the time; and I have lived long
enough to be satisfied there is no earthly happiness
more durable than the smoke which floats above my
meerschaum.”
“You may be right,” said I; “but I should be
miserable to believe you.”
“Better for you to believe me now, than to suddenly
awake from your youthful dream of future
delight, to the bitter, heart-blighting reality! You are
young, healthy, sanguine — all before you seems
bright and beautiful—but you only see the glaciers
of far-off mountains sparkling in the sun, which a
near inspection will prove to be crags of ice—cold,
dreary, and unattainable—or valueless when attained.
I saw with your eyes once; but alas! I have lived to
As my new acquaintance said this, he drew a long,
deep sigh, and, casting down his eyes, appeared to
become absorbed in a painful reverie. While he thus
sat silent, I eyed him closely, and with that feeling
of romantic curiosity which we involuntarily attach
to a high-bred, intellectual stranger, whose history is
to us unknown, and whose air is one from which our
fancy weaves a mystery. He seemed to be about
forty years of age, and his dark, Castilian features
were handsome, expressive, and intellectual. His
hair was long, black, and of a wavy curl; and a thick,
black beard, neatly trimmed, covered the lower part
of his face. His profile was straight, with a slightly
acquiline nose; and when his thin lips parted with a
cheerful laugh, he displayed two rows of white, even
teeth. His eyes were rather hazel than black, and
their general expression was soft and winning; but
varying with every mood of their owner—from the
twinkle of humor, the gentleness of affection, to the
fiery fierceness of passion. His height, as I afterward
ascertained, was a trifle under six feet, and his form
athletic, flexible, and graceful. Of his character,
temperament, and intellect, I need not speak, as the
reader can form his own idea of the inner man and
his abilities from what will follow in the course of my
narrative.
“I crave your pardon!” said the stranger, suddenly
looking up: “I have been letting my memory recall
were blotted out with my hopes; and then again, it
gives me a kind of twilight pleasure—bringing back, as
it were, the evening of a glorious day, without the
day itself. You will not understand all my similes,
and metaphorical expressions, and allusions, perhaps
—but it does not follow that you will thereby be the
loser. Well, well, what a world this is! and what a
curious life we live in it! Here now are two persons,
of different countries, different races, and born thousands
of miles apart, sitting quietly down in a savage
wilderness, to enjoy a tête-à-tête, and without even so
much as knowing each other's names. I am called
Juan El Doliente.”[2]
“My name, sir, is Roland Rivers,” I replied.
“By-the-by, how is it I find you without weapons?
it did not strike me before.”
I gave him a brief account of what had occurred
the night previous.
“A very remarkable escape,” he rejoined, as I concluded;
“but you spoke of this old woodsman as an
acquaintance—had you met before? You see I am
curious to know all I can of you!”
“Then I had better begin at the beginning,” returned
I; and I briefly informed him where I was
from, why I came to leave home, and narrated the
prominent incidents of my journey, with the exception
of my adventure with Loyola and Adele.
“You are anxious to rejoin your friend, I suppose,”
loss. He will look upon you as one risen from the
dead. If agreeable to you, we will remain together
in this vicinity, and wait for this military party to
come up.”
“You could not propose anything to please me
better,” I replied.
“And as I have no particular locality in view, suppose
I keep you company for a few days?”
“Better still, sir,” said I.
“Confess, now, you are curious to know something
of my history?”
“I certainly am.”
“You wonder why I am here, with no companion
but my servant, and with no particular destination in
view?”
“I cannot deny I am curious on that point too,”
said I.
“Suppose I tell you I am traveling merely to kill
time?”
“Then I think you have chosen a locality where
you are most likely to be killed yourself,” returned I.
“Well, what of that? Man dies but once, and life
has but little pleasure to me now. It was not always
so, my young friend. There was a time when I should
have shrunk from the King of Terrors, as Death is
called—not because of personal fear—but because I
was surrounded by those I loved, and was happy.
They are all gone now,” he added, in a tremulous
voice, brushing a tear from his eye; “and I stand
you a sketch of my history; but not now—I am not
in the mood now.”
“If you are traveling to find relief to an aching
heart,” said I, “I am surprised that you seek it here
in the wilderness.”
“Where then?”
“Among the haunts of men.”
“You left the haunts of men and came hither for
pleasure, did you not?”
“But I had met with no misfortune.”
“And therefore had never tried human sympathy
for consolation,” he replied. “There are sorrows
which human sympathy can assuage; but, sir, the
heart may hold a grief so terrible, so crushing, that it
can only find relief in undisturbed communion with the
God who made it; and Healways seems to me to be
nearest in the solemn solitude of the pathless wilderness.
But aside from this, the man who has a natural
desire for travel, likes variety; and having seen all
that the genius and art and skill and learning of man
can produce, he turns to the wilderness for novelty,
and studies the almost infinite beauties of nature with
fresh delight. How forcibly your great English poet
expresses this sentiment!
There is a rapture on the lonely shore,
There is society, where none intrudes,
By the deep sea, and music in its roar:
I love not man the less, but Nature more,
From all I may be, or have been before,
To mingle with the Universe, and feel
What I can ne'er express, yet cannot all conceal.'
“Ah! Byron! Byron!” he added, after repeating
the foregoing stanza with great effect—“what genius
and misery united in him! I can appreciate him, for
my own heart has experienced some of his desolation.
But come! we must not forget the subject which drew
us together. You were about to tell me something of
the history of one whom you now suppose to be a
prisoner among the Indians! I have all the time
been eager to hear your story, and yet have purposely
delayed the narrative—can you understand this contradiction?”
“I cannot, sir.”
“Well, no matter, the human heart is full of contradictions.
Go on—I am ready now! tell me all you
know of this girl's history. Stop! a question first!
Where did you make her acquaintance? since you
say you are recently from Philadelphia.”
“The first night after leaving the last western settlement,
I chanced to get lost,” I replied, “and found
my way into the camp of the Santa Fe traders. She
was the first person I spoke to; and her sweet, sad
face made such an impression upon my sympathetic
heart, that, after some preliminary conversation, I put
such questions as drew from her the statement which
I will now repeat.”
The reader will perceive that I thus avoided speaking
man as a villain, and gave my reasons for supposing
him not the father of Adele. I told the story of the
girl, as she had told it to me; and the Spaniard sat and
listened, as one paralyzed—his dark, expressive eyes,
which he fastened upon me, and kept there riveted,
seeming to pierce my very soul. His countenance,
too, during the narration, assumed such a wild, singular
expression, that I felt almost terrified, and
began to wonder if he were subject to fits of insanity.
I cannot better convey an idea of his look and appearance,
than to let the reader imagine a person, suddenly
surprised and startled, and in the act of gasping for
breath, being transformed into a figure of wax. Except
some slight twitchings of the muscles around the
mouth, a quivering of the lips, and short, gasping
respirations, he did not move; but occasionally—as I
paused in alarm, thinking he must be ill—dry, husky
articulations, seeming to issue from his throat or
chest, bade me go on.
For some time after I had finished my story, he
kept his eyes fixed upon me, with the same wild expression;
and then he sprung up, dashed down his
meerschaum, and set off on a run. Cato was near, in
the act of kindling a fire; and calling to him, I exclaimed:
“Quick! quick! follow your master! he has lost his
senses, and may do himself an injury!”
Cato looked up in surprise; and then turning to me,
with a leer, said:
“I guess, mas'er, you is trying to fool dischile—eh!
mas'er?”
“No! no! don't you see he is mad?—look how he
runs!—after him, in Heaven's name!”
The tone of my voice, and the anxious expression
of my features, convinced the negro more than my
words; and starting to his feet, with, “Golly! dat's
queer!” he darted after the Spaniard, with the speed
of an Indian runner.
I watched the chase with intense anxiety. But it
lasted not long; for after running some two or three
hundred yards, El Doliente, as he styled himself,
suddenly came to a halt, and, facing about, began to
retrace his steps at an ordinary walk. He was met
by the negro, who of course had to explain why he
had followed him, and the two came back together.
As they drew near, I was pleased to observe that the
features of the Spaniard had resumed their natural
expression, though somewhat paler than usual.
“So you thought me mad, my friend?” he said,
with a grave smile, as he came up to me.
“I certainly did, sir.”
“Well, I was a good deal excited, I must admit;
and I felt very strangely—as if I must run to get my
breath—a singular way of doing it, doubtless you
think.”
“But what excited you so, if I may ask? You
had a very strange, wild look while I was speaking,
which somewhat alarmed me; and I should have
stopped, only you insisted upon my going on.”
“As to what excited me, perhaps I should say, my
own fancy, acted upon by your story; and I bade you
go on, because I wished to hear the whole, without
interruption. Now tell me—what kind of a looking
man was this Loyola?”
“Tall, sinewy, forbidding, and villanous—with very
dark skin, a low forehead, large, bushy eye-brows, and
black hair and eyes.”
“His age?”
“From thirty-five to forty, I should judge.”
“He is dead, you say?”
“He was killed by the Indians, at the same time
Adele was taken prisoner.”
He stood a short time, with his eyes cast down, as
if reflecting upon what he had heard, and then
abruptly inquired:
“Are you sure the girl's name was Adele?”
“She said she had no remembrance of being called
by any other.”
“And she was educated at the Convent of Santa
Maria, in the interior of Mexico?”
“That was her statement, sir.”
He drew a long deep sigh, and mused again.
“Are you certain of the tribe that captured her?”
he at length inquired.
“My informant, who was present at the attack,
said they were Arrapahoes.”
“Had he any particular knowledge of the different
tribes?”
“I think not,” I answered.
“Then he might easily have been mistaken.”
“Good heavens!” exclaimed I—“so he might; and
if so, then is the poor girl lost indeed! Strange, I
have never thought of this! and now it weakens my
hope. Did you not hear the party you met say what
tribe attacked them?”
“They thought they were Arrapahoes,” he replied,
“but were not certain; for it is almost impossible to
distinguish one tribe from another in the night, even
by those who would recognize their distinctive traits
and dress by daylight—at least I have been told so.”
“Alas! then, what hope is there for the poor
girl?” I sighed. “With any doubt as to her present
locality, if living, I could not ask, with any show of
reason, for Government troops to be sent to her
rescue; and if I did, I should expect my application
to be refused.”
“Then we must act on our own account,” he
replied.
“We?” said I, inquiringly.
“Yes! you have awakened my interest in the girl
—and, if living, I am determined she shall be found
and rescued. If money can procure sufficient aid to
render an expedition in quest of her comparatively
safe, I have enough of that, and will use it for that
purpose.”
“Say you so?” cried I, springing up and grasping
his hand. “God bless you for the noble resolve!”
| CHAPTER XVI.
THE MYSTERIOUS STRANGER. The border rover | |