University of Virginia Library

32. CHAPTER XXXII.
THE PAINTER AND UNCLE 'SIAH'S HARNAH.

“When father settled up nigh the head-waters of the
Penobscot, folks said we'd have to be mighty car'ful, or
some o' the young ones would tumble over the jumping-off-place,
we'd got so nigh. But Uncle 'Siah went right along,
and took up land furder on, whar there wa'n't nothing but
hemlock-trees and chipmunks for company, and no passing
to keep the women-folks running to the winders. Thar
was a good road cut through the woods, and there was the
river run within a stone's-throw of both houses: so, one
way and another, we got back'ards and for'ards consid'able
often, 'specially when the young folks begun to grow up.

“Harnah wor Uncle 'Siah's second gal, and just as pooty
as a picter. She looked suthin' like Dolcy, Dora's little
adopted darter, you know: but she wor alluz a-larfin', and
gitting off her jokes; and had a sort of a wicked look by
spells, enough to make a feller's flesh creep on his bones.”

“Lor', that's enough o' Harnah! She wa'n't so drefful

different from other folks. Git along to the story part
on't,” interrupted Mehitable, clicking her knitting-needles
energetically.

Seth looked at her a little indignantly for a moment, and
then burst into a loud laugh, —

“Lor'! I'd clear forgot how it used ter spite Hit to hear
me praise up Harnah. You see, sir, Mehitabul wor a sort
o' cousin o' my mother's, and so come to live long of us
when her father died: but she never cottoned to Harnah
very strong when she see how well I liked her; though, now
she's got me for her own man, I'd think” —

“But the panther, Mr. Ross,” interposed Dora, who
saw, with womanly sympathy, the flush of mortification
upon Mehitable's face: “do tell us about the panther.”

“Yes: I b'lieve my idees was kind o' wandering from the
pint; but that's nothing strange, if you knowed what an
out-an-outer that gal was. Well, well, 'tain't no use a-crying
over spilt milk, and by-gones may as well be stay-gones.

“Sam Hedge, he was my uncle's hired man, and a
plaguy smart feller too; good-looking, merry as a grig,
a live Yankee for faculty, and pretty forehanded too, though
he hadn't set up for himself then. I more than suspicioned
he'd ruther live with Uncle 'Siah, and see Harnah from

morning to night, than go off and take up land for himself;
or maybe he didn't feel as if he'd the peth to take right
hold of new land all alone. Anyway, there he wor, and
there he stuck, right squar in my way, do as much as I
might to git him out on't.

“Of course, you onderstand about being in my way
means all along o' Harnah. We was both sweet on her,
and no mistake; though nary one on us, nor, I believe, the
gal herself, could ha' told which one she favored.

“Waal, to skip over all the rest (though there's the stuff
for half a dozen stories in it), I'll come to one night when
I'd been up to Uncle 'Siah's, and Harnah and Sam had
come down to the crick to see me off; for I'd come in my
boat. I felt kind o' savage; for Harnah had been mighty
pooty with me all that evening; and I knew Sam had come
down to the boat a purpose to go back to the house with
her, and, 'fore they was half-way, she'd come right round,
and be just as clever to him as she'd been before to
me.”

“If you knew your cousin to be such a terrible little
flirt as that, I shouldn't think you would have cared so
much about her, Seth,” suggested Karl, laughing.

“No more shouldn't I, cap'n,” replied Seth ruefully.

“But somehow I couldn't help it. I'd think it over nights,
and say to myself, `You darned fool! don't you see the
gal's a-playing one of you off agin t'other, and maybe
don't care a pin for neither? Get shet of her once for all,
and be a man; can't ye?' And then I'd find I couldn't; and
so it went till we come to that night, and stood there on the
edge of the crick, — two on us ready to clinch and fight till
one cried enough, and t'other a-laughing at us both.

“So, all to once, Harnah says, says she, —

“`I do believe them harebells are blowed out by this
time. Ain't they, boys?'

“`You and I'll go to-morrow and see, anyway,' says
Sam, speaking up quick, 'fore I got the chance.

“`I'm a-going to see; and, if Harnah'll come too, all the
better,' says I, as pleasant as a bear with a sore head.

“`Two's company, and three's a crowd; so you'd better
stop to home, Seth,' says Sam.

“`Two's company, that's Harnah and me; and three's a
crowd, that's you: so, ef you don't like crowding nor being
crowded, you'd better stop to home yourself,' says I.

“`I believe I spoke first, Seth Ross,' says Sam, pretty
savage at last.

“`That don't make no difference, as I know on. Harnah

was my cousin long afore you was her father's hired man;
and that puts me in mind you hain't asked leave yet.
Maybe the old man won't let you go. What you going to
do then?' asked I, dreadful kind of sneering; for I felt
mad.

“Sam he didn't say nothing; but he drew back, and
doubled up his fists. I caught the glint of his eye in the
moonlight, and my darnder riz.

“`Come on,' says I; `I'm ready for you; and we'll fight
it out like men. The feller that's licked shall give up once
for all.'

“But 'fore Sam could speak, or I could hit out as I
wanted ter, Harnah come right in between us. I swow ef
that gal didn't look harnsome! Her eyes was wide open,
and shining just like blue steel in the moonlight. Her
cheeks and lips was white; and seemed to me the very curls
of her hair shot out sparks, she was so mad.

“`You'd better stop while there's time,' says she, still
and cold. `If you strike one another, or if you ever fight,
and I the cause, I swear to God I never will speak a civil
word to either one of you again as long as I live. So now
you know.

“`As for the harebells, you sha'n't neither one of you go

for 'em. Ef I want harebells, there's them that can get
'em for me, and not make so much fuss about it neither.'

“She turned, and stepped off toward the house as if she'd
got steel springs in the soles of her feet.

“Sam and I eyed each other. It seemed as if Harnah
felt that look; for she turned all of a sudden, and come
back.

“`Sam,' says she, p'inting up to the house, `go home;
and don't you speak to me again to-night. Seth, get into
your boat, and push her off. You needn't come up to-morrow
night.'

“We sort o' looked at one another and at her, and then
meeched off the way she told us, for all the world like two
dogs that's got a licking, and been sent home 'fore the hunt
was done.

“I didn't sleep a great deal that night. Fact is, I was
turning over in my own mind what Harnah had said about
them as would git harebells for her, and not make so much
fuss about it neither.

“`I swow,' says I, `I'd like to clinch that feller, whoever
he may be, and not have Harnah nigh enough to interfere.'
Then I rec'lected a Cap'n Harris, a British officer, that
come down from Canady the summer before, hunting and

fishing, and had stopped a week or more at Uncle 'Siah's,
mostly for the sake of seeing Harnah, as I thought then,
and do now. Ever since, when Harnah didn't know how
else to plague Sam and me, she'd set up to talk about `real
gentlemen,' and `folks that knowed manners,' and all sech
stuff. Then she'd pretend she'd got a letter from Cap'n
Harris, and that he was coming agin, and all that. So
now I got it in my head that Cap'n Harris was coming,
and that she meant he'd get the harebells.

“`But I'll bet he won't, without a fight, anyway,' says
I, elinching up my fist; and then I went to sleep quite
comf'table.

“Now, there wa'n't but one place, as I knew of, where
harebells was to be found; and Harnah had showed me
that place herself the summer afore, and I had picked the
flowers for her. So I made up my mind to go next day
and see if they was in blow; and, if they was, to get a
bunch anyway, and take the resk of giving 'em to Harnah
arterwards.

“I couldn't git away in the morning nohow; for Hitty
seemed to know it was something about Harnah that was
calling me, and contrived all sorts of business to keep me
to hum: but, after dinner, I jist took my hat, and cleared

out afore she knowed it, and, by the time she missed me,
was half a mile up the river.

“'Twas a pooty day as ever you see; and a I rowed
along, listening to the water running by the boat, and the
wind rustling in the trees, I began to feel real sort of good,
and didn't care half so much about Sam or the British cap'n
as I did when I started. When I come to the landing at
Uncle 'Siah's, I never stopped, though I looked with all my
eyes for any signs of Harnah; but couldn't see no one but
Sam going out to the cornfield, with a hoe on his shoulder.

“`Good for you, Sam,' says I to myself. `Hard work's
dreadful wholesome for love-sickness.' So I rowed along as
merry as a cricket, and pretty soon tied up my boat, and
struck off into the woods. It was consid'able of a walk; and
I strolled along easy till I came to the place whar the harebells
growed, 'bout a mile and a half from the river. This
was a high clift, covered with brush and trees on one side,
and on the other falling sheer down to a little deep valley,
with another clift rising opposite. These clifts joined each
other at the two ends of the valley: so there was no getting
into it anyway but down the faces of 'em, and that was as
much as a man's neck was worth; but, fur's I know, no man
had ever wanted to, nor ever tried to, till that day.

“The harebells growed on the very edge of the fust clift,
and a little way down the face of it, and looked mighty
pooty a-floating in the wind. Harnah, who was kind of
romantic, said they was the plume in the old clift's hat; and
she called the place the Lovers' Rock, 'case, she said, the
two clifts seemed taking hold of hands, and jist going to
kiss.”

“That sounds like Harnah, anyway,” muttered Mehitable
contemptuously.

“Yes, it's more uv an idee than you'd 'a been likely to
git off, ain't it, Hit?” asked Seth with a malicious grin, and
winking at the company.

But Mehitable preserving a prudent silence, and only
showing her feelings by an accelerated movement of her
knitting-needles, her husband elevated his eyes again to
the ceiling, recrossed his legs, and continued: —

“I scrambled up the back of the clift easy enough; and,
sure enough, there was the posies, all in blow, and tossing their
heads at me as if they knowed how pooty they was, and
dared me not to say so. Somehow they made me think of
Harnah; and I spoke right out, —

“`Yes, I know you be; and I hain't never said you
ain't as pooty a cretur as walks the airth: but I wish you
wa'n't so awful changeable.'

“Then I laffed right out, to think I was talking to a lot
of flowers same as if they was a gal; and, when I done
laffin', I went down on my knees, and begun to pick 'em.
But I hadn't more than got the first fist-ful when I heerd a
groan, a sort uv a faint holler groan, that sounded as if it
come right out uv the ground underneath me. I dropped
the flowers, and riz right up on eend. My ha'r riz too; for
I was scaart, I tell you. `But,' thinks I, `'twon't do to run
away the fust lick:' so I held on, and pooty soon it come
agin. This time I listened sharp, and had my wits about
me; so that, when it wor through, I clim' right up to the top
uv the ledge, and looked down into the valley, hollerin', —

“`Who be you? Is any one thar?'

“A voice answered, faint and weak; but what it said, or
whar it was, I couldn't for the life of me tell.

“So I hollered agin, —

“`Whar be you, stranger? Holler as loud as you
kin!'

“The voice answered back; and I heerd my own name,
and, as I thought, in a voice that turned me as sick and
weak as a gal.

“It was Harnah's voice; and my first idee was that she
wor dead, and wor ha'nting me.

“`Harnah!' says I, soft and low, `is it you?'

“There wa'n't no answer, but another groan, and along
of it a curious kind of noise, like a lot of cats all growling
together. I knowed that noise; and, afore it eended, I
knowed whar it come from. And, all to once, the hull
story come to me: Harnah was down thar in a painter's
den; and the kittens was a-growling round her.
The old ones must be away, or one of 'em would 'a been out
to see to me afore this.

“I hadn't the fust thing in the way of a we'pon with me;
but there was plenty of stones down in the hollow, and I cut
a good oak-sapling with my jack-knife. Then I sot myself
to scramble down the face of the clift; and, I tell you, I sweat
before I got to the bottom. Ef it hadn't been for Harnah, I
couldn't 'a done it; but, somehow or 'nother, I reached the
bottom, and looked about me. Sure enough, close to my
feet was the mouth of a cave, running right in under the
ledge, though not more than three foot high. I knelt down
and peeked in, calling, —

“`Harnah, be you thar?'

“`Seth, is it you?' asked a voice very faint.

“`Yes, my dear, it is,' says I, `and bound to get you
out uv this scrape about the quickest. What's a-keeping
you in there?'

“`My leg is broke, and the horrid creature is lying on
my feet!' says Harnah.

“I didn't wait for no more questions, but crawled inter the
hole. A dozen feet from the mouth, I come to a snarl of fur,
and glary eyes, and snapping teeth, and savage growls, that
I finally made out to be a couple of painter-kittens, not
more'n a few days old, but savage enough for a hundred.
They was snuggled close up to something: what it was I
couldn't at fust make out in the darkness; but putty soon
I see that it was a full-grown painter, lying stretched out at
length. I started back, with all the blood in me pricking at
my fingers' ends with the scare I'd got; but Harnah's voice
from beyond says, —

“`Don't be frightened at the old panther. She's dead.
They fought, and one ran away; and this one is dead.'

“`And is she a-lying on your feet, did you say? It's so
dark in here, I can't see the fust thing,' says I, feeling round
for the critter's head, and gitting my paws tore by the young
ones, who, I must say for 'em, was mighty handy with their
claws for their age. So says I, —

“`Well, fust thing, I'll get red o' these little devils; and
then I'll drag out the karkiss, and see to you, my poor gal.'

“So I clinched the fust one by the throat, and, when he

hung like a rag, pitched him out, and grappled t'other; but
he was a case, I tell you. Fight! — you'd ought ter have
seen him! — and scratch and bite, and spit and yowl, till
the whole woods rung with his uproar. I mastered him
finally; but he'd done his work, and come nigh beating
me even arter he was dead, as ye shall hear.

“When the kittens was out of the way, I clinched the karkiss
uv the old painter, and dragged it to'rst the mouth uv
the cave. It wor hard work; and, when I'd got part way,
I left it lying, and squeezed by (for it most filled up the
passage), and went to see how bad Harnah might be hurt;
for, when I spoke to her last, she hadn't made no reply.
Leaning over her, I felt round for her face, and had jist
touched her cold cheek, and called to her to know if she was
alive, when I heerd jist over my head the awfulest roar
that ever come out uv a creter's throat; and so loud, that it
echoed through and through the cave enough to deaf you.
The minute I heerd it, I knew what was tew pay, and give
up for lost. It wor the man o' the house come home in a
hurry to see what them squalls uv the dying kittens meant;
and that's how I said they come nigh beating me even arter
they was dead.

“Now, mister, what would you say a man had ought to

have done in such a fix as that? — run, or stay? Mind ye, I
hadn't the fust thing in shape uv a we'pon, nor couldn't get
hold even uv my stick, nor the stones outside; and what
could a feller do with his naked fists, shet up in a hole with
a wild-cat?”

“It was a trying situation; but I don't believe you ran
away,” said Mr. Brown good-humoredly.

“Yer bet your life on that, stranger,” replied Seth with
emphasis. “I hadn't no idee on't; though the only other
chance seemed to be to jump down the critter's throat, and
choke him, so's ter spile his stomach for Harnah.

“I looked to the mouth uv the cave, and thought, `He
won't get by that karkiss very easy;' and then, all of a sudden,
the strangest idee you ever heerd come acrost me, and
I jumped as though I'd been shot. It wor to play off one of
the critters agin the other, and keep the old painter out uv
his den with the karkiss of his mate.

“It wor a curus idee, now, worn't it; but they say a drownding
man'll clinch to a straw, and this wor worth the trying
to a feller in as tight a place as I. So I tumbled the old
lady over as well as I could, and got her wedged inter the
narrerest part uv the road, with her back rounded out, and
her paws in, so's't I should have a better chance for hanging

on than the old feller outside 'ud have for pulling.
Then, with my jack-knife, I cut a slit in one of the fore-legs
and one of the hind, to put my hands inter; and then I held
on.

“'Twa'n't but a minute arter I got fixed 'fore he wor
down upon me, yelling and squalling enough ter make a
man's blood run cold. They call 'em Injin Devils down our
way; and I guess there ain't no kind uv devils make a wuss-soundin'
noise. I jist shut my eyes, and lay low; for when
I knowed that furce, wild creter wor within two foot uv me,
and nothing ter keep him off but a karkiss that he'd claw
ter pieces in ten minutes, I kinder wondered how I'd been
sich a plaguy fool as to think uv the plan, and ter feel so
pleased with it.

“And didn't yer never mind, sir, when you've been laying
out for some great pull, you feel as if you'd got fixed fust-rate,
and was sure ter win, till the minute comes; and then,
all ter once, your gitting-ready seems no account somehow,
and you feel downright shamed uv what, a minute before,
made you so chirk?”

“Yes, that is human nature, Seth; but it is well to
remember that cool precaution is worth more than excitement,
after all,” said Mr. Brown.

“Yes, sir, I suppose so now; but I didn't then. It only
seemed to me as ef I was a darned fool, though I couldn't
hev said what I'd ought to hev done different ef I'd been
ever so wise. Well, the critter come, and he stuck his
head in, snuffing and smelling for a minute; and then
reached in one paw, jest as softly as you've seed a pussy-cat
feeling uv a ball uv yarn on the floor. Then he growled;
for either he'd smelt or he'd seed me a-peekin' over the old
woman's corpse at him. Hokey! didn't I wish I'd a good
gun handy jis' then, with sech a splendid chance to sight it!
But I hadn't; and thar was the critter, growling and tearing
away at the karkiss like mad: fer he'd pooty much made up
his mind by this time what sort o' game lay behind it,
and he was bound to be at it. Any one would 'a thought
his nateral feelings would 'a stood in the way some, seein'
as 'twor his own wife he wor clapper-clawin' at sich a rate;
but they didn't seem to a bit: and, I tell you, he made the
fur fly 'thout con-sideration. The blood streamed down inter
my face, and the smell of that and the flesh choked me.
My arms wor straightened clean out with holding on; and
sometimes I could jest see the green eyes o' the painter, an'
feel his hot breath, as he opened his jaws to hiss and spit at
me jis' like a big cat. I felt the eend uv all things wor at

hand; an', shettin' my eyes, I tried hard ter say a prayer, or
somethin' good an' fittin'. I couldn't think o' none, hows'ever:
so I jis' turned raound, and sez, `Harnah! good-by,
Harnah!' an' felt most as if I'd prayed; though she, poor
gal! wor clean swownded away, and never heerd a word
on't.

“Jes' then, when my thoughts wor so took up that I'd
act'ally most forgot where I wor, and jes' held on to the critter
kind o' mechanical-like, I heerd a shot, and then another.
The painter heerd 'em too, an' more than heerd 'em, I reckon;
for, with a growl an' a roar that made me scringe, he let go
the karkiss, an' backed hisself out o' the hole 'thout never
sayin good-by to me nor to the old lady.

“Next minute I heerd another shot, and then another; and
then sech horrid groans and screams, mixed up with growls
and hisses from the painter, that I knew he wor hit hard, an'
like to die; and, ef I should say I wor sorry, it 'ud be a lie.
Then I heerd feet climbing and scrambling down the rocks;
and next I heerd a v'ice calling, kind o' frightened-like, —

“`Be you raound here, Harnah, or Seth?'

“`Yes, we be,' says I, waking up all uv a sudden; for
I'd lay sort o' stupid till then: but now I wor wide enough
awake, and soon made Sam understand where we was, and

what was to be done. He didn't say much, but worked
away like a good feller, till he got out, fust the mauled karkiss
o' the painter, with the flesh all hanging from it in
strips; then me, covered with blood, and looking wuss than
a dead man, I expect; and finally Harnah, jes' coming to
after her dead faint.

“`We must git her out o' this horrid den 'fore she knows
whar she is, or it'll skeer her to death,' says I, as soon as I
could speak. `But how'll we do it?'

“`You look as if you b'longed here; so I reckon you'd
better stop behind, and I'll git Harnah out by myself,' says
Sam, laffin' in a kind o' hard way.

“I didn't say nothing; but I thought I wouldn't 'a took that
time to laff at a feller, nor yet to show a spite agin him, if
I'd been Sam, and he me.

“It's more nor I could do to justly tell you how we ever
got that gal up them rocks. I expect it wor more the hand
o' God, so to speak, than us that did it. Fust place, we
tied our handkerchers raound her waist, fer a hold, and
then Sam went ahead, pulling her after him, and I sort o'
helped behind, and clim' along as well's I could; and bimby
we got up, and laid Harnah down to rest among the harebells.
When she got a little smarter, she told us how

she thought she'd come and git 'em fer herself, and then pertend
some one had given 'em to her, jest so's to plague us,
and see what we'd say. Then, whilst she was a-picking of
'em, she heerd a painter cry right clost to her, and was so
scared, she sot out to run, and, fust she knew, was over the
edge of the clift, and rolling down the face on't. When she
got to the bottom, her leg was broke, and she couldn't stir;
and up to the top o' the rocks she see the painter's head,
with his green eyeballs a-glaring down at her, and his ears
laid back, ready for a spring. What with the pain, and
what with the scare, I expect the poor gal fainted. Anyways,
the next thing she knowed was finding herself in the
cave with the two painter-kittens playing round her, and the
old one lying close to, moving his tail from side to side, and
yawning till she could see all his white teeth and great red
throat. Ef she wor scart afore, she didn't feel no better
now, you'd better believe. But Harnah was a stout-hearted
gal, with all her delicate ways; and she never stirred, nor
made a sound, only lay still, and fixed her eyes as stiddy as
she could on those uv the great brute beside her. Pooty
soon she see that he wor a-looking at her; and pooty soon
he began to make a purring sort of noise, like 'bout forty big
tomcats tied up in one bag. Then Harnah spoke to him,
like as she'd have coaxed a dog, and, arter a while, began to
play with the cubs a little. One way and another, they'd got
to be 'mazin' good friends all raound, when a cry was heerd
outside; and the old man and the little ones pricked up their
ears, and yowled in answer. It wor the old woman coming
home, sure enough; and the minute she poked her snout inter
the den, and see what company her man had got while she
wor gone, the trouble begun. Harnah, naterally, wor too
much skeered to see justly what went on: but there were a
big fight somehow; and she got a notion that the she-painter
wanted to fall afoul uv her, and that he wouldn't let her;
and, like other married folks, from words they come to
blows; and the upshot uv the hull was, that the old lady got
the wust on't, and lay dead on the field uv action.

“Whether the husband felt bad, or whether he wanted
sunthin' to eat, or whether he had an engagement with
another lady, I couldn't say; but, the minute he'd given the
finishing blow to his wife, he cleared out, and didn't come
back till the cubs called him to see to me.

“Well, we got Harnah home somehow; and next day
we come again, and skun the old tiger and the cubs; and
I got a hull heap o' harebells. I was bound, that, after all
the fuss, Harnah shouldn't lose her harebells; and she
didn't.”

Seth was silent; and, tilting his chair a little farther
back, crossed his hands above his chest, and began to
whistle softly. The company looked at him inquiringly;
and, after a pause, Karl asked, —

“Well, what next, Seth?”

“Nothing, cap'n: that's all; except I didn't tell how
Sam see me going up the river, and suspicioned I wor a
going to meet Harnah, and so dropped all, and followed on.
What he brought his gun fer, I didn't never ask him.”

“But Hannah — what became of her?”

“Oh! she was kind o' peeked a while, with her broken
leg; but, arter that, she was as well as ever.”

“Yes; but how did her love-affairs terminate?” persisted
Karl.

“Waal, she married Sam Hedge the next fall; and I
guess their love-affairs turned out like other folkses a good
deal, — lots o' 'lasses at fust, and, arter a while, lots o'
vinegar: that's the way o' merried life.”

In delivering this sentiment, Seth bestowed a sidelong
glance upon Mehitable, far more merry than sincere in its
expression; but she, tranquilly pursuing her knitting, let
fall her retort, as if she had not perceived the sarcasm.

“Oh, waal!” said she, “I don't know as I've any call

to find fault with merried life. Seth's made as good a husband
as a gal has a right to expect that takes a feller out
o' pity 'cause he's been mittened by another gal.”

The laugh remained upon the feminine side of the argument,
and the party merrily separated for the night.