 | CHAPTER III. The wigwam and the cabin |  |
3. CHAPTER III.
But he was doomed to disappointment. He was rejected,—
tenderly, but firmly. Leda Heywood was not for him; and
resigning himself to the denial, with the instincts of a man by
nature strong, and inured by trial to disappointments, Arthur
Holt retired from the field of Love, to cultivate more certain
fruits in those of Ceres and Pomona. Had the mind of the young
farmer been morbidly affected, his mortification would have been
heightened by subsequent events. Three days afterwards, Leda
Heywood accepted the hand of his enemy, John Houston! Philosophers
will continue to seek in vain for the cause of that
strange perversity, by which the tastes, even of the finest women,
are sometimes found to be governed. There is a mystery here
beyond all solution. The tastes and sympathies of Leda Heywood
and John Houston did not run together;—there was, in reality,
no common ground, whether of the affections or of the sentiments,
upon which they could meet. But he sought, and wooed, and
won her;—they were married; and, to all but Arthur Holt, the
wonder was at an end after the customary limits of the ninth day.
The wonder, in this case, will be lessened to the reader if two or
three things were remembered. Leda Heywood was very young,
and John Houston very handsome. Of the wild passions of the
latter she knew little or nothing. She found him popular—the
favourite of the damsels around her, and this fact, alone, will account
for the rest. But we must not digress in speculations of
this nature. The parties were married, and the honeymoon, in all
countries and climates, is proverbially rose-coloured. The only
awkward thing is, that, in all countries, it is but a monthly moon.
The wedding took place. The honeymoon rose, but set somewhat
earlier than usual. With the attainment of his object, the
passion of John Houston very soon subsided, and we shall make
a long story conveniently short by saying, in this place, that it
was not many weeks before Leda Heywood (or as we must now
with which she had joined herself to a man whose violent
temper made no allowances for the feelings, the sensibilities,
and tastes of others. No longer restrained by the dread of losing
his object, his brutalities shocked her delicacy, while his fierce
passions awoke her fears. She soon found herself neglected and
abused, and learned to loathe the connection she had formed, and
to weep bitter tears in secret. To all this evil may be added the
pressure of poverty, which now began to be more seriously felt
than ever. The hunter life, always uncertain, was still more so,
in the case of one like John Houston, continually led into indulgences
which unfitted him, sometimes for days together, to go
into the woods. Carousing at the tavern with some congenial
natures, he suffered himself to be little disturbed by home cares;
and the privations to which his wife had been subjected even, before
her marriage, were now considerably increased. If will be
remembered that the Widow Heywood was indebted (perhaps
even more than she then knew) to the generous care of Arthur
Holt. Her resources from this quarter were necessarily withdrawn
on the marriage of her daughter with Houston, not so
much through any diminution of the young farmer's sympathy
for the objects of his bounty, as from a desire to withdraw from
any connexion or communion, direct or indirect, with the family
of his bitterest foe. Knowing the fierce, unreasoning nature of
Houston, he was unwilling to expose to his violence the innocent
victims of his ill habits—a consequence which he very well knew
would follow the discovery of any services secretly rendered
them by Holt. But these scruples were soon compelled to give
way to a sense of superior duty. It soon came to his knowledge
that the unhappy women—mother and daughter—were frequently
without food. John Houston, abandoned to vicious habits
and associates, had almost entirely left his family to provide for
themselves. He was sometimes absent for weeks—would return
home, as it appeared, for no purpose but to vent upon his wife and
mother-in-law the caprices of his ill-ordered moods, and then depart,
leaving them hopeless of his aid. In this condition, the
young farmer came again to their rescue. The larder was provided
regularly and bountifully. But Leda knew not at first
did suspect—but Arthur Holt proceeded so cautiously, that his
supplies came to the house with the privity of Widow Heywood
only.
To add to Leda's sorrows, two events now occurred within a
few months of each other, and both in less than sixteen months
after her marriage, which were calculated to increase her burthen,
and to lessen, in some respect, her sources of consolation:
the birth of a son and the death of her mother. These events
drew to her the assistance of neighbours, but the most substantial
help came from Arthur Holt. It was now scarcely possible
to conceal from Leda, as he had hitherto done, his own direct
agency in the support of her family. She was compelled to
know it, and—which was still more mortifying to her spirit—
conscious as she was of the past—she was compelled to receive
it. Her husband's course was not materially improved by events
which had so greatly increased the claims and the necessities of
his wife. The child, for a time, appealed to his pride. It was
a fine boy, who was supposed and said to resemble himself.
This pleased him for a while, but did not long restrain him from
indulgences, which, grateful to him from the first, had now
acquired over him all the force of habit. He soon disappeared
from his home, and again, for long and weary periods, left the
poor Leda to all the cares and solitude, without the freedom, of
widowhood.
But a circumstance was about to occur, which suddenly drew
his attention to his home. Whether it was that some meddlesome
neighbour informed him of the assistance which his wife derived
from Arthur Holt, or that he himself had suddenly awakened to
the inquiry as to the source of her supplies, we cannot say; but
certain it is that the suspicions of his evil nature were aroused;
and he who would not abandon his low and worthless associates
for the sake of duty and love, was now prompted to do so by his
hate. He returned secretly to the neighbourhood of his home,
and put himself in a place of concealment.
The cottage of the Widow Heywood was within three quarters
of a mile of Reedy River, on the opposite side of which
stood the farm of Arthur Holt. This space the young farmer
whether of flour, honey, milk, meat, or corn, which his
benevolence prompted him to place on the threshold of his sad
and suffering neighbour. There was a little grove of chestnut
and other forest trees, that stood about two hundred yards from
Leda's cottage. A part of this grove belonged to their dwelling;
the rest was unenclosed. Through this grove ran one of the lines
of fence which determined the domain of the cottage. On both
sides of the fence, in the very centre of this thicket, there were
steps, gradually rising, from within and without, to its top,—a
mode of constructing a passage frequent in the country, which,
having all the facilities of a gateway, was yet more permanent,
and without its disadvantages. To this point came Arthur Holt
nightly. On these steps he laid his tribute, whether of charity
or a still lingering love, or both, and, retiring to the thicket, he
waited, sometimes for more than an hour, until he caught a
glimpse of the figure of Leda, descending through the grove, and
possessing herself of the supply. This done, and she departed;
the young farmer, sighing deeply, would turn away unseen, unsuspected,
perhaps, and regain his own cottage.
On these occasions the two never met. The Widow Heywood,
on her deathbed, had confided to her daughter the secret of her
own interviews with Arthur, and he, to spare himself as well as
Leda, he pain of meeting, had appointed his own and her hour
of coming, differently. Whether she, at any time, suspected his
propinquity, cannot be conjectured. That she was touched to the
heart by his devotion, cannot well be questioned.
For five weary nights did the malignant and suspicious eyes
of John Houston, from a contiguous thicket, watch these proceedings
with feelings of equal hate and mortification. Filled with
the most foul and loathsome anticipations—burning to find victims—to
detect, expose, destroy—he beheld only a spectacle
which increased his mortification. He beheld innocence superior
to misfortune—love that did not take advantage of its power—a
benevolence that rebuked his own worthlessness and hardness of
heart—a purity on the part of both the objects of his jealousy,
which mocked his comprehension, as it was so entirely above any
capacity of his own, whether of mind or heart, to appreciate.
It was now the fifth night of his watch. He began to despair
of his object. He had seen nothing to give the least confirmation
to his suspicions. His wife had appeared only as she was, as
pure as an angel;—his ancient enemy not less so. He was
furious that he could find no good cause of fury, and weary of a
watch which was so much at variance with his habits. He determined
that night to end it. With the night, and at the usual
hour, came the unfailing Arthur. He placed his bowl of milk
upon the steps, his sack of meal, a small vessel of butter, and a
neat little basket of apples. For a moment he lingered by the
fence, then slipping back, adroitly ensconced himself in a neighbouring
thicket, from whence he could see every movement of
the fair sufferer by whom they were withdrawn. This last
movement of the young farmer had not been unseen by the
guilty husband. Indeed, it was this part of the proceeding
which, more than any thing beside, had forced upon him the
conviction that the parties did not meet. She came, and she, too,
lingered by the steps, before she proceeded to remove the provisions.
Deep was the sigh that escaped her—deeper than usual
were her emotions. She sank upon one of the steps—she clasped
her hands convulsively—her lips moved—she was evidently
breathing a spontaneous prayer to heaven, at the close of which
she wept bitterly, the deep sobs seeming to burst from a heart
that felt itself relieved by this mournful power of expression.
Was it the echo of her own sighs—her sobs—that came to her
from the thicket? She started, and with wild eye gazing around
her, proceeded with all haste to gather up her little stores. But
in this she was prevented. The answering sigh, the sob,—coming
from the lips of his hated rival and ancient enemy, had gone,
hissingly, as it were, into the very brain of John Houston. He
darted from his place of concealment, dashed the provisions from
the hands of his wife, and, with a single blow, smote her to the
earth, while he cried out to Holt in the opposite thicket, some incoherent
language of insults and opprobrium. The movement
of the latter was quite as prompt, though not in season to prevent
the unmanly blow. He sprang forward, and, grasping the
offender about the body, lifted him with powerful effort from the
earth, upon which he was about to hurl him again with all the
interposed. At the sound of her voice, the very tones of which
declared her wish, Arthur released his enemy, but with no easy
effort. The latter, regaining his feet, and recovering in some
degree his composure, turned to his wife and commanded her
absence.
“I cannot go—I will not—while there is a prospect of blood-shed,”
was her firm reply.
“What! you would see it, would you? Doubtless, the sight
of my blood would delight your eyes! But hope not for it!—
Arthur Holt, are you for ever to cross my path, and with impunity?
Shall there never be a settlement between us? Is the day
of reckoning never to come? Speak! Shall we fight it out here,
in the presence of this woman, or go elsewhere, where there will
be no tell-tale witnesses? Will you follow me?”
“Go not,—follow him not,—Arthur Holt. Go to your home!
I thank you, I bless you for what you have done for me and
mine;—for the mother who looks on us from heaven,—for the
child that still looks to me on earth. May God bless you for
your charity and goodness! Go now, Arthur Holt—go to your
own home—and look not again upon mine. Once more, God's
blessings be upon you! May you never want them.”
There was a warmth, an earnestness, almost a violence in the
tone and manner of this adjuration, so new to the usually meek
and calm deportment of his wife, that seemed, on a sudden, to
confound the brutal husband. He turned on her a vacant look
of astonishment. He was very far from looking for such boldness—such
audacity—in that quarter. But his forbearance was
not of long duration, and he was already beginning a fierce and
almost frenzied repetition of his blasphemies, when the subdued,
but firm answer of Arthur Holt again diverted his attention. The
good sense of the young farmer made him at once sensible of the
danger to the unhappy woman of using any language calculated
to provoke the always too prompt brutality of the husband, and,
stifling his own indignation with all his strength, he calmly promised
compliance with her requisitions.
“There are many reasons,” he added, “why there should be
no strife between John Houston and myself; we were boys together,
bed.”
“That shall not be your excuse, Arthur Holt,” exclaimed the
other, interrupting him; “you shall not escape me by any such
pretences. My father's name shall not shelter your cowardice.”
“Cowardice!”
“Ay, cowardice! cowardice! What are you but an unmanly
coward!”
There was a deep, but quiet struggle, in the breast of Arthur,
to keep down the rising devil in his mood; but he succeeded,
and turning away, he contented himself with saying simply:
“You know that I am no coward, John Houston—nobody better
than yourself. You will take good heed how you approach
such cowardice as mine.”
“Do you dare me!”
“Yes!”
“No! no!” cried the wife, again flinging herself between
them. Away, Arthur Holt, why will you remain when you see
what I am doomed to suffer?”
“I go, Leda, but I dread to leave you in such hands. God
have you in his holy keeping!”
| CHAPTER III. The wigwam and the cabin | |