University of Virginia Library

14. CHAPTER XIV.
A TYRANT AND A SLAVE.

The course of the fugitives was nearly northeasterly, and not
diverging far from the river. They followed a road which led at
times through dense woods, and at times through an open country,
where an occasional farm-house was revealed by its evening light,
and by the barking of its watch-dog as they passed. Their progress
was necessarily slow, as the darkness was intense, and the
way unknown to them, and they had not wandered long or far
before Vrail began to contemplate making a trial of the hospitality
of some of the inhabitants. His fatigue was very great; he had
eaten nothing since early in the morning, and Brom, though far
from being exhausted, was, like him, pinched with hunger. Besides,
he thought the chances of meeting a friendly reception as good in
one locality as in another, and being well armed, it would be an
easy matter, if repulsed, or if he had reason to suspect betrayal,
again to take to flight.

Thus arguing, he selected for his hazardous experiment a house,
the faint light of which seemed not only remote from the road on
which he was travelling, but far from any other dwelling. It
proved very difficult of access, and as he travelled slowly across
the meadows towards it, the flickering rays which guided him
danced bewilderingly before his eyes, seeming at times, like the
ignis fatuus, to recede as he approached it.

At length he drew near the building, but ere he came near to

the door, he heard the sound of angry voices within, and he
thought for a moment of passing on in search of more peaceful
indications in other quarters; but impelled by his desperate and
destitute condition, he dismissed his fears and knocked for admitance.
The reply was gruff, but it bade him enter, and flinging
the door open, he passed in, followed by Brom.

In a small room, beside a rough deal table, an elderly couple
sat, with a meal of brown bread and potatoes before them, while
a miserably clad, but pretty and gentle-looking girl, of about thirteen
years, stood by the fireside, apparently the patient recipient
of the joint rebukes of the other two. The man was small, sallow,
and dirty, with harsh and homely features, rendered doubly repulsive
by the scowl of wrath lingering upon them, and the woman,
though possessing the remains of beauty, had a bold and cunning
expression, and a general slatternliness of appearance more disagreeable
than ordinary ugliness.

Vrail was not skilled in physiognomy; he had seen too little of
the world for that; but if he had been so, the woman's countenance
changed almost too suddenly after his entrance to admit of his
analyzing its first expression, or retaining the effect it produced
upon him. Her civil “good evening” was free from all rudeness
or appearance of surprise, while her more blunt partner turned
hastily to the intruders, and asked who they were and what they
wanted.

“We want food, and assistance to cross the river,” replied
Harry, advancing nearer the table, throwing down some silver, and
seizing a piece of bread, which he began eagerly to devour. “I
can make it worth your while to assist us,” he added; “besides,
I think we ought to be friends.”

“Oh, yes,” replied the other, with a sudden change of manner;
“I see what you are now. You belonged to the patriot army, I
s'pose, and you want to get back home.”

“Exactly so.”

“They've been terribly cut up there at the Windmill, poor fellows—they
are all killed or taken, excepting a very few who have
fled, but even they will be taken, you know.”

“Is it really so very bad?” asked Harry, who had not before
learned the full extent of the disaster to his companions.

“Yes, shocking,” was the reply, with a baleful gleam of the eye;
“I've been down to the Point to see about it. There's dozens lying
around there dead, and the prisoners are all marched to Prescott
for to-night, with their general; and troops of people following
and looking on. But come, sit down and eat, both of you, and
we'll talk about that afterwards. You are safe enough here for
the present; to-morrow it would be quite another thing.”

The famished men waited for no second invitation, but sat down
side by side, and attacked the homely fare with as much eagerness
and relish as if it had been composed of the choicest viands.

“You think we shall be safe here for a short time?” asked Vrail,
scarcely gaining the leisure to speak so long a sentence.

“Oh, certainly,” replied the host, exchanging a look of intelligence
with his wife; “there isn't a doubt of it, is there
Hannah?'

“Not the least, I should think,” was the reply, in a very bland
voice. “Lock the door, Ruth.”

The girl obeyed, and at the next instant the Canadian rose, and
glancing again significantly at his wife, approached the negro, who,
like his master, had retained his gun at his side when he sat down.

“Let me set your guns in the corner, out of your way,” he said
to Brom, in the mildest of voices; so mild that it would not have
been recognized as belonging to the same speaker who had addressed
them on entering.

He laid his hand on the weapon as he spoke, and Brom, who
had a whole potato in his mouth and another in his hand, seemed
like to acquiesce in the movement without any remonstrance:
This was far, however, from his design. Clutching at the depart

[ILLUSTRATION]

"The negro, clutching at the departing gun with his unoccupied hand, and shaking his head, drew it back to its former position." —Page 101.

[Description: 463EAF. Image of a group gathered around a table near a fireplace. One man is standing and staring at an African-American man who is holding a long rifle. There is another man watching the situation, and two women in the background hovering.]

ing gun with his unoccupied hand, and shaking his head, he drew
it back to its former position.

“No, I tank you,” he said, as soon as he could speak.

“Ah, very well, perhaps, it is better to keep them near you, in
case of surprise. You would like to cross the river to-night, I suppose?”
said the Canadian, addressing Vrail, very quickly.

“Of course,” replied Harry, “as soon as possible, and, as I said
before, I will pay largely to any one who will take us over.”

“Golly! yes—a hundred dollars,” added the negro.

Harry looked in surprise at Brom, not understanding the secret
of his liberal offer.

“Don't talk about pay,” replied the accommodating man; “I
am ready to help a friend in need, I hope, without being paid for
it. You just sit here and finish your meal, while I go and see
if I can get Larry Smith's boat, and him to help me row you
across.”

“For mercy's sake,” said Harry, jumping up, “do not let us lose
the time, nor run the risk of trusting our secret to any one else.
Let us help ourselves to the boat, and we will give you abundant
means of satisfying your neighbor afterwards for it use. As
to the rowing, we can do that ourselves.”

“But the stream is very rapid, and I could not row the skiff
back; besides, he keeps it locked. No, no, you need not be afraid
to trust Larry—he is as true as steel—isn't he, Hannah?”

“That he is; every body knows that. The poor man's feelings
would be dreadfully hurt, if he thought that anybody distrusted
him.”

“Very well, if it must be so—but do not be gone long.”

“It is about a mile to Larry's, and the night is dark—it will
take some time to go and come, but all you have to do is to keep
quiet; and as soon as you have done eating, perhaps you had better
put out the light, so as not to attract attention if any soldiers
should be passing. If they really do come, why you can jump

out of the window and make for the woods, and then you will be
as well off as you were before.”

“It is well thought of, about the light,” replied Vrail, at once
extinguishing the blaze of the single tallow candle which had
very faintly illumined the room; “I think it would now be difficult
for any one to find the house in such a pitchy darkness, unless
they knew exactly where it stood.”

“Of course it would, for you can't begin to see it from the road.
But good-bye—keep up good heart till I return, which won't be
very long.”

He went out, and the woman followed him to the door, enjoining
upon him in a loud voice to take care of himself, but saying
something in a lower tone, as she drew the door nearly shut after
her, standing on the outside.

At this moment the girl, who had stood nearly motionless in
the chimney-corner ever since the entrance of the fugitives,
advanced quickly a few steps towards Harry, and upon the door
re-opening, as hastily retreated to her former position.

The faint light which gleamed from the embers upon the hearth
revealed this movement, and the young man supposed that she
had meant to take some food secretly from the table, having probably
been kept fasting as a punishment for some offence. He
began to make some inquiries about her, when the woman, in a
whining voice, which was intended to be very gentle, said that
she had been a bad girl, but that she might have her supper now,
and bade her come to the table.

“I ain't hungry,” replied a very faint voice, the articulation of
which seemed to indicate a violent trembling of the speaker.

“Then go to bed,” was the reply.

The girl remained motionless until the mandate was twice
repeated, when she very slowly obeyed, passing near, and pausing
a moment close to Vrail, who distinctly heard her tremble as she
stood beside him.

He was about to speak to her, when the voice of the woman
again urged her along, and she passed into a corner of the room
and ascended a ladder which led to an upper apartment. The
hostess, in the meantime, became very voluble, and seemed bent
on entertaining her guests until the return of her husband.

Nearly an hour passed away, which, of course, seemed to the
young man fully quadrupled in length, and yet there was no sign
of the man's return, and still his garrulous partner talked on with
unflagging rapidity.

The rebellion was the theme, and as she could relate many an
interesting incident connected with it, she found in Harry an
eager listener. But he grew impatient, at last, and would hear
no more.

“He has been gone long enough to have walked four miles—
something must have happened to prevent his return,” he said.

“It is very dark—he will certainly be here soon,” replied the
woman; “I will go and listen if I cannot hear him coming.”

She went, as before, outside the door, quite closing it after her,
for the night was cool, and at the same time Vrail heard a half
whispering voice from the top of the ladder.

“They are cheating you. Larry Smith lives very near us, and
he has no boat. Uncle Shay has gone after soldiers to take you.”

Harry started up, and was about making his exit through the
window, when reflecting that such a course might bring the poor
girl under suspicion and procure some terrible punishment for her,
he resolved to wait a few moments longer, intending to depart as
if not suspecting his host.

“Do you know of any boat?” he asked hastily.

“Yes—about two miles down the river, at Mr. Wells'. But
you must hurry. They will go directly there to find you. Do
not wait a minute. Oh, I hear voices now.”

Vrail sprang to the door and locked it, resolving not to be
taken alive, as he knew that his capture would be equivalent to

death. He next ordered Brom to jump out of the window, a
command which the negro was not slow in obeying, and he stood
ready to follow him, yet waiting, in hopes of obtaining further
information in regard to his way. The next instant the door was
tried, and then the voice of their returned host was heard modulated
to a tone of mildness decidedly winning.

“It is I and Larry—I have found him at last. Be quick, and
open the door.”

“Oh, don't open it,” added the voice from the ladder. “There
are six or eight men. I have seen them from the window. There
is a short way to the place where Wells' boat is kept, if you can
find it—but you must hurry.”

“I fear I can neither find the short way nor the long one; I do
not even know the way to the river, and the night is very dark.”

Harry advanced as he spoke with a foreboding heart, and with
a conviction that if he failed to make good his escape across the
river before daylight his capture would become certain, as the
country would be thoroughly aroused by his pursuers, and all the
passes would be secured.

The girl's warning and his reply had been quickly spoken, and
the reflections we have recorded had been instantaneous; but
already another, and an impatient summons was heard from without,
accompanied by a violent shaking of the door.

“What is the matter there—can't you find the lock?”

“Wait a minute,” replied Harry. “Good-bye, my good girl;
you have saved our lives for the present. Take this.”

As he spoke he felt a light grasp upon his arm, and heard the
whispered words—

“Hurry, hurry, they are coming around the house.”

She had glided down the ladder, and now fairly dragged the
young man forward to the window, and when he leapt out she
followed, seeming almost frantic with the desire to save him.

“I will show you the way to the river, and will go a little way

with you,” she whispered, again grasping his arm outside the
house, and dragging him forward.

They advanced as rapidly as the darkness would permit, followed
by the negro, who had been waiting for his master, and
stimulated by the momentary expectation of hearing the sounds
of pursuit.