University of Virginia Library

2. CHAPTER II.
GREAT EXCITEMENT.

THE publication of the advertisement in the paper
brought the village fever of the last two days to its
height. Myrtle Hazard's disappearance had been pretty
well talked round through the immediate neighborhood, but
now that forty-eight hours of search and inquiry had not
found her, and the alarm was so great that the young girl's
friends were willing to advertise her in a public journal, it
was clear that the gravest apprehensions were felt and justified.
The paper carried the tidings to many who had not
heard it. Some of the farmers who had been busy all the
week with their fields came into the village in their wagons
on Saturday, and there first learned the news, and saw the
paper, and the placards which were posted up, and listened,
open-mouthed, to the whole story.

Saturday was therefore a day of much agitation in Oxbow
Village, and some stir in the neighboring settlements.
Of course there was a great variety of comment, its character
depending very much on the sense, knowledge, and
disposition of the citizens, gossips, and young people who
talked over the painful and mysterious occurrence.

The Withers Homestead was naturally the chief centre
of interest. Nurse Byloe, an ancient and voluminous woman,
who had known the girl when she was a little bright-eyed
child, handed over “the baby” she was holding to
another attendant, and got on her things to go straight up
to The Poplars. She had been holding “the baby” these

forty years and more, but somehow it never got to be more
than a month or six weeks old. She reached The Poplars
after much toil and travail. Mistress Fagan, Irish, house-servant,
opened the door, at which Nurse Byloe knocked
softly, as she was in the habit of doing at the doors of those
who sent for her.

“Have you heerd anything yet, Kitty Fagan?” asked
Nurse Byloe.

“Niver a blissed word,” said she. “Miss Withers is up
stairs with Miss Bathsheby, a cryin' and a lam-entin'.
Miss Badlam's in the parlor. The men has been draggin'
the pond. They have n't found not one thing, but only jest
two, and that was the old coffee-pot and the gray cat, —
it 's them nigger boys hanged her with a string they tied
round her neck and then drownded her.” [P. Fagan, Jr.,
Æt. 14, had a snarl of similar string in his pocket.]

Mistress Fagan opened the door of the best parlor. A
woman was sitting there alone, rocking back and forward,
and fanning herself with the blackest of black fans.

“Nuss Byloe, is that you? Well, to be sure, I 'm glad
to see you, though we 're all in trouble. Set right down,
Nuss, do. O, its dreadful times!”

A handkerchief which was in readiness for any emotional
overflow was here called on for its function.

Nurse Byloe let herself drop into a flaccid squab chair
with one of those soft cushions, filled with slippery feathers,
which feel so fearfully like a very young infant, or a
nest of little kittens, as they flatten under the subsiding
person.

The woman in the rocking-chair was Miss Cynthia Badlam,
second-cousin of Miss Silence Withers, with whom she
had been living as a companion at intervals for some years.

She appeared to be thirty-five years old, more or less, and
looked not badly for that stage of youth, though of course
she might have been handsomer at twenty, as is often the
case with women. She wore a not unbecoming cap; frequent
headaches had thinned her locks somewhat of late
years. Features a little too sharp, a keen, gray eye, a
quick and restless glance, which rather avoided being met,
gave the impression that she was a wide-awake, cautious,
suspicious, and, very possibly, crafty person.

“I could n't help comin',” said Nurse Byloe, “we do so
love our babies, — how can we help it, Miss Badlam?”

The spinster colored up at the nurse's odd way of using
the possessive pronoun, and dropped her eyes, as was natural
on hearing such a speech.

“I never tended children as you have, Nuss,” she said.
“But I 've known Myrtle Hazard ever since she was three
years old, and to think she should have come to such an
end, — `The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately
wicked,”' — and she wept.

“Why, Cynthy Badlam, what do y' mean?” said Nurse
Byloe. “Y' don't think anything dreadful has come o' that
child's wild nater, do ye?”

“Child!” said Cynthia Badlam, — “child enough to
wear this very gown I have got on and not find it too big
for her neither.” [It would have pinched Myrtle here and
there pretty shrewdly.]

The two women looked each other in the eyes with subtle
interchange of intelligence, such as belongs to their sex
in virtue of its specialty. Talk without words is half their
conversation, just as it is all the conversation of the lower
animals. Only the dull senses of men are dead to it as to
the music of the spheres.

Their minds travelled along, as if they had been yoked
together, through whole fields of suggestive speculation,
until the dumb growths of thought ripened in both their
souls into articulate speech, — consentingly, as the movement
comes after the long stillness of a Quaker meeting.

Their lips opened at the same moment. “You don't
mean” — began Nurse Byloe, but stopped as she heard
Miss Badlam also speaking.

“They need n't drag the pond,” she said. “They
need n't go beating the woods as if they were hunting a
patridge, — though for that matter Myrtle Hazard was
always more like a patridge than she was like a pullet.
Nothing ever took hold of that girl, — not catechising, nor
advising, nor punishing. It 's that dreadful will of hers
never was broke. I 've always been afraid that she
would turn out a child of wrath. Did y' ever watch her
at meetin' playing with posies and looking round all the
time of the long prayer? That 's what I 've seen her do
many and many a time. I 'm afraid — O dear! Miss
Byloe, I 'm afraid to say what I 'm afraid of. Men are
so wicked, and young girls are full of deceit and so ready
to listen to all sorts of artful creturs that take advantage
of their ignorance and tender years.” She wept once
more, this time with sobs that seemed irrepressible.

“Dear suz!” said the nurse, “I won't believe no sech
thing as wickedness about Myrtle Hazard. You mean
she 's gone an' run off with some good-for-nothin' man or
other? If that ain't what y' mean, what do y' mean? It
can't be so, Miss Badlam: she 's one o' my babies. At
any rate, I handled her when she fust come to this village,
— and none o' my babies never did sech a thing. Fifteen
year old, and be bringin' a whole family into disgrace!

If she was thirty year old, or five-an'-thirty or more, and
never 'd had a chance to be married, and if one o' them
artful creturs you was talkin' of got hold of her, — then,
to be sure, — why, — dear me! — law! I never
thought, Miss Badlam! — but then of course you could
have had your pickin' and choosin' in the time of it; and
I don't mean to say it 's too late now if you felt called that
way, for you 're better lookin' now than some that 's
younger, and there 's no accountin' for tastes.”

A sort of hysteric twitching that went through the
frame of Cynthia Badlam dimly suggested to the old nurse
that she was not making her slightly indiscreet personality
much better by her explanations. She stopped short, and
surveyed the not uncomely person of the maiden lady sitting
before her with her handkerchief pressed to her eyes,
and one hand clenching the arm of the rocking-chair, as
if some spasm had clamped it there. The nurse looked at
her with a certain growing interest she had never felt before.
It was the first time for some years that she had
had such a chance, partly because Miss Cynthia had often
been away for long periods, — partly because she herself
had been busy professionally. There was no occasion for
her services, of course, in the family at The Poplars; and
she was always following round from place to place after
that everlasting migratory six-weeks or less old baby.

There was not a more knowing pair of eyes, in their
way, in a circle of fifty miles, than those kindly tranquil
orbs that Nurse Byloe fixed on Cynthia Badlam. The
silver threads in the side fold of hair, the delicate lines at
the corner of the eye, the slight drawing down at the
angle of the mouth, — almost imperceptible, but the nurse
dwelt upon it, — a certain moulding of the features as of

an artist's clay model worked by delicate touches with the
fingers, showing that time or pain or grief had had a hand
in shaping them, the contours, the adjustment of every fold
of the dress, the attitude, the very way of breathing, were
all passed through the searching inspection of the ancient
expert, trained to know all the changes wrought by time
and circumstance. It took not so long as it takes to describe
it, but it was an analysis of imponderables, equal to
any of Bunsen's with the spectroscope.

Miss Badlam removed her handkerchief and looked in
a furtive, questioning way, in her turn, upon the nurse.

“It 's dreadful close here, — I 'm 'most smothered,”
Nurse Byloe said; and, putting her hand to her throat,
unclasped the catch of the necklace of gold beads she had
worn since she was a baby, — a bead having been added
from time to time as she thickened. It lay in a deep
groove of her large neck, and had not troubled her in
breathing before, since the day when her husband was run
over by an ox-team.

At this moment Miss Silence Withers entered, followed
by Bathsheba Stoker, daughter of Rev. Joseph Bellamy
Stoker.

She was the friend of Myrtle, and had come to comfort
Miss Silence, and consult with her as to what further
search they should institute. The two, Myrtle's aunt and
her friend, were as unlike as they could well be. Silence
Withers was something more than forty years old, a
shadowy, pinched, sallow, dispirited, bloodless woman,
with the habitual look of the people in the funeral carriage
which follows next to the hearse, and the tone in
speaking that may be noticed in a household where one of its
members is lying white and still in a cool, darkened chamber

overhead. Bathsheba Stoker was not called handsome;
but she had her mother's youthful smile, which was
so fresh and full of sweetness that she seemed like a beauty
while she was speaking or listening; and she could
never be plain so long as any expression gave life to her
features. In perfect repose, her face, a little prematurely
touched by sad experiences, — for she was but seventeen
years old, — had the character and decision stamped in its
outlines which any young man who wanted a companion
to warn, to comfort, and command him, might have depended
on as warranting the courage, the sympathy, and
the sense demanded for such a responsibility. She had
been trying her powers of consolation on Miss Silence.
It was a sudden freak of Myrtle's. She had gone off on
some foolish but innocent excursion. Besides, she was a
girl that would take care of herself; for she was afraid of
nothing, and nimbler than any boy of her age, and almost
as strong as any. As for thinking any bad thoughts about
her, that was a shame; she cared for none of the young
fellows that were round her. Cyprian Eveleth was the
one she thought most of; but Cyprian was as true as his
sister Olive, — and who else was there?

To all this Miss Silence answered only by sighing and
moaning. For two whole days she had been kept in
constant fear and worry, afraid every minute of some
tragical message, perplexed by the conflicting advice of
all manner of officious friends, sleepless of course through
the two nights, and now utterly broken down and collapsed.

Bathsheba had said all she could in the way of consolation,
and hastened back to her mother's bedside, which she
hardly left, except for the briefest of visits.

“It 's a great trial, Miss Withers, that 's laid on you,”
said Nurse Byloe.

“If I only knew that she was dead, and had died in the
Lord,” Miss Silence answered, — “if I only knew that;
but if she is living in sin, or dead in wrong-doing, what is
to become of me? — O, what is to become of me when
`He maketh inquisition for blood'?”

“Cousin Silence,” said Miss Cynthia, “it is n't your
fault, if that young girl has taken to evil ways. If
going to meeting three times every Sabbath day, and
knowing the catechism by heart, and reading of good
books, and the best of daily advice, and all needful discipline,
could have corrected her sinful nature, she would
never have run away from a home where she enjoyed all
these privileges. It 's that Indian blood, Cousin Silence.
It 's a great mercy you and I have n't got any of it in our
veins! What can you expect of children that come from
heathens and savages? You can't lay it to yourself, Cousin
Silence, if Myrtle Hazard goes wrong —”

“The Lord will lay it to me, — the Lord will lay it to
me,” she moaned. “Did n't he say to Cain, `Where is
Abel, thy brother?”'

Nurse Byloe was getting very red in the face. She had
had about enough of this talk between the two women. “I
hope the Lord 'll take care of Myrtle Hazard fust, if she 's
in trouble, 'n' wants help,” she said; “'n' then look out for
them that comes next. Y' 're too suspicious, Miss Badlam;
y' 're too easy to believe stories. Myrtle Hazard
was as pretty a child and as good a child as ever I see, if
you did n't rile her; 'n' d'd y' ever see one o' them hearty,
lively children, that had n't a sperrit of its own? For my
part, I 'd rather handle one of 'em than a dozen o' them

little waxy, weak-eyed, slim-necked creturs that always do
what they tell 'em to, and die afore they're a dozen year
old; and never was the time when I 've seen Myrtle Hazard,
sence she was my baby, but what it 's always been,
`Good mornin', Miss Byloe,' and `How do you do, Miss
Byloe? I 'm so glad to see you.' The handsomest young
woman, too, as all the old folks will agree in tellin' you,
sence the time o' Judith Pride that was, — the Pride of the
County they used to call her, for her beauty. Her great-grandma,
y' know, Miss Cynthy, married old King David
Withers. What I want to know is, whether anything has
been heerd, and jest what 's been done about findin' the
poor thing. How d' ye know she has n't fell into the river?
Have they fired cannon? They say that busts the gall
of drownded folks, and makes the corpse rise. Have they
looked in the woods everywhere? Don't believe no wrong
of nobody, not till y' must, — least of all of them that come
o' the same folks, partly, and has lived with ye all their
days. I tell y', Myrtle Hazard 's jest as innocent of all
what y' 've been thinkin' about, — bless the poor child;
she 's got a soul that 's as clean and sweet — well, as a
pond-lily when it fust opens of a mornin', without a speck
on it no more than on the fust pond-lily God Almighty
ever made!”

That gave a turn to the two women's thoughts, and their
handkerchiefs went up to their faces. Nurse Byloe turned
her eyes quickly on Cynthia Badlam, and repeated her
close inspection of every outline and every light and shadow
in her figure. She did not announce any opinion as to
the age or good looks or general aspect or special points of
Miss Cynthia; but she made a sound which the books
write humph! but which real folks make with closed lips,

thus: m'! — a sort of half-suppressed labio-palato-nasal
utterance, implying that there is a good deal which might
be said, and all the vocal organs want to have a chance at
it, if there is to be any talking.

Friends and neighbors were coming in and out; and the
next person that came was the old minister, of whom, and
of his colleague, the Rev. Joseph Bellamy Stoker, some
account may here be introduced.

The Rev. Eliphalet Pemberton — Father Pemberton as
brother ministers called him, Priest Pemberton as he was
commonly styled by the country people — would have
seemed very old, if the medical patriarch of the village had
not been so much older. A man over ninety is a great
comfort to all his elderly neighbors: he is a picket-guard
at the extreme outpost; and the young folks of sixty and
seventy feel that the enemy must get by him before he can
come near their camp. Dr. Hurlbut, at ninety-two, made
Priest Pemberton seem comparatively little advanced; but
the college catalogue showed that he must be seventy-five
years old, if, as we may suppose, he was twenty at the
time of his graduation.

He was a man of noble presence always, and now, in
the grandeur of his flowing silver hair and with the gray
shaggy brows overhanging his serene and solemn eyes,
with the slow gravity of motion and the measured dignity
of speech which gave him the air of an old pontiff, he was
an imposing personage to look upon, and could be awful, if
the occasion demanded it. His creed was of the sternest:
he was looked up to as a bulwark against all the laxities
which threatened New England theology. But it was a
creed rather of the study and of the pulpit than of every-day
application among his neighbors. He dealt too much

in the lofty abstractions which had always such fascinations
for the higher class of New England divines, to busy himself
as much as he might have done with the spiritual condition
of individuals. He had also a good deal in him of
what he used to call the Old Man, which, as he confessed,
he had never succeeded in putting off, — meaning thereby
certain qualities belonging to humanity, as much as the
natural gifts of the dumb creatures belong to them, and tending
to make a man beloved by his weak and erring fellow-mortals.

In the olden time he would have lived and died king of
his parish, monarch, by Divine right, as the noblest, grandest,
wisest of all that made up the little nation within hearing
of his meeting-house bell. But Young Calvinism has less
reverence and more love of novelty than its forefathers.
It wants change, and it loves young blood. Polyandry is
getting to be the normal condition of the Church; and
about the time a man is becoming a little over-ripe for the
livelier human sentiments, he may be pretty sure the women
are looking round to find him a colleague. In this
way it was that the Rev. Joseph Bellamy Stoker became
the colleague of the Rev. Eliphalet Pemberton.

If one could have dived deep below all the Christian
graces — the charity, the sweetness of disposition, the humility
— of Father Pemberton, he would have found a small
remnant of the “Old Man,” as the good clergyman would
have called it, which was never in harmony with the Rev.
Mr. Stoker. The younger divine felt his importance, and
made his venerable colleague feel that he felt it. Father
Pemberton had a fair chance at rainy Sundays and hot
summer-afternoon services; but the junior pushed him
aside without ceremony whenever he thought there was

like to be a good show in the pews. As for those courtesies
which the old need, to soften the sense of declining
faculties and failing attractions, the younger pastor bestowed
them in public, but was negligent of them, to say
the least, when not on exhibition.

Good old Father Pemberton could not love this man;
but he would not hate him, and he never complained to
him or of him. It would have been of no use if he had:
the women of the parish had taken up the Rev. Mr. Stoker;
and when the women run after a minister or a doctor,
what do the men signify?

Why the women ran after him, some thought it was not
hard to guess. He was not ill-looking, according to the
village standard, parted his hair smoothly, tied his white
cravat carefully, was fluent, plausible, had a gift in prayer,
was considered eloquent, was fond of listening to their spiritual
experiences, and had a sickly wife. This is what
Byles Gridley said; but he was apt to be caustic at times.

Father Pemberton visited his people but rarely. Like
Jonathan Edwards, like David Osgood, he felt his call to
be to study-work, and was impatient of the egotisms and
spiritual megrims, in listening to which, especially from the
younger females of his flock, his colleague had won the
hearts of so many of his parishioners. His presence had
a wonderful effect in restoring the despondent Miss Silence
to her equanimity; for not all the hard divinity he had
preached for half a century had spoiled his kindly nature;
and not the gentle Melanchthon himself, ready to welcome
death as a refuge from the rage and bitterness of theologians,
was more in contrast with the disputants with whom
he mingled, than the old minister, in the hour of trial, with
the stern dogmatist in his study, forging thunderbolts to
smite down sinners.

It was well that there were no tithingmen about on that
next day, Sunday; for it shone no Sabbath day for the
young men within half a dozen miles of the village. They
were out on Bear Hill the whole day, beating up the bushes
as if for game, scaring old crows out of their ragged nests,
and in one dark glen startling a fierce-eyed, growling, bob-tailed
catamount, who sat spitting and looking all ready to
spring at them, on the tall tree where he clung with his
claws unsheathed, until a young fellow came up with a
gun and shot him dead. They went through and through
the swamp at Musquash Hollow; but found nothing better
than a wicked old snapping-turtle, evil to behold, with his
snaky head and alligator tail, but worse to meddle with, if
his horny jaws were near enough to spring their man-trap
on the curious experimenter. At Wood-End there were
some Indians, ill-conditioned savages in a dirty tent, making
baskets, the miracle of which was that they were so clean.
They had seen a young lady answering the description,
about a week ago. She had bought a basket. — Asked
them if they had a canoe they wanted to sell. — Eyes like
hers (pointing to a squaw with a man's hat on).

At Pocasset the young men explored all the thick
woods, — some who ought to have known better taking
their guns, which made a talk, as one might well suppose it
would. Hunting on a Sabbath day! They did n't mean to
shoot Myrtle Hazard, did they? it was keenly asked. A
good many said it was all nonsense, and a mere excuse to
get away from meeting and have a sort of frolic on pretence
that it was a work of necessity and mercy, one or both.

While they were scattering themselves about in this way,
some in earnest, some rejoicing in the unwonted license,
lifting off for a little while that enormous Sabbath-day

pressure which weighs like forty atmospheres on every
true-born Puritan, two young men had been since Friday
in search of the lost girl, each following a clew of his own,
and determined to find her if she was among the living.

Cyprian Eveleth made for the village of Mapleton,
where his sister Olive was staying, trusting that, with her
aid, he might get a clew to the mystery of Myrtle's disappearance.

William Murray Bradshaw struck for a railroad train
going to the great seaport, at a station where it stops for
wood and water.

In the mean time, a third young man, Gifted Hopkins
by name, son of the good woman already mentioned, sat
down, with tears in his eyes, and wrote those touching
stanzas, “The Lost Myrtle,” which were printed in the
next “Banner and Oracle,” and much admired by many
who read them.