University of Virginia Library

32. CHAPTER XXXII.
ACROSS THE BARRENS.

FOR, on the day before, intelligence had come to
him, and this day, with Gilpin and Billy Bow,
and Jesse in his company, (the latter leaving Isaac
Maffen in charge of the funeral arrangements,) the Minister
had followed its leading. His dog, like Tobit's, followed
him.

It was an unsubstantial and broken story: that a man,
going across the Barrens to Trinity Bay on the evening
of Lucy's disappearance, had seen a young woman in
white clothes at about a quarter of a mile's distance before
him, going towards New-Harbor; and, on the evening
of the next day, she, or a like person, had been seen
at the Cove near New-Harbor.

This story did not agree with received theory; nor
was it easily reconciled with known facts; but perhaps it
could be reconciled with both theory and facts; and it
was worth following.

The little nets that spiders spread were bright with
dew, and so were the leaves of the sheep's laurel and other
shrubs, and all the air was clear as air could be. It was
not yet the time for sunrise, and our party left the sun to
rise behind them, as they set forth eagerly from the place
of meeting, which was at Dick McFinn's, where the road

through the woods and across the Barrens leaves Castle-Bay
for New-Harbor.

McFinn “had heard nothing,” he said, “but a small
sketch, just, that was passed about from wan to another,
in a manner, all round the Bay; he could not say was it
true or no.”

Just as they were leaving the place to follow the crossroad
to the Barrens, Gilpin, whose eye was very quick,
and never idle, called the Minister's attention to the road
over which they had lately come.

“There's that noo priest, Father Ignatius, as they calls
un,” said he. “There's something wrong with un.”

Mr. Wellon looked towards the Priest, who seemed to
be walking slowly and thoughtfully; but who was so
far off as to make it impossible to detect the expression
of his face.

“This young Mr. Urston,” continued Gilpin, “says
there's a quarrel between Father Nicholas (they calls un)
and this priest. Father Debree charges un wi' carrying
off Skipper George's daughter, he thinks; and he says
they weren't too good friends before.—I thinks he's too enlightened
for 'em, or he wouldn't trouble himself about it.”

“He might not approve of man-stealing, even if he
believed all their doctrines,” said Mr. Wellon, smiling,
and setting forward.

“The old priest mayn't; but there isn't many like
him.—Do you think this Father Debree used to be a
Protestant, sir?”

“He may have been,” said the Minister; “I don't
know.”

“So they says; and his father used to be a high man
in St. John's. He hasn't met the lady, Mrs. Berry,
since, from what I hears.”

“You keep a pretty sharp look-out for your neighbors'
doings,” said Mr. Wellon.

“I've got into the way of it, I suppose; but he might
do her a good turn now, relation, or no relation. You
heard these stories they got up about her, sir?”

“No; I know only what her letters from England say
of her, and what she has told me herself. If you hear
any thing against Mrs. Barrè, of any sort, you may contradict
it on my authority; she's a lady of the very highest
character.”

“Nobody 'll believe it except the Romans, sir; and
there's just where he ought to stop it, and might, if he
would. We can kill it among Protestants fast enough.”

—There is no house, unless of beasts or birds, between
McFinn's and the other side.

So up the hill and through the woods,—where the
trees of twenty or thirty feet in height look prematurely
old with the long moss clinging to them,—our party
went, at a strong, steady pace, and speculating among
themselves, from time to time, of the lost maiden's fate.

Occasionally a bird started, before or beside them, and,
once or twice, Jesse, who bore, beside his parcel containing
food, a huge king's-arm, fired off,—gravely and
sadly,—his cumbrous piece in the direction of the little
fugitives, with no result unless to inspire confidence in
the feathered inhabitants of the woods that weapons of
that sort were rather used for pleasure than to do mischief
with; and to give the marksman himself occasion to
philosophize on “the toughness they birds got with livun
wild,” as if they had received the whole charge of shot
unharmed.

It is about six miles through these woods before getting
to the wilderness, between them and those upon the

other side, bordering Trinity Bay. The wind was going
upon its errand, in the same direction with themselves;
it may have heard, somewhere, of Lucy; it may, somewhere,
have taken in words of her own; it may, somewhere,
have passed in its flight over the silent remains
of her young beauty; but this wind goes on its own errand,
and leaves them to their slow and toilsome search.

There was a feeling among the Newfoundlanders in
Mr. Wellon's company, that, in a matter of this kind, the
dog had instinct better than human sense; and so, whenever,
with his nose to the earth, he left them for the
woods at either side of the way, they watched his motions;
and when he went a little farther in than usual, and was
longer absent, they followed (one or other of them) to
know what kept him. This feeling was most strong in
Jesse, but was shared by Billy Bow; and Mr. Gilpin,
smith and constable, was not free from it.

The Minister often turned upon his heel and lingered,
swinging his stick over in his hand, or seating himself
upon a stone by the wayside until they came up with him.
He reminded and explained to them, that, though they
must keep a good look-out, still they had not yet got to
the starting-point of their real work; for they had nothing
to go upon until they got over to the other side. The
dog himself quietly abandoned these excursions soon,—
very much as if he saw that he had unintentionally occasioned
loss of time by them,—and, as long as the way
was comparatively good, kept himself in front; and when
it grew harder, fell behind and brought up the rear.

As they came out of the woods, down upon the first
level of the Barrens, and saw beyond the little clump of
trees that has advanced and gained a footing in the waste,
the sun was high enough to bring the whole scene out in

all its wild and dreary sublimity. [We shall have to do
with it again before our tale is out.]

There is a pretty little grassy valley just adjoining the
boundary of this savage wilderness, in which are yellow
lilies, irises, red roses, and altogether such a gathering of
wild flowers as, in the contrast with the neighboring desolation,
or even with the prevailing character of the land
elsewhere, gives the place the look of cultivation. If they
can only find something as bright to cheer them in their
wide waste of fears!

At the first brook within the Barrens, and before you
reach the outgrowing woods, they halted for their breakfast.
Not far off to the right there is a little lake from
which the streamlet flows; the edge of this small sheet of
water is white as snow with its natural bordering of
stones, and over it are wheeling in the air and crying,
like a woman or a child, gray or dark-white gulls and
loos,[1] incessantly. Their cry seemed ominous.

The path beyond, reaching the little knoll of trees in
half a mile or so, is already between bushes and dwarf
trees, and rounded rocks or boulders, over and among
which grows a stiff, strong moss. Berries are frequent
everywhere; but desolate, and more desolate, and most
desolate, is the whole view out toward the horizon. Northward
and southward from you, as you enter on the waste
beyond the wooded knoll, until the sight is bounded by
the far-off, many-colored hills, is a stretch of land scarce
passable; and for one who should get astray from the
accustomed path, a trackless, hopeless desert.

Those hills, unknown to man, (as all the waste between
is quite untrodden,) have a mysterious look; but where
is any promise, north or south, of safety to a hapless

wanderer outside of the line of bare guide-poles that
mark this path? or where is hope of finding his dead
body?

About mid-way, they met a man coming from the other
side over to Conception Bay, and as he had some slight
acquaintance with our smith, the two fell easily into conversation.
This man had heard of the lost girl, and of
the person seen upon the other side; and he had heard
what they had not yet heard, that, at this very moment,
a sick girl, answering to their description, was lying in a
house over at the Cove,—two miles or so from New-Harbor.
He thought her friends knew of it, but something
hindered them from coming over.

“That's a droll story,” said Gilpin, as he turned away
from his Trinity-Bay acquaintance. “I don't think it
would be long that we'd have sat still, thinking about it,
after we'd heard of it. Once, would have been enough,
I think.”

Little likelihood as there seemed in the story, the Minister
was not inclined to dismiss it summarily; he thought
it possible that it had been taken for granted, as it often
is in sickness, that intelligence had been carried, or had
found its way to those who ought to know. He said “it
was not very likely, but it was possible, and that was a
good deal.”

Jesse seized on the story instantly, as one which gratified
the appetite for something rather marvellous, and
therefore seemed to him more probable than any simpler
and more common-place solution of a strange and mysterious
affair. Will Frank said, “there had bin amany
strange things in this world; it was a strange thing that
Lucy was not to be heard or sid, all of a sudden; and
another strange thing, like what the Trinity-B'y-man

had just atold, might be true, too. He couldn' take it
upon himself to say it wasn', surely.” The constable
thought “there was a better road leading to where she
was than any in the Barrens;” but all went forward
faster than before, to be resolved about this story.

They reach the woods upon the other side, toil through
them, and come out upon the pretty shore and water of
New-Harbor. A schooner was lying near a stage in
front of Mr. Oldhame's premises, to the right; and there
was a vessel of some size upon the ways, nearly ready
for launching. From this last, the sound of caulkers'
hammers, though not so fast and frequent as in some
countries, came frequent; and towards that point, our
party turned their steps.

They found the merchant overseeing operations at the
new schooner, and ready to enter into their business,
but unable to give any information. He said that he
had not been able to hear any thing at all definite; that,
certainly, a person might go through a place, and there
might be no more trace left of him than of the way of a
bird through the air, as the Bible said; but as to proof
that could be depended upon, of any one's having seen
any such girl as was described, he did not believe there
was any.

The latest information which they had received,—that
which had met them, namely, in the way,—had but discouraging
reception here: Mr. Oldhame said that he had
daily communication with the Cove, and many times a
day; and, if there had really been any such person lying
sick there, he must have heard of it. However, to make
all sure, it was only necessary to ask among half a dozen
men, from that place, who were at work upon the
schooner.

These men, alas, knew only of old Mrs. Ayles, who
had been bed-ridden for three years, that could be called
sick, among their neighbors; they had heard that a girl
from Conception Bay had been sick in New-Harbor, and
that her friends had come and got her home.

So, among them all, then, this down of fleeting, unsubstantial
hope was blown from one to another, and seemed
scarce worth the following. Vain chase!

If it could have been narrowed down to this spot, and
the roads or paths that lead from it, there would have
been some end toward which to work, and limits to their
labor; but if there should be nothing to connect the missing
one with this place, then the whole waste, a little way
from them, or, rather, the whole world, was open again;
and the world is wide.

The merchant offered, heartily, to go about with them
and make inquiries; and so he did. They went about in
vain. They stood on the ground of the little mist, that, at
first, and afar, had something the look of substance. If
there were any thing in it, at least they could not find it.

About four o'clock in the afternoon, after refreshment
at the hospitable Mr. Oldhame's, they started to go home;
and as they trode, again, the same road through the
woods, toward the wide, weary Barrens, the way seemed
wearier than before.

Mr. Wellon, who followed, was going thoughtfully up
the side of the first “gulch,” when he was suddenly overtaken
and addressed by a man, whom, on turning round,
he saw to be Ladford.

“Why! what brings you over here?” asked the Minister.

“Same that drives a good many away from home:—
fear!” said the former smuggler. “It wouldn't do for

me to come before the Justice, right or wrong.—It'll
blow past in a day or two.—But, Mr. Wellon, I KNOW
where Skipper George's daughter is! I thought it might
be: now, I KNOW it.—I must tell it fast.—O' Monday
night, between nine and ten, by the moon, I was over
beyond the priests' place, there, at Bay-Harbor, looking
at the back of that building they say is a nunnery.
There was a light burning in one particular room, with
just a white curtain down against the window. I was
just thinking: `there are no gratings on the window;
but it seems to me, if I could only once see into that
room, I should see where Lucy Barbury was kept.'
Exactly at that very word, as the thought came into my
mind, there was a sort of stir in the room, and the light
veered, and there was a shadow on the curtain. I could
see more than one woman,—in their nun's dress, I suppose
it was;—and then there was a picture painted on
that curtain, as clear as the lines of a cliff in the lightning:
there was a woman this side and t'other, and in the middle
was Lucy Barbury, just as plain as that fir-tree.”

“What! Are you sure of your senses?”

“They've had thirty-six years of pretty good practice,”
said the smuggler.—“No, sir; there's no mistake: I see
a thing, when I see it. It was as if they'd taken her out
of bed, and had her in their arms; and there was her
face—just the side of it—and the bend of her neck, and
her lips open, as I've seen her for hours and hours, take
it altogether, when I've sat and heard her read. The
back of the house, and where I was, was pitch-dark; for
the moon was afront, scarce rising; it couldn't have been
plainer, and I wasn't a stone's throw off. It didn't last
half a minute, perhaps, but it lasted long enough; and
then I was startled, and came away. I've never told

a living soul,—not the men that were with me that
night.”

“That's a wonderful story!” answered the Minister,
“but it confirms the suspicion.” So saying, he turned
round in the direction of Bay-Harbor, while he was
silently thinking. Then turning to Ladford, with the
look of thought still upon his face, he asked, “What night
was that?”

“Monday night, sir. I tried to see you that night, and
again yesterday morning, and to-day I sent a letter.”

“I'm glad no one knows it,” said Mr. Wellon; “we
must work silently, and when we're ready, finish suddenly.”

“My secrets are pretty safe with me,” said the poor
smuggler, smiling sadly; “if I wanted to tell them, I
couldn't.”

“It will be time enough for this, when we must have
evidence,” said the clergyman.

“How far do you think my story would go?” asked
Ladford.

“I think it must be good in law. You can swear to
it?”

“Ay, sir: but my story?” asked Ladford again, with
a long emphasis on the possessive pronoun. “Where am
I to swear? What court could I testify in? or what
magistrate could I go before, to make my affidavit?”

“The question of your credibility—”

“No, sir; no question of my credibility. Let me come
near a court of justice, or even let it be known that I
could testify, and there'll be some one to get a noose
round my neck, that I can't slip. I ought to be gone,
now, Mr. Wellon; Gilpin would have to take me.”

“We must take care of that,” said Mr. Wellon. “I
won't bring you into danger.”

“If I could save a life that's worth so much more than
mine—and George Barbury's daughter,”—the smuggler
answered; “if it was even by dangling in the air, like a
reef-point;—but I wouldn't throw away life for nothing,
and least of all, just when I've set about using it to some
good.”

There was nothing base in the poor man's look, as Mr.
Wellon now saw him; but to the Minister's eye, there
stood within that worthless raiment, and in the subject of
that sad history, one for whom the world would be no
equal ransom, and about whom, even now, there was
melodious, joyful converse in the streets of that city,
where “there is joy over one sinner that repenteth.”

Neither the constable nor any of the party turned
back; and Mr. Wellon finished his short communication
with Ladford, uninterrupted. It was not until they got
near the knoll towards the other side of the Barrens, that
he communicated to Gilpin the information he had received.
Skipper Charlie expressed no surprise at hearing
of Ladford's whereabouts, but said of his news,—

“Well, he's been away for some good; that puts us on
the old track again, sir.”