University of Virginia Library

30. CHAPTER XXX.
THE FOX IN THE TRAP.

The youth barely stopped to swallow his breakfast, when
he set off from the village. He managed his movements
with considerable caution; and, fetching a circuit from an opposite
quarter, after having ridden some five miles out of his
way, passed into the road which he suspected that Stevens
would pursue. We do not care to show the detailed processes
by which he arrived at this conclusion. The reader
may take for granted that he had heard from some way-side
farmer, that a stranger rode by his cottage once a week,
wearing such and such breeches, and mounted upon a nag
of a certain color and with certain qualities. Enough to
say, that Ned Hinkley was tolerably certain of his route
and man.

He sped on accordingly — did not once hesitate at turns,
right or left, forks and cross-roads, but keeping an inflexible
course, he placed himself at such a point on the road
as to leave it no longer doubtful, should Stevens pass, of
the place which usually brought him up. Here he dismounted,
hurried his horse, out of sight and hearing, into
the woods, and choosing a position for himself, with some
nicety, along the road-side, put himself in close cover,
where, stretching his frame at length, he commenced the
difficult labor of cooling his impatience with his cogitations.

But cogitating, with a fellow of his blood, rather whets
impatience. He was monstrous restiff. At his fishing-pond,

with a trout to hook, he would have lain for hours,
as patient as philosophy itself, and as inflexible as the solid
rock over which he brooded. But without an angle at his
hand, how could he keep quiet? Not by thinking, surely;
and, least of all, by thinking about that person for whom
his hostility was so active. Thinking of Stevens, by a
natural association, reminded him of the pistols which
Calvert had given him. Nothing could be more natural
than to draw them from his bosom. Again and again he
examined them in fascinated contemplation. He had already
charged them, and he amused himself by thinking
of the mischief he could do, by a single touch upon the
trigger, to a poor little wood-rat, that once or twice ran
along a decaying log some five steps from his feet. But
his object being secrecy, the rat brushed his whiskers in
safety. Still he amused himself by aiming at this and
other objects, until suddenly reminded of the very important
difference which he had promised Calvert to make
between the pistols in his future use of them. With this
recollection he drew out his knife, and laid the weapons
before him.

“This,” said he, after a careful examination, in which
he fancied he discovered some slight difference between
them in the hang of the trigger — “this shall be my bull-pup
— this my peace-maker!”

The latter was marked accordingly with a “P,” carved
rudely enough by one whose hand was much more practised
in slitting the weasand of a buck, than in cutting out,
with crayon, or Italian crow-quill, the ungainly forms of the
Roman alphabet. Ned Hinkley shook his head with some
misgiving when the work was done; as he could not but
see that he had somewhat impaired the beauty of the peacemaker's
butt by the hang-dog looking initial which he had
grafted upon it. But when he recollected the subordinate
uses to which this “puppy” was to be put, and considered
how unlikely, in his case, it would be exposed to sight in

comparison with its more masculine brother, he grew partially
reconciled to an evil which was now, indeed, irreparable.

It does not require that we should bother the reader with
the numberless thoughts and fancies which bothered our
spy, in the three mortal hours in which he kept his watch.
Nothing but the hope that he should ultimately be compensated
to the utmost by a full discovery of all that he sought
to know, could possibly have sustained him during the trying
ordeal. At every new spasm of impatience which he
felt, he drew up his legs, shifted from one side to the other,
and growled out some small thunder in the shape of a threat
that “it would be only so much the worse for him when
the time came!” Him — meaning Stevens.

At last Stevens came. He watched the progress of his
enemy with keen eyes; and, with his “bull-pup” in his hand,
which a sort of instinct made him keep in the direction of
the highway, he followed his form upon the road. When
he was out of sight and hearing, the spy jumped to his feet.
The game, he felt, was secure now — in one respect at least.

“He's for Ellisland. That was no bad guess then. He
might have been for Fergus, or Jonesboro', or Debarre, but
there's no turn now in the clear track to Ellisland. He's
there for certain.”

Ned Hinkley carefully restored his pistols to his bosom
and buttoned up. He was mounted in a few moments, and
pressing slowly forward in pursuit. He had his own plans
which we will not attempt to fathom; but we fear we shall
be compelled to admit that he was not sufficiently a gentleman
to scruple at turning scout in a time of peace (though,
with him, by the way, and thus he justified, he is in pursuit
of an enemy, and consequently is at war), and dodging
about, under cover, spying out the secrets of the land, and
not very fastidious in listening to conversation that does
not exactly concern him. We fear that there is some such
flaw in the character of Ned Hinkley, though, otherwise, a

good, hardy fellow — with a rough and tumble sort of good
nature, which, having bloodied your nose, would put a
knife-handle down your back, and apply a handful of cobwebs
to the nasal extremity in order to arrest the hæmorrhage.
We are sorry that there is such a defect in his
character; but we did not put it there. We should prefer
that he should be perfect — the reader will believe us —
but there are grave lamentations enough over the failures
of humanity to render our homilies unnecessary. Ned
Hinkley was not a gentleman, and the only thing to be said
in his behalf, is, that he was modest enough to make no
pretensions to the character. As he once said in a row, at
the company muster: —

“I'm blackguard enough, on this occasion, to whip e'er
a gentleman among you!”

Without any dream of such a spectre at his heels to disturb
his imagination, Alfred Stevens was pursuing his way
toward Ellisland, at that easy travelling gait, which is the
best for man and beast, vulgarly called a “dog-trot.” Some
very fine and fanciful people insist upon calling it a “jog-trot.”
We beg leave, in this place, to set them right.
Every trot is a jog, and so, for that matter, is every canter.
A dog-trot takes its name from the even motion of the
smaller quadruped, when it is seized with no particular
mania, and is yet disposed to go stubbornly forward. It
is in more classical dialect, the festina lente motion. It is
regularly forward, and therefore fast — it never puts the
animal out of breath, and is therefore slow. Nobody ever
saw a dog practice this gait, with a tin canister at his tail,
and a huddle of schoolboys at his heels. No! it is the
travelling motion, considering equally the health of all parties,
and the necessity of getting on.

In this desire, Ned Hinkley pressed too closely on the
heels of Stevens. He once nearly overhauled him; and
falling back, he subdued his speed, to what, in the same
semi-figurative language, he styled “the puppy-trot.” Observing

these respective gaits, Brother Stevens rode into
Ellisland at a moderately late dinner-hour, and the pursuer
followed at an unspeakable, but not great, distance behind
him. We will, henceforward, after a brief glance at Ellisland,
confine ourselves more particularly to the progress
of Brother Stevens.

Ellisland was one of those little villages to which geographers
scarcely accord a place upon the maps. It is not
honored with a dot in any map that we have ever seen of
Kentucky. But, for all this, it is a place! Some day the
name will be changed into Acarnania or Etolia, Epirus or
Scandinavia, and then be sure you shall hear of it. Already,
the village lawyers — there are two of them — have
been discussing the propriety of a change to something
classical; and we do not doubt that, before long, their stupidity
will become infectious. Under these circumstances
Ellisland will catch a name that will stick. At present
you would probably never hear of the place, were it not
necessary to our purposes and those of Brother Stevens.

It has its tavern and blacksmith shop — its church — the
meanest fabric in the village — its postoffice and public
well and trough. There is also a rack pro bono publico,
but as it is in front of the tavern, the owner of that establishment
has not wholly succeeded in convincing the people
that it was put there with simple reference to the public
convenience. The tavern-keeper is, politically, a quadrupled
personage. He combines the four offices of postmaster,
justice of the peace, town council, and publican;
and is considered a monstrous small person with all. The
truth is, reader — this aside — he has been democrat and
whig, alternately, every second year of his political life.
His present politics, being loco-foco, are in Ellisland considered
contra bonos mores. It is hoped that he will be
dismissed from office, and a memorial to that effect is in
preparation; but the days of Harrison — “and Tyler too”
— have not yet come round, and Jerry Sunderland, who

knows what his enemies are driving at, whirls his coat-skirts,
and snaps his fingers, in scorn of all their machinations.
He has a friend at Washington, who spoons in the
back parlor of the white-house — in other words, is a member
of the kitchen-cabinet, of which, be it said, en passant,
there never was a president of the United States yet entirely
without one — and — there never will be! So much for
politics and Ellisland.

There was some crowd in the village on the day of
Brother Stevens's arrival. Saturday is a well known day
in the western and southern country for making a village
gathering; and when Brother Stevens, having hitched his
horse at the public rack, pushed his way to the postoffice,
he had no small crowd to set aside. He had just deposited
his letters, received others in return, answered some ten or
fifteen questions which Jerry Sunderland, P. M., Q. U.,
N. P., M. C., publican and sinner — such were all deservedly
his titles — had thought it necessary to address to
him, when he was suddenly startled by a familiar tap upon
the shoulder; such a tap as leads the recipient to imagine
that he is about to be honored with the affectionate salutation
of some John Doe or Richard Roe of the law. Stevens
turned with some feeling of annoyance, if not misgiving,
and met the arch, smiling, and very complacent visage
of a tall, slender young gentleman in black bushy whiskers
and a green coat, who seized him by the hand and shook
it heartily, while a chuckling half-suppressed laughter gurgling
in his throat, for a moment, forbade the attempt to
speak. Stevens seemed disquieted and looked around him
suspiciously.

“What! you here, Ben?”

“Ay, you see me! You didn't expect to see me, Warham—”

“Hush!” was the whispered word of Stevens, again looking
round him in trepidation.

“Oh! ay!” said the other with a sly chuckle, and also

in a whisper, “Mr. Stevens — Brother Stevens — hem! I
did not think. How is your holiness to-day?”

“Come aside,” muttered Stevens; and, taking the arm
of the incautious speaker, he led him away from the crowd,
and took the way out of the village. Their meeting and
departure did not occasion much, if any, sensation. The
visiters in the village were all too busy in discussing the
drink and doctrines, pretty equally distributed, of Jerry
the publican. But there was one eye that noted the meeting
of the friends; that beheld the concern and confusion
of Stevens: that saw their movements, and followed their
departing steps.

“Take your horse — where is he?” demanded Stevens.

“Here, at hand; but what do you mean to do?”

“Nothing, but get out of hearing and sight; for your
long tongue, Ben, and significant face, would blab any secret,
however deep.”

“Ah! did I not say that I would find you out? Did you
get my last letter?”

“Ay, I did: but I'm devilish sorry, Ben, that you've
come. You'll do mischief. You have always been a marplot.”

“Never, never! You don't know me.”

“Don't I? — but get your horse, and let's go into the
woods, while we talk over matters.”

“Why not leave the nags here?”

“For a very good reason. My course lies in that direction,
so that I am in my way; while yours, if your purpose
be to go back to Frankfort, will lie on the upper side. Neither
of us need come back to the village.”

“And you think to shuffle me off so soon, do you?”

“What would you have me do?”

“Why, give us a peep at this beauty — this Altamira of
yours — at least.”

“Impossible! Do not think of it, Ben; you'd spoil all.
But, get the horse. These billet-heads will suspect mischief

if they see us talking together, particularly when they
behold your conceited action. This political landlord will
surmise that you are a second Aaron Burr, about to beat
up recruits to conquer California. Your big whiskers —
what an atrocious pair! — with your standing collar, will
confirm the impression.”

The two were soon mounted, and rode into the adjoining
woods. They were only a stone's-throw from the village,
when Stevens alighted, followed by his companion. They
hitched their horses to some swinging branches of a sheltering
tree, and, going aside a few paces beyond, seated
themselves upon the grass, as they fancied, in a place of
perfect security.

“And now, Ben, what in truth brings you here?” demanded
Stevens, in tones of voice and with a look which
betrayed anything but satisfaction with the visit.

“Curiosity, I tell you, and the legs of my horse.”

“Pshaw! you have some other motive.”

“No, 'pon honor. I resolved to find you out — to see
what you were driving at, and where. I could only guess
a part from your letter to Barnabas, and that costive scrawl
with which you honored me. Perhaps, too — and give my
friendship credit for the attempt — I came with some hope
to save you.”

“Save me — from what?”

“Why, wedlock — the accursed thing! The club is in
terror lest you should forget your vows. So glowing were
your descriptions of your Cleopatra, that we knew not what
to make. We feared everything.”

“Why, Barnabas might have opened your eyes: he knew
better.”

“You're not married, then?”

“Pshaw! no.”

“Nor engaged?”

The other laughed as he replied:—

“Why, on that head, the least said the better. The roving

commission permits you to run up any flag that the
occasion requires.”

“Ah, you sly dog! — and what success?”

“Come, come, Ben, you must not be so inquisitive. The
game's my own, you know; and the rules of the club give
me immunity from a fellow-member.”

“By Gad, I'll resign! I must see this forest beauty.”

“Impossible!”

“Where's she? How will you prevent?”

“By a very easy process. Do you know the bird that
shrieks farthest from her young ones when the fowler is at
hand? I'll follow her example.”

“I'll follow you to the uttermost ends of the earth, Warham!”

“Hush! you forget! Am I not Brother Stevens? Ha!
ha! ha! You are not sufficiently reverent, brother. See
you no divinity in my look and bearing? Hark you, Ben,
I've been a sort of small divinity in the eyes of a whole
flock for a month past!”

“You pray?”

“And preach!”

“Ha! ha! ha! — devilish good; but I must see you in
order to believe. I must, indeed, Brother Stevens. Why,
man, think of it — success in this enterprise will make you
head of the fraternity — you will be declared pope: but you
must have witnesses!”

“So I think; and hark ye, Ben” — laying a finger on the
arm of the other — “I am successful!”

“What! you don't say so! This queen, this princess of
Egypt, Cleopatra, Altamira — eh?”

“Is mine — soul and body — she is mine!”

“And is what you say? Come, come, you don't mean
that such a splendid woman as you describe — such a genius,
poet, painter, musician — beauty too! — you don't mean to
say that—”

“I do, every bit of it.”

“'Gad! what a fellow! — what a lucky dog! But you
must let me see her, Warham!”

“What! to spoil all — to blurt out the truth? — for, with
every disposition to fib, you lack the ability. No, no,
Ben: when the game's up — when I'm tired of the sport,
and feel the necessity of looking out fresh viands — you
shall then know all; I'll give the clue into your own hands,
and you may follow it to your heart's content. But not
now!”

“But how will you get rid of me, mon ami, if my curiosity
is stubborn?”

“Do as the kill-deer does — travel from the nest — go
home with you, rather than you should succeed in your impertinence,
and have you expelled from the club for thrusting
your spoon into the dish of a brother-member.”

“You're a Turk, with no bowels of compassion. But,
at all events, you promise me the dish when you're done
with it? you give me the preference?”

“I do!”

“Swear by Beelzebub and Mohammed; by Jupiter Ammon
and Johannes Secundus; by the ghost of Cardinal
Bembo, and the gridiron of the fraternity!”

“Ay, and by the virginity of Queen Elizabeth!”

“Simulacrum! no! no! no such oath for me! That's
swearing by the thing that is not, was not — could not be!
You shall swear by the oaths of the club — you must be
bound on the gridiron of the fraternity, before I believe you.
Swear!”

“You are as tenacious as the ghost of buried Denmark.
But you shall be satisfied. I swear by the mystic gridiron
of the fraternity, and by the legs thereof, of which the
images are Beelzebub, Mohammed, Johannes Secundus,
and so forth — nay, by that memorable volume, so revered
in the eyes of the clnb, the new edition of `The Basiad,'
of which who among us has been the true exponent? —
that profound mystery of sweets, fathomed hourly, yet

unfathomable still — for which the commentators, already
legions, are hourly becoming legions more; — by these,
and by the mysteries of the mirror that reflects not our
own, but the image we desire; — by these things — by all
things that among the brotherhood are held potent — I
swear to—”

“Give me the preference in the favor of this princess;
the clue to find her when you have left her; and the assurance
that you will get a surfeit as soon as possible: swear!”

“Nay, nay! I swear not to that last! I shall hold on
while appetite holds, and make all efforts not to grow dyspeptic
in a hurry. I'll keep my stomach for a dainty, be
sure, as long as I can. I were no brother, worthy of our
order, if I did not.”

“Well, well — to the rest! Swear to the rest, and I am
satisfied.”

“You go back, then, instanter?”

“What! this very day?”

“This hour!”

“The d—l! you don't mean that, Warham?” returned
the other in some consternation.

“Ay, this very hour! You must swear to that. Your
oath must precede mine.”

“Ah! man, remember I only got here last night — long
ride — hard-trotting horse. We have not seen each other
for months. I have a cursed sight to tell you about the
boys — girls too — love, law, logic, politics. Do you know
they talk of running you for the house?”

“All in good season, Ben; not now. No, no! you shall
see me when you least look for me, and there will be time
enough for all these matters then. They'll keep. For the
present, let me say to you that we must part now within
the hour. You must swear not to dog my steps, and I will
swear to give you carte blanche, and the first privileges at
my princess, when I leave her. This is my bargain. I
make no other.”

“I've a great mind not to leave you,” said the other
doggedly.

“And what will that resolution bring you, do you fancy?
Do you suppose I am to be tracked in such a manner? No,
Ben! The effect will be to make me set off for the east
instantly, whether you go with me or not; and an equally
certain effect will be to make us cut loose for ever.”

“You're a d—d hard colt to manage,” said the other
moodily.

“I sha'n't let myself be straddled by every horse-boy, I
assure you.”

“Come, come, old fellow, that's too much like horse-play.
Don't be angry with me. I'll accept your conditions.”

“Very good,” said Stevens; “if you did not, Ben, it
would be no better for you; for, otherwise, you should
never even see my beauty!”

“Is she so very beautiful, old boy?”

“A queen, I tell you! a proud, high-spirited, wild beauty
of the mountains — a thing of fire and majesty — a glorious
woman, full of song and sentiment and ambition — a genius,
I tell you — who can improvise like Corinne, and, by the
way, continually reminds one of that glorious creature. In
Italy, she would have been greater than Corinne.”

“And you've won her — and she loves you?”

“Ay — to doting! I found her a sort of eagle — soaring,
striving — always with an eye upon the hills, and fighting
with the sunbeams. I have subdued her. She is now like
a timid fawn that trembles at the very falling of a leaf in
the forests. She pants with hope to see me, and pants with
tremulous delight when I come. Still, she shows every
now and then, a glimmering of that eagle spirit which she
had at first. She flashes up suddenly, but soon sinks again.
Fancy a creature, an idolater of fame before, suddenly made
captive by love, and you have a vain, partial image of my
forest-princess.”

“What a lucky dog! You'll marry her yet, old boy, in
spite of all!”

“Pshaw! You are green to talk so.”

“You'll be devilish loath to give her up; I'm afraid I'll
have to wait a cursed long time.”

“No, not long! Do not despair. Easy won, easy
valued.”

“And was she easily won?”

“Very! the game was a short one. She is a mere
country-girl, you know, but eighteen or thereabouts — suspeeting
nobody, and never dreaming that she had a heart
or passions at all. She thought only of her poetry and her
books. It was only necessary to work upon heart and passions
while talking of poetry and books, and they carried
her out of her depth before she could recover. She's wiser
now, Ben, I can assure you, and will require more dexterity
to keep than to conquer.”

“And she has no brother to worry a body — no d—d
ugly Hobnail, who has a fancy for her, and may make a
window between the ribs of a gallant, such as nature never
intended, with the ounce-bullet of some d—d old-fashioned
seven-foot rifle — eh?”

“There was a silly chap, one Hinkley, who tried it on
me — actually challenged me, though I was playing parson,
and there might have been work for me but for his own
bull-headed father, who came to my rescue, beat the boy
and drove him from the place. There is nobody else to
give me any annoyance, unless it be a sort of half-witted
chap, a cousin of the former — a sleepy dog that is never,
I believe, entirely awake unless when he's trout-fishing.
He has squinted at me, as if he could quarrel if he dared,
but the lad is dull — too dull to be very troublesome. You
might kiss his grandmother under his nose, and he would
probably regard it only as a compliment to her superior virtues,
and would thank you accordingly—”

A voice a little to the left interrupted the speaker.

“So he does, my brave parson, for his grandmother's
sake and his own,” were the words of the speaker. They
turned in sudden amaze to the spot whence the sounds
issued. The bushes opening in this quarter, presented to
the astonished eyes of Brother Stevens, the perfect image
of the dull lad of whom he had been speaking. There was
Ned Hinkley in proper person — perfectly awake, yet not
trout-fishing! A sarcastic grin was upon his visage, and
rolling his eyes with a malicious leer, he repeated the words
which had first interrupted the progress of the dialogue
between the friends.

“I thank you, Brother Stevens, for the compliment to
my grandmother's virtues. I thank you, on her account
as well as my own. I'm very grateful, I assure you, very
grateful, very!”