University of Virginia Library

15. CHAPTER XV.
TRAILING OF THE SCOUT.

Fortunately, the surgeon of Lord Rawdon was along with
his party. He was engaged in examining the hurt of Nelly,
which was in the shoulder, when she opened her eyes to consciousness.
She strove to rise; looking somewhat bewildered,
and more conscious, apparently, of the unwonted persons about
her, than of her wound. They would not suffer her efforts, the
surgeon continued his examination, and to the relief of all
parties, pronounced the injury to be trifling — a mere flesh
wound, the effects of which a few days of quiet would entirely
relieve. He dressed the wound where she lay, and she was
then, at the voluntary instance of Mrs. Travis, lifted into the
carriage. It was a narrow escape, however; the wound was
given obliquely, as the profile of the girl was presented to the
assassin. The bullet barked the arm, but it was in direct line
with the heart; an inch one side or the other, it would have
been instantly fatal. But the miserable old wretch had already
paid, with his life, for his horrible attempt at a deadly crime.

Nelly would have resisted the efforts to place her in the carriage,
if she could. She opposed it by a murmur of dissent.

“No! no! Aggy, my pony.”

She could do no more. She was still too faint.

“You must ride with us, my dear,” said Mrs. Travis — “with
me and my daughter. We are friends and will take care of
you. My girl here will ride your pony, and bring him along.
Do not oppose us. We are friends, my child.”

“Friends! friends!” murmured the girl again, looking with

an earnest tenderness in their faces, and offering no further
opposition. She yielded herself quietly to the arms of those
who helped her into the carriage — assisted herself — and with
a sad sort of smile seem to thank her newly-found friends.

“Good stuff,” said the surgeon — “makes no unnecessary fuss.
Half of the young lady patients I have known, in such a situation,
and with so many eyes upon them, would have required
help for every curl upon their temples.”

The increasing consciousness of the girl was apparent in her
eyes, the moment she entered the carriage, in the expression
not only of pain, but of anxiety. She suddenly looked out of
the carriage windows at the troopers and the woods, and then
sank back with a slight moan. But this was not the effect of
any physical suffering. Thought was busy. “Where is Mat?”
“Is he safe?” Her own helplessness, at the moment, in the
feeling of doubt, indicated by these questions to herself, was
the parent of the moan.

Here a conference took place between Lord Rawdon and the
ladies.

“The Sinclair barony is scarce two miles distant, ladies,”
said his lordship, “and from my knowledge of the proprietor,
Colonel Sinclair, I can assure you of his own and the hospitable
welcome of his daughter. I am bent thither myself, and will
be happy to give you my escort. If you will allow me to
counsel, you will stop there for awhile, till my dragoons shall
scour these woods, when you can pursue your further progress
in safety. This young creature will need to rest there for a
few days.”

Here a whispered conversation ensued between the mother
and daughter — the latter somewhat earnestly saying — “Oh!
no, mother! not there! not there!”

Lord Rawdon had quick ears. He overheard the words.

“And why not, my dear young lady? I can answer, without
hesitation for the cordial welcome of Colonel Sinclair and his
admirable daughter.”

The mother answered for Bertha Travis.

“We are so circumstanced, sir — my lord — that we are not
permitted to pause anywhere, if it is in our power to avoid
doing so. But we will drive to Colonel Sinclair's residence and

leave our patient, to whom the refuge is, perhaps, absolutely
necessary.”

My lord was a little curious. He saw that Mrs. Travis was
a real lady, of good condition, and his eyes were not insensible
to the beauty of her daughter. Who were they? Where can
they be travelling? With what mission? In the conference that
had taken place between them, he observed their shyness and
reserve in respect to themselves. As a gentleman, he could not
venture to ask any direct questions on any of these matters.
He could only insinuate his desires indirectly.

“I do not see exactly where you can find accommodations
along this route for the night, if you go farther — none, certainly,
which would be grateful to you, madam. And we know not
how many gangs of such scoundrels as we have had the good
fortune to disperse, may be upon the road. If I knew whither
you were going—”

He paused here, judiciously. The old lady smiled gratefully,
but said:—

“I fancy, my lord, your late service will suffice. We have
every assurance that the route is now clear,” — and so forth.

“Well, madam, I trust when we get to the barony of our
friend Sinclair, that his amiable daughter will prove more eloquent
in persuasion than a rough soldier like myself.”

The old lady's reply showed her to be far from inexperienced
in the easy verbal play of good society.

“Where the soldier and the courtier so perfectly unite, as in
the present instance, my lord, it is scarcely possible to suppose
that any persuasion can be needed to enforce your own.”

His lordship bowed:—

“Madam, your reply would seem to show that you are possessed
of some good Irish affinities. May I have the honor to
know, that I may recall this interview hereafter with more satisfaction,
who are the excellent ladies whom I have had the
good fortune to succor?”

“Ah! my lord, your Irish frankness, however admirable,
must fail to prompt me to its emulation. But to a certain extent
I will be frank with you. We are on a secret expedition.
We are nameless dames on an enterprise. You must be content,
as a soldier and gentleman, with the single assurance that

the enterprise does not contemplate any treason against king,
lords, or commons.”

Rawdon laughed.

“You are too much for me, my dear madam. But it did not
need this assurance. I have only to look into your own, and
the face of your daughter, to answer for the loyalty of both.”

And he bowed low upon his charger, waved his hand forward,
a bugle sounded, and he rode away from the carriage, which
came on slowly — one half of the dragoons bringing up the rear.

“Who the d—l can they be?” said Rawdon, as Lord Edward
Fitzgerald dashed up beside him. “Quite an adventure, Lord
Edward, for a young chevalier des dames.”

“Have you made them out, my lord?”

“Not a syllable. The old lady is close. She confessed to a
mystery, and thus silenced all further attempts to get at it. Her
daughter, by the way, is a very beautiful creature.”

“And the wounded girl strikes me wonderfully, my lord.
Her face is brown but exquisite. She might sing with the
dusk nymph of Solomon — `I am dark but comely.' But did
you ever see such a costume — half man's — quite Turkish; and
she evidently rode man-fashion, and on a man's saddle. She
is a curiosity.”

And so, talking as they rode, they at length entered the
noble avenue leading to the Sinclair barony. As they rode
considerably in advance of the carriage, they were able to get
over all the preliminaries of the meeting with the veteran of
that establishment, and to apprize himself and the fair Carrie
Sinclair, of the approaching visiters, and their patient.

“I have promised a welcome for all at your hands, my dear
Miss Sinclair, for they will interest you, as they have interested
me. The wounded girl is something of a curiosity, but a pleasingly
piquant one. The other ladies express their determination
to travel on, after delivering the girl to your hospitality;
but you may be more successful than myself in persuading them
to become your guests for a season. I know not who they are
— can not guess — and acknowledge myself to be curious.
They are evidently well bred, and the daughter is quite a
beauty, though my Lord Edward scarcely finds her standard
of beauty to his taste.”

The last sentence was an adroit speech made for the gallant
aid-de-camp. Of course, Carrie Sinclair was in the piazza
awaiting the arrival of the cortége. As the carriage drove up
to the steps, she hurried down to it, without reserve, and, with
the frankness of her temperament, and the graceful ease which
was natural to all her actions, she endeavored to succeed in
the object in which Rawdon had failed.

Bertha's eyes eagerly observed her as the carriage was
approaching.

“She is very beautiful, mother, and very much like Willie.
Do you not see the likeness? Oh! how I long to speak out to
her — to feel her arms around me.”

“Hush!” said the mother, glancing to Nelly.

The quick ears of Nelly heard the warning. She smiled, and
put her hand in that of Bertha, so confidingly, so promptly, and
with such tenderness, that the action said everything. From
that moment Bertha would have freely trusted her with the
dearest secret of her soul.

Time was allowed for no more. They were at the steps.
The carriage stopped. Carrie Sinclair was already beside it,
and there were assistants ready to lift out the wounded girl.
But she suffered none of them. She but looked into Carrie's
face, and that was enough. She took her arm — hers only —
and was conducted up the steps into the parlor. Having laid
her on the sofa, Carrie ran out again to the carriage.

“Come in — oh, do! Alight, if you please. Do not refuse.”

And, just then, a servant brought a message from the wounded
girl, begging to see the ladies for a moment. They could
not deny her — and in another moment, Bertha Travis stood
within the stately halls of her lover's father. How she longed
to throw herself into Carrie's arms, and say “sister;” but
the policy was thought to be doubtful, by both mother and
daughter; and the lords, Rawdon and Fitzgerald, were present,
and there too was the old baron Sinclair, in his easy-chair,
with his feet upon a cushion. All eyes were upon the party,
and emotions were impossible.

The ladies sat beside Nelly, and she took the hands of Bertha,
and looked up into her face, smiled archly — so Bertha
thought — and murmured a few syllables of thanks. Then

came the surgeon who felt her pulse, and nodded his head as if
approving her performances. And then refreshments were
handed.

Meanwhile, Colonel Sinclair added his voice of entreaty that
the ladies would remain at the barony. And he was a gentleman,
doing the graces of the host handsomely, spite of the sharp
twinges in his feet. The old despot little dreamed who were
the parties whom he so solicited. And Carrie Sinclair renewed
her solicitations as warmly as if she had known them and loved
them a thousand years. And little Lottie, her younger sister, stole
up to Bertha, and got hold of her hand, and said — “Do stay.
I like your looks.” And poor Bertha hardly kept the tears
down from her eyes, as she thought of Willie and remembered
that these were his sisters. How she longed to go aside with
Carrie, and tell her all. But she could only sigh in answer,
leaving it to her mother, to play the inflexible in open terms.
And the old lady did her part firmly, but not without her emotions
also, and made it finally evident to all parties, that entreaty
was unavailing. Still, she so completely fulfilled the
conditions of the lady, that the sting was taken from refusal;
and when they had gone, it was agreed with one voice, that they
were certainly fine women, and ladies too.

“And — what a beautiful girl,” said Carrie, as she turned,
from looking after the receding carriage, and took her place beside
the wounded girl, possessing herself of her hand.

“Who can they be? Do you know?” to Nelly. Nelly
smiled, as she whispered —

“Yes; but I must not tell.”

“There is really, then, a mystery.”

Nelly did know — possibly by guess only; but it was quite
sufficient for the simple truthful nature of the girl, that the parties
most interested in the secret, were desirous that it should
remain so. Her instincts were Heaven's teaching; and the
proprieties came to, and tutored her mind, without any necessary
effort of the thought. And this is always the way with
the ingenuous spirit, where nature has strength enough to assert,
and is permitted to have her own way.

After resting awhile, Nelly was able to retire with Carrie to
her chamber, where the two soon became intimate; the latter

being surprised and interested with every moment's increased
knowledge of the curious stranger. Her nice propriety of
thought and phrase, the high pitch of her enthusiasm, showing
itself gradually as she warmed with society, her bold imagination,
the spiritual lifting of her thought — all seemingly so much
at variance with her apparent isolation in life, and the peculiarity
of her costume. Of course, it had been ascertained by
Rawdon that the two ladies, who had continued their journey,
knew absolutely nothing of her. They had not seen her before,
and though they might have told of her generous attempt
to rescue them the night previous, still, it did not occur to them
to do so; and, indeed, in the caution which kept them from all
communicativeness, they had said not a syllable of their late
captivity.

Meanwhile, a detachment of Rawdon's escort beat the woods
in the Sinclair precincts; the larger body making their camps
in the open ground in front of the mansion, and along the
avenue. The scout resulted in no discoveries; the woods were
clear. The outlaws were all off, in other thickets or lying
perdue, so close that no ordinary search could find them.

You will please suppose that Carrie Sinclair was remiss in
none of her duties, entertaining her own and the guests of her
father. That she made our poor Nelly comfortably at home,
we may take for granted — that she made her quite easy in
mind was impossible. Nelly could not subdue her fears for
Mat. She knew nothing of his fate. She heard nothing of
that of old Rhodes, and his son Nat, her brother-in-law. Her
anxiety lessened the degree of satisfaction which she might
have felt in the solicitous kindness of Carrie Sinclair; but she
was not insensible to it, and with that rare instinct which she
possessed, for the appreciation of character, she did not require
much intercourse to see and feel all that was charming and
beautiful in that of Carrie Sinclair.

But the latter — like the gentle lady married to the Moor —
was required to see to the household affairs. So, leaving Nelly
to the companionship of little Lottie, she descended to her duties.
We shall not follow her in these performances. We are
to suppose that there were intervals when she looked in upon
her father's guests, passing from hall and pantry to parlor, and

occasionally lingering in speech with the gentlemen. Of course,
my Lord Edward Fitzgerald sought his opportunities, and seized
avidly on all that he found. Rawdon had too much to confer
upon with the old colonel, to interfere with, or note, the progress
of his aid-de-camp. The day hurried on. Supper was
served and discussed; and, after supper, Lord Edward persuaded
Carrie to the harpsichord. She played and sang for
him — not for him only; for the surgeon, the captain of the detachment,
and a couple of young scions of nobility, had, of
course, received the freedom of the house, and were present.
Rawdon remained with Colonel Sinclair in the supper-room,
engaged in close and interesting conversation on public affairs.

Let us leave these parties, thus engaged, for a brief season,
while we note the progress of other persons in this truthful history.
For three days had Jim Ballou, the scout, been looking
for Willie Sinclair and his troopers, and in vain. The scout is
at a loss.

“Where can he be?” he argued with himself, sitting at noon
upon a fallen tree in the forest, where he had eaten his frugal
dinner, while his horse was browsing about for the coarse and
scanty patches of grass in the wood.

“Where can he be? He's left me no tracks this time — no
tracks. He must be hard pressed somewhere — hard pressed
— or he'd ha' made out to let me know where to look for him
— to look. I must try the barony. I reckon he's been there.
Benny Bowlegs, perhaps, knows all about him. By this time,
'Bram ought to be getting up from over the Santee — ought to
be. He's perhaps at the barony now; he'll take it in his way
up. He or Benny Bowlegs ought to be knowing where to find
the major — ought to be knowing. I'll take a peep at the
barony.”

The resolve was no sooner taken, than he caught up his
steed and mounted. He was about five miles from the barony.
Picking his way cautiously through the woods, avoiding the
public road where this was possible, our scout made his progress
very slowly, not being disposed to reach the barony till
night had fallen. Meanwhile, his eyes were busy, and his ears
vigilant. He kept his course in the thicket, some two hundred
yards from the main road, thus securing himself from chance

discovery of wayfarers, yet sufficiently near, perhaps, to distinguish
the sounds from any body of horse that might be pursuing
the highway. The sun, meanwhile, gradually sloped downward,
leaving the woods clad in that “little glooming light,
most like a shade,” which, along with the usual stillness of a
deep forest, imparts such a solemn and impressive character to
such a region in the hour of twilight. As our scout mused and
rode, thoughtful and observant, he was necessarily impressed
by the moral aspects of the scene. People who live much in
the solitude, whether of a mountain or a forest country, have a
more earnest character, more religious sensibility, and more self-esteem,
and less vanity, than those who dwell in more crowded
situations, and with whom the daily attrition of society and its
small diversions lessen the intensity and the concentrativeness
of thought. Scouts and hunters are usually of grave habit;
and, in the single province in which their minds work, they become
wonderfully tenacious of their moods. A degree of solemnity
ensues upon this concentration of thought, and the marvellous
and spiritual are likely to have large exercise in their souls,
in degree as their fancies become active. Jim Ballou was not
unlike his brethren; and, in a situation like the present, his
spiritual sensibilities usually grew more lively and coercive.
Having first settled in his mind what he had to do, he went forward
habitually, not tasking himself to think of the routine
performance; but, yielding himself up to the foreign — the musings
and meditations of a nature which is only suffered to assert
itself fully in the solitude. The silence, the dusky silence of
the scene, had made his spiritual nature active, and our scout
was brooding upon the supernatural, in vague, wandering fancies,
which lifted him quite above the earth. He was thinking
of death, of the grave, and of those dark problems of the wondrous
future which no thought has yet been found sufficient to
solve. Thus lost in dubious mazes, and heedless, to a certain
extent, of the very world through which he sped, he was suddenly
aroused by a wild start of his horse, quite aside from the
track, as if with a sense of danger.

“A snake!” was the first notion of Ballou. He fancied the
beast had been struck, and looked down about him; but there
was no snake. He looked up, and his own start was almost as

great as that of his steed. A man was hanging, quite dead, from
the very bough which overhung the pathway. It was some minutes
before the veteran scout, whose previous meditations had
rendered him peculiarly sensitive at this moment, could recover
his steadiness of nerve and coolness of purpose, so as to resume
his habits of search and inquiry. He looked about him heedfully,
and listened. Everything was quiet in the woods. It
was the stillness of death. He recovered himself, and alighted
from his steed, which he fastened carefully a little away from
the spot, to which he then drew nigh slowly, and with every
faculty of watch now fully aroused and anxious.

He examined the body of the hanging man. It was that of
old Rhodes.

“Don't know him,” said Ballou to himself; “don't know him,
and it's too late for him to make himself acquainted.”

He felt the body.

“He's been dead about five hours. It's mighty curious!
There's been a good many people about here, and horses.”

The scout then circled about the spot like a hound, enlarging
the sweep of his circuit gradually, till he came upon the body
of Nat Rhodes.

“Curious!” he said. “What's killed this man?”

He turned over the carcass, found the horrid crush of the
bones of the forehead, but no other wound.

“He's had his brains beat out,” said he. “Somebody has
taken him while he slept, and brained him with a lightwood
knot.”

The scout was at fault for once. But the subject was not
one of importance to his present object, or it is possible he would
have worked out the problem to a right conclusion. He contented
himself with extending his circuit, and found the numerous
horse-tracks.

“Hard riding here,” quoth he; “there's been a run for it,
and more than twenty men at work.”

He took the heaviest tracks, and they led him to the roadside
where the action had begun. He found that a tolerably
numerous troop had gone by. He found the fresh marks of the
carriage-wheels. At length, he found the traces of the blood
from poor Nelly's shoulder.

“There's been a skrimmage here — a skrimmage! It's pretty
nigh to the barony, too. I reckon Sinclair or St. Julien had
something to do in this business.”

Having satisfied himself of all that could be gleaned by personal
inspection, Ballou remounted his horse. The sun had
now set; the woods were soon enveloped in thick darkness;
But Ballou knew the route in darkness or in daylight equally
well, and rode on fearlessly, till he reached the immediate precincts
of the barony, when he shot aside, went toward the river-swamp,
and finally, after fastening his horse in the thicket, stole
forward with cautious footsteps to a wigwam which he knew to
be that of a trusty negro of Colonel Sinclair. He found Benny
Bowlegs, the driver of the plantation, in his cabin.

“Ha! Mass Ballou, you yer, and de ab'nue fill' wid red-coat?
More dan a hundred, I 'spec'; and de great gineral — de
British gineral, Lord Roddon — he yer too; and de young Lord
Fizgera'd, him yer too, and de hundred dragoon, and heap o'
ossifers. Oh, ef we had Mass Willie, wid 'noder hundred ob
he men, wouldn't we hab a pretty slashing business, eh?”

Ballou and Benny Bowlegs talked over the whole history in
an hour. The story of the adventure with the outlaws, the
rescue of the carriage, the two ladies, and the strange girl who
had been wounded — all had been picked up by Benny Bowlegs,
and enabled Ballou to find the clue to his own discoveries
of the day. He attached no sort of importance to the ladies
and the carriage, since, knowing nothing of the disasters to the
female part of Captain Travis's family, he never once fancied
they could be of interest. He was made wiser after a season.

“And the major has not been here, Benny?”

“Who, Mass Willie?”

“Yes.”

“No! I no sh'um [see 'em].”

“And 'Bram?”

“He no git yer yet.”

An hour, as we have said, sufficed to empty Benny's budget.

“And now, Benny,” said Ballou, “I must sleep here for a
while. I'm pretty well done up. Let me sleep till an hour before
day. Then I'll be off. If I can find Willie Sinclair, with
his whole battalion, we can give an account of this hundred

men, and his lordship too. That would be a great affair,
Benny.”

“Wha'! for catch de red-coat gineral? Ha! ef Mass Willie
kin do dat, I reckon de liberty-people guine mek' him a gineral
hese'f. Who knows?”

“I'll come pretty nigh to doing it, Benny: so, you see, wake
me an hour before day, and let me be off — be off. I'll find the
major, I reckon, higher up. And if I can do so — soon enough
— we'll box up this lord-general of the red-coats, and send him
on to Congress for a show.”

“Put 'em in cage, enty?”

And the negro chuckled heartily at the notion; while, throwing
himself down on a blanket in the hovel, Ballou was sound
asleep in twenty minutes. Benny, meanwhile, stole out to carry
provisions to the horse of the scout.