 | Clovernook, or, Recollections of our
neighborhood in the West |  |
THE END OF THE ILL-STARRED.
The light wagon was drawn in front of the door, fragrant
with tar and new straw; a basket of apples, and some small
niceties, which Mrs. Claverel had selected, arranged for safe
transportation. Before the fire hung the red flannel shirt and
the new trowsers, that they might be “good and warm” in the
morning; and the cap and dress, which Mrs. Claverel said were
almost too gay and fashionable for her, but which had been
purchased for the special occasion, were also placed conveniently
at hand.
Martha and Jane come laughing down the lane, each with a
long withered weed at her side, which she calls a horse, and
before them trots the sleek heifer. She looks angry, and as if
she were half inclined not to “give down her milk” to-night;
and a little behind, soberly, and with axes over their shoulders,
come David and Oliver. They are tired, and hoping supper
will be ready.
Oh, Martha,” says Jane, as she leans her weed against the
fence, and calls it putting her horse in the stable, “just look!
Some old woman is coming to our house. Who can she be,
riding an old white horse, and with a great basket on the horn
of her saddle? She must be a peddler woman.”
Martha looks up, and skipping past, with a look of wise
indignation, hastens to inform her mother that Aunt Jane has
come, and that her sister called her an old peddler woman!
“Why, Aunt Jane!” exclaims Mr. Claverel, as he assists her
to alight, as much as to say, what in the world brings you
here? But the face full of benevolent kindness, does not look
as if any one was dead; and he ventures to ask if all were well
her basket as she says nobody is sick or dead, as she knows of.
Mr. Claverel is satisfied, and leads the white horse toward the
barn. Not so, Mrs. Claverel; she feels instinctively that all is
not right, and her premonitory fears point to Richard.
“Is he sick, or dead? neither—what, then?” and before Aunt
Jane unties her bonnet she learns the truth. He is gone, no
one knows whither, and has taken with him, as everybody
supposes, the village school-mistress. Little comfort is it now
to hear how well he did; how many persons he had cured, who
had previously had the advice of the greatest physicians,
besides trying almost everything in the world they could hear
of; how much money he made, and how well everybody
thought of him.
He has gone, and every one but his mother and Aunt Jane
forgets the right he has done, in the wrong. Mr. Claverel says
he always expected some such thing; and after supper, which
he does not want, says he must go to Clovernook, and takes
with him the camphor bottle to be refilled, though it is half-full
now, and requires no replenishing; he merely wishes to get rid
of his thoughts—that is all. He will find it a hard thing, poor
man! And especially, as he will meet with many persons
ready to remind him of his sorrow. Thoughtfully, he goes
through the deepening twilight, thinking very sorrowfully. He
does not hear the clatter of the hoofs on the road behind him,
till the rider overtakes him, and reins in his horse, glossy-black,
with a pink nose and a strip of white in his face.
“Good evening, worthy neighbor,” says the familiar voice;
“I have been recently made aware of a feet of a very painful
nature, connected intimately with yourself, but more intimately
still with your eldest born, Dr. Richard Claverel. I was, as
you may readily suppose, averse to receiving the evidence
without demur or question, and accordingly made the most
rigid scrutiny of the report, purporting to be simply a strict
relation of facts; but my zealous efforts to find any flaw were
signally baffled, as from the first, indeed. I had cause to fear,
inasmuch as my informant, in all the multifarious relations
which it has been my fortune to hold with him for a term of
proven himself a man of invariable honesty, integrity, and
veracity, to the fullest and amplest meaning of those words.
Therefore, I have been constrained, neighbor Claverel, to reluctant
acquiescence in the now prevalent belief that your eldest
born, Dr. Richard Claverel, has abandoned the practice of his
profession in the hamlet of Medford, which my informant states
to have been lucrative, and of a nature satisfactory to his
various employers, and to have secretly departed in that dark
portion of time which we are accustomed to denominate night,
and to have taken with him a young woman of comely personal
endowments, and mental parts—of unusual development
and cleverness, who has, for a number of consecutive months,
been employed in teaching the young idea how to shoot, in a
small school in the aforesaid hamlet. Allow me, worthy neighbor,
to offer you my sympathy on this sorrowfully interesting
occasion, and to beg that you present to Mistress Claverel the
assurance of my unabated and continued friendship, and regard,
and esteem. A very good evening to you, worthy neighbor
Claverel;” and Mr. Jameson gave the rein to his black steed,
which in a prancing sideways fashion, obeyed the signal, while
Mr. Claverel took the camphor bottle from his pocket and
shook it violently.
But this was only the beginning of sorrows. Calling at Dr.
Hilton's for a pint of the best alcohol, as also for a little cheerful
talk, he found the Doctor out, and seated in the arm-chair,
awaiting his return, the loquacious Mrs. Bates. She thought
likely Dr. Hilton could tell what she wanted to know: “But
you,” she said, addressing Mr. Claverel, “can doubtless tell me
what I want to know, as well as Dr. Hilton could tell me what
I want to know, because you are full likelier to know what I
want to know, than he is likely to know what I want to know.”
Mr. Claverel set the camphor bottle on the table with such
violence as to break it in a dozen pieces, and the lady continued,
“It's no use mourning over spilt milk, nor spilt camphor either,
for that is a small thing to have done, compared to some things
that have been done, if things have been done that people say
have been done, and I suppose you know whether things have
have'nt been done.”
“What do folks say?” asked Mr. Claverel, quietly.
“Why, they say that a man has just come over from Medford,
where Dick has been living all so fine, and they say he
should have said that the young Doctor has run away with a
school mistress, they say he should have said. But if he
thought he abandinged my daughter, he was mistaken; for my
daughter was divorced by the law two weeks come Saturday,
and so he was the abandinged one.”
Mr. Claverel did not purchase a new bottle, nor was he ever
known to use camphor thereafter in any way, but always protested
that cider vinegar was a great deal better.
To a lonesome little cabin on the banks of one of the Western
rivers Richard Claverel took his fair, sad bride, for shortly
after their flight they had learned its needlessness, and were
married; but they were well aware that all the shame attaching
to their first intention would cling to them still, and so were
prevented from returning. The house they occupied was intended
only as a temporary residence, until Richard should
have time to look out a more desirable location in one of the
many flourishing villages along the river bank. On this quest
one day, he was overtaken by a sudden storm. No shelter was
at hand, and, before reaching home, he became thoroughly
drenched. The result was an attack of the prevalent disease
of the country, chills and fever, which at length terminated in
fever of the most malignant sort.
Very tenderly and patiently the young wife watched by his
bedside, divining his unspoken wants, and ministering to them
all. But with all she did, all she could do, his comforts were
poor and scanty. How long and desolate the hours were, for
no friend or neighbor came to give her advice or assistance, and
at the close of the tenth day of his illness despair came down
upon her heart. A dozen times that day a little bird had
lighted in the window at the head of the bed, and trilled its
merry song, and as often Caty had gone forth and frighted it
away. She knew not why, but she felt a superstitious dread
when she saw it, and wished it would not come.
All day the sick man had only spoken to ask for water; but
toward sunset he seemed to revive, complained of pain, and
said the noise of the river disturbed him; and then, wandering
deliriously, he besought Caty to go out and make it still.
Wishing to humor all his wishes, she affected to go, and sitting
down in the door of her cabin, she watched the sun set, and
wept alone. The sun sunk lower and lower and was gone, and
the shadows deepened and deepened till the woods about the
cabin were quite dark. The bird sung no longer; but once
Caty heard the beating of its wings against the pane, and
groaned aloud.
The pale moon struggled up through the tree-tops, and the
thousand lamps of the fire-flies shone along the banks of the
gloomy river—the river that went moaning down the darkness
in spite of the oft-repeated prayer of the dying man that it
would be still.
“It is like a voice reproaching me,” he said, “for what I cannot
help. Am I to blame for the evil star that has ruled my
destiny? Be still, Oh river, be still, and let me sleep!” But
the river went moaning through the darkness all the same. The
moon rose higher and higher through the window and across
the floor, and over the hushed sleeper fell the still, cold light.
The moaning of the river had ceased to trouble him.
| Clovernook, or, Recollections of our
neighborhood in the West | |