 | The luck of Roaring Camp, and other sketches |  |
HIGH-WATER MARK.
WHEN the tide was out on the Dedlow
Marsh, its extended dreariness was patent.
Its spongy, low-lying surface, sluggish, inky pools,
and tortuous sloughs, twisting their slimy way, eel-like,
toward the open bay, were all hard facts. So
were the few green tussocks, with their scant
blades, their amphibious flavor, and unpleasant
dampness. And if you choose to indulge your
fancy, — although the flat monotony of the Dedlow
Marsh was not inspiring, — the wavy line of
scattered drift gave an unpleasant consciousness
of the spent waters, and made the dead certainty
of the returning tide a gloomy reflection, which no
present sunshine could dissipate. The greener
meadow-land seemed oppressed with this idea, and
made no positive attempt at vegetation until the
work of reclamation should be complete. In the
bitter fruit of the low cranberry-bushes one might
fancy he detected a naturally sweet disposition
curdled and soured by an injudicious course of too
much regular cold water.
The vocal expression of the Dedlow Marsh was
also melancholy and depressing. The sepulchral
scream of passing brent, the wrangling of quarrel-some
teal, the sharp, querulous protest of the
startled crane, and syllabled complaint of the
“killdeer” plover were beyond the power of written
expression. Nor was the aspect of these
mournful fowls at all cheerful and inspiring. Certainly
not the blue peron standing midleg deep
in the water, obviously catching cold in a reckless
disregard of wet feet and consequences; nor the
mournful curlew, the dejected plover, or the low-spirited
snipe, who saw fit to join him in his
suicidal contemplation; nor the impassive kingfisher
— an ornithological Marius — reviewing the
desolate expanse; nor the black raven that went
to and fro over the face of the marsh continually,
but evidently could n't make up his mind
whether the waters had subsided, and felt low-spirited
in the reflection that, after all this trouble,
he would n't be able to give a definite answer.
On the contrary, it was evident at a glance that
the dreary expanse of Dedlow Marsh told unpleasantly
on the birds, and that the season of
migration was looked forward to with a feeling of
relief and satisfaction by the full-grown, and of
extravagant anticipation by the callow, brood. But
if Dedlow Marsh was cheerless at the slack of the
low tide, you should have seen it when the tide
was strong and full. When the damp air blew
to the faces of those who looked seaward like
another tide; when a steel-like glint marked the
low hollows and the sinuous line of slough; when
the great shell-incrusted trunks of fallen trees
arose again, and went forth on their dreary, purposeless
wanderings, drifting hither and thither,
but getting no farther toward any goal at the falling
tide or the day's decline than the cursed Hebrew
in the legend; when the glossy ducks swung
silently, making neither ripple nor furrow on the
shimmering surface; when the fog came in with
the tide and shut out the blue above, even as the
green below had been obliterated; when boatmen,
lost in that fog, paddling about in a hopeless way,
started at what seemed the brushing of mermen's
fingers on the boat's keel, or shrank from the tufts
of grass spreading around like the floating hair of
a corpse, and knew by these signs that they were
lost upon Dedlow Marsh, and must make a night
of it, and a gloomy one at that, — then you might
know something of Dedlow Marsh at high water.
Let me recall a story connected with this latter
view which never failed to recur to my mind in
my long gunning excursions upon Dedlow Marsh.
Although the event was briefly recorded in the
county paper, I had the story, in all its eloquent
detail, from the lips of the principal actor. I cannot
hope to catch the varying emphasis and peculiar
was a woman; but I 'll try to give at least
its substance.
She lived midway of the great slough of Dedlow
Marsh and a good-sized river, which debouched
four miles beyond into an estuary formed
by the Pacific Ocean, on the long sandy peninsula
which constituted the southwestern boundary
of a noble bay. The house in which she lived
was a small frame cabin raised from the marsh
a few feet by stout piles, and was three miles distant
from the settlements upon the river. Her
husband was a logger, — a profitable business in
a county where the principal occupation was the
manufacture of lumber.
It was the season of early spring, when her husband
left on the ebb of a high tide, with a raft of
logs for the usual transportation to the lower end
of the bay. As she stood by the door of the little
cabin when the voyagers departed she noticed
a cold look in the southeastern sky, and she remembered
hearing her husband say to his companions
that they must endeavor to complete
their voyage before the coming of the southwesterly
gale which he saw brewing. And that night
it began to storm and blow harder than she had
ever before experienced, and some great trees fell
in the forest by the river, and the house rocked
like her baby's cradle.
But however the storm might roar about the
little cabin, she knew that one she trusted had
driven bolt and bar with his own strong hand,
and that had he feared for her he would not
have left her. This, and her domestic duties, and
the care of her little sickly baby, helped to keep
her mind from dwelling on the weather, except, of
course, to hope that he was safely harbored with
the logs at Utopia in the dreary distance. But
she noticed that day, when she went out to feed
the chickens and look after the cow, that the
tide was up to the little fence of their garden-patch,
and the roar of the surf on the south
beach, though miles away, she could hear distinctly.
And she began to think that she would
like to have some one to talk with about matters,
and she believed that if it had not been so
far and so stormy, and the trail so impassable,
she would have taken the baby and have gone
over to Ryckman's, her nearest neighbor. But
then, you see, he might have returned in the
storm, all wet, with no one to see to him; and it
was a long exposure for baby, who was croupy
and ailing.
But that night, she never could tell why, she
did n't feel like sleeping or even lying down. The
storm had somewhat abated, but she still “sat and
sat,” and even tried to read. I don't know whether
it was a Bible or some profane magazine that this
the words all ran together and made such sad nonsense
that she was forced at last to put the book
down and turn to that dearer volume which lay
before her in the cradle, with its white initial leaf
as yet unsoiled, and try to look forward to its mysterious
future. And, rocking the cradle, she thought
of everything and everybody, but still was wide
awake as ever.
It was nearly twelve o'clock when she at last
laid down in her clothes. How long she slept she
could not remember, but she awoke with a dreadful
choking in her throat, and found herself standing,
trembling all over, in the middle of the room,
with her baby clasped to her breast, and she was
“saying something.” The baby cried and sobbed,
and she walked up and down trying to hush it,
when she heard a scratching at the door. She
opened it fearfully, and was glad to see it was
only old Pete, their dog, who crawled, dripping
with water, into the room. She would like to
have looked out, not in the faint hope of her husband's
coming, but to see how things looked; but
the wind shook the door so savagely that she could
hardly hold it. Then she sat down a little while,
and then walked up and down a little while, and
then she lay down again a little while. Lying
close by the wall of the little cabin, she thought
she heard once or twice something scrape slowly
Then there was a little gurgling sound, “like the
baby made when it was swallowing”; then something
went “click-click” and “cluck-cluck,” so
that she sat up in bed. When she did so she was
attracted by something else that seemed creeping
from the back door towards the centre of the room.
It was n't much wider than her little finger, but
soon it swelled to the width of her hand, and began
spreading all over the floor. It was water.
She ran to the front door and threw it wide
open, and saw nothing but water. She ran to the
back door and threw it open, and saw nothing but
water. She ran to the side window, and, throwing
that open, she saw nothing but water. Then she
remembered hearing her husband once say that
there was no danger in the tide, for that fell regularly,
and people could calculate on it, and that he
would rather live near the bay than the river,
whose banks might overflow at any time. But
was it the tide? So she ran again to the back
door, and threw out a stick of wood. It drifted
away towards the bay. She scooped up some of
the water and put it eagerly to her lips. It was
fresh and sweet. It was the river, and not the
tide!
It was then — O, God be praised for his goodness!
she did neither faint nor fall; it was then —
blessed be the Saviour for it was his merciful
awful moment — that fear dropped from her like
a garment, and her trembling ceased. It was then
and thereafter that she never lost her self-command,
through all the trials of that gloomy night.
She drew the bedstead towards the middle of
the room, and placed a table upon it and on that
she put the cradle. The water on the floor was
already over her ankles, and the house once or
twice moved so perceptibly, and seemed to be
racked so, that the closet doors all flew open.
Then she heard the same rasping and thumping
against the wall, and, looking out, saw that a large
uprooted tree, which had lain near the road at the
upper end of the pasture, had floated down to the
house. Luckily its long roots dragged in the soil
and kept it from moving as rapidly as the current,
for had it struck the house in its full career, even
the strong nails and bolts in the piles could not
have withstood the shock. The hound had leaped
upon its knotty surface, and crouched near the
roots shivering and whining. A ray of hope
flashed across her mind. She drew a heavy
blanket from the bed, and, wrapping it about the
babe, waded in the deepening waters to the door.
As the tree swung again, broadside on, making the
little cabin creak and tremble, she leaped on to its
trunk. By God's mercy she succeeded in obtaining
a footing on its slippery surface, and, twining
moaning child. Then something cracked near the
front porch, and the whole front of the house she
had just quitted fell forward, — just as cattle fall
on their knees before they lie down, — and at the
same moment the great redwood-tree swung round
and drifted away with its living cargo into the
black night.
For all the excitement and danger, for all her
soothing of her crying babe, for all the whistling
of the wind, for all the uncertainty of her situation,
she still turned to look at the deserted and
water-swept cabin. She remembered even then,
and she wonders how foolish she was to think of
it at that time, that she wished she had put on
another dress and the baby's best clothes; and
she kept praying that the house would be spared
so that he, when he returned, would have something
to come to, and it would n't be quite so
desolate, and — how could he ever know what had
become of her and baby? And at the thought
she grew sick and faint. But she had something
else to do besides worrying, for whenever the long
roots of her ark struck an obstacle, the whole
trunk made half a revolution, and twice dipped
her in the black water. The hound, who kept
distracting her by running up and down the tree
and howling, at last fell off at one of these collisions.
He swam for some time beside her, and she
“acted silly” and wild, and at last she lost sight of
him forever. Then she and her baby were left
alone. The light which had burned for a few
minutes in the deserted cabin was quenched suddenly.
She could not then tell whither she was
drifting. The outline of the white dunes on the
peninsula showed dimly ahead, and she judged
the tree was moving in a line with the river. It
must be about slack water, and she had probably
reached the eddy formed by the confluence of the
tide and the overflowing waters of the river. Unless
the tide fell soon, there was present danger of
her drifting to its channel, and being carried out
to sea or crushed in the floating drift. That peril
averted, if she were carried out on the ebb toward
the bay, she might hope to strike one of the
wooded promontories of the peninsula, and rest
till daylight. Sometimes she thought she heard
voices and shouts from the river, and the bellowing
of cattle and bleating of sheep. Then again
it was only the ringing in her ears and throbbing
of her heart. She found at about this time that
she was so chilled and stiffened in her cramped
position that she could scarcely move, and the baby
cried so when she put it to her breast that she
noticed the milk refused to flow; and she was so
frightened at that, that she put her head under
her shawl, and for the first time cried bitterly.
When she raised her head again, the boom of
the surf was behind her, and she knew that her
ark had again swung round. She dipped up the
water to cool her parched throat, and found that it
was salt as her tears. There was a relief, though,
for by this sign she knew that she was drifting
with the tide. It was then the wind went down, and
the great and awful silence oppressed her. There
was scarcely a ripple against the furrowed sides of
the great trunk on which she rested, and around
her all was black gloom and quiet. She spoke to
the baby just to hear herself speak, and to know that
she had not lost her voice. She thought then, —
it was queer, but she could not help thinking it, —
how awful must have been the night when the
great ship swung over the Asiatic peak, and the
sounds of creation were blotted out from the world.
She thought, too, of mariners clinging to spars, and
of poor women who were lashed to rafts, and beaten
to death by the cruel sea. She tried to thank God
that she was thus spared, and lifted her eyes from
the baby who had fallen into a fretful sleep. Suddenly,
away to the southward, a great light lifted
itself out of the gloom, and flashed and flickered,
and flickered and flashed again. Her heart fluttered
quickly against the baby's cold cheek. It was the
lighthouse at the entrance of the bay. As she
was yet wondering, the tree suddenly rolled a little,
dragged a little, and then seemed to lie quiet
gurgled against it. The tree was aground, and, by
the position of the light and the noise of the surf,
aground upon the Dedlow Marsh.
Had it not been for her baby, who was ailing and
croupy, had it not been for the sudden drying up
of that sensitive fountain, she would have felt safe
and relieved. Perhaps it was this which tended to
make all her impressions mournful and gloomy.
As the tide rapidly fell, a great flock of black brent
fluttered by her, screaming and crying. Then the
plover flew up and piped mournfully, as they
wheeled around the trunk, and at last fearlessly lit
upon it like a gray cloud. Then the heron flew
over and around her, shrieking and protesting, and
at last dropped its gaunt legs only a few yards from
her. But, strangest of all, a pretty white bird,
larger than a dove, — like a pelican, but not a pelican,
— circled around and around her. At last it
lit upon a rootlet of the tree, quite over her shoulder.
She put out her hand and stroked its beautiful
white neck, and it never appeared to move.
It stayed there so long that she thought she would
lift up the baby to see it, and try to attract her attention.
But when she did so, the child was so
chilled and cold, and had such a blue look under
the little lashes which it did n't raise at all, that
she screamed aloud, and the bird flew away, and
she fainted.
Well, that was the worst of it, and perhaps it
was not so much, after all, to any but herself.
For when she recovered her senses it was bright
sunlight, and dead low water. There was a confused
noise of guttural voices about her, and an
old squaw, singing an Indian “hushaby,” and
rocking herself from side to side before a fire
built on the marsh, before which she, the recovered
wife and mother, lay weak and weary. Her
first thought was for her baby, and she was about
to speak, when a young squaw, who must have
been a mother herself, fathomed her thought and
brought her the “mowitch,” pale but living, in
such a queer little willow cradle all bound up, just
like the squaw's own young one, that she laughed
and cried together, and the young squaw and the
old squaw showed their big white teeth and
glinted their black eyes and said, “Plenty get
well, skeena mowitch,” “wagee man come plenty
soon,” and she could have kissed their brown faces
in her joy. And then she found that they had
been gathering berries on the marsh in their queer,
comical baskets, and saw the skirt of her gown
fluttering on the tree from afar, and the old squaw
could n't resist the temptation of procuring a new
garment, and came down and discovered the “wagee”
woman and child. And of course she gave
the garment to the old squaw, as you may imagine,
and when he came at last and rushed up to her,
felt so faint again that they had to carry her to
the canoe. For, you see, he knew nothing about
the flood until he met the Indians at Utopia, and
knew by the signs that the poor woman was his
wife. And at the next high-tide he towed the
tree away back home, although it was n't worth
the trouble, and built another house, using the
old tree for the foundation and props, and called
it after her, “Mary's Ark!” But you may guess
the next house was built above High-water mark.
And that 's all.
Not much, perhaps, considering the malevolent
capacity of the Dedlow Marsh. But you must
tramp over it at low water, or paddle over it at
high tide, or get lost upon it once or twice in
the fog, as I have, to understand properly Mary's
adventure, or to appreciate duly the blessings of
living beyond High-Water Mark.
| The luck of Roaring Camp, and other sketches | |