The Little Red Foot Part 39

When he saw me he came and squatted at my feet.

"Sleep you, also, brother," said I. "Day dawns and the sunset is far away."

But the last time I looked before I slept I saw him still squatting at my feet like a fierce, lean dog, and staring straight before him.

And I remember that the fresh, joyous chorus of waking birds was like the loud singing of spirit-children. And to the sweet sound of that blessed choir I surrendered mind and body, and so was borne on wings of song into the halls of slumber-land.

The sun was high when our sentinel hailed a detail from Fish House, bringing us a sheep, three sacks of corn, and a keg of fresh milk.

I had bathed me in the Vlaie Water, had eaten soupaan, turned over my command to Nick, and now was ready to report in person to the Commandant at Summer House Point.

My Saguenay had slain a gorgeous wood-duck with his arrows; and now, brave in fresh paint and brilliant plumage, he sat awaiting me in the patched canoe which had belonged, no doubt, to John Howell.

I went down among the pinxter bushes and tall reeds to the sh.o.r.e; and so we paddled away on the calm, deep current which makes a hundred snake-like curls and bends to every mile, so that the mile itself becomes doubled,--nay, tripled!--ere one attains his destination.

It was strange how I was not yet rid of that vague sense of impending trouble, nor could account for the foreboding in any manner, being full of health and now rested.

My mind, occupied by my report, which I was now reading where I had written it in my _carnet_, nevertheless seemed crowded with other thoughts,--how we would seem each to the other when we met again,--Penelope Grant and I. And if she would seem to take a pleasure in my return ... perhaps say as much ... smile, perhaps.... And we might walk a little on the new gra.s.s under the apple bloom....

A troubled mind! And knew not the why and wherefore of its own restlessness and apprehension. For the sky was softly blue, and the water, too; and a gentle wind aided our paddles, which pierced the stream so silently that scarce a diamond-drop fell from the sunlit blades.

I could see the Summer House, and a striped jack flying in the sun. The green and white lodge seemed very near across the marshes, yet it was some little time before I first smelled the smoke of camp fires, and then saw it rising above the bushes.

Presently a Continental on guard hailed our canoe. We landed. A corporal came, then a sergeant,--one Caspar Quant, whom I knew,--and so we were pa.s.sed on, my Indian and I, until the gate-guard at the Point halted us and an officer came from the roadside,--one Captain Van Pelt, whom I knew in Albany.

Saluted, and the officer's salute rendered, he became curious to see the fresh scalps flapping at my Saguenay's girdle, and the new war-paint and the oil smelling rank in the sweet air.

But I told him nothing, asking only for the Commandant, who, he gave account, was a certain Major Westfall, lodging at the Summer House, and lately transferred from the Ma.s.sachusetts Line, along with other Yankee officers--why?--G.o.d and Ma.s.sachusetts knew, perhaps.

So I pa.s.sed the gate and walked toward the lodge. Sir John's blooded cattle were grazing ahead, and I saw Flora at the well, and Colas busy among beds of garden flowers, spading and weeding under the south porch.

And I saw something else that halted me. For, seated upon a low limb of an apple tree, her two little feet hanging down, and garbed in pink-flowered chintz and snowy fichu, I beheld Penelope Grant, a-knitting.

And by all the pagan G.o.ds!--there in a ring around her strolled and lolled a dozen Continental officers in buff and blue and gold!

There was no reason why, but the scene chilled me.

One o' these dandies had her ball of wool, and was a-winding of it as he sat cross-legged on the turf, a silly, happy look on his beardless face.

Another was busy writing on a large sheet of paper,--verses, no doubt!--for he seemed vastly pleased with his progress, and I saw her look at him shyly under her dark lashes, and could have slain him for the smirk he rendered. Also, it did not please me that her petticoat was short and revealed her ankles and slim feet in silver-buckled shoon.

I was near; I could hear their voices, their light laughter; and, rarely, her voice in reply to some pointed gallantry or jest.

None had perceived me advancing among the trees, nor now noticed me where I was halted there in the checkered suns.h.i.+ne.

But, as I stirred and moved forward, the girl turned her head, caught a glimpse of me and my painted Indian, stared in silence, then slid from her perch and stood up on the gra.s.s, her needles motionless.

All the young popinjays got to their feet, and all stared as I offered them the salute of rank; but all rendered it politely.

"Lieutenant of Rangers Drogue to report to Major Westfall," said I bluntly, in reply to a Continental Captain's inquiry.

"Yonder, sir, on the porch with Lady Johnson," said he.

I bared my head, then, and walked to Penelope. She curtsied: I bent to her hand.

"Are you well, my lord?" she asked in a colourless voice, which chilled me again for its seeming lack of warmth.

"And you, Penelope?"

"I am well, I thank you."

"I am happy to learn so."

That was all. I bowed again. She curtsied. I replaced my mole-skin cap, saluted the popinjays, and marched forward. My Indian stalked at my heels.

G.o.d knew why, but mine had become a troubled mind that sunny morning.

CHAPTER XVII

DEEPER TROUBLE

I had been welcomed like a brother by Polly Johnson. Claudia, too, made a little fete of my return, unscathed from my first war-trail. And after I had completed my report to the Continental Major, who proved complacent to the verge of flattery, I was free to spend the day at the Summer House--or, rather, I was at liberty to remain as long a time as it took a well-mounted express to ride to Johnstown with my report and return with further orders from Colonel Dayton for me and my small command.

A Continental battalion still garrisoned the Point; their officers as I had been forced to notice in the orchard, were received decently by Lady Johnson.

And, at that crisis in her career, I think I admired Polly Johnson as entirely as I ever had admired any woman I ever knew.

For she was still only a child, and had been petted and spoiled always by flattery and attentions: and she was not very well--her delicate condition having now become touchingly apparent. She was all alone,--save for Claudia,--among the soldiery of a new and hostile nation; she was a fugitive from her own manor; and she must have been constantly a prey to the most poignant anxieties concerning her husband, whom she loved,--whatever were his fishy sentiments regarding her!--and who, she knew, was now somewhere in the Northern and trackless wilderness and fighting nature herself for his very life.

Her handsome and beloved brother, also, was roaming the woods, somewhere, with Walter Butler and McDonald and a b.l.o.o.d.y horde of Iroquois in their paint,--and, worse still, a horde of painted white men, brutes in man's guise and Mohawk war-paint and feathers, who already were known by the terrifying name of Blue-eyed Indians.

Yet this young girl, having resolved to face conditions with courage and composure, after her first bitter and natural outburst, never whimpered, never faltered.

Enemy officers, if gentlemen, she received with quiet, dignified civility, and no mention of politics or war was suffered to embarra.s.s anybody at her table.

All, I noticed, paid her a deference both protective and tender, which, in gentlemen, is instinctive when a woman is in so delicate a condition and in straits so melancholy.

Claudia, however, I soon perceived, had been nothing tamed, and even less daunted by the errant arrows of adversity; for her bright eyes were ever on duty, and had plainly made a havoc of the Continental Major's heart, to judge by his sheep's eyes and clumsy a.s.siduities.

For when he left the veranda and went away noisily in his big spurs, she whispered me that he had already offered himself thrice, and that she meant to make it a round half-dozen ere he received his final quietus.

"A widower," quoth she, "and bald; and with seven hungry children in Boston! Oh, Lord. Am I come to that? Only that it pa.s.ses time to play with men, I'd not trouble to glance askance at your Yankee gentlemen, Jack Drogue."