The Pathfinder, James Fenimore Cooper [top reads .TXT] 📗

“Father! my poor, dear, murdered father!” said the girl wildly, though habitual caution, even at that trying moment, induced her to speak low. “Pathfinder, if you love me, let me go to my dear father.”

“This will not do, Mabel. It is singular that no one speaks; no one returns the fire from the boats; and I have left Killdeer in the block! But of what use would a rifle be when no one is to be seen?”

At that moment the quick eye of Pathfinder, which, while he held Mabel firmly in his grasp, had never ceased to roam over the dim scene, caught an indistinct view of five or six dark crouching forms, endeavoring to steal past him, doubtless with the intention of intercepting the retreat to the blockhouse. Catching up Mabel, and putting her under an arm, as if she were an infant, the sinewy frame of the woodsman was exerted to the utmost, and he succeeded in entering the building. The tramp of his pursuers seemed immediately at his heels. Dropping his burden, he turned, closed the door, and had fastened one bar, as a rush against the solid mass threatened to force it from the hinges. To secure the other bars was the work of an instant.

Mabel now ascended to the first floor, while Pathfinder remained as a sentinel below. Our heroine was in that state in which the body exerts itself, apparently without the control of the mind. She relighted the candle mechanically, as her companion had desired, and returned with it below, where he was waiting her reappearance. No sooner was Pathfinder in possession of the light than he examined the place carefully, to make certain no one was concealed in the fortress, ascending to each floor in succession, after assuring himself that he left no enemy in his rear. The result was the conviction that the blockhouse now contained no one but Mabel and himself, June having escaped. When perfectly convinced on this material point, Pathfinder rejoined our heroine in the principal apartment, setting down the light and examining the priming of Killdeer before he seated himself.

“Our worst fears are realized!” said Mabel, to whom the hurry and excitement of the last five minutes appeared to contain the emotions of a life. “My beloved father and all his party are slain or captured!”

“We don’t know that — morning will tell us all. I do not think the affair so settled as that, or we should hear the vagabond Mingos yelling out their triumph around the blockhouse. Of one thing we may be sartain; if the inimy has really got the better, he will not be long in calling upon us to surrender. The squaw will let him into the secret of our situation; and, as they well know the place cannot be fired by daylight, so long as Killdeer continues to desarve his reputation, you may depend on it that they will not be backward in making their attempt while darkness helps them.”

“Surely I hear a groan!”

“‘Tis fancy, Mabel; when the mind gets to be skeary, especially a woman’s mind, she often concaits things that have no reality. I’ve known them that imagined there was truth in dreams.”

“Nay, I am not deceived; there is surely one below, and in pain.”

Pathfinder was compelled to own that the quick senses of Mabel had not deceived her. He cautioned her, however, to repress her feelings; and reminded her that the savages were in the practice of resorting to every artifice to attain their ends, and that nothing was more likely than that the groans were feigned with a view to lure them from the blockhouse, or, at least, to induce them to open the door.

“No, no, no!” said Mabel hurriedly; “there is no artifice in those sounds, and they come from anguish of body, if not of spirit. They are fearfully natural.”

“Well, we shall soon know whether a friend is there or not. Hide the light again, Mabel, and I will speak the person from a loop.”

Not a little precaution was necessary, according to Pathfinder’s judgment and experience, in performing even this simple act; for he had known the careless slain by their want of proper attention to what might have seemed to the ignorant supererogatory means of safety. He did not place his mouth to the loop itself, but so near it that he could be heard without raising his voice, and the same precaution was observed as regards his ear.

“Who is below?” Pathfinder demanded, when his arrangements were made to his mind. “Is any one in suffering? If a friend, speak boldly, and depend on our aid.”

“Pathfinder!” answered a voice that both Mabel and the person addressed at once knew to be the Sergeant’s, —“Pathfinder, in the name of God, tell me what has become of my daughter.”

“Father, I am here, unhurt, safe! and oh that I could think the same of you!”

The ejaculation of thanksgiving that followed was distinctly audible to the two, but it was clearly mingled with, a groan of pain.

“My worst forebodings are realized!” said Mabel with a sort of desperate calmness. “Pathfinder, my father must be brought within the block, though we hazard everything to do it.”

“This is natur’, and it is the law of God. But, Mabel, be calm, and endivor to be cool. All that can be effected for the Sergeant by human invention shall be done. I only ask you to be cool.”

“I am, I am, Pathfinder. Never in my life was I more calm, more collected, than at this moment. But remember how perilous may be every instant; for Heaven’s sake, what we do, let us do without delay.”

Pathfinder was struck with the firmness of Mabel’s tones, and perhaps he was a little deceived by the forced tranquillity and self-possession she had assumed. At all events, he did not deem any further explanations necessary, but descended forthwith, and began to unbar the door. This delicate process was conducted with the usual caution, but, as he warily permitted the mass of timber to swing back on the hinges, he felt a pressure against it, that had nearly induced him to close it again. But, catching a glimpse of the cause through the crack, the door was permitted to swing back, when the body of Sergeant Dunham, which was propped against it, fell partly within the block. To draw in the legs and secure the fastenings occupied the Pathfinder but a moment. Then there existed no obstacle to their giving their undivided care to the wounded man.

Mabel, in this trying scene, conducted herself with the sort of unnatural energy that her sex, when aroused, is apt to manifest. She got the light, administered water to the parched lips of her father, and assisted Pathfinder in forming a bed of straw for his body and a pillow of clothes for his head. All this was done earnestly, and almost without speaking; nor did Mabel shed a tear, until she heard the blessings of her father murmured on her head for this tenderness and care. All this time Mabel had merely conjectured the condition of her parent. Pathfinder, however, had shown greater attention to the physical danger of the Sergeant. He had ascertained that a rifle-ball had passed through the body of the wounded man; and he was sufficiently familiar with injuries of this nature to be certain that the chances of his surviving the hurt were very trifling, if any.

CHAPTER XXIV.

Then drink my tears, while yet they fall — Would that my bosom’s blood were balm; And — well thou knowest — I’d shed it all, To give thy brow one minute’s calm. MOORE.

The eyes of Sergeant Dunham had not ceased to follow the form of his beautiful daughter from the moment that the light appeared. He next examined the door of the block, to ascertain its security; for he was left on the ground below, there being no available means of raising him to the upper floor. Then he sought the face of Mabel; for as life wanes fast the affections resume their force, and we begin to value that most which we feel we are about to lose for ever.

“God be praised, my child! you, at least, have escaped their murderous rifles,” he said; for he spoke with strength, and seemingly with no additional pain. “Give me the history of this sad business, Pathfinder.”

“Ah’s me, Sergeant! It has been sad, as you say. That there has been treachery, and the position of the island has been betrayed, is now as sartain, in my judgment, as that we still hold the block. But — “

“Major Duncan was right,” interrupted Dunham, laying a hand on the other’s arm.

“Not in the sense you mean, Sergeant — no, not in that p’int of view; never! At least, not in my opinion. I know that natur’ is weak — human natur’, I mean — and that we should none of us vaunt of our gifts, whether red or white; but I do not think a truer-hearted lad lives on the lines than Jasper Western.”

“Bless you! bless you for that, Pathfinder!” burst forth from Mabel’s very soul, while a flood of tears gave vent to emotions that were so varied while they were so violent. “Oh, bless you, Pathfinder, bless you! The brave should never desert the brave — the honest should sustain the honest.”

The father’s eyes were fastened anxiously on the face of his daughter, until the latter hid her countenance in her apron to conceal her tears; and then they turned with inquiry to the hard features of the guide. The latter merely wore their usual expression of frankness, sincerity, and uprightness; and the Sergeant motioned to him to proceed.

“You know the spot where the Sarpent and I left you, Sergeant,” Pathfinder resumed; “and I need say nothing of all that happened afore. It is now too late to regret what is gone and passed; but I do think if I had stayed with the boats this would not have come to pass. Other men may be as good guides — I make no doubt they are; but then natur’ bestows its gifts, and some must be better than other some. I daresay poor Gilbert, who took my place, has suffered for his mistake.”

“He fell at my elbow,” the Sergeant answered in a low melancholy tone. “We have, indeed, all suffered for our mistakes.”

“No, no, Sergeant, I meant no condemnation on you; for men were never better commanded than yourn, in this very expedition. I never beheld a prettier flanking; and the way in which you carried your own boat up ag’in their howitzer might have teached Lundie himself a lesson.”

The eyes of the Sergeant brightened, and his face even wore an expression of military triumph, though it was of a degree that suited the humble sphere in which he had been an actor.

“‘Twas not badly done, my friend,” said he; “and we carried their log breastwork by storm.”

“‘Twas nobly done, Sergeant; though, I fear, when all the truth comes to be known, it will be found that these vagabonds have got their howitzer back ag’in. Well, well, put a stout heart upon it, and try to forget all that is disagreeable, and to remember only the pleasant part of the matter. That is your truest philosophy; ay, and truest religion too. If the inimy has got the howitzer ag’in, they’ve only got what belonged to them afore, and what we couldn’t help. They haven’t got the blockhouse yet, nor are they likely to get it, unless they fire it in the dark. Well, Sergeant, the Sarpent and I separated about ten miles down the river; for we thought it wisest not to come upon even a