Chapter III.
NESTING.
She spent a week in Port Nassau, recognised by none. She walked itsstreets, her features half hidden by a veil; and among the PortNassauers she passed for an English lady of quality who, by one of thosefreaks from which the wealthy suffer, designed to rent or build herselfa house in the neighbourhood. Her accent by this time was English; byunconscious preference she had learnt it from her lover, translating andadapting it to her own musical tones. It deceived the Port Nassauerscompletely.
She visited many stores, always with a manservant in attendance; and,always paying down ready-money, bought of the best the little town couldafford (but chiefly small articles of furniture, with some saltedprovisions and luxuries such as well-to-do skippers took to sea fortheir private tables). The waggon had arrived; it, too, contained aquantity of wine and provisions, camp furniture, clothes, etc.
At the end of the week she left Port Nassau with her purchases, the twomen escorting her, the laden waggon following. They climbed the hillabove the town, and struck inland from the base of the peninsula,travelling north and by west. The road--a passably good one--led themacross a dip of cultivated land, shaped like a saddle-back, with a lineof forest trees topping its farther ridge. This was the fringe of aconsiderable forest, and beyond the ridge they rode for miles in theshade of boughs, slanting their way along a gentle declivity, with hereand there glimpses of a broad plain below, and of a broad-banded riverwinding through it with many loops.
But these glimpses were rare, and a stranger could not guess the extentof the plain until, stepping from the forest into broad day, he foundhimself on the very skirts of it.
An ample plain it was; a grass ground of many thousand acres, wherefifty years ago the Indians had pastured, but where now the farmerslaboriously saved their hay when the floods allowed, and in springlaunched their punts and went duck-shooting with long guns andwading-boots. For in winter one sheet of water--or of ice, as it mighthappen--covered the meadows and made the great river one with the manybrooks that threaded their way to her. But at this season they ran lowbetween their banks and the eye easily traced their meanderings, whilethe main stream itself rolled its waters in full view--in places threehundred yards wide, and seldom narrower than one hundred. Dwarf willowsfringed it: at some distance back from the shore, alders and reddeningmaples dotted the meadows, with oaks here and there, and everywhere wildcranberry bushes in great moss-like hummocks.
It ran sluggishly, and always--however long the curve--up to its near orright bank the plain lay flat, or broken only by these hummocks.But from the farther shore the ground rose at a moderate slope, and herewere farmhouses and haystacks planted above reach of the waters.A high ridge of forest backed this inhabited terrace, and dense forestfilled the eastward gap through which the river passed down to theselevels from the cleft hills.
At one point on the farther shore the houses had drawn together in acluster, and towards this the road ran in a straight line on the raisedcauseway that had suffered much erosion from bygone floods. It cost thetravellers an hour to reach the river-bank, where a ferry plied to andfrom the village. It was a horse-boat, but not capable of conveying thewaggon, the contents of which must be unladen and shipped across inparcels, to be repacked in a cart that stood ready on the village quay.Leaving her men to handle this, Ruth crossed alone with her mare androde on, as the ferryman directed her, past the village towards herlodging, some two miles up the stream. The house stood beside a moreancient ferry, now disused, to which it had formerly served as a tavern.It rested on stout oaken piles driven deep into the river-mud; a notablebuilding, with a roof like the inverted hull of a galleon, pierced withdormer windows and topped by a rusty vane. Its tenants were a childlesscouple--a Mr. and Mrs. Strongtharm: he a taciturn man of fifty, a bornnaturalist and great shooter of wildfowl; she a douce woman, with eyeslike beads of jet, and an incurable propensity for mothering andspoiling her neighbours' children.
The couple received her kindly, asking few questions. Their dwellingwas by many sizes too large for them, and she might have taken herchoice among a dozen of the old guest-chambers. But Sir Oliverhad come and gone a month before and selected the best for her.Its roof-timbers, shaped like the ribs of a ship, curved outwards anddownwards from a veritable keelson; and it was reached by way of azig-zagging corridor, lit by port-holes, and adorned in every niche andcorner with cases of stuffed wildfowl. Ruth supped well on game Mr.Strongtharm's gun had provided, and slept soundly, lulled between herdreams by the ripple of water swirling between the piles that supported,far below her, the house's cellarage.
She awoke at daybreak to the humming of wind; and looked forth on aleaden sky, on the river ruffled and clapping in small waves against ashrill north-easter, and on countless birds in flocks rising from themeadows and balancing their wings against it. Before breakfast-time theweather had turned to heavy rain. But this mattered nothing; she had aday's work indoors before her.
She spent the morning in unpacking the stores, which had arrived lateovernight from the ferry, and in putting a hundred small touches to herbedroom and sitting-room, to make them more habitable. By noon she hadfinished the unpacking, and dismissed the two grooms to make their wayback to Boston and report that all was well with her. It rained untilthree in the afternoon; and then, the weather clearing, she saddledMadcap with her own hands and rode to the edge of the forest.Little light remained when she reached its outskirts, and she peeredcuriously between the dim boles for a few minutes before turning for herhomeward ride. She had brought a beautiful scheme in her head, and theforest was concerned in it; but for the moment, in this twilight, theforest daunted her. She had--for she differed from most maidens--lefther lover to arrange all the business of the marriage ceremony,stipulating only that it must be private. But she had at the same timebound him by a lover's oath that all details of the honeymoon must beleft to her; that he should neither know where and how it was to bespent, nor seek to enquire. She would meet him at the church porch inthe village below--in what garb, even, she would not promise; and afterthe ceremony he must be ready to ride away with her--she would notpromise whither.
Her project had been to build a camp far in the woods; and to this endshe had made her many purchases in Port Nassau. They included, besidesan array of provisions and cooking-pots, a hunter's tent such as thebackwoodsmen used in their expeditions after beaver and moose.It weighed many pounds, and a part of her problem was how to convey itto any depth of the forest unaided.
The easterly gale blew itself out. The next morning broke with rifts ofblue, and steadied itself, after two hours, to clear sunshine.She awoke in blithe spirits, and after breakfast went off without wasteof time to saddle Madcap. By the stable door she found Mr. Strongtharmseated and polishing his gun, and paused to catechise him on the foresttracks, particularly on those leading up through Soldier's Gap--by whichname he called the gorge at the head of the plain.
"The best track beyond, you'll find, lies pretty close 'longside theriver," he said. "But 'tis no road for the mare. I doubt if a mulecould manage it after the third mile. The river, you see, comes throughin a monstrous hurry--by the look of it here you'd never guess.No, indeed, 'tisn't a river at all, properly speakin', but a whole heapo' streams tumblin' down this-a-way, that-a-way, out o' the sidevalleys; and what you may call the main river don't run in one body, butbreaks itself up considerable over waterfalls. Rock for the most part,an' pretty steep, with splashy ground below the falls. I han't beenright up the Gap these dozen years; an' a man's job it is at the best--atwo days' journey. The las' time I slept the night, goin' an' comin',in Peter Vanders' lodge."
"A lodge?"
"That's what they call it. He was a trapper, and a famous one, butbefore my time; an' that was his headquarters--a sort o' cabin, prettystout, just by the head in the sixth fall, or maybe 'tis the seventh--I forget. He lived up there without wife or family--" Mr. Strongtharmwould have launched into further particulars abo
ut the dead trapper,whose skill and strange habits had passed into a legend in the valley.But Ruth wished to hear more of the cabin.
"It's standin', no doubt, to this day. Vanders was a Dutchman, an'Dutchmen build strong by nature. The man who built _this_ yer house wasa Dutchman, an' look at the piles of it--_an_ the ribs you may ha'noticed. Ay, the lodge will be there yet; but you'll never find it, notunless I takes ye. That fourth fall is a teaser."
Ruth saddled her mare, and rode off in the direction of the gap,thoughtfully. Mr. Strongtharm had given her a new notion. . . .
It was close upon nightfall when she returned. She was muddy, butcheerful; and she hummed a song to herself in her chamber as she slidoff her mired garments and attired herself for supper.
That song was her nesting song. Away Boston-wards, her lover, too, wasbuilding in his magnificent fashion; but Ruth had found a secret place,such as birds love, and shyly, stealthily as a mating bird, she setabout planning and furnishing. It is woman's instinct. . . . Every day,as soon as breakfast was done, she saddled and rode towards the Gap, andalways with a parcel or two dangling from the saddle-bow or strappedupon Madcap's back.
For the first time in her life she had money to handle; money furnishedby Sir Oliver to be spent at her own disposal on the honeymoon.It seemed to her a prodigious sum, but she was none the less economicalwith it. I fear that sometimes she opened the bags and gloated over thecoins as over a hoard. She was neither miser nor spendthrift; butunlike many girls brought up in poverty, she brought good husbandry togood fortune.
Yet "shopping"--to enter a store and choose among the goods for sale,having money to pay, but weighing quality and price--was undeniablypleasant. Twice or thrice, bethinking her of some trifle overlooked atPort Nassau, she enjoyed visiting the village store--it boasted butone--and dallying with a purchase.
She was riding back from one of these visits--it had been (if the Musewill smile and condescend) to buy a packet of hairpins--when, half-wayup the village street, she spied a horseman approaching. An instantlater she recognised Mr. Trask.
There was really nothing strange in her meeting him here. Mr. Traskowned a herd of bullocks, and had ridden over from Port Nassau tobargain for their winter fodder. He had not aged a day. His horse wasa tall grey, large-jointed, and ugly.
Ruth wore a veil, but it was wreathed just now above the brim of herhat. Her first impulse was to draw it over her face, and her hand wentup; but she desisted in pride, and rode by her old enemy with a calmface.
They passed one another, and she believed that he had not recognisedher; but after a few paces she heard him check his horse.
"Hi, madam!"
She halted, and he came slowly back.
"You are Ruth Josselin," he said.
"I am, sir."
"And what are you doing here?"
She smiled at him a little scornfully. "Do you ask as a magistrate,sir, or in curiosity?"
He frowned, narrowing his eyes. "You are marvellously changed.You appear prosperous. Has Vyell married you yet?"
"No, sir."
"Nor as yet cast you off, it would seem."
"No, sir."
"Ah, well, go your ways. You are a beautiful thing, but evil; and Iwould have saved ye from it. I whipped ye, remember."
Her face burned, but she held her eyes steady on him. "Mr. Trask," shesaid, "do you believe in hell?"
"Eh?" He was taken aback, but he could not frown away the question; forshe asked it with a certain authority, albeit very courteously. "Eh?To be sure I do."
"I am going to prove to you (and some day you may take comfort from it)that, except on earth, there is no such place."
"Ye'd like to believe that, I daresay!"
"For you see," she went on, letting the sneer pass, "it is agreed that,if there be a hell, none but the wicked go there."
"Well?"
"Why, then, hell must defeat itself. For, where all are wickedtogether, no punishment can degrade, because no shame is felt."
"There's the pain, madam." He eyed her, and barked it in a short,savage laugh. "The torment--the worm that dies not, the fire that's notquenched. Won't these content ye, bating the shame?"
Her eyes answered his in scorn. "No, sir. Because I once suffered yourcruelty, you have less understanding than I; but you have more ingenuitythan the Almighty, being able, in your district, to make a hell ofearth."
"You blaspheme thus to me, that honestly tried to save your soul?"
"Did you? . . . Well, perhaps you did in your fashion, and you may takethis comfort for reward. Believe me, who have tried, hell isbottomless, but in its own way. Should ever you attain to it--and theremay in another world be such a place for the cruel--go down boldly; andit may be you will drop through into bliss."
"You, to talk of another world!" he snapped.
"And why not, Mr. Trask? Once upon a time you killed me."
He turned his grey horse impatiently. "I whipped ye," was his partingshot. "If 'twarn't too late, I'd take pleasure to whip ye again!"