XXIX.
_IN THE BURNING WOODS._
The incessant excitement and fatigue of the past few days had causedPenn to fall asleep almost immediately after Carl left him. The rudeground on which he stretched himself proved a blissful couch of repose.Virginia climbed the mountain to meet him, and no fine intuitive senseof her approach thrilled him with wakeful expectancy. Carl was captured,and still he slept. The lost young girl wandered within fifty yards ofwhere he lay steeped in forgetfulness, dreaming, perhaps, of her; andall the time they were as unconscious of each other's presence as wereEvangeline and her lover when they passed each other at night on thegreat river.
Penn was the first to wake; and still his stupid heart whispered to himno syllable of the strange secret of the beautiful sleeper whom he mighthave looked down upon from the edge of the cliff so near.
The grove had been but recently fired, and it would have been easyenough then for him to rush into the gorge and rescue her. From whatterrors, from what perils would she have been saved! But he wasted theprecious moments in staring amazement; then, thinking of his own safety,he commenced running _away_ from her,--his escape lighted by the samefatal flames that were enclosing her within the gorge.
She never knew whether, on awaking, she cried for help or remained dumb;nor did it matter much then: he was already too far off to hear.
The glow on the clouds lighted all the broad mountain side. Under theruddy canopy he ran,--now through dimly illumined woods, and now overbare rocks faintly flushed by the glare of the sky.
As he drew near the cave, he saw, on a rock high above him, a wild humanfigure making fantastic gestures, and prostrating itself towards theburning forests. He ran up to it, and, all out of breath, stood on theledge.
"Cudjo! Cudjo! what are you doing here?"
The negro made no reply, but, folding his arms above his head, spreadthem forth towards the fire, bowing himself again and again, until hisforehead touched the stone.
Penn shuddered with awe. For the first time in his life he found himselfin the presence of an idolater. Cudjo belonged to a tribe of Africanfire-worshippers, from whom he had been stolen in his youth; and,although the sentiment of the old barbarous religion had smouldered foryears forgotten in his breast, this night it had burst forth again,kindled by the terrible splendors of the burning mountain.
Penn waited for him to rise, then grasped his arm. The negro, startledinto a consciousness of his presence, stared at him wildly.
"That is not God, Cudjo!"
"No, no, not your God, massa! My God!" and the African smote his breast."Me mos' forgit him; now me 'members! Him comin' fur burn up de whitefolks, and set de brack man free!"
Penn stood silent, thinking the negro might not be altogether wrong. Nodoubt the dim, dark soul of him saw vaguely, with that prophetic sensewhich is in all races of men, a great truth. A fire was indeedcoming--was already kindled--which was to set the bondman free: and Godwas in the fire. But of that mightier conflagration, the combustion ofthe forests was but a feeble type.
Penn turned from Cudjo to watch the burning, and became aware of itsthreatening and rapidly increasing magnitude. The woods had been set inseveral places, but the different fires were fast growing into one,swept by a strong wind diagonally across and up the mountain. It seemedthen as if nothing could prevent all the forest growths that lay to thesouthward and westward along the range from being consumed.
As he gazed, he became extremely alarmed for the safety of Stackridgeand his friends: and where all this time was Carl? In vain he questionedCudjo. He turned, and was hastening to the cave when he met Pomp comingtowards him. Tall, majestic, naked to the waist, wearing a garment ofpanther-skins, with the red gleam of the fire on his dusky face andlimbs, the negro looked like a native monarch of the hills.
"O Pomp! what a fire that is!"
"What a fire it is going to be!" answered Pomp, with a lurid smile. "Ournew neighbors have brought us bad luck. All those woods are gone. Thefire is sweeping up directly towards us--it will pass over all themountain--nothing will be left." Yet he spoke with a lofty calmness thatastonished Penn.
"And our friends!--Carl!--have you heard from them?"
"I have not seen Carl since he left the cave with you, nor any ofStackridge's people to-night."
"Then they are in the woods yet!"
"Yes; unless they have been wise enough to get out of them! I was juststarting out to look for them.--Who comes there?"--poising his rifle.
"It's Carl!" exclaimed Penn, recognizing the confederate coat. But in aninstant he saw his mistake.
"It is one of Ropes's men!" said Pomp. "He has discovered us--he shalldie for setting my mountains on fire!"
"Hold!" Penn grasped his arm. "He is beckoning and calling!"
Pomp frowned as he lowered his rifle, and waited for the soldier to comeup.
"What! is it you? I didn't know you in that dress, and came nearshooting you, as you deserve, for wearing it!" And Pomp turnedscornfully away.
The comer was Dan Pepperill, breathless with haste, horror-struck,haggard. It was some time before he could reply to Penn's impetuousdemand--what had brought him up thither?
"Carl!" he gasped.
"What has happened to Carl?"
"Ben tuck! durned if he hain't! But that ar ain't the wust!"
"What, then, is the worst?" for that seemed bad enough.
"Virginny--Miss Villars!"
"Virginia! what of her?"
"She's down thar! in the fire!"
"Virginia in the fire!"
"She ar,--durned if she ain't! Carl said she war on the mountain, andwanted me to hurry up and help her or find you; and I'd a done it, but Icouldn't git off till we was runnin' from the fires we'd sot; then Ikinder got scattered a puppus; t'other ones hung on to Carl, though, soI had to come alone."
Penn interrupted the loose and confused narrative--Virginia: had he_seen_ her?
"Wal, I reckon I hev! Ye see I war huntin' fur her thar, above the roundrock; fur Carl said,----"
A short, sharp groan broke from the lips of Penn. At first the idea ofVirginia being on the mountain had appeared to him incredible. But atthe mention of the place of rendezvous the truth smote him: she had comeup there with Toby, or in his stead. With spasmodic grip he wrungPepperill's arm as if he would have wrung the truth out of him that way.
"You saw her!--where?"
His hoarse voice, his terrible look, bewildered the poor man more andmore.
"I war a tellin' ye! Don't break my arm, and don't look so durned f'erceat me, and I'll out with the hull story. Ye see, I warn't to blame, now,no how. They sot the fires; they sot the grove on our way back; and if Ihelped any, 'twas cause I had ter. But about _her_. Wal, I begun to thebig rock, and war a-huntin' up along, till the grove got all in a blaze,and the red limbs begun ter fall, and I see 'twas high time for me toput. Says I ter myself, 'She hain't hyar; she ar off the mountain andsafe ter hum afore this time, shore!' But jest then I heern a screech;it sounded right inter the grove, and I run up as clust ter the fire's Icould, and looked, and thar I seen right in the middle on't, amongst theburnin' trees, a woman's gownd, and then a face: 'twas her face, Iknowed it, fur she hadn't nary bunnit on, and the fire shone on itbright as lightnin'! But thar war half a acre o' blazin' timber atweenher and me; and besides, I was so struck up all of a heap, I couldn't donary thing fur nigh about a minute--I couldn't even holler ter let herknow I war thar. And 'fore I knowed what I war about, durned if shehadn't gone!"
Penn afterwards understood that Dan had actually had a glimpse ofVirginia when she ran out to the entrance of the gorge, and stood therea moment in the terrible heat and glare.
"Where--show me where!" he exclaimed with fierce vehemence, draggingPepperill after him down the rocks.
"It war a considerable piece this side the round rock, nigh the uppereend o' the grove," said Dan, in a jarred voice, clattering after him,as fast as he could. "I reckon I kin find it, if 'tain't too late."
T
oo late? It must not be too late! Penn leaps down the ledges, andrushes through the thickets, as if he would overtake time itself. Theyreach the burning grove. Pepperill points out as nearly as he can thespot where he stood when he saw Virginia. Great God! if she was inthere, what a frightful end was hers!
"Daniel! are you sure?"--for Penn cannot, will not believe--it is tooterrible!
Daniel is very sure; and he withdraws from the insufferable heat, towhich his companion appears insensible.
"There is a gorge just above there; perhaps she escaped into the gorge.O, if I had known!" groans the half-distracted youth, thinking how nearhe must have been to her when the fire awoke him.
He still hopes that Dan's vision of her in the fire was but thehallucination of a bewildered brain. Yet no effort will he spare, nodanger will he shun. The entrance to the gorge is all a gulf of flame;and the woods are blazing upwards along the cliffs, and all the forestbeyond is turning to a sea of fire. Yet the gorge must be reached. Backagain up the steep slope they climb. Penn flies to the verge of thecliff. He looks down: the chasm is all a glare of light. There runs thered-gleaming brook. He sees the logs, the stones, the mosses, all thewild entanglement, deep below. But no Virginia. He runs almost into thecrackling flames, in order to peer farther down the gorge. Then he dartsaway in the opposite direction, along the very brink of the precipice,among the fire-lit trees,--Pepperill stupidly following. He seizes holdof a sapling, and, with his foot braced against its root, swings hisbody forward over the chasm, the better to gaze into its depths. Fromthat position he casts his eye up the gorge. He sees the cascade fallingover the ledge in a sheet of ruddy foam. He discovers the upper gorge;sees a monster of the forest come plunging and plashing down to thefall, and there lift himself on his haunches to look;--and what is thatother object, half hidden by a drooping bough? It is Virginia clingingto the rocks.
A moment before, had Penn made the discovery of the young girl stillunharmed by fire, his happiness would have been supreme. But now joy waschecked by an appalling fear. The bear might seize her, or with a strokeof his paw hurl her from his path.
Penn caught hold of the bough that impeded his view, and saw howprecarious was her hold. He dared not so much as call to her, or shoutto frighten the monster away, lest, her attention being for an instantdistracted, she might turn her head, lose her balance, and fallbackwards from the rocks.
"Durned if she ain't thar!" said Dan, excitedly. "But she's got apowerful slim chance with the bar!"
"Come with me!" said Penn.
He ran to the upper gorge, showed himself on the bank above the cascade,and shouted. The bear, as he anticipated, turned and looked up at him.Virginia at the same time saw her deliverer.
"Hold on! I'll be with you in a minute!" he cried in a voice heard abovethe noise of the waterfall and the roar of the conflagration.
She clung fast, hope and gladness thrilling her soul, and giving her newstrength.
To reach her, Penn had a precipitous descent of near thirty feet tomake. He did not pause to consider the difficulty of getting up again,or the peril of encountering the bear. He jumped down over aperpendicular ledge upon a projection ten feet below. Beyond that was arapid slope covered with moss and thin patches of soil, with here andthere a shrub, and here and there a tree. Striking his heels into thesoil, and catching at whatever branch or stem presented itself, he tookthe plunge. Clinging, sliding, falling, he arrived at the bottom. In aposture half sitting, half standing, and considerably jarred, he foundhimself face to face with Bruin. The animal had settled down on allfours, and now, with his surly, depressed head turned sullenly to oneside, he looked at Penn, and growled. Penn looked at him, and saidnothing. He had heard of staring wild beasts out of countenance--anexperiment that could be conducted strictly on peace principles, if thebear would only prove as good a Quaker as himself. He resolved to tryit: indeed, all unarmed as he was, what else could he do? He might atleast, by diverting the brute's attention, give Virginia time to getinto a position of safety. So he stood up, and fixed his eyes on thered-blinking eyes of the ferocious beast. Something Bruin did not like:it might have been the youth's company and valiant bearing, but moreprobably his observation of the fire had satisfied him that he was outof his place. With another growl, that seemed to say, "All I ask is tobe let alone," he seceded,--turning his head still more, twisting hisbody around, after it, and retreating up the gorge.
In an instant Penn was at the young girl's side: his hand clasped hers;he drew her up over the rock.
Not a word was uttered. He was too agitated to speak; and she, after theterror and the strain to which her nerves had been subjected so long,felt all her strength give way. But as he lifted her in his arms, afaint smile of happiness flitted over her white face, and her lips movedwith a whisper of gratitude he did not hear.
In spite of all the dangers behind them, and of the dangers stillbefore, both felt, in that moment, a shock of mutual bliss. Neither hadever known till then how dear the other was.
Pepperill had by this time leaped down upon the bulge of the bank. Therehe waited for them, shouting,--
"Hurry up! the bar'll meet the fire up thar, and be comin' down agin!"
Penn required no spur to his exertions: he knew too well the necessityof getting speedily beyond the reach, not of the bear only, but also ofthe fire, which threatened them now on three sides--below, above, and onthe farther bank of the gorge.
Clasping the burden more precious to him than life, resolved in his soulto part with it only with life, he toiled heavily up the bank, downwhich he had descended with such tremendous swiftness a few minutesbefore.
But it was not in Virginia's nature to remain long a helplessencumbrance. Seeing the labor and peril still before them, her willreturned, and with it her strength. She grasped a branch by which he wastrying in vain with one hand, holding her with the other, to draw themboth up a steep place. Her prompt action enabled him to seize the trunkof a young tree: she assisted still, and slipping from his hands, clungto it until he had reached the next tree above. He pulled her up afterhim, and then pushed her on still farther, until Pepperill could reachher from where he stood. A minute later the three were together on thesummit of the slope.
But now they had above them the ten feet of sheer perpendicularity downwhich Dan had indiscreetly jumped, following Penn's lead. A single handabove them would now be worth several hands below.
"What a fool I war! durned if I warn't!" said Dan, endeavoringunsuccessfully to find a place by which he could reascend.
"Get on my shoulders!" And Penn braced himself against the ledge.
Dan made the attempt, but fell, and rolled down the bank.
Just then a grinning black face appeared above.
"Gib me de gal! gib me de gal!" and a prodigiously long arm reacheddown.
"O Cudjo! you are an angel!" cried Penn, "Daniel! Here!"
Pepperill was up the bank again in a minute, at Penn's side. They liftedVirginia above their heads. Holding on by a sapling with one hand, thenegro extended the other far down over the ledge. Those miraculous armsof his seemed to have been made expressly for this service. He grasped awrist of the girl; with the other hand she clung to his arm until he haddrawn her up to the sapling; this she seized, and helped herself out.Then once more Penn gave Daniel his shoulder, while Cudjo gave him ahand from above; and Daniel was safe. Last of all, Penn remained.
"Cotch holt hyar!" said Cudjo, extending towards him the end of a branchhe had broken from a tree.
To this Penn held fast, assisting himself with his feet against theledge, while Cudjo and Dan hauled him up.
"Good Cudjo! how came you here?"
"Me see you and Pepperill a gwine inter de fire. So me foller."
"This is the old man's daughter, Cudjo."
Cudjo regarded the beautiful young girl with a look of vague wonder andadmiration.
"He remembers me," said Virginia. "I saw him the night he climbed in atToby's window." She gave him her hand; it trembled wi
th emotion. "Ithank you, Cudjo, for what you have done for my father--and for me."
"Now, Cudjo! show us the nearest and easiest path. We must take her tothe cave--there is no other way."
"You must be right spry, den!" said Cudjo. "De fire am a runnin' oberdat way powerful!"
Indeed, it had already crossed the upper end of the gorge, where theforest brook fell into it; and, getting into some beds of leaves, andthence into dense and inflammable thickets, it was now blazing directlyacross their line of retreat.
Penn would have carried Virginia in his arms, but she would not sufferhim.
"I can go where you can!" she cried, once more full of spirit anddaring. "Just give me your hand--you shall see!"
Penn took one of her hands, Pepperill the other, and with their aid,supporting her, lifting her, she sprang lightly up the ledges, and fromrock to rock.
Cudjo, carrying Dan's gun, ran on before, leading the way throughhollows and among bushes, by a route known only to himself. So theyreached a piece of woods, by the thin skirts of which he hoped to headoff the fire. Too late--it was there before them. It ran swiftly amongthe fallen leaves and twigs, and spread far into the woods.
The negro turned back. There was a wild grimace in his face, and aglitter in his eyes, as he threw up his hand, by way of signal thattheir flight in that direction was cut off.
"Cudjo! what is to be done!" And Penn drew Virginia towards him with alook that showed his fears were all for her.
"We can't git off down the mountain, nuther!" said Dan. "It's gittin'into the woods down thar. It'll be all around us in no time!"
"You let Cudjo do what him pleases?" said the black.
"I can trust you! Can you, Virginia?"
"He should know what is best. Yes, I will trust him."
"Take dat 'ar!" Pepperill received his gun. "Now you look out furyouselves. Me tote de gal."
And catching up Virginia, before Penn could stop him, or question him,he rushed with her into the fire.
Penn ran after him, perceiving at once the meaning of this bold act. Thewoods were not yet fairly kindled; only now and then the loose bark of adry trunk was beginning to blaze. Cudjo leaped over the line of flamethat was running along the ground, and bore Virginia high above it tothe other side. Penn followed, and Dan came close behind. They then hadbefore them a tract of blackened ground which the flames had swept,leaving here and there a dead limb or mat of leaves still burning.
These little fires were easily avoided. But they soon came to anotherline of flame raging on the upper side of the burnt tract. They werealmost out of the woods: only that red, crackling hedge fenced them in;but that they could not pass: the underbrush all along the forest edgewas burning. And there they were, brought to a halt, half-stifled withsmoke, in the midst of woods kindling and blazing all around them.
"May as well pull up hyar, and take a bref," remarked Cudjo, grimly,placing Virginia on a log too dank with decay and moss to catch fireeasily. "Den we's try 'em agin."
A horrible suspicion crossed Penn's mind; the fanatical fire-worshipperhad brought them there to destroy them--to sacrifice them to his god!
"Virginia!"--eagerly laying hold of her arm,--"we must retreat! It willsoon be too late! We can get out of the woods where we came in, if we goat once!"
"Beg pardon, sar," said Cudjo, stamping out fire in the leaves by theend of the log,--and he looked up through the smoke at Penn, with theold malignant grin on his apish face.
"What do you mean, Cudjo?" said Penn, in an agony of doubt.
"Can't get back dat way, sar!"
"Then you have led us here to destroy us!"
"You's no longer trust Cudjo!" was the negro's only reply.
"Didn't we trust you? Haven't we come through fire, following you? OCudjo! more than once you have helped to save my life! You have helpedto save this life, dearer than mine! Why do you desert us now?"
"'Sert you? Cudjo no 'sert you." But the negro spoke sullenly, and therewas still a sparkle of malignancy in his look.
"Then why do you stop here?"
"Hugh! tink we's go trough dat fire like we done trough tudder?"
"What then are we to do?"
"You's no longer trust Cudjo!" was once more the sullen response.
Virginia, with her quick perceptions, saw at once what Penn was eithertoo dull or too much excited to see. Cudjo felt himself aggrieved; buthe was not unfaithful.
"_I_ trust you, Cudjo!"--and she laid her hand frankly and confidinglyon his shoulder. "Did I tremble, did I shrink when you carried methrough the fire? I shall never forget how brave, how good you are! Hetrusts you too,--only he is so afraid for me! You can forgive that,Cudjo."
"She is right," said Penn, though still in doubt. "If you know a way tosave her, don't lose a moment!"
"He knows; on'y let him take his time," said Pepperill, whose firm faithin the negro's good will shamed Penn for his distrust. And yet Pepperilldid not love, as Penn loved, the girl whose life was in danger; and hehad not seen the evidences of Cudjo's fire-worshipping fanaticism whichPenn had seen.
Under the influence of Virginia's gentle and soothing words, the glitterof resentment died out of the negro's face. But his aspect was stillmorose.
"De fire take his time to burn out; so we's take our time too," said he."You try your chance wid Cudjo agin, miss?"
"Certainly! for I am sure you will take us safely through yet!" saidVirginia, without a shadow of doubt or hesitation on her face, howeverdark may have been the shadow on her heart.
The negro was evidently well pleased. He examined carefully the line offire in the undergrowth. And now Penn discovered, what Cudjo had knownvery well from the first, that there were barren ledges above, and thatthe fire was rapidly burning itself out along their base. An openingthrough which a courageous and active man might dash unscathed soonpresented itself. Then Cudjo waited no longer to "take bref." He caughtVirginia in his arms, and bore her through the second line of fire, ashe had borne her through the first, and placed her in safety on therocks above.
"Cudjo, my brave, my noble fellow!" said Penn, deeply affected, "I havewronged you; I confess it with shame. Forgive me!"
"Cudjo hab nuffin to forgib," replied the negro, with a laugh ofpleasure "Neber mention um, massa! All right now! Reckon we's better begitt'n out o' dis yer smudge!"
He showed the way, and Penn and Daniel helped Virginia up the rocks asbefore.
They had reached a smooth and unsheltered ledge near the ravine, alittle below the mouth of the cave, when a hideous and inhuman shriekrent the air.
"What dat?" cried Cudjo, stopping short; and his visage in the smoky andlurid light looked wild with superstitious alarm.
The sound was repeated, louder, nearer, more hideous than before,seeming to make the very atmosphere shudder above their heads.
"Go on, Cudjo! go on!" Penn commanded.
The terrified black crouched and gibbered, but would not stir. Thenstraightway a sharp clatter, as of iron hoofs flying at a furiousgallop, resounded along the mountain-side. By a simultaneous impulse thelittle party huddled together, and turned their faces towards the fire,and saw coming down towards them a horse with the speed of the wind.
"Stand close!" said Penn; and he threw himself before Virginia, toshield her, shouting and swinging his hat to frighten the animal fromhis course.
"Stackridge's hoss!" exclaimed Cudjo, recovering from his fright,leaping up, and flinging abroad his long arms in the air. "Wiv some poordebil onter him's back!"
It was so. The little group stood motionless, chilled with horror. Thebeast came thundering on, with lips of terror parted, nostrils wide andsnorting, mane and tail flying in the wild air, hoofs striking fire fromthe rocks. A human being--a man--was lying close to his neck, andclinging fast: the face hidden by the tossing and streaming mane: afearful ride! the mystery surrounding him, and the awful glare andsmoke, enhancing the horror of it.
Approaching the group on the ledge, the animal veered, and shot pastthem li
ke a thunderbolt; clearing rocks, hollows, bushes, withincredible bounds; nearing the ravine, but halting not; dashing into thethickets there, missing suddenly the ground beneath his feet, strikingonly the air and yielding boughs with frantic hoofs; then plunging downwith a dull, reverberant crash,--horse and unknown rider rollingtogether over rocks and spiked limbs to the bottom of the ravine.
Then all was still again: it had passed like a vision of fear.