XXVIII.
_BEAUTY AND THE BEAST._
Unfortunately the poor girl had no suspicion of the mischance that hadovertaken her guide. She heard voices, and believed that he had fallenin with some friends. Thus she waited, expecting momently that he wouldreturn to her. She saw a single gleam of light that vanished in thedarkness. Then the voices grew fainter and fainter, and at length diedin the distance. And she was once more utterly alone.
Fearful doubt and uncertainty agitated her. In a moment of despair,yielding to the terrors of her situation, she wrung her hands and calledon Carl imploringly not to abandon her, but to come back--"O, dear, dearCarl, come back!"
Suddenly she checked herself. Why was she sitting there, wasting thetime in tears and reproaches?
"Poor Carl never meant to desert me in this way, I know. If I ever seehim again, he will make me sorry that I have blamed him. No doubt he hasdone his best. But, whatever has become of him, I am sure he cannot findhis way back to me now. I'll follow him; perhaps I may find him, orPenn, or some of their friends."
She arose accordingly, and groped her way in the direction in which shehad seen the light and heard the voices. And soon another and verydifferent light gladdened her eyes--a faint glow, far off, as of a firekindled among the forest trees. It was the camp of the patriots, shethought.
She came to the brook, which, invisible, mysterious, murmuring, rolledalong in the midnight blackness, and seemed too formidable for her toford. She felt the cold rush of the hurrying water, the slippery slimeof the mossy and treacherous stones, and withdrew her appalled hands. Tofind a shallow place to cross, she followed up the bank; and as thelight was still before her, higher on the mountain, she kept on, gropingamong trees, climbing over logs and rocks, falling often, but alwaysresolutely rising again, until, to her dismay, the glow began todisappear. She had, without knowing it, followed the stream up into thedeep gorge through which it poured; and now the precipitous wood-crownedwall, rising beside her, overhanging her, shut out the last glimpse ofthe fire.
She was by this time exceedingly fatigued. It seemed useless to advancefarther; she felt certain that she was only getting deeper and deeperinto the entangling difficulties of that unknown, horrible place.Neither had she the courage or strength to retrace her steps. Nothingthen remained for her but to pass the remainder of the night where shewas, and wait patiently for the morning.
Little knowing that the light she had seen was the glare of the kindledforest, she endeavored to convince herself that she had nothing to fear.At all events, she knew that trembling and tears could avail hernothing. She had not ventured to call very loudly for help, fearing lesther voice might bring foe instead of friend. And now it occurred to herthat perhaps Carl had been taken by the soldiers: yes, it must be so:she explained it all to herself, and wondered why she had not thought ofit before. It would therefore be folly in her now to scream for aid.
Comfortless, yet calm, she explored the ground for a resting-place. Shecleared the twigs away from the roots of a tree, and laid herself downthere on the moss and old leaves. Everything seemed dank with thenever-failing dews of the deep and sheltered gorge; but she did not mindthe dampness of her couch. A strong wind was rising, and the great treesabove her swayed and moaned. She was vexed by mosquitoes that bit as ifthey then for the first time tasted blood, and never expected to tasteit again; but she was too weary to care much for them either. She restedher arm on the mossy root; she rested her head on her arm; she drew herhandkerchief over her face; she shut out from her soul all the miseriesand dangers of her situation, and quietly said her prayers.
There is nothing that calms the perturbations of the mind like thatinward looking for the light of God's peace which descends upon us whenin silence and sweet trust we pray to him. A delicious sense of reposeensued, and her thoughts floated off in dreams.
She dreamed she was flying with her father from the fury of armed men.She led him into a wilderness; and it was night; and great rocks rose upsuddenly before them in the gloom, and awful chasms yawned. Then she waswandering alone; she had lost her father, and was seeking him up anddown. Then it seemed that Penn was by her side; and when she asked forher father he smilingly pointed upward at a wondrously beautiful lightthat shone from the summit of a hill. She sought to go up thither, butgrew weary, and sat down to rest in a deep grove, with an ice-coldmountain stream dashing at her feet. Then the light on the hill became alake of fire, and it poured its waves into the stream, and the streamflowed past her a roaring river of flame. Lightnings crackled in the airabove her. Thunderbolts fell. The heat was intolerable. The river hadoverflowed, and set the world on fire. And she could not fly, for terrorchained her limbs. She struggled, screamed, awoke. She started up. Herdream was a reality.
Either the fire set by the soldiers had spread, driven by the wind overthe dry leaves, into the grove below her, or else they had fired thegrove itself on their retreat. Her eyes opened upon a vision ofappalling brightness. For a moment she stood utterly dazzled andbewildered, not knowing where she was. Memory and reason were paralyzed:she could not remember, she could not think: amazement and terrorpossessed her.
Instinctively shielding her eyes, she looked down. The ground where shehad lain, the log, the sticks, the moss, and her handkerchief fallenupon it, were illumined with a glare brighter than noonday. At sight ofthe handkerchief came recollection. Her terrible adventure, the glow shehad seen in the woods, her bed on the earth,--she remembered everything.And now the actual perils of her position became apparent to herreturning faculties.
Where all was blackness when she lay down, now all was preternaturallight. Every bush and jutting rock of the wild overhanging cliffs stoodout in fearful distinctness. The saplings and trees on their summits,fifty feet above her head, seemed huddling together, and leaning forwardterror-stricken, in an atmosphere of whirling flame and smoke. Climbthose cliffs she could not, though she were to die.
She must then flee farther up into the deep and narrow gorge, orendeavor to escape by the way she had come. But the way she had come wasfire.
The conflagration already enveloped the mouth of the gorge, shutting herin. The trunks of near trees stood like the bars of a stupendous cage,through which she looked at the raging demons beyond. Burning limbsfell, shooting through the air with trails of flame. Every tree was apillar of fire. Here a bough, still untouched, hung, dark and impassive,against the lurid, surging chaos. Then the whirlwind of heated airstruck it, and you could see it writhe and twist, until its darknessburst into flame. There stood what was late a lordly maple, butnow,--trunk, and limb, and branch,--a tree of living coal. And downunder this gulf of fire flowed the brook, into which showers of sparksfell hissing, while over all, fearfully illumined clouds of smoke andcinders and leaves went rolling up into the sky.
Virginia approached near enough to be impressed with the dreadfulcertainty that there was no outlet whatever, for any mortal foot, inthat direction. Tortured by the heat, and pursued by lighted twigs, thatfell like fiery darts around her, she fled back into the gorge.
The conflagration was still spreading rapidly. The timber along bothsides of the gorge, at its opening, began to burn upwards towards thesummits of the cliffs. Soon the very spot where she had slept, and whereshe now paused once more in her terrible perplexity and fear, would bean abyss of flame.
Again she took to flight, hasting along the edge of the stream, up intothe heart of the gorge. Over roots of trees, over old decaying trunks,over barricades of dead limbs brought down by freshets and left lodged,she climbed, she sprang, she ran. All too brightly her way was lightednow. A ghastly yellow radiance was on every object. The waters sparkledand gleamed as they poured over the dark brown stones. Every slender,delicate fern, every poor little startled wild flower nestled in cool,dim nooks, was glaringly revealed. Little the frightened girl heededthese darlings of the forest now.
All the way she looked eagerly for some slant or cleft in the mountainwalls where she might hope to ascend. Here, o
ver the accumulated soil ofcenturies, fastened by interwoven roots to the base of the cliff, shemight have climbed a dozen feet or more. Yonder, by the aid of shrubsand boughs, she might have drawn herself up a few feet farther. But,wherever her eye ranged along the ledges above, she beheld themdizzy-steep and unscalable. And so she kept on until even the way beforeher was closed up.
On the brink of a rock-rimmed, flashing basin she stopped. Down intothis, from a shelf twenty feet in height, fell the brook in a bright,fire-tinted cascade. Fear-inspired as she was, she could not but pauseand wonder at the strange beauty of the scene,--the plashy pool beforeher, the flame-color on the veil of silver foam dropped from the brow ofthe ledge, and--for a wild background to the picture--the wooded,fire-lit, shadowy gorge, opening on a higher level above.
During the moment that she stood there, a great bird, like an owl, thathad probably been driven from his hollow tree or fissure in the rocks bythe conflagration, flapped past her face, almost touching her with hiswings, and dashed blindly against the waterfall. He was swept down intothe pool. After some violent fluttering and floundering in the water, heextricated himself, perched on a stone at its edge, shook out his wetfeathers, and stared at her with large cat-like eyes, without fear. Shewas near enough to reach him with her hand; but either he was so dazzledand stunned that he took no notice of her, or else the greater terrorhad rendered him tame to human approach. She believed the latter was thecase, and saw something exceedingly awful in the incident. When even thewild winged creatures of the forest were stricken down with fear, whatcause had she to apprehend danger to herself!
On reaching the waterfall she had felt for a moment that all wasover--that certain death awaited her. Then, out of her very despair,came a gleam of hope. She might creep under the cascade, or behind it,and that would protect her. But when she looked up, and saw, around andabove her, the forest trees with the frightful and ever-increasing glowupon them, and knew that they too soon must kindle, and thought offirebrands rained down upon her, and falling columns of fire filling thegorge with burning rubbish,--then her soul sickened: what protectionwould a little sheet of water prove against such furnace heat?
No: she must escape, or perish. Beside the cascade there was a brokenangle of the rocks, by which, if she could reach it, she might at least,she thought, climb to the upper part of the gorge. But the nearestfoothold she could discover was ten feet above the basin, in sheerascent. The ledge was dank and slippery with the dashing spray. Gain thetop of it, however, she must. She ran up the embankment under the cliff.Here a sapling gave her support; she clung to a crevice or projectionthere; a drooping bough saved her from falling when the soft earth slidfrom beneath her feet farther on. So she climbed along the side of theprecipice, until the broken corner of the cliff was hardly two yards offbefore her. Yes, a secure foothold was there, and above it roseirregular pointed stairs, leading steeply to the top of the cascade. O,to reach that shattered ledge! A space of perpendicular wall intervened.No shrub, no drooping bough, was there. Here was only a slightprojection, just enough to rest the edge of a foot upon. She placed herfoot upon it. She found a crevice above, and thrust her fingers into itas if there was no such thing as pain. She clung, she took a step--shewas half a yard nearer the angle. But what next could she do? She washanging in the air above the basin, into which the slightest slip wouldprecipitate her. To change hands--relieve the one advanced and insertthe fingers of the other in its place,--was a perilous undertaking. Butshe did it. Then she reached forward again with hand and foot, foundanother spot to cling to, and took another step. She was thankful forthe great light that lighted the rocks before her. Close by now was thefractured angle of the cliff: one more step, and she could set her footupon the nethermost stair. Her strength was almost gone; her hands,though insensible to pain, were conscious of slipping. To fall would beto lose all she had gained, and all the strength she had exhausted inthe effort. Her feet now--or rather one of them--had a tolerably securehold on the rib of the ledge. She made one last effort with her hands,and, just as she was falling, gave a spring. She knew that all wasstaked upon that one dizzy instant of time. But for that knowledge shecould never have accomplished what she did. She fell forwards towardsthe angle, caught a point of the rock with her hands, and clung thereuntil she had safely placed her feet.
This done, it was absolutely necessary to stop a moment to rest. Shelooked downwards and behind her, to see what she had done. The sightmade her dizzy--it seemed such a miracle that she could ever have scaledthat wall!
Nearer and louder roared the conflagration, and she had little time todelay. Her labor was not ended, neither was the danger past. She cast ahurried glance upwards over the ridge she was to climb, and advancedcautiously, step by step. Her soul kept saying within her, "I will notfall; I will not fall;" but she dared not look backwards again, lesteven then she should grow giddy and miss her hold.
As she ascended, the ridge inclined nearer and nearer to the side of thecascade, until she found the stones slimy and dripping. This was anunforeseen peril. Still she resolutely advanced, taking the utmostprecaution at each step against slipping. At length she was at the topof the waterfall. She could look up into the upper gorge, and see thewater come rushing down. There was space beside the brook for her tocontinue her flight; and the sides of the gorge above were far lesssteep and rugged than below. She was thrilled with hope. She had but onesteep, high stair to surmount. She was getting her knee upon it, when acrashing sound in the underbrush arrested her attention. The crashingwas followed by a commotion in the water, and she saw a huge blackobject plunge into the stream, and come sweeping down towards her.
On it came, straight at the rock on which she clung, and from which amotion, a touch, might suffice to hurl her back into the lower gorge.She saw what it was; and for a moment she was frozen with terror. Shewas directly in its path: it would not stop for her. The sight of theblazing woods below, however, brought it to a sudden halt. And there,close by the brink of the waterfall, facing her, not a yard distant, inthe full glare of the fire, it rose slowly on its hind feet to look--amonster of the forest, an immense black bear.
And now, but for the nightmare of horror that was upon her, Virginiamight have perceived that the forest _above_ the cascade was likewisewrapped in flames. The bear had been driven by the terror of them downthe stream; and here, between the two fires, on the verge of thewaterfall, the slight young girl and the great shaggy wild beast hadmet. She would have shrieked, but she had no voice. The bear also wassilent; with his huge hairy bulk reared up before her, his paws pendant,and his jaws half open in a sort of stupid amazement, he stood andgazed, uttering never a growl.