Читать книгу Silas Strong, Emperor of the Woods - Irving Bacheller - Страница 7

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THE day was hot and still. Slowly they mounted the foot-hills between meadows aglow with color. The country seemed to flow ever downward past their sleepy eyes on its way to the great valley. The daisies were like white foam on the slow cascade of Bowman's Hill, and there were masses of red and yellow which appeared to be drifting on the flats. A driver sat on the front seat, and Gordon behind with Socky and Sue. The little folk chattered together and wearied their father with queries about birds and beasts. By-and-by the girl grew silent, her chin sank upon her breast, and her head began to shake and sway as their wagon clattered over the rough road. In a moment Socky's head was nodding also, and the feet of both swung limp below the wagon-seat.

They had seemed to sink and rise and struggle and cry out in the silence, and were now as those drowned beneath it. Gordon drew them towards him and lifted their legs upon the cushioned wagon-seat. He sat thinking as they rode. They had been hard on him—those creditors. He had not meant to steal, but only to borrow that small sum which he had taken out of the business in order to feed and clothe the children who lay beside him. True, some dollars of it had gone to buy oblivion—a few hours of unearned, of unholy relief. How else, thought he, could he have stood the reproaches of brutal men?

They arrived at Tupper's Mill late in the afternoon. There Gordon found a canoe and made ready. At this point the river turned like a scared horse and ran east by south, around Tup-per Ridge, in a wide loop, and, as if doubting its way, slackened pace, and, wavering right and left, moved slowly into the shade of the forest, and then, as if reassured, went on at a full gallop, leaping over the cliff at Fiddler's Falls. Below, it turned to the north, and, seeming to see its way at last, grew calm and crossed the flats wearily, covered with foam.

Socky woke and rubbed his eyes when he and his sister were taken out of the wagon. Sue continued to sleep, although carried like a sack of meal under the arm of the driver and Silas Strong laid amidships on a blanket. Mr. Tupper, the mill man, gave them a piece of meat which, out of courtesy to the law, he called "mountain lamb." With pack aboard and Socky on a blanket in the bow, Gordon pushed his canoe into the current.

All who journeyed to the Lost River country from the neighborhood of Hillsborough arrived at Tupper's late in the afternoon. There, generally, they took canoe and paddled six miles to a log inn at the head of the still water. But as Gordon started from Tupper's Mill down stream he had in mind a destination not on any map of this world. Socky sat facing him, a little hand on either gunwale.

Socky had thought often that day of the incident of the night before and of his father's poverty. Now he looked him over from head to foot. He saw the little steel chain fastened to his father's waistcoat and leading into the pocket where he knew that his own watch lay hidden. The look of it gave him a feeling of great virtue and satisfaction.

"Father, will you please tell me what time it is?" he inquired.

Gordon removed the watch from his pocket. "Half-past six. We've got to push on."

It was fine to see that watch in his father's hand.

"I'm going to give it to you," said the boy, soberly. "You can wear it Sundays an' every day."

Gordon looked into the eyes of his son. He saw there the white soul of the little traveller just entering upon the world.

"I'm going to buy you some new clothes, too," said Socky, now overflowing with generosity.

"Where'll you get the money?"

"From my Uncle Silas." After a few moments Socky added, "If I was Lizzie Cornell's father I'd give her a good whipping."

They rode in silence awhile, and soon the boy lay back on his blanket looking up at the sky.

"Father," said he, presently.

"What?"

"I'm good to you, ain't I?"

"Very."

There was a moment of silence, and then the boy added, "I love you."

Those words gave the man a new sense of comfort. If he could have done so he would have embraced his son and covered his face with kisses.

The sun had sunk low and they were entering the edge of the night and the woodland. Soon the boy fell asleep. The silence of the illimitable sky seemed to be flooding down and delightful sounds were drifting on its current. They had passed the inn, long ago and walls of fir and pine were on either side of them. Gordon put into a deep cove, stopping under the pine-trees with his bow on a sand-bar. Then he let himself down, stretching his legs on the canoe bottom and lying back on his blanket.

For a long time he lay there thinking. He had been a man of some refinement, and nature had punished him, after an old fashion, for the abuse of it with extreme sensitiveness. He had come to the Adirondacks from a New England city and married and gone into business. At first he had prospered, and then he had begun to go down.

He had been a lover of music and a reader of the poets. As he lay thinking in the early dusk he heard the notes of the wood-thrush. That bird was like a welcoming trumpeter before the gate of a palace; it bade him be at home. Above all he could hear the water song of Fiddler's Falls—the tremulous, organ bass of rock caverns upon which the river drummed as it fell, the chorus of the on-rushing stream and great overtones in the timber.

Sound and rhythm seemed to be full of that familiar strain—so like a solemn warning: