Читать книгу The Road to Paris - Robert Neilson Stephens - Страница 9

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As they proceeded, Dick laughingly alluded to the time when, at the age of four, he had started out on this same road, thinking it would take him to Paris in a few hours.

"And wha kens," said MacAlister, in all seriousness, "but this same road may yet lead ye there, or to Chiney, for that matter? Him that sets out on a journey knowing where 'twill land him is a wiser man nor you and me, my son!"

Presently MacAlister fell behind, and was soon lost to sight as Dick rode on. By and by Dick dismounted, tied the horse to a tree by the path, and went on afoot. When he had walked about an hour, he was overtaken and passed by MacAlister, on the horse, which Tom, on coming up to it, had untied and mounted. Walking on alone, Dick in due time found the horse tied at the path's side, and mounted to overtake and pass Tom in turn. He caught up to his comrade at the place where, it had been decided, they should cross the Juniata, which they did on horseback together, partly by fording and partly by swimming the horse. Proceeding as before, and not losing the time to cross to the island for a visit to Dick's grandfather when they reached the Susquehanna, they came at nightfall to the house of a farmer on the west bank of that river, and lodged there. At early dawn they were on their way again, and just as the sun rose Dick reached the crest of the farthest mountains southeast of his home. Who could describe his feelings as he looked for the first time over the fair wooded country that rolled afar towards the purple and golden east? Did his mother, at this moment, looking towards the farthest azure line, know he was there at last, and that he saw what the birds had seen that he had so often envied when they flew eastward? "Get up!" he cried, and urged his horse down the eastern mountainside towards his future.

Riding and tying, the two comrades came to Harris's ferry-house, whence they crossed the Susquehanna in a scow, to the small collection of low buildings—stone residence, old storehouse for skins, blockhouse for defence, and others—which then constituted Harrisburg. While they were crossing, the ferryman at the pole entertained them with anecdotes of the parents of the John Harris of that day,—how they were sturdy Yorkshire people; how the wife Esther once in time of necessity rode all the way to Philadelphia in one day on the same horse; how she was once up the river on a trading trip to Big Island, and heard of her husband's illness and came down in a bark canoe in a day and a night; how she was a good trader, and could write, and had boxed the ears of many an Indian chief when he was drunk; how she could swim as well as a man and handle firearms as well as any hunter; how she worked at the building of her brick house five miles up the Susquehanna; how she once ran up-stairs and took from a cask of powder a lighted candle that her maid had mistakenly stuck in the bung-hole; how the then present John Harris was the first white child born thereabouts and was taken to Philadelphia to be baptized in Christ's Church. Dick would have liked to see the inside of the church at Paxton, three miles from Harrisburg, because one of his acquaintances, having got a girl into trouble, had made public confession before the congregation there, praying in the usual formula:

"For my own game,

Have done this shame,

Pray restore me to my lands again."

He would have liked, also, to seek out some member of the gang of "Paxton Boys" that had killed the Conestogo Indians in Lancaster County, in 1764, and get the other side of that story, which was generally accepted as one of unwarranted massacre of friendly natives. But the impulse to press forward overcame the other, and the travellers, having followed the left bank of the Susquehanna, by the road which had been in existence from Harris's since 1736, lodged on the second night of their journey at a wooden tavern in the village of Middletown. The next morning they turned directly eastward, their backs towards the Susquehanna, and proceeded on the road to Lancaster. They now entered the band of country settled by German Protestants, whose fertile farms gave the slightly undulating land a soft and smiling appearance.

At noon, dining at a rude log hostelry, more farmhouse than tavern, they were invited to drink by two thin, middle-aged, merry fellows, in brown cloth coats and cocked hats, who said they were Philadelphia merchants returning from a view of some interior land which they intended to purchase for the purpose of developing trade. They invited Tom and Dick to drink with them, laughed so boisterously at Tom's sage jokes, and expressed so much admiration of Dick's intelligence and book-learning, that when all four left the tavern to proceed eastward, Dick and Tom, seeing that the two jolly merchants were afoot, took counsel together and agreed to share with them the use of the horse. This generous idea was engendered by a hint that one of the merchants made in jest. The horse was a huge animal and could easily bear any two of four such thin men as were those concerned. Lots were cast to determine which two should be the pair to mount first. One of the two merchants held the straws, and as a result of the drawing he and his companion got on the horse together and started. A turn in the road hid them from view in half a minute. Dick and MacAlister were about to follow afoot, when they were reminded by the tavern-keeper that the drinks taken at the merchants' invitation were yet to be paid for.

"Bedad," said Tom, "our friends were so busy laughing at my tale of the ensign's wife at the battle of Minden, they forgot to settle the score." Dick, who had been provided with sufficient silver to see him to Philadelphia, besides his two gold pieces, speedily paid the bill, and the two comrades resumed their journey. After several minutes of silence, Tom expressed some belated surprise at the fact that two substantial merchants should be travelling afoot. Dick replied that there must be some interesting reason for so unusual a circumstance. "Ay," said Tom, "we'll speer them when we catch up to them." The two trudged on. By and by Dick began to look, each time the road made a turn, for the horse standing at the side of the way, accordingly to agreement. An hour had passed since the tavern had been left behind. Another hour followed. At last Dick broke the silence:

"Is it likely our friends may have lost their way?"

Tom MacAlister drew a deep breath and replied:

"Devil a bit is it them that's lost their way! It's us that's lost our horse."

"Why, what do you mean? Two such worthy Philadelphia merchants!"

"Philadelphia nothing! I'll warrant they do be a pair of rascals from the Connecticut settlement in the Wyoming Valley, turned out of the community for such-like tricks as they've played on us new-born babes. That's the effect on me of twelve years' residence in the wilderness. My son, it's time we throwed off our state of innocence and braced ourselves to meet the mickle deviltry of the world. Richard, lad, I tell it to ye now, though ye'll no mind it till ye've had it pounded into ye by sore experience, your fellow man is kittle cattle, and your fellow woman more so!"

They might have had to walk all the way to Lancaster but that they were overtaken by a train of pack-horses from Carlisle, and paid the pack-driver to shift the horses' loads and give them the use of one of the animals. At evening they arrived at Lancaster, which then had some thousands of inhabitants and was to Dick quite a busy and town-like place. He saw the prison where the Indian chief Murhancellin had been confined on being apprehended by Captain Jack's hunters for the murder of three Juniata men the previous year. Dick went to see the barracks, the Episcopal and German churches, and a house where some of the famous Lancaster stockings were made. He gazed with wonder and hidden disapproval at the long beards of the Omish men, and enjoyed the bustle of horses and wagons before the excellent tavern where he and Tom passed the night. The next morning the two got seats in one of the huge covered wagons engaged in the trade between Philadelphia and the interior. They dined at the Duke of Cumberland Tavern, and put up at evening at the sign of the Ship, thirty-five miles from Philadelphia. This distance was covered the next day, and a little before sunset, the wagon having crossed the picturesque Schuylkill by the Middle Ferry and passed under beautiful trees down the High Street road, through the Governor's Woods and by brick kilns and verdant commons, and across little water-courses spanned by wooden bridges, Dick set his eyes on Philadelphia, whose spires and dormer windows reflected the level sun rays, and whose trim brick and wooden houses rose among leafy gardens. The town then had about thirty thousand people, and lay close along the Delaware, its built-up portion extending at the widest part about seven or eight streets from the river, not counting the alleys and by-streets. As the wagon lumbered down High Street, which was then popularly (as it is now officially) known as Market Street, Dick kept his emotions to himself, satisfying his curiosity without betraying it, and in no outward way disclosing how novel to him was the actual sight, which neither excelled nor fell short of the scene he had so often imagined, much as it differed from it in general appearance. At Fourth Street, as the wagon continued east, the houses began to be quite close together. At Third, the markets began, and ran thence down the middle of the street towards the Delaware. The wagon, with its eight horses, stopped for some reason at the Indian King Tavern, near Third Street, whereupon Tom and Dick, having settled with the wagoner, and not intending to lodge at that inn, proceeded afoot down Market Street, a part of which was paved with stones and had a narrow sidewalk for foot-passengers. This last-named convenience was one that even some of the first cities of Europe then lacked.

The animation of the streets quite put to shame Dick's recollections of the little bustle at Lancaster. The rifles and baggage of the two did not attract much attention among the citizens and tradespeople, in those days of much hunting, and especially at a time when there was already talk of new military companies forming, when the provincial militia was drilling and recruiting, and when men were coming to town to offer the colonies their services in the event of general revolt. Delegates were already arriving from other colonies to attend the Second Continental Congress, which was to meet on the tenth.

As the two comrades approached the London Coffee House, at Front and Market Streets, they saw three well-dressed citizens issue from the door and greet with the utmost respect a stocky old gentleman who had just turned in from Front Street, and whose face was both venerable and worldly, kind and shrewd, while his plain brown coat took nothing from his look of distinction, and his walking-stick seemed quite unnecessary to one whose vigor was still that of youth. He cordially responded to the three gentlemen, the first of whom detained him for the purpose of introducing the third. The name by which the old gentleman was addressed startled Dick for the moment out of his self-possession, and he stopped and stared with unfeigned curiosity and pleasure. It was his first sight of a world-famous man, and the writer of Poor Richard's Almanac, whose proverbs every Pennsylvanian knew by heart, the celebrated philosopher, the wise agent of the provinces, who had just returned from London, lost nothing in Dick's admiration from the youth's visual inspection of his face and person.

While Doctor Franklin stood talking with the three, Dick and Tom went on past Front and Water Streets, turned down along the wharves, and presently arrived at their recommended destination, the Crooked Billet Inn, which stood at the end of an alley on a wharf above Chestnut Street. The two engaged lodging for the night, bestowed their belongings, and went for supper to Pegg Mullen's Beefsteak House, at the southeast corner of Water Street and Mullen's Alley. Having devoured one of the steaks for which that house was famous, and as it was not yet dark, Dick proposed a walk about the city. But Tom demurred as to himself, and said in a low tone, turning his eye towards a party of young gentlemen who sat at a near-by table:

"Go and see the sights, lad, and ye'll meet me at the Crooked Billet some time before the hour of setting out, the morning. I've other fish to fry, for a private purpose of my own. And should ye see me in company with yon roisterers, mind to call me captain or not at all, for I'm bent on introducing myself to their acquaintance, and that'll require me belonging to the quality."

Dick looked at the group indicated, which consisted of a handsome, insolent-looking young man of about twenty-five and three gay dogs of the same age, whose loud conversation had dealt exclusively with cards and other implements of fortune. With no hope or wish of fathoming MacAlister's designs, Dick paid the bill (for his friend was almost without money), and left the eating-house. He first inspected parts of Water and Front Streets, where many rich merchants lived over their shops; then viewed the handsomer residences in South Second Street; saw the City Tavern and some of the well-dressed people resorting there; looked at Carpenter's Hall, where the Congress had met the preceding year; walked out to the State House, crossed Chestnut Street therefrom, to drink at the sign of the Coach and Horses, the old rough-dashed tavern nestling amidst great walnut-trees; loitered on the bridge to look down at Dock Creek each time he crossed that stream. When, at dusk, the street lamps were lighted (for, thanks to Franklin, Philadelphia had long possessed the best street lamps in the world), the town assumed what to Dick was a fairylike appearance. Of the people he saw in the streets, perhaps a third wore the broadbrims of the Quakers. A few of the faces were of the German type, but most were of the unmistakable English character, and from such of these as were not Quaker a trained observer might easily have picked out a Church of England person or a Dissenter at sight. On first entering the city Dick had been struck with the prettiness of the young women, but now that night had fallen and he had returned to the vicinity of the river, the few of the fair that he saw abroad were of rather bedraggled appearance.

As he walked along the wharves, listening to the lap of the tide against the piles and vessels, he heard a sharp scream of mingled pain and anger, in a feminine voice. Looking quickly towards the wharf whence it came, he saw, in the light from the corner of a small warehouse, a young woman recoiling from the blow of a sailor who was about to strike her again. She dodged the second blow, and the sailor made ready to deliver a third, but before he could do so Dick's fist landed on the side of his head and he dropped to the wharf, dazed and limp. Dick then took off his hat to the woman, who was a slender creature of about twenty, dressed with a cheap attempt at gaiety. With quite attractive large eyes, she quickly viewed Dick from head to foot.

"Rely on my protection, madam," said he, tingling with exultation at having had so early an opportunity to figure as a rescuer of assailed womankind.

"I am afraid he will follow me," said the girl, in a low tone, glancing at the sailor, after her examination of Dick's appearance.

"He will do so at his peril, if you'll accept my arm to the place where you are going," said Dick, with great gallantry and inward self-applause.

The girl took the proffered arm, cast a final look at the sailor, who was foggily trying to get on his legs, and led Dick off at a rapid gait. They had turned into an alley towards Water Street before the sailor had fully regained his senses. Up Water Street the girl went, giving Dick the opportunity to see, by a window light or a street lamp here and there, that her features, though pale, were well formed. For beauty they lacked only something in expression. After passing several streets, the girl turned into another alley that led towards the river, stopped at a mean two-story wooden house half way down, and asked her preserver to come in and accept some refreshment. He did so with alacrity, and found himself in a small room beneath the rafters, the floor bare, the single window broken in most of its small panes, a tumble-down bed taking up half the apartment, a broken wooden chair beside a dressing-table, the whole lighted by a single tallow candle that the girl obtained down-stairs. Without consulting her guest, she called to some invisible person below for brandy and water, with two tumblers. Dick sat on the chair, his hostess on the bed, both in silence, till the liquor was brought by a fat, red-faced woman with unkempt hair, who grinned amiably at Dick, and departed only after several suggestive looks at the brandy. Her fishing for an invitation to partake was all in vain, being unobserved by the inexperienced Dick.

When he was alone with the heroine of his first adventure, and the brandy had been tasted, Dick undertook to overcome her reticence, being sure that she had some story of unmerited misfortune to tell. She soon gratified him with a tale as harrowing as might have been found anywhere in fiction. She was the daughter of people of quality who had lost their all through the schemes of designing persons, and her only weapon against starvation was her needle. She had that evening delivered some sewing to the wife of a sea-captain on his vessel, which was to sail that night, and it was on her return therefrom that she had been accosted by the sailor, whose blows were elicited by the repulse she had given him. Her face became more animated as she talked, and Dick began to think her fascinating. Brandy was called for and served repeatedly, and at last the red-faced woman who brought it said she was going to bed and could serve no more that night, and her bill was ten shillings. Dick promptly paid, forgetting that he was the invited guest, and not neglecting the occasion to show in a careless way how much money he carried. The girl then told him that, as he would certainly find his tavern closed should he return to it at so late an hour, she would, in spite of appearances and on account of his character and his services to her, share her own poor accommodations with him for the rest of the night. As Dick was now in a state in which he would have solicited this favor had it not been offered, he readily accepted.

When he awoke, at dawn, he found himself alone. Taking up his waistcoat to put it on, he noticed that a certain inner pocket did not bulge as usually. A swift investigation disclosed that all his money had disappeared, silver as well as gold. There was not a sign of his hostess left in the bare, squalid room. He hastened down the steep, narrow stairs, and met, in the entry below, the red-faced servitor, of whom he inquired the whereabouts of the girl. The fat woman professed entire ignorance of all occurrences since she had left the young people the night before. From that moment to this, she said, she had slept like a top, and from her reply Dick learned that she was the proprietress of the house, and that the unfortunate daughter of people of quality was a new lodger, of whom she knew nothing. A theory formed itself in Dick's mind, and he hastened from the house to the Crooked Billet, where he was astonished to find Tom MacAlister just arrived from a night, like Dick's, passed elsewhere than at that inn. Dick rapidly recounted his adventure to Tom, over a morning glass at the bar, and ended his narration with the words:

"Do you know what her disappearance means?"

"What?" grunted Tom.

"It means that my robbers have carried her away in order to silence all evidence of their crime! Or, maybe, the sailor tracked us and procured a gang to abduct her, and robbed me in doing so, either in revenge or to pay his accomplices!"

"Huh! Ye're ower fu' of them there things ye read in the novel-books, Dickie, lad."

"By George, this proves that real life is sometimes very like the novels! I hope this affair will end like them. We must find the girl, Tom; we must rescue her!"

"Be jabers, we maun be spry about it, then, for the New York stage-coach starts from the sign of the George in an hour."

"Come, then! But I won't leave Philadelphia till I've found her, though we have to wait for another day's stage-coach. Come, Tom, for God's sake don't be so slow!"

Tom indeed walked so deliberately from the Crooked Billet that Dick had to accelerate his progress by tugging at his arm. Dick hurried him up along the wharves, without the slightest plan of action formed. "Bide a wee," said Tom, presently; "sure, there's no arriving anywhere till ye've laid out your line of march. Come wi' me into yon tavern, and we'll plan a campaign in decency and order." Dick saw the good sense of this, and turned with Tom up an alley towards a wretched-looking place, of which the use was indicated alike by its dirty sign and by the sounds of drunken merriment issuing from its windows. As Dick and Tom entered, they saw by whom those sounds were produced,—a sailor and a young woman drinking together in great good-fellowship at a table. Dick recognized both,—the sailor whom he had knocked down the night before, the girl in whose defence he had knocked him down. Both looked up as he entered, and the girl burst out laughing in a jeering, drunken fashion. "That's him," she said to her companion, who thereupon began to bellow mirthfully to himself, regarding Dick with mingled curiosity and amusement.

"Wha might your friends be?" queried MacAlister of Dick.

"Come away," said Dick, a little huskily; and when the two were out in the alley, whither the derisive shouts of the pair inside followed them, he added, "If the stage goes in an hour, we'd better be taking our things to the sign of the George."

"But your money? 'Twas a canny quantity of coin ye had in the bit pocket there."

"Damn the money! I couldn't prove anything, and I want to get away from here. But—by the lord, how can we go on without money?"

"Whist, lad! If some folk choose to spend the nicht a-losing of their coin, there's others knows how to tell a different tale the morning. Do ye mind the braw soldier-looking lad I proposed to thrust my company on, in the beefsteak house? If I didn't introduce myself as Captain MacAlister, retired on half pay from his Majesty's army, and if I didn't pile up a bonny pile of yellow boys through handling the cards wi' him and his pals in his room at the George all nicht, then I'm seven kinds of a liar, and may all my days be Fridays! Oh, Dickie, lad, a knowledge of the cards, ye'll find, comes in handy at mony a place in the journey through this wicked, greedy, grasping world!" And old Tom made one of his pockets jingle as he finished.

The two travellers returned to the Crooked Billet, paid for the lodging they had not used, got their weapons and baggage, and went to Second Street and thereon north to Arch, at the southwest corner of which the sign of St. George battling with the dragon hung before the fine and famous inn where the stage-coaches departed and arrived. The "Flying Machine" was already drawn up before the entrance, the horses snorting and pawing in impatience to start. Dick and Tom saw their belongings safely stowed in the coach, which was a flat-roofed vehicle simple and plain in shape, and loitered before the inn, watching the hostlers and enjoying the fine spring sunshine, while MacAlister gave Dick a further description of the card-playing young man from whom much of the money had been won.

"I took the more joy in winning," added Tom, "for because the young buck showed himsel' sic a masterfu', overbearing de'il and ill-natured loser, not at all like his friend wi' the French name, who dropped his round shiners like a gentleman. And mind here, now, take heed to call me captain should they fa' in wi' us on the way to New York, for, frae the talk of them, I conjecture that them and the Frenchman's sister start the morning hame-bound for Quebec, on their ain horses."

"Do they come from Quebec?"

"Ay, on business for the Frenchman and his sister, wha, it seems, cam' in for the proceeds of some estate in this town, them being of English bluid on the mother's side. That I gathered frae the Frenchman's talk wi' a man of the law wha called while his hot-headed friend and me and the others were at the cards. Ah, now I mind the friend's name,—Blagdon, Lieutenant Blagdon; for, bechune you and me, he's a King's officer on leave of absence frae Quebec, only he keeps it quiet just now, lest the mob might throw a stane or two his way."

"Then what's he doing here?"

"Bearing company to the Frenchman and his sister. It's like there's summat bechune him and the girl, though devil a bit could I find that out, wi' all my speering. But come, lad, while we ha' our choice of seats."

They entered the coach, where they were soon joined by other passengers. While Dick was watching the driver on the front seat take up lines and whip, three horses were brought from the yard, and at the same time two young gentlemen and a young lady came out of the inn and stood ready to mount. Dick did not observe them until his attention was called from the driver by some low-spoken words of MacAlister's:

"That's a sour-faced return for a friendly salutation! 'Tis the English lieutenant that gave me a scowl for my bow. Sure, the French Canadian has more civility."

By this time the three were mounted. Dick at once recognized the robust but surly-looking young man on the right as the arrogant talker of the beefsteak house, and the rather slight but good-looking and well-mannered youth on the left as one of the other's companions there. The lady between the two was partly concealed from Dick's view by the English officer, until with a crack of the driver's whip the stage-coach pulled out, when, by looking back, he had a full sight of her. The sight caused his lips to part and himself to throw all his consciousness into his eyes alone.

Catherine de St. Valier, daughter of a younger branch of the noble French Canadian family of that name, was then in her seventeenth year, tall and well developed for her age, in carriage erect without stiffness, her face oval in shape with chin full but not too sharp or too strong, nose straight and delicate, dainty ears, forehead about whose sides hair of dark brown fell in curves but left the middle uncovered, brows finely arched and high above the eyes, which were of a piercing black and never too wide open, full red lips, complexion pale but clear, with a very faint touch of red in each cheek, her countenance dignified and made doubly interesting by a slight frown ever present save when she smiled, which was rarely and then naturally and with no gush of overpowering sweetness. The slightly thrown-back attitude of her head was no affectation, but was a family characteristic, possessed also by her brother.

"What is it, lad?" whispered MacAlister, catching Dick's arm. "Sure, ye'll be leaving that head of yours behind ye in the road if ye bean't carefu'!"

"Sure," Dick murmured, as he drew his head in, "I think I've left this heart of mine back yonder under the sign of the George."

Tom gave a low whistle. "Weel, weel," he then said, "it 'ull soon catch up, for this Flying Machine, as they call it, is no match for them Virginia pacers the Canadian folk is mounted on."

This prediction was soon fulfilled. Ere the stage-coach had passed the outskirts of the city, a little above Vine Street, the three riders had cantered by at a gait that promised soon to take them far ahead.

"Nay, don't be cast down," quoth Tom. "We're like to run across them on the journey, and they'll have to wait in New York for their baggage, which goes by wagon. I mind now, frae the gentlemen's talk, they'll go up the Hudson by sloop till Albany, then by horse again to Montreal, and then by the St. Lawrence to Quebec. What a pity they don't be bound for Boston,—eh, lad! But whist, Dickie! The sea do be full of good fish, and it's mony a sonsie face ye'll be drawing deep breaths about, now ye're over the hills and far away,—and ganging furder every turn of the coach-wheels."