The scout looked behind him, laughing at his own conceit, while he clambered up the partition, imitating, as he went, the clumsy motions of the beast he represented; but the instant the summit was gained, he made a gesture for silence, and slid down with the utmost precipitation.
“She is here,” he whispered, “and by that door you will find her. I would have spoken a word of comfort to the afflicted soul, but the sight of such a monster might well upset her reason. Though, for that matter, major, you are none of the most inviting yourself, in your paint.”
Duncan, who had already sprung eagerly forward, drew instantly back, on hearing these discouraging words.
“Am I then so very revolting?” he demanded, with an air of manifest chagrin.
“You might not startle a wolf, or turn the Royal Americans from a charge; but I have seen the time when you had a better favoured look, major,” returned the scout, dryly; “your streaked countenances are not ill judged of by the squaws, but young women of white blood give the preference to their own colour. See,” he added, pointing to a place where the water trickled from a rock, forming a little crystal spring, before it found an issue through the adjacent crevices; “you may easily get rid of the Sagamore’s daub, and when you come back, I will try my hand at a new embellishment. It’s as common for a conjuror to alter his paint, as for a buck in the settlements to change his finery.”
The deliberate woodsman had little occasion to hunt for arguments to enforce his advice. He was yet speaking, when Duncan availed himself of the water. In a moment, every frightful or offensive mark was obliterated, and the youth appeared again in the fine and polished lineaments with which he had been gifted by nature. Thus prepared for an interview with his mistress, he took a hasty leave of his companion, and disappeared through the indicated passage. The scout witnessed his departure with complacency, nodding his head after him, and muttering his good wishes; after which, he very coolly set about an examination of the state of the larder among the Hurons–the cavern, among other purposes, being used as a receptacle for the fruits of their hunts.
Duncan had no other guide than a distant glimmering light, which served, however, the office of a polar star to the lover. By its aid, he was enabled to enter the haven of his hopes, which was merely another apartment of the cavern, that had been solely appropriated to the safe keeping of so important a prisoner, as a daughter of the commandant of William Henry. It was profusely strewed with the plunder of that unlucky fortress. In the midst of this confusion he found the maiden, pale, anxious, and terrified, but still lovely. David had prepared her for such a visit.
“Duncan!” she exclaimed, in a voice that seemed to tremble at the sounds created by itself.
“Alice!” he answered, leaping carelessly among trunks, boxes, arms, and furniture, until he stood at her side.
“I knew, Duncan, that you would never desert me,” she said, looking up with a momentary glow of pleasure beaming on her otherwise dejected countenance. “But you are alone! grateful as it is to be thus remembered, I could wish to think you are not entirely alone!”
Duncan, observing that she trembled in a manner which betrayed an inability to continue standing, gently induced her to be seated, while he recounted those leading incidents which it has been our task to record. Alice listened with breathless interest; and though the young man touched lightly on the sorrows of the stricken father, taking care, however, not to wound the self-love of his auditor, the tears ran as freely down the cheeks of the daughter, as though she had never wept before. The soothing tenderness of Duncan, however, soon quieted the first burst of her emotions, and she then heard him to the close with undivided attention, if not with composure.
“And now, Alice,” he added, “you will see how much is still expected of you. By the assistance of our experienced and invaluable friend, the scout, we may find our way from this savage people, but you will have to exert your utmost fortitude. Remember, that you fly to the arms of your venerable parent, and how much his happiness, as well as your own, depends on those exertions.”
“Can I do otherwise for a father who has done so much for me!”
“And for me too!” continued the youth, gently pressing the hand he held in both his own.
The look of innocence and surprise which he received, in return, convinced Duncan of the necessity of being more explicit.
“This is neither the place nor the occasion to detain you with selfish wishes, sweet Alice,” he added; “but what heart loaded like mine would not wish to cast its burthen! They say misery is the closest of all ties; our common suffering in your behalf, left but little to be explained between your father and myself.”
“And dearest Cora, Duncan; surely Cora was not forgotten!”
“Not forgotten! no; regretted as woman was seldom mourned, before. Your venerable father knew no difference between his children; but I– Alice, you will not be offended, when I say, that to me her worth was in a degree obscured–”
“Then you knew not the merit of my sister,” said Alice, withdrawing her hand; “of you she ever speaks, as of one who is her dearest friend!”
“I would gladly believe her such,” returned Duncan, hastily; “I could wish her to be even more; but with you, Alice, I have the permission of your father to aspire to a still nearer and dearer tie.”
The maiden trembled violently, and there was an instant, during which she bent her face aside, yielding to the emotions common to her sensitive sex; but they quickly passed away, leaving her completely mistress of her deportment, if not of her affections.
“Heyward,” she said, looking him full in the eye, with a touching expression of innocence and dependency, “give me the sacred presence and the holy sanction of that parent, before you urge me farther.”
“Though more I should not, less I could not say,” the youth was about to answer, when he was interrupted by a light tap on his shoulder. Starting to his feet, he turned, and confronting the intruder, his looks fell on the dark form and malignant visage of Magua. The deep, guttural laugh of the savage, sounded, at such a moment, to Duncan, like the hellish taunt of a demon. Had he pursued the sudden and fierce impulse of the instant, he would have cast himself on the Huron, and committed their fortunes to the issue of a deadly struggle. But, without arms of any description, ignorant of what succours his subtle enemy could command, and charged with the safety of one who was just then dearer than ever to his heart, he no sooner entertained, than he abandoned the desperate intention.
“What is your purpose?” said Alice, meekly folding her arms on her bosom, and struggling to conceal an agony of apprehension in behalf of Heyward, in the usual cold and distant manner with which she received the visits of her captor.
The exulting Indian had resumed his austere countenance, though he drew warily back before the menacing glance of the young man’s fiery eye. He regarded both his captives for a moment with a steady look, and then stepping aside, he dropped a log of wood across a door different from that by which Duncan had entered. The latter now comprehended the manner of his surprise, and believing himself irretrivably lost, he drew Alice to his bosom, and stood prepared to meet a fate which he hardly regretted, since it was to be suffered in such company. But Magua meditated no immediate violence. His first measures were very evidently taken to secure his new captive; nor did he even bestow a second glance at the motionless forms in the centre of the cavern, until he had completely cut off every hope of retreat through the private outlet he had himself used. He was watched in all his movements by Heyward, who however remained firm, still folding the fragile form of Alice to his heart, at once too proud and too hopeless to ask favour of an enemy so often foiled. When Magua had effected his object, he approached his prisoners, and said, in English–
“The pale-faces trap the cunning beavers; but the red-skins know how to take the Yengeese!”
“Huron, do your worst!” exclaimed the excited Heyward, forgetful that a double stake was involved in his life; “you and your vengeance are alike despised.”
“Will the white man speak these words at the stake?” asked Magua; manifesting, at the same time, how little faith he had in the other’s resolution, by the sneer that accompanied his words.