Darrel of the Blessed Isles by Irving Bacheller

I >> Irving Bacheller >> Darrel of the Blessed Isles

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All that afternoon they spent in the city of the field. The life
of the birds in the great maple interested them most of all. In
the evening he played checkers with Polly and told her of school
life in the village of Hillsborough--the work and play of the
students.

"Oh! I do wish I could go," said she, presently, with a deep sigh.

He thought of the eighty-two dollars in his pocket and longed to
tell her all that he was planning for her sake.

Mrs. Vaughn went above stairs with the children.

Then Trove took Polly's hand. They looked deeply into each other's
eyes a moment, both smiling.

"It's your move," said she, smiling as her glance fell.

He moved all the checkers.

There came a breath of silence, and a great surge of happiness that
washed every checker off the board, and left the two with flushed
faces. Then, as Mrs. Vaughn was coming downstairs, the checkers
began to rattle into position.

"I won," said he, as the door opened.

"But he didn't play fair," said Folly.

"Children, I'm afraid you're playing more love than checkers," said
the widow. "You're both too young to think of marriage."

Those two looked thoughtfully at the checkerboard, Polly's chin
resting on her hand. She had begun to smile.

"I'm sure Mr. Trove has no such thought in his head," said she,
still looking at the board.

"You're mother is right; we're both very young," said Trove.

"I believe you're afraid of her," said Polly, looking up at him
with a smile.

"I'm only thinking of your welfare," said Mrs. Vaughn, gently.
"Young love should be stored away, and if it keeps, why, then it's
all right."

"Like preserves!" said Polly, soberly, as if she were not able to
see the point.

Against the protest of Polly and her mother, Trove went to sleep in
the sugar shanty, a quarter of a mile or so back in the woods. On
his first trip with the drove he had developed fondness for
sleeping out of doors. The shanty was a rude structure of logs,
with an open front. Tunk went ahead, bearing a pine torch, while
Trove followed, the blanket over his shoulder. They built a
roaring fire in front of the shanty and sat down to talk.

"How have you been?" Trove inquired.

"Like t' killed me there at the ol' maids'."

"Were they rough with you?"

"No," said Tunk, gloomily.

"What then?"

"Hoss."

"Kicked?" was Trove's query.

"Lord! I should think so. Feel there."

Trove felt the same old protuberance on Tunk's leg.

"Swatted me right in the knee-pan. Put both feet on my chest, too.
Lord! I'd be coughin' up blood all the while if I wa'n't careful."

"And why did you leave?"

"Served me a mean trick," said Tunk, frowning. "Letishey went away
t' the village t' have a tooth drawed, an' t'other one locked me up
all day in the garret chamber. Toward night I crawled out o' the
window an' clim' down the lightnin' rod. An' she screamed for help
an' run t' the neighbours. Scairt me half t' death. Heavens! I
didn't know what I'd done!"

"Did you come down fast?" Trove inquired.

"Purty middlin' fast."

"Well, a man never ought to travel on a lightning rod."

Tunk sat in sober silence a moment, as if he thought it no proper
time for levity.

"I made up my mind," said he, with an injured look, "it wa'n't
goin' t' do my character no good t' live there with them ol' maids."

There was a bitter contempt in his voice when he said "ol' maids."

"I'd kind o' like t' draw the ribbons over that mare o' yourn,
mister," said Tunk, presently.

"Do you think you could manage her?"

"What!" said Tunk, in a voice of both query and exclamation. "Huh!
Don't I look as if I'd been used t' hosses. There ain't a bone in
my body that ain't been kicked--some on 'em two or three times.
Don't ye notice how I walk? Heavens, man! I hed my ex sprung
'fore I was fifteen!"

Tunk referred often and proudly to this early springing of his
"ex," by which he meant probably that horse violence had bent him
askew.

"Well, you shall have a chance to drive her," said Trove, spreading
his blanket. "But if I'd gone through what you have, I'd keep out
of danger."

"I like it," said Tunk, with emphasis. "I couldn't live without
it. Danger is a good deal like chawin' terbaccer--dum nasty 'til
ye git used to it. Fer me it's suthin' like strawberry short-cake
and allwus was. An' nerve, man, why jes' look a' there."

He held out a hand to show its steadiness.

"Very good," Trove remarked.

"Good? Why, it's jest as stiddy as a hitchin' post, an' purty nigh
as stout. Feel there," said Tunk, swelling his biceps.

"You must be very strong," said Trove, as he felt the rigid arm.

"A man has t' be in the boss business, er he ain't nowheres. If
they get wicked, ye've got t' put the power to 'em."

Tunk had only one horse to care for at the widow's, but he was
always in "the hoss business."

Then Tunk lit his torch and went away. Trove lay down, pulled his
blanket about him, and went to sleep.

XXIII

A New Problem

When Trove woke in the morning, a package covered with white paper
lay on the blanket near his hand. He rose and picked it up, and
saw his own name in a strange handwriting on the wrapper. He
turned it, looking curiously at seal and superscription. Tearing
it open, he found to his great surprise a brief note and a roll of
money. "Herein is a gift for Mr. Sidney Trove," said the note.
"The gift is from a friend unknown, who prays God that wisdom may
go with it, so it prove a blessing to both."

Trove counted the money carefully. There were $3000 in bank bills.
He sat a moment, thinking; then he rose, and began searching for
tracks around the shanty. He found none, however, in the dead
leaves which he could distinguish from those of Tunk and himself.

"It must be from my father," said he,--a thought that troubled him
deeply, for it seemed to bring ill news--that his father would
never make himself known.

"He must have seen me last night," Trove went on. "He must even
have been near me--so near he could have touched me with his hand.
If I had only wakened!"

He put the money in his pocket and made ready to go. He would
leave at once in quest of Darrel and take counsel of him. It was
early, and he could see the first light of the sun, high in the
tall towers of hemlock. The forest rang with bird songs. He went
to the brook near by, and drank of its clear, cold water, and
bathed in it. Then he walked slowly to Robin's Inn, where Mrs.
Vaughn had begun building a fire. She observed the troubled look
in his face, but said nothing of it then. Trove greeted her and
went to the stable to feed his mare. As he neared the door he
heard a loud "Whoa." He entered softly, and the big barn, that
joined the stable, began to ring with noise. He heard Tunk
shouting "Whoa, whoa, whoa!" at the top of his voice. Peering
through, he could see the able horseman leaning back upon a pair of
reins tied to a beam in front of him. His cry and attitude were
like those of a jockey driving a hard race. He saw Trove, and
began to slow up.

"You are a brave man--there's no doubt of it," said the teacher.

"What makes ye think so?" Tunk inquired soberly, but with a glowing
eye.

"If you were not brave, you'd scare yourself to death, yelling that
way."

"It isn't possible, or Tunk would have perished long ago," said the
widow, who had come to feed her chickens.

"It's enough to raise the neighbours," Trove added.

"There ain't any near neighbours but them over 'n the
buryin'-ground, and they must be a little uneasy," said the widow.

"Used t' drive so much in races," said Tunk, "got t' be kind of a
habit with me--seems so. Ain't eggzac'ly happy less I have holt o'
the ribbons every day or two. Ye know I used t' drive ol' crazy
Jane. She pulled like Satan. All ye had t' do was t' lean back
an' let 'er sail."

"But why do you shout that way?"

"Scares the other hosses," Tunk answered, dropping the reins and
tossing his whip aside. "It's a shame I have t' fool my time away
up here on a farm."

He went to work at the chores, frowning with discontent. Trove
watered and fed his mare and went in to breakfast. An hour later,
he bade them all good-by, and set out for Allen's. A new fear
began to weigh upon him as he travelled. Was this a part of that
evil sum, and had his father begun now to scatter what he had never
any right to touch? Whoever brought him that big roll of money had
robbed him of his peace. Even his ribs, against which it chafed as
he rode along, began to feel sore. Home at last, he put up the
mare and went to tell his mother that he must be off for
Hillsborough.

"My son," said she, her arms about his neck, "our eyes are growing
dim and for a long time have seen little of you."

"And I feel the loss," Trove answered. "I have things to do there,
and shall return tonight."

"You look troubled," was her answer. "Poor boy! I pray God to
keep you unspotted of the world." She was ever fearing unhappy
news of the mystery--that something evil would come out of it.

As Trove rode away he took account of all he owed those good people
who had been mother and father to him. What a pleasure it would
give him to lay that goodly sum in the lap of his mother and bid
her spend it with no thought of economy.

The mare knew him as one may know a brother. There was in her
manner some subtle understanding of his mood. Her master saw it in
the poise of her head, in the shift of her ears, and in her tender
way of feeling for his hand. She, too, was looking right and left
in the fields. There were the scenes of a boyhood, newly but
forever gone. "That's where you overtook me on the way to school,"
said he to Phyllis, for so the tinker had named her.

She drew at the rein, starting playfully as she heard his voice,
and shaking his hand as if to say, "Oh, master, give me the rein.
I will bear you swiftly to happiness."

Trove looked down at her proudly, patting the silken arch of her
neck. If, as Darrel had once told him, God took note of the look
of one's horses, she was fit for the last journey. Arriving at
Hillsborough, he tied her in the sheds and took his way to the Sign
of the Dial. Darrel was working at his little bench. He turned
wearily, his face paler than Trove had ever seen it, his eyes
deeper under their fringe of silvered hair.

"An' God be praised, the boy!" said he, rising quickly. "Canst
thou make a jest, boy, a merry jest?"

"Not until you have told me what's the matter."

"Illness an' the food o' bitter fancy," said the tinker, with a sad
face.

"Bitter fancy?"

"Yes; an' o' thee, boy. Had I gathered care in the broad fields
all me life an' heaped it on thy back, I could not have done worse
by thee."

Darrel put his hand upon the boy's shoulder, surveying him from
head to foot.

"But, marry," he added, "'tis a mighty thigh an' a broad back."

"Have you seen my father?"

"Yes."

There was a moment of silence, and Trove began to change colour.

"And what did he say?"

"That he will bear his burden alone."

Then, for a moment, silence and the ticking of the clocks.

"And I shall never know my father?" said Trove, presently, his lips
trembling. "God, sir! I insist upon it. I have a right to his
name and to his shame also." The young man sank upon a chair,
covering his face.

"Nay, boy, it is not wise," said Darrel, tenderly. "Take thought
of it--thou'rt young. The time is near when thy father can make
restitution, ay, an' acknowledge his sin before the world. All
very near to him, saving thyself, are dead. Now, whatever comes,
it can do thee no harm."

"But I care not for disgrace; and often you have told me that I
should live and speak the truth, even though it burn me to the
bone."

"So have I, boy, so have I; but suppose it burn others to the bone.
It will burn thy wife; an' thy children, an' thy children's
children, and them that have reared thee, an' it would burn thy
father most of all."

Trove was utterly silenced. His father was bent on keeping his own
disgrace.

"Mind thee, boy, the law o' truth is great, but the law o' love is
greater. A lie for the sake o' love--think o' that a long time,
think until thy heart is worn with all fondness an' thy soul is
ready for its God, then judge it."

"But when he makes confession I shall know, and go to him, and
stand by has side," the young man remarked.

"Nay, boy, rid thy mind o' that. If ye were to hear of his crime,
ye'd never know it was thy father's."

"It is a bitter sorrow, but I shall make the best of it," said
Trove.

"Ay, make the best of it. Thou'rt now in the deep sea, an' God
guide thee."

"But I ask your help--will you read that?" said Trove, handing him
the mysterious note that came with the roll of money.

"An' how much came with it?" said Darrel, as he read the lines.

"Three thousand dollars. Here they are; I do not know what to do
with them."

"'Tis a large sum, an' maybe from thy father," said Darrel, looking
down at tile money. "Possibly, quite possibly it is from thy
father."

"And what shall I do with the money? It is cursed; I can make no
use of it."

"Ah, boy, of one thing be sure; it is not the stolen money. For
many years thy father hath been a frugal man--saving, ever saving
the poor fruit of his toil. Nay, boy, if it come o' thy father,
have no fear o' that. For a time put thy money in the bank."

"Then my father lives near me--where I may be meeting him every day
of my life?"

"No," said Darrel, shaking his head. Then lifting his finger and
looking into the eyes of Trove, he spoke slowly and with deep
feeling. "Now that ye know his will I warn ye, boy, seek him no
more. Were ye to meet him now an' know him for thy father an' yet
refuse to let him pass, I'd think thee a monster o' selfish
cruelty."

XXIV

Beginning the Book of Trouble

The rickety stairway seemed to creak with surprise at the slowness
of his feet as Trove descended. It was circus day, and there were
few in the street. Neither looking to right nor left he hurried to
the bank of Hillsborough and left his money. Then, mounting his
mare, he turned to the wooded hills and went away at a swift
gallop. When the village lay far behind them and the sun was low,
he drew rein to let the mare breathe, and turned, looking down the
long stairway of the hills. In the south great green waves of
timber land, rose into the sun-glow as they swept over hill and
mountain. Presently he could hear a galloping horse and a faint
halloo down the valley, out of which he had just come. He stopped,
listening, and soon a man and horse, the latter nearly spent with
fast travel, came up the pike.

"Well, by Heaven! You gave me a hard chase," said the man.

"Do you wish to see me?" Trove inquired.

"Yes--my name is Spinnel. I am connected with the bank of
Hillsborough. Your name is Trove--Sidney Trove?"

"Yes, sir."

"You deposited three thousand dollars today?"

"I did."

"Well, I've come to see you and ask a few questions. I've no
authority, and you can do as you like about answering."

The man pulled up near Trove and took a note-book and pencil out of
his pocket.

"First, how came you by that money?" said he, with some show of
excitement in his manner.

"That is my business," said Trove, coolly.

"There's more or less truth in that," said the other. "But I'll
explain. Night before last the bank in Milldam was robbed, and the
clerk who slept there badly hurt. Now, I've no doubt you're all
right, but here's a curious fact--the sum taken was about three
thousand dollars."

Trove began to change colour. He dismounted, looking up at the
stranger and holding both horses by the bit.

"And they think me a thief?" he demanded.

"No," was the quick reply. "They've no doubt you can explain
everything."

"I'll tell you all I know about the money," said Trove. "But come,
let's keep the horses warm."

They led them and, walking slowly, Trove told of his night in the
sugar-bush. Something in the manner of Spinnel slowed his feet and
words. The story was finished. They stopped, turning face to face.

"It's grossly improbable," Trove suggested thoughtfully.

"Well, it ain't the kind o' thing that happens every day or two,"
said the other. "If you're innocent, you won't mind my looking you
over a little to see if you have wounds or weapons. Understand,
I've no authority, but if you wish, I'll do it."

"Glad to have you. Here's a hunting-knife, and a flint, and some
bird shot," Trove answered, as he began to empty his pockets.

Spinnel examined the hunting-knife and looked carefully at each
pocket.

"Would you mind taking off your coat?" he inquired.

The young man removed his coat, uncovering a small spatter of blood
on a shirt-sleeve.

"There's no use going any farther with this," said the young man,
impatiently. "Come on home with me, and I'll go back with you in
the morning and prove my innocence."

The two mounted their horses and rode a long way in silence.

"It is possible," said Trove, presently, "that the robber was a man
that knew me and, being close pressed, planned to divert suspicion."

Save that of the stranger, there was no sleep at the little house
in Brier Dale that night. But, oddly, for Mary and Theron Allen it
became a night of dear and lasting memories of their son. He sat
long with them under the pine trees, and for the first time they
saw and felt his strength and were as children before it.

"It's all a school," said he, calmly. "An' I'm just beginning to
study the Book of Trouble. It's full of rather tough problems, but
I'm not going to flunk or fail in it."

XXV

The Spider Snares

Trove and Spinnel were in Hillsborough soon after sunrise the
morning of that memorable day. The young man rapped loudly on the
broad door at the Sign of the Dial, but within all was silent. The
day before Darrel had spoken of going off to the river towns, and
must have started. A lonely feeling came into the boy's heart as
he turned away. He went promptly to the house of the district
attorney and told all he knew of the money that he had put in the
bank. He recounted all that took place the afternoon of his stay
at Robin's Inn--the battles of the cocks, and the spider, and how
the wounded fowl had probably sprinkled his sleeve with blood. In
half an hour, news of the young man's trouble had gone to every
house in the village. Soon a score of his schoolmates and half the
faculty were at his side--there in the room of the justice. Theron
Allen arrived at nine o'clock, although at that hour two
responsible men had already given a bail-bond. After dinner,
Trove, a constable, and the attorney rode to Robin's Inn. The news
had arrived before them, but only the two boys and Tunk were at
home. The latter stood in front of the stable, looking earnestly
up the road.

"Hello," said he, gazing curiously at horse and men as they came up
to the door. He seemed to be eyeing the attorney with hopeful
anticipation.

"Tunk," said Trove, cheerfully, "you have a mournful eye."

Tunk advanced slowly, still gazing, both hands deep in his trousers
pockets.

"Ez Tower just went by," said he, with suppressed feeling. "Said
you was arrested fer murder."

"I presume you were surprised."

"Wal," said he, "Ez ain't said a word before in six months."

Tunk opened the horse's mouth and stood a moment, peering
thoughtfully at his teeth.

"Kind of unexpected to be spoke to by Ez Tower," he added, turning
his eyes upon them with the same curious look.

The interrogation of Tunk and the two boys began immediately. The
story of the fowl corroborated, the sugar-bush became an object of
investigation. Milldam was ten miles away, and it was quite
possible for the young man to have ridden there and back between
the hour when Tunk left him and that of sunrise when he met Mrs.
Vaughn at her door. Trove and Tunk Hosely went with the officers
down a lane to the pasture and thence into the wood by a path they
followed that night to and from the shanty. They discovered
nothing new, save one remarkable circumstance that baffled Trove
and renewed the waning suspicion of the men of the law. On almost
a straight line from bush to barn were tracks of a man that showed
plainly where they came out of the grass upon the garden soil.
Now, the strange part of it lay in this fact: the boots of Sidney
Trove exactly fitted the tracks. They followed the footprints
carefully into the meadow-grass and up to the stalk of mullen.
Near the top of it was the abandoned home of the spider and around
it were the four snares Trove had observed, now full of prey.

"Do not disturb the grass here," said Trove, "and I will prove to
you that the tracks were made before the night in question. Do you
see the four webs?"

"Yes," said the attorney..

"The tracks go under them," said Trove, "and must, therefore, have
been made before the webs. I will prove to you that the webs were
spun before two o'clock of the day before yesterday. At that hour
I saw the spinner die. See, her lair is deserted."

He broke the stalk of mullen and the cables of spider silk that led
away from it, and all inspected the empty lair. Then he told of
that deadly battle in the grass.

"But these webs might have been the work of another spider," said
the attorney.

"It matters not," Trove insisted, "for the webs were spun at least
twelve hours before the crime. One of them contains the body of a
red butterfly with starred wings. We cut the wings that day, and
Miss Vaughn put them in a book she was reading."

Paul brought the wings, which exactly fitted the tiny torso of the
butterfly. They could discern the footprints, one of which had
broken the ant's road, while another was completely covered by the
butterfly snare.

"Those tracks were made before the webs--that is evident," said the
attorney. "Do you know who made the tracks?"

"I do not," was the answer of the young man.

Trove remained at Robin's Inn that night, and after the men had
gone he recalled a circumstance that was like a flash of lightning
in the dark of his great mystery.

Once at the Sign of the Dial his friend, the tinker, had shown him
a pair of new boots. He remembered they were of the same size and
shape as those he wore.

"We could wear the same boots," he had remarked to Darrel.

"Had I to do such penance I should be damned," the tinker had
answered. "Look, boy, mine are the larger by far. There's a man
coming to see me at the Christmas time--a man o' busy feet. That
pair in your hands I bought for him."

"Day before yesterday," said Tunk, that evening, "I was up in the
sugar-bush after a bit o' hickory, an' I see a man there, an' I
didn't have no idee who 'twas. He was tall and had white hair an'
whiskers an' a short blue coat. When I first see him he was
settin' on a log, but 'fore I come nigh he got up an' made off."

Although meagre, the description was sufficient. Trove had no
longer any doubt of this--that the stranger he had seen at Darrel's
had been hiding in the bush that day whose events were now so
important.

Whoever had brought the money, he must have known much of the plans
and habits of the young man, and, the night before Trove's arrival
at Robin's Inn, he came, probably, to the sugar woods, where he
spent the next day in hiding.

The young man was deeply troubled. Polly and her mother sat well
into the night with him, hearing the story of his life, which he
told in full, saving only the sin of his father. Of that he had
neither the right nor the heart to tell.

"God only knows what is the next chapter," said he, at last. "It
may rob me of all that I love in this world."

"But not of me," said Polly, whispering in his ear.

"I wish I were sure of that," he answered.

XXVI

The Coming of the Cars

That year was one of much reckoning there in the land of the hills.
A year it was of historic change and popular excitement. To begin
with, a certain rich man bought a heavy cannon, which had roared at
the British on the frontier in 1812, and gave it to the town of
Hillsborough. It was no sooner dumped on the edge of the little
park than it became a target of criticism. The people were to be
taxed for the expense of mounting it--"Taxed fer a thing we ain't
no more need of than a bear has need of a hair-brush," said one
citizen. Those Yankees came of men who helped to fling the tea
into Boston harbour, and had some hereditary fear of taxes.

Hunters and trappers were much impressed by it. They felt it over,
peering curiously into the muzzle, with one eye closed.

"Ye couldn't kill nuthin' with it," said one of them.

"If I was to pick it up an' hit ye over the head with it, I guess
ye wouldn't think so," said another.

Familiarity bred contempt, and by and by they began to shoot at it
from the tavern steps.

The gun lay rejected and much in the way until its buyer came to
his own rescue and agreed to pay for the mounting. Then came
another and more famous controversy as to which way they should
"p'int" the gun. Some favoured one direction, some another, and at
last, by way of compliment, they "p'inted" it squarely at the house
of the giver on the farther side of the park. And it was loaded to
the muzzle with envy and ingratitude.

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