CHAPTER LX.
THE LODGE IN THE HILLS.
Sitting by the crackling twigs which drove away the cool airs of the autumn night with their inspiring warmth, the young man, whose early fortunes we have thus far endeavored to narrate, leaned his head upon his hand, and mused and dreamed.
Overhead the shadows played upon the rafters; around him, the firelight lit up the wild and uncouth interior, with its sleeping hounds, and guns, and fishing-rods, and chests; on the opposite side of the fire-place, the old Indian woman was indulging, like Verty, in a reverie.
From time to time, Longears or Wolf would stir in their sleep, and growl, engaged in dreaming of some forest adventure which concerned itself with deer or other game; or the far cry of the whip-poor-will would echo through the forest; or the laughter of the owl suddenly come floating on, borne on the chill autumn wind.
This, with the crackle of the twigs, was all which disturbed the silence of the solitary lodge.
The silence lasted for half an hour, at the end of which time Verty changed his position, and sighed. Then looking at the old woman with great affection, the young man said:
"I was thinking who I was; and I wanted to ask you, ma mere—tell me."
The old woman looked startled at this address, but concealing her emotion with the marvellous skill of her people, replied in her guttural accent—
"My son wants to know something?"
"Yes, ma mere, that is it. I want to know if I really am your son."
The old woman turned her eyes from Verty.
"The fawn knows the deer, and the bear's cub knows his fellows," continued Verty, gazing into the fire; "but they laugh at me. I don't know my tribe."
"Our tribe is the Delaware," said the old Indian woman evasively—" they came from the great woods like a river."
"Like a river? Yes, they know their source. But where did I spring from, ma mere?"
"Where was my son born?"
"Yes, tell me everything," said Verty; "tell me if I am your son. Do not tell me that you love me as a son, or that I love you as my mother. I know that—but am I a Delaware?"
"Why does my son ask?"
"Because a bird of the air whispered to me—'You are not a Delaware, nor a Tuscarora, nor a Dacotah; you are a pale face.' Did the bird lie!"
The old woman did not answer.
"Ma mere," said Verty, tenderly taking the old woman's hand and sitting at her feet, "the Great Spirit has made me honest and open—I cannot conceal anything. I cannot pry and search. I might find out this from some other person—who knows? But I will not try. Come! speak with a straight tongue. Am I the son of a brave; am I a Delaware; or am I what my face makes me out—a Long-knife?"
"Ough! ough! ough!" groaned the old woman; "he wants to go, away from the nest where he was warmed, and nursed, and brought up. The Great Spirit has put evil into his heart—it is cold."
"No, no," said Verty, earnestly—"my heart is red, not white; every drop of my life-blood is yours, ma mere; you have loved me, cherished me: when my muscles were soft and hot with fever, you laid my head upon your bosom, and rocked me to sleep as softly as the topmost bough of the oak rocks the oriole; you loved me always. My heart shall run out of my breast and soak the ground, before it turns white; yet, I love you, and you love me. But, ma mere, I have grown well nigh to manhood; the bird's song is changed, and the dove has flown to me—the dove yonder at Apple Orchard—"
"Ough!" groaned the old woman, rocking to and fro; "she is black! She has made you bad!"
"No, no! she is white—she is good. She told me about the Great
Spirit, and makes me pure."
"Ough! ough!"
"She is as pure as the bow in the cloud," continued Verty; "and I did not mean that the dove was the bird who whispered, that I was no Delaware. No—my own heart says, 'know—find out.'"
"And why should the heart say 'know?'" said the old woman, still rocking about, and looking at Verty with anxious affection. "Why should my son seek to find?"
"Because the winds are changed and sing new songs; the leaves whisper, as I pass, with a new voice; and even the clouds are not what they were to me when I ran after the shadows floating along the hills, and across the hollows. I have changed, ma mere, and the streams talk no more with the same tongue. I hear the flags and water-lilies muttering as I pass, and the world opens on me with a new, strange light. They talked to me once; now they laugh at me as I pass. Hear the trees, yonder! Don't you hear them? They are saying, 'The Delaware paleface! look at him! look at him!'"
And crouching, with dreamy eyes, Verty for a moment listened to the strange sob of the pines, swaying in the chill winds of the autumn night.
"I am not what I was!" he continued; the world is open now, and I must be a part of it. The bear and deer speak to me with tongues I do not understand. Ma mere! ma mere! I must know whether I am a Delaware or pale face!—whether one or the other, I am still yours—yours always! Speak! speak with a straight tongue to your child!"
"Ough! ough! ough!" groaned the old woman, looking at him wistfully, and plainly struggling with herself—hesitating between two courses.
"Speak!" said Verty, with a glow in his eye, which made him resemble a young leopard of the wild—"speak, ma mere!—I am no longer a child! I go into a new land now, and how shall it be? As a red face, or a long knife—which am I? Speak, ma mere—say if I am a Delaware, whose place is the woods, or a white, whose life must take him from the deer forever!"
The struggle was ended; Verty could not have uttered words more fatal to his discovering anything. He raised an insuperable barrier to any revelations—if, indeed, there existed any mystery—by his alternative. Was he a Delaware, and thus doomed to live in the forest with his old Indian mother—or was he a white, in which case, he would leave her? Pride, cunning, above all, deep and pure affection, sealed the old woman's lips, if she had thought of opening them. She looked for sometime at Verty, then, taking his head between her hands, she said, with eyes full of tears:
"You are my own dear son—my young, beautiful hawk of the woods—who said you were not a true Delaware!"
And the old woman bent down, and with a look of profound affection, pressed her lips to Verty's forehead.
The young man's face assumed an expression of mingled gloom and doubt, and he sighed. Then he was an Indian—a Delaware—the son of the Indian woman—he was not a paleface. All the talk about it was thrown away; he was born in the woods—would live and die in the woods!
For a moment the image of Redbud rose before him, and he sighed. He knew not why, but he wished that he was not an Indian—he wished that his blood had been that of the whites.
His sad face drooped; then his eyes ware raised, and he saw the old woman weeping.
The sight removed from Verty's mind all personal considerations, and he leaned his head upon her knee, and pressed her hand to his lips.
"Did the child make his mother weep," he said; "did his idle words bring rain to her eyes, and make her heart heavy? But he is her child still, and all the world is nothing to him."
Verty rose, and taking the old, withered hand, placed it respectfully on his breast.
"Never again, ma mere" he said, "will the wind talk to me, or the birds whisper. I will not listen. Have I made your eyes dark? Let it pass away—I am your son—I love you—more than all the whole wide world."
And Verty sat down, and gazed tenderly at the old woman, whose face had assumed an expression of extraordinary delight.
"Listen," said Verty, taking down his old violin, with a smile, "I will play one of the old tunes, which blow like a wind from my childhood—happy childhood."
And the young man gazed for a moment, silent and motionless, into the fire. Then he raised his old, battered instrument, and began to play one of the wild madrigals of the border.
The music aroused Longears, who sat up, so to speak, upon his forepaws, and with his head bent upon one side, gazed with dignified and solemn interest at his master.
The young man smiled, and continued playing; and as the rude border music floated from the instrument, the Verty of old days came back, and he was once again the forest hunter.
The old woman gazed at him with thoughtful affection, and returned his smile. He went on playing, and the long hours of the autumn night went by like birds into the cloudland of the past.
When the forest boy ceased playing, it was nearly midnight, and the brands were flickering and dying.
Waked by the silence, Longears, who had gone to sleep again, rose up, and came and licked his master's hand, and whined. Verty caressed his head, and laying down his violin, looked at the old Indian woman with affectionate smiles, and murmured:
"We are happy still, ma mere!"