"MRS. ELWOOD, MY FRIEND,—Our Mr. Phillips has been here, and told us all that has happened in your settlement. Mrs. Elwood, I am greatly troubled at the loss your family suffer, with the rest of the hunters, but still more troubled and fearful for your husband and your noble son, about what may grow out of the quarrel with that dark man. My father knew him, time long past, and said there would be mischief done the company, when we heard he was going with them. I hope Mr. Elwood will keep out of his way; and I hope, Claud,—O, I cannot write the thought. Mrs. Elwood, I am very unhappy. I sometimes wish your brave and noble son had suffered me to go down and be lost in the dark, wild waters of those fearful rapids. By the goodness of my white father, whom I am proud to hope you may some time see with me in your settlement, I have all the comforts and indulgences that a heart at ease could desire; warm, carpeted rooms, dress, books, company, smooth flatterers, who mean little, it may be, together with real friends, who mean much, and prove it by actions, which do not, like words, ever deceive. And yet, Mrs. Elwood, they are all now without any charms for me. My heart is in your settlement. The grand old forest, and the bright lake, were always things of beauty for me, before I saw him; but now, when associated with him,—O, Mrs. Elwood, if I did not know you had something of what I meant should forever be kept secret from all but the Great Eye, in your keeping, and if you had not made me feel you would be my discreet friend, and keep it as safe from all as an unspoken thought, I would not for worlds write what I have, and what I every moment find my pen on the point of writing more fully. O, how I wish I could make you understand, without words, what I feel,—how I grieve over what I almost know must be vain hopes, and vainer visions of happiness! You have sometimes had, it may be, very bright, delightful dreams, which seemed to bring you all your heart desired; and then you suddenly awoke, and found all had vanished, leaving you dark and sad with disappointment and regret. If you have, you may fancy what my thoughts are undergoing every hour of the day. O, how my heart is drawn away towards you! I often feel that I must fly up, like a bird, to be there. I should come now, but for what might be thought. I shall certainly be there in early spring. I can't stay away, though I may come only to see what I could bear less easy than these haunting, troubled fancies. Mrs. Elwood, adieu. You won't show this, or breathe a word about it,—I know you won't; you could not be so cruel as that. Mrs. Elwood, may I not sign myself your friend? FLUELLA."
On perusing this unexpected communication, Mrs. Elwood felt—she scarcely knew herself what she felt, except a keenly appreciating sense of the writer's embarrassed feelings, and except, also, the pleasurable emotions which this timid and tender outpouring of an unsophisticated heart somehow afforded her. Ever since her singular interview with this remarkable girl, as described in a former chapter, Mrs. Elwood had not ceased to think of her as of some good angel, sent by an interposing Providence, in answer to the agonizing supplications which immediately preceded her unexpected appearance at the time,—sent to be the means, in some unforeseen way, of extricating her family from the fatal influences, as she viewed them, under which they had insidiously been brought by their different connections with the Gurleys. Especially had she been impressed that this would prove the case, in all that related to her idolized son, Claud; whom, in her disregard to all considerations of lineage, when relieved by such excellence of beauty and character, she would a thousand times rather have seen united to the Indian girl than to the one he appeared to have chosen. She was, therefore, besides being touched by the broken pathos of the letter, gratified by its reception; for it seemed to come as a sort of confirmation of her grateful presentiment, that her son, at least, was to be happily disenthralled. Nor was she, at this time, without the evidence which led her to hope that her husband, also, had now finally escaped from the toils that had, once and again, caused him such calamity and suffering. The sudden and terrible outbreak of indignation, which, with equal surprise and gratification, she had seen him exhibit against Gaut, and the quarrel in court, which followed in consequence, must, she thought, now forever keep them separate. If so, poorly as her family could afford to suffer their part of the loss of the avails of the fall's work, she would cheerfully bear it, and even look upon the event in the light of a Heaven-sent mercy. But even of this poor comfort she was destined soon to be deprived. After the trial, Mark Elwood—who, however bravely he bore himself at first, on that occasion, was finally seen to quail under the terrible glances of Gaut—soon became strangely silent respecting the prosecution and supposed perpetration of the offence about which he had before manifested so much zeal and indignation. And, in the active exertions which Phillips and Codman, in the vain search for evidence or some clue to the robbery of the furs, perseveringly kept up during the whole of the long and dreary winter that followed, he could not be induced to take any decided part. Nor would he, when they met him at his own house, or that of Phillips, as they several times did, that winter, to compare the discoveries and observations they had made, and discuss the subject, any longer maintain the position he at first so boldly took, respecting Gaut's guilt, or say any thing in aid of their deliberations. He, indeed, as they grew more decided and convinced, seemed to grow more wavering and doubtful. Such was his demeanor and conduct in company of his late companions; while, with his own family, he appeared moody, irresolute, and restless, and even, at length, he began to throw out occasional hints tending to defend or extenuate the conduct of the very man whom, a few weeks before, he had so confidently denounced as a thief and a robber. Alarmed at these indications of returning weakness and fatuity in her husband, Mrs. Elwood soon put herself on inquiry, to ascertain the cause; and she was not long in making discoveries that more than justified her worst fears and suspicions.
It appeared that Gaut Gurley, after his arrest, and after his escape from the punishment of the law, through the means, as was now generally believed, which he had cunningly provided before he entered on the commission of the offence charged, remained almost constantly at home, during nearly the whole winter, brooding, in savage mood, over his own dark thoughts and varying schemes for advantage and revenge, keeping his family in continual awe of him, and causing all who approached him to recoil, shuddering, from his presence, and mark him as a dangerous man in the community. Towards spring, however, he appeared suddenly to change his tactics, or, at least, to undergo a great change in his deportment and conduct. All at once, he came round in his usual manner. The dark cloud had been banished from his brow. He civilly accosted every acquaintance he met, appeared cheerful and good-humored, and desirous of prolonging the conversation with all with whom he came in contact, without seeming to notice, in the least, the evident inclination of most of the settlers to avoid his company. He came down, every few days, to the little village before named as the place where the court was held, and lounged for hours about the tavern; which, during the winter season, was the common resort of the settlers. Here he soon encountered his old companions, Phillips, Codman, and the Elwoods, all of whom, notwithstanding the cold and demure manner with which the two former, at least, turned away from him, he saluted with careless ease, and as if nothing had happened to disturb their former social relations. And, having thus surmounted the somewhat difficult task of breaking the ice with them, without receiving the open and absolute repulse which, however disposed, they did not deem it wise to give him, he, at the next meeting, ventured to broach the subject of their late quarrel, affecting to laugh at their mutual exhibitions of folly in getting so angry with each other in court, under the belief, on his part, that they had got the furs, and, on their part, that he had made way with them; when neither of them were guilty, and ought not to be charged with the offence. For himself, he said, he was now satisfied, on thinking the matter over, who were the real culprits. They were a couple of "cussed runagate Indians," that had strolled over from Canada, and, having discovered his camp, had laid in wait for his absence. He had seen the tracks of two different-sized moccasins in the sand on the lake-shore, but two days before he left; but the circumstance was forgotten, or he should not have left the camp unguarded. It was a great loss for them all; but it would not help the matter to mourn now. It must be borne; and he knew of no way to make it up but to try their luck in another expedition. He should, for his part; for he had no notion of giving up so.
Such was the drift of his conversation at this interview; and, seeming to think he had ventured far enough for one experiment on their credulity, he dropped that subject and struck off on to others. But the next time he met them he contrived to turn the conversation upon the same theme; when, telling them with a confidential air that, a few days before he left camp, he discovered, on a stream coming in at the upper end of the Megantic, a succession of freshly-constructed beaver dams, which, from the number of houses and other indications around each, he thought must be occupied by one of the largest colonies of beavers ever collected on one stream in that part of the country, he directly proposed to them to join him, when the spring opened, in an expedition to secure this extraordinary collection of the valuable animals that were, unquestionably, still all there, and as unquestionably might be captured.
This story, with the accompanying proposal, presented, as Gaut well knew, the most tempting inducement that could be offered, to trappers. But it made no impression on Phillips and Codman. They deeply distrusted the man, his whole story, and the motives which they believed moved him to concoct it. Spurning in their hearts, therefore, the bait that had been so artfully laid for them, they would have nothing to do with him or his proposal. And, both then and thereafter, they remained unmoved, and stood proof against all the arguments his taxed ingenuity and devilish cunning could invent and bring to bear upon them.
With the infatuated Mark Elwood, however, the case seemed to be almost wholly reversed. He again listened,—was again lost. He, restless, uneasy, and evidently apprehensive of something he did not disclose, from continuing under the terrible displeasure which Gaut had so significantly manifested towards him,—he had appeared, from the first, to hail with pleasure the indications of the relenting mood of the other, and seemed but too glad to be again noticed with favor. He could see no reason to distrust the man's sincerity, he said, when others raised the question; and he was much inclined to adopt his version of the robbery and burning of their camp. When, therefore, the proposal of a new expedition was made, under the circumstances we have named, the blinded Elwood seemed fully prepared to accept it; and he would have openly and without reserve done so, but for the restraining presence of his companions, who, he felt conscious, would disapprove and deprecate his conduct. Gaut had noticed all this, and was not long in bringing about a private interview with his dupe and victim, which resulted, as might be supposed, in settling the matter in just the way he intended.
From that time, the conduct of Mark Elwood became wholly inexplicable to all his friends and acquaintances in the settlement. He commenced with defending Gaut Gurley, thus giving the lie to all he had said, and ended with declaring an intention of accompanying him in another trapping expedition to the upper lakes, to be entered upon on a given day in April, then near at hand. And, in spite of all the advice and warnings of his late associates in the former disastrous campaign; the remonstrances of his son, who shared in the apprehensions of the others; and the agonizing tears and entreaties of his wife, he strangely persisted in his purpose, and, like the fated one of the Scriptures, steadily "set his face" towards his contemplated destination.
"The man is hurried!" said Phillips to Codman, as they left Elwood's on a second and last visit, made with the sole object of dissuading him from a step which they shrank from themselves,—that of going into the distant forest with such a desperate fellow as they now deeply suspected Gaut Gurley to be,—"the man is evidently hurried. When I saw that look Gaut gave Elwood in court, I knew he was marked for destruction, more especially than the rest of us, who are doubtless both placed on the same list. And Elwood would see it himself, if he was right-minded. Yes, he is hurried, and can't help it. He will go, and God grant my fears may not be realized."
And he did go, but not alone. As soon as Claud became fully satisfied that his father's purpose was not to be shaken, he began earnestly to debate in mind the question whether he himself should not, as a filial duty, become a participant in the expedition, with the view of making his presence instrumental in averting the apprehended danger. And, although he perceived that his mother's distress, all troubled and doubtful as she was in deciding between her conflicting duties of affection, would be enhanced by the step; and, although his mind had been still more staggered by a brief confidential note from Avis Gurley, advising him, if not too late, to find means to break up the project of the expedition entirely, yet he finally made up his mind in the affirmative. And, accordingly, on the morning of the appointed day, both father and son, after a leave-taking with the despondent wife and mother, more ominously sad and mournful than had ever before marked their family trials, set forth again for the wild wastes of the lakes, with their now doubly questionable companion.