Marcus shook his head.
“I do not think there is much chance of that,” he said.
“How dare you say so?” said John Cleveland sharply; “and you who would be a minister and teach others. With God nothing is impossible. Have faith, lad—faith which can remove mountains,” and he clapped him on the shoulder, adding, “And now I’ll just let my missis know I’m going to breakfast up at the Marshes. I won’t leave you to face Father Nat alone. How he’ll live the day through without Loïs, his right hand, is more than I can tell. She thinks she’s of no account because she’s a woman, but we men should be badly off without our womankind, even though there are not many like our Loïs. I only want to live long enough to give her and Roger my blessing on their wedding-day, and I believe I shall, and that before long.”
It was no easy matter to hoodwink Father Nat. But she was gone; there was no remedy: they could not go after her, not knowing which way she had taken; and so, when Martha wept and wailed “that all her children were going from her,” Nathaniel said quietly,—
“She’s a wise and a good lass, and the Lord is with her. No harm will come to her, and maybe she’ll bring both the lads back.”
And so they watched and waited at the Marshes, and the snow fell covering the earth, and the rivers were icebound, and still there was no news of the wanderers.
CHAPTER XXXII
ON THE BATTLE-FIELD
The silver light of the moon was shining down on the battle-field, where the dead and dying lay in hideous confusion, the night after the fray. Dark figures moved stealthily to and fro, lanterns flashed on ghastly upturned faces, piteous voices called for help, hands were stretched out praying for mercy, too often only to meet death and spoliation. Birds of prey hovered overhead. Alas for poor human nature! there were those abroad who reverenced neither heroism nor death, but laid rude hands on their fellow-men, robbing and mutilating the prostrate forms as they lay writhing in death’s agony.
A group of half a dozen men in the well-known dress of the Royal Rangers had found their way to that part of the battle-field where the Indians had made their last fierce onslaught. The near approach of death had not extinguished the passionate instincts of hatred and revenge; more than once the treacherous knife gleamed in a dying hand seeking still to slay. Every precaution had to be taken by the searchers, as they picked their way over the ground strewn so thickly with the dead and dying, to avoid the murderous thrusts.
“Look here, Captain!” and the speaker, a young man, pointed to where a red chief lay, with a little child clasped in his arms. A shot had pierced the baby heart, in kindly mercy quieting for ever its wild fluttering; but the blue eyes were wide open still, and retained that look of terror mirrored in them which gleamed there when death came, and the long fair curls were dabbled in blood.