From that day to the end of his life, no one ever heard George Shannon mention a word of this episode. Beyond the two leaders of the party, none of the expedition ever knew who had played the part of the mysterious messenger. Nor did any one know, later, whence came the funds which eventually carried George Shannon through his schooling in the East, through his studies for the bar, and into the successful practise which he later built up in Kentucky’s largest city.
Meriwether Lewis, limp and lax now, shivering in the chill under the reaction from his excitement, turned away, stepped back to his own lodge, and contrived a little light, after the frontier fashion—a rag wick in a shallow vessel of grease. With this uncertain aid he bent down closer to read the finely written lines, which ran:
My Friend:
This is my last letter to you. This is the one I have marked Number Six—the last one for my messenger.
Yes, since you have not returned, now I know you never can. Rest well, then, sir, and let me be strong to bear the news when at length it comes, if it ever shall come. Let the winds and the waters sound your requiem in that wilderness which you loved more than me—which you loved more than fame or fortune, honor or glory for yourself. The wilderness! It holds you. And for me—when at last I come to lay me down, I hope, too, some wilderness of wood or waters will be around me with its vast silences.
After all, what is life? Such a brief thing! Little in it but duty done well and faithfully. I know you did yours while you lived. I have tried to do mine. It has been hard for me to see what was duty. If I knew as absolute truth that conviction now in my heart—that you never can come back—how then could I go on?
Meriwether—Merne—Merne—I have been calling to you! Have you not heard me? Can you not hear me now, calling to you across all the distances to come back to me? I cannot give you up to the world, because I have loved you so much for myself. It was a cruel fate that parted us—more and more I know that, even as more and more I resolve to do what is my duty. But, oh, I miss you! Come back to me—to one who never was and never can be, but is——
Yours,
Theodosia.
It took him long to read this letter. At last his trembling hand dropped the creased and broken sheets. The guttering light went out. The men were silent, sleeping near their fires. The peace of the great plains lay all about.