Yes. It was all up with him. He had been a wicked boy; he must take what came. But how they would all feel! Ally and Essie would cry fit to break their hearts. Old Uncle and Uncle Billy—oh, it would be dreary in the Valley! And his dear, dear, dear Aunt Susan, the only mother he had ever known—the image of her pale sweet face was too much for him, and he was crying himself with all his might. And then, wearied out, and sending up now a prayer to Heaven that he might not die, and now a prayer that they might not feel too bad at home—all at once he was sound asleep, and the great hemlock-tree was bending down its branches heavy with snow about him, and sheltering him.
When at last, aroused by a disturbance about him, the cry of voices, the blast of horns, the flash of lanterns, Will sleepily opened his eyes again, he might have thought it was heaven, with some great light glowing on a heavenly spirit’s face, only that he knew he deserved nothing of that sort! In another moment he saw that it was Aunt Susan, and without asking how she came there he threw himself into her arms.
The facts in the case were, that when Will had not returned to the camp there had been an alarm given. The whole body of men had gone out in search-parties after him and Pincher; for Pincher, too, was gone. It was one of these parties, passing in the distance, that had given Will his instant’s dream of the Wild Huntsman.
And Old Uncle, driving down from the upper camp, with a jingle of bells and flashing of sleigh-lamps, was passing just as a group of the men had paused wondering at the place not far from the wayside where for a circle of some hundred yards in diameter the snow was somewhat trodden down around the old post-office tree (the very circle where poor Will had done his tramping), and naturally Old Uncle had stopped and come to see what was the cause of the excitement. Aunt Susan had alighted too, and followed, and had been first of all to see Will in beneath the broad hemlock boughs.
In that moment of joy and relief and gratitude, Will never noticed the big pea-jacket that had been spread over him and from which Pincher was shaking the snow.
“I’ll—I’ll go to Bowdoin, Uncle,” Will was saying, standing between Old Uncle and Aunt Susan. “I’ll—I’ll learn the lines of the Greek ships by heart. I’ll—I’ll go to Bowdoin!”
Then he was in the sleigh, cuddled under the robes, ready for the drive to the lean-to of bark and boughs beside the long low log house of the camp, where Old Uncle and Aunt Susan were going to rough it for the night.
“I guess he’s cured,” muttered Pincher to Old Uncle, handing up the reins. “I guess he’s cured. I ain’t been fur off none er the time. And I guess he’s hed all he wants o’ loggin.’ And I’ll warrant he won’t run away to sea, nuther! He’s cured.”