The lost hunter: A tale of early times

by John Turvill Adams

"Thou didst find compensation for lamentation over the dead, in the caresses of the living?"

"True, too true. While Frances lived, she was my heaven. It was necessary that this idol should be torn from me. My son, too. Oh, James, my son! my son!"

Holden, during the conversation, had been unable to keep his seat, but with the restlessness of his nature had been walking across the room, stopping occasionally before Armstrong. The last expression of feeling evidently affected him. The rapidity of his steps diminished; his motions became less abrupt; and presently he laid his hand upon the shoulder of Mr. Armstrong.

"Thy tale," he said, "is one of sorrow and suffering. Thou didst violate thy duty, and art punished. No wrong shall escape the avenger. As it is written, 'Vengeance is mine, I will repay, saith the Lord.' But it is also written, 'He is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repenteth him of the evil.' Thou art after all but an instrument in the hand of One mighty to do. Even out of crime He works out the purposes of his will. Thou knowest not from what sin and sorrow an early death may be the refuge. Commit thyself to the hands of the Lord, nor grieve as one without hope. Thy brother liveth, and thou shalt yet behold him."

"I know he lives, and at the Judgment shall I behold him," said
Armstrong, shuddering, "to upbraid me with his murder."

"Not to upbraid, but to forgive, and to imprint upon thy brow the seal of reconciliation, as I now, by this token, vow to thee an everlasting love." So saying, Holden bent down, and his lips touched the forehead of Armstrong.

We do not know that we ought to be surprised at anything in the conduct of this extraordinary man. The principles by which he regulated himself, if he had any that were fixed and determinate, and was not impelled to his actions by the impulse of the moment, were so different from those of other men, that it is difficult to reduce them to the same standard, or, indeed, to assign them to any standard. Be it as it may, so accustomed was Mr. Armstrong to his ways, that so singular a thing did not impress him as strange. He only looked up with eyes dimmed with tears, and, in broken accents, thanked the Solitary.

The rest of the time spent by Armstrong on the island, was passed in conversation of very much the same description. It would seem from his self-reproaches and confessions, that during the lives of his wife and son, the melancholy death of his brother had made no great impression upon him. Happy in a woman he adored, and who returned his affection; with a blooming family around him; immersed in thoughts of business; and in the enjoyment of a large fortune, there seemed nothing wanting to complete his felicity. He remembered, too, that there had been an instance of insanity in his family, some years before the birth of himself, which had terminated fatally, the cause of which could not be traced, and felt disposed, therefore, with the natural tendency to self-exculpation of the happy, to find the reason for the tragical end of his brother in hereditary infirmity, rather than attach any serious blame to himself for securing the affections of a lady, whom he was assured had never loved another. But when after a few years of unclouded bliss, first his wife, and then his son, was taken away, all things assumed an altered aspect. He found himself the last male of his family, his name about to become extinct and forgotten, with only one other being in the world in whose veins ran his blood, and for whose life his paternal solicitude almost daily trembled. His mind brooded day by day more and more over his misfortunes, which gradually began to wear the form of judgments, the object and result of which must be to erase his hated name from the earth. As Faith grew up, his anxieties on her account diminished, but that only left him the wider scope to dwell upon wild imaginations and make himself more the subject of his thoughts. Of a grave and reflective cast of mind, he had even from his early years respected the duties of religion, and now he turned to it for consolation. But the very sources whence he should have derived comfort and peace were fountains of disquiet. His diseased mind seemed incapable of appropriating to itself the gentle promises of pardon and acceptance, but trembled at the denunciations of punishment. The universal Father came not to him with open arms, as to welcome a returned prodigal, but frowned with the severity of a Judge about to pronounce sentence. Whithersoever the unhappy man turned, he saw no ray of light to gild the darkness, and he himself sometimes feared lest reason should desert her throne. But his friends felt no apprehensions of the kind. In their presence, though grave, he was always reasonable and on his guard—for he shrunk with the sensitiveness of a delicate mind from exposing its wounds—nor with the exception of the minister, and now Holden, was there one who suspected his condition, and they probably did not realize it fully. These remarks may serve to abate, if not to remove entirely the reader's surprise, that one with the education, and in the position of Armstrong, should have sought counsel from Holden. But it may be, that the condition of mind to which Armstrong was approaching—similar in some respects to that of the Solitary—established a sort of relation or elective affinity between them, operating like the influence of the magnet, to attract one to the other. We have seen how fond Holden was of visiting the house of Mr. Armstrong. Could it be that this mysterious influence, all unconsciously to himself, led his steps thither, and that afar off he dimly espied the talisman that should establish a full community between them? Or was not this community already established? How else account for the visit of Armstrong, the strange conversation, the confessions, concluded by an act, tender, and perhaps graceful, but only such as was to be expected from a deranged man?

Josiah Sill, true to his promise, arrived while the two men were still talking, heedless of the passage of time. Mr. Armstrong stepped on board, and the boat resumed her course. The wind was drawing down the river, remaining nearly in the same point from which it had blown in the morning, and they were obliged in consequence to pursue a zig-zag course, tackling from one shore to the other. It blew fresh, and the little vessel, gunwale down, with the water sometimes pouring over the lee side, flew like a bird. They had run two-thirds of the distance, nor was the sun yet set, when the wind, which, till then, had blown pretty steadily, began to intermit and come in flaws or puffs, now driving the small craft with great rapidity, and now urging her gently on. At an instant, when she was about to tack, having hardly head-way sufficient to prevent missing stays, a sudden and violent puff, from a gorge in the hills, struck the sail. Had it come at any other moment, the catastrophe that followed could not have happened; but the boat lying almost motionless, received all the force of the wind, and instantly upset. Mr. Armstrong, unable to swim, and encumbered by his clothes, sank, but was caught by the strong arm of Sill, and pulled upon the keel. In a state of great discomfort, though of safety, there both remained for some time, waiting for assistance. None arriving, Sill, at last, became impatient, and as he was an excellent swimmer, proposed to throw off the heavier part of his clothing, and swim to land to hasten succor. As Mr. Armstrong made no objection, and the danger appeared less than what was likely to proceed from a long continuance on the boat, exposed in their wet clothes to the wind, the shore being but a few rods distant, Sill, after divesting himself of a part of his clothes, plunged into the water, and with vigorous strokes swam towards the land. He had proceeded but a short way when, either in consequence of becoming benumbed by the coldness of the water after being chilled by exposure to the wind, or from being seized by cramp, or from what other cause, the unfortunate man suddenly turning his face towards Armstrong, and uttering a cry of alarm, sank and disappeared from sight. Once more only was anything seen of him, when brought near the surface, perhaps, by an eddy in the stream, a hand emerged, and for an instant the fingers quivered in the air.

With a sort of desperate horror Armstrong gazed upon the appalling spectacle. The expression of anguish on the face of the drowning fisherman, as his distended eyes met his own, froze his blood, and left a memory behind to last to his dying day. Fascinated, his eyes dwelt on the spot where the fisherman sunk, and for a moment a terrible temptation was whispered into his ear quietly, to drop into the river, and accompany the spirit of the drowned man. But it lasted only a moment, and the instinct of life resumed its power.