When we came out, the men crowded round to hear our adventures. Amos started to tell the story, and when he got hung up on a word, Edmund would go on with the tale.
BEN HAS A FEVER
I felt hot and feeble and sick. My head ached. I became dizzy, and finally asked some one to take me to a room where I could lie down, and I went to bed. I haven't any clear idea of what happened afterward. I have a faint recollection of Edmund and Amos bending over me, saying good-by. But I do remember that Indian who tried again and again to scalp me. John Stark drove him off several times, but he kept coming back, and at last caught me by the hair, ran his knife round my head, braced his foot on my shoulder, pulled, and I felt my scalp go. Then I knew nothing more till I opened my eyes, and saw the rafters above, and the bedclothes about me.
I smelt smoke, and heard the wood snap and crackle. Beside the fireplace a girl was seated, knitting. Such a pretty girl, the loveliest I had ever seen. I watched her knit, and then stop and count the stitches. How beautiful she was, with her light brown hair, the pretty side face, with the fresh colour in it! Her figure was lithe, supple, full of grace. I thought at once of Shakespeare's Rosalind. My heart went out to her. As I gazed, she looked up, and turned a pair of big brown eyes at me. I had never been in love before. But, as she rose and came over to the bed, I said to myself:—
"This is she. This is the one for whom I have waited."
She smiled, and a little dimple came in her cheek.
"Ah! I'm glad you've come to your senses again. How do you feel?"
"Perfectly content and happy. I seem to be in a pleasant dream."
"That's good. You've had dreams enough, in the last month, that didn't seem pleasant. You must keep quiet. I'll be back in a minute."
She returned with her mother, who gave me some medicine, and a drink of broth, and I fell asleep. When I awoke, the pretty girl was knitting by the fire. She got me some broth, and after I had drunk it brought a flax-wheel and sat down by it. I was sick and weak, but the joy of Michael Wigglesworth's saints in heaven was nothing compared to mine. That is, until the dreadful thought occurred that she might have been already sought and won by some one else. But I said: "Keep your courage up, Ben. She isn't over seventeen. I'm sick, and she's here, and I won't get well in a hurry."