"Yes, I'm able—and if it's done, it shall be done in the best style. I haven't cut down all the pine timber I've set afloat for the last fifteen year, without laying up something for my cub. I want you to dress as well as any you see, and study whatever you like, and play lady to yer heart's content. You'd better find a dress-maker, the first thing, and not be stared at every time you step out of the door. Get yourself silks and satins, girl, and hold your head up like the queen of the prairie."
When Captain Wilde returned up the river, he and his sable suite made a melancholy journey; for the light of their eyes, the joy of their hearts, was left behind them.
A young ladies' seminary, "a flourishing young institution, beautifully located in a healthy region, with spacious grounds enjoying the salubrious river-breezes," etc., etc., held prisoner, the wild bird of the forest.
"Where's your daughter?" asked Ben Perkins of his employer, when he saw the returning party land without Alice. His face was blanched to a dead-white, for he expected certainly to hear that she had been claimed as his bride by Philip Moore.
"Yer story was true, Ben, though I did ye the wrong to doubt it. Alice will never be the wife of that counter-jumper. But she'll never be yours, neither; so you might as well give up, first as last. Go off somewhere, Ben, and find somebody else; that's my advice."
"Look-a-here, Captain Wilde, I know you mean the best, and that my chance is small; but I tell you, sir, jest as long as Alice is free to choose, and I've got breath and sense to try for her, I shan't give her up. Never, sir! I'll work my fingers off to serve you and her—I'll wait years—I'll do any thing you ask, only so you won't lay any thing in my way."
The raftsman looked pityingly in the haggard face of the speaker—the face which a year ago was so bright and boyish. He saw working in those dark lineaments, in the swart blood coursing under the olive skin, in the gleam of the black eyes, passions difficult to check, which might urge him in future years to yet other crimes than the one into which he had already been betrayed.
"You're high-tempered, Ben, my boy, and a little too rough to suit a girl like mine. She knows what your temper has already led you to do;" and he looked straight at the youth as he spoke, whose eyes wavered and sunk to the ground—it was the first intimation he had had that his guilt was suspected. "Why not go off, and find some one more like yourself—some pretty, red-cheeked lass who'll think you the best and handsomest fellow on the earth, and be only too happy to marry you? Thar's plenty such chances—and you'd be a deal happier."
"Don't, don't talk so!" burst forth Ben, impetuously. "I can't do it, and that's the end on 't. I've tried to get away, but I'm bound here. It's like as if my feet were tied to this ground. I've done bad things in my determination to keep others away. I know it, and I own up to it. I've been desp'rate-crazy! But I ain't a bad fellow. If Miss Alice would smile upon me, 'pears to me I couldn't be bad—'pears to me I'd try to get to be as good as she is. Even if she never would marry me, if she'd let me stay 'round and work for you, and she didn't take up with nobody else, I'd be content. But if I have to give her up entirely, I expect I'll make a pretty bad man, cap'n. I've all kinds of wicked thoughts about it, and I can't help it. I ain't made of milk-and-water. I'd rather fight a bar' than court a girl. I shan't never ask another woman to have me—no, sir! I'd 'ave made you a good son, if all hands had been willin'. But if Miss Alice means to make herself a fine lady to catch some other sweet lady-killer like the one that's given her the mitten, it's her choice. She'll up and marry somebody that won't speak to her old father, I s'pose."
"Thar's no telling," answered the raftsman, sadly; for, in truth, the changed manner of his darling before he left her, lay like a weight upon his memory and heart. He felt a chord of sympathy binding him to the young man, as if theirs was a common cause. Alice seemed to have receded from them, as in a dream, growing more cold and reserved, as she glided into the distance. Her trouble, instead of flinging her more closely into her father's arms, had torn her from him, and taught her self-control. She had deserted her home, had left him to care for himself, while she fitted herself for some sphere into which he could not come. That "sharper than a serpent's tooth—a thankless child," he was tempted to call her. Yet his heart refused such an accusation. She had been suddenly shaken in her innocent faith in others, had been wounded in pride and deserted in love—and her present mood was the high reaction of the blow. Presently she would be herself again, would come back to her home and her humble friends with the same modest, affectionate, gentle character as of old.