The Pilgrims of New England / A Tale of the Early American Settlers

by Mrs. J. B. Webb

Edith sat on the mossy seat that Henrich had formed in her bower. It looked towards the wood, and the commanding situation which it occupied, on a rising ground towards the center of the garden, enabled her to overlook the green fence that enclosed the grounds, and to watch the receding forms of her brothers, until they were hidden from her sight by the winding of the path through the underwood. Still she gazed, and her heart grew sad; and tears, which she could not check, rolled down her cheeks. Did she again fancy? and did her tearful eyes now convert the bushes into the figures of two dark Indians, in the costume of the dreaded Nausetts? Surely those were human forms that moved so swiftly and so silently from the dark stem of a gigantic oak, and crossing the forest path, were instantly again concealed. Edith wiped her glistening eyes. She held her breath, and feared to move; but the beating of her young heart was audible. No sound met her listening ear—no movement again was detected by her straining eye—and she began to think that her own fears had conjured up those terrible forms.

But what was that distant cry that sounded from the wood in the direction in which her brothers had gone? And why does she now behold Ludovico running wildly, and alone, down the path, with terror depicted in his countenance?

Edith flew to meet him; but ere she reached him, the dreadful truth was made known to her by his agonized cry.

'O, my brother! my brother! they have taken him, Edith; they are dragging him away! They will kill him!' he shrieked aloud, as he threw himself into Edith's arms, almost choked with the violence of his feelings, and the speed with which he had fled.

What could Edith do? She dared not leave him, to be carried off, perhaps, by some other prowling savage, who might still be lingering near; and she could not carry him home. Slowly she drew him on, while every moment seemed an hour, that delayed her from giving the alarm, and sending friends to the rescue of her darling brother.

O! why did he leave me?' she murmured. 'Why did he go, when I knew that danger was near?'

As soon as she had brought the panting and terrified Ludovico within the precincts of the garden, she left him, and ran towards the house, calling loudly on her mother, who rushed out on hearing her voice of terror, and was instantly made acquainted with the appalling fact that had occurred. Who shall tell the agony of her feelings, or describe the sufferings of that mother's heart, when she knew that her child was in the power of the savage and relentless enemies of the white men? She was, indeed, ignorant of the peculiar vengeance that they desired to wreak on her husband and all his race; but the malevolent character of the Nausetts had been sufficiently manifested in their repeated and destructive attacks on the settlement, and their willful desecration of the graves of the exiles, to awaken the most poignant fears in her breast. Rodolph, too, was absent, and Brewster was still at the Wampanoge village; and where should she seek for succor or for counsel!

Hastily calling Janet, who was the only domestic at home, she committed Ludovico to her care; and taking Edith by the hand, she hurried from the garden, scarcely knowing whither she bent her steps, but in the vague hope of meeting some of the settlers returning from their labors in the fields, and inducing them to go to the rescue of her boy.

Onward she fled along the skirts of the forest, towards the fields of her husband's friend Winslow, who, she well knew, would aid her with all his power: but she found him not, and no human being appeared in sight to listen to her appeal for succor. The sun was setting, and all had returned to the village. What then could Helen do? To retrace her steps, and seek her friends and neighbors in their homes, would be to lose precious moments, on which the life and liberty of her Henrich might depend. To strike into the depths of the forest, and cross the belt of wood that divided the settlement from Mooanam's encampment would be the quickest plan, and probably the most effectual, as her Wampanoge friends would know far better than the settlers how to follow in the train of the fugitives, and how either to persuade or to compel them to release their prisoners. Helen had never dared to enter the wood, except under the protection of her husband, even in the broad light of day; and now the gloom of evening was gathering around her, and the path that led into the wood was obscured by the shadows of the thick foliage above. Bat where were all her fears and apprehensions? She was unconscious of such feelings now. The timid woman's heart was nerved to the occasion, and no danger could now make her shrink.

She turned rapidly into the narrow path, and pursued her way with a firmness and decision, of which, at any other time, when she was trusting to the arm and guidance of Rodolph, she would have believed herself incapable. She knew the direction in which the Indian village lay, and the slanting rays of the declining sun occasionally penetrated the thick wood, and cast bright streaks of light on the mossy ground, and the boles of the giant trees around; but soon they faded away, and a deep gloom overspread her path.