of man, of whom the Indian appeared to speak slightingly. His name I could make out to be Steevens, or Steebins, or something of the sort—not very intelligible by the Indian’s mode of pronouncing it—and, furthermore, that he had been a schoolmaster in Swampville.
During the progress of the dialogue, I had my eye fixed on the young hunter. I could perceive that the announcement of the marriage was quite new to him; and its effect was as that of a sudden blow. Of course, equally unknown to him had been the name of the husband; though from the exclamatory phrase that followed, he had no doubt had his conjectures.
“O God!” he exclaimed, “I thort so—the very man to a’ done it. Lord ha’ mercy on her!” All this was uttered with a voice hoarse with emotion. “Tell me!” continued he, “whar are they gone? Ye say ye know!”
The shrill screech of a tree-cricket, breaking forth at that moment, hindered me from hearing the reply. The more emphatic words only reached me, and these appeared to be “Utah” and “Great Salt Lake.” They were enough to fix the whereabouts of Marian Holt and her husband.
“One question more!” said the rejected lover hesitatingly, as if afraid to ask it. “Can ye tell me—whether—she went willingly, or whether—thar wan’t some force used?—by her father, or some un else? Can ye tell me that, girl?”
I listened eagerly for the response. Its importance can be easily understood by one who has sued in vain—one who has wooed without winning. The silence of the cicada favoured me; but a long interval passed, and there came not a word from the lips of the Indian.
“Answer me, Su-wa-nee!” repeated the young man in a more appealing tone. “Tell me that, and I promise—”
“Will the White Eagle promise to forget his lost love? Will he promise—”
“No, Su-wa-nee; I cannot promise that: I can niver forget her.”
“The heart can hate without forgetting.”
“Hate her? hate Marian? No! no!”
“Not if she be false?”
“How do I know that she war false? You haven’t told me whether she went willin’ly or agin her consent.”
“The White Eagle shall know then. His gentle doe went willingly to the covert of the wolf—willingly, I repeat. Su-wa-nee can give proof of her words.”
This was the most terrible stroke of all. I could see the hunter shrink in his saddle, a death-like pallor over-spreading his cheeks, while his eyes presented the glassy aspect of despair.
“Now!” continued the Indian, as if taking advantage of the blow she had struck, “will the White Eagle promise to sigh no more after his false mistress? Will he promise to love one that can be true?”
There was an earnestness in the tone in which these interrogatories were uttered—an appealing earnestness—evidently prompted by a burning headlong passion. It was now the turn of her who uttered them, to wait with anxiety for a response. It came at length—perhaps to the laceration of that proud heart: for it was a negative to its dearest desire.
“No, no!” exclaimed the hunter confusedly. “Impossible eyther to hate or forget her. She may a been false, an’ no doubt are so; but it’s too late for me: I can niver love agin.”
A half-suppressed scream followed this declaration, succeeded by some words that appeared to be uttered in a tone of menace or reproach. But the words were in the Chicasaw tongue, and I could not comprehend their import.
Almost at the same instant, I saw the young hunter hurriedly draw back his horse—as if to get out of the way. I fancied that the crisis had arrived, when my presence might be required. Under this belief, I touched my steed with the spur, and trotted out into the open ground. To my astonishment, I perceived that the hunter was alone. Su-wa-nee had disappeared from the glade!
Chapter Fifteen.
Making a Clean Breast of it.
“Where is she?—gone?” I mechanically asked, in a tone that must have betrayed my surprise.
“Yes—gone! gone! an’ wi’ a Mormon!”
“A Mormon?”
“Ay, stranger, a Mormon—a man wi’ twenty wives! God forgi’ her! I’d rather heerd o’ her death!”
“Was there a man with her? I saw no one.”
“O stranger, excuse my talk—you’re thinkin’ o’ that ere Injun girl. ’Taint her I’m speakin’ about.”
“Who then?”
The young hunter hesitated: he was not aware that I was already in possession of his secret; but he knew that I had been witness of his emotions, and to declare the name would be to reveal the most sacred thought of his heart. Only for a moment did he appear to reflect; and then, as if relieved from his embarrassment, by some sudden determination, he replied:
“Stranger! I don’t see why I shedn’t tell ye all about this bisness. I don know the reezun, but you’ve made me feel a kind o’ confidence in you. I know it’s a silly sort o’ thing to fall in love wi’ a handsum girl; but if ye’d only seen her!”
“I have no doubt, from what you say, she was a beautiful creature,”—this was scarcely my thought at the moment—“and as for falling in love with a pretty girl, none of us are exempt from that little weakness. The proud Roman conqueror yielded to the seductions of the brown-skinned Egyptian queen; and even Hercules himself was conquered by a woman’s charms. There is no particular silliness in that. It is but the common destiny of man.”
“Well, stranger, it’s been myen; an’ I’ve hed reezun to be sorry for it. But it’s no use tryin’ to shet up the stable arter the hoss’s been stole out o’t. She are gone now; an’ that’s the end o’ it. I reckon I’ll niver set eyes on her agin.”
The sigh that accompanied this last observation, with the melancholy tone in which it was uttered, told me that I was talking to a man who had truly loved.
“No doubt,” thought I, “some strapping backwoods wench has been the object of his passion,”—for what other idea could I have about the child of a coarse and illiterate squatter? “Love is as blind as a bat; and this red-haired hoyden has appeared a perfect Venus in the eyes of the handsome fellow—as not unfrequently happens. A Venus with evidently a slight admixture of the prudential Juno in her composition. The young backwoodsman is poor; the schoolmaster perhaps a little better off; in all probability not much, but enough to decide the preference of the shrewd Marian.”
Such were my reflections at the moment, partly suggested by my own experience.
“But you have not yet told me who this sweetheart was? You say it is not the Indian damsel you’ve just parted with?”
“No, stranger, nothin’ o’ the
