The Lost Hunter Part 38

"But the child, but the child," exclaimed Holden, "he is yet alive!"

"I do not doubt he is alive, I am confident we shall be able to discover him. Your trust in Providence is not misplaced."

"Tell me," cried Holden, a little sternly, "what thou knowest of the boy. My soul travaileth sore, and hope and doubt rend me in twain."

"Hold fast your hope my friend," said Mr. Pownal, "for all will yet be well. Prepare yourself to hear what, without preparation, might overcome your strength."

"Fear not," said Holden. "Yet alas! who knoweth his own heart? But a moment ago, I thought myself as an iron mountain, and now am I weaker than the untimely birth."

"Eliza," said Mr. Pownal turning to his wife, "bring the token you preserved."

During the absence of his wife, Mr. Pownal endeavored to prepare the mind of the Solitary for the joyful discovery he was about to make.

It was now, too, that Holden perceived, from the agitation of his feelings, that he was weak, like other men, and that with whatever hope and confidence and calmness he might contemplate the prospect of distant happiness, its near approach shook him like a reed. Mrs.

Pownal presently returned, with a coral necklace in her hand, and presented it to Holden.

"Do you recognize it?" she said.

He took it into his hands, and as if overcome by the violence of his emotions, was unable to speak a word. He gazed steadily at it, his lips moved but made no sound, and tears began to fall upon the faded coral. At last, with broken utterance, he said:

"The last time my eyes beheld these beads they were upon the neck of my dear child. They were the gift of his mother, and she hung them around his neck. Examine the clasp and you will find S.B., the initials of her maiden name, engraved upon it. My tears blind my sight."

"They are, indeed, upon the clasp," said Mrs. Pownal, who appeared to have a greater control over herself than her husband over his feelings: "we have often seen them, but little did we expect they would ever contribute to the discovery of the parentage of our dear"----

She turned to young Pownal, and threw her arms again about his neck.

"Come hither, Thomas," said Mr. Pownal, "the necklace was taken from your neck. This is your father. Mr. Holden, embrace your son."

The young man rushed to his father, and threw himself at his feet.

Holden extended his hands, but the sudden revulsion of high wrought feeling was more than he could bear. The color fled face and lips, and he fell forward insensible into the arms of his long lost son.

"I feared it would be so," said Mr. Pownal; "but joy seldom kills.

See," he added, after Mrs. Pownal had sprinkled some water in the face of the gasping man, "he is recovering. He will soon be himself again."

Restored to consciousness, Holden clasped his recovered son to his bosom, and kissed his cheeks, while the young man returned with warmth his demonstrations of affection. Pownal, we have seen, had been from the first attracted to the Solitary, either by the n.o.ble qualities he discovered in him, or from the interest he felt in his romantic mode of life, or from that mysterious sympathy of consanguinity, the existence of which is a.s.serted by some, and denied by others. He was, therefore, prepared to receive with pleasure the relations.h.i.+p.

Besides, it was a satisfaction to find his father in one, who, however poor his worldly circ.u.mstances, and whatever his eccentricities, was evidently a man of education and n.o.ble mind. For the young man was himself a n.o.bleman of nature, who had inherited some of the romance of his father, and, indeed, in whom were slumbering, unconsciously to himself, many traits of character like those of the father, and which needed only opportunity to be developed.

The first words Holden uttered, after recovering from his emotion sufficiently to speak, were:

"Lord! now let thou thy servant depart, for mine eyes have seen thy salvation."

"Do not talk of departing," said Mr. Pownal. "It seems to me now is the very time to stay. Many years of happiness are in store for you."

"But," said Holden, "tell me, thou who hast conferred an obligation that can never be repaid, and restored as it were the dead to life, how didst thou become the preserver of my child?"

But a few words are necessary to answer Holden's questions. As the happy father sat with his arm over his son's neck, Mr. Pownal related the following particulars.

"The John Johnson, of whom Esther the squaw told you," said Mr.

Pownal, "was some nineteen or twenty years ago a porter in the employ of our house. He was an honest, industrious man, who remained in our service until his death, which happened two or three years after the event I am about to relate, and enjoyed our confidence to the last. It was in the Spring--the month I do not recollect--when he came to the counting-room and desired to speak with me in private. He told me that on the previous evening he had found a child, dressed in rags, asleep upon the steps of his house, and that to preserve it from peris.h.i.+ng he had taken it in. His own family was large, and he was a poor man, else he would willingly keep it. He knew not exactly what to do, and as he was in the habit of consulting me when in any difficulty, he thought he had better do so now. It was a pretty lively little boy, but so young that though beginning to speak it was unable to give any account of itself.

"While Johnson was speaking a plan came into my mind, which I had thought of before, and it seemed as if the child were providentially sent in order to enable me to accomplish it. The truth is, that I had been married for several years, and the merry voice of no child of my own had gladdened my home and I had given up the expectation of children. Loving them dearly, it occurred to me to adopt some child, and rear it as my own. The feelings of Mrs. Pownal were the same as mine, and we had often talked over the subject together, but one circ.u.mstance and another, I can hardly tell what they were, had postponed the execution of our purpose from day to day. I therefore said to Johnson that I would attend him home and see the child, after which I should be better able to give him advice. Accordingly we went together to his house, which I recollect was the very one you described as having visited in your search in William street. There I found the little waif, a bright eyed boy of some three or four years of age, though his cheeks were pale and thin, as if he had already known some suffering. He wore around his neck the coral beads you have in your hand, which seemed to me at the time to have been left in order to facilitate a recognition. The appealing look and sweet smile with which he gazed into my eyes, as if demanding protection, was, in the condition of my feelings, more than I could withstand, and I took him home and gave him to my wife. She seemed equally pleased with myself, and for a time we reared him as a child of our own. Richly has he repaid our love, and you may well be proud of such a son. But some ten years afterwards, to our surprise, for we had given up all hope of such a blessing, Heaven gave us a son, and two years after that a daughter. The birth of the children altered, in some respects, our calculations, and I thought it necessary to communicate to Thomas the fact that he was not my son, but promising that he should ever be to me as one, and leaving it to be inferred from the ident.i.ty of name, for I had given him my own, that he was a relative. He has more than once endeavored to penetrate the mystery, but I have always shrunk from revealing it, although determined that at some time or another he should be made acquainted with it, and with that view, to guard against the contingencies of sudden death, prepared a narrative of the events I am relating, which is at this moment in my desk addressed to him. Mr. Holden," concluded Mr. Pownal, and his voice choked for an instant, "I can wish you no higher good fortune than that the youth, who, if not the offspring of my loins, is the son of my affection, may be to you a source of as much happiness as he has been to me."

Moved to tears the young man threw himself into the arms of his benefactor, and in broken words murmured his grat.i.tude.

"Ah!" cried he, "you were always so indulgent and so kind, dear sir!

Had it not been for, you, what should I have been to day?"

"Nay, Thomas," said Mr. Pownal, "you have conferred a benefit greater than you received. You filled a void in hearts that were aching for an object of parental love, and for years were the solitary beam of suns.h.i.+ne in a household that would else have been desolate and dark.

And had I not interposed, other means would have been found to restore you to your proper sphere. There is that in you, my son--let me still call you by the dear name--that under any circ.u.mstances would have forced its way, and elevated you from darkness into light, from obscurity into distinction."

Young Pownal cast his eyes upon the carpet, and blushed like a girl at the recital of his praises. No words came to his a.s.sistance, but the deep voice of his father relieved him from his embarra.s.sment.

"It may be true what thou sayest, angel of the Lord," he said, addressing Mr. Pownal, "thou who hast been even as a cloud by day, and a pillar of fire by night, to guide the lad through the wilderness of the world, but not the less are our thanks and eternal grat.i.tude due to thee as the chosen instrument to accomplish His will. May the blessing of the Lord G.o.d of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, of Him who called unto Moses out of the burning bush, of Him who is the root and the offspring of David, the bright and morning Star, rest and abide with thee and thy house for ever. And thou, madam," he added, approaching Mrs. Pownal with a dignity and grace that caused his singular appearance to be quite overlooked, "how shall he, who is an outcast no longer, thank thee?" He pressed his hand upon his heart, as if to restrain its beating, then bending over and taking her hand into his own, kissed it with the devotion of a devotee. "Blessed be thou above women. The Lord hear thee in the day of trouble, and fulfill all thy desire. Thou didst pity and shalt be pitied: thou wast merciful and shalt receive mercy. 'Inasmuch as ye did it unto the least of these little ones, ye did it unto me,' saith Christ."

"We are abundantly compensated, Mr. Holden," observed Mrs. Pownal, feeling it inc.u.mbent to say something, and yet at a loss what to say.

"Mr. Pownal has expressed my feelings better than I can myself. But, Thomas, you shall still be our son, for all these disclosures."

"Mother! mother!" cried Pownal, kneeling by her side, and kissing the lips she offered to his, "you shall always be my dear mother, as long as you permit me to call you so. Oh, how little have I known how much I was indebted to you, and my second father. I have dreamed and wondered, but the imagination still fell short of the truth."

"Thou hast received an obligation, my son," said Holden, "which all thy love and devotedness can never repay, and the claims of thy parents by kindness are stronger than mine. To me thou owest life, to them its preservation and honorable station. Thou wilt give me the love thou hast to spare, but to them belongs the greater portion."

"We will be content with equal parts," said Mr. Pownal, smiling. "In this partners.h.i.+p of affection none must claim a superior share."

"Strange!" exclaimed Holden, fastening his eyes on his son, and speaking, as was his wont sometimes, as to himself, "that the full truth broke not on me before. The heart yearned to him, he was as a bright star to me; his voice was the music of the forest to my ears; his eyes were as a sweet dream, a vanished happiness, but I understood not. It is plain now. It was the voice of my Sarah I heard: they were her eyes that looked into my heart through his. And was it not thy prompting, mysterious Nature, that inclined him to me? Was there not a dim revelation, that I was more to him than other men? Else why delighted he in the society of a lone, wayward man like me? Lord G.o.d Almighty, no man knoweth the ordinances of heaven, nor can he set the dominion thereof upon the earth!"

CHAPTER x.x.xII.

Welcome pure thoughts, welcome ye silent groves.

These guests, these courts my soul most dearly loves: Now the winged people of the sky shall sing My cheerful anthems to the gladsome spring.

QUOTED BY IZAAK WALTON, AS BY SIR HARRY WOTTON.

No reason seemed now to exist for Holden's impatience to depart, yet he longed for the quiet of his hut on the island. The excitement of his feelings, which, while it acted as a stimulus, sustained him, had pa.s.sed away, and the ordinary consequences of overtasking nature followed. Besides, he had lived so long in solitude, that any other mode of life was to him unnatural, and especially the roar and tumult of a populous place, disturbed him. The loudest sounds to which he had been accustomed were the rippling of the tide on the beach, or the sigh of the wind, and the songs of birds; and the difference between them and the noises he now heard, formed a contrast equally harsh and discordant. But by no word did he betray his wish. Both Mr. and Mrs.

Pownal were desirous to delay the departure of himself and son, and it seemed to him ingrat.i.tude to act in any respect in opposition to the inclinations of persons to whom he was so greatly indebted.

Several days, therefore, pa.s.sed after the happening of the events recapitulated in the last chapter, and yet he remained in New York.

But his feelings could not escape the observation of his son. Better acquainted than their host and hostess with the peculiarities of his father, he seized an opportunity to speak of the necessity of a speedy farewell.

"You are right, I do not doubt, Thomas," said Mr. Pownal, in reply to the observation of the young man, "and yet I never felt so loth to let you go. While with me you seem still in some wise to belong to me, and I feel a reluctance to lose you out of my sight."

"Do you think it possible," exclaimed young Pownal--whom his father, out of a sentiment of delicacy towards his friends, had insisted should be called by the name of his preserver, he had so long borne, for which reason we shall continue to use it--"do you think it possible I can ever forget how deeply I am indebted, that I shall ever cease to love you with all the affection of a son, on whom you have lavished every possible kindness?"

"No; I have no fear of that. It is only the pain of parting from which I shrink. As we grow older we cling with the greater tenacity, and, perhaps, selfishness, to the enjoyments that are left. But this will never do. I must think more of you, and less of myself. I have some questions to ask, and something besides to say before you leave for Hillsdale, and this is as good an opportunity, probably, as we shall have, so take a seat by me, and we will enter upon business."

Pownal, who hitherto had remained standing, now took a seat by the side of his benefactor, and waited for him to continue the conversation.