The Wild Man of the West Part 37

March ran hastily in for a.s.sistance, and was not a little surprised to find d.i.c.k sitting alone by the side of the fire, and so absorbed in the perusal of a little book that he had not noticed his entrance--a very singular and unaccountable piece of absence of mind in one so well trained in the watchful ways of the backwoods.

"Ho! d.i.c.k!" cried the youth.

"What, March--March Marston!" exclaimed the Wild Man, springing up, seizing him by the shoulders, and gazing intently into his face, as if to a.s.sure himself that he was not dreaming.

"Ay, no doubt I'm March Marston; though how you came to find out my name I don't know--"

"Easy enough that, lad, when you leave your mother's Bible behind ye,"

cried d.i.c.k with a wild laugh. "She must be a good mother that o' yours.

Is she alive yet, boy?"

"That is she, an' well, I trust--"

"An' your father," interrupted d.i.c.k; "how's he, lad, eh?"

"I don't know," said March, frowning; "he forsook us fourteen years agone; but it's little good talking o' such matters now, when there's a poor fellow dyin' outside."

"Dyin'?"

"Ay, so it seems to me. I've brought him to see if ye can stop the bleedin', but he's fainted, and I can't lift--"

d.i.c.k waited for no more, but, hastening out, raised Macgregor in his arms, and carried him into the inner cave, where Mary was lying sound asleep on her lowly couch.

"Come, Mary, la.s.s, make way for this poor feller."

The child leaped up, and, throwing a deerskin round her, stepped aside to allow the wounded man to be placed on her bed. Her eye immediately fell on March, who stood in the entrance, and she ran to him in surprise.

"What's de matter, March?"

"Hush, Mary," said d.i.c.k in a low voice; "we'll have to speak soft. Poor Macgregor won't be long for this world, I'm afear'd. Fetch me the box o' things."

"You know him, then?" whispered March, in surprise.

"Ay, I've often bin to the Mountain Fort and seed him there. See, he's comin' to. Put that torch more behind me, lad. It'll be better for him not to see me."

As he spoke the wounded man sighed faintly. Opening his eyes, he said, "Where am I?"

"Speak to him," whispered d.i.c.k, looking over his shoulder at March, who advanced, and, kneeling at the side of the couch, said--

"You're all right, Mr Macgregor. I've brought you to the hunter's home. He'll dress your wound and take care of you, so make your mind easy. But you'll have to keep quiet. You've lost much blood."

The fur trader turned round and seemed to fall asleep, while d.i.c.k bound his wound, and then, leaving him to rest, he and March returned to the other cave.

During that night d.i.c.k seemed in an unaccountably excited state.

Sometimes he sat down by the fire and talked with March in an absent manner on all kinds of subjects--his adventures, his intentions, his home at Pine Point; but from his looks it seemed as if his thoughts were otherwise engaged, and occasionally he started up and paced the floor hurriedly, while his brows darkened and his broad chest heaved as though he were struggling with some powerful feeling or pa.s.sion.

"Could it be," thought March, "that there was some mysterious connection between d.i.c.k and the wounded fur trader?" Not being able to find a satisfactory reply to the thought, he finally dismissed it, and turned his attentions altogether towards Mary, whose looks of surprise and concern showed that she too was puzzled by the behaviour of her adopted father.

During that night and all the next day the wounded man grew rapidly worse, and March stayed with him, partly because he felt a strong interest in and pity for him, and partly because he did not like to leave to Mary the duty of watching a dying man.

d.i.c.k went out during the day in the same excited state, and did not return till late in the evening. During his absence, the dying man's mind wandered frequently, and, in order to check this as well as to comfort him, March read to him from his mother's Bible. At times he seemed to listen intently to the words that fell from March's lips, but more frequently he lay in a state apparently of stupor.

"Boy," said he, starting suddenly out of one of those heavy slumbers, "what's the use of reading the Bible to me? I'm not a Christian, an'

it's too late now--too late!"

"The Bible tells me that '_now_' is G.o.d's time. I forget where the words are, an' I can't find 'em," said March earnestly; "but I _know_ they're in this book. Besides, don't you remember the thief who was saved when he hung on the cross in a dyin' state?"

The fur trader shook his head slowly, and still muttered, "Too late, too late."

March now became deeply anxious about the dying man, who seemed to him like one sinking in the sea, yet refusing to grasp the rope that was flung to him. He turned over the sacred pages hurriedly to find appropriate texts, and blamed himself again and again for not having made himself better acquainted with the Word of G.o.d. He also repeated all he could think of from memory; but still the dying man shook his head and muttered, "Too late!" Suddenly March bent over him and said--

"Christ is able to save to the _uttermost_ all who come unto G.o.d through Him."

The fur trader looked up in silence for a few seconds. "Ay," said he, "many a time have I heard the old minister at Pine Point say that."

"Pine Point!" exclaimed March in surprise.

"Perhaps they're true, after all," continued Macgregor, not noticing the interruption. "Oh! Mary, Mary, surely I did the uttermost when I forsook ye. Let me see the words, boy; are they there?"

A strange suspicion flashed suddenly on the mind of March as he listened to these words, and he trembled violently as he handed him the book.

"What--what's this? Where got ye my wife's Bible? You must," (he added between his teeth, in a sudden burst of anger) "have murdered my boy."

"Father!" exclaimed March, seizing Macgregor's hand.

The dying man started up with a countenance of ashy paleness, and, leaning on one elbow, gazed earnestly into the youth's face--"March! can it be my boy?" and fell back with a heavy groan. The bandages had been loosened by the exertion, and blood was pouring freely from his wound.

The case admitted of no delay. March hurriedly attempted to stop the flow of the vital stream, a.s.sisted by Mary, who had been sitting at the foot of the couch bathed in tears during the foregoing scene.

Just then d.i.c.k returned, and, seeing how matters stood, quickly staunched the wound; but his aid came too late. Macgregor, or rather Obadiah Marston, opened his eyes but once after that, and seemed as if he wished to speak. March bent down quickly and put his ear close to his mouth; there was a faint whisper, "G.o.d bless you, March, my son,"

and then all was still!

March gazed long and breathlessly at the dead countenance; then, looking slowly up in d.i.c.k's face, he said, pointing to the dead man, "My father!" and fell insensible on the couch beside him.

We will pa.s.s over the first few days that succeeded the event just narrated, during which poor March Marston went about the wild region in the vicinity of the cave like one in a dream. It may be imagined with what surprise the trappers learned from him the near relations.h.i.+p that existed between himself and the fur trader. They felt and expressed the deepest sympathy with their young comrade, and offered to accompany him when he laid his father in the grave. But d.i.c.k had firmly refused to allow the youth to bring the trappers near his abode, so they forbore to press him, and the last sad rites were performed by himself and d.i.c.k alone. The grave was made in the centre of a little green vale which lay like an emerald in the heart of that rocky wilderness; and a little wooden cross, with the name and date cut thereon by March, was erected at the head of the low mound to mark the fur trader's last lonely resting-place. March Marston had never known his father in early life, having been an infant when he deserted his family; and the little that he had seen of him at the Mountain Fort, and amid the wild scenes of the Rocky Mountains, had not made a favourable impression on him. But, now that he was gone, the natural instinct of affection arose within his breast. He called to remembrance the last few and sad hours which he had spent by his parent's dying bed. He thought of their last few words on the momentous concerns of the soul, and of the eagerness with which, at times, the dying man listened to the life-giving Word of G.o.d; and the tear of sorrow that fell upon the grave, as he turned to quit that solitary spot, was mingled with a tear of joy and thankfulness that G.o.d had brought him there to pour words of comfort and hope into his dying father's ear.

That night he spent in the cave with d.i.c.k; he felt indisposed to join his old comrades just then. The grave tenderness of his eccentric friend, and the sympathy of little Mary, were more congenial to him.

"March," said d.i.c.k in a low, sad tone, as they sat beside the fire, "that funeral reminds me o' my friend I told ye of once. It's a lonesome grave his, with nought but a wooden cross to mark it."

"Had you known him long, d.i.c.k?"

"No, not long. He left the settlement in a huff--bein', I b'lieve, crossed in love, as I told ye."

d.i.c.k paused, and clasping both hands over his knee, gazed with a look of mingled sternness and sorrow at the glowing fire.

"Did ye ever," he resumed abruptly, "hear o' a feller called Louis, who once lived at Pine Point--before ye was born, lad; did ye ever hear yer mother speak of him?"

"Louis? Yes--well, I believe I do think I've heard the name before. Oh yes! People used to say he was fond o' my mother when she was a girl; but I never heard her speak of him. Now ye mention it, I remember the only time I ever asked her about it, she burst into tears, and told me never to speak of him again. Thadwick was his name--Louis Thadwick; but he was better known as Louis the Trapper. But he's almost forgotten at the settlement now; it's so long ago. Every one thinks him dead. Why d'ye ask?"