LEATHERSTOCKING TALES – Complete Collection. Джеймс Фенимор Купер

      “Lay her head more off the shore, Delaware,” said Deerslayer for the third time, speaking in English that his fair companion might understand his words —“Lay her head well off shore. We have got embayed here, and needs keep the mast clear of the trees. Judith, there’s a canoe!”

      The last words were uttered with great earnestness, and Deerslayer’s hand was on his rifle ere they were fairly out of his mouth. But the truth flashed on the mind of the quick-witted girl, and she instantly told her companion that the boat must be that in which her sister had fled.

      “Keep the scow straight, Delaware; steer as straight as your bullet flies when sent ag’in a buck; there — I have it.”

      The canoe was seized, and immediately secured again to the side of the Ark. At the next moment the sail was lowered, and the motion of the Ark arrested by means of the oars.

      “Hetty!” called out Judith, concern, even affection betraying itself in her tones. “Are you within hearing, sister — for God’s sake answer, and let me hear the sound of your voice, again! Hetty!— dear Hetty.”

      “I’m here, Judith — here on the shore, where it will be useless to follow me, as I will hide in the woods.”

      “Oh! Hetty what is’t you do! Remember ’tis drawing near midnight, and that the woods are filled with savages and wild beasts!”

      “Neither will harm a poor half-witted girl, Judith. God is as much with me, here, as he would be in the Ark or in the hut. I am going to help my father, and poor Hurry Harry, who will be tortured and slain unless some one cares for them.”

      “We all care for them, and intend to-morrow to send them a flag of truce, to buy their ransom. Come back then, sister; trust to us, who have better heads than you, and who will do all we can for father.”

      “I know your head is better than mine, Judith, for mine is very weak, to be sure; but I must go to father and poor Hurry. Do you and Deerslayer keep the castle, sister; leave me in the hands of God.”

      “God is with us all, Hetty — in the castle, or on the shore — father as well as ourselves, and it is sinful not to trust to his goodness. You can do nothing in the dark; will lose your way in the forest, and perish for want of food.”

      “God will not let that happen to a poor child that goes to serve her father, sister. I must try and find the savages.”

      “Come back for this night only; in the morning, we will put you ashore, and leave you to do as you may think right.”

      “You say so, Judith, and you think so; but you would not. Your heart would soften, and you’d see tomahawks and scalping knives in the air. Besides, I’ve got a thing to tell the Indian chief that will answer all our wishes, and I’m afraid I may forget it, if I don’t tell it to him at once. You’ll see that he will let father go, as soon as he hears it!”

      “Poor Hetty! What can you say to a ferocious savage that will be likely to change his bloody purpose!”

      “That which will frighten him, and make him let father go —” returned the simple-minded girl, positively. “You’ll see, sister; you’ll see, how soon it will bring him to, like a gentle child!”

      “Will you tell me, Hetty, what you intend to say?” asked Deerslayer. “I know the savages well, and can form some idee how far fair words will be likely, or not, to work on their bloody natur’s. If it’s not suited to the gifts of a red-skin, ’twill be of no use; for reason goes by gifts, as well as conduct.”

      “Well, then,” answered Hetty, dropping her voice to a low, confidential, tone, for the stillness of the night, and the nearness of the Ark, permitted her to do this and still to be heard —“Well, then, Deerslayer, as you seem a good and honest young man I will tell you. I mean not to say a word to any of the savages until I get face to face with their head chief, let them plague me with as many questions as they please I’ll answer none of them, unless it be to tell them to lead me to their wisest man — Then, Deerslayer, I’ll tell him that God will not forgive murder, and thefts; and that if father and Hurry did go after the scalps of the Iroquois, he must return good for evil, for so the Bible commands, else he will go into everlasting punishment. When he hears this, and feels it to be true, as feel it he must, how long will it be before he sends father, and Hurry, and me to the shore, opposite the castle, telling us all three to go our way in peace?”

      The last question was put in a triumphant manner, and then the simple-minded girl laughed at the impression she never doubted that her project had made on her auditors. Deerslayer was dumb-founded at this proof of guileless feebleness of mind, but Judith had suddenly bethought her of a means of counteracting this wild project, by acting on the very feelings that had given it birth. Without adverting to the closing question, or the laugh, therefore, she hurriedly called to her sister by name, as one suddenly impressed with the importance of what she had to say. But no answer was given to the call.

      By the snapping of twigs, and the rustling of leaves, Hetty had evidently quitted the shore, and was already burying herself in the forest. To follow would have been fruitless, since the darkness, as well as the dense cover that the woods everywhere offered, would have rendered her capture next to impossible, and there was also the never ceasing danger of falling into the hands of their enemies. After a short and melancholy discussion, therefore, the sail was again set, and the Ark pursued its course towards its habitual moorings, Deerslayer silently felicitating himself on the recovery of the canoe, and brooding over his plans for the morrow. The wind rose as the party quitted the point, and in less than an hour they reached the castle. Here all was found as it had been left, and the reverse of the ceremonies had to be taken in entering the building, that had been used on quitting it. Judith occupied a solitary bed that night bedewing the pillow with her tears, as she thought of the innocent and hitherto neglected creature, who had been her companion from childhood, and bitter regrets came over her mind, from more causes than one, as the weary hours passed away, making it nearly morning before she lost her recollection in sleep. Deerslayer and the Delaware took their rest in the Ark, where we shall leave them enjoying the deep sleep of the honest, the healthful and fearless, to return to the girl we have last seen in the midst of the forest.

      When Hetty left the shore, she took her way unhesitatingly into the woods, with a nervous apprehension of being followed. Luckily, this course was the best she could have hit on to effect her own purpose, since it was the only one that led her from the point. The night was so intensely dark, beneath the branches of the trees, that her progress was very slow, and the direction she went altogether a matter of chance, after the first few yards. The formation of the ground, however, did not permit her to deviate far from the line in which she desired to proceed. On one hand it was soon bounded by the acclivity of the hill, while the lake, on the other, served as a guide. For two hours did this single-hearted and simple-minded girl toil through the mazes of the forest, sometimes finding herself on the brow of the bank that bounded the water, and at others struggling up an ascent that warned her to go no farther in that direction, since it necessarily ran at right angles to the course on which she wished to proceed. Her feet often slid from beneath her, and she got many falls, though none to do her injury; but, by the end of the period mentioned, she had become so weary as to want strength to go any farther. Rest was indispensable, and she set about preparing a bed, with the readiness and coolness of one to whom the wilderness presented no unnecessary terrors. She knew that wild beasts roamed through all the adjacent forest, but animals that preyed on the human species were rare, and of dangerous serpents there were literally none. These facts had been taught her by her father, and whatever her feeble mind received at all, it received so confidingly as to leave her no uneasiness from any doubts, or scepticism. To her the sublimity of the solitude in which she was placed, was soothing, rather than appalling, and she gathered a bed of leaves, with as much indifference to the circumstances that would have driven the thoughts of sleep entirely from the minds of most of her sex, as if she had been preparing her place of nightly rest beneath the paternal roof. As soon as Hetty had collected a sufficient number of the dried leaves to protect her person from the damps of the ground, she kneeled beside the humble pile, clasped her raised hands in an attitude of deep devotion, and in a soft, low,